I hadn't really been writing much about the Russia-trump scandal because too many details were coming in too many directions, and a lot of it was pretty much only going to get me riled up without any honest solutions (reason why is later).
But today a major bomb dropped.
And trump's excuse for it? Oh, it's not because the FBI and other agencies happen to be investigating Russia's ties to trump's political campaign handlers and advisors. According to the firing letter, trump is claiming he's dumping Comey for mishandling the investigation into Hillary's emails.
The very same email "scandal" in late October that had a part in weakening voter turnout for Hillary, essentially gaming the election FOR trump.
Remember what I said about that non-scandal?
And then people started asking just WHAT was in these new emails to begin with, and how they could tie into the questionably overblown scandal of Hillary's Secret Sec of State Server. Reporters like Pete Williams at NBC started digging - and started hearing from sources in the FBI and Department of Justice - and found out the "new and shocking" emails were in fact tied into the ongoing investigation into disgraced ex-Congressman Anthony Weiner's habit of sexting (including the recent allegations he went after a 14-year-old girl online), and that it had more to do with Hillary's personal advisor Huma Abedin - Weiner's rightly angry ex - than with Hillary herself. There's no evidence Hillary has anything to do with these new emails.
In other words, this is just another goddamn Nothing-burger the Far Right are twisting into another anti-Hillary conspiracy.
The story quickly turned on the fact that Comey overstated the value of the new revelations as they related to Hillary, and that he misrepresented which investigation was actually being pursued. He also - according to former FBI personnel - violated various departmental protocols with the FBI and DOJ. The one who's really in trouble now is Comey...
A lot of follow-up stories between now and October painted Comey in unflattering ways. He jumped out too early on the Hillary emails, for example, while saying NOTHING in public about the then-growing investigation into trump's Russian ties. He kept trying to make himself into a hero - that he was trying to warn voters, that he was trying to be nonpartisan - but more and more evidence cropped up that he caved to Republican pressure to leak anything embarrassing about Hillary if he could.
But this really, HONESTLY, doesn't have to do with Hillary's emails.
This has everything to do with trump. And how scared he is that the FBI - among others - are digging too close to his Russian allies.
A lot of Twitter chatter has been comparing this sudden firing to the infamous Saturday Night Massacre, when Nixon - realizing the special prosecutor investigating Watergate could gain access to his tape recordings - panicked and fired the Attorney General, drove the Deputy AG to resign in order to force the investigation to close. It backfired. Public outrage - and political anger in Congress even among Republicans - forced Nixon to backtrack and hire another special prosecutor... and eventually had to turn over the "smoking gun" tapes anyway.
What trump just did - firing a government official in the middle of overseeing a legal investigation involving the same White House firing him - is a very Nixonian, Active-Negative, "save my ass" move. All it does is give your political opponents more ammunition that you're trying to kill that investigation, which falls under very serious charges of Obstruction.
The troubling matters now are 1) trump will try to hire an FBI Director who will shut down the Russia probes, 2) fire additional agency employees and officers who may threaten his hold on power, and 3) how quickly the Republicans in Congress roll over and play dead.
That's the reason why I'm not blogging about #Russiatrump every day yelling my head off about the clear criminal wrong-doings of the likes of Mike Flynn and Paul Manafort and Carter Page and GODS KNOWS how many other people (including trump himself). We're talking election tampering, computer hacking, questionable business deals, shady money transactions... These are things where if a Democratic President was doing ONE of these things the Republican Congress would be gleefully filing impeachment papers on an hourly basis.
But it's trump. It's one of their own. Republicans were oh so eager to investigate the shit out of Hillary for nothing-burgers like her emails and BEHGHAZI ZOMG, but where trump is involved the House and the Senate leadership turn into a bunch of cowards.
Already that "sane veteran" of the Senate Lindsey Graham is rolling over on the Comey firing on his damn tweet feed. I guarantee you the "moderates" among the GOP are running for the hills.
As long as we have a Republican-controlled Congress TERRIFIED OF THEIR FOX-NOT-NEWS HATE-DRIVEN VOTING BASE THAT WORSHIPS trump, this nation is not going to see one iota of law and justice resolving these matters.
This train wreck is going to keep piling up until the Republicans get their damn tax cuts passed. And THAT becomes another disaster altogether.
We are so fucking screwed.
To the 62 million who voted for trump, Иди́/Пошёл в жо́пу!
Update: Rude Pundit's take is concise and accurate and truthful. We are so fucking screwed.
3 comments:
Dear Anonymous:
if you're gonna troll, have the courage to sign your work.
And this morning I read that Weiner was actually catfished by a Trump supporter for the expressed purpose of damaging Hillary Clinton through Huma Abedin.
And that Comey had just now requested more staff and money for the Russia investigation, signaling that it was ramping up, not winding down.
And that president four-year-old had tasked Sessions, who is supposed to be recused from both the Russia investigation AND the Clinton investigation, with coming up with a reason to fire Comey a week ago.
God damn it, we warned you guys this would happen.
And today a reporter was arrested for yelling questions at Tom Price and Kellyanne Conway.
Where are the bananas? This has devolved into banana republic territory.
-Doug in Oakland
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