I recall that Hillary Clinton when on the campaign trail emphasized repeatedly that cordiality, amenity, and congeniality are missing from political discussion and relationships within our political institutions, among are elected officials, and from the actions and speech of increasing numbers of people on the street. We exist in a highly partisan era marked by enmity, calumny, and, inflammatory speech. As exhausting as this atmosphere is to our collective political engagement, a duty all citizens owe to American democracy is to remain staunch in the defense of Facts and Truth. If we don’t, we face unimaginable historical danger to our American democratic government.
The truth is that the facts are Director Comey is heading a criminal investigation into the past and present illegal activities of Donald Trump and a number of his former and present advisors whom he gathered to his 2016 presidential campaign. Let us be clear. Very clear. The FBI is not investigating of the basis of conspiracy theories, rumors, political axes to grind, or Russian propaganda. The FBI is conducting a criminal investigation based on factual evidence.
Since this criminal investigation is firmly rooted in reality, only factual evidence is of interest to the FBI. Since Comey testified under oath that this is an ongoing (criminal) investigation, we know that such evidence exists in the immediate present, has existed in the non-determined past, and is expected to be uncovered in the upcoming future. That President Obama’s former Director of National Intelligence (DNI) has denied the existence of evidence of Obama-ordrered wiretapping of Trump Tower, in fact broadening his denial that any surveillance of Trump Tower occurred under his tenure, and went even further by denying that President Obama had abused his Executive power, averring that the president had never issued any orders to undertake any kind of surveillance does not mean factual evidence did not exist. It could have remained hidden or it could have not yet been evaluated at the level of confirmation of Truth.
President Obama has never been suspected of reality based criminal activity of any kind because the truth is no evidence of it exists.
No charges of criminal wrong-doing by Hillary Clinton for any trumped up criminal accusation based on right wing political dirty tricks rooted in baseless conspiracy theories were pressed by the FBI because no case was possible due to the fact that no evidence of criminal action by her exists, no conspiracy, no collusion, no obstruction of justice ever took place.
The Trump dossier compiled by former MI-6 agent, Christopher Steele’s, is not a collection of empty allegations, questionable hearsay, or baseless rumor. Intelligence agents and organizations are called “intelligence” because it is composed of information analyzed and interpreted by experts for plausibility, likelihood, existence, and by employing logical deduction and intellectually synthesized links. Espionage agents, former and current, don’t go into hiding over made up fiction about enemies of state known for brutality, tyranny, and frequent “mysterious” deaths of its own officials and foreign actors who embarrass, endanger, and expose its dark secret Truths. Professional intelligence is generated from facts and truths that political and state enemies try to keep hidden and secret.
Former Director of National Intelligence under Obama, James Clapper, asserted while he was in office no evidence of Trump colluding with Russians existed. Steele’s dossier was made public 10 days before the inauguration, 10 days before Clapper resigned. 10 days is insufficient time for a professional intelligence agency to assess the credibility of a piece of information, especially one gathered and produced outside its own resources, concerning a foreign state’s acts for plausibility, likelihood, existence by logical deduction and intellectual synthesis. Therefore, it cannot claim factual evidence existed.
Comey and NSA Director, Adm. Mike Rogers, made statements in their sworn testimony today, echoing Clapper, that were destined to conflict with Trump’s later afternoon categorical tweet that "Russia did not influence electoral process." Why? “. . . because we don't have any information on that subject.“
Further, as reported in the LA times today,
“. . .U.S. officials made no effort to determine if Russian hacking and leaks of Democratic Party emails had affected voters on Election Day.”
and
“. . .they stood by a Jan. 6 report by the U.S. intelligence community that said Russian President Vladimir Putin had approved the meddling in an effort to hurt Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and to help Trump.”
Let’s be clear. This is a criminal investigation of great magnitude in many applications. We are witnessing criminal behavior both domestically and internationally; we’re witnessing efforts by the entities being investigated to cover up their crimes, which is additional criminal behavior; we’re witnessing treasonous behavior at the highest levels of American government that subverts our Constitutional democracy. And we will shortly be witnessing even more criminal behavior in the form of obstruction of justice as predicted by John Dean on tonight’s MSNBC, All In, broadcast of his interview conducted by Chris Hayes.
Let’s not mince words. Donald Trump is disqualified from saying, “I am not a crook,” for the same reason Richard Nixon lied when he said it on November 17th, 1973.
Let’s not mince words, Donald Trump not only failed his oath, he actively subverted it before he took it.
Let’s not mince words. The Guardian’s Julian Borger didn’t.
Comey’s appearance, flanked by the NSA director, Adm Michael Rogers, marked a remarkable and unprecedented threshold in US political history, putting beyond doubt that a sitting’s president’s entourage was under investigation for possibly conniving with a foreign adversary to put that president in power.
Let’s not mince words. Adm. Rogers and the NSA are involved in this investigation because factual evidence probably exists that Trump and his cronies have gone beyond criminal behavior to treasonous betrayals of our country to Russia, which has led to the corruption of our political system at the highest levels and the destruction of our acknowledged position as the leader of the “free” world.
Let’s not mince words. The USA has been defeated by a sovereign enemy who launched a surprise attack with the help and secret collusion with it by Americans intent on betraying their country to the enemy in order to install Donald Trump as president by means of hostile subversion. This is the first major battle in a cyber war where America will have to fight for its life. We must win. Everything hangs on it.