Posted on 05/13/2020 4:19:10 AM PDT by Kaslin
This week, former President Barack Obama reemerged from hibernation to lecture Americans about the threat to rule of law posed by the Trump administration. After Attorney General Bill Barr announced that the Department of Justice would be dropping its case against President Donald Trump's former national security advisor Michael Flynn, who had pled guilty to one count of lying to the FBI, Obama told his former aides, "our basic understanding of rule of law is at risk." He explained, "There is no precedent that anybody can find for someone who has been charged with perjury just getting off scot-free. ... And when you start moving in those directions, it can accelerate pretty quickly as we've seen in other places."
In reality, of course, Flynn was never charged with perjury. He was charged with lying to the FBI in the course of an investigation, a separate and far lesser offense, particularly given the fact that his alleged lie was immaterial to any underlying crime. In fact, as America found out over the past two weeks, Flynn wasn't supposed to be the subject of any investigation at all: The FBI had decided to close an investigation into Flynn in January 2017, even after supposedly nefarious calls between Flynn and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. Disgraced former FBI agent Peter Strzok -- the same man who pledged to lover and former FBI attorney Lisa Page that Donald Trump would never be president and suggested an "insurance policy" against that possibility -- then intervened to keep the investigation open. The next day, during an Oval Office meeting, President Obama himself asked then-FBI Director James Comey about the Flynn-Kislyak communications. Next, Comey upped the ante: He avoided following normal FBI-White House protocols in order to interview Flynn, and Comey's deputy director, Andrew McCabe, avoided informing Flynn of his rights. Nonetheless, the FBI agents who conducted the interview suggested that they did not think Flynn was lying during that interview. As it turns out, notes between top FBI officials at the time said, "What's our goal? Truth/Admission or to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired?" Flynn would later plead guilty to one count of lying to the FBI -- at least in part because the FBI was threatening his son with prosecution.
This should be a massive scandal. It should be a massive scandal because, at the very least, it demonstrates the nation's chief law enforcement agencies, prompted by political actors at the very top of the government, racing to bend the rules in order to pursue a case they were convinced they would make: the case that the Trump campaign had conspired with the Russian government. From the purposefully botched Carter Page Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act warrant to the absurdly conjured prosecution of Flynn, the most powerful institutions in American life violated the protocols meant to restrict abuse, firmly secure in their own feelings of moral rectitude.
That's the best-case scenario.
The worst-case scenario is far darker: that by early January, with no evidence of Russian collusion, leaders of the nation's political and law enforcement agencies decided that guilt was irrelevant, and that the Trump administration had to be strangled in the crib. This seems like a major stretch, but in a highly partisan era, such a narrative will have legs.
Meanwhile, blithe in the knowledge that they were on the side of the angels, members of the Obama-era government continue to chide Attorney General Bill Barr for ending a charade of a case. Their incredible inability to see how their conduct looks beyond the echo chamber of sycophantic media sources only undermines their credibility further. As it turns out, President Obama isn't wrong -- at least not entirely. Our basic understanding of the rule of law is at risk, not because Bill Barr stepped in to prevent an unjust prosecution but because our institutions under the Obama administration were politicized in ways that should shock the American conscience.
Deep State is bigger than Obama...
I hope that arrogant pos will get the punishment he deserves.
I don't like this sentence. I think it implies that, perhaps, at one point, these people might have been acting in good faith and had genuine concerns about Russian collusion. The problem, you see, was that they had trouble finding evidence and then decided that the guilt was irrelevant.
I think that misses the point.
This was a setup. Just pick a crime. Whatever. It was a 100% scam right from the start. I mean, they could have chased Trump over a charge of counterfeiting Australian dollars. I guess they decided that Russian collusion would play better in the press. The problem wasn't "lack of evidence". The problem was a failed railroad job because Trump fought back.
He won’t.
In any case, I care far less about Barry getting his just desserts than I do about seeing Deep State defanged.
Barry is a tool.
Deep State is the real threat to the republic.
Way mo' bigga'.
#SPECTRE
#CobraCommand
#KAOS
#UmbrellaCorporation
Didn’t shatter it, just redefined it.
Pretty much every “big deal” has been outside the law.
Mueller - there is no SC for counterintelligence
Impeachment - Oval Office is not in ICIG jurisdicton
That will never happen. No one in the Justice Dept. has the courage to go after the One. I have a more realistic hope that Brennan/Clapper/Yates/Power/S.Rice/Sztrok/Page will get the punishment they deserve, and that would be a forever smear on the 0bama legacy.
Left out that pos Comey...
The whole career government, career paid actor politician system will not unwind gracefully. The republic has been a sham for a long time. It exists in name and form only, the substance, the real stuff, that is totally out of control.
We have a crisis on the table here of a free people with limited government or a complete loss of our country to Marxist elites.
These are the very same idiots that subscribe to the ‘living Constitution theory’, they simply morphed such into the ‘living Rule of Law’ theory. /s
I didn’t read it that way...I think they were fishing, fishing vigorously, searching, using FISA surveillance and human sources, looking for something, anything they could grab and hold up in the air.
You, I, and many others fully accept the fact that this was never done in good faith for the good of the country.
It was done in BAD faith for the good of the Left.
Heads must roll, or the FBI must be disbanded.
Anything less and the FBI is the enemy of a free people.
“Barry is a tool”
Barry is also a has-been. You heard it first right here.
He accomplished little as President. He was puffed up by his cheerleaders. Most now realize that there’s little behind his sonorous voice. Not many want to listen to him any more. He didn’t have good people around him. And now it’s beginning to appear that he was deep into the anti-Trump conspiracies.
Nothing will happen to him even though his acts were treasonous and threatening to our country. I often wondered what it would take for an ex-president to be charged with a felony. Maybe if he committed murder???? Maybe not??
He'd have to be guilty of being a republican for a start. I wonder what would have happened had Nixon not resigned and been pardoned by Ford?
Bennie Bennie Bennie.
Obama told his former aides, “our basic understanding of rule of law is at risk.”
Good points above...... based on “precedent” in DC, members of the GOP always folded like cheap tents under withering pressure.
The idea never crossed the mind of Trump, much to the dismay of the “swamp”.
Despite all of this “noise” he has moved his agenda forward even when members of his own party, in the majority, opposed him.
It really is remarkable when you step back and view it all from a distance.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.