Reason for Optimism? Durham's Plan

 

This John Durham thing is really picking up steam. I’ll miss some of the details here but this is a complicated story. Worst of all it plays out over the course of 5 years, from 2016 to 2021, an insanely long time to wait. John Durham is the special prosecutor assigned by Trump AG Bill Barr in 2019. The purpose of which was to investigate the origins of the Trump Russian collusion hoax. By this point most regular Americans at least suspected the collusion was kind of bullshit.

I was an avid Rush Limbaugh listener since about 2004. He was on this since day 1. Looking back at everything that’s come out about the Steele Dossier recently I can see how right he was. I never doubted of course but it’s nice when it’s confirmed.

In 2017 the assistant AG Rod Rosenstein appointed Robert Mueller (former FBI director) to investigate the supposed collusion. Naturally they took close to 2 years to and found nothing really. Officially they found no collusion and didn’t charge Trump with obstruction, which they think probably happened. The details were so thin though. Don McGahn, a trump advisor, talked Trump out of firing Mueller during the investigation. That always gets pointed to as ‘evidence’ that Trump was obstructing justice. But nothing came of it. McGahn ignored Trump and treated it like a tantrum.

Mueller and his team knew there was no collusion pretty early on in the case but kept investigating anyway. The FBI led by James Comey was looking into allegations against the president from a dossier filled with embarrassing stuff. This was right after the election. Comey briefed Trump on the dossier, supposedly to let him know what kind of stuff was out there. He also ensured Trump that the FBI wasn’t investigating him over any of it. A lie as it turns out. Trump fired Comey which prompted the Mueller team to take over, looking into the same stuff.

The stuff from the dossier was opposition research for Hilary Clinton’s team. They put together a packet with salacious rumors from supposed insiders about Trump’s behavior in Russia. Christopher Steele compiled it from ‘former spies’ and intel types, another lie. The most damaging rumor was about Trump hiring prostitutes to pee on a Moscow bed that Obama had slept in. This story sounded designed to attract the attention of the public. Nothing gets attentions like titillating accounts. Then team Clinton peddled this nonsense to the FBI as legitimate intel.

The FBI used the dossier to get a FISA (foreign intelligence surveillance act) warrant and spy on the Trump campaign in 2016. There is more here to say about the spying on the campaign. But the bottom line is the Clinton campaign tried to set Trump up from the beginning and the deep state helped. I think the Obama White House helped too but that’s just speculation right now.

Now it looks like Durham might actually be putting a lot of this sordid affair right. I’ll refrain from being too excitable. Not because I’m a cynic but because too many of these wasteful investigations result in fines. When other Feds are charged with wrongdoing it takes years to inspect, millions of dollars to fund and they get a slap on the wrist. Agencies protect each other. But I won’t spoil the food while it’s still cooking though.  

John Durham arrested a fake Russian source hired by Christopher Steele just this last week. He indicted a lawyer (Sussman) who went to the FBI with information on Trump and Russia. They asked him if he was working on behalf of a campaign, he said no. That was a lie since his law firm was hired by Clinton.

There is a third recent one but I don’t remember who. Trump allies in Congress like Devin Nunes had tried telling the American people this collusion stuff was bogus. He was censured for it, or at least threatened to be censured. For two years the press ran with lie after lie about the dossier, collusion, obstruction of justice. Trump’s team were assaulted on all sides and need vindication in the worst way. So I’m hopeful that Durham gets some justice and lays down some serious punishment. But I’ve been here before. I was sure Trump would be reelected. He was actually. But the same people who lied about his Russia dealings stole it from him.

I say the same people meaning the deep state. I used to talk about them like they were separate entities, the press, the FBI, the CIA, the Justice Department and so on. But it’s really one big incestuous family that helps each other out. I hope Durham is different, but like the Who says, We Won’t Get Fooled Again.