500 Pages

Scrambling to put the best possible spin on a scathing 500-page report that eviscerates the FBI actions associated with the Hillary Clinton email investigation (opps, sorry, "matter") and all of the other actions taken in the run-up to the 2016 presdiential election, the democrats appear to have settled on two talking points. Quoting from the report's findings, they claim there was (1) "no bias" in the investigation, and (2) that James Comey's "insubordinate actions" were responsible for Hillary Clinton's defeat.

Wait! What?

For the past 18 months the Dems have claimed the Trump's "Russian collusion" brought Hillary down ... or was it misogyny on the part of White males? Or maybe it was white women who know no better than to do the bidding of their anti-Hillary husbands?

The last time I checked, even the most unhinged member of the Trump Derangement Syndrome crowd has not claimed that Comey was a Russian puppet, nor that he was a misogynist, and he's certainly not a woman. When reality collides with progressive fantasy, we find that Hillary Clinton's decision to use a private email server, her irresponsible disregard for national security documents, and a cloud of self-serving dishonesty and corruption that goes back decades, is what brought her down. But never mind.

The FBI actions associated with the 2016 campaign are old news—concerning, but old news. The key point is that many of the same high-level FBI actors and some of the DoJ lawyers who were involved in 2016 are still involved right now—in Robert Mueller's "investigation" of Russian "collusion."

Kim Strassel summarizes what happened in 2016:

it is the report’s findings on the wider culture of the FBI and Justice Department that are most alarming. The report depicts agencies that operate outside the rules to which they hold everybody else, and that showed extraordinary bias while investigating two presidential candidates.

There’s Loretta Lynch, who felt it perfectly fine to have a long catch-up with her friend Bill Clinton on a Phoenix tarmac and whom the inspector general slams for an “error in judgment.” Mr. Comey’s entire staff was complicit in concealing the contents of the July press conference from Justice officials. We discover that significant FBI “resources” were dedicated in October to spinning FBI “talking points” about the Clinton investigation—rather than actually investigating the new Anthony Weiner laptop emails the bureau discovered in September. We even find that Mr. Comey used personal email and laptops to conduct government work.

There’s former Assistant Attorney General Peter Kadzik, who was tipping off the Clinton campaign even as he took part in the investigation, and who “failed to strictly adhere to [his] recusal” when he finally stepped away. Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe also did not “fully comply with his recusal,” and he’d already been found to have lied to the bureau about a leak to the media. Speaking of leaks, Mr. Horowitz needed full attachments and charts to list the entire “volume of communication” between FBI employees and the press. Not only did these folks have “no official reason to be in contact with the media,” but they also “improperly received benefits from reporters, including tickets to sporting events, golfing outings, drinks and meals, and admittance to nonpublic social events.”

Be ready to hear the report absolves the FBI and DOJ of “bias.” Not true. It very carefully states that “our review did not find documentary or testimonial evidence directly connecting the political views these employees expressed in their text messages and instant messages to the specific investigative decisions we reviewed.” Put another way, he never caught anyone writing down: Let’s start this Trump investigation so we can help Hillary win.

But the bias is everywhere. It’s in the texts between Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, and those of three other employees who are routinely “hostile” to Candidate Trump. It’s in Ms. Page’s freak-out that Mr. Trump might win the presidency and Mr. Strzok’s reply: “No. No he won’t. We’ll stop it.” It’s in a message from an unnamed agent in November 2016 who writes that although the FBI found Clinton aide Huma Abedin had “lied,” it doesn’t matter since “no one at DOJ is going to prosecute.” To which a second agent replies. “Rog—noone is going to pros[ecute] even if we find unique classified.”

The same bias that pervaded top levels of the 2016 FBI campaign investigations also pervades the Mueller probe. After all, the majority of Mueller's team are documented Clinton supporters who contributed to Hillary's campaign and likely have a distinct animus toward Trump. Sure, they're not as stupid as Strok (as far as we know) and have not put their feelings down on paper or in digital messages, but that doesn't mean the feelings don't exist. They cannot be trusted to do an objective assessment of evidence or lack of evidence surrounding any allegation of Russian collusion with the Trump campaign.

Couple all of that with the DoJ stonewalling on current Congressional requests for documents associated with the Crossfire Hurricane scandal and we have an out of control attempt to bring Trump down.

It's not clear who will win, but one thing is certain, public trust in our federal law enforcement agencies and the DoJ is the big loser.