FBI and Hillary: Banana Trees All the Way to the Horizon?

A shoe dropped. Well, one of many shoes that have and maybe still will drop in the ongoing Hillary Clinton email scandal.

FBI Director James Comey, one of the most respected persons in Washington, gave a barely 15-minute press conference, July 5, laying out the FBI's perspective on the investigation of that scandal. He, of course, has recommended no prosecution. The Clinton Crime Family (CCF) and their legions of lawyers, captains, soldiers, and assorted hit men must have breathed a sigh of relief. It would certainly seem that the CCF continues its nearly unbroken string of victories over the forces of Truth, Justice, and the American Way. Once again, one of the CCF principals has apparently managed to jump a tall hurdle in a single bound, and, again, escape the Keystone Cops who have dogged CCF for the past few decades. Stay tuned for our next installment in the never-ending saga of the Clinton Crime Family!

The Comey presser was odd and even perplexing. He opened (more on that) saying that nobody else in the government knew what he was about to say. He then laid out what apparently was a powerful bill of indictment. He described the facts which clearly contradicted everything Hillary has said about this affair for the past 16 months. In his bureaucratic, matter-of-fact way, Comey called Hillary Clinton a liar, and a careless, clueless wreck of a leader and a manager.

The Director described a chaotic situation in which Secretary Clinton used not one but many private servers, and not one but many handheld devices--directly contradicting Clinton's claims on both scores. He, furthermore, described the handling of classified information by Clinton and her aides as "extremely careless," and that under her, the State Department proved lax in its protection of classified information. He noted that, indeed, again contradicting Clinton, classified information, both labeled and unlabeled, appeared on Clinton's servers, including material classified at the highest levels, and which no "responsible person" would have discussed on an unclassified server. He pointed out that Hillary had discussed this material while on the territory of sophisticated foreign actors, and that most likely the information had been "hacked." There was lots more; you can find it here.

The shocker came at the end when he announced,

In looking back at our investigations into mishandling or removal of classified information, we cannot find a case that would support bringing criminal charges on these facts. All the cases prosecuted involved some combination of: clearly intentional and willful mishandling of classified information; or vast quantities of materials exposed in such a way as to support an inference of intentional misconduct; or indications of disloyalty to the United States; or efforts to obstruct justice. We do not see those things here. 

To be clear, this is not to suggest that in similar circumstances, a person who engaged in this activity would face no consequences. To the contrary, those individuals are often subject to security or administrative sanctions. But that is not what we are deciding now. As a result, although the Department of Justice makes final decisions on matters like this, we are expressing to Justice our view that no charges are appropriate in this case.

The Mother of all non-sequiturs?

When Comey announced that he did not think any "reasonable prosecutor" (weird term) would seek an indictment of Hillary based on the evidence, "Banana Republic" was all I could think. I have spent many years in Banana Republics and know the sound, feel, and smell of them. I could see, feel, and smell acres and acres of trees sagging under the burden of nice ripe, sweet bananas all the way to the horizon and beyond. For starters, clearly what Comey said about nobody knowing the content of his address was incorrect. At a minimum, AG Lynch knew; she probably passed that info to President Obama and to Hillary's husband, and both of them passed it to Hillary. Note that Obama scheduled his campaign stop today with Hillary in tow, well before Comey's press event. He would have done that only if he knew that Comey would recommend no prosecution. All this is in the bananas portion of this evening's entertainment.

Why would Comey do what he did? Lots of theories out there. My number two son made a cogent argument to me today that this is yet another example of the establishment elite closing ranks to protect one of their own. Perhaps there is some truth to that. Others have said that the CCF have something on Comey or have "made him an offer he can't refuse." Perhaps, I don't know.

The more I think about it, however, the more complex it becomes. If we assume that Comey is basically a good guy--I don't know him at all--he might have been horrified by the scope of the thing, the enormous consequences of pursuing Hillary in the courts. Presumably, the DOJ would have had to go after the large number of persons, either as suspects or witnesses, who knew about the private server, and used it to communicate with Hillary, including sending her classified information and receiving it. President Obama, of course, was one of those persons. Perhaps he worried that all this would produce a President Joe Biden? Maybe, this sort of concern led Comey to "rewrite" the law with a lot of mumbo-jumbo about "intent" as a justification for not recommending prosecution? I leave the "intent" argument to the lawyers--I am not a lawyer and do not play one on the internet.

Whatever his own "intent," however, Comey has slipped Hillary a poison political pill mixed in with the heady "no prosecution" bourbon. In the first 12 or 13 minutes of his presser, Comey described a factual situation and a pattern of behavior by Clinton far, far worse than most of us had imagined. Everything, absolutely everything, Hillary said about this matter is a demonstrable lie. Comey called her on it. He provided a picture of a senior official totally unqualified for the serious position she held, and surrounded by equally as unqualified and incompetent staff. Comey, I repeat, powerfully made the case that she is not qualified for high office. Perhaps this was Comey's Machiavellian maneuver: avoid the legal process but cripple Hillary politically? Maybe he was like a mad Solomon, to wit, actually splitting the baby?

Is this giving Comey too much credit? You tell me.

It will now be up to Donald Trump to exploit the opening left, intentionally or otherwise, by Comey's presentation. He will need to be like a laser cutting into Hillary's protective fabric of deception and corruption. It will also be up to the American public and to the "Never Trump" bunch of conservative poseurs to resolve that Hillary Clinton is the worst thing that could happen to our already beleagured Republic and its tattered institutions, and help ensure that the CCF is run out of DC.