TONIGHT: BZ interviews MIKE MOORE of TruePundit.com, author of “PAINE: HOW WE DISMANTLED THE FBI IN OUR PAJAMAS”

TONIGHT, on BZ’s Berserk Bobcat Saloon Radio Show, there will be a very important SHR Media Special Report.

MIKE MOORE aka Thomas Paine @Thomas1774Paine, will be LIVE on BZ’s Berserk Bobcat Saloon Radio Show Tuesday night, October 30th, in order to talk about Moore’s new book PAINE: HOW WE DISMANTLED THE FBI IN OUR PAJAMAS.

Broadcasting at 11 PM Eastern, 8 PM Pacific, 10 PM Central, everyone is cordially invited to please join us for this landmark interview with MIKE MOORE of TruePundit.com.

You can listen and simultaneously engage with lots of great people in the chat room at SHRMEDIA.COM.

You can also watch the show on the SHR Media Facebook page, the SHR Media YouTube channel or on the SHR Media Group Periscope page.

Again, please make sure you check out TRUEPUNDIT.COM.

Want to hear the truth about the Deep State, the FBI and other alphabet agencies — and more? Want to hear how your country really works? Want to find out what it’s like to be targeted by the US government and have your life ruined for political purposes?

Join BZ and Mike Moore TONIGHT, as we discuss Mr Moore’s book “PAINE: HOW WE DISMANTLED THE FBI IN OUR PAJAMAS.”

Listen to an exclusive interview with a man who paid a shockingly-high personal price in today’s tumultuous and chaotic political environment.

You are all graciously invited! Tell a friend!

BZ

P.S.
Thanks to Kari Baxter Donovan for all the arrangements with Mike Moore.

 

The FBI can no longer be trusted

Not because of the bottom, but because of the top.

Trust me when I tell you that it pains me to write this, after having worked in the federal system, for the FBI and also as a sworn US Marshal. I spent the last 35 of my 41 years with local California law enforcement agencies. I retired in 2016.

James Comey was, to date, the worst FBI Director I’ve encountered, and I’ve seen a few. He took bias, political insertion, corruption and manipulation to a level even greater than that of J Edgar Hoover on his worst day because, quite frankly, Hoover didn’t have the intrusive technology available to him then that Comey and Wray have now at their fingertips.

The jury may be officially out on Christopher Wray but, in my opinion, he is well on his way towards another serious precipice when I noted him parsing weasel words before Congress.

He is not the droid the FBI is looking for. And droid he is.

It’s clear, in one recent example, that a case worked by the FBI regarding the Bundy prosecution in Nevada, which resulted in Judge Gloria Navarro declaring a mistrial, wasn’t on the up-and-up.

The decision to intervene came after U.S. District Chief Judge Gloria Navarro declared a mistrial over the government’s “willful failure to disclose information” to the defense, saying it would have been “impossible” for the four co-defendants to receive a fair trial.

Now, because of it, AG Sessions said it was time to find out why. From the WashingtonTimes.com:

AG Sessions orders examination of Bundy case after mistrial over prosecution bungling

by Valerie Richardson

Attorney General Jeff Sessions has stepped into the Bundy prosecution after Wednesday’s mistrial, ordering a third-party examination of the case in light of the latest government snafu.

“The Attorney General takes this issue very seriously and has personally directed that an expert in the Department’s discovery obligations be deployed to examine the case and advise as to the next steps,” said Ian D. Prior, principal deputy director of public affairs, in a late Wednesday statement.

The decision to intervene came after U.S. District Chief Judge Gloria Navarro declared a mistrial over the government’s “willful failure to disclose information” to the defense, saying it would have been “impossible” for the four co-defendants to receive a fair trial.

The FBI was involved in the case, yes, but their role in the judge’s decision is unclear yet, for me, causes questions demanding answers.

What goes around comes around. And it appears that 2016 is morphing into 2017 and then continuing into 2018. Senator Rand Paul is already calling for an investigation of Obama officials colluding against Trump. Yes. That would include former FBI Director James Comey.

The FBI does have a recent tick in the “win” column with regard to the San Francisco Pier 39 Muslim terror plot they halted. I have and must continue to emphasize: this is the massive difference between line level agents who do their jobs and the upper echelons who so readily make compromises for political purposes.

FBI thwarts Christmas terror plot in San Francisco

by Douglas Ernst

The Federal Bureau of Investigation says it has thwarted a Christmas terror attack in San Francisco by a suspect inspired by ISIS.

U.S. officials say the City by the Bay narrowly avoided a massacre inspired by 2015’s terror attack in San Bernardino and October’s rental-truck attack in Manhattan, which killed eight. Court documents say Everitt Aaron Jameson was arrested this week while prepping for a rampage at the city’s Pier 39.

The suspect was charged with attempting to supply support to a foreign terrorist organization.

A local ABC affiliate reported Friday that Mr. Jameson, a convert to Islam who referred to himself as Abdallah adu Everitt ibn Gordon, eyed the location because he “knew it was a heavily crowded area,” and that Christmas would be “the perfect day.”

The suspect had some weapons training due to a brief stint — a few months — in the Marine Corps.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions, perhaps finally semi-cognizant of the testicles between his legs, the most simpering, limp-wristed AG I’ve seen (otherwise known as the AG Who Didn’t — have to reveal Russian talks), also ordered a DOJ review after Obama gave a terrorist group a pass so he could finalize his much-vaunted and much-West-bertraying Iranian cash deal, as I wrote about here.

Sessions orders DOJ review after report Obama administration gave Hezbollah a pass

by Alex Pappas

Attorney General Jeff Sessions is launching a review of a law enforcement initiative called Project Cassandra after an investigative report was published this week claiming the Obama administration gave a free pass to Hezbollah’s drug-trafficking and money-laundering operations to help ensure the Iran nuclear deal would stay on track.

The Justice Department said in a statement to Fox News that Sessions on Friday directed a review of prior Drug Enforcement Administration investigations “to evaluate allegations that certain matters were not properly prosecuted and to ensure all matters are appropriately handled.”

“While I am hopeful that there were no barriers constructed by the last administration to allowing DEA agents to fully bring all appropriate cases under Project Cassandra, this is a significant issue for the protection of Americans,” Sessions said in a written statement. “We will review these matters and give full support to investigations of violent drug trafficking organizations.”

The FBI provided surveillance. Or so it’s said. How effectively? What was their role? And how might it have been muted by Barack Hussein Obama or his 57-year-old lackey, the 6’8″ James Brien Comey? Will we know?

As we all recall, FBI Director Comey independently decided in July of 2016 that he would not recommend an indictment for Hillary Clinton or even the impaneling of a Grand Jury. DOJ under Lynch and Obama, corrupt as they are, pretended to be professional and placed the decision right back squarely at the feet of James Comey as in: “whatever he decides is good enough for us.”

“[AG Lynch] said…she would accept whatever recommendations career prosecutors and the F.B.I. director made…” –NYTimes July 1, 2016

Though, of course, the fix was already in. Any logical thinking human being knew the meeting between AG Lynch and Bill Clinton at the airport was 1) not coincidental, and 2) an agreement by Lynch to assure Bill Clinton that Hillary would not be indicted. Judicial Watch has rightly filed a FOIA request for all documents related to that meeting.

We already know that Comey drafted Hillary’s exoneration letter literally months before even having any member of the FBI conduct an interview with Hillary herself. We know that FBI Super Agent Peter Strzok — as vehemently anti-Trump as he was — was the one who actually drafted that letterStrzok wangled Comey’s initial finding that Hillary Clinton had been “grossly negligent” in her handling of sensitive and classified government documents with the use of her private email server. Weasel words.

It was Strzok who actually “interviewed” Hillary Clinton days before Comey released his “findings” in July of 2016. The “interview” with Hillary was conducted “without the benefit of any recording devices or a sworn oath.” Imagine my chagrin.

But wait; there’s more.

Peter Strzok also oversaw the questioning of then-National Security Director Michael Flynn over his contacts with Russian officials during the post-election transition process. Flynn’s answers to Strzok’s questions were later found to rise to the level of criminal deception leading Flynn to a guilty plea agreement with the Mueller investigation.

Translated: Flynn agreed to wear a wire. As did others who pled under lesser charges. None of which rose to, well, a few dribbles of piss in a sclerotic bladder.

But wait; there’s more.

We’ve also learned that Strzok was a “key figure” with regard to the acceptance of and possible dissemination of the infamous Russian Dossier, a collection of unverified tales about Donald Trump that was paid for by the Clinton campaign. Strzok reportedly briefed the House Intelligence Committee on the dossier in December of 2016, just one month after the presidential election and in the middle of the transition process.

I connected all the dots here, to that point. Those dots were many, varied, complex, tightly interwoven and crafted like the careful dovetailing on a fine piece of furniture. But it all depended on one highly critical element that cannot be maintained perpetually: believing the lies. When one lie breaks and is discovered, there can be an eventual unraveling. The unraveling is what were are seeing now, from early 2017 to late 2017. I call it the Tip of the Obama Iceberg.

But wait. Not only did FBI Director refuse to recommend either an indictment or even a Grand Jury for Hillary Clinton in July, the FBI has destroyed evidence (the FBI agreement to destroy the laptops of Clinton aides Cheryl Mills and Heather Samuelson), the Clinton campaign has destroyed evidence (the cell phones smashed by staffers with hammers as well as wiping of Hillary’s private servers with BleachBit), and the interview of Hillary Rodham Clinton was a sham, there were no subpoenas, no evidence collected.

Notes released from the FBI (pages can be viewed here) indicate Hillary Clinton could not recall much information and provided little detail in the 3.5 hours she was interviewed. Agents asked few direct and pointed questions and few follow-up questions (for example, regarding her health claims, documentation, doctors’ notes, etc). The takeaway was a weak interview consisting of softballs and puffy clouds. Even then, Hillary Clinton revealed her ignorance.

Angelina Jolie was interviewed for four hours regarding child abuse claims against Brad Pitt. The former Secretary of State and presidential candidate is taken less seriously than an actress in Hollywood.

Besides James Comey being an absolute dumpster fire in terms of logic, ethics, Constitutional law, betrayal, corruption and political bias, there was also his Number Two Dude, Andrew McCabe.

Assistant Director Andrew McCabe, the number two man in the FBI, directly supervised and monitored the Hillary Clinton email investigation. From the WSJ.com:

The Wall Street Journal reported last week that Mr. McCabe’s wife, Jill McCabe, received $467,500 in campaign funds in late 2015 from the political-action committee of Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, a longtime ally of the Clintons and, until he was elected governor in November 2013, a Clinton Foundation board member.

In February of this year, Mr. McCabe ascended from the No. 3 position at the FBI to the deputy director post. When he assumed that role, officials say, he started overseeing the probe into Mrs. Clinton’s use of a private email server for government work when she was secretary of state.

FBI officials have said Mr. McCabe had no role in the Clinton email probe until he became deputy director, and by then his wife’s campaign was over.

But other Clinton-related investigations were under way within the FBI, and they have been the subject of internal debate for months, according to people familiar with the matter.

Does the federal government purposely hire people, pay them large salaries and install them into positions of massive power, who are not only blind to ethics but tone deaf as well?

Others further down the FBI chain of command, however, said agents were given a much starker instruction on the case: “Stand down.” When agents questioned why they weren’t allowed to take more aggressive steps, they said they were told the order had come from the deputy director—Mr. McCabe.

From the microsecond McCabe had any linkage to an investigation with Clinton, Democrats or the Foundation, via his wife, he should have immediately recused himself and assigned supervision to others, making the conflict of interest apparent to the director himself verbally and on paper.

Then on the 20th there was this, after McCabe was “grilled” for over seven hours.

McCabe draws blank on Democrats’ funding of Trump dossier, new subpoenas planned

by James Rosen

Congressional investigators tell Fox News that Tuesday’s seven-hour interrogation of Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe contained numerous conflicts with the testimony of previous witnesses, prompting the Republican majority staff of the House Intelligence Committee to decide to issue fresh subpoenas next week on Justice Department and FBI personnel.

While HPSCI staff would not confirm who will be summoned for testimony, all indications point to demoted DOJ official Bruce G. Ohr and FBI General Counsel James A. Baker, who accompanied McCabe, along with other lawyers, to Tuesday’s HPSCI session.

The issuance of a subpoena against the Justice Department’s top lawyer could provoke a new constitutional clash between the two branches, even worse than the months-long tug of war over documents and witnesses that has already led House Speaker Paul Ryan to accuse DOJ and FBI of “stonewalling” and HPSCI Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif., to threaten contempt-of-Congress citations against Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and FBI Director Christopher Wray.

“It’s hard to know who’s telling us the truth,” said one House investigator after McCabe’s questioning.

This is the same conundrum faced by anyone watching someone speaking from DC.

Then from everything upon which any molecule could be drawn, from the WashingtonTimes.com:

Faced with libel lawsuit, dossier drafter Christopher Steele hedges on linking Trump to Russia

by Rowan Scarborough

Christopher Steele, the former British spy who fueled an ongoing investigation into President Trump’s administration, was a lot more confident of his charges when he wrote his now-notorious 2016 dossier than he is today in defending it in a libel lawsuit.

While Mr. Steele stated matter-of-factly in his dossier that collusion between Mr. Trump and the Russian government took place, he called it only “possible” months later in court filings. While he confidently referred to “trusted” sources inside the Kremlin, in court he referred to the dossier’s “limited intelligence.”

Now that Mr. Steele must defend those charges in a London courtroom, his confidence level has shifted down several notches.

Huh. Imagine that. But wait; what of the consistent lies of Peter Strzok in House testimony? What of Lisa Page refusing to appear?

This is just the tip of the iceberg.

There is so much more yet to be revealed. Just wait until we find the smoking guns — and we will — that lead to McCabe, Comey, Lynch and ultimately to Obama.

It’s there. Why?

Because “digital never dies.”

Trust me when I tell you it pains line level agents to know that their beloved FBI has been tainted with bias, partisanship, corruption and politics.

It sickens them in their hearts.

Worse yet, they realize just how long it will take to untarnish and resurrect the reputation of a once fine organization.

Further, unfortunately, I fear it will get much worse for the FBI when even more corruption and scandal is uncovered — as it will be.

BZ

 

Hypocrisy and hyperbole; the aftermath of Comey’s firing

If you’d been listening to the American Media Maggots the past 24 hours, you’d think the sky had indeed fallen all across the United States of America.

President Trump fired FBI Director James Comey on Tuesday, and the world has, literally, stopped rotating on its axis.

It all started with a letter by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.

May 9, 2017

MEMORANDUM FOR THE ATTORNEY GENERAL

FROM: ROD J. ROSENSTEIN

DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL

SUBJECT: RESTORING PUBLIC CONFIDENCE IN THE FBI

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has long been regarded as our nation’s premier federal investigative agency. Over the past year, however, the FBI’s reputation and credibility have suffered substantial damage, and it has affected the entire Department of Justice. That is deeply troubling to many Department employees and veterans, legislators and citizens.

The current FBI Director is an articulate and persuasive speaker about leadership and the immutable principles of the Department of Justice. He deserves our appreciation for his public service. As you and I have discussed, however, I cannot defend the Director’s handling of the conclusion of the investigation of Secretary Clinton’s emails, and I do not understand his refusal to accept the nearly universal judgment that he was mistaken. Almost everyone agrees that the Director made serious mistakes; it is one of the few issues that unites people of diverse perspectives.

The director was wrong to usurp the Attorney General’s authority on July 5, 2016, and announce his conclusion that the case should be closed without prosecution.

It is not the function of the Director to make such an announcement. At most, the Director should have said the FBI had completed its investigation and presented its findings to federal prosecutors. The Director now defends his decision by asserting that he believed attorney General Loretta Lynch had a conflict. But the FBI Director is never empowered to supplant federal prosecutors and assume command of the Justice Department. There is a well-established process for other officials to step in when a conflict requires the recusal of the Attorney General. On July 5, however, the Director announced his own conclusions about the nation’s most sensitive criminal investigation, without the authorization of duly appointed Justice Department leaders.

Compounding the error, the Director ignored another longstanding principle: we do not hold press conferences to release derogatory information about the subject of a declined criminal investigation. Derogatory information sometimes is disclosed in the course of criminal investigations and prosecutions, but we never release it gratuitously. The Director laid out his version of the facts for the news media as if it were a closing argument, but without a trial. It is a textbook example of what federal prosecutors and agents are taught not to do.

In response to skeptical question at a congressional hearing, the Director defended his remarks by saying that his “goal was to say what is true. What did we do, what did we find, what do we think about it.” But the goal of a federal criminal investigation is not to announce our thoughts at a press conference. The goal is to determine whether there is sufficient evidence to justify a federal criminal prosecution, then allow a federal prosecutor who exercises authority delegated by the Attorney General to make a prosecutorial decision, and then – if prosecution is warranted – let the judge and jury determine the facts. We sometimes release information about closed investigations in appropriate ways, but the FBI does not do it.

Concerning his letter to the Congress on October 28, 2016, the Director cast his decision as a choice between whether he would “speak” about the decision to investigate the newly-discovered email messages or “conceal” it. “Conceal” is a loaded term that misstates the issue. When federal agents and prosecutors quietly open a criminal investigation, we are not concealing anything; we are simply following the longstanding policy that we refrain from publicizing non-public information. In that context, silence is not concealment.

My perspective on these issues is shared by former Attorneys General and Deputy Attorneys General from different eras and both political parties. Judge Laurence Silberman, who served as Deputy Attorney General under President Ford, wrote that “it is not the bureau’s responsibility to opine on whether a matter should be prosecuted.” Silberman believes that the Director’s “Performance was so inappropriate for an FBI director that [he] doubt[s] the bureau will ever completely recover.” Jamie Gorelick, Deputy Attorney General under President Clinton, joined with Larry Thompson, Deputy Attorney General under President George W. Bush, to opine that the Director had “chosen personally to restrike the balance between transparency and fairness, departing from the department’s traditions.” They concluded that the Director violated his obligation to “preserve, protect and defend” the traditions of the Department and the FBI.

Former Attorney General Michael Mukasey, who served under President George W. Bush, observed the Director “stepped way outside his job in disclosing the recommendation in that fashion” because the FBI director “doesn’t make that decision.”

Alberto Gonzales, who also served as Attorney General under President George W. Bush, called the decision “an error in judgement.” Eric Holder, who served as Deputy Attorney General under President Clinton and Attorney General under President Obama, said the Director’s decision“was incorrect. It violated long-standing Justice Department policies and traditions. And it ran counter to guidance that I put in place four years ago laying out the proper way to conduct investigations during an election season.” Holder concluded that the Director “broke with these fundamental principles” and “negatively affected public trust in both the Justice Department and the FBI.”

Former Deputy Attorneys General Gorelick and Thompson described the unusual events as“real-time, raw-take transparency taken to its illogical limit, a kind of reality TV of federal criminal investigation,” that is “antithetical to the interests of justice.”

Donald Ayer, who served as Deputy Attorney General under President H.W. Bush, along with former Justice Department officials, was“astonished and perplexed” by the decision to “break[] with longstanding practices followed by officials of both parties during past elections.” Ayer’s letter noted, “Perhaps most troubling… is the precedent set by this departure from the Department’s widely-respected, non-partisan traditions.”

We should reject the departure and return to the traditions.

Although the President has the power to remove an FBI director, the decision should not be taken lightly. I agree with the nearly unanimous opinions of former Department officials. The way the Director handled the conclusion of the email investigation was wrong. As a result, the FBI is unlikely to regain public and congressional trust until it has a Director who understands the gravity of the mistakes and pledges never to repeat them. Having refused to admit his errors, the Director cannot be expected to implement the necessary corrective actions.

I set out my objections to now-former Director James Comey last year with his horribly flawed reasoning for failing to forward the Hillary Clinton case to the DOJ last year, and also in this post. I was heartened to see that the bulk of my objections were quite similar to those of the Deputy Attorney General.

We all know that President William Jefferson Clinton fired his FBI Director, William Sessions, back in 1993 for essentially political reasons. That was fine with Demorats.

Many Demorats themselves were calling for the severed head of William Comey quite recently.

Yes, two words: what changed?

We all know the answer, quite obviously. Judicial Watch’s CJ Farrell had this to say from last year.

Maxine Waters at least had the guts to come out and say what every other Demorat and Leftist is thinking about the situation.

From RealClearPolitics.com:

Maxine Waters: I Don’t Support Trump Firing Comey, I Would Support Hillary Clinton Firing Comey

by Ian Schwartz

NBC’s Peter Alexander grills Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Cali.) for her displeasure at President Trump firing FBI Director James Comey after she had announced in January that he has lost all credibility after attending a classified briefing conducted by the now-former director.

In March, Waters issued a press release that read Comey “advanced Russia’s misinformation campaign.”

However, in the interview Wednesday on MSNBC, asked if she would be okay with a hypothetical President Hillary Clinton dismissing Comey from his position, Waters said yes.

“If she had won the White House, I believe that given what he did to her, and what he tried to do, she should have fired him. Yes,” the California Democrat said.

“So she should have fired him but had he shouldn’t fire him. This is why I’m confused,” Alexander said to Waters.

Honesty and clarity, for once, coming from Maxine Waters in terms of her clear bias.

But it wasn’t just politicians who became unhinged over the firing of James Comey. The so-called “celebrities” did so as well.

Steven Colbert was not amused.

Neither was our favorite moonbat, Keith Olbermann.

So what really happened in the White House? What was the final straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back? I wrote back on Tuesday that Comey’s final waffling on the number of emails found in Weiner’s laptop was the kicker. Oddly enough, Dr Sebastian Gorka highlighted that same issue.

The New York Times wrote this about the White House decision.

‘Enough was Enough’: How Festering Anger at Comey Ended in His Firing

by Maggie Haberman, Glenn Thrush, Michael S Schmidt and Peter Baker

WASHINGTON — By the end, neither of them thought much of the other.

After President Trump accused his predecessor in March of wiretapping him, James B. Comey, the F.B.I. director, was flabbergasted. The president, Mr. Comey told associates, was “outside the realm of normal,” even “crazy.”

For his part, Mr. Trump fumed when Mr. Comey publicly dismissed the sensational wiretapping claim. In the weeks that followed, he grew angrier and began talking about firing Mr. Comey. After stewing last weekend while watching Sunday talk shows at his New Jersey golf resort, Mr. Trump decided it was time. There was “something wrong with” Mr. Comey, he told aides.

The problem, you see, was that Donald Trump waited too long. As I believed and wrote numerous times, on January 20th at noon, President Trump should have demanded Comey’s resignation letter.

The collision between president and F.B.I. director that culminated with Mr. Comey’s stunning dismissal on Tuesday had been a long time coming. To a president obsessed with loyalty, Mr. Comey was a rogue operator who could not be trusted as the F.B.I. investigated Russian ties to Mr. Trump’s campaign. To a lawman obsessed with independence, Mr. Trump was the ultimate loose cannon, making irresponsible claims on Twitter and jeopardizing the bureau’s credibility.

The other problem was that Comey wasn’t obsessed with any independence other than his own, and not that of the bureau itself. The only person who jeopardized the FBI’s credibility was James Comey.

The White House, in a series of shifting and contradictory accounts, first said Mr. Trump decided to fire Mr. Comey because the attorney general and his deputy recommended it. By Wednesday, it had amended the timeline to say that the president had actually been thinking about getting rid of the F.B.I. director as far back as November, after he won the election, and then became “strongly inclined” after Mr. Comey testified before Congress last week.

Mr. Comey’s fate was sealed by his latest testimony about the bureau’s investigation into Russia’s efforts to sway the 2016 election and the Clinton email inquiry. Mr. Trump burned as he watched, convinced that Mr. Comey was grandstanding. He was particularly irked when Mr. Comey said he was “mildly nauseous” to think that his handling of the email case had influenced the election, which Mr. Trump took to demean his own role in history.

Director Comey was grandstanding.

At that point, Mr. Trump began talking about firing him. He and his aides thought they had an opening because Mr. Comey gave an incorrect account of how Huma Abedin, a top adviser to Mrs. Clinton, transferred emails to her husband’s laptop, an account the F.B.I. later corrected.

As I wrote on Tuesday, that element was the final straw. And yes, it did provide an opening.

At first, Mr. Trump, who is fond of vetting his decisions with a wide circle of staff members, advisers and friends, kept his thinking to a small circle, venting his anger to Vice President Mike Pence; the White House counsel, Donald F. McGahn II; and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who all told him they generally backed dismissing Mr. Comey.

Then President Trump finally did the right thing.

But wait; hold up on that car wash. Isn’t this the same New York Times that wrote in 1993:

DEFIANT F.B.I. CHIEF REMOVED FROM JOB BY THE PRESIDENT

By DAVID JOHNSTON
Published: July 20, 1993

WASHINGTON, July 19— President Clinton today dismissed William S. Sessions, the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, who had stubbornly rejected an Administration ultimatum to resign six months after a harsh internal ethics report on his conduct.

Mr. Clinton said he would announce his nominee to replace Mr. Sessions on Tuesday. He was expected to pick Judge Louis J. Freeh of Federal District Court in Manhattan; officials said Judge Freeh had impressed Mr. Clinton favorably on Friday at their first meeting.

Mr. Clinton, explaining his reasons for removing Mr. Sessions, effective immediately, said, “We cannot have a leadership vacuum at an agency as important to the United States as the F.B.I. It is time that this difficult chapter in the agency’s history is brought to a close.”

But in a parting news conference at F.B.I. headquarters after Mr. Clinton’s announcement, a defiant Mr. Sessions — his right arm in a sling as a result of a weekend fall — railed at what he called the unfairness of his removal, which comes nearly six years into his 10-year term.

“Because of the scurrilous attacks on me and my wife of 42 years, it has been decided by others that I can no longer be as forceful as I need to be in leading the F.B.I. and carrying out my responsibilities to the bureau and the nation,” he said. “It is because I believe in the principle of an independent F.B.I. that I have refused to voluntarily resign.”

It appears, according to the New York Times, that President William Clinton, a Demorat, was perfectly well within his rights and abilities to fire Director Sessions who insisted that the FBI be independent. That same newspaper now states that President Donald Trump, a Republican, is not perfectly well within his rights and abilities to fire Director Comey who insisted that the FBI be independent.

The difference? Political parties. Simply that.

James Comey, in a letter to his office the day after his firing, said the president was within his authority to fire a sitting FBI director. From TheHill.com:

Comey farewell: ‘A president can fire an FBI director for any reason’

Former FBI Director James Comey on Wednesday sent a letter to agents and friends following President Trump firing him the previous day.

“I have long believed that a President can fire an FBI director for any reason, or for no reason at all,” he wrote, according to CNN. “I’m not going to spend time on the decision or the way it was executed.”

Leftist attorney and professor Alan Dershowitz came in on the side of President Trump. From Breitbart.com:

Dershowitz: Comey Firing ‘Appropriate,’ No Special Prosecutor

by Joel B Pollak

Harvard Law School professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz told CNN’s Don Lemon on Tuesday night that President Donald Trump was well within his rights to fire former FBI director James Comey, and that there was no need for a special prosecutor in the investigation into possible collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign.

Dershowitz appeared next to CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin, who was apoplectic. “The fact that he did this will disgrace his memory for as long as this presidency is remembered. There is only one date that will be remembered after Januarth 20th so far in the Trump presidency, and it is the day of the ‘Tuesday Night Massacre,’” Toobin said, referencing President Richard Nixon’s firing of Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox during the Watergate scandal.

Toobin had also told CNN’s Anderson Cooper earlier that Trump would likely name a “campaign stooge” as Comey’s replacement at the FBI.

But Dershowitz disagreed.

“Should Comey be the director of the FBI? The answer to that is no,” he said, noting that he had called earlier for Comey to resign. “He lost his credibility. … A lot of this is his fault.”

When Toobin objected that Trump had fired former Acting Attorney General Sally Yates and former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara as well as Comey, “all three of whom had the potential to investigate and trouble the Trump presidency,” Dershowitz argued that they were all Democrat appointees and had all been dismissed appropriately by a Republican president.

Perquisites of the job that have been replicated time and again by Demorat presidents.

Where is John McCain on this because, after all, when the story appears to be about someone else, well, it’s really about John McCain, isn’t it? From the WashingtonPost.com:

John McCain on Comey firing: ‘There will be more shoes to drop’

by Josh Rogin

President Trump’s sudden firing of FBI Director James B. Comey is bad for the country and will not be the end of the Trump-Russia affair, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) told a group of foreign diplomats and experts Tuesday night.

Although McCain did not directly accuse the White House of firing Comey to thwart the FBI’s investigation into the Trump campaign’s possible Russia ties, he did say that if that was the intention, it would fail.

Again, news about truth isn’t news. News about specious insinuation is news.

“This scandal is going to go on. I’ve seen it before,” McCain told a meeting of the Munich Security Conference core group. “This is a centipede. I guarantee you there will be more shoes to drop, I can just guarantee it. There’s just too much information that we don’t have that will be coming out.”

He called Trump’s actions against Comey “unprecedented” and said the position of FBI director has held special meaning in American public life dating back decades.

Ooooh, scary, John, very scary.

“Probably the most respected individual in all of the American government is probably the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation,” McCain said. “I’m very sorry that this has happened.”

The event was off the record, but McCain gave me permission to place his comments on the record. He said that Trump had the legal basis to fire Comey but that his decision would have long-term negative consequences.

“I regret it, I think it’s unfortunate,” McCain said. “The president does have that constitutional authority. But I can’t help but think that this is not a good thing for America.”

I refer to this article solely to illustrate how terribly out-of-touch is John McCain with the law and with reality. However, even McCain isn’t yet sufficiently addled to refute the authority of a president to fire an FBI director.

Former FBI Assistant Director James Kallstrom weighs in on the Comey situation and likewise concludes that President Trump acted appropriately. “I’m glad it happened.”

As I’ve said, I still have law enforcement contacts across the fruited plain and I know that the bulk of line-level agents, not necessarily supervisors or managers, were relieved to see the dismissal of William Comey. Judge Andrew Napolitano confirms this.

Newt Gingrich also weighs in on the issue with Sean Hannity.

Let us not forget the 10 major scandals that occurred on the 3.5-year watch of Director Comey.

The bottom line is this: former FBI Director James Comey made quite a number of flawed decisions based not upon the law but instead on politics. He placed himself in front of cameras frequently as he enjoyed the limelight. He did so for self-aggrandizing reasons. Having a self-righteous and poor decision-maker in charge of the FBI is not a formula for success or for ensuring confidence in the bureau.

The firing of James Comey was long overdue.

BZ