Mind you, the mid-and-upper level managers aren’t. They were too busy aligning themselves and slashing at each other in order to grasp a small piece of the bottom of former FBI Director James Comey’s cape, hoping to climb over whatever corpses necessary to kiss the Comey Ring.

Now that Comey is gone, thanks to President Trump, management is in a bit of a kerfuffle to say the least. Whose ring or arse to kiss now in management? Certainly not acting-Director McCabe. He’s — well — acting director. And Andrew McCabe is rife with sufficient conflicting baggage himself that the next FBI director may just kick McCabe to the proverbial curb. Which would be quite appropriate. McCabe reeks, in my opinion, of Leftist/Demorat corruption.

Here is Assistant FBI Director Andrew McCabe not actively campaigning for his Demorat wife. All is well. Nothing to see here. No corruption, no conflict of interest. Just ask former FBI Director James Comey. Just don’t ask the line-level agents.

From the NYPost.com:

Comey’s firing is a gift to the FBI

by Michael Walsh

Let’s cut right to the chase: James Comey should have been fired immediately following his disastrous press briefing last July, in which he candidly laid out the case against Hillary Clinton over her mishandling of classified information and then refused to recommend charges. Overstepping his authority while radiating sanctimony, arrogating power while clumsily intervening in the election, Comey deserved to be sacked on the spot.

Absolutely. Comey’s press conference about his decision to do nothing about Hillary Clinton was right out of Kabuki Theater if you know something about the law and its application. Or if you could simply read and understand a few paragraphs of English.

Everything since has been one long slow twist in the wind for Comey, a former US attorney in Manhattan, where his most notable accomplishment was sending Martha Stewart to jail.

Ignore for the moment Comey’s series of missteps resulting from the Clinton investigation and his increasingly erratic and unconvincing public fan dance as he sent the nation into electoral paroxysms over the past 10 months.

Precisely. And unnecessarily so. Former Director Comey set a terrible precedent for the FBI. He couldn’t keep himself out of camera lenses or shut his mouth.

Now the bureau’s tied up and bogged down in the almost certainly chimerical “Russian hacking” fantasy, which bubbled up out of the leftist fever swamp in the wake of Clinton’s loss in November, and for which there is exactly zero evidence.

So when President Trump finally put Comey out of his — and our — misery last week, it was the best merited cashiering since Truman fired a showboating MacArthur.

Now there’s an accurate analogy. Wish I’d thought of it.

The American Media Maggots insist that FBI agents are in full lacrimal duct mode after Comey’s firing. The truth is that the FBI is a tight-knit and proud organization that seldom admits to internal turbulence in public. It is anathema to the institution.

The American Media Maggots also conveniently forget this from 2016. From the UKDailyMail.com:

EXCLUSIVE: Resignation letters piling up from disaffected FBI agents, his wife urging him to admit he was wrong: Why Director Comey jumped at the chance to reopen Hillary investigation

by Ed Klein

• James Comey revived the investigation of Clinton’s email server as he could no longer resist mounting pressure by mutinous agents, sources say
•  The atmosphere at the FBI has been toxic ever since Jim announced last July that he wouldn’t recommend an indictment against Hillary
•  He told his wife that he was depressed by the stack of resignation letters piling up on his desk from disaffected agents
• Comes was also worried that Republicans would accuse him of granting Hillary political favoritism after the presidential election
•  When new emails allegedly linked to Hillary’s personal server turned up in  Abedin and Anthony Weiner’s computer, Comey jumped at the excuse 

James Comey’s decision to revive the investigation of Hillary Clinton’s email server and her handling of classified material came after he could no longer resist mounting pressure by mutinous agents in the FBI, including some of his top deputies, according to a source close to the embattled FBI director.

‘The atmosphere at the FBI has been toxic ever since Jim announced last July that he wouldn’t recommend an indictment against Hillary,’ said the source, a close friend who has known Comey for nearly two decades, shares family outings with him, and accompanies him to Catholic mass every week.

‘Some people, including department heads, stopped talking to Jim, and even ignored his greetings when they passed him in the hall,’ said the source. ‘They felt that he betrayed them and brought disgrace on the bureau by letting Hillary off with a slap on the wrist.’

According to the source, Comey fretted over the problem for months and discussed it at great length with his wife, Patrice. 

He told his wife that he was depressed by the stack of resignation letters piling up on his desk from disaffected agents. The letters reminded him every day that morale in the FBI had hit rock bottom.

“Stack of resignation letters piling up on his desk.” Disaffected agents. Poor morale. Lack of confidence in leadership. Betrayal. Disgrace. Spoken to singly, the narrative of agents is different than that of the American Media Maggots.

DailyCaller.com printed quotes, following Comey’s firing, from agents who didn’t wish to be named to include “we don’t need a political hack” to “good riddance” and “It should have been expected because he was not doing a good job. He had it coming to him.”

Personnel who have spoken to me on both coasts say roughly the same thing, indicating they believed Comey was an embarrassment to the agency who started well but began seeking the limelight behind decisions that reflected political and not legal motivations.

Of course, the agents didn’t want to be named and wished to be publicly quiet because that’s not what they do and it’s not what they believe their director should do either.

Overall, one said, it was like a big pressure valve had been opened at 935 Pennsylvania; you could almost hear the collective sigh of relief. Confidence in leadership will likely return. I personally suspect, bit by bit, you’ll begin to hear just how lacking in leadership and confidence the agency had been under James Comey.

James Kallstrom, former Assistant Director for the FBI, summarized best.

Even when things were good, they weren’t fabulous under James Comey. In three-and-a-half years of his admin , Grabien.com documented the Top 10 Scandalous Low Points for the FBI:

1. Before he bombed the Boston Marathon, the FBI interviewed Tamerlan Tsarnaev but let him go. Russia sent the Obama Administration a second warning, but the FBI opted against investigating him again.

2. Shortly after the NSA scandal exploded in 2013, the FBI was exposed conducting its own data mining on innocent Americans; the agency, Bloomberg reported, retains that material for decades (even if no wrongdoing is found).

3. The FBI had possession of emails sent by Nidal Hasan saying he wanted to kill his fellow soldiers to protect the Taliban — but didn’t intervene, leading many critics to argue the tragedy that resulted in the death of 31 Americans at Fort Hood could have been prevented.

4. During the Obama Administration, the FBI claimed that two private jets were being used primarily for counterterrorism, when in fact they were mostly being used for Eric Holder and Robert Mueller’s business and personal travel.

5. When the FBI demanded Apple create a “backdoor” that would allow law enforcement agencies to unlock the cell phones of various suspects, the company refused, sparking a battle between the feds and America’s biggest tech company. What makes this incident indicative of Comey’s questionable management of the agency is that a) The FBI jumped the gun, as they were indeed ultimately able to crack the San Bernardino terrorist’s phone, and b) Almost every other major national security figure sided with Apple (from former CIA Director General Petraeus to former CIA Director James Woolsey to former director of the NSA, General Michael Hayden), warning that such a “crack” would inevitably wind up in the wrong hands.

6. In 2015, the FBI conducted a controversial raid on a Texas political meeting, finger printing, photographing, and seizing phones from attendees (some in the group believe in restoring Texas as an independent constitutional republic).

7. During its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s mishandling of classified material, the FBI made an unusual deal in which Clinton aides were both given immunity and allowed to destroy their laptops.

8. The father of the radical Islamist who detonated a backpack bomb in New York City in 2016 alerted the FBI to his son’s radicalization. The FBI, however, cleared Ahmad Khan Rahami after a brief interview.

9. The FBI also investigated the terrorist who killed 49 people and wounded 53 more at the Pulse Nightclub in Orlando, Fla. Despite a more than 10-month investigation of Omar Mateen — during which Mateen admitting lying to agents — the FBI opted against pressing further and closed its case.

10. CBS recently reported that when two terrorists sought to kill Americans attending the “Draw Muhammad” event in Garland, Texas, the FBI not only had an understanding an attack was coming,

Continuing, from the New York Post.

What’s needed now is a restoration of what should be the FBI’s primary mission, as it was in the early Hoover days: counterterrorism. Since the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, it’s far less important for the bureau to be chasing bank robbers in Burlington and Butte than it is for it to function as the nation’s first line of homeland security defense.

Sad but true. I made my bones on the reactive Squad 3. Those days may be over. But even with the FBI’s newest sea change, who should lead that ship in those turbulent seas following James Comey?

In a conciliatory gesture to the Demorats I believe, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s pick would be Merritt Garland. From FoxNews.com:

McConnell thinks Garland as FBI director ‘fantastic idea,’ ex-adviser says

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is behind the idea of Judge Merrick Garland, whose Supreme Court nomination McConnell squashed, becoming the next FBI director, a former adviser to the Kentucky senator said Sunday.

“I think the senate majority leader thinks that’s a fantastic idea,” former adviser Josh Holmes, who now runs the strategy firm Cavalry LLC, told “Fox News Sunday.” “He certainly thinks (Garland) will be qualified. And (McConnell) certainly thinks he would be somebody that he could support.”

Garland was former President Barack Obama’s nominee to replace conservative Justice Antonin Scalia, who died in 2016.

However, McConnell infuriated Democrats by declining to hold Senate confirmation hearings on Garland, saying the next president should have that choice.

The idea of Garland as the next FBI director was posed by Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee after President Trump on Tuesday fired agency Director James Comey.

Some are considering Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn as well. Politico.com writes about some serious complications, however.

If President Donald Trump selects Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn as his next FBI director it would accelerate a major shift in Republican politics with implications for both the Senate and the national GOP.

If Cornyn were to accept the position as director, it would leave a GOP leadership vacuum in the Whip position.

Further, ABCNews.com indicates there are 11 candidates in the running besides John Cornyn:

• Rep Trey Gowdy;
• Former Rep Mike Rogers;
• Former NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly
• Former 4th DCA Judge J Michael Luttig;
• Former Deputy AG Larry Thompson;
• Current FBI official Paul Abbate;
• Former Assistant AG Alice Fisher;
• Current Assistant FBI Director Andrew McCabe (worst choice);
• Former Manhattan US Attorney Michael Garcia;
• Former US Attorney John Suthers.

At this point I think I’m safe to say that, no matter who President Trump selects, there’s going to be a fight in confirmation.

One consolation: James Comey is gone.

And the line-level agents can finally breathe.

BZ