If there is one truism regarding American government that has held solid through three generations of evolving norms, it is this; Once one appoints a special prosecutor, he or she will damn well prosecute something, whether the case should be filed or not. This morning, the crew at Morning Joe piled on John Durham, the special prosecutor charged with providing the MAGAs special stimulation over three years. Durham would “investigate the investigators.” And here we are.
Yesterday, a jury acquitted Michael Sussman, the Democratic lawyer who – with what is now seen as true – went to the FBI as a concerned citizen, one worried about a possible internet backchannel between the Trump Organization and Kremlin-linked Alfa Bank. The FBI failed to establish that there was such a link and Durham prosecuted Sussman as lying to the FBI in an attempt to set up some October surprise, an accusation that was absurd on its face.
This morning, the entire team on Morning Joe tore into Special Prosecutor John Durham to shreds for his three-year-long snipe hunt, a longer and more convoluted investigation than Mueller’s endeavor. Mueller, however, brought to light significant facts, charges, and verdicts (Including Trump campaign officials). Durham has produced next to nothing.
As Scarborough noted, the entire endeavor should humiliate Trump, Barr, and especially John Durham:
It’s just asinine. It’s been asinine from the start. This started in March 2017 when Donald Trump said that Barack Obama was tapping his phones, and it continued, one lie after another lie after another lie, which was picked up by all of those news outlets that you just quoted, and then Barr lets Durham start investigating, supposedly investigating the investigators.
Hold mid-quote for a moment. Trump and his people regularly accused the American government of “spying on” them. And yet, this is fairly straightforward. The FBI listens in on Russian spies. If Russian spies are talking to someone obvious like a Trump, is the FBI supposed to hang up? It is not the FBI’s fault that, in doing their job, they may have heard the Russians talking to the Trump team. There is a reason that before Trump even put his hand on the Bible, Jared Kushner and Mike Flynn (Mike Flynn!) were in the Russian embassy seeking a “back channel” to communicate with Moscow.
Back to Scarborough:
“But there’s been absolutely nothing there from the beginning, and this pleading that everybody jumped on in February, we did an entire segment. I mean, I read it, tried to figure it out for 24 hours. I talked to legal scholars, I said, ‘I don’t understand this pleading, it looks like it was written by a seventh grader,’ and sure enough, it basically was.
And then you see, at the end of the day, that this investigation of the ‘deep state,’ this investigation of the investigators, is much ado about nothing. It’s more weirdos, more conspiracy theorists, more freaks, actually getting an attorney general to allow Durham go out and make a fool of himself, to drag this out years to make the investigation of the investigators longer than the original investigation.
Scarborough went on to point out that the Durham investigation caused immense damage to the FBI’s reputation and allowed MAGA-world and especially Trump to both play the victim and act as though the investigations were basically of equal weight or that the real problem was the original investigation and “Obama tapped my phones!”
The ridiculousness of the entire matter makes one harken back to the practicality of Mark Cuban’s wise advice to Trump relayed through the Sean Hannity show:
“He’s the most powerful man in the world and he always plays the victim card. The Dems are out to get me, the media is out to get me.’ You’ve got to be the leader, you’ve got to be the strongest man in the game.”
Hannity: “But they spied on the guy!,”
No. They did not. But Cuban answered perfectly regarding an investigation: “Who cares? He’s the most powerful man in the world! Be powerful, be a leader!”
Never happened.
Watch Scarborough:
Jason Miciak believes a day without learning is a day not lived. He is a political writer, features writer, author, and attorney. He is a Canadian-born dual citizen who spent his teen and college years in the Pacific Northwest and has since lived in seven states. He now enjoys life as a single dad of a young girl, writing from the beaches of the Gulf Coast. He loves crafting his flower pots, cooking, while also studying scientific philosophy, religion, and non-math principles behind quantum mechanics and cosmology. Please feel free to contact for speaking engagements or any concerns.
