Durham Report: Corruption At The Highest Levels.
Until this week the “Durham Report” was a joke. Another pipe dream of Trump fans who - for a time, anyway - believed that Special Counsel John Durham would unmask the Deep State, haul the corruptocrats from their offices , frogmarch them into court to watch them stand trial for their crimes.
Four years ago energized conservative media outlets voiced confidence in the man appointed by then-Attorney General William Barr to investigate possible wrongdoing in the Trump-Russia probe. They believed he was going to expose the entire nest of liars who had infiltrated the highest levels of the FBI.
And four years after he started, Durham finally issued his 300+ page report. In some ways it was anti climatic. Not because it didn’t contain revelations - it did - but because it seems too late.
Too late to make a difference. Too late to bring people to trial. Too late to really matter.
And Durham concludes that clear wrongdoing by the FBI didn’t rise to the level of criminality.
Still, some on the right demand scalps while some on the left to insist the report is much ado about nothing.
Have I read the entire 306 pages? No. Have you?
I have however, read excerpts and analysis from those far smarter than I who did read the report.
Predictably, far left MSNBC commentators have shrugged off the report as a big nothingburger.
Most analysts disagree.
It’s disconcerting to learn that partisan hacks running the FBI launched an investigation into the preposterous charges that Donald Trump was a Russian agent based entirely on lies cooked up by political opponents.
The FBI probe into Trump-Russian connection was nicknamed “Crossfire Hurricane” and Durham charges that the Bureau used “raw, unanalyzed, and uncorroborated intelligence,” to launch what was ultimately a smear campaign against the GOP candidate for president.
The Bureau used an entirely different standard when faced with charges of wrongdoing by Hillary Clinton, however.
By expanding on the dirty work of political operatives, the FBI damaged its reputation and destroyed much of the trust Americans had in the Bureau.
It isn’t just the FBI and the Justice Department that have suffered perhaps irreversible damage from their craven behavior.
The Wall Street Journal indicts the press for its confirmation bias and active role in spreading the preposterous charges leveled against Trump and for failing to exercise skeptism.
The press corps was also an all-too-willing accomplice to the collusion con, yet there has been little to no outrage or even self-reflection at having been played for dupes. Most coverage largely dismisses the Durham report because no one new was indicted. The press performance in the collusion story has done untold damage to its credibility, and it’s a major reason that much of the country believes nothing it reads or hears about Donald Trump.
It goes beyond Trump. Many of us believe precious little that the American press reports about ANYTHING.
