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James Comey, Hillary Clinton, Anthony Weiner and Our Descent Into Pulp
Fiction Democracy
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/comey_clinton_weiner_and_our_descent_int
o_pulp_fiction_democracy_20161104/
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Posted on Nov 4, 2016
By Bill Blum
FBI Director James Comey testified before the House Judiciary Committee
(https://judiciary.house.gov/hearing/oversight-federal-bureau-investigation/
) in September. (Pablo Martinez Monsivais / AP
(http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Congress-FBI/193f44d203f946e4ab90359
21977eaac/25/0) )
Crafting a compelling and intricate story is a challenge. The key, I learned
as author of three popular legal thrillers
(https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_2?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&fie
ld-keywords=bill+blum) , is getting the right mix of character development,
suspense, atmosphere and, above all, an ending no one can see coming. You
need an activeand sometimes jadedimagination to pull off the trick.
Still, even in my most febrile writers dreams, I couldnt have devised a
plotline approaching what happened the morning of Oct. 28, when FBI Director
James Comey sent a terse, 166-word letter
(http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/10/28/us/politics/fbi-letter.html)
to the chairs of eight congressional committees, disclosing that the bureau
had discovered additional emails that required it to take further
appropriate investigative steps regarding Hillary Clintons use of a
private internet server during her tenure as secretary of state. Only last
July, Comey had broken the hearts of Republicans everywhere as he told
Congress and the world that the email probe had been completed and Clinton
would not be prosecuted.
So forget WikiLeaks, and forget Clintons speeches to Goldman Sachs and the
behind-the-scenes machinations of John Podesta: Comeys letter was the
ultimate October surprise, at once breathing new life into the seemingly
moribund Trump campaign and triggering shockwaves of anxiety and spasms of
political bed-wetting among Democrats.
And then came another, even more improbable twist
(http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/29/us/politics/fbi-hillary-clinton-email.htm
l) : The new emails had been found on a laptop computer owned by none other
than Anthony Weiner, the disgraced former New York congressman who just
happens to be the estranged husband of top Clinton aide and confidante Huma
Abedin. The emails had been uncovered during the course of a separate
investigation into sexual messages Weiner had dispatched to a 15-year-old
North Carolina girl.
If I had pitched a screenplay like thateven to the edgy Coen brothersthe
concept would have been shot down as too implausible and incapable (in the
argot of the trade) of generating the required suspension of disbelief
needed to sustain viewer interest. I can just see the rejection note now,
telling me that no one would buy into a culprit named Weiner with a penchant
for circulating dick pics online. No one.
Except this plotline isnt fiction. Its fact, and it has the potential to
alter the outcome of the presidential election and, with it, our collective
future.
So I, along with sundry other legal and political commentators, have to ask:
Why did Comey write his letter, and was his decision to do so a clear break
with long-standing FBI and Justice Department policiesand possibly itself a
violation of law? Even more fundamentally, I have to ask what the whole
stomach-turning tale says about the state of American democracy.
Unfortunately, coming up with answers isnt easy. For starters, only Comey
knows the full extent of his motives. In his letter to Congress, the
director wrote merely that his Oct. 28 letter was sent to supplement my
previous testimony, given before the House Oversight Committee
(http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/james-comey-testimony-clinton-email-2
25224) in July and House Judiciary Committee
(http://www.cbsnews.com/news/fbi-director-testifies-on-extremist-violence-hi
llary-clinton-emails/) in September.
In a memo
(https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/10/28/read-the-lett
er-comey-sent-to-fbi-employees-explaining-his-controversial-decision-on-the-
clinton-email-investigation/) circulated to FBI staff the afternoon of Oct.
28, Comey elaborated:
Of course, we dont ordinarily tell Congress about ongoing investigations,
but here I feel an obligation to do so given that I testified repeatedly in
recent months that our investigation was completed. I also think it would be
misleading to the American people were we not to supplement the record. At
the same time, however, given that we dont know the significance of this
newly discovered collection of emails, I dont want to create a misleading
impression. In trying to strike that balance, in a brief letter and in the
middle of an election season, there is significant risk of being
misunderstood, but I wanted you to hear directly from me about it.
Comey is an imposing physical figure. A towering 6 feet 8 inches tall, he
has a blunt, no-nonsense speaking style and a stern countenance. He also has
a reputation for doing the right thing, no matter the consequences and who
gets pissed off.
Comey was the guy who in 2004, as a deputy attorney general
(https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/10/28/read-the-lett
er-comey-sent-to-fbi-employees-explaining-his-controversial-decision-on-the-
clinton-email-investigation/) , rushed to the hospital bed of his seriously
ill boss, John Ashcroft, and stood up to then-White House counsel Alberto
Gonzales and George W. Bush chief of staff Andrew Card as they attempted to
persuade the weakened Ashcroft to certify aspects of the Bush
administrations domestic surveillance program that the Justice Department
had deemed unconstitutional. If cast in a classic Hollywood movie for the
gesture, youd think of Gary Cooper, standing tall and alone as the
quintessential lawman in High Noon (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0044706/)
.
But dig a little deeper into his background and a more nuanced and far less
flattering picture of Comey emerges as a GOP hitman
(http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/07/politics/who-is-james-comey-fbi-director-thin
gs-to-know/) . Early in his government career, Comey worked as a special
counsel for the Senate Whitewater Committee, investigating Bill and Hillary
Clintons involvement in a set of shady Arkansas real-estate investments
from the 1970s and 80s. Later, as a federal prosecutor, he supervised a
probe of Bill Clintons 2001 pardon of financier Marc Rich, who had been
indicted for tax evasion and illegally trading with Iran and subsequently
fled the country.
In addition, Comeys resume includes important and highly lucrative
private-sector stints of a decidedly right-wing bent. As MarketWatch
columnist Brett Arends catalogued in a post
(http://www.marketwatch.com/story/fbis-comey-has-a-sinister-history-as-a-pol
itical-and-corporate-fixer-2016-11-02/print) Wednesday, Comey raked in
millions a year in salary and stock bonuses as an attorney working on behalf
of defense-contractor giant Lockheed Martin, and Bridgewater Associates,
known as the countrys largest hedge fund. For a time, he held a seat on the
board of HSBC, the global investment bank that was hit in March 2013 with a
$1.3 billion fine for international money laundering.
Initially appointed to the Justice Department by the Bush-Cheney
administration in 2003, Comey was nominated by President Obama in June 2013
to become FBI director. He was confirmed a month later by the Senate on a
93-1 vote, with Rand Paul, R-Ky., the lone dissenter
(http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/jul/29/sen-rand-paul-is-lone-disse
nter-as-james-comey-con/) .
Among his public declarations since assuming the top post that September,
Comey has claimed that the Black Lives Matter movement and the Ferguson
effect (referring to the impact of street protests against police shootings
and viral videos of police misconduct) are responsible for the recent uptick
in violent crime
(http://atlantablackstar.com/2016/05/13/fbi-director-claims-the-ferguson-eff
ect-and-black-lives-matter-are-to-blame-for-the-rise-in-violent-crimes-again
/) in some cities. His position has drawn sharp criticism from the Obama
administration, as well as the broader civil rights community
(http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/may/12/fbi-director-james-b-comey-
black-lives-matter-hams/) .
So, was Comeys Oct. 28 letter the result of his pent-up urge to get back
finally at the Clintons and the Democratic establishment? The highly
respected Guardian columnist Spencer Ackerman asserted in an article
(https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/03/fbi-leaks-hillary-clinton-j
ames-comey-donald-trump) published Wednesday that the FBI has become
Trumpland, populated by field agents and other officials rankled over
Comeys initial decision not to seek criminal charges against Hillary
Clinton.
Those looking for bias in Comeys letter might also point to the bureaus
release Tuesday of a 129-page archive from the Marc Rich investigation and
pardon
(http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/11/01/fbi-releases-documents-on-bill-c
lintons-2001-pardon-financier-rich.html) . Why make such documents public,
Clinton backers have asked
(http://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/marc-rich-pardon-files-230590) , just
days before voters head to the polls if not to place a thumb on the
electoral scale?
Still, its not easy to come to any definite conclusions about Comeys
intentions. Ever since Attorney General Loretta Lynchs fateful encounter
with Bill Clinton
(https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-everyone-looks-bad-because-bill
-clinton-met-with-loretta-lynch/2016/07/02/a7807adc-3ff4-11e6-a66f-aa6c1883b
6b1_story.html) at the Phoenix airport in early July, Lynch has encountered
demands that she recuse herself from the email controversy. As a result,
Comey has been forced to become the public face of justice on the issue and
take on the task of announcing the results of the long federal inquiry into
the email controversy.
He remains that public face to this day.
To be sure, in revealing that the bureau is once again looking into Hillary
Clintons emails, Comey has violated long-standing Justice Department
protocols
(http://www.cnn.com/2016/10/31/politics/eric-holder-op-ed-rips-comey-letter/
) that instruct federal prosecutors to remain silent about ongoing
investigations within 60 days of an election.
But to be fair, Comey has been caught between the proverbial rock and hard
place. By announcing that the email hunt is once again on, he has entered
the forbidden arena of partisan politics, condemned by Democrats for
boosting Donald Trumps fading prospects at the last possible minute. On the
other hand, remaining silent until after the election would also have had
profound political ramifications, especially if Hillary wins, sparking
outrage on the Republican right over yet another Clinton cover-up.
In the end, the biggest casualty in the entire tangled and interminable
scandal may be democracy itself. Weve been reduced to a pulp-fiction
version of constitutional governance. The head of the nations pre-eminent
law enforcement agency, his hand forced by an online sex addict named
Weiner, may determine the outcome of one of the most consequential
presidential elections in our history.
Thats something I, for one, never saw coming.
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