News Story of the Day: former FBI director James Comey released a bombshell during the Thursday hearing in the Senate, but the media aren’t necessarily bothered by it.
Comey testified that he was pressured by former Attorney General Loretta Lynch to downplay the investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her email.
“At one point, the Attorney General [Lynch] told me not to call it an investigation but instead to call it a ‘matter,’ which confused and concerned me,” Comey said. “But that was one of the bricks in the load that led me to conclude I have to step away from the [Justice] Department if we’re to close this case credibly.”
That’s big news.
Chart of the Day: The Economist put together interesting chart that highlights the downfall of Comey:
Illustration of the Day: since Thursday’s testimony helped President Donald Trump a lot more than it hurt him, you may begin to see reports from the networks that suggest Comey is actually a Russian spy:
Tweet of the Day: there have been multiple images of stone-faced individuals at bars, presumably upset that there wasn’t any smoking gun at the Comey hearing, except for the fact that Trump doesn’t know how to run government. Here is what may be at least one reaction (hahaha):
Is this from Election Day? Or #ComeyDay ? pic.twitter.com/e95GxMBePL
— Dinesh D’Souza (@DineshDSouza) June 8, 2017
Quote of the Day: after Comey’s hearing, will the saga continue? If the media have anything to say about it then yes. Ben Shapiro, editor at The Daily Wire, put together a sublime statement that Trump could deliver if he wants to end Comey-Mania. Here is the statement:
I did not collude with Russia during the 2016 election. I have said that all along, and Comey confirmed that there is no evidence to suggest collusion by me; he even admitted, finally, that I was not under personal investigation. He told me that privately, but wouldn’t say it publicly, which upset me. That’s the real reason I fired him — out of anger that I wasn’t being exonerated in the public view, despite Comey knowing full well that I was not under investigation.
Furthermore, I didn’t obstruct any investigation. Comey admits I never tried to obstruct the Russia investigation; he even admits that I said he should check out my “satellite” associates regarding Russia. As far as my comments on General Flynn, they were merely hot-headed statements about my hopes — I know and like General Flynn, as does Comey. I’m not interested in protecting Flynn if he’s guilty of something. But we still have no evidence that beyond Flynn lying to Mike Pence about his phone calls to the Russians — phone calls that have not been shown to be anything but within legal bounds — anything was done that was wrong, in my opinion. I hoped Comey would feel the same way and bring the investigation to what I felt was a just conclusion, but I never instructed him to kill the investigation outright.
Actually, Comey knows that I didn’t obstruct his Flynn investigation. He said in his testimony that all investigations moved forward smoothly. If Comey thought I was obstructing his exercise of his duty, he should have quit or said something. He didn’t — not to me, not to Attorney General Sessions, not to anyone.
Look, I know I should have had patience with the process. But I’m not by nature a patient man. I want to get things done, and the cloud hanging over my administration thanks to Democratic scandalmongering has hampered my ability to pursue policies to help the American people. Calling my actions obstruction — without any evidence of an underlying crime — is nasty.
So let’s get back to work. I’ll try to contain my impatience with a process that simply doesn’t exist in the private sector, where we’re judged on whether we perform or not, not on what people say about us. And all of my Democratic colleagues should stop trying to oust me out of loyalty to Hillary Clinton, and start trying to focus on helping me help Americans.
Trump won’t, though.
Video of the Day: as the mainstream media focus entirely on the incoherent, senile and crazy John McCain and his rambling questions to former FBI director James Comey on Thursday, there is one clip that they are not really concentrating on. And that is the exchange between Comey and Florida Republican Senator Marco Rubio, who had some pretty decent stuff:
It was a bad day for the media and the Democrats.
Those who are excusing Trump are using an X and Y argument, that: (X) No competent person who wished to shut-down an investigation, would be stupid enough to (Y) fire the head on the agency doing the investigation. So far Trump’s incompetence/stupidity has mainly hurt himself.
In the future, Trump’s incompetence/stupidity may involve an excuse that (X) No competent person who wished to (insert goal here, such as prevent war in the Middle East) would be stupid enough to (Y) (insert action here, such a bomb Iran)
The special prosecutor’s report will indicate that reasonable prosecutors may disagree as to whether Trump saying “I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go” was obstruction of justice. However, Trump’s assertions under oath to the FBI and others that he did not say that to Comey is clearly impeachable perjury.
It might also say that when Trump tweeted that Comey should hope there are no tapes, he thought that false tapes can be easily created if you have recordings of both speakers, by splicing words together as was done in various movies and television programs such a Mission Impossible. Probably Bannon and Jared told him that it might not be a good idea to ask the CIA to do that. After a recording of Comey’s testimony was available, Trump tried to create the false tape, but had to wait until it was finished before releasing it. The work was performed in Russia.
“…The question then becomes what did Putin hope to gain by aiding Trump? What Russia and Putin desperately need is money. Even if Putin asked Trump to have the American Treasury transfer, say $200 billion to Russia, that is not going to happen. Even Kellyanne Conway could not spin that one into anything that would be acceptable to the American people or congress. How could Trump cause Russia to gain $200 billion? The answer would be a $50 increase in the price of oil. What has caused most of the oil price spikes? That has been wars in the Middle East..” http://seekingalpha.com/article/4034048