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It may be that Comey's handling of the email investigation during the election was egregious enough to can him, but the circumstances and timing are bizarre.

Reasonable normie: It is horrid PR. Trump (or his advisers) must know how bad it looks to fire someone who is investigating you and even worse when a pattern emerges. Could they really be that naive to think they can control the narrative on this story?

Paranoid conspiracist: It is a way to fan into flame the slow burning Russia story to distract from something else (healthcare, nepotism, budget, lies ...) Are they that clever? Is it a necessary step towards appointing a stooge?

The simpler explanation is that Trump's administration is inept or misinformed but those are worrying conclusions.

It may be that Comey's handling of the email investigation during the election was egregious enough to can him, but the circumstances and timing are bizarre. Reasonable normie: It is horrid PR. Trump (or his advisers) must know how bad it looks to fire someone who is investigating you and even worse when a pattern emerges. Could they really be that naive to think they can control the narrative on this story? Paranoid conspiracist: It is a way to fan into flame the slow burning Russia story to distract from something else (healthcare, nepotism, budget, lies ...) Are they that clever? Is it a necessary step towards appointing a stooge? The simpler explanation is that Trump's administration is inept or misinformed but those are worrying conclusions.

5 comments

[–] Violentlight 5 points (+5|-0)

Cromey told everyone that Hillary was guilty. But she had no intent to be guilty. So its all good.

He did not seem like a man doing his job.

[–] TheRedArmy 5 points (+5|-0)

This is my impression as well.

I've heard from a lot of private-sector people who handled relatively low classified materials. "Confidential" is the lowest classified material rating (for reference, my brother, a 6-year grunt in the National Guard who achieved the rank of Specialist, has "Top Secret" clearance, a full two ratings higher; although likely only on a need-to-know basis), and several private contractors for the government deal with confidential information routinely. They all, almost universally, report that if they ever leaked anything with even confidential classification out to the general public they would:

  • Lose their job
  • Never get clearance to work with anything classified ever again
  • Face a heavy fine by way of their contract
  • Possibly/probably face criminal charges, depending on the information

Note that among Hillary's leaked e-mails I believe something like 80 were confidential, and some number of others (not more than 12, as I recall), were even higher classification.

So definitely not doing his job, and definitely would've been far, far worse for any regular person who did something like that.

[–] phoxy [OP] 3 points (+3|-0)

So maybe this is Trump trying to keep his Jail Hillary promise. It would be good to see consequences for elite lawbreakers. Hopefully it isn't trading consequences for Hillary in exchange for a lip service Russia investigation.

I'm not holding my breath.