Robert Mueller and James Comey have probably done more damage to the credibility and effectiveness of the federal law enforcement establishment than any two men in American law enforcement history. Perhaps their public demeanor and mien reveal as much about their psyches as anything. In the case of Mueller, we see a humorless, cadaverous Lurch-like character, who became the designated driver of the Deep State’s vehicle to subvert a duly elected president when their other machinations failed. In the case of Comey, we see a morally preening, if confused, sanctimonious poseur whose lodestar was a Socialist theologian for whom the rules did not apply.
Both men successfully managed to project, until recently, a Boy Scout aura, now shown to be a sham. Perhaps the fate of the Boy Scouts, which has also lost its way, and dropped “Boy” from its title as its own moral compass went haywire, was a portent of the Mueller/Trump collapse.
In what will surely be a saga that will eventually fill volumes when it’s fully exposed, these two men were central figures in the most brazen attempt to subvert our Republic from within in its 243-year history. Mueller’s personal reputation appears to be grounded in his service as a young Marine Corps officer in Vietnam. And we surely should credit him for this act of selflessness to our country, as we should all our young men and women who have worn the uniform. However, his actions late in life to overturning a presidency in a politically-fueled Special Counsel investigation that he should have recognized nearly from its inception was a political hit job grossly eclipsed his youthful service to the country. Does noble military service early in life grant one immunity from conduct later in life that should make all patriots shudder?
Mueller allowed his Special Counsel team of rabidly anti-Trump and highly conflicted Democrat partisan lawyers to be commandeered, and indeed assembled, by Andrew Weissmann, a viciously partisan prosecutor with a long and troubling prosecutorial history. As Judicial Watch revealed recently in its exposure of Weissmann’s calendar entries that it forced out of the Justice Department through litigation, Weissmann played a central role in hiring the team of Democrats who would populate the Special Counsel team, many of whom had contributed to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.
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Weissmann himself attended Hillary Clinton’s would-be “victory” party on Election Night 2016 at the Jacob Javits Center in New York City. He also famously praised former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates for her insubordination in not carrying out an executive order from President Trump temporarily suspending travel to the United States of individuals from notoriously jihadist-infected countries. Weissmann gushed to Yates, “I am so proud. And in awe. Thank you so much,” as revealed in emails also uncovered by Judicial Watch.
According to former Justice Department prosecutor Sidney Powell, author of License to Lie: Exposing Corruption in the Department of Justice, Weissmann is the “poster boy of prosecutorial misconduct.” Among his other abuses of authority, according to Powell, Weissmann manufactured a “crime” absent criminal intent, with which to indict the giant public accounting firm, Arthur Andersen, when he was the lead prosecutor and eventually head of the Justice Department’s Enron Task Force from 2002 to 2005. Once he got that indictment, he destroyed Arthur Andersen, which employed 85,000 people. After Arthur Andersen was convicted in federal district court, upheld on appeal, the Supreme Court unanimously overturned Arthur Andersen’s conviction. But it was too late. The company, known as the gold standard in accounting, was damaged irreparably and collapsed.
Who appointed Weissmann to the Enron Task Force? Robert Mueller, then Director of the FBI.
Weissmann was also responsible for indicting four executives at Merrill Lynch, also in connection with Enron, charging them with honest services fraud. DOJ put them “through a 10-year period of unmitigated hell,” according to Powell. All four men were convicted. Problem was, Weissmann and DOJ claimed that they possessed no “Brady material” - that is, evidence that would demonstrate the men’s innocence. This was a lie. On appeal, all the honest services fraud charges were reversed against the men. But the damage was done. The men all went to prison for a period of time. In the case of the youngest defendant, he was sent to a maximum security prison at the insistence of Weissmann. That young man’s conviction was entirely thrown out on appeal.
So wouldn’t Weissmann be a disgraced prosecutor for these tactics? Not in Mueller’s eyes. Mueller brought him back in 2011 to be the General Counsel of the FBI. And then, Mueller brings him back again in 2018 to be the de facto head of his Special Counsel investigative team meant to take down President Donald Trump.
Mueller is a disgrace. In World War II, a comic strip was created by Sgt. George Baker called The Sad Sack, which depicted the life of a lowly private who was subjected to the absurdities and humiliations of life in the Army. The term “Sad Sack” eventually gained traction as a colloquialism to define an inept person. Robert Mueller is the Sad Sack of the Deep State - an inept individual who managed to fail upward throughout his life, while always protecting the interests of the powerful, destroying innocents who got in the way.
And then we have Mr. Comey, whose book, hilariously titled A Higher Loyalty, was meant to convey his conviction that he operated at standards above those of us mortal men. In his view, as long as one feels that one is “doing right,” one can ignore the rules that apply to everyone else.
In his college thesis focusing on the teachings of his beloved hero, Socialist theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, Comey wrote: “The Christian in politics must be willing to transgress any purely Christian ethic. He must be willing to sin in the name of justice.” You know, one rule for me, another for thee.
It was not for reasons of fondness that FBI agents sneeringly referred to James Comey behind his back as “The Cardinal.” As former US Attorney Joe diGenova relates, Comey was denigrated by colleagues within DOJ as a drama queen, full of “pomposity and self-regard” when Comey was Deputy Attorney General in the George W. Bush Administration.
Our country’s federal law enforcement establishment has passed through - indeed, is passing through - an excruciating period of disgrace, entirely deserved, at the hands of these two loathsome men. Let us hope that Lady Justice eventually catches up with them.
William F. Marshall has been an intelligence analyst and investigator in the government, private, and non-profit sectors for more than 30 years. He is a senior investigator for Judicial Watch, Inc. (The views expressed are the author’s alone, and not necessarily those of Judicial Watch.)
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