=========
=========
Promoted from the diaries by streiff. Promotion does not imply endorsement.
=========
=========

Caricature by DonkeyHotey flic.kr/p/Ct4G4K https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

Remember Barack Obama laughing off suggestions that any foreign government, let alone the dreaded Russians, could tamper with or rig American elections?  Said the esteemed former president: “There is no serious person out there who would suggest that you could even rig America’s elections.”  That was a preemptive strike against Trump figuring that Hillary would win and Trump would claim the election was rigged.  It is somewhat ironic since those who poo-pooed collusion are now the purveyors of collusion.

We can recount the Uranium One deal where the State Department under Clinton potentially sold America’s uranium reserves to Russian oligarchs.  Soon thereafter, the Clinton Foundation received thousands in donations from Russians directly tied to the villainous Putin.  Bill even received $500,000 for a one-hour speech making that one hell of a minimum wage.

Even Obama, running in 2012, was caught on a live mic considering a quid pro quo with the Russian foreign official: “This is my last election . . . After my election, I have more flexibility.”  Remember the calls for investigations by Jerrold Nadler and Adam Schiff?  Seriously… such a statement is surely the stuff of a crown jewel in any investigation of collusion.

Which brings me to Mueller and the fact the guy who is so esteemed and such a great prosecutor and all that, but buried his head in the sand when it came to the real collusion.  Using the triple fire walls of the DNC, a Washington law firm, and Fusion GPS, Clinton hired a British ex-spy to compile a dossier on Trump.  He, in turn, used Russian sources for the dirt.  Never mind the fact that almost all the allegations were false if not the effort of a Russian disinformation campaign, the dossier made its way to the FBI who then used it to obtain a FISA warrant against a Trump campaign official.  If the FBI believed that Michael Steele was a great source of information, that does not say much for the FBI under Comey’s leadership.

If there was Russian collusion in 2016, it stops at Hillary Clinton’s decrepit feet.  Nevertheless, after over two years, $35 million and 440 pages, collusion is off the table and now the battle cry is obstruction.  Obstruction of what?  A non-underlying crime to obstruct?  Some very public statements by Trump defending himself?  Unfettered access to Trump officials and documents by the Mueller dream team?  This is probably the most public example of obstruction ever.  It makes you think what real obstruction looks like.  I think it might go something like this:

It might be members of the FBI and intelligence community deliberately misleading members of a FISA court to obtain a warrant to spy on an American campaign official; not only that, but three subsequent renewals when the previous ones delivered squat- not even an apology to Carter Page.  Imagine if Comey told that court that the dossier was paid for by the Clinton campaign, that nothing in it was verified, and it was written by someone fired by the FBI for unprofessional conduct, one has to ask whether the court would have signed off on the warrant.  Holding back on pertinent information is the stuff of obstruction.

Perhaps obstruction looks like a chance meeting on an airport tarmac between Clinton’s husband and the attorney general whose department was investigating Hillary Clinton.  Perhaps, obstruction is the destruction of over 30,000 emails under subpoena.  Maybe it is Loretta Lynch instructing staff not to refer to an investigation of Hillary Clinton’s emails as “an investigation.”  We even have a case of actual obstruction- an alleged Republican working in the White House to obstruct Trump’s agenda.  They even bragged about it in a New York Times article.

Then we have Sally Yates whose idea of Logan Act enforcement- a 220 year old law that has resulted in exactly two convictions over its lifespan- was her impetus for an FBI investigation of Michael Flynn.   In the transition period, Flynn had the nerve to discuss sanctions with the Russian ambassador.  For this, Yates believed there was a Logan Act violation.  But what would real Logan Act violations look like?

Could it be John Kerry consulting with Iranian officials prior to Trump pulling out of the bogus nuclear accords?  Surely, Kerry- now a private citizen- was interfering in foreign affairs.  Kerry met with Iranian officials on at least two occasions to brainstorm ideas of how they can thwart and obstruct Trump’s actions.  Or how about Susan Thornton, a former State Department official telling an audience of Chinese leaders to just wait out the Trump administration.  Isn’t that a case of a private citizen meddling in foreign affairs?  How about former Pentagon official Rosa Brooks who penned an article addressed to foreigners titled, “Three Ways to Get Rid of President Trump Before 2020.”  After a week in office, Brooks came to the conclusion that Trump just had to go and she then boasted she had her hand on the pulse of the global elite.

Of course, my favorite bit of hubris is people like Nadler and Schiff- both subpoena happy about the urinating habits of Trump- decrying the fact Trump is going to declassify documents leading up to the Mueller investigation.  Suddenly, national security is a major concern of two dingbats who care nothing about national security.  Those who have leaked Mueller investigation and Congressional testimony “bombshells,” have now become the voice of the anti-leakers.

So what does real leaking look like?  Let’s start with Smarmy Comey deliberately leaking memos of a private conversation with the President so that a Special Counsel would be appointed.  That one worked out pretty good for them and the anti-leakers were suspiciously quiet.  How about Andrew McCabe feeding the press frenzy with the Russian collusion hoax?  FBI officials leaking pre-election stories of Russian collusion with Yahoo News and Mother Jones?  How about the pre-dawn arrest of Roger Stone where a CNN news van just happened to be stationed outside his home?

We have learned two very important things in this whole affair.  The zeal to remove and/or undermine Trump at every opportunity involved Logan Act violations, real collusion with Russians, leaks of an unprecedented nature, and lying to FISA courts (real obstruction).  The moral of the story: the Resistance is simply projecting their own sins on Trump.

Second, they claim Trump is a narcissist, but it is the Deep State and media elites who are pathologically narcissistic.  They really believe they have the right to subvert democracy and undermine a duly and legally elected President.  Their’s is a belief and attitude transformed into action where the wrong people voted for the wrong candidate in 2016 and they are the ones who stand steadfast to correct a grievous wrong.  And, of course, it goes without saying that they are right.

Real coups are not the result of the masses storming the palace, or the military rising up to depose a leader.  They are the result of bureaucrats, bough-for elitist intellectuals, a willing and susceptible press and political hacks accusing their target of doing something they are doing.  They are the noble patriots risking life, reputations and careers.  In their minds, they are the self-appointed guardians of American democracy.

For the past 29 months, we have been subjected to this Resistance projection.  That is why the last 29 months have been scary and dangerous.  If these people are not stopped and held accountable, the future will be darker, more scary and more dangerous.