Comey: what did I know? I was just the FBI director [Part 1]
[NOTE: I’ll probably post Part 2 tomorrow.]
The interview Comey gave to Chris Wallace on Sunday was a study in evasion and deception. I could take it sentence by sentence and spend many hours analyzing each one, but I’m not going to do that. I’m probably giving it more time than it deserves to even write this post, but Comey engenders a kind of repugnance and yet fascination in me, and his interview just cries out for a fisking.
You can follow along. Here’s the transcript, and here’s the video.
First, a word about Chris Wallace. He straddles a fine line here between hard-hitting and letting Comey off the hook. He repeatedly points out the contradictions in what Comey has said versus what Horowitz has said about the FBI investigation known as Crossfire Hurricane, and sometimes Wallace even hammers home the discrepancies. And yet when Comey fails to answer his points or answers them in an evasive way, and Wallace could ask certain rather obvious follow-up questions that would nail him even further, Wallace sometimes doesn’t do so.
Perhaps he’s pressed for time. Perhaps he thinks Comey’s evasions speak for themselves. Or perhaps he’s reluctant to go too hard on Comey.
One general observation I have about Comey and the way he deals with his different stories at different times is to think tactically but remain almost completely in the moment. It’s as though he comes up with a new approach depending on the attack and the amount of information in the public domain, and sees no need for internal consistency on his part.
For example, when the Horowitz Report first came out, Comey said it vindicated him and the FBI, and that “those who smeared the FBI are due for an accounting…The FBI fulfilled its mission — protecting the American people and upholding the U.S. Constitution.” Then, just a few days later – and only because Horowitz explicitly testified to Congress that the report didn’t vindicate anyone connected with the FBI probe – Comey suddenly (and as far as I can tell, for the very first time) admits that mistakes were made. But only by his “sloppy” underlings, and that his only mistake was to trust them too much.
So one of my own questions to Comey (one Wallace doesn’t ask) would be: did you even bother to read the report before you wrote your “vindication” op-ed?
Now let’s take some quotes from the Wallace interview.
“James Comey: Well, maybe it turns upon how we understand the word [“vindicate”].
But “vindicate” is not some term of art, nor is it an arcane legal phrase. It’s a perfectly good English word that most people understand. It means “to show something to have been right or true, or to show someone to be free from guilt or blame.” Comey is not an idiot, but he must think his listeners are. Or perhaps he just can’t think of any other defense.
Comey again: “But [Horowitz] also found things that we were never accused of, which is real sloppiness, and that’s concerning.”
It’s almost risible, isn’t it? But Comey isn’t joking. No one accused the FBI of mere “sloppiness” I did a search of Horowitz’s testimony and the word does not seem to appear. I haven’t searched the report, but I very much doubt it’s in there either. “Sloppiness” is quite the euphemism for errors of the scope, frequency, and magnitude the report details. “Sloppiness” indicates carelessness, like failing to spell a word correctly, or leaving out a small and unimportant fact. Leaving out exculpatory evidence over and over? That’s so basic a violation that the word “sloppiness” becomes an absurdity. Saying Carter Page was not a source for US intelligence when the original document said he was a source? That could be described by a lot of words, but “sloppy” is not one of them.
When Wallace doesn’t buy Comey’s answer, and mentions the 17 violations, that’s when Comey admits “wrongdoing.” His “confession” goes like this:
“I was wrong. I was overconfident in the procedures that the FBI and Justice had built over 20 years. I thought they were robust enough. It’s incredibly hard to get a FISA. I was overconfident in those. Because he’s right. There was real sloppiness…”
Notice that here Comey persists in labeling it “sloppiness.” And the buck certainly doesn’t stop at Comey’s desk. In fact, apparently no details of the investigation ever even reached his desk, according to Comey. He was some sort of remote figurehead, uninvolved in the running of an operation against the candidate for president of the Republican Party – as though this was a routine process that didn’t need his expertise or supervision. He signed those FISA warrants knowing nothing about what was in them, apparently.
Or so he says.
Yeah, right. Apparently Comey believes that “fool” is a much better thing to claim to be than “knave.” It’s really quite astounding. And although Wallace rightly says “But you make it sound like you’re a bystander, an eyewitness. You were the director of the FBI while a lot of this was going on, sir,” Comey just basically repeats his first answer, and Wallace then goes on to the next point.
What about a follow-up like: “Were you usually in the habit of signing off on request after request that you knew nothing about?” Or “Then why have you been claiming for this whole time, till now, that everything was completely on the up-and-up with the FISA requests? How could you claim that if you knew almost nothing about them? Why didn’t you admit long ago that you were totally disengaged from the process and that you signed off on requests about which you were completely ignorant?”
[To be continued…]
Comey’s a lowlife grifter who still believed the pee tape for ages; maybe even now. That a professional FBI guy would believe what was so obviously Russian BS tells you all you need to know about him and his motives and actions no matter what he says.
I stopped watching Fox many years ago for the very reason that they rarely press with follow-up questions when clearly it is called for… IMO it happens too frequently to be accidental.
“those who smeared the FBI are due for an accounting…The FBI fulfilled its mission — protecting the American people…”
“[T]hose who smeared”, we are told by the Examiner writer, includes AG Barr. If this is so, if Comey is actually taunting the sitting AG, he’s a bigger moron than I had realized.
“[F]ulfilled its mission” clearly includes wasting the precious and rare counterintelligence resources of the FBI on an illicit endeavor to throw an election and failing that, bring down a Presidency. Some fucking “mission” that is.
I hope this piece of shit Comey hangs, together with the rest of his cabal.
The head chef of the top resturant accepts all sorts of awards and accolades for his performance while drawing an excellent salary and explaining to the world in detail how well their receipts, ingredients, storage, prep, cooking and presentation are the finest. Then one day when a bunch of maggots come floating to the top of the soup and the meat dishes are rancid the head chef goes all out explaining that he has done his job of giving good head and has no idea how all the mistakes of others could have occurred since he is just the man in charge and not the one doing the work, or something.
Wallace is, to his credit, an actual journalist who does care about doing his job. He’s also, to his detriment, a card-carrying member of the DC establishment who knows you can only push so hard and so long when it comes to a fellow member.
For example, when the DC establishment decided that the Ukraine nonsense had to be taken seriously, Wallace was as breathlessly credulous as the rest. But now that the IG report has been accepted as a “serious” thing, he’ll be harder on Comey than…say…any of the doofuses at MSNBC.
Mike
Comey..lock him up.
I wonder how Comey, et. al. will feel when they read this order just entered by the FISA court:
https://www.fisc.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/MIsc%2019%2002%20191217.pdf
Judges don’t like to be lied to….
Keep in mind that Mueller, Comey, and Rosenstein were all Justice Department lifers. Comey among them spent the largest amount of time in private sector employment (consequent to one of those baffling hires financial-sector firms make wherein for some peculiar reason they make a gift of a lucrative position to a quondam official who knows nothing about securities underwriting, proprietary trading, retail brokerage, treasury services, private equity…). Still, we’re talking 65% to 90% of their work life spent in the employ of one federal department. It’s a reasonable inference that in getting promoted within the ranks one of the skills they acquired and deployed was how to stick the blame for SNAFUs with someone else. They’re in an organization filled with lawyers, and one skill lawyers have is making specious arguments.
While we’re at it, can someone explain why Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George Bush the Younger, Barack Obama, and now Donald Trump each saw fit to place the FBI under the direction of a man with no experience in police work? Wm Webster, William Sessions, Robert Mueller, James Comey, and now Christopher Wray, all lawyers.
I scanned through the transcript. Comey says initially that there was no illegal spying or wire-tapping done illegally. Near the end he says, there was no spying.
If the CIA spies on Angela Merkel, it is legal in some sovereign sense, but it is still spying. AG Barr prefers to use that word too, though we are supposed to now believe that Barr is an unhinged hyper partisan.
If an agent or cop cons a sitting judge into signing off on a wire-tap warrant with false information, then the information is obtained legally, except … If it goes to trial and the probably cause was found to be fraudulent, then the information is fruit of the poisonous tree. Correct me if I’m wrong, but the information is thrown out because it was illegally obtained.
Even if Comey believed that the surveillance was performed legally at the time, we now have strong reason to believe it was performed illegally. Unless Comey really believes that “broader mosaic” crap and thinks they still would have gotten the warrants even if all 17 errors had been eliminated at the start.
_____
“He [Comey] was some sort of remote figurehead, uninvolved in the running of an operation against the candidate …” — Neo
Years ago, I thought about having a bumper sticker made up that said, “The Buck Never Stops” — Pres. Obama (We miss you Harry Truman.)
This is just SOP for Dem leaders now. Deny. I know nothing. I read about it in the media. It’s under investigation, so it’s confidential. Blame somebody else.
_____
Comey only seems to care that Carter Page’s name became public. Hmmm.
_____
OMG! The FISC judges speak! They are not potted plants.
Fox headline: Surveillance Court slams the FBI’s handling of FISA warrant applications.
Judge Rosemary Collyer flaps her wrist, does not a goddam thing but demand a white paper. So weak.
End the FISC. Dead. Kill it. Deader than dead.
And what the hell, while we’re at it kill PBS, NPR, CPB and the frickin’ BBC.
” In fact, apparently no details of the investigation ever even reached his desk, according to Comey. ”
AKA The Stalin Gambit
vanderleun:
“If only Comey knew!”
Wallace didn’t go hard enough. He let him up off the mat.
That figures. The secret court needs permission to talk or publish.
Still, a 15 day declassification sounds PDQ. I love the officious restating of the obvious in the rest of Collyer’s letter. We really mean it this time, damn it!
“The OGC attorney” This is beginning to look like “the fall guy.”
“If only Comey knew!”
neo: I was thinking Wannsee Conference, i.e. if only Hitler knew.
Comey, in this interview, reveals himself as either an incompetent fool of an administrator, or a consummate liar. I lean towards the latter, based on evidence and his demeanor.
The interesting question I see is. If Comey was not managing the investigation on a day to day basis, how is it reasonable to say that firing him was an attempt to stop the investigation?
I watched Wallace and liked what I saw.
He asked questions, did not allow B.S answers and allowed Comey to expose himself.
I hear a lot of criticism of him, but I don’t expect him to be a Trump supporter.
I loved Pam Bondis response.
Comey‘s sloppy subordinates did not sign those FISA warrants, Comey did. You signed, you own it. This sanctimonious gasbag has to do hard time or DC needs to admit there is no rule of law and we deplorables should act accordingly. We are at a tipping point that has nothing to do with St. Greta’s deranged fantasies.
Didn’t Bluto (and later, Senator) Blutarsky have something to say about the only mistake made by somebody whom he royally screwed was trusting him?
William Webster, who was Director of the FBI (1978-1987) and Director of the CIA (1987-1991), surfaced the other day to deliver a blistering op-ed against Trump’s sniping at the FBI:
As a lawyer and a former federal judge, I made it clear when I headed both the F.B.I. and the C.I.A. that the rule of law would be paramount in all we did. While both agencies are staffed by imperfect human beings, the American people should understand that both agencies are composed of some of the most law-abiding, patriotic and dedicated people I have ever met. While their faces and actions are not seen by most Americans, rest assured that they are serving our country well.
I have complete confidence in Mr. Wray, and I know that the F.B.I. is not a broken institution. It is a professional agency worthy of respect and support. The derision and aspersions are dangerous and unwarranted.
“I Headed the F.B.I. and C.I.A. There’s a Dire Threat to the Country I Love”
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/16/opinion/FBI-Trump-russia-investigation.html
One looks for something solid in Webster’s outraged blather to no avail. Webster makes no attempt to come to terms with the numerous failures and mistakes, if such may be called, of the FBI, FISC, CIA, DOJ. Clearly the dire threat isn’t the concerted coup-like efforts of the three-letter acronyms on an elected president, but that their reputations have been besmirched. “Well, I never!”
I remember Webster as a bland organization guy who made it to the top of the FBI, then the CIA. Looking him up in wiki, one can see his steady rise and accumulation of credentials and honors. But accomplishments? Nothing, absolutely nothing, specific.
Webster appears to be a pure specimen of the Swamp. BTW, Webster is a Republican.
Something might be going on as a conservative undercurrent, change up on subject but I need to share for what it’s worth.
My daughter and her family moved from Savannah Georgia which she liked after living outside of Aspen and then in two years the husband got a very good job that took them to Michigan where they live in one of the Grosse Pointe suburbs in a nice 90 year old house which means next to nothing. However her best friend is a black woman who has an 8 year old son best friend to my daughter and the moms are now best friends. Most of the other neighbors are too progressive for daughter to bond up very much.
Last week they blew up an old power station a few blocks from daughter’s home which sounded like a huge bomb had gone off and scared a good bit of the town, Chrysler if going to build a new plant on the site and daughter’s friend told her that it has been decades since Detroit felt this way about new jobs. They are working three shifts in some companies up there right now and some corporations are running out of inventory because the economy is so hot.
This wonderful conservative black woman who befriended my daughter grew up in Detroit and her prediction is that Trump will carry the whole state including the Detroit area because this has never happened in the lifetime of the people 40 and younger. Why would the Democrats try to kill the goose that seems to be laying the golden eggs?
Sorry I am off topic but I think there might be a seismic shift coming on.
Ah, Webster. And he commends Wray? Ok, fine, Wray has to go. Pronto.
And kill the FISC. Dead. Stone cold, never to be revived.
Marg bar Khamenei. Marg bar FISC. Marg bar NPR. Marg bar PBS. Marg bar BBC.
I lost interest in Wallace some time ago. Establishment TV performer who exists to strut, preen make big bucks, and protect the clever people inside the bubble. I decided awhile back that he would be a better fit on ABC, or one of the other phony news organs.
A very basic question would have been: “Failed FBI Director Comey, you signed documents justifying warrants to spy on an American citizen. This is a very serious act. Did you make any attempt to verify their accuracy? With all due respect, it appears that you are either a liar, who abused his power in an attempted coup, or an incompetent hack. Are you now claiming the latter?”
There is an old saying, success has 1000 fathers and failure is an orphan. Nobody is going to admit they were responsible for a failure. Just remember, nobody ever admitted they ordered the Watergate burglary.
Everyone else-The IG report and actions seem to reveal a pattern of bias and illegality by government officials. Something that at the very least needs reform and likely needs firings and prosecutions. To ensure this does not happen again.
Predicted upcoming defense from left
Trump and his violation of norms, racism, election stealing, and bungling everything he touches. Forced us to break numerous laws to try to frame him. Because he was so obviously corrupt and Russia is clearly helping him hide all of it.
I find the constant shifting of the goalposts fascinating. I have numerous relatives that still think Trump is guilty of…something. Not something they seem to be able to prove or really define. But at this point they are willing to accept ANY pretext they can to justify his demise. No amount of reason or discussion seems able to dissuade them from their view. Ironically their utter zealotry and constant false claims. Have made him bullet proof. I have noticed even in my own beliefs that i now reflexively refuse to believe the left and media’s claims about anything. Especially when it involves “anonymous government” sources.
Sadly I see where this ends. And no place good. The left will continue its decades long pattern of doubling down when they lose. The media will remain utter blind to their own prejudice and continue the farce they have pedaled. That they are the only real objective observers. And the huge government bureaucracies will shuffle the cards. Hide the corrupt in other departments. Make token changes that have zero ability to be enforced.
And all 3 institutions will continue on as if nothing happened. I do not see any way that any of them can show any moderation, let alone reform. I expect nothing substantial to happen regardless what any of the reports show.
does your title paraphrase “Mephisto’s” conclusion?
Well, maybe it turns upon how we understand the word [“vindicate”].
Well, it depends on the definition of “is”.
I have numerous relatives that still think Trump is guilty of…something.
mythx: I’ve always liked this J.D. Salinger quote:
Where there’s smoke, there’s usually strawberry Jello.
It is interesting whenever I read anti-Trump claims of outrage, I can never find specific antecedents to the vague nouns and pronouns.
Huxley: That a great quote. I will have to remember it.
My mother who has a PHD in History of all things. Is utter convinced Trump is guilty. But whenever I try to pin her down on what. Well its like trying to play basketball on an ice rink. Fascinating and utterly frustrating.
Unfortunately having spent my life working in government institutions has forced me into the very pessimistic conclusion of their possible reform. The last 30 years they have spent most of their time changing labor laws and administrative rules. Making firing them nearly impossible. And the politicians and their appointees have grown entirely gutless in trying to challenge them.
Mythx, until now. Therein we find the crux of the issue.
My mother who has a PHD in History of all things. Is utter convinced Trump is guilty.
mythx: I’ve said it before here, but academic historians seem to have largely betrayed their discipline. I can understand being right or left or Dem or Rep, but to be so reflexively hyperpartisan strikes me as crazy.
I remember a poll of American historians in the 2000s, which showed a large majority (>60%) agreed Bush 43 was the worst president in history even before he left office. Academic malpractice. You say that over a couple of beers in a bull session, not publicly and pinned to one’s professional authority.
It takes time to sort out a contentious issue like that and real historians should know better. I see no excuse except such historians have abandoned the pursuit of truth for pushing propaganda.
“There are mistakes I consider more consequential than this during my tenure”
This was Comey’s biggest whopper by far. What could possibly have been worse? Unsurprisingly, Swamp Rat Wallace fails to ask the obvious follow up questions.
Here’s McCabe reacting to Horrowitz’ report and the FISA court slap down of the FBI and its procedures, by telling Wolf Blitzer that he’s “horrified” that such “mistakes” with the FISA warrant applications were made, but that these horrific mistakes were made because so much of the process was done by “low level FBI personnel.”
(I note that reporting says that this whole “Russian collusion” investigation, which–according to normal procedure–would have been run out of FBI field offices by the agents there, was, instead,taken over by and run from FBI headquarters, and by the top FBI leadership on the 7th floor at FBI headquarters.)
This is perhaps the clearest example of “throwing your subordinates under the bus.”
Or, to put it another way, this is a form of perhaps Judge Judy’s favorite excuse used by the guilty, “the other dude did it.”
Note, as well, that in this interview Blitzer points out–several times–that these were “deliberate” errors and blunders, but Blitzer never inquires about “why” such deliberate errors and omissions were made, what their aim was, or what or whose interests such “deliberate” mistakes might have served.
See https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2019/12/andrew-mccabe-deflects-and-pushes-blame-of-fisa-curt-abuse-on-low-level-fbi-agents-video/
I agree with some of the commenters here that this complaint and order by the FISA court’s Chief Judge Collyer is pathetically weak–“oooh, we were lied to, we’re so mad we could spit.”
The rubber stamp, never look too deeply into, or “outside of the four corners of the documents” presented FISA Court is, to coin a phrase, “fatally flawed,” and should be abolished.
In fact, the whole post 9/11 intelligence apparatus that was supposed to make us “safer’ by spying on our foreign terrorist enemies should be entirely rethought.
So much unchecked power is just too open to and likely to be abused, and–as we’ve seen demonstrated–too easily turned into a political tool for widespread illegal surveillance of U.S. citizens, and oppression of the same.
Given the multiple and dedicated enemies we face, all this current apparatus would perhaps be an acceptable gamble, if the people running it were incredibly well-qualified–absolutely top-notch–had forsworn personal or party ambition, were absolutely loyal to our Constitution, to the vision of the Founders, and were always and only doing their best to protect us citizens.
But, as we have seen all too ample evidence of, none of these conditions has been met, in fact, quite the opposite.
In a world full of ambition, the weapons available to that ambition should be very carefully circumscribed, with all sorts of safeguards, and not have to rely on the supposed “goodness” and “fidelity” of the men who wield those weapons.
Cont’d–We can no longer just assume that things are as the seem, or we might ideally believe or want them to be.
At this juncture, blind trust and naivete are fatal errors, and wariness and a healthy suspicion must rule the day, if we want to keep our Republic alive, and keep our Rights and Freedoms.
I agree with Snow On Pines that Judge Collyer’s letter is tepid at best. I would have expected a lot more anger at having the FBI abuse the FISC, and that’s what this is. Perhaps the very short deadline in Collyer’s letter is an expression of her anger at, and frustration with, the FBI. But it is frankly, too little and too late.
As for Comey’s “I didn’t know” plea — that just screams incompetence and irresponsibility. It might mean he won’t be charged with an illegal act, but it should also make anything he says in future unreliable.
As for Snow on Pines’ conclusion that we need to rethink the intelligence apparatus that was set up after 9-11, could we also throw airport security inspectors into this basket? They have gotten a little better, but they’re still a PITA and, as far as anyone knows, have never caught a single bomber or hijacker.
Of course, Comey knew a whole lot more than he is admitting to. He was in on the planning, in on the execution of the plan to take down the lawfully elected President.
For this, Comey should be indicted, tried and imprisoned. All of his assets should be confiscated. To say he should do hard time is to say the least. Months in Rikers would be a good start, and then release into general population.
Yes, that sounds a little over the top. But then, what should be the penalty for very serious violations of the Constitution?
A) comeys private sector experience was at bridgewater- a place notorious for it’s ‘radical openness’ wherein the company is basically all knowing about its employees. I would think that would bear on how he ran the FBI and should be brought up when questioning him
B) his evasiveness is particularly falling when you recall his writing about his takedown of Martha Stewart and the John Ashcroft hospital room. Stuff he writes on and on about in his book. Making himself out to be the last honest man etc
Comey is a POS and should not be let off the hook by virtue of sloppiness or Directorial inattention. He should be tried for his multiple felonies and sentenced to Leavenworth.
We are paying tooo much attention to his demeanor, his slipperiness, his “oozing charm out of every pore”, and not enough to his criminality.
Try him and convict the SOB! If not, just hang him from the highest tree.
}}} Gerard vanderleun on December 17, 2019 at 5:59 pm said:
” In fact, apparently no details of the investigation ever even reached his desk, according to Comey. ”
AKA The Stalin Gambit
I thought that was the Schultz Gambit:
“I know NuHTHINK!! Nuhthink!!”
😀
parker writes: Comey‘s sloppy subordinates did not sign those FISA warrants, Comey did. You signed, you own it.
In the US corporation / securities law there’s this thing called Sarbanes-Oxley, put in place after some business calamities I’m too lazy to look up right now.
Among other things it requires that the CEO and CFO (IIRC) of public companies personally sign off on the account filings required by the SEC.
Personally. Under penalty of perjury, I believe.
I wonder if Comey would be inclined to let a CEO disclaim responsibility for criminal misbehavior by middle management on the grounds that “I just signed it, I didn’t really know what it said.”
Sure. Sure he would.