William Webster, a former CIA and FBI director, claimed in an op-ed published on Monday that the bureau is not a “broken institution” and that anyone who criticizes it threatens the “rule of law.”
Yes, seriously.
Webster defended a bureau (and CIA) that very clearly and very purposefully abused its power in an attempt to depose a presidential contender — and then president — some of its ranking members did not like. But it’s not likely to quell the public’s outcry, at least from fair-minded Americans who are acutely aware of what happened under Obama’s watch.
Webster’s full-throated defense of the two agencies comes amid the fallout from the Department of Justice Inspector General (IG) report, in which it was confirmed that FBI officials made 17 “significant inaccuracies and omissions” in its submissions to the FISA court to obtain warrants to surveil former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page during the 2016 presidential election.
And let’s be clear: As DoJ IG Michael Horowitz noted in his report, making that many ‘errors’ is either the result of abject incompetence — highly unlikely — or purposeful actions (which, of course, would demonstrate bias).
“The privilege of being the only American in our history to serve as the director of both the F.B.I. and the C.I.A. gives me a unique perspective and a responsibility to speak out about a dire threat to the rule of law in the country I love,” Webster wrote in the New York Times (because, of course it would be the NY Times).
“Order protects liberty, and liberty protects order. Today, the integrity of the institutions that protect our civil order are, tragically, under assault from too many people whose job it should be to protect them,” he added.
What gall. What hubris. What arrogance.
How can our society have “liberty” when its premier law enforcement agency, and the intelligence community in general, deny it to innocent Americans? Remember that there are people currently in prison on trumped up charges, compliments of the Mueller probe which of course stemmed from the bogus “Trump-Russia collusion” narrative, which of course was a fabrication of the Obama-led deep state.
And how can there be long-term “order” if a state’s institutions and law enforcement apparatuses are so blatantly abused to overturn the results of an election?
“The rule of law is the bedrock of American democracy, the principle that protects every American from the abuse of monarchs, despots and tyrants. Every American should demand that our leaders put the rule of law above politics,” Webster added.
Is he kidding? Is he senile? Because the FBI, under then-Director James Comey, appears to have broken several laws when agents lied to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court in order to obtain a warrant to spy on a member of the 2016 Trump campaign, under false pretenses while using a fabricated ‘intelligence’ dossier. (Related: What was done by the deep state to Flynn, Page prove why NO one should ever work for the intelligence community again.)
Webster also wrote that the FBI must be “independent” — but how, like when it was run by J. Edgar Hoover, who had something on everyone in government?
“The independence of both the F.B.I. and its director are critical and should be fiercely protected by each branch of government,” he wrote.
By “independence” does he mean…beyond congressional and Executive Branch oversight? Because it sure sounds like it.
This obscene defense of an agency whose leaders went rogue to depose a duly elected president is precisely why Trump and AG William Barr must disassemble the deep state.
Or else a future president will be similarly abused. And maybe he/she won’t be nearly as strong as Trump.
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