Corruption in our government

FBI Director James Comey removed all doubt this week that our government is corrupt at all levels.

During his announcement concerning the FBI investigation on Hillary Clinton’s misuse of a private email server, he listed several instances where Federal statutes were violated. However, despite that he ended with the view that “Although there is evidence of potential violations of the statutes regarding the handling of classified information, our judgment is that no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case.”

In other words, she broke the law, but the FBI definition of a reasonable prosecutor would not charge her because she didn’t intend to cause harm. Evidently their definition of a reasonable prosecutor does not include the majority of prosecutors in the U.S. Besides, even if she didn’t intend to violate the law, she did intend to hide her activities from government and the public.

According to Andrew McCarthy of National Review, “In essence, in order to give Mrs. Clinton a pass, the FBI rewrote the statute, inserting an intent element that Congress did not require. The added intent element, moreover, makes no sense: The point of having a statute that criminalizes gross negligence is to underscore that government officials have a special obligation to safeguard national defense secrets; when they fail to carry out that obligation due to gross negligence, they are guilty of serious wrongdoing. The lack of intent to harm our country is irrelevant. People never intend the bad things that happen due to gross negligence.”

James Comey used to have a good reputation as a fair-minded and unbiased FBI agent. If you don’t believe a lot of strong-arming went on over this, I have some beach-front property in the Sonora Desert for you. Let’s look at the timing of this.

Loretta Lynch met privately with Bill Clinton on June 27 in Phoenix. On July 1, she announced that she will allow the FBI to decide whether Hillary would be charged with a crime. On July 5, Hillary is seen on Air Force One with Obama. Also on July 5, Comey announced that the FBI will not recommend prosecution. Coincidence? I don’t believe so.

Just think of the precedent this action sets. There are so many federal laws that you probably break several just driving to the store. If the feds want to get you, they will find a law you broke. It can now be argued that anyone who breaks a federal statute can make the argument that they didn’t mean to cause harm. Essentially, the law is dead.

General David Petraeus can now go back and renegotiate his settlement with prosecutors for committing the same crime as Hillary, although not on her scale. The poor guy who was imprisoned for the video that supposedly caused Benghazi can argue that he didn’t mean to. The Malheur Refuge occupants should be released immediately since there was no intent to cause damage.

And how about Dinesh D’Souza, who was charged with an illegal campaign contribution, that was admitted by the court to be an honest mistake, because he made a movie unflattering to Obama. He has one coming out on Hillary, by the way. I can’t wait for that one.

There is a more important issue here. We know that the Obama administration is essentially corrupt, lacks moral clarity, engages in crony capitalism, and uses government agencies to punish those who disagree. Until now, however, the FBI was one agency that I thought could be trusted to resist the Obama/Clinton machine. That is apparently no longer so.

Law enforcement relies on two things to keep the upper hand in any confrontation. Those are respect and fear. To me, the FBI has lost respect, leaving only fear. With one action, Director Comey has managed to force the FBI to become jack-booted thugs reminiscent of Nazi Shutzstaffel or SS troops in order to maintain control of a situation. Fear will most likely be their only way to keep the upper hand in any confrontation from now on.

While disappointing, the FBI decision was not unexpected. All is not lost. This decision is so transparently wrong that the speech presenting it outlined how she broke the law. Trumps has shown himself willing to attack Hillary Clinton like she hasn’t seen before. While she may have skated criminally, there is plenty of ammunition to attack her politically.

As I said once, you can break the law and run for president as long as you are not from flyover America and your name is Clinton.

Tom Riggins’ column appears every other Friday. He may be reached at news@lahontanvalleynews.com.