Trust Test

For John, BLUF:  Distrust between the President and the Intelligence Community goes back to before the election, and has not gotten better.  This article is from June and here in September it is still an atmosphere of distrust.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

Only with Real Transparency Will the FBI Ever Be Trusted Again

From Pajama Media, by Roger L Simon, 16 June 2019.

Here is the lede plus four:

When Donald Trump told George Stephanopoulos he (Donald) might listen to "oppo" research coming from a foreign source and that he might not tell the FBI about it, the mainstream media, as is so often the case, deliberately missed or misstated what he meant, went into one of their usual hissy fits, and attacked the president, even calling him treasonous.

Besides the obvious hypocrisy, pointed out with characteristic aplomb by Andrew McCarthy, something else, likely more important, was at play.

The media (and the Democrats, of course) deliberately missed the point because you would have to be seriously intellectually challenged not to get why Trump might have been hesitant or ambivalent about going to the FBI.  These days only a total dimwit would unquestioningly trust the supposed "world's greatest law enforcement agency."  The FBI is under a dark cloud.

The litany of personages who have recently left or been expelled from that organization is long and getting longer.  As is well known, it's under investigation for its practices during and before the Mueller probe, via the inspector general and recently-appointed U.S. Attorney John Durham, who is famed for prosecuting FBI agents with ties to the Boston mob.  All this is being supervised by AG William Barr.

Significantly, Durham is also investigating the CIA and, it appears, the State Department.  President Trump has given Barr (and therefore presumably Durham) the ability to compel the agencies to reveal their secret documents and to make their personnel cooperate with investigators.

If the President can't trust the FBI, or the larger Intelligence Community, then who in DC can he trust?

My question is, how do we restore trust.  Did the recent DOJ IG Report On Mr James Comey make it worse or did it put us on a positive path?

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff