Note to Attorney General Barr: If you’re really just digging around, hoping to save the President from onrushing doom, and have no real evidence, you may want to pay attention to Maddowblog, it’s eponymous heroine, and Steve Benen, her author and scribe of message:
But Team Trump is going considerably further, firing prominent U.S. officials who did nothing wrong, taking steps to strip some officials of their security clearances, and now opening a criminal inquiry into the work of American law enforcement and intelligence professionals.
The Republican president has long hoped to turn the Justice Department into a political weapon, to be used against his perceived enemies. It’s the stuff of banana republics, and there’s reason to be concerned about it happening in the United States right now.
Postscript: For the sake of historical context, Rachel noted at the end of last night’s show that that Americans have lived through a scandal in which a U.S. attorney general was sent to prison for misusing the powers of the Justice Department, using federal law enforcement as part of a political scheme to benefit the president.
Something I’ve learned from fencing: trying really, really, REALLY hard to do something often results in over-reaching, loss of balance, and disaster.
If Barr thinks he has strong evidence of something wrong, fine. Investigate it. Find something, even better. It may not be fun to be corrected, but I adhere to the view that truth is better than lies.
But if he’s indulging in some misguided loyalty to a President who has set historical records, unlikely to ever be beat, for lying, boasting, and grasping, then he may find himself occupying a jail cell next to Trump himself.
Your allegiance is to the Constitution, not to the President, Mr. Attorney General Barr.
