Just replace every instance of "FBI" in that story with "McCabe"
We already got this story months ago, all they've changed is a detail of what they call their investigation. After Trump fired Comey, McCabe immediately broke with any pretense of neutrality and professionalism and went full blown Hoover mode to throw everything at Trump. Comey was always trying to justify himself as following protocols, while McCabe was abusing his office in every way he could until he got caught.

There's an argument about whether Comey did the right or wrong things as the FBI was on a collision course with partisan politics and he steered into it. But he was hardly a Hoover. He wasn't openly using the FBI to plot against Trump. But McCabe sure did. He used his brief stint without Comey at the helm to turn the FBI into the DNC's own little charade. He should have gotten axed much sooner.



/e also isn't it a bit curious how the NYTimes story manages to make the "FBI Officials" they keep talking about completely faceless, as if to minimize any personal motivations or biases present and instead cast them as a faceless institution?
Not a single mention of mccabe or strzok in that entire article. But those are the "FBI officials" who rushed to open the investigation into Trump the minute Comey was out of the picture and they were free to weaponize the FBI.

This post was edited by Goomshill on Jan 12 2019 09:23am

There's a distinct difference between an obstruction of justice investigation and a counter-intelligence investigation.

The fact that the FBI took this long to open that investigation affirms their neutrality and professionalism. I'm really at a loss for words... you're just incapable of seeing any of Trump's actions or words as suspicious, and that's putting aside any non-public information the FBI had on him. I think you Trump guys really need to step back and reexamine the story here... you've been stuck in "nothing to see here lolz" for two years, while the evidence has continued to mount.

It isn’t partisan to hate evil.

I hate you.

Took that long? They went in a mad rush the day Comey was fired, before a special counsel could be appointed and take it away from them.
We've seen enough to know that McCabe and Strzok were obviously politically motivated and not even remotely neutral or professional. Comey and his legacy is more of a question, but when the blatantly anti-Trump guys who were already engaging in political interference trip over themselves to open an investigation the moment that Comey is fired for his own political interference, all it does is reaffirm their lack of neutrality and lack of professionalism.
I'd be a lot more suspicious of Trump's actions and words if it wasn't for the fact that he had such motivated actors aligned against him for years and were unable to dig up any such dirt.

The FBI had four FISA warrants on people who worked for the Trump campaign, including the campaign manager, and they investigated for months, so yes, regardless of your boring hackery, the fact that they waited so long to investigate Trump directly affirms their neutrality and professionalism. Also worth noting that Rosenstein almost certainly had to approve opening the investigation.

I understand you committed to "Russiagate is politically motivated nonsense" years ago, but at some point you need to open your eyes and look at the evidence. Without looking at every piece in isolation. And without viewing it in the most unrealistic, charitable way.

Holding the opinion that it's highly unlikely Trump colluded with Russia is a legitimate position. Holding the view that the FBI didn't have good reason to open these investigations is right-wing nuttery.

Join the Party.

As if the blatant infringement on civil rights of FISA courts in general weren't bad enough, the political taint that surrounded the whole process doesn't paint a picture of dignified professionals above reproach. The evidence we've been inundated with is that the FBI was plagued with political agendas, and not all the same. If you take James Comey at the charitable interpretation, he was the force that held back the worst elements of political interference, but it still thrived under his watch. I don't care whether that was Comey being incompetent, complicit, or just put into an impossible no-win scenario where politicians were passing the buck to the FBI while he was head of a house filled with rats. But we've seen enough to say there was a difference between what Comey wanted and what the likes of McCabe/Strzok wanted.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/12/06/politics/rosenstein-comey-firing-obstruction-probe/index.html

It was McCabe who was opening the investigations after Comey was fired, that much is clear. How much role Rosenstein played is itself a contested issue, with his own account being that of one on the sidelines just offering ideas, not signing off on them. At least in the 8 day span between penning the memo arguing justifying Comey's firing, and then appointing Mueller. McCabe didn't need his authorization to run the FBI internally, and Rosenstein has since denied much of what has been claimed about his involvement, dismissing the reporting of the 'wire' story as sarcasm

Maybe two years ago I could understand the blind obedience to institutionalized authority figures and misplaced trust in a system, but scooby-doo and the shaggy crew already pulled the disguise off Comey, McCabe, Strzok, Page, Ohr, the FISA courts, etc and revealed their biases, missteps, abuses and crimes. The world doesn't have to fall neatly into groups of heroes and villains all aligned along two parties, they each had their own motivations and shades of gray. I think maybe its the crass orange carnival barker ever so loudly barking about it on twitter that makes you shut it out and ignore it, but we've seen plenty enough to say the FBI was rife with political intrigue and misconduct that poisoned both the Clinton and Trump investigations from before their starts. Heck, the entire winter of nonstop leaks from inside the IC was enough to prove the clusterfuck existed, just not who was behind it. The Russian boogeymen could never have done as much damage to American faith in the institutions than they did to themselves.

The FBI probably needed approval from DOJ to open an investigation into the president directly, so Rosenstein would've had to sign off.

I'm not going to rehash every right-wing nutter theory you included in your post. Actually, I'm not going to rehash any of them. While you look at every piece of evidence implicating Trump and his campaign as naively and skeptically as possible, you view any scent of possible(or real) misconduct from individuals at the FBI as some grand indictment of the organization as a whole, or as some exoneration of the suspicious behavior of Trump and his ilk. Cause if Strzok was a big ol' meanie towards Trump over text, or possibly delayed the reopening of the Hillary email investigation, clearly that explains why Carter Page was thought to be a Russian spy in 2014, or that Manafort was in deep with a Russian oligarch close to Putin, or that Papadopoulos talked about Russia having Hillary's emails to an Australian diplomat.

Attacking the FBI leadership only goes so far, because unless you're venturing into David Icke level conspiracy nutter territory, the evidence they gather isn't manufactured. It'd be amusing to watch you twist into a pretzel to explain away all the public evidence revealed so far in Russiagate, and explain why the FBI should've taken no investigative steps after receiving that evidence, but I'm not going to waste my time. You've committed to your position, and you wouldn't backtrack unless Trump defected to Russia. It's weird cause you're obviously a smart person, and seem to have kept up with this investigation, but I guess we all have our blind spots.