Time to revisit FBI Director James Comey’s statement that no reasonable prosecutor would bring charges against Hillary Clinton. Not only was it a lie that allowed Hillary to abscond, we have been predictably rewarded with more lying, more evidence that indeed Hillary’s private server was hacked by foreign intelligence services, and now face the very likely prospect that our next president will not only be a lawless, pathological liar, but open to the worst kind of blackmail. This is the legacy of Comey’s FBI, and should Hillary win election, he and his agency are fully complicit.

Comey and the FBI colluded to protect Clinton in the FBI interview. It is now clear beyond reasonable cavil that the purpose of the meeting on the Phoenix tarmac between Attorney General Loretta Lynch and Bill Clinton was to advise Hillary through her husband that 1) the investigation would be concluded without prejudice against her provided 2) she did not lie in her forthcoming FBI interview and 3) confirmed the gist of the questions to be asked (and doubtless vetted by Hillary’s attorneys.)  While this is not a particularly stunning revelation, Hillary’s excuse that she “short-circuited” when she told Chris Wallace on national television that Comey said she’d been honest, puts the tarmac meeting and especially her FBI interview in a new perspective. Hillary now relies on Comey’s statement that her “FBI interview” was truthful to vouch for her overall honesty in the matter, even though he has otherwise implied she lied in public statements. 

For Hillary to have been truthful in her statements to the FBI and to also have escaped indictment, the FBI must have conducted the interview with the intent of effectively exonerating her from criminal liability at least as Comey intended to define it two days later. Regardless of how one views Comey’s discretionary judgment about Clinton’s criminal liability, it is now quite clear that it was a judgment deliberately cooked into the investigation, which was entirely improper. The purpose of FBI interviews is to gather information, not to provide defenses to subjects of investigation. Yet this is exactly what the FBI did, and Hillary is throwing it back in their faces by claiming her “honest responses” in her FBI interview prove she did not lie about her private email server, and by implication is free of wrongdoing.

The usual purposes of an investigatory interview are to develop information to refine or expand the investigation; to tie the interview subject down to one story, no matter what it may be; to set potential traps for the subject in the event that she is lying; and to obtain admissions where possible. It is very clear that the FBI did not try to do any of these things during Clinton’s interview.

Let’s parse what we know of the farcical “interview” itself, based on Comey’s own accounts. Supposedly it was conducted by “five or six” agents (you’d think he’d know for sure) and lasted about three hours. Hillary was not sworn, nor was the interview recorded either electronically or via transcript. Comey testified that the agents did not find evidence of “evasion” during the interview, but if Comey is being truthful, depending on the questions, no evasion would have been necessary.

First, a three hour interview for the subject in such a long lasting and complex case is exceedingly short, but even so is probably exaggerated. Counted in those hours no doubt is Hillary’s arrival, administrative tasks, set up (“would you like some coffee Madam Secretary”), and dozens of time wasting preliminary questions:

“Now , um, Madam Secretary, are you married (tee hee)?”

“And to whom would that be (har har)?”

Those five or six agents don’t make the already short interview more efficient, they complicate it. As did Hillary’s small army of attorneys. Count in probable frequent breaks for consultations (and the bathroom) and it is doubtful that more than 15 or 20 minutes were devoted to any kind of relevant questioning. And when that occurred those questions must have been deliberately phrased in a way that “exonerated” Hillary so as to fit Comey’s rubric for the statement he intended to deliver (and did) shortly thereafter. They would not require evasion, because they were designed to elicit truthful responses.

For example, in a real interview, which would have lasted many, many more hours, the questioning might have gone like this:

“Mrs. Clinton, I am showing you what’s been marked exhibit one. Can you identify it?”

“Exhibit one is part of an email chain in which you sent and received, is that correct?”

“Exhibit one contains a classified markings on it is that right?”

“And the date of the email chain indicates that it was so marked at the time sent and received?”

“You received this marked classified email via your private server?”

“And that server was not authorized by the State Department?”

“Was its use in keeping with State Department policies concerning business related and most especially classified communications?”

“Didn’t you stipulate this yourself in instructions that went to all State Department personnel over your signature that private email should not be used for this purpose?”

Now, of course, if Clinton believed the questioning would have been anything like that she would not have agreed to the interview. If actually so questioned, she would have taken the 5th and walked out. But she knew ahead of time that this would not be the case and so attended and answered canned questions that were structured so that she could respond “honestly” without incriminating herself.  A question like this:

“Did you ever knowingly, with intent to compromise classified information, send or receive any emails that you personally knew were classified at the time you sent or received them?”

Here Hillary could answer “no” honestly, since part of that convoluted compound question accuses her of specific intent to compromise classified information, which Hillary probably did not do. Perhaps she personally did not even notice the classified markings. The question is deliberately designed to allow an “honest” denial. It is a sure bet that besides introductory and meaningless background questions, the entire interview was of this nature.

Hillary has now adopted that interview as proof of her truthfulness, allowing her to engage in all manner of Clintonian evasion now. If Comey thought his non-indictment indictment of her actions, and subsequent Congressional testimony somehow redeemed his honor, or gave him some leverage despite his genuflection to Clinton and Obama on the merits, Hillary’s subsequent conduct has put paid to that idea. I’m well beyond giving Comey the benefit of the doubt on matters related to the Clintons. He’s an unethical hack who wants to eat his cake and have it too. Hillary has now made him look a fool though he evidently (and perhaps reasonably) believes this is survivable so long as the mainstream media don’t report it that way, and the American people don’t get it.

The FBI subverted itself in this investigation, something that Hillary’s claims of “honestly” make absolutely clear. That among the many scores of agents that supposedly worked on this investigation, not one has stepped forward, despite this fundamental abuse of the agency is perhaps more disturbing than Comey’s own dishonesty. It suggests that the entire agency is corrupted, and will be in Hillary’s pantsuit pocket if she wins in November.