AG Jeff Sessions Will Appear Before the Senate Intelligence Committee

Attorney General Jeff Sessions has agreed to appear before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Tuesday. He will be attempting to clear his name, after former FBI Director James Comey's explosive testimony last week, in which he spoke about the pressure he felt coming from the President to drop the investigation into Mike Flynn. Comey specifically called the President a liar, and also had something to say about Jeff Sessions' possible involvement in the investigation into Russian involvement in the 2016 election.

“Our judgment, as I recall, was that [Jeff Sessions] was very close and inevitably going to recuse himself for a variety of reasons. We were also aware of facts that I can’t discuss in an open setting that would make his continued engagement in a Russia-related investigation problematic.”

In his confirmation hearing, Sessions said he had not met with Russian officials during the Trump campaign, when in fact he had met with Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak. There was enormous Democratic resistance to Sessions' nomination before the truth was revealed, but Democrats were over-ridden. In the hearing, Elizabeth Warren tried to read out part of a letter written thirty years ago by Coretta King, widow of Martin Luther King Jr. It related to Sessions' failed judicial nomination in 1980 because of his racism.

Mitch McConnell shut Elizabeth Warren down, on the grounds that Senate rules prohibit one Senator from bad-mouthing another on the floor, and Republicans voted to support his move. It backfired spectacularly. Firstly it was pointed out that the rule could not apply during a confirmation hearing, and secondly McConnell had said nothing when Ted Cruz had accused him of being a liar. But worse, Elizabeth Warren ended up being heard by a much wider audience. She first tweeted about the incident, triggering off a viral hashtag #LetLizSpeak.

I will not be silent while the Republicans rubber stamp an AG who will never stand up to the @POTUS when he breaks the law.

— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) February 8, 2017

Then she read the letter outside the Senate, on camera, and posted the video on her Facebook page. To date, the video has had 12 million views.

“During the debate on whether to make Jeff Sessions the next Attorney General, I tried to read a letter from Coretta Scott King on the floor of the Senate. The letter, from 30 years ago, urged the Senate to reject the nomination of Jeff Sessions to a federal judgeship. The Republicans took away my right to read this letter on the floor – so I’m right outside, reading it now.”

In Sessions' confirmation hearings, on the 10th of January, Senator Al Franken asked (at 3:18 in the video), "If there is any evidence that anyone affiliated with the Trump campaign communicated with the Russian government during the course of this campaign, what would you do?" Sessions replied, "Senator Franken, I'm not aware of any of those activities. I have been called a surrogate at a time or two in that campaign, but I did not have communications with the Russians."

On the 17th, Senator Leahy asked him; " Several of the President-Elect’s nominees or senior advisers have Russian ties. Have you been in contact with anyone connected to any part of the Russian government about the 2016 election, either before or after election day?" Sessions said, "No".

Also on the 17th, Senator Feinstein asked if he would recuse himself "from any FBI or Justice Department investigation into whether Flynn’s communications were permissible under the law, including the Logan Act." Sessions replied "I am not aware of a basis to recuse myself from such matters. "

On the 1st of March, the Washington Post, which had exposed Mike Flynn's dissemination, leading to Trump being forced to fire him, reported that Sessions had spoke twice with Kislyak. At first Sessions dug his heels in, but later, amid Democratic calls to resign, was forced to recuse himself from the Russia investigation. Trump was enraged, and called it all a witch hunt of an 'honest man'. But then he thought Mike Flynn was a 'good guy', even after his lies were exposed.

Since his inauguration Trump has been dogged the Russia investigation which, in spite of all his efforts to distract from it, continues to gather momentum. Having gotten his way his whole life, Trump took on the presidency believing it would be business as usual. He took a page from Putin's playbook, attempting to control the narrative and create an alternative to the truth.

But Putin, frightening as he is, is a clever man. Trump is not. So where Putin has succeeded, Trump's considerable efforts are failing miserably. Out of control, he is his own worst enemy. He continues to paint himself into an ever-diminishing corner.

Republicans and Trump supporters consistently insist that there's no there, there. No evidence of collusion. The process of unearthing it is moving along swiftly, the overriding response to Trump supporters being that this president has attacked every person under the sun, practically every world leader. Except Putin. And one after another of his staff, including his own son-in-law, have been exposed as having communications or suspected deals of some sort with Russians, including officials and/or people very close to Putin.

So Sessions' insistence that he didn't know of any activity between Trump campaign officials and Russians, apart from being a blatant lie on his own account, is unlikely to be true with regards to those who have now been exposed. And his recusal from the Russia investigation wasn't water-tight. Subsequently, he did get involved again, potentially violating his recusal pledge. On the 9th of May, Sessions wrote a letter to the president, recommending that Comey be fired.

Trump has admitted—and subsequently tried to deny—that he fired Comey because the Russia investigation was causing a cloud; it was irritating him.

In his testimony, Comey expressed said the president lied. Trump's response was to double down and accuse Comey of perjury. The problem for Trump is that he is, by his own hand, an established liar, and Comey, in his long career at the FBI, is a known truth-teller. Sessions has also been exposed as a liar. It looks like the chickens have come home to roost for him. It is unknown yet whether he will testify openly or in a closed hearing. 

James Comey Testimony Full Hearing and Highlights

James Comey's testimony was every bit as explosive as predicted, as he answered questions about his conversations with Donald Trump directly and honestly. He said that he had felt pressured by the president to drop the investigation into Mike Flynn, that Trump had tried to manipulate him into 'loyalty' and had said the Russia investigation was irritating him.

Comey believed that he was fired because he refused to protect Mike Flynn, or put a stop to the entire investigation.

He stated that the president lied when he said the FBI was in disarray. When asked if there was any evidence of collusion with Russia on Trump's part, Comey said he couldn't respond in an open hearing, leaving everybody to draw their own conclusions. Comey also had something to say about Jeff Sessions. “Our judgment, as I recall, was that he was very close and inevitably going to recuse himself for a variety of reasons. We were also aware of facts that I can’t discuss in an open setting that would make his continued engagement in a Russia-related investigation problematic.”

When questioned about leaking his memos to the press, Comey admitted that he asked a friend of his, Columbia Professor Daniel Richman, to share his memo of a meeting with the president with the press, because he was alarmed at the pressure being exerted on him, and hoped that his memo would prompt the appointment of a special counsel. 

Hillary Clinton Campaign Stays Steady In The Comey-Induced Firestorm

When I saw the news about Comey's letter the other night and the glee with which anchors descended on it like starving vultures, I switched off the TV and turned to Twitter where I found expression of outrage that Comey would say so much and yet so little so soon before a presidential election in a climate where millions have been whipped up into a frenzy of paranoia by innuendo and misinformation.

It's where I learned from the New Yorker that Comey was advised doing anything that could influence the election.

'Traditionally, the Justice Department has advised prosecutors and law enforcement to avoid any appearance of meddling in the outcome of elections, even if it means holding off on pressing cases. One former senior official recalled that Janet Reno, the Attorney General under Bill Clinton, “completely shut down” the prosecution of a politically sensitive criminal target prior to an election. “She was adamant—anything that could influence the election had to go dark,” the former official said. 

Four years ago, then Attorney General Eric Holder formalized this practice in a memo to all Justice Department employees. The memo warned that, when handling political cases, officials “must be particularly sensitive to safeguarding the Department’s reputation for fairness, neutrality, and nonpartisanship.” To guard against unfair conduct, Holder wrote, employees facing questions about “the timing of charges or overt investigative steps near the time of a primary or general election” should consult with the Public Integrity Section of the Criminal Division.'

A tweet from Paul Krugman (always an excellent source of sanity) said it all:

The Washington Post printed "Justice officials warned FBI that Comey’s decision to update Congress was not consistent withdepartment policy":

'Justice officials reminded the FBI of the department’s position “that we don’t comment on an ongoing investigation. And we don’t take steps that will be viewed as influencing an election,” said one Justice Department official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the high-level conversations. “Director Comey understood our position. He heard it from Justice leadership,” the official said. “It was conveyed to the FBI, and Comey made an independent decision to alert the Hill. He is operating independently of the Justice Department. And he knows it.”' 

A lot has been said about Comey trying to get ahead of a potential disaster. None of it amounts to a hill of beans. Whatever his motives were, he's not a stupid man and he knew what impact his actions would have. If, by some miracle, he'd somehow been oblivious, he was warned and advised not to act. He should be formally charged with interfering with a presidential election. And he should resign.

The hosts and anchors will hold onto this for as long as they can, twisting it all into another giant condemnation of Hillary Clinton, under the guise of "informing". Influencing the weak-minded, pandering to their lust for drama, assaulting the strong-minded.

But as she always has, Hillary Clinton will remain an example to us all; steady and strong, undeterred, a brilliant role model—as Barack and Michelle Obama have been for the past eight years—for anybody who struggles under the weight of persecution and the kind of double standards she's dealt with. The more this kind of hysteria happens the more I admire her, what she stands for, the way she's conducted this campaign, the people of towering integrity she's drawn towards her from all walks of life.

She brings people together, she stands up to bullies, she has never become bitter. She can still light up a room with her smile and her campaign is still about love.

It's been getting clearer and clearer since Barack Obama was elected, that there is a monumental fight in America between the sane and the sociopathic, between intelligence and tabloid mentality, between wisdom and recklessness, between everything that's decent, good, inclusive and generous and everything that's mean-spirited and bigoted. That fight has come to a head.

The noise made by the tabloid-mentality press and anchors' and hosts' frenzied attempts to whip up hysteria, and create dark drama and catastrophe where there is none is alarming. It's an assault on the senses and on the mind and spirit. But the challenge is to remember that although it casts a dark shadow over reality, it doesn't change it and the reality is that Hillary Clinton is a tremendous woman, she isn't and has never been a criminal or anything closely resembling one, she's never been reckless in public office, millions and millions like, love and admire her.

She's winning, because of who she is and what she represents, not because she's bent people's minds into paranoia. And the more she's needlessly and senselessly targeted, the more impassioned, committed and determined Democrats become.