Revenge
“Revenge is a dish best served cold”. That’s what a drunk parent growled at me, as the police escorted him from the high school wrestling tournament I managed. I was kind of impressed, drunk and fighting mad; he came up with a “literate” quote to throw at me (well, maybe a misquote from the Godfather). But I still threw him out. Parents fighting in the stands while the kids wrestled on the mat just didn’t make it.
It’s been thirty years, so I think the “statute of limitations” has expired. To my knowledge, he never got his “revenge”, hot, cold or even lukewarm. But he did help prove a point – revenge is a difficult thing to get, even in the best of circumstances. And many times, it isn’t worth what it costs to “right” some perceived “wrong”.
Need a good example? John Durham, Special Prosecutor for the US Attorney’s Office in Connecticut, released his final report on the FBI investigation of the 2016 Trump Campaign yesterday. Three hundred pages, two acquittals, one guilty plea, $6.5 million, and four years later; the big “revenge” of Donald Trump and Bill Barr turns out, to quote good old Don Junior, to be a “big old nothing-burger”.
Benghazi
Remember the “good old days”? First there was the endless (six) Benghazi investigations by the Republican House of Representatives. The goal wasn’t to really find out what happened to the four Americans killed in Benghazi. It was to bring down Hillary Clinton, the Secretary of State at the time and soon to be 2016 Presidential candidate. The House spent $7.5 million, two years, and wrote an 800 page report. In the end, the only thing they proved was that Hillary could testify for a straight eleven hours without a break, and wasn’t responsible for the deaths.
But it did reveal a Clinton weakness: she used her personal email instead of her State Department account. And that generated an FBI investigation, “Midyear Exam”, that went on for months, right into the summer of the 2016 election cycle. In the end, FBI Director Comey took it upon himself to “scold” Clinton for her carelessness, but announced that he wouldn’t bring charges. (Oddly, the FBI doesn’t ever bring charges. The Department of Justice brings the charges, after FBI investigation. Comey believed that the Obama Justice Department was unable to “objectively” determine the charging decision, so he took it upon himself to make the announcement).
Crossfire Hurricane
But even as Comey took the stage to announce that the FBI (and Department of Justice) would do nothing, there was another secret FBI investigation already underway – code named “Crossfire Hurricane”. This one was looking into the “smoke” around the Trump Presidential campaign: rumors of connections between the campaign and Russian intelligence.
This started out as an “intelligence” investigation, requiring a lower threshold of probable cause. There were statements from the Australian Ambassador in the United Kingdom, connections between Trump Campaign Chairman Paul Manafort and Russian oligarchs, and goofy Campaign foreign policy advisor Carter Page, already implicated in another Russian related investigation. And while the “Midyear Exam” investigation was public from the beginning, “Crossfire Hurricane” was done in almost total secrecy.
After Trump was elected President, a group of senior US Intelligence leaders trooped up to Trump Tower in Manhattan, and briefed the President-elect on their findings. They also informed him of the Steele Dossier, including the titillating details of supposed Trump behavior in a Moscow Hotel. After the leaders, including Comey and CIA Director John Brennan, left, Trump started looking for a way to get his “revenge”, hot or cold.
Brennan was fired almost as soon as Trump took office. Comey hung on for a few months, trying to, as he put it, blend in with the curtains. But “Crossfire Hurricane” continued, gathering more evidence about Russian connections to the campaign. Finally, Comey was fired (while giving a talk to FBI personnel in Los Angeles – Trump said let him find his own way back to Washington). Then-Attorney General William Sessions recused himself from the process, leaving Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein in charge.
Mueller
Rosenstein closed down “Crossfire Hurricane”, but appointed a Special Prosecutor, former FBI Director Robert Mueller, to investigate the matter. And so we began again, this one cost $40 million, but it did get at least that much in back taxes and fines from several Trump operatives, including Paul Manafort. It also convicted Manafort, National Security Advisor Mike Flynn, campaign operative Roger Stone, Russian intelligence agent Maria Butina, deputy campaign manager Rick Gates, Trump lawyer Michael Cohen and others.
But when Sessions finally resigned and William Barr became Attorney General, the Mueller Investigation abruptly ended. Mueller released his report (240 pages) but Barr dramatically undercut its impact.
The House of Representatives, now under Democratic control, held hearings on the Mueller investigation, potentially leading to Trump’s impeachment. But Mueller was never able to close the circle on Trump himself, and his personal testimony revealed a diminished man. The investigation, the report, the Russian connections, all faded away. It took an ugly extortion of Ukraine, and the January 6th Insurrection, to bring Trump himself to trial.
Durham
And Trump, through Barr, wanted his revenge. His “tool” was another well respected Prosecutor, John Durham.
There already was Inspector General Horowitz’s critical critique of Crossfire Hurricane, and Senate hearings about his findings. There also was a Senate Intelligence Committee finding that Russia did influence the 2016 election, though they didn’t go far into direct connections with the Trump Campaign. But what Trump and Barr wanted was criminal charges against Comey, Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, Agent Peter Strzok, and others. This was Trump’s final revenge, and hopefully a platform to win the 2020 election.
But it didn’t happen. Durham (and Barr) even went to Italy, demanded information from the Italian intelligence agencies. They questioned everyone from Comey to McCabe and everyone else involved. In the end, Durham did little but echo the criticisms that Horowitz outlined in his report. Trump never got his revenge for the “…horrible, horrible, Witch Hunt”.
The moral of the story: revenge is a dish best not ordered. Hot or cold, it never tastes as good as you think.
