OK, this is goldarn hilarious—to me, at least. The National Review is throwing itself into a goldarn—or perhaps goldurn—full-court press over the utterly laughable, load o’ shit “Durham Report”, cranking out such utterly laughable, bullshit pieces as The FBI Didn’t Ignore Russian Intel on Hillary’s Plan to Smear Trump — It Abetted the Plan, and The Shoddy Russia Investigation, and Partisan Paranoia Runs Roughshod over the Rule of Law (nice alliteration on that one, guys!), not to mention How Can Anybody Take Them Seriously?
How indeed? Four years ago, John Durham was tasked by then Attorney General William Barr to “investigate whether any federal official, employee, or any other person or entity violated the law in connection with the intelligence, counter-intelligence, or law-enforcement activities directed at the 2016 presidential campaigns, individuals associated with those campaigns, and individuals associated with the administration of President Donald J. Trump.” He investigated. One individual pleaded guilty to changing the wording in a document submitted in court and was given a year’s probation. Two more individuals were charged with technical crimes, pleaded not guilty, and, after being brought to trial, were quickly acquitted after a few hours of deliberation. End of story, right?
Well, it should have been. But, of course, that wasn’t the real point of Durham’s investigation. The real point was Barr’s, and Durham’s, furious determination to corrupt justice, to cover up the Trump administration’s grievous sins and crimes, and to heap endless abuse on Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party. Failing to indict, much less convict, anyone of the sort of “heinous” crimes that Barr—not to mention, of course, Donald Fucking Trump—repeatedly claimed the Democrats had committed—Durham now delivers to the public this massive mass of intellectual manure, which has nothing to do with the task with which he was charged, filled with endless innuendo implying in imagination all the high crimes and misdemeanors that he had hoped—hoped and failed—to find in truth, manure that the National Review folks eagerly gobble down as though it were literal manna from Heaven. But why?
In part, of course, because they simply want to believe that Democrats are evil. But, more importantly, the NR folks are trying—trying pretty desperately, one would guess—to make nice with the “True Trumpers”—the folks who believe that Donald Trump won the 2020 election by, probably, the greatest landslide in history—in other words, the Republican Party. Well, the NR crowd can’t quite swallow that shit, so they’re gulping franticly on this John Durham shit, to convince the Trump can do no wrong crowd that they too know just how much the Big D has suffered, so that, maybe, maybe, it would OK if Ron DeSantis were the nominee in 2024? (Please don’t hit us!)
I strongly doubt that appealing to “reason” is the way to reach the True Trumpers. But, when you’re as desperate as the NR crowd, you’ll try anything.
Afterwords
If you want to know the “truth” about John Durham, and Bill Barr, and Donald Trump, here is a reading list, starting with one of my own, two from the New York Times, and one from Cathy Young at the Bulwark:
Shorter Bill Barr: Yes, I am a complete tool. Surprised?
How Barr’s Quest to Find Flaws in the Russia Inquiry Unraveled
Bill Barr’s Image Rehab Is Kaput
No, ‘Russiagate’ Wasn’t the Hoax That Team Trump Claims It Was
Also at the Times, Charlie Savage provides the perspective on the newly released “Durham Report” so sadly missing from the National Review’s frumious froth: After Years of Political Hype, the Durham Inquiry Failed to Deliver
