Rosenstein, Mueller, Wray and the Deep State Swamp.
A Conspiracy Theory Lie To Justify Killing the Russian Investigation.
Someone recently told me that Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein was “was part of the Obama DOJ that politicized the Department.” This person declared that “Trump was elected to drain the swamp” and that “Rosenstein is part of the swamp and appointed one of the swamp creatures to investigate the fake collusion by the Trump campaign.” I also had a Twitter exchange that included the following.
Believe it or not, this belief that Rosenstein and Mueller are part of the “Deep State” of Obama people frustrating the noble President Trump at every turn, and brewing up the Russia investigation “witch hunt” is common in Trump personality cult circles. FBI Director Christopher Wray is often thrown in too because of his strongly stated opposition to releasing the Nunes Memo.
The myth here is that this cabal of powerful Obamatons are behind a biased DOJ and FBI attacking Trump. The highly partisan, and inaccurate in its core claims, Nunes Memo is touted as proof of this bias. It should be noted that even if the mostly factually false Nunes Memo is accepted as completely true, it does not undermine the basis for the FISA warrant against Page.
Why shouldn’t the President’s followers believe this, considering the President himself has fostered this belief?
This one even directly uses the term “Deep State” to describe the mysterious cabal against him.
Cartoons and memes such as this are popular among the crowd believing this propaganda.
All of this is patently absurd. If we did have a law firm of “Rosenstein, Mueller and Wray” it would be a very Republican law firm. Let’s examine the biographies individually.
Rod Rosenstein.
Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein has attracted Trump’s ire for appointing Mueller. Attorney General Sessions could not do it, having supposedly recused himself from Russia investigation because he might be a target. Congressional and popular demand for an independent counsel was high, triggered by Trump’s foolish tweet that Comey “better hope that there are no tapes of our conversations.”
That tweet set off a firestorm of questions over whether such tapes exist, which Trump refuses to answer for six weeks. The tweet prompted Comey to leak contents of his meetings with Trump where Trump sought a loyalty oath and urged Comey to drop the Flynn investigation. All of this eventually lead Rosenstein, under considerable Congressional pressure, to appoint Robert Mueller as Special Prosecutor.
Rosenstein certainly played the pivotal role in appointing Mueller, who has been a bear on Trump’s back since. Thing is a significant portion of Trump’s base believe Rosenstein was appointed by Obama and is a hold over from Obama’s Administration. That’s not true. You know who appointed Rosenstein? Trump did.
Rosenstein was originally appointed to the DOJ, as a United States Attorney, not by Obama, but by George W. Bush. Bush also nominated him to the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals, but the nomination was defeated by Democrats, in particular Senators Barbara Mikulski and Ben Cardin, who put a hold on his nomination. Democrat Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Patrick Leahy, refused to schedule hearings on Rosenstein’s nomination.
Rosenstein was one of 46 United States Attorneys subject to Trump’s order for all U.S. Attorneys to resign issued on March 10, 2017. Rosenstein submitted his letter of resignation, but guess what? Trump rejected Rosenstein’s resignation.
Donald Trump appointed Rosenstein to his current position. That’s right, Donald Trump personally hand picked, Rosenstein to be Deputy Attorney General of the United States. When Trump nominated Rosenstein Trump said “he’s highly respected. Very good guy, very smart guy. And the Democrats like him. The Republicans like him.”
Trump’s nomination of Rosenstein was confirmed in the Senate by a 94–6 vote. Every Republican voted to confirm, all six no votes were Democrats. The no votes were: Blumenthal (D-CT), Booker (D-NJ), Cortez Masto (D-NV), Gillibrand (D-NY), Harris (D-CA), Warren (D-MA). Congrats, you are on Elizabeth Warren’s side.
When Trump decided to fire Comey it was Rosenstein that drafted the letter justifiying the firing. Rosenstein’s letter put forth Comey’s handling of the Clinton investigation as the basis for the firing. The problem (as we know) is Trump stupidly could not stick to that script and himself said it was because of the Russia investigation.
The suggestion that Rosenstein is an Obama Deep Stater is nothing but a flat out hopeless stupidly absurd lie. That people believe such obvious tripe, in defiance of verifiable facts, is a testimony to the stomach lurching cult worship of this President and the gullibles who support him.
And there are plenty of such gullibles. Daniel Sobieski of “American Thinker” declares the Trump appointed Rosenstein an “Agent of the Deep State Coup” with the lopsided 94–6 confirmation vote actually offered as proof of that claim. The same words are echoed by “True Pundit.” In declaring that “Rosenstein, Mueller, McCabe et al have used the office of special counsel and a politicized the FBI and DOJ to conduct a silent coup against a duly elected president,” True Pundit failed to even inform their readers that Rosenstein was actually nominated by Trump. The Gateway Pundit declares that Comey, Mueller and Rosenstein are all part of the “Deep State Swamp” before conferring upon them title of “most corrupt officials ever!” As with the not-so True Pundit, the Gateway Pundit also avoided telling its readers that Trump appointed this deep state swamper and most corrupt official ever. “Stone Cold Truth” cutely describes Comey, Rosenstein and Mueller as “The Three Amigos From the Deep State.”
I could go on. The point is that it is sources like this from which the gullibles get their information. They read this stuff and they believe it because it is what they want and need to believe to support their views of Trump, and because Trump is basically telling them the same tripe.
Robert Mueller.
Mueller is, of course, the Special Prosecutor appointed by Rosenstein to lead the Russia investigation. Mueller’s investigation has already secured two convictions of Trump’s former Director of National Intelligence Michael Flynn and former Trump Foreign Policy Advisor George Papadopoulos. Their plea agreements require them to cooperate with the continuing investigation. Mueller has also secured two indictments against former Trump Campaign Head Manager Paul Manafort and his assistant Rick Gates.
Mueller is a highly decorated former Marine Corps officer whose service in Vietnam earned him a Bronze Star with “V-Device” (for valor) and the Purple Heart. A lifelong Republican he was appointed to be the Director of the FBI by George W. Bush in 2001. He was unanimously confirmed by the Senate by a 98–0 vote.
He would become the longest serving FBI Director since J. Edgar Hoover. While it may not seem this way in the revolving door of the Trump Administration, FBI Director is supposed to be an apolitical post with ten year terms. Obama allowed Mueller to serve out his ten year, then appointed him to two more, before replacing him in 2013 with James Comey.
Put simply, the Special Prosecutor investigating possible collusion by the Trump Campaign with Russia is a lifelong Republican, previously appointed by a Republican President to head the FBI, and appointed as Special Prosecutor by another lifelong Republican, who was in turn appointed by Trump himself.
Christopher Wray.
I previously discussed some of FBI Director Wray’s bio. Wray, is a registered Republican. He has donated tens of thousands to Republican candidates over the years. He represented New Jersey Governor Chris Christie in the “Bridgegate” scandal.
Wray was originally nominated to an Attorney General position by George W. Bush where he was unanimously confirmed by the Senate.
Wray was Trump’s hand picked man to be Director of the FBI after Trump fired James Comey. In a statement announcing the nomination Trump told the American people:
“I am proud to announce Christopher as my choice as the director of the FBI. He is an impeccably qualified individual, and I know that he will again serve his country as a fierce guardian of the law and model of integrity once the Senate confirms him to lead the FBI.”
This is what Trump himself tweeted upon nominating him.
Ironically, the White House declared that Trump was confident Wray would be among those leading the charge against the deep state.
Wray was confirmed by at 92–5 vote. Once again all the nay votes were Democrats.
Now Trump is declaring that Wray is the top leadership of an organization where “the top Leadership and Investigators of the FBI and the Justice Department have politicized the sacred investigative process in favor of Democrats and against Republicans.”
Once again, the gullibles have plenty of sources, other than Trump, to “confirm” this in their own minds. Newt Gingrich announced that Christopher Wray is “an example of the deep state” who is in “open rebellion” against the President. Our old friends at True Pundit advised the gullibles that “FBI Director Turns Toward Deep State.” True Pundit quoted a conveniently unnamed Congressman as supposedly saying that “we think somebody threatened him, got to him.” The reliably looney Infowars declared Trump’s appointee “A Deep State Operative.”
Once again, I could continue. This dishonest, frankly lunatic stuff, is echoed by the President of the United States. You might wonder how anyone could possibly lack the critical thinking skills that would reject this nonsense. There are several answers.
First, the people believing this stuff believe the “mainstream media” (MSM) is part of the conspiracy. So they don’t get their facts from CNN or other reliable sources. They get their stuff from some of the sources we’ve seen above, American Thinker, True Pundit and InfoWars. Their closest thing to a MSM would be Fox News, chosen because it confirms their biases.
Second, think about it. These people already voted for a President who:
- First achieved political notoriety by advocating Birtherism.
- Even suggested the plane crash that killed a doctor who certified Obama’s birth certificate was actually murder.
- Claims Ted Cruz’s father was in on the JFK assassination.
- Claimed the CDC is lying to us about Ebola. If he’d been President that lunacy would have killed two Americans for no reason.
- Claimed doctors are lying to us about the safety of vaccines.
- Claimed global warming was a commie plot made up the Chinese to make the U.S. non-competitive.
There’s actually a lot more than that. Let’s just say that Trump’s supporters are prone to accepting loopy conspiracy theories. The bottom line is that those who support Trump can find reinforcement for patently untrue claims in the finite bowels of the internet and believe it true simply because they want it to be true.
There is considerable concern the President is leading this campaign to kill Mueller’s Russia collusion investigation, even at the risk of a Constitutional crisis. His supporters have already bought into backing Trump on that.
There must be some reason for this campaign of lies. If these three men are part of the supposed Deep State, Trump put them there.
