Thoughts About James Comey

I don’t want to read James Comey’s new book, “A Higher Loyalty”.  I’m not sure I need to after watching him be interviewed day after day.  I think I’ve formed an opinion of him.  And I find that I am truly ambivalent when it comes to him.I wasn’t all that angry at Comey when he first announced that he was reopening the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails just days before the election.  I really thought that he must have had a very good reason and that perhaps the FBI was going to actually find something.  I was disappointed for Hillary, but thought the truth needed to come out.  And then it turned out to be nothing.

That was when I got angry.  In truth, I was more angry with Bill Clinton and Loretta Lynch for creating the circumstances that put Comey in charge. Remember that conversation on the airport tarmac?  How stupid they were to allow an appearance of impropriety.  It set the stage for Comey to break with protocol, making public the investigation just days before an election.  I couldn’t believe he had done such a thing.  Not everyone watches the news everyday and some people would continue to think that Hillary had done something illegal.  Then the election happened and I realized that this man had just handed the election over to someone we already knew was an actual crook.

It is accurate to say that I wasn’t thrilled with the last two choices for president in 2016.  I liked Bernie and O’Malley and even Kasich over Hillary and Donald.  But none of them were on the final ballot.  So, I voted for Hillary and was devastated when Trump won.  I wouldn’t have been thrilled that Hillary won, but she was heads and shoulders more qualified and sane than Trump.

I actually went into mourning.  And now we are again dealing with the most stressful public upheaval since Civil Rights and Vietnam.  While I blame  Comey ‘s poor judgement for giving us Donald Trump, I also believe Comey is an honorable and honest person.  I believe him when he says that he thought Hillary was going to win and that he was protecting Hillary from possibly facing scandal after she was elected, but what about Donald?  It turns out that Trump was also under investigation but Comey didn’t disclose that.  He placed his hands on the scale of this presidential election and we all lost.

Now we have this unbelievably horrible  president who is riddled with more scandals than anyone ever thought possible.  But Comey had to know that if Trump was elected, this would happen since he knew Trump was also under investigation.  So here we are, left to deal with a different scandal  front and center every day.  In the midst of it all, Comey was fired because he rightly wouldn’t be loyal to this corrupt president and do his bidding.  It’s hard for me to feel sorry for Comey when we are dealing with the daily stressors of having Trump as president because of him.  I wonder how much he must regret his decision to publically announce the reopening of the Hillary email investigation, breaking protocol to do it.  I wonder how much he regrets the double standard of not revealing that Trump was also under investigation.

I’ve heard all the reasons he gives for his actions and I understand them. I  think he misjudged the situation.  But we are collectively living with the consequences of his poor judgement and so is he.  He is obviously angry over being fired and wants to defend his actions.  But I don’t want to read about it.  Perhaps if I wasn’t so distressed by the current situation, I might forgive Comey and purchase his book.  I guess there is a part of me that refuses to reward his poor judgement.