John McCain lived a full life and had a storied career. It’s a shame he will be remembered for being part of a conspiracy to try to destroy a Republican candidate and ultimately President of the United States with Russian disinformation.
It was no secret that the two men disliked each other intensely. The animus is said to have begun in 1999 when Trump questioned McCain being a hero solely for being captured. I think that was harsh and unfair but that’s Trump. McCain did repay the kindness and then some.
McCain blocked repeal of Obamacare.
McCain became far more critical of Trump than he ever was of Obama
“Flattery secures his friendship, criticism his enmity,” McCain reportedly wrote, according to excerpts reviewed by the media. “It is hard to know what to expect from President Trump, what’s a pose, what’s legitimate.”
McCain also darkly hinted
“I’m being very nice. I’m being very, very nice. But at some point I fight back, and it won’t be pretty,”
It wasn’t.
The New Yorker published an article that asked:
How Far Will John McCain Go Against President Trump?
We know now just how far. McCain would actively participate in the Russian collusion conspiracy. After the FBI dropped Christopher Steele, John McCain was the courier delivering Steele’s Russian disinformation to James Comey
Late Senator John McCain provided disgraced former FBI chief James Comey with five separate reports from Christopher Steele that the FBI didn’t previously possess related to unsubstantiated allegations of collusion between Russia and President Trump’s 2016 campaign, the Justice Department’s recent Inspector General report revealed.
There have long been questions about why it was necessary for McCain to pass Steele’s anti-Trump dossier to Comey on December 9, 2016, several weeks after the November 2016 presidential election. By then, Steele had already met numerous times with FBI agents to provide them with his controversial reports. Steele, however, was terminated as an FBI source in the fall of 2016 because he spoke to the news media.
The IG report discloses that McCain gave five new Steele reports to Comey that the FBI did not previously possess, showing that McCain served as a conduit for Steele’s information to reach the FBI even after the British ex-spy was formally cut off as an FBI source.
It is not clear whether McCain knew at the time that Steele had previously been terminated as an FBI source.
The IG report also verifies that a McCain aid obtained the Steele reports directly from Fusion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson, meaning that when McCain transferred the anti-Trump charges to Comey he had to have known that the material originated with a firm that specializes in controversial opposition tactics.
From the IG Report:
Several weeks later, on December 9, 2016, Senator John McCain provided Comney with a collection of 16 Steele election reports, 5 of which Steele had not given the FBI. McCain had obtained these reports from a staff member at the McCain Institute. The McCain Institute staff member had met with Steele and later acquired the reports from Simpson.
That McCain staff member was David Kramer, who would be the person to leak the dossier to Buzzfeed.
The dossier is in tatters. Virtually all of it has been debunked, which makes McCain’s later words worse:
In his book published last year, McCain maintained he had an “obligation” to pass the dossier charges against Trump to Comey and he would even do it again. “Anyone who doesn’t like it can go to hell,” McCain exclaimed.
If only McCain could have shown that same fire and motivation in his campaign against Barack Obama in 2008 instead of simply knuckling under and surrendering. He might have saved this country from Obama. He didn’t, but he did his best to stop Trump using Russian disinformation. Sadly, this is how McCain will be remembered
DrJohn has been a health care professional for more than 30 years. In addition to clinical practice he has done extensive research and has published widely with over 70 original articles and abstracts in the peer-reviewed literature. DrJohn is well known in his field and has lectured on every continent except for Antarctica. He has been married to the same wonderful lady for over 30 years and has three kids- two sons, both of whom are attorneys and one daughter on her way into the field of education.
DrJohn was brought up with the concept that one can do well if one is prepared to work hard but nothing in life is guaranteed.
Except for liberals being foolish.