Why firing FBI chief will spell disaster for President Trump
"While I greatly appreciate you informing me, on three separate occasions, that I am not under investigation, I nevertheless concur with the judgment of the department of justice that you are not able to effectively lead the bureau."
That’s from the letter Donald J Trump, US President sent to James Comey, firing the FBI director who was reportedly conducting an investigation into the Russia-Trump campaign connections.
In the backdrop of the firing of Michael Flynn, national security adviser to the Trump administration, it is truly a stunning development of epochal proportions, causing convulsions in Washington and beyond.
While the White House was unable to identify/confirm the “three separate occasions", evading a response, they claimed that the "firing" had to do with Comey mishandling of the Hilary Clinton e-mail issue. The tone of Trump's letter when allied with the Clinton e-mail affair makes it evident that Comey was getting "darned close" to treading on Trump’s shoes and Trump had to move in quickly.
And boy, he has moved so fast that even Comey came to know of his "firing" from a ticker tape running on the idiot box, even as he was addressing FBI officials.
Two close parallels could be drawn from this midnight mauling of the rule of law. One, the Saturday Night Massacre" that refers to US president Richard Nixon's orders to fire independent counsel special prosecutor Archibald Cox, which led to the resignations of attorney general Elliot Richardson and deputy attorney general William Ruckleshaus on October 20, 1973, during the Watergate scandal, leading to the run on the corrupt administration and the eventual fall of Nixon, who famously proclaimed, “I am not a crook.”
The night he was fired, Cox gave an impassioned news conference during which he said: "Whether ours shall continue to be a government of laws and not of men is now for Congress and ultimately the American people [to decide]."
The second parallel, closer home, was when the saintly Jayaprakash Narayan, on being told of his arrest consequent to the proclamation of Emergency on June 26, 1975 and the suspension of fundamental rights, said, "Vinaash kaale vipreet buddhi (when one's destruction time is soon to arrive, one thinks unintelligently or negatively)."
That brings us to Allan Lichtman, American political historian who teaches at American University in Washington DC, who had predicted the Trump win against all odds, polls and widespread expectation the world over in the 2016 US presidential elections.
His prediction stuck out like a sore thumb and was ridiculed for going against "popular wisdom". He, who had predicted every presidential election since 1984 was insistent that his research, based on his "two century study", would be spot on. So, he proved.
Now, on April 10, 2017, Lichtman has told Time magazine that his new book Case for Impeachment making a second prediction on the Trump administration had the "solid backing of logic" that Trump would not complete his term.
Trump he says would be impeached and Mike Pence, his vice-president would take over and complete the term.
One had read that upon declaration of the results of the electoral college win against the loss of popular vote, Trump sent a thank you card to Lichtman inviting him to the White House after inauguration.
Now, with the Lichtman second prediction and the Comey Tuesday Night Massacre — rest assured Lichtman would be persona non grata at the White House.
Even if Trump comes up with an impeccable replacement, the downhill appears to have begun too fast even in the chaotic first 100 days of Trump presidency.
Perception they say is reality. The suppression of Income Tax returns of Trump — unlike the past presidents for several decades — along with the firing of Comey, who was looking into the "Russian connections", would suffice to constitute credible proof in the Bar of Public Opinion, that Trump has and had a lot to hide.
Nonstop nonsense and it may be entertaining for late night shows — but Trump who dropped the Mother of All Bombs (MOAB) in Afghanistan — the world, better take notice, has the nuclear code at his command as if a Twitter handle.