The calendar says 2023 but it feels more like George Orwell’s 1984. Orwell’s novel envisioned a dystopian future in which we lived in an autocracy overseen by “Big Brother.” If the state proclaimed that 2+2=5, then that was the Truth according to the Orwellian Ministry of Truth.
In 2016, evidence emerged suggesting that Russia was interfering with the presidential election on behalf of Trump. This prompted the FBI to begin an investigation.
That investigation culminated with the Mueller Report, which detailed more than 140 contacts between Russian operatives and the Trump campaign as well as 10 instances in which Trump obstructed justice.
Trump was not indicted due to a long-standing Department of Justice policy that prohibited indictment of a sitting president. Trump termed the Mueller investigation the “Russia Hoax” and “Crime of the Century.”
Trump argued the investigation into Russia’s meddling in our elections was a “Deep State” plot.
In 2019, Trump instructed his sycophantic attorney general to open an investigation of those who dared to investigate Trump. That investigation, led by John Durham, has finally issued a report.
Durham’s report didn’t find anything to support Trump’s claims. In fact, Durham provided nothing whatsoever that hadn’t already been revealed in a 2019 report by the DOJ inspector general.
The only “substantive” claim by Durham was his opinion that the evidence warranted a preliminary rather than full investigation. This is a distinction without a difference as it would have had absolutely no impact on the investigation of Russian interference on behalf of Trump.
Naturally, Trump and his cult followers claimed Durham had completely exonerated him. This is total nonsense.
Nevada Republican Jim Marchant, a 2024 U.S. Senate candidate, suggested the military should intervene in the upcoming elections if the results didn’t go his way.
U.S. Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Alabama), who recently claimed that white nationalists are simply Trump supporters, was so upset by the Durham Report that he proclaimed: “If people don’t go to jail for this, the American people should just stand up and say, ‘Listen, enough’s enough, let’s don’t have elections anymore.’”
Durham didn’t suggest that anyone should go to jail. The so-called “election crimes” committed by those investigating Russia’s interference in our 2016 election were nonexistent.
But, in Trump’s world, up is down, black is white, round is square, and imaginary crimes are real. Clearly, we are now living in Orwell’s 1984.
