THE INFALLIBLE FBI

                                  
                                                            BY BILL JUNEAU
                         
                        In the past four years, the FBI's reputation for excellence has gotten a bit tarnished.  In 2018, it was the school shooting in Parkland, Florida, which revealed that the world's most efficient police department was not above committing egregious acts of negligence that triggered disastrous results. 
                       On top of the Parkland debacle, the a-Political FBI which ideally always follows the evidence, and prides itself in never favoring one side over the other, did the unimaginable. It abandoned its cloak of neutrality and climbed into bed with Democrats and participated in an effort to take down and destroy the nation's duly elected 45th President, Donald Trump....and it got caught.
                        But this is a new day, and the FBI says that the past is the past. The 112-year old Bureau is said to be up and running again  under Director Christopher Wray, appointed by President Trump in  July 2017;  and Wray has promised that reforms are being implemented. 
                        The Parkland, Florida, school shooting happened on a balmy February 14th, 2018,  Valentine's Day, when 19-year-old Nicholas Cruz turned his assault rifle on  teenagers on the second floor of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High school.  His gunfire killed sixteen students and an assistant football coach and security guard.  
                         Cruz scampered from the school following the slaughter, went to a nearby fast food restaurant, had a hamburger and was arrested a few hours later, offering no resistance. 
                         Parents were broken with grief and news of the school massacre swept the nation and the world.  How did this happen?  Could it have been prevented?  Wasn't Cruz a known troublemaker and a disturbed youth? The sad story of  how the FBI functioned more like the Keystone cops than as the foremost police department on the planet rolled out for all to see.
                         On September 25, five months prior  to the shooting, the FBI received an email tip in the form of a posting on You Tube in which the user identified himself as "Nickolas Cruz" and said that,  "I'm going to be a professional school shooter."  Agents opened a file, but apparently that's all they did.    
                                 As the explanatory story was later told, the  agents  concluded that the "Nickolas Cruz" that had posted on U Tube could not be located.  That alibi seemed ridiculous, since inquiries around south Florida very likely would have produced  "Nicholas Cruz," a troublemaker with a very thick file in the hands of the Broward County Sheriff's office and who had been expelled from Stoneman Douglas school for disciplinary reasons. 
                                On January 5, a mere six weeks before Cruz implemented his plans to be a "professional school shooter,"the FBI received a telephone message from a caller who said he was a person "close to Nicholas Cruz" and that Cruz  had a "desire to kill people" and the caller said that he was worried about the "potential of him conducting a school shooting."                                   .
                                  The caller identified himself to the FBI, according to allegations contained in lawsuits, and said that "Cruz stockpiled weapons and hurt animals."  The informant even provided the address and telephone number of where Cruz was living in Parkland. With that information, it was alleged in court  documents, an FBI agent consulted with a supervisor and the matter was then  "closed" without any further action.
                                  After the shootings and the incredible negligence  of the FBI was exposed, apologies came from then Attorney General Jeff Sessions and FBI Director Christopher Wray.  Former Florida Gov. Rick Scott, now U.S. Senator Scott, demanded that Director Wray resign. 
                                 Deputy FBI Director David Bodich provided the following response to the Parkland debacle:  
                         "Under established protocols, the information provided by the callers should have been assessed as a potential threat to life...and the tip should have been forwarded to the Miami 
field office.  We clearly should have done more." 
                                  In the Parkland case, the FBI's sin was one of gross negligence, but that was not the case in a national controversy generated by the campaign and election of Donald Trump in 2016. That was all politics.  FBI Director James Comey and his deputy, Andrew McCabe, were rooting for Hillary Clinton to become President, and they did what they could to make it happen.  
                                 Pushed and arranged by Comey, Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller was appointed by Congress to investigate the President's make believe "collusion" with Russia.  Twenty two months later, at a cost of $33 million, Mueller reported there was no "collusion" and he exonerated Trump of all wrongdoing. 
                                 An Inspector General investigation revealed that Comey approved phony petitions which were filed under oath with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance court (FISA), and that warrants were obtained for spying on a a member of the Trump team.  Subsequently, FBI  lawyer, Kevin Clinesmith was arrested and confessed to altering documents relied upon by that court. 
                                Agent Peter Strzok, a lead investigator for Comey, illegally tapped into a phone conversation between General Michael Flynn, Trump's NSA chief, and a Russian ambassador. The conversation was labeled "legit," and professional, but Strzok interviewed Flynn and had him arrested for "lying" to to the FBI.                                    Earlier this year, Attorney General William Barr canceled the prosecution saying that Gen. Flynn, a retired three star general, had been "set up." Barr's decision to non-suit the prosecution was objected to by the judge hearing the case, and appellate review of the matter is currently underway.  
                            Comey, McCabe, Peter Strzok and Strzok's in house girl friend, Lisa Page have been fired, and others answering to Comey have resigned and grabbed their pensions.  McCabe also has been accused of lying to investigators, but so far has avoided prosecution.  One FBI lawyer has been convicted of altering documents, and awaits sentencing.  
                           Investigations into the Democrat controlled attack upon President Trump are continuing by U.S. Attorney John Durham and by the U.S. Senate Judiciary committee.  
                          South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham,  committee chairman, said recently in an interview that he would be very "surprised, if there are not more arrests coming from the Durham investigation."    
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