Proof Of Collusion, The Fallout, GOP Betrayal

by Gary Bauer

by Gary Bauer, Contributing Author: Proof Of Collusion - Finally, we have proof of campaign collusion with Russia! The only problem is that it is the wrong campaign, according to the left-wing media's narrative.

The Washington Post broke the story last night that Marc Elias, an attorney connected to Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign and the Democrat National Committee, hired Fusion GPS and former British spy Christopher Steele last April to produce the so-called "dirty dossier" on Donald Trump.

Here are some key points you need to understand:

• We don't know how much Elias paid for the dossier, but we do know that the Clinton campaign and the DNC paid his law firm more than $9 million.
• Former FBI Director James Comey described the dossier as "salacious and unverified." The Post writes that many of the dossier's details "have not been verified and may never be."
• According to various reports, some of Steele's sources were Russians, including "a senior Russian foreign ministry figure" and "a former top intelligence officer still active in the Kremlin." So in their attempts to dig up dirt on Trump, the Democrats were colluding with Russians.
• Keep in mind that we just learned about a major Russian bribery scheme aimed at influencing the Clinton Foundation and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
• There have been persistent rumors that the dossier began with an unknown GOP donor. That is a plausible theory given the GOP establishment's vehement opposition to Trump, but it has weaknesses.
• We also know that there was another potential donor -- the Obama/Comey FBI. Senator Charles Grassley, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has been demanding answers for months about the FBI's relationship with Christopher Steele.
• Steele, a paid Clinton operative, shared his "oppo research" with the Obama FBI, which it used to launch investigations of associates connected to the Republican presidential nominee. This makes Watergate look like child's play!
• Moreover, President-elect Trump reportedly felt that then-Director Comey tried to threaten him with the dossier.
• Somehow, the dossier was leaked to various reporters, but it was never published until this year, well after the election.

The Fallout - The fallout from last night's bombshell report is intense as the left is at war with itself. The Democrat National Committee was quick to issue a press release distancing its current leadership from those who participated in this smear campaign.

But some Clinton operatives are doubling down on their dirty deeds. In a tweet storm last night, former Clinton spokesman Brian Fallon defended the dossier as "money well spent," adding that while he never knew about Steele or the dossier, if he had, "I would have volunteered to go to Europe and try to help him" dig up dirt.

New York Times reporters were all over this story for months, but Marc Elias and others "vigorously" lied to them, and lied "with sanctimony." Now these journalists are furious that they trusted liberal hacks.

Really? How could anyone be surprised that Clinton loyalists lied? Let's not forget that Bill Clinton was impeached for perjury and obstruction of justice. And Hillary has had her own troubles with the truth, including the concocted narrative within 24 hours of her loss that Russia cost her the election.

Last night's revelation is a victory for House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA). It was his subpoena of Fusion GPS' bank records that forced this disclosure. And it is giving renewed impetus for various congressional investigations into the activities of the Obama Justice Department.

Here's the bottom line: The Washington Post has confirmed what we suspected all along -- that the Russian collusion delusion was nothing more than bought-and-paid-for dirty campaign tricks. Yet, the left-wing media and overzealous bureaucrats swallowed it hook, line and sinker and used it to divide the country.

Desperate to delegitimize the Trump presidency, they have hammered this narrative day after day. It triggered an incredible chain of events, eventually leading to the appointment of a special counsel, who is still on the loose investigating who knows what.

GOP Betrayal - Republican Senators Jeff Flake (AZ) and Bob Corker (TN) have been making headlines this week, too. They have been fighting President Trump with a passion rarely seen by any Republican senator in the past eight years.

One thing that struck me throughout the 2016 GOP primaries were the repeated exit polls finding that huge percentages of Republican voters felt "betrayed" by the GOP. Bob Corker and Jeff Flake are two leading examples of why there is such grassroots frustration.

Politicians such as Corker and Flake are why the left always succeeds in pushing its agenda while so little gets done when the GOP is in charge. As one supporter emailed me this morning, "Hey, snowFlakes. . . Put a Corker in it!"

As most of you know, I began my political career with Ronald Reagan. And day after day, I watched high-ranking, respected members of the Republican Party working to undermine Reagan's agenda.

The story then was that Reagan was an affable buffoon. Today, the story is that Trump is a mean buffoon. But it's the same story. Too many in the GOP establishment are perfectly happy to make big government bigger, perfectly happy to fight the conservative agenda.

In 1980, they were so mortified when Reagan came along that they tried to force Gerald Ford on him at the RNC convention as a "co-president." When that failed, a Midwestern Republican congressman ran as an independent candidate in the general election, trying to throw the race to Jimmy Carter.

Well, here we go again. The rhetoric Corker and Flake are using against Trump is meaner than anything they ever said while Barack Obama and the left attacked everything we hold dear.

Where was their outrage when Obama and unelected judges redefined marriage?

Where was there outrage when Obama was undermining police officers and stoking racial discord?

Where was their outage when Obama was attacking the Little Sisters of the Poor and threatening religious liberty?

Both men have made comments in recent days suggesting that Trump might bungle his way into a war.

Well, Bob Corker refused to enforce the Constitution's treaty clause and, as a result, ensured the survival of Obama's disastrous nuclear deal with Iran.

What about Flake? He's a big free trader and a proud globalist. He wanted to vote for Obama's Iran deal. Those of us opposed to the deal talked to him many times, and it was clear what direction he was headed. It was only after several organizations started running ads in Arizona against the deal that he finally came down against it.

Sen. Flake's Senate seat was widely considered to be "at risk" before he said anything this week. He has a dismal approval rating. If anything, he has done the party a favor by stepping aside for a more viable candidate.

Corker knew that discontent in Tennessee was so high that he too could have easily lost a primary. There is a decent chance that both of these senators will be replaced by solid conservative populists.
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Gary Bauer is a conservative family values advocate and serves as president of American Values and chairman of the Campaign for Working Families

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