In Blowout Poll, Majority of Americans Say Pull Comey, Brennan Sec. Clearances
Former CIA Director John Brennan frequently uses his social media accounts to call the president a “traitor” — a crime which, by the way, is punishable by death.
Former FBI Director James Comey is less incendiary but more flaky, always touted as the voice of reason until it turns out that very little of what he says is actually true.
Oh yeah, and he’s spent an inordinate amount of time thinking about the existence of the Trump “pee tapes,” for which as much evidence actually exists as for that tape from “The Ring,” or for people who’ve actually read Hillary Clinton’s “What Happened” all the way through without laughing.
President Donald Trump had long floated removing security clearances from both men, neither of whom is in government any longer, before he finally did it with Brennan. This was met with the kind of outrage in the media usually reserved for, say — well, anything else Trump does.
Needless to say, the American people are similarly apoplectic, demanding that these two fine Americans retain … oh, wait, what’s that? No, I’m sorry, I just got a message through my rhetorical earpiece that they don’t care one bit.
“The majority of U.S. voters believe that former CIA Director John Brennan and former FBI Director James Comey should have their security clearances revoked,” The Hill reported Monday, citing a Harvard CAPS/Harris Poll.
“The survey showed 59 percent of registered voters felt Brennan should have lost his security clearance, while 64 percent said Comey and others at the FBI who were fired or demoted over their actions should lose their clearance.
“Overall, 60 percent of registered voters said they believed that former national security officials who become consultants and TV news contributors should give up their national security clearances.”
That’s pretty cut-and-dried.
I mean, the only thing that liberals can possibly take any sort of solace from in this poll is that more people think Comey should lose his clearance than Brennan. That means they aren’t informed about how unstable Brennan really is.
What was interesting was the takeaway by Harvard CAPS/Harris Poll co-director Mark Penn.
“An overwhelming majority of the public thinks that former officials should lose their security clearance, and believe that former officials like Brennan and Comey should no longer have any clearance,” Penn said, according to The Hill.
“There would definitely be support for a wholesale policy revoking their clearances.”
I find it funny that at least one political observer sees huge majorities of Americans thinking James Comey, John Brennan, and other figures who became pundits or consultants should give up their security clearance as evidence of support for a blanket policy that all former officials should give up clearance.
This after the national mainstream media trotted out intelligence expert after intelligence expert on TV fuming about the mere possibility of this.
In the case of pundits and consultants, there’s a clear potential for conflict of interest. In the cases of Comey and Berennan, the conflict of interest is a reality.
As The Hill report notes, Comey just recently wrote a memoir in which he remarked on how orange the president’s skin was and how small his hands were. Brennan, meanwhile, has constantly used his Twitter feed as a sort of in-kind contribution to the Democrat Party.
Both have forfeited the assumption of good faith that stands behind the government allowing former officials to keep their security clearances on the grounds that the access might make them helpful to the United States even after their government service.
And the American people know it.
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