Bear with me, but this is tough to take.

Our new Acting-Director of National Intelligence, John Ratcliffe (R-TX), is a man so inept that Graham and McConnell nixed him from consideration the last time this job was open. Why he is satisfactory now might be indicative of just how thoroughly Trump has overtaken the GOP. On the day prior to starting his duties at DNI, Ratcliffe – who has no experience in intelligence – decided to spend his time at CPAC even though the Director of National Intelligence job is supposed to be one of the least partisan jobs in the federal government.

At CPAC, Ratcliffe was “quite partisan,” to say the least. He spoke during a discussion entitled: “The Coup: Impeachment—Hyped Slimes and Nancy’s Schemer.” The constitutional remedy known as “impeachment,” cannot be a “coup” since it would have left Mike Pence as president and happens to be – again – in the constitution. “Hyped slimes” we could take to mean the accusations against Trump, though it couldn’t have been all that “hyped” since they didn’t want any testimony or evidence to come in. They construe anything against Trump to be slimy, so that is a given. Your guess is as good as mine was to the definition of “Nancy’s Schemer” because it didn’t come up according to Right Wing Watch, but it was important to put in the title, and so we did, too.

The moderator asked Ratcliffe – a man, again, who is supposed to be the Director of National Intelligence, not the Director of Republican intelligence – if the Democrats had “learned their lesson” during the impeachment process:

“And they haven’t learned a lesson,” Ratcliffe said of the Democrats, “despite the fact that throughout this process … whether it’s the Russia hoax or the Ukraine hoax—in every instance, the president’s been right. The president’s been the one that’s been telling the truth with respect to what’s happening.”

Ratcliffe did not go on to say, “And my job is to sit and talk about how right the president always is!” but he clearly could have.

The president is the one who is telling the truth? The president is that guy that wouldn’t allow anyone in the room with firsthand knowledge to testify. He wouldn’t let Mulvaney testify, nor Bolton, nor his lawyer who happened to be a key witness and an impeachment defense attorney, a Trump White House two-fer.

Similar to “the Russian hoax,” the thing that Democrats “learned” again is that Trump will do all he can to keep the facts from getting out. Many on his staff lied about their affairs with Russia, and many were not allowed to testify concerning Ukraine.

But much more concerningly, as we’ve noted throughout this piece, the DNI is supposed to be a guy who gathers intelligence for the United States, to present to the president, to review and analyze. It is not supposed to be molded to fit any one side’s pre-determined prism. If Ratcliffe hears some inconvenient truths, it is not his job to cover it up or write it off as Democrats “not learning their lessons.”

He sounds like he’s planning on being quite partisan:

Ratcliffe also took aim at the intelligence community he has been nominated to lead, saying that Trump was correct to complain of the actions of the FBI and the Department of Justice regarding surveillance that revealed contacts between the Trump campaign and agents of the Russian Federation government.

“President Trump was right when the law enforcement community and the intelligence community didn’t get it right on all of those respects,” Ratcliffe said.

No! Trump said he was wire tapped, he said it was politically motivated, he said it was all a hoax against him. He was not “right” about it. This is the second investigation which found errors – 17 of them – but they did not find a wiretap, or that the campaign was spied-upon, nor any politically motivated vendetta against him. He might want to cut down on his conversations with Russians, since that is what always seems to get him in trouble. Our intelligence people do watch them.

The very fact that Trump named Ratcliffe to this position says a great deal about what matters to Trump. He is far more comfortable with a guy who will participate in a talk entitled “Something something and Nancy’s Schemer!” than he is having a retired 3-4 star military officer (like the one he fired) who tells him the truth.

We are learning lessons, over and over. He hasn’t changed, nor will he.

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Peace, y’all

Jason

[email protected] and on Twitter @MiciakZoom