Article by Larry O'Connor in Townhall
Obama Could Have United Us with What He Knew About Hillary, Instead He Divided Us Further
He didn't have to stay silent. He could have told us all that he knew, and if he had, he would have finally become the uniter he claims to be. But he didn't.
President Barack Obama could have addressed the American people in November 2016 and said:
"My fellow Americans, we have just gone through a tumultuous and unprecedented election. I supported and campaigned for Secretary Clinton and opposed Donald Trump's campaign with every ounce of my soul, and we lost. It hurts. But that's how things go in our great Democratic Republic.
"Now, I have been hearing news reports that Mr. Trump's campaign worked covertly with a foreign country to meddle in our election and therefore won this election through criminal activity and is not a legitimate president.
"That is not true. In fact, the evidence that we have seen suggests that these reports are actually fabricated as a part of Mrs. Clinton's opposition research campaign. Let me repeat, there is no evidence of the Trump campaign colluding with Russia, and the suggestion that there is evidence of such behavior was fabricated by Mrs. Clinton.
"I am instructing Attorney General Loretta Lynch to recuse herself and have asked President-Elect Trump to join me in asking for an independent counsel to investigate whether Mrs. Clinton, members of her campaign, or anyone in my administration may have violated the law.
"Our country deserves no less.
"Now, we must move on, together, and we Democrats have to learn some lessons and live to fight another day.
"Donald Trump is the president-elect, and I call on Mrs. Clinton, members of my administration, and all Americans to put this election behind us and unite behind him as our legitimate president."
In May, I used this space at Townhall Media to ask an important question: What did President Obama know about the plot to investigate, surveil and frame the Trump campaign (and later the Trump presidency), and when did he know it?
Today, we have a much clearer answer to that question.
As Katie Pavlich reported here last night, former CIA Director John Brennan personally briefed Obama in late July 2016, right in the middle of the presidential campaign, about Hillary Clinton's scheme to falsely accuse Trump of criminally colluding with Russia.
Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe on Tuesday declassified documents that revealed former CIA Director John Brennan briefed former President Obama on Hillary Clinton’s purported “plan” to tie then-candidate, Donald Trump, to Russia as “a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server” ahead of the 2016 presidential election, Fox News has learned.
Ratcliffe declassified Brennan’s handwritten notes – which were taken after he briefed Obama on the intelligence the CIA received – and a CIA memo, which revealed that officials referred the matter to the FBI for potential investigative action.
...
"CITE [summarizing] alleged approved by Hillary Clinton a proposal from one of her foreign policy advisers to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by the Russian security service,” Brennan’s notes read.
It's clear. This was days before James Comey's FBI began its unprecedented counterintelligence investigation into the Trump campaign, apparently based on the Clinton campaign scheme Obama had been briefed on.
From that point forward, through the entire campaign, Obama knew that all the accusations and leaks and "Breaking Exclusive" reports about Russian collusion were nothing more than another dirty campaign trick from the dirtiest of politicians, Hillary Clinton.
Maybe it was the odious Sid Blumenthal who dreamed up the plot. Obama knew what a problem this guy was; he blocked him from a job in the State Department under Hillary Clinton in his first term. Maybe Blumenthal was the one who convinced Hillary to start the whole "birther" thing in the 2008 primaries and Obama hated him for it.
Regardless, Obama knew.
He remained silent all through the campaign when Hillary and her well-paid minions at Fusion GPS planted stories in the media accusing Trump of working with Putin to hack the DNC and meddle in the election. He knew and said nothing.
OK. It was an election. He was the sitting president, and he clearly had a vested interest in the outcome. Maybe he thought he should just keep his mouth shut and let things play out.
As so many of us have been wondering why Obama did nothing to stop Russia from meddling in the election in 2016, perhaps the real answer is because he figured it was all Clinton's dirty trick Brennan had briefed him on.
Who knows?
What we do know is what Obama could have done and what he refused to do after the election.
After the election, Obama knew Trump had won fair and square and without any meddling from Russia. He knew it as early as July.
And he still stayed silent.
The reprehensible "Russian Collusion" accusations began in the media (planted by Clinton and members of Obama's Administration), and he knew none of it was true.
And we were divided like never before. And we remain divided.
Now we know what Obama knew and when he knew it. And we know what he chose to do.
He chose to divide us.
