Robert Mueller, a conservative Republican, had an unblemished record as a marine and earned both the Bronze Star and the Purple Heart for his heroism in Vietnam. Later in his illustrious career, he served as director of the FBI for longer than anybody other than J. Edgar Hoover.
As special counsel appointed by this administration’s Justice Department, he is doing what an ethical, professional prosecutor should do—he is keeping his mouth shut. He has issued no comments since the investigation began a little over a year ago. What his office has to say will be done in a court of law and in a report to congress, not in the press.
Would that it were so for everybody else, especially Trump and his cohorts. Recently there has been a constant drumbeat that the president is the victim of a “witch hunt.” Giuliani, Trump’s most recent attorney, seems downright giddy now that he is back in front of the cameras, and leads the chorus attacking the investigation—and thereby Mueller by implication.
As is all too often the case with Trump, he believes everything is about him, and so Trump repeats ad nauseam that he is not guilty of collusion with the Russians, even though nobody conducting the investigation has said anything to the contrary.
The mandate of the special counsel is clear—investigate “any links and/or coordination between the Russian government and individuals (i) associated with the campaign of President Donald Trump; and (ii) any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation.”
Nowhere in the mandate does the word “collusion” appear, nor does the mandate specifically call for an investigation of the president. Trump’s constant self-serving declarations of innocence call to mind “The lady doth protest too much, methinks,” from Shakespeare’s “Hamlet.”
This investigation is of critical importance. Our intelligence services unanimously concluded that Russia, our most significant adversary since the conclusion of World War II, interfered with our presidential election with the intent of helping Donald Trump. The Senate Intelligence Committee, controlled by Republicans, recently issued a report confirming this conclusion.
It is high time for all of us to get off the field and return to our respective dugouts. Let the investigation proceed without obstruction and let Special Counsel Mueller do his job. Let us not prejudge the results and let us keep an open mind. Our country deserves nothing less.