'More than stupidity': Analyst claims Comer was willing to use Russian lies against Biden
House Oversight Chair James Comer's seeming lack of embarrassment after his key witness in the drive to impeach President Joe Biden turned out to be a now-accused liar who the Department of Justice claims was a pipeline for Russian disinformation suggests he knew what he was doing, an analyst wrote Thursday.
With Kentucky Republican Comer joining Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) in an attempt to blow off concerns that they had been duped — and argue they still have a strong case against Biden — fellow lawmaker Rep Dan Goldman (D-NY) suggested the two are more than willing to use Russian propaganda as a political tool in their war with Democrats.
In her column for Salon, political analyst Amanda Marcotte cited Goldman, stating, "Wittingly or unwittingly, House Republicans have been acting as an agent or an asset of Russian intelligence for Vladimir Putin." She singled out his use of the word "wittingly."
As she wrote, it would be easy to agree with, for example, MSNBC's "Morning Joe" hosts calling Comer and Jordan "morons" who got played — but there is evidence suggesting they knew exactly what they were doing.
Writing "more than stupidity" was in play, she first singled out fired Fox News personality Tucker Carlson, who has been over in Russia boosting President Vladimir Putin's leadership skills.
Writing, "Carlson was called a "useful idiot" by many observers, a phrasing that suggests he might have been sincerely confused about whether an expensive neighborhood in Moscow was representative of the entire nation. A far more likely explanation is that Carlson is just lying. We know from Dominion's successful lawsuit against Fox News that Carlson knowingly lies to his audience and, frankly, thinks it's funny to do so."
She added Comer appears to be using the same playbook to save his faltering investigation into Biden.
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"It's much the same story with Comer, who has winkingly acknowledged on occasion that his relentless accusations against Biden are inventions," she recalled, before adding, "For people like Comer and Carlson, a guiding principle is that the truth simply does not matter. The only value information can possess is to serve their political purposes, no matter how blatantly false it is or how evil the people peddling it may be. Nor should we expect them to feel any embarrassment when they're exposed as liars."
Marcotte claimed that she sees Comer having no problem serving the needs of both Trump and Russia.
"By adopting his reckless disregard for the truth and his loyalty to Russia over America, Republicans like Comer are inching toward their perverse goal of making Trump's extreme corruption seem commonplace," she concluded.
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