The Odd Couple

I like Attorney General Jeff Sessions, but he has certainly been a puzzlement. He has by all appearances, and with no plausible explanation, in the face of massive evidence of wrongdoing and corruption on the part of members of the previous administration and the previous Democratic candidate for president, declined to appoint a special prosecutor to pursue a serious investigation of the apparent malefactors.

If the president chose to relieve Mr. Sessions of his duties, it'd be hard for those of us on the outside of the DOJ (Department of Justice) to think of a reason why he'd be wrong to do so. If he chooses not to cashier him then he should stop humiliating the man in his public pronouncements.

Indeed, the manner in which President Trump is treating AG Sessions is deplorable. The constant tweets maligning Sessions are childish, cruel and often belie a desire on the part of the president to have an AG, as FOX News contributor Brit Hume put it, who'd be "a goalie for the president".

The Odd Couple

Trump's latest tweet criticized Sessions for bringing charges against two Republican congressmen against whom there's considerable evidence of malfeasance. Trump objected in his tweet to the timing of the indictments, since the scandal will almost certainly guarantee that the Republicans will lose those two seats in November, a loss they can ill-afford to sustain.

Here's the content of the president's tweet:

"Two long running, Obama era, investigations of two very popular Republican Congressmen were brought to a well publicized charge, just ahead of the midterms, by the Jeff Sessions Justice Department. Two easy wins now in doubt because there is not enough time. Good job Jeff."

". . . The Democrats, none of whom voted for Jeff Sessions, must love him now. Same thing with Lyin' James Comey. The Dems all hated him, wanted him out, thought he was disgusting – UNTIL I FIRED HIM! Immediately, he became a wonderful man, a saint-like figure, in fact. Really sick!"

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding the president's intent (it's easy to do), but it seems as though President Trump wants his AG to be something of an advocate and a defender, like a personal lawyer, a legal bug bra, as it were, to protect the president from being sullied by the offal the left relentlessly seeks to splatter him with.

Indeed, that's essentially what President Obama had in Eric Holder and perhaps in Loretta Lynch, but the partisan nature of the Obama AG (and the Obama IRS) made his administration ethically repellant. A political hack is not what the AG is supposed to be regardless of who the president is.

Sessions is right to eschew political considerations in his decision to bring charges against those congressmen. Now, if he would just apply that same principle to the derelictions of Hillary Clinton and her associates the temptation to think that he's out of his depth as Attorney General might subside.