The many errors and omissions were never satisfactorily explained to the Office of Investigations. The report stated that it appeared agents were substituting their own judgements in place of the OI judgements. If this isn’t investigatory bias, what is?
The FBI knew that the Steele Dossier contained many errors and much questionable data but never asked Christopher Steele who funded the dossier, even though there was fairly open speculation that it was the Clinton campaign. Why not, other than political bias?
I think the only “error” Horowitz made was saying there was no proof of bias. He didn’t need to put that in if he is looking at the facts. For instance, “Oh by the way, there was also no proof that the coke machine had run out of cokes.” Like this example, the “lack of bias” statement is an unconnected thought to the process which was to discover the FACTS (not opinions, motivations or misc “weather reports”). The report did this, it found the errors and the facts. Had he left out the “opinion” of no bias found ... it would have been a perfect report.
After digesting the furor in the media, I’ve come to what I think is an understanding of what the Horowitz report presents.
IG Horowitz seems to have tried to take an even hand, while finding some very disturbing wrongdoing. The IG didn’t say there wasn’t bias, he said there was no documentary bias. That is, no written statements like: “We must do whatever it takes to make Crossfire Hurricane bring down Trump”.
Clearly, even a blind idiot could see that there was, and is bias in the FBI. Horowitz found wrong doing, documented it, and now, it is up to the Congress to fix or ignore.
Watching Horowitz testify, he struck me as someone genuinely concerned and upset by what was going on at the FBI.
In a fair and reasonable world, John Brennan and James Comey would be hung for treason.
The purpose of the Horowitz Report was to provide shade for the deep state. What part have I misunderstood?
Steele was classed as an FBI confidential source, so anything he gave them didn’t need to be verified according to the Woods procedure and the FISA application rules. If they had tried to verify any of it, then they might be on the hook to try and and verify all of it, or throw it out.
It’s like if a cop wants to search your house and gets a CI to say he bought drugs from you. It doesn’t matter if the cop knows the CI is a liar, the point is not whether the story is true, the point is only that the story gives the cop an excuse to get a warrant and search, and then the cop has the opportunity to find some real evidence (or perhaps plant some).
bkmk