Krauthammer slams Dan Rather for his 'deranged' analogy attacking Trump

Conservative commentator Charles Krauthammer derided former news anchor Dan Rather's analogy of alleged Trump-Russia collusion to the surprise attack on America that dragged us into World War II. Krauthammer explained on Fox News Monday why calling the conspiracy theory a "psychological Pearl Harbor" was a poor comparison.

"I think that's a deranged analogy," he said. "I mean that's like saying this is the worst scandal since Tea Pot Dome, Watergate is insignificant compared to it."

"Look, so far — and Lordy, I am not a Trump apologist — so far it starts with the charge that the Russians have interfered in our election," Krauthammer continued. "In the [James] Comey hearing, people got all incredibly sanctimonious about that. Comey said it's not a Republican issue, it's not a Democrat. It's an American issue; it's a threat to our democracy.

"Yes, they leaked some documents," he said, "we think, the evidence is. The idea that they actually tampered with the system? The Russians have been doing this just about every election. And every country that we know. It's just a little more obvious this time.

"But imagine that this had happened in 2012, and it was Mitt Romney the man who said Russia is our biggest enemy was at the receiving end of Russian hacking. And that the accusation was that they re-elected Barack Obama," he said, alleging that Democrats would not have been so incensed about the attack on our democracy. "This is the purest hypocrisy."

"But let's ignore that and say, 'OK, you want to investigate that.' But that's not what the Democrats are interested in," Krauthammer continued. "It's the collusion argument, that's the sort of the sidebar to this, supposedly the sidebar. There's no evidence up until now. And they've been looking since July of Trump collusion in this affair.

"So on the second count, there's no evidence of this," he concluded.

"So now they're going after the post-facto stuff, what Trump did afterward," Krauthammer continued. "People know they're not gonna get him on collusion, at least not on the evidence that we have. The head of the FBI tells him three times, 'You're not a target,' meaning you're, in our eyes, innocent of this.

"So now it's going to be on obstruction," he explained, "where, as professor Alan Dershowitz said, how can a president be obstructing justice, assuming on the [Michael] Flynn case, when he had the constitutional authority to dismiss the case or to order its dismissal instantly? So if he's allowed, I say it's improper, he shouldn't have done it, but the idea that it's obstruction of justice when he has the authority to dismiss it completely, is simply absurd.

"I think Trump had a really bad day on the day of the Comey testimony," Krauthammer said. "I think Comey had a really bad day as well. The idea that he was sort of sainted by the Democrats was sort of shocking, and revolting. Here's a guy who admitted to being cowardly in the face of instructions, from Loretta Lynch, to being cowardly when he's supposedly being improperly influenced by the president, but not going to the authorities if he thought there was obstruction going on, instead, putting it in a memo, sticking it in a box and holding it for protection.

"These are not very honorable things to do," he concluded, "I thought he came out diminished as well."

U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions is scheduled to testify before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Tuesday about the investigation into Russian collusion and meddling. He recused himself from the investigation after it was discovered that he neglected to disclose a meeting he had with a Russian ambassador to a confirmation committee. He later explained that the meeting was under his former role as a U.S. senator, and not as a representative of the Trump transition team.