Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein’s efforts to halt the presidential request to release the declassified Carter Page FISA application has been thwarted by his boss AG Jeff Sessions.

Rosenstein apparently had many reasons to quash the release none of them lawful, most of the reasons centered on covering up lawlessness within the Obama Justice Department and FBI.

While President Trump neglected to cite as the reason for the declassification it ironically goes back to a Obama executive order 13526 signed in 2009. This is why he used the phrase “for reasons of transparency” in his directive.

The EO details reasons for prohibiting classified documents.

Executive Order 13526 Sec 1.7 “Classification Prohibitions and Limitations. (a) In no case shall information be classified, continue to be maintained as classified, or fail to be declassified in order to: (1) conceal violations of law, inefficiency, or administrative error; (2) prevent embarrassment to a person, organization, or agency; (3) restrain competition; or (4) prevent or delay the release of information that does not require protection in the interest of the national security.”

I say ironically because President Trump is able to use a Obama directive to unseal documents, which shows violations of law, which at the very least, will cause embarrassment to his administration.

The line from “Hamlet” hoist by his own petard seems to apply here quite well. Its literal meaning: the bombmaker blew himself up.

I don’t see Rosenstein being employed by the Justice Department much longer. Once the documents are released AG Sessions will fire him for cause. Taking the highly partisan politics out of the debate.