ANALYSIS/OPINION:

Sending a defeated rival to the penitentiary is not the American way (except, maybe, in New Jersey, Illinois or Louisiana). But in a swamp there’s always an alligator eager to bite off any fingers searching in the murk for the drain plug.

Democrats are big fans of special prosecutors, especially this year, so maybe Hillary Clinton deserves the scrutiny Robert Mueller and his lawyers are giving Donald Trump & Co. Since nearly all of Mr. Mueller’s lawyers contributed to Hillary’s campaign, they might leap at the opportunity to see how their money was spent. Or maybe Hillary deserves a special prosecutor of her own.

The only candidate found to have committed “extremely careless” breaches of national security protocols, after all, was Hillary herself, James Comey’s decision not to seek prosecution notwithstanding. There’s lots of colluding (along with the canoodling) in a swamp.

Tossing an accusation into an accuser’s face without batting an eye is an exceptional skill. Regular folks caught in wrongdoing quail with self-mortification triggered by a guilty conscience. Not everyone has a conscience, nor have the Democrats and Republicans who inhabit our swamp.

Collusion can be a sign of corruption, but so far the only whiff of corruption anyone is known to have sniffed in Trumpworld is from Donald Jr.’s taking delight in the prospect of finding proof that Hillary benefited from dirty dealing.

Authentic collusion was more likely in that secret meeting between Loretta Lynch, then the attorney general, and Bill Clinton at the Phoenix airport just when the Justice Department was wrapping up its investigation of Hillary’s slipshod handling of classified information on her private email server. The Obama administration brushed off suggestions that the meeting was anything more nefarious than that Bubba and the lady bumped into each other and were overwhelmed by an urge to talk about Bubba’s new grandchild and his golf game.

But there’s always someone to smell something on the bottom of someone’s shoe. Freedom of Information Act requests from Judicial Watch and the American Center for Law and Justice have just scored the release of 413 pages of relevant material that Loretta Lynch’s Justice Department first denied even existed.

The new material reveals that Ms. Lynch hid behind an email alias called “Elizabeth Carlisle” when communicating with others about that tarmac meeting, but not much more. That’s because it was mostly blacked out — evidence that Democrats’ control of the deep state is so complete that the facts about the runway run-in are as cleverly hidden as if Hillary were in the Oval Office after all.

Some Republicans have asked the Justice Department to appoint a special counsel to investigate the Clinton shenanigans after the manner with which Robert Mueller is looking into every nook and granny in the Trump campaign. Rep. Robert Goodlatte of Virginia, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee and nearly two dozen fellow Republicans asked Attorney General Jeff Sessions to open a Clinton investigation: “The American public has a right to know the facts — all of them — surrounding the election and its aftermath. We urge you to appoint a second special counsel to ensure these troubling, unanswered questions are not relegated to the dust bin of history.”

We’re no fans of special prosecutors. They’re designed to spend money on expensive lawyers who could look for clients elsewhere. The Justice Department has plenty of resources already at the ready. But given the givens, the request for another investigation is reasonable enough. If the new Justice Department is too intimidated by the Democrats and the media to take up the hunt, the swamp is here to stay, alligators and all.

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