“Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive.” —Sir Walter Scott (Marmion, 1808)

For more than a year, the mainstream media and the Democrats (but we repeat ourselves) were positively aflame with righteous indignation, broadcasting 24/7 claims that Donald Trump colluded with the Russians to rig the 2016 election, and demanding investigations into and the impeachment of President Trump.

One might be forgiven, in the age of the 24/7 news cycle that jumps from one outrage and crisis to another, for not recognizing the disappearance of the Russia story from the headlines. One might also conclude the story’s disappearance is due to Democrats being forced to admit there is no evidence, despite intense effort to find it, of Trump/Russia collusion.

Yet even that misses the real story, which is that Democrats are now desperate to bury this story as evidence mounts that there WAS collusion with Russian operatives … by Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.

According to recently revealed files, the FBI had uncovered a plot by Russian officials and operatives as far back as 2009 in which The Hill reports the Russians were “engaged in bribery, kickbacks, extortion and money laundering designed to grow Vladimir Putin’s atomic energy business inside the United States.”

Recall it was then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton whose department authorized the sale of mining company Uranium One to a Russian state-owned energy company, giving the Russians control of 20% of the U.S. uranium supply. At the time, Hillary and the Obama administration defended their decision, claiming there was no evidence of Russian government wrongdoing and no national security concerns to prevent the committee from authorizing the sale.

We now know that to be an unmitigated lie.

It is also no coincidence that, around the time of the sale’s approval, Bill Clinton cashed in a $500,000 speaking fee to give a speech in Moscow, and the Clinton Foundation raked in $145 million in donations from nine shareholders in Uranium One.

Meanwhile, the genesis of the Trump/Russia collusion claim lies in a dossier compiled by former British intelligence agent Christopher Steele. Despite the claims in the dossier being either thoroughly debunked or still without corroborating evidence, a special counsel, in the form of former FBI Director Robert Mueller, was assigned to investigate.

And while any claims of interference in the internal political processes of our nation must be taken seriously, what must also be taken seriously is the increasingly evident reality that high-ranking Democrats, including Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, were themselves the instigators of the very collusion they now seek to obfuscate.

The infamous Steele dossier that set these accusations ablaze was assembled on behalf of Fusion GPS, a firm that specializes in political opposition research. So it would seem obvious that the best way to get to the truth is to have the principals at Fusion GPS testify as to their knowledge regarding collusion.

That has become very difficult, however, as lawyers for Fusion GPS CEO Glenn Simpson say he refuses to testify, invoking his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. By its own admission, Fusion GPS lobbied for a Russian company with ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Kremlin. There is evidence that the Steele dossier, used to attack Trump, was commissioned at the behest of the Russians for the purpose of sowing confusion and discord into the American electoral process.

Mission accomplished.

Just as disturbing is the fact that the FBI — the same FBI that was aware of Russian attempts to bribe and extort American officials and bureaucrats in order to acquire American uranium — has thus far refused to comply with a House Intelligence Committee demand to produce documents related to this investigation.

The tangled web grows more tangled still, as we note with concern that Mueller, the special counsel whose investigative team is loaded with Clinton donors, was the head of the FBI when the discovery of Russian influence-peddling was made. This discovery would not be made public until four years after Obama and Hillary approved the sale of the uranium to the Russians.

Tangles upon tangles, we note that the investigation was supervised by then-U.S. Attorney Rod Rosenstein, an Obama appointee currently serving as Trump’s deputy AG, as well as Andrew McCabe, who served as assistant FBI director under Obama, and today as Trump’s deputy FBI director. This is the same McCabe who is under investigation for a $675,000 donation given to his wife, a Virginia state senate candidate in 2016, by Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, former DNC Chair and prolific fundraiser for the Clintons, also now under investigation by the FBI.

The investigation into the Uranium One deal ended in 2015 at the direction of former FBI Director James Comey without ever briefing the FBI’s top counter-intelligence official or Congress on the staggering national security implications. That would be the same James Comey who leaked details of his conversations with President Trump for the purpose, by his own admission, of forcing the appointment of a special counsel to investigate Trump, recommending his buddy and former Obama FBI Director Mueller, who buried the initial findings.

If you are thoroughly confused by this nefarious web of corruption, bribes, extortion and Russian influence-peddling, you are not alone.

Yet one thing seems increasingly evident: Those who were screaming the loudest now appear to have the most to hide.