General Discussion

There are exceptions here and there, the the dominant culture is one of "We know more than the American people about these things, so we will judge what will be prosecuted and what won't." A certain amount of prosecutorial judgement is always necessary, of course, but over the years that morphed into the "bad guys" being street gangs, bank robbers, and kids selling some dope on the streets. Government corruption was not just tolerated, but actively permitted. As a powerful public figure, you had to do something pretty obvious to get any prosecution.

Over the past couple of decades, the GOP abandoned its "law and order" rhetoric and became far more lawless than the Dems. We always demanded our people be prosecuted if they were corrupt, but the Good Old Putin party reflexively rose in defense of each one of their scoundrels. That asymmetry just reinforced the authoritarian foundations of DoJ.

So no, of course Garland didn't act alone. Mueller, Comey, Rosenstein -- all of them were part of this system and they all did their jobs just as J Edgar would have wanted. And dozens more behind the scenes, no doubt.