Trump when in Moscow did rent the same room where Obama and Michel did sleep before. Than
he did hire a three Russian prostitutes who performed striptease for him while he played with
himself. the scene culminated by three prostitutes peeing on the bed on which Obama and
Michel slept. In my opinion this total idiotic BS made up story.
The second angle against Trump is that Russians told through some intermediary that they
have some dirt on Hillary and they want a meeting with Trumps son.
This is quite a double idiocy of the idiocy before, Because it denigrate the Russian
diplomacy to some wild tribe in Amazon. Even if they wanted to meet with Trump's son, they
would never acknowledge the intermediary of the purpose of the meeting.
In my opinion the people who submitted on basis of this request for FISA should be hanged
for stupidity, and judge who signed it of, should be locked in mental institution for
life. Imagine how shameful and deranged the US politicians are at highest level of
government.
Democrats draw conclusion that Trump should resign or be impeached because he is
vulnerable to blackmail by Russians. In the second case they are trying to prove that there was collusion with Russia. Both cases are only pile of manure. So here is the state of American politics -- –manure.
Obama usually does not want to expose himself in such, potentially illegal, actions. CIA exists exactly for this type
of operations. Most probably FBI liaison with CIA
Strzok was used. Nunes memo proved that Steele dossier was used as a bait to obtain FISA warrant for wiretapping (that's
probably what Strzok meant then he spoke about "insurance" against Trump victory). Facts speak for themselves:
The Obama administration has a history of manipulating intelligence for political gain.
The most under-reported scandal of Obama’s presidency was the
CENTCOM scandal, in which it emerged that “senior U.S.
Central Command (CENTCOM) leaders manipulated
intelligence assessments in 2014 and 2015 to make it appear that President Barack Obama is winning
the war against the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL).” There is even more reason to doubt the truth of a
selective leak about the election.
Looks like they went beyond manipulation of intelligence.
Everybody understood that the system is pretty well rigged on federal level and there two levels of justice -- one for neoliberal
"masters of the universe" who are by-and-large above the law, and another for shmucks. That's not a news. The news is the
level of sophistication is escaping the changes and use of the accusation of hacking falsified via false flag operation as a new
smokescreen to pass the blame to selected scapegoat.
Here we see very successful efforts to unleash Neo-McCarthyism campaign and put all the blame for Hillary defeat on Russians, which
later was extended into the color revolution against Trump of falsified changed of Russia collision. Few people understand the US MSM
is just a propaganda department of the US intelligence agencies and do their bidding. The fact that at some point CIA controlled major
journalists was known from Church commission hearings. And there was some backlash. But now the situation reversed and due to the regime
to total surveillance their capability to dictate the agenda far exceed the level that was in the past.
moreover, now CIA cyberwarriors can cook any accusation using their "technical capabilities" and spread is using subservant MSM in
a matter of days creating the wave of hate which far exceed what was described in famous dystopian novel 1984 by George Orwell.
Refuting those "cooked" intrusions (which are a new and very nasty form of false flag operations) is difficult what when (and if) it
is done, typically it is too late. As Hermann Goering said (Hermann Goering War
Games):
“Of course the people don’t want war. But after all, it’s the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and
it’s always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it’s a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament,
or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That
is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism,
and exposing the country to greater danger.”
— Herman Goering at the Nuremberg trials
... ... ...
His comments were made privately to Gustave Gilbert, a German-speaking American intelligence officer and psychologist who
was granted free access by the Allies to all the prisoners held in the Nuremberg jail. Gilbert kept a journal of his observations
of the proceedings and his conversations with the prisoners, which he later published in the book Nuremberg Diary.
The quote offered above was part of a conversation Gilbert held with a dejected Hermann Goering in his cell on the evening
of 18 April 1946, as the trials were halted for a three-day Easter recess.
Paradoxically while the value of cyberspace for offensive operations against adversaries is unclear, it is clear that it has tremendous
potential for conducting false flag operations serving as a pretext for real wars, or some "Show trials" of dissidents in best Stalin
traditions. and witch hunt against Trump is a just form of Show Trials in a court of public opinion.
Everything can be forged in cyberspace -- source of attack, attack methods. Fake personalities like
Guccifer 2.0 can be created to support the accusations. Sky is the limit
for false flag operations in cyberspace. Steele dossier in this sense is old school falsification. It is "DNC hack" that is the
harbinger of things to come.
Sky is the limit for false flag operations in cyberspace. Steele dossier in this sense is old school
falsification. It is "DNC hack" that is the harbinger of things to come.
We may feel uneasy by the idea that people now could be so easily manipulated into sacrificing themselves in wars at the whims of
the neoliberal elite, but perhaps we can be more concerned (and maybe even scared) at the thought that the capabilities to deceive us
are now greater not less that it was before. Much greater. They now really can create "artificial reality" using MSM.
In any case capabilities of intelligence agencies to hatch and then inject into MSM "DNC hack style disinformation" to blackmail
a major political figure using a "cyberspace" false flag operation are now enormous. Even POTUS can be the target of such blackmail.
In this sense the current Russiagate hysteria makes Joseph McCartney like a pretty uninventive, even somewhat dull guy with very limited
capabilities to frame his victims ;-) Recently even Nunes was accused (with impunity) to be a Russian agent. This is "communists
under each bed" type of witch hunt on a new level.
Now we know that Russiagate was initially the criminal plot to exonerate Hillary and derail Sanders campaign hatched by intelligence
community in cooperation with connected members of Clinton campaign like John Podesta (who as a former WH chief of staff has deep connections
to "intelligence community".) Intelligence agencies and journalists connected with intelligence services were recruited and the
well planned obfuscation campaign started. which later morphed into color regulation against Trump (typical for color revolution charges
of rigged election were replaced by accusation of "collision" with foreign power.) All this was done with full cooperation
and eager participation of NYT, WaPo, CNN. MSNBC and other neoliberal outlets. As the result in May 2016 a Special Prosecutor was appointed
to take care of Trump removal.
Sanders did not have the courage to switch to alternative Open Convention to get a nomination from Democratic Party. He was so aftraid
(or was threatened, the meaning of his visit with Obama is not known) that he chose to betray his voters and support Hillary. So with
the help of neoliberal MSM a brazen plot to exonerate Hillary Clinton from a clear violation of the law (with regard to the way she
handled classified information with her private email server; absolutely a crime, absolutely a felony) did succeed. In this
sense Russiagate is in reality FBI-gate.
It is an established fact that Comey and the senior DOJ officials conducted a fake criminal investigation of Hillary Clinton. Following
none of the regular rules, gave her every break in the book, immunized all kinds of people, allowed the destruction of evidence, no
grand jury, no subpoenas, no search warrant. That was not an investigation, that was a Potemkin village. It was a farce.
DOJ should convene grand jury to indict the major players (whose in high positions in DOJ and FBI should be fired). If like torturers
in Bush II era will not be brought to justice this is just another sign that the USA is neither a republic not a democracy.
Unfortunately Trump while a good tactician, is not strategic thinker on any level. He might have some courage which allowed him to
fire Comey, and then tell that truth to American people that this firing is about "Russiagate". But you need more that courage
to take on "deep state". You need to have a plan. You need to have a coalition. And we do not know if Trump was threatened
or not (see Chuck Schumer remark above.) He should address the nation from Oval Office and tell that FBI story can only be believed
by people with IQ below 70. And that DOJ should immediately appoint a Special Prosecutor investigating this matter. But
this will most probably just a fantasy.
Summarizing we can say that "FISA memo" is a testimony of tremendous personal courage of Nunes (note that one neoliberal MSM jerk
already accused him being a Russian spy). He did tremendous job driven by noble motives of restoring justice. And his memo undermined
the Color revolution against Trump by making Mueller position more vulnerable as he is clearly a member of the gang of FBI Mayberry
Machiavellians. It also put Rosenstein into defensive position. But this is an uphill battle and he might lose at the end of the
date. The neoliberal swamp is way too powerful and can consume even such courageous people as Nunes.
"... The Russiagate investigation, which had formerly focused against the current US President, has reversed direction and now targets the prior President. ..."
"... In order to appreciate the seriousness of that misconduct and its implications, it is useful to understand certain procedural and substantive requirements that apply to the government's conduct of electronic surveillance for foreign intelligence purposes. Title I of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA ), codified as amended at 50 USC. 1801-1813, governs such electronic surveillance. It requires the government to apply for and receive an order from the FISC approving a proposed electronic surveillance. When deciding whether to grant such an application, a FISC judge must determine among other things, whether it provides probable cause to believe that the proposed surveillance target is a "foreign power" or an agent a foreign power. ..."
"... The government has a heightened duty of candor to the FISC in ex parte proceedings, that is, ones in which the government does not face an adverse party, such as proceedings on electronic surveillance applications. The FISC expects the government to comply with its heightened duty of candor in ex parte proceedings at all times. Candor is fundamental to this Court's effective operation. ..."
"... On December 9, 2019, the government filed, with the FISC, public and classified versions of the OIG Report. It documents troubling instances in which FBI personnel provided information to NSD ..."
"... which was unsupported or contradicted by information in their possession. It also describes several instances in which FBI personnel withheld from NSD information in their possession which was detrimental to their case for believing that Mr. ..."
"... Page was acting as an agent of a foreign power. ..."
"... MACCALLUM: Were you surprised that he ..."
"... seemed to give himself such a distance from the entire operation? ..."
"... "JAMES COMEY: As the director sitting on top of an organization of 38,000 people you can't run an investigation that's seven layers below you. You have to leave it to the career professionals to do." ..."
"... MACCALLUM: Do you believe that? ..."
"... BARR: No, I think that the -- one of the problems with what happened was precisely that they pulled the investigation up to the executive floors, and it was run and bird dogged by a very small group of very high level officials. And the idea that this was seven layers below him is simply not true. ..."
"... Allegedly, George Papadopoulos said that "Halper insinuated to him that Russia was helping the Trump campaign" , and Papadopoulos was shocked at Halper's saying this. Probably because so much money at the Pentagon is untraceable, some of the crucial documentation on this investigation might never be found. For example, the Defense Department's Inspector General's 2 July 2019 report to the US Senate said "ONA personnel could not provide us any evidence that Professor Halper visited any of these locations, established an advisory group, or met with any of the specific people listed in the statement of work." ..."
"... very profitable business ..."
"... Schultz and other members of the DNC staff had exercised bias against Bernie Sanders and in favor of Hillary Clinton during the 2016 Democratic primaries -- which favoritism had been the reason why Obama had appointed Shultz to that post to begin with. She was just doing her job for the person who had chosen her to lead the DNC. Likewise for Comey. In other words: Comey was Obama's pick to protect Clinton, and to oppose Trump (who had attacked both Clinton and Obama). ..."
"... Nowadays, Obama is telling the Party's billionaires that Elizabeth Warren would be good for them , but not that Sanders would -- he never liked Sanders. ..."
"... and, so, Trump now will be gunning against Obama ..."
"... Whatever the outcome will be, it will be historic, and unprecedented. (If Sanders becomes the nominee, it will be even more so; and, if he then wins on November 3rd, it will be a second American Revolution; but, this time, a peaceful one -- if that's even possible, in today's hyper-partisan, deeply split, USA.) ..."
"... There is no way that the outcome from this will be status-quo. Either it will be greatly increased further schism in the United States, or it will be a fundamental political realignment, more comparable to 1860 than to anything since. ..."
"... Reform is no longer an available option, given America's realities. A far bigger leap than that will be required in order for this country to avoid falling into an utter abyss, which could be led by either Party, because both Parties have brought the nation to its present precipice, the dark and lightless chasm that it now faces, and which must now become leapt, in order to avoid a free-fall into oblivion. ..."
"... The problem in America isn't either Obama or Trump; it's neither merely the Democratic Party, nor merely the Republican Party; it is instead both; it is the Deep State . ..."
Former US President
Barack Obama is now in severe legal jeopardy, because the Russiagate investigation has turned
180 degrees; and he, instead of the current President, Donald Trump, is in its cross-hairs.
The biggest crime that a US President can commit is to try to defeat American democracy (the
Constitutional functioning of the US Government) itself, either by working with foreign powers
to take it over, or else by working internally within America to sabotage democracy for his or
her own personal reasons. Either way, it's treason (crime that is intended to, and does,
endanger the continued functioning of the Constitution itself*), and Mr. Obama is now being
actively investigated, as possibly having done this.
The Russiagate investigation, which had
formerly focused against the current US President, has reversed direction and now targets the
prior President. Although he, of course, cannot be removed from office (since he is no longer
in office), he is liable under criminal laws, the same as any other American would be, if he
committed any crime while he was in office.
A
December 17th order by the FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) Court severely
condemned the performance by the FBI under Obama, for having obtained, on 19 October 2016 (even prior to the US Presidential
election), from that Court, under false pretenses, an authorization for the FBI to commence
investigating Donald Trump's Presidential campaign, as being possibly in collusion with
Russia's Government. The Court's ruling said:
In order to appreciate the seriousness of that misconduct and its implications, it is
useful to understand certain procedural and substantive requirements that apply to the
government's conduct of electronic surveillance for foreign intelligence purposes. Title I of
the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA ), codified as amended at 50 USC. 1801-1813,
governs such electronic surveillance. It requires the government to apply for and receive an
order from the FISC approving a proposed electronic surveillance. When deciding whether to
grant such an application, a FISC judge must determine among other things, whether it
provides probable cause to believe that the proposed surveillance target is a "foreign power"
or an agent a foreign power.
The government has a heightened duty of candor to the FISC in ex parte proceedings, that
is, ones in which the government does not face an adverse party, such as proceedings on
electronic surveillance applications. The FISC expects the government to comply with its
heightened duty of candor in ex parte proceedings at all times. Candor is fundamental to this
Court's effective operation.
On December 9, 2019, the government filed, with the FISC, public and classified versions
of the OIG Report. It documents troubling instances in which FBI personnel provided information
to NSD [National Security Division of the Department of Justice] which was unsupported
or contradicted by information in their possession. It also describes several instances in
which FBI personnel withheld from NSD information in their possession which was detrimental to
their case for believing that Mr. [Carter] Page was acting as an agent of a foreign
power.
On December 18th, Martha McCallum, of Fox News,
interviewed US Attorney General Bill Barr , and asked him (at 7:00 in the video
) how high up in the FBI the blame for this (possible treason) goes:
MACCALLUM: Were you surprised that he [Obama's FBI Director James Comey]
seemed to give himself such a distance from the entire operation?
"JAMES COMEY: As the director sitting on top of an organization of 38,000 people you
can't run an investigation that's seven layers below you. You have to leave it to the career
professionals to do."
MACCALLUM: Do you believe that?
BARR: No, I think that the -- one of the problems with what happened was precisely
that they pulled the investigation up to the executive floors, and it was run and bird dogged
by a very small group of very high level officials. And the idea that this was seven layers
below him is simply not true.
The current (Trump) A.G. there called the former (Obama) FBI Director a liar on that.
If Comey gets heat for this possibly lie-based FBI investigation of the US Presidential
nominee from the opposite Party of the sitting US President (Comey's own boss, Obama), then
protecting himself could become Comey's top motivation; and, in that condition, protecting his
former boss might become only a secondary concern for him.
Though Halper actually did no such studies for the Pentagon,
he instead functioned as a paid FBI informant (and it's not yet clear whether that money came
from the Pentagon, which spends
trillions of dollars that are off-the-books and untraceable ), and at some point Trump's
campaign became a target of Halper's investigation. This investigation was nominally to examine
"The Russia-China Relationship: The impact on US Security interests."
It seems that the Pentagon-contracted work was a cover-story, like
pizza parlors have been for some Mafia operations. But, anyway, this is how America's
'democracy' actually functions .
And, of course, America's
Deep State works not only through governmental agencies but also through
underworld organizations . That's just reality, not at all speculative. It's been this way
for decades, at least since the time of Truman's Presidency (as is documented at that
link).
Furthermore, inasmuch as this operation certainly involved Obama's CIA Director John Brennan
and others, and not only top officials at the FBI, there is no chance that Comey would have
been the only high official who was involved in it. And if Comey was
involved, then he would have been acting in his own interest, and not only in his boss's -- and
here's why: Comey would be expected to have been highly motivated to oppose Mr. Trump,
because Trump publicly questioned whether NATO (the main international selling-arm for
America's 'defense'-contractors) should continue to exist, and also because Comey's entire
career had been in the service of America's Military-Industrial Complex, which is the reason
why Comey's main
lifetime income has been the tens of millions of dollars he has received via the revolving door
between his serving the federal Government and his serving firms such as Lockheed Martin .
For these people, restoring, and intensifying, and keeping up, the Cold War , is a very profitable business . It's called
by some "the Military-Industrial Complex," and by others "the Deep State," but by any name it
is simply agents of the billionaires who own and control US-based international corporations,
such as General Dynamics and Chevron. As a governmental official, making decisions that are in
the long-term interests of those investors is the likeliest way to become wealthy.
Consequently, Comey would have been benefitting himself, and other high officials of the
Obama Administration, by sabotaging Trump's campaign, and by weakening Trump's Presidency in
the event that he would become elected. Plus, of course, Comey would have been benefitting
Obama himself. Not only was Trump constantly condemning Obama, but Obama had appointed to lead
the Democratic National Committee during the 2016 Presidential primaries, Debbie Wasserman Schultz ,
who as early as
20 February 2007 had endorsed Hillary Clinton for President in the Democratic Party
primaries, so that Shultz was one of the earliest supporters of Clinton against even Obama
himself. In other words, Obama had appointed Shultz in order to
increase the odds that Clinton -- not Sanders -- would become the nominee in 2016 to
continue on and protect his own Presidential legacy. Furthermore, on 28 July 2016, Schultz
became forced to resign from her leadership of the DNC after WikiLeaks released emails
indicating that Schultz and other members of the DNC staff had exercised bias against Bernie
Sanders and in favor of Hillary Clinton during the 2016 Democratic primaries -- which
favoritism had been the reason why Obama had appointed Shultz to that post to begin with. She
was just doing her job for the person who had chosen her to lead the DNC. Likewise for Comey.
In other words: Comey was Obama's pick to protect Clinton, and to oppose
Trump (who had attacked both Clinton and Obama).
Nowadays, Obama is telling the Party's billionaires that Elizabeth Warren would be good for
them , but not that Sanders would -- he never liked Sanders. He wants Warren to get the
voters who otherwise would go for Sanders, and he wants the Party's billionaires to help her
achieve this (be the Party's allegedly 'progressive' option), so that Sanders won't be able to
become a ballot option in the general election to be held on 3 November 2020.
He is telling
them whom not to help win the Party's nomination. In fact, on November 26th,
Huffington Post headlined
"Obama Said He Would Speak Up To Stop Bernie Sanders Nomination: Report" and indicated that
though he won't actually say this in public (but only to the Party's billionaires), Obama is
determined to do all he can to prevent Sanders from becoming the nominee. In 2016, his
choice was Hillary Clinton; but, today, it's anyone other than Sanders; and, so, in a sense, it
remains what it was four years ago -- anyone but Sanders.
Comey's virtually exclusive concern, at the present stage, would be to protect himself, so
that he won't be imprisoned. This means that he might testify against Obama. At this stage,
he's free of any personal obligation to Obama -- Comey is now on his own, up against Trump, who
clearly is his enemy. Some type of back-room plea-bargain is therefore virtually inevitable --
and not only with Comey, but with other top Obama-appointees, ultimately. Obama is thus clearly
in the cross-hairs, from now on. Congressional Democrats have opted to gun against Trump (by
impeaching him); and, so, Trump now will be gunning against Obama -- and against the
entire Democratic Party (unless Sanders becomes its nominee, in which case, Sanders will
already have defeated that Democratic Party, and its adherents will then have to choose between
him versus Trump; and, so, too, will independent voters).
But, regardless of what happens, Obama now is in the cross-hairs. That's not just political
cross-hairs (such as an impeachment process); it is, above all, legal cross-hairs (an
actual criminal investigation). Whereas Trump is up against a doomed effort by the Democratic
Party to replace him by Vice President Mike Pence, Obama will be up against virtually
inevitable criminal charges, by the incumbent Trump Administration. Obama played hardball
against Trump, with "Russiagate," and then with "Ukrainegate"; Trump will now play hardball
against Obama, with whatever his Administration and the Republican Party manage to muster
against Obama; and the stakes this time will be considerably bigger than just whether to
replace Trump by Pence.
Whatever the outcome will be, it will be historic, and unprecedented. (If Sanders becomes
the nominee, it will be even more so; and, if he then wins on November 3rd, it will be a second
American Revolution; but, this time, a peaceful one -- if that's even possible, in today's
hyper-partisan, deeply split, USA.)
There is no way that the outcome from this will be status-quo. Either it will be greatly
increased further schism in the United States, or it will be a fundamental political
realignment, more comparable to 1860 than to anything since.
The US already has a
higher percentage of its people in prison than does any other nation on this planet.
Americans who choose a 'status-quo' option will produce less stability, more violence, not more
stability and a more peaceful nation in a less war-ravaged world. The 2020 election-outcome for
the United States will be a turning-point; there is no way that it will produce reform.
Americans who vote for reform will be only increasing the likelihood of hell-on-Earth. Reform
is no longer an available option, given America's realities. A far bigger leap than that will
be required in order for this country to avoid falling into an utter abyss, which could be led
by either Party, because both Parties have brought the nation to its present precipice, the
dark and lightless chasm that it now faces, and which must now become leapt, in order to avoid
a free-fall into oblivion.
The problem in America isn't either Obama or Trump; it's neither merely the Democratic
Party, nor merely the Republican Party; it is instead both; it is the
Deep State .
That's the reality; and the process that got us here started on 26 July 1945 and secretly continued on the American side even after
the Soviet Union ended and Russia promptly ended its side of the Cold War. The US regime's
ceaseless thrust, since 26 July 1945, to rule the entire world, will climax either in a Third
World War, or in a US revolution to overthrow and remove the Deep State and end its
dictatorship-grip over America. Both Parties have been controlled by that
Deep State , and the final stage or climax of this grip is now drawing near. America thus
has been having a string of the worst
Presidents -- and worst Congresses -- in US history. This is today's reality.
Unfortunately, a lot of American voters think that this extremely destabilizing reality, this
longstanding trend toward war, is okay, and ought to be continued, not ended now and replaced
by a new direction for this country -- the path toward world peace, which FDR had accurately
envisioned but which was aborted on 26 July 1945. No matter how many Americans might vote for
mere reform, they are wrong. Sometimes, only a minority are right. Being correct is not a
majority or minority matter; it is a true or false matter. A misinformed public can willingly
participate in its own -- or even the world's -- destruction. That could happen.
Democracy is a
prerequisite to peace, but it can't exist if the public are being systematically misinformed.
Lies and democracy don't mix together any more effectively than do oil and water.
"... However, DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz confirmed in his report that the dossier was used in the Obama administration's 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA). As stated in the IG report, there were discussions by top intelligence officials as to whether the Steele dossier should be included in the ICA report. ..."
"... But upon careful inspection of Horowitz's report, on page 179, investigators ask former FBI Director James Comey if he discussed the dossier with Brennan and whether or not it should be given to President Obama. According to the report, Comey told investigators that Brennan said it was "important" enough to include in the ICA -- clearly part of the "corpus of intelligence information" they had. ..."
"... "Mr. Durham appears to be pursuing a theory that the C.I.A., under its former director John O. Brennan, had a preconceived notion about Russia or was trying to get to a particular result -- and was nefariously trying to keep other agencies from seeing the full picture lest they interfere with that goal, the people said." ..."
"... Brennan's assessment stated that Putin wanted to "undermine public faith in the U.S. democratic process, denigrate former Secretary of State [Hillary] Clinton, and harm her electability and potential presidency." It also stated that Putin "developed a clear preference for President-elect Trump." ..."
"... Durham's investigation appear to have many tentacles. For example, he has expanded his probe to the Pentagon's Office of Net Assessment. According to sources who spoke to SaraACarter.com he is carefully scrutinizing money paid through the office to former FBI confidential informant Cambridge academic Stefan Halper. Halper, who worked in previous U.S. administrations and is an academic, is connected to three of President Donald Trump's campaign officials that were wrapped up into the FBI's probe, most notably Carter Page. ..."
"... Halper, along with others such as former MI6 Chief Sir Richard Dearlove, founded the Cambridge Intelligence Seminar, in England at Cambridge University. According to several sources, Durham has questioned officials at the Office of Net Assessment about Halper's contracts, how the money was utilized and what agency actually awarded the contract. ..."
"... Durham's criminal investigation into the FBI , CIA, as well as private entities is ongoing. Known by its acronym ONA, the secretive office is run by Director James Baker, who has been in the role since being appointed by the Obama Administration in 2015. In a January letter to Baker, Grassley asks a litany of questions as to Halper's role within ONA, his contracts, his foreign contacts and whether the FBI, or CIA, used the ONA office to pay Halper for spying on Trump campaign personnel. ..."
"... "Can ONA state for certain that Halper did not use taxpayer money provided by DoD to recruit, or attempt to recruit, sources for the FBI investigation into the now-debunked theory of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia," Grassley asks Baker. ..."
"... Ironically, documents obtained by SaraACarter.com suggest that during Halper's tenure with the seminar, he had also invited senior Russian intelligence officials to co-teach his course on several occasions. Further, according to news reports, he also accepted money to finance the course from a top Russian oligarch with ties to Putin. ..."
"... Several course syllabi from 2012 and 2015 obtained by this outlet reveal Hapler had invited and co-taught his course on intelligence with the former Director of Russian Intelligence Gen. I. Vyacheslav Trubnikov. ..."
"... However, there is evidence that Halper had similar sources to former MI6 spy Christopher Steele, who compiled the dossier. Based on hand written notes from an interview the State Department's Kathleen Kavalec states two of Steele's dossier sources; "Trubnikov" and "Surkov." ..."
U.S. Attorney John Durham – charged with the criminal probe into the FBI's Russia
investigation of the Trump campaign – has been questioning CIA officials closely involved
with John
Brennan's 2017 intelligence community assessment regarding direct Russian interference in
the 2016 election, according to U.S. officials.
In May 2017, Brennan denied during a hearing before the House Permanent Select Committee on
Intelligence that its agency relied on the now debunked Christopher Steele dossier for the
Intelligence Community Assessment report. He told then Congressman Trey Gowdy "we didn't"
use the Steele dossier.
"It wasn't part of the corpus of intelligence information that we had," Brennan
stated.
"It was not in any way used as a basis for the Intelligence Community assessment that was
done. It was -- it was not."
However, DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz confirmed in his report that the dossier was
used in the Obama administration's 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA). As stated in
the IG report, there were discussions by top intelligence officials as to whether the Steele
dossier should be included in the ICA report.
But upon careful inspection of Horowitz's report, on page 179, investigators ask former
FBI Director James Comey if he discussed the dossier with Brennan and whether or not it should
be given to President Obama. According to the report, Comey told investigators that Brennan
said it was "important" enough to include in the ICA -- clearly part of the "corpus of
intelligence information" they had.
According to a recent report by The New York Times, Durham's probe is specifically looking
at that January 2017 intelligence community assessment, which concluded with "high confidence" that
Russian President Vladimir Putin "ordered an influence campaign in 2016."
"Mr. Durham appears to be pursuing a theory that the C.I.A., under its former director
John O. Brennan, had a preconceived notion about Russia or was trying to get to a particular
result -- and was nefariously trying to keep other agencies from seeing the full picture lest
they interfere with that goal, the people said."
Sources with knowledge have said CIA officials questioned by Durham's investigative team
"are extremely concerned with the investigation and the direction it's heading."
Brennan's assessment stated that Putin wanted to "undermine public faith in the U.S.
democratic process, denigrate former Secretary of State [Hillary] Clinton, and harm her
electability and potential presidency." It also stated that Putin "developed a clear preference
for President-elect Trump."
But not everyone agreed with Brennan. The NSA then under retired Adm. Mike Rogers stated it
only had "moderate confidence" that Putin tried to help Trump's election. As stated in the
New York times Durham is investigating whether Brennan was keeping other intelligence
agencies out of the loop to keep his narrative that Putin was helping Trump's campaign
public.
"I wouldn't call it a discrepancy, I'd call it an honest difference of opinion between
three different organizations, and, in the end, I made that call," Rogers
told the Senate in May 2017.
"It didn't have the same level of sourcing and the same level of multiple sources."
According to The Times Durham is reviewing emails from the CIA, FBI, and National Security
Agency analysts who worked on the January, 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment on Russia's
interference in the election.
Durham's office could not be reached for comment. DOJ spokesperson Kerri Kupec also could
not be reached for comment.
However, Brennan told MSNBC's "Hardball" last week,
that Durham's questioning is dangerous.
"It's kind of silly," he said.
"Is there a criminal investigation now on analytic judgments and the activities of C.I.A.
in terms of trying to protect our national security? I'm certainly willing to talk to Mr.
Durham or anybody else who has any questions about what we did during this period of 2016
."
Durham And FBI Spy Stefan Halper
Durham's investigation appear to have many tentacles. For example, he has expanded his
probe to the Pentagon's
Office of Net Assessment. According to sources who spoke to SaraACarter.com he is carefully
scrutinizing money paid through the office to former FBI confidential informant Cambridge
academic Stefan Halper. Halper, who worked in previous U.S. administrations and is an academic,
is connected to three of President Donald Trump's campaign officials that were wrapped up into
the FBI's probe, most notably Carter
Page.
Halper, along with others such as former MI6 Chief Sir Richard Dearlove, founded the
Cambridge Intelligence Seminar, in England at Cambridge University. According to several
sources, Durham has questioned officials at the Office of Net Assessment about Halper's
contracts, how the money was utilized and what agency actually awarded the contract.
Further, Sen. Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, is also
investigating the over $1 million in contracts Halper received from the ONA, as
first reported at SaraACarter.com. It is, of course, a separate investigation from Durham's
but on the same issues.
The Office Of Net Assessment, according to sources with knowledge, is sometimes used as a
front to pay contractors, like Halper, who are conducting work for U.S. intelligence agencies.
It is for this reason, that Durham is investigating the flow of money that Halper received and
whether or not agencies other than the FBI were involved in the investigation into Trump's
campaign and whether or not, the contracts were accurately accounted for in the reports
received by Grassley.
Durham's criminal investigation
into the FBI , CIA, as well as private entities is ongoing. Known by its acronym ONA, the
secretive office is run by Director James Baker, who has been in the role since being appointed
by the Obama Administration in 2015. In a January letter to Baker, Grassley asks a litany of
questions as to Halper's role within ONA, his contracts, his foreign contacts and whether the
FBI, or CIA, used the ONA office to pay Halper for spying on Trump campaign personnel.
"Can ONA state for certain that Halper did not use taxpayer money provided by DoD to
recruit, or attempt to recruit, sources for the FBI investigation into the now-debunked
theory of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia," Grassley asks Baker.
But it is Halper's role overseas and concern that the CIA may have been involved that is
leading to more questions than answers. In 2016, in what appeared to be an unexpected move,
Halper left the Cambridge Intelligence Seminar. He
told papers in London – at the time – that it was due to "unacceptable Russian
influence."
Ironically, documents obtained by SaraACarter.com suggest that during Halper's tenure with the
seminar, he had also invited senior Russian intelligence officials to co-teach his course on
several occasions. Further, according to news reports, he also accepted money to finance the
course from a top Russian oligarch with ties to Putin.
Several course syllabi from 2012 and 2015 obtained by this outlet reveal Hapler had
invited and co-taught his course on intelligence with the former Director of Russian
Intelligence Gen. I. Vyacheslav Trubnikov.
Moreover, the New York Times recent report suggests that Durham's probe into Brennan is also
looking closely at an alleged secret source said to have direct ties to the Kremlin. It is not
certain if the same secret Kremlin source discussed by Brennan is the same source used by
Halper in his reports.
However, there is evidence that Halper had similar sources to former MI6 spy Christopher
Steele, who compiled the dossier. Based on hand written notes from an interview the State
Department's Kathleen Kavalec states two of Steele's dossier sources; "Trubnikov" and
"Surkov."
Interesting, isn't it.
Surkov is Vladislav Surkov, an aide of Vladimir Putin who is on the U.S.'s list of
sanctioned individuals, and Trubnikov is none other than Vyacheslav Trubnikov. Trubnikov was
the First Deputy of Foreign Minister of Russia and he formally served as the Director of
Foreign Intelligence Service. He is also a source of Halper.
Russiagate Spy Paid $1 Million By Obama Was WaPo Deep Throat by Tyler Durden Thu, 01/23/2020 - 19:44 0
SHARES
Stephan Halper, the longtime CIA and FBI operative who
conducted espionage on the 2016 Trump campaign, was feeding information to Washington Post
reporter David Ignatius through his handler , according to
The Federalist , which describes his actions as "more evidence that the intelligence
community has co-opted the press to push anti-Trump conspiracy theories."
According to a court filing by Michael Flynn's defense team, Halper's 'handler' in the
Office of Net Assessment (ONA), Col. James Baker, "regularly lunched with the Washington Post
reporter."
As we noted in
May of 2018 , Halper was paid over $1 million by the Obama administration through the
Office of Net Assessment - nearly half of which came during
'Russiagate' - in which he not only surveilled multiple Trump campaign aides, he was
involved in an effort to tie General Flynn to a Russian academic, Svetlana Lokhova, as part of
a smear campaign.
Svetlana Lokhova, the Russian-born English citizen and Soviet-era scholar, told The
Federalist that she only realized the significance of her communications with and about
Ignatius following the filing of attorney Sidney Powell's reply brief in the Michael Flynn
case.
In last week's court filing, Powell highlighted how the CIA, FBI, Halper , and possibly
James Baker used the unnamed and unaware Lokhova and the complicit Ignatius to destroy Flynn
. This James Baker is not the one who worked under James Comey at the FBI, but a James Baker
in the Department of Defense Office of National Assessment. -
The Federalist
Powell wrote:
Stefan Halper is a known long-time operative for the CIA/FBI. He was paid exorbitant sums
by the FBI/CIA/DOD through the Department of Defense Department's Office of Net Assessment in
2016. His tasks seem to have included slandering Mr. Flynn with accusations of having an
affair with a young professor (a British national of Russian descent) Flynn met at an
official dinner at Cambridge University when he was head of DIA in 2014. Flynn has requested
the records of Col. James Baker because he was Halper's 'handler' in the Office of Net
Assessment in the Pentagon, and ONA Director Baker regularly lunched with Washington Post
Reporter David Ignatius. Baker is believed to be the person who illegally leaked the
transcript of Mr. Flynn's calls to Ignatius . The defense has requested the phone records of
James Clapper to confirm his contacts with Washington Post reporter Ignatius -- especially on
January 10, 2017, when Clapper told Ignatius in words to the effect of 'take the kill shot on
Flynn.' It cannot escape mention that the press has long had transcripts of the Kislyak calls
that the government has denied to the defense.
Lokhova sued Halper and multiple MSM outlets for defamation after Halper-fuelled rumors that
she was a Russian spy who had 'honeypotted' Flynn, which were first promoted by Lokhova's
mentor at Cambridge University - Professor Christopher Andrew, who wrote in the London Sunday
Times in February 2017 that her brief meeting with Flynnn during a 2015 dinner event was the
beginning of the former National Security Adviser's relationship with a Russian spy.
Prior to Andrew's article, other outlets such as the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post
and the New York Times had published rumors of a Flynn connection to a supposed Russian spy,
however Lokhova had no clue it was her until she was outed.
"Halper had been pushing the story that I was a Russian spy and Flynn's mistress since
December of 2016," Lokhova told The Federalist . "The New York Times' Mathew Rosenberg told me
a source had been circulating these stories since December 2016," she said, adding "but they
held the story until they could find a second source and someone at the Cambridge dinner."
In his book "
The Plot Against the President ," Lee Smith confirms that the story about a Flynn-Lokhova
intrigue was circulated to the press starting in December 2016.
But it wasn't until the Wall Street Journal published its March 17, 2017, article
suggesting she had inappropriate contacts with Flynn that Lokhova discovered the earlier
article Andrew had written about her for the Sunday Times , Lokhova said. Before then, within
days of February 28, 2017, several journalists reached out to her for comment, including two
working for the Wall Street Journal, but Lokhova didn't know why .
She also didn't comprehend who the inquiring journalists were at the time. That remained
true even after her mentor and unknown betrayer, Andrew, wrote Lokhova telling her that
"David Ignatius of Washington Post is in UK at moment. I've known him for years and trust
him. I've given him your email and he accepts that if you don't wish to respond, that an end
to it." -
The Federalist
It is unknown what Andrew meant by Ignatius's "inside track," however the above email was
sent to Lokhova just one month after
Ignatus reported the illegally leaked details of Flynn's conversation with Russia's
ambassador - leading to his firing .
Svetlana Lokhova is suing numerous media outlets, as well as FBI informant
Stefan Halper, for defamation and tells The Sara Carter Show that she was used as a target of
opportunity by the FBI in an attempt to discredit former National Security Advisor Michael
Flynn and target President Donald Trump.
Lokhova, a Russian born British scholar, calls Halper "the dirty trickster."
She says his past connections to these agencies and the FBI is a 'big tell' as to why he was
used to used to gather information on the Trump campaign.
"So you have 17 intelligence agencies in the United States with an $80 billion budget you
have thousands if not tens of thousands of trained people working for your intelligence
services and, yet, they seek out this complete outsider (Halper) right he's not a trained
investigator," she says, describing Halper as an overweight 74 year old.
"He's somebody whose known... has a history of being involved in every single scandal for
over forty years," said Lokhova. She says Halper's money trail is the answer.
Lokhova isn't the only one.
Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley's sent a letter last year demanding answers on
Halper's contracts and the Office of Net Assessment. Grassley sent the request in a
letter to Department of Defense Acting Secretary Mark Esper, after a Pentagon Inspector
General investigation discovered that the office failed to conduct appropriate oversight of the
contracts. Grassley urged Esper for the information.
According to Grassley's office it is currently reviewing information sent from the
Pentagon.
"The committee is currently reviewing information received recently from the Pentagon, in
response to Grassley's request," Taylor Foy, a spokesman for the committee, said in an
earlier interview with this news site. Foy confirmed Grassley is continuing to investigate
the matter.
According to the DoD Inspector General's report the
Office of Net Assessment (ONA) Contracting Officer's Representatives (CORs) " did not
maintain documentation of the work performed by Professor Halper or any communication that ONA
personnel had with Professor Halper; therefore, ONA CORs could not provide sufficient
documentation that Professor Halper conducted all of his work in accordance with applicable
laws and regulations. We determined that while the ONA CORs established a file to maintain
documents, they did not maintain sufficient documentation to comply with all the FAR
requirements related to having a complete COR."
Lokhova tells me at length about the erroneous and inaccurate articles published about her
and Flynn. She says it turned her life upside down. She also discusses the toll the lawsuits
are taking on her family financially and why she intends to keep on fighting.
Lokhova goes into lengthy details about the malicious targeting operation against her. She
says the DOJ must examine Halper's financial trail that began at the Office of Net Assessment
at the Pentagon. This, she says, will expose the Russia Hoax Origins.
Halper was used to spread malicious lies about her in an operation that utilized her brief
encounter with Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn at a dinner 2014 at the Cambridge Intelligence Seminar as
a way of spreading malicious lies about her, she said.
She has filed
numerous lawsuits in the federal court in Alexandria, Virginia, and is seeking more than
$25 million in damages from Halper, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington
Post and MSNBC.
"80% sure that Mifsud is dead". What has become of the Russiagate professor? InsideOver
(Furzy Mouse).
When is a CIA asset not an asset?
When the asset is made up out of thin air.
Somebody should make a movie out of this. Yes, Ghost Writer comes close and I highly
recommend it if you've not seen it. But this takes it a big set forward.
Of course, the director will have to be especially attentive to character development.
That could be difficult unless it's thought thru.
Top recommendation, Polar Socialist. Alec Guinness by way of Graham Greene makes for an
excellent combination to poke fun at the whole world of state-sponsored spycraft.
timbers: The story posted today is bizarre indeed. So the university consortium (Agrigento
doesn't have its own university and the plan is to continue to sponsor a branch of the
University of Palermo) wants a leader and ends up with Mifsud?
From Italian Wikipedia, entry Agrigento:
Agrigento, oltre ad essere sede di varie scuole medie superiori (alle quali sono iscritti
anche studenti provenienti dalla provincia), ospita una sede distaccata
dell'Università degli Studi di Palermo. Il polo universitario della provincia di
Agrigento nell'anno accademico 2008/2009 contava 3.613 studenti iscritti, così
suddivisi nelle 6 facoltà attivate nella sede decentrata
Mifsud, head of a small branch of a major university? Odd. And then he starts
grifting.
Yet Agrigento is the home turf of Andrea Camilleri and, supposedly, one of the models for
his city of Vigàta. This story is definitely something for Inspector Montalbano.
Background: Il Giornale was founded by Indro Montanelli, who was a "classic" Italian
conservative. He was notoriously stubborn. Kneecapping didn't stop him. One of the products
of Il Giornale is Marco Travaglio, who founded Il Fatto Quotidiano. So the source is
legitimate. I can't find an Italian version of the article, which is strange.
But the oddities of the obviously dodgy Mifsud and the hapless Papadopoulos are just part
of the whole saga of the current palace coup.
No wonder Nancy Pelosi can't figure out to send the charges to the Senate.
In March 2016, Papadopoulos first met Mr. Mifsud impromptu at Link Campus University, a
for-profit college in Rome that instructs NATO intelligence personnel.
Link Campus instructs NATO intelligence personnel[2] and the US intelligence and law
enforcement officials are also involved with Link.
The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) have
sent their officers to lecture at Link.
Regarding "the mysterious audio file sent to the editors of Adnkronos and Il Corriere
della Sera", that was found to be fake by the "expert in forensic sciences, one of the most
important in Italy working in the field", it is interesting to note that NATO-aligned
propaganda outlet Bellingcat
claims the voice in the recording is authentic (i.e. Mifsud).
Bellingcat deciding to "investigate" something is always a giant red flag.
The big question: Has Durham convened a grand jury or is he just planing another report?
On the conspiracy front: Apparently Mifsud is dead, so say some Italian journalists. Has
he been epsteined too?
Then there is the Intercept story that Adm. Rogers has been voluntarily cooperating with
Durham.
In any case, I'm really curious if Durham's playing Sherlock Holmes and uncovering the
various threads of this fascinating story of alleged meddling by law enforcement &
intelligence agencies in several countries in a presidential election and the framing of an
opposition presidential campaign and then president as a Manchurian Candidate.
No doubt Hollywood material if Durham lays it all out. Could beat All the Presidents
Men!
Sara Carter has the current story about Jospeh Mifsud alleged second reported demise, after
his allleged first demise reported a few years ago, as the Russiagate story was just
breaking. Second demise now that Russiagate story is concluding.
Papadopolus reports of Mifsud's death are greatly exaggerated. And the curtain will soon
be going up on his third act. Could this be the CIA disinformation coup crew working
overtime?
I guess we wait to get the real story from CNN.
(Sarcasm)
This is selective quotes from anti-Trump of neocon author. The general tone of the article is
completely different from presented quotes.
Notable quotes:
"... ..."This was an overthrow of government, this was an attempted overthrow -- and a lot of people were in on it," Trump declared , while Barr insisted , in a more lawyerly fashion, "The Inspector General's report now makes clear that the FBI launched an intrusive investigation of a U.S. presidential campaign on the thinnest of suspicions that, in my view, were insufficient to justify the steps taken." ..."
The report confirmed that the Russia investigation originated, as has been previously
reported, with the Trump campaign adviser
George Papadopoulos bragging to an Australian diplomat about Russia possessing "dirt" on
Hillary Clinton, which the IG determined "was sufficient to predicate the investigation." The
widespread conservative belief that the investigation began because of the dubious claims in
the Steele dossier was false. "Steele's reports played no role" in the opening of the Russia
investigation, the report found, because FBI officials were not "aware of Steele's election
reporting until weeks later."
...The IG also "did not find any records" that Joseph Mifsud, the professor who told
Papadopoulos the Russians had obtained "dirt" on Clinton, was an FBI informant sent to entrap
him.
...Page "did not play a role in the decision to open" the Russia investigation, and that
Strzok was "was not the sole, or even the highest-level, decision maker as to any of those
matters."
...the IG did determine that the Page FISA application was "inaccurate, incomplete, or
unsupported by appropriate documentation," which misled the court as to the credibility of the
FBI's evidence when seeking authority to surveil Page.
..."This was an overthrow of government, this was an attempted overthrow -- and a lot of
people were in on it,"
Trump declared , while Barr insisted , in a more lawyerly fashion, "The Inspector General's
report now makes clear that the FBI launched an intrusive investigation of a U.S. presidential
campaign on the thinnest of suspicions that, in my view, were insufficient to justify the steps
taken."
Adam
Serwer is a staff writer atThe Atlantic, where he covers
politics.
The possibility of CrowdStrike central role in creation of Russiagate might be one reason that Congressional Democrats (and
Republicans) were trying to swipe under the carpet the part of Trump conversation where he asked Zelenski to help to recover
server images CrowdStrike shipped to Ukraine.
Another question is that now it is possible that one of CrowdStrike employees or Alperovich himself played the role of Gussifer
2.0
Notable quotes:
"... There is strong reason to doubt Mueller's suggestion that an alleged Russian cutout called Guccifer 2.0 supplied the stolen emails to Assange. ..."
"... Mueller's decision not to interview Assange – a central figure who claims Russia was not behind the hack – suggests an unwillingness to explore avenues of evidence on fundamental questions. ..."
"... the government allowed CrowdStrike and the Democratic Party's legal counsel to submit redacted records, meaning CrowdStrike and not the government decided what could be revealed or not regarding evidence of hacking. ..."
"... John Brennan, then director of the CIA, played a seminal and overlooked role in all facets of what became Mueller's investigation: the suspicions that triggered the initial collusion probe; the allegations of Russian interference; and the intelligence assessment that purported to validate the interference allegations that Brennan himself helped generate. Yet Brennan has since revealed himself to be, like CrowdStrike and Steele, hardly a neutral party -- in fact a partisan with a deep animus toward Trump. ..."
Most of the material in this article will be familiar to regular readers of SST because I
wrote about it first. Here are the key conclusions:
The report uses qualified and vague language to describe key events, indicating that
Mueller and his investigators do not actually know for certain whether Russian intelligence
officers stole Democratic Party emails, or how those emails were transferred to
WikiLeaks.
The report's timeline of events appears to defy logic. According to its narrative,
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange announced the publication of Democratic Party emails not
only before he received the documents but before he even communicated with the source that
provided them.
There is strong reason to doubt Mueller's suggestion that an alleged Russian cutout
called Guccifer 2.0 supplied the stolen emails to Assange.
Mueller's decision not to interview Assange – a central figure who claims
Russia was not behind the hack – suggests an unwillingness to explore avenues of
evidence on fundamental questions.
U.S. intelligence officials cannot make definitive conclusions about the hacking of the
Democratic National Committee computer servers because they did not analyze those servers
themselves. Instead, they relied on the forensics of CrowdStrike, a private contractor for
the DNC that was not a neutral party, much as "Russian dossier" compiler Christopher Steele,
also a DNC contractor, was not a neutral party. This puts two Democrat-hired contractors
squarely behind underlying allegations in the affair – a key circumstance that Mueller
ignores.
Further, the government allowed CrowdStrike and the Democratic Party's legal counsel
to submit redacted records, meaning CrowdStrike and not the government decided what could be
revealed or not regarding evidence of hacking.
Mueller's report conspicuously does not allege that the Russian government carried out
the social media campaign. Instead it blames, as Mueller said in his closing remarks, "a
private Russian entity" known as the Internet Research Agency (IRA).
Mueller also falls far short of proving that the Russian social campaign was
sophisticated, or even more than minimally related to the 2016 election. As with the
collusion and Russian hacking allegations, Democratic officials had a central and overlooked
hand in generating the alarm about Russian social media activity.
John Brennan, then director of the CIA, played a seminal and overlooked role in all
facets of what became Mueller's investigation: the suspicions that triggered the initial
collusion probe; the allegations of Russian interference; and the intelligence assessment
that purported to validate the interference allegations that Brennan himself helped generate.
Yet Brennan has since revealed himself to be, like CrowdStrike and Steele, hardly a neutral
party -- in fact a partisan with a deep animus toward Trump.
I encourage you to read the piece. It is well written and provides an excellent overview of
critical events in the flawed investigation.
"... According to a Nov. 21 report by independent journalist Sara Carter, U.S. Attorney John Durham is questioning personnel in the Pentagon's Office of Net Assessment (ONA). ONA awarded about $1 million in contracts to FBI informant Stefan Halper, who appears to have played a key role in alleged U.S. intelligence agency spying on 2016 Trump campaign advisers Carter Page and George Papadopoulos. ..."
"... In addition, however, a court filing indicates that ONA's director, James H. Baker, "is believed to be the person who illegally leaked the transcript of Mr. Flynn's calls" to The Washington Post. ..."
"... The filing adds that Baker "was Halper's 'handler'" at ONA. Moreover, according to the court filing, the tasks assigned to "known long-time operative for the CIA/FBI" Halper "seem to have included slandering Mr. Flynn with accusations of having an affair with a young professor (a British national of Russian descent)." ..."
"... The filing notes that Flynn's defense team has requested phone records for then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper , likewise in order to confirm contacts with Ignatius. The filing singles out records for Jan. 10, 2017, when, according to the filing, "Clapper told Ignatius in words to the effect of 'take the kill shot on Flynn.'" ..."
"... The Pentagon's current inspector general has already found that Baker's office "did not maintain documentation of the work performed by Professor Halper or any communication that ONA personnel had with Professor Halper." As a result, according to the inspector general, ONA staff "could not provide sufficient documentation that Professor Halper conducted all of his work in accordance with applicable laws and regulations." ..."
"... Acting Pentagon Inspector General Glenn A. Fine in November 2017 started an investigation into charges that Baker retaliated against a whistleblower who red-flagged "rigged" contracts, including Halper's. Another $11 million in contracts under scrutiny went to the Long Term Strategy Group (LTSG), which is run by a schoolmate of Chelsea Clinton, whom she has referred to as her "best friend." ..."
"... The House Judiciary and Oversight committees -- which interviewed almost two dozen witnesses -- concluded in December 2018 that the Obama Justice Department treated Trump and Clinton unequally, affording Clinton and her associates extraordinary accommodations, while potentially abusing surveillance powers to investigate Trump's associates. ..."
The
Obama holdover heading the Pentagon office
reportedly under investigation by the U.S. attorney who is conducting the criminal probe of
the Trump -- Russia investigation was accused of leaking a classified document, in a recent
court filing for retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn.
The connection hasn't been previously reported.
According to a Nov. 21 report by independent journalist Sara Carter, U.S. Attorney John
Durham is questioning personnel in the Pentagon's Office of Net Assessment (ONA). ONA awarded
about $1 million in contracts to FBI informant Stefan Halper, who appears to have played a key
role in alleged U.S. intelligence agency spying on 2016 Trump campaign advisers Carter Page and
George Papadopoulos.
In addition, however, a
court filing indicates that ONA's director, James H. Baker, "is believed to be the person
who illegally leaked the transcript of Mr. Flynn's calls" to The Washington Post.
Specifically, the filing states, "ONA Director Baker regularly lunched with Washington Post
Reporter David Ignatius."
The filing adds that Baker "was Halper's 'handler'" at ONA. Moreover, according to the
court filing, the tasks assigned to "known long-time operative for the CIA/FBI" Halper "seem to
have included slandering Mr. Flynn with
accusations of having an affair with a young professor (a British national of Russian
descent)."
Baker didn't respond to a request for comment by The Epoch Times as of press time.
The filing notes that Flynn's defense team has requested phone records for
then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper , likewise in order to confirm
contacts with Ignatius. The filing singles out records for Jan. 10, 2017, when, according to
the filing, "Clapper told Ignatius in words to the effect of 'take the kill shot on
Flynn.'"
Clapper didn't respond to a request for comment by The Epoch Times as of press time.
The Pentagon's current inspector general has already found that Baker's office "did not
maintain documentation of the work performed by Professor Halper or any communication that ONA
personnel had with Professor Halper." As a result, according to the inspector general, ONA
staff "could not provide sufficient documentation that Professor Halper conducted all of his
work in accordance with applicable laws and regulations."
Acting Pentagon Inspector General Glenn A. Fine in November 2017 started an
investigation into charges that Baker retaliated against a whistleblower who red-flagged
"rigged" contracts, including Halper's. Another
$11 million in contracts under scrutiny went to the Long Term Strategy Group (LTSG), which
is run by a schoolmate
of Chelsea Clinton, whom she has referred to as her "best friend."
According to the whistleblower's attorney, "Baker's interest was his awareness of the
LTSG-Clinton connection; his presumptive desire to exploit that to his advantage in the event
of a Clinton election win; and the fact that contractors like LTSG served as a lucrative
landing pad for ONA retirees."
The attorney charged that Baker's claims about the whistleblower were "demonstrably false,"
calling Baker "partisan and highly vindictive."
At the time, Richard Perle, Ronald Reagan's former Assistant Secretary of Defense, called
Baker "a shallow and manipulative character that should have gone with the change in
administration." Perle further charged that the whistleblower "clearly was the target, for
political reasons, of an effort to push him out of government," saying "he's a Trump loyalist,
and it was launched and sustained by an Obama holdover."
That inquiry is being carried out by the inspector general's Investigations of Senior
Officials Directorate.
Raising additional questions, a 2016 report further revealed
that the ONA had failed to produce the top-secret net assessments the office was established to
conduct for more than 10 years, even with a yearly budget approaching $20 million.
Baker was named
as ONA director on May 14, 2015, during the Obama administration. A contemporaneous report
called his appointment "part of a wave of new Pentagon personnel moves in recent days,
senior-level officials who will outlast President Obama's final term in office." Baker
replaced Andrew W. Marshall, nicknamed "Yoda" for his "wizened appearance, fanatical
following in defense circles, and enigmatic nature." Obama Defense Secretary Ash Carter, in
selecting Baker, "passed over several of Marshall's acolytes who were in the running for the
position."
The House Judiciary and Oversight committees -- which interviewed almost two dozen
witnesses --
concluded in December 2018 that the Obama Justice Department treated Trump and Clinton
unequally, affording Clinton and her associates extraordinary accommodations, while potentially
abusing surveillance powers to investigate Trump's associates.
Jacqueline Deal, president of LTSG, wrote in an email to The Epoch Times: "My colleagues and
I began performing work in support of the Office of Net Assessment during the George W. Bush
administration, over a decade before the office's current director was appointed. None of the
awards received by LTSG from the Department of Defense resulted directly or indirectly from the
actions or influence of Secretary [Hillary] Clinton. Any statement or implication otherwise is
false."
Baker
replaced Andrew W. Marshall, nicknamed “Yoda” for his “wizened
appearance, fanatical following in defense circles, and enigmatic nature.” Obama
Defense Secretary Ash Carter, in selecting Baker, “passed over several of
Marshall’s acolytes who were in the running for the position.”
Holy ****...The replacement head of the Highlands Group..he may as well be that white
bearded guy in the matrix.. Hes the director of the MIC CIA NSA. ..the whole ball of
wax..puts it all together...only he is not Yoda like before him..like putting a restaurant
fast food manager in charge of the manhattan project. I know those acolytes must be really
pissed..and probably a potential source of leaks.
Investigations my eye! This has been going on since Moby **** was a minnow.
McCabe has been out there making money while under criminal referral.. That investigation
is DONE and still nothing happens.
The public information available on at least 50 of these double dealers is enough to send
them all up the river as of a few YEARS ago...but we have to have more
investigations...that's so they can figure out how to cover it all up.
Fire these creeps. Hire Sidney Powell.. They'll be swinging inside of six months.
Justice Department prosecutor U.S. Attorney
John Durham is questioning personnel connected to the Pentagon's Office of Net Assessment,
which awarded multiple contracts to FBI informant Stephan Halper. Halper, who was informing the
bureau on Trump campaign advisors, is a central figure in the FBI's original investigation into
President Donald Trump's 2016 campaign, SaraACarter.com has learned.
These latest developments reveal the expansive nature of what is now a Justice Department
criminal probe into the FBI's investigation into the Trump campaign. The revelation also comes
on the heels of DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz's report regarding the bureau's
investigation into the Trump campaign and Russia. Sen.
Lindsey Graham, R-SC, announced to Fox News' Sean Hannity Wednesday night the lengthy
investigative report will be released to the public on Dec., 9.
DOJ Attorney General William
Barr, who appointed Durham, is conducting a separate investigation alongside Horowitz's
probe. Both investigations are examining how U.S. intelligence agencies began investigating now
debunked ties between Russia and Trump campaign personnel in the 2016 presidential
election.
Multiple sources confirmed to this news site that Durham has spoken extensively with sources
working in the Office of Net Assessment, as well as outside contractors, that were paid through
Pentagon office.
Department of Justice officials declined to comment on Durham's probe.
In 2016, Halper was an integral part of the FBI's investigation into short-term Trump
campaign volunteer,
Carter Page and George Papadopolous . Halper first made contact with Page at his seminar in
July 2016. Page, who was already on the FBI's radar, was accused at the time of being
sympathetic to Russia. Halper stayed in contact with Page until September 2017.
During that time, the FBI sought and obtained a warrant from the Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Court (FISC) to spy on Page and used Halper to collect information on him,
according to sources. It is further alleged that Halper may have secretly recorded his
conversations with Page and Papadopolous. Some congressional officials believe that if
recordings exist they were kept from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, and would be
exculpatory evidence that would've exonerated Page from the
FISA warrant and allegations that Papadopolous was attempting to seek any help from the
Russians with regard to Hillary Clinton's emails.
In an interview with Papadopolous earlier this year, he told this reporter that he was
shocked when Halper insinuated to him that Russia was helping the Trump campaign. Papadopolous
said that he told him, "he didn't have any idea what the hell he was talking about that would
be treason and I have nothing to do with that."
Grassley's Office Gets Pentagon Docs
Moreover, this news site has learned that the Pentagon has finally sent Finance Committee
Chairman Chuck Grassley's committee the information it requested in July, regarding Halper's
contracts and the Office of Net Assessment. Grassley sent the request in a
letter to Department of Defense Acting Secretary Mark Esper, after a Pentagon Inspector
General investigation discovered that the office failed to conduct appropriate oversight of the
contracts. Grassley urged Esper for the information.
According to the DoD Inspector General's report the
Office of Net Assessment (ONA) Contracting Officer's Representatives (CORs) "did not
maintain documentation of the work performed by Professor Halper or any communication that ONA
personnel had with Professor Halper; therefore, ONA CORs could not provide sufficient
documentation that Professor Halper conducted all of his work in accordance with applicable
laws and regulations. We determined that while the ONA CORs established a file to maintain
documents, they did not maintain sufficient documentation to comply with all the FAR
requirements related to having a complete COR."
Although, Grassley stated that he wanted the information no later than July 25, the Pentagon
delivered the information only last week.
Grassley's office didn't elaborate on what information was given to the committee but
confirmed that it was in the process of reviewing hundreds of pages of documents.
"The committee is currently reviewing information received recently from the Pentagon, in
response to Grassley's request," said Taylor Foy, a spokesman for the committee. Foy
confirmed Grassley is continuing to investigate the matter.
Pentagon officials did not immediately respond to calls and emails. ( SaraACarter.com will
update this story if they so chose to respond. )
The Pentagon Audit
Grassley's July letter stated that "shockingly, the audit found that these types of
discrepancies were not unique to contracts with Professor Halper, which indicates ONA must take
immediate steps to shore up its management and oversight of the contracting process."
"Accordingly, no later than July 25, 2019, please explain to the Committee the steps DoD
has taken to address the recommendations that DoD IG made with respect to ONA's contracting
procedures and produce to the Committee all records related to Professor Halper's contracts
with DoD," Grassley's letter stated. "In addition, I request that ONA provide a briefing to
my Committee staff regarding the Halper contracts."
The 74-year old professor, has rarely spoken out publicly since being outed by The
Washington Post, and other news organizations, as one of the informants for the bureau who
spied on the Trump campaign. He spent a career developing top-level government
connections–not just through academia, as he did in Great Britain through the Cambridge
Security Initiative, but through his connections in both the CIA and British MI-6. He is
expected to be speaking this month at the seminar, he helped found, according to The Daily
Caller.
"The results of this audit are disappointing and illustrate a systemic failure to manage
and oversee the contracting process," stated the Senator in the
letter sent July, 12 to the DOD. "Time and again, DoD's challenges with contract
management and oversight are put on display. It is far past time the largest, most critical
agency in this country steps up and takes immediate action to increase its efforts to stop
waste, fraud and abuse of taxpayer dollars."
The Office of Net Assessment came under fire in 2016, when Bill
Gertz, a columnist for The Washington Times, revealed that it failed to produce the
top-secret net assessments the office was established to do for more than a decade, despite its
then nearly $20 million annual budget.
In August, a Pentagon Inspector General report revealed that the office failed to document
the research Halper had conducted for the Pentagon in four separate studies worth roughly $1
million. The inspector general's report revealed that loose contracting practices at the office
and failed oversight was to blame.
"... The Task Force also could carry out other covert actions, such as information operations. A nice sounding euphemism for propaganda, and computer network operations. There has been some informed speculation that Guccifer 2.0 was a creation of this Task Force. ..."
The average American has no idea how alarming is the news that former CIA Director John
Brennan reportedly created and staffed a CIA Task Force in early 2016 that was named, Trump
Task Force, and given the mission of spying on and carrying out covert actions against the
campaign of candidate Donald Trump.
This was not a simple gathering of a small number of disgruntled Democrats working at the
CIA who got together like a book club to grouse and complain about the brash real estate guy
from New York. It was a specially designed covert action to try to destroy Donald Trump.
A "Task Force" is a special bureaucratic creation that provides a vehicle for bring case
officers and analysts together, along with admin support, for a limited term project. But it
also can be expanded to include personnel from other agencies, such as the FBI, DIA and NSA.
Task Forces have been used since the inception of the CIA in 1947. Here's a recently
declassified memo outlining the considerations in the creation of a task force in 1958. The
author, L.K. White, talks about the need for a coordinating Headquarters element and an
Operational unit "in the field", i.e. deployed around the world.
A Task Force operates independent of the CIA " Mission Centers
" (that's the jargon for the current CIA organization chart).
So what did John Brennan do? I am told by an knowledgeable source that Brennan created a
Trump Task Force in early 2016. It was an invitation only Task Force. Specific case officers
(i.e., men and women who recruit and handle spies overseas), analysts and admin personnel were
recruited. Not everyone invited accepted the offer. But many did.
This was not a CIA only operation. Personnel from the FBI also were assigned to the Task
Force. We have some clues that Christopher Steele's FBi handler, Michael Gaeta, may have been
detailed to the Trump Task Force ( see here
).
So what kind of things would this Task Force do? The case officers would work with foreign
intelligence services such as MI-6, the Italians, the Ukrainians and the Australians on
identifying intelligence collection priorities. Task Force members could task NSA to do
targeted collection. They also would have the ability to engage in covert action, such as
targeting George Papadopoulos. Joseph Mifsud may be able to shed light on the CIA officers who
met with him, briefed on operational objectives regarding Papadopoulos and helped arrange
monitored meetings. I think it is highly likely that the honey pot that met with George
Papadopoulos, a woman named Azra Turk, was part of the CIA Trump Task Force.
The Task Force also could carry out other covert actions, such as information
operations. A nice sounding euphemism for propaganda, and computer network operations. There
has been some informed speculation that Guccifer 2.0 was a creation of this Task
Force.
In light of what we have learned about the alleged CIA whistleblower, Eric Ciaramella, there
should be a serious investigation to determine if he was a part of this Task Force or, at
minimum, reporting to them.
When I described this to one friend, a retired CIA Chief of Station, his first response was,
"My God, that's illegal." We then reminisced about another illegal operation carried out under
the auspices of the CIA Central American Task Force back in the 1980s. That became known to
Americans as the Iran Contra scandal.
I sure hope that John Durham and his team are looking at this angle. If true it marks a new
and damning indictment of the corruption of the CIA. Rather than spying on genuine foreign
threats, this Task Force played a critical role in creating and feeding the meme that Donald
Trump was a tool of the Russians and a puppet of Putin.
"... George Papadopoulos was nothing more than a naive, eager patsy. A young guy who wanted to be important to the Trump campaign got played. ..."
"... Here are salient sections of the Mueller Report. Read them for yourself and you will see that Mifsud was never fingered as a Russian intelligence asset. You were just asked to believe this nonsense. Sadly, many seemingly smart people have bought into this lie. ..."
"... According to Papadopoulos , Mifsud at first seemed uninterested in Papadopoulos when they met in Rome. After Papadopoulos informed Mifsud about his role in the Trump Campaign, however, Mifsud appeared to take greater interest in Papadopoulos. ..."
"... On March 24, 2016, Papadopoulos met with Mifsud in London. 422 Mifsud was accompanied by a Russian female named Olga Polonskaya. Mifsud introduced Polonskaya as a former student of his who had connections to Vladimir Putin. (p. 84) ..."
"... During the meeting, Polonskaya offered to help Papadopoulos establish contacts in Russia and stated that the Russian ambassador in London was a friend of hers .425 Based on this interaction, Papadopoulos expected Mifsud and Polonskaya to introduce him to the Russian ambassador in London, but that did not occur. (p. 84) ..."
"... Throughout April 2016, Papadopoulos continued to correspond with , meet with, and seek Russia contacts through Mifsud and , at times , Polonskaya. For example, within a week of her initial March 24 meeting with him, Polonskaya attempted to send Papadopoulos a text messagewhich email exchanges show to have been drafted or edited by Mifsud-addressing Papadopoulos 's "wish to engage with the Russian Federation." When Papadopoulos learned from Mifsud that Polonskaya had tried to message him , he sent her an email seeking another meeting. (p. 87) ..."
"... Following the meeting, Mifsud traveled as planned to Moscow.455 On April 18, 2016, while in Russia, Mifsud introduced Papadopoulos over email to Ivan Timofeev, a member of the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC).456 Mifsud had described Timofeev as having connections with the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA),457 the executive entity in Russia responsible for Russian foreign relations. (p. 88) ..."
"... After a stop in Rome, Mifsud returned to England on April 25, 2016.462 The next day, Papadopoulos met Mifsud for breakfast at the Andaz Hotel (the same location as their last meeting). 463 During that meeting, Mifsud told Papadopoulos that he had met with high-level Russian government officials during his recent trip to Moscow . Mifsud also said that, on the trip, he learned that the Russians had obtained "dirt" on candidate Hillary Clinton. As Papadopoulos later stated to the FBI, Mifsud said that the "dirt" was in the form of " emails of Clinton," and that they "have thousands of emails." (pp. 88-89) ..."
"... I believe that the term that you are looking for is "entrapment" or something very close. ..."
"... you're being far too kind to Papadop, who, while "naive" and "eager", was also a serial liar and fantasist, whose lies, amplified by unethical Mueller thugs, have caused a lot of trouble. He's made matters worse by spreading new fantasies, which have been uncritically believed by far too many. ..."
"... is CNN really a CIA run disinformation site? They have no viewers, credibility, revenues or business plan. Yet they persist in airports world wide. And now this odd CNN relationship to the very same Link Campus that included "visiting professor" Mifsud. ..."
Joseph Mifsud, the Maltese Diplomat who reportedly told George Papadopoulos that Russia had
Hillary's emails, was a British intelligence asset (known as a "Joe" among British spies). But
the Brits did not keep Mifsud for themselves. They offered him to the CIA and the FBI, and
those two US agencies, in a coordinated effort, relied on Mifsud to entrap Papadopoulos and to
manufacture a Russian collusion case against the Trump Campaign.
Mifsud's job was simple--dangle the possibility of getting Hillary's emails from the
Russians, offer up meetings with Russian Government officials and introduce Papadopoulos to
another Western intelligence operative who pretended to be the niece of Vladimir Putin (Putin
does not have a niece). These communications were recorded and then used against
Papadopoulos.
The FBI falsely claims that they learned of the Papadopoulos "meeting" with Mifsud two
months after it happened from an Australian diplomat, Alexander Downer, who also was tied
closely to British intelligence and the Clintons. But this story does not hold water. Take a
look at the criminal complaint filed against Papadopoulos (
see here ).
The complaint recounts meetings, emails and conversations that George Papadopoulos had with
Professor Mifsud and people Mifsud introduced to Papadopoulos.Where the hell did the FBI get
that information? Remember, they charged George with lying to the FBI because of discrepancies
between what he told Agents and what Agents claimed was actually said and written.
The meaning of this leaves only two possibilities--the FBI secured a FISA warrant against
Papadopoulos sometime in March or April of 2016 or the Brits and American intelligence
intercepted the communications between Papadopoulos and the Mifsud crew.
We already know that there is a recording--an exculpatory recording--of Papadopoulos
rebuffing the offer to collaborate with the Russians. There was no legal reason to get a FISA
warrant against Papadopoulos. And anything collected by British intelligence and passed to the
CIA or NSA could not be used as evidence. There is much more to this story to unravel.
What should shock all civil libertarians and Americans of good will is that the public has
been bamboozled into believing that Joseph Mifsud was a Russian intelligence operative. But
there is no evidence whatsoever for that claim. Please look at the Mueller Report (I have
copied key sections and inserted below, at the end of this article). Mueller only claims that,
"Joseph Mifsud, a London-based professor who had connections to Russia and traveled to Moscow
in April 2016." If that is the standard, then Bill Clinton is a Russian intelligence
asset--Clinton has connections to Russia (he got paid a lot of money by the Russians) and he
traveled to Moscow.
If you want to get the full picture of Mifsud's ties to British intelligence, the CIA and
the FBI, I encourage you to read,
The Death of Russiagate?, Mueller team tied to Mifsud network, a tangled web . This article
provides actual evidence about the intelligence pedigree of Joseph Mifsud. Robert Mueller, by
contrast, provides not one single piece of actual evidence. Mueller and his team of clown
lawyers relied on innuendo and guilt by association.
If this had been a genuine counter-intelligence investigation, then the FBI should have
asked one fundamental question--"Who is Joseph Mifsud working for?" They did not need to ask
The FBI knew the answer. Joseph Mifsud was working for the CIA and the FBI with the permission
of the British MI-6.
I hope the full dimensions of this hoax will be exposed. George Papadopoulos was nothing
more than a naive, eager patsy. A young guy who wanted to be important to the Trump campaign
got played.
Here are salient sections of the Mueller Report. Read them for yourself and you will see
that Mifsud was never fingered as a Russian intelligence asset. You were just asked to believe
this nonsense. Sadly, many seemingly smart people have bought into this lie.
Spring 2016. Campaign foreign policy advisor George Papadopoulos made early contact with
Joseph Mifsud, a London-based professor who had connections to Russia and traveled to Moscow in
April 2016. Immediately upon his return to London from that trip, Mifsud told Papadopoulos that
the Russian government had "dirt" on Hillary Clinton in the form of thousands of emails. One
week later, in the first week of May 2016, Papadopoulos suggested to a representative of a
foreign government that the Trump Campaign had received indications from the Russian government
that it could assist the Campaign? through the anonymous release of information damaging to
candidate Clinton. Throughout that period of time and for several months thereafter,
Papadopoulos worked with Mifsud and two Russian nationals to arrange a meeting between the
Campaign and the Russian government. No meeting took place. . . .
George Papadopoulos, a foreign policy advisor during the campaign period , pleaded guilty to
lying to investigators about, inter alia, the nature and timing of his interactions with Joseph
Mifsud, the professor who told Papadopoulos that the Russians had dirt on candidate Clinton .in
the form of thousands of emails. . . .
In late April 2016, Papadopoulos was told by London-based professor Joseph Mifsud,
immediately after Mifsud 's return from a trip to Moscow, that the Russian government had
obtained "dirt" on candidate Clinton in the form of thousands of emails. . . .Throughout the
relevant period of time and for several months thereafter, Papadopoulos worked with Mifsud and
two Russian nationals to arrange a meeting between the Campaign and the Russian government.
That meeting never came to pass. (p. 81)
The purpose of the trip was to meet officials affiliated with Link Campus University, a
for-profit institution headed by a former Italian government official.412 During the visit ,
Papadopoulos was introduced to Joseph Mifsud. (p. 83)
Mifsud is a Maltese national who worked as a professor at the London Academy of Diplomacy in
London, England. 413 Although Mifsud worked out of London and was also affiliated with LCILP,
the encounter in Rome was the first time that Papadopoulos met him.414 Mifsud maintained
various Russian contacts while living in London, as described further below. Among his contacts
was ,XXXX a one-time employee of the IRA,. . . In January and February 2016, Mifsud and -
discussed possibly meeting in Russia. (p. 83)
According to Papadopoulos , Mifsud at first seemed uninterested in Papadopoulos when they
met in Rome. After Papadopoulos informed Mifsud about his role in the Trump Campaign, however,
Mifsud appeared to take greater interest in Papadopoulos. The two discussed Mifsud 's European
and Russian contacts and had a general discussion about Russia; Mifsud also offered to
introduce Papadopoulos to European leaders and others with contacts to the Russian government.
Papadopoulos told the Office that Mifsud 's claim of substantial connections with Russian
government officials interested Papadopoulos, who thought that such connections could increase
his importance as a policy advisor to the Trump Campaign. (p. 83)
On March 24, 2016, Papadopoulos met with Mifsud in London. 422 Mifsud was accompanied by a
Russian female named Olga Polonskaya. Mifsud introduced Polonskaya as a former student of his
who had connections to Vladimir Putin. (p. 84)
During the meeting, Polonskaya offered to help Papadopoulos establish contacts in Russia and
stated that the Russian ambassador in London was a friend of hers .425 Based on this
interaction, Papadopoulos expected Mifsud and Polonskaya to introduce him to the Russian
ambassador in London, but that did not occur. (p. 84)
Throughout April 2016, Papadopoulos continued to correspond with , meet with, and seek
Russia contacts through Mifsud and , at times , Polonskaya. For example, within a week of her
initial March 24 meeting with him, Polonskaya attempted to send Papadopoulos a text
messagewhich email exchanges show to have been drafted or edited by Mifsud-addressing
Papadopoulos 's "wish to engage with the Russian Federation." When Papadopoulos learned from
Mifsud that Polonskaya had tried to message him , he sent her an email seeking another meeting.
(p. 87)
Mifsud , who had been copied on the email exchanges, replied on the morning of April 11,
2016. He wrote, "This is already been agreed. I am flying to Moscow on the 18th for a Valdai
meeting, plus other meetings at the Duma. We will talk tomorrow." 448 The two bodies referenced
by Mifsud are part of or associated with the Russian government: the Duma is a Russian
legislative assembly, 449 while "Valdai" refers to the Valdai Discussion Club, a Moscow-based
group that "is close to Russia's foreign-policy establishment." 450 Papadopoulos thanked Mifsud
and said that he would see him "tomorrow." 451 (p. 87)
Following the meeting, Mifsud traveled as planned to Moscow.455 On April 18, 2016, while in
Russia, Mifsud introduced Papadopoulos over email to Ivan Timofeev, a member of the Russian
International Affairs Council (RIAC).456 Mifsud had described Timofeev as having connections
with the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA),457 the executive entity in Russia
responsible for Russian foreign relations. (p. 88)
After a stop in Rome, Mifsud returned to England on April 25, 2016.462 The next day,
Papadopoulos met Mifsud for breakfast at the Andaz Hotel (the same location as their last
meeting). 463 During that meeting, Mifsud told Papadopoulos that he had met with high-level
Russian government officials during his recent trip to Moscow . Mifsud also said that, on the
trip, he learned that the Russians had obtained "dirt" on candidate Hillary Clinton. As
Papadopoulos later stated to the FBI, Mifsud said that the "dirt" was in the form of " emails
of Clinton," and that they "have thousands of emails." (pp. 88-89)
Appreciate your efforts in peeling the onion on the shenanigans of our intel and law
enforcement agencies. This Russia Collusion/SpyGate story was a regular topic at our monthly
"guys night out" gathering at a local watering hole. However at our last gathering the
general consensus was "who cares" if Trump the butt of these machinations is unwilling to
Drain the Swamp by declassifying. Why do you think Trump is not aggressively going after
Brennan, Comey, Clapper, et al?
Larry..Fits The Timeline of for Operations that already been planned in Advance.while
watching the Election Result for Trump and Hillary..in 2016..By March 2016 the States were
making their choices... 2016..s clear..Long before May. ,,,.Using Its Profile Data n obtained
By Fusion GPS..since October 2015..AND..??????.What sources were they Using..Why...and were
they actually being Given MISINFORMATION.??.then through It. all these
Events.Happened..This,,.Operation you write of.....in May to June...The Steele Dossier
Operation was Conducted..The Muller Team..And Case Built..An Extra Ordinary SUPER PACK..and
Illegal..(THE REAL COLLUSION).. Operation..So Now...Its Time for the TRUTH..
also..to me...The..."Mystery Woman " in this Spy story...would be Nellie Ohr..especially the
European Operations...and That to Me..Has Brennen Finger Prints..on The
"Dossier"...So..Background..an d Fine Tuning...
Why Nellie Ohr..Because She her time line go's from The Steel Dossier and Fusion GPS meetings
With Obama..Clinton connected People like Attorney Edwin Lieberman..Husband of Hillary
Clintons Chief of Staff..To Ukrainetothe" Black Ledger.also a HOAX..To.."Joe.Bidens
Connections to the Ukraine..and back to herto work at CIA Open Source Operations..All done
Under the time Period when John Brennen was Director ..DCI..of the CIA...Appointed by
President OBAMA..To Replace General Petraeus..who looks like He may have been another.PAWN
..and Put into the DCI position on Purpose by Obama..Way back in September 2011..
Someone
advised DCI Petraeus..to use the same TRANSITIONAL COMMUNICATION SYSTEMS..
That Petraeus had
Used in the Field During Operations in Afghanistan and Iraq.Believing They were SECURE
Systems..
Apparently those Systems had already been Hacked By IRAN and China..Long before
Obama ...
Made his deals with Iran..Petraeus got into a Affair tht Compromised
Him..(Setup),,?? and The FBI..Under Director Muller to General Petraus Out..Shame
him..Brought Charges...and Petraeus was Replaced with John Brennen as DCI..in
On..Nov...2012...Then Bob Muller was replaced at the FBI,,was replaced By James Comey..In
September 2013...ALL Events Occurred during The time Barrack Obama was President..Jan
20...2009 to Jan 20th,,2017...and...Brennen and Nellie Ohr were in the Middle of everything
that happened..All Operations..ALL Information gathering..
And ALL Intended to Blame The
Russians..and Protect all other Poker Game High Rollers..Including The "Ukraine Train..' Thi
is just a Theory..Based on "Open Information...
you're being far too kind to Papadop, who, while "naive" and "eager", was also a serial liar
and fantasist, whose lies, amplified by unethical Mueller thugs, have caused a lot of
trouble. He's made matters worse by spreading new fantasies, which have been uncritically
believed by far too many.
George proved to be an easy mark. I don't beat up on "nobodies." Papadopoulos qualifies as
such in my book. He had done nothing to distinguish himself and suddenly had the world thrust
on him. I do feel sorry for hm. This is akin to raping a retarded girl.
AND YET the MSM largely remain AWOL on this and related subjects. They must figure if they
continue to hear, see and speak no evil the voting public will be deaf, dumb and blind to
such widespread corruption. It's not encouraging that the FBI and DOJ continue to be
intractable when it comes to attempts by Judicial Watch to gain transparency and clarity.
Unless something like optimal political timing is a big factor, it's also not encouraging
that AG Barr and even the POTUS are still keeping a lid on all of this.
It's going to be very interesting to see if the truth can break through the stonewalling
especially when it comes to the 2020 elections. Thanks to this site and a few others, there's
still hope. Thank you Larry and Col. Lang.
A BIASED FBI means ALL FBI sworn testimony is questionable and unreliable.
A BIASED FBI means every court case outcome in which the FBI has been involved is
untrustworthy.
A BIASED FBI means that everything from WACO to Oklahoma Bomb to 9/11 must be reexamined.
The Feds/FBI did a criminally irresponsible job of investigating the Oklahoma Bomb and
Sanilac county, with the Militia Culture permeating it. There were TWO militias up there. (1)
The CITIZENS Militia, with 85 year old Hattie Farley, which OPPOSED the Sheriff and the "Good
Old Boys" and (2) The violence prone, RACIST, PRO-sheriff "element".
Sanilac county Sheriff Virgil Strickler was BFF and business partner with David Rydel,
"commandant" of the "united States Theatre Command" militia which is named in the FBI
"Project Megiddo" report for Y2K. Strickler let the Rydel militia use the department's
shooting range. LOUD explosions on the Nichols farm were repeatedly reported to Strickler, So
what do you know! when the Feds raided the farm the evidence was cleaned up. James Nichols
stated in his speech at the Dearborn Centennial Library that the FIRST person he wanted to
talk to was Strickler, which he did BEFORE talking to the FEDS. James was welcomed home as a
HERO when he was released from Federal custody. All described in Nichols' book "Freedom's
End"
The "support network" for the bomb extended to the very top of Sanilac County. Worth Township
in Sanilac county, had a Supervisor, James Payne, who flew Confederate flags on his property
for decades. He drove around with a Confederate license plate, and had a Black Lawn Jockey
holding a Confederate flag standing right at his door. Sheriff Strickler and Judge Donald
Teeple redularly passed that lawn jockey and saw the flags as they entered Payne's home to
socialize. Payne bragged about "using" his Public Office to direct the State Police
Weighmaster to harrass Minority truckers coming through Worth township, and how he did not
want "dirty niggers" in His township. This got recorded and all came out in a township
meeting. Eric Levine, owner/editor of "The Sanilac County News" never once printed a negative
word about the Racism and Confederate flags, rendering support via his silence. Levine never
printed a word about Janice Putz, the Township Clerk, and Payne's successor in office,
publicly defending Payne's racism in a township meeting. Levine also "ignored" a letter that
was mailed to EVERY Worth township resident exposing Payne's racism . .... NOT ONE WORD. Eric
Levine supports racism by failing to expose it even when it is major news in his reporting
area. Nothing printed beyond the "obligatory" columns denouncing the bombers.
James Nichols gave a talk at the Dearborn Centennial Library promoting his book/conspiracy
theory blaming the Government for the Oklahoma bomb. I walked up to him afterward and offered
him documentation about judge Donald Teeple's campaign financing. Nichols did not want to
hear anything negative about THAT "Government Operative" ...... very ODD to say the least.
Why would he decline documentation on someone supposedly his enemy ..... unless .......
Teeple was a real "hero"when it came to looting elderly Citizen's property like ordering the
"cleanup" of a fortune in antiques from Hattie Farley, but Teeple was gentle as a lamb with
the Nichols boys.
The FBI lost all credibility with me back when they trotted out their parade of "domestic
terrorists" who they themselves were selling Play-Doh to, but who had only asked for combat
boots so that they could practice close order drill in Miami, or a guy who turned out to be
bootlegging cell phones in Michigan.
Now they're at it again, patting themselves on the back and making press conferences about
no fewer than five mass shooters apprehended this week, among them "saving dozens of lives"
by arresting a hotel cook who told a coworker he was planning on coming back to the hotel in
a few days to "shoot everyone he saw."
Sure, he was nuts, but even so if he was actually planning to do that would he announce it
to someone two days in advance? In any case, the FBI didn't find him, a coworker turned him
in when he was not on the FBI's radar.
Linked article raises the question again: is CNN really a CIA run disinformation site? They
have no viewers, credibility, revenues or business plan. Yet they persist in airports world
wide. And now this odd CNN relationship to the very same Link Campus that included "visiting
professor" Mifsud.
To wit: ......"tried to get him a cushy job working with CNN's Freedom Project at Link
Campus in Rome."
The more we learn, the more questions arise. No wonder no one is ready to go public with
the final Russia-gate analysis yet.
Halper has links to the CIA and MI6. He also served in the Nixon, Ford, and Reagan
administrations.
Halper met with Carter Page, a volunteer adviser to the Trump campaign, at a Cambridge
symposium held on July 11 and 12, 2016. Page had just returned from a trip to Russia a few days
prior and said he remained in contact with Halper for a number of months after that.
Page's trip became the core subject of the Steele dossier -- a collection of unsubstantiated
claims about Trump-Russia collusion put together by former MI6 agent Christopher Steele that
was paid for by Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign and the Democratic National
Committee. The dossier was used by the FBI as the core evidence to obtain from the Foreign
Intelligence Surveillance Court a warrant to spy on Page several weeks before the presidential
election
On Sept. 2, 2016, Halper also contacted George Papadopoulos, another Trump campaign aide,
and offered $3,000 and a paid trip to London to write a paper about a gas field in the
Mediterranean Sea. Papadopoulos accepted the offer and flew to London, where he met Halper and
his assistant.
On Aug. 31 or Sept. 1, 2016, Halper also met with Trump campaign co-Chairman Sam Clovis in
Northern Virginia and offered help to the Trump campaign with foreign policy, The Washington
Post
reported .
Halper's concern about Lokhova is portrayed as feigned in her complaint, since he seemed to
have shown no concern for about two years after the 2014 Flynn meeting, only showing concern
after Flynn started to aid Trump.
In fact, Halper appears himself to be rather close to Russian intelligence, having invited
Vladimir Trubnikov, former director of Russian intelligence, to teach at CIS at least twice --
in 2012 and in 2015 -- according to the complaint. Trubnikov obliged him both times.
Between 2012 and 2017, Halper was
paid more than a $1 million by the Office of Net Assessment, a strategy think tank that
falls directly under the U.S. secretary of defense.
Adam Lovinger, an analyst at the think tank, raised alarm about the contracts to Halper,
but was punished for it , according to his lawyer.
Flynn
Flynn was one of the most consequential post-9/11 intelligence officials in the world.
"Mike Flynn's impact on the nation's War on Terror probably trumps any other single person
as his energy and skill at harnessing the Intelligence Community into a focused effort was
literally historic," wrote then-Brig. Gen. John Mulholland in Flynn's 2007 performance
review.
At the time, Flynn headed intelligence at the Joint Special Operations Command.
Mulholland, himself a former special forces officer, called Flynn "easily the best
intelligence professional of any service serving today."
In 2014, however, he was forced into retirement over disagreements with the Obama
administration.
More than a year ago, Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to two FBI agents about conversations
with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak that took place when former President Barack Obama
imposed additional sanctions on Russia in December 2016.
He also pleaded guilty to lying about asking Russia to vote against or delay the vote on a
U.N. Security Council resolution.
Finally, he pleaded guilty to lying about his foreign lobbying disclosures regarding the
extent to which his work benefiting the Turkish government was overseen by that government.
Foreign lobbying paperwork violations are seldom prosecuted. Flynn said the work started in
August 2016; he shut down his lobbying firm in November 2016.
Flynn has extensively cooperated with government prosecutors
on multiple investigations and further cooperation will give him yet more grounds to ask
for a lenient sentence. Even before the delay, the prosecutors were asking for a lenient
sentence, including no prison time, while the defense wanted no more than a year of probation
and community service.
They are afraid to admin that a color revolution was launched to depose Trump after the
elections of 2016. Essentially a coup d'état by intelligence agencies and Clinton wing of
Democratic Party.
Notable quotes:
"... The 53 House Intel interviews. House Intelligence interviewed many key players in the Russia probe and asked the DNI to declassify those interviews nearly a year ago, after sending the transcripts for review last November. There are several big reveals, I'm told, including the first evidence that a lawyer tied to the Democratic National Committee had Russia-related contacts at the CIA. ..."
"... The Stefan Halper documents. It has been widely reported that European-based American academic Stefan Halper and a young assistant, Azra Turk, worked as FBI sources . ..."
"... Page/Papadopoulos exculpatory statements. Another of Nunes' five buckets, these documents purport to show what the two Trump aides were recorded telling undercover assets or captured in intercepts insisting on their innocence. Papadopoulos told me he told an FBI undercover source in September 2016 that the Trump campaign was not trying to obtain hacked Clinton documents from Russia and considered doing so to be treason. ..."
"... The 'Gang of Eight' briefing materials. These were a series of classified briefings and briefing books the FBI and DOJ provided key leaders in Congress in the summer of 2018 that identify shortcomings in the Russia collusion narrative. ..."
"... The Steele spreadsheet. I wrote recently that the FBI kept a spreadsheet on the accuracy and reliability of every claim in the Steele dossier. According to my sources, it showed as much as 90 percent of the claims could not be corroborated, were debunked or turned out to be open-source internet rumors. ..."
"... The Steele interview. It has been reported, and confirmed, that the DOJ's inspector general (IG) interviewed the former British intelligence operative for as long as 16 hours about his contacts with the FBI while working with Clinton's opposition research firm, Fusion GPS. It is clear from documents already forced into the public view by lawsuits that Steele admitted in the fall of 2016 that he was desperate to defeat Trump ..."
"... The redacted sections of the third FISA renewal application. This was the last of four FISA warrants targeting the Trump campaign; it was renewed in June 2017 after special counsel Robert Mueller 's probe had started, and signed by then-Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein . It is the one FISA application that House Republicans have repeatedly asked to be released, and I'm told the big reveal in the currently redacted sections of the application is that it contained both misleading information and evidence of intrusive tactics used by the U.S. government to infiltrate Trump's orbit. ..."
"... Records of allies' assistance. Multiple sources have said a handful of U.S. allies overseas – possibly Great Britain, Australia and Italy – were asked to assist FBI efforts to check on Trump connections to Russia. ..."
"... Attorney General Bill Barr's recent comments that "the use of foreign intelligence capabilities and counterintelligence capabilities against an American political campaign, to me, is unprecedented and it's a serious red line that's been crossed." ..."
As the Russiagate circus attempts to quietly disappear over the horizon, with Democrats
preferring to shift the anti-Trump narrative back to "racist", "white supremacist",
"xenophobe", and the mainstream media ready to squawk "recession"; the Trump administration may
have a few more cards up its sleeve before anyone claims the higher ground in this farce we
call an election campaign.
As
The Hill's John Solomon details, in September 2018 that President Trump told my Hill.TV
colleague Buck Sexton and me that he would order the release of all classified documents
showing what the FBI, the Department of Justice (DOJ) and other U.S. intelligence agencies may
have done wrong in the Russia probe.
And while it's been almost a year since then, of feet-dragging and cajoling and
deep-state-fighting, we wonder, given Solomon's revelations below, if the president is getting
ready to play his 'Trump' card.
Here are the documents that
Solomon believes have the greatest chance of rocking Washington, if declassified:
1.) Christopher
Steele 's confidential human source reports at the FBI. These documents, known in bureau
parlance as 1023 reports, show exactly what transpired each time Steele and his FBI handlers
met in the summer and fall of 2016 to discuss his anti-Trump dossier. The big reveal, my
sources say, could be the first evidence that the FBI shared sensitive information with
Steele, such as the existence of the classified
Crossfire Hurricane operation targeting the Trump campaign. It would be a huge discovery
if the FBI fed Trump-Russia intel to Steele in the midst of an election, especially when his
ultimate opposition-research client was Hillary Clinton and the Democratic National
Committee (DNC). The FBI has released only one or two of these reports under FOIA lawsuits
and they were 100 percent redacted. The American public deserves better.
2.) The 53 House Intel interviews. House Intelligence interviewed many key players in
the Russia probe and asked the DNI to declassify those interviews nearly a year ago, after
sending the transcripts for review last November. There are several big reveals, I'm told,
including the first evidence that a lawyer tied to the Democratic National Committee had
Russia-related contacts at the CIA.
3.) The Stefan Halper documents. It has been widely reported that European-based
American academic Stefan Halper and a young assistant, Azra Turk,
worked as FBI sources . We know for sure that one or both had contact with targeted
Trump aides like Carter Page and George Papadopoulos at the end of the
election. My sources tell me there may be other documents showing Halper continued working
his way to the top of Trump's transition and administration, eventually reaching senior
advisers like Peter Navarro inside the White House in summer 2017. These documents would show
what intelligence agencies worked with Halper, who directed his activity, how much he was
paid and how long his contacts with Trump officials were directed by the U.S. government's
Russia probe.
4.) The October 2016 FBI email chain. This is a key document identified by Rep. Nunes and
his investigators. My sources say it will show exactly what concerns the FBI knew about and
discussed with DOJ about using Steele's dossier and other evidence to support a Foreign
Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant targeting the Trump campaign in October 2016. If
those concerns weren't shared with FISA judges who approved the warrant, there could be major
repercussions.
5.) Page/Papadopoulos exculpatory statements. Another of Nunes' five buckets, these
documents purport to show what the two Trump aides were recorded telling undercover assets or
captured in intercepts insisting on their innocence. Papadopoulos told me he told an FBI
undercover source in September 2016 that the Trump campaign was not trying to obtain hacked
Clinton documents from Russia and considered doing so to be treason. If he made that
statement with the FBI monitoring, and it was not disclosed to the FISA court, it could be
another case of FBI or DOJ misconduct.
6.) The 'Gang of Eight' briefing materials. These were a series of classified
briefings and briefing books the FBI and DOJ provided key leaders in Congress in the summer
of 2018 that identify shortcomings in the Russia collusion narrative. Of all the
documents congressional leaders were shown, this is most frequently cited to me in private as
having changed the minds of lawmakers who weren't initially convinced of FISA abuses or FBI
irregularities.
7.) The Steele spreadsheet. I
wrote recently that the FBI kept a spreadsheet on the accuracy and reliability of every
claim in the Steele dossier. According to my sources, it showed as much as 90 percent of the
claims could not be corroborated, were debunked or turned out to be open-source internet
rumors. Given Steele's own effort to leak intel in his dossier to the media before
Election Day, the public deserves to see the FBI's final analysis of his credibility. A
document
I reviewed recently showed the FBI described Steele's information as only "minimally
corroborated" and the bureau's confidence in him as "medium."
9.) The redacted sections of the third FISA renewal application. This was the last of
four FISA warrants targeting the Trump campaign; it was renewed in June 2017 after special
counsel Robert
Mueller 's probe had started, and signed by then-Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein . It is the one
FISA application that House Republicans have repeatedly asked to be released, and I'm told
the big reveal in the currently redacted sections of the application is that it contained
both misleading information and evidence of intrusive tactics used by the U.S. government to
infiltrate Trump's orbit.
10.) Records of allies' assistance. Multiple sources have said a handful of U.S.
allies overseas – possibly Great Britain, Australia and Italy – were asked to
assist FBI efforts to check on Trump connections to Russia. Members of Congress have
searched recently for some key contact documents with British intelligence . My sources
say these documents might help explain Attorney General Bill Barr's
recent comments that "the use of foreign intelligence capabilities and
counterintelligence capabilities against an American political campaign, to me, is
unprecedented and it's a serious red line that's been crossed."
These documents, when declassified, would show more completely how a routine
counterintelligence probe was hijacked to turn the most awesome spy powers in America against a
presidential nominee in what was essentially a political dirty trick orchestrated by
Democrats.
I disagree with Solomon. Nothing will "doom" the swamp unless the righteous few are
willing to indict, prosecute and carry out sentencing for the guilty. Exposing the guilty
accomplishes nothing, because anyone paying attention already knows of their crimes. Those
who want to believe lies will still believe them after the truth comes out.
It's ALL A WASTE OF TIME unless we follow through.
Does anyone see a pattern here after the 2009 Tea Party movement began?
2009 - Republicans: "If we win back the House, we can accomplish our agenda."
2011 - Republicans: "If we win back the Senate, we can accomplish our agenda." (NOTE:
After winning back the House)
2012 - Republicans: "If we win back the Senate, we can accomplish our agenda." (NOTE: 2
YEARS After winning back the House)
2013 - Republicans: "If we win back the Presidency, we can accomplish our agenda." (NOTE:
1 YEAR after winning back the House and the Senate)
2014 - Republicans: "If we win back the Presidency, we can accomplish our agenda." (NOTE:
2 YEARS after winning back the House and the Senate)
2015 - Republicans: "If we win back the Presidency, we can accomplish our agenda." (NOTE:
3 YEARS after winning back the House and the Senate)
2016 - Republicans: "If we win back the Presidency, we can accomplish our agenda." (NOTE:
4 YEARS after winning back the House and the Senate)
2017 - Republicans: "Now that we've won back the Presidency, we can accomplish our
agenda." (NOTE: After winning back the House 6 YEARS AGO and the Senate 4 YEARS AGO)
2018 - Republicans: "Now that we've won back the Presidency, we can accomplish our
agenda." (NOTE: After winning back the House 7 YEARS AGO and the Senate 5 YEARS AGO)
2019 - John Solomon - "If Trump Declassifies These 10 Documents, Democrats Are Doomed"
I hate to say it, but I DON'T BELIEVE YOU, JOHN.
ALL WE HAVE HEARD OVER THE COURSE OF THIS DECADE IS "IF THIS HAPPENS...THEN THEY ARE
DOOMED / WE CAN ACCOMPLISH OUR AGENDA / YADDA YADDA YADDA.
WHEN THE FOLLOWING ARE FOUND GUILTY OF TREASON, THEN AND ONLY THEN WILL I BELIEVE YOU:
CLINTONS
OBAMA
BIDEN
KERRY
BRENNAN
CLAPPER
COMEY
MCCABE
MUELLER
WEISSMAN
STRZOK
RICE
POWERS
LYNCH
YATES
ET AL
WHY ARE THESE TREASONOUS, VILE, CORRUPT CRIMINALS NOT INDICTED FOR TREASON?
As if there's any major philosophical difference between the Librtads and Zionist
Cocksuckvatives.
Both sides use the .gov agencies to subvert and ignore the Constitution whenever possible.
Best example is WikiLeaks and how each party wished Assange would just go away when he
revealed damaging information about both sides on multiple occasions.
"... "I can report absolutely that the Durham investigators have now obtained an audiotape deposition of Joseph Mifsud, where he describes his work, why he targeted George Papadopoulos , who directed him to do that, what directions he was given, and why he set that entire process of introducing Papadopoulos to Russia in motion in March of 2016, which is really the flashpoint the starting point of this whole Russia collusion narrative," Solomon told Fox News' Sean Hannity. ..."
"... You can't save the Russian collusion narrative, if you can't find any real Russians anywhere in the story. The FBI under James Comey will then be seen as having engaged in an operation to entrap people, and "Russian agents" turn out to be fakes working for the FBI and who were making fake offers of Russian help to the Trump campaign. ..."
"... Mifsud turning out to be a fake Russian agent working for the FBI ..."
"... To have to admit that the story was actually right, while they themselves were still peddling the Trump-Russia collusion hoax, would be a most bitter pill for many of these 'legitimate' news outlets to swallow. ..."
"... And yet when it comes to recent developments about Mifsud, a key player in this Trump-Russia collusion narrative, many mainstream reporters appear indifferent at best, or outrightly hostile at worst to these latest developments. ..."
"... While many of these mainstream media reporters have been desperately trying to find some way to save the Trump/Russian collusion narrative, the last thing they want to have to report is that the supposed key Russian agent that started this whole Spygate thing wasn't really a Russian agent, but was instead an FBI asset pretending to be a Russian agent. ..."
While many mainstream media journalists have been
spinning fantasies for more than two years, based on Russian collusion stories being handed to
them by anonymous sources, crack reporter John Solomon of The Hill has been pursuing real leads
and uncovering actual evidence.
Now, Solomon is reporting that an audiotape
containing professor Joseph Mifsud's deposition has been given to both U.S. Attorney John
Durham's investigators and to the Senate Judiciary Committee.
"I can report absolutely that the Durham investigators have now obtained an audiotape
deposition of Joseph Mifsud, where he describes his work, why he targeted George Papadopoulos , who
directed him to do that, what directions he was given, and why he set that entire process of
introducing Papadopoulos to Russia in motion in March of 2016, which is really the flashpoint
the starting point of this whole Russia collusion narrative," Solomon told
Fox News' Sean Hannity.
"I can also confirm that the Senate Judiciary Committee has also obtained the same
deposition," he said.
So I'm wondering why Solomon appears to be the only mainstream reporter pursuing this Mifsud
story.
I suspect it's because many DNC Media outlets, after having fallen deeply and passionately
in love with the Trump-Russia collusion hoax, are reluctant to call attention to something that
would be the final nail in its coffin.
The last thing the mainstream media wants right now would be for Mifsud to go on the record
with both Durham's investigative team and with Congress to say he was working for the FBI and
was only pretending to be a Russian agent.
If Mifsud was an FBI asset sent to entrap Papadopoulos, then there are no real Russian
agents anywhere in this entire Trump-Russia collusion story.
Foreign policy advisor to US President Donald Trump's election campaign, George
Papadopoulos goes through security at the US District Court for his sentencing in Washington,
DC on Sept. 7, 2018. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP/Getty Images)
Ponder what that means for a minute.
You can't save the Russian collusion narrative, if you can't find any real Russians
anywhere in the story. The FBI under James Comey will then be seen as having engaged in an
operation to entrap people, and "Russian agents" turn out to be fakes working for the FBI and
who were making fake offers of Russian help to the Trump campaign.
Some of these news media outlets are still - at this late date - claiming there's some life
left in the Russian collusion narrative. Mifsud is literally the last dying hope for these
people that somewhere in all of this there is a real Russian asset and real collusion. They
literally need Mifsud to be a real asset of the Putin government. And if Mifsud goes on the
record to officially affirm he was working for the FBI, then the media's last dying hope is
gone forever.
To hear the mainstream media tell it, Mifsud turning out to be a fake Russian agent
working for the FBI is a "conspiracy theory" created by "right-wing zealots" such as Reps.
Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) and Jim Jordan (R-Ohio).
To have to admit that the story was actually right, while they themselves were still
peddling the Trump-Russia collusion hoax, would be a most bitter pill for many of these
'legitimate' news outlets to swallow.
Which likely explains why Solomon appears to be just about the only mainstream reporter
pursuing the Mifsud story. If there are any other major news outlet reporters out there avidly
pursuing the facts about Mifsud and his reported contacts and testimony to Justice Department
investigators, they're being pretty quiet about it.
What are the mainstream news reporters who are ignoring the Mifsud story telling themselves,
anyway?
"I can't pursue this new information on Mifsud, because it's taking the story where I
don't want it to go!"?
That's a thought process that happens only to a political activist disguised as a reporter.
No real reporter would ever think that way.
And yet when it comes to recent developments about Mifsud, a key player in this
Trump-Russia collusion narrative, many mainstream reporters appear indifferent at best, or
outrightly hostile at worst to these latest developments.
While many of these mainstream media reporters have been desperately trying to find some
way to save the Trump/Russian collusion narrative, the last thing they want to have to report
is that the supposed key Russian agent that started this whole Spygate thing wasn't really a
Russian agent, but was instead an FBI asset pretending to be a Russian agent.
These selfsame media reporters have spent more than two years mocking the idea that Mifsud
is an FBI asset as something straight out of the right-wing fever swamp of convoluted nonsense
conspiracy theories. This is why so many political activists masquerading as journalists are
desperately hoping that somehow the Mifsud story will just go away and die on its own.
My instinct says they're going to be massively disappointed soon.
The only one's ever colluding with the Russians was Hillary the "******* Rotten" Clinton,
Obongo "the One" and the usual suspects (Comey,Clapper,Brennan,Lynch,) et.al .. FBI/DOJ/CIA Rats, British UN-intelligence,Australian &
Ukraine interference. The DNC server was never hacked by Russians but copied, the
Steele/Fusion GPS dossier was a work of worn out fiction that was originally put together in
2007 and used against McCain.
Russian agent Mifsud working with Papadopoulos to get Hillary emails claimed by
DNC/Crowdstrike/Perkins Coie hacked by Russians before destroyed by Hillary under subpoena,
just a FBI paid actor to keep the narrative going and covering up illegal spying on Trump,
NSA 702 "about" querries by private contractors ang gov. violating FISA which happened much
earlier.
Conservative treehouse does a better job than just about anywhere else I've seen of tying
that all together. But, if they are correct about this, as they've been correct about a lot
of things, it won't change anything or matter at all. None of these people will ever be
indicted, much less spend a single day in jail. Sad, but true. In a year and a half trump
will most likely be gone, and all of this will be memory holed.
Most Democrats still adhere to the Trump - Russia collusion narrative. And they wonder why
some Leftists like Roseanne Barr admit 'Democrats have gone insane.' An opinion shared by
most of the rest of the country. And yet public speeches by Trump are enthusiastically
attended by thousands - a story very much minimized by these same "news" outlets.
Those Democrats exist within a media bubble (95% of press outlets - online, too) working
for the Deep State (99% are Democrats) that misinforms them. Perhaps they are intentionally
self-duped. Though it remains shocking how deeply deluded they are.
They adhere to the hoax because they knew it was a hoax to begin with.
The dems have never been sincere calling people racist, sexist, Hitler, then Russian or
Assad stooges, etc.
Their Saul Alinsky tactic is to shriek incessantly, always accuse, never take the
defensive because your position is indefensible. You can't argue why offering open borders
and free health care to 7 billion people is rational.
That is why the violence is so important to them, and so important to keep concealing the
deep state/democratic crime syndicate.
The main stream media is the mouth piece of the intelligence community.
The main stream media is [ currently ] the mouth piece of the [ criminal Deep
State ] intelligence community.
There; fify. The "Intelligence Community" in its entirety is hardly any monolith of
pure evil. There are cadres and factions within every agency, including Old-School
Patriot.
MUST be said now and then lest others lose perspective. And that is all. 0{:-\o[
The progressives will happily embrace the worst criminal behavior by our government as
JUSTIFIED to depose the devil incarnate Trump.
There is only one principle...winning. The law is THEIR weapon devised to punish their
enemies and control their minions. All means are justifiable to the ends, and the vast
majority of those "serving" in government have no hesitancy in abusing their power to fulfill
the larger agenda.
They will have proof and undeniable facts...to no avail because those charged with the
prosecution of their own, will NOT.
More sensationalism... how many articles are you going to post saying the spygate
situation is about to blow up? I would love for it to happen but unlike the libtards hanging
on Rachel Maddow's every word... when I hear the walls are closing in for over 2 or 3 months
straight... I start to call ********... Give up the sensationalism Tyler... it's straight up
MSM flavor ********.
"... In 2017, The Guardian reported that Britain's spy agencies had played a key role in alerting their American counterparts of communications between members of the Trump campaign and "suspected Russian agents," which was passed along to the US in what was characterized as a "routine exchange of information." ..."
"... "For over a year, people have asked me to declassify. What I've done is declassified everything," said Trump, adding "He can look and I hope he looks at the UK and I hope he looks at Australia and I hope he looks at Ukraine ." ..."
"... "It's the greatest hoax probably in the history of our country and somebody has to get to the bottom of it. We'll see. For a long period of time, they wanted me to declassify and I did." ..."
"... in May, Fox News reported that the discredited "Steele Dossier" - assembled by former MI6 spy Christopher Steele - was referred to as "crown material" in an email exchange suggesting that former FBI Director James Comey insisted that CIA Director John Brennan pushed for the inclusion of the dossier in the intelligence community assessment (ICA) on Russian interference. ..."
"... Moreover, much of "Operation Crossfire Hurricane" - the FBI's official investigation into the Trump campaign - occurred on UK soil , which is perhaps why the New York Times reported last September that the UK begged Trump not to declassify 'Russiagate' documents 'without redaction.' ..."
"... Maltese professor and self-described Clinton foundation member Joseph Mifsud fed him the rumor that Russia had damaging information on Hillary Clinton. It was later at a London bar that Papadopoulos would drunkenly pass the rumor to Australian diplomat Alexander Downer. ..."
Newly surfaced text messages between Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe and his counterpart at MI-5, the UK's domestic security
service, have cast new light on Britain's role in the FBI's 2016 'Russiagate' investigation, according to
The Guardian .
Two of the most senior intelligence officials in the US and UK privately shared concerns about " our strange situation " as
the FBI launched its 2016 investigation into whether Donald Trump's campaign was colluding with
Russia , the Guardian has learned.
Text messages between Andrew McCabe, the deputy director of the FBI at the time, and Jeremy Fleming , his then counterpart
at MI5, now the head of GCHQ , also reveal their mutual surprise
at the result of the EU referendum, which some US officials regarded as a "wake-up call", according to a person familiar with
the matter. -
The Guardian
McCabe and Flemming's texts were "infrequent and cryptic," but "occurred with some regularity" after the June 2016 Brexit referendum.
In his text message about the August 2016 meeting, Fleming appeared to be making a reference to
Peter Strzok ,
a senior FBI official who travelled to London that month to meet the Australian diplomat
Alexander Downer . Downer had agreed to speak with the FBI about a Trump campaign adviser, George Papadopoulos, who had told
him that Russia had dirt on Hillary Clinton, the Democratic nominee in the race. -
The Guardian
In 2017, The Guardian reported that Britain's spy agencies had played a key role in alerting their American counterparts of communications
between members of the Trump campaign and "suspected Russian agents," which was passed along to the US in what was characterized
as a "routine exchange of information."
UK begged Trump not to declassify
In May, President Trump issued a sweeping declassification order on materials related to the DOJ/FBI Russia investigation - leaving
it in the hands of Attorney General William Barr to determine exactly what happened to Trump and his campaign before and after the
2016 US election.
"For over a year, people have asked me to declassify. What I've done is declassified everything," said Trump, adding "He can look
and I hope he looks at the UK and I hope he looks at Australia and I hope he looks at Ukraine ."
"It's the greatest hoax probably in the history of our country and somebody has to get to the bottom of it. We'll see. For a long
period of time, they wanted me to declassify and I did."
Meanwhile, also in May,
Fox News reported that the discredited "Steele Dossier" - assembled by former MI6 spy Christopher Steele - was referred to as
"crown material" in an email exchange suggesting that former FBI Director James Comey insisted that CIA Director John
Brennan pushed for the inclusion of the dossier in the intelligence community assessment (ICA) on Russian interference.
Moreover, much of "Operation Crossfire Hurricane" - the FBI's official investigation into the Trump campaign - occurred on UK
soil , which is perhaps why the
New York Times reported last September that the UK begged Trump not to declassify 'Russiagate' documents 'without redaction.'
Let's also not forget that shortly after Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos announced his intention to work for the campaign,
he was lured to London in March, 2016, where Maltese professor and self-described
Clinton foundation member Joseph Mifsud fed him the rumor that Russia had damaging information on Hillary Clinton. It was later
at a London bar that Papadopoulos would drunkenly pass the rumor to Australian diplomat Alexander Downer.
We wonder what else McCabe's texts with his MI-5 counterpart will reveal?
"... Mueller is not currently mentally capable of programming his microwave, never mind author a report or conduct an investigation. ..."
"... I think if Barr digs deep enough he is going to see a foreign country was In control of Hillary during her state department days, and potentially Bubba during his presidency, remember how those secrets got leaked to China during Bill's Presidency? The preceding would also implicate that inner circle assisting Hill Dog, ie Comey, Clapper, MCabe, Brennan and the rest of those rat bastards BTW where is the computer guy that they were all using who got nabbed just before fleeing on a jet out of the country, What about Huma? ..."
"... Mueller was the token 'R'/Marine Vet/Never Trumper hired to give this corruption an air of 'fairness'. He was a tool, and has been for decades. Special place for him somewhere. ..."
"... Unfortunately the DNC clowns have discovered how to use Hillary's projection techniques and they are using them more and more. No matter what they do or what we discover they do they project it back on us. ..."
A DOJ internal review of the Russia investigation is now focusing on transcripts of (not-so)
covertly recorded conversations between former Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos and 'at
least one government source' during an overseas conversation in 2016.
In particular, DOJ investigators are focusing on why certain exculpatory (or exonerating)
evidence from the transcripts was not included in subsequent FBI surveillance warrant
applications , according to
Fox News , citing two sources familiar with the review.
"A source told Fox News that the "exculpatory evidence" included in the transcripts is
Papadopoulos denying having any contact with the Russians to obtain the supposed "dirt" on
Clinton," according to the report.
And while Fox doesn't name the 'government source,' it's undoubtedly Australian diplomat and
Clinton ally Alexander Downer, who was "idiotic enough" to spy on Papadopoulos with his phone,
according to the former Trump aide.
But Papadopoulos did not only meet with Mifsud and Downer while overseas. He met with
Cambridge professor and longtime FBI informant Stefan Halper and his female associate, who
went under the alias Azra Turk. Papadopoulos told Fox News that he saw Turk three times in
London: once over drinks, once over dinner and once with Halper. He also told Fox News back
in May that he always suspected he was being recorded . Further, he tweeted during the
Mueller testimony about "recordings" of his meeting with Downer . -
Fox News
"These recordings have exculpatory evidence," one source told Fox , adding " It is
standard tradecraft to record conversations with someone like Papadopoulos -- especially when
they are overseas and there are no restrictions. "
The recordings in question pertain to conversations between government sources and
Papadopoulos, which were memorialized in transcripts. One source told Fox News that Barr and
Durham are reviewing why the material was left out of applications to surveil another former
Trump campaign aide, Carter Page.
" I think it's the smoking gun ," the source said. -
Fox News
Also under review by AG Barr and US Attorney John Durham of Connecticut is the actual start
date of the original FBI investigation into the Trump campaign and Russian interference in the
US election.
Former Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) first revealed the existence of transcripts documenting the
secretly recorded conversations earlier this year.
"If the bureau's going to send in an informant, the informant's going to be wired, and if
the bureau is monitoring telephone calls, there's going to be a transcript of that," Gowdy said
on Fox News in May.
"Some of us have been fortunate enough to know whether or not those transcripts exist. But
they haven't been made public, and I think one, in particular ... has the potential to actually
persuade people," he continued, adding "Very little in this Russia probe I'm afraid is going to
persuade people who hate Trump or love Trump. But there is some information in these
transcripts that has the potential to be a game-changer if it's ever made public. "
According to the report, the transcripts are currently classified - however President
Trump's May order to approve declassification at AG Barr's discretion means they may see the
light of day. And even if not, the declassification allowed Barr to barge in on DNI Director
Dan Coats' office and demand the files .
A source told Fox News that without the declassification order signed by Trump, Director
of National Intelligence Dan Coats was not going to give anyone access to the files -- over
concerns for protecting sources and methods. But another source told Fox News in May that
Coats, along with CIA Director Gina Haspel and FBI Director Chris Wray, are all working
"collaboratively" with Barr and Durham on the review.
Barr and Durham are also trying to pinpoint the actual "start date" of the investigation,
according to a source. -
Fox News
As passionately laid out by Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) during this week's Mueller testimony, the
FBI officially opened the Russia investigation after Papadopoulos told Downer about a rumor
(told to him by Clinton Foundation member Joseph Mifsud) that Russia had 'dirt' on Hillary
Clinton.
https://www.youtube.com/embed/QC529hakU6U
That said, some have suggested that the FBI probe began long before Downer's report to
intelligence agencies .
On Wednesday, House Intelligence Committee Ranking Member Devin Nunes, R-Calif.,
challenged former Special Counsel Mueller over when the investigation started.
"The FBI claims the counterintelligence investigation of the Trump campaign began on July
31, 2016, but in fact, it began before that," Nunes said. "In June 2016, before the
investigation was officially opened, Trump campaign associates Carter Page and Stephen Miller
were invited to attend a symposium at Cambridge University in July 2016. Your office,
however, did not investigate who was responsible for inviting these Trump associates to the
symposium." -
Fox News
"Maybe a better course of action is to figure out how the false accusations started," said
Jordan on Wednesday, adding "Here's the good news -- that's exactly what Bill Barr is doing and
thank goodness for that."
For what it's worth, I think the whole thing started w/Her campaign, in particular:
Podesta (means, motive and opportunity). I think it began as a cheating strategy and
snowballed into a coup; many ppl involved... Trump won (Thank G--!) and they've been trying
to cover their tracks ever since
Mueller is not currently mentally capable of programming his microwave, never mind author
a report or conduct an investigation.
We are seeing a spectacular display of an ill advised poorly thought out conspiracy to
take Trump down...
No one is really looking at why the desperation to get Hillary in, remember Cuntlery
herself stated that if Trump were to be elected "we will all hang"
I think if Barr digs deep enough he is going to see a foreign country was In control of
Hillary during her state department days, and potentially Bubba during his presidency,
remember how those secrets got leaked to China during Bill's Presidency? The preceding would
also implicate that inner circle assisting Hill Dog, ie Comey, Clapper, MCabe, Brennan and
the rest of those rat bastards BTW where is the computer guy that they were all using who got
nabbed just before fleeing on a jet out of the country, What about Huma?
Why the desperation to obliterate the server with bleach bit, and hammer pound the
phones?
Suddenly "enhanced interrogation" makes a whole lot more sense... Lets see how the tough marine remembers his training. As for Mifsud, he will likely instantly remember his past life as a canary the moment he's
shown a fuckin phone book...
Mueller was the token 'R'/Marine Vet/Never Trumper hired to give this corruption an air of
'fairness'. He was a tool, and has been for decades. Special place for him somewhere.
Becoming pretty clear at this point that the ***** that perpetrated this treason have
pretty much already played out every option
Yes that's right Cuntlery...your time is coming Bitch. At what point do they just punt for the good of the country and accept guilt quietly. Nadler and Schiff keep pushing it, will go very badly after Horowitz report
Unfortunately the DNC clowns have discovered how to use Hillary's projection techniques and
they are using them more and more. No matter
what they do or what we discover they do they project it back on us. With unending driveby
complicity it always buys at least a few weeks or gets them to the next news cycle where they
feel safe again. Complex criminality wreaks of the company.
Alexander Downer is a the classic groomed fwit who was given a path to power so he could
be controlled. He was the national leader of the opposition but was such a *** he was unelectable and
dumped. Most cartoonists in Australia depict him in fishnet stockings. The usual *** of his generation who could never come out (like Mcron). Quite effeminate
and in *** terms would be the bottom.
"That said, some have suggested that the FBI probe began long before Downer's report to
intelligence agencies ."
The patriots already know that the entire Russia/Trump probe was just cover for illegal
spying that they were doing WITHOUT FISA approval. The Russia/Trump probe was going to be
their excuse.
it's fortuitous in any case as the great first cause of the last generation of government
malfeasance, 9-11, was investigated by mueller as head of the fbi for the bush
administration. it keeps that more in the public eye and mind. it let's people see that the
deep state is bipartisan: helps republican bush and democrat clinton. just as long as they
both help the likud mossad.
There's a LOT for which to blame Mueller. Whitey Bulger, Ruby Ridge, Pan Am flight 103
come immediately to mind. As for who wanted him so bad, I would hazard a guess it was all the
democrats on his "staff" who needed the cover of a "conservative republican". I know, hard to
say that with a straight face.
"... Halper, such as he could be called a source at all, appears to have been, has to have been, working in the UK with Agency people and almost certainly with MI6 as well. ..."
"... If John Brennan was not there at the genesis of this fiasco, I will eat my hat; and I cannot see how there weren't high level officials at MI6 engaged as well ..."
"... Similarly, Steele is dredging for Russian dirt wherever he can get it and he's sealed himself off from his former employer? Not likely. ..."
"... The one thing which overwhelms all else is the actual nature of the material that came from the DNC servers and appeared on Wikileaks. A great deal of noise is made about that information's journey, who stole (hacked or copied) it, how it was done, who transmitted it, etc. But no noise whatever is made about the information itself, or at least when an attempt is made it is buried by the "Russia meddled" noise. ..."
"... The information itself is that the DNC is a bad actor, that it rigged the primary election for Hillary Clinton. No one, no one , denies the truth of the information itself. When what the DNC did is mentioned the conversation instantly changes to the Russians having "meddled in our election." ..."
"... Buried in the noise is that the DNC meddled in the electoral process far more destructively and far more directly than the Rusians did, if the Russians did so at all, which I perceive as highly doubtful. ..."
I would guess that the Bureau Agents had to be read in on what the Agency people had been
doing with Halper and possibly Mifsud,; that, and to bring their purported
counter-intelligence expertise to bear. Active investigation in the UK with respect to
Papadopolis was in prospect, probably to include tech surveillance, and the Bureau has no
authority to conduct active independent investigation overseas.
Halper, such as he could be called a source at all, appears to have been, has to have
been, working in the UK with Agency people and almost certainly with MI6 as well.
If NSA was there in the UK, it was with a view to coordinating tech; but with that said,
it would be highly irregular for our people to be conducting active investigation, especially
if it included physical and technical surveillance, without coordinating at some level with
MI6 and 5 as well.
If John Brennan was not there at the genesis of this fiasco, I will eat my hat; and I
cannot see how there weren't high level officials at MI6 engaged as well .
Halper is working in the UK with the Agency in re Russia and not working with the Russia
obsessed MI6? Similarly, Steele is dredging for Russian dirt wherever he can get it and
he's sealed himself off from his former employer? Not likely.
The one thing which overwhelms all else is the actual nature of the material that came
from the DNC servers and appeared on Wikileaks. A great deal of noise is made about that
information's journey, who stole (hacked or copied) it, how it was done, who transmitted it,
etc. But no noise whatever is made about the information itself, or at least when an attempt
is made it is buried by the "Russia meddled" noise.
The information itself is that the DNC is a bad actor, that it rigged the primary election
for Hillary Clinton. No one, no one , denies the truth of the information itself. When
what the DNC did is mentioned the conversation instantly changes to the Russians having
"meddled in our election."
Buried in the noise is that the DNC meddled in the electoral process far more
destructively and far more directly than the Rusians did, if the Russians did so at all,
which I perceive as highly doubtful.
i'm not familiar with all the intricate details of the "investigation" (i just detect a
strong smell of bs coming from mueller), and I found this piece hard to follow on the
page-strzok texts and their significance.
This from the Fox article: "Fox News has learned some of the words and names that were
redacted in the string of Strzok-Page messages" prompts a (maybe dumb) question:
Do we know/can we infer how Fox managed to fill in just some of the redacted info?
It seems odd to me that only a few of the blanks have been filled in, as if Fox had access to
the original FBI phone records they'd have all of it. Also, the new handwritten parts seem to
contain information which could not possibly have been gathered from any other source outside
of this private 2 way conversation - e.g. "Just you two? Was DCM present for the interview?"
and the reply "No, two of them, two of us".
Do Fox have it all and are they then just teasing us, or is perhaps one of the two
star-crossed lovers singing?
"... Rob Reiner (backed by David Frum, Max Boot, James Clapper and their absolutely-not-xenophobic-sounding "Committee to Investigate Russia") continues to use Hollywood celebrities to spread the Trump Derangement Syndrome. First it was Morgan Freeman. Didn't go over too well. Even the "liberals" hated it. Now it's Robert De Niro, Martin Sheen, Laurence Fishburne, Stephen King, George Takei, and a few lesser known actors. ..."
"... Woah! Stop right there! The "Trump adviser" is George Papadopoulos -- that is clear from the video sequence. So the "Russian operative" they're talking about is none other than Joseph Mifsud. ..."
"... So how can it be that Joseph Mifsud is now a "Russian operative"? Well, look no further than his Wikipedia page. You see, he visited Valdai Discussion Club annual conference once or twice. Apparently, that's all it takes nowadays to become a Russian-linked Russian operative with close connections to Russia. ..."
Rob Reiner (backed by David Frum, Max Boot, James Clapper and their
absolutely-not-xenophobic-sounding "Committee to Investigate Russia") continues to use
Hollywood celebrities to spread the Trump Derangement Syndrome. First it was Morgan Freeman.
Didn't go over too well. Even the "liberals" hated it. Now it's Robert De Niro, Martin Sheen,
Laurence Fishburne, Stephen King, George Takei, and a few lesser known actors. Here's an
excerpt:
Stephen King: Here are some other specific examples from the Mueller report.
Sophia Bush: One: in the Spring of 2016, a Russian operative told a Trump adviser
that the Russian government had dirt on Hillary Clinton in the form of thousands of
emails.
Jonathan Van Ness: The adviser then worked to arrange a meeting between the
campaign and the Russian government.
Laurence Fishburne: That's collusion.
Woah! Stop right there! The "Trump adviser" is George Papadopoulos -- that is clear from
the video sequence. So the "Russian operative" they're talking about is none other than
Joseph Mifsud. Here's Papadopoulos himself talking about Mifsud in an April 16, 2019
interview with Michael Tracey:
George Papadopoulos: He remains an enigma to this day and no one could track him
down, but I've been told recently he's not dead, so there's some improvements.
Michael Tracey: Right, we should say I mean, he was rumored to have been deceased
at a certain point, right?
George Papadopoulos: That's right.
Michael Tracey: And now it appears he might be living under an assumed name [?]
but nobody's heard from him quite a while.
George Papadopoulos: Well, the only in-public statements that he's made were two.
One, he gave an interview -- a bizarre interview -- to the Italian media the day my name
was released and he said he's never heard of "Putin's niece" and "George is probably
talking about some girl that he was trying to have a romantic relationship with" (and we
could get into that aspect of my relationship with Joseph Mifsud). And also he his lawyer,
this man named Stephan Roh, who's a prominent Swiss attorney, has gone public numerous
times and stated that Joseph Mifsud was no Russian asset, but he was a Western intelligence
operative, and he was working under the guidance of the FBI when he was interacting with
Papadopoulos. He said this on CNN during a one-hour short documentary that CNN had about my
life, and he's given interviews subsequently to The Daily Caller , where he
suggested the same exact thing.
Now, anybody who's been following my case and who could just simply google Joseph Mifsud
can also see that: Joseph Mifsud, of course, was dealing with MI6 figures at the highest
level; three months after I notified the FBI that he could be potentially a Russian asset,
he was in Saudi Arabia on a panel with Ash Carter, who was the former defense secretary
under Obama; and around the time [?] my name was released in October of 2017, he was
photographed in The Guardian attending private parties with Boris Johnson, who just
happened to be the Secretary of State of the UK. So, unless the Russians, basically,
infiltrated the upper echelons of the U.S. and UK security establishment, then Mifsud was
no Russian agent, and he's, in my opinion, and what everybody now who is objective believes
is that he was actually an operative working on behalf of the West to, basically, entrap me
with this unsolicited information regarding Hillary Clinton and her emails, and that's why
he's gone underground, and he's living somewhere in Italy, I've been told, and he's
actually on the payroll of Italian intelligence -- that's what I've been told recently. So,
it's a very bizarre story, but I can try and go step-by-step and explain my entire
encounters with him, and what we know now about him.
And he does indeed go step-by-step and describe his encounters with Mifsud in the full
two-hour interview
(continue from 15:14). And of course after Mifsud told Papadopoulos during their last meeting
that "the Russians have Hillary Clinton's emails", no attempt was made by Papadopoulos to
"arrange a meeting between the Trump campaign and the Russian government". In fact,
Papadopoulos was scared and confused as it was right after that meeting that his life went
very bizarre.
So how can it be that Joseph Mifsud is now a "Russian operative"? Well,
look no further than his Wikipedia page. You see, he visited Valdai Discussion Club annual
conference once or twice. Apparently, that's all it takes nowadays to become a Russian-linked
Russian operative with close connections to Russia.
It would all be very funny if it weren't so depressing. I can understand Hollywood actors
doing this -- after all, these people excel at reading from a script for money. But Stephen
King? I thought he was somewhat of an intellectual. Apparently not. Or perhaps he's buddies
with CIA shill Reiner. Who knows.
"... "All political analysis which favors either the Democratic Party or the Republican Party is inherently worthless, because both parties are made of swamp and exist in service of the swamp. If you can't see that the entire system is one unified block of corruption and that ordinary people need to come together and unite against it, then you really don't understand what you're looking at." ..."
Whatever you may think of Trump, the people who set out to 'get him' are the scum of the
Earth. I recommend listening to the two-part interview of George Papadopoulos with Mark
Steyn, where he describes the convoluted plot to use him to bring down Trump.
What they did to this guy is truly disgusting. Brennan belongs in a prison cell, and he
should be sharing it with Mueller. Papadopoulos also has written a book about his
experiences called 'Deep State Target, How I got caught in the crosshairs of the plot to
bring down President Trump.
And, a final comment. Hillary Clinton proved beyond all doubt that she and not Trump was
not fit to be President. To engage in this scheme and then to raise tensions through the
roof with a nuclear superpower, which can destroy this country, is about as low and selfish
as it is possible to be.
As I stated on the open thread, to paraphrase Muller;
I don't give a s###. figure it out yourself, Im f***ing outta' here.
The whole point of impeachment, is to have a show trial, not actually impeach. If the
thing is on TV, the American people may watch it, and that would be interesting.
Not to worry though, Pelosi and Schumer won't let that happen. Appeasing their donors,is
all they care about.
psycho @ 2 quoting C. Johnston stated;
"All political analysis which favors either the Democratic Party or the Republican
Party is inherently worthless, because both parties are made of swamp and exist in service of
the swamp. If you can't see that the entire system is one unified block of corruption and
that ordinary people need to come together and unite against it, then you really don't
understand what you're looking at."
A Russian-born British scholar [Svetlana Lokhova] is suing an alleged FBI informant
[Halper] and four news outlets for allegedly defaming her by linking her to Russian efforts
to influence President Donald Trump's 2016 campaign .
... Lokhova alleges that Halper and the news outlets conspired to spread a false narrative
that she approached then-Defense Intelligence Agency Director Michael Flynn on behalf of
Russian intelligence at a seminar dinner in England in 2014 and that Flynn and Lokhova had
an intimate relationship.
Over time, as public attention focused on links between the Trump campaign and Russia --
and after Flynn was fired from his role as national security adviser by Trump in February
2017, individuals hostile to Trump and Flynn seized on the alleged connection to Lokhova as
evidence that Flynn had been compromised by Russia, she alleges in the suit.
... "Stefan Halper is a rat ----- and a spy, who embroiled an innocent woman in a conspiracy
to undo the 2016 Presidential election and topple the President of the United States of
America," Lokhova alleges in the 66-page complaint .
"... The Clinton campaign and the DNC retained the law firm of Perkins Coie; in turn, one of its partners, Marc E. Elias, retained Fusion GPS. We don't know how much Fusion GPS was paid, but the Clinton campaign and the DNC paid $9.1 million to Perkins Coie during the 2016 campaign (i.e., between mid-2015 and late 2016). ..."
"... Fusion GPS then "hired" FBI Informant Christopher Steele in May 2016. More about that later. ..."
"... As Lisa Page and Peter Strzok noted in their text exchange, Ted Cruz dropping out of the race in early May was the catalyst for focusing all resources on Donald Trump. This effort, which I label, the Trump Russia covert action, involved the CIA, the NSA, the FBI and British Intelligence ..."
"... May 4, 2016, George Papadopolous forwarded to Corey Lewandowski an email from Timofeev [who was introduced to Papadopolous by Joseph Mifsud] raising the possibility of a meeting in Moscow ..."
"... May 4, 2016, FBI Informant Felix Sater followed up with Michael Cohen re Trump Tower Moscow Project: ..."
"... John Brennan convened a secret task force at CIA headquarters composed of several dozen analysts and officers from the CIA, the NSA and the FBI. ..."
"... The unit functioned as a sealed compartment, its work hidden from the rest of the intelligence community. Those brought in signed new non-disclosure agreements to be granted access to intelligence from all three participating agencies ..."
"... It was manufactured as part of a broader plan to paint Trump as a tool of Putin and a servant of Russia ..."
"... We must take a new look at the story told about the so-called Russian hack of the DNC. I believe that Crowd Strike is lying about its role and the timeline. Here is the "official" story ..."
"... We are asked to believe that the Russians were in the DNC network on the 6 th of May and that Crowd Strike knew it. But what steps did Crowd Strike take to shut down the "Russians." Short answer -- nothing until June 10 th ..."
"... The DNC emails were taken on the 25 th of May 2016. That is the last date for the DNC emails posted on Wikileaks ..."
"... CrowdStrike effort did not shut down the DNC network until 10 June. If you know on May 6 th that the "Russians" are in the network, why does any credible, competent cyber security company wait until the 10 th of June to shut the system down? ..."
"... Seth Rich, a DNC employee and Bernie Sanders supporter, downloaded the emails and then gave them to Wikileaks. Rich was in contact with Wikileaks. That is not my opinion. We know that courtesy of a FOIA request by lawyer Ty Clevenger to the NSA filed in November 2017, who requested any information regarding Seth Rich and Julian Assange. ..."
"... NSA has records of communications between Seth Rich and Julian Assange. ..."
"... the CIA had a task force set up. I believe this intelligence was communicated to the Clinton campaign and that a bogus story, with Crowd Strike in a starring role, was cooked up. Implausible? ..."
"... It was Crowd Strike with the help of the Washington Post that went public and pinned the blame on the Russians ..."
"... But that was not the only active measure in place. Christopher Steele, a fully signed up FBI informant, was hired by Fusion GPS and produced his first block buster report on June 20 th claiming Trump was under the thumb of Vladimir Putin ..."
"... Things should get very interesting with the declassification in force. Can you see the NSA/Seth Rich/Wikileaks material being made declassified as well (albeit redacted for methods, etc of course)? ..."
"... Can Barr declassify the Rich/Assange material? Also, was Skripal one of Steele's "sources"? ..."
"... Joseph Mifsud is missing in this time line. He always appeared to be the most curious player. Any reason he is left out? ..."
"... This is the second time in the past few weeks I've read about surveillance on Sanders. Is there a link to a reliable source? ..."
"... I believe it's established that a guy from the UK worked in his campaign, and is now on the Integrity Initiative payroll. And the investigation into his wife's role in the financial affairs of the college she works for seems mysteriously to have run into the sands ..."
"... Before joining Manafort in Kiev, Kliminik worked for almost a decade in Moscow for the International Republican Institute, effectively running that office for some of those years. The IRI is part of the NED/USAID network. There is no way an identified "GRU agent" would be permitted as a long time employee of such an organization. ..."
"... To avoid the conflict [of interest] President Trump designates the U.S. Attorney General as arbiter and decision-maker for the purposes of declassifying evidence within the investigation ..."
"... I realize Larry Johnson's already alluded to the existence of NSA files about communications between Seth Rich and Julian Assange, but the implications are finally sinking in as to how evil this whole mess is. ..."
"... I've always been dismissive of those who've made comments about "Arkancide" in connection with the Clintons, but I may have to revise my POV. I wonder who was involved in the process of getting rid of Mr. Rich? ..."
"... Declassify the list of persons "Samantha Powers" asked FISA courts to unmask during the 11th hours of the Obama administration. Or learn who signed her name to these requests, if in fact she did not as she claimed. ..."
"... Redstate reports the 260 FISA unmasking requests in 2016 in Samantha Power name were perhaps for an Israel Settlesment-gate; not Russiagate? https://www.redstate.com/elizabeth-vaughn/2019/05/25/samantha-powers-unmasked-260-americans-2016-soon-well-learn/ ..."
Forget July 31, 2016 as the alleged start date for the full blown Trump counter intelligence investigation. That day is a sham.
The actual campaign to paint Trump as a full fledged stooge of Russia started in early May 2016. We now know the start date thanks
to the text messages between star-crossed lovers Strzok and Page and the timeline buried in the Mueller Report:
It is important to understand that the collection of intelligence on U.S. Presidential candidates was not limited to Donald Trump.
The collection effort started in the summer of 2015 and included the main Republican candidates and, according to a knowledgeable
source, also targeted Bernie Sanders.
Also remember that the Presidential campaign is a dynamic event that changes over time. In the summer of 2015, the conventional
wisdom touted Jeb Bush as the likely nominee. But as the months passed the field narrowed. By March of 2016, Donald Trump was the
leader and appeared likely to garner the nomination.
April was the turning point where the foundation for attacking Trump was being laid. The law firm, Perkins Coie, hired
Fusion GPS on
behalf of Hillary Clinton's campaign . Andy McMarthy reported on the details of this arrangement in October 2017:
The Clinton campaign and the DNC retained the law firm of Perkins Coie; in turn, one of its partners, Marc E. Elias, retained
Fusion GPS. We don't know how much Fusion GPS was paid, but the Clinton campaign and the DNC paid $9.1 million to Perkins Coie during
the 2016 campaign (i.e., between mid-2015 and late 2016).
Fusion GPS then "hired" FBI Informant Christopher Steele in May 2016. More about that later.
As Lisa Page and Peter Strzok noted in their text exchange, Ted Cruz dropping out of the race in early May was the catalyst
for focusing all resources on Donald Trump. This effort, which I label, the Trump Russia covert action, involved the CIA, the NSA,
the FBI and British Intelligence. How do we know? Just look at the Robert Mueller Report:
May 4, 2016, George Papadopolous forwarded to Corey Lewandowski an email from Timofeev [who was introduced to Papadopolous
by Joseph Mifsud] raising the possibility of a meeting in Moscow , asking Lewandowski whether that was " something we want
to move forward with. " The next day, Papadopoulos forwarded the same Timofeev email to Sam Clovis, adding to the top of the email
"Russia update." (From Mueller Report)
May 4, 2016, FBI Informant Felix Sater followed up with Michael Cohen re Trump Tower Moscow Project: "I had a chat with
Moscow. ASSUMING the trip does happen the question is before or after the convention. I said I believe, but don't know for sure,
that 's it's probably after the convention. Obviously the pre-meeting trip (you only) can happen anytime you want but the 2 big
guys where [sic] the question. I said I would confirm and revert. . . . Let me know about If I was right by saying I believe after
Cleveland and also when you want to speak to them and possibly fly over." (From Mueller Report)
May 5, 2016, FBI Informant Felix Sater wrote to Michael Cohen: "Peskov would like to invite you as his guest to the St. Petersburg
Forum which is Russia's Davos it's June 16-19. He wants to meet there with you and possibly introduce you to either Putin or Medvedev
, as they are not sure if 1 or both will be there. This is perfect. The entire business class of Russia wiU be there as well. He
said anything you want to discuss including dates and subjects are on the table to discuss[. ]" (From Mueller Report)
May 6, 2016, George Papadopoulos suggested to a representative of a foreign government [i.e., Erika Thompson, senior aide to
Alexander Downer] that the Trump Campaign had received indications from the Russian government that it could assist the Campaign
through the anonymous release of information that would be damaging to candidate Clinton. (p. 81 Mueller Report)
May 6, 2016, two military attachés at the US embassy in London, Terrence Dudley and Gregory Baker, reach out to George Papadopolous
to set up a meeting." [Both, per Papadopolous are with Defense Intelligence Agency, {
https://books.apple.com/us/book/deep-state-target/id1446495998
) (From Papadopolous Book)
May 7, 2016 (12 days before becoming campaign chair for Trump's) Paul Manafort meets with Konstantin Kilimnik, a Russian national
who has lived in both Russia and Ukraine and was a longtime Manafort employee. (From Mueller Report) [NOTE -- Mueller's team identified
this as "suspect" activity that needed to be investigated.]
May 16, 2016, while that request was still under consideration, Carter Page emailed Clovis, J.D. Gordon, and Walid Phares and
suggested that candidate Trump take his place speaking at the commencement ceremony in Moscow. (From Mueller Report)
May 19, 2016, Paul Manafort was promoted to campaign chairman and chief strategist, and Gates, who had been assisting Manafort
on the Campaign, was appointed deputy campaign chairman. (From Mueller Report) [NOTE -- the Mueller team believed that Manafort
was acting on behalf of Russian interests but failed to find corroborating evidence.]
May 2016, the IRA created the Twitter account @march_for_trump , which promoted IRA-organized rallies in support of the Trump
Campaign (From Mueller Report
May 2016-- FBI Informant Henry Oknyansky (who also went by the name Henry Greenberg), claimed to have information pertaining
to Hillary Clinton. Michael Caputo notified Roger Stone and brokered communication between Stone and Oknyansky. Oknyansky and Stone
set up a May 2016 in-person meeting. (From Mueller Report)
John Brennan convened a secret task force at CIA headquarters composed of several dozen analysts and officers from the CIA,
the NSA and the FBI.
The unit functioned as a sealed compartment, its work hidden from the rest of the intelligence community. Those brought in
signed new non-disclosure agreements to be granted access to intelligence from all three participating agencies.
They worked exclusively for two groups of "customers," officials said. The first was Obama and fewer than 14 senior officials
in government. The second was a team of operations specialists at the CIA, NSA and FBI who took direction from the task force on
where to aim their subsequent efforts to collect more intelligence on Russia.
Investigators must get the date that this CIA task force was established. They also need to identify and interview the people
who participated and were cleared to work on this task force. President Trump must understand that this was not a legitimate intelligence
operation. It was weaponizing the intel community to act against a Presidential candidate. It was manufactured as part of a
broader plan to paint Trump as a tool of Putin and a servant of Russia.
We must take a new look at the story told about the so-called Russian hack of the DNC. I believe that Crowd Strike is lying
about its role and the timeline. Here is the "official" story
May 6, 2016, Dmitri Alperovitch woke up in a Los Angeles hotel to an alarming email. Alperovitch is the thirty-six-year-old cofounder
of the cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, and late the previous night, his company had been asked by the Democratic National Committee
to investigate a possible breach of its network. A CrowdStrike security expert had sent the DNC a proprietary software package,
called Falcon, that monitors the networks of its clients in real time. Falcon "lit up," the email said, within ten seconds of being
installed at the DNC: Russia was in the network. (From Esquire--
Esquire Magazine offers a different
timeline)
We are asked to believe that the Russians were in the DNC network on the 6 th of May and that Crowd Strike knew
it. But what steps did Crowd Strike take to shut down the "Russians." Short answer -- nothing until June 10 th.
The DNC emails were taken on the 25 th of May 2016. That is the last date for the DNC emails posted on Wikileaks.
Washington Post reporter Ellen Nakashima and Esquire magazine each reported that that the CrowdStrike effort did not shut down
the DNC network until 10 June. If you know on May 6 th that the "Russians" are in the network, why does any credible,
competent cyber security company wait until the 10 th of June to shut the system down?
I believe this is a cover story. Here is what I think really happened.
Seth Rich, a DNC employee and Bernie Sanders supporter, downloaded the emails and then gave them to Wikileaks. Rich was in contact
with Wikileaks. That is not my opinion. We know that courtesy of a FOIA request by lawyer Ty Clevenger to the NSA filed in November
2017, who requested any information regarding Seth Rich and Julian Assange. The NSA informed Clevenger in a letter dated 4 October
2018 that:
Former NSA Technical Director, William Binney commented on this revelation:
Ty Clevenger has FOIAed information from NSA asking for any data that involved both Seth Rich and also Julian Assange. And they
responded by saying we've got 15 files, 32 pages, but they're all classified in accordance with executive order 13526 covering classification,
and therefore you can't have them.
That says that NSA has records of communications between Seth Rich and Julian Assange. I mean, that's the only business
that NSA is in -- copying communications between people and devices.
We already know, as noted above, that the CIA had a task force set up. I believe this intelligence was communicated to the
Clinton campaign and that a bogus story, with Crowd Strike in a starring role, was cooked up. Implausible? Not as implausible
as a supposed cracker jack cyber security company waiting almost six weeks before taking common sense steps to shut down and clean
the DNC servers.
It was Crowd Strike with the help of the Washington Post that went public and pinned the blame on the Russians.
But that was not the only active measure in place. Christopher Steele, a fully signed up FBI informant, was hired by Fusion
GPS and produced his first block buster report on June 20 th claiming Trump was under the thumb of Vladimir Putin.
This is not a complete timeline. More remains to be discovered. But there are key facts that most of the media and punditry have
ignored. Donald Trump's announcement tonight (Thursday, 23 May 2019) to start declassifying documents on the Trump counter intelligence
investigation and directing the intelligence agencies to cooperate may be the final straw that ends the conspiracy of ignorance.
Once again, thank you for the good work on this important topic. Looking forward to your future installments.
Things should get very interesting with the declassification in force. Can you see the NSA/Seth Rich/Wikileaks material
being made declassified as well (albeit redacted for methods, etc of course)?
O'Shawnessey, if the Rich/Assange material establishes communication between the two, I would expect it to be declassified
to bolster the "Russia didn't do it" narrative. Even if that communication was't specifically about transferring DNC files or
the actual transference of DNC files, it would be useful to Russia and/or Trump supporters.
If, OTOH, the file NSA files consist of Assange discussing the use of Rich as a useful scapegoat, the files will never see
the light of day. According to what Larry has written, Clevenger asked for files with information involving Rich and Assange
and did not specify communications between Assange and Rich.
Clevenger should have at least specified a cut off date. If the NSA files were produced before Rich's death, it would be
a gold mine for Barr and Trump. If the documents covered the time after Rich's death, not so much.
My theory is that the Rich as leaker story is similar to the whole G2 story. They muddy the water and create chaos. Classic
maskirovka.
Siht, I hadn't even thought about classified info on SR. I had thought about how it would be interesting if it turned out
Sanders had been spied on. Seriously explosive stuff. Something about Robert Duvall using the other N word, quote from Apocalypse
Now.
This is the second time in the past few weeks I've read about surveillance on Sanders. Is there a link to a reliable
source?
I believe it's established that a guy from the UK worked in his campaign, and is now on the Integrity Initiative payroll.
And the investigation into his wife's role in the financial affairs of the college she works for seems mysteriously to have
run into the sands.
Before joining Manafort in Kiev, Kliminik worked for almost a decade in Moscow for the International Republican Institute,
effectively running that office for some of those years. The IRI is part of the NED/USAID network. There is no way an identified
"GRU agent" would be permitted as a long time employee of such an organization.
The Mueller team deliberately seeded the suspicion, and credulous journalists speculated on polling data without pause. Kliminik
was, in effect, Manafort's deputy in Kiev, working very closely with him - so again for the Mueller team to suggest there was
anything at all sinister in the two men holding meetings, whether tied to campaign events or not, is unfounded speculation,
which should have been obvious to all.
I've been waiting for that one. Next comes Papadopoulos. I think the British Fraud Act of 2006 is quite relevant to what
Halper was doing. Cambridge University, Magdalene College, even Pembroke College would seem to me to be at risk for lawsuits.
Fraud Act 2006 Wikipedia explains why litigation is now appropriate.
To avoid the conflict [of interest] President Trump designates the U.S. Attorney General as arbiter and decision-maker
for the purposes of declassifying evidence within the investigation
...
[etc.]
I realize Larry Johnson's already alluded to the existence of NSA files about communications between Seth Rich and Julian
Assange, but the implications are finally sinking in as to how evil this whole mess is.
I've always been dismissive of those who've made comments about "Arkancide" in connection with the Clintons, but I may
have to revise my POV. I wonder who was involved in the process of getting rid of Mr. Rich?
Wasn't there a "murder case" in DC itself? In other words do you really need to lead us down to Arkansas, murky real estate
deals, drugs, extramarital relationships bordering on rapes and other shady associate networks? But I agree, suicided may not fit all too well.
I am struck by the irony of the Trump administration is prosecuting Julian Assange under the Espionage Act for actions that
are common journalistic practices, while simultaneously conducting an investigation that is closing in on malefactors of high
position for probable actions that threaten the very core of our democracy and which in all likelihood would still be unknown
to the public were it not for the work of that same heterodox journalist.
I suspect that the Trump government really doesn't want Assange extradited but feels it has to be seen to have gone through
the motions. 17+ indictments might be effective in the American judicial system but here in good old Blighty it's way too many
and they might all be thrown out as being oppressive.
But then again the Conservative government after Brexit will be a bunch of craven shits desperate for a trade deal from Trump
and will reply "how high" when he says jump.
Declassify the list of persons "Samantha Powers" asked FISA courts to unmask during the 11th hours of the Obama administration.
Or learn who signed her name to these requests, if in fact she did not as she claimed.
That remind me how old Kushner tried to smear his relative...
Notable quotes:
"... They are told that the daughter of a Russian billionaire plans large investments in Austria. It was said that she would like to help his party. The alleged daughter of the Russian billionaire, who is actually also Austrian, and her "friend" serve an expensive dinner. Alcohol flows freely. The pair offers a large party donation but asks for returns in form of mark ups on public contracts. ..."
"... The "Russian" female is notably very attractive with a slender build. There is a honey-trap angle here as well. This would likely inspire the boasting (in order to impress her) on the part of the wingnut politician. ..."
"... The far-right is the Troy Horse of transnational corporations and capital and already discredited neoliberal stablishment which comes now disguised under the softening label of "populists". Beware, there seems to be a coordinated effort at several blogs in the ten previous days of the European elections to whitewash the far-right. ..."
"... So this very much hints something more. Right now there is a debate of cocain being visible on the table but this accusation points more towards schnickle with a babe imho. The babe to his right is not that ugly, admittely. ..."
"... As expected the hysteria of "russian" meddling have now publicized to weaken FPÖ in the EU election. Winners? NATO/US parties. ..."
"... Seems indeed to be a honeypot aspect to the entrapment, and it's quite possible Strache stepped down at once to avoid that part to come to light, so that the public revelations would be limited to the economic shenanigans and influence-peddling level. ..."
"... Also, this goes to show that the bulk of our Western politicians, across all the political spectrum, are a bunch of mediocre and quite corrupt fools. For him not to smell that this was a setup from the very first minute, it must be that such proposals are common place all across the board - which will only reinforce my suspicion that our societies, peoples and mankind as a whole would only benefit if we fully wiped out our economic, financial and political establishment and started from scratches. ..."
"... Blackmail, smear campaigns, various traps via honey or corruption, hookers and blow, gay sex, paedofilia, or what-have-you, - all or in combination. Politicians are "all" compromised in these ways. Buck the system or threaten the status quo - whereby it gets somebody's serious attention and the shite hits the fan. ..."
"... The savages in this neoliberal order use the secret services to subvert democracy. Deception and manipulation are the means used to corrupt the public domain. They would push the most pliable and ruthless leaders into office. Catastrophe and violence and disinformation are their most powerful weapons. But I still think that political processes and elections do matter; and what counts is a struggle to improve and reform the system of government. Doing our best to protect and maintain the integrity of electoral processes is something that requires both protests and political campaigns. ..."
"... The very strong implication certainly seems to be that there may be further video of Strache sleeping with the honey pot. He obviously knows what happened that night. If there were video cameras hidden everywhere, that was obviously one of the intentions behind the sting from the outset. ..."
"... B, please do an article on the Nazi penetration of the German security services, Interior Ministry, Army, CDU etc, and links to the NSU affair, shredding of millions of documents by the Interior Ministry when demanded by the courts as evidence, links with the Board members and advisory board members of German big business especially Siemens and Deutche Bank and Bayer, etc. ..."
"... It is a wonder Strache's remark "Journalists are the biggest whores on the planet" and how he says he can subvert an entire media outlet to his political agenda by even firing the few remaining fringe elements. ..."
"... I don't think Strache is as harmless as you portray him, B. You fall for his defence strategy if you attribute all his statements to the influence of alcohol. At that time, the man was very confident that he would soon be at the levers of power, which then materialized. It remains to be proven whether he did not put into practice anything of what he talked about at that house in Ibiza. After all, he was talking about the by far most influential newspaper in Austria. ..."
"... Of course it is true that it is the neoliberal globalisers who have brought us to where we stand today. But that doesn' make people like Strache and Salvini any less dangerous. If they rise to total power, the result will be a naked dictatorship. Strache was beaten with his own weapons, you don't have to be under any illusions. ..."
"... Who could have ordered such an elaborate sting operation? ..."
"... The sophisticated operation using actors and a villa prepared with hidden cameras and microphones shows that this is hardly a normal case of dirty campaigning by political opponents. Most likely, either it was an action by a secret service or someone with deep pockets hired former secret agents. ..."
"... If it was an action by secret services, the most plausible explanation seems to be that Western secret services targeted Strache because FPÖ is one of the parties who is in favor of restoring normal relations with Russia ..."
"... François Fillon comes to mind, a French conservative candidate who also had a quite a friendly attitude towards Russia - shortly before the elections, it was revealed (at least claimed) that Fillon had given his wife ficticious employment, and Fillon lost popularity, which helped Macron enormously. ..."
"... Probably, some of the things Strache said during this sting operation were inacceptable, and Fillon may also not be innocent, but if there is a systematic selective targeting of European politicians who want to normalize relations with Russia by secret services, that would be a huge problem for democracy. ..."
"... In 2016, Joseph Mifsud invited George Papadopoulos to Rome and introduced him to "Putin's niece" with the intent of smearing Trump as "Russian puppet" and destroying his election chances. In 2017, someone (who?) invited Heinz-Christian Strache to Ibiza and introduced him to "Russian billionaire's niece" with the intent of smearing Strache as "Russian puppet" and destroying his party's election chances. Notice a pattern? ..."
"... This is a clear case of Germany interfering in Austrian elections. Austria should deport 60 German diplomats, shut down German embassy in Vienna, and impose sanctions on Germany. Also put a German girl interested in Austrian politics in jail for 18 months. ..."
"... Thinking about it, after revealing e-mail of HRC, Podesta etc. were published, their core supporters were enraged about the dirty trick and did not pay attention to the disclosed content, while for the core opponents of HRC she was already sufficiently vilified so the net change in voting intentions that can be attributed to that incident was modest. ..."
"... Anyone who does not directly have his or her family's nose in the EU trough at this point knows that the policies espoused by transatlantic puppets like Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron push our countries and our continent towards self-destruction. Life in Europe, post-1968 and pre-2013, has been pretty damn good. There's absolutely no good reason for us to rip up our traditions or turn into a continent of immigrants and mobile job seekers. ..."
"... As Strache explains in the video, Austrian dirty tricks are done "via another country". ..."
"... To those who fill that politics of Strache are obnoxious and that justifies entrapment, remembers that methods of that type are not improvised, and that means that there is an apparatus that does it. We noted similarities with provocations against George Papadopoulos. In the latter case the target was cautious, after all, we had to be well aware of such methods. But anyone who is despised by NATO establishment are similar group can be on the receiving end, think about Assange. ..."
During the last days a right wing politician in Austria was taken down by using an elaborate
sting. Until Friday Heinz-Christian Strache was leader of the far right (but not fascist)
Freedom Party of Austria (FPOe) and the Vice Chancellor of the country. On Friday morning two
German papers, the Sueddeutsche Zeitung and Der Spiegel
published (German)
reports (English) about an old video that was made to take Strache down.
The FPOe has good connections with United Russia, the party of the Russian President Putin,
and to other right-wing parties in east Europe. It's pro-Russian position has led to verbal
attacks on and defamation of the party from NATO supporting and neoliberal circles.
In July 2017 Strache and his right hand man Johann Gudenus, who is also the big number in
the FPOe, get invited for dinner to a rented villa on Ibiza, the Spanish tourist island in the
Mediterranean. They are told that the daughter of a Russian billionaire plans large investments
in Austria. It was said that she would like to help his party. The alleged daughter of the
Russian billionaire, who is actually also Austrian, and her "friend" serve an expensive dinner.
Alcohol flows freely. The pair offers a large party donation but asks for returns in form of
mark ups on public contracts.
Unknown to Strache the villa is professionally bugged with many hidden cameras and
microphones.
A scene from the video. Source: Der Falter (vid, German)
During the six hour long party several schemes get proposed by the "Russian" and are
discussed. Strache rejects most of them. He insists several times that everything they plan or
do must be legal and conform to the law. He says that a large donation could probably be
funneled through an endowment that would then support his party. It is a gray area under
Austrian party financing laws. They also discuss if the "Russian" could buy the Kronen
Zeitung , Austria's powerful tabloid, and use it to prop up his party.
The evening goes on with several bottles of vodka on the table. Starche gets a bit drunk and
boosts in front of the "oligarch daughter" about all his connections to rich and powerful
people. He does not actually have these.
Strache says that, in exchange for help for his party, the "Russian" could get public
contracts for highway building and repair. Currently most of such contracts in Austria go to
the large Austrian company, STRABAG, that is owned by a neoliberal billionaire who opposes the
FPOe. At that time Strache was not yet in the government and had no way to decide about such
contracts.
At one point Strache seems to understand that the whole thing is a setup. But his right hand
man calms him down and vouches for the "Russian". The sting ends with Strache and his companion
leaving the place. The never again see the "Russian" and her co-plotter. Nothing they talked
about will ever come to fruition.
Three month later Strache and his party win more than 20% in the Austrian election and form
a coalition government with the conservative party OeVP led by Chancellor Sebastian Kurz. Even
while the FPOe controls several ministries, it does not achieve much politically. It lacks a
real program and the government's policies are mostly run by the conservatives.
Nearly two years after the evening on Ibiza, ten days before the European parliament
election in which Strache's party is predicted to achieve good results, a video of the evening
on Ibiza is handed to two German papers which are known to be have strong transatlanticist
leanings and have previously been used for other shady 'leaks'. The papers do not hesitate to
take part in the plot and publish extensive reports about the video.
After the reports appeared Strache immediately stepped down and the
conservatives ended the coalition with his party. Austria will now have new elections.
On Bloomberg Leonid Bershidsky opines
on the case:
Strache's discussion with the Russian oligarch's fake niece shows a propensity for dirty
dealing that has nothing to do with idealistic nationalism. Nationalist populists often
agitate against entrenched, corrupt elites and pledge to drain various swamps. In the videos,
however, Strache and Gudenus behave like true swamp creatures, savoring rumors of drug and
sex scandals in Austrian politics and discussing how to create an authoritarian media machine
like Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's.
I do not believe that the people who voted for the FPOe (and similar parties in other
countries) will subscribe to that view. The politics of the main stream parties in Austria have
for decades been notoriously corrupt. Compared to them Strache and his party are astonishingly
clean. In the video he insists several times that everything must stay within the legal realm.
Whenever the "Russian" puts forward a likely illegal scheme, Starche emphatically rejects
it.
Bershidsky continues:
Strache, as one of the few nationalist populists in government in the European Union's
wealthier member states, was an important member of the movement Italian Interior Minister
Matteo Salvini has been trying to cobble together ahead of the European Parliament election
that will take place next week. On Saturday, he was supposed to attend a Salvini-led rally in
Milan with other like-minded politicians from across Europe. Instead, he was in Vienna
apologizing to his wife and to Kurz and protesting pitifully that he'd been the victim of a
"political assassination" -- a poisonous rain on the Italian right-winger's parade.
...
This leaves the European far right in disarray and plays into the hands of centrist and
leftist forces ahead of next week's election. Salvini's unifying effort has been thoroughly
undermined, ...
This is also a misreading of the case. The right-wing parties will use the case to boost
their legitimacy.
Strache was obviously set up by some intelligence services, probably a German one with a
British assist. The original aim was likely to blackmail him. But during the meeting on Ibiza
Strache promised and did nothing illegal. Looking for potential support for his party is not a
sin. Neither is discussing investments in Austria with a "daughter of a Russian oligarch." Some
boosting while drunk is hardly a reason to go to jail. When the incident provided too little
material to claim that Strache is corrupt, the video was held back until the right moment to
politically assassinate him with the largest potential damage to his party. That moment was
thought to be now.
But that Strache stepped down after the sudden media assault only makes him more convincing.
The right-wing all over Europe will see him as a martyr who was politically assassinated
because he worked for their cause. The issue will increase the right-wingers hate against the
'liberal' establishment. It will further motivate them: "They attack us because we are right
and winning." The new far-right block Natteo Salvini
will setup in the European Parliament will likely receive a record share of votes.
Establishment writers notoriously misinterpret the new right wing parties and their
followers. This stand-offish sentence in the Spiegel story about Strache's party
demonstrates the problem:
In the last election, the party drew significant support from the working class, in part
because of his ability to simplify even the most complicated of issues and play the common
man, even in his role as vice chancellor.
The implicit thesis, that the working class is too dumb to understand the "most complicated
of issues", is not only incredibly snobbish but utterly false. The working class understands
very well what the establishment parties have done to it and continue to do. The increasing
vote share of the far-right is a direct consequence of the behavior of the neoliberal center
and of the lack of real left alternatives.
Last week, before the Strache video appeared, Craig Murray put his finger on the
wound:
The massive economic shock following the banking collapse of 2007–8 is the direct cause
of the crisis of confidence which is affecting almost all the institutions of western
representative democracy. The banking collapse was not a natural event, like a tsunami. It
was a direct result of man-made systems and artifices which permitted wealth to be generated
and hoarded primarily through multiple financial transactions rather than by the actual
production and sale of concrete goods, and which then disproportionately funnelled wealth to
those engaged in the mechanics of the transactions.
...
The rejection of the political class manifests itself in different ways and has been diverted
down a number of entirely blind alleys giving unfulfilled promise of a fresh start –
Brexit, Trump, Macron. As the vote share of the established political parties – and
public engagement with established political institutions – falls everywhere, the
chattering classes deride the political symptoms of status quo rejection by the people as
"populism". It is not populism to make sophisticated arguments that undermine the received
political wisdom and take on the entire weight of established media opinion.
If one wants to take down the far right one has to do so with arguments and good politics
for the working class. Most people, especially working class people, have a strong sense for
justice. The political assassination of Christian Strache is unjust. What was done during the
2007-8 banking crisis was utterly corrupt and also unjust. Instead of going to jail the bankers
were rewarded with extreme amounts of money for their assault on the well being of the people.
The public was then told that it must starve through austerity to make up for the loss of
money.
While I consider myself to be a strong leftist who opposes the right wherever possible, I
believe to understand why people vote for Strache's FBOe and similar parties. When one talks to
these people issues of injustice and inequality always come up. The new 'populist' parties at
least claim to fight against the injustice done to the common men. Unlike most of the
establishment parties they seem to be still mostly clean and not yet corrupted.
In the early 1990s Strache actually flirted with violent fascists but he rejected their way.
While he has far-right opinions, he and his like are no danger to our societies. If we can not
accept that Strache and his followers have some legitimate causes, we will soon find us
confronted with way more extreme people. The neoliberal establishment seems to do its best to
achieve that.
Posted by b on May 19, 2019 at 01:10 PM |
Permalink
b - thanks .. i agree "elaborate sting" and "the video was held back until the right
moment"... clearly this was a set up.. strache says he is going to pursue this legally..
"working class people, have a strong sense for justice. The political assassination of
Christian Strache is unjust." injustices are being done on a constant basis now and being
justified by the msm regularly.. i think this is part of the reason people are seeking
alternatives - whatever they might be... power to the people..screw the neoliberal agenda and
blackmail artists that are so rampant at present...
Funny thing is e.g.- a German comedian Jan Böhmerman knew before. Already in April he
said in a Video call live in Austian television duringthe TV-prize-giving of the trophy
"Romy" that he couldn´t attend personally to receive the price because right know he
was sitting together with some FPÖ-buddies in a Russian oligarch-villa on Ibiza,
sniffing cocain, drinking and negotiating the takeover of the "Krone-Zeitung" (the biggest
rag in Austira, smth like the "Bild" in Germany or "The sun" in Britain).
Your article here raises a number of important issues. More or less at random:
* If I understand your characterization of your political leanings, based on this and on
the perspectives MoA offers, I share many of your views. And whereas there may be a certain
Schadenfreude at seeing a right-wing, B-team operator reveal himself, I agree that the forces
behind the sting itself are of potentially far greater interest (and danger)..
* For every sting and smear such as this that we see, how many others take place sub rosa,
corrupting our political and social landscapes, leaving no evidence that might trigger
criticism or resistance?
* I'm not sure of how this plays out legally, but this seems not just to have been a
sting, but entrapment, in which (if these were law enforcement agents) we could protest that
the only illegal activity being proposed, was by those conducting the sting.
* If this was, as you suggest, authored by the BND, then this would be a clear instance of
election "meddling" -- though not of the sort that our shining democracies are now being
warned against. (At least President Putin will not be accused of conducting it, for once.
That oligarch's daughter could have come from anywhere, but of course Russia.) Russia gets
smeared is probably the larger aim, rather than this particularly Austrian politician.
The "Russian" female is notably very attractive with a slender build. There is a honey-trap
angle here as well. This would likely inspire the boasting (in order to impress her) on the
part of the wingnut politician.
I think the word is protofascist. b. you have got a blind spot seeing geopolitics everywhere. Truth is most of this is
simply a battle of billionaires. The key to understand the Ibiza video is the product placement. Everybody there drinks Red
Bull plus alcohol (I am not sure about the alcohol the loss of control of the politicians who
are present suggests cocaine).
The owner of Red Bull is an Austrian billionaire called Dietrich Mateschitz.
Mateschitz is a right wing crank building a media empire in Austria including an
"investigative platform" called addendum that is something like the Austrian version of
Breitbart.
For some reason "addendum" began to shoot against Rene Benzko, an Austrian real estate
billionaire, who intends to take over Kronenzeitung.
And guess what, Rene Benzko was mentioned in the video "as a friend", and a large part of
the conversation centered on taking over Kronenzeitung something Rene Benzko is involved
in.
Strache, Vice Chancellor of Austria, explained in the video for every Austrian to
understand, that his party's scheme is based on accepting illegal contributions via a ngo,
and lowering taxes in return.
According to what he says in the video he also intends to charge for water by selling the
right to the Latvian/Russien "niece of a Russian oligarch" or someone else prepared to pay to
his party's ngo.
Anybody who is not a billionaire voting for FPÖ after this must be braindead.
> with United Russia, the party of the Russian President Putin
Putin himself though stresses his non involvement in that party, he also tried to
bootstrap organizations that could supplant or even challenge U.R. at least in some
niches.
While U.R. probably is party of Russian ruling elites, it is hardly one-man-show of
LDPR/Zhirinovsky kind and whether Putin is "gray cardinal" of U.R. is very questionable.
It is said that children and drunk people always say the truth...
Why is it not to be taken into account what he said once drunk enough?
For to be a strong leftist, b, you spend a great effort in discharging this man, while
whitewashing the far-right saying they are no danger for our societies and assuring that they
are clean, when that is a thing you do not know since they have not had yet the possibility
to rule.
They are neither cleaner nor inocuous for our societies. For starters they have chosen as
scapegoat the migrants when who is to blame for the wave of migration is the US, NATO and
their imperial ambitions, so as to throw poor against poor and that way the elites could
continue quietly looting us, while we fight each other. You will never heard anything agsint
banks ans elites from anybody in the far-right.
FYI, it is not Matteo Salvini who is forming a coalition of the far-right to conflude to
European elections, but it is Bannon from his HQ in a Cisterciense monastery in Italy who is
commanding this operation. Salvini is really a piece, having supported Guiado and the
Venezuelan coup intend, and said what he would do with the Yellow Vests , "I don't go to the
Yellow Vests with Molotov cocktails, if anything, I put them in prison" ...
Then it is AfD, who goes also in the block, whose members have claimed the Germans should
be proud of the performance of the German Army during both WW....
Then Vox, financed by MEK and Israeli lobby and promoted by Bannon and the WH, who only wear
clear neoliberal economic policies in their, for the rest, confusing program.
The far-right is the Troy Horse of transnational corporations and capital and already
discredited neoliberal stablishment which comes now disguised under the softening label of
"populists". Beware, there seems to be a coordinated effort at several blogs in the ten
previous days of the European elections to whitewash the far-right.
"Glaubt er, man wäre bei Alkohol nachsichtiger? Offenbar schien er sich betrunken kaum
mehr im Griff zu haben - und dies ist wohlgemerkt seine Erklärung für die
Äußerungen im Video. Erst gegen Ende beginnt er eigenes Fehlverhalten
einzuräumen und bittet insbesondere seine Frau um Verzeihung, mit der er ein wenige
Monate altes Kind hat. Kenner Straches ahnten an dieser Stelle bereits, dass dieser sich
bereits für Dinge entschuldigt, die zu diesem Zeitpunkt der Öffentlichkeit noch gar
nicht bekannt sind."
Does he (Strache) really assume he would get more indulgence by blaming it on the
alcolhol? Obviously when being drunken he wasn´t in control of himself anymore - and
this is actually his explanation for his statements in the video. Somehow at the end he
finally begins admitting own misconduct and especially asks his wife for forgiveness, with
which he has a few months old child. Experts on Strache suspected from this moment on, that
he apologized for things which at this moment are not known to the public, yet"
So this very much hints something more. Right now there is a debate of cocain being
visible on the table but this accusation points more towards schnickle with a babe imho. The
babe to his right is not that ugly, admittely.
battle of billionaires.... Anybody who is not a billionaire voting for FPÖ after
this must be braindead.
Anyone who believes voting will change anything is braindead. Only supporting protest Movements (like Gillet Jeune) and free press/citizen journalism
(Wikileaks/Assange) will have any real effect.
Great piece - I dont see how Strache actually made anything wrong or atleast nothing not
normal to politicians that constantly seek out support by big, powerful people. Most likely
the deep state in Austria struck FPÖ just like FBI struck Trump.
As expected the hysteria of "russian" meddling have now publicized to weaken FPÖ in the
EU election.
Winners? NATO/US parties.
Not some very close relative like daughter or sister, which may be fearsome, as "russian
mafia" oligarch could be expected to "protect" her of ladykillers viciously. But also not some far relative who would be seen alien and have no financial support.
Just enough distance to be safe to hit on and try to share the oligarch's money. It was both honey&gold trap.
If voting would be such a waste, why would had taken so hard and long to achieve voting
for minorities and women?
Why the parties go to such efforts to campaign and disguise themselves as wolves with
sheepskin like the far-right?
Why would certain forces need to go to such editorial coordinated efforts through their
several blogs out there to give an impression of certain candidates which is opposite to what
they really are? Wikilieaks/Assange are part of this efforts, btw
Seems indeed to be a honeypot aspect to the entrapment, and it's quite possible Strache
stepped down at once to avoid that part to come to light, so that the public revelations
would be limited to the economic shenanigans and influence-peddling level.
Also, this goes to show that the bulk of our Western politicians, across all the political
spectrum, are a bunch of mediocre and quite corrupt fools. For him not to smell that this was
a setup from the very first minute, it must be that such proposals are common place all
across the board - which will only reinforce my suspicion that our societies, peoples and
mankind as a whole would only benefit if we fully wiped out our economic, financial and
political establishment and started from scratches.
Spanish Colonel ( ret.) Pedro Baños, who was postulated for head of the CNI by the
Socialist government of Pedro Sanchez, was object of slander campiagn as "pro-Russian" by the
Spanish cluster of Integrity Initiative, only for declarations on the prejudice of sanctions
for Spain, and nobody made such noise....
Blackmail, smear campaigns, various traps via honey or corruption, hookers and blow, gay sex,
paedofilia, or what-have-you, - all or in combination. Politicians are "all" compromised in
these ways. Buck the system or threaten the status quo - whereby it gets somebody's serious
attention and the shite hits the fan.
Enforcement and and penalties are selective. Selective enforcement. It's how "The Law" operates. Not defending the wingnut pig in the article. I appreciate Sasha's Trojan Horse allegory above.
wow...a bunch of elitist neoliberals with contempt for anyone lacking 10 zeroes on their
paychecks and zero useful policies use "russian collusion" to entrap and embarrass a
pseudo-right wing politician. who could ever imagine such a scenario? and why learn from the
masses you represent when james o'keefe gives you all the inspiration you need?
but at least they blocked the ascension of someone who would trade political favors for
money. that kind of nonsense simply won't do in western society.
Thanks for this explanation, b! I first saw this reported at Geroman's Twitter and used
machine translation of the article he linked, but it lacked the context which you provided.
This incident is subsumed within the larger conflict that's trying to keep EU from combining
with BRI/EAEU, which means its roots/culprits are NATO/Outlaw US Empire--it points to
desperation on their part.
Sorry, you don't see the Latvian/Russian woman. You see Gudenus' wife who is from
Serbia. Whatever the publishing papers got, it was a copy. More will come out.
The savages in this neoliberal order use the secret services to subvert democracy. Deception
and manipulation are the means used to corrupt the public domain. They would push the most
pliable and ruthless leaders into office. Catastrophe and violence and disinformation are
their most powerful weapons. But I still think that political processes and elections do
matter; and what counts is a struggle to improve and reform the system of government. Doing
our best to protect and maintain the integrity of electoral processes is something that
requires both protests and political campaigns.
So this very much hints something more. Right now there is a debate of cocain being
visible on the table but this accusation points more towards schnickle with a babe imho. The
babe to his right is not that ugly, admittely. Posted by: Bratislav Metulski | May 19, 2019 2:20:38 PM | 8
The very strong implication certainly seems to be that there may be further video of
Strache sleeping with the honey pot. He obviously knows what happened that night. If there
were video cameras hidden everywhere, that was obviously one of the intentions behind the
sting from the outset.
---
On the issue of "populism" and right-wing parties I confess I have a problem. I certainly
want to see the Establishment thrashed, and especially in next week's EU elections, and there
is no question that at the moment the right-wing parties have far more potential to upset the
establishment than the left. If "Populist" parties are able to radically upset the EU
Parliament, that should bring a much-needed hammer and axe to the anti-populist activities of
the EU, and hopefully lead to the breakup of the EU.
On the other hand, unlike B, I do have extremely strong worries about the rising power of
the far right and their connections to Nazis and neo-Nazis. I am concerned - even without the
involvement of Bannon, but far more so with - that the rise of "populism" is a calculated
policy of a Nazi segment of the Establishment that is designed specifically to usher in an
international Nazi movement across Europe and Latin America under the leadership of and
proxies of the - ever more and more Nazi behaving - US (which itself is in so many very real
ways descended from Adolf Hitler's Nazi Party and the Japanese war criminals including Bush's
family, tight connections with Nazi war criminals in the CIA, and historical leadership
figures in the CIA). The large scale and extremely high level infiltration of hardcore Nazis
in the German security services, Interior Ministry, Army, and CDU politics is a ticking
timebomb waiting for its moment. There seems to be similar high level Nazi infiltration in
many other countries.
We have to be careful what we wish for!
B, please do an article on the Nazi penetration of the German security services, Interior
Ministry, Army, CDU etc, and links to the NSU affair, shredding of millions of documents by
the Interior Ministry when demanded by the courts as evidence, links with the Board members
and advisory board members of German big business especially Siemens and Deutche Bank and
Bayer, etc.
Colonialism is a leech with two suckers, one of which sucks the metropolitan proletariat
and the other that of the colonies. If we want to kill this monster, we must cut off both
suckers at the same time. If only one is cut off, the other will continue to suck the blood
of the proletariat, the animal will continue to live, and the cut–off sucker will
grow again. The Russian Revolution has grasped this truth clearly. That is why it is not
satisfied with making fine platonic speeches and drafting "humanitarian" resolutions in
favor of oppressed peoples, but it teaches them to struggle; and helps them spiritually, as
proclaimed by Lenin in his theses on the colonial question. To the Baku Congress,
twenty–one Eastern nations sent delegates. Representatives of Western workers'
parties also participated in the work of this congress. For the first time, the proletariat
of the conquering Western States and that of the subject Eastern countries fraternally
joined hands and deliberated in common on the best means to defeat their common enemy,
imperialism .
Following this historic congress, despite internal and external difficulties,
revolutionary Russia has never hesitated to come to the help of peoples awakened by its
heroic and victorious revolution. One of its first important acts was the founding of the
University of the East.(...)
The sixty–two nationalities represented at the University form a "Commune." Its
chairman and functionaries are elected every three months by all the students.
A student delegate takes part in the economic and administrative management of the
University. All must regularly and in turn work in the kitchen, the library, the club, etc.
All "misdemeanors" and disputes are judged and settled by an elected tribunal in the
presence of all comrades. Once a week, the "Commune" holds a meeting to discuss the
international political and economic situation. From time to time, meetings and evening
parties are organized where the amateur artists introduce the art and culture of their
country.
The fact that the Communists not only treat the "inferior natives of the colonies"
like brothers, but that they get them to participate in the political life of the country,
is highly characteristic of the "barbarity" of the Bolsheviks. Treated in their native
country as "submissive subjects" or "protéges," having no other right but that to
pay taxes, the Eastern students, who are neither electors nor eligible for election in
their own country, from whom the right to express their political opinion is withdrawn, in
the Soviet Union take part in the election of the Soviets and have the right to send their
representatives to the Soviets. Let our brothers of the colonies who vainly seek a change
of nationality make a comparison between bourgeois democracy and proletarian
democracy.
These students have suffered themselves and have witnessed the sufferings of others.
All have lived under the yoke of "high civilization," all have been victims of exploitation
and oppression by foreign capitalists . Moreover, they passionately long to acquire
knowledge and to study. They are serious and full of enthusiasm. They are entirely
different from the frequenters of the boulevards of the Latin Quarter, the Eastern students
in Paris, Oxford, and Berlin. It can be said without exaggeration that under the roof of
this University is the future of the colonial peoples.
The colonial countries of the Near and Far East, stretching from Syria to Korea,
cover an extent of more than 15 million square kilometers and have more than 1,200 million
inhabitants. All these immense countries are now under the yoke of capitalism and
imperialism. Although their considerable numbers should be their strength, these submissive
peoples have never yet made any serious attempts to free themselves from this yoke. Not yet
having realized the value of international solidarity, they have not known how to unite for
the struggle. Relationships between their countries are not yet established as they are
among the peoples of Europe and America. They possess gigantic strength and do not yet
realize it. The University of the East, assembling all the young, active, and intelligent
leaders of the colonized countries, has fulfilled a great task, namely:
-It teaches to the future vanguard militants the principles of class struggle,
confused in their minds by race conflicts and patriarchal customs.
-It establishes between the proletarian vanguard of the colonies a close contact with the
Western proletariat, thus preparing the way for the close and effective cooperation which
will alone ensure the final victory of the international working class.
-It teaches the colonized people, hitherto separated from one another, to know one another
and to unite, by creating the bases of a future union of Eastern countries, one of the
wings of the proletarian revolution.
-It sets the proletariat of colonialist countries and example of what they can and must do
in favor of their oppressed brothers .
This is why it is needed to throw the workers from the West against the migrants from the
East and South, to avoid the invincible force they would constitute together.
This dirty work is made by the far-right in the name of corporate liberal elites.
They can play that they fight each other, but as soon as they get seats at the European
Parliament, you will find the previous allegedly opponents all together aligned in the same
Eurogroup. Time to time.
It is a wonder Strache's remark "Journalists are the biggest whores on the planet" and how he
says he can subvert an entire media outlet to his political agenda by even firing the few
remaining fringe elements. Yet here we can still talk about he was drunk, how his being set
up was unjust, and how the poor guy will have to miss his lovers' right cause in Italy. Those
vulgar masses are at it again! There can be no justification about the masses' support of
far-right causes and the clowns like him. If you think otherwise it is the likes of moonofalabama next in line to be "fired", or eliminated. Legitimize their causes and it is
Germany in 1920s all over again.
"Left/right", I agree, is nearly without semantic value. Nevertheless class interests
remain...how is it that this is so? Think about that, comrades.
And then consider wsws report about "At the annual meeting of the Bundeswehr reserve in
autumn 2016, Veith announced: "I dream that in 2026 there will be a provincial regiment in
each state with a charismatic commander, a troop flag and an organization of between 800 and
2,000 reservists to support the police and the Bundeswehr in emergency situations." " see>
"German government prepares troops for domestic missions" @ wsws.org
Considering the overall aspects, it's rational to expect all parties in Europe to make
plans, is it not? Of course the working class is not permitted to make such plans...is
it?
I don't think Strache is as harmless as you portray him, B. You fall for his defence strategy
if you attribute all his statements to the influence of alcohol. At that time, the man was
very confident that he would soon be at the levers of power, which then materialized. It
remains to be proven whether he did not put into practice anything of what he talked about at
that house in Ibiza. After all, he was talking about the by far most influential newspaper in
Austria.
Of course it is true that it is the neoliberal globalisers who have brought us to where we
stand today. But that doesn' make people like Strache and Salvini any less dangerous. If they
rise to total power, the result will be a naked dictatorship. Strache was beaten with his own
weapons, you don't have to be under any illusions.
I agree with you that this is not the big setback for the right the mainstream parties dream
of. But it won't help the fascists in spe in the future either.
Who could have ordered such an elaborate sting operation?
A first association might be the dirty, deceptive campaigning SPÖ used against
Sebastian Kurz (ÖVP) - the Silberstein affair -, but I think the methods that were
chosen are too different to make a common source likely, Strache was targeted in a much more
sophisticated way. The Silberstein affair may, however, be the reason why the tapes have
partially been published now rather than before the last Austrian elections - at that time,
dirty campaigning might have been discredited too much for the tape to have the desired
effect,
The sophisticated operation using actors and a villa prepared with hidden cameras and
microphones shows that this is hardly a normal case of dirty campaigning by political
opponents. Most likely, either it was an action by a secret service or someone with deep
pockets hired former secret agents.
If it was an action by secret services, the most plausible explanation seems to be that
Western secret services targeted Strache because FPÖ is one of the parties who is in
favor of restoring normal relations with Russia.
François Fillon comes to mind, a
French conservative candidate who also had a quite a friendly attitude towards Russia -
shortly before the elections, it was revealed (at least claimed) that Fillon had given his
wife ficticious employment, and Fillon lost popularity, which helped Macron enormously.
Probably, some of the things Strache said during this sting operation were inacceptable, and
Fillon may also not be innocent, but if there is a systematic selective targeting of European
politicians who want to normalize relations with Russia by secret services, that would be a
huge problem for democracy.
In the case of Strache and FPÖ, a different motive may also be plausible. There are
connections between FPÖ and neonazis, and there are, in my view, legitimate concerns
that Strache is too close to such far-right networks. I don't think it is good when
right-wing populists whose rise is mainly due to the unpopularity of the neoliberal elites
are equated with Nazis too quickly.
But in the case of FPÖ, this is less far-fetched
than in the case of other European right-wing parties - historically, Nazis played an
important role in FPÖ in post-war Austria, and it is one of the current right-wing
parties that probably has more connections to the extreme right (e.g. via Burschenschaften)
than others. I could imagine that someone might have ordered and financed the sting operation
out of antifascist principles. While I may recognize the motivation as ethical and even
partially agree with it, I don't think the right means were chosen, and such dirty methods
can backfire.
"While I consider myself to be a strong leftist who opposes the right wherever possible, I
believe to understand why people vote for Strache's FBOe and similar parties"
Quite. It seems to me that only the Right and the Left have a clue right now, because they
have an instinctive mistrust of what they are told in the media.
People like "b" and Craig Murray are to be thanked for explaining that to us middling
voters.
You miss the most glaring "injustice". That which shows that GDP in most western countries
had doubled in the last 30 odd years, that earnings for the top quartile have gone up by
factors of 3 or 4. But that median earnings in US are unchanged, and in say UK are only up
10% or so (unless one is seeking to buy one's own house or flat).
All the improvements in inequality from 1930s to 1980s have been reversed in full.
"Populists" (or better "anti-elitists") are driven mostly by sheer anger at how a small group
had taken all the Economic gains of the last 35 years.
I don't know what b. saw in the video what I saw was a discussion of an Orban like take
over of Austria by FPÖ.
In other news people are arguing the following
- who will profit most - ÖVP
- why was the video not published after it was produced in 2017 - because ÖVP wanted a
coalition with FPÖ
- why was it published now - ÖVP has been renting advertising space for weeks for an
election in September (renting before the video came out), Sebastian Kurz will be the saviour
who will get the disappointed FPÖ vote
add
- why the emphasis on Kronenzeitung,
who were the people producing the video
why Red Bull everywhere - Red Bull media empire billionaire Dietrich Mateschitz publicly
announced that he would back Sebastian Kurz in 2017
ÖVP/Kurz/Mateschitz have moved so far to the right that there is not much space for
FPÖ anyway. His problems will return when he needs another coalition.
While the right wing parties in Europe don't have a problem with Putin, it does seem that
much of the Western European establish has gone full McCarthyite hysterical where they see
any contact for any reason with a Russian is automatically criminal. Aside from being a setup
it relied the underlying false flag of presenting the woman as a Russian (and hence guility
of some crime against the Austrians).
In fact, a suggestion for a column--personal impressions on whether everyday Europeans are
falling for anti-Russian propaganda. Polls in the US indicate that Americans simply do not
care (they could believe it, but not effecting their daily lives).
1. The ER (United Russia) party was founded by Sergey Shoygu, Yuriy Luzhkov, and Mintimer
Shaymiev. Its chairman is Dmitriy Medvedev, not Vladimir Putin. Putin is not even a member of
ER. Putin is the leader of ONF (All-Russia People's Front), which is a nation-wide discussion
platform for politicians, professionals, and NGOs.
2. Russian billionaire Igor Makarov denies having a niece: "I was the only child in the
family." (
Forbes.ru , in Russian).
3. In 2016, Joseph Mifsud invited George Papadopoulos to Rome and introduced him to
"Putin's niece" with the intent of smearing Trump as "Russian puppet" and destroying his
election chances. In 2017, someone (who?) invited Heinz-Christian Strache to Ibiza and
introduced him to "Russian billionaire's niece" with the intent of smearing Strache as
"Russian puppet" and destroying his party's election chances. Notice a pattern?
4. This is a clear case of Germany interfering in Austrian elections. Austria should
deport 60 German diplomats, shut down German embassy in Vienna, and impose sanctions on
Germany. Also put a German girl interested in Austrian politics in jail for 18 months.
Thinking about it, after revealing e-mail of HRC, Podesta etc. were published, their core
supporters were enraged about the dirty trick and did not pay attention to the disclosed
content, while for the core opponents of HRC she was already sufficiently vilified so the net
change in voting intentions that can be attributed to that incident was modest.
Leaving aside the discussion of of various factors in that election, this public reaction
is typical. Actually, in both cases the core supporters may be energized by the suspicion
that this trick was performed by a foreign government. I do not think that there is a
particular hostility toward Germany in Felix Austria, but the to the right wing Merkel
government is like red cape for a bull. The women who unleashed a wave of refugees. On top of
that, traditionally major parties of Austria gained reputation of dirty patronage, so the
voters who care about that issue probably do not vote for them.
I do not expect Austrians to demand expulsions of German diplomats -- interference in our
democracy -- or other sanctions, but nevertheless it stinks. Making sting operations on
politicians has corrupt potential even if it is done by domestic law enforcement, but foreign
intelligence services really do not have any excuse.
Thinking about it, the stings against George Papadopoulos described in his book were
remarkably similar.
That said, Austrians have a reputation of good manners etc., they will not unload their
frustration on a girl. BTW, why there are suspicions of Germany being involved? Again, even
extremist Austrians probably would like to have some proof before doing anything. I guess,
America is indeed exceptional.
For all those of you whining about the corruption of Strache, this is how business and
politics is done in Austria. Strache was just talking about the FPÖ's fair share after
an election which they would win.
This all starts with Austrian's Presidential Election of 2016. The FPÖ won the
presidential election a couple of years ago in May 2016. After the bell, postal votes
overturned it! – postal votes more than 90% in favour of the establishment candidate
Van der Bellen. Some constituencies full of Van der Bellen votes turned out to have 148% turn
out. There was a court case by the FPÖ about procedure and hinting at ballot
falsification. The case was judged by a (non-corrupt but under serious pressure) judge to
have enough merit that the elections had to
be annulled and the election rerun six months later . Austria went without a
president at all for six months!
For six months the mainstream Austrian media campaigned non-stop against the FPÖ and
Norbert Hofer. Huge efforts were made for voter turnout (it included huge bussing of
potential anti-FPÖ constituencies and bribing pensioners to vote against the FPÖ
via parties and cakes). With all of that, Van der Bellen scraped in on 4 December 2016, by
348,231 votes. Despite the non-stop anti-FPÖ propaganda and banging on drums, votes for
Hofer's fell by less than 100,000 (95,993 votes to be exact). It's just that with six months
to prepare the establishment had found enough "dead souls" to win the second round.
In the parliamentary elections of 15 October 2017, the FPÖ were set to win a strong
majority in parliament. To defeat the FPÖ and Strache, the conservatives
(Völkspartei) were forced to elect a male model non-university graduate 30 year old sex
symbol with no work experience outside of politics as party leader. Of course Sebastian Kurz
was mainly a figurehead for establishment figures in the venerable Völkspartei. Kurz
does have a mind of his own though (I had the opportunity to interact with him personally at
a local political discussion group in 2015) and it's hard to know exactly how much of his
policy is dictated to him and how much is off his own bat.
Going back to Austrian corruption, there are enormous sums at stake. There is a long
entrenched system of corruption in the establishment parties, the Völkspartei and the
SPÖ. Strabag does win most of the government contracts. Favour is regularly granted on
quid pro basis. The media landscape is very partisan and mostly for sale. Kurz's spiritual
predecessor as a powerful head of the Völkspartei if not direct predecessor Wolfgang
Schüssel was forced to retire from politics in 2011 due to never-ending corruption
scandals. Schüssel's longstanding finance minister Karl-Heinz Grasser was caught carrying
bags of cash to Lichtenstein and is still under investigation. If his mother-in-law were
not the richest woman in Austria (Swarovski Crystal) and devoted to her daughter (Grasser's
wife), he would long ago have been in jail.
Politically, Grasser knows where a lot of the bodies are buried from the Schlüssel
political machine so either he has to be kept out of jail or he may take others down with
him. In elite Austrian circles turning informant would be considered unsportsmanlike so
there's an uneasy truce still fought to this day in the courts where Grasser is kept out of
jail via procedural methods (detect a pattern) and Grasser doesn't rat out the others.
Strache's sin is not planning to use the advantages which accrue to the governing Austrian
party but getting caught out talking about it. Strache is something of a lout, not terribly
loyal (he was the Brutus who threw Jörg Haider under the bus in 2005 in a palace
putsch). He's a smoker in power who used his power to overturn some very positive
anti-smoking laws. But he's less corrupt than any of his equivalents in the Völkspartei
and is only a nose ahead of the his equivalents in the SPÖ. His politics and policies of
Austria for Austrians are pretty simple. Hence people vote for these policies.
Here's a sample of the SPÖ's wares in the 2010 Vienna elections:
Zu viel Fremdes tut niemandem gut. (Too many foreigners [or more literally: Too much
foreign] does nobody well.)
Wir bewahren unsere Heimatstadt. Die SPÖ macht sie uns fremd. (We maintain our
homeland-city. The SPÖ makes it foreign.)
Wir glauben an unsere Jugend. Die SPÖ an Zuwanderung. (We believe in our youth.
The SPÖ in immigration.)
Wir schützen freie Frauen. Die SPÖ den Kopftuchzwang (We protect free women.
The SPÖ protects the compulsory veil.)
Mehr Mut für unser Wiener Blut (More courage for our Viennese blood.)
Uns geht's um die Wiener (To us, it's about the Viennese)
The FPÖ has historically been weakest in Vienna but in 2010 they took 27% of the vote
in this SPÖ stronghold, their first step in what has been a steady march to power.
Anyone who does not directly have his or her family's nose in the EU trough at this point
knows that the policies espoused by transatlantic puppets like Angela Merkel and Emmanuel
Macron push our countries and our continent towards self-destruction. Life in Europe,
post-1968 and pre-2013, has been pretty damn good. There's absolutely no good reason for us
to rip up our traditions or turn into a continent of immigrants and mobile job seekers. We
instinctively abhor what is happening to our nations. By nature Strache is inclined this way
himself (he's no great thinker) and has the good sense to ride the wave.
For all those of you whining about the corruption of Strache, this is how business and
politics is done in Austria. Strache was just talking about the FPÖ's fair share after
an election which they would win.
So why did he step down?
Here's a sample of the SPÖ's wares in the 2010 Vienna elections:
...
"This stand-offish sentence in the Spiegel story about Strache's party demonstrates the
problem:"
In the last election, the party drew significant support from the working class, in
part because of his ability to simplify even the most complicated of issues and play the
common man, even in his role as vice chancellor.
"The implicit thesis, that the working class is too dumb to understand the "most
complicated of issues", is not only incredibly snobbish but utterly false..."
I can't agree that Spiegel's attitude to Strache's party is condescending toward the
working class. Right-wing parties tend to spout a lot of aggressively authoritarian spin tank
bullshit to encourage voters to tune out when a R-w politician is telling them what to think.
If Strache is adept at separating fact from fiction and superfluous verbiage, then people
would appreciate his candor.
In a Democracy, and in theory at least, politicians are supposed to represent and defend the
views of the people who voted for them, not vested intere$t$. Or so we've been led to
believe...
I'll always remember Spiegel as the folks whose photo-journalists torpedoed Crooked
Hillary's feeble-minded Cheonan (NK-SK) bullshit. That story vanished overnight. It's not
even referred to in NK smear campaigns. Dead & buried.
In a Democracy, and in theory at least, politicians are supposed to represent and
defend the views of the people who voted for them, not vested intere$t$. Or so we've been led
to believe...
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish
Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general
Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity,
That's it.
The German constitution is absolutely clear that members of parliament represent all of
the people (ie different views and interests) and are bound by their own judgement and
conscience only.
As we are discussing Austria, lets see what the Austrian constitution says.
Austria has "linguistic and cultural diversity" and the protection of its grown native
peoples in its constitution, this means Slovenian, Croatian, Czech, Slovakian, Roma and
Hungarian.
So the Austrian constitution has a concept of a multinational state where different peoples
grow and are protected even if the Viennese "Stammtisch" does not like them.
There is no "democratic theory" that suggests representatives should follow the uninformed
and prejudiced views of their electorate against their better judgement.
Strache seems to have specialized in "fake news" - ie mostly invented stuff claiming
Muslims, immigrants or whoever were treated in a better way than native Austrians or
threatened native Austrians.
It is a very convenient technique when you plan to cut social services, you have someone to
blame.
To those who fill that politics of Strache are obnoxious and that justifies entrapment,
remembers that methods of that type are not improvised, and that means that there is an
apparatus that does it. We noted similarities with provocations against George Papadopoulos.
In the latter case the target was cautious, after all, we had to be well aware of such
methods. But anyone who is despised by NATO establishment are similar group can be on the
receiving end, think about Assange.
Alexander Downer former foreign minister is the one who was meddling - Australia's high
commissioner to the UK in 2016
Started whole Russiagate investigation against Trump's campaign by telling the FBI that a
drunken George Papadopoulos had said Russia had dirt on Hillary. Because of his diplomatic
standing the FBI took Downer seriously and it was a major factor in their decision to
investigate.
Alexander Downer also funnelled millions in Australian tax dollars to the Clinton
Foundation during Hillary's election campaign
"Downer is suspected of helping to "dishonestly" obtain $25 million from the Australian
government for the Clinton Foundation's Clinton HIV/AIDs Initiative (CHAI). Michael Smith
(former Australian police detective) says that he gave materials to the FBI containing
evidence that shows "corrupt October 2006 backdating of false tender advertisements
purporting to advertise the availability of a $15 million contract to provide HIV/AIDS
services in Papua New Guinea on behalf of the Australian government after an agreement was
already in place to pay the Clinton Foundation and/or associates."
Smith also found evidence of a "$10 million financial advantage dishonestly obtained by
deception between April 1, 2008, and Sept. 25, 2008, at Washington, D.C., New York, New York,
and Canberra Australia involving an MOU between the Australian government, the 'Clinton
Climate Initiative,' and the purported 'Global Carbon Capture and Storage Institute
Inc.'"
"... If Mifsud is the asset of any foreign intelligence service, it is Britain's -- but that is a story for another day. ..."
"... We learn from the Mueller report (Volume I, p. 193) that Mifsud was interviewed by the FBI on February 10, 2017, a couple of weeks after the bureau started interviewing Papadopoulos. Mifsud denied that, when he met Papadopoulos in London on April 26, 2016, he either knew about or said anything about Russia's possession of Clinton-related emails. ..."
"... The Trump-Russia investigation continued for over two years after the FBI's interview of Mifsud. Mueller took over the probe in May 2017. During his 22 months running the investigation, Mueller charged many people (including Papadopoulos) with lying to the FBI. But he never charged Mifsud. The government has never alleged that Mifsud's denial was false. ..."
"... First, there is no evidence in Mueller's report that Mifsud had any reason to know the operations of Russia's intelligence services. ..."
"... Downer's flawed assumption that Papadopoulos must have been referring to the hacked DNC emails was then inflated into a Trump–Russia conspiracy theory by Clinton partisans in the Obama administration -- first at the State Department, and then in the Justice Department, the FBI, and the broader intelligence community -- all agencies in which animus against Donald Trump ran deep. ..."
"... Although Papadopoulos is extensively quoted in the Mueller report, the prosecutors avoid any quote from Downer regarding what Papadopoulos told him at the meeting. This is consistent with Mueller's false-statements charge against Papadopoulos, which includes the aforementioned 14-page "Statement of the Offense" that studiously omits any reference to Papadopoulos's May meeting with Downer, notwithstanding that it was the most consequential event in Papadopoulos's case. (See pp. 7–8, in which the chronology skips from May 4 to May 13 as if nothing significant happened in between.) ..."
George Papadopoulos leaves after his sentencing hearing at U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., September
7, 2018.
(Yuri Gripas/Reuters)
The State Department and an Australian diplomat grossly exaggerated Papadopoulos's claims -- which were probably
false anyway.
C
hicanery was the force behind the formal opening of the FBI's Trump-Russia
investigation. There was a false premise, namely: The Trump campaign must have known that Russia possessed
emails related to Hillary Clinton. From there, through either intentional deception or incompetence, the
foreign ministries of Australia and the United States erected a fraudulent story tying the Trump campaign's
purported knowledge to the publication of hacked Democratic National Committee emails.
That is what we learn from the saga of George Papadopoulos, as fleshed out by the
Mueller report
.
The investigative theory on which the FBI formally opened the foreign-counterintelligence probe code-named
"Crossfire Hurricane" on July 31, 2016, held that the Trump campaign knew about, and was potentially complicit
in, Russia's possession of hacked emails that would compromise Hillary Clinton; and that, in order to help
Donald Trump, the Kremlin planned to disseminate these emails anonymously (through a third party) at a time
maximally damaging to Clinton's campaign.
There are thus two components to this theory: the emails and Russia's intentions.
I. Papadopoulos Knew Nothing about the DNC Emails -- and Probably Nothing about Any Emails
The one and only source for the email component of the story is George Papadopoulos. He, of course, is a
convicted liar -- convicted, in fact, of lying to the FBI during the very same interviews in which he related
the detail about emails. Moreover, the Mueller report confirms that he is simply unreliable: To inflate his
importance, he overhyped his credentials and repeatedly misled his Trump-campaign superiors regarding his
discussions with people be believed had connections to the Russian regime -- who they were and what they were in
a position to promise.
Other than Papadopoulos's own word, there is no evidence --
none --
that he was told about emails by Joseph Mifsud, a Maltese academic whom the FBI and the Mueller
investigation deceptively portrayed as a Russian agent.
As I've previously detailed
, because the investigation could not establish that Mifsud was a Russian agent,
Mueller's charge against Papadopoulos is artfully framed to obscure this weakness. Carefully parsed, Mueller
allegation is that Papadopoulos
had reason to believe Mifsud was a Russian agent
-- not that Mifsud actually was one.
If Mifsud is the asset of any foreign intelligence service, it is Britain's -- but that is a story for
another day.
We learn from the Mueller report (Volume I, p. 193) that Mifsud was interviewed by the FBI on February 10,
2017, a couple of weeks after the bureau started interviewing Papadopoulos. Mifsud denied that, when he met
Papadopoulos in London on April 26, 2016, he either knew about or said anything about Russia's possession of
Clinton-related emails.
The Trump-Russia investigation continued for over two years after the FBI's interview of Mifsud. Mueller
took over the probe in May 2017. During his 22 months running the investigation, Mueller charged many people
(including Papadopoulos) with lying to the FBI. But he never charged Mifsud. The government has never alleged
that Mifsud's denial was false.
There appear to be very good reasons for that.
First, there is no evidence in Mueller's report that Mifsud had any reason to know the operations of
Russia's intelligence services.
Second, prior to being interviewed by the FBI in January 2017, Papadopoulos never reported anything about
Russia having emails -- neither to his Trump-campaign superiors, to whom he was constantly reporting on his
conversations with Mifsud; nor to Alexander Downer, the Australian diplomat whose conversation with
Papadopoulos was the proximate cause for the formal opening of the FBI probe. (As further detailed below,
Papadopoulos told Downer the Russians had damaging information;
he did not say emails
.)
It was only when he was interviewed by the FBI in late January 2017, nine months after his conversation with
Mifsud, that Papadopoulos is alleged to have claimed that Mifsud said the Russians had "thousands" of "emails
of Clinton." There is no known recording of this FBI interview, so there is no way of knowing whether (a)
Papadopoulos volunteered this claim that Mifsud mentioned emails or (b) this claim was suggested to
Papadopoulos by his interrogators' questions. We have no way of knowing whether Papadopoulos is telling the
truth (which, for no good reason, he kept hidden from his Trump-campaign superiors) or if he was telling the
FBI agents what he thought they wanted to hear (which is what he often did when reporting to the Trump
campaign).
But the email component is only half the concocted story.
II. Papadopoulos Had No Knowledge of Russia's Intentions
There is no evidence whatsoever, including in the 448-page Mueller report, that Papadopoulos was ever told
that Russia intended, through an intermediary, to disseminate damaging information about Clinton in a manner
designed to hurt Clinton's candidacy and help Trump's. There is, furthermore, no evidence that Papadopoulos
ever said such a thing to anyone else -- including Downer, whom he famously met at the Kensington Wine Rooms in
London in early May 2016 (the record is not clear on whether it was May 6 or May 10).
The claim that Papadopoulos made such a statement is a fabrication, initially founded on what, at best, was
a deeply flawed assumption by Downer, the Australian diplomat.
On July 22, 2016, the eve of the Democratic National Convention and two months after Downer met with
Papadopoulos, WikiLeaks began disseminating to the press the hacked DNC emails. From this fact, Downer drew the
unfounded inference that
the hacked emails must have been what Papadopoulos was talking about
when he said Russia had damaging
information about Clinton.
Downer's assumption was specious, for at least four reasons.
1) In speaking with Downer, Papadopoulos never mentioned emails. Neither Downer nor Papadopoulos has ever
claimed that Papadopoulos spoke of emails.
2) Papadopoulos did not tell Downer that Russia was planning
to publish
damaging information about Clinton through an intermediary. There is no allegation in the
Mueller report that Mifsud ever told Papadopoulos any such thing, much less that Papadopoulos relayed it to
Downer. Mueller's report says:
Mifsud told Papadopoulos that he had met with high-level Russian government officials during his recent
trip to Moscow. Mifsud also said that, on the trip, he learned that the Russians had obtained "dirt" on
candidate Hillary Clinton. As Papadopoulos later stated to the FBI, Mifsud said that the "dirt" was in the
form of "emails of Clinton," and that they "have thousands of emails."
(Vol. I, p. 89 & n. 464). In neither the Mueller report nor the "
Statement
of the Offense
" that Mueller filed in connection with Papadopoulos's plea (pp. 6–7) have prosecutors
claimed that Mifsud told Papadopoulos what Russia was planning to do with the "dirt," much less why. And, to
repeat, Mifsud denied telling Papadopoulos anything about emails; Mueller never alleged that Mifsud's denial
was false.
3) Papadopoulos says the emails he claims Mifsud referred to
were not the DNC emails
; they were
Clinton's own emails
. That is, when Papadopoulos claims that Mifsud told him that Russia had "dirt" in the
form of "thousands" of "emails of Clinton," he understood Mifsud to be alluding to the thousands of State
Department and Clinton Foundation emails that Clinton had stored on a private server. These, of course, were
the emails that were being intensively covered in the media (including speculation that they might have been
hacked by hostile foreign intelligence services) at the time Mifsud and Papadopoulos spoke – i.e., April 2016,
when neither Mifsud nor Papadopoulos had any basis to know anything about hacked DNC emails.
4) The DNC emails did not damage Clinton in any material way, and it would have been ridiculous to imagine
that they would. They were not Clinton's emails and she was not a correspondent in them. The emails embarrassed
the DNC by showing that the national party favored Clinton over Bernie Sanders. But Clinton was already the
certain nominee; nothing in the emails threatened that outcome or set her back in the race against Donald
Trump.
The State Department and the FBI Distort What Papadopoulos 'Suggested'
Downer's flawed assumption that Papadopoulos must have been referring to the hacked DNC emails was then
inflated into a Trump–Russia conspiracy theory by Clinton partisans in the Obama administration -- first at the
State Department, and then in the Justice Department, the FBI, and the broader intelligence community -- all
agencies in which animus against Donald Trump ran deep.
To recap, though Downer initially dismissed his conversation with Papadopoulos as trite gossip, he suddenly
decided their discussion was significant after the hacked DNC emails were published. In late July, he
personally went to the American embassy in London to report the two-month-old conversation to Elizabeth Dibble,
the chargé d'affaires (i.e., the deputy chief of mission, who was running the embassy because Matthew Barzun,
the U.S. ambassador and heavyweight Democratic-party fundraiser, was on vacation).
Although Papadopoulos is extensively quoted in the Mueller report, the prosecutors avoid any quote from
Downer regarding what Papadopoulos told him at the meeting. This is consistent with Mueller's false-statements
charge against Papadopoulos, which includes the aforementioned 14-page "Statement of the Offense" that
studiously omits any reference to Papadopoulos's May meeting with Downer, notwithstanding that it was the most
consequential event in Papadopoulos's case. (See pp. 7–8, in which the chronology skips from May 4 to May 13 as
if nothing significant happened in between.)
Instead, Mueller carefully describes
not what Papadopoulos said
to Downer,
but
what Downer understood Papadopoulos had "suggested,"
namely that
the Trump Campaign had received indications from the Russian government that it could assist the Campaign
through the anonymous release of information that would be damaging to Hillary Clinton.
The "Trump Campaign" here is Papadopoulos; the "Russian government" is Mifsud. But Papadopoulos was as
low-ranking as it got in the Trump campaign, and Mifsud -- the source of the "indications" -- was not part of the
Russian government at all.
More to the point, even if it were mistakenly assumed that Mifsud was a Russian-government operative
(notwithstanding that the FBI could easily have established that he was not), there is no evidence that Mifsud
ever told Papadopoulos that the Russian government was planning to assist the Trump campaign by anonymously
releasing information damaging to Clinton.
In his February 2017 FBI interview, Mifsud denied saying anything to Papadopoulos about Clinton-related
emails in the possession of the Kremlin. Of course, Mifsud could be lying. But there is no evidence that he
would have been in a position to know. As we've noted, Mueller never charged Mifsud with lying to the FBI.
Interestingly, prosecutors allege that Mifsud "falsely" recounted the last time he had seen Papadopoulos;
but prosecutors do not allege that Mifsud's denial of knowledge about Russia's possession of emails is false
(Vol. I, p. 193).
Moreover, the Mueller report does not allege that Papadopoulos ever claimed Mifsud told him the Russians
would try to help Trump by anonymously releasing information damaging to Clinton. Again, instead of quoting
Papadopoulos, prosecutors repeatedly and disingenuously stress the "suggestion" that Papadopoulos purportedly
made -- as if the relevant thing were the operation of Downer's mind rather than the words that Papadopoulos
actually used.
Prosecutors acknowledge that Papadopoulos's conversation with Downer is "contained in the FBI case-opening
document and related materials" (Vol. I, p. 89, n. 465). But Mueller's report does not quote these materials,
even though it extensively quotes other investigative documents. Mueller does not tell us what Papadopoulos
said.
Here is how the report puts it (Vol. I, p. 192) in explaining why Papadopoulos was interviewed in late
January 2017 (my italics):
Investigators approached Papadopoulos for an interview based on his role as a foreign policy advisor to
the Trump Campaign and
his suggestion to a foreign government representative that Russia had indicated it could assist the Campaign
through the anonymous release of information damaging to candidate Clinton.
The "suggestion" that Papadopoulos said such a thing is sheer invention. Plainly, it is based on the wayward
deduction by Downer and the State Department that Russia's anonymous publication (via WikiLeaks) of the hacked
DNC emails must have been what Papadopoulos was talking about. But that is not what Papadopoulos was talking
about.
Distorting Papadopoulos's Role to Obscure Reliance on the Steele Dossier
This deduction was not just unfounded but self-interested. The State Department (very much including the
American embassy in London) was deeply in the tank for Clinton. Downer has a history with the Clintons that
includes arranging a $25 million donation to the Clinton Foundation in 2006, when he was Australia's foreign
minister and then-senator Hillary Clinton was the favorite to become U.S. president in 2008. For years,
furthermore, Downer has been closely tied to British intelligence, which, like the British government broadly,
was anti-Trump. (More on that in the future.)
The State Department's Dibble immediately sent Downer's information though government channels to the FBI.
About three weeks earlier, Victoria Nuland, the Obama administration's top State Department official for
European and Eurasian affairs, had supported the FBI's request to meet former British intelligence officer
Christopher Steele in London. Steele was the principal author of the Clinton-campaign-sponsored faux
intelligence reports (the unverified "Steele dossier"), which claimed -- based on anonymous sources and multiple
layers of hearsay -- that Russia was plotting to help Trump win the election, and that it had been holding
compromising information about Hillary Clinton.
On July 5, agent Michael Gaeta, the FBI's legal attaché in Rome (who had worked with Steele on the FIFA
soccer investigation when Steele was still with British intelligence), met with Steele at the latter's London
office. Steele permitted him to read the first of the reports that, over time, would be compiled into the
so-called dossier. An alarmed Gaeta is said to have told Steele, "I have to report this to headquarters."
It is inconceivable that Gaeta would have gone to the trouble of clearing his visit to London with the State
Department and getting FBI headquarters to approve his trip, but then neglected to report to his headquarters
what the source had told him -- to wit, that the Trump campaign was conspiring with the Kremlin to undermine the
2016 election.
As I have previously detailed
, after the hacked DNC emails were published, Steele (whose sources had not
foretold the hacking by Russia or publication by WikiLeaks) simply folded this event into his preexisting
narrative of a Trump–Russia conspiracy.
Prior to early July, when the FBI began receiving Steele-dossier reports (which the State Department would
also soon receive), the intelligence community -- particularly the CIA, under the direction of its
hyperpolitical director, John Brennan -- had been theorizing that the Trump campaign was in a corrupt
relationship with Russia. Thanks to the Steele dossier, even before Downer reported his conversation with
Papadopoulos to the State Department, the Obama administration had already been operating on the theory that
Russia was planning to assist the Trump campaign through the anonymous release of information that would be
damaging to Clinton. They had already conveniently fit the hacked DNC emails into this theory.
Downer's report enabled the Obama administration to cover an investigative theory it was already pursuing
with a report from a friendly foreign government,
as if that report had triggered the Trump-Russia investigation
. In order to pull that off, however, it was
necessary to distort what Papadopoulos had told Downer.
To repeat,
Papadopoulos never told Downer anything about emails
. Moreover, the Mueller report provides no basis for
Papadopoulos to have known that Russia was planning the anonymous release of information damaging to Clinton in
order to help Trump; nor does the Mueller report allege that Papadopoulos actually told Downer such a thing.
The State Department's report to the FBI claiming that Papadopoulos had "suggested" these things to Downer
was manufactured to portray a false connection between (a) what Papadopoulos told Downer and (b) the hacking
and publication of the DNC emails. That false connection then became the rationale for formally opening the
FBI's Trump-Russia investigation -- paper cover for an investigation of the Trump campaign that was already
under way.
Editor's Note:
This
column has been amended to reflect that it is unclear whether the meeting between Papadopoulos and Downer
occurred on May 6, 2016, or on May 10, 2016.
"... Before digging into the details it is important to note this is a DOJ/FBI entrapment operation being conducted in 2017 by the special counsel ; this is not prior to the 2016 election. The detail surrounds a series of events previously discussed { Go Deep } where George Papadopoulos was approached by a known CIA operative named Charles Tawil. ..."
"... In interviews Papadopoulos said he was uncomfortable with the way the encounters had taken place. He became suspect of Tawil's motives; something didn't feel right. Instead of keeping the cash, Papadopoulos gave the money to an attorney in Greece before traveling back to the U.S. on July 27th, 2017. ..."
"... Upon arrival at Dulles airport on July 27th, 2017, Robert Mueller had FBI agents waiting. Papadopoulos was stopped and his bags were searched; however, he did not have the cash because he smartly left it in Greece with his lawyer. Papadopoulos was detained overnight by FBI agents, and questioned. ..."
"... [W]hen he was arrested [detained] at Dulles Airport on July 27 after coming off a flight from Munich, prosecutors had no warrant for him and no indictment or criminal complaint . The complaint would be filed the following morning and approved by Howell in Washington. ..."
"... All of it suggests something of a scramble, rather than a carefully prepared plan to take Papadopoulos into custody. ( more ) ..."
"... Papadopoulos has stated the special counsel threatened him with charges of acting as a unregistered agent for Israel. There's a clear picture here . ..."
"... #1) Papadopoulos was lured to Israel and paid in Israel to give the outline of a FARA premise (ie. Papadopoulos is an agent of Israel). #2) Bringing $10,000 (or more) in cash into the U.S., without reporting, is a violation of U.S. treasury laws. Add into that aspect the FARA violation and the money can be compounded into #3) laundering charges. ..."
"... Andrew Weissmann was conducting an entrapment scheme that would have ended up with three violations of law: (1) Treasury violation; (2) FARA violation; (3) Money laundering . All it needed was Papadopoulos to carry the undeclared cash into the U.S. ..."
"... Lastly, to repeat, this entire scenario was constructed by the DOJ/FBI team operation in 2017. The members of the Special Counsel were running the entrapment operation; the FBI agents were participating in the operation. This is not *investigating* criminal conduct; this is manufacturing criminal conduct. ..."
"... Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein was in charge of the Mueller Special Counsel. ..."
"... The only way DAG Rosenstein and Robert Mueller didn't know about the operation is if they both claim that Andrew Weissmann was completely rogue and in control over the FBI agents. ..."
Recently release FOIA documents into the special counsel team of Robert Mueller reveal the remarkable trail of a 2017 entrapment
scheme conducted by Prosecutor Andrew Weissmann to target George Papadopoulos.
Before digging into the details it is important to note this is a DOJ/FBI entrapment operation being conducted in 2017 by
the special counsel ; this is not prior to the 2016 election. The detail surrounds a series of events previously discussed {
Go Deep } where George Papadopoulos was approached by a
known CIA operative named Charles Tawil.
In 2017 George Papadopoulos and his wife Simona were approached in Greece by a
known CIA/FBI operative , Charles Tawil.
Mr. Tawil enlisted George as a business consultant, under the auspices of energy development interests, and invited him to Israel.
On June 8th, 2017, in Israel under very suspicious circumstances, where Papadopoulos felt very unnerved, Mr. Tawil hands him $10,000
in cash for future consultancy based on a
$10k/month retainer .
On June 9th, 2017, according to his book, Papadopoulos and Tawil fly back to Cyprus.
... ... ...
In interviews Papadopoulos said he was uncomfortable with the way the encounters had taken place. He became suspect of Tawil's
motives; something didn't feel right. Instead of keeping the cash, Papadopoulos gave the money to an attorney in Greece before traveling
back to the U.S. on July 27th, 2017.
Upon arrival at Dulles airport on July 27th, 2017, Robert Mueller had FBI agents waiting. Papadopoulos was stopped and his
bags were searched; however, he did not have the cash because he smartly left it in Greece with his lawyer. Papadopoulos was detained
overnight by FBI agents, and questioned.
[ ] Stanley said Papadopoulos arrived on a Lufthansa flight from Munich that touched down at about 7 p.m . on July 27, and
the FBI intercepted him as soon as he got off the plane.
"He was arrested [detained] before he got to Customs and he was then held at the airport before being brought to
a law enforcement office," Stanley recalled. (
link )
[W]hen he was arrested [detained] at Dulles Airport on July 27 after coming off a flight from Munich, prosecutors
had no warrant for him and no indictment or criminal complaint . The complaint would be filed the following morning and approved
by Howell in Washington.
And when prosecutors filed the complaint the next day they got a spoken order from Howell to seal it, but followed up with
a written request that they could take to the magistrate in Alexandria, where they showed up almost an hour later than she expected.
All of it suggests something of a scramble, rather than a carefully prepared plan to take Papadopoulos into custody. (
more )
Here's where the recent revelations come in. According to Andrew Weissmann's schedule on June 13th, 2017, he was in conversations
surrounding the basis of a Cyprus Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT):
6/8/17 US intelligence asset Charles Tawil gives George $10K cash in Israel 6/9/17 George Papadopoulos flies to Cyprus w $10K 6/13/17
Andrew Weissmann starts series of "Cyprus MLAT" meetings with FBI 6/13/17 Andrew Weissmann phone call w/ FBI Money Laundering and
Asset Recovery "MLARS" section of FBI.
It would appear Weissmann was well aware of the Cyprus "Tawil operation" and engaged in communication regarding Cyprus. Additionally,
he was discussing "Money Laundering and Asset Recovery" w/ FBI. [MLARS Link
]
Taken in combination with hindsight of the search for the cash, and lack of a pre-existing warrant at the airport, this is clear
evidence of a coordinated operation to entrap Papadopoulos.
Remember, the preferred approach toward targeting Paul Manafort, Mike Flynn and George Papadopoulos surrounded FARA (Foreign Agent
Registration Act) lobbying violations. Papadopoulos has stated the special counsel threatened him with charges of acting as a
unregistered agent for Israel. There's a clear picture here .
#1) Papadopoulos was lured to Israel and paid in Israel to give the outline of a FARA premise (ie. Papadopoulos is an agent
of Israel). #2) Bringing $10,000 (or more) in cash into the U.S., without reporting, is a violation of U.S. treasury laws. Add into
that aspect the FARA violation and the money can be compounded into #3) laundering charges.
[A "laundering" charge applies if the money is illegally obtained. The FARA violation would be the *illegal* aspect making the
treasury charges heavier. Note: the use of the airport baggage-check avoids the need for a search warrant.]
Andrew Weissmann was conducting an entrapment scheme that would have ended up with three violations of law: (1) Treasury violation;
(2) FARA violation; (3) Money laundering . All it needed was Papadopoulos to carry the undeclared cash into the U.S.
However, because Papadopoulos suspected something, and left the money in Greece with his lawyers, upon arrival at the airport
the operation collapsed in reverse . No money means no treasury violation, no laundering and no evidence of the consultancy
agreement (which would have been repurposed in the DOJ filing to mean lobbying for Israel via Mr. Tawil who would have become
a confidential informant and witness).
That operational collapse is why the FBI agents were "scrambling" at the airport and why they had no pre-existing criminal complaint.
The entrapment's success was contingent upon the cash.
Lastly, to repeat, this entire scenario was constructed by the DOJ/FBI team operation in 2017. The members of the Special
Counsel were running the entrapment operation; the FBI agents were participating in the operation. This is not *investigating* criminal
conduct; this is manufacturing criminal conduct.
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein was in charge of the Mueller Special Counsel.
The only way DAG Rosenstein and Robert Mueller didn't know about the operation is if they both claim that Andrew Weissmann
was completely rogue and in control over the FBI agents.
Oh, wait, what does the Mueller report say about the FBI agents and their chain-of-legal guidance and command?
... ... ...
With events happening in June/July 2017 Rod Rosenstein, Robert Mueller, former FBI legal counsel Jim Baker, former Deputy FBI
Director McCabe, together with current FBI legal counsel Dana Boente and current FBI Director Wray were what? Hoodwinked?
A foreign intelligence asset was used to justify surveillance of Trump[ and some of his associates
Notable quotes:
"... What is clear from the new records is that Christopher Steele, a foreign intelligence officer, had frequent and extensive contacts with the FBI. Who was his FBI Case Agent? ..."
"... The main thing I want to know is WHEN was the decision made to tar Trump with Russia - both at the FBI (and likely CIA) and at the DNC (over the leak) - and WHO was the deciding entity - Comey, Brennan, Clinton, Obama or someone else? And perhaps who came up with the idea in the first place (at the DNC, it was very likely Alexandra Chalupa, the Ukrainian-American DNC "consultant"). ..."
"... The bad thing is that our MSM is so reverent of our Intel agencies that I see them encouraged to increasingly put their hand on the scale. ..."
"... Recently, I saw arm flailing by a Congressman, Dan Coats, and Mueller about how the Russians are still at it. They are trying to disrupt or influence the 2018. Really, then I demand to get a list of the pro-Kremlin candidates. How long before the mere threat of being outed as a Kremlin agent is used to punish elected officials if they are not sufficiently hawkish or don't support certain programs. Unchallenged claims by Intel agencies gives them a lot of political power. ..."
"... I am skeptical. Russia has a lot of fish to fry, why would they expend resources on midterm elections. Now everyone in the U.S. hates them, both traditional hawk Republicans and born again uber-hawk Democrats. There is a tiger behind both doors. ..."
"... if Steele had been a CHS since at least February of 2016, what was the purpose of passing the Dossier to the FBI through Fusion GPS? Why not just going to his FBI handler? Was Steele collaboration with Fusion even in compliance with FBI regulations? Did the FBI know? ..."
"... Because part of the plan was to leak the information in order to damage Trump. FBI could not do that. Would have exposed them to some real legal jeopardy. This was a dual track strategy. Diabolical almost. ..."
"... Don't forget the Nellie Ohr (Fusion GPS) -> Bruce Ohr (DOJ) back channel. The husband & wife tag team. Yes, the same Nellie that was investigating using ham radio to communicate to avoid NSA mass surveillance. ..."
"... From the very beginning that information about all this was slowly leaking from the Congressional investigation, this whole thing smelled very fishy. Then add intense effort at DOJ & FBI to obstruct and obfuscate. And the unhinged tweets and interviews by Brennan, Clapper & Comey. ..."
"... He was working with FBI and GPS at the same time. GPS was in the dark supposedly about his work with the FBI and Steele got their approval to hand over what he had delivered to GPS to the FBI as a cover for his work with the FBI. ..."
"... its also likely FBI had some input into the content of what was delivered to GPS, and more importantly what was not delivered. ..."
"... Re the 'standing agreement to not recruit each other's intelligence personnel for clandestine activities.' As Steele was not by this time a current employee of MI6, was the FBI in technical violation of this? ..."
"... A central question in regard to Steele, as with quite a number of former intelligence/law enforcement/military people who have started at least ostensibly private sector operations, is how far these are being used as 'cover' for activities conducted on behalf of either the state agencies for which they used to work, or other state agencies. ..."
"... It is at least possible that one advantage of such arrangements may be that they make it possible to evade the letter of agreements between intelligence agencies in different countries ..."
"... If, as seems likely, both current and former top FBI and DOJ people – very likely Mueller as well as Comey, Strzok and many others – were intimately involved in the conspiracy to subvert the constitution, then a means of making it possible for Steele to combine feeding information to the FBI while also engaging in 'StratCom' via the MSM could have been necessary. ..."
"... An obvious means of 'squaring the circle' would have been to issue a formal 'termination' to Steele, while creating 'back channels' to those who were officially supposed not to be talking to him ..."
"... A report yesterday by John Solomon in 'The Hill' quotes from messages exchanged between Steele and Bruce Ohr after the supposed termination ..."
"... 'In all, Ohr's notes, emails and texts identify more than 60 contacts with Steele and/or Simpson, some dating to 2002 in London. But the vast majority occurred during the 2016-2017 timeframe that gave birth to one of the most controversial counterintelligence probes in American history.' ..."
"... I have just finished taking a fresh look at Sir Robert Owen's travesty of a report into the death of Litvinenko. In large measure, this develops claims originally made in Christopher Steele's first attempt to provide a convincing account of why figures close to Putin might have thought it made sense to assassinate that figure, and to do so with polonium. The sheer volume of fabrication which has been deployed in an attempt to defend the patently indefensible almost beggars belief. ..."
"... Just as a question arises as to whether Steele is essentially acting on behalf of MI6, a question also arises as to whether the FBI leadership were knowledgeable about, and possibly involved with, the various shenanigans in which Shvets and Levinson were involved. Given that claims about Mogilevich have turned out to be central to 'Russiagate', that seems a rather important issue, and I am curious as to whether Ohr's communications with Steele may cast any light on it. ..."
"... Apparently the FBI got Deripaksa to fund the rescue of Levinson from Iran. Furthermore apparently FBI personnel maybe including McCabe visited with Deripaksa and showed him the Steele dossier. He supposedly had a nice guffaw and dismissed it as nonsense. So on the one hand while they make Russia out to be the most evil they play footsie with Russian oligarchs. ..."
"... Thinking about "Christopher Steele was terminated as a Confidential Human Source for cause.", something that doesn't seem to have gotten as much attention is that Peter Strzok failed his poly: ..."
"... Steele's relationship with the FBI extends far further back than February 2016. Shortly after he left MI6, he contracted with the Football Association to investigate possible FIFA corruption. Once he realized the massiveness of this corruption he contacted his old friends at the FBI Eurasian Crimes Task Force in 2011. Thus began his association with the FBI as a CHS. That investigation culminated in the 2015 FIFA corruption indictments and convictions. ..."
"... One thing I don't understand...we have the anti-Trumpers saying that Donald Junior meeting with a Russian national to get 'dirt' on Hillary is illegal...due to some law about candidates collaborating with foreigners or something like that...[obviously I'm foggy on the technical details]... Yet we know that the Hillary campaign worked with a foreign national, Steele, to get dirt on Trump...how is this not the same...? ..."
"... What role did Stefan Halper and Mifsud play as Confidential Human Sources in all this? ..."
"... Why was British Intelligence allegedly collecting and passing along info about Donald Trump in the first place? Or could this have been a pretext created to give cover and/or support to the agenda here in the US to insure his defeat? Could a foreign intelligence source such as this trigger/facilitate/justify the US counterintelligence investigation of Trump, or give cover to a covert investigation that may have already begun? ..."
"... British intelligence was collecting / passing on info about Trump because of his campaign stance on NATO (he said it was obsolete), his desire to end regime change wars (he castigated the fiasco in Iraq, took Bush to task over it etc.), and his often stated desire to get along with Russia (and China). Trump also talked of ending certain economic policies (NAFTA, TPP, etc.) and reenacting others (Glass-Steagall, the American System of Economics i.e. Hamilton, Carey, Clay), If Trump had acted on those, which he has not so far, he would changed the entire world system, a system in place since the end of WW II, or earlier. That was a risk too big to take without some kind of insurance policy - I believe Christopher Steele was that insurance policy. ..."
"... British Intelligence is verifiably the foreign source with the most extensive and effective meddling in the 2016 election. Perfidious Albion. ..."
"... Or, GSHQ was hovering up signint on Trump campaign early-on (using domestics US resources and databases via their 5-Eyes "sharing agreement" with NSA) cuz Brennan asked them to do it? ..."
"... Trump announced his run for President in 2015. I'm pretty sure that every intel service on the planet was watching him, they would be derelict not to. GCHQ may have been collecting intel on all the candidates, ..."
"... Trump announced his run for President in 2015. I'm pretty sure that every intel service on the planet was watching him, they would be derelict not to. GCHQ may have been collecting intel on all the candidates, ..."
"... I've heard that the Echelon system is used by the Five Eyes IC to do something similar. The Brits spy on US, and give the NSA the data so the NSA can evade US laws prohibiting spying on us, and we return the favor to help them evade what (few) laws they have that prohibits spying on their people. ..."
"... still wonder why the US would need to rely so much on British intelligence sources ..."
"... I've read that Steele's cover was blown 20 years ago and he hasn't even been to Russia since, so I wonder why he was considered such a reliable source by both the US and UK? In my opinion as an absolute naif about such things, Steele seems like he may be a has-been when it comes to Russia. ..."
"... Here is a simple explanation from someone who knows almost nothing about how any of the people in power work: Most of them are not as clever and smart as they think they are. And most of the regular people who are just citizens are smarter than these people think they are. ..."
"... It's simply that their arrogant assessment of their own superiority caused them to do really stupid things ..."
The revelations from US Government records about the FBI/Intel Community plot to take out Donald Trump continue to flow thanks
to the dogged efforts of Judicial Watch. The latest nugget came last Friday with the release of FBI records detailing their recruitment
and management of Britain's ostensibly retired Intelligence Officer, Christopher Steele. He was an officially recruited FBI source
and received at least 11 payments during the 9 month period that he was signed up as a Confidential Human Source.
You may find it strange that we can glean so much information from
a document dump that is almost
entirely redacted . The key is to look at the report forms; there are three types--FD-1023 (Source Reports), FD-209a (Contact
Reports) and FD-794b (Payment Requests). There are 15 different 1023s, 13 209a reports and 11 794b payment requests covering the
period from 2 February 2016 thru 1 November 2016. That is a total of nine months.
These reports totally destroy the existing meme that Steele only came into contact with the FBI sometime in July 2016. It is important
for you to understand that a 1023 Source Report is filled out each time that the FBI source handler has contact with the source.
This can be an in person meeting or a phone call. Each report lists the name of the Case Agent; the date, time and location of the
meeting; any other people attending the meeting; and a summary of what was discussed.
What is clear from the new records is that Christopher Steele, a foreign intelligence officer, had frequent and extensive
contacts with the FBI. Who was his FBI Case Agent?
The main thing I want to know is WHEN was the decision made to tar Trump with Russia - both at the FBI (and likely CIA)
and at the DNC (over the leak) - and WHO was the deciding entity - Comey, Brennan, Clinton, Obama or someone else? And perhaps
who came up with the idea in the first place (at the DNC, it was very likely Alexandra Chalupa, the Ukrainian-American DNC "consultant").
We can be pretty sure this predates any alleged Russian "hacking" (unless it occurred as a result of alleged Russian hacking
of the DNC in 2015).
This needs to be pinned down if anyone is to be successfully prosecuted for creating this treasonous hoax.
A very closely related topic, Victor Davis Hanson is onto something but it is darker than he suggests,
https://www.nationalreview.... Paraphrasing, he gives the typical, rally around the flag we must stop the Russians intro but
then documents how govt flaks abused their power to influence our elections and then makes the point, 'this is why the public
is skeptical of their claims'.
The bad thing is that our MSM is so reverent of our Intel agencies that I see them encouraged to increasingly put their
hand on the scale.
Recently, I saw arm flailing by a Congressman, Dan Coats, and Mueller about how the Russians are still at it. They are
trying to disrupt or influence the 2018. Really, then I demand to get a list of the pro-Kremlin candidates. How long before the
mere threat of being outed as a Kremlin agent is used to punish elected officials if they are not sufficiently hawkish or don't
support certain programs. Unchallenged claims by Intel agencies gives them a lot of political power.
I am skeptical. Russia has a lot of fish to fry, why would they expend resources on midterm elections. Now everyone in
the U.S. hates them, both traditional hawk Republicans and born again uber-hawk Democrats. There is a tiger behind both doors.
What I can't figure out is: if Steele had been a CHS since at least February of 2016, what was the purpose of passing the
Dossier to the FBI through Fusion GPS? Why not just going to his FBI handler? Was Steele collaboration with Fusion even in compliance
with FBI regulations? Did the FBI know?
Because part of the plan was to leak the information in order to damage Trump. FBI could not do that. Would have exposed them
to some real legal jeopardy. This was a dual track strategy. Diabolical almost.
Don't forget the Nellie Ohr (Fusion GPS) -> Bruce Ohr (DOJ) back channel. The husband & wife tag team. Yes, the same Nellie
that was investigating using ham radio to communicate to avoid NSA mass surveillance.
From the very beginning that information about all this was slowly leaking from the Congressional investigation, this whole
thing smelled very fishy. Then add intense effort at DOJ & FBI to obstruct and obfuscate. And the unhinged tweets and interviews
by Brennan, Clapper & Comey. And of course the media narrative that Rep. Nunes, Goodlatte and others were endangering "national
security" by casting aspersions on the "patriotic" law enforcement and intelligence agencies.
He was working with FBI and GPS at the same time. GPS was in the dark supposedly about his work with the FBI and Steele got
their approval to hand over what he had delivered to GPS to the FBI as a cover for his work with the FBI.
Of course, he had most likely already done so and its also likely FBI had some input into the content of what was delivered
to GPS, and more importantly what was not delivered.
Re the 'standing agreement to not recruit each other's intelligence personnel for clandestine activities.' As Steele was
not by this time a current employee of MI6, was the FBI in technical violation of this?
The point is not merely a quibble. A central question in regard to Steele, as with quite a number of former intelligence/law
enforcement/military people who have started at least ostensibly private sector operations, is how far these are being used as
'cover' for activities conducted on behalf of either the state agencies for which they used to work, or other state agencies.
It is at least possible that one advantage of such arrangements may be that they make it possible to evade the letter of
agreements between intelligence agencies in different countries.
Another related matter has to do with the termination of Steele as a 'Confidential Human Source.'
It has long seemed to me that it was more than possible that this was not to be taken at face value. If, as seems likely,
both current and former top FBI and DOJ people – very likely Mueller as well as Comey, Strzok and many others – were intimately
involved in the conspiracy to subvert the constitution, then a means of making it possible for Steele to combine feeding information
to the FBI while also engaging in 'StratCom' via the MSM could have been necessary.
An obvious means of 'squaring the circle' would have been to issue a formal 'termination' to Steele, while creating 'back
channels' to those who were officially supposed not to be talking to him.
A report yesterday by John Solomon in 'The Hill' quotes from messages exchanged between Steele and Bruce Ohr after the
supposed termination.
When on 31 January 2017 – well after the publication of the dossier by BuzzFeed – Ohr provided reassurance that he could continue
to help feed information to the FBI, Steele texted back:
"If you end up out though, I really need another (bureau?) contact point/number who is briefed. We can't allow our guy to be
forced to go back home. It would be disastrous."
At that point, Solomon tells us that 'Investigators are trying to determine who Steele was referring to.' This seems to me
a rather important question. It would seem likely, although not certain, that he is talking about another Brit. If he is, would
it have been someone else employed by Orbis? Or someone currently working for British intelligence? What is the precise significance
of 'forced to go back home', and why would this have been 'disastrous'?
Another crucial paragraph:
'In all, Ohr's notes, emails and texts identify more than 60 contacts with Steele and/or Simpson, some dating to 2002 in
London. But the vast majority occurred during the 2016-2017 timeframe that gave birth to one of the most controversial counterintelligence
probes in American history.'
The earlier contacts may be of little interest, but there again they may not be.
As it happens, it was following Berezovsky's arrival in London in October 2001 that the 'information operations' network he
created began to move into high gear. It is moreover clear that this was always a transatlantic operation, and also fragments
of evidence suggest that the FBI may have had some involvement from early on.
I have just finished taking a fresh look at Sir Robert Owen's travesty of a report into the death of Litvinenko. In large
measure, this develops claims originally made in Christopher Steele's first attempt to provide a convincing account of why figures
close to Putin might have thought it made sense to assassinate that figure, and to do so with polonium. The sheer volume of fabrication
which has been deployed in an attempt to defend the patently indefensible almost beggars belief.
The original attempt came in a radio programme broadcast by the BBC – which was to become known to some of us as the 'Berezovsky
Broadcasting Corporation' – on 16 December 2006, presented by Tom Mangold, a familiar 'trusty' for the intelligence services.
(A transcript sent out from the Cabinet Office at the time is available on the archived 'Evidence' page for the Inquiry, at
http://webarchive.nationala... , as HMG000513. There is an interesting and rather important question as to whether those who
sent it out, and those who received it, knew that it was more or less BS from start to finish.)
The programme was wholly devoted to claims made by the former KGB operative Yuri Shvets, who was presented as an independent
'due diligence' expert, without any mention of the rather major role he had played in the original 'Orange Revolution.'
Back-up was provided by his supposed collaborator in 'due diligence', the former FBI operative Robert 'Bobby' Levinson. No
mention was made of the fact that he had been, in the 'Nineties, a, if not the lead FBI investigator into the notorious Ukrainian
Jewish mobster Semyon Mogilevich.
The following March Levinson would disappear on the Iranian island of Kish, on what we now know was a covert mission on behalf
of elements in the CIA.
Just as a question arises as to whether Steele is essentially acting on behalf of MI6, a question also arises as to whether
the FBI leadership were knowledgeable about, and possibly involved with, the various shenanigans in which Shvets and Levinson
were involved. Given that claims about Mogilevich have turned out to be central to 'Russiagate', that seems a rather important
issue, and I am curious as to whether Ohr's communications with Steele may cast any light on it.
Apparently the FBI got Deripaksa to fund the rescue of Levinson from Iran. Furthermore apparently FBI personnel maybe including
McCabe visited with Deripaksa and showed him the Steele dossier. He supposedly had a nice guffaw and dismissed it as nonsense.
So on the one hand while they make Russia out to be the most evil they play footsie with Russian oligarchs.
Thinking about "Christopher Steele was terminated as a Confidential Human Source for cause.", something that doesn't seem
to have gotten as much attention is that Peter Strzok failed his poly:
Steele's relationship with the FBI extends far further back than February 2016. Shortly after he left MI6, he contracted with
the Football Association to investigate possible FIFA corruption. Once he realized the massiveness of this corruption he contacted
his old friends at the FBI Eurasian Crimes Task Force in 2011. Thus began his association with the FBI as a CHS. That investigation
culminated in the 2015 FIFA corruption indictments and convictions. His initial contact with old friends at the FBI Eurasian
Crime Task Force is awfully similar to his contacting these same friends in 2016 after deciding his initial Trump research was
potentially bigger than mere opposition research.
One thing I don't understand...we have the anti-Trumpers saying that Donald Junior meeting with a Russian national to get
'dirt' on Hillary is illegal...due to some law about candidates collaborating with foreigners or something like that...[obviously
I'm foggy on the technical details]... Yet we know that the Hillary campaign worked with a foreign national, Steele, to get dirt
on Trump...how is this not the same...?
Even worse is that the FBI was using this same foreign agent that a presidential
candidate had hired to get dirt on an opponent... Even knowing nothing about legalities this just doesn't look very good...
Stupid question? As the Col. has explained, the President can declassify any document he pleases. So, why doesn't Donaldo unredact
the redacted portions of these bullcrap docs? What is he afraid of? That the Intel community will get mad and be out to get him?
Isn't time for him to show some cojones?
Why was British Intelligence allegedly collecting and passing along info about Donald Trump in the first place? Or could this
have been a pretext created to give cover and/or support to the agenda here in the US to insure his defeat? Could a foreign intelligence
source such as this trigger/facilitate/justify the US counterintelligence investigation of Trump, or give cover to a covert investigation
that may have already begun?
British intelligence was collecting / passing on info about Trump because of his campaign stance on NATO (he said it was obsolete),
his desire to end regime change wars (he castigated the fiasco in Iraq, took Bush to task over it etc.), and his often stated
desire to get along with Russia (and China). Trump also talked of ending certain economic policies (NAFTA, TPP, etc.) and reenacting
others (Glass-Steagall, the American System of Economics i.e. Hamilton, Carey, Clay), If Trump had acted on those, which he has
not so far, he would changed the entire world system, a system in place since the end of WW II, or earlier. That was a risk too
big to take without some kind of insurance policy - I believe Christopher Steele was that insurance policy.
Or, GSHQ was hovering up signint on Trump campaign early-on (using domestics US resources and databases via their 5-Eyes "sharing
agreement" with NSA) cuz Brennan asked them to do it? And therefore without having to mess about with any formal FISA warrant
thingy's ... But, then use what might be found (or plausibly alleged) to try to get a proper FISA warrant later on (July 2016)?
'Parallel Discovery' of sorts; with Fusion GPS also a leaky cut-out: channelling media reports to be used as confirmation of Steele's
"raw intelligence" in the formal FISA application(s)?
Trump announced his run for President in 2015. I'm pretty sure that every intel service on the planet was watching him, they
would be derelict not to. GCHQ may have been collecting intel on all the candidates,
" Trump announced his run for President in 2015. I'm pretty sure that every intel service on the planet was watching
him, they would be derelict not to. GCHQ may have been collecting intel on all the candidates, "
That's a good question, could it legally enable an end run around the FISC until enough evidence was gathered for a FISC surveillance
authorization?.
I've heard that the Echelon system is used by the Five Eyes IC to do something similar. The Brits spy on US, and give the
NSA the data so the NSA can evade US laws prohibiting spying on us, and we return the favor to help them evade what (few) laws
they have that prohibits spying on their people.
Only a matter of time until someone figured out the same method could be used to "meddle" in national affairs.
I understand, but still wonder why the US would need to rely so much on British intelligence sources such as Steele about
a very high profile American citizen and businessman -- aren't our intelligence services competent enough to have known and discovered
as much if not more about Trump than other countries' intelligence services? I've read that Steele's cover was blown 20 years
ago and he hasn't even been to Russia since, so I wonder why he was considered such a reliable source by both the US and UK? In
my opinion as an absolute naif about such things, Steele seems like he may be a has-been when it comes to Russia.
Here is a simple explanation from someone who knows almost nothing about how any of the people in power work: Most of them
are not as clever and smart as they think they are. And most of the regular people who are just citizens are smarter than these
people think they are.
It's simply that their arrogant assessment of their own superiority caused them to do really stupid things.
"... Hannigan's meeting was noteworthy because Brennan wasn't Hannigan's counterpart. That position belonged to NSA Director Mike Rogers. In the following year, Hannigan abruptly announced his retirement on Jan. 23, 2017 -- three days after Trump's inauguration. ..."
"... Christopher Steele, who authored the dossier on Trump, was an MI6 agent while the agency was headed by Sir Richard Dearlove. Steele retains close ties with Dearlove. ..."
"... Dearlove has ties to most of the parties mentioned. It was he who advised Steele and his business partner, Chris Burrows, to work with a top British government official to pass along information to the FBI in the fall of 2016. He also was a speaker at the July 2016 Cambridge symposium that Halper invited Carter Page to attend. ..."
"... Dearlove knows Halper through their mutual association at the Cambridge Intelligence Seminar. Dearlove also knows Sir Iain Lobban, a former head of GCHQ, who is an advisory board member at British strategic intelligence and advisory firm Hakluyt , which was founded by former MI6 members and retains close ties to UK intelligence services. ..."
"... Halper has historical connections to Hakluyt through Jonathan Clarke, with whom he has co-authored two books. ..."
"... Downer, who met Papadopoulos in a May 2016 meeting established through a chain of two intermediaries, served on the advisory board of Hakluyt from 2008 to 2014. He reportedly still maintains contact with Hakluyt officials. Information from his meeting with Papadopoulos was later used by the FBI to establish the bureau's counterintelligence investigation into Trump–Russia collusion. Downer has changed his version of events multiple times. ..."
"... Trump, after issuing an order for the declassification of documents and text messages related to the Russia-collusion investigations -- including parts of the Carter Page FISA warrant application -- received phone calls from two U.S. allies saying, "Please, can we talk." Those "allies" were almost certainly the UK and Australia. ..."
"... Stefan Halper met with Page for the first time on July 11, 2016, at a Cambridge symposium , just three days after Page's July 2016 Moscow trip. As noted previously, former MI6 head Sir Richard Dearlove was a speaker at the symposium. Halper and Dearlove have known each other for years and maintain several mutual associations. ..."
"... Page was already known to the FBI. The Page FISA warrant application references the Buryakov spy case and an FBI interview with Page. Current information suggests there was only one meeting between Page and the FBI in 2016. It happened on March 2, 2016. It was in relation to Victor Podobnyy, who was named in the Buryakov case. ..."
"... Page, who cooperated with the FBI on the case, almost certainly was providing testimony or details against Podobnyy. Page had been contacted by Podobnyy in 2013 and had previously provided information to the FBI. Buryakov pleaded guilty on March 11, 2016 -- nine days after Page met with the FBI on the case -- and was sentenced to 30 months in prison on May 25, 2016. On April 5, 2017, Buryakov was granted early release and was deported to Russia. ..."
"... House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes said in August that exculpatory evidence on Page exists that wasn't included by the DOJ and the FBI in the FISA application and subsequent renewals. The exculpatory evidence likely relates specifically to Page's role in the Buryakov case. ..."
"... If the FBI failed to disclose Page's cooperation with the bureau or materially misrepresented his involvement in its application to the FISA Court, it means that the FBI's Woods procedures, which govern FISA applications, were violated. ..."
UK and Australian intelligence agencies also played meaningful roles during the 2016 presidential election.
Britain's GCHQ was involved in
collecting information regarding then-candidate Trump and transmitting it to the United States. In the summer of 2016, Robert
Hannigan, the head of GCHQ, flew from London to
meet personally
with then-CIA Director John Brennan, The Guardian reported.
Hannigan's meeting was noteworthy because Brennan wasn't Hannigan's counterpart. That position belonged to NSA Director Mike Rogers.
In the following year, Hannigan
abruptly announced
his retirement on Jan. 23, 2017 -- three days after Trump's inauguration.
As GCHQ was gathering intelligence, low-level Trump campaign foreign-policy adviser George Papadopoulos appears to have been targeted
after a series of highly coincidental meetings. Maltese professor Josef Mifsud, Australian diplomat Alexander Downer, FBI informant
Stefan Halper, and officials from the UK's Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) all crossed paths with Papadopoulos -- some repeatedly
so.
Christopher Steele, who authored the dossier on Trump, was an MI6 agent while the agency was headed by Sir Richard Dearlove. Steele
retains close ties with Dearlove.
Dearlove has ties to most of the parties mentioned. It was he who advised Steele and his business partner, Chris Burrows, to
work with a top British government official to pass along information to the FBI in the fall of 2016. He also was a speaker at
the July 2016 Cambridge symposium that Halper invited Carter
Page to attend.
Dearlove knows Halper through their
mutual association at the Cambridge Intelligence Seminar. Dearlove also knows Sir Iain Lobban, a former head of GCHQ, who is
an advisory board member at British strategic intelligence
and advisory firm Hakluyt , which was founded by former MI6 members and
retains close ties to UK intelligence services.
Halper has historical connections to Hakluyt through Jonathan Clarke, with whom he has
co-authored two books.
Downer, who
met Papadopoulos in a May 2016 meeting
established through a chain
of two intermediaries, served on the advisory board of Hakluyt
from 2008 to 2014. He reportedly still
maintains contact with Hakluyt officials. Information from his meeting with Papadopoulos was later used by the FBI to establish
the bureau's counterintelligence investigation into Trump–Russia collusion. Downer has changed his version of events multiple times.
The Steele dossier was fed into U.S. channels through several different sources. One such source was Sir Andrew Wood, the former
British ambassador to Russia, who had been briefed about the dossier by Steele. Wood later
relayed information regarding the dossier to Sen. John McCain, who dispatched David Kramer, a fellow at the McCain Institute,
to London to meet with Steele in November 2016. McCain would later admit in a Jan. 11, 2017,
statement that he had personally passed on the dossier to then-FBI Director James Comey.
Trump, after issuing an order for the declassification of documents and text messages related to the Russia-collusion investigations
-- including parts of the Carter Page FISA warrant application -- received phone calls from two U.S. allies saying, "Please, can
we talk." Those "allies" were almost certainly the UK and Australia.
In a Twitter post , Trump wrote that
the "key Allies called to ask not to release" the documents.
Questions to be asked are why is it that two of our allies would find themselves so opposed to the release of these classified
documents that a coordinated plea would be made directly to the president? And why would these same allies have even the slightest
idea of what was contained in these classified U.S. documents?
Britain and Australia appear to know full well what those documents contain, and their attempt to prevent their public release
appears to be because they don't want their role in events surrounding the 2016 presidential election to be made public.
Fusion GPS/Orbis/Christopher Steele
Glenn Simpson, a former Wall Street Journal reporter, is co-founder of Fusion GPS, along with Peter Fritsch and Tom Catan. Fusion
was hired by the DNC and the Clinton campaign through law firm Perkins Coie to produce and disseminate the Steele dossier used against
Trump. The dossier would later be the primary evidence used to obtain a FISA warrant on Carter Page on Oct. 21, 2016.
Christopher Steele, who retains close ties to UK intelligence, worked for MI6 from 1987 until his retirement in 2009, when he
and his partner, Chris Burrows, founded Orbis Intelligence. Steele
maintains contact with British intelligence,
Sir Richard Dearlove
, and UK intelligence firm Hakluyt.
Steele appears to have been
represented
by lawyer Adam Waldman, who also represented Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska. We know this from
texts sent by Waldman. On April 10, 2017, Waldman sent this to Sen. Mark Warner:
"Hi. Steele: would like to get a bi partisan letter from the committee; Assange: I convinced him to make serious and important
concessions and am discussing those w DOJ; Deripaska: willing to testify to congress but interested in state of play w Manafort.
I will be with him next tuesday for a week."
Steele also appears to have
lobbied on behalf of Deripaska, who was discussed in
emails between Bruce Ohr and Steele that were recently
disclosed by the Washington Examiner:
"Steele said he was 'circulating some recent sensitive Orbis reporting' on Deripaska that suggested Deripaska was not a 'tool'
of the Kremlin. Steele said he would send the reporting to a name that is redacted in the email."
Fusion GPS was also employed by Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya in a previous case. Veselnitskaya was involved in litigation
pitting Russian firm Prevezon Holdings against British-American financier William Browder. Veselnitskaya hired U.S. law firm BakerHostetler,
who, in turn, hired Fusion GPS to dig up dirt on Browder. Veselnitskaya was one of the participants at the June 2016 Trump Tower
meeting, at which she discussed the
Magnitsky Act .
Fox News reported on Nov. 9, 2017, that Simpson
met with Veselnitskaya immediately before and after the Trump Tower meeting.
A declassified top-secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court report released on April 26, 2017, revealed that government
agencies, including the FBI, CIA, and NSA, had improperly accessed Americans' communications. The FBI specifically provided outside
contractors with access to raw surveillance data on American citizens without proper oversight.
Communications and other data of members of the Trump campaign may have been accessed in this way.
Bruce and Nellie Ohr have
known Simpson since at least 2010 and have known Steele since at least 2006. The Ohrs and Simpson worked together on a
DOJ report in 2010 . In that report, Nellie Ohr's biography
lists her as working for Open Source Works, which is part of the CIA. Simpson met with Bruce Ohr
before and after the 2016 election.
Bruce Ohr had been in
contact repeatedly with Steele during the 2016 presidential campaign -- while Steele was constructing his dossier. Ohr later
actively shared information he received from Steele with the FBI, after the agency had terminated Steele as a source. Interactions
between Ohr and Steele stretched for months into the first year of Trump's presidency and were documented in a number of FD-302s
-- memos that summarize interviews with him by the FBI.
Spy Traps
In an effort to put forth evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, it appears that several different spy traps
were set, with varying degrees of success. Many of these efforts appear to center around Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos
and involve London-based professor Joseph Mifsud, who has
ties to Western intelligence, particularly in the UK.
Papadopoulos and Mifsud
both worked
at the London Centre of International Law Practice (LCILP). Mifsud appears to have joined LCILP around
November
2015 . Papadopoulos reportedly
joined
LCILP sometime in late February 2016 after leaving Ben Carson's presidential campaign. However, some
reports indicate Papadopoulos joined LCILP in November
or December of 2015. Mifsud and Papadopoulos reportedly never crossed paths
until March 14, 2016, in Italy.
Mifsud introduced Papadopoulos to several Russians, including Olga Polonskaya, whom Mifsud introduced as "Putin's niece," and
Ivan Timofeev, an official at a state-sponsored think tank called the Russian International Affairs Council. Both Papadopoulos and
Mifsud were interviewed by the FBI. Papadopoulos was ultimately charged with a process crime and was recently sentenced to 14 days
in prison for lying to the FBI. Mifsud was never charged by the FBI.
Throughout this period, Papadopoulos continuously pushed for meetings between Trump campaign officials and Russian contacts but
was ultimately unsuccessful in establishing any meetings.
Papadopoulos met with Australian diplomat Alexander Downer on May 10, 2016. The Papadopoulos–Downer meeting has been portrayed
as a
chance encounter in a bar. That does not appear to be the case.
Papadopoulos was introduced
to Downer through a chain of two intermediaries who said Downer wanted to meet with Papadopoulos. Another individual happened
to
be in London at exactly the same time: the FBI's head of counterintelligence, Bill Priestap. The purpose of Priestap's visit
remains unknown.
The Papadopoulos–Downer
meeting was later used to establish the FBI's counterintelligence investigation into Trump–Russia collusion. It was repeatedly
reported that Papadopoulos told Downer that Russia had Hillary Clinton's emails. This is incorrect.
According to Downer, Papadopoulos at some point
mentioned the Russians had damaging information on Hillary Clinton.
"During that conversation, he [Papadopoulos] mentioned the Russians might use material that they have on Hillary Clinton in the
lead-up to the election, which may be damaging,'' Downer told
The Australian about the Papadopoulos meeting in an April 2018 article. "He didn't say dirt, he said material that could be damaging
to her. No, he said it would be damaging. He didn't say what it was."
Downer, while serving as Australia's foreign minister, was
responsible for one of the largest foreign donations to the Clinton Foundation: $25 million from the Australian government.
Unconfirmed media reports, including a Jan. 12, 2017,
BBC article , have suggested that the FBI attempted
to obtain two FISA warrants in June and July 2016 that were denied by the FISA court. It's likely that Papadopoulos was an intended
target of these failed FISAs.
Interestingly, there is no mention of Papadopoulos in the Steele dossier. Paul Manafort, Carter Page, former Trump lawyer Michael
Cohen, Gen. Michael Flynn, and former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski are all listed in the Steele dossier.
Papadopoulos may have started out assisting the FBI or CIA and later discovered that he was being set up for surveillance himself.
After failing to obtain a spy warrant on the Trump campaign using Papadopoulos, the FBI set its sights on campaign volunteer Carter
Page. By this time, the counterintelligence investigation was in the process of being established, and we know now that it was formalized
with no official intelligence. The FBI needed some sort of legal cover. They needed a retroactive warrant. And they got one on Oct.
21, 2016. The Page FISA warrant would be renewed three times and remain in force until September 2017.
Stefan Halper met with Page for the first time on July 11, 2016, at a
Cambridge symposium , just three days after Page's July 2016
Moscow trip. As noted previously, former MI6 head Sir Richard Dearlove was a speaker at the symposium. Halper and Dearlove have known
each other for years and maintain several mutual associations.
Page was already known to the FBI. The Page FISA warrant application references the Buryakov spy case and an FBI interview with
Page. Current information suggests there was only
one meeting between Page and the FBI in 2016. It happened on March 2, 2016. It was in relation to Victor Podobnyy, who was named
in the Buryakov case.
Page, who
cooperated with the FBI on the case, almost certainly was providing testimony or details against Podobnyy. Page had been contacted
by Podobnyy in 2013 and had previously provided information to the FBI. Buryakov
pleaded guilty on March 11, 2016 -- nine days after Page met with the FBI on the case -- and was
sentenced to 30 months in prison on May 25, 2016. On April 5, 2017, Buryakov was granted early release and was
deported to Russia.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes
said in August that exculpatory evidence
on Page exists that wasn't included by the DOJ and the FBI in the FISA application and subsequent renewals. The exculpatory evidence
likely relates specifically to Page's role in the Buryakov case.
If the FBI failed to disclose Page's cooperation with the bureau or materially misrepresented his involvement in its application
to the FISA Court, it means that the FBI's Woods procedures, which govern FISA applications, were violated.
Page has not been arrested or charged with any crime related to the investigation.
Jeff Carlson is a regular contributor to The Epoch Times. He also runs the website TheMarketsWork.com and can be followed
on Twitter @themarketswork.
"... The FBI opened a counterintelligence probe after learning of Papadopoulos' encounter with another shadowy figure, a Maltese professor called Joseph Mifsud who said he had 'dirt' on Hillary Clinton and claimed to be accompanied by Russian President Vladimir Putin's niece. Mifsud has now vanished. ..."
"... Papadopoulos described her in his book as attractive, and said soon after they met she started asking him questions about Trump and Russia. 'There is no way this is a Cambridge professor's research assistant,' Papadopoulos recalled thinking. He wrote in his book, 'Deep State Target' about meeting her: 'Azra Turk is a vision right out of central casting for a spy flick. She's a sexy bottle blonde in her thirties, and she isn't shy about showing her curves -- as if anyone could miss them. She's a fantasy's fantasy. 'If this is what academic researchers look like, I've been going to the wrong school,' I laugh to myself.' ..."
"... Papadoulos remembers that her initial approach began with the email: 'Let's meet for a drink. I'm looking forward to meeting you.' At the meeting, he says he told her: 'I have nothing to do with Russia, and I don't know anyone else who has anything to do with Russia, either. 'But she keeps pushing. She puts her hand on my arm. She says I'm more attractive in person than in my pictures. She says I've been doing important work. It's all a come-on,' he writes. ..."
'I don't think she was FBI, I think she was CIA': George Papadopoulos recounts how 'curvy blonde' agent posing as a researcher
tried to extract Trump-Russia information from him in London - and he believes British spooks helped plan it
George Papadopoulos believes Britain helped the U.S. spy on him in 2016
It emerged Thursday that the FBI arranged for an 'attractive' woman to approach him for information after he made contact
with a government informant
The woman - a so-called researcher named Azra Turk - was trying to extract information to determine if the Trump campaign
was working with Russia
Papadopoulos spoke of the meeting during an appearance on Fox News
Trump has claimed Obama administration 'spied' on his campaign; his attorney general Bill Barr says he is investigating origins
of Russian collusion claims
Published: 01:49 EDT, 3 May 2019 | Updated: 03:15 EDT, 3 May 2019
Former Trump advisor George Papadopoulos says he believes Britain helped the U.S. spy on him when a 'curvy blonde' agent posing
as a researcher approached him to try and determine if the Trump campaign was working with Russia. The FBI arranged for an 'attractive' woman to approach Papadopoulos for information after he made contact with a government informant
back in 2016, it emerged on Thursday. Papadopoulos' contact with academic Stefan Halper, a Cambridge University professor who has served as an informant, had already
come to light amid the Mueller probe.
But it was revealed on Thursday that the FBI also dispatched an investigator, who said she was a researcher called Azra Turk,
to accompany Halper as part of its counterintelligence probe. The investigator met with Papadopoulos at a London bar in September 2016 - two months before the election that brought Trump to
office.
Following a New York Times report about the meeting on Thursday, Papadopoulos went on Fox News' Tucker Carlson Tonight to describe
how he was approached by the investigator and to claim the the UK was in on it too. Former Trump advisor George Papadopoulos says he believes Britain helped the U.S. spy on him when a 'curvy blonde' agent posing
as a researcher approached him to try and determine if the Trump campaign was working with Russia
Papadopoulos, who has written about his encounter with the 'sexy bottle blonde in her thirties' in a new book, ended up serving
12 days in prison after pleading guilty to lying to the FBI when he was questioned by investigators during the Mueller probe.
'I received an unsolicited email in September of 2016 from a man who was suggesting that he wanted to pay me $3,000 to write a
report on energy security questions and I was an expert on it at the time and Israel, Turkey and Cyprus,' Papadopoulos told Fox News.
'I looked him up because I'd never heard of him. I saw that he had worked in four administrations and he was a professor at Cambridge
so accepted his offer and he flew me to London where he paid for my five-star hotel and he said before I meet with you I want you
to meet my assistant.'
Papadopoulos said he was immediately suspicious because he recognize the name - Azra Turk - as being Turkish. He said some of
his passed work wasn't viewed favorably by Turkey.
'I went and I met with her and she was very suggestive as you can understand, younger, very flirtatious,' he said of their meeting.
'I right away understood this wasn't a Cambridge assistant and she barely spoke English and she was very flirty and was trying
to do two things, want to extract information about my professional connections in the Middle East and two to see if I had any information
that she could potentially extract from meat on a Trump Russia which is nonsense.
'From that moment I knew there was something wrong and I was laughing about it but now of course The New York Times reported that
she was some sort of agent but I don't think she was FBI, I think she was CIA.'
Papadopoulos went on to say that he didn't think it was a coincidence that Trump started tweeting about UK interference last week.
'The day I met with them in London, I was invited by the British ministry of foreign affairs to meet with them at their offices,'
he said.
'I believe the British actively were spying on me as well and I believe part of what President Trump was tweeting last week about
the British spying was about this involvement in this operation.'
Trump foreign policy advisor George Papadopoulos had an encounter with a woman named 'Azra' Turk who the FBI dispatched to seek
information from him. He described as a curvaceous 'sexy bottle blonde in her thirties' and writes that he discerned she was part
of a 'honey trap'
The revelations in the Times report on Thursday came amid mounting questions over the origins of the Russian collusion claims,
which eventually led to the commissioning of the Mueller inquiry - and which Bill Barr, Trump's attorney general, says he is actively
investigating.
According to the Times, 'Turk' was a government investigator posing as Halper's research assistant. She was not operating under
her real name.
President Trump has fumed that the early days of the Russia probe amounted to 'Spygate,' and his attorney general used the term
'spying' to what went on, testifying on Wednesday that he didn't consider the word a 'pejorative.'
'I think spying on a political campaign is a big deal,' Barr had earlier testified, saying the question was whether it was 'adequately
predicated.'
The FBI opened a counterintelligence probe after learning of Papadopoulos' encounter with another shadowy figure, a Maltese professor
called Joseph Mifsud who said he had 'dirt' on Hillary Clinton and claimed to be accompanied by Russian President Vladimir Putin's
niece. Mifsud has now vanished.
Trump foreign policy advisor Carter Page also raised suspicions with his Russia contacts and campaign trip to Moscow, and became
the subject of a secret surveillance warrant.
Papadopoulos described her in his book as attractive, and said soon after they met she started asking him questions about Trump
and Russia. 'There is no way this is a Cambridge professor's research assistant,' Papadopoulos recalled thinking. He wrote in his book, 'Deep State Target' about meeting her: 'Azra Turk is a vision right out of central casting for a spy flick.
She's a sexy bottle blonde in her thirties, and she isn't shy about showing her curves -- as if anyone could miss them. She's a fantasy's
fantasy. 'If this is what academic researchers look like, I've been going to the wrong school,' I laugh to myself.'
When Papadopoulos landed in London on September 15, 2016, the woman invited him out for drinks. They met up at the Sofitel St.
James.
Papadoulos remembers that her initial approach began with the email: 'Let's meet for a drink. I'm looking forward to meeting you.' At the meeting, he says he told her: 'I have nothing to do with Russia, and I don't know anyone else who has anything to do with
Russia, either. 'But she keeps pushing. She puts her hand on my arm. She says I'm more attractive in person than in my pictures. She says I've
been doing important work. It's all a come-on,' he writes.
She attended a subsequent meeting with Papadopoulos and Halper at the exclusive private Travellers Club, an institution frequented
by British diplomats and - reputedly - members of Britain's foreign spy agency, MI6.
Halper would later ask Papadopoulos about hacked Democratic emails and whether Wikileaks was helping the Trump camp. He says he was
angry over the line of questioning and ended the meeting. In an email following their encounter, Turk called their meeting the 'highlight of my trip.' She wrote him a message saying: 'I am excited about what the future holds for us :)' – ending with an emoji.
Papadapoulos served 12 days in jail for lying to the FBI when he was questioned by investigators during the Mueller probe.
"... After being in contact with Page for 14 months, Halper stopped contact exactly as the final FISA warrant on Page expired. Page, who has steadfastly maintained his innocence, was never charged with any crime by the FBI. Efforts for the declassification of the Page FISA application are currently ongoing through the DOJ's Office of the Inspector General. ..."
FBI's formal involvement with the
Steele dossier began on July 5, 2016,
when Mike Gaeta, an FBI agent and assistant legal attaché at the US Embassy in Rome, was dispatched to visit former MI6 spy Christopher
Steele in London. Gaeta would return from this meeting with a copy of Steele's first memo. This memo was given to Victoria Nuland
at the State Department, who passed it along to the FBI.
Gaeta, who also headed the FBI's Eurasian Organized Crime unit, had known Steele since at least 2010, when Steele had provided
assistance to the FBI's investigation into the
FIFA corruption
scandal .
Prior to the London meeting, Gaeta may also have met on a less formal basis with Steele
several weeks earlier.
"In June, Steele flew to Rome to brief the FBI contact with whom he had cooperated over FIFA," The Guardian reported. "His information
started to reach the bureau in Washington."
It's worth noting that there was no "dossier" until it was fully compiled in December 2016. There was only a sequence of documents
from Steele -- documents that were passed on individually -- as they were created. Therefore, from the FBI's legal perspective, they
didn't use the dossier. They used individual documents.
For the next month and a half, there appeared to be little contact between Steele and the FBI. However, the FBI's interest in
the dossier suddenly accelerated in late August 2016, when the bureau
asked Steele "for all information in his possession and for him to explain how the material had been gathered and to identify
his sources."
In September 2016, Steele traveled back to Rome to meet with the FBI's Eurasian squad once again. It's likely that the meeting
included several other FBI officials as well. According to a
House Intelligence Committee
minority memo , Steele's reporting reached the FBI counterintelligence team in mid-September 2016 -- the same time as Steele's
September trip to Rome.
The reason for the FBI's renewed interest had to do with an adviser to the Trump campaign -- Carter Page -- who had been in
contact with Stefan Halper, a CIA
and FBI source, since July 2016. Halper
arranged to meet with Page for the first time on July 11, 2016, at a
Cambridge symposium , just three days after Page took a trip
to Moscow. Speakers at the symposium included Madeleine Albright, Vin Webber, and Sir Richard Dearlove, the former head of MI6.
Page was now the FBI's chosen target for a FISA warrant that would be obtained on Oct. 21, 2016. The Steele dossier would be the
primary evidence used in obtaining the FISA warrant, which would be renewed three separate times, including after Trump took office,
finally expiring in September 2017.
The FBI obtained a retroactive FISA spy warrant on Page
After being in contact with Page for 14 months, Halper stopped contact exactly as the final FISA warrant on Page expired.
Page, who has steadfastly maintained his innocence, was never charged with any crime by the FBI. Efforts for the declassification
of the Page FISA application are currently ongoing through the DOJ's Office of the Inspector General.
Jeff Carlson is a regular contributor to The Epoch Times. He also runs the website
TheMarketsWork.com and can be followed on Twitter @themarketswork.
One of the central figures to the Russian-collusion narrative is Maltese professor Joseph Mifsud. He is the man that helped
allegedly jumpstart the counterintelligence investigation into then-candidate Donald Trump's 2016 campaign when he allegedly
told Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos that Russians had "dirt" on Hillary Clinton, including her emails.
In Special Counsel Robert Mueller's final report on the investigation, Mifsud is portrayed as being intimately connected to
the Putin regime in Russia. Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee have similarly portrayed Mifsud as a "cutout" who gave
Papadopoulos information on behalf of the Russians in order to influence the 2016 election.
But as Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) wrote in
a letter
sent to the
U.S. State Department and the CIA last Friday, if Mifsud is the dangerous liaison Mueller made him out to be, then many more
Western politicians have been compromised, as many have had their own contact with the professor.
"Alternatively, if Mifsud is not in fact a counterintelligence threat, then that would cast doubt on the Special Counsel's
fundamental depiction of him and his activities, and raise questions about the veracity of the Special Counsel's statements and
affirmations," Nunes wrote.
"It should be noted that the Special Counsel declined to charge Mifsud with any crime even though, to justify seeking a prison
sentence for Papadopoulos, the Special Counsel claimed Papadopoulos' untruthful testimony 'undermined investigators' ability to
challenge the Professor [Mifsud] or potentially detain or arrest him while he was still in the United States,'" Nunes continued.
"Furthermore, it's still a mystery how the FBI knew to ask Papadopoulos specifically about Hillary Clinton's emails, on multiple
occasions throughout 2016-17 before having interviewed Mifsud, if the FBI hadn't already somehow received this information
directly or indirectly from Mifsud himself."
Nunes included in his letter photos of Mifsud with British politician Boris Johnson, member of the Italian military, and a
former member of the United Kingdom's Joint Intelligence Committee. Mueller's report also explains that Mifsud met Papadopoulos
at Link Campus University, described as "a for-profit institution headed by a former Italian government official." As Nunes
wrote, the report "omits" additional information about the university, which a Guardian report cited by Mueller's team claimed
the school "had a reputation for being closely connected to some elements within the Italian intelligence services." Mifsud, the
article quoted someone saying, collaborated regularly with the university.
This contradiction in Mueller's report should remind us of another problem with the final report,
as
described by
The Federalist's Margot Cleveland (full disclosure: I also have a byline at The Federalist). Cleveland pointed
out that "Not once in the 448-page tome does Mueller mention an investigation into whether Russia interfered with the U.S.
presidential election by feeding dossier author Christopher Steele misinformation." That dossier has been the "evidence" for many
of the media and Democrats' claims of collusion between Trump and Russia.
Papadopoulos pleaded guilty to providing false statements to the FBI when he told him in January 2017 that he had the meeting
with Mifsud
before
he joined the Trump campaign. It was Papadopoulos' April 26, 2016 meeting with Mifsud -- which he told
FBI agents about -- where he learned the Russians allegedly had "dirt" on Hillary Clinton. Weeks later, Papadopoulos would tell
Australian diplomate Alexander Downer about this gossip, which has been reported as the event that sparked the investigation into
the campaign.
The Daily Caller
reported
that Papadopoulos has
said he never told anyone on Trump's campaign about what Mifsud told him, and Mueller's report makes clear there's no evidence to
contradict those claims.
When we saw these tweets from George Papadopoulos, we thought we could help him out with some answers. If you can
get them to George, please do.
Has congress figured out why Peter Strzok's former
boss, Bill Priestap, was in London (of all places) the days before Alexander Downer was sent to spy on me and lie
about our meeting? If not, time to get a move on it.
Britain is in a political crisis. To push Brexit hard, declassifying the spy
role of the David Cameron government on Trump and his team is paramount. Congress can not overlook the vital
importance of London as the center of the coup attempt.
Bill
Priestap was the Director of the FBI national security division and would have gone to the London CIA "office" for
a meeting. There he would have met with Stefan Halper and Gina Haspel who was, at the time, head of the London CIA
office and would have been in charge of the connections with Robert Hannigan (British GCHQ) and John Brennan who
planned and executed the wiretapping of Trump Team at Trump Towers. Haspel's communications, when released, will
reveal the full scope of the CIA led international attack on the 2016 presidential election.
Gina Haspel would have known about the coup. If she has not reported
all of this to the President Trump, she is complicit in the overthrow attempt and is guilty of HIGH TREASON.
Pictured:
Evil SES Conspirator
Keep in mind, Peter Strzok was a CIA Regional Director who John
Brennan appointed as the head of Crossfire Hurricane, the CIA counter-intelligence operation to "take out"
candidate Trump – later it became the Mueller Witch Hunt after 13 different iterations spanning:
the CIA (John Brennan),
FBI (James Comey, Andrew McCabe, James Baker, etc.),
DoJ (Loretta Lynn, Sally Yates, Andrew Weisseman),
State Department (Victoria Nuland, Jonathon Winer, Hilary Clinton, John Kerry),
ODNS (James Clapper),
NSA (Admiral Mike Rogers)
and the White House senior staff (directly to Obama, Biden, Jarret, Rice, Powers,
etc.).
Bill Preistap was the supervisor for Strzok and Lisa Page who also worked for
John Carlin
in the Department of Justice National Security Division under Sally Yates. Then Strozk and Page
continued their CIA operation as they were appointed to Mueller's Special Council Investigation.
Gina Haspel worked directly for the instigator of the Crossfire Hurricane operation – John Brennan. It would
have been impossible for Haspel not to have known about the British spying from London since it was reported in UK
newspaper on a weekly basis. She certainly was controlling
Stefan Halper
,
Josef Mifsud
,
Stephan Roh
, Alexander Downer, Andrew Wood, John McCain, Mark Warner, Adam Schiff and the other conspirators.
All of these facts are well known and reported in open source documents. As the 53 testimonies of the House
Intelligence Committee are released, we will see the house of cards all fall down and Gina Haspel will go with it.
Mueller Mifsud blunder is indicative of the quality of this "Investigation". The final results desired were established before
any investigating took place.
This is definitely a cover up. Mueller could call Jina Haspel and get all the information about Maltese professor Joseph Mifsud
who tried to tie George Papadopoulos to Russia. It is definitely available via regular CIA channels as
CIA Director Gina
Haspel is Complicit with the Attempted Overthrow of Trump
.
Bill Priestap was the Director of the FBI national security division and would have gone to the London CIA "office" for a
meeting. There he would have met with Stefan Halper and Gina Haspel who was, at the time, head of the London CIA office and would
have been in charge of the connections with Robert Hannigan (British GCHQ) and John Brennan who planned and executed the wiretapping
of Trump Team at Trump Towers. Haspel's communications, when released, will reveal the full scope of the CIA led international
attack on the 2016 presidential election.
On May 3, 2019 Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) requested information on Friday from the State Department, CIA, FBI and NSA on operative
Joseph Mifsud (
May3,
2019)
Notable quotes:
"... So how many companies or agencies that you know of, when you say, hey, I'm quitting, and they say, hey, what about a free four-to-five-day vacation in Rome? We're going to fly you there. We're going to put you up for free. We're going to give you food... And all you have to do is meet this guy Mifsud, right... We're trying to get to the bottom of Mifsud . So, as we talked about it on the last segment, this guy originates the investigation. We know that the Mueller team wrote this Mueller dossier. They used a lot of these news stories that, in fact, sometimes were generated by leaks from the FBI. ..."
"... Robert Mueller never inquired about Peter Strzok and Lisa Page's "insurance policy" when he fired Strzok. When Mueller testifies in front of the House Judiciary Committee, I'm going to ask why he never even asked about what evidence might have been polluted by Strzok and Page. ..."
"... Come ON! YOU KNOW THIS is ********! There was no Russian disinformation and that sounds just like out of the Integrity Initiative in the UK and sponsored by the foreign office that seeks to quell Russian disinformation. ..."
"... This whole thing is DELIBERATE to demonize Russia.. ..."
"... Hillarys conflicts of interests never reveled as Secretary of State can and should be investigated by House Democrats instead of magical fabrications of obstruction of justice by Barr..... ..."
"... Mueller and the other intel guys were there to be an exit strategy for the dems, hide the bodies, and make sure to bungle or destroy any evidence that could be used against them. no duh ..."
"... Steele was a Confidential Human Source on the FBI payroll back in 2016. Steele had a handling agent. I'd sure like to know who the handler was. So, how directly the **** is Steele not a liar? ..."
Barr replied that he had yet to "go through the full scope of [Mueller's] investigation to
determine whether he did address or look at all into those issues," but that he would "try to
assemble all the existing information out there about it, not only for the Hill investigations and
the OIG, but also to see what the Special Counsel looked into. So I really couldn't say what he
looked into."
Meanwhile,
Barr said that he has assembled a DOJ team
to examine Mueller's investigation, findings, and
whether the spying conducted by the FBI against the Trump campaign in 2016 was improper.
Mueller's second major oversight
- which we have touched on repeatedly - is
the
special counsel's portrayal of Maltese professor Joseph Mifsud was a Russian agent
-
when
available evidence suggests he may have been a Western agent.
Weeks after returning from Moscow, Mifsud - a self-described
Clinton
Foundation member
- 'seeded' the rumor that Russia had 'dirt' on Hillary Clinton with Trump
campaign adviser George Papadopoulos on April 26, 2016, according to the Mueller report.
As Rep.
Devin Nunes (R-CA) noted on
Fox News
on Sunday, "
how is it that we spend
30-plus-million dollars on this, as taxpayers and they can't even tell us who Joseph Mifsud is?
"
"...this is important, because, in the Mueller dossier, they use a fake news story to describe
Mifsud. In one of those stories, they cherry- pick it," Nunes added.
BARTIROMO: Then he's working for Trump. So how come somebody from Britain, Australia, Italy,
they're all reaching out to him? And, by the way, how come this London Center of International
Law reached out to Papadopoulos on LinkedIn to go work there, after Ben Carson withdrew?
NUNES: And I think a better question is, is that -- so, Papadopoulos claims that he was quitting
this London Center.
So how many companies or agencies that you know of, when you say, hey, I'm quitting, and they
say, hey, what about a free four-to-five-day vacation in Rome? We're going to fly you there.
We're going to put you up for free. We're going to give you food...
And all you have to
do is meet this guy Mifsud, right... We're trying to get to the bottom of Mifsud
. So,
as we talked about it on the last segment, this guy originates the investigation. We know that
the Mueller team wrote this Mueller dossier. They used a lot of these news stories that, in
fact, sometimes were generated by leaks from the FBI.
Now, I don't think the American people expect 20 DOJ lawyers and 40 FBI agents to write a
450-page report that's built off of news stories that in many cases they generated.
Why I particularly have a problem with this is -- with one of the stories is because they pick a
news story, and then they cherry-pick from it.
So they use it partly to describe where
Mifsud worked, but then they fail to say in that same story that they have given support to by
using it in the Mueller dossier
, they cherry-pick it. -Via
RealClearPolitics
As
conservative commentator
and former US Secret
Service agent
Dan Bongino
notes of Mifsud, "either we have a Russian asset who's
infiltrated the highest echelons of friendly Intelligence Services, or we have a friendly who was
setting up George Papadopoulos."
Perhaps Mueller's reportedly scheduled testimony next week will shed more light on
why
he failed to question the possible role of Russian disinformation with the Steele Dossier
,
and
why he didn't flush out who Joseph Mifsud really is
.
Other omissions, meanwhile, are on the table as well...
Robert Mueller never inquired about Peter Strzok and Lisa
Page's "insurance policy" when he fired Strzok. When Mueller testifies in front of the House Judiciary Committee,
I'm going to ask why he never even asked about what evidence might have been polluted by Strzok and Page.
Hillary paid Perkins Coie to pay Fusion GPS to write a fake
dossier and then paid Christopher Steele to try to infuse what
they wrote with a little authenticity. To anyone who is not brain
dead, the whole dossier read like 4chan fan fiction and was
laughable from the very start. The whole thing was an obvious set
up to all observers (even the Dems though they will cling to their
lies to the very end and continue to double down). Most people are
growing tired of their antics and their virtue signalling and
moralizing.
The House Committee will just mute the microphones and prevent
anyone from asking a worthwhile probing question to Mueller during
the hearing. It will be the usual circus, but totally transparent
to all who do not suffer from chronic TDS.
'why he failed to question the possible role of Russian
disinformation with the Steele Dossier
, and
why he didn't
flush out who Joseph Mifsud really is
.".
Come ON! YOU KNOW
THIS is ********! There was no Russian disinformation and that
sounds just like out of the Integrity Initiative in the UK and
sponsored by the foreign office that seeks to quell Russian
disinformation.
This whole thing is DELIBERATE to demonize Russia..
The only "Russian disinfo came from SKRIPAL who has now been
poisoned and taken to a secret location to serve out the remainder
of his life so that he never talks again!
Here is your Hillary Russian agent connected to 2016 election and
the true obstruction of justice pirate :
"
CHELSEA CLINTON
On Sep. 22, 2011
, Barry Diller appointed Chelsea Clinton, then
a college student, to be a director of IAC/Interactivecorp which
has a current market value of $10 billion. At the same time,
Diller appointed Sonali De Rycker of Accel Partners LLP London and
formerly Goldman Sachs. Accel is the largest inside shareholder in
Facebook after Mark Zuckerberg.
It should also be noted that on
Mar.
11, 2009
, IAC/Interactivecorp received what has been, in
effect, a PERMANENT CONFIDENTIALITY EXEMPTION from the SEC from
reporting its Google AdSense revenue numbers in its public
reporting. This is totally outrageous.
See
the redacted
revenue numbers from Google AdSense on
IAC/Interactivecorp's
10-K, Exhibit 10-25 on Mar. 11, 2009
.
As Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton had an ethical duty to
disclose to the public her conflicts of interest in Chelsea
Clinton's appointment as director of IAC/Interactivecorp in 2011.
Given Chelsea's ties to Facebook director and venture capitalist
Accel Partners, the Clinton's engaged in obstruction of justice in
the
Leader v. Facebook
patent infringement lawsuit as well
as the
Ceglia v. Zuckerberg
contract dispute. Also,
Chelsea's relationship to Barry Diller shows that mainstream media
was engaging in undisclosed bias for the Clintons and against
Donald Trump."
Hillary paid Facebook starting on Nov. 26, 2009 to write a "
Template for winning elections" directed by RUSSIAN Dmitry
Schevelenko of FACEBOOK.
Hillarys conflicts of interests never reveled as Secretary of
State can and should be investigated by House Democrats instead of
magical fabrications of obstruction of justice by Barr.....
If this wasn't such comic relief for conservatives it would be
written as a template for losers.👎😄🌾
Mueller and the other intel guys were there to be an exit strategy
for the dems, hide the bodies, and make sure to bungle or destroy
any evidence that could be used against them. no duh
So... if we investigate The Mueller Report, is that a
Special-Special Counsel, or a Super-Special Counsel?
Either way,
the target is a Counsel investigation that was not so special
(read corrupted).
Competent counter-intelligence guards against being caught...
these fools were already in over their heads by the time it dawned
on them that victory was not assured.
And to that end, there is no one in the intelligence community
that would have had an early inkling that HRC could blow (poor
choice of words, sorry to creep you out) the election (against any
Republican nominee) save for someone with authority (executive),
motivation (legacy), and accurate polling. Gee... who could that
have possibly been?
Mueller's appointment by Rosenstein was illegal and the stated
purpose of said investigation was outside the scope of a Special
Counsel.
The purpose of the report is to propagate and lend some
credibility to the lies that Russia somehow interfered in our
elections, hacked the DNC, and Mifsud was a Russian agent.
These claims have already been conclusively disproven by
multiple sources. Mifsud is MI6 hiding in Italy so he doesn't get
Skripal'ed.
Hmmm. You would think Mueller and his team would vet the
authenticity of Steele dossier and look into the bleach biting of
Hitlery's e-mail server since both were prima facie evidence in
this whole charade. The fact this wasn't done is quite damning in
and of itself and suggests the Mueller team was complicit in the
entire "Russian Collusion" hoax.
"confided that the Kremlin had been feeding Trump and his team
valuable intelligence on his opponents, including Democratic
presidential candidate Hillary Clinton."
And how is this
different from the Venezuela, Syria, Libya, Iran False Flags
???????? Not one time has Hit-Lary personnel written or spoken
that the leaked intel about the DNC and Clinton 2019 presidential
campaign was False....the whole Russia-Gate is a Cover-up of the
Crimes of the DNC and Deep State during the Obozo Administration,
during the electoral Process for the 2019 Presidential Elections,
by the DNC, Clinton's, and the Deep State - NeoCon's.......Thats
why Trump won the Election.... We the People are tired of the
never ending **** show in D.C., and We the People voted for anyone
running on the Novel Idea of Change!!!!
Everyone in America knows that the Mueller investigation was a
fraud predicated on fabricated evidence, that Obama used
government intelligence agencies to spy on and entrap the
political opposition, and that Crooked Hillary Clinton and her
minions are guilty of numerous crimes, mishandling of classified
information being the least of these offenses.
The only thing
the whole country is waiting for is to find out what these *******
criminals are going to get away with.
The New York Times reports that two months before the 2016 presidential election Trump
campaign adviser George Papadopoulos sat down with an undercover investigator for the FBI who
was trying to probe whether the Trump campaign was working with Russia. The FBI declined
comment, according to the paper.
"... For over two years, anyone who suggested that the Russia investigation was a sham was harshly ridiculed by establishment mouthpieces as a conspiracy theorist. The notion that the Obama Justice Department (led by Eric " wingman " Holder and then Loretta " tarmac " Lynch) could have conspired with other US intel agencies and foreigners to paint Donald Trump as a Russian stooge was considered beyond the pale. ..."
"... Then we found out that virtually the entire FBI's top brass absolutely hate Donald Trump and supported Hillary Clinton; the former of whom the FBI launched a counterintelligence investigation against, while giving Hillary a pass despite the fact that she destroyed evidence from her homebrew basement server while under subpoena. We were asked to believe that the FBI's extreme biases played no role in their investigations, while the left insisted that special counsel Robert Mueller was going to confirm fairy tales of Russian collusion peddled by a Clinton-funded dossier. ..."
"... And then the Mueller report came out - blowing the Russian collusion narrative out of the water, while painting a damning picture that suggests the entire genesis of the FBI's counterintelligence investigation, Crossfire Hurricane , was a setup ..."
"... We have now pinned Peter Strzok's boss, Bill Priestap, in London the week of May 6th, 2016 and on the 9th. The day before Alexander Downer was sent to spy on me and record our meeting. Congress must release the transcripts and embarrass the deep state. ..."
"... Mifsud was working for US intelligence services and seeded Papadopoulos with the 'dirt' rumor in order to kick off the FBI's counterintelligence operation. ..."
"... In short - based on what we know, it appears that Joseph Mifsud was part of a setup by Western intelligence services on then-candidate Donald Trump. ..."
"... A Company Whose Director Represents Joseph Mifsud Changed Its Name To "No Vichok Ltd" After The Salisbury Attack. "Novichok" was the nerve agent used to poison fmr GRU agent Sergei Skripal when the UK govt was caught lying about the analysis from Porton Down ..."
"... In his letter, Nunes says it is " still a mystery how the FBI knew to ask Papadopoulos specifically about Hillary Clinton's emails " if the bureau had not spoken with Mifsud. - Washington Examiner ..."
"... "If he is in fact a Russian agent, it would be one of the biggest intelligence scandals for not only the United States, but also our allies like the Italians and the Brits and others. Because if Mifsud is a Russian agent, he would know all kinds of our intelligence agents throughout the globe," said Nunes during a recent interview with Fox News' Sean Hannity. ..."
"... Why are there zero citations to Mifsud's 302 in the Mueller Report? ..."
For over two years, anyone who suggested that the Russia investigation was a sham was harshly ridiculed by establishment
mouthpieces as a conspiracy theorist. The notion that the Obama Justice Department (led by Eric "
wingman
"
Holder and then Loretta "
tarmac
"
Lynch) could have conspired with other US intel agencies and foreigners to paint Donald Trump as a Russian stooge was
considered beyond the pale.
Then we found out that virtually the entire FBI's top brass
absolutely hate Donald Trump
and supported Hillary
Clinton; the former of whom the FBI launched a counterintelligence investigation against, while giving Hillary a pass
despite the fact that she
destroyed evidence
from her homebrew basement server while under subpoena. We were asked to believe that the FBI's extreme biases played no
role in their investigations, while the left insisted that special counsel Robert Mueller was going to confirm fairy tales
of Russian collusion peddled by a Clinton-funded dossier.
And then the Mueller report came out
- blowing the Russian collusion narrative out of the water, while
painting
a damning picture that suggests the entire genesis of the FBI's counterintelligence investigation,
Crossfire Hurricane
, was a setup
.
One of those brave enough to risk his reputation laying out what was going on
before
the Mueller report
dropped is
conservative commentator
and former US Secret Service agent
Dan Bongino
- who has repeatedly mentioned the suspicious role of self-described
Clinton Foundation member
Joseph Mifsud,
who
seeded the rumor that
Russia had 'dirt' on Hillary Clinton
to Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos on April 26, 2016 -
shortly
after returning from Moscow,
according to the Mueller report.
Two weeks later
,
Papadopoulos
would be bilked for information by Australian diplomat (another
Clinton
ally
) Alexander Downer at a London bar, who relayed the Kremlin 'dirt' rumor to Australian authorities, which alerted
the FBI (as the story goes), and operation Crossfire Hurricane was thus hatched.
We have now pinned Peter Strzok's boss, Bill Priestap, in London the week of May
6th, 2016 and on the 9th. The day before Alexander Downer was sent to spy on me and record our meeting. Congress must
release the transcripts and embarrass the deep state.
As Bongino lays out, there are
two working theories about Mifsud
. The first is that he's a
Russian
asset who tried to bait the Trump campaign
. The second is that Mifsud
was working for US intelligence services
and
seeded Papadopoulos with the 'dirt' rumor in order to kick off the FBI's counterintelligence operation.
"So either we have a Russian asset who's infiltrated the highest echelons of friendly Intelligence Services, or we have
a friendly who was setting up
@GeorgePapa19
- That's
the real scandal. This was not spying, this was entrapment."
pic.twitter.com/wGnV8HHur1
We know that Papadopoulos met multiple times with Mifsud in the first half of 2016:
March 14 2016
–
Papadopoulos
first meets Mifsud in Italy
– approximately one week after finding out he will be
joining the Trump team.
March 24 2016
– Papadopoulos,
Mifsud, Olga Polonskaya and unknown fourth party meet in a London cafe.
April 18 2016
– Mifsud
introduces Papadopoulos to Ivan Timofeev, an official at a state-sponsored think tank called Russian International
Affairs Council.
April 26 2016
– Mifsud
tells Papadopoulos he's met with high-level Russian government officials who have "dirt" on Clinton. Papadopoulos
will
tell the FBI
he learned of the emails prior to
joining the Trump Campaign.
May 13 2016
– Mifsud emails Papadopoulos an update of
"recent conversations".
Note:
Papadopoulos and Mifsud reportedly
both
worked
at the London Centre of International Law Practice. -
The
Markets Work
In short - based on what we know, it appears that Joseph Mifsud was part of a setup by Western intelligence
services on then-candidate Donald Trump.
Did You Know:
A Company Whose Director Represents Joseph Mifsud Changed Its Name To "No Vichok Ltd" After The Salisbury Attack.
"Novichok" was the nerve agent used to poison fmr GRU agent Sergei Skripal when the UK govt was caught lying about the
analysis from Porton Down
Great claims require great evidence, however,
which is why Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) has requested a wide swath of
documents about Mifsud from several federal agencies.
As the
Washington
Examiner
reports, Nunes - the House Intelligence Committee ranking member, "
seeks information about who
Mifsud was working for at the time
and wrote in a letter that special counsel Robert
Mueller "omits any
mention of a wide range of contacts Mifsud had with Western political institutions and individuals"
in his report
on Russian interference in the 2016 election."
The special counsel's
sentencing
memo
to the District Court for the District of Columbia said Papadopoulos hindered the FBI's ability to get to
Mifsud. "The defendant's lies undermined investigators' ability to challenge the Professor or potentially detain or
arrest him while he was still in the United States. The government understands that the Professor left the United States
on February 11, 2017 and he has not returned to the United States since then," the memo said.
In his letter, Nunes says it is "
still a mystery how the FBI knew to ask Papadopoulos specifically about
Hillary Clinton's emails
" if the bureau had not spoken with Mifsud. -
Washington
Examiner
"If he is in fact a Russian agent, it would be one of the biggest intelligence scandals for not only the United States,
but also our allies like the Italians and the Brits and others. Because if Mifsud is a Russian agent, he would know all
kinds of our intelligence agents throughout the globe," said Nunes during a recent interview with Fox News' Sean Hannity.
Look deeper at the Report re: Mifsud. One interesting omission --
Why are there zero citations to Mifsud's 302 in the Mueller Report?
"... The Senate minority leader–Deep Stater par excellence –knew whereof he spoke. But Trump somehow survived the storm, although sometimes it seemed as if he wouldn't. Now, some of the obvious parties –John K. Brennan and James Clapper with their apparatchik miens -- have suddenly found themselves in the crosshairs, as the Washington Times notes: ..."
"... Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper also leveled up highly publicized comments that President Trump could even be an "asset" of Russian President Vladimir Putin , part of a slew of remarks that critics say went far beyond the usual partisan sniping that can accompany a change of administrations. ..."
"... More's afoot here, however, considerably more because the entire American intelligence system and the unique power referred to by Schumer are also now in those same crosshairs, as they should be. But many of the men and women involved are less overtly Stalinist in their style than Mssrs. Brennan and Clapper and slip more easily under the radar. ..."
"... A top FBI official admitted to Congressional investigators last year that the agency had contacts within the Trump campaign as part of operation "Crossfire Hurricane," which sounds a lot like FBI "informant" Stefan Halper – a former Oxford University professor who was paid over $1 million by the Obama Department of Defense between 2012 and 2018, with nearly half of it surrounding the 2016 US election. ..."
"... "Crossfire Hurricane," as most know, is the codename the wannabe hipsters at the FBI gave the Trump-Russia investigation. But more important is the word "before" in Ms. Cleveland's title. ..."
"... Papadopoulos and Page are the two naifs of the most obvious sort (sorry, guys) we have all seen on television who spent the last couple of years having to defend themselves against absurd charges. Considering the timing, it's pretty obvious they were being set up (i. e. entrapped) on some level well back during the Obama administration. ..."
"... I suggest that an attempt was being made to implant Halper in the Trump campaign, one way or another, not just for spying purposes but actually to help create this collusion of the campaign with Russia–that is, to help manufacture it. ..."
"... Four decades ago, Halper was responsible for a long-forgotten spying scandal involving the 1980 election , in which the Reagan campaign – using CIA officials managed by Halper, reportedly under the direction of former CIA Director and then-Vice-Presidential candidate George H.W. Bush – got caught running a spying operation from inside the Carter administration. The plot involved CIA operatives passing classified information about Carter's foreign policy to Reagan campaign officials in order to ensure the Reagan campaign knew of any foreign policy decisions that Carter was considering. ..."
"... We need Halper, under oath and unredacted. Whether that's possible is another question. ..."
It's bad enough, as has been evident for some time, that Donald Trump and his campaign
were being spied upon by our own government, but it's highly likely they were also subject to
literal entrapment–at least a serious attempt was made.
I don't mean the entrapment of promulgating the salacious Steele dossier both to the public
and the FISA court as if it were the truth. That was more of a smear to justify a phony
investigation. I mean something more subtle and LeCarré-like coming from the depths of
our intelligence communities. It raises once more the question of the power of such agencies in
a free society, a conundrum with no easy answers but of great significance to our lives.
For all his New York rough-and-tumble, Trump was an innocent abroad when he arrived in
Washington. Way back in January 2017, he was warned by old-timer
Chuck Schumer that "intel officials have six ways from Sunday at getting back at
you."
The Senate minority leader–Deep Stater par excellence –knew whereof he
spoke. But Trump somehow survived the storm, although sometimes it seemed as if he wouldn't.
Now, some of the obvious parties –John K. Brennan and James Clapper with their
apparatchik miens -- have suddenly found themselves in the crosshairs, as the
Washington Times notes:
Special counsel Robert Mueller's finding that there was no Trump campaign conspiracy with
Russia to steal
the 2016 election has unleashed a tsunami of outrage toward Obama-era intelligence chiefs,
particularly former CIA
Director John
O. Brennan and former FBI Director James B. Comey, who are accused of pushing the
allegation during congressional hearings, in social media posts and in highly charged
interviews on television over the past two years.
Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper also leveled up
highly publicized comments that President Trump could even be an "asset" of
Russian President Vladimir Putin , part of a slew of
remarks that critics say went far beyond the usual partisan sniping that can accompany a change
of administrations.
More's afoot here, however, considerably more because the entire American intelligence
system and the unique power referred to by Schumer are also now in those same crosshairs, as
they should be. But many of the men and women involved are less overtly Stalinist in their style
than Mssrs. Brennan and Clapper and slip more easily under the radar.
Notable among these, and perhaps able to reveal much of the McGuffin to the mystery of where
this all started and how, is Stefan Halper. Mr. Halper is "an American foreign policy scholar and Senior Fellow at
the University
of Cambridge where he is a Life Fellow at Magdalene College and directs the
Department of Politics and International Studies ." He is also a spook who worked for
Nixon, Ford, and Reagan, no less, and was a principle American connection to the UK's MI-6.
A top FBI official admitted to Congressional investigators last year that the agency had
contacts within the Trump campaign as part of operation "Crossfire Hurricane," which sounds a
lot like FBI "informant" Stefan Halper – a former Oxford University professor who was
paid over $1 million by the Obama Department of Defense between 2012 and 2018, with nearly
half of it surrounding the 2016 US election.
"Crossfire Hurricane," as most know, is the codename the wannabe hipsters at the FBI gave
the Trump-Russia investigation. But more important is the word "before" in Ms. Cleveland's
title.
The Post further noted that the academic, since identified as Stefan
Halper, first met with Trump campaign advisor Carter Page "a few weeks before the opening of
the investigation," and then after Crossfire Hurricane's July 31, 2016, start, he met again
with Carter Page and "with Trump campaign co-chairman Sam Clovis," offering the latter his
"foreign-policy expertise" for the Trump team. Then in September, Halper "reached out to George
Papadopoulos, an unpaid foreign-policy adviser for the campaign, inviting him to London to work
on a research paper."
Papadopoulos and Page are the two naifs of the most obvious sort (sorry, guys) we have all
seen on television who spent the last couple of years having to defend themselves against
absurd charges. Considering the timing, it's pretty obvious they were being set up (i. e.
entrapped) on some level well back during the Obama administration.
Who ordered it is the obvious question, but I'm not going to leave it there.
I
suggest that an attempt was being made to implant Halper in the Trump campaign, one way or
another, not just for spying purposes but actually to help create this collusion of the
campaign with Russia–that is, to help manufacture it.
Putting it another way, someone or some group wanted to create -- or, more subtly, to
encourage the creation -- of Trump-Russia collusion from the inside in order to destroy
Trump before, or failing that, after he was elected.
How's that for a nefarious plot? Worthy of LeCarré or maybe even Graham Greene. But
is it true? I wouldn't bet against it. Something close anyway.
By the way, if I am right, this won't be the first time for Halper. And unfortunately for
Republicans, the shoe was then on the proverbial other foot. As
Glenn Greenwald wrote last year:
Four decades ago, Halper was responsible for
a long-forgotten spying scandal involving the 1980 election , in which the Reagan campaign
– using CIA officials managed by Halper, reportedly under the direction of former CIA
Director and then-Vice-Presidential candidate George H.W. Bush – got caught running a
spying operation from inside the Carter administration. The plot involved CIA operatives
passing classified information about Carter's foreign policy to Reagan campaign officials in
order to ensure the Reagan campaign knew of any foreign policy decisions that Carter was
considering.
Republicans can console themselves that their malfeasance was more benign, relatively. This
new one was outright sedition involving a foreign power. It is a blow to the heart of our
democratic republic. We need Halper, under oath and unredacted. Whether that's possible is
another question.
I don't want to say # AGBarr is positively engaged
on the Dem(on)rats. His mere level headed and professionalism exposed the Dem(on)rats' circus act.
Notable quotes:
"... You might remember that McCabe picked Goldman of all people to interview him about the use of 'Confidential Human Sources' in Operation Crossfire Hurricane - funny that! ..."
"... Goldman's (McCabe's) argument is that the President was a national security risk because he fired Comey. "Counterintelligence investigators had to consider whether the president's own actions constituted a possible threat to national security." ..."
"... 3 years and at least 33 million have been wasted in attempt to link Trump campaign to Russian intelligence ..."
"... Brennan used any Russian talking to a U.S. person as a reason to surveillance the U.S. person. Red scare...the century old excuse used by the FBI to illegally spy on Americans. The history books won't describe his actions as honorable ..."
"... What was it that prompted Goldman (ie McCabe) to publish his latest article on the FBI Russia investigation? Answer: Barr's criticism's of the FBI. ..."
"... CIA/FBI helping each other out. Informally of course. Standard off the books quid pro quo. ..."
"... The F.B.I. received the information from the Australian government on July 26, 2016, the special counsel's report said, and the bureau code-named its investigation Crossfire Hurricane . ..."
Both the Washington Post and CNN - which breathlessly reported on their peers' anonymously-sourced anti-Trump propaganda for two
years - have somehow failed to write a single article mentioning Azra Turk . As the Times revealed on Thursday, the FBI operative
who went by the name Azra Turk repeatedly flirted with Trump aide George Papadopoulos during their encounters as well as in email
exchanges according to an October, 2018
Daily Caller report, confirmed by
the Times.
While in London in 2016, Ms. Turk exchanged emails with Mr. Papadopoulos, saying meeting him had been the " highlight of my
trip ," according to messages provided by Mr. Papadopoulos.
" I am excited about what the future holds for us :), " she wrote. -
New York Times
And as the Times makes clear, "the FBI sent her to London as part of the counterintelligence inquiry opened that summer" to investigate
the Trump campaign. Verified account @ ByronYork May 2 Follow Follow @ ByronYork Following
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In his House testimony, George Papadopoulos described undercover FBI informant Stefan Halper introducing him to undercover FBI
informant 'Azra Turk.' pic.twitter.com/8jO4lK6Ldt
So I get there. I get to
London. And he introduces -- or he does not introduce me to, but I can't remember exactly how I came into contact with his assistant,
this young lady named Azra Turk, which I think is a fake name, by the way. My --
Mr. Meadows. Why do you believe it's a fake name?
Mr. Papadopoulos. Reading -- reading Twitter and people saying that Azra in Turkish means pure and then Turk. So unless she has
the name of pure Turk. I don't know. Maybe that's -- those are common names in Turkey. I don't know. But it just seems that it was
probably a fake alias.
Another beautiful young lady -- you know, I had many young beautiful ladies coming into my life with Joseph Mifsud and now another
professor. The professors liked to introduce me to young beautiful women.
And we're sitting there, and she didn't strike me as a Cambridge associate at all. So right away, I was suspicious that there
was something not right here. She -- her English was very bad. She spoke with -- I think she was a Turkish national, but she also
might have been a dual American citizen. I'm not sure. And she took me to -- out for drinks in London and was probing me a lot.
Meanwhile, a Russian-born academic falsely accused of being a Kremlin 'honeypot' operative against Mike Flynn, Svetlana Lokhova,
has an interesting theory as to why the Times published the '2nd spy' revelation in the first place.
I am a 'veteran' of reading Adam Goldman (NYT) articles about Halper's role with the FBI so here are pointers. You always have
to ask: 1) Why did he write the article? 2) When did he write the article? 3) What is the narrative he is placing? 4) What has
he left out? THREAD
2/ You might remember that McCabe picked Goldman of all people to interview him about the use of 'Confidential Human Sources'
in
Operation Crossfire Hurricane - funny that!
Andrew McCabe intervied by NYT's Adam Goldma...
Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe discussed his career, the FBI, and his firing from the Bureau. He was interviewed
by New York Times reporter Adam Go...
4/ Goldman's (McCabe's) argument is that the President was a national security risk because he fired Comey. "Counterintelligence
investigators had to consider whether the president's own actions constituted a possible threat to national security."
3 years and at least 33 million have been wasted in attempt to link Trump campaign to Russian intelligence. As I stated 2 years
ago, I am not A Russian honeytrap for Gen Flynn.
Brennan used any Russian talking to a U.S. person as a reason to surveillance the U.S. person. Red scare...the century
old excuse used by the FBI to illegally spy on Americans. The history books won't describe his actions as honorable
Svetlana Lokhova @RealSLokhova • 7h v
7/ This is Goldman's implausible explanation for spying. The President is portrayed as nuts, nytimes.com/2018/05/18/us/...
President Trump accused the without evidence, of planting a mole inside his campaign to undermine his presidential run. But
the F.B.I. in fact dispatched a confidential informant to meet with Trump campaign advisers as it began its investigation into
possible links between his campaign and Russia.
8/ What was it that prompted Goldman (ie McCabe) to publish his latest article on the FBI Russia investigation? Answer:
Barr's criticism's of the FBI.
Barr: One of the things I want to look -- there are people -- many people seem to assume that the only intelligence collection
that occurred was a single confidential informant and a FISA warrant. I would like to find out whether that is, in fact, true.
It strikes me as a fairly anemic effort if that was the counterintelligence effort designed to stop the threat as it's being represented.
9/ The message by NYT (McCabe) is that the FBI threw their best guys at this, hence sudden reference to Operation 'Ghost Stories'.
10/ The main message is that the Russia investigation was legally predicated,
CNN law enforcement analyst and retired FBI agent James A. Gagliano opined on Twitter that perhaps the Times was helping the intelligence
community get out in front of the upcoming Inspector General report on the FBI's conduct during the 2016 election.
James A. Gagliano @JamesAGagliano
Must caveat with -- would have had to have been a "CERTIFIED" FBI Undercover Agent (UCA), who had passed the UCA course,
been pre-screened (psychologicals) and been handpicked by FBI HQ for a high-profile overseas assignment. Also, Legat London
would've assuredly coordinated w/MI5.
James A. Gagliano @JamesAGagliano
Unless it was foreign intelligence service supplying the "honey trap.'' Papadopoulos argued *Azra Turk* had thick accent
-- which wouldn't preclude her from FBI service, if US citizen. Some argue Agency employee. Surmise, absent heavy redaction,
pending IG report lays this bare.
James A. Gagliano @JamesAGagliano
MAYBE this is why @nytimes helped get out in front of the news cycle that will roil following IG report that may be released
this month or next.
As I understand it, the CIA is not supposed to be involved with spying on American citizens, but the FBI has wide ranging latitude.
This article says she was presumed to be FBI, but Papadoploulos says he thinks she was CIA. So, it would be a graver offense if
she was CIA and busy performing illegal spying activities on an American citizen.
If I am fuzzy on this, maybe someone can clarify who knows the rules a little better.
MSM burying the truth? Well imagine my shock. I'm surprised the likes of CNN and Facebook are still trying to hide their ban
on truth and just openly claim truth is hate speech.
If you work at the CIA, do you get "honeypot" privileges ?
They must have a lot of downtime.
Wonder if "honeypot" is a line item in the CIA budget and how they forecast that. Do their rates decline over time, maybe with
an associated depletion account set up like for petroleum reserves. Lots of questions here.
"Mr. Barr reignited the controversy last month when
he told
Congress , "I think spying on a political campaign is a big deal." He backed off the charged declaration later in the same
hearing, saying: "I think spying did occur. The question is whether it was adequately predicated. And I'm not suggesting that
it wasn't adequately predicated. But I need to explore that." "
......
Mr. Barr again defended his use of the term "spying" at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday, saying he wanted
to know more about the F.B.I.'s investigative efforts during 2016 and explained that the early inquiry most likely went beyond
the use of an informant and a court-authorized wiretap of a former Trump campaign adviser, Carter Page, who had interacted with
a Russian intelligence officer.
.....
Weeks before Mr. Papadopoulos met with Ms. Turk and Mr. Halper, the F.B.I. had opened its investigation into the Russia effort
-- based largely on information that Mr. Papadopoulos had relayed to an Australian diplomat about a Russian offer to help the
Trump campaign by releasing thousands of hacked Democratic emails.
The F.B.I. received the information from the Australian government on July 26, 2016, the special counsel's report said, and
the bureau code-named its investigation
Crossfire Hurricane .
Investigators scrambled to determine whether Mr. Papadopoulos had any Russian contacts while deciding to scrutinize three additional
Trump campaign aides who had concerning ties to Russia: Paul Manafort, its chairman; Michael T. Flynn, who went on to be the president's
first national security adviser; and Mr. Page.
His response: "I'm just going to leave it right now as a 'government investigator.' I use that wording for a reason, and
I'm going to leave it at that."
Priceless!
Not FBI, just a 'government investigator.' and "I use that wording for a reason," and people on Twitter all trying to solve
that complicated puzzle ! LOL.
There's a very easy way to pin this down. Since Halper introduced her as his "assistant",
he should have no problem telling everybody where she is now.
If he is unable to produce her or show any proof that she was his own assistant-- he's a
spy. period.
Q said tonight that this is the order of the tsunami of documents/testimony coming out
in the next few days/weeks:
AG BARR testifies in front of Congress on MAY 1,2
The Comey Investigation is coming out in less than 14 days...indictments are
coming
The FISA declass comes out after that in May. This will take down Obama and everyone
else
The Horrowitz IG Report comes out right after that....it will be devastating to all
the players in this mess
... ... ...
Here is the lineup of what happened by the traitors in the coup
- Obama led everything from the White House. He spied on everyone
- Hillary Clinton was the financier through her fake foundation
- Brennan was the instigator
- Clapper and Comey were the leakers
- Christopher Steele and Glen Simpson were facilitators who created it all and
fabricated the document with the Russians
- Comey and McCabe and Strozk and Page were driving the engine of this attempted coup
on Trump
... ... ...
-The democrats were involved in all of this...from Schiff to the rest of them in
Congress.
The FISA declass coming out Monday?...
Hannity, Tucker, and Laura Ingrahm were all out on Friday. Something BIG is up,
folks!!!
Stay tuned...!!!
Obama, Biden, and Hillary are TOAST!! OBAMA RAN THE WHOLE SHOW FROM THE WHITE
HOUSE!!!!
"IT'S HANGIN' TIME!!"
" New Spygate Revelation: The Corruption Is Leading Right Back To The
'Scandal-Free' Obama White House!!"
ObamaGate: No Misdemeanors, Only High Crimes
Sens. Charles Grassley & Ron Johnson Release Letter to Attorney General William Barr,
Demand Details About Investigation Into Obama's Illegal Spying on Trump Campaign [FULL
LETTER]
"Those that yell the loudest are the ones going down" -Q
: Schiff, Waters, BRENNAN , Comey, Hillery, etc!!
Here it is folks, for those who have not seen it...the full interview of Trump last
night where Trump himself lays it all out. "When do birds sing? Springtime!" - Q
These people are going to hang. The coup has been stopped. The deep state is surrounded.
OUR BORDER IS BEING MANNED WITH OUR MILITARY EVEN AS YOU READ THIS! Trump is building
the Wall! The entire thing is going to be seen on public TV this summer. Trump said you will
see:
The FISA declass...which will take down the House! That means Obama, Hillary, Comey,
Lynch, Rosenstein, Biden, all of the perps who you already know in the FBI, Brennan ,
Clapper, McCabe, Mueller, the democrats, Waters, Schiff, Nadler, Swalowswell, Nadler, Pelosi,
the lousy lying MSM...all of them! And lots more!
Trump said he is going to declass everything! The FISA, AND A WHOLE LOT MORE!!!
Everything! Trump is going after them, and they are surrounded. No place to hide, Hillary!
No place to hide, Obama and all of your creeps. You are going to jail, or the hanging tree.
One way or another, you are done!
FISA declass.
OIG Report Horrowitz.
302's
*HUGE COMEY REPORT COMING OUT IN TWO WEEKS! INDICTMENTS COMING!!- Prosecutor Joe
Digenova! Leaking classified information to the press, lying to the FISA COURT!!
Gang of 8 documents
Documents and testimony from 53 closed door investigations.
Senate Intel investigations
House Intel investigations
The AG Barr report
Huber's leaking report and the 90,000 sealed indictments
3 large prison barges are going back and forth from New York to Gitmo... WHY?
Barr's testimony on March 1, 2 that will be a bombshell
Q was right all along!
The FISA court Judges have just turned over the documents showing that they were lied to
by Comey, Rosenstein, etc.
New Spygate Revelation: The Corruption Is Leading Right Back To The 'Scandal-Free' Obama
White House
Trump is closing every avenue of escape, money laundering, pedo stuff, criminal CEO's,
politicians, etc.
Trump has ALL of Hillary's emails, including those that Obama had
Trump will declass 911, JFK, aliens, who Obama really is, his citizenship status of the
country he was born in, everything!
Trump has Wikileaks sources....; )) ...soon he will have Assange
Trump has all of their communications....; )) ALL OF THEM!
Obama had thousand of Hillary's emails (49,000) and ran the entire op from his office in
the White House
Hillary-"if Trump gets in we will all hang!", as she screamed at everybody on election
night!
Trump has the NSA and the other 17 intel orgs that nobody knows about that have
everything.... ; )))
Trump has it all! Trump also has clawed back $Trillions of stolen funds they took
The dems will be retiring en masse soon...Trump will take back the House in 2020
Court TV is coming back this summer. Hillary wanted that. Now you will be watching HER
being indicted!
The libtard morons are going to go berserk folks! The show is beginning officially as of
last night. There is no place to hide for them. The MSM is in full meltdown and the perps are
panicking all over the planet!
*Bill Maher just turned on Adam Schiff....says "he is stalking Trump!"...
*Washington Times reporter Bob Woodward says "the Steele Dossier is a bunch of
garbage!"
... ... ...
Proud-Christian-White-American-Man , 1 minute ago
link
Real Estate Guru: Great compilation of really bad news for the globalist traitors who sold
the US out to the Chicoms and really good news for the Patriots!
The war on Zero Hedge against the Chicom trolls will soon go to the next level On a gut
level the Steverino999's , his other screen names and the reset of the trolls know that when
Patriots fully regain control of the US government it won't be pretty for them
Yes, Real Estate Guru and other fellow Patriots it is wonderful to see the battle turning
for liberty and against globalist chicom tyranny ( and their henchmen) but Please do not be
complacent there is much yet to be done before these sewer rats are flushed away from body
politic of the US
The investigation was weak and biased: the real McCarthyism witch hunt. Mueller Mifsud blunder now will be played by Nunes
and other republicans to the fullest extent possible, althouth this is only a tip of the iceberg of Mueller corruption. Other
parts are too dangerous to expose and will be swiped under the carpet.
Notable quotes:
"... Mueller begins, on Page 1, with this assertion: "The Russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion." Maybe so, but Mueller, who is not averse to editorializing and contextualizing elsewhere in the report, gives readers no historical background or context for this large generalization. ..."
"... Readers might wonder if, had Hillary Clinton won the 2016 election, there even would have been a Russiagate and Mueller investigation. ..."
"... Mueller repeatedly attributes to Trump campaign members and Russians who interacted in 2016, potentially in sinister or even criminal ways, a desire for "improved U.S.-Russian relations," for "bringing the end of the new Cold War," for a "new beginning with Russia." ..."
"... As reflected in the text and footnotes, Mueller relies heavily on reports by US intelligence agencies , but without treating the recorded misdeeds of those agencies, particularly the CIA under John Brennan , in promoting the Russiagate saga. ..."
"... Mueller reports that Mifsud "had connections to Russia" (p. 5), although a simple Google search suggests that Mifsud was indeed an "agent" but not a Russian one, as widely alleged in media accounts. ..."
"... Toward the end of the first volume (pp. 144, 146), Mueller produces a truly stunning revelation, though he seems unaware of it. After the 2016 US presidential election, the Kremlin "appeared not to have preexisting contacts with senior officials around the President-Elect." Even more, "Putin spoke of the difficulty faced by the Russian government in getting in touch with the incoming Trump Administration . Putin indicated that he did not know with whom formally to speak and generally did not know the people around the President-Elect." ..."
"... So much for all the shameful Russiagate allegations of Trump-Putin collusion, conspiracy, even treason. Surely it means the United States needs another, different investigation, one into the actual origins and meaning of this fraudulent, corrosive, exceedingly dangerous, and still unending American political scandal. ..."
Special prosecutor Robert S. Mueller III's two-volume
"
Report on the Investigation Into Russian Interference in the 2016 Presidential Election "
is not an easy read -- not unlike those manuals that come boxed with "easy to assemble"
multipart children's toys on Christmas Eve. Nonetheless, considering the exceedingly damaging
effects Russiagate has had on America at home and abroad for nearly three years, the report
will long be studied for what it reveals and does not reveal, what it includes and does not
include.
Because of my own special interest in Russia, I read carefully the first volume, which
focuses on that country's purported role in the scandal. I came away with as many questions
about the report as about the role of Moscow and that of candidate and then President Donald
Trump. To note a few:
Mueller begins, on Page 1, with this assertion: "The Russian government interfered in the
2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion." Maybe so, but Mueller, who is
not averse to editorializing and contextualizing elsewhere in the report, gives readers no
historical background or context for this large generalization.
In particular, was the
interference -- or "meddling," as media accounts characterize it -- more or less "sweeping and
systematic" than was Washington's military intervention in the Russian civil war in 1918 or its
very intrusive campaign to re-elect Russian President Boris Yeltsin in 1996 -- or, on the other
side of the ledger, the role of the Soviet-backed American Communist Party in US politics in
the 20th century? That is, what warranted a special investigation of this episode in
a century of mutual American-Russian interference in the other's politics? Put somewhat
differently: Readers might wonder if, had Hillary Clinton won the 2016 election, there even
would have been a Russiagate and Mueller investigation.
It has occasionally been suggested that Russiagate was originated by high-level US
officials who disliked candidate Trump's pledge to "cooperate with Russia." This suspicion
remains unproven, but throughout, Mueller repeatedly attributes to Trump campaign members and
Russians who interacted in 2016, potentially in sinister or even criminal ways, a desire for
"improved U.S.-Russian relations," for "bringing the end of the new Cold War," for a "new
beginning with Russia."
Even Russian President Vladimir Putin is reported to have wanted
"reconciliation between the United States and Russia." (See, for example, pp. 5, 98, 105, 124,
157.) The result is, of course, to discredit America's once-mainstream advocacy of
détente. Mueller even brands American pro-détente views -- as Presidents
Eisenhower, Nixon, and Reagan held in the 20th century -- as "pro-Russia foreign policy
positions" (p. 102). Does this mean that Americans who hold pro-détente views today, as
I and quite a few others do, are to be investigated for their "contacts" with Russians in
pursuit of better relations? Mueller seems to say nothing to offset this implication, which has
already adversely affected a few Americans mentioned and not mentioned in his report.
As reflected in the text and footnotes, Mueller relies heavily on reports by US intelligence
agencies , but without treating the recorded misdeeds of those agencies, particularly
the CIA under John
Brennan , in promoting the Russiagate saga. He also relies heavily on contemporary media
accounts of Russiagate as it unfolded, but without taking into account their journalistic
malpractices, as abundantly documented by
Matt Taibbi , who equates the malpractice with news reports leading up to the US invasion
of Iraq.
Nor does Mueller consider alternative scenarios and explanations, as any good historical
or judicial investigation must do. For example, he accepts uncritically the Clinton/Democratic
National Committee allegation that Russian agents hacked and disseminated their emails in 2016.
Again, maybe so, but why did he not do his own forensic examination or even mention the
alternative finding by VIPS that they were stolen and leaked by an insider? Why did he not
question Julian Assange, who claimed to know how and through whom the emails reached WikiLeaks?
And how to explain Mueller's minimal interest in the shadowy professor Joseph Mifsud, who
helped entrap George Papadopoulos in London?
Mueller reports that Mifsud "had connections to
Russia" (p. 5), although a simple Google search suggests that Mifsud was indeed an "agent" but
not a Russian one, as widely alleged in media accounts.
Though he may do so in the second volume of the report, Mueller oddly does not focus in
the first volume on the Steele dossier, where it surely belongs as a foundational Russiagate
document and whose anti-Trump "information" is now widely acknowledged to have been "salacious
and unverified." At one point, however, Mueller delivers a telling report: "Trump would not pay
for opposition research" (p. 61). Can this be anything other than a damning, if oblique,
judgment on the Clinton campaign, which is known to have paid for the Steele
dossier?
Toward the end of the first volume (pp. 144, 146), Mueller produces a truly stunning
revelation, though he seems unaware of it. After the 2016 US presidential election, the Kremlin
"appeared not to have preexisting contacts with senior officials around the President-Elect."
Even more, "Putin spoke of the difficulty faced by the Russian government in getting in touch
with the incoming Trump Administration . Putin indicated that he did not know with whom
formally to speak and generally did not know the people around the President-Elect."
So much for all the shameful Russiagate allegations of Trump-Putin collusion, conspiracy,
even treason. Surely it means the United States needs another, different investigation, one
into the actual origins and meaning of this fraudulent, corrosive, exceedingly dangerous, and
still unending American political scandal.
This commentary is based on Stephen F. Cohen's most recent weekly discussion with the host
of The John Batchelor Show . Now in their sixth year, previous installments are at
TheNation.com .
"... The truth is, that a foreign government did indeed meddle in the American Presidential election, in a failed attempt to fix the outcome, but it was not Russia. It was the City of London, and the Five Eyes imperial intelligence services of the British Commonwealth, along with treasonous, "Tory" American elements. If that admission is forced to the surface, through the vigorous actions of all that oppose the presently dominant Big Lie tyranny, that revelation will shock and liberate people all over the world. The mental stranglehold of "fake news" media outlets can be permanently broken. That is the task of the next days and weeks. ..."
"... Apart from documenting the presence of "former" British intelligence agent Christopher Steele, former MI6 head Sir Richard Dearlove, and former GCHQ head Robert Hannigan at the center of the Russiagate campaign against President Trump for the past several years, we must, in order to expose this successfully, identify not only what was actually done and who was doing it, but the deeper policy motivation: why it was done. ..."
"... President Donald Trump has no vested interest in protecting the British "special relationship." From his second day in office, Trump declared that he would clean out the intelligence agencies. If Trump were to do that, however, the real, tragic history of America's last 50 years would be exhumed from that swamp. Shining a light into that darkness would illuminate the world. The American people would stop playing Othello to the City of London's Iago. They would denounce the British "special relationship," never again to fight imperial wars for the greater glory of the British Empire. They would learn the true story of Vietnam, of Iraq 1991 and Iraq 2003, of Libya 2011, and many other conflicts, special operations, and assassinations. The American people would know the truth, and the truth would set them free. ..."
"... The current insurrection against the United States Presidency is part of a global strategic battle: will a conspiracy of republican forces overcome the modern day British imperial system, centered in the hot money centers of the City of London and Wall Street, or will the oligarchical system once again triumph, immiserating all but the very wealthy? That is the real issue of the insurrection against the maverick American president being conducted by the London and NATO-centered enforcers of the old world. To paraphrase the American Declaration of Independence, ..."
"... According to CIA Director John Brennan's Congressional testimony, the British began complaining loudly about candidate Trump and Russia in late 2015. Brennan's statements were echoed in articles in The Guardian . According to Brennan, intelligence leads about Trump and Russia had been forwarded to Brennan from both British intelligence and from Estonia. ..."
"... This task force targeted Trump campaign volunteers Carter Page and George Papadopoulos in entrapment operations on British soil, using British agents, during the spring and summer of 2016. ..."
"... Hannigan abruptly resigned from GCHQ shortly after the election, sparking widespread speculation that the British were making an attempt at damage control. ..."
"... In 2016, the Manafort investigation migrated to the Democratic National Committee with direct assistance provided by Ukrainian state intelligence. This effort was led by Alexandra Chalupa, an admirer of Stepan Bandera and other heroes of Nazi history in Ukraine. Chalupa also had deep connections to British-oriented networks at the U.S. State Department. ..."
"... The final nail in this case has been provided by The Hill 's John Solomon. He says that Steele told former Associate Attorney General Bruce Ohr about the sources for the dirty dossier. According to Solomon, Ohr's notes reveal one main source, a former senior Russian intelligence official living in the United States. But, as anyone familiar with the territory would know, there is no such retired senior Russian intelligence official living in the United States whose entire life is not controlled by the CIA. ..."
"... As a result of Congressional investigations of Russiagate, it has become abundantly clear that the British operation against Trump was aided and abetted by the Obama White House, the State Department, the CIA, the FBI, and personalities associated with the National Endowment for Democracy. ..."
"... Out of the Ukraine coup, an entire military-centered propaganda apparatus arose, first through NATO, and then out from there to military units and diplomatic centers in the U.S., Europe, and Britain, to run low intensity operations, and black propaganda, against Russia. ..."
"... The British end of the operation includes the Integrity Initiative, the 77th Brigade, and NATO's Strategic Communications Center. In the United States, the Integrity Initiative has been integrated into the Global Engagement Center at the U.S. State Department. Most certainly, this operation is poised again to intervene in the U.S. elections; the British House of Lords have stated explicitly, in their December 2018 report, British Foreign Policy in a Shifting World Order, that Donald Trump must not be re-elected. ..."
"... This is why the British are yelping that under no circumstances can the classified documents concerning their role in the attempted coup against Donald Trump be declassified. It would end their leverage over the United States and much of Europe. That is why these documents must indeed be declassified, and parallel investigations by citizens and government officials concerned with ending the imperial system, otherwise known as the current "war party," must begin in earnest. ..."
"... Why did the DNC not allow the FBI to investigate the so-called" Russian hacked" emails? Rather, they hire CrowdStrike did you know: ..."
"... War with Afghanistan was Obama's payoff to the MIC, just as Russia is now Trump's payoff. ..."
"... The important truth about the emails is in their authenticity and in the contents. No one has even attempted to claim that they are not authentic or that the contents we've seen are other than the actual contents of the authentic messages. ..."
"... That is what i think. People should not concentrate on how, who and where. This is just a smokescreen to avoid talking about the content of the emails and Hillary Clinton's disgusting actions. She is a criminal and a murderess just like Obama and Tony Blair are lyers and mass murderers. ..."
The British Role in 'Russiagate' Is About to Be Fully Exposed April 8, 2019
20190408-russiagate-exposed-brits.pdf
The "fake news" media has now dropped its pretense of having ever had any intention of allowing the truth -- as documented in
U.S. Attorney General Barr's summary of Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller's report, exonerating President Donald Trump of having
"conspired or coordinated with the Russian government" -- to thoroughly refute the Russiagate "Big Lie." Soon, however, it is certain
that the deliberate, British Intelligence-originated, military-grade disinformation campaign carried out against the United States,
including to this day, will be exposed.
The truth is, that a foreign government did indeed meddle in the American Presidential election, in a failed attempt to fix
the outcome, but it was not Russia. It was the City of London, and the Five Eyes imperial intelligence services of the British Commonwealth,
along with treasonous, "Tory" American elements. If that admission is forced to the surface, through the vigorous actions of all
that oppose the presently dominant Big Lie tyranny, that revelation will shock and liberate people all over the world. The mental
stranglehold of "fake news" media outlets can be permanently broken. That is the task of the next days and weeks.
"It's hard to find a black cat in a dark room, especially if there is no cat," says the Chinese proverb. Yet, although the Mueller
report was called a "nothing burger," it was not: it still presented the potentially lethal lie that twelve Russian gremlins, code-named
Guccifer 2.0, hacked the DNC. Sundry media meatheads thus continue to blog and broadcast about "what else is really there."
The false Russian hack story, still being repeated, marches on, undeterred, like the emperor without any clothes. One lame-brained
variation, promoted in order to cover up the British role, states that Hillary Clinton, rather than Trump, colluded with the Russians.
It is being repeated by Republicans and Democrats alike, some of them malicious, some of them confused, and all of them completely
wrong. The media, such as the failed New York Times and various electronic media, must be forced to either admit the truth,
or be even more thoroughly discredited than they already have been. They must stop their constant repetition of this Joseph Goebbels-like
Big Lie. There must be a vigorous dissemination of the truth by all those journalists, politicians, activists and citizens that love
truth more than their own assumptions, including about President Trump, or other dearly-held systems of false belief.
Apart from documenting the presence of "former" British intelligence agent Christopher Steele, former MI6 head Sir Richard
Dearlove, and former GCHQ head Robert Hannigan at the center of the Russiagate campaign against President Trump for the past several
years, we must, in order to expose this successfully, identify not only what was actually done and who was doing it, but the deeper
policy motivation: why it was done.
A New Cultural Paradigm
The world is actually on the verge of ending the military conflicts among the major world powers, such as Russia, China, the United
States, and India. These four powers, and not the City of London, are the key fulcrum around which a new era in humanity's future
will be decided. A new monetary and credit system brought into being through these four powers would foster the greatest physical
economic growth in the history of humanity. In addition, discussions involving Italy working with China on the industrialization
of the African continent (discussions which could soon also involve the United States) show that sections of Europe want to join
China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and leave the dying trans-Atlantic financial empire behind.
The recent announcement of a United States commitment to return to the Moon by 2024 can, in particular, become the basis for a
proposal to other nations -- for example, China, Russia, and India, all of whom are space powers of demonstrated capability -- to
resolve their differences on Earth in a higher, joint mission. As Russia's Roscosmos Director Dmitry Rogozin said in a recent interview:
"I am a fierce proponent of international cooperation, including with Americans, because their country is big and technologically
advanced, and they can make good partners Especially since personal and professional relations between Roscosmos and NASA at the
working level are great."
There is also the possibility of ending the danger of thermonuclear war. President Trump, speaking on April 4 of the prospects
for world peace, stated:
"Between Russia, China, and us, we're all making hundreds of billions of dollars worth of weapons, including nuclear, which is
ridiculous. I think it's much better if we all got together and didn't make these weapons those three countries I think can come
together and stop the spending and spend on things that are more productive toward long-term peace."
This is a statement of real importance. Such an outlook is a rejection of the "perpetual crisis/perpetual war" outlook of the
Bush-Obama Administration, a four-term "war presidency" which was abruptly, unexpectedly ended in 2016. The British were not amused.
It is to stop this new cultural paradigm, pivoted on the Pacific and the potential Four Powers alliance, that British imperial
forces have deployed. The 2016 election of President Trump, and his personal friendship with President Xi Jinping and desire to work
with President Putin, are an intolerable strategic threat to the eighteenth-century geopolitics of the British empire. They have
repeatedly used Russiagate to disrupt the process of deliberation among Presidents Xi, Trump, and Putin, thus increasing the danger
of war. Russiagate, in the interest of international security, must be ended by exposing it for the utter fraud that it is.
The Truth Set Free
President Donald Trump has no vested interest in protecting the British "special relationship." From his second day in office,
Trump declared that he would clean out the intelligence agencies. If Trump were to do that, however, the real, tragic history of
America's last 50 years would be exhumed from that swamp. Shining a light into that darkness would illuminate the world. The American
people would stop playing Othello to the City of London's Iago. They would denounce the British "special relationship," never again
to fight imperial wars for the greater glory of the British Empire. They would learn the true story of Vietnam, of Iraq 1991 and
Iraq 2003, of Libya 2011, and many other conflicts, special operations, and assassinations. The American people would know the truth,
and the truth would set them free.
The current insurrection against the United States Presidency is part of a global strategic battle: will a conspiracy of republican
forces overcome the modern day British imperial system, centered in the hot money centers of the City of London and Wall Street,
or will the oligarchical system once again triumph, immiserating all but the very wealthy? That is the real issue of the insurrection
against the maverick American president being conducted by the London and NATO-centered enforcers of the old world. To paraphrase
the American Declaration of Independence,
"The history of the present Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the
undermining of the United States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world."
DOCUMENTATION
While Robert Mueller found that there was "no collusion" between Donald Trump or the Trump Campaign and Russia, he also filed
two indictments regarding alleged Russian interference in the 2016 election. The first alleges that 12 members of Russian Military
Intelligence hacked the DNC and John Podesta and delivered the purloined files to WikiLeaks for strategic publication before the
July 2016 Democratic National Convention and in October 2016, one month before the election. The second indictment charges the Internet
Research Agency, a Russian internet merchandising and marketing firm, with running social media campaigns in the U.S. in 2016 designed
to impact the election. When the fuller version of the Mueller report becomes public, it is certain to recharge the claims of Russian
interference based on the so-called background "evidence" supporting these indictments.
The good news, however, is that investigations in the United States and Britain, have unearthed significant contrary evidence
exposing British Intelligence, NATO, and, to a lesser extent, Ukraine, as the actual foreign actors in the 2016 U.S. presidential
election. We provide a short summary of the main aspects of that evidence to spark further investigations of the British intelligence
networks, entities, and methods at issue, internationally. More detailed accounts concerning specific aspects of what we recite here
can be found on our website.
The Russian Hack That Wasn't
The Veterans Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, an association of former U.S. intelligence officials, have demonstrated that
the Russian hack of the DNC alleged by Robert Mueller, was more likely an internal leak,
rather than a hack conducted
over the internet. William Binney, who conducted the main investigations for the VIPS, spent 30 years at the National Security Agency,
becoming Technical Director. He designed the sorts of NSA programs that would detect a Russian hack if one occurred. Binney conducted
an actual forensic examination of the DNC files released by WikiLeaks, and the related files circulated by the persona Guccifer 2.0,
who Robert Mueller claims is a GRU creation. Binney has demonstrated that the calculated transfer speeds and metadata characteristics
of these files are consistent with downloading to a thumb drive or storage device rather than an internet-based hack. This supports
the account by WikiLeaks of how it obtained the files. According to WikiLeaks and former Ambassador Craig Murray, they were obtained
from a person who was not a Russian state actor of any kind, in Washington, D.C. WikiLeaks offered to tell the Justice Department
all about this, and actual negotiations to this effect were proceeding in early 2017, when Senator Mark Warner and FBI Director James
Comey acted to sabotage and end the negotiations.
Further, as opposed to the hyperbole in the media and in Robert Mueller's indictment, analysis of the Internet Research Agency's
alleged "weaponization" of Facebook in 2016 involved
a paltry total of $46,000 in Facebook
ads and $4,700 spent on Google platforms . In an election in which the major campaigns spend tens of thousands of dollars every
day on these platforms, whatever the IRA thought it was doing in its amateurish and juvenile memes and tropes was like throwing a
stone in the ocean. Most of these activities occurred after the election and never mentioned either candidate. The interpretation
that these ads were designed to draw clicks and website traffic, rather than influence the election, must be considered.
The "evidence" for Mueller's GRU hacking indictment was provided, in part, by CrowdStrike, the DNC vendor that originated the
claims that the Russians had hacked that entity. CrowdStrike is closely associated with the Atlantic Council's Digital Research Lab
(DRL), an operation jointly funded by NATO's Strategic Communications Center and the U.S. State Department, to counter Russian "hybrid
warfare." CrowdStrike has been caught more than once falsely attributing hacks to the Russians and the Atlantic Council's DRL is
a font of anti-Russian intelligence operations.
The British Target Trump
According to CIA Director John Brennan's Congressional testimony, the British began complaining loudly about candidate Trump
and Russia in late 2015. Brennan's statements were echoed in articles in The Guardian . According to Brennan, intelligence
leads about Trump and Russia had been forwarded to Brennan from both British intelligence and from Estonia. The former head
of the Russia Desk for MI6 and protégé of Sir Richard Dearlove, Christopher Steele, fresh from working for British Intelligence,
the FBI, and U.S. State Department in the 2014 Ukraine coup, assembled in 2016 a phony dossier called Operation Charlemagne, claiming
widespread Russian interference in European elections, including in the Brexit vote. By the spring of 2016, Steele was contributing
to a British/U.S. intelligence task force on the Trump Campaign which had been convened at CIA headquarters under John Brennan's
direction.
This task force targeted Trump campaign volunteers Carter Page and George Papadopoulos in entrapment operations on British
soil, using British agents, during the spring and summer of 2016. The personnel employed in these operations all had multiple
connections to the British firm Hakluyt, to Steele's firm Orbis, and to the British military's Integrity Initiative. Sometime in
the summer of 2016, Robert Hannigan, then head of GCHQ, flew to Washington to brief John Brennan personally. Hannigan abruptly
resigned from GCHQ shortly after the election, sparking widespread speculation that the British were making an attempt at damage
control.
Michael Flynn and Paul Manafort were already on the radar and under investigation by the same British, Dearlove-centered intelligence
network and by Christopher Steele specifically. Flynn had been defamed by Dearlove and Stefan Halper, as a possible Russian agent
way back in 2014 because he spoke to Russian researcher Svetlana Lokhova at a dinner sponsored by Dearlove's Cambridge Security Forum.
Or, at least that was the pretext for the targeting of Flynn, who otherwise defied British intelligence by exposing Western support
for terrorist operations in Syria and sought a collaborative relationship with Russia to counter ISIS. Manafort was under FBI investigation
throughout 2014 and 2015, largely in retaliation for his role in steering the Party of the Regions to political power in Ukraine.
In 2016, the Manafort investigation migrated to the Democratic National Committee with direct assistance provided by Ukrainian
state intelligence. This effort was led by Alexandra Chalupa, an admirer of Stepan Bandera and other heroes of Nazi history in Ukraine.
Chalupa also had deep connections to British-oriented networks at the U.S. State Department.
In or around June 2016, Christopher Steele began writing his dirty and bogus dossier about Trump and Russia. This is the dossier
which claimed that Trump was compromised by Putin and that Putin was coordinating with Trump in the 2016 election. The main "legend"
of this full-spectrum information warfare operation run from Britain, was that Donald Trump was receiving "dirt" on Hillary Clinton
from Russia. The operations targeting Page and Papadopoulos consisted of multiple attempts to plant fabricated evidence on them which
would reflect what Steele himself was fabricating in the dirty dossier. At the very same time, the infamous June 2016 meeting at
Trump Tower was being set up. That meeting involved the Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya, who, it was alleged in a series of
bizarre emails written by British publicist Ron Goldstone to set up the meeting, could deliver "dirt" on Hillary Clinton direct from
the Russian government. Veselnitskaya didn't deliver any such dirt. But the entire operation was being monitored by State Department
intelligence agent Kyle Parker, an expert on Russia. Parker's emails reveal deep ties to the highest levels of British intelligence
and much chatter between them about Trump and Russia.
A now-changed version of the website for Christopher Steele's firm, Orbis, trumpeted an expertise in information warfare operations,
and the networks in which Steele runs are deeply integrated into the British military's Integrity Initiative. The Integrity Initiative
is a rapid response propaganda operation using major journalists in the United States and Europe to carry out targeted defamation
campaigns. Its central charge, according to documents posted by the hacking group Anonymous, is selling the United States and Western
Europe on the immediate need for regime change in Russia, even if that involves war.
Much has been made by Republicans and other lunkheads in the U.S. Congress of Steele's contacts with Russians for his dossier.
They claim that such contacts resulted in a Russian disinformation operation being run through the duped Christopher Steele. Nothing
could be further from the truth.
MI6's Dirty Dossier on Donald Trump: Full-Spectrum Information Warfare
On its face, Steele's dossier would immediately be recognized as a complete fabrication by any competent intelligence analyst.
He cites some 32 sources inside the Russian government for his fabricated claims about Trump. What they allegedly told him is specific
enough in time and content to identify them. To believe that the dossier is true or that actual Russians contributed to it, you must
also believe that that the British government was willing to roll up this entire network, exposing them, since the intention was
for the dossier's wild claims to be published as widely as possible. By all accounts, Britain and the United States together do not
have 32 highly placed sources inside the Russian government, nor would they ever make them public in this way or with this very sloppy
tradecraft. Steele's fabrication also uses aspects of readily available public information, such as the sale of 19% of the energy
company Rosneft, (the alleged bribe offered to Carter Page for lifting sanctions) to concoct a fictional narrative of high crimes
and misdemeanors.
Other claims in the dossier were published, publicly, in various Ukrainian publications. The famous claim that Trump directed
prostitutes to urinate on a bed once slept upon by Barack Obama seems to be plagiarized from similarly fake 2009 British propaganda
stories about Silvio Berlusconi spending the night with a prostitute in a hotel room in Rome, "defiling" Putin's bed. According to
various sources in the United States, this outrageous claim was made by Sergei Millian. George Papadopoulos has stated that he believes
Millian is an FBI informant, recounting in his book how a friend of Millian's blurted this out when Millian, Papadopoulos and the
friend were having coffee.
The final nail in this case has been provided by The Hill 's John Solomon. He says that Steele told former Associate
Attorney General Bruce Ohr about the sources for the dirty dossier. According to Solomon, Ohr's notes reveal one main source, a former
senior Russian intelligence official living in the United States. But, as anyone familiar with the territory would know, there is
no such retired senior Russian intelligence official living in the United States whose entire life is not controlled by the CIA.
Despite its obvious fake pedigree, Steele's dossier was laundered into the Justice Department repeatedly, by the CIA and State
Department and the Obama White House. It was used to obtain FISA surveillance warrants turning key members of the Trump Campaign
into walking microphones. It was circulated endlessly by the Clinton Campaign to a network of reporters in the U.S. known to serve
as scribes for the intelligence community. John Brennan used it to conduct a special emergency briefing of the leading members of
the U.S. Congress charged with intelligence responsibilities in August of 2016 and to brief Harry Reid, who was Senate Majority Leader
at the time. All of this activity meant that the salacious accusation that Trump was a Putin pawn and the FBI was investigating the
matter, leaked out and was used by the Clinton Campaign to defame Trump for its electoral advantage. When Trump won, Steele's nonsense
received the stamp of the U.S. intelligence community and official currency in the campaign to take out the President.
As a result of Congressional investigations of Russiagate, it has become abundantly clear that the British operation against
Trump was aided and abetted by the Obama White House, the State Department, the CIA, the FBI, and personalities associated with the
National Endowment for Democracy. The individuals involved might be named Veterans of the 2014 Ukrainian Coup, since all of
them also worked on this operation. It is no accident that Victoria Nuland, the case agent for the Ukraine coup, played a major role
in bolstering Steele's credentials for the purpose of selling his dirty dossier to the media and to the Justice Department. This
went so far as Steele giving a full scale briefing on his fabricated dossier at the State Department in October 2016.
Out of the Ukraine coup, an entire military-centered propaganda apparatus arose, first through NATO, and then out from there
to military units and diplomatic centers in the U.S., Europe, and Britain, to run low intensity operations, and black propaganda,
against Russia.
The British end of the operation includes the Integrity Initiative, the 77th Brigade, and NATO's Strategic Communications
Center. In the United States, the Integrity Initiative has been integrated into the Global Engagement Center at the U.S. State Department.
Most certainly, this operation is poised again to intervene in the U.S. elections; the British House of Lords have stated explicitly,
in their December 2018 report, British Foreign Policy in a Shifting World Order, that Donald Trump must not be re-elected.
This is why the British are yelping that under no circumstances can the classified documents concerning their role in the
attempted coup against Donald Trump be declassified. It would end their leverage over the United States and much of Europe. That
is why these documents must indeed be declassified, and parallel investigations by citizens and government officials concerned with
ending the imperial system, otherwise known as the current "war party," must begin in earnest.
"in a post-Iraq invasion world, only herd-minded human livestock believe"
Perhaps add mainstream media to the list of such sincere believers, they will fire their own real journalists.
David Walters , April 24, 2019 at 13:14
"This doesn't mean that Russia would never use hackers to interfere in world political affairs or that Vladimir Putin is some
sort of virtuous girl scout, it just means that in a post-Iraq invasion world, only herd-minded human livestock believe the unsubstantiated
assertions of opaque and unaccountable government agencies about governments who are oppositional to those same agencies."
Absolutely correct.
Anyone who still believes what the IC says if a moron. As Pompeo recently said to the student body of Texas A&M University,
my alma matta, the CIA's job is to lie, cheat and steel. He went on the explain that the CIA has courses to teach their agent
that dark "art".
Right, David Walters, and see Pompous Pompeo now. The only truths he's told was to a student body of Texas A&M University –
his own alma mater – the CIA's job is to lie, cheat and steal.
Even though he's left his post as CIA Director and assumed his current post of Secretary of State. Pompous Pompeo continues his
CIA traits of lying, cheating, and stealing. It's in a way similar to a phrase, "A leopard never changes its spots". This is why
the DPRK govt issued a Persona Non Grata on Pompous Pompeo – that he isn't a bona fide diplomat, but a CIA official.
CWG , April 22, 2019 at 17:15
Here's my take on the 'Russian Collusion Deep State LIE.
There was NO Russian Collusion at all to get Trump in the White House. Most probably, Putin would have favored Clinton, since
she could be bought. Trump can't.
What did happen was illegal spying on the Trump campaign. That started late 2015, WITHOUT a FISA warrant. They only obtained
that in 2016, through lying to the FISA Court. The basis for that first warrant was the Fusion GPS Steele Dossier.
Ever since Trump won the election, they real conspirators knew they had a problem. That was apparent ever after Devin Nunes
did the right thing by informing Trump they were spying on him.
Since they obtained those FISA warrant through lying to the FISA Court (which is treason) they needed to cover that up as quickly
as possible.
So what did they do? Instead of admitting they lied to the FISA Court they kept on lying till this very day. The same lie through
which they obtained the FISA warrants to spy on the Trump campaign was being pushed openly.
The lie is and was 'Trump colluded with the Russians in order to win the Presidential Election'.
They knew from day one Trump didn't do anything wrong. They did know they spied on Trump through lying to the FISA Court, which
again, is treason. According to the Constitution, lying to the FISA court= Treason.
In order to avoid being indicted and prosecuted, they somehow needed to 'take down' the Attorney General. At all costs, they
needed to try and hide what really happened.
So there they went. 'Trump colluded with the Russians. Not just Trump, but the entire Trump campaign!'.
'Sessions should recuse himself', the propaganda MSM said in unison. 'Recuse, recuse'.
Sessions, naively recused himself. Back then, even he probably didn't know the entire story. It was only later on that Sarah
Carter and Jon Solomon found out it had been Hillary who ordered and paid the Steele Dossier.
The real conspirators hoped that through the Special Counsel rat Mueller they might be able to achieve three main objectives.
1: Convince the American people Russia indeed was meddling in the Presidential Election.
2: Find any sort of dirt on Trump and/or people who helped him win the Election in order to 'take them down'.
Many people were indicted, some were prosecuted. Yet NONE of them were convicted for a crime that had ANYTHING to with with
the elections. NONE.
They stretched it out as long as possible. 'The longer you repeat a lie, the more people are willing to believe the lie'.
So that is what they did. They still do it. Mueller took TWO years to brainwash as many people as possible. 'Russian Collusion,
Russian Collusion. Russia. Russia. Russia. Russia. Rusiaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh ..
Why did they want to make sure they could keep telling that lie as long as possible?
Because they FEAR people will learn the truth. There was NEVER any Russian Collusion with the Trump campaign.
There was spying on the Trump campaign by Obama in order to try and make Hillary win the Presidential Election.
That is the actual COLLUSION between the Clinton Campaign and a weaponized Obama regime!!
So what did 'Herr Mueller' do?
He took YEARS to come up with the conclusion that the Trump campaign did NOT collude with Russia.
The MSM tried to make us all believe it was about that. Yet it was NOT.
His conclusive report is all about the question 'did or didn't the Trump campaign collude with the Russians'.
Trump exonerated, and the MSM only talks about that. Trump, Trump, Trump.
They still want us all to believe that was what the Mueller 'investigation' was all about. Yet it was not.
The most important objective of the Mueller 'investigation' was not to 'investigate'.
It was to 'instigate' that HUGE lie.
The same lie which they used to obtain the FISA warrant on the Trump campaign.
"Russia'.
So what has 'Herr Mueller' done?
A: He finds ZERO evidence at all which proves the Trump campaign colluded with ANY Russians.
And now the huge lie, which after all was the main objective right from the get go. (A was only a distraction)
B: Russians hacked the DNC.
That is what they wants us all to believe. That Russia somehow did bad stuff.
Now it was not Russia who did bad stuff.
It was Obama working together with the Clinton campaign. Obama weaponized his entire regime in order to let Clinton win the
Presidency.
That is the REAL collusion. The real CRIME. Treason!
In order to create a 'cover up' Mueller NEEDED to instigate that Russia somehow did bad things.
That's what the Mueller Dossier is ALL about. They now have 'black on white' 'evidence' that Russia somehow did bad things.
Because if Russia didn't do anything like that, it would make us all ask the fair question 'why did Obama spy on the Trump
Campaign'.
Let's go a bit deeper still.
Here's a trap Mueller created. What if Trump would openly doubt the LIE they still push? The HUGE lie that Russia did bad things?
After all, they NEED that LIE in order to COVER UP their own crime.
If Trump would say 'I do not believe Russia did anything to influence the elections, I think Mueller wrote that to COVER UP
the real crime', what would happen?
They would say 'GOTCHA now, see Trump is colluding with Russia? He even refuses to accept Russia hacked the DNC, this ultimately
proofs Trump indeed is a Russian asset'.
They believe that trap will work. They needed that trap, since if Russia wasn't doing anything wrong, it would show us all
THEY were the criminals.
They NEED that lie, in order to COVER UP.
That is the 'Insurance Policy' Stzrok and Page texted about. Even Sarah Carter and Jon Solomon still don't seem to see all
that.
They should have attacked the HUGE lie that Russia was somehow hacking the DNC. That is simply not true. It's a Mueller created
LIE.
That LIE = the Insurance Policy.
What did they need an Insurance Policy for? They want us all to believe that was about preventing Trump from being elected.
Although true, that is only A.
They NEEDED an Insurance Policy in the unlikely case Trump would become President and would find out they were illegally spying
on him!
The REAL crime is Obama weaponized the American Government to spy on even a duly elected President.
What's the punishment for Treason?
About Assange and Seth Rich.
Days after Mueller finishes his 'mission' (Establish the LIE Russia did bad things) which seems to be succesfull, the Deep
State arrest the ONLY source who could undermine that lie.
Assange Since he knows who is (Seth Rich?) and who isn't (Russia) the source.
If Assange could testify under oath the emails did not come from Russia, the LIE would be exposed.
No coincidences here. I fear Assange will never testify under oath. I actually fear for his life.
Deniz , April 23, 2019 at 13:48
While I wholeheartedly agree with you that Obama and Clinton are criminals, the far less convincing part of your argument is
that Trump is not now beholden to the same MIC interests. Bolton, Abrahams, Pompeo, Pence his relationship with Netanyahu, the
overthrow of Madura are all glaring examples that contradict the Rights narrative that he is some type of hero. Trump may not
have colluded with Russia, but he does seem to be colluding with Saudia Arabia, Israel, Big Oil and the MIC.
Whether one is on the Right or Left, the house is still made of glass.
boxerwars , April 22, 2019 at 17:13
RE: "A Russian Agent Smear"
:::
Was Pat Tillman Murdered?
JUL 30, 2007
I don't know, but it seems increasingly conceivable. Just absorb these facts:
O'Neal said Tillman, a corporal, threw a smoke grenade to identify themselves to fellow soldiers who were firing at them. Tillman
was waving his arms shouting "Cease fire, friendlies, I am Pat [expletive] Tillman, damn it!" again and again when he was killed,
O'Neal said
In the same testimony, medical examiners said the bullet holes in Tillman's head were so close together that it appeared the
Army Ranger was cut down by an M-16 fired from a mere 10 yards or so away.
The motive? I don't know. It's still likeliest it was an accident. But there's some mysterious testimony in the SI report about
nameless snipers. A reader suggests the following interpretation:
News this weekend said that there were "snipers" present and the witnesses didn't remember their names. I believe that's code
in the Army–these guys were Delta. In the Tillman incident, these snipers weren't part of the unit and they were never mentioned
publicly before. That's a key indicator that they weren't supposed to be acknowledged.
If you've ever read Blackhawk Down, Mark Bowden explains how he grew frustrated because interviewed Rangers kept referring
to "soldiers from another unit" while claiming they didn't know the unit ID or the soldiers' names. It took him months to crack
the unit ID and find people from Delta who were present at the fight.
Randy Shugart and Gary Gordon, the Delta operators who earned Medals of Honor in Mogadishu, have always been identified as
snipers, too.
If my theory is correct, the Delta guys could have fired the shots – a three-round burst to the forehead from 50 yards is impossible
for normal soldiers and Rangers, but is probably an easy shot for those guys. But because Delta doesn't officially exist and Tillman
was a hero, nobody in the Army would want to have to explain exactly how the event went down. Easier just to claim hostile fire
until the family forced them to do otherwise.
This makes some sense to me, although we shouldn't dismiss the chance he was murdered. Tillman was a star and might have aroused
jealousy or resentment. He also opposed the Iraq war and was a proud atheist. In Bush's increasingly sectarian military, that
might have stirred hostility. I don't know. But I know enough to want a deeper investigation. My atheist readers will no doubt
admire the way Tillman left this world, according to the man who was with him:
As bullets flew above their heads, the young soldier at Pat Tillman's side started praying. "I thought I was praying to myself,
but I guess he heard me," Sgt. Bryan O'Neal recalled in an interview Saturday with The Associated Press. "He said something like,
'Hey, O'Neal, why are you praying? God can't help us now."'
(Maybe the Congress can )
////// The USA is aghast with "smears" and "internal investigations" and promised but never produced "White Papers" 'as the
world turns' and circles continents Dominated by American Military Power / Predominantly Barbarous / Uncivilized Use of Force
/ and Arrogantly Effective in it's use of Dominating Military Power.
\\\\ The Poorer Peoples of the World accept their lots-in-life with some acceptance of reality vis-a-vis the "lot-in-life"
they've been alleged/assigned.
/// But How Do We Accept The Fact that our Self-Sacrificiing Hero,Pat Tillman, was slaughtered in Afghanistan,
(WITH POSITIVE PROOF) – by his own Fellow American soldiers – ???
!!!! What i'm say'n is, if Tillman represents the Life Surrendering "American Hero"
WHY DID HIS FELLOW "AMERICAN SOLDIERS" ASSASSINATE & MURDER HIM ???????
AND WHY IS THIS STORY BURIED ALONG WITH MANY OTHER SMEAR Stories
that provide prophylactic protection for all the Trump pianist prophylaxis cover
Up for the Right Wing theft of American Democracy under FDR
In favor of Ayn Rand's prevalent OBJECTIVISM under Trump.
"Capitalism and Altruism
are incompatible
capitalism and altruism
cannot coexist in man,
or in the same society".
President Trump represents
Stark & Total Capitalism
Just as "Conservative Party"
Core is in The Confederacy
AKA; The RIGHT WING
The Right Wing of US Gov't
Is All About PRESERVING
Confederate States' Laws
Written by Thomas Jefferson
Prior to The Constitution, which
became the Received/Judicial
Constitutional Law of the Land in
The Republic of the "United States"
It's not enough that Trump is clearly a classic narcissist whose behavior will continue to deteriorate the more his actions
and statements are attacked and countered? You know what happens when narcissists are driven into a corner by people tearing them
down? They get weapons and start killing people.
There is already more than ample evidence to remove Donald Trump from office, not the least being he's clearly mentally unfit.
Yet the Democrats, some of whom ran for office on a promise to impeach, are suddenly reticent to act without "more investigation".
Nancy Pelosi stated on the record prior to release of the Mueller report impeachment wasn't on the agenda "for now". She's now
making noises in the opposite direction, but that's all they are: noise.
The bottom line is the Clintonite New Democrats currently running the party have only one issue to run on next year: getting
rid of Donald Trump. They still operate under the delusion they will be able to use him to draw off moderate Republican voters,
the same ones they were positive would come out for Hillary Clinton in '16. Their multitude of candidates pay lip service to progressive
policy then carefully walk back to the standard centrist positions once the donations start coming, but the common underlying
theme was and continues to be "Donald Trump is evil, and we need to elect a Democrat."
In short, without Donald Trump in the Oval Office, the Democrat Party has no platform. They need him there as a target, because
Mike Pence would be impossible for them to beat. They are under orders, according to various writers who've addressed the Clinton
campaign, to block Bernie Sanders and his platform at all costs; and they will allow the country to crash and burn before they
disobey those orders. That means keeping Donald Trump right where he is through next November.
Eddie S , April 24, 2019 at 21:14
Exactly right, EKB -- - you can't ballroom dance without a partner! Also reminds me of the couples you occasionally run into
where one partner repeatedly runs-down the other, and you get the feeling that the critical partner doesn't have much going on
in his/her life so they deflect that by focusing on the other partner
Johnny Ryan S , April 22, 2019 at 13:38
Why did the DNC not allow the FBI to investigate the so-called" Russian hacked" emails? Rather, they hire CrowdStrike did
you know:
1)Obama Appoints CrowdStrike Officer To Admin Post Two Months Before June 2016 Report On Russia Hacking DNC
2) CrowdStrike Co-Founder Is Fellow On Russia Hawk Group, Has Connections To George Soros, Ukrainian Billionaire
3) DNC stayed that the FBI never asked to investigate the servers – that is a lie.
4) CrowdStrike received $100 million in investments led by Google Capital (since re-branded as CapitalG) in 2015. CapitalG is
owned by Alphabet, and Eric Schmidt, Alphabet's chairman, was a supporter of Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. More than just
supporting Clinton, leaked emails from Wikileaks in November 2016 showed that in 2014 he wanted to have an active role in the
campaign.
-daily caller and dan bongino have been bringing these points up since 2016.
Deniz , April 22, 2019 at 12:36
The Right is currently salivating over the tough law enforcement rhetoric coming out of Barr and Trump.
It reminds me of when Obama was running for office in 2008 when everyone, including myself, was in awe of him. What kept slipping
into his soaring anti-intervention speeches, was a commitment to the good war in Afghanistan, which seemed totally out of place
with the rest of his rhetoric. The fine print was far more reflective of his administration actions as the rest of it his communications
turned out to be just telling people what they wanted to hear.
War with Afghanistan was Obama's payoff to the MIC, just as Russia is now Trump's payoff.
The argument about not inserting Rich and the download is a good one as a defense strategy but doesn't help with finding the
truth about the emails. We can only hope that pursuing the truth and producing it will have a cumulative effect and the illusory
truth effect will include this truth.
Red Douglas , April 22, 2019 at 16:00
>>> ". . . doesn't help with finding the truth about the emails."
The important truth about the emails is in their authenticity and in the contents. No one has even attempted to claim that
they are not authentic or that the contents we've seen are other than the actual contents of the authentic messages.
Why should we much care how they were acquired and provided to the publisher?
Lily , April 22, 2019 at 17:55
That is what i think. People should not concentrate on how, who and where. This is just a smokescreen to avoid talking about
the content of the emails and Hillary Clinton's disgusting actions. She is a criminal and a murderess just like Obama and Tony
Blair are lyers and mass murderers.
All three of them are free, earning millions with their publicity whereas two brave persons who were telling the truth have
been tortured and are still in jail. Reality has become like the most horrible nightmare. Everything simply seems to have turned
upside down. No writer would invent such a primitive plot. And yet it is the unbelievable reality.
Dump Pelousy , April 23, 2019 at 13:21
I totally agree with you, and in fact believe that this whole 22month expensive and mind numbing circus has been played out
JUST to keep the public from knowing what the emails actually said. Can you imagine Madcow focusing with such ferocity on John
Pedesta as she has on Putin, by discussing what he wrote during a presidential campaign to "influence the election" ? We'd be
a different country now, not fighting our way thru the McCarthite Swamp she helped create.
Mueller's Lies About George Papadopolous by Larry C Johnson
This article provides a comprehensive presentation of facts and an analysis that
demonstrates the disengenuity and dishonestly of the Mueller Report with respect to George
Papadopolous.
The egregious, dishonest misreprensentation about Papadopolous is introduced on page 1 on
page 1 of the Mueller report:
In late July 2016, soon after WikiLeaks's first release of stolen documents, a foreign
government contacted the FBI about a May 2016 encounter with Trump Campaign foreign policy
advisor George Papadopoulos. Papadopoulos had suggested to a representative of that foreign
government that the Trump Campaign had received indications from the Russian government that it
could assist the Campaign through the anonymous release of information damaging to
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. That information prompted the FBI on July
31, 2016, to open an investigation into whether individuals associated with the Trump Campaign
were coordinating with the Russian government in its interference activities.
The claim that Papadopoulos had information from a source representing Russia is
demonstrably false. As I noted in my previous article,
Special Counsel Mueller--Disingenuous and Dishonest , the FBI was going after the Trump
team as early as September 2015. Let's take a look at George Papadopolous' account: ( The
following are excerpts from: George Papadopolous. "Deep State Target." Apple Books. https://books.apple.com/us/book/deep-state-target/id1446495998
)
"I really like Energy Stream, but three months into the job, I am approached by a man named
Nagi Khalid Idris who offers me a position at the London Centre of International Law
Practice.
Idris is an interesting figure. As it turns out, he is the first in a handful of interesting
figures I am about to meet. A Sudanese-born UK citizen, he's the founder of EN Education Group
Limited -- an education consultancy operation that's core business seems to be placing students
from Arab countries in international settings. " (p. 50)
"I really like Energy Stream, but three months into the job, I am approached by a man named
Nagi Khalid Idris who offers me a position at the London Centre of International Law
Practice.
Idris is an interesting figure. As it turns out, he is the first in a handful of interesting
figures I am about to meet. A Sudanese-born UK citizen, he's the founder of EN Education Group
Limited -- an education consultancy operation that's core business seems to be placing students
from Arab countries in international settings. " (p. 61)
"I really like Energy Stream, but three months into the job, I am approached by a man named
Nagi Khalid Idris who offers me a position at the London Centre of International Law
Practice.
Idris is an interesting figure. As it turns out, he is the first in a handful of interesting
figures I am about to meet. A Sudanese-born UK citizen, he's the founder of EN Education Group
Limited -- an education consultancy operation that's core business seems to be placing students
from Arab countries in international settings. " (p. 62)
The next day, . . . . "Nagi comes by my office again. His attitude has suddenly changed.
It's a night-and-day difference. He starts telling me that there is someone I have to meet, a
very important person who will be "very useful to me during my time with Trump. I remember Nagi
telling me, "He's a man who knows many people." Then he insists I join him at a conference at
Link Campus University in Rome.
And he calls in a director with the LCILP whom I've never laid eyes on.
"You have to meet her," he tells me while we wait. "Her name is Arvinder Sambei. She's
setting up our team at the conference, and she can help arrange the introduction." (pp
64-65)
"[Nagi] keeps at me, insisting I had to go to Rome. "It's a three-day conference. It will
help you with Trump."
"After that session, I'm sitting in a conference room when Nagi Idris approaches. At his
side is a well-dressed man in his mid-fifties.
"George," Nagi says. "This is Professor Joseph Mifsud, and you should talk."
Joseph Mifsud is the man Nagi had planned for me to meet, the man Nagi had asked Arvinder
Sambei to contact, and the man Nagi had portrayed as a major player, a guy with diplomatic
experience and "extensive contacts. A man, in other words, who can change my life.
It turns out Mifsud has a PhD in Education from Queen's University, Belfast, which isn't
exactly what I'd expect from a guy reputed to be politically connected. But Mifsud spins
himself as a worldly insider, a guy with an I-have-connections-everywhere arrogance. He offsets
that by flashing warmth and interest in me. He asks about my background. He asks if I have
Russian contacts. I shake my head.
"I heard you have connections," I say. "And that you might be able to help me with the
campaign."
"Oh yes, absolutely. Let's talk tonight. Let's go to dinner." (pp. 70-71)
[At dinner] "Mifsud says: "I'm going introduce you to everyone and set up a meeting between
Trump and Putin."
"That's an excellent idea," I say. "You really think it can be arranged?"
"Oh, yes. I can do it."
"That would be amazing." (p. 74)
"Mifsud emails me a few days later when I'm back in London to tell me he wants to introduce
me to somebody very important. When am I available?
I respond with some possible dates. Then I head to the LCILP offices where I run into Nagi
Idris. He's very excited. He tells me I'm going to meet Putin's niece. That Mifsud knows her
and is going to introduce us." (p. 75)
"The lunch is booked for March 24 at the Grange Holborn Hotel,. . . . "When I get there,
Mifsud is waiting for me in the lobby with an attractive, fashionably dressed young woman with
dirty blonde hair at his side. He introduces her as Olga Vinogradova." (p. 76)
"Mifsud sells her hard. "Olga is going to be your inside woman to Moscow. She knows
everyone." He tells me she was a former official at the Russian Ministry of Trade. Then he
waxes on about introducing me to the Russian ambassador in London." (p. 77)
"on April 12, "Olga" writes: "I have already alerted my personal links to our conversation
and your request. The embassy in London is very much aware of this. As mentioned, we are all
very excited by the possibility of a good relationship with Mr. Trump. The Russian Federation
would love to welcome him once his candidature would be officially announced."
So I have no choice but to hurry up and wait. I communicate this back to the campaign
managers, primarily Stephen Miller." (p. 101)
"Then Mifsud returns from the Valdai conference. On April 26 we meet for breakfast at the
Andaz Hotel, near Liverpool Street Station, one of the busiest train stations in London. He's
in an excellent mood and claims he met with high-level Russian government officials. But once
again, he's very short on specifics. This is becoming a real pattern with Mifsud. He hasn't
offered any names besides Timofeev. Then, he leans across the table in a conspiratorial manner.
The Russians have "dirt" on Hillary Clinton, he tells me. "Emails of Clinton," he says. "They
have thousands of emails." (p. 104)
[In early May 2016] "two military attachés at the US embassy in London, Terrence
Dudley and Gregory Baker, reach out to me to set up a meeting. "
(NOTE -- this meeting comes in the wake of controversial comments Papadopolous made to a
reporter criticizing UK Prime Minister Cameron). (p. 117).
"They take me to a private club known far and wide as The Rag -- the same place we hosted
the 2015 Energy Stream Conference. Its real name is The Army and Navy Club" (p. 117)
"They spare no expense during our meeting, dropping at least $500. They ask me what I'm
doing in London." (p.118)
"IT'S A WET, ugly London evening on May 10, 2016, when I go meet Erika Thompson and her
boss, Australian High Commissioner Alexander Downer." (p. 125)
"Downer is oozing aggression by comparison. After our introduction, the first thing he says
is, "Tell your boss he needs to leave my friend David Cameron alone, and you should leave him
alone too.'" (p. 127)
"Downer starts talking: He tells me he's connected to a British security firm called
Hakluyt. He boasts about being a board member and that the firm has a great presence in London
and close ties to the Obama administration. "We advise many governments," he says." (p.
128)
"And then something happens.
Or more accurately, Downer later claims something happens.
In his version of events, he asks me a question about Russia and Trump.
I then tell him that the Russians have a surprise or some damaging material related to
Hillary Clinton.
I have no memory of this. None. Zero. Nada." (p. 130)
The Papadopolous account reveals several things. First, George is an earnest but naïve
young man. He did not realize he was being set up.
Second, George's multiple emails to Corey Lewandowski were intercepted by both GCHQ and the
NSA. It is clear now, with the benefit of hindsight, that these communications were transmitted
as SIGINT Intelligence Reports. Investigation by Attorney Bill Barr will show that these
reports were "unmasked."
Third, the people who brokered the contacts with Mifsud -- Nagi and Arvinder Sambei -- have
ties to British and US intelligence organizations and the FBI.
Arvinder Sambei's ties, for example, are reported by
Disobedient Media :
" Mifsud and Papadopoulos's co-director Arvinder Sambei was also the former FBI British
counsel working 9/11 cases for Robert Mueller. She also runs a consultancy which deals with
Special Investigative Measure (SIMs) which is just a posh description for covert espionage and
evidence gathering. She has worked for major intelligence and national law agencies in the
past. She wore two hats as a director of London Centre and a consultant for the Global Center
on Cooperative Security (GCCS), a counter-terrorism think tank which is sponsored by the
Australia, Canada, UK and US governments. Alexander Downer's former Chief of Staff while at the
Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade now works for the Global Center. Mifsud was
also due to meet with Australian private intelligence figures in Adelaide in March 2016. So.
Australia is certainly a major focus for the investigation."
Sambei's critical role in introducing Papadopolous to Joseph Mifsud is not, in my view, a
mere coincidence.
Joseph Mifsud bears all the hallmarks of an MI-6 intelligence asset (please refer to my
previous article,
Special Counsel Mueller: Disingenuous and Dishonest . Introducing Papadopolous to Mifsud is
a classic humint covert action. In this case the plan was to select an individual -- a
naïve, inexperienced eager soul--who had access to the Trump campaign, who could be fed
compromising information and put into an incriminating situations that would feed the concocted
meme that the Trump campaign was colluding with the Russians.
The entire concept of working with the Russians and having Trump meet with Putin was a meme
introduced and encouraged by Joseph Mifsud. George Papadopolous was an unwitting, albeit eager,
patsy.
Then we have Alexander Downer. He is closely tied to the Clintons. Bill and Alexander signed
a deal that produced millions of dollars for the Clinton Foundation. Downer, despite his
credentials and pedigree, was not an honest actor. I believe that he was engaged in a
pre-planned political dirty trick, to feed the lie that the Trump campaign was working with the
Russians to "steal" Hillary's emails.
Remember. The critical meeting with Downer took place while the Russians were ostensibly
hacking the DNC. This is not a tin-foil hatted conspiracy theory. The facts are clear.
For those not aware Peter Strzok was the FBI agent who initiated the Trump investigation.
As part of this he recruited Stefan Halper, a University of Cambridge professor with long
standing ties to the CIA and Britain's MI6. Halper offered up his services to the Trump
campaign as a foreign policy advisor, which apparently was his in.
In the aftermath of Strzok's role in this fiasco and his anti-Trump texts to his lover
Lisa Page, he was initially only demoted and suspended by the FBI. This was later overruled
and he was fired. Now, rightly I think, his actions are being investigated.
Strzok should have known from the beginning he was always going to be the fall guy if
things went sideways. He's lucky this is the US. In many other countries he would have been
found dead.
And there is more. George Papodopoulus was entrapped by individuals linked to British MI-6 and the CIA with offers to provide
meetings with Russians and Putin. The Mueller account is a lie:
In late April 2016, Papadopoulos was told by London-based professor Joseph Mifsud, immediately after Mifsud 's return from a trip
to Moscow, that the Russian government had obtained "dirt" on candidate Clinton in the form of thousands of emails. One week later,
on May 6, 2016, Papadopoulos suggested to a representative of a foreign government that the Trump Campaign had received indications
from the Russian government that it could assist the Campaign through the anonymous release of information that would be damaging
to candidate Clinton.
Papadopoulos shared information about Russian "dirt " with people outside of the Campaign, and the Office investigated whether
he also provided it to a Campaign official. Papadopoulos and the Campaign officials with whom he interacted told the Office that
they did · not recall that Papadopoulos passed them the information. Throughout the relevant period of time and for several months
thereafter, Papadopoulos worked with Mifsud and two Russian nationals to arrange a meeting between the Campaign and the Russian
government. That meeting never came to pass.
Once again, the Mueller team treats the provocateur -- -i.e., Joseph Mifsud -- -as some simple guy with ties to Russia's political
elites. Another egregious lie. Mifsud was not working on behalf of Russia. He was deployed by MI-6. Disobedient Media has been on
the forefront of exposing Mifsud's ties to
western intelligence in general and the Brits in particular .
Mifsud's alleged links to Russian intelligence are summarily debunked by his close working relationship with Claire Smith, a major
figure in the upper echelons of British intelligence. A number of Twitter users recently observed that Joseph Mifsud had been
photographed standing next to Claire Smith of the UK Joint Intelligence Committee at Mifsud's LINK campus in Rome. Newsmax and Buzzfeed
later reported that the professor's name and biography had been removed from the campus' website, writing that the mysterious removal
took place after Mifsud had served the institution for "years."
WikiLeaks Editor-in-Chief Julian Assange likewise noted the connection between Mifsud and Smith in a Twitter thread, additionally
pointing out his connections with Saudi intelligence: "[Mifsud] and Claire Smith of the UK Joint Intelligence Committee and eight-year
member of the UK Security Vetting panel both trained Italian security services at the Link University in Rome and appear to both
be present in this [photo]."
The photograph in question originated on Geodiplomatics.com, where it specified that Joseph Mifsud is indeed standing next to
Claire Smith, who was attending a: " Training program on International Security which was organised by Link Campus University and
London Academy of Diplomacy." The event is listed as taking place in October, 2012. This is highly significant for a number of reasons.
This is not a mere matter of Mueller and his team "failing" to disclose some important facts. If they were operating honestly
they should have investigated Mifsud, Greenberg and Sater. But they did not. Two of the three -- Sater and Greenber -- alleged Russian
stooges have ties to the FBI. And Mifsud has been living and working in the belly of the intelligence community.
"... So as it turns out, the informant used by the FBI in 2016 to gather information on the Trump campaign was not some previously unknown, top-secret asset whose exposure as an operative could jeopardize lives. Quite the contrary: his decades of work for the CIA -- including his role in an obviously unethical if not criminal spying operation during the 1980 presidential campaign -- is quite publicly known. ..."
"... In any event, publication of those articles by the NYT and Post last night made it completely obvious who the FBI informant was, because the Daily Caller's investigative reporter Chuck Ross on Thursday had published an article reporting that a long-time CIA operative who is now a professor at Cambridge repeatedly met with Papadopoulos and Page. The article, in its opening paragraph, named the professor, Stefan Halper, and described him as "a University of Cambridge professor with CIA and MI6 contacts." ..."
"... Ross' article, using public information, recounted at length Halper's long-standing ties to the CIA, including the fact that his father-in-law, Ray Cline, was a top CIA official during the Cold War, and that Halper himself had long worked with both the CIA and its British counterpart, the MI6. As Ross wrote: "at Cambridge, Halper has worked closely with Dearlove, the former chief of MI6. In recent years they have directed the Cambridge Security Initiative , a non-profit intelligence consulting group that lists 'UK and US government agencies' among its clients." ..."
"... The professor who met with both Page and Papadopoulos is Stefan Halper, a former official in the Nixon, Ford and Reagan administrations who has been a paid consultant to an internal Pentagon think tank known as the Office of Net Assessment, consulting on Russia and China issues, according to public records. ..."
"... Then there are questions about what appear to be some fairly substantial government payments to Halper throughout 2016. Halper continues to be listed as a "vendor" by websites that track payments by the federal government to private contractors. ..."
"... Whatever else is true, the CIA operative and FBI informant used to gather information on the Trump campaign in the 2016 campaign has, for weeks, been falsely depicted as a sensitive intelligence asset rather than what he actually is: a long-time CIA operative with extensive links to the Bush family who was responsible for a dirty and likely illegal spying operation in the 1980 presidential election. For that reason, it's easy to understand why many people in Washington were so desperate to conceal his identity, but that desperation had nothing to do with the lofty and noble concerns for national security they claimed were motivating them. ..."
The FBI Informant Who Monitored the Trump Campaign, Stefan Halper, Oversaw a CIA Spying
Operation in the 1980 Presidential ElectionGlenn Greenwald
May 19 2018, 10:27 a.m. An extremely strange episode that has engulfed official Washington over
the last two weeks came to a truly bizarre conclusion on Friday night. And it revolves around a
long-time, highly sketchy CIA operative, Stefan Halper.
Four decades ago, Halper was responsible for
a long-forgotten spying scandal involving the 1980 election , in which the Reagan campaign
-- using CIA officials managed by Halper, reportedly under the direction of former CIA Director
and then-Vice-Presidential candidate George H.W. Bush -- got caught running a spying operation
from inside the Carter administration. The plot involved CIA operatives passing classified
information about Carter's foreign policy to Reagan campaign officials in order to ensure the
Reagan campaign knew of any foreign policy decisions that Carter was considering.
Over the past several weeks, House Republicans have been claiming that the FBI during the
2016 election used an operative to spy on the Trump campaign, and they triggered outrage within
the FBI by trying to learn his identity. The controversy escalated when President Trump joined
the fray on Friday morning. "Reports are there was indeed at least one FBI representative
implanted, for political purposes, into my campaign for president," Trump tweeted , adding: "It
took place very early on, and long before the phony Russia Hoax became a "hot" Fake News story.
If true -- all time biggest political scandal!"
In response, the DOJ and the FBI's various media spokespeople did not deny the core
accusation, but quibbled with the language (the FBI used an "informant," not a "spy"), and then
began using increasingly strident language to warn that exposing his name would jeopardize his
life and those of others, and also put American national security at grave risk. On May 8, the
Washington Post
described the informant as "a top-secret intelligence source" and cited DOJ officials as
arguing that disclosure of his name "could risk lives by potentially exposing the source, a
U.S. citizen who has provided intelligence to the CIA and FBI."
The top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, Mark Warner, who spent much of last
week working to ensure confirmation of Trump's choice to lead the CIA, Gina Haspel, actually
threatened his own colleagues in Congress with criminal prosecution if they tried to obtain
the identity of the informant. "Anyone who is entrusted with our nation's highest secrets
should act with the gravity and seriousness of purpose that knowledge deserves," Warner
said.
But now, as a result of some very odd choices by the nation's largest media outlets,
everyone knows the name of the FBI's informant: Stefan Halper. And Halper's history is quite
troubling, particularly his central role in the scandal in the 1980 election. Equally troubling
are the DOJ and FBI's highly inflammatory and, at best, misleading claims that they made to try
to prevent Halper's identity from being reported.
To begin with, it's obviously notable that the person the FBI used to monitor the Trump
campaign is the same person who worked as a CIA operative running that 1980 Presidential
election spying campaign.
It was not until several years after Reagan's victory over Carter did this scandal emerge.
It was leaked by right-wing officials inside the Reagan administration who wanted to undermine
officials they regarded as too moderate, including then White House Chief of Staff James Baker,
who was a Bush loyalist.
The NYT
in 1983 said the Reagan campaign spying operation "involved a number of retired Central
Intelligence Agency officials and was highly secretive." The article, by then-NYT reporter
Leslie Gelb, added that its "sources identified Stefan A. Halper, a campaign aide involved in
providing 24-hour news updates and policy ideas to the traveling Reagan party, as the person in
charge." Halper, now 73, had also worked with Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, and Alexander Haig
as part of the Nixon administration.
When the scandal first broke in 1983, the
UPI suggested that Halper's handler for this operation was Reagan's Vice Presidential
candidate, George H.W. Bush, who had been the CIA Director and worked there with Halper's
father-in-law, former CIA Deputy Director Ray Cline, who worked on Bush's 1980 presidential
campaign before Bush ultimately became Reagan's Vice President. It quoted a former Reagan
campaign official as blaming the leak on "conservatives [who] are trying to manipulate the
Jimmy Carter papers controversy to force the ouster of White House Chief of Staff James
Baker."
Halper, through his CIA work, has extensive ties to the Bush family. Few remember that the
CIA's perceived meddling in the 1980 election -- its open support for its former Director,
George H.W. Bush to become President -- was a somewhat serious political controversy. And
Halper was in that middle of that, too.
In 1980, the Washington Post
published an article reporting on the extremely unusual and quite aggressive involvement of
the CIA in the 1980 presidential campaign. "Simply put, no presidential campaign in recent
memory -- perhaps ever -- has attracted as much support from the intelligence community as the
campaign of former CIA director Bush," the article said.
Though there was nothing illegal about ex-CIA officials uniting to put a former CIA Director
in the Oval Office, the paper said "there are some rumblings of uneasiness in the intelligence
network." It specifically identified Cline as one of the most prominent CIA official working
openly for Bush, noting that he "recommended his son-in-law, Stefan A. Halper, a former Nixon
White House aide, be hired as Bush's director of policy development and research."
In 2016, top officials from the intelligence community similarly rallied around Hillary
Clinton. As The Intercept has
previously documented :
Former acting CIA Director Michael Morell not only
endorsed Clinton in the New York Times but claimed that "Mr. Putin had recruited Mr.
Trump as an unwitting agent of the Russian Federation." George W. Bush's CIA and NSA
director, Gen. Michael Hayden, pronounced
Trump a "clear and present danger" to U.S. national security and then, less than a week
before the election,
went to the Washington Post to warn that "Donald Trump really does sound a lot like
Vladimir Putin" and said Trump is "the useful fool, some naif, manipulated by Moscow,
secretly held in contempt, but whose blind support is happily accepted and exploited."
So as it turns out, the informant used by the FBI in 2016 to gather information on the
Trump campaign was not some previously unknown, top-secret asset whose exposure as an operative
could jeopardize lives. Quite the contrary: his decades of work for the CIA -- including his
role in an obviously unethical if not criminal spying operation during the 1980 presidential
campaign -- is quite publicly known.
And now, as a result of some baffling choices by the nation's largest news organizations as
well as their anonymous sources inside the U.S. Government, Stefan Halper's work for the FBI
during the 2016 is also publicly known
Last night, both
the Washington Post and New
York Times -- whose reporters, like pretty much everyone in Washington, knew exactly who
the FBI informant is -- published articles that, while deferring to the FBI's demands by not
naming him, provided so many details about him that it made it extremely easy to know exactly
who it is. The NYT described the FBI informant as "an American academic who teaches in Britain"
and who "made contact late that summer with" George Papadopoulos and "also met repeatedly in
the ensuing months with the other aide, Carter Page." The Post similarly called him "a retired
American professor" who met with Page "at a symposium about the White House race held at a
British university."
In contrast to the picture purposely painted by the DOJ and its allies that this informant
was some of sort super-secret, high-level, covert intelligence asset, the NYT described him as
what he actually is: "the informant is well known in Washington circles, having served in
previous Republican administrations and as a source of information for the C.I.A. in past
years."
Despite how "well known" he is in Washington, and despite publishing so many details about
him that anyone with Google would be able to instantly know his name, the Post and the NYT
nonetheless bizarrely refused to identity him, with the Post justifying its decision that it
"is not reporting his name following warnings from U.S. intelligence officials that exposing
him could endanger him or his contacts." The NYT was less melodramatic about it, citing a
general policy: the NYT "has learned the source's identity but typically does not name
informants to preserve their safety," it said.
In other words, both the NYT and the Post chose to provide so many details about the FBI
informant that everyone would know exactly who it was, while coyly pretending that they were
obeying FBI demands not to name him. How does that make sense? Either these newspapers believe
the FBI's grave warnings that national security and lives would be endangered if it were known
who they used as their informant (in which case those papers should not publish any details
that would make his exposure likely), or they believe that the FBI (as usual) was just invoking
false national security justifications to hide information it unjustly wants to keep from the
public (in which case the newspapers should name him).
In any event, publication of those articles by the NYT and Post last night made it
completely obvious who the FBI informant was, because the Daily Caller's investigative reporter
Chuck Ross on Thursday had published an article
reporting that a long-time CIA operative who is now a professor at Cambridge repeatedly met
with Papadopoulos and Page. The article, in its opening paragraph, named the professor, Stefan
Halper, and described him as "a University of Cambridge professor with CIA and MI6
contacts."
Ross' article, using public information, recounted at length Halper's long-standing ties
to the CIA, including the fact that his father-in-law, Ray Cline, was a top CIA official during
the Cold War, and that Halper himself had long worked with both the CIA and its British
counterpart, the MI6. As Ross wrote: "at Cambridge, Halper has worked closely with Dearlove,
the former chief of MI6. In recent years they have directed the Cambridge Security Initiative , a non-profit intelligence
consulting group that lists 'UK and US government agencies' among its clients."
Both the NYT and Washington Post reporters boasted , with seeming
pride, about the fact that they did not name the informant even as they published all the
details which made it simple to identify him. But NBC News -- citing Ross' report and other
public information -- decided to name him , while stressing that it
has not confirmed that he actually worked as an FBI informant:
The professor who met with both Page and Papadopoulos is Stefan Halper, a former
official in the Nixon, Ford and Reagan administrations who has been a paid consultant to an
internal Pentagon think tank known as the Office of Net Assessment, consulting on Russia and
China issues, according to public records.
There is nothing inherently untoward, or even unusual, about the FBI using informants in an
investigation. One would expect them to do so. But the use of Halper in this case, and the
bizarre claims made to conceal his identity, do raise some questions that merit further
inquiry.
To begin with, the New York Times
reported in December of last year that the FBI investigation into possible ties between the
Trump campaign and Russia began when George Papadopoulos drunkenly boasted to an Australian
diplomat about Russian dirt on Hillary Clinton. It was the disclosure of this episode by the
Australians that "led the F.B.I. to open an investigation in July 2016 into Russia's attempts
to disrupt the election and whether any of President Trump's associates conspired," the NYT
claimed.
But it now seems clear that Halper's attempts to gather information for the FBI began before
that. "The professor's interactions with Trump advisers began a few weeks before the opening of
the investigation, when Page met the professor at the British symposium," the Post reported.
While it's not rare for the FBI to gather information before formally opening an investigation,
Halper's earlier snooping does call into question the accuracy of the NYT's claim that it was
the drunken Papadopoulos ramblings that first prompted the FBI's interest in these possible
connections. And it suggests that CIA operatives, apparently working with at least some
factions within the FBI, were trying to gather information about the Trump campaign earlier
than had been previously reported.
Then there are questions about what appear to be some fairly substantial government
payments to Halper throughout 2016. Halper continues to be listed as a "vendor" by websites that track
payments by the federal government to private contractors.
Earlier this week,
records of payments were found that were made during 2016 to Halper by the Department of
Defense's Office of Net Assessment, though it not possible from these records to know the exact
work for which these payments were made. The Pentagon office that paid Halper in 2016,
according to
a 2015 Washington Post story on its new duties , "reports directly to Secretary of Defense
and focuses heavily on future threats, has a $10 million budget."
It is difficult to understand how identifying someone whose connections to the CIA is a
matter of such public record, and who has a long and well-known history of working on spying
programs involving presidential elections on behalf of the intelligence community, could
possibly endanger lives or lead to grave national security harm. It isn't as though Halper has
been some sort of covert, stealth undercover asset for the CIA who just got exposed. Quite the
contrary: that he's a spy embedded in the U.S. intelligence community would be known to anyone
with internet access.
Equally strange are the semantic games which journalists are playing in order to claim that
this revelation disproves, rather than proves, Trump's allegation that the FBI "spied" on his
campaign. This bizarre exchange between CNN's
Andrew Kaczynski and the New York Times' Trip Gabriel vividly illustrates the strange
machinations used by journalists to justify how all of this is being characterized:
Despite what Halper actually is, the FBI and its dutiful mouthpieces have spent weeks using
the most desperate language to try to hide Halper's identity and the work he performed as part
of the 2016 election. Here was the deeply emotional reaction to
last night's story from Brookings' Benjamin Wittes, who has become a social media star by
parlaying his status as Jim Comey's best friend and long-time loyalist to security state
agencies into a leading role in pushing the Trump/Russia story:
Wittes' claim that all of this resulted in the "outing" of some sort of sensitive
"intelligence source" is preposterous given how publicly known Halper's role as a CIA operative
has been for decades. But this is the scam that the FBI and people like Mark Warner have been
running for two weeks: deceiving people into believing that exposing Halper's identity would
create grave national security harm by revealing some previously unknown intelligence
asset.
Wittes also implies that it was Trump and Devin Nunes who are responsible for Halper's
exposure but he almost certainly has no idea of who the sources are for the NYT or the
Washington Post. And note that Wittes is too cowardly to blame the institutions that actually
made it easy to identify Halper -- the New York Times and Washington Post -- preferring instead
to exploit the opportunity to depict the enemies of his friend Jim Comey as traitors.
Whatever else is true, the CIA operative and FBI informant used to gather information on
the Trump campaign in the 2016 campaign has, for weeks, been falsely depicted as a sensitive
intelligence asset rather than what he actually is: a long-time CIA operative with extensive
links to the Bush family who was responsible for a dirty and likely illegal spying operation in
the 1980 presidential election. For that reason, it's easy to understand why many people in
Washington were so desperate to conceal his identity, but that desperation had nothing to do
with the lofty and noble concerns for national security they claimed were motivating
them.
The issue was also
raised by WikiLeaks's
Julian Assange
, just days before the Ecuadorian government silenced him last March. Assange's Twitter
thread cited research by
Chris Blackburn
,
who spoke with
Disobedient
Media
on multiple occasions covering Joseph Mifsud's ties to British intelligence figures and
organizations, as well as his links to
Hillary Clinton's Presidential campaign, the FBI, CIA
and the private cyber-security firm Crowdstrike.
We return, now, to this issue and specifically the research of Chris Blackburn, to place the final nail in
the coffin of the Trump-Russia collusion charade. Blackburn's insights are incredible not only because they
return us to the earliest reporting on the role of British intelligence figures in manufacturing the
Trump-Russia collusion narrative, but because they also implicate members of Mueller's investigation. What we
are left with is an indication of collusion between factions of the US and UK intelligence community in
fabricating evidence of Trump-Russia collusion: a scandal that would have rocked the legacy press to its core,
if Western establishment-backed media had a spine.
In
Disobedient Media's
previous coverage of Blackburn's work, he described his experience in intelligence:
"I've been involved in numerous investigations that involve counter-intelligence techniques in the past. I
used to work for the
9/11 Families United to Bankrupt Terrorism
, one of the biggest tort actions in American history. I helped
build a profile of Osama bin Laden's financial and political network, which was slightly different to the one
that had been built by the
CIA's Alec Station
,
a dedicated task force which was focused on Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda. Alec Station designed its profile to
hunt Osama bin Laden and disrupt his network. I thought it was flawed. It had failed to take into account
Osama's historical links to Pakistan's main political parties or that he was the figurehead for a couple of
organizations, not just Al-Qaeda."
"I also ran a few conferences for US intelligence leaders during the Bush administration. After the 9/11
Commission published its report into the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon it created a public
outreach program. The US National Intelligence Conference and Exposition (
Intelcon
)
was one of the avenues it used. I was responsible for creating the 'View from Abroad' track. We had guidance
from former Senator Slade Gorton and Jamie Gorelick, who both sat on the 9/11 Commission. We got leaders such
as Sir John Chilcot and Baroness Pauline Neville Jones to come and help share their experiences on how the US
would be able to heal the rifts after 9/11."
"The US intelligence community was suffering from severe turf wars and firewalls, which were hampering
counter-terrorism efforts. They were concentrating on undermining each other rather than tackling terrorism. I
had mainly concentrated on the Middle East, but in 2003 I switched my focus to terrorism in South Asia."
Counter Terrorism, Not Counter Intelligence, Sparked Probe
In an article published by
The Telegraph
last
November, the paper acknowledged the following:
"It forces the spotlight on whether the UK played a role in the FBI's investigation launched before the 2016
presidential election into Trump campaign ties to the Kremlin Mr. Trump's allies and former advisers are
raising questions about the UK's role in the start of the probe, given many of the key figures and meetings
were located in Britain One former top White House adviser to Mr. Trump made similar insinuations, telling
this newspaper: "You know the Brits are up to their neck." The source added on the Page wiretap application:
"I think that stuff is going to implicate MI5 and MI6 in a bunch of activities they don't want to be
implicated in, along with FBI, counter-terrorism and the CIA.
" [Emphasis Added]
The article
cites
George Papadopoulos, who asked why the "British intelligence apparatus was weaponized against Trump and his
advisers." Papadopoulos has also addressed the issue at length via Twitter. In response to the Telegraph's
coverage of the issue, Chris Blackburn wrote via
Twitter
: "The
Telegraph story on Trump Russia acknowledges that activities involving counter-terrorism are at the heart of
the scandal not counter-intelligence. If the [London Centre for International Law Practice] was British state,
not private, some Commonwealth countries are going to be seriously pissed off."
Blackburn spoke with Disobedient Media, saying: "If you factor in the dreadful reporting to discredit Joseph
Mifsud and leaks, it is pretty clear something rather strange happened to George Papadopoulos during the
campaign while he was shuttling around Europe and the Middle East. He was working with people who have
intelligence links at the London Centre of International Law Practice. A recent article in
The Telegraph
also
alludes to MI5, MI6, and CIA using counter-terrorism assets which would tie into the London Centre of
International Law Practice (LCILP), and its sister organizations, doing counter-terrorism work for the
Australian, UK and US governments. They quote anonymous officials who believe that their
intelligence
agencies used counter-terrorism personnel to kick start the investigation/scandal."
[Emphasis Added]
Blackburn discussed this differentiation with Disobedient Media: "Counter-terrorism is obviously involved in
more kinetic, violent political actions-concerning mass casualty events, bombings, assassinations, poisonings,
and hacking. But, the lines are blurring between them. Counter-intelligence cases have been known to stretch
for decades- often relying on nothing more than paranoia and suspicion to fuel investigations.
Counter-terrorism is also a broader discipline as it involves tactical elements like hostage rescue, crime
scene investigations, and explosive specialists. Counter-Terrorism is a collaborative effort with
counter-terrorism officers working closely with local and regional police forces and civic organizations. There
is also a wider academic field around countering violent, and radical ideology which promotes terrorism and
insurgencies. Cybersecurity has become the third major discipline in intelligence. The London Center of
International Law Practice, the mysterious intelligence company that
employed both Papadopoulos and Mifsud
,
had also been working in that area."
Continuing, Blackburn pinpointed the significance of defining counter-terrorism as the starting point of the
investigation, saying: "It shows that there is a high probability that intelligence was deliberately abused to
make Papadopoulos' activities look like they were something else. As counter-terrorism and counterintelligence
are close in tactics and methods, it would seem that they were used because they share the same skill sets –
covert evidence gathering and deception. It's basically sleight of hand. A piece of theatre would be more
precise. However, we don't know if the FBI knew it was real or make-believe. It's more likely that the CIA
played the FBI with the help of close allies who were suspicious and frightened of a Trump presidency."
Mueller's Team And Joseph Mifsud
Zainab Ahmad
, a
member
of Mueller's legal team, is the former Assistant United States Attorney in the Eastern District of New York. As
pointed out by
Blackburn
, Ahmad attended a Global Center on Cooperative Security event in 2017. In recent days, Blackburn
wrote via
Twitter
:
"Zainab Ahmad is a major player in the Russiagate scandal at the DOJ. Does she work for SC Mueller? She was at
a GCCS event in May 2017. Arvinder Sambei, a co-director of the [London Centre of International Law Practice],
worked with Joseph Mifsud, [George Papadopoulos] and [Simona Mangiante]. She's a GCCS consultant."
Blackburn told this author: "Zainab Ahmad was one of the first DOJ prosecutors to have seen the Steele
dossier. In May 2017, she attended a counter-terrorism conference in New York with the Global Center on
Cooperative Security (GCCS), an organization which Joseph Mifsud, the alleged Russian spy, had been working
within London and Riyadh, Saudi Arabia."
<img src="https://i2.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/zainab-work.png?resize=295%2C300&ssl=1" alt="" width="295" height="300" srcset="https://i2.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/zainab-work.png?resize=295%2C300&ssl=1 295w, https://i2.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/zainab-work.png?resize=768%2C782&ssl=1 768w, https://i2.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/zainab-work.png?resize=1006%2C1024&ssl=1 1006w, https://i2.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/zainab-work.png?w=1560&ssl=1 1560w" sizes="(max-width: 295px) 100vw, 295px" data-recalc-dims="1" />
Zainab
Ahmad (AHMAD). Image via the Combatting Terrorism Center, West Point
"Richard Barrett,
the Former Chief of Counter-Terrorism at MI6, Britain's foreign intelligence department traveled with Mifsud to
Saudi Arabia to give a talk on terrorism in 2017. Ex-CIA officers, US Defense, and US Treasury officials were
also there. The London Centre of International Law Practice's relationship to the Global Center had been
established in 2014. The Global Center on Cooperative Security made Martin Polaine and Arvinder Sambei
consultants, they then became directors at the London Centre of International Law Practice."
"The Global Center on Cooperative Security's first major UK conference was at Joseph Mifsud's London Academy
of Diplomacy (LAD). Mifsud then followed Arvinder Sambei and Nagi Idris over to the London Centre of
International Law Practice. Sources have told me that Mifsud was moonlighting as a specialist on
counter-terrorism and Islamism while working at LAD which explains why he went to work in counter-terrorism
after LAD folded."
"I don't think it's a coincidence that Global Center on Cooperative Security is connected to various
elements that popped up in the Papadopoulos case. The fact that a prosecutor on Mueller's team was at Global
Center before Mueller was appointed as special counsel is also troubling."
Days ago,
The
Hill
reported on Congressional testimony by Bruce Ohr, revealing that when served as a DOJ official, he
warned FBI and DOJ figures that the Steele dossier was problematic and linked to the Clintons. Critically,
The Hill
writes:
"Those he briefed included Andrew Weissmann, then the head of DOJ's fraud section; Bruce Swartz, longtime
head of DOJ's international operations, and
Zainab Ahmad
, an accomplished terrorism prosecutor
who, at the time, was assigned to work with Lynch as a senior counselor. Ahmad and Weissmann would go on to
work for Mueller, the special prosecutor overseeing the Russia probe." [Emphasis Added]
This point is essential, as it not only describes Ahmad's role in Mueller's team but places her at a crucial
pre-investigation meeting.
Last year,
Blackburn
noted the connection between Mifsud and
Arvinder
Sambei
, writing: "LCILP director and FBI counsel, works with Mike Smith at the Global Center. They ran
joint counter-terrorism conferences and training with Mifsud's London Academy. Sambei then brought Mifsud over
to the [London Centre of International Law Practice]. [Global Center works with Aussies, UK and US State too."
Sambei has been
described
elsewhere as a "Former practising barrister, Senior Crown Prosecutor with the Crown Prosecution
Service of England & Wales, and Legal Adviser at the Permanent Joint Headquarters (PJHQ), Ministry of Defence."
[British spelling has been retained]
<img src="https://i0.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/AS-2016-cut.jpg?resize=300%2C296&ssl=1" alt="" width="300" height="296" srcset="https://i0.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/AS-2016-cut.jpg?resize=300%2C296&ssl=1 300w, https://i0.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/AS-2016-cut.jpg?w=455&ssl=1 455w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" data-recalc-dims="1" />
Arvinder
Sambei. Image via the Public International Law Advisory Group
That Sambei has been so
thoroughly linked to organizations where Mifsud was a central figure is yet another cause of suspicion
regarding allegations that Joseph Mifsud was a shadowy, unknown Russian agent until the summer of 2016. She is
also a direct link between Robert Mueller and Mifsud.
Blackburn wrote via
Twitter
: "Arvinder Sambei helped to organize LCILP's counter-terrorism and corruption events. She used her
contacts in the US to bring in Middle Eastern government officials that were seen to be vulnerable to graft.
Lisa Osofsky, former FBI Deputy General Counsel, was working with her." Below, Arvinder is pictured at a London
Centre of International Law Practice (LCILP) event.
<img src="https://i2.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/sambeilcilp.jpg?resize=720%2C566&ssl=1" alt="" width="720" height="566" srcset="https://i2.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/sambeilcilp.jpg?w=720&ssl=1 720w, https://i2.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/sambeilcilp.jpg?resize=300%2C236&ssl=1 300w" sizes="(max-width: 720px) 100vw, 720px" data-recalc-dims="1" />
Arvinder
Sambei, pictured at an LCILP event. Image via Chris Blackburn, Twitter
As Chris
Blackburn told this author: "
Mifsud and Papadopoulos's co-director Arvinder Sambei was also the former
FBI British counsel working 9/11 cases for Robert Mueller.
She also runs a consultancy which deals
with Special Investigative Measure (SIMs) which is just a posh description for covert espionage and evidence
gathering. She has worked for major intelligence and national law agencies in the past. She wore two hats as a
director of London Centre and a consultant for the Global Center on Cooperative Security (GCCS), a
counter-terrorism think tank which is sponsored by the Australia, Canada, UK and US governments. Alexander
Downer's former Chief of Staff while at the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade now works for
the Global Center. Mifsud was also due to meet with Australian private intelligence figures in Adelaide in
March 2016. So. Australia is certainly a major focus for the investigation." [Emphasis Added]
<img src="https://i0.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Lisa-Osofsky.jpg?resize=720%2C524&ssl=1" alt="" width="720" height="524" srcset="https://i0.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Lisa-Osofsky.jpg?w=720&ssl=1 720w, https://i0.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Lisa-Osofsky.jpg?resize=300%2C218&ssl=1 300w, https://i0.wp.com/disobedientmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Lisa-Osofsky.jpg?resize=370%2C270&ssl=1 370w" sizes="(max-width: 720px) 100vw, 720px" data-recalc-dims="1" />
Lisa
Osofsky, pictured at an LCILP event. Image via Chris Blackburn, Twitter
An
Embarrassment For John Brennan?
Disobedient Media
previously reported that Robert Hannigan, then head of British spy agency GCHQ, flew to
Washington DC to share 'director-to-director' level intelligence with then-CIA Chief John Brennan in the summer
of 2016. This writer noted that "
The
Guardian
reported Hannigan's announcement that he would step down from his leadership position with the
agency just three days after the inauguration of President Trump, on 23 January 2017. Jane Mayer, in her
profile of Christopher Steele published in the
New
Yorker,
also noted that Hannigan had flown to Washington D.C. to personally brief the then-CIA Director
John Brennan on alleged communications between the Trump campaign and Moscow. What is so curious about this
briefing
"deemed so
sensitive it was handled at director-level"
is why Hannigan was talking director-to-director to the CIA and
not Mike Rogers at the NSA, GCHQ's Five Eyes intelligence-sharing partner."
Blackburn told Disobedient Media: "Former Congressman Trey Gowdy, who has seen most of the information
gathered by Congress from the intelligence community concerning the Russia investigation, said that if
President Trump were to declassify files and present the truth to the American public, it would "
embarrass
John Brennan
." I think that is pretty concrete for me, but it's not definitive. I know the polarization and
spin in Washington has become perverse, but that statement is pretty specific for me. If Brennan is involved,
it is most probably through Papadopoulos who sparked off the 'official' investigation at the FBI. He also made
sure the Steele dossier was spread through the US government."
Blackburn added: "Chris Steele was also working on FIFA projects, and a source has told me that he was
working to investigate the Russian and Qatari World Cup bids. The London Centre of International Law Practice
has been working with Majed Garoub, the former Saudi legal representative of FIFA, the world governing body for
soccer. He's also been working against the Qatari bid. Steele likes to get paid twice for his investigations."
"Mifsud has also been associated with Prince Turki the former Saudi intelligence chief, Mifsud and the
London Academy of Diplomacy used to train Saudi diplomats and intelligence figures while Turki was the Saudi
Ambassador to London. Turki is a close friend of Bill Clinton and John Brennan. Nawaf Obaid was also courting
Mifsud and tried to get him a cushy job working with CNN's Freedom Project at Link Campus in Rome. He also
knows John Brennan. Intelligence agencies like to give out professional gifts like this plum academic position
for completing missions. In the US, it is widely known that intelligence agencies gift the children of assets
to get them into prestigious Ivy League schools."
At minimum, we can surmise that Mifsud was not a Russian agent, but was an asset of Western intelligence
agencies. We are left with the impression that the Mifsud saga served as a ploy, whether he participated
knowingly or not. It seems reasonable to conclude that the gambit was initially developed with participation of
John Brennan and UK intelligence. Following this, Mueller inherited and developed the Mifsud narrative thread
into the collusion soap opera we know today.
Ultimately, we are faced with the reality that British and US interests worked together to fabricate a
collusion scandal to subvert a US Presidency, and in doing so, intentionally raised tensions between the West
and a nuclear-armed power.
"... evidence has surfaced that suggests Mifsud was anything but a Russian spy, and may have actually worked for British intelligence. ..."
"... This new evidence culminates in the ground-breaking conclusion that the UK and its intelligence apparatus may be responsible for the invention of key pillars of the Trump-Russia scandal. ..."
"... Mifsud strongly denied claims that he was associated with Russian intelligence, telling Italian newspaper Repubblica that he was a member of the European Council on Foreign Relations and the Clinton Foundation, adding that his political outlook was "left-leaning." Last month, Slate reported Mifsud had 'disappeared', as did some of the other figures linking the UK to the Trump-Russia scandal. This aspect will be discussed in more detail below. ..."
"... WikiLeaks Editor-in-Chief Julian Assange likewise noted the connection between Mifsud and Smith in a Twitter thread, additionally pointing out his connections with Saudi intelligence: "[Mifsud] and Claire Smith of the UK Joint Intelligence Committee and eight-year member of the UK Security Vetting panel both trained Italian security services at the Link University in Rome and appear to both be present in this [photo] ..."
"... A particularly compelling factor indicating that Mifsud's working relationship with Claire Smith suggests his direct connection with UK intelligence is Smith's membership of the UK's Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) , a supervisory body overseeing all UK intelligence agencies. The JIC is part of the Cabinet Office and reports directly to the Prime Minister. The Committee also sets the collection and analysis priorities for all of the agencies it supervises. Claire Smith also served as a member of the UK's Cabinet Office. ..."
"... In summary, Mifsud's appearance with Claire Smith at the LINK campus, in addition to her discussion on intelligence at yet another university where Mifsud was also employed, as well as her long-standing role in UK intelligence vetting and her position as a member of the UK Joint Intelligence Committee, would suggest that the roving scholar is not a Russian agent, but is actually a UK intelligence asset. ..."
"... Claire Smith is not the only British official associated with Mifsud. He was a speaker at an event by the Central European Initiative alongside former British diplomat Charles Crawford, whose postings included Moscow, Sarajevo, Belgrade and Warsaw. Crawford is listed as a visiting Professor with the same London Academy of Diplomacy (LAD) where Mifsud served as Director, associated with Stirling University. This adds more weight to the idea that Mifsud is a familiar figure among the upper echelons of the UK intelligence and foreign policy establishment. ..."
Over the last few months, Professor Joseph Mifsud has become a feather in the cap for those pushing the
Trump-Russia narrative. He is characterized as a "Russian" intelligence asset in mainstream press, despite his
declarations to the contrary. However, evidence has surfaced that suggests Mifsud was anything but a Russian
spy, and may have actually worked for British intelligence.
This new evidence culminates in the ground-breaking
conclusion that the UK and its intelligence apparatus may be responsible for the invention of key pillars of
the Trump-Russia scandal. If true, this would essentially turn the entire RussiaGate debacle on its head.
To
give an idea of the scope of this report, a few central points showing the UK connections with the central
pillars of the Trump-Russia claims are included here, in the order of discussion in this article:
Mifsud
allegedly discussed
that Russia has 'dirt' on Clinton in the form of 'thousands of emails' with George
Papadopoulos in London in April 2016.
The following month,
Papadopoulos
spoke with Alexander Downer,
Australia's ambassador to the UK, about the alleged Russian dirt on Clinton
while they were drinking at a swanky Kensington bar, according to The Times. In late July 2016, Downer
shared his tip with Australian intelligence officials who forwarded it to the FBI.
Robert Goldstone, a key figure in the 'Trump Tower' part of the RussiaGate narrative, sent Donald Trump
Jr. an email claiming Russia wanted to help the Trump campaign. He is a British music promoter.
Christopher Steele, ex-MI6, who worked as an MI6 agent in Moscow until 1993 and ran the Russia desk at
MI6 HQ in London between 2006 and 2009. He produced the totally unsubstantiated 'Steele Dossier' of
Trump-Russia allegations, with funding from the Clinton campaign and the DNC.
Robert Hannigan, the head of British spy agency GCHQ, flew to Washington DC to share
'director-to-director' level intelligence with then-CIA Chief John Brennan.
Each of these strands of UK-tied elements of the Russiagate narrative can be substantially dismantled on
close inspection. This untangling process leads to the surprising conclusion that UK intelligence services
fabricated evidence of collusion in order to create the appearance of a Trump-Russia connection.
This trend begins with Joseph Mifsud, a Maltese scholar with an eclectic academic history who
Quartz
described as
an "enigma," while legacy press has enthusiastically characterized him as a central personality in the
Trump-Russia scandal.
The
New York Times
described Mifsud as an "enthusiastic promoter of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia",
citing his regular involvement in the annual meetings of the
Valdai Discussion Club
,
a Russian-based think-tank, as well as
three short articles
he wrote in support of Russian policies.
Mifsud strongly denied claims that he was associated with Russian intelligence, telling
Italian newspaper Repubblica
that he was a member of the European Council on Foreign Relations and the
Clinton Foundation, adding that his political outlook was "left-leaning." Last month,
Slate
reported
Mifsud had 'disappeared', as did some of the other figures linking the UK to the Trump-Russia scandal. This
aspect will be discussed in more detail below.
To contextualize Mifsud's eclectic academic career in terms of intelligence service, it is helpful to note
that research undertaken by this author and Suzie Dawson as part of the
Decipher You
project has repeatedly shown the close ties – an outright merger in many cases – between the intelligence
community and academia. This enmeshment also takes place with think-tanks, NGOs, and in the corporate sphere.
In this light, Mifsud's brand of 'scholarship' becomes far less mysterious.
Mifsud's alleged links to Russian intelligence are summarily debunked by his close working relationship with
Claire Smith, a major figure in the upper echelons of British intelligence. A number of
Twitter users
recently
observed that Joseph Mifsud had been photographed standing next to Claire Smith of the UK Joint Intelligence
Committee
at Mifsud's LINK campus in Rome
.
Newsmax
and
Buzzfeed
later
reported that the professor's name and biography had been removed from the campus' website, writing that the
mysterious removal took place after Mifsud had served the institution for "years."
WikiLeaks Editor-in-Chief Julian Assange likewise noted the connection between Mifsud and Smith in a
Twitter
thread, additionally pointing out his connections with Saudi intelligence: "[Mifsud] and Claire Smith of the
UK Joint Intelligence Committee
and eight-year member of the
UK Security Vetting panel
both trained Italian security services at the Link University in Rome and appear to both be present in this
[photo]."
The photograph in question originated on
Geodiplomatics.com
, where it specified that Joseph Mifsud is indeed standing next to Claire Smith, who
was attending a: " Training program on International Security which was organised by
Link Campus
University and London Academy of Diplomacy
." The event is listed as taking place in October, 2012.
This is highly significant for a number of reasons.
(Image deleted) Claire
Smith standing with Joseph Mifsud, on the left side of the back row.
First, the
training program Smith attended
with high-ranking members of the Italian military
was organized by the
London Academy of
Diplomacy
, where Joseph Mifsud served as Director, as noted by
The Washington Post.
That Claire Smith was training military and law enforcement officials alongside Mifsud
in 2012
during her tenure as a member of the UK Cabinet Office Security Vetting Appeals Panel
,
which oversees the vetting process for UK intelligence placement, strongly suggests that Mifsud has been
incorrectly characterized as a Russian intelligence asset. It is extremely unlikely that Claire Smith's role in
vetting UK intelligence personnel would lead to her accidentally working with a Russian agent.
The connection between Mifsud and Smith does not end at bumped elbows in a photograph. Mifsud's
LinkedIn
profile
lists the
University of Stirling
as a place of occupation in connection with his
service as Director of the London Academy of Diplomacy (LAD), where Claire Smith served as a visiting professor
from 2013-2014 according to her
LinkedIn
profile
. This adds yet another verifiable connection between a man who is at the center of already-flimsy
Trump-Russia allegations and a high-ranking British intelligence figure.
(Picture deleted) Claire
Smith's LinkedIn profile details her service on the Security Vetting Appeals
Panel while also occupied as a
visiting Professor at Stirling University
Claire Smith also hosted a seminar titled "
Making
Sense of Intelligence
" at the University of Stirling. The event registration form describes her career,
including her service as Deputy Chief of Assessments Staff in the Cabinet Office, as a member of the UK Joint
Intelligence Committee and her completion of an eight-year term as a member of the UK Security Vetting and
Appeals Panel.
A particularly compelling factor indicating that Mifsud's working relationship with Claire Smith suggests
his direct connection with UK intelligence is Smith's membership of the UK's
Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC)
, a supervisory body overseeing all UK intelligence agencies. The JIC is
part of the Cabinet Office and reports directly to the Prime Minister. The Committee also sets the collection
and analysis priorities for all of the agencies it supervises. Claire Smith also served as a member of the UK's
Cabinet Office.
In summary, Mifsud's appearance with Claire Smith at the LINK campus, in addition to her discussion on
intelligence at yet another university where Mifsud was also employed, as well as her long-standing role in UK
intelligence vetting and her position as a member of the
UK Joint Intelligence Committee,
would
suggest that the
roving scholar
is not a Russian agent, but is actually a UK intelligence asset. The possibility that such a
high-ranking member of this extremely powerful intelligence supervisory group was photographed standing next to
a "Russian" asset unknowingly is patently absurd.
This finding knocks the first pillar out from under the
edifice of the Trump-Russia allegations. It provides an initial suggestion of the UK's involvement in procuring
the 'evidence' that fueled the debacle.
Claire Smith is not the only British official associated with Mifsud. He was a speaker at an event by the
Central European Initiative
alongside former British diplomat Charles Crawford, whose postings included
Moscow, Sarajevo, Belgrade and Warsaw. Crawford is listed as a visiting Professor with the same London Academy
of Diplomacy (LAD) where Mifsud served as Director, associated with Stirling University. This adds more weight
to the idea that Mifsud is a familiar figure among the upper echelons of the UK intelligence and foreign policy
establishment.
The final nail in the coffin of the theory that Mifsud is a Russian spy is this photograph of Mifsud
standing next to Boris Johnson, the UK Foreign Secretary, as reported by
The Guardian.
The
photograph, taken in October 2017 –
nearly a full year after the US Presidential election and nine months
after Mifsud's name appeared in newspaper headlines worldwide as allegedly involved in Russian meddling in that
election –
is either highly embarrassing for the hapless Mr Johnson, or it's not, because Joseph Mifsud is
actually a valued and security-vetted asset to the United Kingdom.
Image
via The Guardian (deleted): Boris Johnson pictured at the dinner with the 'London professor',
Joseph Mifsud (left) and
Prasenjit Kumar Singh.
Another aspect of the RussiaGate claims tied to the UK includes
the reported conversation between
George
Papadopoulos and Alexander Downer,
Australia's High Commissioner to the UK who was based in London. The
pair reportedly spoke about the alleged Russian 'dirt' on Hillary Clinton while they were drinking at a swanky
bar in London. According to
Lifezette
, Downer
is closely tied with The Clinton Foundation via his role in securing $25 million in aid from his country to
help the Clinton Foundation fight AIDS.
He is also a member of the advisory board of
London-based Hakluyt & Co
,
an opposition research and intelligence firm set up in 1995 by three former UK intelligence officials and
described as "
a retirement
home for ex-MI6 [British foreign intelligence] officers
, but it now also recruits from the worlds of
management consultancy and banking". Whereas opposition research group Fusion GPS has received all the media
attention so far, Lifezette states that Hakluyt is "a second, even more powerful and mysterious opposition
research and intelligence firm with significant political and financial links to former Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton and her 2016 campaign".
Yet another UK link to a central pillar of the Trump-Russia narrative is British music promoter Robert
Goldstone, who was
reported
to have organized a meeting between Donald Trump Jr. and Russian nationals in June 2016. In the
email chain setting up the Trump Tower meeting, both before and after the meeting, the only real 'evidence' of
collusion with Russia come from Goldstone's own emails; none-too-subtle heavy hints about 'Russian help'
dropped by Goldstone but later – after the emails became public – walked back by him as "
hyping
the message and using hot-button language to puff up the information
I had been given."
Some have speculated
that Goldstone was also involved with British or US intelligence efforts to concoct the RussiaGate narrative.
As soon as his name emerged in the press, Goldstone – like Christopher Steele and Joseph Mifsud – went into
'hiding'. Multiple
press
reports
claimed he had done so out of fear for his
safety, a claim also made about Christopher Steele when his name first became public. Indeed, the
UK government
issued a DA Notice
(a press suppression advisory notice) to the British press to suppress the ex-spy
Steele's name. It is notable that, of all the people swept up into the ever-burgeoning RussiaGate
investigation, it is only the UK-linked witnesses – Mifsud, Steele, Goldstone – who have felt the need to go
into hiding when their role has been exposed.
The New York Times
summed up the contents of Christopher Steele's dossier: "Mr. Steele produced a series of
memos that alleged a broad conspiracy between the Trump campaign and the Russian government to influence the
2016 election on behalf of Mr. Trump. The memos also contained unsubstantiated accounts of encounters between
Mr. Trump and Russian prostitutes, and real estate deals that were intended as bribes."
Press reports
also relate that Steele was ordered by an English court to appear for a videotaped deposition
in London as part of an ongoing civil litigation against Buzzfeed for publishing the unverified dossier, for
which Steele was paid $168,000 by Glenn Simpson's company Fusion GPS, who were in turn paid by Mark Elias of
law firm Perkins Coie, lawyers to both the Hillary Clinton campaign and the DNC.
In his thread on the role of UK intelligence interference in the 2016 US Presidential race,
Assange also noted
how Christopher Steele used another former UK ambassador to Moscow, Sir Andrew Wood, to funnel the dossier to
Senator John McCain in a way that moved the handover out of London, to Canada. It's often said that no one ever
really leaves the UK security services when they retire – many 'former' MI6 or MI5 officers' private
intelligence businesses are dependent on maintaining good contacts among their ex-colleagues – so it is
interesting to note that Sir Andrew Wood says he was
"instructed"
-- by
former British spy Christopher Steele -- to reach out to the senior Republican, whom Wood called "a good man,"
about the unverified document.
Lastly, Robert Hannigan, former head of British intelligence agency GCHQ, is another personality of note in
the formation of the RussiaGate narrative and its surprisingly deep links to the UK. The
Guardian
noted that
Hannigan announced he would step down from his leadership position with the agency just three days after the
inauguration of President Trump, on 23 January 2017. Jane Mayer in her profile of Christopher Steele published
in the
New Yorker
also
noted that Hannigan had flown to Washington D.C. to personally brief the then-CIA Director John Brennan on
alleged communications between the Trump campaign and Moscow.
What is so curious about this briefing
"deemed so sensitive it was
handled at director-level"
is why Hannigan was talking director-to-director to the CIA and not Mike Rogers
at the NSA, GCHQ's Five Eyes intelligence-sharing partner.
The central supporting pillars of the RussiaGate allegations hinge on figures with close ties to British
intelligence and UK nationals. Even establishment media like
The Guardian
reported
that British spies from GCHQ were the first to alert US authorities to so-called Russian interference. Did the
entire narrative originate with UK intelligence groups in an effort to create the appearance of Russian
collusion with the Trump Presidential campaign, much as the Guccifer 2.0 persona was used in the US to
discredit WikiLeaks' publication of the DNC emails?
If it was not Russia at the heart of a complex operation to topple the Clinton campaign in 2016, then was
British Intelligence responsible for creating false narratives and mirage-like 'evidence' on which the
Trump-Russia scandal could hinge?
Put another way, if UK intelligence is responsible for manufacturing the Trump-Russia allegations, it
suggests that the UK's efforts formed an international arm running concurrently with domestic US 'Deep State'
efforts to sabotage Trump's presidential campaign and/or oust him once he had been elected.
Is British intelligence involvement in RussiaGate, as outlined above, the international version of
CrowdStrike and former FBI figures manufacturing the Guccifer 2.0 persona specifically to smear WikiLeaks via
false allegations of a Russian hack of the DNC? Have we been looking in the wrong place – at the wrong country
– to unearth the so-called 'foreign meddling' in the 2016 US election all along?
Stefan Halper
the University of Cambridge professor identified in multiple media outlets as the alleged FBI informant who made contact with
Donald Trump campaign aides during the 2016 presidential election, has long-standing ties to both the CIA and former Presidents George
H.W. Bush and Ronald Reagan.
Halper has been paid over $1 million by the U.S. government from 2012 through 2017,
this official government database shows. He praised Hillary Clinton
in a Russian news source during the presidential election, saying she would be a better choice for the UK and European Union than
Trump. Halper's father-in-law was a long-time CIA man.
Halper was once caught up in a scandal over allegations that he led an operation within the Reagan campaign to dig up information
on Jimmy Carter. In 1983,
The New York Times reported that Halper was in charge of "an operation to collect inside information on Carter Administration
foreign policy" that was "run in Ronald Reagan's campaign headquarters in the 1980 presidential campaign."
Some news outlets did not name Halper, such as The New York Times , but gave details about his background that were so
specific that
other media sources have named Halper as the alleged informant, whom Trump supporters are referring to as a "plant" or "mole"
within the campaign. Heavy is naming Halper because his name has already been widely reported. He has not confirmed that he was an
alleged informant, nor have authorities.
Trump has highlighted the informant in tweets without naming him. "I hereby demand, and will do so officially tomorrow, that the
Department of Justice look into whether or not the FBI/DOJ infiltrated or surveilled the Trump Campaign for Political Purposes –
and if any such demands or requests were made by people within the Obama Administration!" the president wrote.
On May 19, 2018, Trump also wrote, "If the FBI or DOJ was infiltrating a campaign for the benefit of another campaign, that is
a really big deal. Only the release or review of documents that the House Intelligence Committee (also, Senate Judiciary) is asking
for can give the conclusive answers. Drain the Swamp!"
The DOJ's Rod Rosenstein then ordered the Inspector General to look into those claims, saying, that if "anyone did infiltrate
or surveil participants in a presidential campaign for inappropriate purposes, we need to know about it and take appropriate action."
Who is Stefan Halper?
Here's what you need to know:
1. Halper, a Professor, Made Contact With Three Trump Campaign Officials During the Election & Has Provided Information to
the CIA & FBI for Years, Reports Say
The New York Times described the academic, but didn't name him, as "an American academic who teaches in Britain" and who
"made contact" in summer 2016 with Trump campaign aides Carter Page and George Papadopoulos. Halper is an University of Cambridge
Professor with "ties to American and British intelligence,"
according
to The Washington Times.
"Halper's sit-downs with Page reportedly started in early July 2016, undermining fired FBI Director James Comey's previous claim
that the bureau's investigation into the Trump campaign began at the end of that month,"
The New
York Post reported.
People close to Papadopoulos
told NBC that "he has described being summoned to England in September 2016 by Halper, who was offering to pay him to discuss
energy issues involving Turkey, Israel and Cyprus, which was his area of expertise."
Getty Carter Page arrives at the courthouse on the same day as a hearing regarding Michael Cohen, longtime personal lawyer and
confidante for President Donald Trump, at the United States District Court Southern District of New York, April 16, 2018 in New York
City.
Papadopoulos told these sources, according to NBC, "that Halper attended the meetings with his assistant, a young Turkish woman.
Papadopoulos said he found Halper's demeanor odd, and in retrospect believes Halper was working on behalf of an intelligence or law
enforcement agency."
Page told NBC he met Halper several times on his farm but didn't find it suspicious at the time. He wrote the same on Twitter,
saying, "Reporters keep asking me about my interactions with Prof. Halper. I found all our interactions to be cordial. Like this
email I received about a year after I first met him. He never seemed suspicious. Just a few scholars exchanging ideas. He had interests
in policy, and politics."
An email that Page posted was written by Halper to him in 2017 – after Trump was already president. Page said on Fox News that
he was giving Halper the benefit of the doubt until more confirmation comes out.
The Washington
Post reported that the professor (whom the Post didn't name) approached Carter Page at a symposium in England in mid-July 2016.
The Post described him as a "longtime U.S. intelligence source." According to The Post, "the source in question engaged in a months-long
pattern of seeking out and meeting three different Trump campaign officials."
The Post reported that the professor also met Trump campaign co-chairman Sam Clovis "for coffee in Northern Virginia, offering
to provide foreign-policy expertise to the Trump effort." According to the Post, he invited Papadopoulos to "London to work on a
research paper."
"For years, the professor has provided information to the FBI and the CIA," reports The Post.
The FBI "formally opened its counterintelligence investigation" into possible Russia collusion on July 31, 2016, the Post reported,
after Papadopoulos "boasted to an Australian diplomat" that he knew Russia had information damaging to Hillary Clinton. As for Page,
The Post reports he'd been on the "FBI's radar since at least 2013" because the FBI heard Russian spies "discussing their attempts
to recruit him" on a wiretap.
Stefan Halper "was appointed Senior Fellow at the Centre of International Studies and Director of The American Studies Programme
in 2001. Professor Halper lectures on latter 20th and early 21st Century U.S. foreign policy, US-China relations, China in the World,
Anglo-American relations, and contemporary international security issues," the bio reads.
During March 2016, Sputnik
News reported that Halper believed "The victory of Hillary Clinton, who is more experienced and predictable than her Republican
rival Donald Trump, in the US presidential elections will be more beneficial for the US-UK relations."
The exact quote per Sputnik News, which is controlled by the Russian government, reads, "I believe [Hillary] Clinton would be
best for US-UK relations and for relations with the European Union. Clinton is well-known, deeply experienced and predictable. US-UK
relations will remain steady regardless of the winner although Clinton will be less disruptive over time."
2. Halper's Father-in-Law, Ray Cline, Worked for the CIA During the Cuban Missile Crisis & Halper Advised George H.W. Bush's
Presidential Campaign
Stefan Halper has a strong connection to the Central Intelligence Agency through his father-in-law, Ray Cline.
A 1980 story
in The Washington Post mentions Cline. It says that the intelligence community was strongly supporting the then-presidential
campaign of George H.W. Bush, who had been CIA director. One of those people was identified as Ray Cline, the father-in-law of Stefan
Halper and a legendary figure within intelligence circles. "One top foreign policy and defense adviser is Ray Cline, a former deputy
director of the CIA and director of intelligence and research at the State Department," The Post reported.
Bush ran for president that year but withdrew during the primaries, and Ronald Reagan became the party's nominee and eventual
victor; George H.W. Bush then served as Reagan's vice president.
The Post reported at the time that Cline, who was "director of the Center for Strategic and International Studies at Georgetown
University, had been delivering pro-CIA lectures on college campuses and elsewhere since 1973 when he left the government in disgust
'over what they were doing to the intelligence agencies.'" He was heckled at many of the stops, according to The Post.
The article says that Cline recommended Stefan Halper "a former Nixon White House aide, be hired as Bush's director of policy
development and research."
NBC News reports that Cline "was the chief CIA analyst during the Cuban missile crisis."
According to a book on the Iran-Contra scandal, Cline's other son-in-law Roger
Fontaine "made at least two visits to Guatemala in 1980 (with General Sumner) drafting the May 1980 Santa Fe Statement, which said
that World War III was already underway in Central America against the Soviets and that Nicauragua was the enemy." The book alleges
that some former Reagan aides felt that Halper "was receiving information from the CIA."
Palmer National Bank, where Halper worked for a time,
was described in one book as "the DC hub by which Lt. Col. Oliver North sent arms and money to the anti-Sandinista guerrilla
Contras in Nicaragua. One of Palmer's founders, Stefan Halper, had no previous banking experience but was George H.W. Bush's foreign
policy director during Bush's unsuccessful 1980 presidential campaign." The book describes Halper as an "accomplished political operative."
Halper was on the
board of directors of the National Intelligence Center alongside Ray Cline in the early 1980s.
Cline died at age 77 in 1996.
Cline's obituary
in The New York Times said he was survived by his wife of 54 years, Marjorie Wilson, and two daughters Sibyl MacKenzie
and Judith Fontaine, of Arlington, Virginia. The obituary describes Cline as "the Central Intelligence Agency's chief analyst during
the Cuban missile crisis and in retirement a fierce defender of the agency."
3. Halper Was Accused of Being in Charge of a Reagan Operation Digging Up Information on Jimmy Carter & Received Over $1 Million
in Contracts With the U.S. Government
The operation into Jimmy Carter was described as "highly secretive" and involving a "number of retired Central Intelligence Agency
officials," The New York Times reported at the time.
"The sources identified Stefan A. Halper, a campaign aide involved in providing 24-hour news updates and policy ideas to the traveling
Reagan party, as the person in charge," according to the 1983 Times article. Halper adamantly denied the accusations,
telling UPI , "I never knew or talked to anyone in the Carter White House, the Carter administration or the Carter campaign throughout
the course of the campaign and I never asked anybody to talk to anybody from the Carter camp or to get any information."
The newspaper identified Halper as "until recently deputy director of the State Department's Bureau of Politico-Military Affairs
and now chairman of the Palmer National Bank in Washington."
Cline told the newspaper that the story was "romantic fallacy" and rejected any theories about "an old CIA network." The Times
reported there was already a "furor over revelations that Reagan campaign officials came into possession of Carter debate strategy
papers" before the debate.
A Reagan campaign aide told the Times of Halper that "people talked about his having a network that was keeping track of things
inside the Government, mostly in relation to the October surprise." The same article said that Halper worked "closely with David
R. Gergen on the staff of George Bush." James A. Baker and Gergen were responsible for bringing Halper into the campaign, the story
reports.
The old UPI article also contains this paragraph: "The former campaign official said the next step in the strategy would be to
attempt to establish that the Carter campaign materials reached the Reagan camp through the vice presidential campaign staff of George
Bush -- who was CIA director under President Ford."
In totality, Stefan Halper has ties to three Republican administrations. "The American-born academic previously served in the
Nixon, Ford and Reagan administrations,"
reports
The New York Post. Halper is 73-years-old.
However, he also received a lot of money from the U.S. government during the Obama administration.
NBC News reports that Halper has worked as "a paid consultant to an internal Pentagon think tank known as the Office of Net Assessment,
consulting on Russia and China issues." According
to Gov.Tribe , Halper has been paid in recent years by the federal government for things including a Russa/China relationship
study. Some of the money came from "defense agencies."
Other large payments
date back to 2012. According to an official U.S. government database, contracts with Stefan Halper from 2012 through 2017 total
$1,058,160.
Some of the contracts are coded as "SPECIAL STUDIES/ANALYSIS- FOREIGN/NATIONAL SECURITY POLICY" and others as "SUPPORT- PROFESSIONAL:
OTHER."
4. Halper Worked in Republican Administrations & for the Campaigns of Reagan & Bush Sr.
The Institute for World Politics' biography reports that Halper served from 1971 to 1977 in the Nixon and Ford administrations.
Among the positions he has held include the White House Domestic Counsel; assistant director of the White House Office of Management
and Budget; and Assistant to the White House Chief of Staff.
He also served as "Legislative Assistant to Senator William Roth (R-Del.) and Special Counsel to the Joint Economic Committee"
and was the national director for policy development for George H.W. Bush's presidential campaign from 1979-80 and national director
of policy coordination for the Reagan-Bush presidential campaign in 1980.
Halper also served in the 1980s as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Politico-Military Affairs. His portfolio "included
China-US relations, Taiwan, non-proliferation, technology transfer, unconventional warfare," the bio reads.
He spent six years working for three prominent banks in the 1980s. From 1984 through 2001, he served as "Senior Advisor to the
Department of Defense and a Senior Advisor to the Department of Justice," the bio reads. He was a distinguished fellow at the Nixon
Center, wrote a newspaper column, and wrote a research document into the Iraq War, according to the biography, which says
he was educated at Stanford University and the Universities
of Oxford and Cambridge. The site says that Halper graduated from Oxford in 1971 with a doctor of Philosophy. (Bill Clinton
was at Oxford
from 1968 through spring 1970.)
In December 2016, The Telegraph reported, Halper was one of several academics who "unexpectedly resigned from their positions
at the Cambridge Intelligence Seminar (CIS), an academic forum on the Western spy world." His reason for stepping down? "Unacceptable
Russian influence" on the group,
according to UK Telegraph .
According to The Telegraph, the group "was set up by official MI5 historian Professor Christopher Andrew" and holds seminars that
previously were attended by Michael Flynn, among others. The concern about Russia derives from claims that a digital publishing host
covering some of the group's costs "may be acting as a front for the Russian intelligence services," Telegraph reports.
5. The FBI Operation Was Dubbed 'Crossfire Hurricane' & Halper Is an Author
The New
York Times reported that "FBI agents sent an informant to talk to two campaign advisers only after they received evidence that
the pair had suspicious contacts linked to Russia during the campaign."
Papadopoulous pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI last year, and a federal surveillance warrant into Page has caused great controversy
because of revelations that it was at least in part obtained through an unverified and salacious dossier funded by the Hillary Clinton
campaign and Democratic National Committee through a law firm and research firm. That dossier was compiled by a former member of
British intelligence named Christopher Steele.
Republicans in Congress have demanded that the FBI turn over documents about the informant, but the officials have refused.
The Times reports that the operation was called Crossfire Hurricane and was launched after the FBI learned information that Papadopoulos
"was told that Moscow had compromising information on (Hillary) Clinton in the forms of 'thousands of emails'" before WikiLeaks released
hacked emails. The FBI also started investigating Trump Campaign Chairman Paul Manafort and Michael Flynn, ,who later became his
National Security adviser.
Halper is the author of several books, including America Alone: The Neo-Conservatives and the Global Order , The Silence
of the Rational Centre: Why American Foreign Policy is Failing , and The Beijing Consensus: Legitimizing Authoritarianism
in our Time .
The country was divided before Mueller Report. Now it is even more divided.
Notable quotes:
"... We wouldn't know that a Clinton-linked operative, Joseph Mifsud, seeded Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos with the rumor that Russia had 'Dirt' on Hillary Clinton - which would later be coaxed out of Papadopoulos by a Clinton-linked Australian ambassador, Alexander Downer, and that this apparent 'setup' would be the genesis of the FBI's " operation crossfire hurricane " operation against the Trump campaign. ..."
"... We wouldn't know about the role of Fusion GPS - the opposition research firm hired by Hillary Clinton's campaign to commission the Steele dossier. Fusion is also linked to the infamous Trump Tower meeting , and hired Nellie Ohr - the CIA-linked wife of the DOJ's then-#4 employee, Bruce Ohr. Nellie fed her husband Bruce intelligence she had gathered against Trump while working for Fusion , according to transcripts of her closed-door Congressional testimony. ..."
"... Now the dossier -- financed by Hillary Clinton's campaign and the Democratic National Committee , and compiled by the former British intelligence agent Christopher Steele -- is likely to face new, possibly harsh scrutiny from multiple inquiries . - NYT ..."
"... The report was debunked after internet sleuths traced the IP address to a marketing server located outside Philadelphia, leading Alfa Bank executives to file a lawsuit against Fusion GPS in October 2017, claiming their reputations were harmed by the Steele Dossier. ..."
"... And who placed the Trump-Alfa theory with various media outlets? None other than former FBI counterintelligence officer and Dianne Feinstein aide Dan Jones - who is currently working with Fusion GPS and Steele to continue their Trump-Russia investigation funded in part by George Soros . ..."
"... Of course, when one stops painting with broad brush strokes, it's clear that the dossier was fabricated bullshit. ..."
"... after a nearly two-year investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller and roughly 40 FBI agents and other specialists, no evidence was found to support the dossier's wild claims of "DNC moles, Romanian hackers, Russian pensioners, or years of Trump-Putin intelligence trading ," as the Times puts it. ..."
"... As there was spying, there must necessarily also have been channels to get the information thus gathered back to its original buyer - the Clinton campaign. Who passed the information back to Clinton, and what got passed? ..."
"... the NYTt prints all the news a scumbag would. remember Judith Miller, the Zionazi reporter the NYT ..."
"... There was no 'hack.' That is the big, anti-Russia, pro-MIC lie which all the other lies serve. ..."
"... Seth Rich had the means and the motive. So did Imran Awan, but it would make no sense for Awan to turn anything over to wikileaks . . .he would have kept them as insurance. ..."
"... Until the real criminals are processed and the media can be restored you don't have a United States. This corruption is beyond comprehension. You had the (((media)) providing kickbacks to the FBI for leaked information. These bribes are how CNN was on site during Roger Stones invasion. ..."
"... So now the narrative is, "We were wrong about Russian collusion, and that's Russia's fault"?! ..."
As we now shift from the "witch hunt" against Trump to 'investigating the investigators' who spied on him - remember this; Donald
Trump was supposed to lose the 2016 election by almost all accounts. And had Hillary won, as expected, none of this would have seen
the light of day .
We wouldn't know that a Clinton-linked operative, Joseph Mifsud,
seeded Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos with the rumor that Russia had 'Dirt' on Hillary Clinton - which would later be
coaxed out of Papadopoulos by a Clinton-linked Australian ambassador, Alexander Downer, and that this apparent 'setup' would be the
genesis of the FBI's "
operation crossfire hurricane " operation against the Trump campaign.
We wouldn't know about the role of Fusion GPS - the opposition research firm hired by Hillary Clinton's campaign to commission
the Steele dossier. Fusion is also linked to the infamous
Trump Tower meeting , and hired
Nellie Ohr - the CIA-linked wife of the DOJ's then-#4 employee, Bruce Ohr. Nellie fed her husband Bruce intelligence she had
gathered against Trump while working for Fusion ,
according to transcripts of her closed-door Congressional testimony.
And if not for reporting by the Daily
Caller 's Chuck Ross and others, we wouldn't know that the FBI sent a longtime spook, Stefan Halper, to infiltrate and spy on
the Trump campaign - after the Obama DOJ paid him over $400,000
right before the 2016 US election (out of more than $1 million he received while Obama was president).
According to the New
York Times , the tables are turning, starting with the Steele Dossier.
[T]he release on Thursday of
the report
by the special counsel , Robert S. Mueller III, underscored what had grown clearer for months -- that while many Trump aides
had welcomed contacts with the Russians, some of the most sensational claims in the dossier appeared to be false, and others were
impossible to prove . Mr. Mueller's report contained over a dozen passing references to the document's claims but no overall assessment
of why so much did not check out.
While Congressional Republicans have vowed to investigate, the DOJ's Inspector General is considering whether the FBI improperly
relied on the dossier when they used it to apply for a surveillance warrant on Trump campaign adviser Carter Page. The IG also wants
to know about Steele's sources and whether the FBI disclosed any doubts as to the veracity of the dossier .
Attorney General Barr, meanwhile, said he will review the FBI's conduct in the Russia investigation after saying the agency
spied on the Trump
campaign .
Doubts over the dossier
The FBI's scramble to vet the dossier's claims are well known. According to an April, 2017
NYT report , the FBI agreed
to pay Steele $50,000 for "solid corroboration" of his claims . Steele was apparently unable to produce satisfactory evidence - and
was ultimately not paid for his efforts:
Mr. Steele met his F.B.I. contact in Rome in early October, bringing a stack of new intelligence reports. One, dated Sept.
14, said that Mr. Putin was facing "fallout" over his apparent involvement in the D.N.C. hack and was receiving "conflicting advice"
on what to do.
The agent said that if Mr. Steele could get solid corroboration of his reports, the F.B.I. would pay him $50,000 for his efforts,
according to two people familiar with the offer. Ultimately, he was not paid . -
NYT
Still, the FBI used the dossier to obtain the FISA warrant on Page - while the document itself was heavily shopped around to various
media outlets . The late Sen. John McCain provided a copy to Former FBI Director James Comey, who already had a version, and briefed
President Trump on the salacious document. Comey's briefing to Trump was then used by CNN and BuzzFeed to justify reporting on and
publishing the dossier following the election.
Let's not forget that in October, 2016, both Hillary Clinton and her campaign chairman John Podesta promoted the conspiracy theory
that a secret Russian server was communicating with Trump Tower.
The report was debunked after internet sleuths traced the IP address to a marketing server located outside Philadelphia, leading
Alfa Bank executives to file a lawsuit against Fusion GPS in October 2017, claiming their reputations were harmed by the Steele Dossier.
And who placed the Trump-Alfa theory with various media outlets? None other than former FBI counterintelligence officer and Dianne
Feinstein aide Dan Jones - who is currently working with Fusion GPS and Steele to continue their Trump-Russia investigation funded
in part by
George Soros .
Russian tricks? The Times notes that Steele "has not ruled out" that he may have been fed Russian disinformation while assembling his dossier.
That would mean that in addition to carrying out an effective attack on the Clinton campaign, Russian spymasters hedged their
bets and placed a few land mines under Mr. Trump's presidency as well.
Oleg D. Kalugin, a former K.G.B. general who now lives outside Washington, saw that as plausible. "Russia has huge experience
in spreading false information," he said. -
NYT
In short, Steele is being given an 'out' with this admission.
A lawyer for Fusion GPS, Joshua Levy, says that the Mueller report substantiated the "core reporting" in the Steele memos - namely
that "Trump campaign figures were secretly meeting Kremlin figures," and that Russia's president, Vladimir V. Putin, had directed
"a covert operation to elect Donald J. Trump."
Of course, when one stops painting with broad brush strokes, it's clear that the dossier was fabricated bullshit.
The dossier tantalized Mr. Trump's opponents with a worst-case account of the president's conduct. And for those trying to
make sense of the Trump-Russia saga, the dossier infused the quest for understanding with urgency.
In blunt prose, it suggested that a foreign power had fully compromised the man who would become the next president of the
United States.
The Russians, it asserted, had tried winning over Mr. Trump with real estate deals in Moscow -- which he had not taken up --
and set him up with prostitutes in a Moscow hotel in 2013, filming the proceedings for future exploitation. A handful of aides
were described as conspiring with the Russians at every turn.
Mr. Trump, it said, had moles inside the D.N.C. The memos claimed that he and the Kremlin had been exchanging intelligence
for eight years and were using Romanian hackers against the Democrats , and that Russian pensioners in the United States were
running a covert communications network . -
NYT
And after a nearly two-year investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller and roughly 40 FBI agents and other specialists, no
evidence was found to support the dossier's wild claims of "DNC moles, Romanian hackers, Russian pensioners, or years of Trump-Putin
intelligence trading ," as the Times puts it.
Now that the shoe is on the other foot, and key Democrats backing away from talks of impeachment, let's see if lady justice will
follow the rest of us down the rabbit hole.
This is why the whole FISA court is a joke. What is their remedy if their power is abused? What happens. Well,... the FISA
courts was lied to and found out about it in the early 2000's. Mueller was FBI chief. So they got a strongly worded dressing-down,
a mark in their permanent record from high school, and NO ONE was fired... no one was sanctioned, no agent was transferred to
Alaska.
Fast forward 10 or 12 years and the FBI is doing this **** again. Lying to the court... you know the court where there are
no Democrat judges or Republican judges.. they are all super awesome.... and what is the remedy when the FISA court is told they've
been lied to by the FBI and used in a intel operation with MI6, inserting assets, into a freaking domestic Presidential campaign!!!
and then they WON. Good god.
And what do we hear from our court? Nadda. Do we hear of some Federal Judges hauling FBI and DOJ folks in front of them and
throwing them in jail? Nope. It appears from here... that our Federal Justices are corrupt and have no problem letting illegal
police-state actions go on with ZERO accountability or recourse. They could care less evidently. It's all secret you know... trust
us they say.. Why aren't these judges publicly making loud noises about how the judiciary is complicit , with the press, in wholesale
spying and leaking for political reasons AND a coup attempt when the wrong guy won.???
Where is awesome Justice Roberts? Why isn't he throwing down some truth on just how compromised the rule of law in his courts
clearly are in the last 10 years? The FISA court is his baby. It does no good for them to assure us they are concerned too, and
they've taken action and sent strongly worded letters. Pisses me off. ? Right? heck of rant...
When did Russians interfere in our elections?? 2016. Who was president when Russians interfered with elections?? oobama. Who
was head of the CIA?? Brennan. Who was National Intelligence director?? Clapper. Who was head of the FBI when the Russians interfered
in our elections?? Comey. The pattern is obvious. When Trump was a private citizen the oobama and all his cabinet appointees and
Intel Managers had their hands on all the levers and instruments of Government..and did nothing . Your oobama is guilty of treason
and failing his Oath Of Office...everybody knows this.
This article is still a roundabout gambit to blame Russia.
Fair enough, where's Bill Browder? In England. Browder's allegations were utilized to try and damage Russia, even though Russia
(not the USSR), is about the most reliable friend America has.
Russia helped Lincoln, and were it not for that crucial help, there'd be no America to sanction Russia today. The Tsar paid
for that help with his dynasty, when Nicholas II was murdered, and dethroned.
Americans are truly ungrateful brutes..
Now, sanctions, opprobrium, and hatred are heaped on Russia, most cogently by chauvinistic racists, who look down their noses
at Rus (Russ) and yet, cannot sacrifice 25 millions of their own people, for the sake of others.
Russians are considered subhuman, and yet, the divine spark of humanity resides solely in their breasts. The zionists claim
a false figure of 6 million for a faux holocaust, and yet, nobody pays attention to the true holocaust of 25 millions, or the
many millions before that disastrous instigated war.
That the Russians are childlike, believing others to be like them, loyal, self sacrificing, and generous, has now brought the
world to the brink of armageddon, and still, they bear the burden of proof, though their accusers, who ought provide the evidence,
are bereft of any..
Thomas Jefferson it was, who observing whatever he observed, exclaimed in cogent agitation, that "I fear for my countrymen,
when I remember that God is Just, and His Justice does not repose forever".
Investigate Jared and Ivanka Kushner, along with Charles Kushner, and much ought be clear, no cheers...
I don't buy that "Few bad apples at the top", "Good rank and file" Argument. I have never seen one. We should assume everyone
from the top to the bottom of FBI, DOJ, and State, just to get started, probably every other three better agency is bad. At least
incompotent, at worst treasonous.
As there was spying, there must necessarily also have been channels to get the information thus gathered back to its original
buyer - the Clinton campaign. Who passed the information back to Clinton, and what got passed?
the NYTt prints all the news a scumbag would. remember Judith Miller, the Zionazi reporter the NYT used to push
the Iraq war with all sorts of ********? after the war was determined to be started under a false premise and became common knowledge
there were no wmds in iraq the nyt came forward and reported the war was ******** as if they were reporting breaking news.
they have done the same thing here. they pushed the russiagate story with both barrels even though the informed populace knew
it was ******** before trump was sworn in as potus. now that the all the holes in the story are readily apparent the nyt comes
forward with breaking revelation that something is wrong with the story.
The Seth Rich investigation; where is it now? Murder of a campaign staffer; tampering with or influencing an election, is it
not? Hmmm... When nine hundred years old you become, look this good you will not.
Once upon a time there was a Bernie supporter. And his name was Seth Rich. Then there was a "botched robbery", which evidence
that was concluded on, I have no idea. Do you? Anyhow, The End.
Seth Rich had the means and the motive. So did Imran Awan, but it would make no sense for Awan to turn anything over to
wikileaks . . .he would have kept them as insurance.
Why wouldn't Assange name the source for the DNC emails? Is this a future bargaining chip? And what if he did name Seth Rich?
He would have to prove it. Could he?
They've got Assange now...Maybe they should ask him if it was Seth Rich who gave him the emails?
Maybe even do it under oath and on national television. I don't think it's still considered "burning a source" if your source
has already been murdered....
Until the real criminals are processed and the media can be restored you don't have a United States. This corruption is
beyond comprehension. You had the (((media)) providing kickbacks to the FBI for leaked information. These bribes are how CNN was
on site during Roger Stones invasion.
Treason and Sedition is rampant in America and all SPY roads lead to Clapper, Brennan and Obama...This needs attention.
The media is abusive and narrating attacks on a dully elected president
Oleg D. Kalugin, a former K.G.B. general who now lives outside Washington, saw that as plausible. "Russia has huge experience
in spreading false information," he said. -
NYT
You have got to be ******* kidding me. So now the narrative is, "We were wrong about Russian collusion, and that's
Russia's fault"?!
"... As I noted in my previous piece-- The FBI Tried and Failed to Entrap Trump --Sater was an active FBI undercover informant. ..."
"... An honest prosecutor would have and should have disclosed this fact. He, Sater, was the one encouraging the Trump team to cozy up to Russia. Mueller does not disclose one single instance of Trump or Cohen or any of the Trump kids calling Sater on the carpet and chewing his ass for not bringing them deals and not opening doors in Russia. Omitting this key fact goes beyond simple disingenuity. It is a conscious lie. ..."
"... The circumstantial evidence indicates that Sater was doing this at the behest of FBI handlers. We do not yet know who they are. ..."
"... We also have the case of Michael Caputo and Roger Stone being approached by a Russian gangster named Henry Greenberg. ..."
"... How does a guy like Vorkretsov/Greenberg, with an extensive criminal record and circumstantial ties to the Russian mob gain entrance into the United States? Very simple answer. He too was an FBI informant : ..."
"... Please take time to read the full dossier at democrat dossier . This is more than an odd coincidence. This is a pattern. The FBI was targeting the Trump campaign and personnel in a deliberate effort to implicate them in wanting to work with Russians. ..."
"... Once again, the Mueller team treats the provocateur -- -i.e., Joseph Mifsud -- -as some simple guy with ties to Russia's political elites. Another egregious lie. Mifsud was not working on behalf of Russia. He was deployed by MI-6. Disobedient Media has been on the forefront of exposing Mifsud's ties to western intelligence in general and the Brits in particular . ..."
"... A number of Twitter users recently observed that Joseph Mifsud had been photographed standing next to Claire Smith of the UK Joint Intelligence Committee at Mifsud’s LINK campus in Rome. Newsmax and Buzzfeed later reported that the professor’s name and biography had been removed from the campus’ website, writing that the mysterious removal took place after Mifsud had served the institution for “years.” ..."
"... WikiLeaks Editor-in-Chief Julian Assange likewise noted the connection between Mifsud and Smith in a Twitter thread, additionally pointing out his connections with Saudi intelligence: “[Mifsud] and Claire Smith of the UK Joint Intelligence Committee and eight-year member of the UK Security Vetting panel both trained Italian security services at the Link University in Rome and appear to both be present in this [photo].” ..."
"... This is not a mere matter of Mueller and his team "failing" to disclose some important facts. If they were operating honestly they should have investigated Mifsud, Greenberg and Sater. But they did not. Two of the three--Sater and Greenber--alleged Russian stooges have ties to the FBI. And Mifsud has been living and working in the belly of the intelligence community. ..."
"... Don't hold your breath .The so called deep state which in reality are our plutocratic oligarchical class that win. Look at the new boss same as the old boss. ..."
"... Look at all the hair triggers that have been laid out with the TRUMP regime since he became POTUS with regards to the ME and the Russian Federation . THe IRGC being labelled a terrorist organization and further more both Dems and Repub are trying to introduce a bill that labels the Russian Federation as a sponsor of terrorism. ..."
"... You just can't make this stuff up. Least we forget replacing the meme of ASSAD HAS TO GO TO MADURRO HAS TO GO. War is a racket and as per usual we the sheeple just fall for it. Ret. Col Wilkerson lays all out at last years Israeli influence conference. ..."
"... The Special Relationship is hopefully entering the divorce stage. None too soon. Great work, Mr. Johnson. ..."
While President Trump is correct to celebrate the Mueller Report’s conclusion that no one on Trump’s side of the ledger attempted
to or succeeded in collaborating or colluding with the Russian Government or Russian spies, there remains a dark cloud behind the
silver lining. And I am not referring to the claims of alleged obstruction of justice. A careful reading of the report reveals
that Mueller has issued findings that are both disingenuous and dishonest. The report is a failed hatchet job. Part of the failure
can be attributed to the amount of material that Attorney General Barr allowed to be released. It appears that Bill Barr's light
editing may have been intended to expose the bias and sloppiness of Mueller and his team.
Let us start with the case of trying to build a Trump Tower in Moscow. If you were to believe that the Steele Dossier accurately
reported Vladimir Putin's attitude towards Trump, then a Trump real estate deal in Moscow was a slam dunk. According to one of Steele's
breathless reports:
The Kremlin's cultivation operation on TRUMP also had comprised offering him various lucrative real estate development business
deals in Russia, especially in relation to the ongoing 2018 World Cup soccer tournament.
How ever, so far, for reasons unknown, TRUMP had not taken up any of these.
Then there is reality. The impetus, the encouragement for the Moscow project came from one man--Felix
Sater.
In the late summer of 2015, the Trump Organization received a new inquiry about pursuing a Trump Tower project in Moscow. In approximately
September 2015, Felix Sater . . . contacted Cohen on behalf of I.C. Expert Investment Company (I.C. Expert), a Russian real-estate
development corporation controlled by Andrei Vladimirovich Rozov.J07 Sater had known Rozov since approximately 2007 and, in 2014,
had served as an agent on behalf of Rozov during Rozov's purchase of a building in New York City.30S Sater later contacted Rozov
and proposed that I.C. Expert pursue a Trump Tower Moscow project in which I.C. Expert would license the name and brand from the
Trump Organization but construct the building on its own. Sater worked on the deal with Rozov and another employee of I.C. Expert.
(see page 69 of the Mueller Report).
To reiterate--if the Steele Dossier was based on truthful intelligence then the Trump organization only had to sit back, stretch
out their hands and seize the moment. Instead, little Felix Sater keeps coming back to the well. In January 2016, according to the
Mueller report,
Sater then sent a draft invitation for Cohen to visit Moscow to discuss the Trump Moscow project,along with a note to "[t]ell
me if the letter is good as amended by me or make whatever changes you want and send it back to me."
After a further round
of edits, on January 25, 2016, Sater sent Cohen an invitation -- signed by Andrey Ryabinskiy of the company MHJ -- to travel to
"Moscow for a working visit" about the "prospects of development and the construction business in Russia," "the various land plots
available suited for construction of this enormous Tower," and "the opportunity to co-ordinate a follow up visit to Moscow by
Mr. Donald Trump..
This produced nothing. No deal, no trip. But Sater persisted:
Beginning in late 2015, Sater repeatedly tried to arrange for Cohen and candidate Trump, as representatives of the Trump Organization,
to travel to Russia to meet with Russian government officials and possible financing partners. . . .
Into the spring of 2016, Sater and Cohen continued to discuss a trip to Moscow in connection with the Trump Moscow project.
On April 20, 2016, Sater wrote Cohen, " [t)he People wanted to know when you are coming?,,
On May 4, 2016, Sater followed up:
“I had a chat with Moscow. ASSUMING the trip does happen the question is before or after the convention. I said I believe,
but don't know for sure, that's it's probably after the convention. Obviously the pre-meeting trip (you only) can happen anytime
you want but he 2 big guys where [sic) the question. I said I would confirm and revert.”
On May 5, 2016, Sater wrote to Cohen:
“Peskov would like to invite you as his guest to the St. Petersburg Forum which is Russia's Davos it's June 16-19. He wants
to meet there with you and possibly introduce you to either Putin or Medvedev, as they are not sure if 1 or both will be there.
This is perfect. The entire business class of Russia will be there as well.”
On June 14, 2016, Cohen met Sater in the lobby of the Trump Tower in New York and informed him that he would not be traveling
at that time.
Why was Felix Sater the one repeatedly identified pushing to arrange deals with the Russians and yet did not face any subsequent
charges by the Mueller team? Sater had been working as part of the Trump team since 2003. Why is it that the proposed deals and travel
to Moscow came predominantly from Felix Sater?
As I noted in my previous piece--The
FBI Tried and Failed to Entrap Trump--Sater was an active FBI undercover informant. He had been working with the
FBI since 1998. When he agreed to start working as an undercover informant aka cooperator in December 1998 guess who signed off on
the deal? Andrew Weissman. You can see the
deal here. It was signed 10
December 1998.
An honest prosecutor would have and should have disclosed this fact. He, Sater, was the one encouraging the Trump team to
cozy up to Russia. Mueller does not disclose one single instance of Trump or Cohen or any of the Trump kids calling Sater on the
carpet and chewing his ass for not bringing them deals and not opening doors in Russia. Omitting this key fact goes beyond simple
disingenuity. It is a conscious lie.
The circumstantial evidence indicates that Sater was doing this at the behest of FBI handlers. We do not yet know who they are.
But Sater's behavior and status as an FBI Informant was not an isolated incident. We also have the case of Michael Caputo and
Roger Stone being approached by a Russian gangster named Henry Greenberg. According to
democratdossier.com:
Greenberg's birth name is Gennady Vasilievich Vostretsov, the son of Yekatrina Vostretsova and Vasliy Vostretsov. He later adopted
new names twice as a result of two different marriages and became Gennady V. Arzhanik and later Henry Oknyansky. Henry Greenberg
is not a legal alias, but he uses it quite commonly in recent years.
But you would not know this from reading the Mueller report. Mr. Disingenuous strikes again:
In the spring of 2016, Trump Campaign advisor Michael Caputo learned through a Florida-based Russian business partner that another
Florida-based Russian, Henry Oknyansky (who also went by the name Henry Greenberg), claimed to have information pertaining to
Hillary Clinton . Caputo notified Roger Stone and brokered communication between Stone and Oknyansky.
Oknyansky and Stone set
up a May 2016 in-person meeting. 260 Oknyansky was accompanied to the meeting by Alexei Rasin, a Ukrainian associate involved
in Florida real estate. At the meeting, Rasin offered to sell Stone derogatory information on Clinton that Rasin claimed to have
obtained while working for Clinton. Rasin claimed to possess financial statements demonstrating Clinton's involvement in money
laundering with Rasin's companies. According to Oknyansky, Stone asked if the amounts in question totaled millions of dollars
but was told it was closer to hundreds of thousands. Stone refused the offer, stating that Trump would not pay for opposition
research.
How does a guy like Vorkretsov/Greenberg, with an extensive criminal record and circumstantial ties to the Russian mob gain entrance
into the United States? Very simple answer. He too
was an FBI informant:
In an affidavit, Vostretsov explained to an immigration judge he worked for the FBI for 17 years throughout the world, including
in the US, Iran and North Korea. He explained in the same paperwork the FBI granted him several temporary visas to visit the US in
exchange for information about criminal activities.
Please take time to read the full dossier at
democrat dossier. This is more than
an odd coincidence. This is a pattern. The FBI was targeting the Trump campaign and personnel in a deliberate effort to implicate
them in wanting to work with Russians.
And there is more. George Papodopoulus was entrapped by individuals linked to British MI-6 and the CIA with offers to provide
meetings with Russians and Putin. The Mueller account is a lie:
In late April 2016, Papadopoulos was told by London-based professor Joseph Mifsud, immediately after Mifsud 's return from a trip
to Moscow, that the Russian government had obtained "dirt" on candidate Clinton in the form of thousands of emails. One week later,
on May 6, 2016, Papadopoulos suggested to a representative of a foreign government that the Trump Campaign had received indications
from the Russian government that it could assist the Campaign through the anonymous release of information that would be damaging
to candidate Clinton.
Papadopoulos shared information about Russian "dirt " with people outside of the Campaign, and the Office
investigated whether he also provided it to a Campaign official. Papadopoulos and the Campaign officials with whom he interacted
told the Office that they did · not recall that Papadopoulos passed them the information. Throughout the relevant period of time
and for several months thereafter, Papadopoulos worked with Mifsud and two Russian nationals to arrange a meeting between the
Campaign and the Russian government. That meeting never came to pass.
Once again, the Mueller team treats the provocateur -- -i.e., Joseph Mifsud -- -as some simple guy with ties to Russia's political
elites. Another egregious lie. Mifsud was not working on behalf of Russia. He was deployed by MI-6. Disobedient Media has been on
the forefront of exposing Mifsud's ties to
western intelligence in general and the Brits in particular.
Mifsud’s alleged links to Russian intelligence are summarily debunked by his close working relationship
with Claire Smith, a major figure in the upper echelons of British intelligence. A number of Twitter users recently observed
that Joseph Mifsud had been photographed standing next to Claire Smith of the UK Joint Intelligence Committee at Mifsud’s LINK campus
in Rome. Newsmax and Buzzfeed later reported that the professor’s name and biography had been removed from the campus’ website, writing
that the mysterious removal took place after Mifsud had served the institution for “years.”
WikiLeaks Editor-in-Chief Julian Assange likewise noted the connection between Mifsud and Smith
in a Twitter thread, additionally pointing out his connections with Saudi intelligence: “[Mifsud] and Claire Smith of the UK Joint
Intelligence Committee and eight-year member of the UK Security Vetting panel both trained Italian security services at the Link
University in Rome and appear to both be present in this [photo].”
The photograph in question originated on Geodiplomatics.com, where it specified that Joseph Mifsud
is indeed standing next to Claire Smith, who was attending a: “…Training program on International Security which was organised by
Link Campus University and London Academy of Diplomacy.” The event is listed as taking place in October, 2012. This is highly significant
for a number of reasons.
This is not a mere matter of Mueller and his team "failing" to disclose some important facts. If they were operating
honestly they should have investigated Mifsud, Greenberg and Sater. But they did not. Two of the three--Sater and Greenber--alleged
Russian stooges have ties to the FBI. And Mifsud has been living and working in the belly of the intelligence community.
When you put these facts together it is clear that there is real meat on the bone for Barr's upcoming investigation of the "spying"
that was being done on the Trump campaign by law enforcement and intelligence. These facts must become a part of the public consciousness.
The foreign country that worked feverishly to meddle in the 2016 Presidential election and the subsequent rule of Donald Trump is
the United Kingdom. Russia is the patsy.
turcopolier, 20 April 2019 at 10:44 PM
IMO the FBI leadership, Clapper, Brennan and his flunkies were working with the Brits at some senior level of their IO apparatus
to screw Trump. Mueller's testimony before the Congress should be revelatory of his true position.
falcemartello, 20 April 2019 at 11:28 PM
Don't hold your breath .The so called deep state which in reality are our plutocratic oligarchical class that win. Look
at the new boss same as the old boss.
It was obvious from way back in June 2016 when most of the fabricated /novella known as the Steele Dossier was floating around
and the role Fusion GPS played in the Clinton POTUS machine. There is a lot out there but as per usual smokey mirrors and deception.
I live you with this one thought.
Look at all the hair triggers that have been laid out with the TRUMP regime since he became POTUS with regards to the ME
and the Russian Federation . THe IRGC being labelled a terrorist organization and further more both Dems and Repub are trying
to introduce a bill that labels the Russian Federation as a sponsor of terrorism.
You just can't make this stuff up. Least we forget replacing the meme of ASSAD HAS TO GO TO MADURRO HAS TO GO. War is a
racket and as per usual we the sheeple just fall for it. Ret. Col Wilkerson lays all out at last years Israeli influence
conference.
Rick Merlotti
The Special Relationship is hopefully entering the divorce stage. None too soon. Great work, Mr. Johnson.
"... It wasn't just Mifsud and Halper, it was everyone -- the head of the London law firm where Papadopoulos was working, as well as his immediate boss at the firm -- everyone was working to set him up as "Trump's liason with the Russians". ..."
Michael Tracey's interview with George Papadopoulos is also available on YouTube (for those who have
difficulty playing it on Patreon). It's two hours long, but if you have any interest in the
Russiagate, you should listen to it.
It wasn't just Mifsud and Halper, it was everyone -- the
head of the London law firm where Papadopoulos was working, as well as his immediate boss at
the firm -- everyone was working to set him up as "Trump's liason with the Russians".
"Many in the USA have come to realize this stealth organization does not work on the behalf of the USA but rather to its own
ends."
CIA probably was involved in Skripals false flag operation as well. Because the behaviour of Theresa May suggest that she from
the very beginning was sure about the USA full and unconditional support and putting pressure on EU allies. Then now we know
that Gina Haspel, who was also involved in Steele dossier and handled most oversees assets involved in entrapment of Trump, misled
Trump and pervaded him to expel 80 Russian diplomats.
Notable quotes:
"... Then there is 9/11. This one also has a USA government narrative that defies logic. This time it is so blatant and egregious that an organization called "Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth" was founded by Richard Gage, an architect with vast experience in steel structured buildings and fire. The organization demands on official investigation by Congress into exactly how the buildings came down. ..."
"... According to a statement reported by the BBC , Loose Change film producer Dylan Avery thinks the destruction of the building was suspicious because it housed some unusual tenants, including a clandestine CIA office on the 25th floor, an outpost of the U.S. Secret Service, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and New York City's emergency command center." Wikipedia ..."
"... So now we have Prime Minister, Teresa May, accusing Putin and Russia of the May 4 nerve agent attack of Sergei V. Skripal (66) and his daughter, Yulia (33), in Salibury, England. Both are in critical condition after being found unconscious on a bench outside The Maltings Shopping Center in Salibury. As we all know Russia is the new Antichrist. The harbinger of all evil. The enemy we all must view with the utmost fear and loathing. Daily, the MSM in USA recoils as they report story after story of Russia meddling in our elections, shaking the very foundations of our democracy. ..."
"... Let's get this straight. Mr. Skripal was convicted of high treason in Russia in 2004. He was not tortured, killed or murdered, rather he was allowed to settle in Britain after a spy swap in 2010. Sounds pretty friendly to me, considering that Putin is portrayed as a sadistic monster out to settle scores with those who cross him, by the Western media. ..."
"... So, why now? Why this attempted assassination now? This is the question, dear reader. Why attempt to assassinate Mr. Skripal now? He was convicted of high treason 14 years ago. He has been in England for eight years. Russia knew at this point he was no threat to them with no new secrets to betray. What would be gained at this point by assassinating the man? ..."
"... None. However, if the CIA took him out, or paid unscrupulous foreign mercenaries to take him out, much could be gained. The narrative of big bad Putin, in his big bad Russia, would be reinforced. Now, not only is he meddling in elections, getting the dastardly Trump elected, he is using nerve gas to take out enemies on foreign soil. My god, what will be next? ..."
"... "If we don't take immediate concrete measures to address this now, Salisbury will not be the last place we see chemical weapons used," said Haley. "They could be used here in New York or in cities of any country that sits on this council." CNN Politics ..."
Many in the USA have come to realize this stealth organization does not work on the behalf
of the USA but rather to its own ends. And, in this realization, comes a jaded view of both the
CIA and the government it represents.
This realization may have begun with the assassination of John F. Kennedy. The Warren
Commission, a congressional investigation was convened. The commission concluded there was a
single lone shooter, a fringe outcast, Lee Harvey Oswald who acted alone in the assassination
of the president. Many felt, in light of the facts, that the Warren Commission was a cover up
of what really went down on November 22, 1963, in Houston, Texas.
In 1976, the Congress reopened the Kennedy investigation. They created The United States
House of Representatives Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) to investigate the
assassination of John F. Kennedy (and Martin Luther King Jr.).
The HSCA completed its investigation in 1978 and determined the Warren Commission was faulty
and there was more than one shooter and there was indeed a conspiracy to kill the president. So
much for the official narrative of the Warren Commission.
Why the Warren Commission cover up back then that even the Congress in 1976 (HSCA) reported
was bogus? One theory April 25, 1966, The New York Times wrote, "And, President Kennedy, as the
enormity of the Bay of Pigs disaster came home to him, said to one of the highest officials of
his Administration, that he wanted to splinter the C.I.A. in a thousand pieces and scatter it
to the winds."
Kennedy was no fan of the Director of the C.I.A. Allen Dulles or his agency, and in the
autumn of 1961 he purged the C.I.A. of Dulles and his entourage. This included Deputy Director
for Plans Richard M. Bissell Jr. and and Deputy Director Charles Cabell. You do not mess with
Allen Dulles and the C.I A. Let's leave it at that. Kennedy was dead within two years.
Then there is 9/11. This one also has a USA government narrative that defies logic. This
time it is so blatant and egregious that an organization called "Architects & Engineers for
9/11 Truth" was founded by Richard Gage, an architect with vast experience in steel structured
buildings and fire. The organization demands on official investigation by Congress into exactly
how the buildings came down.
By December 2014, over 2,300 architectural and engineering professionals had signed a
petition for this investigation. If one looks at controlled demolitions and how the buildings
actually came down it is obvious the collapse was not due to an airplane flying into the
buildings, but rather a controlled demolition. 2,300 architects and engineers with verified
credentials all testify that the narrative of the government is patently false and
scientifically implausible if not impossible.
At about nine a.m. the Twin Towers are crashed into and collapse. At about five twenty p.m.
that same day, Building Seven collapses. No planes fly into Building 7, it just collapses.
Again, the videos show a controlled demolition.
There are various theories as to why 7 WTC was taken down. Theories range from 7 WTC being
the operation center for the demolition of the Twin Towers to more nefarious motives. "
According to a statement reported by the BBC , Loose Change film producer Dylan Avery thinks the
destruction of the building was suspicious because it housed some unusual tenants, including a
clandestine CIA office on the 25th floor, an outpost of the U.S. Secret Service, the Securities
and Exchange Commission, and New York City's emergency command center." Wikipedia
What is important to remember is that NO STEEL FRAME HIGH RISE HAS EVER TOTALLY COLLAPSED
DUE TO FIRE.
These are but two examples of hundreds where we have been mislead by the official narrative
of the government and its MSM news. Remember the Trump Dossier that was leaked and printed as
fact? Or, the death of Seth Rich, a "botched" robbery? Or, the list of 200 news outlets in the
USA that were Russian Propaganda fronts? All reported as fact by the New York Times and
Washington Post. All fake news by the MSM fed to an unsuspecting American people.
So now we have Prime Minister, Teresa May, accusing Putin and Russia of the May 4 nerve
agent attack of Sergei V. Skripal (66) and his daughter, Yulia (33), in Salibury, England. Both
are in critical condition after being found unconscious on a bench outside The Maltings
Shopping Center in Salibury. As we all know Russia is the new Antichrist. The harbinger of all evil. The enemy we all
must view with the utmost fear and loathing. Daily, the MSM in USA recoils as they report story
after story of Russia meddling in our elections, shaking the very foundations of our
democracy.
Let's get this straight. Mr. Skripal was convicted of high treason in Russia in 2004. He was
not tortured, killed or murdered, rather he was allowed to settle in Britain after a spy swap
in 2010. Sounds pretty friendly to me, considering that Putin is portrayed as a sadistic
monster out to settle scores with those who cross him, by the Western media.
Teresa May called the act "reckless" and "indiscriminate", and basically said Putin put
innocent English bystanders at risk. She upped the ante by dismissing 23 Russian diplomats, the
largest such expulsion in thirty years.
On Thursday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov accused May of grandstanding in her
response to the incident. Russian news agency Interfax reported that The Kremlin denies
involvement in the nerve agent poisoning, insisting one motive was to complicate Russia's
hosting of the World Cup this summer. Ah, dear Kremin, the motive was much deeper than the
World Cup games, which were only a bonus to the attack.
So, why now? Why this attempted assassination now? This is the question, dear reader.
Why attempt to assassinate Mr. Skripal now? He was convicted of high treason 14 years ago. He
has been in England for eight years. Russia knew at this point he was no threat to them with no
new secrets to betray. What would be gained at this point by assassinating the man?
None. However, if the CIA took him out, or paid unscrupulous foreign mercenaries to take
him out, much could be gained. The narrative of big bad Putin, in his big bad Russia, would be
reinforced. Now, not only is he meddling in elections, getting the dastardly Trump elected, he
is using nerve gas to take out enemies on foreign soil. My god, what will be next?
Nikki Haley, Ambassador to the UN tells us, "The United States of America believes that
Russia is responsible for the attack on two people in the United Kingdom using a military-grade
nerve agent," Haley said in her remarks at a UN Security Council emergency session, blasting
the Russian government for flouting international law.
"If we don't take immediate concrete measures to address this now, Salisbury will not be
the last place we see chemical weapons used," said Haley. "They could be used here in New York
or in cities of any country that sits on this council." CNN Politics
The USA needs an enemy to foment fear to justify it's astronomical defense budget. It just
loves a good cold war. However, now that Russia is no longer a pinko commie nation to be
demonized, and is indeed a capitalist democracy, we have to resurrect a new straw man to
hate.
It is remarkable the degree to which the liberal left has bought into this
industrial-military-complex narrative. The USA always has to be bombing someone, droning
someone or napalming someone to keep the monies flowing into the defense budget. Take a look at
our spending compared to Russia or other nations.
Alas, it is certainly not out of the question that the CIA was behind the attack. After this
amount of time Mr. Putin had nothing to gain in assassinating Mr. Skripal and his daughter. In
fact, he had a lot to lose. The CIA? They had a lot to gain, and nothing to lose. Never
underestimate the CIA and its brilliance in setting the narrative for its agenda. And, never
underestimate Mr. Putin in his resolve not to become their lapdog.
Ms. Simpson was a radio personality in New York. She was a staff writer for The Liberty Report.
A PBS documentary was done on her activism for human rights. She is a psychotherapist and
political commentator.
Money quote: "The Russian collusion investigation was based solely on the dodgy Steele Dossier that was discredited here from
the get-go. This was a product of British Intelligence Community. The intent was to keep and then to get Donald Trump out of the White
House. It failed but they did succeed in turning him into a neo-lib-con fellow traveler. There are clear parallels between the end stages
of the Soviet Union and the American Empire. My take since the Iraq Invasion is that they are insane. The ruling elite is detached from
reality, incompetent and arrogant. Sooner or later someone with their facilities still intact will lead a middle-class revolt against
the global plutocracy to restore democracy and reverse the rising inequality. We were lucky that the fall of the Soviet Union did not
lead to a nuclear war. The next time a nuclear armed Empire crashes we may not be so fortunate."
Notable quotes:
"... Among interesting dates, it appears that Stefan Halper was already trying to reach out to Lokhova in January-February 2016 – a lot earlier than his approaches to Papadopoulo s and Page. This was done through Professor Christopher Andrew, co-convenor with Halper and the former MI6 had Sir Richard Dearlove of the ‘Cambridge Intelligence Seminar.’ ..."
"... Meanwhile, Lokhova has set up a blog on which she has posted a some interesting relevant material, with perhaps more to come. It is very well worth a look.(See https://www.russiagate.co.uk .) ..."
"... Of particular interest, to my mind, is the full text of her – unpublished – May 2017 interview with the ‘New York Times.’ This points us back to is the fact – of which Lokhova shows no signs of awareness – that the idea that the Western powers and the Russians might have a common interest in fighting jihadist terrorism has been absolute anathema to many key figures on both sides of the Atlantic, with Dearlove certainly among them. ..."
"... ‘AN APOLOGY: Yesterday, I compared @nytimes journalists, who smeared @GenFlynn and accused me of being a Russian spy, to cockroaches. In good conscience, I must apologize to the cockroaches for the distress caused to them for being compared to @nytimes #Russiagate hoaxers. Sorry!’ ..."
"... The centerpiece of this is a proposal submitted to the FCO in August last year by what seems to be essentially the same consortium whose existence as a government contractor has now been made public. The ‘Institute for Statecraft’ has vanished, and one consortium member, ‘Aktis Strategy’, has gone into liquidation. But other key members are the same. ..."
"... A central underlying premise is that if anyone has any doubts as to whether the ‘White Helmets’ are a benevolent humanitarian organisation, or the Russians were responsible for the poisoning of the Skripals or the shooting down of MH17, the only possible explanation is that their minds have been poisoned by disinformation. ..."
"... In fact, what is at issue an ambitious project to co-ordinate and strengthen a very large number of organisations in different countries which are committed to a relentlessly Russophobic line on everything. (The possibility that it might not be very bright to push Russia into the arms of China, the obviously rising power, does not seem to have occurred to these people – perhaps they need less ons from Sir Halford Mackinder, or indeed Niccolò Machiavelli, on ‘statecraft.’) ..."
"... The clear close integration of other cyber people from the ‘Atlantic Council’ into Orwellian ‘information operations’ sponsored by the British Government simply puts these facts into sharp relief. ..."
"... There has to be a strong possible ‘prima facie’ case that anyone in authority prepared to accept the ‘digital forensics’ from ‘CrowdStrike’ is complicit in the conspiracy against the constitution, and/or the conspiracy to cover-up that conspiracy. This certainly goes for Comey, and I think it also goes for Mueller." ..."
"... I'd recommend for reading Alexei Yurchak's "Everything Was Forever, Until It was No More: The Last Soviet Generation." Its about a class of apparatchiks and bureaucrats and hangers on who spoke this arcane, abstract dogmatic language that anyone normal had long since given up trying to understand. It had long ceased to have any relevance or attachment to the lives lived by ordinary, increasingly suffering people, who started talking to each other in practical and direct language. ..."
"... The Russian collusion investigation was based solely on the dodgy Steele Dossier that was discredited here from the get-go. This was a product of British Intelligence Community. The intent was to keep and then to get Donald Trump out of the White House. It failed but they did succeed in turning him into a neo-lib-con fellow traveler. ..."
"... There are clear parallels between the end stages of the Soviet Union and the American Empire. My take since the Iraq Invasion is that they are insane. The ruling elite is detached from reality, incompetent and arrogant. Sooner or later someone with their facilities still intact will lead a middle-class revolt against the global plutocracy to restore democracy and reverse the rising inequality. We were lucky that the fall of the Soviet Union did not lead to a nuclear war. The next time a nuclear armed Empire crashes we may not be so fortunate. ..."
"Dan, Thanks for the reference, which I will follow up. Unfortunately, although Bongino has produced a lot of extremely valuable
material, a lot of it is buried in the 'postcasts', searching through which is harder than with printed materials. It would greatly
help if there were transcripts, but of course those cost money.
I am still trying to fit the exploding mass of information which has been coming out into a coherent timeline. Part of the
problem is that there is so much appearing in so many different places. In addition to trying to think through the implications
of the information in this post and the subsequent exchanges of comments, I have been trying to make sense of evidence coming
out about the British end of the conspiracy.
An important development here has been rather well covered by Chuck Ross, in a recent ‘Daily Caller’ piece headlined ‘Cambridge
Academic Reflects On Interactions With 'Spygate’ Figure’ and one on ‘Fox’ by Catherine Herridge and Cyd Upson, entitled ‘Russian
academic linked to Flynn denies being spy, says her past contact was “used” to smear him.’ However, the evidence involved has ramifications
which they cannot be expected to understand, as yet at least.
At issue is the attempt to use the – apparently casual – encounter between Lieutenant-General Flynn and Svetlana Lokhova at a
dinner in Cambridge (U.K.) in February 2016 to smear him by, among other things, portraying her as some kind of ‘Mata Hari’ figure.
Among interesting dates, it appears that Stefan Halper was already trying to reach out to Lokhova in January-February 2016
– a lot earlier than his approaches to Papadopoulo s and Page. This was done through Professor Christopher Andrew, co-convenor with
Halper and the former MI6 had Sir Richard Dearlove of the ‘Cambridge Intelligence Seminar.’
This suggests that this was not simply a case Halper acting on his own. It also I think brings us back to the central importance
of Flynn’s visit to Moscow in December 2015.
Meanwhile, Lokhova has set up a blog on which she has posted a some interesting relevant material, with perhaps more to come.
It is very well worth a look.(See https://www.russiagate.co.uk
.)
Of particular interest, to my mind, is the full text of her – unpublished – May 2017 interview with the ‘New York Times.’ This
points us back to is the fact – of which Lokhova shows no signs of awareness – that the idea that the Western powers and the Russians
might have a common interest in fighting jihadist terrorism has been absolute anathema to many key figures on both sides of the Atlantic,
with Dearlove certainly among them.
Some of Lokhova’s comments on ‘twitter’ are extremely entertaining. An example, with which I have much sympathy:
‘AN APOLOGY: Yesterday, I compared @nytimes journalists, who smeared @GenFlynn and accused me of being a Russian spy, to
cockroaches. In good conscience, I must apologize to the cockroaches for the distress caused to them for being compared to @nytimes
#Russiagate hoaxers. Sorry!’
Meanwhile, another interesting recent ‘tweet’ comes from Eliot Higgins, of ‘Bellingcat’ fame. He is known to some skeptics as
‘the couch potato’ – perhaps he should be rechristened ‘king cockroach.’ It reads:
‘Looking forward to gettin g things rolling with the Open Information Partnership, with @bellingcat, @MDI_UK, @DFRLab, and @This_Is_Zinc
https://www.openinformation...’
There is an interesting ‘backstory’ to this. The announcement of an FCO-supported ‘Open Information Partnership of European Non-Governmental
Organisations, charities, academics, think-tanks and journalists’, supposedly to counter ‘disinformation’ from Russia, came in a
written answer from the Minister of State, Sir Alan Duncan, on 3 April.
In turn this followed the latest in a series of releases of material either leaked or hacked from the organisations calling themselves
‘Institute for Statecraft’ and ‘Integrity Initiative’ by the group calling themselves ‘Anonymous’ on 25 March.
The centerpiece of this is a proposal submitted to the FCO in August last year by what seems to be essentially the same consortium
whose existence as a government contractor has now been made public. The ‘Institute for Statecraft’ has vanished, and one consortium
member, ‘Aktis Strategy’, has gone into liquidation. But other key members are the same.
A central underlying premise is that if anyone has any doubts as to whether the ‘White Helmets’ are a benevolent humanitarian
organisation, or the Russians were responsible for the poisoning of the Skripals or the shooting down of MH17, the only possible
explanation is that their minds have been poisoned by disinformation.
An interesting paragraph reads as follows:
‘An expanded research component could generate better understanding of the drivers (psychological, sociopolitical, cultural
and environmental) of those who are susceptible to disinformation. This will allow us to map vulnerable audiences, and build scenario
planning models to test the efficiency of different activities to build resilience of those populations over time.’
They have not yet got to the point of recommending psychiatic treatment for ‘dissidents’, but these are still early days. The
‘Sovietisation’ of Western life proceeds apace.
In fact, what is at issue an ambitious project to co-ordinate and strengthen a very large number of organisations in different
countries which are committed to a relentlessly Russophobic line on everything. (The possibility that it might not be very bright
to push Russia into the arms of China, the obviously rising power, does not seem to have occurred to these people – perhaps they
need less ons from Sir Halford Mackinder, or indeed Niccolò Machiavelli, on ‘statecraft.’)
Study of the proposal hacked/leaked by ‘Anonymous’ bring out both the ‘boondoggle’ element – there is a lot of state funding available
for people happy to play these games – and also the strong transatlantic links.
A particularly significant presence, here, is the ‘DFRLab’. This is the ‘Digital Forensic Research Lab’ at the ‘Atlantic Council’,
where Eliot Higgins is a ‘nonresident senior fellow.’ The same organisation has a ‘Cyber Statecraft Initiative’ where Dmitri Alperovitch
is a ‘nonresident senior fellow.’
It cannot be repeated often enough that it is difficult to see any conceivable excuse for the FBI to fail to secure access to
the DNC servers. One would normally moreover expect that, on an issue of this sensitivity, they would have the ‘digital forensics’
done by their own people.
There can be no conceivable excuse for relying on a contractor selected by the organisation which is claiming that there has been
a hack, when an alternative possibility is a leak: and the implications of the alternative possibility could be devastating for that
organisation.
To rely on a contractor linked to the notoriously Russophobic ‘Atlantic Council’ is even more preposterous.
The clear close integration of other cyber people from the ‘Atlantic Council’ into Orwellian ‘information operations’ sponsored
by the British Government simply puts these facts into sharp relief.
There has to be a strong possible ‘prima facie’ case that anyone in authority prepared to accept the ‘digital forensics’ from
‘CrowdStrike’ is complicit in the conspiracy against the constitution, and/or the conspiracy to cover-up that conspiracy. This certainly
goes for Comey, and I think it also goes for Mueller."
OT but related, just watched a former naval Intelligence officer, now working for the Hoover Institute interviewed on FOX about
the Rooshins in Venezuela. Said, the 100 Russians are there to protect Maduro because he cannot trust his own army. Maduro's days
are numbered because he is toxically unpopular.
Got me thinking, our Intelligence services are good at psy-ops and keeping our gullible MSM in line but God help us if we ever
actually needed real Intelligence about a country. I remember about a month ago how all of these 'Think Tank Guys' were predicting
how the only people loyal to Maduro were a few of his crony Generals, that the rank and file military hated him and there were
going to be mass defections.
It didn't happen and we are all just supposed to forget that.
[not a socialist, don't have any love for Maduro, I just know that I will never learn anything of about Venezuela from these think
tank dudes, we are just getting groomed]
Venezuela isn't about "socialism," or even Maduro--it's about the oil. They have the largest proven reserves in the world, though
much of it is non-conventional and would need a ton of investment to exploit. But it's their oil, not ours, and we have no right
to meddle in their internal affairs.
Venezuela is neither about socialism nor oil in my opinion. It is everything to do with the neocons. And Trump buying into their
hegemonic dreams. Notice the resurrection of Elliott Abrams of Iran-Contra fame as the man spearheading this in a triumvirate
with Bolton & Pompeo. IMO, a perfect foil for Putin & Xi to embroil the US in another regime change quagmire that further weakens
the US.
"There can be no conceivable excuse for relying on a contractor selected by the organisation which is claiming that there has
been a hack, when an alternative possibility is a leak: and the implications of the alternative possibility could be devastating
for that organisation.
To rely on a contractor linked to the notoriously Russophobic 'Atlantic Council' is even more preposterous."
True; and true. It is also true that the Clinton e-mail investigation was faux, a limp caricature of what an investigation
would look like when it is designed to uncover the truth. Allowing a subject's law firm to review the subject's e-mails from when
she was in government for relevancy is beyond preposterous. An investigation conducted in the normal way by apolitical Agents
in a field office would not walk away from a trove of evidence empty handed.
The inter-relatedness and overlapping of DoJ, CIA, and FBI personnel assigned to the Clinton e-mail case, the Russophobic nightmare
of a 'case' targeting Carter Page, and by extension, the Trump presidential campaign, and yes, the Mueller political op, all reek
of political bias and ineptitude followed by more political bias; and then culmination in a scorched earth investigation more
characteristic of something the STASI might have undertaken than American justice.
Early morning raids, gag orders, solitary confinements, show indictments that will never see adjudication in a court room - truly
unbelievable.
In your opinion was this surveillance, criminal & counter-intelligence investigation as well as information operations against
Trump centrally orchestrated or was it more reactive & decentralized?
There are so many facets. Fusion GPS & Nellie Ohr with her previous CIA connection. Her husband Bruce at the DOJ stovepiping
the dossier to the FBI. Brennan and his EC. Clapper and his intelligence assessment. Halper, Mifsud, Steele along with Hannigan
and the MI6 + GCHQ connection. Downer and the Aussies. FISA warrants on Page & Papadopolous. The whole Strzok & Page texting.
Comey, Lynch & the Hillary exoneration. McCabe. Then all the Russians. And the media leaks to generate hysteria.
I'd recommend for reading Alexei Yurchak's "Everything Was Forever, Until It was No More: The Last Soviet Generation." Its
about a class of apparatchiks and bureaucrats and hangers on who spoke this arcane, abstract dogmatic language that anyone normal
had long since given up trying to understand. It had long ceased to have any relevance or attachment to the lives lived by ordinary,
increasingly suffering people, who started talking to each other in practical and direct language.
And yet the chatterati
continued to chatter and invent ludicrously unreal worlds and analyses of the actual world they lived in until... bang... it was
no more.
I'd skip the first few chapters which are full of impenetrable marxist jargon.
The Russian collusion investigation was based solely on the dodgy Steele Dossier that was discredited here from the get-go.
This was a product of British Intelligence Community. The intent was to keep and then to get Donald Trump out of the White House.
It failed but they did succeed in turning him into a neo-lib-con fellow traveler.
There are clear parallels between the end stages of the Soviet Union and the American Empire. My take since the Iraq Invasion
is that they are insane. The ruling elite is detached from reality, incompetent and arrogant. Sooner or later someone with their
facilities still intact will lead a middle-class revolt against the global plutocracy to restore democracy and reverse the rising
inequality. We were lucky that the fall of the Soviet Union did not lead to a nuclear war. The next time a nuclear armed Empire
crashes we may not be so fortunate.
This is probably the most comprehensive outline of the color revolution against Trump. Bravo, simply bravo !!!
Reads like Agatha Christi Murder on the Orient
Express ;-) Rosenstein role is completely revised from a popular narrative. Brennan role clarifies and detailed. Obama
personal role hinted. Victoria Nuland role and the role of the State Department in Russiagate is documented for the first
time, I think.
Notable quotes:
"... The "insurance policy" appears to have been the effort to legitimize the Trump–Russia collusion narrative so that an FBI investigation, led by McCabe, could continue unhindered. ..."
"... Ohr, one of the highest-ranking officials in the DOJ, was communicating on an ongoing basis with Steele, whom he had known since at least 2006 , well into mid-2017. He is also married to Nellie Ohr, an expert on Russia and Eurasia who began working for Fusion GPS sometime in late 2015 . Nellie Ohr likely played a significant role in the construction of the dossier. ..."
"... The Obama administration provided a simultaneous layer of protection and facilitation for the entire effort. One example is provided by Section 2.3 of Executive Order 12333 , also known as Obama's data-sharing order . With the passage of the order, agencies and individuals were able to ask the NSA for access to specific surveillance simply by claiming the intercepts contained relevant information that was useful to a particular mission. ..."
"... Leaking, including felony leaking of classified information, has been widespread. The Carter Page FISA warrant -- likely the unredacted version -- has been in the possession of The Washington Post and The New York Times since March 2017. Traditionally, the intelligence community leaked to The Washington Post while the DOJ leaked to sources within The New York Times. This was a historical pattern that stood until this election. The leaking became so widespread, even this tradition was broken. ..."
"... The information contained within both articles likely came via felony leaks from James Wolfe, former director of security for the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, who was arrested on June 7, 2018, and charged with one count of lying to the FBI. Wolfe's indictment alleges that he was leaking classified information to multiple reporters over an extended period of time. ..."
"... The Steele dossier was fed into U.S. channels through several different sources. One such source was Sir Andrew Wood, the former British ambassador to Russia, who had been briefed about the dossier by Steele. Wood later relayed information regarding the dossier to Sen. John McCain, who dispatched David Kramer, a fellow at the McCain Institute, to London to meet with Steele in November 2016. McCain would later admit in a Jan. 11, 2017, statement that he had personally passed on the dossier to then-FBI Director James Comey. ..."
"... Trump, after issuing an order for the declassification of documents and text messages related to the Russia-collusion investigations -- including parts of the Carter Page FISA warrant application -- received phone calls from two U.S. allies saying, "Please, can we talk." Those "allies" were almost certainly the UK and Australia. ..."
"... Questions to be asked are why is it that two of our allies would find themselves so opposed to the release of these classified documents that a coordinated plea would be made directly to the president? And why would these same allies have even the slightest idea of what was contained in these classified U.S. documents? ..."
Spygate: The True Story of Collusion [Infographic] How America's most powerful agencies were weaponized against President
Donald Trump
Although the details remain complex, the structure underlying Spygate -- the creation of the false narrative that candidate Donald
Trump colluded with Russia, and the spying on his presidential campaign -- remains surprisingly simple:
CIA Director John Brennan, with some assistance from Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, gathered foreign intelligence
and fed it throughout our domestic Intelligence Community.
The FBI became the handler of Brennan's intelligence and engaged in the more practical elements of surveillance.
The Department of Justice facilitated investigations by the FBI and legal maneuverings, while providing a crucial shield of
nondisclosure.
The Department of State became a mechanism of information dissemination and leaks.
Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee provided funding, support, and media collusion.
Obama administration officials were complicit, and engaged in unmasking and intelligence gathering and dissemination.
The media was the most corrosive element in many respects. None of these events could have transpired without their willing
participation. Stories were pushed, facts were ignored, and narratives were promoted.
Let's start with a simple premise: The candidacy of Trump presented both an opportunity and a threat.
Initially not viewed with any real seriousness, Trump's campaign was seen as an opportunistic wedge in the election process. At
the same time, and particularly as the viability of his candidacy increased, Trump was seen as an existential threat to the established
political system.
The sudden legitimacy of Trump's candidacy was not welcomed by the U.S. political establishment. Here was a true political outsider
who held no traditional allegiances. He was brash and boastful, he ignored political correctness, he couldn't be bought, and he didn't
care what others thought of him -- he trusted himself.
Governing bodies in Britain and the European Union were also worried. Candidate Trump was openly challenging monetary policy,
regulations, and the power of special interests. He challenged Congress. He challenged the United Nations and the European Union.
He questioned everything.
Brennan played a crucial role in the creation of the Russia-collusion narrative and the spying on the Trump campaign. (Don Emmert/AFP/Getty
Images)
Brennan became the point man in the operation to stop a potential Trump presidency. It remains unclear whether his role was self-appointed
or came from above. To embark on such a mission without direct presidential authority seems both a stretch of the imagination and
particularly foolhardy.
Brennan took unofficial foreign intelligence compiled by contacts, colleagues, and associates --
primarily from the UK , but also from other Five Eyes members, such as Australia.
Individuals in official positions in UK intelligence, such as Robert Hannigan -- head of the UK Government Communications Headquarters
(GCHQ, Britain's equivalent of the National Security Agency) -- partnered with former UK foreign intelligence members. Former MI6
head Sir Richard Dearlove
, former Ambassador Sir Andrew Wood, and private UK intelligence firm
Hakluyt all played a role.
In the summer of 2016, Hannigan traveled to Washington to
meet with Brennan
regarding alleged communications between the Trump campaign and Moscow. On Jan. 23, 2017 -- three days after Trump's inauguration
-- Hannigan abruptly announced
his retirement. The Guardian openly
speculated that Hannigan's
resignation was directly related to the sharing of UK intelligence.
One method used to help establish evidence of collusion was the employment of "spy traps." Prominent among these were ones set
for Trump campaign advisers George Papadopoulos and Carter Page. The intent was to provide or establish connections between the Trump
campaign and Russia. The content and context mattered little as long as a connection could be established that could then be publicized.
The June 2016 Trump Tower meeting was another such attempt.
Western intelligence assets were used to initiate and establish these connections, particularly in the cases of Papadopoulos and
Page.
Ultimately, Brennan formed an inter-agency task
force comprising an estimated six agencies and/or government departments. The FBI, Treasury, and DOJ handled the domestic inquiry
into Trump and possible Russia connections. The CIA, Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and the National Security Agency
(NSA) handled foreign and intelligence aspects.
Brennan's inter-agency task force is not to be confused with the July 2016 FBI counterintelligence investigation, which was formed
later at Brennan's urging.
During this time, Brennan also employed the use of
reverse targeting , which relates to the targeting of a foreign individual with the intent of capturing data on a U.S. citizen.
This effort was uncovered and
made public by Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) in a March 2017
press conference :
"I have seen intelligence reports that clearly show the president-elect and his team were monitored and disseminated out in
intelligence-reporting channels. Details about persons associated with the incoming administration, details with little apparent
foreign-intelligence value were widely disseminated in intelligence community reporting.
"From what I know right now, it looks like incidental collection. We don't know exactly how that was picked up but we're trying
to get to the bottom of it."
As this foreign intelligence -- unofficial in nature and outside of any traditional channels -- was gathered, Brennan began a
process of feeding his gathered intelligence to the FBI. Repeated transfers of foreign intelligence from the CIA director pushed
the FBI toward the establishment of a formal counterintelligence investigation. Brennan repeatedly noted this during
a May 23, 2017, congressional testimony :
"I made sure that anything that was involving U.S. persons, including anything involving the individuals involved in the Trump
campaign, was shared with the [FBI]."
Brennan also admitted that his intelligence helped establish
the FBI investigation:
"I was aware of intelligence and information about contacts between Russian officials and U.S. persons that raised concerns in
my mind about whether or not those individuals were cooperating with the Russians, either in a witting or unwitting fashion, and
it served as the basis for the FBI investigation to determine whether such collusion [or] cooperation occurred."
Once the FBI began its counterintelligence investigation on July 31, 2016, Brennan shifted his focus. Through a series of meetings
in August and September 2016, Brennan informed the congressional Gang of Eight regarding intelligence and information he had gathered.
Notably, each Gang of Eight member was briefed separately, calling into question whether each of the members received the same information.
Efforts to
block the release of the transcripts from each meeting remain ongoing.
This final report was used to continue pushing the Russia-collusion narrative following the election of President Donald Trump.
Notably, Admiral Mike Rogers of the NSA publicly dissented from the findings of the ICA, assigning only a moderate confidence level.
Although the FBI is technically part of the DOJ, it is best for the purposes of this article that the FBI and DOJ be viewed as
separate entities, each with its own related ties.
The FBI itself was comprised of various factions, with a particularly active element that has come to be known as the "insurance
policy group." It appears that this faction was led by FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe and comprised other notable names such as
FBI agent Peter Strzok, FBI lawyer Lisa Page, and FBI general counsel James Baker.
The FBI established the counterintelligence investigation into alleged Russia collusion with the Trump campaign on July 31, 2016.
Comey initially refused to say whether the FBI was investigating possible connections between members of the Trump campaign and Russia.
He would continue to refuse to provide answers until March 20, 2017, when he disclosed the existence of the FBI investigation
during congressional testimony.
Comey also testified that he did not provide notification to the Gang of Eight until early March 2017 -- less than one month earlier.
This admission was in stark contrast to actions taken by Brennan, who had notified members of the Gang of Eight individually during
August and September 2016. It's likely that Brennan never informed Comey that he had briefed the Gang of Eight in 2016. Comey did
note that the DOJ "had been aware" of the investigation all along.
Comey opened the counterintelligence investigation into Trump on the urging of CIA Director John Brennan.
Following Comey's firing on May 9, 2017, the FBI's investigation was transferred to special counsel Robert Mueller. The
Mueller investigation remains ongoing.
The FBI's formal involvement with the
Steele dossier began on July 5, 2016,
when Mike Gaeta, an FBI agent and assistant legal attaché at the US Embassy in Rome, was dispatched to visit former MI6 spy Christopher
Steele in London. Gaeta would return from this meeting with a copy of Steele's first memo. This memo was given to Victoria Nuland
at the State Department, who passed it along to the FBI.
Gaeta, who also headed the FBI's Eurasian Organized Crime unit, had known Steele since at least 2010, when Steele had provided
assistance to the FBI's investigation into the
FIFA corruption
scandal .
Prior to the London meeting, Gaeta may also have met on a less formal basis with Steele
several weeks earlier.
"In June, Steele flew to Rome to brief the FBI contact with whom he had cooperated over FIFA," The Guardian reported. "His information
started to reach the bureau in Washington."
It's worth noting that there was no "dossier" until it was fully compiled in December 2016. There was only a sequence of documents
from Steele -- documents that were passed on individually -- as they were created. Therefore, from the FBI's legal perspective, they
didn't use the dossier. They used individual documents.
For the next month and a half, there appeared to be little contact between Steele and the FBI. However, the FBI's interest in
the dossier suddenly accelerated in late August 2016, when the bureau
asked Steele "for all information in his possession and for him to explain how the material had been gathered and to identify
his sources."
In September 2016, Steele traveled back to Rome to meet with the FBI's Eurasian squad once again. It's likely that the meeting
included several other FBI officials as well. According to a
House Intelligence Committee
minority memo , Steele's reporting reached the FBI counterintelligence team in mid-September 2016 -- the same time as Steele's
September trip to Rome.
The reason for the FBI's renewed interest had to do with an adviser to the Trump campaign -- Carter Page -- who had been in
contact with Stefan Halper, a CIA
and FBI source, since July 2016. Halper
arranged to meet with Page for the first time on July 11, 2016, at a
Cambridge symposium , just three days after Page took a trip
to Moscow. Speakers at the symposium included Madeleine Albright, Vin Webber, and Sir Richard Dearlove, the former head of MI6.
Page was now the FBI's chosen target for a FISA warrant that would be obtained on Oct. 21, 2016. The Steele dossier would be the
primary evidence used in obtaining the FISA warrant, which would be renewed three separate times, including after Trump took office,
finally expiring in September 2017.
Former volunteer Trump campaign adviser Carter Page on Nov. 2, 2017. The FBI obtained a retroactive FISA spy warrant
on Page.
After being in contact with Page for 14 months, Halper stopped contact exactly as the final FISA warrant on Page expired. Page,
who has steadfastly maintained his innocence, was never charged with any crime by the FBI. Efforts for the declassification of the
Page FISA application are currently ongoing through the DOJ's Office of the Inspector General.
Peter Strzok and Lisa Page
Peter Strzok and Lisa Page were two prominent members of the FBI's "insurance policy" group. Strzok, a senior FBI agent, was the
deputy assistant director of FBI's Counterintelligence Division. Lisa Page, an FBI lawyer, served as special counsel to FBI Deputy
Director Andrew McCabe.
Strzok was in charge of the investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server for government business. He helped
FBI Director James Comey draft the statement exonerating Clinton and was personally responsible for changing specific wording within
that statement that reduced Clinton's legal liability. Specifically, Strzok changed the words "grossly negligent," which could be
a criminal offense, to "extremely careless."
Strzok also personally led the FBI's counterintelligence investigation into the alleged Trump–Russia collusion and signed the
documents that opened the investigation on July 31, 2016. He was one of the FBI agents who interviewed Trump's national security
adviser, Gen. Michael Flynn. Strzok met multiple times with DOJ official Bruce Ohr and received information from Steele at those
meetings.
Following the firing of FBI Director James Comey, Strzok would join the team of special counsel Robert Mueller. Two months later,
he was removed from that team after the DOJ inspector general discovered a lengthy series of texts between Strzok and Page that contained
politically charged messages. Strzok would be fired from the FBI in August 2018.
Both Strzok and Page engaged in strategic
leaking to the press. Page did so at the direction of McCabe, who directly
authorized Page to share information with Wall Street
Journal reporter Devlin Barrett. That information was used in an Oct. 30, 2016, article headlined
"FBI in Internal Feud Over Hillary Clinton Probe ." Page leaked to Barrett thinking she had been granted legal and official authorization
to do so.
McCabe would later initially deny providing such
authorization to the Office of Inspector General. Page, when confronted with McCabe's denials, produced texts refuting his statement.
It was these texts that led to the inspector general uncovering the texts between Strzok and Page.
The two exchanged thousands of texts, some of them indicating surveillance activities, over a two-year period. Texts sent between
Aug. 21, 2015, and June 25, 2017, have been made
public . The series comes
to an end with a final text by Page telling Strzok, "Don't ever text me again."
On Aug. 8, 2016, Stzrok wrote that they would prevent candidate Trump from becoming president:
Page: "[Trump is] not ever going to become president, right? Right?!"
Strzok: "No. No he won't. We'll stop it."
On Aug. 15, 2016, Strzok sent a text referring to an "insurance policy":
"I want to believe the path you threw out for consideration in Andy's office -- that there's no way [Trump] gets elected --
but I'm afraid we can't take that risk. It's like an insurance policy in the unlikely event you die before you're 40."
The "insurance policy" appears to have been the effort to legitimize the Trump–Russia collusion narrative so that an FBI investigation,
led by McCabe, could continue unhindered.
Department of Justice
The Department of Justice, which comprises 60 agencies , was transformed
during the Obama years. The department is forbidden by federal law from hiring employees based on political affiliation.
However, a
series
of investigative articles by PJ Media published during Eric Holder's tenure as attorney general revealed an unsettling pattern
of ideological conformity among new hires at the DOJ: Only lawyers from the progressive left were hired. Not one single moderate
or conservative lawyer made the cut. This is significant as the DOJ enjoys significant latitude in determining who will be subject
to prosecution.
The DOJ's job in Spygate was to facilitate the legal side of surveillance while providing a protective layer of cover for all
those involved. The department became a repository of information and provided a protective wall between the investigative efforts
of the FBI and the legislative branch. Importantly, it also served as the firewall within the executive branch, serving as the insulating
barrier between the FBI and Obama officials. The department had become legendary for its stonewalling tactics with Congress.
DOJ Official Bruce Ohr on Aug. 28, 2018. Ohr passed on information from Christopher Steele to the FBI.
The DOJ, which was fully aware of the actions being taken by James Comey and the FBI, also became an active element acting against
members of the Trump campaign. Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, along with Mary McCord, the head of the DOJ's National Security
Division, was actively
involved in efforts to remove Gen. Michael Flynn from his position as national security adviser to President Trump.
To this day, it remains unknown which individual was responsible for making public Flynn's call with the Russian ambassador. Flynn
ultimately pleaded guilty to a process crime: lying to the FBI. There have been
questions raised in Congress regarding the possible alteration of FD-302s, the written notes of Flynn's FBI interviews. Special
counsel Robert Mueller has repeatedly deferred Flynn's sentencing hearing.
David Laufman, deputy assistant attorney general in charge of counterintelligence at the DOJ's National Security Division, played
a key role in both the Clinton email server and Russia hacking investigations. Laufman is currently the attorney for Monica McLean,
the long-time friend of Christine Blasey Ford, who recently accused Judge Brett Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her while in high
school. McLean was also
employed
by the FBI for 24 years.
Bruce Ohr was a significant DOJ official who played a
key role in Spygate. Ohr held
two important positions at the DOJ: associate deputy attorney general, and director of the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task
Force. As associate deputy attorney general, Ohr was just four offices away from then-Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, and he
reported directly to her. As director of the task force, he was in charge of a program described as "the centerpiece of the attorney
general's drug strategy."
Ohr, one of the highest-ranking officials in the DOJ, was communicating on an ongoing basis with Steele, whom he had known
since at
least 2006 , well into mid-2017. He is also married to Nellie Ohr,
an expert on Russia and Eurasia who began working
for Fusion GPS sometime in
late 2015 . Nellie Ohr likely played a significant role in the construction of the dossier.
According to testimony from FBI agent Peter Strzok, he and Ohr met at least five times during 2016 and 2017. Strzok was working
directly with then-Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe.
Additionally, Ohr met with the FBI at least
12 times between late November 2016 and May 2017 for a series of interviews. These meetings could have been used to
transmit information from Steele to the FBI. This came after the FBI had formally severed contact with Steele in late October
or early November 2016.
John Carlin is another notable figure with the DOJ. Carlin was an assistant attorney general and the head of the DOJ's National
Security Division until October 2016. His role will be discussed below in the section on FISA abuse.
The Battle Between Rosenstein and McCabe
Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe held a pivotal role in what has become known as "Spygate." He directed the activities of Peter
Strzok and Lisa Page and was involved in all aspects of the Russia investigation. He was also mentioned in the infamous "insurance
policy" text message.
McCabe was a major component of the insurance policy.
On April 26, 2017, Rosenstein found himself appointed as the new deputy attorney general. He was placed into a somewhat chaotic
situation, as Attorney General Jeff Sessions had recused himself from the ongoing Russia investigation a little less than two months
earlier, on March 2, 2017. This effectively meant that no one in the Trump administration had any oversight of the ongoing investigation
being conducted by the FBI and the DOJ.
Additionally, the leadership of then-FBI Director James Comey was coming under increased scrutiny as the result of actions taken
leading up to and following the election, particularly Comey's handling of the Clinton email investigation.
On May 9, 2017, Rosenstein wrote a memorandum recommending that Comey be fired. The subject of the memo was "Restoring Public
Confidence in the FBI." Comey was fired that day. McCabe was now the acting director of the FBI and was immediately under consideration
for the permanent position.
On the same day Comey was fired, McCabe would lie during an interview with agents from the FBI's Inspection Division (INSD) regarding
apparent leaks that were used in an Oct. 30, 2016, Wall Street Journal article, "FBI in Internal Feud Over Hillary Clinton Probe"
by Devlin Barrett. This would later be disclosed in the inspector general report, "A Report of Investigation of Certain Allegations
Relating to Former Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe."
At the time, nobody, including the INSD agents, knew that McCabe had lied, nor were the darker aspects of McCabe's role in Spygate
fully known.
In late April or early May 2016, McCabe opened a federal criminal investigation on Sessions, regarding potential lack of candor
before Congress in relation to Sessions's contacts with Russians. Sessions was unaware of the investigation.
Sessions would later be cleared of any wrongdoing by special counsel Robert Mueller.
On the morning of May 16, 2017, Rosenstein reportedly suggested to McCabe that he secretly record President Trump. This remark
was reported in a New York Times article that was sourced from memos from the now-fired McCabe, along with testimony taken from former
FBI general counsel James Baker, who relayed a conversation he had with McCabe about the occurrence. Rosenstein issued a statement
denying the accusations.
The alleged comments by Rosenstein occurred at a meeting where McCabe was "pushing for the Justice Department to open an investigation
into the president." An unnamed participant at the meeting, in comments to The Washington Post, framed the conversation somewhat
differently, noting Rosenstein responded sarcastically to McCabe, saying, "What do you want to do, Andy, wire the president?"
Later, on the same day that Rosenstein had his meetings with McCabe, President Trump met with Mueller, reportedly as an interview
for the FBI director job. On May 17, 2017, the day after President Trump's meeting with Mueller -- and the day after Rosenstein's
encounters with McCabe -- Rosenstein appointed Mueller as special counsel.
The May 17 appointment of Mueller in effect shifted control of the Russia investigation from the FBI and McCabe to Mueller. Rosenstein
would retain ultimate authority for the probe and any expansion of Mueller's investigation required authorization from Rosenstein.
Interestingly, without Comey's memo leaks, a special counsel might not have been appointed -- the FBI, and possibly McCabe, would
have remained in charge of the Russia investigation. McCabe was probably not going to become the permanent FBI director, but he was
reportedly under consideration. Regardless, without Comey's leak, McCabe would have retained direct involvement and the FBI would
have retained control.
On July 28, 2017, McCabe lied to Inspector General Michael Horowitz while under oath regarding authorization of the leaking to
The Wall Street Journal. At this point, Horowitz knew McCabe was lying, but did not yet know of the May 9 INSD interview with McCabe.
On Aug. 2, 2017, Rosenstein secretly issued Mueller a revised memo on "the scope of investigation and definition of authority"
that remains heavily redacted. The full purpose of this memo remains unknown. On this same day, Christopher Wray was named as the
new FBI director.
Two days later, on Aug. 4, 2017, Sessions announced that the FBI had created a new leaks investigation unit. Rosenstein and Wray
were tasked with overseeing all leak investigations.
That Aug. 2 memo from Rosenstein to Mueller may have been specifically designed to remove any residual FBI influence -- specifically
that of McCabe -- from the Russia investigation. The appointment of Wray as FBI director helped cement this. McCabe was finally completely
neutralized.
On March 16, 2018, McCabe was fired for lying under oath at least three different times and is currently the subject of a grand
jury investigation.
State Department
The State Department, with its many contacts within foreign governments, became a conduit for the flow of information. The transfer
of Christopher Steele's first dossier memo was personally
facilitated by Victoria Nuland, the assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs. Nuland gave approval for
FBI agent Michael Gaeta to travel to London to obtain the memo from Steele. The memo may have passed directly from her to FBI leadership.
Secretary of State John Kerry was also given a copy.
Steele was already well-known within the State Department. Following Steele's involvement in the FIFA scandal investigation, he
began to provide reports
informally to the State Department. The reports were written for a "private client" but were "shared widely within the U.S. State
Department, and sent up to Secretary of State John Kerry and Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, who was in charge of
the U.S.
response to Putin's annexation of Crimea and covert invasion of eastern Ukraine," the Guardian reported.
Nuland passed on parts of the Steele dossier to the FBI. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
In July 2016, when the FBI wanted to send Gaeta to visit Steele in London, the bureau
sought permission from the office of Nuland, who provided this version of events during a Feb. 4, 2018,
appearance on CBS's "Face the Nation":
"In the middle of July, when [Steele] was doing this other work and became concerned, he passed two to four pages of short
points of what he was finding and our immediate reaction to that was, this is not in our purview. This needs to go to the FBI
if there is any concern here that one candidate or the election as a whole might be influenced by the Russian Federation. That's
something for the FBI to investigate."
Steele also
met with Jonathan Winer, a former deputy assistant secretary of state for international law enforcement and former special envoy
for Libya. Steele and Winer had known each other since at least 2010. In an opinion article in The Washington Post, Winer wrote the
following:
"In September 2016, Steele and I met in Washington and discussed the information now known as the 'dossier.' Steele's sources
suggested that the Kremlin not only had been behind the hacking of the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign
but also had compromised Trump and developed ties with his associates and campaign."
In a strange turn of events, Winer also received a
separate dossier , very similar to Steele's, from long-time Clinton confidant Sidney Blumenthal. This "second dossier" had been
compiled by another longtime Clinton operative, former journalist Cody Shearer, and echoed claims made in the Steele dossier. Winer
then met with Steele in late September 2016 and gave Steele a copy of the "second dossier." Steele went on to
share this second dossier with the FBI, which may have used it to corroborate his dossier.
Winer passed on memos from Christopher Steele to Victoria Nuland. (State Department)
Other foreign officials also used conduits into the State Department. Alexander Downer, Australia's high commissioner to the UK,
reportedly funneled his conversation
with Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos -- later used as a reason to open the FBI's counterintelligence investigation --
directly to the U.S. Embassy in London.
"The Downer details landed with the embassy's then-chargé d'affaires, Elizabeth Dibble, who previously served as a principal deputy
assistant secretary in Mrs. Clinton's State Department," The Wall Street Journal's Kimberley Strassel wrote in a May 31, 2018,
article .
If true, this would mean that neither Australian intelligence nor the Australian government alerted the FBI to the Papadopoulos
information. What happened with the Downer details, and to whom they were ultimately relayed, remains unknown.
Curiously, details surprisingly similar to the Papadopoulos–Downer conversation show up in the
first memo written
by Steele on June 20, 2016:
"A dossier of compromising information on Hillary Clinton has been collated by the Russian Intelligence Services over many
years and mainly comprises bugged conversations she had on various visits to Russia and intercepted phone calls. It has not yet
been distributed abroad, including to Trump."
Clinton Campaign and the DNC
The Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee both occupied a unique position. They had the most to gain but they
also had the most to lose. And they stood willing and ready to do whatever was necessary to win. Hillary Clinton's campaign manager,
Robby Mook, is credited with being the first to raise the specter of candidate Donald Trump's alleged collusion with Russia.
The entire Clinton campaign willfully promoted the narrative of Russia–Trump collusion despite the uncomfortable fact that they
were the ones who had engaged the services of Fusion GPS and Christopher Steele through their law firm Perkins Coie. Information
flowed from the campaign -- sometimes through Perkins Coie, other times through affiliates -- ultimately making its way into the
media and sometimes to the FBI. Information from the Clinton campaign may also have ended up in the Steele dossier.
Jennifer Palmieri, the communications director for the Clinton campaign, in tandem with Jake Sullivan, the senior policy adviser
to the campaign,
took the lead in briefing the press on the Trump–Russia collusion story.
Another example of this behavior can be seen from an instance when Perkins Coie lawyer Michael Sussmann
leaked information from Steele and Fusion GPS to Franklin Foer of Slate magazine. This event is described in the House Intelligence
Committee's final report on
Russian active measures
, in footnote 43 on page 57. Foer then published the article
"Was a Trump Server Communicating With Russia? " on Oct. 31, 2016. The article concerns allegations regarding a server in the
Trump Tower.
The Slate article managed to attract the immediate attention of Clinton, who posted a
tweet on the same day the article was
published:
"Computer scientists have apparently uncovered a covert server linking the Trump Organization to a Russian-based bank."
Attached to her tweet was a
statement from Sullivan:
"This could be the most direct link yet between Donald Trump and Moscow. Computer scientists have apparently uncovered a covert
server linking the Trump Organization to a Russian-based bank.
"This secret hotline may be the key to unlocking the mystery of Trump's ties to Russia. It certainly seems the Trump Organization
felt it had something to hide, given that it apparently took steps to conceal the link when it was discovered by journalists."
These statements, which were later proven to be incorrect, are all the more disturbing with the hindsight knowledge that it was
a senior Clinton/DNC lawyer who helped plant the story. And given the prepared statement by Sullivan, the Clinton campaign knew this.
This type of behavior would be engaged in repeatedly -- damning leaks leading to media stories, followed by ready attacks from
the Clinton campaign.
Alexandra Chalupa is a Ukrainian-American operative who was consulting for the Democratic National Committee. Chalupa
met with top officials in the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington in an effort to expose ties between Trump, Paul Manafort, and Russia.
Chalupa began investigating
Manafort in 2014. In late 2015, Chalupa expanded her opposition research on Manafort to include Trump's ties to Russia. In January
2016, Chalupa shared her information with a senior DNC official.
Chalupa's meetings with DNC and Ukrainian officials would continue. On April 26, 2016, investigative reporter Michael Isikoff
published a story
on Yahoo News about Manafort's business dealings with Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska. It was later learned from a DNC email leaked
by Wikileaks that Chalupa had been working with Isikoff
-- the same journalist Christopher Steele
leaked to
in September 2016. Manafort would later be indicted for Foreign Agents Registration Act violations that occurred during the Obama
administration.
Perkins Coie
International law firm Perkins Coie served as the legal arm for both the Clinton campaign and the DNC. Ties to Perkins Coie extended
beyond the DNC into the Obama White House.
Bob Bauer, a partner at the law firm and founder of its political law practice, served as
White House counsel to President Barack Obama throughout 2010 and 2011. Bauer was also
general counsel to Obama's campaign organization, Obama for America, in 2008 and 2012.
Perkins Coie partners Marc Elias and Michael Sussmann each played critical roles and were the ones who hired Fusion GPS and Steele.
Sussmann
personally handled the alleged hack of the DNC server. He also transmitted information, likely from Steele and Fusion GPS, to
James Baker, then-chief counsel at the FBI, and to several members of the press.
Perkins Coie partner Michael Sussmann. Sussmann transmitted information to FBI chief counsel James Baker and several
journalists. (Courtesy Perkins Coie)
According to a
letter
dated Oct. 24, 2017, written by Matthew Gehringer, general counsel at Perkins Coie, the firm was approached by Fusion GPS founder
Glenn Simpson in early March 2016 regarding the possibility of hiring Fusion GPS to continue opposition research into the Trump campaign.
Simpson's overtures were successful, and in April 2016, Perkins Coie
hired
Fusion GPS on behalf of the DNC.
Sometime in April or May 2016, Fusion GPS
hired Christopher Steele. During
this same period, Fusion also reportedly
hired Nellie Ohr, the wife of Associate Deputy Attorney General Bruce Ohr. Steele would complete his first memo on June 20, 2016,
and send it to Fusion via enciphered mail.
Perkins Coie appears to have also been acting as a conduit between the DNC and the FBI.
Documents suggest that Sussmann was feeding information to FBI general counsel James Baker and at least one journalist ahead
of the FBI's application for a FISA warrant on the Trump campaign.
The information provided by Sussmann may have been used by the FBI as "corroborating information."
Obama Administration
The Obama administration provided a simultaneous layer of protection and facilitation for the entire effort. One example is
provided by
Section
2.3 of Executive Order 12333 , also known as Obama's
data-sharing
order . With the passage of the order, agencies and individuals were able to ask the NSA for access to specific surveillance
simply by claiming the intercepts contained relevant information that was useful to a particular mission.
Section 2.3 had been expected to be finalized by early to mid-2016. Instead, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper didn't
sign off on Section 2.3 until Dec. 15, 2016. The order was finalized when Attorney General Loretta Lynch signed it on Jan. 3, 2017.
The reason for the delay could relate to the fact that while the executive order made it easier to share intelligence between
agencies, it also limited certain types of information from going to the White House.
An example of this was provided by Evelyn Farkas during a March 2, 2017,
MSNBC interview , where she detailed how the Obama administration
gathered and disseminated intelligence on the Trump team:
"I was urging my former colleagues and, frankly speaking, the people on the Hill 'Get as much information as you can. Get as
much intelligence as you can before President Obama leaves the administration.'
"The Trump folks, if they found out how we knew what we knew about the Trump staff's dealing with Russians, [they] would try
to compromise those sources and methods, meaning we would no longer have access to that intelligence. That's why you have the
leaking."
Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Russia/Ukraine/Eurasia Evelyn Farkas on May 6, 2014. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)
Many of the Obama administration's efforts appear to have been structural in nature, such as establishing new procedures or creating
impediments to oversight that enabled much of the surveillance abuse to occur.
DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz was appointed by Obama in 2011. From the very start, he found his duties throttled by the
attorney general's office. According to congressional
testimony by Horowitz:
"We got access to information up to 2010 in all of these categories. No law changed in 2010. No policy changed. It was simply
a decision by the General Counsel's Office in 2010 that they viewed, now, the law differently. And as a result, they weren't going
to give us that information."
These new restrictions were
put in place by Attorney General Eric Holder and Deputy Attorney General James Cole.
On Aug. 5, 2014, Horowitz and other inspectors general sent a
letter to Congress asking for unimpeded access to all records. Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates responded on July 20, 2015,
with a 58-page
memorandum . The memo specifically denied the inspector general access to any information collected under Title III -- including
intercepted communications and national security letters.
The New York Times recently
disclosed that national security letters were used in the surveillance of the Trump campaign.
At other times, the Obama administration's efforts were more direct. The
Intelligence Community assessment was released
internally on Jan. 5, 2017. On this same day, Obama held an undisclosed White House meeting to discuss the dossier with national
security adviser Susan Rice, FBI Director James Comey, and Yates. Rice would later send herself an email
documenting
the meeting.
The following day, Brennan, Clapper, and Comey attached a written summary of the Steele dossier to the classified briefing they
gave Obama. Comey then met with President-elect Trump to inform him of the dossier. This meeting took place just hours after Comey,
Brennan, and Clapper formally briefed Obama on both the Intelligence Community assessment and the Steele dossier.
Comey would only inform Trump of the "salacious" details contained within the dossier. He later
explained on CNN in an April 2018 interview
why:
"Because that was the part that the leaders of the Intelligence Community agreed he needed to be told about."
Shortly after Comey's meeting with Trump, both the Trump–Comey meeting and the existence of the dossier were leaked to CNN. The
significance of the meeting was material, as Comey
noted in
a Jan. 7 memo he wrote:
"Media like CNN had them and were looking for a news hook. I said it was important that we not give them the excuse to write
that the FBI has the material."
Clapper leaked information to CNN, after which he publicly condemned the leaks. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)
The media had widely dismissed the dossier as unsubstantiated and, therefore, unreportable. It was only after learning that Comey
briefed Trump that
CNN reported
on the dossier. It was later
revealed that DNI James Clapper personally leaked Comey's meeting with Trump to CNN.
The Obama administration also directly participated in a series of
intelligence unmaskings
, the process whereby a U.S. citizen's identity is revealed from collected surveillance. U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Samantha
Power reportedly engaged in hundreds of unmasking requests. Rice has admitted to doing the same.
The Obama administration engaged in the ultimately successful effort to oust Trump's newly appointed national security adviser,
Gen. Michael Flynn. Yates, along with Mary McCord, head of the DOJ's National Security Division,
led that effort
.
Executive Order 13762
President Barack Obama issued a last-minute executive order on Jan. 13, 2017, that altered the line of succession within the DOJ.
The action was not done in consultation with the incoming Trump administration.
Acting Attorney General Sally Yates was fired on Jan. 30, 2017, by a newly inaugurated President Trump for refusing to uphold
the president's executive order limiting travel from certain terror-prone countries. Yates was initially supposed to serve in her
position until Jeff Sessions was confirmed as attorney general.
Obama's executive order placed the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia next in line behind the department's senior leadership.
The attorney at the time was Channing Phillips.
Phillips was first hired by former Attorney General Eric Holder in 1994 for a position in the D.C. U.S. attorney's office. Phillips,
after serving as a senior adviser to Holder, stayed on after he was replaced by Attorney General Loretta Lynch.
It appears the Obama administration was hoping the Russia investigation would default to Channing in the event Sessions was forced
to recuse himself from the investigation. Sessions, whose confirmation hearings began three days before the order, was already coming
under intense scrutiny.
The implementation of the order may also tie into Yates's efforts to remove Gen. Michael Flynn over his call with the Russian
ambassador.
Trump ignored the succession order, as he is legally allowed to do, and instead appointed Dana Boente, the U.S. attorney for the
Eastern District of Virginia, as acting attorney general on Jan. 30, 2017, the same day Yates was fired.
Trump issued a new executive order on Feb. 9, 2017, the same day Sessions was sworn in, reversing Obama's prior order.
On March 10, 2017, Trump fired 46 Obama-era U.S. attorneys, including Preet Bharara, the U.S. attorney in Manhattan. These firings
appear to have been unexpected.
Media
In some respects, the media has played the most disingenuous of roles. Areas of investigation that historically would have proven
irresistible to reporters of the past have been steadfastly ignored. False narratives have been all-too-willingly promoted and facts
ignored. Fusion GPS personally made a
series of payments to several as-of-yet-
unnamed reporters .
The majority of the mainstream media has represented positions of the DNC and the Clinton campaign.
Steele met with members of certain media with relative frequency. In
September 2016 ,
he met with a number of U.S. journalists for "The New York Times, the Washington Post, Yahoo! News, the New Yorker and CNN," according
to The Guardian. It was during this period that Steele met with Michael Isikoff of Yahoo News.
In mid-October
2016, Steele returned to New York and met with reporters again. Toward the end of October, Steele spoke via Skype with Mother
Jones reporter David Corn.
Leaking, including felony leaking of classified information, has been widespread. The Carter Page FISA warrant -- likely the
unredacted version -- has been in the possession of The Washington Post and The New York Times since March 2017. Traditionally, the
intelligence community leaked to The Washington Post while the DOJ leaked to sources within The New York Times. This was a historical
pattern that stood until this election. The leaking became so widespread, even this tradition was broken.
On April 3, 2017, BuzzFeed reporter Ali Watkins wrote the article "
A Former Trump Adviser Met With a Russian Spy ." In the article, she identified "Male-1," referred to in
court documents
relating to the case of Russian spy Evgeny Buryakov, as Trump campaign adviser Carter Page, who had provided the FBI with assistance
in the case. Just over a week later, on April 11, 2017, a Washington Post article, "
FBI Obtained FISA Warrant to Monitor Former Trump Adviser Carter Page ," confirmed the existence of the October 2016 Page FISA
warrant.
The information contained within both articles likely came via felony leaks from James Wolfe, former director of security
for the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, who was arrested on June 7, 2018, and
charged with one count of lying
to the FBI. Wolfe's indictment
alleges that he was leaking classified information to multiple reporters over an extended period of time.
Reporter Ali Watkins likely received the undredacted FISA application on Carter Page from James Wolfe.
It appears probable that Wolfe leaked unredacted copies of the Page FISA application. According to the
indictment , Wolfe
exchanged 82 text messages with
Watkins on March 17, 2017. That same evening they engaged in a 28-minute phone call. The original Page FISA application is 83 pages
long, including one final signatory page.
In the public version of the application, there are 37 fully redacted pages. In addition to that, several other pages have redactions
for all but the header. There are only two pages in the entire document that contain no redactions.
Why would Wolfe bother to send 37 pages of complete redactions? It seems more than plausible that Wolfe took pictures of the original
unredacted FISA application and sent them by text to Watkins.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes has repeatedly
stated that evidence within the FISA application
shows the counterintelligence agencies were abused by the Obama administration. Most of the mainstream media has known this.
Despite this, most major news organizations for over two years have promoted the Russia-collusion narrative. Despite ample evidence
having come out to the contrary, they have not admitted they were wrong, likely because doing so would mean they would have to admit
their complicity.
Foreign Intelligence
UK and Australian intelligence agencies also played meaningful roles during the 2016 presidential election.
Britain's GCHQ was involved in
collecting information regarding then-candidate Trump and transmitting it to the United States. In the summer of 2016, Robert
Hannigan, the head of GCHQ, flew from London to
meet personally
with then-CIA Director John Brennan, The Guardian reported.
Former GCHQ head Robert Hannigan in this file photo. Hannigan transmitted information regarding Donald Trump to John
Brennan in the summer of 2016. (Romeo Gacad/AFP/Getty Images)
Hannigan's meeting was noteworthy because Brennan wasn't Hannigan's counterpart. That position belonged to NSA Director Mike Rogers.
In the following year, Hannigan
abruptly announced
his retirement on Jan. 23, 2017 -- three days after Trump's inauguration.
As GCHQ was gathering intelligence, low-level Trump campaign foreign-policy adviser George Papadopoulos appears to have been targeted
after a series of highly coincidental meetings. Maltese professor Josef Mifsud, Australian diplomat Alexander Downer, FBI informant
Stefan Halper, and officials from the UK's Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) all crossed paths with Papadopoulos -- some repeatedly
so.
Christopher Steele, who authored the dossier on Trump, was an MI6 agent while the agency was headed by Sir Richard Dearlove. Steele
retains close ties with Dearlove.
Dearlove has ties to most of the parties mentioned. It was he who advised Steele and his business partner, Chris Burrows, to
work with a top British government official to pass along information to the FBI in the fall of 2016. He also was a speaker at
the July 2016 Cambridge symposium that Halper invited Carter
Page to attend.
Dearlove knows Halper through their
mutual association at the Cambridge Intelligence Seminar. Dearlove also knows Sir Iain Lobban, a former head of GCHQ, who is
an advisory board member at British strategic intelligence
and advisory firm Hakluyt , which was founded by former MI6 members and
retains close ties to UK intelligence services.
Halper has historical connections to Hakluyt through Jonathan Clarke, with whom he has
co-authored two books.
Downer, who
met Papadopoulos in a May 2016 meeting
established through a chain
of two intermediaries, served on the advisory board of Hakluyt
from 2008 to 2014. He reportedly still
maintains contact with Hakluyt officials. Information from his meeting with Papadopoulos was later used by the FBI to establish
the bureau's counterintelligence investigation into Trump–Russia collusion. Downer has changed his version of events multiple times.
The Steele dossier was fed into U.S. channels through several different sources. One such source was Sir Andrew Wood, the
former
British ambassador to Russia, who had been briefed about the dossier by Steele. Wood later
relayed information regarding the dossier to Sen. John McCain, who dispatched David Kramer, a fellow at the McCain Institute,
to London to meet with Steele in November 2016. McCain would later admit in a Jan. 11, 2017,
statement that he had personally passed on the dossier to then-FBI Director James Comey.
Trump, after issuing an order for the declassification of documents and text messages related to the Russia-collusion investigations
-- including parts of the Carter Page FISA warrant application -- received phone calls from two U.S. allies saying, "Please, can
we talk." Those "allies" were almost certainly the UK and Australia.
In a Twitter post , Trump wrote that
the "key Allies called to ask not to release" the documents.
Questions to be asked are why is it that two of our allies would find themselves so opposed to the release of these classified
documents that a coordinated plea would be made directly to the president? And why would these same allies have even the slightest
idea of what was contained in these classified U.S. documents?
Britain and Australia appear to know full well what those documents contain, and their attempt to prevent their public release
appears to be because they don't want their role in events surrounding the 2016 presidential election to be made public.
Fusion GPS/Orbis/Christopher Steele
Glenn Simpson, a former Wall Street Journal reporter, is co-founder of Fusion GPS, along with Peter Fritsch and Tom Catan. Fusion
was hired by the DNC and the Clinton campaign through law firm Perkins Coie to produce and disseminate the Steele dossier used against
Trump. The dossier would later be the primary evidence used to obtain a FISA warrant on Carter Page on Oct. 21, 2016.
The company was hired by the Clinton campaign and the DNC–through law firm Perkins Coie–to produce the dossier on Trump.
Christopher Steele, who retains close ties to UK intelligence, worked for MI6 from 1987 until his retirement in 2009, when he
and his partner, Chris Burrows, founded Orbis Intelligence. Steele
maintains contact with British intelligence,
Sir Richard Dearlove
, and UK intelligence firm Hakluyt.
Steele appears to have been
represented
by lawyer Adam Waldman, who also represented Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska. We know this from
texts sent by Waldman. On April 10, 2017, Waldman sent this to Sen. Mark Warner:
"Hi. Steele: would like to get a bi partisan letter from the committee; Assange: I convinced him to make serious and important
concessions and am discussing those w DOJ; Deripaska: willing to testify to congress but interested in state of play w Manafort.
I will be with him next tuesday for a week."
Steele also appears to have
lobbied on behalf of Deripaska, who was discussed in
emails between Bruce Ohr and Steele that were recently
disclosed by the Washington Examiner:
"Steele said he was 'circulating some recent sensitive Orbis reporting' on Deripaska that suggested Deripaska was not a 'tool'
of the Kremlin. Steele said he would send the reporting to a name that is redacted in the email."
Fusion GPS was also employed by Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya in a previous case. Veselnitskaya was involved in litigation
pitting Russian firm Prevezon Holdings against British-American financier William Browder. Veselnitskaya hired U.S. law firm BakerHostetler,
who, in turn, hired Fusion GPS to dig up dirt on Browder. Veselnitskaya was one of the participants at the June 2016 Trump Tower
meeting, at which she discussed the
Magnitsky Act .
Fox News reported on Nov. 9, 2017, that Simpson
met with Veselnitskaya immediately before and after the Trump Tower meeting.
A declassified top-secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court report released on April 26, 2017, revealed that government
agencies, including the FBI, CIA, and NSA, had improperly accessed Americans' communications. The FBI specifically provided outside
contractors with access to raw surveillance data on American citizens without proper oversight.
Communications and other data of members of the Trump campaign may have been accessed in this way.
Nellie Ohr, the wife of high-ranking DOJ official Bruce Ohr, was hired by Fusion GPS to work on the dossier on Trump.
Bruce and Nellie Ohr have
known Simpson since at least 2010 and have known Steele since at least 2006. The Ohrs and Simpson worked together on a
DOJ report in 2010 . In that report, Nellie Ohr's biography
lists her as working for Open Source Works, which is part of the CIA. Simpson met with Bruce Ohr
before and after the 2016 election.
Bruce Ohr had been in
contact repeatedly with Steele during the 2016 presidential campaign -- while Steele was constructing his dossier. Ohr later
actively shared information he received from Steele with the FBI, after the agency had terminated Steele as a source. Interactions
between Ohr and Steele stretched for months into the first year of Trump's presidency and were documented in a number of FD-302s
-- memos that summarize interviews with him by the FBI.
Spy Traps
In an effort to put forth evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, it appears that several different spy traps
were set, with varying degrees of success. Many of these efforts appear to center around Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos
and involve London-based professor Joseph Mifsud, who has
ties to Western intelligence, particularly in the UK.
Papadopoulos and Mifsud
both worked
at the London Centre of International Law Practice (LCILP). Mifsud appears to have joined LCILP around
November
2015 . Papadopoulos reportedly
joined
LCILP sometime in late February 2016 after leaving Ben Carson's presidential campaign. However, some
reports indicate Papadopoulos joined LCILP in November
or December of 2015. Mifsud and Papadopoulos reportedly never crossed paths
until March 14, 2016, in Italy.
Mifsud introduced Papadopoulos to several Russians, including Olga Polonskaya, whom Mifsud introduced as "Putin's niece," and
Ivan Timofeev, an official at a state-sponsored think tank called the Russian International Affairs Council. Both Papadopoulos and
Mifsud were interviewed by the FBI. Papadopoulos was ultimately charged with a process crime and was recently sentenced to 14 days
in prison for lying to the FBI. Mifsud was never charged by the FBI.
Throughout this period, Papadopoulos continuously pushed for meetings between Trump campaign officials and Russian contacts but
was ultimately unsuccessful in establishing any meetings.
Papadopoulos met with Australian diplomat Alexander Downer on May 10, 2016. The Papadopoulos–Downer meeting has been portrayed
as a
chance encounter in a bar. That does not appear to be the case.
Papadopoulos was introduced
to Downer through a chain of two intermediaries who said Downer wanted to meet with Papadopoulos. Another individual happened
to
be in London at exactly the same time: the FBI's head of counterintelligence, Bill Priestap. The purpose of Priestap's visit
remains unknown.
The Papadopoulos–Downer
meeting was later used to establish the FBI's counterintelligence investigation into Trump–Russia collusion. It was repeatedly
reported that Papadopoulos told Downer that Russia had Hillary Clinton's emails. This is incorrect.
Foreign policy adviser to the Trump campaign was approached by several individuals with ties to UK and U.S. intelligence
agencies. (Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images)
According to Downer, Papadopoulos at some point
mentioned the Russians had damaging information on Hillary Clinton.
"During that conversation, he [Papadopoulos] mentioned the Russians might use material that they have on Hillary Clinton in the
lead-up to the election, which may be damaging,'' Downer told
The Australian about the Papadopoulos meeting in an April 2018 article. "He didn't say dirt, he said material that could be damaging
to her. No, he said it would be damaging. He didn't say what it was."
Downer, while serving as Australia's foreign minister, was
responsible for one of the largest foreign donations to the Clinton Foundation: $25 million from the Australian government.
Unconfirmed media reports, including a Jan. 12, 2017,
BBC article , have suggested that the FBI attempted
to obtain two FISA warrants in June and July 2016 that were denied by the FISA court. It's likely that Papadopoulos was an intended
target of these failed FISAs.
Interestingly, there is no mention of Papadopoulos in the Steele dossier. Paul Manafort, Carter Page, former Trump lawyer Michael
Cohen, Gen. Michael Flynn, and former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski are all listed in the Steele dossier.
Papadopoulos may have started out assisting the FBI or CIA and later discovered that he was being set up for surveillance himself.
After failing to obtain a spy warrant on the Trump campaign using Papadopoulos, the FBI set its sights on campaign volunteer Carter
Page. By this time, the counterintelligence investigation was in the process of being established, and we know now that it was formalized
with no official intelligence. The FBI needed some sort of legal cover. They needed a retroactive warrant. And they got one on Oct.
21, 2016. The Page FISA warrant would be renewed three times and remain in force until September 2017.
Stefan Halper met with Page for the first time on July 11, 2016, at a
Cambridge symposium , just three days after Page's July 2016
Moscow trip. As noted previously, former MI6 head Sir Richard Dearlove was a speaker at the symposium. Halper and Dearlove have known
each other for years and maintain several mutual associations.
Page was already known to the FBI. The Page FISA warrant application references the Buryakov spy case and an FBI interview with
Page. Current information suggests there was only
one meeting between Page and the FBI in 2016. It happened on March 2, 2016. It was in relation to Victor Podobnyy, who was named
in the Buryakov case.
Page, who
cooperated with the FBI on the case, almost certainly was providing testimony or details against Podobnyy. Page had been contacted
by Podobnyy in 2013 and had previously provided information to the FBI. Buryakov
pleaded guilty on March 11, 2016 -- nine days after Page met with the FBI on the case -- and was
sentenced to 30 months in prison on May 25, 2016. On April 5, 2017, Buryakov was granted early release and was
deported to Russia.
FBI informant Stefan Halper approached Trump campaign advisers George Papadopoulos and Carter Page.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes
said in August that exculpatory evidence
on Page exists that wasn't included by the DOJ and the FBI in the FISA application and subsequent renewals. The exculpatory evidence
likely relates specifically to Page's role in the Buryakov case.
If the FBI failed to disclose Page's cooperation with the bureau or materially misrepresented his involvement in its application
to the FISA Court, it means that the FBI's Woods procedures, which govern FISA applications, were violated.
Page has not been arrested or charged with any crime related to the investigation.
FISA Abuse
Admiral Mike Rogers, while director of the NSA, was personally responsible for
uncovering an unprecedented level of FISA abuse that would later be documented in a 99-page
unsealed FISA
court ruling . As the FISA court noted in the April 26, 2017, ruling, the abuses had been occurring since at least November 2015:
"The FBI had disclosed raw FISA information, including but not limited to Section 702-acquired information, to private contractors.
"Private contractors had access to raw FISA information on FBI storage systems.
"Contractors had access to raw FISA information that went well beyond what was necessary to respond to the FBI's requests."
The FISA Court report is particularly focused on the FBI:
"The Court is concerned about the FBI's apparent disregard of minimization rules and whether the FBI may be engaging in similar
disclosures of raw Section 702 information that have not been reported."
The FISA Court
disclosed that illegal NSA database searches were endemic. Private contractors, employed by the FBI, were given full access to
the NSA database. Once in the contractors' possession, the data couldn't be traced.
In April 2016, after Rogers became aware of
improper
contractor access to raw FISA data on March 9, 2016, he
directed the NSA's Office
of Compliance to conduct a "fundamental baseline review of compliance associated with 702."
On April 18, 2016, Rogers shut down all outside contractor access to raw FISA information -- specifically outside contractors
working for the FBI.
Then-NSA Director Adm. Mike Rogers on May 23, 2017. Rogers uncovered widespread abuse of FISA data by the FBI. (Saul
Loeb/AFP/Getty Images)
DOJ National Security Division (NSD) head John Carlin filed the government's proposed
2016 Section 702 certifications on Sept. 26, 2016. Carlin knew the general status of compliance review by Rogers. The NSD was
part of the review. Carlin failed to disclose a critical Jan. 7, 2016,
report by the Office
of the Inspector General and associated FISA abuse to the FISA Court in his 2016 certification. Carlin also failed to disclose
Rogers's ongoing Section 702 compliance review.
The following day, on Sept. 27, 2016, Carlin
announced his resignation, effective Oct. 15, 2016.
After receiving a briefing by the NSA compliance officer on Oct. 20, 2016, detailing
numerous "about query"
violations from the 702 NSA compliance audit, Rogers shut down all "about query" activity the next day and
reported his findings
to the DOJ. "About queries" are searches based on communications containing a reference "about" a surveillance target but that are
not "to" or "from" the target.
On Oct. 21, 2016, the DOJ and the FBI sought and received a Title I FISA probable-cause order authorizing electronic surveillance
on Carter Page from the FISA Court.
At this point, the FISA Court was still unaware of the Section 702 violations.
On Oct. 24, 2016, Rogers verbally
informed
the FISA Court of his findings. On Oct. 26, 2016, Rogers appeared formally before the FISA Court and presented the written findings
of his audit.
The FISA Court had been unaware of the query violations until they were presented to the court by Rogers.
Carlin didn't disclose his knowledge of FISA abuse in the annual Section 702 certifications in order to avoid raising suspicions
at the FISA Court ahead of receiving the Page FISA warrant.
The FBI and the NSD were literally racing against Rogers's investigation in order to obtain a FISA warrant on Carter Page.
While all this was transpiring, DNI James Clapper and Defense Secretary Ash Carter submitted a
recommendation that Rogers be removed from his post as NSA director.
The move to fire Rogers, which ultimately failed, originated sometime in mid-October 2016 -- exactly when Rogers was preparing
to present his findings to the FISA Court.
The Insurance Policy
Ever since the release of FBI text messages revealing the existence of an "insurance policy," the term has been the subject of
wide speculation.
Some observers have suggested that the insurance policy was the FISA spy warrant used to monitor Trump campaign adviser Carter
Page and, by extension, other members of the Trump campaign. This interpretation is too narrow and fails to capture the underlying
meaning of the text.
The insurance policy was the actual process of establishing the Trump–Russia collusion narrative.
It encompassed actions undertaken in late 2016 and early 2017, including the leaking of the Steele dossier and James Clapper's
leaks of James Comey's briefing to President Trump. The intent behind these actions was simple. The legitimization of the investigation
into the Trump campaign.
The strategy involved the recusal of Trump officials with the intent that Andrew McCabe would end up running the investigation.
The Steele dossier, which was paid for by the Clinton presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee, served as the
foundation for the Russia narrative.
The intelligence community, led by CIA Director John Brennan and DNI James Clapper, used the dossier as a launching pad for creating
their Intelligence Community assessment.
This report, which was presented to Obama in December 2016, despite NSA Director Mike Rogers having only moderate confidence in
its assessment, became one of the core pieces of the narrative that Russia interfered with the 2016 elections.
Through intelligence community leaks, and in collusion with willing media outlets, the narrative that Russia helped Trump win
the elections was aggressively pushed throughout 2017.
Spygate
Spygate represents the biggest political scandal in our nation's history. A sitting administration actively colluded with a political
campaign to affect the outcome of a U.S. presidential election. Government agencies were weaponized and a complicit media spread
intelligence community leaks as facts.
But a larger question remains: How long has the United States been subject to interference from the intelligence community and
our political agencies? Was the 2016 presidential election a one-time aberration, or is this episode symptomatic of a larger pattern
extending back decades?
The intensity, scale, and coordination suggest something greater than overzealous actions taken during a single election. They
represent a unified reaction of the establishment to a threat posed by a true outsider -- a reaction that has come to be known as
Spygate.
Jeff Carlson is a regular contributor to The Epoch Times. He also runs the website TheMarketsWork.com and can be followed
on Twitter @themarketswork.
"... The transfer of Christopher Steele's first dossier memo was personally facilitated by Victoria Nuland, the assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs. Nuland gave approval for FBI agent Michael Gaeta to travel to London to obtain the memo from Steele. The memo may have passed directly from her to FBI leadership. Secretary of State John Kerry was also given a copy. ..."
"... Steele was already well-known within the State Department. Following Steele's involvement in the FIFA scandal investigation, he began to provide reports informally to the State Department. The reports were written for a "private client" but were "shared widely within the U.S. State Department, and sent up to Secretary of State John Kerry and Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, who was in charge of the U.S. response to Putin's annexation of Crimea and covert invasion of eastern Ukraine," the Guardian reported. ..."
The State Department, with its many contacts within foreign governments, became a conduit for the flow of information. The transfer
of Christopher Steele's first dossier memo was personally
facilitated by Victoria Nuland, the assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs. Nuland gave approval for
FBI agent Michael Gaeta to travel to London to obtain the memo from Steele. The memo may have passed directly from her to FBI leadership.
Secretary of State John Kerry was also given a copy.
Steele was already well-known within the State Department. Following Steele's involvement in the FIFA scandal investigation, he
began to provide reports
informally to the State Department. The reports were written for a "private client" but were "shared widely within the U.S. State
Department, and sent up to Secretary of State John Kerry and Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, who was in charge of
the U.S.
response to Putin's annexation of Crimea and covert invasion of eastern Ukraine," the Guardian reported.
Nuland passed on parts of the Steele dossier to the FBI. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
In July 2016, when the FBI wanted to send Gaeta to visit Steele in London, the bureau
sought permission from the office of Nuland, who provided this version of events during a Feb. 4, 2018,
appearance on CBS's "Face the Nation":
"In the middle of July, when [Steele] was doing this other work and became concerned, he passed two to four pages of short
points of what he was finding and our immediate reaction to that was, this is not in our purview. This needs to go to the FBI
if there is any concern here that one candidate or the election as a whole might be influenced by the Russian Federation. That's
something for the FBI to investigate."
Steele also
met with Jonathan Winer, a former deputy assistant secretary of state for international law enforcement and former special envoy
for Libya. Steele and Winer had known each other since at least 2010. In an opinion article in The Washington Post, Winer wrote the
following:
"In September 2016, Steele and I met in Washington and discussed the information now known as the 'dossier.' Steele's sources
suggested that the Kremlin not only had been behind the hacking of the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign
but also had compromised Trump and developed ties with his associates and campaign."
In a strange turn of events, Winer also received a
separate dossier , very similar to Steele's, from long-time Clinton confidant Sidney Blumenthal. This "second dossier" had been
compiled by another longtime Clinton operative, former journalist Cody Shearer, and echoed claims made in the Steele dossier. Winer
then met with Steele in late September 2016 and gave Steele a copy of the "second dossier." Steele went on to
share this second dossier with the FBI, which may have used it to corroborate his dossier.
Winer passed on memos from Christopher Steele to Victoria Nuland. (State Department)
Other foreign officials also used conduits into the State Department. Alexander Downer, Australia's high commissioner to the UK,
reportedly funneled his conversation
with Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos -- later used as a reason to open the FBI's counterintelligence investigation --
directly to the U.S. Embassy in London.
"The Downer details landed with the embassy's then-chargé d'affaires, Elizabeth Dibble, who previously served as a principal deputy
assistant secretary in Mrs. Clinton's State Department," The Wall Street Journal's Kimberley Strassel wrote in a May 31, 2018,
article .
If true, this would mean that neither Australian intelligence nor the Australian government alerted the FBI to the Papadopoulos
information. What happened with the Downer details, and to whom they were ultimately relayed, remains unknown.
Curiously, details surprisingly similar to the Papadopoulos–Downer conversation show up in the
first memo written
by Steele on June 20, 2016:
"A dossier of compromising information on Hillary Clinton has been collated by the Russian Intelligence Services over many
years and mainly comprises bugged conversations she had on various visits to Russia and intercepted phone calls. It has not yet
been distributed abroad, including to Trump."
"... Halper is reportedly a longtime CIA and FBI informant, and has been involved in US politics at the highest levels for decades, becoming George H.W. Bush's National Director for Policy Development during his presidential campaign. After Bush lost to Reagan, Halper worked as Reagan's Deputy Assistant Secretary of State - where he served under three different Secretaries . ..."
"... He then became a senior advisor to the Department of Defense and DOJ between 1984 and 2001. Halper's former father-in-law was Ray Cline, former Deputy Director of the CIA . He also allegedly spied on the Carter administration - collecting information on foreign policy (an account disputed by Ray Cline). ..."
A top FBI official admitted to Congressional investigators last year
that the agency had contacts within the Trump campaign as part of operation "Crossfire
Hurricane," which sounds a lot like FBI "informant" Stefan Halper - a former Oxford University
professor who was
paid over $1 million by the Obama Department of Defense between 2012 and 2018, with nearly
half of it surrounding the 2016 US election.
According to portions of transcripts published on Tuesday by the
Epoch Times of a Aug. 31, 2018 deposition by Trisha Anderson, the FBI relied on sources who
"already had campaign contacts" in order to surveil the Trump team.
"To my knowledge, the FBI did not place anybody within a campaign but, rather, relied upon
its network of sources, some of whom already had campaign contacts, including the source that
has been discussed in the media at some length beyond Christopher Steele ," said Anderson - who
was the #2 attorney at the FBI's Office of General Counsel, and had extensive involvement with
the Trump counterintelligence investigation.
Halper is reportedly a longtime CIA and FBI informant, and has been involved in US politics
at the highest levels for decades, becoming George H.W. Bush's National Director for Policy
Development during his presidential campaign. After Bush lost to Reagan, Halper worked as
Reagan's Deputy Assistant Secretary of State - where he served under three different Secretaries
.
He then became a senior advisor to the Department of Defense and
DOJ between 1984 and 2001. Halper's former father-in-law was Ray Cline, former Deputy Director
of the CIA . He also allegedly spied on the Carter administration - collecting information
on foreign policy (an account disputed by Ray Cline).
Halper's involvement in surveilling the Trump campaign was exposed by the Daily Caller 's
Chuck Ross, who reported that the 74-year-old spook was enlisted by the FBI to befriend and spy
on three members of the Trump campaign during the 2016 US election .
Halper received a DoD contract from the Obama administration for $411,575 - made in two payments, and had a
start date of September 26, 2016 - three days after a September 23
Yahoo! News article by Michael Isikoff about Trump aide Carter Page, which used information
fed to Isikoff by "pissgate" dossier creator Christopher Steele . The FBI would use the Yahoo!
article along with the unverified "pissgate" dossier as
supporting evidence in an FISA warrant application for Page. Halper approached Page during
an election-themed conference at Cambridge on July 11, 2016, six weeks after the September 26
DoD award start date. The two would stay in contact for the next 14 months, frequently meeting
and exchanging emails .
He said that he first encountered the informant during a conference in mid-July of 2016
and that they stayed in touch. The two later met several times in the Washington area. Mr.
Page said their interactions were benign. -
New York Times
And as the Daily Caller reports, Halper used a decades-old association with Paul Manafort to
break the ice with Page.
In September 2016, the FBI would send Halper to further probe Trump aide George Papadopoulos
on an allegation he made that Russia had "dirt" on Hillary Clinton. According to Papadopoulos
in an interview with Dan Bongino, Halper angrily accused him of working with Russia before
storming out of a meeting.
Halper essentially began interrogating Papadopoulos, saying that it's "obviously in your
interest to be working with the Russians" and to "hack emails." " You're complicit with
Russia in this, isn't that right George " Halper told him. Halper also inquired about
Hillary's hacked emails, insinuating that Papadopoulos possessed them. Papadopoulos denied
knowing anything about this and asked to be left alone. -
Bongino.com
All of these blatant crimes done by the Democrat cheerleading swamp creatures NEVER get
investigated and I am starting to wonder what the hell Trump is doing. Is he stupid or is all
of this just a charade and they are all on the same team. How could this creep Rod Rosenstein
have been left at his position until this time? It makes no sense to me. Sure all of these
rodents have control files on each other but come on how scared are they? It's ridiculous. If
Trump soon gets impeached I'll hold him responsible himself for not doing anything.
They are all on the same team. Trump was never your saviour. He was designed to be a
distraction so the 0.01% that own both parties can rape you some more.
Correct. It's all a big lie and show for the uninformed masses. God help these liars when
all the Qanon followers wake up to this truth. All this 'tremendous winning' bs will
boomerang back big time.
The above Halper story has been circulating for about a year now, so this isn`t
actually big news. As for the FBI and the CIA subverting just about every political campaign
or social movement in existence: Well, duh. The deep state and its satanic minions will
remain in control as long as such "intelligence" and State Security agencies (the FBI is
essentially nothing but a US version of the SS) are allowed to exist.
Alex Acosta works out an illegal deal for Epstein = Trump gives Acosta a cabinet position
= Trump is a protector of Pedo protectors = Trump doesn't give 2 shits about Pedos
"... There are missing pieces to this jigsaw puzzle but it's starting to look like a deep state operation to dirty Trump in the unlikely event that he went on to win. ..."
March 14th. Popadopoulos has first encounter with Mifsud. April
26th.
Mifsud tells Popadopoulos that Russians have "dirt" on Clinton, including "thousands of
e-mails". May 4th. Trump last man standing in Republican primary. May 10th. Popadopoulos gets
drunk with London based Australian diplomat and talks about "dirt" but not specifically
e-mails. June 9th. Don. Jr meets in Trump tower with Russians promising "dirt" but not
specifically in form of e-mails.
It all comes down to who Mifsud is, who he is working for and why he has been "off grid"
to journalists (but not presumably Intelligence services) for > 6 months.
Specific points.
On March 14th Popadopoulos knew he was transferring from team Carson to team Trump, but
this was not announced to the (presumably underwhelmed) world 'till March 21st. Whoever put
Mifsud onto Popadopoulos was very quick on their feet.
The Australian diplomat broke chain of command by reporting the drunken conversation to
the State Department as opposed to his domestic Intelligence service. If Mifsud was a western
asset, Australian Intelligence would likely be aware of his status.
If Mifsud was a Russian asset why would demonstrably genuine Russians be trying to dish up
the dirt on Clinton in June?
There are missing pieces to this jigsaw puzzle but it's starting to look like a deep state
operation to dirty Trump in the unlikely event that he went on to win.
"George Papadopoulos revealed [redacted] that individuals linked to Russia, who took
interest in Papadopoulos as a Trump campaign foreign policy adviser, informed him in late
April 2016 that Russia [two lines redacted].
Papadopoulos's disclosure, moreover, occurred against the backdrop of Russia's aggressive
covert campaign to influence our elections, which the FBI was already monitoring.
We would later learn in Papadopoulos's plea that the information the Russians could assist
by anonymously releasing were thousands of Hillary Clinton emails."
my problem with this is wikileaks released the e mails via a search-able archive on march
16th 2016...
I still don't see how anything papadopolous said is relevant time wise.. what am i missing
here, other then the obvious fact papadopolous looks like a lousy liar.. apparently he got
this from Joseph Mifsud who as it turns out was 'director of the London Academy of Diplomacy'
and etc - according to the nyt here - https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/31/world/europe/russia-us-election-joseph-mifsud.html
and from the nyt article "Mr. Papadopoulos has pleaded guilty to lying to the F.B.I. about
his conversations with the "professor." Mr. Mifsud is referred to in the papers only as "the
professor," based in London, but a Senate aide familiar with emails involving Mr. Mifsud --
lawmakers in both the Senate and the House are investigating Russia's role in the election --
confirmed that he was the person cited."
the whole thing of Russia influencing the usa election seems built on via a number of
sketchy characters at best..
at any rate - this is what emptywheel thinks is relevant in an otherwise irrelevant memo
from schiff... i don't get how it is!
A man President Donald Trump named as a member of his foreign policy team
during the 2016 campaign began his two-week sentence on Monday for lying to the FBI about his
Russian contacts.
George Papadopoulos, the first Trump campaign aide sentenced as a result of special counsel
Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian election meddling, was ordered to report to the
Federal Bureau of Prisons after his lawyers' last-ditch motions to delay his sentence were
denied.
Papadopoulos arrived Monday at a minimum-security camp in Oxford, Wisconsin, the BOP
confirmed to USA TODAY. There are currently 153 inmates at the camp, according to the agency's website .
U.S. District Court Judge Randolph Moss
issued a 13-page ruling Sunday rejecting two motions filed by Papadopoulos' attorneys. Moss
said Papadopoulos' time to file an appeal expired on Sept. 25 and that his hopes of having his
plea deal voided by a case challenging Mueller's appointment were without merit.
The case before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit argues that
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein did not have the constitutional authority to appoint
Mueller after then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from matters dealing with the
Russia investigation. Papadopoulos' lawyers said it would be "unjust" for their client to go to
prison only to see Mueller's investigation declared illegitimate after he served his time.
But Moss said those arguments had been available to Papadopoulos for more than a year. And
he pointed out that two other judges had "issued thorough and carefully reasoned opinions
rejecting the arguments that Papadopoulos now champions."
Moss said the "prospect that the D.C. Circuit will reach a contrary conclusion is
remote."
The judge also said nothing in the Bail Reform Act cited by Papadopoulos' lawyers would
justify suspending a sentence to await "an appeal brought by a different party in a different
case."
Papadopoulos pleaded guilty last year to lying to the FBI about his Russian contacts while
working for the Trump campaign in 2016. In September, he was sentenced to two weeks
in prison , a year of supervised release, 200 hours of community service and a $9,500
fine.
Mueller's prosecutors had sought a six-month sentence for Papadopoulos, who asked the judge
to give him probation. A conviction for lying to the FBI can carry a sentence of up to five years in prison
.
According to Mueller, Papadopoulos "lied to the FBI regarding his interactions with a
foreign professor whom he understood to have significant ties to the Russian government, as
well as a female Russian national."
Papadopoulos identified that
professor as Joseph Mifsud , who introduced him to the Russian woman he knew as Olga.
Mifsud told Papadopoulos Olga was related to Russian President Vladimir Putin and Papadopoulos
later identified her as "Putin's niece" in a campaign email.
When asked about his contacts with Mifsud and Olga, Papadopoulos falsely told the FBI agents
that his meetings with them happened before he joined the Trump campaign.
"He's an energy and oil consultant," Trump said at the time. "Excellent guy."
According to Papadopoulos, he met with Trump, Sessions and other campaign officials at the
Trump Hotel in Washington on March 31, 2016, and told them he could use his new connections to
set up a meeting between Trump and Putin.
"While some in the room rebuffed George's offer, Mr. Trump nodded with approval and deferred
to Mr. Sessions who appeared to like the idea and stated that the campaign should look into
it," Papadopoulos' lawyers wrote in a court filing.
Summary: George Papadopoulos and his wife Simone Mangiante approached in Greece by a known
CIA/FBI operative, Charles Tawil. Mr. Tawil enlists George as a business consultant, under
the auspices of energy development interests, and hands him $10,000 in cash to take back to
the U.S. Upon arrival at the Dulles airport Robert Mueller had FBI agents waiting.
Papadopoulos was stopped and searched; however, he never had the cash because he smartly
left it in Greece with his lawyer. Further:
[W]hen he was arrested at Dulles Airport on July 27 after coming off a flight from
Munich, prosecutors had no warrant for him and no indictment or criminal complaint. The
complaint would be filed the following morning and approved by Howell in Washington.
"... "I am more than happy to deliver the $10,000 in cash I received, as part of what I believe was a sting operation to frame me in summer 2017, to your committee to examine for marked bills. This is in the interest of me being fully transparent," he wrote last week on Twitter to North Carolina Rep. Mark Meadows and Texas Rep. John Ratcliffe. ..."
"... Afraid he might be killed if he didn't accept the money, Papadopoulos took the funds and later contacted Tawil - who allegedly told Papadopoulos he didn't want it back. From there, Papadopoulos gave the cash to his attorney in Greece. Upon his return to the United States several days later, Papadopoulos was arrested on July 28, 2017 at Dulles International Airport in Washington D.C., by agents who he believes were looking for the cash. ..."
"... And then when Papadopoulos landed back in America, he was arrested at Dulles International Airport on July 27th. Strangely, he wasn't shown the warrant for his arrest when arrested, and didn't know the reason why until the next day. The $10,000 that Tawil paid Papadopoulos in cash is interesting in this context, as it would be the exact amount of money one would be required to declare at customs. Papadopoulos didn't recall if he was arrested before or after he filled out a customs slip (but didn't have the money on him). - Bongino.com ..."
George Papadopoulos - a central figure and self-admitted dupe in the Obama administration's targeted spying on the Trump campaign,
gave a wide-ranging interview to Dan Bongino on Friday, detailing what he claims to have been a setup by deep state operatives across
the world in order to ultimately infiltrate the Trump campaign.
In March 2016
, Maltese professor Joseph Mifsud told Papadopoulos - an energy consultant who had recently joined the Trump campaign - that
Russia had "dirt" on Hillary Clinton, a claim which Papadopoulos repeated in May 2016 to Australian diplomat Alexander Downer in
a
London bar . Of note, former FBI Assistant Director of counterintelligence, Bill Priestap, reportedly
traveled to London directly before Downer
met with Papadopoulos, while a few months later former FBI agent Peter Strzok met with Downer in London directly before the DOJ officially
launched their investigation into the Trump campaign.
The alleged admission about Clinton's emails officially sparked the Obama administration's counterintelligence operation on Trump
on July 31, 2016 - dubbed Operation Crossfire Hurricane. In September 2016, the FBI would send spy Stefan Halper to further probe
Papadopoulos on the Clinton email allegation, and - according to his interview with Dan Bongino, Papadoplous says Halper angrily
accused him of working with Russia before storming out of a meeting.
Halper essentially began interrogating Papadopoulos, saying that it's "obviously in your interest to be working with the Russians"
and to "hack emails." " You're complicit with Russia in this, isn't that right George " Halper told him. Halper also inquired
about Hillary's hacked emails, insinuating that Papadopoulos possessed them. Papadopoulos denied knowing anything about this and
asked to be left alone. -
Bongino.com
There are two schools of thought on Papadopoulos and his relationship with Mifsud - the first link in the chain regarding the
Clinton email rumor. Notably, Mifsud claimed
last November to be a member of the Clinton Foundation, and has
donated to the charity.
The first theory is that Mifsud and Papadopoulos are Russian agents, and that Papadopoulos was used to try and establish a backchannel
to Putin.
Papadopoulos admits he tried to set up a Trump-Putin meeting - which was flatly rejected by the Trump campaign. Papadopoulos,
however, claims the Putin connection was a woman Mifsud introduced him to claiming to be Putin's niece, who was present at a March
24, 2016 meeting.
The second theory regarding Mifsud is that he was a deep state plant working with the FBI; convincing Papadopoulos that he could
arrange a meeting with members of the Russian government and then seeding Papadopoulos with the Clinton email rumor. From there,
as the theory goes, the "deep state" attempted to pump Papadopoulos for information and set up a case against him - beginning with
Alexander Downer and the "drunken" confession in London.
Papadopoulos told Bongino that he wasn't drunk during his meeting with Downer, and that he was being recorded . Papadopoulos noted
during the Bongino interview that transcripts of his meetings with Mifsud and Dower reportedly exist - which he says proves that
he was set up. According to Papadopoulos, Mifsud's lawyer said that he's not a Russian asset and was instead working for Western
intelligence.
Papadopoulos pleaded guilty to lying the FBI about his interactions with Mifsud, and was sentenced to 14 days in federal prison
and a $9,500 fine.
$10,000 cash
Papadopoulos also told Bongino about $10,000 in cash that he was given in an Israel hotel room in July 2017 - which he claims
was another attempt to set him up. He says that he believes the bills were marked, and is looking for a way to bring the cash into
the United States for Congressional investigators to analyze. The cash is currently with his attorney in Greece.
"I'm actually trying to bring that money back somehow so that Congress can investigate it because I am 100 percent sure those
are marked bills, and to see who was actually running this operation against me," Papadopoulos gold Bongino.
"I am more than happy to deliver the $10,000 in cash I received, as part of what I believe was a sting operation to frame me in
summer 2017, to your committee to examine for marked bills. This is in the interest of me being fully transparent," he wrote last
week on Twitter to North Carolina Rep. Mark Meadows and Texas Rep. John Ratcliffe.
The two Republicans are members of a congressional task force investigating the FBI's investigation into possible collusion
between the Trump campaign and Russia. The task force interviewed Papadopoulos on Oct. 25.
Papadopoulos acknowledged in his interview with Bongino that his claims about his encounters with an Israeli-American businessman
named Charles Tawil were "an incredible, insane story."
"But it's true," he asserted.
Papadopoulos told Bongino the he believes that Tawil "was working on behalf of Western intelligence to entrap me."
Papadopoulos does not have direct evidence that Tawil was working on behalf of a Western government when they met in March
and July 2017. Instead, Papadopoulos is speculating based on what he says is the peculiar circumstances of his encounters with
Tawil as well as his meetings with at least one known FBI informant. -
Daily Caller
Afraid he might be killed if he didn't accept the money, Papadopoulos took the funds and later contacted Tawil - who allegedly
told Papadopoulos he didn't want it back. From there, Papadopoulos gave the cash to his attorney in Greece. Upon his return to the
United States several days later, Papadopoulos was arrested on July 28, 2017 at Dulles International Airport in Washington D.C.,
by agents who he believes were looking for the cash.
And then when Papadopoulos landed back in America, he was arrested at Dulles International Airport on July 27th. Strangely,
he wasn't shown the warrant for his arrest when arrested, and didn't know the reason why until the next day. The $10,000 that
Tawil paid Papadopoulos in cash is interesting in this context, as it would be the exact amount of money one would be required
to declare at customs. Papadopoulos didn't recall if he was arrested before or after he filled out a customs slip (but didn't
have the money on him). -
Bongino.com
At minimum, one should set aside an hour for the Bongino-Papadopoulos interview if only to hear his version of events.
Perhaps the biggest mystery of all is how George was able to end up with such a hot Italian (not Russian) wife:
"... Department of Justice and FBI officials in the Obama administration in October of 2016 only presented to the court the evidence that made the government's case to get a warrant to spy on a Trump campaign associate ..."
"... The FBI referred to Papadopoulos in a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant application - however what has been released to the public is so heavily redacted that it's unclear why he is mentioned. ..."
"... As The Hill 's John Solomon notes, based on Congressional testimony by former FBI General Counsel James Baker - the DOJ / FBI redactions aren't hiding national security issues - only embarrassment . ..."
"... President Trump issued an order to declassify the documents on September 17, but then walked it back - announcing that the DOJ would be allowed to review the documents first after two foreign allies asked him to keep them classified. ..."
"... "My opinion is that declassifying them would not expose any national security information, would not expose any sources and methods," said Ratcliffe. "It would expose certain folks at the Obama Justice Department and FBI and their actions taken to conceal material facts from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court." ..."
After hinting for months that the FBI was not forthcoming with federal surveillance court
judges when they made their case to spy on the Trump campaign, Texas Rep. John Ratcliffe (R)
said on Sunday that the agency is holding evidence which "directly refutes" its premise for
launching the probe, reports the Daily Caller 's Chuck Ross.
Texas Rep. John Ratcliffe provided Sunday the clearest picture to date of what the FBI
allegedly withheld from the surveillance court.
Ratcliffe suggested that the FBI failed to include evidence regarding former Trump
campaign adviser George Papadopoulos , in an interview with Fox News.
Ratcliffe noted that the FBI opened its investigation on July 31, 2016, after receiving
information from the Australian government about a conversation that Papadopoulos had on May
10, 2016, with Alexander Downer , the
top Australian diplomat to the U.K. - Daily Caller
While Australia's Alexander Downer claimed that Papadopoulos revealed Russia had "dirt" on
Hillary Clinton, Ratcliffe - who sits on the House Judiciary Committee - suggested on Sunday
that the FBI and DOJ possess information which directly contradicts that account.
"Hypothetically, if the Department of Justice and the FBI have another piece of evidence
that directly refutes that, that directly contradicts that, what you would expect is for the
Department of Justice to present both sides of the coin to the Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Court to evaluate the weight and sufficiency of that evidence," Ratcliffe said,
adding: "Instead, what happened here was Department of Justice and FBI officials in the Obama
administration in October of 2016 only presented to the court the evidence that made the
government's case to get a warrant to spy on a Trump campaign associate."
The FBI referred to Papadopoulos in a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant
application - however what has been released to the public is so heavily redacted that it's
unclear why he is mentioned.
As The Hill 's John Solomon notes, based on Congressional testimony by former FBI General
Counsel James Baker - the DOJ / FBI redactions aren't hiding national security issues -
only embarrassment .
Other GOP lawmakers have suggested that evidence exists which would exonerate Papadopoulos -
who pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his contacts with Maltese professor (and
self-professed member of the Clinton Foundation), Joseph Mifsud.
Ratcliffe suggested that declassifying DOJ / FBI documents related to the matter "would
corroborate" his claims about Papadopoulos.
Republicans have pressed President Trump to declassify the documents, which include 21
pages from a June 2016 FISA application against Page. House Intelligence Committee Chairman
Devin Nunes has said
that the FBI failed to provide "exculpatory evidence" in the FISA applications. He has also
said that Americans will be "shocked" by the information behind the FISA redactions. -
Daily Caller
President Trump issued an order to declassify the documents on September 17, but then walked
it back - announcing that the DOJ would be allowed to review the documents first after two
foreign allies asked him to keep them classified.
"My opinion is that declassifying them would not expose any national security information,
would not expose any sources and methods," said Ratcliffe. "It would expose certain folks at
the Obama Justice Department and FBI and their actions taken to conceal material facts from the
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court."
"... Not sure about that, as at least 2 crucial allies, the UK and Australia, were pressured by the Obama and Hillary camps to set this whole narrative off...and therefore does he seriously damage those international and key security countries with info or does he compromise to keep the peace? ..."
"... I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop.... That's that the UK's GCHQ initiated spying on Popadolous and Trump Tower at the request of Obummer and/or Rice and/or Brennan, BEFORE the FBI/Comey said UNDER OATH that they started in May, and were denied a FISA warrant in June 2016.... that's why they needed the 'golden shower dossier.' ..."
Some say that declassifying the documents would expose " sources and methods ".
Others say that the documents are being kept secret to prevent the DOJ and FBI from becoming
embarrassed . I say that both can be true.
If the documents expose the liars and fabrications that went into the entire Russia Gate
fraud, then declassifying the documents will indeed embarrass the DOJ and FBI by
showing that their " sources " are liars and that their " methods " are
fabrications.
Either Trump is constantly threatened, boxed into a corner, or it IS ALL FOR SHOW!
The best example is now, Trump "walking back the release" because of Aussie and UK
complicity. The threatened release of USA dirty laundry, of which there is plenty knowing how
our CIA works. Or we are being played once more.
Frankly, I'm beyond sick of these walk backs! IG report! Rosenstein resigns! FISA
Declas!!
I'm an independent voter. It's high time I WALK BACK my vote for all Republicans on
November 6th UNLESS WE THE People that they represent get a FULL UNREDACTED FISA AND IG
REPORT published .
Tell Trump and the Republican party . Protect NOT ONE Criminal. If UK or Aus threaten
exposing spies or military secrets then threaten back with annihilation should they endanger
Americans.
I'm fed up beyond return with Holder, Brennan et al.
Obama, Hillary and the DNC pressured the UK's M16 as the No.1 instigator via Steele, its
lapdog Australia's intelligence service, then told Alexander Downer to forward "salted" info
to US agencies...and 2.5 years later here we are
It's always something that causes The Never Ending Wait..
and it always makes decent sense in the short term (memory loss)..
and it always; and for years now, happens.
I can't buy that those involved are powerful, savvy, or more importantly, courageous
enough to finally stand the hell UP to the powers that be bullshitting the Citizenry. It's
clearly not the case.
And what does Sundance say of the MIA Sessions? Is he really wearing tights and cape under
those rumpled wee suits of his, and just snarling to leap out, indictments in hand, to read
off tens of thousands of the accused' names? "Stealth Jeff"; actor par excellence? Sessions
as Hero? Any day now to be proved The Truth's Hitman?
A GOP-won Midterms would benefit from the declassification of criminal intent that
supports the US President. -> Before the vote. Afterward, and if the vote gone badly, lol
it'll be as useful as John Brennan's soul. And a "Mueller surprise"; if the declassification
happened before the vote, would be tainted beyond its .. surprise.
So why the wait this time - again?
I'm sorry; I don't mean to come across rudely, but "hoping; forever" is exhausting,
damaging to fact based living, induces apathy and entirely suits those who have so much to
hide, and offers nothing to the targets involved; We, the People.
The factions in the FBI/DOJ who want to keep the Russian collusion hoax going are the same
ones who protected Hillary from the most outrageous violation of the espionage laws ever to
bubble to the surface. Office politics in that axis are a lot like any other large company,
with the exception of sending people to prison. So her supporters are still on the job.
The investigation never made first page news, living out here in the alternate press, and
now that The Donald seems to walk back obvious Donaldesque moves, it might never come to
light. Remember his campaign promise was to prosecute Sec. Clinton, and he settled for firing
Comey. So they may get away with most of this yet.
Any time the US government cooperates with the British, we get stuck. The Austrailians are
colonials and love it. So the paperwork for the Comey-McCabe-Rosenstien conspiracy might
never be published.
When the FBI wants a warrant, its presumed that they are not going to make an even-handed
case to the FISA Court. All they have to do is deny that they had sufficient infomation to
the contrary. Thats what makes this court an abomination to our freedom. This is why the US
Patriot Act and the Homeland Security Act are a bunch of crap. We are now finding out that
intelligence services knew who concocted 911 (elements within the Saudi Govt along side the
wealthy dissident near-royals ie. the Khashoggis and the Bin-Ladens, and possibly the
Israelis knew too).
Everyone, none of this matters. Has everyone forgotten about 9/11 and the conspiracy
perpetrated on the American people. Frankly all is not what it seems and most of what we are
seeing is simply theatre for the masses.
Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture,
are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle,
so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not speak above
their breath when they speak in condemnation of it."
~ Woodrow Wilson (1856 – 1924), 28th President of the United States
"The very word "secrecy" is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people
inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret
proceedings...Our way of life is under attack. Those who make themselves our enemy are
advancing around the globe...no war ever posed a greater threat to our security. If you are
awaiting a finding of "clear and present danger," then I can only say that the danger has
never been more clear and its presence has never been more imminent...For we are opposed
around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy that relies primarily on covert
means for expanding its sphere of influence–on infiltration instead of invasion, on
subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by
night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material
resources into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine that combines
military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations. Its
preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its
dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no
secret is revealed."
― President John F. Kennedy
Anyone else worried that the President keeps doing an about face or being unable or
unwilling to deliver on important issues? Orders papers to be published unredacted then they are not? Hillary walking free. No Wall,
no withdrawal from Afghanistan and now backtracking on punishing Saudi Arabia....
" and now backtracking on punishing Saudi Arabia.."
And you think the Russian's really poisoned the Skripals, or that Assad merrily gassed his
own people just before entering peace talks, or that the White Helmet people being invited
into Canada are not Al Nusra terrorists?
You had better be prepared to believe all that if you think the Saudis are stupid enough
to dismember a Washington Post journalist in a Saudi consulate, and to let it be recorded to
boot. How dumb can you get? But then, maybe I misjudge you. Maybe you do believe all that. Not me, pal.
PS For extra confirmation, just look at who has decided not to attend Davos in the Desert.
Top of the list are the New Yawk banksters.
You want to might ask yourself why the Post ran this story, employed the journalist and
published that John Brennan demand that we "punish" Saudi Arabia. You might ask yourself why the NYT pushed the narrative that RR should be fired before
mid-terms.
i watched a documentary about that. basically, binney was genius who created a genius
system to find terrorists while maintaining the integrity of the constitution (and for
relatively cheap cost!). The deep state was like "piss on that," spent 100x more money than
they had to, and wiped their *** with the constitution.
dont forget that the FBI fabricated evidence about Binney and three of his colleagues.The
criminal case against Binney and his colleagues was then thrown out of court once the
fabrication was revealed. This out of control corruption has been going on a long time...
I've stated for months that rank and file are in the tank w/leadership corruption OR they
have been threatened either with harm to themselves of family members if they didn't go
along. However at this point, no whistleblowers proves the former.
Strzok testifed several CDs of ALL 680K emails that included crimes against children,
classified info was handed over to Comey who merely placed them in his office. Comey has been
gone for over six months, why have those CDs not been reviewed and acted on?
There are a LOT of dots and THEY count on YOU not connecting them. I keep a journal.
Lets suppose its all true. Which we pretty much know if you have been paying attention
that the FBI has gone rogue. Then what? Arrests? Mueller? I don't think that's even close to
what is needed. We are talking major treason from multiple levels and people through out
government.
" the DOJ would be allowed to review the documents first after two foreign allies asked
him to keep them classified. "
refers to the British and Australian governments who would be embarassed because rogue
agents wishing to arrange for the impeachment of Trump would be exposed.
as such, this would represent a threat to the apolitical use of five eyes security pact
for intelligence purposes - a pact intended to detect and prevent EXTERNAL threats to the
five eyes nations - rather than instigate POLITICAL control of INTERNAL affairs of the
democratic functioning of five eyes countries.
treason and sedition has been exposed within the US - aided and abetted by drunks and
sycophants in britain and australia,
My impression is that FIVE EYES exists so that the individual members can ask one of the
other members to spy on their own people without violating constitutional limits on such
activity.
In my humble opinion, politicians and government bureaucrats should be strictly prohibited
from falsely accusing their ideological opponents of criminal activity and then manufacturing
fake evidence to support those claims.
No amount of sanctimonious political-correctness justifies Authoritarian rule squarely in
opposition to the US Constitution.
Exactly @NoDebt. Nearly every day or multiple times a day there's something huge that
radically alters the narrative... people are worn out. This is so huge!
Not sure about that, as at least 2 crucial allies, the UK and Australia, were pressured by
the Obama and Hillary camps to set this whole narrative off...and therefore does he seriously
damage those international and key security countries with info or does he compromise to keep
the peace? Too much is at play here for Trump expose the truth
I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop.... That's that the UK's GCHQ initiated spying on
Popadolous and Trump Tower at the request of Obummer and/or Rice and/or Brennan, BEFORE the
FBI/Comey said UNDER OATH that they started in May, and were denied a FISA warrant in June
2016.... that's why they needed the 'golden shower dossier.' That's i-l-l-e-g-a-l.
Oh, and Brennan said he pushed the FBI to initiate an investigation but Nunes said there
was no intelligence (EC) which they could base it on. It was a set-up from day 1.
"... Steele also had extensive contacts with DOJ official Bruce Ohr and his wife Nellie, who - along with Steele - was paid by opposition research firm Fusion GPS in the anti-Trump campaign. Trump called for the declassification of FBI notes of interviews with Ohr, which would ostensibly reveal more about his relationship with Steele. Ohr was demoted twice within the Department of Justice for lying about his contacts with Fusion GPS. ..."
"... Perhaps the Brits are also concerned since much of the espionage performed on the Trump campaign was conducted on UK soil throughout 2016 . Recall that Trump aid George Papadopoulos was lured to London in March, 2016, where Maltese professor Joseph Mifsud fed him the rumor that Russia had dirt on Hillary Clinton. It was later at a London bar that Papadopoulos would drunkenly pass the rumor to Australian diplomat Alexander Downer (who Strzok flew to London to meet with). ..."
"... Papadopoulos accepted a flight to London and a $3,000 honorarium. He claims that during a meeting in London, Halper asked him whether he knew anything about Russian hacking of Democrats' emails. ..."
"... Papadopoulos had other contacts on British soil that he now believes were part of a government-sanctioned surveillance operation. - Daily Caller ..."
"... In total, Halper received over $1 million from the Obama Pentagon for "research," over $400,000 of which was granted before and during the 2016 election season. ..."
"... In short, it's understandable that the UK would prefer to hide their involvement in the "witch hunt" of Donald Trump since much of the counterintelligence investigation was conducted on UK soil. And if the Brits had knowledge of the operation, it will bolster claims that they meddled in the 2016 US election by assisting what appears to have been a set-up from the start . ..."
"... Steele's ham-handed dossier is a mere embarrassment, as virtually none of the claims asserted by the former MI6 agent have been proven true. ..."
"... Steele, a former MI6 agent, is the author of the infamous and unverified anti-Trump dossier. He worked as a confidential human source for the FBI for years before the relationship was severed just before the election because of Steele's unauthorized contacts with the press. ..."
"... That said, Steele hasn't worked for the British government since 2009, so for their excuse focusing on the former MI6 agent while ignoring the multitude of events which occurred on UK soil, is curious. ..."
"... I find it interesting that the Theresa May Govt in UK has the temerity to interfere with US politics (until they got caught out!), yet can't find the spine to stand up to the EU. ..."
"... THE UNITED KINGDOM along with ISRAEL & SAUDI ARABIA have always been the ones behind US Politics making, pulling the strings behind the curtains since the Petrodollar Inception, The Greater Israel project & the NWO initiative - only this time around Trump was not the UK's pick... ..."
"... England dominates the offshore money laundering havens where the super rich hide their money and evade taxes. They need to be brought down. No more African dictators looting their nation's resources and hiding the money first in offshore banks and then in JP Morgan and Brit banks. ..."
"... It is a test. If Trump doesn't go ahead with declassification, we know for sure he is no better than the globalists and neocons whose goal has always been to destroy and depopulate America. ..."
"... 'focusing on the former MI6 agent while ignoring the multitude of events which occurred on UK soil, is curious' ..."
"... Not at all. It's obvious - the problem ISN'T Steele. They're living in fear, as are many in DC and elsewhere, that Trump is going to pry the lid open and reveal at least some of their activities. If killing him would fix the problem, they would. It's too late, considering what Trump is threatening to do. I wonder if he'll back down, at least some? ..."
"... U.K. does not want the jurisdiction. U.S. spies lure you overseas then...compromise you. ..."
"... Duh. This Started In London! Britain is the "foreign country" involved in our elections. Wake up everyone. It's LONDONGATE ..."
"... May gonna owe Vlad an apology when Skripal is revealed to be Steele's source. Steele himself hadn't been to Russian in 15 years. Will he get life in prison for attempted murder? ..."
"... "t's hard to tell who's telling the truth and who isn't in this whole Russia narrative. Fact is, NOBODY is telling the truth. That is what I've determined after doing my own research.": https://youtu.be/2AA5BIfGj3g ..."
"... Trump made promises before being elected, then lied and sold America out, just like every other corrupted assklown politician. he is no different than clinton bush obama, just as arrogant, just as corrupt, and just as much a traitor. ..."
UK Begged Trump Not To Declassify Russia Docs; Cited "Grave Concerns" Over Steele
Involvement
by Tyler Durden
Sun, 09/23/2018 - 11:15 4.6K SHARES
The British government "expressed grave concerns" to the US government over the
declassification and release of material related to the Trump-Russia investigation, according
to the New
York Times . President Trump ordered a wide swath of materials "immediately" declassified
"without redaction" on Monday, only to
change his mind later in the week by allowing the DOJ Inspector General to review the
materials first.
The Times reports that the UK's concern was over material which "includes direct references
to conversations between American law enforcement officials and Christopher Steele," the former
MI6 agent who compiled the infamous "Steele Dossier." The UK's objection, according to former
US and British officials, was over revealing Steele's identity in an official document,
"regardless of whether he had been named in press reports."
We would note, however, that Steele's name was contained within the Nunes Memo
- the House Intelligence Committee's majority opinion in the Trump-Russia case.
Steele also had
extensive contacts with DOJ official Bruce Ohr and his wife Nellie, who - along with Steele
- was paid by opposition research firm Fusion GPS in the anti-Trump campaign. Trump called for
the declassification of FBI notes of interviews with Ohr, which would ostensibly reveal more
about his relationship with Steele. Ohr was demoted twice within the Department of Justice for
lying about his contacts with Fusion GPS.
Perhaps the Brits are also concerned since much of the espionage performed on the Trump
campaign was conducted on UK soil throughout 2016 . Recall that Trump aid George Papadopoulos
was lured to London in March, 2016, where Maltese professor Joseph Mifsud fed him the rumor
that Russia had dirt on Hillary Clinton. It was later at a London bar that Papadopoulos would
drunkenly pass the rumor to Australian diplomat Alexander Downer (who Strzok flew to London to
meet with).
Also recall that CIA/FBI "informant" (spy) Stefan Halper met with both Carter Page
and Papadopoulos in
London.
Halper, a veteran of four Republican administrations, reached out to Trump aide George
Papadopoulos in September 2016 with an offer to fly to London to write an academic paper on
energy exploration in the Mediterranean Sea.
Papadopoulos accepted a flight to London and a $3,000 honorarium. He claims that during a
meeting in London, Halper asked him whether he knew anything about Russian hacking of
Democrats' emails.
Papadopoulos had other contacts on British soil that he now believes were part of a
government-sanctioned surveillance operation. - Daily Caller
In total, Halper received over $1 million from the Obama Pentagon for "research," over
$400,000 of which was granted before and during the 2016 election season.
In short, it's understandable that the UK would prefer to hide their involvement in the
"witch hunt" of Donald Trump since much of the counterintelligence investigation was conducted
on UK soil. And if the Brits had knowledge of the operation, it will bolster claims that they
meddled in the 2016 US election by assisting what appears to have been a
set-up from the start .
Steele's ham-handed dossier is a mere embarrassment, as virtually none of the claims
asserted by the former MI6 agent have been proven true.
Steele, a former MI6 agent, is the author of the infamous and unverified anti-Trump
dossier. He worked as a confidential human source for the FBI for years before the
relationship was severed just before the election because of Steele's unauthorized contacts
with the press.
He shared results of his investigation into Trump's links to Russia with the FBI beginning
in early July 2016.
The FBI relied heavily on the unverified Steele dossier to fill out applications for four
FISA warrants against Page. Page has denied the dossier's claims, which include that he was
the Trump campaign's back channel to the Kremlin. - Daily Caller
That said, Steele hasn't worked for the British government since 2009, so for their excuse
focusing on the former MI6 agent while ignoring the multitude of events which occurred on UK
soil, is curious.
StychoKiller , 54 minutes ago
I find it interesting that the Theresa May Govt in UK has the temerity to interfere with
US politics (until they got caught out!), yet can't find the spine to stand up to the EU. If
I were Trump, not only would the shoe be dropping re: UK Govt involvement in US politics, but
said shoe would be making an imprint across her face! (stoopid twat!)
texantim , 1 hour ago
I say release the docs and put sanctions on UK.
BitchesBetterRecognize , 1 hour ago
So the Motherland ******* up with the ex-colony yet again, huh?
THE UNITED KINGDOM along with ISRAEL & SAUDI ARABIA have always been the ones behind
US Politics making, pulling the strings behind the curtains since the Petrodollar Inception,
The Greater Israel project & the NWO initiative - only this time around Trump was not the
UK's pick...
Oh, but those "civilized" Allies backstabbing each other for more power grip on the
USA....
Baron von Bud , 2 hours ago
England dominates the offshore money laundering havens where the super rich hide their
money and evade taxes. They need to be brought down. No more African dictators looting their
nation's resources and hiding the money first in offshore banks and then in JP Morgan and
Brit banks.
Many hedge funds are deep into this game. I'd wager on Carlyle Group and the Bush
clan. Billions of people can't get ahead because the super rich are ******* crooks running
the banks and governments. They don't pay taxes but force a small dry cleaner to pay 45% in
fed/state taxes. These criminals include Hillary Clinton and many members of congress.
Feinstein, Pelosi, Maxine and many more of both parties need to be investigated. How do they
get so rich on a congressman's salary. Deep into tax evasion and payoffs? Release the
documents and let MI6 hang.
Malvern Joe , 3 hours ago
It is a test. If Trump doesn't go ahead with declassification, we know for sure he is no
better than the globalists and neocons whose goal has always been to destroy and depopulate
America. It would represent the biggest sellout of this country since the creation of the Fed
in 1913, He will go down as the biggest fraud ever and his base will deport his *** to the
sums of India where he can defecate in public.
Bricker , 3 hours ago
You dont get to supply a rogue agent, that was probably told to do it in the first place,
and then tell Trump not to do it out of harm, harm is all you BRIT DEEP STATES deserve
Moving and Grooving , 3 hours ago
'focusing on the former MI6 agent while ignoring the multitude of events which occurred on
UK soil, is curious'
Not at all. It's obvious - the problem ISN'T Steele. They're living in fear, as are many
in DC and elsewhere, that Trump is going to pry the lid open and reveal at least some of
their activities. If killing him would fix the problem, they would. It's too late,
considering what Trump is threatening to do. I wonder if he'll back down, at least some?
The sheer corruption of the Global Government is on display here, revealing itself, if you
watch for it. Whether planned or not, the last 6 months or so have been astonishing to watch.
The entire media has been shown to be liars, academia is shown to be an expensive provider of
unprepared students, the corporate world is furiously rent-seeking and finding new ways to
destroy humanity, and government is too busy selling Americans out to write a budget. In all
countries around the world, adjusting for national status. Lawsuits in the west, machetes in
the third world.
Ban KKiller , 4 hours ago
U.K. does not want the jurisdiction. U.S. spies lure you overseas then...compromise you.
John C Durham , 4 hours ago
Duh. This Started In London! Britain is the "foreign country" involved in our elections.
Wake up everyone. It's LONDONGATE .
Anunnaki , 4 hours ago
May gonna owe Vlad an apology when Skripal is revealed to be Steele's source. Steele himself hadn't been to Russian in 15 years. Will he get life in prison for attempted murder?
PeaceForWorld , 4 hours ago
"t's hard to tell who's telling the truth and who isn't in this whole Russia narrative.
Fact is, NOBODY is telling the truth. That is what I've determined after doing my own
research.": https://youtu.be/2AA5BIfGj3g
I really like this woman "Shut the **** up!". She is a former Bernie supporter just like
me. She has turned against Democrats just like me. She doesn't trust any of the Establishment
parties.
Buddha71 , 4 hours ago
Trump made promises before being elected, then lied and sold America out, just like every other
corrupted assklown politician. he is no different than clinton bush obama, just as arrogant,
just as corrupt, and just as much a traitor. he has broken the promises upon which he was
elected, just like all the other fkn liars before him. no different. just a pos. he has not
made america great again, just more of the same, unemployment is a lie, it is closer to
17%.
'Assume, for the sake of argument, that powerful, connected people in the intelligence community and in politics worried that a
wildcard Trump presidency, unlike another Clinton or Bush, might expose a decade-plus of questionable practices. Disrupt long-established
money channels. Reveal secret machinations that could arguably land some people in prison.
'What exactly might an "insurance policy" against Donald Trump look like?'
All this leads me back to the suspicion that Steele's involvement may have been less in crafting the dossier, than making it
possible to conceal its actual origins while giving it an appearance of credibility. It could also be the case that Nellie Ohr's sudden
interest in radio transmissions had to do with communications inside the United States, rather than with Steele.
Notable quotes:
"... A great deal of evidence, I think, suggests that practically all those involved in 'Russiagate' were caught totally unprepared by Trump's victory, that they then went rushing around like headless chickens, and that part of this process involved a decision being taken to publish the dossier, without consulting British intelligence. If people like Younger were not consulted, then it would seem to me unlikely that Steele was. ..."
"... And I have immense difficulty seeing how any competent media lawyer would not have recommended, at the minimum, the redaction of the names of Aleksej Gubarev and his company from the final December 2016 memorandum. This would have made legal action unlikely, without greatly diminishing the effect of the claims. ..."
"... But if this was so, and if what they thought was accurate information was actually disinformation, the likely conduit would not have been through Steele, but from FSB cybersecurity people to their FBI counterparts. ..."
"... It it is I think material that intelligence agencies commonly include a great variety of people, ranging from very able analysts and operators to complete dolts. So, the CIA has employed both Philip Giraldi and John Brennan, MI6 both Alastair Crooke and also Christopher Steele and Alex Younger. ..."
"... It is however somewhat revealing that one now finds Giraldi and Crooke appearing on a Russian site, 'Strategic Culture Foundation', while Brennan and Younger are treated as authoritative figures by the MSM. ..."
"... My strong suspicion is that 'Russiagate' is a kind of nemesis, arising from the fact that key figures in British and American intelligence have, over a protracted period of time, got involved in intrigues where they are way out of their depth. The unintended consequences of these have meant that people like Brennan and Younger, and also Hannigan, have ended up having to resort to desperate measures to cover their backsides. ..."
"... There are many aspects to this story that don't make any sense to me if one looks at it from a rational perspective. One of course being concerns about libel litigation and the related legal discovery that you note. The second being no real contingency planning in the event Hillary loses the election. Admittedly they must have bought the media line and Nate Silver's forecast of a greater than 75% probability of a Hillary win. ..."
"... The purported "arms length" relationships don't make any sense. There's Fusion GPS and Glenn Simpson playing a central role. They hire Nellie Ohr, a possible CIA asset and the wife of Bruce Ohr, the 4th highest ranking official at the DOJ. ..."
"... Glenn Simpson also hires Christopher Steele who he knows from previous "spook" associations. Steele had numerous and continuous communications including telephone, Skype, email and personal meetings with Bruce and Nellie Ohr during all this. ..."
"... Then there is Mifsud and Halper. Apparently both are CIA and FBI assets. ..."
"... You have Brennan ginning up concerns giving super secret and individual briefings to the Gang of 8 in Congress. There's Democratic Senator Mark Warner, the minority leader on the Senate Intelligence Committee texting and calling Adam Waldman, Deripaska's US attorney about setting up clandestine meetings with Steele. ..."
"... Not to be left behind there's Sen. McCain doing the same. His top aide even travels to London to meet Steele. And then there's Strzok and his mistress Lisa Page busily spending every waking moment texting each other about every twist and turn in all the political games being played. Of course there's Admiral Rogers investigating unusual searches by FBI officials and contractors on the NSA database. And he briefs President-elect Trump at Trump Tower which prompts the entire transition team to move to Trump's golf course in NJ. ..."
"... In fact the IG report on the Clinton "investigation" states that many at the FBI were accepting "gifts" from various media personalities for a quid pro quo ..."
"... There's Rod Rosenstein, Bruce Ohr's direct boss who testifies he knew nothing about Ohr being a conduit to Strzok for Steele. Of course he knew nothing but signed the FISA application on Carter Page. ..."
"... At this point I don't buy that Christopher Steele dug up real intelligence from his contacts at the highest levels of the Russian government, which caught Brennan, Clapper, Comey and Lynch's pants on fire, who then launched a formal investigation of Russia collusion with Trump. Many things just don't pass the smell test. Now of course I have no qualifications nor experience in spookdom. ..."
"... I agree that it (and Skripalmania) are almost impossible to make sense of unless you think of a bunch of highly politicised not very bright people sinking deeper and deeper into what looked like a bright idea at the time. ..."
"... I ask because, if one tries to look at it in a non-partisan way, the Western IC seemed to be a failure when it came to predicting Russian reactions in the Donbass, the Crimea, and it seems in Syria. I link this to various comments from Colonel Lang indicating that true experts were replaced over the years by less experienced and knowledgeable people. Does being "highly politicised" mean that they're not up to much when it comes to minding the shop? ..."
"... I thought I detected a protest against the politicisation of the US in the world some years ago. And we must not forget that Gen Flynn (DIA) and Adm Rogers (NSA) acted strongly against this. Flynn was the first casualty of the Trump/Russia hysteria and the Clapper claque tried to fire Rogers. ..."
"... I was born in the Depression and have seen vitriolic politics but never have seen such a massive opposition by the media, the pundits and the establishment of both parties. Over 500 print publications endorsed Hillary. Only some 20 endorsed Trump. Yet he confounds the pundits by winning the election. Clearly many voters are at odds with the political media class. ..."
"... I think there is an ideological background to this, on which the piece by Alastair Crooke – himself former MI6 – to which Patrick Armstrong links, and the piece by James George Jatras to which Crooke links, are both to the point. The 'end of history' crowd thought they were inhabiting a realised utopia, and cannot cope with the fact that their dream is collapsing. ..."
"... In relation to the millenarian undercurrents on which Crooke focuses, however, it is also worth noting that a traditional conservative suspicion has been that millenarianism is naturally linked to antinomianism: the belief that the moral law is not binding on the elect. ..."
"... It is obviously possible that Ohr did not report up the chain of command, and if so, he and his wife become pivotal figures in the conspiracy. Alternatively, it could be that Rosenstein is lying – in which case, we have large questions about who else is implicated, and specifically whether the termination of Steele by the FBI was anything more than a ruse. ..."
"... 'Yet, Simpson allegedly acknowledged that most of the information Fusion GPS and British intelligence operative Christopher Steele developed did not come from sources inside Moscow. "Much of the collection about the Trump campaign ties to Russia comes from a former Russian intelligence officer (? not entirely clear) who lives in the U.S.," Ohr scribbled in his notes.' ..."
"... And it confirms my strong suspicion that the dossier is actually a composite product, much of it assembled at Fusion, which could indeed contain material from a range of people from the former Soviet space, who could living in the United States, Britain, or elsewhere – Ukraine and the Baltics being obvious possibilities. ..."
"... So Sergei Skripal and Sergei Millian, neither of whom fit the description by Simpson, have been mentioned as possible sources, and there is also the very curiously ambiguous role of Rinat Akhmetshin. ..."
"... All these people, obviously, could simply have fabricated material or retailed gossip, and Steele himself was involved in fabricating material on an industrial scale to cover up what actually happened to Alexander Litvinenko. ..."
"... All this leads me back to the suspicion that Steele's involvement may have been less in crafting the dossier, than making it possible to conceal its actual origins while giving it an appearance of credibility. It could also be the case that Nellie Ohr's sudden interest in radio transmissions had to do with communications inside the United States, rather than with Steele. ..."
"... Apparently that organisation is doing rather well in sustaining the claiming that 'fair report privilege' could circumvent any requirement to prove truth – and a key question now is whether documents which the DOJ is being forced to produce will establish that the dossier was being used by officials in ways that would trigger the privilege as of 10 January 2017. ..."
"... That said, what Ohr reports Simpson as telling him raises fundamental questions about how anyone could have relied upon the dossier for anything – and should push people back to actually asking hard questions about its origins. ..."
"... To add: Steele was on the FBI's payroll, in addition to being on Fusion GPS's payroll. And on the payroll of Her Majesty's Government. After he got caught leaking to the media he was apparently "fired" by the FBI. But he was continuing to communicate and brief through Bruce Ohr at the DOJ. ..."
"... I think the circle of Glenn Simpson. Chris Steele, Bruce & Nellie Ohr, Adam Waldman. Peter Strzok, and Sen. Mark Warner will be very interesting to pursue. ..."
"... The other circle that should be investigated is the Brennan, Clapper, Lynch, Comey, Yates, Susan Rice. ..."
"... No investigation can exclude the active participation of key people from the media complex including people like Comey's good friend Benjamin Wittes. ..."
"... In its original version, the 'Statement of Principles' explained, among other things, that the Society: 'Believes that only modern liberal democratic states are truly legitimate, and that any international organization which admits undemocratic states on an equal basis is fundamentally flawed.' ..."
"... Ironically, it was shortly after the publication of the dossier that Anatol Lieven published in the 'National Interest' an article entitled 'Is America Becoming a Third World Country?' (See https://nationalinterest.or... .) ..."
"... Also in June, Sergei Karaganov published a piece in 'Russia in Global Affairs', of which he is publisher, entitled 'Ideology of Eastward Turn.' ..."
"... I do not think Karaganov's article is simply a reflection of changes in Russian attitudes. The changes, it seems to me, are global. ..."
"... I do think that we in the West really blew it. In 1990, we could have said, in all humility, that our way of life (IMO the key word is pluralism) had proven more survivable. So we should welcome the others into the tent. Instead, we were right and that was that. ..."
"... Just as you're asking about the origins of the dossier I wonder if it was orchestrated or something that evolved organically? If it was orchestrated, then who was the mastermind? Did Brennan, Clapper and Come sit down and hatch it or was Simpson the brains? What is astounding is the scale. So many people involved. Were they all motivated by ideology or by the need to protect their racket? ..."
"... It seems there are many sub-plots. There's the Deripaska, Steele, Waldman, Mueller, Sen. Warner angle. Then there's the Simpson, Steele, Ohr, Strzok, Page, McCabe angle. There's also the Simpson, Steele, media reporters angle. Then there's the whole Mifsud, Halper, Carter Page, Papadopolous, Downer bit. There's the Comey, Rosenstein, Yates, Strzok FISA application piece. Then there's all the stuff happening in the UK including Hannigan's resignation as soon as Trump is elected. Of course the whole Mueller appointment and the obstruction of justice thread to tie Trump's hand. There are so many elements. Who initiated and coordinated? Was each element separate? ..."
"... Together, these methods are likely to have produced a mass of information. It is important to remember, for example, that at the time of his mysterious death on 23 March 2013 Boris Berezovsky was negotiating to return to Russia, and that his head of security, Sergei Sokolov did return, with a 'cache' of documents. ..."
"... The purpose was to demonstrate that Alexei Navalny was the instrument of a 'régime change' plot in which William Browder was acting as an agent of MI6. ..."
"... An important role in the Apelbaum piece is played by the private security company Hakluyt. A quick look at the entries on Wikipedia and Powerbase will make clear that, if there is a British 'deep state', this is likely to be at its core. ..."
"... It is against this background that on has to see a specific claim which Apelbaum makes, for which I do not think any evidence is produced, about two figures whose role in 'Russiagate' is clearly central. So Luke Harding is described as 'A Guardian reporter and a Hakluyt and Orbis contractor' (note word.) Meanwhile, Edward Baumgartner is described as 'Co-founder of Edward Austin. Contractor at Orbis and Hakluyt.' ..."
"... That Harding is corrupt, as also Sir Robert Owen's 'Inquiry' into the death of the late Alexander Litvinenko, I can prove. When Owen's report was published in January 2016, a preliminary response by me was posted here on SST, which among other things listed some of the evidence establishing that the interviews supposedly recorded with Litvinenko by Detective Inspector Brent Hyatt immediately before his death were blatant forgeries. ..."
"... In relation to that part of the evidence discussed in my January 2016 post which exposes the fumbling attempts by Steele and his colleagues to cover up the truth about when and how Litvinenko travelled into central London on the day he was supposedly killed, most of this had been among a mass of material submitted by me to the Inquiry Team, which I have e-mails to prove was read. ..."
"... Further study of Owen's report has confirmed my suspicion that a strong 'prima facie case' of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice exists against very many of those involved in it. ..."
"... At the same time, materials produced on the Russian side have confirmed my suspicion that the reason why Steele and others have been able to get away with their cover-up is that the Russian intelligence services are no more enthusiastic than their British counterparts about having anything like the whole truth about how Litvinenko lived and died made public. ..."
"... Additionally, the text itself displays an odd parallelism with his assertion regarding the Steele Dossier- that is, the likelihood of multiple authors, of diverse origins. ..."
"... My curiosity about who Apelbaum might be is reinforced by the fact that the intimations he gives about his background in his responses to comments, while not incompatible with what he has said in the past, do not sit so easily with it. ..."
"... So, questions naturally arise about Apelbaum's intelligence career, in particular, who he is likely to have been employed by, and associated with, in the past, and whether he is still involved with any of those agencies which have employed him. ..."
"... 'Also, there is a large Hakluyt/Orbis "commercial intelligence" network in the US that regularly services political and federal agencies and has the power to summon Nazgűls the likes of John Brennan. So Steele is not the new kid on the block, he has been doing this type of work long before 2016. This is also why he has such a cozy relationship with the brass at the DOJ and state.' ..."
"... This is that he, the Ukrainian nationalist former KGB person Yuri Shvets, the convicted Italian disinformation peddler Mario Scaramella, and quite possibly the sometime key FBI expert on Mogilevich, Robert 'Bobby' Levinson, were involved in trying to suggest that Mogilevich was an instrument of a plot by Putin to equip Al Qaeda with a 'mini nuclear bomb.' ..."
"... In his prepared statement, Lugovoi claimed that his supposed victim used to say that everyone in Britain were ''retards', to use the translation submitted in evidence to Owen's Inquiry, or 'idiots', to use that by RT. And according to this version, the British believed in everything that 'we' – that is, the Berezovky group – said was happening in Russia. ..."
"... Whether or not Litvinenko expressed this cynical contempt, the credulity with which the claims of the 'information operations' people around Berezovsky have been accepted – well illustrated by Owen's report and perhaps most ludicrous in Harding's journalism – makes clear it is justified. ..."
"... Perhaps then, cartoons about Trump as a puppet, with the strings pulled by another puppet representing Manafort, whose strings are in turn pulled by Putin, should be replaced by ones in which Mueller is seen as a puppet manipulated by the ghost of Boris Berezovsky. ..."
"... But that is the irony. The relationship with Berezovsky blew up in the faces of all concerned, when in the wake of the successsful corruption of the investigation into the death of Litvinenko by him and his 'information operations' people, he attempted to recoup his fortunes by suing Roman Abramovich, and got taken to pieces by Lord Sumption. ..."
"... The 'Vesti Nedeli' piece uses what Elizaveta Berezovskaya says in support of the claim that Berezovsky was murdered by British 'special forces', because he was planning to return to Russia, and he 'knew too much about them.' ..."
"... One of the things I've never understood about the Trump Dossier story is the lack of any forensic analysis of its content and style anywhere in the media, even the alt media. Who was supposed to have actually written it? Steele? The style does not match someone of his background and education, and the formatting and syntax were atrocious. The font actually varied from "report" to "report." It certainly did not give me the impression of being the product of a high-end, Belgravia consultancy. ..."
"... I wonder whether it was produced by an American of one sort or another and then "laundered" by being accorded association with the UK firm. Given that Steele just happened to be hired by the USG to help in the anti-FIFA skulduggery, he and his firm seem very much to be a concern that does dirty little jobs that need discretely to be done, though in this case, the discretion was undermined. ..."
"... Most of the memos were issued before October and Fusion/Simpson authorized Steele to release information to the FBI starting in July. The question is why the memos were released after the election when a release before the election would have been enough to sink Trump. Instead the FBI and presumably those paying Fusion on Hillarys behalf sat on it, and Comey comes out days before the election ..."
"... Kind of looks like they all wanted Trump in office and the disclosure was to give Trump the excuse needed to back track on his promises to improve relations with Russia and blame that on pressure from the Deep State and Russia Gate. ..."
"... Looking at Trumps history with Sater (FBI/CIA asset) and his political aspirations that began following his Moscow visit in 1987 it seems likely Trump has been a Deep State asset for 30 years and fed intelligence to CIA/FBI on Russian oligarchs and mafia . Indeed he may well have duped Russians into believing he was working for them when in fact it was the CIA/FBI who had the best Kompromat with US RICO laws that could have beggared him ..."
"... One thing to remember about the FBI is Sy Hersh. Hersh claims the FBI has been sitting on a report for two years that fingers murdered DNC staffer Seth Rich as the Wikileaks DNC email leaker (or one of them, at least.) ..."
"... I suspect the decision to publish the dossier was political. It was required to enable Clapper, Brennan, and others to opine on national media and create further media hysteria prior to the vote as well as to justify the counter-intelligence investigations underway. They were throwing the kitchen sink to sink Trump's electoral chances. I don't think a lot of thought was given about the legal ramifications. ..."
"... This seems to be a pattern. Leak information. Then use the leaked story to justify actions like apply for a FISA warrant or fan the media flames. ..."
"... I find it incredulous that former leaders of the intelligence and law enforcement agencies have gained paid access to powerful media platforms and they have used it to launch vicious attacks on a POTUS. ..."
"... I find it amazing that McCabe and Peter Strzok are raising hundreds of thousands of dollars on social media platforms. ..."
"... If the GOP retains the House and Jim Jordan becomes speaker, then there may be a possibility that Sessions, Rosenstein and Wray may be fired and another special counsel appointed who will then convene a grand jury. ..."
My strong impression is that nobody on the British side vetted the dossier for publication. A striking feature of the early news
coverage is that there appeared to be total confusion, with some of the reporting suggesting that the sources quoted wanted to hang
him out to dry, others that they wanted to defend him.
An interesting aspect is that not only were anonymous sources linked to MI6 quoted on both sides of the argument -- which could
have been explained by disagreements within the organisation: in different stories, not however far apart in date, its head, Sir
Alex Younger, was portrayed as holding radically different views.
When CNN publicised the existence of the dossier on 10 January 2017, the same day that it was published by 'BuzzFeed', it suggested
that the author was British. The following day, the WSJ named Steele.
On 13 January, Martin Robinson, UK Chief Reporter for 'Mail Online', published a report whose headlines seem worth quoting in
full:
'I introduced him to my wife as James Bond': Former spy Chris Steele's friends describe a "show-off" 007 figure but MI6 bosses
brand him "an idiot" for an "appalling lack of judgement" over the Trump "dirty dossier": Intelligence expert Nigel West says friend
is like Ian Fleming's famous character; He said: "He's James Bond. I actually introduced him to my wife as James Bond'; Mr West says
Steele dislikes Putin and Kremlin for ignoring rules of espionage; Angry spy source calls him 'idiot' and blasts decision to take
on the Trump work; Current MI6 boss Sir Alex Younger is said to be livid about reputation damage.'
On 15 January, however, Kim Sengupta, Defence Editor of the 'Independent', produced a report headlined: 'Head of MI6 used information
from Trump dossier in first public speech; Warnings on cyberattacks show ex-spy's work is respected.'
A great deal of evidence, I think, suggests that practically all those involved in 'Russiagate' were caught totally unprepared
by Trump's victory, that they then went rushing around like headless chickens, and that part of this process involved a decision
being taken to publish the dossier, without consulting British intelligence. If people like Younger were not consulted, then it would
seem to me unlikely that Steele was.
This leads me on to another puzzle about the dossier to which I have been having a difficulty finding a solution. Long years
ago I was reasonably familiar with libel law in relation to journalism. Anyone who 'served indentures', as very many of us did in
those days, had to study it. Later, I got involved in a protracted libel suit -- successfully, I hasten to add -- in relation to
a programme I made, and had the sobering experience of having a top-class libel barrister requiring me to justify every assertion
I had made.
In the jargon then, a crucial question when an article, or programme, was being 'vetted' before publication was whether it represented
a 'fair business risk.' This involved both the technical legal issues, and also judgements as to whether people were likely to sue,
and how if they did the case would be likely to pan out.
On the face of things, one would not have expected that people at 'BuzzFeed' would have gone ahead and make the dossier public,
without having it 'vetted' by competent lawyers. And I have difficulty seeing how, if they did, the advice could have been to publish
what they published.
I have some difficulty seeing how the advice could have been to include the memorandum with the claims about the Alfa Group oligarchs,
unless either these could be seriously defended or it was assumed that contesting them effectively would involve revealing more 'dirty
linen' than these wanted to see aired in public.
And I have immense difficulty seeing how any competent media lawyer would not have recommended, at the minimum, the redaction
of the names of Aleksej Gubarev and his company from the final December 2016 memorandum. This would have made legal action unlikely,
without greatly diminishing the effect of the claims.
Trying to make sense of why such an obvious precaution was not taken, I find myself wondering whether, in fact, the reason may
have been that the people responsible for the dossier may have actually believed this part of it at least.
If that is so, however, the most plausible explanation I can see is that while other claims in the dossier may well be total fabrication,
either by the people at Fusion and Steele or by some of their questionable contacts, this information at least did come from what
Glenn Simpson, Nellie Ohr et al thought were reliable Russian government sources.
But if this was so, and if what they thought was accurate information was actually disinformation, the likely conduit would
not have been through Steele, but from FSB cybersecurity people to their FBI counterparts.
I think that the cases involving Karim Baratov and Dmitri Dokuchaev and his colleagues may be much more complex than is apparent
from what looks to me like patent disinformation put out both on the Western and Russian sides.
It it is I think material that intelligence agencies commonly include a great variety of people, ranging from very able analysts
and operators to complete dolts. So, the CIA has employed both Philip Giraldi and John Brennan, MI6 both Alastair Crooke and also
Christopher Steele and Alex Younger.
It is however somewhat revealing that one now finds Giraldi and Crooke appearing on a Russian site, 'Strategic Culture Foundation',
while Brennan and Younger are treated as authoritative figures by the MSM.
If you want to get a clear picture of quite how low-grade the latter figure is, incidentally, it is worth looking at the speech
to which Kim Sengupta refers.
A favourite line of mine comes in Younger's discussion of the -- actually largely mythical -- notion of 'hybrid warfare': 'In
this arena, our opponents are often states whose very survival owes to the strength of their security capabilities; the work is complex
and risky, often with the full weight of the State seeking to root us out.'
Leaving aside the fact that this is borderline illiterate, what it amazing is Younger's apparent blindness to clearly unintended
implications of what he writes. If indeed, the 'very survival' of the Russian state 'owes to the strength of [its] security capabilities',
the conclusions, seen from a Russian point of view, would seem rather obvious: vote Putin, and give medals to Patrushev and Bortnikov.
My strong suspicion is that 'Russiagate' is a kind of nemesis, arising from the fact that key figures in British and American
intelligence have, over a protracted period of time, got involved in intrigues where they are way out of their depth. The unintended
consequences of these have meant that people like Brennan and Younger, and also Hannigan, have ended up having to resort to desperate
measures to cover their backsides.
There are many aspects to this story that don't make any sense to me if one looks at it from a rational perspective. One
of course being concerns about libel litigation and the related legal discovery that you note. The second being no real contingency
planning in the event Hillary loses the election. Admittedly they must have bought the media line and Nate Silver's forecast of
a greater than 75% probability of a Hillary win.
The purported "arms length" relationships don't make any sense. There's Fusion GPS and Glenn Simpson playing a central
role. They hire Nellie Ohr, a possible CIA asset and the wife of Bruce Ohr, the 4th highest ranking official at the DOJ.
Glenn Simpson also hires Christopher Steele who he knows from previous "spook" associations. Steele had numerous and continuous
communications including telephone, Skype, email and personal meetings with Bruce and Nellie Ohr during all this. They even
have discussions about Deripaska and about his visa application to visit the US. Bruce is a conduit to Strzok at FBI. Glenn Simpson
also is part of these discussions with Steele and the Ohrs.
Simpson also arranges for Steele to brief "reporters" like David Corn and others at the NY Times, WaPo, WSJ, Politico and others.
Then there is Mifsud and Halper. Apparently both are CIA and FBI assets. They are communicating with Carter Page and
Papadopolous, who in turn is drinking and yapping with Aussie ambassador Downer.
You have Brennan ginning up concerns giving super secret and individual briefings to the Gang of 8 in Congress. There's
Democratic Senator Mark Warner, the minority leader on the Senate Intelligence Committee texting and calling Adam Waldman, Deripaska's
US attorney about setting up clandestine meetings with Steele. There's Sen. Harry Reid passing on the Steele "dossier" to
Comey.
Not to be left behind there's Sen. McCain doing the same. His top aide even travels to London to meet Steele. And then
there's Strzok and his mistress Lisa Page busily spending every waking moment texting each other about every twist and turn in
all the political games being played. Of course there's Admiral Rogers investigating unusual searches by FBI officials and contractors
on the NSA database. And he briefs President-elect Trump at Trump Tower which prompts the entire transition team to move to Trump's
golf course in NJ.
Oh, there is also Nellie Ohr setting up ham radio to avoid detection in her communications with Steele. Then we have everyone
leaking and spinning to their "cohorts" in the premier media like the NY Times, CNN and WaPo.
Comey even has his buddy a professor and ostensibly his legal counsel on the payroll of the FBI as a contractor with access
to all the sensitive databases leaking to the media.
Andy McCabe has his legal counsel Lisa Page spin stories around his wife's huge campaign contributions from Clinton consigliere
McAuliffe.
In fact the IG report on the Clinton "investigation" states that many at the FBI were accepting "gifts" from various media
personalities for a quid pro quo.
As if all this was not enough there's AG Loretta Lynch, meeting with Bill Clinton on a tarmac ostensibly to discuss their grandkids.
Not to forget there were these "unmaskings" of surveillance information by Susan Rice, Samantha Power.
There's Rod Rosenstein, Bruce Ohr's direct boss who testifies he knew nothing about Ohr being a conduit to Strzok for Steele.
Of course he knew nothing but signed the FISA application on Carter Page. Then there are the FISC judges who never believed
their mandate required them to verify the evidence before issuing sweeping surveillance warrants. Now all this is what I as an
old farmer and winemaker have read. Those more in tune would easily add to these convoluted machinations.
I don't know how to make sense of all this. All I see is the extent of effort to prevent Donald Trump from being elected and
after he won from governing. The most obvious observation is that the leadership in our law enforcement and intelligence agencies
are so busy politicking spinning and leaking they have neither the time or the inclination let alone competence to do their real
job for which they get paid a handsome wage and sterling benefits.
At this point I don't buy that Christopher Steele dug up real intelligence from his contacts at the highest levels of the
Russian government, which caught Brennan, Clapper, Comey and Lynch's pants on fire, who then launched a formal investigation of
Russia collusion with Trump. Many things just don't pass the smell test. Now of course I have no qualifications nor experience
in spookdom.
If you have any speculative theories that connects some of the dots it would be my great pleasure to read.
I agree that it (and Skripalmania) are almost impossible to make sense of unless you think of a bunch of highly politicised
not very bright people sinking deeper and deeper into what looked like a bright idea at the time.
Confident that their horse is going to win the race and that the media will cover it all up and nobody will ever hear anything
about anything. Now that the unexpected happened, they're just spinning and denying faster hoping the Dems win in Nov and stop
all the investigations. And, they're getting nervous wondering who's going to sell out whom next. Up and down, around and around.
Gerbils -- there really isn't anything very consistent, planned or thought-out.
"I agree that it (and Skripalmania) are almost impossible to make sense of unless you think of a bunch of highly politicised
not very bright people sinking deeper and deeper into what looked like a bright idea at the time."
I believe your summary of what's happening is more accurate than Alastair Crooke's as set out in the article linked to.
But bright or not, what are these people in the IC doing being "highly politicised"? Does that not render them considerably
less efficient?
I ask because, if one tries to look at it in a non-partisan way, the Western IC seemed to be a failure when it came to
predicting Russian reactions in the Donbass, the Crimea, and it seems in Syria. I link this to various comments from Colonel Lang
indicating that true experts were replaced over the years by less experienced and knowledgeable people. Does being "highly politicised"
mean that they're not up to much when it comes to minding the shop?
I thought I detected a protest against the politicisation of the US in the world some years ago. And we must not forget
that Gen Flynn (DIA) and Adm Rogers (NSA) acted strongly against this. Flynn was the first casualty of the Trump/Russia hysteria
and the Clapper claque tried to fire Rogers.
Usually the incumbent party loses the mid-term election. The Democrats lost big in Obama's first mid-term. The Republicans
won the House and gained six senators. While the punditry claims a Blue Wave and Nate Silver is giving the Dems the odds. I'm
not so sure. I think the GOP will increase their majority in the Senate putting any conviction of Trump out of question.
I was born in the Depression and have seen vitriolic politics but never have seen such a massive opposition by the media,
the pundits and the establishment of both parties. Over 500 print publications endorsed Hillary. Only some 20 endorsed Trump.
Yet he confounds the pundits by winning the election. Clearly many voters are at odds with the political media class.
Yeah. My bet is that the Repubs hold onto both. 1) the economy is getting better 2) what do the Dems have to offer other than
this crazy Trump/Russia thing?
Economy will slow down sharply in 2019 but there should be enough momentum to help with the mid-terms. Trump needs to stop
with the endless sanction stuff. The House does look like a close one.
At a very general level, a 'speculative theory' which I have been mulling over for some time was rather well set out in a commentary
in 'The Hill' on 9 August by Sharyl Attkisson, which opens:
'Let's begin in the realm of the fanciful.
'Assume, for the sake of argument, that powerful, connected people in the intelligence community and in politics worried that
a wildcard Trump presidency, unlike another Clinton or Bush, might expose a decade-plus of questionable practices. Disrupt long-established
money channels. Reveal secret machinations that could arguably land some people in prison.
'What exactly might an "insurance policy" against Donald Trump look like?'
And Attkisson goes on to outline precisely the developments that appear to have happened.
I think there is an ideological background to this, on which the piece by Alastair Crooke – himself former MI6 – to which
Patrick Armstrong links, and the piece by James George Jatras to which Crooke links, are both to the point. The 'end of history'
crowd thought they were inhabiting a realised utopia, and cannot cope with the fact that their dream is collapsing.
In relation to the millenarian undercurrents on which Crooke focuses, however, it is also worth noting that a traditional
conservative suspicion has been that millenarianism is naturally linked to antinomianism: the belief that the moral law is not
binding on the elect. And in turn, according to a familiar skeptical view, antinomianism can easily end up in in straightforward
rascality.
On the rascality – to which Attkisson is pointing – I am working on how parts of the picture can be fleshed out. A few preliminary
points raised by your remarks.
As you note, 'There's Rod Rosenstein, Bruce Ohr's direct boss who testifies he knew nothing about Ohr being a conduit to Strzok
for Steele.' So, we know that Ohr and Steele were conspiring together to ensure that the latter could continue to be intimately
involved in the Mueller investigation, despite the FBI termination,
It is obviously possible that Ohr did not report up the chain of command, and if so, he and his wife become pivotal figures
in the conspiracy. Alternatively, it could be that Rosenstein is lying – in which case, we have large questions about who else
is implicated, and specifically whether the termination of Steele by the FBI was anything more than a ruse.
If, as seems to me likely, although not certain, the second possibility is closer to the truth than the former, then before
Ohr testifies on 28 August before the House Judiciary and Oversight Committees he will have to consider whether he is prepared
to 'take the rap' for his superiors, or 'sing sweetly.'
The fact that in a report in 'The Hill', I think on the same day as the Attkisson piece, John Solomon was quoting from Ohr's
handwritten notes of a meeting with Glenn Simpson in December 2016 makes me wonder whether he may not already have made a decision.
A key paragraph from the report:
'Yet, Simpson allegedly acknowledged that most of the information Fusion GPS and British intelligence operative Christopher
Steele developed did not come from sources inside Moscow. "Much of the collection about the Trump campaign ties to Russia comes
from a former Russian intelligence officer (? not entirely clear) who lives in the U.S.," Ohr scribbled in his notes.'
There is I think a need for caution here. There is no guarantee that Simpson was telling the literal truth to Ohr, or indeed
the latter reproducing with absolute accuracy with he was told (handwritten notes can be disposed of easily, but they can also
be rewritten.)
One is I think on firmer ground in relation to what it suggests was not the case – that there is any substance whatsoever in
the ludicrous story of someone running a private security company in London sending out hired employees who then gain access to
top Kremlin insiders, with these, of course, telling them precisely what they actually think.
And it confirms my strong suspicion that the dossier is actually a composite product, much of it assembled at Fusion, which
could indeed contain material from a range of people from the former Soviet space, who could living in the United States, Britain,
or elsewhere – Ukraine and the Baltics being obvious possibilities.
So Sergei Skripal and Sergei Millian, neither of whom fit the description by Simpson, have been mentioned as possible sources,
and there is also the very curiously ambiguous role of Rinat Akhmetshin.
All these people, obviously, could simply have fabricated material or retailed gossip, and Steele himself was involved
in fabricating material on an industrial scale to cover up what actually happened to Alexander Litvinenko.
That said, I continue to think it possible that both the second and final memoranda may incorporate some 'glitter', as well
as 'chickenfeed' fed from FSB cybersecurity people to their FBI counterparts, to hark back to George Smiley says to the Minister,
quite possibly included in the hope that the BS involved would be reproduced in contexts where it could provoke legal action.
All this leads me back to the suspicion that Steele's involvement may have been less in crafting the dossier, than making
it possible to conceal its actual origins while giving it an appearance of credibility. It could also be the case that Nellie
Ohr's sudden interest in radio transmissions had to do with communications inside the United States, rather than with Steele.
It could then be that Steele has been, in effect, hoist with his own petard, in that he is having to sustain the fiction that
he had some kind of grounds for making the claims about Aleksej Gubarev and XBT. How far this matters, at least in relation to
the action bought against 'BuzzFeed' in Florida, remains moot at the moment.
Apparently that organisation is doing rather well in sustaining the claiming that 'fair report privilege' could circumvent
any requirement to prove truth – and a key question now is whether documents which the DOJ is being forced to produce will establish
that the dossier was being used by officials in ways that would trigger the privilege as of 10 January 2017.
That said, what Ohr reports Simpson as telling him raises fundamental questions about how anyone could have relied upon
the dossier for anything – and should push people back to actually asking hard questions about its origins.
Mr Habakkuk, you mention "ambiguous role of Rinat Akhmetshin" - I am not sure if you meant Akhmetov.
I am surprised and curious about you mentioning him - if you meant Akhmetov - because that is one name among all the oligarchs
which has so far not been prominent. Thank you for your posts, these posts and the SST comments could and should serve as help
to the congressional investigations and hearings.
To add: Steele was on the FBI's payroll, in addition to being on Fusion GPS's payroll. And on the payroll of Her Majesty's
Government. After he got caught leaking to the media he was apparently "fired" by the FBI. But he was continuing to communicate
and brief through Bruce Ohr at the DOJ.
I think the circle of Glenn Simpson. Chris Steele, Bruce & Nellie Ohr, Adam Waldman. Peter Strzok, and Sen. Mark Warner
will be very interesting to pursue.
The other circle that should be investigated is the Brennan, Clapper, Lynch, Comey, Yates, Susan Rice.
No investigation can exclude the active participation of key people from the media complex including people like Comey's
good friend Benjamin Wittes.
Younger isn't the brightest bulb in the box, is he?
"If you doubt the link between legitimacy and effective counter-terrorism, then – albeit negatively – the unfolding tragedy
in Syria will, I fear, provide proof. I believe the Russian conduct in Syria, allied with that of Assad's discredited regime,
will, if they do not change course, provide a tragic example of the perils of forfeiting legitimacy. In defining as a terrorist
anyone who opposes a brutal government, they alienate precisely that group that has to be on side if the extremists are to
be defeated. Meanwhile, in Aleppo, Russia and the Syrian regime seek to make a desert and call it peace. The human tragedy
is heart-breaking"
Those were indeed some of the most inane comments in an inane piece.
But then, if you read an interview given to Jay Elwes of 'Prospect' magazine in May last year by Younger's predecessor Sir
Richard Dearlove, who looks to have been a significant background presence in what has been going on, you will find that, although
he is much more coherent than than his successor, it is almost as inane.
As it happens, Dearlove was one of the signatories of the 'Statement of Principles' of something called the 'Henry Jackson
Society.'
This was founded in 2005, in Cambridge, by a group in whom acolytes of an historian called Maurice Cowling were prominent –
Dearlove is himself a graduate in history from that university.
In its original version, the 'Statement of Principles' explained, among other things, that the Society: 'Believes that
only modern liberal democratic states are truly legitimate, and that any international organization which admits undemocratic
states on an equal basis is fundamentally flawed.'
Ironically, it was shortly after the publication of the dossier that Anatol Lieven published in the 'National Interest'
an article entitled 'Is America Becoming a Third World Country?' (See
https://nationalinterest.or...
.)
Among other things, he harked back to the way that, in 1648, a century and a half of bloody ideological strife in Europe had
been ended with a recognition that the legitimacy of different state forms had to be accepted, if a kind of 'war of all against
all' was to be avoided.
And Lieven went on to reflect on the way that, at what was then widely seen as the end of the Cold War, the abandonment of
universalisitic pretensions by Russia and China was interpreted as justifying an embrace of these by the the West.
This, he went on to argue, had actually had the paradoxical effect of relegitimising 'régimes' which do not conform to Western
'democratic' models, concluding by noting what appears to our new, quasi-Soviet, preference for not letting experience interfere
with ideological dogma:
'Finally – even after the catastrophes of Iraq and Libya – there is almost no awareness among US policymakers of the fact that
US attempts to change the regimes of other countries are likely to be seen not only by the elites of those countries but also
by their populations as leading to – and intended to lead to – the destruction of the state itself, leading to disaster for its
society and population. When the Communist regime in the USSR collapsed (though only in part under Western pressure), it took
the Soviet state with it. The Russian state came close to following suit in the years that followed, Russia was reduced to impotence
on the world stage, and large parts of the Russian and other populations suffered economic and social disaster. Remembering their
own past experiences with state collapse, warlordism, famine and foreign invasion, Chinese people looked at this awful spectacle
and huddled closer to the Chinese state – one that they may dislike in many ways, but which they certainly trust more than anything
America has to offer – especially given the apparent decay of democracy throughout the West.'
I read with interest your piece back in June entitled 'Putin Once Dreamed the American Dream', reprinting Charles Heberle's
account of the 'Transforming Subjects Into Citizens' project, and the attitude of some people close to Putin to it.
One of the things which struck me was that the question why the American Revolution succeeded, and so many others failed, which
was concerning the intellectuals to whom Heberle talked, is one of the central questions of modern political thought, from Tocqueville
on.
(Indeed, the question of the preconditions for what might be called 'constitutional' government, has been central to 'republican'
thought, ever since it was revived by Italian thinkers, including prominently Machiavelli, when the 'Renaissance' made them reactivate
and rework debates from ancient Rome and Greece.)
However, to hark back to the anxieties expressed by Lieven, nothing in the analysis of the great French thinker necessary guarantees
that the success of 'Democracy in America' is stable and permanent, or indeed that the relatively civilised order of the post-war
'Pax Americana' is necessarily durable in Western Europe.
Also in June, Sergei Karaganov published a piece in 'Russia in Global Affairs', of which he is publisher, entitled 'Ideology
of Eastward Turn.' A paragraph that struck me:
'Russian society should by no means abdicate from its mostly European culture. But it should certainly stop being afraid,
let alone feel ashamed, of its Asianism. It should be remembered that from the standpoint of prevailing social mentality and
society's attitude to the authorities Russia, just as China and many other Asian states, are offspring of Chengiss Khan's Empire.
This is no reason for throwing up hands in despair or for beginning to despise one's own people, contrary to what many members
of intelligencia sometimes do. It should be accepted as a fact of life and used as a strength. The more so, since amid the
harsh competitive environment of the modern world the authoritarian type of government – in the context of a market economy
and equitable military potentials – is certainly far more effective than modern democracy. This is what our Western partners
find so worrisome. Of course, we should bear in mind that authoritarianism – just like democracy – may lead to stagnation and
degradation. Russia is certainly confronted with such a risk.'
Unlike you, I cannot claim serious expertise on Russia. But, as a reasonably alert generalist television current affairs producer,
I took note of the indications which were emerging in the course of 1987 that the Gorbachev 'new thinking' was underpinned by
a realisation that Soviet institutions and ideas had become fundamentally dysfunctional, to which you have referred repeatedly
over the years.
And, after long tedious months trying interest the powers that were in British broadcasting in what was happening, I ended
up producing a couple of programmes for BBC Radio in February/March 1989 in which we interviewed some of the leading 'new thinkers',
among them Karaganov's then immediate superior at the Institute of Europe, Vitaly Zhurkin.
At the Institute for the USA and Canada, by contrast, we did not interview its head, Georgiy Arbatov, but his deputy, Andrei
Kokoshin, and one of the latter's mentors on military matters and collaborators General-Mayor Valentin Larionov, who I later realised
had earlier been one of the foremost Soviet nuclear strategists. (At the Institute for World Economy and International Relations,
we interviewed Arbatov's son, Alexei.)
Talking to these people we got a sense, although it had to be fleshed out later, of the scale of the disillusion with Soviet
models, and indeed – which began to frighten me not long after – of the way many of them were romanticising the West.
What Karaganov now writes is I think a hardly very surprising reaction to the way that the Western powers responded to the
'new thinking.' Moreover, it seems to me that the disillusionment involved is in no sense particular Russian, but rather global.
If one regards 'democracy' as though it were quoted on the stock exchange, before 1914 there were very many buyers, including
among the Russian élite. By 1931, in very many places, including large sections of the 'intelligentsia' in Western countries,
it was a sellers' market, to put it mildly.
After 1945, a kind of long 'bull market' in 'democracy' started: for very good reasons.
The – largely but very far from entirely – peaceful retreat and collapse of Soviet power was to a very significant extent the
product of this. The subsequent behaviour of Western élites has generated a vicious 'bear market', a fact they appear unable to
understand.
I do not think Karaganov's article is simply a reflection of changes in Russian attitudes. The changes, it seems to me,
are global.
I do think that we in the West really blew it. In 1990, we could have said, in all humility, that our way of life (IMO
the key word is pluralism) had proven more survivable. So we should welcome the others into the tent. Instead, we were right and
that was that.
PS, in light of the Henry Jackson society and all Younger's references to "values" this one rather stands out "A vital lesson
I take from the Chilcot Report is the danger of group think."
Yeah. Group think, the very opposite of what I mean by pluralism.
Sharyl Atkinson describes well the conspiracy. When one steps back and look at all the machinations we know now, it seems incredible.
Just as you're asking about the origins of the dossier I wonder if it was orchestrated or something that evolved organically?
If it was orchestrated, then who was the mastermind? Did Brennan, Clapper and Come sit down and hatch it or was Simpson the brains?
What is astounding is the scale. So many people involved. Were they all motivated by ideology or by the need to protect their
racket?
It seems there are many sub-plots. There's the Deripaska, Steele, Waldman, Mueller, Sen. Warner angle. Then there's the
Simpson, Steele, Ohr, Strzok, Page, McCabe angle. There's also the Simpson, Steele, media reporters angle. Then there's the whole
Mifsud, Halper, Carter Page, Papadopolous, Downer bit. There's the Comey, Rosenstein, Yates, Strzok FISA application piece. Then
there's all the stuff happening in the UK including Hannigan's resignation as soon as Trump is elected. Of course the whole Mueller
appointment and the obstruction of justice thread to tie Trump's hand. There are so many elements. Who initiated and coordinated?
Was each element separate?
There's no doubt a political thriller movie could be made.
I guess the comedy part is that there actually exist people with medically functioning brains, who are somehow able to contort
such a worldview...Aleppo as peaceful 'desert' indeed...who knew that having bearded fanatics in charge is somehow 'better'...[and
not 'heart-breaking']...
Some here may find blogpost from March of this year interesting as it speaks to the production of the Steele dossier. I have
not seen it mentioned here before and a site search produced no results.
https://apelbaum.wordpress....
Some sections seem to have gotten David Cay Johnston's hackles up.
I had seen Yaacov Apelbaum's piece referred to by Clarice Feldman in a post on the 'American Thinker' site a few days back,
but not looked at it properly.
It is indeed fascinating, and clearly repays a closer study than I have so far had time to give it. I was however relieved
to find that what Apelbaum writes 'meshes' quite well with my own views of the likely authorship of the dossier.
A question I have is whether the monumental amount of labour involved in producing it can really be the work of a single IT
person – however wide-ranging his abilities and interests. My suspicion is that there may be input from Russian intelligence.
This is not said in order to discredit Apelbaum's work. In matters where I have had occasion critically to examine claims from
official Russian sources, I have found several unsurprising, but recurring, patterns. Sometimes, the information provided can
be shown to be essentially accurate, and it is reasonably clear how it has been obtained.
At other times, claims are made which information from other sources suggests either are, or may well be, true, but the 'sources
and methods' involved are deliberately obscured, making evaluation more difficult.
And then, there are many occasions when what one gets is quite patently a mixture of accurate information and disinformation.
Analysing these can be very productive, if one can both sift out the accurate information, and attempt to see what the disinformation
is designed to obscure.
One thing of which I am absolutely certain is that the networks which are outlined by Apelbaum are precisely those which Russian
intelligence will have spent a great deal of time and ingenuity penetrating.
This will have been attempted by 'SIGINT' and surveillance methods, and also through infiltrating agents and turning people.
(There are often grounds to suspect that some of those most vociferously denouncing Putin are colluding with Russian intelligence.)
Together, these methods are likely to have produced a mass of information. It is important to remember, for example, that
at the time of his mysterious death on 23 March 2013 Boris Berezovsky was negotiating to return to Russia, and that his head of
security, Sergei Sokolov did return, with a 'cache' of documents.
Some of these were used back in April 2016 in a 'Vesti Nedeli' edition presented by Dmitry Kiselyov, who manages Russia's informational
programming resources, and an accompanying documentary on the 'Pervyi Kanal' station.
The purpose was to demonstrate that Alexei Navalny was the instrument of a 'régime change' plot in which William Browder was
acting as an agent of MI6.
There is a good discussion of this, which highlights some of the problems with the documents, by Gilbert Doctorow, and Sokolov
appears to have been involved in some murky activities since.
But whatever the credibility or lack of it of the material, its appearance illustrates a general pattern, where the political
disintegration of the London-based opposition to Putin has meant that more and more people involved in it have been supplying
information to the Russians.
If, as I strongly suspect, there is fire beneath the smoke in those Russian television programmes, and if a great part of a
series of projects of a related kind orchestrated in conjunction by elements in American and British intelligence were actually
large run from this side, this will be creating headaches for people in Washington, as well as London.
An important role in the Apelbaum piece is played by the private security company Hakluyt. A quick look at the entries
on Wikipedia and Powerbase will make clear that, if there is a British 'deep state', this is likely to be at its core.
It is against this background that on has to see a specific claim which Apelbaum makes, for which I do not think any evidence
is produced, about two figures whose role in 'Russiagate' is clearly central. So Luke Harding is described as 'A Guardian reporter
and a Hakluyt and Orbis contractor' (note word.) Meanwhile, Edward Baumgartner is described as 'Co-founder of Edward Austin. Contractor
at Orbis and Hakluyt.'
That Harding is corrupt, as also Sir Robert Owen's 'Inquiry' into the death of the late Alexander Litvinenko, I can prove.
When Owen's report was published in January 2016, a preliminary response by me was posted here on SST, which among other things
listed some of the evidence establishing that the interviews supposedly recorded with Litvinenko by Detective Inspector Brent
Hyatt immediately before his death were blatant forgeries.
If this is the case, then questions are raised about how much of the apparently compelling forensic evidence is forged – and
close examination suggests that key parts of it are.
In relation to that part of the evidence discussed in my January 2016 post which exposes the fumbling attempts by Steele
and his colleagues to cover up the truth about when and how Litvinenko travelled into central London on the day he was supposedly
killed, most of this had been among a mass of material submitted by me to the Inquiry Team, which I have e-mails to prove was
read.
Likewise, also in January 2016, I sent the key relevant evidence on this crucial matter to Harding and senior figures at the
'Guardian', and have reason to believe it was read.
Further study of Owen's report has confirmed my suspicion that a strong 'prima facie case' of conspiracy to pervert the
course of justice exists against very many of those involved in it.
At the same time, materials produced on the Russian side have confirmed my suspicion that the reason why Steele and others
have been able to get away with their cover-up is that the Russian intelligence services are no more enthusiastic than their British
counterparts about having anything like the whole truth about how Litvinenko lived and died made public.
Given the central role which Steele has now assumed in what looks like one of the biggest political scandals in American history,
and the fact that in his book 'Collusion' Harding was again coming out in support of him, it would be of the greatest possible
interest if indeed the latter had combined being a senior 'Guardian' correspondent with being paid by both Orbis and – even more
important – Hakluyt.
And, particularly given the peculiar ambiguities of the role both of Fusion GPS and Baumgartner in the 'Trump Tower' meeting,
it would be of great interest if the latter could be tied not only to Fusion, but to Orbis and – again even more important – Hakluyt.
This in turn might be relevant in trying to make sense of whether the fact that he and Simpson appear to have been working
against Trump and Browder at the same time was or was not part of an elaborate ploy to give credibility to 'information operations'
against the former.
There are accordingly two possibilities. It may be that, while much else in the Apelbaum material can be shown to be accurate,
such accurate information is being used to give credibility to disinformation.
Alternatively, he is being used as a conduit for accurate and really explosive information about the British end of 'Russiagate',
which he is unlikely to have unearthed all by himself, and the actual sources of which are – for very understandable reasons –
being obscured.
Thank you for your reply. You have given me much to think about and I am very grateful that you took the time to respond in
such a comprehensive manner, and that you have provided me and others here with some really compelling information and notions.
In particular, the issue of sources and methods you note seems spot on. The author(s)'s information gathering methodologies
and expertise are certainly not those of the laiety. In fact in the comments below his post YA mentions intelligence work.
Additionally, the text itself displays an odd parallelism with his assertion regarding the Steele Dossier- that is, the
likelihood of multiple authors, of diverse origins.
One thing that did catch my eye was a response he made to David Cay Johnston's pissy request for a retraction about Jacoby
involvement. YA included a quote in Latin from Cicero's accusations against Cataline. Here is the English: What is there that
you did last night, what the night before -- where is it that you were -- who was there that you summoned to meet you -- what
design was there which was adopted by you, with which you think that any one of us is unacquainted?
While this sort of riposte isn't exactly hyper-erudite, it ain't chopped liver either. What I mean to say is that exceptional
cyber skills, algorithm coding (I'm guessing crawlers) are not commonly coupled with that sort of classical formation. His recourse
to various biblical quotes suggests an unusual level of education as well. And no way is he younger than 38 or so.
At any rate, thank you for the article and your kind and informative reply.
Thanks. I have now read both a good few of Apelbaum's earlier posts, and also the comments on his discussion of the dossier.
Given the importance of his analysis of that document closer study is clearly needed of all this material, but I have some preliminary
reactions.
My curiosity about who Apelbaum might be is reinforced by the fact that the intimations he gives about his background in
his responses to comments, while not incompatible with what he has said in the past, do not sit so easily with it.
In a July 2010 post, he explained that: 'In my previous life, I was a civil engineer. I worked for a large power marine construction
company doing structural design and field engineering.' According to the account he gave then, he subsequently shifted to software
development.
What he now tells us is that: 'As far as how I first started, I do have an intelligence background and have been developing
OSINT/cyber/intelligence platforms for many years.'
That makes sense in terms of the analysis, which – whatever other inputs there may or may not have been – looks to me like
the work of someone who has a serious background in these kinds of methodology, and moreover, is clearly not any kind of 'Fachidiot.'
So, questions naturally arise about Apelbaum's intelligence career, in particular, who he is likely to have been employed
by, and associated with, in the past, and whether he is still involved with any of those agencies which have employed him.
Even if he is not, questions would obviously rise about present connections arising from past work. This is in addition to
the possibility that the logic of events may have provoked him to collaborate with those who might earlier have been his adversaries.
Reading Apelbaum's work, I am reminded of another interesting intervention in an embittered argument relating to the Middle
East and the post-Soviet space, from what turned out to be an unexpected source.
In the period following the 'false flag' sarin attack at Ghouta on 21 August 2013 an incisive demolition of the conventional
wisdom was provided in the 'crowdsourced' investigation masterminded by one 'sasa wawa' on a site entitled 'Who Attacked Ghouta?'
And then, in December 2016, an Israeli high technology entrepreneur called Saar Wilf, a former employee of Unit 8200, that
country's equivalent of the NSA or GCHQ, who had subsequently made a great deal of money when he and his partner sold their company
to Paypal, co-founded a site called 'Rootclaim.'
The site, it was explained, was dedicated to applying Bayesian statistics to 'current affairs' problems. This is a methodology,
whose modern form owes much to work done at Bletchley Park in the war, which is invaluable in 'SIGINT' analysis and also combating
online fraud.
At the outset, 'Rootclaim' posted a recycled version of some of the key material from the 'Who Attacked Ghouta?' investigation.
So, it seems likely, if not absolutely certain, that Saar Wilf and 'sasa wawa' are one and the same.
Following the Salisbury incident on 4 March, a blogger using the name 'sushi' produced a series of eleven posts under the title
'A Curious Incident' on the 'Vineyard of the Saker' blog.
Again, there are some very clear resemblances to 'sasa wawa' and Saar Wilf, which made me wonder whether the same person may
be reappearing under yet another 'moniker.'
While the 'flavour' of Apelbaum seems to be different, the combination of what looks like serious technical expertise in IT
techniques relating to intelligence with broad general intellectual interests looks to me similar.
I was amused by the combination of his quotation of the words from John 8:32 etched into the wall of the original CIA headquarters
– 'And you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free' – and the following remarks:
'The June 2016 start date of Steele's contract with Fusion GPS is the start of the "billable" activity, not the beginning of
the research. Steele and Simpson/Jacoby have been collaborating on Trump/Russia going back to 2009.
'Also, there is a large Hakluyt/Orbis "commercial intelligence" network in the US that regularly services political and
federal agencies and has the power to summon Nazgűls the likes of John Brennan. So Steele is not the new kid on the block, he
has been doing this type of work long before 2016. This is also why he has such a cozy relationship with the brass at the DOJ
and state.'
As it happens, I think that many of the collaborations involved may have started significantly earlier than this. In his response
to David Cay Johnston, Apelbaum links to an April 2007' WSJ' article by Simpon and Jacoby which, among other things, deals with
Semyon Mogilevich.
This is behind a paywall, but, fortunately, the fact that Ukrainian nationalists have had an obvious interest in treating it
as a source of reliable information has meant that it is easily accessible.
It should I think be clear from my January 2016 post why I find this particularly interesting, in that it has to be interpreted
in the context of a crucial 'key' to the mystery of the death of Alexander Litvinenko.
This is that he, the Ukrainian nationalist former KGB person Yuri Shvets, the convicted Italian disinformation peddler
Mario Scaramella, and quite possibly the sometime key FBI expert on Mogilevich, Robert 'Bobby' Levinson, were involved in trying
to suggest that Mogilevich was an instrument of a plot by Putin to equip Al Qaeda with a 'mini nuclear bomb.'
So, I then come back to the question of whether this notion of a 'large Haluyt/Orbis "commercial intelligence" network in the
US', playing the role of Sauron with Brennan, perhaps, as the 'Witch-king of Angmar', does or does not have substance.
If it does, there would be very good reasons for a variety of people, with a range of different attitudes to events in the
post-Soviet space and the Middle East, to think that they had an interest in collaborating with Russian intelligence against a
common enemy.
If it does not, then there is a real possibility that Apelbaum may be involved in using accurate intelligence to disseminate
inaccurate. (It seems to me that he is much too intelligent to be a plausible candidate for the role of 'useful idiot.')
One further point that may, or may not, be relevant. Many of the most influential American and British Jews, for reasons which
I find somewhat hard to understand, seem to have decided that the heirs of the architects of the Lvov pogrom are nice and cuddly.
So, for example, Chrystia Freeland, the unrepentant granddaughter of the notorious Nazi collaborator Michael Chomiak, has been
able to end up as Canadian Foreign Minister because made a successful journalistic career on the London 'Financial Times', a paper
with a strong Jewish presence.
That the editorial staff of such a paper thought it appropriate to have someone like Freeland as their Moscow correspondent
gives you a good insight into how moronic British élites have become. This may well be relevant, in trying to evaluate claims
about Hakluyt and other matters.
In relation to Apelbaum, it may be quite beside the point that other Jews from a Russian/East European background, both in
Russia, Israel, and the United States, have very different views on Ukraine, Russia, and the dangers posed – not least to Israel
– by jihadists. It is however a fact which needs to be born in mind, when one comes across people whose views cut across conventional
dividing lines in the United States and Britain.
Beside the point in relation to Apelbaum, I am confident, but also needing to be kept in mind, is the possibility that elements
in the United States 'intelligence community', seeing the 'writing on the wall', may think it appropriate to shift from trying
to pass the buck by blaming the Russians to doing so by blaming the Brits.
It seems apparent that Putin's reordering of the Russian economy after the collapse of Long-Term Capital Management, Republic
Bank's difficulites and the death of Edmund Safra left a bitter taste in the mouths of many who had hoped to exercise rentier
rights over the Russian economy and resources. Why so much US resources and energy have been committed to recovering a contested
deed is a real conundrum.
I was unaware of Freeland's grandfather and his lamentable CV. Thank you. It's funny that you mentioned both the Ghouta post
and the Vineyard of the Saker. I recall reading those and thinking- this is not like common fare on the intertubes.
Your last points about failings in the quality of elite decision-making is extremely important. This dynamic of the dumb (US,
UK, EU) at the wheel is, for me, the most frightening feature of the current state of play. In the worst moments I fear we are
all on a bus driven by a drunk monkey, careening through the Andes. It's going to hurt all the way to the bottom.
Again, I am very grateful for your replies and all the great information and thought.
I think the question of why large elements in both American and British élites got so heavily invested, in essence, in supporting
the oligarchs who refused Putin's terms in what turned into a kind of 'bare knuckles' struggle they were always likely to lose
is a very interesting one.
It has long seemed to me that, even if one looked at matters from the most self-interested and cynical point of view, this
represented a quite spectacular error of judgement. And, viewing the way in which 'international relations' are rearranging themselves,
I am reasonably confident that this was one matter on which I got things right.
A central reason for this, I have come to think, is that Berezovsky and the 'information operations' people round him – Litvinenko
is important, but the pivotal figure, the 'mastermind', if you will, was clearly Alex Goldfarb, and Yuri Shvets and Yuri Felshtinsky
both played and still play important supporting roles – were telling people in the West what these wanted to hear.
It is a truth if not quite 'universally acknowledged', at least widely recognised by those who have acquired some 'worldly
wisdom', that intellectually arrogant people, with limited experience of the world and a narrow education, can commonly be 'led
by the nose' by figures who have more of the relevant kinds of intelligence and experience, and few scruples.
This rather basic fact is central to understanding the press conference on 31 May 2007 where the figure whom the Berezovsky
group and Christopher Steele had framed in relation to the death of Litvinenko, Andrei Lugovoi, responded to the Crown Prosecution
Service request for his extradition.
In his prepared statement, Lugovoi claimed that his supposed victim used to say that everyone in Britain were ''retards',
to use the translation submitted in evidence to Owen's Inquiry, or 'idiots', to use that by RT. And according to this version,
the British believed in everything that 'we' – that is, the Berezovky group – said was happening in Russia.
Whether or not Litvinenko expressed this cynical contempt, the credulity with which the claims of the 'information operations'
people around Berezovsky have been accepted – well illustrated by Owen's report and perhaps most ludicrous in Harding's journalism
– makes clear it is justified.
What moreover became very evident, when Glenn Simpson testified to the House Intelligence and Senate Judiciary Committees,
was that he was once again recycling the Berezovsky's group's version of Putin 'sistema' as the 'return of Karla.'
Given what has been emerging on the ways in which Fusion GPS and Steele were both integrated into networks involving top-level
people in the FBI, DOJ, State Department and CIA, it seems clear that the 'retards'/'idiots' label is as applicable to people
on your side as to people on ours.
Perhaps then, cartoons about Trump as a puppet, with the strings pulled by another puppet representing Manafort, whose
strings are in turn pulled by Putin, should be replaced by ones in which Mueller is seen as a puppet manipulated by the ghost
of Boris Berezovsky.
But that is the irony. The relationship with Berezovsky blew up in the faces of all concerned, when in the wake of the
successsful corruption of the investigation into the death of Litvinenko by him and his 'information operations' people, he attempted
to recoup his fortunes by suing Roman Abramovich, and got taken to pieces by Lord Sumption.
As to what happened next, a recent item on 'Russian Insider', providing a link to and transcript of a more recent piece presented
by Dmitry Kiselyov on 'Vesti Nedeli is a good illustration of where accurate information and disinformation can be mixed in material
from Russian sources.
The piece, which appeared in July, discusses, and quotes from, an interview given the previous month to Dmitry Gordon, who
runs a Ukrainian nationalist site, by Berezovsky's daughter Elizaveta. Among other things, this deals with Berezovsky's death.
(See
https://gordonua.com/public...
. A little manipulation will get you a reasonably serviceable English translation, although
it becomes comic because Berezovsky is referred to as 'pope'.)
The 'Vesti Nedeli' piece uses what Elizaveta Berezovskaya says in support of the claim that Berezovsky was murdered by
British 'special forces', because he was planning to return to Russia, and he 'knew too much about them.'
As it happens, this is a patently tendentious reading of what she says. However, interesting features of the actual text of
the interview are 1. that it does provide what to my mind is compelling evidence that her father was murdered, and 2. while she
clearly suggests that this was covered up by the British, she is not suggesting that they were responsible – but also not making
Putin 'prime suspect.'
Whether the suggestion by his daughter that her father might have been murdered by people who knew that by so doing they might
get control of assets he might otherwise recoup has any merit I cannot say: I doubt it but cannot simply rule the possibility
out.
What remains the case is that at that point there were very many people, including but in no way limited to elements in Western
intelligence agencies, who had strong interests in avoiding a return by Berezovsky to Russia.
And the same people had the strongest possible interest in avoiding his being treated at the Inquest into Litvinenko's death
by a competent barrister representing the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation in the way he had been treated by
Lord Sumption.
Ironically, it may have been partly because Lugovoi had made a dramatic announcement that he was withdrawing from the proceedings
less than a fortnight before Berezovsky's death that before this happened a lot of people were staring at an absolutely worst-case
scenario.
Time and again, in Owen's report, one finds matters where he recycles patent disinformation, which a well-briefed barrister
acting for the ICRF could have easily ripped to shreds. At the same time, in this situation, the Russians could most probably
have made a reasonable fist of coping with the multiple contradictions in claims made on their own side.
And, crucially, their patent weak suit – the need to obscure the actual role of Russian intelligence in the smuggling of the
polonium into London, which had nothing to do with any murder plot – could have been reasonably well 'covered.'
Precisely because of these facts, the one scenario which can very easily be completely ruled out is that which is basic to
the 'information operations' now coming out of London and Washington. In this, Berezovsky's death is portrayed as a key element
in a systematic attempt by the Putin 'sistema' to eradicate the supposedly heroic opposition, much of it located in London.
That sustaining this fable is critical to defending the credibility of Steele, and therefore of the whole 'Russiagate' narrative,
is quite evident from the 'From Russia With Blood' materials published by 'BuzzFeed' in July last year.
This, however, leads on to a paradox, which is highlighted by a piece posted by James George Jatras on the 'Strategic Culture
Foundation' site on 18 August, entitled 'Have You Committed Your Three Felonies Today?'
Among the points Jatras – who I think is an Orthodox Christian – makes is that the logic of contesting the 'Russiagate' narrative
has had some strange consequences. Among these, there is one on which the actual history of the activities of Berezovsky and his
'information operations' people bears directly:
'Flipping the "Russians did it" narrative: Among the President's defenders, on say Fox News, no less than among his detractors,
Russia is the enemy who (altogether now!) "interfered in our elections" in order to "undermine our democracy." Mitt Romney was
right! The only argument is over who was the intended beneficiary of Muscovite mendacity, Trump or Hillary – that's the variable.
The constant is that Putin is Hitler and only a traitor would want to get along with him. All sides agree that the Christopher
Steele dossier is full of "Russian dirt" – though there's literally zero actual evidence of Kremlin involvement but a lot pointing
to Britain's MI6 and GCHQ.'
For reasons I have already discussed, I think what while Jatras is substantially right, 'zero evidence' is only partially correct:
It seems to me that disinformation supplied by elements in Russian intelligence could quite possibly have found its way into the
second and final memoranda.
That said, Jatras has pointed to a fundamental feature of the current situation, which involves multiple ironies.
The total destruction of Steele's credibility could easily be achieved by anyone who was interested in looking at the evidence
about the life and death of the late Alexander Litvinenko seriously. However, because a central tactic of most of those who are
attacking the 'Russiagate' narrative has generally been 'Flipping the "Russians did it" narrative', they are like people who ought
to be able to see Steele's 'Achilles' heel', but in practice, often end up attacking him where his armour is, without being, not
at its weakest.
Meanwhile, as I have already stressed, the ability of the Russian authorities to undermine the 'narrative' produced by the
'information operations' people around Berezovsky, of whom the most important are Alex Goldfarb and Yuri Shvets, is compromised
by their fear of having to 'own up to' their actual role in the smuggling of the polonium into London in October-November 2007.
The person who had a strong interest in blowing this structure of illusion to pieces was actually Lugovoi. But it seems to
me at least possible that there has been a kind of disguised covert conspiracy by elements in Western and Russian intelligence
to ensure there was no risk of him doing so.
One of the things I've never understood about the Trump Dossier story is the lack of any forensic analysis of its content
and style anywhere in the media, even the alt media. Who was supposed to have actually written it? Steele? The style does not
match someone of his background and education, and the formatting and syntax were atrocious. The font actually varied from "report"
to "report." It certainly did not give me the impression of being the product of a high-end, Belgravia consultancy.
I wonder whether it was produced by an American of one sort or another and then "laundered" by being accorded association
with the UK firm. Given that Steele just happened to be hired by the USG to help in the anti-FIFA skulduggery, he and his firm
seem very much to be a concern that does dirty little jobs that need discretely to be done, though in this case, the discretion
was undermined.
Most of the memos were issued before October and Fusion/Simpson authorized Steele to release information to the FBI starting
in July. The question is why the memos were released after the election when a release before the election would have been enough
to sink Trump. Instead the FBI and presumably those paying Fusion on Hillarys behalf sat on it, and Comey comes out days before
the election
Saying he was reopening the HC email investigation.
Kind of looks like they all wanted Trump in office and the disclosure was to give Trump the excuse needed to back track
on his promises to improve relations with Russia and blame that on pressure from the Deep State and Russia Gate.
Looking at Trumps history with Sater (FBI/CIA asset) and his political aspirations that began following his Moscow visit
in 1987 it seems likely Trump has been a Deep State asset for 30 years and fed intelligence to CIA/FBI on Russian oligarchs and
mafia . Indeed he may well have duped Russians into believing he was working for them when in fact it was the CIA/FBI who had
the best Kompromat with US RICO laws that could have beggared him
One thing to remember about the FBI is Sy Hersh. Hersh claims the FBI has been sitting on a report for two years that fingers
murdered DNC staffer Seth Rich as the Wikileaks DNC email leaker (or one of them, at least.)
Now can we imagine that not everyone in a senior position at the FBI knows about that report? I can't. Literally everyone from
the supervisor of the Special Agent or computer forensic investigator who examined Rich's computer right up to the Director HAD
to know that report exists - and covered it up.
That right there is obstruction of justice and conspiracy. Literally everyone at the FBI who can't PROVE he didn't know about
that report will be going to jail. The entire top administration of the FBI is going to go down.
And how many people at the Department of Justice are aware of that report? Did Rosenstein know? Who else in the Obama administration
knew?
That would be motivation for a lot of desperate maneuvering. Add to that who was really behind the Steele Dossier and even
more people are likely to end up in jail.
You haven't heard that yet? It's the infamous audio tape that Hersh was caught on discussing it. He's since obfuscated what
he said, but the tape stands on its own, and he has never said that anything he said on the tape wasn't true, despite that a lot
of Democrats and Trump-bashers claim he has.
I have told you several times and I will tell you again probably hopelessly that Hersh PERSONALLY has told me that the "tape"
was made without his permission or knowledge when he was aimlessly speculating on possibilities.
I am unaware of your explicitly telling me that he personally told you that the tape was "aimless speculation." My apologies
if I missed that response.
Of course the tape was made without his permission. We all know that. It's irrelevant to what he said on the tape.
What I'm saying is that despite what he may have told you, nothing on that tape sounds like "aimless speculation".
When you consider that he has four good reasons for dissembling about the tape, I view it as far more likely that everything
he said was true.
1) If what he said is true, he may have compromised his FBI contact. Not good for his line of work.
2) If what he said is true, compromising that contact may well make all his other contacts wary about talking to him in the
future - a bad deal for a journalist who relies on his contacts.
3) If what he said is true, he may have compromised his ability to get his "long form journalism" article published - a problem
he already has had in the past.
4) If what he said is true, he's accusing the FBI of sitting on that report for two years, which might well make him a target
of retaliation in some way.
If you believe that everything he said on the tape is untrue and that is what he explicitly told you, fine. I'm waiting for
his "long form journalism" report to explain it. So far everything he has said publicly about it has not contradicted what he
said on the tape, but merely waved his hands about it.
Sy Hersh talks a lot both loudly and profanely. He never intended to tell Buttowski that there was more than a possibility
that the FBI held more than a rumor that this might be true. He talked to Buttowski because a mutual friend of him and me asked
him to do so for no good reason. Please go talk to all the other people you pester and not on SST. You are an argumentative nuisance.
I have no stake in the debate about Rich, DNC, wikileaks. But I do notice some loose ends. Hersh may well have engaged in speculation, but it is interesting speculation:
quote: 55. During his conversation with Butowsky, Mr. Hersh claimed that he had received information from an "FBI report." Mr. Hersh
had not seen the report himself, but explained: "I have somebody on the inside who will go and read a file for me. And I know
this person is unbelievably accurate and careful. He's a very high level guy."
56. According to Mr. Hersh, his source told him that the FBI report states that, shortly after Seth Rich's murder, the D.C.
police obtained a warrant to search his home. When they arrived at the home, the D.C. police found Seth Rich's computer, but were
unable to access it.The computer was then provided to the D.C. police Cyber Unit, who also were unable to access the computer.
At that point, the D.C. police contacted the Cyber Unit at the FBI's Washington D.C. field office. Again, according to the supposed
FBI report, the Washington D.C. field office was able to get into the computer and found that in "late spring early summer [2016],
[Seth Rich][made] contact with Wikileaks." "They found what he had done. He had submitted a series of documents, of emails. Some
juicy emails from the DNC." Mr. Hersh told Butowsky that Seth Rich "offered a sample [to WikiLeaks][,] an extensive sample, you
know I'm sure dozens, of emails, and said I want money." . . . "I hear gossip," Hersh tells NPR on Monday. "[Butowsky] took two and two and made 45 out of it."
. . . The clip is definitely worth listening to in its entirety if you haven't already. Hersh is heard telling Butowsky that he had
a high-level insider read him an FBI file confirming that Seth Rich was known to have been in contact with WikiLeaks prior to
his death, which is not even a tiny bit remotely the same as having "heard rumors". Hersh's statements in the audio recording
and his statement to NPR cannot both be true. endquote https://medium.com/@caityjo...
You may very well be right. There may be a large element of 'amateur night out' about this.
But then I come back to the question of who decided that the dossier be published, and who, if anyone, was consulted before
the decision was made. For the reasons I gave, I am reasonably confident that those on this side who had been in one way or another
complicit in its production and covert dissemination were taken aback by the publication.
It is not clear to me whether anything significant can be inferred from the publicly available evidence about whether those
on your side who had been complicit were involved in the decision to publish without taking even elementary precautions, or whether
the 'Buzzfeed' people just had a rush of blood to the head.
I suspect the decision to publish the dossier was political. It was required to enable Clapper, Brennan, and others to
opine on national media and create further media hysteria prior to the vote as well as to justify the counter-intelligence investigations
underway. They were throwing the kitchen sink to sink Trump's electoral chances. I don't think a lot of thought was given about
the legal ramifications.
This seems to be a pattern. Leak information. Then use the leaked story to justify actions like apply for a FISA warrant
or fan the media flames.
And now they are turning on one another. Hayden just slammed Clapper for making too much of losing the security clearance the
he abuse for political reasons.
Looks like both Clapper and Haydon made the same comment about Brennan. they said "his rhetoric was becoming a problem. Ah,
the USAF intel rats are swimming for the shore. Lets see how many others (not all USAF) decide to try to save themselves.
I find it incredulous that former leaders of the intelligence and law enforcement agencies have gained paid access to powerful
media platforms and they have used it to launch vicious attacks on a POTUS.
I find it amazing that McCabe and Peter Strzok are raising hundreds of thousands of dollars on social media platforms.
IMO, everyone on the list that Sarah Sanders noted, should not just lose their clearance but should be testifying to a grand
jury.
Not really incredulous. Just expected behavior from swamp creatures whose self-assumed importance and "rights" (that the rest
of us peasants don't have) are coming under threat.
It seems to me absolutely appalling, and I am also appalled that people on this side appear to have been playing a central
role in all this.
One question. It seems to me that if what seems likely to be true does prove true, a range of these people must have committed
very serious offences indeed.
However, I am too ignorant to know what precisely those offences might be. If you, or anyone else, had a clear understanding,
I would be interested.
"It seems to me absolutely appalling, and I am also appalled that people on this side appear to have been playing a central
role in all this."
That says it all. We got the more discreditable side of the affair outsourced to us. Ugh. Is that all we're fit for now in
the UK? White helmets and Khan Sheikhoun and Steele, all the scrubby stuff? Is that what the famous "Special Relationship" now
consists of? We get to do the scrubby stuff because it's what we're fit for and we can be relied upon to keep it quiet?
Because at least on the American side there are people concerned about the political/PR involvement of parts of their own Intelligence
Community, and seeking to have it looked into. Here - am I right? - it's dead silence.
I've been permitted to say before on SST that I don't think the Americans are going to resolve this affair satisfactorily until
more light is cast on the UK side. But I also think that, for our own sakes, we should be looking at what exactly our IC does,
and in particular, how much UK political involvement there was in what is now clear was a direct PR attack on an American President.
I'm not a lawyer and have no experience with the federal criminal statutes. Having said that I suspect that the following could
be considered crimes:
intentionally misleading FISC
perjury
leaking classified information
launching investigations on the basis of known false information
surveillance of US citizens on the basis of false information
conspiracy to subvert the constitution
sedition/treason
There may also be certain professional agreements with the government that may have been violated. The only way any of these
people will face a grand jury is if Donald Trump chooses to take action. Left to the natural devices of the law enforcement institutions
nothing will happen and they will sweep everything under the rug. The intensity of Trump's tweets and the accusations therein
are rising. If the GOP retains the House and Jim Jordan becomes speaker, then there may be a possibility that Sessions, Rosenstein
and Wray may be fired and another special counsel appointed who will then convene a grand jury.
Considering what has been uncovered by Congressional investigators and the DOJ IG, I am truly surprised that Sessions has resisted
the appointment of a special counsel. But of course that could go the way of the Owens inquiry in your country.
"... These new questions about Mifsud come as Trump draws attention to reports that the FBI used another individual as a confidential informant in connection with the Russia case. The informant met several campaign officials, including Papadopoulos, during the 2016 race. ..."
"... A Tablet investigatio n using public sources to trace the evolution of the now-famous dossier suggests that central elements of the Russiagate scandal emerged not from the British ex-spy Christopher Steele's top-secret "sources" in the Russian government -- which are unlikely to exist separate from Russian government control -- but from a series of stories that Fusion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson and his wife Mary Jacoby co-wrote for TheWall Street Journal well before Fusion GPS existed, and Donald Trump was simply another loud-mouthed Manhattan real estate millionaire. Understanding the origins of the "Steele dossier" is especially important because of what it tells us about the nature and the workings of what its supporters would hopefully describe as an ongoing campaign to remove the elected president of the United States. ..."
"... 1) Mills and Samuelson should have been compelled to produce the computers by grand-jury subpoena with no immunity agreement; ..."
You know, I have been selling the DNC short. They're crazier than I ever imagined they could be. And what happens if the guy shows
up? They'll have to grease his doorknobs with some Novichok juice I guess.
But just in case he is MIA, they need to check and see what The Clinton Creature's been up to. Generally she's the common thread
between a political scandal and a dead body, right?
DNC: Papadopoulos's UK contact may be dead
The Democratic National Committee (DNC) on Friday raised the prospect that the London-based professor who told former Trump
campaign adviser George Papadopoulos that Russia had "dirt" on Hillary Clinton may be dead.
DNC lawyers wrote in court filings Friday that Joseph Mifsud, who spoke to Papadopoulos during the 2016 presidential election,
"is missing and may be deceased," Bloomberg News reported. The lawyers did not elaborate.
The DNC stood by its claim in a statement to The Hill on Friday. The committee indicated that an investigator had been used
to find Mifsud, who had disappeared for months, and was told the Maltese professor may be dead.
"The DNC's counsel has attempted to serve Mifsud for months and has been unable to locate or contact him. In addition, public
reports have said he has disappeared and hasn't been seen for months," DNC spokeswoman Adrienne Watson said.
The possibilities for really bad drama and/or high camp comedy here are endless. How's Booby going to pin this on some poor low
hanging fruit?
I hope there are future episodes coming because I want to see what happens if he shows up. Or even better yet, if he IS defunct.
Which will open the door to how did they know ?
UPDATE :
Professor Joe Mifsud: a 'ghost' on the run from the Americans, Russians and Italians
Maltese Professor Joseph Mifsud, who has gained international notoriety for allegedly being the person who connected the Trump
campaign to the Russians looking to derail Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, is not only on the run from the Americans,
Russians and the press, but also from the Italian judicial authorities, who have been unable to track down the wayward academic.
This week, in fact, Mifsud was a no-show in the courts of Palermo, where he was to answer to charges, along with two others,
of having unjustifiably inflated salaries at a university consortium in Agrigento, Sicily, which he presided almost a decade ago.
At a hearing in Palermo, Italy, Joseph Mifsud was described as "a ghost" after neither he nor his lawyers turned up in court
on Wednesday.
Sicilian prosecutors described Mifsud as a "peculiar subject" and said that all attempts to reach and notify the professor
about the hearing had proved futile.
*
The Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee, in their report on Russia's attempted interference in the election released
in April, described Mifsud as being "Kremlin-linked".
However, Mifsud also had Western ties at academic institutions like the Link Campus University in Rome, the University of Stirling
in Scotland, the London Academy of Diplomacy and the London Centre for International Law Practice.
*
These new questions about Mifsud come as Trump draws attention to reports that the FBI used another individual as a confidential
informant in connection with the Russia case. The informant met several campaign officials, including Papadopoulos, during the
2016 race.
This puts some meat on the bones of gulfgal's essay interpreting the meaning of some very interesting video from McStain's
funeral. The wheels of the DNC bus seem to just about ready to fall off.
George Webb has also been all over the Ohrs over the past few days. The thousands of sealed warrants rumored to be waiting
for a mass extinction event may be more than just wishful thinking.
Through this process, what few recognize is that much of the material inside the Steele Dossier is actually research intelligence
material unlawfully extracted from the FBI and NSA database; most likely in majority an assembly by Nellie Ohr.
Nellie et al. ran unauthorized searches through the security databases and gave the results to foreign agent Steele to pretend
it was his own research.
How many serious crimes in just that one sentence?
This puts some meat on the bones of gulfgal's essay interpreting the meaning of some very interesting video from McStain's
funeral. The wheels of the DNC bus seem to just about ready to fall off.
George Webb has also been all over the Ohrs over the past few days. The thousands of sealed warrants rumored to be waiting
for a mass extinction event may be more than just wishful thinking.
@dervish
What is the significance of the license? I read the post, and all the comments on the first page. There's a really long comment
by "CET" that rambles on about it, but I'm not thinking too clearly today. What is the significance?
#1
What is the significance of the license? I read the post, and all the comments on the first page. There's a really long comment
by "CET" that rambles on about it, but I'm not thinking too clearly today. What is the significance?
in the scenario, but, am I the only one who did not know that the FBI has an office in Rome?
On a related note, isn't it past time for the FBI, the CIA and Homeland Security to merge? Not only is all the duplication
among them costly, but the artificial divisions and rivalries among them are dangerous.
in the scenario, but, am I the only one who did not know that the FBI has an office in Rome?
On a related note, isn't it past time for the FBI, the CIA and Homeland Security to merge? Not only is all the duplication
among them costly, but the artificial divisions and rivalries among them are dangerous.
span y Amanda Matthews on Sat, 09/08/2018 - 8:01pm
Election Security
Elections play a vital role in a free and fair society and are a cornerstone of American democracy. We recognize the fundamental
link between the trust in election infrastructure and the confidence the American public places in basic democratic function.
A secure and resilient electoral process is a vital national interest and one of our highest priorities at the Department of
Homeland Security.
We are committed to working collaboratively with those on the front lines of elections – state and local government, election
officials, federal partners and the vendor community – to manage risks to election infrastructure. We will remain transparent
as well as agile to combat and secure our physical and cyber infrastructure against new and evolving threats.
The Department of Duct Tape and Plastic running our elections is very unsettling to me.
As the Homeland Security Department called on Americans to buy duct tape and plastic sheeting to seal windows and doors
in the event of a terrorist attack, critics on Wednesday said such precautions would have limited value and likened them to
ineffective civil defense measures of the Cold War era.
...is filled with lies, fabrications, and FBI-type revisions. Those lies attempt to pull the DNC emails into Russia's hands.
There are many other points of direct misinformation, as well, that attempt to build a case for Mueller that simply is not there
in reality. Important events have been scrubbed.
But, there's something missing in all this reportage I should chase down. Remember when an Austrailian official contacted the
FBI to blow the whistle on Papadopoulos after a drunken cocktail hour they shared in London? That now has been scrubbed from history.
It came from lies spewed from the NYT, when people were finally catching on to the FISA warrants, to cover for the wiretapping
that was already going on. That's the only time dirt on Hillary has ever been tied to Papadopoulos. The only "witness." Now, it's
like it never happened.
Thanks for posting, Amanda.
span y Pluto's Republic on Sat, 09/08/2018 - 12:14pm
Maltese Professor Joseph Mifsud, who has gained international notoriety for allegedly being the person who connected the
Trump campaign to the Russians looking to derail Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign... .
There is nothing out there that has ever suggested a motive like "derailing Hillary." The idea is absurd on the face of it.
This is new disinformation.
If you read the real timeline, you'll see that Papadopoulos was obsessed with getting a meeting together between Russia and
Trump for the purpose of peaceful relations in the future. And, cui bono? , also to make his first big score on the geopolitical
stage.
Nobody cared about Hillary.
I wouldn't be a bit surprised if Mifsud was a US asset. The girl he introduced Papadopoulos to was an obvious set-up -- but
almost too low-level to be bothered with. This whole charade is not about Russia. It's about entrapment.
@Pluto's
Republic
I wouldn't be a bit surprised if Mifsud was a US asset. Or Dem/Steele hireling.
Maltese Professor Joseph Mifsud, who has gained international notoriety for allegedly being the person who connected
the Trump campaign to the Russians looking to derail Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign... .
There is nothing out there that has ever suggested a motive like "derailing Hillary." The idea is absurd on the face of
it. This is new disinformation.
If you read the real timeline, you'll see that Papadopoulos was obsessed with getting a meeting together between Russia
and Trump for the purpose of peaceful relations in the future. And, cui bono? , also to make his first big score on
the geopolitical stage.
Nobody cared about Hillary.
I wouldn't be a bit surprised if Mifsud was a US asset. The girl he introduced Papadopoulos to was an obvious set-up --
but almost too low-level to be bothered with. This whole charade is not about Russia. It's about entrapment.
Which would make Nellie Ohr much more than just an invited panelist at a CIA Open Source symposium along with Simpson some
years ago. There are reported to be about 20 people legally authorized to do unmaskings, most are at NSA, and it is unlikely Nellie
Ohr is one of them.
I therefore doubt Nellie was the one doing the extracting, which has been elsewhere referenced as "unmasking" of raw NSA intercepts.
In that case, the unmasking was likely carried out by someone at the NSC. Rice or Power, maybe?
Thus, could it be that the Steele Dossier was really just a cover for the dissemination from the White House basement of classified
materials unmasked by the same people at the NSC who then acted unlawfully to make them public to help the Clinton campaign/DNC
sink the opposition?
Yes, that would violate a whole bunch of laws -- keep in mind, two FISA warrant applications were denied, the first in June
2016 after which the Steele Memo was commissioned until one was finally granted for coverage of Page in October. So, something
had to be put together earlier to evade the warrant requirements.
Indeed, this turns Russiagate completely on its head.
There may have been a criminal conspiracy, but it was by the alleged victims of the Russian plot. No wonder the pillars of
Russiagate all seem to morph into something else under close scrutiny, and the alleged Russian agents -- Page and Papadoloulos,
along with their first-level handler, Milfsud -- turn out to be FBI or MI-6 plants.
Which would make Nellie Ohr much more than just an invited panelist at a CIA Open Source symposium along with Simpson some
years ago. There are reported to be about 20 people legally authorized to do unmaskings, most are at NSA, and it is unlikely
Nellie Ohr is one of them.
I therefore doubt Nellie was the one doing the extracting, which has been elsewhere referenced as "unmasking" of raw NSA
intercepts. In that case, the unmasking was likely carried out by someone at the NSC. Rice or Power, maybe?
Thus, could it be that the Steele Dossier was really just a cover for the dissemination from the White House basement of
classified materials unmasked by the same people at the NSC who then acted unlawfully to make them public to help the Clinton
campaign/DNC sink the opposition?
Yes, that would violate a whole bunch of laws -- keep in mind, two FISA warrant applications were denied, the first in June
2016 after which the Steele Memo was commissioned until one was finally granted for coverage of Page in October. So, something
had to be put together earlier to evade the warrant requirements.
Indeed, this turns Russiagate completely on its head.
There may have been a criminal conspiracy, but it was by the alleged victims of the Russian plot. No wonder the pillars
of Russiagate all seem to morph into something else under close scrutiny, and the alleged Russian agents -- Page and Papadoloulos,
along with their first-level handler, Milfsud -- turn out to be FBI or MI-6 plants.
@leveymg
I'm no security clearance expert, but unless the whole system had a protocol and clearance overhaul, it's probable, imo, that
Nellie could have had access.
Hell, Manning still had access to, and the ability to download, 10s of thousands (might have been 100s of thousands -- it's
been too long ago for me to recall the exact number) of classified documents and audios/videos after assaulting a superior and
being moved to the mail room. If you can try to beat up your superior, get arrested by MPs, get basically demoted to the mail
room, and still have your clearance, something is wrong. I know we're talking military -vs- IC, but it's all still government
and all still classified information. Seems to me, the only ones without access are us.
Which would make Nellie Ohr much more than just an invited panelist at a CIA Open Source symposium along with Simpson some
years ago. There are reported to be about 20 people legally authorized to do unmaskings, most are at NSA, and it is unlikely
Nellie Ohr is one of them.
I therefore doubt Nellie was the one doing the extracting, which has been elsewhere referenced as "unmasking" of raw NSA
intercepts. In that case, the unmasking was likely carried out by someone at the NSC. Rice or Power, maybe?
Thus, could it be that the Steele Dossier was really just a cover for the dissemination from the White House basement of
classified materials unmasked by the same people at the NSC who then acted unlawfully to make them public to help the Clinton
campaign/DNC sink the opposition?
Yes, that would violate a whole bunch of laws -- keep in mind, two FISA warrant applications were denied, the first in June
2016 after which the Steele Memo was commissioned until one was finally granted for coverage of Page in October. So, something
had to be put together earlier to evade the warrant requirements.
Indeed, this turns Russiagate completely on its head.
There may have been a criminal conspiracy, but it was by the alleged victims of the Russian plot. No wonder the pillars
of Russiagate all seem to morph into something else under close scrutiny, and the alleged Russian agents -- Page and Papadoloulos,
along with their first-level handler, Milfsud -- turn out to be FBI or MI-6 plants.
span y Amanda Matthews on Sat, 09/08/2018 - 8:12pm
Ignore the 'reasons' in the article. It's pure BS.
Which would make Nellie Ohr much more than just an invited panelist at a CIA Open Source symposium along with Simpson some
years ago. There are reported to be about 20 people legally authorized to do unmaskings, most are at NSA, and it is unlikely
Nellie Ohr is one of them.
I therefore doubt Nellie was the one doing the extracting, which has been elsewhere referenced as "unmasking" of raw NSA
intercepts. In that case, the unmasking was likely carried out by someone at the NSC. Rice or Power, maybe?
Thus, could it be that the Steele Dossier was really just a cover for the dissemination from the White House basement of
classified materials unmasked by the same people at the NSC who then acted unlawfully to make them public to help the Clinton
campaign/DNC sink the opposition?
Yes, that would violate a whole bunch of laws -- keep in mind, two FISA warrant applications were denied, the first in June
2016 after which the Steele Memo was commissioned until one was finally granted for coverage of Page in October. So, something
had to be put together earlier to evade the warrant requirements.
Indeed, this turns Russiagate completely on its head.
There may have been a criminal conspiracy, but it was by the alleged victims of the Russian plot. No wonder the pillars
of Russiagate all seem to morph into something else under close scrutiny, and the alleged Russian agents -- Page and Papadoloulos,
along with their first-level handler, Milfsud -- turn out to be FBI or MI-6 plants.
Washington (CNN)Former national security adviser Susan Rice privately told House investigators that she unmasked the identities
of senior Trump officials to understand why the crown prince of the United Arab Emirates was in New York late last year, multiple
sources told CNN.
The New York meeting preceded a separate effort by the UAE to facilitate a back-channel communication between Russia and
the incoming Trump White House.
According to numerous reports, "[f]ormer United Nations Ambassador Samantha Power is believed to have made 'hundreds' of
unmasking requests to identify individuals named in classified intelligence community reports related to Trump and his presidential
transition team."
Think about that: Hundreds of unmasking requests by Obama's U.N. Representative. And "[o]f those [hundreds of] requests,
only one offered a justification that was not boilerplate."
Now new reports have revealed the unprecedented number of unmasking requests made by former Ambassador Power: "[She] was
"unmasking" at such a rapid pace in the final months of the Obama administration that she averaged more than one request for
every working day in 2016 – and even sought information in the days leading up to President Trump's inauguration . . . ."
At the ACLJ, we have been consistently fighting the Obama-era deep state's usurpation, unmasking, and criminal violations
of the Espionage Act. Now we're fighting to get to the bottom of yet another frightening Obama Administration scandal.
I remember reading this article when it came out. It has some good links in it.
Mary Jacoby, the wife of Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson, who is the man in the middle of the entire Russiagate scandal,
boasted on Facebook about how 'Russiagate,' would not exist if it weren't for her husband.
A Tablet
investigatio n using public sources to trace the evolution of the now-famous dossier suggests that central elements
of the Russiagate scandal emerged not from the British ex-spy Christopher Steele's top-secret "sources" in the Russian government
-- which are unlikely to exist separate from Russian government control -- but from a series of stories that Fusion GPS
co-founder Glenn Simpson and his wife Mary Jacoby co-wrote for TheWall Street Journal well before Fusion GPS existed, and
Donald Trump was simply another loud-mouthed Manhattan real estate millionaire. Understanding the origins of the "Steele
dossier" is especially important because of what it tells us about the nature and the workings of what its supporters would
hopefully describe as an ongoing campaign to remove the elected president of the United States.
From the Tablet article:
A Tablet investigation using public sources to trace the evolution of the now-famous dossier suggests that central elements
of the Russiagate scandal emerged not from the British ex-spy Christopher Steele's top-secret "sources" in the Russian governmen
t -- which are unlikely to exist separate from Russian government control -- but from a series of stories that Fusion GPS co-founder
Glenn Simpson and his wife Mary Jacoby co-wrote for The Wall Street Journal well before Fusion GPS existed, and Donald Trump
was simply another loud-mouthed Manhattan real estate millionaire
I think this needs more attention paid to it. I'll see what I can do. All 4 articles are worth a read. All of this information
was known over a year ago, but we have been lied to so much it's hard to keep track of everything.
Or like you said, Rice or Powers. I have the article bookmarked somewhere. I'll see if I can dig it up.
Which would make Nellie Ohr much more than just an invited panelist at a CIA Open Source symposium along with Simpson some
years ago. There are reported to be about 20 people legally authorized to do unmaskings, most are at NSA, and it is unlikely
Nellie Ohr is one of them.
I therefore doubt Nellie was the one doing the extracting, which has been elsewhere referenced as "unmasking" of raw NSA
intercepts. In that case, the unmasking was likely carried out by someone at the NSC. Rice or Power, maybe?
Thus, could it be that the Steele Dossier was really just a cover for the dissemination from the White House basement of
classified materials unmasked by the same people at the NSC who then acted unlawfully to make them public to help the Clinton
campaign/DNC sink the opposition?
Yes, that would violate a whole bunch of laws -- keep in mind, two FISA warrant applications were denied, the first in June
2016 after which the Steele Memo was commissioned until one was finally granted for coverage of Page in October. So, something
had to be put together earlier to evade the warrant requirements.
Indeed, this turns Russiagate completely on its head.
There may have been a criminal conspiracy, but it was by the alleged victims of the Russian plot. No wonder the pillars
of Russiagate all seem to morph into something else under close scrutiny, and the alleged Russian agents -- Page and Papadoloulos,
along with their first-level handler, Milfsud -- turn out to be FBI or MI-6 plants.
What the post above suggests is "unmasking", which is the individualized review of NSA raw "take" (content) of targeted intercepts
in order to identify specific US persons involved in conversations with foreign surveillance targets. That's done relatively infrequently,
and requires a very high-level security clearance for access.
The stored metadata reportedly destroyed by NSA was obtained under the Stellar Wind program, which is an umbrella program,
with various NSA components.
The metadata take (dotted line segments), which the Times references, would be that collected and stored under the Marina or
one of the other large scale NSA Internet Section 215 "trolling net" metadata collection programs (see the illustration below):
@leveymg
my point is that while scrubbing this data, they may be also scrubbing any other evidence of wrong-doing on their part.
Who knows what they've been up to, or what their level of culpability might be?
What the post above suggests is "unmasking", which is the individualized review of NSA raw "take" (content) of targeted
intercepts in order to identify specific US persons involved in conversations with foreign surveillance targets. That's done
relatively infrequently, and requires a very high-level security clearance for access.
The stored metadata reportedly destroyed by NSA was obtained under the Stellar Wind program, which is an umbrella program,
with various NSA components.
The metadata take (dotted line segments), which the Times references, would be that collected and stored under the Marina
or one of the other large scale NSA Internet Section 215 "trolling net" metadata collection programs (see the illustration
below):
that a lot of the information on Trump was received from the British government because they didn't have to get a warrant to
spy on people in Trump's campaign. Which proves that the warrants were gotten illegally. People should go to prison over the things
they did, but will they? There is a grand jury investigation into McCabe's lying so there's that.
but not really. Basically a record of what was done to create Russia Gate.
The Dirty Trickery of Hillary's Campaign is Proving to be of Mind-Boggling Magnitude , Wasserman Schultz ( Hillary's campaign
manager in 2008) had been installed as DNC head in 2009 because Hillary had secured the resignation of the previous chairman,
Tim Kaine, by promising that he would be her running mate in 2016; needless to say, if Bernie or Elizabeth Warren had been
the VP choice, rather than the nebbish Kaine, Hillary would have won in a walk. So Hillary's egomaniacal drive for power came
back to bite her in the ass
....
Throughout the campaign, Hillary faced grave legal problems because, during her tenure as Secretary of State, she had traded
access -- and perhaps favorable decisions -- for donations to the Clinton Foundation and large speaking fees for Bill.
Her private server was a scam intended to evade FOIA requirements for government transparency, likely because she didn't want
any "smoking guns" to emerge documenting quid-pro-quos linking donations with favorable actions. The fact that this scheme
inherently entailed exposing US secrets -- including the identify of US intelligence assets overseas -- to hacking by foreign
governments, was of no concern to Hillary. When this effort to evade FOIA was confronted with a subpoena, 33 thousand subpoenaed
emails were bleach-bitted out of existence -- while Hillary partisans continued to smugly insist that there was no proof
of quid-pro-quo.
....
Comey did not have the integrity to resign in protest of executive corruption; instead, he cravenly chose to "go with the flow".
And since Comey had no reason to suspect that Hillary had functioned as a spy, it is hardly surprising that he drafted her
exoneration letter months in advance of key FBI interviews. With respect to pay-for-play, the DOJ simply made it impossible
for the FBI field offices looking into this to make any progress, denying them use even of the Hillary emails then in the FBI's
possession. Furthermore, the fact that this investigation was in progress was kept secret from the public. Offers of immunity
were handed out like candy, but there were zero indictments. Owing to this intentional obstruction, Hillary skated throughout
the campaign; if indictments had been forthcoming, Bernie would likely have been the nominee, and Trump would not now be President.
This information has been known for over a year and we are only now finding out about some of this information now..
Hillary's buttocks should be sitting inside a prison by now, but because of the criminal acts by Obama's justice department
she is still walking free. But if Trump actually does want to "lock her up" he has the authority to declassify lots of the documents
that have been covered up. That Loretta Lynch threatened the NY FBI office to not release the information about the emails that
belong to Hillary on Weiner's laptop is just one more criminal act by the justice department. The unmasking of hundreds of people
by Powers was a huge crime according to the legal system.
When the history of Obama's presidency is written he will be 'unmasked' to have been one of the most corrupt presidents in
history. We already know that he is a war criminal, but what else will be discovered if an investigation into his presidency is
ever done?
The people in charge of The Hague missed a golden opportunity to arrest countless war criminals who attended McCain's funeral.
. . . if Bernie or Elizabeth Warren had been the VP choice, rather than the nebbish Kaine, Hillary would have won in a walk.
Bwahahahaa! Nope!
Kain had kneepads surgically implanted for his visits to Wall Street. Nebbish is a nice worfd for him. Skankface would have
had to swallow vomit to take Bernie onto Her ticket; though Bernie proved later that he was cool with her policies and even voted
to move the embassy. Goofy ass Warren is as flaky as a box of cereal, and is as gymnastic as Her, almost.
Blech!
Her should be held accountable.
but not really. Basically a record of what was done to create Russia Gate.
The Dirty Trickery of Hillary's Campaign is Proving to be of Mind-Boggling Magnitude , Wasserman Schultz ( Hillary's
campaign manager in 2008) had been installed as DNC head in 2009 because Hillary had secured the resignation of the previous
chairman, Tim Kaine, by promising that he would be her running mate in 2016; needless to say, if Bernie or Elizabeth Warren
had been the VP choice, rather than the nebbish Kaine, Hillary would have won in a walk. So Hillary's egomaniacal drive
for power came back to bite her in the ass
....
Throughout the campaign, Hillary faced grave legal problems because, during her tenure as Secretary of State, she had traded
access -- and perhaps favorable decisions -- for donations to the Clinton Foundation and large speaking fees for Bill.
Her private server was a scam intended to evade FOIA requirements for government transparency, likely because she didn't
want any "smoking guns" to emerge documenting quid-pro-quos linking donations with favorable actions. The fact that this
scheme inherently entailed exposing US secrets -- including the identify of US intelligence assets overseas -- to hacking
by foreign governments, was of no concern to Hillary. When this effort to evade FOIA was confronted with a subpoena, 33
thousand subpoenaed emails were bleach-bitted out of existence -- while Hillary partisans continued to smugly insist that
there was no proof of quid-pro-quo.
....
Comey did not have the integrity to resign in protest of executive corruption; instead, he cravenly chose to "go with the
flow". And since Comey had no reason to suspect that Hillary had functioned as a spy, it is hardly surprising that he drafted
her exoneration letter months in advance of key FBI interviews. With respect to pay-for-play, the DOJ simply made it impossible
for the FBI field offices looking into this to make any progress, denying them use even of the Hillary emails then in the
FBI's possession. Furthermore, the fact that this investigation was in progress was kept secret from the public. Offers
of immunity were handed out like candy, but there were zero indictments. Owing to this intentional obstruction, Hillary
skated throughout the campaign; if indictments had been forthcoming, Bernie would likely have been the nominee, and Trump
would not now be President.
This information has been known for over a year and we are only now finding out about some of this information now..
Hillary's buttocks should be sitting inside a prison by now, but because of the criminal acts by Obama's justice department
she is still walking free. But if Trump actually does want to "lock her up" he has the authority to declassify lots of the
documents that have been covered up. That Loretta Lynch threatened the NY FBI office to not release the information about the
emails that belong to Hillary on Weiner's laptop is just one more criminal act by the justice department. The unmasking of
hundreds of people by Powers was a huge crime according to the legal system.
When the history of Obama's presidency is written he will be 'unmasked' to have been one of the most corrupt presidents
in history. We already know that he is a war criminal, but what else will be discovered if an investigation into his presidency
is ever done?
The people in charge of The Hague missed a golden opportunity to arrest countless war criminals who attended McCain's funeral.
How many people even knew about him before she picked him? He is so bland and had as much centrist leanings as she did. Or
was he picked because of his blandness? He wouldn't outshine the Queen. Isn't he strongly pro life too? One of his first acts
after not becoming VP was to write the new AUMF that would give presidents the right to wage unlimited war without any oversight
from congress. No sunset on wars, not that there are now, but still. Gawd. We dodged a bullet with her loss, but not much has
changed.
BTW. Just saw a tweet that had a poll on who people would vote for today. Jill Stein got over 60%.
. . . if Bernie or Elizabeth Warren had been the VP choice, rather than the nebbish Kaine, Hillary would have won in
a walk.
Bwahahahaa! Nope!
Kain had kneepads surgically implanted for his visits to Wall Street. Nebbish is a nice worfd for him. Skankface would have
had to swallow vomit to take Bernie onto Her ticket; though Bernie proved later that he was cool with her policies and even
voted to move the embassy. Goofy ass Warren is as flaky as a box of cereal, and is as gymnastic as Her, almost.
Was it EDNY who had Weiner's laptop filled with over 700,000 of Hillary's emails that Loretta threatened not to release them?
I've been saying that it was the NY FBI who had them, but I might be wrong. TMI to keep track of so much information. Lynch should
have had nothing to do with any of the investigations into Hillary's shenanigans after her meeting with Bill on her plane during
Tarmac Gate. And because of her history with the Clintons. Maybe it doesn't matter since DC is so incestous because of the revolving
doors between so many government positions.
Readers are unlikely to know that the Eastern District of New York in Brooklyn is not just any United States attorney's
office. It is the office that was headed by Attorney General Loretta Lynch until President Obama elevated her to attorney general
less than two years ago.
It was in the EDNY that Ms. Lynch first came to national prominence in 1999, when she was appointed U.S. attorney by President
Bill Clinton -- the husband of the main subject of the FBI's investigations with whom Lynch furtively met in the back of a
plane parked on an Arizona tarmac days before the announcement that Mrs. Clinton would not be indicted. Obama reappointed Lynch
as the EDNY's U.S. attorney in 2010. She was thus in charge of staffing that office for nearly six years before coming to Main
Justice in Washington. That means the EDNY is full of attorneys Lynch hired and supervised.
When we learn that Clinton Foundation investigators are being denied access to patently relevant evidence by federal prosecutors
in Brooklyn, those are the prosecutors -- Loretta Lynch's prosecutors -- we are talking about.
Recall, moreover, that it was Lynch's Justice Department that:
‐refused to authorize use of the grand jury to further the Clinton e-mails investigation, thus depriving the FBI of the
power to compel testimony and the production of evidence by subpoena;
‐consulted closely with defense attorneys representing subjects of the investigation;
‐permitted Cheryl Mills and Heather Samuelson -- the subordinates deputized by Mrs. Clinton to sort through her e-mails
and destroy thousands of them -- to represent Clinton as attorneys, despite the fact that they were subjects of the same investigation
and had been granted immunity from prosecution (to say nothing of the ethical and legal prohibitions against such an arrangement);
‐drastically restricted the FBI's questioning of Mills and other subjects of the investigation; and
‐struck the outrageous deals that gave Mills and Samuelson immunity from prosecution in exchange for providing the FBI with
the laptops on which they reviewed Clinton's four years of e-mails. That arrangement was outrageous for three reasons:
1) Mills and Samuelson should have been compelled to produce the computers by grand-jury subpoena with no immunity
agreement;
2) Lynch's Justice Department drastically restricted the FBI's authority to examine the computers; and
3) Lynch's Justice Department agreed that the FBI would destroy the computers following its very limited examination
.
....
As I have detailed, it was already clear that Lynch's Justice Department was stunningly derelict in hamstringing the bureau's
e-mails investigation. But now that we know the FBI was simultaneously investigating the Clinton Foundation yet being denied
access to the Clinton e-mails, the dereliction appears unconscionable.
The biggest understatement ever:
Were it not for the Clinton Foundation, there probably would not be a Clinton e-mail scandal.
Dead men tell no tales, especially about their role in trying to set up and take down U.S. President Donald Trump.
Notable quotes:
"... DNC lawyers wrote in court filings Friday that Joseph Mifsud, who spoke to Papadopoulos during the 2016 presidential election, "is missing and may be deceased," Bloomberg News reported. The lawyers did not elaborate. ..."
"... "The DNC's counsel has attempted to serve Mifsud for months and has been unable to locate or contact him. In addition, public reports have said he has disappeared and hasn't been seen for months," DNC spokeswoman Adrienne Watson said. ..."
The Democratic National Committee (DNC) on Friday raised the prospect that the London-based professor who told former Trump campaign
adviser George Papadopoulos that Russia had "dirt" on
Hillary Clinton may be dead.
DNC lawyers wrote in court filings Friday that Joseph Mifsud, who spoke to Papadopoulos during the 2016 presidential election,
"is missing and may be deceased,"
Bloomberg News reported. The lawyers did not elaborate.
The DNC stood by its claim in a statement to The Hill on Friday. The committee indicated that an investigator had been used to
find Mifsud, who has been missing for months, and was told the Maltese professor may be dead.
"The DNC's counsel has attempted to serve Mifsud for months and has been unable to locate or contact him. In addition, public
reports have said he has disappeared and hasn't been seen for months," DNC spokeswoman Adrienne Watson said.
Mifsud was reportedly teaching at a private university in Rome before he
vanished late
last year , shortly after his name emerged as a key figure in the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
The professor had reportedly not been in contact with prosecutors in Italy seeking to question him over allegations of financial
wrongdoing and his fiancée
told Business Insider
earlier this year that she could not reach him.
The DNC's revelation came in court filings Friday in their lawsuit against Russia, the Trump campaign and WikiLeaks for interfering
in the 2016 presidential election. According to Bloomberg, the DNC said it believed all of the defendants in the case had been served,
with the exception of Mifsud.
From comments: "In short, false inquiry into imaginary collusion hands down pseudo-indictments for quasi-obstruction of
fraudulent justice based on fake news reported by mock journalists quoting fictitious sources leaking fabricated stories about
made-up events about the false inquiry into imaginary collusion. " Papadopolous lied to hide the fact that the
Trump tower meeting was intended as an entrapment to make Trump look like he was colluding - and even having TAKEN that meeting,
it remains undisclosed to the public what information might have been considered 'dirt' that would be regarded as illegal for a
political opponent to use or disclose
Trump's former campaign foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos was sentenced to 14 days
in jail, the first campaign official to be sentenced as part of Robert Mueller's probe into
Russian election interference. Papadopoulos was sentenced to one year of supervised release,
200 hours of community service and a $9,500 fine.
Papadopoulos pleaded guilty in October
2017 to making false statements to the FBI about his contacts with Russia nationals and efforts
to arrange a meeting with the Trump campaign and the Russian government.
During the sentencing, Papadopoulos' lawyer told the judge that he was motivated to lie in
part by Trump characterizing investigation as "Fake news."
Imxploring ,
First rule in dealing with the FBI or law enforcement.... Say NOTHING! When they come
calling to talk to you they are trying to lock you up.... and if they want to "talk"... they
don't have enough to do so.... don't give it to them!
haruspicio ,
I have just been through this is another country. Just give a no comment interview and
make sure you have a lawyer by your side before even opening your mouth to answer a question
from a cop.
Golden Phoenix ,
This is why you should never say anything to police or other investigators. They'll entrap
you, twist your words, and suddenly an otherwise innocent person is convicted of a purely
procedural crime.
Justapleb ,
This carried the flag for Russian Collusion a year ago, how Papadopoulus had been
"flipped" and was "cooperating" with the Mueller investigation.
What happens after they "flip" former Trump people and they start "cooperating"? Nothing.
Because there is no crime even coherently stated pertaining to Russia. "Colluding" is not a
crime.
God what convoluted potempkin show trials.
Davidduke2000 ,
hillary lied and lied and lied and lied to the FBI, CIA, NSA and everybody in the
intelligence and law enforcement agencies and got zero days in jail.
pparalegal ,
Not hard when your co-conspirators are all given pre-immunity and you are given the
questions beforehand. And because the loudest, smartest woman in the world always says "I
don't recall".
RICKYBIRD ,
Let's not forget that an FBI contract "lure" met George in Europe and hired George to do
some work for him. Gave George $10,000 in marked bills. The object was to dirty George up,
maybe even claim he was paid by a Russian agent. When shortly thereafter George arrived in
the US, before he could go to Customs the FBI stopped him. They thought they'd catch him with
the bills. They didn't. George had left them behind in Europe. Tough luck, FBI.
bh2 ,
The lesson this teaches is the one every defense attorney advises to his clients: "never
speak to the police".
All these brain-dead prosecutions accomplish is to confirm those defense attorneys are
correct.
"... The professor who reportedly assisted the FBI's Russia probe as a confidential source is at the center of a Defense Department whisteblower complaint that alleges government contractor abuses, as well as excessive payments with taxpayer dollars, according to interviews and documents reviewed by Fox News. ..."
"... Earlier this month, conservative watchdog Judicial Watch announced it was suing the Defense Department on behalf of Lovinger to force the release of emails and other electronic messages after Lovinger had his security clearance suspended. ..."
"... Bigley, who is representing Lovinger pro bono, said his client flagged the concerns about contractors -- including Stefan Halper , the professor -- as early as 2016, to Lovinger's leadership at the Office of Net Assessment (ONA), which is like an internal Pentagon think tank. ..."
The professor who reportedly assisted the FBI's Russia probe as a confidential source is at
the center of a Defense Department whisteblower complaint that alleges government contractor
abuses, as well as excessive payments with taxpayer dollars, according to interviews and
documents reviewed by Fox News.
The complaint was filed by attorney Sean Bigley on behalf of Pentagon lawyer Adam Lovinger.
Earlier this month, conservative watchdog Judicial Watch announced it was suing the Defense
Department on behalf of Lovinger to force the release of emails and other electronic messages
after Lovinger had his security clearance suspended.
Bigley, who is representing Lovinger pro bono, said his client flagged the concerns about
contractors -- including
Stefan Halper , the professor -- as early as 2016, to Lovinger's leadership at the Office
of Net Assessment (ONA), which is like an internal Pentagon think tank.
"... At that point, Lovinger wouldn't have known was a spy working with the FBI/DOJ on operation " Crossfire Hurricane " - the code name for the Obama administration's counterintelligence operation against the Trump campaign. ..."
"... Halper - an Oxford University professor, former US government official and longtime FBI / CIA asset (who was married to the CIA deputy director's daughter at one point), received over $400,000 for a 2016 contract which Lovinger complained about. ..."
"... According to USASpending.gov, Mr. Halper was paid $411,000 by Washington Headquarters Services on Sept. 26, 2016 , for a contract that ran until this March. - Washington Times ..."
"... In total, the American citizen teaching abroad received over $1 million from contracts dated between 2012 and 2016. ..."
"... "As it turns out, one of the two contractors Mr. Lovinger explicitly warned his ONA superiors about misusing in 2016 was none other than Mr. Halper ," wrote Bigley in the ethics complaint, which referred to the contracts as " cronyism and corruption ." ..."
"... " Nobody in the office seemed to know what Halper was doing for his money ," said Bigley. "Adam said Jim Baker, the director, kept Halper's contracts very close to the vest. And nobody seemed to have any idea what he was doing at the time. He subcontracted out a good chunk of it to other academics. He would compile them all and then collect the balance as his fee as a middleman . That was very unusual." ..."
"... A longtime CIA and FBI asset who once reportedly ran a spy-operation on the Jimmy Carter administration, Halper was enlisted by the FBI to spy on several Trump campaign aides during the 2016 U.S. election, including Carter Page and George Papadopoulos. ..."
"... The unassuming university professor approached Page during an election-themed conference at Cambridge on July 11, 2016, six weeks after the September 26 DoD award start date. The two would stay in contact for the next 14 months, frequently meeting and exchanging emails . ..."
"... And as the Daily Caller reported, Halper used a decades-old association with Paul Manafort to break the ice with Page. ..."
"... In the email to Page, Halper asks what his plans are post-election, possibly probing for more information. " It seems attention has shifted a bit from the 'collusion' investigation to the ' contretempts' [sic] within the White House and, how--or if--Mr. Scaramucci will be accommodated there," Halper wrote. ..."
A Pentagon whistleblower was stripped of his security clearance and demoted after complaining about questionable government contracts
with both FBI informant spy Stefan Halper and a company headed by Chelsea Clinton's "best friend" for whom then-Secretary
of State Hillary Clinton arranged meetings, reports the
Washington
Times .
Adam Lovinger, a Trump supporter and 12-year veteran of the Pentagon's Office of Net Assessment (ONA), filed a whistleblower reprisal
complaint with the Defense Department's inspector general in May against ONA boss James Baker - who hired Halper, 73, to "conduct
foreign relations" and kept the details of the spy's contracts "close to the vest." Baker was appointed chief of the ONA in 2015
by Obama Defense Secretary, Ashton Carter.
At that point, Lovinger wouldn't have known was a spy working with the FBI/DOJ on operation "
Crossfire Hurricane " - the code name for the Obama administration's counterintelligence operation against the Trump campaign.
In an internal October 2016 email to higher-ups, Mr. Lovinger wrote of " the moral hazard associated with the Washington Headquarters
Services contracting with Stefan Halper ," the complaint said. It said Mr. Baker hired Mr. Halper to "conduct foreign relations,"
a job that should be confined to government officials.
...
In the fall of 2016, as the election loomed, Mr. Lovinger sent emails to Mr. Baker and other officials at the Office of Net
Assessment complaining about the entire outside contracting process. He also said the office failed to write papers on long-term
threats presented by radical Islam, China and Iran .
And in September 2016, Lovinger sent an email directly to
Baker summing up the perceived problems, which
reads in part:
"Some of our contractors distribute to others their ONA work for personal and professional self-promotion," wrote Lovinger.
"Another part is the growing narrative that ONA's most high-profile contractors are known for getting paid a lot to do rather
peripheral work ."
"On the issue of pay, our contractors boast about how much they get paid from ONA . Such boasting, of course, generates jealously
among those outside the club, and particularly from those who have tried to secure ONA contracts unsuccessfully."
"On the issue of quality, more than once I have heard our contractor studies labeled 'derivative,' 'college-level' and based
heavily on secondary sources . One of our contractor studies was literally cut and pasted from a World Bank report that I just
happened to have read the week before reading the contractor study itself. Even the font was the same."
Halper - an Oxford University professor, former US government official and longtime FBI / CIA asset (who was married to the CIA
deputy director's daughter at one point),
received over $400,000 for a 2016 contract which Lovinger complained about.
According to USASpending.gov, Mr. Halper was paid $411,000 by Washington Headquarters Services on Sept. 26, 2016 , for a contract
that ran until this March. -
Washington Times
In total, the American citizen teaching abroad received over
$1 million from contracts dated between 2012 and 2016.
Lovinger's attorney, Sean M. Bigley, filed the second of four complaints on July 18 with the Pentagon's senior ethics official,
claiming that Lovinger's bosses punished him on May 1, 2017 by abusing the security clearance process to yank his credentials and
relegate him to clerical chores. Lovinger's complaint also names the Washington Headquarters Services, a support agency within the
Pentagon that awarded the Halper contracts.
"As it turns out, one of the two contractors Mr. Lovinger explicitly warned his ONA superiors about misusing in 2016 was none
other than Mr. Halper ," wrote Bigley in the ethics complaint, which referred to the contracts as " cronyism and corruption ."
" Nobody in the office seemed to know what Halper was doing for his money ," said Bigley. "Adam said Jim Baker, the director,
kept Halper's contracts very close to the vest. And nobody seemed to have any idea what he was doing at the time. He subcontracted
out a good chunk of it to other academics. He would compile them all and then collect the balance as his fee as a middleman . That
was very unusual."
A longtime CIA and FBI asset who once reportedly
ran a spy-operation on the Jimmy Carter administration, Halper was enlisted by the FBI to spy on several Trump campaign aides
during the 2016 U.S. election, including Carter Page and George Papadopoulos.
Halper's $411,575 award came three days after a September 23
Yahoo! News article by Michael Isikoff about Trump aide Carter Page, which used information fed to Isikoff by "Steele dossier"
creator Christopher Steele . The FBI would use the Yahoo! article along with the largely unverified dossier as
supporting evidence in an FISA warrant application for Page.
The unassuming university professor approached Page during an election-themed conference at Cambridge on July 11, 2016, six weeks
after the September 26 DoD award start date. The two would stay in contact for the next 14 months,
frequently meeting and exchanging
emails .
He said that he first encountered the informant during a conference in mid-July of 2016 and that they stayed in touch. The
two later met several times in the Washington area. Mr. Page said their interactions were benign. -
New York
Times
And as the Daily Caller reported, Halper used a decades-old association with Paul Manafort to break the ice with Page.
Page noted that in their first conversation at Cambridge, Halper said he was longtime friends with then-campaign chairman Paul
Manafort . A person close to Manafort told TheDCNF that Manafort has not seen Halper since the Gerald Ford administration . Manafort
and Page are accused in the Steele dossier of having worked together on the campaign's collusion conspiracy, but both men say
they have never met. -
Daily Caller
Halper would continue to spy on Page after the election. Two days after the second installment of Halper's 2016 DoD contract,
On July 28, he emailed Page with what the Trump campaign aide describes as a "cordial" communication, which did not seem suspicious
to him at the time.
In the email to Page, Halper asks what his plans are post-election, possibly probing for more information. " It seems attention
has shifted a bit from the 'collusion' investigation to the ' contretempts' [sic] within the White House and, how--or if--Mr. Scaramucci
will be accommodated there," Halper wrote.
Clinton connection
The other complaint lodged by Lovinger concerns a string of contracts totaling $11 million to Long Term Strategy Group - a D.C.
consulting firm headed by self-described "best friend" of Chelseal Clinton, Jacqueline Newmyer Deal.
In October, the
Washington Free Beacon reported that then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arranged meetings in 2009 between Deal and Pentagon
officials to discuss contracts - to which Deal says no award "resulted directly or indirectly from the actions or influence of Secretary
Clinton ."
According to one 2009 email, Clinton said she recommended Deal to Michele Flournoy, the newly installed undersecretary of defense
for policy, who was seeking young women to mentor.
Deal, a specialist in China affairs who worked at the White House as a press aide for First Lady Clinton in the 1990s, wrote
back to Clinton saying she would meet Flournoy on May 5, 2009, and stated "thank you very much for making this happen."
Later that month, Deal thanked Clinton for "all your encouragement and help with DoD, " shorthand for the Defense Department.
-
Free Beacon
In a statement, Deal said: "Jacqueline Deal and the Long Term Strategy Group (LTSG) are justifiably proud of their collaboration
with the US Department of Defense across multiple administrations over the last two decades, beginning under the administration of
President George W. Bush. LTSG's work has consistently earned the highest respect and confidence of its clientele in government and
has won LTSG a reputation for producing research and analysis of exceptional quality."
"... [Manifort and Deripaska] had a falling out laid bare in 2014 in a Cayman Islands bankruptcy court. The billionaire gave Manafort nearly $19 million to invest in a Ukrainian TV company called Black Sea Cable, according to legal filings by Deripaska's representatives. It said that after taking the money, Manafort and his associates stopped responding to Deripaska's queries about how the funds had been used. ..."
Much of what is known about Paul Manafort's alleged activities on
behalf of Russia is based on court documents revealed in a series of law suits dating back to
2014. One of them was filed in Virginia in August 2015, leading to the "outing" of Paul
Manafort and his firing as Trump's Campaign Manager. The plaintiff in those cases is Oleg
Deripaska.
It is Manafort's relationship with Deripaska that happens to underlie most of the
allegations made in the standard "Russiagate" narrative that Manafort was a secret agent
advancing Putin's interests inside the Trump campaign. At the same time, Oleg has been cast by
the western media as simply an agent of Putin. Furthermore, it was Christopher Steele's "Dirty
Dossier" that got Russiagate up and rolling.
Now, it comes out, that Steele was working not only for the DNC and with Clinton Campaign
funds, but was also shared a DC lawyer and possibly doing business with Deripaska. https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/2018-02-26%20CEG%20to%20W...
(Mr.%20Steele,%20Mr.%20Deripaska,%20and%20Mr.%20Jones).pdf
All this seems implausible and contradictory, doesn't it? Yes, it does, read on.
Documents emerging from the Senate Judiciary Committee indicate Christopher Steele shares a
lawyer with Oleg Deripaska, and the committee wants to know the details of that going back to
2015. Keep in mind, Fusion-GPS started developing its opposition file on Trump at about that
time, we have been told funded by money provided by another GOP candidate or by Robert Mercer,
the reclusive billionaire hedge-fund operator and backer of Ted Cruz.
Then, a year later, after the CIA/FBI cleared him of charges of corruption, the State Dept.
issued it, and he got the 24 or 48 hours he then needed during the first visit to be inside the
US. The only reason anyone needs to be physically inside the US for a day that I can think of
is to establish bank accounts here in his own name. Since then, he comes and goes. According to
the WSJ, during the 2009 visits he had meetings with both the FBI and several major NY banks.
https://web.archive.org/web/20170624031454/https://www.wsj.com/news/arti...
The Senate Committee first became aware of the relationship between Deripaska and Steele
when Mark Warner received a text last March from a lawyer named Adam Waldman saying that his
client, Christopher Steele, wanted to talk to him. According to Tablet:
http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/255290/christopher-ste...
In 2009, Waldman filed papers with the Department of Justice under the Foreign Agents
Registration Act (FARA) registering himself as an agent for Deripaska in order to provide
"legal advice on issues involving his U.S. visa as well as commercial transactions" at a
retainer of $40,000 a month. In 2010, Waldman additionally registered as an agent for Russian
foreign minister Sergei Lavrov, "gathering information and providing advice and analysis as
it relates to the U.S. policy towards the visa status of Oleg Deripaska," including meetings
with U.S. policymakers. Based on the information in his FARA filings, Waldman has received at
least $2.36 million for his work with Deripaska.
Clearly, Chris Steele and Oleg Deripaska have the same Washington, DC lawyer, the one who
arranged for Deripaska's visa, who is the head of the Endeavor Group, a K Street lobby shop
located two blocks from the White House. Waldman is also an executive of one of Deripaska's New
York companies, Basic Element. An unrelated 2017 law suit against Deripaska lays that out,
along with Oleg's U.S. banking and investments, corporate ownerships, including the U.S.
subsidiary of Rusal aluminum, and his New York City real estate holdings. Also laid bare are
his ten trips to the U.S. since 2009 during which he has met with among others, the heads of
Wolfonsohn Investments, a large hedge fund, and Alcoa Aluminum. According to the allegation
cited in the court Order, "Deripaska derives billions in revenues from the United States - and
its U.S. operations in N.Y." While the plaintiff's suit was ultimately dismissed because Oleg
was found to not be domiciled in New York, the essential facts in the complaint are summarized
in the Judge's Order: https://law.justia.com/cases/new-york/other-courts/2017/2017-ny-slip-op-
...
What does all this mean? That's what some members of the Senate Judiciary Committee would
like to find out, including records of any direct transactions between Deripaska and Steele or
through Waldman going back to 2015.
It looks like Oleg Deripaska made a deal to be able to do business and to safely park large
parts of his fortune in the United States. Let's look at the big picture and then focus back in
on Steele and Deripaska. The really big backdrop to Russia!Russia!Russia! is the botched serial
regime change operations in the Ukraine and Syria cooked up under Secretary Clinton and her
BFFs at the CIA.
If those operations had succeeded, as planned, that might have ended with the removal of Mr.
Putin. Unfortunately for the plan, certain Americans got in the way – primarily, the DIA
Director, General Michael Flynn who worked with Russian military to abort the planned ISIS
takeover of Damascus, and Paul Manafort, who was a thorn in the side of the State Department,
CIA and MI-6 who were working to remove Russia from Ukraine, including its key naval base in
eastern Ukraine, on the Crimean Peninsula at Sebastipole. Here, we make an assumption, and
connect a dot, but it doesn't change the bigger picture. Maybe, promises were made that the
CIA/MI-6 would help Mr. Deripaska with some of his own ambitions, East and West. He seems
pretty ambitious and capable. Almost as much so as Vladimir Putin.
What ended up actually happening, apparently, is in exchange for turning on Manafort, Oleg
has been granted clubhouse and greens privileges at Club Langley. At the same time, his role
can't be so deep and murky to amount to something that actually ever really threatened Putin,
so one might conclude Putin has been playing along with this whole thing and it has paid off.
Indeed, he has something like 90 percent approval ratings and will be reelected. Mr. Putin also
appears greatly amused by how, indeed, the scheme has backfired and ended up absolutely
paralyzing the American political process and much of the U.S. government.
Russiagate! has turned into some kind of a weird game of mutual advantage that the CIA is
playing with Putin after it became clear that the Moscow regime change operation (which was
supposed to follow those in Ukraine and Syria -- which is how this thing started -- had failed
miserably. The Agency gets its revenge against Manafort and Flynn (who were instrumental in
blocking the intermediate ops), and Putin gets the credit for fucking with the heads of the
Deep State and another term as uncontested boss of the Kremlin.
The Booby Prize goes to the parrots in the major media who still really believe that
Manafort was working with Deripaska inside the Trump Campaign in 2016 to advance Putin's
influence. That joint venture, if there ever was one, certainly wasn't helped much when
Deripaska sued Manafort in open court three times, first in the Cayman Islands in 2014,
followed by a 2015 filing in federal court in Virginia. That information led eventually to
front-page exposure in the New York Times, leading to Manafort's being dismissed as Campaign
Director, and most recently this January using information contained in the indictment handed
down by Mueller.
So, the CIA gets it revenge against Manafort and Flynn, while Vladimir gets to keep his
place as leader of all Russia. And part of Ukraine, and Syria, and . . .
The lesson here: The Great Game continues. Who says we all can't still get along with each
other?
Deripaska is not who he has been portrayed to be
Oleg Deripaska showed up on Thursday in an American Op-ed in which he tried to get ahead of
the changing portrait that is emerging of him that show he has actually been doing business
with Christopher Steele, and that relationship predated the Dirty Dossier.
When I attended the Munich Security Conference in February, the extraordinary, coordinated
message of a panel of U.S. senators was summarized by moderator Victoria Nuland, former
assistant secretary of state under President Barack Obama, as: "Deep State-proud loyalists
giv[ing] broad reassurance about continuity." One of the panelists, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse
(D-R.I.), said: "What the Breitbart crowd would call the 'Deep State' is what many of us
would call 'knowledgeable professionals.'" The panel's uniform message was essentially:
Ignore Donald Trump and increase your defense budget to 2 percent, because the generals who
are 'operationalizing policy' remain in charge.
[ . . .]
What has been inelegantly termed the "Deep State" is really this: shadow power exercised
by a small number of individuals from media, business, government and the intelligence
community, foisting provocative and cynically false manipulations on the public. Out of these
manipulations, an agenda of these architects' own design is born.
Unfortunately, I am personally familiar with this group. Before they moved to their
current, bigger ambitions of reversing the U.S. presidential election results, they
scurrilously attacked me and others from the shadows for two decades. The various story lines
and roles they have created for me don't survive close scrutiny and are internally
inconsistent, yet they simply follow the "Wag the Dog" playbook: We don't need it to prove to
be true. We need it to distract them.
[ . . .]
The distractions no longer can mask these "unholy alliances." The wife of a central
architect of the Department of Justice's "Russia narrative" secretly worked for the
dossier-peddling Fusion GPS. Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson attempted -- according to his
own congressional admissions -- to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential election and its
aftermath, to attack Russia and to "embarrass" me and cause trouble for the company I
founded.
As entertaining and on some level gratifying it is to read Oleg Deripiska's snarky take on
Victoria Nuland's, "Deep State-proud loyalists," and his insider poop on Fusion-GPS, keep in
mind that Oleg, himself, is integral to the prosecution case against Paul Manafort and has his
own axe to grind. It turns out, in addition, there is reason to believe he has his own
relationship with the author of the "Dirty Dossier" that may have predated the direct funding
of Fusion-GPS by the DNC.
Deripaska, too, is playing both sides of the "Russiagate" game. Here's why. As I wrote about
him last November when he emerged as the primary source of renewed allegations that Paul
Manafort was acting as Putin's agent inside the Trump camp, it was Deripaska who "outed"
Manafort by suing him in a U.S. court to recover tens of millions of dollars that PM allegedly
couldn't account for in his older business dealings with Deripaska in Ukraine. Much of what is
publicly known about Manafort's dealings with the Russians comes from documents that came out
of that law suit filed in a civil court in Cyprus. See,
https://jackpineradicals.com/boards/topic/all-the-standard-errors-that-u...
So what moved Paul Manafort to get into the Trump Campaign? It has been surmised elsewhere
that it was Oleg Deripaska, or more exactly the pressure of owing Oleg Deripaska millions of
dollars, that motivated Manafort.
What was Oleg Deripaska's interest in Manafort, aside from recovering a debt? Deripaska
has a reported net worth in excess of $5 billion. What's a trifling $19 million in the
Russian oligarch's money that Manafort is reported to have kept from a 2009 cable TV
investment deal in Ukraine that went bad. That's a good question that Mr. Sypher doesn't even
ask.
[Manifort and Deripaska] had a falling out laid bare in 2014 in a Cayman Islands
bankruptcy court. The billionaire gave Manafort nearly $19 million to invest in a Ukrainian
TV company called Black Sea Cable, according to legal filings by Deripaska's representatives.
It said that after taking the money, Manafort and his associates stopped responding to
Deripaska's queries about how the funds had been used.
That leads to an obvious question that isn't raised by the likes of NBC and AP. Why, if
Deripaska is simply Putin's Cat's Paw, as is alleged -- and, if, as the Russiagate narrative
presumes, Manafort was working to further Putin's interests inside the Trump campaign (see,
e.g.,
http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/paul-manafort-once-worked-b... and the March,
2017 AP Report: https://apnews.com/122ae0b5848345faa88108a03de40c5a
) -- would Oleg be playing a central role in taking down Manafort by suing him before Manafort
joined the Trump campaign? Seems a very unlikely way of maintaining operational secrecy if the
two were really Kremlin operatives.
Jan 10, 2018 – Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska used details from Mueller's
indictment in a new lawsuit against Paul Manafort and Rick Gates. Wealthy Russian oligarch
Oleg Deripaska filed a lawsuit against President Donald Trump's former campaign chairman,
Paul Manafort, and his associate, Rick . . .
The fiction created that Deripaska is simply an agent of Putin is falling apart. Like Carter
Page, who is now publicly shown to be an FBI informant, the fact that Oleg Deripaska outed Paul
Manafort is one of the "fog facts" -- inconvenient facts that are conveniently ignored by most
reporters and others with a perceived stake in the game -- that underlie the standard
Russia!Russia!Russia! narrative.
Thanks for the analysis leveymg. The political connections get very complicated. The bare
facts from Wiki:
He was once Russia's richest man, worth $28 billion, but nearly lost everything due to
mounting debts amid the 2007–08 financial crisis. As of May 2017, his wealth was
estimated by Forbes at $5.2 billion.[8] Deripaska is also known for his close ties to
Russian president Vladimir Putin, as well as his connection to American political
consultant Paul Manafort, whom Deripaska employed from at least 2005 to 2009.[9]
And:
He is married to Polina Yumasheva, step-granddaughter of former Russian President Boris
Yeltsin and daughter of Valentin Yumashev, Yeltsin's son-in-law and close advisor.
Then we have to add in political and financial battles over corporate empires to muddy the
waters of global intrigue even more with deceptions and global legal battles.
Thanks again leveymg. I'm still not sure what to think about this whole convoluted
investigation, but there is without a doubt a whole lot of criminal conduct going on from a
whole lot of political and financial syndicates.
All the other people who are being installed in the Mueller investigation is hard to
follow. This started with Russia hacking the DNC computers and that Trump and Putin colluded
so that Trump would win. Everything else that has been thrown at the wall isn't sticking.
Plus the hacking accusations were started to deflect from what was in the files. They
showed that the DNC put their thumb on the election so she would win. Besides, at first they
were saying that Guiciffer 2.0 was the one that hacked the DNC and gave them to
Wikileaks.
If you have to keep changing the story to make your case, something is wrong.
and trying to read through this essay, I was reminded that before you get some good
organic compost you have to wade through lots of shitty free range political actors.
Can't follow, dear. Too complicated. I bet you have given some people a lot of inside
knowledge.
and trying to read through this essay, I was reminded that before you get some good
organic compost you have to wade through lots of shitty free range political actors.
Can't follow, dear. Too complicated. I bet you have given some people a lot of inside
knowledge.
do business in and park a considerable portion of his aluminum fortune in the U.S.
Here's some new information I updated the article with:
Clearly, Chris Steele and Oleg Deripaska have the same Washington, DC lawyer, the one
who arranged for Deripaska's visa, who is the head of the Endeavor Group, a K Street lobby
shop located two blocks from the White House. Waldman is also an executive of one of
Deripaska's New York companies, Basic Element. An unrelated 2017 law suit against Deripaska
lays that out, along with Oleg's U.S. banking and investments, corporate ownerships,
including the U.S. subsidiary of Rusal aluminum, and his New York City real estate
holdings. Also laid bare are his ten trips to the U.S. since 2009 during which he has met
with among others, the heads of Wolfonsohn Investments, a large hedge fund, and Alcoa
Aluminum. According to the allegation cited in the court Order, "Deripaska derives billions
in revenues from the United States - and its U.S. operations in N.Y." While the plaintiff's
suit was ultimately dismissed because Oleg was found to not be domiciled in New York, the
essential facts in the complaint are summarized in the Judge's Order: https://law.justia.com/cases/new-york/other-courts/2017/2017-ny-slip-op-...
What does all this mean? That's what some members of the Senate Judiciary Committee
would like to find out, including records of any direct transactions between Deripaska and
Steele or through Waldman going back to 2015.
It looks like Oleg Deripaska made a deal to be able to do business and to safely park
large parts of his fortune in the United States.
How Secretive Manhattan Heiress Rebekah Mercer Became One of the Most Powerful Women in
Politics
A decade ago, Mercer was running a Hell's Kitchen bakery. Now she's advising the
president.
By Kate Storey
Mar 17, 2017
... Though he's not shy about throwing his weight behind conservative causes, Robert
prefers to remain in the background. According to a recent Wall Street Journal profile, the
hedge fund titan once told a colleague he preferred the company of cats to humans. So, it's
his more sociable middle daughter who has become the face of the family, meeting with power
players and initiating deals. She sits on boards of conservative foundations he funds,
including the Heritage Foundation, and has reportedly been seen walking arm-and-arm with
him at events he funds like the Jackson Hole Summit, a conference promoting the gold
standard. Politico just put her as 21 on their PlayBook Power List.
By Rebekah's most public -- and influential -- role so far is as an executive on Trump's
16-person transition executive committee, which advises the president-elect on Cabinet
appointments and organizing his White House. ...
... The big Mercer money came when Robert began working for the ultra-mysterious
Renaissance Technologies hedge fund on Long Island in 1993. In 2009, Robert became the
co-CEO of Renaissance, which author Sebastian Mallaby called "perhaps the most successful
hedge fund ever" in his 2011 book More Money Than God.
Robert and his wife Diana moved into an extravagant Long Island mansion, which they
dubbed "Owl's Nest," closer to the Renaissance offices. The home is so palatial, the family
created Owl's Nest Inc., a company used to manage household staff. In 2013, the service
staff sued Robert for allegedly penalizing them for doing things like failing to close a
door or not refilling the shampoo. The case was dismissed a few months later and appears to
have been quietly settled. ...
... Pinning down the Mercers's specific political motivations is tricky. Robert and
Rebekah have directed money to anti-abortion groups and a Christian college, according to
Bloomberg Businessweek, which also reports the father and daughter "don't talk about
religion."
They secretly funded ads for a research chemist named Arthur Robinson during his run for
Congress in Oregon. Robinson believes climate change is a hoax, thinks nuclear radiation
could be good for you, and insists he can extend the human life span by studying human
urine. Robinson told the Bloomberg Businessweek that political ads supporting him just
began popping up -- he had no idea who was behind them until a third party revealed it was
Robert.
Rebekah sits on the boards of Heritage Foundation, an influential conservative think
tank, the Goldwater Institute, a conservative and libertarian public policy think tank, and
Reclaim New York, a nonprofit focused on transparency and the city's affordability.
(Heritage and Goldwater representatives didn't respond to requests for comment about her
work.) ...
In an interview I read some time back, Mercer said that he preferred computers to people,
which left me with an entirely different impression...In any event, they shifted from
supporting Cruz to Trump - and this is particularly interesting:
...After that fiasco, research firm Cambridge Analytica was one of the very few that
remained confident that Trump would still win the election. Robert is reportedly a major
backer of the relatively unknown strategic communications company, which also worked with
Leave.EU in the U.K. ahead of the Brexit vote.
So, while many may have been shocked when Trump clinched the Electoral College late
November 8, the Mercers surely felt vindicated.
One of Trump's first actions as president-elect was to name Mercer associate Bannon as
chief strategist, sparking outrage from the Anti-Defamation League as well as politicians
on both side of the aisle because of his work with Breitbart, which Bannon himself told
Mother Jones was a "platform for the alt-right," an online movement with white supremacist
views. ...
This is the Real Story Behind How Steve Bannon Joined Forces With Donald Trump
Secretive Republican donor Rebekah Mercer recently convinced the president's chief
strategist not to resign.
By Kate Storey
Apr 6, 2017
... Once Trump had sealed the 2016 GOP nomination, the Mercers made their move. Over the
course of her reporting, Ward learned that Rebekah's first point of action was to oust
Trump's campaign manager, Paul Manafort, to put into place her family's allies, Kellyanne
Conway and Steve Bannon. As part-owners of far-right nationalist website Breitbart news,
the Mercers have been close to Bannon, who ran the site, for years.
In a scene that foreshadowed the current controversy surrounding the administration,
Rebekah used Manafort's ties to Russia to make her point. Here, Ward lays out the Mercers's
coup d'etat:
[Trump] had been disturbed by recent stories detailing disorganization in his campaign
and alleging ties between Trump's campaign manager, Paul Manafort, and pro-Russia officials
in Ukraine. Rebekah knew of this and arrived at her meeting with "props," says the source
who strategized with the Mercers: printouts of news articles about Manafort and Russia that
she brandished as evidence that he had to go. And she also had a solution in mind: Trump
should put Bannon in charge of the campaign and hire the pollster Kellyanne Conway.
Within four days, Manafort was out, and Bannon and Conway were in. ...
Since this has always appeared to be a Battle of the Billionaires, and assuming that this
is accurate, I kinda wonder who actually 'owns' the CIA and others (Dems loading up on
CIA/Military Intelligence candidates all of a sudden) and who might be issuing orders to the
military Generals now that Trump's 'given them their heads'. Does all of this 'military
might, for the use of': go to the highest bidder and if so, by the individual war-crime or
the whole attack/invasion over seemingly forever? Dunno, but with all of the weirdness and
strategic misdirection/disinformation further muddying the propaganda stream, my speculators
are pointed, albeit conditionally, in all directions. Just don't have the energy for actual
research or the ability to verify any of this.
One more potentially indicative thing, (although a lot of Republican billionaires do seem
to get all excited and 'Dom'-ish over other people's sex lives, loves and personal
reproductive choices, and the CorpoDems want them all to hire them rather than Repubs as
their Representatives in government,) regarding a tid-bit from that top article '...Robert
and Rebekah have directed money to anti-abortion groups and a Christian college...' - with
Pelosi pushing an anti-LGBT and anti-abortion candidate, below.
11 minute video which I found interesting and covers ground - really like this guy,
although I never seem to get subscription notices from Youtube on him and only come across
his vids down the side sometimes...
Bernie Endorses Marie Newman Over Pelosi's Anti-LGBT Candidate
The Rational National
Published on 9 Mar 2018
Bernie Sanders has endorsed Marie Newman for Illinois 3rd congressional district, over
Nancy Pelosi-backed candidate Dan Lipinski.
If I had the energy, I'd start trying a bit of poking around, regarding the following from
that first article, see how shiny, squeaky clean that money might possibly be, even if not
expecting much to be visible...
'...the ultra-mysterious Renaissance Technologies hedge fund on Long Island in 1993. In
2009, Robert became the co-CEO of Renaissance, which author Sebastian Mallaby called "perhaps
the most successful hedge fund ever" in his 2011 book More Money Than God. ...'
Renaissance Technologies: Hedge Fund on a $7 Billion Winning Streak
Hedge-fund firm Renaissance Technologies has attracted more than $7 billion in new investor
money over the past year even as peers have struggled
By Gregory Zuckerman
Updated Oct. 11, 2016
Many hedge funds and mutual funds are slashing fees, laying off employees and losing
customers following years of subpar performance.
Then there is Renaissance Technologies LLC.
The hedge-fund firm, which relies on closely held computer models and algorithms, has
staged a comeback after an uneven spell, with its funds posting market-beating gains for
more than the past year.
Now they are getting a cash influx, even as rivals suffer withdrawals. Renaissance
attracted more than $7 billion in new investor money over the past year from wealthy
clients of UBS Group AG, Citigroup Inc. and others, according to people close to the
matter. Renaissance now manages more than $36 billion, up from $27 billion a year ago, even
after returning about $1 billion from its signature Medallion fund, which is closed to
investors.
The success is the latest sign that some quantitative funds are beating traditional
investors. ...
What is a Quantitative Hedge Fund?
of Quantitative Hedge Fund Training
Brief Summary of Hedge Funds
Hedge Funds, broadly speaking, are investment funds that have less regulation and more
flexibility relative to other, "classic" investment funds, such as mutual funds (more on
this distinction is written below). A Hedge Fund will have an investment manager, and will
typically be open to a limited range of investors who pay a performance fee to the fund's
manager on profits earned by the fund. Each Hedge Fund has its own investment philosophy
that determines the type of investments and strategies it employs.
In general, the Hedge Fund community undertakes a much wider range of investment and
trading activities than do traditional investment funds. Hedge Funds can employ high-risk
or exotic trading, such as investing with borrowed money or selling securities for short
sale, in hopes of realizing large capital gains. Additionally Hedge Funds invest in a
broader range of assets, including long and short positions in Equities, Fixed Income,
Foreign Exchange, Commodities and illiquid hard assets, such as Real Estate.
The first hedge funds were thought to have existed prior to the Great Depression in the
1920s, though they did not gain in popularity until the 1980s, with funds managed by
legendary investors including Julian Robertson, Michael Steinhardt and George Soros. Soros
gained widespread notoriety in 1992 when his Quantum Investment Fund correctly bet against
the Bank of England by predicting that the pound would be devalued, having been pushed into
the European Rate Mechanism at too high a rate. Soros' bet paid off to the tune of $1
billion, and set the stage for future hedge fund entrants, who speculated on markets based
on fundamental and quantitative factors. ...
... Quantitative Trading Models
Quantitative Hedge Funds development complex mathematical models to try to predict
investment opportunities -- typically in the form of predictions about which assets are
projected to have high returns (for long investments) or low/negative returns (for short
investments). As computing power has blossomed over the past couple of decades, so has the
use of sophisticated modeling techniques, such as optimization, prediction modeling, neural
networks and other forms of machine-learning algorithms (where trading strategies evolve
over time by "learning" from past data).
One common, classic Quant Hedge Fund modeling approach is called Factor-Based Modeling.
In this data, predictor (or "independent") variables, such as Price/Earnings ratio, or
inflation rates, or the change in unemployment rates, are used to attempt to predict the
value of another variable of interest ("dependent" variables), such as the predicted change
in the price of a stock. Factor models may base trading decisions on a pre-determined set
of factors (such as returns on the S&P 500, the U.S. dollar index, a corporate bond
index, a commodity index such as the CRB, and a measure of changes in corporate bond
spreads and the VIX) or a set of factors related mathematically (but with no explicit
specification) such as those gleaned through Principal Component Analysis (PCA). ...
Gee, if only these wealthy clients from '...UBS Group AG, Citigroup Inc. and others...'
actually knew how the markets were going to move and this data was used in programming, they
could all really make a packet among a limited group of investors, while others went sub-par,
couldn't they?
Renaissance Technologies: Hedge Fund on a $7 Billion Winning Streak
Hedge-fund firm Renaissance Technologies has attracted more than $7 billion in new investor
money over the past year even as peers have struggled
... Some traditional stock pickers say unexpected trading patterns caused by the rush
into exchange-traded funds make investing harder for those reliant on fundamental
strategies, such as buying underpriced stocks. By contrast, Renaissance's models rely on
signals from a range of inputs, including technical factors related to stock-price
movements, helping the firm avoid some issues slowing traditional investors, clients
say.
"Technical factors are swamping fundamental analysis lately," helping Renaissance, says
Amanda Haynes-Dale, co-founder of Pan Reliance Capital Advisors, which became a Renaissance
client this year.
That recipe hasn't always worked for Renaissance, which Mr. Simons founded in 1982. The
firm opened two hedge funds to outside investors in 2005 and 2007 but experienced mediocre
early results.
In 2010, when Mr. Simons stepped back from running the East Setauket, N.Y., firm, new
leadership considered closing the two hedge funds open to outside investors. By then,
assets had fallen to $5 billion from over $20 billion a few years earlier. Last year,
Renaissance closed a $1 billion futures fund due to poor interest.
Renaissance's recent rebound comes as the company's executives are playing larger roles
in politics. Co-Chief Executive Robert Mercer has been among the largest political donors
of the 2016 election cycle, spending more than $13 million to back Texas Sen. Ted Cruz
through a super PAC while also funding Breitbart News, the conservative media outlet.
He and his daughter, Rebekah, played a role in the August shake-up of Donald Trump's
presidential campaign, recommending Breitbart Chairman Stephen Bannon and Republican
pollster Kellyanne Conway for top posts. Mr. Simons has given millions to a Hillary Clinton
super PAC. ...
...Renaissance avoids hiring Wall Street veterans, helping it avoid mistakes made by
those reliant on traditional investing methods, the firm says.
"The advantage scientists bring is less their mathematical or computational skills than
their ability to think scientifically," Mr. Simons said, according to an investor document.
"They are less likely to accept an apparent winning strategy that might be a mere
statistical fluke."
'... In 2010, when Mr. Simons stepped back from running the East Setauket, N.Y., firm,
new leadership considered closing the two hedge funds open to outside investors. By then,
assets had fallen to $5 billion from over $20 billion a few years earlier. Last year,
Renaissance closed a $1 billion futures fund due to poor interest. ...
... Now they are getting a cash influx, even as rivals suffer withdrawals. Renaissance
attracted more than $7 billion in new investor money over the past year from wealthy
clients of UBS Group AG, Citigroup Inc. and others, according to people close to the
matter. Renaissance now manages more than $36 billion, up from $27 billion a year ago, even
after returning about $1 billion from its signature Medallion fund, which is closed to
investors. ...
... Renaissance's recent rebound comes as the company's executives are playing larger
roles in politics. Co-Chief Executive Robert Mercer has been among the largest political
donors of the 2016 election cycle, spending more than $13 million to back Texas Sen. Ted
Cruz through a super PAC while also funding Breitbart News, the conservative media
outlet.
He and his daughter, Rebekah, played a role in the August shake-up of Donald Trump's
presidential campaign, recommending Breitbart Chairman Stephen Bannon and Republican
pollster Kellyanne Conway for top posts. Mr. Simons has given millions to a Hillary Clinton
super PAC. ...
So Mercer quite recently made his billions in an astounding spurt in both
algorithm-operated hedge fund investment and returns, with a restricted group of investors,
within a previously failing firm he was/is? Co-Chief Executive of, while the firm's founder
steps back, all this in conjunction with an influx of unnamed wealthy clients of '...UBS
Group AG, Citigroup Inc. and others...' and then moved into influencing politics, king-making
an unlikely President he is said to have essentially got elected and who his daughter and
various of his suggested own staffers/employees advise/have advised?
Dunno, but these are not groups in which I hold faith, and some of these coinky-dinks are
awfully familiar... kinda smells as though he's been made a billionaire in order to funnel
Presidential political funding and advice from Wall St., doesn't it?
And I wonder if they'll be one of the few to come out of the anticipated crash this
fall-ish richer than ever...
Obviously just speculating while wondering if anyone out there (on what'll be a long-dead
thread by now, lol) Who Knows About This Stuff, has a functional brain and some energy, and
maybe who's better at searching, lol, is interested in following this up to see if it leads
anywhere interesting? Especially with the regs coming off this Oct. and a resultant crash
expected.
You may not be surprised to learn this, but the organization that pioneered the
specialization of working with financial speculators in creating political crises to
manipulate 19th Century bonds markets was actually, hold it, the Okhrana , the
Czarist secret police. The elaborate competing games that Mercer, Soros, Deripaska, et al.,
seem to be up to is a hoary tradition of false flags, dirty-tricks, forgeries, provocations,
and assassinations carried out to police the Czarist Court from afar. When you have a chance,
you might want to go back to the beginning of this, which I wrote about a dozen or so years
ago during a simpler time of crisis (never seems to end, does it?):
The History of Political Dirty Tricks: Pt. 1, The Okhrana and the Paris Bourse https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2006/11/15/271437/-
The History of Political Dirty-Tricks: (Pt 2) How to Colonize a Larger Country https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2006/11/29/275653/-
The History of Dirty Tricks (pt. 3): Who Benefited From the Self-Destruction of Europe?,
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2006/12/11/279897/-
because the details immediately debunk the MSM narrative.
Russiagate! has turned into some kind of a weird game of mutual advantage that the CIA
is playing with Putin after it became clear that the Moscow regime change operation (which
was supposed to follow those in Ukraine and Syria -- which is how this thing started -- had
failed miserably. The Agency gets its revenge against Manafort and Flynn (who were
instrumental in blocking the intermediate ops), and Putin gets the credit for fucking with
the heads of the Deep State and another term as uncontested boss of the Kremlin.
The Booby Prize goes to the parrots in the major media who still really believe that
Manafort was working with Deripaska inside the Trump Campaign in 2016 to advance Putin's
influence. That joint venture, if there ever was one, certainly wasn't helped much when
Deripaska sued Manafort in open court three times , first in the Cayman Islands in 2014,
followed by a 2015 filing in federal court in Virginia. That information led eventually to
front-page exposure in the New York Times, leading to Manafort's being dismissed as
Campaign Director, and most recently this January using information contained in the
indictment handed down by Mueller. . .
The lesson here: The Great Game continues.
It's clear to those few critical thinkers following this sewer of bullshit that just about
everyone involved in this ridiculous false flag is some kind of Deep Stater/intelligence
operative. It is, as you say, some weird Game of Thrones nonsense funded from the $100 B
black budget that taxpayers willingly fork over.
The UK poisoning thing is just more of the same. The victim was known to Steele, and they
shared the same intelligence officer. The victim had been pardoned by Russia years ago. But
"Russia,Russia,Russia".
----
Unfortunately, I do believe the propaganda is drowning out the truth. More and more people
accept the "fact" of Russian "meddling" (whatever the fuck "crime" that is). Each false flag
is trumpeted until debunked. Then, like the Chesire Cat, the accusation fades but the dirt is
left to stick to Russia.
The WSWS series on how many spies, special forces, and intelligence folks are running in
the Democratic Party primaries is just the brown icing on the cake of the militarized state
that America has been turned into by the neocons.
I have not had the heart to find out what is behind the latest incoming barrel-of-shit
bomb: "Putin accused the Jews". (Could he have accused the neocons, many of whom have Israeli
dual citizenship?)
The entire Spygate scandal is finally being exposed. In this episode I address the
scandalous beginnings of the FBI investigation into Trump and the sources they may be
hiding.
If John Solomon were still doing journalism, the lede of
this piece would be that the FBI interviewed Oleg Deripaska in September 2016, even as the Russian operation to tamper in the
election was ongoing.
Two months before Trump was elected president, Deripaska was in New York as part of Russia's United Nations delegation when
three FBI agents awakened him in his home; at least one agent had worked with Deripaska on the aborted effort to rescue Levinson.
During an hour-long visit, the agents posited a theory that Trump's campaign was secretly colluding with Russia to hijack the
U.S. election.
"Deripaska laughed but realized, despite the joviality, that they were serious," the lawyer said. "So he told them in his informed
opinion the idea they were proposing was false. 'You are trying to create something out of nothing,' he told them." The agents
left though the FBI sought more information in 2017 from the Russian, sources tell me. Waldman declined to say if Deripaska has
been in contact with the FBI since Sept, 2016.
Telling that story would make it clear that the FBI pursued an investigation into Russian tampering at the source, by questioning
Russians suspected of being involved. Republicans should be happy to know the FBI was using such an approach.
But Solomon isn't doing journalism anymore -- even his employer now
acknowledges that that's true. After
complaints about his propaganda (in part, attacking the Mueller investigation) he has been relegated to the opinion section of
The Hill.
Not before his last effort to impugn Mueller, though, claiming that because the FBI used Deripaska as a go-between in a 2009 effort
to rescue Robert Levinson, Mueller is prevented from investigating him now.
In 2009, when Mueller ran the FBI,
the
bureau asked Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska to spend millions of his own dollars funding an FBI-supervised operation to rescue
a retired FBI agent, Robert Levinson, captured in Iran while working for the CIA in 2007.
[snip]
Deripaska's lawyer said the Russian ultimately spent $25 million assembling a private search and rescue team that worked with
Iranian contacts under the FBI's watchful eye. Photos and videos indicating Levinson was alive were uncovered.
Then in fall 2010, the operation secured an offer to free Levinson. The deal was scuttled, however, when the State Department
become uncomfortable with Iran's terms, according to Deripaska's lawyer and the Levinson family.
FBI officials confirmed State hampered their efforts.
"We tried to turn over every stone we could to rescue Bob, but every time we started to get close, the State Department seemed
to always get in the way," said Robyn Gritz, the retired agent who supervised the Levinson case in 2009, when Deripaska first
cooperated, but who left for another position in 2010 before the Iranian offer arrived. "I kept Director Mueller and Deputy Director
[John] Pistole informed of the various efforts and operations, and they offered to intervene with State, if necessary."
FBI officials ended the operation in 2011, concerned that Deripaska's Iranian contacts couldn't deliver with all the U.S. infighting.
Even assuming Solomon's tale -- which is that offered by Deripaska's lawyer -- is factually correct, what this means is that the
FBI used Deripaska as an asset, just like they've used Christopher Steele as a source. Of course, using ex-MI6 officer Steele, for
the frothy right, is a heinous crime. But using a Russian billionaire, according to a propagandist who has been regurgitating Trump
spin since he was elected, is heroic. Perhaps that's why a Trump crony, Bryan Lanza, is also trying to help Deripaska's company
beat the sanctions
recently imposed on him.
Of course, Solomon doesn't consider the possibility that FBI and State balked in 2011 because Deripaska himself had proven unreliable.
Which would explain a lot of what transpired in the years since. Nor does he consider --
nor has the frothy right generally -- the
possibility that any damning
disinformation in the Steele dossier ended up there in part via Deripaska.
Certainly, Deripaska's own asset, Paul Manafort, seemed
prepared to
capitalize on that disinformation.
As the Mueller investigation has proceeded, we've gotten just a glimpse of how the spooks trade in information, involving allies
like Steele and Stefan Halper, and more sordid types like George Nader (who appears to have traded information to get out of consequences
for a child porn habit), Felix Sater (who claims, dubiously, to be offering full cooperation with Mueller based on years of working
off his own mob ties), and even Deripaska.
Curiously, it's Deripaska that propagandists spewing the White House line seem most interested in celebrating.
Update: Chuck Ross did a story based on
Solomon's report, and did note that the FBI questioned Deripaska in September 2016. But, fresh off complaining that I had
called him out for doing this in another story, turns a story about Manafort and his long-time Russian associate into a story about
the dossier (in which Deripaska is not named).
In September 2016, FBI agents approached Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska to ask about allegations President Donald Trump's
campaign was colluding with the Russian government to influence the election, according to a new report.
Deripaska, who was at his apartment in New York City for the interview, waved the three agents off of the collusion theory,
saying there was no coordination between the Trump team and Kremlin,
The Hill reported Monday.
The agents, one of whom Deripaska knew from a previous FBI case, said they believed former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort
was involved in the conspiracy, an allegation made in the infamous Steele dossier.
Ross then continues on, dossier dossier dossier dossier dossier, including this claim not supported by any public evidence.
It is also an indicator of how they investigated some of the allegations made in the dossier.
By the time September 2016 rolled around, it had been
two months since Deripaska go-between Konstantin Kilimnik emailed (
probably via
a PRISM service ) Manafort about paying off his debt to Deripaska by giving inside dirt on the campaign. There were meetings
in NYC. In September 2016, Alex Van der Zwaan was
actively covering
up the ongoing efforts to hide Manafort's involvement in Ukraine's persecution of Yulia Tymoshenko, and doing so in the servers of
a law firm going to pains to clear their name.
And all that's before you consider what hasn't been shared with Congress and leaked to the press.
Meanwhile, the only mention of Deripaska in the dossier by September was an undated
July report claiming
that Manafort was happy to have the focus on Russia because the Trump corruption in China was worse (and also suggesting that Manafort
used Carter Page as a go-between with Russia); given reports about when Steele shared reports with the FBI, it's not clear the Bureau
would have had that yet. In any case, the more extensive discussion of Manafort comes later, after the Deripaska interview.
Had Manafort been a surveillance focus solely for the dossier (something that wasn't even true for Page), you'd have heard that
by now.
Every time Mueller submits a filing explaining how the Manafort Ukraine investigation came out of the Russia investigation, he
has mentioned Deripaska. Trump's own team leaked questions suggesting that Mueller is sitting on information that Manafort reached
out to Russians asking for help (and Deripaska was among those we know he was in touch with).
And yet, after competently noting that the FBI interviewed Deripaska, Ross made the crazypants suggestion that any suspicion of
Manafort would arise from the dossier and not abundant other known evidence.
I fail to see how Solomon is saying Mueller isn't allowed to investigate Deripaska because he once recruited him for the
Levinson rescue operation. Perhaps if you were doing honest blogging, the lede of your piece would be how three FBI agents
showed up to persuade Deripaska to help them create a phony Russiagate narrative. Or isn't this line obvious enough: 'You are
trying to create something out of nothing.'
You might also want to be asking why Mueller omitted any mention of Deripaska in his Manafort indictment. Strange, huh?
Excuse me? What part of 'You are trying to create something out of nothing' didn't you get? I'm sorry,
but this is the elephant in the room. Three agents show up to tell a Russian oligarch to go along with their tale of collusion --
I guess because he's been so cooperative in the past. Not only that, they suggest to him "keep an open mind" about things. What does
that mean?
Forget R-TV, this should be on every American news network not to mention every major newspaper. But of course we know it won't
be, for obvious reasons. So ignore this if you wish, but please, spare me the suggestion this is tin-foil stuff. It's right there in the open.
Special Counsel Robert Mueller obtained a secret order from a federal magistrate judge to suspend the statute of limitations
on one of the charges he ultimately brought against Paul Manafort, a court filing revealed Monday evening.
Mueller did not inform Manafort of the secret order until after the former Trump campaign chairman had requested that charge be thrown out, the filing
said. [ ]
Mueller also disclosed in the Monday court filing that, as recently as April 30 of this year, the government of Cyprus
was still turning over documents related to the special counsel's Manafort investigation. [ ]
[Editor's note: The following article is an excerpt
from investigative journalist Seth Hettena's new book, "Trump / Russia: A Definitive History."]
*
[quote] [ ] In April of 2008, Deripaska paid nearly $19 million to fund the acquisition of Chorne More, then paid Manafort an
additional $7.35 million in fees. Years later, Deripaska learned that the purchase price of Chorne More was $1.1 million less
than Manafort and Gates had led him to believe. Gates and Manafort had simply pocketed the difference, laundering it through accounts
in Cyprus that the two men used as "their personal piggy banks," the oligarch said in a lawsuit. [ ] [end quote]
Emails in 2016 between former British spy Christopher Steele and Justice Department official
Bruce Ohr suggest Steele was deeply concerned about the legal status of a Putin-linked Russian
oligarch, and at times seemed to be advocating on the oligarch's behalf , in the same time
period Steele worked on collecting the Russia-related allegations against Donald Trump that
came to be known as the Trump dossier. The emails show Steele and Ohr were in frequent contact,
that they intermingled talk about Steele's research and the oligarch's affairs, and that Glenn
Simpson , head of the dirt-digging group Fusion GPS that hired Steele to compile the dossier,
was also part of the ongoing conversation.
The emails, given to Congress by the Justice Department, began on Jan. 12, 2016, when Steele
sent Ohr a New Year's greeting. Steele brought up the case of Russian aluminum magnate Oleg
Deripaska (referred to in various emails as both OD and OVD), who was at the time seeking a
visa to attend an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in the United States. Years
earlier, the U.S. revoked Deripaska's visa, reportedly on the basis of suspected involvement
with Russian organized crime. Deripaska was close to Paul Manafort , the short-term Trump
campaign chairman now on trial for financial crimes, and this year was sanctioned in the wake
of Russian involvement in the 2016 presidential election.
"I heard from Adam WALDMAN [a Deripaska lawyer/lobbyist] yesterday that OD is applying for
another official US visa ice [sic] APEC business at the end of February," Steele wrote in the
Jan. 12 email. Steele said Deripaska was being "encouraged by the Agency guys who told Adam
that the USG [United States Government] stance on [Deripaska] is softening." Steele concluded:
"A positive development it seems."
Steele also asked Ohr when he might be coming to London, or somewhere in Europe, "as I would
be keen to meet up here and talk business." Ohr replied warmly the same day and said he would
likely travel to Europe, but not the U.K., at least twice in February.
Steele emailed again on Feb. 8 to alert Ohr that "our old friend OD apparently has been
granted another official [emphasis in original] visa to come to the US later this
month." Steele wrote, "As far as I'm concerned, this is good news all round although as before,
it would be helpful if you could monitor it and let me know if any complications arise." Ohr
replied that he knew about Deripaska's visa, and "to the extent I can I will keep an eye on the
situation." Steele again asked to meet anytime Ohr was in the U.K. or Western Europe.
Steele wrote again on Feb. 21 in an email headlined "Re: OVD – Visit To The US."
Steele told Ohr he had talked to Waldman and to Paul Hauser, who was Deripaska's London lawyer.
Steele reported that there would be a U.S. government meeting on Deripaska that week –
"an inter-agency meeting on him this week which I guess you will be attending." Steele said he
was "circulating some recent sensitive Orbis reporting" on Deripaska that suggested Deripaska
was not a "tool" of the Kremlin . Steele said he would send the reporting to a name that is
redacted in the email, "as he has asked, for legal reasons I understand, for all such reporting
be filtered through him (to you at DoJ and others)."
Deripaska's rehabilitation was a good thing, Steele wrote: "We reckon therefore that the
forthcoming OVD contact represents a good opportunity for the USG." Ohr responded by saying,
"Thanks Chris! This is extremely interesting. I hope we can follow up in the next few weeks as
you suggest."
Steele was eager to see Ohr face to face. On March 17, Steele wrote a brief note asking if
Ohr had any update on plans to visit Europe "in the near term where we could meet up." Ohr said
he did not and asked if Steele would like to set up a call. It is not clear whether a call took
place.
There are no emails for more than three months after March 17. Then, on July 1, came the
first apparent reference to Donald Trump, then preparing to accept the Republican nomination
for president. "I am seeing [redacted] in London next week to discuss ongoing business," Steele
wrote to Ohr, "but there is something separate I wanted to discuss with you informally and
separately. It concerns our favourite business tycoon!" Steele said he had planned to come to
the U.S. soon, but now it looked like it would not be until August. He needed to talk in the
next few days, he said, and suggested getting together by Skype before he left on holiday. Ohr
suggested talking on July 7. Steele agreed.
Ohr's phone log for July 7 notes, "Call with Chris Steele" from 8:00 a.m. to 8:30 a.m.
eastern time.
(A caution here: It is possible the "favourite business tycoon" could be Deripaska, or
perhaps even someone else, and not Trump. But no one referred to Deripaska in that way anywhere
else in the communications. Also, Steele made it clear the "tycoon" subject was separate from
other business. And July 1 was just before Steele met with the FBI with the first installment
of the Trump dossier . So it appears reasonable, given Steele's well-known obsession with
Trump, and unless information emerges otherwise, to see the "favourite business tycoon" as
Trump.)
On the morning of Friday, July 29, Steele wrote to say that he would "be in DC at short
notice on business" later that day and Saturday. He asked if Ohr and wife Nellie were free for
breakfast on Saturday morning. They were, and agreed to meet for breakfast at the Mayflower
Hotel in downtown Washington.
Ohr's log of contacts with Steele lists a meeting with Steele on July 30. Steele finished
installments of the dossier on July 19 and 26.
On Aug. 22, Ohr received an email from Simpson with the subject line "Can u ring." There was
no message beyond a phone number. Ohr's log lists some sort of contact – it's not
specified what – with Simpson on Aug. 22.
Steele finished an installment of the dossier on Aug. 22.
Steele dated three installments of the dossier on Sept. 14. On Sept. 16, Steele wrote Ohr to
say that he would be back in Washington soon "on business of mutual interest." Ohr said he
would be out of town Sept. 19-21. On Sept. 21, Steele wrote to say he was in Washington and was
"keen to meet up with you." The two agreed to have breakfast on Sept. 23. Meeting on that date
would be "more useful," Steele said, "after my scheduled meetings" the day before. It's not
clear what those scheduled meetings were. Ohr's log lists a meeting with Steele on Sept.
23.
On October 18, Steele emailed Ohr at 6:51 a.m. with a pressing matter. "If you are in
Washington today, I have something quite urgent I would like to discuss with you, preferably by
Skype (even before work if you can)." Steele wrote. Ohr suggested they do it immediately.
"Thanks Bruce. 2 mins," Steele replied. Ohr's log lists a call with Steele on Oct. 18.
There is no note on what they discussed. But a few hours later, still on Oct. 18, Steele
emailed Ohr again, and the subject was related to Deripaska. "Further to our Skypecon earlier
today," Steele wrote, Hauser had asked Steele to forward to Ohr information about a dispute
between the government of Ukraine and RUSAL, Deripaska's aluminum company. "Naturally, he
[Hauser] wants to protect the client's [Deripaska's] interests and reputation," Steele wrote.
"I pass it on for what it's worth."
After another few hours had passed, Ohr asked if Steele had time for a Skype call. Steele
said, let's do it now. Ohr's log lists calls with Steele on Oct. 18 and 19.
Steele finished dossier installments on Oct. 18, 19, and 20. The installment on Oct. 18 was
the infamous Russians-offer-Carter-Page-millions-of-dollars allegation, and the ones on Oct. 19
and 20 concerned Manafort's alleged role in an alleged collusion scheme.
On Nov. 21, other players entered the conversation. Ohr received an an email from Kathleen
Kavalec, a deputy assistant secretary of state in the Bureau of European Affairs in the State
Department. (Kavalec is now President Trump's nominee to be ambassador to Albania.) Kavalec
sent Ohr information on Simon Kukes, a Russian-born executive who contributed more than
$250,000 to Trump-supporting organizations after Trump won the Republican nomination. Kavalec
said she met Kukes around 2014, when "Tom Firestone brought him in," a reference to former
Justice Department official Thomas Firestone, now a partner at the Washington law firm
BakerHostetler. Kavalec also linked to a Mother Jones article about Kukes.
Ohr responded by saying, "I may have heard about him from Tom Firestone as well, but I can't
recall for certain." Then Kavalec answered by saying she was "just re-looking at my notes from
my convo with Chris Steele" and that "I see that Chris said Kukes has some connection to Serge
Millian, an emigre who is identified by FT as head of the Russian-American Chamber of
Commerce." [In the book Russian Roulette , authors Michael Isikoff and David Corn
wrote that Millian claimed to have some sort of business relationship with the Trump
organization – which the Trumps denied. More importantly, Millian went on to become
Steele's source for the infamous "golden showers" allegation that Donald Trump had engaged in a
kinky sex scene in a Moscow hotel room in 2013.]
Ohr's phone log indicates that he called Simpson on Dec. 8 to set up a meeting for coffee
the next day, Dec. 9.
There is not another email until Dec. 11. Simpson sent Nellie Ohr a link to an article in
the left-wing ThinkProgress headlined, "Why has the NRA been cozying up to Russia?" The article
focused on now-indicted Russian agent Maria Butina and Russian Alexander Torshin. Nellie Ohr
responded, "Thank you!" to which Simpson, the next day, answered, "Please ring if you can."
Nellie Ohr forwarded the Simpson message to Bruce Ohr, saying, "I assume Glenn means you not
me."
Ohr's phone log on Dec. 13 said, "Glenn Simpson. Some more news. Yesterday 9:27 a.m. Spoke
with him."
Steele dated a dossier installment Dec. 13.
On Jan. 20, 2017, inauguration day, Bruce Ohr received an email from Simpson that said
simply, "Can you call me please?"
The emails raise a clear question of whether Steele was working, directly or indirectly,
with Oleg Deripaska at the same time Steele was compiling the dossier – and whether the
Justice Department, along with Simpson and Fusion GPS, was part of the project. Given
Deripaska's place in the Russian power structure, what that means in the big picture is
unclear.
On Feb. 9 of this year, Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Charles Grassley wrote a letter
to Hauser, the London lawyer, and asked, "Is it the case that Mr. Steele, through you, works or
has worked on behalf of Mr. Deripaska or businesses associated with him?"
Hauser refused to answer, claiming such information was privileged. But he added: "I can
confirm that neither my firm nor I was involved in the commissioning of, preparation of or
payment for the so-called 'Steele Dossier.' I am not aware of any involvement by Mr. Deripaska
in commissioning, preparing or paying for that document."
On Feb. 14, at an open hearing of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Republican Sen. Tom
Cotton asked FBI Director Christopher Wray about Deripaska.
"Is it fair to call him a Putin-linked Russian oligarch?" asked Cotton.
"Well, I'll leave that characterization to others, and certainly not in this setting," Wray
said.
"Chuck Grassley, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, last week sent a letter to a
London-based lawyer who represents Mr. Deripaska," Cotton continued, "and asked if Christopher
Steele was employed, either directly or indirectly, by Oleg Deripaska at the time he was
writing the so-called Steele dossier. Do you know if Christopher Steele worked for Oleg
Deripaska?'
"That's not something I can answer," Wray said.
"Could we discuss it in a classified setting?"
"There might be more we could say there," Wray answered.
The newly-released Ohr-Steele-Simpson emails are just one part of the dossier story. But if
nothing else, they show that there is still much for the public to learn about the complex and
far-reaching effort behind it.
from
https://www.sott.net/article/393095-DOJ-gives-Congress-emails-between-Ohr-Steele-Simpson-suggesting-ties-to-Putin-ally-oligarch-Deripaska
Christopher Steele was working on the Trump dossier at the same time he was lobbying DOJ
official Bruce Ohr on behalf of a Russian oligarch linked to Putin.
Newly revealed emails show Steele thought the U.S. government should grant visas to
Deripaska, who had been barred from traveling to the U.S.
Steele asked Ohr to "keep an eye" on Deripaska's visa case.
At the same time Christopher Steele was compiling a dossier accusing the Trump campaign of
colluding with the Russian government, the former British spy was lobbying Department of
Justice official Bruce Ohr on behalf of a Russian oligarch with close ties to Russian President
Vladimir Putin.
The connection between Steele and the oligarch, Oleg Deripaska, is laid out in emails the
Justice Department recently provided Congress.
The emails show that Steele, a former British spy, advocated for Deripaska in negotiations
over his visa status with the U.S. government. Deripaska, an aluminum magnate, had been blocked
from traveling to the U.S. in 2006 because of suspected ties to Russian mobsters. Deripaska
hired an American lawyer named Adam Waldman in 2009 to lobby the U.S. government to obtain
a visa for the billionaire.
The Washington Examiner
detailed the exchanges, which show Steele discussing Deripaska with Ohr, the former No. 4
official at the Justice Department.
Steele's relationship with Deripaska has been one of the more bizarre aspects of the dossier
saga, mainly because it raises the possibility that the Putin-connected businessman was a
source for the salacious document. Steele's unverified 35-page dossier relies heavily on
information from anonymous Kremlin insiders who claimed that the Russian government was
colluding with the Trump campaign to defeat Hillary Clinton. (RELATED:
Oleg Deripaska's Lawyer Goes On The Record About His Senate Testimony)
"I heard from Adam WALDMAN [a Deripaska lawyer/lobbyist] yesterday that OD is applying for
another official US visa ice [sic] APEC business at the end of February," Steele wrote in a
Jan. 12, 2016, email to Ohr, according to The Examiner.
Steele claimed that Deripaska had been "encouraged by the Agency guys who told Adam that the
USG [United States Government] stance on [Deripaska] is softening."
"A positive development it seems," Steele added.
Steele emailed Ohr again on Feb. 8, 2016, to say that Deripaska had been granted a visa to
travel to the U.S. later that month. He also made a request of Ohr in the email.
"As far as I'm concerned, this is good news all round although as before, it would be
helpful if you could monitor it and let me know if any complications arise," he wrote.
Ohr said that "to the extent I can I will keep an eye on the situation."
In a Feb. 21, 2016, email Steele said he was circulating reporting that he had done on
Deripaska that suggested the oligarch was not a "tool" of the Kremlin.
"We reckon therefore that the forthcoming [Deripaska] contact represents a good opportunity
for the [U.S. Government]," said Steele.
Links between the Steele and Deripaska began to emerge earlier in 2018 after Republican
lawmakers began inquiring about a possible relationship between the two.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley has pressed Steele, Waldman and a
London-based lawyer named Paul Hauser about Steele's possible links to Deripaska.
FBI Director Christopher Wray was also asked about the relationship during a Senate Select
Committee on Intelligence hearing on Feb. 13.
"Do you know if Christopher Steele worked for Oleg Deripaska?" Arkansas Republican Sen. Tom
Cotton asked Wray.
"That's not something I can answer," Wray replied, adding added that "there might be more"
that he could say in a classified setting.
It is still not clear whether Steele was working for Deripaska or interested in his visa
status for other reasons.
Steele's support for Deripaska would seem to undercut one of Trump critics' theories about
possible collusion: that Deripaska conspired with Paul Manafort.
Deripaska's business ties to the longtime Republican political operative have come under
intense scrutiny from Democrats and the media, leading to some speculation that Manafort and
Deripaska may have colluded during the 2016 presidential campaign. (RELATED: Chuck Grassley
Connects Dossier Dots)
In one July 7, 2016, email, Manafort
told a Ukraine-based associate that he would be willing to provide briefings about the
campaign to Deripaska.
"If he needs private briefings we can accommodate," Manafort wrote to his associate,
Konstantin Kilimnik.
At the time, Manafort and Deripaska were in a dispute over a failed business deal involving
Ukrainian cable companies.
Manafort is currently on trial in Virginia for tax evasion and money laundering related to
his political work in Ukraine.
Steele and Ohr maintained contact throughout the presidential campaign and beyond, according
to Ohr's emails.
Nellie Ohr also happened to work at the time for Fusion GPS, the opposition research firm
that hired Steele.
Bruce Ohr and Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson also appear to have had contact prior to the
election. Simpson emailed Ohr on Aug. 22, 2016, asking to speak by phone.
It is not clear whether the two spoke, but Simpson did not disclose that contact when he
discussed Ohr during a Nov. 14, 2017, deposition before the House Intelligence Committee.
During that interview, Simpson said he met with Ohr for coffee after the election to discuss
the Trump investigation. Simpson did not tell the House panel that Ohr's wife worked for Fusion
GPS.
Chittum's work makes more sense than either of the books reviewed here. The two books
discussed above are good for the Harry Potter set but in no way conform to 2018 reality.
I frequently reread Chittum's work and am amazed at how he correctly analyzed the future into
what is contemporary USSA.
LOOK NO further, than the incipient election of a reparation Democrat governor in Georgia and
a like minded legislature,come November, for validation of Chittum's hypotheses. The one
weakness in his predictions is the belief that there will be a patriotic core in the local
police and national military that could be relied on to protect the lives and property of
traditional Americans. This just won't happen. The FBI, CIA, ATFE, Homeland Security Police
and like activities set the pace, call the shots and control the funds and the locals provide
a conditioned response.
Chittum writing 20 years back could not see the rise of the mass surveillance and correct
thought propagation that we increasingly welcome or endure today.
My bet is Unz Review will totally access denied after the massive Democrat election gains in
November.
Inc.'s Fawning Response to James Gunn Scandal Reveals Where Its True
Loyalties Lie •
It's the classic man-bites-dog story; a Leftist artist suffered a career setback because of
his statements on social media. The person in question is Guardians of the
Galaxy director James Gunn, who lost his gig directing Disney's next installment in
the film series after independent reporters such as Mike Cernovich highlighted his "jokes"
about the sexual exploitation of children. Senator Ted Cruz, among others, was outraged and
suggested Gunn's comments even bordered on illegality.
Hollywood celebrities are defending Gunn and even demanding that he be rehired [
Chris Pratt
and more break silence after James Gunn fired from 'Guardians of the Galaxy 3 ,' by
Lisa Respers France, CNN, July 23 2018). However, one can't help but notice the same
celebrities defending or telling graphic "jokes" about sexually exploiting children are also
the people who want careers ended for Politically Incorrect comments directed at privileged
classes such as women, homosexuals, or nonwhites [
Note: Hollywood Finds Child Rape Hilarious , by John Nolte, Breitbart, July
22, 2018].
It's not clear why Disney, a company dependent on its appeal to children, would ever employ
someone who thinks horrific crimes are comedic fodder. After all, as Gunn himself once
tweeted:
Yet it isn't just Leftist celebrities who are suddenly eager to defend the sacred right of
free speech when it comes to pedophilia. Shockingly, some Conservativism
Inc. luminaries, particularly those who love to showily brag about their
Christianity and social
conservatism , have chosen this hill to die on as well.
David French, one of the most prominent
Never Trump activists of
the 2016 election, rushed to Gunn's defense, saying:
Similarly, S.E. Cupp, who has a long career as one of CNN's token conservatives , decided this of all
things was something that she couldn't remain silent about. She endorsed French's tweet in
support of Gunn and added:
Yet only two months ago. when mob rule on Twitter decided Roseanne's fate, Cupp gleefully
piled on. Like NR 's French, she faulted ABC for hiring Roseanne in the first
place.
Remember, this is a woman who was an early supporter of birtherism, has compared Muslims
to Nazis, took to Twitter regularly to attack citizens both private and public, floated wild
conspiracy theories and bullied Trump opponents with racist, homophobic and anti-Semitic
insults.
Minicon Ben Shapiro , another
opponent of Trump during the primaries, is also among Gunn defenders. Shapiro acknowledged
Gunn's tweets were "loathsome" but said "that doesn't mean he should have lost his job at
Disney". [ Should
James Gunn have lost his job at Disney ? Daily Wire, July 20, 2018]
Roseanne, however, was different: "Roseanne played herself in the series, so when she made a
new racist reference about Valerie Jarrett, her persona was inseparable from her
character," Shapiro wrote. " Roseanne was Roseanne."
Erick Erickson is another
Never Trumper whose views about respectability have mysteriously changed within two months.
When Roseanne was driven off the air, Erickson self-righteously proclaimed: "Her joke was not
in poor taste. It was racist" [
Roseanne's behavior is not defensible , The Maven, May 30, 2018]. Yet regarding Gunn,
he said:
The last comment is revealing. It's hard to imagine in what ways conservatives are "winning"
-- Trump supporters are regularly attacked on the street and expelled from businesses. Random
white people are humiliated by the Main Stream Media and
fired
from their jobs
for calling the police. [
BBQ Becky, Permit Patty and why the Internet is shaming white people who police people 'simply
for being black' , Jessica Guynn, USA TODAY, July 18, 2018] Meanwhile, even as the
Democrats become ever more radical, they continue to enjoy all but unanimous support from the
MSM and are leading the polls. Insofar as the American Right has won any major victories in the
recent past, it was President Trump's election -- something Erickson and his Never Trump
co-conspirators fought every step of the way.
Yet the strange connection between Never Trump and defending James Gunn is easily explained.
All of the figures above rely on Leftist media, and the
powerful mafias that dominate it , to grant them fame and legitimacy as "leading" American
conservatives. For that reason, Never Trump conservatives share a common interest with System
media outlets in making sure only certain people have access to a mass audience -- certainly
not independents like Mike Cernovich [
How Pizzagate Pusher Mike Cernovich Keeps Getting People Fired , by Luke O'Brien,
Huffington Post, July 21, 2018].
For ideological and ethnic reasons, Never Trumpers are desperate to purge the American Right
of any authentic populist and nationalist tendencies that can't be controlled from the top
down. Their power relies on their audience remaining corralled within a certain ideological
space and not hearing dissident ideas such as the biological reality of race or the political
insanity of expecting nonwhites to vote for "limited government." These Beltway Right hacks
have a positive interest in making sure that websites and platform outside Conservatism Inc.,
although equally or more critical of supposed common enemies on the Left, are marginalized and
stripped of resources.
Thus, Cupp, French, Shapiro, Erickson et. al will always be far more eager to purge the
Conservative movement than to combat Leftist control of key cultural institutions. To a Never
Trump conservative dreaming of future bylines in The New York Times and television
appearances on CNN, a far-Left Hollywood degenerate poisoning the minds of America's youth
isn't even a problem, let alone an enemy. The problem for Conservatism Inc. remains Donald
Trump and what he represents -- a fighting American Right, united behind nationalism, and
willing to do what it takes to win power.
After all, the point of that fighting Right is not to get a sinecure in the enemy's System.
The point is to destroy it entirely.
If Zero Hedge commenters represent a part of the US public opinion Clinton neoliberal are in
real trouble. This is real situation when the elite can't goverm as usual
Notable quotes:
"... it does seem odd that Rosenstein was part of the plan to indict charges on Russians right before Trump met Putin since he met Trump earlier that week to discuss those plans ..."
"... Mule-face is just as conflicted... he applies and interviews for the FBI job, doesn't get it... then takes on an investigation of Trump??? Bullshiiiiiiiiit!!!! Special Counsel statutes are CLEAR... but Sessions is totally corrupt. ..."
"... For those of you who have not seen this...This has been in the works since April...... https://gosar.house.gov/uploadedfiles/criminal-referral.pdf ..."
"... Recuse himself? He violated US Code with improper appointment of Special Counsel. Don't even think he didn't know. That alone is enough for Malfeasance, Abuse of Office, and a mistrial for anything Bueller can get in front of a Judge. ..."
News of the resolution comes after weeks of frustration by Congressional investigators, who
have repeatedly accused Rosenstein and the DOJ of "slow walking" documents related to their
investigations. Lawmakers say they've been given the runaround - while Rosenstein and the rest
of the DOJ have maintained that handing over vital documents would compromise ongoing
investigations.
Not even last week's
heavily redacted release of the FBI's FISA surveillance application on former Trump
campaign Carter Page was enough to dissuade the GOP lawmakers from their efforts to impeach
Rosenstein. In fact, its release may have sealed Rosenstein's fate after it was revealed that
the FISA application and subsequent renewals - at least one of which Rosenstein signed off on ,
relied heavily on the salacious and largely unproven Steele dossier.
In late June, Rosenstein along with FBI Director Christopher Wray clashed with House
Republicans during a fiery hearing over an internal DOJ report criticizing the FBI's handling
of the Hillary Clinton email investigation by special agents who harbored extreme animus
towards Donald Trump while expressing support for Clinton. Republicans on the panel grilled a
defiant Rosenstein on the Trump-Russia investigation which has yet to prove any collusion
between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin.
"This country is being hurt by it. We are being divided," Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) said of
Mueller's investigation. "Whatever you got," Gowdy added, " Finish it the hell up because this
country is being torn apart. "
Rosenstein pushed back - dodging responsibility for decisions made by subordinates while
claiming that Mueller was moving "as expeditiously as possible," and insisting that he was "not
trying to hide anything."
" We are not in contempt of this Congress, and we are not going to be in contempt of this
Congress ," Rosenstein told lawmakers.
Congressional GOP were not impressed.
" For over eight months, they have had the opportunity to choose transparency. But they've
instead chosen to withhold information and impede any effort of Congress to conduct
oversight," said Representative Mark Meadows of North Carolina, a sponsor of Thursday's House
resolution who raised the possibility of impeachment this week. " If Rod Rosenstein and the
Department of Justice have nothing to hide, they certainly haven't acted like it. " -
New York Times (6/28/18)
And now, Rosenstein's fate is in the hands of Congress.
I got directed to Meadows Twitter feed earlier and I couldn't believe some of the comments
from the Hilary crowd. Either they actually believe the CNN/MSNBC "Russia did it" bullshit or
they've decided to roll with that narrative regardless of what reality shows because they
think it gives them some kind of leverage if they keep spewing those accusations. Those
people are really sick in the head.
Somewhat. Yes, sometimes cowards need a good swift kick in the ass to get em
going...lol.
But you gotta place yourself into the mind of a bureautocracy kleptocrat like Rosenstein
to discover where his head was at (or whatever bureaucrat, pick any one)...this was "business
as usual"...for EIGHT SOLID YEARS they were able to delay/obstruct Congressional oversight at
will into any number of things, from "recycled hard drives" to "rogue agents" to "smashed
Blackberries" to "Bleachbit" to "illegal servers" to "spontaneous protests in Benghazi" to
"Car Czars" to "the benign tracking of weapons into Mexico" (lol...my personal favorite) et
fucking cetra so...there was no reason whatsoever that Rosenstein would suspect that
oversight would..."change".
See, all of this nation ending angst, hate, ill-will, divide & conquer, the rending of
clothes and gnashing of teeth could have been completely avoided if the People would have
just complied with their betters, the elites, the educated, the non-deplorables and used that
gift of, ahem, "democracy" (lol) that the rich & powerful are so insecure in trusting us
with...none of this would have happened.
There would have been a "historic" coronation of our new Queen Hillary! There were royal
wedding plans even!
And we, the deplorables, the plebes, the low-lifes, had to go and mess up their plans of
sweeping it all under the rug ;-)
Why in the Sam hell do you think they're jawboning this thing to death ..
swmnguy Wed, 07/25/2018 - 19:39 Permalink
"They'll move to impeach Rosenstein just as they voted to repeal ObamaCare 50 times or
however many. And, just like when they got the chance to re-do ObamaCare altogether and had
not the foggiest notion what to do, if they get to impeach Rosenstein they won't have any
idea how to proceed."
This ..
Damned Kabuki, will be answered! With more Kabuki ..
Also a big problem, was his CHOICE to not recuse himself from being involved in appointing
Mueller, when he was heavily involved in the investigations, such as signing a FISA warrant
to spy on Trump campaign staff when there was allegedly (in the FISA warrant) Russian
collusion.
What is the swamp hiding? This latest revelation by Republicans looking into Spygate
offers us some tantalizing clues. In this episode I address the growing efforts by the swamp
to sweep the scandal under the rug.
"Is they don't want to get into who pushed the Information into the Trump Team orbit. And,
the questions surrounding Joseph Mizut. Who was the initiator, I should say, of the
Papadopoulos, "they have dirt on Hillary story."
"If this guy was working for Western Intelligence Agencies, this whole case is going to
explode." "It's already exploding. But it's going to explode at just Nuclear Levels."
"Right?"
"Now they're starting to realize that, that may be a problem too. So, now there's a third
track. The third track Joe, is going to be:
"Verification is not necessary." "They're starting to creep this out there now."
"Remember what I told you about the "Woods Procedure." "The Woods Procedure" is a
procedure in the FBI & DOJ to verify information before it goes in front of the FISA
Court, right?"
"The new line of attack is going to be:
"Well, that's really not necessary. This thorough verification of all the information."
"Why they're going down that track I can't give you a conclusive explanation. I can only tell
you that, my guess here, is that they're realizing that whatever fork they take in the
road."
"Cater Paige who was spied on. With no verified information. Not good. Papadoplolus, who
we Prosecuted despite the fact that a potential "Western Connected Intelligence Asset,"
pushed the information into Papadopoulos. Meaning he was framed. That's not good either."
"They know there's no way out. So what are they going to do? Now, they're going to
push:
"Well, lets go back to Cater Paige. But let's say, "Alright, we may have made a mistake
but Verification is really not necessary. We were really worried he (Carter Paige) was a
terrorist or a spy. So we had to just run with it."
"Folks, they have no where to go."
"Now, how does this tie into the Bryon York piece. Remember, that they're are people up in
the House. Nunes & other folks in these Committees. Don't forget this. They're folks,
Republicans in the House & on the Senate side too who have seen the Declassified,
Unredacted documents about why this whole case stated."
"They've seen that now. They haven't seen all of the DOJ or FBI records. That is where
this fight is brewing. But the FISA application. They have seen most of what's in it. The
redacted copy the one you've seen. Obviously, has blacked out information. Hence, the
redactions. They dropped a hint yesterday. They want disclosed Joe. And, I'm quoting Bryon
York here:
"What is on pages 10-12 & 17-34. of the FISA application."
"He says, this is York:
"That is certainly a tantalizing clue dropped by the House Intel Members. But it's not
clear what is means. Comparing the relevant sections from the initial FISA application in
October & the third renewal in June much appears the same. But in pages 10-12 the date
the Republicans want redacted. Of the third renewal. There's a sightly different
headline:
"The Russian Governments coordinated effort to influence the 2016 Presidential Election."
Plus a footnote seven lines long that was not in the original."
"Folks, the Republicans know something. They have seen these redactions. now, based on
some research. I can't tell you because I have not seen the unredacted copy of the document.
I can only tell you based on research surrounding the case & some Information I've been
working hard to develop. That it may disclose, those footnotes may disclose some connections
for information streams. Again, that were not related to formal Intelligence Channels."
"In other words, the theory from the start that we've been operating on is that this case
was not developed through standard protocol. If you develop Intelligence in a Five Eyes
Country & Intelligence cooperated with the UNITED STATES against Donald Trump. You pass
that information to your domestic Intelligence Agency who passes it Central Intelligence
Agency. They vet the information before it makes it to the Presidents desk."
"That is not the way this case worked. May I suggest to you that the redactions describe
other channels. Other channels of information that developed outside of those standard
channels."
"Are we clear on this? I want to make clear what we're talking about. Standard way to do
this is Intel Agency to Intel Agency. Vet it, vet the information, check the information
before it makes it to the President. The only reason you would go outside of that network
with Intelligence, specifically against a Political Candidate in the UNITED STATES is because
you want to launder the information without vetting it. You want to clean it to make it seen
legitimate."
"We already know, based on Public admissions by State Department Officials on the Obama
Administration that they used The State Department. We already know, that there where people
working for the Clinton Team that met with people on The State Department. May I suggest that
this describes an alternative information channel outside of the standard "modus operandi"
here that is going to expose The whole thing was an information laundering operation. The
Republicans know something here folks."
Woods procedure IS required, it's not optional. And we have the FBI self-admittedly not
adhering to their own procedure. If they had, Steele would have been paid. The FBI stiffed
him.
Further, it's the Judge's responsibility to insure the Prosecutors and Agents followed the
procedure, and additionally that they vetted the sources - not just the informant. The
informant's sources. They were criminally negligent on that point as well. The Judge was no
victim here, the Judge had to be complicit in the conspiracy.
Totally illegal in their own country, so they have another country do it for them. Can it
be prosecuted as Espionage? What about when it's used in Conspiracy to commit Sedition? What
about failure to prosecute a crime of this magnitude, a direct attack on our govt by
FVEY?
What will the punishment be, nothing, be fired for incompetence, that's all. Why are they
being stubborn dicks and not handing over the information because if fucking proves they are
incompetent and gets them fired.
So either way they are fired, they just suck up more inflated salary for longer by holding
off as long as they can and fuck everyone else, fuck the government, fuck Americans, fuck
justice, they will stay there as long as they can sucking up quite a large salary well over
$100,000 per year, plus perks, plus super and we are not talking dicking around for days but
months.
Fired months and months later for not releasing the information versus fired within days
of the information being released. As simple as that and as far as they are concerned fuck
all other US citizens, they will not leave their spot at the trough of corruption until
forced.
Trump hired him but I don't think he's Trump's guy. Although it does seem odd that Rosenstein was part of the plan to indict charges on Russians right before Trump met Putin
since he met Trump earlier that week to discuss those plans. It is all theater, you got that
right, just not sure what the plot is.
Zerohedge readers might want to read this article from
theconservativetreehouse.....Rosenstein and Sessions may be up to more than meets the eye;
i.e., drain the swamp by catching the leakers:
Mule-face is just as conflicted... he applies and interviews for the FBI job, doesn't get it... then takes on an
investigation of Trump??? Bullshiiiiiiiiit!!!! Special Counsel statutes are CLEAR... but Sessions is totally corrupt.
Rosenstein signing off on the FISA documents means he should have recused himself from the
Mueller investigation instead of overseeing it. That's what is going to take him down.
Recuse himself? He violated US Code with improper appointment of Special Counsel. Don't
even think he didn't know. That alone is enough for Malfeasance, Abuse of Office, and a
mistrial for anything Bueller can get in front of a Judge.
True... but WTF is Trump thinking??? He should use this action to FIRE Rosenstein's
traitor's ass NOW. Include the useless Sessions and Wray and, obviously, McCabe and Ohr.
DiGenova for AG, David Clarke for FBI head... Maybe Andy McCarthy for new Special Counsel
to prosecute Hillary and all the rest of the Barry Obongo criminals... especially pigfart
Brennan.
What difference will this make to Brennan and the others? Granted a security clearance is
life blood to a mid-level or high level government employee who intends to start a second
career as a contractor in the classified DC government arena, but once you're retired who
gives a rat's ass.
Comey just said he doesn't have one and he's still yapping. I don't think McCabe has
one either. I don't know about the others. These guys are going to keep talking,
clearance or no clearance, unless Trump takes them into custody and puts them in Gitmo.
Or he could just stick his fingers in his ears, close his eyes and shout la, la, la la
la...
You are right. The lack of a clearance to read US classified information will mean
nothing to these particular malefactors. Their value to employers is in their notoriety
and what is in ther heads. I was de-briefed from TS cat-3 acess plus 45 or so SAPs and
other HUMINT, SIGINT and even more exotic stuff when I left DIA in 1994. I had no
clearances while I was in the business world and that meant nothing to me in terms of
income. Several years after 9/11 parts of the government started asking me to do things
for them. For me to do that my clearances had to be restored as they applied to the
specific work. None of the renewed access had anything to do with the subject matter of
SST. Based on my voluminous security dossier the adjudicators did that in 48 hours. I
asked to be debriefed from all access in the very narrow areas I consulted in for DoJ,
DoD and the NIC in May, 2015. IMO a system should be devised for granting very temporary
access to annuitants or "formers" from government whose expertise is needed for specific
projects. Government leaders like Brennan, Clapper etc should not be allowed to have
standing clearances that they can use to continue to have access through old colleagues.
that should be stopped. When you leave, you should really leave,
a bill of attainder specifies an individual by name. If that's okay then maybe we start
with the Mark Zuckerberg tax act then lean in to Sheryl Sandberg's money next.
You say:
quote
Whether
the U.S. Constitution by its text even permits agency regulations and
that they can have legal effect is a real and interesting question,
which no one will touch with a 10-foot pole.
endquote
Sounds like something said by opponents of FDR back in 1932.
A good place to start reading (including links to many who have analyzed the subject
thoroughly) is
Update : The responses have begun. James Clapper spoke on CNN this
afternoon, calling Trump's actions "a petty way of retribution."
"Well, it's interesting news. I'm reading it and learning about it just as you are. I think
it's off the top of my head it's a sad commentary,"
Clapper said. "For political reasons, this is a petty way of retribution, I suppose for
speaking out against the president, which I think, on the part of all of us, are born out of
genuine concerns about President Trump."
"It's frankly more of a courtesy that former senior officials and the intelligence community
are extended the courtesy of keeping the security clearance. Haven't had a case of using it.
And it has no bearing whatsoever on my regard or lack thereof for President Trump or what he's
doing," he continued.
* * *
President Trump is exploring ways to strip several former Obama officials of their security
clearances over politicized statements, including John Brennan, James Clapper, James Comey, Susan
Rice, and Andrew McCabe, according to White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
Responding to a question about comments tweeted earlier in the day by Senator Rand Paul (R-KY)
that former CIA Director Brennan should have his clearance stripped, Sanders replied:
"Not only is the President looking to take away Brennan's security clearance, he's also
looking into the clearances of Comey, Clapper, Hayden, Rice and McCabe," said Sanders, reading
from a prepared statement, "because they've politicized, and in some cases, monetized their
public service and security clearances. Making baseless accusations of improper contact with
Russia or being influenced by Russia, against the President, is extremely inappropriate."
"The fact that people with security clearances are making these baseless charges provides
inappropriate legitimacy to accusations with zero evidence."
Earlier in the day, Senator Rand Paul tweeted: "Is John Brennan monetizing his security
clearance? Is John Brennan making millions of dollars divulging secrets to the mainstream media
with his attacks on @realDonaldTrump ?"
Brennan, a senior national security and intelligence analyst for NBC News and MSNBC, said that
President Trump's comments following the Helsinki summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin
"rises to & exceeds the threshold of "high crimes & misdemeanors," adding "It was nothing
short of treasonous."
James Clapper, meanwhile, is an employee of CNN, while former FBI Director James Comey has
been traveling around the country peddling his book, telling people to vote Democrat - just not "
Socialist Democrat. "
"... The Mueller special counsel investigation was launched to probe charges that the key FBI officials developing evidence in the case thought were baseless. That's a bombshell accusation that appears to have been confirmed by former FBI lawyer Lisa Page , according to John Solomon . It tends to confirm the suspicion that the Mueller probe is a cover-up operation to obscure the criminal use of counterintelligence capabilities to spy on a rival presidential campaign and then sabotage the presidency that resulted. ..."
"... she offered a bombshell confirmation of the meaning of one of the most enigmatic text messages that the public has seen (keep in mind that there are many yet to be released). ..."
"... The truth behind the Mueller probe is looking uglier and uglier. Pursuing bogus accusations without foundation is the very definition of a witch hunt – President Trump's term for Mueller's team of Hillary-supporters. ..."
"... We don't know anything at all about the activities of Utah U.S. attorney Peter Huber , who is investigating the potential abuse of U.S. intelligence apparatus for political purposes. That is the proper procedure for grand jury probes. But if Lisa Page is honestly answering questions under oath for a congressional committee, she probably is doing so in grand jury sessions, if summoned. ..."
The Mueller special counsel investigation was launched to probe charges that the key FBI
officials developing evidence in the case thought were baseless. That's a bombshell accusation
that appears to have been confirmed by former FBI lawyer Lisa Page , according to John Solomon
. It tends to confirm the suspicion that the Mueller probe is a cover-up operation to obscure
the criminal use of counterintelligence capabilities to spy on a rival presidential campaign
and then sabotage the presidency that resulted.
Earlier reports indicated that Page has been answering questions from the House Judiciary
Committee quite frankly and may even have
cut a deal selling out her ex-lover Peter Strzok over their professional misbehavior (and
quite possibly worse) in targeting the campaign and presidency of Donald Trump with the
intelligence-gathering tools of the FBI.
Last night, John Solomon of
The Hill revealed that he has obtained information from sources who heard Page's testimony
in two days of sworn depositions behind closed doors that she offered a bombshell
confirmation of the meaning of one of the most enigmatic text messages that the public has seen
(keep in mind that there are many yet to be released).
[T]here are just five words, among the thousands of suggestive texts Page and Strzok
exchanged, that you should read.
That passage was transmitted on May 19, 2017. "There's no big there there," Strzok
texted.
The date of the text long has intrigued investigators: It is two days after Deputy
Attorney General Rod
Rosenstein
named special counselRobert Mueller to oversee an investigation
into alleged collusion between Trump and the Russia campaign.
Since the text was turned over to Congress, investigators wondered whether it referred to
the evidence against the Trump campaign.
This month, they finally got the chance to ask. Strzok declined to say – but Page,
during a closed-door interview with lawmakers, confirmed in the most pained and contorted way
that the message in fact referred to the quality of the Russia case, according to multiple
eyewitnesses.
The admission is deeply consequential. It means Rosenstein unleashed the most awesome
powers of a special counsel to investigate an allegation that the key FBI officials, driving
the investigation for 10 months beforehand, did not think was "there."
The truth behind the Mueller probe is looking uglier and uglier. Pursuing bogus
accusations without foundation is the very definition of a witch hunt – President Trump's
term for Mueller's team of Hillary-supporters.
We don't know anything at all about the activities of Utah U.S. attorney Peter Huber ,
who is
investigating the potential abuse of U.S. intelligence apparatus for political purposes.
That is the proper procedure for grand jury probes. But if Lisa Page is honestly answering
questions under oath for a congressional committee, she probably is doing so in grand jury
sessions, if summoned.
The glacial pace of this probe is frustrating for Trump-supporters. But doing it right and
observing the ethical and legal constraints takes time and does not generate leaks.
Nevertheless, I am deeply encouraged by this leak to Solomon, as it seems to indicate that the
truth will come out.
Appearing on Hannity last night, Solomon elaborated: watch video
here .
Demonstrating that he continues to learn about the application of governmental politics,
Senator Rand Paul said that he plans to meet with president Trump today, 23 July 2018, and
request that John O. Brennan's security clearance be revoked--
He asks: "Is John Brennan monetizing his security clearance? Is John Brennan making millions
of dollars divulging secrets to the mainstream media with his attacks on @realDonaldTrump?"
This important issue is rarely stated, much less discussed as a topic in itself, and is not
limited in relevance to Brennan. Paul asked back in January 2018 if FBI agent Peter Strzok and
FBI attorney Lisa Page still had security clearances. Arrogantly delaying exactly three months
to reply, the FBI liaison for congressional affairs tap danced in a letter and gave no real
answer (a non-answer answer)--
Strzok was asked at the recent Congressional hearing if he had a security clearance, to
which he answered in the affirmative. However, an article reported that the clearance was
"limited" for purposes of the hearing--
A person keeping a security clearance after leaving government employment is not a bad thing
on its face, but when an individual with that privilege appears to make dubious or less than
candid statements before congress (to say it diplomatically), or to the public, that privilege
should be canceled and revoked. In addition to Brennan, this issue can be thought about
regarding others, such as former NSA directors Michael Hayden and Keith Alexander. Remember the
little hearing from 2012, when Representative Henry C. Johnson, Jr. (Dem., Georgia), talked to
Alexander?
Instead of struggling with the cumbersome procedures involved when holding a witness before
Congress in contempt or issuing articles of impeachment, the House and Senate could simply
either pass a law denying a certain person a security clearance, or ask the president to revoke
a person's clearance as part of the negotiation process regarding legislation. After all, horse
trading in Congress seems to apply to almost everything.
Although executive order 13526 is seen as the primary authority for classified information
[1] -- an interesting situation since it is an "executive order" -- Congress could modify or
repeal it. Just as Congress created most government departments and agencies, such as the CIA
and Department of Homeland Security, it can modify them or close them down.
The Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) is the collection of regulations created by government
departments and agencies. In general, these are the rules that can and have caused problems, as
part of the "bureaucracy" and "administrative state". Federal regulations are not supposed to
conflict with the law passed by Congress that authorized their creation. Whether the U.S.
Constitution by its text even permits agency regulations and that they can have legal effect is
a real and interesting question, which no one will touch with a 10-foot pole.
In volume 32, CFR, part 2001 is where the regulations about national security information
are found [2]. Also relevant is direction from the Information Security Oversight Office
(ISOO), in its "Marking Classified National Security Information" [3].
Not to get off the subject too much, but concerning the conduct of former Secretary of State
and presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and her private, home-brew e-mail server, you can
read through the regulations -- especially regarding "derivative classification" and the
"electronic environment" [4] -- as well as executive order 13526 and the ISOO handbook on
marking classified information, and decide for yourself.
The truth is not for cowards: Obama was in the center of "Russiagate" and pushed for illegal
actions. Such a scoundrel.
"Unless we assume the FBI went completely rogue, it is inconceivable that the deployments of
personnel to spy on the Trump campaign and make provocative contact with its lesser members could
have occurred without the full knowledge and control of the occupants of the Oval Office."
Jarrett
and Obama are Behind Spygate
" In a Tuesday appearance on Fox News , Newt Gingrich said that he believed
former President Barack Obama and some of his top officials – including Valerie Jarrett
– were involved in spying on Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign[.] ..." Jarrett
and Obama are Behind Spygate
"Former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer said Thursday he believes it's highly
unlikely that President Obama did not know an FBI informant was in the Trump campaign."
Notable quotes:
"... If it weren't for President Obama we might not have done the intelligence community assessment that we did that set up a whole sequence of events which are still unfolding today including Special Counsel Mueller's investigation. President Obama is responsible for that. It was he who tasked us to do that intelligence community assessment in the first place. ..."
If it weren't for President Obama we might not have done the intelligence community
assessment that we did that set up a whole sequence of events which are still unfolding
today including Special Counsel Mueller's investigation. President Obama is responsible for
that. It was he who tasked us to do that intelligence community assessment in the first
place.
Rita Moreau @ritmmor Replying to @prayingmedic
Rats are jumping ship and singing. Obamagate for sure. Biggest political spy scandal in
history
The Wall Street Journal
continues to counter the liberal
mainstream media's Trump Derangement Syndrome , dropping uncomfortable truth-bombs and
refusing to back off its intense pressure to get to the truth and hold those responsible,
accountable (in a forum that is hard for the establishment to shrug off as 'Alt-Right' or
'Nazi' or be 'punished' by search- and social-media-giants) .
And once again Kimberley
Strassel - who by now has become the focus of social media attacks for her truth-seeking
reporting - does it again this morning, as she points out - after his 'treasonous' outbursts,
that Obama's CIA Director John Brennan acknowledges that it was him egging on the FBI's probe
of Trump and Russia.
The Trump-Russia sleuthers have been back in the news, again giving Americans cause to
doubt their claims of nonpartisanship. Last week it was Federal Bureau of Investigation agent
Peter Strzok testifying to Congress that he harbored no bias against a president he still
describes as "horrible" and "disgusting." This week it was former FBI Director Jim Comey
tweet-lecturing Americans on their duty to vote Democratic in November.
But the man who deserves a belated bit of scrutiny is former Central Intelligence Agency
Director John Brennan . He's accused President Trump of "venality, moral turpitude and
political corruption," and berated GOP investigations of the FBI. This week he claimed on
Twitter that Mr. Trump's press conference in Helsinki was "nothing short of treasonous." This
is rough stuff, even for an Obama partisan.
That's what Mr. Brennan is -- a partisan -- and it is why his role in the 2016 scandal is
in some ways more concerning than the FBI's. Mr. Comey stands accused of flouting the rules,
breaking the chain of command, abusing investigatory powers. Yet it seems far likelier that
the FBI's Trump investigation was a function of arrogance and overconfidence than some
partisan plot. No such case can be made for Mr. Brennan. Before his nomination as CIA
director, he served as a close Obama adviser. And the record shows he went on to use his
position -- as head of the most powerful spy agency in the world -- to assist Hillary
Clinton's campaign (and keep his job).
Mr. Brennan has taken credit for launching the Trump investigation. At a House
Intelligence Committee hearing in May 2017, he explained that he became "aware of
intelligence and information about contacts between Russian officials and U.S. persons." The
CIA can't investigate U.S. citizens, but he made sure that "every information and bit of
intelligence" was "shared with the bureau," meaning the FBI. This information, he said,
"served as the basis for the FBI investigation." My sources suggest Mr. Brennan was
overstating his initial role, but either way, by his own testimony, he was an Obama-Clinton
partisan was pushing information to the FBI and pressuring it to act.
More notable, Mr. Brennan then took the lead on shaping the narrative that Russia was
interfering in the election specifically to help Mr. Trump - which quickly evolved into the
Trump-collusion narrative. Team Clinton was eager to make the claim, especially in light of
the Democratic National Committee server hack. Numerous reports show Mr. Brennan aggressively
pushing the same line internally. Their problem was that as of July 2016 even then-Director
of National Intelligence James Clapper didn't buy it. He publicly refused to say who was
responsible for the hack, or ascribe motivation. Mr. Brennan also couldn't get the FBI to
sign on to the view; the bureau continued to believe Russian cyberattacks were aimed at
disrupting the U.S. political system generally, not aiding Mr. Trump.
The CIA director couldn't himself go public with his Clinton spin -- he lacked the support
of the intelligence community and had to be careful not to be seen interfering in U.S.
politics. So what to do? He called Harry Reid. In a late August briefing, he told the Senate
minority leader that Russia was trying to help Mr. Trump win the election, and that Trump
advisers might be colluding with Russia. (Two years later, no public evidence has emerged to
support such a claim.)
But the truth was irrelevant. On cue, within a few days of the briefing, Mr. Reid wrote a
letter to Mr. Comey, which of course immediately became public. "The evidence of a direct
connection between the Russian government and Donald Trump's presidential campaign continues
to mount," wrote Mr. Reid, going on to float Team Clinton's Russians-are-helping-Trump
theory. Mr. Reid publicly divulged at least one of the allegations contained in the infamous
Steele dossier, insisting that the FBI use "every resource available to investigate this
matter."
The Reid letter marked the first official blast of the Brennan-Clinton collusion narrative
into the open. Clinton opposition-research firm Fusion GPS followed up by briefing its media
allies about the dossier it had dropped off at the FBI. On Sept. 23, Yahoo News's Michael
Isikoff ran the headline: "U.S. intel officials probe ties between Trump adviser and
Kremlin." Voilà. Not only was the collusion narrative out there, but so was evidence
that the FBI was investigating.
In their recent book "Russian Roulette," Mr. Isikoff and David Corn say even Mr. Reid
believed Mr. Brennan had an "ulterior motive" with the briefing, and "concluded the CIA chief
believed the public needed to know about the Russia operation, including the information
about the possible links to the Trump campaign." (Brennan allies have denied his aim was to
leak damaging information.)
Clinton supporters have a plausible case that Mr. Comey's late-October announcement that
the FBI had reopened its investigation into the candidate affected the election. But Trump
supporters have a claim that the public outing of the collusion narrative and FBI
investigation took a toll on their candidate .
And as Strassel so poignantly concludes:
Politics was at the center of that outing, and Mr. Brennan was a ringmaster. Remember that
when reading his next "treason" tweet.
This all boils down to one simple thing: A failed coup d'état.
I really is just that. Once that very concept begins to take root in the populace, it'll
counter the 'conspiracy theory' mumbo jumbo dismissals the MSM keeps pushing.
This was a power grab that failed, and as each day unfolds, we see that the very top of
the power structure was attempting to subvert the will of the people, and destroy a duly
elected President. This is nothing short of sedition and treason. I cannot wait until the
tables turn on the pundits and powerful elites. When the ground swell accepts this very
simple fact, no amount of shit shoveling excuses and dismissals will be enough.
"we are headed for some Bladerunner style dystopian future Hitler could only dream of"
Good post, all true including Japan being forced to attack Pearl Harbour by Eisenhouwer's
economic sanctions, EXCEPT you need to seriously question your information on Hitler's role
in WWII.
Check out the amazing revisionist history series on WWII "HITLER: THE GREATEST STORY NEVER
TOLD" by Dennis Wise:
Mrs Clinton lost. That was the shot heard 'round the world. Everything before Nov 8 was
maneuvering for position in her administration, or buying a seat at the table. Since then
it's been outraged denial and maneuvering for an escape route.
Her not winning was the unspeakable thing. Bill knew though.
Bigger than sedition - it is massive conspiracy to use every branch of government &
MSM to reach Brennan's goals - as Schumer said - these guys get what they want -
John Dulles had Intel Agencies control for JFK's murder but not every branch of
government
Bobby was going to reopen the Warren Commission which Dulles was the defacto head and
controlled the discovery, data and conclusions - The Martin Luther King Murder was used a
diversion - back to back - from the single purpose to get Bobby stopped
Sabotage is a deliberate action aimed at weakening a polity, effort or organization
through subversion, obstruction, disruption or destruction. One who engages in sabotage is a
saboteur. (Wiki)
Brennan is the REAL SOURCE of the Russian Election meddling story. And Brennan is a water
boy for the British Royals, who still run everything behind the scenes along with their
banker buddies.
China is enjoying this as the Dems distract us without real evidence about Russia collusion
we are being blindsided by them. Funny how Brennan a former communist sympathizer who voted
for Gus Hall in 1976 is crying treason. Wow.
Brennan, who voted for the US Communist Party candidate in the 1976 election, is screaming
the treason hyperbole because the CIA is most likely the origin of the Russia Collusion
farce:
"According to one account, GCHQ's then head, Robert Hannigan, passed material in summer
2016 to the CIA chief, John Brennan. The matter was deemed so sensitive it was handled at
"director level". After an initially slow start, Brennan used GCHQ information and
intelligence from other partners to launch a major inter-agency investigation."
BTW, Hannigan resigned for the usual "family reasons" the Monday after Trump was sworn
in.
It now appears that there were three dossier versions, all coming via different unofficial
channels, outside the intel community channels which was therefore unvetted. Many suspect
they were all from the same source coming in from different angles to create a false
impression of legitimacy.
What we are going to find out when Trump declassifies everything after the mid-term
election, regardless of whether or not the Dems take the House and try to impeach him, is
that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act put in place after the revelations of
COINTELPRO wasn't adequate protection against the serious misuse of power.
The reason Trump won't declassify now is obvious – if you think screams of
interference/obstruction are loud now, just watch after he does that, something which would
harm the Reps in the mid-terms because any revelations buried within would take time to dig
out and would suppressed as much as possible by the incredibly biased media.
The DOJ/FBI stalling in providing the documents demanded by Congress is an obvious
stalling tactic in the hope that the Dems take the house in the mid-terms. If Clinton had won
as everyone expected, we'd have never heard about any of this which is why they thought they
could get away with it.
Why is anyone surprised ? Peter Strzok is still employed by the fbi and now works in the
human resources department where he can determine the fitness of prospective agents to do their
job with integrity and accuracy . The rat determines who will get a raise and promotion based
on their performance within the fbi ? This would be morbidly humorous if it wasn't the sick
truth .
If he's not doing the quarterly training, then legally he does NOT have Top Secret
clearance. I have a Top Secret Security Clearance and if I come within 2 weeks of the quarterly
training deadline, I get warning after warning until it's done. Since he's not employed by the
Feds anymore, I can't see any way he can legally have the clearance.
John Brennan running psyops. Psychological operations are planned operations to convey
selected information and indicators to audiences to influence their emotions, motives, and
objective reasoning, and ultimately the behavior of governments, organizations, groups, and
individuals. Cia and deep state totally corrupt
Yes Tucker he is a 25 year veteran of the CIA who served under Clinton and Bush and Obama.
You seemed to forget that fact. And he is a Independent another fact you forgot. Just like you
forgot to mention how you and the rest of Fox praised him when he served under Bush during the
Enhanced Integrations. And I never heard you complain once about a former C.I.A Director keep
his Security Clearance while he sat on the Caryle group with Bin Ladens father and who's son
was President of the United States in George Bush.
Brennan, Clapper and Hayden are a threat to our national security. These 3 disgraced clowns
are an example of how low America's intelligence agencies have sunk. The US intelligence
community has become politically weaponized and is working against the interests of US
citizens. The president needs to take action NOW!
You know what? I love POTUS BUT this is unacceptable Mr. President. You have the power to
revoke all these violations of security clearances. You have the power to declassify all the
documents and memos! Please Mr. President! Stop listening to your attorneys and look at this
situation with the grit and common sense the world trusts you have!
If only we had more Senators like Senator Rand Paul. He has common sense & it gives me
hope for my children & grandchildren. The world is unstable (Africa refugees & So
America) after Obama & Bush years. BTW Bruce Ohr is still in the FBI. see White House Soft
Coup (Sekulow)
He visited Kaaba; non-muslims are not allowed there. HENCE, it's true that he is a secret
convert (when he studied at the American University in Cairo, Egypt in 1970s)
Brennan is pissed off because his work has been rejected and not wanted!!! The underworld is
now awake!! And can't let the religious terrorism dominate the world!! Europe needs to wake up
instead of supporting the terrorist Islamic medieval Regime of Iran by the misuse of JCPOA!!!
40 yrs of terror and massacre is enough!! Dont you think so???
Winston Churchill said all there is to say about political summits with his quote: "Jaw jaw
is better than war war." That is the thing to bear in mind when examining the rights and wrongs
of the The Trump-Putin summit: Two leaders of two of the world's most powerful nations, in
Trump's words "competitors" sorting out differences eyeball to eyeball. Both men share
Churchill's approach, with Putin saying: "As nuclear powers, we bear special responsibility"
for international security.
Putin said Russia (as a devout Christian country) considered it necessary for the two
countries to work together on nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation – and to avoid
weapons being placed in space. "Even during the tensions of the Cold War, the US and the
Soviets were able to maintain a strong dialogue (with now Russia)," said Trump. "But our
relations (with now Russia) have never been worse than they are now. However that changed as of
about four hours ago." He added: "nothing would be easier politically than to refuse to engage"
which would "appease partisan critics, the media" and the opposition."
Donald Trump correctly reiterated the significance and importance of holding a meeting with
Putin, despite the widespread criticism from within his own country and most notably from the
mainstream media who are very now clearly controlled entirely by what has popularly become
known as the "Deep State."
And what was the response in America to the summit? The most vitriolic insult came from the
odious former CIA Director, John Brennan. The not so funny irony is that Brennan literally
voted for the then Soviet Union dominated US Communist Party to take power in the United States
of America.
... ... ...
As a Brit, a keen observer of American politics for decades, it appears astonishing that a
father and son, Americans Ron and Rand Paul seem to be representative of only a few sane voices
that debate logically and objectively on the subject of Russia, acknowledging, as Trump put it,
that they are our competitors not enemies. On Monday on CNN Wolf Blitzer was aghast that Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul
spoke on his programme saying that critics of Trump, Putin summit have "Trump Derangement
Syndrome." Blitzer almost angrily asking the Senator "Let me get right to the questioning. Do
you believe that President Trump's meeting with Putin made America safer?"
The Senator answered "You know, I think engagement with our adversaries, conversation with
our adversaries is a good idea. Even in the height of the Cold War (with the Soviets), maybe at
its lowest ebb when we were in the midst of the Cuban missile crisis, I think it was a good
thing that Kennedy had a direct line to Khrushchev. I think it was a good thing that we
continued to have Ambassadors to the Soviet Union even when we really objected greatly to what
was going on, especially during Stalin's regime. So I think , yes, that it is a good idea to
have engagement."
... ... ...
"... It isn't a pretty face, but one scarred from a dark past, repackaged now by the frenzy of "resistance." Accusing Donald Trump recklessly, implying he knows more than he lets on, promising redemption: John Brennan is the face of American politics in 2018. ..."
"... But before all that, Brennan lived in a hole about as far down into the deep state as one can dwell while still having eyes that work in the sunlight. He was director of the Central Intelligence Agency. He was Obama's counterterrorism advisor, helping the president decide who to kill every week, including American citizens. He spent 25 years at the CIA, and helped shape the violent policies of the post-9/11 Bush era. He was a fan of torture and extrajudicial killing to the point that a 2012 profile of him was entitled, "The Seven Deadly Sins of John Brennan." Another writer called Brennan "the most lethal bureaucrat of all time, or at least since Henry Kissinger." Today, however, a New York Times ..."
"... On Twitter this week, Brennan cartoonishly declaimed, "Donald Trump's press conference performance in Helsinki rises to and exceeds the threshold of high crimes and misdemeanors. It was nothing short of treasonous. Not only were Trump's comments imbecilic, he is wholly in the pocket of Putin." ..."
"... Brennan is a man of his times, all bluster and noise, knowing that so long as he says what a significant part of the country apparently believes -- that the president of the United States is under the control of the Kremlin -- he will never be challenged. ..."
"... New York Magazine ..."
"... Only after Clinton lost did it become necessary to create a crisis that might yet be inflated (it wasn't just the Russians, as originally thought, it was Trump working with them) to justify impeachment. Absent that need, Brennan would have disappeared alongside other former CIA directors into academia or the lucrative consulting industry. Instead he's a public figure with a big mouth because he has to be. That mouth has to cover his ass. ..."
"... Brennan is part of the whole-of-government effort to overturn the election. ..."
"... Yet despite all the hard evidence of treason that only Brennan and his supine journalists seem to see, everyone appears resigned to have a colluding Russian agent running the United States. You'd think it would be urgent to close this case. Instead, Brennan admonishes us to wait out an investigative process that's been underway now through two administrations. ..."
"... Is Brennan signaling that there is one step darker to consider? A Reuters commentary observes that "Trump is haunted by the fear that a cabal of national-security officers is conspiring in secret to overthrow him . Trump has made real enemies in the realm of American national security. He has struck blows against their empire. One way or another, the empire will strike back." ..."
"... Peter Van Buren, a 24-year State Department veteran, is the author of ..."
He accuses Trump of treason. But what's his bluster really about?
•
It isn't a pretty face, but one scarred from a dark past, repackaged now by the frenzy of
"resistance." Accusing Donald Trump recklessly, implying he knows more than he lets on,
promising redemption: John Brennan is the face of American politics in 2018.
But before all that, Brennan lived in a hole about as far down into the deep state as
one can dwell while still having eyes that work in the sunlight. He was director of the Central
Intelligence Agency. He was Obama's counterterrorism advisor, helping the president decide who
to kill every week, including American citizens. He spent 25 years at the CIA, and helped shape
the violent policies of the post-9/11 Bush era. He was a fan of torture and extrajudicial
killing to the point that a 2012 profile of him was entitled, "The Seven Deadly Sins of John
Brennan." Another writer called Brennan "the most lethal bureaucrat of all time, or at least
since Henry Kissinger." Today, however, a New York Times puff piece sweeps all that
away as a "troubling inheritance."
On Twitter this week, Brennan cartoonishly declaimed, "Donald Trump's press conference
performance in Helsinki rises to and exceeds the threshold of high crimes and misdemeanors. It
was nothing short of treasonous. Not only were Trump's comments imbecilic, he is wholly in the
pocket of Putin."
Because it is 2018, Brennan was never asked to explain exactly how a press conference
exceeds the threshold of high crimes and misdemeanors the Constitution sets for impeachment,
nor was he asked to lay a few cards on the table showing what Putin has on Trump. No,
Brennan is a man of his times, all bluster and noise, knowing that so long as he says what
a significant part of the country apparently believes -- that the president of the United
States is under the control of the Kremlin -- he will never be challenged.
Brennan slithers alongside those like Nancy Pelosi and Cory Booker who said Trump is
controlled by Russia, columnists in the New York Times who called him a traitor, an
article (which is fast becoming the Zapruder film of Russiagate) in New York Magazine
echoing former counterterrorism coordinator Richard Clarke in speculating that Trump met Putin
as his handler, and another former intelligence officer warning that "we're on the cusp of
losing the constitutional republic forever."
Brennan's bleating has the interesting side effect of directing attention away from who was
watching the front door as the Russians walked in to cause what one MSNBC analyst described as
a mix of Pearl Harbor and Kristallnacht. During the 2016 election, Brennan was head of the CIA.
His evil twin, James Clapper, who also coughs up Trump attacks for nickels these days, was
director of national intelligence. James Comey headed the FBI, following Robert Mueller into
the job. Yet the noise from that crowd has become so loud as to drown out any questions about
where they were when they had the duty to stop the Russians in the first place.
The excuse that "everybody believed Hillary would win" is in itself an example of collusion:
things that now rise to treason, if not acts of war, didn't matter then because Clinton's
victory would sweep them all under the rug. Only after Clinton lost did it become necessary
to create a crisis that might yet be inflated (it wasn't just the Russians, as originally
thought, it was Trump working with them) to justify impeachment. Absent that need, Brennan
would have disappeared alongside other former CIA directors into academia or the lucrative
consulting industry. Instead he's a public figure with a big mouth because he has to be. That
mouth has to cover his ass.
Brennan is part of the whole-of-government effort to overturn the election.
Remember how recounts were called for amid (fake) allegations of vote tampering? Constitutional
scholars proposed various Hail Mary Electoral College scenarios to unseat Trump. Lawsuits
claimed the Emoluments Clause made it illegal for Trump to even assume office. The media set
itself the goal of impeaching the president. On cue, leaks poured out implying the Trump
campaign worked with the Russian government. It is now a rare day when the top stories are not
apocalyptic, rocketed from Raw Story to the Huffington Post to the New York Times .
Brennan, meanwhile, fans the media's flames with a knowing wink that says "You wait and see.
Soon it's Mueller time."
Yet despite all the hard evidence of treason that only Brennan and his supine
journalists seem to see, everyone appears resigned to have a colluding Russian agent running
the United States. You'd think it would be urgent to close this case. Instead, Brennan
admonishes us to wait out an investigative process that's been underway now through two
administrations.
The IRS, meanwhile, has watched Trump for decades (they've seen the tax docs), as have
Democratic and Republican opposition researchers, the New Jersey Gaming Commission, and various
New York City real estate bodies. Multiple KGB/FSB agents have defected and not said a word.
The whole Soviet Union has collapsed since the day that some claim Trump first became a Russian
asset. Why haven't the FBI, CIA, and NSA cottoned to anything in the intervening years? Why are
we waiting on Mueller Year Two?
If Trump is under Russian influence, he is the most dangerous man in American history. So
why isn't Washington on fire? Why hasn't Mueller indicted someone for treason? If this is Pearl
Harbor, why is the investigation moving at the pace of a mortgage application? Why is everyone
allowing a Russian asset placed in charge of the American nuclear arsenal to stay in power even
one more minute?
You'd think Brennan would be saying it is time to postpone chasing the indictments of
Russian military officers that will never see the inside of a courtroom, stop wasting months on
decades-old financial crimes unconnected to the Trump campaign, and quit delaying the real
stuff over a clumsy series of perjury cases. "Patriots: Where are you???" Brennan asked in a
recent tweet. Where indeed?
Is Brennan signaling that there is one step darker to consider? A
Reuters commentary observes that "Trump is haunted by the fear that a cabal of
national-security officers is conspiring in secret to overthrow him . Trump has made real
enemies in the realm of American national security. He has struck blows against their empire.
One way or another, the empire will strike back." James Clapper is confirming reports that
Trump was shown evidence of Putin's election attacks and did nothing. Congressman Steve Cohen
asked, "Where are our military folks? The Commander-in-Chief is in the hands of our enemy!"
Treason, traitor, coup, the empire striking back -- those are just words, Third World stuff,
clickbait, right? So the more pedestrian answer must then be correct. The lessons of Whitewater
and Benghazi learned, maybe the point is not to build an atmosphere of crisis leading to
something undemocratic, but just to have a perpetual investigation, tickled to life as needed
politically.
Because, maybe, deep down, Brennan (Clapper, Hayden, Comey, and Mueller) really do know that
this is all like flying saucers and cell phone cameras. At some point, the whole alien
conspiracy meme fell apart because somehow when everyone had a camera with them 24/7/365, there
were no more sightings and we had to admit that our fears had gotten the best of us. The threat
was inside us all along. It is now, too.
Peter Van Buren, a 24-year State Department veteran, is the author ofWe Meant Well : How I Helped Lose the Battle for the
Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People andHooper's War : A Novel of WWII Japan . Follow him on Twitter
@WeMeantWell.
As the Snowden documents and David Sanger's great new book and other books make plain, and
as U.S. officials are wont to brag, the U.S. intelligence services break into computers and
computer networks abroad at an astounding rate, certainly on a greater scale than any other
intelligence service in the world. Every one of these intrusions in another country violates
that country's criminal laws prohibiting unauthorized computer access and damage, no less
than the Russian violations of U.S. laws outlined in Mueller's indictment...
It is no response to say that the United States doesn't meddle in foreign elections,
because it has in the past - at least as recently as Bill Clinton's intervention in the
Russian presidential election of 1996 and possibly as recently as the Hillary Clinton State
Department's alleged intervention in Russia's 2011 legislative elections .
And during the Cold War the United States intervened in numerous foreign elections, more
than twice as often as the Soviet Union.
Intelligence history expert Loch Johnson told Scott Shane that the 2016 Russia electoral
interference is "the cyber-age version of standard United States practice for decades,
whenever American officials were worried about a foreign vote."
The CIA's former chief of Russia operations, Steven L. Hall, told Shane: "If you ask an
intelligence officer, did the Russians break the rules or do something bizarre, the answer is
no, not at all." Hall added that "the United States 'absolutely' has carried out such
election influence operations historically, and I hope we keep doing it."
Nothing gets the phony "Resistance," corporate media and neocons more hysterical than when
Trump isn't belligerent enough while meeting with foreign leaders abroad. While the pearl
clutching was intense during the North Korea summit, the reoccurring, systematic outrage
spectacle was taken to entirely new levels of stupidity and hyperbole during yesterday's
meeting with Putin in Finland.
The clown parade really got going after compulsive liar and former head of the CIA under
Barack Obama, John Brennan, accused Trump of treason on Twitter -- which resistance drones
dutifully retweeted, liked and permanently enshrined within the gospel of Russiagate.
Some people hate Trump so intensely they're willing to take the word of a professional liar
and manipulator as scripture.
In fact, Brennan is so uniquely skilled at the dark art of deception, Trevor Timm, executive
direction of the Freedom of the Press foundation described him in the following manner in a
must read 2014
article :
"this is the type of spy who apologizes even though he's not sorry, who lies because he
doesn't like to tell the truth." The article also refers to him as "the most talented liar in
Washington."
This is the sort of hero the phony "resistance" is rallying around. No thank you.
It wasn't just Brennan, of course. The mental disorder colloquially known as Trump
Derangement Syndrome is widely distributed throughout society at this point. Baseless
accusations of treason were thrown around casually by all sorts of TDS sufferers, including
sitting members of Congress. To see the extent of the disease, take a look at the show put on
by Democratic Congressman from Washington state, Rep. Adam Smith.
"At every turn of his trip to Europe, President Trump has followed a script that parallels
Moscow's plan to weaken and divide America's allies and partners and undermine democratic
values. There is an extensive factual record suggesting that President Trump's campaign and
the Russians conspired to influence our election for President Trump," Smith, a top Democrat
on the House Armed Services Committee, said in an official
statement .
"Now Trump is trying to cover it up. There is no sugar coating this. It is hard to see
President Trump siding with Vladimir Putin over our own intelligence community and our
criminal investigators as anything other than treason."
Those are some serious accusations. He must surely have a strong argument to support such
proclamations, right? Wrong. Turns out it was all show, pure politics.
In an interview with The Seattle Times, Smith expanded on his "treason" comment, saying
Trump legally did not commit treason but has committed other impeachable offenses.
"Treason might have been a little bit of hyperbole," Smith
told The Seattle Times . "There is no question in my mind that the United States has the
need to begin an impeachment investigation."
It says a lot that the resistance itself doesn't even believe its own nonsense. They're just
using hyperbolic and dangerous language to make people crazy and feed more TDS.
Here's yet another example of a wild-eyed Democratic Congressman sounding utterly
bloodthirsty and unhinged. Rep. Steve Cohen of Tennessee is openly saying the U.S. is at war
with Russia.
"No question about it," Cohen told Hill.TV's Buck Sexton and Krystal Ball on "Rising" when
asked whether the Russian hacking and propaganda effort constituted an act of war.
"It was a foreign interference with our basic Democratic values. The underpinnings of
Democratic society is elections, and free elections, and they invaded our country," he
continued.
Cohen went on to say that the U.S. should have countered with a cyber attack on
Russia.
"A cyber attack that made Russian society valueless. They could have gone into Russian
banks, Russian government. Our cyber abilities are such that we could have attacked them with
a cyber attack that would have crippled Russia," he said.
This is a very sick individual.
While the above is incredibly twisted, it's become increasingly clear that Russiagate has
become something akin to a religion. It's adherents have become so attached to the story that
Trump's "wholly in the pocket of Putin," they're increasingly lobbing serious and baseless
accusations against people who fail to acquiesce to their dogma.
I was a victim of this back in November 2016 when
I was falsely slandered in The Washington Post's ludicrous and now infamous PropOrNot
article.
More recently, we've seen MSNBC pundit Malcom Nance (ex-military/intelligence) call Glenn
Greenwald a Russian agent (without evidence of course), followed by "journalist" David Corn
calling Rand Paul a "traitor" for stating indisputable facts .
Calling someone a traitor for stating obvious facts that threaten the hysteria you're trying
to cultivate is a prime example of how this whole thing has turned into some creepy D.C.
establishment religion. If these people have such a solid case and the facts are on their side,
there's no need to resort to such demented craziness. It does nothing other than promote
societal insanity and push the unconvinced away.
It's because of stuff like this that we're no longer able to have a real conversation about
anything in this country (many Trump cheerleaders employ the same tactics) . This is a deadly
thing for any society and will be explored in Part 2.
* * *
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appreciation for independent content creators.
"... No Russian interference in America's political process occurred in 2016, earlier, or is being cooked up for the nation's November midterm elections. ..."
"... Trump knows it and said so in Helsinki. When asked if he holds Russia accountable for anything, he said: ..."
"... Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the CRG, Correspondent of Global Research based in Chicago. ..."
"... VISIT MY NEW WEB SITE: stephenlendman.org (Home – Stephen Lendman). Contact at [email protected]. My newest book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III." http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html ..."
No Russian interference in America's political process occurred in 2016, earlier, or is
being cooked up for the nation's November midterm elections.
Trump knows it and said so in Helsinki. When asked if he holds Russia accountable for
anything, he said:
"I hold both countries responsible (for dismal bilateral relations). I think that the
United States has been foolish. I think we've all been foolish And I think we're all to
blame."
Regarding election meddling, he said:
"There was no collusion at all. Everybody knows it. And people are being brought out to
the fore. So far that I know, virtually none of it related to the campaign. And they're going
to have to try really hard to find somebody that did relate to the campaign."
"My people came to me and some others (T)hey think it's Russia President Putin said it's
not Russia. I will say this: I dont see any reason why it would be."
" President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today."
Trump is wrong about most things, not this. No evidence, nothing, proves Russian meddling in
the US political process.
If it existed, it would have been revealed long ago. It never was and never will be because
there's nothing credible to reveal, Big Lies alone.
Trump's above remarks were in Helsinki. In response to a raging Russophobic firestorm of
criticism back home, he backtracked from his above comments, saying he misspoke abroad.
He accepts the intelligence community's claim about Russian US election meddling –
knowing it didn't occur.
Russiagate was cooked up by Obama's thuggish Russophobic CIA director John Brennan , media
keeping the Big Lie alive.
DNC/John Podesta emails were leaked, not hacked – an indisputable fact media
scoundrels suppress to their disgrace.
Former UK ambassador to Uzbekistan Craig Murray earlier explained that
"(t)he source of these emails and leaks has nothing to do with Russia at all," adding:
"I discovered what the source was when I attended the Sam Adam's whistleblower award in
Washington."
"The source of these emails (came) from within official circles in Washington DC. You
should look to Washington, not to Moscow."
"WikiLeaks has never published any material received from the Russian government or from
any proxy of the Russian government. It's simply a completely untrue claim designed to divert
attention from the content of the material" and its true source.
The Big Lie alone matters when it's the official narrative. The Russian meddling hoax and
mythical Kremlin threat to US security are central to maintaining adversarial relations with
America's key invented enemy.
It's vital to unjustifiably justifying the nation's global empire of bases, its outrageous
amount of military spending, its belligerence toward all sovereign independent states, its
endless wars of aggression, its scorn for world peace and stability, its neoliberal harshness
to pay for it all, along with transferring the nation's wealth from ordinary people to its
privileged class.
America's deeply corrupted political process is far too debauched to fix, rigged to serve
wealth, power and privilege exclusively, at war on humanity at home and abroad.
It's a tyrannical plutocracy and oligarchy, a police state, not a democracy, a cesspool of
criminality, inequity and injustice, run by sinister dark forces – monied interests and
bipartisan self-serving political scoundrels, wicked beyond redemption, threatening humanity's
survival.
Today is the most perilous time in world history. What's going on should terrify everyone
everywhere.
Washington's rage for global dominance, its military madness, its unparalleled recklessness,
threatens world peace, stability, and survival.
*
Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the CRG, Correspondent of Global Research
based in Chicago.
VISIT MY NEW WEB SITE: stephenlendman.org (Home – Stephen Lendman). Contact at [email protected].
My newest book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III."
Putin handed Trump a means of openly investigating Killary's/CIA's manipulation of US politics via the Browder investigation,
the crime of manipulating the DNC to remove Bernie can also loop into the mix.
Let's hope Trump follows through and exposes the nest of vipers. The majority of people are now seeing the light, only the
people with skin the game or those far too controlled through an excellent propaganda/mass mind control experiment do not.
Edward Bernays and Joseph Goebels could only dream that their methods would go this far.
"But being dependent, every day of the year and for year after year, upon certain politicians for news, the newspaper reporters
are obliged to work in harmony with their news sources."
― Edward L. Bernays ,
Propaganda
"... Then there's the fact, and I love this one, that the New York Times, in 2008, directly called Brennan a war criminal for openly supporting torture, rendition, and illegal wiretaps under the Bush Jr. administration, in the CIA, yet now he's the MSM's "main" consultant on these matters: ..."
"... Exactly. People simply have to remember 9/11 and that the US intelligence agencies are the most sophisticated and most controlling monsters on the globe. They are masters of disinformation and deception and if they were not trying to fool all of the people all of the time they would simply be out of work. ..."
"... The only sense we the people - the unwashed and constantly deceived masses - can make of the apparent division in the US over Russia, is through history. Historically Russia has been the arch enemy of both the Zionists and the Brits, and that it was the banksters of Wall Street, London and Zurich which did the most to install a communist regime in Russia, with their efforts beginning years before 1917. The plan was mainly to destroy the Russian establishment and religion, which they largely did, but the communist alternative they used had a life of its own. ..."
"... When the USSR folded in the early 1990's, the Western banksters and capitalists couldn't wait to get their hands on Russian resources and economic opportunities and they started gobbling up everything of value at bargain basement prices from the cash-starved Russians. In reaction, the old guard - the highly trained and efficient Russian intelligence community - reacted to the corruption and installed Putin on the throne. He nationalized the oil and gas industry and other interests and kicked the Western carpetbaggers clean out of Russia. They have never and will not forgive him, and his main opposition in Russia is the Zio establishment. ..."
I posted this in another ZH article, but wanted to spread awareness about these matters:
I cracked up when MSNBC kept showing the headline, "Former CIA Director Calls Trump Treasonous", yet they didn't use Brennan's
name. Plus all the "guests" they had on were intel officers who either served under Obama, Mueller, or both. Definitely attempted
CYA going on.
Then there's the fact, and I love this one, that the New York Times, in 2008, directly called Brennan a war criminal for
openly supporting torture, rendition, and illegal wiretaps under the Bush Jr. administration, in the CIA, yet now he's the MSM's
"main" consultant on these matters:
Exactly. People simply have to remember 9/11 and that the US intelligence agencies are the most sophisticated and most
controlling monsters on the globe. They are masters of disinformation and deception and if they were not trying to fool all of
the people all of the time they would simply be out of work.
The only sense we the people - the unwashed and constantly deceived masses - can make of the apparent division in the US
over Russia, is through history. Historically Russia has been the arch enemy of both the Zionists and the Brits, and that it was
the banksters of Wall Street, London and Zurich which did the most to install a communist regime in Russia, with their efforts
beginning years before 1917. The plan was mainly to destroy the Russian establishment and religion, which they largely did, but
the communist alternative they used had a life of its own.
When the USSR folded in the early 1990's, the Western banksters and capitalists couldn't wait to get their hands on Russian
resources and economic opportunities and they started gobbling up everything of value at bargain basement prices from the cash-starved
Russians. In reaction, the old guard - the highly trained and efficient Russian intelligence community - reacted to the corruption
and installed Putin on the throne. He nationalized the oil and gas industry and other interests and kicked the Western carpetbaggers
clean out of Russia. They have never and will not forgive him, and his main opposition in Russia is the Zio establishment.
Remember, how the US-Anglo-Zionist establishment reacted to the ousting of the Shah of Iran in 1979, and the end of Western
control of Iranian oil and gas. That nation has been on the hit list ever since.
Trump is either not sincere in dealing with Putin and the US-led axis will pull something off very shortly, or he is doing
something quite revolutionary and wants rapprochement.
I didn't vote for Trump. His handling of the Iran deal, Palestine and regurgitation of Likudnik talking points, many of his
appointments... these aren't America First positions. They smack of Adelson and Bibi and using the MEK to foment moar regime change
should trouble everyone.
However, I always conceded that he was better than Hillary. I almost voted for GJ but live in MA so why bother.
But he has my vote next time.
This isn't about Trump anymore - it's about the ability of a shadow government to undo elections with fisa and intel abuse
and with the help of a controlled, CIA-minded legacy media.
I also think these 'deep state' types are determined to get major wars going, and determined to keep flooding the country with
debt serfs and cannon fodder all while attacking our sovereignty and promoting endless wars that benefit the banks and MIC.
I think we are in an incredibly dangerous time and that Brennan and Clapper need to be indicted and arrested for sedition ASAP.
Ditto Hillary, and others, including Obama.
In simple terms its the Republic versus the Empire, and if you support the Republic, I don't care if we deeply disagree on
lots of other stuff - I am on your side.
And if the Left marches on Washington as some are calling for, I think patriots need to go out and meet them with a peaceful
show of our numbers.
$400,000,000 doesn't stay in a campaign, it is spent or transferred (if it made it that
far?). So where did it go, who received it? Surely it was reported if true? If
not................? Putin is not likely to put his questionable integrity out to dry in
front of the world. Mueller is all over it already?
Critical piece of the statement: " Intelligence agents funneled"
(Clinton>State>Embassy>CIA (Brennan).
divingengineer -> two hoots • Mon, 07/16/2018 - 17:34 Permalink
You are right, that was a PRETTY BIG STATEMENT, right in front of the world. I wonder what
was said in that two hour talk between him and Trump? Man, I would love to have been a fly on
the wall. Things are going to get spicy now.
Putin just nailed the US intelligence establishment. Up until now they've been cynically trying to limit Trumps freedom of action by laying out
allegations of Russian collusion. Now they're in a spot of bother when every time they start
to wind up the anti-Russia campaign someone points out that they've got a vested money
interest.
I'd love to see the FBI and CIA cleaned out from top to bottom over this, trials of
hundreds of sleazeballs with their assets confiscated and pensions cancelled. Although its
pretty obvious you'd need a lot of security on your side to deal with that.
If you've been watching Putin since the year 2000, you'd know he's not exactly known for
throwing around wild accusations. Less so, very precise accusations. He will be asked about that and he will not mumble words but likely expand. The Browder Affair is well known so I don't really know why anyone is remotely
surprised.
This is a perfect opportunity for the Social Justice Warriors to INSIST that all foreign
contributions to domestic US politicians or political parties be immediately outlawed or they
will march on Washington IMMEDIATELY!!
While they're at it....they should also include all contributions made by multi-national
corporations both public and private.
and while they're at it...they should also include all contributions made by foreign
governments or agents of foreign governments.
Browder, Rothschild, Clinton. Remember this back when Rothschild et al got their butt hurt from Putin? "As is known, despite the public promise not to engage in political activity after his
release from prison, former Russian oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky has been actively involved
in the financing of various media and political projects. The structures of Khodorkovsky
actively communicated with the international fraudster William Browder and helped to lobby
for the adoption of anti-Russian sanctions in the US Congress. However, the projects of
Khodorkovsky, as it turned out, have more high patrons and sponsorship streams than only the
means of the former oligarch."
Now we understand why some of the intelligence agencies are bending over backwards to
incriminate Russia along with Brennan, et al., crying treason when in reality it was those
people and agencies actually doing it. This is way beyond fucked up and the damn MSM is
ignoring every bit of it.
Trump needs to take some sort of action that draws this so far out into the open that it
can't be denied. The fucking GOP senators that were out today bad talking Trump need to be
indicted for their likely crimes as well. Fuck these creeps!
The Looking Glass warned us 2016 would be a pivotal election where the People would
finally realize the CIA (really MI6) runs our country with a complicated web of compromise,
corruption and illegal funding. Too bad it was off by a few years...
Putin has a thousand times more credibility and honor than Mueller. Mueller is a stinking
crook. He was instrumental as head of the FBI in certifying to the Bush administration that
Saddam had WMDs. He covered up the real (and known) anthrax terrorists while he went on a
witch hunt against Hatfield -which eventually resulted in the US Government paying Hatfield
$8 million for defamation of character. Mueller is pure scum -a fiend and traitor who belongs
in prison for the rest of his miserable life.
Money quote: "This is just a softer "Saddam has WMDs [scam]" And people fell for it."
The cat fight between two factions of the US elite would be funny, if it was not so dangerous.
Notable quotes:
"... The greatest irony in all this is we have hard evidence that the Clinton machine swayed the MSM to promote T-rump in the primary and squash Bernie. Isn't that election tampering? ..."
"... We also witness the blatant privilege when Comey didn't indict the $hill when she obviously and without a doubt broke the law. So we have the Clinton's above the law laundering money through their foundation But it's Russia's fault....come on. ..."
"... You have totally taken the wind out of the sails of Russia Gate. As you stated, what was the crime? The information that came from the DNC computers and Podesta's emails showed that there was a plan to rig the primary against Bernie so that Hillary would win it. I've said numerous times that was the real election interference. ..."
"... Brennan who had admitted in Jan 2017 that there was no evidence that Russia affected the election in any way has since been prattling on about Russia Gate without every offering any evidence, but that is why this country has been peddling propaganda since Wilson decided it was a great way to get people on board with anything their government want to do. Here is the latest from Brennan. ..."
"... While standing next to the American president, Putin accuses Hillary Clinton of accepting illegal Russian campaign contributions. Trump doesn't push back. ..."
"... Propaganda baby. It works. Every person I have spoken with since Her Majesty lost the election really believes that this country is being run by Putin directly and with the full knowledge and help from the GOP. Because Putin has blackmailed them too or something ..."
"... @lizzyh7 ..."
"... What this episode really proves is that the US finally has joined the USSR as a broken, bankrupt empire that is run by shifting coalitions of international bankers and splinter groups of spooks. The facade of law and democratic norms in America has fallen and shattered on Washington steps. ..."
"... Personally, I accept that in modern times all major intelligence agencies and military general staffs routinely spy on each other and meddle in politics, including elections in their own countries. That's a given and should be obvious to everyone since Yuri Andropov succeeded Brezhnev and Director George H.W Bush had three terms as President of the United States. ..."
"... What is most significant about the current spectacle is how it reveals the polarization and breakdown in discipline within US military and intelligence agencies. The internal policy dispute over Syria and Ukraine and botched election tampering has led to open infighting among the spooks. That's what "Russiagate" is really all about and it's why Flynn and Manafort were the first Mueller indicted. ..."
"... The Mueller investigation is an extension of politics by other means. ..."
"... Social media is completely insane. I've got a very large demographic of fairly open minded people given my trade, and it's unanimous: Drumpf is a Traitor and has committed Treason - both with capital Ts. ..."
The FBI never examined the DNC server. And even if they had, we learned from the vault 7 wikileaks that the CIA can leave evidence
of any country they choose when they hack into a system. I can't believe my normally rational friends can be so brainwashed as
to buy into the whole Russiagate narrative. T-rump has caused them to lose their ability to think.
The greatest irony in all this is we have hard evidence that the Clinton machine swayed the MSM to promote T-rump in the
primary and squash Bernie. Isn't that election tampering?
We also witness the blatant privilege when Comey didn't indict the $hill when she obviously and without a doubt broke the
law. So we have the Clinton's above the law laundering money through their
foundation But it's Russia's fault....come on.
Jimmy accuse people of thinking with their lizard brains...I fear he is right.
You have totally taken the wind out of the sails of Russia Gate. As you stated, what was the crime? The information that came
from the DNC computers and Podesta's emails showed that there was a plan to rig the primary against Bernie so that Hillary would
win it. I've said numerous times that was the real election interference. As to what Russia is accused of doing Obama, Brennan
and others have stated that no votes were changed from Hillary to Trump no were any voting machines hacked. Funny thing about
that though. 3 states have said that they did see signs of some entity trying to hack into their state's voting data bases but
it came from the DHS. Not a foreign country.
Could it be that Mueller is acknowledging something important here without stating it? There is no real victim in "Russiagate."
So, where is the crime? Was anyone harmed? No. Was a U.S. Navy battleship resting at anchor blown up? No, again. Not a scratch
to anything except the reputations of those who were shown to have rigged the Democratic primaries so that the DNC Chair's
favored candidate won.
Putin said that he would welcome the US investigation into those 12 military officers if the US would send someone to interview
them in Russia since the two countries have a treaty to do just that. Will anyone take him up on that offer? Anyone? Bueller?
After Trump's meeting with Putin neocons are doubling down and accusing Trump of doing all kinds of shady things.
Mueller indictments strengthen case that Trump's win was stolen. What's new? a) Strong possibility Russians monkeyed w/
voter rolls, affecting the 11/8/16 outcome and b) Trump's fall strategy may have been driven by stolen Democratic analytics.
My column: https://t.co/io2B8Nhjs7
Brennan who had admitted in Jan 2017 that there was no evidence that Russia affected the election in any way has since been
prattling on about Russia Gate without every offering any evidence, but that is why this country has been peddling propaganda
since Wilson decided it was a great way to get people on board with anything their government want to do. Here is the latest from
Brennan.
Donald Trump's press conference performance in Helsinki rises to & exceeds the threshold of "high crimes & misdemeanors."
It was nothing short of treasonous. Not only were Trump's comments imbecilic, he is wholly in the pocket of Putin. Republican
Patriots: Where are you???
A few other tweets from the joint press conference.
I'm pretty sure that no one will ask Putin a follow up question about what he meant by this.
While standing next to the American president, Putin accuses Hillary Clinton of accepting illegal Russian campaign contributions.
Trump doesn't push back. pic.twitter.com/dDt2TTV24E
Debunked? I don't see that this was debunked. In fact I don't remember anyone ever talking about the content of the emails
that showed that the primary was rigged.
Asked if he believes US intel agencies or Putin about Russia's interference in the 2016 election, Trump immediately starts
pushing debunked DNC & Hillary conspiracy theories.
"I don't see any reason why it would be" Russia, Trump says, affirming he believes Putin's denials.
pic.twitter.com/uciAoRxbxA
PUTIN doesn't deny having blackmail material on Trump
"When Trump was in Moscow back then, I didn't even know that he was there. I treat him with utmost respect, but back then
when he was private person, a businessman, nobody informed me"
What we saw *today* was collusion. Trump's refusal to treat Russian sabotage of our democracy as the crime that it is encourages
Putin to keep it up. https://t.co/9OTDPQUmpWpic.twitter.com/efyNriYSwy
Propaganda baby. It works. Every person I have spoken with since Her Majesty lost the election really believes that this country is
being run by Putin directly and with the full knowledge and help from the GOP. Because Putin has blackmailed them too or something
....
I kept waiting for the day Russia Gate exploded and became known for the farce it is. I really wanted to see Rachel's reaction
and see how she would explain to her viewers that she had just made everything up. But now I'm don't think that is going to happen.
The PTB have invested to much into it and they won't let their agendas be derailed. This is just a softer "Saddam has WMDs." And
people fell for it.
What this episode really proves is that the US finally has joined the USSR as a broken, bankrupt empire that is run by shifting
coalitions of international bankers and splinter groups of spooks. The facade of law and democratic norms in America has fallen
and shattered on Washington steps.
Personally, I accept that in modern times all major intelligence agencies and military general staffs routinely spy on each
other and meddle in politics, including elections in their own countries. That's a given and should be obvious to everyone since
Yuri Andropov succeeded Brezhnev and Director George H.W Bush had three terms as President of the United States.
What is most significant about the current spectacle is how it reveals the polarization and breakdown in discipline within
US military and intelligence agencies. The internal policy dispute over Syria and Ukraine and botched election tampering has led
to open infighting among the spooks. That's what "Russiagate" is really all about and it's why Flynn and Manafort were the first
Mueller indicted.
The Mueller investigation is an extension of politics by other means.
Social media is completely insane. I've got a very large demographic of fairly open minded people given my trade, and it's
unanimous: Drumpf is a Traitor and has committed Treason - both with capital Ts.
I could see Civil War in weeks. Completely terrifying.
@detroitmechworks He ostensibly went to seek advice on how to do his confirmation hearing for SOS. What actually happened
is the Medusa told him who to retain and what policies to pursue. Pompeo had no intention of adopting her policies (except Neocon
points) but he got valuable clues as to Clinton allies in the DOS. He then began purging them. Stupid HRC! But I hope she runs
in 2020.
"... For instance, we can bring up Mr. Browder, in this particular case. Business associates of Mr. Browder have earned over $1.5 billion in Russia and never paid any taxes neither in Russia or the United States and yet the money escaped the country. They were transferred to the United States. They sent [a] huge amount of money, $400,000,000, as a contribution to the campaign of Hillary Clinton. Well that's their personal case. ..."
"... we have solid reason to believe that some [US] intelligence officers accompanied and guided these transactions. So we have an interest in questioning them. ..."
"... Browder is notoriously the man behind the 2012 Magnitsky Act, which exploited Congressional willingness to demonize Russia and has done so much to poison relations between Washington and Moscow. ..."
"... Browder, a media favorite who self-promotes as "Putin's enemy #1," portrays himself as a selfless human rights advocate, but is he? He has used his fortune to threaten lawsuits for anyone who challenges his version of events, effectively silencing many critics. He claims that his accountant Sergei Magnitsky was a crusading "lawyer" who discovered a $230 million tax-fraud scheme that involved the Browder business interest Hermitage Capital but was, in fact, engineered by corrupt Russian police officers who arrested Magnitsky and enabled his death in a Russian jail. ..."
"... William Browder is again in the news recently in connection with testimony related to Russiagate. On December 16th Senator Diane Feinstein of the Senate Judiciary Committee released the transcript of the testimony provided by Glenn Simpson, founder of Fusion GPS. According to James Carden, Browder was mentioned 50 times, but the repeated citations apparently did not merit inclusion in media coverage of the story by the New York Times, Washington Post and Politico. ..."
Vladimir Putin made a bombshell claim during Monday's joint press conference with President
Trump in Helsinki, Finland, when the Russian President said some $400 million )should be $400K) in illegally
earned profits was funneled to the Clinton campaign by associates of American-born British
financier Bill Browder - at one time the largest foreign portfolio investors in Russia. The
scheme involved members of the U.S. intelligence community, said Putin, who he said
"accompanied and guided these transactions."
Browder made billions in Russia during the 90's. In December, a Moscow court sentenced
Browder in absentia to nine years in prison for tax fraud, while he was also found guilty of
tax evasion in a separate 2013 case. Putin accused Browder's associates of illegally earning
over than $1.5 billion without paying Russian taxes, before sending $400 million to Clinton.
After offering to allow special counsel Robert Mueller's team to come to Russia for their
investigation - as long as there was a reciprocal arrangement for Russian intelligence to
investigate in the U.S., Putin said this:
For instance, we can bring up Mr. Browder, in this particular case. Business associates of
Mr. Browder have earned over $1.5 billion in Russia and never paid any taxes neither in
Russia or the United States and yet the money escaped the country. They were transferred to
the United States. They sent [a] huge amount of money, $400,000,000, as a contribution to the
campaign of Hillary Clinton. Well that's their personal case.
It might have been legal, the contribution itself but the way the money was earned was
illegal. So we have solid reason to believe that some [US] intelligence officers accompanied
and guided these transactions. So we have an interest in questioning them.
Israel Shamir, a keen observer of the
American-Russian relationship, and celebrated American journalist Robert
Parryboth think
that one man deserves much of the credit for the new Cold War and that man is William Browder,
a hedge fund operator who made his fortune in the corrupt 1990s world of Russian commodities
trading.
Browder is also symptomatic of why the United States government is so poorly informed about
international developments as he is the source of much of the Congressional "expert testimony"
contributing to the current impasse. He has somehow emerged as a trusted source in spite of the
fact that he has self-interest in cultivating a certain outcome. Also ignored is his
renunciation of American citizenship in 1998, reportedly to avoid taxes. He is now a British
citizen.
Browder is notoriously the man behind the 2012 Magnitsky Act, which exploited Congressional
willingness to demonize Russia and has done so much to poison relations between Washington and
Moscow. The Act sanctioned individual Russian officials, which Moscow has rightly seen as
unwarranted interference in the operation of its judicial system.
Browder, a media favorite who self-promotes as "Putin's enemy #1," portrays himself as a
selfless human rights advocate, but is he? He has used his fortune to threaten lawsuits for
anyone who challenges his version of events, effectively silencing many critics. He claims that
his accountant Sergei Magnitsky was a crusading "lawyer" who discovered a $230 million
tax-fraud scheme that involved the Browder business interest Hermitage Capital but was, in
fact, engineered by corrupt Russian police officers who arrested Magnitsky and enabled his
death in a Russian jail.
Many have been skeptical of the Browder narrative, suspecting that the fraud was in fact
concocted by Browder and his accountant Magnitsky. A Russian court recently
supported that alternative narrative, ruling in late December that Browder had deliberately
bankrupted his company and engaged in tax evasion. He was sentenced to nine years prison in
absentia.
William Browder is again in the news recently in connection with testimony related to
Russiagate. On December 16th Senator Diane Feinstein of the Senate Judiciary Committee released
the transcript of the testimony provided by Glenn Simpson, founder of Fusion GPS.
According to James Carden, Browder was mentioned 50 times, but the repeated citations
apparently did not merit inclusion in media coverage of the story by the New York Times,
Washington Post and Politico.
Fusion GPS, which was involved in the research producing the Steele Dossier used to
discredit Donald Trump, was also retained to provide investigative services relating to a
lawsuit in New York City involving a Russian company called Prevezon. As information provided
by Browder was the basis of the lawsuit, his company and business practices while in Russia
became part of the investigation. Simmons maintained that Browder proved to be somewhat evasive
and his accounts of his activities were inconsistent. He claimed never to visit the United
States and not own property or do business there, all of which were untrue, to include his
ownership through a shell company of a $10 million house in Aspen Colorado. He repeatedly
ran away , literally, from attempts to subpoena him so he would have to testify under
oath.
Per Simmons, in Russia, Browder used shell companies locally and also worldwide to avoid
taxes and conceal ownership, suggesting that he was likely one of many corrupt businessmen
operating in what was a wild west business environment.
My question is, "Why was such a man granted credibility and allowed a free run to poison the
vitally important US-Russia relationship?" The answer might be follow the money. Israel Shamir
reports
that Browder was a major contributor to Senator Ben Cardin of Maryland, who was the major
force behind the Magnitsky Act.
"... When one believes that patriotism and defense of empire must be synonymous, and that skepticism of international conflict implies sympathy with a foreign power, it is easy to see why someone would seek out the most nefarious answer. ..."
"... But when one is an empire, the indispensable nation, rules just don't apply to it like they do to other, lesser countries. "He [Rohrabacher] is widely suspected of having an ulterior motive." What Chait means is his cocktail party peers widely suspect it. ..."
"... But what he is convinced about is the utility of the U.S. led liberal world order imposed at the point of a gun. ..."
"... Yet at the same time it's quite out of the question to discuss how Israel controls our politics, tells Congress what bills to pass, frog-marches us into wars on her behalf, openly buys both presidential candidates, etc. ..."
"... It's like a prostitute getting out from under her John and complaining in all seriousness about who a man is looking at her legs. It's positively bizarre. ..."
"... Posting Trump as a decision maker is making fun of the global deplorables as being dull. He is an insider joke, as Hillary, in case someone might misfire. ..."
"... As for Brennan, corporate animals as Brennan do strictly nothing that is grounded in original thought, has any kind of career risk, requires physical courage. Corpses keeping corpses warm. Ah, what a time in history to be a journalist, an artesan of linear fairy and horror. How far away from any meaningfulness. The middle classes, digging their own demise. ..."
"... In fact, the crooked Russians Trump knows are small fry among the CIA agents that looted Russia under CIA's puppet ruler Yeltsin. Felix Sater bragged about it, till they shut him up. Trump aided Russian capital flight by helping Russian crooks and traitors launder their money in real estate (because you don't get to be president without running lots of errands for CIA.) It is a truism that the best oppo is slightly distorted tales of the candidate's dirty work for CIA. That way party dupes foam at the mouth demonizing their enemy figurehead and forget about CIA, who runs them all. ..."
"... As for John Brennan, the walking conspiracy machine, he is the godfather of the U.S. intelligence (civilian) war against outsider Trump. ..."
The former intelligence official Chait trots out as an example is John O. Brennan, who has
gone on the record saying there is something fishy about the Trump-Russia relationship that
might even breach on treasonous. "While the fact that the former CIA director has espoused this
theory hardly proves it, perhaps we should give more credence to the possibility that Brennan
is making these extraordinary charges of treason and blackmail at the highest levels of
government because he knows something we don't." Contrary to that impression, Brennan's
statements should make one very skeptical. Or at least that's the logical conclusion of anyone
outside the establishment groupthink previously described. If the former CIA director knows
something the public doesn't, why has no action been taken? If there is solid, irrefutable
evidence that Donald Trump has been compromised by a foreign power, why is John Brennan keeping
it secret? Congress should be alerted, and Vice President Pence sworn in under the Twenty-fifth
Amendment. But in two years since the original start of the investigation, Brennan has
presented no such evidence. In fact, using Brennan as the example shows how blind one can be
when only seeing life through the establishment paradigm. As CIA director, John Brennan not
only provided a real-guard defense
of torture , but oversaw U.S.
military aid to Syrian jihadists allied with Al-Qaeda. If Donald Trump is a traitor to his
country, what does that make Brennan and his aiding and abetting of America's sworn enemy? The
actions of the Obama administration are widely sourced and admitted by public officials, but
Chait pays no mind. That's because people like Chait don't see crimes committed in defense of
the empire as real crimes.
Chait opens his chronology in the year 1987, when Donald Trump both visited Moscow on a
business trip and began voicing open political sentiments. Trump's comments focused on the
United States' relationship with its allies, saying Americans were getting a raw deal. "The
safest assumption is that it's entirely coincidental that Trump launched a national campaign,
with himself as spokesman, built around themes that dovetailed closely with Soviet
foreign-policy goals shortly after his Moscow stay." Chait is nothing short of duplicitous
here, admitting that the whole premise reaches nothing above coincidental while simultaneously
trying to poison the waters. As Trump said, why shouldn't countries that can afford to defend
themselves do so? Why does the burden fall on the American taxpayer to defend the economically
rich people of Germany and Japan? The answer, Chait says, is to defend the "liberal
international order" of the postwar era. An order that requires U.S. military domination of the
planet. Having other countries defend themselves would take away from U.S. preeminence, and
most importantly, U.S. power. The idea of Americans protecting America only would at first
glance to be the logical, even pro-American answer. But it is certainly the anti-hegemony
answer, and to Chait that puts it in the category of a pro-Soviet goal.
In a single sentence, Chait tries to both summarize and dismiss the downturn in
Russian-American relations that accelerated during Barack Obama's second term. "During the
Obama administration, Russia grew more estranged from the United States as its aggressive
behavior toward its neighbors triggered hostile responses from NATO." Perhaps it would be
unreasonable to expect Chait to detail Russian relations with the West over the past 25 years,
such as NATO expansion eastward in contradiction to
previous promises , the U.S. withdraw from the
Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002, or the 2008 Russo-Georgian War with violence initiated by
the latter . But to not only ignore the February 2014 coup in Ukraine that initiated recent
hostilities between the U.S. and Russia, but to also put the blame on the latter's "aggressive
behavior," is at best laughable and at worst dishonest. In February of 2014 the democratically
elected government of Ukraine was overthrown in a coup orchestrated by the United States
government, an event Chait and his peers do their best to forget .
Russia's subsequent annexation of the Crimean Peninsula (containing the Russian naval base at
Sevastopol) was a wholly reactive measure. To say the recent estrangement was triggered by
anything else than western aggressive behavior is factually inaccurate.
A deep-dive into Paul Manafort's past relationships fills the middle of the article, along
with Chait's biased perceptions. "This much was clear in March 2016: The person [Manafort] who
managed the campaign of a pro-Russian candidate in Ukraine was now also managing the campaign
of a pro-Russian candidate in the United States." What makes Donald Trump pro-Russian? "Well I
hope that we do have good relations with Russia. I say it loud and clear, I've been saying it
for years. I think it's a good thing if we have great relationships, or at least good
relationships with Russia. That's very important," says the President. Donald Trump has not
proposed any kind of military alliance with Russia, giving it financial aid of any kind, or
granting it favored-nation status. Simply to want "good" relations with a country is enough to
be pro-Russian, in Chait's characterization. Does that make Trump pro-any country he doesn't
wish to bomb? Is Donald Trump equally pro-Peruvian, pro-Nepalese, and pro-Tanzanian as he is
pro-Russian? Shouldn't it be the proper view of the United States to try to have good working
relations with all foreign powers, especially if that power has thousands of stockpiled nuclear
weapons? A better description of that view would be pro-American .
It is important to emphasize and explain these seemingly small choices of language because
of how much they reveal of Chait's worldview. When one believes that patriotism and defense
of empire must be synonymous, and that skepticism of international conflict implies sympathy
with a foreign power, it is easy to see why someone would seek out the most nefarious
answer. Chait is willing to overlook obvious, mundane explanations to imply Trump has
committed wrong because to Chait, he already has by opposing the international order's chosen
script. "It is possible to construct an innocent explanation for all the lying and skulduggery
[sic], but it is not the most obvious explanation. More likely, collusion between the Russians
and the Trump administration has continued beyond the campaign." Or, perhaps, politics is
naturally a game for liars and the political world is specially made to house them. "Why would
Manafort, who has a law degree from Georgetown and years of experience around white-collar
crime, behave like this? Of all those in Trump's camp, he is the furthest thing from a true
believer, and he lacks any long-standing personal ties to the president or his family, so what
incentive does he have to spend most or all of his remaining years in prison rather than betray
Trump?" The most obvious answer would seem to be that there is nothing to betray; if there is
no grand conspiracy of Russian collusion, Manafort has not spilled the beans for any reason
more inexplicable than there is nothing to spill. Or if that's too boring, there's always the
answer Chait is giddy to suggest. "One way to make sense of his behavior is the possibility
that Manafort is keeping his mouth shut because he's afraid of being killed." Creativity knows
no bounds.
Chait seeks comfort in those who might be even further down the establishment paradigm than
he is. He describes an exchange between House Speaker Paul Ryan and House Majority Leader Kevin
McCarthy in the summer of 2016 where they joke about Trump and California Congressman Dana
Rohrabacher being on Russian President Vladimir Putin's payroll. While criticizing the GOP
leaders' joke as in bad taste, he describes the foreign policy positions taken by Rohrabacher.
He once again uses the phrase "pro-Russian" to describe them, falling into the same verbal trap
as before. Of interest, Chait mentions Rohrabacher's denouncement of U.S. opposition to the
Crimean annexation as "hypocrisy" considering America's foreign policy. The implication is that
this is some sort of hokum, but it is nothing more than showing American self-awareness. Verbal
reproaches to Russia by the U.S. government are drown out by the facts, including the overthrow
of the Ukrainian government just days before Russian actions in Crimea, and the 2003 invasion
of Iraq which stands to this day as the biggest crime of the 21 st century. But
when one is an empire, the indispensable nation, rules just don't apply to it like they do to
other, lesser countries. "He [Rohrabacher] is widely suspected of having an ulterior motive."
What Chait means is his cocktail party peers widely suspect it.
What follows is a description of Trump's actions as President regarding Russia, which seem
to belie Chait's point of a special closeness. Trump was apparently "apoplectic" when political
realities compelled him to sign new sanctions on Russia in the summer of 2017. Since those
sanctions ran counter to the explicit platform Trump campaigned and won on, that would seem to
be a normal reaction to any policy reversal. Trump says he thinks Russia should be allowed back
into the G7. The idea that a geopolitical power player that approaches nuclear parity with the
United States should be involved in such a global forum doesn't require further explanation.
During that G7 conference Trump expressed the belief that Crimea rightfully belongs to Russia
because the people there speak Russian. He's not wrong; the people of Crimea are ethnically
Russian, speak the language, and culturally identify with Russia proper. The people of Crimea
should have the right to vote in a fair, internationally monitored referendum on whether to be
a part of Ukraine or Russia. That's the right of self-determination, an American goal if there
ever was one. Chait says Putin engineered the end of the U.S.-South Korea military exercises
during the recent negotiations with North Korea. Such an insinuation, outright ignoring the
months of talks that have been taking place between North and South Korea, the stated goals of
the Moon Jae-in administration, and South Korean public opinion, is naïve to the highest
degree. That sort of western-centric view, that the United States is always the decision maker,
is further proof of the establishment imperialistic mindset Chait has written his entire
article from. He concludes with the foreboding note that Trump is about to meet with Putin in a
special summit next month. Somehow Trump meeting with Putin 19 months into his presidential
term is scandalous, while George Bush meeting Putin 5 months into his term, and Barack Obama 6
months into his term (in Moscow no less!) garnered so such suspicious coverage.
Chait, to his credit, almost makes it through the entire article without pulling out one of
the most overused, most debunked
storylines of "Russiagate." The storyline that anyone who says Russia was not behind the 2016
Democratic National Committee hack (or leak )
is " contradicting the conclusion of every U.S. intelligence agency." That conclusion was
reached not by the U.S. intelligence community but handpicked analysts from only four of
seventeen agencies. "But who is bending the president's ear to split the Western alliance and
placate Russia? His motive for these foreign-policy moves is obviously strong enough in his
mind to be worth prolonging an investigation he is desperate to terminate." It cannot be that
good relations with Russia is self-evidently beneficial to the United States, or that Donald
Trump is a genuine believer in that policy. Jonathan Chait is so enamored with established
Washington foreign policy that no disagreement can be anything other than odious.
To reiterate, Jonathan Chait is not convinced that what he wrote is the truth. He admits
that there is no conclusive evidence that Donald Trump was a Russian intelligence asset in 1987
or any other year. But what he is convinced about is the utility of the U.S. led liberal world
order imposed at the point of a gun. The biases of his language towards permanent military
hegemony run through his writing. This leads to the discoloring or even misrepresentation of
the facts.
Hunter DeRensis is a senior at George Mason University majoring in History and
minoring in Public Policy & Administration. You can follow him on Twitter
[@HunterDeRensis]
But what he is convinced about is the utility of the U.S. led liberal world order
imposed at the point of a gun.
He's channeling Lenin/Trotsky:
But what they were convinced about was the utility of the Bolshevik led soviet world order
imposed at the point of a gun.
Same people, same totalitarianism, same repression – the difference is that the U.S.
totalitarians don't quite yet have the absolute power they need to liquidate the
"Deplorables".
The truly absurd thing about all this is that people profess concern about Russia influencing
our poloitical process. If she does, it's in various ways so haphazard, trivial, marginal,
and ineffectual as to verge on the illusory.
Yet at the same time it's quite out of the question to discuss how Israel
controls our politics, tells Congress what bills to pass, frog-marches us into wars on
her behalf, openly buys both presidential candidates, etc.
It's like a prostitute getting out from under her John and complaining in all
seriousness about who a man is looking at her legs. It's positively bizarre.
If only Russian influence was all we had to worry about. Let's get that Israeli implant
out of our cerebral cortex -- then think about whether that Russian fungus on our toenail
really is a problem.
Doesn't the story of the little boy who cried wolf apply here?
Yes, but point being that this seems to be the consensus among the many factions –
mostly of the left (aka soft neoliberals --NNB) , and the retarded left(those who think the
Democratic Party has their back, known as RL – Retarded Left). But some on the hard
right are on board too.
As many contrary, but not mainstream, articles have pointed out – it's faith based,
like a religion. No hard evidence is ever needed, and that is why it keeps getting more
cult-like the more time goes by. Soon there will be a condition named for all the
nonbelievers, and medications prescribed.
Yet at the same time it's quite out of the question to discuss how Israel controls our
politics, tells Congress what bills to pass, frog-marches us into wars on her behalf,
openly buys both presidential candidates, etc.
It would be interesting to see a poll of how many Americans really understand that? 1%
maybe? I don't know, but that's the rub – how effective the corporate owned media has
over the mass mentality of their captive audience.
Yesterday evening, here in the Netherlands, I saw a former Obama adviser interviewed, who
complained about the Atlantic alliance having been built up in 70 years destroyed in a few
days.
Knowing nothing about history and obvious facts seems to be the rule these days.
Until 1917 Europe had intensive trade with Russia.
Why not resume this trade ?
Meaning, since there is nothing much to write about in the heat of the Northern
hemisphere, anything goes. A classic example of inducing irrelevant thought in braindeads.
Trump, true or not? Well, Trump does not matter.
Posting Trump as a decision maker is making fun of the global deplorables as being
dull. He is an insider joke, as Hillary, in case someone might misfire.
As for Brennan, corporate animals as Brennan do strictly nothing that is grounded in
original thought, has any kind of career risk, requires physical courage. Corpses keeping
corpses warm. Ah, what a time in history to be a journalist, an artesan of linear fairy and
horror. How far away from any meaningfulness. The middle classes, digging their own
demise.
This summer will see more then usual "snatch a bone" and have the pack run with it.
Amen.
Trump visits unsteady, dilapidated Moscow in 1987. He notices that the USSR is not the
all-powerful mega-threat it may have been in the 70s.
Trump also visits various glistening European capitals and notices the much higher level
of development.
He then reads that America is paying for the defence of Europe against the USSR. He
notices that this doesn't make sense. Europe has more than enough capacity to defend itself.
America might better spend that money elsewhere.
Two decades later New York Times writer insinuates that Trump could be a sleeper Soviet
agent for coming to this conclusion. Even though Trump was proven right by events.
Here is an interesting historical look at how the United States responded when it believed
that Russia/the USSR was using propaganda against Washington:
I really didn't read very far in this. But let's stop and end with Chait's comment:
"Russia was already broadcasting its strong preference for Trump through the media."
Well hmmm. Considering that Hillary was all but declaring war on Russia and an even-bet to
get us into a shooting war with them, and considering that nearly all the other Republicans
were members of NeoCon incorporated, and considering that Jewish media hysteria about Russia
was ramping up by the day, and considering that Trump was the ONLY candidate poking holes in
the NeoCon narrative, then Russia would have been pretty stupid NOT to prefer Trump.
Yeah, I might prefer the candidate who was far and away the least likely to drop nuclear
bombs on my nation too.
It's simply amazing how such extreme story telling is allowed to avoid the fact that the US
is wasting its resources on pointless conflicts thruout the world while the nation decays.
Also surprising? The fact that supposedly sane political and military leaders can continue
to demand ever more conventional military spending based on a fantasy that war with
China/Russia wouldn't go nuclear.
Where are the liberals with any principles? Or is that a contradiction in terms? Why not
support Trump against the warmongers and fix the country instead?
The linchpin of the TrumpRussianSpy!!1! notion is identifying the Russian mafiya with the
Russian government. Every crooked Russian gets the epithet Putin-linked, close to Putin, or
some variant.
In its purest form you see Amy Knight writing in CIA house organ Daily Beast, "The real
question is where does the Russian criminal state end and the criminal underworld begin, and
how do they work together in what amounts to a new murder incorporated?" This is classic
projection by CIA. It's CIA that recruits every kind of organized crime as agents and
cutouts. They project this trait onto the entire Russian state.
In fact, the crooked Russians Trump knows are small fry among the CIA agents that
looted Russia under CIA's puppet ruler Yeltsin. Felix Sater bragged about it, till they shut
him up. Trump aided Russian capital flight by helping Russian crooks and traitors launder
their money in real estate (because you don't get to be president without running lots of
errands for CIA.) It is a truism that the best oppo is slightly distorted tales of the
candidate's dirty work for CIA. That way party dupes foam at the mouth demonizing their enemy
figurehead and forget about CIA, who runs them all.
"As CIA director, John Brennan not only provided a real-guard defense of torture, but oversaw
U.S. military aid to Syrian jihadists allied with Al-Qaeda. If Donald Trump is a traitor to
his country, what does that make Brennan and his aiding and abetting of America's sworn
enemy? "
Alinsky/Clinton rule: Always accuse your opponent of what YOU are doing.
Why does no one believe the signals intelligence arms of USA allies, even if they say they
stumbled upon communications between the Trump campaign and Russia (as far back as 2015) and
became concerned enough to alert their US counterparts?
I respond to your question with an observation.. the intelligence arms of most of the
nations are interlocked globally. The so called Intelligence groups have done so many regime
changes, false flag operations, tv fake interviews, and contributed to so much false and
misleading and war attitude generating propaganda, that no one believes . If an intelligence
group were to say it was raining outside, those outsiders interested to know, would have to
go look for themselves.
As long as leaders of nations, elected, military, contractor, or bureaucrat operate in
secret, make people who work for them sign NDAs, criminalize truth speaking whistle blowers,
operate as super top secret projects, redirect public socially needed money to fund war
machines, use technology and access to spy on people, or threaten the lives or well being of
human beings who happened to live in a nation that is unfriendly, for no apparent or valid
public stated reason, no reasonable person will ever believe the signal intelligence arms of
USA or its allies.. Colin Powell comes to mind! Secrecy, intentional falsity, 24/7
surveillance, controlled, limited and gated access to knowledge or information, and silence
maintained when the facts should have been make known, has produced a "public enemy at large"
response.
if these agencies presented a hungry angry wolf in plain view, most people would wonder
"what is it" in disguise. One of the first rules in taking over a nation, is to prevent those
who lead from being heard. So not having reliable information constitutes a very dangerous
situation, but it is one that cannot be easily remedied until 9/11, Holocaust, and all kinds
of global events are completely and fully disclosed, and those responsible held
accountable.
It was a speech given to veterans before the election in which she nearly promised
military confrontation with Russia in response to supposed cyber attacks. Shown on YouTube,
ignored by MSM.
"Yet at the same time it's quite out of the question to discuss how Israel controls our
politics "
Yep. It is also third rail to discuss how Israel and Saudi Arabia often work in tandem to
influence U.S. foreign policy. Saudi Arabia has the mountain of cash; Israel has the Mossad.
Jeffrey Epstein is an example of this influence operation at work. As for John Brennan,
the walking conspiracy machine, he is the godfather of the U.S. intelligence (civilian) war
against outsider Trump.
Looks like another Steele dossier and it has Brennan fingertips all over. Looks like another
exercise in creation of a parallel reality. The content of the document implies that malware was
installed in GRU computers and those computers were monitored 24/7 by CIA. The documents
describes both GNU officers and DNC employees as unsophisticated idiots. DNC employees who who
should undergo some basic security training were easily deceived by fishing emails from a foreign
country. And a good practice is to disable hotlinks in emails.
I always suspected that Guccifer 2.0 was a false flag operation to hide the leak of DNC
documents. If this is true this was really sophisticated false flag.
BTW GRU is military intelligence unit, so to hack into civil computers is kind of out of
their main sphere of activities. They also should be aware about NSA capabilities of intercepting
the traffic.
I especially like the following tidbit: "On or about June 1,2016, the Conspirators attempted
to delete traces of their presence on the DCCC network using the computer program CCleaner." This
is how third rate hackers (wannabes) behave.
First of all the investigation of DNC was botched by hiring a private, connected to
Democratic Party security company (Crowdstrike), so no data from it are acceptable in court. FBI
did not have any access to the data.
Which means that Mueller is a patsy of more powerful forces
How about speed of download that proved to be excessive for Internet connection? Nothing is
said about Dmitri
Alperovitch role is all this investigation, which completely discredit all that results? See for example diuscusstion at
Why
Crowdstrike's Russian Hacking Story Fell Apart- Say Hello to Fancy Bear And, again, the question is: Was Guccifer 2.0 in itself a USA false flag operation ?
Looks like Mueller is acting as an operative of Democratic Party. Could not dig up enough
dirt on Trump, so he now saddled his beloved horse, trying to provoke Russia to respond.
And this John Le Carre style details about individuals supposedly involved. Probably were
provided by CIA ;-)
4. By in or around April 2016, the Conspirators also hacked into the computer networks of
the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee ("DCCC") and the Democratic National Committee
("DNC"). The Conspirators covertly monitored the computers of dozens of DCCC and DNC employees,
implanted hundreds of files containing malicious computer code ("malware"), and stole emails
and other documents from the DCCC and DNC.
5. By in or around April 2016, the Conspirators began to plan the release of materials
stolen from the Clinton Campaign, DCCC, and DNC.
6. Beginning in or around June 2016, the Conspirators staged and released tens of thousands
of the stolen emails and documents. They did so using fictitious online personas, including
"DCLeaks" and "Guccifer 2.0."
7. The Conspirators also used the Guccifer 2.0 persona to release additional stolen
documents through a website maintained by an organization ("Organization Iй), that had
previously posted documents stolen from U.S. persons, entities, and the U.S. government The
Conspirators continued their U.S. election-interference operations through in or around
November 2016.
8. To hide their connections to Russia and the Russian government, the Conspirators used
false identities and made false statements about their identities. To further avoid detection,
the Conspirators used a network of computers located across the world, including in the United
States, and paid for this infrastructure using cryptocurrency.
... ... ...
13. Defendant ALEKSEY VIKTOROVICH LUKASHEV
(Лукашсв
Алексей
Викторович) was a Senior Lieutenant
in the Russian military assigned to ANTONOV's department within Unit 26165. LUKASHEV used
various online personas, including "Den Katenberg" and "Yuliana Martynova." In on around 2016,
LUKASHEV sent spcarphisliing emails to members of the Clinton Campaign and affiliated
individuals, including the chairman of the Clinton Campaign.
14. Defendant SERGEY ALEKSANDROVICH MORGACHEV
(Моргачев
Сергей
Александрович)
was a Lieutenant Colonel in the Russian military assigned to Unit 26165. MORGACHEV oversaw a
department within Unit 26165 dedicated to developing and managing malware, including a hacking
tool used by the GRU known as "X-Agent." During the hacking of the DCCC and DNC networks,
MORGACHEV supervised the co-conspirators who developed and monitored the X-Agent malware
implanted on those computers.
15. Defendant NIKOLAY YURYEVICH KOZACHEK (Козачек
Николай
Юрьевич) was a Lieutenant Captain in the Russian
military assigned to MORGACHEV's department within Unit 26165. KOZACHEK used a variety of
monikers, including "kazak" and "blablablal234565 " KOZACHEK developed, customized, and
monitored X-Agent malware used to hack the DCCC and DNC networks beginning in or around April
2016.
16. Defendant PAVEL VYACHESLAVOVICH YERSHOV (Ершов
Павел
Вячеславович) was a
Russian military officer assigned to MORGACHEV's department within Unit 26165. In or around
2016, YERSHOV assisted KOZACHEK and other co-conspirators in testing and customizing X-Agent
malware before actual deployment and use.
17. Defendant ARTEM ANDREYEVICH MALYSHEV (Малышев
Арт е м
Андреевич) was a Second Lieutenant in the
Russian military assigned to MORGACHEV's department within Unit 26165. MALYSIIEV used a variety
of monikers, including "djangomagicdev" and "realblatr." In or around 2016, MALYSHEV monitored
X-Agent malware implanted on the DCCC and DNC networks.
18. Defendant ALEKSANDR VLADIMIROVICH OSADCHUK
(Осадчук
Александр В
ладимирович) was a Colonel in
the Russian military and the commanding officer of Unit 74455. Unit 74455 was located at 22
Kirova Street, Khimki, Moscow, a building referred to within the GRU as the 'Tower." Unit 74455
assisted in the release of stolen documents through the DC Leaks and Guccifer 2.0 personas, the
promotion of those releases, and the publication of anti-Clinton content on social media
accounts operated by the GRU.
19. Defendant ALEKSEY ALEKSANDROVICH POTEMKIN
(Потемкин
Алексей
Александрович)
was an officer in the Russian military assigned to Unit 74455. POTEMKIN was a supervisor in a
department within Unit 7445f responsible for the administration of computer infrastructure used
in cyber operations. Infrastructure and social media accounts administered by POTEMKIN'S
department were used, among other things, to assist in the release of stolen documents through
the DCLeaks and Guccifer 2 0 personas.
21, ANTONOV, BADIN, YKRMAKOV, LUKASHEV, and their co-conspiratore targeted victims using a
technique known as spearphishing to steal victims' passwords or otherwise gain access to their
computers. Beginning by at least March 2016, the Conspirators targeted over 300 individuals
affiliated with the Clinton Campaign, DCCC, and DNC.
a. For example, on or about March 19, 2016, LUKASHEV and his co-conspirators created and
sent a spearphishing email to the chairman of the Clinton Campaign. LUKASHEV used the account
"John356gh" at an online service that abbreviated lengthy website addresses (referred to as a
"URL-shortcning service"). LIJKASHEV used the account to mask a link contained in the
spearphishing email, which directed the recipient to a GRU-created website. LUKASHEV altered
the a security notification from Google (a technique known as "spoofing"), instructing the user
to change his password by clicking the embedded link. Those instructions wore followed. On or
about March 21, 2016, LUKASHEV, YERMAKOV, and their co-conspirators stole the contents of the
chairman's email account, which consisted of over 50,000 emails.
Starting on or about March 19, 2016, LUKASHEV and his co-conspirators sent spearphishing
emails to the personal accounts of other individuals affiliated with the Clinton Campaign,
including its campaign manager and a senior foreign policy advisor. On or about March 25, 2016,
LUKASHEV used the same john356gh account to mask additional links included in spearphishing
emails sent to numerous individuals affiliated with the Clinton Campaign, including Victims 1
and 2. LUKASliEV sent these emails from the Russia-based email account [email protected] that he spoofed to appear to be from
Google. On or about March 28,2016, YERMAKOV researched the names of Victims 1 and 2 and their
association with Clinton on various social media sites. Through their spearphishing operations,
LUKASHEV, YERMAKOV, and their co-conspirators successfully stole email credentials and
thousands of emails from numerous individuals affiliated with the Clinton Campaign. Many of
these stolen emails. Including those from Victims 1 and 2, were later released by the
Conspirators through DCLeaks.
On or about April 6, 2016, the Conspirators created an email account in the name (with a
one-letter deviation from the actual spelling) of a known member of the Clinton Campaign. The
Conspirators then used that account to send spearphishing emails to the work accounts of more
than thirty different Clinton Campaign employees. In the spearphishipg emails, LUKASHEV and his
co-conspirators embedded a link purporting to direct the recipient to a document titled
"hillary-clinton-favorable-rating.xlsx " In fact, this link directed the recipients' computers
to a GRU-crcatcd website.
22. The Conspirators spearphished individuals affiliated with the Clinton Campaign
throughout the summer of 2016. For example, on or about July 27, 2016, the Conspirators
attempted after hours to spearphish for the first time email accounts at a domain hosted by a
third-
party provider and used by Clinton's personal office. At or around the same time, they also
targeted seventy-six email addresses at the domain for the Clinton Campaign.
Hacking into the DCCC Network
23. Beginning in or around March 2016, the Conspirators, in addition to their spearphishing
efforts, researched the DCCC and DNC computer networks to identify technical specifications and
vulnerabilities.
For example, beginning on or about March 15,2016, YERMAKOV ran a technical query for the
DNC's internet protocol configurations to identify connected devices.
On or about the same day, YERMAKOV searched for opcn-source information about the DNC
network, the Democratic Party, and Hillary Clinton.
On or about April 7. 2016. YKRMAKOV ran я technical query for the DNC's internet
protocol configurations to identify connected devices.
24. By in or around April 2016, within days of YERMAKOV's searches regarding the DCCC, the
Conspirators hacked into the DCCC computer network. Once they gained access, they installed and
managed different types of malware to explore the DCCC network and steal data.
a. On or about April 12,2016. the Conspirators used the stolen credentials of a I )CCC On or
about April 12,2016, the Conspirators used the stolen credentials of a DCCC Employee ('"DCCC
Employee 1") to access the DCCC network. DCCC Employee 1 had received a spearphishing email
from the Conspirators on or about April 6,2016, and entered her password after clicking on the
link.
b. Between in or around April 2016 and June 2016, the Conspirators installed multiple
versions of their X-Agent malware on at least ten DCCC computers, which allowed them to monitor
individual employees' computer activity, steal passwords, and maintain access to the DCCC
network.
c. X-Agent malware implanted on the DCCC network transmitted information from the victims'
computers to a GRU-leased server located in Arizona. The Conspirators referred to this server
as their "AMS" panel. KOZACHEK, MALYSHEV, and their со-conspirators logged into the
AMS panel to use X-Agent's keylog and screenshot functions in the course of monitoring and
surveilling activity on the DCCC computers. 'Ibe keylog function allowed the Conspirators to
capture keystrokes entered by DCCC employees. The screenshot function allowed the Conspirators
to take pictures of the DCCC employees' computer screens.
d. For example, on or about April 14, 2016, the Conspirators repeatedly activated X-Agent's
keylog and screensiot functions to surveil DCCC Employee 1's computer activity over the course
of eight hours. During that time, the Conspirators captured DCCC Employee 1 's communications
with co-workers and the passwords she entered while working on fundraising and voter outreach
projects. Similarly, on or about April 22, 2016, the Conspirators activated X-Agcnt's keylog
and screenshot functions to capture the discussions of another DCCC Employee ("DCCC Employee
2") about the DCCC's finances, as well as her individual banking information and other personal
topics.
25. On or about April 19, 2016, KOZAC1IEK, YERSIIOV, and their co-conspirators remotely
configured an overseas computer to relay communications between X-Agent malware and the AMS
panel and then tested X-Agent's ability to connect to this computer. The Conspirators referred
to this computer as a "middle server." The middle server acted as a proxy to obscure the
connection between malware at the DCCC and the Conspirators' AMS panel. On or about April 20,
2016, the Conspirators directed X-Agent malware on the DCCC computers to connect to this middle
server and receive directions from the Conspirators.
Hacking into the DNC Network
26. On or about April 18, 2016, the Conspirators hacked into the DNC's computers through
their access to the DCCC network. The Conspirators then installed and managed different types
of malware (as they did in the DCCC network) to explore the DNC network and steal documents, a.
On or about April 18, 2016, the Conspirators activated X-Agent's keylog and screenshot
functions to steal credentials of a DCCC employee who was authorized
to access the DNC network. The Conspirators hacked into the DNC network from the DCCC network
using stolen credentials. By in or around June 2016, they gained access to approximately
thirty-three DNC computers.
In or around April 2016, the Conspirators installed X Agent malware on tho DNC network,
including the same versions installed on the DCCC network.
MALYSHEV and his co-conspifators monitored the X-Agent malware from the AMS panel and captured
data from the victim computers. The AMS panel collected thousands of keylog and screenshot
results from the DCCC and DNC computers, such as a screenshot and keystroke capture of DCCC
Employee 2 viewing the DCCC's online banking information.
Theft of DCCC and DNC Documents
27. The Conspirators searched for and identified computers within the DCCC and DNC networks
that stored information related to the 2016 U.S. presidential election, for example, on or
about April 15, 2016, the Conspirators searched one hacked DCCC computer for terms that
included "hillary," "cruz," and "trump." The Conspirators also copied select DCCC folders,
including "Benghazi Investigations." The Conspirators targeted computers containing information
such as opposition research and field operation plans for the 2016 elections.
28. To enable them to steal a large number of documents at once without detection, the
Conspirators used a publicly available tool to gather and compress multiple documents on the
DCCC and DNC networks. The Conspirators then used other GRU malware, known as "X-Tunncl," to
move the stolen documents cutside the DCCC and DNC networks through encrypted channels.
a. For example, on or about April 22, 2016, the Conspirators compressed gigabytes of data
from DNC computers, including opposition research. The Conspirators later moved the compressed
DNC data using X-Tunnel to a GRU-leased computer located in Illinois.
b. On or about April 28, 2016, the Conspirators connected to and tested the same computer
located in Illinois. Later that day, the Conspirators used X-Tunnel to connect to that computer
to steal additional documents from the DCCC network.
29. Between on or about May 25, 2016 and June 1, 2016, the Conspirators hacked the DNC
Microsoft Exchange Server and stole thousands of emails from the work accounts of DNC
employees. During that time, YERMAKOV researched PowerShell commands related to accessing and
managing the Microsoft Exchange Server.
30. On or about May 30, 2016, MALYSHEV accessed the AMS panel in order to upgrade custom AMS
software on die server. That day, the AMS panel received updates from approximately thirteen
different X-Agent malware implants on DCCC and DNC computers.
31. During the hacking of the DCCC and DNC networks, the Conspirators covered their tracks
by Intentionally deleting logs and computer flies. For example, on or about May 13, 2016, the
Conspirators cleared the event logs from a DNC computer. On or about June 20, 2016, the
Conspirators deleted logs from the AMS panel that documented their activities on the panel,
including the login history. Efforts to Remain on the X'CC and PNC Networks
32. Despite the Conspirators' efforts to hide their activity, beginning in or around May
2016, both the DCCC and DNC became aware that they had been hacked and hired a security company
("Company 1") to identify the extent of the intrusions. By in or around June 2016, Company 1
took steps to exclude intruders from the networks. Despite these efforts, a Linux-based version
of X-Agent, programmed to communicate with the GRU-registercd domain linuxkml.net, remained on
the DNC network until in or around October 2016.
33. In response to Company Ts efforts, the Conspirators took countermeasures to maintain
access to the DCCC and DNC networks.
a. Oil 01 about May 31, 2016, YERMAKOV searched for opcn-sourcc information about Company 1
and its reporting on X-Agent and X-Tunnel. On or about June 1,2016, the Conspirators attempted
to delete traces of their presence on the DCCC network using the computer program CCleaner.
b. On or about June 14, 2016, the Conspirators registered the domain actblues.com,
which mimicked the domain of a political fundraising platform that included a
DCCC donations page. Shortly thereafter, the Conspirators used stolen DCCC
credentials to modify the DCCC website and redirect visitors to the actblucs.com
On or about June 14, 2016, the Conspirators registered the domain actblues.com,
which mimicked the domain of a political fundraising platform that included a
DCCC donations page. Shortly thereafter, the Conspirators used stolen DCCC
credentials to modify the DCCC website and redirect visitors to the actblucs.com
domain.
On or about June 20, 2016, after Company 1 had disabled X-Agent on the DCCC
network, the Conspirators spent ever seven hours unsuccessfully trying to connect
to X-Agent. The Conspirators also tried to access the DCCC network using
previously stolen credentials.
34. In or around September 2016, the Conspirators also successfully gained access to DNC
computers hosted on a third-party cloud-computing service. These computers contained test
applications related to the DNC's analytics. After conducting reconnaissance, the
Conspirators
gathered data by creating backups, or "snapshots," of the DNC's eloud-based systems using
the
cloud provider's own technology. The Conspirators then moved the snapshots to cloud-based
accounts they had registered with the same service, thereby stealing the data from the DNC.
Stolen Documents Released through DCLcaks
35. More than a month before the release of any documents, the Conspirators constructed the
online persona DCLeaks to release and publicize stolen election-related documents. On or about
April 19, 2016, after attempting to register the domain clcctionleaks.com, the Conspirators
registered the domain dcleaks.com through a service that anonymizcd the registrant. The funds
used to pay for the dcleaks.com domain originated from an online cryptocutrrecy service that
the Conspirators also used to fund the lease of a virtual private server registered with the
operational email account [email protected]. The dirbinsaabol email account was also used
to register the john356gh URL-shortening account used by LUKASHEV to spearphish the Clinton
Campaign chairman and other campaign-related individuals.
36. On or about June 8,2016, the Conspirators launched the public website dcleaks.com, which
they used to release stolen emails. Before it shut down in or around March 2017, the site
received over one million page views. The Conspirators falsely claimed on the site that DCLeaks
was started by a group of "American hacktivists," when in fact it was started by the
Conspirators.
37. Starting in or around June 2016 and continuing through the 2016 U.S. presidential
election, the Conspirators used DCLeaks to release emails stolen from individuals affiliated
with the Clinton Campaign. The Conspirators also released documents they had stolen in other
spearphishing operations, including those they had conducted in 2015 that collected emails from
individuals affiliated with the Republican Party.
38. On or about June 8,2016, and at approximately the same time that the dcleaks.com website
was launched, the Conspirators created a DCLeaks Facebook page using a preexisting social media
account under the fictitious name "Alice Donovan." In addition to the DCLeaks Facebook page,
the Conspirators used other social media accounts in the names of fictitious U.S. persons such
as "Jason Scott" and "Richard Gingrey" to promote the DCLeaks website. The Conspirators
accessed these accounts from computers managed by POTEMKFN and his co-conspirators.
39. On or about June 8, 2016, the Conspirators created the Twitter account @dcleaks_. The
Conspirators operated the @dclcaks_ Twitter account from the same computer used for other
efforts to interfere with the 2016 U.S. presidential election. For example, the Conspirators
used the same computer to operate the Twitter account @BaltimorcIsWhr, through which they
encouraged U.S. audiences to "[j]oin our flash mob" opposing Clinton and to post images with
the hashtag #BlacksAgainstHillary.
Stolen Documents Released through Guccifer 2.0
40. On or about June 14, 2016, the DNC -- through Company 1 -- publicly announced that it
had been hacked by Russian government actors. In response, the Conspirators created the online
persona Guccifer 2.0 and falsely claimed to be a lone Romanian hacker to undermine the
allegations of Russian responsibility for the intrusion.
41. On or about June 15,2016, the Conspirators logged into a Moscow-based server used and
managed by Unit 74455 and, between 4:19 PM and 4:56 PM Moscow Standard Time, searched for
certain words and phrases, including:
Search terms
"some hundred sheets"
"some hundreds of sheets"
dcleaks
illuminati
широко
известный
перевод [widely known translation]
"worldwide known"
"think twice about"
"company's competence"
42. Later that day, at 7:02 PM Moscow Standard Time, the online persona Guccifer 2.0
published its first post on a blog site created through WordPress. Titled "DNC's servers hacked
by a lone hacker," the post used numerous English words and phrases that the Conspirators had
searched for earlier that day (bolded below):
Worldwide known cyber security company [Company 1] announced that the Democratic National
Committee (DNC) servers had been hacked by
"sophisticated" hacker groups.
I'm very pleased the company appreciated my skills so highly))) [...]
Here are just a few docs from many thousands I extracted when hacking
into DNC's network. [...]
Some hundred sheets! This's a serious case, isn't it? [...]
I guess [Company 1] customers should think twice about company's competence.
F[***J the Illuminati and their conspiracies! МШШ F[***]
[Company 1] !!!!!!!!
43. Between in or around June 2016 and October 2016, the Conspirators used Guccifer 2.0 to
release documents through WordPrcss that they had stolen from the DCCC and DNC. The
Conspirators, posing as Guccifer 2.0, also shared stolen documents with certain
individuals.
a. On or about August 15,2016, the Conspirators, posing as Guccifer 2.0, received a request
for stolen documents from a candidate for the U.S. Congress. The Conspirators responded using
the Guccifer 2.0 persona and sent the candidate stolen documents related to the candidate's
opponent. On or about August 22,2016, the Conspirators, posing as Guccifer 2.0, transferred
approximately 2.5 gigabytes of data stolen from the DCCC to a then-registered state lobbyist
and online source of political news. The stolen data included donor records and personal
identifying information for more than 2,000 Democratic donors.
On or about August 22, 2016, the Conspirators, posing as Guccifer 2.0, sent a reporter
stolen documents pertaining to the Black Lives Matter movement. The reporter responded by
discussing when to release the documents and offering to write an article about their
release.
44. The Conspirators, posing as Guccifer 2.0, also communicated with U.S. persons about the
release of stolen documents. On or about August 15, 2016, the Conspirators, posing as Guccifer
2.0, wrote to a person who was in regular contact with senior members of the presidential
campaign of Donald J. TVump, "thank u for writing back... do u find anyt[h]ing interesting in
the docs i posted?" On or about August 17, 2016, the Conspirators added, "please tell me if i
can help u anyhow ... it would be a great pleasure to me." On or about September 9,2016, the
Conspirators, again posing as Guccifer 2.0, referred to a stolen DCCC document posted online
and asked the person, "what do u think of the info on the tunout model for the democrats entire
presidential campaign." The person responded, "[p]retty standard."
45. The Conspirators conducted operations as Guccifer 2.0 and DCLeaks using overlapping
computer infrastructure and financing.
a. For example, between on or about March 14, 2016 and April 28. 2016, the Conspirators used
the same pool of bitcoin funds to purchase a virtual private network ("VPN") account and to
lease a server in Malaysia. In or around June 2016, the Conspirators used the Malaysian server
to host the dcleaks.com website.
On or about July 6, 2016, the Conspirators used the VPN to log into the @Guccifcr_2 Twitter
account. The Conspirators opened that VPN account from
the same server that was also used to register malicious domains for the hacking of the DCCC
and DNC networks.
On or about June 27, 2016, the Conspirators, posing as Guccifer 2.0, contacted a U.S.
reporter with an offer to provide stolen emails from "Hillary Clinton's staff." The
Conspirators then sent the reporter the password to access a nonpublic, password-protected
portion of dc.eaks.com containing emails stolen from Victim 1 bу LUKASHEV, YERMAKOV, and
thier co-conspirators in or around March 2016.
46. On or about January 12,2017, the Conspirators published a statement on the Guccifer 2.0
WordPrcss blog, falsely claiming that the intrusions and release of stolen documents had
"totally no relation to the Russian government"
Use of Organization 1
47. In order to expand their interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, the
Conspirators transferred many of the documents they stole from the DNC and the chairman of the
Clinton Campaign to Organization 1. The Conspirators posing as Guccifer 2.0, discussed the
release of the stolen documents and the timing of those releases with Organization 1 to
heighten their impact on the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
a. On or about Juno 22, 2016, Organization 1 sent a private message to Guccifer 2.0 to
"[s]end any new material [stolen from the DNC] here for us to review and it will have a much
higher impact than what you are doing." On or about July 6, 2016, Organization 1 added, "if you
have anything hillary related we want it in the next tweo [sic] days prefable [sic] because the
DNC [Democratic National Convention] is approaching and she will solidify bernie supporters
behind her after." The Conspirators responded, "ok... i see." Organization I explained, "we
think trump has only a 25% chance of winning against hillary ... so conflict between bernie and
hillary is interesting "
b After failed attempts to transfer the stolen documents starting in late June 2016, on or
about July 14, 2016, the Conspirators, posing as Guccifer 2.0, sent Organization 1 an email
with an attachment titled "wk dnc linkl.txt.gpg." The Conspirators explained to Organization 1
that the encrypted file contained Instructions on how to access an online archive of stolen DNC
documents. On or about July 18, 2016, Organization 1 confirmed it had "the 1Gb or so archive"
and would make a release of the stolen documents "this week."
48. On or about July 22, 2016, Organization 1 released over 20,000 emails and other
documents stolen from the DNC network by the Conspirators. This release occurred approximately
three days before the start of the Democratic National Convention. Organization 1 did not
disclose Guccifer 2.0's role in providing them. The latest-in-time email released through
Organization 1 was dated on or about May 25,2016, approximately the same day the Conspirators
hacked the DNC Microsoft Exchange Server.
49. On or about October 7, 2016, Organization 1 released the first set of emails from the
chairman of the Clinton Campaign that had been stolen by LUKASHEV and his co-conspirators.
Between on or about October 7, 2016 and November 7, 2016, Organization 1 released approximately
thirty-three tranches of documents mat had been stolen from the chairman of the Clinton
Campaign. In total, over 50,000 stolen documents were released.
Mifsud was most probably MI5 asset. So we can speak about entrapment of people connected to Trump campaign.
The same probably is true for Goldstone.
Notable quotes:
"... The most high-level Trump campaign official to be indicted is Paul Manafort, as well as his former business partner and Trump campaign deputy Rick Gates. The charges, as a Virginia judge observed last month , "manifestly don't have anything to do with the campaign or with Russian collusion." ..."
"... There is widespread supposition that Manafort's dealings in Ukraine make him a prime candidate for collusion with Moscow. But that stems from the mistaken belief that Manafort promoted Kremlin interests during his time in Kiev. The opposite appears to be the case. The New York Times ..."
"... According to his charge sheet , Flynn falsely told agents that he did not request that Russia respond to new US sanctions "in a reciprocal manner" because the incoming Trump team "did not want Russia to escalate the situation." Flynn also hid from FBI agents that, days before that call, he first asked Kislyak to veto a UN Security Council measure condemning Israeli settlement building, which the outgoing Obama administration had decided to let pass (Russia ultimately rebuffed Flynn and supported the measure). ..."
"... The FBI was able to charge Flynn because it had concrete evidence that his statements to them were false: wiretaps of his conversations with Kislyak. But these calls offer nothing on collusion. As The Washington Post ..."
"... Donald Trump Jr. is often faulted for accepting Goldstone's overture to begin with, since it floated damaging information from a foreign power. He is also faulted for initially providing a misleading statement about the meeting to the media. But lying to reporters is not an indictable offense, and neither is showing a willingness to obtain foreign dirt. During the 2016 contest, the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign accepted help from Ukraine and paid for the salacious and outlandish Steele "dossier" from across the pond. ..."
"... By now the details are well known: About $100,000 was spent on Facebook ads, more than half of that after ..."
"... Yet prominent media and political voices have portrayed the ads as a major component of a "sophisticated" Russian interference campaign akin to Pearl Harbor and 9/11. On his current book tour, former national-intelligence director James Clapper has declared that, taken together, the Russian ads and stolen Democratic e-mails handed Trump the presidency . ..."
"... Washington Post ..."
"... Mueller's indictment reinforces Facebook's initial conclusion. The defendants "used the accounts to receive money from real US persons in exchange for posting promotions and advertisements" on their social-media pages, for a fee of "between 25 and 50 U.S. dollars per post." And not only does Mueller say that the troll farm had no ties to the Trump campaign, he doesn't even allege that it worked with the Russian government ..."
"... One of the indicted firms is challenging the case in court, accusing Mueller of inventing "a make-believe crime" in order to "justify his own existence" and "indict a Russian -- any Russian." Whether the troll farm's indictment is make-believe or not, Mueller has yet to indict anyone -- let alone any Russian -- for Russiagate's underlying crime: the theft of Democratic Party e-mails. And more than a year after they accused the Russian government of carrying it out, intelligence officials have yet to produce a shred of proof. ..."
"... The January 2017 intelligence report begat an endless cycle of innuendo and unverified claims, inculcating the public with fears of a massive Russian interference operation and suspicions of the Trump campaign's complicity. The evidence to date casts doubt on the merits of this national preoccupation, and with it, the judgment of the intelligence, political, and media figures who have elevated it to such prominence. ..."
A year of investigations has led to several guilty pleas, but none of them go to the core of the special counsel's mandate.
The Mueller Indictments Still Don't Add Up to Collusion | The Nation
n just over one year, special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation of the Trump campaign and Russia has generated
five guilty pleas, 20 indictments, and more than 100 charges. None of these have anything to do with Mueller's chief focus: the Russian
government's alleged meddling in the 2016 election and the Trump campaign's suspected involvement.
While it's certainly possible that Mueller will make new indictments that go to the core of his case, what's been revealed so
far does not make a compelling brief for collusion.
The most high-level Trump campaign official to be indicted is Paul Manafort, as well as his former business partner and Trump
campaign deputy Rick Gates. The charges, as a Virginia judge
observed last month
, "manifestly don't have anything to do with the campaign or with Russian collusion." Instead, Manafort and Gates are accused
of financial crimes beginning in 2008, when they worked as political operatives for a Russia-leaning party in Ukraine (and for which
Manafort was previously investigated, but not indicted).
There is widespread supposition that Manafort's dealings in Ukraine make him a prime candidate for collusion with Moscow.
But that stems from the mistaken belief that Manafort promoted Kremlin interests during his time in Kiev. The opposite appears to
be the case. The New York Times recounts that Manafort
"pressed [then–Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor] Yanukovych to sign an agreement with the European Union that would link the country
closer to the West -- and lobbied for the Americans to support Ukraine's membership." If that picture is accurate, then Manafort's
activities in Ukraine during the period for which he has been indicted were diametrically opposed to the Kremlin's agenda.
Manafort's employment of Konstantin Kilimnik, who was indicted last week on obstruction charges in Manafort's case, is seen as
another Kremlin link. Kilimnik studied as a linguist at a Soviet-era military school and went on to become Manafort's translator
and fixer in Ukraine. According to Mueller, Kilimnik has "ties to Russian intelligence" that were active during the 2016 campaign.
The evidence to support that assertion is sealed. For his part, Kilimnik
denies
being a Russian agent . Ukrainian authorities investigated him in August 2016 but did not bring charges.
According to The Atlantic , "insinuations" that Kilimnik worked for Russian intelligence then "were never backed by
more than a smattering of circumstantial evidence."
While Manafort's alleged offenses (aside from the new obstruction charges) occurred well before the 2016 campaign, those of former
national security adviser Michael Flynn came after. Flynn admitted to making "false statements and omissions" about his conversations
with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak during the transition in December 2016. According to
his charge sheet , Flynn falsely told agents that he
did not request that Russia respond to new US sanctions "in a reciprocal manner" because the incoming Trump team "did not want Russia
to escalate the situation." Flynn also hid from FBI agents that, days before that call, he first asked Kislyak to veto a UN Security
Council measure condemning Israeli settlement building, which the outgoing Obama administration had decided to let pass (Russia ultimately
rebuffed Flynn and supported the measure).
The FBI was able to charge Flynn because it had concrete evidence that his statements to them were false: wiretaps of his
conversations with Kislyak. But these calls offer nothing on collusion. As The Washington Post
reported , FBI agents who "reviewed" the calls with Kislyak had "not found any evidence of wrongdoing or illicit ties to the
Russian government."
Like Flynn, George Papadopoulos has also pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI after the election. Although he is the lowest-level
member of the Trump campaign to be charged, his case has emerged front and center. In the months since Papadopoulos's October indictment,
we have been told that the FBI
launched an investigation , code named "
Crossfire Hurricane ," because of him. We also recently learned that the FBI
enlisted an
informant , Cambridge Professor Stefan
Halper , to make contact with Papadopoulos and two other campaign officials, Carter Page and Sam Clovis, in a bid to pry loose
information on potential campaign ties to Russia.
In charging Papadopoulos, Mueller's team raised the prospect that Papadopoulos was told about stolen Democratic e-mails before
the theft of DNC e-mails was publicly known. According to the Statement of Offense, Maltese professor Joseph Mifsud informed
Papadopoulos that "the Russians" had obtained "thousands of emails" containing "dirt" on Hillary Clinton. The two spoke in April
2016, before the first DNC e-mails were released. Papadopoulos volunteered to agents his information on Mifsud's offer; he pleaded
guilty to misrepresenting the timing of when he spoke to Mifsud. All of this would be more explosive if, as the Mueller team suggested,
Mifsud actually "had substantial connections to Russian government officials," and recently "met with some of those officials in
Moscow."
And yet there were ample reasons to question whether Papadopoulos was a plausible conduit for Trump-Kremlin collusion. He was
an unpaid volunteer known for
embellishing
credentials ; who not only didn't land a job in the Trump administration post-election but couldn't even get his
travel
expenses reimbursed during the campaign.
It is also quite possible that Mifsud was referring to the 30,000 State Department e-mails deleted from Hillary Clinton's private
server, by that point a well-publicized controversy. Papadopoulos's wife, Simona Mangiante,
now says that Papadopoulos believes
that to be the case. She also says that Papadopoulos has no knowledge of collusion and pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI only because
Mueller threatened to charge him for having been an unregistered foreign agent of Israel.
If Papadopoulos offers Mueller nothing on collusion, the other main staple of collusion allegations -- the infamous June 2016
meeting at Trump Tower -- is an unlikely alternative. The music publicist who set up the meeting, Rob Goldstone, e-mailed Donald
Trump Jr. with an offer of "official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia," -- not,
it should be noted, stolen e-mails. But because Goldstone also wrote of "very high level and sensitive information," as "part of
Russia and its government's support for Mr. Trump," his message has been quoted endlessly as Exhibit A for a Trump-Russia plot. There
were already reasons to question whether an e-mail sent by a kooky publicist is plausible groundwork for such a high-level conspiracy.
The
recently released transcripts of Goldstone's congressional testimony give us more. Goldstone explains that he set up the meeting
on behalf of Emin Agalarov, a Russian pop singer who employed Goldstone as a publicist, and whose father, Aras Agalarov, is a billionaire
who partnered with Trump on the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow.
Goldstone recounts that Emin gave him "limited information" -- and that was a problem. Emin had told him that a "well-connected
Russian attorney," Natalia Veselnitskaya, had met with his father and "told him that they had some interesting information that could
potentially be damaging regarding funding by Russians to the Democrats and to its candidate, Hillary Clinton." Goldstone's follow-up
attempts to get "more information" from Emin yielded nothing more. So Goldstone drew upon his professional tools. As he told the
Senate Judiciary Committee: "I had puffed it and used some keywords that I thought would attract Don Jr.'s attention." In his field,
he explained, "publicist puff is how they get meetings."
By his telling, Goldstone was not being a Kremlin intermediary; he was being a good publicist. His Russian pop-star client had
passed on vague information based on what his father had told him about what a Russian lawyer said. His "publicist puff" secured
the meeting. All parties contend that the meeting ended quickly after the assembled Trump representatives struggled to understand
what Veselnitskaya was talking about, which included none of the advertised incriminating information. Veselnitskaya says she tried
to discuss repealing the Magnitsky Act sanctions on Russia, which is not hard to believe given that Veselnitskaya and her client,
Prevazon Holdings, have fought those sanctions for years.
Donald Trump Jr. is often faulted for accepting Goldstone's overture to begin with, since it floated damaging information from
a foreign power. He is also faulted for initially providing a misleading statement about the meeting to the media. But lying to reporters
is not an indictable offense, and neither is showing a willingness to obtain foreign dirt. During the 2016 contest, the Democratic
National Committee and the Clinton campaign
accepted help from Ukraine
and paid for the salacious and outlandish Steele "dossier" from across the pond.
This brings us to the last major indictment, and the first one to include Russian nationals: 13 Russians and three companies accused
of running a US-aimed social media campaign out of the St. Petersburg–based Internet Research Agency (IRA). By now the details are
well known: About $100,000 was spent on Facebook ads, more than half of that after the November 2016 vote. The bulk of the
remaining $46,000 in ads ran during the primaries. The majority of the ads did not even reference the election and got little traction.
Yet prominent media and political voices have portrayed the ads as a major component of a "sophisticated" Russian interference
campaign akin to Pearl Harbor and 9/11. On his current book tour, former national-intelligence director James Clapper has declared
that, taken together, the Russian ads and stolen Democratic e-mails
handed Trump the presidency
.
Now that we can
see all of the ads for ourselves , it is difficult to argue with
Facebook executive Rob Goldman , who said
that "swaying the election was *NOT* the main goal." The main goal, in fact, appears to be exactly what Facebook initially found,
according to The Washington Post , before the social-media giant came under pressure from congressional Democrats:
"A review by the company found that most of the groups behind the problematic pages had clear financial motives, which suggested
that they weren't working for a foreign government."
Mueller's indictment reinforces Facebook's initial conclusion. The defendants "used the accounts to receive money from real
US persons in exchange for posting promotions and advertisements" on their social-media pages, for a fee of "between 25 and 50 U.S.
dollars per post." And not only does Mueller say that the troll farm had no ties to the Trump campaign, he doesn't even allege that
it worked with the Russian government. The IRA's owner, Yevgeny Prigozhin, is said to be close to Putin. But even if the ads
came right from the Kremlin, does anyone think that the bizarre offerings -- from
Buff Bernie to pro-Beyoncé and
anti-Beyoncé to the juvenile
attacks
on
Hillary Clinton
-- impacted the US voters who saw them?
One of the indicted firms is challenging the case in court,
accusing Mueller of inventing "a make-believe crime" in order to "justify his own existence" and "indict a Russian -- any Russian."
Whether the troll farm's indictment is make-believe or not, Mueller has yet to indict anyone -- let alone any Russian -- for Russiagate's
underlying crime: the theft of Democratic Party e-mails. And more than a year after they accused the Russian government of carrying
it out, intelligence officials have yet to produce a shred of proof.
The January 2017 intelligence report begat an endless cycle of innuendo and unverified claims, inculcating the public with
fears of a massive Russian interference operation and suspicions of the Trump campaign's complicity. The evidence to date casts doubt
on the merits of this national preoccupation, and with it, the judgment of the intelligence, political, and media figures who have
elevated it to such prominence.
Are you stupid enough to believe that American voters elected Trump president because
Vladimir Putin influenced them to vote for Russia's candidate? The US Senate Intelligence (sic)
Committee is that stupid. This collection of nitwits actually produced a report that a few ads
allegedly placed online on Putin's instructions, ads that did not cost one-hundredth of one
percent of the huge sum spent by the candidates themselves, both national committees and
everyone else, were decisive in influencing voters who never saw the ads in the first place or
read or responded to tweets.
That a Senate Committee would expect anyone to believe such a far-fetched story shows that
the Senate Intelligence (sic) Committee has no respect whatsoever for the people who elected
President Trump, or, for that matter, for anyone else at home or abroad.
This Senate report is the most incredible bullshit I have every encountered in my life.
There is no evidence whatsoever in the report. Only assertions. And most of these are based on
"open-source" internet postings by trolls and bots financed by the military/security complex
and Democratic Party.
What the report actually tells us is that no member of the Senate Intelligence Committee has
enough intelligence or integrity to serve in the US Senate. It is the Senate Intelligence
Committee that is a disgrace to America and to the entire human race.
In my last post, I mentioned the fake news that suddenly appeared to undermine President
Trump's peace effort with North Korea. I now learn the sole source of this "news" is Ken
Dilanian, the former national security reporter for the Los Angeles Times. He was
fired for having a "collaborative relationship" with the CIA . Ken Dilanian was publicly
fired from a major newspaper for inventing fake news in collaboration with the CIA, yet was
hired by NBC News! Now NBC allows him to write national security articles citing unnamed
intelligence sources! The worst part is that dozens of other corporate news organizations cite
his NBC stories. If they insist on repeating fake news, they should print this disclaimer at
the beginning of his articles:
Warning: This writer was fired by the Los Angeles Times for producing fake news in
secret cooperation with the CIA.
"... The fact of the matter is, if Russia wanted to do, cause lot of difficulty to the American election they could have. Instead, they went and talked privately to us. So when the government says Russia intercepted stuff that was very important to us, I'm being very fuzzy about it, it wasn't about the election. They told us that there were certain people in America doing things that were very deleterious to the War on Terrorism for personal and financial gain, and they could have blown it publicly but they went internally to us." ..."
"... I haven't listened to that particular interview yet, but can say the the HRC emails with Sid Blumenthal show the reason we got in bed with Sarkozy (and Britain) to destroy Libya was: ..."
"... To steal the nationalized oil ..."
"... To steal the hundreds of tons of gold and silver. ..."
"... To prevent Libya from developing a pan-African gold dinar and development bank to complete with the Federal Reserve petrodollar and the IMF. ..."
"... I can also say that Hersh documented that Ambassador Stevens was an arms dealer, smuggling Libyan military weapons into Syria to finish the "regime change" operation still ongoing there. Also, HRC knew her "rebels" were hunting down and murdering any black Libyans they could find even before Gaddafi was anally bayonet raped. ..."
Hello There! I'm curious to know if any readers have comments about a recent Sy Hersh
interview. In response to a question about Russian interference in the last US presidential
election Hersh replied:
"I have been reporting something, I've been watching something since 2011 in Libya, when we
had a secretary of state that later ran for president, and I will tell you: Some stories take
a long time. And I don't know quite how to package it. I don't know how much to say about it.
I assure you that there's no known intelligence that Russia impacted, cut into the DNC,
Podesta e-mails. That did not happen. I can say that.
I can also say Russia learned other things about what was going on in Libya with us and
instead of blowing -- [. . . lots cut out here before returning to the topic . . . ]
The fact of the matter is, if Russia wanted to do, cause lot of difficulty to the
American election they could have. Instead, they went and talked privately to us. So when the
government says Russia intercepted stuff that was very important to us, I'm being very fuzzy
about it, it wasn't about the election. They told us that there were certain people in
America doing things that were very deleterious to the War on Terrorism for personal and
financial gain, and they could have blown it publicly but they went internally to
us."
I haven't listened to that particular interview yet, but can say the the HRC emails with Sid
Blumenthal show the reason we got in bed with Sarkozy (and Britain) to destroy Libya was:
To steal the nationalized oil
To steal the hundreds of tons of gold and silver.
To prevent Libya from developing a pan-African gold dinar and development bank to complete
with the Federal Reserve petrodollar and the IMF.
I can also say that Hersh documented that Ambassador Stevens was an arms dealer, smuggling
Libyan military weapons into Syria to finish the "regime change" operation still ongoing there.
Also, HRC knew her "rebels" were hunting down and murdering any black Libyans they could find
even before Gaddafi was anally bayonet raped.
If I come up with more after listening, I'll post again.
Looks like Brennan abused his power as a head of CIA and should be held accountable for that.
Notable quotes:
"... Did the U.S. "Intelligence Community" judge that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election? ..."
"... it is not that ..."
"... even that is misleading ..."
"... the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence Research did, in fact, have a different opinion but was not allowed to express it ..."
"... The second thing to remember is that reports of the intelligence agencies reflect the views of the heads of the agencies and are not necessarily a consensus of their analysts' views. The heads of both the CIA and FBI are political appointments, while the NSA chief is a military officer; his agency is a collector of intelligence rather than an analyst of its import, except in the fields of cryptography and communications security. ..."
"... Among the assertions are that a persona calling itself "Guccifer 2.0" is an instrument of the GRU, and that it hacked the emails on the Democratic National Committee's computer and conveyed them to Wikileaks. What the report does not explain is that it is easy for a hacker or foreign intelligence service to leave a false trail. In fact, a program developed by CIA with NSA assistance to do just that has been leaked and published. ..."
"... Retired senior NSA technical experts have examined the "Guccifer 2.0" data on the web and have concluded that "Guccifer 2.0's" data did not involve a hack across the web but was locally downloaded. Further, the data had been tampered with and manipulated, leading to the conclusion that "Guccifer 2.0" is a total fabrication. ..."
"... "Disclosures through WikiLeaks did not contain any evident forgeries." ..."
"... DHS [the Department of Homeland Security] assesses that the types of systems Russian actors targeted or compromised were not involved in vote tallying ..."
"... Prominent American journalists and politicians seized upon this shabby, politically motivated, report as proof of "Russian interference" in the U.S. election without even the pretense of due diligence. They have objectively acted as co-conspirators in an effort to block any improvement in relations with Russia, even though cooperation with Russia to deal with common dangers is vital to both countries. ..."
Musings II The "Intelligence Community," "Russian Interference," and Due Diligence
Posted on by JackDid the U.S. "Intelligence Community" judge that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential
election?
Most commentators seem to think so. Every news report I have read of the planned meeting of
Presidents Trump and Putin in July refers to "Russian interference" as a fact and asks whether
the matter will be discussed. Reports that President Putin denied involvement in the election
are scoffed at, usually with a claim that the U.S. "intelligence community" proved Russian
interference. In fact, the U.S. "intelligence community" has not done so. The intelligence
community as a whole has not been tasked to make a judgment and some key members of that
community did not participate in the report that is routinely cited as "proof" of "Russian
interference."
I spent the 35 years of my government service with a "top secret" clearance. When I reached
the rank of ambassador and also worked as Special Assistant to the President for National
Security, I also had clearances for "codeword" material. At that time, intelligence reports to
the president relating to Soviet and European affairs were routed through me for comment. I
developed at that time a "feel" for the strengths and weaknesses of the various American
intelligence agencies. It is with that background that I read the January 6. 2017 report of three
intelligence agencies: the CIA, FBI, and NSA.
This report is labeled "Intelligence Community Assessment," but in fact it is not
that . A report of the intelligence community in my day would include the input of all the
relevant intelligence agencies and would reveal whether all agreed with the conclusions.
Individual agencies did not hesitate to "take a footnote" or explain their position if they
disagreed with a particular assessment. A report would not claim to be that of the
"intelligence community" if any relevant agency was omitted.
The report states that it represents the findings of three intelligence agencies: CIA, FBI,
and NSA, but even that is misleading in that it implies that there was a consensus of
relevant analysts in these three agencies. In fact, the report was prepared by a group of
analysts from the three agencies pre-selected by their directors, with the selection process
generally overseen by James Clapper, then Director of National Intelligence (DNI). Clapper told
the Senate in testimony May 8, 2017, that it was prepared by "two dozen or so analysts --
hand-picked, seasoned experts from each of the contributing agencies." If you can hand-pick the
analysts, you can hand-pick the conclusions. The analysts selected would have understood what
Director Clapper wanted since he made no secret of his views. Why would they endanger their
careers by not delivering?
What should have struck any congressperson or reporter was that the procedure Clapper
followed was the same as that used in 2003 to produce the report falsely claiming that Saddam
Hussein had retained stocks of weapons of mass destruction. That should be worrisome enough to
inspire questions, but that is not the only anomaly.
The DNI has under his aegis a National Intelligence Council whose officers can call any
intelligence agency with relevant expertise to draft community assessments. It was created by
Congress after 9/11 specifically to correct some of the flaws in intelligence collection
revealed by 9/11. Director Clapper chose not to call on the NIC, which is curious since its
duty is "to act as a bridge between the intelligence and policy communities."
During my time in government, a judgment regarding national security would include reports
from, as a minimum, the CIA, the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), and the Bureau of
Intelligence and Research (INR) of the State Department. The FBI was rarely, if ever, included
unless the principal question concerned law enforcement within the United States. NSA might
have provided some of the intelligence used by the other agencies but normally did not express
an opinion regarding the substance of reports.
What did I notice when I read the January report? There was no mention of INR or DIA! The
exclusion of DIA might be understandable since its mandate deals primarily with military
forces, except that the report attributes some of the Russian activity to the GRU, Russian
military intelligence. DIA, the Defense Intelligence Agency, is the U.S. intelligence organ
most expert on the GRU. Did it concur with this attribution? The report doesn't say.
The omission of INR is more glaring since a report on foreign political activity could not
have been that of the U.S. intelligence community without its participation. After all, when it
comes to assessments of foreign intentions and foreign political activity, the State
Department's intelligence service is by far the most knowledgeable and competent. In my day, it
reported accurately on Gorbachev's reforms when the CIA leaders were advising that Gorbachev
had the same aims as his predecessors.
This is where due diligence comes in. The first question responsible journalists and
politicians should have asked is "Why is INR not represented? Does it have a different opinion?
If so, what is that opinion? Most likely the official answer would have been that this is
"classified information." But why should it be classified? If some agency heads come to a
conclusion and choose (or are directed) to announce it publicly, doesn't the public deserve to
know that one of the key agencies has a different opinion?
The second question should have been directed at the CIA, NSA, and FBI: did all their
analysts agree with these conclusions or were they divided in their conclusions? What was the
reason behind hand-picking analysts and departing from the customary practice of enlisting
analysts already in place and already responsible for following the issues involved?
As I was recently informed by a senior official, the State Department's Bureau of
Intelligence Research did, in fact, have a different opinion but was not allowed to express
it . So the January report was not one of the "intelligence community," but rather of
three intelligence agencies, two of which have no responsibility or necessarily any competence
to judge foreign intentions. The job of the FBI is to enforce federal law. The job of NSA is to
intercept the communications of others and to protect ours. It is not staffed to assess the
content of what is intercepted; that task is assumed by others, particularly the CIA, the DIA
(if it is military) or the State Department's INR (if it is political).
The second thing to remember is that reports of the intelligence agencies reflect the views
of the heads of the agencies and are not necessarily a consensus of their analysts' views. The
heads of both the CIA and FBI are political appointments, while the NSA chief is a military
officer; his agency is a collector of intelligence rather than an analyst of its import, except
in the fields of cryptography and communications security.
One striking thing about the press coverage and Congressional discussion of the January
report, and of subsequent statements by CIA, FBI, and NSA heads is that questions were never
posed regarding the position of the State Department's INR, or whether the analysts in the
agencies cited were in total agreement with the conclusions.
Let's put these questions aside for the moment and look at the report itself. On the first
page of text, the following statement leapt to my attention:
We did not make an assessment of the impact that Russian activities had on the outcome of
the 2016 election. The US Intelligence Community is charged with monitoring and assessing the
intentions, capabilities, and actions of foreign actors; it does not analyze US political
processes or US public opinion.
Now, how can one judge whether activity "interfered" with an election without assessing its
impact? After all, if the activity had no impact on the outcome of the election, it could not
be properly termed interference. This disclaimer, however, has not prevented journalists and
politicians from citing the report as proof that "Russia interfered" in the 2016 U.S.
presidential election.
As for particulars, the report is full of assertion, innuendo, and description of
"capabilities" but largely devoid of any evidence to substantiate its assertions. This is
"explained" by claiming that much of the evidence is classified and cannot be disclosed without
revealing sources and methods. The assertions are made with "high confidence" or occasionally,
"moderate confidence." Having read many intelligence reports I can tell you that if there is
irrefutable evidence of something it will be stated as a fact. The use of the term "high
confidence" is what most normal people would call "our best guess." "Moderate confidence" means
"some of our analysts think this might be true."
Among the assertions are that a persona calling itself "Guccifer 2.0" is an instrument of
the GRU, and that it hacked the emails on the Democratic National Committee's computer and
conveyed them to Wikileaks. What the report does not explain is that it is easy for a hacker or
foreign intelligence service to leave a false trail. In fact, a program developed by CIA with
NSA assistance to do just that has been leaked and published.
Retired senior NSA technical experts have examined the "Guccifer 2.0" data on the web and
have concluded that "Guccifer 2.0's" data did not involve a hack across the web but was locally
downloaded. Further, the data had been tampered with and manipulated, leading to the conclusion
that "Guccifer 2.0" is a total fabrication.
The report's assertions regarding the supply of the DNC emails to Wikileaks are dubious, but
its final statement in this regard is important: "Disclosures through WikiLeaks did not
contain any evident forgeries." In other words, what was disclosed was the truth! So,
Russians are accused of "degrading our democracy" by revealing that the DNC was trying to fix
the nomination of a particular candidate rather than allowing the primaries and state caucuses
to run their course. I had always thought that transparency is consistent with democratic
values. Apparently those who think that the truth can degrade democracy have a rather bizarre
-- to put it mildly–concept of democracy.
Most people, hearing that it is a "fact" that "Russia" interfered in our election must think
that Russian government agents hacked into vote counting machines and switched votes to favor a
particular candidate. This, indeed, would be scary, and would justify the most painful
sanctions. But this is the one thing that the "intelligence" report of January 6, 2017, states
did not happen. Here is what it said: " DHS [the Department of Homeland Security] assesses
that the types of systems Russian actors targeted or compromised were not involved in vote
tallying ."
This is an important statement by an agency that is empowered to assess the impact of
foreign activity on the United States. Why was it not consulted regarding other aspects of the
study? Or -- was it in fact consulted and refused to endorse the findings? Another obvious
question any responsible journalist or competent politician should have asked.
Prominent American journalists and politicians seized upon this shabby, politically
motivated, report as proof of "Russian interference" in the U.S. election without even the
pretense of due diligence. They have objectively acted as co-conspirators in an effort to block
any improvement in relations with Russia, even though cooperation with Russia to deal with
common dangers is vital to both countries.
This is only part of the story of how, without good reason, U.S.-Russian relations have
become dangerously confrontational. God willin and the crick don't rise, I'll be musing about
other aspects soon.
Thanks to Ray McGovern and Bill Binney for their research assistance.
Jack F. Matlock, Jr.
Booneville, Tennessee
June 29, 2018
Pat Lang: "Anybody can claim anything. The power of description is a mighty power. If the leaks are right at the top is that
break-down in discipline? It may be a continuation of Brennan and Clapper's people left behind to sow chaos."
Notable quotes:
"... "pour encourager les autres." pl ..."
"... By now, it seems amply clear that many people in the 'intelligence communities' both in the United States and Britain have believed that because they had 'friends in high places', and in particular were confident that their preferred candidate could, with their help, win the Presidential election, they could safely attempt to subvert the constitutional order in the United States. ..."
"... Far be it from me to suggest that, in current conditions, shooting would be an appropriate punishment for such scum. I cannot however see how the constitutional order can be expected to survive, unless drastic sanctions -- public exposure and obloquy, combined with and reinforced by long custodial sentences -- are imposed. ..."
"... This seems to be a media operation designed to thwart the rapprochement with North Korea. It would make no sense for Kim to destroy all his nukes at this stage of the negotiations. It would only make sense as the culmination of a period of good relations and maybe even the reunification with the south. ..."
"... Exactly...all of us could see this coming...but I think at this point they are overplaying their hand...I don't think the people are in the mood right now for this kind of sniping from the shadows...especially when POTUS is making VERY LARGE things happen on the world stage... ..."
"... I am astounded that after all that we have learned, it doesn't seem that AG Sessions has had Brennan, Clapper, Comey, McCabe and Loretta Lynch testifying to a grand jury. I find it incredulous that DAG Rosenstein said in congressional testimony that he signed a FISA application without reading it and that there is no action to that revelation. ..."
"... The top 1% are above the law. From exploiting the world to wars for profit, multi-national corporations are above mundane Nation-States and Constitutions. If caught, they pay a fine, the cost of doing business. ..."
"Per
Reuters and
NBC News , US intelligence officials (albeit ones speaking under the cover of anonymity)
believe that Kim may care a little bit more about the long-term survival of his regime than
being flattered with Trumpian
propaganda videos , and so may have told a few white lies about whether or not he is
continuing to move forward with his nuclear weapons program. Specifically, reports suggest that
while North Korea has stopped testing nukes or missiles for now, they are continuing to enrich
uranium and stockpile the relevant materials." Gizmodo
********
"Four other officials agreed that North Korea is intentionally trying to deceive the US
about its ongoing nuclear capabilities, NBC News reported, and others said intel suggests that
North Korea is continuing to operate more secret uranium enrichment sites than previously
believed." Gizmodo
------------
Well, pilgrims, unauthorized disclosure of classified information of any kind and especially
the results of satellite photography is a federal felony subject on conviction to sentencing to
mandatory prison terms. You can be sure that these Deep State operatives within the
Intelligence Community received NO permission to disclose this information to Gizmodo and the
numerous other media outlets for whom they spied.
The Deep State continues to wage war against President Trump. There should be a massive
manhunt to find these violators of the Espionage and Illegal Disclosure laws and imprison them
"pour encourager les autres." pl
Leaving aside the Deep State propaganda campaign against Trump, my question is: even if
Kim agreed to "denuclearize", did he agree to stop enriching uranium immediately?
The Agreement signed by Trump and Kim merely states, "the DPRK commits to work toward
complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula." It says nothing about when and
how.
What is needed is something along the lines of the Agreed Framework in 1994. That
specified that North Korea would (in exchange for two light water reactors (LWR), fuel
oil, a non-aggression agreement with the US, and normalization of relations):
Freeze all graphite-moderated nuclear reactors (5MWe reactor and 50 & 200 MWe
under construction)
Remain a party to the NPT
Take steps to implement 1992 Joint Declaration of the Denuclearization of the Korean
Peninsula
Dismantle graphite-moderated reactors when LWR project is completed
Move toward full normalization of political and economic relations
Note that the same accusation was used to torpedo the Agreed Framework. Wikipedia
notes:
Quote
In October 2002, a U.S. delegation led by Assistant Secretary of State James A. Kelly
visited North Korea to confront the North Koreans with the U.S. assessment that they had
a uranium enrichment program.[37] The parties' reports of the meeting differ. The U.S.
delegation believed the North Koreans had admitted the existence of a highly
enriched uranium program.[38] The North Koreans stated Kelly made his assertions in an
arrogant manner, but failed to produce any evidence such as satellite photos, and
they responded by denying that North Korea planned to produce nuclear weapons using
enriched uranium. They went on to state that as an independent sovereign state North
Korea was entitled to possess nuclear weapons for defense, although they did not possess
such a weapon at that point in time.[8][39][40] Relations between the two countries,
which had seemed hopeful two years earlier, quickly deteriorated into open
hostility.[14]
The HEU intelligence that James Kelly's accusation is based on is still controversial:
According to the CIA fact sheet to Congress on November 19, 2002, there was "clear
evidence indicating the North has begun constructing a centrifuge facility" and this
plant could produce annually enough HEU for two or more nuclear weapons per year when it
is finished. However, some experts assessed that the equipment North Korea
imported was insufficient evidence of a production-scale enrichment program.
End Quote
There seems little doubt that the current accusation is intended to derail the US-NK
diplomatic process and that this is being fueled by a faction of the US intelligence
community (and probably some Republicans and Democrats.)
A large faction of US Intell WANTED and still wants NK to have nukes. The Bush the Dumber
Admin, with its moronic Axis of Evil ad campaign and actions described above forced NK's
hand. Nothing changed during Obama's time.These people don't want peace breaking out.
It's bad for bidniz. Geopolitical hotspots are what these ghouls fetishize over, desire
and live for.
It may be of interest to look at comments on Voltaire's epigram about the execution of
Admiral Byng by the authors of important recent studies of the period, both American and
British.
From a discussion by George Yagi, an American scholar who has produced a monumental
history of the Seven Years' War, in the course of which Byng was executed, and which was
central to the shaping of the contemporary United States:
'Upon learning of the execution, the French writer, philosopher and playwright
Voltaire satirically wrote that the British needed to occasionally execute an admiral
from time to time, "in order to encourage the others."
'Although his comments were written as a form of mockery, surprisingly, the
observation was entirely accurate. Byng's role in the Minorca fiasco led to what was
darkly termed in the Royal Navy the "Byng Principle," which meant that "nothing is to be
undertaken where there is risk or danger."
'This sardonic term served as a cautionary reminder to naval officers of the sort of
conduct that should be avoided in battle. And just or not, Byng's death was to instill in
them an aggressive fighting spirit that would succeed in turning the war in favour of
Britain.'
According to the leading contemporary historian of the Royal Navy, N.A.M. Rodger,
the effects may have been much more long-lasting:
'There was more truth in the epigram than perhaps [Voltaire] knew, for the execution
of Byng had a profound effect on the moral climate of the Navy, and sharply reversed
the effects of the battle of Toulon. The fates of Matthews and Lestock had taught
officers that misconduct with support in high places had nothing to fear; the fate of
Byng taught them that even the most powerful political friends might not save an
officer who failed to fight. Many things might go wrong with an attack on the enemy,
but the only fatal error was not to risk it. Byng's death revived and reinforced a
culture of aggressive determination which set British officers apart from their foreign
contemporaries, and which in time gave them a steadily mounting psychological
ascendancy. More and more in the course of the century, and for long afterwards,
British officers encountered opponents who expected to be attacked, and more than half
expected to be beaten, so that they went into battle with an invisible disadvantage
which no amount of personal courage or numerical strength could entirely make up
for.'
By now, it seems amply clear that many people in the 'intelligence communities'
both in the United States and Britain have believed that because they had 'friends in
high places', and in particular were confident that their preferred candidate could, with
their help, win the Presidential election, they could safely attempt to subvert the
constitutional order in the United States.
Far be it from me to suggest that, in current conditions, shooting would be an
appropriate punishment for such scum. I cannot however see how the constitutional order
can be expected to survive, unless drastic sanctions -- public exposure and obloquy,
combined with and reinforced by long custodial sentences -- are imposed.
This seems to be a media operation designed to thwart the rapprochement with North
Korea. It would make no sense for Kim to destroy all his nukes at this stage of the
negotiations. It would only make sense as the culmination of a period of good relations
and maybe even the reunification with the south.
It is clear from all these leaks that there is a faction in the intel community that
want permanent belligerence and a state of fear that enhances their power and their
ability to act with impunity in the dark. I agree with your characterization of this
group that also includes elements in the media and political complex as the Deep State.
Unaccountable and using the rubric of state secrets to obfuscate their nefarious
activities.
If there is any credence to media reports of Trump planning a Kim-style arrangement
with Putin that could begin the process of our disentanglement from our near permanent
state of covert and military activities destabilizing the world, we could see a ramp up
of information operations by the Deep State.
Jack says...'...we could see a ramp up of [dis]information operations by the Deep
State...'
Exactly...all of us could see this coming...but I think at this point they are
overplaying their hand...I don't think the people are in the mood right now for this kind
of sniping from the shadows...especially when POTUS is making VERY LARGE things happen on
the world stage...
Let's see how the Donald-Vlad powwow plays out...whatever happens [or doesn't] in
terms of real substance...I think the optics are going to be awesome...Trump is on a big
roll...I think the deep state and their #resistance is just digging its own grave at this
point...
Have we reached the point wherein if one is high up the government totem pole in law
enforcement and intelligence you are above the law and consequently can act with
impunity?
I am astounded that after all that we have learned, it doesn't seem that AG
Sessions has had Brennan, Clapper, Comey, McCabe and Loretta Lynch testifying to a grand
jury. I find it incredulous that DAG Rosenstein said in congressional testimony that he
signed a FISA application without reading it and that there is no action to that
revelation.
OTOH, if you're an ordinary citizen, the DOJ and FBI give you no break and can ruin
you financially and your reputation. And the fact is that the judiciary is largely not
independent and by and large buy into the government prosecutors' story line. It is very
rare that a judge acts with independence like the Bundy case.
It seems a strong case can be made that we no longer have a republic.
To answer your question: yes, provided that you have sufficient influence and authority.
Keep in mind that the criminal laws in the United States today are sufficient broad
and deep in scope that an aggressive prosecutor can always find an excuse to bring
charges against anyone. The decision whether or not to prosecute largely depends on how
much juice the putative target has.
The top 1% are above the law. From exploiting the world to wars for profit,
multi-national corporations are above mundane Nation-States and Constitutions. If caught,
they pay a fine, the cost of doing business.
Although corporate media avoids discussing it, this attack on the President for
deescalating tensions in Korea by illegally releasing classified information is one more
example of the seams of the nation being pulling apart without any punishment. Until,
plutocrats and their contractors start doing jail time for their crimes, the West will
continue its descent.
I agree. These leakers are on the edge of treason, BUT. When the FBI's "star" CI agent is
a teenage texter (OPSEC, anyone?), these leakers are pretty safe.
Hell, the Feebs couldn't find Robert Hanssen, right under their nose. On top of that
the AG - Sessions - makes Rip Van Winkle look like a olympic sprinter.
The reason this US intel sewage is able to rise to the top of the Korea issue is that the
Koreans have lost the narrative. The April 27 Panmunjon Declaration, endorsed at the
recent Trump-Kim summit, includes:
South and North Korea affirmed the principle of determining the destiny of the Korean
nation on their own accord and agreed to bring forth the watershed moment for the
improvement of inter-Korean relations by fully implementing all existing agreements and
declarations adopted between the two sides thus far.
Since then we've had the freeze-for-freeze but where is the news on the full
implementation of existing (and new) agreements? What have Russia and China been doing
regarding progress on the issues coupled to a reduction in sanctions as required? A
steady drum-beat of Korean talk on progress is needed, endorsed by Russia and China,
coupled with UNSC motions, otherwise the intel sleaze-bags take over the narrative, as
they have just done. We need to experience the "watershed moment" that Moon and Kim said
they would bring forth.
Well we don't have Jesus but we now have Bolton with a plan, which is wondrous (to
me).
WASHINGTON -- President Donald Trump's national security adviser said Sunday the U.S.
has a plan that would lead to the dismantling of North Korea's nuclear weapons and
ballistic missile programs in a year.
John Bolton said top U.S. diplomat Mike Pompeo will be discussing that plan with North
Korea in the near future. Bolton added that it would be to the North's advantage to
cooperate to see sanctions lifted quickly and aid from South Korea and Japan start to
flow. . .
here
Suppose, for argument, there is no leaking of classified docs, that the IC Muckety Mucks
feeding the reporters are just inventing? that no useful pics, from space or otherwise,
exist, no air filtration samples show anything... during 1943-44 Oak Ridge drew enough
electricity to power Detroit at the same time, but nowadays Bitcoin miners are the only
big juice hogs so that proof is out.
Lying about NK's nuke activity is just as useful as actual stolen documentation. The
stenographer/'reporters' get their hair-raising stories, the public, insofar as it gives
a damn, gets alarmed and eventually the story recedes, lingers in the public's memory
until the Borgistas stoke it up again.
And in the end, So What? Did anyone seriously expect the NK's to go into hibernation?
So they've got a metric ton of enriched uranium more than they had X months ago. Maybe
there's an emerging market for the stuff in south Asia and Kim wants to corner it.
Sir,
Terrible. Simply terrible the wider damage that these people are willing to risk just to
get at Trump.
I have noticed you more willing to use the term "Deep State" lately. Have you changed
your mind about it's existence/level of influence (as opposed to "Borg")? Or is this just
the deployment of a lingua franca to communicate with a wider audience?
It's my understanding that "Deep State" (and not necessarily in the Turkish sense) is now
an accepted concept in political science.
Question: what you say "this conspiracy nonetheless exists", do you mean a
"conspiracy" in the sense of an uncoordinated group of people with shared motives, or in
the sense of "hey, let's you and me and Bob down at State meet up for lunch and do this
to topple Trump!"
Are you sure this is classified information? Several articles are only referring to
it as an unreleased assessment. The 38 North web site, part out by the Henry R.
Stimson center put out a fairly detailed assessment along with annotated commercial
satellite imagery a few days ago. However, if this was a classified report, the
leakers should definitely be arrested and charged. For at least five intelligence
officials to leak classified information, there would have to be a complete and
deliberate breakdown in discipline in the IC. And that would need to be corrected.
The danger in publishing this kind of information, even if it was not classified,
is that it risks embarrassing Trump. That would enrage him and could lead to his
reverting to his "little rocket man" and "fire and fury" rhetoric. That is not
helpful. The nukes are still there, but the situation is still greatly improved. It
would be better if Trump could comfortably maintain the narrative that there is no
longer a nuclear threat from NK. This is not the time to point out the emperor is
naked.
From the NBC article: "NBC News agreed to withhold some details of the latest
intelligence assessment that officials said could put sources at risk."
Yes 38 North uses open source satellite imagery, but NBC News seem to have been
given an intelligence assessment, at least part of which could put sources at risk.
You will know better than me, but surely this type of intel must be classified? Worst
of all, the MSM are now effectively making judgments about source protection. Seems
to me this won't give potential new sources of intel a whole lot of confidence in
trusting the US IC - leaking like a sieve as it currently does.
As to the risks of embarrassing Trump, it seems clear there are many in the IC who
are perfectly happy to risk a very great deal in order to achieve this end. Some
encouragement to engender better behavior is well overdue.
TTG...commercial sat imagery and 'analysis' by the Stimson stinktank..?
Come on man...you pulling my leg..?
Sat imagery 'analysis' might as well be tea leaves...as far as the public's ability to separate truth from fiction...Stimson
like all the other DC stinktanks is funded by the usual deep state fronts...ie Carnegie, Ford etc...not to mention heavy funding
from FOREIGN countries that are deeply invested in the US MIC...even the dirtbag NYT took notice of this...
This is plainly an agit-prop pushback from the Borg...whatever the technicalities I would say that the POTUS could decide to
crack the whip... the 'law' in DC is a very amorphous thing...it can be and is twisted in any way that suits whoever is wielding
the big stick...
Trump, now that he is winning the regime change war, needs to start putting people in jail...wouldn't be too hard...
Peter Strzok, the FBI counterintelligence agent removed from Special Counsel Robert
Mueller's Russia investigation over anti-Trump bias, appeared before a closed door session in
front of two House committees on Wednesday, where he tried to explain anti-Trump text exchanges
with his FBI mistress as " Just an intimate conversation between intimate friends, "
according to Texas Democrat Sheila Jackson Lee , quoting Strzok's description of the
controversial messages.
While Jackson Lee gladly accepted Strzok's answer, Republican Mark
Meadows of North Carolina wasn't buying it:
While Jackson Lee said she believed Strzok's account that his "intimate" messages didn't
reflect political bias in his work, Republican Representative Mark Meadows said, " None of my
concerns about political bias have been alleviated based on what I've heard so far ." -
Bloomberg
" If you have intimate personal conversations between two people, that normally would show
the intent more so than perhaps something that would be said out in public ," said Meadows.
Meadows said that some of the questions on Wednesday revolved around "who knew what when -
and what was the genesis of the Russia collusion investigation," into Trump's campaign.
Rep Matt Gaetz (R-FL) wasn't buying it either, as Sara Carter details : "
It was a waste -- Strzok is full of it and he kept hiding behind [the] classified information
excuse."
Others had similarly disappointed reactions: Freedom Caucus & Judiciary Committee
member, Matt Gaetz (R-FL) attended today's deposition and reacted to Strzok's testimony,
telling the Sean Hannity Radio Show, that " I am shocked at the lack of curiosity with Robert
Mueller. I mean Sean, if you were in Mueller's shoes, and you had found these text messages, I
would think that you would want to ask whether or not they impacted the investigative decisions
that were made, whether there was bias, whether there was contact with other members of the FBI
regarding the investigation and where it was going and who was making the critical judgment
calls," the Florida Congressman said. " I just cannot believe the lack of curiosity on the part
of Robert Mueller. It was the strongest reaction I had today from Peter Strzok's
testimony."
* * *
Strzok and his paramour Lisa Page - known as the FBI "lovebirds" - harbored extreme
political bias for Hillary Clinton and against Donald Trump while actively involved in cases
against each candidate during the 2016 US election.
Their raging hatred of Donald Trump was discovered in a trove of over 50,000 texts between
Strzok and Page which were discovered by DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz. While Strzok
was relegated to the HR department and marched out of his FBI office in mid-June, Page
tendered her resignation in May.
In one of the most controversial text exchanges - perhaps because the DOJ withheld it until
it came to light in the Inspector Genera's report, Page asks Strzok whether Trump will ever
become President:
Page: "(Trump's) not ever going to become president, right? Right?!"
Strzok: "No. No he's not. We'll stop it. "
After the Inspector Genera's report came out in mid-June, President Trump tweeted: "The IG
Report totally destroys James Comey and all of his minions including the great lovers, Peter
Strzok and Lisa Page, who started the disgraceful Witch Hunt against so many innocent
people."
The Judiciary Committee will be meeting with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and FBI
Director Christopher Wray on Thursday to discuss the OIG report. Moreover, GOP Rep. Jim Jordan
of Ohio is expected to bring a House floor vote demanding that the DOJ turn over documents.
Also Thursday, a Republican resolution demanding that Rosenstein and the Justice
Department turn over more internal documents is expected to be brought to the House floor for
a vote. It will be a test of how widely Republicans back the push by party conservatives to
probe inner workings of the FBI and Justice Department and cast doubt on the legitimacy of
the continuing Russia probe. -
Bloomberg
"All we are asking for are documents we deserve to get -- and they are giving us the
finger," said Jordan.
Meanwhile, every Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee sent a letter to protest Jordan's
resolution on "emergency bias," as they say that it shows the committee "has been hijacked by
its most extreme majority members at the expense of upholding longstanding committee rules and
minority rights."
It was not exactly clear how Congress asking the DOJ to see documents related to a massive
political scandal constitute a hijacking.
No one ever mentions how fucking stupid the FBI idiots must be to have ever text this
stupidity with each other. These people are overpaid clowns. Get rid of them ALL.
"... Comey's memo was a key component in Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein's decision to launch a special counsel investigation headed by former FBI Director Robert Mueller. ..."
"... Some have also suggested ( Paul Sperry to be exact) that Cambridge professor and FBI "informant" (spy) Stefan Halper, may have had a much larger role in the operation. ..."
"... Halper is a longtime spook whose ex-father-in-law, Ray Cline , was the former chief Soviet analyst and Deputy Director of the CIA from 1962 - 1966. Halper also spied on the Carter campaign during the 1980 election for Reagan - whose Vice President was former CIA director George H.W. Bush ( Ray Cline denied the spying took place). ..."
"... Papadopoulos' statement of offense also detailed his April 26, 2016, meeting with Mifsud at a London hotel. Over breakfast Mifsud told Papadopoulos "he had just returned from a trip to Moscow where he had met with high-level Russian governmental officials." Mifsud explained "that on that trip he (the Professor) learned that the Russians had obtained 'dirt' on then-candidate Clinton." Mifsud told Papadopoulos "the Russians had emails of Clinton." - The Federalist ..."
Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) says he'll issue subpoenas for former FBI Director James Comey and former Attorney
General Loretta Lynch, but the panel's top Democrat Dianne Feinstein (CA) has to agree to it per committee rules. Grassley also said
he would be open to exploring immunity for Comey's former #2, Andrew McCabe.
"I will want to subpoena him," Grassley said of Comey during an appearance on C-SPAN's Newsmakers ."
The Iowan added that committee rules require that he and Feinstein "agree to it, and at this point I can't tell you if she
would agree to it. But if she will, yeah, then we will subpoena . " -
Politico
Feinstein may be hesitant to sign on, as she says she thinks Comey acted in good faith - which means she thinks Congress shouldn't
have a crack at questioning a key figure in the largest political scandal in modern history.
"While I disagree with his actions, I have seen no evidence that Mr. Comey acted in bad faith or that he lied about any of his
actions," said Feinstein during a Monday Judiciary panel hearing. Former Feinstein staffer and FBI investigator Dan Jones, meanwhile,
continues to work with Christopher Steele and Fusion GPS on a
$50 million investigation privately funded by George Soros and other "wealthy donors" to continue the investigation into Donald
Trump.
Also recall that
Feinstein
leaked Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson's Congressional testimony in January.
Comey skipped out on appearing before Grassley's committee this week following the June 14 release of DOJ Inspector General Michael
Horowitz's (OIG) report on FBI conduct during the Hillary Clinton email investigation - which dinged Comey for being "insubordinate"
and showing poor judgement. Horowitz is conducting a separate investigation into the FBI's counterintelligence operation on the Trump
campaign, including allegations of FISA surveillance abuse.
Maybe Comey also decided to bail after Horowitz admitted on Monday that
he's under a separate investigation for mishandling classified information after leaking a memo to the press documenting what
he felt was President Trump obstructing the FBI's probe into former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn - which was conducted
by the FBI under dubious circumstances, and for which evidence may have been
tampered
with .
Comey's memo was a key component in Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein's decision to launch a special counsel investigation
headed by former FBI Director Robert Mueller.
Loretta Lynch, on the other hand , was dinged in the IG report over an "ambiguous" incomplete recusal from the Clinton email "matter"
despite a clandestine 30-minute "tarmac" meeting with Bill Clinton
one week before the FBI exonerated
Hillary Clinton .
All part of the bigger picture...
Despite IG Horowitz ultimately concluding that pro-Clinton / anti-Trump bias among the FBI's top brass did not make its way into
the Clinton email investigation, his report revealed alarming facts about FBI officials handling parallel investigations into each
candidate who received vastly different treatment.
For starters, it's clear that the FBI rushed to wrap up the Clinton email investigation before the election, while at the same
time the agency launched an open-ended counterintelligence operation against those in Trump's orbit.
We also know that opposition research paid for by Hillary Clinton was used by the FBI to justify surveilling the Trump campaign
- while new facts point to a multi-pronged campaign of espionage and deceit spanning several continents, governments and agencies
which was deployed at the highest levels in an effort to undermine Donald Trump before and after the 2016 U.S. election.
Some have also suggested ( Paul Sperry to be exact) that Cambridge
professor and FBI "informant" (spy) Stefan Halper, may have had a much larger role in the operation.
Halper is a longtime spook whose ex-father-in-law, Ray Cline , was the
former chief Soviet analyst and Deputy Director of the CIA from 1962 - 1966. Halper also
spied on the Carter campaign during the 1980 election for Reagan - whose Vice President was former CIA director
George H.W. Bush (
Ray Cline denied the spying took place).
From 2012 - 2017, the Pentagon under Obama awarded Halper over
$1 million in "research" contracts - nearly half of which was awarded during the 2016 US election .
Then there's the mysterious Maltese professor, Joseph Mifsud - a key witness in the Mueller investigation who
disappeared last fall , and who told Trump aide George Papadopoulos that Russia had dirt on Hillary Clinton. Papadopoulos would
drunkenly repeat the rumor to seasoned Australian diplomat (and
Clinton ally ) Alexander Downer in a London Bar, only to be construed by the FBI as potential collusion in order to justify their
counterintelligence operation against Trump.
And just Monday Trump advisor Roger Stone said that a
second FBI informant , Henry Greenberg, tried to entrap the Trump campaign with an offer to sell dirt on Hillary Clinton in exchange
for $2 million.
While the entire mosaic of events is multi-faceted and requires perhaps the world's biggest corkboard - here's a basic timeline
of various espionage or other spycraft conducted against the Trump campaign.
Papadopoulos' statement of offense also detailed his April 26, 2016, meeting with Mifsud at a London hotel. Over breakfast
Mifsud told Papadopoulos "he had just returned from a trip to Moscow where he had met with high-level Russian governmental officials."
Mifsud explained "that on that trip he (the Professor) learned that the Russians had obtained 'dirt' on then-candidate Clinton."
Mifsud told Papadopoulos "the Russians had emails of Clinton." -
The Federalist
May 10, 2016 - Papadopoulos tells this to former Australian Diplomat Alexander Downer during an alleged "
drunken barroom admission ."
Late May, 2016 - Roger Stone is approached by Greenberg with the $2 million offer for dirt on Clinton
July 2016 - FBI informant (spy) Stefan Halper meets with Trump campaign aide Carter Page for the first time, which would be one
of many encounters.
July 31, 2016 - the FBI officially launches operation
Crossfire Hurricane , the code name given to the counterintelligence operation against the Trump campaign.
September, 2016 - Halper invites Papadopoulos to London, paying him $3,000 to work on an energy policy paper while wining and
dining him at a 200-year-old private London club on September 15.
While the FBI has yet to find any evidence that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia, they were able to use information Mifsud
planted with Papadopoulos to launch a
counterintelligence operation .
And as new facts and revelations continue to emerge, and IG Horowitz continues to unravel the FBI's counterintelligence operation
on Donald Trump, several rank-and-file FBI employees say
they want Congress to subpoena them so that they can step forward and testify against Comey and Andrew McCabe.
Funny - for two "innocent" people, Comey and Lynch want the exact opposite!
~Grassley also said he would be open to exploring immunity for Comey's former #2, Andrew McCabe.~
Screw you, Chuck. No one gets immunity. Stay the fuck out of what should be the business of a federal criminal grand jury.
Diane has enough trouble of her own with the leaky aide.
No, I think she will. They have the goods on her for leaking like a sieve through her aide and on to the entry level Pulitzer
Prize media whore (remember, they raided the newspaper. The goods are still there).
Rumor has it there is a subpoena waiting for DiFi out there. It would be best if she complied.
If two or more
persons in any State or Territory, or in any place subject to the jurisdiction of the
United States , conspire to overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the
United States , or to levy war against them, or to oppose by force the authority thereof, or by force to prevent, hinder,
or delay the execution of any law of the
United States , or by force to seize, take, or possess any property of the
United States contrary to the authority thereof, they shall each be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty
years, or both.
We don't need Commey and Lynch questioned by those losers on Capitol Hill, that is a waste of money and time. What is required
is a DOJ inquiry, or better yet, a special council for the HRC Mail Server and Corruption in the Meuller probe.
I am normally against a special council, but in this case the DOJ is clearly biased. They should get to the bottom of the crimes
committed by hillery on her mail server including realated crime transacted on the server like uranium one. That is what the FBI
would do to us, and they should be no different. Equal protection under the law means equal punishment under the law as well.
An additional special council should be formed to get to the bottom of the FISA warrant to used for surveillance on the Trump
team and find out if there was any malfeasance obtaining those warrants. This would also bring up the question of whether the
meuller probe obstructed justice by obscuring exonerating evidence that the probe was established with junk evidence.
If a good prosecutor was used, there is enough evidence in the public forum now to throw a bunch of the obama administration
in prison for political corruption and the higher echelon members of the FBI in jail for bribery. That's right, the FBI can't
take gifts, even if the media are offering them. This is corruption of the highest order and our country will not survive this
if it is not prosecuted properly.
IF WE WANT THE SWAMP DRAINED PEOPLE HAVE TO GO TO PRISON FOR LIFE TO PUT THE FEAR OF GOD AND THE PEOPLE BACK INTO BUTEAUCRATS.
"... Papadopoulos' statement of offense also detailed his April 26, 2016, meeting with Mifsud at a London hotel. Over breakfast Mifsud told Papadopoulos "he had just returned from a trip to Moscow where he had met with high-level Russian governmental officials." ..."
"... Halper invites Papadopoulos to London, paying him $3,000 to work on an energy policy paper while wining and dining him at a 200-year-old private London club on September 15. ..."
"... Stone told the Post that he may be indicted by Special Counsel Robert Mueller and charged "with a crime unrelated to the election in order to silence him," and that he anticipates the meeting with Greenberg may be used to try and pressure him to testify against President Trump (leaving no Stone unturned), which he told the Post he would never do. ..."
"... There were several times during the Roman Empire when the Praetorian Guard murdered the Emperor and then auctioned off the Emperor's position to the highest bidder. We're probably close to that point ourselves where the FBI and CIA just dispense with the pretense and murder the President and auction it off themselves to the highest bidder. ..."
Trump campaign aides Roger Stone and Michael Caputo say that a meeting Stone took in late May, 2016 with a Russian appears to
have been an " FBI sting operation " in hindsight, following
bombshell reports in May
that the DOJ/FBI used a longtime FBI/CIA asset, Cambridge professor Stefan Halper, to perform espionage on the Trump campaign.
When Stone arrived at the restaurant in Sunny Isles, he said, Greenberg was wearing a Make America Great Again T-shirt and hat. On
his phone, Greenberg pulled up a photo of himself with Trump at a rally, Stone said.
The meeting went nowhere - ending after Stone told Greenberg " You don't understand Donald Trump... He doesn't pay for anything
." The Post independently confirmed this account with Greenberg.
Aftter the meeting, Stone received a text message from Caputo - a Trump campaign communications official who arranged the meeting
after Greenberg approached Caputo's Russian-immigrant business partner.
" How crazy is the Russian? " Caputo wrote according to a text message reviewed by The Post. Noting that Greenberg wanted "big"
money, Stone replied: "waste of time." -
WaPo
Stone and Caputo now think the meeting was an FBI attempt to entrap the Trump administration - showing the Post evidence that
Greenberg, who sometimes used the name Henry Oknyansky, " had provided information to the FBI for 17 years, " based on a 2015 court
filing related to his immigration status.
He attached records showing that the government had granted him special permission to enter the United States because his presence
represented a "significant public benefit."
Between 2008 and 2012, the records show, he repeatedly was extended permission to enter the United States under a so-called
"significant public benefit parole." The documents list an FBI agent as a contact person. The agent declined to comment.
Greenberg did not respond to questions about his use of multiple names but said in a text that he had worked for the "federal
government" for 17 years.
"I risked my life and put myself in danger to do so, as you can imagine," he said. -
WaPo
"Wherever I was, from Iran to North Korea, I always send information to" the FBI, Greenberg told The Post . " I cooperated
with the FBI for 17 years, often put my life in danger . Based on my information, there is so many arrests criminal from drugs and
human trafficking, money laundering and insurance frauds ."
Stone and Caputo say it was a "sting operation" by the FBI:
" I didn't realize it was an FBI sting operation at the time, but it sure looks like one now ," said Stone.
"If you believe that [Greenberg] took time off from his long career as an FBI informant to reach out to us in his spare time,
I have a bridge in Brooklyn that I want to sell you," Caputo said in an interview.
Greenberg told WaPo he stopped working with the FBI "sometime after 2013."
In terms of the timeline , here's where the Greenberg meeting fits in:
April 26, 2016 -
Maltese
professor Joseph Mifsud allegedly tells Trump campaign aide George Paoadopoulos that the Russians had dirt on Hillary Clinton
Papadopoulos' statement of offense also detailed his April 26, 2016, meeting with Mifsud at a London hotel. Over breakfast
Mifsud told Papadopoulos "he had just returned from a trip to Moscow where he had met with high-level Russian governmental officials." Mifsud explained "that on that trip he (the Professor) learned that the Russians had obtained 'dirt' on then-candidate Clinton."
Mifsud told Papadopoulos "the Russians had emails of Clinton." -
The Federalist
May 10, 2016 - Papadopoulos tells former Australian Diplomat Alexander Downer during an alleged "
drunken barroom admission " that the Russians had information which "could be damaging" to Hillary Clinton.
Late May, 2016 - Stone is approached by Greenberg with the $2 million offer for dirt on Clinton
July 2016 - FBI informant (spy) Stefan Halper meets with Trump campaign aide Carter Page for the first time, which would be one
of many encounters.
July 31, 2016 - the FBI officially launches operation Crossfire Hurricane , the code name given to the counterintelligence operation
against the Trump campaign.
September, 2016 - Halper invites Papadopoulos to London, paying him $3,000 to work on an energy policy paper while wining and
dining him at a 200-year-old private London club on September 15.
Foggy memory
Stone and Caputo say they didn't mention the meeting during Congressional testimony because they forgot, chalking it up to unimportant
"due diligence." Apparently random offers for political dirt in exchange for millions are so common in D.C. that one tends to forget.
Stone and Caputo said in separate interviews that they also did not disclose the Greenberg meeting during testimony before
the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence because they had forgotten about an incident that Stone calls unimportant
"due diligence" that would have been "political malpractice" not to explore . -
WaPo
While Greenberg and Stone's account of the meeting mostly checked out (after Greenberg initially denied Stone's account), Greenberg
said that a Ukrainian friend named "Alexi" who was fired by the Clinton Foundation attended as well, and was the one asking for the
money - while Stone said Greenberg came alone to the meeting.
"We really want to help Trump," Stone recalled Greenberg saying during the brief encounter.
Greenberg says he sat at a nearby table while Alexei conducted the meeting. " Alexei talk to Mr. Stone, not me ," he wrote.
The Clinton Founation has denied ever employing anyone with the first name of Alexi.
Caputo's attorney on Friday sent a letter amending his House testimony, and he plans to present Caputo's account of the Greenberg
incident to the Office of Inspector General for the Department of Justice, which has announced it is examining the FBI's use of
informants during the Russia probe. Stone said his attorney has done the same. -
WaPo
Second FBI informant
Caputo hinted at the interaction in late May when he said that there were multiple government informants who approached the Trump
campaign:
"Let me tell you something that I know for a fact," Caputo said during a May 21 interview on Fox News. " This informant, this
person [who] they tried to plant into the campaign he's not the only person who came into the campaign . And the FBI is not the only
Obama agency who came into the campaign."
" I know because they came at me ," Caputo added. " And I'm looking for clearance from my attorney to reveal this to the public.
This is just the beginning. "
Stone told the Post that he may be indicted by Special Counsel Robert Mueller and charged "with a crime unrelated to the election
in order to silence him," and that he anticipates the meeting with Greenberg may be used to try and pressure him to testify against
President Trump (leaving no Stone unturned), which he told the Post he would never do.
There were several times during the Roman Empire when the Praetorian Guard murdered the Emperor and then auctioned off the
Emperor's position to the highest bidder. We're probably close to that point ourselves where the FBI and CIA just dispense with
the pretense and murder the President and auction it off themselves to the highest bidder.
The FBI has obtained 'indisputable evidence' that Obama-era CIA officials paid British spies to fabricate the Trump-Russia dossier
in order to justify wiretapping the Trump campaign.
Notable quotes:
"... George Papadopoulos was targeted deliberately by U.K. intel operatives in a plot to trick him. ..."
"... It was Joseph Mifsud, not Papadopoulos, who raised the prospect of meeting with the Russians and introduced the claim that Russia had damaging information about Hillary Clinton. ..."
"... Joeseph Mifsud was a British operative, not a Russian asset. ..."
"... The only entity that could have coordinated the entire operation was the Obama White House. ..."
The U.K.'s Joint Intelligence Committee was the venue used by the CIA and the DNI to share and receive "intelligence" allegedly
linking Trump to Russia.
The sources believe that John Brennan and James Clapper used highly classified intelligence channels to create a trail of fake
evidence linking Trump to Russia.
George Papadopoulos was targeted deliberately by U.K. intel operatives in a plot to trick him.
It was Joseph Mifsud, not Papadopoulos, who raised the prospect of meeting with the Russians and introduced the claim that
Russia had damaging information about Hillary Clinton.
Joeseph Mifsud was a British operative, not a Russian asset.
The only entity that could have coordinated the entire operation was the Obama White House.
"Britain's spy agencies played a crucial role in alerting their counterparts in Washington to contacts between members of Donald
Trump's campaign team and Russian intelligence operatives..
GCHQ first became aware in late 2015 of suspicious 'interactions' between figures connected to Trump and known or suspected
Russian agents, a source close to UK intelligence said. This intelligence was passed to the US as part of a routine exchange of
information, they added."
"... Brock sees oddities in how the Russia case began. " These types of investigations aren't normally run by assistant directors and deputy directors at headquarters ," he told me. "All that happens normally in a field office, but that isn't the case here and so it becomes a red flag. Congress would have legitimate oversight interests in the conditions and timing of the targeting of a confidential human source against a U.S. person." -The Hill ..."
"... A series of text messages recovered by DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz between FBI lawyer Lisa Page and special agent Peter Strzok reveal political pressure around the same time as the Trump-Russia probe officially opened. ..."
"... "We're not going to withstand the pressure soon," Page texted Strzok on Aug. 3, 2016 - days after Strzok returned from London and opened the official Trump-Russia investigation. ..."
"... John Solomon of The Hill notes, "they were dealing with simultaneous challenges: the wrap-up of the Hillary Clinton email scandal and the start of the Russia-Trump probe." ..."
"... The texts reveal that Strzok and Page were also concerned about someone within the DOJ leaking details of their investigation ("This is MUCH more tasty for one of those DOJ aholes to leak," Strzok texted Page), as well as concerns that the White House was spearheading the investigation. ..."
A new report from John Solomon of
The Hill ties together several loose threads floating around over the genesis of the FBI/DOJ espionage operation against the
Trump campaign, who was involved in the "setup" of campaign aides, and how text messages between FBI employees suggest that the Obama
White House was not only aware of the operation - but possibly directing it .
Not only is the timeline moved up from the summer of 2016 to spring, Solomon provides clarification on early contacts between
the players involved in DOJ/FBI sting and Trump campaign aides.
The bridge to the Russia investigation wasn't erected in Moscow during the summer of the 2016 election.
It originated earlier, 1,700 miles away in London, where foreign figures contacted Trump campaign advisers and provided the
FBI with hearsay allegations of Trump-Russia collusion, bureau documents and interviews of government insiders reveal. These contacts
in spring 2016 -- some from trusted intelligence sources, others from Hillary Clinton supporters -- occurred well before FBI headquarters
authorized an official counterintelligence investigation on July 31, 2016.
The new timeline makes one wonder: Did the FBI follow its rules governing informants? -
The Hill
" The revelation of purposeful contact initiated by alleged confidential human sources prior to any FBI investigation is troublesome
," Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.), an ally of President Trump and chairman of a House subcommittee that's taking an increasingly aggressive
oversight role in the scandal, told me. " This new information begs the questions: Who were the informants working for, who were
they reporting to and why has the [Department of Justice] and FBI gone to such great lengths to hide these contacts ? "
Retired assistant FBI director for intelligence Kevin Brock also has questions. Brock supervised an agency update to their longstanding
bureau rules governing the use of sources while working under then-director Robert Mueller. These rules prohibit the FBI from directing
a human source to perform espionage on an American until a formal investigation has been opened - paperwork and all.
Brock sees oddities in how the Russia case began. " These types of investigations aren't normally run by assistant directors
and deputy directors at headquarters ," he told me. "All that happens normally in a field office, but that isn't the case here
and so it becomes a red flag. Congress would have legitimate oversight interests in the conditions and timing of the targeting
of a confidential human source against a U.S. person." -The Hill
The Text Messages
A series of text messages recovered by DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz between FBI lawyer Lisa Page and special agent
Peter Strzok reveal political pressure around the same time as the Trump-Russia probe officially opened.
"We're not going to withstand the pressure soon," Page texted Strzok on Aug. 3, 2016 - days after Strzok returned from London
and opened the official Trump-Russia investigation. At the time, as John Solomon of The Hill notes, "they were dealing with
simultaneous challenges: the wrap-up of the Hillary Clinton email scandal and the start of the Russia-Trump probe."
The texts reveal that Strzok and Page were also concerned about someone within the DOJ leaking details of their investigation
("This is MUCH more tasty for one of those DOJ aholes to leak," Strzok texted Page), as well as concerns that the White House was
spearheading the investigation.
"Went well, best we could have expected," Strzok texted Page after an Aug. 5, 2016, meeting. "Other than Liz quote 'the
White House is running this.' " Page then texted to assure Strzok of a paper trail showing the FBI in charge: "We got emails that
say otherwise."
"... This effort was originally revealed in February and reported on by The Federalist , after a series of leaked text messages between Senator Mark Warner (D-VA) and lobbyist Adam Waldman suggested that Daniel J. Jones - an ex-FBI investigator and former Feinstein staffer, was " intimately involved with ongoing efforts to retroactively validate a series of salacious and unverified memos published by Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence agent, and Fusion GPS. " ..."
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) has accused Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson of giving "extremely misleading"
testimony that may have been an "outright lie" regarding his post-election work conducting opposition research on the Trump matter.
Of note, when Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) asked Simpson if he was still being paid for work related to the dossier,
Simpson refused
to answer .
" So you didn't do any work on the Trump matter after the election date; that was the end of your work? " Schiff asked.
Simpson responded, saying: " I had no client after the election. "
where we do have actual evidence of misleading testimony in Committee interviews, we should treat it seriously. For example,
when the Committee staff interviewed Glenn Simpson in August of 2017, Majority staff asked him: "So you didn't do any work on
the Trump matter after the election date, that was the end of your work?" Mr. Simpson answered: "I had no client after the election."
As we now know, that was extremely misleading, if not an outright lie . -Sen. Chuck Grassley
"Contrary to Mr. Simpson's denial in the staff interview, according to the FBI and others," Grassley notes, " Fusion actually
did continue Trump dossier work for a new client after the election ."
Grassley also noted comments made by Senate Intelligence Committee staffer Daniel Jones, who is conducting an ongoing,
private investigation into Trump-Russia claims is being funded with $50 million supplied by George Soros and a group of 7-10
wealthy donors from California and New York.
This effort was originally revealed in February and reported on by
The Federalist , after a series of
leaked text messages between Senator Mark Warner (D-VA) and lobbyist Adam Waldman suggested that Daniel J. Jones - an ex-FBI
investigator and former Feinstein staffer, was " intimately involved with ongoing efforts to retroactively validate a series of salacious
and unverified memos published by Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence agent, and Fusion GPS. "
In short, Jones is working with Fusion GPS and Christopher Steele to continue their investigation into Donald Trump, using a $50
million war chest just revealed by the House Intel Committee report.
Simpson was commissioned by the DNC and Hillary Clinton campaign to perform opposition research on the Trump campaign during the
2016 election. Through their efforts they recruited former MI6 spy Christopher Steele to compile the salacious and unverified "Steele
Dossier" used in part by the FBI to apply for a FISA surveillance warrant on Trump campaign aide Carter Page.
"So, despite the fact Mr. Simpson said he had no client after the election, he in fact did, and that client revealed himself to
the FBI," Grassley said.
Hey Grassley, We have had 2 years of obviously guilty people who never go to jail and are never punished in any way. It's time
to stop talking about what these people have done wrong and start doing something about it instead.
True.. when was the last time someone was prosecuted for Treason? For Sedition? How about 18 USC § 2385 - Advocating overthrow
of Government? How about Treason: Whoever, owing allegiance to the
United States , levies war against them or adheres to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort within the
United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason and shall suffer death......
March 29, 2018: Ep. 687 Another Bombshell Revelation
"I've already told you there was some White House Involvement in
this. Now how do we know that? What we learn in Sara's piece according
to her sources, is that there was a meeting in August of 2016. Between
a lead FBI investigator by the name of Jonn Moffa. He had a key role by
the way folks, in the Hillary exoneration letter. Remember the speech
by Jim Comey? That exonerated Hillary. They laid all this stuff out and
then said, oh..and by the way, we're not going to prosecute."
"So this is an upper level manager in the FBI. Follow the time line
here. This'll be quick. In August, early August he meets with the
White House Chief of Staff. Dennis McDonough to talk about this case,
against Trump. Against the Trump Team & probably about Hillary too."
"White House Chief of Staff. You're now a breath away from the
President of the UNITED STATES. Moffa meets McDonough in August. Why
is this time line August of 2016. Why is this significant? Because what
happens in August of 2016 too?"
"John Breanan. Aaaaa Joe! What did we say that the master of puppets
here might be John Breanan. Again, on the Don Bongino show. Yep! John
Breanan, in August of 2016. What does he do? He waltz's his butt up to
Capital Hill and gives a briefing to the gang of eight there....Harry
Reid included. About this case. Includes in the briefing which is
highly likely based on the letter Reid produces just days later. Briefs
them in the Dossier. He said he know nothing about in December. Which
is after August. So, in August. Just to be clear about what we're
talking about."
"For those Liberals out there that listen to the show. That think
the White House has no attachment to this scandal at all. In August of
2016. Senior high level managers at the FBI. Who had a role in
drafting the exoneration letter for Hillary Clinton. Meet with White
House Officials. The White House Chief of Staff. A stone throws away
from the President. In that very same month. The President's CIA
Director. A noted Political Hack. And, a lair in John Breanan. Brief
members of the Senate & the Congress. On a Dossier. He claims he knew
nothing about. And, just days after that briefing. Harry Reid fires off
a letter to the FBI requesting that they investigate Trump. Of which, by
the way, right after that. Strzok texts Lisa Paige. "Here we go."
Insinuating in the text that this was all planned the whole entire time.
"
"This entire case is built on a fake piece of information in the
Dossier. Or multiple pieces of information in a Fake Dossier, I should say
to be more precise. Breaking yesterday, Breanan has insisted that to
multiple people by the way, that he didn't know much about the Dossier.
Wait till we play this audio. Get the Chuck Todd one ready Joe."
"This is Devastating audio. But hold on a minute. Why is Breanan doing
this? Because Breanan knows that the Dossier was his case. And, the
minute he admits on the record. That as a Senior Level, powerful member of
the Intelligence Community. That John Breanan started a Political
Investigation based on Fake Information he may very well of known was not
verified. John Breanan is going to be in a World of trouble. So he has to
run from this thing."
"Now I'll get to this Sberry piece in a second. And, why it's
important. But just to show you that Breanan has run from this Dossier.
Despite the fact, we know he knew about it. And, he Lied about it. Here's
him basically telling Chuck Todd....listen to how he emphasizes on the
Dossier played no role, no, no, no role, no, no, no, no, no to the
Dossier. Listen to him with Chuck Todd:"
Chuck Todd Interview 3:30 Mark. Pure Evil War Criminal Treasonous
Seditious Psychopath John Breanan admits the Fake Dossier Played
"and it did not play any role whatsoever in the Intelligence
Community Assessment that was done. That was presented to then...Pesident
Obama & President Elect Trump."
"... As it turns out, George Papadopoulos made several new friends in London. There was Joseph Mifsud, a Maltese professor living in London who has ties to British intelligence. It was Mifsud - who has since disappeared - who told Papadopoulos in March 2016 that the Kremlin had "dirt" on Hillary Clinton. ..."
"... A cabal of CIA and FBI operatives, including the Director of the CIA, John Brennan, along with other members of the intelligence "community," prominently including James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence, and various members of the Obama administration, colluded to undermine Donald Trump's campaign. ..."
"... It is banana republic behaviour, but it looks now as if those responsible for this effort to undermine American democracy and repeal the results of a free, open, and democratic election will be exposed. Let's hope that they are also held to account ..."
"... Certainly they will be able to do it with Comey, Brennen, Clapper, McCabe, Strzok, Page and the rest of the sweet potatoes who got paid to set up candidate and then President Trump, don't they? ..."
"... "The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power, pure power. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power" - Orwell ..."
"... Anyone that's part of this anti-constitutional movement should be purged from government and barred for life from participating in government in any capacity. ..."
"... Don't forget Trump interviewed Mueller for the FBI position just days before Rosenputz made him the special counsel. That, in and of itself, is a conflict of interest. If that idiot Sessions had any balls, he would've stepped in and pointed that out. ..."
How highly placed members of one administration mobilised the intelligence services to undermine their successors...
Who, what, where, when, why? The desiderata school teachers drill into their charges trying to master effective writing skills
apply also in the effort to understand that byzantine drama known to the world as the Trump-Russia-collusion investigation.
Let's start with "when." When did it start? We know that the FBI opened its official investigation on 31 July 2016. An obscure,
low-level volunteer to the Trump campaign called Carter Page was front and centre then. He'd been the FBI's radar for a long time.
Years before, it was known, the Russians had made some overtures to him but 1) they concluded that he was an "idiot" not worth recruiting
and 2) he had actually aided the FBI in prosecuting at least two Russian spies.
But we now know that the Trump-Russia investigation began before Carter Page. In December 2017, The New York Times excitedly reported
in an article called "How the Russia Inquiry Began" that, contrary to their reporting during the previous year, it wasn't Carter
Page who precipitated the inquiry. It was someone called George Papadopoulous, an even more obscure and lower-level factotum than
Carter Page. Back in May 2016, the twenty-something Papadopoulous had gotten outside a number of drinks with one Alexander Downer,
an Australian diplomat in London and had let slip that "the Russians" had compromising information about Hillary Clinton. When Wikileaks
began releasing emails hacked from the Democratic National Committee in June and July, news of the conversation between Downer and
Papadopoulos was communicated to the FBI. Thus, according to the Times , the investigation was born.
There were, however, a couple of tiny details that the Times omitted. One was that Downer, an avid Clinton supporter, had arranged
for a $25 million donation from the Australian government to the Clinton Foundation. Twenty-five million of the crispest, Kemo Sabe.
They also neglected say exactly how Papadopoulos met Alexander Downer.
As it turns out, George Papadopoulos made several new friends in London. There was Joseph Mifsud, a Maltese professor living
in London who has ties to British intelligence. It was Mifsud - who has since disappeared - who told Papadopoulos in March 2016 that
the Kremlin had "dirt" on Hillary Clinton.
Then there is Stefan Halper, an American-born Cambridge prof and Hillary supporter. Out of the blue, Halper reached out to Papadopoulos
in September 2016. He invited him to meet in London and then offered Papadopoulos $3,000 to write a paper on an unrelated topic.
He also pumped him about "Russian hacking." "George, you know about hacking the emails from Russia, right?" Halper is said to have
asked him. He also made sure Papadopoulos met for drinks with his assistant, a woman called Azra Turk, who flirted with him over
the Chardonnay while pumping him about Russia.
Halper also contacted Carter Page and Sam Clovis, Trump's campaign co-chair. Is Stefan Halper, the "spy" on the Trump campaign,
at the origin of the Trump-Russia meme?
Not really. The real fons et origo is John Brennan, Director of the CIA under Obama. As Trump's victories in the primaries piled
up, Brennan convened a "working group" at CIA headquarters that included Peter Strzok, the disgraced FBI agent, and James Clapper,
then Director of National Intelligence, in order to stymie Trump's campaign.
So much of this story still dwells in the tenebrous realm of redaction. But little by little the truth is emerging, a mosaic whose
story is gradually taking shape as one piece after the next completes now this face, now another.
There are details yet to come, but here is the bottom line, the irreducible minimum ...
A cabal of CIA and FBI operatives, including the Director of the CIA, John Brennan, along with other members of the intelligence
"community," prominently including James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence, and various members of the Obama administration,
colluded to undermine Donald Trump's campaign.
Like almost everyone else, they assumed that Hillary Clinton was a shoo-in, so they were careless about covering their tracks.
If Hillary had won, the department of Justice would have been her Department of Justice, John Brennan would still be head of
the CIA, and the public would never have known about the spies, the set-ups, the skulduggery.
But Hillary did not win. For the last 16 months, we've watched as that exiled cabal shifted its efforts from stopping Trump
from winning to a desperate effort to destroy his Presidency. Thanks to the patient work of Devin Nunes, Chairman of the House
Intelligence Committee, and a handful of GOP Senators, that effort is now disintegrating.
What is being exposed is the biggest political scandal in the history of the United States : the effort by highly placed -
exactly how highly placed we still do not know - members of one administration to mobilise the intelligence services and police
power of the state to spy upon and destroy first the candidacy and then, when that didn't work, the administration of a political
rival.
It is banana republic behaviour, but it looks now as if those responsible for this effort to undermine American democracy
and repeal the results of a free, open, and democratic election will be exposed. Let's hope that they are also held to account.
If the proof is there, does America have the balls to indict, prosecute and then jail a former president who happens to have
black skin?
Certainly they will be able to do it with Comey, Brennen, Clapper, McCabe, Strzok, Page and the rest of the sweet potatoes
who got paid to set up candidate and then President Trump, don't they?
Corruption! It's what's for breakfast. - Judas Sessions
"The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely
in power, pure power. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power"
- Orwell
Important to note that all of these illegal DOJ actions have been undertaken in the context of a political movement calling
itself "Resistance" whose openly stated goal is to destroy the candidacy and presidency of the people's chosen leader. And whose
implicit goal has been to ensure one-party rule, eliminate the people from involvement in self governance and implement an anti-American
globalist agenda.
Anyone that's part of this anti-constitutional movement should be purged from government and barred for life from participating
in government in any capacity.
Try going to work and announcing to your boss that you're part of a movement to destroy the company from within. See if you
keep your job.
Don't forget Trump interviewed Mueller for the FBI position just days before Rosenputz made him the special counsel. That,
in and of itself, is a conflict of interest. If that idiot Sessions had any balls, he would've stepped in and pointed that out.
So Strzok was involved with this part of the story too. Strzokgate now has distinct British accent and probably was coordinated
by CIA and MI6.
Harper was definitely acted like an "agent provocateur", whose job was to ask leading questions to get Trump campaign advisers to
say things that would corroborate-or seem to corroborate-evidence that the FBI believed it already had in hand. It looks like among
other things Halper was tasked with the attempt elaborate on the claims made in Steele's
September 14 dossier memo: "Russians
do have further 'kompromat' on CLINTON (e-mails) and considering disseminating it."
London was the perfect place for such dirty games -- the territory where the agent knew he could operate safely.
"Halper's fishing expedition therefore came up with nothing to suggest the Steele dossier was true. The real story is therefore
the continuing attempt to assert that the dossier, or key parts of it, are true, after large-scale investigations by the FBI, and now
by special counsel Robert Mueller, have failed to turn up any evidence of a plot hatched between Trump and Vladimir Putin to take over
the White House."
"... So, how many "informants" targeted the Trump campaign? Were they being paid by the U.S. government? What are their names? What were they doing? ..."
Notable quotes:
"... The New York Times' ..."
"... The New York Times ..."
"... Washington Post ..."
"... The New York Times ..."
"... The New York Times ..."
"... So, how many "informants" targeted the Trump campaign? Were they being paid by the U.S. government? What are their names? What were they doing? ..."
"... Under whose authority were they spying on a political campaign? Did FBI and DOJ leadership sign off? Did FBI director James Comey and Attorney General Loretta Lynch know about it? What about other senior Obama administration officials? CIA Director John Brennan? Did President Obama know the FBI was spying on a presidential campaign? Did Hillary Clinton know? What about Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta? ..."
The New York Times'
4,000-word report last week on the Federal Bureau of Investigation probe of Donald Trump's 2016 campaign's possible ties to Russia
revealed for the first time that the investigation was called "Crossfire Hurricane."
The name, explains the paper, refers to the Rolling Stones lyric "I was born in a crossfire hurricane," from the 1968 hit "Jumpin'
Jack Flash." Mick Jagger, one of the songwriters, said the song was a "metaphor" for psychedelic-drug induced states. The other,
Keith Richards, said it "refers to his being born amid the bombing and air raid sirens of Dartford, England, in 1943 during World
War II."
Investigation names, say senior U.S. law enforcement officials, are designed to refer to facts, ideas, or people related to the
investigation. Sometimes they're explicit, and other times playful or even allusive. So what did the Russia investigation have to
do with World War II, psychedelic drugs, or Keith's childhood?
The answer may be found in the 1986 Penny Marshall film named after the song, "Jumpin' Jack Flash." In the Cold War-era comedy,
a quirky bank officer played by Whoopi Goldberg comes to the aid of Jonathan Pryce, who plays a British spy being chased by the KGB.
The code name "Crossfire Hurricane" is therefore most likely a reference to the former British spy whose allegedly Russian-sourced
reports on the Trump team's alleged ties to Russia were used as evidence to secure a Foreign Intelligence Service Act secret warrant
on Trump adviser Carter Page in October 2016: ex-MI6 agent Christopher Steele.
Helping Spin a New Origin Story
It is hardly surprising that the Times refrained from exploring the meaning of the code name. The paper of record has
apparently joined a campaign, spearheaded by the Department of Justice, FBI, and political operatives pushing the Trump-Russia collusion
story, to minimize Steele's role in the Russia investigation.
After an October news report showed his dossier was funded by the Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee, facts that
further challenged the credibility of Steele's research, the FBI investigation's origin story shifted.
In December, The New York Times
published a "scoop " on the new origin story. In the revised narrative, the probe didn't start with the Steele dossier at all.
Rather, it began with an April 2016 meeting between Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos and a Maltese professor named Joseph
Mifsud. The professor informed him that "he had just learned from high-level Russian officials in Moscow that the Russians had 'dirt'
on Mrs. Clinton in the form of 'thousands of emails.'"
Weeks later, Papadopoulos boasted to the Australian ambassador to London, Alexander Downer, that he was told the Russians had
Clinton-related emails. Two months later, according to the Times , the Australians reported Papadopoulos' boasts to the
FBI, and on July 31, 2016, the bureau began its investigation.
Further reinforcement of the new origin story came from congressional Democrats. A
January 29 memo
written by House Intelligence Committee minority staff under ranking member Rep. Adam Schiff further distances Steele from the opening
of the investigation. "Christopher Steele's raw reporting did not inform the FBI's decision to initiate its counterintelligence investigation
in late July 2016. In fact, the FBI's closely-held investigative team only received Steele's reporting in mid-September."
Last week's major Times article echoes the Schiff memo. Steele's reports, according to the paper, reached the "Crossfire
Hurricane team" "in mid-September."
Yet the new account of how the government spying campaign against Trump started is highly unlikely. According to the thousands
of favorable press reports asserting his credibility, Steele was well-respected at the FBI for his work on a 2015 case that helped
win indictments of more than a dozen officials working for soccer's international governing body, FIFA. In July 2016, Steele met
with the agent he worked with on the FIFA case to show his early findings on the Trump team's ties to Russia.
The FBI took Steele's reporting on Trump's ties to Russia so seriously it was later used as evidence to monitor the electronic
communications of Trump campaign adviser Carter Page. But, according to Schiff and the Times , the FBI somehow lost track
of reports from a "credible" source who claimed to have information showing that the Republican candidate for president was compromised
by a foreign government. That makes no sense.
The code name "Crossfire Hurricane" is further evidence that the FBI's cover story is absurd. A reference to a movie about a British
spy evading Russian spies behind enemy lines suggests the Steele dossier was always the core of the bureau's investigation into the
Trump campaign.
Was Halper an Informant, Spy, Or Agent Provocateur?
Taken together with the other significant revelation from last Times story, the purpose and structure of Crossfire Hurricane
may be coming into clearer focus. According to the Times story: "At least one government informant met several times with
[Trump campaign advisers Carter] Page and [George] Papadopoulos, current and former officials said."
As we now know, the informant is Stefan Halper, a
former classmate of Bill Clinton's at Oxford University who worked in the Nixon, Ford, and Reagan administrations. Halper is
known for his good connections in intelligence circles. His father-in-law
was Ray Cline , former deputy director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Halper
is also reported to have led the 1980 Ronald Reagan campaign team that collected intelligence on sitting U.S. President Jimmy
Carter's foreign policy.
So what was Halper doing in this instance? He wasn't really a spy (a person who is generally tasked with stealing secrets) or
an informant (a person who provides information about criminal activities from the inside). Rather, it seems he was more like an
agent provocateur, whose job was to ask leading questions to get Trump campaign advisers to say things that would corroborate --
or seem to corroborate -- evidence that the bureau believed it already had in hand.
It appears Halper's job was to induce inexperienced Trump campaign figures to say things.
Halper met with at least three Trump campaign advisers: Sam Clovis, Page, and George Papadopoulos. The latter two he met with
in London, where Halper had reason to feel comfortable operating.
Halper's close contacts in the intelligence world weren't limited to the CIA. They also include foreign intelligence officials
like Richard Dearlove , the former head of the United Kingdom's foreign intelligence service, MI6. According to
a Washington Times report , Halper and Dearlove are partners in a UK consulting firm, Cambridge Security Initiative.
Dearlove is also close to Steele. According
to the Washington Post , Dearlove met with Steele in the early fall of 2016, when his former charge shared his "worries"
about what he'd found on the Trump campaign and "asked for his guidance."
London was therefore the perfect place for Halper to spring a trap -- outside the direct purview of the FBI, but on territory
where he knew he could operate safely. It appears Halper's job was to induce inexperienced Trump campaign figures to say things that
corroborated the 35-page series of memos written by Steele -- the centerpiece of the Russiagate investigation -- in order to license
a broader campaign of government spying against Trump and his associates in the middle of a presidential election.
Halper Reached Out to Trump Campaign Members
Chuck Ross's reporting in The Daily Caller provides invaluable details and insight. As Ross
explained in The Daily Caller back
in March, Halper emailed Papadopoulos on September 2, 2016 with an invitation to write a research paper, for which he'd be paid $3,000,
and a paid trip to London. According to Ross, "Papadopoulos and Halper met several times during the London trip," with one meeting
scheduled for September 13 and another two days later.
Ross writes: "According to a source with knowledge of the meeting, Halper asked Papadopoulos: 'George, you know about hacking
the emails from Russia, right?' Papadopoulos told Halper he didn't know anything about emails or Russian hacking." It seems Halper
was looking to elaborate on the claims made in Steele's
September 14 dossier
memo : "Russians do have further 'kompromat' on CLINTON (e-mails) and considering disseminating it."
Halper's fishing expedition therefore came up with nothing to suggest the Steele dossier was true.
Had Papadopoulos confirmed that a shadowy Maltese academic had told him in April about Russians holding Clinton-related emails,
presumably that would have entered the dossier as something like, "Trump campaign adviser PAPADOPOULOS confirms knowledge of Russian
'kompromat.'"
Another Trump campaign adviser Halper contacted was Page. They first met in Cambridge, England at a July 11, 2016 symposium. Halper's
partner Dearlove spoke at the conference, which was held just days after Page had delivered a widely reported speech at the New Economic
School in Moscow. According to another
Ross article reporting on Page and Halper's interactions, the Trump adviser "recalls nothing of substance being discussed other
than Halper's passing mention that he knew then-campaign chairman Paul Manafort."
Page and Manafort both figure prominently in the Steele dossier's July 19 memos. According to
the document ,
Manafort "was using foreign policy advisor, Carter PAGE, and others as intermediaries." Page had also, according to the dossier,
met with senior Kremlin officials -- a charge he later denied in
his November
2, 2017 testimony before the House Intelligence Committee. Evidently, he also gave Halper nothing to use in verifying the charges
made against him.
Halper's fishing expedition therefore came up with nothing to suggest the Steele dossier was true. The real story is therefore
the continuing attempt to assert that the dossier, or key parts of it, are true, after large-scale investigations by the FBI, and
now by special counsel Robert Mueller, have failed to turn up any evidence of a plot hatched between Trump and Vladimir Putin to
take over the White House.
Using Spy Powers on Political Opponents Is a Big Problem
That portions of the American national security apparatus would put their considerable powers -- surveillance, spying, legal pressure
-- at the service of a partisan political campaign is a sign that something very big is broken in Washington. Our Founding Fathers
would not be surprised to learn that the post-9/11 surveillance and spying apparatus built to protect Americans from al-Qaeda has
now become a political tool that targets Americans for partisan purposes. That the rest of us are surprised is a sign that we have
stopped taking the U.S. Constitution as seriously as we should.
The damage done to the American press is equally large. Since the November 2016 presidential election, a financially imperiled
media industry gambled its remaining prestige on Russiagate. Yet after nearly a year and a half filled with thousands of stories
feeding the Trump-Russia collusion conspiracy, last week still represented a landmark moment in American journalism. The New
York Times , which proudly published the Pentagon Papers, provided cover for an espionage operation against a presidential campaign.
The New York Times , which proudly published the Pentagon Papers, provided cover for an espionage operation against a presidential
campaign.
There are significant errors and misrepresentations in the article that the Times could've easily checked, if it weren't
in such a hurry to hide the FBI and DOJ's crimes and abuses. Perhaps most significantly, the Times avoided asking the key
questions that the article raised with its revelation that "at least one government informant" met with Trump campaign figures.
So, how many "informants" targeted the Trump campaign? Were they being paid by the U.S. government? What are their names?
What were they doing?
Under whose authority were they spying on a political campaign? Did FBI and DOJ leadership sign off? Did FBI director James
Comey and Attorney General Loretta Lynch know about it? What about other senior Obama administration officials? CIA Director John
Brennan? Did President Obama know the FBI was spying on a presidential campaign? Did Hillary Clinton know? What about Clinton campaign
chairman John Podesta?
These questions are sure to be asked. What we know already is that the Times reporters did not ask them, because they
do not bother to indicate that the officials interviewed for the story had declined to answer. That they did not ask these questions
is evidence the Times is no longer a newspaper that sees its job as reporting the truth or holding high government officials
responsible for their crimes. Lee Smith is the media columnist at Tablet.
"... Keep in mind this Halper guy was an old Bush operative. And Bush began the Dossier thing. ..."
"... It's quite likely that Christopher Steele, a former MI6 spy, knew Stepan Halper (CIA and FBI spy who began his spying on Trump campaign long before the FBI "officially" started spying) who is a friend of the head of MI6, Richard Dearlove and may have used him to support the dossier. ..."
"... Also, Christopher Steele's company Orbis also hired another MI6 agent by the name of Pablo Miller who lives in Salisbury and who is the MI6 agent that originally recruited MI6 spy Sergei Skripal. ..."
"... All this seems to indicate that Skripal may have been a source of the misinformation in the dossier and poisoned by MI6/CIA spooks to shift more blame on the Russians ..."
"... The Zenith occures when Fusion GPS hires Chris Steel, april 2016, same time DNC money gets to them. Fusion GPS immediatly hire Nellie Orh. Nelli'es husband Bruce then fed NSA query data to Fusion GPS and steel assembled it. ..."
The Bush mention you made I think is quite on the target in one, the Bushes were/are
anti-Trumpers RINOs to their marrow
chet roman , May 19, 2018 at 4:21 pm
Not even close. Fusion GPS was initially hired by the Washington Free Beacon (a neocon rag
funded by billionaire Paul Singer) to do some background investigation on all Republican
presidential candidates. After Trump won the nomination the Beacon ended its business ties to
Fusion GPS and then, and only then, did the DNC/Hillary Campaign begin their funding of
Fusion GPS through a "cut out" law firm (Perkins Coie) to hide their activities. Christopher
Steele was hired by Fusion GPS only after the DNC/Hillary got involved, it had nothing to do
with Bush or the Republican party.
It's quite likely that Christopher Steele, a former MI6 spy, knew Stepan Halper (CIA and
FBI spy who began his spying on Trump campaign long before the FBI "officially" started
spying) who is a friend of the head of MI6, Richard Dearlove and may have used him to support
the dossier.
Also, Christopher Steele's company Orbis also hired another MI6 agent by the
name of Pablo Miller who lives in Salisbury and who is the MI6 agent that originally
recruited MI6 spy Sergei Skripal. Miller deleted his ties to Orbis on his Linkedin account
but reporters found archival evidence. All this seems to indicate that Skripal may have been
a source of the misinformation in the dossier and poisoned by MI6/CIA spooks to shift more
blame on the Russians.
andy--s , May 23, 2018 at 12:34 am
The Zenith occures when Fusion GPS hires Chris Steel, april 2016, same time DNC money
gets to them. Fusion GPS immediatly hire Nellie Orh. Nelli'es husband Bruce then fed NSA
query data to Fusion GPS and steel assembled it.
Meanwhile "dual-citizen" John "freaking" Bolton our U.S. National Security Advisor is
lobbying for policies toward Iran that miraculously somehow manage to mirror those of
Israel's psychopath-in-chief Netanyahu -- what a "freaking" coincidence, but, we're all
supposed to keep repeating the official deep state mantra: "Russia, Russia, Russia, Putin, oh
my!" -- like good little zombies.
"... Daniel Lazare's article makes no mention of Israel and Israeli interference in the 2016 presidential election, the Israel-gate reality underlying all the Russia-gate fictions. For example, George Papadopoulos is directly connected to the pro-Israel Lobby, right wing Israeli political interests, and Israeli government efforts to control regional energy resources. ..."
Daniel Lazare's article makes no mention of Israel and Israeli interference in the
2016 presidential election, the Israel-gate reality underlying all the Russia-gate fictions.
For example, George Papadopoulos is directly connected to the pro-Israel Lobby, right wing
Israeli political interests, and Israeli government efforts to control regional energy
resources.
Papadopoulos' LinkedIn page lists his association with the right wing Hudson Institute.
The Washington, D.C.-based think tank part of pro-Israel Lobby web of militaristic security
policy institutes that promote Israel-centric U.S. foreign policy.
The Hudson Institute confirmed that Papadopoulos was an intern who left the
neoconservative think tank in 2014.
In 2014, Papadopoulos authored op-ed pieces in Israeli publications.
In an op-ed published in Arutz Sheva, media organ of the right wing Religionist Zionist
movement embraced by the Israeli "settler" movement, Papadopoulos argued that the U.S. should
focus on its "stalwart allies" Israel, Greece, and Cyprus to "contain the newly emergent
Russian fleet".
In another op-ed published in Ha'aretz, Papadopoulos contended that Israel should exploit
its natural gas resources in partnership with Cyprus and Greece rather than Turkey.
In November 2015, Papadapalous participated in a conference in Tel Aviv, discussing the
export of natural gas from Israel with a panel of current and past Israeli government
officials including Ron Adam, a representative of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
and Eran Lerman, a former Israeli Deputy National Security Adviser.
Among Israel's numerous violations of United Nations Resolution 242 was its annexation of
the Syrian Golan Heights in 1981. Recent Israeli threatened military threats against Lebanon
and Syria have a lot to do with control of natural gas resources, both offshore from Gaza and
on land in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights region.
The Israel-gate realities are predictably ignored by the mainstream media, which continues
to salivate at every moldy scrap of Russia-gate fiction.
Eliot Higgins and his UK-based bogus "online investigations" crew assiduously avoid
performing any actual journalism or substantive investigation. The function of the Atlantic
Council's Bellingcat site is to serve as a propaganda channel for "fake news" and
"alternative facts".
"The FBI thus made the classic methodological error of allowing its investigation to be
contaminated by its preconceived beliefs. Objectivity fell by the wayside."
This part I cannot agree with, though. I do not think for one second that the FBI made an
"error". The whole lot of them conspired to get Hillary Clinton exonerated of her email
crimes, and then get her elected. They set out purposely and with intent to infiltrate
Trump's campaign, spy on him, leak information and disparage him as much as humanely
possible. Once he did get elected, they set out to impeach him any way they could. The media
has been on side.
This was all done with "intent". They knew from the get-go that there was no Russian
collusion. They made it up. Hillary Clinton's campaign paid for the phony Steele dossier,
although this information was not made apparent to the FISA Court.
This has all been an attempted coup to unseat the President of the United States. Criminal
referrals have been made by Horowitz (the Inspector General). Heads are going to roll.
To paraphrase what Hillary said during the campaign: "If they find out what we've done,
we'll all hang."
andy--s , May 23, 2018 at 12:29 am
Further more Conservatives and a leftie, (me) are convinced that the bad actors got busted
using the NSA database in April 2016(look up Admiral Rodgers) and they needed a cover to keep
spying on Trump and retro activly legitimize the NSA query abuse.
Read 70 page summary of FISA abust from judge Collier. .
backwardsevolution , May 19, 2018 at 4:01 pm
Tucker Carlson's three-minute interview with Don Di Genova, former U.S. attorney:
"We know that Hillary Clinton was illegally exonerated. We knew that a year ago. We know
that there was a substantial effort to frame the current President of the United States with
crimes by infiltrating his campaign and then his administration with spies that the FBI had
set upon them. We have learned that the crimes were committed by the FBI, senior members of
the Department of Justice, John Brennan, Mr. Clapper, Mr. Comey and others associated with
the Democratic Party, and that Donald Trump and his associates committed no crimes. [ ]
As of today, I understand that a referral for criminal prosecution has been made by Mr.
Horowitz [Inspector General] to Mr. Huber, who is investigating the FISA leaks, the
unmasking, the leaks of the unmasking, and everything we described tonight. Criminal
referrals have already been made.
l suggest that Mr. Brennan, who loves to make comment about the process, get himself a
good lawyer, not a good writer. [ ]
Yes, NBC News' consultant, the former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, the
most partisan hack leader of the CIA in history, needs a very, very good lawyer. [ ] Yes, a
criminal lawyer. He doesn't need a 'slip and fall' lawyer, although he's going to slip and
fall. He's going to be in front of a Grand Jury shortly."
"... The FBI Informant Who Monitored the Trump Campaign, Stefan Halper, Oversaw a CIA Spying Operation in the 1980 Presidential Election https://theintercept.com/20... ..."
"... Put the two together - Mifsud and Halper - and you get a clear effort by the CIA and FBI to "entrap" hapless Trump associates into the Russiagate narrative as a deliberate project to undermine the Trump campaign and the subsequent Trump Presidency. ..."
"... It is worth noting that Halper was paid $1,058,161 by the Department of Defense - I presume for his work as an "informant". ..."
"... I think it is insane that Rosenstein keeps getting away with telling the House Intelligence Committee to go jump in a lake. ..."
"... Did you know that Trump refuses to use a secure cellphone? https://www.politico.com/st... ..."
"... However, to further flesh out the ever-clearer role of MI6 in the set-up, you might want to cast an eye at this recent post from Justin Raimondo at antiwar.com that ties together Papadapoulos, Mifsud, Richard Dearlove, and Stefan Halper, a dual-national (UK & US) who had been active in the Trump campaign. A rather dodgy dude, from appearances... ..."
"... Because nobody thought Trump would win. It waq only after the election that the heat was really cranked up, in order make it clear to Trump that he may be titular president, but he is not the one in charge. ..."
"... if Papadopoulos was actually a secret FBI asset, perhaps Papadopoulos was trying hard to become an important member of the Trump campaign in order to compromise or entrap both Trump and members of the campaign with his (fake) info about being an expert on Russia who had met Putin and had access to lots of Russian-held dirt about Hillary. If Mifsud's whereabouts are known, the House Intel Committee really ought to call him as a witness. ..."
"... Mifsud's belated efforts to cover his tracks failed. His denials don't matter. The Statement of Offense establishes the "facts." You are missing the key point -- how would anyone know about thousands of "stolen" emails on 26 April when the so-called hack of the DNC and Clinton did not occur until 31 May? ..."
There are still many unanswered questions, but the evidence that now is part of the public
record removes any doubt that British and US Intelligence services collaborated in a devious
and fabricated scheme to portray the Trump campaign as intent on collaborating with Russia. The
evidence was planted and cleverly fabricated. It was done through highly classified
intelligence channels, which created a paper trail and provided prima facie "evidence" that
individuals with tenuous ties to the Trump campaign where seeking meetings with Russian
officials. What was not reported, however, was the fact that the original impetus for those
reporting on those communications originated with an individual who appears to be an MI-6
intelligence asset. His name is Joseph Mifsud and I believe that evidence ultimately will
establish that he was directed to contact and then feed incriminating information to George
Papadopoulos. That information became the foundation of creating a counter intelligence
investigation of Donald Trump and his campaign.
First a word about Joseph Mifsud. He is currently missing. But the public record on him
strongly suggests that he was working as an intelligence asset of the United Kingdom's MI-6.
Elizabeth Vos at Disobedient Media provides an excellent review of Mifsud and his links to
British intel (
her article appears to have been taken down , but it is solid and I saved a copy):
Joseph Mifsud, a Maltese scholar with an eclectic academic history who Quartz described as
an "enigma," while legacy press has enthusiastically characterized him as a central personality
in the Trump-Russia scandal. The New York Times described Mifsud as an "enthusiastic promoter
of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia", citing his regular involvement in the annual
meetings of the Valdai Discussion Club, a Russian-based think-tank, as well as three short
articles he wrote in support of Russian policies.
Mifsud strongly denied claims that he was associated with Russian intelligence, telling
Italian newspaper Repubblica that he was a member of the European Council on Foreign Relations
and the Clinton Foundation, adding that his political outlook was "left-leaning." Last month,
Slate reported Mifsud had 'disappeared', as did some of the other figures linking the UK to the
Trump-Russia scandal.
Mifsud's alleged links to Russian intelligence are summarily debunked by his close working
relationship with Claire Smith, a major figure in the upper echelons of British intelligence. A
number of Twitter users recently observed that Joseph Mifsud had been photographed standing
next to Claire Smith of the UK Joint Intelligence Committee at Mifsud's LINK campus in Rome.
Newsmax and Buzzfeed later reported that the professor's name and biography had been removed
from the campus' website, writing that the mysterious removal took place after Mifsud had
served the institution for "years."
The FBI got its foot in the door to investigate Trump for Russian ties because of
"intelligence" about George Papadopoulos. But that intelligence was fabricated. Let me show you
how this happened. Let's go to the Statement of Offense filed against
Papadopoulos . It states that Papadopoulos made "material false statements and material
omissions to the FBI:"
Papadopoulos claimed that his interactions with Joseph Mifsud occurred before Papadopoulos
"became a foreign policy advisor to the Campaign."
Defendant PAPADOPOULOS further told the investigating agents that the professor was "a
nothing" and "just a guy talk[ing] up connections or something." In truth and in fact, however,
defendant PAPADOPOULOS understood that the professor had substantial connections to Russian
government officials (and had met with some of those officials in Moscow immediately prior to
telling defendant PAPADOPOULOS about the "thousands of emails") and, over a period of months,
defendant PAPADOPOULOS repeatedly sought to use the professor's Russian connections in an
effort to arrange a meeting between the Campaign and Russian government officials.
Defendant
PAPADOPOULOS claimed he met a certain female Russian national before he joined the Campaign and
that their communications consisted of emails such as,'"Hi, how are you?"'In truth and in fact,
however, defendant PAPADOPOULOS met the female Russian national on or about March 24, 2016,
after he had become an adviser to the Campaign; he believed that she had connections to Russian
government officials; and he sought to use her Russian connections over a period of months in
an effort to arrange a meeting between the Campaign and Russian government officials.
Pay close attention to the actual facts. Papadopoulos met with Mifsud in Italy on 14 March
2016. Although both shared an affiliation prior to that 14 March meeting with the
London Centre of International Law Practice, they were not buddies nor in regular
communication. According to the
NY Times , Mifsud had little interest in Papadopoulos until the latter was named a Trump
foreign policy advisor.
Traveling in Italy that March, Mr. Papadopoulos met Joseph Mifsud, a Maltese professor at a
now-defunct London academy who had valuable contacts with the Russian Ministry of Foreign
Affairs. Mr. Mifsud showed little interest in Mr. Papadopoulos at first.
But when he found out he was a Trump campaign adviser, he latched onto him, according to
court records and emails obtained by The New York Times. Their joint goal was to arrange a
meeting between Mr. Trump and President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia in Moscow, or between their
respective aides.
Only one tiny problem--Mifsud met in Italy with Papadopoulos on the 14th of March but George
was not announced publicly as an advisor until ONE WEEK later, on the 21st. So how did Joseph
Mifsud know about Papadopoulos' new job? Why was Mifsud so eager to meet with Papadopoulos?
Once Papdopolous was announced, Mifsud kicked into overdrive trying to introduce George to
Russians. On 24 March Mifsud hosted Papadopolous, who reported the meeting to Stephen Miller on
the Trump campaign:
Papadopoulos: "just finished a very productive lunch with a good friend of mine, [Mifsud ] .
. . ‐ who introduced me to both Putin's niece and the Russian Ambassador in London
‐ who also acts as the Deputy Foreign Minister."
"The topic of the lunch was to arrange a meeting between us and the Russian leadership to
discuss U.S.-Russia ties under President Trump. They are keen to host us in a 'neutral' city,
or directly in Moscow. They said the leadership, including Putin, is ready to meet with us and
Mr. Trump should there be interest. Waiting for everyone's thoughts on moving forward with this
very important issue."
Here is what you need to understand. When Papadopoulos communicated to persons in the Trump
campaign the results of his meetings with Mifsud and Mifsud's Russian contacts, that
information was relayed from the UK to America via telephone and email. Those conversations,
without one doubt, were intercepted and put into a Top Secret intel reports (known in intel
circles as SIGINT) by GCHQ.
It would be damning if Papadopoulos had initiated the contact with Russian sources and was
lighting up the web with requests for info about Russians willing to work with or help Trump.
But that did not happen. The impetus to talk about Russia originated with Mifsud, who, based on
circumstantial evidence, was a British intelligence asset and was directed to target and bait
Papadopoulos. It was Mifsud who raised the specter of the Russians targeting Hillary Clinton
(see pp 6-7 of the Statement of Offense):
On or about April 26, 2016, defendant PAPADOPOULOS met the Professor for breakfast at a
London hotel. During this meeting, the Professor told defendant PAPADOPOULOS that he had just
returned from a trip to Moscow where he had met with high-level Russian government officials.
The Professor told defendant PAPADOPOULOS that on that trip he (the Professor) learned that the
Russians had obtained "dirt" on then-candidate Clinton. The Professor told defendant
PAPADOPOULOS, as defendant PAPADOPOULOS later described to the FBI, that "They [the Russians]
have dirt on her; the Russians had emails of Clinton; "they have thousands of emails."
Mifsud provided the Russian information. Not Papadopoulos. Mifsud's mission of feeding
Papadopoulos "Russian intelligence," which the later then reported back to the Trump campaign
produced the casus belli (of sorts) to justify opening an FBI counter intelligence
investigation. The FBI also was ensnared, most likely. It does not appear the FBI was briefed
immediately on these matters. Instead, John Brennan and Jim Clapper built up a pretty sizable
intel file, filled with SIGINT reports from the UK's GCHQ, which contained American names and
reports of efforts to broker a meeting with Vladimir Putin. Of course they (Clapper and
Brennan) conveniently failed to mention to the FBI that the information originated with a UK
plant. But it did provide legal cover for unmasking the identities of Trump campaign
personnel.
This was not the only "information dump" in place. MI-6 also helped ensure that there was an
"independent" source of intelligence--human intelligence. Hence the Steele Dossier, with the
first reports being produced in June 2016. It is this combination of SIGNALS INTELLIGENCE and
HUMAN INTELLIGENCE, which persuaded the FBI that something serious was going on. While it may
be possible that Comey and McCabe conspired initially with Brennan and Clapper, I do not think
that is what happened. Comey and McCabe were duped by Brennan and Clapper into believing that
there was actual malfeasance underway with the Trump campaign. They were naive, even stupid,
but not engaged in sedition.
What I have outlined above is the circumstantial case for how the so-called intelligence was
generated to create a feasible foundation for opening a counter intelligence investigation of
President Trump and his campaign. But if Vegas allowed a bet on this scenario I would bet my
house and feel confident of collecting a big payoff.
Meanwhile, we also have an FBI informant who was a CIA spy who ran a spying operation for
a previous election campaign. Nothing like hiring people with experience!
The FBI Informant Who Monitored the Trump Campaign, Stefan Halper, Oversaw a CIA
Spying Operation in the 1980 Presidential Election
https://theintercept.com/20...
Put the two together - Mifsud and Halper - and you get a clear effort by the CIA and
FBI to "entrap" hapless Trump associates into the Russiagate narrative as a deliberate
project to undermine the Trump campaign and the subsequent Trump Presidency.
July comes after April in the calendar. "Weeks after..." is even further after that.
Try reading the actual article. Then read the publicly available ones that state how
Comey left out details in that briefing. Nice try though.
Total bullshit and irrelevant. The briefing each received was routine and had nothing to
do with the clandestine campaign to frame Trump and his team as colluding with the
Russians. Is that the best you got?
However, to further flesh out the ever-clearer role of MI6 in the set-up, you might
want to cast an eye at this recent post from Justin Raimondo at
antiwar.com that ties together Papadapoulos, Mifsud, Richard Dearlove, and Stefan
Halper, a dual-national (UK & US) who had been active in the Trump campaign. A rather
dodgy dude, from appearances...
Thanks for the link. However, Raimondo's piece is dreadful. He fails to grasp what
actually happened. I will do a longer piece that will connect the dots.
Because nobody thought Trump would win.
It waq only after the election that the heat was really cranked up, in order make it
clear to Trump that he may be titular president, but he is not the one in charge.
Thank you very much for this very penetrating article. I think it should also be
mentioned that Mifsud himself explicitly denies most of the allegations quoted in the
Statement of Offense, a situation that opens up the possibility that many of
Papadopoulos' later confessions to the FBI regarding Mifsud were just as fictional as the
earlier statements for which he was arrested.
Mifsud told The Telegraph last year that
many of the contents of the alleged April 26 conversation with Papadopoulos, quoted in
your article, have no basis in reality.
Mifsud denied that he pushed Papadopoulos toward
the Russian government. Instead, he says he introduced Papadopoulos to 1) the director of
an academic Russian think tank and 2) experts connected with the EU.
Mifsud also said he
never told Papadopoulos that he had just returned from Russia after meeting with senior
Russian government officials, and he also denied he had mentioned anything about the
Russians allegedly having lots of "dirt" about Hillary. In addition, Mifsud thought the
claim that he had introduced a female "Russian national" to Papadopoulos was completely
ridiculous.
Why might Papadopoulos have made up fictional stories and told them to the FBI and the
Trump campaign? No one knows, but perhaps Papadopoulos wanted to please the FBI by
telling them what he thought they wanted to hear. As for the Trump campaign, The
Telegraph comments: "Papadopoulos also appeared to over-exaggerate the extent of his
Russian contacts in messages to the Trump campaign, according to court documents. In one
email sent to the Trump campaign Mr Papadopoulos says he has just been introduced to the
Russian Ambassador in London.
He has since admitted
the pair never met." Possibly Papadopoulos wanted to impress the Trump campaign and make
them think he was an important figure with crucial info. Or, if Papadopoulos was actually
a secret FBI asset, perhaps Papadopoulos was trying hard to become an important member of
the Trump campaign in order to compromise or entrap both Trump and members of the
campaign with his (fake) info about being an expert on Russia who had met Putin and had
access to lots of Russian-held dirt about Hillary. If Mifsud's whereabouts are known, the
House Intel Committee really ought to call him as a witness.
Mifsud's belated efforts to cover his tracks failed. His denials don't matter. The
Statement of Offense establishes the "facts." You are missing the key point -- how would
anyone know about thousands of "stolen" emails on 26 April when the so-called hack of the
DNC and Clinton did not occur until 31 May?
the risks of pre-emption...by covertly instigating a crime to a party one suspects as
criminal,,,one may miss out on the chance to prosecute a self-initiated crime
Was Rosenstein-Comey-Mueller gambit so called "insurance" about which Strzok told Lisa Page ? It looks more and more
likely that it was. So Trump was declared illegitimate president by intelligence community even before he was elected. And
actions against him were actins typically done during color revolutions by the State Department and CIA. Role of FBI
in "regime change" efforts was to implement directives from those agencies. It is doubtful that FBI acted as an independent
player.
Notable quotes:
"... The regulations require that such an appointment recite the facts justifying the conclusion that a federal crime was committed, and specify the crime. However, the initial appointment of Robert Mueller did neither, referring instead to a national security investigation that a special counsel has no authority to pursue. Although Rosenstein apparently tried to correct his mistake in a new appointment memo, he has thus far refused to disclose, even to a federal judge, a complete copy of it. ..."
"Stopping Robert Mueller to protect us all" [Mark Penn (!), The
Hill ]. "Rather than a fair, limited and impartial investigation, the Mueller investigation
became a partisan, open-ended inquisition that, by its precedent, is a threat to all those who
ever want to participate in a national campaign or an administration again. Its prosecutions
have all been principally to pressure witnesses with unrelated charges and threats to family,
or just for a public relations effect, like the indictment of Russian internet trolls.
Unfortunately, just like the Doomsday Machine in 'Dr. Strangelove; that was supposed to save
the world but instead destroys it, the Mueller investigation comes with no 'off' switch: You
can't fire Mueller. He needs to be defeated, like Ken Starr, the independent counsel who
investigated President Clinton. Finding the 'off' switch will not be easy. Step one here is for
the Justice Department inspector general report to knock Comey out of the witness box. Next,
the full origins of the investigation and its lack of any real intelligence needs to come out
in the open." ( Penn was a
chief strategist and pollster for the 2008 Clinton campaign .)
"End Robert Mueller's investigation: Michael Mukasey" [
USA Today ]. "Recall that the investigation was begun to learn whether the Trump campaign
had gotten help unlawfully from Russia . Because Attorney General Jeff Sessions had worked on
the Trump campaign, he recused himself from the matter, and so the deputy -- Rod Rosenstein --
took the decision to appoint a special counsel. The regulations require that such an
appointment recite the facts justifying the conclusion that a federal crime was committed, and
specify the crime. However, the initial appointment of Robert Mueller did neither, referring
instead to a national security investigation that a special counsel has no authority to pursue.
Although Rosenstein apparently tried to correct his mistake in a new appointment memo, he has
thus far refused to disclose, even to a federal judge, a complete copy of it.
In other investigations supposedly implicating a president -- Watergate and Whitewater
come to mind -- we were told what the crime was and what facts justified the investigation. Not
here . Nor have any of the charges filed in the Mueller investigation disclosed the Trump
campaign's criminal acceptance or solicitation of help from the Russians." I missed that detail
about the lettre
de cachet aspect of the appointment memo
"The FBI Informant Who Wasn't Spying" [Editorial Board,
Wall Street Journal ]. "Could a Trump FBI task agents to look into the foreign ties of
advisers to the Bernie Sanders presidential campaign in 2020?"
"Hayden: The Intel Community and Presidents -- Facts vs. Vision" [
RealClearPolitics ]. Hayden on Presidential transitions and the intelligence community:
"HAYDEN : We knew that if it were to be a President Trump this [transition] would be a big
speed bump because these attributes I described over here, I think the creator gave him an
extra measure. He is inherently instinctive, spontaneous, not very reflective, prone to
action, has an almost preternatural view of his own preternatural confidence in his own a
priori narrative of how things work. So we well, this one's gonna be tough. To your point, it
is a national tragedy and a perfect storm that the first time we had to do that with the new
president, we knew it's always tough but it was gonna be especially tough with this one,
through no one's fault, it was on an issue as you described. An issue that other
Americans, not the intel guys, other Americans were using to challenge his legitimacy of
President of the United States ."
There is no question that Trump of over his head and folded early on, adopting the deep state
foreign policy in even more militant incarnation the under Obama.
All those moves about "Russiagate" now is an empty sound or a cat fight of the faction of the
US elite for contracts and sinecures in government.
Notable quotes:
"... Since being inaugurated, orange clown has reversed himself on the pre-election intimations and campaign promises that apparently got him elected. Instead of improving relations with Russia, he's made everything worse; he never misses a chance to provoke Russia. Instead of pulling out of Afghanistan, he's escalating that pointless war. He's increased the illegal, immoral and unconstitutional U.S. military occupation of Syria. He's escalating the genocidal war against Yemen. He's arming the corrupt puppet government in Kiev. He's already slaughtered more people with drone strikes than Obama did in eight years. He's surrounded himself with bloodthirsty psychopaths. He's trying to overthrow the Maduro government in Venezuela. He puts Israel first and America second (or lower) on the list. He wants more military spending. He seems to want a bigger, more powerful more and aggressive NATO, not the reverse. Rather than investigate 9/11, he studiously avoids the topic. Etc., etc., etc. ..."
"... From a "deep state" perspective, what is there to dislike about orange clown? How can the "deep state" have any kind of serious problem with someone who's making Obama look like Mister Rogers? ..."
"... Has the "deep state" deployed a "lone nut" against him? Apparently not. Is he being impeached? No. Is there even a hint of political opposition to his reckless, imperial "foreign policy"? No. Have any of his appointees been blocked? No. Has there been any kind of significant legal action against him challenging his blatantly unconstitutional military adventurism for example? As far as I know, no. ..."
"... Not where I live in the Northwest. I have spoken to people who are convinced Trump is "beyond guilty" of collusion. These people are either CNN watchers or work in IT. Everyday I go to the gym people are either watching CNN or MSNBC on their screen. ..."
"... How do you "manipulate" a reasonable person into flirting with planetary extinction? How can someone who actually cares about America be manipulated into risking war with Russia for no good reason? Such a person is not morally or mentally fit for the job of president in the first place. ..."
"... So in essence Trump's whole campaign platform was reversed by "deep state" "manipulation" but rather than surround himself with reasonable people, appeal to his supporters, investigate or threaten to investigate 9/11, or even resign (rather than become a mass-murderer), he decides to stay on because he enjoys killing people with drones and he loves the vacations, etc.? ..."
"... The more likely case is that orange clown's a con man whose whole campaign was a calculated bait and switch fraud from the beginning. And all this "out to get Trump" nonsense depicting Trump as hapless "victim" of the deep state is pure political theater. ..."
"... Michael Caputo now says he was approached by a SECOND recruiter, someone other than Halper. ..."
"... Yes, Halper was involved in getting President Carter's debate briefing book to the Reagan/ BUSH campaign ahead of the debate. He's been in there, connected, for years and years, a call-boy the players, the powers-that-be have at their disposal. ..."
"... Democrats and Republicans serve the same master, no difference, neither have real any real power. The Wall St bankers,, The Lobby, MIC, International Corporations call the shots. All the politicians are dirty, and deep state has plenty of blackmail info on ALL of them if they step out of line. They're only puppets for you to get angry at, and vote out to ease your anger. But nothing changes with elections because the ones with power are unelected, and never move. See Jim Traficant or JFK for what happens when one dares to tell the truth, or challenge the establishment. ..."
"... If Trump really wanted to change things, if he was the real deal, he would have Sessions start a new 9/11 investigation, and start imprisoning and executing the perps and traitors, all the way from Tel Aviv back home to Wall St. All of them. ..."
"... In fairness, his life expectancy after such an announcement would be about 6 minutes. Getting the public to realize the truth about 9/11 is the best chance I can see for real political change in the U.S., but hoping that anyone in Washington will lead the charge seems quite futile. A group of lawyers representing victims' families recently filed a petition for a new investigation – the media of course were not interested. It really comes down to spreading the word on the grassroots level. ..."
"... Halper was not a recruiter. He was there to collect information for the FBI, the very definition of a spy. ..."
"... The Democrats truly hate the whole concept of democracy. They've tried as best they can to ban democracy from their party. And now they've instituted both illegal campaign tactics before the election and a coup after the election to try to keep the power in the Democratic Party and the money flowing to them. ..."
"... Did Imram Awan leak the documents exposing that the DNC was colluding with the Clintons and rigging the primaries and convention in her favor? After all, that's where this all began. ..."
"... That was when Hillary came up with the idea to try to blame the Russians for the leaks and thus lead the world close to nuclear war for her own personal ambition. ..."
So, help me out here – the only reason the NYT is even reporting on this is because
Congress was closing in on this turd's identity, right?
"F.B.I. agents sent an informant to talk to two campaign advisers only after they
received evidence that the pair had suspicious contacts linked to Russia during the
campaign.
"Suspicious contacts" = Russians who talked to Trump's employees.
So the FISA surveillance, the national-security letters, the FBI informants and 18
months of relentless probing-harassment have all been justified on the basis of allegations
about Russia hacking that may or may not have happened at all??
The one silver lining to all of this is that the GOP can to absolutely DRAG the Democrats
about this in the next election. If the GOP is smart, they will not listen to a goddamn word
coming out of the mouths of the Democrats or their (((Big Media))) mouthpieces during the
2020 election. They will not respond to a single point they have to make, except to call them
hopelessly corrupt authoritarians who are unfit to govern until they come clean about their
malfeasance and cut the rot from their ranks, and then spout their other talking points and
drop the mic.
"According to people familiar with (General Michael) Flynn's visit to the intelligence
seminar, the source was alarmed by the general's apparent closeness with a Russian woman
who was also in attendance. The concern was strong enough that it prompted another person
to pass on a warning to the American authorities that Mr. Flynn could be compromised by
Russian intelligence, according to two people familiar with the matter."
*Facepalm*
These fucks are beyond parody now. We're literally ruled by corrupt morons, stooges, and
degenerates.
"The cockblocking/penis-envy concern was enough for Stasi agents to follow up "
I would be shocked if both political party's didn't have a myriad of spies in each other's
campaigns dating back to Lincoln! Grow up people, there's a ton of money here.
Rod Rosenstein is a traitorous weasel POS who never should've been appointed. Christopher
Wray worked as a deputy to James Comey and is highly likely dirty and another deep state
puppet. Mike Pence, Paul Ryan, McConnell, Pompeo, John Kelly, Kirstjen Nielsen, Gina Haspel,
John Bolton, Nikki Haley, all are deep state puppets. Why does Trump keep appointing more
deep state puppets to take over from the other deep state puppets?
I cannot for the life of me understand why Jeff Sessions continues to stick up for
Rosenstein the weasel. My only explanation is that this whole thing is a coup set up by Deep
State and Mike Pence from the get go so Pence can be president, and Sessions is in on the
coup to keep his job.
I did not know it was Rosenstein's memo that prompted Trump to fire James Comey. Trump
needs to bring that out in the open and let everyone know Rosenstein set him up. This POS
weasel needs to go to jail. As long as he's still in the DOJ no real investigation of deep
state will ever take place. We've got the fox guarding the hen house.
It notes that all the corporate media knows it was Halper, but they obey the Deep State
and refuse to report this, pretending that evil Republicans are trying to out an innocent FBI
spy. Even today, their coverage is "alleged" informant. For some reason, NBC News was the
only "mainstream" team to ignore this absurd BS and report his name as part of the biggest
news story of the decade. Note that Halper is not a Democratic Party mole, but a Bush family
mole.
Doesn't Mueller have the self-respect to end his witch hunt and crawl back under a
rock?
A very strong move by President Trump. It is a fact that the FBI sent an informant, Mr.
Halper, to gather information on the Trump campaign. The FBI can plead it was to gather info
on alarming Russians, but the informant my gather other info just as easily. If the FBI can
send one, Halper, they can just as easily send another, or more unknown informants. This
RussiaGate nonsense has always been a matter to be tried in the court of public opinion, by
innuendo. Therefore President Trump's investigation can use the "have you stopped beating
your wife?" method. Every time the FBI says no to a question it looks like they are lying to
cover something bigger. Informants have Control Officers, who write reports to superiors, the
reports make reference to code words, places and dates. Reports generate memos and orders.
Everything becomes fuel for innuendo and the only out the FBI will have is "We honestly
thought .but no, we found nothing".
A point well made in qualification of the merits of the article. Surely the author knows
on reflection that no political party or campaign is going to forgo the chance of getting
inside information on what their opponents are up to, including crimes – and
spying.
Since Trump could do some shuffling so as to appoint an Attorney-General who wouldn't
recuse himself or get rid of Rosenstein by appointing him a judge, or ambassador just for
example maybe it is best to assume that the President doesn't feel immediately threatened and
is reasonably confident that he can find and time his countermeasures satisfactorily. It is
hardly beyond belief that there are Trump moles in Mueller's army who are assuring him that
his instinct is right: apparent witch hunting persecution by Mueller is actually a harmless
distraction and so good for him until the time is right to blow it up.
Considered in its entirety, this Trump/Russia business is indeed turning into the political
crime (& shame) of the century. Were someone who had died in the 50′s to suddenly
resurrect, they would suffer the equivalent of a psychotic episode or a bad LSD trip.
Its mind boggling to anyone even vaguely conscious .
Mr Trump needs to clean house: politiclly difficult, yes, but Trump needs to visit a Lehman
Bros' moment on the DOJ, CIA & FBI.
No doubt the above toxic agencies will (again) spew forth the magic word:
"Russia-Russia-Russia" to render all opposition impotent.
One may, of course, truly wonder whether a majority of citizens will awake & notice the
stench of rotting democracy & having noticed, draw the correct conclusions and –
finally – act .
Trump has surrounded himself with lifer Deep Staters who no doubt tell him that
investigations and prosecutions will do grave harm to national security and, at the same
time, would appear to be his own politically motivated witch hunt, the kind one sees only in
third-world basket case countries, and that would reflect more poorly on him than on the
actual cabal attempting to overthrow him and overturn his election.
But the actual collusion has become so obvious that he has to pull the trigger, because
nobody else is going to. Sessions should have been all over this a year ago, but he too is a
long-serving government employee, which suggests he is also of the swamp. As for Congress, a
few brave souls, e.g. Nunes, have tried and have been exposed to withering fire from all
sides.
The purpose of the informant/spy was to "dirty" Page and Papadopoulos; to make them plausible
suspects so that full use of the NSA database could be used on the Trump team both pre- and
post-election and as far back in the past as they wanted to go. The warrants used on Page and
Papadopoulos were counterintelligence warrants that allow using NSA resources on anyone "two
hops" (two people) away from Page and Papadopoulos. "Two-hops" would easily include everyone
near Trump even if Page and Papadopoulos had only minimal contact with the campaign. This is
the heart of the crime. Page and Papadopoulos were used as place-holders to gather
information on everyone near Trump. The informer was used to set those two up.
Trump posting something on Twitter isn't "fighting back"–it's venting steam. As the
article correctly states, letting the DOJ investigate itself is a joke. So Trump needed a
Special Counsel of his own, and he needed him right after his inauguration. It may be that
Trump likes a dose of Russia Scare to push overpriced American weapons and LNG to clueless
Europeans. It may be that he's found out (or at least his people have) that he needs
Deep-State sleaze for his anti-Iran campaign. It may be that Trump well knows he's vulnerable
on nepotism, old NY Mob ties, and oh yeah some sexual peccadilloes, so he better play along
and color within the lines. Or it may simply be that Trump is a moron without the attention
span for anything beyond venting on Twitter.
It doesn't really matter now, the ship has sailed, he's gone too far in with "Putin-Assad
baby killers" to return to sanity now.
"After 18 months of withering attacks and accusations, Donald Trump has decided to get up off
the canvas and fight back."
If "they" are really out to "get" orange clown, why don't "they" go after him for his
impeachable war crimes in Syria, for example? Why don't "they" at least bring a lawsuit
against him for his illegal, immoral and unconstitutional occupation of Syria?
Generally speaking, when one party ostensibly dislikes another party, and apparently seeks
to "get" that party, isn't there usually some kind of plausible, identifiable reason for the
enmity?
Since being inaugurated, orange clown has reversed himself on the pre-election intimations
and campaign promises that apparently got him elected. Instead of improving relations with
Russia, he's made everything worse; he never misses a chance to provoke Russia. Instead of
pulling out of Afghanistan, he's escalating that pointless war. He's increased the illegal,
immoral and unconstitutional U.S. military occupation of Syria. He's escalating the genocidal
war against Yemen. He's arming the corrupt puppet government in Kiev. He's already
slaughtered more people with drone strikes than Obama did in eight years. He's surrounded
himself with bloodthirsty psychopaths. He's trying to overthrow the Maduro government in
Venezuela. He puts Israel first and America second (or lower) on the list. He wants more
military spending. He seems to want a bigger, more powerful more and aggressive NATO, not the
reverse. Rather than investigate 9/11, he studiously avoids the topic. Etc., etc., etc.
From a "deep state" perspective, what is there to dislike about orange clown? How can the
"deep state" have any kind of serious problem with someone who's making Obama look like
Mister Rogers?
"In any event, Trump has decided to throw caution to the wind and go for broke. He's
decided that the only way he's going to get his enemies off his back is by flushing them out
into the open and subjecting their activities to public scrutiny."
Has the "deep state" deployed a "lone nut" against him? Apparently not. Is he being
impeached? No. Is there even a hint of political opposition to his reckless, imperial
"foreign policy"? No. Have any of his appointees been blocked? No. Has there been any kind of
significant legal action against him challenging his blatantly unconstitutional military
adventurism for example? As far as I know, no.
3D chess, 4D chess or what is it up to now, 14D chess? Trumpistas have too much faith in
their man. Trump is a businessman not a politician. He's in over his head. Just look at how
easily he was goaded into canning James Comey that set off this whole sorry affair.
One may, of course, truly wonder whether a majority of citizens will awake & notice
the stench of rotting democracy & having noticed, draw the correct conclusions and
– finally – act.
Not where I live in the Northwest. I have spoken to people who are convinced Trump is "beyond guilty" of collusion.
These people are either CNN watchers or work in IT. Everyday I go to the gym people are either watching CNN or MSNBC on their
screen. Most Americans are brain dead sheeple.
"Has the "deep state" deployed a 'lone nut' against him? Apparently not. Is he being
impeached? No. Is there even a hint of political opposition to his reckless, imperial
'foreign policy'? No. Have any of his appointees been blocked? No. Has there been any kind of
significant legal action against him challenging his blatantly unconstitutional military
adventurism for example? As far as I know, no.
So how is anybody actually '[on] his back'?"
Answer: the Deep State obviously is on his back, It is has successfully manipulated him
into a foreign policy that he did not want. He wanted an America First policy, but because of
political blackmail and dishonest allegations about collusion with Russia, Trump has felt
compelled to do what Zionists want in the Middle East. At home, massive legal immigration
continues, there will be no mass deportations, and the border wall will not be built. The
Democrats will be firmly entrenched after Trump is gone from the scene.
"the Deep State obviously is on his back, It is has successfully manipulated him into a
foreign policy that he did not want. "
Or so goes the Trump apologists' claim. But that's pure unfounded speculation.
How do you "manipulate" a reasonable person into flirting with planetary extinction? How
can someone who actually cares about America be manipulated into risking war with Russia for
no good reason? Such a person is not morally or mentally fit for the job of president in the
first place.
So in essence Trump's whole campaign platform was reversed by "deep state" "manipulation"
but rather than surround himself with reasonable people, appeal to his supporters,
investigate or threaten to investigate 9/11, or even resign (rather than become a
mass-murderer), he decides to stay on because he enjoys killing people with drones and he
loves the vacations, etc.?
I think not. The more likely case is that orange clown's a con man whose whole
campaign was a calculated bait and switch fraud from the beginning. And all this "out to get
Trump" nonsense depicting Trump as hapless "victim" of the deep state is pure political
theater.
"In an earlier version of this article I stated that the FBI planted a spy INSIDE the Trump
campaign. This is not correct, which is why I asked editor Ron Unz to remove the article. The
informant was not part of the Campaign but sought information from members of the Campaign."
Hyper-technical hair splitting that is ultimately false. The point of Halper's approaches
were to recruit people in the campaign to provide information. Those recruits would have been
spies. Michael Caputo now says he was approached by a SECOND recruiter, someone other than Halper.
Trump is head of the Executive Branch. The DoJ and FBI are part of the executive branch and
subordinate to Trump. He can send 30-40 US Marshals to FBI headquarters, and to DoJ
headquarters, and have them extract by force the necessary documents, and no one can say
"boo!"
I wish he would.
The downside of course is that everyone in the media and in Congress would scream
"tyrant!" So Trump currently is leaving them alone to continue digging their own grave with
the Mueller/Russia witchunt, as the country moves towards the midterm elections.
Yes, Halper was involved in getting President Carter's debate briefing book to the Reagan/
BUSH campaign ahead of the debate. He's been in there, connected, for years and years,
a call-boy the players, the powers-that-be have at their disposal.
Stefan Halper is one of the creepy-crawly things that have been living under the rock
Donald Trump kicked over.
As Steve Sailer points out, Halper is the son-in-law of CIA man Ray. S. Cline, who was
instrumental in the Bay of Pigs fiasco.
Democrats and Republicans serve the same master, no difference, neither have real any real
power. The Wall St bankers,, The Lobby, MIC, International Corporations call the shots. All
the politicians are dirty, and deep state has plenty of blackmail info on ALL of them if they
step out of line. They're only puppets for you to get angry at, and vote out to ease your
anger. But nothing changes with elections because the ones with power are unelected, and
never move. See Jim Traficant or JFK for what happens when one dares to tell the truth, or
challenge the establishment.
9/11 and silence from both sides with regard to a real investigation into the biggest
"terrorist" attack in US History, and the murder of 3000 Americans, this tells you who is in
power, the people that pulled it off. Neither party supports a real investigation into this
attack, they both work for the same people. The fact that the MSM still lies about it means
they are also controlled by the goons. The FBI, CIA lies about it, and Muellers coverup of
the crime tells you all of the "Intelligence" and "Law" enforcement agencies are also
controlled by the same cabal.
Until they start telling the truth about 9/11, you can bet the same goons are still in
charge, no matter who the president is, no matter which Democrat or Republican you elect, the
shadow government, deep state are still calling the shots. If you do vote, vote 3rd party.
The whole election system is rigged to keep out most anyone who might dare to challenge the
establishment, thats why we only get lowlifes like Mitt Romney or the Cintons running for
office year after year, out of millions of people the same dirtbags just won't go away.
Everything else is just noise, distractions from this reality. If Trump really wanted to
change things, if he was the real deal, he would have Sessions start a new 9/11
investigation, and start imprisoning and executing the perps and traitors, all the way from
Tel Aviv back home to Wall St. All of them.
If Trump really wanted to change things, if he was the real deal, he would have Sessions
start a new 9/11 investigation, and start imprisoning and executing the perps and traitors,
all the way from Tel Aviv back home to Wall St. All of them.
In fairness, his life expectancy after such an announcement would be about 6 minutes. Getting the public to realize the truth about 9/11 is the best chance I can see for real
political change in the U.S., but hoping that anyone in Washington will lead the charge seems
quite futile. A group of lawyers representing victims' families recently filed a
petition for a new investigation – the media of course were not interested. It
really comes down to spreading the word on the grassroots level.
Hyper-technical hair splitting that is ultimately false. The point of Halper's
approaches were to recruit people in the campaign to provide information. Those recruits
would have been spies. Michael Caputo now says he was approached by a SECOND recruiter,
someone other than Halper.
Halper was not a recruiter. He was there to collect information for the FBI, the very
definition of a spy.
Hatunggal Muda Siregar, a spokesman for MNC, said the theme park and the Trump
properties are separate projects within the Lido development. The agreement with the
Chinese company to build the theme park does not include any financing for the project, he
said.
Mr. Trump's business dealings in Indonesia prompted scrutiny even before his
inauguration, and he pledged not to embark on any new deals while in office. But the Trump
Organization held onto the projects in Indonesia, saying the contracts with Mr. Hary were
signed in 2015 and were binding.
Yet another nothing burger. This an old deal made before he even ran for president. The
Chinese loan does not extend to building of the Trump properties.
As the article repeatedly pointed out:
There isn't any evidence that the agreement with the construction company was intended
to sway the Trump administration on any matters.
If there's no evidence, why report it at all? To give more ammo to people who are always
for looking for any reason to disparage Trump, and only bother to read headlines.
"It's worth noting, that the current Russia investigation is based on the dubious claim that
Russia hacked DNC computers."
Imran Awan is not Russian, he's a Paki. And he didn't need to hack the DNC, Debbie
Wasserman Schultz let him in and gave him the password. There, huge mystery solved.
"Anyone who refers to Trump as 'orange clown' is obviously partisan to the point of not
worth listening to."
You may be right about that; now that I think about it, it does seem too generous.
How about "teflon-don-the-con-man"; or, "the ignorant orange savage in the White House"?
Of course there's always the Biblical description to fall back on: "the beast from the earth"
(i.e. the second beast of Rev 13); will that work?
Meanwhile, at the same time we also learn that there is evidence that there really was
collusion between the Trump campaign and foreign powers that wanted to see it elected in
return for favorable policies. But, the problem that the Deep State has is that the foreign
powers were not the cartoon-pinup-all-purpose villan of the Russians. No, it was Israel and
Saudi Arabia.
The point of all of this is that the United States is supposed to be a democracy which
means that the government does what the people want it to do. The one thing that we are
seeing is that nobody in Washington wants that. The Democrats truly hate the whole concept of
democracy. They've tried as best they can to ban democracy from their party. And now they've
instituted both illegal campaign tactics before the election and a coup after the election to
try to keep the power in the Democratic Party and the money flowing to them.
But, it turns out Trump was off cutting deals with Israel and Saudi Arabia that now seem
to have the USA headed straight into a disasterous war that was the last thing that voters
wanted. The voters keep electing candidates who claim to be against these wars. The problem
is that they whole bunch of them are a lot of liars, and the one and only thing they are
truly against is democracy and letting the people have a say.
America desperately needs a Democracy Movement. One that cleans the temples of DC of all
of the corrupt liars that currently rule us in both fake parties.
"He's decided that the only way he's going to get his enemies off his back is by flushing
them out into the open and subjecting their activities to public scrutiny. It's a risky
strategy "
It's the only strategy he can pursue. If he doesn't take the fight out into the open,
where his enemies are vulnerable, they will bury him.
Did Imram Awan leak the documents exposing that the DNC was colluding with the Clintons and
rigging the primaries and convention in her favor? After all, that's where this all began.
It was a bit before the conventions when those emails leaked. Hillary certainly knew that
they could be the death of her lifelong quest to see how much she could steal as President.
If the Bernie voters were upset that the whole fake primary and caucus process had been
rigged all along and refused to support Hillary, then she was done as a Presidential
contender.
That was when Hillary came up with the idea to try to blame the Russians for the leaks and
thus lead the world close to nuclear war for her own personal ambition.
You know it's funny, all those 'conservatives' screaming that Edward Snowden is a traitor,
that we should trust the US government to spy on us in secret because national security
demands it, etc. Because only bad people have something to hide, right?
And now we begin to see exactly what it means when the central government can essentially
spy on anyone for any reason not so wonderful after all, is it?
There is an old saying that a conservative is a liberal who has been mugged, and a liberal
is a conservative who's been arrested. I guess a civil libertarian is a national security hawk that's been spied on.
I see your point, bread and circus for the people. I'm more worried about is Israel attacking
Lebanon, tbh, dragging the entire ME in to the conflict ending up with trump/bibi and Erdogan
stumbling us into a ww and/or financial breakdown.
America desperately needs a Democracy Movement. One that cleans the temples of DC of all
of the corrupt liars that currently rule us in both fake parties
Yes indeed we do. The Dems are using the corruption theme, but of course they are
hypocrites also and don't live up to ethical standards either.
Still, maybe an election platform based on ITS THE CORRUPTION STUPID ..will open the eyes of
some of our more mentally challenged voters.
Hate always works – Tump pretended he was going to drain the hateful deep state swamp to
save his little people -- -so I guess the Dems can pretend they are going to kill the corrupt
to save the little people.
Democrats Roll Out Anti-Corruption Message for 2018
1 day ago – Instead, Democrats are returning to an anti-corruption message that A
decade later, Trump seized on a similar theme, directing voter ire at
Mueller is the only admirable man in this mess. Trump's problem is he is for once up against
an honest man, someone he cant threaten or bribe or bully.
Trump, as we say in the south, is white trash he is way out of his class with Mueller.
Mueller's investigation isn't going to 'wrap up' soon -- and Trump is still in peril
Anyone paying attention over the last year knows Mueller will not yield to political
pressure. His investigators haven't leaked; they have ignored vicious personal attacks; they
haven't veered in the slightest from prosecutorial professionalism.
So to "wrap it up," Trump would have to make a move, but will he?
The president and his lawyers are strategizing about whether he will agree to be
interviewed by Mueller, either voluntarily or under subpoena. If he were to refuse, as the
current swing of the pendulum suggests, and then try to end the probe, he would only seem
more guilty and undermine his support even among Republicans. If his refusal were to lead, as
expected, to a court battle, we would expect the Supreme Court to settle the issue. Any move
by Trump to preempt it would again only undermine his credibility.
In addition, the president and his circle are well aware of how fast the midterm election
is approaching and what effect an attempt to fire Mueller could have on the outcome. They
want to avoid any action that would help the Democrats flip the House. Such a shift would
change every calculation, not least because a Democratic majority could move to impeach the
president early next year.
Of course, Trump may calculate that he could get away with firing Mueller now, if he moved
quickly and the Republican leadership rallied to his side. But it is equally possible that
Congress would respond with legislation to reinstate Mueller. Again, the field of battle
would shift to the courts.
Most importantly, even a successful ouster of Mueller would not derail the investigation
at this point. Too much evidence has been gathered, and too many prosecutors, who have surely
considered and planned for the contingency, stand ready to carry on. Should Trump try to
shutter the entire special counsel's office, a much graver and politically and legally
riskier act than firing Mueller or Rosenstein, other divisions in the Department of Justice,
in particular the Southern District of New York, would also be ready to take up the
charge.
The strength of all that evidence, the careful work done thus far, and the indictments
already filed are the special counsel's protection against "witch hunt" tweets and
protestations that the investigation is already over with nothing to show for it.
In the course of the past year, we've learned not to underestimate what Mueller knows and
what bombshell he may have prepared. It may involve the Russians and the campaign, it may
involve obstruction of justice, but there are other relevant threads as well: the true motive
behind the Seychelles meeting between Trump associate Erik Prince and the head of a Russian
wealth fund, the hacking of Democratic Party emails and its links to Trump political advisor
Roger Stone, the recent sale of Russia's state owned oil company to Qatar.
Last week we discovered that Mueller was way ahead of us on the huge payments made to
Trump's personal lawyer Michael Cohen for access to the president. We don't yet know what
he's found out from cooperating witnesses, including Michael Flynn and Rick Gates, that might
point directly at the president. And there is still the possibility that Paul Manafort or
Cohen could decide to cooperate with the investigation.
None of these threads signals Trump's removal from office. A conviction in the Senate, no
matter what happens in the midterm, would require a good number of Republicans to turn
against the president, which seems remote absent a smoking gun that proves grave criminal
conduct. But it is more than plausible that the probe and associated investigations will
result in additional indictments of Trump associates -- including Jared Kushner and Donald
Trump Jr. -- and will leave Trump seriously wounded, an untenable candidate in 2020. Once he
leaves office, his legal exposure, both civil and criminal, would skyrocket.
The "wrap it up" crowd is indulging in wishful thinking. The first anniversary of the
Mueller investigation is unlikely to be the last.
Harry Litman teaches constitutional law at UC San Diego. He is a former U.S. attorney
and deputy assistant attorney general.
This is another interesting information about sanctimonious Comey
Obama once again proved that he is a real "CIA democrat"
Notable quotes:
"... American Thinker ..."
"... After the Daily Caller ..."
"... Whatever else is true, the CIA operative and FBI informant used to gather information on the Trump campaign in the 2016 campaign
has, for weeks, been falsely depicted as a sensitive intelligence asset rather than what he actually is: a long-time CIA operative with
extensive links to the Bush family who was responsible for a dirty and likely illegal spying operation in the 1980 presidential election.
..."
"... So the mole, Halper is "a long-time CIA operative with extensive links to the Bush family" with deep CIA and MI6 connections.
..."
"... It's worth noting that the dossier by ex-MI6 spy Christopher Steele was allegedly commissioned originally by someone connected
to the Bush family, possibly Jeb Bush. The extending of the dossier's financing by the DNC in the summer of 2016 seemed strangely seamless.
..."
The Intercept should not have used "monitored".
Prof. Stefan Halper , a man
with deep CIA and MI6 connections, spied on the Trump campaign for the FBI. He wasn't an informant, he was an operator. Chuck Ross
of the Daily Callerreported
the story on March 25 and was the first to name Halper. Larouche Pub and the American Thinker also
ran the story and
expanded it further .
After the Daily Caller report came out the FBI tried to hide the name of its spy, telling Congress that revealing
the name would endanger the man as well as other 'informants' and secret investigations. The main stream media played along and the
anti-Trump 'resistance'
feigned outrage that anyone would attempt to look into this. But the name was out there all along for everyone to see, as was
the whole story.
Greenwald concludes:
Whatever else is true, the CIA operative and FBI informant used to gather information on the Trump campaign in the 2016 campaign
has, for weeks, been falsely depicted as a sensitive intelligence asset rather than what he actually is: a long-time CIA operative
with extensive links to the Bush family who was responsible for a dirty and likely illegal spying operation in the 1980 presidential
election.
For that reason, it's easy to understand why many people in Washington were so desperate to conceal his identity, but that
desperation had nothing to do with the lofty and noble concerns for national security they claimed were motivating them.
This is a hundred times worse than Watergate. The media will drown the story but Obama is just as bad, if not worse, than the
right had painted him to be. It's part of the reason that I am no longer a leftist. I think a lot of people feel the same way.
The Left has let us down.
Thank you b for your good works. I'm grateful when thoughtful people like you or Glenn Greenwald put your work in the public sphere.
I have hoped for years that someone like Stefan Halper be unearthed. Here is continuity from Nixon to the present day of the dirty
activity of the now-called "deep state". A handmaiden to Cheney, Rumsfeld and all republican presidents since Kennedy, he needs
to be safe-guarded for hostile debriefing before he is silenced. "October Surprise", Iran Contra, and now this FBI/CIA spying
activity... We need more honest investigative efforts. He and his cohorts are likely linked to other illegal activities.
(This is my 1st post to this community. B is my name too [Bernhard] and my favorite character is from the 1967 series "The
Prisoner")
So the mole, Halper is "a long-time CIA operative with extensive links to the Bush family" with deep CIA and MI6 connections.
It's worth noting that the dossier by ex-MI6 spy Christopher Steele was allegedly commissioned originally by someone connected
to the Bush family, possibly Jeb Bush. The extending of the dossier's financing by the DNC in the summer of 2016 seemed strangely
seamless.
Also, of course, the then CIA director John Brennan used allegations in the Steele dossier as a justification for the Trump-Russian
investigations.
It looks like a lot people and organisations were working for the same goal, even though they were supposed to be independent
of each other, and even political rivals in the case of the Bushes and the DNC.
Humint on Trump election campaign staff is a the last nail in the coffin of the US republic,
as we know it. This is essentially "national security state" mode of operation, where
intelligence agencies are primary political force.
CIA
and MI6 asset Stefan Halper as an FBI asset sent to infiltrate the Trump campaign has
social media abuzz today. Reactions have ranged from celebration to outrage, with little
inbetween.
To recap, after two weeks of hunting for a "mole" in the Trump campaign, the New
York Times and
Washington Post both printed incredibly detailed descriptions of Halper - printing all but
his name, solidly corroborating a March report by the Daily Caller 's Chuck
Ross about Halper's meetings with the Trump aides. Neither publication give Ross credit, of
course.
Somehow several anti-Trump intellectuals got their wires crossed, conflating President Trump
and Senate Intel Committee Chair Devin Nunes' calls for transparency by the DOJ, with the
actual media outlets that exposed Halper.
Senior Brookings Institute fellow, and James Comey's close friend, Benjamin Wittes is beside
himself - angrily tweeting: " I have a whole lot to say about how the chairman of the House
Intelligence Committee and the President of the United States teamed up to out an intelligence
source ...," adding in a subsequent tweet "But I am too angry to write right now -- and Twitter
is probably not the right forum. So I'll leave it at this for now: Important people defiled
their oaths of office for these stories to appear."
Two months
after Podesta joined the board, Joule managed to raise $35 million from Putin's Kremlin-backed
investment fund Rusnano. Not only did John Podesta fail to properly disclose this
relationship before joining the Clinton Campaign, he transferred
75,000 shares of Joule to his daughter through a shell company using
her address.
AlaricBalth
two hoots
PermalinkThe Caller - flying him out to
London to work on a policy paper on energy issues in
Turkey, Cyprus and Israel - for which he was ultimately
paid $3,000."
It would be interesting to find out through bank
transaction records who reimbursed Halper for the $3,000
he paid Papadopoulos for this policy paper, which was
clearly a ruse by Halper in an attempt to make
Papadopoulos comfortable with him.
"They will go down fighting trump six
ways to sunday."
-Since there was no "criminal" Russia Gate proof,
the Dem's & Deep State moved to an "illegal" counter
intelligence investigation against Trump.
-Bringing down Trump at any cost, fuck the
constitution or laws, is ok in the Dem books.
-The louder the Left shrieks, the guiltier they
are.
Sudden suicides, jumping off towers, car crashes
or exiting the US begin in 3...2...1...
Posa
LaugherNYC
Permalink
"What the
Times story makes explicit, with
studious understatement, is that the
Obama administration used its
counterintelligence powers to
investigate the opposition party's
presidential campaign.
That is, there was no criminal predicate
to justify an investigation of any
Trump-campaign official. So, the FBI did
not open a criminal investigation.
Instead, the bureau opened a
counterintelligence investigation and
hoped that evidence of crimes committed
by Trump officials would emerge. But it
is an abuse of power to use
counterintelligence powers, including
spying and electronic surveillance, to
conduct what is actually a criminal
investigation.
The Times barely mentions the
word counterintelligence in its
saga. That's not an accident. The paper
is crafting the media-Democrat
narrative."
Kayman
AlaricBalth
Permalink
They sure ain't the Obamas and the Clintons. Pallets of Cash
purportedly flown to Iran, bullshit speeches for $500,000, millions thru
their dirty Canadian conduit. Life sure was grand, selling out your
country.
Thanks to Friday's carefully crafted deep-state disclosures by WaPo and the Times , along
with actual reporting by the Daily Caller 's Chuck
Ross, we now know it wasn't a mole at all - but 73-year-old University of Cambridge professor
Stefan Halper, a US citizen, political veteran and longtime US Intelligence asset enlisted by
the FBI to befriend and spy on three members of the Trump campaign during the 2016 US election
.
the "American academic who teaches in Britain" described by The Times,
Seems like Carter Page knew what he was talking about in this May 11 tweet.
Carter Page, Ph.D. @carterwpage
No @JackPosobiec, not me. But if what I'm hearing alleged is correct, it's a guy I know
who splits most his time between inside the Beltway and in one of the other Five Eyes
countries.
And if so, it'd be typical: swamp creatures putting themselves first.
4:17 AM - May 11, 2018
I think Rudy's flipped seeking redemption for his role in 911.
The deep state is not going down quietly or without a fight and they are in full attack
mode. Multiple questionable instances yesterday to change news cycle, plus a week worths of
leaks by major media mouthpieces justifying their crimes.
What's great is they are so caught up in their nest of lies, each new lie just contradicts
previous ones and exposes more of the truth.
Now the question is: How do you bring these people to justice without starting a violent
backlash / Civil War?
The cognitive dissonance is very strong on the left and they've fallen victim to hive
mentality, simply regurgitating talking points they hear through pop culture and media. We
are so afraid of not fitting in (as a society) that we will willingly accept completely
contradicting "facts", defend them, and deride those who disagree. Further, there is no room
for disagreement, for they are the party of tolerance, and if you disagree with them, you are
intolerant, which cannot be tolerated in an open and free society (see how that works?).
The real hope is people are able to break the spell and think for themselves again. But I
worry it's too late. A generation of children assaulted with excessive vaccination are now
adults and it shows...
People in the USA better get a grip real fast and realize that it's not Russia, China or
Iran that is the real enemy of Americans, it's the British . . . the money gnomes in London
and the "Queens men". They've caused more problems for the USA in the last 100+ years than
the other three combined many times over.
Let's see. Money was exchanged, foreign govt agents and contractors hired. The FBI knew
about Hillary's criminal enterprises and illegal dissemination of classified documents and
apparently has been complicit in helping or protecting her. The NYT and WaPo along with the
network media regurgitated much of the anti-Trump rhetoric together in sync with the tsunami
of fake news, either in creating it or knowingly participating in it. No wonder the news
media in a sudden shift have been trying to paint themselves as now being on the other side
of this Russkie Fubar after they promoted it 24/7 for two years without let-up. What's the
penalty for trying to overthrow the President of the United States? Lots of folks here are
sitting on potential indictments for treason. Enough talk. With all they got from the
Congressional hearings, and now this, it's time!!!... for Trump to start draining.
Because that is what (((they))) want. Do a little research on how that came about in the
US you will find that the same ole (((culprits))) got the law changed to their benefit of
course.
"... Back in Dec., NYT assured us it was the Papadopoulos-Downer convo that inspired FBI to launch official counterintelligence operation on July 31, 2016. Which was convenient, since it diminished the role of the dossier. However . . . ..."
"... Now NYT tells us FBI didn't debrief Downer until August 2nd. And Nunes says no "official intelligence" from allies was delivered to FBI about that convo prior to July 31. So how did FBI get Downer details? (Political actors?) And what really did inspire the CI investigation? ..."
"... House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes appeared on "Fox & Friends" Tuesday, where he provided a potentially explosive hint at what's driving his demand to see documents related to the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Trump-Russia probe. "If the campaign was somehow set up," he told the hosts, "I think that would be a problem." ..."
"... government "officials" acknowledged that the bureau had used "at least one" human "informant" to spy on both Carter Page and George Papadopoulos. ..."
"... Think of the 2016 Trump-Russia narrative as two parallel strands -- one politics, one law enforcement. The political side involves the actions of Fusion GPS, the Hillary Clinton campaign and Obama officials -- all of whom were focused on destroying Donald Trump. The law-enforcement strand involves the FBI -- and what methods and evidence it used in its Trump investigation. At some point these strands intersected -- and one crucial question is how early that happened. ..."
"... Which brings us to timing. It's long been known that Mr. Steele went to the FBI in early July to talk about the dossier, and that's the first known intersection of the strands. But given the oddity and timing of those U.K. interactions concerning Messrs. Page and Papadopoulos, and given the history of some of the people involved in arranging them, some wonder if the two strands were converging earlier than anyone has admitted. The Intelligence Committee subpoena is designed to sort all this out: Who was pulling the strings, and what was the goal? Information? Or entrapment? ..."
"... Whatever the answer-whether it is straightforward, or whether it involves political chicanery-Congress and the public have a right to know. And a Justice Department willing to leak details of its "top secret" source to friendly media can have no excuse for not sharing with the duly elected members of Congress. ..."
"... Thanks for stopping by, Bob. Before you ask me your questions I need you to answer a few of mine: ..."
"... You have had a full year to investigate the allegations that my campaign colluded with the Russian government to meddle in our election. Has anyone obstructed you from doing this job to the best of your ability? If so, who have you notified of this and what corrective action have you taken or requested be taken? ..."
"... Have you found any evidence that I personally committed any crime involving collusion with the Russians to interfere with the election? ..."
"... Have you found any evidence that any member of my campaign committed any crime involving collusion with the Russians to interfere with the election? ..."
Earlier in the week, with Trump now calling out the debacle as
"possible
bigger than Watergate," Strassel tweet-stormed some key points that everyone - leftist and right - should consider ... (that's
wishful thinking)...
1. So a few important points on that new NYT "Hurricane Crossfire" piece. A story that, BTW, all of us following this knew
had to be coming. This is DOJ/FBI leakers' attempt to get in front of the facts Nunes is forcing out, to make it not sound so
bad. Don't buy it. It's bad.
2. Biggest takeaway: Govt "sources" admit that, indeed, the Obama DOJ and FBI spied on the Trump campaign. Spied . (Tho NYT
kindly calls spy an "informant.") NYT slips in confirmation far down in story, and makes it out like it isn't a big deal. It is
a very big deal.
3. In self-serving desire to get a sympathetic story about its actions, DOJ/FBI leakers are willing to provide yet more details
about that "top secret" source (namely, that spying was aimed at Page/Papadopoulos) -- making all more likely/certain source will
be outed. That's on them
4. DOJ/FBI (and its leakers) have shredded what little credibility they have in claiming they cannot comply with subpoena .
They are willing to provide details to friendly media, but not Congress? Willing to risk very source they claim to need to protect?
5. Back in Dec., NYT assured us it was the Papadopoulos-Downer convo that inspired FBI to launch official counterintelligence
operation on July 31, 2016. Which was convenient, since it diminished the role of the dossier. However . . .
6. Now NYT tells us FBI didn't debrief Downer until August 2nd. And Nunes says no "official intelligence" from allies was
delivered to FBI about that convo prior to July 31. So how did FBI get Downer details? (Political actors?) And what really did
inspire the CI investigation?
7. As for whether to believe line that FBI operated soberly/carefully/judiciously in 2016, a main source for this judgment
is, um . . .uh . . . Sally Yates. Who was in middle of it all. A bit like asking Putin to reassure that Russia didn't meddle in
our election.
8. On that, if u r wondering who narrated this story, note paragraphs that assure everybody that hardly anybody in DOJ knew
about probe. Oh, and Comey also was given few details. Nobody knew nothin'! (Cuz when u require whole story saying u behaved,
it means u know you didn't.)
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes appeared on "Fox & Friends" Tuesday, where he provided a potentially explosive
hint at what's driving his demand to see documents related to the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Trump-Russia probe. "If the campaign
was somehow set up," he told the hosts, "I think that would be a problem."
Or an understatement. Mr. Nunes is still getting stiff-armed by the Justice Department over his subpoena, but this week his efforts
did force the stunning admission that the FBI had indeed spied on the Trump campaign. This came in the form of a Thursday New York
Times apologia in which government "officials" acknowledged that the bureau had used "at least one" human "informant" to spy
on both Carter Page and George Papadopoulos. The Times slipped this mind-bending fact into the middle of an otherwise glowing
profile of the noble bureau -- and dismissed it as no big deal.
But there's more to be revealed here, and Mr. Nunes's "set up" comment points in a certain direction. Getting to the conclusion
requires thinking more broadly about events beyond the FBI's actions.
Think of the 2016 Trump-Russia narrative as two parallel strands -- one politics, one law enforcement. The political side
involves the actions of Fusion GPS, the Hillary Clinton campaign and Obama officials -- all of whom were focused on destroying Donald
Trump. The law-enforcement strand involves the FBI -- and what methods and evidence it used in its Trump investigation. At some point
these strands intersected -- and one crucial question is how early that happened.
What may well have kicked off both, however, is a key if overlooked moment detailed in the House Intelligence Committee's recent
Russia report .
In "late spring" of 2016, then-FBI Director James Comey briefed White House "National Security Council Principals" that the FBI
had counterintelligence concerns about the Trump campaign. Carter Page was announced as a campaign adviser on March 21, and Paul
Manafort joined the campaign March 29. The briefing likely referenced both men, since both had previously been on the radar of law
enforcement. But here's what matters: With this briefing, Mr. Comey officially notified senior political operators on Team Obama
that the bureau had eyes on Donald Trump and Russia. Imagine what might be done in these partisan times with such explosive information.
And what do you know? Sometime in April, the law firm Perkins Coie (on behalf the Clinton campaign) hired Fusion GPS, and Fusion
turned its attention to Trump-Russia connections. The job of any good swamp operator is to gin up a fatal October surprise for the
opposition candidate. And what could be more devastating than to paint a picture of Trump-Russia collusion that would provoke a full-fledged
FBI investigation?
We already know of at least one way Fusion went about that project, with wild success. It hired former British spy Christopher
Steele to compile that infamous dossier. In July, Mr. Steele wrote a memo that leveled spectacular conspiracy theories against two
particular Trump campaign members -- Messrs. Manafort and Page. For an FBI that already had suspicions about the duo, those allegations
might prove huge -- right? That is, if the FBI were to ever see them. Though, lucky for Mrs. Clinton, July is when the Fusion team
decided it was a matter of urgent national security for Mr. Steele to play off his credentials and to take this political opposition
research to the FBI.
The question Mr. Nunes's committee seems to be investigating is what other moments -- if any -- were engineered in the spring,
summer or fall of 2016 to cast suspicion on Team Trump. The conservative press has produced some intriguing stories about a handful
of odd invitations and meetings that were arranged for Messrs. Page and Papadopoulos starting in the spring -- all emanating from
the United Kingdom. On one hand, that country is home to the well-connected Mr. Steele, which could mean the political actors with
whom he was working were involved. On the other hand, the Justice Department has admitted it was spying on both men, which could
mean government was involved. Or maybe . . . both.
Which brings us to timing. It's long been known that Mr. Steele went to the FBI in early July to talk about the dossier, and
that's the first known intersection of the strands. But given the oddity and timing of those U.K. interactions concerning Messrs.
Page and Papadopoulos, and given the history of some of the people involved in arranging them, some wonder if the two strands were
converging earlier than anyone has admitted. The Intelligence Committee subpoena is designed to sort all this out: Who was pulling
the strings, and what was the goal? Information? Or entrapment?
Whatever the answer-whether it is straightforward, or whether it involves political chicanery-Congress and the public have
a right to know. And a Justice Department willing to leak details of its "top secret" source to friendly media can have no excuse
for not sharing with the duly elected members of Congress.
Thanks for stopping by, Bob. Before you ask me your questions I need you to answer a few of mine:
You have had a full year to investigate the allegations that my campaign colluded with the Russian government to meddle
in our election. Has anyone obstructed you from doing this job to the best of your ability? If so, who have you notified of this
and what corrective action have you taken or requested be taken?
Have you found any evidence that I personally committed any crime involving collusion with the Russians to interfere with
the election?
Have you found any evidence that any member of my campaign committed any crime involving collusion with the Russians to
interfere with the election?
Assuming the answers to all 3 are "No" (which they likely are or such evidence would have already leaked to CNN via Clapper)
or if he refuses to answer, inform Muller the meeting and his investigation are over. He is will be escorted to his office to
turn over all records gathered in the investigation to the appropriate DOJ officials, debrief them on his findings and then is
fired and all security clearances revoked.
Let the MSM and Dems bitch and cry all they want. You had a year to find evidence for your phony allegations with your top
investigator on the job, access to millions of documents and millions of taxpayer dollars. You failed because there was no crime
committed. Time to move on.
Of course this is assuming the Mueller investigation is actually what it is purported to be which I have serious doubts about.
I think it's more likely Mueller cut an immunity deal for himself when he met with Trump the day before being appointed as SC
and this whole thing was nothing but a charade to keep Trump's enemies believing Mueller is their guy. This way they put all their
attention and energy into this investigation only to have it blow up in their faces just before the midterms when Trump is fully
vindicated by the guy all his enemies said was above reproach. If that happens watch how fast they all turn on Mueller and every
MSM outlet starts running hit pieces on him the next morning.
Mollie Hemingway's piece on a similar vein in The Federalist. Cunts leak like a sieve to their collusional media scum, but
woe-betied Congress getting access. Fuckers should be hanging from lamposts.
"... House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes appeared on "Fox & Friends" Tuesday, where he provided a potentially explosive hint at what's driving his demand to see documents related to the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Trump-Russia probe. "If the campaign was somehow set up," he told the hosts, "I think that would be a problem." ..."
"... government "officials" acknowledged that the bureau had used "at least one" human "informant" to spy on both Carter Page and George Papadopoulos. ..."
"... Think of the 2016 Trump-Russia narrative as two parallel strands -- one politics, one law enforcement. The political side involves the actions of Fusion GPS, the Hillary Clinton campaign and Obama officials -- all of whom were focused on destroying Donald Trump. The law-enforcement strand involves the FBI -- and what methods and evidence it used in its Trump investigation. At some point these strands intersected -- and one crucial question is how early that happened. ..."
"... Which brings us to timing. It's long been known that Mr. Steele went to the FBI in early July to talk about the dossier, and that's the first known intersection of the strands. But given the oddity and timing of those U.K. interactions concerning Messrs. Page and Papadopoulos, and given the history of some of the people involved in arranging them, some wonder if the two strands were converging earlier than anyone has admitted. The Intelligence Committee subpoena is designed to sort all this out: Who was pulling the strings, and what was the goal? Information? Or entrapment? ..."
"... Whatever the answer-whether it is straightforward, or whether it involves political chicanery-Congress and the public have a right to know. And a Justice Department willing to leak details of its "top secret" source to friendly media can have no excuse for not sharing with the duly elected members of Congress. ..."
"... Thanks for stopping by, Bob. Before you ask me your questions I need you to answer a few of mine: ..."
"... You have had a full year to investigate the allegations that my campaign colluded with the Russian government to meddle in our election. Has anyone obstructed you from doing this job to the best of your ability? If so, who have you notified of this and what corrective action have you taken or requested be taken? ..."
"... Have you found any evidence that I personally committed any crime involving collusion with the Russians to interfere with the election? ..."
"... Have you found any evidence that any member of my campaign committed any crime involving collusion with the Russians to interfere with the election? ..."
Earlier in the week, with Trump now calling out the debacle as
"possible bigger than Watergate," Strassel tweet-stormed some key points that everyone -
leftist and right - should consider ... (that's wishful thinking)...
1. So a few important points on that new NYT "Hurricane Crossfire" piece. A story that,
BTW, all of us following this knew had to be coming. This is DOJ/FBI leakers' attempt to get
in front of the facts Nunes is forcing out, to make it not sound so bad. Don't buy it. It's
bad.
2. Biggest takeaway: Govt "sources" admit that, indeed, the Obama DOJ and FBI spied on the
Trump campaign. Spied . (Tho NYT kindly calls spy an "informant.") NYT slips in confirmation
far down in story, and makes it out like it isn't a big deal. It is a very big deal.
3. In self-serving desire to get a sympathetic story about its actions, DOJ/FBI leakers
are willing to provide yet more details about that "top secret" source (namely, that spying
was aimed at Page/Papadopoulos) -- making all more likely/certain source will be outed.
That's on them
4. DOJ/FBI (and its leakers) have shredded what little credibility they have in claiming
they cannot comply with subpoena . They are willing to provide details to friendly media, but
not Congress? Willing to risk very source they claim to need to protect?
5. Back in Dec., NYT assured us it was the Papadopoulos-Downer convo that inspired FBI to
launch official counterintelligence operation on July 31, 2016. Which was convenient, since
it diminished the role of the dossier. However . . .
6. Now NYT tells us FBI didn't debrief Downer until August 2nd. And Nunes says no
"official intelligence" from allies was delivered to FBI about that convo prior to July 31.
So how did FBI get Downer details? (Political actors?) And what really did inspire the CI
investigation?
7. As for whether to believe line that FBI operated soberly/carefully/judiciously in 2016,
a main source for this judgment is, um . . .uh . . . Sally Yates. Who was in middle of it
all. A bit like asking Putin to reassure that Russia didn't meddle in our election.
8. On that, if u r wondering who narrated this story, note paragraphs that assure
everybody that hardly anybody in DOJ knew about probe. Oh, and Comey also was given few
details. Nobody knew nothin'! (Cuz when u require whole story saying u behaved, it means u
know you didn't.)
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes appeared on "Fox & Friends" Tuesday,
where he provided a potentially explosive hint at what's driving his demand to see documents
related to the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Trump-Russia probe. "If the campaign was
somehow set up," he told the hosts, "I think that would be a problem."
Or an understatement.
Mr. Nunes is still getting stiff-armed by the Justice Department over his subpoena, but this
week his efforts did force the stunning admission that the FBI had indeed spied on the Trump
campaign. This came in the form of a Thursday New York Times apologia in which government
"officials" acknowledged that the bureau had used "at least one" human "informant" to spy on
both Carter Page and George Papadopoulos. The Times slipped this mind-bending fact into the
middle of an otherwise glowing profile of the noble bureau -- and dismissed it as no big deal.
But there's more to be revealed here, and Mr. Nunes's "set up" comment points in a certain
direction. Getting to the conclusion requires thinking more broadly about events beyond the
FBI's actions.
Think of the 2016 Trump-Russia narrative as two parallel strands -- one politics, one law
enforcement. The political side involves the actions of Fusion GPS, the Hillary Clinton
campaign and Obama officials -- all of whom were focused on destroying Donald Trump. The
law-enforcement strand involves the FBI -- and what methods and evidence it used in its Trump
investigation. At some point these strands intersected -- and one crucial question is how early
that happened.
What may well have kicked off both, however, is a key if overlooked moment detailed in the
House Intelligence Committee's recent Russia report .
In "late spring" of 2016, then-FBI Director James Comey briefed White House "National
Security Council Principals" that the FBI had counterintelligence concerns about the Trump
campaign. Carter Page was announced as a campaign adviser on March 21, and Paul Manafort joined
the campaign March 29. The briefing likely referenced both men, since both had previously been
on the radar of law enforcement. But here's what matters: With this briefing, Mr. Comey
officially notified senior political operators on Team Obama that the bureau had eyes on Donald
Trump and Russia. Imagine what might be done in these partisan times with such explosive
information.
And what do you know? Sometime in April, the law firm Perkins Coie (on behalf the Clinton
campaign) hired Fusion GPS, and Fusion turned its attention to Trump-Russia connections. The
job of any good swamp operator is to gin up a fatal October surprise for the opposition
candidate. And what could be more devastating than to paint a picture of Trump-Russia collusion
that would provoke a full-fledged FBI investigation?
We already know of at least one way Fusion went about that project, with wild success. It
hired former British spy Christopher Steele to compile that infamous dossier. In July, Mr.
Steele wrote a memo that leveled spectacular conspiracy theories against two particular Trump
campaign members -- Messrs. Manafort and Page. For an FBI that already had suspicions about the
duo, those allegations might prove huge -- right? That is, if the FBI were to ever see them.
Though, lucky for Mrs. Clinton, July is when the Fusion team decided it was a matter of urgent
national security for Mr. Steele to play off his credentials and to take this political
opposition research to the FBI.
The question Mr. Nunes's committee seems to be investigating is what other moments -- if any
-- were engineered in the spring, summer or fall of 2016 to cast suspicion on Team Trump. The
conservative press has produced some intriguing stories about a handful of odd invitations and
meetings that were arranged for Messrs. Page and Papadopoulos starting in the spring -- all
emanating from the United Kingdom. On one hand, that country is home to the well-connected Mr.
Steele, which could mean the political actors with whom he was working were involved. On the
other hand, the Justice Department has admitted it was spying on both men, which could mean
government was involved. Or maybe . . . both.
Which brings us to timing. It's long been known that Mr. Steele went to the FBI in early
July to talk about the dossier, and that's the first known intersection of the strands. But
given the oddity and timing of those U.K. interactions concerning Messrs. Page and
Papadopoulos, and given the history of some of the people involved in arranging them, some
wonder if the two strands were converging earlier than anyone has admitted. The Intelligence
Committee subpoena is designed to sort all this out: Who was pulling the strings, and what was
the goal? Information? Or entrapment?
Whatever the answer-whether it is straightforward, or whether it involves political chicanery-Congress and the public
have a right to know. And a Justice Department willing to leak details of its "top secret" source to friendly media can have no
excuse for not sharing with the duly elected members of Congress.
Thanks for stopping by, Bob. Before you ask me your questions I need
you to answer a few of mine:
You have had a full year to investigate the allegations that my
campaign colluded with the Russian government to meddle in our election.
Has anyone obstructed you from doing this job to the best of your
ability? If so, who have you notified of this and what corrective action
have you taken or requested be taken?
Have you found any evidence that I personally committed any crime
involving collusion with the Russians to interfere with the election?
Have you found any evidence that any member of my campaign
committed any crime involving collusion with the Russians to interfere
with the election?
Assuming the answers to all 3 are "No" (which they likely are or such
evidence would have already leaked to CNN via Clapper) or if he refuses to
answer, inform Muller the meeting and his investigation are over. He is
will be escorted to his office to turn over all records gathered in the
investigation to the appropriate DOJ officials, debrief them on his
findings and then is fired and all security clearances revoked.
Let the MSM and Dems bitch and cry all they want. You had a year to
find evidence for your phony allegations with your top investigator on the
job, access to millions of documents and millions of taxpayer dollars.
You failed because there was no crime committed. Time to move on.
Of course this is assuming the Mueller investigation is actually what
it is purported to be which I have serious doubts about. I think it's
more likely Mueller cut an immunity deal for himself when he met with
Trump the day before being appointed as SC and this whole thing was
nothing but a charade to keep Trump's enemies believing Mueller is their
guy. This way they put all their attention and energy into this
investigation only to have it blow up in their faces just before the
midterms when Trump is fully vindicated by the guy all his enemies said
was above reproach. If that happens watch how fast they all turn on
Mueller and every MSM outlet starts running hit pieces on him the next
morning.
The First Rule
bowie28
Permalink
"... On July 27, 2017 the House Judiciary Committee called on the DOJ to appoint a Special Counsel, detailing their concerns in 14 questions pertaining to "actions taken by previously public figures like Attorney General Loretta Lynch, FBI Director James Comey, and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton." ..."
"... On September 26, 2017 , The House Judiciary Committee repeated their call to the DOJ for a special counsel, pointing out that former FBI Director James Comey lied to Congress when he said that he decided not to recommend criminal charges against Hillary Clinton until after she was interviewed, when in fact Comey had drafted her exoneration before said interview. ..."
"... And now, the OIG report can tie all of this together - as it will solidify requests by Congressional committees, while also satisfying a legal requirement for the Department of Justice to impartially appoint a Special Counsel. ..."
"... Who cares how many task forces, special prosecutors, grand juries, commissions, or other crap they throw at this black hole of corruption? We all know the score. The best we can hope for is that the liberals and neo-cons are embarrassed enough to crawl under a rock for awhile, and it slows down implementation of their Orwellian agenda for a few years. ..."
As we reported on
Thursday , a long-awaited report by the Department of Justice's internal watchdog into the Hillary Clinton email investigation
has moved into its final phase, as the DOJ notified multiple subjects mentioned in the document that they can privately review it
by week's end, and will have a "few days" to craft any response to criticism contained within the report, according to the
Wall Street Journal .
Those invited to review the report were told they would have to sign nondisclosure agreements in order to read it , people
familiar with the matter said. They are expected to have a few days to craft a response to any criticism in the report, which
will then be incorporated in the final version to be released in coming weeks . -
WSJ
Now, journalist Paul Sperry reports that " IG Horowitz has found "reasonable grounds" for believing there has been a violation
of federal criminal law in the FBI/DOJ's handling of the Clinton investigation/s and has referred his findings of potential criminal
misconduct to Huber for possible criminal prosecution ."
Who is Huber?
As we
reported
in March , Attorney General Jeff Sessions appointed John Huber - Utah's top federal prosecutor, to be paired with IG Horowitz
to investigate the multitude of accusations of FBI misconduct surrounding the 2016 U.S. presidential election. The announcement came
one day after Inspector General Michael Horowitz confirmed that he will also be investigating allegations of FBI FISA abuse .
While Huber's appointment fell short of the second special counsel demanded by Congressional investigators and concerned citizens
alike, his appointment and subsequent pairing with Horowitz is notable - as many have pointed out that the Inspector General is significantly
limited in his abilities to investigate. Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) noted in March " the IG's office does not have authority to compel
witness interviews, including from past employees, so its investigation will be limited in scope in comparison to a Special Counsel
investigation ,"
Sessions' pairing of Horowitz with Huber keeps the investigation under the DOJ's roof and out of the hands of an independent investigator
.
***
Who is Horowitz?
In January, we profiled Michael Horowitz based on thorough research assembled by independent investigators. For those who think
the upcoming OIG report is just going to be "all part of the show" - take pause; there's a good chance this is an actual happening,
so you may want to read up on the man whose year-long investigation may lead to criminal charges against those involved.
Horowitz was appointed head of the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) in April, 2012 - after the Obama administration hobbled
the OIG's investigative powers in 2011 during the "Fast and Furious" scandal. The changes forced the various Inspectors General for
all government agencies to request information while conducting investigations, as opposed to the authority to demand it. This allowed
Holder (and other agency heads) to bog down OIG requests in bureaucratic red tape, and in some cases, deny them outright.
What did Horowitz do? As one twitter commentators puts it,
he went to war ...
In March of 2015, Horowitz's office
prepared
a report for Congress titled Open and Unimplemented IG Recommendations . It laid the Obama Admin bare before Congress - illustrating
among other things how the administration was wasting tens-of-billions of dollars by ignoring the recommendations made by the OIG.
After several attempts by congress to restore the OIG's investigative powers, Rep. Jason Chaffetz successfully introduced H.R.6450
- the Inspector General Empowerment Act of 2016 - signed by a defeated lame duck President Obama into law on
December 16th, 2016 , cementing an alliance between Horrowitz and both houses of Congress .
1) Due to the Inspector General Empowerment Act of 2016, the OIG has access to all of the information that the target agency
possesses. This not only includes their internal documentation and data, but also that which the agency externally collected and
documented.
See here for a complete overview of the
OIG's new and restored powers. And while the public won't get to see classified details of the OIG report, Mr. Horowitz is also big
on public disclosure:
Horowitz's efforts to roll back Eric Holder's restrictions on the OIG sealed the working relationship between Congress and the
Inspector General's ofice, and they most certainly appear to be on the same page. Moreover, FBI Director Christopher Wray seems to
be on the same page
Which brings us back to the OIG report
expected by Congress a week from Monday.
On January 12 of last year, Inspector Horowitz announced an OIG investigation based on " requests from numerous Chairmen and Ranking
Members of Congressional oversight committees, various organizations (such as Judicial Watch?), and members of the public ."
The initial focus ranged from the FBI's handling of the Clinton email investigation, to whether or not Deputy FBI Director Andrew
McCabe should have been recused from the investigation (ostensibly over
$700,000 his wife's campaign took from Clinton crony Terry McAuliffe around the time of the email investigation), to potential
collusion with the Clinton campaign and the timing of various FOIA releases. Which brings us back to the
OIG report expected by Congress a week from
Monday.
On July 27, 2017 the House Judiciary Committee called on the DOJ to appoint a Special Counsel, detailing their concerns in
14 questions pertaining to "actions taken by previously public figures like Attorney General Loretta Lynch, FBI Director James Comey,
and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton."
The questions range from Loretta Lynch directing Mr. Comey to mislead the American people on the nature of the Clinton investigation,
Secretary Clinton's mishandling of classified information and the (mis)handling of her email investigation by the FBI, the DOJ's
failure to empanel a grand jury to investigate Clinton, and questions about the Clinton Foundation, Uranium One, and whether the
FBI relied on the "Trump-Russia" dossier created by Fusion GPS.
On September 26, 2017 , The House Judiciary Committee repeated their call to the DOJ for a special counsel, pointing out that
former FBI Director James Comey lied to Congress when he said that he decided not to recommend criminal charges against Hillary Clinton
until after she was interviewed, when in fact Comey had drafted her exoneration before said interview.
And now, the OIG report can tie all of this together - as it will solidify requests by Congressional committees, while also
satisfying a legal requirement for the Department of Justice to impartially appoint a Special Counsel.
As illustrated below by TrumpSoldier , the report will go from the Office of the Inspector General to both investigative committees
of Congress, along with Attorney General Jeff Sessions, and is expected within weeks .
Once congress has reviewed the OIG report, the House and Senate Judiciary Committees will use it to supplement their investigations
, which will result in hearings with the end goal of requesting or demanding a Special Counsel investigation. The DOJ can appoint
a Special Counsel at any point, or wait for Congress to demand one. If a request for a Special Counsel is ignored, Congress can pass
legislation to force an the appointment.
And while the DOJ could act on the OIG report and investigate / prosecute themselves without a Special Counsel, it is highly unlikely
that Congress would stand for that given the subjects of the investigation.
After the report's completion, the DOJ will weigh in on it. Their comments are key. As TrumpSoldier points out in his analysis,
the DOJ can take various actions regarding " Policy, personnel, procedures, and re-opening of investigations. In short, just about
everything (Immunity agreements can also be rescinded). "
Meanwhile, recent events appear to correspond with bullet points in both the original OIG investigation letter and the 7/27/2017
letter forwarded to the Inspector General:
... ... ...
With the wheels set in motion last week seemingly align with Congressional requests and the OIG mandate, and the upcoming OIG
report likely to serve as a foundational opinion, the DOJ will finally be empowered to move forward with an impartially appointed
Special Counsel.
"To save his presidency, Trump must expose a host of criminally cunning Deep State political operatives as enemies to the Constitution,
including John Brennan, Eric Holder, Loretta Lynch, James Comey and Robert Mueller - as well as Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton."
Killing the Deep State , Dr Jerome Corsi, PhD., p xi
I've been more than upfront about my philosophy. I have said on more than one occasion that progs will rue the day they drove
a New Yorker like Trump even further to the right.
Now you see it in his actions from the judiciary to bureaucracy destruction to (pick any) and...as I often cite... some old
dead white guy once said ..."First they came for the ___ and I did not speak out. Then they came for..."
Now I advocate for progs to swim in their own deadly juices, without a moment's hesitation on my part, without any furtive
look back, without remorse or any compassion whatsover.
Forward! ...I think is what they said, welcome to the Death Star ;-)
There have been (and are) plenty on "our side"...Boehner, Cantor, McCain, Romney and the thinly disguised "social democrat"
Bill Kristol just to name several off the top of my head but the thing is, they always have to hide what they really are from
us until rooted out.
That's what I try to point out to "our friends" on the left all the time, for example, there was never any doubt that Chris
Dodd, Bwaney Fwank and Chuck Schumer were (and are) in Wall Streets back pocket. But for any prog to openly admit that is to sign
some sort of personal death warrant, to be ostracized, blacklisted and harassed out of "the liberal community" so, they bite their
tongue & say nothing...knowing what the truth really is.
Hell, they even named a "financial reform bill" after Dodd & Frank...LMAO!!!
It's just the dripping hypocrisy that gets me.
For another example, they knew what was going on with Weinstein, Lauer, Spacey, Rose etal but as long as the cash flowed and
they towed-the-prog-BS-line outwardly, they gladly looked the other way and in the end...The Oprah...gives a speech in front of
them (as they bark & clap like trained seals) about...Jim Crow?
Jim Crow?!...lol...one has nothing to do with the other Oprah! The perps & enablers are sitting right there in front of you!
"After the report's completion, the DOJ will weigh in on it. Their comments are key. As TrumpSoldier points out in his analysis,
the DOJ can take various actions regarding " Policy, personnel, procedures, and re-opening of investigations. In short, just about
everything (Immunity agreements can also be rescinded). "
Rescind Immunity, absolutely damn right, put them ALL under oath and on the stand! This is huge! Indeed this goes all the way
to the top, would like to see Obama and the 'career criminal' testify under oath explaining how their tribe conspired to frame
Trump and the American people.
Hell, put them on trial in a military court for Treason, what's the punishment for Treason these days???
Also would like to see Kerry get fried under the 'Logan Act'!
As are half of their fellow travelers in the GOP. Neocon liars. Talk small constitutional govt then vote for war. Those two
are direct opposites, war and small govt. The liars must be exposed and removed. The Never Trumpers have outed themselves but
many are hiding in plain sight proclaiming they support the President. It appears they have manipulated Trump into an aggressive
stance against Russia with their anti Russia hysteria. Time will tell. The bank and armament industries must be removed from any
kind of influence within our govt. Most of these are run by big govt collectivists aka communists/globalists.
Who cares how many task forces, special prosecutors, grand juries, commissions, or other crap they throw at this black
hole of corruption? We all know the score. The best we can hope for is that the liberals and neo-cons are embarrassed enough to
crawl under a rock for awhile, and it slows down implementation of their Orwellian agenda for a few years.
"... In my opinion the key points are: - Obama spied on Trump and many other Senator's Congressmen, Judges, and the press without warrants they only did Trump warrants well after they started spying. ..."
"... This was to cover their a$$ because they had no warrants when the spying started. ..."
"... Obama spied using our allies (GCHQ) 5 eyes etc. and DOJ, IRS, FBI, CIA, Treasury and all the Alphabet Obamagate will be 10,000 x worse than Watergate, ..."
"... They're covering up an attempted coup. ..."
"... essions (via his absurd recusal) and Rosenstein allowed the Statute of Limitations to run out against Clapper without filing a perjury charge. ..."
"... It's a bit ironic that Comey has been the focus of so much ire from the Trump people. Brennan and Clapper, not Comey, were the Obama political hacks who were pushing the Russian collusion angle. ..."
"... They forced the FBI to open a Trump/Russia investigation, even though Strzok and Comey were skeptical that any real evidence existed. ..."
"... It's hard to believe that Clapper and Brennan (and Lynch, Yates, and Ohr from DoJ) cooked-up the scheme without the approval/direction of Obama. In fact, the sheer political evil genius of the Trump/Russia collusion plot, including how it "explained" the DNC hack, reeks of the only person capable of inventing it: that 'ol silver fox himself, Bill Clinton. ..."
"... I think it is Comey's sanctimonious self-righteousness that brings that reaction. It always does. No matter who the parties are or what event it is. Even though their crimes are greater, it is easier to tolerate the obviously slimy swamp critters like Clapper and Brennan than it is the pious hypocrite like Comey. ..."
"... The DNC was caught in the act of rigging the Primaries. Fact. ..."
"... And someone inside hacked their computers for all those emails, too. That's why they didn't turn over their computers to the F.B.I. because it would bear that out. ..."
"... Brennan and Clapper may have been the puppetmasters, with Comey, McCabe, Stzrok, Page, Ohr and Yates dancing to their tune, but Rogers didn't play nice and they didn't even invite the Defense Intelligence Agency to play. ..."
"... Rogers is a white hat in a sea of black hats who tried to fire him for being a patriot. Rogers is a true American hero, without whom the extent of this coup and treasonous plot may never have been fully uncovered. The big ugly awaits the traitors and hopefully, the great awakening begins. ..."
"... I believe the name you're looking for is "Seth Rich." ..."
"... Aside from the obvious crimes of espionage and certainly extortion and fraud, why was Imran Awan trying to flee the country just after Seth Rich's assassination? Was Rich spilling the beans about Debbie Schultz's Pakistani mole and not just the Hillary scam? ..."
"... Brennan and Clapper are dirty as can be. They are both corrupt deep state agents, and should go to prison for their lies and corruption. Adm. Rogers looks like the only straight-shooter in the bunch. ..."
"... There are 2 sets of Laws in America. One for the elite, power political people and one for the Joe Sixpacks ..."
"... Former FBI Director James Comey has a long history of involvement in Department of Justice actions that arguably ended up favorable to the Clintons. ..."
"... FBI has had its ups and downs, certainly, but usually it found those low times due to some mishap or bad policy decisions based on matters of process by its upper management. But despite some of the worst 1970s conspiracy theories, rarely has the FBI been considered a bald-faced political actor until Director James Comey tarnished the shield by becoming a member of the Hillary Clinton's election campaign. ..."
"... If these yokels better knew history, they would better understand the dangers of fomenting revolution. ..."
Former CIA Director John Brennan's insistence that the salacious and unverified Steele
dossier was not part of the official Intelligence Community Assessment on Russian interference in the 2016 election is being
contradicted by two top former officials.
Recently retired National Security Agency Director Michael Rogers stated in a classified letter to Congress that the Clinton campaign-funded
memos did factor into the ICA . And James Clapper,
Director of National Intelligence under President Obama, conceded in a recent CNN interview that the assessment was based on "some
of the substantive content of the dossier." Without elaborating, he maintained that "we were able to corroborate" certain allegations.
In a March 5, 2018, letter to House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, Adm. Rogers informed the committee that a two-page
summary of the dossier -- described as "the Christopher Steele information" -- was "added" as an "appendix to the ICA draft," and
that consideration of that appendix was "part of the overall ICA review/approval process."
His skepticism of the dossier may explain why the NSA parted company with other intelligence agencies and cast doubt on one of
its crucial conclusions: that Vladimir Putin personally ordered a cyberattack on Hillary Clinton's campaign to help Donald Trump
win the White House.
Rogers
has testified that while he was sure the Russians wanted to hurt Clinton, he wasn't as confident as CIA and FBI officials that
their actions were designed to help Trump, explaining that such as assessment "didn't have the same level of sourcing and the same
level of multiple sources."
Here and in photo at top, from left, the National Security Agency Director, Adm. Michael Rogers; FBI Director James Comey; Director
of National Intelligence James Clapper; CIA Director John Brennan; and the Defense Intelligence Agency Director, Lt. Gen. Vincent
Stewart, testifying before the
The dossier, which is made up of 16 opposition research-style memos on Trump underwritten by the Democratic National Committee
and Clinton's own campaign, is based mostly on uncorroborated third-hand sources. Still, the ICA has been viewed by much of the Washington
establishment as the unimpeachable consensus of the U.S. intelligence community. Its conclusions that "Vladimir Putin ordered" the
hacking and leaking of Clinton campaign emails "to help Trump's chances of victory" have driven the "Russia collusion" narrative
and subsequent investigations besieging the Trump presidency.
Except that the ICA did not reflect the consensus of the intelligence community. Clapper broke with tradition and decided not
to put the assessment out to all 17 U.S. intelligence agencies for review. Instead, he limited input to a couple dozen chosen analysts
from just three agencies -- the CIA, NSA and FBI. Agencies with relevant expertise on Russia, such as the Department of Homeland
Security, Defense Intelligence Agency and the State Department's intelligence bureau, were excluded from the process.
While faulting Clapper for not following intelligence community tradecraft standards that
Clapper himself ordered
in 2015, the House Intelligence Committee's
250-page report
also found that the ICA did not properly describe the "quality and credibility of underlying sources" and was not "independent of
political considerations."
In another departure from custom, the report is missing any dissenting views or an annex with evaluations of the conclusions from
outside reviewers. "Traditionally, controversial intelligence community assessments like this include dissenting views and the views
of an outside review group," said Fred Fleitz, who worked as a CIA analyst for 19 years and helped draft national intelligence estimates
at Langley. "It also should have been thoroughly vetted with all relevant IC agencies," he added. "Why were DHS and DIA excluded?"
Fleitz suggests that the Obama administration limited the number of players involved in the analysis to skew the results. He believes
the process was "manipulated" to reach a "predetermined political conclusion" that the incoming Republican president was compromised
by the Russians.
"I've never viewed the ICA as credible," the CIA veteran added.
A source close to the House investigation said Brennan himself selected the CIA and FBI analysts who worked on the ICA, and that
they included former FBI counterespionage chief Peter Strzok.
"Strzok was the intermediary between Brennan and [former FBI Director James] Comey, and he was one of the authors of the ICA,"
according to the source.
Last year, Strzok was reassigned to another department and removed from Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation after anti-Trump
and pro-Clinton text messages he wrote to another investigator during the 2016 campaign were discovered by the Justice Department's
inspector general. Strzok remains under IG investigation, along with other senior FBI officials, for possible misconduct.
Strzok led the FBI's investigation of Trump campaign ties to Russia during 2016, including obtaining electronic surveillance warrants
on Carter Page and other campaign advisers. The Page warrant relied heavily on unverified allegations contained in the Democratic
Party-funded dossier.
Brennan has sworn the dossier was not "in any way" used as a basis for the ICA. He explains he heard snippets of the dossier from
the press in the summer of 2016, but insists he did not see it or read it for himself until late 2016. "Brennan's claims are impossible
to believe," Fleitz asserted.
"Brennan was pushing the Trump collusion line in mid-2016 and claimed to start the FBI collusion investigation in August 2016,"
he said. "It's impossible to believe Brennan was pushing for this investigation without having read the dossier."
He also pointed out that the key findings of the ICA match the central allegations in the dossier. The House Intelligence Committee
concluded that Brennan, who previously worked in the White House as Obama's deputy national security adviser, created a "fusion cell"
on Russian election interference made up of analysts from the CIA, FBI and NSA, who produced a series of related papers for the White
House during the 2016 campaign.
Less than a month after Trump won the election, Obama directed Brennan to conduct a review of all intelligence relating to Russian
involvement in the 2016 election and produce a single, comprehensive assessment. Obama was briefed on the findings, along with President-elect
Trump, in early January.
"Brennan put some of the dossier material into the PDB [presidential daily briefing] for Obama and described it as coming from
a 'credible source,' which is how they viewed Steele," said the source familiar with the House investigation. "But they never corroborated
his sources."
Attempts to reach Brennan for comment were unsuccessful. Several prominent Washington news outlets had access to the dossier during
the 2016 campaign -- or at least portions of it -- but also could not confirm Steele's allegations. So they shied away from covering
them. All that changed in early January 2017, after CNN and The Washington Post learned through Obama administration leaks that the
CIA had briefed the president and president-elect about them. Then the allegations became a media feeding frenzy. On Jan. 11, 2017,
within days of the dossier briefings and release of the declassified ICA report, BuzzFeed published virtually all of the dossier
memos on its website.
The House committee found "significant leaks" of classified information around the time of the ICA -- and "many of these leaks
were likely from senior officials within the IC." Its recently released report points to Clapper as the main source of leaks about
the presidential briefings involving the dossier. It also suggests that during his July 17, 2017, testimony behind closed doors in
executive session, he misled House investigators.
When first asked about leaks related to the ICA in July 2017, Clapper flatly denied "discuss[ing] the dossier or any other intelligence
related to Russia hacking of the 2016 election with journalists." But he subsequently acknowledged discussing the "dossier with CNN
journalist Jake Tapper," and admitted he might have spoken with other journalists about the same issue.
On Jan. 10, 2017, CNN published an
article by Tapper
and others about the dossier briefings sourced to "multiple U.S. officials with direct knowledge of the briefings." Tapper shared
a byline with lead writer Evan Perez, a close friend of the founders of Fusion GPS, which hired Steele as a subcontractor on the
dossier project.
The next day, Clapper expressed his "profound dismay at the leaks that have been appearing in the press," while stressing that
"I do not believe the leaks came from within the IC." A month after his misleading testimony to House investigators, Clapper joined
CNN as a "national security analyst."
Attempts to reach Clapper for comment were unsuccessful.
Tom JonesLeader 3d
My, My, My.....what a tangled web they weave. Interesting that both Rogers and Clapper indicated the dossier was part of the assessment
and Brennan does not. All while Obama was assuring the public that in no way could Russia impact our elections. With the recent
allegations of a plant in the Trump campaign organization and the continued reluctance of the DOJ to release documents, it's becoming
more evident by the day of significant irregularities that took place. Certainly, one would hope that only under the most severe
probabilities would a President allow his intelligence agencies to spy on an opponents campaign....but it's looking more and more
like it was an intended political operation rather than a national security issue. And if so, it's a direct threat to our democracy
and should be addressed with the full power and legal impact of our judicial system. If it was political, EVERYONE involved should
be prosecuted to the fullest extend of the law and they should spend significant time behind bars.
magic_worker 1d
In my opinion the key points are: - Obama spied on Trump and many other Senator's Congressmen, Judges, and the press without
warrants they only did Trump warrants well after they started spying.
This was to cover their a$$ because they had no warrants when the spying started. Did it start the second a billionaire
stepped on the escalator or before? - Obama spied using our allies (GCHQ) 5 eyes etc. and DOJ, IRS, FBI, CIA, Treasury and
all the Alphabet Obamagate will be 10,000 x worse than Watergate, Don't fall for the golly gee Obama knew nothing Schultz
defense. - Awan's were hired by Obama to run the DNC server, you really don't think Debbie hired them do you? ... See more
Rosa1984 Leader 3d
They're covering up an attempted coup. What we've witnessed the past 15 months is HORRIFIC, Deeply Disturbing, and a
Threat to the U.S. We CANNOT allow Democrats and Deep State to get away with this.
NoBS NoSpam Influencer 3d Edited
Did you know the President was in Nevada and Las Vegas during the Mandalay Assassination? Err, I mean the mass shooting by an
FBI informant, of course. We assume Trump is free to govern. Why? If the Deep State owns the FBI, CIA, NSA and the most powerful
weapon on Earth, the IRS. Martial Law of all Security clearance holders who are still alive "off" the books or not. Operative
word is "Ex" spooks and their active psychopath cousins in the Military Industrial Complex.
Peps Leader 3d
All of which means precisely nothing, because Sessions (via his absurd recusal) and Rosenstein allowed the Statute of Limitations
to run out against Clapper without filing a perjury charge. So, once again, if you are a high-ranking DC insider, you can
commit a felony for which any average citizen would be arrested, prosecuted and jailed, and do so with absolute, arrogant impunity,
regardless of which party is technically in charge of the Department of Justice.
KathyMcP 3d
What is the limitation period for a perjury charge???
carolinaswampfox Leader 3d
What is the limitations period for sedition, treason, conspiring to interfere with a presidential election, conspiring to overturn
the results of an American presidential election, obstruction of justice, illegal abuse of the FISA process, perjury in sworn
testimony and in the FISA process, etc.
Sam Hyde Leader 3d Edited
Mr. Clapper, did you leak any information on the briefings that took place with the President and President-elect? Clapper: Not
wittingly. How many times has this guy committed perjury and gotten away with it? lol
Carolinatarheel Leader 3d
Obama lowered the bar substantially for ethical standards and telling the truth! Our FBI is corrupt and dangerous! Mueller and
Comey are dirty cops! ...
chris_zzz Leader 3d
It's a bit ironic that Comey has been the focus of so much ire from the Trump people. Brennan and Clapper, not Comey, were
the Obama political hacks who were pushing the Russian collusion angle.
They forced the FBI to open a Trump/Russia investigation, even though Strzok and Comey were skeptical that any real evidence
existed. Congressional investigators as well as the relevant IGs need to look at whether Obama himself, as well as the White
House staff, engineered the Trump/Russia collusion hocus-pocus. It's hard to believe that Clapper and Brennan (and Lynch,
Yates, and Ohr from DoJ) cooked-up the scheme without the approval/direction of Obama. In fact, the sheer political evil genius
of the Trump/Russia collusion plot, including how it "explained" the DNC hack, reeks of the only person capable of inventing it:
that 'ol silver fox himself, Bill Clinton.
Greg Bed 2d
I think it is Comey's sanctimonious self-righteousness that brings that reaction. It always does. No matter who the parties
are or what event it is. Even though their crimes are greater, it is easier to tolerate the obviously slimy swamp critters like
Clapper and Brennan than it is the pious hypocrite like Comey.
GameTime68 Leader 3d
How much more of this are we going to have to read about before someone with authority begins investigating this entire sordid
mess? Until someone is indicated and charged with something, there is no incentive for the truth - just more media stories about
conflicting congressional testimony, colleague disagreements on the veracity of statements, and so forth. Those of us who sat
through Watergate were not naive enough to think it was a one-off. What is Sessions doing? Where is the special investigator for
Dossiergate?
NoBS NoSpam Influencer 3d
The DNC was caught in the act of rigging the Primaries. Fact. Do we really think they stopped at only the level of the
DNC Primaries? I wish to be that naive so my love for America was still alive and not dead like Seth Rich. The low lives could
not even cheat well, but not from lack of trying.
GameTime68 Leader span 3d
And someone inside hacked their computers for all those emails, too. That's why they didn't turn over their computers to the
F.B.I. because it would bear that out.
Old Paratrooper Contributor 3d
Brennan and Clapper may have been the puppetmasters, with Comey, McCabe, Stzrok, Page, Ohr and Yates dancing to their tune,
but Rogers didn't play nice and they didn't even invite the Defense Intelligence Agency to play. But I suspect the conspiracy
went to the White House. Didn't Page say that the President "wanted to know everything we do"? And I suspect that Susan Rice,
Valarie Jarrett and Ben Rhodes left fingerprints all over this crime.
chris_zzz Leader span oper 3d
The NSA director at the time, Adm. Rogers, reportedly visited Trump (without Clapper's authorization) during the transition to
inform Trump about the FBI's surveillance of his operation. The next day Trump tweeted that Obama was wiretapping Trump Tower.
carolinaswampfox Leader 3d
Rogers is a white hat in a sea of black hats who tried to fire him for being a patriot. Rogers is a true American hero, without
whom the extent of this coup and treasonous plot may never have been fully uncovered. The big ugly awaits the traitors and hopefully,
the great awakening begins.
carolinaswampfox Leader span oper 3d
--and BHO communicated with Hillary at her private email address. The computers were smashed and bleach bit and Comey and company
obstructed justice in whitewashing the Clinton investigation because all roads lead to BHO.
Right-Here; Right Now ! Influencer 3d
The cogent fact is that none of that matters since the entire premise is that the Russians hacked the emails.....the ENTIRE Russia
collusion theory collapses without the hacking of emails. And of course the Russians did not hack the DNC emails (time stamps
on the meta data PROVE that they were copied at speeds too fast for any internet hack) ....they were downloaded on site on to
a portable storage devise. We Know that the DNC denied law enforcement access to its server, (why would any "victim," of a crime
refuse to cooperate with investigators?) Even more remarkable, experts determined that the files released by Guccifer 2.0 have
been "run, via ordinary cut and paste, through a template that effectively immersed them in what could plausibly be cast as Russian
fingerprints." Brennan Clapper and Comey ALL testified to congress that the CIA...and many others.. had this capability to leave
"fingerprints" of whomever they wished to implicate. Moreover, for what it is worth, Julian Assange has repeatedly denied that
Russia "or any state actor" was the source of the stolen DNC data published by WikiLeaks...but rather a staffer who passed a portable
drive on the Mall in DC I think its safe to assume that the downloading was done by Imran Awan who we KNOW had access and we KNOW
downloaded material and we KNOW used unauthorized methods to access unauthorized areas of Congressional servers and TOTAL ...
See more
James Fitzpatrick Influencer span Right Now ! 3d Edited
I believe the name you're looking for is "Seth Rich." This is a case that requires a bull dog, not Droopy Dog. It's got
murder, blackmail, extortion, Deep State conspiracy, high treason, low-level corruption, perverted sex cults... c'mon! Why are
we still hearing about how a Senator met a Russian Ambassador at a meet-and-greet?! This is real drama!
NoBS NoSpam Influencer span atrick 3d
They are mocking Seth Rich as the Russian Hacker. They keep dragging this kids hard work through the mud!
JayTeigh Leader span Right Now ! 3d
I think you're right about Awan being the hacker. I now wonder if the somehow sold the emails to someone who sent them to Assange.
James Fitzpatrick Influencer 3d
Here are some things that need investigation:
Aside from the obvious crimes of espionage and certainly extortion and fraud, why was Imran Awan trying to flee the
country just after Seth Rich's assassination? Was Rich spilling the beans about Debbie Schultz's Pakistani mole and not just
the Hillary scam?
Russia expert Nellie Ohr was hired by FusionGPS during the launch of the Steele scam. But she was CIA. Was Fusion itself
a rogue CIA shell org? And nobody seems to get the connection to the CIA OpenSource hackers' toolbox that was leaked into the
wild, just as the "resist" people were expressing concern that THEY would lose access to these spying malware products and
could no longer spy on Trump. And who worked for the OpenSource project? Why, Nellie Ohr, of course. Funny.
pmidas span atrick 3d
Didn't Nellie state in some format that "i am going to be purchasing short-wave radios for our communications going forward"....?
James Fitzpatrick Influencer 3d
Yes. One of many attempts to dodge a trail for investigators, oversight and FOIA.
BorisBadinov Leader 3d
Brennan and Clapper are dirty as can be. They are both corrupt deep state agents, and should go to prison for their lies and
corruption. Adm. Rogers looks like the only straight-shooter in the bunch.
NoBS NoSpam Influencer span v 3d
General Flynn was the main crusader for our children's dignity. The son of a b*censured*ich is still fighting for them!
Grandmother of 7 Contributor 3d
May Brennan and all his cohorts, including Obama, rot from the inside out because I doubt anything we could punish them with would
be enough. They did more damage to the Republic than Osama bin Laden and his ilk ever could.
Mcgovern72 Leader 3d
The Clap-Man and Jimmy the B continue to be the best sources of intrigue on the whole collusion confusion, huh? Their legacy tarnished
by all the lies, they now get to spew it on 'fake news', further tarnishing the credibility of 'faux news'. Brilliant!!
Sam Hyde Leader span 3d Edited
DNI Clapper doing what DNI Clapper does best. I can see him rubbing his greasy egg head right now for not having his story straight.
dadling 3d
There are 2 sets of Laws in America. One for the elite, power political people and one for the Joe Sixpacks.....there
is NO Law in America...the people are still asleep and have yet to be roused. However, when they do wake up, pitchforks, tar &
feathers will be the order of the day for these criminals.
dawg1234 3d
Ouch! Quite a scathing article from Real Clear! Impressive! Brennan? Brennan? Calling Mister, John, Brennan! LOL, this is getting
fun!
cjones1 Leader 3d
The plot thickens!
leestauf4 Leader 2d
The democrats accuse Trump of colluding with the Russians to get elected, have ZERO proof of it after two years of trying to invent
it, and yet it is a proven fact that Hillary and the DNC, through the middlemen Fusion GPS and Steele, COLLUDED with and paid
high level Russian officials millions of dollars to produce the "salacious and completely unverified dossier" (Comey's words),
in an attempt to throw our election like they did in their own primary, and to then try to impeach a constitutionally elected
president with the same Russian supplied lies when that failed! So where was the actual collusion with the enemy? And why is Mueller
completely ignoring those facts?
jrc_mrc 2d
Former FBI Director James Comey has a long history of involvement in Department of Justice actions that arguably ended up
favorable to the Clintons. In 2001, following the original 9/11 mass murder by the Muslim jihadists, President Bush asked
the FBI to track the movements of likely Muslim jihadists; Comey and Mueller refused that request on the basis that such tracking
would be "un-American". The jihadist mass murders of Americans in Boston, Chattanooga, Orlando, Fort Hood, and San Bernardino
are therefore the direct result of that irresponsible refusal. In 2004 Comey, then serving as a deputy attorney general in the
Justice Department, apparently limited the scope of the criminal investigation of Sandy Berger, which left out former Clinton
administration officials who may have coordinated with Berger in his removal and destruction of classified records from the National
Archives. The documents were relevant to the accusations that the Clinton administration was negligent in the build-up to the
9/11 terrorist attack. Back a year or two ago, FBI director Comey announced that despite the evidence of "extreme negligence"
by Hillary Clinton and her top aides regarding the handling of classified information through her unprotected private email server,
the FBI would not refer criminal charges to Attorney General Loretta Lynch and the Justice Department since it was just a case
of innocent negligence.
jrc_mrc 2d
FBI has had its ups and downs, certainly, but usually it found those low times due to some mishap or bad policy decisions
based on matters of process by its upper management. But despite some of the worst 1970s conspiracy theories, rarely has the FBI
been considered a bald-faced political actor until Director James Comey tarnished the shield by becoming a member of the Hillary
Clinton's election campaign.
The FBI is no longer a legitimate or competent law enforcement agency. The FBI has become nothing more than a bunch of goons
for the DNC and the Democrat Party. The FBI should now be considered a domestic corrupt terrorist organization. Due to the FBI's
corruption and political affiliation with the Democrat Party, they should no longer have jurisdiction over a single American citizen.
Comey is now guilty of treason by default and association. He has violated his sworn oath and must be removed. "Yes – Hillary
Clinton is guilty but we will not recommend prosecution" – he declared to the congressional inquiry with a straight face. In other
words, and for all practical purposes our FBI had become the American KGB.
KenPittman 2d
Clapper, Brennan and Comey have al likely retained legal counsel as Nunes has brilliantly followed the trail methodically backwards
to the source. The Ohr couple, the intercepts of Strzok and the common denominators linking Stefan Halper are going to rock the
Deep State to its foundation. Thankfully there are enough patriots in Washington to continue to outflank the framing of the POTUS.
johnmike 2d
The butts of Brennan, Clapper, and Comey should be hauled before a Grand Jury by John Huber, the US Attorney, as stated by Joe
DiGenova. I believe all three are enemies of the US and the biggest threats to our constitutional republic. Brennan once voted
for a communist. All three are pathological liars...it's scary that these three scumbags held the highest and most critical intelligence
and law enforcement positions in the nation.
Ralph Lynch Contributor 1d
If these yokels better knew history, they would better understand the dangers of fomenting revolution.
In a March 5, 2018, letter to House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, Adm. Rogers
informed the committee that a two-page summary of the dossier -- described as "the Christopher
Steele information" -- was "added" as an "appendix to the ICA draft," and that consideration of
that appendix was "part of the overall ICA review/approval process."
A source close to the House investigation said Brennan himself selected the CIA and FBI
analysts who worked on the ICA, and that they included former FBI counterespionage chief Peter
Strzok.
"Strzok was the intermediary between Brennan and [former FBI Director James] Comey, and he
was one of the authors of the ICA," according to the source.
Clapper's Assessment Report was the third in series of reports – each building on the
other.
The first report, an assessment of Russian Intervention, was made in an October 7, 2016,
Joint Statement from the Department of Homeland Security and the Office of the Director of
National Intelligence noting the Intelligence Community was confident of Russian involvement in
our election.
Later testimony by our various Intelligence Directors confirmed that Russia is always
involved in Presidential elections.
This report was meant to directly tie Russian hacking to the election.
What the report actually did was use technical language to describe a generalized hacking
process – and the means by which hacking and phishing can be generally prevented.
I strongly encourage you to read the report. Its lack of actual detail is eye-opening.
3. John Brennan, James Clapper and Admiral Rogers stage-managed a paper in January, 2017
that asserted that the Intelligence Community believed various things about Russian government
tinkering with the US election (much as the US does in other countries' elections). The
paper was represented to be an IC wide opinion (like an NIE).
Clapper gave it his imprimatur as Director of National Intelligence but Admiral
Rogers at the National Security Agency could not get his people to express more than limited
confidence in the document. DIA, State Department INR, the Army, Navy, Air Force and other
agencies were either not consulted or did not deign to "sign on." Donald J Trump thinks this is
a "rum deal," a phony politically motivated procedure run by a group of "hacks". Why would he
not think that? The reaction of the Left is to excoriate him for his lack of "respect", for the
people who "cooked up" this document. We should remember that the people who "cooked" the
document have no legal or constitutional existence outside the framework of the Executive
Branch. Any president, in any circumstance could dismiss them all at will. No president is
under any obligation at all to accept their opinion or that of anyone in the Executive Branch
on anything. They are his advisers and subordinates, tools in his kit box, and that is all they
are.
"... In summer 2016, Brennan with his FBI liaison Strzok, along with help from Kerry @ State, were trying to set Russian espionage traps for minor players in the Trump campaign through cultivated intel assets ..."
"... You might find this article on mifsud of interest.. there are some earlier ones on that site too worth a read.. the gist of the articles are essentially mifsud is a british or cia intel asset, as opposed to how he is portrayed in the west.. ..."
@JulianAssange There is something very odd about the Joseph Mifsud story and the role of the UK in the 2016 US presidential election: (thread) 5:07 PM · Mar 22, 2018
DEVELOPING: A major new front is opening in the political espionage scandal. In summer 2016, Brennan with his FBI liaison Strzok,
along with help from Kerry @ State, were trying to set Russian espionage traps for minor players in the Trump campaign through cultivated intel assets
@96 wj... You might find
this article on mifsud of interest.. there are some earlier ones on that site too worth a read.. the gist of the articles
are essentially mifsud is a british or cia intel asset, as opposed to how he is portrayed in the west..
@99 / 100 a p.. thanks for your perspective and your many fine posts! i guess we can wait and see how it unfolds..
...President Barack Obama, who had run a quasi-antiwar liberal campaign for the White House, had embraced the assassination program
and had decreed, "the CIA gets what it wants." Intelligence budgets were maintaining the steep upward curve that had started in 2001,
and while all agencies were benefiting, none had done as well as the CIA At just under $15 billion, the agency's budget had climbed
by 56 percent just since 2004.
Decades earlier, Richard Helms, the CIA director for whom the event was named, would customarily
refer to the defense contractors who pressured him to spend his budget on their wares as "those bastards." Such disdain for commerce
in the world of spooks was now long gone, as demonstrated by the corporate sponsorship of the tables jammed into the Grand Ballroom
that evening. The executives, many of whom had passed through the revolving door from government service, were there to rub shoulders
with old friends and current partners. "It was totally garish," one attendee told me afterward. "It seemed like every arms manufacturer
in the country had taken a table. Everyone was doing business, right and left."
In the decade since 9/11, the CIA had been regularly blighted by scandal-revelations of torture, renditions, secret "black site"
prisons, bogus intelligence justifying the invasion of Iraq, ignored signs of the impending 9/11 attacks-but such unwholesome realities
found no echo in this comradely gathering. Even George Tenet, the CIA director who had presided over all of the aforementioned scandals,
was greeted with heartfelt affection by erstwhile colleagues as he, along with almost every other living former CIA director, stood
to be introduced by Master of Ceremonies John McLaughlin, a former deputy director himself deeply complicit in the Iraq fiasco. Each,
with the exception of Stansfield Turner (still bitterly resented for downsizing the agency post-Vietnam), received ringing applause,
but none more than the night's honoree, former CIA director and then-current secretary of defense Robert M. Gates.
Although Gates had left the CIA eighteen years before, he was very much the father figure of the institution and a mentor to the
intelligence chieftains, active and retired, who cheered him so fervently that night at the Ritz-Carlton. He had climbed through
the ranks of the national security bureaucracy with a ruthless determination all too evident to those around him. Ray McGovern, his
supervisor in his first agency post, as an analyst with the intelligence directorate's soviet foreign policy branch, recalls writing
in an efficiency report that the young man's "evident and all-consuming ambition is a disruptive influence in the branch." There
had come a brief check on his rise to power when his involvement in the Iran-Contra imbroglio cratered an initial attempt to win
confirmation as CIA director, but success came a few years later, in 1991, despite vehement protests from former colleagues over
his persistent willingness to sacrifice analytic objectivity to the political convenience of his masters.
Gates's successful 1991 confirmation as CIA chief owed much, so colleagues assessed, to diligent work behind the scenes on the
part of the Senate Intelligence Committee's staff director, George Tenet. In 1993, Tenet moved on to be director for intelligence
programs on the Clinton White House national security staff, in which capacity he came to know and esteem John Brennan, a midlevel
and hitherto undistinguished CIA analyst assigned to brief White House staffers. Tenet liked Brennan so much that when he himself
moved to the CIA as deputy director in 1995, he had the briefer appointed station chief in Riyadh, an important position normally
reserved for someone with actual operational experience. In this sensitive post Brennan worked tirelessly to avoid irritating his
Saudi hosts, showing reluctance, for example, to press them for Osama bin Laden's biographical details when asked to do so by the
bin Laden unit back at headquarters.
Brennan returned to Washington in 1999 under Tenet's patronage, initially as his chief of staff and then as CIA executive director,
and by 2003 he had transitioned to the burgeoning field of intelligence fusion bureaucracy. The notion that the way to avert miscommunication
between intelligence bureaucracies was to create yet more layers of bureaucracy was popular in Washington in the aftermath of 9/11.
One concrete expression of this trend was the Terrorist Threat Integration Center, known as T-TIC and then renamed the National Counter
Terrorism Center a year later. Brennan was the first head of T-TIC, distinguishing himself in catering to the abiding paranoia of
the times. On one occasion, notorious within the community, he circulated an urgent report that al-Qaeda was encrypting targeting
information for terrorist attacks in the broadcasts of the al-Jazeera TV network, thereby generating an "orange" alert and the cancellation
of dozens of international flights. The initiative was greeted with malicious amusement over at the CIA's own Counterterrorism Center,
whose chief at the time, José Rodríguez, later opined that Brennan had been trying to build up his profile with higher authority.
"Brennan was a major factor in keeping [the al-Jazeera/al-Qaeda story] alive. We thought it was ridiculous," he told a reporter.
"My own view is he saw this, he took this, as a way to have relevance, to take something to the White House." Tellingly, an Obama
White House spokesman later excused Brennan's behavior on the grounds that though he had circulated the report, he hadn't believed
it himself.
Exiting government service in 2005, Brennan spent the next three years heading The Analysis Corporation, an obscure but profitable
intelligence contractor engaged in preparing terrorist watch lists for the government, work for which he was paid $763,000 in 2008.
Among the useful relationships he had cultivated over the years was well-connected Democrat Anthony Lake, a former national security
adviser to Bill Clinton, who recommended him to presidential candidate Barack Obama. Meeting for the first time shortly after Obama's
election victory, the pair bonded immediately, with Obama "finishing Brennan's sentences," by one account. Among their points of
wholehearted agreement was the merit of a surgical approach to terrorist threats, the "need to target the metastasizing disease without
destroying the surrounding tissue," as Brennan put it, for which drones and their Hellfire missiles seemed the ideal tools. Obama
was initially balked in his desire to make Brennan CIA director because of the latter's all-too-close association with the agency's
torture program, so instead the new president made him his assistant for counterterrorism and homeland security, with an office down
the hall from the Oval Office. Two years into the administration, everyone in the Ritz-Carlton ballroom knew that the bulky Irishman
was the most powerful man in U.S. intelligence as the custodian of the president's kill list, on which the chief executive and former
constitutional law professor insisted on reserving the last word, making his final selections for execution at regularly scheduled
Tuesday afternoon meetings. "You know, our president has his brutal side," a CIA source cognizant of Obama's involvement observed
to me at the time.
Now, along with the other six hundred diners at the Helms dinner, Brennan listened attentively as Gates rose to accept the coveted
award for "exemplary service to the nation and the Central Intelligence Agency." After paying due tribute to previous honorees as
well as his pride in being part of the CIA "family," Gates spoke movingly of a recent and particularly tragic instance of CIA sacrifice,
the seven men and women killed by a suicide bomber at an agency base, Forward Operating Base Chapman, in Khost, Afghanistan, in 2009.
All present bowed their heads in silent tribute.
Gates then moved on to a more upbeat topic. When first he arrived at the Pentagon in 2007, he said, he had found deep-rooted resistance
to "new technology" among "flyboys with silk scarves" still wedded to venerable traditions of fighter-plane combat. But all that,
he informed his rapt audience, had changed. Factories were working "day and night, day and night," to turn out the vital weapons
for the fight against terrorism. "So from now on," he concluded, his voice rising, "the watchword is: drones, baby, drones!"
"Brennan/CIA democrats" can't talk about about anything else because they sold themselves under Bill Clinton to Financial oligarchy.
And stay sold since then.
Notable quotes:
"... do they honestly think that people that were just laid off another shift at the car plant in my home county give a shit about Russia when they don't have a frickin' job? ..."
Democrats in midwestern battleground states want the Democratic National Committee (DNC) to back off the Trump-Russia rhetoric,
as state-level leaders worry it's turning off voters.
"The DNC is doing a good job of winning New York and California," said Mahoning, OH Democratic county party chair David Betras.
"I'm not saying it's not important -- of course it's important -- but do they honestly think that people that were just
laid off another shift at the car plant in my home county give a shit about Russia when they don't have a frickin' job? "
Betras says that Trump and Russia is the "only piece they've been doing since 2016. [ Trump ] keeps talking about jobs and the
economy, and we talk about Russia. "
The Democratic infighting comes on the heels of a multimillion-dollar lawsuit filed by the DNC against the Trump campaign, Wikileaks
and several other parties including the Russian government, alleging an illegal conspiracy to disrupt the 2016 election in a "brazen
attack on American Democracy."
Many midwestern Democrats, however, are rolling their eyes.
"I'm going to be honest; I don't understand why they're doing it," one Midwestern campaign strategist told BuzzFeed. "My sense
was it was a move meant to gin up the donor base, not our voters. But it was the biggest news they've made in a while."
The strategist added "I wouldn't want to see something like this coming out of the DNC in October."
Another Midwest strategist said that the suit was "politically unhelpful" and that they havent seen "a single piece of data that
says voters want Democrats to relitigate 2016. ... The only ones who want to do this are Democratic activists who are already voting
Democratic."
Perhaps Midwestern Democrats aren't idiots, and realize that a two-year counterintelligence operation against Donald Trump which
appears to have been a coordinated "insurance policy" against a Trump win, might not be so great for optics, considering that criminal
referrals have been submitted to the DOJ for individuals involved in the alleged scheme to rig the election in favor of Hillary Clinton.
Devin Nunes said today that after reviewing the electronic communication that launched the
counter intelligence investigation of Trump there was no evidence that warranted this
investigation. It is also interesting that Comey memorialized his discussions with Trump but
did not do that with others. His memos note that he only informed Trump on the salacious part
of the FusionGPS dossier and not the other parts. It looks like the conspiracy around the
smearing of Trump by the Obama administration is slowly coming out.
"An article in the Guardian last week provides more confirmation that John Brennan was the
American progenitor of political espionage aimed at defeating Donald Trump. One side did
collude with foreign powers to tip the election -- Hillary's."
The DOJ's Inspector General Michael Horowitz announced Wednesday that he is expanding his internal investigation into alleged
FBI abuses surrounding Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) applications - and will be examining their relationship with
former MI6 spy Christopher Steele. The announcement follows several requests from lawmakers and Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
"The OIG will initiate a review that will examine the Justice Department's and the Federal Bureau of Investigation's compliance
with legal requirements, and with applicable DOJ and FBI policies and procedures, in applications filed with the U.S. Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Court (FISC) relating to a certain U.S. person," the statement reads.
It should be noted that the OIG's current investigation and upcoming report - which led to former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe's
firing, is focused on the agency's handling of the Clinton email investigation. This new probe will focus on FISA abuse and surveillance
of the Trump campaign.
On March 1, House Intelligence Committee (HPSCI) Chairman Devin Nunes (R-CA) wrote in a letter to Attorney General Jeff Sessions
that the FBI may have violated criminal statutes, as well as its own strict internal procedures by using unverified information to
obtain a surveillance warrant on onetime Trump campaign advisor Carter Page.
Nunes referred to the Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide (DIOG), which states that the "accuracy of information contained
within FISA applications is of utmost importance... Only documented and verified information may be used to support FBI applications
to the court."
A "FISA memo" released
in February by the House Intel Committee (which has since closed its Russia investigation), points to FBI's use of the salacious
and unverified "Steele Dossier" funded by the Clinton Campaign and the DNC.
"Former and current DOJ and FBI leadership have confirmed to the committee that unverified information from the Steele
dossier comprised an essential part of the FISA applications related to Carter Page," Nunes wrote in his March 1 letter.
Meanwhile, a February 28 letter from Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) requested
that IG Horowitz "conduct a comprehensive review of potential improper political influence, misconduct, or mismanagement" in relation
to the FBI's handling of counterintelligence and criminal investigations of the Trump campaign prior to the appointment of Robert
Mueller.
Steele in the crosshairs
The OIG letter also notes "As part of this examination, the OIG also will review information that was known to the DOJ and the
FBI at the time the applications were filed from or about an alleged FBI confidential source."
The source, in this case, is Christopher Steele.
The House Intel Committe's "FISA memo" alleges that the political origins of the dossier - paid for by Hillary Clinton and the
Democratic National Committee (DNC) - were not disclosed to the clandestine court that signed off on the warrant request, as DOJ
officials knew Steele was being paid by democrats. Moreover, officials at the DOJ and FBI signed one warrant, and three renewals
against Carter Page.
Considering that much of the Steele dossier came from a collaboration with high level Kremlin officials (a collusion if you
will), Horowitz will be connecting dots that allegedly go from the Clinton campaign directly to the Kremlin.
Although the contents of the dossier were unable to be corroborated, the FBI told the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act
(FISA) court that Steele's reputation was solid - and used a Yahoo News article written by Michael Isikoff to support the FISA
application. The Isikoff article, however, contained information provided by Steele. In other words, the FBI made it appear to
the FISA court that two separate sources supported their application, when in fact they both came from Steele.
(interestingly, Isikoff also wrote a hit piece to discredit an undercover FBI informant who testified to Congress last week about
millions of dollars in bribes routed to the Clinton Foundation by Russian nuclear officials. Small world!)
So despite the FBI refusing to pay Steele $50,000 when he couldn't verify the dossier's claims, they still used it - in
conjunction with a Steele sourced Yahoo! article to spy on a Trump campaign associate. And to make up for the fact that the
underlying FISA claims were unverified, they "vouched" for Steele's reputation instead.
The crux of Phil Giraldi's call for the investigation of Brennan centers on the intelligence
provided by allied intel services concerning contact between Russian officials and some of
Trump's people. Did the allies share this kind of information as standard practice or did
Brennan somehow induce them to collect and report it? I agree that this question would fall
within the scope of Mueller's investigation. Whether Mueller investigates the provenance of
this allied intelligence is unknown. I hope he has already done so. If Brennan really thought
those contacts between Russian officials and Trump's people posed a potential CI risk, he
would have been derelict if he did not pursue the matter. After all, three Russian
intelligence officers were already convicted of trying to recruit Page who became one of
Trump's people.
Beyond L'Affaire Russe, there is much that needs to be investigated concerning the CIA's
capture-kill MO during the entire GWOT era. Brennan was in the thick of that, but that is not
a subject for Mueller.
"... It's impossible to overstate the significance of the survey. The data suggest that representative democracy is a largely a fraud, that congressmen and senators are mostly sock-puppets who do the bidding of wealthy powerbrokers, and that the entire system is impervious to the will of the people. These are pretty damning results and a clear indication of how corrupt the system really is. ..."
"... So, along with the fact, that most Americans think democracy is a pipe-dream, a clear majority also believe that the country has changed into a frightening, lock-down police state in which government agents gather all-manner of electronic communications on everyone without the slightest suspicion of wrongdoing. ..."
"... There's no doubt in my mind that the relentless attacks on Donald Trump have reinforced the public's belief that the country is controlled by an invisible group of elites whose agents in the bureaucracy follow their diktats ..."
"... Brennan says "America will triumph over you." But whose America is he talking about? The American people elected Trump, he is the legitimate president of the United States. Many people may not like his policies, but they respect the system that put him in office. ..."
"... Brennan and his cadres of rogue agents have been at war with Trump since Day 1. Brennan does not accept the results of the election because it did not produce the outcome that he and his powerful constituents wanted. Brennan wants to destroy Trump. He even admits as much in his statement. ..."
"... And why do Brennan and his fatcat allies hate Trump so much? They don't. Because it's not really about Trump. It's about the presidency, the highest office in the land. The US Plutocrat Class honestly believe that they are entitled to govern the country that they physically own. It's theirs, they own it and they are taking it back. That's what this is all about ..."
On Monday, the Monmouth University Polling Institute released the results of a survey that
found that "a large bipartisan majority feel that national policy is being manipulated or
directed by a 'Deep State' of unelected government officials ..
[1] Public Troubled By Deep State, Monmouth University Polling Institute
The Monmouth University Poll was conducted by telephone from March 2 to 5, 2018
with 803 adults in the United States. The results in this release have a margin of error of +/-
3.5 percent. The poll was conducted by the Monmouth University Polling Institute in West Long
Branch, NJ.
According to the survey:" 6-in-10 Americans (60%) feel that unelected or appointed
government officials have too much influence in determining federal policy. Just 26% say the
right balance of power exists between elected and unelected officials in determining policy.
Democrats (59%), Republicans (59%) and independents (62%) agree that appointed officials hold
too much sway in the federal government. ("Public Troubled by 'Deep State", Monmouth.edu)
The survey appears to confirm that democracy in the United States is largely a sham. Our
elected representatives are not the agents of political change, but cogs in a vast bureaucratic
machine that operates mainly in the interests of the behemoth corporations and banks.
Surprisingly, most Americans have not been taken in by the media's promotional hoopla about
elections and democracy. They have a fairly-decent grasp of how the system works and who
ultimately benefits from it. Check it out:
" Few Americans (13%) are very familiar with the term "Deep State ;" another 24%
are somewhat familiar, while 63% say they are not familiar with this term. However, when
the term is described as a group of unelected government and military officials who secretly
manipulate or direct national policy, nearly 3-in-4 (74%) say they believe this type of
apparatus exists in Washington. Only 1-in-5 say it does not exist." Belief in the
probable existence of a Deep State comes from more than 7-in-10 Americans in each partisan
group "
So while the cable news channels dismiss anyone who believes in the "Deep State" as a
conspiracy theorist, it's clear that the majority of people think that's how the system really
works, that is, "a group of unelected government and military officials secretly manipulate or
direct national policy."
It's impossible to overstate the significance of the survey. The data suggest that
representative democracy is a largely a fraud, that congressmen and senators are mostly
sock-puppets who do the bidding of wealthy powerbrokers, and that the entire system is
impervious to the will of the people. These are pretty damning results and a clear indication
of how corrupt the system really is.
The Monmouth survey also found that "A majority of the American public believe that the U.S.
government engages in widespread monitoring of its own citizens and worry that the U.S.
government could be invading their own privacy." .
"Fully 8-in-10 believe that the U.S. government currently monitors or spies on the
activities of American citizens, including a majority (53%)who say this activity is
widespread Few Americans (18%) say government monitoring or spying on U.S. citizens is
usually justified, with most (53%) saying it is only sometimes justified. Another 28% say
this activity is rarely or never justified ." ("Public Troubled by 'Deep State",
Monmouth.edu)
So, along with the fact, that most Americans think democracy is a pipe-dream, a clear
majority also believe that the country has changed into a frightening, lock-down police state
in which government agents gather all-manner of electronic communications on everyone without
the slightest suspicion of wrongdoing. Once again, the data suggests that the American people
know what is going on, know that the US has gone from a reasonably free country where civil
liberties were protected under the law, to a state-of-the-art surveillance state ruled by
invisible elites who see the American people as an obstacle to their global ambitions–but
their awareness has not evolved into an organized movement for change. In any event, the public
seems to understand that the USG is not as committed to human rights and civil liberties as the
media would have one believe. That's a start.
There's no doubt in my mind that the relentless attacks on Donald Trump have reinforced the
public's belief that the country is controlled by an invisible group of elites whose agents in
the bureaucracy follow their diktats. From the time Trump became the GOP presidential nominee
more than 18 months ago, a powerful faction of the Intelligence Community, law enforcement
(FBI) and even elements form the Obama DOJ, have vigorously tried to sabotage his presidency,
his credibility and his agenda. Without a scintilla of hard evidence to make their case, this
same group and their dissembling allies in the media, have cast Trump as a disloyal
collaborator who conspired to win the election by colluding with a foreign government. The
magnitude of this fabrication is beyond anything we've seen before in American political
history, and the absence of any verifiable proof makes it all the more alarming. As it happens,
the Deep State is so powerful it can wage a full-blown assault on the highest elected office in
the country without even showing probable cause. In other words, the president of the United
States is not even accorded the same rights as a common crook. How does that happen?
Over the weekend, former CIA Director and "Russia-gate" ringleader John Brennan fired off an
angry salvo at Trump on his Twitter account. Here's what he said:
"When the full extent of your venality, moral turpitude, and political corruption becomes
known, you will take your rightful place as a disgraced demagogue in the dustbin of history.
You may scapegoat Andy McCabe, but you will not destroy America America will triumph over
you."
Doesn't Brennan's statement help to reinforce the public's belief in the Deep State? How
does a career bureaucrat who has never been elected to public office decide that it is
appropriate to use the credibility of his former office to conduct a pitch-battle with the
President of the United States?
Brennan says "America will triumph over you." But whose America is he talking about? The
American people elected Trump, he is the legitimate president of the United States. Many people
may not like his policies, but they respect the system that put him in office.
Not so, Brennan. Brennan and his cadres of rogue agents have been at war with Trump since
Day 1. Brennan does not accept the results of the election because it did not produce the
outcome that he and his powerful constituents wanted. Brennan wants to destroy Trump. He even
admits as much in his statement.
And Brennan has been given a platform on the cable news channels so he can continue his
assault on the presidency, not because he can prove that Trump is guilty of collusion or
obstruction or whatever, but because the people who own the media have mobilized their deep
state agents to carry out their vendetta to remove Trump from office by any means possible.
This is the "America" of which Brennan speaks. Not my America, but deep state America.
And why do Brennan and his fatcat allies hate Trump so much? They don't. Because it's not really about Trump. It's about the presidency, the highest office in the land. The US Plutocrat
Class honestly believe that they are entitled to govern the country that they physically own. It's theirs, they own it and they
are taking it back. That's what this is all about
I have known both Brennan and Giraldi for a long time. They are examples of the worst
(Brennan) and the best (Giraldi) that the CIA has produced although I will remind that Giraldi
started in the Army and was lured to Langley when already a well known and respected person in
the intelligence community.
Brennan, at the beginning of his career was judged by CIA to be unsuited to be a field man
and was made an analyst. I first knew him when I was Defense Attache in Jiddah and he was
attached to Alan Fiers office. It was clear to me from the beginning that he was someone whom
you should not trust or turn your back on.
Giraldi here lays out the case for Brennan's turpitude. Let Sessions act on this! Let him
act! pl
1. That will undermines further the US political system (which already is weakened by
this slash and burn anti-Trump campaign, or color revolution, if you wish) and might open a
can of worms. For example, Brennan was a really big player in Obama administration and
probably was behind Nulandgate (UNZ comment):
JR says:
March 27, 2018 at 6:24 am GMT
Within a week after Brennan's 'routine' visit in April 2014 to the Ukraine the Ukrainian
army launched a civil war. That was within 2 weeks of the CIA instigated coup an the end
of February 2014.
2. Who might be able to do it ? Definitely not Trump Justice Department. They appointed
Mueller to investigate Trump. Which is an action in the opposite direction.
3. Brennan probably is the key person behind Russiagate and color revolution against
Trump that still is running unabated. And that means that he has influential friends in
high places. Including UK (the origin of Steele dossier, in which he was probably
personally involved too ). Attacking Brennan might be viewed as an attack of this trusted
ally. UNZ has several insightful comments on the topic. As Art said:
Art says:
March 27, 2018 at 8:38 pm GMT • 200 Words
How Brennan came to power, should draw questions. Was the dethroning of Gen. David
Petraeus, as CIA chief, a palace coup? Was Brennan spying on Petraeus? Was the NSA
tapping his phones? Did the idea that a military man was heading the CIA, anathema to the
institution – so they got rid of him?
Just how much actual power does the CIA have in the American permanent Deep State?
Congress is NO check on the CIA – all the politicians on the intel security
committees are handpicked dedicated worshipers.
The CIA is the most anti democracy organization on the planet. From its beginning, it
has played with, subverted, and toppled democracies and sovereign governments. Today it
assonates, tortures, and bombs people around the world. (Has Trump given them a free
hand?)
The commie cold war is over – let's not start another one. The CIA's covert
activities must stop.
(Spying is rational.)
4. After a short initial period intelligence agencies become untouchable and the tail
start wagging the dog (from the Art comment above): "Congress is NO check on the CIA
– all the politicians on the intel security committees are handpicked dedicated
worshipers. " Here we return to q.2 "Who might be able to do it ? " and we know the
answer.
"... Of course the CIA 'interfered' in the 2016 Presidential election. But our Elites do not want that discussed as a mere possibility. We might also look more closely at the CIA and the JFK assassination. ..."
"... The CIA is the child of British imperial secret service, as are the Mossad and the Saudi General Intelligence Presidency. 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse. ..."
"... Why Mueller? Brennan isn't a president, or even a government official at all. He's a former federal employee who is wide open to investigation by the DOJ. Brennan's past terms employment are an open book to the DOJ or to Congress. ..."
"... John Brennan may well be the most dangerous and dirty CIA director in the Company's history. ..."
"... If the USA empire could have been established and maintained, without a CIA, I doubt. Empires are ruthless, 'perfidious Albion' was the expression for the British empire. ..."
"... Which brings us to John Brennan, the Central Intelligence Agency's chief under President Obama, who rushed to MSNBC this week to claim: "The fact that he has had this fawning attitude towards Mr. Putin and has not said anything negative about him, it continues to say something to me that he has something to fear and something serious to fear [from Russia]." ..."
"... Uh huh. Presidents have secrets but they also have power, so if you think they are easily blackmailable, Mr. Brennan may have a third-rate spy novel to sell you. What occurred to anybody who has followed matters closely was a different thought: Mr. Brennan, who has a few things to hide himself, has decided his best defense is a strong offense. ..."
"... For the truth is, Mr. Trump's version of the loudmouth demagogue is increasingly coming out on the better side of the emerging facts on Russia. The Kremlin wasn't the most consequential meddler in the 2016 election: It was James Comey's FBI, with Mr. Brennan standing obscurely at his elbow every step of the way. ..."
"... If a planted Russian intercept was instrumental in the fiasco of Mr. Comey's intervention in the Hillary Clinton email matter, as numerous leaks indicate, then that intercept would have come from Mr. Brennan's CIA. What's more, it likely came not with a shrug, but with a clear expectation that Mr. Comey would act to protect a Clinton presidency from an alleged Russian plot. ..."
"... John Brennan is a propaganda whore for the family that owns Comcast. Comcast runs NBC. I would call them the Roberts family, but none of them look like Henry Fonda, so I won't. I don't dare speculate what their real name is. ..."
"... Mike Morell is a propaganda whore for the family that owns Viacom. Viacom runs CBS. I don't care how convoluted those shysters made the exact corporate control of CBS, they run it. The family name of these nasty Viacom shysters ain't their real name either. ..."
"... Is this trolling or naïvete? All US investigating agencies are complicit, so who is going to investigate investigators? ..."
"... Americans are pragmatic people. Identifying John Brennan as a so-called "war criminal" because he was involved in all the extraneous crap the American Empire is pulling overseas won't get the interest of ordinary Americans. Calling John Brennan a "propaganda whore" for the family that controls Comcast will pique their interest. ..."
Trump is clearly having a perilous time trying to put together a defense team. He is made to
look the fool on an hourly basis. It isn't even news anymore. Fans of his in the media were
complaining about the 60 Minutes broadcast asking isn't "there more" in terms of news
value?
It was with that pending backdrop that we heard from Brennan. It took no courage. Trump is
in the ring and he's battered. Make no mistake others heard what Brennan was making clear.
Yes, Trump is headed for the "dustbin" and it's just a matter of how. Brennan was telling
those that matter to back off and let it happen. Quality legal counsel trust Trump about as
much as Brennan does.
We saw the large number of Russians tossed out yesterday. Trump acquiesced, though made no
statement. The decision was probably taken while the president was preparing for his Florida
break and how best to react to his porn actress assignation, that never happened (in his
mind).
The system is obviously sick to the point of degeneracy yet some still proclaim that it
can still be "reformed" if we somehow manage to magically get the right guy into the
m̶o̶n̶a̶r̶c̶h̶y̶, I mean prezudensy.
'Taint gonna happen goys 'n squirrels.
It is a system that robs all who work for a living.
What, -- did I hear you say that this of which we have spoken, gives employment to lots
of people? That is an insult to the intelligence of any thinking person, yet that statement
is excusable as long as we continue the existing business and political scheme. As things
now are, the main thing aimed at by the wealth grabbers is to use us -- to make of us mere
machines to wear out in producing wealth for them.
-Charles A. Lindbergh, Why is your country at war and what happens to you after the war,
and related subjects, p 36-7. (1917)
Thanks to President Truman for both the CIA and recognizing the spawning of Israel, two
demonic entities that have and continue to give both America and the world an endless amount
of trouble, while leeching money out of our economy.
Thank Mr. Giraldi for not babbling on about the latest washed up porn star who claims that
Trump bedded her, which makes for endless conversations among the rubes, while the CIA
continues on with its world-wide assassination program, moving paid for jihadists to Syria,
helping the head-chopping Saudi dictator remain in office, running opium out of Afghanistan
and making sure 90% of the MSM keeps feeding toxic slop to people in the guise of news.
Of course the CIA 'interfered' in the 2016 Presidential election. But our Elites do
not want that discussed as a mere possibility. We might also look more closely at the CIA and
the JFK assassination.
The CIA is the child of British imperial secret service, as are the Mossad and the
Saudi General Intelligence Presidency. 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse.
Morell:
"commitment to our nation's security: her belief that America is an exceptional nation that
must lead in the world for the country to remain secure and prosperous; her understanding
that diplomacy can be effective only if the country is perceived as willing and able to use
force if necessary; and her capacity to make the most difficult decision of all: whether to
put young American women and men in harm's way."
What a fine chunk of bullsheat. I wonder how long it took him to come up with that.
Everybody with over 100 IQ knows who steers foreign policy, and they are not American
patriots.
The CIA is the USA's secret army, of course the director is a criminal, judged by common
standards.
If the CIA manipulated elections, I doubt, as nearly all military, they're not very
intelligent.
Only a mighty revolution will even begin to drain the massive D.C. swamp of the
deleterious scum and muck that fills it.
However it has to be a revolution of the spirit and it has to be continuous as you no
doubt already know.
Violent revolutions quickly burn themselves out and are soon co-opted by the usual sleaze.
It's very apparent it even happened to the much vaunted Am Rev, and we see the inevitable
results today. There never, ever, shall be any MAGA. It's merely circus time rhetoric and we
all know that there's a sucker born every minute.
"But while I beheld with pleasure the dawn of liberty rising in Europe, I saw with
regret the lustre of it fading in America
But a faction, acting in disguise, was rising in America; they had lost sight of first
principles. They were beginning to contemplate government as a profitable monopoly, and the
people as hereditary property."
THOMAS PAINE TO THE CITIZENS OF THE UNITED STATES,
And particularly to the Leaders of the Federal Faction.
LETTER I, Nov 15, 1802
"Brennan should be thoroughly investigated by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, "
Why Mueller? Brennan isn't a president, or even a government official at all. He's a
former federal employee who is wide open to investigation by the DOJ. Brennan's past terms
employment are an open book to the DOJ or to Congress.
It probably wouldn't take a week for felony charges to be brought against him and he could
be in jail waiting for a trial. Any ordinary citizen is subject to being hounded by the FBI
and charged with multiple felonies, having charges piled up against him until he agrees to
bargain with a guilty plea.
That happens all the time to ordinary citizens. The same could be done to Brennan, who is
just another civilian now. I guess, though, that we would need to have an AG who would be
willing to target a fellow Swamp Creature.
The government will never investigate Brennan or any of the other deep state organs as they
are controlled by the Zionists who also control every facet of the gov, and this control was
proven by the fact that Israel and the deep state did 911 and got away with it.
They might as well call for a real investigation of 911, have a snowballs chance in hell
of getting that done.
You will gain a better understanding of Vladimir Putin if you study his career as a
sportsman, 3rd degree blackbelt Judoka than by sifting through his career as an ex-spy.
First of all, Judo is a sport. It's not a "martial art". It's not meant to maim or injure
-- though of course, people do get injured because they get thrown. Every particular
technique that could inevitably result in injury has been culled from the sport. You don't
"practice" Judo, you "play" it -- literally, that's what they say when talking about
participation.
Practice sessions are democratic. Everyone practices against everyone else. Of course,
this results in mismatches as rank beginners will at some point be paired up with advanced
players. But this mismatch doesn't result in humiliation because the advanced take special
pains to play cleanly, pull their throws i.e. execute them perfectly so the person thrown can
land without injury to themselves and it also is an opportunity for every good Judoka to
teach the novices.
There are some people who come to Judo who don't fit in. They standout because they can be
seen really playing rough with those who are lower in rank than them. But this doesn't go
unnoticed. As people cycle through opponents during the practice session, the bully will
eventually be paired up with someone who is better than they are. And they will be taught a
lesson. Either they learn and conform to the rules or they never show up again. Judo weeds
out opportunistic bullies.
Now I hope the above helps people better understand Putin. To sum up: he is competitive
but will try to win fairly, within the prescribed rules. He won't tolerate bullying by the
stronger over the weaker, will, in fact, come to the aid of the weaker. Has a strong sense of
tradition, of belonging to a school of thought and action that is greater than himself and
that is worth preserving for its own sake, believes and more importantly, knows through
experience, that belonging to such a school improves individual character. He is competent.
I've seen film of him in practice and his technique is quite good. His third degree black
belt was honestly earned, it wasn't an honorary award.
From the above it can be seen why he would have little respect for the current crop of
weak, cowardly, politicians who rule America, lacking as they are in discipline, integrity
and dedication to a larger, noble cause. He would, in fact, find it hard not to hold them in
contempt but, keeping his eyes on the long-term goals of what's good for his country, masters
his emotions when dealing with them face to face.
Not all CIA is bad believe it or not..
Meet CIA Intelligence Officer Michael Scheuer, says Parkland and Las Vegas shootings were
false flags and FBI is covering them up. Goes on to encourage Americans to arm themselves and
stockpile ammo, seems he knows something we don't.
Trump should hire this guy, he doesn't mince words when it comes to Israel either, he is da
man.
If only America had more guys like this in govt, how awesome would America be?
Former CIA Intelligence Officer Dr. Michael Scheuer
You have half a point, from my reading, Truman turned OSS into CIA. Do you think there was
some magical and instant change in the organisation?
On Israel, he may have been having his shoulders twisted, but his writings are very clear
that he found the proto-neocons to be very irritating, specifically the new arrivals from
Europe.
As an outside observer, and excepting the cruel continuing of LeMay's firebombing and the
two atomic bombs, the latter and former clearly war crimes, taking their records into
account, I can not think of one U.S.A. president who was any good since Harding. Perhaps
Coolidge.
They all have their moments, whether the moments are good, bad or meaningless, but the bad
is always outweighing the good.
Philip Giraldi wrote: "Time to find out if CIA interfered in the 2016 election."
Hi Phil,
If Brennan's CIA did not interfere in the volatile 2016 election, I'd be rather
disappointed in them. Will explain. CIA Directors are typically partisan to whichever
political party appoints them to serve. The agency has a long history of interference in
foreign government elections, and a willingness to serve major corporate interests and
foreign governments, i.e., Israel, those interests above & beyond dumb goyim basic
needs.
Consequently, when a solid argument (with evidence) is made that CIA interfered in the
2016 presidential election, the first thing that must be cleared up is the "smoke" that the
CIA works to defend the integrity of American "elections" which allot no other citizen option
but to tolerate and accept Jewish Lobbies who influence (determine) both the outcome of
Congressional & Executive offices.
No doubt, our country's sorry fate would be comforted by a high profile investigation into
Brennan. However, who will conduct such investigation. Robert Mueller who was FBI Director
during the uninvestigated 9/11 attacks?
And then we have 9/11′s CIA Director, George Tenet. I have no clue about CIA funding
for it's operations, but given the huge annual budget allotment to the ZUS Department of
Defense, how was it possible for ESPECIALLY the Pentagon to get victimized by a commercial
airplane attack.
Even moreso than Brennan, does ex-Director Tenet deserve to stand accountable to a serious
criminal coverup investigation, which of course would be the nation's first?
Below is a You Tube video that features an interesting interview with Mark Rossini,
former-FBI "Counter Terrorism" agent and who served under Robert Mueller's command.
Minus any reference to (well known) nefarious Mossad activities in the U.S., Mr. Rossini
tells a passionate story about his attempts to call attention to troublesome Saudi operations
in the "Homeland" prior to 9/11 and how his agency was "coddling the Saudis."
Yes, to expose ex-Director Brennan's more recent "lies" is very necessary. But the man
stood atop an agency that set an incredible example of "by deception we do war" and the
collateral damage is
mankind. "Let's roll!"
Thank you, Philip.
Selah, Great and Holy Tuesday Commemoration of the Ten Wise Virgins (Mt 25:14)
"He [Brennan] said that the U.S. President is 'afraid of the president of Russia' and
that the Kremlin 'may have something on him personally.' "
John Brennan may well be the most dangerous and dirty CIA director in the Company's
history. I think he was engaging in projection when he uttered the above comments.
The true darkness at the heart of the 2016 'hacked' election story is that the Podesta
emails revealed the existence of a pedophile cult in the upper echelons of D.C. society. And
that John Podesta, a long-time CIA asset, was running the cult as an influence and blackmail
operation. Brennan's hands were deep into that miasma, and he has been working overtime at
misdirection since the election.
No fan of Trump and his crew here, but the other team, the D.C. establishment, are much
worse.
We had our bipartisan corporate tax reduction, one of only two things our partisans can agree
on. The other is the ongoing war to make Israel Great. Rinse and repeat.
Depends on what you see as bad. If the USA empire could have been established and
maintained, without a CIA, I doubt. Empires are ruthless, 'perfidious Albion' was the
expression for the British empire.
Ian Hernon, 'Britain's Forgotten Wars, Colonial Campaigns of the 19th Century', 2003,
2007, Chalford -- Stroud
How an important British diplomat saw British control of the greater part of the world as
the natural order of things
Lord Vansittart, 'The Mist Procession, The autobiography of LORD VANSITTART', London
1958
Great pity that death prevented the biography from going furher than 1938.
The machinations of Vansittart during the thirties are described in
Philip M. Taylor, 'The Projection of Britain, British Overseas Publicity and Propaganda
1919-1939′, Cambridge 1981
and
Lawrence R. Pratt, 'East of Malta, West of Suez', London, 1975
The ideas of Vansittart's friend Leeper one finds in
Sir Reginald Leeper, 'When Greek Meets Greek', London 1950
He more or less ruled Greece from 1945 to say 1950.
Holman Jenkins Jr, Wall Street Journal columnist, is a cranky writer who was wrong about
which faction to support in a New Hampshire supermarket war, but he is right when he suggests
that John Brennan has decided that a good offense is the best defense. Call it the John
Brennan attempt to replicate the Dan Fouts-era San Diego Chargers strategy of piling up the
passing yards and the points and hoping that you have more points at the end of the game than
your opponent.
Holman Jenkins Jr:
Which brings us to John Brennan, the Central Intelligence Agency's chief under
President Obama, who rushed to MSNBC this week to claim: "The fact that he has had this
fawning attitude towards Mr. Putin and has not said anything negative about him, it
continues to say something to me that he has something to fear and something serious to
fear [from Russia]."
Uh huh. Presidents have secrets but they also have power, so if you think they are
easily blackmailable, Mr. Brennan may have a third-rate spy novel to sell you. What
occurred to anybody who has followed matters closely was a different thought: Mr. Brennan,
who has a few things to hide himself, has decided his best defense is a strong
offense.
For the truth is, Mr. Trump's version of the loudmouth demagogue is increasingly
coming out on the better side of the emerging facts on Russia. The Kremlin wasn't the most
consequential meddler in the 2016 election: It was James Comey's FBI, with Mr. Brennan
standing obscurely at his elbow every step of the way.
If a planted Russian intercept was instrumental in the fiasco of Mr. Comey's
intervention in the Hillary Clinton email matter, as numerous leaks indicate, then that
intercept would have come from Mr. Brennan's CIA. What's more, it likely came not with a
shrug, but with a clear expectation that Mr. Comey would act to protect a Clinton
presidency from an alleged Russian plot.
So how do you reform the Secret Police? It is an interesting idea. The National Security
State has locked out any outside criticism and made reform almost impossible.
Then, there is also the whole indoctrination process. From hire to retire, these three
letter agencies indoctrinate their employees with esprit de corps and being a team player
with the greatest enthusiasm for the mission.
Claim made by high level persons in the link, suggest need for deep investigation into who in
the USA is getting paid to deliver or make available American taxpayer paid for resources to
foreign payee governments conducting terrorism and destabilization programs?
John Brennan is a propaganda whore for the family that owns Comcast. Comcast runs NBC. I
would call them the Roberts family, but none of them look like Henry Fonda, so I won't. I
don't dare speculate what their real name is.
Mike Morell is a propaganda whore for the family that owns Viacom. Viacom runs CBS. I
don't care how convoluted those shysters made the exact corporate control of CBS, they run
it. The family name of these nasty Viacom shysters ain't their real name either.
President Trump should have declared war on the corporate propaganda apparatus and the
Deep State on day number one of his administration. Trump let the shysters who run the
corporate media and the treasonous rats in the Deep State off the hook.
President Trump won the GOP presidential primary and the presidency itself because Trump
promised to put the safety, security and sovereignty of America first. The largest vote
getter in terms of specific issues was the IMMIGRATION issue. Trump had the chance to fire
every damn treasonous rat in the Deep State and he didn't do it. Trump betrayed his voters
who wanted immigration reduced and illegal aliens deported.
President Trump should face a GOP presidential primary challenger. Maybe that will force
Trump to remove the Deep State, remove the current controllers of the corporate media and put
America first.
Trump should also call for an immigration moratorium and begin deporting all illegal
aliens immediately.
Trump's problems with the corporate media and the Deep State stem from the fact that Trump
didn't immediately remove them when he had the chance. Trump's voter base was more than ready
for a "burn the boats on the beach" battle plan to defend the United States against the
treasonous rats in the Deep State and the anti-White, anti-Christian shyster rats in the
corporate media.
He won't tolerate bullying by the stronger over the weaker, will, in fact, come to the
aid of the weaker.
Thanks for your comment. Now I think I have an idea about why he seems so competent, and
why said competence is especially enhanced when he's contrasted with the unmanly screwballs
we've been burdened with for a very long time.
"He [Brennan] said that the U.S. President is 'afraid of the president of Russia' and
that the Kremlin 'may have something on him personally.' "
Brennan is PROJECTING. They have the goods on HIM, and will squeeze out of him every last
second of influence operations as long as he draws breath. Brennan will never be able to get
off the HAMSTER WHEEL alive.
Charles Pewitt wrote: "John Brennan is a propaganda whore for the family that owns
Comcast."
Hi C.P., Above reflects the better part of Brennan' s character. More definitive is Mr.
Giraldi's identifying him as a "possible war criminal." Also, why can not you see that
"treasonous rats" rule? A learning deficiency? Thanks.
More definitive is Mr. Giraldi's identifying him as a "possible war criminal."
Americans are pragmatic people. Identifying John Brennan as a so-called "war criminal"
because he was involved in all the extraneous crap the American Empire is pulling overseas
won't get the interest of ordinary Americans. Calling John Brennan a "propaganda whore" for
the family that controls Comcast will pique their interest.
I would suggest that John Brennan could be politically damaged the most by stating that
John Brennan supports open borders mass immigration. John Brennan and the rest of the Deep
State are dangerous to Americans because they all support open borders mass immigration. The
corporate media all supports mass immigration.
Over 60 million of us voted for Trump because Trump said he would stop the unnecessary
overseas wars, reduce immigration and scrap the sovereignty-sapping trade deal scams. We
voted for Trump to make the American Empire act more like a republic. We're stuck with the
American Empire until it croaks or is croaked in turn. And the empires all turn into rust
again.
The treasonous rats in the American Empire's Deep State all push nation-wrecking mass
immigration.
Within a week after Brennan's 'routine' visit in April 2014 to the Ukraine the Ukrainian army
launched a civil war. That was within 2 weeks of the CIA instigated coup an the end of
February 2014.
What is interesting is a strong Brennan connections with UK and his possiblke role in Steel dossier creation and propogation. Which actually were typical for
many members of Trump administration. He also has connections with Saudi intelligence services
Notable quotes:
"... So Morell is by his own words clearly an idiot, which explains a lot about what is wrong with CIA and is probably why he is now a consultant with CBS News instead of serving as Agency Director under the beneficent gaze of President Hillary Clinton. ..."
"... Back in 2013 John Brennan, then Obama's counter-terrorism advisor, had a difficult time with the Senate Intelligence Committee explaining some things that he did when he was still working at CIA. ..."
"... He claimed that he had only "raised serious questions" in his own mind on the interrogation issue after reading the 525 page summary of the 6,000 page report prepared by the Senate Intelligence Committee which detailed the failure of the Agency program. Brennan's reaction, however, suggested at a minimum that he had read only the rebuttal material produced by CIA that had deliberately inflated the value of the intelligence produced. ..."
"... Surprisingly the subject of rendition, which Brennan must surely have been involved with while at CIA, hardly surfaced though two other interesting snippets emerged from the questioning. ..."
"... Brennan was not questioned at all about the conflict of interest or ethical issues raised by the revolving door that he benefited from when he left CIA as Deputy Executive Director in 2005 and joined a British-owned company called The Analysis Corporation (TAC) where he was named CEO. ..."
"... At the Center of the Storm ..."
"... Brennan certainly knew how to feather his nest and reward his friends, but the area that is still murky relates to what exactly he was up to in 2016 when he was CIA Director and also quite possibly working hard to help Hillary get elected. He was still at it well after Trump got elected and assumed office. In May 2017, his testimony before Congress was headlined in a Washington Post ..."
"... The precise money quote by Brennan that the two articles chiefly rely on is "I encountered and am aware of information and intelligence that revealed contacts and interactions between Russian officials and US persons involved in the Trump campaign that I was concerned about because of known Russian efforts to suborn such individuals. It raised questions in my mind whether or not Russia was able to gain the co-operation of those individuals." ..."
"... The testimony inevitably raises some questions about just what Brennan was actually up to. First of all, the CIA is not supposed to keep tabs on American citizens and tracking the activities of known associates of a presidential candidate should have sent warning bells off, yet Brennan clearly persisted in following the trail. ..."
"... it is clear that Brennan then used that information to request an FBI investigation into a possible Russian operation directed against potential key advisers if Trump were to somehow get nominated and elected, which admittedly was a longshot at the time. That is how Russiagate began. ..."
"... So, Mr. Brennan, for all his bluster and scarcely concealed anger, has a lot of baggage, to include his possible role in coordinating with other elements in the national security agencies as well as with overseas parties to get their candidate Hillary Clinton elected. ..."
Former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director John Brennan, a Barack Obama friend and
protégé as well as a current paid contributor for NBC and MSNBC, has
blasted President Donald Trump for congratulating President Vladimir Putin over his victory
in recent Russian national elections. He said that the U.S. President is "afraid of the
president of Russia" and that the Kremlin "may have something on him personally. The fact that
he has had this fawning attitude toward Mr. Putin continues to say to me that he does have
something to fear and something very serious to fear."
It is an indication of how low we have sunk as a nation that a possible war criminal like
Brennan can feel free to use his former official status as a bully pulpit to claim that someone
is a foreign spy without any real pushback or objection from the talking heads and billionaire
manipulators that unfortunately run our country. If Trump is actually being blackmailed, as
Brennan implies, what evidence is there for that? One might reasonably conclude that Brennan
and his associates are actually angry because Trump has had the temerity to try to improve
relations with Russia.
It is ironic that when President Trump does something right he gets assailed by the same
crowd that piles on when he does something stupid, leading to the conclusion that unless The
Donald is attacking another country, when he is lauded as becoming truly presidential, he
cannot ever win with the inside the Beltway Establishment crowd. Brennan and a supporting cast
of dissimulating former intelligence chiefs opposed Trump from the git-go and were perfectly
willing to make things up to support Hillary and the status quo that she represented. It was,
of course, a status quo that greatly and personally benefited that ex-government crowd which by
now might well be described as the proverbial Deep State.
The claim that Trump is a Russian agent is not a new one since it is an easy mark to allege
something that you don't have to prove. During the campaign, one was frequently confronted on
the television by the humorless stare of the malignant Michael Morell, former acting CIA
Director, who wrote in a mind numbing August 2016
op-ed how he was proud to support Hillary Clinton because of her "commitment to our
nation's security: her belief that America is an exceptional nation that must lead in the world
for the country to remain secure and prosperous; her understanding that diplomacy can be
effective only if the country is perceived as willing and able to use force if necessary; and
her capacity to make the most difficult decision of all: whether to put young American women
and men in harm's way." Per Morell, she was a "proponent of a more aggressive approach [in
Syria], one that might have prevented the Islamic State from gaining a foothold "
But Morell saved his finest vitriol for Donald Trump, observing how Vladimir Putin, a wily
ex-career intelligence officer "trained to identify vulnerabilities in an individual and to
exploit them" obtained the services of one fairly obscure American businessman named Trump
without even physically meeting him. Morell, given his broad experience as an analyst and desk
jockey, notes, "In the intelligence business, we would say that Mr. Putin had recruited Mr.
Trump as an unwitting agent of the Russian Federation." An "unwitting agent" is a contradiction
in terms, but one wouldn't expect Morell to know that. Nor would John Brennan, who was also an
analyst and desk jockey before he was elevated by an equally witless President Barack
Obama.
So Morell is by his own words clearly an idiot, which explains a lot about what is wrong
with CIA and is probably why he is now a consultant with CBS News instead of serving as Agency
Director under the beneficent gaze of President Hillary Clinton.
Well, Trump's fractured foreign policy aside, I have some real problems with folks like
Michael Morell and John Brennan throwing stones. Both can be reasonably described as war
criminals due to what they did during the war on terror and also as major subverters of the
Constitution of the United States that has emerged as part of the saga of the 2016 election,
the outcome of which, ironically, is being blamed on the Russians.
Back in 2013 John Brennan, then Obama's counter-terrorism advisor, had a difficult time
with the Senate Intelligence Committee explaining some things that he did when he was still
working at CIA. He was predictably
attacked by some senators concerned over the expanding drone program, which he supervised;
over CIA torture; for the kill lists that he helped manage; and regarding the pervasive
government secrecy, which he surely condoned to cover up the questionable nature of the
assassination lists and the drones. Not at all surprisingly, he was forced to defend the
policies of the administration that he was then serving in, claiming that the United States is
"at war with al-Qaeda." But he did cite his basic disagreement with the former CIA
interrogation policies and expressed his surprise at learning that enhanced interrogation,
which he refused to label torture because he is "no lawyer," had not provided any unique or
actionable information. He claimed that he had only "raised serious questions" in his own
mind on the interrogation issue after reading the 525 page summary of the 6,000 page report
prepared by the Senate Intelligence Committee which detailed the failure of the Agency program.
Brennan's reaction, however, suggested at a minimum that he had read only the rebuttal material
produced by CIA that had deliberately inflated the value of the intelligence produced.
Surprisingly the subject of rendition, which Brennan must surely have been involved with
while at CIA, hardly surfaced though two other interesting
snippets emerged from the questioning. One was his confirmation that the government
has its own secret list of innocent civilians killed by drones while at the same time
contradicting himself by maintaining that the program does not actually exist and that if even
if it did exist such fatalities do not occur. And more directly relevant to Brennan himself,
Senator John D. Rockefeller provided an insight into the classified sections of the Senate
report on CIA torture, mentioning that the enhanced interrogation program was both "managed
incompetently" and "corrupted by personnel with pecuniary conflicts of interest." One would
certainly like to learn more about the presumed contractors who profited corruptly from
waterboarding and one would like to know if they were in any way punished, an interesting
sidebar as Brennan has a number of times spoken about the need for accountability.
Brennan was not questioned at all about the conflict of interest or ethical issues
raised by the revolving door
that he benefited from when he left CIA as Deputy Executive Director in 2005 and joined a
British-owned company called The Analysis Corporation (TAC) where he was named CEO. He
made almost certainly some millions of dollars when the Agency and other federal agencies
awarded TAC contracts to develop biometrics and set up systems to manage the government's
various watch lists before rejoining the government with a full bank account to help him along
his way. Brennan also reportedly knew how to return a favor, giving his former boss at CIA
George Tenet a compensated advisory position in his company and also hosting in 2007 a book
signing for Tenet's At the Center of the Storm . The by-invitation-only event included
six hundred current and former intelligence officers, some of whom waited for hours to have
Tenet sign copies of the book, which were provided by TAC.
Brennan certainly knew how to feather his nest and reward his friends, but the area that
is still murky relates to what exactly he was up to in 2016 when he was CIA Director and also
quite possibly working hard to help Hillary get elected. He was still at it well after Trump
got elected and assumed office. In May 2017, his testimony before Congress was headlined in a
Washington Post front page featured article as
Brennan's explosive testimony just made it harder for the GOP to protect Trump . The
article stated that Brennan during the 2016 campaign "reviewed intelligence that showed
'contacts and interaction' between Russian actors and people associated with the Trump
campaign." Politico was also in on the chase in an article entitled
Brennan: Russia may have successfully recruited Trump campaign aides .
The precise money quote by Brennan that the two
articles chiefly rely on is "I encountered and am aware of information and intelligence that
revealed contacts and interactions between Russian officials and US persons involved in the
Trump campaign that I was concerned about because of known Russian efforts to suborn such
individuals. It raised questions in my mind whether or not Russia was able to gain the
co-operation of those individuals."
The testimony inevitably raises some questions about just what Brennan was actually up
to. First of all, the CIA is not supposed to keep tabs on American citizens and tracking the
activities of known associates of a presidential candidate should have sent warning bells off,
yet Brennan clearly persisted in following the trail. What Brennan did not describe,
because it was "classified," was how he came upon the information in the first place. We know
from Politico and other sources that it came from foreign intelligence services,
including the British, Dutch and Estonians, and there has to be a strong suspicion that the
forwarding of at least some of that information might have been sought or possibly inspired by
Brennan unofficially in the first place. But whatever the provenance of the intelligence,
it is clear that Brennan then used that information to request an FBI investigation into a
possible Russian operation directed against potential key advisers if Trump were to somehow get
nominated and elected, which admittedly was a longshot at the time. That is how Russiagate
began.
So, Mr. Brennan, for all his bluster and scarcely concealed anger, has a lot of baggage,
to include his possible role in coordinating with other elements in the national security
agencies as well as with overseas parties to get their candidate Hillary Clinton elected.
Brennan should be thoroughly investigated by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, to include
subpoenaing all records at CIA relating to the Trump inquiries before requiring testimony under
oath of Brennan himself with possible legal consequences if he is caught lying
I was quite surprised when I heard what Brennan said. To me, it seemed mostly an angry
response to the election that had meant he would no longer have a position of power as he
might have had under HRC. And I felt he had been entirely too emotional and bitter about
that.
I guess I didn't think ahead to legal ramifications in regard to what he said. I just felt
as I might have if I had heard a friend or a student spout angry nonsense when they had lost
a job or had earned a low grade from another teacher.
But, you are absolutely correct. He should be sued. Furthermore, the people who paid him
to make those statements without themselves questioning what he said or countering him in any
way should also have to face repercussions.
I am so sick of the inability of the Democrats to accept that they lost to Trump and
"their" political officials' Whiny and mean-spirited pronouncements. They are all
pathetic.
Their behaviors makes it hard for some of us who aren't' always thrilled with Trump's
Tweets and his counter-punching, etc., to criticize him as we hope for more civility and
reason in our political discussions.
Brennan committed 'Sedition' against the Unites States when he used his lock-lips (called
foot in mouth syndrome) and actions behind the scenes, and stepped over the line. Sedition is
under the Treason Statute and there is no time limitations regarding prosecution for the act.
Brennan, anytime of the POTUS's choosing can be legally detained and sent to GITMO and
arranged before a Military Tribunal, and if found guilty taken out in the exercise yard and
shot by firing squad.
Colonel,
It looks it's official that Trump is replacing McMasters with Bolton as his advisor on the
NSC. Now we have one more pain-in-the-ass blockhead to worry about with Bolton on the NSC and
having the President's ear.
Col:
I would love to see Brennan and Clapper and Comey and McCabe and Strozk and all the rest of
the dimwits tried and convicted.
Its just that I don't have any faith in the swamp to do the right thing.
Take a look at this recent budget - all Democrat wins, Republicans bend over as usual.
Democrats - the evil party.
Republicans - the stupid party.
And all joined in the brotherhood of the "imperial city."
Clapper lied to Congress and nothing happened. Brennan should get sued so it can prove once
again that the private sector can generally do things better than the public sector.
Brennan, "A windbag and a fool."
-- Perhaps a claim to dementia will be the strongest point in his defense strategy. He is
more than a fool - he has been a dangerous and potent warmonger and the major rot that let to
violations of the US Constitution in the upper echelons of the US national security
apparatus.
There is also a grave issue of competence: Where had they been when Awans had an open access
to the classified documents on the congressional computers? Cooking the grandiose intrigues
while being "guided" by the Lobby?
Looking at Brennan and Clapper the question needs asking "why after esteemed careers (in
their minds) in govenment service rising to the pinnacle of their professions do they then
move on as commentators on CNN and NBC where whatever credibility they may have had is now
lost in being shown as just political hacks?
The President does seem to spend much Twitter time on Brennan which indicates Brennan is
either not worth that time or the President knows what Brennan has done and is waiting for
Justice to do its job.
Brennan certainly seems to be deflecting quite a bit so it means the onion is being peeled
back getting closer to him. His actions and statements indicate a lack of discipline.
Sue him, I would wait and let him run his mouth further then pounce.
Trump gave Brennan enough rope to hang himself, and Brennan with his foot-in-mouth-symdrome
has done just that. Brennan has committed Sedition which is under the Treason Statute, with
no statue of time limitations for prosecution. Trump has a treasure trove of evidence against
Brennan, and Trump knows it.
Trump is letting the rest of the nation see just how much of a dumb-ass Brennan really
is.
"... The presence of former military and intelligence officials in newsrooms was once thought controversial. In 2008, the New York Times wrote an investigative analysis outlining the George W. Bush administration's use of military analysts to shape terrorism coverage. ..."
"... Internal Pentagon documents referred to them as "message force multipliers" or "surrogates" who could be counted on to deliver administration "themes and messages" to millions of Americans "in the form of their own opinions." ..."
First appearance used to accuse Nunes of abusing role to protect
Trump
Former CIA Director John Brennan has been hired as a paid contributor by NBC and MSNBC, the
media company announced. He led the agency from 2013 to early 2017, under President Barack
Obama.
Brennan's appointment comes amid the outcry over the memorandum released by House
Intelligence Committee Chair Devin Nunes (R-California) alleging impropriety by the FBI and DOJ
while investigating claims of Russian interference in the 2016 election.
That Brennan previously lied to an NBC journalist about the CIA's attempts to thwart a
Senate Intelligence Committee investigation into the agency's use of torture was apparently no
deterrent to his appointment.
... ... ...
The irony of Brennan's new post was not lost on journalist and The Intercept co-founder
Glenn Greenwald, who pointed out that it was a "little strange" for the network to
constantly denounce RT and Fox as "state TV" and then hire CIA Directors &
Generals as your "news analysts?"
... ... ...
The presence of former military and intelligence officials in newsrooms was once thought
controversial. In 2008, the New York Times wrote an investigative analysis outlining the George
W. Bush administration's use of military analysts to shape terrorism coverage.
Internal Pentagon documents referred to them as "message force multipliers" or
"surrogates" who could be counted on to deliver administration "themes and messages" to
millions of Americans "in the form of their own opinions."
The largest contingent of analysts were affiliated with Fox News, followed by NBC and CNN,
the investigation found.
Brennan is a bottom feeding cocksucker of the worst kind, he is a shining example of the
privileged ivy league businessman model of American society who claims his great patriotism
while simultaneously gutting the American Constitution, he's just a military industrial
complex suit and tie wearing POS...That a national news network employs him is a fucking
joke,,,,the CIA owns all of the national media!!!!!! The deep state has taken off the gloves
and have made themselves visible for the first time!
Hillary and the DNC were conned out of tens of millions of dollars by Fusion GPS and
Steele.. They gave her what she wanted so desperately but too bad it was all lies supported
by lies leaked to the MSM to corroborate what they were feeding her.. When it all blew up and
they became aware of the con it was too late and they had already locked a strategy based on
it with the implanted FBI and DOJ partisan traitors..
It seems the CIA is unhappy with the delivery the MSM is giving to the CIA created talking
points.. So now they put another insider to the front of the information war to deliver the
lines first hand..
Ultimately the CIA has controlled the media for decades but now they are doubling down and
determined to show their presence, a desperate and bold move!!!!!
Poop news creator, shadow president Brennan of the NWO intelligence service is back in
action. Watch out for the Amazon of dung balls hes' going to roll now.
"... We finally have the most concrete evidence yet of shadowy actors using dirty tricks in order to rig elections ..."
"... In a series of tweets Thursday night, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange suggested that there is evidence indicating that the British government and intelligence agencies were involved in a plot to bring down the Trump presidency. Assange laid out the possible role that he believes MI6 and the government played in the so called 'dirty dossier' scandal ..."
"... Misfud worked in Riyadh for a "think tank" run by the former head of Saudi intelligence, Prince Turki al Faisal. (BBC) ..."
"... Misfud and Claire Smith of the UK Joint Intelligence Committee and eight year member of the UK Security Vetting panel both trained Italian security services at the Link university in Rome and appear to be both present in this phone https://t.co/HAbldyx73m pic.twitter.com/xtaGEiZxQG ..."
"... It was Alexander Downer in London, closely associated with Hakluyt (now Holdingham Group Ltd) a private MI6 outfit, that met with Papadopulos. The FBI used AD's statement about Misfud to open the FISA interception warrants against the Trump camp. https://t.co/O9wT5ufPQE ..."
In a series of tweets Thursday night, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange suggested that
there is evidence indicating that the British government and intelligence agencies were
involved in a plot to bring down the Trump presidency. Assange laid out the possible role that
he believes MI6 and the government played in the so called 'dirty dossier' scandal :
There is something very odd about the Joseph Mifsud story and the role of the UK in the
2016 US presidential election:
(thread)
Assange notes that back in November, British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson was pictured
meeting with Joseph Mifsud, a professor with strong Kremlin ties who also worked for a group
run by the former head of Saudi intelligence.
3/ Misfud and Claire Smith of the UK Joint Intelligence Committee and eight year member of
the UK Security Vetting panel both trained Italian security services at the Link university
in Rome and appear to be both present in this phone https://t.co/HAbldyx73mpic.twitter.com/xtaGEiZxQG
Assange notes that The FBI used MI6 associate Alexander Downer's statement about Misfud to
open the FISA interception warrants against the Trump camp:
4/ It was Alexander Downer in London, closely associated with Hakluyt (now Holdingham
Group Ltd) a private MI6 outfit, that met with Papadopulos. The FBI used AD's statement about
Misfud to open the FISA interception warrants against the Trump camp. https://t.co/O9wT5ufPQE
8/ Steele used former UK ambassador Sir Andrew Wood to funnel the dossier to the Trump
hating Senator John McCain; seemingly deliberately moving the handover out of London, to
Canada. https://t.co/hzMAuTasFn
9/ UK government TV then "verified" the dossier. The reporter? Paul Wood, a reporter who
has been repeatedly operated within UK military and intelligence covert operation zones.
https://t.co/jyN0XLHgKjpic.twitter.com/vKpk7Cbzzg
Assange followed up with a tweet concerning election interference at the hands of the
British government.
"We finally have the most concrete evidence yet of shadowy actors using dirty tricks in
order to rig elections. But these characters aren't operating from Moscow Instead, they are
British, Eton educated, and have close ties to Her Majesty " https://t.co/14nQXGa90H
Clearly the Wikileaks head is suggesting that rather than 'muh Russians' being the shady
actors trying to rig the election in favor of Trump, of which there has been no evidence, it
may in fact have been British government and intelligence operatives attempting to rig the
election to stop Trump getting into office.
Millions thanx, Bob H for this reminder of Michael Hastings' murder /// and of the
"Putin-esk" eliminations of truth tellers within our own borders.
How Come Their TOTAL SILENCE regarding Reality Leigh Winner???? !!!!!
What truth did She Uncover/Expose ?????
SPEAK !!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!! !!!!!!
Anon , March 20, 2018 at 8:21 am
Cut your disgusting bullying with capitalized words and bursts of punctuation marks. If
you have a point, make it calmly and rationally. Otherwise stay out of the debate.
geeyp , March 20, 2018 at 1:57 am
Any time, Mr. H., that you come across an article pertaining to Michael Hastings, I need
to see it. So please carry on! I haven't seen this one.
geeyp , March 20, 2018 at 2:05 am
Having read it now, I wouldn't expect too much from the Hoover Org. This, what I have
referred to as a drone attack or a remote vehicle hack, was done with the encouragement of
the man who Ray's article pertains to!
cmp , March 20, 2018 at 12:27 pm
Read the numerous stories' about Aubrey McClendon and his subsequent car crash. The crash
was on March 2nd of 2016, and it was very similar to M.H.'s; as well.
"... I agree that they are a big threat to life on earth. From the amount of ecological damage that our wars create, the number of people who we have killed or misplaced, to their planned war with Russia that could see the end of the human race and animals. That so many people are believing this Russian propaganda crap is beyond belief. These are the same people who used to question what the intelligence agencies were saying, but not any more. ..."
"... All Maxine "Lip Flappin" Waters does nowadays, like Adam Schiff, is ignore their districts in favor of Russiagate and get Trump out. They don't deserve their congressional positions. ..."
"... Ain't no one touching Schumer, and as for our president all he has to do is make another $10B donation to his favorite country and all this will go away. They done sold this country out many times over. ..."
"... The quaint idea that the public should "just trust" the "intelligence" (sic) "community" (sic) is trotted out by the propaganda media whenever anyone dares to question this gang of spies and dirty tricksters. As if these scum are somehow paragons of virtue and truthfulness! And the mass of Americans just swallow this rotten bait, and continue their profound sleep ..."
"... Yes, the secret agencies must be nearly abolished, as completely incompatible with democracy. ..."
"... I am wondering if Trump is going to make it out of this alive. ..."
"... I can see the pure evil in Brennan's eyes. He is dripping with hatred. Not that I like Trump, but our so-called intelligence agencies must be brought to heel if we are to have any hope for the future. People like Brennan need to be prosecuted and go to jail. ..."
"... Skip Scott -- Trump should keep his mouth shut, I know, but I can't blame the guy for speaking out, especially when he's been hounded by the press with something like 90+% negative coverage. He was right about his phones being "tapped", and everyone said he was out of his mind for saying such a thing. The Steele dossier is a phony, made-up dossier purposely invented to spy on Trump and bring in the Special Prosecutor. Everyone who had a hand in this should be behind bars. This has been an attempted coup against a duly-elected President. ..."
"... When the Inspector General's Report comes out, when Devin Nunes and Trey Gowdy finally get the information they've been asking for, I think we're going to see people go to jail. They're now looking into Uranium One and the Clinton Foundation. ..."
"... These guys brought down the World Trade Center just to further their geopolitical agenda. Nothing is beyond their treachery. They don't have to assassinate the man, as they did the hapless Skripal's just to smear Russia one more time. They can bring down Airforce One and blame it on the Russians in some kind of grand two-fer, if they so choose (everyone knows those Russians just can't quit their evil ways). ..."
"... These spooks and their collaborators in the Pentagon, the MIC, Capitol Hill and the MSM have as effectively seized all power in this country as the Stalinists did in the Soviet Union. Idiots like Schumer sometimes unwittingly let the cat out of the bag, and he was right in pin-pointing who runs this country and to what extent they will go to destroy you to maintain their stake in ruling the planet ..."
"... Realist, very true, and you have summarized it so well. I am afraid this Skirpal incident in U.K. has been staged as a prelude to attack on Syria by U.S., U.K., Israel, and France, with Germany and other Western Nations cheering from the side. ..."
"... Trump is completely safe & will not be taken out? Why? Because Candidate Trump has completely backtracked from every foreign policy statements he made such as seeking peace with Russia? It's no coincidence that Trump was made to pay a visit to the one of the Deepstate's intelligence agencies at the CIA? ..."
"... I wonder to what extent Trump is whistling past the graveyard. Most women understand the dynamic: When you know you are under threat, pretend not to notice anything untoward ..."
"... "Power also saw fit to remind Trump where the power lies, so to speak. She warned him publicly that it is "not a good idea to piss off John Brennan." Didn't Michael Hastings piss off Brennan? ..."
"... Washington is like a continuing Soap Opera, as the real bad guys battle it out with the other really bad guys. We the people are mere pawns in their hands, to be influenced and duped to no end, as the lies swirl around and around until a citizen is completely buffaloed into submission. ..."
"... While reading this about John Brennan I could not help but think of JFK firing Allen Dulles. Again with the rhyming. ..."
"... "Former Assistant FBI Director James Kallstrom said that there was a plot among "high-ranking" people throughout government -- "not just the FBI," who coordinated in a plot to help Hillary Clinton avoid indictment. ..."
"... "I think we have ample facts revealed to us during this last year and a half that high-ranking people throughout government, not just the FBI, high-ranking people had a plot to not have Hillary Clinton, you know, indicted," Kallstrom told Fox News' Maria Bartiromo. ..."
"... "I think it goes right to the top. And it involves that whole strategy -- they were gonna win, nobody would have known any of this stuff, and they just unleashed the intelligence community. Look at the unmaskings. We haven't heard anything about that yet. Look at the way they violated the rights of all those American citizens." ..."
"... "Mike Whitney suspects that John Brennan was the mastermind behind Russia-gate." Looking at the pictures of Barack Obama with John Brennen, they seemed to have very cozy relationship. I wonder about Obama's role in this Russia-Gate. There are many unanswered questions about the top-echelons' role in this bizarre drama which may end up in many ominous consequences for the country and for the World. ..."
"... I think the intelligence agencies are the true source of nearly all of the problems..instead of gathering intelligence the IAs are effecting the events about which the intelligence is supposed to be about. Certainty Intelligence agencies can be credited with 9/11 and the war on Iraq. Interconnected between nations, shuffling in open-source form, secret sharing, false flag event production, and media delivered propaganda are activities which define the intelligence agencies. Secret means slave citizens are denied the knowledge that would allow them to understand how corrupt our societies are; so that the leaders of such societies can continue in the office that commands the power. ..."
"... Brilliantly stated, faraday's law. You've raised the all-important point that the intelligence agencies are are not simply gathering intelligence, they are also engaging in covert action, unlawfully, unaccountably, and unscrutinized. For all we know they could be spending their virtually unlimited funds on creating our enemies, thereby creating a need for our military industrial complex, the only entity that benefits from their work. ..."
"... Seems like the two wings of the Anglo-American establishment alliance are working in concert to defeat all who stand in their way and regain dominance over the western world. In Britain, Teresa May and the Tories -- who are losing popularity to the resurgent Labour party and its progressive leader Jeremy Corbyn -- are trying to blame Russia for a nerve agent attack. The blame game over there is evidence-free of course and the lies and weasel-word assertions are being effectively countered by, among others, ex-Ambassador Craig Murray ( https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/ ) in post after post. ..."
"... You present some interesting points, but John Brennan is no "Wild Bill Donovan" or even a William Casey with the backup of the fraternity of OSS which no longer has meetings. It seems to me that Brennan's and his diminishing followers' power lies with the media that has done the dance of "valued sources" and perception manipulation of the masses. Actually, "night of the long knives" occurred in Saudi Arabia when Prince "Bandar Bush" was captured and "interviewed" not by the FBI or the CIA, but most probably by individuals with videos of confessions which summarized the long history of the activities involving operatives conducting activities during the presidential administrations of both political parties but continuously for clans such as the Bush Dynasty and assorted associates within the institutions that are now domestically profiting from the policies of the President. ..."
"... But beyond this crisis is the larger one of how to harness the Deep State to reflect the nation's interests, not those few who run things now. Some say start to rid foreign intelligence of its operational arm which has been at the forefront of regime change and other mischief. ..."
"... Yes, the CIA operations division should be made small because it is abused for the hidden agendas of oligarchy, that the People would never approve. It should be monitored by an agency reporting directly to Congress. ..."
"... The Deep State, through the CIA, pursues a foreign policy that is often at odds with the wishes of the vast majority of the people in this country ..."
"... Brennans screech confirms that Trump is not just smoke and mirrors. He really hit the bureaucracy where it hurts, their pensions -- brilliant move. ..."
"... Trump and Brennan represent equally criminal factions of the ruling class, divided over foreign policy, particularly in the civil war in Syria, and more generally towards Russia. ..."
"... Brennan and the Democrats speak for powerful sections of the military-intelligence apparatus embittered by the failure of US intervention in Syria and Trump's apparent abandonment of the Islamic fundamentalist groups armed by the CIA to fight the Russian and Iranian-backed government of President Bashar al-Assad. They want to push further into the Syrian slaughter, regardless of the risk of open military conflict with Russia, the world's second strongest nuclear power. ..."
"... That "moral turpitude" reference seems to imply that there is some -- yet to be revealed -- scandal held in abeyance, fully capable of delivering a decisive blow. And, the "deep staters" are merely waiting for the right moment to pull this shark-toothed rabbit out of the hat. ..."
"... Former heads of the nation's top intelligence organization do not attack sitting presidents, let alone in such a visceral vituperative and public fashion. This is indication of deep fissures, quite beyond politics as most citizens understand. As the World Socialist Web Site published today: "There is no recent parallel for statements and actions such as those of the past three days. One would have to go back to the period before the American Civil War to find equivalent levels of tension, which in the late 1850s erupted in violence in the halls of Congress before exploding in full-scale military conflict." ..."
"... Trump is a maverick outsider so it's hard to get a handle on what or who he represents, but the Brennan/deep state side of the dispute is very much aligned with the corporate DNC Democratic Party. That they seem, by Brennan's comments, to consider themselves as the representation of "America" as they abandon constitutional and etiquette norms and articulate visceral hatred towards political rivals should serve as fair warning. ..."
"... Kevin Zeese: "He basically is a Senator for Israel. He totally supports the Israeli foreign policy viewpoint, which is a very hawkish, if you were a Republican you would call him a neocon." ..."
"... Thomas Hedges: "Schumer's staunch support for Israel has prompted him for example, to criticize the Obama administration, when in 2016, the United States abstained from a UN Security Council resolution re-affirming something the Council had almost unanimously upheld since 1979. Namely, that Israel's settlement building projects on Palestinian land violated international law." ..."
"... Brennan is history's most hilarious DCI. His grandiose hissy fit suggests that CIA continues the Dulles tradition of infiltrating the civil service with 'focal points -' illegal CIA moles infiltrating US government agencies -- and the IG fumigated one key out in firing McCabe. ..."
"... the MSM and the Left see the "crime" being that McCabe was fired, not that McCabe broke the law. Kind of like when they didn't see a crime in Hillary using her own personal servers, but saw the crime as being that the emails might have been hacked by a foreign government. That they had no evidence of this didn't matter. ..."
"... Brennan sounds like a desperate man. They must be getting closer to him. ..."
"... See how this works? The article is about Brennan. The comment is about Brennan's CIA. But immersive CIA propaganda immediately diverts the topic to CIA's synthetic warring factions, Hillary! Trump! Hillary! Trump! ..."
"... CIA runs your country. You're not going to get anywhere until you stop bickering about their presidential puppet rulers. ..."
"... The mention of John Brennan brings to mind the bizarre death of Rolling Stone's writer, Michael Hastings, who was reported to be working on a story about Brennan just before he had his "accident". ..."
"... Our MS Media is nothing more than Democrat Propaganda, and that situation will doom us to Russian interference. Every election the Russians can do the same as 2016: release the truth about justice not served. ..."
"... Israel has advised, trained and equipped, and ran "dirty war" operations in the Latin American "dirty war" conflicts in Argentina, El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and Colombia. In the case of the Salvadoran "bloodbath", the Israelis were present from the beginning. Besides arms sales, they helped train ANSESAL, the secret police who were later to form the framework of the infamous death squads that would kill tens of thousands of mostly civilian activists. ..."
"... USMC activated. Well, I'd put my two-cents on POTUS. Just like we've all seen throughout our lives when the supposed tough guy starts making threats he is really scared Sh**less. Lots of these clowns are just going to disappear during the late night hours of the day never to be heard from again. ..."
"... Guys like Brennan are scared rats in a sinking ship, good riddance! ..."
"... What an amazingly illuminating article. Devin Nunes, who perfectly ok with wire taps as long as the target aren't from his party is somehow a noble individual. While I agree that Brennan should be in prison, it should be for torturing people ..."
Great article. I hope Brennan is running scared, along with Power. It's like the Irish
Mafia.
"Meanwhile, the Washington Post is dutifully playing its part in the deep-state game of
intimidation. The following excerpt from Sunday's lead article conveys the intended message:
"Some Trump allies say they worry he is playing with fire by taunting the FBI. 'This is open,
all-out war. And guess what? The FBI's going to win,' said one ally, who spoke on the
condition of anonymity to be candid. 'You can't fight the FBI. They're going to torch
him.'"
That sounds like something "Six Ways From Sunday" Schumer would say. In fact, I'd bet
money that it is the shyster himself. That guy should be removed from the Senate in leg
irons. He is a menace to society.
Abby , March 19, 2018 at 9:51 pm
I agree that they are a big threat to life on earth. From the amount of ecological
damage that our wars create, the number of people who we have killed or misplaced, to their
planned war with Russia that could see the end of the human race and animals. That so many
people are believing this Russian propaganda crap is beyond belief. These are the same people
who used to question what the intelligence agencies were saying, but not any more.
The fact that most of congress and people in other governments have made up the Russian
propaganda is what needs to be exposed. This is a huge crime against humanity, IMO. This
includes Bernie of all people. They are doing this so they can get their war on with Russia
and escalate the Syrian war.
geeyp , March 20, 2018 at 3:02 am
Agreed. All Maxine "Lip Flappin" Waters does nowadays, like Adam Schiff, is ignore
their districts in favor of Russiagate and get Trump out. They don't deserve their
congressional positions. I wish to add a comment Coleen Rowley's piece. An update: Law
Professor Jonathan Turley says Andrew M. will still get his pension, just have to wait until
he's 57 (now 50). Can you understand this? What will it take to punish these arrogant evil
little punks? And why should we pay their pensions, especially when so many of us get
nothing!
Ain't no one touching Schumer, and as for our president all he has to do is make
another $10B donation to his favorite country and all this will go away. They done sold this
country out many times over.
Brad Owen , March 19, 2018 at 12:16 pm
The draining of the swamp has now begun, and battle is about to be joined. That's the word
from Alex Jones, Roy Potter and that youtube crowd of similar "guerilla journalists", who
fill in for the Deep State-captured and untrustworthy MSM.
The Deep State miscalculated the alignment of forces for the upcoming, somewhat covert,
civil war within the governing apparatus; Trump knows the military has his back, especially
the Marines, and they are part & parcel of the Constitution. The Deep State is a sick
Post-WWII mistake, rogue and criminal, and will be rolled up. There are a lot of jewels
hidden in their unacknowledged black programs of great benefit to the World, if we can
wrestle them away from these weaponizing psychopaths of the Deep State.
jean , March 20, 2018 at 2:53 pm
Unfortunately whistleblowers like Bill Binny and others can't get airtime on in corporate
media but can get a voice on Alex Jones.
William Binney High Ranking NSA Whistle Blower Interview with Alex. Video for Bill Binney
alex jones
? 34:25 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sW-V-TOJVE8
Jun 14, 2017 -- Uploaded by N Jacobson
William Binney High Ranking NSA Whistle Blower Interview w/ Alex Jones 6-14-17 William
Binney, and ..
Whistleblower Reveals NSA Blackmailing Top Govt Officials -- YouTube
Video for Russ tice alex jones
? 22:27 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZoV52qdaOA
Jun 8, 2014 -- Uploaded by The Alex Jones Channel
NSA whistleblower Russell Tice was a key source in the 2005 New York Times report that blew
the lid off the
saveourliberty , March 20, 2018 at 8:35 pm
Attacks on Alex Jones might be warranted, but I find those trivial in comparison for how
he has awakened the masses and has given a bully-pit to those that have been silenced by the
MSM. Choose your battles. Jones isn't one I want to silence though we can never let our guard
down to co-option neither.
Andrew , March 20, 2018 at 7:04 am
An open threat to torch the POTUS and there are no consequences for making such threats?
Like Brennan's clear threat? No judicial system to deal with those threats?
mike k , March 19, 2018 at 7:46 am
The quaint idea that the public should "just trust" the "intelligence" (sic)
"community" (sic) is trotted out by the propaganda media whenever anyone dares to question
this gang of spies and dirty tricksters. As if these scum are somehow paragons of virtue and
truthfulness! And the mass of Americans just swallow this rotten bait, and continue their
profound sleep ..
Sam F , March 20, 2018 at 6:32 am
Yes, the secret agencies must be nearly abolished, as completely incompatible with
democracy.
Wolfbay , March 20, 2018 at 6:54 am
There are only 17 secret agencies. No room to cut.
toni , March 21, 2018 at 11:51 am
Why do you think that there all the shows on television and the movies where the good guy
is the cop, or some federal agent?
Skip Scott , March 19, 2018 at 8:06 am
I am wondering if Trump is going to make it out of this alive. I know they don't
want to tip their hand to the public, but if their media circus performance doesn't gain
sufficient traction, it'll probably be time for a "lone nut" assassin. I can see the pure
evil in Brennan's eyes. He is dripping with hatred. Not that I like Trump, but our so-called
intelligence agencies must be brought to heel if we are to have any hope for the future.
People like Brennan need to be prosecuted and go to jail.
backwardsevolution , March 19, 2018 at 8:34 am
Skip Scott -- Trump should keep his mouth shut, I know, but I can't blame the guy for
speaking out, especially when he's been hounded by the press with something like 90+%
negative coverage. He was right about his phones being "tapped", and everyone said he was out
of his mind for saying such a thing. The Steele dossier is a phony, made-up dossier purposely
invented to spy on Trump and bring in the Special Prosecutor. Everyone who had a hand in this
should be behind bars. This has been an attempted coup against a duly-elected
President.
When the Inspector General's Report comes out, when Devin Nunes and Trey Gowdy finally
get the information they've been asking for, I think we're going to see people go to jail.
They're now looking into Uranium One and the Clinton Foundation.
Never mind the damage being done re relations between Russia and the U.S. and the possible
nuclear threat. These people truly are insane. I agree with you, these intelligence agencies
really have gone rogue and need to be "brought to heel".
laninya , March 19, 2018 at 11:22 am
The day Trump keeps his mouth shut or stops tweeting is the day he and his revolution will
be over. What do you think is smoking all these malefactors out into the open?
Steve Naidamast , March 19, 2018 at 12:51 pm
backwardsevolution
Former CIA Officer, Kevin Shipp, spoke out in an article I saw the other day that the FBI
is working very methodically on the investigations into the Clinton Foundation. He expects
that when it comes out so many "heads will roll" in the Congress and the Executive branch
that we will have a Constitutional crises portending a collapse of the US government.
Can't wait to see these fireworks :-)
Typingperson , March 19, 2018 at 9:33 pm
Not holding my breath -- but I hope so!
Abby , March 19, 2018 at 9:55 pm
I read this article and I too hope that Shipp is right about this. The Clinton foundation
and everything connected to them is rotten. They robbed Haiti's reconstruction funds and gave
their friends and family members special access to bilking them. Everyone knew that they did
that, yet no one said a word about it.
Dave P. , March 20, 2018 at 1:27 am
Steve, I watched this Youtube video of Kevin Shipp talking to this Group of citizens, last
evening. It is really very informative. The title of the video was: "CIA Officer exposes the
shadow government" dated Feb 19, 2018. This video is really worth watching.
Realist , March 19, 2018 at 3:38 pm
These guys brought down the World Trade Center just to further their geopolitical
agenda. Nothing is beyond their treachery. They don't have to assassinate the man, as they
did the hapless Skripal's just to smear Russia one more time. They can bring down Airforce
One and blame it on the Russians in some kind of grand two-fer, if they so choose (everyone
knows those Russians just can't quit their evil ways).
These spooks and their collaborators in the Pentagon, the MIC, Capitol Hill and the
MSM have as effectively seized all power in this country as the Stalinists did in the Soviet
Union. Idiots like Schumer sometimes unwittingly let the cat out of the bag, and he was right
in pin-pointing who runs this country and to what extent they will go to destroy you to
maintain their stake in ruling the planet .
All this has been clear for a long time now, yet nothing is ever done about it, probably
because the task is too immense, these devils are too numerous and too deeply entrenched.
Everything they say or do before the public is simply stagecraft and dramatics, and that
includes all the gibbering that emanates from Congress each day, dispensed to you in a direct
feed by the propaganda organs of the mass media which now includes most of the internet. You
want to hear the truth? Go read a novel, maybe the publishing monolith will occasionally let
slip an accurate description of our world couched in metaphor, a glitch in the Matrix, if you
will.
Dave P. , March 20, 2018 at 3:16 pm
Realist, very true, and you have summarized it so well. I am afraid this Skirpal
incident in U.K. has been staged as a prelude to attack on Syria by U.S., U.K., Israel, and
France, with Germany and other Western Nations cheering from the side.
Most likely, a false flag event will staged in Syria very soon to justify it. And there
will be some sort of action in Ukraine too. U.S., U.K., and France are deep in debt. China is
rising economically, and I am afraid that these Western Imperial Nations will not let go
their complete dominance over the planet without a fight.
Events may take a very sad and violent turn in no time.
Skip Scott , March 21, 2018 at 8:47 am
Realist.
That is a very scary scenario you propose about Air Force One, and quite conceivable. The
way things are heating up, I suspect something in that order of magnitude very soon.
KiwiAntz , March 20, 2018 at 12:02 am
Trump is completely safe & will not be taken out? Why? Because Candidate Trump has
completely backtracked from every foreign policy statements he made such as seeking peace
with Russia? It's no coincidence that Trump was made to pay a visit to the one of the
Deepstate's intelligence agencies at the CIA?
Trump would have been taken into a office & shown a continuous looped, Zapruder film
of JFK getting his head blasted apart, as a warning of what happened to the last President
who tried to destroy their power & influences? Remember Chuck Schumer's threat in 2017,
warning Trump that the Intelligence Agencies have a number of ways, to take you down, if you
rock the boat? Trump was shown what to expect if he doesn't toe the line & do what he's
told by his real masters? Confirmation of Trump's obedience to the Deepstate agenda is that
as he's now singing from the same song sheet that the Deepstate is singing from, completely
backtracking most of his his election promises, making America great again, not by diplomacy
but by endless war mongering & foreign interventions with no end in sight?
geeyp , March 20, 2018 at 12:51 am
We have known for sometime that the CIA and Google (not to mention WaPo and Jeff's garage
sale site) are tight. Julian Assange's "When Google Met Wikileaks" is a go to for this. And
you know that Eric Schmidt and Hillary Clinton are close connivers.
Litchfield , March 20, 2018 at 9:17 am
I wonder to what extent Trump is whistling past the graveyard. Most women understand
the dynamic: When you know you are under threat, pretend not to notice anything untoward
. . . So as not to trigger something really bad happening. If the picture changed
dramatically -- say, with indictments of co-conspirators in the DNC shenanigans or the FBI
collusion, or the Russiagate farce -- Trump might do some kind fo about-face. The big
question, though, is his real relationship to and heartfelt convictions regarding
Netanyahu/Israel.
Gregory Herr , March 20, 2018 at 6:45 pm
"Power also saw fit to remind Trump where the power lies, so to speak. She warned him
publicly that it is "not a good idea to piss off John Brennan." Didn't Michael Hastings piss
off Brennan?
Washington is like a continuing Soap Opera, as the real bad guys battle it out with
the other really bad guys. We the people are mere pawns in their hands, to be influenced and
duped to no end, as the lies swirl around and around until a citizen is completely buffaloed
into submission.
While reading this about John Brennan I could not help but think of JFK firing Allen
Dulles. Again with the rhyming.
backwardsevolution , March 19, 2018 at 9:07 am
Two short interviews with James Kallstrom at this site:
"Former Assistant FBI Director James Kallstrom said that there was a plot among
"high-ranking" people throughout government -- "not just the FBI," who coordinated in a plot
to help Hillary Clinton avoid indictment.
"I think we have ample facts revealed to us during this last year and a half that
high-ranking people throughout government, not just the FBI, high-ranking people had a plot
to not have Hillary Clinton, you know, indicted," Kallstrom told Fox News' Maria
Bartiromo.
"I think it goes right to the top. And it involves that whole strategy -- they were
gonna win, nobody would have known any of this stuff, and they just unleashed the
intelligence community. Look at the unmaskings. We haven't heard anything about that yet.
Look at the way they violated the rights of all those American citizens."
Yes, very interesting interview with Kallstrom -- on mainstream media, which is important.
Seems too many people understand what's really transpired for Trump -- or anyone -- to be in
mortal danger. We'll see.
Brennan's tweet suggests he knows the walls are closing in on him.
I agree. If you're very strong, you don't bother making public threats against powerful
people. You just break their backs without comment. Brennan comes across like he's been
backed into a corner where he has no weapons and from which he knows there is no escape.
It is what I already sussed out, Paul. In reading Whitney's piece, it reminded me that
over the last eight years the State Department in their press gatherings continuously mocked
any RT reporters and disrespected them. You could easily surmise from this that they had a
hand in these propaganda smears and lies.
Dave P. , March 20, 2018 at 1:53 am
"Mike Whitney suspects that John Brennan was the mastermind behind Russia-gate."
Looking at the pictures of Barack Obama with John Brennen, they seemed to have very cozy
relationship. I wonder about Obama's role in this Russia-Gate. There are many unanswered
questions about the top-echelons' role in this bizarre drama which may end up in many ominous
consequences for the country and for the World.
Dave P(et.al.) it's getting more involved every day. It is interesting that the interview
was on Fox as it indicates prominent Republicans may be leaning towards a more thorough
investigation. However, if the investigation includes an inquiry into Cambridge Analytica
they are likely to find that most of the fake news on Facebook that was influential in
throwing the election to Trump was the result of Breitbart strategy with no Russian
connection. Some Republicans may be willing to do this, but if it were conclusive I doubt
whether either the Democrats or the Trump administration would come out on top; there are
very few innocents that didn't add to the stench of the swamp. BTW: thanks for that valuable
link B.E.!
How will it end, or will it go on without end?
This feasting on blood that these demons depend
Will these diabolical devils ever be arraigned and indicted
And will we ever see the land of the free tried and convicted?
[more info at link below]
http://graysinfo.blogspot.ca/2017/04/is-this-land-of-free.html
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --
-- -- --
"It has become embarrassing to be an American. Our country has had four war criminal
presidents in succession. Clinton twice launched military attacks on Serbia, ordering NATO to
bomb the former Yugoslavia twice, both in 1995 and in 1999, so that gives Bill two war
crimes. George W. Bush invaded Afghanistan and Iraq and attacked provinces of Pakistan and
Yemen from the air. That comes to four war crimes for Bush. Obama used NATO to destroy Libya
and sent mercenaries to destroy Syria, thereby committing two war crimes. Trump attacked
Syria with US forces, thereby becoming a war criminal early in his regime."
Paul Craig Roberts, Information Clearing House, April 15/16, 2017.
Yes, this "H.W., Kuwait" is the war crime that started the era of ruthless war-making in
which we are now trapped. It is the era of the kicked-down Vietnam Syndrome, where we are
free once again to enrich our mercenary corporations as we project our military force
'exceptionally' to 'creatively destroy' in our noble quest to guide the world to do things
our way. Some may recall how, back then, the pundit and Congressional classes deployed
propaganda that was the prototype for what we have since become accustomed to. "We are doing
this for peace, so all you dissenters shut up." Nobody then would acknowledge that we had
covertly -- and treacherously -- aided and abetted both Iran and Iraq during their 8-year war
that immediately preceded our war. (Hush, hush, wink, wink, said the media.) Thus, we had no
moral or legal standing to pronounce any country guilty of 'aggression', as we did Saddam's
country, who we had also green-lighted into settling his border dispute with force. That
alone was enough to reveal our collective disregard for Muslim life. The rules of engagement
that allowed water treatment plants to be bombed only confirmed our disregard. Warnings of
unintended (or intended?) consequences then, as later, went unheeded, such as the certainty
of blow back when one betrays so many peoples of the world who thought we had 'principles'.
Is it any wonder there was blow back, such as the 1993 World Trade Center bombing? (By the
way, Rep. Dick Gephardt, criticized in this article, eventually led a valiant but futile
effort to derail the war momentum in the House.) Peace.
Paul Craig Roberts is a bit off. Each of the war crimes he mentions were waging wars of
aggression. But there were a multitude of lesser war crimes committed in each of those wars.
And his count is off. Bush's wars on Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, and Yemen did not cease
being wars of aggression in 2008 simply because 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue acquired new tenants
that year. Obama gets credit for the continuation of those four wars in addition to the wars
first launched while he was in office. And Trump likewise must be given credit for his
continuations of wars of aggression launched by his predecessors.
Michael Kenny , March 19, 2018 at 11:01 am
For over 50 years, I have applied the rule that I never take the word of anyone who has
ever been connected with the CIA.
Skip Scott , March 20, 2018 at 8:21 am
Bullshit. I've seen your posts going back months, and you are a typical MSM propaganda
apologist. If you know anything about "Operation Mockingbird", then you know that all of your
past comments are "connected with the CIA".
Realist , March 20, 2018 at 11:17 pm
I'm telling ya, the guy seems like the amazing schizoid man these days.
faraday's law , March 19, 2018 at 11:05 am
I think the intelligence agencies are the true source of nearly all of the
problems..instead of gathering intelligence the IAs are effecting the events about which the
intelligence is supposed to be about. Certainty Intelligence agencies can be credited with
9/11 and the war on Iraq. Interconnected between nations, shuffling in open-source form,
secret sharing, false flag event production, and media delivered propaganda are activities
which define the intelligence agencies. Secret means slave citizens are denied the knowledge
that would allow them to understand how corrupt our societies are; so that the leaders of
such societies can continue in the office that commands the power.
Linda Wood , March 20, 2018 at 6:24 pm
Brilliantly stated, faraday's law. You've raised the all-important point that the
intelligence agencies are are not simply gathering intelligence, they are also engaging in
covert action, unlawfully, unaccountably, and unscrutinized. For all we know they could be
spending their virtually unlimited funds on creating our enemies, thereby creating a need for
our military industrial complex, the only entity that benefits from their work.
Dr. Ip , March 19, 2018 at 11:17 am
Seems like the two wings of the Anglo-American establishment alliance are working in
concert to defeat all who stand in their way and regain dominance over the western world. In
Britain, Teresa May and the Tories -- who are losing popularity to the resurgent Labour party
and its progressive leader Jeremy Corbyn -- are trying to blame Russia for a nerve agent
attack. The blame game over there is evidence-free of course and the lies and weasel-word
assertions are being effectively countered by, among others, ex-Ambassador Craig Murray (
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/
) in post after post.
Over here, where the establishment Democrats and their cabal of friendly old Republicans
(think: Mitt Romney) have lost their hold on direct power, they are trying to assert it
through their long-time henchmen in the intelligence services. Ever since Wild Bill Donovan
and the Dulles brothers, the intelligence services have been looking after their own survival
and proliferation (and the profits of their masters) while, as a side-benefit, the United
States got some security.
This clash of the services with Trump is only the latest in a series of clashes which
Presidents have mostly lost (Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Carter, even Obama backed
down after he became President) unless they were card-carrying members of the clan like Bush
the First. So, you can expect Trump to lose as well unless he has the armed forces behind him
and can purge the services of his enemies. We actually might have a night of the long knives
coming. The question is of course if Caesar can survive the knifings!
Not that this Caesar is an Augustus or Marcus Aurelius
You present some interesting points, but John Brennan is no "Wild Bill Donovan" or
even a William Casey with the backup of the fraternity of OSS which no longer has meetings.
It seems to me that Brennan's and his diminishing followers' power lies with the media that
has done the dance of "valued sources" and perception manipulation of the masses. Actually,
"night of the long knives" occurred in Saudi Arabia when Prince "Bandar Bush" was captured
and "interviewed" not by the FBI or the CIA, but most probably by individuals with videos of
confessions which summarized the long history of the activities involving operatives
conducting activities during the presidential administrations of both political parties but
continuously for clans such as the Bush Dynasty and assorted associates within the
institutions that are now domestically profiting from the policies of the President.
Yes, Pres. Trump and his advisers (such as Peter Thiel and even possibly Erik Prince and
individuals of varied backgrounds possibly to even include Rabbis, Cardinals and other wise
men not members of the Brookings Institution or the CFR) knew the obstacles and the nature of
the enemies that would unit against a Populist Movement. In addition to advisers aware of the
cyber world and the underworld of intelligence/counter-intelligence operations, advisers
aware of the functioning of institutions and how institutions change their "culture" were
absolutely necessary when the "resistance" was sending the message non-stop that Pres. Trump
was only a temporary resident of the White House, and he would follow the path of Nixon, but
in short order! Well, it seems that even the FBI is cleaning house internally and even
Brennan's supporters within the old intelligence community leadership are giving their
endorsement to the President's choice for CIA Dir. and she has a loyal following among the
rank and file members of that institution.
Yes, ministers of Egypt wanted to present documents on the Muslim Brotherhood and it's
relationship with the Obama Adm.; and Prince Salman will probably bring gifts during his
State Visit. Pres. Trump and his team will decide the time and date to unwrap the evidence
that will shatter the camera lens and stop the presses! No knives or guns, please!
"Moral turpitude is a legal concept in the United States and some other countries that
refers to "an act or behavior that gravely violates the sentiment or accepted standard of the
community".[1] This term appears in U.S. immigration law beginning in the 19th
century.[2]"
I guess the "community" Brennan was referring to was the Deep State. Not willingly but
perhaps fortuitously Trump finds himself on the battlefield playing David and Goliath is
there wearing a stone proof helmet. Obama liked to go after leakers, so long as the were
underling leakers. If Trump is successful, which is to be hoped for but unlikely, how will
the New York Times and Washington Post fill their editorial pages?
Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely, which is a paraphrase but apt.
But beyond this crisis is the larger one of how to harness the Deep State to reflect
the nation's interests, not those few who run things now. Some say start to rid foreign
intelligence of its operational arm which has been at the forefront of regime change and
other mischief.
Sam F , March 19, 2018 at 1:00 pm
Yes, the CIA operations division should be made small because it is abused for the
hidden agendas of oligarchy, that the People would never approve. It should be monitored by
an agency reporting directly to Congress.
Joe Wallace , March 19, 2018 at 3:32 pm
Herman and Sam F:
"But beyond this crisis is the larger one of how to harness the Deep State to reflect the
nation's interests, not those few who run things now. Some say start to rid foreign
intelligence of its operational arm which has been at the forefront of regime change and
other mischief."
"Yes, the CIA operations division should be made small because it is abused for the hidden
agendas of oligarchy, that the People would never approve. It should be monitored by an
agency reporting directly to Congress."
Not until Citizens United v FEC is overturned will we have a foreign policy that reflects
the nation's interests, administered by elected officials who actually represent the will of
the electorate. The Deep State, through the CIA, pursues a foreign policy that is often
at odds with the wishes of the vast majority of the people in this country .
Sam F , March 20, 2018 at 6:55 am
Yes, but the judiciary that decided Citizens United are corruption leaders installed by
corrupt politicians installed by the dictatorship of the rich. Until the rich are overthrown
there will be no democracy in the US.
I believe the system has become corrupted. The same people who parrot the words "rule of
law" are according to numerous reports working hand in glove with terrorists. They even pass
"laws" against terrorism, while at the same time consorting with terrorists. I guess "our
hypocrite leaders" are above the law? The latest horrific terrorist bombing in Manchester
raises questions about the spy agency "MI5."
[read more at link below] http://graysinfo.blogspot.ca/2017/06/has-system-become-corrupted.html
mike k , March 19, 2018 at 12:13 pm
Our problem is how to shock the American public into awareness of who their real enemies
are: the Oligarchs, Deep State, Zionazis, MSM, MIC. What kind of major disclosure could start
the ball rolling? What kind of outrage would be too much for the zombified public to brush
off and continue sleeping? What the hell would it take to knock the middle class out of it's
putrid comfort zone?
Linda Wood , March 20, 2018 at 7:04 pm
zendeviant, I think it will come to a national refusal to fund illegal activity on the
part of our federal government. I don't think it will come to violence, which would
accomplish less than nothing. Instead, I think the American people will take legal action to
stop the hemorrhage of black funding.
Skip Scott , March 21, 2018 at 10:22 am
Linda-
Funding is not the issue. They just print the money and give it out. Our tax dollars are
just demanded to make sure we are in submission. The Pentagon isn't even audited, and at this
point would be impossible to audit. Legal action requires an uncompromised judiciary. Haven't
seen that in my lifetime. It will take real "boots on the ground" from the people to get any
real change. TPTB will only budge when their backs are against the wall.
Sam F , March 20, 2018 at 7:54 am
Fair question, Mike, although perhaps annoying at times to very well-meaning people.
Middle class comfort is indeed the security of a corrupt government, and so affluence
destroys democracy.
As you know, I have advocated a College of Policy Debate constituted to protect all points
of view, and to conduct moderated text-only debate among university experts of several
disciplines, of the status and possibilities of each world region, and the policy options.
Debate summaries commented by all sides are to be made available for public study and
comment.
The debates would require a higher standard of argument in foreign and domestic policy on
all sides, and would have much reduced the group-think that led to our endless mad wars since
WWII. Extreme and naïve politicians would be easier to expose, and media commentators
would have a starting point and a standard for media investigation and analysis.
While most politicians will ignore and attack careful analysis, and "the common man avoids
the truth [because] it is dangerous, no good can come of it, and it doesn't pay" (Mencken),
the CPD can bring the knowledge of society into public debate, educate the electorate,
discourage propaganda, and expose the wrongs of society and the corruption of government that
desperately need reform.
If such a rational mechanism fails to awaken the public and cause reform, then we are
doomed to overthrow of the dictatorship of the rich, requiring far greater degradation to
motivate the people, and greater violence than any previous revolution due to the advance of
technology. I fear that both will in fact occur, after a long era of US corruption.
Deniz , March 19, 2018 at 12:36 pm
Brennans screech confirms that Trump is not just smoke and mirrors. He really hit the
bureaucracy where it hurts, their pensions -- brilliant move.
orwell , March 19, 2018 at 1:15 pm
It's nice to see that everybody here agrees about this situation. Really refreshing, and
no pro-CIA/FBI TROLLS !!!!!!
I remember that Larry Johnson described this threat in detail more than a year ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMkR_5Sesgg
It was on RT but he made a lot of sense. Appears to have been vindicated.
backwardsevolution , March 19, 2018 at 4:39 pm
Herry Smith -- thanks for posting that interview. Larry Johnson was excellent, articulate,
and he's going to be proven right.
Gregory Kruse , March 19, 2018 at 2:05 pm
"Shortly before his re-election in 2012, Obama reportedly was braced at a small dinner
party by wealthy donors who wanted to know whatever happened to the 'progressive Obama.' The
President did not take kindly to the criticism, rose from the table, and said, 'Don't you
remember what happened to Dr. King?'"
Dr. Ip , March 19, 2018 at 3:06 pm
" Trump and Brennan represent equally criminal factions of the ruling class, divided
over foreign policy, particularly in the civil war in Syria, and more generally towards
Russia.
Brennan and the Democrats speak for powerful sections of the military-intelligence
apparatus embittered by the failure of US intervention in Syria and Trump's apparent
abandonment of the Islamic fundamentalist groups armed by the CIA to fight the Russian and
Iranian-backed government of President Bashar al-Assad. They want to push further into the
Syrian slaughter, regardless of the risk of open military conflict with Russia, the world's
second strongest nuclear power. "
It is imperative to bring about a cleansing of the FBI and DOJ, removing high-ranking
officials who place politics and personal agendas ahead of enforcing the law fairly and
without bias. Will that mean a "war" with the deep state? Or are there enough people within
the FBI and DOJ who WANT to remove the stains from their agencies? If so, we may see more
corruption exposed in the coming days.
A cleansing of the CIA or NSA is probably not feasible, even though it is sorely needed. If
the president tried, he would probably be regime-changed.
Bob Van Noy , March 19, 2018 at 3:39 pm
Craig Murray has been totally reliable on Russiagate from the beginning. There is an
excellent synopsis of his web reporting with commentary at Unz for those interested.
http://www.unz.com/article/russian-to-judgement/
JWalters , March 19, 2018 at 10:24 pm
Excellent link. Thanks very much. His theory that the murder of the ex-Russian spy in
England was an Israeli false flag operation seems to me the most plausible theory, for the
reasons he states. And it fits so well into the overall picture.
KiwiAntz , March 19, 2018 at 4:03 pm
What a Banana Republic America has become? Russia has just had it's election & we have
had all the usual negative comments by Western Leaders regarding Putin & Russia's
supposed lack of a democratic process in voting?
Russians, at least, voted for a well known individual in Putin with a proven track record,
so they know exactly what they can look forward to, secure in that knowledge of certainty?
Russia has no Deepstate puppeteer's pulling the strings behind the scenes!
Contrast that with America? The whole Political system is corrupt & dominated by
Corporate money paying off its Leaders? The sick joke is America claims it's a Democracy
which it isn't? It's a Fascist Oligarchy ruled by a unelected Deepstate, & it doesn't
matter what Party or Leader you voted for, the Deepstate, shadow Govt never just marches on
& rules?
It also raises the issue, is there any point in American's actually getting out &
voting every 4 yrs, they may as well just stay home & have a beer instead, as this
electoral process is a complete & utter farce! America's Deepstate Govt doesn't need or
care for your vote? Your vote doesn't matter in the overall scheme of things? And that, by
definition, is what America has become, a Banana Republic!
Typingperson , March 20, 2018 at 12:47 am
True. And sad.
Michael Wilk , March 19, 2018 at 4:06 pm
Speaking for myself, I'd love nothing more than to see that degenerate orange-painted
child take the intel agencies and their scum-willing leaders down several pegs, just to
remind them who is supposed to be working for whom. Alas, the Great Orange Dope hasn't the
brains to do anything but screw things up. But give the boy credit for trying, bless his
toupée-glue-crusted head.
backwardsevolution , March 19, 2018 at 5:04 pm
Dumb like a fox: to be smart or cunning, but pretend you don't know what you're doing.
President Trump is letting them hang themselves. As someone said above, he is smoking them
out. It is working beautifully too. Who, besides Trump, could have or would have put up with
what he's had to contend with? It took a tough, hard-shelled individual who wouldn't cow,
someone who would hang in there long enough while the others (the Inspector General,
intelligence committees) could do their work.
I grant you that President Trump's brain is not like Slick Willy's or polished smooth like
the last Narcissist in Chief, but he's right about a lot of things: you can't have a country
without borders; you can't have a country without making your own steel and a healthy
manufacturing base; and you can't have a country run by the intelligence agencies.
I'm putting my money on Trump.
Michael Wilk , March 19, 2018 at 5:50 pm
That might be true if this country respected the borders of other nations or if it
actually brought back steel-making and a healthy manufacturing base. But Caligula Drumpf
never intended to bring any of that back, nor will he even try. Oh, he'll make a few token
statements bragging about his exaggerated actions having actually achieved success, but
that's all it will be is empty boasting. Let's face it: Drumpf supporters were had.
backwardsevolution , March 19, 2018 at 6:11 pm
Too early to call. It took years to ship all of the jobs overseas (thanks, Slick Willy!),
and it will take years to bring them back. Did you think Trump was magical, that he could
bring the jobs back in one year with the wave of a wand or something? I mean, he's been a tad
busy fighting the intelligence community, hasn't he?
If given the chance, he will secure the borders, decrease immigration, institute a
merit-based immigration system, bring some jobs back (a lot are being automated). The
globalists are losing, but it takes time.
The Swamp will take time to drain as well, but it's proceeding along quite nicely.
But Drumpf won't even try to bring the jobs back. This is not a matter of how quickly he
can do something he's never going to do, but about his will to actually follow through on his
campaign promises. There's simply no reason to believe Drumpf will bother. Why would he? He's
got no stake in bringing manufacturing back to the U.S.
Bart Hansen , March 19, 2018 at 5:28 pm
That "six ways from Sunday" saying may keep Schumer in line; but for Trump, what could
they possibly have against him that would in the least embarrass or bother his voters,
himself or his family? Day after day he crosses a variety of moral red lines.
F. G. Sanford , March 19, 2018 at 6:22 pm
That "moral turpitude" reference seems to imply that there is some -- yet to be
revealed -- scandal held in abeyance, fully capable of delivering a decisive blow. And, the
"deep staters" are merely waiting for the right moment to pull this shark-toothed rabbit out
of the hat. I can't help but wonder what you suspect they'll try next, Ray but this
whole thing reminds me of an old friend's advice given to me during a dark and desolate
period of my own life: "If they had something really good, they'd have used it by now."
jaycee , March 19, 2018 at 7:23 pm
A word of caution -- the intensely partisan fighting may induce a certain fascination as a
spectator, like eye-witnessing the aftermath of a vehicle accident, but what is happening is
without precedent, at least in modern history. Former heads of the nation's top
intelligence organization do not attack sitting presidents, let alone in such a visceral
vituperative and public fashion. This is indication of deep fissures, quite beyond politics
as most citizens understand. As the World Socialist Web Site published today: "There is no
recent parallel for statements and actions such as those of the past three days. One would
have to go back to the period before the American Civil War to find equivalent levels of
tension, which in the late 1850s erupted in violence in the halls of Congress before
exploding in full-scale military conflict."
Trump is a maverick outsider so it's hard to get a handle on what or who he
represents, but the Brennan/deep state side of the dispute is very much aligned with the
corporate DNC Democratic Party. That they seem, by Brennan's comments, to consider themselves
as the representation of "America" as they abandon constitutional and etiquette norms and
articulate visceral hatred towards political rivals should serve as fair warning.
backwardsevolution , March 19, 2018 at 8:25 pm
jaycee -- great post. I agree with what you've said: what is happening IS without
precedent, Brennan/deep state ARE aligned with the Democrats, and they believe only THEY
represent the true "America".
Dangerous game by very dangerous people who are systematically destroying the Constitution
in their quest to retain power.
Over and over I've heard people who know Trump well say that he listens to them, but then
makes up his own mind. They say he wants to stay true to what he promised to the American
people, that that is actually important to him. Of course he's willing to compromise some,
but he wants the basics of what he promised.
If the Swamp takes him out, the lid is going to come off.
Kevin Zeese: "He basically is a Senator for Israel. He totally supports the Israeli
foreign policy viewpoint, which is a very hawkish, if you were a Republican you would call
him a neocon."
Ariel Gold: "He has come out in strong opposition to the Boycott Divestment and Sanctions
movement and was very supportive of New York Governor Cuomo's order to ban BDS in New York
state, and Schumer made a direct statement in support of that."
Thomas Hedges: "Schumer's staunch support for Israel has prompted him for example, to
criticize the Obama administration, when in 2016, the United States abstained from a UN
Security Council resolution re-affirming something the Council had almost unanimously upheld
since 1979. Namely, that Israel's settlement building projects on Palestinian land violated
international law."
Ben Norton: "Schumer criticized the Obama administration for abstaining on this very basic
resolution, which every other country voted for. So the US was still a pariah, because the US
didn't vote for it, it just abstained on it. But to Schumer that was not enough, he wanted it
to be completely vetoed, because anything that Israel does is sacrosanct, and anyone who
criticizes it, in Schumer's eyes, is not someone he wants to ally with politically, so he'd
rather affectively ally with Trump."
Thomas Hedges: "The most recent showing of that allegiance was [ ] when Schumer supported
Trump's decision to launch an air strike on an Air Force base in Syria, something Israel also
strongly supported. [ ] But perhaps Schumer's greatest show of allegiance to Israel, was his
decision to oppose the Iran nuclear deal, without which experts have warned, would put the
United States and Iran on a collision course."
Ben Norton: "Under President Obama, Schumer was one of the most prominent Democrats to
oppose the Iran nuclear deal, and he was of course fearmongering about Iran, which to him is
the devil incarnate, and he actually made factually false statements about the nuclear
agreement, and claimed that it would allow Iran in 10 years to produce nuclear weapons
etc."
Thomas Hedges: "Leading up to his decision, Schumer reassured Zionists that he was
consulting the most credentialed men in Washington, including Henry Kissinger, an opponent of
the deal, and the man who orchestrated the violent coup in Chile that toppled its
democratically elected leader, as well as the architect of the very bloody Vietnam war."
Chuck Schumer: I spent some time with Dr. Kissinger, I'm spending time with
excellence.
Ariel Gold: So it threatened to pull us into another war, and we're back in that threat
again with Trump winning the election we hear a lot about undoing the Iran nuclear deal, and
it's one of the things that Israel has been saying they would like to see come out of the
Trump administration.
Thomas Hedges: Schumer's willingness to oppose the deal early on, which created an opening
for other undecided Democrats to do the same, is a strong display of support for Israel.
JWalters , March 19, 2018 at 10:32 pm
Spot on about Chuck Schumer. The following link, from a Jewish-run, anti-Zionist website,
proves that Schumer lies to Americans for the benefit of Israel. He puts Israel's interests
above those of the US. He is an Israeli mole in the US government. "Schumer says he
opposed the Iran deal because of 'threat to Israel'"http://mondoweiss.net/2018/03/schumer-opposed-because/
Opus Doi , March 19, 2018 at 7:40 pm
America will triumph over you. Wo wo wo. Wo wo wo. Doo doo-doo doo doo! ?
Brennan is history's most hilarious DCI. His grandiose hissy fit suggests that CIA
continues the Dulles tradition of infiltrating the civil service with 'focal points -'
illegal CIA moles infiltrating US government agencies -- and the IG fumigated one key out in
firing McCabe.
backwardsevolution , March 19, 2018 at 8:35 pm
Opus Doi -- and the MSM and the Left see the "crime" being that McCabe was fired, not
that McCabe broke the law. Kind of like when they didn't see a crime in Hillary using her own
personal servers, but saw the crime as being that the emails might have been hacked by a
foreign government. That they had no evidence of this didn't matter.
Brennan sounds like a desperate man. They must be getting closer to him.
Opus Doi , March 20, 2018 at 7:56 am
See how this works? The article is about Brennan. The comment is about Brennan's CIA.
But immersive CIA propaganda immediately diverts the topic to CIA's synthetic warring
factions, Hillary! Trump! Hillary! Trump!
People need to come to grips with the fact that the past four presidents -- the ones you
hate and the ones you like -- were all drawn from CIA nomenklatura. DCI Bush; Bill Clinton,
recruited by Cord Meyer at Oxford; spy brat and hopeless Arubusto 'wildcatter' GW Bush; and
Obama, son of spooks, grandson of spooks, greased into Harvard by Alwaleed bin-Talal's
bagman, invisible student at Columbia, honored guest of the future acting president of
Pakistan before his career even started. Before CIA took over directly they thwarted (Truman,
Eisenhower's disarmament plan, Carter's human rights initiative,) purged (Nixon, Carter,)
shot at (Ford,) and shot (Kennedy, Reagan) their presidential figureheads.
CIA runs your country. You're not going to get anywhere until you stop bickering about
their presidential puppet rulers.
Kenneth Rapoza , March 19, 2018 at 8:46 pm
Who makes the laws? He who makes the laws can break the laws. I would bet my life that
Brenna, Hillary and all the "deep state" actors do not see one second in jail nor pay a
nickel in fines.
backwardsevolution , March 19, 2018 at 10:22 pm
Comey and McCabe were fired for breaking the law. Lots of laws have been broken. The only
thing separating the U.S. and a Third World country is the Rule of Law. Start breaking laws
and looking the other way on corruption and you've got a Banana Republic. Jail time coming up
for some of them.
E. Leete , March 20, 2018 at 1:29 pm
"Give me control over a nation's money and I care not who makes the laws." -- Meyer A
Rothschild
Whoever controls the creation and destruction of money, as well as credit regulation (this
is the deep state; the massive financial matrix including the MIC -- all run by wealthpower
giants with their insatiable desires for power to control nothing less than the entire
planet) controls the government including the spook/spy agencies (this is the shadow
government).
the two are intimately connected, of course, and function thru unbridled unconstitutional
powers of secrecy -- empowered by the state secrets privilege
nothing changes until we once and for all time do away with the bankers having the power
to issue our money as debt
because, again, it all starts with private control of money creation -- the most enormous
farce in all of history and it rules yet today
"The real truth of the matter is, as you and I know, that a financial element in the large
centers has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson." -- Franklin Delano
Roosevelt
"Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no
allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people." -- Theodore Roosevelt
"Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men's views confided to me privately. Some
of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid
of somebody, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized,
so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not
speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it." -- Woodrow Wilson
The mention of John Brennan brings to mind the bizarre death of Rolling Stone's
writer, Michael Hastings, who was reported to be working on a story about Brennan just before
he had his "accident".
Imagine if a Trump tweet alleged that a man who was found guilty by the FBI was really
innocent. Imagine if Trump tweeted that a man was really guilty despite no evidence found
after almost 2 years of investigation.
What would be the response to either tweet be from the MS Media? Our MS Media is
nothing more than Democrat Propaganda, and that situation will doom us to Russian
interference. Every election the Russians can do the same as 2016: release the truth about
justice not served.
Skip Scott , March 20, 2018 at 1:00 pm
Michael-
I'm no fan of Trump, but Hillary had absolutely no intention to "address the needs of the
people". They are all globalizing warmongers who know how to say what needs to be said to get
elected, and then do whatever their paymasters tell them. Hillary's speeches to her banker
buddies unearthed via Podesta's email account show that she felt it necessary to have
"private views" separate from her "public views". How much plainer could it be than that!
j. D. D. , March 20, 2018 at 7:59 am
"Does one collect a full pension in jail?" Brilliant, provocative and persuasive, in the
way that any follower of Ray McGovern has come to expect.
Abe , March 21, 2018 at 11:38 am
As the Russia-gate fictions erode and Israel-gate emerges, the Hasbara troll army is
scraping the bottom of the propaganda barrel.
Here we have "j. D. D." and the shrill refrain of "BobS"
Comrade "BobS" and fellow Hasbara troll "will" are positively obsessed about Reagan era
"dirty wars" Central and South America. That's understandable.
Israel has advised, trained and equipped, and ran "dirty war" operations in the Latin
American "dirty war" conflicts in Argentina, El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and Colombia.
In the case of the Salvadoran "bloodbath", the Israelis were present from the beginning.
Besides arms sales, they helped train ANSESAL, the secret police who were later to form the
framework of the infamous death squads that would kill tens of thousands of mostly civilian
activists.
McGovern certainly understands what sort of "ally" Israel can be.
So keep on yappin' "BobS". We got you.
IsItAnyWonder , March 20, 2018 at 11:10 am
USMC activated. Well, I'd put my two-cents on POTUS. Just like we've all seen
throughout our lives when the supposed tough guy starts making threats he is really scared
Sh**less. Lots of these clowns are just going to disappear during the late night hours of the
day never to be heard from again.
Our society is sitting on a knifes edge, anything at all happens to Trump and the entire
nation will just burn to the ground with literal blood in the streets. No one needs to pound
their chest and say what tough guy acts they will do since most of the heavy lifting is
already going on with Spec Ops and very soon USMC.
Most of us would not have the skills are knowledge to do what is needed. Foggy Bottom is
about to get a big enema along with the CIA to our benefit. Guys like Brennan are scared
rats in a sinking ship, good riddance!
geeyp , March 20, 2018 at 3:05 pm
Excuse me Mr. Williamson, I think you are precisely right. This indeed is the time to get
it all out. Expose it all. Lay it all out and go for it. These people have it coming to
them.
will , March 20, 2018 at 1:23 pm
What an amazingly illuminating article. Devin Nunes, who perfectly ok with wire taps
as long as the target aren't from his party is somehow a noble individual. While I agree that
Brennan should be in prison, it should be for torturing people ...
Abe , March 21, 2018 at 12:18 pm
As the Russia-gate fictions erode and Israel-gate emerges, the Hasbara propaganda troll
army keeps on sending in the clowns.
Comrade "will" and his fellow Hasbara troll "BobS" recite the same propaganda script,
going on and on about the war in Latin America.
Of course, the trolls never mention the fact that the US government, especially the CIA,
recruited an all-too-eager Israel to "support" the Central and South American military forces
and intelligence units engaged in violent and widespread repression during the Reagan and
Bush era "dirty wars".
Recently declassified 1983 US government documents have obtained by the Washington,
DC-based National Security Archives through the Freedom of Information Act. One such
declassified document is a 1983 memo from the notorious Colonel Oliver North of the Reagan
Administration's National Security Council and reads: "As discussed with you yesterday, I
asked CIA, Defense, and State to suggest practical assistance which the Israelis might offer
in Guatemala and El Salvador."
Another document, this time a 1983 cable from the US Ambassador in Guatemala to Washington
Frederic Chapin shows the money trail. Chapin says that at a time when the US did not want to
be seen directly assisting Guatemala, "we have reason to believe that our good friends the
Israelis are prepared, or already have, offered substantial amounts of military equipment to
the GOG (Government of Guatemala) on credit terms up to 20 years (I pass over the importance
of making huge concessionary loans to Israel so that it can make term loans in our own
backyard)."
The Reagan and Bush era "dirty wars" were bad enough. The Israeli-Saudi-US Axis jumped the
shark with Bush the Lesser and Obama wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria. Under Trump,
Israel remains only to happy to continue providing "support" for Al Qaeda and ISIS.
So keep on blabbin', Hasbara troll team mates "will" and "BobS". We got you.
Drogon , March 20, 2018 at 6:45 pm
"It is an open secret that the CIA has been leaking like the proverbial sieve over the
last two years or so" And this is supposed to be a bad thing? I'm sorry, but the more leaks
the better IMO.
Drogon, You're right; usually the more leaks the better ..BUT these are "AUTHORIZED" leaks
to co-opted journalists and PR people like Palmieri designed to give some "substance" to
Russia-gate, for example. ray
The Nuremberg judges rejected the Nuremberg defense, and both Jodl and Keitel were hanged.
The United Nations International Law Commission later codified the
underlying principle from Nuremberg as "the fact that a person acted pursuant to order of his
Government or of a superior does not relieve him from responsibility under international law,
provided a moral choice was in fact possible to him."
John Brennan, who ran the CIA under President Barack Obama, made similar remarks on Tuesday
when asked about Haspel. The Bush administration had decided that its torture program was
legal,
said Brennan , and Haspel "tried to carry out her duties at CIA to the best of her ability,
even when the CIA was asked to do some very difficult things."
Article of interest at link below.
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --
"WASHINGTON BREAKS OUT THE "JUST FOLLOWING ORDERS" NAZI DEFENSE FOR CIA DIRECTOR-DESIGNATE
GINA HASPEL"
Jon Schwarz
"... It is an open secret that the CIA has been leaking like the proverbial sieve over the last two years or so to its favorite stenographers at the New York Times ..."
"... Washington Post. ..."
"... Wall Street Journal ..."
"... On April 6, 2017 I attended a panel discussion on "Russia's interference in our democracy" at the Clinton/Podesta Center for American Progress Fund. In my subsequent write-up I noted that panelist Palmieri had inadvertently dropped tidbits of evidence that I suggested "could get some former officials in deep kimchi -- if a serious investigation of leaking, for example, were to be conducted." ..."
"... Palmieri was asked to comment on "what was actually going on in late summer/early fall [2016]." She answered: "It was a surreal experience so I did appreciate that for the press to absorb the idea that behind the stage that the Trump campaign was coordinating with Russia to defeat Hillary Clinton was too fantastic for people to, um, for the press to process, to absorb . ..."
"... But she lost. And a month ago, House Intelligence Committee Chair Devin Nunes (R-CA) threw down the gauntlet, indicating that there could be legal consequences, for example, for officials who misled the FISA court in order to enable surveillance on Trump and associates. ..."
"... John Brennan is widely reported to be Nunes's next target. Does one collect a full pension in jail? ..."
"... Unmasking: Senior national security officials are permitted to ask the National Security Agency to unmask the names of Americans in intercepted communications for national security reasons -- not for domestic political purposes. ..."
"... Brennan's words and attitude are a not-so-subtle reminder of the heavy influence and confidence of the deep state, including the media -- exercised to a fare-thee-well over the past two years. ..."
"... Meanwhile, the Washington Post ..."
"... The Post, incidentally, waited until paragraph 41 of 44 to inform readers that it was the FBI's own Office of Professional Responsibility and the Inspector General of the Department of Justice that found McCabe guilty, and that the charge was against McCabe, not the FBI. A quite different impression was conveyed by the large headline "Trump escalates attacks on FBI" as well as the first 40 paragraphs of Sunday's lead article. ..."
"... "Let me tell you, you take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you," Schumer told Maddow. "So even for a practical, supposedly hard-nosed businessman, he's being really dumb to do this." Did Maddow ask Schumer if he was saying President of the United States should be afraid of the intelligence community? No, she let Schumer's theorem stand. ..."
With former CIA Director John Brennan accusing President Donald Trump of "moral turpitude"
for his "scapegoating" of Andy McCabe, it remains to be seen whether a constitutional crisis
will be averted, writes Ray McGovern.
What prompted former CIA Director John Brennan on Saturday to accuse President Donald Trump
of "moral turpitude" and to predict, with an alliterative flourish, that Trump will end up "as
a disgraced demagogue in the dustbin of history"? The answer shines through the next sentence
in Brennan's threatening tweet : "You
may scapegoat Andy McCabe [former FBI Deputy Director fired Friday night] but you will not
destroy America America will triumph over you."
It is easy to see why Brennan lost it. The Attorney General fired McCabe, denying him full
retirement benefits, because McCabe "had made an unauthorized disclosure to the news media and
lacked candor -- including under oath -- on multiple occasions." There but for the grace of God
go I, Brennan must have thought, whose stock in trade has been unauthorized disclosures.
In fact, Brennan can take but small, short-lived consolation in the fact that he succeeded
in leaving with a full government pension. His own unauthorized disclosures and leaks probably
dwarf in number, importance, and sensitivity those of McCabe. And many of those leaks appear to
have been based on sensitive intercepted conversations from which the names of American
citizens were unmasked for political purposes. Not to mention the leaks of faux intelligence
like that contained in the dubious "dossier" cobbled together for the Democrats by British
ex-spy Christopher Steele.
It is an open secret that the CIA has been leaking like the proverbial sieve over the
last two years or so to its favorite stenographers at the New York Times and
Washington Post. (At one point, the obvious whispering reached the point that the
Wall Street Journal saw fit to complain that it was being neglected.) The leaking can
be traced way back -- at least as far as the Clinton campaign's decision to blame the Russians
for the publication of very damning DNC emails by WikiLeaks just three days before the
Democratic National Convention.
This blame game turned out to be a hugely successful effort to divert attention from the
content of the emails, which showed in bas relief the dirty tricks the DNC
played on Bernie Sanders. The media readily fell in line, and all attention was deflected from
the substance of the DNC emails to the question as to why the Russians supposedly
"hacked into the DNC and gave the emails to WikiLeaks."
This media operation worked like a charm, but even Secretary Clinton's PR person, Jennifer
Palmieri, conceded later that at first it strained credulity that the Russians would be doing
what they were being accused of doing.
Magnificent Diversion
On April 6, 2017 I attended a panel discussion on "Russia's interference in our
democracy" at the Clinton/Podesta Center for American Progress Fund. In my subsequent write-up I noted that panelist
Palmieri had inadvertently dropped tidbits of evidence that I suggested "could get some former
officials in deep kimchi -- if a serious investigation of leaking, for example, were to be
conducted." (That time seems to be coming soon.)
Palmieri was asked to comment on "what was actually going on in late summer/early fall
[2016]." She answered: "It was a surreal experience so I did appreciate that for the press to
absorb the idea that behind the stage that the Trump campaign was coordinating with Russia to
defeat Hillary Clinton was too fantastic for people to, um, for the press to process, to absorb
.
"But then we go back to Brooklyn [Clinton headquarters] and heard from the -- mostly our
sources were other intelligence, with the press who work in the intelligence sphere, and that's
where we heard things and that's where we learned about the dossier and the other story lines
that were swirling about; and how to process And along the way the administration started
confirming various pieces of what they were concerned about what Russia was doing. So I do
think that the answer for the Democrats now in both the House and the Senate is to talk about
it more and make it more real."
So the leaking had an early start, and went on steroids during the months following the
Democratic Convention up to the election -- and beyond.
As a Reminder
None of the leaking, unmasking, surveillance, or other activities directed against the Trump
campaign can be properly understood, if one does not bear in mind that it was considered a sure
thing that Secretary Clinton would become President, at which point illegal and extralegal
activities undertaken to help her win would garner praise, not prison.
But she lost. And a month ago, House Intelligence Committee Chair Devin Nunes (R-CA)
threw down the gauntlet, indicating
that there could be legal consequences, for example, for officials who misled the FISA court in
order to enable surveillance on Trump and associates. His words are likely to have sent
chills down the spine of yet other miscreants. "If they need to be put on trial, we will put
them on trial," he said. "The reason Congress exists is to oversee these agencies that we
created."
John Brennan is widely reported to be Nunes's next target. Does one collect a full
pension in jail?
Unmasking: Senior national security officials are permitted to ask the National Security
Agency to unmask the names of Americans in intercepted communications for national security
reasons -- not for domestic political purposes. Congressional committees have questioned
why Obama's UN ambassador Samantha Power (as well as his national security adviser Susan Rice)
made so many unmasking requests. Power is reported to have requested the unmasking of more than
260 Americans, most of them in the final days of the administration, including the names of
Trump associates.
Deep State Intimidation
Back to John Brennan's bizarre tweet Saturday telling the President, "You may scapegoat Andy
McCabe but you will not destroy America America will triumph over you." Unmasking the word
"America," so to speak, one can readily discern the name "Brennan" underneath. Brennan's
words and attitude are a not-so-subtle reminder of the heavy influence and confidence of the
deep state, including the media -- exercised to a fare-thee-well over the past two
years.
Later on Saturday, Samantha Power, with similar equities at stake, put an exclamation point
behind what Brennan had tweeted earlier in the day. Power also saw fit to remind Trump where
the power lies, so to speak. She warned him publicly that it is "not a good idea to piss off
John Brennan."
Meanwhile, the Washington Post is dutifully playing its part in the deep-state
game of intimidation. The following excerpt from Sunday's lead article conveys the intended
message: "Some Trump allies say they worry he is playing with fire by taunting the FBI. 'This
is open, all-out war. And guess what? The FBI's going to win,' said one ally, who spoke on the
condition of anonymity to be candid. 'You can't fight the FBI. They're going to torch him.'"
[sic]
The Post, incidentally, waited until paragraph 41 of 44 to inform readers that it was
the FBI's own Office of Professional Responsibility and the Inspector General of the Department
of Justice that found McCabe guilty, and that the charge was against McCabe, not the FBI. A
quite different impression was conveyed by the
large headline "Trump escalates attacks on FBI" as well as the first 40 paragraphs of Sunday's
lead article.
Putting Down a Marker
It isn't as though Donald Trump wasn't warned, as are all incoming presidents, of the power
of the Deep State that he needs to play ball with -- or else. Recall that just three days
before President-elect Trump was visited by National Intelligence Director James Clapper, FBI
Director James Comey, CIA Director John Brennan, and NSA Director Michael Rogers, Trump was put
on notice by none other than the Minority Leader of the Senate, Chuck Schumer. Schumer has been
around and knows the ropes; he is a veteran of 18 years in the House, and is in his 20th year
in the Senate.
On Jan. 3, 2017 Schumer said it all, when he told MSNBC's Rachel Maddow, that
President-elect Trump is "being really dumb" by taking on the intelligence community and its
assessments on Russia's cyber activities:
"Let me tell you, you take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday
at getting back at you," Schumer told Maddow. "So even for a practical, supposedly hard-nosed
businessman, he's being really dumb to do this." Did Maddow ask Schumer if he was saying
President of the United States should be afraid of the intelligence community? No, she let
Schumer's theorem stand.
With gauntlets now thrown down by both sides, we may not have to wait very long to see if
Schumer is correct in his blithe prediction as to how the present constitutional crisis will be
resolved.
Ray McGovern works for Tell the Word, a publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the
Saviour in inner-city Washington. He served as a CIA analyst under seven Presidents and nine
CIA directors and is now on the Steering Group of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
(VIPS).
"... "When the full extent of your venality, moral turpitude, and political corruption becomes known, you will take your rightful place as a disgraced demagogue in the dustbin of history. You may scapegoat Andy McCabe, but you will not destroy America America will triumph over you." ..."
"... Gary Leupp is Professor of History at Tufts University, and holds a secondary appointment in the Department of Religion. He is the author of Servants, Shophands and Laborers in in the Cities of Tokugawa Japan ; Male Colors: The Construction of Homosexuality in Tokugawa Japan ; and Interracial Intimacy in Japan: Western Men and Japanese Women, 1543-1900 . He is a contributor to Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of Illusion , (AK Press). He can be reached at: [email protected] ..."
John Brennan was CIA director from March 2013 to January 2017. If there is a "deep state"
he's been a key figure in it in recent history. So it's particularly significant when he
tweets, addressing the president:
"When the full extent of your venality, moral turpitude, and political corruption
becomes known, you will take your rightful place as a disgraced demagogue in the dustbin of
history. You may scapegoat Andy McCabe, but you will not destroy America America will triumph
over you."
"... in reality -- the security services have the skills-sets and the abilities, to do damage anyone they want to do damage to -- and to probably get away with it. ..."
"... Fast forward to January, 2017 and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer telling MSNBC's Rachael Maddow that President-elect Donald Trump is "being really dumb" by criticizing the intelligence community and its assessments on Russia's cyber activities: Shumer: "Let me tell you, you take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you, So even for a practical, supposedly hard-nosed businessman, he's being really dumb to do this." No, Shumer wasn't joking. He was serious. ..."
"... Fast forward again to yesterday, March 17, 2018: Former CIA Director John Brennan wasn't joking when he reacted to the firing of FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe -- and President Donald Trump's tweeted celebration of it -- by tweeting this attack against Trump ..."
"... When the full extent of your venality, moral turpitude, and political corruption becomes known, you will take your rightful place as a disgraced demagogue in the dustbin of history. You may scapegoat Andy McCabe, but you will not destroy America. America will triumph over you. ..."
"... Obama UN Representative Samantha Power followed up on the Brennan tweet with this: "Not a good idea to piss off John Brennan." ..."
Does Peter Van Buren's criticism of the CIA's Haspel put him at risk?
In the 2003 film "Love Actually" the British Prime Minister (played by Hugh Grant) jokes with a Downing Street employee Natalie
(Martine McCutcheon):
"PM: You live with your husband? Boyfriend, three illegitimate but charming children? --
"NATALIE: No, I've just split up with my boyfriend, so I'm back with my mum and dad for a while.
"PM: Oh. I'm sorry.
"NATALIE: No, it's fine. I'm well shot of him. He said I was getting fat.
"PM: I beg your pardon?
"NATALIE: He said no one's going to fancy a girl with thighs the size of big tree trunks. Not a nice guy, actually, in the end.
"PM: Right You know, being Prime Minister, I could just have him murdered.
"NATALIE: Thank you, sir. I'll think about it.
"PM: Do -- the SAS are absolutely charming -- ruthless, trained killers are just a phone call away."
It's just a film. It's just a joke. But the joke works because the public knows that -- in reality -- the security services
have the skills-sets and the abilities, to do damage anyone they want to do damage to -- and to probably get away with it.
Fast forward to January, 2017 and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer telling MSNBC's Rachael Maddow that President-elect
Donald Trump is "being really dumb" by criticizing the intelligence community and its assessments on Russia's cyber activities:
Shumer: "Let me tell you, you take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you, So even
for a practical, supposedly hard-nosed businessman, he's being really dumb to do this." No, Shumer wasn't joking. He was serious.
Fast forward again to yesterday, March 17, 2018: Former CIA Director John Brennan wasn't joking when he reacted to the
firing of FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe -- and President Donald Trump's tweeted celebration of it -- by tweeting this attack
against Trump :
" When the full extent of your venality, moral turpitude, and political corruption becomes known, you will take your
rightful place as a disgraced demagogue in the dustbin of history. You may scapegoat Andy McCabe, but you will not destroy
America. America will triumph over you. "
Obama UN Representative Samantha Power followed up on the Brennan tweet with this: "Not a good idea to piss off John Brennan."
When public officials and former public officials -- like Shumer, Brennan and Power -- make such public statements it must
necessarily have a chilling effect on public criticism of the security services.
After all, none of the three are joking. They're serious. And the American people know that they're serious.
Does Peter Van Buren's criticism of CIA operative Haspel put him at risk?
"... If the Democrats capture a majority in the House of Representatives on November 6, as widely predicted, candidates drawn from the military-intelligence apparatus will comprise as many as half of the new Democratic members of Congress. They will hold the balance of power in the lower chamber of Congress. ..."
"... Both push and pull are at work here. Democratic Party leaders are actively recruiting candidates with a military or intelligence background for competitive seats where there is the best chance of ousting an incumbent Republican or filling a vacancy, frequently clearing the field for a favored "star" recruit. ..."
"... The Democratic leaders are promoting CIA agents and Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans. At the same time, such people are choosing the Democratic Party as their preferred political vehicle. ..."
An extraordinary number of former intelligence and military operatives from the CIA,
Pentagon, National Security Council and State Department are seeking nomination as Democratic
candidates for Congress in the 2018 midterm elections. The potential influx of
military-intelligence personnel into the legislature has no precedent in US political
history.
If the Democrats capture a majority in the House of Representatives on November 6, as widely
predicted, candidates drawn from the military-intelligence apparatus will comprise as many as
half of the new Democratic members of Congress. They will hold the balance of power in the
lower chamber of Congress.
Both push and pull are at work here. Democratic Party leaders are actively recruiting
candidates with a military or intelligence background for competitive seats where there is the
best chance of ousting an incumbent Republican or filling a vacancy, frequently clearing the
field for a favored "star" recruit.
A case in point is Elissa Slotkin, a former CIA operative with three tours in Iraq, who
worked as Iraq director for the National Security Council in the Obama White House and as a top
aide to John Negroponte, the first director of national intelligence. After her deep
involvement in US war crimes in Iraq, Slotkin moved to the Pentagon, where, as a principal
deputy assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs, her areas of
responsibility included drone warfare, "homeland defense" and cyber warfare.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) has designated Slotkin as one of its
top candidates, part of the so-called "Red to Blue" program targeting the most vulnerable
Republican-held seats -- in this case, the Eighth Congressional District of Michigan, which
includes Lansing and Brighton. The House seat for the district is now held by two-term
Republican Representative Mike Bishop.
The Democratic leaders are promoting CIA agents and Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans. At
the same time, such people are choosing the Democratic Party as their preferred political
vehicle. There are far more former spies and soldiers seeking the nomination of the Democratic
Party than of the Republican Party. There are so many that there is a subset of Democratic
primary campaigns that, with a nod to Mad magazine, one might call "spy vs. spy."
"... In February 2018, former CIA director John Brennan, the man who fed the Russian "hacking" story to the House Intelligence Committee, became a senior national security and intelligence analyst for NBC and MSNBC in what has become standard revolving door practice between government and the corporate world. ..."
"... And he certainly knows something about hacking, as he was forced to admit, after first lying about it, that his CIA hacked the computers of Senate staffers who were investigating the agency's role in torturing prisoners. A man the MSM apparently regard as having impeccable credentials for truth telling. ..."
"... There's no downside to making even the most absurd claims about Russia and Trump, no penalty for fabrications, misrepresentations, or getting facts wrong. If they were honest, their ledes might read: "This fictional news report is loosely based on a true story." Or: "Any resemblance in this story to real people and events is merely coincidental." ..."
In February 2018, former CIA director John Brennan, the man who fed the Russian
"hacking" story to the House Intelligence Committee, became a senior national security and
intelligence analyst for NBC and MSNBC in what has become standard revolving door practice
between government and the corporate world. Brennan was a well-known advocate for the
CIA's rendition and torture program, spying on its critics, and its use of drone bombings and
assassinations in the Middle East. And he certainly knows something about hacking, as he
was forced to admit, after first lying about it, that his CIA hacked the computers of Senate
staffers who were investigating the agency's role in torturing prisoners. A man the MSM
apparently regard as having impeccable credentials for truth telling.
If the Russia "hacking" story has no legs, the more interesting piece of news is the
organized efforts of the Democrats and some Republicans to bring down Trump and turn over the
White House to theocrat Mike Pence. Mainstream pundits and reporters are churning out
unsubstantiated speculations about Russia and Trump by the hour. A number of Democrats,
military brass, and mercenary journalist (and former country club caddy) Thomas Friedman have
characterized alleged Russian intervention as a new "Pearl Harbor" or "9/11," thereby building
a case for war and for treason against the president. There's no downside to making even
the most absurd claims about Russia and Trump, no penalty for fabrications, misrepresentations,
or getting facts wrong. If they were honest, their ledes might read: "This fictional news
report is loosely based on a true story." Or: "Any resemblance in this story to real people and
events is merely coincidental."
"... To be precise, CrowdStrike did provide the FBI with allegedly "certified true images" of the DNC servers allegedly involved in the alleged "hack." They also allegedly provided these images to FireEye and Mandiant, IIRC ..."
"... Of course, given the CrowdStrike itself is a massively compromised organization due to its founder and CEO, those "certified true images" are themselves tainted evidence. ..."
"... In addition, regardless of whether the images were true or not, the evidence allegedly contained therein is painfully inadequate to confirm that APT28 or APT29 were involved, nor that the Russian government was involved, or even that there was a real hack involved, and even less evidence that any emails that might have been exfiltrated were given to Wikileaks as opposed to another leak such as that alleged by Sy Hersh to have been done by Seth Rich. ..."
Re this: " In the case of Russian meddling there is no forensic evidence available to the IC
because the Democratic National Committee did not permit the FBI to investigate and examine
the computers and the network that was allegedly attacked."
To be precise, CrowdStrike did provide the FBI with allegedly "certified true images"
of the DNC servers allegedly involved in the alleged "hack." They also allegedly provided
these images to FireEye and Mandiant, IIRC .
All three allegedly examined those images and concurred with CrowdStrike's analysis.
Of course, given the CrowdStrike itself is a massively compromised organization due to
its founder and CEO, those "certified true images" are themselves tainted evidence.
In addition, regardless of whether the images were true or not, the evidence allegedly
contained therein is painfully inadequate to confirm that APT28 or APT29 were involved, nor
that the Russian government was involved, or even that there was a real hack involved, and
even less evidence that any emails that might have been exfiltrated were given to Wikileaks
as opposed to another leak such as that alleged by Sy Hersh to have been done by Seth
Rich.
The "assessment" that Putin ordered any of this is pure mind-reading and can be utterly
dismissed absent any of the other evidence Publius points out as necessary.
The same applies to any "estimate" that the Russian government preferred Trump or wished
to denigrate Clinton. Based on what I read in pro-Russian news outlets, Russian officials
took great pains to not pick sides and Putin's comments were similarly very restrained. The
main quote from Putin about Trump that emerged was mistranslated as approval whereas it was
more an observation of Trump's personality. At no time did Putin ever say he favored Trump
over Clinton, even though that was a likely probability given Clinton's "Hitler"
comparison.
As an aside, I also recommend Scott Ritter's trashing of the ICA. Ritter is familiar with
intelligence estimates and their reliability based on his previous service as a UN weapons
inspector in Iraq and in Russia implementing arms control treaties.
"... What has however become clear in recent days is that the 'Gerasimov Doctrine' was not invented by its supposed author, but by a British academic, Mark Galeotti, who has now confessed – although in a way clearly designed to maintain as much of the 'narrative' as possible. ..."
"... Three days ago, an article by Galleoti appeared in 'Foreign Policy' entitled 'I'm Sorry for Creating the "Gerasimov Doctrine": I was the first to write about Russia's infamous high-tech military strategy. One small problem: it doesn't exist.' ..."
"... The translation of the original article by Gerasimov with annotations by Galeotti which provoked the whole hysteria turns out to be a classic example of what I am inclined to term 'bad Straussianism.' ..."
"... What Strauss would have called the 'exoteric' meaning of the article quite clearly has to do with defensive strategies aimed at combatting the kind of Western 'régime change' projects about which people like those who write for 'Lawfare' are so enthusiastic. But Galeotti tells us that this is, at least partially, a cover for an 'esoteric' meaning, which has to do with offensive actions in Ukraine and similar places. ..."
More material on the British end of the conspiracy.
Commenting on an earlier piece by PT, I suggested that a key piece of evidence pointing to
'Guccifer 2.0' being a fake personality created by the conspirators in their attempt to
disguise the fact that the materials from the DNC published by 'WikiLeaks' were obtained by a
leak rather than a hack had to do with the involvement of the former GCHQ person Matt
Tait.
To recapitulate: Back in June 2016, hard on the heels of the claim by Dmitri Alperovitch
of 'CrowdStrike' to have identified clinching evidence making the GRU prime suspects, Tait
announced that, although initially unconvinced, he had found a 'smoking gun' in the
'metadata' of the documents released by 'Guccifer 2.0.'
A key part of this was the use by someone modifying a document of 'Felix Edmundovich'
– the name and patronymic of Dzerzhinsky, the Lithuanian-Polish noble who created the
Soviet secret police.
As I noted, Tait was generally identified as a former GCHQ employee who now ran a
consultancy called 'Capital Alpha Security.' However, checking Companies House records
revealed that he had filed 'dormant accounts' for the company. So it looks as though the
company was simply a 'front', designed to fool 'useful idiots' into believing he was an
objective analyst.
As I also noted in those comments, Tait writes the 'Lawfare' blog, one of whose founders,
Benjamin Wittes, looks as though he may himself have been involved in the conspiracy up to
the hilt. Furthermore, a secure income now appears to have been provided to replace that from
the non-existent consultancy, in the shape of a position at the 'Robert S. Strauss Center for
International Security and Law', run by Robert Chesney, a co-founder with Wittes of
'Lawfare.'
A crucial part of the story, however, is that the notion of GRU responsibility for the
supposed 'hacks' appears to be part of a wider 'narrative' about the supposed 'Gerasimov
Doctrine.' From the 'View from Langley' provided to Bret Stephens by CIA Director Mike Pompeo
at the 'Aspen Security Forum' last July:
'I hearken back to something called the Gerasimov doctrine from the early 70s, he's now
the head of the – I'm a Cold War guy, forgive me if I mention Soviet Union. He's now
the head of the Russian army and his idea was that you can win wars without firing a single
shot or with firing very few shots in ways that are decidedly not militaristic, and that's
what's happened. What changes is the costs; to effectuate change through cyber and through RT
and Sputnik, their news outlets, and through other soft means; has just really been lowered,
right. It used to be it was expensive to run an ad on a television station now you simply go
online and propagate your message. And so they have they have found an effective tool, an
easy way to go reach into our systems, and into our culture to achieve the outcomes they are
looking for.'
What has however become clear in recent days is that the 'Gerasimov Doctrine' was not
invented by its supposed author, but by a British academic, Mark Galeotti, who has now
confessed – although in a way clearly designed to maintain as much of the 'narrative'
as possible.
Three days ago, an article by Galleoti appeared in 'Foreign Policy' entitled 'I'm
Sorry for Creating the "Gerasimov Doctrine": I was the first to write about Russia's infamous
high-tech military strategy. One small problem: it doesn't exist.'
'Gerasimov was actually talking about how the Kremlin understands what happened in the
"Arab Spring" uprisings, the "color revolutions" against pro-Moscow regimes in Russia's
neighborhood, and in due course Ukraine's "Maidan" revolt. The Russians honestly –
however wrongly – believe that these were not genuine protests against brutal and
corrupt governments, but regime changes orchestrated in Washington, or rather, Langley. This
wasn't a "doctrine" as the Russians understand it, for future adventures abroad: Gerasimov
was trying to work out how to fight, not promote, such uprisings at home.'
The translation of the original article by Gerasimov with annotations by Galeotti
which provoked the whole hysteria turns out to be a classic example of what I am inclined to
term 'bad Straussianism.'
What Strauss would have called the 'exoteric' meaning of the article quite clearly has
to do with defensive strategies aimed at combatting the kind of Western 'régime
change' projects about which people like those who write for 'Lawfare' are so enthusiastic.
But Galeotti tells us that this is, at least partially, a cover for an 'esoteric' meaning,
which has to do with offensive actions in Ukraine and similar places.
Having now read the text of the article, I can see a peculiar irony in it. In a section
entitled 'You Can't Generate Ideas On Command', Gerasimov suggests that 'The state of Russian
military science today cannot be compared with the flowering of military-theoretical thought
in our country on the eve of World War II.'
According to the 'exoteric' meaning of the article, it is not possible to blame anyone in
particular for this situation. But Gerasimov goes on on to remark that, while at the time of
that flowering there were 'no people with higher degrees' or 'academic schools or
departments', there were 'extraordinary personalities with brilliant ideas', who he terms
'fanatics in the best sense of the word.'
Again, Galeotti discounts the suggestion that nobody is to blame, assuming an 'esoteric
meaning', and remarking: 'Ouch. Who is he slapping here?'
Actually, Gerasimov refers by name to two, utterly different figures, who certainly were
'extraordinarily personalities with brilliant ideas.'
If Pompeo had even the highly amateurish grasp of the history of debates among Soviet
military theorists that I have managed to acquire he would be aware that one of the things
which was actually happening in the 'Seventies was the rediscovery of the ideas of Alexander
Svechin.
Confirming my sense that this has continued on, Gerasimov ends by using Svechin to point
up an intractable problem: it can be extraordinarily difficult to anticipate the conditions
of a war, and crucial not to impose a standardised template likely to be inappropriate, but
one has to make some kinds of prediction in order to plan.
Immediately after the passage which Galeotti interprets as a dig at some colleague,
Gerasimov elaborates his reference to 'extraordinary people with brilliant ideas' by
referring to an anticipation of a future war, which proved prescient, from a very different
figure to Svechin:
'People like, for instance, Georgy Isserson, who, despite the views he formed in the
prewar years, published the book "New Forms Of Combat." In it, this Soviet military
theoretician predicted: "War in general is not declared. It simply begins with already
developed military forces. Mobilization and concentration is not part of the period after the
onset of the state of war as was the case in 1914 but rather, unnoticed, proceeds long before
that." The fate of this "prophet of the Fatherland" unfolded tragically. Our country paid in
great quantities of blood for not listening to the conclusions of this professor of the
General Staff Academy.'
Unlike Svechin, whom I have read, I was unfamiliar with Isserson. A quick Google search,
however, unearthed a mass of material in American sources – including, by good fortune,
an online text of a 2010 study by Dr Richard Harrison entitled 'Architect of Soviet Victory
in World War II: The Life and Theories of G.S. Isserson', and a presentation summarising the
volume.
Ironically, Svechin and Isserson were on opposite sides of fundamental divides. So the
former, an ethnic Russian from Odessa, was one of the 'genstabisty', the former Tsarist
General Staff officers who sided with the Bolsheviks and played a critical role in teaching
the Red Army how to fight. Meanwhile Isserson was a very different product of the
'borderlands' – the son of a Jewish doctor, brought up in Kaunas, with a German Jewish
mother from what was then Königsberg, giving him an easy facility with German-language
sources.
The originator of the crucial concept of 'operational' art – the notion that in
modern industrial war, the ability to handle a level intermediate between strategy and
tactics was critical to success – was actually Svechin.
Developing the ambivalence of Clausewitz, however, he stressed that both the offensive and
the defensive had their places, and that the key to success was to know which was appropriate
when and also to be able rapidly to change from one to the other. His genuflections to
Marxist-Leninist dogma, moreover, were not such as to take in any of Dzerzhinsky's
people.
By contrast, Isserson was unambiguously committed to the offensive strand in the
Clausewitzian tradition, and a Bolshevik 'true believer' (although he married the daughter of
a dispossessed ethnically Russian merchant, who had their daughter baptised without his
knowledge.)
As Harrison brings out, Isserson's working through of the problems of offensive
'operational art' would be critical to the eventual success of the Red Army against Hitler.
However, the specific text to which he refers was, ironically, a warning of precisely one of
the problems implicit in the single-minded reliance on the offensive: the possibility that
one could be left with no good options confronting an antagonist similarly oriented –
as turned out to be the case.
As Gerasimov intimates, while unlike Svechin, executed in 1938, Isserson survived the
Stalin years, he was another of the victims of Dzerzhinsky's heirs. Arrested shortly before
his warnings were vindicated by the German attack on 22 June 1941, he would spend the war in
the Gulag and only return to normal life after Stalin's death.
So I think that the actual text of Gerasimov's article reinforces a point I have made
previously. The 'evidence' identified by Tait is indeed a 'smoking gun.' But it emphatically
does not point towards the GRU.
Meanwhile, another moral of the tale is that Americans really should stop being taken in
by charlatan Brits like Galeotti, Tait, and Steele.
Looks like Brennan was the architect of DNS false flag operation: "Hersh also told Butowsky that the DNC made up the Russian hacking story as a disinformation campaign -- directly pointing a finger
at former CIA director (and now
MSNBC/NBC contributor
) John Brennan as the architect."
Now all this staff started to remind me 9/11 investigation. Also by Mueller.
Notable quotes:
"... Notably, Crowdstrike has been considered by many to be discredited over their revision and retraction of a report over Russian hacking of Ukrainian military equipment ..."
"... Also notable is that Crowdstrike founder and anti-Putin Russian expat Dimitri Alperovitch sits on the Atlantic Council - which is funded by the US State Department, NATO, Latvia, Lithuania, and Ukranian Oligarch Victor Pinchuk. Who else is on the Atlantic Council? Evelyn Farkas - who slipped up during an MSNBC interview with Mika Brzezinski and disclosed that the Obama administration had been spying on the Trump campaign: ..."
"... Hersh also told Butowsky that the DNC made up the Russian hacking story as a disinformation campaign -- directly pointing a finger at former CIA director (and now MSNBC/NBC contributor ) John Brennan as the architect. ..."
"... I have a narrative of how that whole f*cking thing began. It's a Brennan operation, it was an American disinformation , and the fu*kin' President, at one point, they even started telling the press -- they were backfeeding the Press, the head of the NSA was going and telling the press, fu*king c*cksucker Rogers, was telling the press that we even know who in the Russian military intelligence service leaked it. ..."
"... Listen to Seymour Hersh leaked audio: https://www.youtube.com/embed/giuZdBAXVh0 (full transcription here and extended audio of the Hersh conversation here ) ..."
"... As we mentioned last week, Dotcom's assertion is backed up by an analysis done last year by a researcher who goes by the name Forensicator , who determined that the DNC files were copied at 22.6 MB/s - a speed virtually impossible to achieve from halfway around the world, much less over a local network - yet a speed typical of file transfers to a memory stick. ..."
"... Last but not least, let's not forget that Julian Assange heavily implied Seth Rich was a source: ..."
"... Given that a) the Russian hacking narrative hinges on Crowdstrikes's questionable reporting , and b) a mountain of evidence pointing to Seth Rich as the source of the leaked emails - it stands to reason that Congressional investigators and Special Counsel Robert Mueller should at minimum explore these leads. ..."
"... As retired U.S. Navy admiral James A. Lyons, Jr. asks: why aren't they? ..."
In addition to several odd facts surrounding Rich's still unsolved murder - which officials have deemed a "botched robbery," forensic
technical evidence has emerged which contradicts the Crowdstrike report. The Irvine, CA company
partially
funded by Google , was the
only
entity allowed to analyze the DNC servers in relation to claims of election hacking:
Notably, Crowdstrike has been considered by many to be discredited over their revision and retraction of a report over Russian
hacking of Ukrainian military equipment - a report which the government of Ukraine said was fake news.
In connection with the emergence in some media reports which stated that the alleged "80% howitzer D-30 Armed Forces of Ukraine
removed through scrapping Russian Ukrainian hackers software gunners," Land Forces Command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine informs
that the said information is incorrect .
Ministry of Defence of Ukraine asks journalists to publish only verified information received from the competent official sources.
Spreading false information leads to increased social tension in society and undermines public confidence in the Armed Forces
of Ukraine. -- mil.gov.ua (translated) (1.6.2017)
In fact, several respected journalists have cast serious doubt on CrowdStrike's report on the DNC servers:
Pay attention, because Mueller is likely to use the Crowdstrike report to support the rumored upcoming charges against Russian
hackers.
Also notable is that Crowdstrike founder and anti-Putin Russian expat Dimitri Alperovitch sits on the Atlantic Council - which
is funded by the US State Department, NATO, Latvia, Lithuania, and
Ukranian Oligarch Victor Pinchuk.
Who else is on the Atlantic Council?
Evelyn Farkas - who slipped up during an MSNBC interview with Mika Brzezinski and disclosed that the Obama administration had
been spying on the Trump campaign:
The Trump folks, if they found out how we knew what we knew about the Trump staff dealing with Russians, that they would try
to compromise those sources and methods , meaning we would not longer have access to that intelligence. - Evelyn Farkas
... ... ...
Brennan and Russian disinformation
Hersh also told Butowsky that the DNC made up the Russian hacking story as a disinformation campaign -- directly pointing a finger
at former CIA director (and now
MSNBC/NBC contributor
) John Brennan as the architect.
I have a narrative of how that whole f*cking thing began. It's a Brennan operation, it was an American disinformation , and
the fu*kin' President, at one point, they even started telling the press -- they were backfeeding the Press, the head of the NSA
was going and telling the press, fu*king c*cksucker Rogers, was telling the press that we even know who in the Russian military
intelligence service leaked it.
Hersh denied that he told Butowsky anything before the leaked audio emerged , telling NPR " I hear gossip [Butowsky] took two
and two and made 45 out of it. "
Technical Evidence
As we mentioned last week, Dotcom's assertion is backed up by an analysis done last year by a researcher who goes by the name
Forensicator , who determined that the DNC files were copied at
22.6 MB/s - a speed virtually impossible to achieve from halfway around the world, much less over a local network - yet a speed
typical of file transfers to a memory stick.
The big hint
Last but not least, let's not forget that Julian Assange heavily implied Seth Rich was a source:
Given that a) the Russian hacking narrative hinges on Crowdstrikes's questionable reporting , and b) a mountain of evidence pointing
to Seth Rich as the source of the leaked emails - it stands to reason that Congressional investigators and Special Counsel Robert
Mueller should at minimum explore these leads.
As retired U.S. Navy admiral James A. Lyons, Jr. asks: why aren't they?
Relax you conspiracy theory-loving extremists. Our 336 spy agencies are just busy trying to solve the Michael Hasting's murder
first. But it's just really hard to find the culprits because they're all hiding in Siberia.
"... Why are all the Obama administration people so caught up in their own celebrity status? Clapper is always on MSNBC, or CNN. ..."
"... If you go back to Brennan's testimony to Congress he admitted that they use the bogus dossier as the basis for their investigation it was in April you can go look it up ..."
"... Sounds like he's projecting a little doesn't it? After all he was in charge in Saudi Arabia when the 9/11 hijackers got EXCEPTIONS approved for their visas to come to America! ..."
"... Brennan is a key figure of the deep state who is highly pissed off that they did not get their puppet Clinton into office. ..."
"... I am fairly certain that Brennen is in as deep as any of them in the seditious act of trying to destroy Trump's presidency by framing him with the charge of collusion. The cracks are widening in their story and if it breaks into pieces as it appears to be, there are going to be a lot of people in Obama's former administration facing some very serious charges. ..."
Why are all the Obama administration people so caught up in their own celebrity
status? Clapper is always on MSNBC, or CNN.
Susan Rice, Samantha Powers, Kerry, who cares what these people have to say?
I only want to hear them plead the fifth, or give witness, after they cut a deal to save
their worthless hide. If Iran had an embassy, Brennan would already be hiding in it. Better
take his passport
If you go back to Brennan's testimony to Congress he admitted that they use the bogus
dossier as the basis for their investigation it was in April you can go look it up
Sounds like he's projecting a little doesn't it? After all he was in charge in Saudi
Arabia when the 9/11 hijackers got EXCEPTIONS approved for their visas to come to
America!
Brennan's erroneous dig of Trump's approval rating being at 30% is proof that Trump's
tweet has hit its mark. I am fairly certain that Brennen is in as deep as any of them in
the seditious act of trying to destroy Trump's presidency by framing him with the charge of
collusion. The cracks are widening in their story and if it breaks into pieces as it appears
to be, there are going to be a lot of people in Obama's former administration facing some
very serious charges.
The Washington Free Beacon reported
Under a CIA polygraph test he admitted to voting for a communist running for president. In
doing so he admitted to supporting a group, "dedicated to overthrowing the U.S.,"...
Brennan is doing the Democrat Party action of projecting his own beliefs/feelings onto
someone else. I always thought Brennan looked scary to me or maybe it is the pictures
that are published. Both sides always show the worse pictures of the opposition
folks.
Sad to watch the Democrat Party reduced to only this type of action and no ideas or
support to fix problems. This is not the Democrat Party of old, not close. Democrat
voters need to take a hard look at what their party represents these days. I don't think
they really want to support what the DNC is pushing.
This soft civil war between faction of the Us elite is going to be really interesting. If Brennan fails with his color revolution
against Trump think he might be prosecuted -- the first head of CIA who was ever prosecuted.
Notable quotes:
"... Perhaps it is John Brennan who is panicking since President Trump is exposing the Deep State and illegal spying carried out by Obama's crooked Intel agencies. ..."
"... As previously reported, Chairman of the House Intel Committee, Devin Nunes plans to investigate former CIA Director John Brennan and other Obama officials for their role in promoting Hillary's phony dossier. ..."
"... According to investigative reporter, Paul Sperry, Chairman Nunes is also investigating whether Brennan perjured himself in a public testimony about the dossier. ..."
Former CIA Director John Brennan has been reduced to a pathetic Twitter troll.
Brennan, who may have perjured himself in a May 2017 testimony to the House Intel Committee spends his days attacking President
Trump and his allies on Twitter.
On Monday morning President Trump unleashed fury from his Twitter account.
Trump tweeted:
"Why did the Obama Administration start an investigation into the Trump Campaign (with zero proof of wrongdoing) long before
the Election in November? Wanted to discredit so Crooked H would win. Unprecedented. Bigger than Watergate! Plus, Obama did NOTHING
about Russian meddling."
Brennan called President Trump a paranoid charlatan in response.
"This tweet is a great example of your paranoia, constant misrepresentation of the facts, and increased anxiety and panic (rightly
so) about the Mueller investigation. When will those in Congress and the 30 percent of Americans who still support you realize
you are a charlatan?"
Perhaps it is John Brennan who is panicking since President Trump is exposing the Deep State and illegal spying carried out by
Obama's crooked Intel agencies.
As previously reported, Chairman of the House Intel Committee, Devin Nunes plans to investigate former CIA Director John Brennan
and other Obama officials for their role in promoting Hillary's phony dossier.
According to investigative reporter, Paul Sperry, Chairman Nunes is also investigating whether Brennan perjured himself in a public
testimony about the dossier.
Brennan is also furious with Nunes and previously lashed out at the Chairman from Twitter after the FISA memo was released.
The demons always scream the loudest when they are being exorcised.
I highly recommend reading "Dark Forces: The Truth About What Happened in Benghazi". It's an amazing book. Among the many gold
nuggets of information in it, you'll learn Brennan's role in making sure that a whole big bunch of Gaddafi's shoulder-fired missiles
ended up in the hands of radical muslims. He's an extremely dangerous traitor.
I have thought he was much worst that all that almost from the first time he came on my radar. Long before I ever heard of
Obama. It is the reason I always write Obama/Brennan. I think he is a vile, evil man that hates everything we equate with America.
Nasty. Vile. Obama. Holder. Brennan.
Brennan was in charge of the department at the State Dept that handles the passport records that were breached just before
the 2008 election. One of the persons who worked for Brennan and who was in on the scheme, Sgt. Quarles Harris (Not a mistake,
that's his name) who maintained the records where Obama's were purportedly hacked, stolen, along with Hillary's and McCain's (All
2008 Presidential Candidates) so the culprits could use the information to obtain fraudulent Amx cards; or so the ridiculous story
goes. Only trouble is, Harris took a bullet in the back of the head the night before he was to go in front of a grand jury. Obama's
passport records were no longer anywhere to be found. Google this for full story.
Brennan's ridiculous personal jabs at the President are the behavior of a man who knows he has lost. Trump plays those tools
like fiddles. The only anxiety and panic are coming from the Dems, who know what will happen to them when the electorate absorbs
the fact that the Obama DOJ targeted and spied on the domestic political campaign of an opposition candidate based on fabricated
oppo research funded by the DNC and Clinton campaign. Worse than watergate, indeed. This will define American politics for decades.
Notice how Brennan deflects the substance of Trump's claim...that's why Sessions must appoint a special counsel that has the
power to subpoena Mr. Brennan to finally get some answers. Brennan belongs in jail for his part in an ongoing soft coup attempt
against the president.
Oh, here is one other thing:
The FBI has screwed the pooch one too many times.
WHOOPS! Internal Department Guidelines Prove FBI GUILT in FISA Warrant Scandal
heir own department "rules" prove their GUILT in FISA Warrant scandal.
Internal department guidelines for submitting evidence is as follows:
"Only documented and verified information" may be used in
Department of Justice surveillance applications, according to FBI
internal guidelines.
The FBI relied on an unverified dossier of opposition
research against President Donald Trump to apply for a warrant,
according to House Republicans.
"Only documented and verified information may be used to
support FBI applications [FISA] to the court [FISC]," according to the
guidelines.
Did The Dossier Have To Be 'Verified' For FBI To Use It For Carter Page FISA?
If there is one dirty mofo who is worse than Comey, it is this guy. The most corrupt CIA head ever and a man with no shame.
Clapper is an idiot but this dirtbag was dangerous and is personally responsible for inventing the "17 intelligence agencies"
nonsense and doctoring up that garbage CIA "report" on behalf of his crooked master Obama to delegitimize the incoming President.
Sob thinks we are idiots to not see through this crap.
Michael Hastings was working on a profile of CIA director John Brennan for Rolling Stone at the time of his death (6/13). I'll
always believe Brennan was involved.
Brennan shopped the pee pee dossier to members of congress and then testified to the committees that he knew nothing about
it's origins. Brennan is squirming right now and deservedly so. My hope is that Holder, Clapper, Brennan, Rice and the rest keep
talking. They aren't aiding their cause by doing so and if they shut up now, they simply look guilty (which they are). O hasn't
said anything regarding this subject he is ultimately behind this. The first black POTUS should dangle over this and I voted for
the traitor in chief. I feel stupid and am pissed about the whole affair.
Since 2001 the CIA has gained political and budgetary preeminence over the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA). The CIA found
itself building not just its now infamous drone fleet, but a very different type of covert, globe-spanning force -- its own substantial
fleet of hackers. The agency's hacking division freed it from having to disclose its often controversial operations to the NSA
(its primary bureaucratic rival) in order to draw on the NSA's hacking capacities.
By the end of 2016, the CIA's hacking division, which formally falls under the agency's Center for Cyber Intelligence (CCI),
had over 5000 registered users and had produced more than a thousand hacking systems, trojans, viruses, and other "weaponized"
malware. Such is the scale of the CIA's undertaking that by 2016, its hackers had utilized more code than that used to run Facebook.
The CIA had created, in effect, its "own NSA" with even less accountability and without publicly answering the question as to
whether such a massive budgetary spend on duplicating the capacities of a rival agency could be justified.
Criminals like John Brennan, James Comey, and Hillary Clinton aren't afraid of running their big mouths, because the Justice
Department has their backs. At this point, I don't believe that anything will ever happen to these people. And that speaks volumes
for our justice system!
I'll tell you what. I didn't really buy into the whole deep state concept until all of this stuff had been unearthed. There
are some really dirty criminals currently in our government. Of course having someone like Obama running the show for 8 years
certainly didn't help. I honestly think it all started when Clinton was in office. I couldn't believe he won and there is no doubt
in my mind he started the corruption we see today.
Mr. Brennan did you orchestrate the maleware to make it look like a foreign entity hacked the DNC when everyone knew it was
a whistle blower and this is what you did to cover it up, REMEMBER what Vault 7 suggests....in Wikileaks?? Your pathetic and part
of the cover up and got caught.
It came out right away that the leak came from the DNC. Remember the FBI bragged they could make anything look like it came
from anywhere. Putin swears Russia had nothing to do with it and told the left to produce the evidence.
Why would Russia help Trump win when they were already getting everything they wanted from Obama and Clinton, from the very beginning
when Obama took down the missile shields.
Before Obama's election there was a break-in at the DC Passport office by employees of a janitorial company owned by Brennan.
The purpose was to cleanse Obama's passport files. A week before the man witness was to testify he was found in his car shot once
in the head. Anyone know what happened to that investigation?
Running scared, are you John? The world already knows that YOU spearheaded a stealth task force of saboteurs from SIX US agencies
to run to covert, illegal wiretaps in domestic surveillance of President Trump associates and possibly Trump himself. We KNOW
your conspiracy to illegally wiretap and ruin Donald Trump - and feed intel to Obama who passed it to Hillary during and after
the campaign - started long before the bogus "Trump Dossier".
Paul Manafort was wiretapped. Cater Page was wiretapped. Donald Trump Jr. was wiretapped. Jared Kushner was wiretapped. Gen. Michael
Flynn was wiretapped as were others. Not very legal of you was it, John?
"... The deep state (the oligarchs, MIC, and intelligence community, which controls the media and most politicians) whether or not it actually helped Trump by harming Hillary is immaterial. The election is over and there was never any real resolve in the deep state to impeach Trump or to jail Hillary and their never will be. The reason should be obvious. ..."
"... The only thing consistent in the Russian collusion and election rigging nonsense is the groundless and unrelenting vilification of Russia, blaming Putin for everything. Just as we see grandiose deep state theatrics for the US to obtain access to strategic rare-earth resources in North Korea, we see the similar deep state orchestrated theatrics falsely alleging that Russians rigged or interfered in the US Presidential election. Russia's Putin is the main obstacle to the Western bankster-corporate cabal obtaining resource and geopolitical hegemony over the entire planet. That is the main fact. It is the main reason to subject that nation to constant vilification, sanctions, and military aggression and provocation. ..."
"... The deep state cabal will likely spend tens, if not hundreds, of billions of US dollars interfering in the Russian election. Presently they are most likely bribing, blackmailing, and intimidating thousands of people to swing and rig the election to ensure Putin does not win. "You did it to us." Will be their justification when Putin complains. ..."
Well of course there are. We've been told repeatedly that the Obama administration was on the job and focused like a laser
on Russia collusion and meddling.
Unfortunately, the hard drive all that was stored on crashed and it was all lost.
If we really want the truth then we have to stop relying on what people say just because we like them, or we think they are
on our side, and instead we have to examine the interests of the various sources. Only then we can make better decisions. At this
stage of the game the deep state can no longer blame with any credibility Russian hacking as the source of the alleged leak. The
know it came directly from the DNC. However, the deep state has a priority (a very strong interest) to keep the heat on Russia.
The deep state (the oligarchs, MIC, and intelligence community, which controls the media and most politicians) whether
or not it actually helped Trump by harming Hillary is immaterial. The election is over and there was never any real resolve in
the deep state to impeach Trump or to jail Hillary and their never will be. The reason should be obvious.
The only thing consistent in the Russian collusion and election rigging nonsense is the groundless and unrelenting vilification
of Russia, blaming Putin for everything. Just as we see grandiose deep state theatrics for the US to obtain access to strategic
rare-earth resources in North Korea, we see the similar deep state orchestrated theatrics falsely alleging that Russians rigged
or interfered in the US Presidential election. Russia's Putin is the main obstacle to the Western bankster-corporate cabal obtaining
resource and geopolitical hegemony over the entire planet. That is the main fact. It is the main reason to subject that nation
to constant vilification, sanctions, and military aggression and provocation.
The disproportionate ongoing emphasis on the fake story that Russia meddled in the US election, not only serves to stir up
suspicions and fears regarding Russia in the generally brain-numbed population, but mainly at this stage, and by the sheer fact
that the deep state has carried this rouse so far down the field, the only rational conclusion one can make is that the deep state
is going to interfere in the Russian elections in a very major way to ensure that Putin and his cronies - those wicked oil and
gas nationalizers, those heinous enemies of the Rothschild banksters and their plans for an expanded US Fed to the auspices of
their proposed One World Bank; those upstart renegades who support nations which choose to trade oil without US petrodollars;
those evil monsters who oppose globalism and defend their own nation's sovereignty and other nations like Syria which call for
help.
The deep state cabal will likely spend tens, if not hundreds, of billions of US dollars interfering in the Russian election.
Presently they are most likely bribing, blackmailing, and intimidating thousands of people to swing and rig the election to ensure
Putin does not win. "You did it to us." Will be their justification when Putin complains.
"... " Incidental collection " is the claimed inadvertent or accidental monitoring of Americans' communications under Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act. Incidental collection exists alongside court-approved warranted surveillance authorized on a specific individual. But for incidental collection, no probable cause is needed, no warrant is needed, and no court or judge is involved. It just gets vacuumed up. ..."
"... While exactly how many Americans have their communications monitored this way is unknown , we know these Republican Trump supporters and staffers were caught up in surveillance authorized by a Democratic administration (no evidence of incidental surveillance of the Clinton campaign exists). Election-time claims that the Obama administration wasn't " wiretapping " Trump were disingenuous. They in fact gathered an unprecedented level of inside information. How was it used? ..."
"... Incidental collection nailed Michael Flynn : the NSA was ostensibly not surveilling Flynn, just listening in on the Russian ambassador as the two spoke. The embarrassing intercept formed the basis for Flynn's firing as Trump's national security advisor, his guilty plea for perjury, and very possibly his "game-changing" testimony against others. ..."
A significant number of Trump's people were electronically monitored by
a Democratic administration -- many "by accident." We now know that a significant number of
people affiliated with Donald Trump were surveilled during and after the 2016 campaign, some
under warrants, some via "inadvertent" or accidental surveillance. That surveillance is now
being used against these individuals in perjury cases, particularly to press them to testify
against others, and will likely form the basis of Robert Mueller's eventual action against the
president himself.
How did the surveillance state become so fully entrenched in the American political process?
Better yet, how did we let it happen?
The role pervasive surveillance plays in politics today has been grossly underreported. Set
aside what you think about the Trump presidency for a moment and focus instead on the new
paradigm for how politics and justice work inside the surveillance state.
" Incidental
collection " is the claimed inadvertent or accidental monitoring of Americans'
communications under Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act. Incidental collection exists
alongside court-approved warranted surveillance authorized on a specific individual. But for
incidental collection, no probable
cause is needed, no
warrant is needed, and no court or judge is involved. It just gets vacuumed up.
While exactly how many Americans have their communications monitored this way is
unknown , we know these Republican Trump supporters and staffers were caught up in
surveillance authorized by a Democratic administration (no evidence of incidental surveillance
of the Clinton campaign exists). Election-time claims that the Obama administration wasn't "
wiretapping
" Trump were disingenuous. They in fact gathered an unprecedented level of inside information.
How was it used?
Incidental collection nailed Michael
Flynn : the NSA was ostensibly not surveilling Flynn, just listening in on the Russian
ambassador as the two spoke. The embarrassing intercept formed the basis for Flynn's firing as
Trump's national security advisor, his guilty plea for perjury, and very possibly his
"game-changing" testimony against others.
Jeff Sessions was similarly incidentally surveilled, as was former White House chief
strategist Steve
Bannon , whose conversations were picked
up as part of a FISA warrant issued against Trump associate
Carter Page .
Paul Manafort and
Richard Gates were also the subjects of FISA-warranted surveillance: they were surveilled
in 2014, the case was dropped for lack of evidence, and then they were re-surveilled after they
joined the Trump team and became more interesting to the state.
Officials on the National Security Council revealed that
Trump himself may also have been swept up in the surveillance of foreign targets. Devin
Nunes, chair of the House Intelligence Committee, claims multiple communications by Trump
transition
staff were inadvertently picked up.
Trump officials were monitored by British
GCHQ with the information shared with their NSA partners. Some reports
claim that after a criminal warrant was denied to look into
whether or not Trump Tower servers
were communicating with a Russian bank, a FISA warrant was issued.
How much information the White House may have acquired on Trump's political strategy, as
well as the full story of what might have been done with that information, will never be known.
We do know that the director of national intelligence Dan Coats saw enough after he took office
to
specify that the "intelligence community may not engage in political activity, including
dissemination of U.S. person identities to the White House, for the purpose of affecting the
political process of the United States."
Coats likely had in mind the use of unmasking by the Obama administration. Identities of
U.S. persons picked up inadvertently by surveillance are supposed to be masked, hidden from
most users of the data. However, a select group of officials, including political appointees in
the White House, can unmask and include names if they believe it is important to understanding
the intelligence, or to show evidence of a crime.
Former Obama national security advisor Susan Rice
told House investigators in at least one instance she unmasked the identities of Michael
Flynn,
Jared Kushner , and Steve Bannon. Obama's ambassador to the United Nations,
Samantha Power , also made a number of unmasking requests
in her final year in office.
But no one knows who unmasked Flynn in his conversations with the Russian ambassador. That
and the subsequent leaking of what was said were used not only to snare Flynn in a perjury
trap, but also to force him out of government. Prior to the leak that took Flynn down, Obama
holdover and then-acting attorney general Sally Yates warned Trump that Flynn could be
blackmailed by Moscow for lying about his calls. When Trump didn't immediately fire Flynn, the
unmasked surveillance was leaked by a "senior government official" (likely
Yates ) to the
Washington Post . The disclosure pressured the administration to dump Flynn.
Similar leaks were used to try to pressure Attorney General
Jeff Sessions to resign, though they only resulted in him recusing himself from the
Russiagate investigation. Following James Comey's firing, that recusal ultimately opened the
door for the appointment of Special Counsel Mueller.
A highly classified leak was used to help marginalize Jared Kushner. The Washington
Post ,
based on leaked intercepts, claimed foreign officials' from four countries spoke of
exploiting Kushner's economic vulnerabilities to push him into acting against the United
States. If the story is true, the leakers passed on data revealing sources and methods; those
foreign officials now know that, however they communicated their thoughts about Kushner, the
NSA was listening. Access to that level of information and the power to expose it is not a
rank-and-file action. One analyst
described the matter as "the Deep State takes out the White House's Dark Clown Prince."
Pervasive surveillance has shown its power perhaps most significantly in creating
perjury traps to manufacture indictments to pressure people to testify against others.
Trump associate George
Papadopoulos lied to the FBI about several meetings concerning Clinton's emails. The FBI
knew about the meetings, "
propelled in part by intelligence from other friendly governments, including the British
and Dutch." The feds asked him questions solely in the hope that Papadopoulos would commit
perjury, even though there was nothing shown to be criminal about the meetings themselves. Now
guilty of a crime, the FBI will use the promise of a light punishment to press Papadopoulos into
testifying against others.
There is a common thread here of using surveillance to create a process crime out of a
non-material lie (the FBI already knew) where no underlying crime of turpitude exists (the
meetings were legal). That this is then used to press someone to testify in an investigation
that will have a significant political impact seems undemocratic -- yet it appears to be a
primary tool Mueller is using.
This is a far cry from a traditional plea deal, giving someone a light sentence for actual
crimes so that they will testify against others. Mueller should know. He famously allowed Mafia
hitman Sammy the Bull to escape more serious punishment for 19 first-degree
murders in return for testimony against John Gotti. No need to manufacture a perjury trap;
the pile of bodies that never saw justice did the trick.
Don't be lured into thinking the ends justify the means, that whatever it takes to purge
Trump is acceptable. Say what you want about Flynn, Kushner, et al, what matters most is the
dark process being used. The arrival of pervasive surveillance as a political weapon is a
harbinger that should chill Americans to their cores.
Peter Van Buren, a 24-year State Department veteran, is the author ofWe Meant Well : How I Helped Lose the Battle for the
Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People andHooper's War : A Novel of WWII Japan. He tweets@WeMeantWell.MORE FROM THIS
AUTHOR
Pervasive surveillance has shown its power perhaps most significantly in creating
perjury traps to manufacture indictments to pressure people to testify against others.
Key advice: Never talk to a cop. Never trust an agent of the Security State. They may still wreck your life, but at least you won't make it easy for them.
Are you really arguing that using surveillance on foreign agents and spies to catch and
compel traders to testify against each other is bad????? Isn't that the way it is usually
done?
It is extremely easy to avoid a perjury trap: don't tell lies. And don't tell me the
government has no right to investigate what could be treason by the president and his staff.
I know how you love Trump and Russia.
I voted for Trump but now I'm completely disgusted with his failures and betrayals and won't
vote for him again.
Setting that aside, it's starting to look to me like the Hillary campaign and allies in
the Obama federal bureaucracy were spying on the Trump campaign.
They fully expected Hillary to win and therefore to be able to cover up what they were
doing.
But then they lost, and now they're ginning up the Russia/national security angle to blow
smoke over what's starting to look like the worst campaign skullduggery since Nixon and
Watergate.
It needs to be investigated, and if there's any fire there, vigorously prosecuted. I don't
give a damn about Trump anymore, but I give a damn about our democracy and system of
government, and if it turns out that some government filth was spying on Trump's campaign, I
want them arrested, prosecuted, and thrown in the darkest, dirtiest hole in our prison
system. We can't have that kind of s***.
If I see one more variation on "if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear" in a
comment my brain will explode. Anyone who writes that kind of thing ("Well maybe they
shouldn't lie") is missing the point: our political process was surveilled and no one can
control what happens to information gathered. Even if you think it good to "take down" Trump,
the process will exist past him to be aimed at a future candidate you support.
"It is extremely easy to avoid a perjury trap: don't tell lies."
Even if true, do you think it is fair for Flynn to be hit with felony charges for his
"less than candid answers" with regard to politically and diplomatically sensitive phone
calls to the Russian ambassador after the elections were over?
Republicans created this mess in their desire to make "security" a partisan issue after 9/11.
If they now regret it and wish to undo the mess, more power to them!
Peter: "If I see one more variation on 'if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear'
in a comment my brain will explode."
The Left used to be vociferously in favor of privacy rights. I took note during the Obama
years that it really only mattered for abortion and library books, nothing beyond that.
But a thought experiment: How many progressives, for that matter how many Black and
Hispanic Americans would be comfortable with the following government requirements:
– Federal, state, and local law enforcement have your name and current address on
file at all times.
– Federal, state, and local law enforcement have a key to your home at all times.
– Federal, state, and local law enforcement have a tracking device on your car or your
person at all times.
If you have nothing to hide, you should have no objections to any of those
requirements.
[[It is extremely easy to avoid a perjury trap: don't tell lies.]]
Even easier: Be a Democrat, preferably the Party's presidential candidate, and then it
doesn't matter whether you tell lies or commit felonies because the corrupt Deep
State-lib-Dem-media alliance will hold you safely above the law.
Even in the midst of all of this, the ongoing ability to continue to spy on our own citizens
was recently voted on and passed overwhelmingly, with large bipartisan support. Save your
crocodile tears now.
Russia is not an enemy of the United States despite all the hoopla about how eeeevil they
are, we are not at war. Treason is not on the table unless you, you know, amend the
constitution, or abandon it, or something.
@MM: apart from the key to your house (and even that might be questionable if you have
certain "smart" appliances), you are describing Facebook, Google, Amazon, Apple, and/or
Microsoft. Adding Federal Government to that list isn't as much of a jump as you seem to
believe.
"The arrival of pervasive surveillance as a political weapon is a harbinger that should chill
Americans to their cores."
Thankfully J. Edgar Hoover practiced his job with restraint.
That being said, while there is certainly a need for improvement of the FISA program (sadly,
the 'principled' Devin Nunes, Trey Gowdy, Matt Gaetz, et al., missed their opportunity in
January when they voted for reauthorization), those individuals caught in the web "by
accident" were regularly communicating with targets of legitimately obtained warrants. It was
their choice to subsequently lie.
With respect to their "unmasking", it doesn't seem unreasonable that policy makers in the
White House should have knowledge of their identity (even in the politicized environment of a
presidential campaign), especially when there's the taint of influence of an adversarial
government and/or organized crime on a potential POTUS.
It is amazing how many law and order Conservatives start screaming about abuses of power, and
targeting specific people when they are the ones at the receiving end.
As a rule, if they did defended the police when the subject was racial profiling, they get
to shut up on the subject now.
(Maybe they SHOULD team up with Black Lives Matter..)
We have come a long way from the reactionary and authoritarian chants of "if you have done
nothing wrong, you have nothing to hide" in the lead-up and then wake of the sarcastically
name PATRIOT Act.
Surveillance and monitoring are, like all other "national securities" spending, primarily
profit extraction driven public-private "partnerships", but the major point here always was
"if you build it, they will use it".
That, too, is the foundational criticism driving Global Zero and the insistence that
Article IV of the Non-Proliferation Treaty be honored by all signatory nuclear powers.
The basic principle of any evolutionary stable open society based on checks and balances
is that no self-inflating institutions and power centers are permissible – whether that
is inbred, networked multi-generational wealth, incorporated power such as financial
institutions, or specific government institutions, such as the military, the "intelligence"
agencies etc.
Of course, the whole idea of having secret courts applying secret law in secret decisions
without adversary parties, and no mandatory disclosure after the fact, is also fundamentally
incompatible with the idea of transparency and accountability, without which free speech and
elections are little more than a travelling circus and a vehicle for advertising profit.
mark_be: Sorry, I meant to include fingerprints and DNA samples in that list of items for all
levels of law enforcement to retain on file on every American.
Any government whose interests clash with ours must be considered a potential enemy
– not enough to go to war, of course, but to be wary of what steps they may take to
protect their interests and thwart ours.
As for Russia, alas, she is known for playing very dirty. Before there was a KGB, there
was an Okhrana, among whose achievements was the writing and disemination of the Protocols of
the Elders of Zion. Anyone who thinks that because they are no longer communists they
Russians are nice guys lives in a fool's paradise
YKW: "As a rule, if they did defended the police when the subject was racial profiling, they
get to shut up on the subject now."
There is no such rule in a free society. People are within their rights to be as
hypocritical and inconsistent as they like.
But if there were such a rule, where are the civil libertarians in the Democratic Party?
Why aren't they castigating DOJ abuse of power in the previous administration?
Why are neoconservatives and Bush era creeps like Brennan, Clapper, and Hayden darlings of
the Left?
Brennan is now afraid that Trump might survive the color revolution against him and he will be cooked...
Notable quotes:
"... Why did the Obama Administration start an investigation into theTrump Campaign (with zero proof of wrongdoing) long before the Election in November? Wanted to discredit so Crooked H would win. Unprecedented. Bigger than Watergate! Plus, Obama did NOTHING about Russian meddling. ..."
"... Trump in November called Brennan and other intelligence leaders "political hacks" and the investigation into Russia's election interference "a pure hit job." ..."
"... Trump has similarly attacked Mueller's probe into Russia's election interference, repeatedly labeling it a "witch hunt." ..."
"This tweet is a great example of your paranoia, constant misrepresentation of the facts,
and increased anxiety and panic (rightly so) about the Mueller investigation," Brennan tweeted
Monday.
"When will those in Congress and the 30 percent of Americans who still support you realize
you are a charlatan?" he continued.
Trump had tweeted the claim earlier Monday, declaring the accusation "bigger than
Watergate."
"Why did the Obama Administration start an investigation into the Trump Campaign (with zero
proof of wrongdoing) long before the Election in November? Wanted to discredit so Crooked H
would win," Trump wrote.
Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump
Why did the Obama Administration start an investigation into theTrump Campaign (with
zero proof of wrongdoing) long before the Election in November? Wanted to discredit so
Crooked H would win. Unprecedented. Bigger than Watergate! Plus, Obama did NOTHING about
Russian meddling.
8:22 AM-Mar 5, 2018
Q105K Q 83.7K people are talking about this О
Brennan, a frequent critic of Trump, led the CIA when a declassified report from
the CIA and other U.S. intelligence agencies was released that said Russia created an influence
campaign aimed at interfering in the 2016 election.
Trump in November
called Brennan and other intelligence leaders "political hacks" and the investigation into
Russia's election interference "a pure hit job."
Trump has similarly attacked Mueller's probe into Russia's election interference, repeatedly
labeling it a "witch hunt."
Mueller charged 13 Russian nationals and three Russian groups last month with interfering in
the U.S. election.
He also filed new charges against former Trump campaign staffers Paul Manafort and Richard Gates.
A federal court in Virginia in February returned a 32-count superseding indictment charging
Manafort and Gates with committing tax fraud, failing to file reports on foreign bank and
financial accounts, and bank fraud conspiracy.
Muller was the guy who buried 911 investigation. That's probably why he was hired for Russiagate investigation too.
Notable quotes:
"... retired U.S. Navy admiral James A. Lyons, Jr. asks a simple, yet monumentally significant question: Why haven't Congressional
Investigators or Special Counsel Robert Mueller addressed the murder of DNC staffer Seth Rich - who multiple people have claimed was
Wikileaks' source of emails leaked during the 2016 U.S. presidential election? ..."
"... Mueller has been incredibly thorough in his ongoing investigations -- however he won't even respond to Kim Dotcom, the New
Zealand entrepreneur who clearly knew about the hacked emails long before they were released, claims that Seth Rich obtained them with
a memory stick , and has offered to provide proof to the Special Counsel investigation. ..."
"... In addition to several odd facts surrounding Rich's still unsolved murder - which officials have deemed a "botched robbery,"
forensic technical evidence has emerged which contradicts the Crowdstrike report. The Irvine, CA company partially funded by Google
, was the only entity allowed to analyze the DNC servers in relation to claims of election hacking: ..."
"... Notably, Crowdstrike has been considered by many to be discredited over their revision and retraction of a report over Russian
hacking of Ukrainian military equipment - a report which the government of Ukraine said was fake news. ..."
"... Also notable is that Crowdstrike founder and anti-Putin Russian expat Dimitri Alperovitch sits on the Atlantic Council - which
is funded by the US State Department, NATO, Latvia, Lithuania, and Ukranian Oligarch Victor Pinchuk. Who else is on the Atlantic Council?
Evelyn Farkas - who slipped up during an MSNBC interview with Mika Brzezinski and disclosed that the Obama administration had been spying
on the Trump campaign: ..."
"... "The facts that we know of in the murder of the DNC staffer, Seth Rich, was that he was gunned down blocks from his home on
July 10, 2016. Washington Metro police detectives claim that Mr. Rich was a robbery victim, which is strange since after being shot
twice in the back, he was still wearing a $2,000 gold necklace and watch. He still had his wallet, key and phone. Clearly, he was not
a victim of robbery, " writes Lyons. ..."
"... Another unexplained fact muddying the Rich case is that of a stolen 40 caliber Glock 22 handguns stolen from an FBI agent's
car the same day Rich was murdered. D.C. Metro police said that the theft occurred between 5 and 7 a.m., while the FBI said two weeks
later that the theft had occurred between Midnight and 2 a.m. - fueling speculation that the FBI gun was used in Rich's murder ..."
"... Perhaps the most stunning audio evidence, however, comes from leaked audio of a recorded conversation between Ed Butowsky and
Pulitzer Prize winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, who told him of a " purported FBI report establishing that Seth Rich
sent emails to WikiLeaks ." ..."
"... Hersh also told Butowsky that the DNC made up the Russian hacking story as a disinformation campaign – directly pointing a
finger at former CIA director (and now MSNBC/NBC contributor ) John Brennan as the architect. ..."
As rumors swirl that Special Counsel Robert Mueller is
preparing a case against Russians who are alleged to have hacked Democrats during the 2016 election -- a conclusion based solely
on the analysis of cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike, a Friday op-ed in the
Washington Times by retired
U.S. Navy admiral James A. Lyons, Jr. asks a simple, yet monumentally significant question: Why haven't Congressional Investigators
or Special Counsel Robert Mueller addressed the murder of DNC staffer Seth Rich - who multiple people have claimed was Wikileaks'
source of emails leaked during the 2016 U.S. presidential election?
Mueller has been incredibly thorough in his ongoing investigations -- however he won't even respond to Kim Dotcom, the New
Zealand entrepreneur who
clearly knew about the hacked emails long before they were released, claims that Seth Rich obtained them with a
memory
stick , and has offered to provide proof to the Special Counsel investigation.
On May 18, 2017, Dotcom proposed that if Congress includes the Seth Rich investigation in their Russia probe, he would provide
written testimony with evidence that Seth Rich was WikiLeaks' source.
In addition to several odd facts surrounding Rich's still unsolved murder - which officials have deemed a "botched robbery,"
forensic technical evidence has emerged which contradicts the Crowdstrike report. The Irvine, CA company
partially
funded by Google , was the
only
entity allowed to analyze the DNC servers in relation to claims of election hacking:
Notably, Crowdstrike has been considered by many to be discredited over their revision and retraction of a report over Russian
hacking of Ukrainian military equipment - a report which the government of Ukraine said was fake news.
In connection with the emergence in some media reports which stated that the alleged "80% howitzer D-30 Armed Forces of Ukraine
removed through scrapping Russian Ukrainian hackers software gunners," Land Forces Command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine informs
that the said information is incorrect .
Ministry of Defence of Ukraine asks journalists to publish only verified information received from the competent official sources.
Spreading false information leads to increased social tension in society and undermines public confidence in the Armed Forces
of Ukraine. –mil.gov.ua (translated) (1.6.2017)
In fact, several respected journalists have cast serious doubt on CrowdStrike's report on the DNC servers:
Pay attention, because Mueller is likely to use the Crowdstrike report to support the rumored upcoming charges against Russian
hackers.
Also notable is that Crowdstrike founder and anti-Putin Russian expat Dimitri Alperovitch sits on the Atlantic Council - which
is funded by the US State Department, NATO, Latvia, Lithuania, and
Ukranian Oligarch Victor Pinchuk.
Who else is on the Atlantic Council?
Evelyn Farkas - who slipped up during an MSNBC interview with Mika Brzezinski and disclosed that the Obama administration had
been spying on the Trump campaign:
The Trump folks, if they found out how we knew what we knew about the Trump staff dealing with Russians, that they would try
to compromise those sources and methods , meaning we would not longer have access to that intelligence. - Evelyn Farkas
Odd facts surrounding the murder of Seth Rich
"The facts that we know of in the murder of the DNC staffer, Seth Rich, was that he was gunned down blocks from his home on
July 10, 2016. Washington Metro police detectives claim that Mr. Rich was a robbery victim, which is strange since after being shot
twice in the back, he was still wearing a $2,000 gold necklace and watch. He still had his wallet, key and phone. Clearly, he was
not a victim of robbery, " writes Lyons.
Another unexplained fact muddying the Rich case is that of a stolen 40 caliber Glock 22 handguns stolen from an FBI agent's
car the same day Rich was murdered. D.C. Metro police said that the theft occurred between 5 and 7 a.m., while the FBI said two weeks
later that the theft had occurred between Midnight and 2 a.m. - fueling speculation that the FBI gun was used in Rich's murder.
Furthermore, two men working with the Rich family - private investigator and former D.C. Police detective Rod Wheeler and family
acquaintance Ed Butowsky, have previously stated that Rich had contacts with WikiLeaks before his death.
"According to Ed Butowsky, an acquaintance of the family, in his discussions with Joel and Mary Rich, they confirmed that their
son transmitted the DNC emails to Wikileaks ," writes Lyons.
While Wheeler initially told TV station Fox5 that proof of Rich's contact with WikiLeaks lies on the murdered IT staffer's laptop,
he later walked
the claim back - though he maintained that there was "some communication between Seth Rich and WikiLeaks."
Wheeler also claimed in recently leaked audio that Seth Rich's
brother, Aaron – a Northrup Grumman employee, blocked him from looking at Seth's computer and stonewalled his investigation.
Wheeler said that brother Aaron Rich tried to block Wheeler from looking at Seth's computer, even though there could be evidence
on it. "He said no, he said I have his computer, meaning him," Wheeler said. "I said, well can I look at it? He said, what are
you looking for? I said anything that could indicate if Seth was having problems with someone. He said no, I already checked it.
Don't worry about it."
Aaron also blocked Wheeler from finding out about who was at a party Seth attended the night of the murder.
"All I want you to do is work on the botched robbery theory and that's it," Aaron told Wheeler -
Big League Politics
Perhaps the most stunning audio evidence, however, comes from leaked audio of a recorded conversation between Ed Butowsky
and Pulitzer Prize winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, who told him of a " purported FBI report establishing that Seth
Rich sent emails to WikiLeaks ."
As transcribed and exclusively reported on by journalist Cassandra Fairbanks last year:
What the report says is that some time in late Spring he makes contact with WikiLeaks, that's in his computer," he says. "
Anyway, they found what he had done is that he had submitted a series of documents -- of emails, of juicy emails, from the DNC."
Hersh explains that it was unclear how the negotiations went, but that WikiLeaks did obtain access to a password protected
DropBox where Rich had put the files.
" All I know is that he offered a sample, an extensive sample, I'm sure dozens of emails, and said 'I want money.' Later, WikiLeaks
did get the password, he had a DropBox, a protected DropBox," he said. They got access to the DropBox."
Hersh also states that Rich had concerns about something happening to him, and had
"The word was passed, according to the NSA report, he also shared this DropBox with a couple of friends, so that 'if anything
happens to me it's not going to solve your problems,'" he added. "WikiLeaks got access before he was killed."
Brennan and Russian disinformation
Hersh also told Butowsky that the DNC made up the Russian hacking story as a disinformation campaign – directly pointing a
finger at former CIA director (and now
MSNBC/NBC contributor
) John Brennan as the architect.
I have a narrative of how that whole f*cking thing began. It's a Brennan operation, it was an American disinformation , and
the fu*kin' President, at one point, they even started telling the press – they were backfeeding the Press, the head of the NSA
was going and telling the press, fu*king c*cksucker Rogers, was telling the press that we even know who in the Russian military
intelligence service leaked it.
(full transcription here and extended audio of the Hersh conversation
here )
Hersh denied that he told Butowsky anything before the leaked audio emerged , telling NPR " I hear gossip [Butowsky] took two
and two and made 45 out of it. "
Technical Evidence
As we mentioned last week, Dotcom's assertion is backed up by an analysis done last year by a researcher who goes by the name
Forensicator , who determined that the DNC files were copied at
22.6 MB/s - a speed virtually impossible to achieve from halfway around the world, much less over a local network - yet a speed
typical of file transfers to a memory stick.
The big hint
Last but not least, let's not forget that Julian Assange heavily implied Seth Rich was a source:
Given that a) the Russian hacking narrative hinges on Crowdstrikes's questionable reporting , and b) a mountain of evidence pointing
to Seth Rich as the source of the leaked emails - it stands to reason that Congressional investigators and Special Counsel Robert
Mueller should at minimum explore these leads.
As retired U.S. Navy admiral James A. Lyons, Jr. asks: why aren't they?
Something all of us here already know, if Mueller gets away from the delusion of Trump-Russia collusion then it will be his
ass in the frying pan. So he won't go after the Clintons, Obama, Comey or anyone else. Hitlery could show up with a gun in her
hand and tell Mueller she shot Seth and he would ignore it.
And, sadly, there ain't nobody gonna do anything about it unless and until a Special Prosecutor from outside DC is hired. Right
now a snowball in hell has a better chance.
Why don't the Democrats scream about the exploitation of his murder against them like they do with every minor accusation? It's as if they want his death to disappear from the public view...wonder why?
I think it is mostly because they know so much of their world hangs in the secrecy. If they let the Seth Rich story get out,
the Uranium One story gets out. If the Uranium One story gets out, the Awans' stolen cars with diplomatic cover for guns to Syria
in return for heroin to America comes out. If that story comes out, then the ISI Pakistani doctors with fake medical degrees pushing
pharma opiods in America comes out. And finally, Pizzagate, Pedogate, call it what you want, it comes out too. And then all of
these dirty sons of bitches go to jail.
And that's why you aren't hearing any of it. Especially from Mueller. I think he got hoodwinked too. They sold him this job
as a slam dunk to get Trump out of the White House. It really is the shits when the best laid plans of mice go south.
One of Trumps big problems is that as an outsider he did not have people both qualified and loyal to appoint to critical offices
in the deep state. That is why he wound up with a cipher like Sessions, a guy naive and gullible enough to believe the justice
department was filled with honorable and trustworthy people or at least men who played by some set of rules. Having found out
the hard way that he screwed up Trump is groping for a way out, trying to use a knife in a gun fight. The other side is too ruthless
and i suspect they will take him down in the end.
"All I know is that he offered a sample, an extensive sample, I'm sure dozens of emails, and said 'I want money.'
Later, WikiLeaks did get the password, he had a DropBox, a protected DropBox," he said. They got access to the
DropBox."
Why has no one followed the money on this yet? This introduces an interesting angle - did Seth Rich get paid by WikiLeaks?
And if so, can we find evidence of the payoff? How did he afford his expensive watch and necklace?
Report a crime, yet don't allow law enforcement access to evidence to help them solve the case.
Sounds like a case in Illinois. A 1 1/2 year old went missing, yet the parent wouldn't let the authorities search the house.
I don't remember if there was a warrant or what finally happened that the police were allowed to search the home, but they did,
and found the baby, dead, under the sofa.
The other key is Rod Rosenstein's post-indictment presser. At the very end, he gave away the game by admitting there was no
collusion, no Americans were involved, and nothing allegedly done by the Russians affected the election's outcome. BOOM. Stick
a fork in Mueller's ham sandwich indictment.
The one bit of evidence that pushes me over from the possible to probably is the gun, what are the odds of this gun being stolen
from the FBI, not just some random joe, but the FBI themselves. If that was the same gun used in the murder than the odds of it
happening to turn up immediately in a robbery where nothing was stolen in an area where no one commits crimes is so small as to
be near zero. It is vague above, what do ballistics say?
If Trump really wants to drain his swamp then this would be the way in, however if they did murder Seth then they'll murder
Trump's family too so he is neutralized unless they can go in and get everyone involved in one go. Otherwise I'd expect the job
to be handed over to someone ready to die, thinking here a retired general/admiral with no family might be the one to do it.
"... Brennan has the bad luck to be the nastiest Deep Stater out there, plus its poster-boy, just when the Deep State is being put on trial by an enraged citizenry. Maybe this explains why he is shilling for big money Trump haters, as explained in last week's article by Charles Bausman. Maybe he thinks they will protect him. ..."
"... Mike Whitney and Philip Giraldi gave him a shellacking in major articles last week. Now Stone joins them. ..."
"... "DOJ statement and indictments reveal the extent and motivations of Russian interference in 2016 election. Claims of a "hoax" in tatters. My take: Implausible that Russian actions did not influence the views and votes of at least some Americans." ..."
"... – February 16, 2018 Tweet by Embittered Obama Spy Chief John O. Brennan ..."
The alleged convert to Islam almost certainly perjured himself in the RussiaGate hearings, and is the most
egregious of all the RussiaHoax plotters. His legal problems are real, and his checkered career leaves him
vulnerable.
Roger Stone
Feb 20, 2018
|
5,230
86
MORE:
Politics
Brennan has the bad luck to be the nastiest Deep Stater out there, plus its poster-boy, just when the Deep
State is being put on trial by an enraged citizenry. Maybe this explains why he is shilling for big money Trump
haters, as explained in
last week's article
by Charles Bausman. Maybe he thinks they will protect him.
"DOJ statement and indictments reveal the extent and motivations of Russian interference in 2016
election. Claims of a "hoax" in tatters. My take: Implausible that Russian actions did not influence the views
and votes of at least some Americans."
– February 16, 2018 Tweet by Embittered Obama Spy Chief John O. Brennan
At the heart of this Obama-Clinton-Democrat FBI-DOJ-CIA-FISA Court cabal is the originator of the Trump-Russia
collusion hoax himself, the deepest deep state denizen of the bunch, former CIA Director John O. Brennan. As our
country's Russian Collusion Hoaxmaster General John Brennan has good reason to be worried.
Best known for indulging Obama's most evil compulsions as Obama's 2nd-term CIA chief, Brennan was just
freshly-minted as an NBC "News" shill (shocking) under the title "senior national security and intelligence
analyst." It is obvious to anyone near Brennan that he is now bitter, acrimonious, hellbent on malicious
retribution and likely the Obama-Clinton coup plotter with the most to fear should President Trump, and a
newly-inspired, freshly-fumigated DOJ actually perform its constitutional duty and prosecute these manipulative
Obama-Clinton gangsters.
Thanks to the unflappable courage of the House Intelligence Committee Chairman and astute, stalwart
truth-seeker Devin Nunes, John Brennan's legal jeopardy is real and the most immediate of all the Obama-Clinton
sedition mechanics. Investigative journalist Paul Sperry
broke
the news last week
that Nunes is initiating an investigation into Brennan's central and leading role in
promoting and leaking the "dirty dossier" in a manic effort to smear Donald Trump with any and every means at
Brennan's disposal. (Just consider the import of this proposition, given that Brennan was the DIRECTOR OF THE
CIA!).
It is almost certain that Brennan perjured himself before the House Intelligence Committee in May 2017, at
minimum, when he denied knowledge of the origin of the Steele dossier and that it was in any way used in the
intelligence community "assessment" that the Russians were attempting to influence the 2016 election, specifically
via the Trump Campaign.
"the information and intelligence revealed contacts and interactions between Russian officials and US
persons involved in the Trump campaign that I was concerned about because of known Russian efforts to suborn
such individuals.
It raised questions in my mind about whether the Russians were able to gain the cooperation of such
individuals."
When Rep. Trey Gowdy asked Brennan directly about any evidence that Trump officials colluded with the Kremlin,
Brennan said "I don't know" and "I don't know whether such collusion existed."
Yet in the same response, Brennan said that there was a sufficient basis of information and intelligence that
required further investigation by the FBI to determine whether or not US persons were actively conspiring or
colluding with Russian officials. Brennan also testified that he had no knowledge of who commissioned the
anti-Trump reports, although senior national security and counterintelligence officials at the DOJ knew in 2016
that the Clinton campaign had funded them.
It is extremely unlikely that Brennan somehow didn't know of Clinton's role in the fake reports. It was Brennan,
after all, who in April 2016 supplied the reports to Obama and then briefed Hill Democrats on its existence. If he
didn't know the source of the reports, he's guilty of gross negligence for not verifying the material. If he knew
the source of the reports he's guilty of disseminating false information. Either way, Brennan should be held
accountable for his role in attempting to undermine the will of the American voters.
If the Russians had a plan to destabilize and influence our elections then John Brennan was carrying out that
plan to the letter. In recent months there have been startling revelations that leading members of Mueller's task
force investigating Trump were found to have orchestrated a plan to undermine the Trump presidency using the fake
dossiers. It's certainly not in dispute that the dossiers were funded by Hillary Clinton and the DNC, and were
approved of by Obama and some of his top staff. Evidence from their own texts exposed a conspiracy to destroy
Trump's credibility, hopefully leading to his forced resignation.
Initially, the focus of the current investigation was on Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, and Ben Rhodes. Thanks to
Chairman Nunes, the focus is now going to shift to Obama's murky national security apparatchiks, with Brennan
topping the list of those warranting scrutiny for their outrageous abuses of the massive powers of our national
security-intelligence complex. Truth is that there is much about John Brennan that warrants investigation.
Brennan, who also served as Obama's Homeland Security Advisor from 2009-2013, before becoming CIA Director, is
believed to be a Muslim convert. He clearly despised Trump for what duplicitous Democrats characterized as the
president's "Muslim ban." Former CIA field operations officer Gene Coyle said Brennan was:
"known as the greatest sycophant in the history of the CIA, and a supporter of Hillary Clinton before the
election. I find it hard to put any real credence in anything that the man says."
Brennan was not sworn into office on a Bible, as the tradition goes in America, but on an original draft of
the Constitution WITHOUT the Bill of Rights. Clearly, this was a purposeful signal that Brennan has no regard
for the limits on the powers of the state enshrined in these amendments. [Just this past week, this
constitutional quisling called on Congress to ban semi-automatic firearms altogether, a radical infringement on
the right to keep and bear arms that even most Democrats do not support.]
Brennan's 1980 graduate thesis at the University of Texas at Austin denied the existence of "absolute human
rights", arguing in favor of censorship by Egypt's dictatorship. "Since the press can play such an influential
role in determining the perceptions of the masses, I am in favor of some degree of government censorship.
Inflammatory articles can provoke mass opposition and possible violence, especially in developing political
systems."
Brennan hewed to his own thesis when he possessed extraordinary power, as shown in an obscure November 2012
Wikileaks email dump which pointed to Brennan as the official behind a "witch hunt" conducted on journalists
who reported unflattering Obama administration leaks.
In Brennan's CIA Director confirmation hearing, he refused to answer direct questions by Sen. Rand Paul
about the Obama administration's use of lethal drone attacks on U.S. citizens in U.S. territory. Brennan coyly
responded that the U.S. "has not carried out such attacks" and "has no intentions of doing so." The Obama
administration did, however, conduct such attacks on U.S. citizens abroad.
Consistent with Brennan's sympathies for Islamic terror nations, he warned President-Elect Donald Trump that
scrapping the outrageous Obama-Iran nuclear deal would be "the height of folly" and "disastrous."
Brennan went out of his way to attack Donald Trump throughout the 2016 campaign, even saying publicly he
would refuse to employ water-boarding in some extreme cases. "I can say that as long as I'm director of CIA,
irrespective of what the president says, I'm not going to be the director of CIA that gives that order. They'll
have to find another director," said the pre-emptively insubordinate Brennan.
In 2016, Brennan admitted that in the 1976 presidential election he actually supported the
Communist
Party
presidential candidate – a hard line, unrepentant Stalinist named Gus Hall.
Brennan has long been cozy with the Muslim Brotherhood. Despite evidence presented (and later upheld)
during the landmark 2008 Holy Land Foundation trial in federal court, which established the Islamic Society of
North America as a Muslim Brotherhood organization and financial supporter of the terrorist organization Hamas,
Brennan has continued to meet with ISNA officials and participate in ISNA events. Brennan delivered the keynote
address to ISNA's annual conference in 2009.
With all of this questionable information about Brennan, it is no surprise that he inspired a lack of
confidence among key national security hawks in Congress, who began calling for Brennan's resignation as far back
as 2010. Brennan addressed a New York University assembly in 2010 and defended freeing U.S.-held terror
combatants, saying that it "isn't that bad" that 20 percent of terrorists released by the U.S. return to terrorist
attacks, since the recidivism rate for inmates in the U.S. prison system is higher. After this, Senator Lindsey
Graham told Fox News that Brennan had "lost my confidence" and called for Brennan's resignation.
"when you impugn people's patriotism and integrity and make statements that compare people going back into
the fight in Afghanistan or Yemen or other places with criminals who go back to a life of crime in the United
States, you've lost touch with reality."
New York Congressman Peter King said,
"I strongly believe that John Brennan ought to resign immediately or be fired because of his incompetence
and inability to do his job any homeland security adviser who can't tell the difference between a terrorist and
a shoplifter doesn't belong in office."
In March 2014 Brennan denied to the Associated Press that CIA was involved in hacking U.S. Senate computers.
Barely three months later, Brennan was back, publicly apologizing to the Senate Intelligence Committee leadership
for you guessed it CIA hacking of Senate computers. This little outrage clearly demonstrated that Brennan is both
a manipulator and a liar, who has absolutely no respect for the notion of oversight by elected representatives, or
for the sanctity of our 1st branch of government as representatives of the people.
The origins of the Trump – Russia collusion started when John Brennan used phony and uncorroborated intel
provided by Estonian spies to British intelligence assets purporting to show a link between the Kremlin and
members of Trump's campaign.
The BBC's Paul Wood reported last year that the intelligence agency of an
unnamed Baltic State had tipped Brennan off in April 2016 to a conversation that supposedly indicated that the
Kremlin was funneling cash into the Trump campaign. Even Brennan's equally bald-headed Obama administration soul
mate, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, discounted the report saying "we could not corroborate the
sourcing." That should have put an end to the whole thing.
Brennan didn't think so and despite having no corroboration for the Estonian intel he attached the information
to an official report to President Obama. He also included these unverified allegations in a briefing he gave to
Hill Democrats known as the "Gang of Eight," practically guaranteeing that it would be leaked.
Of course, it was.
Brennan also showed incredible disrespect for DonaldTrump during the first weeks of Trump's presidency. The
Washington Times
reported that
"[m]
embers of President
Trump
'
s
inner circle charged Sunday that former
CIA
director
John
O. Brennan
is trying to undermine the relationship between the new administration and the
intelligence community on his way out the door."
When
President Trump officially visited the CIA headquarters for the first time to support and bridge any gap
with the intelligence community, Trump blamed it on "dishonest" media reporting. Brennan used the opportunity to
take a swipe at Trump:
"Former
CIA
director
Brennan
is
deeply saddened and angered at
Donald
Trump
's despicable display of self-aggrandizement in front of the
CIA
's
Memorial Wall of Agency heroes,"
said
Brennan
's former deputy chief of staff, Nick Shapiro.
President Trump tweeted an immediate rebuttal: "
Brennan
says
that
Trump
should
be ashamed of himself Is this the leaker of Fake News?" Then-White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus added, "I
think that Brennan has a lot of things that he should answer for with regard to these leaked documents I think
perhaps he's bitter." There can be no doubt that John Brennan is, at minimum, a very shady and malevolent
character.
But, even worse, as recent revelations are beginning to prove, Brennan is a criminally-manipulative partisan
sycophant who abused nearly every power of his position as director of perhaps the most powerful, and
historically-lawless, agencies of the federal government in service to a seditious conspiracy intent on
illicitly-securing the election of his preferred candidate for President of the United States by
fraudulently-framing her opponent with perhaps the most grave offenses that can possibly be levied against any
person seeking public office at any level in this country.
When Brennan's and his co-conspirators' plot to smear and defeat his political matron's opponent failed
spectacularly in the greatest upset in American political history, a now-embittered and politically-unrestrained,
if not unhinged, Brennan maliciously set about poisoning the well and salting the fields to undermine the incoming
president and his administration. He did this by systematically and purposefully disseminating the defamatory
contents of the sleazy, Clinton-purchased "dirty dossier" to official Washington and numerous sympathetic media
mouthpieces during the transition period and beyond, ensuring their continued proliferation, compounding the
damage Brennan hoped and expected would result from his calculated treachery.
Brennan was even so brazen as to attach the dossier's contents to an official daily intelligence briefing
provided to the outgoing president just weeks before the inauguration of the president-elect. He also persisted in
pressing Congressional leaders to launch expansive, disruptive investigations targeting the president and his
team.
Being highly-practiced in the art of diabolical backstabbing, Brennan knew full well that the murky, outlandish
nature and wide-ranging subject matter of the fake dossier's contents would only serve to complicate, prolong and
ultimately thwart the orderly expeditious resolution of any good faith investigative effort undertaken by any
official body, especially those impacted by the cumbersome demands of dealing with classified materials. (See e.g.
the "FISA memo" saga.) That his deceitful, underhanded scheme would falsely divert public resources and distract
official efforts and public attention, costing hundreds of thousands of lost manhours and tens of millions of
dollars, fruitlessly chasing down a sordid fraud, is not just of no consequence to Brennan,
it is what he
intended.
To this day, the dossier's contents remain almost entirely-unverified for the simple reason that falsehoods and
fabrications are incapable of ever being verified, at least by any standard that would be the minimum applied by
any law enforcement or intelligence agency, or at least one not tainted by the criminal corruption of a lawless
agency head.
Perhaps the most vile aspect of Brennan's ruthless political jihad against our democracy, seeking to undermine
a quadrennial national election by which we choose our president, lies in his motives.
He did not run around splattering our national political life with gutter-grade filth and Clinton-grade lies in
service to some higher purpose or noble patriotic impulse. Not in the slightest. Just like his petty, vain,
manipulative Obama administration crony, the worse-than-a-woman-scorned James Comey, this degenerate megalomaniac
Brennan did it all, first out of borderline-psychotic desperation to preserve his power and position atop
America's near-omnipotent intelligence infrastructure.
Brennan fully-expected, and was valid in his expectation, that Hillary Clinton would have retained him as CIA
Director, had she been elected president. Having failed to achieve this first and only motivation for his
miserable existence, Brennan then persisted, in the second place, out of seething, now-undeniably-psychotic
bitterness over his now-ended career, matched only by his almost-satanic lust to wreak destructive vengeance on
the man, and the movement, that denied him the power he has so unequivocally and despicably demonstrated that he
believes to be his divine right.
John Brennan is an evil, repugnant criminal on par with our nation's most righteously-reviled villains and
monsters. If there is any justice in this land, he will spend the rest of his grotesque blighted existence locked
in a windowless concrete cage somewhere halfway to the center of the earth.
(By Roger Stone) The extraordinary effort by leakers inside US Intelligence Agencies to
create a false narrative accusing Donald Trump and his associates of colluding with the Russian
State has been orchestrated by former CIA Chief Brennan. Brennan even took the incredible step
of putting out a statement denying he is the leaker, a move so ham- handed it virtually
guarantees he is the ring-leader. Who is this man and how did he come to serve both Bush and
Obama and thus the Deep State.
John Brennan, CIA chief during the Obama-administration starting in 2013 until 2017.
Previously he held the position of Homeland Security Advisor from 2009- 2013. This is a man who
has subverted justice and is responsible for planting the seeds of the Russian collusion story
designed to undermine the administration of Donald Trump. Well for starters he was a supporter
of Hillary Clinton and wanted to retain his position as CIA director under her administration,
Brennan despised Trump for his "Muslim ban."
Brennan himself is almost certainly a believed to be a Muslim convert. Two former CIA
employees stationed at the CIA Station in Riyadh told the Stone Cold Truth that their suspicion
Brennan had converted to Wahhabism, the most radical form of Islam had been confirmed by things
they both saw and heard. Former CIA field operations officer Gene Coyle said Brennan was "known
as the greatest sycophant in the history of the CIA, and a supporter of Hillary Clinton before
the election. I find it hard to put any real credence in anything that the man says." (1)
http://nypost.com/2017/05/26/how-team-obama-tried-to-hack-the-election/
The origins of the Trump -Russia collision started when John Brennan used phony and
uncorroborated intel provided by Estonian spies to British, intel purporting to show a link
between the Kremlin and members of Trump's campaign. (2) April 19, 2017, 12:04 am THE AMERICAN
SPECTATOR https://spectator.org/confirmed-john-brennan-colluded-with-foreign-spies-to-defeat-trump/
The BBC's Paul Wood reported last year that the intelligence agency of an unnamed Baltic State
had tipped Brennan off in April 2016 to a conversation purporting to show that the Kremlin was
funneling cash into the Trump campaign. Obama's intel czar James Clapper discounted the report
testifying that "we could not corroborate the sourcing." That should have put an end to the
whole thing. Brennan didn't think so and despite having no corroboration for the Estonian
intel, Brennan attached the report to an official report to President Obama. He also included
the unverified allegations in a briefing he gave to Hill Democrats known as the "Gang of Eight"
practically guaranteeing that it would be leaked, which it was.
According to National Review, the Russian collusion scandal is manufactured. "Throughout our
consideration of the "collusion with Russia" narrative, we have taken pains to stress that the
probe is a counterintelligence investigation, not a criminal investigation. It is a salient
distinction for two reasons. First, the subject of the investigation is the foreign power (in
this case, Russia), not those Americans whom the foreign power may seek to trick, co-opt, or
recruit. If those Americans were suspected of criminal wrongdoing, they would be made the
subject of a criminal investigation; counterintelligence investigations are not conducted for
the purpose of building prosecutable court cases. Second, counterintelligence investigations
are classified. The presumption is that the information they uncover will never see the light
of day.
There are several good reasons for this. The one of most relevance here is to prevent the
smearing of Americans. Purely for political gain, officials of the prior administration and
Democrats on Capitol Hill are publicizing an investigation that should never be public. It may
be called a "counterintelligence investigation," but the objective is to undermine Trump, not
Russia. In a criminal investigation, agents and prosecutors fully expect that their work will
eventually become public when arrests are made. Yet even in a criminal investigation,
government officials are not supposed to speak publicly about suspicions or uncharged conduct.
Due process dictates that they withhold comment unless and until they file a formal charge in
court. It is a grave ethical breach to smear a person who is presumed innocent and whom the FBI
and Justice Department lack sufficient evidence to charge with a crime." (3) by Andrew C.
McCarthy May 24, 2017, 1:04 PM @ANDREWCMCCARTHY NATIONAL REVIEW
Brennan answered questions posed by members of the House Intelligence Committee this past
recently and by his answers, he clearly showed a disconnect with his reasoning in the Trump
collision matters. When Rep. Trey Gowdy asked whether he saw any evidence that Trump officials
colluded with the Kremlin, Brennan said: "I don't know." "I don't know whether such collusion
existed." Yet in the same response, Brennan said that there was a sufficient basis of
information and intelligence that required further investigation by the Bureau (FBI) to
determine whether or not US persons were actively conspiring, colluding with Russian
officials."(4) http://nypost.com/2017/05/26/how-team-obama-tried-to-hack-the-election/
Brennan refused sworn into office on a Bible, as the tradition goes in America, but on an
original draft of the Constitution sans the Bill of Rights. He was swearing to uphold the
Constitution not on a complete copy, but on one that omitted the documents that most clearly
limit State powers, such as the First Amendment and Second Amendment, which prohibit the
federal government from abridging freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of religion
and the individual freedom to bear arms. This is also an act intended to appease his Muslim
brothers.
In his 1980 graduate thesis at the University of Texas at Austin, Brennan denied the
existence of "absolute human rights" and argued in favor of censorship on the part of the
Egyptian dictatorship. "Since the press can play such an influential role in determining the
perceptions of the masses, I am in favor of some degree of government censorship.
Inflammatory articles can provoke mass opposition and possible violence, especially in
developing political systems."
Not surprising with that background, an obscure November 2012 Wikileaks email dump points
to Brennan as the person behind the "witch hunt" of journalists who reported unflattering
Obama administration leaks.
In his confirmation hearing to become CIA director, Brennan refused to answer direct
questions by Sen. Rand Paul about the Obama administration's use of lethal drone attacks on
U.S. citizens on U.S. territory. He would only say the U.S. "has not carried out such
attacks" and "has no intentions of doing so." The Obama administration did, however, conduct
such attacks on U.S. citizens abroad.
In November he warned Donald Trump that scrapping the nuclear deal with Iran would be
"the height of folly" and "disastrous." Brennan also started claiming the Russians would hack
the election at almost the same time as Clinton Campaign Chief John Podesta coined the phony
storyline to distract from his own extensive and lucrative dealings with the circle around
Putin not to mention then pay-day realized by Bill and Hillary Clinton.
Brennan admitted in 2016 to support the Communist Party presidential candidate – a
hard line, unrepentant Stalinist named Gus Hall – in the 1976 presidential election.
Neither was Brennan penitent about casting that vote. Brennan even chortled at his good luck
after no Senator in his confirmation hearings to be Director of Central Intelligence asked
him directly if he had been a member of the US Communist Party at that time, Brennan has long
been cozy with the Muslim Brotherhood. Despite evidence presented (and later upheld) in
federal court during the landmark 2008 Holy Land Foundation trial, which established the
Islamic Society of North America as a Muslim Brotherhood organization and financial supporter
of the terrorist organization Hamas, Brennan has continued to meet with ISNA officials and
participate in ISNA events. At ISNA's annual conference in 2009, for example, Brennan
delivered the keynote address.
It gets worse. One of the FBI's former top experts on Islam says Brennan converted to
Islam years ago in Saudi Arabia. FBI veteran John Guandolo says Brennan remains a closeted
Muslim, having been recruited by the Saudis as part of a counter-intelligence operation.
In a speech delivered Aug. 9, 2009, to the Center for Strategic and International Studies
that is archived on the White House website, Brennan said using "a legitimate term, 'jihad'
– meaning to purify oneself or to wage a holy struggle for a moral goal" – to
describe terrorists "risks reinforcing the idea that the United States is somehow at war with
Islam itself."
In 2010, when Brennan was serving as Obama's Homeland Security chief, He said that having
20 percent of terrorists released by the U.S. return to terrorist attacks "isn't that bad,"
since the recidivism rate for inmates in the U.S. prison system is higher."The statement
prompted Sen. John McCain to assert Brennan had "lost touch with reality."
Brennan clearly has had his own agenda for minimizing Muslim extremist activities as well as
his personal vendetta against Trump. He's a reborn Muslim and possible Saudi plant in addition
to being a liar. In March of 2014, he told Associated Press that the CIA was not involved in
hacking Senate computers. But by July 2014 he publicly apologized to the Senate Intelligence
Committee leaders for CIA hacking into Senate computers. Former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton
said "It is not at all clear to me, just viewing this from the outside, that this hacking into
the DNC and the RNC was not a false flag operation," he said. "We just don't
know.
Back in 2010, Brennan was being called upon to resign. After Brennan addressed a New York
University Assembly, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., called for Brennan's departure. Graham told
Fox News that Brennan had "lost my confidence." Then Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., added his
perspective. "I strongly believe that John Brennan ought to resign immediately or be fired
because of his incompetence and inability to do his job," he told Fox. "Any homeland security
adviser who can't tell the difference between a terrorist and a shoplifter doesn't belong in
office." Then McCain, the Republican from Arizona, joined in. "When you impugn people's
patriotism and integrity and make statements that compare people going back into the fight in
Afghanistan or Yemen or other places with criminals who go back to a life of crime in the
United States, you've lost touch with reality," he said. (5) http://www.wnd.com/2010/02/12528
Brennan showed incredible disrespect for Trump during the first weeks of his presidency. As
reported by The Washington Times "Members of President Trump's inner circle charged Sunday that
former CIA director John O. Brennan is trying to undermine the relationship between the new
administration and the intelligence community on his way out the door."
Mr. Trump made his first official visit to the CIA on Saturday in order to show his support
for and clear the air with the intelligence community, following a series of damaging leaks
during the presidential transition period. He said reports of a feud between his campaign and
the intelligence services were the product of "dishonest" media reporting. "I love you, I
respect you, there's nobody I respect more," Mr. Trump told several hundred cheering workers
who came in the Langley complex on a Saturday. "We're going to start winning again, and you're
going to be leading the charge."
"Former CIA Director Brennan is deeply saddened and angered at Donald Trump's despicable
display of self-aggrandizement in front of the CIA's Memorial Wall of Agency heroes," Nick
Shapiro, Mr. Brennan's former deputy chief of staff, said in a statement. "Brennan says that
Trump should be ashamed of himself."
"Is this the leaker of Fake News?" Trump tweeted. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus
reinforced those suspicions on Sunday. "I think that Brennan has a lot of things that he should
answer for with regard to these leaked documents," Mr. Priebus said. "I think perhaps he's
bitter."(6)
Russian active measures hope to topple democracies through the pursuit of five complementary
objectives: One, undermine citizen confidence in democratic governance; two, foment, exacerbate
divisive political fissures; three, erode trust between citizens and elected officials and
their institutions; four, popularize Russian policy agendas within foreign populations; and
five, create general distrust or confusion over information sources by blurring the lines
between fact and fiction -- a very pertinent issue today in our country. John Brennan has
enabled at least four of these objectives
John Brennan should be charged with treason. Why hasn't Attorney General Jeff Sessions
convened a grand jury?
"DOJ statement and indictments reveal the extent and motivations of Russian interference in 2016
election. Claims of a "hoax" in tatters. My take: Implausible that Russian actions did not influence the
views and votes of at least some Americans."
– February 16, 2018 Tweet by Embittered Obama Spy Chief John O. Brennan
There can be no doubt that panic is rapidly setting in amongst the principal players of the neo-leftist
Obama-Clinton-Democrat crime cabal that has largely been consigned to watching impotently from the sidelines
as the central pillar of their plot to frame and take down President Donald J. Trump -- the Trump-Russia
collusion hoax – has now begun to crash down on top of them.
At the heart of this Obama-Clinton-Democrat FBI-DOJ-CIA-FISA Court cabal is the originator of the
Trump-Russia collusion hoax himself, the deepest deep state denizen of the bunch, former CIA Director John
O. Brennan.
As our country's Russian Collusion Hoaxmaster General John Brennan has good reason to be worried.
Best known for indulging Obama's most evil compulsions as Obama's 2nd-term CIA chief, Brennan was just
freshly-minted as an NBC "News" shill (shocking) under the title "senior national security and intelligence
analyst."
It is obvious to anyone near Brennan that he is now bitter, acrimonious, hellbent on malicious
retribution and likely the Obama-Clinton coup plotter with the most to fear should President Trump, and a
newly-inspired, freshly-fumigated DOJ actually perform its constitutional duty and prosecute these
manipulative Obama-Clinton gangsters.
Thanks to the unflappable courage of the House Intelligence Committee Chairman and astute, stalwart
truth-seeker Devin Nunes, John Brennan's legal jeopardy is real and the most immediate of all the
Obama-Clinton sedition mechanics.
Investigative journalist Paul Sperry
broke
the news last week
that Nunes is initiating an investigation into Brennan's central and leading role in
promoting and leaking the "dirty dossier" in a manic effort to smear Donald Trump with any and every means
at Brennan's disposal. (Just consider the import of this proposition, given that Brennan was the DIRECTOR OF
THE CIA!).
It is almost certain that Brennan perjured himself before the House Intelligence Committee in May 2017,
at minimum, when he denied knowledge of the origin of the Steele dossier and that it was in any way used in
the intelligence community "assessment" that the Russians were attempting to influence the 2016 election,
specifically via the Trump Campaign.
Brennan testified that: "the information and intelligence revealed contacts and interactions between
Russian officials and US persons involved in the Trump campaign that I was concerned about because of known
Russian efforts to suborn such individuals.
It raised questions in my mind about whether the Russians were able to gain the cooperation of such
individuals."
When Rep. Trey Gowdy asked Brennan directly about any evidence that Trump officials colluded with the
Kremlin, Brennan said "I don't know" and "I don't know whether such collusion existed."
Yet in the same response, Brennan said that there was a sufficient basis of information and intelligence
that required further investigation by the FBI to determine whether or not US persons were actively
conspiring or colluding with Russian officials.
Brennan also testified that he had no knowledge of who commissioned the anti-Trump reports, although
senior national security and counterintelligence officials at the DOJ knew in 2016 that the Clinton campaign
had funded them.
It is extremely unlikely that Brennan somehow didn't know of Clinton's role in the fake reports.
It was Brennan, after all, who in April 2016 supplied the reports to Obama and then briefed Hill
Democrats on its existence.
If he didn't know the source of the reports, he's guilty of gross negligence for not verifying the
material.
If he knew the source of the reports he's guilty of disseminating false information.
Either way, Brennan should be held accountable for his role in attempting to undermine the will of the
American voters.
If the Russians had a plan to destabilize and influence our elections then John Brennan was carrying out
that plan to the letter.
In recent months there have been startling revelations that leading members of Mueller's task force
investigating Trump were found to have orchestrated a plan to undermine the Trump presidency using the fake
dossiers.
It's certainly not in dispute that the dossiers were funded by Hillary Clinton and the DNC, and were
approved of by Obama and some of his top staff.
Evidence from their own texts exposed a conspiracy to destroy Trump's credibility, hopefully leading to
his forced resignation.
Initially, the focus of the current investigation was on Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, and Ben Rhodes.
Thanks to Chairman Nunes, the focus is now going to shift to Obama's murky national security
apparatchiks, with Brennan topping the list of those warranting scrutiny for their outrageous abuses of the
massive powers of our national security-intelligence complex.
Truth is that there is much about John Brennan that warrants investigation.
Brennan, who also served as Obama's Homeland Security Advisor from 2009-2013, before becoming CIA
Director, is believed to be a Muslim convert.
Brennan clearly despised Trump for what duplicitous Democrats characterized as the president's "Muslim
ban."
Former CIA field operations officer Gene Coyle said Brennan was "known as the greatest sycophant in the
history of the CIA, and a supporter of Hillary Clinton before the election. I find it hard to put any real
credence in anything that the man says."
In an article for World Net Daily, Joseph Farah enumerates Brennan's history of dubious or even outright
anti-American proclivities:
Brennan was not sworn into office on a Bible, as the tradition goes in America, but on an original
draft of the Constitution WITHOUT the Bill of Rights. Clearly, this was a purposeful signal that Brennan
has no regard for the limits on the powers of the state enshrined in these amendments. [Just this past
week, this constitutional quisling called on Congress to ban semi-automatic firearms altogether, a
radical infringement on the right to keep and bear arms that even most Democrats do not support.]
Brennan's 1980 graduate thesis at the University of Texas at Austin denied the existence of "absolute
human rights", arguing in favor of censorship by Egypt's dictatorship. "Since the press can play such an
influential role in determining the perceptions of the masses, I am in favor of some degree of government
censorship. Inflammatory articles can provoke mass opposition and possible violence, especially in
developing political systems."
Brennan hewed to his own thesis when he possessed extraordinary power, as shown in an obscure
November 2012 Wikileaks email dump which pointed to Brennan as the official behind a "witch hunt"
conducted on journalists who reported unflattering Obama administration leaks.
In Brennan's CIA Director confirmation hearing, he refused to answer direct questions by Sen. Rand
Paul about the Obama administration's use of lethal drone attacks on U.S. citizens in U.S. territory.
Brennan coyly responded that the U.S. "has not carried out such attacks" and "has no intentions of doing
so." The Obama administration did, however, conduct such attacks on U.S. citizens abroad.
Consistent with Brennan's sympathies for Islamic terror nations, he warned President-Elect Donald
Trump that scrapping the outrageous Obama-Iran nuclear deal would be "the height of folly" and
"disastrous."
Brennan went out of his way to attack Donald Trump throughout the 2016 campaign, even saying publicly
he would refuse to employ water-boarding in some extreme cases. "I can say that as long as I'm director
of CIA, irrespective of what the president says, I'm not going to be the director of CIA that gives that
order. They'll have to find another director," said the pre-emptively insubordinate Brennan.
In 2016, Brennan admitted that in the 1976 presidential election he actually supported the Communist
Party presidential candidate – a hard line, unrepentant Stalinist named Gus Hall.
Brennan has long been cozy with the Muslim Brotherhood. Despite evidence presented (and later upheld)
during the landmark 2008 Holy Land Foundation trial in federal court, which established the Islamic
Society of North America as a Muslim Brotherhood organization and financial supporter of the terrorist
organization Hamas, Brennan has continued to meet with ISNA officials and participate in ISNA events.
Brennan delivered the keynote address to ISNA's annual conference in 2009.
With all of this questionable information about Brennan, it is no surprise that he inspired a lack of
confidence among key national security hawks in Congress, who began calling for Brennan's resignation as far
back as 2010.
After Brennan addressed a New York University assembly in 2010 and defended freeing U.S.-held terror
combatants, saying that it "isn't that bad" that 20 percent of terrorists released by the U.S. return to
terrorist attacks, since the recidivism rate for inmates in the U.S. prison system is higher."
After this, Senator Lindsey Graham told Fox News that Brennan had "lost my confidence" and called for
Brennan's resignation.
Similarly, John McCain weighed in, saying that "when you impugn people's patriotism and integrity and
make statements that compare people going back into the fight in Afghanistan or Yemen or other places with
criminals who go back to a life of crime in the United States, you've lost touch with reality."
New York Congressman Peter King said, "I strongly believe that John Brennan ought to resign immediately
or be fired because of his incompetence and inability to do his job any homeland security adviser who can't
tell the difference between a terrorist and a shoplifter doesn't belong in office."
In March 2014 Brennan denied to Associated Press that CIA was involved in hacking U.S. Senate computers.
Barely three months later, Brennan was back, publicly apologizing to the Senate Intelligence Committee
leadership for you guessed it CIA hacking of Senate computers.
This little outrage clearly demonstrated that Brennan is both a manipulator and a liar, who has
absolutely no respect for the notion of oversight by elected representatives, or for the sanctity of our
1st branch of government as representatives of the people.
The origins of the Trump – Russia collusion started when John Brennan used phony and uncorroborated intel
provided by Estonian spies to British intelligence assets purporting to show a link between the Kremlin and
members of Trump's campaign.
The BBC's Paul Wood reported last year that the intelligence agency of an unnamed Baltic State had tipped
Brennan off in April 2016 to a conversation that supposedly indicated that the Kremlin was funneling cash
into the Trump campaign.
Even Brennan's equally bald-headed Obama administration soul mate, Director of National Intelligence
James Clapper, discounted the report saying "we could not corroborate the sourcing." That should have put
an end to the whole thing.
Brennan didn't think so and despite having no corroboration for the Estonian intel he attached the
information to an official report to President Obama.
Brennan also included these unverified allegations in a briefing he gave to Hill Democrats known as the
"Gang of Eight," practically guaranteeing that it would be leaked.
Of course, it was.
Brennan also showed incredible disrespect for DonaldTrump during the first weeks of Trump's presidency.
The Washington Times reported that "[m]embers of President
Trump
's
inner circle charged Sunday that former
CIA
director
John
O. Brennan
is trying to undermine the relationship between the new administration and the intelligence
community on his way out the door."
When
President Trump officially visited the CIA headquarters for the first time to support and bridge
any gap with the intelligence community, Trump blamed it on "dishonest" media reporting.
Brennan used the opportunity to take a swipe at Trump.
"Former
CIA
director
Brennan
is
deeply saddened and angered at
Donald
Trump
's despicable display of self-aggrandizement in front of the
CIA
's
Memorial Wall of Agency heroes,"
said
Brennan
's former deputy chief of staff, Nick Shapiro.
President Trump tweeted an immediate rebuttal: "
Brennan
says
that
Trump
should
be ashamed of himself Is this the leaker of Fake News?"
Then-White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus added, "I think that Brennan has a lot of things that he
should answer for with regard to these leaked documents I think perhaps he's bitter."
There can be no doubt that John Brennan is, at minimum, a very shady and malevolent character.
But, even worse, as recent revelations are beginning to prove, Brennan is a criminally-manipulative
partisan sycophant who abused nearly every power of his position as director of perhaps the most powerful,
and historically-lawless, agencies of the federal government in service to a seditious conspiracy intent on
illicitly-securing the election of his preferred candidate for President of the United States by
fraudulently-framing her opponent with perhaps the most grave offenses that can possibly be levied against
any person seeking public office at any level in this country.
When Brennan's and his co-conspirators' plot to smear and defeat his political matron's opponent failed
spectacularly in the greatest upset in American political history, a now-embittered and
politically-unrestrained, if not unhinged, Brennan maliciously set about poisoning the well and salting the
fields to undermine the incoming president and his administration.
Brennan did this by systematically and purposefully disseminating the defamatory contents of the sleazy,
Clinton-purchased "dirty dossier" to official Washington and numerous sympathetic media mouthpieces during
the transition period and beyond, ensuring their continued proliferation, compounding the damage Brennan
hoped and expected would result from his calculated treachery.
Brennan was even so brazen as to attach the dossier's contents to an official daily intelligence briefing
provided to the outgoing president just weeks before the inauguration of the president-elect.
He also persisted in pressing Congressional leaders to launch expansive, disruptive investigations
targeting the president and his team.
Being highly-practiced in the art of diabolical backstabbing, Brennan knew full well that the murky,
outlandish nature and wide-ranging subject matter of the fake dossier's contents would only serve to
complicate, prolong and ultimately thwart the orderly expeditious resolution of any good faith investigative
effort undertaken by any official body, especially those impacted by the cumbersome demands of dealing with
classified materials. (See e.g. the "FISA memo" saga.)
That his deceitful, underhanded scheme would falsely divert public resources and distract official
efforts and public attention, costing hundreds of thousands of lost manhours and tens of millions of
dollars, fruitlessly chasing down a sordid fraud, is not just of no consequence to Brennan, it is what he
intended.
To this day, the dossier's contents remain almost entirely-unverified for the simple reason that
falsehoods and fabrications are incapable of ever being verified, at least by any standard that would be the
minimum applied by any law enforcement or intelligence agency, or at least one not tainted by the criminal
corruption of a lawless agency head.
Perhaps the most vile aspect of Brennan's ruthless political jihad against our democracy, seeking to
undermine a quadrennial national election by which we choose our president, lies in his motives.
Brennan did not run around splattering our national political life with gutter-grade filth and
Clinton-grade lies in service to some higher purpose or noble patriotic impulse. Not in the slightest.
Just like his petty, vain, manipulative Obama administration crony, the worse-than-a-woman-scorned James
Comey, this degenerate megalomaniac Brennan did it all, first out of borderline-psychotic desperation to
preserve his power and position atop America's near-omnipotent intelligence infrastructure.
Brennan fully-expected, and was valid in his expectation, that Hillary Clinton would have retained him as
CIA Director, had she been elected president.
Having failed to achieve this first and only motivation for his miserable existence, Brennan then
persisted, in the second place, out of seething, now-undeniably-psychotic bitterness over his now-ended
career, matched only by his almost-satanic lust to wreak destructive vengeance on the man, and the movement,
that denied him the power he has so unequivocally and despicably demonstrated that he believes to be his
divine right.
John Brennan is an evil, repugnant criminal on par with our nation's most righteously-reviled villains
and monsters.
If there is any justice in this land, John Brennan will spend the rest of his grotesque blighted
existence locked in a windowless concrete cage somewhere halfway to the center of the earth.
Raconteur, bon vivant, boulevardier – Roger Stone is a seasoned political operative,
speaker, pundit, and New York Times Bestselling Author featured in the Netflix documentary "Get me Roger
Stone". A veteran of ten national presidential campaigns, he served as a senior campaign aide to three
Republican presidents: Nixon, Reagan and, to his regret, Bush. An outspoken libertarian, he is the author
of the New York Times bestseller "The Man Who Killed Kennedy: The Case Against LBJ", the Clinton's War on
Women, The Bush Crime Family, and the Making of the President 2016- How Donald Trump Orchestrated a
Revolution. Mr. Stone has written for Fox Opinion, Infowars, Breitbart News, StoneZone, the Daily Caller,
and the New York Times. A well-known voice in politics for over forty years, Roger Stone often gives
insights on behind-the-scenes political agendas at
StoneColdTruth.com
, as well as
InfoWars.com
, where he hosts an hour long
show every Wednesday at 3 pm ET. Follow him at
StoneColdTruth.com
.
Anyone up for a story? It is going on bedtime somewhere, so why not?
Full disclosure – have not read all the comments (Incorrigibly Deplorable mind
elsewhere).
Shall we check on Lisa Monaco? Chris Farrell says Lisa Monaco was the Trump
Administraton's Homeland Security Director in the vid above (2:17).
No. Gen John Kelly was Trump Administration Sec of Homeland Security 20 Jan 2017 to 31 Jul
2017 (Wikipedia). Farrell obviously meant Obama Administration.
Monaco's title was Homeland Security Advisor 8 Mar 2013 – 20 Jan 2017, not Secretary
of Homeland Security (Wikipedia).
Lisa Monaco was DOJ NSD AAG before John Carlin took over, 1 Jul 2011 – 8 Mar 2013.
Monaco was Counsel to Attorney General Janet Reno.
Monaco obviously had DOJ-NSD ties. Monaco's JD is from Univ of Chicago. Where did Obama teach
Constitutional Law? Univ of Chicago, iirc. There is much more at Wikipedia.
Working from the PBS youtube uploads of the PBS series "The Putin Files" (25 Oct 2017), as
well as Joe Biden at the CFR, the Intel Community's presentation for the Gang of 8 7 Aug 2016
on "Russian hacking" was a Really Big Deal (have listened to hours and hours of these
PBS-Putin vids – these people are nutz). The idea was to get the Gang of 8 to sign on
to a bi-partisan statement declaring Russia was behind the hacking of the DNC, the DCCC,
Podesta, Clinton, etc. The GOPe was reticent, and rightly so. (More on that in a sec.) This
was a week before the RNC 2016 Convention.
(a search for these files is easily done, rather than embedding a ton of links – search
for "youtube PBS The Putin Files")
Back to our story. Lisa Monaco.
Let us ask Obama Deputy Secretary of State and former Deputy National Security Advisor
Anthony Blinken, shall we?
42:58 "And so in August (7 Aug 2016), Brennan, and other leaders in the Intelligence
community, as well as our top Counterterrorism and Homeland Security at the White House, Lisa
Monaco, went to Capitol Hill to talk to the leadership, about what we had learned and what we
were seeing."
Lisa Monaco was "our top Counterterrorism and Homeland Security at the White House," not
Homeland Security, during the 2016 campaign. Our top, mind you.
Jeh Johnson was Obama's Secretary of Homeland Security. Shall we ask Jeh Johnson?
33:00 "There was a session on Capitol Hill, in their SKIF, in their classified briefing
room. It was me, Lisa Monaco, and Jim Comey. And, they were all there, the Speaker, Leader
Pelosi, Leader McConnell, Leader Reed, the Chair and Ranking of the Foreign Affairs
Committee, the Intel Committees, and all the Homeland Security Committees, they were all
there. And, we briefed them again on what we knew."
Lisa Monaco was in the White House, Counterterrorism and Homeland Security, "our top,"
even. Lisa Monaco was in on this from the start, before 7 Aug 2016.
The GOPe leaders were reticent to sign on to that bi-partisan agreement, and did not do so
until mid-Sept 2016. Why?
The PBS interviewer speaking with Jeh Johnson obviously was a Russian plant.
34:15 "The way the story has been reported is that the Republicans, and McConnell
specifically, (garbled, may be the word "eventually") said, I don't see the evidence."
Huh. Imagine that. And there was still was no evidence in the ICA Report. Blast those
Deplorables.
Jeh Johnson did not see that, either. The GOPe intentions, and all that.
Apologies. The Incorrigibly Deplorable mind goes to Deplorable places.
Back to our story. Our top whatsit, Lisa Monaco. Unmaskings.
Staying with Jeh Johnson –
39:25 "My preference was that, however we responded, we respond with some things that were
cyber-security related, so that part of our steps should be effectively unmasking the bad
actors so that they couldn't do it again, outing them, effectively, and that was part of what
we did the actions we did, we took within the last month of our Administration "
Unmaskings, huh? Who was doing the unmaskings?
Samantha Power said she was not doing all the bazillon unmaskings that were done in her
name.
Oh yes. Anthony Blinken, former Deputy National Security Advisor, was Deputy Secretary of
State at that time.
How many unmaskings were done by Lisa Monaco, who worked with Jeh Johnson who wanted
to unmask the bad actors?
Lisa Monaco was White House Counterterrorism and Homeland Security. Lisa Monaco was also
very experienced in cyber-security (Wikipedia).
The FBI was running a counterintelligence operation. But Lisa Monaco was also Homeland
Security Advisor. Lisa Monaco would have every reason to be read into FBI counterintelligence
investigations, if one includes the emphasis the Obama White House was presenting at the
time, which was cyber-security and Russia's hacking.
Odds are Lisa Monaco was in on the John Brennan-Obama meeting in July 2016, as well as the
PDB and all the National Security meetings.
The FBI counterintelligence unit had that FISA Title I thingy going on with DOJ National
Security Division. Just like John Brennan had outlined to Obama (PBS vids, detailed in
comment couple three days ago). And we know National Security Advisor Susan Rice was
unmasking Trump people.
Lisa Monaco did not need to unmask. Others were doing the unmaskings. Laundering unmaskings.
Pretty clever, yes?
Go back to the Chris Farrell vid, 02:23 to 03:24 – "She (Lisa Monaco) appears in the
notes and calender of Andy McCabe in May of 2016, and if you note back a couple weeks, you
remember that there's a text from Page saying that Andy McCabe and Strzok, her friend or
boyfriend, that the White House wanted to know everything that they were doing. And so you
see that there's contact in May, and then in August you see that the counterintelligence
investigation that's opened on the Trump Campaign gets a nickname, they call it Latitude, and
it's tied back apparently to Lisa Monaco And who in the White House was managing that? And it
appears, it's likely, that it is Lisa Monaco."
Monaco was counterterrorism, not counterintelligence, should one care to get really down
in the weeds. Does that matter? Doubtful. The Obama emphasis was originally cyber-security,
and Monaco was the Obama cyber-security expert put forward at the time.
Back to our story.
Jake Sullivan was in the Clinton Campaign. What did Jake Sullivan know about FBI
investigations? Shall we ask PajamaJake?
47:50 "We heard very late in the day, very late in the process, with just days to go before
the election, that there might be some kind of investigation Into the Trump campaign
involving the FBI, and we flagged what we were hearing for a variety of reporters who were
all told, no that's not true that's not happening. We know now in fact it was true and it was
happening, but nobody was able to establish it in the closing days of the campaign."
The Clinton campaign knew about the FBI investigation into the Trump Campaign before the 8
Nov 2016 election. How did Clinton know? McCabe. Wifey. McAuliff.
One last question. Staying with the little weaselly PajamaBoi Jake Sullivan (what a wuss)
–
51:57 "The (Trump) White House directed the State Department to essentially draw up a game
plan for the lifting of (Russian) sanctions. State Department pushed back hard "
Oh really? Who is leaking from the State Department, one wonders.
Oh yes, Antony Blinken was Deputy Secretary of State. When, exactly, did Anthony Blinken
leave the State Department?
Wikipedia says Blinken left the State Department 20 Jan 2017 and was succeeded by John
Sullivan. Blinken is now a Global Affairs Analyst for CN&N .
John Sullivan has been working very well with Sec Tillerson by all accounts, and has
announced his future retirement.
This Deplorable did not care enough to look up the whereabouts of any of the others. No
doubt they are all fomenting our Grande Revolutione somewhere.
Hopefully this is not too convoluted. One's mind has been designated one of the crazies'
disaster areas and condemned. There is so much more, but no one would read it anyway.
The Brennan and Podesta stories from those PBS-Putin vids are much too repulsive and
frightening for a bedtime story, so we shall save those for summer-round-the-campfire ghost
stories.
Nightnight.
" When Brennan's and his co-conspirators' plot to smear and defeat his political matron's
opponent failed spectacularly in the greatest upset in American political history, a
now-embittered and politically-unrestrained, if not unhinged, Brennan maliciously set about
poisoning the well and salting the fields to undermine the incoming president and his
administration.
Brennan did this by systematically and purposefully disseminating the defamatory contents
of the sleazy, Clinton-purchased "dirty dossier" to official Washington and numerous
sympathetic media mouthpieces during the transition period and beyond, ensuring their
continued proliferation, compounding the damage Brennan hoped and expected would result from
his calculated treachery.
Brennan was even so brazen as to attach the dossier's contents to an official daily
intelligence briefing provided to the outgoing president just weeks before the inauguration
of the president-elect "
"... Following Admiral Roger's closing the FSA mega-file to the FBI, it looks as though Christopher Steele's real role was laundering information stateside which had been obtained through continued Inquiries of the NSA mega-file by our Ambassador to the UN. *** Fusion GPS immediately hired FBI manager Bruce Ohr's wife, Nellie Ohr, and Christopher Steele. Bruce Ohr passed his illegally obtained information to Nellie, she to Steele, who then relayed the material back to Fusion / FBI as coming from his "Russian contacts." ..."
"... And here 44 may have made a mistake in authorizing the spread his Daily Briefing to 30+ agencies and individuals -- again as a work-around of the Roger's information ban. This places 44's fingerprints on the work-around. ..."
"... As it happens, I think the suggestion that Steele's role may have been, in very substantial measure, to give the impression that material from other source was the product of a high-quality 'humint' investigation merits being taken extremely seriously. ..."
"... Carter Page during his period of cooperation with the FBI, almost certainly was handled by Agents assigned to a field office. I wonder what they had to say, assuming they even knew, about HQ opening a CI case targeting their former cooperating witness for FISA coverage. It will be very interesting to see who handled Steele. Strzok? ..."
"... What was the compelling evidence and who furnished it to turn a US Naval Academy graduate, and presumably a Naval Officer with a readily accessible track record in service, into the targeted subject of an espionage investigation. Did he even have any current access to classified information? This is not looking good. ..."
Following Admiral Roger's closing the FSA mega-file to the FBI, it looks as though
Christopher Steele's real role was laundering information stateside which had been obtained
through continued Inquiries of the NSA mega-file by our Ambassador to the UN. *** Fusion GPS
immediately hired FBI manager Bruce Ohr's wife, Nellie Ohr, and Christopher Steele. Bruce Ohr
passed his illegally obtained information to Nellie, she to Steele, who then relayed the
material back to Fusion / FBI as coming from his "Russian contacts."
And here 44 may have made a mistake in authorizing the spread his Daily Briefing to 30+ agencies and individuals --
again as a work-around of the Roger's information ban. This
places 44's fingerprints on the work-around.
You may recall the incident of the wrong Michael Cohen traveling to Prague to meet with
Russians -- when the future 45's personal lawyer was having a family celebration / baseball
game stateside? The error was generated by the NSA mega-file. Steele's "Russian contacts"
dutifully corroborated Cohen's visit with them in Prague -- how could they not, since they
exist only in Steele's mind. In short, the Steele "Russians contacts" are proved to be
fictions and if fictions then there was no Russian collusion between the Trump Campaign and
Russia.
*** Our UN Ambassador claims she was not generating hundreds of NSA Inquiries per week and
we can believe her. The NSA Inquiries were coming from the FBI via her State Department
"support" in DC.
It really does help if, when you make claims, you link to the source so that others can
evaluate them. In the case of the claims you are making, the source is clearly a post two days ago by
'sundance' on the 'Conservative Treehouse' site entitled 'Tying All The Loose Threads
Together – DOJ, FBI, DoS, White House: "Operation Latitude" '
As it happens, I think the suggestion that Steele's role may have been, in very
substantial measure, to give the impression that material from other source was the product
of a high-quality 'humint' investigation merits being taken extremely seriously.
However, to repeat claims by 'sundance', while not taking the – rather minimal
– amount of trouble required to provide the link which allows others to evaluate them,
simply puts people's backs up and makes them less likely to take what you are suggesting
seriously.
Most unusual, I would say, for an Agent in an upper management position in FBI HQ to open a
counter intelligence case and then for all intents and purposes assign it to himself. Cases
are normally worked and directly supervised in field offices.
Carter Page during his period of cooperation with the FBI, almost certainly was handled by
Agents assigned to a field office. I wonder what they had to say, assuming they even knew,
about HQ opening a CI case targeting their former cooperating witness for FISA coverage.
It will be very interesting to see who handled Steele. Strzok?
What was the compelling evidence and who furnished it to turn a US Naval Academy graduate,
and presumably a Naval Officer with a readily accessible track record in service, into the
targeted subject of an espionage investigation. Did he even have any current access to
classified information?
This is not looking good.
"... The Russian independent TV Rain, also known as Dozhd, found (Russian, machine translation ) that one management person of the IRA was missing in the Mueller indictment. That women, Agata Burdonova, has recently moved with her husband to the United States. She had run the "translator" department of the IRA that created English language social marketing campaigns. She has now applied for a U.S. Social Security number. ..."
"... On June 15, 2017, Dmitry Fyodorov says he received an employment offer from Facebook. On August 8, 2017 Fyodorov marries Burdonova. Employer (presumably, Facebook) sponsors both of their visas -- prob. H1B. ..."
"... On December 7 2017 both moved to Bellevue, Washington. Two month later Mueller indicts the alleged IRA owner and management, but not Burdonova. This smells of a deal made by some US agency to get insight into the IRA. In return, an opportunity to move to the US was offered. ..."
Automated Twitter accounts, or trolls, repeated a tweet about a MoA piece
on Muller's indictment of "Russian trolls" . Funny but not really important. There is
interesting news though related to the original Muller indictment. Mueller accused with little
evidence 13 persons involved in the private Russian Internet Research Agency (IRA) of meddling
with the U.S. election campaign.
The Russian independent TV Rain, also known as Dozhd,
found (Russian,
machine translation ) that one management person of the IRA was missing in the Mueller
indictment. That women, Agata Burdonova, has recently moved with her husband to the United
States. She had run the "translator" department of the IRA that created English language social
marketing campaigns. She has now applied for a U.S. Social Security number.
On June 15, 2017, Dmitry Fyodorov says he received an employment offer from Facebook. On
August 8, 2017 Fyodorov marries Burdonova. Employer (presumably, Facebook) sponsors both of
their visas -- prob. H1B.
On December 7 2017 both moved to Bellevue, Washington. Two month later Mueller indicts the
alleged IRA owner and management, but not Burdonova. This smells of a deal made by some US
agency to get insight into the IRA. In return, an opportunity to move to the US was
offered.
" Democracy is not under stress – it's under aggressive attack, as
unconstrained financial greed overrides public accountability ."
I request a lessatorium* on the term 'democracy', because there aren't any democracies.
Rather than redefine the term, why not use a more accurate one, like 'plutocracy', or
'corporatocracy'.
-- -- -- -
* It's like a moratorium, you just do less of it.
The reality of Russiagate is that the corrupt neoliberal system and its institutions were laid bare in an
unprecedented way. The Democratic Party is toast. The Republican Party is a vile sham. And the MSM has exposed itself as attack
dogs of intelligence agencies like never before. People are waking up to the corrupt
and useless system in place. The reality of the system was exposed in magnifying Russiagate lens. That's probably the only
good thing about it
Notable quotes:
"... John Sipher (ha ha) starts out by re-asserting the lie that Russians "hacked" the DNC ..."
"... Why are the people who work for this guy trying to sell opinions being called trolls? This is just another way to give credence to the FBI narrative that trolls tried to sway the election. If anyone was a troll, ..."
"... And Rachel? Quit lying to yourself and others. My gawd! You have come a long way from your time at Air America that I don't even recognize you anymore. You are creating hysteria and you have become a raving lunatic. Enjoy your $30,000/day, $7 million a month salary for selling out to the people who you used to despise. I despise you! ..."
"... He retorts that 'there's enough hot spots -- Syria, Iran, Afghanistan, China' -- but fails to acknowledge that for example, the Iraq invasion and subsequent insurgency/civil war/rise-of-ISIS is all about what Aaron pointed to, the ginning up intelligence to create the Iraq invasion - which then spilled over into Syria. The role that the US is playing in all the other place he mentions, they have constantly resorted to lethal force and refused negotiation. ..."
"... The establishment media leaves out the essential context: The US is on a single superpower, Pax Americana global empire gambit; with everyone else playing for time while building their defences. ..."
"... And 'Russian Doctrine' is just recycled Soviet Doctrine - but the US always lead arms escalations during the old cold war - the so called soviet doctrine was in fact defence against US pressure and aggression. ..."
"... The Democratic Party is toast. The Republican Party is a vile sham. And the main stream media has exposed itself like never before. People are waking up to the corrupt and useless system in place. The reality of the system is being laid bare in an unprecedented way. As bad as things seem, this is a good thing, if we can keep those in power from destroying the earth before we can recover it. ..."
"... Unless something more comes of this, the Dems and their media cohorts will do a repeat of the Repubs and that same media when the WMD failed to materialize in Iraq. The wonderful thing about The Homeland, though, is that being wrong, all the time, in no way disqualifies you for remaining an important and serious person. ..."
"... Black Lives Matter ..."
"... Bernie Sanders ..."
"... Yeah, I think the point of this is not to change opinions, the point was to try to either suppress voters on one side, or to get people to hardened opinions, and get people to come out to vote, and we've even seen the same troll farm, looks like they're doing this now around the Parkland shooting in Florida. They were going around Black Lives Matter, they're trying to spin up divisions to get us working against each other, as much as electing Jill Stein or Bernie Sanders. ..."
AARON MATÉ: Now, Maddow makes at least one error here. The indictment does say that
the operation had a monthly budget of $1.25 million dollars, but that was for its entire global
operations, of which the U.S. was only a part. And more importantly, can we say conclusively
that this was the work of Russian intelligence? Well, joining me is John Sipher, national
security analyst with Cipher Brief, and a former member of the CIA's clandestine service.
John Sipher (@john_sipher) is a former Chief of Station for the C.I.A. He worked for
over 27 years in Russia, Europe and Asia and now writes for various publications and works as a
consultant with CrossLead and New Media Frontier.
Here's what Mr CIA guy 'Sipher' is selling: The indicted 13 Russian trollers
interfered w the 2016 POTUS election- NOT by hacking US voting machines & flipping
votes to Repug Trump, but by sowing discord among the US electorate which even 'Sipher'
admits already existed. Most of the Face-Book posts by these alleged Russian trollers
were either posted AFTER Nov 8, 2016 &/or were seen by virtually NO-One, thus
'Sipher' effectively admits he now ilk in the US intel biz can even assess how much
alleged impact these alleged Russian trollers had on the 2016 POTUS election -But- I can:
Virtually ZERO!!
Now compare that to the US' notorious track-record of nefariously 'meddling' in other
countries' political processes- Mainly by Mr CIA guy 'Sipher's' so-called 'ex'
employer:
- In 1996 the US actively & blatantly interfered in Russia's presidential election to
get Slick Willy's pal & chum(p) that drunk Boris Yeltsin guy elected, & even
openly bragged about it. And then orchestrated a fire-sale of Russia's resources, that
resulted in great hardship to the Russian people.
In 2014 while Putin's attention was on the Winter-Olympics in Sochi, Killary Clinton's
protege' Vikky Nuland actively stoked a Neo-NAZI coup vs Ukraine's democratically elected
president -- In an blatant attempt to push NATO right up into Russia's face / west-flank
& to try to grab Russia's naval base in Crimea [which up till the 1950s was actually
officially Russian territory].
In 1953 the CIA in tandem w MI6 actively worked to overthrow Iran's democratically
selected leader Mosadeq, in an out-right COUP, that brought that notorious dictator the
Shah of Iran to power!
In 1954 the CIA actively worked to overthrow Guatemala's democratically elected leader
Arbenz, in an out-right COUP!
In 1960-61 the CIA in tandem w the Belgiums [& even the UN] actively worked to
overthrow Congo's democratically elected leader Patrice Lumuba, in an out-right COUP the
resulted in Lumumba's DEATH [w the OK of Ike Eisenhower's & Alan Dulles' CIA]! A coup
that brought the notorious despot Mobutu to power.
In 1961 Dulles' & 'Tricky Dick' Nixon's CIA talked JFK into allowing the CIA to
try to over-throw Castro in Cuba, in the 'Bay of Pigs' fiasco.
In 1966 LBJ's CIA helped to overthrow Ghanaian leader Kwame' Nkruma in a military
coup.
In 1973 Nixon's & Kissinger's CIA helped to overthrow the democratically elected
leader of Chile' Allende' in an out-Right coup, the resulted in Allende's DEATH! And
brought the notoriously murderous military regime of Pinochet to power!!
In 1991 Mr CIA POTUS Bush Sr OKed an out-right Coup vs the democratically elected
leader of Haiti Aristide. And Bush Sr's son, Bush Jr would do a repeat vs Aristide yet
again in 2004- Which was Haiti's bicentennial anniversary of its independence from
Napoleon's France [in 1804] as France's notorious [ex] slave-colony. The US & France
have been causing misery in Haiti ever since!!
In 2002 the US [likely spear-headed by the CIA] tried to pull a coup vs Venezuela's
democratically elected leader Hugo Chavez, which failed. But the US has been actively
meddling in Venezuela ever since, & is apparently plotting a coup vs Chavez'
democratically elected successor Maduro.
In 2003 the Bush-Cheney-Bliar nexus used false intel from Mr 'Sipher's' CIA, launched
that disastrous Iraq Attack Pt2 based on LIES, which resulted in over 1 Million Iraqis'
death, in an nefarious Neo-CONian / Neo-Liberal regime-change scheme!! This CIA backed
disaster directly resulted in the rise of AL-CIAeda in Iraq & then ISIS!!
In 2009 under Dim Obama & Billary HRC as his Sec of State, the US OKed a coup vs
Honduras' democratically elected leader Zelaya. And Honduras remains in turmoil to this
day!
In 2011 Dim OBomber & Killary [I came,. I saw, He died, Ha, ha, ha- Yes!] Clinton
in combo w France's Sarkozy, the UK's Cameron & those 'bastions of democracy' the
Saudi-GCC oil monarchs- actively overthrew Libya's leader Col Khadaffi via FUK-US NATO's
relentless 9 month 'R2P' bombing assault in yet another notorious Neo-CONian / NeoLiberal
regime-change scheme [based on LIES yet again]- Resulting in Khadaffi's brutal murder
[that KIllary openly called for just a few days before & then hideously cackled over
afterwards] mass chaos in what was Africa's most prosperous country, & brought to
power a regime that's directly linked to AL-CIAeda & even ISIS, & who are now
openly selling Black Libyans & African immigrants on Libyan SLAVE-Markets!!
In 2012 the US under then Sec of State Billary HRC tried to interfere in Russia's
elections [yet again] to block Putin's regaining Russia's presidency.
In 2011 the US under Slick Willy Clinton [as the UN's Gov of Haiti] & wife Billary
HRC as Sec of State, actively interfered in Haiti's elections yet again to bring that
neo-Duvalier guy Martelli to power, while outlawing Aristide's political party which is
the most popular party in Haiti.
In 2015 the US covertly backed a 'parliamentary coup' vs Brazil's democratically
elected leader Delma Roussef!
And oh let's NOT forget the US' & it allies [UK, the Saudis, the Turks, the IAF,
etc] actively involvement in the on-going Syrian disaster- In yet another Neo-CONian /
Neo-Liberal nefarious regime-change scheme!! And how Mr CIA guy Sipher's CIA & other
intel' agencies have been trying to bait first Dim OBomber & now Repug Trump into an
all out attack on Syria to accomplish it, using dubious 'intel' ala 'WMD redux'!!
I mean seriously Mr CIA guy 'Sipher' & all you other Russia-Gaters [IE: Rachael
Mad-cow & even Bernie]?? All this BS hype over 13 Russians trolling click-bait on
Face-Book, vs all that I've outlined above [just a short-list] that the CIA & even
so-called 'liberal' Dims have actively supported, w DISASTROUS results- Literally
destroying MILLIONS of lives in the process!! PLEASE!!
John Sipher (ha ha) starts out by re-asserting the lie that Russians "hacked" the DNC.
Everything that follows is just blah, blah,blah....Why is TRN interviewing this
buffoon?
No, sorry. I have great respect for Aaron, but TRN is not doing us any favors by
helping spread this noxious propaganda. They legitimize it by acknowledging it.
Meanwhile, there is other news they could be giving us.Check this out:
http://bit.ly/2EMOl4S Sad we have to depend upon comedians to give us the
news....
BTW. Why are the people who work for this guy trying to sell opinions being called
trolls? This is just another way to give credence to the FBI narrative that trolls tried
to sway the election. If anyone was a troll,
I'd say it was the Correct the Record folks
who were the trolls. Hillary's campaign paid over a million dollars for people to go into
websites and if anyone was being critical of Hillary, they tried to get them to change
their minds. How is that not election interference? And was that even legal? It was
unethical if not against campaign finance laws.
It arose inside the country, though Hillary is, without a doubt, scum. Hillbots were
actual 'Murkins, a lot of them still suffering from Hillbotulism. Elections featuring two
absolutely unacceptable candidates are a real drag, and, unfortunately, probably the
OFFICIAL end of the United States (though in reality, the US died in March 2003).
Unbelievable. Aaron: I don't believe that the Mueller investigation has delivered
solid proof that Russia did anything against the country.
Sipher:
Well I think that he and the FBI are reputable sources and I'm going to
believe them and what they tell me. Even if they haven't proven anything, we know that
Putin is a bad man and he wants to sow divisions here and besides he's using chemical
weapons in Syria (even though that's so totally off topic) and when I go to bed at night
I see Putin in my dreams and yackity, yack, yack! So there. I'm a poopy head and you're
not.
Good grief, how can people believe anything by this time? And Rachel? Quit lying to
yourself and others. My gawd! You have come a long way from your time at Air America that
I don't even recognize you anymore. You are creating hysteria and you have become a
raving lunatic. Enjoy your $30,000/day, $7 million a month salary for selling out to the
people who you used to despise. I despise you!
This guys arguments are so weak he must be interacting the very ignorant audience most
of the time (I think the great majority of Americans don't pay attention to what their
own foreign policy is -- and MSM the vast majority of the time offers nothing but safe
softball foreign policy questions).
He retorts that 'there's enough hot spots -- Syria, Iran, Afghanistan, China' -- but
fails to acknowledge that for example, the Iraq invasion and subsequent insurgency/civil
war/rise-of-ISIS is all about what Aaron pointed to, the ginning up intelligence to
create the Iraq invasion - which then spilled over into Syria. The role that the US is
playing in all the other place he mentions, they have constantly resorted to lethal force
and refused negotiation.
The establishment media leaves out the essential context: The US is on a single
superpower, Pax Americana global empire gambit; with everyone else playing for time while
building their defences.
And 'Russian Doctrine' is just recycled Soviet Doctrine - but the US always lead arms
escalations during the old cold war - the so called soviet doctrine was in fact defence
against US pressure and aggression.
MoonofAlabama gives a good analysis of the marketing scheme aspect of these
"meddlings". Max Blumenthal mentions it in his discussion with Mate from earlier in the
week, but this is a very detailed look into the matter:
http://www.moonofalabama.or...
I suppose it is ok for Aaron to interview guys like this CIA agent but the agent
clearly doesn't understand the validity of an indictment. An indictment doesn't prove
anything; If it did, we wouldn't need trial courts.
The Department of Justice could
indict a ham sandwich if they wanted.
The DOJ knows that this case will never go to trial
and they will never have to prove anything. It is depressing that the Democrats and MSNBC
have lost all credibility. We are very lucky to have Aaron and Max looking at this sutff.
The Democratic Party is toast. The Republican Party is a vile sham. And the main
stream media has exposed itself like never before. People are waking up to the corrupt
and useless system in place. The reality of the system is being laid bare in an
unprecedented way. As bad as things seem, this is a good thing, if we can keep those in
power from destroying the earth before we can recover it.
I just got done reading the Mueller indictment. For the MSM and the Dems to continue
their pathetic witch hunt is a true indictment of the corruption at the heart of this
country's political and media elites. No doubt there was an attempt, weak as it was, to
influence Americans, but for anyone to think this is the smoking gun that proves it was
decisive in determining the 2016 election, or that the Russian government definitely
orchestrated it, or that Trump, whom I despise as much as anyone else, colluded with
them, reveals a startling lack of intellectual honesty.
The effort put forth by the Russians involved seemed to have two objectives; first to
take advantage of the tribalization of American society to advance the Trump campaign,
and secondly, to make money off it.
Worst of all, if nothing more comes out of this, then the Dems, as corrupt as they are
incompetent, will have added more fuel to the Trump charges of fake news and will have
served only to weaken any resistance they claim to represent as this clown leads this
country on an ever accelerating demise.
I take issue with advancing the Trump campaign as an objective. Some ads, etc., were
anti-Trump and some were about kittens. I haven't seen any predominant political message,
at all, in that "effort". Also, it was so paltry that they had to know that it would have
no effect, at all, and never could have any effect. Implying otherwise is part of what
makes the whole story look like a bumbling, comedic farce to most thinking people.
If you read the Mueller indictment, it's clearly stated that they did contact various
American groups working for Trump, locally, that is, and arranged events, paid for
various materials, even someone to dress up as HRC and be in a jail, and also travel to
the states to do some first hand research, but as you say, the effort was minor, at best,
and was no factor in Trump winning, especially compared to the billions of $ of free air
time he got when running in the Repub primary, he was a cash cow for the networks, after
all, and the DNC advancing his cause during those same primaries, thinking he was an
easier opponent than Cruz or Rubio.
Unless something more comes of this, the Dems and
their media cohorts will do a repeat of the Repubs and that same media when the WMD
failed to materialize in Iraq. The wonderful thing about The Homeland, though, is that
being wrong, all the time, in no way disqualifies you for remaining an important and
serious person.
I haven't seen ANY evidence of traveling to the US for "first hand research". WHERE
does this crap come from? It comes from people desperate to keep the war budget higher
than any war budget in the history of planet earth. I still see nothing in that
"indictment" that serves as any real evidence that Trump colluded with any Russians, much
less any Russians definitively working for the Government of Russia, or any evidence that
the campaign was affected or that Russians were trying to create "discord" in the US.
If they bothered to look at the same types of activities and even direct money given
to candidates by Israeli, Saudi, UK, and other nationals, I think it would dwarf anything
Russian citizens used to fund or further any campaign. They won't look elsewhere, though,
because nothing perpetrates the fraud on the American people that is the Defense budget
like the word "Russians" and most of the "defense" (i.e., war) budget is completely
unnecessary. They should be cut by a third right now, with further cuts pending.
The indictment gives the names and dates of two Russians who made it here for a few
days; a third was unable to secure a visa. There are dates and places named in the
indictment, but nothing that could of had any influence on the election. If the Dems are
so worked up over having lost two elections this century even though their candidate had
more popular votes, you'd think they'd be screaming for a change in determining the
presidential election. We all know the Repubs would.
We are in total agreement as to what really mattered and matters regarding this issue
and the reasons behind the Dems sudden embrace of McCarthyism and their overall need to
point to Russia or anyone else to maintain the unmaintainable American empire. If you
haven't read the indictment, it's not that long, 37 short pages, several of which can be
skipped because they simply list names or laws broken.
If the dems really cared, they would be calling for publicly funded elections, cuts of
a quarter or more of the war budget (i.e., "defense"), and public health care and
education, and jobs programs with benefits. They care about nothing but their own
butts.
Aaron Mate is an excellent, intelligent, sincere, and questioning journalist--in
short, what everything one would expect from a real journalist. So, what is it the
naysayers don't like about him? Is it because he does not support their narrative. Is it
his laid back style? What in particular?
Glen Ford penetrates all the BS and gets right down to the real agenda, Black or
otherwise. He called out Obama back in 2007, when nearly everyone else on the so called
left were coming in their pants over that fake.
CIA staff exhibit two qualities in abundance: 1) Suspicious incredulity regarding all
apparent statements, actions and motivations of subjects in the field, and 2) Studied,
refined, and highly purposeful public mendacity regarding their and their government's
apparent statements, actions and motivations.
Mr Sipher is lying and the tell is his amazing degree of credulity regarding numerous
US entities paired with across the board mistrust and outright defamation of numerous
non-US entities. Virtually every accusation Sipher made against Russia, Putin and the
indicted, is a menu item on standard CIA operational plans for disrupting the elections
of foreign nations and has been practiced continuously for several decades, technology
permitting.
As a companion to this interview it might be nice to solicit an interview with a CIA
antagonist who knows how to expose--point by point, in policy, practice and
tradition--one of the most destructive covert entities in world history.
Mr. Sipher is throwing everything at the wall to see what might stick, attempting to
conflate what he laughably refers to as the "Russian Black Arts" with the Parkland
shooting. He talks in circles; on one hand acknowledging pre-existing social
"hyperpartisan", "tribal", divisions", while on the other hand dismissing genuine
political movements Black Lives Matter , Democratic Socialism ( Bernie
Sanders ), and the Environmental Movement ( Jill Stein ) as products of
Russian propaganda that is at once both sophisticated and simple.
JOHN SIPHER: Yeah, I think the point of this is not to change opinions, the point
was to try to either suppress voters on one side, or to get people to hardened
opinions, and get people to come out to vote, and we've even seen the same troll farm,
looks like they're doing this now around the Parkland shooting in Florida. They were
going around Black Lives Matter, they're trying to spin up divisions to get us working
against each other, as much as electing Jill Stein or Bernie Sanders.
His assessment lacks any measure of self/social-awareness or self/social-consciousness
that should be a pre-requisite before laying out criticism of another. It seems to me Mr.
Sipher might be protecting his CIA pension.
Hey there Munk! True believers will lay down their lives for their preferred criminal
syndicate because they are of one body; pensions are just icing. Your observations among
others are exactly why I said Sipher is lying.
Bill Binney, Ray McGovern and John Kiriakou are the first three that come to mind as
potential contrarians, although I am sure there are others as well. Perhaps the Clapper
lyings will come up in part two?
A few months ago, while waiting for wifey to come out of Target, I saw a preteen kid
wearing a T shirt that said, "I speak fluent sarcasm." I want one of those.
Muhammad Ali used rope a dope to defeat George Foreman; Mate let's these idiots expose
themselves with their own words; nothing is more effective than letting a fool speak.
"... The Deep State (Oligarchs and the MIC) is totally fucking loving this: they have Trump and the GOP giving them everything they ever wanted and they have the optics and distraction of an "embattled" president that claims to be against or a victim of the "deep state" and a base that rally's, circles the wagons around him, and falls for the narrative. ..."
"... They know exactly who it was with the memory stick, there is always video of one form or another either in the data center or near the premises that can indicate who it was. They either have a video of Seth Rich putting the stick into the server directly, or they at least have a video of his car entering and leaving the vicinity of the ex-filtration. ..."
"... This would have been an open and shut case if shillary was not involved. Since it was involved, you can all chalk it up to the Clinton body count. I pray that it gets justice. It and the country, the world - needs justice. ..."
Kim Dotcom has once again chimed in on the DNC hack, following a Sunday morning tweet from President Trump clarifying his previous
comments on Russian meddling in the 2016 election.
In response, Dotcom tweeted " Let me assure you, the DNC hack wasn't even a hack. It was an insider with a memory stick. I know
this because I know who did it and why," adding "Special Counsel Mueller is not interested in my evidence. My lawyers wrote to him
twice. He never replied. 360 pounds! " alluding of course to Trump's "400 pound genius" comment.
Dotcom's assertion is backed up by an analysis done last year by a researcher who goes by the name Forensicator , who determined
that the DNC files were copied at
22.6 MB/s - a speed virtually impossible to achieve from halfway around the world, much less over a local network - yet a speed
typical of file transfers to a memory stick.
The local transfer theory of course blows the Russian hacking narrative out of the water, lending credibility to the theory that
the DNC "hack" was in fact an inside job, potentially implicating late DNC IT staffer, Seth Rich.
John Podesta's email was allegely successfully "hacked" (he fell victim to a
phishing scam
) in March 2016, while the DNC reported suspicious activity (the suspected Seth Rich file transfer) in late April, 2016 according
to the
Washington Post.
On May 18, 2017, Dotcom proposed that if Congress includes the Seth Rich investigation in their Russia probe, he would provide
written testimony with evidence that Seth Rich was WikiLeaks' source.
On May 19 2017 Dotcom tweeted "I knew Seth Rich. I was involved"
Three days later, Dotcom again released a guarded statement saying "I KNOW THAT SETH RICH WAS INVOLVED IN THE DNC LEAK," adding:
"I have consulted with my lawyers. I accept that my full statement should be provided to the authorities and I am prepared
to do that so that there can be a full investigation. My lawyers will speak with the authorities regarding the proper process.
If my evidence is required to be given in the United States I would be prepared to do so if appropriate arrangements are made.
I would need a guarantee from Special Counsel Mueller, on behalf of the United States, of safe passage from New Zealand to the
United States and back. In the coming days we will be communicating with the appropriate authorities to make the necessary arrangements.
In the meantime, I will make no further comment."
Dotcom knew.
While one could simply write off Dotcom's claims as an attention seeking stunt, he made several comments and a series of tweets
hinting at the upcoming email releases prior to both the WikiLeaks dumps as well as the publication of the hacked DNC emails to a
website known as "DCLeaks."
In a May 14, 2015
Bloomberg article entitled "Kim Dotcom: Julian Assange Will Be Hillary Clinton's Worst Nightmare In 2016 ": "I have to say it's
probably more Julian," who threatens Hillary, Dotcom said. " But I'm aware of some of the things that are going to be roadblocks
for her ."
Two days later, Dotcom tweeted this:
Around two months later, Kim asks a provocative question
Two weeks after that, Dotcom then tweeted "Mishandling classified info is a crime. When Hillary's emails eventually pop up on
the internet who's going to jail?"
It should thus be fairly obvious to anyone that Dotcom was somehow involved, and therefore any evidence he claims to have, should
be taken seriously as part of Mueller's investigation. Instead, as Dotcom tweeted, "Special Counsel Mueller is not interested in
my evidence. My lawyers wrote to him twice. He never replied. "
The Deep State (Oligarchs and the MIC) is totally fucking loving this: they have Trump and the GOP giving them everything
they ever wanted and they have the optics and distraction of an "embattled" president that claims to be against or a victim of
the "deep state" and a base that rally's, circles the wagons around him, and falls for the narrative.
Meanwhile they keep enacting the most Pro Deep State/MIC/Police State/Zionist/Wall Street agenda possible. And they call it
#winning
"Had to be a Russian mole with a computer stick. MSM, DNC and Muller say so."
They know exactly who it was with the memory stick, there is always video of one form or another either in the data center
or near the premises that can indicate who it was. They either have a video of Seth Rich putting the stick into the server directly,
or they at least have a video of his car entering and leaving the vicinity of the ex-filtration.
This would have been an open and shut case if shillary was not involved. Since it was involved, you can all chalk it up
to the Clinton body count. I pray that it gets justice. It and the country, the world - needs justice.
Kim is great, Assange is great. Kim is playing a double game. He wants immunity from the US GUmmint overreach that destroyed
his company and made him a prisoner in NZ.
Good on ya Kim.
His name was Seth Rich...and he will reach out from the grave and bury Killary who murdered him.
There are so many nuances to this and all are getting mentioned but the one that also stands out is that in an age of demands
for gun control by the Dems, Seth Rich is never, ever mentioned. He should be the poster child for gun control. Young man, draped
in a American flag, helping democracy, gunned down...it writes itself.
They either are afraid of the possible racial issues should it turn out to be a black man killing a white man (but why should
that matter in a gun control debate?) or they just don't want people looking at this case. I go for #2.
Funny that George Webb can figure it out, but Trump, Leader of the Free World, is sitting there with his dick in his hand waiting
for someone to save him.
Whatever he might turn out to be, this much is clear: Trump is a spineless weakling. He might be able to fuck starlets, but
he hasn't got the balls to defend either himself or the Republic.
Webb's research is also...managed. But a lot of it was/is really good (don't follow it anymore) and I agree re: SR piece of
it.
I think SR is such an interesting case. It's not really an anomaly because SO many Bush-CFR-related hits end the same way and
his had typical signatures. But his also squeels of a job done w/out much prior planning because I think SR surprised everyone.
If, in fact, that was when he was killed. Everything regarding the family's demeanor suggests no.
MANY patterns in shootings: failure in law enforcement/intelligence who were notified of problem individuals ahead of time,
ARs, mental health and SSRIs, and ongoing resistance to gun control in DC ----these are NOT coincidences. Nor are distractions
in MSM's version of events w/ controlled propaganda.
Children will stop being killed when America wakes the
fuck up and starts asking the right questions, making the right demands. It's time.
I don't think you know how these hackers have nearly ALL been intercepted by CIA--for decades now. DS has had backdoor access
to just about all of them. I agree that Kim is great, brilliant and was sabotaged but he's also cooperating. Otherwise he'd be
dead.
Bes is either "disinfo plant" or energy draining pessimist. Result is the same - to deflate your power to create a new future.
Trump saw the goal of the Fed Reserve banksters decades ago and spoke often about it. Like Prez Kennedy he wants to return
USA economy to silver or gold backed dollar then transition to new system away from the Black Magic fed reserve/ tax natl debt
machine.
The Globalist Cabal has been working to destroy the US economy ever since they income tax April 15th Lincoln at the Ford theater.
125 years. But Bes claims because Trump cannot reverse 125 years of history in one year that it is kabuki.
"... As the days since Mueller's latest indictment have passed, the failure of his investigation to make any claim of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia has begun to sink in, even amongst some of Donald Trump's most bitter enemies. ..."
"... Even the Guardian – arguably the most fervid of Donald Trump's British media critics, and the most vocal supporter of the Russiagate conspiracy theory – has grudgingly admitted that Special Counsel Robert Mueller has "once again failed to nail Donald Trump" ..."
"... In fact the latest indictment when considered properly is a further huge nail in the coffin of the Russiagate conspiracy theory and in the already disintegrating credibility of the Trump Dossier, which is the foundation document for that theory ..."
"... Notwithstanding claims to the contrary, the Russiagate conspiracy theory is laid out in its most classic form in the Trump Dossier, and it is the Trump Dossier which remains the primary and indeed so far the only 'evidence' for it ..."
"... This theory holds that Donald Trump was compromised by the Russians in 2013 when he was filmed by Russian intelligence performing an orgy in a hotel room in Moscow, and he and his associates Paul Manafort, Carter Page and Michael Cohen subsequently engaged in a massive criminal conspiracy with Russian intelligence to steal the election from Hillary Clinton by having John Podesta's and the DNC's emails stolen by Russian intelligence and passed on by them for publication by Wikileaks. ..."
"... The Trump Dossier never mentions Jared Kushner's four conversations with Russian ambassador Kislyak, including the famous meeting between Kislyak and Kushner in Trump Tower on 1st December 2016 (which Michael Flynn also attended) over the course of which the setting up of a backchannel to discuss the crisis in Syria is supposed to have been discussed (Kushner denies that it was). ..."
"... The last entry of the Trump Dossier is dated 13th December 2016 ie. twelve days after this meeting took place, and given its high level a genuinely well-informed Russian source familiar with the private ongoing discussions in the Kremlin might have been expected to know about it. ..."
"... Nor does the Trump Dossier mention the now famous meeting in Trump Tower between the Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya and Donald Trump Junior – which Paul Manafort and Jared Kushner also attended – which took place on 9th June 2016. ..."
"... Now Special Counsel Mueller has provided further details in his latest indictment of actual albeit unknowing contacts between members of the Trump campaign and various Russian employees of Yevgeny Prigozhin's Internet Research Agency, LLC, apparently both in person and online. ..."
"... The Trump Dossier has however nothing to say about these contacts either, just as it has nothing to say about the Internet Research Agency, LLC, Yevgeny Prigozhin, or the entire social media campaign set out in such painstaking detail by Special Counsel Mueller in his indictment. ..."
"... I only remembered Helmer's 18th January 2017 article about the Trump Dossier after I wrote my article about Senator Grassley's and Senator Lindsey Graham's memorandum to the Justice Department on 6th February 2018. ..."
"... This is most unfortunate, not only because Grassley's and Lindsey Graham's memorandum resoundingly vindicates Helmer's reporting, but because it shows that a genuine expert about Russia like Helmer was able to spot immediately the holes in the Trump Dossier, which only now – a whole year and months of exhaustive investigations later – are starting to be officially admitted. ..."
"... Heroic efforts to elevate Papadopoulos's case and the meeting between Donald Trump Junior and the Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya into 'evidence' of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia which exists supposedly independently of the Trump Dossier fail because as I have discussed extensively elsewhere (see here and here ) they in fact do no such thing. ..."
"... With the Trump Dossier – the lynchpin of the whole collusion case – not just unverified and discredited but proved repeatedly to have been completely uninformed about events which were actually going on, why do some people persist in pretending that there is still a collusion case to investigate? ..."
As the days since Mueller's latest indictment
have passed, the failure of his investigation to make any claim of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia has begun to sink
in, even amongst some of Donald Trump's most bitter enemies.
Even the Guardian – arguably the most fervid of Donald Trump's British media critics, and the most vocal supporter of the
Russiagate conspiracy theory – has grudgingly
admitted that Special Counsel Robert Mueller has "once again failed to nail Donald Trump"
There will be understandable disappointment in many quarters that the latest indictments delivered by Robert Mueller, the special
counsel investigating Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election, once again failed to nail Donald Trump. Although
the charges levelled against 13 Russians and three Russian entities are extraordinarily serious, they do not directly support
the central claim that Trump and senior campaign aides colluded with Moscow to rig the vote.
The Times of London meanwhile has
admitted
that the latest indictment contains "no smoking gun"
The Department of Justice, however, offered no confirmation to those still smarting from the election in November 2016, who
believe that, in the absence of Russian interference, Hillary Clinton would be in the White House today. Friday's allegations
offered no evidence that the outcome had been affected. Sir John Sawers, former head of MI6, said yesterday that Donald Trump's
victories in the key swing states were his own.
There was further comfort for Mr Trump, which he was quick to celebrate with a tweet. The investigation uncovered no evidence
"that any American was a knowing participant in the alleged unlawful activity". That includes, so far, anybody involved in the
Trump campaign. If there is a smoking gun it has yet to emerge, though Robert Mueller's investigation will grind on. President
Vladimir Putin is a malign and dangerous mischief maker. It has not been proved that he is an evil genius with the ability to
swing a US election.
In fact the latest indictment when considered properly is a further huge nail in the coffin of the Russiagate conspiracy theory
and in the already disintegrating credibility of the Trump Dossier, which is the foundation document for that theory.
Notwithstanding claims to the contrary, the Russiagate conspiracy theory is laid out in its most classic form in the Trump
Dossier, and it is the Trump Dossier which remains the primary and indeed so far the only 'evidence' for it
This theory holds that Donald Trump was compromised by the Russians in 2013 when he was filmed by Russian intelligence performing
an orgy in a hotel room in Moscow, and he and his associates Paul Manafort, Carter Page and Michael Cohen subsequently engaged in
a massive criminal conspiracy with Russian intelligence to steal the election from Hillary Clinton by having John Podesta's and the
DNC's emails stolen by Russian intelligence and passed on by them for publication by Wikileaks.
Belief in this conspiracy dies hard, and an interesting
article in the Financial Times by Edward
Luce provides a fascinating example of the dogged determination of some people to believe in it. Writing about Mueller's latest indictment
Luce has this to say
Mr Mueller's report hints at more dramatic possibilities by corroborating contents of the "Steele dossier", which was compiled
in mid-2016 by the former British intelligence officer, Christopher Steele -- long before the US intelligence agencies warned
of Russian interference. Mr Steele, who is in hiding, alleged that the Russians were using "active measures" to support the campaigns
of Mr Trump, Bernie Sanders, the Democratic runner-up to Hillary Clinton, and Jill Stein, the Green party nominee. Mr Mueller's
indictment confirms that account.
Likewise, Mr Mueller's indictment confirms the Steele dossier's claim that Russia wished to "sow discord" in the US election
by backing leftwing as well as rightwing groups. Among the entities run by the IRA were groups with names such as "Secured Borders",
"Blacktivists", "United Muslims of America" and "Army of Jesus".
What is fascinating about these words is that none of them are true.
Christopher Steele is not in hiding.
The actua l
Trump Dossier does
not allege "that the Russians were using "active measures" to support the campaigns of Mr Trump, Bernie Sanders, the Democratic
runner-up to Hillary Clinton, and Jill Stein, the Green party nominee".
Bernie Sanders is mentioned by the Trump Dossier only in passing. By the time the Trump Dossier's first entries were written Bernie
Sanders's campaign was all but over and it was already clear that Hillary Clinton would be the Democratic Party's candidate for the
Presidency.
Jill Stein is mentioned – again in passing – only once, in a brief mention which refers to her now infamous visit to Russia where
she attended the same dinner with President Putin as Michael Flynn.
Nor does the Trump Dossier anywhere claim that "Russia wished to "sow discord" in the US election by backing leftwing as well
as rightwing groups".
On the contrary the Trump Dossier is focused – exclusively and obsessively – on documenting at fantastic length the alleged conspiracy
between the Russian government and the campaign of the supposedly compromised Donald Trump to get him elected US President.
Supporters of the Russiagate conspiracy theory need to start facing up to the hard truth about the Trump Dossier.
At the time the Trump Dossier was published in January 2017 little was known publicly about the contacts which actually took place
between members of Donald Trump's campaign and tranisiton teams and the Russians during and after the election.
Today – a full year later and after months of exhaustive investigation – we know far more about those contacts.
What Is striking about those contacts is how ignorant the supposedly high level Russian sources of the Trump Dossier were about
them.
Thus the Trump Dossier never mentions Jeff Sessions's two meetings with Russian ambassador Kislyak, or the various conversations
Michael Flynn is known to have had with Russian ambassador Kislyak, some of which apparently took place before Donald Trump won the
election.
The Trump Dossier never mentions Jared Kushner's four conversations with Russian ambassador Kislyak, including the famous
meeting between Kislyak and Kushner in Trump Tower on 1st December 2016 (which Michael Flynn also attended) over the course of which
the setting up of a backchannel to discuss the crisis in Syria is supposed to have been discussed (Kushner denies that it was).
The last entry of the Trump Dossier is dated 13th December 2016 ie. twelve days after this meeting took place, and given its
high level a genuinely well-informed Russian source familiar with the private ongoing discussions in the Kremlin might have been
expected to know about it.
Nor does the Trump Dossier mention the now famous meeting in Trump Tower between the Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya
and Donald Trump Junior – which Paul Manafort and Jared Kushner also attended – which took place on 9th June 2016.
This despite the fact that the Trump Dossier's first entry is dated 20th June 2016 i.e. eleven days later, so that if this meeting
really was intended to set the stage for collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia – as believers in the Russiagate conspiracy
theory insist – a well informed Russian source with access to information from the Kremlin would be expected to know about it.
Nor does the Trump Dossier have anything to say about George Papadopoulos, the Trump campaign aide who had the most extensive
contacts with the Russians, and whose drunken bragging in a London bar is now claimed by the FBI to have been its reason for starting
the Russiagate inquiry.
In fact George Papadopoulos is not mentioned in the Trump Dossier at all.
This despite the fact that members of Russia's high powered Valdai Discussion Club were Papadopoulos's main interlocutors in his
discussions with the Russians, and Igor Ivanov – Russia's former foreign minister, and a senior albeit retired official genuinely
known to Putin – was informed about the discussions also, making it at least possible that high level people in the Russian Foreign
Ministry and conceivably in the Russian government and in the Kremlin were kept informed about the discussions with Papadopoulos,
so that a genuinely well-informed Russian source might be expected to know about them.
By contrast none of the secret meetings between Carter Page and Michael Cohen and the Russians discussed at such extraordinary
length in the Trump Dossier have ever been proved to have taken place.
Now Special Counsel Mueller has provided further details in his latest indictment of actual albeit unknowing contacts between
members of the Trump campaign and various Russian employees of Yevgeny Prigozhin's Internet Research Agency, LLC, apparently both
in person and online.
The Trump Dossier has however nothing to say about these contacts either, just as it has nothing to say about the Internet
Research Agency, LLC, Yevgeny Prigozhin, or the entire social media campaign set out in such painstaking detail by Special Counsel
Mueller in his indictment.
The only conclusion possible is that if the Trump Dossier's Russian sources actually exist (about which I am starting to
have doubts) then they were extraordinarily ignorant of what was actually going on.
That of course is consistent with the fact – recently revealed in the heavily redacted memorandum sent to the Justice Department
by Senators Grassley and Lindsey Graham – that many of the sources of the Trump Dossier were not actually Russian but were American.
John Helmer – the most experienced journalist covering Russia, and a person who has a genuine and profound knowledge of the country
– made that very point – that many of the Trump Dossier's sources were American rather than Russian – in an
article he published on 18th January 2017, ie. just days after the Trump Dossier was published.
In that same
article Helmer also made this very valid point about the Trump Dossier's compiler Christopher Steele
Steele's career in Russian intelligence at MI6 had hit the rocks in 2006, and never recovered. That was the year in which the
Russian Security Service (FSB) publicly exposed an MI6 operation in Moscow. Russian informants recruited by the British were passed
messages and money, and dropped their information in containers fabricated to look like fake rocks in a public park. Steele was
on the MI6 desk in London when the operation was blown. Although the FSB announcement was denied in London at the time, the British
prime ministry confirmed its veracity in 2012.Read more on Steele's fake rock operation
here , and the attempt by the Financial Times to cover it up by blaming
Putin for fabricating the story.
Given that Steele was outed by Russian intelligence in 2006, with his intelligence operation in Russia dismantled by the FSB that
year, it beggars belief that ten years later in 2016 he still had access to high level secrets in the Kremlin.
What we now know in fact proves that he did not.
I only remembered Helmer's 18th January 2017 article about the Trump Dossier after I wrote my
article
about Senator Grassley's and Senator Lindsey Graham's memorandum to the Justice Department on 6th February 2018.
This is most unfortunate, not only because Grassley's and Lindsey Graham's memorandum resoundingly vindicates Helmer's reporting,
but because it shows that a genuine expert about Russia like Helmer was able to spot immediately the holes in the Trump Dossier,
which only now – a whole year and months of exhaustive investigations later – are starting to be officially admitted.
For my part I owe Helmer an apology for not referencing his 18th January 2017 article in my article of 6th February 2018. I should
have done so and I am very sorry that I didn't.
I have spent some time discussing the Trump Dossier because despite denials it remains the lynchpin of the whole Russiagate scandal
and of the claims of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.
Heroic efforts to elevate Papadopoulos's case and the meeting between Donald Trump Junior and the Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya
into 'evidence' of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia which exists supposedly independently of the Trump Dossier fail
because as I have discussed extensively elsewhere (see
here and
here ) they in fact do no
such thing.
Despite Edward Luce's desperate efforts to argue otherwise, Mueller's latest indictment far from corroborating the Trump Dossier,
has done the opposite.
With the Trump Dossier – the lynchpin of the whole collusion case – not just unverified and discredited but proved repeatedly
to have been completely uninformed about events which were actually going on, why do some people persist in pretending that there
is still a collusion case to investigate?
"... The Dulles brothers, with Allan as head of Sullivan and Cromwells' CIA were notorious facilitators for the international banksters and their subsidiary corporations which comprise the largest oil and military entities which have literally plainly stated in writing, need to occasionally "GALVANIZE" the American public through catastrophic and catalyzing events in order for Americans to be terrified into funding and fighting for those interlocked corporations in their quest to spread "FULL SPECTRUM DOMINANCE," throughout the globe. ..."
"... The book by Peter Dale Scott, "The American Deep State Wall Street, Big Oil And the Attack on American Democracy" covers in detail some of the points you mention in your reply. It is a fascinating book. ..."
Your link to the Giraldi piece is appreciated, however, Giraldi starts off on a false
premise: He claims that people generally liked and trusted the FBI and CIA up until or
shortly after 9/11. Not so! Both agencies were complicit in the most infamous assassinations
and false flag episodes since the Kennedy/MLK Vietnam days. Don't forget Air America CIA drug
running and Iran/Contra / October Surprise affairs.
The Dulles brothers, with Allan as head of Sullivan and Cromwells' CIA were notorious
facilitators for the international banksters and their subsidiary corporations which comprise
the largest oil and military entities which have literally plainly stated in writing, need to
occasionally "GALVANIZE" the American public through catastrophic and catalyzing events in
order for Americans to be terrified into funding and fighting for those interlocked
corporations in their quest to spread "FULL SPECTRUM DOMINANCE," throughout the globe.
The political parties are theatre designed to fool the people into believing we are living
in some sort of legitimate, representative system, when it's the same old plutocracy that
manages to get elected because they've long figured out the art of polarizing people and
capitalising on tribal alignments.
We should eliminate all government for a time so that people can begin to see that
corporations really do and most always have run the country.
It's preposterous to think the stupid public is actually discussing saddling ourselves and
future generations with gargantuan debt through a system designed and run by banksters!
it should be self evident a sovereign nation should maintain and forever hold the rights
to develop a monetary/financial system that serves the needs of the people, not be indentured
servants in a financial system that serves the insatiable greed of a handful of parasitic
banksters and corporate tycoons!
Joe Tedesky , February 17, 2018 at 5:08 pm
You are so right, in fact Robert Parry made quite a journalistic career out of exposing
the CIA for such things as drug running. I gave up on that agency a longtime ago, after JFK
was murdered, and I was only 13 then. Yeah maybe Phil discounts the time while he worked for
the CIA, but the CIA has many, many rooms in which plots are hatched, so the valiant truth
teller Giraldi maybe excused this one time for his lack of memory .I guess, right?
Good comment Lee. Joe
Annie , February 17, 2018 at 5:56 pm
Yes, but he's referring to the public's opinion of these agencies, and if they didn't
continue to retain, even after 9/11, a significant popularity in the public's mind how would
we have so many American's buying into Russia-gate? In my perception of things they only lost
some ground after 9/11, but Americans notoriously have a short memory span.
Gregory Herr , February 17, 2018 at 6:42 pm
And films that are supposed to help Americans feel good about the aims and efficacy of the
agencies like Zero Dark Thirty and Argo are in the popular imagination.
Skeptigal , February 17, 2018 at 7:19 pm
The book by Peter Dale Scott, "The American Deep State Wall Street, Big Oil And the Attack
on American Democracy" covers in detail some of the points you mention in your reply. It is a
fascinating book.
"... The other question is to what extent Strzok and McCabe can be considered as Brennan allies, or maybe even Brennan agents of influence within FBI. It is not that plausible that those two guys ventured into "va bank" operation of spying on Trump by themselves. From recovered texts, it is clear that Strzok opinion about Hillary was pretty low. ..."
"... "It was then-CIA Director John O. Brennan, a close confidant of Mr. Obama's, who provided the information -- what he termed the "basis" -- for the FBI to start the counterintelligence investigation last summer .Mr. Brennan told the House Intelligence Committee on May 23 that the intelligence community was picking up tidbits on Trump associates making contacts with Russians." ..."
"... Links from Crowdstrike "analysis" (which most probably was a false flag operation to implicate Russians and cover the leak of emails to a USB drive) also might lead to Brennan. ..."
First of all the "Intelligence community" here means predetermined conclusions by specifically handpicked for this purpose
by Brennan team, consisting of a dozen or so analysts. Which included Peter Strzok and, most probably, Andrew McCabe.
The key operation launched after election nicely fits the scheme of a color revolution (which are CIA specialty in tandem with
the State Department ;-) In this context, the role ICA was to launch the media frenzy (to use controlled MSM as attack dogs to
de-legitimize the elected government accusing it of some mortal sin such as corruption, collision with Russia (or other chosen
scapegoat country), plunging the standard of living and economics of the country, racism and suppression of ethnic minorities,
etc) is a classic recipe from Gene Sharp book
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jan/30/gene-sharp-dead-arab-spring-political-scientist
).
That goal was successfully achieved -- unprecedented neo-McCarthyism campaign, along with the allegations of "collision with
Russia" by Trump and his team were both in full bloom by January 2017.
Here are the names and rank of the principal conspirators:
John Brennan, CIA director;
Susan Rice, National Security Advisor;
Samantha Power, UN Ambassador;
James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence;
James Comey, FBI director;
Andrew McCabe, Deputy FBI director;
Sally Yates, deputy Attorney General,
Bruce Ohr, associate deputy AG;
Peter Strzok, deputy assistant director of FBI counterintelligence;
Lisa Page, FBI lawyer;
and countless other lessor and greater poobahs of Washington power, including President Obama himself.
And this MSM witch hunt was in turn a step stone toward "Appointment of the Special Prosecutor" gambit (for which Rosenstein
was used possibly with help of intimidation), the most important goalpost so far achieved by plotters.
Your interpretation of the visit of Brennan to Reid is probably wrong. Information about Steele dossier was of secondary importance.
His goal was to recruit an influential Congress ally who shared the agenda "Trump should go" and who can help with the forthcoming
color revolution steps based on dossier and ICA. Reid subsequent steps of propagating Steele dossier were just a part of larger
effort.
Barack Obama biography and his very strange relations with Brennan raises a lot of interesting questions one of which is: To
what extent Obama was dependent/controlled by CIA and to what extent he was the part of the color revolution plot. He definitely
took unprecedented (and dangerous for him personally) steps to de-legitimize Trump and implicate Russians before leaving the office
("unmasking" campaign by Rice and Powell, exclusion of Russian diplomats and confiscation of Russian property made of the basis
of Steele falsification and the burning desire to "get" Trump )
The other question is to what extent Strzok and McCabe can be considered as Brennan allies, or maybe even Brennan agents
of influence within FBI. It is not that plausible that those two guys ventured into "va bank" operation of spying on Trump by
themselves. From recovered texts, it is clear that Strzok opinion about Hillary was pretty low.
Now we know that Brennan single-handedly opened Russiagate investigation and even boasted about that. That means that he is
the real godfather of Russiagate. According to the Washington Times:
"It was then-CIA Director John O. Brennan, a close confidant of Mr. Obama's, who provided the information -- what he termed
the "basis" -- for the FBI to start the counterintelligence investigation last summer .Mr. Brennan told the House Intelligence
Committee on May 23 that the intelligence community was picking up tidbits on Trump associates making contacts with Russians."
Links from Crowdstrike "analysis" (which most probably was a false flag operation to implicate Russians and cover the leak
of emails to a USB drive) also might lead to Brennan.
The same is true about Fusion GPS. And even Steele himself, who, as we now know, got some information collected by the duo
of Shearer-Blumenthal via State Department. So it is plausible that none, or very little of the dirt on Trump published in the
dossier belongs to Steele. He might simply be used for the legitimization purpose of already collected by somebody else dirt;
I read somewhere that he produced the "initial" dossier memo used for FISA court in record short period; something like three
days). The story with prostitutes urinating on the bed in a Moscow hotel really smells with Blumenthal. It's his methods of dealing
with Hillary political opponents. BTW he is the author of "birth certificate hypothesis" and "birther movement" (of which Trump
became a part much later, after Obama victory) and due to this was rejected by Ralph Emmanuel when Hillary tried to get him into
Obama WH (
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/does-clinton-have-a-blumenthal-birther-problem/article/2602090
)
But now the plan has backfired and the investigations are gaining pace. Trump's allies in the House smell the blood in the
water and they want answers. Did the CIA surveil members of the Trump campaign on the basis of information they gathered in
the dossier? Who saw the information? Was the information passed along to members of the press and other government agencies?
Was the White House involved? What role did Obama play? What about the Intelligence Community Assessment? Was it based on the
contents of the Steele report? Will the "hand-picked" analysts who worked on the report vouch for its conclusions in or were
they coached about what to write? How did Brennan persuade the reluctant Comey into opening a counterintelligence investigation
on members in the Trump campaign when he knew it would be perceived as a partisan attempt to sabotage the elections by giving
Hillary an edge?
I'm wondering why it's that much of a stretch to believe that the CIA might have engineered the whole thing.
"... In September 2016, the two men reportedly were involved in obtaining information on Page and it has also been suggested that Brennan sought and obtained raw intelligence from British, Polish, Dutch and Estonian intelligence services, which might have motivated FBI's James Comey to investigate the Trump associates. Brennan and Clapper, drawing on intelligence resources and connections, might have helped the FBI build a fabricated case against Trump. ..."
"... Currently the senior officials who were so hostile to Donald Trump have decided against going quietly into their generously rewarded retirements. Morell has long been a paid contributing "expert" for CBS news, Hayden has had the same role at CNN, and they are are now being joined by John Brennan at NBC. ..."
"... Brennan, an NBC "senior national security and intelligence analyst," is an Obama-Clinton loyalist who can be relied upon to oppose policies and actions undertaken by the Trump Administration, admittedly not a bad thing, but he will be doing so from a strictly partisan perspective. ..."
"... Brennan has behaved predictably in his new role. In his first appearance on Meet the Press last Sunday he said that the Steele dossier did "not play any role whatsoever in the intelligence community assessment that was presented to President Obama " which is a lie. He denounced the release of the so-called "Nunes memo" by the House Intelligence Committee because it was "exceptionally partisan," which is true, and because it exposes secrets, which it does not. ..."
"... Brennan, who was hated by much of the CIA's rank-and-file during his tenure as director, does not have much of a reputation for truth-telling. He lied about how the Agency under his leadership tried to spy on and disrupt the Senate's investigation into CIA torture. ..."
"... Of course that makes Brennan turning into a TV "expert" even worse. It marks the completion of Operation Mockingbird http://en.wikipedia.org/wik... ..."
"... US corporate media is now 100% propaganda, 1% truth (the 1% being where the truth actually is what they would have you believe it is -- the little overlap between truth and propaganda) ..."
"Brennan, who was hated by much of the CIA's rank-and-file during his tenure as director, does not have much of a
reputation for truth-telling."
Once upon a time in the United States there was a general perception that organizations like the Federal Bureau of Investigation
(FBI) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) were both apolitical and high-minded, existing only to calmly and professionally
promote the safety and security of the nation. Directors of both organizations often retired quietly without fanfare to compose their
memoirs, but apart from that, they did not meddle in politics and maintained low profiles.
There was a widespread belief at CIA that former officers should rightly retire to a log cabin in the Blue Ridge Mountains where
they could breed Labrador retrievers or cultivate orchids.
But the relative respectability of America's national security agencies largely vanished in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist
incidents. It was learned that both the CIA and FBI had made fatal mistakes in their investigations of the al-Qaeda group, putting
in question their effectiveness, and the leaders of both organizations began to focus on pleasing their political masters. The appearance
of CIA Director George Tenet at the United Nations supporting lies promoted by Secretary of State Colin Powell was a low point, but
there were many more to follow.
In September 2016, the two men reportedly
were involved
in
obtaining information on Page and it has
also been suggested
that Brennan sought and obtained raw intelligence from British, Polish, Dutch and Estonian intelligence services, which might
have motivated FBI's James Comey to investigate the Trump associates. Brennan and Clapper, drawing on intelligence resources and
connections, might have helped the FBI build a fabricated case against Trump.
Currently the senior officials who were so hostile to Donald Trump have decided against going quietly into their generously
rewarded retirements. Morell has long been a paid contributing "expert" for CBS news, Hayden has had the same role at CNN, and they
are
are now being joined
by John Brennan at NBC.
Brennan, an NBC "senior national security and intelligence analyst," is an Obama-Clinton loyalist who can be relied upon to
oppose policies and actions undertaken by the Trump Administration, admittedly not a bad thing, but he will be doing so from a strictly
partisan perspective.
And the danger is that his tag as former DCI will give him a certainly credibility, which, depending on
the issue, might not be deserved or warranted. To be sure CIA interests will be protected, but they will be secondary to commentary
from a partisan and revenge seeking John Brennan who is out to burnish his own sorry reputation. He looks perpetually angry when
he is on television because he is.
Brennan has behaved predictably in his new role. In his
first appearance
on Meet the Press last Sunday
he said that
the Steele dossier did "not
play any role whatsoever in the intelligence community assessment that was presented to President Obama " which is a lie. He denounced
the release of the so-called "Nunes memo" by the House Intelligence Committee because it was "exceptionally partisan," which is true,
and because it exposes secrets, which it does not.
Brennan, who was hated by much of the CIA's rank-and-file during his tenure as director, does not have much of a reputation
for truth-telling.
He lied
about how the Agency
under his leadership tried to spy on and disrupt the Senate's investigation into CIA torture.
He was also the driving force behind the Obama administration "kill list" of U.S. citizens selected for assassination. Concerns
that Brennan will represent the Agency's viewpoint on NBC News are largely irrelevant as the network should have instead considered
his credibility and judgment before hiring him.
The CIA is very much effective - it just doesn't do what we're told it does.
Of course that makes Brennan turning into a TV "expert" even worse. It marks the completion of Operation Mockingbird
http://en.wikipedia.org/wik...
.
US corporate media is now 100% propaganda, 1% truth (the 1% being where the truth actually is what they would have you believe
it is -- the little overlap between truth and propaganda)
.
"... Another compelling fact is that the NSA only signed on as having "moderate confidence" in the conclusions and analysis presented in the document. That's a weasel word for "not sure." If there actually existed solid intel from reliable sources do you think that the NSA would insist that it only had "moderate confidence." Given my experience on working such issues the answer is a resounding, "hell no!" ..."
"... Finally, there is the dog that did not bark. It was a canard to claim, as Clapper did in October 2016, that "17 intelligence agencies" agreed there was Russian meddling. That was a lie. No document had been circulated and cleared on by all "17 agencies." ..."
"... Here is the bottom line. John Brennan is a proven liar and this whole charade about having some sensitive, well placed source giving us the inside dope on Putin is a new fraud and raises further questions about his credibility. ..."
"... UPDATE--More mindless idiocy courtesy of Robert Mueller. His indictment of Russians for meddling in the US election is a goddamn joke. Seriously? This kind of activity has been going on between Russia and the US for 60 plus years. Anyone remember Radio Free Europe? Voice of America? (And I can't disclose what we were doing covertly to meddle in Soviet/Russia politics, but we were). ..."
"... This is a clever move on Mueller's part - indict a bunch of Russians who (some) already have been arrested by the Russians and therefore are in no position to defend themselves against a US indictment. I suppose Brennan doesn't care that a bunch of Russians recruited as CIA assets get dumped on their own resources. Good luck recruiting any more Russians to help you! ..."
"... How nice and simple and tidy. '13 Russians'... has nice ring to it... will make a great propaganda movie. Seriously though, will this face saving result in any way encourage the Dems to pick a new strategy for "success" the Republicans? Or will they simply triple down on dumb? ..."
"... Yet, somehow, a few Russian trolls posting online claims that were indistinguishable from most of the "normal" election rhetoric is a threat to our democracy ..."
"... Imho, a far bigger threat to our elections is the massive amounts of money involved, and the funding of candidates by oligarchs. But the msm seems confortable with that. ..."
"... And it goes without saying that one of the most immediate threats to our democracy generated by Russiagate are the ongoing attempts to silence alternative dissent to the status-quo and label it as coming from Russianbots. ..."
"... Sounds even more desperate than simply dumb to me. Comey and his kins seem so pressed by (the lack of) facts and the overall incoherence of their ludicrous tale that they finally see no other choice than resorting to the ultimate weapon in store : direct scolding and shaming of ordinary citizen bold enough to object HRC's wrongdoings, past, present and future. ..."
Sorry to belabor the point of the Deep State conspiracy, but the tenacious insistence of TTG
in clinging to Democrat talking points and refusing to step back and objectively look at the
facts demands an answer.
He is upset because I refused to post his comments to my last posting. He does a masterful
job of seizing on an issue, such as John Brennan's briefing to key members of Congress sometime
in August 2016, and insisting that this proves that Brennan was on the up and up. What I did
not put on paper was the fact that I have spoken to one of the members of Congress briefed by
Brennan and the content was not as advertised. Everyone did not get the same brief.
But let's go back and look at what Brennan was leaking to the press about this supposedly
damning intelligence. If it really was as clear cut and damning, as TTG and others seem willing
to believe, then we are faced with having to conclude that the Obama Administration, including
Obama himself, endangered America's security or that the info was based on innuendo and
conjecture.
Let's keep the timeline straight:
The FBI learns from Christopher Steele in early July that the Russians reportedly are in
cahoots with Donald Trump, who also happens to have a golden shower fetish. The FBI opens a
counter intelligence case.
John Brennan supposedly receives intelligence from a different source that Vladimir Putin
is not only meddling in the US election in order to sow chaos but to get Donald Trump
elected.
Brennan then, at the urging for Barack Obama, supposedly briefs this incredible material
to members of Congress.
Okay, so TTG wants us to believe that all members of the Congressional leadership got the
same briefing and that it had nothing to do with the Steele memo. This is total bullshit. Let's
go to the record.
We know that Harry Reid was briefed by John Brennan on 25 August 2016, according to a 6
April 2017 NY Times piece
by Eric Lichtblau .
What did John Brennan tell Reid? Well, we only have to look at the letter that Reid sent to
Comey two days later (27 August 2016) to understand the content of what Brennan briefed. Reid
states:
The evidence of a direct connection between the Russian government and Donald Trump's
presidential campaign continues to mount . . .
questions have been raised about whether a Trump advisor who has been highly critical of
U.S. and European economic sanctions on Russia, and who has conflicts of interest due to
investments in Russian energy conglomerate Gazprom, met with high-ranking sanctioned
individuals while in Moscow in July of 2016, well after Trump became the presumptive
Republican nominee.
This last point comes directly from the Steele dossier. There is no other source for it.
Yet, Reid was not briefed by Comey or anyone from the FBI on the matter. He was only briefed by
John Brennan.
I can hear TTG howling now. "Oh no," he'll insist, "Brennan surely had an independent source
from the Steele dossier." Really?
Then how do you square the circle that James Comey, in his testimony before Congress in June
of 2017, said that the dossier was "UNVERIFIED and salacious?" If the CIA actually had info
corroborating the claim in the Steele dossier that Carter Page was acting as an agent of Trump
and conspiring with the Russians then Comey would have had access to such information. In fact,
if there actually were at least two sources confirming that Page was in Russia and
collaborating with Putin on behalf of Trump, then Comey would have at least been able to say
that part of the dossier was VERIFIED. He did not.
Do I think James Comey is a liar? Not on this point. I believe that if he had one shred of
evidence corroborating one part of the dossier then he would have testified to that fact. He
would not have said, "unverified and salacious." He would have said, "yes, some key parts but I
cannot discuss that in open session."
But I do not have to rely on mere inference. I know from a source well placed in the
intelligence community that Brennan was peddling the Steele memo and had no independent
alternative source for such information. In fact, the intel backing up the audacious claims of
Brennan and DNI Chief James Clapper was so weak that only a hand picked group of analysts were
allowed to review and write up their analysis of that material.
Here again, I do not need to rely on inference. The only document supposedly coordinated in
the intelligence community was the one published in January 2017 at DNI Jim Clapper's
direction. TTG should know better, given his experience in the intel community, what charade
and fraud this document is because only three agencies cleared on it (note, the term
"clearance" refers to the process of relevant personnel from each of the named agencies
certifying the language and content of the analysis).
It was a cooked, pre-determined document. Rather than let the analysts who were the actual
substantive experts on the issues work on the document, DNI's Jimmy
Clapper testified :
before a Senate Judiciary subcommittee on May 8 that "the two dozen or so analysts for this
task were hand-picked, seasoned experts from each of the contributing agencies."
I know for a fact that a senior CIA analyst with special expertise on the GRU and Russia,
who normally would be part of such a drafting process, was excluded. And it was not because the
analyst lacked the appropriate clearance.
Another compelling fact is that the NSA only signed on as having "moderate confidence"
in the conclusions and analysis presented in the document. That's a weasel word for "not sure."
If there actually existed solid intel from reliable sources do you think that the NSA would
insist that it only had "moderate confidence." Given my experience on working such issues the
answer is a resounding, "hell no!"
Finally, there is the dog that did not bark. It was a canard to claim, as Clapper did in
October 2016, that "17 intelligence agencies" agreed there was Russian meddling. That was a
lie. No document had been circulated and cleared on by all "17 agencies." The reality is
that one would never have all 17 clear on such a document because not all have expertise or
even access to the intel that such a judgment would be based on. However, two agencies with
direct and important expertise were excluded from coordinating on the DNI fraud--DIA and
State's INR. Both agencies have experienced analysts with substantive knowledge. Don't believe
for a minute that the "intel" (which only inspired moderate confidence in the NSA) was so
sensitive that analysts with TS SCI clearances at DIA and INR could not see nor comment on such
material.
Here is the bottom line. John Brennan is a proven liar and this whole charade about
having some sensitive, well placed source giving us the inside dope on Putin is a new fraud and
raises further questions about his credibility.
So, if TTG wants to rely on Brennan as a solid source, that is his right as a free citizen.
But buyer beware. Brennan's story does not add up.
UPDATE--More mindless idiocy courtesy of Robert Mueller. His indictment of Russians for
meddling in the US election is a goddamn joke. Seriously? This kind of activity has been going
on between Russia and the US for 60 plus years. Anyone remember Radio Free Europe? Voice of
America? (And I can't disclose what we were doing covertly to meddle in Soviet/Russia politics,
but we were). And here is Mueller's conclusion:
anyone who was disparaging Clinton, may have "unwittingly" been a collaborator of the 13
Russian "specialists" who cost Hillary the election.
PT,
re"God help America. We've lost our damn minds."
I am of the opinion that the parasites infesting the US body politic have now infected the
nerve centers and the brain.
God help the World. Things are reaching a breaking point all over.
Ishmael Zechariah
The problem is not whether the meddling did or did not happen, it's that the general populace
here has no curiosity, and thus have lost their ability to think for themselves, and decide
between what seems right, let alone the difference between right and wrong. We have
institutional disregard for critical thinking here, and the fallout is that you have people
who can be easily swayed by soundbites, 140 character twitter posts, and the onion type rags.
If they want to have a congressional hearing on something, it should be why a sitting
member of congress thinks the Island of Guam might tip over if the Military continues to
build on it.
We have lost our minds, but that is the question that needs answering. Maybe then you can
find evidence of foreign interference.
In the Mueller indictment it also notes (page 23) that "Trump is Not my President" NYC,
Novermber 12 2016, was a Russian idea. So by Meuller logic the Resistance is a Russian idea.
How many members of congress should get expelled over being Putin's puppets?
Is this all he has to show for millions of dollars and how many damned months of
investigation? How about all the NGOs that get foreign donations? When the hell are they
going to get investigated for "defrauding" the United States? Better not ask, that would
violate the narrative . God help us.
Russian meddling -- Finally some "evidence" for the gullible:
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-02-16/special-counsel-robert-mueller-indicts-13-russians-hacking-during-us-election
"Defendant ORGANIZATION had a strategic goal to sow discord in the U.S. political system,
including the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Defendants posted derogatory information about
a number of candidates, and by early to mid-2016, Defendants' operations included supporting
the presidential campaign of then-candidate Donald J. Trump ("Trump Campaign") and
disparaging Hillary Clinton."
-- Really? Somehow the righteous Mueller and Rosenstein have missed very important Intel:
Comment section: "Sixteen thousand Facebook users said that they planned to attend a Trump
protest on Nov. 12, 2016, organized by the Facebook page for BlackMattersUS, a Russian-linked
group [?!!] that sought to capitalize on racial tensions between black and white Americans.
The event was shared with 61,000 users. As many as 5,000 to 10,000 protesters actually
convened at Manhattan's Union Square. They then marched to Trump Tower, according to media
reports at the time. ... The group's protest was the fourth [4th!] consecutive anti-Trump
rally in New York following election night, and one of many across the country."
http://thehill.com/policy/technology/358025-thousands-attended-protest-organized-by-russians-on-facebook
-- And then there was a pink-pussy D.C. riot and the DisruptJ20 protest group riot against
Trump. Have Mueller and Rosenstein had a sudden onset of dementia and forgotten the mass
protests? Who was financing and organizing the logistics for the anti-Trump protests? Was
there any investigation of the organizers of the protests against the elected POTUS?
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/what-i-saw-at-the-anti-trump-riot-in-dc/article/2612548
http://www.businessinsider.com/pussy-hats-womens-march-washington-trump-inauguration-2017-2
It sounds like the indictment makes 13 Russian trolls into felons. How many trolls do we
have? Where do they work, will other governments decide they are felons as well? This isn't a
"nothingburger", it's a "veginothingburger". Hasn't President Trump now been exonerated as
well, "unwittings" versus "colluders"?
thanks pt... good overview.. i want to reiterate you last words here -
"God help America. We've lost our damn minds."
is this what happens when a country goes overdrive with propaganda? the propaganda ends up
eating away at the host country itself and causes a complete collapse of it's own
sanity..
Back during the Cold War we were told that the USSR would try to block or jam
VoA/RFE broadcasts from reaching their citizens.
So, my very sincere question is:
Just how did U.S. efforts to influence the population of the USSR via the broadcasts of
VoA/RFE
differ from the alleged efforts of Russia to support
what the media calls far-right parties and policies in the U.S. and Europe?
So these 13 Russians are accused of trolling and planting rumors?
Since the same thing is being done by Americans and, yes, Israelis, it seems ludicrous to
suggest this is really "meddling" in the election. More like "feeding red meat to grey dogs"
in the sense of stoking the fires of internecine culture wars already ongoing in this
country.
If we actually end up arresting any of these individuals there will be tit for tat since
there are still American financed NGOs operating in Russia whose personnel can be easily
arrested on similar charges of promoting chaos and discord. Maybe the Germans can rent us
that famous Berlin Bridge where "spies" were exchanged in various cold war movies.
See my comment in TTG's thread about who these "Internet Research Agency" people actually
are. Scott Humor over at The Saker dug deep into these people and determined that they are
actually anti-Russian Russians who were allegedly proven in court to be CIA spies!
I link to Scott's piece in the TTG thread. Hell, might as well link it here, too:
This is a clever move on Mueller's part - indict a bunch of Russians who (some) already
have been arrested by the Russians and therefore are in no position to defend themselves
against a US indictment. I suppose Brennan doesn't care that a bunch of Russians recruited as CIA assets get dumped
on their own resources. Good luck recruiting any more Russians to help you!
It's a measure of Mueller's desperation, nothing more.
To summarize: in 2014, 13 Russians launched a campaign to interfere with the US political
system by "disparaging" candidates. This continued until ultimately Trump was elected,
meanwhile, "there is no allegation in this indictment that any American was a knowing
participant in this illegal activity. There is no allegation in the indictment that the
[Russians'] conduct altered the outcome of the 2016 election."
----------------
How nice and simple and tidy. '13 Russians'... has nice ring to it... will make a great
propaganda movie. Seriously though, will this face saving result in any way encourage the Dems to pick a new
strategy for "success" the Republicans? Or will they simply triple down on dumb?
Aren't the economic sanctions imposed upon Russia due to Russian meddling in our elections?
Might it not be prudent for Putin to round the 13 yokels up and put them on the next flight
to NY (with lots of publicity)?
During the campaign any voter using social media could come across literally hundreds of
posts effectively proclaiming "Hillary is trash" and "Trump is trash".
Or for that matter the voters could see much the same by reading the campaign literature
in their mailboxes, or listening to speeches on television.
Yet, somehow, a few Russian trolls posting online claims that were indistinguishable from
most of the "normal" election rhetoric is a threat to our democracy.
Imho, a far bigger threat to our elections is the massive amounts of money involved, and
the funding of candidates by oligarchs. But the msm seems confortable with that.
And it goes without saying that one of the most immediate threats to our democracy
generated by Russiagate are the ongoing attempts to silence alternative dissent to the
status-quo and label it as coming from Russianbots.
"anyone who was disparaging Clinton, may have "unwittingly" been a collaborator of the 13
Russian "specialists" who cost Hillary the election"
Sounds even more desperate than simply dumb to me. Comey and his kins seem so pressed by
(the lack of) facts and the overall incoherence of their ludicrous tale that they finally see
no other choice than resorting to the ultimate weapon in store : direct scolding and shaming
of ordinary citizen bold enough to object HRC's wrongdoings, past, present and future.
I this vein, I also read in earlier comment threads speculations regarding a new, very
cunning objective of the putative Russian attackers : getting willfully spotted in order to
spread chaos within the US politics and doubt within the heart of citizen. Frankly this
sounds a wee bit far-fetched, like machiavelous 2.3 with Putin and the Kremlin gang upgrading
to 4-D chess politics. Wouldn't it have been bold enough for them to bet on the universally
predicted loser Trump? What sense does it make to interfere ostenteously when precisely their
vowed nemesis is bound to win? How would that have tarnished her victory if she had won
despite their meddling? Doesn't hold any water to me, but desperation stimulates imagination,
and truly, confusion. Contenders of this view seem well engaged in a perillous intellectual
twister game.
Besides, such an account shows very little appreciation for the intelligence and critical
thinking of American voters. I bet that if many came to distrust their institutions, it is
out of their own experience and reflexion rather than out of foreign engineering.
Delusion, desperation, confusion, stupidity, whatever. But for sure the seams are
creaking.
The funny thing is that it looks like the Russian government jailed several people from IRA
last year. It would be prudent to look into it and try to figure out what is going on for
real.
You say: "Harry Reid was briefed by John Brennan on 25 August 2016, according to a 6 April
2017 NY Times piece by Eric Lichtblau.
Well, now that's pretty convenient timing, don't you think? After all, Trump didn't become
the GOP candidate for prez until the GOP convention on July 16, 2016. That gave the scheming
Brennan a month to make up this dumb story and start passing it around Capitol Hill.
Regarding your claim that Mueller concluded "unwittingly collaborated":
According to the text of the indictment that our host, Pat Lang, posted Mueller made no
such conclusion. I note you did not put it within quotation marks.
Is there a separate indictment floating around out there with those conclusions?
You need to do a better job of reading
"Some defendants, posing as U.S. persons and without revealing their Russian association,
communicated with unwitting individuals associated with the Trump Campaign and with other
political activists to seek to coordinate political activities," the indictment said.
With all due respect (and I read you assiduously), GeneO raises a valid point. Mueller's
text, paraphrased accurately, says that some of the Russians contacted Trump campaigners with
the intent to seek a collaboration. That's all it says. Nothing is said about a collaboration
having been achieved with anyone or any organization
At the conclusion of your original essay, you augment Mueller with your own
interpretations and words: "anyone who was disparaging Clinton, may have"; "been a
collaborator with the 13 Russian"; and "who cost Hillary the election". You wrap your added
words around two words that Mueller did use, "unwittingly" and "specialists". By doing this,
you concoct a statement that summarizes what you read into the indictment, likely what you
regard as Mueller's unspoken message.
Having done this, you present the blend of your several words and Mueller's two words as
Mueller's conclusion. In this, you stretch a bit too far. "Anyone who was disparaging
Clinton, may have 'unwittingly' been a collaborator with the 13 Russian 'specialists' who
cost Hillary the election" is your conclusion, not Mueller's. To have prefaced the conclusion
with something like "Here is what I think Mueller really means" would have been acceptable,
and the supposition very likely might have been accurate. To say "And here is Mueller's
conclusion" is disingenuous.
Well it is an organisation that has received a lot of publicity in the West for awhile so it
is an odd choice, I would have thought they would want a less public organisation for any IO.
Comey was telling the truth, he was still in the delusional belief he could weasel out of
it and continue on as FBI chief.
PT, in the latest, US indictment against a number of Russians, as its only example, cites a
US placard holder on the birthday of JFK as evidence of "Russian interference". Jeez, JFK was
a Russian?
what a friggin shambles the empire has become.
Yes indeed. As I said before in another thread. If the election is "disrupted" by voters
altering their votes due to Russians posting on Facebook, then the problem is not that
Russians are posting on Facebook, the problem is that voters are altering their votes based
on posts they read on Facebook. There is little point in correcting the former problem
without correcting the latter and vastly more serious problem.
The indictment accuses Russia of attempting to "diminish the public's faith in
democracy," or some such thing. I really don't think our own voting public needs Russia's
help in doing that.
Nope, our crooked Politicians AND Intelligence/Law Enforcement entities are doing a good job
of diminishing the public's faith. I don't know how many of my fellow Americans I have talked
to have said to round them all the crooked politicians/intelligence/law enforcement and
eradicate them from the earth permanently. That is why we see more and more the crooked
politicians/intelligence/law enforcement understanding well their simmering public anger, and
because of their fear of the angry public that they have created the surveillance grids (has
nothing to do with misnomer terrorism), their legislation/laws that further restrict the
public's ability to fight back against their crooked ways.
Diminished public faith, that's putting it mildly.
The Democrats remember how well the Republicans ( with help from Truman and others)
made Loyalty Oathism and HUACism and McCarthyism work for them. So the Democrats have decided
to try making their own 2.0 version of Loyalty Oathism and HUACism and McCarthyism work for
them. They will spend the next several-to-many years running their Reverse McCarthyism 2.0
operation.
They will accuse any Bitter Berners rejectful of yet-one-more-Clintonite of witless
dupe-ness. If that doesn't win us over, they will accuse us of Russian subversive
Fellow-Traveller-ism. If that doesn't win us over, they will accuse us of being Russian
agents.
Of course they will try doing this to Republicans as well. If the Republicans complain,
the Democrats will say such complaints are proof of Republican secret-Russian-agent
subversionism; while quietly thinking to themselves " payback time for
McCarthy and HUAC").
I have no connection to intelligence agencies. I'm a mere citizen. I've been spending the
last few days making cold calls to registered party members here in CO, trying to get them
interested in the caucuses that are coming up. Remember how the caucuses became an issue when
Trump was running?
Almost no one responded that they were going to attend. Several said they were so sick of
politics they would definitely not attend. I'm beginning to believe that I and our precinct
captain and her husband will be the only ones there.
What a sad state our country is in. Your last line is true, to a great extent, but I have
to add to it. Yes, we need God to help American. And, yes, many Americans seem to have lost
their mind. But what makes me sadder is that most of us who have not lost our minds are
losing our belief that we could ever make a difference, to make things better.
"... Well, now that's pretty convenient timing, don't you think? After all, Trump didn't become the GOP candidate for prez until the GOP convention on July 16, 2016. That gave the scheming Brennan a month to make up this dumb story and start passing it around Capitol Hill. ..."
You say: "Harry Reid was briefed by John Brennan on 25 August 2016, according to a 6 April
2017 NY Times piece by Eric Lichtblau.
Well, now that's pretty convenient timing, don't you think? After all, Trump didn't become
the GOP candidate for prez until the GOP convention on July 16, 2016. That gave the scheming
Brennan a month to make up this dumb story and start passing it around Capitol Hill.
Russians Spooked by Nukes-Against-Cyber-Attack Policy February 16, 2018
New U.S. policy on nuclear retaliatory strikes for cyber-attacks is raising concerns, with
Russia claiming that it's already been blamed for a false-flag cyber-attack – namely the
election hacking allegations of 2016, explain Ray McGovern and William Binney.
By Ray McGovern and William Binney
Moscow is showing understandable concern over the lowering of the threshold for employing
nuclear weapons to include retaliation for cyber-attacks, a change announced on Feb. 2 in the
U.S. Nuclear Posture Review (NPR).
A nuclear test detonation carried out in Nevada on April 18, 1953.
Explaining the shift in U.S. doctrine on first-use, the NPR cites the efforts of potential
adversaries "to design and use cyber weapons" and explains the change as a "hedge" against
non-nuclear threats. In response, Russia described the move as an "attempt to shift onto others
one's own responsibility" for the deteriorating security situation.
Moscow's concern goes beyond rhetoric. Cyber-attacks are notoriously difficult to trace to
the actual perpetrator and can be pinned easily on others in what we call "false-flag"
operations. These can be highly destabilizing – not only in the strategic context, but in
the political arena as well.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has good reason to believe he has been the target of a
false-flag attack of the political genre. We judged this to be the case a year and a half ago,
and said so. Our judgment was fortified last summer – thanks to forensic evidence
challenging accusations that the Russians hacked into the Democratic National Committee and
provided emails to WikiLeaks. (Curiously, the FBI declined to do forensics, even though the
"Russian hack" was being described as an "act of war.")
Our conclusions were based on work conducted over several months by highly experienced
technical specialists, including another former NSA technical director (besides co-author
Binney) and experts from outside the circle of intelligence analysts.
On August 9, 2017, investigative reporter Patrick Lawrence
summed up our findings in The Nation. "They have all argued that the hack theory is wrong
and that a locally executed leak is the far more likely explanation," he explained.
As we wrote in an open letter to Barack Obama dated January 17, three days before he left
office, the NSA's programs are fully capable of capturing all electronic transfers of data. "We
strongly suggest that you ask NSA for any evidence it may have indicating that the results of
Russian hacking were given to WikiLeaks," our letter said. "If NSA cannot produce such evidence
– and quickly – this would probably mean it does not have any."
A 'Dot' Pointing to a False Flag?
In his article, Lawrence included mention of one key, previously unknown "dot" revealed by
WikiLeaks on March 31, 2017. When connected with other dots, it puts a huge dent in the
dominant narrative about Russian hacking. Small wonder that the mainstream media immediately
applied white-out to the offending dot.
Lawrence, however, let the dot out of the bag, so to speak: "The list of the CIA's
cyber-tools WikiLeaks began to release in March and labeled Vault 7 includes one called
Marble Framework
that is capable of obfuscating the origin of documents in false-flag operations and leaving
markings that point to whatever the CIA wants to point to."
If congressional oversight committees summon the courage to look into "Obfus-Gate" and
Marble, they are likely to find this line of inquiry as lucrative as the Steele "dossier." In
fact, they are likely to find the same dramatis personae playing leading roles in both
productions.
Two Surprising Visits
Last October CIA Director Mike Pompeo invited one of us (Binney) into his office to discuss
Russian hacking. Binney told Pompeo his analysts had lied and that he could prove it.
In retrospect, the Pompeo-Binney meeting appears to have been a shot across the bow of those
cyber warriors in the CIA, FBI, and NSA with the means and incentive to adduce "just
discovered" evidence of Russian hacking. That Pompeo could promptly invite Binney back to
evaluate any such "evidence" would be seen as a strong deterrent to that kind of operation.
Pompeo's closeness to President Donald Trump is probably why the heads of Russia's three top
intelligence agencies paid Pompeo an unprecedented visit in late January. We think it likely
that the proximate cause was the strategic danger Moscow sees in the
nuclear-hedge-against-cyber-attack provision of the Nuclear Posture Statement (a draft of which
had been leaked a few weeks before).
If so, the discussion presumably focused on enhancing hot-line and other fail-safe
arrangements to reduce the possibility of false-flag attacks in the strategic arena -- by
anyone – given the extremely high stakes.
Putin may have told his intelligence chiefs to pick up on President Donald Trump's
suggestion, after the two met last July, to establish a U.S.-Russian cyber security unit. That
proposal was widely ridiculed at the time. It may make good sense now.
Ray McGovern, a CIA analyst for 27 years, was chief of the Soviet Foreign Policy Branch and
briefed the President's Daily Brief one-on-one from 1981-1985. William Binney worked for NSA
for 36 years, retiring in 2001 as the technical director of world military and geopolitical
analysis and reporting; he created many of the collection systems still used by NSA.
mike k , February 16, 2018 at 5:36 pm
Those Russians had a strange mission coming to CIA headquarters to try to negotiate with
soulless mass murderers in the name of maintaining a precarious semblance of peace, knowing
full well that these men's words and assurances were worth less than nothing. Ah well, I
guess in a mad situation one is reduced to making desperate gestures, hoping against hope
.
Mild-ly -Facetious , February 16, 2018 at 5:42 pm
F Y I :> Putin prefers Aramco to Trump's sword dance
Hardly 10 months after honoring the visiting US president, the Saudis are open to a
Russian-Chinese consortium investing in the upcoming Aramco IPO
By M.K. BHADRAKUMAR
FEBRUARY 16, 2018
[extract]
In the slideshow that is Middle Eastern politics, the series of still images seldom add up
to make an enduring narrative. And the probability is high that when an indelible image
appears, it might go unnoticed – such as Russia and Saudi Arabia wrapping up huge
energy deals on Wednesday underscoring a new narrative in regional and international
security.
The ebb and flow of events in Syria – Turkey's campaign in Afrin and its threat to
administer an "Ottoman slap" to the United States, and the shooting down of an Israeli F-16
jet – hogged the attention. But something of far greater importance was unfolding in
Riyadh, as Saudi and Russian officials met to seal major deals marking a historic challenge
to the US dominance in the Persian Gulf region.
The big news is the Russian offer to the Saudi authorities to invest directly in the
upcoming Aramco initial public offering – and the Saudis acknowledging the offer. Even
bigger news, surely, is that Moscow is putting together a Russian-Chinese consortium of joint
investment funds plus several major Russian banks to be part of the Aramco IPO.
Chinese state oil companies were interested in becoming cornerstone investors in the IPO,
but the participation of a Russia-China joint investment fund takes matters to an entirely
different realm. Clearly, the Chinese side is willing to hand over tens of billions of
dollars.
Yet the Aramco IPO was a prime motive for US President Donald Trump to choose Saudi Arabia
for his first foreign trip. The Saudi hosts extended the ultimate honor to Trump – a
ceremonial sword dance outside the Murabba Palace in Riyadh. Hardly 10 months later, they are
open to a Russian-Chinese consortium investing in the Aramco IPO.
Riyadh plans to sell 5% of Saudi Aramco in what is billed as the largest IPO in world
history. In the Saudi estimation, Aramco is worth US$2 trillion; a 5% stake sale could fetch
as much as $100 billion. The IPO is a crucial segment of Vision 2030, Saudi Crown Prince
Mohammad bin Salman's ambitious plan to diversify the kingdom's economy.
"Last October CIA Director Mike Pompeo invited one of us (Binney) into his office to
discuss Russian hacking. Binney told Pompeo his analysts had lied and that he could prove
it."
That was about some Dm. Alperovitch for CrowdStrike fame, who had discovered the "hacking" in
10 sec. Guess Alperovitch, as an "expert" at the viciously Russophobic Atlantic Council
(funded by the State Dept., NATO, and a set of unsavory characters like Ukrainian oligrach
Pinchuk) decided to show his "understanding" of the task. The shy FBI did not even attempt to
look at the Clinton's server because the bosses "knew better."
Alperovitch must be investigated for anti-American activities; the scoundrel has been sowing
discord into the US society with his lies while endangering the US citizenry.
Is not "included supporting the presidential campaign of then-candidate Donald J. Trump ("Trump Campaign") and disparaging
Hillary Clinton . " (or vise versa) by posting on social media an example of free speech ?
But usage of fake identities clearly is not: "The Russians tracked the metrics of their effort in reports and budgeted for their efforts. Some,
as described below, traveled to the U.S. to gather intelligence for the surreptitious campaign. They
used stolen U.S. identities, including fake driver's licenses, and contacted news media outlets to
promote their activities."
The question is how those unquestionable very talented Russians managed to learn English language without living in the USA and
operate such a sophisticated operation from oversees? English is a very difficult language for Russians to master and
Russian immigrants who came to the USA being older then 16 and living in the USA for ten or twenty years typically still have
horrible accent and bad or very bad grammar (tenses, "a" and "the" usage, you name it). Actually Russian woman are noticeably better
then men in this area, especially if they are married to a US spouse. Ass to this dismal understanding of the USA politics
including differences between Democratic and Republican parties (you probably need to live in the USA for ten years to start
appreciate those differences ;-) . How they managed to learn local political culture to be effective? That's a strong argument
in favor of false flag operation -- in case they have puppeteers from the USA everything is more or less rationally explainable.
Notable quotes:
"... It gets better: the defendants reportedly worked day and night shifts to pump out messages, controlling pages targeting a range of issues, including immigration, Black Lives Matter, and they amassed hundreds of thousands of followers. They set up and used servers inside the U.S. to mask the Russian origin of the accounts. ..."
"... The Russian organization named in the indictment - the Internet Research Agency - and the defendants began working in 2014 - so one year before the Trump candidacy was even announced - to interfere in U.S. elections, according to the indictment in Washington. They used false personas and social media while also staging political rallies and communicating with "unwitting individuals" associated with the Trump campaign, it said. ..."
"... The Russians tracked the metrics of their effort in reports and budgeted for their efforts. Some, as described below, traveled to the U.S. to gather intelligence for the surreptitious campaign. They used stolen U.S. identities, including fake driver's licenses, and contacted news media outlets to promote their activities. ..."
"... Defendant ORGANIZATION had a strategic goal to sow discord in the U.S. political system, including the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Defendants posted derogatory information about a number of candidates, and by early to mid-2016, Defendants' operations included supporting the presidential campaign of then-candidate Donald J. Trump ("Trump Campaign") and disparaging Hillary Clinton . ..."
"... Defendants, posing as U.S. persons and creating false U.S. personas, operated social media pages and groups designed to attract U.S. audiences. These groups and pages, which addressed divisive U.S. political and social issues, falsely claimed to be controlled by U.S. activists when, in fact, they were controlled by Defendants. Defendants also used the stolen identities of real U.S. persons to post on ORGANIZATION-controlled social media accounts. Over time, these social media accounts became Defendants' means to reach significant numbers of Americans for purposes of interfering with the U.S. political system, including the presidential election of 2016 ..."
"... Sixteen thousand Facebook users said that they planned to attend a Trump protest on Nov. 12, 2016, organized by the Facebook page for BlackMattersUS, a Russian-linked group that sought to capitalize on racial tensions between black and white Americans. The event was shared with 61,000 users. ..."
"... As many as 5,000 to 10,000 protesters actually convened at Manhattan's Union Square. They then marched to Trump Tower, according to media reports at the time . ..."
"... 13 Russians can influence US elections meanwhile US CIA and State Department spend $1 BIllion every year on opposition groups inside Russia without success. ..."
"... Indict AIPAC. That is the real foreign interference in ALL US elections. Such hypocrisy. At the very least, make them register as a foreign operation! Information warfare using social media ? What, you mean like the Israeli students who are paid to shape public opinion thru social media? This is no secret and has been in the news. I fail to find the difference? Psychologists call this projection, that is where you accuse others of the crimes you commit . ..."
"... It looks like Mueller would have these people for identity theft if he had them in the US, which he probably doesn't. ..."
"... Deep state pivot to keep the Russian hate alive. ..."
"... Fucking hilarious - Mueller has indicted an anti-Russian CIA operation that was run out of St. Petersburg. http://thesaker.is/a-brief-history-of-the-kremlin-trolls/ ..."
"... The bigger question is "when is Mueller going to be indicted for covering up the controlled demolition of the WTC buildings on nine eleven??" ..."
Mueller charges "defendants knowingly and intentionally conspired with each other (and with persons
known and unknown to the Grand Jury)
to defraud the United States by impairing, obstructing,
and defeating the lawful functions of the government through fraud and deceit for the purpose of
interfering with the U.S. political and electoral processes,
including the presidential
election of 2016."
The indictment adds that the Russians "
were instructed to post content
that focused on 'politics in the USA' and to 'use any opportunity to criticize Hillary and the rest
(except Sanders and Trump -- we support them)'
."
It gets better: the defendants reportedly worked day and night shifts to pump out messages,
controlling pages targeting a range of issues, including immigration, Black Lives Matter, and they
amassed hundreds of thousands of followers. They set up and used servers inside the U.S. to mask the
Russian origin of the accounts.
Ultimately, and this is the punchline,
the goal was to disparage Hillary Clinton and to
assist the election of Donald Trump.
In other words,
anyone who was disparaging Clinton, may have "unwittingly" been a
collaborator of the 13 Russian "specialists" who cost Hillary the election.
The Russian organization named in the indictment - the Internet Research Agency -
and the
defendants began working in 2014
-
so one year before the Trump candidacy was even
announced
- to interfere in U.S. elections, according to the indictment in Washington.
They used false personas and social media while also staging political rallies and
communicating with "unwitting individuals" associated with the Trump campaign, it said.
The Russians "had a strategic goal to sow discord in the U.S. political system," according to the
indictment in Washington.
The Russians also reportedly bought advertisements on U.S. social media, created numerous Twitter
accounts designed to appear as if they were U.S. groups or people, according to the indictment. One
fake account, @TEN_GOP account, attracted more than 100,000 online followers.
The Russians tracked the metrics of their effort in reports and budgeted for their efforts. Some,
as described below, traveled to the U.S. to gather intelligence for the surreptitious campaign. They
used stolen U.S. identities, including fake driver's licenses, and contacted news media outlets to
promote their activities.
The full list of named defendants in addition to the Internet Research Agency, as well as Concord
Management and Consulting and Concord Catering, include:
MIKHAIL IVANOVICH BYSTROV,
MIKHAIL LEONIDOVICH BURCHIK,
ALEKSANDRA YURYEVNA KRYLOVA,
ANNA VLADISLAVOVNA BOGACHEVA,
SERGEY PAVLOVICH POLOZOV,
MARIA ANATOLYEVNA BOVDA,
ROBERT SERGEYEVICH BOVDA,
DZHEYKHUN NASIMI OGLY ASLANOV,
VADIM VLADIMIROVICH PODKOPAEV,
GLEB IGOREVICH VASILCHENKO,
IRINA VIKTOROVNA KAVERZINA,
VLADIMIR VENKOV
YEVGENIY VIKTOROVICH PRIGOZHIN
Mueller's office said that none of the defendants was in custody.
So how is Trump involved? Well, he isn't, as it now seems that collusion narrative is dead, and
instead Russian involvement was unilateral. Instead, according to the indictment, the Russian
operations were unsolicited and pro bono, and included "
supporting Trump... and disparaging
Hillary Clinton,' staging political rallies, buying political advertising while posing as grassroots
U.S. groups.
Oh, and communicating "
with unwitting individuals associated with the
Trump Campaign and with other political activists to seek to coordinate political activities.
"
Defendant ORGANIZATION had a strategic goal to sow discord in the U.S. political system,
including the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
Defendants posted derogatory information
about a number of candidates, and by early to mid-2016, Defendants' operations included supporting
the presidential campaign of then-candidate Donald J. Trump
("Trump Campaign")
and
disparaging Hillary Clinton
.
Defendants made various expenditures to carry out those
activities, including buying political advertisements on social media in the names of U.S. persons
and entities. Defendants also staged political rallies inside the United States, and while posing
as U.S. grassroots entities and U.S. persons, and without revealing their Russian identities and
ORGANIZATION affiliation, solicited and compensated real U.S. persons to promote or disparage
candidates.
Some Defendants, posing as U.S. persons and without revealing their Russian
association, communicated with unwitting individuals associated with the Trump Campaign and with
other political activists to seek to coordinate political activities.
Furthermore, the dastardly Russians created fake accounts to pretend they are Americans:
Defendants, posing as U.S. persons and creating false U.S. personas, operated social media pages
and groups designed to attract U.S. audiences. These groups and pages, which addressed divisive
U.S. political and social issues, falsely claimed to be controlled by U.S. activists when, in fact,
they were controlled by Defendants. Defendants also used the stolen identities of real U.S. persons
to post on ORGANIZATION-controlled social media accounts.
Over time, these social media
accounts became Defendants' means to reach significant numbers of Americans for purposes of
interfering with the U.S. political system, including the presidential election of 2016
Mueller also alleges a combination of traditional and modern espionage...
Certain Defendants traveled to the United States under false pretenses for the purpose
of collecting intelligence to inform Defendants' operations.
Defendants also procured and
used computer infrastructure, based partly in the United States, to hide the Russian origin of
their activities and to avoid detection by U.S. regulators and law enforcement.
Mueller also charges that two of the defendants received US visas and from approximately June 4,
2014 through June 26, 2014, KRYLOVA and BOGACHEVA "
traveled in and around the United States,
including stops in Nevada, California, New Mexico, Colorado, Illinois, Michigan, Louisiana, Texas, and
New York to gather intelligence, After the trip, KRYLOVA and BURCHIK exchanged an intelligence report
regarding the trip."
* * *
The indictment points to a broader conspiracy beyond the pages of the indictment,
saying
the grand jury has heard about other people with whom the Russians allegedly conspired in their
efforts.
I wonder if any of these Russians were behind the anti-Trump rallies
of November 2016?
Thousands attended protest organized by Russians on
Facebook.
Thousands of Americans attended a march last November organized by
a Russian group that used social media to interfere in the 2016
election.
The demonstration in New York City, which took place a few
days after the election, appears to be the largest and most
successful known effort to date pulled off by Russian-linked groups
intent on using social media platforms to influence American
politics.
Sixteen thousand Facebook users said that they planned to attend a
Trump protest on Nov. 12, 2016, organized by the Facebook page for
BlackMattersUS, a Russian-linked group that sought to capitalize on
racial tensions between black and white Americans. The event was
shared with 61,000 users.
As many as 5,000 to 10,000 protesters actually convened at
Manhattan's Union Square. They then marched to Trump Tower, according
to media reports at the time
.
The BlackMattersUS-organized rally took advantage of outrage among
groups on the left following President Trump's victory on Nov. 8 to
galvanize support for its event. The group's protest was the fourth
consecutive anti-Trump rally in New York following election night,
and one of many across the country.
"Join us in the streets! Stop Trump and his bigoted
agenda!" reads the Facebook event page for the rally. "Divided is the
reason we just fell. We must unite despite our differences to stop
HATE from ruling the land."
13 Russians can influence US elections meanwhile US CIA and State
Department spend $1 BIllion every year on opposition groups inside
Russia without success.
Indict AIPAC.
That is the real foreign
interference in ALL US elections. Such hypocrisy. At the
very least, make them register as a foreign operation! Information
warfare using social media
?
What,
you mean like the Israeli students who are paid
to shape public opinion
thru social media? This is
no secret and has been in the news. I fail to find the
difference? Psychologists call this projection, that is where
you
accuse others of the crimes you commit
.
Boy Hillary sure didnt get her money's worth. She
shoulda hired these people.
Is it ok for MSM for
to make all of their disparaging commentary, but
not ok for people to do the same? Mueller
mustve forgot about the craigslist ads hiring
protesters to attack Trump rallies. What a fucking
clown show.
I guess that's it Mueller gets his indictments
to save face and Trump is pleased its over.
This ties directly into the October 31, 2017
testimony from Facebook, Twitter and Google
regarding Russian media presence on social
media. Mueller is grasping here, and given that
it talks about visas granted for short visits,
I'm led to believe that most of these people are
actually not on US soil to be arrested. This
means political grandstanding via an indictment
that is never going to see a courtroom where the
evidence can be examined and witnesses can be
cross examined. It looks like Mueller would
have these people for identity theft if he had
them in the US, which he probably doesn't.
I'm going to get called a Russian bot over
this elsewhere. Well, maybe facetiously here.
#WeAreAllRussianBotsNow
Wow, I am going to have to keep the
radio off for a couple of days.
They are going to be wall to wall on
this. Maybe even bump the stories
where fakely sympathetic reporter
cunts (FSRC) ask mother's if they
miss their dead kids.
This is a
fucking clownshow anymore. Jesus,
THIS is what the investigation
brought home? Holy fuckshit, this
is a joke. Some guy had 100k
followers? Really? Like anyone GAF
about that? We have AIPAC making
candidates kneel before them and yet
some guys on Tweeter fucked around.
I think that is even bullshit. If
Russians really did that, they
wouldn't "work in shifts" they would
program some fucking bots to do
this.
I can just imagine the fake
outrage that that worthless kike
from NY Chuckie "don't get between
me and a camera" Schumer has to say
about this.
This is a Matrix alright, and a
cheap ass one at that.
Mueller should be taken out and
horsewhipped for bringing this shit
home.
Hey Mueller, I read a comment on
Yahoo news that was in broken
English. Go get um!
I was gonna vote for
Hillary then I read tweets where
she bullied the woman her husband
raped to keep quiet. And how her
foundation got hundreds of
$millions from countries with
business before her at the state
dept. ALEKSANDRA YURYEVNA
KRYLOVA mislead me.
WANHUA CHEMICAL, A
$10
billion chemical company
controlled by the Chinese
government, now has an avenue
to influence American
elections.
On Monday, Wanhua joined
the American Chemistry
Council, a lobby organization
for chemical manufacturers
that is unusually aggressive
in intervening in U.S.
politics.
The ACC is a prominent
recipient of so-called dark
money -- that is, unlimited
amounts of cash from
corporations or
individuals the origins of
which are only disclosed to
the IRS, not the public.
During the
2012
,
2014
,
and
2016
election
cycles, the ACC took this dark
money and spent
over
$40 million
of it on
contributions to super PACs,
lobbying, and direct
expenditures. (Additional
money flowed directly to
candidates via the ACC's
political action
committee.).....
~" In other words, anyone
who was disparaging Clinton, may
have "unwittingly" been a
collaborator of the 13 Russian
"specialists" who cost Hillary
the election. "~
Wait,
does this mean that "disparaging
Hillary" was just for the
witless? I've been doing that for
years, (without any Russian
influence at all), and have found
it to be rather witty virtually
all the time.
Can we
NOW
get to the point where we appoint
a special prosecutor to
investigate Hillary?
any of us who
spread "fake news"
are now "conspirators" who
gave "support" to foreign
agents
with the goal of
undermining the "democratic
process"
by denying Hillary the
presidency.
tsk, tsk.
ignorance can be no excuse
for such wanton lawlessness.
Yes, Mueller is a clown
show, but he came up w/ this crap
in an attempt to divert media
attention away from his & McCabes
direct involvement in trying to
cover up Uranium 1 for
Hillary...The Truth!
The FBI going
DEEP
(#sarc)
into its playbook for this one.
Simultaneously distracting from their
incompetencies with regards to domestic
threats (school shooters/government
collusion to subvert presidential
election), and exonerating Hillary AGAIN.
"Using lies and deception to cover our
lies and deceptions, so that we can
enslave the populace to our will"
(visualize
Meuller/Comey/Strzok/Page/Ohr/Rosenstein/Obama/Rice/
with left hands on Satanic Bible and right
arms extended giving oath in Temple of
Mammon before upside down American flag).
The DoJ and Miller
activities are anti-American. What else is new
in occupied America?
PS
Note Trump does nothing about this
unprecedented assault on Freedom of Speech and
Assembly in the USA. Therefore, Trump is a
willing player in these criminal activities.
Mueller is going to go until he gets some meat.
Maybe this lean and stringy meat is enough to
satisfy. Of course, nobody will look at AIPAC and
all of the foreign influence money funneling into
senators coffers.
He said they stole identities, posting anti-Hillary remarks on
Russian-controlled sites, using the stolen identities. They must do that
through hacking, which is illegal.
They also organized rallies, he
said. There were ads on job sites, advertising for paid
[leftist] protestors, long before Trump emerged as a candidate. People
posted them on American sites. Some attribute it to Soros. I am a little
skeptical that Soros controls the world, anymore than Russians, but that
is what people often believe, when it is leftist ads.
Advertisements are all over the Internet. Is that illegal? He called
it fraud, referring to the misrepresentation of identity, I guess. They
should not be manipulating unknowing people.
But, I wonder if he has the same vigilance when illegal aliens use
fake SS cards to acquire jobs, while their girlfriends use real SS cards
of US-born kids to get $450 on average in EBT food assistance, in
addition to other welfare, making it easy for illegal aliens to undercut
American citizens in jobs. Using a fake SS number -- i.e. posing as an
American to get a job -- is fraud.
As long as the illegal aliens have sex after illegal border
crossings, reproduce and say they misrepresent their identities for the
good of their kids, this is legal and deserving of pay-per-birth welfare
/ child-tax-credit freebies and citizenship, whereas these Russians are
committing fraud.
They should not be doing that in either case, but the double standard
is interesting.
And if people cannot post freely on the internet without revealing
their real names, a lot of internet activity (and a lot of related
commerce) will cease. Many people post anonymously, often due to jobs or
other factors that have nothing to do with elections.
In fact, FBI agents post under identities (personas) that are not
their own. There are many articles, describing how police agencies
use fake identities on the internet to track down criminals, including
those who abuse children. They do the same thing to monitor terrorists;
they use fake identities.
Where are these indictments ? Obama, Hillary
Clinton, Victoria Nuland, Geoffrey Pyatt and John McCain.
The US has been meddling and interfering in other countries
elections and internal affairs for decades. Not only does
the US meddle and interfere in other countries elections it
overthrows democratically elected governments it simply
doesn't like, and then installs its own puppet leaders. Our
deep-state MIC owned neocons casually refer to this as
"regime change".
I can only imagine the hell that would break loose if
Russia fomented, paid for, and assisted in a violent
overthrow of the legitimately and democratically elected
government in Mexico. Imagine Russian spymasters working
from the Russian Embassy in Mexico City training radicals
how to use social media to bring out angry people and foment
violent pubic unrest. Then Russian Duma members in Mexico
City handing out tacos, and tamales emboldening and urging
these angry people to riot, and overthrow the government and
toss the bums out. Then Putin's executive group hand picking
all the new (anti-USA) drug cartel junta puppet leaders and
an old senile Russian senator in Mexico City stating at a
podium on RT, there are no drug cartels here, that's all
propaganda!
On the other side of the world Obama's neocon warmongers
spent billions doing exactly this. Instead of drug cartels
it was Banderist Neo-Nazis. Obama and our neocons, including
John McCain intentionally caused all of this fucking mess,
civil war and horrific death in Ukraine on Russia's border
and then placed the blame on Putin and Russia.
Thanks to John McCain and our evil fucking neocons - the
regime change policy implemented by Obama, Clinton and
Nuland's minions, like Geoffrey Pyatt, the Ukraine today is
totally fucked. It is now a corrupt banana republic
embroiled in a bloody civil war. For the US and NATO the
golden prize of this violent undemocratic regime change was
supposed to be the Crimea. This scheme did not play out as
intended. No matter what sanctions the warmongering neocons
place on Russia they will NEVER give back the Crimea!
Our neocon fuck heads spent billions of our hard earned
taxpayer dollars to create pain, suffering, death and a
civil war in Ukraine on the border with
Russia.
This is a case of don't do what we do, only do what we
tell you to do. It's perfectly okay when we meddle. We don't
like it when we think it may have been done to us. It's
hypocrisy and duplicity at its finest!
Tech Camp NGO
- operating out of US
Embassy in Kiev
(using social media to help bring out radicals-and cause
civil war-pre Maidan 2013)
This was clear a color revolution against Trump and Brennan was the key player. Which means
that he might be guilty of sedition.
"Intelligence community" below means handpicked by Brennan a dosen of so analysts, which
included Peter Strzok and probably Andrew McCabe.
Notable quotes:
"... "In other words, if the Russians really were in a full court press beyond their normal propaganda activities, then the intelligence community should have been galvanized to collect more information and should have briefed the leaders of the Senate and House intelligence committees. That did not happen. Key Republican leaders DID NOT, I repeat NOT, receive such a briefing. For example, Devin Nunes, the Chair of the House Intelligence Committee, did not get briefed by Brennan or any of his minions on this ..."
"... "Brennan started briefing the Gang of Eight individually beginning with Reid. He finished all individual briefings on 5 Sep 2016 commenting that it proved difficult to get appointments and talk with certain Republicans. Obama also sent Comey, Jeh Johnston and Lisa Monaco to brief the "Gang of Twelve" that included the chairmen and ranking minority members of Homeland Security and Intelligence to seek bipartisan support to respond forcefully to the Russians in early Sep 2016. McConnell reacted forcefully to stifle the intelligence and any forceful response saying "he would consider any effort by the White House to challenge the Russians publicly an act of partisan politics."" ..."
"... "Again, in consultation with the White House, I PERSONALLY briefed the full details of our understanding of Russian attempts to interfere in the election to congressional leadership; specifically: Senators Harry Reid, Mitch McConnell, Dianne Feinstein and Richard Burr; and to representatives Paul Ryan, Nancy Pelosi, Devin Nunes and Adam Schiff between 11th August and 6th September [2016], I provided the same briefing to each of the gang of eight members." ..."
"... "Given the highly sensitive nature of what was an active counter-intelligence case [that means the FBI], involving an ongoing Russian effort, to interfere in our presidential election, the full details of what we knew at the time were shared only with those members of congress; each of whom was accompanied by one senior staff member." ..."
"... The whole Trump/Putin narrative has lost steam. It has descended into an incomprehensible storm of "he said, she said." Unless Democrats, Mueller or the intelligence services can finally produce some kind of smoking gun, I doubt that Americans will just tune out. Advantage Trump. ..."
"... The whole adventure reminds me of the campaign against Bill Clinton in the 1990s. They could only 'get' Clinton because he shot himself in the foot with Monica. Of course, Trump, being Trump, is perfectly capable of doing the same thing. ..."
"... In any event, the longer this bullshit goes on with the innuendo, leaks, counter leaks, memos, and ridiculous histrionics the greater the level of transparency of the entire process and investigations will be necessary to assuage the "losing" side of this debate. And even granted that, it's doubtful there is a happy ending at the end of this particular rainbow. But some clear and convincing cards need to be thrown on the table soon, regardless of what they show. ..."
"... All in all, if there are solid clues, I'd wonder first if Russians aren't framed, and barring that, if their key goal isn't to cause paranoia inside the USA and make people doubt their whole political system. ..."
"... So what are we the people supposed to do with this....beat the bushes for another 3 years to see if something pops up? How is that fair to the people who voted for Trump and think he should be left to rule according to the results of the balloting? ..."
"... At what point does the onus fall on the prosecution to produce hard-evidence or shut the hell up?? Seriously. Or are you okay with a president being put under the microscope for 4 years with no probable cause, and no proof of criminal wrongdoing? ..."
"... Where did Mother Jones get that info on Russian bots? Why according to the article from the German Marshal Fund: http://securingdemocracy.gmfus.org/publications/methodology-hamilton-68-dashboard ..."
"... So Germany working to influence Americans is OK. Russians no. Yep. No influencing US elections via activities camouflaged as NGOs doing their good deeds. Never happen here. It's not like millions in donations to the Cxxxxxn Foundation, such as the $25 million donation of the Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership (Canada) - surprise! protected by Canadian law from releasing thier donor identities (see the NYT linked below)- or the multi-million donations of the Kindom of Norway, Kindom of Saudi Arabia, the Commonwealth of Australia and a slew of others would provide that organization with fungable assets that could be used in the USA to influence government policy or influence those voting for representatives who determine US government policy. ..."
"... Democracy dies in darkness. If this is actually worse than Watergate then declassify it all and hold public hearings - with no immunity for anybody. ..."
Another response to Publius Tacitus concerning those
meddlesome Russians - TTG
In the latest posting by Publius Tacitus concerning this subject, he made the following
claim.
"In other words, if the Russians really were in a full court press beyond their normal
propaganda activities, then the intelligence community should have been galvanized to collect
more information and should have briefed the leaders of the Senate and House intelligence
committees. That did not happen. Key Republican leaders DID NOT, I repeat NOT, receive such a
briefing. For example, Devin Nunes, the Chair of the House Intelligence Committee, did not get
briefed by Brennan or any of his minions on this subject."
I took issue with this interpretation of events in a response to a question posed by
Fred.
"Brennan started briefing the Gang of Eight individually beginning with Reid. He
finished all individual briefings on 5 Sep 2016 commenting that it proved difficult to get
appointments and talk with certain Republicans. Obama also sent Comey, Jeh Johnston and Lisa
Monaco to brief the "Gang of Twelve" that included the chairmen and ranking minority members of
Homeland Security and Intelligence to seek bipartisan support to respond forcefully to the
Russians in early Sep 2016. McConnell reacted forcefully to stifle the intelligence and any
forceful response saying "he would consider any effort by the White House to challenge the
Russians publicly an act of partisan politics.""
I got it mostly right, but upon further research I discovered I was wrong about the 5
September date. It was 6 September. Publius Tacitus still took issue with this insisting
"Brennan did not brief all of the Republicans." I offered further proof of my claim in two
comments which Publius chose not to publish. That is his prerogative as a guest writer here.
I've decided to continue the discussion in this post. That is my prerogative as a guest writer
subject to the final decision of Colonel Lang, of course. Both Publius and I must abide by
those decisions.
I offer the testimony of John Brennan given before the HPSCI on 23 May 2017 to bolster my
case that Brennan did brief the "Gang of Eight" on the intelligence community's initial
findings that Russia was interfering with the 2016 elections.
"Again, in consultation with the White House, I PERSONALLY briefed the full details of
our understanding of Russian attempts to interfere in the election to congressional leadership;
specifically: Senators Harry Reid, Mitch McConnell, Dianne Feinstein and Richard Burr; and to
representatives Paul Ryan, Nancy Pelosi, Devin Nunes and Adam Schiff between 11th August and
6th September [2016], I provided the same briefing to each of the gang of eight
members."
"Given the highly sensitive nature of what was an active counter-intelligence case [that
means the FBI], involving an ongoing Russian effort, to interfere in our presidential election,
the full details of what we knew at the time were shared only with those members of congress;
each of whom was accompanied by one senior staff member."
This particular transcription of Brennan's remarks was done by a darling of the deep state
conspiracy crowd, sundance. Sundance was also kind enough to provide a video of Brennan's
remarks. Note that Brennan names those he briefed and that list included Nunes. Sundance
accepts Brennan's account of these meetings and, in fact, uses those remarks to beat Comey over
the head over a related issue.
As long as I'm writing a post, I might as well address a couple of other points raised by
Publius Tacitus. There was no "formal lack of response by the intelligence community." Prior to
the briefing of the "Gang of Eight," Brennan established an intelligence task force of a couple
dozen analysts from CIA, NSA and FBI to focus on the issue of Russian interference. This is
probably the same team that wrote the January 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment. The
establishment of this task force was preceded by intelligence obtained by the CIA through some
kind of SIGINT, HUMINT or bilateral (FVEY) operation that detailed Putin's direct involvement
in the cyber campaign to disrupt and discredit the US election. This intelligence also captured
Putin's instructions on the operation's eventual objectives, to defeat or at least damage
Clinton, and help elect Trump. Brennan sent this intelligence directly to Obama by courier
prior to the "Gang of Eight" briefings. I remember the widespread outcry when the existence of
this intelligence came out. It appeared to blow an apparent US penetration of Russian
government secure communications. Maybe it did. But Brennan's call to FSB director, Alexander
Bortnikov, on 4 August 2016 warning him to knock it off probably tipped off the Russians long
before the public outing of the intelligence as did Obama's face to face warning to Putin at
the G20 Summit that he knew what Putin was doing and warned him to knock it off.
In addition to this intelligence, the IC had at that time intelligence from Estonia (and
maybe others) about Page's June trip to Moscow, the Dutch observation of Cozy Bear activities
and the report from Australia about Popadopoulis' drunken ramblings in a London bar. None of
that came from the Steele dossier. All of that is conveniently ignored by the deep state
conspiracy theorists. All the information Reid referenced in his letter to Comey probably came
from his briefing by Brennan, but we can reasonably disagree on the role or non-role of the
Steele dossier.
In my earlier response to Publius Tacitus, I noted the forcefulness of McConnell in
preventing a public release of intelligence about Russian meddling or a public response to that
meddling. At that point in time, the Republican desire to keep this issue quiet can be seen as
a reasonable maneuver of political electioneering or healthy skepticism. However, perhaps
there's more to it than that. There are dueling conspiracy theories swirling around this whole
Russia thing. Nunes was close to Flynn and was on the Trump transition team. I think he's too
close to this to not recuse himself altogether, rather than this half-hearted recusal he
currently claims. His continued efforts to derail the Mueller investigation smacks of
conspiracy in my mind.
We still need to wait for the Mueller investigation to run its course and hope that the
results will be released to the public. We need that and the results of the ongoing FBI IG
investigation. Until then we'll continue to gleefully argue our respective points in a vacuum.
Unless your comments are unusually abrasive and contribute nothing to the conversation, I'll
publish them.
Well argued, but I respectfully disagree....
and, regrettably, your argument sounds like a defense of the disgraced and untrustworthy John
Brennan, who deserves a recap from author Glenn Greenwald at The Guardian:
"Brennan, as a Bush-era CIA official, had expressly endorsed Bush's programs of torture
(other than waterboarding) and rendition and also was a vocal advocate of immunizing
lawbreaking telecoms for their role in the illegal Bush NSA eavesdropping program
Obama then appointed him as his top counter-terrorism adviser . In that position, Brennan
last year got caught outright lying when he claimed Obama's drone program caused no civilian
deaths in Pakistan over the prior year .
Brennan has also been in charge of many of Obama's most controversial and radical
policies, including "signature strikes" in Yemen – targeting people without even
knowing who they are – and generally seizing the power to determine who will be marked
for execution without any due process, oversight or transparency .." ("John Brennan's
extremism and dishonesty rewarded with CIA Director nomination", Glenn Greenwald, The
Guardian)
So, Brennan supported kidnapping (rendition), torture (enhanced interrogation techniques)
and targeted assassinations (drone attacks). And this is the man we are supposed to trust
about Russia???
You fail to mention that deputy director of the FBI Andrew McCabe stated under oath that
the dossier was used to "improperly obtain" FISA warrants to spy on a member of the Trump
camp or that the investigation has yet to produce even one scintilla of hard evidence in 18
months or that the media deliberately circulated stories they knew were uncorroborated
nonsense in order to damage the president they never wanted.
I suggest you go back and reread the ODNI that Brennen put out with the help of his
hand-picked team of analysts. I think you might be surprised in retrospect how weak the case
against Trump really is...
thanks ttg.. it is nice to have 2 strong opponents battling it out, for us to possibly gain
greater understanding here!
i am curious if you can shed more light on this quote from your post? "Obama's face to
face warning to Putin at the G20 Summit that he knew what Putin was doing and warned him to
knock it off."
that sounds very subjective to me... is there a transcript or recording of it? otherwise -
it is total conjecture with nothing to substantiate it.. thanks..
The "full spectrum information operation"by British operative Christopher Steele( working
with MI6 ) and US "security and Intell services" ie : John Brennan points to an attempt at a
unconstitutional coup against a duly elected President. Why? To maintain the British/US
establishment policy of geopolitical confrontation with Russia & China and the policy of
"regime change wars "; a policy candidate Trump voiced opposition to.
Russiagate or Intelgate?
The publication of the Republican House Committee memo and reports of other documents
increasingly suggest not only a "Russiagate" without Russia but also something darker: The
"collusion" may not have been in the White House or the Kremlin.
By Stephen F. Cohen FEBRUARY 7, 2018
"some kind of SIGINT, HUMINT or bilateral (FVEY) operation that detailed Putin's direct
involvement in the cyber campaign to disrupt and discredit the US election. This intelligence
also captured Putin's instructions on the operation's eventual objectives, to defeat or at
least damage Clinton, and help elect Trump."
I call drivel.
Absent the presentation of "some kind of" said intel, Brennan is lying and conducting a
disinformation campaign.
There is no chance that Putin is dumb enough to believe that his Russian intelligence
services had the capability of swinging the election to anyone, let alone Trump whose
victory, I remind those with - as Publius put it in his thread - "memory on the level of an
Alzheimer patient" - was completely dismissed by everyone until it happened.
So we're supposed to believe the Russians knew better?
Hogwash.
When Brennan goes down for this disinformation campaign, I expect TTG to post a thread
here with his mea culpa.
The whole Trump/Putin narrative has lost steam. It has descended into an incomprehensible
storm of "he said, she said." Unless Democrats, Mueller or the intelligence services can
finally produce some kind of smoking gun, I doubt that Americans will just tune out.
Advantage Trump.
The whole adventure reminds me of the campaign against Bill Clinton in the 1990s. They
could only 'get' Clinton because he shot himself in the foot with Monica. Of course, Trump,
being Trump, is perfectly capable of doing the same thing.
If you expect me to argue that Brennan is not a typical scheming bureaucratic hack, you'd
have to wait a long time. I dislike him as I dislike most of his contemporaries, but I bear
him no personal grudge. The purpose of the ICA on Russian interference was not to make a case
against Trump. It was to make a case against Russia. I don't think it contained anything
referring to any kind of collusion. You're conflating two very different, albeit related,
subjects.
Reread the ICA on "Russian activities and intentions." It lays out the evolution of
Russian thinking over the course of the election season. Russian actions were logical and in
Russia's interests. They were not dependent on Trump's election victory.
This is a point that is rarely addressed or gets lost amongst all the vitriol. The Russians
absolutely could have been (and almost assuredly were) involved in instigating and generally
fuckery with respect to our elections and Trump could be squeaky clean as far as
collusion/obstruction/etc... One does not preclude the other.
In any event, the longer this bullshit goes on with the innuendo, leaks, counter
leaks, memos, and ridiculous histrionics the greater the level of transparency of the entire
process and investigations will be necessary to assuage the "losing" side of this debate. And
even granted that, it's doubtful there is a happy ending at the end of this particular
rainbow. But some clear and convincing cards need to be thrown on the table soon, regardless
of what they show.
On a lighter note, Karl Sharro wrote an entertaining piece last year about all this--more
so to those on here with direct ME experience:
If there was some Russian meddling and hacking going on, I have to wonder if getting caught
wasn't part of the plan. The key goal not being to put Trump in the White House, but to make
sure each party would be at each others' throat and claims of foreign influence, possible
treason and very dubious if not fake election results would poison the inner political life
of the USA for the next 4 years. Basically, sowing seeds of mistrust towards the various
authorities and the whole political process itself, to weaken the US system as a whole.
I base this hypothesis on reasoning similar to Richardstevenhack. Putin knows he can't win
elections by internet and IT shenanigans; GOP or dems would use it already and would be far
more effective than faraway Russia if it were the case. He's also smart enough to expect to
be caught if such a massive endeavour was underway. On the other hand, going in without
taking enough care not to get spotted and making sure the US agencies notice would indeed
mean the operation was designed to be uncovered, and that was its purpose.
All in all, if there are solid clues, I'd wonder first if Russians aren't framed, and
barring that, if their key goal isn't to cause paranoia inside the USA and make people doubt
their whole political system.
I thought it might help to quote the first part of the "Key Judgements in the Intel
Community Assessment:
Key Judgments
Russian efforts to influence the 2016 US presidential election represent the most recent
expression of Moscow's longstanding desire to undermine the US-led liberal democratic order,
but these activities demonstrated a significant escalation in directness, level of activity,
and scope of effort compared to previous operations.
We assess Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at
the US presidential election. Russia's goals were to undermine public faith in the US
democratic process, denigrate Secretary Clinton, and harm her electability and potential
presidency. We further assess Putin and the Russian Government developed a clear preference
for President-elect Trump. We have high confidence in these judgments.
We also assess Putin and the Russian Government aspired to help President-elect
Trump's election chances when possible by discrediting Secretary Clinton and publicly
contrasting her unfavorably to him. All three agencies agree with this judgment. CIA and FBI
have high confidence in this judgment; NSA has moderate confidence." (end quote)
The report was supposed to provide proof-positive that Russia meddled, but facts or
evidence are excluded in the 40 page document.
So what are we the people supposed to do with this....beat the bushes for another 3
years to see if something pops up?
How is that fair to the people who voted for Trump and think he should be left to rule
according to the results of the balloting?
At what point does the onus fall on the prosecution to produce hard-evidence or shut
the hell up?? Seriously. Or are you okay with a president being put under the microscope for
4 years with no probable cause, and no proof of criminal wrongdoing?
Tell me, how long should this investigation be allowed to continue without any proof?
"... cyber campaign to disrupt and discredit the US election." Which other nations are
doing the same thing? Which ones were doing so on behalf of the other candidate and why
aren't those campaigns under investigation?
So Germany working to influence Americans is OK. Russians no. Yep. No
influencing US elections via activities camouflaged as NGOs doing their good deeds. Never
happen here. It's not like millions in donations to the Cxxxxxn Foundation, such as the $25
million donation of the Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership (Canada) - surprise! protected
by Canadian law from releasing thier donor identities (see the NYT linked below)- or
the multi-million donations of the Kindom of Norway, Kindom of Saudi Arabia, the Commonwealth
of Australia and a slew of others would provide that organization with fungable assets that
could be used in the USA to influence government policy or influence those voting for
representatives who determine US government policy.
"Nunes was close to Flynn and was on the Trump transition team. I think he's too close to
this to not recuse himself altogether..."
Guilt by association? How many other transition team members should be removed from doing
thier jobs for being "close to Flynn"?
"We still need to wait for the Mueller investigation to run its course and hope that the
results will be released to the public. "
How many years will that be?
Democracy dies in darkness. If this is actually worse than Watergate then declassify
it all and hold public hearings - with no immunity for anybody.
"... And the dossier, a pastiche of falsehoods from gossips in the Kremlin, has been exposed as a smear job paid for by the Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee ..."
"... The hunters are the prey and Trump will prosecute, sack, or intimidate the deep state. But it is there, can arise quickly and can be very dangerous. Forewarned is forearmed. ..."
...Donald Trump went to war against the entire political class: all factions of both parties, the bureaucracy, the national
media, the lobbyists, Hollywood and Wall Street. He said the whole system was rotten and had failed the nation: hopeless wars
that accomplished nothing except the wastage of thousands of lives and trillions of dollars, the extension of Iranian influence
and an immense humanitarian crisis, a flatlined economy, a shrinking workforce, increasing poverty and crime, oceans of debt,
large trade deficits from trade agreements that exported unemployment to the United States and the unmonitored influx of
millions of illiterate peasants from Latin America.
... ... ...
For the first nine months of the new administration, there was the constant confected threat
of impeachment. The phantasmagorical imbecility that Trump had somehow colluded and connived
with the Russian government to rig the election was the excuse of the hapless Clinton and her
Trump-hating echo chamber in the national media for the election result.
The deep state was almost the whole state, and it pitched in to sabotage the administration.
For nearly that long, the Republican leaders sat on their hands waiting to see if he would be
impeached or not. His nominees were a long time in being confirmed. There were leaks of White
House conversations, including with foreign leaders -- outright acts of insubordination
causing Trump, a decisive executive, to fire some fairly high officials, including the malign
director of the FBI, who then informed Congress that he had leaked a self-addressed memo
(probably illegally, as it was technically government property), in order to have a special
prosecutor named to torment the president over the fatuous Russian allegations, although
Comey testified that Trump himself was not a target or suspect and the Russians had not
influenced the outcome of the election. (This was a sober position compared to the wholesale
fabrications of the Democratic vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Mark
Warner, that a
thousand Russian agents had swarmed the key battleground states and had delivered
Wisconsin to Trump.)
The president has strengthened the White House staff. The FBI and Justice Department have
been ripped apart in their partisanship and misuse of the dossier on which the collusion
argument and the surveillance of the Trump campaign were based. And the dossier, a pastiche
of falsehoods from gossips in the Kremlin, has been exposed as a smear job paid for by the
Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee, and the whole impeachment movement has
collapsed. The hunters are the prey and Trump will prosecute, sack, or intimidate the deep
state. But it is there, can arise quickly and can be very dangerous. Forewarned is
forearmed.
Conrad Black is a writer and former newspaper publisher whose most recent book is
Richard M. Nixon: A Life in Full
(PublicAffairs, 2007).
"... Mainly, unnamed intelligence officials and operatives who are in the CIA or recently retired from such. A number of media outfits are exceptionally active in propagating negative headlines and stories about Trump and his administration. Elements of other intelligence agencies and departments of government are possibly involved. We do not know the names of those operating against Trump, and this is a weakness of the coup hypothesis. ..."
"... Its foundation was laid in 2016 by accusations of Russian interference in the election. The coup began in earnest as soon as the election in November 2016 made Trump the winner. ..."
"... On Jan. 14, 2017, a news report states that the CIA set up a task force in 2016 to investigate possible Russian funding of Trump's campaign. The task force included the FBI, the Treasury, and Justice Departments, the CIA, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and the National Security Agency (NSA). ..."
"... On February 24, 2016, ex-CIA chief Hayden said he'd be "frightened" of a Trump presidency. He said, "I would be incredibly concerned if President Trump governed in a way that was consistent with the language that candidate Trump expressed during the campaign." A news report told us "Former CIA director Michael Hayden believes there is a legitimate possibility that the U.S. military would refuse to follow orders given by Donald Trump if the Republican front-runner becomes president and decides to make good on certain campaign pledges." ..."
"... There is ample evidence in the form of sharp public bickering between Trump and these two CIA chiefs, present and the past, that the CIA set up a task force to investigate Trump's campaign as a weapon against Trump and his possible election. The motive behind the investigation was not to ensure a clean campaign free of Russian influence but to work against Trump's election chances. The CIA was dismayed by what appeared to them to be a possible president who was aiming to work with Putin and not against him. ..."
"... The excuse was an allegation that three of Trump's associates had received campaign money from the Kremlin. This allegation came from a Baltic state and it was processed by the CIA and made into something worthy of following up. We read that the task force " was set up after the director of the CIA, John Brennan, received a recording of a conversation about money from the Kremlin going into Trump's campaign coffers, the BBC's Paul Wood reported. The recording was apparently passed to the CIA by the intelligence agency of one of the Baltic States." ..."
"... According to this, John Brennan is the key player in the anti-Trump movement. He wants to see Trump's presidency brought to a quick end or otherwise neutered and made compliant to rule by the CIA. By their control over information and its interpretation, the leaders of the CIA have gained considerable power within the government. They've enhanced this by developing operational forces in the field. ..."
"... As occurred during the propaganda campaign that preceded Bush 2's attack on Iraq and as in the Ukraine case noted above, we again observe murky foreign sources that are given credence and validity by the CIA. The public and media have no viable way of checking on the story of Kremlin money except perhaps through off the record sources. Such stories can't be traced through public hearings without subpoena power and a will to wash a lot of dirty linen in public. They are perfect for propaganda and cover-ups. ..."
"... On January 3, 2016, Charles Schumer said that Trump was "being really dumb" for arguing against the assessments of the intelligence community on Russian hacking. He adds ominously: "Let me tell you, you take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you." ..."
"... On January 15, 2017, we read "CIA Director John Brennan on Sunday had a stern parting message for Republican Donald Trump days before he assumes the U.S. presidency, cautioning him against loosening sanctions on Russia and warning him to watch what he says. Brennan rebuked the president-elect for comparing U.S. intelligence practices to Nazi Germany in comments that laid bare the friction between Trump and the intelligence community he has criticized and is on the verge of commanding." ..."
"... In 2016 Trump and the CIA became foes of one another because of vast policy differences. Past and present CIA directors went public against Trump. They instigated a series of reports and leaks to discredit Trump and to link his campaign to Russian meddling in the election. They went after several of his aides, causing Paul Manafort to resign. After the election, they produced new anti-Trump material and managed to get his National Security Advisor, Michael Flynn, to resign. This adds up to an attempted coup that has had some success. ..."
A. Mainly, unnamed intelligence officials and operatives who are in the CIA or recently
retired from such. A number of media outfits are exceptionally active in propagating negative
headlines and stories about Trump and his administration. Elements of other intelligence
agencies and departments of government are possibly involved. We do not know the names of those
operating against Trump, and this is a weakness of the coup hypothesis.
Q. When did the coup attempt begin?
A. Its foundation was laid in 2016 by accusations of Russian interference in the
election. The coup began in earnest as soon as the election in November 2016 made Trump the
winner.
Q. What evidence points to the CIA's role in the coup attempt?
A. A news report from September 5, 2016, reports that "U.S. intelligence and law enforcement
agencies are investigating what they see as a broad covert Russian operation in the United
States to sow public distrust in the upcoming presidential election and in U.S. political
institutions, intelligence, and congressional officials said."
On Jan. 14, 2017, a news report states that the CIA set up a task force in 2016 to
investigate possible Russian funding of Trump's campaign. The task force included the FBI, the
Treasury, and Justice Departments, the CIA, the Office of the Director of National
Intelligence, and the National Security Agency (NSA).
Q. Why did the CIA set up a task force to investigate Trump's campaign?
A. Why did the CIA not set up a task force to investigate Hillary Clinton's activities
during and after being Secretary of State in response to receipt of mammoth amounts of foreign
money that were laundered through the Clinton Foundation? The reason is that she was the
candidate favored by the CIA leadership and Trump was not.
Early in 2016, Trump was raising very strong doubts in the intelligence community that he'd
govern as they saw fit.
On February 24, 2016, ex-CIA chief Hayden said he'd be "frightened" of a Trump presidency.
He said, "I would be incredibly concerned if President Trump governed in a way that was
consistent with the language that candidate Trump expressed during the campaign." A news report
told us "Former CIA director Michael Hayden believes there is a legitimate possibility that the
U.S. military would refuse to follow orders given by Donald Trump if the Republican
front-runner becomes president and decides to make good on certain campaign pledges."
A month later, Hayden opined that Trump was a larger threat to national stability on
security matters than Hillary Clinton.
On April 11, 2016, we learn that CIA Director "Brennan said on NBC News Sunday that he would
not allow enhanced interrogation tactics, including waterboarding, even if a future president
ordered it." Trump wasted no time responding: "Donald Trump is taking on CIA Director John
Brennan on torture, saying Brennan's pledge not to allow waterboarding is 'ridiculous.'"
On July 13, 2016, Brennan testified that he'd consider quitting rather than obey a
president's order to reinstate waterboarding, something that Trump had suggested. Another
article says that even before that date, "[Brennan] has already expressed his distaste for
Trump."
There is ample evidence in the form of sharp public bickering between Trump and these two
CIA chiefs, present and the past, that the CIA set up a task force to investigate Trump's
campaign as a weapon against Trump and his possible election. The motive behind the
investigation was not to ensure a clean campaign free of Russian influence but to work against
Trump's election chances. The CIA was dismayed by what appeared to them to be a possible
president who was aiming to work with Putin and not against him.
Q. But wasn't the CIA doing the right thing to investigate possible Russian funding of
the Trump campaign?
A. The idea of Russian funding of Trump's campaign was absurd. This investigation had no
reason to be started other than a goal of smearing Trump and preventing a Trump presidency. It
was absurd because foreign money given to American political campaigns is illegal and everyone
knows it. Trump would not jeopardize his campaign for some trivial amount of money nor would
his campaign officials; and a large amount would easily be spotted through the banking system.
It was also absurd because the Kremlin would not operate and does not operate in this way. It
would not risk being found out blatantly violating American law in this way, as that would
greatly diminish its credibility. "Doing the right thing" for the American system was strictly
a plausible and disingenuous device.
Q. If the investigation was absurd, what leads or allegations did the CIA have to set it
up?
A. The excuse was an allegation that three of Trump's associates had received campaign money
from the Kremlin. This allegation came from a Baltic state and it was processed by the CIA and
made into something worthy of following up. We read that the task force " was set up after the
director of the CIA, John Brennan, received a recording of a conversation about money from the
Kremlin going into Trump's campaign coffers, the BBC's Paul Wood reported. The recording was
apparently passed to the CIA by the intelligence agency of one of the Baltic States."
According to this, John Brennan is the key player in the anti-Trump movement. He wants to
see Trump's presidency brought to a quick end or otherwise neutered and made compliant to rule
by the CIA. By their control over information and its interpretation, the leaders of the CIA
have gained considerable power within the government. They've enhanced this by developing
operational forces in the field.
As occurred during the propaganda campaign that preceded Bush 2's attack on Iraq and as in
the Ukraine case noted above, we again observe murky foreign sources that are given credence
and validity by the CIA. The public and media have no viable way of checking on the story of
Kremlin money except perhaps through off the record sources. Such stories can't be traced
through public hearings without subpoena power and a will to wash a lot of dirty linen in
public. They are perfect for propaganda and cover-ups.
John Brennan has the CIA initiate an investigation on a flimsy basis and gets away with it.
We know from his public statements at that time and later that he's thoroughly anti-Trump and
anti-Russia. This is why such an investigation went forward. Brennan had nothing to lose. If he
found some dirt on Trump or his associates, he'd discredit Trump and lose him votes. If he
didn't find anything, the investigation itself would still raise suspicions about Trump and
provide Hillary Clinton and her aides with anti-Trump ammunition. In fact, her campaign did use
the alleged Russian connection against Trump.
Q. What else do we know of Brennan's differences with Trump?
A. On Sept. 11, 2016, Brennan disagreed with Trump publicly: "CIA Director John Brennan
pushed back against Donald Trump's claim that he could read disapproval of President Barack
Obama's policies in the body language of the intelligence officers who gave him a confidential
national security briefing."
On November 30, 2016, we read that Brennan expressed another difference with Trump: "The
director of the CIA has issued a stark warning to President-elect Donald J. Trump. Tearing up
the Iran nuclear deal would be 'the height of folly' and 'disastrous.'"
On January 3, 2016, Charles Schumer said that Trump was "being really dumb" for arguing
against the assessments of the intelligence community on Russian hacking. He adds ominously:
"Let me tell you, you take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday at
getting back at you."
On January 15, 2017, we read "CIA Director John Brennan on Sunday had a stern parting
message for Republican Donald Trump days before he assumes the U.S. presidency, cautioning him
against loosening sanctions on Russia and warning him to watch what he says. Brennan rebuked
the president-elect for comparing U.S. intelligence practices to Nazi Germany in comments that
laid bare the friction between Trump and the intelligence community he has criticized and is on
the verge of commanding."
Q. What became of the allegations against the three associates of Trump?
A. The three accused men each strongly denied allegations of being paid by the Kremlin. On
October 15, the FISA court granted a warrant to intercept communications from two Russian
banks. The investigators were looking for evidence that money passed from Russia to the three
Trump associates. No such evidence was found.
On January 19, 2017, the continuing investigation by "American law enforcement and
intelligence agencies" was confirmed, and Paul Manafort, Trump's former campaign manager, was
mentioned:
"The counterintelligence investigation centers at least in part on the business dealings
that some of the president-elect's past and present advisers have had with
Russia . Mr. Manafort has done business in Ukraine and Russia. Some of his contacts there
were under surveillance by the National Security Agency for suspected links to Russia's Federal
Security Service, one of the officials said."
Mr. Manafort has done nothing illegal, we learn. He has merely done some business in Ukraine
and Russia. He merely came into contact with people with suspected links to a Russian
intelligence outfit. They weren't even known spies. Mr. Manafort has fallen victim to
suspicion by association two or three times removed even from guilt by association.
The other two being investigated are Carter Page and Roger Stone, and we learn that they too
are innocent of wrongdoing.
"The F.B.I. is leading the investigations, aided by the National Security Agency, the
C.I.A. and the Treasury Department's financial crimes unit. The investigators have
accelerated their efforts in recent weeks but have found no conclusive evidence of wrongdoing,
the officials said."
So, we know that a concerted effort has been made to investigate three of Trump's close
aides. We know that the CIA was the instigator and that it used its typical murky and
unverifiable tips to gain credibility. Finally, we know that this inquiry has produced no
evidence of any illegal activities of Trump or his aides.
Q. What other evidence is there of an attempted coup against Trump?
A. On Oct. 7, 2016, there was released the "Joint Statement from the Department Of Homeland
Security and Office of the Director of National Intelligence on Election Security". This brief
statement on behalf of U.S. intelligence agencies linked the Russian government to hacking:
"The U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) is confident that the Russian Government directed the
recent compromises of e-mails from US persons and institutions, including from US political
organizations." It stated its belief "that only Russia's senior-most officials could have
authorized these activities."
On Nov. 30, 2016, an outfit named PropOrNot with links to the U.S. intelligence community
published a report that named 200 websites as propagators of Russian propaganda: "Russia Is
Manipulating US Public Opinion through Online Propaganda".
On Dec. 9, 2016, it was reported that "The CIA has concluded in a secret assessment that
Russia intervened in the 2016 election to help Donald Trump win the presidency "
Dec. 29, 2016, arrived the FBI-DHS report: "Grizzly Steppe – Russian Malicious Cyber
Activity". This was widely denounced as lacking even persuasive circumstantial evidence, never
mind direct evidence of Russian involvement.
On Jan. 10, 2017, the Golden Showers report was leaked, accusing Trump of having been
compromised by Russian agents and therefore subject to blackmail. This report had been
circulating for weeks in intelligence and media circles. It had supposedly been written between
July and December by former British MI-6 agent, Christopher Steele.
Once again we observe that a spurious anti-Trump report is purported or arranged to have a
foreign origination; but that it is carried to the public by means of the CIA and leaks within
the U.S.
On February 13, 2017, the coup perps drew fresh blood when Michael Flynn resigned, despite
no evidence of wrongdoing. Their success is attributable to their use of wiretapped phone calls
and to leaking these to the media. Since intelligence agents have access to these calls that
the NSA collects, we once again observe that intelligence circles are active in seeking to
undermine Trump. This is consistent with the conclusion that a coup attempt is ongoing.
Q. Could you summarize, please?
A. In 2016 Trump and the CIA became foes of one another because of vast policy differences.
Past and present CIA directors went public against Trump. They instigated a series of reports
and leaks to discredit Trump and to link his campaign to Russian meddling in the election. They
went after several of his aides, causing Paul Manafort to resign. After the election, they
produced new anti-Trump material and managed to get his National Security Advisor, Michael
Flynn, to resign. This adds up to an attempted coup that has had some success.
Q. What happens next?
A. The future is guesswork. We will be surprised at what happens, but here are some guesses.
The coup attempt will not cease. There is nothing presently opposing it unless Trump is
counterattacking behind the scenes, of which there is no evidence. Trump will eventually sense
the coup's efficacy and devise ways to stop it. The anti-Trump media will keep the pot boiling.
They will need new stories to exploit. Anti-Trump elements in the CIA can be expected to come
up with new, dubious and devious revelations aimed at discrediting Trump's handling of foreign
affairs. We can expect former intelligence officials to speak out against Trump at critical
times and to recruit allies who will add what appears to be an even more independent criticism
of Trump. The coup may transform into an effort to control Trump's policies from outside his
administration.
Putin blocked from 2000 onward the IMF/World Bank extreme privatization/liberalization
forced upon Russia to destroy it as a state and transfer control of its resources. This
process facilitated by Yeltsin caused Russia to default on its loans in 1998. Never have the
US/UK banking and deep state complex forgiven Putin for destroying their dreams of continuing
empire.
Brennan is just another Israeli tool , nothing more , nothing less , and a traitor
besides.
Not a shred of doubt about that.
Also, wouldn't one have to be in possession of something called a mind, to be classified
as a mastermind? I doubt the doofus can put on his own socks unaided.
True, if Brennan is the mastermind, that might explain why the whole Russiagate shitaree
is so obviously stupid. Other than making this little point, though the article is just yet
another rehashing of the same tired points.
Yo, Mike, if you want to say that Brennan is behind this reeking pile of manure, there's
no need to restate everything ever written about it. You could have made this same point in
the comments section of any other article posted here.
Wrong is that Zijlstra in 2006 worked for Shell, he just was a member of the
representatives for the town of Utrecht.
Pandora's box went open in yesterday evening Jinek talkshow, Rutte concluded gas deals for E
Ukraine for Shell.
MH17 now also comes into a different light, why Russia must be blamed for the catastrophe,and
why we still dot not know who did it.
lolz at Putin. More theater from the ActWhores. The Trump character made billions, which
shows he played more people than others played him. The two "intelligence" chiefs worked as
government bureaucrats their entire lives and never did anything on their own. Sorry, but I
grew up in the military, went to military schools, and knew tons of military officers and
NCOs as a child and teenager. People in such organizations become institutionalized and all
think and talk alike and write the same kind of propaganda. Clapper and Brennan and the rest
of their community only can think like their community. Carroll Quigley called it the
Institutionalization of the Instrument. It happens to all large human organizations without
exception. Look at the major US car companies that declined into almost extinction because
the inbred people who run them can't function well.
"... Bottom line: Despite the denials of former-CIA Director John Brennan, the dossier may have been used in the ICA. ..."
"... Most disturbing is the fact that Steele reportedly received information from friends of Hillary Clinton. (supposedly, Sidney Blumenthal and others) ..."
"... These are just a few of the questions Steele will undoubtedly be asked if he ever faces prosecution for lying to the FBI. But, so far, we know very little about man except that he was a former M16 agent who was paid $160,000 for composing the dubious set of reports that make up the dossier. We don't even know if Steele's alleged contacts or intermediaries in Russia actually exist or not. ..."
"... Some analysts think the whole thing is a fabrication based on the fact that he hasn't worked the Russia-scene since the FSB (The Russian state-security organization that replaced the KGB) was completely overhauled. Besides, it would be extremely dangerous for a Russian to provide an M16 agent with sensitive intelligence. And what would the contact get in return? According to most accounts, Steele's sources weren't even paid, so there was little incentive for them to put themselves at risk? All of this casts more doubt on the contents of the dossier. ..."
"... What is known about Steele is that he has a very active imagination and knows how to command a six-figure payoff for his unique services. We also know that the FBI continued to use him long after they knew he couldn't be trusted which suggests that he served some other purpose, like providing the agency with plausible deniability, a 'get out of jail free' card if they ever got caught surveilling US citizens without probable cause. ..."
"... Since then, GOP lawmakers have been quietly buzzing about allegations that an Obama-era State Department official passed along information from allies of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton that may have been used by the FBI to launch an investigation into whether the Trump campaign had improper contacts with Russia. ..."
"... Regular readers of this column know that we have always believed that the Russiagate psyops originated with Brennan. Just as the CIA launched its disinformation campaigns against Saddam Hussein and Muammar Gadhafi, so too, Russia has emerged as Washington's foremost rival requiring a massive propaganda campaign to persuade the public that America faces a serious external threat. In any event, the demonizing of Russia had already begun by the time Hillary and Co. decided to hop on the bandwagon by blaming Moscow for hacking John Podesta's emails. The allegations were never persuasive, but they did provide Brennan with some cover for the massive Information Operation (IO) that began with him. ..."
"... It was then-CIA Director John O. Brennan, a close confidant of Mr. Obama's, who provided the information -- what he termed the "basis" -- for the FBI to start the counterintelligence investigation last summer .Mr. Brennan told the House Intelligence Committee on May 23 that the intelligence community was picking up tidbits on Trump associates making contacts with Russians. ..."
"... It all started with Brennan. After Putin blocked Brennan's operations in both Ukraine and Syria, Brennan had every reason to retaliate and to use the tools at his disposal to demonize Putin and try to isolate Russia. The "election meddling" charges (promoted by the Hillary people) fit perfectly with Brennan's overall strategy to manipulate perceptions and prepare the country for an eventual confrontation. It provided him the opportunity to kill two birds with one stone, to deliver a withering blow to Putin and Trump at the very same time. The temptation must have been irresistible. ..."
"... But now the plan has backfired and the investigations are gaining pace. Trump's allies in the House smell the blood in the water and they want answers. Did the CIA surveil members of the Trump campaign on the basis of information they gathered in the dossier? Who saw the information? Was the information passed along to members of the press and other government agencies? Was the White House involved? What role did Obama play? What about the Intelligence Community Assessment? Was it based on the contents of the Steele report? Will the "hand-picked" analysts who worked on the report vouch for its conclusions in or were they coached about what to write? How did Brennan persuade the reluctant Comey into opening a counterintelligence investigation on members in the Trump campaign when he knew it would be perceived as a partisan attempt to sabotage the elections by giving Hillary an edge? ..."
"... Brennan, Clapper, Clinton, Blumenthal, Abedin, Mills, Podesta, Strzok, McCabe whoever might have been mastermind or mere footsoldier in the drama, one cannot escape the fact that the Capo di tutti capi is Barak Hussein Obama, even if only on the "Buck stops here" principle. ..."
"... Last September Brennan began a two-year stint as a distinguished fellow for global security at Fordham Law School. Brennan is a 1977 college graduate of this Jesuit institution which undoubtedly laid the groundwork for a career of duplicity and malfeasance ..."
The report ("The Dossier") that claims that Donald Trump colluded with Russia, was paid for
by the DNC and Hillary Clinton campaign. The company that claims that Russia hacked DNC computer servers, was paid by the DNC and
Hillary Clinton campaign. The FBI's counterintelligence probe into Trump's alleged connections to Russia was launched
on the basis of information gathered from a report that was paid for by the DNC and Hillary
Clinton campaign.
The surveillance of a Trump campaign member (Carter Page) was approved by a FISA court on
the basis of information from a report that was paid for by the DNC and Hillary Clinton
campaign.
The Intelligence Community Analysis or ICA was (largely or partially) based on information
from a report that was paid for by the DNC and Hillary Clinton campaign. (more on this
below)
The information that was leaked to the media alleging Russia hacking or collusion can be
traced back to claims that were made in a report that was paid for by the DNC and Hillary
Clinton campaign.
The entire Russia-gate investigation rests on the "unverified and salacious" information
from a dossier that was paid for by the DNC and Hillary Clinton Campaign. Here's how Stephen
Cohen sums it up in a recent article at The Nation:
"Steele's dossier was the foundational document of the Russiagate narrative from the time
its installments began to be leaked to the American media in the summer of 2016, to the US
"Intelligence Community Assessment" of January 2017 .the dossier and subsequent ICA report
remain the underlying sources for proponents of the Russiagate narrative of "Trump-Putin
collision." ("Russia gate or Intel-gate?", The Nation)
There's just one problem with Cohen's statement, we don't really know the extent to which
the dossier was used in the creation of the Intelligence Community Assessment. (The ICA was the
IC's flagship analysis that was supposed to provide ironclad proof of Russian meddling in the
2016 elections.) According to some reports, the contribution was significant. Check out this
excerpt from an article at Business Insider:
"Intelligence officials purposefully omitted the dossier from the public intelligence
report they released in January about Russia's election interference because they didn't want
to reveal which details they had corroborated, according to CNN." ("Mueller reportedly
interviewed the author of the Trump-Russia dossier -- here's what it alleges, and how it
aligned with reality", Business Insider)
Bottom line: Despite the denials of former-CIA Director John Brennan, the dossier may have
been used in the ICA.
In the last two weeks, documents have been released that have exposed the weak underpinnings
of the Russia investigation while at the same time revealing serious abuses by senior-level
officials at the DOJ and FBI. The so called Nunes memo was the first to point out these abuses,
but it was the 8-page "criminal referral" authored by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck
Grassley and Senator Lindsey Graham that gave credence to the claims. Here's a blurb from the
document:
"It appears the FBI relied on admittedly uncorroborated information, funded by and obtained
for Secretary Clinton's presidential campaign, in order to conduct surveillance of an associate
of the opposing presidential candidate. It did so based on Mr. Steele's personal credibility
and presumably having faith in his process of obtaining the information. But there is
substantial evidence suggesting that Mr. Steele materially misled the FBI about a key aspect of
his dossier efforts, one which bears on his credibility."
There it is. The FBI made a "concerted effort to conceal information from the court" in
order to get a warrant to spy on a member of a rival political campaign. So –at the very
least– there was an effort, on the part of the FBI and high-ranking officials at the
Department of Justice, to improperly spy on members of the Trump team. And there's more. The
FBI failed to mention that the dossier was paid for by the Hillary campaign and the DNC, or
that the dossier's author Christopher Steele had seeded articles in the media that were being
used to support the dossier's credibility (before the FISA court), or that, according to the
FBI's own analysts, the dossier was "only minimally corroborated", or that Steele was a
ferocious partisan who harbored a strong animus towards Trump. All of these were omitted in the
FISA application which is why the FBI was able to deceive the judge. It's worth noting that
intentionally deceiving a federal judge is a felony.
Most disturbing is the fact that Steele reportedly received information from friends of
Hillary Clinton. (supposedly, Sidney Blumenthal and others) Here's one suggestive tidbit that
appeared in the Graham-Grassley" referral:
" Mr. Steele's memorandum states that his company "received this report from REDACTED US
State Department," that the report was the second in a series, and that the report was
information that came from a foreign sub-source who "is in touch with REDACTED, a contact of
REDACTED, a friend of the Clintons, who passed it to REDACTED."
It is troubling enough that the Clinton campaign funded Mr. Steele's work, but that these
Clinton associates were contemporaneously feeding Mr. Steele allegations raises additional
concerns about his credibility." (Lifted from The Federalist)
What are we to make of this? Was Steele shaping the dossier's narrative to the
specifications of his employers? Was he being coached by members of the Hillary team? How did
that impact the contents of the dossier and the subsequent Russia investigation?
These are just a few of the questions Steele will undoubtedly be asked if he ever faces
prosecution for lying to the FBI. But, so far, we know very little about man except that he was
a former M16 agent who was paid $160,000 for composing the dubious set of reports that make up
the dossier. We don't even know if Steele's alleged contacts or intermediaries in Russia
actually exist or not.
Some analysts think the whole thing is a fabrication based on the fact
that he hasn't worked the Russia-scene since the FSB (The Russian state-security organization
that replaced the KGB) was completely overhauled. Besides, it would be extremely dangerous for
a Russian to provide an M16 agent with sensitive intelligence. And what would the contact get
in return? According to most accounts, Steele's sources weren't even paid, so there was little
incentive for them to put themselves at risk? All of this casts more doubt on the contents of
the dossier.
What is known about Steele is that he has a very active imagination and knows how to command
a six-figure payoff for his unique services. We also know that the FBI continued to use him
long after they knew he couldn't be trusted which suggests that he served some other purpose,
like providing the agency with plausible deniability, a 'get out of jail free' card if they
ever got caught surveilling US citizens without probable cause.
But that brings us to the strange case of Carter Page, a bit-player whose role in the Trump
campaign was trivial at best. Page was what most people would call a "small fish", an
insignificant foreign policy advisor who had minimal impact on the campaign. Congressional
investigators, like Nunes, must be wondering why the FBI and DOJ devoted so much attention to
someone like Page instead of going after the "big fish" like Bannon, Flynn, Kushner, Ivanka and
Trump Jr., all of whom might have been able to provide damaging information on the real target,
Donald Trump. Wasn't that the idea? So why waste time on Page? It doesn't make any sense,
unless, of course, the others were already being surveilled by other agencies? Is that it, did
the NSA and the CIA have a hand in the surveillance too?
It's a moot point, isn't it? Because now that there's evidence that senior-level officials
at the DOJ and the FBI were involved in improperly obtaining warrants to spy on members of the
opposite party, the investigation is going to go wherever it goes. Whatever restrictions
existed before, will now be lifted. For example, this popped up in Saturday's The Hill:
"House Intelligence Committee lawmakers are in the dark about an investigation into
wrongdoing at the State Department announced by Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) on Friday.
Nunes told Fox News on Friday that, "we are in the middle of what I call phase two of our
investigation. That investigation is ongoing and we continue work toward finding answers and
asking the right questions to try to get to the bottom of what exactly the State Department
was up to in terms of this Russia investigation."
Since then, GOP lawmakers have been quietly buzzing about allegations that an Obama-era
State Department official passed along information from allies of former Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton that may have been used by the FBI to launch an investigation into whether
the Trump campaign had improper contacts with Russia.
"I'm pretty troubled by what I read in the documents with respect to the role the State
Department played in the fall of 2016, including information that was used in a court
proceeding. I am troubled by it," Gowdy told Fox News on Tuesday." ("Lawmakers in dark about
'phase two' of Nunes investigation", The Hill)
So the State Department is next in line followed by the NSA and, finally, the Russia-gate
point of origin, John Brennan's CIA. Here's more background on that from Stephen Cohen's
illuminating article at The Nation:
" .when, and by whom, was this Intel operation against Trump started?
In testimony to the House Intelligence Committee in May 2017, John Brennan, formerly
Obama's head of the CIA, strongly suggested that he and his agency were the first, as The
Washington Post put it at the time, "in triggering an FBI probe." Certainly both the Post and
The New York Times interpreted his remarks in this way. Equally certain, Brennan played a
central role in promoting the Russiagate narrative thereafter, briefing members of Congress
privately and giving President Obama himself a top-secret envelope in early August 2016 that
almost certainly contained Steele's dossier. Early on, Brennan presumably would have shared
his "suspicions" and initiatives with James Clapper, director of national intelligence. FBI
Director Comey may have joined them actively somewhat later .
When did Brennan begin his "investigation" of Trump? His House testimony leaves this
somewhat unclear, but, according to a subsequent Guardian article, by late 2015 or early 2016
he was receiving, or soliciting, reports from foreign intelligence agencies regarding
"suspicious 'interactions' between figures connected to Trump and known or suspected Russian
agents."
In short, if these reports and Brennan's own testimony are to be believed, he, not the
FBI, was the instigator and godfather of Russiagate." ("Russiagate or Intelgate?", Stephen
Cohen, The Nation)
Regular readers of this column know that we have always believed that the Russiagate psyops
originated with Brennan. Just as the CIA launched its disinformation campaigns against Saddam
Hussein and Muammar Gadhafi, so too, Russia has emerged as Washington's foremost rival
requiring a massive propaganda campaign to persuade the public that America faces a serious
external threat. In any event, the demonizing of Russia had already begun by the time Hillary
and Co. decided to hop on the bandwagon by blaming Moscow for hacking John Podesta's emails.
The allegations were never persuasive, but they did provide Brennan with some cover for the
massive Information Operation (IO) that began with him.
According to the Washington Times:
"It was then-CIA Director John O. Brennan, a close confidant of Mr. Obama's, who provided
the information -- what he termed the "basis" -- for the FBI to start the counterintelligence
investigation last summer .Mr. Brennan told the House Intelligence Committee on May 23 that
the intelligence community was picking up tidbits on Trump associates making contacts with
Russians."
It all started with Brennan. After Putin blocked Brennan's operations in both Ukraine and
Syria, Brennan had every reason to retaliate and to use the tools at his disposal to demonize
Putin and try to isolate Russia. The "election meddling" charges (promoted by the Hillary
people) fit perfectly with Brennan's overall strategy to manipulate perceptions and prepare the
country for an eventual confrontation. It provided him the opportunity to kill two birds with
one stone, to deliver a withering blow to Putin and Trump at the very same time. The temptation
must have been irresistible.
But now the plan has backfired and the investigations are gaining pace. Trump's allies in
the House smell the blood in the water and they want answers. Did the CIA surveil members of
the Trump campaign on the basis of information they gathered in the dossier? Who saw the
information? Was the information passed along to members of the press and other government
agencies? Was the White House involved? What role did Obama play? What about the Intelligence
Community Assessment? Was it based on the contents of the Steele report? Will the "hand-picked"
analysts who worked on the report vouch for its conclusions in or were they coached about what
to write? How did Brennan persuade the reluctant Comey into opening a counterintelligence
investigation on members in the Trump campaign when he knew it would be perceived as a partisan
attempt to sabotage the elections by giving Hillary an edge?
Soon the investigative crosshairs will settle on Brennan. He'd better have the right
answers.
That the whole media can be in service of a such a fraud and beam their relentless lies
across millions of TV screens even in a democracy like America goes to tell you that the
Power ultimately decides what is 'fiction' and 'non-fiction'.
Why else would most of Big Media be spreading all these lies about Russia Hacking or
'Russiagate' when the only real 'gate' is Deepstategate and Jewishhategate. The anti-Trump
hysteria is nothing but an act of arson set by Jewish globalists who hate him.
Brennan, Clapper, Clinton, Blumenthal, Abedin, Mills, Podesta, Strzok, McCabe whoever might
have been mastermind or mere footsoldier in the drama, one cannot escape the fact that the
Capo di tutti capi is Barak Hussein Obama, even if only on the "Buck stops here"
principle.
Planting stories in the kept lugenpresse then citing the resulting articles as evidence is a
common technique of the national security state. Anyone remember DickiePoo Cheney (the man
with no heart) planting bogus weapons-of-mass-destruction stories with "reporter" Judith (the
jooie) Miller whose stuff was dutifully published in the rapidly anti arab Jew York Times.
DickiePoo then cited the stories as evidence that Iraq needed to be invaded and destroyed.
This kind of propaganda is quite effective and very long lasting to this day something like
60% of the american public still believe Saddam had a hand in the 911 false flag operation
and probably future history books will agree.
Last September Brennan began a two-year stint as a distinguished fellow for global security
at Fordham Law School. Brennan is a 1977 college graduate of this Jesuit institution which
undoubtedly laid the groundwork for a career of duplicity and malfeasance .
His appointment is in the grand tradition of Jesuitical sucking up to the
powers-that-be.
An especially egregious example of this would be the current Jesuit "Bishop of Rome" (his
preferred parlance) playing footsie with communist China. And in the process throwing
faithful Chinese under the proverbial bus – just being chalked up as collateral
damage!
"... In today's podcast, we hear how Vault 8 has succeeded Vault 7 among WikiLeaks dumps (but it's still all CIA all the time from Mr. Assange and company). GCHQ expresses concerns about Kaspersky anti-virus products. ..."
"... The US Intelligence Community reiterates its conclusion that dog bites man, or rather, that Russia wants to work mischief with the United States ..."
In today's podcast, we hear how Vault 8 has succeeded Vault 7 among WikiLeaks dumps (but it's still all CIA all the time from
Mr. Assange and company). GCHQ expresses concerns about Kaspersky anti-virus products.
Media reports suggest that NSA is in the middle of a big mole hunt. Equifax begins to tally up the costs of its breach.
The US Intelligence Community reiterates its conclusion that dog bites man, or rather, that Russia wants to work mischief
with the United States...
"... Hardware and software vendors that are complicit -- most of which are American, British or Israeli -- give the CIA the opportunity to achieve informational full-spectrum dominance, relegating privacy to extinction. Such a convergence of power, money and technology entails major conflicts of interest, as can be seen in the case of Amazon AWS (Amazon's Cloud Service), cloud provider for the CIA , whose owner, Jeff Bezos, is also the owner of The Washington Post ..."
"... In general, when the 16 US spy agencies blamed Russia for the hacking of the elections, they were never specific in terms of forensic evidence. Simply put, the media, spies and politicians created false accusations based on the fact that Moscow, together with RT ..."
"... Now what is revealed through Wikileaks' publications in Vault 7 is the ability of a subsection of the CIA, known as Umbrage , to use malware, viruses, trojans and other cyber tools for their own geopolitical purposes. The CIA's Umbrage collects, analyzes and then employs software created variously from foreign security agencies, cyber mafia, private companies, and hackers in general. ..."
"... These revelations are yet more reason why countries targeted by Washington, like China, Russia, Iran and North Korea, should get rid of European and American products and invest in reducing technological dependence on American products in particular. ..."
"... This article first appeared on Strategic-Culture.org and was authored by Federico Pieraccini. ..."
New revelations from Wikileaks' 'Vault 7' leak shed a disturbing light on the safeguarding of privacy. Something already known
and largely suspected has now become documented by Wikileaks. It seems evident that the CIA is now a state within a state, an entity
out of control that has even arrived at the point of creating its own hacking network in order to avoid the scrutiny of the NSA and
other agencies.
Reading the revelations contained in the documents
released by WikiLeaks and adding them to those already presented in recent years by Snowden, it now seems evident that the
technological aspect regarding espionage is a specialty in which the CIA, as far as we know, excels. Hardware and software vendors
that are complicit -- most of which are American, British or Israeli -- give the CIA the opportunity to achieve informational full-spectrum
dominance, relegating privacy to extinction. Such a convergence of power, money and technology entails major conflicts of interest,
as can be seen in the case of Amazon AWS (Amazon's Cloud Service),
cloud provider for the
CIA , whose owner, Jeff Bezos, is also the owner of The Washington Post . It is a clear overlap of private interests
that conflicts with the theoretical need to declare uncomfortable truths without the need to consider orders numbering in the millions
of dollars from clients like the CIA.
While it is just one example, there are thousands more out there. The perverse interplay between media, spy agencies and politicians
has compromised the very meaning of the much vaunted democracy of the land of the Stars and Stripes. The constant scandals that are
beamed onto our screens now serve the sole purpose of advancing the deep interest of the Washington establishment. In geopolitical
terms, it is now more than obvious that the deep state has committed all available means toward sabotaging any dialogue and détente
between the United States and Russia. In terms of news, the Wikileaks revelations shed light on the methods used by US intelligence
agencies like the CIA to place blame on the Kremlin, or networks associated with it, for the hacking that occurred during the American
elections.
Perhaps this is too generous a depiction of matters, given that the general public has yet to see
any evidence of the hacking of the DNC servers. In addition to this, we know that the origin of Podesta's email revelations stem
from the
loss of a smartphone and the low
data-security measures
employed by the chairman of Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign. In general, when the 16 US spy agencies blamed Russia for
the hacking of the elections, they were never specific in terms of forensic evidence. Simply put, the media, spies and politicians
created false accusations based on the fact that Moscow, together with
RT and other media (not directly
linked to the Kremlin), finally enjoy a major presence in the mainstream media. The biggest problem for the Washington establishment
lies in the revelation of news that is counterproductive to the interests of the deep state. RT, Sputnik, this site and many others
have diligently covered and reported to the general public every development concerning the Podesta revelations or the hacking of
the DNC.
Now what is revealed through Wikileaks' publications in Vault 7 is the ability of a subsection of the CIA, known as
Umbrage , to use malware, viruses, trojans and
other cyber tools for their own geopolitical purposes. The CIA's Umbrage collects, analyzes and then employs software created variously
from foreign security agencies, cyber mafia, private companies, and hackers in general. These revelations become particularly
relevant when we consider the consequences of these actions. The main example can be seen in the hacking of the DNC. For now, what
we know is that the hacking – if it ever occurred – is of Russian origin. This does not mean at all that the Kremlin directed it.
It could actually be very much the opposite, its responsibility falling into the category of a cyber false-flag. One thing is for
sure: all 16 US intelligence agencies are of the view that "the Russians did it". That said, the methods used to hack vulnerabilities
cannot be revealed, so as to limit the spread of easily reusable exploits on systems, such as the one that hosted the DNC server.
It is a great excuse for avoiding the revelation of any evidence at all.
So, with little information available, independent citizens are left with very little information on which to reliably form an
opinion on what happened. There is no evidence, and no evidence will be provided to the media. For politicians and so-called mainstream
journalists, this is an acceptable state of affairs. What we are left with instead is blind faith in the 16 spy agencies. The problem
for them is that what WikiLeaks revealed with Vault 7 exposes a scenario that looks more likely than not: a cyber false-flag carried
out by the Central Intelligence Agency using engineered malware and viruses made in Russia and hypothetically linking them back to
hacking networks in Russia. In all likelihood, it looks like the Democrats' server was hacked by the CIA with the clear objective
of leaving Russian fingerprints and obvious traces to be picked up by other US agencies.
In this way, it becomes easier to explain the unique views of all 16 spy agencies. Thus, it is far more likely that the CIA intentionally
left fake Russian fingerprints all over the DNC server, thereby misleading other intelligence agencies in promoting the narrative
that Russia hacked the DNC server. Of course the objective was to create a false narrative that could immediately be picked up by
the media, creating even more hysteria surrounding any rapprochement with Russia.
Diversification of computer systems.
The revelations contained in the Wikileaks vault 7 (
less than 1 % of the total data in Wikileaks'
possession has been released to date) have caused a stir, especially by exposing the astonishing complicity between hardware and
software manufacturers, often intentionally creating backdoors in their products to allow access by the CIA and NSA. In today's digital
environment, all essential services rely on computer technology and connectivity. These revelations are yet more reason why countries
targeted by Washington, like China, Russia, Iran and North Korea, should get rid of European and American products and invest in
reducing technological dependence on American products in particular.
The People's Republic has
already started down this track, with the replacement of many network devices with local vendors like Huawei in order to avoid
the type of interference revealed by Snowden.
Russia has been doing the same in terms of software, even laying the groundwork to launch of
its own operating system, abandoning American
and European systems. In North Korea, this idea was already put
into practice years ago and is an excellent tool for deterrence for external interference. In more than one computer security
conference, US experts have praised the capabilities of the DPRK to
isolate its Internet network from the rest of the world, allowing them to have strong safety mechanisms. Often, the only access
route to the DPRK systems are through the People's Republic of China, not the easiest way for the CIA or NSA to infiltrate a protected
computer network.
An important aspect of the world in which we live today involves information security, something all nations have to deal with.
At the moment, we still live in a world in which the realization of the danger and effect of hacking attacks are not apparent to
many. On the other hand, militarily speaking, the diversification and rationalization of critical equipment in terms of networks
and operability (smartphones, laptops, etc) has already produced
strong growth in non-American and European manufacturers, with the aim of making their systems more secure.
This strengthening of technology also produces deleterious consequences, such as the need for intelligence agencies to be able
to
prevent the spread of data encryption so as to always enjoy access to any desired information. The birth of the Tor protocol,
the deployment of Bitcoin, and apps that are more and more encrypted (although the WikiLeaks documents have shown that the collection
of information takes place on the device b
efore the information is encrypted ) are all responses to an exponential increase in the invasion of privacy by federal or American
government entities.
We live in a world that has an enormous dependence on the Internet and computer technology. The CIA over the years has focused
on the ability to make sure vulnerable systems are exploited as well as seeking out major security flaws in consumer products without
disclosing this to vendors, thereby taking advantage of these security gaps and leaving all consumers with a potential lack of security.
Slowly, thanks to the work and courage of people like Snowden and Assange, the world is beginning to understand how important it
is to keep personal data under control and prevent access to it by third parties, especially if they are state actors. In the case
of national security, the issue is expanded exponentially by the need to protect key and vital infrastructure, considering how many
critical services operate via the Internet and rely on computing devices.
The wars of the future will have a strong technological basis, and it is no coincidence that many armed forces, primarily the
Russian and Chinese, have opted in recent years to training troops, and conducting operations, not completely relying on connectivity.
No one can deny that in the event of a large-scale conflict, connectivity is far from guaranteed. One of the major goals of competing
nations is to penetrate the military security systems of rival nations and be able to
disarm the internal networks that operates major systems
of defense and attack.
The Wikileaks revelations are yet another confirmation of how important it is to break the technological unipolar moment, if it
may be dubbed this way, especially for nations targeted by the United States. Currently Washington dictates the technological capacities
of the private and government sectors of Europe and America, steering their development, timing and methods to suit its own interests.
It represents a clear disadvantage that the PRC and its allies will inevitably have to redress in the near future in order to achieve
full security for its vital infrastructure.
This article first appeared on Strategic-Culture.org and was authored
by Federico Pieraccini.
"... The FBI asked Steele if he was the source for the Isikoff report, something Steele denied. This was a lie. ..."
"... In documents submitted to a British court, Steele acknowledged that he was the source for the Isikoff article, something Simpson confirmed in his congressional testimony. ..."
"... Steele, the much-admired former British intelligence officer, had committed the ultimate sin an FBI confidential human source can commit---he lied to his handlers. ..."
"... James Baker ..."
"... The House intelligence committee majority memo specifically notes that Steele had lied to the FBI about his contact with Isikoff. ..."
"... Chuck Grassley, together with Sen. Lindsey Graham, chairman of the subcommittee on crime and terrorism, which referred Steele to the DOJ on suspicion of lying to the FBI about the dissemination of information by Steele to the media. The referral contained a top-secret memorandum prepared by the judiciary majority staff that would, from its classification, appear to be derived from information relating to statements made by Steele to the FBI about the Isikoff article. ..."
The problem with the Isikoff report is the similarity between it and a July 20, 2016, report
Steele prepared and provided to the FBI during their meeting in Rome. The FBI asked Steele
if he was the source for the Isikoff report, something Steele denied. This was a lie.
In documents submitted to a British court, Steele acknowledged that he was the source
for the Isikoff article, something Simpson confirmed in his congressional testimony. The
Steele lie played an important role in shaping the information the FBI and DOJ provided in
support of their Oct. 21, 2016, FISA warrant application targeting Page. The Isikoff article
was submitted to the FISA court as corroborating evidence, along with a statement attributed to
Steele denying that he was the source of the information used by Isikoff.
Steele's lies caught up with him when, on Oct. 31, 2016, David Corn
wrote an article in Mother Jones titled "A Veteran Spy Has Given the FBI Information
Alleging a Russian Operation to Cultivate Donald Trump," with a subtitle asking, "Has the
bureau investigated this material?" Steele, the much-admired former British intelligence
officer, had committed the ultimate sin an FBI confidential human source can commit---he lied
to his handlers. Describing Steele (whom the article did not name) as a "credible source
with a proven record of providing reliable, sensitive and important information to the US
government," David Corn wrote that "the former spy told me that he was reluctant to be talking
with a reporter. He pointed out this was not his common practice. 'Someone like me stays in the
shadows,' he said. But he indicated that he believed this material was important, and he was
unsure how the FBI was handling it. Certainly, there had been no public signs that the FBI was
investigating these allegations."
The problem for the FBI was that it had used Steele's information to support its
investigation into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, mainly in the form
of sworn affidavits submitted in support of a FISA warrant derived from the FBI's interactions
with Steele. Corn's article exposed as a lie the information at the heart of the FBI and DOJ's
FISA warrant application, simultaneously invalidating any information attributed to Steele, as
well as all information that relied upon Steele's now-tainted information for corroboration.
This included both Isikoff's appended article and the Papadopoulos information. As of October
2016, the FBI had yet to interview Papadopoulos. Without corroboration of the information
Steele provided in his June 20, 2016, report, turned over to Gaeta on July 5, 2016, the
counterintelligence investigation Strzok headed would have not been able to act on the
information the Australian government provided concerning alleged barroom conversations between
Papadopoulos and Downer. The "emails" allegedly alluded to by Papadopoulos that Mifsud claimed
Russia possessed would have had no "hook" to corroborate them. The emails WikiLeaks released in
July 2016 that triggered Strzok's investigation had either not been written at the time
Papadopoulos spoke with Mifsud in April 2016 or had not yet been compiled by the malware
alleged by the cybersecurity company CrowdStrike to have been behind the theft of the DNC
emails.
Void of the Steele dossier as corroboration, the Papadopoulos-Mifsud conversation, as
reported by Downer, simply had no legal legs to stand on, and as such would have been unusable
in support of a FISA warrant application. Underscoring the seriousness the FBI attached to this
issue, James
Baker , the FBI's general counsel, met with Corn prior to the 2016 election. Corn
specifically denies that Baker was a source for his article on Steele. The only other
explanation for a Baker-Corn meeting would be for the FBI's general counsel to confirm Steele
as Corn's source in support of the FBI's subsequent decision to sever relations with Steele,
including the forfeiture of the $50,000 payment Steele was to have received for his work.
The FBI's decision to suspend and then sever its confidential human source relationship with
Steele is reflected in the House intelligence committee majority memo, as is the FBI's decision
to not give Steele the payment that had been authorized for his work on behalf of the FBI,
reflected in the three October memorandums previously cited.
The House intelligence committee majority memo specifically notes that Steele had lied
to the FBI about his contact with Isikoff. This helps explain the
Jan. 18, 2018 , letter from the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Chuck
Grassley, together with Sen. Lindsey Graham, chairman of the subcommittee on crime and
terrorism, which referred Steele to the DOJ on suspicion of lying to the FBI about the
dissemination of information by Steele to the media. The referral contained a top-secret
memorandum prepared by the judiciary majority staff that would, from its classification, appear
to be derived from information relating to statements made by Steele to the FBI about the
Isikoff article.
The role the FBI general counsel played in investigating the link between Steele and the
media brings to light another important facet of the complex web woven by Steele in marketing
his Fusion GPS-funded opposition research as "intelligence." Corn, in his Mother Jones article,
cites communications between Sen. Harry Reid and FBI Director James Comey, in which Reid refers
to "explosive information" in the possession of the FBI pertaining to Page's alleged meetings
in Moscow in July 2016 with "sanctioned" Russian officials. The specificity of the information
cited by Reid strongly mirrors the information contained in Steele's July 26, 2016, report
detailing his sub-sources' allegations about Carter's purported meeting with Russian officials.
Reid's communication with Comey closely tracks with a top-secret briefing provided to Reid by
former CIA Director John Brennan, in which the information about Page was shared.
"... John Brennan, formerly Obama's head of the CIA, strongly suggested that he and his agency were the first, as The Washington Post ..."
"... The New York Times ..."
"... Brennan played a central role in promoting the Russiagate narrative thereafter, briefing members of Congress privately and giving President Obama himself a top-secret envelope in early August 2016 that almost certainly contained Steele's dossier. Early on, Brennan presumably would have shared his "suspicions" and initiatives with James Clapper, director of national intelligence. FBI Director Comey, distracted by his mangling of the Clinton private-server affair during the presidential campaign, may have joined them actively somewhat later. ..."
"... The question therefore becomes: When did Brennan begin his "investigation" of Trump? His House testimony leaves this somewhat unclear, but, according to a subsequent Guardian article , by late 2015 or early 2016 he was receiving, or soliciting, reports from foreign intelligence agencies regarding "suspicious 'interactions' between figures connected to Trump and known or suspected Russian agents." ..."
"... In short, if these reports and Brennan's own testimony are to be believed, he, not the FBI, was the instigator and godfather of Russiagate. ..."
"... According to Steele and his many stenographers -- which include his American employers, Democratic Party Russiagaters, the mainstream media, and even progressive publications -- it came from his "deep connections in Russia," specifically from retired and current Russian intelligence officials in or near the Kremlin . From the moment the dossier began to be leaked to the American media, this seemed highly implausible (as reporters who took his bait should have known) for several reasons: ..."
"... would these purported Russian insiders really have collaborated with this "former" British intelligence agent under what is so widely said to be the ever-vigilant eye of the ruthless "former KGB agent" Vladimir Putin, thereby risking their positions, income, perhaps freedom, as well as the well-being of their families? ..."
"... The New York Times ..."
"... And most intriguingly, there was the "research" provided by Nellie Ohr, wife of a top Department of Justice official, Bruce Ohr, who, according to the Republican memo, "was employed by Fusion GPS to assist in the cultivation of opposition research on Trump. Ohr later provided the FBI with all of his wife's opposition research." Most likely, it found its way into Steele's dossier. (Mrs. Ohr was a trained Russian Studies scholar with a PhD from Stanford and a onetime assistant professor at Vassar, and thus, it must have seemed, an ideal collaborator for Steele.) ..."
"... Was Russiagate produced by the primary leaders of the US intelligence community, not just the FBI? If so, it is the most perilous political scandal in modern American history, and the most detrimental to American democracy. And if so, it does indeed, as zealous promoters of Russiagate assert, make Watergate pale in significance. ..."
"... If Russiagate involved collusion among US intelligence agencies, as now seems likely, why was it undertaken? ..."
"... Did Brennan, for example, aspire to remaining head of the CIA, or to a higher position, in a Hillary Clinton administration? ..."
The publication of the Republican House Committee memo and reports of other documents
increasingly suggest not only a "Russiagate" without Russia but also something darker: The
"collusion" may not have been in the White House or the Kremlin.
... ... ...
In order to defend itself against the memo's charge that it used Steele's unverified dossier
to open its investigation into Trump's associates, the FBI claims it was prompted instead by a
May 2016 report of remarks made earlier by another lowly Trump adviser, George Papadopoulos, to
an Australian ambassador in a London bar. Even leaving aside the ludicrous nature of this
episode, the public record shows it is not true. In testimony to the House Intelligence
Committee in May 2017, John Brennan, formerly Obama's head of the CIA, strongly suggested
that he and his agency were the first,
as The Washington Post put it at the time , "in triggering an FBI probe."
Certainly both the Postand The
New York Times interpreted his remarks in this way. Equally certain, Brennan
played a central role in promoting the Russiagate narrative thereafter,
briefing members of Congress privately and giving President Obama himself a top-secret
envelope in early August 2016 that almost certainly contained Steele's dossier. Early on,
Brennan presumably would have shared his "suspicions" and initiatives with James Clapper,
director of national intelligence. FBI Director Comey, distracted by his mangling of the
Clinton private-server affair during the presidential campaign, may have joined them actively
somewhat later.
But when he did so publicly, in his March 2017 testimony to the House Intelligence
Committee, it was as J. Edgar Hoover reincarnate -- as the nation's number-one expert on Russia
and its profound threat to America (though, when asked, he said he had never heard of Gazprom,
the giant Russian-state energy company often said to be a major pillar of President Putin's
power). The question therefore becomes: When did Brennan begin his "investigation" of
Trump? His House testimony leaves this somewhat unclear, but,
according to a subsequent Guardian article , by late 2015 or early 2016 he was receiving,
or soliciting, reports from foreign intelligence agencies regarding "suspicious 'interactions'
between figures connected to Trump and known or suspected Russian agents."
In short, if these reports and Brennan's own testimony are to be believed, he, not the
FBI, was the instigator and godfather of Russiagate. Certainly, his subsequent frequent
and vociferous public retelling of the Russiagate allegations against Trump suggest that he
played a (and probably the ) instigating role. And, it seems, a role in the Steele
dossier as well. Where, then, Cohen asks, did Steele get his information? According to
Steele and his many stenographers -- which include his American employers, Democratic Party
Russiagaters, the mainstream media, and even progressive publications -- it came from his "deep
connections in Russia,"
specifically from retired and current Russian intelligence officials in or near the Kremlin
. From the moment the dossier began to be leaked to the American media, this seemed highly
implausible (as reporters who took his bait should have known) for several reasons:
Steele has not returned to Russia after leaving his post there in the early 1990s.
Since then, the main Russian intelligence agency, the FSB, has undergone many personnel and
other changes, especially after 2000, and especially in or near Putin's Kremlin. Did Steele
really have such "connections" so many years later?
Even if he did, would these purported Russian insiders really have
collaborated with this "former" British intelligence agent under what is so widely said to be
the ever-vigilant eye of the ruthless "former KGB agent" Vladimir Putin, thereby risking
their positions, income, perhaps freedom, as well as the well-being of their
families?
Originally it was said that his Russian sources were highly paid by Steele.
Arguably, this might have warranted the risk. But subsequently Steele's employer and head of
Fusion GPS, Glenn Simpson, wrote
in The New York Times that "Steele's sources in Russia were not paid." If the
Putin Kremlin's purpose was to put Trump in the White House, why then would these
"Kremlin-connected" sources have contributed to Steele's anti-Trump project without financial
or political gain -- only with considerable risk?
There is the also the telling matter of factual mistakes in the dossier that
Kremlin "insiders" were unlikely to have made, but this is the subject for a separate
analysis.
And indeed we now know that Steele had at least three other "sources" for the dossier, ones
not previously mentioned by him or his employer. There was the information from foreign
intelligence agencies provided by Brennan to Steele or to the FBI, which we also now know was
collaborating with Steele. There was the contents of a " second
Trump-Russia dossier " prepared by people personally close to Hillary Clinton and who
shared their "findings" with Steele.
And most intriguingly, there was the "research" provided by Nellie Ohr, wife of a top
Department of Justice official, Bruce Ohr, who, according to the Republican memo, "was employed
by Fusion GPS to assist in the cultivation of opposition research on Trump. Ohr later provided
the FBI with all of his wife's opposition research." Most likely, it found its way into
Steele's dossier. (Mrs. Ohr was a trained Russian Studies scholar with a PhD from Stanford and
a onetime assistant professor at Vassar, and thus, it must have seemed, an ideal collaborator
for Steele.)
We are left, then, with a vital, ramifying question: How much of the "intelligence
information" in Steele's dossier actually came from Russian insiders, if any? (This uncertainly
alone should stop Fox News's Sean Hannity and others from declaring that the Kremlin used
Steele -- and Hillary Clinton -- to pump its "propaganda and disinformation" into America. Such
pro-Trump allegations, like those of Russiagate itself, only fuel the new Cold War, which risks
becoming actual war any day, from Syria to Ukraine.) And so, Cohen concludes, we are left with
even more ramifying questions:
Was Russiagate produced by the primary leaders of the US intelligence community,
not just the FBI? If so, it is the most perilous political scandal in modern American
history, and the most detrimental to American democracy. And if so, it does indeed, as
zealous promoters of Russiagate assert, make Watergate pale in significance. (To understand
more, we will need to learn more, including whether Trump associates other than Carter Page
and Paul Manafort were officially surveilled by any of the agencies involved. And whether
they were surveilled in order to monitor Trump himself, on the assumption they were or would
be in close proximity to him, as the president once suggested in a tweet.)
If Russiagate involved collusion among US intelligence agencies, as now seems
likely, why was it undertaken? There are various possibilities. Out of loathing for Trump?
Out of institutional opposition to his promise of better relations -- "cooperation" -- with
Russia? Or out of personal ambition? Did Brennan, for example, aspire to remaining head of
the CIA, or to a higher position, in a Hillary Clinton administration?
"... A footnote also reveals that the FBI has not been able to produce the 1023s on many of its meetings with Steele. These are like CIA contact reports that are written up to include the details of what is discussed in a meeting with a source. This is beginning to smell like a good old CIA style Covert Operation to disrupt an election only it is playing out right here in the U.S.A. And no one has yet even looked into the actual Agency angle with good old John Brennan! ..."
You're right Ilyana. Those following the Nunes memo story here on Unz should also read the Grassley letter, link below. It
is somewhat heavy going but it really confirms that the Steele Dossier was the principal source for the FISC warrant request sought
by the Bureau and that Steele was a controlled source working for the FBI.
But even so, the information he was providing was both unvetted and largely uncorroborated. He also was receiving information
from a Clinton associate and leaking his story to the press to validate what he was presenting to the Bureau. Really wild stuff!
A footnote also reveals that the FBI has not been able to produce the 1023s on many of its meetings with Steele. These
are like CIA contact reports that are written up to include the details of what is discussed in a meeting with a source. This
is beginning to smell like a good old CIA style Covert Operation to disrupt an election only it is playing out right here in the
U.S.A. And no one has yet even looked into the actual Agency angle with good old John Brennan!
"... Trump doesn't wear the pretty face mask that most recent Presidents had. In that, he is showing that the Emperor has no clothes (and the Empire no morals). This could be a good thing as people realize the one truth he campaigned on – "the system is rigged" is still true. But this Administration's faux "war" with the Establishment is serving to blind many from the reality that it is continuing and even expanding the horrible NeoCon foreign policies and Neoliberal economic policies that the Establishment desires. ..."
"... This Reality TV Show Presidency is sweeping up most USAmericans. Like all Reality TV Shows, we in the audience cheer our favorites and jeer their opponents as if it was real, and not a fully-scripted performance. ..."
"... I feel your pain cmp thank you for your post. For you and others interested in this combination of Student Anti-War activism and Government Surveillance, I'd like to recommend a truly insightful book entitled, "Subversives": The FBI's War On Student Radicals, and Reagan's Rise To Power by Seth Rosenfeld. Matt Taibbi remarked in a review of this book which now seems understated, that "Domestic intelligence forces will tend to use all the powers they're given (and even some that they're not) to spy on people who are politically defenseless, irreverent from a security standpoint and targeted for all the wrong reasons". ..."
"... "Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley's push to force the DOJ to open a criminal investigation into ex-British spy and 'Trump dossier' author Christopher Steele is being met with resistance from the bureau, the latest sign that it doesn't want information about its relationship with Steele to be shared with the public." ..."
'Deep State' Veterans find New Homes in Mainstream Media February 5, 2018
NBC News' hiring of former CIA Director John Brennan is the latest in a wave of intelligence
community stalwarts being given jobs in the media, raising concerns over conflicts of
interests, reports Caitlin Johnstone.
"Former CIA director John Brennan has become the latest member of the NBC News and MSNBC
family, officially signing with the network as a contributor," chirps a recent
article by The Wrap, as though that's a perfectly normal thing to have to write and not a
ghastly symptom of an Orwellian dystopia. NBC reports that the former head of
the depraved ,
lying, torturing ,
propagandizing , drug
trafficking , coup-staging , warmongering Central
Intelligence Agency "is now a senior national security and intelligence analyst."
Brennan, who
played a key role in the construction of the establishment's Russia narrative that has been
used to manufacture public consent for
world-threatening new cold war escalations , is just the latest addition in an ongoing trend
of trusted mainstream media outlets being packed to the gills with stalwarts from the U.S.
intelligence community. Brennan joins CIA and DoD Chief of Staff Jeremy Bash on the NBC/MSNBC lineup, who is
serving there as a national security analyst, as well as NBC intelligence/national security
reporter and known
CIA collaborator Ken Dilanian.
Former CIA analyst and now paid CNN analyst Phil Mudd, who
last year caused Cuomo's show to have to issue a retraction and apology for a
completely baseless claim he made on national television asserting that
WikiLeaks' Julian Assange is "a pedophile", is once again
making headlines for suggesting that the FBI is entering into a showdown with the current
administration over Trump's decision to declassify the controversial Nunes memo.
More and more of the outlets from which Americans get their information are being filled not
just with garden variety establishment loyalists, but with longstanding members of the U.S.
intelligence community. These men got to their positions of power within these deeply
sociopathic institutions based on their willingness to facilitate any depravity in order to
advance the secret agendas of the U.S. power establishment, and now they're being paraded in
front of mainstream Americans on cable news on a daily basis. The words of these "experts" are
consistently
taken and
reported on by smaller news outlets in print and online media in a way that seeds their
authoritative assertions throughout public consciousness.
The term "deep state" does not refer to a conspiracy theory but to a simple concept in
political analysis which points to the undeniable reality that (A) plutocrats, (B) intelligence
agencies, (C) defense agencies, and (D) the mainstream media hold large amounts of power in
America despite their not being part of its elected government. You don't need to look far to
see how these separate groups overlap and collaborate to advance their own agendas in various
ways. Amazon's Jeff Bezos, for example, is deeply involved in
all of the aforementioned groups : (A) as arguably the wealthiest
person ever he is clearly a plutocrat, with a company that is
trying to control the underlying infrastructure of the economy ; (B) he is a CIA contractor ; (C) he is part of a
Pentagon advisory board ; and (D) his
purchase of the Washington Post in 2013 gave him total control over a major mainstream
media outlet.
Bezos did not purchase the Washington Post because his avaricious brain predicted
that newspapers were about to make a profitable resurgence; he purchased it for the same reason
he has inserted himself so very deeply into America's unelected power infrastructure – he
wants to ensure a solid foundation for the empire he is building. He needs a potent propaganda
outlet to manufacture support for the power establishment that he is weaving his plutocratic
tentacles through. This is precisely the same reason other mass media-controlling
plutocrats are stocking their propaganda machines with intelligence community insiders.
Time and again you see connections between the plutocratic class which effectively
owns America's elected
government , the intelligence and defense agencies which operate behind thick veils of
secrecy in the name of "national security" to advance agendas which have nothing to do with the
wishes of the electorate, and the mass media machine which is used to manufacture the consent of the people to be
governed by this exploitative power structure.
America is ruled by an elite class which has slowly created a system where money
increasingly
translates directly into political power , and which is therefore motivated to maintain
economic injustice in order to rule over the masses more completely. The greater the economic
inequality, the greater their power. Nobody would willingly consent to such an oppressive
system where wealth inequality keeps growing as expensive bombs from expensive drones are
showered upon strangers on the other side of the planet, so a robust propaganda machine is
needed.
And that's where John Brennan's new job comes in. Expect a consistent fountain of lies to
pour from his mouth on NBC, and expect them to all prop up this exploitative power
establishment and advance its
geopolitical agendas . And expect clear-eyed rebels everywhere to keep calling it all what
it is.
Yeah, I noticed this too and it disgusts me. It doesn't surprise me, though. Ever since
Oliver North got his own show and has been a regular contributor at Fox News, this has been
the trend. CNN also gives plenty of Air Time to the disgraced John Dean of Watergate
Infamy.
It underscores how vital it is We The People take back The Media from the Corporate
Thieves who now own it. We need to reverse consolidation in the Media Industry and in fact,
reverse the trend of Media as an Industry.
Ol' Hippy , February 5, 2018 at 1:58 pm
There appears to be two types of media these days. The first type plays by the "rules" of
the corporate/banking/military state and gets prestigious jobs with all the perks, i.e. Nice
house, good salary, steady work, etc. The second type works independent from the power
structures. They have integrity; Robert Parry being a prime example. They also become media
pariahs. They work hard for less pay, get denigrated, marginalized, called liars, etc.
Without them we would all be as clueless as those that only read and watch MSM. Thank
goodness for these brave people.
They work hard for less pay, get denigrated, marginalized, called liars, etc. Without
them we would all be as clueless as those that only read and watch MSM. Thank goodness for
these brave people.
Yes, I agree. Thank goodness for the few of us who still remain and persist against all
odds with no support.
Joe Tedesky , February 5, 2018 at 10:48 am
The culture in DC being described recently as 'critters in the swamp', does not nearly
come close to describing the choking filth that has taken our government over. To be clear,
this coup toke place a very longtime ago, but don't announce that to any good red blooded
American Patriot, that is unless you want to be titled 'un-American'.
My hesitation to get excited over the 'Nunes Memo', is my frustration over what all is
missing from this Congressional members flaming Memo. Like where is Brennan, Clapper, or any
DNC Operatives, as if we should have expected the MSM to be mentioned? Why, just go after a
couple of cheating lovers?
Seeing Brennan join the NBC staff, is like watching him walk across the hall at Langley
only to start his mischief in another CIA department. I'd love to wish the old spook good
luck on his first day at his new job, but then that would be like condoning that pain be
inflicted upon more unsuspecting poor souls, so I won't.
Inserting guys like that into the center of the storm within the corporate media whose job
it *should* be to expose the truth to the public is clearly a conflict of interest (because
they themselves are prime suspects in the purported criminal activities) and obvious
obstruction of justice because we know they are actually snow-jobbing the public and hiding
the truth to protect themselves and their puppetmasters.
In all fairness, when does General Flynn, Paul Manafort, Carter Page or Jared Kushner get
to have a regular segment on the Rachel Maddow show? Why doesn't the media interview Barack
Obama himself to find out what he knows and when he first knew it, or to force him into
self-incriminating or at least highly-suspicious obfuscations? It was his justice department
that targeted the Trump campaign on highly problematic grounds. Or, put a microphone in front
of Hillary's face and ask her how the administration (of which she was an organic outgrowth)
interfaced with the FISA court, allegedly on her behalf to spy on the competition.
This caper is not only worse than Watergate (Watergate was conducted in the shadows), this
crime and subsequent cover-up are being carried out in broad daylight with the full
complicity of the media. They don't care who knows because those people, regardless of their
substantiated facts, will never get a hearing in the media which now creates our
moment-to-moment reality, as far as 99% of Americans know or care about.
Joe Tedesky , February 5, 2018 at 3:48 pm
Our MSM is lacking the honor and truthfulness of Robert Parry.
Realist, I always like reading your comments, and with this comment of yours you don't
disappoint. I too would like to know when the truth will be broadcast over our airways, and
printed in our national news outlets. Although, I could watch the grass grow, or the snow
melt, and have better results to jump up and down about, before the MSM will shoot straight
with us viewers. I have come to the conclusion that what hurts our nation most, is we have to
much corporate control, like our infamous corporate owned MSM. These pundits, and news
anchors only do what they do best, and that is they promote themselves. I mean, the omissions
of facts, and the over the top characterizations of world leaders and national political
opponents goes to the degree of slander, and yet life goes on. I know it would be an
impossible task, but wouldn't it be great to if we news junkies could sue the MSM for
fraud?
Realist , February 5, 2018 at 8:44 pm
I could have been more strident than I was, Joe. I might have called the FISA court
outright illegal and unconstitutional like Jimmy Dore did yesterday. I mean, what the hell is
its role in America today? It serves as a SECRET COURT which gives permissions to
intelligence agencies to SPY without limits on any American citizen they choose to target,
including, apparently, their supposed boss, the president of the United States. As if the
carte blanch, full spectrum eavesdropping done by DARPA on every American weren't enough of a
violation of our constitutional rights, they have to dress up some of their spying with
special judicial privilege. Useful tools like Brennan, Clapper, Mueller and Comey have been
justifying or fallaciously LYING about this imposition on our citizens for years now.
Remember when the KGB was disbanded and folks were publicly rooting through the files in a
carnival atmosphere after the Soviet Union collapsed? This country needs a dose of the same
thing. We need more of our freedoms back and less of the so-called "order" imposed by the
Deep State and its string pullers. I don't believe for a moment that the Russians, the
Chinese, ISIS, Al Queda, Kim Yung-Un, the Ayatollahs or a squadron of Klingon battle cruisers
are waiting just outside our borders preparing to attack the United States and we all must be
defended by the "Intelligence Community" by living like Winston Smith.
Joe Tedesky , February 5, 2018 at 9:57 pm
The U.S. is so shallow at even their attempting to address its citizens with the
appropriate truth, that after 50 years to prepare for the public more information on the JFK
Assassination that when the time come the government wasn't even ready for the release. What
an insult to the nation.
The purge you spoke of Realist is a dream in this purist eye. I really do welcome a much
broader investigation of panoramic proportions of our nation's massive bureaucracy, and the
discovery of the elements who only conspire to enact their agendas could then be exposed.
You are right about our freedoms. We Americans are in the end going to need to put our
foot down to our governments police state rules, and all of us will need to brave it out when
going into public places. (Oh boy what false flag bate) At some point it will be necessary to
say, enough is enough, and hopefully catch them while at their game. Joe
Ps that last part I doubt will ever happen.
Gregory Herr , February 6, 2018 at 12:52 am
I think you touched upon something really important referring to the "moment-to-moment
reality" that media "creates". A big problem with television "news" and the funny papers is
the failure to.contextualize what's going on today with related events or issues–even
from the relatively recent past. It's almost always about a myopic and usually distorted
focus on just one particularly vexing item that generates competing opinions that must be
paired and parsed to death–until there's something else to "talk" about. Yeah, yeah!
Pick a team–partisanship is entertaining don't ya know! Rachel's got ratings and
Hannity's one of us!
Just one for instance:
Obama relaxed constraints on sharing of NSA raw data as a parting blow to privacy that also
makes it easier to "leak" and cover up the leaking. He signed a Countering Disinformation and
Propaganda Act which essentially is a way for government to make it harder to "counter" their
disinformation and propaganda. Google and Facebook are are all in on the filter and censor
project. Yet with all this and much more there isn't a peep of a national discussion about
the First Amendment and the value of protecting free and diverse expression. Oh, I know why.
The Court says money is speech so all the "important" people can buy their freedom of
expression. Guess that will leave me out.
Bob Van Noy , February 5, 2018 at 11:16 am
Thank you Caitlin Johnstone!
I'm going to refer readers to an off-guardian article running now and specifically to the
comment pages where one can see Noam Chomsky's (as a young researcher) explain cointelpro.
This is an exceptional explination
Thanks, Caitlin. People need to learn more about Deep State and and also the One World
Order. There are lots of videos on the Internet, including some featuring former CIA
(whistleblower-type) agents who feel impelled to divulge the hidden government. Thanks for
your links, Bob. I'll take a look.
Erin , February 5, 2018 at 11:51 am
Don't watch, don't watch, don't watch!
Skip Scott , February 5, 2018 at 12:42 pm
Erin-
I agree. I think people need to turn off their TV sets. They are mind numbing. People like
Brennan belong in jail, not on television.
Nancy , February 5, 2018 at 2:24 pm
I don't think the majority of people are watching this crap anymore. It's mainly a bunch
of circle jerks mouthing off in an echo chamber. Problem is, the rest of the population is
either preoccupied with making a living or playing with their gadgets to find out what's
really going on. People seem to have given up on the idea of democracy, justice and fairness
and in a way I don't blame them.
It's kind of a curse to still have this notion that a better world is possible.
Good points. I agree. It's as though "The News" is intended for the Oligarchs and the
Political Class. The ads are a dead giveaway that's the target market. The products they are
selling are not for the Average Joe who can't afford such luxuries.
Bob Van Noy , February 5, 2018 at 12:00 pm
Now finally for the most adventurous of you I'll introduce you to a man I discovered in an
agonizingly slow way over the course of years. His name is Carl Oglesby and as a young worker
at a defense industry job he started doing research on the Vietnam War. He ultimately wrote a
book called "The Yankee and Cowboy Wars" that surprisingly accurately describes our current
condition. It is one of those books long out of print worth thousands of dollars in
resale.
I will post a link to Spartacus
Educational below but you can find it on your own..
I promise to now shut-up and listen
I saw that recent Mudd comment regarding President Trump = 13 months vs. Hoover Org. =
since 1908. The President needs to eliminate this agency. Then we can watch this asshole
cough up his spleen LIVE on t.v.! I guess these creatures have license to claim anything they
want and get away with it. His Assange accusation falls out of his mouth and gets repeated
endlessly. Then when the weak retraction occurs, it never gets the same press/traction and
the damage is already done.
Babyl-on , February 5, 2018 at 12:25 pm
Nothing particularly new here, this has been established practice for decades. What is new
about this issue and so many others now is that it is done openly, without any pretense that
there is a constitution. The Imperial institutions housed in the US now act openly for the
interests of an overarching transnational oligarchy.
Trump has destroyed the dominate narrative this is by far the deepest wound I have seen
the Empire receive. No one really believes Clapper any more – whether it is a plurality
or a majority is not the point, enough people don't believe them that the Empire has lost
control of the message. That is the source of their panic. Trotting out their apparatchiks
once worked and worked for decades but – "It's all over now baby blue."
Trump has exposed much of the ways things have been done behind the seines for many years
and unwittingly forced them into the open – this has been his biggest contribution to
the weakening of the Imperial structures. Leaving them naked in their policies of slaughter.
The Empire has nothing now but a huge military which it can't use without destroying
civilization so it goes around the world destroying countries and cities in its helpless
thrashing around slaughtering innocent people as it looses on every front. The last gasp of
Empire – kill them all if they will not submit. In its death throws the Empire will do
untold damage and create vast human suffering, it might very well destroy civilization with
its nuclear weapons rather that accept a place as one part of the human community not the
ruler of humanity.
Daniel , February 5, 2018 at 6:13 pm
Trump doesn't wear the pretty face mask that most recent Presidents had. In that, he is
showing that the Emperor has no clothes (and the Empire no morals). This could be a good
thing as people realize the one truth he campaigned on – "the system is rigged" is
still true. But this Administration's faux "war" with the Establishment is serving to blind many from
the reality that it is continuing and even expanding the horrible NeoCon foreign policies and
Neoliberal economic policies that the Establishment desires.
This Reality TV Show Presidency is sweeping up most USAmericans. Like all Reality TV
Shows, we in the audience cheer our favorites and jeer their opponents as if it was real, and
not a fully-scripted performance.
exiled off mainstreet , February 5, 2018 at 12:29 pm
Yankee media has degenerated into an echo chamber for the deep state structure. This is
just further proof of that salient fact.
No More Neos , February 5, 2018 at 1:35 pm
Maybe we should view this as a good sign that they need to "call in the National Guard"
for corporate media back-up reinforcements. The propaganda machine is sputtering and
sparking, overheated from working OT to push flimsy narrative, which only accentuates the
cartoonish spectacle of it all.
Neoliberalism rests on a fragile foundation of financial myths that are beginning to come
crashing down, aside from shooting itself in the foot in the 2008 crash. They had to admit
that:
Global banks are global in health and national in death. ~ Mervyn King
A growing number of economics students are demanding to be taught economic history and not
just neoclassical economics. Hayek, Friedman, Greenspan and the Apostles of Doublespeak in
the academic and corporate media realm have lost all credibility. Heterodox economists like
Steve Keen, Michael Hudson, Bill Mitchell and Stephanie Kelton are gaining popularity in
their blinders-off clarity of how the economy actually works, sans the political spin.
Even Russia and China have decided to not allow Monsanto to control the world's food
supply, have no desire to continue working with the IMF and World Bank and are wise enough to
see the futility in acquiescing to a unipolar world view. Ultimately, the US will be the
bigger loser by going it alone and not accepting the vast multipolar opportunities that
await, based on faulty principle. But that won't deter them from continuing provocations in
Ukraine, Venezuela (and other Latin American countries), etc., even though Western agenda's
neoliberal offerings are now considered to be an appalling joke internationally.
But this has been known for some time. It was just a matter of time before the "market
society" experiment crashed and burned:
"To allow the market mechanism to be the sole director of the fate of human beings and
their natural environment would result in the demolition of society." ~ Karl Polanyi,
1944
"In 1945 or 1950 if you had seriously proposed any of the ideas and policies in today's
standard neo-liberal toolkit, you would have been laughed off the stage or sent off to the
insane asylum." ~ Susan George
Do not confuse the economic -- oikos nomia -- the norms of running home and community with
chrematistics -- krema atos -- the accumulation of money. ~ Aristotle
Bob Van Noy , February 6, 2018 at 8:50 am
Many thanks No More Neos. I was unaware of most of what you wrote. I have noted the names
that you mentioned and I will pay more attention to them. I do know of Michael Hudson and
admire his work.
It has occurred to me that there will be Rich academic histories written about the
organized management of subject matter by TPTB. See my Response To cmp below.
Re, The Deep State and the "media."Do: "Birds of a feather produce propaganda
together?
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --
December 25, 2015
Are the Corporate Media and Others Covering Up The Treachery of The War Criminals?
There is plenty of evidence that people in positions of power planned and plotted a number
of "illegal" wars [1] in "defiance of international law." Unfortunately, this information is
suppressed and censored in most of the corporate monopoly media. Instead we are fed
propaganda that attempts to disguise the truth, and covers up the massive human suffering
caused by the warmongering criminals of these 21st century war crimes. This has resulted in
the creation of millions of refugees, [1a] many soldiers dead and maimed, countries
destroyed, millions dead, children dead and contaminated, and the war criminals are FREE.
[2]
[read more at link below] http://graysinfo.blogspot.ca/2015/12/are-corporate-media-and-others-covering.html
Bob Van Noy , February 5, 2018 at 2:52 pm
Thank you Stephan J. Here is a link that you provided from a Robert Parry piece.
If one goes through the commentary, you will see that comments have always been decent,
informative and educational on this truly wonderful site.
Man oh man I miss Robert Parry and F. G. Sanford where are you?
(Caitlin Johnstone you're our new leader, and apparently another fine journalist. Thank
You)
This article by Caitlin just helps me to be glad that I never bought cable TV. I didn't
realize how many former government criminals/ex-officials populated their polluted networks.
Former head spook Mike Morell on CBS doesn't seem like an anomaly any more. The hens are
fattening the foxes guarding the air and cable waves. No wonder those with little time, due
to work and family matters, know so little about what's actually going on.
j. D. D. , February 5, 2018 at 2:25 pm
Looks like the Obama/British connected warmongering intel agents have decided to eliminate
the "middle-men" (and women) and go directly on record. Rachel, Chris, Jim and Wolfe, your
jobs are in jeopardy, Not to be left out, I expect that Comey, McCabe, Strzok, and perhaps
Mueller, are filling out their own applications right now.
, , February 5, 2018 at 2:45 pm
Johnstone tells it like it is. It's a pure pleasure to read her ripping out the guts of
the oligarchic monster creating our present deepening dystopia. Wouldn't it be nice if every
American could read her little piece, and think about what it says? Maybe I can get a few of
my friends to read it. You have to start somewhere to wake people up. If enough of us gently
encourage our friends to take a brief dip into reality, who knows what might come from
it?
Realist , February 5, 2018 at 2:48 pm
Mainstream liberal pundits used to talk like this, blasting the privileged insiders
"feeding at the trough" and such. Now they have become just a bunch of crybaby spoilers and
haters because their push for power via the Hildebeast movement came crashing down. If they
can't have it, they'd rather break it. They couldn't beat the warmongering neocons or the
rapacious neoliberals, so they joined 'em. They became what they always professed to
hate.
Their followers, being just mindless tribalists rather than the perspicacious philosophers
they are told they are, leap in lockstep over the precipice. They can never give you a
coherent or logical reason why, just vapid slogans usually diametrically at odds with any
real truth. All that matters to them is receiving daily affirmation from their fellow ranks
of sloganeering nincompoops. In their newfound McCarthyism they've morphed into the lost boys
from "Lord of the Flies" who went so far as to kill Piggy, Piggy's counterpart being Al
Franken and his career as a champion of liberal causes in the U.S. senate.
But, in a world where one can purportedly choose any identity one pleases with no basis in
reality, these self-immolations merely win accolades from the right-thinking media clerics as
society in general goes into a death spiral. Living the "theatre of the absurd" has become
the new "American way of life." Now, if we could just quickly get out of the way of the rest
of the world, things might turn out all right for the rest of humanity. Unfortunately,
they've designed an "app" to prevent that, it's called the MIC, and it's not user
friendly.
We are all victims of the pernicious 24/7 scientifically-designed propaganda apparatus. It
has little to do with the victim's intelligence since almost all human opinions are formed by
emotional reactions that occur even before the conscious mind registers the input.
Through critical thinking, we can overcome these emotional impulses, but only with effort,
and a pre-existing skepticism of all information sources. And even still, I have no doubt
that all of us who are aware of the propaganda still accept some falsehoods as true.
It could be that having former Intelligence Agency Directors as "news" presenters, and
Goldman Sachs alum and Military/Industrial complex CEOs running important government agencies
makes clear to some the reality that we live in an oligarchy with near-tyrannical powers. But
most people seem too busy surviving and/or being diverted by the circus to notice the depths
of the propaganda.
Chris , February 5, 2018 at 3:43 pm
"America is ruled by an elite class which has slowly created a system where money
increasingly translates directly into political power, and which is therefore motivated to
maintain economic injustice in order to rule over the masses more completely. The greater the
economic inequality, the greater their power. " This is backwards. The elite does not create
economic injustice to maintain and solidify their power for then there would have been no
French, Russian, Cuban, Chinese revolutions. The capitalist system leads to economic
injustice because it steals unpaid labour power from the working class and puts into the
hands of the capitalists. The reason they keep wages lower is to increase the rate of profit
not to keep power thought they try to hold on to the power to maintain that system. And the
more that inequality is produced the weaker they become because the working class then
realises it has nothing to lose and revolts. This is basic marxism which the writer seems to
be unaware of. The greater the economic inequality, the greater the distress of the working
class is and greater the motivation to change their condition.
backwardsevolution , February 5, 2018 at 4:01 pm
Chris – you are right, conditions must be favorable for any action to take place. It
is when the crowd gets a taste of fear that they move.
Daniel , February 5, 2018 at 7:02 pm
Cold, you may know that the original use of the term "American Exceptionalism" was
Stalin's description of how the USAmerican working classes seem incapable of revolting
against capitalist exploitation, no matter how egregious it becomes. We are "the exception"
to Marx's theories about the tipping points for revolutions.
cmp , February 5, 2018 at 4:20 pm
Just what does democracy look like to these cowards who sell prejudice, discrimination,
hate and violence?
Here is an example of how much they think of their (our) own kids, if they even dare to
speak to the teachers & preachers:
On May 2nd 1970, Governor James A. Rhodes (R-OH), says of student protesters at Kent State
University:
"They're worse than the brown shirts and the communist element and also the night riders and
the vigilantes. They're the worst kind of people we harbor in America. I think that we're up
against the strongest, well-trained, militant revolutionary group that has ever assembled in
America. We're going to eradicate the problem, we're not going to treat the symptoms." Two
days later, on May 4th, National Guardsmen kill four unarmed students on the Kent State
campus and wounded nine others.
~ Jim Hunt; 'They Said What?'; 9/1/ 2009
On May 5th 1970, Governor Ronald Reagan (R-CA) says of the efforts to stop student
protests on university campuses:
"If it takes a bloodbath, then let's get it over with.."
~ Jim Hunt; 'They Said What?'; 9/1/ 2009
.. And, 10 years later, in 1980, America elected who??
Who will the sellers offer up in 2024? Are we closing in on the end of the era of the
puppet?
Perhaps it will be a pro. (with media experience on the resume, to boot) .. A John
Brennan-ite?
If there is a hell, then certainly there must be a special spot reserved for those who are
the worst of the guru's in greed. But, in the meantime, for America's own good, maybe someday
soon, the International Community will close Guantanamo.. .. And, do all of the citizens of
the planet a great justice by reopening it in the middle of the Mohave Desert. These cowards
that corporatize & commercialize prejudice, discrimination, hate and violence, they can
be the honorary members. And since it is they who have long killed their conscience, then
maybe that desert heat will serve as a small reminder for what a little heat really feels
like.
Bob Van Noy , February 6, 2018 at 8:31 am
I feel your pain cmp thank you for your post. For you and others interested in this
combination of Student Anti-War activism and Government Surveillance, I'd like to recommend a
truly insightful book entitled, "Subversives": The FBI's War On Student Radicals, and
Reagan's Rise To Power by Seth Rosenfeld. Matt Taibbi remarked in a review of this book which
now seems understated, that "Domestic intelligence forces will tend to use all the powers
they're given (and even some that they're not) to spy on people who are politically
defenseless, irreverent from a security standpoint and targeted for all the wrong
reasons".
cmp , February 6, 2018 at 4:43 pm
Bob, "Thank You!" I have made a note to look for Lansdale, Carl Oglesby, and now Seth
Rosenfeld. All of this I know, will be such great reading for me!
I also sent you some follow up on the 28th. Did you receive those two? Would you like for
me to send them again?
I look forward to all of your posts – Keep up all of your great work Bob!
backwardsevolution , February 5, 2018 at 4:31 pm
Sean Hannity on Fox is doing a stellar job of exposing the Department of Justice, FBI, and
all of the other characters re the Steele dossier and Russiagate. Every night more
information is revealed; it's like a spy novel. None of the other outlets are even talking
about this stuff. Crickets. If you want the latest on criminality, go there. Meanwhile, Zero
Hedge says:
"Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley's push to force the DOJ to open a
criminal investigation into ex-British spy and 'Trump dossier' author Christopher Steele is
being met with resistance from the bureau, the latest sign that it doesn't want information
about its relationship with Steele to be shared with the public."
The Hillary Clinton campaign and the DNC had paid Steele for his dossier. But the FBI also
hired Steele, and just before they paid out $50,000.00 to Steele for his work, they
discovered he lied, didn't pay him, but still continued to spy on Trump and his team. With
Steele's dossier now discredited in the eyes of the FBI, they should have stopped their
spying, but they didn't. Russiagate has been based on this Steele dossier, and yet there was
"no there there", and the DOJ and the FBI knew it.
Zero Hedge goes on:
"Furthermore, a section on a second memo by Steele says he received information from the
State Department, which in turn got it from a foreign source who was in touch with 'a friend
of the Clintons.'
'It is troubling enough that the Clinton Campaign funded Mr. Steele's work, but that these
Clinton associates were contemporaneously feeding Mr. Steele allegations raises additional
concerns about his credibility,' Grassley and Graham wrote in their criminal referral."
So Steele was receiving information from the State Department and a friend of the
Clinton's? How impartial is that?
All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
~ The Bard
The Reality TV Show Presidency has great ratings.
Do you think Nikki Haley got the red rose? Apparently Michael Wolf, the author of "Fire
and Fury," is backing down on that bit of salacious gossip "news."
backwardsevolution , February 6, 2018 at 4:39 pm
Daniel – and a line I like to quote from Shakespeare applies so well to the
Clinton's:
"Hell is empty, and all the devils are here."
backwardsevolution , February 5, 2018 at 4:36 pm
John Brennan – "By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes." That
guy is evil, and nothing good will come of this.
Mark Thompson , February 5, 2018 at 8:13 pm
Really happy to see Caitlin writing on this forum. Keep up the good work Caitlin. You'll
never be short on material to write about. If what we're witnessing in this point in time is
any barometer, we're in for a world of hurt. Orwell is in his grave wishing he had two more
hands. He has to choose whether to cover his eyes or ears. What a sad state of affairs
Lois Gagnon , February 5, 2018 at 11:18 pm
It becomes more evident by the day that we live in a military dictatorship. One of the
incidents that brought this realization home to me was when John Kerry had negotiated a deal
with the Russians regarding military operations in Syria. The military took it upon
themselves to nullify that deal when it purposely attacked and killed 60 Syrian soldiers.
That was a clear case of insubordination that should have led to firings of the military
brass who ordered that strike. Instead, Obama just carried on as if nothing happened except
that the negotiated deal was null and void.
And of course the press said nothing about the blatant criminality of the military
action.
What president is willing to stand up to the military and the Department of Skullduggery
AKA the CIA anymore? Who is really calling the shots?
Thank you Caitlin! Good job! I especially like: "Nobody would willingly consent to such an
oppressive system where wealth inequality keeps growing as expensive bombs from expensive
drones are showered upon strangers on the other side of the planet, so a robust propaganda
machine is needed." I agree! NO ONE is "willfully ignorant". NO ONE chooses to be under the
influence of government mass mind control/propaganda. Mind control is something that is "done
to" people -- – whether the perpetrator is a psychopathic spouse or cult leader;
religious indoctrinator, military boot camp sargeant, and/or the voice of government control
of the media. Blaming victims of mind control for being mind controlled and therefore being
"willfully ignorant" is just another form of mind control used to discount the reality of
mind control.
The key question was DNC investigation by Crowdstrike a false flag operation or not
Notable quotes:
"... According to the New York Times , after being introduced to a number of Russian contacts by a Professor Joseph Mifsud – supposedly a "Maltese academic" who has since completely disappeared – the mysterious pedagogue told Papadopoulos that the Russians had "thousands" of incriminating emails that would damage Mrs. Clinton's campaign. Although there's no evidence Papadopoulos communicated this information to the Trump campaign, the young would-be mover-and-shaker got drunk one night in a London pub and supposedly told an Australian diplomat about the emails: it's not known whether the Australian had a role in getting him in a talkative mood, but we are told the two met due to the efforts of an Israeli diplomat in London. ..."
"... The Russia-gate conspiracy theorists believe that the Trump campaign somehow had a hand in either procuring or publishing the Clinton/Podesta emails – even though no one has ever produced any evidence of this. Aside from this important lack, there are some big problems with the conspiracist thesis. To begin with, if the Trump people knew about the DNC/Podesta emails in advance, why didn't they utilize this vital information before WikiLeaks published them? And what purpose would it serve the Russians to let the Trump camp in on the operation, and risk exposure in the process? If they wanted to help Trump, all they had to do was make sure the emails were published. The collusion theory makes no sense – but, then again, Russia-gate has never made much sense. ..."
the
memo " and its meaning. A simple reading reveals that allegations of skullduggery peeking
by the Obama administration during the presidential campaign were entirely accurate: the memo
just filled us in on the details. And while the debate has largely been over whether the proper
legal procedures were followed by the FBI and administration officials in spying on Carter Page
– someone only marginally connected to the Trump campaign – the real question is:
why were they sneaking around Page at all?
Oh, he claimed to be an "informal advisor" to the Russian government: he had business
interests in Russia and met with Russian officials. Furthermore, and most importantly, he
opposed the anti-Russian hysteria that permeates official Washington, and he often said –
in public speeches as well as privately – that US sanctions against Russia are a
mistake.
But so what? Since when is it illegal to hold these views?
Page was never a "Russian agent," and the FBI never proved that he was or is. Instead, they
submitted that phony BuzzFeed "dossier" to the FISA court as "evidence" justifying their hot
pursuit of him on more than one occasion. They did so without telling the judge who paid for
the dossier (it was the Clinton campaign, as Trump claimed when this
first came out) and they withheld other important details about its provenance –
including that it was written by Christopher Steele, a "former" British intelligence agent who
openly expressed a passionate desire to see Trump defeated. Nor had they verified the
information in the dossier related to Page, because they " didn't have time ," as former DNI
chief James Clapper has said on numerous occasions.
Page was targeted and the information gleaned from listening in on his phone conversations,
reading his email, and god knows what other sneaky intrusions, was leaked to the media in a
concerted campaign to influence the outcome of the election. So, yes, there was "collusion"
– except it wasn't a pact between Putin and Trump but rather an alliance between
Hillary's campaign and the national security bureaucracy to get her elected. In effect, the top
leadership of the FBI became an adjunct of the Clinton campaign – and, after Trump won,
they executed a plan to frame him for "collusion" and oust him.
When Intelligence Committee chair Devin Nunes announced he was going public with it, the
Democrats and their Republican Never-Trump allies said it meant the national security of the
United States would be put in mortal danger. They trotted out the old "sources and methods"
argument, which, it turned out, did not apply to the memo – because it just laid out the
bare facts, and revealed neither sources nor methods. (Unless one is talking about the
political methodology of the FBI scam, which involved sneaking, peaking, and then leaking).
The Deep State-Democrat fallback position is that Carter Page is really beside the point,
because the real genesis of the Russia-gate probe was the investigation into 28-year-old
George Papadopoulos, an "energy consultant" even more marginal to the Trump campaign than
Page.
According to the New York Times , after being introduced to a number of Russian
contacts by a Professor Joseph Mifsud – supposedly a "Maltese academic" who has since
completely disappeared – the mysterious pedagogue told Papadopoulos that the Russians had
"thousands" of incriminating emails that would damage Mrs. Clinton's campaign. Although there's
no evidence Papadopoulos communicated this information to the Trump campaign, the young
would-be mover-and-shaker got drunk one night in a London pub and supposedly told an Australian
diplomat about the emails: it's not known whether the Australian had a role in getting him in a
talkative mood, but we are told the two met due to the efforts of an Israeli diplomat in
London.
If this sounds like a setup to you, then you win the door prize: your very own copy of
What Happened , now going for fifty cents at the remainder table.
The Russia-gate conspiracy theorists believe that the Trump campaign somehow had a hand
in either procuring or publishing the Clinton/Podesta emails – even though no one has
ever produced any evidence of this. Aside from this important lack, there are some big problems
with the conspiracist thesis. To begin with, if the Trump people knew about the DNC/Podesta
emails in advance, why didn't they utilize this vital information before WikiLeaks published
them? And what purpose would it serve the Russians to let the Trump camp in on the operation,
and risk exposure in the process? If they wanted to help Trump, all they had to do was make
sure the emails were published. The collusion theory makes no sense – but, then again,
Russia-gate has never made much sense.
While the most fanatical anti-Trump types simply denied everything in the memo, the Beltway
"libertarians" who hate Trump's guts -- and the honest liberals like Glenn Greenwald who also
hate Trump's guts but who have a conscience and won't go along with the Russia-gate hoax
– were reduced to finger-wagging in response to the memo's release. Why, they asked, did
these very same people, like Rep. Nunes, vote to expand the Deep State's power to spy on
Americans right before the memo came out?
The question answers itself. As Rep. Thomas Massie put it : "Who made the decision
to withhold evidence of FISA abuse until after Congress voted to renew FISA program?" More than
a few votes would no doubt have been cast differently, and perhaps
the outcome would've been different. Certainly the debate would've been more extensive, and
much more interesting.
What's exciting, to me at least, is the promise by Nunes that this is just the start of the
revelations. Next up: the key role played by
the State Department in the plot to destroy our republic and hand power over to unelected
Deep State bureaucrats. And this means the important – perhaps decisive – part
played by foreign actors in all this will be exposed to the light of day. If you thought there
was howling about the first Nunes memo, wait until you hear the screams of pain coming from the
foreign lobbyists and their "American" sock puppets over Part Two of the Nunes narrative. The
real story of who is subverting our republic – and colluding with foreigners to
accomplish that goal – is about to come out.
I can hardly wait!
This isn't about Trump. You may hate him. You may love him. That's irrelevant. What matters
is that a powerful group of Washington insiders is trying to exercise its assumed veto power
over who gets to inhabit the White House – and that is impermissible as long as the
republic endures.
NOTES IN THE MARGIN
You can check out my Twitter feed by going here . But please note that my tweets are sometimes
deliberately provocative, often made in jest, and largely consist of me thinking out loud.
Justin Raimondo is the editorial director of Antiwar.com, and a senior fellow at the
Randolph Bourne Institute. He is a contributing editor at The American Conservative ,
and writes a monthly column for Chronicles . He is the author of Reclaiming the
American Right: The Lost Legacy of the Conservative Movement [Center for Libertarian
Studies, 1993; Intercollegiate Studies Institute, 2000], and An Enemy of the State: The
Life of Murray N. Rothbard [Prometheus Books, 2000]. View all posts by Justin Raimondo
I'm really stuck. Here's the deal: Comey and Co used the dossier to gat the FISA judge to
approve a warrant for spying on Page.
Check.
But why Page? Page was just a small fish who had already left the campaign. Besides, even
if they got dirt on Page, it probably wouldn't be sufficient to nail Trump (which is what
they really wanted). My guess is that Page just provides the first clue in a much bigger
criminal investigation that will uncover massive surveillance on people closer to Trump.
That, at least, would make sense. If they were just spying on Page, it doesn't make any
sense.
Were Samantha Power and Susan Rice using their connections with the NSA (and "unmasking")
to get secret electronic info on other Trump campaign members without even getting a FISA
warrant? How big is this thing and how widespread? Clapper MUST have a hand in this, and
maybe Brennan too.
The screw up and move up syndrome is alive and well. Brennan the DCI screw up is set to make
more bucks as a screw up. Brennan has been hired by NBC as an analyst.
This outline is the story of how the FBI Counterintelligence Division and DOJ National Security Division were weaponized. This
outline is the full story of what House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes is currently working to expose. This outline exposes the
biggest political scandal in U.S. history. This outline is also the story of how one man's action likely saved our constitutional
republic.
His name is Admiral Mike Rogers.
I'm calling the back-story to the 2016 FISA 702(16)(17) political corruption by the Obama administration "Operation Condor". Those
of you familiar with the film " Three Days of The Condor
" will note how the real life storyline almost mirrors the Hollywood film. For the real life version, NSA Director Admiral Mike Rogers
plays the role of "Condor".
"We could look at it this way"...Muller gathered together, "A Special Council of
Disgusting Back Stabbing Clinton Thug's". So now President Trump and all America have a
clearer picture of who was tapping us in the back of the head, a few month back, no one
really knew, we were all just guessing.
I'm all for removing mueller and his corrupt team but why replace them with another one?
The whole reason for the current investigation was to prove collusion between trump and
russia...it's been debunked and is an obvious hoax. What would there be for another team to
investigate? If they want to create a new special investigation team, put one together to go
after Hillary Clinton and all the other treasonous people she has surrounded herself
with.
They need to close that witch hunt investigation concerning Russia due to the lack of any
evidence. Let's face it if Trump did anything wrong whatsoever someone would have uncovered
some smidgin of evidence of wrongdoing. If there was evidence against Trump it would be all
over CNN.
I think it's very clear that US Intel is freaking out that Judge Napolitano exposed the
truth about how Obama bypassed the FISA process so that no fingerprints would be disclosed.
It's more than important to notice that Judge Napolitano has been kept off the air as a Fox
NewsLegal Consultant since he made the comment about the British Intel spying on the Trump
campaign. Some people say he was fired, but I haven't officially seen that from Fox News as of
today! If I had to bet, and I am a betting man, I would say that Judge Napolitano exposed
something so dirty on the British Intel and Obama that Fox had to discredit it! What that means
to me after researching this stuff for many years, is that the smoke is from the intel or
people that deny it the most!
The only way for the US Intel to safe face now is to throw someone else under the bus!
Expect US Intel to create a situation where they can pin this on anyone other than the
British.
Trump clearly knew all about what was going on and when he already has the facts he doesn't
back down. Neither Trump or Spicer ever backed down about Trumps original claims! People are
going to go to jail about this! If you watch this entire video the only conclusion you can come
to is that the US Intel Is completely corrupt and operating beyond their directive! It is
sick!
"... Unable to come to terms with losing the 2016 election, Democrats are still pushing the 'Russiagate' probe and blocking the release of a memo describing surveillance abuses by the FBI, former Congressman Ron Paul told RT. ..."
"... I don't think anybody is seeking justice or seeking truth as much as they're seeking to get political advantage ..."
"... "I would be surprised if they haven't spied on him. They spy on everybody else. And they have spied on other members of the executive branch and other presidents." ..."
"... "The other day when they voted to get FISA even more power to spy on American people, the president couldn't be influenced by the fact that they used it against him. And I believe they did, and he believes that." ..."
"... "I've always maintained that government ought to be open and the people ought to have their privacy. But right now the people have no privacy and all our government does is work on secrecy and then it becomes competitive between the two parties, who get stuck with the worst deal by arguing, who's guilty of some crime," the politician explained. ..."
"... Paul also blasted the infamous 'Russian Dossier' compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele, and which the Democrats used in their attack on Trump, saying it ..."
"... "has no legitimacy being revealing [in terms of] of Trump being associated with Russia. From the people I know The story has been all made up, essentially." ..."
"... "I'm no fan of Trump. I'm not a supporter of his, but I think that has been carried way overboard. I think the Democrats can't stand the fact that they've lost the election, and they can't stand the fact that Trump is a little bit more independent minded than they like," he said. ..."
Unable to come to terms with losing the 2016 election, Democrats are still pushing the
'Russiagate' probe and blocking the release of a memo describing surveillance abuses by the
FBI, former Congressman Ron Paul told RT.
A top-secret intelligence memo, believed to reveal political bias at the highest levels of
the FBI and the DOJ towards President Trump, may well be as significant as the Republicans say,
Ron Paul told RT. But, he added, "there's still to many unknowns, especially, from my view
point."
"Trump connection to the Russians, I think, has been way overblown, and I'd like to just
get to the bottom of this the new information that's coming out, maybe this will reveal
things and help us out," he said.
"Right now it's just a political fight," the former US Congressman said. "I think they're
dealing with things a lot less important than the issue they ought to be talking about Right
now, I don't think anybody is seeking justice or seeking truth as much as they're seeking to
get political advantage."
Trump's claims that he was wiretapped by US intelligence agencies on the orders of the Obama
administration may well turn out to be true, Paul said.
"I would be surprised if they haven't spied on him. They spy on everybody else. And they
have spied on other members of the executive branch and other presidents."
However, he criticized Trump for doing nothing to prevent the Senate from voting in the
expansion of warrantless surveillance of US citizens under the Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Act (FISA) earlier this week.
"The other day when they voted to get FISA even more power to spy on American people, the
president couldn't be influenced by the fact that they used it against him. And I believe
they did, and he believes that."
"I've always maintained that government ought to be open and the people ought to have
their privacy. But right now the people have no privacy and all our government does is work
on secrecy and then it becomes competitive between the two parties, who get stuck with the
worst deal by arguing, who's guilty of some crime," the politician explained.
The fact that Democrats on the relevant committees have all voted against releasing the memo
"might mean that Trump is probably right; there's probably a lot of stuff there that would
exonerate him from any accusation they've been making," he said.
Paul also blasted the infamous 'Russian Dossier' compiled by former British spy Christopher
Steele, and which the Democrats used in their attack on Trump, saying it
"has no legitimacy being revealing [in terms of] of Trump being associated with Russia.
From the people I know The story has been all made up, essentially."
"I'm no fan of Trump. I'm not a supporter of his, but I think that has been carried way
overboard. I think the Democrats can't stand the fact that they've lost the election, and
they can't stand the fact that Trump is a little bit more independent minded than they like,"
he said.
Donald Trump Jr. called for the release of a memo that allegedly contains information about
Obama administration surveillance abuses and suggested that Democrats are complicit with the
media in misleading the public.
"It's the double standard that the people are fed by the Democrats in complicity with the
media, that's why neither have any trust from the American people anymore," Trump said on Fox
News Friday.
So much for the director of CIA personal email security ;-)
Notable quotes:
"... A schoolboy hacker impersonated a CIA director to gain access to top secret military reports, a court heard yesterday. Kane Gamble was just 15 when he posed as CIA chief John Brennan from his Leicestershire home, even taking control of his wife's iPad. The teenager gained access to passwords, personal information, security details, contacts lists and sensitive documents about operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. ..."
"... Mr Lloyd-Jones said: 'He told a journalist, "It all started by me getting more and more annoyed at how corrupt and cold-blooded the US government are. So I decided to do something about it".' ..."
A schoolboy hacker impersonated a CIA director to gain access to top secret military
reports, a court heard yesterday. Kane Gamble was just 15 when he posed as CIA chief John Brennan from his Leicestershire
home, even taking control of his wife's iPad. The teenager gained access to passwords, personal information, security details, contacts
lists and sensitive documents about operations in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Gamble, who founded the pro-Palestinian group 'Crackas With Attitude', taunted the security
service on Twitter about his successes.
During the attacks, which spanned from June 2015 to February 2016, he made hoax calls to Mr
Brennan's family home and took control of his wife's iPad.
His other targets included former deputy director of the FBI Mark Giuliano, secretary of
Homeland Security Jeh Johnson and James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence under
Obama.
He used the phone numbers he obtained to call and taunt his victims and their families, and
take control of their devices.
Gamble, who is autistic, boasted about targeting Mr Clapper's email account and said:
'That's where the juicy s*** is'.
He also pretended to be Mr Clapper to phone communications company Verizon and set up
call-forwarding to divert calls to the Free Palestine movement.
Gamble used Clapper's email to message other officials.
While speaking to an accomplice, he said: 'This email of Clapper's is very useful to fool
these r****d into thinking I'm him. I can't wait lmao [sic].'
He also boasted about carrying out 'the best breach ever' after accessing an FBI database to
get the names of 1,000 staff, including the officer responsible for the controversial shooting
of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.
The information Gamble collected was later used to carry out a 'swatting' attack on John
Holdren, a science and technology adviser to President Barack Obama.
Gamble made a hoax call to Massachusetts police, resulting in armed officers being sent to
the aide's family home.
The information Gamble collected was later used to carry out a 'swatting' attack on John
Holdren, a science and technology adviser to President Barack Obama
+3
The information Gamble collected was later used to carry out a 'swatting' attack on John
Holdren, a science and technology adviser to President Barack Obama
In the days before his arrest Gamble accessed the Department of Justice network using
compromised details he gained from a former employee.
He gathered documents and information relating to offshore drilling rig Deepwater Horizon
and details of more than 9,000 DHA officers and 20,000 FBI members of staff.
These details were posted online with the messages 'This is Free Palestine' and 'Long live
Palestine.'
The Department of Homeland Security spent 40,000 dollars to resolve the problem and suffered
'substantial reputational damage', the court heard.
Gamble was arrested in February 2016 at his council home in Coalville, near Leicester, at
the request of the FBI after he hacked into the Department of Justice network.
Last October, Gamble, of Linford Crescent, Coalville, pleaded guilty at Leicester Crown
Court to eight charges of performing a function with intent to secure unauthorised access to
computers and two charges of unauthorised modification of computer material.
Prosecutor John Lloyd-Jones QC told a sentencing hearing at the Old Bailey: 'Kane Gamble
gained access to the communications accounts of some very high-ranking US intelligence
officials and government employees.
'The group incorrectly have been referred to as hackers. The group in fact used something
known as social engineering, which involves socially manipulating people - call centres or help
desks - into performing acts or divulging confidential information.'
'The group frequently bragged on social media and subjected the victims to online harassment
and abuse.'
The court heard Gamble 'felt particularly strongly' about US backed Israeli violence on
Palestinians, the shooting of black people by US police, racist violence by the KKK and the
bombing of civilians in Iraq and Syria.
Mr Justice Haddon-Cave described Gamble's activity as 'torture in the general sense - he got
these people in control and played with them to make their lives difficult'.
Gamble was allowed to sit next to his mother behind his barrister rather than the dock when
he appeared at the Old Bailey dressed in a dark blue coat.
Gamble also used an anonymous Twitter profile to talk to journalists.
Mr Lloyd-Jones said: 'He told a journalist, "It all started by me getting more and more
annoyed at how corrupt and cold-blooded the US government are. So I decided to do something
about it".'
He is due to be sentenced at the Old Bailey at a later date.
Pargolfer, Billericay, United Kingdom, 2 days ago
Does this not show, that the higher up you are the more you think you are too important to
be hacked? If a 15 year old could do this, how safe is American security? I think you had
better hire him.
oscartheone, London, United Kingdom, 2 days ago
In fact what he actually did was to gain access to the CIA directors hotmail account and
ex po se d the fact the director of the CIA was using hotmail to email top secret documents.
The travesty being it should be the director of the CIA on trial, not Gamble
steviewunda, Warrington, United Kingdom, 2 days ago
Some state he should be given a job, but then others would do outrageous things to put on
their CV for a job in intelligence. We can't be seen to encourage this despicable behaviour,
for any reason.
Villain1874, Villain Park, United Kingdom, 2 days ago
This will either ruin him or make him, if hes smart (which looks that way) he will use his
talents for the better if hes arrogant and tries this again U.S and U.K authorities will
destroy him before he knows whats hit him...
stc6, Stratford upon Avon, United Kingdom, 2 days ago
A talented kid! We should put him to good use but keep him on a tight leash!
CallMeDave, Bury, United Kingdom, 2 days ago
And right this minute the CIA are trying to link him to Russia.
Del, AEglesburgh, United Kingdom, 2 days ago
A lot of suggestions here to employ him. Yes appears to be a clever chap and probably
could do a good job, but he has acted in a criminal manner with intent to cause harm. He's
done this from his house, what damage could he do if employed by a Gov't agency? Temptation
would be too great.
erict, ipswich, United Kingdom, 2 days ago
Well this goes to show intelligent the US homeland security the NSA and the FBI are I'am
surprised the haven't put sanction's on Liestershire Iexpect those who work at HCHQ are
laughing their head's off,
"... And if this is covered closely, then we may get some traction about how it was done and who pulled the strings. This maybe why former NSC Clapper is running scared, he set up his own personal intelligence network (there were reports early on, Clapper had his own intelligence network besides the 17 official intel agencies) to spy for the Obama WH, both he and former CIA Brennan were running intel ops for the Obama WH. Brennan ran political intel for the Obama election campaign. Indicating the Deep State intelligence apparatus is deeply involved in presidential elections. Brennan political campaign intel network using Deep State assets, next Obama;s NSC, next Obama's CIA director and was said to be the most political CIA director in history by CIA employees. ..."
"... The UK Govt appears to be complicit in the overthrow of the newly elected US Govt..........Team Globalist ..."
"... as I noted my beliefs before. Trump can be goofy at times. can be a walking ego at times. but he does not have an inherently evil heart. So he never fully comprehends the evil hearted person or collection of persons. ..."
"... He is a great marketer, but he is not a brilliant war strategist, because he doesn't fully understand the heart of his enemy. Example: He thought laying off of Hillary after the election was actually the gentlemanly thing to do....because, he thought she'd accept defeat and leave the playing field. (we on ZH knew better, but Trump actually didn't know) ..."
"... So now we know the real purpose of the FBI Trump investigation, to give Mueller and his band of merry Clinton-Lawyers the opportunity clean up the evidence. ..."
"... First, the backups are at the NSA and the Telco systems. 2nd, I'd ask WHO ELSE in the FBI was affected by lack of backups for such long period, AND how does that other impact ongoing investigations... If the answer is just those 2, well, follow the money. If the answer is more than these 2, than the credibility of the entire FBI is at stake. Which may not be much, but that is the only thing left at the moment. ..."
"... By the way, for non-techie out there, the FBI's excuse is that they couldn't get the software upgrade done right. If you work in a big company, you know how much testing and disturbance goes on before new software is rolled out. There is no such thing as a serious bug left running for months. Big companies just roll back in such extreme cases. Now imagine the amount of testing that goes on for secure phone on FBI systems. LOL. I suggest my american friends to look at this great invention called the guillotine? ..."
A major contradiction has been discovered between yesterday's revelation that the FBI "lost"
five months of text messages, and a claim by the DOJ's Inspector General, Michael Horowitz -
who claimed his office received the texts in question between FBI employees Peter Strzok and
his mistress Lisa Page last August.
... ... ...
Knowledge of the missing texts was revealed in a Saturday letter from Ron Johnson (R-WI),
Chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee (HSGAC) - after the
Committee received an additional 384 pages of text messages between Strzok and Page, several of
which contained anti-Trump / pro-Clinton bias. The new DOJ submission included a cover letter
from the Assistant AG for Legislative Affairs, Stephen Boyd, claiming that the FBI was unable
to preserve text messages between the two agents for a five month period between December 14,
2016 and May 17, 2017 - due to "misconfiguration issues" with FBI-issued Samsung 5 devices used
by Strzok and Page (despite over
10,000 texts which were recovered from their devices without incident).
However - as the Gateway Pundit 's Josh Caplan
points out , the lost text messages are in direct contradiction to a
December 13, 2017 letter from the DOJ's internal watchdog - Inspector General Michael
Horowitz, to Senate Judiciary Committee Chuck Grassley and HSGAC Chairman Ron Johnson, in which
he claims he received the texts in question on August 10, 2017 .
In gathering evidence for the OIG's ongoing 2016 election review, we requested,
consistent with standard practice, that the FBI produce text messages from the FBI-issued
phones of certain FBI employees involved in the Clinton email investigation based on search
terms we provided. After finding a number of politically-oriented text messages between
Page and Strzok, the OIG sought from the FBI all text messages between Strzok and Page from
their FBI-issued phones through November 30, 2016 , which covered the entire period of the
Clinton e-mail server investigation. The FBI produced these text messages on July 20, 2017.
Following our review of those text messages, the OIG expanded our request to the FBI to
include all text messages between Strzok and Page from November 30, 2016, through the date
of the document request, which was July 28, 2017.
The OIG received these additional messages on August 10, 2017.
This glaring contradiction suggests someone is lying or perhaps simply incompetent. Did
Horowitz's office *think* they had received the texts in question without actually verifying?
Did the DOJ screw up and fail to read Horowitz's letter before "losing" the text messages so
that "leaky" Congressional investigators wouldn't see them? Either way, this question needs
answering.
While you can draw your own conclusions, keep in mind that Inspector Horowitz has been
described as your archetypical Boy Scout bureaucrat - who
as we reported two weeks ago - fought the Obama administation to restore powers taken away
from the OIG by then-Attorney General, Eric Holder.
After a multi-year battle, Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) successfully introduced H.R.6450 - the
Inspector General Empowerment Act of 2016 - signed by a defeated lame duck President Obama into
law on
December 16th, 2016 , cementing an alliance between Horrowitz and both houses of Congress
.
And Congress has been very engaged with Horowitz's investigation; spoon-feeding the OIG all
the questions they need in order to nail the DOJ, FBI and the Obama Administration for what
many believe to be egregious abuses of power. As such, the OIG report is expected to be a
bombshell , while also satisfying a legal requirement for the Department of Justice to
impartially appoint a Special Counsel to launch an official criminal investigation into the
matter.
As illustrated below, the report will go from the Office of the Inspector General to both
investigative committees of Congress, along with Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
At this point, Horowitz's office needs to clarify whether or not they indeed took delivery
of the "lost" text messages. If the OIG does indeed have them, it will be interesting to get to
the bottom of exactly what the DOJ claims happened, and particularly juicy if they're caught in
a lie.
If not found at the NSA, surely the texts will still be at Verizon or whichever SP the
phones operate under. Only talking 18 months here. What really cracks me up is "Peter Strzok - Head of Counter Intelligence." Really? Has a dumber cunt ever graced the 7th floor of the Hoover Building?
Speaking of which, by the time this shit has gone down in it's entirety, they won't need a
7th floor. Chris Wray will be bloody lonely up there on his own. Probably coinciding with the
search for Andrew McCabe's missing pension beginning in earnest...
Six U.S. agencies created a stealth task force, spearhead by CIA's Brennan, to run
domestic surveillance on Trump associates and possibly Trump himself.
To feign ignorance and to seemingly operate within U.S. laws, the agencies freelanced
the wiretapping of Trump associates to the British spy agency GCHQ.
The decision to insert GCHQ as a back door to eavesdrop was sparked by the denial of
two FISA Court warrant applications filed by the FBI to seek wiretaps of Trump
associates.
GCHQ did not work from London or the UK. In fact the spy agency worked from NSA's
headquarters in Fort Meade, MD with direct NSA supervision and guidance to conduct sweeping
surveillance on Trump associates.
The illegal wiretaps were initiated months before the controversial Trump dossier
compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele.
The Justice Department and FBI set up the meeting at Trump Tower between Trump Jr.,
Manafort and Kushner with controversial Russian officials to make Trump's associates appear
compromised.
Following the Trump Tower sit down, GCHQ began digitally wiretapping Manafort, Trump
Jr., and Kushner.
After the concocted meeting by the Deep State, the British spy agency could officially
justify wiretapping Trump associates as an intelligence front for NSA because the Russian
lawyer at the meeting Natalia Veselnitskaya was considered an international security risk
and prior to the June sit down was not even allowed entry into the United States or the UK,
federal sources said.
By using GCHQ, the NSA and its intelligence partners had carved out a loophole to
wiretap Trump without a warrant. While it is illegal for U.S. agencies to monitor phones
and emails of U.S. citizens inside the United States absent a warrant, it is not illegal
for British intelligence to do so. Even if the GCHQ was tapping Trump on U.S. soil at Fort
Meade.
The wiretaps, secured through illicit scheming, have been used by U.S. Special Counsel
Robert Mueller's probe of alleged Russian collusion in the 2016 election, even though the
evidence is considered "poisoned fruit."
Bottom Line: The party in power used the apparatus of the police state to spy on and damage an
opposition candidate. There really isn't a higher crime in our supposed system. THEN there's the cover-up.....as in deleting files and pretending you never had them even
though the IG already does.
This used to be the reason why each new gov't as soon as it took power would toss out any
folks showing any alignment to a party at all.........guess they knew a thing or two back
then, didn't they. Time for Trump to warm up those Apprentice vocal chords and start uttering
his famous words. At the current rate Nixon will be exonerated by the end of 2018.
Could the treason be any more obvious? And not just treason, but treason in collaboration
with foreign governments and multinational corporate elitists!
"However [political parties] may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely in the
course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and
unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for
themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted
them to unjust dominion." President George Washington
Farewell Address | Saturday, September 17, 1796
I read about this, it was quickly brushed under the rug. Didn't know it was as extensive
because media coverage on this angle hasn't been clear. Good report.
And if this is covered closely, then we may get some traction about how it was done and
who pulled the strings. This maybe why former NSC Clapper is running scared, he set up his
own personal intelligence network (there were reports early on, Clapper had his own
intelligence network besides the 17 official intel agencies) to spy for the Obama WH, both he
and former CIA Brennan were running intel ops for the Obama WH. Brennan ran political intel
for the Obama election campaign. Indicating the Deep State intelligence apparatus is deeply
involved in presidential elections. Brennan political campaign intel network using Deep State
assets, next Obama;s NSC, next Obama's CIA director and was said to be the most political CIA
director in history by CIA employees.
Clapper may have been the one behind using British intelligence to spy on Trump. It would
explain Clappers irrational statements about Trump, sabotage and incitement of government
employees not to follow Trump's orders. We got that from Clapper, Brennan and former CIA
director Hayden. All three have joined forces in LA, using celebrities to continue the coup
against Trump. They formed, essentially a convert political action group using celebrities,
to make their case in the media. It's illogical for Clapper to continue with the coup, there
is no reward in it unless, he is guilty of treason and must continue the coup to protect
himself. In other words, this isn't for Hillary Clinton.
And we wonder why these "intelligence agencies" endorse Hillary for President? These fuckers need to hang. They not only conspired to excuse the email scandal, torpedoed
Sanders in the primary -- and were conspiring against her political opponent. President Trump the time is NOW!
Nice write up, keep improving, updating and posting it. The UK Govt appears to be complicit in the overthrow of the newly elected US
Govt..........Team Globalist
They ARE ALL in on it. ALL of them are guilty of TREASON, SEDITION. Republicans didn't want Trump in power at first...until they realized Trump, as Mitch
McConnell said, "He'll sign anything we put in front of him." If you want to know what is being done on Trump Administration end. Just watch SESSIONS.
Right now, Sessions has bigger fish to fry with weed smokers.
ZIOCONS have an invested interest in Russia gate: to win public support for a war on
Russia. Russiagate is WMD all over again. It's why Trump does ZERO about Russia gate, while
arming neonazis in the Ukraine and surrounding Russia and China's borders with US and NATO
troops.
N. Korea isn't about N. Korea but about regime change to put nukes on China's doorstep.
Look at what they are or are not doing. Not what they SAY..
i disagree. they're digging their hole deeper. it's ALL already been captured. everything going on is to keep us off balance & emotional. don't feed the beast.
as I noted my beliefs before. Trump can be goofy at times. can be a walking ego at times. but he does not have an
inherently evil heart. So he never fully comprehends the evil hearted person or collection of
persons.
He is a great marketer, but he is not a brilliant war strategist, because he doesn't fully
understand the heart of his enemy. Example: He thought laying off of Hillary after the
election was actually the gentlemanly thing to do....because, he thought she'd accept defeat
and leave the playing field. (we on ZH knew better, but Trump actually didn't know)
Bannon understood but wires got crossed there somehow. Kellyanne Conway understood.
Sessions is a fine gentleman that appears to have no clue the battle that is really
waging.
Most of the Washington VIPs that DO understand, are more interested in preserving their
membership in the country club than saving America. This is why I like Trump...because he already has a country club and doesn't need to get
invited to another party and doesn't really care about those scumbags. He just needs to understand a little bit more.
So now we know the real purpose of the FBI Trump investigation, to give Mueller and his
band of merry Clinton-Lawyers the opportunity clean up the evidence.
First, the backups are at the NSA and the Telco systems. 2nd, I'd ask WHO ELSE in the FBI was affected by lack of backups for such long period, AND
how does that other impact ongoing investigations... If the answer is just those 2, well,
follow the money. If the answer is more than these 2, than the credibility of the entire FBI
is at stake. Which may not be much, but that is the only thing left at the moment.
By the way, for non-techie out there, the FBI's excuse is that they couldn't get the
software upgrade done right. If you work in a big company, you know how much testing and
disturbance goes on before new software is rolled out. There is no such thing as a serious
bug left running for months. Big companies just roll back in such extreme cases. Now imagine
the amount of testing that goes on for secure phone on FBI systems. LOL. I suggest my
american friends to look at this great invention called the guillotine?
I thought all deleted materials could be recovered from any hard drive, unless something
like BleachBit is used, or the hard drive is physically destroyed. If the FBI lacks the
expertise to recover the materials, may a team of IT specialists should be sent in to help
them.
There are magnetic traces left behind even after several passes of a "zero-fill" utility
or pseudo-random over-writes. There are commercial companies whose business it is to recover
such data. I recovered data for the Sheriff's department from a computer involved in a murder
case. A company I worked for lost a Dell 96-drive array when just the right 3 drives died at
the same time. A data recovery company got everything back and sold us our own data (and
that's on a RAID 10 striped and mirrored array with 3 crashed drives).
They can get any data back if they want to badly enough.
"... FISA is an abomination. Let's get that out of the way. And since I don't believe there are any coincidences in U.S. or geo-politics, the releasing of the explosive four-page FISA memo after Congress reauthorized FISA is suspicious ..."
"... Former NSA analyst (traitor? hero?) turned security state gadfly Edward Snowden came out in favor of President Trump vetoing the FISA reauthorization now that the full extent of what the statute is used for is known to members of the House Intelligence Committee, who are rightly aghast. ..."
"... Someone leaked this memo to the House Intelligence Committee with the sole intention of giving President Trump the opportunity to do exactly what Snowden is arguing for. And well Trump should. ..."
"... This is the essence of draining the swamp. It is the essence of his war with the Shadow Government. If one makes the distinction between the Deep State and the Shadow Government, like former CIA officer Kevin Shipp does , then this falls right in line with Trump's goals in cleaning up the rot and corruption in the U.S. government. In a recent interview with Greg Hunter at USAWatchdog.com, ..."
"... Shipp explains, "I differentiate between the 'Deep State' and the shadow government. The shadow government are the secret intelligence agencies that have such power and secrecy that they act even without the knowledge of Congress. There are many things that they do with impunity. Then there is the 'Deep State,' which is the military industrial complex, all of the industrial corporations and their lobbyists, and they have all the money, power and greed that give all the money to the Senators and Congressmen. So, they are connected, but they are really two different entities. It is the shadow government . . . specifically, the CIA, that is going after Donald Trump. It is terrified that some of its dealings are going to be exposed. If they are, it could jeopardize the entire organization." [emphasis mine] ..."
"... Trump's continued needling of the establishment; playing the long game and demonizing the media which is the tip of the Shadow Government's spear while strengthening the support of both the military (through his backing them at every turn) and his base by assisting them destroy the false narratives of globalism has been nothing short of amazing. ..."
"... So, Trump cozying up to the military, cutting a deal with the military-industrial complex (MIC) has the Deep State now incentivized to fight the Shadow Government for him. The tax cut bill, while a brilliant example of political knife-fighting, is fundamentally about shoring up the finances of the corporations that make up the MIC through the repatriation of foreign-earned income, lowering the corporate tax rate and stealing even more of the middle class back from the Democrats. ..."
FISA
is an abomination. Let's get that out of the way. And since I don't believe there are any
coincidences in U.S. or geo-politics, the releasing of the explosive four-page FISA memo after
Congress reauthorized FISA is suspicious.
Former NSA analyst (traitor? hero?) turned security state gadfly Edward Snowden came out in
favor of President Trump vetoing the FISA reauthorization now that the full extent of what the
statute is used for is known to members of the House Intelligence Committee, who are rightly
aghast.
Officials confirm there's a secret report showing abuses of spy law Congress voted to
reauthorize this week. If this memo had been known prior to the vote, FISA reauth would have
failed. These abuses must be made public, and @realDonaldTrump should send
the bill back with a veto. https://t.co/BEwJ9EyIq0
But, like I said, timing in these things is everything. And the timing on this leak is
important.
Someone leaked this memo to the House Intelligence Committee with the sole intention of
giving President Trump the opportunity to do exactly what Snowden is arguing for. And well Trump should.
This is the essence of draining the swamp. It is the essence of his war with the Shadow
Government. If one makes the distinction between the Deep State and the Shadow Government,
like former
CIA officer Kevin Shipp does , then this falls right in line with Trump's goals in cleaning
up the rot and corruption in the U.S. government. In a recent interview with Greg Hunter at
USAWatchdog.com,
Shipp explains, "I differentiate between the 'Deep State' and the shadow government. The
shadow government are the secret intelligence agencies that have such power and secrecy that
they act even without the knowledge of Congress. There are many things that they do with
impunity. Then there is the 'Deep State,' which is the military industrial complex, all of
the industrial corporations and their lobbyists, and they have all the money, power and greed
that give all the money to the Senators and Congressmen. So, they are connected, but they are
really two different entities. It is the shadow government . . . specifically, the CIA, that
is going after Donald Trump. It is terrified that some of its dealings are going to be
exposed. If they are, it could jeopardize the entire organization." [emphasis mine]
Court the Military Against the Spooks
And as I've talked about at length, I've felt from the moment Trump was elected he was going
to have to ally himself with the U.S. military to have any chance of surviving, let alone
achieve his political goals.
Trump's final campaign ad was a clarion call to action. It was a declaration of war against
both the Shadow Government and the Deep State. And it ensured that if he won, which he did,
they would immediately go to war with him.
And you don't declare war like this if you aren't prepared for the biggest knock-down,
drag-out street brawl of all time. If you aren't prepared for it, don't say it. And for the
past year we've been left wondering whether Trump was 1) prepared for it 2) capable of pulling
it off.
Trump's continued needling of the establishment; playing the long game and demonizing the
media which is the tip of the Shadow Government's spear while strengthening the support of both
the military (through his backing them at every turn) and his base by assisting them destroy
the false narratives of globalism has been nothing short of amazing.
As a hard-core, jaded politico, I can tell you I never thought for a second he had the
ability to what he's already done. But, as the past few months have pointed out, the real power
in the world doesn't rest with the few thousand who manipulate the levers of power but the
billions who for years stood by and let them.
And those days of standing by are gone.
So, Trump cozying up to the military, cutting a deal with the military-industrial complex
(MIC) has the Deep State now incentivized to fight the Shadow Government for him. The tax cut
bill, while a brilliant example of political knife-fighting, is fundamentally about shoring up
the finances of the corporations that make up the MIC through the repatriation of
foreign-earned income, lowering the corporate tax rate and stealing even more of the middle
class back from the Democrats.
Trump had the right strategy from the beginning. Civil Wars turn on what the police and the
military do. They are instigated by and fanned by the spooks, but it is the soldiers and the
cops who decide the outcome.
And so here we are.
FISA, It's Everywhere You Don't Want it to Be
Trump has called the Democrats' and RINOs' bluff on DACA and chain-immigration as a
vote-buying scheme with zero political fallout. He's properly reframed the looming government
shutdown on their inability to stick to their original agreements.
His much-maligned Justice Department is now rolling up traitors associated with Uranium One,
pedophiles and human traffickers all over the country and preparing for a showdown with blue
state governors and attorney generals over "Sanctuary" grandstanding.
By leading the charge, he gave strength to the patriots within both the Shadow Government
and the Deep State organizations to leak the material needed to keep his campaign afloat.
And as each new thing drops at the most inopportune time for the political establishment
mentioned ad nauseum in that final campaign ad linked above, you have to wonder just how big
the revolt inside these organizations is.
Because, right here, right now, Trump can demand the release of this FISA memo and use it to
torpedo the very thing that allowed the entire "Russia Hacked Muh Election" nonsense and send
it back to the sh$&hole it was spawned from in the first place, the CIA and the DNC.
And if that means for a few months the FISA courts are inoperable while a new bill and a new
set of rules is drafted so be it.
* * *
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What a bombshell! Finally some truth about the "Justice system" in the US.
Following on from this should be the whole subsequent story of the DNC-Fusion-Steele dossier in detail, exposing the MSM too
for what it has been worth.
Perhaps then Trump dares to go against the deep state swamp and stop wars instead of following the dictates of CIA, Israel and
Military Industrialists. That would be a real POTUS PLUS result.
""It's troubling. It is shocking," North Carolina Rep. Mark Meadows said. "Part of me wishes that I didn't read it because
I don't want to believe that those kinds of things could be happening in this country that I call home and love so much.""
***
Come on, child! Enough with that spectacle. Get real. Have the basic courage to know and to admit what everybody has known
about your country for ages!... The entire world already knows.
More proof, if any were needed, that the only threat to the people of the USA comes from their own government. The 'external
threat' is a fiction calculated to enslave the US population and enrich the Oligarchy.
Somebody's going to leak this in short order. Let's take a real look at what both Dems and Repubs just expanded, let's look
at the monster they are feeding in broad daylight.
"... Sally Yates essentially said 'all DOJ is subject to oversight, except the National Security Division'. ..."
"... In short, FISA "queries" from any national security department within government are allowed without seeking court approval. ..."
"... We know NSA Director Admiral Mike Rogers became aware of an issue with unauthorized FISA-702(17) " About Queries " early in 2016. As a result of a FISA court ruling declassified in May of 2017 we were able to piece a specific timeline together. ..."
"... At the same time Christopher Steele was assembling his dossier information (May-October 2016), the NSA compliance officer was conducting an internal FISA-702 review as initiated by NSA Director Mike Rogers. The NSA compliance officer briefed Admiral Mike Rogers on October 20th 2016. On October 26th 2016, Admiral Rogers informed the FISA Court of numerous unauthorized FISA-702(17) "About Query" violations. Subsequent to that FISC notification Mike Rogers stopped all FISA-702(17) "About Queries" permanently . They are no longer permitted. ..."
"... Mike Rogers discovery becomes the impetus for him to request the 2016 full NSA compliance audit of FISA-702 use. It appears Fusion-GPS was the FBI contracted user identified in the final FISA court opinion/ruling on page 83. ..."
"... What plan came from that April 19th,2016 White House meeting? What plan did Mary Jacoby and Glenn Simpson present to use the information they had assembled? How and who would they feed their information to; and how do they best use that 'valuable' information? This appears to be where Fusion-GPS contracting with Christopher Steele comes in. ..."
"... Contacted by Fox News, investigators for the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) confirmed that Nellie H. Ohr, wife of the demoted official, Bruce G. Ohr, worked for the opposition research firm last year. ..."
"... The precise nature of Mrs. Ohr's duties – including whether she worked on the dossier – remains unclear but a review of her published works available online reveals Mrs. Ohr has written extensively on Russia-related subjects. HPSCI staff confirmed to Fox News that she was paid by Fusion GPS through the summer and fall of 2016. ( link ) ..."
"... DOJ Deputy Bruce Ohr and his wife Nellie Ohr had a prior working relationship with Fusion-GPS founder Glenn Simpson. Together they worked on a collaborative CIA Open Source group project surrounding International Organized Crime. ( pdf here ) Page #30 Screen Shot Below . ..."
"... Nellie Ohr is a subject matter expert on Russia, speaks Russian, and also is well versed on CIA operations. Nellie Ohr's skills would include how to build or create counterintelligence frameworks to give the appearance of events that may be entirely fabricated. ..."
"... Knowing the NSA was reviewing FISA "Queries"; and intellectually accepting the resulting information from those queries was likely part of the framework put together by Glenn Simpson and Mary Jacoby; we discover that GPS employee Nellie Ohr applied for a HAM radio license [ May 23rd 2016 ] (screen grab below). ..."
"... Accepting the FBI was utilizing Fusion-GPS as a contractor, there is now an inherent clarity in the relationship between: FBI agent Peter Strzok, Fusion-GPS Glenn Simpson, and 'Russian Dossier' author Christopher Steele. They are all on the same team. ..."
"... The information that Fusion-GPS Glenn Simpson put together from his advanced work on the 'Trump Project', was, in essence, built upon the foundation of the close relationship he already had with the FBI. ..."
"... Simpson, Jacoby and Ohr then passed on their information to Christopher Steele who adds his own ingredients to the mix, turns around, and gives the end product back to the FBI. That end product is laundered intelligence now called "The Trump/Russia Dossier". ..."
"... The FBI turn around and use the "dossier" as the underlying documents and investigative evidence for continued operations against the target of the entire enterprise, candidate Donald Trump. As Peter Strzok would say in August 2016: this is their "insurance policy" per se'. ..."
"... In October 2016, immediately after the DOJ lawyers formatted the FBI information (Steele Dossier etc.) for a valid FISA application, the head of the NSD, Asst. Attorney General John P Carlin, left his job . His exit came as the NSD and Admiral Rogers informed the FISC that frequent unauthorized FISA-702 searches had been conducted. Read Here . ..."
"... Yes, the FBI was working with Christopher Steele through their contractor Fusion-GPS. Yes, the FBI and Clinton Team were, in essence, both paying Christopher Steele for his efforts. The FBI paid Steele via their sub-contractor Fusion-GPS. ..."
"... Lastly, when the DOJ/FBI used the Steele Dossier to make their 2016 surveillance activity legal (the October FISA application), they are essentially using the outcome of a process they created themselves in collaboration with both Fusion GPS and the Clinton campaign. ..."
"... All research indicates the intelligence information the DOJ and FBI collected via their FISA-702 queries, combined with the intelligence Fusion GPS created in their earlier use of contractor access to FISA-702(17) "about queries", was the intelligence data delivered to Christopher Steele for use in creating "The Russian Dossier". ..."
"... Christopher Steele was just laundering intelligence. The Steele "dossier" was then used by the DOJ to gain FISA-702 approvals – which provided retroactive legal cover for the prior campaign surveillance, and also used post-election to create the "Russian Narrative". ..."
"... The ENTIRE SYSTEM of FISA-702 surveillance and data collection was weaponized against a political campaign. The DOJ and FBI used the FISA Court to gain access to Trump data, and simultaneously justify earlier FISA "queries" by their contractor, Fusion GPS. FISA-702 queries were used to gather information on the Trump campaign which later became FBI counterintelligence surveillance on the officials therein. ..."
Following the released transcript of Fusion-GPS Co-Founder Glenn Simpson's testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee
by Senator Dianne Feinstein , several media outlets have begun questioning the relationship between the FBI investigators, Glenn
Simpson and dossier author Christopher Steele.
What we have discovered highlights the answer to those relationship questions; and also answers a host of other questions, including:
Did the FBI pay Christopher Steele? Yes, but now how media has stated. Was the FBI connected to the creation of the Steele Dossier?
Yes, but again, not the way the media is currently outlining.
"... An extensive review of Simpson's 312-page Aug. 22 interview transcript shows that his strongest evidence for believing the dossier's accuracy is that he trusts Christopher Steele, the former British spy who compiled the 35-page document. ..."
"... when pressed for independent evidence to support the dossier's allegations, Simpson demurred. He also refused to discuss dossier sources or to say whether he had vetted any of them. ..."
"... The revelation raises questions about why the FBI would have shared seemingly sensitive information about its sources with Steele, a former MI6 officer who now operates a private intelligence firm ..."
"... Simpson was cagey when asked whether Steele had received that information directly from the FBI, but he did not deny it. "And did Mr. Steele tell you that the FBI had relayed this information to him?" Simpson was asked. "He didn't specifically say that," said Simpson, adding that Steele "would say very generic things like I saw them, they asked me a lot of questions, sounds like they have another source or they have another source." ..."
"... Simpson's remarks generated gleeful speculation from some media outlets that a mole within Trump's orbit was a confidential source for the FBI. But sources close to Fusion told reporters on Tuesday that Simpson conflated information he had been told by Steele. NBC News reported that the Trump campaign source Simpson was referring to was George Papadopoulos, a former Trump campaign adviser who recently pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about Russian contacts. ..."
"... A month earlier, Papadopoulos had met in April 2016 with a London-based professor named Joseph Mifsud who claimed to have learned that Russian operatives had stolen "thousands" of Clinton-related emails. ..."
"... Bruce and Nellie Ohr have become two of the more intriguing figures in the dossier saga. Bruce Ohr was a deputy assistant attorney general at the Justice Department when he met with Steele before the 2016 election. He also met with Simpson just after Trump's election win. Nellie Ohr, a former CIA employee with expertise in Russia, worked for Fusion GPS on its Trump research. Neither Ohr appears by name in the Simpson transcript. ..."
"... Simpson acknowledged in a Nov. 14 interview with the House Intelligence Committee that he had met with Bruce Ohr. Ohr was demoted from his DOJ position weeks later. Fox News reported that DOJ officials were not aware of his contacts with Steele and Simpson ..."
"... Simpson was also asked whether his firm employed anyone who speaks Russian. And though Nellie Ohr seemingly speaks Russian , Simpson told Senate investigators that he did not employ anyone with that particular skill. ..."
"... Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya speaks during an interview in Moscow, Russia November 8, 2016. ..."
"... Simpson suggested that the FBI expressed frustration with Steele during meetings in Sept. 2016 that some of the information that he had shared with the bureau was appearing in the media. ..."
"... Steele first shared his findings with an FBI acquaintance in July 2016. He met with agents again in Sept. 2016. ..."
"... "Did Mr. Steele ever indicate to you whether the FBI had asked him not to speak with the media?" one investigator asked Simpson. "I remember Chris saying at some point that they were upset with media coverage of some of the issues that he had discussed with him," replied Simpson, adding that "he never said they told him he couldn't talk to them." ..."
"... Kramer is the only person known to have handled the dossier who has not denied being BuzzFeed's source. He was recently interviewed by the House Intelligence Committee and by lawyers who represent a Russian businessman suing BuzzFeed for publishing the dossier. (RELATED: BuzzFeed's Dossier Gets Closer To Being Identified) ..."
One of the biggest takeaways from Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson's Senate Judiciary Committee testimony is that he has no independent
proof that the allegations made in the infamous Trump dossier are accurate. An extensive review of Simpson's 312-page Aug. 22 interview transcript shows that his strongest evidence for believing the dossier's
accuracy is that he trusts Christopher Steele, the former British spy who compiled the 35-page document.
"Chris, as I say, has a sterling reputation as a person who doesn't exaggerate, doesn't make things up, doesn't sell baloney,"Simpson, a former Wall Street Journal, told Senate investigators in the interview. But when pressed for independent evidence to support the dossier's allegations, Simpson demurred. He also refused to discuss dossier
sources or to say whether he had vetted any of them. But that's not the only conclusion to be drawn from Simpson's testimony, a transcript of which was released on Tuesday by California
Sen. Dianne Feinstein against the wishes of her Republican colleagues.
Here are other major revelations from Simpson's testimony.
FBI may have disclosed Russia investigation sources to Steele
Simpson suggested in his interview that Steele learned from the FBI in Sept. 2016 that the bureau had received information from
inside the Trump campaign that corroborated some of the dossier's allegations.
The revelation raises questions about why the FBI would have shared seemingly sensitive information about its sources with Steele,
a former MI6 officer who now operates a private intelligence firm.
In his testimony, Simpson says Steele told him during a Sept. 2016 meeting with FBI agents that the FBI "had other intelligence
about this matter from an internal Trump campaign source" and that they thought Steele "might be credible" because they had other
intelligence from "a human source from inside the Trump organization."
Simpson was cagey when asked whether Steele had received that information directly from the FBI, but he did not deny it. "And
did Mr. Steele tell you that the FBI had relayed this information to him?" Simpson was asked. "He didn't specifically say that,"
said Simpson, adding that Steele "would say very generic things like I saw them, they asked me a lot of questions, sounds like they
have another source or they have another source."
Simpson's remarks generated gleeful speculation from some media outlets that a mole within Trump's orbit was a confidential source
for the FBI. But sources close to Fusion told reporters on Tuesday that Simpson conflated information he had been told by Steele.
NBC News
reported that the Trump campaign source Simpson was referring to was George Papadopoulos, a former Trump campaign adviser who
recently pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about Russian contacts.
The New York Times reported late last month that Papadopoulos was put on the FBI's radar after he told Australian diplomat Alexander
Downer in May 2016 that he had received information that Russian operatives had "dirt" on Hillary Clinton.
Papadopoulos, an energy consultant, shared that information during a booze-filled conversation with Downer at a London bar.
A month earlier, Papadopoulos had met in April 2016 with a London-based professor named Joseph Mifsud who claimed to have learned
that Russian operatives had stolen "thousands" of Clinton-related emails.
Former Trump campaign foreign policy aide George Papadopoulos admitted that he misled FBI agents about his contact with Russians
in order to protect Trump. (Youtube screen grab via LinkedIn)The timing of that encounter is significant because it was before it was publicly known that Russians had hacked Clinton campaign
chairman John Podesta's Gmail account.
It remains unclear whether Papadopoulos told anyone in the Trump campaign about Mifsud's claims. The White House has downplayed
Papadopoulos' work on the campaign.
Downer, the Australian diplomat, told his colleagues about his conversation with Papadopoulos two months after it occurred. He
initially brushed off the young campaign adviser's claims but passed them along after reports surfaced of Russian cyberattacks. The
Australian government then contacted the FBI, which reportedly opened its counterintelligence investigation into possible collusion
between the Trump campaign and Kremlin.
But why Steele and then Simpson were made privy to the FBI's knowledge of Papadopoulos and Downer remains unclear.
Simpson omits the Ohrs
Bruce and Nellie Ohr have become two of the more intriguing figures in the dossier saga. Bruce Ohr was a deputy assistant
attorney general at the Justice Department when he met with Steele before the 2016 election. He also met with Simpson just after
Trump's election win. Nellie Ohr, a former CIA employee with expertise in Russia, worked for Fusion GPS on its Trump research. Neither
Ohr appears by name in the Simpson transcript.
Simpson insisted to investigators that he did not talk with anyone from the FBI during the Trump project. But he for some reason
did not acknowledge his contact with a high-ranking DOJ official.
Simpson acknowledged in a Nov. 14 interview with the House Intelligence Committee that he had met with Bruce Ohr. Ohr was demoted
from his DOJ position weeks later. Fox News reported that DOJ officials were not aware of his contacts with Steele and Simpson.
Simpson was also asked whether his firm employed anyone who speaks Russian. And though Nellie Ohr
seemingly speaks Russian , Simpson told Senate
investigators that he did not employ anyone with that particular skill.
"Do any Fusion employees or associates speak Russian?" Simpson was asked. "No," he said. And asked if he had any support from Russia-speaking employees, Simpson said "not in my company, at least not that I can recall."
Fusion lawyer claimed that a dossier source has been murdered
Josh Levy, who accompanied Simpson in the testimony, claimed that a dossier source has been murdered.
Levy made the statement during a line of questioning to Simpson about sources for the dossier. The lawyer interjected to say that
it would be unsafe to discuss dossier sources because at least one source had been killed.
"It's a voluntary interview, and in addition to that he wants to be very careful to protect his sources. Somebody's already been
killed as a result of the publication of this dossier and no harm should come to anybody related to this honest work," said Levy.
(RELATED: 'Somebody's Already Been Killed' Over The Dossier, Fusion GPS Lawyer Claimed) It is unclear who Levy was referring
to, though there has been speculation that a former KGB official who was found dead in the back of his car in Russia was a source
for the dossier. But that Kremlin insider, Oleg Erovkinin, was found dead on Dec. 26, 2016, two weeks before the dossier was published
by BuzzFeed.
Russian lawyer's inconsistent statements about Simpson encounters
Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya has become a central figure in the Russia investigation because of her involvement in the
June 9, 2016 Trump Tower meeting.
And one of the stranger wrinkles in that saga is Veselnitskaya's interactions with Simpson just hours before that controversial
conclave.
Simpson's interview transcript confirms past reporting that he was with Veselnitskaya the day of that meeting as well as the day
before and day after.
Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya speaks during an interview in Moscow, Russia November 8, 2016. REUTERS/Kommersant
Photo/Yury Martyanov
But in her own testimony to the Judiciary committee, Veselnitskaya denied encountering Simpson on those days.
"Did you have contact with Glenn Simpson on June 8, 9, or 10, 2016?" reads one of the 94 questions posed to Veselnitskaya by the
Senate panel.
Undercutting that testimony, Simpson said that Veselnitskaya attended dinners where he was also present on June 8 and June 10. They
were also together in a Manhattan court room on the morning of the Trump Tower meeting.
Simpson's work with Veselnitskaya and Rinat Akhmetshin, a Russian-American lobbyist who also visited Trump Tower, has stoked speculation
that the Russians provided information that ended up in the dossier.
But Simpson denied in his testimony that either Russian contact told him about the Trump Tower meeting. He also said he doubted
that either provided information to Steele.
FBI was upset that Steele's findings were ending up in media reports
Simpson suggested that the FBI expressed frustration with Steele during meetings in Sept. 2016 that some of the information
that he had shared with the bureau was appearing in the media.
Steele first shared his findings with an FBI acquaintance in July 2016. He met with agents again in Sept. 2016.
"Did Mr. Steele ever indicate to you whether the FBI had asked him not to speak with the media?" one investigator asked Simpson.
"I remember Chris saying at some point that they were upset with media coverage of some of the issues that he had discussed with
him," replied Simpson, adding that "he never said they told him he couldn't talk to them."
The only reporting that appeared to be based on Steele's findings up to that point was from Yahoo! News. The website published
a Sept. 23, 2016 article based on Steele's allegations about Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.
Page is suing Yahoo!'s parent company over the article.
Longstanding relationship with John McCain associate
Simpson told investigators that he has known an associate of Arizona Sen. John McCain's "for a long time."
David Kramer, a former State Department official, was with McCain in Nov. 2016 when the Republican lawmaker was first told of
the dossier by an associate of Steele's.
Kramer, McCain and Steele soon developed plans for Kramer to contact Simpson to access the dossier.
Kramer is the only person known to have handled the dossier who has not denied being BuzzFeed's source. He was recently interviewed
by the House Intelligence Committee and by lawyers who represent a Russian businessman suing BuzzFeed for publishing the dossier.
(RELATED:
BuzzFeed's Dossier Gets Closer To Being Identified)
In his testimony, Simpson said that he has known Kramer since his days at The Wall Street Journal.
"So Chris asked me do you know David Kramer, and I said yes, I've known David Kramer for a long time," said Simpson.
"David Kramer is part of a small group of people that I'm sort of loosely affiliated with. We've all worked on Russia and are
very concerned about kleptocracy and human rights and the police state that Russia has become, in particular the efforts of the Russians
to corrupt and mess with our political system," Simpson added.
Simpson was "opposed to Donald Trump" before Russia investigation
Simpson insisted that his research of Trump was apolitical, but at the end of his interview he acknowledged being deeply opposed
to the Republican.
"I think it's safe to say that, you know, at some point probably early in 2016 I had reached a conclusion about Donald Trump as
a businessman and his character and I was opposed to Donald Trump," he said.
He defended his opposition, saying that it did not cloud his investigation of Trump's business activities or those of his campaign.
"... Well this clearly shows Morell is smart enough to realize that the whole Russian conspiracy is collapsing, and he wants to be the first in line to cover his backside. ..."
"... Well well well no big surprise there. Now, I'm wondering how much of our money they used to try and prove this conspiracy to be true ..."
Well, one of Trump's most outspoken critics in the CIA (Michael Morell Former Director of the CIA) admits in an interview with
Politico, that if there was any collusion, it would have already been found. Morell also admits his becoming political, and attacking
Trump was something "he didn't think through".
Well this clearly shows Morell is smart enough to realize that the whole Russian conspircy is collapsing, and he wants to be
the first in line to cover his backside.
That's not what he actually said regarding collusion. He did indicate that weighing into the election was a mistake both by him and
other intelligence agency heads because it gave the Bannon-Gorka wing conspiracy theory credibility. There was certainly reason to
criticize Trump but they would have been better off remaining out of the fray.
You should read the entire article, good read on Ukraine, Russia. I got a lot more out of it than your statement. It was a half
hour interview and that's all you got.
Also it would be nice if you would provide a link when you are referring to a quote.
Quote:
Morell: So, let's talk about what I think the possibilities are, going forward. So, I would not be surprised if Bob
Mueller concludes that the Trump campaign did not violate the law with regard to its interactions with the Russians. I'm really open
to that possibility. Why? Because, as you know, The New York Times, The Washington Post , every media outlet that is worth
its salt has reporters digging into this, and they haven't found anything. And I think that, had there been something there, they would have found something. And I think Bob Mueller would have found it already
and it would have leaked.
So, I'm really open to the possibility that there's no there there on a crime being committed by the campaign and the Russians.
Right? That interaction leading to criminal charges.
Well, one of Trump's most outspoken critics in the CIA (Michael Morell Former Director of the CIA) admits in an interview
with Politico, that if there was any collusion, it would have already been found. Morell also admits his becoming political, and
attacking Trump was something "he didn't think through".
Well this clearly shows Morell is smart enough to realize that the whole Russian conspiracy is collapsing, and he wants to be the
first in line to cover his backside.
Well well well no big surprise there. Now, I'm wondering how much of our money they used to try and prove this conspiracy to be
true
Sounds like there was no collusion. Manafort may have laundered money, obstructed, etc. but what he may have or may
not have done was done years ago, before there was a Trump campaign.
Well not exactly, also from the interview:
Quote:
The second point I'd make is that I wouldn't be surprised if there were single individuals who were associated with the campaign
who violated the law with respect to their interactions with the Russians on the election. Paul Manafort comes to mind. I think
he has little to no integrity. There's no way you spend that much time with the old Ukrainian government and not bump up against
Russian intelligence officers a lot.
Former Prosecutor Katie Phang called to investigate CIA Director John Brennan over whether he
leaked information about the Russian hacking investigation to the media ( CIA Director under fire , Dec 19,
2016)
Notable quotes:
"... The CIA Has Always Played Political Chess ..."
"... Brennan is a politician, He was working for Clinton because he thought she would prevail. Brennan has NO integrity. He is a spineless worm trying to placate his masters. He needs to be indicted. ..."
"... Brennan is an idiot. what kind of moron tries to undermine and destabilize the administration of his incoming boss by leaking fake news about him? total fool and a liar. he has done america a great disservice. he not only deserveds to be fired, he should be arrested ..."
The CIA is one of the Barrack Obamas corrupt agencies. Trump will need to replace the FBI,
CIA, DOJ, the STATE DEPARTMENT, IRS departments. It would be stupid for Trump to trust the
Obama intelligence machinery.
Here are Clinton's "17 agencies:" Air Force Intelligence, Army Intelligence, Central
Intelligence Agency, Coast Guard Intelligence, Defense Intelligence Agency, Energy
Department, Homeland Security Department, State Department, Treasury Department, Drug
Enforcement Administration, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Marine Corps Intelligence,
National Geospatial Intelligence Agency, National Reconnaissance Office, National Security
Agency, Navy Intelligence and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. What does
the Coast Guard Intelligence, National Geospatial Intelligence Agency or the Drug Enforcement
Administration know about John Podesta's emails? Answer: nothing.
Brennan is probably THE MOST DANGEROUS person in Gov't, IMO. I wonder if people remember
that Brennan is who Michael Hastings was allegedly investigating when his car 'crashed and
burned'. A BRAND NEW Mercedes, at that.... yet, again, there was NOTHING to see there...
Brennan is a politician, He was working for Clinton because he thought she would prevail.
Brennan has NO integrity. He is a spineless worm trying to placate his masters. He needs to
be indicted.
Brennan is an idiot. what kind of moron tries to undermine and destabilize the
administration of his incoming boss by leaking fake news about him? total fool and a liar. he
has done america a great disservice. he not only deserveds to be fired, he should be
arrested.
John Brennen , CIA Director , pushing the Russia Hacking agenda but not releasing the
evidence but are here are some facts for you, Obama appointed him , when sworn into office
refused to put his hand on the bible because he joined the Muslim faith, lied about
associations with Hilary in Bengazia and the facts , and there is more to numerous to
mention. When Trump gets in , he'll fire his sorry ass for sure , Ha Ha !!!
"... the premise underpinning its sourcing (that the Russian intelligence service provided access to what would be one of its most sensitive operations to a Maltese academic and a minor American advisor) is patently absurd ..."
"... On its surface, the wild claims made by Papadopoulos, as reported by Downer, are of a similarly poor quality as the information that underpinned the pitch made by the British publicist, Robert Goldstone , that put the Fusion GPS-affiliated Russian lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya, in contact with Donald Trump, Jr., on June 9. ..."
"... The Goldstone information is eerily like the information provided by Christopher Steele himself in his report of June 20: "A dossier of compromising material on Hillary Clinton has been collated (sic) by the Russian Intelligence Services over many years and mainly comprises bugged conversations she had on various trips to Russia and intercepted phone calls." Mr. Steele was contracted by Fusion GPS sometime after June 17; less than three days later, he was able to produce a report that made use of no fewer than seven named senior sources, as well as making use of a "company ethnic Russian operative" to conduct an investigation inside Russia. This time frame is unrealistically short, suggesting that Steele himself was spoon fed a pre-packaged storyline -- in short, "Kremlin disinformation." Seen in this light, the Papadopoulos story is more about a Russian campaign to neutralize a future American president as part of its ongoing effort to undermine American power and prestige than it is about collusion between this candidate and Russia to get him elected. That the FBI, and others, would rely on such information to actively undermine the legitimacy of a duly elected American president remains a topic which Republicans in Congress would do well to continue to investigate. ..."
The latest narrative about GPS Fusion and the Steele dossier doesn't pass the smell test.
•
January 8, 2018
Credit:
Andrea Izzatti/Shutterstock
The
New York Times
has delivered a one-two punch to critics of the role played by the so-called "Steele Dossier" in influencing the FBI's
decision to launch a criminal investigation into the possibility of the Trump campaign colluding with Russia to
influence the 2016 election.
The narrative that emerges from these two sources is that Republican supporters of
Donald Trump are overstating the role the dossier played in shaping the FBI's investigation. This is being echoed,
without question, in mainstream media as fact. Yet his narrative, however nicely packaged and rational it may seem, does
not hold up to even the most basic scrutiny.
The heart of the
New York Times'
story rests on the role played by an Australian diplomat, Alexander Downer, who since 2014 has served as Australia's
High Commissioner to the United Kingdom, in triggering the FBI's decision to investigate possible collusion. The genesis
of this saga took place on April 26, 2016, when George Papadopoulos, a member of Trump's foreign advisory team, met with
Joseph Mifsud, an obscure former Maltese diplomat who taught international relations at the University of Sterling, in
Scotland. Mifsud was a frequent attendee of the
Valdai
Discussion Club
, an annual conference held in Sochi, Russia, where Russian
President Vladimir Putin often spoke. In an email to Papadopoulos dated April 11, Mifsud claimed that he was travelling
to Russia on April 18 to attend a
Valdai
meeting
, and to meet with members of the Russian Parliament.
Papadopoulos and Mifsud had met several times since their introduction in March of
2016, where the focus of their efforts revolved around arranging a meeting between Trump and Russian officials to
discuss the possibility of improving U.S.-Russian relations should Trump be elected. Despite push-back from senior Trump
advisors, including
current
U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions
(who in effect told Papadopoulos to stand
down on any attempt to arrange a meeting between Trump and the Russians), Papadopoulos continued to pursue the subject
with Mifsud. At the April 26 meeting, Mifsud told Papadopoulos that he had just returned from Moscow where, among other
things, he had been told by high-level Russian government officials that Russia had "dirt" on Hillary Clinton, including
"thousands of emails" (this description was provided
by
Papadopoulos to the FBI
during an interview conducted on January 27, 2017 -- nine
months after the fact). The next day, April 27, Papadopoulos emailed the Trump campaign about the meeting -- no reference
was made about the Mifsud's explosive claims; indeed, there is no record of Papadopoulos ever communicating Mifsud's
information about "dirt" to anyone in the Trump campaign at any time.
Fast forward three weeks. Papadopoulos had sent a series of emails to the Trump
campaign, pressing the issue of a meeting between Trump and the Russians; all had been ignored. Papadopoulos met with
Alexander Downer, the Australian diplomat, over drinks, during which time Papadopoulos allegedly passed on Mifsud's
claims that Russia had "dirt," in form of "thousands of emails," on Clinton. Downer was clearly not impressed with
Papadopoulos's information; it took two months before the Aussie diplomat put pen to paper, and dispatched a cable to
Canberra where he reportedly recounted the conversation. The
New York Times
,
citing four unnamed sources, claims that the Downer cable was forwarded by the Australian government to the FBI, where
it, rather than the Steele dossier, served as one of the driving factors behind the FBI's decision to investigate the
Trump campaign. What gave the Downer cable its import, the
New York Times
claimed, was that it arrived in the FBI's hands right around the same time -- July 22, 2016 -- when Wikileaks began releasing
thousands of emails sourced to the Democratic National Committee (DNC). "It's around this same time," Mark Mazzetti, one
of the journalists who broke the Downer story,
told
Rachel Maddow
, "that the DNC emails are leaking out over the internet, so it
is possible, although we haven't confirmed this yet, that this becomes public, and the Australian government realizes
what it is sitting on, and it notifies the US government."
On the surface, the logic of the
New York
Times'
story appears unassailable -- the cause-effect relationship alone would
seem to justify alarms being sounded in the FBI. The problem with this narrative, however, is that this cause-effect
relationship
does not exist
. Of the
27,500 emails sourced from the DNC that were eventually released by Wikileaks,
21,800
were written
after
April 29
-- three
days
after
Mifsud allegedly informed
Papadopoulos about the existence of Russian "dirt". Indeed,
nine
of the ten "most damaging" emails
released by Wikileaks were written
after
April 29. Whatever the source of the
"dirt" Mifsud allegedly referenced during his April 26 meeting with Papadopoulos was, it was not referring to the hacked
DNC emails, if for no other reason, that these emails had not even been accessed by parties outside the DNC at that
time. There simply is no connection between the information contained in the Downer cable and the Wikileaks documents,
no matter how hard the
New York Times
tries to make such a link stick.
That the FBI would have used the Downer cable as the catalyst around which it would
launch a criminal investigation into Trump's campaign is facially absurd -- a single uncorroborated source, based upon an
alcohol-fueled conversation that had transpired two months before the cable was drafted, is not the basis upon which
such a politically sensitive initiative would be undertaken. One of the principle tenets of assessing raw intelligence
information, such as that contained in the Downer cable, is whether the actors involved could plausibly have had access
to that which is claimed. Russia, like the United States, treats intelligence derived from communications
intercepts -- including cyber operations -- as among the most sensitive, and therefore highly classified, sources. The notion
that the existence of information that would amount to the crown jewels of the Russian intelligence service would be
handed over to an obscure non-Russian professor to share with a low-level American campaign advisor represents the kind
of red flag that any intelligence analyst worthy of the title would raise when evaluating the Downer cable.
Despite this glaring reality, the
New York
Times
reported that "once the information Mr. Papadopoulos had disclosed to
the Australian diplomat reached the FBI, the bureau opened an investigation that became one of its most closely guarded
secrets." The impetus behind this investigation, the
Times
reported, "was not, as Mr. Trump and other politicians have alleged, a dossier compiled
by a former British spy hired by a rival campaign. Instead, it was firsthand information from one of America's closest
intelligence allies."
The conclusion reached by the paper was parroted three days later when it published an
op-ed written by the co-founders of Fusion GPS, the firm that contracted the Steele dossier. "We don't believe the
Steele dossier was the trigger for the FBI's investigation into Russian meddling," Glenn Simpson and Peter Fritsch
wrote. "As we told the Senate Judiciary Committee in August, our sources said the dossier was taken so seriously because
it corroborated reports the bureau had received from other sources, including one inside the Trump camp." It is presumed
that the Fusion GPS founders were referring to the Downer cable.
"The intelligence committees," Simpson and Fritsch stated, "have known for months that
credible allegations of collusion between the Trump camp and Russia were pouring in from independent sources during the
campaign. Yet lawmakers in the thrall of the president continue to wage a cynical campaign to portray us as the
unwitting victims of Kremlin disinformation."
"Kremlin disinformation" is the best way to describe the information contained in the
Downer cable; it is clearly not linked to the DNC hacks (despite the
New York
Times'
efforts to establish such), and the premise underpinning its sourcing
(that the Russian intelligence service provided access to what would be one of its most sensitive operations to a
Maltese academic and a minor American advisor) is patently absurd.
On its surface, the wild claims made by Papadopoulos,
as reported by Downer, are of a similarly poor quality as the information that underpinned
the
pitch made by the British publicist, Robert Goldstone
, that put the Fusion
GPS-affiliated Russian lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya, in contact with Donald Trump, Jr., on June 9.
The Goldstone information is eerily like the information provided by Christopher
Steele himself in his report of June 20: "A dossier of compromising material on Hillary Clinton has been collated (sic)
by the Russian Intelligence Services over many years and mainly comprises bugged conversations she had on various trips
to Russia and intercepted phone calls." Mr. Steele was contracted by Fusion GPS sometime after June 17; less than three
days later, he was able to produce a report that made use of no fewer than seven named senior sources, as well as making
use of a "company ethnic Russian operative" to conduct an investigation inside Russia. This time frame is
unrealistically short, suggesting that Steele himself was spoon fed a pre-packaged storyline -- in short, "Kremlin
disinformation." Seen in this light, the Papadopoulos story is more about a Russian campaign to neutralize a future
American president as part of its ongoing effort to undermine American power and prestige than it is about collusion
between this candidate and Russia to get him elected. That the FBI, and others, would rely on such information to
actively undermine the legitimacy of a duly elected American president remains a topic which Republicans in Congress
would do well to continue to investigate.
Scott Ritter is a former Marine Corps intelligence officer who served in the former Soviet Union implementing
arms control treaties, in the Persian Gulf during Operation Desert Storm, and in Iraq overseeing the disarmament of WMD.
He is the author of
Deal of the Century: How Iran Blocked the West's Road to War
(Clarity Press, 2017).
"... Reading that piece it becomes clear (but is never said) that the sole source for that August 2016 Brennan claim of "Russian hacking" is the absurd Steele dossier some ex-MI6 dude created for too much money as opposition research against Trump . The only other "evidence" for "Russian hacking" is the Crowdstrike report on the DNC "hack". Crowdstrike has a Ukrainian nationalist agenda, was hired by the DNC ..."
"... The Crowdstrike' report was concocted under command of Dmitri Alperovitch, a rabid Russophobe of Jewish ethnicity, who is also an "expert" at Atlantic Council, where he joins other "experts" like Eliot Higgins. Higgins was nicely dressed recently by the honorable C0l. Pat Lang who wrote about Higgins: " an uneducated, inexperienced guy with an opinion The fact that this gentlemen is treated as a credible source is further proof of the insanity that has taken over the public debate. He knows nothing other than what he has read. He has not been through live agent training at Fort McClellan (I have). He has no scientific background in the subject matter and no experience (other than playing video games) with actual chemical weapons (Ted Postol, who has written extensively on the subject, does have actual scientific and military expertise on the topic). Higgins knows nothing of the military doctrine for employing such weapons. He knows nothing of the process and procedures required for a military unit to safely handle, load, activate and deploy such weapons." ..."
"... To illustrate the power of the Lobby, it is educational to know that Higgins is also a "Visiting Research Associate at the Centre for Science and Security Studies (CSSS), Department of War Studies, King's College London, Strand, London WC2R 2LS," - kidding you not. http://www.kcl.ac.uk/sspp/departments/warstudies/people/visiting/higgins.aspx ..."
"WaPo has a 8,300 word weekend opus on how Obama failed to react to CIA director Brennan's
claims that Putin himself ordered to hack the U.S. election.
Note:
Reading that piece it becomes clear (but is never said) that the sole source for that
August 2016 Brennan claim of "Russian hacking" is the absurd Steele dossier some ex-MI6 dude
created for too much money as opposition research against Trump . The only other
"evidence" for "Russian hacking" is the Crowdstrike report on the DNC "hack". Crowdstrike has
a Ukrainian nationalist agenda, was hired by the DNC , had to retract other "Russian
hacking" claims and no one else was allowed to take a look at the DNC servers.
Said
differently: The whole "Russian hacking" claims are solely based on "evidence" of two fake
reports."
The Crowdstrike' report was concocted under command of Dmitri Alperovitch, a rabid
Russophobe of Jewish ethnicity, who is also an "expert" at Atlantic Council, where he joins
other "experts" like Eliot Higgins. Higgins was nicely dressed recently by the honorable C0l.
Pat Lang who wrote about Higgins: " an uneducated, inexperienced guy with an opinion The fact
that this gentlemen is treated as a credible source is further proof of the insanity that has
taken over the public debate. He knows nothing other than what he has read. He has not been
through live agent training at Fort McClellan (I have). He has no scientific background in
the subject matter and no experience (other than playing video games) with actual chemical
weapons (Ted Postol, who has written extensively on the subject, does have actual scientific
and military expertise on the topic). Higgins knows nothing of the military doctrine for
employing such weapons. He knows nothing of the process and procedures required for a
military unit to safely handle, load, activate and deploy such weapons."
To illustrate the power of the Lobby, it is educational to know that Higgins is also a
"Visiting Research Associate at the Centre for Science and Security Studies (CSSS), Department of War Studies, King's College London, Strand, London WC2R 2LS," - kidding
you not. http://www.kcl.ac.uk/sspp/departments/warstudies/people/visiting/higgins.aspx
Papadopoulos rumor is that he told some Aussie diplomat that the Russians have dirt on Clinton. He claims to have learned that
from some mysterious Professor Mifsud who was trying to set up a Trump-Putin meeting with the hope to profit from the effort. The
professor was some kind of imposter. He arranged a meeting for Papadopoulos with "Putin's niece". Both of Putin's siblings died at
child's age during the World War II siege of Leningrad - he has no niece. Whatever Mifsud claimed was probably not true.
The Australian diplomat heard from a drunk Papadopoulos that some weird professor claimed to have heard from Russian sources
that the Kremlin had dirt on Clinton. Two month later the Aussies tell their U.S. colleagues of that claim. It is fourth degree
hearsay when it it reaches the FBI
The bio of Joseph Mifsud, the professor at the center of the Trump-Russia probe, has been
removed from the website of the university in Rome where he has worked for years, BuzzFeed
reports.
In late October Mifsud was identified by the Washington Post as one of George Papadopoulos'
key links to Russian officials. Papadopolous, President Donald Trump's former foreign policy
adviser during the presidential campaign, pleaded guilty Oct. 5 to lying to federal agents
about his contacts with people with connections to the Russian government.
Mifsud worked as a professor at Link Campus University (LCU) in Rome, where he led a
three-year degree course in political science and international relations. An FBI affidavit
unsealed in late October stated Papadopoulos acknowledged the professor "had told him about the
Russians possessing dirt on then-candidate Hillary Clinton in the form of thousands of
emails."
But his name no longer appears on the faculty pages, and his bio now goes to a 404 error
page. Mifsud, according to a fellow professor who spoke to BuzzFeed anonymously, hasn't been
seen on the Rome campus in weeks.
Who is Ezra Cohen-Watnick, the 30-year-old White House aide who could be a key player in the blockbuster
investigation into Russian ties to President Trump and his campaign?
Cohen-Watnick, 30, who
The New York Times reports
provided key information in the probe, is a once fast-rising protege of ousted
Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn with deep roots in suburban Washington's Jewish community.
The paper identified him as one of two staffers who explosively gave information on intelligence gathering in
the Russia probe to Republican House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, a move that potentially
compromised the lawmaker's role in the bombshell probe.
Cohen-Watnick grew up in Chevy Chase, Maryland, just outside the nation's capital, and attended the nearby
Conservative synagogue Ohr Kodesh. Last November he celebrated his engagement to Rebecca Miller at the synagogue.
He attended the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in 2008. Cohen-Watnick began working as an intelligence
analyst at the Defense Intelligence Agency after college. At the DIA, Cohen-Watnick met Flynn, the then-director
who was later removed from his position during the Obama administration.
After Trump won the November election, Flynn brought Cohen-Watnick from the DIA to the Trump transition team,
where the young staffer, according to
The Washington Post,
was among the few Trump advisers to hold a top security clearance. He participated in
high-level intelligence briefings and briefed Trump, Vice President Mike Pence and their team on national security
issues.
When Flynn was appointed to lead the National Security Council, he hired Cohen-Watnick to work with him there.
But Flynn served as national security adviser for less than a month before being asked to leave following
revelations that he had maintained ties with Russia during the campaign.
Flynn's successor, Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster, sought to remove Cohen-Watnick from the team, following input from
the CIA director who pointed to problems intelligence officers had when dealing with Cohen-Watnick. Questions were
raised about his ability to carry out the position of senior NSC director for intelligence programs, who oversees
ties with intelligence agencies and vets information that should reach the president's desk.
But Cohen-Watnick was spared when Trump personally intervened, reportedly after top White House aides Sphen
Bannon and Jared Kushner stepped in. Cohen-Watnick still serves as senior director at the NSC.
Cohen-Watnick is known for holding hawkish views on national security issues and of being a proponent of an
American tough line toward Iran.
The Times said that Cohen-Watnick became swept up in the Russia probe this month, shortly after Trump wrote on
Twitter about unsubstantiated claims of being wiretapped on the orders of the former president Barack Obama.
Cohen-Watnick apparently was reviewing highly classified reports detailing the intercepted communications of
foreign officials that consisted primarily of ambassadors and other foreign officials talking about how they were
trying to curry favor with Trump's family and inner circle in advance of his inauguration.
He and another aide, identified as Michael Ellis, came across information that Trump aides may have been
inadvertently caught on some of the surveillance.
Nunes says he went to the White House to meet with the aides, whom he has refused to identify. Nunes would not
share the information with his colleagues on the committee but did brief Trump, raising major questions about his
independence.
"... In totalitarian systems where the media does nothing but churn out propaganda, people learn to read between the lines. You understand what is really going on by inferring what they don't want you to know from what they do what you to know. ..."
"... Why would you not believe "unnamed officials"? But what we are seeing very obviously is some of the shape and texture of the war based on who is being targeted and why. While those doing the targeting are "unnamed", their targets are named. And that tells us also about those doing the targeting. ..."
In totalitarian systems where the media does nothing but churn
out propaganda, people learn to read between the lines. You understand what is really going on
by inferring what they don't want you to know from what they do what you to know.
The interesting thing about the current political conflict is which key anti-terrorist Trump
figures are being targeted. Flynn was a major target. Then Gorka. The case of Gorka made the
targeting obvious. You can tell the targeting when if the first attack fails, they come back
with a second one.
Now there's Ezra Watnick-Cohen. He showed up in the news recently when McMaster attempted
to replace him with an establishment infiltrator.
President Donald Trump has overruled a decision by his national security adviser, Lt. Gen.
H.R. McMaster, to sideline a key intelligence operative who fell out of favor with some at
the Central Intelligence Agency, two sources told POLITICO.
On Friday, McMaster told the National Security Council's senior director for intelligence
programs, Ezra Cohen-Watnick, that he would be moved to another position in the
organization.
The conversation followed weeks of pressure from career officials at the CIA who had
expressed reservations about the 30-year-old intelligence operative and pushed for his
ouster.
But Cohen-Watnick appealed McMaster's decision to two influential allies with whom he had
forged a relationship while working on Trump's transition team -- White House advisers Steve
Bannon and Jared Kushner. They brought the matter to Trump on Sunday, and the president
agreed that Cohen-Watnick should remain as the NSC's intelligence director, according to two
people with knowledge of the episode.
Cohen-Watnick was brought onto Trump's transition team and then the NSC by a leading
critic of the CIA: retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, who was Cohen-Watnick's boss at the
Defense Intelligence Agency and preceded McMaster as national security adviser.
Cohen-Watnick and Flynn "saw eye to eye about the failings of the CIA human intelligence
operations," said a Washington consultant who travels in intelligence circles. "The CIA saw
him as a threat, so they tried to unseat him and replace him with an agency loyalist," the
operative said.
Two sources within the White House tell me that last week McMaster had interviewed a
potential replacement for Cohen-Watnick: longtime CIA official Linda Weissgold. Weissgold
apparently had a good interview with McMaster, as she was overheard saying as she left the
White House she would next have to "talk to Pompeo" -- as in Mike Pompeo, the director of the
CIA. But Weissgold was never offered the job; days later, Trump himself overruled the effort
to move Cohen-Watnick out of his senior director role.
During the Obama administration Weissgold served as director of the CIA's Office of
Terrorism Analysis. She was among those who briefed Congress following the Benghazi terrorist
attack in 2012, a team of intelligence and military experts who reportedly earned the
nickname "the dream team" within the administration.
In her position at OTA, she was also involved directly in drafting the now infamous
Benghazi talking points, which government officials revised heavily to include factually
incorrect assessments that stated the attackers were prompted by protests. According to the
House Select Committee on Benghazi's report, Weissgold testified she had changed one such
talking point to say that extremists in Benghazi with ties to al Qaeda had been involved in
"protests" in the Libyan city, despite the fact that no such protests had occurred there on
the day of the attack.
McMaster's interview of Weissgold last week raised eyebrows beyond the White House, with
members of the congressional oversight committees expressing concerns about Weissgold to top
officials in the White House and the intelligence community.
A Jewish security official has been named as the confidential source of House Intelligence
Committee chairman Devin Nunes (R-CA) following claims that US President Donald Trump and his
aides were swept up in surveillance by US intelligence agencies, The New York Times revealed
Thursday.
Citing unnamed US officials, the Times identified the White House official as "Ezra
Cohen-Watnick, the senior director for intelligence at the National Security Council."
Why would you not believe "unnamed officials"? But what we are seeing very obviously is some of the shape and texture of the war based on
who is being targeted and why. While those doing the targeting are "unnamed", their targets are
named. And that tells us also about those doing the targeting. Any enemy action reveals
something about the enemy, his motives, his nature and his goals. That is how wars of this kind
must be understood.
This is clearly neoliberal/neocon outlet and its interpretation of events is highly suspect. But there one art quote here due to
which I decided to reproduce this example of garbage journalism -- quote from Trump about national security state: "Intelligence agencies should never have allowed this
fake news to "leak" into the public. One last shot at me. Are we living in
Nazi Germany? "
Calling CIA judgment into question is a dangerous business in the USA (as Chuck Shumer told Trump), as the tail is wagging
the dog.
Notable quotes:
"... In his Person of the Year interview with Time , Trump said that he did not believe Russia interfered in the election. "It could be Russia," Trump said. "And it could be China. And it could be some guy in his home in New Jersey." Later, his transition team released a statement that not only rejected the CIA's findings, but called the agency's judgement into question . ..."
"... "These are the same people that said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction," the Trump transition team said Dec. 9 ..."
"... Trump continued to attack the intelligence community into January, appearing to side with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange over his own intelligence community and expressing skepticism about the agencies on Twitter. ..."
"... After the release of an unverified bombshell report alleging Russia had been "assisting Trump for at least five years" and that he had received a "golden shower show," Trump invoked Nazi Germany in a tirade against U.S. intelligence. ..."
"... Intelligence agencies should never have allowed this fake news to "leak" into the public. One last shot at me. Are we living in Nazi Germany? ..."
"... "I have a running war with the media," Trump said. "They are among the most dishonest human beings on Earth. And they sort of made it sound like I had a feud with the intelligence community. And I just want to let you know, the reason you're the number-one stop is exactly the opposite -- exactly." ..."
In December
, the CIA told Senators that Russia had not only interfered in
the 2016 election, but had done so with the intent of getting Trump into the
White House.
Trump and his transition team immediately dismissed the
claims.
In his
Person of the Year
interview with
Time
, Trump said that he did not
believe Russia interfered in the election.
"It could be Russia," Trump said. "And it could be China. And it could be
some guy in his home in New Jersey."
Later, his transition team released a statement that not only rejected the
CIA's findings, but
called the agency's judgement into question
.
"These are the same people that said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass
destruction," the Trump transition team said Dec. 9. "The election ended a
long time ago in one of the biggest Electoral College victories in history.
It's now time to move on and "Make America Great Again.'"
After the release of an unverified
bombshell report
alleging Russia had been "assisting Trump for at least
five years" and that he had received a "golden shower show," Trump invoked
Nazi Germany in a tirade against U.S. intelligence.
Intelligence agencies should never have allowed this
fake news to "leak" into the public. One last shot at me. Are we living in
Nazi Germany?
The day after Trump assumed the presidency, he
gave a rambling speech at CIA headquarters in which he
blamed the media
for "[making] it sound like I had a feud with the
intelligence community."
"I have a running war with the media," Trump
said. "They are among the most dishonest human beings on Earth. And they sort
of made it sound like I had a feud with the intelligence community. And I just
want to let you know, the reason you're the number-one stop is exactly the
opposite -- exactly."
Essentially CIA dictates the US foreign policy. The tail is wagging the dog. The current Russophobia hysteria mean
additional billions for CIA and FBI. As simple as that.
The article contain some important observation about self-sustaining nature of the US
militarism. It is able to create new threats and new insurgencies almost at will via CIA activities.
The key problem is that wars are highly profitable for important part of the ruling elite,
especially representing finance and military industrial complex. Also now part of the US
ruling elite now consists of "colonial administrators" which are directly interested in maintaining
and expanding the US empire. This is trap from which nation might not be able to escape.
Notable quotes:
"... The U.S. government may pretend to respect a "rules-based" global order, but the only rule Washington seems to follow is "might makes right" -- and the CIA has long served as a chief instigator and enforcer, writes Nicolas J.S. Davies. ..."
"... Once the CIA went to work in Vietnam to undermine the 1954 Geneva Accords and the planned reunification of North and South through a free and fair election in 1956, the die was cast. ..."
"... No U.S. president could extricate the U.S. from Vietnam without exposing the limits of what U.S. military force could achieve, betraying widely held national myths and the powerful interests that sustained and profited from them. ..."
"... The critical "lesson of Vietnam" was summed up by Richard Barnet in his 1972 book Roots of War . "At the very moment that the number one nation has perfected the science of killing," Barnet wrote, "It has become an impractical means of political domination." ..."
"... Even the senior officer corps of the U.S. military saw it that way, since many of them had survived the horrors of Vietnam as junior officers. The CIA could still wreak havoc in Latin America and elsewhere, but the full destructive force of the U.S. military was not unleashed again until the invasion of Panama in 1989 and the First Gulf War in 1991. ..."
"... Half a century after Vietnam, we have tragically come full circle. With the CIA's politicized intelligence running wild in Washington and its covert operations spreading violence and chaos across every continent, President Trump faces the same pressures to maintain his own and his country's credibility as Johnson and Nixon did. ..."
"... Trump is facing these questions, not just in one country, Vietnam, but in dozens of countries across the world, and the interests perpetuating and fueling this cycle of crisis and war have only become more entrenched over time, as President Eisenhower warned that they would, despite the end of the Cold War and, until now, the lack of any actual military threat to the United States. ..."
"... U.S. Air Force Colonel Fletcher Prouty was the chief of special operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 1955 to 1964, managing the global military support system for the CIA in Vietnam and around the world. Fletcher Prouty's book, The Secret Team: The CIA and its Allies in Control of the United States and the World , was suppressed when it was first published in 1973. Thousands of copies disappeared from bookstores and libraries, and a mysterious Army Colonel bought the entire shipment of 3,500 copies the publisher sent to Australia. But Prouty's book was republished in 2011, and it is a timely account of the role of the CIA in U.S. policy. ..."
"... The main purpose of the CIA, as Prouty saw it, is to create such pretexts for war. ..."
"... The CIA is a hybrid of an intelligence service that gathers and analyzes foreign intelligence and a clandestine service that conducts covert operations. Both functions are essential to creating pretexts for war, and that is what they have done for 70 years. ..."
"... Prouty described how the CIA infiltrated the U.S. military, the State Department, the National Security Council and other government institutions, covertly placing its officers in critical positions to ensure that its plans are approved and that it has access to whatever forces, weapons, equipment, ammunition and other resources it needs to carry them out. ..."
"... Many retired intelligence officers, such as Ray McGovern and the members of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS), saw the merging of clandestine operations with intelligence analysis in one agency as corrupting the objective analysis they tried to provide to policymakers. They formed VIPS in 2003 in response to the fabrication of politicized intelligence that provided false pretexts for the U.S. to invade and destroy Iraq. ..."
"... But Fletcher Prouty was even more disturbed by the way that the CIA uses clandestine operations to trigger coups, wars and chaos. The civil and proxy war in Syria is a perfect example of what Prouty meant ..."
"... The role of U.S. "counterterrorism" operations in fueling armed resistance and terrorism, and the absence of any plan to reduce the asymmetric violence unleashed by the "global war on terror," would be no surprise to Fletcher Prouty. As he explained, such clandestine operations always take on a life of their own that is unrelated, and often counter-productive, to any rational U.S. policy objective. ..."
"... This is a textbook CIA operation on the same model as Vietnam in the late 1950s and early 60s. The CIA uses U.S. special forces and training missions to launch covert and proxy military operations that drive local populations into armed resistance groups, and then uses the presence of those armed resistance groups to justify ever-escalating U.S. military involvement. This is Vietnam redux on a continental scale. ..."
"... China is already too big and powerful for the U.S. to apply what is known as the Ledeen doctrine named for neoconservative theorist and intelligence operative Michael Ledeen who suggested that every 10 years or so, the United States "pick up some small crappy little country and throw it against the wall, just to show we mean business." ..."
"... As long as the CIA and the U.S. military keep plunging the scapegoats for our failed policies into economic crisis, violence and chaos, the United States and the United Kingdom can remain the safe havens of the world's wealth, islands of privilege and excess amidst the storms they unleash on others. ..."
"... But if that is the only "significant national objective" driving these policies, it is surely about time for the 99 percent of Americans who reap no benefit from these murderous schemes to stop the CIA and its allies before they completely wreck the already damaged and fragile world in which we all must live, Americans and foreigners alike. ..."
"... Douglas Valentine has probably studied the CIA in more depth than any other American journalist, beginning with his book on The Phoenix Program in Vietnam. He has written a new book titled The CIA as Organized Crime : How Illegal Operations Corrupt America and the World, in which he brings Fletcher Prouty's analysis right up to the present day, describing the CIA's role in our current wars and the many ways it infiltrates, manipulates and controls U.S. policy. ..."
"... In Venezuela, the CIA and the right-wing opposition are following the same strategy that President Nixon ordered the CIA to inflict on Chile, to "make the economy scream" in preparation for the 1973 coup. ..."
"... The U.S. willingness to scrap the Agreed Framework in 2003, the breakdown of the Six Party Talks in 2009 and the U.S. refusal to acknowledge that its own military actions and threats create legitimate defense concerns for North Korea have driven the North Koreans into a corner from which they see a credible nuclear deterrent as their only chance to avoid mass destruction. ..."
"... Obama's charm offensive invigorated old and new military alliances with the U.K., France and the Arab monarchies, and he quietly ran up the most expensive military budge t of any president since World War Two. ..."
"... Throughout history, serial aggression has nearly always provoked increasingly united opposition, as peace-loving countries and people have reluctantly summoned the courage to stand up to an aggressor. France under Napoleon and Hitler's Germany also regarded themselves as exceptional, and in their own ways they were. But in the end, their belief in their exceptionalism led them on to defeat and destruction. ..."
The U.S. government may pretend to respect a "rules-based" global order, but the only rule Washington
seems to follow is "might makes right" -- and the CIA has long served as a chief instigator and enforcer,
writes Nicolas J.S. Davies.
As the recent PBS documentary on the American War in Vietnam acknowledged, few American officials
ever believed that the United States could win the war, neither those advising Johnson as he committed
hundreds of thousands of U.S. troops, nor those advising Nixon as he escalated a brutal aerial bombardment
that had already killed millions of people.
As conversations tape-recorded in the White House reveal, and as other writers have documented,
the reasons for wading into the Big Muddy, as
Pete Seeger satirized it
, and then pushing on regardless, all came down to "credibility": the domestic political credibility
of the politicians involved and America's international credibility as a military power.
Once the CIA went to work in Vietnam to undermine the
1954 Geneva Accords
and the planned reunification of North and South through a free and fair election in 1956, the die
was cast. The CIA's support for the repressive
Diem regime and its successors
ensured an ever-escalating war, as the South rose in rebellion, supported by the North. No U.S. president
could extricate the U.S. from Vietnam without exposing the limits of what U.S. military force could
achieve, betraying widely held national myths and the powerful interests that sustained and profited
from them.
The critical "lesson of Vietnam" was summed up by Richard Barnet in his 1972 book
Roots
of War . "At the very moment that the number one nation has perfected the science of killing,"
Barnet wrote, "It has become an impractical means of political domination."
Even the senior officer corps of the U.S. military saw it that way, since many of them had survived
the horrors of Vietnam as junior officers. The CIA could still wreak havoc in Latin America and elsewhere,
but the full destructive force of the U.S. military was not unleashed again until the invasion of
Panama in 1989 and the First Gulf War in 1991.
Half a century after Vietnam, we have tragically come full circle. With the CIA's politicized
intelligence running wild in Washington and its covert operations spreading violence and chaos across
every continent, President Trump faces the same pressures to maintain his own and his country's credibility
as Johnson and Nixon did. His predictable response has been to escalate ongoing wars in Syria, Iraq,
Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia and West Africa, and to threaten new ones against North Korea, Iran and
Venezuela.
Trump is facing these questions, not just in one country, Vietnam, but in dozens of countries
across the world, and the interests perpetuating and fueling this cycle of crisis and war have only
become more entrenched over time, as
President Eisenhower warned that they would, despite the end of the Cold War and, until now,
the lack of any actual military threat to the United States.
Ironically but predictably, the U.S.'s aggressive and illegal war policy has finally provoked
a real military threat to the U.S., albeit one that has emerged only in response to U.S. war plans.
As I explained in a recent article , North Korea's discovery in 2016 of a U.S. plan to assassinate
its president, Kim Jong Un, and launch a Second Korean War has triggered a crash program to develop
long-range ballistic missiles that could give North Korea a viable nuclear deterrent and prevent
a U.S. attack. But the North Koreans will not feel safe from attack until their leaders and ours
are sure that their missiles can deliver a nuclear strike against the U.S. mainland.
The CIA's Pretexts for War
U.S. Air Force Colonel Fletcher Prouty was the chief of special operations for the Joint Chiefs
of Staff from 1955 to 1964, managing the global military support system for the CIA in Vietnam and
around the world. Fletcher Prouty's book,
The Secret Team: The CIA and its Allies in Control of the United States and the World ,
was suppressed when it was first published in 1973. Thousands of copies disappeared from bookstores
and libraries, and a mysterious Army Colonel bought the entire shipment of 3,500 copies the publisher
sent to Australia. But Prouty's book was republished in 2011, and it is a timely account of the role
of the CIA in U.S. policy.
Prouty surprisingly described the role of the CIA as a response by powerful people and interests
to the abolition of the U.S. Department of War and the creation of the Department of Defense in 1947.
Once the role of the U.S. military was redefined as one of defense, in line with the United Nations
Charter's
prohibition against the threat or use of military force in 1945 and similar moves by other military
powers, it would require some kind of crisis or threat to justify using military force in the future,
both legally and politically. The main purpose of the CIA, as Prouty saw it, is to create such
pretexts for war.
The CIA is a hybrid of an intelligence service that gathers and analyzes foreign intelligence
and a clandestine service that conducts covert operations. Both functions are essential to creating
pretexts for war, and that is what they have done for 70 years.
Prouty described how the CIA infiltrated the U.S. military, the State Department, the National
Security Council and other government institutions, covertly placing its officers in critical positions
to ensure that its plans are approved and that it has access to whatever forces, weapons, equipment,
ammunition and other resources it needs to carry them out.
Many retired intelligence officers, such as Ray McGovern and the members of Veteran Intelligence
Professionals for Sanity (VIPS), saw the merging of clandestine operations with intelligence analysis
in one agency as corrupting the objective analysis they tried to provide to policymakers. They formed
VIPS in 2003 in response to the fabrication of politicized intelligence that provided false pretexts
for the U.S. to invade and destroy Iraq.
CIA in Syria and Africa
But Fletcher Prouty was even more disturbed by the way that the CIA uses clandestine operations
to trigger coups, wars and chaos. The civil and proxy war in Syria is a perfect example of what Prouty
meant. In late 2011, after destroying Libya and aiding in the torture-murder of Muammar Gaddafi,
the CIA and its allies began
flying fighters
and weapons from Libya to Turkey and infiltrating them into Syria. Then, working with Saudi Arabia,
Qatar, Turkey, Croatia and other allies, this operation poured
thousands of tons of weapons across Syria's borders to ignite and fuel a full-scale civil war.
Once these covert operations were under way, they ran wild until they had unleashed a savage Al
Qaeda affiliate in Syria (Jabhat al-Nusra, now rebranded as Jabhat Fateh al-Sham), spawned the even
more savage "Islamic State," triggered
the heaviest
and
probably the deadliest U.S. bombing campaign since Vietnam and drawn Russia, Iran, Turkey, Israel,
Jordan, Hezbollah, Kurdish militias and almost every state or armed group in the Middle East into
the chaos of Syria's civil war.
Meanwhile, as Al Qaeda and Islamic State have expanded their operations across Africa, the U.N.
has published a report titled
Journey to Extremismin Africa: Drivers, Incentives and the Tipping Point for Recruitment
, based on 500 interviews with African militants. This study has found that the kind of special operations
and training missions the CIA and AFRICOM are conducting and supporting in Africa are in fact the
critical "tipping point" that drives Africans to join militant groups like Al Qaeda, Al-Shabab and
Boko Haram.
The report found that government action, such as the killing or detention of friends or family,
was the "tipping point" that drove 71 percent of African militants interviewed to join armed groups,
and that this was a more important factor than religious ideology.
The conclusions of Journey to Extremism in Africa confirm the findings of other similar
studies. The Center for Civilians in Conflict interviewed 250 civilians who joined armed groups in
Bosnia, Somalia, Gaza and Libya for its 2015 study,
The People's Perspectives: Civilian Involvement in Armed Conflict . The study
found that the most common motivation for civilians to join armed groups was simply to protect themselves
or their families.
The role of U.S. "counterterrorism" operations in fueling armed resistance and terrorism, and
the absence of any plan to reduce the asymmetric violence unleashed by the "global war on terror,"
would be no surprise to Fletcher Prouty. As he explained, such clandestine operations always take
on a life of their own that is unrelated, and often counter-productive, to any rational U.S. policy
objective.
"The more intimate one becomes with this activity," Prouty wrote, "The more one begins to realize
that such operations are rarely, if ever, initiated from an intent to become involved in pursuit
of some national objective in the first place."
The U.S. justifies the deployment of 6,000 U.S. special forces and military trainers to
53 of the 54 countries in Africa as a response to terrorism. But the U.N.'s Journey to Extremism
in Africa study makes it clear that the U.S. militarization of Africa is in fact the "tipping
point" that is driving Africans across the continent to join armed resistance groups in the first
place.
This is a textbook CIA operation on the same model as Vietnam in the late 1950s and early
60s. The CIA uses U.S. special forces and training missions to launch covert and proxy military operations
that drive local populations into armed resistance groups, and then uses the presence of those armed
resistance groups to justify ever-escalating U.S. military involvement. This is Vietnam redux on
a continental scale.
Taking on China
What seems to really be driving the CIA's militarization of U.S. policy in Africa is China's growing
influence on the continent. As Steve Bannon put it in an
interview with the Economist in August, "Let's go screw up One Belt One Road."
China is already too big and powerful for the U.S. to apply what is known as the Ledeen doctrine
named for neoconservative theorist and intelligence operative Michael Ledeen who suggested that every
10 years or so, the United States "pick up some small crappy little country and throw it against
the wall, just to show we mean business."
China is too powerful and armed with nuclear weapons. So, in this case, the CIA's job would be
to spread violence and chaos to disrupt Chinese trade and investment, and to make African governments
increasingly dependent on U.S. military aid to fight the militant groups spawned and endlessly regenerated
by U.S.-led "counterterrorism" operations.
Neither Ledeen nor Bannon pretend that such policies are designed to build more prosperous or
viable societies in the Middle East or Africa, let alone to benefit their people. They both know
very well what Richard Barnet already understood 45 years ago, that America's unprecedented investment
in weapons, war and CIA covert operations are only good for one thing: to kill people and destroy
infrastructure, reducing cities to rubble, societies to chaos and the desperate survivors to poverty
and displacement.
As long as the CIA and the U.S. military keep plunging the scapegoats for our failed policies
into economic crisis, violence and chaos, the United States and the United Kingdom can remain the
safe havens of the world's wealth, islands of privilege and excess amidst the storms they unleash
on others.
But if that is the only "significant national objective" driving these policies, it is surely
about time for the 99 percent of Americans who reap no benefit from these murderous schemes to stop
the CIA and its allies before they completely wreck the already damaged and fragile world in which
we all must live, Americans and foreigners alike.
Douglas Valentine has probably studied the CIA in more depth than any other American journalist,
beginning with his book on
The Phoenix Program in Vietnam. He has written a new book titled
The CIA as Organized Crime: How Illegal Operations Corrupt America and the World, in which he brings Fletcher Prouty's
analysis right up to the present day, describing the CIA's role in our current wars and the many
ways it infiltrates, manipulates and controls U.S. policy.
The Three Scapegoats
In
Trump's speech to the U.N. General Assembly, he named North Korea, Iran and Venezuela as his
prime targets for destabilization, economic warfare and, ultimately, the overthrow of their governments,
whether by coup d'etat or the mass destruction of their civilian population and infrastructure.
But Trump's choice of scapegoats for America's failures was obviously not based on a rational reassessment
of foreign policy priorities by the new administration. It was only a tired rehashing of the CIA's
unfinished business with two-thirds of Bush's "axis of evil" and Bush White House official
Elliott Abrams'
failed 2002 coup in Caracas, now laced with explicit and illegal threats of aggression.
How Trump and the CIA plan to sacrifice their three scapegoats for America's failures remains
to be seen. This is not 2001, when the world stood silent at the U.S. bombardment and invasion of
Afghanistan after September 11th. It is more like 2003, when the U.S. destruction of Iraq split the
Atlantic alliance and alienated most of the world. It is certainly not 2011, after Obama's global
charm offensive had rebuilt U.S. alliances and provided cover for French President Sarkozy, British
Prime Minister Cameron, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the Arab royals to destroy Libya,
once ranked by the U.N. as the
most developed country
in Africa , now mired in intractable chaos.
In 2017, a U.S. attack on any one of Trump's scapegoats would isolate the United States from many
of its allies and undermine its standing in the world in far-reaching ways that might be more permanent
and harder to repair than the invasion and destruction of Iraq.
In Venezuela, the CIA and the right-wing opposition are following the same strategy that President
Nixon ordered the CIA to inflict on Chile, to
"make the economy
scream" in preparation for the 1973 coup. But the
solid victory of Venezuela's
ruling Socialist Party in recent nationwide gubernatorial elections, despite a long and deep
economic crisis, reveals little public support for the CIA's puppets in Venezuela.
The CIA has successfully discredited the Venezuelan government through economic warfare, increasingly
violent right-wing street protests and a global propaganda campaign. But the CIA has stupidly hitched
its wagon to an extreme right-wing, upper-class opposition that has no credibility with most of the
Venezuelan public, who still turn out for the Socialists at the polls. A CIA coup or U.S. military
intervention would meet fierce public resistance and damage U.S. relations all over Latin America.
Boxing In North Korea
A U.S. aerial bombardment or "preemptive strike" on North Korea could quickly escalate into a
war between the U.S. and China, which has reiterated
its commitment to North
Korea's defense if North Korea is attacked. We do not know exactly what was in the
U.S. war plan discovered by North Korea, so neither can we know how North Korea and China could
respond if the U.S. pressed ahead with it.
Most analysts have long concluded that any U.S. attack on North Korea would be met with a North
Korean artillery and missile barrage that would inflict unacceptable civilian casualties on Seoul,
a metropolitan area of 26 million people, three times the population of New York City. Seoul is only
35 miles from the frontier with North Korea, placing it within range of a huge array of North Korean
weapons. What was already a no-win calculus is now compounded by the possibility that North Korea
could respond with nuclear weapons, turning any prospect of a U.S. attack into an even worse nightmare.
U.S. mismanagement of its relations with North Korea should be an object lesson for its relations
with Iran, graphically demonstrating the advantages of diplomacy, talks and agreements over threats
of war. Under the
Agreed Framework
signed in 1994, North Korea stopped work on two much larger nuclear reactors than the small experimental
one operating at Yongbyong since 1986, which only produces 6 kg of plutonium per year, enough for
one nuclear bomb.
The lesson of Bush's Iraq invasion in 2003 after Saddam Hussein had complied with demands that
he destroy Iraq's stockpiles of chemical weapons and shut down a nascent nuclear program was not
lost on North Korea. Not only did the invasion lay waste to large sections of Iraq with hundreds
of thousands of dead but Hussein himself was hunted down and condemned to death by hanging.
Still, after North Korea tested its first nuclear weapon in 2006, even its small experimental
reactor was shut down as a result of the
"Six Party Talks" in
2007, all the fuel rods were removed and placed under supervision of the International Atomic Energy
Agency, and the cooling tower of the reactor was demolished in 2008.
But then, as relations deteriorated, North Korea conducted a second nuclear weapon test and again
began reprocessing spent fuel rods to recover plutonium for use in nuclear weapons.
North Korea has now conducted six nuclear weapons tests. The explosions in
the first five tests increased gradually up to 15-25 kilotons, about the yield of the bombs the
U.S. dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but estimates for the yield of the 2017 test range
from 110
to 250 kilotons , comparable
to a small hydrogen bomb.
The even greater danger in a new war in Korea is that the U.S. could unleash part of its arsenal
of
4,000 more powerful weapons (100 to 1,200 kilotons), which could kill millions of people and
devastate and poison the region, or even the world, for years to come.
The U.S. willingness to scrap the Agreed Framework in 2003, the breakdown of the Six Party Talks
in 2009 and the U.S. refusal to acknowledge that its own military actions and threats create legitimate
defense concerns for North Korea have driven the North Koreans into a corner from which they see
a credible nuclear deterrent as their only chance to avoid mass destruction.
China has proposed a
reasonable framework for diplomacy to address the concerns of both sides, but the U.S. insists
on maintaining its propaganda narratives that all the fault lies with North Korea and that it has
some kind of "military solution" to the crisis.
This may be the most dangerous idea we have heard from U.S. policymakers since the end of the
Cold War, but it is the logical culmination of a
systematic normalization of deviant and illegal U.S. war-making that has already cost millions
of lives in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Pakistan. As historian Gabriel Kolko
wrote in Century of War in 1994, "options and decisions that are intrinsically dangerous
and irrational become not merely plausible but the only form of reasoning about war and diplomacy
that is possible in official circles."
Demonizing Iran
The idea that Iran has ever had a nuclear weapons program is seriously contested by the IAEA,
which has examined every allegation presented by the CIA and other Western "intelligence" agencies
as well as Israel. Former IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei revealed many details of this wild
goose chase in his 2011 memoir,
Age of Deception: Nuclear Diplomacy in Treacherous Times .
When the CIA and its partners reluctantly acknowledged the IAEA's conclusions in a 2007 National
Intelligence Estimate (NIE), ElBaradei issued
a press release confirming that, "the agency has no concrete evidence of an ongoing nuclear weapons
program or undeclared nuclear facilities in Iran."
Since 2007, the IAEA has resolved all its outstanding concerns with Iran. It has verified that
dual-use technologies that Iran imported before 2003 were in fact used for other purposes, and it
has exposed the mysterious "laptop documents" that appeared to show Iranian plans for a nuclear weapon
as forgeries. Gareth Porter thoroughly explored all these questions and allegations and the history
of mistrust that fueled them in his 2014 book,
Manufactured
Crisis: the Untold Story of the Iran Nuclear Scare , which I highly recommend.
But, in the parallel Bizarro world of U.S. politics, hopelessly poisoned by the CIA's
endless disinformation campaigns, Hillary Clinton could repeatedly take false credit for disarming
Iran during her presidential campaign, and neither Bernie Sanders, Donald Trump nor any corporate
media interviewer dared to challenge her claims.
"When President Obama took office, Iran was racing toward a nuclear bomb," Clinton fantasized
in a
prominent foreign policy speech on June 2, 2016, claiming that her brutal sanctions policy "brought
Iran to the table."
In fact, as Trita Parsi documented in his 2012 book,
A Single
Roll of the Dice: Obama's Diplomacy With Iran , the Iranians were ready, not just
to "come to the table," but to sign a comprehensive agreement based on a U.S. proposal brokered by
Turkey and Brazil in 2010. But, in a classic case of "tail wags dog," the U.S. then rejected its
own proposal because it would have undercut support for tighter sanctions in the U.N. Security Council.
In other words, Clinton's sanctions policy did not "bring Iran to the table", but prevented the U.S.
from coming to the table itself.
As a senior State Department official told Trita Parsi, the real problem with U.S. diplomacy with
Iran when Clinton was at the State Department was that the U.S. would not take "Yes" for an answer.
Trump's ham-fisted decertification of Iran's compliance with the JCPOA is right out of Clinton's
playbook, and it demonstrates that the CIA is still determined to use Iran as a scapegoat for America's
failures in the Middle East.
The spurious claim that Iran is the world's greatest sponsor of terrorism is another CIA canard
reinforced by endless repetition. It is true that Iran supports and supplies weapons to Hezbollah
and Hamas, which are both listed as terrorist organizations by the U.S. government. But they are
mainly defensive resistance groups that defend Lebanon and Gaza respectively against invasions and
attacks by Israel.
Shifting attention away from Al Qaeda, Islamic State, the
Libyan Islamic Fighting Group and other groups that actually commit terrorist crimes around the
world might just seem like a case of the CIA "taking its eyes off the ball," if it wasn't so transparently
timed to frame Iran with new accusations now that the manufactured crisis of the nuclear scare has
run its course.
What the Future Holds
Barack Obama's most consequential international achievement may have been the triumph of symbolism
over substance behind which he expanded and escalated the so-called "war on terror," with a vast
expansion of covert operations and proxy wars that eventually triggered the
heaviest U.S.
aerial bombardments since Vietnam in Iraq and Syria.
Obama's charm offensive invigorated old and new military alliances with the U.K., France and
the Arab monarchies, and he quietly ran up the
most expensive military budget of any president since World War Two.
But Obama's expansion of the "war on terror" under cover of his deceptive global public relations
campaign created many more problems than it solved, and Trump and his advisers are woefully ill-equipped
to solve any of them. Trump's expressed desire to place America first and to resist foreign entanglements
is hopelessly at odds with his aggressive, bullying approach to every foreign policy problem.
If the U.S. could threaten and fight its way to a resolution of any of its international problems,
it would have done so already. That is exactly what it has been trying to do since the 1990s, behind
both the swagger and bluster of Bush and Trump and the deceptive charm of Clinton and Obama: a "good
cop – bad cop" routine that should no longer fool anyone anywhere.
But as Lyndon Johnson found as he waded deeper and deeper into the Big Muddy in Vietnam, lying
to the public about unwinnable wars does not make them any more winnable. It just gets more people
killed and makes it harder and harder to ever tell the public the truth.
In unwinnable wars based on lies, the "credibility" problem only gets more complicated, as new
lies require new scapegoats and convoluted narratives to explain away graveyards filled by old lies.
Obama's cynical global charm offensive bought the "war on terror" another eight years, but that only
allowed the CIA to drag the U.S. into more trouble and spread its chaos to more places around the
world.
Meanwhile, Russian President Putin is winning hearts and minds in capitals around the world by
calling for a recommitment to the
rule of international
law , which
prohibits
the threat or use of military force except in self-defense. Every new U.S. threat or act of aggression
will only make Putin's case more persuasive, not least to important U.S. allies like South Korea,
Germany and other members of the European Union, whose complicity in U.S. aggression has until now
helped to give it a false veneer of political legitimacy.
Throughout history, serial aggression has nearly always provoked increasingly united opposition,
as peace-loving countries and people have reluctantly summoned the courage to stand up to an aggressor.
France under Napoleon and Hitler's Germany also regarded themselves as exceptional, and in their
own ways they were. But in the end, their belief in their exceptionalism led them on to defeat and
destruction.
Americans had better hope that we are not so exceptional, and that the world will find a diplomatic
rather than a military "solution" to its American problem. Our chances of survival would improve
a great deal if American officials and politicians would finally start to act like something other
than putty in the hands of the CIA
Nicolas J. S. Davies is the author of Blood On Our Hands: the American Invasion and Destruction
of Iraq . He also wrote the chapters on "Obama at War" in Grading the 44th President: a Report Card
on Barack Obama's First Term as a Progressive Leader .
If this is true, then this is definitely a sophisticated false flag operation. Was malware Alperovich people injected specifically
designed to implicate Russians? In other words Crowdstrike=Fancy Bear
Images removed. For full content please thee the original source
One interesting corollary of this analysis is that installing Crowdstrike software is like inviting a wolf to guard your chicken.
If they are so dishonest you take enormous risks. That might be true for some other heavily advertized "intrusion prevention" toolkits.
So those criminals who use mistyped popular addresses or buy Google searches to drive lemmings to their site and then flash the screen
that they detected a virus on your computer a, please call provided number and for a small amount of money your virus will be removed
get a new more sinister life.
"... Disobedient Media outlines the DNC server cover-up evidenced in CrowdStrike malware infusion ..."
"... In the article, they claim to have just been working on eliminating the last of the hackers from the DNC's network during the past weekend (conveniently coinciding with Assange's statement and being an indirect admission that their Falcon software had failed to achieve it's stated capabilities at that time , assuming their statements were accurate) . ..."
"... To date, CrowdStrike has not been able to show how the malware had relayed any emails or accessed any mailboxes. They have also not responded to inquiries specifically asking for details about this. In fact, things have now been discovered that bring some of their malware discoveries into question. ..."
"... there is a reason to think Fancy Bear didn't start some of its activity until CrowdStrike had arrived at the DNC. CrowdStrike, in the indiciators of compromise they reported, identified three pieces of malware relating to Fancy Bear: ..."
"... They found that generally, in a lot of cases, malware developers didn't care to hide the compile times and that while implausible timestamps are used, it's rare that these use dates in the future. It's possible, but unlikely that one sample would have a postdated timestamp to coincide with their visit by mere chance but seems extremely unlikely to happen with two or more samples. Considering the dates of CrowdStrike's activities at the DNC coincide with the compile dates of two out of the three pieces of malware discovered and attributed to APT-28 (the other compiled approximately 2 weeks prior to their visit), the big question is: Did CrowdStrike plant some (or all) of the APT-28 malware? ..."
"... The IP address, according to those articles, was disabled in June 2015, eleven months before the DNC emails were acquired – meaning those IP addresses, in reality, had no involvement in the alleged hacking of the DNC. ..."
"... The fact that two out of three of the Fancy Bear malware samples identified were compiled on dates within the apparent five day period CrowdStrike were apparently at the DNC seems incredibly unlikely to have occurred by mere chance. ..."
"... That all three malware samples were compiled within ten days either side of their visit – makes it clear just how questionable the Fancy Bear malware discoveries were. ..."
Of course the DNC did not want to the FBI to investigate its "hacked servers". The plan was well underway to excuse Hillary's
pathetic election defeat to Trump, and
CrowdStrike would help out by planting evidence to pin on those evil "Russian hackers." Some would call this
entire DNC server hack an
"insurance policy."
"... By illuminating CIA programs and systems of surveillance, control, and assassination utilized against the civilian population of South Vietnam, we are presented with parallels with operations and practices at work today in America's seemingly perpetual war against terror. ..."
"... Through the policies of covert infiltration and manipulations, illegal alliances, and "brute force" interventions that wreak havoc on designated enemy states, destroy progress and infrastructure under the claim of liberation, degrade the standards of living for people in the perceived hostile nations, "...America's ruling elite empowers itself while claiming it has ensured the safety and prestige of the American people. Sometimes it is even able to convince the public that its criminal actions are 'humanitarian' and designed to liberate the people in nations it destroys." ..."
"... Want to know why the DEA is losing the war on drugs, how torture has become policy? Want to know why the government no longer represents your interests? Look no further. ..."
Of the extraordinarily valuable and informative works for which Mr. Valentine is responsible, his latest, CIA As Organized
Crime, may prove to be the best choice as an introduction to the dark realm of America's hidden corruptions and their consequences
at home and around the world. This new volume begins with the unlikely but irrevocable framework by which Mr. Valentine's path
led to unprecedented access to key Agency personnel whose witting participation is summarized by the chapter title: "How William
Colby Gave Me the Keys to the CIA Kingdom."
By illuminating CIA programs and systems of surveillance, control, and assassination utilized against the civilian population
of South Vietnam, we are presented with parallels with operations and practices at work today in America's seemingly perpetual
war against terror.
Through the policies of covert infiltration and manipulations, illegal alliances, and "brute force" interventions that
wreak havoc on designated enemy states, destroy progress and infrastructure under the claim of liberation, degrade the standards
of living for people in the perceived hostile nations, "...America's ruling elite empowers itself while claiming it has ensured
the safety and prestige of the American people. Sometimes it is even able to convince the public that its criminal actions are
'humanitarian' and designed to liberate the people in nations it destroys."
Mr. Valentine has presented us with a major body of work which includes: The Strength of the Wolf; The Strength of the Pack;
The Pheonix Program, to which we may now add The CIA as Organized Crime, and for which we are profoundly indebted.
If you want the inside scoop on the CIA and it's criminal past; this is the book. Additionally, why the Phoenix Program is
pertinent for our own times. This book connects the dots.
If you have been wondering why Homeland Security has fusion centers; why the USA Anti-Patriot Act, NDAA and Rex 84 have been
passed by Congress; you will get your answer here.
A book every intelligent American needs to read and place in a prominent place in their library. Oh, and don't forget after
you read it; spread the word !!! (this book is based upon actual face to face interviews and documents)
Run, don't walk, and get yourself a copy of this book. The author has been warning us for decades about the clear and present
danger that is the CIA I was unaware of Valentine's work for most of those years, perhaps because our media outlets (even the
"anti-establishment" ones like Democracy Now and The Intercept) have been compromised. Valentine's work has been suppressed since
his ground-breaking book on the Phoenix Program.
Not that I didn't know anything about the sordid history. I knew about MK-Ultra, some of the agency's drug running and empire-building
exploits. This work goes much deeper and paints a much bigger picture. The extent of the agency's influence is much greater than
I had imagined.
This is not another history book about dirty tricks. It is not just about our insane foreign policy and empire building. The
cancer of corruption, of outright crime, has metastasized into every agency of the government right here in the US itself. Those
dirty tricks and crimes have become domestic policy- in fusion centers and Homeland Security, in the militarization of local police
and in Congress, from Wall Street to Main Street. Border Patrol, the DEA, Justice and State have all been compromised.
Want to know why the DEA is losing the war on drugs, how torture has become policy? Want to know why the government no
longer represents your interests? Look no further.
The problem is now. We are the new targets.
Read it and weep, but for God's sake, please read it.
A highly informative and comprehensive book, and a scathing, fearless indictment of government corruption.
I cannot overstate it's importance.
I just picked up this book and have not read it yet--but I am writing this to CORRECT THE RECORD regarding very basic information.
There are 446 PAGES (not 286, as listed above). 160 Pages is a big difference--obviously, QUALITY is more important than quantity--but
I do feel the listing needs be corrected.
The "Inside Look" feature is also cutting off the last 9 chapters of the book, which are as follows:
Chapter 16: Major General Bruce Lawlor: From CIA Officer in Vietnam to Homeland Security Honcho
Chapter 17: Homeland Security: The Phoenix Comes Home to Roost
PART IV: MANUFACTURING COMPLICITY: SHAPING THE AMERICAN WORLDVIEW
Chapter 18: Fragging Bob Kerrey: The CIA and the Need for a War Crimes Tribunal
Chapter 19: Top Secret America Shadow Reward System
Chapter 20: How Government Tries to Mess with Your Mind
Chapter 21: Disguising Obama's Dirty War
Chapter 22: Parallels of Conquest, Past and Present
Chapter 23: Propaganda as Terrorism
Chapter 24: The War on Terror as the Greatest Covert Op Ever
This is a devastating and must-read study of the social and political calamity created by the CIA over the last sixty years.
The portrait shows the criminal character of the agency and finally of the government it is said to serve. The portrait is a double
shock because it shows not just a sordid corruption but a malevolent 'dark side' mafia-style corruption of american civilization
and government. That the CIA controls the drug trade is not the least of the stunning revelations of this history.
This was written almost a year ago. Not author demonstrated tremendous insight which was confirmed by subsequent events.
Notable quotes:
"... The decisive shift to 'regime change' at home has been a continual process organized, orchestrated and implemented by elected and appointed officials within the Obama regime and by a multiplicity of political action organizations, which cross traditional ideological boundaries. ..."
"... The outgoing President Obama mobilized the entire leadership of the security state to fabricate 'dodgy dossiers' linking Donald Trump to the Russian President Vladimir Putin, insisting that Trump was a stooge or 'vulnerable to KGB blackmail'. The CIA's phony documents (arriving via a former British intelligence operative-now free lance 'security' contractor) were passed around among the major corporate media who declined to publish the leaked gossip. Months of attempts to get the US media to 'take the bite' on the 'smelly' dossier were unsuccessful. The semi-senile US Senator John McCain ('war-hero' and hysterical Trump opponent) then volunteered to plop the reeking gossip back onto the lap of the CIA Director Brennan and demand the government 'act on these vital revelations'! ..."
"... Under scrutiny by serious researchers, the 'CIA dossier' was proven to be a total fabrication by way of a former 'British official – now – in – hiding !' Undaunted, despite being totally discredited, the CIA leadership continued to attack the President-Elect. Trump likened the CIA's 'dirty pictures hatchet job' to the thuggish behavior of the Nazis and clearly understood how the CIA leadership was involved in a domestic coup d'état. ..."
"... CIA Director John Brennan, architect of numerous 'regime changes' overseas had brought his skills home – against the President-elect. For the first time in US history, a CIA director openly charged a President or President-elect with betraying the country and threatened the incoming Chief Executive. He coldly warned Trump to ' just make sure he understands that the implications and impacts (of Trump's policies) on the United States could be profound " ..."
The norms of US capitalist democracy include the election of presidential candidates through competitive elections, unimpeded
by force and violence by the permanent institutions of the state. Voter manipulation has occurred during the recent elections, as
in the case of the John F. Kennedy victory in 1960 and the George W. Bush victory over 'Al' Gore in 2000. But despite the dubious
electoral outcomes in these cases, the 'defeated' candidate conceded and sought via legislation, judicial rulings, lobbying and peaceful
protests to register their opposition.
These norms are no longer operative. During the election process, and in the run-up to the inauguration of US President-Elect
Donald Trump, fundamental electoral institutions were challenged and coercive institutions were activated to disqualify the elected
president and desperate overt public pronouncements threatened the entire electoral order.
We will proceed by outlining the process that is used to undermine the constitutional order, including the electoral process and
the transition to the inauguration of the elected president.
Regime Change in America
In recent times, elected officials in the US and their state security organizations have often intervened against independent
foreign governments, which challenged Washington 's quest for global domination. This was especially true during the eight years
of President Barack Obama's administration where the violent ousting of presidents and prime ministers through US-engineered coups
were routine – under an unofficial doctrine of 'regime change'.
The violation of constitutional order and electoral norms of other countries has become enshrined in US policy. All US political,
administrative and security structures are involved in this process. The policymakers would insist that there was a clear distinction
between operating within constitutional norms at home and pursuing violent, illegal regime change operations abroad.
Today the distinction between overseas and domestic norms has been obliterated by the state and quasi-official mass media. The
US security apparatus is now active in manipulating the domestic democratic process of electing leaders and transitioning administrations.
The decisive shift to 'regime change' at home has been a continual process organized, orchestrated and implemented by elected
and appointed officials within the Obama regime and by a multiplicity of political action organizations, which cross traditional
ideological boundaries.
Regime change has several components leading to the final solution: First and foremost, the political parties seek to delegitimize
the election process and undermine the President-elect. The mass media play a major role demonizing President-Elect Trump with personal
gossip, decades-old sex scandals and fabricated interviews and incidents.
Alongside the media blitz, leftist and rightist politicians have come together to question the legitimacy of the November 2016
election results. Even after a recount confirmed Trump's victory, a massive propaganda campaign was launched to impeach the president-elect
even before he takes office – by claiming Trump was an 'enemy agent'.
The Democratic Party and the motley collection of right-left anti-Trump militants sought to blackmail members of the Electoral
College to change their vote in violation of their own mandate as state electors. This was unsuccessful, but unprecedented.
Their overt attack on US electoral norms then turned into a bizarre and virulent anti-Russia campaign designed to paint the elected
president (a billionaire New York real estate developer and US celebrity icon) as a 'tool of Moscow .' The mass media and powerful
elements within the CIA, Congress and Obama Administration insisted that Trump's overtures toward peaceful, diplomatic relations
with Russia were acts of treason.
The outgoing President Obama mobilized the entire leadership of the security state to fabricate 'dodgy dossiers' linking Donald
Trump to the Russian President Vladimir Putin, insisting that Trump was a stooge or 'vulnerable to KGB blackmail'. The CIA's phony
documents (arriving via a former British intelligence operative-now free lance 'security' contractor) were passed around among the
major corporate media who declined to publish the leaked gossip. Months of attempts to get the US media to 'take the bite' on the
'smelly' dossier were unsuccessful. The semi-senile US Senator John McCain ('war-hero' and hysterical Trump opponent) then volunteered
to plop the reeking gossip back onto the lap of the CIA Director Brennan and demand the government 'act on these vital revelations'!
Under scrutiny by serious researchers, the 'CIA dossier' was proven to be a total fabrication by way of a former 'British
official – now – in – hiding !' Undaunted, despite being totally discredited, the CIA leadership continued to attack the President-Elect.
Trump likened the CIA's 'dirty pictures hatchet job' to the thuggish behavior of the Nazis and clearly understood how the CIA leadership
was involved in a domestic coup d'état.
CIA Director John Brennan, architect of numerous 'regime changes' overseas had brought his skills home – against the President-elect.
For the first time in US history, a CIA director openly charged a President or President-elect with betraying the country and threatened
the incoming Chief Executive. He coldly warned Trump to ' just make sure he understands that the implications and impacts (of Trump's
policies) on the United States could be profound "
Clearly CIA Director Brennan has not only turned the CIA into a sinister, unaccountable power dictating policy to an elected US
president, by taking on the tone of a Mafia Capo, he threatens the physical security of the incoming leader.
From a Scratch to Gangrene
The worst catastrophe that could fall on the United States would be a conspiracy of leftist and rightist politicos, the corporate
mass media and the 'progressive' websites and pundits providing ideological cover for a CIA-orchestrated 'regime change'.
Whatever the limitations of our electoral norms- and there are many – they are now being degraded and discarded in a march toward
an elite coup, involving elements of the militarist empire and 'in`telligence' hierarchy.
Mass propaganda, a 'red-brown alliance, salacious gossip and accusations of treason ('Trump, the Stooge of Moscow') resemble the
atmosphere leading to the rise of the Nazi state in Germany . A broad 'coalition' has joined hands with a most violent and murderous
organization (the CIA) and imperial political leadership, which views overtures to peace to be high treason because it limits their
drive for world power and a US dominated global political order.
James Petras is a Bartle Professor (Emeritus) of Sociology at Binghamton University, New York.
http://petras.lahaine.org/
"... "I think it's the obligation of some executive branch officials to refuse to carry that out," former CIA director John Brennan said of the possibility of Donald Trump firing special counsel Robert Mueller. "I would just hope that this is not going to be a partisan issue. That Republicans, Democrats are going to see that the future of this government is at stake and something needs to be done for the good of the future. ..."
"... The American people, after all, elected Trump. Rod Rosenstein elected Mueller. ..."
"... A self-flattering interpretation by the puppeteers imagines Trump voters as Pap Finns resentful of the mere existence of the edumacated elites. Cultural tics surely explain part of this divide. But more so do frustrations with votes repeatedly resulting in policies unwanted by voters. Brennan encouraging employees of the executive branch to subvert the executive comes off as too analogous to the unelected continually sabotaging the will of the electorate that directly caused Trump's election. Trump's supporters certainly see it this way. This fight is an extension of the overall fight that colored the presidential election. ..."
Last year, the marionettes rebelled. Naturally, the Great Puppeteer Counter-revolt of
2017 followed.
"I think it's the obligation of some executive branch officials to refuse to carry that
out," former CIA director John Brennan said of the possibility of Donald Trump firing special
counsel Robert Mueller. "I would just hope that this is not going to be a partisan issue. That
Republicans, Democrats are going to see that the future of this government is at stake and
something needs to be done for the good of the future. "
Leaving aside the imprudence of the president firing the man investigating his campaign's
alleged ties to Russian interference in the 2016 election, Trump certainly possesses the right
to dismiss Mueller. Unelected people who work for the man elected president do not possess the
right to thwart the legal directives of their boss.
The American people, after all, elected Trump. Rod Rosenstein elected Mueller.
A fine line exists between anonymous, unelected, unaccountable government officials
undermining the president's legal directives and such people working to overturn the results of
last year's election. One might argue the two as one in the same differing only in degree.
Did the Russians meddle in our electoral process in 2016 or do entrenched bureaucrats do so
on a constant basis? How one answers that question dictates one's response to this current
controversy.
November's results, one might think, would have sparked epiphanies. Americans voted for a
populist outsider to, in his words, "drain the swamp." Brennan's words indicate that the swamp
thrives six months after inauguration. The election neither hastened the drain nor chastened
the creatures from the swamp. As the late, great Stan Evans oft reflected, people go to
Washington imagining it a swamp only to soon regard it as a hot tub. Who wants to vacate a hot
tub?
A self-flattering interpretation by the puppeteers imagines Trump voters as Pap Finns
resentful of the mere existence of the edumacated elites. Cultural tics surely explain part of
this divide. But more so do frustrations with votes repeatedly resulting in policies unwanted
by voters. Brennan encouraging employees of the executive branch to subvert the executive comes
off as too analogous to the unelected continually sabotaging the will of the electorate that
directly caused Trump's election. Trump's supporters certainly see it this way. This fight is
an extension of the overall fight that colored the presidential election.
Consider any massive change in America over the last half century or so. The demographic sea
change in the United States occurred in large part in spite, not because, of U.S. immigration
laws. Courts, not the people, determined the legal status of abortion, gay marriage, school
prayer, and much else. On important questions regarding the environment, the internet, and
health care unelected bureaucrats make the rules under which we live. Such policy
change exposes the metachange of process change that allows unelected people to
impose their will on massive numbers of people. Tolerating the hijacking of policy soon leads
to empowered hijackers thinking they can hijack the presidency.
The Constitution decrees, "The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a
Republican Form of Government." Do the deep-state puppeteers imagine that this principle does
not apply to Washington?
Donald Trump attempts to bring down the curtain on the long-running Puppet Show on the
Potomac. Naturally, Charlie McCarthy finds this more liberating than Edgar Bergen
Now we can view Brennan testimony throw the prism of Steele dossier scandal and Strzok-gate
(with whom he who probably has direct contacts)
Please note that the interview was given directly after the appointment of the Special
Prosecutor Mueller and at this time many though that Trump was "fully cooked" and that neocon and
neoliberal swamp in Washington managed to consume him.
Former CIA Director John Brennan told the House Intelligence Committee Tuesday that Russia
"brazenly interfered in the 2016 election process," despite U.S. efforts to warn it off.
Brennan testified in an open session of the committee, one of a handful of congressional
committees now investigating Russian meddling in the 2016 election.
Brennan said he told his Russian counterpart, the head of Russia's FSB, last August that if
Russia pursued its efforts to interfere, "it would destroy any near-term prospect for
improvement in relations" between the two countries. He said Russia denied any attempts to
interfere.
In his opening statement, Brennan also recounted how he had briefed congressional leaders in
August of last year, including House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., Senate Majority Leader Mitch
McConnell, R-Ky., and the chairs and ranking members of the House and Senate Intelligence
Committees about the "full details" of what he knew of Russia's interference in the 2016
election. Brennan said he became convinced last summer that Russia was trying to interfere in
the campaign, saying "they were very aggressive."
Brennan said he is "aware of information and intelligence that revealed contacts and
interactions between Russian officials and U.S. persons involved in the Trump campaign."
Brennan said that concerned him, "because of known Russian efforts to suborn such individuals,"
and that it raised questions about whether or not the Russians "were able to gain the
cooperation of those individuals." Brennan added he didn't know if "collusion existed" between
the Russians and those he identified as involved in the Trump campaign.
While Brennan would not specifically identify any individuals associated with the Trump
campaign who had contacts with Russian officials and would not opine as to whether there was
any collusion or collaboration, he did tell lawmakers why he was concerned about the contacts
occurring against the general background of Russian efforts to meddle in the election. Brennan
said he's studied Russian intelligence activities over the years, and how Russian intelligence
services have been able to get people to betray their country. "Frequently, individuals on a
treasonous path do not even realize they're on that path until it gets to be too late," he
said.
Brennan said Russia was motivated to back Donald Trump in the presidential election because
of a "traditional animus" between Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and Russian President
Vladimir Putin. He told committee members there had not been a good relationship between Putin
and the Clintons over the years. What's more, Brennan said Putin blamed Hillary Clinton's
actions as secretary of state during the Obama administration for domestic disturbances inside
Russia. He said Putin was concerned Clinton would be more "rigid" on issues such as human
rights if elected president.
But Brennan told the committee he believed that Russia anticipated that Clinton would be the
likely winner of the presidential race, and that Russia tried to "damage and bloody" her before
Election Day. Had she won, Brennan said, Russia would have continued to attempt to "denigrate
her and hurt her" during her presidency. If Russia had collected more information about Clinton
that they did not use against her during the campaign, Brennan said they were likely
"husbanding it for another day."
On another question, Brennan criticized President Trump's reported sharing of classified
intelligence with Russia officials. Brennan said if reports were accurate, Trump violated
"protocols" by sharing the information with Russia's foreign minister and ambassador to the
U.S.
Brennan also said he was "very concerned" by the release of what he said appears to be
classified information from the Trump administration. He said there appear to be "very, very
damaging leaks, and I find them appalling and they need to be tracked down."
Reacting to Brennan's testimony, a White House spokesman said "This morning's hearings back
up what we've been saying all along: that despite a year of investigation, there is still no
evidence of any Russia-Trump campaign collusion, that the President never jeopardized
intelligence sources or sharing, and that even Obama's CIA Director believes the leaks of
classified information are 'appalling' and the culprits must be 'tracked down.'"
Under questioning from Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., Brennan said the Russians have been
trying to disrupt Western elections since the 1960s, and that they've quickly adapted to the
times. Brennan pointed to the ease with which Russia was able to hack Democratic operatives'
emails, which were then published on WikiLeaks.
"The cyber-environment now really provides so much more opportunity for troublemaking and
the Russians take advantage of it," he said. Brennan said the use of spear phishing, and
"whatever else so that they can then gain access to people's emails, computer systems
networks," is something that the Russians are adept at.
He said Russia used WikiLeaks as a "cut-out," or go-between, and that protests by WikiLeaks
that it is not working with Russia and Russia's claims it is not working with WikiLeaks are
"disingenuous."
The rule for retired intelligence officials is to keep their mouth shut and disappear from
the public view. This not the case with Brennan. Probably worried about his survival chances in
case of failure, Brennan tries to justified the "putsch" of a faction of intelligence officials
against Trump. Nice... Now we have indirect proof that he conspired with Michael Morell to depose
legitimately elected president.
Now the question arise whether he worked with MI6 to create Steele dossier. In other words
did CIA supplied some information that went to the dossier.
Moreover, since JFK assassination, the CIA is prohibited from spying on American citizens,
especially tracking the activities of associates of a presidential candidate, which is clearly
political activity.
This alone should have sent warning bells off for Congress critters, yet Brennan clearly
persisted in following this dangerous for him and CIA trail. Very strange.
Notable quotes:
"... Speaking to a Russian becomes treasonous ..."
"... The article states that Brennan during the 2016 campaign "reviewed intelligence that showed 'contacts and interaction' between Russian actors and people associated with the Trump campaign." Politico was also in on the chase in an article entitled Brennan: Russia may have successfully recruited Trump campaign aides . ..."
"... The precise money quote by Brennan that the two articles chiefly rely on is "I encountered and am aware of information and intelligence that revealed contacts and interactions between Russian officials and US persons involved in the Trump campaign that I was concerned about because of known Russian efforts to suborn such individuals. It raised questions in my mind whether or not Russia was able to gain the co-operation of those individuals." ..."
"... At a later point in his testimony Brennan also said that "I had unresolved questions in my mind about whether or not the Russians had been successful in getting US persons, involved in the campaign or not, to work on their behalf, again, either in a witting or unwitting fashion," clearly meant to imply that some friends of Trump might have become Russian agents voluntarily but others might have cooperated without knowing it. ..."
"... It is a line that has surfaced elsewhere previously, most notably in the demented meanderings of former acting Director of Central Intelligence Michael Morell. As the purpose of recruiting an intelligence agent is to have a resource that can be directed to do things for you, the statement is an absurdity and Brennan and Morell, as a former Director and acting Director of the CIA, should know better. ..."
"... In his testimony, Brennan also hit the main theme that appears to be accepted by nearly everyone inside the beltway, namely that Russian sought to influence and even pervert the outcome of the 2016 election. Interpreting his testimony, the Post article asserts that "Russia was engaged in an 'aggressive' and 'multifaceted 'effort to interfere in our election." As has been noted frequently before, even though this assertion has apparently been endorsed by nearly everyone in the power structure AKA (also known as) "those who matter," it is singularly lacking in any actual evidence. ..."
"... Last Wednesday, the New York Times led off its front page with a piece entitled Top Russian Officials Discussed How to Influence Trump Aides Last Summer . Based, as always, on anonymous sources citing "highly classified" intelligence, the article claimed that "American spies collected information last summer revealing that senior Russian intelligence and political officials were discussing how to exert influence over Donald J. Trump through his advisers " The "discussions," which are presumably NSA intercepts of phone calls, reportedly focused on two aides in particular, Paul Manafort and Michael Flynn, both of whom had established relationships with Russian businessmen and government officials. ..."
"... It would appear that the New York Times ' editors are unaware that the United States routinely interferes in elections worldwide and that the action taken in various places including Ukraine goes far beyond phone conversations. In some other places like Libya, Syria, Iraq, Somalia and Afghanistan the interference is particularly robust taking place at the point of a bayonet, but the Times and Washington Post don't appear to have any problem when the regime change is being accomplished ostensibly to make the world more democratic, even if it almost never has that result. ..."
"... "The "discussions," which are presumably NSA intercepts of phone calls, reportedly ." ..."
"... US is now like USSR? https://pjmedia.com/rogerlsimon/2017/05/29/forget-russian-collusion-we-are-russia/ ..."
"... The end result of Brennan's fulminations likely is nuclear war, since he seems to consider even contact with the Russians treasonous. His view is both fascist and nihilist and treasonous to civilization itself and a threat to our survival. ..."
"... Of course those, their mouth pieces Washpost, CNN and NYT, who still want USA control of the world, have aligned their careers on this policy, do anything to get rid of Trump. As Russia is seen by them as the next country to be subjugated, any talk with this 'enemy' to them is high treason. ..."
"... Mr. Clapper finally found the answer to this 1 billion dollar question why US is suffering in his NBC interview -- it is because Russians are untermensch. Russian genetics is wrong and we all were so sweating and suffering over this whole mess., while the answer was so close, on the surface. ..."
"... "If you put that in context with everything else we knew the Russians were doing to interfere with the election, and just the historical practices of the Russians, who typically, almost genetically driven to co-opt, penetrate, gain favor, whatever, which is a typical Russian technique. So we were concerned." ..."
"... This is a fact showing the US' direct meddling in the affairs of another state and in creating a war on a border with Russian federation. Brennan has been so much immersed in lies and politicking and war crimes that it is impossible to expect any decent reasoning from this miserable opportunist. ..."
"... What Goering did say – cogently and precisely – is that, regardless of the form of government, the people can always be quite easily stirred up to want war. The key sentence is this: "All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger". That is exactly what the US, UK and European governments have been doing for years to justify their terrorist scares and their wars of aggression. And Goering was absolutely right to point out that it works just the same in democracies (or "democracies") as under dictatorships. ..."
"... "Apparently we need to focus on protecting our vote from our own government". I very much doubt if the Deep State needs to resort to such small-scale and easily-detected trickery to retain control. As Philip Berrigan pointed out long ago, "If voting made any difference, it would be illegal". ..."
The Washington Post and a number
of other mainstream media outlets are sensing blood in the water in the wake of former CIA
Director John Brennan's public testimony before the House Intelligence Committee. The Post
headlined a front page featured article with
Brennan's explosive testimony just made it harder for the GOP to protect Trump . The
article states that Brennan during the 2016 campaign "reviewed intelligence that showed
'contacts and interaction' between Russian actors and people associated with the Trump
campaign." Politico was also in on the chase in an article entitled
Brennan: Russia may have successfully recruited Trump campaign aides .
The precise money quote by Brennan that the two
articles chiefly rely on is "I encountered and am aware of information and intelligence that
revealed contacts and interactions between Russian officials and US persons involved in the
Trump campaign that I was concerned about because of known Russian efforts to suborn such
individuals. It raised questions in my mind whether or not Russia was able to gain the
co-operation of those individuals."
Now first of all, the CIA is not supposed to keep tabs on American citizens and tracking the
activities of known associates of a presidential candidate should have sent warning bells off,
yet Brennan clearly persisted in following the trail. What Brennan did not describe, because it
was "classified," was how he came upon the information in the first place. We know from the New
York Times and other sources that it came from foreign intelligence services, including the
British, Dutch and Estonians, and there has to be a strong suspicion that the forwarding of at
least some of that information might have been sought or possibly inspired by Brennan
unofficially in the first place. But whatever the provenance of the intelligence, it is clear
that Brennan then used that information to request an FBI investigation into a possible Russian
operation directed against potential key advisers if Trump were to somehow get nominated and
elected, which admittedly was a longshot at the time. That is how Russiagate began.
But where the information ultimately came from as well as its reliability is just
speculation as the source documents have not been made public. What is not speculative is what
Brennan actually said in his testimony. He said that Americans associated with Trump and his
campaign had met with Russians. He was "concerned" because of known Russian efforts to "suborn
such individuals." Note that Brennan, presumably deliberately, did not say "suborn those
individuals." Sure, Russian intelligence (and CIA, MI-6, and Mossad as well as a host of
others) seek to recruit people with access to politically useful information. That is what they
do for a living, but Brennan is not saying that he has or saw any evidence that that was the
case with the Trump associates. He is speaking generically of "such individuals" because he
knows that spies, inter alia , recruit politicians and the Russians presumably, like the
Americans and British, do so aggressively.
At a later point in his testimony Brennan also said that "I had unresolved questions in
my mind about whether or not the Russians had been successful in getting US persons, involved
in the campaign or not, to work on their behalf, again, either in a witting or unwitting
fashion," clearly meant to imply that some friends of Trump might have become Russian agents
voluntarily but others might have cooperated without knowing it.
It is a line that has surfaced elsewhere previously, most notably in the demented
meanderings of former acting Director of Central Intelligence Michael Morell. As the
purpose of recruiting an intelligence agent is to have a resource that can be directed to do
things for you, the statement is an absurdity and Brennan and Morell, as a former Director and
acting Director of the CIA, should know better. That they don't explains a lot of things
about today's CIA
Brennan confirms his lack of any hard evidence when he also poses the question "whether or
not Russia was able to gain the co-operation of those individuals." He doesn't know whether the
Americans were approached and asked to cooperate by Russian intelligence officers and, even if
they were, he does not know whether they agreed to do so. That means that the Americans in
question were guilty only of meeting and talking to Russians, which was presumably enough to
open an FBI investigation. One might well consider that at the time and even to this day Russia
was not and is not a declared enemy of the United States and meeting Russians is not a criminal
offense.
In his testimony, Brennan also hit the main theme that appears to be accepted by nearly
everyone inside the beltway, namely that Russian sought to influence and even pervert the
outcome of the 2016 election. Interpreting his testimony, the Post article asserts that "Russia
was engaged in an 'aggressive' and 'multifaceted 'effort to interfere in our election." As has
been noted frequently before, even though this assertion has apparently been endorsed by nearly
everyone in the power structure AKA (also known as) "those who matter," it is singularly
lacking in any actual evidence.
Nor has any evidence been produced to support the claim that it was Russia that hacked the
Democratic National Committee (DNC) server, which now is accepted as Gospel, but that is just
one side to the story being promoted. Last Wednesday, the New York Times led off its
front page with a piece entitled Top
Russian Officials Discussed How to Influence Trump Aides Last Summer . Based, as always, on
anonymous sources citing "highly classified" intelligence, the article claimed that "American
spies collected information last summer revealing that senior Russian intelligence and
political officials were discussing how to exert influence over Donald J. Trump through his
advisers " The "discussions," which are presumably NSA intercepts of phone calls, reportedly
focused on two aides in particular, Paul Manafort and Michael Flynn, both of whom had
established relationships with Russian businessmen and government officials.
The article goes on to concede that "It is unclear, however, whether Russian officials
actually tried to directly influence Mr. Manafort and Mr. Flynn ," and that's about all there
is to the tale, though the Times wanders on for another three pages, recapping Brennan
and the Flynn saga lest anyone has forgotten. So what do we have? Russians were talking on the
phone about the possibility of influencing an American's presidential candidate's advisers, an
observation alluded to by Brennan and also revealed in somewhat more detail by anonymous
sources. Pretty thin gruel, isn't it? Isn't that what diplomats and intelligence officers
do?
It would appear that the New York Times ' editors are unaware that the United
States routinely interferes in elections worldwide and that the action taken in various places
including Ukraine goes far beyond phone conversations. In some other places like Libya, Syria,
Iraq, Somalia and Afghanistan the interference is particularly robust taking place at the point
of a bayonet, but the Times and Washington Post don't appear to have any problem
when the regime change is being accomplished ostensibly to make the world more democratic, even
if it almost never has that result.
How one regards all of the dreck coming out of the Fourth Estate and poseurs like John
Brennan pretty much depends on the extent one is willing to trust that what the government, its
highly-politicized bureaucrats and the media tell the public is true. For me, that would be not
a lot. The desire to bring down the buffoonish Donald Trump is understandable, but buying into
government and media lies will only lead to more lies that have real consequences, up to and
including the impending wars against North Korea and Iran. It is imperative that every American
should question everything he or she reads in a newspaper, sees on television "news" or hears
coming out of the mouths of former and current government employees.
Thanks for the reassurance, Phil. It's lonely standing against the tide, and many are
trying to fabricate excuses for the lack of evidence.
Take Melvin Goodman, author of Whistleblower at the CIA, for instance. (I realize CIA is a
big place, but did you know him?) I've met Mr. Goodman, and he struck me as thoughtful,
rational and capable of objective discussion. However, in his talk at the Gaithersburg Book
Festival, he seemed a rather different person. At the end of Q&A, he said that he was
trying to figure out how the Russians had laundered the "hacked" DNC emails to make it look
like they were leaked by an insider. He's sure the Russians did it. With such creative
speculation, who needs facts?
The book, though, is probably pretty good. Which makes it that much stranger that he's
taking the political line on the DNC emails!
Ah, another day, another disgraceful display by the media. Incidentally: "The
"discussions," which are presumably NSA intercepts of phone calls, reportedly ."
"Presumably" here is quite generous: I'd be tempted to presume a whole string of lies
.
It's like climate change: The MSM tells us that 17 intelligence agencies agree that the
Russians hacked the election and thereby influenced it, but when you dig a little you find
that NSA, for example, did not express a high degree of confidence that this might have
actually been the case. Nevertheless, the case is settled. Pravda and Izvestia should have
been so convinced in their day.
The end result of Brennan's fulminations likely is nuclear war, since he seems to
consider even contact with the Russians treasonous. His view is both fascist and nihilist and
treasonous to civilization itself and a threat to our survival.
It all seems quite simple to me. After WWI the USA people decided that their sons should
not die ever more for imperialism. Isolation, neutrality laws. In 1932 Roosevelt was brought
into politics to make the USA great, great as the country controlling the world. Trump and
his rich friends understand that this policy is not just ruining the USA, but is ruining them
personally. If I'm right in this, it is the greatest change in USA foreign policy since
1932.
Of course those, their mouth pieces Washpost, CNN and NYT, who still want USA control
of the world, have aligned their careers on this policy, do anything to get rid of Trump. As
Russia is seen by them as the next country to be subjugated, any talk with this 'enemy' to
them is high treason.
@exiled off mainstreet The end result of Brennan's fulminations likely is nuclear war,
since he seems to consider even contact with the Russians treasonous. His view is both
fascist and nihilist and treasonous to civilization itself and a threat to our
survival.
Is he an Anglo-Zionist? I kind of missed a reference to the true puppet-masters in the
article
Is someone going to look in to how the Izzys influence our politicians and elections? No.
Why? Because Russia is the "enemy" and Israel is our "ally." Can someone explain in simple
terms why Russia is the enemy? Yes. Because Jews don't like them very much. Can someone
explain in simple terms why Israel is our ally? Because of New York City, Hollywood, CNN,
Fox, MSNBC, CBS and NBC, the major newspapers, Wall Street, porn, military subsidies, dual
citizenship, etc. And because every president just can't wait to wear the beanie and
genuflect at some wall. Any other questions?
" One might well consider that at the time and even to this day Russia was not and is
not a declared enemy of the United States and meeting Russians is not a criminal
offense".
Although in point of fact the USA has committed, and continues to commit, acts of war
against Russia.
"Because of New York City, Hollywood, CNN, Fox, MSNBC, CBS and NBC, the major
newspapers, Wall Street, porn, military subsidies, dual citizenship, etc. "
Let's not forget 911 and it's ongoing coverup, the State Dept's Bureau of Near Eastern
Affairs exemplifying our bestest ally's parallel command and control apparatus in every
federal agency such as the FBI, etc
The only problem I have with the article is understanding the vehemence with which Brennan
and Morell are denounced for, as I read it, blathering about unwitting agents who might have
co-operated without knowing it. I construed the objection to be based on a foreign
intelligence service necessarily seeking to "direct" its agents. It would indeed follow that
the agents could not help knowing what they were doing. However .
Is there not a category of people who Brennan and Morell might be referring to who could
be aptly described as useful idiots. You meet them at a writer's festival, invite them to
accept your country's generous and admiring hospitality and soon have them spouting the memes
you have made sure they are fed as well inadvertently feeding you useful titbits of
information, especially about people.
I think something fascinating is going on, Tom. Our leaders made a choice to defraud us
into the Iraq war. Russia didn't. This is a very serious crime for which there has been zero
accountability. It seems that all the various people who should be in federal prison for
having done this, are the one's "braying the loudest" about the Russian threat.
The real crisis in our country is the absence of accountability for the heinous crimes
THEY committed, not anything the Russians did. If we allow acts of "war fraud" to go
unprosecuted, then War Fraud becomes acceptable behavior. I do not know of one American,
anywhere, who feels this is okay.
Nor has any evidence been produced to support the claim that it was Russia that
hacked the Democratic National Committee (DNC) server
It doesn't matter. Mr. Clapper finally found the answer to this 1 billion dollar
question why US is suffering in his NBC interview -- it is because Russians are untermensch.
Russian genetics is wrong and we all were so sweating and suffering over this whole mess.,
while the answer was so close, on the surface.
"If you put that in context with everything else we knew the Russians were doing to
interfere with the election, and just the historical practices of the Russians, who
typically, almost genetically driven to co-opt, penetrate, gain favor, whatever, which is a
typical Russian technique. So we were concerned."
I know some others actually know you cannot believe spies. Some on the other hand so
not.
Mar 22, 2017 How the CIA Plants News Stories in the Media. It is no longer disputed that
the CIA has maintained an extensive and ongoing relationship with news organizations and
journalists, and multiple, specific acts of media manipulation have now been documented.
August 30, 2015 THE CIA AND THE MEDIA: 50 FACTS THE WORLD NEEDS TO KNOW By Prof. James F.
Tracy
Since the end of World War Two the Central Intelligence Agency has been a major force in
US and foreign news media, exerting considerable influence over what the public sees, hears
and reads on a regular basis.
@alexander Alexander, I definitely don't think it's OK, but I am not American – I
am British (Scottish, to be exact). Although we have exactly the same problem over here
– in miniature – with our local pocket Hitlers strutting around in their
jackboots just salivating for the blood of foreigners.
I think the people who are braying about Russia, China, Iran, Venezuela, etc. are doing so
largely to distract attention from their own crimes. The following celebrated dialogue
explains very clearly how it works.
-------------------------------------–
We got around to the subject of war again and I said that, contrary to his attitude, I did
not think that the common people are very thankful for leaders who bring them war and
destruction.
"Why, of course, the people don't want war," Goering shrugged. "Why would some poor slob
on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best that he can get out of it is to come
back to his farm in one piece. Naturally, the common people don't want war; neither in Russia
nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after
all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple
matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a
Parliament or a Communist dictatorship."
"There is one difference," I pointed out. "In a democracy the people have some say in the
matter through their elected representatives, and in the United States only Congress can
declare wars."
"Oh, that is all well and good, but, voice or no voice, the people can always be brought
to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being
attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to
danger. It works the same way in any country."
- Conversation with Hermann Goering in prison, reported by Gustave Gilbert
@Tom Welsh I suppose the story is meant to show that Goering wanted war. The opposite is
true, he sent the Swedish negotiator Dahlerus several times to London in his plane, taking
himself care, telephoning with the Dutch authorities, that the Junckers could fly safely over
the Netherlands. What Goering did not know was that Britain had been preparing for war at
least since 1936. The march 1939 guarantee to Poland was meant to provoke Hitler to attack
Poland. The trap worked.
@Agent76 That even Senator Moynihan, of the CIA Oversight Committee, was lied to by the
CIA director, about laying mines in Havana harbour, says enough. The CIA is not a secret
service, it is a secret army. This secret army began drugs production in Afghanistan, mainly
for the USA market, when funds for the CIA's war in Afghanistan were insufficient.
@alexander It is.
After an investigation of some seven years the lies of Tony Blair were exposed, in a report
of considerable size. What happened ? Nothing. Instead of being in jail, the man flies aroud
in a private jet, with an enormous income, paid by whom for what, I do not have a clue.
Dec 12, 2016 Georgia Official Says Homeland Security Tried To Hack Their State's Voter
Database
While most of the country frets over Russia's role in the 2016 election, the state of
Georgia has come forward saying that they've traced an IP from a hack of their voter database
right back to the offices of the Department of Homeland Security. Apparently we need to focus
on protecting our vote from our own government.
The end result of Brennan's fulminations likely is nuclear war, since he seems to consider
even contact with the Russians treasonous. His view is both fascist and nihilist and
treasonous to civilization itself and a threat to our survival. Brennan is just a regular
profiteering opportunist. Someone needs to remind the scoundrel that the civil war in Ukraine
(initiated by an illegal Kievan junta sponsored and installed by the US), had started
immediately upon Brennan's arrival to Kiev in 2014. He tried to make the visit secret but
this did not work and Brennan's presence in Ukraine became widely known:
https://sputniknews.com/world/20140415189240842-ANALYSIS-CIA-Director-Brennans-Trip-to-Ukraine-Initiates-Use-Of/
"CIA Director John Brennan visited Ukraine over the weekend, information that was
confirmed by White House Press Secretary Jay Carney on Monday, after being reported by media
on Sunday.
Over the same weekend, Kiev authorities cracked down on pro-federalization protests in
eastern Ukraine. Regime troops advanced toward a number of cities in eastern Ukraine Tuesday
to attack the protesters. "Brennan's appearance in Kiev just before the announcement of a
violent crackdown in eastern Ukraine is just too timely to assume that it is a coincidence,"
Turbeville [an American international affairs expert] said.
"Brennan, who has been actively involved in arming insurgents in Libya, Syria and
Venezuela, has a reputation for using thuggish tactics in pursuit of CIA goals," Wayne
Madsen, an American investigative journalist told RIA Novosti."
This is a fact showing the US' direct meddling in the affairs of another state and in
creating a war on a border with Russian federation. Brennan has been so much immersed in lies
and politicking and war crimes that it is impossible to expect any decent reasoning from this
miserable opportunist.
Unfortunately for you and myself there are literally millions of people in America who do
not think or challenge what they read or view as we do apparently. Thanks, *government
schooling* .
Mar 6, 2017 Drug Boss Escobar Worked for the CIA
The notorious cocaine kingpin Pablo Escobar worked closely with the CIA, according to his
son. In this episode of The Geopolitical Report, we look at the long history of CIA
involvement in the international narcotics trade, beginning with its collaboration with the
French Mafia to using drug money to illegally fund the Contras and overthrow the Sandinista
government in Nicaragua.
I suppose the story is meant to show that Goering wanted war. The opposite is true, he
sent the Swedish negotiator Dahlerus several times to London in his plane, taking himself
care, telephoning with the Dutch authorities, that the Junckers could fly safely over the
Netherlands. What Goering did not know was that Britain had been preparing for war at least
since 1936. The march 1939 guarantee to Poland was meant to provoke Hitler to attack Poland.
The trap worked.
What Goering did say – cogently and precisely – is that, regardless of the
form of government, the people can always be quite easily stirred up to want war. The key
sentence is this: "All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the
pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger". That is exactly what
the US, UK and European governments have been doing for years to justify their terrorist
scares and their wars of aggression. And Goering was absolutely right to point out that it
works just the same in democracies (or "democracies") as under dictatorships.
As for your point about Britain having deliberately fomented the war, I don't think that
holds water. Britain was grossly – almost grotesquely – underarmed in 1939, and
came very close indeed to being conquered in 1940. In my view, it was FDR and his friends who
assiduously wound up the Nazis and the Poles to fight one another, and then persuaded the
British and French to give Poland guarantees. Everyone believed that, if war came, the USA
would immediately join Britain and France in fighting Germany. Alas, they were very much
mistaken.
"Apparently we need to focus on protecting our vote from our own government". I very
much doubt if the Deep State needs to resort to such small-scale and easily-detected trickery
to retain control. As Philip Berrigan pointed out long ago, "If voting made any difference,
it would be illegal".
@Tom Welsh Well, another ruler also stated this, "Education is a weapon whose effects
depend on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed." Joseph Stalin
Brennan is just a regular profiteering opportunist. Someone needs to remind the scoundrel
that the civil war in Ukraine (initiated by an illegal Kievan junta sponsored and installed
by the US), had started immediately upon Brennan's arrival to Kiev in 2014. He tried to make
the visit secret but this did not work and Brennan's presence in Ukraine became widely known:
https://sputniknews.com/world/20140415189240842-ANALYSIS-CIA-Director-Brennans-Trip-to-Ukraine-Initiates-Use-Of/
"CIA Director John Brennan visited Ukraine over the weekend, information that was confirmed
by White House Press Secretary Jay Carney on Monday, after being reported by media on
Sunday.
Over the same weekend, Kiev authorities cracked down on pro-federalization protests in
eastern Ukraine. Regime troops advanced toward a number of cities in eastern Ukraine Tuesday
to attack the protesters. "Brennan's appearance in Kiev just before the announcement of a
violent crackdown in eastern Ukraine is just too timely to assume that it is a coincidence,"
Turbeville [an American international affairs expert] said.
"Brennan, who has been actively involved in arming insurgents in Libya, Syria and Venezuela,
has a reputation for using thuggish tactics in pursuit of CIA goals," Wayne Madsen, an
American investigative journalist told RIA Novosti."
This is a fact showing the US' direct meddling in the affairs of another state and in
creating a war on a border with Russian federation. Brennan has been so much immersed in lies
and politicking and war crimes that it is impossible to expect any decent reasoning from this
miserable opportunist.
the civil war in Ukraine (initiated by an illegal Kievan junta sponsored and installed
by the US), had started immediately upon Brennan's arrival to Kiev in 2014
I wouldn't so much call it a civil war, as a ZUSA imposed putsch, installing a
Zio-bankster-quisling.
PG:
the United States routinely interferes in elections worldwide and that the action taken
in various places including Ukraine goes far beyond phone conversations.
getting to the crux of the matter
when Russia released the phone conversation where ZUS State Dept. – Kagan klan /
Zio-bitch Nuland was overheard deciding who was going to be the next president of Ukraine
(some democracy), it was this breach of global oligarch protocol that has riled the deepstate
Zio-war-scum ever since. Hence all the screeching and hysterics about "Russian hacking".
The thug Brennan, (as you correctly call him [imagine this mug coming into the room as
you're about to be 'enhanced interrogated'])
has his fingerprints not just all over the war crimes and atrocities in Ukraine, but Syria
and elsewhere too.
All these war criminals are all scrambling to undermine Trump in the fear that he'll
eventually hold some of them accountable for their serial crimes, treasons, and treachery.
Which brings us to this curious comment..
The desire to bring down the buffoonish Donald Trump is understandable,
what the hell does Mr. G think will replace him?!
So far the "buffoonish Donald Trump" has not declared a no-fly zone in Syria, as we know
the war sow would have by now. He's not materially harmed the Assad regime, but only made
symbolic attempts to presumably mollify the war pigs like McBloodstain and co in the
zio-media/AIPAC/etc..
His rhetoric notwithstanding, he seems to be making nice with the Russians, to the
apoplectic hysteria of people like Brennan and the Stain.
In fact the more people like Brennan and Bloodstain and the zio-media and others seem on
the brink of madness, the better Trump seems to me every day.
And if it puts a smelly sock in the mouths of the neocons and war pigs to saber rattle at
Iran, with no possibility to actually do them any harm, because of the treaty and Europe's
need to respect it, then what's the harm of Trump sounding a little buffoonish if it gets
them off his back so that he can circle himself with a Pretorian guard of loyalists and get
to the bottom of all of this. I suspect that is what terrifies people like Brennan more than
anything else.
"... Freedom Watch lawyer Larry Klayman has a whistle-blower who has stated on the record, publicly, he has 47 hard drives with over 600,000,00 pages of secret CIA documents that detail all the domestic spying operations, and likely much much more. ..."
"... The rabbit hole goes very deep here. Attorney Klayman has stated he has been trying to out this for 2 years, and was stonewalled by swamp creatures, so he threatened to go public this week. Several very interesting videos, and a public letter, are out there, detailing all this. Nunes very likely saw his own conversations transcripted from surveillance taken at Trump Tower (he was part of the transition team), and realized the jig was up. Melania has moved out of Trump Tower to stay elsewhere, I am sure after finding out that many people in Washington where watching them at home in their private residence, whichi is also why Pres Trump sent out those famous angry tweets 2 weeks ago. Democrats on the Committee (and many others) are liars, and very possibly traitors, which is probably why Nunes neglected to inform them. Nunes did follow proper procedures, notifying Ryan first etc, you can ignore the MSM bluster there ..observe Nunes body language in the 2 videos of his dual press briefings he gave today, he appears shocked, angry, disturbed etc. ..."
"... This all stems from Obama's Jan 16 signing of the order broadening "co-operation" between the NSA and everybody else in Washington, so that mid-level analysts at almost any agency could now look at raw NSA intercepts, that is where all the "leaks" and "unmasking" are coming from. ..."
"... AG Lynch, Obama, and countless others knew, or should have known, all about this, but I am sure they will play the usual "I was too stupid too know what was going on in my own organization" card. ..."
So I see where Nunes in a ZeroHedge posting says that there might have been "incidental surveillance" of "Trump" (?Trump associates?
?Trump tower? ?Trump campaign?)
Now to the average NC reader, it kinda goes without saying. But I don't think Trump understands the scope of US government "surveillance"
and I don't think the average citizen, certainly not the average Trump supporter, does either – the nuances and subtleties of
it – the supposed "safeguards".
I can understand the rationale for it .but this goes to show that when you give people an opportunity to use secret information
for their own purposes .they will use secret information for their own purposes.
And at some point, the fact of the matter that the law regarding the "incidental" leaking appears to have been broken, and
that this leaking IMHO was purposefully broken for political purposes .is going to come to the fore. Like bringing up "fake news"
– some of these people on the anti Trump side seem not just incapable of playing 11th dimensional chess, they seem incapable of
winning tic tac toe .
Was Obama behind it? I doubt it and I don't think it would be provable. But it seems like the intelligence agencies are spending
more time monitoring repubs than Al queda. Now maybe repubs are worse than Al queda – I think its time we have a real debate instead
of the pseudo debates and start asking how useful the CIA is REALLY. (and we can ask how useful repubs and dems are too)
If Obama taped the information, stuffed the tape in one of Michelle's shoeboxes, then hid the shoebox in the Whitehouse basement,
he could be in trouble. Ivanka is sure to search any shoeboxes she finds.
Oh the Trump supporters are all over this, don't worry. There are many more levels to what is going on than what is reported
in the fakenews MSM.
Adm Roger of NSA made his November visit to Trump Tower, after a SCIF was installed there, to .be interviewed for a job uh-huh
yeah.
Freedom Watch lawyer Larry Klayman has a whistle-blower who has stated on the record, publicly, he has 47 hard drives with
over 600,000,00 pages of secret CIA documents that detail all the domestic spying operations, and likely much much more.
The rabbit hole goes very deep here. Attorney Klayman has stated he has been trying to out this for 2 years, and was stonewalled
by swamp creatures, so he threatened to go public this week. Several very interesting videos, and a public letter, are out there,
detailing all this. Nunes very likely saw his own conversations transcripted from surveillance taken at Trump Tower (he was part
of the transition team), and realized the jig was up. Melania has moved out of Trump Tower to stay elsewhere, I am sure after
finding out that many people in Washington where watching them at home in their private residence, whichi is also why Pres Trump
sent out those famous angry tweets 2 weeks ago. Democrats on the Committee (and many others) are liars, and very possibly traitors,
which is probably why Nunes neglected to inform them. Nunes did follow proper procedures, notifying Ryan first etc, you can ignore
the MSM bluster there ..observe Nunes body language in the 2 videos of his dual press briefings he gave today, he appears shocked,
angry, disturbed etc.
You all should be happy, because although Pres Trump has been vindicated here on all counts, the more important story for you
is that the old line Democratic Party looks about to sink under the wieght of thier own lies and illegalities. This all stems
from Obama's Jan 16 signing of the order broadening "co-operation" between the NSA and everybody else in Washington, so that mid-level
analysts at almost any agency could now look at raw NSA intercepts, that is where all the "leaks" and "unmasking" are coming from.
AG Lynch, Obama, and countless others knew, or should have known, all about this, but I am sure they will play the usual
"I was too stupid too know what was going on in my own organization" card.
"... Here you had Obama's people using the NSA to spy on his adversaries, and apparently include the CIA, the FBI, and members of the Department of Justice in that loop, in a manner that was not approved of by any court, that was not approved by even a FISA court – the special court that monitors certain kinds of surveillance," he said. ..."
"... "Just because a conversation involves a foreign official doesn't allow you to illegally tape it, illegally monitor it, or illegally record it when a U.S. citizen is on there, particularly when it's your political adversary," Barnes explained. ..."
"Yes, there is," Barnes replied. "In fact, it's one of the directions that a future
investigation can take. A future investigation doesn't have to focus on whatever it is the
Democrats or liberals want. It can focus on the illegal leaks that took place."
"As I mentioned the other day to a liberal lawyer friend of mine, the worst thing ever
accused concerning Nixon was about using private resources to try to illegally spy on people.
Here you had Obama's people using the NSA to spy on his adversaries, and apparently include
the CIA, the FBI, and members of the Department of Justice in that loop, in a manner that was
not approved of by any court, that was not approved by even a FISA court – the special
court that monitors certain kinds of surveillance," he said.
"Just because a conversation involves a foreign official doesn't allow you to illegally
tape it, illegally monitor it, or illegally record it when a U.S. citizen is on there,
particularly when it's your political adversary," Barnes explained.
"I'm sure the liberals would go nuts if Trump tomorrow started listening in on every
conversation Obama had with anybody that's foreign, or that Bill Clinton had with anybody
that's foreign, or that Hillary Clinton had with anybody that's foreign. So it's a dangerous,
precarious path that Obama has opened up, and hopefully there is a full investigation into that
activity," he said.
"You clearly also have lots of illegal leaks going on, particularly as it related to the
recent Yemen issue involving the widow of the Navy SEAL who passed way, that became a big issue
at the State of the Union. There you had people reporting that no intelligence was gathered.
Well, that's an illegal leak. It turns out that they're wrong, they were lying about
what intelligence developed or the fact that intelligence did develop, but they
shouldn't have been out there saying anything like that," he noted.
"There are people willing to leak the most sensitive national security secrets about any
particular matter, solely to have a one-day political hit story on Trump. These are people who
are violating their oath, and violating the law. Hopefully there is ultimately criminal
punishment," Barnes urged.
"This is far worse than the Plame matter that got all that attention, that got a special
prosecutor in W's reign. This is far, far worse than any of that. This is putting national
security at risk. This is an effective de facto coup attempt by elements of the deep state. So
hopefully there's a meaningful investigation and a meaningful prosecution of these people who
have engaged in reckless criminal acts for their personal political partisan purposes," he
said.
"... Scared and panicking Evelyn Farkas spilled the beans. By saying "I became very worried..." she's obviously trying to justify her behavior in case a legal bomb is dropped on her. This is a side effect of Nunes' dramatized little trip to the White House intelligence secure facilities: as long as they don't know Nunes and Trump's hands, panic will bring more people to come forward and look for some kind of justification and/or protection. ..."
Obama and Clinton thought they had the election in the bag. They broke surveillance laws thinking that Clinton would be in
the Whitehouse to cover it anyway. Imagine their shock on election day when they realized how many felonies would be exposed when
Trump took over.........cover-up.
Look at her face at 2:06 ... Scared and panicking
Evelyn Farkas spilled the beans. By saying "I became very worried..." she's obviously trying to justify her behavior in case a
legal bomb is dropped on her. This is a side effect of Nunes' dramatized little trip to the White House intelligence secure facilities:
as long as they don't know Nunes and Trump's hands, panic will bring more people to come forward and look for some kind of justification
and/or protection.
"... Morell is "priming" the public, cushioning the landing as it were, for the eventual revelation that the Russian collusion narrative has been entirely fabricated. ..."
"... He's not doing it out of the goodness of his heart, but in an attempt to minimize the intelligence community's inevitable, and i might add deserved, loss of credibility over the fiasco. ..."
"... That guy wanted to "kill Russians" and "kill Iranians". He's not a good guy by any stretch of the imagination. ..."
Former CIA Director Michael Morell said in an interview that he thought if there was
evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, special prosecutor Robert Mueller
would have found it already and that the evidence would've been leaked by now. RT America's
Anya Parampil has more.
Morell is "priming" the public, cushioning the landing as it were, for the eventual
revelation that the Russian collusion narrative has been entirely fabricated.
He's not doing it out of the goodness of his heart, but in an attempt to minimize the
intelligence community's inevitable, and i might add deserved, loss of credibility over the
fiasco.
What boggles the mind is there are 3 or 4 solid ways to go after Trump that don't involve
Russia, but the media doesn't seem to be interested in those.
That is because a) it doesn't exonerate the DNC over it's shitty performance in 2016, and
b) it doesn't push the new cold war (which in turn boosts arms sales, and gives the elite a
way to terrify and therefore control the populace). They thought it was going to work, but
it's becoming increasingly apparent that the Nothingburger is about to be exposed for what it
is.
American politics is a clown show and it's actually embarrassing to watch, the world is
laughing at America because it's like a badly written soap opera live on TV.
Michael Morell is a psychopath and the kind of guy who'd usually be pushing the Russia
narrative. If he is saying this - well that's a mind blowing death blow to the big lie.
Amazing. For once in his pathetic life he actually makes a correct analysis. Fuck
me.
CIA INFILTRATED TOP LEVEL OFFICIALS OF THE FBI. CIA MUST BE BLOWN TO PIECES LIKE PRESIDENT
KENNEDY SAID. IF THE CIA WOULD STICK TO THEIR JOB DESCRIPTION, THE UNITED STATES WOULD NOT BE
IN THE MESS IT IS IN NOW.
Morell didn't think through the implications of his actions! If that's the case it would
be the first move in his life he hadn't thought through. These people think we are cabbages
and believe anything, whether its Comey schoolboy act or Morell lack of foresight, we are
expected to suck it up, its just plain insulting they don't even try and mask their deceit
anymore
Former Acting Director of the CIA, Michael Morell, gives a surprisingly honest interview in
which he admits that leaking and bashing by the intelligence community against an incoming
president might not have been the best idea.
People need to go to jail for this. Too much power is in the hands of the shadow
government. The democratic party along with the republican establishment need to be exposed
for the snakes that they really are, thank you HA !!
If "our plan" exist, then Michael Morell should be persecuted.
Notable quotes:
"... Politico's interview with a somewhat repentant Trump hater Mike Morell now saying 'maybe our plan wasn't that well thought out' , and now these MSM Russia Gate screwups coupled with a discovery of FBI Trump haters, is a result of Trump's recognizing Jerusalem as it being Israel's capital? Just say'n. ..."
"... Amazing how energetically the "democrats" are uniting with the CIA! Exhibit No 1 is Mr. Michael Morell (the former director of the CIA)) who has just confessed his treason in support of H. Clinton: http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_76241.shtml ..."
Philip Giraldi writes about a shift occurring over at the CIA in Trump's favor, Politico's interview with a somewhat repentant
Trump hater Mike Morell now saying 'maybe our plan wasn't that well thought out' , and now these MSM Russia Gate screwups coupled
with a discovery of FBI Trump haters, is a result of Trump's recognizing Jerusalem as it being Israel's capital? Just say'n.
Anna , December 14, 2017 at 1:11 am
"You all keep hating on Democracy."
-- Amazing how energetically the "democrats" are uniting with the CIA! Exhibit No 1 is Mr. Michael Morell (the former director
of the CIA)) who has just confessed his treason in support of H. Clinton:
http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_76241.shtml
Your "democracy" was nowhere when Mr. Clinton had been molesting underage girls on Lolita express. Your "democracy on the march,"
Clinton-Kagan style, has destroyed Libya and Ukraine. Millions of innocent civilians of all ages (including an enormous number
of children) died thanks to your Israel-first & oil-first Clinton & Obama policies.
Very democratic ("We came, we saw, he died ha, ha, ha" – and the gem of Northern Africa has become a hell for Libyan citizens).
One does not need to be Trump apologist to sense the stench of your rotten Clinton-Obama-CIA-FBI "democracy."
When a particular MSN outlet call Intelligence assessment the work of "intelligence
community" and not a handful of analysis picked by Brannan and Clapper from just three agencies
(NSA, CIA and FBI) it ia fair to say it spreads propaganda in best Josef Gebbels tradition:
"The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle
is borne in mind constantly - it must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and
over."
"Think of the press as a great keyboard on
which the government can play." ―
Joseph Goebbels
"That propaganda is good which leads to success, and that is bad which fails
to achieve the desired result. It is not propaganda's task to be intelligent, its task is to lead
to success."
―
Joseph Goebbels
Notable quotes:
"... CIA Director Mike Pompeo recently met -- at the urging of President Donald Trump -- with one of the principal deniers of Russian interference in the US election, according to multiple intelligence sources. ..."
"... The CIA responded to CNN's inquiry about the meeting by saying that Pompeo "stands by and has always stood by the January 2017 intelligence community assessment" that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election ..."
This is utterly untrue. In British court documents Mr. Steele has acknowledged he briefed
U.S. reporters about the dossier in September 2016. Those briefed included journalists from
the New York Times , the Washington Post, Yahoo News and others. Mr. Steele, by his own
admission (in an interview with Mother Jones), also gave his dossier in July 2016 to the FBI.
... ... ...
To that point, it is fair to ask if the entire Trump-Russia narrative -- which has played
a central role in our political discourse for a year, and is now resulting in a special
counsel issuing unrelated indictments -- is based on nothing more than a political smear
document. Is there any reason to believe the FBI was probing a Trump-Russia angle before the
dossier? Is there any collusion allegation that doesn't come in some form from the
dossier?
The idea that the federal government and a special counsel were mobilized -- that American
citizens were monitored and continue to be investigated -- based on a campaign-funded hit
document is extraordinary. Especially given that to this day no one has publicly produced a
single piece of evidence to support any of the dossier's substantive allegations about Trump
team members.
CIA Director Mike Pompeo recently met -- at the urging of President Donald Trump -- with
one of the principal deniers of Russian interference in the US election, according to
multiple intelligence sources. Trump apparently made the highly unusual request that Pompeo
meet with the former National Security Agency employee and look into a theory that the leak
of Democratic Party emails last year was an inside job rather than a cyberattack by Russian
hackers.
William Binney, the former NSA employee-turned-whistleblower who circulated the
conspiracy theory, confirmed to CNN that he met with Pompeo for about an hour on October 24
-- despite the fact the intelligence community concluded early this year that Russia
interfered in the 2016 presidential election. The meeting was first
reported by The Intercept.
The CIA responded to CNN's inquiry about the meeting by
saying that Pompeo "stands by and has always stood by the January 2017 intelligence community
assessment" that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election.
US President Donald Trump said he had "good discussions" with Russian leader Vladimir Putin
when they met briefly at an Asia-Pacific summit in Vietnam.
On Twitter, he blasted "haters and fools", who, he said, do not encourage good relations between
the countries.
Earlier he said Mr Putin told him he was insulted by allegations of Russian interference in the
2016 US election.
The US intelligence community has previously concluded that Russia tried to sway the poll in Mr
Trump's favour.
"He said he absolutely did not meddle in our election," the US president said.
However, after intense criticism, Mr Trump clarified hat he supported US intelligence agencies in
their conclusion. "As to whether or not I believe it or not, I'm with our agencies. I believe in
our... intelligence agencies," he said.
"What he believes, he believes," he added, of Mr Putin's belief that Russia did not meddle.
The two leaders had no formal bilateral talks during the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation (Apec)
event, but meet in passing on three occasions. They spoke about the Syria crisis and the election
allegations, according to Mr Trump.
One useful criteria to distinguish propaganda from honest analyst is to check if the
Intelligence assessment is called the product of "intelligence community" or group of handpicked
by Brennan and Clipper analysts from just three agencies (NSA, CIA, and FBI). This is very
similar to the test if some Western news out let call Magnitsky "a lawyer" or "an
accountant".
T he question why intelligence agencies used Steele dossier remain unanswered. and the answer
to this question if the key.
The forces against rapprochement with Russia are way too strong and include "foright policy
establishment", large part of Pentagon, defense contractors, intelligence agencies and their
contractors. Like any bureaucracies they want to expand much like cancel cells -- uncontrollably.
In this sense the intelligence agencies were dangerous for the US democracy from the moment of
their creation and remain so. The question that arise is " Is democracy compatible with the
existence of hypertrophied, almost out of control by "civic" government intelligence agency,
protected by secrecy of their operations? .
The main reason for their creation and existence in hypertrophied state was the existence of
the USSR. But in less twenty years from its creation CIA became dangerous for the US democracy
(in 1963 to be exact). And it probably remains dangerous now -- agency protected by secrecy and
having huge among of money in their disposal.
It is clear that the bet of intelligence agencies (at least NSA, CIA and FBI) in the last
lection was Hillary. Although it looks like FBI waved a bit. What they did to "help" her now
needs to be investigated using something like Church commission.
Notable quotes:
"... On Saturday, in his Air Force One remarks, Trump suggested that what he called the "artificial Democratic hit job" of investigations of possible collusion between his campaign and Russia were somehow preventing U.S.-Russia cooperation on a range of issues, including North Korea. "It's a shame," he said, "because people will die because of it." ..."
"... Putin, in his own news conference after speaking with Trump, said he knew "absolutely nothing" about Russian contacts with Trump campaign officials, and called reports that a campaign official met with his niece "bollocks," according to an interpreter. "They can do what they want, looking for some sensation," Putin said of the investigations. "But there are no sensations." ..."
"... On Saturday, Trump described the former top U.S. intelligence officials who concluded in January that the tampering took place -- including former director of national intelligence James R. Clapper Jr. and former CIA director John Brennan -- as "political hacks." He called former FBI director James B. Comey, who testified to Congress that Trump asked him to drop an investigation of his campaign's connections to Russian officials, a "liar" and a "leaker." ..."
"... Pompeo said last month that intelligence agencies had determined that Russian interference had not altered the electoral outcome ..."
President Trump said that President Vladimir Putin had assured him again Saturday that
Russia did not interfere in the 2016 presidential campaign, and indicated that he believed
Putin's sincerity, drawing immediate criticism from lawmakers and former intelligence officials
who assessed that the meddling took place.
"I asked him again," Trump said after what he described as several brief, informal chats
with Putin in Danang, Vietnam, where they were attending a regional conference. "You can only
ask so many times . . . He said he absolutely did not meddle in our election. He
did not do what they are saying he did.
"I really believe that when he tells me that, he means it . . . I think he's
very insulted, if you want to know the truth," Trump told reporters traveling with him aboard
Air Force One from Danang to Hanoi, on the ninth day of a long Asia tour. Trump voiced similar
conclusions after his only previous meeting with Putin, last July in Germany.
Trump's response to questions about his conversations with Putin was a jarring return
to the more insular preoccupations of Washington after more than a week of what has been a trip
filled with pageantry and pledges of mutual admiration, but few substantive outcomes, between
Trump and Asian leaders.
Later, in a news conference Sunday in Hanoi with Vietnamese President Tran Dai Quang, Trump
appeared to be trying to parse his earlier remarks, saying, "What I said is that I believe
[Putin] believes that.
"As to whether I believe it or not," he said, "I'm with our [intelligence] agencies,
especially as currently constituted.
"I want to be able . . . to get along with Russia," Trump said. "I'm not
looking to stand and argue with somebody when there are reporters standing all around."
Reporters were not permitted inside the hall where the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation
conference was held in Danang.
... ... ...
On Saturday, in his Air Force One remarks, Trump suggested that what he called the
"artificial Democratic hit job" of investigations of possible collusion between his campaign
and Russia were somehow preventing U.S.-Russia cooperation on a range of issues, including
North Korea. "It's a shame," he said, "because people will die because of it."
Putin, in his own news conference after speaking with Trump, said he knew "absolutely
nothing" about Russian contacts with Trump campaign officials, and called reports that a
campaign official met with his niece "bollocks," according to an interpreter. "They can do what
they want, looking for some sensation," Putin said of the investigations. "But there are no
sensations."
On Saturday, Trump described the former top U.S. intelligence officials who concluded in
January that the tampering took place -- including former director of national intelligence
James R. Clapper Jr. and former CIA director John Brennan -- as "political hacks." He called
former FBI director James B. Comey, who testified to Congress that Trump asked him to drop an
investigation of his campaign's connections to Russian officials, a "liar" and a
"leaker."
Clapper said in a statement that "the president was given clear and indisputable evidence
that Russia interfered in the election. His own DNI and CIA director have confirmed the finding
in the intelligence community assessment. The fact that he would take Putin at his word over
the intelligence community is unconscionable."
Brennan declined to comment.
In a statement, the CIA said that Director Mike Pompeo "stands by and has always stood by
the January 2017 Intelligence Community assessment . . . with regard to Russian
election meddling." That position, it said, "has not changed." The assessment also concluded
that Russia had acted to promote Trump's victory over Democrat Hillary Clinton.
Although
Pompeo said last month that intelligence agencies had determined that Russian interference
had not altered the electoral outcome , the assessment did not address that question.
Does this means that Trump now believes that this was Brenna's false flag operation? And why intelligence
agencies exploited Steele dossier against him?
Notable quotes:
"... "I mean, give me a break," Trump said. "So you look at it, I mean, you have Brennan, you have Clapper and you have Comey. Comey is proven now to be a liar and he is proven now to be a leaker." ..."
The president disparaged officials who worked for Barack Obama, saying former CIA chief John Brennan,
ex-director of national intelligence James Clapper and James Comey,
the FBI director he fired in May , were "political hacks".
"I mean, give me a break," Trump said. "So you look at it, I mean, you have Brennan, you have
Clapper and you have Comey. Comey is proven now to be a liar and he is proven now to be a leaker."
He suggested he put more faith in Putin's word.
"Every time he sees me he says 'I didn't do that' and I really believe that when he tells me that,"
Trump said. "He really seems to be insulted by it and he says he didn't do it. He is very, very strong
in the fact that he didn't do it. You have President Putin very strongly, vehemently says he has
nothing to do with that."
Possibly all of the Russia-gate allegations, which have been taken on faith by Democratic partisans
and members of the anti-Trump Resistance, trace back to claims paid for or generated by Democrats. If
for a moment one could remove the often justified hatred many people feel toward Trump, it would be
impossible to avoid the impression that the scandal may have been devised by the DNC and the Clinton
camp in league with Obama's intelligence chiefs to serve political and geopolitical aims. In other
words this is a sophisticated false flag operation.
Even more alarmingly (what really smells like a part on intelligence agencies coup d'état against
Trump ) is the basis for much of the Jan. 6 intelligence "assessment" by those "hand-picked" analysts
from three U.S. intelligence agencies - the CIA, the FBI and the NSA - not all 17 agencies that Hillary
Clinton continues to insist were involved. (Obama's intelligence chiefs, DNI Clapper and CIA Director
John Brennan, publicly admitted that only three agencies took part and The New York Times printed a
correction saving so.)
Notable quotes:
"... Well its three . And one is Brennan . And one is whatever. I mean, give me a break. They're political hacks . So you look at it, and then you have Brennan, you have Clapper and you have Comey . Comey's proven now to be a liar and he's proven to be a leaker. So you look at that. ..."
"... Trump gets it. He knows the weak points of the propaganda claims of "Russian hacking": Podesta and the fake Steele dossier, the DNC server, the lack of any FBI investigation of the alleged hack, the NYT's long false insistence on the '17 agencies' assessment, the "political hacks" who fitted their claims to the Obama/Clinton narrative. ..."
"... But neither the Washington Post nor the NY Times or others mention the crucial points Trump spelled out in their write-ups of the gaggle. There is no word on the DNC servers in them. Instead they create a claim of "Putin says and Trump just believes him". The do not name the facts and questions Trump listed to support his position. Taking up the valid questions Trump asked would of course require the news outlets to finally delve into them. We can't have that. ..."
"... Trump is not the brightest bulb and he is not well informed. I dislike nearly all of his policies. But he understands that the "Russian hacking" narrative is false and is carried by lunatic political hacks who want to push the U.S. back into a cold, or maybe even hot war with Russia, China, Iran and probably everyone else. ..."
"... I guess it could be that the DNC really was hacked, but maybe they faked the hack story, fed the story to Crowdstrike, then paid Crowdstrike a lot of money to fabricate a fairytale about Russian hacking... ..."
"... This Russian fairytale would be the bedrock of Hillary's campaign, and it gave her a reason to badmouth trump who intended to get along with Putin, which deeply offended the neocon Bolsheviks who've been running things since 9/11 ..."
"... If the hacking really happened, it's maybe more likely to have been the US NSA that did the hacking... that might explain why the DNC and Hillary were not alarmed by the hacking --if it happened-- and did nothing about it, and continued to write incriminating emails... ..."
"... Russia gate is Really Hillary Gate... And that's just the beginning as we consider the DNC lid coming off via Donna Brazile and the Uranium scandal. Mueller has been gatekeeper for the Deep State for OKC bombing, 911,...other False Flag...and now today's Intrigues. ..."
"... Back when Trump looked like he was in the running in the US presidential election, I wondered how one man, even if he was genuine, could without the backing of US intelligence, take down the deepstate/borg/whatever. Putin pulled Russia out of the nineties with key backing from patriotic intelligence and military leadership, but Trump even if genuine would be on his own. Just ordered 'Art of the deal' to try and understand Trump a bit more. Looks like he has just destroyed a big chunk of deep state financing so will be interesting to see how long he can stay alive. ..."
"... well, Mueller declined to find 9/11 evidence against bin laden... or maybe we should say, "he declined to manufacture evidence"... for some unkown reason... ..."
"... Can we just face the facts here that there is a coordinated effort by these elite to get Trump dethroned? What reason for this? Simple...he's a threat. ..."
"... Mike Whitney posted a great piece this week suggesting Brennan, Obama's political 'hack', is behind this mess - "Brennan spearheaded the anti-Russia campaign from the get-go. As early as August 2016, Brennan was providing classified briefings to ranking members of Congress expressing his conviction that Moscow was helping Trump to win the election. The former Director offered no proof to back up his claims nor has he since then. It was also Brennan who gradually persuaded Clapper, Comey and Morrell to join his anti-Russia jihad, although all were reluctant participants at first. Were they won over by compelling secret evidence that has been been withheld from the public?" - http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/48172.htm ..."
"... These are but a few sources digging and reporting on these bogus charges against Putin. I'd like to believe the majority of the U.S. electorate isn't being fooled by the nonsense. I can't speak for those who choose to remain inside the brainwashing corporate media bubble, but for those of us who divorced ourselves from their propaganda long ago ain't buying nor ever did buy into the muh Russia crap. ..."
"... Meanwhile, USG declares RT and Sputnik to be foreign agents and must register as such -- and Trump had nothing to do with that?!? ..."
"... The media is now now in permanent psy op mode, colonizing the public's mind and jamming people's ability to reason, think critically and even tell fact from fiction. It is only a matter of time before overt repression becomes widespread (to protect our freedoms of course) and the last remnants of democracy give way to an Orwellian/Huxleyite dystopia. ..."
"... CNN covers the Binney/Pompeo meeting, and describes Binney in the headline as a "conspiracy theorist": http://www.cnn.com/2017/11/07/politics/mike-pompeo-william-binney-meeting/index.html ..."
Trump Points To Falsehoods In "Russian Hacking" Claims - Media Still Ignore Them
During the flight of his recent Asia tour U.S. President Donal Trump held a press gaggle on board
of the plane. Part of it were questions and answers about the alleged "Russian hacking" of the U.S.
election.
There is no public transcript available yet but the Washington Post's Mark Berman
provided a screenshot
of some relevant parts:
Mark Berman @markberman - 6:20 AM - 11 Nov 2017
Full comment from @realDonaldTrump again questioning the US intel community conclusion that
Russia meddled last year
In the attached transcript Trump talks about his very short encounter with the Russian President
Putin in Hanoi:
Q: When did you bring up the issue of election meddling? Did you ask him a question?
A: Every time he sees me he says he didn't do that and I really believe that when he tells
me that, he means it. But he says, I didn't do that. I think he is very insulted by it, ...
...
He says that very strongly and he really seems to be insulted by it he says he didn't do it.
Q: Even if he didn't bring it up one-on-one, do you believe him?
A: I think that he is very, very strong on the fact that didn't do it. And then you look and
you look what's going on with Podesta , and you look at what's going on with the server from the
DNC and why didn't the FBI take it ? Why did they leave it? Why did a third party look at the
server and not the FBI ? You look at all of this stuff, and you say, what's going on here? And
you hear it's 17 agencies. Well its three . And one is Brennan . And one is whatever. I mean,
give me a break. They're political hacks . So you look at it, and then you have Brennan, you have
Clapper and you have Comey . Comey's proven now to be a liar and he's proven to be a leaker. So
you look at that. And you have President Putin very strongly, vehemently say he has nothing
to do with that. Now, you are not going to get into an argument, you are going to start talking
about Syria and the Ukraine.
Trump gets it. He knows the weak points of the propaganda claims of "Russian hacking": Podesta
and the fake Steele dossier, the DNC server, the lack of any FBI investigation of the alleged hack,
the NYT's long false insistence on the '17 agencies' assessment, the "political hacks" who fitted
their claims to the Obama/Clinton narrative.
But
neither the Washington Post
nor the NY Times or
others mention the crucial points Trump spelled out in their write-ups of the gaggle. There is
no word on the DNC servers in them. Instead they create a claim of "Putin says and Trump just believes
him". The do not name the facts and questions Trump listed to support his position. Taking up the
valid questions Trump asked would of course require the news outlets to finally delve into them.
We can't have that.
Instead we get more "Russian influence" claptrap. Like this from the once honorable Wired
which headlines:
Russian interference in Brexit through targeted social media propaganda can be revealed for the
first time. A cache of posts from 2016, seen by WIRED, shows how a coordinated network of Russian-based
Twitter accounts spread racial hatred in an attempt to disrupt politics in the UK and Europe.
Interesting, enthralling, complicate and sensational ...
... until you get down to paragraph 14(!):
Surprisingly, all the posts around Brexit in this small snapshot were posted after the June vote
"Russian agents" influenced the U.S. election by buying mostly
irrelevant Facebook ads - 25% of which were never seen by anyone and 56% of which were posted
AFTER the election
"Russian-based Twitter accounts" influenced the Brexit vote in the UK by tweeting affirmative
AFTER the vote happened
Trump is not the brightest bulb and he is not well informed. I dislike nearly all of his policies.
But he understands that the "Russian hacking" narrative is false and is carried by
lunatic political hacks who want to push the U.S. back into a cold, or maybe even hot war with
Russia, China, Iran and probably everyone else.
"Trump is not the brightest bulb and he is not well informed. I dislike nearly all of his policies.
But he understands that the "Russian hacking" narrative is false and is carried by lunatic political
hacks who want to push the U.S. back into a cold, or maybe even hot war with Russia, China, Iran
and probably everyone else."
I couldn't agree more B. The distraction to cover up the DNC crimes and the 'pay to play' antics
during HRC's tenure at SECState are part of this nonsense as well.
the term "hacked" implies that someone came in on the internet, right?
I guess it could be that the DNC really was hacked, but maybe they faked the hack story,
fed the story to Crowdstrike, then paid Crowdstrike a lot of money to fabricate a fairytale about
Russian hacking...
This Russian fairytale would be the bedrock of Hillary's campaign, and it gave her a reason
to badmouth trump who intended to get along with Putin, which deeply offended the neocon Bolsheviks
who've been running things since 9/11
If the hacking really happened, it's maybe more likely to have been the US NSA that did
the hacking... that might explain why the DNC and Hillary were not alarmed by the hacking --if
it happened-- and did nothing about it, and continued to write incriminating emails...
...they assumed the hackers were on their side
OK, then, if the hacking was a fairytale, made up by Debbie and Hillary, and reinforced by
Crowdstrike, then what? Maybe it doesn't make any difference in the long run, if the DNC was hacked
or not
Whatever happened, the emails got out, Assange strongly hints that Seth Rich was the leak,
Seth Rich was murdered, and his murder was intended to be a warning to people like Donna Brazile,
who, after Seth was murdered, started drawing her office blinds because she didn't want to be
sniped... presumably by the people who murdered Seth Rich
Russia gate is Really Hillary Gate... And that's just the beginning as we consider the DNC
lid coming off via Donna Brazile and the Uranium scandal. Mueller has been gatekeeper for
the Deep State for OKC bombing, 911,...other False Flag...and now today's Intrigues.
Will
Podesta and Hillary escape?...or get Prison? John McCain with ISIS and photo opp,.. Evil in your
face 24. If certain people are not in Prison....Mueller could wear the label Satan's guardian.
..and it wouldn't be exaggeration
Back when Trump looked like he was in the running in the US presidential election, I wondered
how one man, even if he was genuine, could without the backing of US intelligence, take down the
deepstate/borg/whatever. Putin pulled Russia out of the nineties with key backing from patriotic
intelligence and military leadership, but Trump even if genuine would be on his own. Just ordered
'Art of the deal' to try and understand Trump a bit more. Looks like he has just destroyed a big
chunk of deep state financing so will be interesting to see how long he can stay alive.
well, Mueller declined to find 9/11 evidence against bin laden... or maybe we should say,
"he declined to manufacture evidence"... for some unkown reason...
whatever, if seth rich's murder was an attempt to terrorize politicians and the media into
parroting the party line --like the anthrax letters did after 9/11-- it worked
b, it is so funny that everytime you allude to Trump being in the right against the teeming hordes
or globalist, anti-Russia elites, you always offer the caveat: "but...he's a bastard and I hate
him."
Can we just face the facts here that there is a coordinated effort by these elite to get
Trump dethroned? What reason for this? Simple...he's a threat.
Enemy of my enemy anyone?
P.s. I view him as an opportunist. a chameleon. At the very least, perhaps he realizes the
absolute absurdity of trying to keep the house of cards aloft in the ME. So far, no wars, and
a de-escalation in Syria. Pundits are talking about 3+% growth in US for first time in decade.
I dont't know...perhaps Donald can cut and run in time to salvage some of the US prosperity.
I'm almost inclined to think Trump is letting this Russian hack thing play out on purpose despite
his Tweets to the contrary. Preventing the feds from 'investigating' it wouldn't make it go away,
it would just cement the notion of guilt and a cover-up into the anti-Trump, anti-Russian segment
of the public. More importantly, the similarly-inclined political/government leaders (pro-Hillary,
DNC, politicized FBI and intel, neocons, deep state, whatever...) and MSM slowly expose themselves
for what they are. They get too confident in the big lie actually working and go into a feeding
frenzy. Trump trolls them on Twitter and they go insane.
When you want to catch sharks, you don't chase them around the ocean to hunt them. You
chum the waters and wait
for them to come to you. Trump isn't the one chumming the waters here - he's letting the sharks
do that themselves.
I scratched my head like everyone else trying to figure out Trump's earlier incomprehensible
hiring/firing volley his first few months. Maybe that was just a bit of theatre. Trump might not
understand the 'little people' too much, but he does understand his opponent psychopaths (corporate,
banking or government/intel) and how to use their basic flaws against them. 'Draining the swamp'
sells well, but letting his opponents stick their necks out far enough before Trump's own Night
of the Long Knives would (to me) be a far more effective strategy towards his ends. And probably
much safer for him than Kennedy's approach.
Kind of worrying that one has to rely on outsider psychopaths to cull other psychopath's well-entrenched
herds within the US government. Does that ever turn out well?
Only the most strident partisans hold tightly to the Russian interference nonsense.
Those who simply want to deal in facts bother ourselves to self inform using multiple sources
who have been trying to make sense of the dastardly twists and turns in this muh Russia whodunit
scandal. The DNC emails, dossier, collusion the whole escapade, from the beginning, could be seen
as being built on nothing more than quicksand.
Mike Whitney posted a great piece this week suggesting Brennan, Obama's political 'hack',
is behind this mess - "Brennan spearheaded the anti-Russia campaign from the get-go. As early
as August 2016, Brennan was providing classified briefings to ranking members of Congress expressing
his conviction that Moscow was helping Trump to win the election. The former Director offered
no proof to back up his claims nor has he since then. It was also Brennan who gradually persuaded
Clapper, Comey and Morrell to join his anti-Russia jihad, although all were reluctant participants
at first. Were they won over by compelling secret evidence that has been been withheld from the
public?" - http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/48172.htm
And then you have the Intercept's piece on Binney's meeting with CIA's Pompeo with Ray McGovern
providing a lot more detail and an interview with his favorite news outlet RT -
http://raymcgovern.com/
Oh, and about Binney's meeting with Pompeo? Trump requested Pompeo meet with him. He did. But
Pompeo, as of today, remains steadfast in supporting the ICA crap report Obama's political intel
hacks put out.
These are but a few sources digging and reporting on these bogus charges against Putin.
I'd like to believe the majority of the U.S. electorate isn't being fooled by the nonsense. I
can't speak for those who choose to remain inside the brainwashing corporate media bubble, but
for those of us who divorced ourselves from their propaganda long ago ain't buying nor ever did
buy into the muh Russia crap.
we got to wonder why donna brazile made such a fuss about Seth Rich. She's being way too cagey
for comfort but even if we leave seth rich out of it, none of it make any sense
Also from a Youtube video I saw earlier there are claims this is what is happening.
1. Obama regime was chronically corrupt including sell of Uranium to Russia for bribes. Elements
of the US military and intelligence were disgusted by this and approached Trump BEFORE the elections
as a figure who could help them.
2. Trump decided to work with them and during his election campaign he deliberately made constant
exaggerated claims of his supposed friendship with Putin, this was bait for the Democrats to smear
him as a Putin-lover, Putin puppet.
3. Once elected, the whole "Trump is a Putin puppet" was allowed to run so that a huge demand
for some sort of investigation in to Trump and his Russia links could be built. Only this investigation
would in fact be used to target the Democrats and Clinton including for their corruption over
the Uranium sales with the Russians.
4. This was apparently (according to these claims) the game plan from the beginning and Mueller
is apparently going to work to convict Hillary Clinton and other senior Democrats.
I don't know how true this is, but it does answer a lot of questions and anomalies and also
ties in with B's thesis that we are essentially seeing a quasi-military government in D.C. under
Trump.
@ PavewayIV who ended his comment with: "Kind of worrying that one has to rely on outsider psychopaths
to cull other psychopath's well-entrenched herds within the US government. Does that ever turn
out well? "
Yep! And we add our textual white noise to the rearranging of the deck chairs on
the top deck of the good ship Humanity as it careens over the falls/into the shoals/pick-your-metaphor
psychohistorian@14 - Captain to crew: "I will not have this ship go down looking
like a garbage scow. Deck chairs will be arranged in a neat and orderly manner at all times!"
The same media you're decrying here is also ignoring this week's paradise papers revelations
about Wilbur Ross, Trump's commerce secretary and business links with Russian Israeli mobsters
and oligarchs like Mogilevich.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMhzkvWuXEM
There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what is not true. The other is to refuse
to believe what is true. Can't fix stupid sociopathy. I pity deplorable goyims, They deserve their
plight...
Please someone end this idiot circus! Russia hacked THE ELECTION ...hacked THE ELECTION ??? For
the love of gawd..the ELECTION, meaning the voting was hacked.....it was NOT. Nothing has focused
on Russian 'hacking' of VOTES. Russia 'if' they hacked, at best hacked some emails and info used
to expose Hillary. And posted negative info on the net. So, so what? How many leakers weren't
doing that?
I have had it with the Dems, they have IQs somewhere below that of cabbages. But
I guess there are a certain number of citizens that will believe anything if it is repeated enough
by their herd leaders.
All this pathetic, lousy street theater resembling staging can only serve one important reason:
Distraction. What is it that people need to be distracted from? That the US has turned openly
into a military dictatorship? That the extermination proceedings are speeding up?
Hitler used
gas chambers, as did the US after the war. While the first was a psychopathic dictator, the latter
is a psychopathic society. It has spend trillions in research and design of lethal weapons and
systems to exterminate any 'enemy'.
With all the technological progress, people do no longer need to be dragged to a gas chamber.
The gas chamber will come to them. Sprayed into the atmosphere and making its way into earth's
life systems.
Trump, Dump, Busch, Koch, Clinton, Reagan, Nixon - plutocratic hand puppets. It is not the
people who decide where and when the ship sinks. It will be sunken for them - with all the useless
eaters on board.
Trump is too stupid to realize that the very reason the election was rigged in his favour was
- the derailment of ANY ZIO/US/Russia relations !! Their top priority ( as always) has been to
keep Russia and Germany apart ! Russia's 'resources' and German 'innovation' is a match made in
heaven - would spell the end of the US economy !
Not only did the Propaganda System refuse to correctly report as b details, but nowhere has it
mentioned the defeat of Daesh, as Pepe Escobar discloses: "This is History in the making.
"And right on cue, VIRTUALLY NOTHING about this REAL ON THE GROUND VICTORY OF
A REAL WAR ON TERROR is being covered by Western corporate media.
"No wonder. Because this was the work of Damascus, Russia, Hezbollah, Iran advisers, Baghdad
and the PMUs – actually the "4+1" - and not the US-led "coalition" that includes Wahhabi mongrels
House of Saud and UAE - that totally smashes to bits the monochord Washington narrative.
The war on Syria and the Russian "hacking" debacle has corrupted the entire western media. Not
that it was ever squeaky clean - far from it - but it was at least somewhat independent from the
dominant establishment. There were pauses between the outrageous lies and blatant fact twisting
and it did not overtly shill for neoliberal political parties and work overtime pushing massive
amounts of propaganda on the public 24/7/365 and relentlessly demonize, in the most crude fashion
imaginable, the leaders of some of the the world's most powerful countries and any sovereign nation
that values its independence and freedom from Western exploitation.
The media is now now in permanent psy op mode, colonizing the public's mind and jamming
people's ability to reason, think critically and even tell fact from fiction. It is only a matter
of time before overt repression becomes widespread (to protect our freedoms of course) and the
last remnants of democracy give way to an Orwellian/Huxleyite dystopia.
If by chance Trump or anyone is genuine about taking down the deep state, they cannot do it
by running around in a pathetic attempt trying to fix small issues. They would have to leave the
machine to carry on as normal and go for its foundations. I thought about this months ago, and
now looking at the latest events, this could be what is happening.
Meanwhile a revolution threatening the federation of Australia is taking place in Canberra utilizing
a formless and compliant press corps and a fake issue of dual citizenship. Chaos is a disease
agent which has jumped out of the Middle Eastern laboratory into all western nations.
"... add Bush. Glenn Greenwald on John Brennan . It is interesting that the empire sues the little people. ..."
"... "It is a perfect illustration of the Obama legacy that a person who was untouchable as CIA chief in 2008 because of his support for Bush's most radical policies is not only Obama's choice for the same position now, but will encounter very little resistance. Within this change one finds one of the most significant aspects of the Obama presidency: his conversion of what were once highly contentious right-wing policies into harmonious dogma of the DC bipartisan consensus. Then again, given how the CIA operates, one could fairly argue that Brennan's eagerness to deceive and his long record of supporting radical and unaccountable powers make him the perfect person to run that agency. It seems clear that this is Obama's calculus." ..."
"... one more quote from your newest link to the NYT: "The job Mr. Brennan once held in Riyadh is, more than the ambassador's, the true locus of American power in the kingdom. Former diplomats recall that the most important discussions always flowed through the CIA station chief." The Saudis bought the CIA From station chief in Riyadh to Director Tenet's chief of staff to Deputy Executive Director of the CIA and finally, under Obama, to Director of the CIA ..."
"... Best background article I've come across on how the Arab Spring pro-democracy uprisings were either suppressed (in the U.S. client oil monarchies like Bahrain) or hijacked for regime change purposes (as in Libya and Syria): http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion... how-the-arab-spring-was-hijacked/ (Feb 2012) ..."
"... The best explanation is that despite the effort to "woo" Assad into the Saudi-Israeli axis (c.2008-2010), Assad refused to cut economic ties with Iran, which was setting up rail lines, air traffic and oil pipeline deals with Assad on very good terms. This led Hillary Clinton, Leon Panetta, etc. to lobby Obama to support a regime change program: ..."
"... Replace "plan" with "ongoing project". The main point would be that Panetta and Clinton also belong on that "illegal arms transfer" charge sheet. Civil damages for the costs Europe, Turkey, Lebanon etc. bore due to millions of fleeing refugees should also be assessed (let alone damage in Syria, often to priceless historical treasures destroyed by ISIS). ..."
"... Then there's the previous regime and its deliberate lies about non-existent WMDs in Iraq, claims used to start a war of aggression that killed thousand of U.S. soldiers and hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians - Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Woolsey, Tenet, Powell - they should have their own separate charge sheet. ..."
"... But it wasn't just anti-arms trafficking laws that were broken, was it? Wouldn't a conspiracy to use extremists as a weapon of state amount to a crime against humanity? David Stockman thinks so, but he pins the 'crime' on old, sick McCain. (see: 'Moderate Rebels' Cheerleader McCain is Fall Guy But Neocon Cancer Lives ..."
"... I classify attempts at regime change as terrorism, too, since it's essentially the waging of aggressive war via different means, which is the #1 War Crime also violating domestic law as well ..."
"... What of the US bases being established in N. Syria that were helpfully marked by the Turks? Within the context that the SF force multiplier model has varied success but hasn't worked AFAIK since the Resistance in WW2. What, short of an explicit invasion, is an option for the US+? US-hired mercenaries failed to do the job, and the US as mercenaries for the Arabs are not willing to commit. Maybe if the USIC offered up more "wives" they'd acquire more psychopathic murderers to spread the joy. ..."
"... Trump may have put Pompeo in to present the facade of housecleaning, but who here believes that there is any serious move to curtail the Syrian misadventure? Just a change in the marketing plan. ..."
"... As the Brits came out with blocking the release of 30-yr-old official records on the basis that "personal information" and "national security" would be compromised? More like the criminal activity at 10 Downing St. and the misappropriation of public money for international crime would be brought to light. https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/4159032/whitehall-refuses-documents-release/ ..."
"... While I do agree with some of the things Trump has done so far, I cannot agree that he makes for a good "leader" of our rapidly devolving nation. As much "good" that Trump has done, he's probably done much worse on other issues and levels. It's really pretty awful all around. ..."
"... That said, when some people say how much they "miss Obama," I want to either pound my head into a brick wall and/or throw up. The damage that Obama and his hench men/women did is incalculable. ..."
"... Not so much with "No drama Obama" the smooth talking viper that we - either unwittingly or wittingly - clutche to our collective bosom. Obama's many many many lies - all told with smooth suave assurance - along with his many sins of omission served as cover for what he was doing. Trump's buffoonery and incessant Twitting at least put his idiocies out on the stage for all to see (of course, the Republicans do use that as cover for their nefarious deeds behind Trump's doofus back). ..."
"... I likened a Trump presidency to sticking the landing of a crashing US empire. ..."
"... Remember this, The prosecution of a Swedish national accused of terrorist activities in Syria has collapsed at the Old Bailey after it became clear Britain's security and intelligence agencies would have been deeply embarrassed had a trial gone ahead, the Guardian can reveal. ..."
"... His lawyers argued that British intelligence agencies were supporting the same Syrian opposition groups as he was, and were party to a secret operation providing weapons and non-lethal help to the groups, including the Free Syrian Army. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jun/01/trial-swedish-man-accused-terrorism-offences-collapse-bherlin-gildo ..."
"... John McCain was neck deep in supporting Terrorists in Syria he wanted to give them manpads. ..."
"... WASHINGTON (Sputnik) -- Media reported earlier in October that Syrian rebels asked Washington for Stinger missiles to use them against Russia's military jets. "Absolutely Absolutely I would," McCain said when asked whether he would support the delivery of Stinger missiles to the opposition in Syria. ..."
"... The US were into regime change in Syria a long time ago..... Robert Ford was US Ambassador to Syria when the revolt against Syrian president Assad was launched. He not only was a chief architect of regime change in Syria, but actively worked with rebels to aid their overthrow of the Syrian government. ..."
"... Ambassador Ford talked himself blue in the face reassuring us that he was only supporting moderates in Syria. As evidence mounted that the recipients of the largesse doled out by Washington was going to jihadist groups, Ford finally admitted early last year that most of the moderates he backed were fighting alongside ISIS and al-Qaeda. ..."
"... b asked : "When will the FBI investigate Messrs Petraeus, Obama and Brennan? Duh, like never... Most here understand this, I'm sure. The wealthy and the connected puppets never face justice, for their crimes, committed in the service of their owners. ..."
"... NYT never saw a war (rather an attack by the US, NATO, Israel, UK, on any defenseless nation) that it did not support. Wiki uses the word "allegedly" in explaining the CIA and Operation Mockingbird. It just isn't feasible that a secret government agency - gone rogue - with unlimited funding and manpower could write/edit the news for six media owners with similar war-profiteering motives. ..."
"... Seymour Hersh, in his 'Victoria NULAND moment' audio, states categorically BRENNAN conceived and ran the 'Russian Hack' psyop after Seth RICH DNC leaks. ..."
Rasheed Al Jijakli,[the CEO of a check-cashing business who lives in Walnut,] along with three
co-conspirators, allegedly transported day and night vision rifle scopes, laser boresighters used
to adjust sights on firearms for accuracy when firing, flashlights, radios, a bulletproof vest,
and other tactical equipment to Syrian fighters.
...
If Jijakli is found guilty, he could face 50 years in prison . Jijakli's case is being prosecuted
by counterintelligence and Terrorism and Export Crimes Section attorneys. An FBI investigation,
in coordination with other agencies, is ongoing.
CIA director, Mike Pompeo, recommended to President Trump that he shut down a four-year-old
effort to arm and train Syrian rebels
...
Critics in Congress had complained for years about the costs [...] and reports that some of the
CIA-supplied weapons had ended up in the hands of a rebel group tied to Al Qaeda
...
In the summer of 2012, David H. Petraeus , who was then CIA director, first proposed a covert
program of arming and training rebels
...
[ Mr. Obama signed] a presidential finding authorizing the CIA to covertly arm and train small
groups of rebels
-...
John O. Brennan , Mr. Obama's last CIA director, remained a vigorous defender of the program
...
When will the FBI investigate Messrs Petraeus, Obama and Brennan? Where are the counterintelligence
and Terrorism and Export Crimes Section attorneys prosecuting them? Those three men engaged in the
exactly same trade as Mr. Jijakil did, but on a much larger scale. They should be punished on an
equally larger scale.
*Note:
The NYT story is largely a whitewash. It claims that the CIA paid "moderate" FSA rebels stormed
Idleb governate in 2015. In fact al-Qaeda and Ahrar al Sham were leading the assault. It says
that costs of the CIA program was "more than $1 billion over the life of the program" when CIA
documents show that it was over $1 billion
per year and likely much more than $5 billion in total. The story says that the program started
in 2013 while the CIA has been providing arms to the Wahhabi rebels since at least fall 2011.
Posted by b on August 3, 2017 at 05:15 AM |
Permalink
India and Pakistan spends insane amounts of money because Pakistan arms "rebels" both countries
could use that money for many other things. Especially Pakistan which has a tenth the economy
of India. BUT Pakistan is controlled by the military or MIC so arming terrorists is more important
than such things as schools and power supplies etc. Their excuse is India is spending so much
on arms. Which India says is because in large part due to Pakistan. US says well move those 2
million troops to attack China instead. Everyone is happy except the population in those 3 countries
which lack most things except iphones. Which makes US extremely happy.
It would interesting to get to the truth about Brennan. Is he an islamist himself? Did he actually
convert to islam in Saudi Arabia? Lots of stories out there.
Has he been acting as a covert agent against his own country for years?Selling out the entire
west and every christian on the planet. Time to find this out, methinks.
Is treason in the USA
a death penalty issue?. Its certainly what he deserves.
"a four-year-old effort to arm and train Syrian rebels."
A four year effort to arm the f**kers? Doubtful it was an effort to arm them, but training
them to act in the hegemon's interests... like upholders of democracy and humanitarian... headchopping
is just too much of an attraction
"7,000 Syrian refugees and fighters return home from Lebanon"
The 'al-Qaeda linked' fighters are mostly foreigners, paid mercenaries. They have been dumped
in Idlib along with the other terrorists. In the standard reconciliation process, real Syrians
are given the option of returning home if they renounce violence and agree to a political solution.
Fake Syrians are dumped in with the foreigners. The real Syrian fighters who reconcile have to
join the SAA units to fight against ISIS etc.
ISIS fighters were encouraged to bring their families with them (for use as human shields and
to provide settlers for the captured territory). ISIS documents recovered from Mosul indicate
that unmarried foreign mercenaries fighting with them were provided with a wife (how does that
work? do the women volunteer or are they 'volunteered'?), a car and other benefits. These families
and hangers-on would probably be the 'Syrian refugees'.
On a side note, the Kurds have released a video showing the training of special forces belonging
to their allies, the 'Syrian Defense Force' (composed largely of foreigners again). The SDF fighters
fly the FSA flag, ie they are the carefully vetted moderate head chopping rebels beloved of the
likes of McCain.
"It is a perfect illustration of the Obama legacy that a person who was untouchable
as CIA chief in 2008 because of his support for Bush's most radical policies is not only Obama's
choice for the same position now, but will encounter very little resistance. Within this change
one finds one of the most significant aspects of the Obama presidency: his conversion of what
were once highly contentious right-wing policies into harmonious dogma of the DC bipartisan
consensus. Then again, given how the CIA operates, one could fairly argue that Brennan's eagerness
to deceive and his long record of supporting radical and unaccountable powers make him the
perfect person to run that agency. It seems clear that this is Obama's calculus."
My own addition to the Brennan record:
Brennan was station chief for the CIA in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia during the planning period for
9/11. The Saudi rulers do not use the US embassy as their first point of contact with Washington,
they use the CIA Brennan moved back to the US some time in (late?) 1999. The first 9/11 Saudi
hijackers arrived on US shores in January 2000. Brennan was made CIA chief of staff to Director
Tenet in 1999 and Deputy Executive Director of the CIA in March 2001.
The support for the Syrian rebels is only the latest chapter in the decades long relationship
between the spy services of Saudi Arabia and the United States, an alliance that has endured
through the Iran-contra scandal, support for the mujahedeen against the Soviets in Afghanistan
and proxy fights in Africa. Sometimes, as in Syria, the two countries have worked in concert.
In others, Saudi Arabia has simply written checks underwriting American covert activities.
... Although the Saudis have been public about their help arming rebel groups in Syria, the
extent of their partnership with the CIA's covert action campaign and their direct financial
support had not been disclosed. Details were pieced together in interviews with a half-dozen
current and former American officials and sources from several Persian Gulf countries. Most
spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the program.
From the moment the CIA operation was started, Saudi money supported it.
...
The roots of the relationship run deep. In the late 1970s, the Saudis organized what was
known as the "Safari Club" -- a coalition of nations including Morocco, Egypt and France -- that
ran covert operations around Africa at a time when Congress had clipped the CIA's wings
over years of abuses.
...
Prince Bandar pledged $1 million per month to help fund the contras, in recognition of the
administration's past support to the Saudis. The contributions continued after Congress cut
off funding to the contras. By the end, the Saudis had contributed $32 million, paid through
a Cayman Islands bank account.
When the Iran-contra scandal broke, and questions arose about the Saudi role, the kingdom
kept its secrets. Prince Bandar refused to cooperate with the investigation led by Lawrence
E. Walsh, the independent counsel.
In a letter, the prince declined to testify, explaining that his country's "confidences
and commitments, like our friendship, are given not just for the moment but the long run."
one more quote from your newest link to the NYT: "The job Mr. Brennan once held in Riyadh
is, more than the ambassador's, the true locus of American power in the kingdom. Former diplomats
recall that the most important discussions always flowed through the CIA station chief." The
Saudis bought the CIA From station chief in Riyadh to Director Tenet's chief of staff to Deputy
Executive Director of the CIA and finally, under Obama, to Director of the CIA
Best background article I've come across on how the Arab Spring pro-democracy uprisings were
either suppressed (in the U.S. client oil monarchies like Bahrain) or hijacked for regime change
purposes (as in Libya and Syria):
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion... how-the-arab-spring-was-hijacked/ (Feb 2012)
In particular:
A fourth trend is that the Arab Spring has become a springboard for playing great-power geopolitics.
Syria, at the center of the region's sectarian fault lines, has emerged as the principal
battleground for such Cold War-style geopolitics. Whereas Russia is intent on keeping its only
military base outside the old Soviet Union in Syria's Mediterranean port of Tartus, the U.S.
seems equally determined to install a pro-Western regime in Damascus.
This goal prompted Washington to set up a London-based television station that began broadcasting
to Syria a year before major protests began there. The U.S. campaign, which includes
assembling a coalition of the willing, has been boosted by major Turkish, Saudi, Qatari and
UAE help, including cross-border flow of arms into Syria and the establishment of two new petrodollar-financed,
jihad-extolling television channels directed at Syria's majority Sunni Arabs.
The best explanation is that despite the effort to "woo" Assad into the Saudi-Israeli axis
(c.2008-2010), Assad refused to cut economic ties with Iran, which was setting up rail lines,
air traffic and oil pipeline deals with Assad on very good terms. This led Hillary Clinton, Leon
Panetta, etc. to lobby Obama to support a regime change program:
Replace "plan" with "ongoing project". The main point would be that Panetta and Clinton
also belong on that "illegal arms transfer" charge sheet. Civil damages for the costs Europe,
Turkey, Lebanon etc. bore due to millions of fleeing refugees should also be assessed (let alone
damage in Syria, often to priceless historical treasures destroyed by ISIS).
Then there's the previous regime and its deliberate lies about non-existent WMDs in Iraq,
claims used to start a war of aggression that killed thousand of U.S. soldiers and hundreds of
thousands of Iraqi civilians - Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Woolsey, Tenet, Powell - they should have
their own separate charge sheet.
Send the lot to Scheveningen
Prison - for the most notorious war criminals. Pretty luxurious as prisons go, by all accounts.
But it wasn't just anti-arms trafficking laws that were broken, was it? Wouldn't a conspiracy
to use extremists as a weapon of state amount to a crime against humanity? David Stockman thinks
so, but he pins the 'crime' on old, sick McCain. (see:
'Moderate Rebels' Cheerleader McCain is Fall Guy But Neocon Cancer Lives
Within the Outlaw US Empire alone, there're several thousand people deserving of those 5,000 year
sentences, not just the three b singled out. But b does provide a great service for those of us
who refuse to support terrorists and terrorism by not paying federal taxes by providing proof
of that occurring. I classify attempts at regime change as terrorism, too, since it's essentially
the waging of aggressive war via different means, which is the #1 War Crime also violating domestic
law as well. Thanks b!
it's the usa!!!! no one in gov't is held accountable.. obama wants to move on, lol... look forward,
not backward... creating a heaping pile of murder, mayhem and more in other parts of the world,
but never examine any of it, or hold anyone accountable.. it is the amerikkkan way...
What of the US bases being established in N. Syria that were helpfully marked by the Turks?
Within the context that the SF force multiplier model has varied success but hasn't worked AFAIK
since the Resistance in WW2. What, short of an explicit invasion, is an option for the US+? US-hired
mercenaries failed to do the job, and the US as mercenaries for the Arabs are not willing to commit.
Maybe if the USIC offered up more "wives" they'd acquire more psychopathic murderers to spread
the joy.
Trump may have put Pompeo in to present the facade of housecleaning, but who here believes
that there is any serious move to curtail the Syrian misadventure? Just a change in the marketing
plan.
As the Brits came out with blocking the release of 30-yr-old official records on the basis
that "personal information" and "national security" would be compromised? More like the criminal
activity at 10 Downing St. and the misappropriation of public money for international crime would
be brought to light.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/4159032/whitehall-refuses-documents-release/
While I do agree with some of the things Trump has done so far, I cannot agree that he makes
for a good "leader" of our rapidly devolving nation. As much "good" that Trump has done, he's
probably done much worse on other issues and levels. It's really pretty awful all around.
That said, when some people say how much they "miss Obama," I want to either pound my head
into a brick wall and/or throw up. The damage that Obama and his hench men/women did is incalculable.
At least with Trump, we can clearly witness his idiocy and grasp the level of at least some
of his damage.
Not so much with "No drama Obama" the smooth talking viper that we - either unwittingly
or wittingly - clutche to our collective bosom. Obama's many many many lies - all told with smooth
suave assurance - along with his many sins of omission served as cover for what he was doing.
Trump's buffoonery and incessant Twitting at least put his idiocies out on the stage for all to
see (of course, the Republicans do use that as cover for their nefarious deeds behind Trump's
doofus back).
Agree with b. NYT is worthless. Limited hangout for sure.
I likened a Trump presidency to sticking the landing of a crashing US empire. He'll
bring it down without going true believer on us, a la Clinton and ilk who were busy scheduling
the apocalypse.
Trump has not been tested yet with a rapidly deteriorating economy which as we all know is
coming. Something is in the air and Trump will have to face it sooner or later. The weight of
the anger of millions will be behind it...will it be too late? Will Trump finally go MAGA in what
he promised: Glas-Steagall, making trade fair for US interests, dialing back NATO...etc. etc.
I fear he can not articulate the issues at hand, like Roosevelt or Hitler. He is too bumbling.
I guess really we can only hope for an avoidance of WW. Will the world even weep for a third world
USA?
Remember this, The prosecution of a Swedish national accused of terrorist activities in Syria
has collapsed at the Old Bailey after it became clear Britain's security and intelligence agencies
would have been deeply embarrassed had a trial gone ahead, the Guardian can reveal.
John McCain was neck deep in supporting Terrorists in Syria he wanted to give them manpads.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik) -- Media reported earlier in October that Syrian rebels asked Washington
for Stinger missiles to use them against Russia's military jets. "Absolutely Absolutely I would,"
McCain said when asked whether he would support the delivery of Stinger missiles to the opposition
in Syria.
"We certainly did that in Afghanistan. After the Russians invaded Afghanistan, we provided
them with surface-to-air capability. It'd be nice to give people that we train and equip and send
them to fight the ability to defend themselves. That's one of the fundamental principles of warfare
as I understand it," McCain said.
https://sputniknews.com/us/201510201028835944-us-stingers-missiles-syrian-rebels-mccain/
They will pay sooner or later for their crimes against the Syrians. Add Sarkozy, Cameron and Holland
to the list of criminals hiding under their position.
The US were into regime change in Syria a long time ago..... Robert Ford was US Ambassador
to Syria when the revolt against Syrian president Assad was launched. He not only was a chief
architect of regime change in Syria, but actively worked with rebels to aid their overthrow of
the Syrian government.
Ford assured us that those taking up arms to overthrow the Syrian government were simply moderates
and democrats seeking to change Syria's autocratic system. Anyone pointing out the obviously Islamist
extremist nature of the rebellion and the foreign funding and backing for the jihadists was written
off as an Assad apologist or worse.
Ambassador Ford talked himself blue in the face reassuring us that he was only supporting
moderates in Syria. As evidence mounted that the recipients of the largesse doled out by Washington
was going to jihadist groups, Ford finally admitted early last year that most of the moderates
he backed were fighting alongside ISIS and al-Qaeda. Witness this incredible Twitter exchange
with then-ex Ambassador Ford:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/you-wont-believe-what-former-us-ambassador-robert-s-ford-said-about-al-qaedas-syrian-allies/5504906
Specially Petraeus. A US Army General, and director of the CIA You don't get more 'pillar'
of the State than that! And off he goes doing illegal arms trades, in the billions, see for ex.
Meyssan, as an ex.:
In other countries / times, he'd be shot at dawn as a traitor. But all it shows really is that
the USA does not really have a Gvmt. in the sense of a 'political structure of strong regulatory
importance with 'democratic' participation..' to keep it vague.. It has an elaborate public charade,
a kind of clumsy theatre play, that relies very heavily on the scripted MSM, on ritual, and various
distractions. Plus natch' very vicious control mechanisms at home.. another story.
Meanwhile, off stage, the actors participate and fight and ally in a whole other scene where
'disaster capitalism', 'rapine', 'mafia moves' and the worst impulses in human nature not only
bloom but are institutionalised and deployed world-wide! Covering all this up is getting increasingly
difficult -Trump presidency - one would hope US citizens no not for now.
The other two of course as well, I just find Petraeus emblematic, probably because of all the
BS about his mistress + he once mis-treated classified info or something like that, total irrelevance
spun by the media, which works.
"They will pay sooner or later for their crimes against the Syrians. Add Sarkozy, Cameron
and Holland to the list of criminals hiding under their position."
I humbly disagree, and they sincerely believe they are helping the Syrians (plus other states)
- freedom and democracy against the brutality of Dr. Assad. I believe all these murderers are
sincere doing god works and will all go to heaven. That is one of the reasons why I refuse to
go to heaven even if gods beg me. Fuck it!
My apologies if I offend you or anyone. It's about time we look carefully beside politic and
wealth, what religion does to a human?
b asked : "When will the FBI investigate Messrs Petraeus, Obama and Brennan? Duh, like never...
Most here understand this, I'm sure. The wealthy and the connected puppets never face justice,
for their crimes, committed in the service of their owners.
You can include ALL the POTUS's
and their minions, since the turn of the century. " It's just business, get over it."
6 Look for signs of instigating violent behavior. As children some sociopaths torture defenseless
people and animals. This violence is always instigating, and not defensive violence. They will
create drama out of thin air, or twist what others say. They will often overreact strongly
to minor offenses. If they are challenged or confronted about it, they will point the finger
the other way, counting on the empathic person's empathy and consideration of people to protect
them, as long as they can remain undetected. Their attempt to point the finger the other way,
is both a smokescreen to being detected, and an attempt to confuse the situation.
The link is a pretty good summary. It is easy to find more respectable psychological sources
for the disorder on the internet.
NYT never saw a war (rather an attack by the US, NATO, Israel, UK, on any defenseless nation)
that it did not support. Wiki uses the word "allegedly" in explaining the CIA and Operation Mockingbird.
It just isn't feasible that a secret government agency - gone rogue - with unlimited funding and
manpower could write/edit the news for six media owners with similar war-profiteering motives.
/s
" Here, evolution had hit on the sweetest of solutions. Such perceptions were guaranteed
to produce a faith-dependent species that believed itself to be thoroughly separate from the rest
of the animal kingdom, ...."
Interesting article, but stop reading years ago when struggled to raise a family, make a living
to survive. Debatable Is "sociopath" (Antisocial Personality Disorder) or the genes make humanly
so brutally? Very often hard to fathom the depth of human suffering be it USA, Syria or elsewhere.
Thanks sharing you thought.
What most of the msm and the echo chamber seem to be deliberately missing is all intentional.
The whole Assad must go meme is dead and buried. The western cabal has not acheived their regime
change in Syria. The Russian economy has not sunk to the bottom of the Black sea, the Russians
hacked into my fridge meme has all been debunked and is falling apart. The collusion of all anglo
antlantacist secret agency and governments to destabalize the ME has all come out with an ever
turbulant flow. Iran being the threat of the world ,debunked. Russia invading and hacking the
free world ,debunked.
Hence I expect that the western oligarchs along with their pressitute
and compromised politicians will be bying up alot of bleach. They will be whitewashing for the
next three months all semblance of anything related to their fraudulent existence.
Nurenberg 2, the Hague would be to soft for these vile criminals of humanity. Look how they
had to back track on the Milosevic conviction mind u post death.
Just another day in the office for these criminals of humanity. Gee can't wait until this petro-dollar
ponzi scheme crashes hopefully we can get back o being human again. The emperor has no clothes.
43 The whole Assad must go meme is dead and buried. The western cabal has not acheived their
regime change in Syria. The Russian economy has not sunk to the bottom of the Black sea, the
Russians hacked into my fridge meme has all been debunked and is falling apart. The collusion
of all anglo antlantacist secret agency and governments to destabalize the ME has all come
out with an ever turbulant flow. Iran being the threat of the world ,debunked. Russia invading
and hacking the free world,debunked.
Optimistic. Has Trump been instrumental in these? Perhaps. This would be a good reason for
Zionists to hate him. But how is it that Trump is such a bumbling idiot? Now the Senate has ratfcked
him with recess appointments. And he signed that stupid Russia Sanctions bill.
Seymour Hersh, in his 'Victoria NULAND moment' audio, states categorically BRENNAN conceived
and ran the 'Russian Hack' psyop after Seth RICH DNC leaks.
Ray McGovern raise important fact: DNC hide evidence from FBI outsourcing everything to CrowdStrike. This is the most unexplainable
fact in the whole story. One hypotheses that Ray advanced here that there was so many hacks into DNC that they wanted to hide.
Another important point is CIA role in elections, and specifically
John O. Brennan behaviour. Brennan's 25 years with the CIA
included work as a Near East and South Asia analyst and as station chief in Saudi Arabia.
McGovern thing that Brennon actually controlled Obama. And in his opinion Brennan was the main leaker of Trump surveillance information.
Notable quotes:
"... Do really think the Deep State cares about the environment. Trump is our only chance to damage Deep State. McGovern is wrong... DNC were from Seth Rich, inside DNC. Murdered for it. McGovern is wrong... i could go on and on but suffice it to say his confidence is way to high. He is wrong. ..."
I really like Ray... I watch and listen , he seems to use logic, reason and facts in his assessments.. I'm surprised CIA and the
deep state allow him to operate ... stay safe Ray...
McGovern, you idiot. To try to put Trump on Hillary's level is complete stupidity. The war with Russia or nothing was avoided
with a Trump victory. Remember the NATO build up on the Russian border preparing for a Hillary win? Plus, if Hillary won, justice
and law in the USA would be over with forever. The Germans dont know sht about the USA to say their little cute phrase. Trump
is a very calm mannered man and his hands on the nuke button is an issue only to those who watch the fake MSM. And no the NSA
has not released anything either. Wrong on that point too.
The German expression of USA having a choice between cholera and plague is ignorant. McGovern is wrong ....everyone knew HRC
was a criminal. McGovern is wrong... Jill Stein in not trustworthy. A vote for Jill Stein was a vote away from Trump. If Jill
Stein or HRC were elected their would be no environment left to save. Do really think the Deep State cares about the environment.
Trump is our only chance to damage Deep State. McGovern is wrong... DNC were from Seth Rich, inside DNC. Murdered for it. McGovern
is wrong... i could go on and on but suffice it to say his confidence is way to high. He is wrong.
Another month or so and the DHS may offer a color-coding system to help the sheeple understand various levels of confidence.
Green - Moderate Confidence Blue - High Confidence Yellow - Very High Confidence Orange - Extremely High Confidence Red - Based
on Actual Fact
The last category may be one of the signs of the apocalypse.
"... The Trump administration lost the initiative when Trump failed to strike at the security state's Achilles heel: international
repudiation of CIA impunity. He could still do a few things to turn the flank of CIA's attacks: ..."
"... Submit a good-faith ratification package for the Rome Statute ..."
"... The Rome Statute is first and foremost a commitment to prosecute or extradite officials suspected of serious crimes. Systematic
and widespread CIA torture is the open-and-shut case, but the US command structure is also provably guilty of the crime of aggression.
..."
The Trump administration lost the initiative when Trump failed to strike at the security state's Achilles heel: international
repudiation of CIA impunity. He could still do a few things to turn the flank of CIA's attacks:
* Pardon Sirhan Sirhan
* Order immediate release of NARA records in accordance with law
* Submit a good-faith ratification package for the Rome Statute
* Give tacit approval to international exposure of nuclear and biological weapons proliferation by CIA
This will provoke a crisis where the soft coup is constrained by concerted pressure from civil society and the international
community.
The Rome Statute is first and foremost a commitment to prosecute or extradite officials suspected of serious crimes. Systematic
and widespread CIA torture is the open-and-shut case, but the US command structure is also provably guilty of the crime of aggression.
US victims including Afghanistan, Libya, and Yemen have ratified the Convention on the non-applicability of statutory limitations
to war crimes and crimes against humanity, so the US cannot run the clock out, as it has tried to do by failing to criminalize
torture and decriminalizing its favorite war crimes, outrages against human dignity and denial of the rights of trial. CIA proliferation
is a boiling issue in the treaty bodies but it's completely suppressed from US public awareness.
If Trump can't take the bull by the horns, CIA* is going to destroy him.
* This is CIA in Fletcher Prouty's sense, including deep-cover CIA agents inserted throughout the three branches of government.
The DCI has the get-out-of-jail card, so this is all CIA's show. All the other agency 'factions' work for CIA
"... In recent times, elected officials in the US and their state security organizations have often intervened against independent foreign governments, which challenged Washington 's quest for global domination. This was especially true during the eight years of President Barack Obama's administration where the violent ousting of presidents and prime ministers through US-engineered coups were routine – under an unofficial doctrine of 'regime change'. ..."
"... The violation of constitutional order and electoral norms of other countries has become enshrined in US policy. All US political, administrative and security structures are involved in this process. The policymakers would insist that there was a clear distinction between operating within constitutional norms at home and pursuing violent, illegal regime change operations abroad. ..."
"... The decisive shift to 'regime change' at home has been a continual process organized, orchestrated and implemented by elected and appointed officials within the Obama regime and by a multiplicity of political action organizations, which cross traditional ideological boundaries. ..."
"... Regime change has several components leading to the final solution: First and foremost, the political parties seek to delegitimize the election process and undermine the President-elect. The mass media play a major role demonizing President-Elect Trump with personal gossip, decades-old sex scandals and fabricated interviews and incidents. ..."
"... Their overt attack on US electoral norms then turned into a bizarre and virulent anti-Russia campaign designed to paint the elected president (a billionaire New York real estate developer and US celebrity icon) as a 'tool of Moscow .' The mass media and powerful elements within the CIA, Congress and Obama Administration insisted that Trump's overtures toward peaceful, diplomatic relations with Russia were acts of treason. ..."
"... The outgoing President Obama mobilized the entire leadership of the security state to fabricate 'dodgy dossiers' linking Donald Trump to the Russian President Vladimir Putin, insisting that Trump was a stooge or 'vulnerable to KGB blackmail'. The CIA's phony documents (arriving via a former British intelligence operative-now free lance 'security' contractor) were passed around among the major corporate media who declined to publish the leaked gossip. Months of attempts to get the US media to 'take the bite' on the 'smelly' dossier were unsuccessful. The semi-senile US Senator John McCain ('war-hero' and hysterical Trump opponent) then volunteered to plop the reeking gossip back onto the lap of the CIA Director Brennan and demand the government 'act on these vital revelations'! ..."
"... Under scrutiny by serious researchers, the 'CIA dossier' was proven to be a total fabrication by way of a former 'British official – now – in – hiding !' Undaunted, despite being totally discredited, the CIA leadership continued to attack the President-Elect. Trump likened the CIA's 'dirty pictures hatchet job' to the thuggish behavior of the Nazis and clearly understood how the CIA leadership was involved in a domestic coup d'état. ..."
"... CIA Director John Brennan, architect of numerous 'regime changes' overseas had brought his skills home – against the President-elect. For the first time in US history, a CIA director openly charged a President or President-elect with betraying the country and threatened the incoming Chief Executive. He coldly warned Trump to ' just make sure he understands that the implications and impacts (of Trump's policies) on the United States could be profound " ..."
"... Mass propaganda, a 'red-brown alliance, salacious gossip and accusations of treason ('Trump, the Stooge of Moscow') resemble the atmosphere leading to the rise of the Nazi state in Germany . A broad 'coalition' has joined hands with a most violent and murderous organization (the CIA) and imperial political leadership, which views overtures to peace to be high treason because it limits their drive for world power and a US dominated global political order. ..."
The norms of US capitalist democracy include the election of presidential candidates through competitive
elections, unimpeded by force and violence by the permanent institutions of the state. Voter manipulation
has occurred during the recent elections, as in the case of the John F. Kennedy victory in 1960 and
the George W. Bush victory over 'Al' Gore in 2000. But despite the dubious electoral outcomes in
these cases, the 'defeated' candidate conceded and sought via legislation, judicial rulings, lobbying
and peaceful protests to register their opposition.
These norms are no longer operative. During the election process, and in the run-up to the inauguration
of US President-Elect Donald Trump, fundamental electoral institutions were challenged and coercive
institutions were activated to disqualify the elected president and desperate overt public pronouncements
threatened the entire electoral order.
We will proceed by outlining the process that is used to undermine the constitutional order, including
the electoral process and the transition to the inauguration of the elected president.
Regime Change in America
In recent times, elected officials in the US and their state security organizations have often
intervened against independent foreign governments, which challenged Washington 's quest for global
domination. This was especially true during the eight years of President Barack Obama's administration
where the violent ousting of presidents and prime ministers through US-engineered coups were routine
– under an unofficial doctrine of 'regime change'.
The violation of constitutional order and electoral norms of other countries has become enshrined
in US policy. All US political, administrative and security structures are involved in this process.
The policymakers would insist that there was a clear distinction between operating within constitutional
norms at home and pursuing violent, illegal regime change operations abroad.
Today the distinction between overseas and domestic norms has been obliterated by the state and
quasi-official mass media. The US security apparatus is now active in manipulating the domestic democratic
process of electing leaders and transitioning administrations.
The decisive shift to 'regime change' at home has been a continual process organized, orchestrated
and implemented by elected and appointed officials within the Obama regime and by a multiplicity
of political action organizations, which cross traditional ideological boundaries.
Regime change has several components leading to the final solution: First and foremost, the
political parties seek to delegitimize the election process and undermine the President-elect. The
mass media play a major role demonizing President-Elect Trump with personal gossip, decades-old sex
scandals and fabricated interviews and incidents.
Alongside the media blitz, leftist and rightist politicians have come together to question the
legitimacy of the November 2016 election results. Even after a recount confirmed Trump's victory,
a massive propaganda campaign was launched to impeach the president-elect even before he takes office
– by claiming Trump was an 'enemy agent'.
The Democratic Party and the motley collection of right-left anti-Trump militants sought to blackmail
members of the Electoral College to change their vote in violation of their own mandate as state
electors. This was unsuccessful, but unprecedented.
Their overt attack on US electoral norms then turned into a bizarre and virulent anti-Russia
campaign designed to paint the elected president (a billionaire New York real estate developer and
US celebrity icon) as a 'tool of Moscow .' The mass media and powerful elements within the CIA, Congress
and Obama Administration insisted that Trump's overtures toward peaceful, diplomatic relations with
Russia were acts of treason.
The outgoing President Obama mobilized the entire leadership of the security state to fabricate
'dodgy dossiers' linking Donald Trump to the Russian President Vladimir Putin, insisting that Trump
was a stooge or 'vulnerable to KGB blackmail'. The CIA's phony documents (arriving via a former British
intelligence operative-now free lance 'security' contractor) were passed around among the major corporate
media who declined to publish the leaked gossip. Months of attempts to get the US media to 'take
the bite' on the 'smelly' dossier were unsuccessful. The semi-senile US Senator John McCain ('war-hero'
and hysterical Trump opponent) then volunteered to plop the reeking gossip back onto the lap of the
CIA Director Brennan and demand the government 'act on these vital revelations'!
Under scrutiny by serious researchers, the 'CIA dossier' was proven to be a total fabrication
by way of a former 'British official – now – in – hiding !' Undaunted, despite being totally discredited,
the CIA leadership continued to attack the President-Elect. Trump likened the CIA's 'dirty pictures
hatchet job' to the thuggish behavior of the Nazis and clearly understood how the CIA leadership
was involved in a domestic coup d'état.
CIA Director John Brennan, architect of numerous 'regime changes' overseas had brought his
skills home – against the President-elect. For the first time in US history, a CIA director openly
charged a President or President-elect with betraying the country and threatened the incoming Chief
Executive. He coldly warned Trump to ' just make sure he understands that the implications and impacts
(of Trump's policies) on the United States could be profound "
Clearly CIA Director Brennan has not only turned the CIA into a sinister, unaccountable power
dictating policy to an elected US president, by taking on the tone of a Mafia Capo, he threatens
the physical security of the incoming leader.
From a Scratch to Gangrene
The worst catastrophe that could fall on the United States would be a conspiracy of leftist and
rightist politicos, the corporate mass media and the 'progressive' websites and pundits providing
ideological cover for a CIA-orchestrated 'regime change'.
Whatever the limitations of our electoral norms- and there are many – they are now being degraded
and discarded in a march toward an elite coup, involving elements of the militarist empire and 'in`telligence'
hierarchy.
Mass propaganda, a 'red-brown alliance, salacious gossip and accusations of treason ('Trump,
the Stooge of Moscow') resemble the atmosphere leading to the rise of the Nazi state in Germany .
A broad 'coalition' has joined hands with a most violent and murderous organization (the CIA) and
imperial political leadership, which views overtures to peace to be high treason because it limits
their drive for world power and a US dominated global political order.
James Petras is a Bartle Professor (Emeritus) of Sociology at Binghamton University, New
York. http://petras.lahaine.org/
And used this possibility again to advertize his hypothesis that Russians hacked the elections... Should not be a rule for former
CIA directors to keep mouth shut ?
Notable quotes:
"... And Brennan is not exactly a tabula rasa. As he observed in his comment, his ire derives from the claims over Russian alleged interference in the U.S. election, a narrative that Brennan himself has helped to create, to include his shady and possibly illegal contacting of foreign intelligence services to dig up dirt on the GOP presidential candidate and his associates. The dirt was dutifully provided by several European intelligence services which produced a report claiming, inter alia, that Donald Trump had urinated on a Russian prostitute in a bed previously slept in by Barack and Michelle Obama. ..."
I was particularly bemused by the
comment
by former CIA Chief John Brennan who denounced Trump's performance during the Group of 20 summit in Hamburg over the lack of
a hard line against Putin and his failure to support the "word of the U.S. intelligence community" about Russian interference in
the recent election. In an interview Brennan complained "He said it's an honor to meet President Putin. An honor to meet the individual
who carried out the assault against our election? To me, it was a dishonorable thing to say."
Former weapons inspector Scott Ritter
has demonstrated how the "word" of U.S. intel is not exactly what it might seem to be. And Brennan is not exactly a tabula
rasa. As he observed in his comment, his ire derives from the claims over Russian alleged interference in the U.S. election, a narrative
that Brennan himself has helped to create, to include his shady and possibly illegal contacting of foreign intelligence services
to dig up dirt on the GOP presidential candidate and his associates. The dirt was dutifully provided by several European intelligence
services which produced a report claiming, inter alia, that Donald Trump had urinated on a Russian prostitute in a bed previously
slept in by Barack and Michelle Obama.
And along the way I have been assiduously trying to figure out the meaning of last week's reports regarding the contacts of Trump
Jr., Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort with two alleged Russian agents while reportedly seeking the dirt on Hillary.
As it turns out, there
may not have been any discussion of Hillary, though possibly something having to do with irregularities in DNC fundraising surfaced,
and there may have been a bit more about the Magnitsky Act and adopting Russian babies.
Barring any new revelations backed up by actual facts revealing that something substantive like a quid pro quo actually took place,
the whole affair appears to be yet another example of a politically inspired fishing expedition. This observation is not necessarily
naivete on my part nor a denial that it all might have been an intelligence operation, but it is an acceptance of the fact that probing
and maneuvering is all part and parcel of what intelligence agencies do when they are dealing with adversaries and very often even
with friends. It does not necessarily imply that Moscow was seeking to overthrow American democracy even if it was trying to advance
its own interests.
"... John O. Brennan, the former director of the CIA, said publicly for the first time Tuesday that he was concerned about possible ties between Russia and the Trump campaign ..."
"... Mr. Brennan became so concerned last summer about signs of Russian election meddling that he held urgent, classified briefings for eight senior members of Congress, speaking with some of them over secure phone lines while they were away on recess. In those conversations, he told lawmakers there was evidence that Russia was specifically working to elect Mr. Trump as president. ..."
"... Mr. Brennan was also one of a handful of officials who briefed both President Barack Obama and Mr. Trump in January on a broad intelligence community report revealing that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia had personally ordered an "influence campaign" targeting the presidential election. ..."
John O. Brennan, the former director of the CIA, said publicly for the first time Tuesday that he was concerned about possible
ties between Russia and the Trump campaign.
President Trump asked two top intelligence officials to deny the existence of any evidence of collusion between his campaign and
Russia, former officials said. Both of the intelligence officials are testifying before lawmakers on Tuesday.
Mr. Brennan, the former CIA director, said Tuesday that he became concerned last year that the Russian government was trying to
influence members of the Trump campaign to act - wittingly or unwittingly - on Moscow's behalf.
"I encountered and am aware of information and intelligence that revealed contacts and interactions between Russian officials
and U.S. persons involved in the Trump campaign that I was concerned about because of known Russian efforts to suborn such individuals,"
Mr. Brennan told lawmakers on the House Intelligence Committee.
It raised questions in my mind about whether Russia was able to gain the cooperation of those individuals," he said, adding that
he did not know whether the Russian efforts were successful. He added, "I don't know whether such collusion existed." It was the first time he publicly acknowledged that he was concerned about possible ties between Russia and the Trump campaign.
He said he left office in January with many unanswered questions about the Russian influence operation. Intelligence officials
have said that Russia tried to tip the election toward Mr. Trump.
Mr. Brennan became so concerned
last summer about signs of Russian election meddling that he held urgent, classified briefings for eight senior members of Congress,
speaking with some of them over secure phone lines while they were away on recess. In those conversations, he told lawmakers there
was evidence that Russia was specifically working to elect Mr. Trump as president.
Mr. Brennan was also one of a handful of officials who briefed both President Barack Obama and Mr. Trump in January on a broad
intelligence community report revealing
that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia had personally ordered an "influence campaign" targeting the presidential election.
"... While he said this Susan Rice was "unredacting" the politically motivated surveillance of republicans, calling it "counter intelligence" while none of these people had any critical sensitive information to share unlike Clinton's 30000 e-mails. ..."
"... Those "unredactings" have been leaked to attempt to discredit the US elections. ..."
"... Seems Obama was surrounded by no one who was "serious/sensible" but many who used his office to attack the US Bill of Rights. ..."
In Oct 2016 Obama said "there is no serious/sensible person
who believes the US election could be hacked...."
While he
said this Susan Rice was "unredacting" the politically
motivated surveillance of republicans, calling it "counter
intelligence" while none of these people had any critical
sensitive information to share unlike Clinton's 30000
e-mails.
Those "unredactings" have been leaked to attempt to
discredit the US elections.
Seems Obama was surrounded by no one who was
"serious/sensible" but many who used his office to attack the
US Bill of Rights.
Since 9 Nov 16 the DNC and its media tools have tried a
coup by discrediting the US election using the security
apparatus to assault privacy and they got nothing!
Former CIA operations officer Scott Uehlinger, co-host of
The Station Chief
podcast,
talked about the
Susan Rice "unmasking" story
with SiriusXM host Raheem Kassam on Tuesday's
Breitbart News Daily.
"I think it's an
issue which deeply concerns people like myself and other people, working-level
officers in the intel community," Uehlinger said. "Even though at this point,
there seems to be no evidence of breaking the law, this 'unmasking' of people was
ill-advised at best. I think it really shows that abuse of power and the fact that
many people in the Obama administration were willing to violate the spirit of the
laws designed to protect Americans, perhaps rather than the law itself."
... ... ...
"As a working-level CIA officer, we were always
told by upper authority, you're always told to – and the quote is – 'avoid the
appearance of impropriety,'" he said. "Well, this does not pass that smell test,
definitely."
Uehlinger said another thing
that concerns working-level officers in the intelligence and military communities
is "the American people, average Americans like myself, are tired of seeing two
sets of rules followed by the higher-ups and then the working-level people."
"This is just part of that again. A
working-level officer would have gotten into big trouble doing anything remotely
like this," he observed. "But now, we have a lot of people saying that she should
just be given a pass."
"While I understand, you know, it's important
that the Trump administration has to move forward with its domestic agenda, but
these allegations demand to be further investigated," he urged.
Kassam proposed that Democrats and their media
would not allow the Trump administration to move forward with any part of its
agenda until this "Russia hysteria" is cleaned up. That will be a difficult task
since, as Kassam noted, the hysteria has been burning at fever pitch for months
without a shred of evidence to back up the wildest allegations.
Uehlinger agreed and addressed Kassam's point
that media coverage alternates between "no surveillance was conducted" and "we
know everything about Trump's Russia connections."
"The Obama administration relaxed the rule that
allowed raw intelligence that was gathered by the NSA to be shared throughout the
government," he pointed out. "First of all, to relax that, there is absolutely no
operational justification for doing that. With all of the counter-intelligence
problems, with espionage, with Snowden, all these things we've had, to raise by an
order of magnitude the access to this very sensitive information makes no
operational sense at all."
"So for someone to approve that, it's clear they
had another intent, and I believe the intent was to allow for further leakage," he
charged. "To give more people access, thus more leaks, which, in fact, would hurt
the Trump administration. It seems very obvious when you put that together and
combine it with the actions of Susan Rice and other people in unmasking people.
That is the true purpose behind this."
"I say this as somebody who – you have to
remember, when I was a station chief overseas, this is what I was reporting on. I
was in countries like Azerbaijan, Tajikistan, Kosovo – countries which constantly
had the offices of the prime minister or president using the intelligence services
to suppress the domestic opposition. So I've been to this rodeo before, many a
time. I saw the storm clouds gathering several weeks ago, and everything I've
suspected has so far come to fruition," Uehlinger said.
He pronounced it "very disappointing" that such
transparent abuse of government power for partisan politics would occur in the
United States.
"An intelligence service has to have the trust
of the people and the government in order to function effectively," he said. "With
all of these scandals happening, and with the name of perhaps the CIA and other
intelligence community elements in the mud, this makes the object of protecting
our national security more problematic. The agencies have to have the trust of the
American people, and they're losing it, because it seems as though they've been
weaponized – perhaps, like I said, not breaking the law but playing very close to
the line."
Kassam suggested that leaking the information
might have been illegal, even if Rice was legally entitled to request information
on Donald Trump's campaign and unmask the U.S. persons monitored during
surveillance of foreign intelligence targets.
"That's absolutely the case," Uehlinger agreed.
He went on to argue that the absence of hard evidence for any wrongdoing by the
Trump campaign in all of these leaks was highly significant.
"Since basically the Obama administration has
sort of loaded this with these rule changes and all to allow for leaks the fact
that there is no 'smoking gun' of Trump administration collusion with Russia
indicates that there isn't any. There is nothing substantial here because a juicy
morsel like that would certainly have been leaked by the same people that have
been leaking everything else. The fact it hasn't been leaked out means it does not
exist," he reasoned.
Kassam said some of the Russia hysteria came
from imputing sinister motives to conventional business dealings, arguing that
Trump's organization made deals around the world, and it is exceedingly difficult
to do business with any Russian entity that is not somehow connected to the
Russian government.
"That's an excellent point. You're absolutely
right," Uehlinger responded. "It shows these people who are doing these gambits
are relying on the relative ignorance of the American public of the actual nuts
and bolts of intelligence to make their point. Anyone with any background in this
stuff can see it for what it is: a desperate attempt to discredit an
administration because they were crushed in the past elections."
Breitbart News Daily
airs on SiriusXM Patriot 125 weekdays from 6:00
a.m. to 9:00 a.m. Eastern.
"... CIA officers penetrated a network used to share information by Senate Intel committee members, including Sen. Diane Feinstein, the committee's Democrat chair. The bombshell New York Times report went on to disclose: ..."
As the facts about who surveilled whom during the transition get sorted out, it is useful to remember why Trump's team and his
supporters have reason to be suspicious, thanks to a long documented history of Obama using shady surveillance tactics on both political
opponents and international allies. Rhodes himself knows this history but that doesn't seem to matter as he once again attempts to
make people believe he fell out of the sky and onto Twitter on January 21st, 2017.
... ... ...
1. Fox News reporter James Rosen
In 2013 the news broke that Eric Holder's Justice Department
had spied on James Rosen . Obama's DOJ collected Rosen's telephone records as well as tracked his movements to and from the State
Department from where he reported. Rosen was named as a possible co-conspirator in a Justice Department affidavit. Rosen claims that
his parents phone line was also swept up in the collection of his records and DOJ records seem to confirm that. Despite the targeting
of Rosen, there were no brave calls to boycott the White House Correspondents Dinner.
2. Senate Intelligence Committee and the CIA
CIA officers
penetrated a network used to share information by Senate Intel committee members, including Sen. Diane Feinstein, the committee's
Democrat chair. The bombshell New York Times report went on to disclose:
The CIA officials penetrated the computer network when they came to suspect that the committee's staff had gained unauthorized
access to an internal CIA review of the detention program that the spy agency never intended to give to Congress. A CIA lawyer then
referred the agency's suspicions to the Justice Department to determine whether the committee staff broke the law when it obtained
that document. The inspector general report said that there was no "factual basis" for this referral, which the Justice Department
has declined to investigate, because the lawyer had been provided inaccurate information. The report said that the three information
technology officers "demonstrated a lack of candor about their activities" during interviews with the inspector general.
The Obama White House defended CIA director John Brennan's actions and response. Imagine that.
3. Associated Press Phone Records
Much like James Rosen and his shady al Qaeda looking parents, Obama's Justice Department
secretly obtained months of phone records belonging to AP journalists while investigating a failed terror attack. And much like
the Rosen spying, this was personally approved by Attorney General Holder.
Mass surveillance and expansion of such under the Patriot Act is one of the most historically prevalent things about the Obama
administration. There's even a Wikipedia page
dedicated to that alone . So why
do the media and former administration officials act shocked and surprised when someone points the finger in their direction and
asks if targeting an incoming President is possible?
There is a long, decorated history of questionable-even unconstitutional-surveillance from the Obama administration none of which
proves Trump's twitter ravings to be true. But it certainly is enough to raise suspicions among Trump's supporters and even some
of this critics that he could be perfectly correct.
White House lawyers last month learned that the former national security adviser Susan Rice requested
the identities of U.S. persons in raw intelligence reports on dozens of occasions that connect to
the Donald Trump transition and campaign, according to U.S. officials familiar with the matter.
The pattern of Rice's requests was discovered in a National Security Council review of the government's
policy on "unmasking" the identities of individuals in the U.S. who are not targets of electronic
eavesdropping, but whose communications are collected incidentally. Normally those names are redacted
from summaries of monitored conversations and appear in reports as something like "U.S. Person One."
The National Security Council's senior director for intelligence, Ezra Cohen-Watnick, was conducting
the review, according to two U.S. officials who spoke with Bloomberg View on the condition of anonymity
because they were not authorized to discuss it publicly. In February Cohen-Watnick discovered Rice's
multiple requests to unmask U.S. persons in intelligence reports that related to Trump transition
activities. He brought this to the attention of the White House General Counsel's office, who reviewed
more of Rice's requests and instructed him to end his own research into the unmasking policy.
The intelligence reports were summaries of monitored conversations -- primarily between foreign
officials discussing the Trump transition, but also in some cases direct contact between members
of the Trump team and monitored foreign officials. One U.S. official familiar with the reports said
they contained valuable political information on the Trump transition such as whom the Trump team
was meeting, the views of Trump associates on foreign policy matters and plans for the incoming administration.
Rice did not respond to an email seeking comment on Monday morning. Her role in requesting the
identities of Trump transition officials adds an important element to the dueling investigations
surrounding the Trump White House since the president's inauguration.
Both the House and Senate intelligence committees are probing any ties between Trump associates
and a Russian influence operation against Hillary Clinton during the election. The chairman of the
House intelligence committee, Representative Devin Nunes, is also investigating how the Obama White
House kept tabs on the Trump transition after the election through unmasking the names of Trump associates
incidentally collected in government eavesdropping of foreign officials.
Rice herself has not spoken directly on the issue of unmasking. Last month when she was asked
on the "PBS NewsHour" about reports that Trump transition officials, including Trump himself, were
swept up in incidental intelligence collection,
Rice said : "I know nothing about this," adding, "I was surprised to see reports from Chairman
Nunes on that account today."
Rice's requests to unmask the names of Trump transition officials do not vindicate
Trump's own tweets from March 4 in which he accused Obama of illegally tapping Trump Tower. There
remains no evidence to support that claim.
But Rice's multiple requests to learn the identities of Trump officials discussed in intelligence
reports during the transition period does
highlight a longstanding concern for civil liberties advocates about U.S. surveillance programs.
The standard for senior officials to learn the names of U.S. persons incidentally collected is that
it must have some foreign intelligence value, a standard that can apply to almost anything. This
suggests Rice's unmasking requests were likely within the law.
The news about Rice also sheds light on the strange behavior of Nunes in the last two weeks. It
emerged last week that he traveled to the White House last month, the night before he made an explosive
allegation about Trump transition officials caught up in incidental surveillance. At the time he
said he needed to go to the White House because the reports were only on a database for the executive
branch. It now appears that he needed to view computer systems within the National Security Council
that would include the logs of Rice's requests to unmask U.S. persons.
The ranking Democrat on the committee Nunes chairs, Representative Adam Schiff, viewed these reports
on Friday. In comments to the press over the weekend he declined to discuss the contents of these
reports, but also said it was highly unusual for the reports to be shown only to Nunes and not himself
and other members of the committee.
Indeed, much about this is highly unusual: if not how the surveillance was collected, then certainly
how and why it was disseminated.
"... And what Earth-shattering insights were revealed as a result of the hacks? That the DNC was in the tank for Hillary Clinton and had been lying to Bernie Sanders. Everybody in Washington already knew that, and it didn't make any difference to Trump. In fact, the revelations gave the Clinton camp a pretext to get rid of DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz - something it wanted to do anyway. Next, Clinton campaign chairman Podesta's emails did not reveal anything beyond Beltway gossip that was only of interest to political junkies. Nothing was revealed that drove any votes. If Russian hackers wanted to harass Podesta, what is the crime that the Trump campaign might have committed? ..."
"... The cacophony of accusations, deflections and distractions has led us to the latest revelation that is causing a "holy cow" double-take, plot-thickening moment in Washington: President Obama's national security adviser, Susan Rice, sought to unmask the identities of Trump aides whose conversations had been collected through routine electronic intercepts of foreign officials' communications. ..."
"... And there are more suspicious reasons for Obama's national security adviser to have sought to unmask the identities of Trump campaign aides than there are valid reasons. Rice has a history of a strained relationship with the truth, and for a national security adviser, she has, at times, flown close to the partisan political flame. ..."
"... Multiple senators are now demanding her testimony . There could have been crimes committed and a real scandal could develop, so you can bet the full story will be slow to emerge. It appears that Rice has issued the standard denials. And her defenders on Capitol Hill and in the media will do all they can to distract and demand that there is nothing to see here. Democrats and their media allies will continue to make baseless allegations, hoping that the Russia investigations will somehow deliver for them and become this president's Watergate. ..."
"... The result so far? Competing outrage. Just as Democrats are pursuing L-TACs (links, ties, associations or contacts) in search of a crime, the Obama White House's national security adviser has now landed as one of the ones who will have to answer for her actions under oath. ..."
"... How did Ed slip this article past the Wapo /DNC/Loony Left /Bezos Puppet editors? ..."
"... Ms. Rice kept a 'spreadsheet' of phone calls taking place within the Trump campaign. Will that be in the next installment of this ongoing drama? ..."
It is said that Watergate wasn't about the crime, but about the coverup. Well, at least in the Watergate scandal, there was a
proper crime - specifically, the break-in and wiretapping. The media hasn't even settled on what to call its quest for a potentially
nefarious Russia-Trump link. The whole pursuit is vaguely referred to as looking at President Trump's "links," "ties," "associations"
or "contacts" with Russia. Since this is Washington, let's give it an acronym: L-TACs. With no end in sight, the manic pursuit of
L-TACs has produced a basket of denials, lies, half-baked plots, evasions, one-off non sequiturs, side tracks, conspiracies and suspicions
between the Trump administration, Democrats and the media. The frenzy has created a scandal without perpetrators or a crime. There
is a sense that Washington is on the brink, but no one can say on the brink of what.
When they have to be specific, some Democrats have settled on the idea that the Trump campaign may have collaborated with Russia
on the hacking of the Democratic National Committee and the John Podesta emails. There is no evidence of this, but it is worth remembering
a few things. First, the FBI was
aware of the DNC
hacking when it occurred. This was
confirmed again yesterday
in Politico's interview with Lisa Monaco
, who served as assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism in the Obama White House. She said the
hacking was handled as a law enforcement matter. I assume she was referring to when the FBI called the dolts at the DNC, but the
DNC took no action.
Then-national security adviser Susan Rice is seen last year on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington. (Carolyn Kaster/Associated
Press)
And what Earth-shattering insights were revealed as a result of the hacks? That the DNC was in the tank for Hillary Clinton
and had been lying to Bernie Sanders. Everybody in Washington already knew that, and it didn't make any difference to Trump. In fact,
the revelations gave the Clinton camp a pretext to get rid of DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz - something it wanted to do anyway.
Next, Clinton campaign chairman Podesta's emails did not reveal anything beyond Beltway gossip that was only of interest to political
junkies. Nothing was revealed that drove any votes. If Russian hackers wanted to harass Podesta, what is the crime that the Trump
campaign might have committed?
The cacophony of accusations, deflections and distractions has led us to the latest revelation that is causing a "holy cow"
double-take, plot-thickening moment in Washington: President Obama's national security adviser, Susan Rice, sought to
unmask the identities of Trump aides whose conversations had been collected through routine electronic intercepts of foreign
officials' communications. To unmask, or reveal, the identities of U.S. citizens whose names and conversations were gathered
through incidental collection is unusual.
And there are more suspicious reasons for Obama's national security adviser to have sought to unmask the identities of Trump
campaign aides than there are valid reasons. Rice has a history of a strained relationship with the truth, and for a national security
adviser, she has, at times, flown close to the partisan political flame.
So, what was going on? Why did she do it? And with whom, in the government and the media, did she share the information?
Multiple senators are now
demanding her
testimony . There could have been crimes committed and a real scandal could develop, so you can bet the full story will be slow
to emerge. It appears that Rice has
issued the standard denials. And her defenders on Capitol Hill and in the media will do all they can to distract and demand that
there is nothing to see here. Democrats and their media allies will continue to make baseless allegations, hoping that the Russia
investigations will somehow deliver for them and
become this president's Watergate.
The result so far? Competing outrage. Just as Democrats are pursuing L-TACs (links, ties, associations or contacts) in search
of a crime, the Obama White House's national security adviser has now landed as one of the ones who will have to answer for her actions
under oath.
Washington is as scandal-primed as I've ever seen it - there is a lot of smoke right now, but no clear fire. So the noise and
finger-pointing will continue. And I have no idea who is winning. The pursuit of Trump may have caught the Obama White House
Ed Rogers is a contributor to the PostPartisan blog, a political consultant and a veteran of the Ronald Reagan and George
H.W. Bush White Houses and several national campaigns. He is the chairman of the lobbying and communications firm BGR Group, which
he founded with former Mississippi governor Haley Barbour in 1991. Follow @EdRogersDC
Bigly Fan 5:38 PM EDT
How did Ed slip this article past the Wapo /DNC/Loony Left /Bezos Puppet editors?
theworm1 5:37 PM EDT
"The whole pursuit [ of Trump's Russian engagement] is vaguely referred to as looking at President Trump's "links', 'ties', 'associations'
or 'contacts'" . These are the same nouns the media uses to describe the alleged "connections" between al Qaeda and Saddam and
between ISIS and whoever we don't like today. They carry meaning or they don't. I think most people think they do.
Io fifty 5:37 PM EDT
I just read in Breitbart, sure you have too Mr. Rogers ...... that Ms. Rice kept a 'spreadsheet' of phone calls taking place
within the Trump campaign. Will that be in the next installment of this ongoing drama?
"... A Monday report by Bloomberg's Eli Lake said that Rice requested the unmasking of Trump officials. Names of Americans swept up incidentally in the collection of intelligence are normally masked, or kept redacted, in intelligence briefings ..."
"... the former official did not dispute the reporting by Bloomberg. ..."
A Monday report by Bloomberg's Eli Lake said that Rice requested the unmasking of Trump officials.
Names of Americans swept up incidentally in the collection of intelligence are normally masked, or
kept redacted, in intelligence briefings . However, the law provides for much leeway when it
comes to unmasking by National Security Council officials, which suggests that Rice's request was
legal.
This type of request was not a special practice related to the Trump transition team, though
the former official did not dispute the reporting by Bloomberg.
As a procedural matter, an intelligence briefer would have had to clear a requested unmasking
with the head of the agency providing the intelligence. It is unclear why these intelligence intercepts
were considered so important that they would need to be shared with the president's national security
adviser.
A former national security official told CBS News that when such information on U.S. individuals
is approved and provided by the intelligence community, it is typically given directly to the senior
official who made the request and is not broadly disseminated.
On some occasions, the official added, it is necessary to know the identity of U.S. persons in
order to understand the context and substance of the intelligence. There is nothing improper, unusual
or political about such requests.
President Donald Trump tweeted last month
that Trump Tower had been wiretapped by President Obama , a claim for which there is still no
evidence. Later, House Intelligence chairman Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif.,
said he had obtained evidence showing that the names of Trump associates that were swept up incidentally
by intelligence agencies had been unmasked. That evidence is believed to have been provided to Nunes
by the White House.
Rice had said that she was unaware of the names of Trump officials being swept up incidentally
by intelligence agencies. "I know nothing about this," she told "PBS NewsHour" last month when asked
about Nunes' claim.
"... Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News. He was named one of the " most influential " people in news media in 2016. His new book, ..."
"... , is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak . ..."
President Barack Obama's National Security Advisor, Susan Rice, allegedly
ordered surveillance of Donald Trump's campaign aides during the last election,
and maintained spreadsheets of their telephone calls, the Daily Caller reports.
The alleged spreadsheets add a new dimension to reports on Sunday and Monday by
blogger
Mike Cernovich
and
Eli Lake
of Bloomberg News that Rice had asked for Trump aides' names to be
"unmasked" in intelligence reports. The alleged "unmasking" may have been legal,
but may also have been part of an alleged political intelligence operation to
disseminate reports on the Trump campaign widely throughout government with the
aim of leaking them to the press.
At the time that radio host Mark Levin and Breitbart News
compiled
the evidence of surveillance, dissemination, and leaking - all based
on mainstream media reports - the mainstream media dismissed the story as a "
conspiracy
theory
."
Now, however, Democrats are backing away from that allegation, and from broader
allegations of Russian collusion with the Trump campaign, as additional details of
the Obama administration's alleged surveillance continue to emerge.
"What was produced by the intelligence community at the request of Ms. Rice
were detailed spreadsheets of intercepted phone calls with unmasked Trump
associates in perfectly legal conversations with individuals," diGenova told
The Daily Caller News Foundation Investigative Group Monday.
"The overheard conversations involved no illegal activity by anybody of the
Trump associates, or anyone they were speaking with," diGenova said. "In short,
the only apparent illegal activity was the unmasking of the people in the
calls."
The surveillance and spreadsheet operation were allegedly "ordered one year
before the 2016 presidential election." According to a
Fox
News
report on Monday, former White House aide Ben Rhodes was also involved.
Rhodes and Rice were both implicated in a disinformation campaign to describe
the Benghazi terror attack in Sep. 2012 as a protest against a YouTube video.
Rhodes also boasted of creating an "
echo
chamber
" in the media to promote the Iran deal, feeding stories to contrived
networks of "experts" who offered the public a steady stream of pro-agreement
propaganda.
On Monday, Rhodes
retweeted
a CNN story quoting Rep. Jim Himes (D-CT) claiming that the alleged
unmasking was "nothing unusual."
To the extent they have reported the surveillance story at all, CNN and other
news outlets have focused on Trump's
tweets last month
that alleged President Obama had "wiretapped" Trump Tower,
describing the claims as unfounded.
CNN continued treating story dismissively on Monday, with
The Lead
host Jake Tapper insisting allegations of Russian interference in the election
were more important than what he referred to as the president's effort to distract
from them.
Later in the day, host Don Lemon
declared
he would ignore the surveillance story and urged viewers to do
likewise.
The potential abuse of surveillance powers for political purposes has long
troubled civil libertarians, and could affect the re-authorization of the Foreign
Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Amendments Act later this year.
Tuesday on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) called on former National
Security Advisor Susan Rice to be brought in front of Congress under subpoena and
asked questions about allegations she was behind the unmasking of American
identities in raw surveillance.
Paul also said she should be asked about former President Barack Obama's
knowledge of these alleged activities.
"For years, both progressives and libertarians have been complaining about
these backdoor searches," Paul said. "It's not that we're searching maybe one
foreign leader and who they talk to; we search everything in the whole world.
There were reports a couple of years ago that all of Italy's phone calls were
absorbed in a one month period of time. We were getting Merkel's phone calls; we
were getting everybody's phone calls. But by rebound we are collecting millions of
Americans phone calls. If you want to look at an American's phone call or listen
to it, you should have to have a warrant, the old fashioned way in a real court
where both sides get represented."
"But a secret warrant by a secret court with a lower standard level because
we're afraid of terrorism is one thing for foreigners but both myself and a
Progressive Ron Wyden have been warning about these back door searches for years
and that they could be politicized," he continued. "The facts will come out with
Susan Rice. But I think she ought to be under subpoena. She should be asked did
you talk to the president about it? Did President Obama know about this? So this
is actually, eerily similar to what Trump accused them of which is eavesdropping
on conversations for political reasons."
"... Additionally, the Friday Fox News report cited "a number of sources" with claims that not only were the two White House officials not the sources of the information shared with Nunes, but that Nunes knew of the information in January, and that the agencies where the information came from had blocked Nunes from gaining access to it. Further, the report cited officials within the agencies who said they were frustrated with the spreading of names for political purposes. ..."
After
slamming NBC's coverage
of the "Fake Trump/Russia story",
congratulating
the NYTimes
for "finally getting it" on Obamacare, Trump on Saturday commented on
the previously discussed Fox News story about a "very senior, very well known" U.S.
intelligence official who was allegedly involved in unmasking the names of Trump
associates, and who had reprotedly surveilled Trump before the nomination.
"Wow,
@FoxNews just reporting big news. Source: 'Official behind unmasking is high up. Known
Intel official is responsible. Some unmasked not associated with Russia. Trump team
spied on before he was nominated. If this is true, does not get much bigger. Would be
sad for U.S.," he added.
Wow,
@FoxNews
just
reporting big news. Source: "Official behind unmasking is high up. Known Intel
official is responsible. Some unmasked....
As
discussed Friday night
, A Fox News source (unnamed, because these days that's all
there is, just ask the NYT and Wapo) said that the U.S. official behind the systematic
unmasking of Trump associates and private individuals was "very well known, very high
up, very senior in the intelligence world" and was doing so for political, not nationa
security reasons, intent on "hurting and embarrassing Trump and his team." In other
words, another intel agency war between the old, pro-Hillary Clinton, guard and the new
administration.
Additionally, the Friday Fox News report cited "a number of sources" with claims that
not only were the two White House officials not the sources of the information shared
with Nunes, but that Nunes knew of the information in January, and that the agencies
where the information came from had blocked Nunes from gaining access to it. Further,
the report cited officials within the agencies who said they were frustrated with the
spreading of names for political purposes.
"Our sources, who have direct knowledge of what took place, were upset because those
two individuals, they say, had nothing to do with the outing of this information," Fox
reported.
"We've learned that the surveillance that led to the unmasking of what started way
before President Trump was even the GOP nominee," Fox News reported Adam Housley said.
"The person who did the unmasking, I'm told, is very well known, very high up, very
senior in the intelligence world and is not in the FBI."
"This led to other surveillance which led to multiple names being unmasked. Again
these are private citizens in the United States," said Housley. "
This had
nothing to do with Russia, I'm told, or foreign intelligence of any kind."
"Fox also learned that an individual with direct knowledge that after Nunes had been
approached by his source, the agencies basically would not allow him in at all," said
Housley.
Understandably, the Fox News report has gotten zero media attention on any other news
outlet.
Intel Official Behind "Unmasking" Of Trump Associates Is "Very Senior, Very
Well Known"
Day after day, various media outlets, well really mostly the NYT and WaPo, have
delivered Trump-administration-incriminating, Russia-link-related tape bombs sourced via
leaks (in the hope of keeping the narrative alive and "resisting."). It now turns out,
according to FXN report
, that the US official who "unmasked" the names of multiple
private citizens affiliated with the Trump team is someone "
very well known,
very high up, very senior in the intelligence world."
As Malia Zimmerman and Adam Housley report
, intelligence and House sources with
direct knowledge of the disclosure of classified names (yes, yet another "unnamed
source") said that House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, now knows who is
responsible - and that person is not in the FBI (i.e. it is not James Comey)
Housley said
his sources were motivated to come forward by a New York Times
report yesterday which reportedly outed two people who helped Nunes access
information during a meeting in the Old Executive Office Building.
However, Housley's sources claim the two people who helped Nunes "navigate" to the
information were not his sources. In fact,
Nunes had been aware of the information
since January (long before Trump's 'wiretap' tweet) but had been unable to view the
documents themselves because of "stonewalling" by the agencies in question.
Our sources: This surveillance that led to the unmasking of
private names of American citizens started before Trump was the GOP nominee.
For a private citizen to be "unmasked," or named, in an intelligence report is
extremely rare. Typically, the American is a suspect in a crime, is in danger or has to
be named to explain the context of the report.
"The main issue in this case, is not only the unmasking of these names of
private citizens, but the spreading of these names for political purposes that have
nothing to do with national security or an investigation into Russia's interference in
the U.S. election,"
a congressional source close to the
investigation told Fox News
.
The White House, meanwhile, is urging Nunes and his colleagues to keep pursuing what
improper surveillance and leaks may have occurred before Trump took office. They've been
emboldened in the wake of March 2 comments from former Obama administration official
Evelyn Farkas, who on MSNBC suggested her former colleagues tried to gather material on
Trump team contacts with Russia.
White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said Friday her comments and
other reports raise "serious" concerns about whether there was an "organized and
widespread effort by the Obama administration to use and leak highly sensitive
intelligence information for political purposes."
"Dr. Farkas' admissions alone are devastating," he said.
The Trump folks,
if they found out how we knew what we knew
about
the Trump staff dealing with Russians, that
they would try to compromise
those sources and methods
, meaning we would not longer have access to that
intelligence.
Furthermore, Farkas effectively corroborated a
New
York Times article
from early March which cited "Former American officials"
as their anonymous source regarding efforts to leak this surveillance on the Trump
team to Democrats across Washington DC.
* * *
In addition, citizens affiliated with Trump's team who were unmasked were not
associated with any intelligence about Russia or other foreign intelligence, sources
confirmed. The initial unmasking led to other surveillance, which led to other private
citizens being wrongly unmasked, sources said.
"
Unmasking is not unprecedented, but unmasking for political purposes ...
specifically of Trump transition team members ... is highly suspect and questionable
,"
according to an intelligence source. "Opposition by some in the intelligence agencies
who were very connected to the Obama and Clinton teams was strong. After Trump was
elected, they decided they were going to ruin his presidency by picking them off one by
one."
* * *
So if the source isn't Comey, has anyone seen Jim Clapper recently? The answer should
emerge soon, meanwhile the ridiculous game with very high stakes of spy vs spy, or in
this case source vs source, continues.
So sorry. Journalism is shit. Very tired of 'source' stories. Cannot trust
any of this crap. Breathless reporters --"We've been talking to sources...."
BFD. Give me a fucking break. Fox tries a little bit of the time, but Fox is
no better than NBC or CNN. Journalists today have no courage. They write
these stories for each other, not for me and you.
There are no journalists; they are simply pritning whatever they are given
by the "sources". They show no curiosity, no suspicion, too credulous to be
a journalist and these are really end times for the MSM.
You are correct. They have been exterminated
... along with the need for truth in media. Since 9-11, all over the
world there has been a concerted and determined effort to target and
remove all those who would stay true to the principles of that craft.
And, to in their place, raise up a raft of imitators who style themselves
reporters, but need have no accountability, nor take the trouble to ever
leave their computer screens to go and "follow" a story.
But what most folks don't see is that this faux-journalism is a direct
consequence of the so-called 'new media' - packaged as "alternative
media" in order to
seem
a challenge and
opposition to special interest groups controlling all communication
channels - but actually just more special interests with even less
accountability!
"There is no longer a stage, not even the minimal illusion that
makes events capable of adopting the force of reality-no more stage
either of mental or political solidarity
:
Only the medium can
make an event - whatever the contents, whether they are conformist or
subversive.
AND -
There are no more media in the literal sense
of the word - that is, of a mediating power between one reality and
another, between one state of the real and another."
The role of medias, in other words, has switched from 'mediating'
between real events and the reader... to medicating the reader with
concocted storylines custom made to appeal to the pre-existing
information preferences of same.
Even more ominously, with the arrival of the TRUMP TWITTER medium, we
reach the full blossoming of the point predicted last year - when a
government staged a coup against itself, using the tools of social media
to coverup their ruse!
https://storify.com/SuaveBel/requiem-for-the-media
"The State has subsumed the role and space of "the media" in
organizing and communicating with "the people." It has re-defined the
terms "democracy" and "participation" on it's own terms, and in
picking up the social media tools which had formerly belonged to "the
people" as a network of communicants, relegated "the media" to the
role of gelded hierophant!"
All of which has been blandly accepted and passed over by a
web-entranced audience which has given over critical thinking skills to a
cabal of 'communications experts' determined to put the lie to that old
adage - 'you can't fool all of the people, all of the time!'
They got that fucker now, whom ever it was. I hope we can finally see some of
the other media pick up on this blockbuster story, probably not though, they
are completely out of their minds with irrationality.
I'd like to see Clapper
get 10 years in buttfuck prison where leroy and shantis practice using their
10" BBCs to make him watertight. Whom ever did this is a complete piece of shit
just like most of the other libtards that don't give a shit about the rule of
law or basic fairness.
Either way, the cat's out of the bag and CNN, et al, won't be able to ignore
this much longer. This story, unlike the Russian fairy tale, actually has some
proof and they will get to the bottom of this crime.
I wish (and hope) you're right. But remember, the intelligence community is
best at misdirection, obfuscation, deceit, and manipulation. If there was
ever a group that could successfully distract or 'arrange' an alternate
truth, it's them.
Isn't Obama pretty much immune from any prosecution? Sure, his reputation
or "legacy" can be tainted (meaning more people will realize what an
a$$clown and criminal he was), but you can't do anything to him, can you?
We have seen no evidence of Trump/Russia collusion and we all know the same
people leaking and smearing Trump aren't waiting for some special moment to
release it....it never works that way and he would not have been allowed by NSA
or CIA to take power if they had it...
Nunes and Schiff have seen info that
was compartmentalized to executive branch obviously, which is all branches
appointed by president CIA,NSA,Defense(Farkas),State(Hillary) etc etc
This has been a set up by Trump from beginning. Flynn knew all his calls
were being recorded and he was fired after eaks to the NYT and WAPO. He
questioned why the info on ISIS he was writing up as head of Defense
Intelligence Agency was being down played and ignored by the half breed...Flynn
will blow the doors off this entire thing...Look up his career...He is a top
level intelligence operative with an ax to grind..He is not some flunky and he
has many sources all throughout the intelligence branches...Nicely played
President Trump...Job is much easier dealing with simpletons
It is definitely someone from the executive branch and that includes CIA
head..The SCIF they are going to is in the old executive office building and
only deals with executive..... state,defense,CIA,NSA etc etc
If I understand correctly, the intel official behind the unmasking of
folks affiliated with Trump campaign, which was taking place dating back
to last summer, is a separate issue from who sheperded Nunes into the
SCIF on the WH grounds (so that he could see docs he had been stonewalled
from seeing), reported to be Ezra Cohen-Watnick of the NSC.
The faction which killed JFK and MLK to send us as papal catspaw to Vietnam
after the president ordered us out with 120 dead; and to restart the Vatican
banker/FedScam he had ended, went on to do 9/11 and is terminally threatened by
God-fearing Americans.
May God bless our president and may Satan's ruling
false-elite pedo homo Fifth Column Beast of (((Gog))) and Babylon on Our Holy
Land be soon cast down, praise God.
Folls forget Trump already ran a sting on his Intel briefing during transistion.
When he was briefed on piss dossier and told no one on his staff, then it was
leaked to press immediately afterwards..President Trump is using tactics folks
like General Flynn perfected in 33 years in the intelligence service.
Funny
shit this letter by Clapper..Trump has been playing these folks BIGLY
"... From Nunes's statements, it's clear that he suspects that this information came from NSA intercepts of Kislyak's phone . An Obama official, probably in the White House, "unmasked" Flynn's name and passed it on to Ignatius. ..."
"... Regardless of how the government collected on Flynn, the leak was a felony and a violation of his civil rights. ..."
"... The leaking of Flynn's name was part of what can only be described as a White House campaign to hype the Russian threat and, at the same time, to depict Trump as Vladimir Putin's Manchurian candidate. ..."
"... On Dec. 29, Obama announced sanctions against Russia as retribution for its hacking activities. From that date until Trump's inauguration, the White House aggressively pumped into the media two streams of information: one about Russian hacking; the other about Trump's Russia connection. In the hands of sympathetic reporters, the two streams blended into one. ..."
"... On Dec. 30, the Washington Post reported on a Russian effort to penetrate the electricity grid by hacking into a Vermont utility, Burlington Electric Department. After noting the breach, the reporters offered a senior administration official to speculate on the Russians' motives. Did they seek to crash the system, or just to probe it? ..."
"... This infrastructure hack, the story continued, was part of a broader hacking campaign that included intervention in the election. The story then moved to Trump: "He has spoken highly of Russian President Vladimir Putin, despite President Obama's suggestion that the approval for hacking came from the highest levels of the Kremlin." ..."
"... Especially damaging were the hundreds of Internet addresses, supposedly linked to Russian hacking, that the report contained. The FBI and DHS urged network administrators to load the addresses into their system defenses. Some of the addresses, however, belong to platforms that are widely used by the public, including Yahoo servers. At Burlington Electric, an unsuspecting network administrator dutifully loaded the addresses into the monitoring system of the utility's network. When an employee checked his email, it registered on the system as if Russian hackers were trying to break in. ..."
"... While the White House was hyping the Russia threat, elements of the press showed a sudden interest in the infamous Steele dossier, which claimed that Russian intelligence services had caught Trump in Moscow in highly compromising situations. The dossier was opposition research paid for by Trump's political opponents, and it had circulated for months among reporters covering the election. Because it was based on anonymous sources and entirely unverifiable, however, no reputable news organization had dared to touch it. ..."
"... With a little help from the Obama White House, the dossier became fair game for reporters. A government leak let it be known that the intelligence community had briefed Trump on the dossier. If the president-elect was discussing it with his intelligence briefers, so the reasoning went, perhaps there was something to it after all. ..."
Senator Chuck Schumer and Congressman
Adam Schiff have both castigated Devin Nunes, the chairman of
the House Intelligence Committee, for his handling of the inquiry into Russia's interference in the 2016 presidential election. They
should think twice. The issue that has recently seized Nunes is of vital importance to anyone who cares about fundamental civil liberties.
The trail that Nunes is following will inevitably lead back to a particularly significant leak . On Jan. 12, Washington Post columnist
David Ignatius
reported that "according to a senior U.S. government official, (General Mike) Flynn phoned Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak
several times on Dec. 29."
From Nunes's statements, it's clear that he suspects that this information came from NSA intercepts of Kislyak's phone . An Obama
official, probably in the White House, "unmasked" Flynn's name and passed it on to Ignatius.
Regardless of how the government collected on Flynn, the leak was a felony and a violation of his civil rights. But it
was also a severe breach of the public trust. When I worked as an NSC staffer in the White House, 2005-2007, I read dozens of NSA
surveillance reports every day. On the basis of my familiarity with this system, I strongly suspect that someone in the Obama White
House blew a hole in the thin wall that prevents the government from using information collected from surveillance to destroy the
lives of the citizens whose privacy it is pledged to protect.
The leaking of Flynn's name was part of what can only be described as a White House campaign to hype the Russian threat and,
at the same time, to depict Trump as Vladimir Putin's Manchurian candidate.
On Dec. 29, Obama
announced sanctions against Russia as retribution for its hacking activities. From that date until Trump's inauguration, the
White House aggressively pumped into the media two streams of information: one about Russian hacking; the other about Trump's Russia
connection. In the hands of sympathetic reporters, the two streams blended into one.
A report that appeared the day after Obama announced the sanctions shows how. On Dec. 30, the Washington Post
reported on a Russian effort to penetrate the electricity grid by hacking into a Vermont utility, Burlington Electric Department.
After noting the breach, the reporters offered a senior administration official to speculate on the Russians' motives. Did they seek
to crash the system, or just to probe it?
This infrastructure hack, the story continued, was part of a broader hacking campaign that included intervention in the election.
The story then moved to Trump: "He has spoken highly of Russian President Vladimir Putin, despite President Obama's suggestion that
the approval for hacking came from the highest levels of the Kremlin."
The national media mimicked the Post's reporting. But there was a problem: the
hack
never happened . It was a false alarm - triggered, it eventually became clear, by Obama's hype.
On Dec. 29, the DHS and FBI
published
a report on Russian hacking, which showed the telltale signs of having been rushed to publication. "At every level this report
is a failure,"
said
cyber security expert Robert M. Lee. "It didn't do what it set out to do, and it didn't provide useful data. They're handing
out bad information."
Especially damaging were the hundreds of Internet addresses, supposedly linked to Russian hacking, that the report contained.
The FBI and DHS urged network administrators to load the addresses into their system defenses. Some of the addresses, however, belong
to platforms that are widely used by the public, including Yahoo servers. At Burlington Electric, an unsuspecting network administrator
dutifully loaded the addresses into the monitoring system of the utility's network. When an employee checked his email, it registered
on the system as if Russian hackers were trying to break in.
While the White House was hyping the Russia threat, elements of the press showed a sudden interest in the infamous Steele
dossier, which
claimed
that Russian intelligence services had caught Trump in Moscow in highly compromising situations. The dossier was opposition research
paid for by Trump's political opponents, and it had
circulated for months among reporters covering the election. Because it was based on anonymous sources and entirely unverifiable,
however, no reputable news organization had dared to touch it.
With a little help from the Obama White House, the dossier became fair game for reporters. A government
leak let it be known that the intelligence community had briefed Trump on the dossier. If the president-elect was discussing
it with his intelligence briefers, so the reasoning went, perhaps there was something to it after all.
By turning the dossier into hard news, that leak weaponized malicious gossip. The same is true of the Flynn-Kislyak leak. Ignatius
used the leak to
deepen speculation about collusion between Putin and Trump: "What did Flynn say (to Kislyak)," Ignatius asked, "and did it undercut
the U.S. sanctions?" The mere fact that Flynn's conversations were being monitored deepened his appearance of guilt. If he was innocent,
why was the government monitoring him?
It should not have been. He had the right to talk to in private - even to a Russian ambassador. Regardless of what one thinks
about him or Trump or Putin, this leak should concern anyone who believes that we must erect a firewall between the national security
state and our domestic politics. The system that allowed it to happen must be reformed. At stake is a core principle of our democracy:
that elected representatives control the government, and not vice versa.
"... Unmasking could be legitimate as well – we don't know right now. But to continue to put forward the proposition that Trump associates were not surveilled (by the Obama ADMINISTRATION) is simply preposterous. ..."
"... And the trust in the honor and integrity of CIA and intelligence agency officials assumed by the MSM when there are so many instances of documented lying is hard to reconcile with an objective press. ..."
"... I pretty much suspect there were some standard Washington scams/influence peddling going on – more so because this is Trump – and someone in the Obama administration was over anxious to leak this information, developed from classified information to hurt Trump. The only problem is that intelligence gathered information is not to be used for common criminal law. So we have the common law breaking on the Trump side and we have constitutional law breaking from the Obama side. Unfortunately, this country seems to have lost all desire to restrain the government from access to ALL communications of US citizens. And the MSM seems entirely unconcerned about unlimited government snooping. ..."
"What Devin Nunes Knows" [Kimberly Strassel, Wall Street Journal]. Why Nunes
left his cab:
Around the same time, Mr. Nunes's own intelligence sources informed him that
documents showed further collection of information about, and unmasking of,
Trump transition officials. These documents aren't easily obtainable, since
they aren't the "finished" intelligence products that Congress gets to see.
Nonetheless, for weeks Mr. Nunes has been demanding intelligence agencies turn
over said documents-with no luck, so far.
Mr. Nunes earlier this week got his own source to show him a treasure trove
of documents at a secure facility. Here are the relevant details:
First, there were dozens of documents with information about Trump
officials. Second, the information these documents contained was not related to
Russia. Third, while many reports did "mask" identities (referring, for
instance, to "U.S. Person 1 or 2") they were written in ways that made clear
which Trump officials were being discussed. Fourth, in at least one instance, a
Trump official other than Mr. Flynn was outright unmasked. Finally, these
documents were circulated at the highest levels of government.
=============================================================
Other than right wing sites, this is the first instance of the argument I have
seen of the repubs that has been put forward coherently and the issue stated
cogently. That does not mean its true, but at least it is put forward.
I was watching CNN last night and the blonde commentator woman (Kirsten ???)
put forward the proposition that the intelligence agencies "collecting"
information on Trump associates does not mean Trump associates were surveilled
– now this was in the context that the discussion was about the fact that Trump
individuals were supposedly illegally "unmasked" by the intelligence agencies
because the information was ..collected because they were under surveillance.
Parsing "collection: vs "surveilling" was disingenuous beyond reality. One can
put forward the idea that Trump personnel had conversations because of
"incidental collection" or that Trump personnel are lawbreakers or treasonous
as a reason for the surveillance (if surveillance happened – it seems obvious
that it did happen) and the surveillance was legitimate.
Unmasking could be legitimate as well – we don't know right now. But to
continue to put forward the proposition that Trump associates were not
surveilled (by the Obama ADMINISTRATION) is simply preposterous.
Again, I just see purposeful obtuseness. And the trust in the honor and
integrity of CIA and intelligence agency officials assumed by the MSM when
there are so many instances of documented lying is hard to reconcile with an
objective press.
I pretty much suspect there were some standard Washington scams/influence
peddling going on – more so because this is Trump – and someone in the Obama
administration was over anxious to leak this information, developed from
classified information to hurt Trump. The only problem is that intelligence
gathered information is not to be used for common criminal law. So we have the
common law breaking on the Trump side and we have constitutional law breaking
from the Obama side. Unfortunately, this country seems to have lost all desire
to restrain the government from access to ALL communications of US citizens.
And the MSM seems entirely unconcerned about unlimited government snooping.
"... "The question is why? Who else did it? Was it ordered? By whom?" Mr. Spicer said. "But I think more and more the substance that continues to come out on the record by individuals continues to point to exactly what the president was talking about that day." ..."
"... TheGatewayPundit.com, a right-wing site, called it a "notorious" interview and said it proved Obama administration officials had disseminated "intel gathered on the Trump team." Reince Priebus, the White House chief of staff, said on the Hugh Hewitt radio show that Ms. Farkas had made "just an incredible statement." Breitbart News reported on Mr. Priebus's comments. ..."
"... The comments by Ms. Farkas, Mr. Spicer said, were evidence that Mr. Trump or his associates "were surveilled, had their information unmasked, made it available, was politically spread." He said that such stories were proof that Obama administration officials had "misused, mishandled and potentially did some very, very bad things with classified information." ..."
The White House on Friday revived President Trump's unproven wiretapping allegations against the Obama administration, insisting
that there is new evidence that it conducted "politically motivated" surveillance of Mr. Trump's presidential campaign.
Senior government officials, including James B. Comey, the F.B.I. director, and lawmakers from both parties have repeatedly and
forcefully rejected the president's claim, saying they have seen no evidence of direct surveillance. A spokesman for former President
Barack Obama has denied that Mr. Obama ever ordered surveillance of Mr. Trump or his associates.
But Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary, asserted to reporters during his daily news briefing that members of Mr. Obama's
administration had done "very, very bad things," just as Mr. Trump
alleged without proof on March 4 when
he posted messages on Twitter accusing Mr. Obama of
"wire tapping" his phones at Trump Tower.
"The question is why? Who else did it? Was it ordered? By whom?" Mr. Spicer said. "But I think more and more the substance that
continues to come out on the record by individuals continues to point to exactly what the president was talking about that day."
... ... ...
Mr. Spicer's remarks on Friday seemed designed to give new life to the allegations against Mr. Obama after weeks of trying to
focus attention on the damage that Mr. Spicer said had been caused by leaks from the investigations into Russia's involvement in
the 2016 presidential campaign.
TheGatewayPundit.com, a right-wing site, called it a "notorious" interview and said it proved Obama administration officials had
disseminated "intel gathered on the Trump team." Reince Priebus, the White House chief of staff, said on the Hugh Hewitt radio show
that Ms. Farkas had made "just an incredible statement." Breitbart News reported on Mr. Priebus's comments.
In fact, the reports do not back up the allegations that Mr. Trump or any officials in his campaign were ever under surveillance.
In the March 2 interview on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" program, Ms. Farkas said she had expressed concern to her former colleagues about
the need to secure intelligence related to the Russian hacking of the American election.
Ms. Farkas was commenting on a New York Times article a day earlier that documented how in the days before Mr. Trump's inauguration,
Obama administration officials had sought to ensure the preservation of those documents in order to leave a clear trail for government
investigators after Mr. Trump took office.
In a statement she gave to the American Spectator, a conservative publication, Ms. Farkas said the furor over her remarks was
"a wild misinterpretation of comments I made on the air in March." She added, "I was out of government, I didn't have any classified
information, or any knowledge of 'tapping' or leaking or the N.Y.T. article before it came out." White House officials also confronted
on Friday the disclosure that Mr. Flynn, who resigned in February over his contacts with Russian officials, has offered to testify
before the two congressional committees investigating the Trump campaign's ties to Russia about those contacts in exchange for immunity
from prosecution.
Mr. Trump said on Twitter on Friday morning that he agreed with Mr. Flynn's proposal.
"Mike Flynn should ask for immunity in that this is a witch hunt (excuse for big election loss), by media & Dems, of historic
proportion!" Mr. Trump wrote.
The comments by Ms. Farkas, Mr. Spicer said, were evidence that Mr. Trump or his associates "were surveilled, had their information
unmasked, made it available, was politically spread." He said that such stories were proof that Obama administration officials had
"misused, mishandled and potentially did some very, very bad things with classified information."
"... He has the data that shows the Trump family and many others were under surveillance for a decade or more when he was still there. 600,000,000 pages of data. ..."
I read that info/ letter on another blog. I hope Dennis and Larry succeed, but there is one thing I don't quite understand.
If Montgomery left the NSA a few years ago how can he have hard evidence Trump and his team were surveilled ? ( other than one
of his former workmates telling him). If he has just been told that makes it hard to prove unless the workmate took a copy of
the data and gave it to Montgomery.
He has the data that shows the Trump family and many others were under surveillance for a decade or more when he was still
there. 600,000,000 pages of data.
We're waay beyond Trump being surveilled after the November vote.
Expect some variation of this story below to come from the upcomine revelations. Trump and Nunes want to not only demonstrate
that Obama was scum, but put a major wedge between the DNC and Jews and Israel:
Firstly, there would have to be sufficient information showing Obama initiated the spying. Unless Obama has political knives
out after him, these facts won't come out until 2030.
Secondly, the media, and other powers-that-be would muddy the water. We'll never know *who* and *why* of the story.
Thirdly, if the NSA comes out with genuine evidence, then we may be able to assume there IS a conflict between the FBI, the
CIA vs the NSA. That, in itself, would be very relevant news.
Growing conflicts in any large government are not conducive to a smooth-operating empire.
Or maybe you are right and the NSA are the good guys. Maybe Snowden did what he did because the NSA itself is not happy about
what they are told to do. Snowden did not go rogue but is following orders from within NSA.
It could also be that the NSA dropped vault 7 onto WikiLeaks as well as the various Hillary leaks during the campaign.
And NYPD says Hillary knew that Wiener was sexing underage girl & did not report it to authorities. The NYPD was prevented
from pursuing charges against her.
As we detailed earlier, it appears Trump may have been right, again.
Two days after FBI director Comey shot down Trump's allegation that Trump was being wiretapped by president Obama before the election,
it appears that president Trump may have been on to something because moments ago, the House Intelligence Chairman, Devin Nunes,
told reporters that the U.S. intelligence community incidentally collected information on members of President Trump's transition
team, possibly including Trump himself, and the information was "widely disseminated" in intelligence reports.
As
AP adds , Nunes said that President Donald Trump's communications may have been "monitored" during the transition period as part
of an "incidental collection."
Nunes told a news conference Wednesday that the communications appear to be picked up through "incidental collection" and do not
appear to be related to the ongoing FBI investigation into Trump associates' contacts with Russia. He says he believes the intelligence
collections were done legally , although in light of the dramatic change in the plotline it may be prudent to reserve judgment on
how "incidental" it was.
"I recently confirmed that on numerous occasions, the intelligence community collected information on U.S. individuals involved
in the Trump transition," Nunes told reporters.
"Details about U.S. persons involved in the incoming administration with little or no apparent foreign intelligence value were
widely disseminated in intelligence community reports."
The information was "legally brought to him by sources who thought we should know it," Nunes said, though he provided little detail
on the source.
BREAKING!!! Rep Devin Nunes (Intel Cmte Chmn): There was "Incidental collection" of
@realDonaldTrump thru IC surveillance <- BOMBSHELL
Nunes also said that "additional names" of Trump transition officials had been unmasked in the intelligence reports. He indicated
that Trump's communications may have been swept up.
The House Intel Chair said he had viewed dozens of documents showing that the information had been incidentally collected. He
said that he believes the information was legally collected. Nunes said that the intelligence has nothing to do with Russia and that
the collection occurred after the presidential election.
Nunes said he briefed House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) on the revelation and will inform the White House later today. Nunes' statement
comes after he and other congressional leaders pushed back on Trump's claims that former President Obama had his "wires tapped" in
Trump Tower ahead of the election.
Nunes said Wednesday that it was unclear whether the information incidentally collected originated in Trump Tower.
The revelation comes in the wake of the committee's explosive hearing on Monday, at which FBI Director James Comey confirmed that
the bureau has been investigating Russia's election hacking since July, which includes probing possible coordination between members
of Trump's presidential campaign and Moscow.
The meeting represented the panel's first open hearing on its investigation into Russia's election meddling and also featured
testimony from NSA Director Adm. Mike Rogers.
Nunes says the communications of Trump associates were also picked up, but he did not name those associates. He says the monitoring
mostly occurred in November, December and January. He added that he learned of the collection through "sources" but did not specify
those source
Politico adds that Nunes is going to the White House later Wednesday to brief the Trump administration on what he has learned,
which he said came from "sources."
Nunes says he is "bothered" by this. Won't say whether or not intel community spied on Trump et. al. But says he is "concerned."
Trump wouldn't of tweeted what he did unless he knew something. He doesn't make blind bets, he only moves on things he knows
he can win. Not to mention he has shown that he can bait, watch the other side respond and deny and then present his case to show
them as the liars they are.
How all these people still let trump bait them like this is hilarious. How many times has he said something that seemed baseless
and everyone was sure would sink him, and then he is vindicated? And they still fucking fall for it.
And yes, incidental surveillance is a funny term. As in you swept all his up the same way they listen to all of us all the
time? Maybe this will piss trump off enough to end this shit. I doubt it though.
The NSA 'wiretaps' EVERYONE. All of what you say on your phone, on-line, and in any other form of electronic communications
is Hoovered up and dumped in their mass storage facilities in Utah and elsewhere. The system is set up to get it all AUTOMATICALLY.
In fact, they would have had to go to great efforts to NOT record what Trump and his associates said electronically. Or searched
for. Or visited on the web. Or even visited in person if he/she carried a cell phone with when going about.
Because it is all recorded for ALL OF US! Standard, all the time, no warrant required.
Of course, if there were FISA warrants issued, then the opposition did more than that, because no warrant is required for any
of the above. So they must have also done some non-standard dirty. Like placing recording malware on the relevant cell phones
to record conversations, take pictures, upload stored files, and even take video. Or sift through his financial records.
OK, so why should you care? I don't mean about Trump, although you should care there as well, but about your privacy. You may
not be getting the full Monte he did, by everything you do in the first paragraph now rests with the NSA.
For an answer, consider this conversation between one of the uber-wealthy and a Federal Prosecutor:
*****
"With enough data, my lawyers can always find a crime. They'll prosecute. Bury anyone under legal motions, make his life miserable.
Maybe even send him up for some felony."
"Even if he didn't do anything?"
"Of course he did something. We got 100,000 laws on the books, twice that in regs. Somewhere, sometime, by accident or intentionally,
he broke one. We get a moving x-ray of his life, all we have to do is find it."
*****
It's called the power of selective prosecution. With enough data, what used to be just an annoyance becomes an unstoppable
control technique. Someday, when the deep state wants you cooperation, they will drill down through their Utah stash for your
name. Then they will call you in for a little chat.
Not willing to spy on your best friend or wife? You may change you mind after their little chat.
So how to avoid this trap? How do you avoid becoming a data serf?
Learn to hide your data so it can't be hovered in the first place. I suggest you start with
www.privacytools.io and work your way up from there.
And do it now. Because protecting your privacy is like quitting smoking. It doesn't matter how long you have been engaged in
unclean behavior, it's never too late to start living right.
The quote above, by the way, was from Thieves Emporium by Max Hernandez. It's a primer on the ways TPTB control us in the new
world of fiat money and ubiquitous surveillance and what we can do to prevent it. I strongly recommend you at least investigate
getting a copy.
There is a simple method for Trump to "drain the swamp". Fucked if I know why he hasn't, given how much butt-hurt they are
dishing out to him.
An Executive Order giving immunity and witness protection (and even a fucking Presidential Medal of Freedom, if you ask me)
to all whistleblowers who reveal unconstitutional malfeasance within both overt and covert .gov departments. Because these are
the true patriots, and all that is stopping them shining a fucking huge spotlight on this bucket of scumfuck is persecution from
the swamp dwellers who control all the levers of power.
Maybe with a (secure) hotline/email direct to the White House, just to bypass Comey and all the other cunts installed by Obama.
Or probably better, directly to a morally rock solid independent Special Prosecutor who is prepared to get down and seriously
dirty with the insidious morally bereft creatures infesting DC. A Trey Gowdy-type of bloke. Because , as far as relying on the
FBI et al is concerned, Trump was fucked before he started.
A typewriter can get it done. Hear they're Hot sellers in Germany again.
What people don't understand is, that the Russian PsyOp / False Narrative Script by the Deep State & Pure Evil War Criminal
Treasonous Psychopath Hillary Clinton Globalist was the game plan all long.
Win, stolen or lost. They were going & are going "all in" with the PsyOp, Scripted False Narrative of Russia hacking the Elections
/ Russia / Putin / Trump Propaganda gone full retard via the Deep States Opeatives in the Presstitute Media.
Plausible Deniability is the name of the game. If the Deep State could of pulled off the False Narrative PsyOp of Russia influencing
our Elections the Deep State could & will hack into Russia's National Elections next March. Call it pay back.
The Deep State's destabilization campaign in Ukraine especially Crimea was part of the ZioNeoConFascist Agenda to destabilize
Russia during their upcoming g elections.
Putin countered by expelling all Geroge Sorros NGO's from Russia. However, rest assured those destabilization cells are in
place to ready to be activated come Russia's next election cycle.
The future meeting between the Two Super Powers will be Epic. The Diplomacy which will Prevail out of those meetings will be
a fresh breath of air to the World.
And, final Death Blows to the Pure Evil Criminal Deep State Elite Compartmentalized Hierarchy.
3) All accounts disassociated with you personally - fake names, no phone numbers, do not link to any personal accounts, make
no comments, do not message your contacts.
4) never use your own wifi.
5) never use your own bank account or credit cards, use crypto currency to pay for VPN, etc.
This setup, as I understand it, would keep you completely anon with the exception of cameras at the store you purchase laptop
at or cameras at the cafe you are using wifi. You can now leak without it being linked to you.
Not to say that this setup is immune from CIA In fact the idea is that you know that the CIA is looking, its just important
that they do not know WHO they are looking at (identity).
my Russian compatriot Vlad told me when he was a kid, every typewriter in USSR was cataloged with samples of its output. By
microscopic analysis, they could tell which typewriter was responsible for any typed document.
every computer printer made also has the same kind of ID backdoor - it will print a specific identifier (like a MAC address)
somewhere on the page - except for the old dot matrix and early inkjet. Defeat that by running it thru a low res copier a few
round trips.
East German Stasi, same deal. All typewriters registered and tracked. Such amazing depth of the deep state crap. Coming soon
to a ruined Republic near you...unless......we stop it.
"An Executive Order giving immunity and witness protection (and even a fucking Presidential Medal of Freedom, if you ask me)
to all whistleblowers who reveal unconstitutional malfeasance within both overt and covert .gov departments. Because these are
the true patriots, and all that is stopping them shining a fucking huge spotlight on this bucket of scumfuck is persecution from
the swamp dwellers who control all the levers of power.
Maybe with a (secure) hotline/email direct to the White House, just to bypass Comey and all the other cunts installed by Obama.
Or probably better, directly to a morally rock solid independent Special Prosecutor who is prepared to get down and seriously
dirty with the insidious morally bereft creatures infesting DC. A Trey Gowdy-type of bloke. Because , as far as relying on the
FBI et al is concerned, Trump was fucked before he started."
"... Now we have "synthetic" surveillance. You don't even need a court order. Now all incidental communication intercepts can be
unmasked. One can search their huge databases for all the incidental communications of someone of interest, then collect all of the
unmasked incidental communications that involve that person and put them together in one handy dandy report. Viola! You can keep tabs
on them every time they end up being incidentally collected. ..."
"... You ever went to an embassy party? Talked to a drug dealer or mafia guy without being aware of it? Correspond overseas? Your
communications have been "incidentally" collected too. There is so much surveillance out there we have probably all bounced off various
targets over the last several years. ..."
"... This is what police states do. In the past it was considered scandalous for senior U.S. officials to even request the identities
of U.S. officials incidentally monitored by the government (normally they are redacted from intelligence reports). John Bolton's nomination
to be U.S. ambassador to the United Nations was derailed in 2006 after the NSA confirmed he had made 10 such requests when he was Undersecretary
of State for Arms Control in George W. Bush's first term. The fact that the intercepts of Flynn's conversations with Kislyak appear
to have been widely distributed inside the government is a red flag. ..."
"... Representative Devin Nunes, the Republican chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, told me Monday
that he saw the leaks about Flynn's conversations with Kislyak as part of a pattern. ..."
"... The real story here is why are there so many illegal leaks coming out of Washington? Will these leaks be happening as I deal
on N.Korea etc? ..."
"... But no matter what Flynn did, it is simply not the role of the deep state to target a man working in one of the political branches
of the government by dishing to reporters about information it has gathered clandestinely. ..."
"... It is the role of elected members of Congress to conduct public investigations of alleged wrongdoing by public officials..
..."
The rank and file of the IC are not involved in this. So let's not tar everyone with the same brush, but Obama revised executive
order 12333 so that communication intercepts incidentally collected dont have to be masked and may be shared freely in the IC.
Now we have "synthetic" surveillance. You don't even need a court order. Now all incidental communication intercepts can
be unmasked. One can search their huge databases for all the incidental communications of someone of interest, then collect all
of the unmasked incidental communications that involve that person and put them together in one handy dandy report. Viola! You
can keep tabs on them every time they end up being incidentally collected.
You ever went to an embassy party? Talked to a drug dealer or mafia guy without being aware of it? Correspond overseas?
Your communications have been "incidentally" collected too. There is so much surveillance out there we have probably all bounced
off various targets over the last several years.
What might your "synthetic" surveillance report look like?
There's way more going on here then first alleged. From Bloomberg, not my choice for news, but There is another component to
this story as well -- as Trump himself just tweeted.
It's very rare that reporters are ever told about government-monitored communications of U.S. citizens, let alone senior U.S.
officials. The last story like this to hit Washington was in 2009 when Jeff Stein, then of CQ, reported on intercepted phone calls
between a senior Aipac lobbyist and Jane Harman, who at the time was a Democratic member of Congress.
Normally intercepts of U.S. officials and citizens are some of the most tightly held government secrets. This is for good reason.
Selectively disclosing details of private conversations monitored by the FBI or NSA gives the permanent state the power to destroy
reputations from the cloak of anonymity.
This is what police states do. In the past it was considered scandalous for senior U.S. officials to even request the identities
of U.S. officials incidentally monitored by the government (normally they are redacted from intelligence reports). John Bolton's
nomination to be U.S. ambassador to the United Nations was derailed in 2006 after the NSA confirmed he had made 10 such requests
when he was Undersecretary of State for Arms Control in George W. Bush's first term. The fact that the intercepts of Flynn's conversations
with Kislyak appear to have been widely distributed inside the government is a red flag.
Representative Devin Nunes, the Republican chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, told me Monday
that he saw the leaks about Flynn's conversations with Kislyak as part of a pattern. "There does appear to be a well orchestrated
effort to attack Flynn and others in the administration," he said. "From the leaking of phone calls between the president and
foreign leaders to what appears to be high-level FISA Court information, to the leaking of American citizens being denied security
clearances, it looks like a pattern."
@?realDonaldTrump?
The real story here is why are there so many illegal leaks coming out of Washington? Will these leaks be happening
as I deal on N.Korea etc?
President Trump was roundly mocked among liberals for that tweet. But he is, in many ways, correct. These leaks are an enormous
problem. And in a less polarized context, they would be recognized immediately for what they clearly are: an effort to manipulate
public opinion for the sake of achieving a desired political outcome. It's weaponized spin.............
But no matter what Flynn did, it is simply not the role of the deep state to target a man working in one of the political
branches of the government by dishing to reporters about information it has gathered clandestinely.
It is the role of elected members of Congress to conduct public investigations of alleged wrongdoing by public officials..
..... But the answer isn't to counter it with equally irregular acts of sabotage - or with a disinformation campaign waged
by nameless civil servants toiling away in the surveillance state.....
And the plot thickens. Whoever said may you live in interesting times......had no idea. Can you feel the desperation from the
filthy corrupt democrats? The demonic spirits that reside in them are going berserk. The light is starting to shine on them and
their evil deeds are more transparent than ever. It's only gonna get better
Fox better rehire Napolitano before it is too late. But it is too late for the Wall Street Journal comparing Trump to 'a drunk'
clinging to 'an empty gin bottle' in scathing editorial.
"... 'Former intelligence analyst Larry Johnson, who has long attacked the U.S. intel community, is standing by his allegation that triggered a feud with America's closest ally' ..."
"How the U.K. spying claim traveled from an ex-CIA blogger to Trump's White House"
'Former intelligence analyst Larry Johnson, who has long attacked the U.S. intel community, is standing by his allegation that
triggered a feud with America's closest ally'
By Matthew Nussbaum...03/18/17...02:38 PM EDT
"...Larry Johnson, a former CIA analyst and blogger, acknowledges he was one of the sources for Fox News commentator Andrew
Napolitano's claim - later repeated by the White House..."
Britain Livid on Spying Claim, but Trump Isn't Apologizing. White House aides scrambled to deal with an unusual rupture after
suggesting that former President Barack Obama used a British spy agency to wiretap Donald J. Trump during the campaign.
At a news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Mr. Trump made clear that he felt the White House had nothing to
retract.
WASHINGTON - President Trump provoked a rare public dispute with America's closest ally on Friday after his White House
aired an explosive and unsubstantiated claim that Britain's spy agency had secretly eavesdropped on him at the behest of President
Barack Obama during last year's campaign.
Livid British officials adamantly denied the allegation and secured promises from senior White House officials never to
repeat it. But a defiant Mr. Trump refused to back down, making clear that the White House had nothing to retract or apologize
for because his spokesman had simply repeated an assertion made by a Fox News commentator. Fox itself later disavowed the report.
...
this equally applied to those with the virulent fixation on Russia completely out of control.
== end of quote ==
Neoliberal DemoRats might pay dearly for this "poisoning of the well" trick -- McCarthyism witch hunt.
We need to remember that corruption of politician is sine qua non of neoliberalism. "Greed is good" completely replaced 10
Commandments.
But the first rule of living in a glass house that modern Internet provides (in cooperation with intelligence agencies, Google,
Microsoft and Facebook) is not to throw stones.
Russia is not Serra Leon with rockets. I am afraid that Russia might have a lot of info about corruption of major Democratic
politicians as most of them took bribes from Russian and Ukrainian oligarchs (whom they essentially created) and some (old Clinton
"associates" like Summers) closely participated in "great economic rape of Russia" of 1991-2000. All neatly recorded and waiting
their hour for release.
At some point Putin's nerves might break and he can order to release this information. Then what ?
"... Merkel's reaction was similarly amusing: almost as if she had heard for the first time that in 2010, and for years onward, Barack Obama had been wiretapping her and countless other heads of state. ..."
"... For those unsure what the exchange was about, we suggest you read the Telegraph's " Barack Obama 'approved tapping Angela Merkel's phone 3 years ago'... President Barack Obama was told about monitoring of German Chancellor in 2010 and allowed it to continue, says German newspaper ." ..."
"... And incidentally, in yet another change in the official narrative, after both Sky News and the Telegraph reported earlier today that the White House had apologized to Britain over the accusation that its spy agency had helped Obama spy on Trump, the NYT reported that the White House has said there was no apology from either Spicer or McMaster, and that instead the Administration defended Spicer's mention of the wiretapping story. ..."
"... Finally, as Axios adds , after Trump and Merkel left the stage reporters again asked Sean Spicer whether he apologized for repeating an anonymously sourced Fox News claim that British intelligence helped in wiretapping Trump Tower. His response: " I don't think we regret anything. " ..."
Following today's latest developments over Trump's allegations that the UK's GCHQ may or may not have helped Obama to wiretap the
Trump Tower, an allegation which the infuriated British Spy Agency called "utterly ridiculous" and
prompted it to demand an apology from the White House, a German reporter asked Trump for his current opinion on whether Obama
had indeed wiretapped Trump. The president's response: he gestured to Angela Merkel and said " on wiretapping by this past administration,
at least we have something in common."
Merkel's reaction was similarly amusing: almost as if she had heard for the first time that in 2010, and for years onward, Barack
Obama had been wiretapping her and countless other heads of state.
And incidentally, in yet another change in the official narrative, after both Sky News and the Telegraph reported earlier today
that the White House had apologized to Britain over the accusation that its spy agency had helped Obama spy on Trump, the NYT reported
that the White House has said there was no apology from either Spicer or McMaster, and that instead the Administration defended Spicer's
mention of the wiretapping story.
WH now sez there was no apology to Brits from @PressSec /McMaster;
they fielded complaints & defended Spicer's mention of wiretapping story
Finally, as
Axios
adds , after Trump and Merkel left the stage reporters again asked Sean Spicer whether he apologized for repeating an anonymously
sourced Fox News claim that British intelligence helped in wiretapping Trump Tower. His response: " I don't think we regret anything.
"
"... It is "our job," not Trump's, to "control exactly what people think," gasped MSNBC's Mika Brzezinski last month. This week's gasp from the media assumes a slightly different form and can be translated as: It is our job, not Trump's, to push stories about the government investigation of Trumpworld. ..."
"... For months, the media, drawing upon criminal leaks from Obama holdovers, has been saying in effect: Trumpworld is under investigation for ties to Russia! Then Trump says essentially the same thing on Twitter and the media freaks out. ..."
"... The Obama holdovers are denying the import of the very stories that they planted. ..."
"... The Obama administration used half-baked (or, more likely, completely fabricated) information from some "foreign source" as the pretext to launch a clandestine fishing expedition against Trump during the election. ..."
"... We live in a police state folks under the warrantless eavesdropping program. ..."
George Neumayr
Posted on 3/6/2017 4:42:04 PM by RoosterRedux
It is "our job," not Trump's, to "control exactly what people think," gasped MSNBC's Mika Brzezinski last month. This week's
gasp from the media assumes a slightly different form and can be translated as: It is our job, not Trump's, to push stories about
the government investigation of Trumpworld.
For months, the media, drawing upon criminal leaks from Obama holdovers, has been saying in effect: Trumpworld is under
investigation for ties to Russia! Then Trump says essentially the same thing on Twitter and the media freaks out.
Why does the latter merit condemnation but not the former?
Notice what is happening here: The Obama holdovers are denying the import of the very stories that they planted. Where
did the liberal BBC's story (building on a story first reported by Heat Street) on intelligence agencies receiving a FISA court
warrant to investigate Russian-Trumpworld ties come from? It came from a "senior member of the US intelligence community":
On 15 October, the US secret intelligence court issued a warrant to investigate two Russian banks. This news was given to me
by several sources and corroborated by someone I will identify only as a senior member of the US intelligence community. He
would never volunteer anything – giving up classified information would be illegal – but he would confirm or deny what I had
heard from other sources.
Notice on the Sunday talk shows that Obama's CIA director John Brennan did not appear. Yet he served as the genesis of this investigation,
according to the BBC story:
The Obama administration used half-baked (or, more likely, completely fabricated) information from some "foreign source"
as the pretext to launch a clandestine fishing expedition against Trump during the election.
Can't wait to see the application paperwork for the requested FISA orders!!
To: RoosterRedux Don't want to start a separate thread for this and it is somewhat related.
Listening to Hannity show today and William Binney was on and interviewed. Binney was a US Intelligence Official with the NSA
who resigned in 2001 and turned whistleblower.
I am paraphrasing but - He says phone, email, test, surveillance is routinely done on everyone with no warrant. He said they
can go back for years and pull out the data.
Please listen to Hannity at the top of the 3rd hour for details.
We live in a police state folks under the warrantless eavesdropping program.
Vault 7 revelations now shed some light on the possibilities of a muti-step operations to get the court order. The absurdity of
the situation is evident: acting POTUS complains about wiretapping by his predecessor who supposedly used one of intelligence agencies
(supposedly CIA) for this operation. Being now a Commander in Chief.
Ray McGovern who probably knows what he is talking about suggested that Obama might be scared of CIA Director Brennan (
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGayl9uNW4A actually this
is a very interesting interview)
The following scheme looks plausible: Scapegoat Russians by hacking into DNC servers; create media hysteria about Russians; implicate
Trump in connections to Russians; get court order for wiretapping on this ground
Notable quotes:
"... Just hours before he publicly responded last week to the Senate Intelligence Committee report accusing the Central Intelligence Agency of torture and deceit, John O. Brennan, the CIA's director, stopped by the White House to meet with President Obama. Ostensibly, he was there for an intelligence briefing. But the messages delivered later that day by the White House and Mr. Brennan were synchronized, even down to similar wording, and the larger import of the well-timed visit was hardly a classified secret: After six years of partnership, the president was standing by the embattled spy chief even as fellow Democrats called for his resignation. ..."
"... I'm not tarring Obama with Brennan's war crimes and that of the Agency, copiously documented in the Senate Report on Torture, and instead am suggesting an active partnership-in-war-crimes, Obama, if anything, giving CIA its head of steam under his watch ..."
"... Obama plucked Brennan to lead the intelligence charge through the interstices of government and military culminating in a permanent war economy and psychosis of vision. ..."
"... in the 67 years since the CIA was founded, few presidents have had as close a bond with their intelligence chiefs as Mr. Obama has forged with Mr. Brennan. It is a relationship that has shaped the policy and politics of the debate over the nation's war with terrorist organizations, as well as the agency's own struggle to balance security and liberty ..."
Baker-Mazzetti's opener says it all: " Just hours before he publicly responded last week to the Senate Intelligence Committee
report accusing the Central Intelligence Agency of torture and deceit, John O. Brennan, the CIA's director, stopped by the White
House to meet with President Obama. Ostensibly, he was there for an intelligence briefing. But the messages delivered later that
day by the White House and Mr. Brennan were synchronized, even down to similar wording, and the larger import of the well-timed
visit was hardly a classified secret: After six years of partnership, the president was standing by the embattled spy chief even
as fellow Democrats called for his resignation. " Nothing could be plainer. As one who remembers well the guilt-by-association
days of McCarthyism, I'm not tarring Obama with Brennan's war crimes and that of the Agency, copiously documented in the Senate
Report on Torture, and instead am suggesting an active partnership-in-war-crimes, Obama, if anything, giving CIA its head of steam
under his watch , as in its role in drone assassination at facilities in Pakistan, Brennan himself installed as Director
after Valiant Service as national security adviser, all despite questions of favoring waterboarding raised in confirmation hearings.
From a pool of gung-ho national-security experts on which to draw, the others still making up his First Team of advisers (include
generals, admirals, members of think tanks with partly disguised neocon credentials), Obama plucked Brennan to lead the intelligence
charge through the interstices of government and military culminating in a permanent war economy and psychosis of vision.
Obama is not Brennan's puppet, nor the other way. Both are electrified by mutual contact and support. The reporters note friction
between the White House and Langley "after the release of the scorching report," Brennan having "irritated advisers by battling
Democrats on the committee over the report during the past year." They do not point out Obama did the same, stalling release,
suffocating criticism of CIA hard-ball tactics against the committee, of which later; yet they make up for that with, given that
this is NYT, an astonishing statement: "But in the 67 years since the CIA was founded, few presidents have had as close a
bond with their intelligence chiefs as Mr. Obama has forged with Mr. Brennan. It is a relationship that has shaped the policy
and politics of the debate over the nation's war with terrorist organizations, as well as the agency's own struggle to balance
security and liberty ."
What they don't say is that counterterrorism is part of the larger US position of counterrevolution, issuing in confrontations
with Russia and China and regime change wherever American interests are challenged. Nor do they say, the Agency's struggle to
balance security and liberty was lost before it had fairly begun, assassination and regime change hardly indicative of liberty,
a no-contest battle.
"... The House intelligence committee says it could resort to subpoenaing the Justice Department if it fails to answer its request for any evidence that President Donald Trump was wiretapped during the election. ..."
"... A spokesman for committee chairman Devin Nunes of California, Jack Langer, says the committee might subpoena the information if the Justice Department fails to answer its questions. ..."
"... The department had been expected to provide a response by Monday to the House Intelligence Committee, which has made Trump's wiretapping claims part of a bigger investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. ..."
"WASHINGTON (AP) - The Latest on President Donald Trump (all times EDT):
7:10 p.m.
The House intelligence committee says it could resort to subpoenaing the Justice Department
if it fails to answer its request for any evidence that President Donald Trump was wiretapped during
the election.
The committee set Monday as the deadline for getting the information, but the Justice Department
says it needs more time.
The committee now says it wants the information in hand before March 20 when it holds its first
public hearing on its investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.
A spokesman for committee chairman Devin Nunes of California, Jack Langer, says the committee
might subpoena the information if the Justice Department fails to answer its questions.
___
6:30 p.m.
The Justice Department is requesting more time to respond to a congressional inquiry into President
Donald Trump's unproven assertion that he was wiretapped by his predecessor.
The department had been expected to provide a response by Monday to the House Intelligence
Committee, which has made Trump's wiretapping claims part of a bigger investigation into Russian
interference in the 2016 presidential election.
But spokeswoman Sarah Isgur Flores says in a statement Monday that the department has asked for
more time to "review the request in compliance with the governing legal authorities and to determine
what if any responsive documents may exist."
"... In this regard, a whistleblower named Dennis Montgomery, a former NSA/CIA contractor, came forward to FBI Director Comey with 47 hard drives and over 600 million pages of largely classified information, under grants of use and derivative use immunity, which I obtained for him with the U.S Attorney for the District of Columbia. Later, Montgomery, who suffers from a potentially fatal brain aneurism, testified under oath, for over 2-and-a-half hours before FBI Special Agents Walter Giardina and William Barnett in a secure room at the FBI's field office in Washington, D.C. The testimony was under oath and videotaped and I have reminded the FBI recently to preserve this evidence. ..."
"... I have also met on several occasions with the staff of Chairman Bob Goodlatte of the House Judiciary Committee, since judges have been illegally surveilled, and asked them to inquire of FBI Director Comey and his General Counsel James Baker why their Montgomery investigation has appeared to have been "buried" for the last few years. They have done so, but as yet have not received, to the best of my knowledge, a clear response. ..."
"... Legally speaking, my cases against the intelligence agencies also encompass the illegal surveillance of President Trump and his men, as what apparently occurred shows a pattern of unconstitutional conduct that at trial would raise a strong evidentiary inference that this illegal behavior continues to occur. Our so called government, represented by dishonest Obama-loyal attorneys in the corrupted Federal Programs Branch of the Justice Department, continues to maintain that they cannot for national security reasons confirm or deny the mass surveillance against me or anyone else. ..."
The newest revelations that the Obama administration wiretapped, that is "bugged" President Trump
and all of his men, in the lead up to and after the November 8, 2016, elections are not surprising.
In this regard, for over 2 years the highest levels of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
have been secretly investigating the "harvesting" of highly confidential information including financial
records of the chief justice of the Supreme Court, other justices, over 156 judges, prominent businessmen
like Donald Trump, and public activists like me.
In this regard, a whistleblower named Dennis Montgomery, a former NSA/CIA contractor, came forward
to FBI Director Comey with 47 hard drives and over 600 million pages of largely classified information,
under grants of use and derivative use immunity, which I obtained for him with the U.S Attorney for
the District of Columbia. Later, Montgomery, who suffers from a potentially fatal brain aneurism,
testified under oath, for over 2-and-a-half hours before FBI Special Agents Walter Giardina and William
Barnett in a secure room at the FBI's field office in Washington, D.C. The testimony was under oath
and videotaped and I have reminded the FBI recently to preserve this evidence.
The newest revelations that the Obama administration wiretapped, that is "bugged" President Trump
and all of his men, in the lead up to and after the November 8, 2016, elections are not surprising.
In this regard, for over 2 years the highest levels of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
have been secretly investigating the "harvesting" of highly confidential information including financial
records of the chief justice of the Supreme Court, other justices, over 156 judges, prominent businessmen
like Donald Trump, and public activists like me.
In this regard, a whistleblower named Dennis Montgomery, a former NSA/CIA contractor, came forward
to FBI Director Comey with 47 hard drives and over 600 million pages of largely classified information,
under grants of use and derivative use immunity, which I obtained for him with the U.S Attorney for
the District of Columbia. Later, Montgomery, who suffers from a potentially fatal brain aneurism,
testified under oath, for over 2-and-a-half hours before FBI Special Agents Walter Giardina and William
Barnett in a secure room at the FBI's field office in Washington, D.C. The testimony was under oath
and videotaped and I have reminded the FBI recently to preserve this evidence.
I have also met on several occasions with the staff of Chairman Bob Goodlatte of the House Judiciary
Committee, since judges have been illegally surveilled, and asked them to inquire of FBI Director
Comey and his General Counsel James Baker why their Montgomery investigation has appeared to have
been "buried" for the last few years. They have done so, but as yet have not received, to the best
of my knowledge, a clear response.
In addition I have gone back to one of the few intellectually honest judges on the U.S. District
Court for the District of Columbia (nearly all of the rest, save for another great, Judge Royce C.
Lamberth, are politically biased appointees of either Presidents Clinton or Obama), and asked him
to move forward to trial with the cases which I filed in 2013 against Obama and his intelligence
agencies over the mass spying on hundreds of millions of Americans.
Not coincidentally, before Edward Snowden revealed this unconstitutional conduct by the National
Security Agency (NSA), which then was run under the direction of the Director of National Intelligence
(DNI), James Clapper, Clapper lied under oath to Congress, denying that this illegal surveillance
was occurring under his watch. That he was never prosecuted for perjury at a minimum, not to mention
that it is crime to wiretap innocent Americans without "probable cause," is a testament to the reality
that official Washington is afraid of the intelligence agencies, knowing that they can dig up "dirt"
to destroy their political and personal lives. Indeed, this may help explain Chief Justice Roberts'
"inexplicable" last minute flip on the Obamacare case before SCOTUS. What, for instance, did Clapper
and the NSA/CIA have on Roberts that may have "convinced" him to rubber stamp President Barack Obama's
unconstitutional Affordable Care Act?
Judge Leon, in the course of my cases before him (see
freedomwatchusa.org for more info),
has already issued two preliminary injunction rulings ordering that the illegal mass surveillance
cease and desist. He termed this unconstitutional violation of our Fourth Amendment, "almost Orwellian,"
a reference to George Orwell's prophetic book "1984" about "Big Brother." Judge Leon's rulings then
prompted Congress to amend the Patriot Act, and call it the USA Freedom Act, which sought to leave
telephonic metadata in the hands of the telephone providers, like Verizon, Sprint, and AT&T, until
a warrant was obtained showing probable cause that a target or subjects communications with terrorists
or a crime was being committed.
It now appears that the Obama intelligence agencies, as I predicted to Judge Leon, have again
ignored and flouted the law, and at the direction of the former President Obama, and/or his men like
Clapper, illegally spied on targets or subjects like Mr. Trump and his associates, including Gen.
Michael Flynn, the former national security adviser. This is why I have pushed Judge Leon to move
my cases along to trial, and have offered to bring Montgomery forth to be interviewed by the judge
in camera in the interim, as he has a security clearance to probe Montgomery about classified information
which I cannot and have not accessed.
Legally speaking, my cases against the intelligence agencies also encompass the illegal surveillance
of President Trump and his men, as what apparently occurred shows a pattern of unconstitutional conduct
that at trial would raise a strong evidentiary inference that this illegal behavior continues to
occur. Our so called government, represented by dishonest Obama-loyal attorneys in the corrupted
Federal Programs Branch of the Justice Department, continues to maintain that they cannot for national
security reasons confirm or deny the mass surveillance against me or anyone else.
I have asked Judge Leon to enter a permanent injunction against Obama and his political hacks
at the NSA and CIA, many of whom are still there and are bent on destroying the Trump presidency
and attempting to blackmail prominent Americans, like me, who might challenge the destructive socialist/pro-Muslim
agenda of the Obama-Clinton-Soros left.
... ... ...
Larry Klayman, founder of Judicial Watch and Freedom Watch, is known for his strong public interest
advocacy in furtherance of ethics in government and individual freedoms and liberties. To read more
of his reports, Go
Here Now .
"... House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, on Capitol Hill Tuesday, wants to "verify" that the intelligence community was using its surveillance authority "ethically." Associated Press/J. Scott Applewhite ..."
"... The committee's ranking Democrat, Adam Schiff of California, also told reporters Tuesday that he was happy to look into the president's allegations – but warned that if they were proven false, accusing Obama of ordering an illegal wiretap could pose much bigger problems for Trump. ..."
"... "If a sitting U.S. president alleging that his predecessor engaged in the most unscrupulous and unlawful conduct that is also a scandal, if those allegations prove to be false," Schiff said. "And we should be able to determine in fairly short order whether this accusation was true or false." ..."
"... Nunes also questioned the official explanation for why Flynn's calls were recorded. Was it actually because of "incidental collection" – as the intelligence community has argued – "or was it something else?" he asked. ..."
"... Nunes may have a chance to grill intelligence community members about that on March 20, when he plans to hold an open hearing as part of the House Intelligence Committee's investigation into allegations of Russian meddling in the 2016 elections. ..."
"... Schiff said Tuesday that he plans "on asking the director of the FBI directly whether there was any wiretap directed at Mr. Trump or his associates" at the hearing. ..."
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, R-California, said Tuesday that he had seen no
evidence supporting President Trump's claim that his phones were tapped by the previous administration.
But unlike many other members of Congress, Nunes did not demand that the administration explain
the basis of Trump's accusation, saying that "we were going to look into it anyway."
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, on Capitol Hill Tuesday, wants to "verify" that
the intelligence community was using its surveillance authority "ethically." Associated Press/J.
Scott Applewhite
"The bigger question that needs to be answered is whether or not Mr. Trump or any of his associates
were in fact targeted by any of the intelligence agencies or law enforcement authorities," Nunes
told reporters Tuesday. Over the weekend, he announced that his committee would look into Trump's
accusation delivered via Twitter that "Obama had my 'wires tapped' in Trump Tower just before the
victory."
"At this point we don't have any evidence of that," Nunes said. "But we also don't have any evidence
of many people who have been named in multiple news stories that supposedly are under some type of
investigation."
The committee's ranking Democrat, Adam Schiff of California, also told reporters Tuesday that
he was happy to look into the president's allegations – but warned that if they were proven false,
accusing Obama of ordering an illegal wiretap could pose much bigger problems for Trump.
"We accept – we will investigate this," Schiff said, referring to another Trump tweet in which
the president likened the alleged wiretap to a "Nixon/Watergate" style scandal.
"If a sitting U.S. president alleging that his predecessor engaged in the most unscrupulous and
unlawful conduct that is also a scandal, if those allegations prove to be false," Schiff said.
"And we should be able to determine in fairly short order whether this accusation was true or false."
Nunes told reporters last week that he had seen no evidence of improper contacts between the Trump
team and Russian officials. He repeated that assertion Tuesday, stressing that it was common practice
for incoming administrations to meet with diplomats.
He added that based on his understanding of the transcripts of calls between Russian Ambassador
Sergey Kislyak and former national security adviser Michael Flynn, there was nothing inappropriate
or suspect about the substance of the conversation.
Nunes also questioned the official explanation for why Flynn's calls were recorded. Was it actually
because of "incidental collection" – as the intelligence community has argued – "or was it something
else?" he asked.
"It's important for us to know whether or not the Department of Justice or any other agency tried
to get a warrant on anybody related to the Trump campaign -– or any other campaign for that matter,"
Nunes said, explaining that the committee wanted to "verify" that the intelligence community was
using its surveillance authorities "ethically, responsibly and by the law."
Nunes may have a chance to grill intelligence community members about that on March 20, when
he plans to hold an open hearing as part of the House Intelligence Committee's investigation into
allegations of Russian meddling in the 2016 elections.
The guest list for the hearing is formidable, but not entirely comprehensive: Nunes and Schiff
agreed to invite FBI Director James Comey, National Security Agency Director Mike Rogers, former
CIA director John Brennan, former director of national intelligence James Clapper, former acting
attorney general Sally Yates, and two senior officers of CrowdStrike – the company that found proof
that Russia hacked the Democratic National Committee.
Schiff said Tuesday that he plans "on asking the director of the FBI directly whether there was
any wiretap directed at Mr. Trump or his associates" at the hearing.
"... Thus, it comes as no surprise that the NSA and likely the CIA continue with their spying, this time on our "the president and his men." This is highly dangerous to our republic, and, as found by one of the few intellectually honest and courageous federal judges on the bench in two cases which I filed a few years ago against the NSA, this conduct is "almost Orwellian," that is, reminiscent of George Orwell's prophesy in his landmark book, "1984." Orwell's "Big Brother" has indeed come to pass, as Judge Leon held in ruling in my favor in these lawsuits. (For more information, see FreedomWatchUSA.org .) ..."
The National Security Agency (NSA), having previously been disclosed by Edward Snowden and my whistleblower
client Dennis Montgomery to have unconstitutionally and illegally spied on the telephonic metadata,
internet, and social media communications of hundreds of millions of American citizens - including
Supreme Court justices, hundreds of lower court judges, prominent businessmen like Trump himself,
and ordinary American activists like yours truly - is at it again!
This time, with the resignation of Trump White House National Security Adviser General Michael
Flynn last night - based on telephone NSA intercepts he allegedly had with the Russian ambassador
- it's clear that the NSA is spying on the president, his White House, and the administration in
general.
This is highly dangerous, particularly since the intelligence agencies are chock full of loyalists
to former President Barack Hussein Obama, Hillary Clinton, and their leftist comrades.
They are also stung by President Trump's criticism of their incompetence, partisanship, and lawlessness
under the direction of former Director of National Security James Clapper, who lied to under oath
to Congress about his wholesale illegal spying, yet as a card carrying member of the Washington,
D.C., establishment got off scot free from prosecution. And, then there is former CIA Director John
Brennan, who was literally at war with President-elect Trump as the hand-picked intelligence hack
of Obama himself. Even after his resignation a day prior to the inauguration of President Trump,
many of Brennan's agents remain in place at the CIA
Thus, it comes as no surprise that the NSA and likely the CIA continue with their spying, this
time on our "the president and his men." This is highly dangerous to our republic, and, as found
by one of the few intellectually honest and courageous federal judges on the bench in two cases which
I filed a few years ago against the NSA, this conduct is "almost Orwellian," that is, reminiscent
of George Orwell's prophesy in his landmark book, "1984." Orwell's "Big Brother" has indeed come
to pass, as Judge Leon held in ruling in my favor in these lawsuits. (For more information, see
FreedomWatchUSA.org .)
My success in this litigation caused Congress to enact the USA Freedom Act, which requires the
intelligence agencies to get warrants to obtain telephonic metadata based on a showing of probable
cause that terrorism is afoot or that a crime is in the act of being committed. But it's now clear
that, as has been documented time-in and time-out in court filings and from other sources, the NSA
and likely the CIA continue to have no respect for the law.
Now the NSA and likely the CIA as well have predictably turned their sights on the President of
the United States and his White House. This is not just an outrage, it threatens to unleash tyranny
the likes of which this nation has never seen. Because if the intelligence agencies are allowed to
continue, the real likelihood of coercion and blackmail will, as is also predicted, become the norm.
And, when this happens, our democracy will have been destroyed, much less the hope of the new Trump
administration, on behalf of all of us, to "Make America Great Again."
Of course, restoring the nation to greatness may not what the hacks at the NSA, CIA, and other
intelligence agencies may have in mind. The NSA and CIA, with this spying, holds a "Sword of Damocles"
over the heads of President Trump and his administration and in many ways they are control of the
fate of the United States. If King George III had had this power in the days leading up to the American
Revolution, our Founding Fathers would never had made to Philadelphia to debate, agree on, and ultimately
sign the Declaration of Independence. They would have been picked up by the Red Coats, arrested,
imprisoned, and ultimately executed.
I will be going back to Judge Leon in our ongoing cases to hold the NSA and CIA in contempt for
continuing its apparently illegal spying which threatens all of us. If there is one jurist who might
protect We the People, Judge Leon is the one. If not, then American patriots regrettably may ultimately
decide to take matters into their own hands, as happened 1776.
Larry Klayman, founder of Judicial Watch and Freedom Watch, is known for his strong public
interest advocacy in furtherance of ethics in government and individual freedoms and liberties. To
read more of his reports,
Go Here Now .
"... Since its inception as the Office of Strategic Services [OSS] at the start of World War II, when it was viewed a somewhat of a gentlemen's club, albeit gentlemen licensed to administer lethal force with great prejudice, to its modern day incarnation as a behemoth with an astounding 21,000 plus employees, there have been rumors of politicization and "cooked" intelligence as well as public demonstrations of same. ..."
"... According to Foreign Policy Magazine the CIA has had some really serious intelligence failures which caught the agency entirely flat footed: the Yom Kippur War, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the fall of the Soviet Union, Ayatollah Khomeini's Iranian Revolution, India's successful nuke test, of course 9/11 and finally, the Iraqi WMD fiasco. [see, The Ten Biggest American Intelligence Failures , FP] ..."
"... Exhibit one is obvious: Brennan is fearful of what the incoming administration might do to his porcine agency, one replete with desk jockeys rather than actual field agents so attacking the incoming CIC might prove advantageous in repelling the supposedly imminent attack on Brennan's turf. ..."
"... Bolstering the image of a CIA director willing to grovel to curry favor with the administration, to the detriment of American interests, in 2010 we wrote about what was a firestorm at the time, an address by Brennan, then one of Obama's national security advisors, at an NYU event called, "A Dialogue on our National Security," which was organized by then president of the Hamas linked Islamic Society of North America, Ingrid Mattson. ..."
What we must presume has been a behind the scene conflict between politicized elements of America's rather vast intelligence infrastructure
[at least 17 discreet agencies, which doesn't take "dark op" players into account] leading up to and now following the November 8
election, has ingloriously boiled over into a public cat fight.
If not for the subject matter the scene would be reminiscent of the now semi-ancient but nonetheless still hilarious Mad Magazine
cartoon series, Spy vs. Spy it's gotten that bad.
The basic thesis, doggedly argued by the most politicized of the various intelligence agencies' nodes - John Brennan's CIA – is
that Vlad Putin's operatives were responsible for the DNC/John Podesta hack which Hillary supporters believe threw the election into
the Dem's nightmare scenario, victory by the Blond Barbarian from New York, Donald J. Trump.
Since its inception as the Office of Strategic Services [OSS] at the start of World War II, when it was viewed a somewhat of a
gentlemen's club, albeit gentlemen licensed to administer lethal force with great prejudice, to its modern day incarnation as a behemoth
with an astounding 21,000 plus employees,
there have been rumors of politicization and "cooked" intelligence as well as public demonstrations of same.
According to Foreign Policy Magazine the CIA has had some really serious intelligence failures which caught the agency entirely
flat footed: the Yom Kippur War, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the fall of the Soviet Union, Ayatollah Khomeini's Iranian Revolution,
India's successful nuke test, of course 9/11 and finally, the Iraqi WMD fiasco. [see,
The Ten Biggest American
Intelligence Failures , FP]
To some observers the very idea that a government organization with the charter of the CIA would not INHERENTLY be politicized
is foolish:
"Indeed, when a government agency relies on taxpayer funding, Congressional lawmaking, and White House politics to sustain
itself, it is absurd to expect that agency to somehow remain not "politicized." That is, it's a logical impossibility to think
it possible to set up a government agency that relies on government policymakers to sustain it, and then think the agency in question
will not attempt to influence or curry favor with those policymakers." [source,
Has the CIA Been Politicized? , Mises Institute]
So much for background and generalizations, let's turn to the real matter at hand, John Brennan's performance as Obama's lap dog,
parroting [highly questionable at best] the Democrat line that Putin put Trump in the Oval Office and is therefore an illegitimate
president.
This line of attack is so common within the modern progressive/Marxist Democrat Party that it would normally have little effect
outside the I95 corridor except for the fact that this one has a very visible [and presumed by many to be beyond reproach] and public
champion, John O. Brennan and his war-toy, the Central Intelligence Agency.
We believe for a number of reasons that in his effort to discredit Mr. Trump, Brennan is acting as an intelligence operative doing
[a uniquely narcissistic] president's bidding.
Exhibit one is obvious: Brennan is fearful of what the incoming administration might do to his porcine agency, one replete with
desk jockeys rather than actual field agents so attacking the incoming CIC might prove advantageous in repelling the supposedly imminent
attack on Brennan's turf.
An above the fold feature story in the January 5 edition of the Wall Street Journal reflects this view:
"President-elect Donald Trump, a harsh critic of U.S. intelligence agencies, is working with top advisers on a plan that would
restructure and pare back the nation's top spy agency, people familiar with the planning said advisers also are working on a plan
to restructure the Central Intelligence Agency, cutting back on staffing at its Virginia headquarters and pushing more people
out into field posts around the world. The CIA declined to comment.
'The view from the Trump team is the intelligence world has become completely politicized,' said the individual, who is close
to the Trump transition. 'They all need to be slimmed down. The focus will be on restructuring the agencies and how they interact.'"
[source, Damian Paletta and Julian E. Barnes,
Trump Plans Spy Agency Overhaul , Wall St. Journal, January 5, 2017]
Exhibit two might be a bit less speculative:
"In telephone conversations with Donald Trump, FBI Director James Comey assured the president-elect there was no credible evidence
that Russia influenced the outcome of the recent U.S. presidential election by hacking the Democratic National Committee and the
e-mails of John Podesta, the chairman of Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign Comey told Trump that James Clapper, the director
of National Intelligence, agreed with this FBI assessment.
The only member of the U.S. intelligence community who was ready to assert that the Russians sanctioned the hacking was John
Brennan, the director of the CIA, according to sources who were briefed on Comey's conversations with Trump.
Bolstering the image of a CIA director willing to grovel to curry favor with the administration, to the detriment of American
interests, in 2010 we wrote about what was a firestorm at the time, an address by Brennan, then one of Obama's national security
advisors, at an NYU event called, "A Dialogue on our National Security," which was organized by then president of the Hamas linked
Islamic Society of North America, Ingrid Mattson.
During the 34 minute speech [video below] Brennan rendered his bizarre - near love affair - with Islam.
https://www.youtube.com/embed/mKUpmFb4h_U
[approximately 5:40 into the speech]
"...And as part of that experience, to learn about the goodness and beauty of Islam....I came to see Islam not as it is often
misrepresented, but for what it is...a faith of peace and tolerance and great diversity...[breaks into spoken Arabic]
[approximately 7:30 into the speech]
"...But I did spend time as an undergraduate at the American University in Cairo in the 1970s. And time spent with classmates
from Egypt, from Jordan, from Palestine, and around the world who taught me that whatever our differences of nationality or race
or religion or language, there are certain aspirations that we all share. To get an education. To provide for our families. To
practice our faith freely. To live in peace and security. And during a 25-year career in government, I was privileged to serve
in positions across the Middle East...as a political officer with the State Department and as a CIA station chief in Saudi Arabia.
In Saudi Arabia, I saw how our Saudi partners fulfilled their duty as custodians of the two holy mosques of Mecca and Medina.
I marveled at the majesty of the Hajj and the devotion of those who fulfilled their duty as Muslims by making that privilege [he
corrects himself] that pilgrimage. And in all my travels, the city I have come to love most is Al Quds ...Jerusalem, where three
great faiths come together..." [see, William Mayer,
John Brennan's "Al Quds" NYU Address - Providing Aid and Comfort to the Islamists ]
The use of the Arabic term - Al Quds - for the capital of Israel, Jerusalem by such a high ranking member of any American administration
is really without precedent, leading one to view with great suspicion the allegiance of Brennan as well as raising substantial questions
about his boss.
For our fourth exhibit, we turn simply to the career of Mr. Brennan. He was recruited by the CIA straight out of college, proceeded
to then serve for 25 years as a field agent followed by a long list of high level intel type government jobs. It's our judgment that
though the CIA director really doesn't come across as the brightest bulb in the box, that persona is a façade hiding a very skilled
operator who views his current attack on the incoming president as if it were a clandestine assignment in some godforsaken part of
the planet.
In short Brennan is a man on a mission, Obama's bagman.
And finally, as our fifth exhibit let's examine the logic, or lack thereof of why someone like Vlad Putin would prefer Trump over
Hillary, thus providing him with motive.
Let us stipulate for the sake of argument that Putin directed a group of Russia's best programmers to hack into the DNC's Internet
network knowing that internal email would make Hillary Clinton and the entire Democrat Party look so bad that voters would decide
to award the election to Trump.
What on earth would motivate the wily Russian strongman to prefer Trump over Hillary, consider the facts.
1. It's
common knowledge that Hillary's bathroom server network was hacked at least 5 times by foreign intelligence agencies. Thus, her
trading access for money through the Clinton Foundation would be well known to a group of individuals eager to exploit such weaknesses.
So it follows that if Putin was clever enough to hack into the DNC which had a more secure computer network than Hillary's, he had
at the same time a literal encyclopedia of dirt on the Clintons.
This of course would make Hillary, as president an obvious target for blackmail.
Think of what a crafty ex-KGB officer could do with only 1% of the type of information which was so inelegantly stored on the
Clinton email server, let alone the whole enchilada.
It would have made Hillary literally a puppet of Vlad Putin.
2. Contrast this with Trump's promise to rebuild the military as well as America's infrastructure and take an aggressive stance
against America's foes.
Sorry, it just doesn't fly. The idea of Putin hacking Trump to victory is absurd and just the last in a very long list of excuses
why one of the worst candidates for president in modern American history lost on November 8.
"... But instead of telling the story of John Brennan, Obama's Cheney, the story pitches Obama as the key decision-maker–a storyline
Brennan has always been one of the most aggressive pitchmen for, including when he confirmed information on the Anwar al-Awlaki strike
he shouldn't have. In a sense, then, Brennan has done Cheney one better: seed a story of his own power, but sell it as a sign of the
President's steeliness. ..."
"... "Pragmatism over ideology," his campaign national security team had advised in a memo in March 2008. It was counsel that only
reinforced the president's instincts. ..."
"... The memo was written not long after Brennan started playing a more central role among Obama's campaign advisors. But the story
makes no mention of his presumed role in it. Further, in describing Jeh Johnson to introduce a quote, the piece notes that he was "a
campaign adviser" (it doesn't say Johnson was also focused on voter protection). But it does not note that Brennan, too, was a key campaign
advisor, one with an exclusively national security focus. ..."
"... In other words, in several places in this story, Brennan plays a key role that is downplayed. ..."
"... There is clearly an attempt to sell the Team Obama Campaign 2012 political viewpoint of a steely-eyed leader astride his charging
steed slaying the nation's enemies left and right. ..."
"... There is clearly an attempt by Father John, Blabbermouth of Brennan to sanctify his patron Saint Obama (and no less sanctify
himself). ..."
"... In the end, it seems to me that Team Obama Campaign 2012 narrative was the overarching theme, and a somewhat defensive one
at that. ..."
"... By that I mean, the campaign narrative seemed to say that even if Obama hasn't done much of anything else, not much to get
Americans back to work, not much to keep Americans in their homes, not much to calm the waters and heal the American political discourse,
at least the American voting public can rest assured that he's personally taken charge of the nation's war on terrorism and has been
slaying the dragons wherever they've appeared ..."
But I'm very interested in how the stories are structured differently. With Angler 1.0, the story was very clearly about Dick
Cheney and the methods he used to manipulate Bush into following his advice. Here, the story is really about John Brennan, Obama's
Cheney, portrayed deep in thought and foregrounding Obama in the article's picture. Indeed, halfway through, the story even gives
biographical background on Brennan, the classic "son of Irish immigrants" story, along with Harold Koh's dubious endorsement of Brennan's
"moral rectitude."
But instead of telling the story of John Brennan, Obama's Cheney, the story pitches Obama as the key decision-maker–a storyline
Brennan has always been one of the most aggressive pitchmen for, including when he
confirmed information on the Anwar al-Awlaki strike he shouldn't have. In a sense, then, Brennan has done Cheney one better:
seed a story of his own power, but sell it as a sign of the President's steeliness.
The Silent Sources for the Story
I already pointed out how, after presenting
unambiguous evidence of Brennan's past on-the-record lies, the story backed off calling him on it.
But there are other ways in which this story shifts the focus away from Brennan.
A remarkable number of the sources for the story spoke on the record: Tom Donilon, Cameron Munter, Dennis Blair, Bill Daley, Jeh
Johnson, Michael Hayden, Jim Jones, Harold Koh, Eric Holder, Michael Leiter, John Rizzo, and John Bellinger. But it's not until roughly
the 3,450th word of a 6,000 word article that Brennan is first quoted–and that's to largely repeat the
pre-emptive lies of his drone speech from last month.
"The purpose of these actions is to mitigate threats to U.S. persons' lives," Mr. Brennan said in an interview. "It is the
option of last recourse. So the president, and I think all of us here, don't like the fact that people have to die. And so he
wants to make sure that we go through a rigorous checklist: The infeasibility of capture, the certainty of the intelligence base,
the imminence of the threat, all of these things."
That is the only on-the-record direct quote from Brennan in the entire article, in spite of the centrality of Brennan to the story.
And I would bet several of the sources quoted anonymously in the section describing Obama's method of counting the dead (which
still ignores the women and children) are Brennan: "a top White House adviser" describing how sharp Obama was in the face of the
first civilian casualties; "a senior administration official" claiming, in the face of credible evidence to the contrary, that the
number of civilians killed in drone strikes in Pakistan were in "single digits."
Note, too, the reference to a memo his campaign national security advisors wrote him.
"Pragmatism over ideology," his campaign national security team had advised in a memo in March 2008. It was counsel that
only reinforced the president's instincts.
The memo was written not long after Brennan
started playing a more central role among Obama's campaign advisors. But the story makes no mention of his presumed role in it.
Further, in describing Jeh Johnson to introduce a quote, the piece notes that he was "a campaign adviser" (it doesn't say Johnson
was also focused on voter protection). But it does not note that Brennan, too, was a key campaign advisor, one with an exclusively
national security focus.
In other words, in several places in this story, Brennan plays a key role that is downplayed.
The Pro-Drone Narrator
Given that fact, I'm really interested in the several places where the story adopts a pro-drone viewpoint (it does adopt a more
critical stance in the narrative voice at the end).
For example, the story claims, in the first part of the story, that the drone strikes "have eviscerated Al Qaeda" without presenting
any basis for that claim. This, in spite of the fact that al Qaeda has expanded in Yemen since we've started hitting it with drones.
Later, the article uncritically accepts the claim that the drone–regardless of the targeting that goes into using it–is a "precision
weapon" that constitutes a rejection of a "false choice between our safety and our ideals."
The care that Mr. Obama and his counterterrorism chief take in choosing targets, and their reliance on a precision weapon,
the drone, reflect his pledge at the outset of his presidency to reject what he called the Bush administration's "false choice
between our safety and our ideals."
For fucks sake! This article describes how the White House has adopted a "guilt by association" approach to drone targeting. It
describes renamed signature strikes (though presents what is almost certainly an outdated picture of the targeting review process).
Yet it uncritically accepts this "precision" claim–which clearly reflects a source's judgment–as true.
Finally, a potentially even bigger bias is in the presentation of the al-Majala strike on December 17, 2009.
It killed not only its intended target, but also two neighboring families, and left behind a trail of
cluster bombs that subsequently killed more innocents. It was hardly the kind of precise operation that Mr. Obama favored.
Videos of children's bodies and angry tribesmen holding up American missile parts flooded You Tube, fueling a ferocious backlash
that Yemeni officials said bolstered Al Qaeda.
The sloppy strike shook Mr. Obama and Mr. Brennan, officials said, and once again they tried to impose some discipline.
The story doesn't name who the target was; it says only that the strike killed him, and the NYT repeats the claim without asking
for such details.
As I have noted
, though, sources speaking immediately after the strike
explained
the target struck where "an imminent attack against a U.S. asset was being planned." (The quotes here are from the source, not
the ABC report.) There was, of course, an imminent attack being planned at the time, one about which we had at least some advance
intelligence. That was Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab's attack. I'm pretty sure the strike on a Yemeni site 10 days after he left the
country missed him, though.
These last two quotes–perhaps all three–look like comments a White House figure (and it'll surprise no one that I suspect it's
Brennan) gave on deep background, such that his exact words are used, but without quotation marks or any indication of the source.
Credible journalists would have no other reason to make such unsubstantiated claims, particularly the "precision" claim that they
disprove elsewhere in the same article.
Who Okayed Killing Mehsud's Wife?
Ultimately, the depiction of John Brennan as Obama's puppetmaster is most interesting in the telling of Baitullah Mehsud's killing.
This version conflicts in key ways from the story that Joby Warrick told in his book, starting with
the uranium
claim that provided the excuse for targeting him. And while I'm working from memory, I believe Warrick portrayed the approval
of that killing–which might kill Mehsud's wife in addition to Mehsud–as involving Panetta alone. This version says Panetta consulted
Obama–through Brennan.
Then, in August 2009, the CIA director, Leon E. Panetta, told Mr. Brennan that the agency had Mr. Mehsud in its sights. But
taking out the Pakistani Taliban leader, Mr. Panetta warned, did not meet Mr. Obama's standard of "near certainty" of no innocents
being killed. In fact, a strike would certainly result in such deaths: he was with his wife at his in-laws' home.
"Many times," General Jones said, in similar circumstances, "at the 11th hour we waved off a mission simply because the target
had people around them and we were able to loiter on station until they didn't."
But not this time. Mr. Obama, through Mr. Brennan, told the CIA to take the shot, and Mr. Mehsud was killed, along with his
wife and, by some reports, other family members as well, said a senior intelligence official.
I'm not surprised by (or critical of) the conflict in the stories. It seems like Warrick relied primarily on CIA sources telling
a packaged version of the strike, while this story tells another packaged version of it. (Note, curiously, Panetta is only named
in this passage and never quoted.)
But I am struck by how obviously this story–whether filtered through Brennan as a direct source for this story, or filtered through
Brennan for Panetta's consumption at the time–depends on John Brennan to narrate Obama's role. If he weren't involved somehow, the
NYT wouldn't have included the "through Mr. Brennan." And while the detail doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things–Mehsud's
wife's death will weigh no more or less against Obama's and Brennan's record than Abdulrahman al-Awlaki or the Bedouin women and
children at al-Majala–it is a testament to the degree to which this story, and so many of those cited in this article, depend on
Brennan narrating Obama's role.
Marcy has been blogging full time since 2007. She's known for her live-blogging of the Scooter Libby trial, her discovery
of the number of times Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was waterboarded, and generally for her weedy analysis of document dumps. Marcy Wheeler
is an independent journalist writing about national security and civil liberties. She writes as emptywheel at her eponymous blog,
publishes at outlets including the Guardian, Salon, and the Progressive, and appears frequently on television and radio. She is the
author of Anatomy of Deceit, a primer on the CIA leak investigation, and liveblogged the Scooter Libby trial. Marcy has a PhD from
the University of Michigan, where she researched the "feuilleton," a short conversational newspaper form that has proven important
in times of heightened censorship. Before and after her time in academics, Marcy provided documentation consulting for corporations
in the auto, tech, and energy industries. She lives with her spouse and dog in Grand Rapids, MI.
Like you EW, I got the sense that this NYT story was the product of a number of different motivations.
There is clearly an attempt to sell the Team Obama Campaign 2012 political viewpoint of a steely-eyed leader astride his
charging steed slaying the nation's enemies left and right.
There is clearly an attempt by Father John, Blabbermouth of Brennan to sanctify his patron Saint Obama (and no less sanctify
himself).
There are a number of attempts by lesser Doubting Thomases to question the sanctity of both Saint Obama and Father John.
There is a certain amount of seemingly NYT editorial tut-tutting as well as cheerleading.
In the end, it seems to me that Team Obama Campaign 2012 narrative was the overarching theme, and a somewhat defensive
one at that.
By that I mean, the campaign narrative seemed to say that even if Obama hasn't done much of anything else, not much to
get Americans back to work, not much to keep Americans in their homes, not much to calm the waters and heal the American political
discourse, at least the American voting public can rest assured that he's personally taken charge of the nation's war on terrorism
and has been slaying the dragons wherever they've appeared.
Conservative Review Editor-in-Chief Mark Levin claims "the evidence is overwhelming" that the Obama administration spied on Donald
Trump leading up his inauguration
, RadarOnline.com has learned.
"I'm saying the public record is damning of the Obama administration. It was investigating the campaign of a presidential candidate
of an opposing party during the course of the campaign. Its use of FISA, loosening of NSA distribution requirements, husbanding
and protecting information at the behest of White House staff on the way out the door, and recent leaks of confidential and perhaps
classified information is extraordinary," Levin said in the CNN Reliable Sources newsletter.
"... FISA surveillance has to be approved by a special court, which almost always allows the government to spy on people when asked . But when the Justice Department asked to spy on several of Trump's associates, the court refused permission, according to the BBC . As McCarthy writes, this is notable because "the FISA court is notoriously solicitous of government requests to conduct national security surveillance." ..."
"... Not taking no for an answer, the Obama administration came back during the final weeks of the election with a narrower request that didn't specifically mention Trump. That narrower request was granted by the court, but reports from the Guardian and the BBC don't mention the tapping of phones. ..."
"... Former Obama officials issued denials that the former president had anything to do with it, which McCarthy calls "disingenuous on several levels." Others have characterized them as a " non-denial denial ." ..."
"... The issues are (a) whether the Obama Justice Department sought such surveillance authorization from the FISA court, and (b) whether, if the Justice Department did that, the White House was aware of or complicit in the decision to do so. Personally, given the explosive and controversial nature of the surveillance request we are talking about – an application to wiretap the presidential candidate of the opposition party, and some of his associates, during the heat of the presidential campaign, based on the allegation that the candidate and his associates were acting as Russian agents – it seems to me that there is less than zero chance that could have happened without consultation between the Justice Department and the White House." ..."
"... Obama's political allies even alleged that his CIA spied on Congress . ..."
"... Trump has called for a congressional investigation , but what this really needs is a special prosecutor, someone from outside the politically tainted Justice Department, to look into the political abuse of surveillance laws by the Obama administration. ..."
So President Trump set off a firestorm over the weekend with a series of tweets alleging that Obama had tapped Trump Tower. But
getting hung up on imprecise language in the president's tweets isn't the right way to look at things. What seems to be true is that
the Obama administration spied on some of Trump's associates and we don't know exactly how much information was collected under what
authority and who was targeted.
FISA surveillance has to be approved by a special court, which
almost always allows
the government to spy on people when asked . But when the Justice Department asked to spy on several of Trump's associates, the
court refused permission,
according to the BBC . As McCarthy writes, this is notable because "the FISA court is notoriously solicitous of government requests
to conduct national security surveillance."
Not taking no for an answer, the Obama administration came back during the final weeks of the election with a narrower request
that didn't specifically mention Trump. That narrower request was
granted by the court, but reports from the Guardian and
the BBC don't mention the tapping of phones.
Former Obama officials issued denials that the former president had anything to do with it, which McCarthy calls "disingenuous
on several levels." Others have characterized them as a "
non-denial denial ."
To the Obama camp's claim that the president didn't "order" surveillance of Trump, McCarthy writes:
"First, as Obama officials well know, under the FISA process, it is technically the FISA court that 'orders' surveillance. And
by statute, it is the Justice department, not the White House, that represents the government in proceedings before the FISA court.
So, the issue is not whether Obama or some member of his White House staff 'ordered' surveillance of Trump and his associates.
The
issues are (a) whether the Obama Justice Department sought such surveillance authorization from the FISA court, and (b) whether,
if the Justice Department did that, the White House was aware of or complicit in the decision to do so. Personally, given the explosive
and controversial nature of the surveillance request we are talking about – an application to wiretap the presidential candidate
of the opposition party, and some of his associates, during the heat of the presidential campaign, based on the allegation that the
candidate and his associates were acting as Russian agents – it seems to me that there is less than zero chance that could have happened
without consultation between the Justice Department and the White House."
And as journalist Mickey Kaus commented on Twitter, there's a reason why presidents name
trusted allies as attorney general.
As close as former attorney general Loretta Lynch was to Obama, and as supportive as she was of his political goals, it seems very
unlikely that this was some sort of rogue operation.
It's certainly not impossible to believe that the Obama administration spied on Trump. Obama wouldn't be the first president to
engage in illegal surveillance of opposition candidates, and his administration has been noted for its great enthusiasm for domestic
spying. In an effort to plug embarrassing leaks, the
Obama administration spied on Associated Press reporters and seized the phone records not only of a Fox News reporter
but also of his parents. Obama's political allies even alleged that his CIA
spied on Congress
.
Nor is it unbelievable that under the Obama administration, supposedly non-partisan civil servants would go after political opponents.
After all, the notorious
IRS scandal was about exactly that.
Trump has called for a
congressional investigation , but what this really needs is a special prosecutor, someone from outside the politically tainted
Justice Department, to look into the political abuse of surveillance laws by the Obama administration. Maybe, upon investigation,
it will turn out that nothing improper happened – that this is a lot of smoke, but that there's no fire. But we can't know without
an investigation, and if there really were political abuses of the Justice Department and the intelligence surveillance process,
those guilty should not simply be exposed but go to jail. Such abuse strikes at democracy itself.
Note that FISA surveillance is severely limited and requires information from surveillance to be kept very secret or, if not relevant,
deleted. If those limits were exceeded, if Obama officials lied to the court, or if the information was – as it appears to have been
– excessively shared within the government, or leaked to outsiders, those are all serious crimes, as
First
Amendment attorney Robert Barnes notes.
Watergate brought down a presidency, but if the worst suspicions here are borne out, we're dealing with something worse. Hopefully
not, but there's no way to tell at this point. As The Washington Post has been saying lately, "Democracy dies in darkness."
Let's shine some light on what the Obama administration was doing during this election.
They can't win hearts and minds of people with discredited neoliberal ideology. So they need to spy on them.
Notable quotes:
"... I find this Real News Network interview with Colin Powell's former chief of staff, Lawrence Wilkerson, to be astonishing. He effectively says that Trump may not be wrong in his claims that he was spied on. ..."
"... Trump used the word "wiretapping," which gave his opponents a huge out, since that means a judge gave a warrant to allow for monitoring. ..."
"... What is therefore striking about this report is that Wilkerson, who is no fan of Trump, nevertheless is defending him in this matter. That is a sign that he regards the campaign against Trump as dangerous from an institutional perspective. ..."
"... three Trump associates were the subject of surveillance and "wiretapping" and that the information was shared with Obama. ..."
"... I am SURE Trump is being advised not to tip over the apple cart and let everybody know who was RIGHT – we're all monitored all the time. And that's the rub. ..."
"... which legalized warrantless surveillance on domestic soil so long as the target is a foreigner abroad, even when the target is communicating with an American ..."
"... The way I understand it, any conversation with the Russian ambassador in it is monitored (and stored) – Flynn talks to the ambassador, he is being monitored. Supposedly, Flynn should know this. ..."
"... My theory is that Flynn was talking policy – albeit SENSITIVE policy – and PERHAPS the intelligence community didn't like the change in policy and decided by leaking to make Flynn look like a dirty commie – Or Flynn is a turncoat (so why isn't he being prosecuted???) ..."
"... Getting "stuff" on people so that they can be manipulated is par for the course. Have we forgotten about J. Edgar Hoover. Does anybody really believe that the Democrats and the "deep state" don't already have enough "on Trump" to remove him from office given his mafia connections, not to mention Roy Cohn? ..."
"... Could Trump's use of "Obama" just have been a metonym for the previous administration? I mean that's how the names of presidents and other leaders are frequently used. Journalists, historians, and people in general will often say "Bush did this" or "Thatcher did that" or "Stalin did something else" when it's clear that the named individuals didn't and couldn't have personally performed the action, rather functionaries of the regimes they headed did the action. ..."
"... Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my "wires tapped" in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism! Is it legal for a sitting President to be "wire tapping" a race for president prior to an election? Turned down by court earlier. A NEW LOW! I'd bet a good lawyer could make a great case out of the fact that President Obama was tapping my phones in October, just prior to Election! How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy! ..."
"... Whoa. Wilkerson looks on edge, usually very cool in these pieces. ..."
"... I have the impression he can't contain himself on the subject of Brennan. Is that your take? ..."
I find
this Real News Network interview with Colin Powell's former chief of staff, Lawrence Wilkerson, to be astonishing. He effectively
says that Trump may not be wrong in his claims that he was spied on.
At the 50,000 foot level, Trump's claim is trivial. Anyone who paid attention to the Edward Snowden revelations knows that the
NSA is in a total data acquisition mode, hoovering up information from smart devices and able to use computers and tablets as monitoring
devices. But Trump used the word "wiretapping," which gave his opponents a huge out, since that means a judge gave a warrant
to allow for monitoring. And pinning surveillance on Obama personally was another huge stretch. In other words, Trump took what
could have been an almost certain statement of fact, and by larding it up with dodgy particulars, pushed it well into crazypants
terrain.
What made Trump look bad was the FBI making clear it was not snooping on Trump, when the FBI would have been involved in a wiretap.
Lambert and I discussed that it wasn't hard to come up with scenarios that weren't wiretaps by which Trump could have been spied
upon while keeping Obama Administration hands clean. The most obvious was to have another member of the Five Eyes do the dirty work.
What is therefore striking about this report is that Wilkerson, who is no fan of Trump, nevertheless is defending him in this
matter. That is a sign that he regards the campaign against Trump as dangerous from an institutional perspective. And he states
that the idea that Lambert and I had casually bandied about, that a foreign spy organization like the GCHQ, did Trump dirty work
for the US government, is seen as a real possibility in the intelligence community.
https://www.youtube.com/embed/Fgd4WDMG4mQ
PAUL JAY: Welcome to The Real News Network. I'm Paul Jay. Welcome to another edition of the Wilkerson Report.
Of course the accusations are flying in every direction in D.C.. The latest Donald Trump saying that President Obama spied on
him, ordered the listening of his telephone conversations. Now joining us to talk about these allegations is Larry Wilkerson.
Larry joins us from Falls Church, Virginia. Larry was the former Chief of Staff for U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell. Currently
an Adjunct Professor of Goverment at the College of Willam and Mary and a regular contributor to The Real News Network.
(discussion)
PAUL JAY: So, Larry what do you make of these allegations? Most of the media seems to be saying Trump is alleging this in order
to distract from the real controversy, which they say his and his administration's connections to Putin and Russia. What do you make
of Trump's allegations?
LARRY WILKERSON: Well, I'm certainly not one, Paul, to defend HMS Trump and that whole entourage of people, but I will paint you
a hypothetical here. There are a number of events that have occurred in the last 96 hours or so that lead me to believe that maybe
even the Democratic party, whatever element of it, approached John Brennan at the CIA, maybe even the former president of the United
States. And John Brennan, not wanting his fingerprints to be on anything, went to his colleague in London GCHQ, MI6 and essentially
said, "Give me anything you've got." And he got something and he turned it over to the DNC or to someone like that. And what he got
was GHCQ MI6's tapes of conversations of the Trump administration perhaps, even the President himself. It's really kind of strange,
at least to me, they let the head of that organization go, fired him about the same time this was brewing up. So I'm not one to defend
Trump, but in this case he might be right. It's just that it wasn't the FBI. Comey's right, he wasn't wire-tapping anybody, it was
John Brennan, at the CIA And you say, "What would be John Brennan's motivation?" Well, clearly he wanted to remain Director of the
CIA for Hillary Clinton when she was elected President of the United States, which he had every reason to believe, as did lots of
us, that she would be.
PAUL JAY: Now, Larry, do we have any evidence of this? Is this like a theory or is there some evidence?
LARRY WILKERSON: Well, it's a theory that's making its way around some in the intelligence community right now because they know
about the relationship between the CIA and the same sort of capabilities, maybe not quite as vast as the NSA has, but still good
capabilities that exist in London. I mean, otherwise the president just came out and said something was patently false. Generally
speaking, you know, I would agree with that, with regard to this particular individual, but not in this case.
PAUL JAY: Now why would the British go along with this?
LARRY WILKERSON: Well, you have to understand this is a real problem, Paul, it's been a problem for a long time. Only certain
governments have national technical means that feature $5 billion satellites orbiting the United States and the rest of the globe
and providing intricate national means of looking at other people 24/7. Even streaming video and so forth. There are only so many
people who can afford that. We're the biggest guy on the block so when we sidle up to France or we sidle up to Germany or Japan or
anybody else, they have two choices, either cooperate with us and share in that treasure trove from time to time or they don't cooperate
with us and I'll tell you what we do, we cut them off. So this is a very incestuous relationship. I saw this up close and personal
when we were saying there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and we had Paris and Tel Aviv and Berlin and London and everybody
agreeing with us. I now know why they agreed with us, more recetively(?) (sound difficulties – 00:04:45 – 00:05:05) You still there?
PAUL JAY: Yeah.
LARRY WILKERSON: Well, they agree with us because they don't have any choice. Their choices are stark. They agree with us and
hope it doesn't rebound to their discredit or hurt them or they don't agree with us and we cut them off.
PAUL JAY: Okay, now let's go back to Trump's allegations. Trump does not seem to be shy about just making stuff up from whole
cloth without any basis at all. Why would one thing this isn't just another fabrication?
LARRY WILKERSON: Paul, I'm no fan of Donald Trump, but I'm not so sure you're right in that–
PAUL JAY: I'm not saying it is. I'm just asking, is there any reason to think that we know that he's not making this up?
LARRY WILKERSON: No, except that the series of events that occurred lead me to believe that John Brennan was, in fact, working
with London and perhaps something came out of that, that might have assured John Brennan of a continuation of his role at the CIA
with a new administration headed by Hillary Clinton. That makes every bit of sense to me when I think about it. And remember, I've
been there and I've seen this stuff.
PAUL JAY: Okay. We'll have to wait over the next few days or hours and see if more hard evidence follows out. But let's go look
a little further, if you're right, Brennan's helping Clinton, you have different sections of the intelligence community helping various
players. Some of them seem to be turning on Trump, some are feeding Trump, some are supporting him, it's like you got little fiefdoms
in the intelligence community all with their own agendas here.
LARRY WILKERSON: This is very disturbing. It's happened in the past, of course, when we politicized intelligence. It happened
when Bill Casey and Ronald Reagan when Bill Casey made the case for a Soviet buildup so Reagan could justify his arms buildup in
the U.S.. The Soviets were not involved in a buildup at all. That was all fabricated intelligence. It's happened with Henry Kissinger
and Richard Nixon from time to time. But this is a new level of 17 different heavily funded intelligence agencies and groups, headed
by the DNI and the CIA all apparently playing their own little games within various segments of a political community in this country
and leaking accordingly. And I don't eliminate the FBI from that either. Why else would Comey come out, for example, just prior to
the elections and say he had other e-mails and imply that they might be damning of one of the candidates? It's everyone playing in
this game and it's an extremely dangerous game.
PAUL JAY: Is part of what's going on here, is that all of these institutions whether it's CIA or FBI or NSA and on and on with
all the alphabet, that their first priority, their deepest interest is their own agency. Their existence, their funding, their own
jobs, that this is really - it's not about some supposed national interest to start with it starts with just who these guys are and
they become entities unto themselves.
LARRY WILKERSON: Absolutely. Hoover, take Hoover at the FBI, during World War II, it can be proven, it can be analytically demonstrated
that Hoover spent more man hours and more money trying to look at his own administration, trying to gain power over elements of that
administration than he did looking at the Nazis. I mean, this is not anything new, it's just come to a depth and a profundity of
action that is scary and dangerous.
When you have your entire intelligence community more interested in its own survival and its own power, and therefore, playing
in politics to the degree that we have it doing so today, you've got a real problem. And I'm not talking about the people beavering
away in the trenches who are trying their best to do a good job, I'm talking about these leaders, these people at the top and the
second tier level, who are participating in this political game in a way that they should not be, but they've been doing for some
time and now they've brought it to a crescendo.
PAUL JAY: Is part of what's happening here an overall decay, if you will, of the state itself, of the American government? Which
is a reflection of what's going on in the economy. You have so much of Wall Street is about pure parasitical investment. There's
more money being invested in derivative gambling and billionaires gambling against billionaires and shorting, kind of manupulating
commodity markets and so on, more money in the parasitical activity than there is investment in productive activity. And these are
the guys that are financing political campaigns even electing presidents, in the case of Robert Mercer, who 's the billionaire who
backed Trump and Bannon. Bannon worked for Mercer. The whole state and the upper echelons in the economy they seem to be into such
practically mafioso short-sightedness. Like, "What can we do today for ourselves and damn what happens later?"
LARRY WILKERSON: The decay of (sound difficulties) empire hat on and I will tell you, yes. You're right. This empire is decaying
at a rapid rate. And it is not just reflected in the fact that we can't govern ourselves, the fact that we have a congress that can't
even see the nation for the trees. My political party, Paul, right now thinks that it's going to achieve its full agenda or at least
a good portion of it while this buffoon in the White House twiddles his thumbs. They don't see the country. They don't care about
the country. All they want to do is achieve their agenda; social, economic and otherwise. This country, in all of its components,
whether it's government or it's finance, economics or whatever, is falling apart.
PAUL JAY: Thanks very much for joining us, Larry.
LARRY WILKERSON: Thanks for having me, Paul.
PAUL JAY: Thank you for joining us on The Real News Network.
I took a glance at the article and read one of its links to the NYTimes article which confirms that three Trump associates
were the subject of surveillance and "wiretapping" and that the information was shared with Obama.
Even without digging into the story, the fact that Trump's claim is viewed with such disdain by the MSM has always struck me
as incredulous. I have generally assumed that most communications among people in power is monitored whether legally or not.
I've read most of those. The problem is that the important thing – was a FISA warrant issued – not been confirmed by the government
to my knowledge. Apparently it is secret by law so it is one of those things that the government will neither confirm nor deny
– and I am SURE Trump is being advised not to tip over the apple cart and let everybody know who was RIGHT – we're all monitored
all the time. And that's the rub.
The other thing about the articles is the incredible amount of contradiction (assuming the government officials aren't being
misquoted there are a LOT of things that just don't square).
I think comes down to this – very simply the government/intelligence community (IC) does not really want to admit how many people's
conversations it actually listens to or CAN listen to. Nobody can look at this and say that the 4th amendment is meaningful .
In this case, a U.S. general, working on behalf of the president elect (or was this before Trump was elected?), was monitored
by the IC and removed from office because of illegal leaks. We don't REALLY know why – but the idea that the IC has a veto over
the president's appointees should give everyone pause.
Would a warrant actually be needed? In the New York Time article on January 12, 2017 they say:
After Congress enacted the FISA Amendments Act - which legalized warrantless surveillance on domestic soil so long as the
target is a foreigner abroad, even when the target is communicating with an American - the court permitted raw sharing of
emails acquired under that program, too.
The way I understand it (gleaned from a National Review article written by a former justice department lawyer Andrew McCarthy
– I excerpted quite a bit of it, but it is now in skynet heaven )
is that Russki subjects of interest (or any nationality) are always monitored. This means that Americans will occasionally get
MONITORED if in communication with such individuals as well and those communications are STORED (monitored and stored ARE NOT
THE SAME AS LISTENED TO). Now, to actually listen to the Americans in these conversation is what supposedly requires the FISA
warrant – it is suppose to be based on something that the person is acting as an AGENT of a foreign power.
Or the FBI could have been doing just a regular financial fraud investigation between Trump companies and Russia found nothing
(OR found something and IS still investigation), and than passed it over as an intelligence matter. I can't do justice to the
article without being skynetted, so you will have to read the article for yourself if interested.
If that is true then what was the basis for Flynn's phone calls being listened to?
So I'm not sure the point about monitored / stored / listened to is the case anymore. The NYT article I referenced is all about
the old privacy rules being removed.
In addition the part of the article I quoted seems to say that isn't the case anymore.
Flynn did a lot of work during the transition from Trump Tower. We know some of his calls where intercepted and not just the
one from the beach.
Evidently Paul Manafort lived in Trump Tower for a while. From the news articles his phone calls where also intercepted.
I did look up a bunch of McCarthy's articles in National Review. Thanks for the pointer.
"If that is true then what was the basis for Flynn's phone calls being listened to?"
The way I understand it, any conversation with the Russian ambassador in it is monitored (and stored) – Flynn talks to the ambassador,
he is being monitored. Supposedly, Flynn should know this.
My theory is that Flynn was talking policy – albeit SENSITIVE policy – and PERHAPS the intelligence community didn't like the
change in policy and decided by leaking to make Flynn look like a dirty commie – Or Flynn is a turncoat (so why isn't he being
prosecuted???)
The issue from the NR article is, as I understand it, is that Flynn should not be listened to unless there was some REAL suspicion
that he was an agent and there was a FISA warrant (a former US general is really suspected of being a Russian agent???). So one
can know that Flynn had a conversation with the ambassador (from monitoring) but not the substance unless there was a FISA warrant
– if I am understanding this correctly.
If he wasn't proven to be an agent than that conversation is suppose to go into the "vault" and never be released or acknowledged.
So there are just a lot of things that don't add up.
I'm thinking like the meme "fake news" that the people who started this whole think may regret looking into whether Trump was
improperly monitored after all. BUT I DON"T KNOW – maybe Trump is guilty of something
Does anybody really believe that these people feel bound by law? This is raw power politics. Getting "stuff" on people so that
they can be manipulated is par for the course. Have we forgotten about J. Edgar Hoover. Does anybody really believe that the Democrats
and the "deep state" don't already have enough "on Trump" to remove him from office given his mafia connections, not to mention
Roy Cohn?
It's not about removing anyone from office but to get them to do your bidding. Likewise it is a big distraction from
the ongoing fraud and corruption consuming this nation. Men like Wilkerson are finally realizing how far along our Mafia culture
has come to complete and utter collapse. Next time the music stops will there be any chairs left?
Could Trump's use of "Obama" just have been a metonym for the previous administration? I mean that's how the names of presidents and other leaders are frequently used. Journalists, historians, and people in general
will often say "Bush did this" or "Thatcher did that" or "Stalin did something else" when it's clear that the named individuals
didn't and couldn't have personally performed the action, rather functionaries of the regimes they headed did the action.
As an example, I've seen a number news articles saying Kim Jong-un killed Kim Jong-nam, even though, as far as I can tell,
Kim Jong-un has an airtight alibi, having been in a different country at the time. Most people understand such claims to mean
that functionaries of the North Korean government headed by Kim Jong-un are responsible for the killing and Kim Jong-un is just
used as a metonym for that government.
Same thing with "wiretap". Trump is of a generation where wiretap was a generic term used to refer to any sort of bugging.
Reading them as specific references comes across as a particularly pedantic and uncharitable interpretation.
Actually, checking the tweet, I see Trump wrote "tapp", an even more generic term for using electronic devices to listen in
on other people's private conversations.
Actually it was "wires tapped" with Trump having put the quotes in. So yeah, very generic term. And it says Trump Tower. Doesn't
he own Trump Tower? All that stuff in the Trump Tower is 'his'. So the claim is even more generic.
There were numerous reports that people associated with the campaign (headquarters in Trump Tower) had their phone conversations
intercepted. I assume it was when they were talking to a 'Russian'.
The first thing I thought when I heard this was "Hey, Trump finally attended an intelligence briefing."
If the NSA really is listening to everything, can anyone answer why the powers that be would even bother with an actual wiretap
anymore? Isn't it something anachronistic, like owning a beeper or something?
This is exactly the way I took it–with "obama" and "wiretap" being generic terms. Funnily enough, it made all the furor over
the tweet initially hard to understand. Now it makes the literal parsing look desperate and deliberately obfuscatory.
I find it impossible to believe that the MSM does not know that wiretap = any kind of monitoring/surveillance and that "Obama"
= white house, and/or Obama administration.
There is nothing wrong about doing a story about the nuances of surveillance, but to go on and on and ON about there is no wiretapping
is absurd. And the MSM professes to wonder why people find them unreliable
I may be "mis-remembering" here, but it reminded me of a time when ben bernanke was testifying in front of some congressional
committee or other. A member of the panel referenced the fed "printing" money. Bernanke replied that the fed doesn't "print" money.
They enter it onto a computer. A textbook distinction without a difference.
OH EXACTLY RIGHT!!! To go off on a tangent – to not say that money is "loaned" into existence and as much as you need can be
obtained from the either, just would beg the question of why Goldman Sachs, somebody who managed to lose trillions is deserving
of more loans, but a borrower who was scammed into some mortgage with some skyrocketing interest rate proviso is not. And the
unpalatable answer – the FED is to protect the rich and f*ck the poor .
Trump's language was very clear (at least to my ear) in attributing personal involvement to Obama (calling him a "bad (or sick)
guy"). But with "wiretap" note the use of quotation marks. When I first heard about these tweets the morning after, the first
thing I did was to go to Trump's twitter feed to have a look for myself. For me the quotation marks scanned as scare quotes and
I instinctively interpreted "wiretap" in its generic sense.
Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my "wires tapped" in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is
McCarthyism!
Is it legal for a sitting President to be "wire tapping" a race for president prior to an election? Turned down by court
earlier. A NEW LOW!
I'd bet a good lawyer could make a great case out of the fact that President Obama was tapping my phones in October, just
prior to Election!
How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad
(or sick) guy!
In his autobiography "Memoirs of a Revolutionist," Peter Kropotkin describes being interrogated by a member of the Okhrana,
the Tsar's secret police, after his arrest.
In the course of the interview, Kropotkin expresses amazement that the secret police had so deeply infiltrated his revolutionary
cell. His interrogator expressed smug satisfaction, and then informed him that such surveillance was commonplace, and that in
fact no one in the entire empire was more closely surveilled than the Tsar himself.
I've always operated under the assumption that the intelligence agencies devote ample resources to keeping the Executive under
close observation, and that he likely has no more secrets than the rest of us.
The difference now is that the agencies are not just monitoring executive goings-on, but becoming active political players.
Needless to say, clueless, hopeless Democrats are cheering them on.
Your title of "Empire In Decay" reminded me of my last two years at school (late 1980s) and the emphasis on Tudors and Stuarts,
Bourbons and Habsburgs in history classes. The school organised lectures from history professors like Henry Kamen and Paul Kennedy.
Kennedy had just written the book on the rise and fall of empires and been on the airwaves. Kamen is an expert on imperial Spain.
One rarely sees that sort of expertise in the MSM. We get the likes of McCain, Miss Lindsey, David Brooks, Bernard-Henri Levy,
Simon Schama (sic) et al masquerading as experts.
Paul Kennedy knew his stuff. Read his book back in the day, cover to cover. That is the level of state-craft these people are
thinking about. One dinky national election is mere detail. I am sure all the agencies have read the Club of Rome report and what
came after it. It isn't just Global Warming time. Chess end games, all the way down, until checkmate.
It's appalling, isn't. Just the same talking heads going around studios and obsessing over trivia and sound bites.
I remember the Sunday lunchtime and evening shows in the UK thirty years ago, featuring academics and journalists who had been
in a country for years and got to know the country well. The advent of 24 hour and international news seems to have destroyed
what was good coverage / analysis.
FWIW, one of my friends and also son of immigrants from a former French and British colony works at the UK mission to the EU.
He is a professional historian and studied at LSE and Cambridge. He hopes to return to Cambridge by the end of the decade and
teach, but will also write about how Brexit panned out from a ring side seat.
It would be great if Yves could get historians of the calibre of Kamen, Kennedy, Howard, Scarisbrick and Sauvigny to contribute.
Gore Vidal was telling the world about the National Security State years ago seemingly without any impact on the wider public
mindset.
Only when the legitimacy of leaders is seriously in question does this stuff pique the public interest. Isn't there something
called positive vetting? But then, there are no qualifications required for becoming a politician – seemingly every other job
nowadays needs a certificate but not that.
I'm just hoping that when I accidentally delete something important I can type a cry for help into Firefox and GCHQ will get
it all back for me.
If these things are true then there is little reason to think we aren't far, far beyond decay.. we are the festering maggot
laden puss spreading more toxic virulent dangers far and wide.
Little can explain those who circle the wagon in deference to, even in favor of the surveillance state unless they are afraid,
blackmailed etc.
Chaotic unpredictable Trump (who must be clean as a whistle to survive this long) may have grabbed this Shock Doctoring chaotic
beast by the tail. Will he be willing or able to bring it down? If so, he may be the greatest thing that's ever happened to this
country. He's already survived more than I ever dared imagine an individual could. I mean we have long been way past stay out
of any and all airplanes territory here.
The irony is just too rich a man in favor of ever increasing military, more torture, more drones just isn't enough for the
intel state.
A long while back a post Snowden revelation was that there exists a rule and mechanisms in the NSA to make sure that politicians
are put on a list that specifically excludes their communications from being vacuumed with everyone else's. To bypass the list
requires authorization at the highest levels in the agencies involved (and maybe even presidential authority). That is how Congress
protects itself and why it so easily gives all kinds of spying authorities to the agencies. This is not czarist Russia in other
words.
On whose authorities were the protections bypassed in the Trump case ? Comey has already come out to say he didn't do it. Devin
Nunes, the Chairman the House Intelligence committee seems to not have been informed of any surveillance op involving Trump so
the committees maybe out of the loop. This implies either CIA/NSA or GCHQ as I don't see Canada getting involved in it or NZ.
Was the flimflam Russian bs crapped out by GCHQ and CIA to gain such legal authorities and dredge opposition on Trump to prevent
his election or to soft coup him out ? That the Russian 'intel' came from an ex British spy seems suspicious.
The history of the FBI under Hoover makes me question your claim that members of Congress are exempt from surveillance. Are
we really supposed to believe that, the technology being what it is, the intelligence agencies would show such admirable self-restraint?
That's a bet I wouldn't take.
Yes I know and agree it would be foolish to rely on it. In practical terms they might do it anyway specially if safe in Obama's
approval, tacit or otherwise, but the rule exists anyway, if only to be a cudgel if the congress is feeling ornery. If I remember
correctly, it was discussed in Emptywheel's website in the context of the hacking of Angela Merkel.
Eureka Springs below mentions the senate hack. The hacking of the senate computers was a CIA screwup and the agencies don't
like to be in the spotlight that way but CIA seems to mind it less than the others. This is another reason I think CIA may be
behind the Trump tapp.
What strikes me is that this is NOT astounding, and should really come as no surprise. Think of the subterfuge and intrigue
back in the ancient empires of China, Greece, Rome. It's part of our human DNA. What cracks me up is the strength of the kool-aid
the innocence and starry-eyed conviction that we are exceptional. The concept of America spun in elementary school is indeed exceptional-
even exceptionally virtuous. But in fact, with our convenient lives, preoccupation with debt service and preoccupation with Dancing
with the Master Chefs, misdirection has kept us from the ugly reality that we are right in there amongst the best, if not the
most aggressive, in our dominant empire phase.
Think about the outrage when it was determined we were monitoring Merkle's phone. Empire in decline, indeed! Seems to me Homo
sapiens is really heading out toward the end of their dead branch on the tree of life: RIP Too much head, not enough heart.
A reason that I don't completely ignore Trump's claim (I do not like Trump!) is that it is beginning to look as if the entire
Obama Presidency had a few real primary objectives. Firstly was to protect Wall Street from any prosecution but one of the other
primary longterm goals was the TTP. Obama's desire to get the TTP through at any cost makes the act of listening in on Trump (who
said he would kill it) very plausible.
I believe that Cocomaan asked about a new Church committee in yesterday's comments. And the entire post above gives the reasons
why not. There is no one in Congress of the caliber of Frank Church. (Even if McCain has fantasies ) No one will take on a multinational
intelligence system, deliberately interlocked to avoid accountability. And when was the last congressional investigation that
produced results and legal proceedings?
The "Five Eyes" always remind me of V for Vendetta. (Which is not just a great graphic novel, but an unfolding prophecy.)
White-collar America, triumphant: Love means never having to say you're sorry.
I agree. Ron Wyden is perhaps the only one possible, but the fact that Clapper was never humiliated for lying to Congress shows
that we don't have anyone up to the task.
A nice interview and a good example of why I keep coming back to this blog. You don't get this kind of analysis anywhere else.
While all this infighting and spy vs. spy skulduggery goes on, one thing is for certain – the neo-cons and "deep state" are
too distracted by operation "take down the Donald" to pay much attention to their usual work.
The creation of failed states appears to be badly behind schedule now; Syria may actually be restored by the Russians and Iran
back to a functional state, and there appears to be a gutting of the State Department in progress which will make future "color
revolutions" difficult.
Is it any wonder there are so many powerful interests screaming that Russia "hacked" the election?
Having just read "Sleepwalkers" and the new Rasputin biography and reading how everyone of any note
in political circles was monitored in Europe and Russia over 100 years ago these modern revelations come as no surprise. In those
days they did it by opening mail, intercepting telegrams and having people followed 24 hours a day.
It reminded me of when the Chaplain was arrested by the CID men because Yossarian signed the chaplain's name or Washington
Irving's or Irving Washington's name as he censored soldiers letters home while staying in the hospital.
Thanks for this very important post. Nothing that Wilkerson said is a surprise – at all – to me. In fact, it's what I've figured
has been happening since well, at least since Hoover, as Wilkerson indicates.
As others have pointed out, though, this type of spying has gone on in many forms over the eons of time. None of it is new.
The only sort of newsworthy aspect of it is that people in positions of some power and knowledge of behind the scenes stuff, like
Wilkerson, are coming out and saying it.
I always figured, esp since the Snowden reveal, that ALL politicians of any major impact/level would be spied on – or at least
the data is gathered and available to be perused on an as needed basis.
I read somewhere that Trump allegedly was steamingly angry about this. I want to say: SO? What did you expect? THIS is the
way things work. Sometimes you're going like that Intel and sometimes you won't.
I'm not that convinced whether it makes a difference if there was an actual wire tap or the info was gathered by spy satellite
or some other method. But I could be wrong in that regard.
So it seems to me that Trump is naive, albeit I also get it that he's hitting out at his enemies and using his tool of choice:
twitter. So he makes his short tweets and expresses his anger against his enemies to shore up the defences of his supporters.
I can only hope that Trump was NOT naive enough to not realize that he wouldn't be spied on. Trump can hate Obama all he wants
– and I don't like Obama much either – but this kind of spying has be de rigueur for a long long time and no doubt, will continue
to be so for a long long time.
Will Trump be able to "tame" the Spooks? Good luck. JFK tried that, and we all witnessed how that turned out.
Thanks for this post. My guess is Wilkerson is right that intel agencies care most about their own turf and budgets. What's
interesting is, judging by the Chicken Little flailing after the election, imo the CIA and other agencies never saw a Trump win
coming, or really even possible. So, what are these agencies doing with all their big data? Did they simply use Google/Ada for
their election probabilities intel? /s
Sorry about length but I think this puts together some interesting info.
According to the BBC (from a Jan 13 report)
FISA warrants were issued:
On 15 October, the US secret intelligence court issued a warrant to investigate two Russian banks. This news was given to
me by several sources and corroborated by someone I will identify only as a senior member of the US intelligence community.
He would never volunteer anything – giving up classified information would be illegal – but he would confirm or deny what I
had heard from other sources.
"I'm going to write a story that says " I would say. "I don't have a problem with that," he would reply, if my information
was accurate. He confirmed the sequence of events below.
Last April, the CIA director was shown intelligence that worried him. It was – allegedly – a tape recording of a conversation
about money from the Kremlin going into the US presidential campaign.
It was passed to the US by an intelligence agency of one of the Baltic States. The CIA cannot act domestically against American
citizens so a joint counter-intelligence taskforce was created.
The taskforce included six agencies or departments of government. Dealing with the domestic, US, side of the inquiry, were
the FBI, the Department of the Treasury, and the Department of Justice. For the foreign and intelligence aspects of the investigation,
there were another three agencies: the CIA, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the National Security Agency,
responsible for electronic spying.
Lawyers from the National Security Division in the Department of Justice then drew up an application. They took it to the
secret US court that deals with intelligence, the Fisa court, named after the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. They wanted
permission to intercept the electronic records from two Russian banks.
Their first application, in June, was rejected outright by the judge. They returned with a more narrowly drawn order in
July and were rejected again. Finally, before a new judge, the order was granted, on 15 October, three weeks before election
day.
Neither Mr Trump nor his associates are named in the Fisa order, which would only cover foreign citizens or foreign entities
– in this case the Russian banks. But ultimately, the investigation is looking for transfers of money from Russia to the United
States, each one, if proved, a felony offence.
A lawyer- outside the Department of Justice but familiar with the case – told me that three of Mr Trump's associates were
the subject of the inquiry. "But it's clear this is about Trump," he said.
I spoke to all three of those identified by this source. All of them emphatically denied any wrongdoing. "Hogwash," said
one. "Bullshit," said another. Of the two Russian banks, one denied any wrongdoing, while the other did not respond to a request
for comment.
The investigation was active going into the election. During that period, the leader of the Democrats in the Senate, Harry
Reid, wrote to the director of the FBI, accusing him of holding back "explosive information" about Mr Trump.
Mr Reid sent his letter after getting an intelligence briefing, along with other senior figures in Congress. Only eight
people were present: the chairs and ranking minority members of the House and Senate intelligence committees, and the leaders
of the Democratic and Republican parties in Congress, the "gang of eight" as they are sometimes called. Normally, senior staff
attend "gang of eight" intelligence briefings, but not this time. The Congressional leaders were not even allowed to take notes.
RT: What do you make of the accusations made by Donald Trump? How big of a deal is this?
Larry Johnson: I think it's a huge deal. The problem is Trump probably should not have done this via Twitter because to
call it a "wiretap" is technically inaccurate. And the denials by the Obama people – like Bill Clinton asking what the meaning
of "is" is with respect to "was oral sex a sexual act."
In this case I understand from very good friends that what happened was both Jim Clapper and John Brennan at CIA were intimately
involved in trying to derail the candidacy of Donald Trump. That there was some collusion overseas with Britain's own GHCQ
[Government Communications Headquarters]. That information that was gathered from GHCQ was actually passed to John Brennan
and it was disseminated within the US government. This dissemination was illegal.
Donald Trump is in essence correct that the intelligence agencies, and some in the law enforcement community on the side
of the FBI, were in fact illegally trying to access, monitor his communications with his aides and with other people. All of
this with an end to try and destroy and discredit his presidency. I don't think there can be any doubt of that. I think it's
worth noting that the head of the National Security Agency, an Admiral [Michael] Rogers, made a journey to the Trump Tower
shortly after Trump had won. And in the immediate aftermath of his visit, Jim Clapper and others in the intelligence community
called
for him to be fired . Why did Rodgers go to Trump Tower? My understanding is that it was to cover himself, because he was
aware that the NSA authorities had been misused and abused with respect to Donald Trump.
Another piece of evidence that Wikerson alludes to (
March
1, 2017 ) :
The American media is ignoring a story from London about the abrupt resignation of Robert Hannigan, the head of Britain's
highly secretive Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), which is the code breaking equivalent of the U.S. National
Security Agency (NSA). Hannigan's resignation on January 23 surprised everyone, with only a few hours' notice provided to his
staff. He claimed in a press release that he wanted to spend more time with his family, which reportedly includes a sick wife
and elderly parents. Given the abruptness of the decision, it seems likely to be a cover story.
Putting it altogether and there seems like a lot of smoke, will the MSM look for the fire?
If we ignore the noise that comes from all sides 24/7 we should ask ourselves what is the worst consequence of this election
cycle. I think that the fact that hatred became acceptable and normal is by far the worst. Will take a long time, if ever, to
heal that.
From the book The Damned Yard by Ivo Andric
The success with which the politicians were able to pursue their campaign of division and mutual antagonism depended to
a very large extend on the power of language to create a reality people are ready to believe in without reference to fact.
Introduction page viii
"It can happen, as you know," wrote Brother Mato, "that some of our people watching the Vizier destroy the Turks and their
"prominent people" would comment on how some good would come of it for the rayah, for our fools think that another's trouble
must do them good. You can tell them straight, so that they know now at least what they refused to see before: that nothing
will come of it. Page 11
Such was their capacity for hatred! And when the hatred of the bazaar attaches itself to an object, it never lets go, but
focuses increasingly on it, gradually altering its shape and meaning, superseding it completely and becoming an end in itself.
Then the object becomes secondary, only its name remains, and the hatred crystallizes, grows out of itself, according to its
own laws and needs, and becomes powerful, inventive and enthralling, like a kind of inverted love; it finds new fuel and impetus,
and itself creates motives for ever greater hatred. Page 19
Well this time Wilkerson did look upset. Just last week he looked tired but not so upset in his RNN interview. The topic this
time is of course Trump being tapped and Wilkerson clearly doesn't like it. But did anybody else notice that Wilkerson is wearing
the exact same clothes as in the most previous interview? And the time of day is very similar by the lighting behind him on the
ceiling and on his face as he speaks down into his computer. So that's odd. Because it indicates to me that they were getting
ready to debunk "Trump is crazy" talk even before Trump's claim hit the news. Or at least as soon as it did; they were ready with
this interview. I get the feeling they waited a few days to make it look spontaneous. Makes me think there is almost a civil war
going on. But regardless of these tactics, it's annoying that the DNC pulled this clumsy crap via the UK.
The nattering nabobs' wild, unfounded,
guilt by association conspiracy theory that OMG! the "Russians are coming with Trump" has been
okay for the past 9 month, now that the president is uncovering the deep state's assault on the Bill
of Rights conspiracy theories are an issue!
If Obama's Stalinist candidate had won it would be already be too late save America's liberty!
"... The threat from Russia is nothing compared to the attack on the Bill of Rights by the Obama Stalinists! Neocon hack Strobe Talbot who brought the neocon Kagans into Bill Clinton's State Dept to run Color Coupes and topple Yugoslavia. Estonia and Ukraine should be dismembered like Bill Clinton did Yugoslavia. Filled with malarkey from PNAC humbug tank nattering nabobs' wild, unfounded, guilt by association conspiracy theory up through here: ..."
"... Really! They "know" Putin [anything other than Clinton and the DLC's wretchedness to many people] cost the neolibs their entitlement to run their deep state power. ..."
"... That is where I stopped reading he "can", "could", "would", "assessments" [from the deep state spooks' neolib agendas] and "NATO is not obsolete" are the very fake news themes of the past 14 months of recently ended Clinton con! How could Putin contaminate the neoliberal permanent war crowd's anointed? Putin could NOT have as much power as the DLC crushing Bernie? ..."
The threat from Russia is nothing compared to the attack on the Bill of Rights by the Obama Stalinists! Neocon hack Strobe Talbot who brought the neocon Kagans into Bill Clinton's State Dept to run Color Coupes and topple Yugoslavia.
Estonia and Ukraine should be dismembered like Bill Clinton did Yugoslavia. Filled with malarkey from PNAC humbug tank nattering nabobs' wild, unfounded, guilt by association conspiracy theory up through
here:
"It is bad for Trump, since the ongoing revelations of a foreign adversary's contamination of an American election undermines
the outcome's validity."
Really! They "know" Putin [anything other than Clinton and the DLC's wretchedness to many people] cost the neolibs their entitlement
to run their deep state power.
That is where I stopped reading he "can", "could", "would", "assessments"
[from the deep state spooks' neolib agendas] and "NATO is not obsolete" are the very fake news themes of the past 14 months of
recently ended Clinton con! How could Putin contaminate the neoliberal permanent war crowd's anointed? Putin could NOT have as much power as the DLC crushing Bernie? Barry insists on linking teaching points about the 10 fallacies of logic spewing forth from alt left Trump assassins.
"... "The original pretext was that FISA warrants were obtained in October for some limited capacity of Trump surrogates," Barnes recalled. "The problem is FISA's a very limited law, especially if you are talking about U.S. citizens. If you're talking about foreigners, then the breadth of the law is very broad, and the president can, in fact, intercept and surveil foreign activities at a much wider degree because of a limited application of the Fourth Amendment – although the Ninth Circuit doesn't seem to understand the limits of the Constitution as to foreigners, but that's another story ." ..."
"... "So President Trump is correct that it appears that's what took place here, based on published reports, headlines in the New York Times that use the words 'intercepted calls' involving Trump advisers who are American citizens. It raises very serious issues, and he's absolutely right to raise them," Barnes said ..."
"... "I think that is problematic about Clapper in particular. He'd be the least likely guy you would want to put up as a credible source for the administration," Barnes replied. "But what he really also did at the same time was that he gutted the sort of defense that Obama could have had. Because here you have these stories that come out about intercepted calls, and Clapper goes on TV and says there's actually no legal grounds for any intercepted calls to be taking place, at least not through the FISA authority, which is exactly what was being cited as the reason it was done." ..."
"... "Actually, Clapper's answer raises even more questions. Either (a) Clapper's lying, which is always possible, or (b) Clapper is being truthful, which means all these intercepted calls were done entirely illegally and off the books, or (c) it was done through the Department of Justice in some entirely different manner that would put Obama right in the middle of it," he said. "In other words, if it wasn't done as some sort of national security matter, but was simply done in some sort of disguised investigation that was a politically motivated means of monitoring your adversaries," Barnes elaborated. "So he ended up opening more Pandora's Box than he closed it." ..."
"... "There were three different interpretations of Comey and Clapper combined coming out and saying that," he suggested. "One interpretation was that they were not being fully forthcoming and that it was a message to their underlings that they were not going to be the ones to take the fall if any such activity took place, and that those underlings could take Hillary-style actions in terms of whatever evidence may remain of that." ..."
"... "The second interpretation of what Clapper and Comey did is that they were both kept in the dark – that you had a sort of a rogue operation of people, including Sally Yates at the Department of Justice, who circumvented both Comey and Clapper in order to engage in this sort of illicit personal surveillance," he continued. ..."
Attorney Robert Barnes appeared on Monday's Breitbart News
Daily to talk about President Trump's allegation that the Obama administration wiretapped him during the 2016 presidential campaign.
Barnes's latest article on the subject for
LawNewz
is entitled "Yes, There Could Be Serious Legal Problems if Obama Admin Involved in Illegal Surveillance."
"The allegations that Trump raises are allegations that derive directly from what the newspapers have reported – the Guardian,
BBC, Heat Street, the New York Times, the Washington Post , where they all talk about there being an interagency
panel of people who were involved in an investigation, who purportedly requested and obtained various means of intercepting phone
calls," Barnes explained.
"So there have been competing stories, and on Sunday, they got even more complicated, as both Clapper and Comey denied any knowledge
of any wiretapping presence," he continued. "Their denials went a little further than Obama's himself, where all he said was that
he himself didn't personally order something – which was a rather absurd cop-out because the president doesn't directly order things
of that nature. His surrogates or delegates do."
"The issue goes right to: why, at any time, was anybody's phone calls being intercepted that were on the Trump team, that are
American citizens?" he said. "The various news stories that are out, including one by Andrew McCarthy, who
recounts
them for the National Review , there's just no legal grounds for any of that surveillance to be taking place. There's
no legal grounds for any of those calls to be intercepted."
"The original pretext was that FISA warrants were obtained in October for some limited capacity of Trump surrogates," Barnes
recalled. "The problem is FISA's a very limited law, especially if you are talking about U.S. citizens. If you're talking about foreigners,
then the breadth of the law is very broad, and the president can, in fact, intercept and surveil foreign activities at a much wider
degree because of a limited application of the Fourth Amendment – although the Ninth Circuit doesn't seem to understand the limits
of the Constitution as to foreigners, but
that's another story ."
"The issue he raises is critical and essential, and it's been ever since these stories started leaking out," he said of McCarthy's
writing. "Aside from the criminality of the leaks, it was that this is information that never should have been gathered in the first
place. What FISA requires is that if you're going to intercept a call where an American is on the line at any level, then what you
have to do is you have to go through certain protocols, and you have to establish basically probable cause that the person is involved
in criminal conduct of some sort. Just the fact that I, as a U.S. citizen, am talking to a foreigner does not allow magically the
Fourth Amendment to disappear as to my right to privacy."
"And yet, purportedly, that's what effectively took place here because here you had Sally Yates discussing a transcript of a call
that involved former NSA assistant Michael Flynn, and that's information that never should have been in her possession or custody,"
he observed.
"Just because one of the people on the phone call may have been not a U.S. citizen, that's no legal grounds to intercept
an American's communications. Another way to think of it is, sometimes you'll see in the movies where the guy is sitting in a van,
and he's listening in on a phone conversation on a wiretap, and the person he's listening to shifts to some personal conversation,
maybe of an intimate nature, that has nothing to do with the criminal investigation going on. You'll see him turn off the recording
device and put down his headphones," he explained.
"If it happens that the manner and method of interception was something that you couldn't physically do that, then what you're
supposed to do is to scrub the information and delete it from the record. In fact, an ex-CIA officer wrote an article for
American Conservative documenting that
that was always the protocol and procedure, whenever they were involved in an intelligence-gathering investigation. Yet apparently
here , according to published reports, what they actually did is they went and they not only kept the information, didn't
scrub it or delete it, they deliberately went back and saved it, and then shared it with a bunch of other people who had no authority
to ever look at it," said Barnes.
"FISA is very particular about this," he noted. "It requires protection of any innocent American's information that ever may be
gathered through this process. You have to not only scrub it and delete it; you cannot disseminate it to people. You can't identify
the individual that's being sourced in the investigation. And the failure to follow FISA's strict procedures is actually a crime.
FISA section 1809 of Title 50 makes it a criminal penalty to either gather the information outside of FISA's procedures or to disseminate
it outside of FISA's procedures."
"So President Trump is correct that it appears that's what took place here, based on published reports, headlines in the
New York Times that use the words 'intercepted calls' involving Trump advisers who are American citizens. It raises very serious
issues, and he's absolutely right to raise them," Barnes said.
SiriusXM host Alex Marlow noted that President Obama's
denial of Trump's wiretapping accusation was "thin." "It clearly leads to many more questions than it answers," Marlow said.
"Oh, absolutely," Barnes agreed. "There's different parts of it that are problematic. The first thing is that if he was being serious
about a denial, you simply issue a two-sentence statement. You say, 'I am not aware of any wiretapping that took place on Mr. Trump
or his campaign, and I would not have supported such a wiretap had it occurred.' He could have been very broad. It's interesting
that Comey and Clapper were much more specific and particular than Obama was."
"The second aspect where there were some ludicrous claims included therein, such as the White House never engaging in electronic
surveillance of a United States citizen," he continued. "Well, as Andrew McCarthy and other attorneys have pointed out, and other
people familiar with the national security operation have pointed out, Obama drone-bombed American citizens in various foreign locations
around the world while he was president, including one in Yemen quite prominently. There's no way you can actually do that without
some form of surveillance on the individuals. It's not like you had a global map tattooed on the wall, and you took a dart and threw
it at the map, and said, 'Oh, okay, we'll drone-bomb there.'"
"The fact that he didn't deny the existence of the wiretap, did not deny his awareness of it, did not deny his approval of it,
and then made clearly materially false or misleading statements about his engagement and involvement with surveillance of American
citizens – and this coming on top of Clapper committing perjury previously before Congress that led to Ed Snowden becoming Ed Snowden
I mean, Ed Snowden probably never becomes Ed Snowden if Clapper doesn't commit perjury, and then, Obama's reaction to Clapper's perjury
was to promote him, rather than to demote him, about spying on American citizens," said Barnes.
After playing a recording of former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper flatly denying the existence of any FISA court
order relating to Trump Tower, Marlow asked, "Do we care what this guy says? He's a known liar."
"I think that is problematic about Clapper in particular. He'd be the least likely guy you would want to put up as a credible
source for the administration," Barnes replied. "But what he really also did at the same time was that he gutted the sort of defense
that Obama could have had. Because here you have these stories that come out about intercepted calls, and Clapper goes on TV and
says there's actually no legal grounds for any intercepted calls to be taking place, at least not through the FISA authority, which
is exactly what was being cited as the reason it was done."
"Actually, Clapper's answer raises even more questions. Either (a) Clapper's lying, which is always possible, or (b) Clapper
is being truthful, which means all these intercepted calls were done entirely illegally and off the books, or (c) it was done through
the Department of Justice in some entirely different manner that would put Obama right in the middle of it," he said. "In other words,
if it wasn't done as some sort of national security matter, but was simply done in some sort of disguised investigation that was
a politically motivated means of monitoring your adversaries," Barnes elaborated. "So he ended up opening more Pandora's Box than
he closed it."
Marlow played an excerpt from an
interview
given by former Bush administration Attorney General Michael Mukasey, in which he essentially said President Trump's accusation
that President Obama directly ordered surveillance on Trump Tower might be "incorrect" in the details, but Trump was "right" to believe
a surveillance operation could have been in progress.
Barnes said Mukasey did "accurately relay what has been reported to the press, which is this request for a FISA warrant in the
summer that was rejected because it put Trump's name in the warrant request."
"To give you an idea of how rare that is, if that did occur, is that the last 35,000-plus requests for the FISA court to issue
a warrant, it's only been denied 12 prior times, to public knowledge," he noted.
"According to the published reports, they went back in October and simply left Trump's name off of it, slightly limited it, and
got it," he said of the FISA request in question. "Now, Clapper's statement completely denies that ever occurred in terms of October,
in terms of ever getting any FISA warrant on anybody connected to, in his own words, the Trump campaign. So there's a major discrepancy
present."
"Secondly, the one area where he doesn't quite correctly describe the situation: there is some misleading information out there
that the government can just tap the phones of anyone involved who's working on any level on behalf of a foreign government, by any
means. Well, if that had been the case, everybody at the Clinton Foundation should have been tapped permanently," Barnes said. "Putting
that aside, the actual law requires that they not only be, quote, 'an agent of a foreign power,' but if they're a United States person,
there has to be evidence that they're engaged in criminal activities of a particular kind."
"So they couldn't just wiretap Michael Flynn, for example, or listen in on his conversations, even if the person on the other
line is not a United States person. They have to have evidence that he was engaged in criminal conduct. That is what was problematic,
as soon as the Flynn story broke, was there was no grounds for them to have ever recorded him, kept the recording, or shared the
recording. FISA law specifically prohibited it under those set of circumstances," he explained.
"That's the illegal aspect of what's going on. It's not just the political motivation that would be impermissible or inappropriate
because it would be First Amendment punitive use, misuse of the search warrant authority. But it actually violates what warrant authority
they could ever obtain in the first place, under both the First and Fourth Amendments, and under the FISA law itself," he said.
Barnes said the
reported request from FBI Director James Comey for the Justice Department to refute Trump's wiretapping accusation was "an interesting
set of statements."
"There were three different interpretations of Comey and Clapper combined coming out and saying that," he suggested. "One interpretation
was that they were not being fully forthcoming and that it was a message to their underlings that they were not going to be the ones
to take the fall if any such activity took place, and that those underlings could take Hillary-style actions in terms of whatever
evidence may remain of that."
"One little-noted story last week was that Trump put out a requirement that everybody connected to the story keep all information,"
he noted. "He did this before he did his tweets, but his motivation may have been to actually prove and document this illicit activity
took place."
"The second interpretation of what Clapper and Comey did is that they were both kept in the dark – that you had a sort of a rogue
operation of people, including Sally Yates at the Department of Justice, who circumvented both Comey and Clapper in order to engage
in this sort of illicit personal surveillance," he continued.
"I've been on the opposite side of Sally Yates in cases where she was at the U.S. Attorney's Office in Atlanta," Barnes revealed.
"If you were going to pick an unethical, corrupt prosecutor, she'd be at the top of the list. She tried to help railroad a family
there, in a case I dealt with over ten years."
"The third possibility is that this was just unlawful surveillance," he concluded. "I've had a lot of cases like that, especially
under the Obama administration. It became too frequent and too regular that you had agents that were just doing illegal surveillance,
without ever notifying their supervisors, without ever obtaining judicial authority, without ever doing it legally at all. And so
you may have had an operation that was a true Deep State kind of operation, that was just doing unlawful surveillance."
"There's too much information, like some of the criticism of President Trump. Well, people should be critical then of the New
York Times because it was their story that said there was intercepted calls of multiple members of Donald Trump's campaign. That
was, I think, the story that ran on Valentine's Day, actually. It was in the very first sentence of the story. So either the New
York Times was purely fake news or somebody in the government is lying about what they were up to," Barnes summarized.
Breitbart News Daily airs on SiriusXM Patriot 125 weekdays from 6:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. Eastern.
"... The more pertinent question is whether we can trust our government to responsibly seek those court orders, once it is armed with a massive expansion in surveillance power. The evidence there is not encouraging. On the same day that the news broke of the Obama administration's plan to support expanded wiretapping capabilities, CNET's Declan McCullagh reported that, according to documents obtained by the ACLU, the U.S. Department of Justice just doesn't believe that it needs search warrants "to review Americans' e-mails, Facebook chats, Twitter direct messages, and other private files." ..."
"... FBI Director Robert Mueller has argued for years that the new wiretapping capabilities are necessary to deal with what he calls the "going dark" problem. As we've moved our communications from voice calls to texting and chatting and tweeting, our activities have become less visible to law enforcement. But even that assumption seems highly questionable. We are now generating vastly more data about our activities than ever before, and great swaths of it are available via subpoenas that don't require a judge's approval. One could easily argue that our incredibly detailed digital trails have put more of our lives in the "light" than ever. ..."
"... So here's why we should be worried about the Obama administration's purported supported for expanded wiretapping. A government that we already know to be overzealous in grabbing our data is using a bogus excuse to justify vastly increased surveillance powers. ..."
Did the surveillance state just take another gigantic Big Brotherish step forward? The New York Times and Washington Post are reporting
that the
Obama
administration is planning to support an FBI plan for "a sweeping overhaul of surveillance laws that would make it easier to
wiretap people who communicate using the Internet rather than by traditional phone services."
Facebook posts, Skype calls, Google chats, Apple's iMessage - under the new plan, every form of Internet communication would have
to be accessible to law enforcement wiretapping. Civil libertarians, Internet companies and privacy activists are all understandably
unenthused. A blogger at FireDogLake immediately labeled the news proof that Obama intended to support the
"end of the 4th Amendment on the Internet."
That's a little overheated. The Fourth Amendment protects against unreasonable search and seizure, chiefly by requiring that search
warrants be authorized by a judge and supported by probable cause. According to all descriptions of the new FBI wiretapping plan,
if law enforcement wants to listen in on your Facebook chats or Apple iMessages, law enforcement will have to get a court order,
just at it would if it wants to wiretap your phone. If society is going to grant government the right to listen in to our old-school
phone conversations, it's hard to see how, in principle, it can deny the same right with regard to our Skype calls.
The more pertinent question is whether we can trust our government to responsibly seek those court orders, once it is armed with
a massive expansion in surveillance power. The evidence there is not encouraging. On the same day that the news broke of the Obama
administration's plan to support expanded wiretapping capabilities, CNET's Declan McCullagh reported that,
according
to documents obtained by the ACLU, the U.S. Department of Justice just doesn't believe that it needs search warrants "to review
Americans' e-mails, Facebook chats, Twitter direct messages, and other private files."
Now we're talking violation of the Fourth Amendment. And if we combine that kind of cavalier attitude toward our constitutionally
mandated protections with vastly expanded technical surveillance capabilities, then we've got a real problem. Civil libertarians
have a right to be nervous. Expanded power implies expanded opportunities to abuse that power.
FBI Director Robert Mueller has argued for years that the new wiretapping capabilities are necessary to deal with what he calls
the "going dark" problem. As we've moved our communications from voice calls to texting and chatting and tweeting, our activities
have become less visible to law enforcement. But even that assumption seems highly questionable. We are now generating vastly more
data about our activities than ever before, and great swaths of it are available via subpoenas that don't require a judge's approval.
One could easily argue that our incredibly detailed digital trails have put more of our lives in the "light" than ever.
So here's why we should be worried about the Obama administration's purported supported for expanded wiretapping. A government
that we already know to be overzealous in grabbing our data is using a bogus excuse to justify vastly increased surveillance powers.
Yippee.
Andrew Leonard
is a staff writer at Salon. On Twitter, @koxinga21.
"... "I think the president is absolutely right. His phone calls, everything he did electronically, was being monitored," Bill Binney, a 36-year veteran of the National Security Agency who resigned in protest from the organization in 2001, told Fox Business on Monday. ..."
"... Binney also told Sean Hannity's radio show earlier Monday, "I think the FISA court's basically totally irrelevant." The judges on the FISA court are "not even concerned, nor are they involved in any way with the Executive Order 12333 collection," Binney said during the radio interview. "That's all done outside of the courts. And outside of the Congress." ..."
"... Binney also told Fox the laws that fall under the FISA court's jurisdiction are " simply out there for show" and "trying to show that the government is following the law, and being looked at and overseen by the Senate and House intelligence committees and the courts." ..."
"... "I think that's what happened here," Binney told Fox. " The evidence of the conversation of the president of the U.S., President Trump, and the [prime minister] of Australia and the president of Mexico. Releasing those conversations. Those are conversations that are picked up by the FAIRVIEW program, primarily, by NSA ." ..."
As we noted previously, Binney is the NSA executive who created the agency's mass surveillance program for digital information,
who served as the senior technical director within the agency, who managed six thousand NSA employees, the 36-year NSA veteran widely
regarded as a "legend" within the agency and the NSA's best-ever analyst and code-breaker, who mapped out the Soviet command-and-control
structure before anyone else knew how, and so predicted Soviet invasions before they happened ("in the 1970s, he decrypted the Soviet
Union's command system, which provided the US and its allies with real-time surveillance of all Soviet troop movements and Russian
atomic weapons"). Binney is the real McCoy.
Binney resigned from NSA shortly after the U.S. approach to intelligence changed following the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. He "became
a whistleblower after discovering that elements of a data-monitoring program he had helped develop -- nicknamed ThinThread -- were
being used to spy on Americans," PBS reported.
On Monday he came to the defense of the president , whose allegations on social media over the weekend that outgoing President
Barack Obama tapped his phones during the 2016 campaign have rankled Washington.
"I think the president is absolutely right. His phone calls, everything he did electronically, was being monitored," Bill
Binney, a 36-year veteran of the National Security Agency who resigned in protest from the organization in 2001, told Fox Business
on Monday.
Everyone's conversations are being monitored and stored, Binney said.
Binney also told Sean Hannity's radio show earlier Monday, "I think the FISA court's basically totally irrelevant." The judges
on the FISA court are "not even concerned, nor are they involved in any way with the Executive Order 12333 collection," Binney said
during the radio interview. "That's all done outside of the courts. And outside of the Congress."
Binney also told Fox the laws that fall under the FISA court's jurisdiction are " simply out there for show" and "trying to
show that the government is following the law, and being looked at and overseen by the Senate and House intelligence committees and
the courts."
"That's not the main collection program for NSA," Binney said.
* * *
What Binney did not delve into, however, was if Obama directed surveillance on Trump for political purposes during the campaign,
a core accusation of Trump's. But Binney did say events such as publication of details of private calls between President Trump and
the Australian prime minister, as well as with the Mexican president, are evidence the intelligence community is playing hardball
with the White House.
"I think that's what happened here," Binney told Fox. " The evidence of the conversation of the president of the U.S., President
Trump, and the [prime minister] of Australia and the president of Mexico. Releasing those conversations. Those are conversations
that are picked up by the FAIRVIEW program, primarily, by NSA ."
Since Binney designed the NSA's electronic surveillance system, he would know.
"... With Holden's explicit direction, the DOJ secretly accessed all of Rosen's gmails, contacts, and surveilled of more than 20 phone lines connected to him, including his mother's phone in Staten Island, NY. ..."
"... Here is Rosen recounting his affair and opining on the plausibility of Trump being a target of the Obama administration too -- which he affirmed in the positive, 'in the age of Snowden.' ..."
Back in 2013, Fox News journalist, James Rosen, was named a 'criminal co-conspirator' and 'flight
risk' by then AG Holder -- which led to a series of events that made
Holden later regret doing it . With Holden's explicit direction, the DOJ secretly accessed all
of Rosen's gmails, contacts, and surveilled of more than 20 phone lines connected to him, including
his mother's phone in Staten Island, NY.
The Washington Post's Dana Milbank wrote a piece on the ordeal, saying "The Rosen affair is as
flagrant an assault on civil liberties as anything done by George W. Bush's administration, and it
uses technology to silence critics in a way Richard Nixon could only have dreamed of. To treat a
reporter as a criminal for doing his job - seeking out information the government doesn't want made
public - deprives Americans of the First Amendment freedom on which all other constitutional rights
are based."
Here is Rosen recounting his affair and opining on the plausibility of Trump being a target of
the Obama administration too -- which he affirmed in the positive, 'in the age of Snowden.'
"... He's not going to. Trump thinks he can enact his policies and make America great again. He is completely underestimating how controlled the country is. FBI, CIA, NSA all of it.. The learning curve is way to steep and he is losing. ..."
"I hope he cleans fucking house and outs every last shit politician for every last little thing
they are probably already being blackmailed on"
He's not going to. Trump thinks he can enact his policies and make America great again. He
is completely underestimating how controlled the country is. FBI, CIA, NSA all of it.. The learning
curve is way to steep and he is losing.
I hate to say this but we are gonna see a sad end to this
administration. Trump should be dropping any and every bomb he has but he isn't. By the time he
figures out what to do it will be too late. I think it might be already. He expects the American
people to stand behind and we are but that is not enough. I think it may be that time... that
time we all fear would come and will show us the real America and Americans.
Trump, if you read ZH, and you read this, drop everything NOW. DROP EVERY BOMB YOU HAVE. ATTACK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I agree. By now Trump has enough pix and AV to crush the firebugs in public. And if the Deep State and their psychotic friends in the CIA NSA FBI, etc., want to take it
outside, Trump should unleash what good Intel forces are left and go Roman on them.
Since the pervert Dems and their psycho alphabetroid friends are hell bent on destroying this
country if they can't keep it in the swamp, then they may as well take a real beat down in the
process.
The one good thing about all this is that it is forcing all the DC sleaze out in the open where
we can all see them for the power abusers they are.
"... The biggest complaint of the "left" is that Obama could be handing over the surveillance state to someone truly bad like Trump. That was the complaint of libertarians like Edward Snowden. But the moderate establishment types didn't care. They were too busy slandering Wikileaks. ..."
"... There is no evidence so support any of the months of "the Russians coming" screed; there is immense evidence in that screed that the GOP was tapped! To listen on a US citizen who is not an object of investigation is covered by the 4th Amendment etc. If they recorded a call from a Russian diplomat to someone not in an order from that special judge the tape should be sealed. It appears no taps were done legally and none of the illegal taps were kept from becoming innuendo in congressional hearings. The coincidental collection is an assault on US Bill of Rights! In many years in the pentagon bureaucracy I have NEVER seen coincidence where malice could be implied. ..."
"... This fake news hysteria over "Russian contacts" might well be a smoke screen explicitly designed to cover illegal wiretapping. They never expected Trump to be elected (neither did I ) and made some major mistakes hoping the Hillary will cover everything up. ..."
"... That actually might help to explain strange behavior of James Clapper. As if he felt that he is sitting on a hot stove. ..."
"Donald Trump Claims Barack Obama Ordered Wire Tap On Trump Tower Before Election"
'But he offered no evidence to back up the claims'
By Lee Moran...03/04/2017...07:16 am ET...Updated 1 hour ago
"President Donald Trump has accused former President Barack Obama of "wire tapping" Trump Tower
before the 2016 presidential election.
Trump made the claims in a series of tweets that he posted early Saturday, although he offered
no evidence to back his allegations up ― and a former adviser to Obama pointed out that presidents
cannot order wiretaps.
"Terrible!" Trump wrote at 6.35 a.m. E.T. "Just found out that Obama had my 'wires tapped' in
Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!"
I'd have to go with PGL. You'd think if they were going to tap a Presidential candidate, they'd
have to get Presidential authority.
We just don't know. Probably they'd have to get a judge to sign off on it but the FISA court
is pretty much rubber stamp.
When is the last time the NSA or FBI go in trouble for overstepping their bounds? Never. If
they had flimsy reasons to tap Trump it's probably still legal strictly speaking.
Maybe Trump will reform the way the spies spy on private citizens?
HAHAHAHAA
The biggest complaint of the "left" is that Obama could be handing over the surveillance state
to someone truly bad like Trump. That was the complaint of libertarians like Edward Snowden.
But the moderate establishment types didn't care. They were too busy slandering Wikileaks.
There is no evidence so support any of the months of "the Russians coming" screed; there is immense
evidence in that screed that the GOP was tapped! To listen on a US citizen who is not an object of investigation is covered by the 4th Amendment
etc. If they recorded a call from a Russian diplomat to someone not in an order from that special
judge the tape should be sealed. It appears no taps were done legally and none of the illegal taps were kept from becoming innuendo
in congressional hearings. The coincidental collection is an assault on US Bill of Rights! In many years in the pentagon bureaucracy I have NEVER seen coincidence where malice could
be implied.
This fake news hysteria over "Russian contacts" might well be a smoke screen explicitly designed
to cover illegal wiretapping. They never expected Trump to be elected (neither did I ) and made some major mistakes hoping
the Hillary will cover everything up.
"... Sasse raises several key points: if the wiretap was authorized by a FISA Court, Trump should demand to see the application, find out on what grounds it was granted, and then present it to the US public at best, or at least the Senate. In case there was no FISA court, it is possible that Trump was illegally tapped. Finally, there is the possibility that Trump was not wiretapped at all, although for the president to make such a public allegation one would hope that there is at least some factual basis to the charge. ..."
"... "We are in the midst of a civilization-warping crisis of public trust, and the President's allegations today demand the thorough and dispassionate attention of serious patriots. A quest for the full truth, rather than knee-jerk partisanship, must be our guide if we are going to rebuild civic trust and health." ..."
Senator Ben Sasse, a Republican member of the Senate Judiciary and Armed Services Committees, has
issued the following statement after President Trump accused former President Obama of wiretapping
his phones in 2016 and Obama's spokesman said that was false.
Sasse raises several key points: if the wiretap was authorized by a FISA Court, Trump should demand
to see the application, find out on what grounds it was granted, and then present it to the US public
at best, or at least the Senate. In case there was no FISA court, it is possible that Trump was illegally
tapped. Finally, there is the possibility that Trump was not wiretapped at all, although for the
president to make such a public allegation one would hope that there is at least some factual basis
to the charge.
"The President today made some very serious allegations, and the informed citizens that a republic
requires deserve more information.
If there were wiretaps of then-candidate Trump's organization or campaign, then it was either
with FISA Court authorization or without such authorization.
If without, the President should explain what sort of wiretap it was and how he knows this. It
is possible that he was illegally tapped.
On the other hand , if it was with a legal FISA Court order, then an application for surveillance
exists that the Court found credible.
The President should ask that this full application regarding surveillance of foreign operatives
or operations be made available, ideally to the full public, and at a bare minimum to the U.S. Senate.
Sasses then concludes:
"We are in the midst of a civilization-warping crisis of public trust, and the President's allegations
today demand the thorough and dispassionate attention of serious patriots. A quest for the full truth,
rather than knee-jerk partisanship, must be our guide if we are going to rebuild civic trust and
health."
It appears that the Trump admin may already be working on Sasse's recommendations: as
the NYT reports ,
" a senior White House official said that Donald F. McGahn II, the president's
chief counsel, was working on Saturday to secure access to what the official described as a document
issued by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court authorizing surveillance of Mr. Trump and his
associates. The official offered no evidence to support the notion that such a document exists; any
such move by a White House counsel would be viewed at the Justice Department as a stunning case of
interference ."
Alternatively, it would be viewed as a case president seeking to determine if his predecessor
was actively plotting to interfere with the election via wiretapping, also a quite "stunning" case.
Former President Obama on Saturday denied President Trump's accusation that Obama had Trump Tower
phones tapped in the weeks before the November 2016 election.
"Neither President Obama nor any White House official ever ordered surveillance on any U.S. citizen.
Any suggestion otherwise is simply false," said Kevin Lewis, a spokesman for the former president.
Trump made the claim in a series of early Saturday morning tweets that included the suggestion
that the alleged wiretapping was tantamount to "McCarthyism" and "Nixon/Watergate."
"Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my 'wires tapped' in Trump Tower just before the victory.
Nothing found. This is McCarthyism," Trump tweeted.
"Is it legal for a sitting President to be 'wire tapping' a race for president prior to an election?
Turned down by court earlier. A NEW LOW!" he said in another tweet.
Trump also tweeted that a "good lawyer could make a great case of the fact that President Obama
was tapping my phones in October, just prior to Election!"
"How low has President Obama gone to tap (sic) my phones during the very sacred election process.
This is Nixon/Watergage. Bad (or sick) guy!" the president continued.
Trump does not specify how he uncovered the Obama administration's alleged wiretapping.
However, he could be referencing a
Breitbart article posted Friday that claimed the administration made two Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Court (FISA) requests in 2016 to monitor Trump communications and a computer server
in Trump Tower, related to possible links with Russian banks.
No evidence was found.
The article was based on a segment by radio host Mark Levin.
However, the timelines for each seems to draw from a range of news reports over the last several
months, including those from The New York Times and Heat Street.
Lewis also said Saturday: "A cardinal rule of the Obama administration was that no White House
official ever interfered with any independent investigation led by the Department of Justice."
wouldsmash
REOPEN CLINTON EMAIL SERVER INVESTIGATION
encorezzzzzzz
GOP lawmaker calls to investigate Obama's $418 million arms deal with Kenya.
Fox News reported: A North Carolina congressman is calling for a probe into a potential $418
million contract between Kenya and a major U.S. defense contractor announced on President Obama's
last day in office -- a deal the lawmaker claims reeks of cronyism. Republican Rep. Ted Budd wants
the Government Accountability Office to investigate a deal between the African nation and New
York-based L3 Technologies for the sale of 12 weaponized border patrol planes.
He said he wants to know why a veteran-owned small company in North Carolina – which specializes
in making such planes – was not considered as the manufacturer. IOMAX USA Inc., based in Mooresville
and founded by a U.S. Army veteran, offered to build Kenya the weaponized planes for roughly $281
million – far cheaper than what its competitor, L3, is selling them for.
"Something smells wrong here," Budd told Fox News. "The U.S. Air Force bypassed IOMAX, which
has 50 of these planes already in service in the Middle East." "They were given a raw deal," Budd
said of Kenya, which had requested from the U.S. 12 weaponized planes in its fight against terrorist
group Al-Shabaab near its northern border. "We want to treat our allies like Kenya fairly," he
said. "And we want to know why IOMAX was not considered."
ricochetdog
"Had my wires tapped"! Just became the new internet meme.
Andrewmag16
Why are democrats always meeting and dealing with us and then act like its bad if anyone else
speaks to Russians?
evolutionmyths
Coming from an ... that never spoke any kind of truth . If he said false it means True
SheSayEh
Obama was community organizer of Chicago. Look at the mess he left behind there.
MrChainBlueLightning
The so called United States experiment should end. It was ultimately a failure. Red and Blue
states should merge and form their own countries.
CLUTCHCARGO1
DON'T STOP INVESTIGATING. OBAMA NEEDS TO MEET INMATE BUBBA
wouldsmash
Trump has enough evidence to put bammy in JAIL
MickeyQBitskoIII
Soros would certainly have it done, and Obama and Hillary would be in on whatever "intel" is
gathered, but there is NO WAY Soros would allow his favorite Kenyan lap dog to be directly involved
in the operation.
frdm399
Tucker Carlson exposed Politifact, New York Times, and Washington Post fact checkers as liars
last night. You just can't believe anything a democRAT says...
jconnelly
The US Govt was spying on Trump during the election. The Russians were spying on Clinton during
the election. Which is worse?
Funny now Obama and Clinton need to be afraid the Trump will wiretap them ;-)
Notable quotes:
"... Notwithstanding any other law, the President, through the Attorney General, may authorize electronic surveillance without a court order under this subchapter to acquire foreign intelligence information for periods of up to one year if the Attorney General certifies in writing under oath ..."
"... The Guardian has learned that the FBI applied for a warrant from the foreign intelligence surveillance (Fisa) court over the summer in order to monitor four members of the Trump team suspected of irregular contacts with Russian officials. The Fisa court turned down the application asking FBI counter-intelligence investigators to narrow its focus. According to one report, the FBI was finally granted a warrant in October, but that has not been confirmed, and it is not clear whether any warrant led to a full investigation. ..."
"... I'd be careful about reporting that Obama said there was no wiretapping. Statement just said that neither he nor the WH ordered it. ..."
"... Additionally, Philip Rucker, the WaPo's White House bureau chief echoed Favreau's caveat, namely that the Obama spokesman's statement does not deny the existence of wiretaps on Trump Tower ..."
Following Trump's stunning allegation that Obama wiretapped the Trump Tower in October of 2016, prior
to the presidential election, which may or may not have been
sourced from a Breitbart story , numerous Democrats and media pundits have come out with scathing
accusations that Trump is either mentally disturbed, or simply has no idea what he is talking about.
The best example of this came from Ben Rhodes, a former senior adviser to President Obama in his
role as deputy National Security Advisor, who slammed Trump's accusation, insisting that " No President
can order a wiretap. Those restrictions were put in place to protect citizens from people like you."
He also said "only a liar" could make the case, as Trump suggested, that Obama wire tapped Trump
Tower ahead of the election.
No President can order a wiretap. Those restrictions were put in place to protect citizens from
people like you. https://t.co/lEVscjkzSw
It would appear, however, that Rhodes is wrong, especially as pertains to matters of Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance, and its associated FISA court, under which the alleged wiretap of Donald Trump would
have been granted, as it pertained specifically to Trump's alleged illicit interactions with Russian
entities.
(1) Notwithstanding any other law, the President, through the Attorney General, may authorize electronic surveillance
without a court order under this subchapter to acquire foreign intelligence information for periods of up to one year if the
Attorney General certifies in writing under oath that
(A) the electronic surveillance is solely directed at- (i) the acquisition of the contents of
communications transmitted by means of communications used exclusively between or among foreign powers,
as defined in section 1801(a)(1), (2), or (3) of this title; or (ii) the acquisition of technical
intelligence, other than the spoken communications of individuals, from property or premises under
the open and exclusive control of a foreign power, as defined in section 1801(a)(1), (2), or (3)
of this title;
(B) there is no substantial likelihood that the surveillance will acquire the contents of any
communication to which a United States person is a party; and
(C) the proposed minimization procedures with respect to such surveillance meet the definition
of minimization procedures under section 1801(h) of this title; and if the Attorney General reports
such minimization procedures and any changes thereto to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence
and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence at least thirty days prior to their effective date,
unless the Attorney General determines immediate action is required and notifies the committees immediately
of such minimization procedures and the reason for their becoming effective immediately.
While (B) seems to contradict the underlying permissive nature of Section 1802 as it involves
a United States person, what the Snowden affair has demonstrated all too clearly, is how frequently
the NSA and FISA court would make US citizens collateral damage. To be sure, many pointed out the
fact that Fox News correspondent
James Rosen was notoriously wiretapped in 2013 when the DOJ was investigating government leaks.
The
Associated Press was also infamously wiretapped in relation to the same investigation.
As pertains to Trump, the
Guardian reported as much in early January, when news of the alleged anti-Trump dossier by former
UK spy Chris Steele broke in January:
The Guardian has learned that the FBI applied for a warrant from the foreign intelligence surveillance
(Fisa) court over the summer in order to monitor four members of the Trump team suspected of irregular
contacts with Russian officials. The Fisa court turned down the application asking FBI counter-intelligence
investigators to narrow its focus. According to one report, the FBI was finally granted a warrant
in October, but that has not been confirmed, and it is not clear whether any warrant led to a full
investigation.
Furthermore, while most Democrats - not to
mention former president Obama himself - have been harshly critical of Trump's comments, some
such as former Obama speechwriter Jon Favreau was quite clear in his warning to reporters that Obama
did not say there was no wiretapping, effectively confirming it:
I'd be careful about reporting that Obama said there was no wiretapping. Statement just said that
neither he nor the WH ordered it.
Additionally, Philip Rucker, the WaPo's White House bureau chief echoed Favreau's caveat, namely
that the Obama spokesman's statement does not deny the existence of wiretaps on Trump Tower, only
that Obama himself and the Obama White House did not approve them if they did exist.
The Obama statement does not say there was no federal wire tapping of Trump Tower. It only says
Obama and White House didn't order it.
Further implying the existence of such a wiretap was David Axelrod, who tweeted today that that
such a wiretap could exist but would have "been OK'ed only for a a reason."
If there were the wiretap @realDonaldTrump
loudly alleges, such an extraordinary warrant would only have been OKed by a court for a reason.
Yet ironically, it was none other than the Trump administration which just earlier this week announced
it supports the renewal of spy law which incorporates the FISA court,
without
reforms :
"the Trump administration does not want to reform an internet surveillance law to address
privacy concerns, a White House official told Reuters on Wednesday, saying it is needed to protect
national security. The announcement could put President Donald Trump on a collision course with Congress,
where some Republicans and Democrats have advocated curtailing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance
Act, or FISA, parts of which are due to expire at the end of the year."
"We support the clean reauthorization and the administration believes it's necessary to protect
the security of the nation," the official said on condition of anonymity.
The FISA law has been criticized by privacy and civil liberties advocates as allowing broad, intrusive
spying. It gained renewed attention following the 2013 disclosures by former National Security Agency
contractor Edward Snowden that the agency carried out widespread monitoring of emails and other electronic
communications.
In any event, the bottom line here appears to be that with his tweet, Trump has opened a can of
worms with two possible outcomes: either the wiretaps exist as Trump has suggested, and the president
will use them to attack both the Obama administration and the media for political overreach; or,
there were no wiretaps,
which as Matthew Boyle writes , would suggest the previous administration had no reason to suspect
Trump colluded with a foreign government.
Senator Ben Sasse said as much in his statement issued earlier today:
The President today made some very serious allegations, and the informed citizens that a republic
requires deserve more information. If there were wiretaps of then-candidate Trump's organization
or campaign, then it was either with FISA Court authorization or without such authorization. If without,
the President should explain what sort of wiretap it was and how he knows this. It is possible that
he was illegally tapped. On the other hand, if it was with a legal FISA Court order, then an application
for surveillance exists that the Court found credible.
But what is perhaps most important, is that we may know soon enough. As the
NYT reported on Saturday afternoon , a senior White House official said that Donald F. McGahn
II, the president's chief counsel, was working on Saturday to secure access to what the official
described as a document issued by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court authorizing surveillance
of Mr. Trump and his associates.
If and when such a document is made public - assuming it exists of course - it would be Trump,
once again, that gets the last laugh.
"... The F.B.I. director, James B. Comey, asked the Justice Department this weekend to publicly reject President Trump's assertion that President Barack Obama ordered the tapping of Mr. Trump's phones, senior American officials said on Sunday. Mr. Comey has argued that the highly charged claim is false and must be corrected, they said, but the department has not released any such statement. ..."
"... The White House showed no indication that it would back down from Mr. Trump's claims. On Sunday, the president demanded a congressional inquiry into whether Mr. Obama had abused the power of federal law enforcement agencies before the 2016 presidential election. In a statement from his spokesman, Mr. Trump called "reports" about the wiretapping "very troubling" and said that Congress should examine them as part of its investigations into Russia's meddling in the election. ..."
"... Mr. Comey's behind-the-scenes maneuvering is certain to invite contrasts to his actions last year, when he spoke publicly about the Hillary Clinton email case and disregarded Justice Department entreaties not to. ..."
"... In his demand for a congressional inquiry, the president, through his press secretary, Sean Spicer, issued a statement on Sunday that said, "President Donald J. Trump is requesting that as part of their investigation into Russian activity, the congressional intelligence committees exercise their oversight authority to determine whether executive branch investigative powers were abused in 2016." ..."
"... Senior law enforcement and intelligence officials who worked in the Obama administration have said there were no secret intelligence warrants regarding Mr. Trump. Asked whether such a warrant existed, James R. Clapper Jr., a former director of national intelligence, said on NBC's "Meet the Press" program, "Not to my knowledge, no. ..."
The F.B.I. director, James B. Comey, asked the Justice Department this weekend to
publicly reject President Trump's assertion that President Barack Obama ordered the tapping of Mr.
Trump's phones, senior American officials said on Sunday. Mr. Comey has argued that the highly charged
claim is false and must be corrected, they said, but the department has not released any such statement.
Mr. Comey, who made the request on Saturday after Mr. Trump leveled his allegation on Twitter,
has been working to get the Justice Department to knock down the claim because it falsely insinuates
that the F.B.I. broke the law, the officials said.
A spokesman for the F.B.I. declined to comment. Sarah Isgur Flores, the spokeswoman for the Justice
Department, also declined to comment.
Mr. Comey's request is a remarkable rebuke of a sitting president, putting the nation's top law
enforcement official in the position of questioning Mr. Trump's truthfulness. The confrontation between
the two is the most serious consequence of Mr. Trump's weekend Twitter outburst, and it underscores
the dangers of what the president and his aides have unleashed by accusing the former president of
a conspiracy to undermine Mr. Trump's young administration.
The White House showed no indication that it would back down from Mr. Trump's claims. On Sunday,
the president demanded a congressional inquiry into whether Mr. Obama had abused the power of federal
law enforcement agencies before the 2016 presidential election. In a statement from his spokesman,
Mr. Trump called "reports" about the wiretapping "very troubling" and said that Congress should examine
them as part of its investigations into Russia's meddling in the election.
Along with concerns about potential attacks on the bureau's credibility, senior F.B.I. officials
are said to be worried that the notion of a court-approved wiretap will raise the public's expectations
that the federal authorities have significant evidence implicating the Trump campaign in colluding
with Russia's efforts to disrupt the presidential election.
One problem Mr. Comey has faced is that there are few senior politically appointed officials at
the Justice Department who can make the decision to release a statement, the officials said. Attorney
General Jeff Sessions recused himself on Thursday from all matters related to the federal investigation
into connections between Mr. Trump, his associates and Russia.
Mr. Comey's behind-the-scenes maneuvering is certain to invite contrasts to his actions last
year, when he spoke publicly about the Hillary Clinton email case and disregarded Justice Department
entreaties not to.
It is not clear why Mr. Comey did not issue the statement himself. He is the most senior law enforcement
official who was kept on the job as the Obama administration gave way to the Trump administration.
And while the Justice Department applies for intelligence-gathering warrants, the F.B.I. keeps its
own set of records and is in position to know whether Mr. Trump's claims are true. While intelligence
officials do not normally discuss the existence or nonexistence of surveillance warrants, no law
prevents Mr. Comey from issuing the statement.
In his demand for a congressional inquiry, the president, through his press secretary, Sean
Spicer, issued a statement on Sunday that said, "President Donald J. Trump is requesting that as
part of their investigation into Russian activity, the congressional intelligence committees exercise
their oversight authority to determine whether executive branch investigative powers were abused
in 2016."
... ... ...
On Sunday, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the deputy White House press secretary, said the president
was determined to find out what had really happened, calling it potentially the "greatest abuse of
power" that the country has ever seen.
"Look, I think he's going off of information that he's seen that has led him to believe that this
is a very real potential," Ms. Sanders said on ABC's "This Week" program. "And if it is, this is
the greatest overreach and the greatest abuse of power that I think we have ever seen and a huge
attack on democracy itself. And the American people have a right to know if this took place."
... ... ...
Senior law enforcement and intelligence officials who worked in the Obama administration have
said there were no secret intelligence warrants regarding Mr. Trump. Asked whether such a warrant
existed, James R. Clapper Jr., a former director of national intelligence, said on NBC's "Meet the
Press" program, "Not to my knowledge, no."
"... Moments ago, Barack Obama through his spokesman Kevin Lewis denied Trump's accusation that he had ordered the Trump Tower wiretapped, saying neither he nor any member of the Obama White House, " ever ordered surveillance on any U.S. citizen. Any suggestion otherwise is simply false ." ..."
"... Yet while the carefully-worded statement, an exercise in semantics, claims Obama did not himself, or through members of his White House team, order a potential wiretapping, it does not deny an actual wiretapping of Trump (or Trump Tower), which as some have speculated in the past , did in fact take place after a FISA Court granted surveillance of Trump over accusations of Russian interference. It also does not preclude the FBI - which is the entity that would most likely have implemented such a wiretap - from having given the order. ..."
"... The Guardian has learned that the FBI applied for a warrant from the foreign intelligence surveillance (Fisa) court over the summer in order to monitor four members of the Trump team suspected of irregular contacts with Russian officials. ..."
"... For the definitive answer, we suggest Trump ask Comey whether or not his building was being tapped in the days prior to the election. ..."
"... Analyzing Obama's own statements over the years on the illegal wiretappings, one does not come to the conclusion that he can be trusted ..."
"... Of course Obama himself did not give the order It's someone in his administration that would have ordered it, which he commanded over. His wordsmithing is so tiresome. ..."
"... Obama, "The Russians did it" ..."
"... He says of course: "I am not a crook " R. Nixon. Give me a break the dickhead even tapped Angela Merkel's phone and half of Europe. ..."
Moments ago, Barack Obama through his spokesman Kevin Lewis denied Trump's accusation that he had ordered the Trump Tower wiretapped,
saying neither he nor any member of the Obama White House, " ever ordered surveillance on any U.S. citizen. Any suggestion otherwise
is simply false ."
Follows the statement from Kevin Lewis, spokesman to former president Barack Obama
"A cardinal rule of the Obama Administration was that no White House official ever interfered with any independent investigation
led by the Department of Justice. As part of that practice, neither President Obama nor any White House official ever ordered surveillance
on any U.S. citizen. Any suggestion otherwise is simply false."
Yet while the carefully-worded statement, an exercise in semantics, claims Obama did not himself, or through members of his White
House team, order a potential wiretapping, it does not deny an actual wiretapping of Trump (or Trump Tower), which as some have
speculated in the past , did in fact take place after a FISA Court granted surveillance of Trump over accusations of Russian
interference. It also does not preclude the FBI - which is the entity that would most likely have implemented such a wiretap - from
having given the order.
The Guardian has learned that the FBI applied for a warrant from the foreign intelligence surveillance (Fisa) court over the summer
in order to monitor four members of the Trump team suspected of irregular contacts with Russian officials. The Fisa court turned
down the application asking FBI counter-intelligence investigators to narrow its focus. According to one report, the FBI was finally
granted a warrant in October, but that has not been confirmed, and it is not clear whether any warrant led to a full investigation.
For the definitive answer, we suggest Trump ask Comey whether or not his building was being tapped in the days prior to the election.
You have to appreciate the way he puts things out there that cause them to issue carefully worded denials that sound more like
confessions than anything else.
Of course Obama himself did not give the order It's someone in his administration that would have ordered it, which he commanded
over. His wordsmithing is so tiresome.
neither he nor any member of the Obama White House, "ever ordered surveillance on any U.S. citizen. Any suggestion otherwise
is simply false."
Obama has taken credit for ordering the drone strike which killed US citizen Anwar al-Awlaki. Now we are being told that no
surveillance preceded that strike. Obama apparently ordered the strike and a drone was launched blindly into the heavens but it
still managed to find and destroy al-Awlaki entirely by chance.
http://theduran.com/obama-replies-trumps-wiretap-charge/
" This statement is classic Obama. It appears on its face to be clear and complete, but in reality it is nothing of the sort.
.. We are at a very early stage in this matter. There are multiple investigations underway, some launched by the outgoing Obama
administration against the incoming Trump administration, and some launched by the current Trump administration against the preceding
Obama administration. ... Obama's highly legalistic statement today – which reads very much like a defence statement – however
gives a good flavour of the direction some of these inquiries are taking. " ...
" The statement hints than any order to wiretap ... was the work of officials in the Justice Department ... This too is almost
certainly true. However it neglects to say that some of these officials were people whom Obama himself appointed, and who were
therefore part of his administration. "
Or he found out about it when his owners told him to make a statement & provide the msm more distraction from the great things
Trump is already accomplishing in this his 7th week on the job , despite the backstabbing congress, senate, spooks, crisis actors,
paid protestors and moochers.
The fanatics who did this are the the same fanatics who bombed London mass transit during a drill, and conducted the 911 heist
and mass execution during a drill.
Is anyone naive enough to think that Loretta Lynch and Obama were unaware that the Republican candidate for POTUS was being
wiretapped the month before the actual election?
This is Hillary like legal speak where Obozo is trying to keep his neck out of a legal sling. Sorry...Nixon tried that.
"A cardinal rule of the Obama Administration was that no White House official ever interfered with any independent investigation
led by the Department of Justice. As part of that practice, neither President Obama nor any White House official ever ordered
surveillance on any U.S. citizen. Any suggestion otherwise is simply false
When Obama says he did not order the wiretapping, he is probably telling the truth. Obama had no power at all -- he took the position knowing that he was only a cat's paw. He was content to be a facade and he knew it, and so did his wife. He was not smart enough to be a President, but he was egotistical enough to take the position and all the bennies in exchange
for taking orders from his handlers without question.
Does anyone really think he was smart enough to plan all the Middle East attacks for 8 years? Of course not -- the logistical planning for those events were far beyond his intelligence.
For that matter, has anyone seen his Columbia and Harvard transcripts? Of course not -- he was a dummy and a fake and the records would show that.
He was editor of the HLR but has anyone seen a sample of his writing? Of course not -- if it exists at all it is unimpressive.
It is doubtful that the Deep State would allow Obama access to such critical wiretapping. That sort of power is reserved for our tax funded, invisible slavemasters.
Intelligence Agencies Ask Americans to "Trust, Don't Verify" in New Cold War
By Mark Weisbrot
Just as the first casualty of war is said to be the truth, the first casualty of the New Cold War is irony. Our most prominent
journalists seem to have missed the Orwellian irony of Senator John McCain asking Director of National Intelligence (DNI) James
Clapper at Friday's Senate hearings if Julian Assange has any credibility. Assange has maintained that the hacked or leaked emails
of Democratic Party officials did not come from the Russian government, or any other government.
As is well known, Clapper lied to Congress about a serious violation of the constitutional rights of tens of millions of Americans.
This lie is a crime for which he actually could have been prosecuted.
In March 2013, Clapper falsely answered, "No, sir" to the question, "Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions,
or hundreds of millions of Americans?" He later admitted that his answer was untrue.
Clapper lied again in Friday's testimony, saying that Assange was "under indictment" for "a sexual crime." In fact, Assange
has not been indicted for anything, and the government of Sweden has never even charged him with a crime. In reality, he is a
political prisoner, and the United Nations Working Group on arbitrary detention has found that he has been arbitrarily detained
since 2010 by the UK and Sweden, and ordered his release and compensation. He has offered from the beginning of his political
persecution to co-operate with the Swedish authorities in any investigation, and to be interviewed at any time in London. He could
not safely return to Sweden without guarantees that he would not be sent to the US, where he currently faces a high likelihood
of imprisonment (even before any trial) for having published leaked documents that exposed US war crimes and other embarrassments.
For years, neither Sweden nor the UK would agree to that because, it appears, their foreign ministries are collaborating with
the US government to keep him imprisoned.
For anyone on a jury who had to weigh the testimony of Clapper against that of Assange, it would be a no-brainer. Not only
is Clapper a proven and serial liar, but in 10 years of WikiLeaks revelations, Assange has never been shown to have lied about
anything.
That said, it is entirely possible the Russian government was involved in the hacking of emails here, and that Assange and
WikiLeaks would not necessarily be able to identify the original source of the leaks, which is very difficult to do. However,
We the People have yet to be presented with evidence that Russian hacking is what actually happened.
But the media has become so distracted with the festivities at America's new 1950's theme party, hating on Putin and Russia
like there's no tomorrow, that the lack of evidence has become almost irrelevant to the big media conversation. The DNI report
released on Friday, supposedly to provide the public with evidence that the Russian government had indeed hacked emails in order
to influence the US elections, contained no actual evidence that they did so. There was a lot of evidence that Trump was the preferred
candidate of Putin and his government. But we didn't need evidence for this; pure logic would have sufficed. What government wouldn't
favor a candidate who promises better relations with them?
About half of the report was littered with a long rant against Russian-sponsored media, including the television station Russia
Today. Here is another deep irony: the media that swung the election for Trump was not Russian but American, despite the fact
that most of these journalists and editors found the candidate repellent. Trump's huge advantage in free publicity not only won
him the primary, but continued into the general election. It was the US media that made the Comey letter so important, because
the broadcast media used it to displace Trump's scandals, including the allegations of sexual assaults, in the crucial last 11
days when millions of voters made up their minds.
Another irony: The US has been hacking elections (and toppling governments) around the world for more than a century. How many
hundreds of millions of people, from Indonesia to Chile and dozens of countries in between, wish that all the United States did
to their elections was what Russia is accused of doing here in 2016? Of course that is no justification for any foreign intervention
here, but it is part of the current story if we want to understand it. Washington's intervention in Ukraine, for example, helped
push that country into a civil war that became the main cause of the current state of Cold War between the US and Russia....
'The US has been hacking elections (and toppling governments) around the world for more than a century. How many hundreds of millions
of people, from Indonesia to Chile and dozens of countries in between, wish that all the United States did to their elections
was what Russia is accused of doing here in 2016?'
Indeed. However, we may insist (feebly) that
this is NOT something which Great Powers do
to one another.
"The Allied intervention was a multi-national military expedition launched during the Russian Civil War in 1918. The initial
goals were to help the Czechoslovak Legion, secure supplies of munitions and armaments in Russian ports, and re-establish the
Eastern Front. After winning World War I, the Allies militarily backed the anti-Bolshevik White forces in Russia. Allied efforts
were hampered by divided objectives, war-weariness after they just finished greater conflict, and a lack of domestic support.
These factors, together with the evacuation of the Czechoslovak Legion, compelled the Allies to withdraw from North Russia and
Siberia in 1920, though Japanese forces occupied parts of Siberia until 1922 and the northern half of Sakhalin until 1925.[3]"
"... "And so, it's been light-years since that report on Iraq WMD has been done and there has been tremendous further development, I think, of our analytic capabilities as well as our intelligence-collecting capabilities," Brennan said. ..."
Outgoing CIA Director John Brennan said Tuesday that those who doubt the connection between
Russia and the hacking of Democratic Party email accounts, leading up to November's election,
should take a look at the forthcoming intelligence report "before they make those
judgments."
President-elect Donald Trump, among others, has questioned the
assessment that Russia is behind the hacking, citing past intelligence community mistakes,
including the finding of no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
"In the aftermath of that, there was a total review of the review process and the analytic
process and the assessments that are done with the intelligence community with a number of
steps that were taken to ensure that we're going to be as accurate as possible," said Brennan
in an exit interview with PBS NewsHour co-anchor Judy Woodruff.
"And so, it's been light-years since that report on Iraq WMD has been done and there has
been tremendous further development, I think, of our analytic capabilities as well as our
intelligence-collecting capabilities," Brennan said.
"I would suggest to individuals that have not yet seen the report, who have not yet been
briefed on it, that they wait and see what it is that the intelligence community is putting
forward before they make those judgments," he said.
A joint
FBI-Department of Homeland Security report released on Dec. 29 has linked
Russian intelligence services to the hacking of the Democratic National Committee and
Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman John Podesta. President
Barack Obama has requested an additional report from the intelligence community.
"... The use of the term, however, rather naďvely implies that it is possible for a government agency to not be politicized. A non -political government agency, it is assumed, acts without regard to how its actions and claims affect its political standing among powerful interests in Washington. Such an agency has never existed. ..."
"... Indeed, when a government agency relies on taxpayer funding, Congressional lawmaking, and White House politics to sustain itself, it is absurd to expect that agency to somehow remain not "politicized." That is, it's a logical impossibility to think it possible to set up a government agency that relies on government policymakers to sustain it, and then think the agency in question will not attempt to influence or curry favor with those policymakers. ..."
"... Does the organization depend on taxpayer funding for a substantial amount of its budget? ..."
"... Does the organization engage in what would be illegal activities were it not for protective government legislation? ..."
Anonymous leakers at the CIA continue to make claims about Russia and the 2016 election. In response to demands to provide evidence,
the CIA has declined to offer any, refusing to meet with Congressional intelligence committees, and refusing to issue any documents
offering evidence. Instead, the CIA, communicating via leaks, simply says the equivalent of "trust us."
Not troubled by the lack of evidence, many in the media and in the Democratic party have been repeating unsubstantiated CIA claims
as fact.
Of course, as
I've noted before , the history of CIA intelligence is largely a history of missing the forest for the trees. Sometimes, the
failures have been spectacular.
One of the questions that immediately arises in the media in situations like these, however, is "
has the CIA been politicized ?"
When used in this way, the term "politicized" means that the CIA is involved in helping or hurting specific political factions
(e,g., specific ideological groups, pressure groups, or presidential administrations) in order to strengthen the CIA's financial
or political standing.
All Government Agencies Are Politicized
The use of the term, however, rather
naďvely implies that it is possible for a government agency to not be politicized. A non -political government agency, it is
assumed, acts without regard to how its actions and claims affect its political standing among powerful interests in Washington.
Such an agency has never existed.
Indeed, when a government agency relies on taxpayer funding, Congressional lawmaking, and White House politics to sustain
itself, it is absurd to expect that agency to somehow remain not "politicized." That is, it's a logical impossibility to think it
possible to set up a government agency that relies on government policymakers to sustain it, and then think the agency in question
will not attempt to influence or curry favor with those policymakers.
This idea might seem plausible to school children in junior-high-school civics classes, but not to anyone who lives in the real
world.
In fact, if we wish to ascertain whether or not an institution or organization is "politicized" we can simply ask ourselves a
few questions:
Does the organization depend on a legal monopoly to accomplish its mission? That is, does the organization benefit from a
government prohibition on other organizations - especially private-sector ones - doing the same thing?
Does the organization depend on taxpayer funding for a substantial amount of its budget?
Was the organization created by government legislation?
Are senior officials appointed by government policymakers (i.e., the President)?
Does the organization engage in what would be illegal activities were it not for protective government legislation?
If the answer to any of these questions is "yes" then you are probably dealing with a politicized organization. If the answer
to all of these questions is "yes" - as is the case with the CIA - then you're definitely dealing with a very politicized organization.
(Other "non-political" organizations that fall well within this criteria as well include so-called "private" organizations such as
the Federal Reserve System and Fannie Mae.)
So, it has always been foolish to ask ourselves if the CIA is "politicized" since the answer is obviously "yes" for anyone who
is paying attention.
Nevertheless, the myth that the CIA and agencies like it can be non-political continues to endure, although in many cases, the
charge has produced numerous helpful historical analysis of just how politicized the CIA has been in practice.
Recent Narratives on CIA Politicization
Stories of CIA politicization take at least two forms: One type consists of anti-CIA writers attempting to illustrate how the
CIA acts to manipulate political actors to achieve its own political ends. The other type consists of pro-CIA writers attempting
to cast the CIA as an innocent victim of manipulation by senior Washington officials.
Of course, it doesn't matter whether the provenance of CIA politicking comes from within the agency or outside it. In both cases,
the fact remains that the Agency is a tool for political actors to deceive, manipulate, and attack political enemies.
With CIA leaks apparently attempting to call the integrity of the 2016 election into question, the CIA is once again being accused
of politicization. Consequently, articles in the
Washington
Times , the
Daily Caller , and
The Intercept all question the CIA's motivation and present numerous examples of the Agency's history of deception.
The current controversy is hardly the first time the Agency has been accused of being political, and during the build up to the
Iraq invasion in 2003, for example, the CIA worked with the Bush Administration to essentially manufacture "intelligence."
In his book Failure of Intelligence , Melvin Allan Goodman writes:
Three years after the invasion of Iraq, a senior CIA analyst, Paul Pillar, documented the efforts of the Bush administration
to politicize the intelligence of the CIA on Iraqi WMD and so-called links between Iraq and al Qaeda. Pillar accused the Bush
administration of using policy to drive intelligence production, which was the same argument offered by the chief of British intelligence
in the Downing Street memorandum prior to the war, and aggressively using intelligence to win public support for the decision
to go to war....Pillar does not explain why no senior CIA official protested, let alone resigned in the wake of the president's
misuse of intelligence on Iraq's so-called efforts to obtain uranium ore in Africa. Pillar falsely claimed "for the most part,
the intelligence community's own substantive judgments do not appear to have been compromised," when it was clear that the CIA
wa wrong on every conclusion and had to politicize the intelligence to be so egregiously wrong."
Since then, CIA officials have attempted to rehabilitate the agency by claiming the agency was the hapless victim of the Administration.
But, as Goodman notes, we heard no protests from the Agency when such protests would have actually mattered, and the fact is the
Agency was easily used for political ends. Whether or not some agents wanted to participate in assisting the Bush administration
with trumping up evidence against Iraq remains irrelevant. The fact remains the CIA did it.
Moreover, according to documents compiled by John Prados
at the George Washington University , "The U.S. intelligence community buckled sooner in 2002 than previously reported" and that
"Under the circumstances, it is difficult to avoid the impression that the CIA and other intelligence agencies defended themselves
against the dangers of attack from the Bush administration through a process of self-censorship. That is the very essence of politicization
in intelligence."
In other words, to protect its own budgets and privileges, the CIA reacted quickly to shape its intelligence to meet the political
goals of others.
Journalist Robert Parry has also
attempted to go the CIA-as-victim
route in his own writings. In an article written before the Iraq War debacle, Parry looks at how the Agency was used by both
Reagan and Clinton, and claims that what is arguably of the CIA's biggest analytical errors - repeatedly overstating the economic
strength of the Soviet Union - was the result of pressure applied to the Agency by the Reagan administration. (Parry may be mistaken
here, as the CIA
was
wrong about the Soviet economy long before the Reagan Administration .)
While attempting to defend the CIA, however, Parry is merely providing a list of the many ways in which the CIA serves to manufacture
false information that are useful for political officials.
In this essay for the Center for
International Policy, Goodman further lists many examples of politicization and concludes "Throughout the CIA's 60-year history,
there have been many efforts to slant analytical conclusions, skew estimates, and repress evidence that challenged a particular policy
or point of view. As a result, the agency must recognize the impact of politicization and introduce barriers to protect analysts
from political pressures. Unfortunately, the CIA has largely ignored the problem."
It is difficult to ascertain whether past intelligence failures were due to pressure form the administration or whether they originated
from within the Agency itself. Nevertheless, the intelligence failures are numerous, including:
The CIA was wrong about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.
The fact that politicization occurs might help explain some of these failures, but simply claiming "politicization" doesn't erase
the legacy of failure, and it hardly serves as an argument in favor of allowing the CIA to continue to
command huge budgets and essentially
function unsupervised. Regardless of fanciful claims of non-political professionalism, it is undeniable that, as an agency of the
US government, the CIA is a political institution.
The only type of organization that is not politicized is a private-sector organization under a relatively laissez-faire regime.
Heavily regulated private industries and all government agencies are politicized by nature because they depend heavily on active
assistance from political actors to sustain themselves.
It should be assumed that politicized organizations seek to influence policymakers, and thus all the actions and claims of these
organization should be treated with skepticism and a recognition that these organizations benefit from further taxation and expanded
government powers inflicted on ordinary taxpayers and other productive members of society outside the privileged circles of Washington,
DC.
Perimetr -> Chupacabra-322 •Dec 23, 2016 11:34 AM
Is the CIA politicized?
...Is the pope catholic?
How many more presidents does the CIA have to kill to answer your question?
Oldwood -> DownWithYogaPants •Dec 23, 2016 11:26 AM
How could the CIA NOT be politicized? They collect "intelligence" and use it to influence policy makers without ANY accountability
and no real proof. The CIA operates on CONJECTURE that is completely subjective to bias and agenda. Is that ANYTHING BUT political?
TeaClipper's picture -> TeaClipper •Dec 23, 2016 11:24 AM
The CIA was not wrong about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, it lied about them. That is a very big distinction.
Old Poor Richard •Dec 23, 2016 12:13 PM
The question is whether the CIA is puppeteer and not the puppet.
The Snowden report, jam packed with provably false scurrilous accusations, demonstrates that not only is the US intelligence
community entirely lacking in credibility, but that they believe themselves so powerful that they can indefinitely get away with
baldfaced lies.
The thing is, the deep state can only keep up the charade when they completely control the narrative, the way China does. Hence
the attacks on the first amendment that are accelerating as fast as the attacks on the second amendment. Majority of Americans
don't believe the Russian hacking hoax and it make the CIA increasingly hysterical.
DarthVaderMentor •Dec 23, 2016 12:33 PM
The CIA has been politicized. In fact, all the way down to the COS level, and in concert with the State Department. Brennan and
Moran are nothing but Clinton surrogates.
In one embassy in a country where IEDs keep blowing up, there were millions of taxpayer dollars spent and continue to be spent
in "safe spaces" and "comfort food and liquor" inside an embassy (taking away space from the US Marine Giuards for it) to let
"Democrat snowflakes" in senior embassy and CIA positions recover from the Trump elections.
The real reaon for the loss of the Phillipines as an ally may eventually come out that a gay senior embassy official made a
pass at the President of the country. Just like it happened with the gay ambassador in the Dominican Republic.
That Libral You Hate •Dec 23, 2016 12:41 PM
I would say the simple answer to the question asked in the headline of this article is "yes" but it is important to actually understand
the nuance of the langer answer.
The critical nuance is that: politics didn't conquor the CIA, but rather the CIA injected itself into politics. I.e. the CIA
aren't political stooges, but act political because they have injected political stooges into politics and they have to act political
to protect them to protect their interests. Thus while the answer is "yes" the question is phrased wrong as: "Has the CIA Been
Politicized," the appropriate question is "Has politics been co-opted by the CIA"
insanelysane •Dec 23, 2016 12:50 PM
The first post is spot on except the CIA was in Southeast Asia stirring stuff up to get us into a war. War is big business.
The entire reason for Vietnam was "If Vietnam falls the commies will be marching down Main Street USA afterwards."
Well we fucking lost Vietnam and the commies still aren't marching down Main Street and yet the assessment is still being peddled
by the Corporation.
Kennedy was killed because, even though he was fucking totally drugged up, he still saw Vietnam for what it was.
The Corporation gave Johnson and offer he couldn't refuse, take the keys to the kingdom, just keep "fighting" in Vietnam. I
say fighting because we were just fucking around there. No one in charge wanted to risk winning the war.
And here we are today, 23rd, December, 2016, "fighting" in the Middle East and the Corporation not willing to risk winning
the war. Just need to keep it hot enough for the weapons and ammunition to be used in a nice steady pace to keep business going.
Fox Business News discusses a potential investigation involving CIA Director John Brennan over whether
he leaked information about the Russian hacking investigation to the media
John Brennan takes his cues directly from Barack Obama, which means the entire CIA, Russian hack
investigation, was initiated and conducted under Obama's direct order.
The Russian hack, media spin, has been and remains a political play. National security has very
little to do with it.
Beverly,
=== quote ===
Just the fact that Trump has now said he thinks the CIA's cyber forensics team is the same group that tries to determine the
nuclear capacity of other countries is itself scary–and revealing. He doesn't recognize and obvious distinctions even about
incredibly important things, doesn't understand the concept of expertise, and can't distinguish between important and unimportant
things.
=== end of quote ===
Two points:
1. After Iraq WMD false claim CIA as agency had lost a large part of its credibility, because it is clear that it had succumbed
to political pressure and became just a pocket tool in the dirty neocon political games. At this time the pressure was from
neocons in Bush administration. Don't you think that it is possible that this is the case now too ?
2. It's not the job of CIA to determine who and how hacked DNC computers or any other computers in the USA. CIA mandate
is limited to foreign intelligence and intelligence aggregation and analysis. It is job of FBI and NSA, especially the latter,
as only NSA has technical means to trace from where really the attack had come, if it was an attack.
So any CIA involvement here is slightly suspect and might point to some internal conflicts within Obama administration.
It is unclear why Obama had chosen CIA Also as CIA and State Department are closely linked as CIA operatives usually use diplomatic
cover that request looks a little bit disingenuous as Hillary used to work for State Department. In this case one of the explanation
might be that it can be attributed to the desire to create a smoke screen and shield Clintons from pressure by rank-and-file
Hillary supporter (and donors) to explain the devastating defeat in electoral college votes against rather weak, really amateur
opponent.
" BARACK OBAMA, WITH THE COOPERATION OF SOME IN THE INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY, ARE TRYING TO DISCREDIT TRUMP BEFORE THE ELECTION"
Notable quotes:
"... The whole "blame Russia" movement to account for Hillary's unexpected failure to win the Presidency got a new shot in the arm with today's announcement that Obama ordered: ..."
"... The stupidity of this is profound. If this review leads to the "discovery" that Russia is carrying out espionage activities in the United States then we have passed the threshold of learning that there is gambling in a casino. ..."
"... The real irony in all of this is that Wikileaks, thanks to the hack of the DNC and John Podesta emails, exposed the reality of Democrats working surreptitiously to tamper with and manipulate the election. Here are the highlights from that leak: ..."
"... Best approach is to slaughter Donald for his bromance with Putin, but not go too far betting on Putin re Syria. ..."
"... Blaming Russia for Hillary's flame out is absurd. The Russians did not create and lie about Hillary's server. They did not force her to back the multilateral trade agreements, such as NAFTA and TPP. They didn't set up the Clinton Foundation as a cash cow for the Clinton family. They did not force her to advocate imposing a No Fly Zone in Syria and having been a cheerleader for past wars, including Iraq and Libya. Vladimir Putin did not slip her a mickey and cause her to pass out at the 9-11 memorial, which fueled concerns about her health. And they did not infect her lungs and cause her to have extended coughing jags. They did not cause her to call Americans deplorables. They did not make her say that the coal industry should be shutdown. With that kind of record, coupled with her shrieking, screechy voice, why are folks surprised that she did not win? ..."
"... So now Democrats and several Republicans are in a lather over the Russians stealing the election for Trump. The list of conspiracy theorists pushing this nonsense include John McCain, Lindsay Graham, Angus King of Maine, Brent Budowsky and Adam Schiff. I defy anyone, to explain to me how Russian meddling gave Trump the win. ..."
"... The realities are this. First, as noted in the Budowsky email, the Clinton campaign came up with the idea of accusing Trump of being a stooge of Russia. They thought they'd get political bang out of that. They didn't. ..."
"... Second, the hack of the DNC emails confirmed that the suspicions of many that the DNC and Hillary were collaborating to screw over Bernie and rig the election. That was not fake news. Cold, unwelcomed truth. That's when this drum beat about the big, bad Russians started meddling in our election started. Why? To distract attention away from the ugly reality that the DNC and Hillary were cheating. ..."
"... The subsequent Wikileaks avalanche of Podesta emails reinforced as fact the existing suspicion that the media was in the bag for Hillary. ..."
"... I would recommend you assemble a short reading list of everything surrounding President Kennedy's full acceptance of responsibility after the Bay of Pigs, beginning with the substance and tone of his unequivocal taking of responsibility and ending with his huge rise in the polls, to nearly 90% favorable ratings, after he did this. ..."
"... And then I would suggest she plan the equivalent and take full, absolute and unequivocal responsibility for making a mistake with the private emails and give an honest, direct, explanation of the reasons I believe she used those private emails. . . . ..."
"... Give Budowsky credit for one thing, if Hillary had followed his advice she might have won the election. But she was too busy exploiting the rules of a rigged game and trying to smear Trump as a Russian agent while failing to exercise genuine, sincere personal responsibility. ..."
"... Barack Obama appears to be actively working to discredit the Trump election and has enlisted the intelligence community in the effort. How else to explain this disconnect? Yesterday, as noted above, Obama directed the intelligence community to: ..."
"... I heard from a knowledgeable friend in September that Hillary's campaign was pressing the Obama White House to lean on the intel community and put something out blaming her woes on the Russians. That led to the October statement. And now we have the CIA via a SECRET report (that is leaked to the public) insisting that Trump's victory came because of the Russians. ..."
"... This is a damn lie. The CIA is now allowing itself to be used once again for blatant political purposes. The politicization became a real problem under Bush. Let's not forget that these are the same cats who insisted it was a slam dunk that were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. The same group who missed the rise of ISIS. ..."
"... Also worth reminding ourselves that the head of the ironically titled "Intelligence Community" is a proven liar. Jim Clapper lied to the Senate about the NSA spying on Americans three years ago (December 2013) : ..."
"... "Congressional oversight depends on truthful testimony – witnesses cannot be allowed to lie to Congress," wrote representatives James Sensenbrenner, Darrell Issa, Trent Franks, Raul Labrador, Ted Poe, Trey Gowdy and Blake Farenthold, citing "Director Clapper's willful lie under oath." ..."
"... There is a consistent pattern in the Obama Administration of lying to the American people, especially when it comes to National Security matters. The NSA is not an isolated case. We also have Benghazi, Syria and Libya as other examples of not telling the truth and misrepresenting facts. ..."
"... In my lifetime, going on 60 years, I have never seen such a display of incompetence as is being manifested by Barack Obama and mental midgets that surround him. ..."
"... What they can say for sure is that the DNC and Podesta emails were hacked. Those hacked emails were passed to WIKILEAKS. Those emails were then released to the public. What the intel community will be hard pressed to prove is that the Russian Government conceived of and directed such a campaign. This is the true information operation to meddle in the U.S. election, but that isn't Russia. That's Obama. ..."
UPDATE–PLEASE SEE BELOW. BOTTOMLINE, BARACK OBAMA, WITH THE COOPERATION OF SOME IN THE INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY, ARE TRYING
TO DISCREDIT TRUMP BEFORE THE ELECTION.
Let me stipulate up front that both the United States and Russia engage in
covert and clandestine information
operations. It is called espionage. It is but one aspect of the broader intelligence activity also known as spying. Time for all
you snowflakes in America to grow up and get a grip and deal with with reality. If the respective intelligence organizations in either
country are not doing this they are guilty of malpractice and should be dismantled.
There are two basic types of espionage activity–Covert refers to an operation that is undetected while in progress, but the outcome
may be easily observed. Killing Bin Laden is a prime example of a "covert" operation. A Clandestine Operation is something that is
supposed to be undetected while in progress and after completion. For example, if the U.S. or Russia had a mole at the top of the
National Security bureaucracy of their respective adversary, communicating with that mole and the mole's very existence would be
clandestine.
So, the alleged Russian meddling in our election–was it covert or clandestine?
The whole "blame Russia" movement to account for Hillary's unexpected failure to win the Presidency got a new shot in the
arm with today's announcement that
Obama ordered:
a full review into hacking by the Russians designed to influence the 2016 election, White House Homeland Security and Counterterrorism
Adviser Lisa Monaco said Friday.
The stupidity of this is profound. If this review leads to the "discovery" that Russia is carrying out espionage activities
in the United States then we have passed the threshold of learning that there is gambling in a casino.
The real irony in all of this is that Wikileaks, thanks to the hack of the DNC and John Podesta emails, exposed the reality
of Democrats working surreptitiously to tamper with and manipulate the election. Here are the highlights from that leak:
DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz Calls Sanders Campaign Manager Jeff Weaver an "A–" and a "Liar"
In May the Nevada Democratic State Convention became rowdy and got out of hand in a fight over delegate allocation. When Weaver
went on CNN and denied any claims violence had happened, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, once she was notified of the exchange, wrote
"Damn liar. Particularly scummy that he never acknowledges the violent and threatening behavior that occurred."
Highlighting Sanders' Faith
One email shows that a DNC official contemplated highlighting Sanders' alleged atheism - even though he has said he is not an
atheist - during the primaries as a possibility to undermine support among voters.
"It may make no difference but for KY and WA can we get someone to ask his belief," Brad Marshall, CFO of the DNC, wrote
in an email on May 5, 2016. "He had skated on having a Jewish heritage. I read he is an atheist. This could make several points
difference with my peeps. My Southern Baptist peeps would draw a big difference between a Jew and an atheist."
Building a Narrative Against Sanders
"Wondering if there's a good Bernie narrative for a story which is that Bernie never ever had his act together, that his campaign
was a mess," DNC National Secretary Mark Paustenbach wrote in an email to National Communications Director Luis Miranda on May 21.
After detailing ways in which the Sanders camp was disorganized, Paustenbach concludes, "It's not a DNC conspiracy it's because they
never had their act together."
The release provides further evidence the DNC broke its own charter violations by favoring Clinton as the Democratic presidential
nominee, long before any votes were cast.
It was the Clinton spokesman, Robbie Mook, who launched the claim on July 24, 2016 that these leaks were done by the Russians
in order to help Trump:
The source of the leak has not been revealed, though Hillary Clinton's campaign manager, Robby Mook, said on ABC News' "This Week
With George Stephanopoulos" on Sunday that he believes the Russians were instrumental in it.
"Experts are telling us that Russian state actors broke into the DNC, took all these emails and now are leaking them out through
these websites," Mook said Sunday. "It's troubling that some experts are now telling us that this was done by the Russians for the
purpose of helping Donald Trump."
The Clinton campaign started planning to smear Trump as a Putin stooge as early as December 2015. The Podesta emails showed clearly
that the Clinton campaign decided early on to clobber Trump for his "bromance" with Putin. It was Brent Buwdosky almost one year
ago (December 21, 2015) who proposed going after
Trump with the Russian card in an email to Podesta:
Putin did not agree to anything about removing Assad and continues to bomb the people we support. We pushed the same position
in 2012 (Geneva 1, which HRC knows all about) and Geneva 2 in 2014. Odds that Putin agrees to remove Assad are only slightly better
than the odds the College of Cardinals chooses me to someday succeed Pope Francis. Best approach is to slaughter Donald for his
bromance with Putin, but not go too far betting on Putin re Syria.
Going after Trump as a Russian stooge was in the Clinton playbook long before Trump won a primary. One the wedge issues for Clinton
with respect to Trump was Syria. Trump took a strong stand (which many thought would hurt him with Republicans) in declaring we should
not be trying to get rid of Assad and that America should cooperate with the Russians in fighting the Islamists. Clinton, by contrast,
called for imposing a No Fly Zone that would have risked a direct confrontation with Russia.
Blaming Russia for Hillary's flame out is absurd. The Russians did not create and lie about Hillary's server. They did not
force her to back the multilateral trade agreements, such as NAFTA and TPP. They didn't set up the Clinton Foundation as a cash cow
for the Clinton family. They did not force her to advocate imposing a No Fly Zone in Syria and having been a cheerleader for past
wars, including Iraq and Libya. Vladimir Putin did not slip her a mickey and cause her to pass out at the 9-11 memorial, which fueled
concerns about her health. And they did not infect her lungs and cause her to have extended coughing jags. They did not cause her
to call Americans deplorables. They did not make her say that the coal industry should be shutdown. With that kind of record, coupled
with her shrieking, screechy voice, why are folks surprised that she did not win?
So now Democrats and several Republicans are in a lather over the Russians stealing the election for Trump. The list of conspiracy
theorists pushing this nonsense include John McCain, Lindsay Graham, Angus King of Maine, Brent Budowsky and Adam Schiff. I defy
anyone, to explain to me how Russian meddling gave Trump the win.
The realities are this. First, as noted in the Budowsky email, the Clinton campaign came up with the idea of accusing Trump
of being a stooge of Russia. They thought they'd get political bang out of that. They didn't.
Second, the hack of the DNC emails confirmed that the suspicions of many that the DNC and Hillary were collaborating to screw
over Bernie and rig the election. That was not fake news. Cold, unwelcomed truth. That's when this drum beat about the big, bad Russians
started meddling in our election started. Why? To distract attention away from the ugly reality that the DNC and Hillary were cheating.
The subsequent Wikileaks avalanche of Podesta emails reinforced as fact the existing suspicion that the media was in the bag
for Hillary. But no amount of media help and foreign money could transform Hillary into a likeable candidate. She was dreadful
on the campaign trail and terrible at talking to the average American. Even her boy, Brent Budowsky, reluctantly acknowledged this
in an email to John Podesta on Wednesday, August 26,
2015 :
While I have been warning for some time about the dangers facing the Clinton campaign, aggressively in privately, tactfully in
columns, during this latest stage I have been publicly defending her with no-holds barred, and here is my advice based on the reaction
I have been receiving and the dangers I see coming to fruition.
I would recommend you assemble a short reading list of everything surrounding President Kennedy's full acceptance of responsibility
after the Bay of Pigs, beginning with the substance and tone of his unequivocal taking of responsibility and ending with his huge
rise in the polls, to nearly 90% favorable ratings, after he did this.
And then I would suggest she plan the equivalent and take full, absolute and unequivocal responsibility for making a mistake
with the private emails and give an honest, direct, explanation of the reasons I believe she used those private emails. . . .
She could say she was right anticipating this, but wrong in overreacting by trying to shield her private emails, and she takes
full responsibility for this, and apologizes to her supporters and everyone else, and now she has turned over all information, it
will ultimately be seen that there no egregious wrongs committed.
She needs to stop talking like a lawyer parsing legalistic words and a potential defendant expecting a future indictment, which
is how she often looks and sounds to many voters today. Instead, she should take full responsibility for a mistake with no equivocation,
and segue into the role of a populist prosecutor against a corrupted politics that Americans already detest ..and make a direct attack
against the Donald Trump politics of daily insults and defamations and intolerance against whichever individuals and groups he tries
to bully on a given day, and while defending some Republican candidates against his attacks, she should deplore their being intimidated
by his insults and offering pastel versions of the intolerance he peddles.
In other words, she should stop acting like a front-runner who cautiously tries to exploit the rules of a rigged game to her advantage,
and start acting like a fighting underdog who will fight on behalf of Americans who want a higher standard of living for themselves,
a higher standard of politics for the nation, and a higher level of economic opportunity and social justice for everyone.
Like JFK after the Bay of Pigs, the more responsibility she takes now the more she will succeed going forward.
Give Budowsky credit for one thing, if Hillary had followed his advice she might have won the election. But she was too busy
exploiting the rules of a rigged game and trying to smear Trump as a Russian agent while failing to exercise genuine, sincere personal
responsibility.
UPDATE –This is an extremely dangerous time now. Barack Obama appears to be actively working to discredit the Trump
election and has enlisted the intelligence community in the effort. How else to explain this disconnect? Yesterday, as noted above,
Obama directed the intelligence community to:
"conduct a full review of what happened during the 2016 election process. It is to capture lessons learned from that and
to report to a range of stakeholders," she said at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast with reporters. "This is consistent with
the work that we did over the summer to engage Congress on the threats that we were seeing."
The CIA has concluded in a secret assessment that Russia intervened in the 2016 election to help Donald Trump win the presidency,
rather than just to undermine confidence in the U.S. electoral system, according to officials briefed on the matter.
Why do you order a review if the CIA has already made a factual determination? In fact, we were told in October that the whole
damn intelligence community determined the Russians did it.
USA Today reported this in October :
The
fact-checking website Politifact says Hillary Clinton is correct when she says 17 federal intelligence agencies have concluded
that Russia is behind the hacking.
"We have 17, 17 intelligence agencies, civilian and military who have all concluded that these espionage attacks, these cyber
attacks, come from the highest levels of the Kremlin. And they are designed to influence our election. I find that deeply disturbing,"
Clinton said during
Wednesday's presidential debate in Las Vegas .
Trump pushed back, saying that Clinton and the United States had "no idea whether it is Russia, China or anybody else."
But Clinton is correct. On Oct. 7, the Department of Homeland Security and Office of the Director of National Intelligence
issued
a joint statement on behalf of the U.S. Intelligence Community. The USIC is
made up of 16 agencies , in
addition to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
I heard from a knowledgeable friend in September that Hillary's campaign was pressing the Obama White House to lean on the
intel community and put something out blaming her woes on the Russians. That led to the October statement. And now we have the CIA
via a SECRET report (that is leaked to the public) insisting that Trump's victory came because of the Russians.
This is a damn lie. The CIA is now allowing itself to be used once again for blatant political purposes. The politicization
became a real problem under Bush. Let's not forget that these are the same cats who insisted it was a slam dunk that were weapons
of mass destruction in Iraq. The same group who missed the rise of ISIS.
"The ability of ISIL to not just mass inside of Syria, but then to initiate major land offensives that took Mosul, for example,
that was not on my intelligence radar screen," Obama told Zakaria, using the administration's term for the Islamic State terror group.
In a letter issued the day after a White House surveillance review placed new political pressure on the National Security Agency,
the seven members of the House judiciary committee said that James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, ought to face
consequences for untruthfully telling the Senate that the NSA was "not wittingly" collecting data on Americans.
"Congressional oversight depends on truthful testimony – witnesses cannot be allowed to lie to Congress," wrote representatives
James Sensenbrenner, Darrell Issa, Trent Franks, Raul Labrador, Ted Poe, Trey Gowdy and Blake Farenthold, citing "Director Clapper's
willful lie under oath."
There is a consistent pattern in the Obama Administration of lying to the American people, especially when it comes to National
Security matters. The NSA is not an isolated case. We also have Benghazi, Syria and Libya as other examples of not telling the truth
and misrepresenting facts.
In my lifetime, going on 60 years, I have never seen such a display of incompetence as is being manifested by Barack Obama
and mental midgets that surround him.
What they can say for sure is that the DNC and Podesta emails were hacked. Those hacked emails were passed to WIKILEAKS. Those
emails were then released to the public. What the intel community will be hard pressed to prove is that the Russian Government conceived
of and directed such a campaign. This is the true information operation to meddle in the U.S. election, but that isn't Russia. That's
Obama.
Larry C. Johnson is a former analyst at the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, who moved subsequently in 1989 to the U.S.
Department of State, where he served four years as the deputy director for transportation security, antiterrorism assistance training,
and special operations in the State Department's Office of Counterterrorism. He left government service in October 1993 and set up
a consulting business. He currently is the co-owner and CEO of BERG Associates, LLC (Business Exposure Reduction Group) and is an
expert in the fields of terrorism, aviation security, and crisis and risk management, and money laundering investigations. Johnson
is the founder and main author of No Quarter, a weblog that addresses issues of terrorism and intelligence and politics. NoQuarterUSA
was nominated as Best Political Blog of 2008.
"... There is no Russian involvement in the leaks of emails showing Clinton's corruption. Yet this rubbish has been the lead today in the Washington Post in the US and the Guardian here, and was the lead item on the BBC main news. I suspect it is leading the American broadcasts also. ..."
I have watched incredulous as the CIA's blatant lie has grown and grown as a media story – blatant
because the CIA has made no attempt whatsoever to substantiate it.
There is no Russian involvement
in the leaks of emails showing Clinton's corruption. Yet this rubbish has been the lead today in
the Washington Post in the US and the Guardian here, and was the lead item on the BBC main news.
I suspect it is leading the American broadcasts also.
Praetorian Guard Redux. Any nation that embraces secret police will find itself ruled by them in short order.
Notable quotes:
"... Yes, the CIA's sterling reputation around the world for truth-telling and integrity might be sullied if someone doubts their claims... https://t.co/2uyQXvFdOK - Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) December 10, 2016 ..."
"... When is it hardest to get people not to blindly accept anonymous, evidence-free CIA claims? When it's very pleasing to believe them. - Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) December 10, 2016 ..."
"... "...there is no clear evidence - even now," said Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee and a member of the Trump transition team. "There's a lot of innuendo, lots of circumstantial evidence, that's it." ..."
"... "...Obama wants the report before he leaves office Jan. 20, Monaco said. The review will be led by [PROVEN LIAR] James Clapper, the outgoing director of national intelligence, officials said." ..."
"... Aside from its instigation of coups and alliances with right-wing juntas, Washington sought to more subtly influence elections in all corners of the world. And so did Moscow. Political scientist Dov Levin calculates that the "two powers intervened in 117 elections around the world from 1946 to 2000 - an average of once in every nine competitive elections. ..."
"... In the late 1940s, the newly established CIA cut its teeth in Western Europe, pushing back against some of the continent's most influential leftist parties and labor unions. In 1948, the United States propped up Italy's centrist Christian Democrats and helped ensure their electoral victory against a leftist coalition, anchored by one of the most powerful communist parties in Europe. CIA operatives gave millions of dollars to their Italian allies and helped orchestrate what was then an unprecedented, clandestine propaganda campaign : This included forging documents to besmirch communist leaders via fabricated sex scandals, starting a mass letter-writing campaign from Italian Americans to their compatriots, and spreading hysteria about a Russian takeover and the undermining of the Catholic Church. ..."
"... "We had bags of money that we delivered to selected politicians, to defray their political expenses, their campaign expenses, for posters, for pamphlets," recounted F. Mark Wyatt , the CIA officer who handled the mission and later participated in more than 2˝ decades of direct support to the Christian Democrats. ..."
"... This template spread everywhere : CIA operative Edward G. Lansdale, notorious for his efforts to bring down the North Vietnamese government, is said to have run the successful 1953 campaign of Philippines President Ramon Magsaysay. Japan's center-right Liberal Democratic Party was backed with secret American funds through the 1950s and the 1960s. The U.S. government and American oil corporations helped Christian parties in Lebanon win crucial elections in 1957 with briefcases full of cash. ..."
"... In Chile, the United States prevented Allende from winning an election in 1964. "A total of nearly four million dollars was spent on some fifteen covert action projects, ranging from organizing slum dwellers to passing funds to political parties," detailed a Senate inquiry in the mid-1970s that started to expose the role of the CIA in overseas elections. When it couldn't defeat Allende at the ballot box in 1970, Washington decided to remove him anyway. ..."
"... Obama & The Presstitutes: Legalized DOMESTIC Propaganda to American Citizens The National Defense Authorization Act of July 2013 (NDAA) included an amendment that legalized the use of propaganda on the American public. The amendment - originally proposed by Mac Thornberry (R-Texas) and Adam Smith (D-Wash.) and passed – nullified the Smith-Mundt Act of 1948, which explicitly forbids information and psychological operations aimed at influencing U.S. public opinion. The Smith-Mundt Modernization Act of 2012 allowed U.S. propaganda intended to influence foreign audiences to be used on the domestic population. ..."
"... This Russia CIA Program aimed at US Citizens is part of the OBAMA FRAUD to cover the crimes of Clinton et al. The MSM and especially the NYT is the epi-center of "Fake News" ..."
"... Hillary was a big threat to Russia security. Trump was willing to work with Russia. Does anyone really believe Russia has absolutely no part to play in Trump's win? Think again. ..."
"... Thinking is one thing. Proving it is another. And what do you "think" about the CIA and Victoria Nuland's role in toppling the elected government in the Ukraine? ..."
"... After a year of MSM propaganda and lies, you are now obsessed with "fake news" ironically the kind that totally obliterated your propaganda for the lies that they were. ..."
"... Go back to the 1960s. Phillp Graham and his wife rans Wa Post. Phillip got a young girl friend and started going off the reservation saying WaPo was becoming a mouthpiece for the See Eye Ah. He was going to divorce his wife. He then was commited to an insane asylum, released and then killed himself with a shotgun. ..."
"... There have to be good, patriotic Americans within CIA These intelligence reports are obvious fictions: The agitprop of a neocon/zionist Deep State that fully intends to expand the wars, target Iran and Russia, while sending American blood and treasure to pay their bill. ..."
"... Kennedy knew that the CIA was nothing but a group of Useless, Meddling, Lying Assholes, and made it known Publicly. Unfortunately for him, things didn't turn out all that well. "Wetwork" is never in shortage with that crew. ..."
"... Praetorian Guard Redux. Any nation that embraces secret police will find itself ruled by them in short order. ..."
"... Most CIA directors are/were members of the Rockefeller/CFR including: Morell, Petraeus, Hayden, Tenet, Deutch, Woolsey, Gates, Webster, Casey, Turner, Bush, Colby, Schlesinger, Helms, McCone and Allen Dulles. Also every Fed chairman since WW2. See member lists at cfr dot org. ..."
"... The domestic policies of both CFR wings are the same: the maintenance of the American Empire... There is no possibility of [outsiders] capturing power at the top of either party... ..."
Overnight the media propaganda wars escalated after the late Friday release
of an article by the Washington Post (which last week
admitted to using unverified, or fake, news in an attempt to smear other so-called "fake news" sites) according to which a secret
CIA assessment found that Russia sought to tip last month's U.S. presidential election in Donald Trump's favor, a conclusion presented
without any actual evidence, and which drew an extraordinary, and angry rebuke from the president-elect's camp.
"These are the same people that said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction," Trump's transition team said, launching
a broadside against the spy agency. "The election ended a long time ago in one of the biggest Electoral College victories in history.
It's now time to move on and 'Make America Great Again.' "
The Washington Post report comes after outgoing President Barack Obama
ordered a review of all cyberattacks that took place during the 2016 election cycle , amid growing calls from Congress for more
information on the extent of Russian interference in the campaign. The newspaper cited officials briefed on the matter as saying
that individuals with connections to Moscow provided WikiLeaks with email hacked from the Democratic National Committee, Democratic
nominee Hillary Clinton's campaign chief and others.
Without a shred of evidence provided, and despite Wikileaks' own on the record denial that the source of the emails was Russian,
the WaPo attack piece claims the email messages were steadily leaked out via WikiLeaks in the months before the election, damaging
Clinton's White House run. Essentially, according to the WaPo, the Russians' aim was to help Donald Trump win and not just undermine
the U.S. electoral process, hinting at a counter-Hillary intent on the side of Putin.
"It is the assessment of the intelligence community that Russia's goal here was to favor one candidate over the other, to
help Trump get elected," the newspaper quoted a senior U.S. official briefed on an intelligence presentation last week to key
senators as saying. " That's the consensus view."
CIA agents told the lawmakers it was "quite clear" - although it was not reported exactly what made it "clear" - that electing
Trump was Russia's goal, according to officials who spoke to the Post, citing growing evidence from multiple sources.
And yet, key questions remain unanswered, and the CIA's report fell short of being a formal U.S. assessment produced by all 17
intelligence agencies the newspaper said, for two reasons. As we reported in November "
The "Fact" That 17 Intelligence Agencies Confirmed Russia is Behind the Email Hacks Isn't Actually A "Fact ", and then also because
aside from so-called "consensus", there is - once again - no evidence, otherwise the appropriate agencies would have long since released
it, and this is nothing more than another propaganda attempt to build tension with Russia. In fact, the WaPo admits as much in the
following text, which effectively destroys the article's entire argument :
The CIA presentation to senators about Russia's intentions fell short of a formal U.S. assessment produced by all 17 intelligence
agencies. A senior U.S. official said there were minor disagreements among intelligence officials about the agency's assessment,
in part because some questions remain unanswered.
For example, intelligence agencies do not have specific intelligence showing officials in the Kremlin "directing" the identified
individuals to pass the Democratic emails to WikiLeaks, a second senior U.S. official said. Those actors, according to the official,
were "one step" removed from the Russian government, rather than government employees. Moscow has in the past used middlemen to
participate in sensitive intelligence operations so it has plausible deniability.
* * *
"I'll be the first one to come out and point at Russia if there's clear evidence, but there is no clear evidence - even now,"
said Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee and a member of the Trump transition team.
"There's a lot of innuendo, lots of circumstantial evidence, that's it."
And since even the WaPo is forced to admit that intelligence agents don't have the proof that Russian officials directed the identified
individuals to supply WikiLeaks with the hacked Democratic emails, the best it can do is speculate based on circumstantial inferences,
especially since, as noted above, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has
denied links with Russia's government
, putting the burden of proof on the side of those who challenge the Wikileaks narrative. So far that proof has not been provided.
Nonetheless, at the White House, Deputy Press Secretary Eric Schultz said Obama called for the cyberattacks review earlier this
week to ensure "the integrity of our elections."
"This report will dig into this pattern of malicious cyberactivity timed to our elections, take stock of our defensive capabilities
and capture lessons learned to make sure that we brief members of Congress and stakeholders as appropriate," Schultz said.
Taking the absurdity to a whole new level, Obama wants the report completed before his term ends on January 20, by none other
than a proven and confirmed liar : " The review will be led by James Clapper, the outgoing director of national intelligence, officials
said. " In other words, the report that the Kremlin stole the election should be prepared by the time Trump is expected to be sworn
in.
"We are going to make public as much as we can," the spokesman added. "This is a major priority for the president."
The move comes after Democrats in Congress pressed the White House to reveal details, to Congress or to the public, of Russian
hacking and disinformation in the election.
On Oct. 7, one month before the election, the Department of Homeland Security and the Director of National Intelligence announced
that "the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of emails from U.S. persons and institutions, including from U.S. political
organizations." "These thefts and disclosures are intended to interfere with the U.S. election process," they said.
Trump dismissed those findings in an interview published Wednesday by Time magazine for its "Person of the Year" award. Asked
if the intelligence was politicized, Trump answered: "I think so."
"I don't believe they interfered," he said. "It could be Russia. And it could be China. And it could be some guy in his home in
New Jersey."
Worried that Trump will sweep the issue under the rug after his inauguration, seven Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee
called on Nov. 29 for the White House to declassify what it knows about Russian interference. The seven have already been briefed
on the classified details, suggesting they believe there is more information the public should know. On Tuesday this week, leading
House Democrats called on Obama to give members of the entire Congress a classified briefing on Russian interference, from hacking
to the spreading of fake news stories to mislead U.S. voters.
Republicans in Congress have also promised hearings into Russian activities once the new administration comes in.
Obama's homeland security adviser Lisa Monaco said the cyberinterference goes back to the 2008 presidential race, when both the
Obama and John McCain campaigns were hit by malicious computer intrusions.
* * *
An interesting aside to emerge from last night's hit piece and the Trump team response is that there is now a full blown turf
war between Trump and the CIA, as NBC's Chuck Todd observed in a series of late Friday tweets:
The implication in the Trump transition statement is that he doesn't believe a single thing from the CIA
To which Glenn Greenwald provided the best counterargument:
Yes, the CIA's sterling reputation around the world for truth-telling and integrity might be sullied if someone doubts
their claims...https://t.co/2uyQXvFdOK - Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald)
December 10, 2016
When is it hardest to get people not to blindly accept anonymous, evidence-free CIA claims? When it's very pleasing to
believe them. - Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald)
December 10, 2016
However, of the mini Tweetstorm, this was the most important aspect: the veiled suggestion that in addition to Russia, both the
FBI and the Obama presidency prevented Hillary from becoming the next US president...
While Obama's FBI director smeared Hillary, Obama sat on evidence of Russian efforts to elect Trump that had basis in evidence.
... which in light of these stunning new unproven and baseless allegations, she may very well have renewed aspirations toward.
* * *
So while there is no "there" there following the WaPo's latest attempt to fan the rarging fires of evidence-free propaganda, or
as the WaPo itself would say "fake news", here is why the story has dramatic implications. First, the only two quotes which matter:
"...there is no clear evidence - even now," said Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee
and a member of the Trump transition team. "There's a lot of innuendo, lots of circumstantial evidence, that's it."
* * *
"...Obama wants the report before he leaves office Jan. 20, Monaco said. The review will be led by [PROVEN LIAR] James
Clapper, the outgoing director of national intelligence, officials said."
And then the summary:
Announce "consensus" (not unanimous) "conclusion" based in circumstantial evidence now, before the Electoral College vote,
then write a report with actual details due by Jan 20.
Put a proven liar in charge of writing the report on Russian hacking.
Fail to mention that not one of the leaked DNC or Podesta emails has been shown to be inauthentic. So the supposed Russian
hacking simply revealed truth about Hillary, DNC, and MSM collusion and corruption.
Fail to mention that if hacking was done by or for US government to stop Hillary, blaming the Russians would be the most likely
disinformation used by US agencies.
Expect every pro-Hillary lapdog journalist - which is virtually all of them - in America will hyperventilate (Twitter is currently
on fire) about this latest fact-free, anti-Trump political stunt for the next nine days.
Or, as a reader put it, this is a soft coup attempt by leaders of Intel community and Obama Admin to influence the Electoral College
vote, similar to the 1960s novel " Seven Days in May
."
Once again it's a case of "watch the shiny object"... The "secret CIA report" seems to focus on who leaked the documents to Wikileaks
and not the content of those documents... The left have not refuted that the emails are real, just who leaked them to Assange...
Fuck 'em, if they keep Trump from the white house there will be revolution...
"Aside from its instigation of coups and alliances with right-wing juntas, Washington sought to more subtly influence elections
in all corners of the world. And so did Moscow. Political scientist
Dov Levin calculates that the "two powers intervened in 117 elections around the world from 1946 to 2000 - an average of once
in every nine competitive elections."
In the late 1940s, the newly established CIA cut its teeth in Western Europe, pushing back against some of the continent's
most influential leftist parties and labor unions. In 1948, the United States propped up Italy's centrist Christian Democrats
and helped ensure their electoral victory against a leftist coalition, anchored by one of the most powerful communist parties
in Europe. CIA operatives gave millions of dollars
to their Italian allies and helped orchestrate what was then
an unprecedented, clandestine propaganda campaign
: This included forging documents to besmirch communist leaders via fabricated sex scandals, starting a mass letter-writing
campaign from Italian Americans to their compatriots, and spreading hysteria about a Russian takeover and the undermining of the
Catholic Church.
"We had bags of money that we delivered to selected politicians, to defray their political expenses, their campaign expenses,
for posters, for pamphlets," recounted F. Mark Wyatt
, the CIA officer who handled the mission and later participated in more than 2˝ decades of direct support to the Christian
Democrats.
This
template spread everywhere : CIA operative Edward G. Lansdale, notorious for his efforts to bring down the North Vietnamese
government, is said to have run the successful 1953 campaign of Philippines President Ramon Magsaysay. Japan's center-right Liberal
Democratic Party was backed with secret American funds through the 1950s and the 1960s. The U.S. government and American oil corporations
helped Christian parties in Lebanon win crucial elections in 1957 with briefcases full of cash.
In Chile, the United States prevented Allende from winning an election in 1964. "A total of nearly four million dollars
was spent on some fifteen covert action projects, ranging from organizing slum dwellers to passing funds to political parties,"
detailed a Senate
inquiry in the mid-1970s that started to expose the role of the CIA in overseas elections. When it couldn't defeat Allende at
the ballot box in 1970, Washington decided to remove him anyway."
A US Official has claimed the Russians are out to get Merkel in a cyber campaign.
A CIA probe confirms Moscow helped Trump win the election.
"In both cases, said the official, Mr. Putin's campaigns in both Europe and the US are intended to disrupt and discredit the
Western concept of democracy by promoting extremist candidates, parties, and political figures."
Both WAPO , & C.TODD would NOT be missed. Per Todd: "How helpful is it for the CIA's reputation around the world if the next US
questions their findings so publicly?"
Todd is concerned about The CIA's "Reputation" ?????? AS IF its current rep is wonderful??? - TODD: There is no "reputation"
to damage!!! Lame brain !!
17 intelligence agencies? Is this some dystopian record?
"There's a lot of innuendo, lots of circumstantial evidence, that's it."
So these 'intelligence' agencies are in the same boat as the pizzgate crowd. The main difference is after failing to produce
any actionable evidence the pizzagate crowd will loose interest and move on. We still have to give the bureaucrats at these intelligence
agencies a paycheck next month.
Russians are training the illegals in secret camps in the Sierra Madre mountains before they are released into the US. I was there
and saw it. Bigfoot was guarding the entrance.
Obama & The Presstitutes: Legalized DOMESTIC Propaganda to American Citizens The National Defense Authorization Act of July
2013 (NDAA) included an amendment that legalized the use of propaganda on the American public. The amendment - originally proposed
by Mac Thornberry (R-Texas) and Adam Smith (D-Wash.) and passed – nullified the Smith-Mundt Act of 1948, which explicitly forbids
information and psychological operations aimed at influencing U.S. public opinion. The Smith-Mundt Modernization Act of 2012 allowed
U.S. propaganda intended to influence foreign audiences to be used on the domestic population.
Signed by .. Obama. This Act formalized systems in place covertly or ad hoc for some time.
Hillary was a big threat to Russia security. Trump was willing to work with Russia. Does anyone really believe Russia has
absolutely no part to play in Trump's win? Think again. They should and I think they did! Whether it was an illegal intervention
would be another question.
Thinking is one thing. Proving it is another. And what do you "think" about the CIA and Victoria Nuland's role in toppling
the elected government in the Ukraine? How about NATO expansion for decades under Clinton, Bush and Obama? Aren't these DIRECT
THREATS against Putin and Russia? Yes, they most certainly are. Fuck the CIA They do far more harm than good for the people in
the USA.
Hillary was a threat to life on Earth. She made it clear her intent was to wage war against Russia (and probably China). Obviously
the US has been conducting cyberwarfare, psyops and propaganda against Russia, as this has been documented in the past. Russia's
response may merely have been presenting authentic information via RT/Sputnik/etc. and putting clips of Putin online where he
sounds like a rational human being. In other words, they may be guilty of nothing more than providing Americans with the truth,
much as America did with the Soviets.
That was exactly what this brought to mind for me - a John F Kennedy moment, but not his assassination. I was thinking of an earlier
time well before this., ie, Nikita Krushev banging the table at the UN with his shoe. The state of the nation - people were in
a panic because Russia let it be known it was about to bring nuclear missiles into Cuba. It was a ploy by the Russians and Krushev
to de-escalate the tensions between the two countries over our attempt to take out Castro and the Bay of Pigs Invasion.
Fade to today. Why would the Russians care who won the presidency? Hillary the war monger or the Donald, the negotiator? Ahh,
maybe because we just brought into Turkey then consequently moved fifty nuclear missiles into position along Russia's border?
Who authorized and ordered that? Would that be any cause for worry by Russia or its citizenry? Is that or is it not total insanity?
Total fuckery? Obama and Hillary have put us four minutes away from a worldwide nuclear holocaust and now they are trying to make
Trump look like he was in bed with Putin. I don't know what Trump is but I do know he and Putin are the only two people on the
same wavelength right now, thank the electoral college.
You are delusional, dishonest, ignrorant, and proud of it. Fortunately, YOU LOST.
After a year of MSM propaganda and lies, you are now obsessed with "fake news" ironically the kind that totally obliterated
your propaganda for the lies that they were.
After a year of cackling laughter when every two bit dictator and NWO globalist bad mouthed Trump, like a child, you are OUTRAGED
that Russia might have not wanted Hillary to take power and make war against it. At least Russia didn't PUBLICALLY attempt to
influence an American election LIKE HILLARY'S NWO GOONS DID FROM THEIR EXECUTIVE OFFICES.
The popular vote: Ignoring fraud, which was proven in the Michigan recount, Hillary supporters are trying to make hay out of
her garnering 2.6 million more votes than Trump. Besides the fact that this is irrelevant in a campaign for the electoral college,
2.6 million votes is only somewhere @0.7% of the US population. That's hardly a mandate, especially when we consider she only
had that dubious edge over Trump, not the entire playing field. There were other candidate you know.
I'm sorry, I forgot, YOU LOST, and you think you can spoil our good time with the assertion that the better candidate was Hillary.
LOL, losers.
Trump is a wildcard, we all knew that when we voted for him.
Hillary is a witchcard and we all knew what she would do.
Bernie wasn't even a choice, Hillary had him as a straw man opponent.
Rand Paul to me was the best choice but establishment didn't want him, Gay media wanted Trump because they thought Hillary
could beat him and many of the Ron Paulers still butthurt over him endorsing Romney. Never mind Ron Paul didn't even put up a
fight when they robbed him of the nomination he won.
Go back to the 1960s. Phillp Graham and his wife rans Wa Post. Phillip got a young girl friend and started going off the reservation
saying WaPo was becoming a mouthpiece for the See Eye Ah. He was going to divorce his wife. He then was commited to an insane
asylum, released and then killed himself with a shotgun.
Phil's wife was the daughter of Eugene Meyer who ran The Fed.
Watergate was not what you were told. Nixon wanted tariffs and the Rockefellers (who myguess started the CIA - David was an
OSS officer in WW2) got mad at their boy Nixon. Nixon hated George Bush and did not trust him. All the info the Wa Post got on
Nixon was C**IIA info to Ben Bradley, editor of Wa Post, probably from George Bush. All of Nixons,relatively minor, dirt was passed
from See EYE Ah to Wa Post. Woodward and Bernstein just typed it up.
Bradley was brther in law to Cord Meyer (operation mockingbird). Cord's wife (Mary Pinchot-Meyer) had an ongoing affair with
JFK. After he was killed, she was gonna spill the beans like Marilyn Monroe. She was killed taking a walk. Ben BRadley and the
See EYE Ah rush to her apartment to get her diary.
the CIA has been arming Al Qaeda and (likely) 'ISIS'.
It is very probable US forces will be killed by these weapons.
Add to that the small issue of the hundreds of thousands of people, Christian and non-Salafist/non-Wahhabi Muslims murdered
by the Islamopsycho and Acadami etc. private western mercs.
There have to be good, patriotic Americans within CIA These intelligence reports are obvious fictions: The agitprop of
a neocon/zionist Deep State that fully intends to expand the wars, target Iran and Russia, while sending American blood and treasure
to pay their bill.
And now they are going to try to overturn an election in which Clinton not only lost by the rules of our system, but in which
Clinton's 'popular vote' win was the product of illegal immigrant and other fraudulent voting.
all of which means they are also willing to risk civil war.
Kennedy knew that the CIA was nothing but a group of Useless, Meddling, Lying Assholes, and made it known Publicly. Unfortunately
for him, things didn't turn out all that well. "Wetwork" is never in shortage with that crew.
Most CIA directors are/were members of the Rockefeller/CFR including: Morell, Petraeus, Hayden, Tenet, Deutch, Woolsey, Gates,
Webster, Casey, Turner, Bush, Colby, Schlesinger, Helms, McCone and Allen Dulles. Also every Fed chairman since WW2. See member
lists at cfr dot org.
"I have discussed Council on Foreign Relations Team A vs. Team B for 35 years. I have seen two anti-CFR people get through
the [presidential] screening... The domestic policies of both CFR wings are the same: the maintenance of the American Empire...
There is no possibility of [outsiders] capturing power at the top of either party..."
"... The White House is standing by Brennan, citing President Obama's "great confidence" in his leadership. But at least two members of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Democrats Mark Udall of Colorado and Martin Heinrich of New Mexico, are calling for his resignation. ..."
The White House is standing by Brennan, citing President Obama's "great confidence" in his leadership. But at least two
members of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Democrats Mark Udall of Colorado and Martin Heinrich of New Mexico, are calling for
his resignation.
The Last but not LeastTechnology is dominated by
two types of people: those who understand what they do not manage and those who manage what they do not understand ~Archibald Putt.
Ph.D
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Bill
Priestap was the Director of the FBI national security division and would have gone to the London CIA "office" for
a meeting. There he would have met with Stefan Halper and Gina Haspel who was, at the time, head of the London CIA
office and would have been in charge of the connections with Robert Hannigan (British GCHQ) and John Brennan who
planned and executed the wiretapping of Trump Team at Trump Towers. Haspel's communications, when released, will
reveal the full scope of the CIA led international attack on the 2016 presidential election.
Death Of Russiagate: Mueller Team Tied To Mifsud's Network
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