May 17, 2018

"If so, this is bigger than Watergate!"


ADDED: Here's the Andrew McCarthy article, "Did the FBI Have a Spy in the Trump Campaign?" — published 5 days ago.

188 comments:

rhhardin said...

Watergate was nothing, blown up in the press.

Psota said...

Before this is over we are going to hear that FBI/CIA/ETC. spied on the Romney campaign, not to mention other GOP politicians

Seeing Red said...

He's pushing them. Good.

FIDO said...

I don't know if he is pushing them as much as not letting the FBI or the Media sweep this under the rug as is their normal wont.

The Democratization of Information via Social Media has not been a friend to Democrats, Media or Feminists. People can compare the bullshit and stories which these groups would love to squelch...can't be.

Fox is the least of their problems.

traditionalguy said...

Today that nice man is cutting out their living guts. Tomorrow he greases the treads of his tanks with them. What a show. It's like PT Barnum with a Military Intelligence Division rolling into The Fourth Reich.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

Before Chuck shows up I want to point out that Obama literally laid a wire to Trump tower himself. Literally. Wiretapped.

n.n said...

Watergate was nothing

A couple of low-level misguided actors.

He's pushing them. Good.

A reverse-Watergate. Deep Plunger is working the "deep state", the DNC, and the press into a frenzy, fast and furious-style.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

Spying is wrong when “they” do it.

DKWalser said...

Watergate may have been 'nothing' as you say. If so, that makes it easier for Obama's decision to spy on Trump to be a bigger deal.

However, even if you don't try to diminish Watergate, the current controversy is justifiably a bigger deal. In Watergate, members of Nixon's campaign attempted to spy on the rival campaign. He then tried, without much success, to use government resources, to cover up the spying. In the current situation, Obama used resources of the FBI, CIA, DOJ, and State Department to spy on the other party's campaign! Ever since, they've been using government resources to try to cover up what they did. That's a very big deal.

Michael K said...

Yes, I read that column and have been reading Andy McCarthy's columns on this for months.

Kim Strassel has been on this too, which is why the leftists attack her. There is much speculation about the identity.

Michael Fitzgerald said...

Much bigger than Watergate. Scumbag Obama should be executed, as should drunk deranged Hillary. Start arresting traitors and Democrats, and Make America Great Again! God bless America, and God bless Donald Trump.

Oso Negro said...

And still, that part of the country that votes for Democrats doesn’t much care. Trump is mean. He should be guilty of something.

Achilles said...

Funny how everything I said was going to happen is happening.

The meltdowns will be good today.

FIDO said...

So, just a question: if the FBI is destroyed, who replaces what they do?

At some point, the Praetorian Guard was more of a problem than a solution, so I get that sometimes it is necessary.

Is the FBI at that point?

We are far beyond "publically flogging Comey, McCabe, Strozk and Paige" I want the show trials. I want them sent to Alaska in a concrete cell. If they get shanked...well, that is the FINAL reason why law enforcement should be beyond reproach.

But what to do about the rest of the FBI.

I like a tense atmosphere of suspicion and a total removal of union protections. Let all the Friends of Comey realize that they are hanging by a thread constantly. Lots of reshuffling.

Anyone else?

Bay Area Guy said...

I fully understand what Obama's DOJ (Lynch) and CIA (Brennan) TRIED to do to push Hillary across the finish line in the 2016 election.

But I take great joy and comfort in knowing that they failed miserably. I am sympathetic to Flynn and Manafort, who are being railroaded, but sadly there are casualties whenever someone declares war on you.

Memo to any Obama loyalists embedded in the federal agencies: we have our eyes on you for 2020. My suggestion would be to sit this one out.

Myiq2xu said...

There is no possible way that Obama was not informed. Even Hoover wasn't crazy enough to do something like that.

Achilles said...

What Obama did was treason and sedition.

In a just world a person who tried to turn the United States into a police state would be executed.

I remember people admonishing me for pointing this out.

I am accepting apologies.

Michael K said...

What is particularly interesting is why all the uproar and hysteria. Trump seems to have stepped into a scene that was already set for Hillary.

I wonder why ? How much do the various financial scandals play a role. Why the $150 billion to Iran, for example?

The 1MDB scandal is huge and Bill and Hillary have many connections to Indonesia.

According to lawsuits filed last week by the United States Department of Justice (DoJ), at least $3.5bn has been stolen from 1MDB. The purpose of the fund, which was set up by Malaysia’s prime minister, Najib Razak, in 2009, was to promote economic development in a country where the median income stands at approximately £300 per month. Instead, the DoJ alleged that stolen money from 1MDB found its way to numerous associates of Prime Minister Najib, who subsequently went on a lavish spending spree across the world. It also accused Najib of receiving $681m of cash from 1MDB – a claim he denied. Money from 1MDB, the US also claimed, helped to purchase luxury apartments in Manhattan, mansions in Los Angeles, paintings by Monet, a corporate jet, and even financed a major Hollywood movie.

The Clintons have to be in there somewhere and Trump stepped on their turf, so to speak.

Amadeus 48 said...

So what's wrong with a little police activity against an obvious crook like Trump, right? And Romney--he's too rich and good-looking to be honest, right? And McCain--he's psycho ever since the North Vietnamese got their hooks (literally) into him. And the Trump/Romney/McCain families are all obvious mob princes and princesses--just look at them. And they are all too stupid and naive not to be taken in by shifty foreigners.

Yep, the CIA and the FBI were just doing their jobs--standing strong for America, and keeping an eye on the bad guys. They should all get medals.

Achilles said...

FIDO said...
“So, just a question: if the FBI is destroyed, who replaces what they do?”

They don’t follow up tips on terrorists or school shooters.

So what exactly is it that they do?

Michael Fitzgerald said...

Still pre-missing Obama?

FIDO said...

They should all get medals.

At least .223 worth.

DanTheMan said...

>>They should all get medals.

The most likely outcome.

Beloved Commenter AReasonableMan said...

If Trump says its bigger than Watergate, then I believe him. He should know.

Nonapod said...

I'm happy that the truth is slowly coming out.

But it is very sad (but unsurprising) that our intelligence apparatus was so clearly politicized and weaponized. And it's also sad (and also unsurprising) that they're were so incompetent.

It's also sad that it's highly unlikely that many of the main architects of this travesty will never see the inside of a jail cell. Rule of Law may be nothing more than a shared delusion, but it was a comforting one.

Big Mike said...

I was an adult when Watergate took place. Yes, this is bigger, and worse, than Watergate. If the FBI and CIA had helped cover up Watergate, as Nixon asked them to, then the two scandals would be comparable. But once upon a time, 45 years ago, the FBI and the intelligence community still had some vestiges of integrity. Since the 1990s, not so much.

Amadeus 48 said...

FIDO--the FBI should return to its normal historical duties of investigating and preparing cases where there is probable cause that a federal crime has been committed (recognizing however, that there are too many federal crimes). They have always been lousy at counter-intelligence because they don't know when to start and when to stop. They are too subject to renegade senior officials who are out for themselves and confuse their careers with the public good. (see Hoover, Felt, Hanssen, Connolly (who protected Whitey Bulger), McCabe, Comey, Mueller, etc.).

The CIA is worse. They failed to forecast or observe the collapse of the Soviet Union. Wasn't that our major adversary? Shouldn't the CIA have had some insight into what was going on in the USSR?

Maybe they are sufficiently humiliated that they'll start over under Haspel--but I doubt it.

buwaya said...

Well, of course it is bigger than Watergate.
Back then it was a very few individuals unofficially implicated.

Now it is entire government bureaucracies implicated, the entire Federal government, and vast numbers of individuals and non-government institutions as well, including foreign powers (the British government for one).

The entire city of Washington, its suburbs, much of NYC, the rich parts of California - this is not simply a political scandal, this is a series of social-cultural acts of conflict overruling both letter and spirit of your laws and social system. It is a complete breakdown.

narciso said...



The answer is mark rich and glencore:


https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.forbes.com/sites/richardminiter/2016/04/17/why-did-congo-offer-clinton-650000-for-two-pics-and-a-speech/amp/

Inga...Allie Oop said...

Good lord, you people have whipped yourselves up into a frenzy. Mass hysteria over conspiracy theories, this is truly sad to see. If there were to have been a FBI plant in the Trump campaign, I’d say hoorah. They most likely had very good reason to put him/ her there in the first place. Conspiring with a foreign power to affect our election is no small matter.

traditionalguy said...

FBI is still useful as a PR created myth of an Agency of straight arrows who are honest and honorable Dudley Do-Rights. When the big corruption needs covering up in DC, the FBI grabs up the evidence calling it an investigation as they alter and destroy it.

How else could a JFK assasination with 7 shooters be completely covered up? The FBI is a sine qua non to the system.

Yancey Ward said...

I think that the truth is going to be worse than an "embedded spy". If this spy is Stefan Halper, and he does fit all the leaked details of this unnamed person, then here is going to be the true story- every single piece of evidence for Russian meddling that is tied to Papadopoulos is false and implanted by agents that were, ultimately, working on Hillary Clinton's behalf- every single piece of it.

Halper is connected to Steele and Joseph Mifsud (the London professor who first approached Papadopoulos). Halper also was the person who introduced Papadopoulos to Alexander Downer, the Australian diplomat to whom Papadopoulos supposedly drunkenly told about Russians having Clinton e-mails. In addition, Halper later invited Papadopoulos back to London and tried once again to elicit some sort of conversation about Clinton e-mails, and likely tried the same sort of thing with Carter Page that same month (September 2016).

Considering Veselnyskaya's connection to Glenn Simpson of Fusion GPS, it is all but certain that the Trump Tower meeting with Kushner, Manafort, and Trump Jr. was another attempt to plant evidence of collusion.

This is the reason the DoJ has fought so hard to keep Halper under wraps- he is the person who connects it all together as a conspiracy to entrap certain members of the Trump Campaign, and it all started in the month it was clear that Trump was likely to win the nomination.

Molly said...

(Eaglebeak)

One suggestion for the spy/operative/whatever is Stefan Halper, now in Britain, former CIA, 100% Bush man.

Obama and John Brennan not looking too good right now. Awaiting with interest the publication of the IG's report.

Drago said...

Michael K: "Yes, I read that column and have been reading Andy McCarthy's columns on this for months.

Kim Strassel has been on this too, which is why the leftists attack her."

Funny you should mention that.

You know who else is attacking Kim Strassel for daring to report honestly on this in addition to the lefties?

If you guessed LLR Chuck, you would absolutely be correct.

Leftists and LLR Chuck. On the same page. Again.

Unexpectedly.

Yancey Ward said...

What do you want to wager that Halper knows Rob Goldstone who first approached Donald Trump Jr. about the Trump Tower meeting?

Amadeus 48 said...

By the way, I am somewhat encouraged by the way that Wray cleaned house at the top of the FBI. The whole Comey HQ senior team walked the plank. The key moment was Wray read the House Intelligence Committee report on Sunday and told McCabe not to come to work on Monday.

Brian said...

Sometimes I wonder if the confidence the Hillary campaign (and by extension the media) was due to the information they were getting from the Trump campaign through such spying.

I'm not saying Hillary had a set of earphones on listening to conversations, but like in a game of telephone information filters out.

It's been said that Trump knew he was going to win, but I'm not buying it. He listens to too much traditional media who were all saying he was going to lose. I don't think Trump was too worried with losing. The man can make victories out of failures after all, and has done it throughout his career. With Hillary as president we'd have TrumpTV right now.

If you read any of the books on the campaign, the only ones that seemed sure that Trump was going to was the unknown digital media guy, Brad Parscale, and possibly Jared Kushner (who as interfacing with Brad). Even Kelly Anne seemed to be hedging her bets that they would win in one radio interview I heard the day before the campaign. I think the Trump campaign knew they COULD win, but was unlikely to breach the blue wall.

The media then fed on the "its a sure thing" from the Clinton campaign. Obama did as well with his Late night Top Ten. Communications inside the Trump campaign leaking out through secret sources would only have reinforced their feelings.

Given that they were secret it was unlikely that counterfactural evidence would have leaked out. Evidence that the digital media campaign was working better than expected, or concerns about rally size and the like would be buttressed by the "secret" good news.

Sometimes cheating is sub-optimal strategy.

Gahrie said...

Good lord, you people have whipped yourselves up into a frenzy. Mass hysteria over conspiracy theories, this is truly sad to see.

The complete lack of self awareness and projection would be stunning if it wasn't so predictable.

Seeing Red said...

McCain passed the dossier on, didn't he?

Gahrie said...

Conspiring with a foreign power to affect our election is no small matter.

It was for Ted Kennedy.

Mike Sylwester said...

It seems to me that the spy was Stefan Halper, who initiated information-seeking contacts with George Papadopoulos and Carter Page.

Halper seems to work for both MI-6 and the CIA.

It seems to me that the CIA's Trump-hating John Brennan asked MI-6 to use Halper to entrap Papadopoulos and Page -- so that Brenner could keep CIA's hands relatively clean.

It seems that CIA pays Halper through make-work contracts managed by the US Department of Defense's Office of Net Assessments (ONA).

In 2016, ONA paid Halper $282,295.

In 2017, ONA paid Halper $129,280.

The American Thinker has published an article by Clarice Feldman titled ...

The Office of Net Assessment paid Stefan Halper...why?

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2018/05/the_office_of_national_assessment_paid_stefan_halper__why.html#ixzz5FmECzV3N

The US Intelligence Community is trying to prevent the US Congress from obtaining any information about Halper's role in the RussiaGate hoax.

FIDO said...

Conspiring with a foreign power to affect our election is no small matter.

By the way, how IS John Kerry doing these days...?

Big Mike said...

Mass hysteria over conspiracy theories, ...

Except it’s not just a theory when it’s true.

Yancey Ward said...

The narrative here was important enough for Glenn Simpson to try to make it public that the counterintelligence operation had an inside source- it was also important enough for Dianne Feinstein to leak the transcript of that testimony at what appears to be Simpson's prodding. It makes it sound like the entire investigation was based on this inside source.

However, if Halper is the source, then he wasn't embedded in the Trump Campaign, and his connections with all the other players make it far more likely that he was implanting information that dirtied up certain Trump Campaign operatives. I think it pretty obvious that the goal was to use these lower level employees to entice the inner circle of the Trump Campaign to reach out for "Russian information on Clinton", but Page and Papadopoulos didn't have those kinds of connections or pull and the operation failed. But the conspirators tried also with Trump Jr., and that paid off to some extent- they actually managed to get a meeting, and were likely hoping that Trump Jr. or Kushner would offer to pay for information, but they also didn't take the bait and cut the meeting short when it became clear the attendees didn't have anything to offer.

Amadeus 48 said...

"Conspiring with a foreign power to affect our election is no small matter."

Yeah--why did the Hillary campaign do it? Where did Steele get his gossip? RUSSIAN INTELLIGENCE--there was conspiring with a foreign power alright, but the FBI and the Hillary campaign were doing it.

tim in vermont said...

BTW, they do literally use “taps” at the NSA.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiber_tapping

https://www.viavisolutions.com/en-us/products/observer-taps-optical

Jupiter said...

Big Mike said...
"But once upon a time, 45 years ago, the FBI and the intelligence community still had some vestiges of integrity."

You seem to have forgotten that Deep Throat was the number two lying weasel at the FBI. Hoover was a reeking pit of corruption, and everyone who worked for him knew it. It has always taken a strong stomach to work at the FBI. But the pay's good.

tim in vermont said...

”Conspiring with a foreign power to affect our election is no small matter."

You mean like getting wiretaps on one’s opponents from fellow “Five Eyes” country, the UK?

tim in vermont said...

The complete lack of self awareness and projection would be stunning if it wasn’t so predictable.

It’s like weapons-grade confirmation bias, I didn’t even have to look to know you were talking about Inga, who cuts and pastes and posts stuff she is clearly unable to understand, as she did yesterday, then blamed CBS for saying something really stupid that she never noticed.

tim in vermont said...

It’t the seriousness of the charge... Evidence will be fabricated later.

Michael K said...

Inga weighs in with the usual vapid comment.

I agree it is probably Halper and Brennan was his agent runner.

However, if Halper is the source, then he wasn't embedded in the Trump Campaign, and his connections with all the other players make it far more likely that he was implanting information that dirtied up certain Trump Campaign operatives. I think it pretty obvious that the goal was to use these lower level employees

Yes, this was a disinformation op plus they wanted to gin up something that could be prosecuted.

I also agree they assumed Trump would lose (as I did) and this was to punish him for sticking his head up when there was live fire.

Jupiter said...

"But the conspirators tried also with Trump Jr., and that paid off to some extent- they actually managed to get a meeting, and were likely hoping that Trump Jr. or Kushner would offer to pay for information, but they also didn't take the bait and cut the meeting short when it became clear the attendees didn't have anything to offer."

Let's not forget that Hillary Clinton's minions did, in fact, pay huge amounts for information they hoped would be damaging to Trump. They bribed at least one FBI agent to leak it to the press, by contributing half a million dollars to his wife's political campaign. They then paid "journalists" to publish the leaked lies. Of course, none of that was illegal, nor would it have been illegal for Trump to do the same.

tim in vermont said...

They most likely had very good reason to put him/ her there in the first place.

Of course they did! They wanted to impress the new boss, Hillary!

tim in vermont said...

Maybe it was to figure out why she wasn’t 50 points ahead.

Jupiter said...

Inga said...
"Conspiring with a foreign power to affect our election is no small matter."

Oh, did you just hear about what Ted Kennedy did in the 80's? Shocking, wasn't it. They should have pitched his fat ass in jail. Hell, they should have hung the bastard.

tim in vermont said...

I still think that giving the 750K to ‘Andy’ of “Andy’s Office” fame by McCauliff was one of the high points of this whole farce. Imagine if Trump had given that much money to a “disinterested investigator”!

Achilles said...

Inga said...
Good lord, you people have whipped yourselves up into a frenzy. Mass hysteria over conspiracy theories, this is truly sad to see. If there were to have been a FBI plant in the Trump campaign, I’d say hoorah. They most likely had very good reason to put him/ her there in the first place. Conspiring with a foreign power to affect our election is no small matter.

Obama and Clinton have both been caught conspiring with British and Russian foreign intelligence.

But to a stalinist like Inga it is a "who whom" issue. There is not a shred of proof Trump did what Clinton and Obama have been caught doing. But there is an election to overturn and political opponents to disenfranchise.

Not a shred of integrity or any recognizably decent morals. Going to be fun watching the leadership of your despicable political tribe being marched off to jail.

Of course you could all consummate your little coup. Take Trump out BAMN. Go for it.

tim in vermont said...

Not to mention that Comey DID want to find Hillary culpable with his “Gross Negligence” wording (illegal) which was changed by Clinton fixer Strzok to “Extreme Carelessness.” After those guys figure out how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, maybe they can explain the difference besides “One gets you in trouble with the law, and the other doesn’t.”

tim in vermont said...

Good lord, you people have whipped yourselves up into a frenzy.

Somebody has whipped themselves into a frenzy, that’s for sure. A mirror might give the answer Inga! I think we are mostly just having some fun with the obvious holes in the MSM narrative.

BTW, how did Hillary’s war in Libya work out? Why should Kim in North Korea trust us after what we did? You are upset that she is not President? Still, after all we know?

I forgot, you are the one to brushed off Bill’s actions, because “Monica loved him” while using a pussy hat avatar for months because of Trump’s words.

Michael K said...

Poor Inga. What is she going to do when the OIG report comes out and some of her best buddies are headed for the graybar hotel ?

buwaya said...

It is a world of conspiracies.
It is the only realistic world-view at this level of society.
The game has been going on for a very long time.

Any proper student of history can explain why the overt is only a small part of any such story, the real meat is in the covert.

The famous case of the Ems Telegram (look it up) is one such. A couple of million men marched off to war, knowing just a a tiny bit about why. The rest of the story had to wait, until it was of course a moot point, the secret fraud, the covert purpose, covered over by the glory of the result.

There are a great number of Ems telegrams in history.

Original Mike said...

Blogger Inga said...“Good lord, you people have whipped yourselves up into a frenzy. Mass hysteria over conspiracy theories, this is truly sad to see....

It didn’t happen...

” If there were to have been a FBI plant in the Trump campaign, I’d say hoorah. They most likely had very good reason to put him/ her there in the first place....”

But if it did happen, it was justified.

”Conspiring with a foreign power to affect our election is no small matter.”

It is. We need to get to the bottom of the UK’s role in all of this.

buwaya said...

In re history and secrets -

It is a curious thing, when reading history, that problem of missing the point that the people of the day had little or at least very incomplete information about the background and state of events. Much that was covert (and certainly not all; much certainly has disappeared from human ken, secrets gone into the grave) is there in black and white in the history books. The stupid reader is tempted to say "such fools!", as one shouts at an impending victim in a horror show.

Michael K said...

Ace is also on the Halper story.

Page's encounters with Halper were quite different from those that another Trump campaign adviser had during the campaign with the 73-year-old academic. As TheDCNF reported exclusively in March, Halper and George Papadopoulos met several times over a period of a few days in Sept. 2016. Several days earlier, Halper contacted and met with a third Trump campaign official. That official, who has requested anonymity, told TheDCNF that Halper expressed interest in helping the campaign.

Unlike with Page, Halper's relationship with Papadopoulos was ostensibly more of a business arrangement than a fledgling friendship.


Ace also points out that Halper and GHW Bush have connections.

Michael K said...

Also from Ace.

It occurs to me that a possiblity here is that that Halper was hired by Jeb Bush, given that he used to run political spying ops for George Bush, Sr.

If true, this could explain the varying claims about "Republicans starting the dossier." No, Republicans didn't start the dossier per se in this hypothetical scenario, but Jeb Bush's man in London Stephan Halper began the spying operation and would have served as one of the first sources to Christopher Steele.

Henry said...

A Die Hard movie quote is in order:

Hans Gruber: You asked for miracles, I give you... the FBI.

Spoiler: Gruber is the bad guy. The non-FBI guys get him.

buwaya said...

Brennan speaking to MI-6, even through cutouts, implicates the British government directly. There is no way that MI-6 would have cooperated in this thing without checking with Downing Street. This is at too high a level.

Oh to be a fly on the wall.

FIDO said...

To give Inga her due, I am pretty sure that Trump did something borderline illegal at some point in his life. I bet, as he was consensually bedding some supermodel, that he tore the tags off a mattress. That is just how he rolls, man. He has a rep of playing fast and lose with the truth and with rules...just like the Clintons.

But HIGH CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS? No. So far nothing. She looks and she looks and she looks some more...and even a blind squirrel finds more nuts than Inga.

Now it seems that, not able to find dirt, the Hillary campaign with Obama's collusion, tried to MAKE dirt on Trump. Just like Obama tried to influence elections in Israel.

Meanwhile, Kerry is lying to the mullahs and Lil Kim saying 'if the Republicans lose, Trump won't be able to force these treaties on you.'

But that isn't collusion, is it Inga?

But just Trump hatred is allowing her to violate law and custom just because she hates Trump and his pussy smelling little fingers. I mean...did Trump ditch you at the prom, Inga?

That level of hate is kind of personal.

Michael K said...

MI06 has much to answer for if this all turns out to be true.

also, buwaya, it was the "Ems Dispatch" and was not secret. A bit like the Zimmerman Telegram.

CStanley said...

Andrew McCarthy has a new article up now, commenting on the NYT piece.

It's a good read as have been his others....he seems to be slowly coming to the realization of the depth of the rot. Much of his focus has been on the legal distinctions between a counterintelligence investigation and a criminal one, and he elaborates on that in this most recent article- explaining the unethical use of a counterintelligence operation to spy on the Trump campaign when they had no basis of opening a criminal investigation,

The part he hasn't even gotten to yet though is that all of the premises for even opening the counterintelligence investigation seem to have been concocted through entrapment. Can't wait till that sinks in.

Michael K said...

"and even a blind squirrel finds more nuts than Inga."

Inga and Maxine are planning a duet.

Henry said...

I just have this image of my head of Hans Gruber being played by Hillary Clinton:

You asked for miracles, I give you... the FBI.

FIDO said...

Considering how horribly Obama treated the Brits, I can't for the life of me see why they allowed any of this.

I think a more likely scenario is that the CIA moles knew a corrupt asshole, and simply requested his services for 'stuff', putting great reliance on the collegiality between the American and British intelligence communities.

Now this blows up. I am betting Mr. Brennen is in some pretty hot water across the pond, if he doesn't get into anything HERE.

tim in vermont said...

Henry, LO FUCKING L!

Francisco D said...

Inga said ... "If there were to have been a FBI plant in the Trump campaign, I’d say hoorah."

I would say people are going to jail.

You imply a certain moral superiority, but your situational ethics say otherwise.

Original Mike said...

Over the last year I’ve been bookmarking articles on this topic in a folder entitled Politics - Russisa. I’ve had to start a new folder: Politics - Obama Spying

Matt Sablan said...

Man. Remember when we were debating whether Obama personally tapped some wires, and now we're at, "did we spend thousands of dollars on human intelligence against the president's political enemies?"

FIDO said...

Inga doesn't care about principles. She just cares about results. I see that a lot in the female of the species, so no wonder she cottoned to Hillary so much.

tim in vermont said...

You imply a certain moral superiority, but your situational ethics say otherwise.

You only say that because you are an infidel. Inga follows The One True Faith, so she needn’t concern herself with doubts about the wisdom of the use of whatever weapon comes to hand.

Original Mike said...

Blogger Inga said...”” If there were to have been a FBI plant in the Trump campaign, I’d say hoorah. They most likely had very good reason to put him/ her there in the first place....”

Wow. It’s almost as if Andrew McCarthy is speaking directly to Inga.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/05/crossfire-hurricane-new-york-times-report-buries-lede/

buwaya said...

The Ems Dispatch was Bismarck's "edited" press release that created the casus belli.

The Ems Telegram was the confidential communication to Bismarck that he was instructed to release to the press, but he did not, in that form.

I.e., Bismarck created "fake news". This was in furtherance of a conspiracy for war within the German government.

Kathryn51 said...

Blogger Michael K said...
Ace is also on the Halper story.

Actually, it's the Daily Caller that is on the Halper story. Ace cut/pasted (and gave DCNF credit). Daily Caller has been months ahead of everyone else on the Papadopoulus/Page angle. They are also the first news source to identify that there was a third person ("official" on the Trump campaign) interfacing with Halper.

CStanley said...

Inga said ... "If there were to have been a FBI plant in the Trump campaign, I’d say hoorah."

The idea that Inga is embracing here, which is fostered by the NYT article, is that there was already probable cause for the FBI to have taken this extraordinary step of putting a mole in the campaign.

But not only would the bar be extraordinarily high for that to be justified, we also already have enough information to know that this wasn't the case. They had no evidence to establish the means to open a criminal investigation, and the only evidence for the counterintelligence investigation was being planted by the intelligence agents and their contracted employees.

RichAndSceptical said...

Obama used every tool of government to try to destroy the Republican party. A spy in the Trump campaign is nothing compared to what the IRS did to the Tea Party.

mandrewa said...

I've always felt this was the real story. Ever since I noticed
what was happening in late 2016. Not this specific assertion that a
government agency had a spy in the Trump campaign, but rather the
pattern of evidence that was appearing that the federal government,
not the Obama administration, even though the of course the Obama
administration was pushing this, but the federal government had
attempted to rig the 2016 election.

Actually I should name that real story #1.

The second real story is the amazing capacity of so many people
to ignore this. It's a dismaying reality of human nature that
so many people can somehow not see this. The second real story
is a continuing real story, of course. This is just the latest
installment.

The third real story is what we do about this. If people just
treat this as a talking point, something to complain about, then
we are done for. The appropriate response I think is to fire a
lot of people and to ban them from further public employment.
And the standard for people being banned is whether they knew
about what was going on, and then did nothing to try to stop it.

buwaya said...

"The appropriate response I think is to fire a
lot of people and to ban them from further public employment.
And the standard for people being banned is whether they knew
about what was going on, and then did nothing to try to stop it."

You can't fix this sort of thing that way. The problem is not with a few, but with a great many, and moreover the system that puts them on the track to leadership, rank after rank down the hierarchy. The whole thing is infected.

The only way to stop this, is to start de novo, with entirely new personnel. Which will be difficult as the educational track that starts these people on their way is itself compromised.

Achilles said...

mandrewa said...

The appropriate response I think is to fire a
lot of people and to ban them from further public employment.
And the standard for people being banned is whether they knew
about what was going on, and then did nothing to try to stop it.



There is a different much more appropriate penalty for sedition and conspiracy.

And the appropriate penalty for treason is firing squad.

mandrewa said...

I agree with you, buwaya, but I don't see how it's possible to do that.

What I'm advocating is what I think should be possible. It's a long
way from solving the problem, but it's a step and it's far better than
pretending there isn't a huge problem, which sadly is what seems to be
the most likely outcome.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Andy McCarthy ought to kick David French in the balls, knock some sense into him.
Couple of assumptions there, I know. What happened to French??

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Inga said...If there were to have been a FBI plant in the Trump campaign, I’d say hoorah. They most likely had very good reason to put him/ her there in the first place.

When I say "beyond parody" this is what I mean. How could one heighten the ridiculousness of such a "thought?!"

It didn't happen and only crazy people would believe it even could have happened.
I wish it would have happened, it would have served those bad Trump people right.
If it did happen I am glad it did and cheer the fact that it did--good!
If the thing I said only crazy people would think could happen did happen then that's proof that there was a good reason for it to happen--it happening is definitive proof that it SHOULD have happened and anyone doubting that must be stupid or evil.

Like...how could you satirize that? That's how these people actually think.

Drago said...

Inga was running around for months telling us the dossier had nothing to do with the start of the counter-intelligence "investigation" into the Trump campaign.

LOL

The dem/left/LLR leak to the NYT blows that one out of the water!!

Better yet, Brennan has been caught in ANOTHER lie under oath when he stated to congressional committees that the dossier played no role whatsoever in the early investigation.

That has been proven false.

Aaaaannnnnnnnd, if that weren't enough, the investigation started BEFORE the Pappadopolous frame-up meeting set up by Halper and Downer.....

No wonder the DOJ/FBI/CIA refuses, absolutely refuses, to produce the actual rationale for the beginning of the "investigation".

Well, they don't need to actually. There was no actual intelligence underlying the investigation. Which is why they went ahead with secret "warrants" and no judicial review.

After all, why not? Hillary was sure to win and all of this illegal behavior would be buried forever.....

StephenFearby said...

Welcome to The Cambridge Security Initiative
fresh thinking and cutting-edge international expertise

CSi Partners

Stefan Halper holds doctorates from both Oxford and Cambridge. He has served four American presidents in the White House and Department of State and is an expert on US foreign policy, national security policy, China and Anglo-American relations. Halper was Executive Editor and host of “Worldwise”, a national televised program on foreign and national security affairs from 1996-2000 and “This Week from Washington”, a national radio program aired from 1985-2001. He is a Life Fellow of the Centre of International Studies and a Life Fellow of Magdalene College, Cambridge."

https://thecsi.org.uk/Professor Stefan Halper

More detailed CSi bio:

https://www.iwp.edu/faculty/detail/stefan-halper


As I previously posted (from the outstanding digging of the DC's Chuck Ross), Harper also carries this baggage:

03/25/2018
A London Meeting Before The Election Aroused George Papadopoulos’s Suspicions

"...In an ironic twist given the Russia probe’s focus on election meddling, Halper was also linked to a Reagan-era scandal dubbed “Briefing-gate.”

Halper was one of several Reagan White House officials linked to the scandal, which involved campaign briefing materials stolen from Carter’s campaign. Prior to the 1980 election, stolen Carter-campaign briefing papers containing classified information ended up in the hands of Reagan’s campaign officials.

The theft was not revealed until 1983. Halper was not directly implicated in stealing the documents, but he was identified as one of the campaign advisers who handled and disseminated them."

http://dailycaller.com/2018/03/25/george-papadopoulos-london-emails/


A logical next step: Why not haul Harper's ass to testify before Devin Nunes' House Committee.

Drago said...

Lets start simply with Inga, since...duh.

Inga, do you now agree that the counter-intelligence investigation into the Trump campaign began before the Pappydappydoppolloppogus/Downer frame-up meeting?

I certainly hope you do, since that's what your deep staters leaked to the NYT knowing that the Horowitz report was going to expose yours and theirs earlier lie.

You wouldn't want to contradict all those brave and courageous souls in the FBI/DOJ/CIA who launched this investigation into Trump, would you?

LOL

So many contradictions happening so fast.

You know, I'm beginning to see the value to Inga of having history begin anew every 5 minutes....

Michael K said...

This was in furtherance of a conspiracy for war within the German government.

Actually, Bismarck was OK with it but France, foolishly, picked the fight.

For all the folderol about French diplomacy, they were singularly inept in 1870 and again in 1911-1914, when they brought on a war they should have lost.

The Germans seemed to have a death wish by using Schrecklichkeit, which alienated the rest of the civilized world.

My uncle told me that Chicago schools had pictures of the Kaiser along with pictures of the president until 1914.

German immigrants were strong supporters of Lincoln and abolition.

CStanley said...

Like...how could you satirize that? That's how these people actually think.

The NYT article is predicated on the idea that lots of people think like that and unfortunately it's true.

This whole long interlude has been a study in limited hangouts. Every time a damning report is about to be released, NYT and WaPo get busy prepping the battlefields. By the time the IG report comes out, the facts of the "eavesdropping" , which was done by the patriots in our government who were concerned about Russian election interference, and which couldn't be divulged because of the political sensitivity of the matter, will be old news.

Jim at said...

If there were to have been a FBI plant in the Trump campaign, I’d say hoorah. - Inga

But, yeah. We're the fucking Nazis in all this.

You will rue the day you cheered this on, you vicious bitch.

Mike Sylwester said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Clyde said...

I was on break this morning at work and whatever show Whoopi Goldberg (and McCain's daughter) is on was on the TV. Whoopi dramatically read that tweet and the audience thought it was hysterically funny. Well, it was probably an all-female audience, so hysterically funny would not be out of character. I wasn't laughing, probably because I'm far better informed than they are. All of the evidence is pointing to it being true, and if it indeed is true, then it certainly is a couple of orders of magnitude worse than Watergate. When it's all over, I suspect we'll have another video roll of liberals pooh-poohing it, much as we had that video roll of all of them laughing at Trump and saying he had no chance of being elected before the election. Trump got the last laugh that time, and I'm betting he will on this DOJ/FBI coup-conspiracy scandal as well.

Mike Sylwester said...

Why did Joseph Mifsud pretend to introduce George Papadopoulos to Vladimir Putin's niece?

The woman introduced to Papdopoulos was a certain Olga Vinogradova -- who was not Putin's niece, no matter that Mifsud told Papadopoulos that she was.

So, Mifsud told Papadopoulos that:

* Russian Intelligence had thousands of Hillary Clinton's e-mails.

* Putin's niece wanted to meet Papadopoulos.

This "niece" was not the only person who wanted to meet Papadopoulos.

Other people who wanted to meet and talk with Papadopoulos included Alexander Downer and Stefan Halper. The latter two were very interested in hearing what Papadopoulos might say about various Russian people and about those people's interest in American politics.

If the American people had an honest Special Counsel investigating this situation, then the American people eventually might learn what Mifsud, Papadopoulos, Vinogradova, Downer and Halper were doing with each other during the 2016 presidential election campaign.

Unfortunately, however, the Special Counsel is Robert "The FBI Whitewasher" Mueller, and so the American people might never learn the facts.

Inga...Allie Oop said...

“You will rue the day you cheered this on, you vicious bitch.”

Coming from a hysterical man boob ninny. Ooooo I’m so scared.

Mike Sylwester said...

Here's my speculation about George Papadopoulos and Vladimir Putin's supposed niece (aka Olga Vinogradova).

At the request of Trump-hating John Brennan, MI-6 told Joseph Mifsud to introduce George and Olga and then leave the attractive young couple alone in a secluded place.

This and that would happen between George and Olga. Then, as they were relaxing, George eventually would ask Olga about her Uncle Vladimir. Immediately Olga would become very upset and would beg George never to tell anyone that she was Vladimir Putin's niece.

George promises never to tell anyone.

More sex and more pillow talk.

Eventually the conversation comes around to the subject that Uncle Vladimir has bragged to his niece Olga that Russian Intelligence has thousands of Hillary Clinton's e-mails. Olga reveals this family secret to George, but begs him never, ever to tell anyone.

George promises Olga never to tell anyone.

George keeps his promise until one day when he sees that Olga has a steady boyfriend. When George confronts Olga about her boyfriend, Olga tells George that the boyfriend is a much, much better lover. She declares that George never has satisfied her sexually, and so she is dumping him right now.

Drago said...

Mike Sylwester: "Why did Joseph Mifsud pretend to introduce George Papadopoulos to Vladimir Putin's niece?"

Well, there are actually A LOT of russian and putin pals that Hillary, Mueller, Glenn Simpson/FusionGPS, Steele et al had.

Particularly after Hillary and Mueller hid evidence from Congress about the Bribery/Corruption surrounding the Uranium One deal that netted the Clintons a cool $145Million.

Also, remember that Mueller worked for the same Ukrainian interests as Manafort. The exact same ones and during the exact same time and those guys had lots of Putin pal contacts.

And also, remember that Mueller and Comey and the FBI henchmen had long relationships with Oleg Deripaska which is why the FBI felt so comfortable in sending a few agents over to see him to try and get him on board the Manafort Railroad express.

Also, recall that Deripaska is the fellow who the obama admin gave many waivers to and allowed back into our nation even after sanctions AND Deripaska's rep, Walden, was the go between being used by dem senator Warner secretly so that the republicans on the Senate intel committee would not know what was going on.

So, naturally, Trump colluded.....LOL

Fabi said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Drago said...

my favorite part of the Veselnitskaya meeting was the fact that she had been a client of Glenn Simpson at FusionGPS and she met with Glenn Simpson immediately preceding and after the Trump Tower meeting.

Because, wouldn't you know it, New York is an awfully small little world where folks pretty much are in each others presence around the clock....

Fabi said...

"If there were to have been a FBI plant in the Trump campaign, I’d say hoorah."

Once a Stasi, always a Stasi.

Drago said...

Inga: "'If there were to have been a FBI plant in the Trump campaign, I’d say hoorah."

There is no longer any "if", which is what the dems are trying to tell you in their NYT leak.

LOL

Further, how far we've come from Inga telling everyone that even entertaining the idea of a mole placed in the Trump campaign was solid gold crazy.

buwaya said...

Mike S,

That makes a much better movie plot than some sleazy (and ugly) MI-6 contact getting the punk drunk while telling him tall tales.

Of course, you have to finish the script. It is supposed to be boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl again.

Fabi said...

Inga actually linked the NYT article last night, but, like every other dullard, she didn't read enough of the article to know how damning it was to her side. Lulz

Matt Sablan said...

"Further, how far we've come from Inga telling everyone that even entertaining the idea of a mole placed in the Trump campaign was solid gold crazy."

-- The slow drift from "we'd never use FISA to watch someone on the fringe of Trump's campaign," to "of course we'd FISA Carter Page, but it would be narrow and targeted," to "of course it was broad, that's how FISA works! But we'd never spy on anyone's electronics," to "Of course we wiretapped Trump tower, how else were we going to do it? It isn't like we'd deploy human intelligence assets against him," to "Hooray for spies!"

Original Mike said...

”"If there were to have been a FBI plant in the Trump campaign, I’d say hoorah."

Yeah, this truly is disappointing. Even for Inga.

Fabi said...

Exactly, Matthew! "We'd never ever break the law by placing a spy in your campaign -- but if we did, you deserved it!"

buwaya said...

Its getting to the time someone has to start producing this movie.

It is already one of those "War and Peace" type things with way too many characters, so some slice of it will have to be used for the narrative, with the rest as setting.

There is the Page-Stzrok adulterous affair, that may be a natural center.

Left Bank of the Charles said...

"Did the FBI Have a Spy in the Trump Campaign?"

Betteridge's law of headlines: "Any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no."

Even Trump lays on the "if so" weasel words, which Althouse seems to notice but without the linguistic comment an earlier version of Althouse would have made. As for such a thing being bigger than Watergate, it might have been if Hillary Clinton had won the election, but since she only won the popular vote, it can't trump Watergate, even if it were true.

Steele of course was a spy, or at least a former spy, and he was spying on the Trump campaign and informing to the FBI, and apparently to anyone in the media who would listen. So there is always that out.

Matt Sablan said...

I mean, isn't getting someone on the inside what the FBI does? It isn't that odd; how many people did they have inside the ranch fiasco?

buwaya said...

Re "War and Peace", this movie sadly lacks spectacles like Sergei Bondarchuk's massive Napoleonic battles. Not even any balls at the Winter Palace.

There's gotta be something.

tim in vermont said...

BREAKING: 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 - Paul Sperry (Tweet)

tim in vermont said...

but since she only won the popular vote,

A game nobody was playing, BTW.

buwaya said...

Well, I suppose the Trump inauguration and the pussy-hat protest will have to do for spectacle.

Much wailing.

It might be better as an opera.

With a chorus as in Nabucco (the Hebrew slaves). Alternately wearing MAGA caps and pussy hats.

Fabi said...

From Andy McCarthy --

"The quick take on the 4,100-word opus is that the Gray Lady “buried the lede.” Fair enough: You have to dig pretty deep to find that the FBI ran “at least one government informant” against the Trump campaign — and to note that the Times learned this because “current and former officials” leaked to reporters the same classified information about which, just days ago, the Justice Department shrieked “Extortion!” when Congress asked about it."

tim in vermont said...

Enough with the name calling. Not sure that “vicious bitch “ really captures Inga anyway. Stasi meter maid, maybe.

CWJ said...

Looking at this and the previous thread, apparently 1pm is shift change between ARM and Inga. There's a little overlap, but still.

Original Mike said...

"Did the FBI Have a Spy in the Trump Campaign?"

Betteridge's law of headlines: "Any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no."


The headline is misleading (that’s got to be another law of headlines). Halper wasn’t “in” the campaign. He was setting up campaign members.

Original Mike said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Original Mike said...

”BREAKING: 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”

I would say aiding and abetting destruction of evidence, for starters.

Matt Sablan said...

"I would say aiding and abetting destruction of evidence, for starters."

-- That's a great start.

Drago said...

Left Bank: "Even Trump lays on the "if so" weasel words,..."

Trump has to, otherwise the weasels on your side would claim that Trump had inside knowledge of the investigation and was obstructing justice.

Obviously.

Trump has not seen the official report, so how can he categorically state it as fact?

Trump is simply repeating what the lefties in the FBI/DOJ are reporting to the lefties at the NYT.

A better observation from you would have been "Trump non-committal on what some lefties told other lefties"

Churchy LaFemme: said...

Was just driving and listening the the lead story on NPR's All Things Considered on the MUller probe. It was like I was picking up signals from some alternate universe.

Mike Sylwester said...

Drago at 2:36 PM
... remember that Mueller and Comey and the FBI henchmen had long relationships with Oleg Deripaska which is why the FBI felt so comfortable in sending a few agents over to see him to try and get him on board the Manafort Railroad express. ...

One attitude that was shared by Oleg Deripaska and Glenn Simpson (owner of GPS Fusion) was that both of them hated Paul Manafort.

To a great extent, the Steele Dossier is an effort to cause problems for Manafort (not simply for Trump).

Therefore I wonder if perhaps Simpson persuaded Deripaska to contribute money to the dossier project on the promise that the dossier would cause problems for Manafort.

Kathryn51 said...

tim in vermont said...
Enough with the name calling. Not sure that “vicious bitch “ really captures Inga anyway. Stasi meter maid, maybe.

Until today, I have studiously avoided responding to anything Inga says and tried to ignore the unending Inga/Draco post hijacks, but today I make an exception. "Stasi meter maid" - thank you Tim, thank you.

buwaya said...

"Trump has not seen the official report,"

Of course he has seen the report, someone put it on the gorilla channel.
Amazing what they have on that.

Drago said...

buwaya: "Of course he has seen the report, someone put it on the gorilla channel."

No he hasn't.

The report was placed in a Samsonite bag and locked prior to giving it to the gorillas.

Drago said...

Mike Sylvester: "One attitude that was shared by Oleg Deripaska and Glenn Simpson (owner of GPS Fusion) was that both of them hated Paul Manafort"

They didn't hate him any more than Andrew McCabe hated Flynn.

And do you want to know why lefties/LLR's?

Because Flynn took the side of a gal who claimed McCabe had harassed her and ruined her career. Flynn defended her and submitted a letter under oath backing her up.

So, you know, no conflict at all with corruptocrats Yates and Comey sending McCabe over to interview Flynn re: Logan Act concerns...LOL.

What a complete farce.

Churchy LaFemme: said...

I think I read both the original and edited version of the "Ems Dispatch" at one time somewhere (though not in the original language). Perhaps it was an artifact of the translations, but the edited version struck me as a pretty fair executive summary of the original.

Darrell said...

So, just a question: if the FBI is destroyed, who replaces what they do?

Some other armed enforcement branch of the Democratic Party. Maybe they'll contract with ex-Russian Special Forces.

FullMoon said...

Trump put FBI,and leftist media in position of having to deny it.


Seeing Red said...

He's pushing them. Good.
5/17/18, 10:29 AM
FIDO said... [hush]​[hide comment]

I don't know if he is pushing them as much as not letting the FBI or the Media sweep this under the rug as is their normal wont.

narciso said...

My theory, that I've posted before, is that it was a revenge ploy for manafort not bailing him out when he lost his shirt, in montenegran silver after 2008, when the latter was riding high, advising the Balladur campaign, including the money that came through a Lebanese middleman, re certain arms transactions,

FullMoon said...

buwaya said...

Its getting to the time someone has to start producing this movie.

It is already one of those "War and Peace" type things with way too many characters, so some slice of it will have to be used for the narrative, with the rest as setting.

There is the Page-Stzrok adulterous affair, that may be a natural center.

5/17/18, 2:48 PM


Has to be a series. Too much for a movie. Suspect it could run for several seasons, as this kind of thing will continue until 2020, at least.

narciso said...

which ended up involving Sarkozy, the file dump that foer printed in the atlantic has the details, now deripasha connected steele with his contacts that included adam Waldman, who had been retained years ago, re the levinson inquiry, and those with akhmetshin's say so, at some point though, cody shearer got involved creating the second dossier, funneling it through jonathan winer, whose firm apco, just happens to represent uranium one, and then on to Daniel jones, Feinstein's factotum,

narciso said...

who was involved in the dossier, four years ago, aimed at the aggressive interrogation program

buwaya said...

If you do the narciso version of this show it would be vastly more exotic and vastly more realistic. The genuine modern version of the Sopranos.

Its all connected in that same churning milieu of international scoundrels.

Beloved Commenter AReasonableMan said...

Unknown said...
It was like I was picking up signals from some alternate universe


... where facts and thought and precedent counted for something.

narciso said...

I got it in part, from watching some episodes of mcmafia, which involves a prague based gangster, which is based on a real life gangster, firtash

John henry said...

Where is crooked Hillary these days? Is she still down u der on her book tour?

When is she coming back?

Is she coming back?

John Henry

Inga...Allie Oop said...

Another guilty plea and another cooperator.

Manafort's former son-in-law cuts plea deal, to cooperate with government.

“The guilty plea agreement, which is under seal and has not been previously reported, could add to the legal pressure on Manafort, who is facing two indictments brought by Special Counsel Robert Mueller in his probe of alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election.”
———————————
Lets see what Judge Ellis does with it.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s office notified a federal court in Virginia on Thursday it had filed under seal an unredacted memorandum that is expected to shed light on the scope of his wide-ranging probe into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

Michael K said...

rrell said...
So, just a question: if the FBI is destroyed, who replaces what they do?

Some other armed enforcement branch of the Democratic Party. Maybe they'll contract with ex-Russian Special Forces.


Lots of former KGB around but most of them are billionaires by now.

Inga is hot on the trail of Manafort. I think she thinks this will finally get Trump.

Drago said...

ARM: ".. where facts and thought and precedent counted for something"

Certainly the obama/hillary action of ginning up a hoax dossier and using it to launch a fake counter-intelligence spying investigation on domestic political opponents is only unprecedented in this nation.

It is however a common practice in totalitarian regimes across the globe.

Seeing Red said...

Former son in law

Let him squirm.

narciso said...

the fellow who resembles firtash, is the subject of a hit, when he's conducting a negotiation with certain indian gentleman in Dubai, he traces it back to the brother of a former oligarch whose nephew much like der swaan, is part of the London establishment,

Matt Sablan said...

Shame Manafort didn't cut whatever deal got offered to Podesta for the same crimes.

narciso said...

and he seeks revenge upon the family, in the way he best knows how,

Seeing Red said...

Once again, Inga is unclear on the American concept.

Seeing Red said...

remember that Mueller and Comey and the FBI henchmen had long relationships with Oleg Deripaska

I think THAT'S the guy with Iranian contacts.

narciso said...

yes that's the one, the fellow I've been mentioning is the one that Simpson, probably with akhmetshin as a source, was investigating 12 years ago over his takeover of an Austrian bank,

Inga...Allie Oop said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
CStanley said...

There is the Page-Stzrok adulterous affair, that may be a natural center.

Something seems off about their texts. Maybe there really are adult leftists who talk that way routinely but it came across like high school, not people in upper echelons of government. I have a working hypothesis that Strzok was the one who was all in with the Clapper-Brennan-McCabe team and they needed McCabe's attorney to buy in (in order to advise on how to stay on razor edge of legality as much as possible and justify illegal acts when they crossed the line) but Page was a political naïf. My theory is that Strzok wooed her and then talked to her like this to gin up her support (the othering of Trump voters, expression of horror at Trump's unfitness, and the self righteousness of how much this MATTERED!")

I mean Occam's razor I guess says that these were typical lefties but it's a thought anyway.

narciso said...

so why is prague important, because that's where fmr Hezbollah?? current Ukrainian arms export rep, ali antar, was operating the deal that operation Cassandra was supposed to stop.

tim in vermont said...

.. where facts and thought and precedent counted for something.

No, just the opposite, where pain at the result of an election still reigns as if it were in the constitution.

Drago said...

So now its Manaforts ex-son in law that conspired with Russia!

LOL

Whew! Glad we got to the bottom of that!

Drago said...

Not a moment too soon!

CStanley said...

narciso's office?

(No offense intended, I just wish I could understand all of the connections you draw!)

Original Mike said...

“(No offense intended, I just wish I could understand all of the connections you draw!)”

He doesn’t want you to.

Dad29 said...

The ex-President of the US oversaw, approved, and encouraged TWO national security/law enforcement US agencies to spy on the campaign of its ideological opponent.

The Democrat nominee ILLEGALLY transferred $84 million to her campaign, laundered through various State (D) party coffers.

The (D) nominee also ILLEGALLY ran NatSec eyes-only and SCI info through a toilet-room computer server AND her "assistant" moved many of those to her pervert-husband's computer.

Obama officials participating in the spying included the National Security Advisor and the UN Ambassador, not to mention various yet-to-be-named White House staffers.

NONE OF THEM HAVE BEEN INDICTED. ALL WILL KEEP THEIR PENSIONS and FABULOUS RETIREMENT HEALTH INSURANCE PACKAGES.

But according to the NYSlimes, this is something that's done all the time, for really good reasons, and after all, it was for the Good of the Country.

When the Country Class has had enough of the City Class, the sewers of D C and N. VA. will be overflowing with.....

Howard said...

Dad29: you are outlining the Quid that goes with the Pro Quo when Mueller Dumps Trumps Charges

narciso said...

This is the backstory for this fellow, much probably came from the sources I mentioned earlier why Simpson went into business subsequently:

https://www.google.com/amp/foreignpolicy.com/2014/03/19/married-to-the-ukrainian-mob/amp/

narciso said...

Surprise surprise

http://www.radio.cz/en/section/news/czech-detainee-ali-fayad-cleared-in-lebanese-court

narciso said...

Two years ago, they left out some details:

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/02/06/world/europe/missing-czechs-lebanon.html

Molly said...

WaPo fact checker gave 4 pinocchios (sp?) to Trump's claim "Obama wiretapped me." Will anyone call factchecker to account? Or will factchecker defend its rating because (as Mike above notes) it wasn't Obama personally, and it was an imbedded informant, not a wiretap.

Can anyone direct me to any mainstream press report that has attempted to interview Loretta Lynch on any of these issues? If I were an aggressive reporter, I would reach out and then (assuming no response) say in my article: Loretta Lynch refused to comment on this, or some other language that implies a coverup.

narciso said...

The only reporters worth a farthing are Sarah Carter herridge Griffin Atkinson David hemingway perhaps a few others.

narciso said...

Lee Smith Kim strassel at the post Thursday was able to uncover the scam behind the gitmo narrative

Drago said...

narciso: "The only reporters worth a farthing are Sarah Carter herridge Griffin Atkinson David hemingway perhaps a few others."

Andy McCarthy has been doing a stellar job of analysis.

For instance, McCarthy points out that the deep staters had no criminal basis for investigation, so they shifted to a super secret counter-intelligence investigation which also had NO BASIS but it was so secret they could operate without judicial oversight so all of LLR Chuck's little lefty deep staters could operated with impunity.

narciso said...

The folks at the tree house, who are more aggregators and researchers Thomas wictor Saul montes bradley who filter through the chaff

narciso said...

Yes even though he has been slow to catch on, McCarthy has finally caught up, the list of merely ignorAnt and or complicit is so large it contains,multitudes at the times fandos haberman Schmidt mazzetti at the journal tau ballhaus Nicholas at the post Barrett and nakashima entous now at the new Yorker.

narciso said...

Those are the pins on the board, now it's curious how some players are targeted yet others are not, lannt Davis is firtashs atty, no mention when he gets so high and lightly, Greg Craig was the supervising atty at skadden he was allowed to quietly retire no charges filed podesta no charges filed despite he lobbied for uranium one and one of the lobbyists for xte,

Original Mike said...

”Blogger narciso said...”The folks at the tree house, who are more aggregators and researchers Thomas wictor Saul montes bradley who filter through the chaff”

Well, that didn’t last even one evening.

Achilles said...

Drago said...

Further, how far we've come from Inga telling everyone that even entertaining the idea of a mole placed in the Trump campaign was solid gold crazy.

Right where I said we would be. Months ago.


I told you this was coming Inga.

Choo Choo bitches.

Achilles said...

mandrewa said...
I agree with you, buwaya, but I don't see how it's possible to do that.

What I'm advocating is what I think should be possible. It's a long
way from solving the problem, but it's a step and it's far better than
pretending there isn't a huge problem, which sadly is what seems to be
the most likely outcome.



You all need to stop being bitches. Seriously.

They will only get away with what we tolerate.

This country was founded by people who demanded and got liberty. We are armed and we are greater in numbers.

Only apathy and cowardice will let them off the hook.

Achilles said...

Inga said...
Another guilty plea and another cooperator.

Manafort's former son-in-law cuts plea deal, to cooperate with government.

“The guilty plea agreement, which is under seal and has not been previously reported, could add to the legal pressure on Manafort, who is facing two indictments brought by Special Counsel Robert Mueller in his probe of alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election.”


So Manafort's former son-in-law had what to do with Trump-Russia collusion?

Oh that is right this is just meant to put pressure on Manafort. And you cheer this.

You are a Stalinist piece of shit.

Saint Croix said...

The Democratization of Information via Social Media has not been a friend to Democrats, Media or Feminists.

You got that right. The media has been hiding abortion for 40 years.

You just have to run the google to see what our journalists have been hiding.

(It's also why the hard left politics at Google is so concerning--sooner or later they will try to nudge searches and control information. I imagine this battle is happening at Google right now).

Saint Croix said...

I think this scandal was set in motion by the over-reaction to Watergate.

After Watergate, we criminalize political differences. We appoint "special prosecutors" to indict the other party. And of course when you have a "special prosecutor" you also need "special FBI agents" to investigate the "special crimes."

What was notable about the Obama administration was there was no special prosecutor investigating his bad stuff. There was, of course, the ATF gun walking scandal. And Eric Holder was held in contempt of Congress. But no special prosecutor!

And what's notable about the Trump administration is that after the 100 day honeymoon period, special prosecutor was appointed. I think they're alleging he committed treason before he was in office(!)

So that's a remarkable difference. Every president has scandals, of course. But Obama's scandals get no special prosecutor. And Trump gets a special prosecutor for his pre-crimes.

Bruce Hayden said...

Got a little behind here, driving back from Spokane to our house in MT. Last summer and the summer before, it was wildfires. This spring, it is flooding. Flooding a week ago in Missoula, and yesterday or so in Kalispell, and we are down river from both. Heavy snow this last winter combined with high temperatures this last week, and a bit of rain, causes excess runoffs. Down river fro us is Pend O'rielle, and have a good friend living at the bottom of the lake. Just moved his motorboat over to the floating dock at the marina, and is taking the doors off etc of his boathouse. Just in time, as his dock is verging on going under. So, went home the long way, to make sure that we were well above the water line all the way.

As I pointed out n the last thread, Crooked Hillary's 30,000 deleted emails were the holy grail of opposition research. Acquiring them would have been greatly beneficial to the Trump campaign.
- Very likely the missing and subsequently deleted emails contained additional classified information. Much of it was very likely not yoga lessons and wedding planning. Which translates into additional Espionage Act and Official Records Act violations by Crooked Hillary and even more of her minions. And made the intent argument by Comey even more untenable than it was.
- Removed any statute of limitations issues to her prosecution.
- Likely contained a number of emails detailing the Clintons' pay-to-play scheme, and foundation abuse. Very likely highly criminal for the SecState. And verging on traitorous. She was, almost assuredly, selling American foreign policy for personal gain. Just no way of proving it, without an IG at the time, and the Lynch DoJ ruling interference. And here would be the details of her crimes.
- Show that the Obama/Lynch DoJ was intentionally protecting her.
- Show that her law breaking by using her insecure private server was not benign, because it allowed our enemies to acquire the highly classified inside information about our foreign policy during those four years. Very likely the biggest, and most harmful, national security breach of a generation, at least.
-.Show that the Obama intelligence agencies were also covering for her national security breaches.
- Etc.

Bruce Hayden said...

Crooked Hillary's missing emails would thus have been the most valuable opposition research that the Trump campaign could have acquired from any source. Which makes it the perfect lure. The honey pot. Which is what I more and more think was going on. The Trump campaign was being set up by the Deep State, and the Obama Administration at the top. My guess is that the mastermind setting it in motion was CIA Dir Brennan, because this scheme feels very CIAish. I think that you have one of their spies setting the hook, telling low level Trump campaign staff that this information was available from the Russians, and then put out another spy to reel them in, get them drunk, and committed to offering something of value for the information. Throw in operatives from multiple allied spy agencies (Australia and the U.K.), and the Putin "niece" setup, and the CIA lead here is almost assured. This is how they operate, and they are the agency that had the resources to pull it off. And, they didn't have to actually provide the emails to the low level Trump staffers - they just had to dirty them up with them to buy in, which could be painted as collusion, even if there were none.

Why did the CIA use Russia, and not one of our other enemies that also very likely had acquired those emails? Partially because they have been our biggest enemy since 1945. 70 years of looking at Ivan as our biggest foe. And now partially because they are so friggen corrupt. Of course, the Russians would sell the information to the Trump team. Everything is for sale there. Plus Putin came out of the KGB, their old Soviet spy agency. So, providing it to the Trump campaign would be just the sort of thing that he would do - and, indeed, we find that the Russian govt was meddling in our election. And getting it to look like the Russian government was involved was simple, because bribery is so prevalent there now. Plus, there is a lot of Soviet block hacking going on these days. Much of the worst non-govt hacking comes from there.

Of course, Trump made their choice of foreign sources for the email lure obvious with his joke, putting together the two strands that she had illegally deleted the 30,000 missing emails while under Congressional subpoena, and that her server had almost assuredly been hacked by multiple intelligence agencies around the world, while she was SecDef. And he very likely picked Russia as the potential source of the Clinton emails for the same reasons that Brenna and the CIA did.

Bruce Hayden said...

Meanwhile, in the summer of 2016, the DoJ and FBI had a problem. NSA Dir Rogers had caught them illegally using FISA 702 (US Person) database searches for unlawful purposes, very likely including opposition research. And it wasn't just the FBI passing information to the a Crooked Hillary campaign - they had been brazen enough to allow contractors to search those databases. He shut this down with his compliance audit. Their problem was that without 702 searches, they couldn't investigate the Trump campaign. They needed their "insurance policy" to make sure that Trump won. They couldn't open a criminal investigation because they didn't have probable cause that a crime had been committed, and they didn't have evidence plausibly justifying a counterintelligence investigation of the Trump campaign. But, Brennan and the CIA had already manufactured it. I think that we saw the pass off from the CIA to the FBI and DoJ with the trip to London by Peter Strzok in August, 2016. And with a counterintelligence investigation open, they could "inadvertently" discover the probable cause that they needed to open a criminal investigation. And, if by some chance that Trump won, they could use the information gained to acquire a Title I FISA warrant, which they ultimately did.

And that, I suspect, more and more, is how Steele and his Dossier came in. Fusion GPS was funded by the Clinton campaign and DNC to do opposition research. They likely had access to the NSA databases, and were allowed to search such as contractors, ostensibly doing other DOJ work. And they were closely tied to the DoJ. The wife (Nellie) of ADAG Bruce Ohr was Fusion's Russia expert, and therefore worked closely with Steele. Moreover, they were personal friends of Glen Simpson and his wife who owned Fusion. My theory is that they were sitting on information that they had acquired through those NSA database searches that they had been allowed (illegally) to do by the FBI, and couldn't use it, because using it would implicate how they got it - unless they could show another source for the information. And, thus, Steele was hired to launder it, and maybe add some additional salacious information, by pretending that it came from the Russians. And, of course, the resulting Steele Dossier was also used to acquire the Title I FISA warrant, because the FISC would have questioned why the FBI was using 702 data as the basis for the warrant, but not if it were from Russian spies.

The interesting conflict setup by this scheme is that Russia was picked as the villain by both Brennan and his CIA, and the FBI,both to harm the Trump campaign. However, the CIA side had Trump benefiting from them hurting Clinton, while the FBI had them helping Clinton and hurting Trump. No problem - we all know that the Russians are so devious that they play both sides.

Bruce Hayden said...

Sorry: "Their problem was that without 702 searches, they couldn't investigate the Trump campaign. They needed their "insurance policy" to make sure that Trump LOST".

Mike Sylwester said...

Thanks for this series of comments, Bruce.

I suggest that you read an explanation of the "insurance policy" proposed on the Meaning in History website, which is written by Mark Wauck a former FBI special agent.

My Theory of the Carter Page FISA Fraud

Wauck thinks that the "insurance policy" was the FISA warrant itself.

If Trump won the election, then the FBI's illegal investigation of Trump might become discovered. Therefore, the major purpose for the FISA warrant was to justify the FBI investigation of Trump that already had been happening for a long time.

http://meaninginhistory.blogspot.com/2018/02/my-theory-of-carter-page-fisa-fraud.html

http://meaninginhistory.blogspot.com/2018/02/about-that-insurance-policy.html

Bruce Hayden said...

A bit more on the FISA 702 problem that Adm Rogers caused the FBI. As I understand it, the criminal side of the FBI operates somewhat like a law firm. Cases are opened, people are assigned to a case, and their time and expenses are billed to the case. Probably don't bill per page, like big firms do, but similar. And, the counterintelligence side probably works similarly. One of the perks/necessities of working for a law firm, is the ability to search Lexis and/or Westlaw. Big firms try to assign such database search costs to clients and matters. Small firms often don't, because the only real purpose most times is to just drive up billables. To make money. And even if you do have to bill clients for the Lexis/Westlaw searches you do for them, you still tend to have an overhead account that you can bill those costs to for situations that don't directly relate to a specific client matter. This allows you to, for example, do the research that you need for a paper you want to publish.

the administrative problem then, for the FBI doing political opposition research, is that the resources utilized have to be charged to some account, to some investigation. Except that high level employees could likely do database searches in their spare time, and assign the costs, if any, to an overhead account. They can't use investigators this way, but they could probably do FISA database searches after hours. Probably not all high level FBI employees, but likely the national security division run by Bill Priestap and where Peter Strzok worked. And it appears that certain contractors got unsupervised access to the NSA databases. 702 searches are those for information about US Persons (citizens and legal resident aliens). Searching for information about non-US Persons doesn't do much good for political opposition research, because pretty much all of the people that you would want dirt on are, naturally, US Persons. Which is why 702 searches are critical for doing political opposition research by searching the NSA FISA databases, that conveniently contain cell phone call records, a lot of email and text messages, as well as customs and maybe even IRS information. But then Adm Rogers caught them and shut down 702 searches of those databases until his compliance review could be completed. Those contractors couldn't do their opposition research anymore sitting at a desk, and using a computer. Neither could politicized employees such as Peter Strzok (don't know if he actually did such, but rather that people similarly placed could have). And, I think that much of what happened later is a result of this cutting off of 702 searches by the FBI by Adm Rogers in late spring of 2016.

Bruce Hayden said...

"Wauck thinks that the "insurance policy" was the FISA warrant itself."

Thanks for the links. Haven't read them yet, but not sure if the "insurance policy" was just the Title I FISA warrant, or it was just a part of it. We shall see.

narciso said...

Ah wauck is an interesting fellow he's fmr bureau like his brother in law Robert Hansen, he was not in counterintelligence but had an interest in it nonetheless.

Bruce Hayden said...

"Wauck thinks that the "insurance policy" was the FISA warrant itself."

Even after reading a lot of his posts this morning, not sure if I think that the “insurance policy” was just the FISA warrant or just part of it. Ultimately I think that we will see. Indeed I suspect that that is one question that has bee asked Peter Strzok by the IG, and maybe his cooperating USA, with whom I strongly believe he is cooperating fully (because he is the one guy who was demoted, reassigned, but prevented from leaving, because he was flipped, but is still considered useful).