Jonathan Turley Comments On The Hearings

On Tuesday, Red State posted an article about the hearings yesterday in the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee. The article included some interesting comments by Jonathan Turley, a professor at George Washington University Law School.

The article reports:

While Republicans continued to stress the two-tiered justice system in the case of Biden’s classified documents vs. those of Donald Trump, Democrats continually tried to put words in Hur’s mouth that neither he nor his report said. 

So how bad were the Democrats? George Washington University Law Professor Jonathan Turley said the Democrats’ questioning of Hur “seemed almost to border on the delusional.”

During an appearance on Fox News’s “America Reports,” Turley gave a perfect example.

Well, I thought the Republicans did a particularly good job today. Often the Democrats are way ahead in framing of hearings, but at points the Democrats seemed almost a border on the delusional. 

When you had Hur say ‘I did not exonerate the president’ and then Democrats would say ‘OK, so you exonerated the president’ and he would say ‘No, I didn’t’ and they would say ‘Thank you for that, with that exoneration.’ 

So for a lot of people watching, they probably kept on having to sort of reverse and see if they missed something here.

The thing to remember when Democrat politicians play this kind of nonsensical game is that they’re playing solely to their base — low-information voters who don’t give a damn about the facts. 

The article also notes:

Turley continued:

The fact is that Hur tried over and over again to distinguish between his findings, which is that he was not confident he could convict if he did bring any charges, and the statement of Democrats that the president was cleared.

Like most people who aren’t Democrats, Turley remains shocked that no charges were brought against Biden, particularly given the charges against Trump.

But out of this hearing, it came really some quite shocking observations. I mean, at the end, you’re sort of still wondering why he wasn’t charged, including Hur saying ‘Look, we have audio tape of the president referring to the fact that he found classified evidence in his basement.’ Well, okay, that seems like full knowledge. But he kept on coming back to the fact that I think a jury might have been persuaded that this is a nice, elderly man with a faulty memory.

There have been four people that I am aware of in the past few years that have been charged with mishandling classified information. Two of them have had very few consequences–Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden. When does this tell us about our justice system?

What Did We Learn From The Hearing?

On Tuesday, Just the News posted an article about the testimony of Special Counsel Robert Hur before the House Judiciary Committee.

The article lists the seven biggest takeaways from that testimony:

1. President Biden “willfully” retained classified documents

2. Hur indicated Biden was lying when he claimed in news conference he did not share classified information

3. President Biden’s motives for retaining classified documents were explored, including $8 million in book proceeds

4. Hur insisted that his report did not “exonerate” Biden

5. The Intelligence Community is completing a damage assessment on Biden’s handling of classified documents

6. Prosecutors believed there was an effort to destroy evidence

7.) Biden displayed a hazy memory, confusion during his two-day interview with Hur’s team

The article concludes:

In one line of questioning about Biden’s time after he left the vice presidency in early 2017, he struggled to remember the year of important events, like Donald Trump’s election in 2016 and the death of his son, Beau Biden, from brain cancer in 2015.

“And so what was happening, though – what month did Beau die? Oh God, May 30,” Biden said, according to the transcript reviewed by Just the News.

“2015,” a White House Counsel’s office attorney interjected.

“Was it 2015 he had died?” Biden asked.

The transcript contradicts statements President Biden made after Hur’s report was released last month. The president was publicly indignant and criticized Hur for allegedly raising the topic.

“How in the hell dare he raise that,” Biden said to reporters, speaking about Hur. “Frankly, when I was asked the question, I thought to myself it wasn’t any of their damn business.” Yet, the transcript shows it was Biden who first mentioned his son’s death.

After confirming the date of his son’s death with the lawyers, Biden still appeared to be confused about the timeline of his post-vice presidential private life.

Biden said: “And what’s happened in the meantime is that Trump gets elected in November of 2017?”

Two individuals corrected him, saying it was in “2016,” according to the transcript.

“2016. Alright, so – why do I have 2017 here?” Biden asked.

Even young people confuse dates. However, the really sleazy move was to blame Hur for bringing up Beau Biden’s death. President Biden brings that up anytime he feels it is useful to him–he even brought it up in the State of the Union address.

More Skullduggery Uncovered

Yesterday I posted an article espousing the theory that the raid on Mar-a-Lago was really about the FBI wanting to recover information that incriminated the Obama administration for spying on the Trump campaign. There was another article posted at Substack yesterday that gave further credence to that theory.

The Substack article reported:

Last December 15th, as Americans decorated trees, lit Menorahs, and prepared to tune out for winter holidays, CNN ran an extraordinary article titled, “The mystery of the missing binder: How a collection of raw Russian intelligence disappeared under Trump.”

Co-authored by Natasha Bertrand, the gargantuan exposé claimed a mysterious “binder” of “highly classified information related to Russian election interference” went “missing” in the chaotic waning days of Donald Trump’s presidency in January 2021, raising concerns that some of America’s most “closely guarded national security secrets… could be exposed.”

CNN and its intelligence sources meant “exposure” in a bad way. Sources have told Public and Racket, however, that the secrets officials worry might be “exposed” are ones that would implicate them in widespread abuses of intelligence authority dating back to the 2015-2016 election season.

“I would call [the binder] Trump’s insurance policy,” said someone knowledgeable about the case. “He was very concerned about having it and taking it with him because it was the road map” of Russiagate.

Transgressions range from Justice Department surveillance of domestic political targets without probable cause to the improper unmasking of a pre-election conversation between a Trump official and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to WMD-style manipulation of intelligence for public reports on alleged Russian “influence activities.”

The CNN report claimed intelligence officials were concerned about the disclosure of “sources and methods that informed the U.S. government’s assessment that Russian President Vladimir Putin sought to help Trump win the 2016 election.”

They should be concerned. The story of how a team “hand-picked” by CIA Director John Brennan relied on “cooked intelligence” to craft that January 6th, 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment is the subject of tomorrow’s story, the last in this three-part series.

Corruption, not tradecraft, is what officials are desperate to keep secret.

I rather doubt the mainstream media will cover this unless they absolutely have to. Meanwhile, please follow the link to read the entire article. It really isn’t surprising, but it is alarming that a group of people inside our government felt entitled to determine the results of an election regardless of the will of the voters.

This Could Get Very Interesting

On Friday, The Gateway Pundit posted an article about the upcoming trial of President Trump regarding the events of January 6h.

The article reports:

Former President Donald Trump’s defense team filed a new motion on Thursday indicating that the former president will present classified information exposing foreign interference in both the 2016 and 2020 U.S. Presidential elections.

The article includes an excerpt from one of the court documents in the case:

The Indictment in this case adopts classified assessments by the Intelligence Community and others that minimized, and at times ignored, efforts by foreign actors to influence and interfere with the 2020 election.

President Trump will offer classified information at trial relating to foreign influence activities that impacted the 2016 and 2020 elections, as well as efforts by his administration to combat those activities.

President Trump will also present classified information relating to the biased and politicized nature of the intelligence assessments that he and others rejected during the events in question.

Collectively, this evidence will undercut central theories of the prosecution and establish that President Trump acted at all times in good faith and on the belief that he was doing what he had been elected to do.
The article concludes:

According to Halper-Hayes ( Dr. Jan Halper-Hayes, a former Global Vice President of Republicans Overseas UK), Trump had chosen not to disclose such evidence early to prevent civil unrest, believing it could lead to a civil war.

“I sit on a task force at the Department of Defense, and the thing is, they’ve got the goods. They’ve got the goods. And Trump knew that if he presented any of the goods early on, we’d have a civil war, that he really felt that the people needed to see how bad it could get,” said Halper-Hayes.

“See, the thing is, think about Edward Snowden and all the information he had. Think about the fact that our military, our Department of Defense Space Force, if you think that they don’t have the actual real results from the election, then you’re fooling yourself,” said Halper-Hayes.

Dr. Halper-Hayes further delved into Executive Order 13848,” enacted by Trump on September 12, 2018, arguing that it was designed to combat foreign interference in U.S. elections, with a focus on the 2020 elections.

“Now, let me say something about this 2020 election, is that Biden is the legitimate president, but he’s the legitimate president of what is now the bankrupt US. Corporation and that was a treaty in 1871,” said Halper-Hayes.

She continued, “Well, on September 12, 2018, Trump created an executive order. Within that, he outlined in future elections any kind of foreign or domestic interference specifically for the 2020 election. So we say, how did he know some of these things were going to happen? Election integrity on both sides of the aisle is tough. It’s really tough. But what this has done is it opened the door for Trump to present his case.”

It will be very interesting to see if this case ever makes it to trial.

 

Why Is The Information Still Classified?

Yesterday The New York Post posted an article by Kenneth R. Timmerman about the 2012 attack on the embassy annex in Benghazi. I strongly suggest that you follow the link to the article as it is extremely complex.

The article reports:

US intelligence agencies are sitting on a treasure trove of documents that detail Iran’s direct, material involvement in the Sept. 11, 2012, attacks in Benghazi, Libya, that cost the lives of four Americans. But until now, deep state bureaucrats have buried them under layers of classification, often without reason.

From CIA officers, military contractors, and sources within US Special Forces, I have learned of the existence of at least 50 briefing documents that warned of Iranian intelligence operations in Benghazi. Some specifically predicted an Iranian attack on US diplomats and US facilities. Those documents have remained inaccessible, including to the Select Committee on Benghazi chaired by former US Representative Trey Gowdy.

The deep state is expert at hiding information that would have a negative impact on its members. The fact that the Select Committee on Benghazi cannot access certain documents relating to Benghazi is further proof of that.

The article continues:

By the summer of 2012, US intelligence and security officers in Benghazi and Tripoli warned their chain of command — including Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens — that the Iranians were preparing a terrorist attack on the US compound in Benghazi. These increased Iranian preparations prompted the head of security for Stevens, Green Beret Colonel Andy Wood, to send a cable to his commanding officer in June 2012 that the Iranian-backed militia — Ansar al Sharia — had received their funding from Iran and were now sending their wives and children to Benghazi, as I reported in these pages previously.

Until now, the government has released just a handful of heavily redacted documents relating to Iran’s Benghazi operations. Throughout the Obama administration, officials with knowledge of the Quds Force presence in Benghazi, including security contractors who defended the CIA Annex in a 13-hour battle with the jihadis, were repeatedly threatened with prosecution if they revealed what they knew. Among them was the then-director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Gen. Michael Flynn.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. It is amazing.

Something To Consider Before You Vote

Yesterday Jed Babbin posted an article at The Washington Times titled, “Biden’s loose lips will make it difficult to maintain national security and America’s secrets.” That is a frightening statement, but unfortunately it is true.The article notes the events following then Vice-President Biden’s statement that Osama bin Laden was killed by a Navy SEAL Team.

The article notes:

On May 2, 2011, President Obama announced the death of Osama bin Laden. He credited the action to a “small team of Americans.” That was the right way to do it.

Nine days later, Mr. Biden made a speech in which he said that the bin Laden operation was conducted by Navy SEALs. He did not name SEAL Team Six specifically, but once the SEALs were named, any intelligence agency (or terrorist network) could easily determine that it was Team Six. The location of their home base — and thus their families — has been one of the worst-kept secrets in the military. Mr. Biden’s remarks endangered them all.

Caring for the nation’s secrets is a mundane task at which the Obama administration — including Mr. Biden — failed utterly. 

The members of Navy SEAL Team Six were killed in an ambush on August 6, 2011. The claim that the ambush was a result of Joe Biden’s stating that the SEALs killed bin Laden is disputed by some, but those familiar with the events believe the ambush was the result of the Vice-President’s statements.

The article also notes that during the Obama administration classified information was sent over non-secure computers (Hillary Clinton’s private server) even by the President. It is considered highly likely that the Chinese had a copy of everything that went through Mrs. Clinton’s server in real time. We lost a lost of intelligence assets in China during those years.

Those who have watched the infrequent appearances of the former Vice-President believe that he is showing his age. He does not seem to be able to hold a train of thought for an extended period of time and seems to be easily distracted or confused. Are the American voters willing to trust a man who may not be working at full mental capacity?

 

On His Way Out The Door…

Ambassador Rick Grenell did a wonderful job as Acting Director of National Intelligence. He showed himself to be a true patriot in revealing to the American public the misuse of the intelligence apparatus by the previous administration. Sara Carter posted an article yesterday about something he has done that will help further the cause of transparency.

The article reports:

Outgoing Acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell slammed Sen. Mark Warner Tuesday saying his request last week to declassify and publicly release the underlying intelligence reports in which Obama officials “unmasked” the identity of former national security advisor Michael Flynn would jeopardize sources and methods.

Grenell also criticized Warner’s alleged political move as ‘cherry picking’ documents for political purposes at the expense of national security. Warner is the ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee and spoke out against Grenell’s declassification of the senior Obama officials that requested Flynn’s private conversations and unmasking of his name.

“I find it puzzling that your letter initially complains about the declassification of the identities of unmaskers, a declassification that posed no conceivable risks to sources or methods, only to then request the declassification of actual intelligence reports,” said Grenell. “Cherry picking certain documents for release, while attacking the release of others that don’t fit your political narrative, is part of the problem the American people have with Washington DC politicians. I would appreciate it if you would explain your philosophy on transparency as it appears to be based solely on political advantage.”

Grenell had declassified the names of 16 former senior Obama officials involved in requesting Flynn’s private communications 48 times, according to the declassified documents provided by the DNI. Grenell only declassified the requests made between Nov. 30, 2016 and Jan. 12, 2017, according to the documents. The most controversial request was the phone calls between Flynn and former Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak, who spoke on Dec. 29, 2016. The contents of that classified phone conversation, which was wiretapped by the FBI, would later be leaked to The Washington Post columnist David Ignatius in January.

Despite Warner’s concerns mentioned in his letter last week, the declassification of the Obama officials’ names did not violate any sources or methods, stated intelligence officials.

Please follow the link to the article for further details.

I would like to point out the contrast between what Mark Warner and Adam Schiff have been doing regarding classified information and what Ambassador Grenell has done. Mark Warner and Adam Schiff have been selectively leaking tidbits to their allies in the press for the purpose of making President Trump look bad. Ambassador Grenell is declassifying information to inform the American public about what has actually been going on. Representative Schiff and Senator Warner need to be held accountable for their leaking. If they are not held accountable, we will see more of the same.

Sunlight Is The Best Disinfactant

Townhall is reporting today that Acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell has declassified documents showing the Obama administration officials allegedly involved in the “unmasking” of Michael Flynn in transcripts of calls he had with Russia’s former ambassador, Sergey Kislyak.

The article reports:

Information on the Flynn-Kislyak phone call was leaked to The Washington Post in 2017, leading many to wonder whether an Obama administration official had illegally disclosed classified information.

In 2017, Rep. Devin Nunes, who was then the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said he had evidence “current and former government officials had easy access to U.S. person information and that it is possible that they used this information to achieve partisan political purposes, including the selective, anonymous leaking of such information.”

He continued, “The committee has learned that one official, whose position had no apparent intelligence-related function, made hundreds of unmasking requests during the final year of the Obama administration.”

The article notes:

Both former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper were pressed by GOP senators in 2017 about their role in alleged unmasking abuses, and denied any wrongdoing. There were reports that United Nations Ambassador Samantha Power unmasked hundreds of U.S. persons, but she has said this is “absolutely false.”

Former FBI Director James Comey told the House Intelligence Committee in 2017 that the National Security Agency, the CIA, the FBI, and the Justice Department all had the ability to unmask individuals.

U.S. Attorney John Durham is reportedly investigating the leaks of potentially classified information related to Flynn to the media in early 2017. (Washington Examiner)

There were many things that went on during the Obama administration regarding classified information that need to be examined. Things that should have remained classified were leaked for political purposes, and things that were classified solely for the purpose of hiding illegal surveillance activities by the administration were kept secret. It’s time to examine that and correct the misdeeds.

How To Write A Report Without Actually Saying Anything

When I heard about the article in The New York Times that proclaimed that a Republican-led Senate panel has issued a report that “undercuts claims by President Trump and his allies that Obama-era officials sought to undermine his candidacy by investigating Russia’s 2016 election meddling,” I wondered how that was possible considering the recently declassified information relating to Operation Crossfire Hurricane. Well Andrew McCarthy posted an article at The National Review yesterday that cleared that up for me. First of all I would like to state that I believe that the Senate Intelligence Committee is one of the most corrupt and leaky groups in Washington. They have been caught leaking fake news on more than one occasion. At any rate, Andrew McCarthy explained in his article exactly what was said in the report and what was not said in the report.

The article notes:

In truth, the story is a nothing-burger. We learn that one of the most useless committees on Capitol Hill, the Senate Intelligence Committee, has issued a 158-page report — festooned with the usual “there are things we can’t tell you” redactions — as a capper to its three-year investigation into a question no one is asking: Did the intelligence community competently conclude that Russia interfered in the 2016 campaign?

No one is asking that question because, for the vast majority of people closely following the collusion caper, that would be like asking whether the Chiefs won the Super Bowl.

We know Russia interfered in our campaign. Given Moscow’s long history of meddling in American politics, it would only have been a story if Russia did not meddle. The principal argument by President Trump and other intelligence agency critics has not been that Obama officials undermined Trump’s candidacy and presidency “by investigating Russia’s 2016 election meddling.” The argument is that they undermined Trump’s campaign and presidency by claiming that Trump and his campaign were complicit in Russia’s 2016 election meddling.

On that key question the Useless Committee is, as is its custom, mum.

They also punted on another key question:

The real question is whether the Obama administration and its officials held over by the new administration fabricated a tale about the Trump campaign’s complicity in Russia’s hacking. Did they peddle that tale to the FISA court while willfully concealing key exculpatory evidence? Did they continue the investigation under the guise of counterintelligence after Trump was elected, in the hope of finding a crime over which he could be impeached? Did they consciously mislead an American president about whether he was under investigation? Did they purposefully suggest in public testimony that the president was a criminal suspect, while privately assuring him that he was not one? And finally, when the Trump-Russia collusion nonsense was collapsing in a heap, did they open a criminal obstruction case — based on an untenable legal theory and facilitated by a leak of investigative information that was orchestrated by the just-fired FBI director — in order to justify continuing the probe under the auspices of a special counsel?

On these questions, the Useless Committee’s report is silent. Indeed, the report says right up front, in the findings section, that the intelligence agencies, over the FBI’s objection, did not include information from the infamous Steele dossier in its December 30, 2016, assessment on Russian interference — though, “as a compromise to the FBI insistence,” dossier allegations were included in an annex to the assessment. The Senate-report findings do not get into why the FBI was pushing so hard on the preposterous dossier. Nor do they mention that, by the time of the assessment, the bureau had already heavily relied on the dossier to obtain a surveillance warrant from the FISA court, and was even then preparing a submission to get yet another warrant — telling the federal judges the bureau believed that the Trump campaign was conspiring with the Kremlin.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. Andrew McCarthy explains how a 158-page report can say absolutely nothing. It is not a coincidence that this report was released just as declassified documents are showing illegal surveillance of the Trump campaign and administration and we are awaiting the Dunbar report. This report is a pre-emptive strike put out by the political class in Washington.

Bucket Five Is Released

Those of us who have followed the investigation into Crossfire Hurricane closely have been waiting for the information in Bucket Five to be released. That is the information that investigative reporters have cited from the beginning as having the real story behind the surveillance on the Trump campaign and the early days of the Trump presidency. The Conservative Treehouse posted an article today about the documents the Senate Judiciary Committee has released today. The article includes links and screenshots of information and is very detailed. I recommend that you follow the link and read the entire article, but I will includes some of the highlights here.

The article reports:

The documents include more Papadopoulos transcripts from wired conversations with FBI confidential human source Stefan Halper; and also for the first time less redacted version of all three Carter Page FISA applications.  It’s going to take some time to go through this.

The declassification and release includes some seriously interesting documents the DOJ submitted to the FISA court, as far back as July 2018, which completely destroy the prior claims made by Lisa Page, Peter Strzok, James Baker, James Comey, Andrew McCabe and their very vocal media and Lawfare defenders.   Here’s one example:

Lisa Page testified to congress, and claimed in media, that the FBI never had any contact with the Steele dossier material until September 2016.  However, the DOJ directly tells the FISA court that Chris Steele was funneling his information to the FBI in June 2016.

Obviously those involved in the surveillance never expected the truth to come out. They assumed that Hillary Clinton would be elected and their illegal activities would be buried in a sea of classified information. All Americans need to understand that if the Democrat party gains power in Washington, no one involved in this illegal surveillance will ever be held accountable and similar activities will continue in the future. Until the people involved in these activities are held accountable, there will be no guarantee that the civil rights of Americans will not be violated by our government in the future.

The Truth Is Slowly Coming To Light

The Federalist posted an article today about the Inspector General’s (IG) report on Operation Crossfire Hurricane.

The article notes:

Sens. Chuck Grassley and Ron Johnson dropped that bombshell in a letter delivered to Attorney General William Barr that requested Barr declassify the information hidden in the redacted footnotes. While the declassified version of the Grassley-Johnson letter did not identify the four footnotes at issue, a detailed analysis of the IG report suggests the redacted information concerned Christopher Steele’s sources and potentially the FBI’s purported predication for the launch of Crossfire Hurricane. These conclusions come from a deep-dive into the IG report read in tandem with the Grassley-Johnson letter.

That letter noted that the senators had “reviewed the classified report of the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) with regard to the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane investigation, and [were] deeply concerned about certain information that remains classified.” Their concern? “That certain sections of the public version of the report are misleading because they are contradicted by relevant and probative classified information redacted in four footnotes.”

The next sentence is the key, as it establishes that the redacted information concerns not just a few details addressed in the IG report, but goes to the heart of the entire Crossfire Hurricane investigation: “This classified information is significant not only because it contradicts key statements in a section of the report, but also because it provides insight essential for an accurate evaluation of the entire investigation.”

The author of the article reads between the lines to list the contradictions within the report and provides the connections between the parts of the report’s footnotes that were redacted and areas of the report those footnotes contradict. The bottom line here is that the redactions are made to protect the intelligence community–not in the interest of national security.

The article concludes:

Without Barr declassifying the information contained in these footnotes, as well as other material, such as the complete FISA applications, we’ll just have to take Grassley and Johnson’s word that the redacted information contradicts other portions of the IG report, making “certain sections of the public version of the report” “misleading.” However, given the accuracy and honesty of Rep. Devin Nunes’ memo on FISA abuse, I’m inclined to trust the Republican senators.

It’s time for full disclosure. The people in the government who misused their power seem very comfortable with the idea that they will not be held accountable for their misconduct. I hope they are wrong.

What Happens Next?

One America News is reporting today that the State Department has concluded its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private server. A Friday report claimed there are nearly 600 security incidents that violated agency policies.

The article reports:

38 individuals were found to be culpable for 91 security violations and will soon face disciplinary action. Another 497 violations occurred without attribution to the individuals responsible.

The investigation was looking into whether Clinton’s use of a private server failed to properly safeguard classified information. Clinton submitted over 30,000 emails for review after the State Department found top secret content in a handful of her correspondences.

Back in 2016, former FBI Director James Comey called the conduct “extremely careless,” but fell short of recommending charges against the former presidential candidate.

The article concludes:

In the latest probe, investigators determined Clinton’s conduct represented an increased degree of risk to the State Department. However, they emphasized there was “no persuasive evidence of systemic, deliberate mishandling of classified information.”

I disagree. Setting up a private server was a “systemic, deliberate mishandling of classified information.” We know from previous reports that the server was hacked and that at least one foreign intelligence agency received everything that traveled through the server in real time. People lost their lives because of what was on that private server. If equal justice under the law still applies in America, Hillary Clinton belongs in jail. Actually, I would not like to see that happen, but I would like her charged (then pardoned) so that she and the American people realize the seriousness of what she did.

The Truth Continues To Seep Out

Yesterday The American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) posted the following on its website:

The ACLJ has just obtained previously unreleased documents related to the Clinton investigation and immunity agreements given to top Clinton aids. These agreements reveal that James Comey’s Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Loretta Lynch’s Department of Justice (DOJ) granted immunity to Hillary Clinton’s aids and lawyers, Cheryl Mills and Heather Samuelson, from prosecution for anything found on their laptops violating multiple felony criminal statutes governing the mishandling of classified information and/or the removal or destruction of records, including Espionage Act provisions. Further, the DOJ and FBI also agreed to evade the statutory requirements of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) by purporting to deem the contents of the laptops as not under DOJ or FBI “custody or control.”

These laptops were critical to any meaningful investigation of Hillary Clinton’s handling of classified emails and records. According to the DOJ Inspector General, who identified these as the “culling laptops,” “[a]ll 62,320 emails pulled from the Clinton servers were stored at one time on these laptops.” Having taken control of these laptops, agreeing to severely limit its searches, agreeing to unlawfully shield the laptops from FOIA, then agreeing to dispose of the laptops, it appears the Comey FBI and Lynch DOJ did everything in their power to protect Clinton’s senior aids and lawyers from both criminal liability and public scrutiny.

While these immunity agreements and related news have been publicly discussed to some extent, the ACLJ has now obtained the actual documents so the public may see and judge them accordingly.

The article also states:

According to the DOJ’s immunity agreement with Mills:

As we have advised you, we consider Cheryl Mills to be a witness based on the information gathered to date in this investigation. We understand that Cheryl Mills is willing to voluntarily provide the Mills Laptop to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, if the United States agrees not to use any information directly obtained from the Mills Laptop in any prosecution of Cheryl Mills for the mishandling of classified information and/or the removal or destruction of records as described below.

And, according to the immunity agreement:

To that end, it is hereby agreed as follows:

    1. That, subject to the terms of consent set forth in a separate letter to the Department of Justice dated June 10, 2016, Cheryl Mills will voluntarily produce the Mills Laptop to the Federal Bureau of Investigation for its review and analysis.
    2. That no information directly obtained from the Mills Laptop will be used against your client in any prosecution under 18 U.S.C. § 793(e) and/or (f); 18 U.S.C. § 1924; and/or 18 U.S.C. § 2071.
    1. That no other promises, agreements, or understandings exist between the parties except as set forth in this agreement, and no modification of this agreement shall have effect unless executed in writing by the parties.

The agreement was then executed by Cheryl Mills. The immunity agreement with Samuelson reads the same.

Mills and Samuelson Were Granted Immunity From Prosecution Under Multiple Felony Statutes for Anything Found on Their Laptops.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. Unfortunately this is a glaring example of unequal justice under the law.

Looking Past The Obvious

Today The Washington Examiner posted an article about the resignation of Britain’s ambassador to the United States, Sir Kim Darroch. The Ambassador was forced to resign after some leaked diplomatic cables that said some very unflattering things about President Trump. Obviously, the man is entitled to his own opinion and obviously, the cables should not have been leaked, but there is a certain amount of karma involved here.

The Washington Examiner reports:

According to one current and one former U.S. government official speaking on the condition of anonymity, Darroch repeatedly leaked classified U.S. intelligence information, including highly classified information, to a journalist for a U.S.-based media outlet. The sources are confirmed by the reaction my related inquiries have received from other government officials.

These leaks are unrelated to the diplomatic cables which sparked Trump’s anger and Darroch’s departure.

Still, one source says that the U.S. government was so alarmed by Darroch’s leaks that it launched an official investigation to find the source of the information. That source described the leaked intelligence as “very sensitive,” and suggested that exigent U.S. security concerns motivated the investigation. That source says that non-U.S. government derived records showed the ambassador and journalist exchanging messages on a continuing basis. The source emphasized that these communications were not derived from U.S. government actions.

A second source, a career government official, described the leaks as “unprecedented.”

Obviously, if you live by the leak, you die by the leak.

The Proof Is In The Emails

Judicial Watch released the following Press Release today:

Judicial Watch: State Department Emails Show Coordination Between Obama State Department and House Democrat Leader on Christopher Steele/Russia

JUNE 12, 2019

‘You’ve been a warrior on these issues, and I look forward to speaking further to preserve and wherever possible strengthen the important work you have done’ – Hoyer aide Daniel Silverberg to Victoria Nuland 

(Washington, DC) Judicial Watch and the Daily Caller News Foundation today released 16 pages of documents revealing former Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and Special Coordinator for Libya Jonathan Winer coordinating with then-House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer’s (D-MD) national security advisor, Daniel Silverberg to work on Russia dossier materials provided by Christopher Steele.

Steele is a former British spy and author of the anti-Trump dossier used to justify a series of FISA spy warrants targeting Carter Page. Winer is a former Obama State Department deputy assistant secretary who was implicated in working with Steele and Clinton associate Sidney Blumenthal to circulate the anti-Trump dossier.

Judicial Watch obtained the documents in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit filed on April 25, 2018 on behalf of itself and the Daily Caller News Foundation against the State Department after it failed to respond to three separate FOIA requests (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of State (No. 1:18-cv- 00968)). The lawsuit seeks:

  • All records of communications between State Department officials, including former Secretary of State John Kerry, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, on the one hand, and British National Christopher Steele and/or employees or contractors of Steele’s company, Orbis Business Intelligence, on the other hand.
  • All records and/or memoranda provided by Christopher Steele and/or his firm Orbis Business Intelligence or by others acting on Steele’s/Orbis’s behalf, to State Department officials.
  • Any and all records in the custody of the State Department related to the provision of documents to British national Christopher Steele and/or his firm, Orbis Business Intelligence, or the receipt of documents from Steele or his firm.  Time period is January 20, 2009 through the present.
  • All records created in 2016 by Jonathan M. Winer relating to research compiled by Christopher Steele.

In an email exchange on September 19, 2016, Glenn Simpson of Fusion GPS asks Winer if he is “in town?” Winer replies “For a couple of hours.”

In an email exchange on September 26, 2016, Winer emails Nuland asking for “15 minutes of your time today if possible,” to discuss a “Russia related issue” from his “old O [Orbis Business Intelligence] friend.” Orbis was co-founded and run by Russia dossier author Christopher Steele. Nuland’s assistant suggests a secure call for the discussion and Winer asks his aide to postpone a meeting he was to have with the State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) to accommodate.

In an exchange beginning in November 2016, Hoyer top-aide Silverberg emails a “thank you” to Nuland, calling her a “warrior on these issues” and stating that he looks forward to pursuing “some of the things we discussed yesterday, albeit on the system integrity side.” Nuland forwards this email to Winer who adds that he wants to talk about “some new info.”

From: Silverberg, Daniel [mailto:Daniel.Silverberg@mail.house.gov]
Sent: Monday, November 28, 2016 10:57 PM
To: Nuland, Victoria J
Subject: Thank you

Toria,

It was a delight to speak today, notwithstanding the context. You’ve been a warrior on these issues, and I look forward to speaking further to preserve and wherever possible strengthen the important work you have done. I’ll follow up regarding a possible working group meeting.

On Nov 29, 2016, at 10:07 AM, Nuland, Victoria J <nulandvi@state.gov> wrote:

Thanks, Daniel. I look forward to continuing our collaboration in whatever capacity life brings. Copied here is Jonathan Winer, who has some legal ideas that may be of interest to you and Cong. Hoyer.

From: Nuland, Victoria J
Sent: Tuesday, November 29, 2016 10:08 AM
To: Winer, Jonathan
Subject: RN: Thank you

They want to pursue some of the things we discussed yesterday, albeit on the system integrity side.

From: Winer, Jonathan
Sent: Tuesday, November 29, 2016 10:12 AM
To: Nuland, Victoria J
Subject: Re: Thank you

Want to talk briefly further. Some new info want you to be aware of. [Redacted] Phone call ok sometime this am? Five minutes is enough.

From: Nuland, Victoria J <nulandvj@state.gov>
Sent: Tuesday, November 29, 2016 10:23 AM
To: Winer, Jonathan <WinerJ@state.gov>
Subject: RE: Thank you

Of course, [redacted] Send me good number and time.

From: Silverberg, Daniel
Sent: Tuesday, November 29, 2016 10:52 AM
To: Nuland, Victoria J
Cc: Winer, Jonathan
Subject: Re: Thank you

Great. Jonathan, I am all ears.

From: Winer, Jonathan
Sent: Saturday, December 10, 2016 2:10 PM
To: Silverberg, Daniel <Daniel.Silverberg@mail.house.gov>
Subject: Re: Thank you

I’ve reached out per our call yesterday. Please call me to talk further at your early convenience. Weekend best but can also talk Monday.

In a November 2016 exchange with the subject line “Would like to catch up on something at your convenience,” Winer reaches out to Nuland for a meeting, which gets booked in the Truman building on November 28. 

In an email exchange dated December 12, 2016, Winer requests a brief meeting with Nuland saying, “Something new has come up of which I want you to be aware.” Nuland replies, “Ok,” and adds her assistant to the exchange. Winer’s assistant then emails Nuland’s assistant looking for a time to meet.

In February 2018, Winer wrote an op-ed claiming anti-Trump dossier author Christopher Steele and Clinton confidant Sidney Blumenthal approached him with separate dossiers. Winer wrote: “In the summer of 2016, Steele told me that he had learned of disturbing information regarding possible ties between Donald Trump, his campaign and senior Russian officials.” Also, “While talking about that hacking, Blumenthal and I discussed Steele’s reports. He showed me notes gathered by a journalist I did not know …”

“Every day of digging reveals more and more political collaboration on this hit job, and at the highest levels. While so much of the media is content to chase Russian conspiracies, The Daily Caller News Foundation and the fantastic lawyers at Judicial Watch are going to keep doing the hard work of holding power accountable,” said Christopher Bedford, editor in chief of the Daily Caller News Foundation.

“These documents further confirm the Obama State Department was obviously a way station for Steele’s smear dossier and other anti-Trump activism,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.

Judicial Watch recently released 43 pages of documents from the State Department revealing that its “Special Coordinator for Libya,” Jonathan Winer, played a key role in facilitating Steele’s access to other top government officials, prominent international business executives. Winer was even approached by a movie producer about making a movie about the Russiagate targeting of President Trump.

Judicial Watch previously released two sets of heavily redacted State Department documents showing classified information was researched and disseminated to multiple U.S. Senators by the Obama administration immediately prior to President Donald Trump’s inauguration. The documents reveal that among those receiving the classified documents were Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD), and Sen. Robert Corker (R-TN).

Also, Judicial Watch is suing the State Department for communications between Nuland and employees of Fusion GPS, as well as top ranking Department of Justice, FBI, and State Department officials.

Stay tuned. More information on the roots of the Russian collusion investigation will be coming out shortly. We already have enough information to realize that because President Trump was a political novice, professional politicians felt that they could easily set him up for disaster. Recent letters from the people involved in investigating the root of the Russia investigation indicate that people will be held accountable for the misuse of government agencies and the violation of the civil rights of Americans.

I Don’t Have Enough Imagination To Come Up With This

The following appeared in The Daily Caller yesterday:

This is real. I am not kidding.

The article notes:

Hillary Clinton, who used a private email server as secretary of state, will speak at a cyber defense summit later in 2019, it was announced Thursday.

FireEye, a cybersecurity company based in California, announced Clinton will give the keynote speech at its annual summit in Washington, D.C., in October.

The article continues:

The FBI investigated Clinton for mishandling classified information, but she was not charged in the probe.

James Comey, who served as FBI director during the investigation, called Clinton’s use of the server “extremely careless.” He said it made more vulnerable to cyber attack by foreign powers, though investigators did not find evidence that the server was hacked.

Clinton has also asserted the hacks of her campaign chairman’s emails and that of the Democratic National Committee led to her defeat at the hands of Donald Trump in the 2016 election.

The Russian government allegedly hacked into the DNC’s computer systems and released nearly 20,000 emails through WikiLeaks. The same Russian intelligence operation also stole John Podesta’s emails through an unsophisticated spear-phishing attack.

I would like to note that the FBI was never allowed to examine the DNC’s computer systems to confirm how John Podesta’s emails were accessed–it was done by an organization called CrowdStrike, considered an ally of the Democrat Party. There has always been speculation that the Podesta emails were leaked by a Democrat. Julian Assange of Wikileaks has stated on numerous occasions that he did not get the emails from the Russians.

At any rate, would you attend a cyber security conference with Hillary Clinton as the featured speaker?

 

Act II

The Mueller Report fizzled. Donald Trump is still President. The House of Representative is preparing for impeachment on possible charges of a cover-up where there is no crime. Most of the Democrat candidates running for President in 2020 support socialism, killing babies up until the moment when they are actually born, open borders, free healthcare for everyone (including those here illegally), and free college. What could possibly go wrong? Well, now is the time to get out the popcorn.

On Thursday, Victor Davis Hanson posted an article at The National Review about the collapse of the Russian-collusion narrative.

Mr. Hanson points out a few obvious facts that made the narrative doubtful from the start:

One, the Washington swamp of fixers such as Paul Manafort and John and Tony Podesta was mostly bipartisan and predated Trump.

Two, the Trump administration’s Russia policies were far tougher on Vladimir Putin than were those of Barack Obama. Trump confronted Russia in Syria, upped defense spending, increased sanctions, and kept the price of oil down through massive new U.S. energy production. He did not engineer a Russian “reset” or get caught on a hot mic offering a self-interested hiatus in tensions with Russia in order to help his own reelection bid.

The article concludes by noting that the rats are deserting the sinking ship:

Comey is also in a tiff with his former deputy, Andrew McCabe. Both know that the FBI under Comey illegally leaked classified information to the media. But Comey says McCabe went rogue and did it. Of course, McCabe’s attorney shot back that Comey had authorized it. Comey also claims the Steele dossier was not the chief evidence for a FISA warrant. McCabe insists that it was. It’s possible that one might work with prosecutors against the other to finagle a lesser charge.

Former CIA director John Brennan has on two occasions lied under oath to Congress and gotten away with it. He may not get away with lying again if it’s determined that he distorted the truth about his efforts to spread the Steele dossier smears. A former CIA official claims that Comey put the unverified Steele dossier into an intelligence community report on alleged Russian interference. Comey has contended that Brennan was the one who did.

It’s possible that both did. Doing so would have been unethical if not illegal, given that neither official told President Obama (if he didn’t already know) that the silly Steele dossier was a product of Hillary Clinton’s amateurish efforts to subvert the 2016 Trump campaign.

In sum, the old leaky vessel of collusion is sinking.

The rats are scampering from their once safe refuge — biting and piling on one another in vain efforts to avoid drowning.

The really scary part of this is that if Hillary Clinton had been elected, we would know none of this, and using the government to spy on political opponents would have become a way of life in America. Unless the people responsible for using the government as a political weapon are brought to justice, using the government to spy on political opponents will become a way of life in America.

When Making More Information Available To The Public Is Called A “Cover-Up”

Yesterday President Trump signed a memo allowing for the declassification of the background information on the investigation into Russian-collusion.

Paul Mirengoff at Power Line Blog reported the event this way:

From the White House comes this announcement:

Today, at the request and recommendation of the Attorney General of the United States, President Donald J. Trump directed the intelligence community to quickly and fully cooperate with the Attorney General’s investigation into surveillance activities during the 2016 Presidential election.

The Attorney General has also been delegated full and complete authority to declassify information pertaining to this investigation, in accordance with the long-established standards for handling classified information. Today’s action will help ensure that all Americans learn the truth about the events that occurred, and the actions that were taken, during the last Presidential election and will restore confidence in our public institutions.

Trump’s directive doesn’t mean that information will be declassified willy-nilly. The Attorney General is instructed to adhere to “long-established standards for handling classified information” — the same standards that those who made the initial classification decisions should have applied, but may not have in order to cover their tracks.

This is how the Associated Press reported the event:

The headline reads, “Trump moves to escalate investigation of intel agencies.”

President Donald Trump on Thursday granted Attorney General William Barr new powers to review and potentially release classified information related to the origins of the Russia investigation, a move aimed at accelerating Barr’s inquiry into whether U.S. officials improperly surveilled Trump’s 2016 campaign.

Trump directed the intelligence community to “quickly and fully cooperate” with Barr’s probe. The directive marked an escalation in Trump’s efforts to “investigate the investigators,” as he continues to try to undermine the findings of special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe amid mounting Democratic calls for impeachment proceedings.

Press secretary Sarah Sanders said in a statement that Trump is delegating to Barr the “full and complete authority” to declassify documents relating to the probe, which would ease his efforts to review the sensitive intelligence underpinnings of the investigation. Such an action could create fresh tensions within the FBI and other intelligence agencies, which have historically resisted such demands.

Still think the media is not biased? The Associated Press accuses the President of trying to undermine the findings of Robert Mueller. It fails to mention that Robert Mueller didn’t find anything. Make no mistake–the media is looking for impeachment. They want Watergate all over again. Only this time the illegal spying was the work of the people they support. That is a hard pill to swallow and is going to get even harder as the evidence comes out.

What was done to the President, his campaign, and his transition team was illegal. It was a flagrant misuse of government agencies for political purposes. Unless we want to see this sort of illegal surveillance occur during every election cycle, those responsible have to be held accountable.

Sunlight is the best disinfectant.

Chutzpah Unleashed!

Chutzpah is loosely defined as the quality of audacity, for good or for bad. We saw that quality illustrated in spades in some recent comments made by Hillary Clinton.

The Washington Times posted an article today that includes the following statement by former Secretary of State Clinton:

“Any other person who had engaged in those acts would certainly have been indicted, but because of the rule in the Justice Department that you can’t indict a sitting President, the whole matter of obstruction was very directly sent to the Congress,” the New York Democrat said while speaking at the Time 100 summit Tuesday.

Ms. Clinton said she has little faith in Congress acting, saying Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s efforts to investigate deeper into special counsel Robert Mueller’s report will be for naught against “the do-nothing Senate.”

“That has become a hotbed of cynicism unlike anything I have ever seen, and I served there for eight years and I know some of these people and they know better,” the former senator said.

Ms. Clinton added additional oversight investigations are necessary to prevent future attacks on American elections.

What about preventing future attacks on the civil rights of average Americans who choose to work for a candidate of the opposition party rather than the party currently in power?

The rules broken during the investigation of Hillary Clinton’s secret server have been listed before and can be found pretty much anywhere on the internet. President Trump did not purposefully destroy evidence that was already under subpoena. President Trump did not use bleach bit on computer hard drives. President Trump did not set up a secret server to conduct government business that would not automatically archive correspondence. President Trump did not mishandle classified information. Hillary, are you sure that President Trump used his power to avoid prosecution?

The Deep State Continues To Fight

Yesterday The Gateway Pundit posted an article yesterday with the following headline, “Judicial Watch Forced to Delay Clinton Email Deposition After DOJ and State Dept Defy Court-Ordered Deadline.”

Judicial Watch is a nonpartisan group that was founded in 1994. They have held both Republican and Democrat politicians accountable through the Freedom of Information Act, which was passed in 1966 and went into effect in 1967.

The article at The Gateway Pundit reports:

Conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch was scheduled to take the deposition of John Hackett, a State Department records official “immediately responsible for responding to requests for records under the Freedom of Information Act” on Friday, April 5th.

The government watchdog group was forced to delay its Clinton email deposition because the Deep State DOJ and Department of State failed to comply with a deadline.

“Turns out we had to delay today’s Clinton email deposition because the State and Justice Departments failed to comply with the court-ordered deadline for needed documents,” JW president Tom Fitton said in a tweet Friday evening.

The article concludes:

If not for Judicial Watch, Americans wouldn’t even know about Hillary Clinton’s use of a private server which she set up to avoid FOIA oversight of her Clinton Foundation pay-to-play while she was the head of the Department of State.

Judicial Watch blew the story wide open and their FOIA lawsuits also revealed Hillary Clinton was sending classified information over her private server.

A name of a clandestine CIA agent was even found in a tranche of emails uncovered by Judicial Watch — classified Hillary emails were found on pervert Anthony Weiner’s laptop after his wife, Huma Abedin, who happened to be Clinton’s aide, appeared to sync Hillary’s emails to her computers at home.

This is the second time in recent days the DOJ and State Department tried to derail Judicial Watch’s scheduled deposition of Obama-era-Clinton aides.

A couple weeks ago, Obama’s speech writer-turned-Iran-echo-chamber Ben Rhodes defied a court order to provide written answers, under oath to Judicial Watch and the State Department and Justice Department objected to Judicial Watch who sought an in-person interview with Mr. Rhodes.

The deep state is alive and well and continuing its attempt to preserve its power until President Trump is out of office.

Trying To Keep The Drip Going

Someone once told me that the Grand Canyon was the result of water dripping on a rock. I’m not sure if that is true, but it is an interesting thought. The Congressional Democrats are actually setting out to prove or disprove that theory.

Yesterday John Solomon posted an article at The Hill titled, “Note to Team Mueller: If you don’t indict, you can’t incite.” Those are wise words that could actually do a lot of good in healing the divide in America if they were heeded.

The article states:

I’ve covered the Justice Department for three decades, and seldom have I seen a story like the one published in The New York Times this week under the headline, “Some on Mueller’s Team Say Report Was More Damaging Than Barr Revealed.”

What concerned me most is that the story’s anonymous allegations reflect a fundamental misunderstanding of the role prosecutors play, including special counsels such as Robert Mueller.

The job of prosecutors is not, as the Times headline suggested, to pen “damaging” narratives about people they couldn’t indict. And it’s not their job to air those people’s dirty laundry, or that of suspects outside of a grand jury room or a courtroom.

Mueller concluded there wasn’t evidence President Trump colluded with Russia to hijack the 2016 election, and therefore no indictment was warranted. And he punted on the question of obstruction, leaving his bosses — Attorney General William Barr and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein — to determine that there wasn’t enough evidence to indict the president on that charge.

And, most significantly, there were no other people charged. That means Trump legally could not be named as an unindicted co-conspirator in an obstruction plot.

Many of the Democrat Congressmen (and Congresswomen) who are calling for the full, unredacted release of the Mueller Report are lawyers. They know that the full Mueller Report includes both Grand Jury testimony and classified information. They know that Grand Jury testimony is not public information and often contains things that may be misleading or have a negative impact on an innocent person’s life. Theoretically they are also aware of the rules regarding the handling of classified information. So if they understand the law, why are they requesting that the Attorney General break the law? Actually, the subpoena for the Mueller Report is simply part of a larger strategy.

The Attorney General is compelled by law to deny the subpoena. This sends the case to the courts where it will be tied up for at least two years–through the 2020 presidential election. I am sure some of the actions of whatever court is involved will keep the story in the news through the election.

Recently someone familiar with the report noted that the summaries in the report, written by highly partisan investigators contain classified information or Grand Jury testimony. If Congress has the full report (or even the redacted version), they can selectively leak things (that might be misleading) to keep the collusion-delusion in the headlines. Victor Davis Hanson noted in a recent article that the Russian investigation was a soft coup attempted by the deep state. I have no reason to believe that the attempt is over.

In Case You Were Wondering If It Was Political…

On Monday, The Washington Examiner posted an article about the Democrats’ calls to make the entire Mueller Report public, including source information, Grand Jury testimony, etc. Well, there are some pretty strict rules protecting the secrecy of Grand Jury testimony, and it is quite possible that disclosing other information could be a problem for our intelligence services (and possibly some foreign intelligence services). It should be noted that in their calls for transparency I haven’t heard them ask that the FISA warrants and background information on those warrants be made public. However, this call for transparency on the part of the Democrats is an interesting contrast to their reactions to previous Special Counsel reports.

The article reports:

Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, is the leading Democrat demanding the release of the Mueller Report “in its entirety” without redactions.

His committee is planning to subpoena the Justice Department for the full report.

But back in 1998, as a member of the same committee, he vociferously opposed the release of the full Starr Report, saying that “as a matter of decency and protecting people’s privacy rights, people who may be totally innocent third parties, what must not be released at all.”

Ken Starr, the independent counsel investigating then-President Bill Clinton, delivered his report to Congress on Sept. 9, 1998. That night, Nadler went on Charlie Rose’s show to push back against the Republican demand that the voluminous report should be made public. “It’s grand jury material. It represents statements which may or may not be true by various witnesses,” Nadler said. “Salacious material. All kinds of material that it would be unfair to release,”

What Nadler, 71, said in 1998 echoes what Attorney General William Barr told Congress last week. Barr, 68, wrote that he might redact grand jury testimony, information related to ongoing investigations, sensitive or classified information, and “information that would unduly infringe on the personal privacy and reputational interests of peripheral third parties” from the report that he provides to Congress and the public.

Representative Nadler does not want the entire report made public–he wants the Democrats to get the entire report so that they can leak misleading parts of the report and make the scandal last until the 2020 election. The is a political game.

The article concludes:

Special counsel Mueller declined to charge anyone associated with the Trump campaign of coordination with the Russians, but did not reach a decision on obstruction. Attorney General Barr and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein concluded that Trump had not obstructed justice.

How can you have obstruction when there was no crime?

 

Fixing The Intelligence Community

On Friday, The Daily Caller posted an article titled, “OPINION: How Could The Intelligence Community Fail So Badly?”

The article states:

Far more than a failure of journalism, the Russia collusion narrative was, at its core, a monstrous failure of U.S. intelligence and counterintelligence.

All criticism of the news media aside for the moment, the bottom line is that professional journalists received fake intelligence information from U.S. government leakers whom they trusted.

That is probably true, but I also think that the personal bias of those individuals reporting the news caused them to believe things that most people would have regarded as totally ridiculous.

The article continues:

The entire Russian collusion debacle shows that the American intelligence and counterintelligence processes have broken down.

Emphatic former CIA director John Brennan, a main engine behind spreading the Russia collusion story through the intelligence community and into the media, suddenly doesn’t sound so certain about himself. The day after Attorney General William Barr released the special prosecutor’s finding of no collusion, Brennan confessed to MSNBC, “I don’t know if I received bad information but I think I suspected that there was more than there actually was.”

This is a shocking admission from the man who was, at the time, the nation’s highest-ranking professional intelligence officer.

Brennan wasn’t indicting just himself. He inadvertently accused the entire CIA. Whatever quality control systems it has, the CIA failed to prevent “bad information” from making its way up the chain to the national strategic level.

The article goes on to mention that journalists have learned to depend on leaks from government officials. Leaking classified information is a crime punishable by law. Those leaking need to be held accountable. At the same time, the government needs to be more transparent. A lot of things that are classified are classified to save the government from embarrassment.

The article concludes:

This leads to the most dangerous conclusion of all. The Russia collusion debacle has shown that the FBI and CIA leadership are not effectively under the oversight of elected officials, but instead are capable of tampering with the American democratic process and constitutional governance.

All this must stop. President Trump should assemble a team of solid intelligence and counterintelligence veterans to dig deep into the FBI and CIA leadership, discover the real nature of the problems and devise solutions before our system self-destructs.

It’s time to create an intelligence community that is apolitical. I don’t know if that is possible, but it’s a great goal.

Sunlight Is The Best Disinfectant

Today Representative Doug Collins, a Georgia Republican, released 370 pages of Lisa Page’s testimony to a joint congressional task force investigating potential bias in the Justice Department.

The Washington Examiner posted an article today revealing some of the details of the testimony.

One of the items in the testimony was the decision not to charge Secretary of State Hillary Clinton with mishandling classified information. The article reports:

Page said Comey and the FBI spoke with DOJ about a gross negligence charge for Clinton multiple times, but that the DOJ consistently pushed back on it. “We had multiple conversations with the Justice Department about bringing a gross negligence charge. And that’s, as I said, the advice that we got from the Department was that they did not think — that it was constitutionally vague and not sustainable,” she said.

Ratcliffe asked if the decision not to charge Clinton with gross negligence was a direct order from the DOJ. “When you say advice you got from the Department, you’re making it sound like it was the Department that told you: ‘You’re not going to charge gross negligence because we’re the prosecutors and we’re telling you we’re not going to,’” he said.

Page responded: “That’s correct.”

Page is the former FBI lawyer who reportedly carried out an affair with FBI agent Peter Strzok, the lead investigator in the Clinton investigation. The thousands of text messages that they sent back and forth about the Clinton and Trump-Russia investigations raised questions of bias, and Mueller eventually removed Strzok from the special counsel investigation. Strzok was also fired by the FBI.

Page’s testimony raises further questions related to the decision not to charge Clinton with any crimes, including gross negligence, following a lengthy FBI investigation into her email practices that potentially put classified information at risk. After the revelation that then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch met with former President Bill Clinton on a Phoenix tarmac in June 2016, while Hillary Clinton was running for president, Lynch refused to recuse herself from the case while also saying she would accept Comey’s decision on what charges to bring against Clinton. But Page’s testimony indicates that DOJ had shut the door on gross negligence.

The decision on to charge Secretary Clinton was a glaring example of unequal justice. Some of our military have spent time in jail for far less serious offenses. There is also the matter of destroying evidence and deleting subpoenaed documents.

As more testimonies are made public, I wonder if it will change the public perception of the abuses of power that were going on in the final days of the Obama administration.

Glossing Over The Actual Crime

This week we watched the Mueller investigation recommend that Michael Flynn not be incarcerated because of his extensive cooperation with the investigation. This creates more questions than it answers. Why was there any kind of continuing investigation of Michael Flynn? Notes released from the investigation show that no one who interviewed him thought he was lying. So why wasn’t the investigation dropped? But wait–there’s more!

Kimberley Strassel posted an article at The Wall Street Journal yesterday with the following title, “Mueller’s Gift to Obama.” The article reminds us that the charges against Michael Flynn were based on his telephone calls and interactions with Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak. As incoming National Security Advisor, Michael Flynn would have been expected to have those conversations. It is also expected that those conversations would be wiretapped because they involved a Russian Ambassador. What is not protocol is the unmasking of General Flynn’s identity.

The article reports:

But what about the potential crimes that put Mr. Flynn in Mr. Mueller’s crosshairs to begin with? On Jan. 2, 2017, the Obama White House learned about Mr. Flynn’s conversations with Mr. Kislyak. The U.S. monitors phone calls of foreign officials, but under law they are supposed to “minimize” the names of any Americans caught up in such eavesdropping. In the Flynn case, someone in the prior administration either failed to minimize or purposely “unmasked” Mr. Flynn. The latter could itself be a felony.

Ten days later someone in that administration leaked to the Washington Post that Mr. Flynn had called Mr. Kislyak on Dec. 29, 2016. On Feb. 9, 2017, someone leaked to the Post and the New York Times highly detailed and classified information about the Flynn-Kislyak conversation.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes has called this leak the most destructive to national security that he seen in his time in Washington. Disclosing classified information is a felony punishable by up to 10 years in federal prison. The Post has bragged that its story was sourced by nine separate officials.

The Mueller team has justified its legal wanderings into money laundering (Paul Manafort) and campaign contributions (Michael Cohen) on grounds that it has an obligation to follow up on any evidence of crimes, no matter how disconnected from its Russia mandate. Mr. Flynn’s being caught up in the probe is related to a glaring potential crime of disclosing classified material, yet Mr. Mueller appears to have undertaken no investigation of that. Is this selective justice, or something worse? Don’t forget Mr. Mueller stacked his team with Democrats, some of whom worked at the highest levels of the Obama administration, including at the time of the possible Flynn unmasking and the first leak.

It is becoming very obvious that Robert Mueller’s investigation is wearing blinders. Their prosecution of Michael Flynn while ignoring the crime of leaking classified material and unmasking Americans on foreign phone calls  (not to mention ignoring the Clinton campaign’s relationship with Fusion GPS, Christopher Steele, and the dossier) is a glaring example of the politicization of our Justice Department. The Congressional hysteria over the idea that Mueller could be fired or limited in any way is a glaring example of the ignorance on the part of some Congressmen of our Constitution. For the past two years we have had a taste of what it would be like to live in a country where justice is political. If we do not successfully deal with this, we will have taken a pretty big step toward becoming a banana republic.