I can just picture the The New York Timesgathering a team of actuaries, legal accountants, tax historians, advisers and financial consultants around a big executive office table, piled high with reams of papers and spent coffee cups, saying:

“We’ve got him now…. as soon as people understand: fixed asset depreciation schedules; and if the assets were depreciated legally using straight line or diminishing balance; then we move to whole-value equity pick-up, or minority interest accounting; before digging into section 1031 ‘like-kind’ asset exchanges; partnerships (limited or writ large), carried interest loopholes, pass-throughs, net capital losses/gains, seven-year income averaging and the difference between long-term and short-term capital gains”…

…or something.

Seriously, the ‘Trump-taxes’ story has to be the biggest, funniest, most well documented, and most absurd, ongoing snipe hunt in history.  “I was going to support President Trump’s re-election until I saw his depreciated amortization schedule from 1989″… said no-one, like, ever.

Could it be possible John Barron is still pulling this hilarious trick twenty-five years after the New York Times called Donald Trump “The Comeback King“?…

October 25th 1995 New York Times – Crowning the Comeback King – Though there are still four years to go in the 90’s, business and government leaders in New York honored Donald J. Trump yesterday for pulling off what they called “the comeback of the decade.”

Mr. Trump, the developer who came to epitomize opulent wealth during the 80’s before tumbling into deep financial trouble, has managed to erase much of his debt and is moving ahead with major projects at a time other developers are idling.

Judging from the attention showered on him yesterday at the Union League Club, some of New York’s civic and business leaders are quite captivated by Mr. Trump, despite the financial uncertainties that still surround some of his properties.

But the operative word at the luncheon was comeback, though Mr. Trump might dispute that he ever went far away. William D. Fugazy, the limousine magnate and chairman of the Forum Club, the group of business and civic leaders that sponsored the luncheon, presented Mr. Trump with a boomerang encased in glass. “You throw it and it always comes back,” he said as he handed it over. (read more)

A win for the Trump administration in the ongoing effort to stem the influx of migrants crossing the U.S-Mexico border seeking asylum.  The ninth circuit federal appeals court ruled (full pdf below) that the Trump administration can continue returning Central American migrants to Mexico while their requests for asylum in the U.S. are adjudicated.

The Ninth Circuit decision is a victory for the administration.  The ruling stays the effect of a decision last month by a judge who blocked the policy while it was being challenged.

(WSJ) […] The policy, officially named the Migrant Protection Protocols, is more commonly known as “Back to Mexico” or “Remain in Mexico.”

While Tuesday’s court action isn’t a final decision on the merits of the case, the appeals court held that several legal factors favored allowing the Trump administration to administer the policy while the litigation continues.

A three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit, in an unsigned opinion, said the administration likely had a legal basis for the policy. The court also said the Department of Homeland Security would be irreparably harmed if the court “takes off the table one of the few congressionally authorized measures available to process the approximately 2,000 migrants who are currently arriving at the nation’s southern border on a daily basis.”  (more)

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Here’s the full ruling:

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It is worth remembering a recent court filing by the FBI where we discover James Comey documented each “Crossfire Hurricane” intelligence decision. Within the CYA memos  Comey included the ID of code-named spies in a journal of sorts, that remains hidden for now.  I have a hunch the full Comey journal will soon be released.

A court filing originally scheduled for April 15th, to determine the outcome of the multiple memos, and FBI closed-court discussion therein, was delayed until May 7th, tomorrow:

The number of Comey memos is why I now describe them collectively as the Comey “journal”.  {Go Deep} The reason I suspect the “journal” will soon be released is connected to the recent New York Times release admitting to the use of FBI intelligence assets(Stefan Halper and Azra Turk)) in the Trump operation.

Last week’s NYT “spy” admission followed a report a month earlier (everyone forgot) that DOJ Inspector General was investigating the FBI use of Stefan Halper.

CTH notes a conspicuous similarity where all FBI leaks are positioned to present justifications ahead of document/investigative releases adverse to the group’s interests.  These leaks appear to be planned releases from corrupt officials still employed within the FBI, and political allies outside government (Lawfare and MSM).

All of the leaks are justifications.  The Comey’s memos, as described by Weissmann and Mueller’s lead FBI Agent, David Archey, are also based around “justification”.

FBI Director James Comey transparently wrote those justification memos in his journal in 2016 and 2017 exactly for a moment when/if questions were raised about what the FBI investigators were doing.

Considering there were already FBI investigators taking notes and documenting the operation, there is no other intellectually honest motive for James Comey writing an independent journal other than justifying the specific activity. 

It would make sense for the currently employed corrupt FBI officials to head-off any inquiry, and lead their defense, with documents/leaks that justify their activity.

Additionally, Weissmann and Mueller positioned the corrupt FBI operation to remain completely in-the-loop on any damaging investigative material when they had a dedicated staff of FBI agents writing reports back to FBI Headquarters:

(Page 13 Weissmann-Mueller report)

When you read that underlined passage you realize how smart Weissmann, Mueller and the small group were.  The corrupt investigative unit set up a process where they could leak to the media at will, and yet if anyone ever made inquiry there are so many people piped-in to the investigation it would be impossible to find the leaker.

Simultaneously, for the ongoing cover-up needs of FBI Director Christopher Wray, Deputy Director David Bowditch and FBI General Counsel Dana Boente they had a daily briefing to use in burying issues adverse to their institutional interests.

If you wondered why the FBI was busy sending lawyers in with each person questioned by congress, well, page #13 of the Weissmann/Mueller report explains exactly what purposes those lawyers likely maintained.   The entire leadership structure of the FBI appears clearly compromised.  Hence the David Archey declarations align therein.

What better ongoing way for Director Wray to protect his institutional interests than to coordinate with General Counsel Dana Boente a series of document releases that will justify the corrupt endeavors of the preceding team of officials.  I digress….

Lastly, don’t be surprised to see the arc of this story bends slightly, and with increased scrutiny will will discover the White House National Security Counsel (NSC) was a participant in the political weaponization of intelligence through a memorandum of understanding with the FBI.

It would make sense if the Obama NSC had access to the FBI surveillance database, and simultaneously extracted raw intelligence search results….. keep watching.

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TheLastRefuge@TheLastRefuge2

Something to consider given the current state of adversarial hostilities toward AG Barr in DC.

What if tomorrow the DOJ/FBI suddenly doesn’t object to releasing *ALL* of Comey’s memos (the full spygate journal)?

Backstory: https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2019/05/04/james-comey-justifies-fbi-spy-operations-more-reason-to-release-his-volumes-of-spygate-memos/ …

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To say there are conflicting reports of the U.S-China trade discussion, and possible breakdown therein, would be an understatement.  However, mining through the various U.S. and China news agencies, a more clear picture emerges.

U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighizer is quoted today: “We felt we were on track to get somewhere. Over the course of last week we have seen an erosion of commitments by China. That in our view is unacceptable.”  This statement appears to be in line with reports from Beijing about Chinese negotiators: “with sources suggesting that President Xi Jinping vetoed additional concessions proposed by his negotiators.”

(Bloomberg) […] Lighthizer and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told reporters on Monday that the Chinese backsliding became apparent during their visit to Beijing last week, but that they had been reassured by their Chinese interlocutors that everything would turn out.

That changed over the weekend when China sent through a new draft of an agreement that included them pulling back on language in the text on a number of issues, which had the “potential to change the deal very dramatically,” Mnuchin said.

At that stage about 90 percent of the pact had been finalized, he said, and the Chinese wanted to reopen areas that had already been negotiated.  “We are not willing to go back on documents that have been negotiated in the past,” he said.  (read more)

The South China Morning Post concurs with Mnuchin and Lighthizer’s explanations when they share:

“Xi told them ‘I’ll be responsible for all possible consequences’,” the second source said. Chinese negotiators subsequently presented a tougher proposal to Washington, although it is not clear if they pitched an amended proposal to Xi after the latest round of talks in Beijing last week. (link)

So we see the framework of the duplicitous and conniving Chinese being duplicitous and conniving. Go figure.

Again, this status-conflict is in complete alignment with the historic Chinese world-view.  It is not so much an issue with differences of opinions; the U.S. -vs- China trade conflict is actually a fundamental issue of cultural clashes.

March 2018 – […] China has no cultural or political space between peace and war; they are a historic nation based on two points of polarity.  They see peace and war as coexisting with each other.

China accepts and believes opposite or contrary forces may actually be complementary, interconnected, and interdependent in the natural world, and they may give rise to each other as they interrelate to one another.  Flowing between these polar states is a natural dynamic to be used -with serious contemplation- in advancing objectives as needed.

Peace or war. Win or lose. Yin and Yang. Culturally there is no middle position in dealings with China; they are not constitutionally capable of understanding or valuing the western philosophy of mutual benefit where concession of terms gains a larger outcome.  If it does not benefit China, it is not done. The outlook is simply, a polarity of peace or war.  In politics or economics the same perspective is true.  It is a zero-sum outlook.

Historic Chinese geopolitical policy, vis-a-vis their totalitarian control over political sentiment (action) and diplomacy through silence, is evident in the strategic use of the space between carefully chosen words, not just the words themselves.

Each time China takes aggressive action (red dragon) China projects a panda face through silence and non-response to opinion of that action;…. and the action continues. The red dragon has a tendency to say one necessary thing publicly, while manipulating another necessary thing privately.  The Art of War.

President Trump is the first U.S. President to understand how the red dragon hides behind the panda mask.

It is specifically because he understands that Panda is a mask that President Trump messages warmth toward the Chinese people, and pours vociferous praise upon Xi Jinping, while simultaneously confronting the geopolitical doctrine of the Xi regime.

In essence Trump is mirroring the behavior of China while confronting their economic duplicity. (more)

The Chinese delegation is still coming to DC on Wednesday/Thursday but it is doubtful anything will stop the increased tariffs from taking place Friday morning.

President Trump is hosting an award ceremony today at the White House to deliver the Presidential Medal of Freedom to U.S. golfer Tiger Woods. Anticipated Start Tim 6:00pm EDT

WH Livestream Link – Fox10 Livestream Link – Global News Livestream Link