Today DOJ Official Bruce Ohr is testifying in a closed-door session to a joint House Oversight and Judiciary Committee. The republican representatives asking questions were selected by Chairman Bob Goodlatte. Democrats are relying on staff.
According to Kyle Cheney (Politico) Bruce Ohr has four lawyers with him, personal lawyers and lawyers representing the interests of the DOJ. Initial indications are Ohr has provided testimony that directly conflicts with Fusion-GPS Glenn Simpson, and prior testimony from witness Lisa Page to the joint committee.
While in the US some people have discovered that running a YouTube Channel can get you in trouble with the law. One many found himself in Georgia with being charged with running a business without a license even though he was not selling anything just offering his opinion. Of course, there are two licensing options provided by YouTube for content uploaded to its service and suggest an additional third option for users wanting more flexibility for their content and their rules and regulations.
The world of information is changing rapidly. There is now radio and TV stations available on the internet expanding the availability of audiovisual content overall. But such broadcasters are regulated and require a license. The traditional reasons for requiring regulation/intervention in broadcast, cable system and satellite system markets, was the scarcity of frequencies, diversity, and localism. With the advent of the internet, certainly scarcity of available frequencies does not apply. These reasons are still used to justify governments’ intervention in media markets which were never supposed to be about stopping free speech.
Moreover, media convergence has certainly blurred traditional distinctions between media providers in the various mediums now available. Print media now also offers on-demand videos and other audiovisual content on their websites blurring the old traditional distinction between print, radio, and TV. Likewise, TV broadcasters and radio stations also publish newspaper-like content on their websites. There is the growing problem that regulation seems to have been left in the Dark Ages.
Regulators still operate under the license regimes and impose their ownership limits to prevent monopolies. They also impose behavioral restraints and they have rules governing things that they must carry. Naturally, channel position privileges are also decided by regulators. Rupert Murdock had to be approved to buy media companies in the USA. The FCC once upon a time had the Fairness Doctrine, but abandoning that has produced Fake News where broadcasters no longer have to provide a balance to both sides. This has ushered in the age of Propaganda.
These regulations have been deemed as NECESSARY yet remain highly disputed among scholars. Such intervention into media has always been dancing on the edge of infringements of First Amendment rights of Free Speech. However, with the new age of the internet, the old interventionist tools really no longer apply as markets converge. Therein lies the problem. Regulators are feeling that they have lost power and politicians have been using the whole Russian conspiracy as a justification to expand regulation that may completely kill free speech.
The jurisdiction of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is limited to broadcast, cable and satellite – not the internet or print media. It lacks the power to regulate the audiovisual media industry as a whole. With the rise of the internet, people can create their own broadcast companies like InfoWars. I have reported that the new European regulations are actually having an impact globally. Alex Jones’ InfoWars has been banned by Apple’s decision to remove five podcasts by Jones and his Infowars website. Other companies have rushed to join including Facebook, YouTube, and Spotify. The general reason is Jones’s podcasts are viewed as “hate content” which can subject them to heavy fines in Europe.
In the USA, the FCC has been weakened with its ability to regulate. It can no longer prevent the emergence of a new market structure in audiovisual media. On December 11, 2007, the European Union adopted an overhauled regulatory framework on audiovisual media, which entered into force on December 19, 2007. The new framework sharply contrasts the FCC’s approach. Not only does the European Union regulate ALL audiovisual media providers, regardless of whether they use airwaves or the internet to convey their content, but it ALSO regulates on-demand offers of audiovisual content. Now the EU has imposed regulation of on-demand offers and that actually opens the door for member states to regulate services like YouTube or Tudou (The China clone in Shanghai). It is the European Union’s intention to cover only mass media which impacts on a significant proportion of the public, or so they say.
Barack Obama’ used the internet to win the election publishing his speeches on YouTube. They have alleged that the Russians helped Trump get elected also by using the internet. The internet has created the ability to have a broadcaster-like service and this is driving the local regulators in Europe absolutely insane. They do not have a First Amendment so if the speech content is against what they want to see in the public, they can just shut it down constitutionally applying hate-speech being their favorite label. This actually forced these internet companies to shut-down InfoWars. They fines and damages can be completely insane in Europe.
Germany has already taken steps that the FCC and the EU are looking at very closely. The German regulator says Twitch and YouTube streams are considered broadcasts, must apply for a broadcasting license. Germany has already taken that step requiring a radio broadcast license for Twitch. Germany under Merkel is deeply concerned about her negative press. They are starting to regulate and shut down free speech under the pretend of hate speech to protect the public. Germany is deliberately applying regulations that define a broadcaster to YouTube channels. The fee they want runs €1,000 to €10,000 or even more depending upon the viewership. The politicians did not make a new law, it is the regulator applying it and they suddenly discovered that a YouTube Channel is like a TV station. So everyone is watching to see if they get away with it.
The EU’s regulation on the internet has been a smashing success and it has forced changes in the USA. The EU can impose regulations to impose must-carry obligations for local channels on worldwide operating TV gateways on the internet or block them from Europe. What has been emerging in Europe is already becoming a major impediment to new forms of audiovisual media and to new ways of producing and conveying content. It is forcing people outside of Europe to comply with foreign laws or face huge fines that would be ruinous in Europe.
The FCC, as well as the Supreme Court, are still locked into the old reasons for regulation. The European Union’s approach seems to intentionally force convergence to their desires upon the entire world. They are deliberately trying to fundamentally change the way broadcast-like services are provided. Already, there are whispers in Brussels that to even have a YouTube Channel will require more than a YouTube license from them. The thinking in Brussels is turning to consider a YouTube Channel to have a broadcaster license. Meanwhile, the FCC sits quietly waiting for Brussels to make the first move. Our sources are deep on this issue. We shall see how far they rise to the surface. We are looking at the most direct assault upon the free speech which is all part of the cycle when governments are fighting to keep power.
If every country adopts this same policy of Germany, they will succeed in completely eliminating free speech which seems to be the real objective here. If someone wanted to do a YouTube Channel in the EU and had to pay €10,000 annually to 28 members, that would be €280,000 per year. That should shut down just about any independent voices. Yet once again, the fact that Germany gets to do this demonstrates why the EU is a failure when any state can act arbitrarily.
John S. McCain has died at 81. Of course, the media calls him a war hero which make others angry. But still, it is not an appropriate time to criticize the man. Condolences are appropriate for his family who survive him. It is never easy to lose a family member. What rises to the surface for them is all the memories. They will miss him.
After the Michael Cohen guilty plea. his attorney Lanny Davis began pitching a claim that the longtime Trump loyalist/lawyer had information Trump knew of the Russian hacking of Democratic emails ahead of time.
Davis said: “I believe that Mr. Cohen has direct knowledge that would be of interest to Mr. Mueller that suggests -I’m not sure it proves- that Mr. Trump was aware of Russian government agents hacking illegally, committing computer crimes, to the detriment of the candidate who he was running against, Hillary Clinton.” And the media ate it up, and put Davis on just about every possible TV show imaginable.
However, in an interview with the Washington Post this weekend, Mr Davis not only walked back that claim, he entirely retreated from it:
(Via Washington Post) An attorney for Michael Cohen, President Trump’s former lawyer, is backing away from confident assertions he made that Cohen has information to share with investigators that shows Trump knew in 2016 of Russian efforts to undermine Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
Lanny Davis, a spokesman and attorney for Cohen, said in an interview this weekend that he is no longer certain about claims he made to reporters on background and on the record in recent weeks about what Cohen knows about Trump’s awareness of the Russian efforts.
[…] asked Saturday how confident he was that Trump knew about the hacking before it became public, Davis said: “I am not sure. There’s a possibility that is the case. But I am not sure.” […] “I was giving an instinct that he might have something to say of interest to the special counsel” about hacking, Davis said. In retrospect, he said, “I am just not sure.” (more)
This follows on the heels of Mr. Davis also walking back his prior claim that candidate Trump knew of the Trump Tower meeting. During a CNN interview Lanny Davis told Anderson Cooper, per his client, candidate Donald Trump had no knowledge of the Trump Tower meeting between Don Jr. and Natalia Veselnitskaya.
And Davis has also stated that all of the claims within the Clinton-Steele dossier about Michael Cohen are also 100% false. “Thirteen references to Mr. Cohen are false in the dossier, and he has never been to Prague in his life,” Davis told Bloomberg news.
So, there we have it. Lanny Davis is saying the dossier is false; Trump never knew about the Trump Tower meeting with the Russian lobbyists; and his client, Michael Cohen, has no knowledge of anything to do with Donald Trump and Russians.
:::poof::: …gone. Just like that!
But why is uber-partisan Democrat Lanny Davis now deconstructing the entire ‘Muh Russia’ conspiracy theory? Why is Clinton acolyte Lanny Davis now single-handily dismantling two years of narratives promoted by the left-wing media?
Well, the answer to those questions is likely found in the outlet now helping to systematically retreat from years of false-reporting; The Washington Post.
There never has been any truth to the vast ‘Muh Russia’ conspiracy, you know that; all research proves that; it is a fundamentally made-up narrative initiated to support the deployment of the scheme team insurance policy. Eventually it was always going to end up hitting a dead end. However, the Washington Post is also the outlet for the aggregate U.S. intelligence apparatus, and particularly the CIA, FBI and DOJ-NSD. Essentially WaPo is their PR and Narrative Engineering firm.
Before giving Lanny Davis any credit for magnanimous honesty, think about what the remaining inside elements of the scheme team need (in combination with the risk matrix of those now on the outside).
Impeachment was the end-objective of the insurance policy. Lanny Davis is now the pivot man to take the impeachment ball from Robert Mueller (Muh Russia) and pass-it-off to the Southern District of New York under the auspices of ‘campaign finance violations‘.
With the DOJ Inspector General FISA and Spygate investigation ongoing -likely nearing completion, and quite possibly bringing unwanted sunlight upon the entire scheme architecture- the impeachment crowd need a way to draw focus away from the risky IG sunlight outcome and still maintain morale amid the resistance movement.
Lanny Davis becomes the tool for the entire shift.
Watch…
The sun is setting on the ‘Muh Russia’ narrative. There was no obstruction. Both failing narratives no longer provide any benefit for the 2018 mid-term elections. Democrats need a valid reason to keep impeachment hopes alive; hence the visible shift toward campaign finance laws…. and terribly immoral Trump etc.
Lanny Davis is the pivot-man.
Remember, this is the Washington Post, CNN, New York Times, MSNBC primary audience; and the democrat party standard voter:
The overwhelming majority of Sunday political talk-show discussion focuses around the death of UniParty Senator John McCain, etc. There is little value there, and grandma’s rule always applies.
However, Representative Darrell Issa appeared on Sunday Morning with Maria Bartiromo for a discussion on multiple subjects including the DOJ, Robert Mueller, North Korea and ongoing trade reset initiatives with China.
It is an inarguable fact that ideologues within the U.S. Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation used their official positions to conduct a political operation against the candidacy of President Trump. It is also an inarguable fact that DOJ/FBI contractors were exploiting the NSA/FBI database for opposition research as evidenced in the FISA 702(16)(17) abuses admitted by the DOJ and outlined in a FISA ruling by presiding FISA Judge Rosemary Collyer. There is currently an Office of Inspector General investigation by Michael Horowitz into FISA abuse to discover the scale of the corrupt use.
Major HatTip@JohnWHuber – Today in the Spectator U.K. another sketchy journalist with deep ties to the intelligence apparatus, and specific ties to leaks from former CIA Director John Brennan, outlines that Robert Mueller has “electronic records” showing Michael Cohen travel to Prague:
[…] The more important question is whether Cohen has even been to Prague. Steele’s dossier claims he did go, in 2016, to meet Russian hackers and Russian intelligence officers. Cohen was asked by The Atlantic magazine about this claim, and about Russia. He responded: ‘I’m telling you emphatically that I’ve not been to Prague, I’ve never been to [the] Czech [Republic], I’ve not been to Russia.’ If my ‘eyewitness’ to the Moscow meeting is telling the truth, then perhaps Cohen was, in the same breath, being misleading about Prague, too — and the whole Russia ‘conspiracy’ starts to unravel. I have spoken to one intelligence source who says Mueller is examining ‘electronic records’ that would place Cohen in Prague. (link)
Michael Cohen has never been to Prague; even Cohen’s anti-Trump lawyer Lanny Davis admits the Cohen claims inside the Steele dossier are nonsense. CNN, again another anti-Trump voice, confirmed in January Cohen was never in Prague as the dossier claimed. Quite simply, Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen has never been to Prague.
However, the Paul Wood source, likely Brennan, is claiming there are “electronic records” that would place a Michael Cohen in Prague. Accepting this claim as possibly true, this actually confirms our initial research into this issue. The intelligence apparatus, either in the U.S. or connected to Brennan’s international CIA objectives (U.K and Australia), extracted electronic FISA records mistakenly identifying the wrong Michael Cohen.
The issue is two-fold. (#1) the mistake is inside the Steele Dossier: meaning the intelligence community was feeding Steele information and vice-versa; and (#2) by extension this shows an official IC conspiracy attached to the use of the dossier.
The Cohen-travel-mistake almost certainly links the use of FBI and NSA database searches to the intelligence laundry scheme between the Clinton campaign, Fusion GPS, Nellie Ohr and the Christopher Steele Dossier….. washed through the DOJ (Bruce Ohr) and passed on to the FBI (Peter Strzok); and then reconstituted for a FISA surveillance application:
The FISA-702(16)(17) abuses lie at the heart of the initial opposition research being conducted against all of Clinton’s opponents. Indeed, as outlined by FISA Judge Collyer, from November 2015 through May 2016 eighty-five percent of the thousands of search queries were unlawful violations of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act:
85% of all FISA search queries were in violation. 85% !!!
The intelligence mistake of Michael Cohen traveling to Prague, is a fingerprint connecting the FBI/DOJ/IC FISA(702)(16)(17) database searches to the Intelligence Community, Fusion-GPS, contractors, and the Steele dossier.
This Cohen-travel-mistake then becomes a risk. As such there would be a very strong motive for similarly aligned political entities within the U.S. intelligence apparatus to cloud the connection.
Thus the origin of the July 31st, 2016, FBI Counterintelligence Operation against candidate Trump began as an unofficial outcome of an unofficial CIA referral (John Brennan) connected to unofficial contacts with political and intelligence people within the U.K and Australia. An unofficial and Machiavellian construct.
After Donald Trump won the election, all of the aligned intelligence entities -including Obama officials therein- were now at risk. Hence “the insurance policy”. The issues extend beyond the unlawful activity of the DOJ and FBI; however, one of the trails of their collective activity ended up inside the Steele Dossier with the false fact surrounding Michael Cohen in Prague.
Paul Wood isn’t the first person to claim Robert Mueller has records. In April of this year, McLatchy, leaking from Mueller’s team, also claimed “electronic record” evidence:
WASHINGTON – The Justice Department special counsel has evidence that Donald Trump’s personal lawyer and confidant, Michael Cohen, secretly made a late-summer trip to Prague during the 2016 presidential campaign, according to two sources familiar with the matter.
Confirmation of the trip would lend credence to a retired British spy’s report that Cohen strategized there with a powerful Kremlin figure about Russian meddling in the U.S. election. (read more)
It is almost certain that CIA Director John Brennan was the source for the most recent U.K. statement about Mueller having electronic records claiming Michael-Cohen-Travel. This is pertinent because in a recent interview with Rachel Maddow the former CIA Director made some remarkable admissions.
Now we come to the segment where I believe Brennan may have slipped badly – and exposed some potentially illegal tactics (19:18 mark):
BRENNAN: When I left office on January 20th of 2017, I had unresolved questions in my mind about whether or not any of those U.S. persons were working in support of the Russian efforts.
MADDOW: And those were referred, those concerns about specific U.S. persons referred to the FBI.
BRENNAN: We call it incidental collection in terms of CIA’s foreign intelligence collection authorities. Any time we would incidentally collect information on a U.S. person, we would hand that over to the FBI because they have the legal authority to do it. We would not pursue that type of investigative, you know, sort of leads. We would give it to the FBI.
So, we were picking things up that was of great relevance to the FBI, and we wanted to make sure that they were there – so they could piece it together with whatever they were collecting domestically here.
That’s not how incidental collection is supposed to work. And the collection doesn’t sound incidental.
FISA Title I and III provisions relate to the conduct of electronic surveillance and physical searches for foreign intelligence purposes of persons, facilities, or property inside the United States.
Section 702 permits the government to target for surveillance foreign persons located outside the United States for the purpose of acquiring foreign intelligence information. To carry out monitoring under Section 702, the government chooses targets, which cannot be individuals known to be US persons.
The law specifies that a “significant” purpose of the monitoring must be to obtain “foreign intelligence information”. Again, U.S. Citizens cannot be the primary target.
Targeting procedures are designed to ensure that only foreign persons located outside the U.S. are targeted for foreign intelligence collection purposes. Minimization procedures are intended to protect any U.S. person information that is incidentally acquired in the course of Section 702 collection.
There are many loopholes to the entire process. The FBI can query acquired Section 702 data. And they can do so using U.S. person inquiries – without a warrant. But U.S. persons are not supposed to be a target of the initial Section 702 collection.
Here’s why Brennan probably chose the surveillance route he did.
Unlike Title I and Title III FISA surveillance, Section 702 collection is not subject to individual formal FISA Court approvals. Due to frequency of collection, instead of issuing individual court orders, the FISC approves annual certifications submitted by the Attorney General and the Director of National Intelligence.
What Brennan discussed sounds eerily similar to what Devin Nunes uncovered in March 2017:
Devin Nunes– “I recently confirmed that on numerous occasions, the intelligence community incidentally collected information about U.S. citizens involved in the Trump transition. I have seen intelligence reports that clearly show the President-elect and his team were at least monitored and disseminated out in intelligence, in what appears to be raw—well I shouldn’t say raw—but intelligence reporting channels.
Details about persons associated with the incoming administration, details with little apparent foreign intelligence value were widely disseminated in intelligence community reporting. From what I know right now, it looks like incidental collection. We don’t know exactly how that was picked up but we’re trying to get to the bottom of it. This is normal incidental collection. It was normal foreign surveillance.
I think the NSA’s going to comply. I am concerned – we don’t know whether or not the FBI is going to comply.”
Earlier today U.S. President Donald Trump highlighted an optimistic outlook toward the framework for a U.S./Mexico trade deal. Not unanticipated:
We continue to remind everyone to focus on U.S.T.R. Robert Lighthizer and AMLO’s guy, Jesus Seade; everyone else is multinational corporate media chaff and countermeasures.
“We are already looking at all the issues. We might close this, not in a matter of hours, but these days. We still have next week,” Jesus Seade, designated chief negotiator of Mexican President-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, told reporters.
It is important to note that U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer has twice asked Jesus Seade to remain AFTER hours when all other trade officials have concluded discussions. Closed-door conversations between Lighthizer and Seade; and no-one else. [Refer back to the two Trump baselines again]
Now, clear the MSM fog from all perspectives; and instead look directly at the discussion framework expressed by Jesus Seade, AMLO’s guy:
[…] Asked by reporters outside the offices of the U.S. Trade Representative in Washington if Canada would then join the talks, [Seade] said: “I don’t see any reason why they have to come after we finish. It’s up to (U.S. Trade Representative Robert) Lighthizer to organize his time.”
The Mexican delegation — and sources familiar with the closed-door negotiations — have said previously Canada would return to the table as soon as the other two resolved their bilateral issues — maybe even this week. Seade’s comments seemed to indicate otherwise. (LINK)
Previously:
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Mexico and the United States are close to resolving remaining bilateral issues in the revamp of the NAFTA trade deal, officials said.
[…] “We are already looking at all the issues. We might close this, not in a matter of hours, but these days. We still have next week,” Jesus Seade, designated chief negotiator of Mexican President-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, told reporters.
“We shouldn’t rush, but we’re already close,” Seade added as he left the Washington offices of U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer following the latest talks on renegotiating the North American Free Trade Agreement.
Since restarting last month, the talks have focused on settling differences between Mexico and the United States that go to the heart of U.S. President Donald Trump’s complaint that NAFTA has hollowed out U.S. manufacturing to Mexico’s benefit. (read more)
Always draw references from what you know to be empirically true. President Trump will not accept the NAFTA fatal flaw. NAFTA is not currently a trade bloc. NAFTA is currently an internal agreement of terms-for-commerce between the U.S., Mexico and Canada. Because it is not a trade bloc, NAFTA is bad.
The U.S. is the host (market), and Mexico/Canada are the parasites exploiting free-movement and economic access to that host. Without new NAFTA rules; making it an actual trade bloc, where Canada and Mexico can only engage with 3rd parties based on the NAFTA group rules; there is no value in NAFTA.
That’s why Trump has essentially sidelined any 3-way discussion, and is engaged in bilateral trade talks. In addition to hiding the ‘fatal flaw’ U.S. financial and corporate media are willfully blind and intentionally obtuse on this key point.
All indications, look at it from a 30,000/ft level, are that Lighthizer has explained this to Seade. President Trump wants to see the Mexican economy gain stability and strength; and he is willing to afford time and economic value toward AMLO to achieve economic strength and more broad-based economic stability; however, team Trump will NOT allow the current exploitation to continue. Period.
Therefore, Mexico has an incredible opportunity…. but only ONE opportunity…. THIS opportunity…. to take advantage of the offer. If they politicize the deal; if they mislead, scheme, or attempt to covertly structure a trade relationship that undermines the basic offer…. POTUS Trump, regardless of opinion or political pressure, will deliver an economic backlash of the size and scale never seen. Mexico has one opportunity.
After the terms are finalized, Mexico will likely have a time-frame where POTUS will permit the slow withdrawal of the ‘fatal flaw’ issue, while simultaneously supporting Mexico’s own internal growth in manufacturing and economic independence.
This is also the goal of AMLO, who wants to see Mexico gain economic independence from the manipulation of the multinational corporations, Wall Street and vulture economics driven by Chinese interests; and this outlook builds the framework of the Win/Win.
It will take time for Mexico to withdraw from prior corrupt agreements with multinational corporations who have invested in exploitative enterprise and bribed corrupt Mexican officials. President Trump is EXACTLY the guy AMLO needs to help guide him through a complex business and economic process of extracting his country from the tentacles of economic exploitation.
Canada is an entirely different kettle-of-fish. Expect no magnanimous Trump approach toward Canada. Hence Jesus Seade said: “I don’t see any reason why they [Canada] have to come after we finish. It’s up to (U.S. Trade Representative Robert) Lighthizer to organize his time.”
By politicizing their economic interests, Justin and Chrystia have made themselves an economic adversary. Battle-hardened Trump, who is impervious to political pressure on trade/economics, will not relent. He simply doesn’t care.
In July 2017, after a speech by former President Obama to the Montreal Board of Trade, Obama instructed Trudeau on how to best weaponize his economic policy to join the anti-Trump resistance. [Conversation pictured above]
President Trump isn’t stupid; he is an apex predator when it comes to the issues of trade, commerce and economics. Trump knew the scheme, he knew the meeting, he knew the likely direction that Trudeau and Chrystia would take after receiving these instructions. And, in typically predictable form, Justin from Canada followed the left-wing plan and began working against any NAFTA renegotiation.
Justin and Chrystia intentionally planned to undermine any change and scuttle the negotiations. Hence the demands for gender issues and climate change within NAFTA.
Last Wednesday Michael Cohen’s attorney, Lanny Davis, crushed an earlier July 27th CNN story about President Trump having advanced knowledge of the Trump Tower meeting between Donald Trump Jr. and a group of Russian lobbyists.
According to CNN’s anonymous sources, Cohen claimed that Trump approved his son taking part in the meeting. That report has now been completely and thoroughly debunked; yet CNN is intentionally ignoring any correction. WATCH:
The refusal of CNN to walk back their earlier claim is further evidence of how far the media are enmeshed and invested within the ‘Muh Russia’ nonsense. However, only recently did we discover the media engagements were not just pervasive, they were/are participatory. Several media outlets were actually working with corrupt officials.
U.S. media cannot reasonably report on any aspect of the DOJ, FBI or intelligence apparatus collusion against the candidacy/presidency of Donald Trump without exposing their own duplicity. They are faced with two choices: (1) double down on lies they helped create and promote; or (2) just ignore any truth that surfaces, and act as if it never happened.
Michael Isikoff highlighted how severe the media participated in February of this year when he admitted his reporting was being used by the DOJ and FBI to advance a political objective. The examples of the collaboration between government officials constructing a scheme against Trump and a complicit and participatory media are jaw-dropping.
Additionally, FBI investigator Peter Strzok and FBI attorney Lisa Page were shown in their text messages to be leaking stories from the Clinton Investigation, the Trump investigation and the Mueller investigation to journalists at Politico, The Wall Street Journal and Washington Post. –SEE HERE–
FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe was busted by the Inspector General for leaking stories to the media and then lying about it to INSD and IG investigators. FBI Director James Comey admitted to leaking stories to the New York Times, and even hired his friend Andrew Richman (off-the-books), gave him access to FBI and NSA databases, and then leaked information to Richman along with another friend Benjamin Wittes at Lawfare blog.
Lest we forget, the IG report on how the FBI handled the Clinton investigation revealed that dozens of FBI officials were actually taking bribes from the media for information:
IG REPORT – We identified numerous FBI employees, at all levels of the organization and with no official reason to be in contact with the media, who were nevertheless in frequent contact with reporters. Attached to this report as Attachments E and F are two link charts that reflect the volume of communications that we identified between FBI employees and media representatives in April/May and October 2016. We have profound concerns about the volume and extent of unauthorized media contacts by FBI personnel that we have uncovered during our review.
[…] We do not believe the problem is with the FBI’s policy, which we found to be clear and unambiguous. Rather, we concluded that these leaks highlight the need to change what appears to be a cultural attitude among many in the organization. (link to pdf – page Xii of executive summary)
Madness.
This is an IG fact-based criticism of the institution of the FBI, not simply a few rogue officials within it.
But wait…. Perspective:
More recently it was revealed that Andrew Weissman, Robert Mueller’s #1 special counsel prosecutor, was coordinating investigative efforts with the full support of four AP reporters who were giving Weissman information to use in his court filings and search warrants.
Additionally, Christopher Steele has stated in U.K. court records the person in charge of the Clinton Campaign’s opposition research firm, Glenn Simpson from Fusion GPS, arranged and coordinated for Mr. Steele to talk to several journalists (CNN, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Yahoo News and Mother Jones) while Mr. Steele was also the primary source of information for the FBI investigators (including Strzok and Page):
Make sure you read that full response from Christopher Steele above to see the scope of the media engagements he was conducting.
As more evidence surfaces the relationship between journalists, Fusion-GPS, Chris Steele and the media’s DOJ/FBI sources begins blending together. The FBI was using media reports, which were based on Fusion-GPS pitches, to bolster its investigative documents to the FISA court. It is an intelligence laundry operation:
According to the U.K records, Christopher Steele reports this September 2016 meeting with Isikoff was arranged by Glenn Simpson. According to Michael Isikoff on his February podcast, he met Christopher Steele at a Washington, D.C. hotel in Sept. 2016. They were joined by his “old friend” Glenn Simpson, the founder of opposition research firm Fusion GPS, who Isikoff now defines as a “private investigator.”
So Christopher Steele was meeting with journalists, the journalists were writing articles; the FBI was leaking to media and simultaneously citing those same articles as underlying evidence to support their counterintelligence investigations; and all of this was used to validate the investigative documents the FBI was receiving from Christopher Steele; who, along with the leaking FBI officials, was also the source of the media articles.
FUBAR! This is exponentially bonkers.
This is a circle of information, all coming from Glenn Simpson, Nellie Ohr and Christopher Steele at Fusion GPS, through Bruce Ohr at DOJ into the FBI via Peter Strzok.
Fusion GPS was the opposition research firm being financed by Hillary Clinton, along with FBI officials who were using their own strategic media leaks to authenticate/validate their own investigation.
Think about the scale of the reporting, and reporting on reporting, of anonymous leaks, false leaks, lies from “people with knowledge of the matter”, “government officials involved in the matter”, “people familiar with the matter”, “government sources” etc. all going in one unified and semi-coordinated direction – against the aggregate Trump administration.
Now, it actually gets even more convoluted.
Christopher Steele has sworn under oath that he met with multiple journalists (at least eight organizations) in September, mid-October, and late-October 2016: “at Fusion’s instruction“. (pdf page #7)
Overlay upon that sworn admission with what Glenn Simpson (Fusion-GPS) told the House Intelligence Committee while also under oath about his involvement in sharing information derived from Christopher Steele:
FBI Director James Comey admits to leaking his ‘memos’ to the New York Times. FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe was busted for leaking and lying about it. FBI #2 Counterintelligence Agent Peter Strzok and FBI Attorney Lisa Page are caught in their text messages leaking to Politico, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post.
…. AND the FBI is caught, in at least one FISA application, using Yahoo media reports provided by them AND their investigative source Christopher Steele to establish a basis for the FISA “Title I” surveillance; the most intrusive and wide-open search and surveillance authority possible.
The Clinton Campaign is paying Fusion GPS to conduct opposition research against Donald Trump. In addition to Glenn Simpson pushing that opposition research into the media, Fusion GPS, Nellie Ohr and Bruce Ohr are also providing that opposition research –including information from contacts with media– directly to the FBI:
… In addition to using the Fusion-GPS opposition research to underpin their counterintelligence investigation, the FBI then turn around and leak the same opposition research information to the media to create secondary support for their counterintelligence investigation.
Tell me again how the media can possibly write about this now?
The problem is not just corruption with the U.S. Justice System, the DOJ and the FBI; the problem is corruption within the media.
We’re talking about thousands of hours of media TV pundits, thousands more columns written, and almost every scintilla of it based on originating intelligence sources -from the larger intelligence system- that are now being exposed as duplicitous and conspiratorial in the scale of their malicious intent.
This larger story-line has traveled in one direction. The narrative has only traveled in one direction. Each thread converging on codependent trails for collective stories all going in one direction. One big engineered narrative endlessly pushed. Think about how far the collective media have traveled with this story over the past eighteen months?
Hell, twenty-something-year-old “journalist” Ali Watkins was so committed to the resistance narrative she was even sleeping with her sources to get any little engineering angle possible. One of the biggest leaks she was able to secure from SSCI Director of Security James Wolfe, was the full unredacted Carter Page FISA application.
Now, over a period of several exhaustive months, it has become obvious the collective journey, using all that collaborative expended effort, was not only going in the wrong direction – it was going in that direction specifically because the media were intentionally complicit in pushing demonstrably false stories in that direction.
The media have fully invested themselves in eighteen months of narrative distribution in only one direction. Not a single MSM entity has questioned their travel as a result of false leaks or false sources in the totality of time they have covered the DOJ and FBI story.
Nothing within their collective need to will-an-outcome will change the media’s proximity to facts when the truthful story behind the DOJ and FBI corruption is finally exposed. The media are so far away from the place where this story ends, they have no inherent capability to even begin to travel in the opposite direction, toward the truth.
The only way they could align with the truth is to admit that virtually every scintilla of their reportage over the past 18 months was inherently false or manipulated by the “sources” distributing the material for their reporting.
There’s not a single media outlet capable of doing that.
Think about a New York Times, CNN, New Yorker, Wall Street Journal, Mother Jones, Yahoo News or Washington Post journalist now having to write an article deconstructing a foundation of two-years worth of lies they participated in creating.
Do we really think such a catastrophic level of corrupted journalism could reconstitute into genuine reporting of fact-based information?
There has been an interesting case of an American Muslim woman who had her phone seized by border guards as she returned home to the United States from a trip to Switzerland. The guards just seized her phone and she had to file a lawsuit to get it returned after 120 days. Meanwhile, they refuse to confirm or deny that a copy of her phone was made and shared with any other agency. This is part of the problem with the rule of law – there is none! Government agents can do whatever they desire and it is always your burden to hopefully find a judge who will at least acknowledge you have any rights at all.
Most people will never think of various crimes by the British that led to the American Revolution. Then there was the No Taxation Without Representation slogan. But the act that perhaps began the Revolution was illegal search and seizure.
The legal case that became the seminal beginning of the American Revolution was Entick v. Carrington and Three Other King’s Messengers, reported at length in 19 Howell’s State Trials 1029. This case was the start of the American Revolution and was also based uponan abuse of the king’s agents. The action, dated November 1762, was for trespassing and interfering with the plaintiff’s dwelling by breaking open his desks and boxes and searching and examining his papers.
George III (b 1738; 1760-1820) became king in 1760. In February1761,Parliament enacted theWrits of Assistance thatwas challenged in court in Boston, Massachusetts. These were writs that empowered every agent to do as they liked and were no different from how agents act today at their discretion. The Writs of Assistance allowed the king’s agents to search anything they suspected. The defending lawyer James Otis (1725-1783) pronounced these writs were“the worst instrument of arbitrary power, the most destructive of English liberty, and the fundamental principles of law, that ever was found in an Englishlaw book.”Otis warned that the king placed discretion in the hands of every agent to act as he desired. Nothing has changed forthe government can do whatever it desires today and it is always the burden of the citizen to prove he has any rights whatsoever.
John Adams (1735–1826; 2nd President 1797–1801) was there in the audience at that hearing that day. Adams was so moved by the four- hour speech of James Otis that he declared: “Then and there was the first scene of the first act of opposition to the arbitrary claims of Great Britain. Then and there, the child independence was born.”
While I was in New Jersey, twice going to work in the morning the road was blocked and the police were looking at every car. At first, you would think they were searching for a terrorist or a missing person or something you see on a TV show. No, the police of Marlton, New Jersey were arbitrarily stopping every car during rush hour and demanded your papers and identification. If you had then, including your insurance card, then you passed. If you were missing anything, they sent you to another line where they were writing tickets. This was an outright violation of the Fourth Amendment. An illegal search without probable cause. Being stopped during rush hour once was bad enough. They did it a second time.
Marlton, New Jersey had the reputation for the worst police in the state. They wrote more tickets than any town and it was one giant money grab. A friend’s wife looked at her phone for Google Maps while at a red light. The cop waited for her to turn on the highway that they designated as a “safe corridor” which meant fines were doubled. She went to court to show she was not talking or texting. The corrupt judge found her guilty and said she was not allowed to even look at her phone. So the same thing on a piece of paper is ok. If on your phone its a $500 fine. What they do is outright illegal, but it will cost you hundreds of thousands of dollars to claim you have any rights at all.
This is our real crisis. There is no rule of law. They get to do whatever they want and we have the burden to argue what they did violates the law. This is why rarely will a cop ever be found guilty of even murder when killing someone. Judges will routinely argue they were justified because they THOUGHT their life was in danger.
Twice I went to the airport to pick up non-Americans coming in. One was picking up a friend daughter from Quebec. Because I was picking her and her friend up and taking them to the hotel her father booked, they did not know the address where they were staying. They spoke primarily French. She was just 16 and traveling to see the history in Philadelphia. She handed her phone to the agent who then called me and asked if I was there to pick them up. He then asked if I spoke French because how would I communicate. I responded in French and asked him if he spoke the language. He said OK. I asked what is the problem. They were Canadian. His response was – “They are still aliens!”
Another time I went to pick up an employee coming in from Ukraine. I was there for more than an hour. Everyone else had passed. Finally, a border guard brought them out and wanted to see me. I asked what is the problem? I thought they were concerned about people who did not leave? They had a 5-year business visa and came here frequently. He was just nasty but released them. When I asked what happened, I was told they searched everything and when they could find nothing, they called another agent and said here, maybe you can find something.
There is really nothing you can do. The circle is complete. We have returned to the same position that started the whole thing and we once more face “the worst instrument of arbitrary power, the most destructive of English liberty, and the fundamental principles of law, that ever was found in an Englishlaw book.”As the Writs of Assistance in the Entick case, because government agents can do whatever they desire and it is our burden to claim we had any right, the Constitution has been completely nullified. It exists only if we have the MONEY to hire lawyers who price themselves way too high and that ensures people are not defended. Otis warned that the king placed discretion in the hands of every agent to act as he desire
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This is a library of News Events not reported by the Main Stream Media documenting & connecting the dots on How the Obama Marxist Liberal agenda is destroying America
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