Tag: Trump

Need to Know 7/23/18 Evening Edition

As first reported yesterday, Trump is likely going to pull security clearances from several former Obama administration appointees.  The appointees, including Andrew McCabe, James Clapper, John Brennan, Susan Rice, and others have been controversial figures.  Clapper and Brennan have accused the President of treason in editorial capacities.  McCabe was fired from the FBI for improper interactions with the press.  Others on the list, like James Comey, have claimed that their security privileges are already revoked.

Trump to revoke security clearance for former intel officials

Indicted Russian operative Maria Butina was part of private meetings with Obama officials in 2015.  Butina met with Federal Reserve vice chairman Stanley Fischer, Treasury Undersecretary Nathan Sheets, and Russian Central Bank deputy governor Alexander Torshin.  Butina has been indicted as a Russian spy who sought to influence US politics and elections.

Alleged Russian agent met with Obama officials

In New York they are literally letting the criminally insane out to vote for Governor Cuomo.  Cuomo has handed out pardons to thousands of former prisoners in time for the election, including 77 sexual predators who had been committed to psychiatric hospitals after serving their prison time.  The pardon gives them the right to vote, according to the New York Daily News.

Cuomo pardons sexual predators so they can vote

The deadest horse in political history, the Trump Russia collusion story, continues to be mercilessly beaten by Democrats.  But it’s over.  Trey Gowdy gave the best summation of the death of the Trump Russia investigation on Sunday, telling Fox host Bret Baier that if there was actually any evidence found against Trump in this two year investigation, Rep. Adam Schiff would have leaked it by now.  The Democrats can pray for an obstruction charge, but the Bill Clinton precedent suggests that’s not going anywhere.  Also, anyone who Trump might have tried to obstruct, such as Comey, McCabe, or Rosenstein, has already proven themselves to be extremely biased and unreliable as a witness.  Stick a fork in this one.  Yup, another fork.

If there was evidence, Schiff would have leaked it

Newsflash 7/23/18

Rand Paul is expected to ask Trump to revoke former CIA chief John Brennan’s security clearance.  Since leaving the CIA, Brennan has joined up with MSNBC as a political commentator, often hostile to Trump.  Brennan recently accused Trump of treason and said he should be impeached over his press conference with Putin in Helsinki.  Paul suggested that Brennan was using his security clearance to enrich himself by passing state secrets to MSNBC.  Republicans have expressed concern over the extreme partisanship shown by the former CIA director and former FBI director James Comey.

Rand Paul to ask for Brennan’s security clearance to be revoked

Need to know 7/23/18

Iran, in trouble with their people and staring down the barrel of new US sanctions, began a tweet war with Trump over the “mother of all wars”.  Trump responded in all caps that Iran’s leaders would suffer consequences few others have.  In the end it’s likely all blowing smoke.  Iran doesn’t have nuclear capabilities and the US isn’t about to go invade another Middle Eastern country.  But the developments continue to show that despite the rhetoric and narrative, Trump has been tougher on Russia allies than Obama was.

Rouhani warns Trump about mother of all wars

Speaking of rhetoric on Russia, Trey Gowdy had a warning for Trump administration officials that they should steer Trump to take Russia more seriously or consider leaving their posts.  Gowdy has consistently chided the Trump administration for not being tough enough on Russia’s election interference, however he has also acknowledged the extreme prejudice shown by Obama’s intel apparatus. In addition to noting that James Comey, James Clapper, and John Brennan continue to show their anti-Trump bias in editorials, Gowdy recently took Inspector General Michael Horowitz to task over his failure to call out anti-Trump bias deeply rooted in the FBI.  Texts from Peter Strzok reveled that the Russia/Trump collusion investigation was an “insurance policy” to “stop Trump”.  But so far, nothing has actually tied Trump to Russia or proven collusion.

Anti-Trump bias in the FBI can’t be put aside

Speaking of bias, the FISA court warrant to spy on Carter Page and the Trump campaign has been released through a Freedom of Information Act request.  This extraordinary release marks the first time a secretive FISA warrant has been released.  It proves two things.  The first is that Hillary Clinton’s paid for political propaganda dossier played a major role in getting the warrant.  Second, that the secret warrant to spy on a US citizen during the Obama administration was obtained simply because there was suspicion that Russia was trying to recruit him.  It’s also important to know that the warrant was issued after Page was no longer with the Trump campaign. Spying on a US Citizen because there is a belief that a foreign power might try to recruit them is likely a violation of the 4th Amendment.

For some good reading, here is Andy McCarthy’s argument why suspicion that someone is being recruited by a foreign government is not good enough to secretly spy on a US Citizen.

If you want to read through the FISA Warrant, you can do that here.

What do Sacha Baron Cohen and James O’Keefe have in common?  Both used hidden cameras to expose the other side.  It’s interesting to see how many lend credence to what Cohen exposes compared to those who dismissed O’Keefe’s videos out of hand  because they felt he was using trickery or deceptive editing.  O’Keefe’s undercover operations exposed massive Democrat voter fraud and routine illegal activities being carried out by Planned Parenthood.  Cohen got a racist Georgia politician to drop his pants and shout the N word.  I wonder if the Left will dismiss Cohen so quickly.

Sacha Baron Cohen gets former GOP lawmaker to make racist jokes 

 

Need to know 7/22/18

“The administration has implemented an ‘Insider Threat Program’ in all government departments to urge federal employees to monitor their colleagues for possible unauthorized information disclosures. Administration employees suspected of leaking classified information are given lie-detector tests and subject to reviews of their telephone and e-mail records”

No, this isn’t Trump era policy.  This is a flashback to a 2013 USA Today article about an Obama crackdown on the press.  “This (The Obama administration) is the most closed, control freak administration I’ve ever covered,” – David E. Sanger, chief Washington correspondent of The New York Times.

Flashback: Obama often blocks Press access to information

Even as Democrats publicly say that #walkaway is simply a ploy by Russian bots to weaken their party, the split between moderates and socialists is deepening.  Centrists are definitely showing concerns over the rise of Ocasio-Cortez, who seems to be the perfect representative for the politically ignorant millennial generation.

Centrist Dems arguing against far leftists 

Want some fun? The Russia/Trump connection was an “insurance policy” to “stop Trump” according to operatives in the FBI.  Their own tweets give this away.  But the Media Research council has highlighted this even better by putting together a compilation of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama talking quite differently about Russia before the election.

“This election will not be rigged.”  “We want Russia to be strong.”

Need to know 7/19/18

Vast majority of Democrats don’t know what their stance on ICE is.  Like Ocasio-Cortez trying to find a position on Israel, Democrats are wandering adrift on the issue of border security.  Republicans took advantage of their wishy washy position Wednesday with a resolution expressing support for ICE.  Of the 183 Democrats in the House, 133 voted “present” rather than take a side.  18 voted yes on the resolution and 34 voted no.  Because 73% of Democrats couldn’t take a side on the issue, the resolution easily passed.  One thing is for sure, there is no unity on the left when it comes to border security, and for most of them the activism is all talk.

Most Democrats refuse to take a stance on ICE

San Francisco takes the next step by registering illegal aliens and non-citizens to vote in local school board elections.  Federal law still prevents them from voting in national elections.  Just like Federal law prevents people from growing and using pot…

Non-citizens register to vote in San Francisco school board elections

Democrats have introduced a bill to make it easier to claim bankruptcy for student loans.  The reason unsubsidized student loan interest rates are around 8% rather than 16% like credit card debt is because it’s hard to claim bankruptcy on student debt.  Student loans have no collateral.  A 16% rate would make a $100,000 student loan cost about $500,000 after the interest is paid over a 30 year term.  Is that the trade off the 89% of students who pay their loans on time want?

What to know about possible bankruptcy changes for student debt

Did Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez call for violent opposition and illegal activities?  In her interview with Now!, Ocasio-Cortez said that activists needed to occupy ICE offices and airports.  While occupying ICE offices violates a few laws, occupying airports would get her mixed up with the TSA and DHS as well.  Probably not a good idea.  I’m pretty sure her followers could face jail time for attempting to illegally enter and occupy any area of an airport past security.  But by all means, I hope she gives it a shot.

Democrat candidate Ocasio-Cortez calls on supporters to violate the law

Need to Know 7/18/18

Democrats are claiming that Trump told Russia to hack the DNC.  What they are actually referring to was a campaign speech Trump gave after Hillary Clinton deleted 30,000 emails under subpoena from her illegal private server.  The FBI couldn’t find those incriminating emails, so Trump joked that he hoped the Russians could find them.  And that is the closest thing we have to Russian Collusion.

Trump asked Russia to find Clinton’s emails

David Love, writing for CNN, is suggesting that #walkaway is actually a ploy by the Russians to make people think that there is an exodus from the Democrat party by those disillusioned with the extreme turn the party has taken toward Socialism.  So when your friends use #walkaway, just know that means they are actually a Russian bot.

Russian bots are using #walkaway to try to wound Dems in the midterm

Trump is being accused of going soft on the Russians by not starting a war with Putin over the hackers.  But actually, it was the Obama administration who decided to back burner efforts to stop Russian hackers.  After US intel agencies had developed a plan to fight back against Russian hacker attacks, Susan Rice issued a stand down order.

Obama cyber chief confirms ‘stand down’ order against Russian cyberattacks in summer 2016

Ocasio-Cortez has screwed up on Israel again.  Despite holding a degree in international relations, the young Socialist candidate for New York’s 14th district has now bumbled through three different interviews on questions about Israel.  But take heart, she is going to be “speaking to activists” so they can finally tell her what to think about Israel.  I feel better already.

Ocasio-Cortez backpedals on two-state solution comments

Hillary Clinton or Roseanne Barr?
Let’s talk reality for a minute. Hillary Clinton ran against Trump in 2016.  Roseanne Barr has been a vocal supporter of Trump.  Roseanne’s ABC show was cancelled because of her racist insult directed at former Obama staffer Valerie Jarrett.  So Clinton is the leftist and Barr is the crazy right winger, right?  In 2012, one of these two individuals took the  Political Courage Test and here’s her results. Go ahead, try to guess. Hillary Clinton or Roseanne Barr:
– Pro-choice
– Supports higher corporate, capital gains, and income taxes on upper earners
– Supports higher government spending on education, welfare, and the environment, and cuts in defense
– Against the death penalty
– Supports federal spending to grow the economy
– Believes humans contribute to global warming and supports federal environmental regulations
– Supports bringing home ALL of our troops and using the savings to pay for Universal Single-Payer healthcare
– Supports gun control
– Does not want Obamacare repealed
– Supports same-sex marriages
– Opposes private accounts for social security
– Supports marijuana legalization
 
Here’s the kicker, ready?
– Does not support requiring illegal immigrants to return to their country of origin
– Supports amnesty for illegal immigrant minors
– Supports sanctuary cities
 
These are the positions Roseanne Barr took in the 2012 survey when she ran for President as the Peace and Freedom party nominee. Oh, I’m sorry, did you think she was a conservative? Did you think her vocal Trump support meant she was a right-winger? Unless she has changed 100% in four years, Roseanne Barr is left of Hillary Clinton. She’s out in the loony left with Bernie Sanders.  It makes me wonder what ABC, and Roseanne had in mind when they brought her show back spotlighting her as a Trump supporter.  
Maybe she’s a better actor than we all thought.

Trump Campaign Mole Had One Question

The cat is out of the bag.  The FBI did actually have a mole working with the Trump campaign.  Cambridge professor Stefan Halper was hired by the FBI and paid nearly half a million dollars by the DoD’s secretive Office of Net Assessment to gain the confidence of Trump campaign officials and inform on them to the FBI.  But the questions Halper asked had nothing to do with Russian collusion.  They wanted to know one thing: did the Trump campaign have Hillary’s emails.

According to reports, Halper asked George Papadopoulos and Carter Page if the Trump campaign had gotten Hillary Clinton’s emails from the Russians.  He wasn’t concerned about collusion, but rather if the Trump campaign had received those emails and was holding on to them for the opportune moment.  If the Trump campaign had those emails, it could spell doom for Clinton, the Obama administration, and the FBI.

Obama’s FBI had exonerated Hillary Clinton before they even began their investigation.  As part of the immunity deal with Clinton’s attorneys, they allowed for the destruction of evidence that might have established a timeline of when and how her emails were deleted.  Obama himself and other Obama administration officials like Loretta Lynch had emailed Hillary under pseudonyms.  The discovery of Hillary’s emails could be detrimental to the entire power base of the Democrat party.  Obama had just as much reason as Hillary to find out if Trump had them.  So that was Halper’s mission.

This wouldn’t be the first election espionage mission for Halper.  In 1980, Halper worked as a mole in the Carter administration, leaking foreign policy intel to the Reagan campaign under George H.W. Bush’s direction.  He was part of a group in the CIA who helped Reagan anticipate Carter’s foreign policy positions during an election year.  The scandal came to light a couple years later, but was quickly forgotten.  Halper also had connections with MI-6, the British spy agency that Christopher Steele used to work for.

The Bush’s have been against Trump from the start.  Stefan Halper was their former spy.  Even working for the Obama’s to help save Hillary, he was the perfect man for the job.

For those keeping score at home, this is another instance where Trump was proven right.  He said the FBI was tapping his phone.  After much ridicule, the FBI admitted that they were surveilling the phone lines at Trump tower.  Trump said the FBI used the phony Steele dossier to start the Russian investigation. The House investigation determined that in fact the dossier, which was paid for by the Clinton campaign, had been used to secure FISA warrants to spy on Trump.  Trump as recently as last week suggested there was an FBI informant working his campaign officials.  After being ridiculed again by the media and relentlessly fact-checked, the truth has come out and he was right again.

But the scariest thing is that Halper wasn’t investigating Trump or Russia, as former CIA director Brennan suggested.  Halper wasn’t there to find out about illegal Russian influence.  He was there to let the Obama administration and Hillary campaign know if there was going to be an October surprise.  His mission was to find out if Trump had Hillary’s emails.

 

Susan Power – The New Face of the Unmasking Scandal

A new name has surfaced in the unmasking scandal. UN Ambassador Susan Power made hundreds of unmasking requests in the last year of the Obama Presidency. Unmasking is the process by which individuals caught up in warrantless NSA surveillance are named in intelligence reports. It is a violation of the 4th amendment when misused.

During the Trump campaign and transition period, there were leaks of damaging information only discovered by government surveillance. At some point, Trump officials were unmasked in US intelligence reports and those reports were leaked to the press. The New York Times was one that reported Trump ties to Russia that were gleaned from NSA wiretaps.  They have since attempted to back off the claim.

Illegally unmasking a US citizen and leaking that information is a felony and carries up to 10 years in jail. The prime people of interest are former CIA director Brennan, Susan Rice, and now Susan Power.

So why would a UN Ambassador be caught up in this? The potential answers to that question truly scare me. If Susan Power was leaking intel on the Trump transition team to other UN member nations, that would be a huge development. Don’t forget, much of the Russia collusion speculation came from intel provided by the UK, Germany and the Ukraine. Were they doing the spying? Or was the US doing the spying, laundering the info through them, and then using it to smear Trump and attempt to influence the election outcome and bolster the resistance movement?

A crime was committed. The fact that we know anything about the Russia investigation is indicative of the many illegal leaks. What we know shows that those leaks include information only our intelligence agencies should know.  Brennan and Rice have both been openly hostile towards the Trump administration.  It will be interesting to see where the investigation of Susan Power goes.