For me, the most serious issue in the entire 2016 scorched earth SPIN information war remains the corruption of top official U.S. intelligence and FBI decision-making based on politicized, spun information being fed to them by partisan sources. From following the 8 years of the Obama administration’s use and abuse of government information, from the IRS scandal weaponizing processes to target right-wing political groups to Clinton-connected lawyers feeding op dirt information into the DOJ, State Department, and FBI, there were many disturbing actions reeking of weaponizing government information for partisan purposes.
At the same time, negative Clinton campaign dirt on Trump was being fed into official Obama administration channels, the FBI, reportedly, had two open criminal investigation into the Clintons – one was Hillary’s email investigation and the other was multiple field office investigations into the Clinton Foundation on pay-to-play corruption.
At top levels of the Obama administration, it seems to me, they wanted to grasp at any wisps of dirt on Trump and build it into treasonous “Russian collusion” and at the same time, bury and dismiss real evidence of grossly negligent handling of highly classified information and Clinton Foundation corruption. The seeming two separate standards of justice disturbs me.
James Comey, former FBI director, to this day remains sketchy on explaining what he knew about the Steele dossier’s provenance. Likewise, his explanation of his decision making in recommending no charges in the Clinton email investigation, back in July 2016, makes no sense. Later still, with the DOJ IG report’s findings regarding the email investigation, Comey’s answers about the FBI leaking, for which the IG found Andrew McCabe, lacked candor and found Comey’s version more credible, don’t sit right with me.
Those McCabe leaks to the media were unauthorized and designed to counter leaks about the FBI investigation of Clinton Foundation pay-to-play corruption. McCabe leaking was initiated to silence leaks coming out of the FBI’s NY field office Those field office leaks dealt with the tens of thousands of Hillary State Dept. emails the FBI found on the Weiner family laptop, while investigating the Anthony Weiner texting scandal.
Comey’s actions juxtaposed to his explanations smell of deceit. He went along with the Clinton spin effort in July of 2016 to bury the email investigation and his clumsy effort of reopening that investigation and doing a quickie investigation of the Weiner laptop, was just an effort to quell the leaks coming out about the Clinton Foundation corruption and Weiner laptop. That quickie Weiner laptop investigation was just cover dressing for him to bury both FBI criminal investigations of the Clintons, and hopefully secure his position and standing with whom he believed would be his next boss – Hillary Clinton.
When he was fired, Comey led the media SPIN charge, by leaking FBI memos of notes (some reportedly containing classified information) that he typed up on FBI equipment, after his private meetings with President Trump. He sent these memos to a friend, who leaked them to the media. Later, after negative press about these memos, Comey declared that the friend, Daniel Richman, a former federal prosecutor for the Southern District of New York, was his attorney. This move seemed to be an attempt to tie a pretty bow on a stinking heap of corrupt Comey leaking, which was designed to create a media SPIN furor over Comey’s firing and create political pressure for the appointment of a special counsel to investigate President Trump and his campaign on “Russian collusion”.
However, it seems to me, that in understanding our domestic spin war timeline, we need to go back to its beginnings in the 90s, and keep referring to notes from then to now. Of course there’s Team Clinton vs Team GOP ( vast, right-wing conspiracy in Hillary’s view), but in the 2008 election Team Obama emerged too and while Team Obama and Team Clinton unite on most efforts to thwart Team GOP, on some others Team Obama tries to distance itself from Team Clinton.
In early 2016, it seems to me some of Team Obama at the top were all-in for Team Clinton, while others were less enthused and at various points with these two ongoing FBI criminal investigations of the Clintons, at the very top, President Obama and his inner-circle were debating whether to throw the Clintons to the FBI hands of justice and have Vice President, Joe Biden, enter the race or help the Clinton machine bury the FBI investigations.
I believe Bill Clinton directly pressured President Obama in 2015 to make the email scandal go away. I believe that by the summer of 2016 and the email scandal still lingering, Bill Clinton was livid and I believe that is why he took matters into his own hands and orchestrated the tarmac meeting with Loretta Lynch directly, to set in motion the “for appearances sake only” 4th of July weekend FBI interview of Hillary and the orchestrated Clinton machine spin to be the end of the email investigation.
Comey decided to place his future in the hands of Team Clinton and he went along with Lynch’s corrupting the process, by refusing to recuse herself after the tarmac meeting with Bill Clinton, while abdicating her prosecutorial duties to Comey. Nothing Comey said at that July press conference made sense – especially the part about how Hillary showed no intent to break the law. He waxed on about “intent”.
Timelines matter to me, when trying to understand events. Personal connections along those timelines help create a clearer picture, at least in my mind of the story. James Comey plays clueless on what he knows about the provenance of the Steele dossier. He also plays clueless on the provenance of the Clinton private server.
Bill Clinton had that server set up in their home in the summer of 2008, after Hillary suspended her 2008 campaign.
At the moment the Attorney General is putting together a team to look at the provenance of the Trump-Russia investigation.
I haven’t sorted out the Mueller report findings in my head yet and am still reading it and mulling over the information.
Andrew McCarthy can be relied on to give fact-based analysis of legal matters and he wrote another must-read piece, The FBI’s Trump-Russia Investigation Was Formally Opened on False Pretenses, at National Review today.
A line in McCarthy’s excellent piece stuck out at me, because it prodded something that’s been missing in the provenance of the Clinton email investigation too and it explains that “intent” issue James Comey says was absent.
I tweeted this tweet thread this morning:
Interesting: “Downer has a history with the Clintons that includes arranging a $25 million donation to the Clinton Foundation in 2006, when he was Australia’s foreign minister and then-senator Hillary Clinton was the favorite to become U.S. president in 2008.”
Here’s an interesting Clinton Foundation fact too, from the FBI Notes released in September of 2016. Justin Cooper, Bill Clinton’s aide/IT guy, told the FBI Bill Clinton’s personal email server was set up around June 2008.
10:07 AM – 6 May 2019
(Sorry the link didn’t copy – https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/fbi-releases-documents-in-hillary-clinton-e-mail-investigation)
Bill Clinton was having a personal Clinton Foundation server installed in their home, as Hillary suspended her presidential campaign. She left the race over $22 million in debt.
She couldn’t do political fundraising as Sec of State. She merged her State Dept business with the Clinton Foundation business on the family personal email server.
#DefinitelyEasierToUseOneDeviceIndeed
Never fear, Hillary always finds a way to “power through it”
:
libertybelle diaries 
“Bombshell” in my humble opinion, is waaaay overused and normally, I wouldn’t use it at all. However, just after about oh … 28:30 I don’t frankly know how I could characterize it otherwise.
https://www.nationalreview.com/podcasts/the-mccarthy-report/episode-46-the-dossier-durham-and-disagreements/
I need to listen to this episode again, JK. I started listening to it this afternoon and fell asleep after a few minutes – nothing to do with the podcast, just I didn’t sleep well last night, lol.
Take care of yourself too my Friend.
Yes of course LB I realize you (or particularly me either) don’t like/trust what I’ve come to refer to as “predictably partisan sources” but my linking has a .. oh I dunno, how was it the ol’ tv commercial jingle put it?
‘Inquiring minds want to know’? Just between you and me though in this case.
Actually I wasn’t even aware until I’d listened to that McCarthy thing there was … is some sort of dispute going on over whether it was Brennan or Comey ultimately being the instigator responsible for getting the dossier thingy before the public.
Anyway, if you will, watch this clip – maybe the identified ‘Saxena’ person’s too. (I never heard of that person either and since I’ve seen instances of the given name bestowed on both [all?] genders I don’t know whether to type ‘Mr or Miss Saxena’).
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2019/05/the-barr-factor.php
Anyway LB, which of the guys Brennan or Comey, your opinion inclines you toward? My gut tells me Brennan owing to that Halifax conference where the McCain guy (Kramer?) first got [apparently] roped into travelling to England to get a copy for McCain so that McCain could then go and visit Comey’s seventh floor Puzzle Palace office. Plus the dossier having Great Britain’s fingerprints all over it.
Then again … the CIA doesn’t ordinarily have to concern itself much with such Constitutional niceties as having to deal with getting FISA warrants.
Oh. Maybe one other thing – Susan Rice’s reported email to herself in the hours leading up to Trump’s getting sworn – the one purportedly saying “The President [Obama] wants all this done by the book.”
My gut telling me is one thing however my successful betting history more often suggests otherwise.
I will check out these links, JK. Andy McCarthy or Lowry mentioned a tweet thread by Undercover Huber on Twitter. I’ve read many of this guy’s tweets.
A few days ago on an older blog post of mine, I posted a comment to you, JK, about a Andy McCarthy retweet of some person(s) going by the name of brennan’sorangejumpsuit, that dealt with a whole bunch of stuff, had lots of documents posted too.
There was a timeline that struck as one where I’d like more information. The documents didn’t copy, but here’s the gist of the tweets that caught my attention:
brennan’sorangejumpsuit
@15poundstogo
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One question I have is whether Crowdstrike participated in the FBI’s investigation (cough, cover-up) of whether Hillary’s private server was hacked by foreign powers. That would undermine Crowdstrike’s credibility/objectivity.
3:34 PM – 12 May 2019
brennan’sorangejumpsuit
@15poundstogo
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The FBI’s investigation of HRC’s private server began with an IC IG referral on 7/6/15. The formal investigation opened 7/10/15.
3:36 PM – 12 May 2019
brennan’sorangejumpsuit
@15poundstogo
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Exactly in between those two dates, on 7/8/15, Crowdstrike was awarded an emergency, no-bid, 364-day contract with the FBI:
3:38 PM – 12 May 2019
brennan’sorangejumpsuit
@15poundstogo
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The FBI is in no big hurry to disclose what that contract was for.
3:41 PM – 12 May 2019
In this tweet thread it’s pointed out that Crowdstrike, Fusion GPS, Steele were all working for Perkins Coie too.
The entire tweet thread is fascinating.
You’ll be remembering Crowdstrike was the company hired by the DNC in the immediate aftermath of the supposedly WikiLeaks “hacking” of Podesta’ s and Wasserman-Shultz’ personal communications? And it was Crowdstrike that “officially” had physical possession of the subpoenaed server which then, for reasons thus far unexplained “went awol”?
There were of course many media stories saying, but never ever saying in such a way as to be admissible evidence that they [Crowdstrike] indeed “had the goods.”
Here’s but one example:
https://www.thedailybeast.com/trumps-missing-dnc-server-is-neither-missing-nor-a-server
Of course subsequent testimony by, among others, Comey himself before the House and under oath directly and unequivocally contradicted just about everything those early reports were trying to sell – what was it mentioned the other day on another thread, “A rumor makes it halfway around the globe before the truth can get its boots on”?
“The FBI is in no big hurry to disclose what that contract was for.”
I’m not saying the twitterer erred I’m just reminding (myself as much as you LB) that with all the twists and turns [largely bullshit all in my frank way of putting things] just about anybody apart from Andrew McC can be forgiven the occasional reasonable confusion. That The Daily Beast “misreported” (if we are to believe Comey’s sworn testimony) doesn’t help much.
“The FBI’s investigation of HRC’s private server began with an IC IG referral on 7/6/15. The formal investigation opened 7/10/15.”
That one’s problematic on its face – an IC IG?
(Presuming on my part, the “IC” is meaning the Agency equally to the Bureau, that would mean there’d have to’ve been two Inspectors General because under the amendment to the IG Act of 1978 (Homeland Security 2002 otherwise The Patriot Act) while an IG may become operative under the Congress’ Oversight Responsibilities where the Bureau is concerned, in the case of the Agency that’s solely an Executive branch call. Now while it’s true there may have been such an appointment and, presumably an IC investigation I, personally, rather doubt it. Primarily, just off the top of my head for two reasons – One: Director CIA [Brennan in ’15] would’ve had to petitioned the President [Obama in ’15] to appoint the guy and Two: in this “Leaky Environment” we find ourselves in these days surely that’d headlined the NYT for all getout.)
Now I must admit LB I’ve not been paying nearly the attention I may have just a short(?) seventeen days ago. You may remember some comment I offhandedly dropped about me “having some stuff to deal with”?
May is my parent’s anniversary month and the Sis I lost last winter quite coincidentally (I think) was born the exact date of when that anniversary would’ve been celebrated. And I got kinda sidetracked by one of my Congress-critters in the late weeks of last month which left me kinda disconnected by what was going on all around me – personallyspeakingwise. And my eldest Grandson a couple months back found himself in a situation my eldest Child has been needing me “to talk to about stuff” (not a medical thing thank God) … Anyway close to the first day of this month I guess the planets aligned or something – the eldest calls with “Dad, you need to be paying more attention to Grandma!” … I asked, “Why, has she fallen again?” … not a good answer I’ve since found out. Mentioning my eldest’s conversation to the Girlfriend she starts in on me, “I been telling you for six months you need to” (several things).
So I’ve been too busy to make my accustomed dates with Sean Hannity and Congressman Schiff as is my normal habit.
I guess I’m a bit behind LB my Friend.
Oh before I forget it – the Daily Beast linking reminds me of something:
https://disobedientmedia.com/2019/02/fat-anomalies-in-leaked-dnc-emails-suggest-use-of-thumbdrive/
Sorry to hear you’ve been swamped in family business, JK, but heck, I can’t deal with listening to Hannity or Schiff. Add most of these Dems running for president and the actual POTUS, whom I still think is a flaming jackass of the first order. And for the record, I still find Trump a loudmouth conman.
With these other investigations, the single person working most to undermine their findings isn’t Nadler or Schiff, it’s none other than Donald J. Trump, with his off-the-wall tweets and comments about “treason” and endless bs about Barr being “great”, which undercuts Barr’s credibility as an unbiased AG. Trump’s own bs will destroy the credibility of all three of the ongoing investigations, because he’s making them sound like a partisan witch hunt… What a total moron!
There was some sort of investigation about emails, not just Hillary’s that triggered this whole thing, in the beginning – not sure whose IG it was State. Intel, not sure – would have to go googling about that and am too tired. The thing would be the FBI did get the go ahead to open an investigation and whether that timeline and an emergency contract with Crowdstrike is correct. That contract would smack of the Clinton lawyers wanted to keep tight control over Bill Clinton’s foundation server, imo.
Just saw a new John Batchelor with Andy McCarthy, so I’ll listen to that and then go to bed: https://audioboom.com/posts/7264660-the-unconnected-dots-of-steele-trubnikov-surkov-halper-page-pappadopolos-andrewcmccarthy
Hmm.
I see Mueller isn’t gonna be appearing before the House, “anytime soon, if ever.” And gee here I was thinking, based on the video clip Powerline helpfully provided on the above link that, Barr has “no problems” with Mueller’s doing so anytime whatsoever.
Oddly enough I see no mention El’ Capitan Mustard (I saw that sometime ago referencing Trump which, at the time, I giggled at) anyway I see no mention Captain Mustard’s invoked Executive Privilege at the prospect of the Special Counsel’s appearing.
Reckon LB it could be as we were discussing ‘Mueller isn’t really much of a problem for the President but he does pose a real problem for the Democrats generally and Nadler especially’?
I think LB, maybe “some people” are listening into our backs and forth.
https://audioboom.com/channel/johnbatchelor
I mean it’s just possible. Probable? Perhaps not but who knows … ?
Haven’t (yet) found a link to the brennan’sorangejumpsuit guy (or gal) but I do see McCarthy’s got a new one dated today [May 18] and therein I noted a link to the undercoverhuber guy he’d mentioned in the McCarthy Report I listed at the top of this thread.
Unsurprisingly I see Cody Shearer’s getting mentioned – Sid too. (Now this is more intuition than anything solid but I’m “kinda of the mind” either Cody or Sid [likelier in my humble opinion Cody] is the mysterious ‘Source E’ mentioned in some of the open-sourced internal emailed communications. Don’t know though whether we’ll ever see verification of that though … ‘officially’ at any rate).
McCarthy’s piece that got pulled from:
https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/05/the-steele-dossier-and-the-verified-application-that-wasnt/
Aaand, I think I’m recognizing Mr. McCarthy’s going with who “my gut” was telling me in my comment of last evening at 9:39pm.
Boy Howdy (fairly common expression in my neck of the woods indicative of excited/surprised exclamation) Anyway Boy Howdy LB, it sure seems like somebody’s finally tipped the dominoes!
(MAYBE Barr when he had the temerity to say the words “spied on” before whatever House Committee that was I saw on C-Span. Judiciary?)
One thing’s for sure [hopefully] I ain’t gonna miss any of tomorrow’s Sunday Shows.
Oh and I agree with what you’ve said in your’s of today at 2:11. I’d only add that if Trump does “suffer some real consequences” arising out of all these new revelations it’ll be his own damn fault.
JK, Here’s the link to McCarthy’s retweet of that brennan’sorangejumpsuit thread: https://twitter.com/AndrewCMcCarthy/status/1127885299735060481
JK, you’ve got to go read this brennan’sorangejumpsuit… this guy is like you with the magically magnificent way of conjuring up government documents and open source info. If I were British, I’d say, I am gobsmacked, but alas Team Clinton reached across the pond and I’m just a hick from the backwoods of PA, LOL.
Thanks for that link – yeah I’d seen that but hadn’t gotten to the ‘bright idea part’ of clicking on the guy’s tweet to open the whole thread. Remember LB, I’m Twitter-Ignorant.
***
Sometime/Somehow I expect we’ll see (maybe not in our lifetimes though maybe our kids will) But anyway I’ve long thought, in at least the Podesta emails hack specifically, “the unrung bell” has the fingerprints of the Awan Crime Family Syndicate all over it. Nobody it sometimes seems to me even remembers those Pakis having access to virtually all the D-Team’s stuff, computerspeakingwise.
I believe you are right there, JK. I found it hilarious with the Dem outrage spin cycles about various Trump administration security clearances, like Kushner’s, yet they all turned a blind-eye to the having a Sec of State running the State Department from an unsecured, makeshift server that two flunkies (with no computer-expertise) put together in the Clinton’s basement and then add in the Awan brothers, who were providing IT services for not just the DNC, but for several Congressional Dems. And add in that the, tens of thousands (one estimate was around 49,000) State Dept emails on the Weiner laptop. Abedin’s family is Muslim Brotherhood-connected, so how she got a security clearance is a mystery to me. The Awan brothers had financial disasters in their background, fraud too, I think, so how they were cleared to be handling computer IT services in Congress baffles me. They stole computer equipment too, I believe…
The mainstream media threw a lid on all of that.
The Dems are total frauds and have zero credibility when it comes to national security.