Reuters article in The Washington Free Beacon

Harris Locks Up VP Nom: Willie Brown’s Ex-Girlfriend Spurns His Advice

(Reuters) – Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden on Tuesday tapped Senator Kamala Harris of California as his choice for vice president, his campaign told supporters in a text message.

Harris, 55, becomes the first Black woman on a major presidential ticket in U.S. history and providing him with a partner well suited to go on the attack against Republican President Donald Trump.

"I have the great honor to announce that I’ve picked @KamalaHarris — a fearless fighter for the little guy, and one of the country’s finest public servants — as my running mate," Biden said on Twitter.

With social unrest over racial injustice and police brutality against Black Americans rocking the country for months, Biden had been under increasing pressure to select a woman of color as his running mate. She is also the first Asian-American on a major presidential ticket.

In Harris, a senator from California who made her own run for the White House before ending it and endorsing Biden, he gains a deeply experienced politician already battle-tested by the rigors of the 2020 presidential campaign as they head into the final stretch of the Nov. 3 election.

Harris, who became only the Senate’s second Black woman in its history when she was elected in 2016, will be relied on to help drive the African-American vote – the Democratic Party’s most loyal constituency. Four years ago, the first dip in Black voter turnout in 20 years contributed to Democrat Hillary Clinton’s upset loss to Trump.

Biden, whose foundering campaign was rescued by Black voters in South Carolina’s primary in February, needs their strong support against Trump. It will be crucial in battleground states such as Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin that Trump won by the slimmest margins in 2016 but where opinion polls now show him trailing his Democratic rival.

The Black vote is also central to Biden’s hopes of winning Southern states Georgia and Florida that Trump carried four years ago but that opinion polls indicate will be competitive this year.

Biden served as vice president for eight years under President Barack Obama, the first Black U.S. president.

Harris, 55, a former prosecutor and state attorney general in California, is well known for her sometimes aggressive questioning style in the Senate, most notably of Brett Kavanaugh during his 2018 Supreme Court confirmation hearing.

As a presidential candidate, she also took Biden to task in a nationally televised debate over his past stances on mandatory busing for students as a means to desegregate schools. Some Biden advisers have told Reuters the attacks made them question whether she would be a trusted working partner because of her political ambitions.

While that exchange failed to boost her White House hopes, the Biden campaign will now look for her to train her prosecutorial fire on Trump and Vice President Mike Pence. Harris is scheduled to debate Pence on Oct. 7 in Salt Lake City, Utah.

The choice of a running mate has added significance for Biden, who will turn 78 in November and be the oldest person to become president if he is elected.

Biden’s age also has led to broad speculation he will serve only one term, making Harris a potential top contender for the nomination in 2024. Some of his allies were concerned that would make her a bad fit for the No.2 job and questioned her loyalty.

Biden publicly committed to choosing a woman as his No. 2 in a March debate after discussing the matter with his wife Jill and had considered other former presidential rivals such as Senators Amy Klobuchar and Elizabeth Warren.

After the protests that erupted over the May 25 killing of George Floyd, a Black man, by a white policeman in Minneapolis, Biden’s search focused predominantly on candidates of color.

Harris will be confirmed as Biden’s running mate at the Democratic convention that begins on Monday, where Biden will also be formally nominated to challenge Trump.

A PROMINENT VOICE

Harris has become a key ally for Biden at a time when race has been thrust to the forefront of the campaign.

After Floyd’s death, she became a prominent voice in the push for racial justice and police reform, standing with marchers and sparring with Republicans in the U.S. Senate over reform legislation.

Harris at times came under criticism from some in the Black community and from progressive advocates for her record as California attorney general where, they say, she did not do enough to investigate police shootings and too often sided with prosecutors in wrongful conviction cases.

Her defenders say she has always been reform-minded – and point to her record in the Senate, where she has championed a police-reform bill and an anti-lynching bill, among other measures. Harris herself has said she became a prosecutor in order to bring a more progressive approach to the office.

The daughter of an Indian mother and a Jamaican father, Harris has knocked down barriers throughout her career. She was the first woman to serve as San Francisco’s district attorney, elected to that office in 2003, and the first woman to serve as California’s attorney general, elected to that office in 2010.

Biden considered several Black women in addition to Harris, including former Obama administration national security adviser Susan Rice, Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms and U.S. Representative Val Demings, a former police chief in Orlando, Florida. Biden also considered Asian-American Senator Tammy Duckworth and New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, a Latina.

Historically, the vice presidential nominee has been the one to take the lead in criticizing the opposing ticket, although Trump has largely shredded that tradition. Brian Brokaw, a California political consultant who managed Harris’ campaigns for attorney general and Senate, said Harris fits that role well.

"She is someone who can really make Republicans quake in their boots," Brokaw said.

https://freebeacon.com/2020-election/willie-browns-ex-spurns-his-advice-and-accepts-biden-vp-nomination/ 

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Facebook removes seven million posts for sharing false information on coronavirus

August 11, 2020
(Reuters) – Facebook Inc <FB.O> said on Tuesday it removed 7 million posts in the second quarter for sharing false information about the novel coronavirus, including content that promoted fake preventative measures and exaggerated cures.
Facebook released the data as part of its sixth Community Standards Enforcement Report, which it introduced in 2018 along with more stringent decorum rules in response to a backlash over its lax approach to policing content on its platforms.
The company said it would invite external experts to independently audit the metrics used in the report, beginning 2021.
The world’s biggest social media company removed about 22.5 million posts containing hate speech on its flagship app in the second quarter, up from 9.6 million in the first quarter. It also deleted 8.7 million posts connected to extremist organizations, compared with 6.3 million in the prior period.
Facebook said it relied more heavily on automation technology for reviewing content during the months of April, May and June as it had fewer reviewers at its offices due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
That resulted in company taking action on fewer pieces of content related to suicide and self-injury, child nudity and sexual exploitation on its platforms, Facebook said in a blog post.
The company said it was expanding its hate speech policy to include “content depicting blackface, or stereotypes about Jewish people controlling the world.”

 Some U.S. politicians and public figures have caused controversies by donning blackface, a practice that dates back to 19th century minstrel shows that caricatured slaves. It has long been used to demean African-Americans.

https://www.oann.com/facebook-to-independently-audit-metrics-on-enforcement-report/

Status Update: Meet At The Old Mill, We Ride At Midnight

posted at the Conservative Treehouse by sundance aka @TheLastRefuge2

A quote from Sam Adams is a good way to encapsulate the week ahead:

“If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or your arms.” 

“Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen.”  ~ Samuel Adams

First, my sincere appreciation for all of your support as we have worked through a complex process of information assembly, travel, and briefings to those who we hope will step forward.

Mid-August was always the most visible date to determine whether or not DC still retained any functional way to self-correct from the severity of corruption that so many people are now familiar with. That date has stuck with me for almost two years; and so it will remain.

Long gone are the ‘hopes’ and ‘trusts’ attached to Jeff Sessions, Rod Rosenstein, Michael Horowitz, John Huber, Matt Whitaker, John Laush, the House of Representatives or Senate;… all futile in their efforts, perhaps purposefully so. That leaves John Durham and AG Bill Barr… and hope is not a strategy as we enter the final stretch.

If no progress is made by this Friday 5pm, CTH will first share the name of the primary Durham investigator to media previously briefed on the documents we assembled. From there, and within 24 hrs, we will make that name public and direct inquiries can begin.

Barring some unforeseen shift in approach; and based on recent Senate responses to Sally Yates during testimony; there’s going to be no help in the delivery of sunlight from anyone on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Senator Ron Johnson and the Senate Homeland Security Committee is equally useless; and by now every American should know the Senate Intelligence Committee was an active participant; no help there.

♦ A note of warning and preparation. Familiar names that have covered the Spygate fiasco are also not necessarily allies in this fight to deliver sunlight. “Spygate” is a lucrative financial business, lots of books have been sold. Expose the real scale of the DC fraud and Spygate is peanuts; therefore, there are friendly elements who could actually defend their prior interests. It is predictably unfortunate; and no energy should be wasted.

Additionally, media voices paid by Wall Street corporations will offer little sunlight assistance.  There are too many vested financial interests; too many issues of credibility at risk, and too many long-standing reputations exposed. In many ways, directly and indirectly, as you well know, corporate media have participated in the effort to remove President Trump.

♦ Phase-2 is to deliver the briefing material we have assembled to larger audiences. The brief is complex, because the operation outlined within it was/is complex. Therefore, it actually takes two reviews to understand it:

• The first review is a timeline of when documents controlled by the Mueller special counsel were made public; the disparate public releases -and the controlled non releases- were/was a method used by the special counsel to keep people from easily connecting the dots. This was by design.  [Review takes about 45 mins]

• The second review encompasses an additional timeline from material within the publicly released documents. That second approach connects the dots and clears up the remaining confusion. Both reviews are not easy to absorb; but when that mental light bulb turns on, it can never be turned off… and, most importantly, everything reconciles; including the purposeful inaction of congress.  [About 45 minutes]

A set of 30 briefs costs roughly $900 to produce; this material is heavy.  Stunningly, and I laugh about this often, there are only about 20 pages within the documents that are needed to tell the whole story.  However, with today’s level of political skepticism, the brief has to contain every page of every document lest anyone be accused of selective editing.

Mid-week a group of good people are gathering to review and discuss the best methods to blast the information into the public consciousness. This has been planned for a long time. Delivery to public is not an easy task; the information is intellectually heavy, and the ramifications are considerable. However, on an optimistic note, despite numerous opportunities, no-one has yet been able to challenge either the material or the conclusions based almost entirely on direct evidence; and some very obvious circumstantial evidence.

♦ Dissemination – Will a video work… will a Zoom network work…. will live streaming work… will in-person public briefings work… or will it take a combination of all of those? Personally, the latter seems the most effective, but it also reaches the least.  One real issue with video is the briefing material has to be in the viewer’s hand to make sense. Regardless, I am committed to travel and share the information with as many people as possible until I run out of briefing material… which is a forward issue.

Following a logical plan, those public/group briefings will likely start about this time next week. If you have a group who would like to have a briefing, we’ll let you know how to contact and schedule.

As a result of this week’s final discussions, on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, CTH will likely be very quiet as these details are worked out. Friday night, if no action has been taken by the DOJ or AG Bill Barr, I will release the name of Durham’s #1. Then on Saturday, that name will go public, and then we go quickly right into phase-2.

On one hand, I still hold hope that Durham/Barr will deliver…. on the other hand, well, the pressure to preserve the institutions might be too much. However, at a certain point; well beyond all the oft-repeated comments about “sensitivity” and “delicate balances”; the brutal truth has to come out – or be forced out.

Oddly, I have yet to find a person who believes Durham’s investigative unit has this information; it’s always the last question I ask a group or individual. Investigators who have worked on these issues for years also give the same reply. Unfortunately, and despite direct contact, that lack of knowledge appears intentional.

So that’s where things stand. If things change, I will keep you updated.

REMINDER – When I share the message “live your best life”, it is not without purpose. Every moment that we allow the COVID and leftist onslaught to deter us from living our dreams, is a moment those who oppose our nation view as us taking a knee.

Do not allow this effort to succeed.

You might ask yourself how can I, one person, a flea looking into a furnace, retain an optimistic disposition while all around me seems chaotic and mad.

That’s the point; it ‘seems’ chaotic and mad because it has been created to appear that way. There are more of us than them; they just control the systems that allow us to connect, share messages, and recognize the scale of our assembly.

Every second that you live your life with thankfulness for the abundance within it; every moment that we CHOOSE to engage with fellowship; every day that we accept guidance from God – however you define him to be; and every moment we cherish this time to be a beacon of optimism; is a moment that we withstand that barrage and hold the flag in place. It is a genuinely patriotic position not to succumb to the attack.

If you allow yourself to be drawn into crisis and despair, you allow them to win. If your center of normal is based around this overwhelming onslaught, you will eventually concede liberty in favor of peace. Once we stop living in liberty, we no longer have peace.

It took me a while to fully understand just how damaging empty streets, soulless eyes, the lack of smiles, shuttered businesses, and the absence of joy would become. But as I travel around trying to deliver a very specific message to a very specific audience, I recognize just how much damage is being done; not just to our nation as a whole, but also to every individual within it – personally.

We must shake this mindset. We must withstand this onslaught and rally to the origin of our true national spirit. We must rally to a standard of Americanism and accept this is not that. In essence, we must individually take a stand. Purposefully, deliberately and with forethought, we must engage those around us to get rid of this sense of foreboding.

This approach is how we win the larger battle.

All around us, in every tribe and region, there are people who need you to show them the strength that you have. Strength of spirit. Strength of fellowship that you will not relent from expressing. No matter what noise is shouting from the loudspeakers, we must withstand it; we must make eye contact and remain joyful. We cannot allow despair to be the status quo.

Our nation needs more people like you, right now. Don’t wait… engage life, get optimistic, however you need to do it. Then, let that part of you shine right now… This is how we fight. Hold up that flag; give the starter smile… rally to the standard you create and spread fellowship again. God knows we need it.

Lift your spirits.  I cannot tell you how much of a difference it makes right now; not only to this internet community, but to our nation as a whole.   Choose to be optimistic. Live your best life, RIGHT NOW, there are people working furiously and with great purpose. Remember, this is the only life we have – so seize this day, and then the next, and then keep going.

We live in the greatest nation on the face of the earth. We are the people of that nation, with boundless opportunities most of the world can only dream of.  Our opposition has nothing but false witness, fear and lies.  Push on them, they are weak and shallow.

We are Americans…. Those who are working against our interests thrive in an atmosphere of despair and disenfranchisement – do not give it to them.  Carry an optimistic spirit, regardless of how challenging. I cannot explain it, but that makes success more certain.

Do not fuel our opposition with the power of fear.  Be strong right now; be happy right now; demand action, you are worth it. Do not give evil elements an inch of space within your heart.   Expect and demand accountability.  Do not worry about being perceived as an a**hole about it.

“Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go.”

Joshua 1:9

Quit listening to those who say “can’t” and “won’t”…

If some feel comfortable sitting in their socially distant box and bitching about all things that are not right, or might be not be right…. Or, if they prefer to allow themselves to be overcome with dark imaginings simply because what cannot be done is more comfortable than the effort to oversee what needs to be done…. well, that’s okay.

They can do that.

And when they are done doing that, they’ll still be in the same place.  However, you can choose to be positive and take action.

Rally your spirits to a standard of worthiness; because you are worth so much more. We are on the right side of history.  We are being guided. It is rather remarkable.

Again, thanks for your support.  Every prayer is felt, and I really believe those prayers are making a difference.  I’m seriously humbled.  Prayerfully so…  But remember, failure has never been in our national lexicon.  Life is good…. now, get to livin’ it.

Hopefully, I’ll see you soon…

Trump Surges In The Polls Ahead Of Conventions

David Marcus reporting for The Federalist

Most presidential election polling throughout July had Democratic nominee Joe Biden in very safe territory. Many surveys showed him with a double digit lead and almost none showed President Trump in striking distance. That has changed over the past week. 

Since the end of July, three of the four polls used by RealClearPolitics to form their average have Trump within four points.

It’s a significant uptick for a president who had been experiencing some serious summer time blues. Over the past few months, Trump has suffered debilitating poll numbers on his handling of the Coronavirus crisis as well as the mounting rioting and lawlessness across the country. But on both issues it looks like Democrats may have overplayed their hand.

July saw the media move away from reporting on Wuhan virus deaths and hospitalizations to a new standard of counting case numbers. The Trump campaign and the media were well aware that a huge spike in testing would keep case numbers high and support the narrative that the worst is yet to come. But even the number of cases is now leveling off, and despite the media’s efforts, Americans can tell that worst of the virus’s destruction is behind us.

Meanwhile, promising work on a potential vaccine known as Operation Warp Speed, has led experts to predict that there will be a viable vaccine by the end of the year, perhaps even earlier. That will be the key to unlocking the lockdown and returning to normal.

On the economy, jobs continue to come back at a robust pace and many parts of the country are loosening restrictions on business. With his pen and phone last week Trump extended unemployment benefits without the help of Democrats, pulling the rug out from a confused House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Americans are growing frustrated with the rioting and looting that continues to sweep some cities like Portland and Chicago. The absurd Democratic talking point that Portland’s violence was created by federal officers is crumbling as local police, not feds, declare riot after riot, night after night in the City of Roses.

The bottom line is that Trump has had a good couple of weeks and it is reflected in polling. The wave may be small at the moment but it is moving in the right direction just in time to carry him to the convention at the end of the month. Joe Biden, who has been content to sit in the basement thus far, now has to play some offense, and he has two big chances to do it.

First will be his pick of a running mate, sometime this week presumably. That is a very different choice with a four or five-point lead than it is with a nine or 10-point lead. With the latter, Biden could worry less about votes and more about an eventual governing partner. Now at the very least he needs to be thinking about both. Because Biden chose to make demography destiny by promising to select a woman, likely of color, he has limited his ability to create a very exciting choice. Is there one who can really move the needle? And have the tightening polls played a role in the delay of the announcement.

Biden’s second shot is his convention. But this is not going to be a national convention in any typical sense of the word. Can the Zoom Hangout version really give his campaign a shot in the arm? Are there any tricks to be pulled out of that bag?

Biden is still winning, there is little doubt of that, but any air of invincibility is withering away. If Trump can stay close, even without gaining much more, Biden will have to engage more forcefully in the election, something Democrats have made little secret about wanting to avoid. With the start of convention season just days away, the American people have a tight, contested race on their hands.

Nancy Pelosi Snaps At Media As She Loses COVID Aid Showdown With Trump

Jordan Davidson reporting for The Federalist

Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi showed her outrage at President Trump’s recent executive actions concerning COVID-19 aid on “Fox News Sunday” with Chris Wallace after Congress failed to negotiate and pass their own bill.

While Trump’s action boosted unemployment benefits, created a 120-day eviction moratorium, a payroll tax holiday until the end of the year, and extended student loan relief, Pelosi accused him of failing to “comprehend the seriousness or the urgency of the health and economic crises facing working families.”

“We’re disappointed that instead of putting in the work to solve Americans’ problems, the President instead chose to stay on his luxury golf course to announce unworkable, weak and narrow policy announcements to slash the unemployment benefits that millions desperately need and endanger seniors’ Social Security and Medicare,” Pelosi said along side Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.

Despite Pelosi’s disdain with Trump’s actions, calling them an “illusion,” Wallace noted that it was better than “having no bill at all,” and that “not coming to any agreement wasn’t going to provide any of the things that you want either.”

“You’re known as a master negotiator, but didn’t you mess this one up?” Wallace asked. “You knew that the president was threatening to take this executive action. I understand that you weren’t going to get everything you wanted and didn’t get everything you wanted, but should you have cut a deal?”

Pelosi, visibly upset by Wallace’s question, told Wallace he “clearly” did not “have an understanding of what is happening.”

While Pelosi claims to be a leader who wanted to pass more aid to Americans, she and other Democrats refused to negotiate their requested $3.4 trillion in aid down closer to the Republican proposed $1 trillion, leaving Congress in a gridlock as they adjourned until September.

“[The Democrats] can’t come up with any significant cuts in their bill,” White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows said. “What they want is a $2.5 trillion blank check.”

Pelosi also reacted to questions about the negotiations in an interview with PBS on Friday by accosting anchor Judy Woodruff for “playing devil’s advocate” when challenging Pelosi about the Democrats’ stance. In the interview, Pelosi accused Woodruff being an “advocate” of congressional Republicans after Woodruff suggested that the GOP demonstrated flexibility in the allocations of the bill and pointed out that money designated by Congress in the spring is still waiting to be spent.

Pelosi flips out at Judy Woodruff here because Woodruff isn't trying to bury the evidence that Democrats are purposely obstructing the stimulus bill because they'd rather see Republicans take a loss than see people receive relief: pic.twitter.com/vUmAedWKCO

— Eddie Zipperer (@EddieZipperer) August 6, 2020

“Democrats want more money, Republicans want a lot less,” Woodruff began. “They are saying they’re willing to show flexibility, and they’re also saying a lot of the money that was passed in the spring, Madam Speaker, has not even been spent yet.”

“Well, if you want to be an advocate for them, Judy, if you want to be an advocate for them, listen to what the facts are,” Pelosi snapped back.

“The point is, we have a bill that meets the needs of the American people. It’s called the HEROES Act. They [Republicans] don’t even want to do state and local, and when they do, it’s very meager and they want to revert money from before,” she added.

Despite the lack of cooperation and negotiation from Pelosi, Schumer, and other congressional Democrats, Pelosi told MSNBC on Friday that she believes her party’s demands for aid are not unreasonable.

“No, we haven’t overplayed our hand,” Pelosi stated. “We are not overplaying our hand when we’re factually presenting what our needs are for our families, for our teachers, for our schools, for ending the virus.”

Trump pointed out on Monday morning that it wasn’t until he stepped in that Pelosi and Schumer showed interest in coming to the negotiation table again.

“So now Schumer and Pelosi want to meet to make a deal. Amazing how it all works, isn’t it. Where have they been for the last 4 weeks when they were ‘hardliners,’ and only wanted BAILOUT MONEY for Democrat run states and cities that are failing badly?

They know my phone number!” he tweeted.

So now Schumer and Pelosi want to meet to make a deal. Amazing how it all works, isn’t it. Where have they been for the last 4 weeks when they were “hardliners”, and only wanted BAILOUT MONEY for Democrat run states and cities that are failing badly? They know my phone number!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 10, 2020

Devin Nunes Discusses Latest Information About Politically Weaponized Intelligence and Fraud

HPSCI ranking member Devin Nunes appears with Shannon Bream to discuss the latest information about DOJ and FBI fraud.

President Trump Calls Out “RINO Senator Ben Sasse”

President Trump calls out a GOP member of the never-Trump community for opposing the administration efforts to assist middle-class workers and families.

“The pen-and-phone theory of executive lawmaking is unconstitutional slop,” Nebraska Senator Sasse said Saturday night. “President Obama did not have the power to unilaterally rewrite immigration law with DACA, and President Trump does not have the power to unilaterally rewrite the payroll tax law. Under the Constitution, that power belongs to the American people acting through their members of Congress.” [LINK]

Simple Questions With Massive Ramifications

If you ever read the indictment of SSCI Security Director James Wolfe [pdf HERE] you would notice how FBI Washington Field Office Supervisory Special Agent Brian Dugan conducted his leak investigation that ultimately led to James Wolfe..

As SSA Dugan explains his investigative process he goes to great lengths to describe how he went to the FISA court to pick up a copy of the Carter Page FISA application on March 17, 2017.  Agent Dugan then takes it to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence where he gave it to SSCI Security Director James Wolfe.

Simple Questions: Why did SSA Dugan go to the FISC to pick up a copy?

Why didn’t Agent Dugan just go to Main Justice an pick up a copy from the DOJ-NSD file that contained the FISA application? Why go to the FISA Court for a copy?

This is not supposition; this is the process described and outlined in court records. So why go to the FISC and not the DOJ?

♦ Secondly, SSA Dugan goes to extreme lengths to draw attention to his copy; he calls the top secret FISA application an “FBI equity” in numerous documents. It’s his equity, his document, because he was the original equity holder of the document.

Agent Dugan was responsible for generating it. Dugan repeats that provenance again, and again in court records throughout 2018: “FBI Equity“.

[Document Link – page #3]

[Document Link – Page #13]

The March 17, 2017, copy of the FISA application -as stamped by the FISA Court- was FBI Agent Brian Dugan’s equity. It was inside his investigative file.

This March 17, 2017, copy is his investigative work product.

So riddle me this… QUESTION:

When Main Justice DOJ (think special counsel) released the FISA application, under the auspices of a FOIA fulfillment, on July 21, 2018, why did they release FBI Agent Brian Dugan’s copy?

Why didn’t the DOJ release their clean copy of the FISA application?

Why did the DOJ find it necessary to release WFO FBI agent Brian Dugan’s equity?

Additionally, how did Main Justice get SSA Brian Dugan’s copy of the FISA?…. But more importantly, when the DOJ decided to release the FISA application to the public, why did they release FBI Agent Dugan’s copy?

The answers to these questions tell a big story.

Isn’t it curious how no-one has ever asked those questions.

View this document on Scribd

♦ Why did Dugan go to the FISA Court for his original copy?

♦ Sixteen months later, why did the DOJ want to release Dugan’s copy?

‘Somebody Needs to Go to Jail for This’

New evidence the FBI misled the Senate Intelligence committee about the Steele dossier.

by James Freeman at WSJ Opinion

On Sunday Sen. Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.) presented new evidence suggesting that in 2018 the FBI lied to the Senate Intelligence Committee about the bureau’s investigation of the 2016 Trump campaign. Specifically, the FBI appears to have made a series of claims directly contradicting information in its possession about the key source for the dossier of anti-Trump rumors compiled by ex-British spy Christopher Steele.

Appearing on Maria Bartiromo’s “Sunday Morning Futures” program on Fox News, Sen. Graham said that highly misleading information was given to senators after the FBI had misled the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court in obtaining a warrant to surveil a Trump campaign associate and long after the FBI had learned its alleged evidence of collusion with Russia was garbage.

“Somebody needs to go to jail for this. This is a second lie. This is a second crime. They lied to the FISA court,” said Graham, who adds that the FBI was then “lying to the Senate Intel Committee.”

Graham has released a copy of the FBI’s draft talking points for a Senate Intelligence Committee briefing. The document dated Feb. 14, 2018 includes the following claims about the Steele dossier’s key Russian source, known as the primary subsource: 

He did not cite any significant concerns with the way his reporting was characterized in the dossier to the extent he could identify it...

At minimum, our discussions with [the Primary Subsource] confirm that the dossier was not fabricated by Steele. Our discussions with [the Primary Subsource] confirmed that he operates within high level academic and government circles, maintains trusted relationships with individuals who are capable of reporting on the material he collected for Steele, and that Steele and [the Primary Subsource] utilized reasonably sound intelligence tradecraft. 

None of this was true, as the FBI had known for roughly a year before the date on the document. As the Obama-appointed Inspector General of the Justice Department Michael Horowitz reported last year, by January of 2017 the FBI was conducting the first of a series of interviews with the Steele dossier’s primary subsource. These interviews and other investigative activity “revealed potentially serious problems with Steele’s descriptions of information in his reports,” according to the IG. For example, “the Primary Sub-source made statements during [his] January 2017 FBI interview that were inconsistent with multiple sections of the Steele reports, including some that were relied upon in the FISA applications.” 

The IG added that the subsource “made statements indicating that Steele misstated or exaggerated the Primary Sub-source’s statements in multiple sections of the reporting.”
For example, a salacious story about Donald Trump which the dossier described as “confirmed” was actually just “rumor and speculation.” 

More holes in the dossier appeared the more the FBI talked to the subsource. The inspector general described a March 2017 FBI interview:

According to [Washington Field Office] Agent 1, the Primary Sub-source said [he] made it clear to Steele that [he] had no proof to support the statements from [his] sub-sources and that “it was just talk.” WFO Agent 1 said that the Primary Sub-source explained that [his] information came from “word of mouth and hearsay;” “conversation that [he] had with friends over beers;” and that some of the information, such as allegations about Trump’s sexual activities, were statements [he] heard made in “jest.” 

Believe it or not, the dossier’s credibility sank even lower in 2017. In April of this year Sens. Chuck Grassley (R., Iowa) and Ron Johnson (R., Wis.) releaseddeclassified footnotes from the inspector general’s report showing that in 2017 the FBI received reports that key dossier claims were not only false but may have been disinformation from Russian Intelligence Services. The senators noted:

For example, footnote 350 indicates that the FBI received a U.S. intelligence report on January 12, 2017, warning of an inaccuracy in the dossier related to Michael Cohen, and assessing that the material was “part of a Russian disinformation campaign to denigrate U.S. foreign relations.”

... A similar U.S. intelligence report arrived on February 28, 2017, undercutting a key allegation against Trump, noting the claims “were false, and that they were the product of RIS “infiltrat[ing] a source into the network” of sources that contributed to the dossier.

For any FBI officials who fed senators the falsehoods contained in that document in 2018, justice must be done. Federal surveillance of political opponents--followed by an FBI coverup—cannot go unpunished if we want to preserve liberty and free elections. Sen. Marco Rubio (R.Fla.), who is now acting chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, tells this column via email that a new bipartisan committee report, “which is currently undergoing declassification, includes a thorough and critical review of FBI and DOJ activities. I believe Americans will find our analysis of Christopher Steele and the ‘Steele dossier,’ and the FBI’s handling of both, to be especially revealing.”

The surveillance abuses of 2016 and their impact on our politics are among the issues Ms. Bartiromo and your humble correspondent explore in a new book about the Trump presidency.

Perseids Peak: Watch Best Meteor Shower of the Year!

By Emily Clay
The Perseid meteor shower is here! With Comet NEOWISE making its way out of the solar system, it is time for a celestial show caused by a different comet. Perseid meteors, caused by debris left behind by the Comet Swift-Tuttle, began streaking across the skies in late July and will peak in the pre-dawn hours of Aug. 12.

The Perseid meteor shower is often considered to be one of the best meteor showers of the year due to its high rates and pleasant late-summer temperatures. This year’s shower, however, has the unfortunate circumstance of the Moon phase—last quarter—impeding the view of the shower peak, reducing the visible meteors from over 60 per hour down to 15-20 per hour. But the Perseids are rich in bright meteors and fireballs, so it will still be worth going out in the early morning to catch some of nature’s fireworks.
WHEN SHOULD I LOOK?
Make plans to stay up late the night of Aug. 11 or wake up early the morning of Aug. 12. The Perseids are best seen between about 2 a.m. your local time and dawn. The Moon rises at around midnight, so its brightness will affect the peak viewing window. However, even though the Moon’s phase and presence will keep the frequency of visible meteors lower, there is still nearly one meteor every two minutes during the peak!
If those hours seem daunting, not to worry! You can go out after dark, around 9 p.m. local time, and see a few Perseids. Just know that you won’t see nearly as many as you would had you gone out during the early morning hours.
How can you see the Perseids if the weather doesn’t cooperate where you are? A live broadcast of the meteor shower from a camera at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, (if our weather cooperates!) will be available on the NASA Meteor Watch Facebook starting around 8 p.m. CDT on Aug. 11 and continuing until sunrise on Aug. 12. Meteor videos recorded by the NASA All Sky Fireball Network are also available each morning; to identify Perseids in these videos, look for events labeled “PER.”
WHY ARE THEY CALLED PERSEIDS?
All meteors associated with one particular shower have similar orbits, and they all appear to come from the same place in the sky, called the radiant. Meteor showers take their name from the location of the radiant. The Perseid radiant is in the constellation Perseus. Similarly, the Geminid meteor shower, observed each December, is named for a radiant in the constellation Gemini.
HOW TO OBSERVE PERSEIDS
If it’s not cloudy, pick an observing spot away from bright lights, lay on your back, and look up! You don’t need any special equipment to view the Perseids – just your eyes.  (Note that telescopes or binoculars are not recommended because of their small fields of view.) Meteors can generally be seen all over the sky so don’t worry about looking in any particular direction.


 Happy viewing!


https://blogs.nasa.gov/Watch_the_Skies/tag/perseids-meteor-shower/

What We Learned Sunday From Spygate Insider Steven Schrage

What Spygate insider Steven Schrage revealed suggests significant revelations will be forthcoming from U.S. Attorney John Durham’s investigation.

Margot Cleveland reporting for The Federalist

This weekend, Spygate insider Steven Schrage broke his silence.

In “The Spies Who Hijacked America” and a follow-up appearance on Maria Bartiromo’s “Sunday Morning Futures,” Schrage detailed the origins of Stefan Halper’s meeting with then-Trump advisor Carter Page. Halper would later serve as a confidential human source (CHS) for the Crossfire Hurricane probe, secretly recording multiple conversations with Page, as well as Trump advisor George Papadopoulos.

But it is what Schrage revealed about Halper’s initial non-interest in Page then Halper’s prediction on January 10, 2017, that Michael Flynn would not last long in the Trump administration that suggest significant revelations will be forthcoming from U.S. Attorney John Durham’s investigation into the origins of Spygate.

In July 2016, Schrage was finishing his Ph.D. at Cambridge University under Halper’s supervision when he invited Page to speak at a conference entitled “2016’s Race to Change the World: How the U.S. Presidential Campaign Can Reshape Global Politics and Foreign Policy.” Given Halper’s later role as a CHS in Crossfire Hurricane, many surmised that Halper sought out Page’s attendance at the conference.

But on Sunday, Schrage made clear that he, not Halper, was responsible for Page’s participation in the conference. In fact, Halper “ironically,” as Schrage wrote, “had repeatedly urged [Schrage] to cancel” the conference, which was “headlined by Presidential Candidate Hillary Clinton’s confidante Madeleine Albright.”

But Schrage did not cancel the conference. Instead, “after a 20-something Cambridge administrative official smugly told me ‘there’s no way Trump can win’ and cut our travel funding, it sent me on a mad scramble,” Schrage wrote. “I had to find someone, anyone, to fly over on a last-minute economy ticket to represent the Trump campaign,” and that is how Page crossed paths with Halper. During his interview with Bartiromo, Schrage added that he wanted a representative of the Trump campaign at the conference to provide balance.

From Schrage’s telling, then, neither he nor Halper sought out Page’s participation in the conference for a nefarious purpose. But he says things changed when former MI6 director Sir Richard Dearlove arrived toward the end of the conference.

“For most of the conference, Halper couldn’t be bothered with Page, about whom he made snarky comments about behind Page’s back,” Schrage wrote. “That all changed,” though, after Halper spoke to his “long-time collaborator,” Dearlove. Halper then “seemed desperately interested in isolating, cornering, and ingratiating himself to Page and promoting himself to the Trump campaign.”

Schrage’s statement contradicts the tale Halper told FBI agents on August 11, 2016, when they asked for his assistance in the Crossfire Hurricane investigation. According to inspector general’s report, the FBI asked Halper if he knew Papadopoulos, and after saying he didn’t, Halper “then asked whether the team had any interest in an individual named Carter Page.” “[T]he members of the investigative team ‘didn’t react because at that point we didn’t know where we were going to go with it,’” the IG report noted, but the Crossfire Hurricane team then asked Halper about how he knew Page.

According to the report, “Halper told the agents in mid-July 2016, Carter Page attended a three-day conference, during which Page had approached [Halper] and asked [Halper] to be a foreign policy advisor for the Trump campaign.” Given Halper’s connection to Page, the FBI tasked him to spy on Page as well as Papadopoulos, leading to Halper recording multiple conversations with the Trump advisor.

If Schrage’s version is accurate, Halper purposefully connected to Page and then sold that connection to the FBI to spy on him. Also, under the scenario Schrage presents, Halper did so at Dearlove’s behest. But why? What was Dearlove’s interest?

Here, Schrage’s article is a must-read synopsis of what he calls “the Cambridge Four,” which in addition to Dearlove and Halper includes Dearlove’s former MI6 underling, Christopher Steele, and the official MI5 historian turned Cambridge academic Christopher Andrew. Together, the four have fingers in several different strands of Spygate, from the spying on Page, to the invention of an affair between Flynn and the Russian-born, Cambridge Ph.D. student Svetlana Lokhova, to, of course, the Steele dossier.

Steele, we know was paid by the Clinton campaign. But what induced Dearlove, Halper, and Andrew to join in the endeavor? Was it money? Or did intelligence agencies seek out their assistance? If so, which intelligence community? While questioning Dearlove, Steele, or Andrew may prove impossible, Halper is a U.S. citizen. So why hasn’t he been hauled before Congress to explain himself?

Halper has quite a bit to explain because, in addition to grooming Page during the Cambridge conference, according to Schrage, Halper seemed amazingly prescient about the fate of Trump’s national security advisor.

In a January 10, 2017, conversation with Halper that Schrage recorded, Halper told him, “I don’t think Flynn’s going to be around long.” Halper then detailed the Machiavellian maneuvers likely to come: “The way these things work,” Halper said, was that “opponents. . . . so-called enemies” of Flynn would be “looking for ways of exerting pressure.” Flynn would be “squeezed pretty hard,” Halper suggested, and then Flynn’s “reaction to that is to blow up and get angry. He’s really f-cked. I don’t know where he goes from there. But that is his reaction. That’s why he’s so unsuitable.”

When Halper made these predictions, Flynn’s telephone calls with the Russian ambassador were not yet publicly known. Two days later, the Washington Post’s David Ignatius reported those calls after receiving a leak of classified information from a still unknown source, and set in motion the scenario that led to Flynn’s firing.

Whether Halper knew the specific “squeeze” that would be put on Flynn, in the form of a leak followed by a perjury trap sham investigation, is unclear. But that Halper saw Flynn not lasting long because “opponents” or “enemies” would seek to “exert pressure” seems strange because Halper supposedly was a Cambridge academic far removed from the D.C. scene. Even stranger is that Halper purported to know how Flynn would react, since Halper has never met Flynn.

How did Halper know any of this? Did Halper have connections in the intelligence community sharing their thoughts on Flynn? Or was Halper hearing things from David Ignatius?

Here, Schrage’s interview with Bartiromo proves enlightening. According to Schrage, Halper often bragged that Ignatius was one of his media contacts. This statement complements Lokhova’s statement to The Federalist that Halper (as well as Andrew) were connected to Ignatius.

In fact, Lokhova told The Federalist that after Halper was outed as a CIA and FBI informant in May 2018, she spoke with Ignatius, and when they spoke, she “registered surprise about Halper’s role” as a CHS. As previously reported, “that prompted Ignatius to say ‘he always found Halper reliable as a source.’ When I said, ‘Wow, he was your source,’ Ignatius hung up. We never spoke again.’”

So maybe intel was flowing two ways between Halper and Ignatius.

Schrage doesn’t know what prompted Halper’s comments, but what he does know he has shared with U.S. Attorney Durham. However, with that investigation dragging on, and Flynn’s case coming before the entire D.C. Circuit Court on Tuesday, Schrage decided to speak out now, telling what he knows.

Schrage, who alerted Durham of his plans to go public, has promised more information will be forthcoming in the days and weeks ahead. Hopefully, the same can be said of information coming from the government’s investigation into the Spygate scandal.