This team pic.twitter.com/qagTVn93Ms
— Jon Ossoff (@ossoff) March 22, 2021
Monday, March 22, 2021
Discussion: Is This An AntiVaccination Message?
GOP lawmakers call for boycott of 2022 Beijing Olympic Winter Games
OAN Newsroom
UPDATED 7:17 AM PT – Monday, March 22, 2021
Several GOP lawmakers in both chambers of Congress have suggested the the 2022 Winter Olympic Games should be held somewhere else. A group of Republicans called for the U.S. to boycott the games if China remains the host country.
Lawmakers cited the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) human rights violations on several mainland communities, including actions against Uighur Muslims and Hong Kong residents, as reasoning for their opposition.
“But what we’re facing right now, the alternative to boycotting the Olympics is participating in, ” stated Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wy.). “…Would be participating in a show that essentially would be whitewashing what the Chinese Communist Party is doing around the world and doing with respect to the Uighurs, and I think that that would be wrong.”
GOP lawmakers in both chambers are leading the charge to mobilize Congress to take action against the CCP. Reps. Guy Reschenthaler (R-Pa.), Michael Waltz (R-Fla.) and John Katko (R-N.Y.) are spearheading efforts in the House with a resolution introduced last month.
The resolution calls on the International Olympic Committee to move the games away from China or face a U.S. withdrawal from the competition. Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) has championed similar calls in the Senate and has urged America’s international partners to join America in a possible boycott.
Additionally, former ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo believe it’s morally imperative to take action against China. They are likening the CCP’s actions towards their Uighur population to the Holocaust in Germany. The officials added, participating in the Beijing games would send a bad signal to the international community.
“But in the end, we cannot allow American athletes to travel to Beijing and reward the Chinese Communist Party all the while that they doing all of the nasty activity that they’re engaged in,” Pompeo stated. “The world ought to unite…the Olympics are an expression of freedom and athletic talent, and to hold them in Beijing is completely inappropriate.”
However, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texs) has warned lawmakers of the drawbacks of withdrawing. He cited former President Jimmy Carter’s decision to withdraw from the 1980 games in Moscow. The Texas lawmaker said the action aimed to apply pressure on the former Soviet Union for invading Afghanistan, but had no real political effect.
The USSR remained in Afghanistan for nearly a decade after the Olympics and the only people really hurt by the move were America’s top athletes. Cruz believes boycotting the 2022 games would fall on deaf ears and bear similar consequences as the 1980 move.
In the meantime, China has responded to threats of boycotting the games from other countries with threats of their own. Chinese state media outlets have claimed the CCP is prepared to fiercely retaliate against those who go through with boycotts.
This comes as the Biden administration has struggled to set the tone with Chinese officials about U.S.-China relations over the next four years. Last week, Chinese officials lashed out at top U.S. diplomats at bilateral talks in Alaska, which left the Biden administration scratching its head
https://www.oann.com/gop-lawmakers-call-for-boycott-of-2022-beijing-olympic-winter-games/
5 Lessons From James Madison For Overcoming Political Polarization
Article by Lynn Uzzell in The Federalist
5 Lessons From James Madison For Overcoming Political Polarization
James Madison lived through one of the worst
epochs of American partisanship but helped lead the country past that
period and into greater harmony.
There has never been a time our nation wasn’t divided by partisanship. Yet some eras are more divisive than others, and few of us would deny that we’re living through an especially polarized time. For those who don’t trust their instincts on this question, numerous surveys bear out a collective hunch: polarization really has gotten worse in recent decades.
We don’t lack for probing examinations of the causes. Ezra Klein blames modern social and news media. Charles Murray notes that ordinary class divisions have become intensified through American “super zips.” Some studies blame the nationalization of local politics, while others suggest that even our leisure activities are exacerbating political divides. Predictably, each side blames the other for increased radicalization within their respective political parties.
While many of these studies provide genuine insights into our current condition and how we got here, too few have grappled seriously with the most pressing question: How do we get beyond the hyper-partisanship? Lessons drawn from our preeminent constitutional founder James Madison might prove helpful.
At first blush, Madison might seem like an unlikely Sherpa to guide us on this quest. In the first place, his most famous argument, found in “Federalist” Number 10, teaches that “the latent causes of faction” are not situational but “sown in the nature of man.” Since a factious tendency in free governments cannot be overcome, he says, we must accept “the spirit of party and faction in the necessary and ordinary operations of the government.”
In the second place, Madison played no small role in establishing the first organized political party in the young republic. He first coined the phrase the “Republican Party,” and while serving as an apparatchik for the Jeffersonian Republicans, he often succumbed to the same partisan fervor we complain about today.
Yet Madison remains a valuable object lesson for these very reasons. First, it is precisely because he knew that factions could not be removed from a free government that he actively sought ways to defang them to render them less destructive.
Second, it is not Madison’s most partisan activities that teach us how to get beyond polarization, but the arc of his whole life and career. Madison’s earlier operations were one reason the 1790s have been characterized as a “decade-long shouting match.” Yet he retired from the presidency in 1817 in what was widely regarded as an “era of good feelings.”
In other words, Madison not only lived through one of the worst epochs of American partisanship but also helped lead the country past that unruly epoch and into greater harmony. That’s why his lessons are worth examining today.
Lesson 1: Teach Classical Rhetoric to America’s Youth
Some polls indicate that support for free speech is declining in America, especially among the young. Such polls tend to gauge young people’s tolerance for speakers they find offensive. But if today’s students believe that protecting “hate speech” (whatever that means) is the only purpose of the First Amendment, we shouldn’t wonder or even blame them if their support for free speech erodes. It’s not a bad sign that they prefer civility to barbarism.
The greater “free speech” scandal is the one that nobody talks about: that most colleges and universities aren’t teaching their students the purpose of free speech. Even college graduates have never been taught that the point of tolerating clashing opinions is the pursuit of truth. For too many, their expensive educations have kept them ignorant of the rational arts of political persuasion. They are taught to assume that all judgments are subjective and can’t be held to rational evaluation, discussion, and debate.
It wasn’t so long ago that an education in classical rhetoric was deemed an essential part of enlightened self-government. When Madison attended Princeton University, he heard lectures on “Moral Philosophy, Rhetoric, and Eloquence” from none other than John Witherspoon.
Madison’s interest in the subject outlasted his college days. In 1784, he ordered a copy of Hugh Blair’s popular “Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres.” “True rhetoric and sound logic are very nearly allied,” argued Blair. The proper study of rhetoric is much more than the artistic arrangement of words; it “teaches to think as well as to speak accurately.”
It’s not fair to castigate today’s students as “snowflakes”; they’ve never been taught a better alternative to disinviting, protesting, or shouting down campus speakers who challenge their presuppositions. If the standard curriculum included classical rhetoric, they would be equipped to engage logically with speakers expressing diverse viewpoints — to discover for themselves whether their visitor was a sophist or a Socrates, or something in between. Even better, their taste in speakers might become too refined for the most inane of the campus rabble-rousers.
Lesson 2: Find Creative Ways to Encourage Both Sides of Every Argument
Throughout his life, Madison retained great faith in the power of the free press to remedy the evils arising from “fake news,” as we call it today. Despite the persistence of such “abuses,” Madison believed that “the world is indebted [to the press] for all the triumphs which have been gained by reason and humanity, over error and oppression.” If one paper published “falsehood and slanders,” these untruths could be corrected “in a certain degree, by contradictions in rival or hostile papers.”
Nevertheless, Madison was not naïve. He understood that “the one-sided publications which happen to predominate at particular periods” created a “delusion” in the minds of people who encountered only perspectives that reinforced their own opinions. He whimsically suggested that the perfect solution might be an arrangement whereby each sheet of newspaper was printed on one side by a press representing one party, then printed on the other side by its rival. That way, readers could not avoid “both sides of every question,” and “truth would always have a fair chance.”
Given the insularity and nasty tone of today’s media “bubbles,” Madison’s suggestion might require further refinement. Currently, both sides in the political debate are writing in such polarizing fashion that a media diet that included listening to the other side’s overheated polemics would not likely moderate or broaden anyone’s opinions. Studies have shown that the experiment may have the opposite effect.
Far more constructive would be publications or events designed to engage opposing sides in a format that encouraged civil disagreement. Instead of promoting free speech on college campuses by inviting the most polarizing or even inflammatory speakers, universities should be encouraging more bipartisan debates.
Robert George and Cornel West are two academics with sharply contrasting political opinions, yet they have teamed up to encourage students to challenge their preexisting beliefs in a spirit of “civic friendship.” This example, all too rare today, is surely worthy of emulation.
Lesson 3: Socialize with Your (Political) Enemies
In the early republic, members from different parties lived in separate boarding houses and rarely met for any purpose other than waging political battles. When he was president, Thomas Jefferson would host a dinner with Federalists on one evening and invite only Republicans the next.
Madison’s administration established a social change in the nation’s capital — one owing perhaps more to the president’s vivacious and charming first lady. Dolley Madison instituted regular Wednesday “drawing-room nights” at the White House, and everyone was invited. Her nonpartisan parties became so popular that they were known as “squeezes.” One guest, Pennsylvanian Rep. Jonathan Roberts, observed: “By her deportment in her own house you cannot discover who is her husband’s friends or foes.”
Of course, partisan rancor did not magically disappear over whipped syllabub and ice cream, but it was softened. One may disagree, vehemently, with a dining companion, but it becomes harder to demonize him.
Even in the spring of 1812 — when a looming presidential election and the possibility of war were fraying everyone’s nerves — Dolley’s charm offensive made hyper-partisanship socially awkward. The Federalists tried to boycott her soirées but changed their minds when the Republicans surged into her drawing-room in greater numbers. The festive crowds representing only the president’s party, she reported, “alarm’d” the opposition party “into a return. They came in a large party last night also & are continuelly calling.”
Today, anecdotal evidence suggests that politicians in Washington have reverted to the worst tendencies of the early republic: they rarely socialize with members from the other party. Some evidence suggests that female politicians are more likely to socialize across party lines or reach across the aisle politically, but other studies dispute that characterization. In any case, the country would benefit from more examples of Dolley Madison’s nonpartisan social graces – whether it comes from the gentlemen or the ladies.
Lesson 4: Never Allow Political Disagreements To Get Personal
In Madison’s day, it was taken for granted that gentlemen did not cast personal aspersions against their adversaries. This rule was not universally observed, of course; contemporaneous newspapers were infamous for their personal invective. But the ruling elite tended to hold itself to a higher standard than the scandalmongers.
In his public speeches, Madison could be a forceful voice for his political party, but he never allowed his criticisms to get personal. Toward the end of his life, Madison grew even more scrupulous: he actively concealed the faults he discerned in others.
Dolley explained his editorial practice when preparing his private papers for publication: “He desired me to read them over, and if any letter, line, or word struck me as being calculated to injure the feelings of any one, or wrong in themselves, that I would withdraw them or it.”
Madison’s surviving correspondence is often stamped with clues revealing this editorial license. In the most humorous instance, Madison had originally written in code to Jefferson that the Marquis de Lafayette was “as amiable a man as his vanity will admit.”
Years later, when reviewing that letter, he evidently regretted the ungenerous sentiment. He blacked out the original code numbers and wrote over Jefferson’s decoded sentence — even imitating Jefferson’s handwriting as he did so — in order to render the sentence: “I take him to be as amiable a man as can be imagined.” Madison’s earlier correspondence probably contained many more cutting remarks that we will never discover because he did a thorough job of scrubbing them before his papers were published.
Madison’s active avoidance of all personal affronts, even during political disagreements, is a standard of conduct sadly foreign to today’s political discourse. Yet ad hominem is listed among the logical fallacies for a reason: it never improves our political understanding but invariably poisons our political atmosphere.
But the fact that Madison needed to remove acerbic remarks from his earlier correspondence shows that he did not always abide by his highest standards. And that fact reminds us of the most important lesson of all.
Lesson 5: Repentance
As Madison grew older, he eventually regretted some of his youthful excesses. Particularly when the younger Madison wrote privately or anonymously (his “Party Press” and “Helvidius” essays were the anonymous blog posts of their day), he sometimes stooped to accusing his political adversaries of malevolent intent.
Madison later described feeling “consciousness & regret” over those earlier compositions. Although he did not repent the positions he had defended, he thought these essays breathed a party spirit “which was of no advantage either to the subject, or to the Author.” Struggling to give an account of one broadside in his 1790s oeuvre, he wrote: “The temper of the pamphlet is explained if not excused by the excitements of the period.”
One of the biggest problems with a hyper-partisan era is that it produces excitements that tempt even capable and well-meaning individuals into misbehavior that they might spurn in better moments. Madison was right: there is no excuse for such vitriolic behavior. Ultimately, the only recourse is regret, remorse, and a resolution to do better in the future. Unless our political and thought leaders adopt this lesson and reconsider their own contributions to today’s toxic political climate, there is no hope for improvement.
The stakes are high since the surest and most final way to resolve polarization is through armed conflict. The most hyper-partisan era in our history, after all, was not the 1790s; it was the 1850s, which ended in the Civil War. Every civil war is simply partisanship that got out of hand.
***************************************************************************
Lynn Uzzell teaches American politics and rhetoric
at the University of Virginia and Washington and Lee University. For
four years she was also the scholar in residence at the Center for the
Constitution at James Madison’s Montpelier. She specializes in the
Constitutional Convention of 1787 and the political thought of James
Madison.
Strzok’s ‘False Memory’ About The Origins Of Crossfire Hurricane
Neither Strzok's initial claims nor his recent attempts at revision explain why Russiagate got started in the first place.
In this week’s news, we are learning that Jordan Fuchs, the Georgia Deputy Secretary of State who was the Washington Post’s source for its blockbuster story on Trump’s call to the Georgia election investigator, gave false information about one of the calls, as discussed by Arthur Bloom.
This seems like an appropriate segue to re-examine an equally grotesque and virtually undiscussed fabrication by notorious FBI official Peter Strzok, who, in a CBS interview and in his recent memoir Compromised, fabricated the damning assertion that Australian diplomat Alexander Downer’s submission of information to the U.S. embassy in London had been “triggered” by Trump’s “Russia, are you listening” quip, and that, accordingly, Trump “with his own words had brought [the Crossfire Hurricane] investigation on himself.”
But it was totally untrue. Although the key documents on Downer’s interviews, first with Deputy Chief of Mission Elizabeth Dibble and subsequently with Strzok and SSA Joe Pientka, remain concealed, it was possible (by sheer chance) to refute Strzok’s fabrication using the very limited open-source chronological information. Strzok quickly recognized his dilemma, promptly gave a new narrative that was, at least, not chronologically impossible, and everyone moved on as though nothing had happened. Neither CBS nor his publisher even bothered issuing a retraction or correction.
But the spectacle of Strzok’s “false memory” relating to one of the most critical Russiagate incidents—an incident at the very origin of Crossfire Hurricane—deserves careful consideration and re-examination.
The Chronology
Downer’s junior associate Erika Thompson, the political counsellor at the Australian embassy in London, had drinks with George Papadopoulos on May 6. (Christian Cantor of the Israeli embassy in London may also have been present.) On May 10, Downer and Thompson had a follow-up meeting with Papadopoulos. It is very unclear whether the now-canonical account of Papadopoulos’s story arose from the May 10 meeting at which Downer was present or from the May 6 meeting, on which Downer’s information was second-hand. The Mueller Report was singularly evasive on this seemingly simple point.
Downer sent a report on his meeting with Papadopoulos back to the Australian Foreign Ministry on May 11 and thought nothing more about the incident for a couple of months. (The existence of Downer’s report has been confirmed, but it remains totally redacted.)
On July 26, Downer—suddenly, urgently and outside of diplomatic protocol—went personally to the U.S. embassy in London and sought out the most senior official, Elizabeth Dibble, the Deputy Chief of Mission (as the Ambassador was not in the country at the time).
Dibble promptly called in and briefed the FBI Legat (Brian Boetig) and most senior CIA official in London (Gina Haspel). Boetig promptly wrote up an FBI “Electronic Communication,” which quickly made its way to FBI Headquarters. On Friday, July 29, Deputy Director Andrew McCabe directed the Assistant Director, Counterintelligence (Bill Priestap) to open the counterintelligence investigation now known to us as Crossfire Hurricane. Priestap passed the direction to open the case on to his subordinate, Peter Strzok (then Section Chief, CD4) and additionally instructed him to proceed immediately to London to interview Downer.
Over the weekend, Strzok officially opened the Crossfire Hurricane investigation, filing the authorizing Electronic Communication memorandum on Sunday, July 31. The form, one of the few available documents on the affair, shows that it was both prepared by Strzok and approved by Strzok—not exactly the check and balance that one would have anticipated. Strzok contacted the FBI Assistant Legat in London (which appears to be Paul Woodbery) and asked him to arrange an interview with the Australian diplomats.
On Monday, August 1, Strzok was informed by the London office that the Australians had agreed to an interview. That evening, Strzok and Pientka left for London on the overnight flight, arriving in London in the early morning of August 2. It took some additional time for terms of the interview to be ironed out, but by about 2 p.m. London time (10 a.m. Eastern), the interview was a go. The interview seems to have gone on for about 2-3 hours. Strzok and Pientka were back in Washington on August 3. Crossfire Hurricane was already in full flight.
Strzok’s Story about Downer
All documents on the Downer interview were promptly placed under extreme classification and remain concealed to this day. Nor is there any relevant information in the available Strzok-Page texts, either because Strzok (uncharacteristically) didn’t gossip with Page about the meeting or, more likely, because any such texts have been withheld or expunged.
Strzok’s September 6, 2020, interview with CBS (and related brief comments in Compromised) gave the very first information on the critical Downer interview, including the very first official explanation of why Downer decided to report the Papadopoulos conversation to the U.S. embassy when he did—in Strzok’s words, what “triggered him.”
Exact words are important, so here are Strzok’s exact words in the CBS interview (transcription and emphasis mine):
Narrator: Papadopoulos was in London having drinks with an Australian diplomat.
Strzok: Papadopoulos told them that somebody on the Trump campaign had received an offer that said the Russians have material that would be damaging to Hillary Clinton and to Obama and they offered to coordinate the release of that information in a way that would help the Trump campaign.
Narrator: The Australians didn’t make much of it until Trump made this appeal about Hillary Clinton’s emails: “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing.” Those Australian diplomats heard that and contacted the FBI.
Strzok:When they saw that speech by Trump, that triggered their memory of the conversation they had with Papadopoulos.
The CBS interviewer observed the implication that Trump had been hoisted on his own petard, as it was his own inflammatory statements that had originated the entire Crossfire Hurricane investigation, not malicious or mistaken conduct by others after all. Strzok agreed:
Interviewer: So, Donald Trump with his own words brought this investigation down on himself.
Strzok: According to what theforeign government told us, yes.
In Compromised, Strzok similarly stated that Downer delivered his original information to the U.S. embassy “shortly after Trump’s Florida press conference”:
When we received the report about Papadopoulos’s revelations to the Friendly Foreign Government’s personnel—intelligence that they sent from their embassy to ours shortly after Trump’s Florida press conference…
In Downer’s recounting, Trump’s words jarred his memory of a series of conversations months earlier…
A vivid narrative from one of the most important figures in the opening of Crossfire Hurricane.
The Contradiction
Here’s the problem.
Trump’s “Russia, are you listening” quip was made at a July 27, 2016, press conference, while Downer’s tip was given to the U.S. embassy on July 26, one day earlier. (The July 26 date is provided in both the Mueller Report, published in April 2019, and the Horowitz Report, published in December 2019.)
It was chronologically impossible for Trump’s quip to have actually triggered Downer’s tip.
Worse, this implies that Strzok’s story about Downer telling him that he had been triggered by Trump’s speech was also untrue—either a false memory or fabrication—each as insalubrious as the other.
Nobody in U.S. major media or its “fact checkers” noticed Strzok’s false information.
It was, however, quickly noticed by Hans Mahncke, a knowledgeable Twitter commentator on Russiagate, who issued the following challenge to Strzok on Twitter at 5:58 p.m. on Sept 6, 2020:
Mahncke’s observation was picked up by Dan Bongino, who two days later (September 8, 2020) colorfully brought it to the attention of his large audience (citing Mahncke). In framing his comment as a choice between Strzok lying or Downer lying, Mahncke was allowing to the remote possibility that Australian ambassador Downer had lied to Strzok about what had triggered him. Because Strzok’s interview with Downer took place after Trump’s quip, Downer would have had knowledge of the quip when he met Strzok, even though he didn’t have knowledge of the quip when he provided the tip. So it is not chronologically impossible that Downer lied, only implausible. But it remains a remote possibility that Strzok himself never suggested, and which became moot when Strzok (as discussed below) walked back part of his false story.
Later on September 6 (9:11 p.m.), Jerry Dunleavy of the Washington Examiner published a short article (together with accompanying announcement on Twitter) that pointed out the impossibility of Strzok’s chronology:
While Dunleavy alertly noticed the chronological issue, unlike Mahncke, he didn’t connect the impossible chronology to Strzok’s false story about what Downer had told him. As discussed in the next section, Strzok capitalized on this oversight to construct a “limited hangout”—to borrow an apt phrase from Nixonian days.
Strzok’s September 11 Lawfare Interview
Three days later (September 11), Strzok did a lengthy interview on Benjamin Wittes’ Lawfare podcast as part of his continued promotion of his memoir.
In an open online question period following the interview, Wittes put the following question from Dunleavy to Strzok:
Wittes: Jerry Dunleavy of Washington Examiner writes: “Can Mr. Strzok clear up what seems to be a contradiction in his timeline of how the Crossfire Hurricane investigation began. He writes that the Australians were prompted to contact the U.S. about a May 2016 conversation with George Papadopoulos following Trump’s ‘Russia, are you listening’ comment in July 2016. But Mueller and Horowitz say that the U.S. was contacted by the Friendly Foreign Government on July 26. Trump’s comments were not until the next day, July 27, 2016.” Any help for Mr. Dunleavy?
Strzok appears to have been already aware of the chronological contradiction of his previous narrative, as he was ready with a smooth answer that purported to sanitize his prior false story, an answer that was given without any request for clarifying details and without the slightest stumble. Strzok crisply acknowledged the error, which, needless to say, he blamed on others:
Strzok: Absolutely. I got that wrong. I was writing my book without the benefit of my notes. The FBI had those. And the IG report had not been issued.
In his new version, Strzok said it was the Wikileaks dump of DNC emails on July 22 that “prompted their memory of the conversation” (not the Trump quip):
What happened was is that there had been a big dump through Wikileaks absolutely, as the IG report describes it. They saw that. That prompted their memory of the conversation. And then they began the process of contacting us overseas and giving us that information to us.
Watch the pea here. Strzok didn’t say that Downer told him that the Wikileaks dump prompted his visit to the U.S. embassy. If Downer had done so, then Strzok’s story to CBS and in his book was even worse than we thought, as not only did he tell a false story about the prompt, but, in doing so, he concealed the actual story. Taken literally, Strzok’s assertion about what prompted Downer could be nothing more than his assessment—or “analytic conclusion,” to borrow a phrase from Igor Danchenko, EC—or, more accurately, speculation. It defies logic that Strzok and Pientka wouldn’t have asked Downer what prompted his visit to the Embassy, but we don’t know whether they did.
Strzok’s new narrative still tried to blame Trump for instigating the Crossfire Hurricane investigation:
My recollection is, and the reason why I mention that conversation about Trump’s speech about Russia, are you listening, when we finally in the Counterintelligence Division got that lead from the FFG, it was at the same time that Trump was making those comments. Which was really concerning. Because they dovetailed exactly with Trump asking for Russian assistance, Trump asking for the Russians to hack in and find her emails, whatever their technique, and that came in at the same time.
This aspect of the chronology is realistic. DCM Dibble briefed FBI Legat Boetig and CIA Head of Station (Haspel) on July 27. On July 28, FBI Legat Boetig sent his Electronic Communication to a contact at the Philadelphia Field Office, who forwarded it the same day to Charles McGonigal, Section Chief of the Cyber Counterintelligence Coordination Section at FBI headquarters. Strzok appears to have learned of the Australian information in the evening of July 28—the day after Trump’s quip.
In this new version, it was the FBI Counterintelligence Division itself which was “triggered” by Trump’s quip (not the Australian ambassador). Strzok didn’t explain or even acknowledge his false memory about Downer telling Strzok about the Trump quip. Nor, needless to say, was he challenged by Trump-deranged Wittes on his prior fabrication.
This may also point to an explanation of the apparent failure of supposedly ace counterintelligence officials Strzok and Pientka to even ask Downer about what “triggered” his report (if the surmise about such neglect is borne out). Because the FBI officials had been “triggered” by Trump’s “Russia, are you listening” speech, perhaps they assumed that Downer had been as well—not turning their minds to the chronological impossibility until confronted by Twitter critics.
Returning to Strzok’s narrative, Strzok then purported to minimize his false memory as “a little error,” casting shade on critics of his story:
So, there was a little error. I know that some people are scrubbing timelines for little details and making headlines around them. But that was an honest mistake based on a lack of specific recollection that came after I submitted my book to pre-pub review, all this information came out afterwards.
Wittes accepted Strzok’s self-serving and implausible answer without comment or question and moved on.
As to Strzok’s supposed “little error” and/or “honest mistake,” it seems easy enough for someone (without access to notes) to be incorrect on the relative order of two events that occurred one day apart four years ago. However, Strzok himself, like other Mueller investigators, was unforgiving of seemingly similar or even lesser missteps by Trump-orbit witnesses. (Or, in the case of Mueller investigators, as alleged by, for example, K.T. McFarland and Rick Gates, seemingly seeking to entrap witnesses, sometimes even denying them access to refreshing documents.)
Strzok also attempted to blame his supposed “little error” on the fact that “the IG report had not been issued” when he was writing the book and when he submitted the manuscript for clearance. But Strzok’s real issue wasn’t that these reports weren’t available in real time, but that he failed to realize that his tall tale about Downer was contradicted by the July 26 date disclosed in the Horowitz Report published in December 2019, long before publication of his memoir in September 2020. (Actually, it’s even worse: The July 26 date was publicly disclosed eight months before the Horowitz Report, in the April 2019 Mueller Report.)
It seems exceptionally hypocritical for Strzok (or any participant in the Mueller investigation) to exonerate their own false statements as merely a “little error” or “honest mistake” due to lack of access to notes and documents, given their prior record of putting Mueller victims on the rack for incorrect statements or recollections about earlier events without showing them the emails to comment on (as they did, for example, in the examination of Hillary Clinton). Richard Gates, Alex van der Zwaan, Michael Flynn, and George Papadopoulos were all charged and convicted for false statements about previous events that were not in themselves criminal or even harmful. Strzok’s expectation that the Lawfare audience should accept his false memory as a “little error” and “honest mistake” seems audacious given his gloating in Compromised.
Strzok’s “False Memory” and its Implications
Out of all the issues arising from Strzok’s CBS and Lawfare interviews, the most important was left unexamined by Wittes: Strzok’s false memory of Downer supposedly telling him about the triggering event—a story that is not only central to Crossfire Hurricane, but which was also prominently used in the CBS interview to discredit Trump.
Note that it was completely fortuitous that there was enough open-source information to contradict Strzok’s false story. If the Mueller and Horowitz reports had merely said “late July,” instead of “July 26” (as would have been entirely possible), there would be no way to contradict Strzok’s false information. Or, if Downer had delayed his visit to the embassy by a day or two (also entirely possible), it would have similarly been impossible to confront Strzok’s disinformation.
Strzok’s false memory on such an essential incident obviously calls into question his recollection and characterization of other Russiagate incidents. In Compromised, Strzok also commented on the “sanctions” issue in the January 24, 2017, Michael Flynn interview (also by Strzok and Pientka). I plan to discuss this in a separate article, as, once again, Strzok’s narrative in Compromised appears to be another case of “false memory.”
Secondly, there’s no reason to uncritically accept Strzok’s second version of what supposedly triggered Downer’s information on July 26. Indeed, the opposite is the case. Strzok’s changing story makes it all the more important to re-examine the events immediately prior to Downer’s visit to the U.S. embassy. These turn out to be considerably more textured and interesting than Strzok’s limited hangout. I intend to discuss these events in another follow-up article as well.
The corollary of discovering Strzok’s lie is that we don’t presently know two of the most fundamental questions about the opening of Crossfire Hurricane: (1) what triggered Downer to report the Papadopoulos conversation to the U.S. embassy; and (2) what Downer actually told Strzok on August 1, 2016, about what triggered him to go to the U.S. embassy.
Finally, Strzok’s illustrated lack of credibility raises a fundamental question on Crossfire Hurricane itself. Strzok’s opening memorandum was based on fourth- (perhaps fifth-)hand information. With that many handoffs in a sort of Pass The Telephone game by multiple officials, there’s an obvious, serious risk of distortion or misunderstanding along the way. In particular, in Downer’s earliest public interview about Crossfire Hurricane, neither the words “Russian offer” nor any cognate concept occur.
Understand That Some People Love the Pandemic
Article by Kurt Schlichter in Townhall
Understand That Some People Love the Pandemic
It might not occur to you, because you are not a bizarre wierdo, but a lot of people really love the pandemic. Not just the little fascist gnome who changes his #science advice more often than a Wellesley girl changes her preferences during her sophomore year experimental phase, and not just the fascist pols who get off on exploiting their emergency powers to boss people around, but even some regular people. The masks, the paranoia, the constant talk about vaccines – some people love this stuff.
This is their Woodstock.
And they never want it to end.
Why would anyone enjoy this idiocy? Limits on your freedom, hectoring pests, nitwits riding around in their Priuses with face diapers wrapped around their talk-holes… it’s an abomination. Yet there’s this slice of the populace that gets into it. They resist a return to normalcy because their normal lives were not that great to begin with and this is the most exciting thing that will ever happen to them.
People crave a challenge, and for a while one of the most challenging things about America was its utter lack of challenge. It’s generally safe here. You probably won’t get hurt, except by accidents or if you live in a big Democratic city, and only then if you find yourself in the wrong neighborhood. You won’t starve – even if you are a bum, someone is handing you a ham sandwich. You really have to go looking for danger, and people do. They get into extreme sports, or flirt with crime, join the military, or date a Cuban chick.
The hardworking people who built America and made it safe, secure, and prosperous, also made it, in some ways, empty. We inherited a paradise. We paid nothing, did nothing, and most importantly, we risked nothing. But human beings are designed to do all those things. And we never really got a chance to.
People need to be tested. They crave meaning. I merely oversaw a heavily-armed carwash during the Gulf War, but even then, being in a war zone as history happened around us, we all had this feeling of being alive unlike anything else we had ever experienced. I did not get it back until I was driving around riot-torn Los Angeles with an M16 rifle during the riots. I did not want there to be a war, or for the Democrats to encourage people to burn down their own communities, but I would not have rather been anywhere else.
That’s what the pandemic is for these people. It’s their war. It’s something that lets them transcend their boring lives.
Look at our entertainment. Dystopian tales are hugely popular in American culture (including mine). Take The Walking Dead (please, and far way). Before it became lousy and boring and woke, it was very popular. Why? Because people like zombies? No, because it showed our regular everyday America turned upside down and let people imagine, just for an hour a week, what they might do if the Schiff hit the fan and they had to struggle to survive.
And some Schiff sort of hit the fan under the pandemic. It was weird and sort of scary and, most importantly, it was different. The disease itself could actually kill you, though with a 99 percent survival rate for most healthy folks, the odds were generally in your favor (when I got it, it was like a slight cold). But there were the public manifestations of chaos. Going to a Trader Joe’s during the first days of the unprecedented lockdown, seeing the wine moms load up on hummus, ciabatta, and $5.99 screw-top Chardonnay as if they were anticipating the breakdown of the entire social fabric, was memorable. For once, things were not certain in America. And something within human beings responds to that uncertainty. We were designed to fight for survival, and even if that meant battling to be the one getting the last bag of frozen orange chicken, it was something.
The initial pandemic uproar broke people out of their rut, which is kind of an odd notion since most of the people in human history would absolutely love to be in the rut Americans were as a people. But as bizarre as it is, and as strange when you look at it closely, it’s still a real thing. People yearned, at some level, for some kind of excitement, and the pandemic had to do.
Now, the better adjusted among us put that nonsense aside pretty quickly. The novelty wore off fast and the stupid masks and inability to eat our bone-in ribeyes inside of restaurants like normal people got old quick. Not all of us had jobs we could do from our laptop in the rumpus room, and this whole thing is a lot less fun if you’re out of a job. But millions are not really put out all that much. They could do their diversity consulting or whatever at home alongside their many cats and allow themselves to be swept away by the excitement of the pandemic.
And now you can see them not wanting to give it up. They talk about nothing but the vaccines, but they also want to disregard their effect and make believe the plague is still sweeping the country. They chatter about herd immunity, but they also fear reaching it because that would mean going back to their old, boring lives.
It’s kind of sad, but not so sad that the rest of us are going to play this nonsense much longer. We’re done with this. It’s time for those with empty lives to fill them up again with something that isn’t a hassle to the rest of us.
Trump Statement on Border Crisis After Secretary Mayorkas Pathetic Justifications on Sunday Talk Shows
Department of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas was confronted today on multiple mainstream media outlets about the complete failure of the JoeBama administration to handle a border crisis they created. The secretary was apparently not prepared for the media to turn on him and stumbled through pathetic justifications on television.
In response, President Donald Trump released the following statement:
Liberalism is in its death throes
Article by Tim Jones in The American Thinker
Liberalism is in its death throes
Out-of-control cancel culture, borders open again to illegal immigration, and the Democrat majorities in Congress attempting to impose one-party rule on the country are nothing less than the symptoms of a dying ideology, a contemporary liberalism that has reached its logical conclusion and is ditching what used to work and is instead imposing its radical will and agenda on the entire country. Beginning in the Sixties when a radical form of liberalism emerged, it has been constantly on the prowl for the next victim class to feed its voracious appetite by preying on their sense of victimhood.
First, beginning with Lyndon Johnson and his “Great Society,” it devoured African-Americans through welfare state programs that utterly failed in their original mission. This has served as the template for liberalism ever since in its attempt to capture every possible demographic (except white males) by pandering to their sense of victimhood in a country supposedly seething with bigots and sexists. If you belong to a specific race, gender, or ethnic group that thinks they've been marginalized and discriminated against, vote for a Democrat and your sense of victimhood will magically disappear. The Left has burned through virtually every demographic starting with blacks, followed by women, gays, Hispanics, Muslims, and now transgenders over the course of the last 50 years.
What we're seeing now is modern liberalism reaching the end of the line where it has run out of options on whom to prey on next. More precisely, it's run out of ideas to sell to the public as to what its vision is for the country going forward. Accusing everyone of bigotry or misogyny is not a vision, it's a distraction and misdirection from actually addressing and solving real problems. This has actually been a fairly good strategy over many decades, but when you get to a point where you've exhausted the strategy that's worked so well for so long, weird things start to happen, most notably when your victim groups begin to see through it and realize they've been taken advantage of. One of the ways this becomes most evident is when what’s being done for one group either does no good for them or is detrimental to their interests.
Generally speaking, the Left views the world in terms of the collective whereas the Right views it in terms of the individual. This is why conservatism beats liberalism every time, because conservative principles are equally applied to everyone regardless of race, religion, or sex. And this is the way the Constitution was designed. Its principles weren't to be applied on a collective basis, rather on the individual, regardless of demographics. You can't get any more equal or "just" in that. One can read the Constitution and find absolutely nothing delineated by group or class. There are large numbers of productive and successful blacks in the middle and even upper classes who surrender their individuality every election day by voting for Democrats out of solidarity with all African Americans while knowing full well that identity politics is rooted in collectivism and is detrimental to their self-interest.
