I WAS RIGHT AND YOU WERE WRONG ALL ALONG!
[Update-1]
○ Steele Dossier Looks More Credible Than Ever
Haha … for the simpletons: by You I am not pointing at Martin. He just about never participated in comments to my diaries. I have and still do appreciate his writings! The legion of fools.
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[Update-3] Some of us grew up in the age of the Cold War, propaganda, brainwashing, LCD drug experiments, Vietnam War, Robert McNamara, the Pentagon Papers, and the RAND corporation.
In high school Russian language course was offered and in college news gathering and how to detect propaganda. Tools that are very useful today. The intelligence community has never changed its tactics. The CIA was the most corrupt bunch of people ever since the end of the Second World War. Why should I even contemplate to belief anything from the mouth of John Brennan or the bigger @$$hole former DNI Michael Hayden.
Torture in Iraq and Afghanistan was accepted by the IC and their henchmen, the FBI was opposed. In the whole Russia affair, Chris Steele and Fusion GPS I see the hand of GCHQ/MI6 and the IC bunch from Langley, VA. In September 2016 the FBI would not touch the Steele report with a ten foot pole, nor provide funds for more of their “research”. The CIA corporate members all had chosen to support HRC in a very early stage of the tilted election contest. Democracy in America? A third world nation and a big laughing stock around the world. 5% is just a tiny minority … watch Xi Jipeng and his thoughts in the China constitution.
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Clinton campaign, DNC paid for research that led to Russia dossier | WaPo |
The Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee helped fund research that resulted in a now-famous dossier containing allegations about President Trump’s connections to Russia and possible coordination between his campaign and the Kremlin, people familiar with the matter said.
Marc E. Elias, a lawyer representing the Clinton campaign and the DNC, retained Fusion GPS, a Washington firm, to conduct the research.
After that, Fusion GPS hired dossier author Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence officer with ties to the FBI and the U.S. intelligence community, according to those people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
Elias and his law firm, Perkins Coie, retained the company in April 2016 on behalf of the Clinton campaign and the DNC. Before that agreement, Fusion GPS’s research into Trump was funded by an unknown Republican client during the GOP primary.
○ Clinton Hires Campaign Lawyer Ahead of Likely Run | NYT – March 2015 |
The Clinton campaign and the DNC, through the law firm, continued to fund Fusion GPS’s research through the end of October 2016, days before Election Day.
Fusion GPS gave Steele’s reports and other research documents to Elias, the people familiar with the matter said. It is unclear how or how much of that information was shared with the campaign and the DNC and who in those organizations was aware of the roles of Fusion GPS and Steele.
« click for more info »
Clinton team and Democrats ‘bankrolled’ Trump dirty dossier | BBC News |
According to US media reports, Perkins Coie, a law firm representing the Clinton campaign and DNC, hired intelligence firm Fusion GPS in April 2016.
When I tried to report this story, Clinton campaign lawyer @marceelias pushed back vigorously, saying "You (or your sources) are wrong." https://t.co/B5BZwoaNhI
— Kenneth P. Vogel (@kenvogel) 24 oktober 2017
Fusion GPS, based in Washington DC, was paid to dig up dirt on Mr Trump, who was then Mrs Clinton’s rival for the presidency.
The intelligence firm subcontracted Christopher Steele, a former British spy who previously worked in Russia, to compile the research.
Attributed to unnamed sources, it claimed that Mr Trump had colluded with Russian officials during the election campaign.The unsubstantiated dossier also alleged that Kremlin intelligence had filmed Mr Trump with prostitutes at Moscow’s Ritz-Carlton hotel in 2013.
« click for more info »
○ ‘Sir’ Andrew Wood as spy chief in Moscow
○ British Intelligence Delivers Another ‘Dodgy Dossier’
Second update below the fold …
[Update-2] Reasons Why Dems Have Been Fucking Stupid on the Steele Dossier, a Long Essay | Emptywheel |
Note, this detail also provides a much better explanation for why the FBI backed out of its planned relationship with Steele in October, one that matches my supposition. As soon as it became clear Elias was leaking the dossier all over as oppo research, the FBI realized how inappropriate it was to use the information themselves, no matter how credible Steele is. This also likely explains why FBI seeded a story with NYT, one Democrats have complained about incessantly since, reporting “none of the investigations so far have found any conclusive or direct link between Mr. Trump and the Russian government.” Ham-handed? Sure. But in the wake of Harry Reid and David Corn’s attempts to force FBI to reveal what Democratic oppo research had handed to FBI, the FBI needed to distance themselves from the oppo research, and make sure they didn’t become part of it. Particularly if Steele was not fully forthcoming about who was paying him, the FBI was fucked.
And consider what Hillary and the DNC did. Back when the June 9 Trump Tower meeting first broke, I warned Democrats who were screaming that this was proof of collusion to be very careful of how they defined it.
[T]hus far, it is not evidence of collusion, contrary to what a lot of people are saying.
That’s true, most obviously, because we only have the implicit offer of a quid pro quo: dirt on Hillary — the source of which is unknown — in exchange for sanctions relief. We don’t (yet) have evidence that Don Jr and his co-conspirators acted on that quid pro quo.
But it’s also true because if that’s the standard for collusion, then Hillary’s campaign is in trouble for doing the same.
Remember: A supporter of Hillary Clinton paid an opposition research firm, Fusion GPS, to hire a British spy who in turn paid money to Russians — including people even closer to the Kremlin than Veselnitskaya — for Russia-related dirt on Don Jr’s dad.
Yes, the Clinton campaign was full of adults, and so kept their Russian-paying oppo research far better removed from the key players on the campaign than Trump’s campaign, which was run by incompetents. But if obtaining dirt from Russians — even paying Russians to obtain dirt — is collusion, then a whole bunch of people colluded with Russians (and a bunch of other foreign entities, I’m sure), including whatever Republican originally paid Fusion for dirt on Trump.
Breaking: Our political process is sleazy as fuck (but then, so are most of our politicians).
I assumed at the time that Democrats were adults and provided Hillary some plausible deniability and distance from the payments to ex-spooks who in turn paid Russian spies.
Why does this matter? Oppo research has been standard politics for a long time. The belief that Hillary Clinton is somehow uniquely nefarious is crazy.
There is no cure for CDS. I just can’t believe a grown-ass person kicked off a post with:”I WAS RIGHT. YOU WERE WRONG.” What the fuck? Is this middle school?
Not that “fair question” wrt anything about Clinton or her campaign exists in your bubble.
That is a lie. But I expected as much.
True — but but that’s an incredibly narrow view of this story. Who lost their shit when the Don Jr. etal oppo research meeting came to light? A meeting that everyone agrees led to nothing.
The same people that hired people that then paid people in Russian for dirt on Trump and weren’t fussy about whether it was true, credible, or verifiable. That’s the story.
“A meeting that everyone agrees came to nothing.”
It’s interesting when so-called liberals regurgitate Trump talking points. Or is it Greenwald talking points, or Wikileaks talking points, that this community member is regurgitating?
It is notable that, on this and other issues, their talking points are essentially identical.
She is not “uniquely” nefarious, esquimaux.
She’s just nefarious.
No better than the rest of the hustlers.
Are you really ready to settle for that?
I’m not.
You?
AG
Let not go all rightwingy or Russia-Putin-lefty on this.
We’ve known from the get-go that the Steele dossier was funded by a Democrat or Democrats to smear Trump and elect HRC and it was only rational to conclude that it was about as independent from the HRC campaign/DNC as Superpacs are from campaigns.
GG is correct on how this should be reported:
Those are the key points and exactly what the Clinton-partisan Democrats hypocritically denied as they called those that shrugged over the Don, jr. etal meeting Putin stooges or operatives.
(GG also has several tweets responding to NYT’s Maggie Habarman, but she’s such a hack propagandist that she can’t see that she’s trying to play on both sides of the matter.)
This latest report does confirm that Fusion pitched the project to VIP Democrats and was hired a couple of months earlier than the previous vague statements suggested. Still the story remains far from complete.
What was Fusion selling in March 2016 (and who had paid for it up until then). As the 12/16 DNC oppo file on Trump contained nothing about Russia, when did this first surface? Note: Trump hired Manafort in March which is when Fusion was selling. Note: Manafort and Tony Podesta were follow lobbyists. Many other plausible suspects within the Clinton orbit to get the Putin-Russia propaganda going. (In a war weary US, it didn’t work as well as expected, but it’s now the only game that DC is pushing.)
your brain must look like oatmeal.
That’s all you’ve got? An adolescent bully boy taunt that only a twelve year old and Trump would be proud of.
DFHs have decades of experience seeing though the propaganda, bs, and hypocrisy of both parties and the candidates in real time and not decades later after reading some book. Not seeing through it, and worse promulgating it, is what turns a brain into mush. 51% of Democrats now view GWB favorably — probably the same 51% that were cool with the Kissinger-Clinton tight bond. Those are the mush brains.
Got it. One side met with political consultants. The other side met with representatives of a foreign government. Totally the same thing.
No. One side hired consultants to consort with and pay anonymous, Kremlin connected Russians to dig up dirt on Trump. The other met with , an attorney for a wealthy Russian businessman, a UK music promoter, and a US citizen, Russian ex-pat because a buddy of the music promoter claimed that the attorney had dirt on Clinton and which the attorney denied. One got nothing and the other got a bunch of salacious, unverifiable crap that didn’t end up being good enough for them to use during the campaign. No shortage of lies from/by parties involved on both sides.
I’m not pointing a finger at either of them for their oppo research efforts — it’s always ugly but fair game. It’s what they do with whatever they get that’s also fair game. What’s not fair game is to demonize one side while giving a pass to the other side for similar enough oppo research efforts.
The genesis of hitting Obama on birth, Rev Wright, Rezko, Ayers, etc. was all part of oppo research by opponents. None of it was worth a hill of beans but it didn’t stop his opponents from slinging it around. (And recall that someone was off in Indonesia attempting to dig up dirt on Obama; so, there was an international component to that oppo research as well.) All of those that kept beating those empty drums are loathsome.
This is peak “Both sides do it, but DemocRats are worse” Greenwald. But I’ll bite. No Russian ratfucking occurred, and even if any did, but it totally didn’t, but if it did, it wasn’t as big a factor as the fact that HRC sucks. We should ignore Russia distraction and move on to other things.
Ok. here’s another thing. Let’s talk about it. Cause HRC isn’t running for anything, ever, again, but the vote suppression tactics in Wisconsin will still exist and grow nationally given that Sessions is in charge of the justice dept.
And the Trump administration just tried to force an immigrant child to carry a pregnancy to term. Nice.
Oh, and a contract to install solar panels or something went to a company in the Interior chiefs hometown.
But hey, SCOREBOARD, because Oui was right and the EVIL RED BAITER, Martin was wrong.
Well, at least you linked to a worthy and important article this time, and from an author with considerable cred in that field. Indeed, Dems should have been investigating and railing about GOP voter suppression since the election and in the months leading up. Not just to point out the dubious EC outcome in one key state, and maybe more, but to prevent future occurrences in 2018 and 2020. But instead, it’s been Russia Russia Russia for the past year, with still nothing by way of evidence to show for it.
Odd to note here how quiet Dem leaders have been about the vote suppression. Except that they always are. 2000, 2004, 2016 — barely a peep about stolen elections.
Re Russiagate, you’re about down to hanging all your hopes on Mueller, but he’s likely only to find secondary crimes — lying to the FBI, obstruction of justice, financial fraud — and probably only as to secondary characters, not the big enchilada.
Meanwhile, thanks to the Deep State-driven efforts of the Dem leadership and their unskeptical followers on the blogs and in the media, we have a new cold war with Russia, heightened tensions not seen since the Cuban crisis of 1962, a new McCarthyism led by supposedly open- and fair-minded Dems, and harsh corporate media suppression which threatens the few existing voices of dissent. Wrt mass media, the Deep State and its many backers in both parties are in the process of Pravda-izing the media landscape, including Twitter and YouTube. They long ago got to PBS and NPR. It’s all rather obvious and blatant what’s occurring, yet Dems meekly go along or even applaud.
Depressing times we live in. I get the feeling of being the Kevin McCarthy figure watching all the townspeople become pod people. Welcome to Santa Mira …
Yes. Exactly. Only the takeover was slower; more like McCarthy’s horror when he saw that Becky had been taken.
A quick comparison with the latest Harris/Harvard poll doesn’t reveal any changes among men. What I’m getting from both of these polls is that Trump’s strength among men (and it’s closer to 50/50 instead of a net positive) centers around one issue: economy and jobs. That is basically on the come with the belief that TrumpTalk will boost the economy and jobs because he sure as hell isn’t doing anything else.
This diary and thread is funny as hell. I’m bookmarking it for when I need a good, hearty laugh in the future.
Propaganda, it’s a helluva drug.
CBS News: Washington Free Beacon funded initial Fusion GPS anti-Trump research
Paul Singer was always at the top of my list for the Republican that might have funded the project, but that meant the scuttlebutt that it was a Jeb donor would have been wrong. iirc Singer has recently broken bread with Trump.