[Right Scoop] "This is crucially important. Everybody’s missing the point. The incredible scandal here is the Obama administration was investigating top officials in the Trump campaign, maybe even Trump himself during the course of the election!
Listen to this from the WSJ today. ’U.S. investigators have examined contacts Attorney General Jeff Sessions had with Russian officials during the time he was advising Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, according to people familiar with the matter.’
They were investigating a sitting United States Senator who hadn’t done anything? They’re investigating a sitting Attorney General who hasn’t done anything? Based on what premise? The fact that he was advising Donald Trump? Is this not appalling and shocking to you?"
#1
U.S. investigators (Democratic Obama drones) have examined contacts Attorney General Jeff Sessions had with Russian officials during the time he was advising Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, according to people (the same Democratic Obama drones) with familiar the matter.
Does that make more sense, now?
Posted by: Bobby ||
03/05/2017 7:56 Comments ||
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#2
You mean the administration that used the IRS to cripple an opposition political movement also used the national security apparatus to attack an opposition political movement?
Huh. Almost like the one constant in the Obama administration is unbound lust for power.
Posted by: Rob Crawford ||
03/05/2017 16:03 Comments ||
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#3
Among many other rocks needing to be flipped over, the FISA request/approval/disapproval documents need to be looked at by the DoJ, House and Senate Intelligence committees.
#4
Actually, the Clinton Foundation Scandal is the source of all of this. The dems did everything to prevent Trump from being elected because of the tentacles of the Clinton Foundation. I swear that I believe the pay for play went straight to the white house and everyone that was a Democratic appointee across the entire spectrum of the executive branch was on the take.
What is Obama trying to "squirrel" us from?
This Russian ambassador thing is so transparently foolish that it has to be a red herring away from the real story.
[Daily Caller] South African president Jacob Zuma this week called for the confiscation of land owned by white people in his country -- without any restitution made to the Caucasian property owners.
In a speech given Friday morning, Zuma said the proposal would be the result of establishing a "pre-colonial land audit of land use and occupation patterns" that would determine what land needs to be taken. The move would require an overwhelming majority in parliament to change the law to allow the expropriation, according to The Telegraph.
"We need to accept the reality that those who are in parliament where laws are made, particularly the black parties, should unite because we need a two-thirds majority to effect changes in the constitution," the South African president argued.
Zuma had previously mentioned the land grab in a speech to parliament last month, but this week marked the first time he had explicitly called for altering the law to do so.
#3
" Wilders represents the real concerns and fears of lots of his countrymen about immigration and Dutch identity." He sees the problem but knows he will have to fight too many of his own people. He is prudent. Currently new and virulent Muslin extremism grows in his country. Unfortunately more suffering among his people must and will occur before they realize the dangers they have let in among their midst.
h/t Instapundit
[LawNewz] President Trump recently tweeted claiming that former President Obama wiretapped him during his campaign. One can only imagine how nuts the media would have gone if the roles had been reversed: President Trump wiretapping either Obama or the Clintons, though his DOJ could have authority to do just that given the expansive leaks of intelligence information by Obama and Clinton supporters the last few months. Heck, he could wiretap the media at this point, legally and legitimately, as the sources of these unlawful leaks, for which Obama himself set precedent.
Do liberals understand what Pandora’s Box Obama opened up by Obama using the powers of the NSA, CIA and FBI to spy on his political opponents? IMO, the only law these "people" understand is: "It feels so right, it can't be wrong"
...If the stories are correct, Obama or his officials might even face prosecution. But, we are still early in all of this and there are a lot of rumors flying around so the key is if the reports are accurate.We just don’t know at this time. The stories currently are three-fold: first, that Obama’s team tried to get a warrant from a regular, Article III federal court on Trump, and was told no by someone along the way (maybe the FBI), as the evidence was that weak or non-existent; second, Obama’s team then tried to circumvent the federal judiciary’s independent role by trying to mislabel the issue one of "foreign agents," and tried to obtain a warrant from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act "courts", and were again turned down, when the court saw Trump named (an extremely rare act of FISA court refusal of the government, suggesting the evidence was truly non-existent against Trump); and so, third, Obama circumvented both the regular command of the FBI and the regularly appointed federal courts, by placing the entire case as a FISA case (and apparently under Sally Yates at DOJ) as a "foreign" case, and then omitted Trump’s name from a surveillance warrant submitted to the FISA court, which the FISA court unwittingly granted, which Obama then misused to spy on Trump and many connected to Trump. Are these allegations true? We don’t know yet, but if any part of them are than Obama and/or his officials could face serious trouble. From your mouth to the ear of G*d, and I hope Donald & Co won't be deterred by some false considerations of "reconciliation" - the only reconciliation vile progs understand and accept is other side's unconditional surrender - ask people whose businesses were destroyed for refusing to cater to gay weddings.
#1
Obama has never been held accountable by law or the media. He got away with droning an American citizen; Wire tapping American media, using the IRS against political opposition...... no need to go on.
#2
Why do I get a feeling of parallels with Turkey? Hey, Donkeets, the coup failed in Turkey, see what is happening to the 'opposition'. Don't play that game here. Trump is not a GOPe. He's a New Yorker. It's nothing personal, it's business.
#4
I would bet the tap was placed in November after a FISA request was granted because the Obama administration alleged money laundering by Trump with Russian banks. No evidence was found but the tap remained.
When are these stupid democrats going to understand that Trumps "tweets" are baited hooks. I'm sure he has all the documentation he needs and he is seeing how many idiots get sucked into the fiasco.
This is the third time he has set them up and I wouldn't be surprised if the democrats are bugged to obtain evidence on how their conspiracy will try to cover up Trumps proof they bugged the Trump Tower.
#5
He does like to set little traps for them, doesn't he?
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
03/05/2017 16:26 Comments ||
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#6
Trump is not going to fold like the usual GOP wet noodle. He will fight.
He will fight. However the cowardly GOPe House Senate will fold and/or stab him in the back. He better get this under control. And, BTW, what is the deal with Sessions recusing himself? I always knew he was squish.
#7
Hopefully the Republican Congress will see that Trump's approval ratings don't drop when he fights back and like good politicians they'll learn the lesson.
#8
Trump likes to set up and bait his trapline. Maybe he will catch a McCain or a L-Graham creature. Trap lines are set usually for fur bearing animals---for their hides.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
03/05/2017 22:01 Comments ||
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[TheBlaze] Ben Rhodes, former senior advisor to President Barack Obama, came to his former boss’s defense Saturday after President Donald Trump accused Obama of wiretapping Trump Tower in the later stages of last year’s presidential campaign.
Quote tweeting Trump’s original tweet, Rhodes fired back at Trump, "No President can order a wiretap."
"Those restrictions were put in place to protect citizens from people like you," he added.
#3
Andrew McCarty: Understand the significance of this: Only the Justice Department litigates before the FISA court; this was not some rogue investigators; this was a high level of Obama’s Justice Department — the same institution that, at that very moment, was whitewashing the Clinton e-mail scandal. And when Justice seeks FISA surveillance authority, it is essentially telling that court that there is probable cause to believe that the targets have acted as agents of a foreign power — that’s the only basis for getting a FISA warrant.
In this instance, the FISA court apparently found the Obama Justice Department’s presentation to be so weak that it refused to authorize the surveillance. That is telling, because the FISA court is generally very accommodating of government surveillance requests. Unwilling to take no for an answer, the Obama Justice Department came back to the FISA court in October
he doesn't have to issue an order, he just makes his wishes known. I heard a statistic on Fox News this AM: 35,000 FISA requests were granted, 12 were not. This is one of 12. Kinda stark, hmm?
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/05/2017 6:52 Comments ||
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#4
'35,000 FISA requests were granted, 12 were not.' Time to order a new rubber stamp ?
#10
#3 Andrew McCarty As Frank G. posted, this came right out of Loretta Lynch's Justice Dept.; the most corrupt, weaponized, and politicized dept. in Obama's cabinet.
#13
and I typo'd his last name. I blame lack of coffee.
McCarthy
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/05/2017 11:35 Comments ||
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#14
Note that this Ben 'we may have to lie to you to get what we want' Rhodes.
Posted by: ed in texas ||
03/05/2017 11:42 Comments ||
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#15
As Special Advisor to the President and Deputy NSA - Ben Rhodes and all his perfumed prince lackies most likely facilitated the failed June 2016 FISA request. That is why it was rejected. Rhodes will soon find out that there are very few G Gordon Liddys left in this world, and when the FBI visits...the weak will snitch...I hope that sick feeling in his gut stays with him.
#16
As Special Advisor to the President and Deputy NSA - Ben Rhodes and all his perfumed prince lackies most likely facilitated the failed June 2016 FISA request.
He seems like a knowledgeable fellow, albeit a bit concerned. I hope his affairs are in order. Could be some difficult times ahead for knowledgeable fellows.
An explication of the nothingburger that is the FISA wiretap case In the run-up to the election Louise Mensch and others broke the story that the Obama Justice Department and federal law enforcement authorities had obtained a Trump-related FISA warrant in October following the denial of an earlier FISA warrant request the previous June. On its way out the door the Obama administration trashed the “minimization” procedures protecting the privacy of American citizens caught in the FISA net. Andrew McCarthy raised a red flag in the troubling NRO column “FISA and the Trump team.” Earlier this week the New York Times reported the involvement of Obama administration officials in disseminating the information obtained along the way.
Breibart has posted a useful timeline with links, as has the Conservative Tree House site. In his NRO column today, Andrew McCarthy provides this summary of events to date as part of his inquiry into the “recusal” of Attorney General Sessions from something or other this week. Here is an excerpt:
While the commentariat was rending its garments over the mere prospect that Trump might have his political adversary, Hillary Clinton, investigated if he won the election, Obama was actually having Trump investigated.
To rehearse briefly, in the weeks prior to June 2016, the FBI did a preliminary investigation, apparently based on concerns about a server at Trump Tower that allegedly had some connection to Russian financial institutions. Even if there were such a connection, it is not a crime to do business with Russian banks — lots of Americans do. It should come as no surprise, then, that the FBI found no impropriety and did not proceed with a criminal investigation.
What is surprising, though, is that the case was not closed down.
Instead, the Obama Justice Department decided to pursue the matter as a national-security investigation under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). In June, it sought the FISA court’s permission to conduct surveillance on a number of Trump associates — and perhaps even Trump himself. It has been reported that Trump was “named” in the application, but it is not publicly known whether he (a) was named as a proposed wiretap target, or (b) was just mentioned in passing in the application.
Understand the significance of this: Only the Justice Department litigates before the FISA court; this was not some rogue investigators; this was a high level of Obama’s Justice Department — the same institution that, at that very moment, was whitewashing the Clinton e-mail scandal. And when Justice seeks FISA surveillance authority, it is essentially telling that court that there is probable cause to believe that the targets have acted as agents of a foreign power — that’s the only basis for getting a FISA warrant.
In this instance, the FISA court apparently found the Obama Justice Department’s presentation to be so weak that it refused to authorize the surveillance. That is telling, because the FISA court is generally very accommodating of government surveillance requests. Unwilling to take no for an answer, the Obama Justice Department came back to the FISA court in October — i.e., in the stretch run of the presidential campaign. According to various reports (and mind you, FISA applications are classified, so the leaks are illegal), the October application was much narrower than the earlier one and did not mention Donald Trump. The FISA Court granted this application, and for all we know the investigation is continuing.
There are two significant takeaways from this. First, a FISA national-security investigation is not a criminal investigation. It is not a probe to uncover criminal activity; it is a classified effort to discover what a potentially hostile foreign government may be up to on American soil. It does not get an assigned prosecutor because the purpose is not to prove anything publicly in court — indeed, it is a major no-no for the Justice Department to use its FISA authority pretextually, for the real purpose of trying to build a criminal investigation. More at the link
#1
The fact that the June FISA request was denied is significant and under reported. Check this out - out "Over the entire 33-year period, the FISA court granted 33,942 warrants, with only 12 denials – a rejection rate of 0.03 percent of the total requests."
#2
Wiretapping is the surreptitious electronic monitoring of telephone, telegraph, cellular, fax or Internet-based communications.
Wiretapping is achieved either through the placement of a monitoring device informally known as a bug on the wire in question or through built-in mechanisms in other communication technologies. Enforcement officials may tap into either for live monitoring or recording. Packet sniffers -- programs used to capture data being transmitted on a network – are a commonly-used modern-day wiretapping tool. A variety of other tools, such as wiretap Trojans, are used for different applications.
whatis.techtarget.com
Trump organization most likely have IT people who setup and maintain on site email, web and telecommunications servers and equipment and do not use third party hosting and email services. If someone is trying to gain access to voice and electronic data, they will have to monitor traffic to and from the firewall at Trump Tower. It would be difficult to get past a good firewall, unless they were able to get a Trojan piece of software behind the firewall, and have it send out hard drive data to a listening IP address that belonged to the regime.
This is probably why they went to FISA. The firewall was successful causing some desperation as Trump gained a lead on Hildabeast and the only way to monitor anything for hopefully some dirt was through FISA. They took the risk and expect Hillary to be caught up in this.
#4
#3 The entire effort is a diversion. What are they (the Obama Shadow Gov't) attempting to mask, to hide? Posted by: Besoeker
Foolish over reach by an arrogant administration. Rhodes is arrogant. Looked a little further into the FISA court numbers... During the Obama administration out of 7,876 FISA request that only 3 requests were denied and 1 of these was a request to wire tap the Trump campaign. What were they doing - tapping an active campaign?
#6
The Nixon Watergate Scandal also involved monitoring political opponents.
The term Watergate, by metonymy, has come to encompass an array of clandestine and often illegal activities undertaken by members of the Nixon administration. Those activities included such "dirty tricks" as bugging the offices of political opponents and people of whom Nixon or his officials were suspicious. Nixon and his close aides also ordered investigations of activist groups and political figures, using the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
Watergate Wikipedia.org
The possible use of the NSA to illegally monitor many others domestically and internationally is what Obama may be trying to cover up. This may be the tip of the iceberg.
#8
Certainly may answer the question about General Mike Flynn's conversations being discovered and monitored.
Obama held no friendship for either Putin or Trump. Both men had similar views on Obama. The 'evil Russian hacker' theme appears to be a sort of Foggy Bottom manufactured honey trap or fishing expedition, with FISA being a tool of discovery. Marching as many Trump people past the Russians as possible, then publicizing it, appears to be the objective.
Enter the one time, aspiring fiction writer Ben Rhodes:
Wiki bio: In a controversial profile in the New York Times Magazine, Rhodes was quoted "deriding the D.C. press corps and boasting of how he created an 'echo chamber' to market the administration's foreign policy," including the international nuclear agreement with Iran.
Emphasis added.
#9
Well, it is pretty much out in the open that Obastard is running the process out of his fancy Kalorama digs according to the NYT which said the goal was to impeach or force the resignation of Trump before the next election cycle.
The fact that this clear definition of what the defeated party is doing is not being blasted over the air ways in red letters ten feet high is enough for me.
This is a dangerous slippery slope for the donks and if they are not careful and don't watch their 6 this entire thing can and will blow sky high and it will expose the duplicity of the media and the democrats in how they view government and elections...as if the corruption of the last regime wasn't enough.
#10
Final para of Wesley Pruden 'Wash Times' editorial from yesterday's Burg:
The Democrats call their scorched-earth attacks on the new president “the resistance.” But it is accurately described as “an insurrection.” They’re determined to destroy a duly elected president of the United States, by resignation or impeachment if they can, and if that doesn’t work, maybe something more sinister will be employed. We’ve never before seen anything like this. We’re sailing in uncharted water.
#12
Pity the poor Russians. They get all the blame but none of the benefit for their alleged nefarious deeds.
Pity the poor Russians. They had to make the hard choice between somebody who, at least promises, to restore their old enemy the USA and a demented witch who was bound to start WWIII.
#15
The Donks are calling for an investigation of Russia connections. Let's do have a "real" investigation and get to the bottom of this. I have a feeling it would end up driving a stake in the black hearts of the Donks.
#16
The Donks are calling for an investigation of Russia connections. Let's do have a "real" investigation and get to the bottom of this. I have a feeling it would end up driving a stake in the black hearts of the Donks.
I would dearly love to see the bank records from the 1970s of top radical groups and operatives, including John Kerry and Obammer's former terrorist buddy.
#19
Former DNI Clapper said today there was no FISA national-security investigation. And further, if there had been one "at that level" he would have known about it. Something big is gonna give on this one way or the other.
#21
I would dearly love to see the bank records from the 1970s of top radical groups and operatives, including John Kerry and Obammer's former terrorist buddy.
I'm sure Vlad has them - you might not like his price.
#22
Oh trust me on this one Vlad would play those cards in a heart beat if it would result in less hostility between us and Russia.
I really don't think Vlad wants another Cold War. I think the empty suit administration wanted it for the graft they could generate on contracts for weapons systems. I also think they decided to use this on Trump when it wasn't working on Vlad.
If Trump does get a full blown investigation, a LOT of people will go to jail, Clapper, Rhoades, Lynch, ValJar, and most of the democratic leadership.
#1
We attrited our strategic lift and green transportation trace over the past 20 years. We had to contract it our during this last mess. And transportation was a mess.
#2
The formalization of the Bataan strategy. Too far to reinforce adequately, too small to hold out long. We go nuke or accept the lost. Expendable troopies not consulted. How about trashing the 1950s strategy and deploy troops according to the ability of the region to defend itself, if it want to.
Well, the non-deployed force is big enough to move to the Mexican border where it may actually be useful in defending the United States.
#3
Well, the non-deployed force is big enough to move to the Mexican border where it may actually be useful in defending the United States.
I believe an attachment under jurisdictional control of the Border Patrol might actually be legal. Same, same use of the Navy littoral by the Coast Guard.
[Wash Times] Major media outlets are having a field day attacking Sebastian Gorka, deputy assistant to President Donald Trump. His offense has been naming "radical Islam" as the enemy. For example, The New York Times carried an op-ed on Feb. 24 by Steven Simon and Daniel Benjamin, both former Obama foreign policy officials, titled "The Islamophobic Huckster in the White House." It was peppered with inaccuracies. This I know from having first met Mr. Gorka in Budapest some 15 years ago and from having lectured with him a number of times in both military and civilian venues since then.
Contrary to the op-ed, he does not say that Islam is the enemy, but Islamism, or that the current conflict is "a historic clash of civilizations," a thesis I have heard him rebut in front of a large Muslim audience. As a sign of desperation, others have stooped to the level of reductio ad Hitlerum, suggesting that Mr. Gorka is an anti-Semite for his former political associations in his native Hungry. If this charge were not so noxious, it would be amusing since he is unabashedly pro-Israel.
...like most of the Trump administration including President Trump himself, both openly pro-Israel and accused of antisemitism.
How is one to understand the hysteria surrounding this issue?
Loss of power and privileges? Interruption in the long march of the revolution?
It reminds me of another era in which I was a participant as a special assistant to President Ronald Reagan. In the early Reagan years, anyone who spoke of the Soviet Union in the same manner as the president was considered a dangerous person. Recall that in 1983 Mr. Reagan named the Soviet Union an "evil empire." He said it was an error to consider the conflict "a giant misunderstanding and thereby remove yourself from the struggle between right and wrong and good and evil." The press and people in academe generally reacted with horror at this crazy cowboy. If you named America’s enemy, you became the enemy.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
By Justin Fox
'35,000 FISA requests were granted, 12 were not.' Time to order a new rubber stamp ? 
