President Trump announces via Truth Social, his intent to nominate former ODNI official John Ratcliffe to the position of Director of the Central Intelligence Agency.
[Source]
Former DNI Ratcliffe passed through the Senate Intel Committee nomination process in 2019 after being blocked by Mitch McConnell in 2018. With a prior SSCI confirmation being successful, the path to confirming John Ratcliffe as CIA Director is essentially a foregone conclusion.
As CIA Director, John Ratcliffe will control the world’s second-most powerful intelligence agency. Ratcliffe has almost no attack vectors for the internal IC apparatus to use against him, that’s why I previously thought a role in the Trump-2 intel system would be good.
Ratcliffe was/is the lead transition team member on all things related to Intelligence. Prior rumor put him in the NatSec Advisor role, but CIA Director is a good fit. John Ratcliffe is very stable, vanilla, no drama and can be expected to deliver on the priorities of the Trump administration. He will work very well with the White House.
The concern would be Ratcliffe’s ability to remove the corrupt players within the darkest part of the darkest IC system.
The CIA operates a totally opaque budget and is the only institution in government with an allowable mandate to lie to every other element of the executive branch and every other branch. The CIA is legislative authorized to be an entirely dark operation with almost no oversight (SSCI).
All lying is legislatively lawful from the CIA, that is the structure of their authority. However, we can quickly see what that authority can lead to when corruption is running amok.
With this in mind, a guy like Ratcliffe in charge of a silo that is permitted to manipulate/lie is worth quite a bit. It will be very interesting to see how truth telling Director Ratcliffe deals with the dark aspects to the omnipotent silo he now controls.
One last word of caution. In the prior administration Ratcliffe never fought for declassification of records, which led to President Trump exiting his second term without vital issues ever seeing sunlight. As DNI John Ratcliffe never declassified the critical information that President Trump was urgently requesting in the final months of his presidency. Ratcliffe maintained the silo structure without conflict.
John Ratcliffe’s best friend is Trey Gowdy.
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Sean Hannity will likely quickly follow with ‘glowing’ reviews.
Watch for a response from those who have a table in the kitchen.
♦ The U.S State Dept and CIA operation is like a restaurant.
The Dept of State is the front of the restaurant, with the Secretary as the Maitre D’. The CIA is the back of the restaurant, the kitchen. The Director is the Chef.
The consulates are the wait staff. USAID are the food runners. The Dept of Defense are the bus boys.
The tables and chairs are assigned by the Maitre D’ according to their value. Countries viewed as more important get the best tables.
The menus offered to each nation are completely different.
Israel has a table in the kitchen.
To get the best experience, tips (bribes) are required for everyone, from the parking valets outside, to the sommelier, to the server. Currently, Ukraine is the biggest tipper.
On the oversight aspect the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is the control mechanism to approve/install the Secretary of State. The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence is the control mechanism to approve/install the CIA Director. Everything therein and thereafter is a system of pretending it is something else.
Jim Rickards, as a ten-year veteran of the CIA, described the problems a Trump CIA director might encounter on Steve Bannon’s War Room this morning. (At the time, the rumor mill had Kash Patel at CIA.) CIA discussion begins at 8:29 minutes in.
https://rumble.com/v5olihz-jim-rickards-reveals-how-polling-can-operate-as-intelligence-operation-expo.html?e9s=src_v1_ucp
he is excellent in his anaylsis.
Solid pick!
I hope Ratcliffe doesn’t decide to bring Trey Gowdy into the fold. He’s an all talk no walk man.
I don’t like it
W hy
” In the prior administration Ratcliffe never fought for declassification of records, which led to President Trump exiting his second term without vital issues ever seeing sunlight. As DNI John Ratcliffe never declassified the critical information that President Trump was urgently requesting in the final months of his presidency. Ratcliffe maintained the silo structure without conflict.”
He has a very, “Mr. President I’d LIKE to follow your instruction and do xyz, but I just “can’t”.
JFK….WTC….
You seem to imply that a) it’s odd when colleagues are friends and that b) it’s unusual that straights are good friends with gays, esp when they work in the same facility.
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Who said he’s no good?
I anxiously await Ratcliffe’s first sitdown meeting with the CIA chief in London.
Would love to be a fly on that wall.
What will he do about the Five Eyes relationship?
Did Kier Starmer expect Kamala to further enable England’s war on the English?
Especially if the CIA chief in London us like the old one Gina Haspel.
Then there was Stroker’s trip to London.
Then Stephan Halper and Azra Turk.
One of Trump’s big disappointments with the CIA was their failure to overthrow the Venezuelan regime toward the end of his first term when Maduro was caught stealing an election. One of the first things that Ratcliff will do could be to fire the people who failed Trump back then.
If so, Rubio will be on the same page. Trump chose Rubio for Secretary of State because he strongly opposes the Communist governments in South America, according to Dick Morris:
https://www.dickmorris.com/trumps-inspired-appointments-lunch-alert/
They CIA didn’t fail, they disobeyed President Trumps orders.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the CIA was running drugs I cooperation with Maduro.
Spooks been druggin’ since 1968 in Nam. Don’t ask.
Hiding the “horse” in bodies coming back in coffins!
Before ’68, in Laos and Cambodia.
Running humans.
Are IC Caribbean operations more likely run out of Guantanamo, or Vieques?
Was Little Saint James a CIA operation?
Q; Why did Mitch McTurtle block DNI Ratcliff in 2018?
Was McTurtle in on the Russia Hoax and all the rest targeting Pres Trump?
“Former DNI Ratcliffe passed through the Senate Intel Committee nomination process in 2019 after being blocked by Mitch McConnell in 2018. With a prior SSCI confirmation being successful, the path to confirming John Ratcliffe as CIA Director is essentially a foregone conclusion.”
How Ben Rhodes and the Obama Bro ‘Echo Chamber’ Inspired a Would-Be Trump Assassin
https://freebeacon.com/author/stiles/politics/going-nuclear-how-ben-rhodes-and-the-obama-bro-echo-chamber-inspired-a-would-be-trump-assassin/
A night of painful posts!
Point to a spot on the doll and tell us where it hurts.
Everywhere. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. Deep State wins again.
Painful for who?
Anyone with a brain who remembers what a good little swamp rat Gowdy is.
“the world’s second-most powerful intelligence agency”
Nice one!
It’s a better pick than others with hats in the ring
2nd most powerful?
You haven’t been paying attention if you don’t understand that statement. Get focused. Stay focused. Learn.
“As DNI John Ratcliffe never declassified the critical information that President Trump was urgently requesting in the final months of his presidency.“
Didn’t Radcliffe say we have all of it, paraphrasing here. Radcliffe didn’t necessarily have to declassify anything. Didn’t I read here thoughts the fbi was after the information, the armed raid in Florida.
What of Radcliffe’s tracking down the information that was siloed by the spooks.
Drain the swamp, it’s deep.
I can’t imagine PDJT not having had this conversation with Radcliffe
Now give us Rep. Clay Higgins (R-LA) for FBI Director and we’re really cooking with gasoline..
Clay is fearsome in an old-school, throwback, deliberate, slow-talking, implacable, “make ’em shake in their boots” way.
No one, but NO ONE will screw around with our Cajun badass.
Is not the beauty of giving Rubio SoS, that he’s removed from the senate and hopefully replaced with a true MAGA senator.
Then Trump can fire Rubio and he has no senate seat to go back to?!
Lil’ Spittle Foam Boy will have to do something bad to get fired.
Not going to Drain The Swamp like this! Any former member of the Tick Tock Boom Club should not be installed.
Unfortunately, I must agree.
“John Ratcliffe will control the world’s second-most powerful intelligence agency.”
Which is the most powerful?
NSA
Mossad if you are talking global.
Well what did SD say yesterday about the country seated in the kitchen, presumably working with (or supervising?) the Chef?
What is the saying? “You are who you hang out with”? Best friend is Rooster Head? LOL! You can’t make this stuff up.
Ugh! 😒
“John Ratcliffe, Trump’s pick for CIA Director, says Iran has committed “acts of war” against the US by allegedly hacking Trump campaign emails, and allegedly plotting to assassinate Trump. He says the US should conduct joint attacks on Iran with Israel”
New menu same cooks.
Vanilla and milk toast seems an odd approach to the introduction of a new menu.
I would be far more satisfied with Gorden Ramsey and a full meltdown scene.
Need a quick exit for the troublemakers. Only then can serious talk about the future of the restaurant happen.
Ratcliffe was kind enough to declassify John Brennan’s “get out of jail free” cards in Oct 2020:
1) Brennan’s briefing notes to Obama on Hillary’s “plan to vilify Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by Russia”
2) Brennan’s memo to Comey/Strzok informing them of “Hillary Clinton’s approval of a plan concerning US presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russian hackers hampering US elections” from Sept 2016.
Obviously a campaign dirty trick is out of the jurisdiction of the CIA so Brennan did what all honorable public servants would do upon receipt to this crucial intel:
He told his boss & he told the cops.
Brennan has marked for removal. Target #1.
Stroker is still at it during this transition. Time for this seditionist to be brought to justice.
So basically Ratcliffe is a zero sum choice. Since he will be confirmed without a problem that means that he must not be a threat to anyone.
Unfortunately Trey Gowdy was all hat and no horse, a deceitful Rino. Trump can dump Ratcliffe if he doesn’t act on the president’s requests to declassify. Can the CIA be reigned in- is it possible with Trump who has been thoroughly vetted? Not sure his family has been, but we would likely know if there is dirt there already. Of course, sadly, anything can be created today with great realism. Only God and the deep state know for sure.
Incredibly disappointing. We are not getting real change. We are getting crumbs
As CIA director, will he be able to find out who are the handlers of McConnell and Thune, and what the CIA has on them? That would be helpful. The handlers should be fired.