Do not get so caught up watching the granules moving at our feet that we forget to look up and notice the landscape is shifting….

A key DIA official from within the White House National Security Council has resurfaced today as reports show Ezra Cohen-Watnick has been hired by Attorney General Jeff Sessions to assist on issues surrounding counterintelligence and counterterrorism.

WASHINGTON — A former American intelligence official who came under intense scrutiny during a stint at the White House last year is returning to government as the national security adviser to Attorney General Jeff Sessions, according to a person familiar with the decision.

The official, Ezra Cohen-Watnick, will play an important role at the Justice Department, advising Mr. Sessions on counterintelligence and counterterrorism.  (NYT Link)

Before getting to the big picture of Cohen-Watnick, let’s look at a few recent granules which at first might seem disconnected – but they are not.

(more…)

It’s well known that Republican Speaker of the House Paul Ryan doesn’t want to be in an actual leadership position; and it’s also well known -enhanced by the campaign, and victory, of Donald Trump- that Republicans did not want to win the majority position and face having to reveal their true UniParty agenda.

The evidence of this UniParty positioning has been staring the electorate in the face, repeatedly and brutally, since candidate Donald Trump actually campaigned on key tenets of the Republican party and found himself being openly opposed by GOP leadership.

Now, a stunning discovery surfaces of Paul Ryan’s Congressional Leadership SuperPAC, congressionalleadershipfund.org, actually campaigning for the Democrat, Conor Lamb, in the recent PA18 congressional race.

As evidenced by Big League Politics the Paul Ryan SuperPAC sent a mailer to Pennsylvania CD-18 voters touting Lamb’s favorable position on gun ownership rights:

(more…)

There is a key distinction being overlooked, perhaps conflated, by many who are reviewing the recently released HPSCI memo as it relates to the outlined targeting of U.S. individual Carter Page.
In the HPSCI outline it specifically notes the targeting of U.S. individual Carter Page was NOT a FISA Title VII search request.  Title VII is FISA(702), the incidental collection of U.S. person information as it relates to National Security or Counterintelligence operations targeting foreign individuals.

The FISA ‘warrant’ request, against Carter Page, was made October 21st, 2016, under Title I of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.  Meaning the surveillance application was specifically stating, to the court, the U.S. individual was likely an actual agent of a foreign government, ie. “a spy.”
(more…)

There continue to be questions about the substance behind the pending release of the House Intelligence Committee memo.  With that release in mind, today it is worthwhile remembering this is the beginning of exposing the corruption within the DOJ not the end.

For several years the U.S. justice department has maintained an attitude of non-accountability within its ranks.  The Obama years elevated that attitude and provided multiple examples of a DOJ gone rogue.
A complicit media enables that attitude by engineering a false narrative the U.S. Justice Department was/is an independent fourth branch of government; unaccountable to congress and entirely separate from the executive branch.
The House Intelligence Memo is simply using the example of currently known FISA abuse to open the door and show the U.S. electorate how corrupt this unaccountable institution has become.  Behind that door are very uncomfortable realities for all of those who constructed the weaponized agency; and also those who have benefited from it.
Consider:
(more…)

Stunning development.

But Things Are Not What They Seem !

You’ve likely begun to hear about this letter from DOJ to Devin Nunes.  Please read it and evaluate.  Important Tip:  Notice the DOJ/FBI are referencing the Nunes Memo from a perspective of they know what the underlying documents are:
(more…)

The majority of Americans are in an abusive relationship with the Justice Department. A large minority of Americans enjoy watching the abuser attack the majority.  This is the reality.  This reality is how the Department of Justice can continue their abusive efforts.
Never forget when President Obama weaponized the IRS to attack conservative groups in 2011  it wasn’t only Democrats who defended the weaponization; almost all of the Republicans in the Senate benefited from the IRS targeting. Removal of the Tea Party threat eliminated GOPe opposition and protected their incumbent power.
Representative Lee Zeldin:  “The American public deserves the truth. We should not hide the truth from them, they’ve waited too long. Do not pull a wool over their eyes. Show them the facts. They deserve nothing less.”

.
Representative Ralph Norman (R-SC) appears on Fox News to discuss the same (below):
(more…)

House Judiciary Committee member Jim Jordan interviewed by Martha MacCallum as he discusses the House Intelligence Committee summary memo that outlined DOJ and FBI abuse of FISA surveillance.
The producers of Martha MacCallum’s show smartly bring Evelyn Farkas prior statements back into the story for additional framework and discussion.

.
Democrats are desperate to avoid reading the summary memo as they will no longer be able to obfuscate he content therein. Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes has used the memo to flip the group boxed in. To make the memo public Nunes will likely hold another vote in the Intelligence Committee, then pass the memo along to the White House for statutory release approval. The White House will approve of the release and then it becomes public.
The ‘kitchen cabinet’ plan for release timing is shaping up to hit right before President Trump’s State of The Union address.
(more…)

The House Intelligence Committee voted today to allow all congressional members to view a summary report of classified documents behind the “Clinton Dossier”.
As Byron York writes in the Washington Examiner: “At the committee’s meeting Thursday morning, Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., offered a motion to allow all House members to review a brief report prepared by the Republican majority summarizing the panel’s investigation into what GOP members call “FISA abuse.””

All of the Republicans voted to allow the sunlight, Adam Schiff and all the Democrats on the committee voted to block the sunlight.

[…]  There will be no copies of the report handed out to House members. Instead, a copy will be made available for them to read in a secure room in the Capitol. They won’t be able to take the report out of the room. But they will know the answers to the questions.

(more…)

Time, further questioning, and a host of inherent contradictions will eventually bring more sunlight upon the authorship of “The Dossier”.  Additionally, how it was used by the DOJ/FBI in gaining FISA-702 query and upstream data surveillance approvals, what the media calls “FISA Warrants”, is soon to reach sunlight.  It’s unavoidable.
In addition to the absurd claims debunked within the dossier, a significantly under-discussed aspect is the actual authorship.  Fusion GPS claims Christopher Steele wrote the memos which were assembled into the “Clinton Dossier”. However, there are numerous mistakes within the documents which no intelligence expert would ever make; including the repeated misspelling of the Russian “Alfa” bank.
Here’s the 35 page assembly of dated memos that media calls the “Steele Dossier”. However, Christopher Steele has never claimed authorship – and the proprietary ownership has always been Fusion-GPS.  Even John McCain had to get his copy from Fusion GPS, not Christopher Steele; so CTH calls it the “Clinton Dossier”.
[scribd id=369319684 key=key-BY7nKBCeolAym8v7kmbb mode=scroll]
(more…)

There is an interesting dynamic unfolding with White Hats and Black Hats amid the story of how political forces within the DOJ and FBI conspired with Clinton allies in the 2016 presidential election, ie. “The Trump Operation”. [Hi Glenn, Jim, Andy]
Back-story – There are two central components:
♦First, corruption within the DOJ and FBI that included their use of unlawful use of FISA-702 exploits; and ♦second, how that intelligence information was extracted, passed along to those outside government, repackaged, and reconstituted into the “Steele Dossier”.  The finished, albeit sketchy, intelligence was later returned to the FBI to request lawful FISA court surveillance authority.  It is a circle of “intelligence laundering”.
We know the DOJ (National Security Division), and FBI (Counterintelligence Division), worked together on the enterprise.  This collaboration is where the insider “small group” participants assemble, intersect and ultimately redistribute themselves into the Mueller investigation with the help of Mueller’s adviser, FBI Chief Legal Counsel James Baker.

The Players, “Insiders”:

DOJ side: Asst. Attorney General Sally Yates, Asst. AG Head of National Security Division John P Carlin; Deputy Attorney Bruce Ohr; and legal liaison between Main Justice and FBI, Attorney Lisa Page.

FBI side: FBI Director Jim Comey; Asst. FBI Director Andrew McCabe; Director of Counterintelligence W.H. “Bill Priestap”; FBI Chief Legal Counsel James Baker; and lead FBI Counterintelligence Agent Peter Strzok.

Outsiders (The Dossier Crew):

Fusion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson; the wife of Simpson, Mary B. Jacoby; a hired private contractor, familiar with CIA operations, Nellie Ohr (also wife of DOJ team insider Bruce Ohr); contracted former British MI6 Agent and head of Russia House, Christopher Steele (also attributed authorship of ‘Dossier’).

♦The basic enterprise seems pretty straightforward albeit corrupt as hell.  During a period of November 2015 through April 18th 2016, Justice Department political insiders and outside political contractors, including Fusion-GPS, accessed the NSA and FBI database using FISA-702(17) “About Queries”. They gathered information on candidate Hillary Clinton’s political opposition including Donald Trump campaign officials and affiliates.
This was essentially deep state political opposition research being conducted inside government for a considerable period of time. The information, gathered on Clinton’s  political opposition, was then weaponized against the candidacy of Donald Trump.
(more…)