Last Thursday it was announced that U.S. District Court Judge Rudolph Contreras was mysteriously recused from the Special Counsel case against General Mike Flynn, five days after Judge Contreras accepting the initial pleading.  No explanation as to ‘why’?

(Reuters) The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia judge presiding over the criminal case for President Donald Trump’s former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn has been recused from handling the case, a court spokeswoman said on Thursday.  (read more)

One might think the media apparatus, or pundit proletariat writ large, might be curious about why a U.S. District Court Judge would be recused.  Alas One would be wrong.  The recusal angle is transparently missing from any follow-up by media; and apparently the judicial cat also has stolen the tongue of congressional curiosity.  Nothing.  Nada.  Zilch.
The story has been memory holed into the concentric whirlpool of nothingness.
We have speculated that U.S. District Court Judge Rudolph Contreras was recused, either by himself or by challenge, because he is also a FISA Court Judge and could have signed off on the October FISA warrant that led to the wiretapping and surveillance of General Flynn.  However, we have received information that it wasn’t ‘by challenge’, leaving the preponderance of the motive for recusal directly upon Judge Contreras personal decision.
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In an otherwise well-buried interview between former interim CIA Director Mike Morell, (the temp director following Petraeus ouster used during initial Benghazi cover), there’s an admission by Morell about the politicized Deep State Intelligence leadership targeting candidate Donald Trump.
What this interview tells CTH is that the Intelligence Community, writ large, is on the precipice of massive institutional change -perhaps high level firings of remaining mid level operators and management- and those who participated in the historic politicization are now attempting to shape an explanation.

[Via Politico] QUESTION: Was that a mistake?
Mike  Morell: So, I don’t think it was a mistake. I think there were downsides to it that I didn’t think about at the time. I was concerned about what is the impact it would have on the agency, right? Very concerned about that, thought that through. But I don’t think I fully thought through the implications.
And one of the ways I’ve thought about that, Susan, is—okay, how did Donald Trump see this? Right? And from—it’s very important—one of the things we do as intelligence analysts is make sure that our guy—the president—understands the other guy. Right?

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After spending a reasonable amount of time looking at the recent CNN Fake News story surrounding Donald Trump Jr; and accepting the leak that spurred that fake news story stemmed from inside the House Intelligence Committee; and after applying a reasonable amount of common sense to how it occurred; CTH believes Adam Schiff was the most likely source of the leak to CNN’s Congressional Correspondant, Manu Raju, that led to the fraudulent story.  Today’s discussion with Jake Tapper confirms that assertion:

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CNN’s ‘Vast Russian Conspiracy‘ sellers and their cast of leakers below.
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There are obviously multiple investigative angles stemming from all the stories within investigations into the previous administration’s politicization of the FBI and DOJ.  One of those angles is the system of applying for FISA warrants and surveillance of U.S. persons.
Against the backdrop of FISA court judge Rudolph Contreras mysterious recusal from the Mike Flynn case; and against increasing sunlight upon FBI investigative agent Peter Strzok, yesterday House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes, discussed his ongoing concerns about abuse within the FBI and DOJ process.

WASHINGTON DC – House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif., told Fox News on Friday that his investigators have already uncovered evidence of “abuse” in the U.S. government’s surveillance practices.

“I believe there’s evidence that abuses have occurred,” Nunes said in his first interview since the House Ethics Committee dismissed allegations he had wrongly released classified information as part of the panel’s Russia investigation.

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Last night news broke that U.S. District Court Judge Rudolph Contreras “has been recused” from the case overseeing the prosecution of General Mike Flynn. Details are vague. According to Reuters, both the judge and the Flynn legal team have yet to comment.
Additionally, there is no concrete answer as to whether the recusal was done by the judge himself or was forced upon him. While the reasoning is the key, the difference between the two options adds another layer of consequence within the rest of this outline.  Reuters News Service puts it this way:

(Reuters) – The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia judge presiding over the criminal case for President Donald Trump’s former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn has been recused from handling the case, a court spokeswoman said on Thursday.
According to a court filing, U.S. District Court Judge Rudolph Contreras, who presided over a Dec. 1 hearing where Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the Federal Bureau of Investigation about his contacts with Russia, will no longer handle the case.
Court spokeswoman Lisa Klem did not say why Contreras was recused, and added that the case was randomly reassigned. Reuters could not immediately learn the reason for the recusal, or reach Contreras. An attorney for Flynn declined to comment. (Link)

Obviously, the customary reason for recusal is when there is a conflict of interest between the case as assigned and the judge overseeing it.  However, as you can clearly see, in this case it’s rather odd that if a conflict existed the judge would have even begun to oversee the case at the prior hearing.  Why wait until six days after the first hearing?
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“The Predicate”

FBI Director Christopher Wray appears before the House Judiciary Committee today to answer questions about the ongoing mission objectives of the FBI.  However, the opportunity for Wray’s appearance is being used to further investigate and unravel the ongoing issues surrounding the politicization of the FBI under the former leadership of Director James Comey.  Specifically how the FBI was weaponized against the campaign of candidate Donald Trump to the benefit of 2016 presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.
In the questioning segment below Ohio Representative Jim Jordan questions Director Wray about the role of FBI Deputy Head of Counterintelligence, FBI Agent Peter Strzok. Jim Jordan outlines the role of Strzok -as it is currently known- and asks if Agent Strzok then took information from Christopher Steele (author of the ‘Steele Russian Dossier’) and used that dossier as the predicate to organize the FISA application that began the surveillance of people associated with the Trump campaign:

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This line of questioning is critical because when combined with a year of investigation by the Dept of Justice, Office of Inspector General, the sunlight takes a two-pronged approach:
♦The IG is working from the inside to investigate the politicization, a more apt term is ‘weaponization‘, of the FBI and DOJ within those organizations.  The IG is then identifying specific people and specific behavior.
♦The oversight committees (Judiciary, Intelligence) are working from the outside of the organizations to spotlight the consequences from those people and from that behavior.
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OK, before going further, we need to step back and take a look at how deeply enmeshed Deputy Head of Counterintelligence FBI Agent Peter Strzok was to this entire FBI investigative enterprise.

•Peter Strzok was the lead FBI agent in charge of the Hillary Clinton email investigation. •Agent Peter Strzok was one of a small group who interviewed Hillary Clinton. •Agent Strzok was also the FBI contact person to receive the Russian Dossier and interview the author Christopher Steele.  [Remember, Hillary Clinton’s team paid Christopher Steele (via Fusion GPS) to create the dossier.] •Agent Strzok was the primary counterintelligence investigator for the ‘vast Russian conspiracy’, narrative.  •Agent Strzok was then hired by Robert Mueller to lead the FBI investigative efforts into  the “Russian Election Collusion/Conspiracy.”  •Agent Strzok was removed from the Mueller Team after the anti-Trump/pro-Clinton content of his internal communications were discovered by the current Inspector General investigation….

…and today we discover that Deputy Head of Counterintelligence, FBI Agent Peter Strzok was the person who interviewed National Security Advisor General Michael Flynn on January 24th, 2017.  An interview, that blindsided Flynn because there was no advanced notification…. And an interview that was the basis for the recent Robert Mueller charging of Flynn.
Good grief, it’s no wonder why the FBI desperately tried to control a pending IG release by advance-scripting a narrative, via leaks to the New York Times and Washington Post.
If FBI Agent Strzok can be shown to have conflicting political and institutional bias, then every aspect of the investigation he was involved in comes into question… and Agent Strzok is at the EPICENTER of every angle, within every aspect, of EVERY investigation.

SARA CARTER – A supervisory special agent who is now under scrutiny after being removed from Robert Mueller’s Special Counsel’s Office for alleged bias against President Trump also oversaw the bureau’s interviews of embattled former National Security advisor Michael Flynn, this reporter has learned.

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Senator Lindsey Graham appears on Face The Nation with John Dickerson to discuss the current state of the swamp.

“I think he [Comey] made some decisions that were really very, very wrong. There’s an ongoing criminal investigation; Comey may be part of it. You tweet and comment regarding ongoing criminal investigations at your own peril. I’d be careful if I were you, Mr. President. I’d watch this.”

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President Trump sends antagonistic media into spastic fits, and pearl-clutching circle-running, with a single tweet about Michael Flynn.  Epic:

Praetorian professional punditry immediately jump into their “he can’t” routine, filled with protestations about poor judgement and the risk of commenting on an on-going investigation, and such… blah, blah, blah…  However, what seemingly never crosses their mind is that: A) Everything asserted is 100% factual; and B) When there’s nothing to hide, there’s no risk.  D’oh, dummies.
There is absolutely NOTHING wrong with the President-Elect’s Transition Team talking to any foreign government, or any official within any foreign government. Ever. Period.  Actually, that’s exactly what transition teams are supposed to do; they reach out and receive information from foreign government officials as the starting point to communication with a new administration.
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The New York Times reporters are outlining another silly story to squeeze out the final drips of usefulness within the vast Russian conspiracy narrative.   Comey’s leak recipient Michael Schmidt, and the narrative engineer with a Phd in passive aggressive writing, Maggie Haberman, collaborate.
The outline is that lawyers for Michael Flynn are no longer sharing information with lawyers from the Trump team.  Obviously the intended premise of this engineering feat is infer that Flynn is cooperating with special counsel Robert Mueller to the detriment of President Trump.  Key word for narrative building here is: ‘infer’.  The years’-long media Russian conspiracy script relies heavily on ‘inference’.

WASHINGTON — Lawyers for Michael T. Flynn, President Trump’s former national security adviser, notified the president’s legal team in recent days that they could no longer discuss the special counsel’s investigation, according to four people involved in the case — an indication that Mr. Flynn is cooperating with prosecutors or negotiating a deal.

Mr. Flynn’s lawyers had been sharing information with Mr. Trump’s lawyers about the investigation by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, who is examining whether anyone around Mr. Trump was involved in Russian efforts to undermine Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.

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