At the time of a Tuesday evening Fox News interview Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was affirming his trip to Ukraine was still planned.  However, by the time Pompeo woke up on Wednesday morning those plans were cancelled….  Perhaps someone told the secretary he needed to stay-attached to the crisis he helped inspire?

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday postponed a trip to Ukraine so he could focus on the situation in Iraq after demonstrators attacked the U.S. embassy.
Supporters of Iranian-backed Iraqi paramilitary groups stormed the U.S. embassy’s perimeter and hurled rocks in two days of protests. They withdrew on Wednesday after Washington dispatched extra troops and threatened reprisals against Tehran.

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Despite the initial reaction a stable-minded person would likely take away from the headline, it is a good thing that ABC News and other MSM have dropped their pretense and shallow-efforts to retain their open secrets.
In this example while lamenting the outcome of the recent U.K. election that saw the socialists and leftists crushed by conservative and pragmatic voters, ABC is concerned the American people may end up similarly interfering in media objectives for the 2020 U.S. presidential election.  The problem they discover is this pesky concept called “freedom”.

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Consider this argument from the article: “One of the things that we’re always very cautious about is everyone looking at Russia. But actually, we should be looking at the party and political dynamics closer to home and how domestic actors are using the platforms and manipulating the systems to spread information or misinformation that’s favorable to their political stance.” 
I mean seriously.  Can you imagine a world where U.S. politicians easily spread information favorable to their political stance.  Oh.My.God… The outcome is almost unimaginable…. People, allowed to think for themselves.  Yikes, the horror of it.
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Most CTH readers are aware the RNC and DNC are literally private clubs with the ability to do anything they want regarding rules & by-laws inside their respective organizations.  As such both republicans and democrats can do whatever they want to determine their candidate. Understanding this opaque process was one of the cornerstones to figuring out how the RNC controlled the nominee outcome in 2012 and their failed attempt in 2016.
Here’s an interesting perspective on the likely DNC nominee looking at the procedural processes within the 2020 democrat national committee rule changes.  No super-delegates (in round one) and no winner-take-all rules for state delegation distribution.

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Despite the challenges to scour through the details of party rules and regulations, it would be nice if more media spent time on this aspect of elections. Ultimately it is the club rules, and the candidate’s ability to use or overcome those rules, that is the best predictor of who will succeed in the nomination process.
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Incredible.  Continuing a legacy of transparency and availability the People’s President stops to hold an impromptu presser upon arrival for the Mar-a-Lago New Year’s eve celebration.  [Video and Transcript Below]
Dressed in formal attire with our stunning First Lady Melania Trump beside him, President Trump responds to a variety of media questions.  WATCH:

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[Transcript]  THE PRESIDENT: Hello, everybody. Happy New Year. Happy New Year. We’re going to have a great year, I predict. I think it’s going to be a fantastic year. We had the best economic year, I think, in our country’s history. And I think we’re really set for additional growth and jobs and everything else. It’ll be great.
Kevin?
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First, the explanation from former CIA Director, current U.S. Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo:

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Does this “escalation” have a familiar feel about it?
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Earlier today, via Tweet, President Trump announced the ‘phase-one’ agreement between the U.S. and China will be signed January 15, 2020.

As U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer previously stated this very challenging agreement will be the first-ever attempted trade deal between a state-run economy and a free-market economy.   It will take time to see if communist China will actually follow-through on the terms and conditions.
Ambassador Lighthizer noted the principle challenge is generating an enforceable set of standards -within a written agreement- between a totally controlled communist economic system (China) and a free-market system (USA). No other nation has ever tried, and there is no preexisting trade agreement to facilitate a mapping. What Lighthizer was/is constructing will be what all nations will start to use going forward. This is historic stuff.
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President Trump responds to the domestic and foreign alignment of provocations.

President Trump doesn’t have too many options here.  However, he’s a much more cunning adversary than the Deep State has faced previously.  Strategically a good decision to head-off those carrying the banners in the war parade.  Secretary Pompeo, Secretary Asper, Joint Chiefs’ Milley have an alignment of domestic interests well organized.
Resounding applause will be heard from The State Department, the Pentagon, the CIA, Nikki Haley, Marco Rubio, Lindsey Graham, John Bolton, Tom Cotton, Adam Kinzinger, Mark Levin, Mitt Romney and a host of well positioned senators, soon to be jurists….
The domestic warning was akin to ‘we can create a Benghazi, watch‘.  POTUS takes the energy from the threat, uses a little judo adding his own energy, and controls the outcome.
“Happy New Year” is akin to “Relax, I got this“…. So now we watch.

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If they think Iran is attempting to bait the U.S. into military action in Iraq that will facilitate the agenda of Iran… then why would Pompeo, Esper and Milley take the bait?
The most likely answer is because they (DoS/CIA) wanted to take the bait… then stage an overreaction (DoD)…. and call it “defensive” (DoS)… which makes matters worse…. and draws us in deeper (DoD/DoS)… which is the excuse for war with Iran…. which is ultimately the end goal.

Only this time it’s obvious…
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The scale of media involvement in the 2020 election will likely be the most massively biased propaganda effort in the history of U.S. media manipulation.  Together with the big tech effort from control operatives in social media, the scale of unified effort is likely to exceed Orwellian proportions…
However, that said, after three years of constant media propaganda and narrative engineering, recent polling shows President Trump beating all Democrat candidates.

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Some of the interesting details inside the polling shows that when the furthest-left candidates (Sanders and Warren) are polled against President Trump the college educated numbers swing quickly in Trump’s favor 50% to 45%.  [Review Polling Data Here]

Trump is winning with union voters (Trump leads 48% to 42%) and consumers-NASCAR fans (Trump leads 63% to 32%), weekly Walmart shoppers (Trump leads 54% to 37%), and weekly Amazon shoppers (Trump leads 54% to 43%).

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Former representative Trey Gowdy appears on Fox News for a discussion of the current impeachment process and his outlook for the Senate trial. Mr. Gowdy spent some time with President Trump last weekend, but states he will not be part of the legal team moving forward.

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