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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 8, 2019 15:45:35 GMT -6
Rare for the party in power & not a good sign for Schiff, Pelosi, etc. news.gallup.com/poll/268136/high-enthusiasm-voting-heading-2020.aspxCurrently, about two in three Republicans (66%) and Democrats (65%) report being more excited about voting than they were in previous elections. This differs from the typical pattern Gallup has seen over the years, whereby those who identify with the political party of the incumbent president have been less enthusiastic about voting than members of the opposing party. This is true whether that president is running for election or leaving office. As Democratic President Bill Clinton was preparing to leave office, Republicans and Republican-leaning independents were more likely than Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents to express greater fervor for voting — by 12 percentage points in both polls Gallup took leading up to the 2000 election. This partisan gap was present throughout 2008 when Republican President George W. Bush’s term was ending: Democrats were more likely to report an increase in their enthusiasm for voting than Republicans in all nine polls Gallup conducted that year. And during both elections when Democratic President Barack Obama was in office, Democrats expressed less enthusiasm for voting than Republicans.
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 9, 2019 12:25:41 GMT -6
President Trump's communications director:
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 9, 2019 12:29:45 GMT -6
So, it's ok for Democrats to do it, but not anyone else? Hypocrites just doesn't seem to cover it properly.
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 9, 2019 12:36:59 GMT -6
www.zerohedge.com/political/visitor-logs-reveal-whistleblower-and-dnc-contractor-visited-obama-white-house-multipleVisitor Logs Reveal 'Whistleblower' And DNC Contractor Visited Obama White House Multiple Times A controversial whistleblower who allegedly reported second-hand on President Donald Trump’s private conversation with the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky visited the Obama White House on numerous occasions, according to Obama era visitor logs obtained by Judicial Watch. Last week Real Clear Investigation’s first reported the whistleblower’s name. It is allegedly CIA officer Eric Ciaramella. His name, however, has been floating around Washington D.C. since the leak of Trump’s phone call. It was considered an ‘open secret’ until reporter Paul Sperry published his article. Ciaramella has never openly stated that he is the whistleblower and most news outlets are not reporting his name publicly. He was detailed to the National Security Counsel during the Obama Administration in 2015 and was allegedly sent back to the CIA in 2017, after a number of people within the Trump White House suspected him of leaking information to the press, according to several sources that spoke with SaraACarter.com. Further, the detailed visitor logs reveal that a Ukrainian expert Alexandra Chalupa, a contractor that was hired by the Democratic National Committee during the 2016 election, visited the White House 27 times. Chalupa allegedly coordinated with the Ukrainians to investigate then candidate Trump and his former campaign manager Paul Manafort. Manafort was forced out of his short tenure as campaign manager for Trump when stories circulated regarding business dealings with Ukrainian officials. Manafort was later investigated and convicted by a jury on much lesser charges then originally set forth by Robert Mueller’s Special Counsel investigation. He was given 47 months in prison for basically failing to pay appropriate taxes and committing bank fraud. Both Ciaramella and Chalupa are of interest to Republican’s investigating the what some conservatives have described as the second Trump ‘witch-hunt.’ And many have called for the whistleblower to testify to Congress. They are absolutely correct and within the law. There is so much information and evidence that reveals that this was no ordinary whistleblower complaint but one that may have been based on highly partisan actions targeting Trump. Here’s just one example: Ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee Devin Nunes said its impossible to have a fair impeachment inquiry without the testimony of the alleged whistleblower because he is a ‘fact foundational witness’ who had met with Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-CA, previously. Schiff had originally denied that he had any contact with his committee and then had to walk back his statements when it was revealed that the whistleblower had met with the Democrats prior to filing his complaint to the Intelligence Inspector General about the President. Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton, said the visitor logs reveal that there is much lawmakers or the American public don’t know about what happened during the 2016 presidential elections and moreover it raises very significant questions about the apparent partisan nature of the whistleblower. “Judicial Watch’s analysis of Obama White House visitor logs raises additional questions about the Obama administration, Ukraine and the related impeachment scheme targeting President Trump,” said Fitton, in a press release Friday. “Both Mr. Ciaramella and Ms. Chalupa should be questioned about the meetings documented in these visitor logs.” Read Below From Judicial Watch The White House visitor logs revealed the following individuals met with Eric Ciaramella while he was detailed to the Obama White House: Daria Kaleniuk: Co-founder and executive director of the Soros-funded Anticorruption Action Center (AntAC) in Ukraine. She visited on December 9, 2015 The Hill reported that in April 2016, during the U.S. presidential race, the U.S. Embassy under Obama in Kiev, “took the rare step of trying to press the Ukrainian government to back off its investigation of both the U.S. aid and (AntAC).” Gina Lentine: Now a senior program officer at Freedom House, she was formerly the Eurasia program coordinator at Soros funded Open Society Foundations. She visited on March 16, 2016. Rachel Goldbrenner: Now an NYU law professor, she was at that time an advisor to then-Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power. She visited on both January 15, 2016 and August 8, 2016. Orly Keiner: A foreign affairs officer at the State Department who is a Russia specialist. She is also the wife of State Department Legal Advisor James P. Bair. She visited on both March 4, 2016 and June 20, 2015. Nazar Kholodnitzky: The lead anti-corruption prosecutor in Ukraine. He visited on January 19, 2016. On March 7, 2019, The Associated Press reported that the then-U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch called for him to be fired. Michael Kimmage: Professor of History at Catholic University of America, at the time was with the State Department’s policy planning staff where specialized in Russia and Ukraine issues. He is a fellow at the German Marshall Fund. He was also one of the signatories to the Transatlantic Democracy Working Group Statement of Principles. He visited on October 26, 2015. James Melville: Then-recently confirmed as Obama’s Ambassador to Estonia, visited on September 9, 2015. On June 29, 2018, Foreign Policy reported that Melville resigned in protest of Trump. Victoria Nuland: who at the time was assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian Affairs met with Ciaramella on June 17, 2016. (Judicial Watch has previously uncovered documents revealing Nuland had an extensive involvement with Clinton-funded dossier. Judicial Watch also released documents revealing that Nuland was involved in the Obama State Department’s “urgent” gathering of classified Russia investigation information and disseminating it to members of Congress within hours of Trump taking office.)
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 10, 2019 9:12:57 GMT -6
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 11, 2019 10:04:56 GMT -6
On Sunday morning Lindsey made this promise, “So, if they don’t call the whistleblower, this thing is dead on arrival in the Senate.”
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 11, 2019 10:06:32 GMT -6
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 11, 2019 10:14:19 GMT -6
Do it & watch the left blow up again lol: www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-says-transcript-of-second-ukraine-call-will-probably-be-released-tuesday/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab7e&linkId=76754601President Trump said Saturday that a transcript of another call he had with the president of Ukraine will “probably” be released on Tuesday. The call took place in April after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was elected. Concerns about Mr. Trump’s July 25 call with Zelensky, where he asked Ukraine to investigate political rival Joe Biden, sparked the ongoing House impeachment inquiry. Mr. Trump spoke to reporters before boarding Air Force One to travel to Alabama for the Alabama-LSU football game. He repeated his assertion that the impeachment inquiry is a “witch hunt.”
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 11, 2019 10:15:08 GMT -6
This has to hurt:
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 11, 2019 10:21:22 GMT -6
www.dailywire.com/news/politico-claims-no-evidence-exists-that-ukraine-colluded-with-clinton-campaign-dnc-in-2016-dismissing-earlier-reportingOn Friday, Politico’s Natasha Bertrand and Andrew Desiderio reported that Trump officials testified that they had not seen evidence that the Ukraine government acted to stop President Donald Trump from winning the 2016 election. The authors call it a “conspiracy theory” to suggest otherwise. From Politico: TOP ARTICLES 1/6 READ MORE JACOBS: Why The U.S. Supreme Court Needs To Recognize Fetal Rights According to [Trump attorney Rudy] Giuliani, Ukrainian officials conspired with the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee to help boost the Democratic nominee’s campaign and damage Trump’s candidacy. No evidence has emerged to support that idea. The “no evidence” line is the one the media likes to use a lot in the Trump era. It lets them dismiss evidence that goes against the Left’s narrative. The line could have been used in the Obama era as well, but the media dutifully reported whatever that administration told them as if it was fact. ADVERTISEMENTSCROLL TO CONTINUE READING In January 2017, two other Politico reporters – Kenneth Vogel and David Stern – reported that there was evidence of what Giuliani had claimed: Ukrainian government officials tried to help Hillary Clinton and undermine Trump by publicly questioning his fitness for office. They also disseminated documents implicating a top Trump aide in corruption and suggested they were investigating the matter, only to back away after the election. And they helped Clinton’s allies research damaging information on Trump and his advisers, a Politico investigation found. That seems to vindicate everything Giuliani has claimed. Journalist Tim Pool, who first noticed the disconnect between the outlet’s reporting, suggested the wording from the most recent Politico story could give them leeway in their claims. “The way Natasha characterizes what the conspiracy is gives them plausible deniability. ‘oh no we KNOW Ukraine did this, but we meant that they thought it was DIRECTLY with Clinton’s campaign,’” Pool tweeted. As Politico reported nearly three years ago, a Ukrainian-American consultant for the DNC, Alexandra Chalupa, shared information she received from her Ukraine sources with the DNC in an effort to undermine Trump’s candidacy. She told the outlet she also shared the information she found on Trump’s campaign manager Paul Manafort’s Ukraine dealings with the country’s ambassador to the U.S., Valeriy Chaly, and one of his top aides. The aide, Oksana Shulyar, claimed that she and Chalupa didn’t work with Clinton’s campaign to dig up dirt on Trump. More from Politico: But Andrii Telizhenko, who worked as a political officer in the Ukrainian Embassy under Shulyar, said she instructed him to help Chalupa research connections between Trump, Manafort and Russia. “Oksana said that if I had any information, or knew other people who did, then I should contact Chalupa,” recalled Telizhenko, who is now a political consultant in Kiev. “They were coordinating an investigation with the Hillary team on Paul Manafort with Alexandra Chalupa,” he said, adding “Oksana was keeping it all quiet,” but “the embassy worked very closely with” Chalupa. The idea that there is “no evidence” that Ukraine officials helped Hillary Clinton’s campaign and the DNC to undermine Trump is the height of media bias. One can object to phrasing, but the evidence we have suggests that there was some level of coordination between the DNC and campaign and Ukraine officials.
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 11, 2019 10:41:58 GMT -6
thefederalist.com/2019/11/08/transcript-shows-vindman-schiff-repeatedly-obstructed-questions-about-classified-leaks/Transcript Shows Vindman, Schiff Repeatedly Obstructed Questions About Classified Leaks NOVEMBER 8, 2019 By Chrissy Clark The transcript of the deposition between Lt. Alexander Vindman and the Select Committee on Intelligence, Committee on Oversight and Reform, and Committee on Foreign Affairs shows how desperate Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., and his staff are to prevent witnesses from answering certain questions. In reference to the call between President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, asked Vindman if he discussed the phone call with anyone after it took place. “Who else did you talk to following the July 25 call?” Jordan asked. Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., Schiff, and Vindman’s criminal defense attorney immediately jumped in to ensure Vindman didn’t answer the question. As Sean Davis points out, Vindman’s attorney was clearly trying to stop him from answering two key questions: Did Vindman deliberately work to undermine President Trump’s foreign policy? Did Vindman have any conversations about Trump’s classified phone call outside the chain of command? Swalwell, Schiff, and Vindman’s attorney disrupted the witnesses’ testimony time and time again. What in the world does Vindman have to hide? Republicans and the American people still do not have answers to these important questions. If Vindman were working to undermine Trump’s foreign policy, it only adds to the growing pile of evidence that this impeachment inquiry is a hoax designed by people who are unhappy with the results of the 2016 election.
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 11, 2019 17:04:26 GMT -6
thehill.com/opinion/white-house/440730-how-the-obama-white-house-engaged-ukraine-to-give-russia-collusionThe other case raised at the January 2016 meeting, Telizhenko said, involved Burisma Holdings, a Ukrainian energy company under investigation in Ukraine for improper foreign transfers of money. At the time, Burisma allegedly was paying then-Vice President Joe Biden’s son Hunter as both a board member and a consultant. More than $3 million flowed from Ukraine to an American firm tied to Hunter Biden in 2014-15, bank records show.
According to Telizhenko, U.S. officials told the Ukrainians they would prefer that Kiev drop the Burisma probe and allow the FBI to take it over. The Ukrainians did not agree. But then Joe Biden pressured Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko to fire Ukraine’s chief prosecutor in March 2016, as I previously reported. The Burisma case was transferred to NABU, then shut down.Obviously, this is a very bold and shocking statement. Sure enough — If you run a search on the White House visitor logs during the final year (2016) of the Obama administration you find that Eric Ciaramella is listed over 200 times. Ciaramella hosted a meeting with Ukrainian diplomat Andrii Telizhenko on January 19, 2016 in the Obama White House. There may have been a series of meetings held that day with Ukrainian officials in the Obama White House. It is clear that Eric Ciaramella hosted one meeting. It is also clear that this is the day the US told Ukrainian officials in the White House to fire Viktor Shokin. This is why Eric Ciaramella MUST TESTIFY. He may have filed his phony second-hand “whistleblower” report because he was definitely in on the plot fire the Ukrainian prosecutor investigating Hunter Biden.
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 11, 2019 17:05:46 GMT -6
saraacarter.com/horowitz-report-will-be-damning-criminal-referrals-likely/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=social-pugHorowitz’s investigation on the bureau’s probe into the now debunked theory that Trump colluded with Russia in the 2016 presidential election will more than likely result in the declassification of documents — requested by senior Republican lawmakers for more than several years. These are the same documents President Trump turned over to Attorney General William Barr in May, giving him ‘full and complete authority” to declassify.
Those documents will contain several classified pages of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act on former Trump campaign advisor Carter Page, exculpatory evidence that was withheld from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, the so-called ‘Gang of Eight’ folder (which contained exculpatory information), as well as the email chain between FBI investigators in the Russia probe and then-FBI Director James Comey. Those emails also include discussions with lawyers in the DOJ’s national security division. As previously reported, the email chains will contain information that prove the FBI knew prior to obtaining a warrant to spy on Page that former British spy Christopher Steele’s information in his infamous dossier on Trump could not be proven.
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 11, 2019 17:07:08 GMT -6
www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/defense-national-security/a-bad-look-vindmans-testimony-while-in-uniform-divides-military-communitySome of Alexander Vindman’s fellow soldiers have blasted him for testifying in uniform during the House impeachment hearings, accusing him of politicizing the military by stating personal opinions that were highly critical of President Trump.
Vindman, 44, the National Security Council’s Ukraine director, was thrust into the political spotlight when he testified before Congress on Oct. 29 as one of the few people who listened in on a July phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
His appearance in uniform has been a point of contention. Military members detailed to the NSC typically wear suits but Vindman gave his testimony in uniform, and was lauded for having been awarded a Purple Heart for being wounded in Iraq, and a Combat Infantryman’s Badge.
“This is a bad look for him to be in uniform,” an active duty military officer stationed at the Pentagon told the Washington Examiner. “He makes it look like the Army is behind this. Like the Army is pushing a coup.”
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 11, 2019 17:09:37 GMT -6
www.dailywire.com/news/trump-tweets-gops-list-of-impeachment-witnesses-dems-tell-gop-get-lost-media-fact-checksTrump Tweets GOP’s List Of Impeachment Witnesses; Dems Tell GOP ‘Get Lost’; Media Fact-Checks Over the weekend, Republicans released their list of witnesses they want to testify in the Democrat-led impeachment hearings, and many Democrats are clearly unhappy about it, decrying the witness list as an attempt to supposedly promote pro-Trump conspiracy theories. While one particularly incensed Democrat told the Republicans to “GET LOST” in response to the “sham” list, President Trump appears to have given his official endorsement of the people GOP congressional committee members would like to get a chance to ask some tough questions related to Ukraine. On Monday, Trump retweeted the list posted by House Oversight Committee Ranking Member Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH): 00:14 / 00:15 TOP ARTICLES 1/6 READ MORE JACOBS: Why The U.S. Supreme Court Needs To Recognize Fetal Rights The whistleblower and all of the whistleblower’s alleged sources Hunter Biden, Joe Biden’s son who was hired by Ukraine-based energy company Burisma Holdings shortly after his father was appointed as head of U.S.-Ukraine relations Devon Archer, Hunter Biden’s former long-time business partner who also served on the board of Burisma Alexandra Chalupa, a “Ukrainian-American consultant for the Democratic National Committee who allegedly had meetings with officials at the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington, D.C. to discuss incriminating information about Trump campaign officials during the 2016 presidential election,” as Fox News explains. (Chalupa’s alleged role in trying to dig up dirt on Trump was first reported by Politico in 2017.) Nellie Ohr, who testified in front of Congress in 2018 that Fusion GPS compiled the salacious anti-Trump Steele dossier in part from information from Ukrainian sources Kurt Volker, a former envoy to Ukraine Tim Morrison, a former National Security Council official As first reported by Fox News, Intelligence Committee Ranking Member Devin Nunes (R-CA) accused House Intelligence Committee Chair Adam Schiff (D-CA), who’s heading up the Democrats’ impeachment efforts, in a letter Saturday of overseeing a “sham impeachment process” and explained the rationale for the witnesses included in the Republicans’ list. “Americans see through this sham impeachment process, despite the Democrats’ efforts to retroactively legitimize it last week,” wrote Nunes. “To provide transparency to your otherwise opaque and unfair process, and after consultation with [House Oversight Committee] Ranking Member Jim Jordan and [House Foreign Affairs Committee] Ranking Member Michael McCaul, the American people deserve to hear from the following witnesses in an open setting.” “Because the Democrats’ resolution unfairly restricts Minority rights and because you have provided no information about which witnesses you may invite to testify at future hearings not yet scheduled, we reserve our right to request additional witnesses, if necessary, as you announce additional hearings,” Nunes wrote. “Your failure to fulfill Minority witness requests shall constitute evidence of your denial of fundamental fairness and due process.” Nunes preemptively defended the choices of the witnesses, including Chalupa, who he said is included because of Trump’s “documented belief that the Ukrainian government meddled in the 2016 election to oppose his candidacy, which forms the basis for a reasonable desire for Ukraine to investigate the circumstances surrounding the election and any potential Ukrainian involvement.” Chalupa, he wrote, “is a prime fact witness who can assist Congress and the American public in better understanding the facts and circumstances surrounding Ukrainian involvement in the 2016 election.” Ohr’s work with Fusion GPS, which included “assist[ing] in the production of the Steele Dossier,” in part allegedly using Ukrainian sources, also makes her a key witness. As for the whistleblower, Republicans have been increasingly demanding a public testimony so Trump can “face his accuser.” Democrats appear to have been unimpressed by the list, House Democratic Caucus Chair Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) tweeting in response to the “sham” list: “My two cents? GET LOST.” Media outlets have since been working to “fact-check” the list. While Fox News took the list of witnesses seriously, explaining the roles the potential witnesses have played in Ukraine-related developments, others, like MSNBC and The New York Times predictably approached it with a skepticism mirroring the Democrats. Along with retweeting the Republicans’ witness list, Trump has been applying even more pressure for the anonymous whistleblower to come forward. “The lawyer for the Whistleblower takes away all credibility from this big Impeachment Scam! It should be ended and the Whistleblower, his lawyer and Corrupt politician Schiff should be investigated for fraud!” Trump tweeted Monday. “Shifty Adam Schiff will only release doctored transcripts. We haven’t even seen the documents and are restricted from (get this) having a lawyer. Republicans should put out their own transcripts! Schiff must testify as to why he MADE UP a statement from me, and read it to all!” he wrote in another, adding later: “Where is the Whistleblower who gave so much false information? Must testify along with Schiff and others!”
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 11, 2019 17:11:50 GMT -6
www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/11/11/democrats-shift-from-quid-pro-quo-to-bribery-and-extortion-ahead-of-public-impeachment-hearings/Democrats are shifting their rhetoric ahead of public impeachment hearings, from accusing President Trump of a “quid pro quo” to “bribery” or “extortion,” believing that the stronger and simpler words will play better. The messaging was unveiled during Sunday morning shows, ahead of the first hearing on Wednesday. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA), a member of the House Intelligence Committee, accused Trump of an “extortion scheme.” “We have enough evidence from the depositions that we’ve done to warrant bringing this forward, evidence of an extortion scheme, using taxpayer dollars to ask a foreign government to investigate the president’s opponent,” he said on CBS News’s Face the Nation. Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA), a member of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, accused Trump of “bribery or treason.” “Because you have an elected official, the president, demanding action of a foreign country in this case, and providing something of value, which is the investigation, and he is withholding aid, which is that official act,” she said on ABC News’s This Week. “And the Constitution is very clear: treason, bribery, or acts of omission. In this case, it’s clearly one of those,” she said. Rep. Jim Himes (D-CT) explained that “quid pro quo” is too complicated a concept. “I have two problems with quid pro quo,” he said on NBC News’s Meet the Press. “Number one, when you’re trying to persuade the American people of something that is really pretty simple, which is that the president acted criminally and extorted in the way a mob boss would extort somebody, a vulnerable foreign country, it’s probably best not to use Latin words to explain it.” He said the distinction between “quid pro quo” and a word like “extortion” will be critical during the public hearings. He said, “What they’re going to hear is they are going to hear immensely patriotic, beautifully articulate people telling a story of a president who — let’s forget quid pro quo, quid pro quo is one of these things to muddy the works — who extorted a vulnerable country by holding up a military aid.” Some mainstream media columnists have been arguing that Democrats should drop the term “quid pro quo.” Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson wrote on November 7, “Enough with all the Latin. ‘Quid pro quo’ is a namby-pamby, wishy-washy way to describe the crime President Trump clearly committed in his dealings with Ukraine. The correct term is bribery, and the punishment under federal law is up to 15 years in prison.” The impeachment inquiry will hold its first public hearings this Wednesday, with Ukraine Embassy Chargé d’Affaires Bill Taylor and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs George Kent, and then Friday with former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch. House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA) chose them to testify first because each has “unimpeachable character” and are “apolitical career officials,” an aide told Axios. “You’ve got to have a blockbuster opener and closer. That’s why we went with Taylor and Kent,” a second aide told Axios. Democrats believe that Yovanovitch, who Trump removed from her posting in May, will engender sympathy from the public. “Yovanovitch was the first victim of the president’s scheme with Giuliani,” the second aide said. That draws the “sympathy of the audience.” Democrats will reportedly have National Security Council (NSC) official Alexander Vindman, an Army lieutenant colonel, testify next week as a “closer.” “He’d come in his dress blues — how powerful would that be?” the aide told Axios. Republicans on Saturday submitted to Schiff their list of witnesses they are requesting to testify. The list included Hunter Biden, Biden’s business partner Devon Archer, the “whistleblower,” anyone else the “whistleblower” spoke to to write his complaint, Democratic National Committee contractor Alexandra Chalupa, Fusion GPS researcher Nellie Ohr, former Special Envoy to Ukraine Kurt Volker, former NSC official Tim Morrison, and State Department official David Hale. House Intelligence Committee Ranking Member Devin Nunes (R-CA) has requested that Schiff testify since he is the only member of Congress whose staff has interacted with the “whistleblower.” Schiff has said he would not approve witnesses that would turn the impeachment inquiry into a “sham” — borrowing Republicans’ description of the impeachment inquiry.
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 11, 2019 17:20:02 GMT -6
As they continue the impeachment sham, let's not forget this classic: www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/jul/12/obama-admin-sent-taxpayer-money-oust-netanyahu/The State Department paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxpayers grants to an Israeli group that used the money to build a campaign to oust Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in last year’s Israeli parliamentary elections, a congressional investigation concluded Tuesday. Some $350,000 was sent to OneVoice, ostensibly to support the group’s efforts to back Israeli-Palestinian peace settlement negotiations. But OneVoice used the money to build a voter database, train activists and hire a political consulting firm with ties to President Obama’s campaign — all of which set the stage for an anti-Netanyahu campaign, the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations said in a bipartisan staff report. In one stunning finding, the subcommittee said OneVoice even told the State Department’s top diplomat in Jerusalem of its plans in an email, but the official, Consul General Michael Ratney, claims never to have seen them. He said he regularly deleted emails with large attachments — a striking violation of open-records laws for a department already reeling from former Secretary Hillary Clinton’s handling of official government records.
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 11, 2019 17:22:20 GMT -6
www.marketwatch.com/story/nikki-haley-says-top-white-house-advisers-tried-to-subvert-trump-2019-11-10Rex Tillerson and John Kelly said they were ‘trying to save the country’ by subverting Trump, Nikki Haley claims ‘[John] Kelly and [Rex] Tillerson confided in me that when they resisted the president, they weren’t being insubordinate, they were trying to save the country.’ That’s how Nikki Haley, who served as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, described attempts by President Trump’s former advisers to recruit her to undermine his authority, according to the Washington Post. “It was their decisions, not the president’s, that were in the best interests of America, they said. The president didn’t know what he was doing,” Haley, who resigned her position in 2018, said of their views. Separately, Haley told CBS she didn’t like having Tillerson and Kelly confide in her. “Instead of saying that to me, they should’ve been saying that to the president, not asking me to join them on their sidebar plan,” she said. Kelly defended himself in a response to CBS. “If by resistance and stalling she means putting a staff process in place … to ensure the (president) knew all the pros and cons of what policy decision he might be contemplating so he could make an informed decision, then guilty as charged,” he said. Here’s Haley’s thoughts on impeachment from the same interview: In her memoir, “With all due respect,” which was obtained by the Post and comes out Tuesday, Haley explained that she and others had an obligation to carry out Trump’s directives since he was elected by voters.
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 12, 2019 6:44:05 GMT -6
Props to Rush Limbaugh, he perfectly called this: www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2019/11/11/keep-an-eye-on-lev-parnas/Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman are the two associates of Rudy Giuliani from Ukraine who were indicted by the Southern District of New York. That story is about a month old now. These two Ukrainian guys — associates of Rudy — claimed that things were being stacked in their favor. If they did this, they were gonna get that. Rudy was said to be right in the middle of their criminal activity, their suspicious activity.
They were originally both represented legally by John Dowd, who was Trump’s original defense lawyer. Lev Parnas has fired John Dowd and hired a lawyer by the name of Joseph Bondy. Joseph Bondy is “a New York City criminal defense and cannabis business attorney,” meaning he’s an attorney in the marijuana business. Sounds like a real beaut of a guy. Joseph Bondy is the new lawyer for Lev Parnas.
Now, the fact that Lev Parnas fired John Dowd and hired Bondy suggests that it was at least possible Parnas and Fruman were parting ways in their defense. They were gonna go it together, but now Fruman is still represented by Dowd; Parnas has fired Dowd and is going his own way. Now, it’s not a surprise the New York Times is reporting that Lev Parnas is saying that Rudy “directed him in May of ’19, 2019, to call the president of Ukraine,” Zelensky, “and to tell him that Zelensky’s aid would not be forthcoming if he didn’t agree to investigate the Bidens.”
The New York Times, again, is reporting that Parnas says that Rudy directed him in May of 2019 to tell the Ukrainian president that his aid would not be forthcoming if Ukraine did not agree to investigate the Bidens. Aid to Ukraine would be withheld and Vice President Pence would not show up at Zelensky’s swearing in. This is what Lev Parnas is now saying. So I think this is gonna be Schiff’s next guy. This is the next bombshell, meaning: “The whistleblower is no longer necessary.
“His information has been trumped,” so to speak, “by Lev Parnas.” The New York Times… Look, folks, when the New York Times is in a story, you can guarantee the whole thing is a manufactured event when the Times reporting on it as though it’s a legitimate news story that they have ferreted out, which is not the case here. They have simply been used, willingly, as they have been throughout this last three years.
The story in the Times “concedes that the other two people at the meeting — Fruman and the aide to Zelensky — say the conversation didn’t happen, as Parnas is alleging it happened.” So again to review: Parnas fires his lawyer — Trump’s original defense lawyer, John Dowd — and hires some guy that works in the cannabis business named Joseph Bondy.
The New York Times is reporting that Lev Parnas says Rudy told him in May of ’19 to tell the president of Ukraine, Zelensky, that “his aid would not be forthcoming if he didn’t investigate the Bidens” and Pence wouldn’t show up at Zelensky’s swearing-in ceremony.
.............................................. Right on cue:
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 12, 2019 6:57:03 GMT -6
www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/11/11/impeachment-inquiry-witness-trump-lectured-previous-ukraine-president-about-corruption-too/A key witness called by Democrats to appear before the House Intelligence Committee testified last month that President Donald Trump had temporarily blocked U.S. aid to Ukraine in 2017 — and expressed some similar concerns to those in 2019. Catherine Croft, a State Department official specializing in Ukraine, told a closed-door meeting that Trump, through the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), held up the first grant of military aid to the Ukrainian government of then-President Petro Poroshenko partly because of concerns about the country’s corruption and the president’s frustration that the U.S. was expected to pay for its defense. Another concern was how Russia would react to the first provision of lethal weapons — which President Barack Obama had denied to Ukraine despite ongoing Russian attacks. Croft testified that prior to the now-infamous hold on aid in the summer of 2019, there had been a hold in late 2017 for “a week or two” at the direction of OMB Director Mick Mulvaney, acting on behalf of President Trump. The main reason, she said, was concern about “the Russian reaction” — the same reason that Obama administration officials had been cautious about providing military aid. Eventually, President Trump provided the aid, particularly Javelin anti-tank missiles, which helped Ukraine push back the Russian advance. But he did so, she said, after lecturing President Poroshenko — to his face — about Ukraine’s corruption and inability to pay for its own defense: Croft: The President was skeptical of providing weapons to Ukraine. Q: Why? A: When this was discussed, including in front of the Ukrainian delegation, in fnont of President Poroshenko, he described his concerns being that Ukraine was corrupt, that it was capable of being a very rich country, and that the United States shouldn’t pay for it, but instead, we should be providing aid through loans. Croft later reiterated the president’s concerns that “Ukraine is corrupt, and that Europe should be stepping up to do more to provide security assistance to Ukraine.” Trump has voiced similar concerns about U.S. military aid to other countries — that American taxpayers bear the burden of their defense. The president expressed similar concerns on his July 25 call with new President Volodymyr Zelensky — with the additional request that Ukraine look into allegations of interference in the 2016 election; and into the firing, at the direction of former Vice President Joe Biden, of a prosecutor overseeing an investigation into Burisma, a Ukrainian gas company on whose board his son, Hunter, served. Democrats have alleged, both during and outside of the hearings, that Trump did not care about corruption in general, and only cared about Burisma and the Bidens.
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 12, 2019 6:57:51 GMT -6
www.breitbart.com/clips/2019/11/11/nunes-transcripts-are-devastating-to-the-democrats/As House Democrats speed toward impeachment, some are wondering how the U.S. Senate, controlled by the Republican Party, will react when the ball is in the Senate’s court. Representative Devin Nunes (R-CA), the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, urged folks to take a wait-and-see approach to the proceedings. He explained how Democrats and the media will attempt to frame the storylines but added that the recently released transcripts from the closed House Intelligence Committee impeachment hearings last week show the testimony given was “devastating to the Democrats.” “Let’s see how this goes this week,” Nunes said. “My guess is it’s going to be a complete circus. We’re not going to get any of our witnesses. The mainstream media is going to say how damaging it is to the president. That’s just going to be the storyline. But the fact of the matter is if you actually read these transcripts and Gregg Jarrett was just going through them … these transcripts as we were saying when the Democrats were slowly leaking them out to their friends in the media – that’s what we’ve been doing for the last six weeks. But now that the transcripts are out, they’re devastating to the Democrats. So, let’s see where this goes. But at the end of the day, the Senate should be calling all these people in as soon as possible.”
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 12, 2019 6:58:36 GMT -6
www.breitbart.com/clips/2019/11/11/mo-brooks-whistleblower-a-spy-acting-on-behalf-of-the-democratic-party-joe-biden/During an appearance on Huntsville, AL radio’s WVNN on Monday, Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL) gave his thoughts on a claim made by former United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley alleging then-White House chief of staff John Kelly and then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson sought to undermine the will of President Donald Trump. Brooks chalked the saga up to “palace intrigue,” which he said was common in presidential administrations, particularly in the Trump administration, given the variety of worldviews Trump has brought into the White House. However, Brooks said where the real threat lies is in “people like” the so-called whistleblower, who Brooks deemed to be a spy for Democrats. “It becomes a real problem when you have people like the whistleblower, who is, in fact, a spy in my judgment,” Brooks said. “And he was a spy on behalf of the Democratic Party, Joe Biden and who knows whom else. And I suspect he went into the White House knowing he was going to spy and he was going to try to undermine the president of the United States as best he could. Now when you have someone of that nature, that is a real problem.” “And to me, we need to look long and hard at this whistleblower, and there ought to be a determination as to whether he should be fired if he violated any laws that relate to the confidentiality of communications between the president of the United States, on the one hand, and the president of the Ukraine on the other, because his doing what he did as a spy on behalf of the Democrats, has created a significant amount of friction between the United States of America, Ukraine and who knows who else,” he added.
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 12, 2019 7:02:31 GMT -6
thefederalist.com/2019/11/12/in-their-own-words-democrats-explain-why-this-impeachment-is-a-farce/In Their Own Words, Democrats Explain Why This Impeachment Is A Farce The House impeachment effort is bureaucracy versus democracy in the Democrats' brazen attempt to protect the 'independence' of the deep state. Adam MillBy Adam Mill NOVEMBER 12, 2019 It’s getting exhausting having to explain over and over and over why the Ukraine farce is a silly (if sinister) exhibition of poorly written political fiction. As such, I’m going to hand the microphone over to some of the people advancing this terrible sequel to the horrible Russia collusion hoax. Let’s start with the former vice president, the person with whom this all started. What is his opinion about the scandal? “This behavior is particularly abhorrent because it exploits the foreign policy of our country and undermines our national security for political purposes,” Biden said in a statement. “It means that [President Trump] used the power and resources of the United States to pressure a sovereign nation — a partner that is still under direct assault from Russia — pushing Ukraine to subvert the rule of law in the express hope of extracting a political favor.” Whoa! Don’t be so rough on yourself, Joe. Here is Biden’s video-recorded confession that he “used the power and resources of the United States to pressure a sovereign nation — a partner that is still under direct assault from Russia — pushing Ukraine to subvert the rule of law in the express hope of extracting a political favor.” www.cfr.org/event/foreign-affairs-issue-launch-former-vice-president-joe-bidenHe said, “I looked at them and said: I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money. Well, son of a b-tch. (Laughter) He got fired.” Biden held up U.S. aid to get a Ukrainian prosecutor fired — but Donald Trump needs to be impeached. Witnesses Are Only Relevant If They Favor ImpeachmentHow about the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee? Rep. Adam Schiff recently penned an article in which he partially explained why he’s so triggered. He wants to know whether the White House conditioned a meeting with Ukraine, “on Ukraine’s willingness to launch and publicly announce sham political investigations to discredit the unanimous conclusion that Russia interfered in the 2016 election and into President Trump’s potential political rival in 2020.” www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2019/11/05/impeachment-trump-redirected-foreign-policy-personal-benefit-column/4159426002/Somewhere in Schiff’s version of the Constitution, it says the elected U.S. president can’t question or attempt to discredit a “unanimous” conclusion or else he must be impeached. Schiff recently issued this letter in which he explained the criteria for approving witnesses requested by Republicans in his hippity-hoppity kangaroo impeachment court. Such witnesses must be “relevant,” or Schiff will not approve them. In order for a witness to be relevant, he or she must not contradict any of the following assumptions: intelligence.house.gov/uploadedfiles/20191106_-_hpsci_ch_letter_to_rm_re_witness_requests_-_9183653.pdfThat the president requested a foreign leader and government to initiate an investigation to benefit the president’s personal political interests, That the president sought to use the power of his office to advance his political interests, and That the president sought to obstruct, suppress, or cover up evidence of his actions. Thus, in black and white, Schiff wrote a letter that instructed the powerless Republican minority that only evidence of the president’s guilt would be considered relevant. Does Schiff have a barn? “Maybe we could hold the trial there. I’ll sew the costumes and maybe Uncle Goober can be the judge.” www.quotes.net/mquote/31536Anything that discredits the unanimous conclusion that Trump committed a high crime or misdemeanor will not be received as relevant evidence. So under this criteria, would evidence of a legitimate law enforcement concern over Biden’s involvement in Ukraine be relevant to justify Trump’s interest? No. Only evidence of Trump’s guilt is “relevant.” What about evidence of the highly partisan nature of the whistleblower and his contacts with the chairman? No. There’s a unanimous conclusion that the burden of proof is on the president to prove the absence of his political motives. Democrats Are Undermining DemocracyThe House impeachment effort is a brazen attempt to protect the “independence” of the permanent bureaucracy. It’s bureaucracy versus democracy, and the ironically named Democratic Party has gone to the mattresses to oppose the threat that elections pose to permanent bureaucratic power. Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., told America, “It’s an abuse of power [for the elected president] to remove an [unelected] ambassador for political reasons because you don’t like what they’re doing … period.” Others have suggested the president should be impeached for threatening the independence of the Department of Justice. Others have argued that Trump questioning the House Intelligence Committee is an act of treason. dailycaller.com/2019/11/07/swalwell-abuse-of-power-trump/www.nytimes.com/2018/05/21/us/politics/trump-justice-department-independence.htmlwww.businessinsider.com/did-trump-committ-treason-russia-summit-2018-7The voters are supposed to exercise their control over these powerful bureaucratic functions through their elected president. If Schiff gets his way, however, our elections will become ceremonial exercises that never change real power. That leads to the question: Why take this question away from the voters? The voters can simply vote for a new president next year. For this, we turn to Rep. Al Green, D-Texas, who was asked, “Congressman, are you concerned that impeachment talk might actually help the president’s reelection?” Green answered, “I’m concerned that if we don’t impeach this president, he will get reelected.” www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/05/06/al_green_im_concerned_if_we_dont_impeach_this_president_he_will_get_re-elected.htmlSo in the words of the people running impeachment: Joe Biden threatened to withhold aid from Ukraine unless it fired the prosecutor investigating his son’s company. This is a crime so troubling that nothing short of impeaching Trump will address the gravity of the situation. Republicans will be allowed to call any witness and ask any question so long as the information shows why the president is guilty. All of this will defend bureaucratic independence, which has been threatened by the results of the 2016 election and must be accomplished before the voters have a chance to repeat their mistake in 2020. These are their words. That’s what they’re saying about their own farce.
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 12, 2019 7:12:47 GMT -6
www.nationalreview.com/2019/11/trump-impeachment-inquiry-illegitimate-ten-reasons-why/Ten Reasons Why Impeachment Is Illegitimate By VICTOR DAVIS HANSON November 12, 2019 6:30 AM President Trump speaks at the White House, April 17, 2019. (Carlos Barria/Reuters) We are witnessing constitutional government dissipating before our very eyes. “#coup has started. First of many steps. #rebellion. #impeachment will follow ultimately. #lawyers …” “#coup has started. As one falls, two more will take their place. #rebellion #impeachment” 2017 Tweets from Mark Zaid, current attorney for the “whistleblower” There are at least ten reasons why the Democratic impeachment “inquiry” is a euphemism for an ongoing coup attempt. 1) Impeachment 24/7. The impeachment “inquiry,” supposedly prompted by the president’s Ukrainian call, is simply the most recent in a long series of “coups” that sought to overturn the 2016 election and thus preclude a 2020 reelection bid. The pattern gives away the game. Usually the serial futile attempts to abort the Trump presidency — with the exception of the Mueller Dream-Team debacle — were each characterized by about a month of media-driven hysteria. We remember the voting machines fraud hoax, the initial 2017 impeachment effort, the attempt to warp the Electoral College voting, the Logan Act, the Emoluments Clause, the 25th Amendment, the McCabe-Rosenstein faux coup, and various Michael Avenatti–Stormy Daniels–Michael Cohen psychodramas. Ukraine then is not unique, but simply another mini-coup attempt that follows the last failed coup and will presage another coup to take its place when it too fails to remove Trump. All of these efforts reflect a desperate effort both to reverse the 2016 election and to preclude a 2020 reelection effort, and, barring that, to drive down the Trump polls to the point of making him delegitimized. A week after Trump was elected, the Wall Street Journal reported that intelligence agencies were withholding information from their president. “Anonymous,” in a Sept. 5, 2018, New York Times op-ed, bragged of an ongoing “resistance” of high-ranking government officials seeking to stonewall Trump. As soon as Trump was inaugurated, Washington lawyer and former Obama official Rosa Brooks was publicly raising the possibility of a military coup to remove him. Retired admiral William McRaven recently called for Trump to be gone — “the sooner, the better.” Mark Zaid, the lawyer for the whistleblower, in his arrogance, long ago at least told the truth when he chose the words “coup” and “rebellion” to characterize left-wing efforts to remove Trump. He admitted that the coups would fail (given their lack of legality), but that they would still be followed by successive efforts. In a sane world, with this “bombshell” disclosure, the entire whistleblower caper would now simply vanish. 2) Whistleblowers Who Are Not Whistleblowers. The “whistleblower” who prompted this most recent iteration of attempted Trump removal is no whistleblower by any common definition of the noun (i.e., “an individual who, without authorization, reveals private or classified information about an organization usually related to wrongdoing or misconduct. Whistleblowers generally state that such actions are motivated by a commitment to the public interest.”). He has no incriminating documents, no information at all. He does not even have firsthand evidence of wrongdoing, much less proof of suspect conduct within intelligence agencies that alone would prompt a legitimate appeal to the Office of the Inspector General of the Intelligence Community. Instead, the whistleblower relied on secondhand, water-cooler gossip about an (illegally) leaked presidential call. Even his mangled version of the call did not match that of official transcribers. He was not disinterested but had a long history of partisanship in general, and concerning Ukraine in particular. He was a protégé of many of Trump’s most adamant opponents including Susan Rice, John Brennan, and Joe Biden. He did not follow protocol by going first to the inspector general but instead caucused with the staff of Adam Schiff’s impeachment inquiry. Neither the whistleblower nor his doppelganger Lieutenant Colonel Vindman, who both professed strong pro-Ukrainian sympathies during their past tenures associated with the Obama administration, were bothered by the activities of the Bidens or by the Obama decision to stop arms deliveries to Ukraine. Their outrage, in other words, was not about Ukraine but over Trump. It is highly unlikely that there are any future plans to call the whistleblower or recall Vindman in person before any committee, because their usefulness as instigators of “impeachment” has already passed, and they are now both rank liabilities. Their inconsistencies and past partisan affiliations only offer vulnerabilities. 3) First-term impeachment. The Clinton and Nixon inquiries were directed at second-term presidencies in which there were no more electoral remedies for alleged wrongdoing. In contrast, Trump is up for election in less than a year. Impeachment then seems a partisan exercise in either circumventing a referendum election or in damaging a president seeking reelection. 4) No Special Counsel Finding. In the past, special counsels have found felonious presidential behavior, such as cited in Leon Jaworski’s and Ken Starr’s investigations. In contrast, special counsel Robert Mueller spent 22 months and $35 million, and yet his largely partisan law and investigative team found no collusion and no actionable presidential obstruction of that non-crime. We are not just proceeding with impeachment without a special counsel’s finding of wrongdoing, but after a special counsel’s finding of no actionable wrongdoing. 5) No Bipartisanship. There was broad bipartisan support for the Nixon impeachment inquiry and even some for the Clinton impeachment. There is none at all for the Schiff impeachment effort, given its overtly partisan nature. 6) Impeachment without High Crimes or Misdemeanors. There is no proof of any actual Trump crime. No longer is Nancy Pelosi describing the whistleblower as central to the impeachment inquiry. Asking a corrupt foreign head of state to look into past corruption is pro forma. That Joe Biden is now a candidate for president and Trump’s potential rival does not ensure him exemption from his possible wrongdoing in the past as vice president when his son used the Biden name for lucrative advantage in leveraging Ukrainian money for assumed preferential Obama administration treatment. In other words, it is certainly not a crime for a president to adopt his own foreign policy to fit particular countries nor to request of a foreign government seeking U.S. aid, with a long history of corruption, to ensure that it has not in the past colluded with prior U.S. officials in suspicious activity. A president can appoint or fire any ambassador he chooses, all the more so when one has a known record of partisanship. It is not a crime to disagree with House Intelligence chairman Adam Schiff that White House officials must testify when he so summons them. The irony is that while the House politicizes impeachment, the IG of the Justice Department, Michael Horowitz, and lifelong civil servant and federal attorney John Durham are likely to show concrete evidence that the now-exempt Obama administration used the powers of the FBI, CIA, and DOJ, unethically if not illegally, to attempt to destroy the candidacy, transition, and presidency of Donald Trump — still the current object of yet another political coup. 7) Thought Crimes? Even if there were ever a quid, there is no quo: Unlike the case of the Obama administration, the Trump administration did supply arms to Ukraine, and the Ukrainians apparently did not reinvestigate the Bidens. As a matter of general policy, Trump has been far harder on Russia and far more concretely supportive of Ukraine than was the Obama administration. That stubborn fact is ipso facto evidence that if there was any quid pro quo, it was more likely a matter of Biden rather than Trump pressuring the Ukrainians, given the actual quite different results: Again, the Trump administration armed the Ukrainians; Obama and his administration did not. Thought crimes are still not impeachable offenses. 8) Different Standards of Justice. There is now no standard of equality under the law. Instead, we are entering the jurisprudence of junta politics. If an alleged quid pro quo is an impeachable offense, should Vice President Joe Biden have been impeached or indicted for clearly leveraging the firing of a Ukrainian prosecutor for dubious reasons by threats of withholding U.S. aid? Should Barack Obama have been investigated for getting caught on a hot mic offering to be flexible after his reelection on missile defense if Vladimir Putin would give him some space? In fact, Russia did not embarrass Obama during the subsequent 2012 successful Obama reelection effort, and Obama did shelve joint Eastern European missile-defense plans. So there is no consistency in presidential audits. Would the Obama administration have welcomed or even tolerated congressional requests to turn over all its emails, private phone conversations, and memos concerning covert meetings of U.S. and Iranian officials that surrounded the nocturnal transfer of $400 million in cash for the release of American hostages — much of such money ending up in the hands of Hezbollah terrorists? Would the Obama administration have complied with requests for texts and transcripts surrounding its decisions to halt Eastern European missile defense? 9 ) The Schiff Factor. Representative Adam Schiff is now de facto chief impeachment prosecutor. He has repeatedly lied about the certainty of impending Mueller indictments or bombshells. He flat-out lied that he and his staff had no prior contact with the whistleblower. He made up a version of the Trump call that did not represent the actual transcript and when called out, he begged off by claiming he was offering a “parody.” He has an unsavory reputation as a chronic selective leaker of classified information in the House Intelligence Committee. For weeks he has not allowed Republican members of his House Intelligence Committee to have the same freedom to call and cross-examine witnesses as was extended to the then-minority Democrats during the committee’s 2016-7 investigation of FISA, unmasking, and surveillance abuses. Tradition and protocol argue that the proper place for impeachment inquiries and investigations is the House Judiciary Committee. Schiff successfully hijacked that committee’s historic role for two reasons: 1) His reputation as a brawling hyperpartisan meant that he would turn the investigation into a proverbial witch hunt and wet the lunatic beak of the progressive base; 2) He has the ability so far as intelligence chair selectively to block rapid dissemination of transcripts of cross-examinations of witnesses and to use secrecy to massage the conduct of the committee and to selectively release information to the media. 10) Precedent. The indiscriminate efforts to remove Trump over the past three years, when coupled with the latest impeachment gambit, have now set a precedent in which the out party can use impeachment as a tool to embarrass, threaten, leverage, or seek to remove a sitting president for political purposes to reverse an election. At best, we have turned a uniquely constitutional republic into a European parliamentary system in which heads of states can be removed from power without national elections. At worst, we are now a rank banana republic in which coups are an accepted model of political opposition. The next Democratic president should be prepared, in his first term, for the real chance of facing the same, and apparently now institutionalized, tactics used against Trump. We are witnessing constitutional government dissipating before our very eyes.
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 12, 2019 11:30:16 GMT -6
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 12, 2019 11:32:04 GMT -6
Some key points from the report (which is in Italian) which were supplied to us overseas overnight from a key resource:
1. Mifsud was apparently kidnapped on October 31, 2017. by the head of Italian external intelligence AISE Alberto Manenti. 2. Manenti was fired in November 2018, prior to the other firings at intelligence which occurred in May 2019 and was fired by Italian leader Conte. 3. The Gentiloni government is responsible for the kidnapping and the Conte government is responsible for covering it up. 4. If Italy sponsors kidnapping, it may well sponsor homicide. This applies to all the people who know something bad about the government.
Mifsud’s whereabouts are currently unknown!
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 12, 2019 11:33:40 GMT -6
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 12, 2019 11:34:57 GMT -6
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 12, 2019 11:37:36 GMT -6
A complaint was filed last week to the Intelligence Community Inspector General alleging the ‘whistleleaker’ Eric Ciaramella may have violated federal law by illicitly soliciting more than $250,000 from anonymous donors through a GoFundMe page. The complaint raised the possibility that donations may have come from ‘foreign citizens’ or ‘agents of a foreign government’ — both prohibited sources according to ICIG. www.foxnews.com/politics/icig-complaint-ukraine-whistleblowerThe complaint, which was filed last week and obtained by Fox News, alleged the donations from roughly 6,000 individuals “clearly constitute” gifts to a current intelligence official that may be restricted because of the employee’s official position pursuant to 5 CFR 2635.203 and other statutes. To date, the GoFundMe has raised over $227,000.
The complaint also raised the possibility that some of the donations may have come from prohibited sources, and asked the ICIG to look into whether any “foreign citizen or agent of a foreign government” contributed.
Tully Rinckey PLLC, the law firm representing the individual reporting the allegations, is closely guarding the identity of their client, though Fox News is told the individual is the holder of a top-secret SCI security clearance and has served in government.
“I have not seen anything on this scale,” Anthony Gallo, the managing partner of Tully Rinckey PLLC, told Fox News, referring to the fundraising. “It’s not about politics for my client — it’s whistleblower-on-whistleblower, and [my client’s] only interest is to see the government ethics rules are being complied with government-wide.”The majority of the donors to the GoFundMe are anonymous and a legal expert told Fox News that the ICIG likely would need to subpoena the website to obtain more information on their origins. The Office of Government Ethics (OGE) warned federal government employees in February that they “may not accept any gift given because of the employee’s official position,” meaning that the gift would “not have been given had the employee not held the status, authority, or duties associated with the employee’s federal position.” The OGE said employees may not receive gifts from prohibited sources such as anyone who “conducts activities regulated by the employee’s agency” or who “has interests that can be affected by the performance or non-performance of the employee’s official duties.”
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Post by soonernvolved on Nov 12, 2019 11:50:59 GMT -6
www.zerohedge.com/political/horowitz-report-will-be-damning-criminal-referrals-likelyDepartment of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s much anticipated report on his investigation into the FBI’s probe into President Trump’s campaign is expected to be made public before Thanksgiving and the outcome is alleged to contain several criminal referrals, according to sources who spoke with SaraACarter.com. Horowitz’s investigation on the bureau’s probe into the now debunked theory that Trump colluded with Russia in the 2016 presidential election will more than likely result in the declassification of documents - requested by senior Republican lawmakers for more than several years. These are the same documents President Trump turned over to Attorney General William Barr in May, giving him ‘full and complete authority” to declassify. Those documents will contain several classified pages of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act on former Trump campaign advisor Carter Page, exculpatory evidence that was withheld from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, the so-called ‘Gang of Eight’ folder (which contained exculpatory information), as well as the email chain between FBI investigators in the Russia probe and then-FBI Director James Comey. Those emails also include discussions with lawyers in the DOJ’s national security division. As previously reported, the email chains will contain information that prove the FBI knew prior to obtaining a warrant to spy on Page that former British spy Christopher Steele’s information in his infamous dossier on Trump could not be proven. It is also expected to reveal that the FBI knew that Steele was leaking to the media but then used those media reports are separate evidence in their request for a FISA warrant, known as circular intelligence reporting. Circular reporting is when a law enforcement official uses false confirmation by making a piece of information appear to come from multiple independent sources. Horowitz’s report is also going to contain evidence that the FBI handled Hillary Clinton’s campaign differently than that of President Trump’s campaign. It will reveal that she had received a detailed debriefing from the FBI on foreign attempts to make contact with her campaign. It will reveal the deep bias and animus those FBI officials had toward the Trump campaign. It is the most highly anticipated Horowitz report during the Trump administration’s tenure. Why? Because for more than three years the American people have not had closure or resolution to what exactly warranted the FBI investigation to spy on a presidential campaign, or for that matter on the President. It will also weaken House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff’s current impeachment probe into Trump, as it will prove that his previous statements in support of the FBI’s FISA into Page was based solely on his biased against Trump. This bias, say Republican officials, continues with his push to impeach the President. “If it’s strong and comes out soon, the IG report will do some real damage to the Democrats’ impeachment charade. It would show that Resistance bureaucrats really are conspiring to take down Trump,” said a House Republican source. “It would also fatally undermine the credibility of Schiff, who argued vehemently that there were no FISA abuses—it will mean that, as Intel Committee Chairman, he’s ignoring severe abuses for purely political purposes.” Those political purposes lead to the most important question lingering in Horowitz’s investigation: Did senior officials within the FBI and U.S. intelligence apparatus weaponize the system for political purposes against a candidate for the presidency and did they continue to do so after Trump had been elected? Unlike Horowitz’s other reports, this investigation, which focuses on the machinations of the FBI’s initial beginnings of the probe, is sure to bring with it a wave of new information that the public may not be aware of and the bureau’s connections to the intelligence communities role in its initial investigation. The players: former FBI Director James Comey, former Deputy Director of the FBI Andrew McCabe, former Special Agent Peter Strzok, along with Strzok’s paramour FBI lawyer Lisa Page, are among some of the cast of characters in Horowitz’s report. Others, like former CIA Director John Brennan, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and DOJ official Bruce Ohr may also play a part in his investigation. However, Horowitz has been careful not to let anything leak – not even the day he plans to release the report, which we now know was completed in mid-September and being reviewed for classification purposes with the FBI and DOJ. Here’s what to expect: According to several sources the report will be ‘damning’ and will allegedly contain criminal referrals on former FBI officials. The report will apparently have at least two criminal referrals, said two sources, with knowledge. One of those criminal referrals is expected to be Comey. However, the Inspector General’s office has not been Those referrals allegedly will be made based on information and evidence obtained by the Inspector General and may very well have been the reason Justice Department Attorney General William Barr and Connecticut prosecutor John Durham opened a criminal probe into the FBI’s investigation into the President. Some information has already been made public. In a recent interview with Fox New’s Martha McCallum Sen. Lindsey Graham, who has spoken with Barr, said “I think his report is going to be stunning. I think it is going to be damning. I think it’s going to prove that the system got off the rails and we need corrective action.” As chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Graham, told McCallum his committee will be examining the FBI’s use of a FISA warrant on Page, alongside the current investigation being conducted separately by Durham. He must. The question as to what extent the senior intelligence and federal law enforcement officials weaponized the most trusted institutions in our nation should be answered and made public for the American people. If senior government officials broke the law and abused the system then they must be held accountable and there should never be any question of a two-tiered justice system in our nation.
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