Has U.S. Democracy Been Trumped?

[ggwhiz]

This would be the same Devin Nunes who previous worked for the Trump campaign and was then forced to recuse himself from the Russia investigation for misrepresenting intelligence to benefit Trump...

 

How does recusing oneself square with this nonsense from a "knowledgeable person" who apparently doesn't understand the meaning of the word recuse.

[ldrews]

 

 

Please recall, ***** for brains, YOU were the trumpeting the accuracy of the memo and review cycles it went through.

 

 

Do you always make things up? Please point me to where I was "trumpeting" the accuracy of the memo, etc.

 

The DOJ and FBI reviewed it indicated there were no factual inaccuracies. Do you dispute this?

[ldrews]

This would be the same Devin Nunes who previous worked for the Trump campaign and was then forced to recuse himself from the Russia investigation for misrepresenting intelligence to benefit Trump...

 

 

The direct quote from the FBI is that they have "grave concerns about material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo’s accuracy.”

 

"FBI Director Christopher Wray told the White House he opposes release of a classified Republican memo alleging bias at the FBI and Justice Department because it contains inaccurate information and paints a false narrative"

 

 

 

I believe the House Ethics Committee cleared Nunes of any problems.

 

If Wray is concerned about the problems caused by missing information, then I would invite him to supply it and remove the problem. If he is concerned about inaccurate information, then I would invite him to provide corrected information supported by documentation.

 

At this point the DOJ/FBI must be considered untrustworthy with respect to this issue. And perhaps other issues as well.

[hrothgar]

 

If Wray is concerned about the problems caused by missing information, then I would invite him to supply it and remove the problem. If he is concerned about inaccurate information, then I would invite him to provide corrected information supported by documentation.

 

At this point the DOJ/FBI must be considered untrustworthy with respect to this issue. And perhaps other issues as well.

 

If Wray were to do this, he would be leaking classified information which is a criminal offense.

 

The Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee attempted to provide correct information.

The Republicans on the committee are refusing to allow this to be published.

[ldrews]

If Wray were to do this, he would be leaking classified information which is a criminal offense.

 

The Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee attempted to provide correct information.

The Republicans on the committee are refusing to allow this to be published.

 

That seems to always be the cop-out. "We would tell you but it is classified, so just trust us." Sorry guys, but you are no longer considered trustworthy.

 

Apparently the Democratic memo was full of intelligence methods and sources that needs to be scrubbed and redacted. It is going through that process right now. It has been released to the full House for review. Which is the exact process that the Nunes memo went through. Or do you think the Democratic memo should have been released in its original form?

[andrei]

Lets start cataloging mistakes in the Nunes memo (note: I am quoting / summarizing analysis by Seth Abraham here)

 

1. It says FISA warrant applications must meet the "highest standard" of proof in the justice system. Uh, no. The "highest standard" in the justice system is "proof beyond a reasonable doubt," which is nowhere *close* to the legal standard required to secure a search warrant. The specific FISA standard is "probable cause that the target is an 'agent of a foreign power' who's 'knowingly engaging in clandestine intelligence activities.'"

 

2. The memo then makes *another* error of law on its first page: saying the law requires "all relevant and material facts" to be shown to a warrant-granting court. But that's not true. Many cases confirm that law enforcement can and does leave out key facts without repercussion.

 

Lol confusing "probable cause" with the "highest standard of proof" on the first page?? I knew Nunes was a hack, but I didn't realise he's be such a completely ridiculous hack. And of course our little Larry falls for such idiocy. Poor little guy.

 

LOL guys, did you read the memo?

It is funny how you pretend to be so smart but you lack basic comprehension skills.

 

"

On October 21, 2016, DOJ and FBI sought and received a FISA probable cause order (not under Title VII) authorizing electronic surveillance on Carter Page from the FISC.

......

The FBI and DOJ obtained one initial FISA warrant targeting Carter Page and three FISA renewals from the FISC. As required by statute (50 U.S.C. §1805(d)(1)), a FISA order on an American citizen must be renewed by the FISC every 90 days and each renewal requires a separate finding of probable cause.

"

 

It seems Nunes is well aware probable cause is what is needed for a FISA warrant.

 

Now here is the entire highest standard quote:

 

"

Due to the sensitive nature of foreign intelligence activity, FISA submissions (including renewals) before the FISC are classified. As such, the public's confidence in the integrity of the FISA process depends on the court's ability to hold the government to the highest standard ­— particularly as it relates to surveillance of American citizens. However, the FISC's rigor in protecting the rights of Americans, which is reinforced by 90-day renewals of surveillance orders, is necessarily dependent on the government's production to the court of all material and relevant facts. This should include information potentially favorable to the target of the FISA application that is known by the government.

"

 

Did it really seem to you he is speaking here about proof beyond reasonable doubt?

He says government should act beyond reproach when requesting FISA warrants.

 

4. Page 2 says Steele prepared the dossier "on behalf of" the DNC and Clinton—suggesting he knew he was working for them, or that he *was* working for them, which he wasn't. He was working for Fusion GPS as a sub-contractor—and had no idea who Fusion's clients were. This is a critical point—as this lie is the one Nunes uses to argue that Steele both had a conflict of interest and was biased, when in fact neither was true. Steele was not getting paid to please the DNC and/or Clinton because he literally did not know his work was for them. In fact for the first 8 months that Steele working on the project he was being funded by the Washington Free Beacon.

 

This is obviously so far remote from the truth is not even funny.

 

https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/the-digger-who-commissioned-the-trump-russia-dossier-speaks

 

"

Simpson, who founded Fusion GPS in 2010, began his testimony by explaining his background as an investigative reporter at the Wall Street Journal and at Roll Call.

....

But in September or October of 2015—Simpson was vague about the exact date—a client hired Fusion GPS to investigate Donald Trump. (The Washington Free Beacon, a conservative Web site that has received funding from the hedge-fund billionaire Paul Singer, has acknowledged hiring Fusion GPS to investigate candidates during the Republican Presidential primaries.) Simpson said the mandate was to carry out an “open-ended” examination of Trump’s business record, including his bankruptcies, and, he added, “it evolved somewhat quickly into issues of his relationship to organized-crime figures.”

.....

Things changed in the spring of 2016, after Fusion GPS got a new client, which we now know to have been the Clinton campaign and the D.N.C. (This fact emerged in October, well after Simpson’s testimony, when lawyers from the Judiciary Committee demanded Fusion GPS’s bank records.) In “May or June of 2016,” Simpson recalled, he engaged Christopher Steele, an old associate of his, who was the former head of the Russia desk at the British foreign-intelligence agency, MI6. He and Steele, who was by then running his own intelligence consultancy in the U.K., shared an interest in the Russian kleptocracy and in organized-crime issues, Simpson said.

"

[jjbrr]

"Rep. Devin Nunes, Chairman of the Intelligence Committee admits he did not read the FISA applications before writing the memo."

[hrothgar]

Very good podcast on the Nunes memo

 

https://lawfareblog.com/lawfare-podcast-special-edition-memo-released

 

Some of the same gets covered in

 

https://lawfareblog.com/thoughts-nunes-memo-we-need-talk-about-devin

[ldrews]

From a Machiavellian point of view Trump and the Republicans are missing a tremendous opportunity.

 

The Obama administration and its political appointees in the DOJ and FBI have demonstrated how to use the NSA databases and the DOJ/FBI as a political weapon to mount an adversarial campaign against a political candidate and subsequently a sitting president.

 

Trump and the Republicans, rather than working to expose and bring to light the various transgressions of the DOJ/FBI should attempt to hide it all. The Democrats would seem to be more than willing to comply. Then Trump and Republicans could take over those clandestine operations with their own people and begin focusing on upcoming political opponents. With the full power of the DOJ/FBI/NSA at their disposal, finding criminal or indictable offenses committed by political opponents should be relatively easy. Or evidence could be manufactured and planted. And if the actual opponent seems immune to such actions, then his/her family members can be entrapped and pressure applied to the opponent to withdraw. Of course one would leave weak opponents alone.

 

The 2020 and 2024 elections would be in the bag. The Republican dominance could last for decades, even generations.

 

Trump and the Republicans should thank Obama, Hillary, and the Democrats for showing the way.

[y66]

The memo will backfire everywhere except among the base. Nunes will be seen for the hack he is, not just for his selective editing but for incompetent editing. Mueller will press on. Trump will go down. This thread too will end.

[ldrews]

The memo will backfire everywhere except among the base. Nunes will be seen for the hack he is, not just for his selective editing but for incompetent editing. Mueller will press on. Trump will go down. This thread too will end.

 

Sounds like you are OK with the weaponizing/politicization of the DOJ/FBI. No big deal. Welcome to the United States of Banana. We can learn a lot from some African countries.

[PassedOut]

Sounds like you are OK with the weaponizing/politicization of the DOJ/FBI. No big deal. Welcome to the United States of Banana. We can learn a lot from some African countries.

Sounds like you are OK with Russia freely recruiting spies in the US, as well as our politicians. Maybe you'd like to move to Russia next.

[ldrews]

Sounds like you are OK with Russia freely recruiting spies in the US, as well as our politicians. Maybe you'd like to move to Russia next.

 

I'm sorry, but I don't understand how you came to that conclusion. I am sure that Russia routinely recruits spies in the US just as I am sure that the US recruits spies in Russia. I have nothing to do with either.

 

However, I do have serious concerns with the apparent corruption, weaponizing, and politicization of the DOJ and FBI. IMO you should too.

[PassedOut]

Sounds like you are OK with Russia freely recruiting spies in the US, as well as our politicians. Maybe you'd like to move to Russia next.

I'm sorry, but I don't understand how you came to that conclusion.

The FISA warrant was issued because the FBI had good reason to suspect Page of being a spy for Russia--well before the Steele report entered the picture. Why shouldn't the FBI be "weaponized" against Russian spies? Seems to me that the administration and some in congress are trying hard to conceal their Russian connections (money laundering, perhaps) by derailing the investigation conducted by a patriotic republican special counsel who was appointed by another patriotic republican in the DOJ. Their good work is being undercut by other republicans who are working for Putin.

 

Statement by John McCain

 

Washington, D.C. ­– U.S. Senator John McCain (R-AZ), Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, released the following statement on partisan attacks on the FBI and Department of Justice:

 

“In 2016, the Russian government engaged in an elaborate plot to interfere in an American election and undermine our democracy. Russia employed the same tactics it has used to influence elections around the world, from France and Germany to Ukraine, Montenegro, and beyond. Putin’s regime launched cyberattacks and spread disinformation with the goal of sowing chaos and weakening faith in our institutions. And while we have no evidence that these efforts affected the outcome of our election, I fear they succeeded in fueling political discord and dividing us from one another.

 

“The latest attacks on the FBI and Department of Justice serve no American interests – no party’s, no president’s, only Putin’s. The American people deserve to know all of the facts surrounding Russia’s ongoing efforts to subvert our democracy, which is why Special Counsel Mueller’s investigation must proceed unimpeded. Our nation’s elected officials, including the president, must stop looking at this investigation through the warped lens of politics and manufacturing partisan sideshows. If we continue to undermine our own rule of law, we are doing Putin’s job for him.”

John McCain is also a republican patriot. Those doing Putin's work in the US are scum.

[ldrews]

The FISA warrant was issued because the FBI had good reason to suspect Page of being a spy for Russia--well before the Steele report entered the picture. Why shouldn't the FBI be "weaponized" against Russian spies? Seems to me that the administration and some in congress are trying hard to conceal their Russian connections (money laundering, perhaps) by derailing the investigation conducted by a patriotic republican special counsel who was appointed by another patriotic republican in the DOJ. Their good work is being undercut by other republicans who are working for Putin.

 

I don't know whether Page was a spy or not, but the justification to the FISA court to obtain a warrant was primarily a "salacious and unverified" dossier, to quote Comey. The DOJ/FBI apparently intentionally withheld key information from the court, not once but 4 times, in order to obtain the warrant and its extensions. As McCabe apparently testified, without the dossier there would have been no warrant.

 

So the bottom line is that the DOJ/FBI surveiled a US citizen in violation of the 4th Amendment to the Constitution by perpetrating a fraud on the FISA court. It doesn't get much worse than that.

[PassedOut]

The DOJ/FBI apparently intentionally withheld key information from the court, not once but 4 times, in order to obtain the warrant and its extensions.

Only according to the scum working for Putin.

[rmnka447]

1. Your conclusion is unwarranted

 

Ok, that's an opinion, but perfectly fair as such.

 

2. The "facts" contained in the memo clearly are not accurate

 

It might be fair to say that certain other key facts have not been included if you know what they are. But unless you have "alternate facts" to present that contradict the facts in the memo, you can't say the facts are false. You can say that you don't believe what the facts seem to imply which is an opinion.

 

Did the FBI obtain a FISA warrant to wiretap/spy on Carter Page?

Was the "Trump Dossier" part of the application for that warrant?

Was the "Trump Dossier" ultimately paid for by Hillary Clinton and the DNC?

 

If the answer to those questions is Yes, then you have a partisan political document being used to support or justify spying by the government on citizens of differing political persuasion. This is the USA and the FBI is supposed to be the FBI, not the KGB.

 

3. Both the DOJ and the FBI opposed the release of the memo

 

The claim was that releasing the memo would do damage to the FBI and DOJ. Do you see anything in the memo that does that? Allen Dershowitz said "99% of the time such claims by the government are unfounded. Similar claims were made by the government against the release of the Pentagon Papers. The government took that fight all the way to the Supreme Court. In the end, their claims of damage to national security didn't materialize."

 

Lets start cataloging mistakes in the Nunes memo (note: I am quoting / summarizing analysis by Seth Abraham here)

 

1. It says FISA warrant applications must meet the "highest standard" of proof in the justice system. Uh, no. The "highest standard" in the justice system is "proof beyond a reasonable doubt," which is nowhere *close* to the legal standard required to secure a search warrant. The specific FISA standard is "probable cause that the target is an 'agent of a foreign power' who's 'knowingly engaging in clandestine intelligence activities.'"

 

Since the FISA court is a secret court granting powers to surveil and wiretap that may tread on Americans 4th amendment rights, the bar for obtaining a warrant is necessarily higher than search warrants and wiretap warrants obtained in open court. So the integrity of the information that provides that "probable cause" needs to be held to a higher standard.

 

2. The memo then makes *another* error of law on its first page: saying the law requires "all relevant and material facts" to be shown to a warrant-granting court. But that's not true. Many cases confirm that law enforcement can and does leave out key facts without repercussion.

 

Yeah, and it also happens that when key information is left out, convictions get thrown out and/or evidence may be excluded. The above assertion says if law enforcement can get away with it, it's OK.

 

3. A *third* legal error on just the *first page* of the memo is it says "all potentially favorable" information—i.e., favorable to the proposed warrant target—must be included in the warrant application. Uh, no, and moreover, this *never* happens in the criminal justice system.

 

See the previous point.

 

4. Page 2 says Steele prepared the dossier "on behalf of" the DNC and Clinton—suggesting he knew he was working for them, or that he *was* working for them, which he wasn't. He was working for Fusion GPS as a sub-contractor—and had no idea who Fusion's clients were. This is a critical point—as this lie is the one Nunes uses to argue that Steele both had a conflict of interest and was biased, when in fact neither was true. Steele was not getting paid to please the DNC and/or Clinton because he literally did not know his work was for them. In fact for the first 8 months that Steele working on the project he was being funded by the Washington Free Beacon.

 

It doesn't matter whether Steele knew he was working for the Dems or not. The question is whether Steele had any personal animus against Donald Trump that would bring the credibility of his work into question. The memo provides some facts based on testimony that would seem to show such animus.

 

I thought the opposition research done on Trump by GPS funded by the Washington Free Beacon was prior to the development of the dossier by Steele.

 

I believe the first warrant application being reported on in the memo was in October 2016. In January 2017, James Comey did a couple things that I think are germane to the memo. He made the President aware of the dossier and represented it as the kind of salacious thing out there. He also testified under oath to Congress that the dossier was unverified. It can't be both credible in October and of unknown veracity in the following January.

[Winstonm]

Here is the conundrum reality-based Americans must solve.

 

Why would Fredo order an inaffective and blatantly partisan memo be prepared and released and then claim that it totally vindicated Trump?

 

But then, all you have to do is understand this quote from Billy Bush about Fredo:

 

The man who once told me — ironically, in another off-camera conversation — after I called him out for inflating his ratings: “People will just believe you. You just tell them and they believe you,” was, I thought, not a good choice to lead our country.

 

The answer becomes simple. The memo may as well have been a handwritten copy of an Apprentice script - as long as Fredo could point to it and say, that totally vindicates me, knowing that the entire viewership of Fox News would believe it, especially after being bombarded with the same message over and over and over.

 

The age-old question for well-meaning people of reason is this: how do we combat what is essentially the equivalent of a state-sponsored propaganda campaign?

[ldrews]

Here is the conundrum reality-based Americans must solve.

 

Why would Fredo order an inaffective and blatantly partisan memo be prepared and released and then claim that it totally vindicated Trump?

 

But then, all you have to do is understand this quote from Billy Bush about Fredo:

 

 

 

The answer becomes simple. The memo may as well have been a handwritten copy of an Apprentice script - as long as Fredo could point to it and say, that totally vindicates me, knowing that the entire viewership of Fox News would believe it, especially after being bombarded with the same message over and over and over.

 

The age-old question for well-meaning people of reason is this: how do we combat what is essentially the equivalent of a state-sponsored propaganda campaign?

 

No, the age-old question is how do we combat the weaponization and politicization against political opponents of our justice system?

[Winstonm]

Ok, that's an opinion, but perfectly fair as such.

 

 

 

It might be fair to say that certain other key facts have not been included if you know what they are. But unless you have "alternate facts" to present that contradict the facts in the memo, you can't say the facts are false. You can say that you don't believe what the facts seem to imply which is an opinion.

 

Did the FBI obtain a FISA warrant to wiretap/spy on Carter Page?

Was the "Trump Dossier" part of the application for that warrant?

Was the "Trump Dossier" ultimately paid for by Hillary Clinton and the DNC?

 

If the answer to those questions is Yes, then you have a partisan political document being used to support or justify spying by the government on citizens of differing political persuasion. This is the USA and the FBI is supposed to be the FBI, not the KGB.

 

 

 

The claim was that releasing the memo would do damage to the FBI and DOJ. Do you see anything in the memo that does that? Allen Dershowitz said "99% of the time such claims by the government are unfounded. Similar claims were made by the government against the release of the Pentagon Papers. The government took that fight all the way to the Supreme Court. In the end, their claims of damage to national security didn't materialize."

 

 

 

Since the FISA court is a secret court granting powers to surveil and wiretap that may tread on Americans 4th amendment rights, the bar for obtaining a warrant is necessarily higher than search warrants and wiretap warrants obtained in open court. So the integrity of the information that provides that "probable cause" needs to be held to a higher standard.

 

 

 

Yeah, and it also happens that when key information is left out, convictions get thrown out and/or evidence may be excluded. The above assertion says if law enforcement can get away with it, it's OK.

 

 

 

See the previous point.

 

 

 

It doesn't matter whether Steele knew he was working for the Dems or not. The question is whether Steele had any personal animus against Donald Trump that would bring the credibility of his work into question. The memo provides some facts based on testimony that would seem to show such animus.

 

I thought the opposition research done on Trump by GPS funded by the Washington Free Beacon was prior to the development of the dossier by Steele.

 

I believe the first warrant application being reported on in the memo was in October 2016. In January 2017, James Comey did a couple things that I think are germane to the memo. He made the President aware of the dossier and represented it as the kind of salacious thing out there. He also testified under oath to Congress that the dossier was unverified. It can't be both credible in October and of unknown veracity in the following January.

 

Let's clarify a couple of problems with your paranoia.

 

First, the initial Carter Page FISA warrant came out after he had left the campaign. How can there be a political motivation to initiate surveillance of an ex-campaign member?

 

Second, who paid Fusion GPS is irrelevant to facts. Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson in testimony stated that the Steele memos were not facts but rather human-source information. No FISA judge would make a ruling based solely or even primarily on that kind of documentary second-hand information.

 

Third, parts of the Steele memos about Carter Page have been verified - by Page himself. There must certainly be wiretaps and other highly classified information that would confirm Page's interactions with Russians - and it would be that factual evidence that would lend credence to the Steel memos. So you have it backwards. The facts presented to the court must have supported the claims of the Steele memos else we wouldn't be having this discussion.

[ldrews]

Rep Ratcliffe confirms abuses:

 

https://ratcliffe.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/rep-ratcliffe-source-documents-confirm-potential-fisa-abused-highlighted

[ggwhiz]

First, the initial Carter Page FISA warrant came out after he had left the campaign. How can there be a political motivation to initiate surveillance of an ex-campaign member?

 

Umm First Page was the subject of a FISA warrant in 2013/14 with no doubt good but classified reason to believe he was being cultivated by Russian Intelligence.

 

Yet the latest one is politically motivated? Just goes to show how rigorous the process to get one is.

[cherdano]

The claim was that releasing the memo would do damage to the FBI and DOJ.

The claims I have seen (from the FBI, and from the Democratic members of the House Oversight Committee) are that the memo omits material facts that give misleading impressions about the government's actions.

 

It doesn't matter whether Steele knew he was working for the Dems or not. The question is whether Steele had any personal animus against Donald Trump that would bring the credibility of his work into question. The memo provides some facts based on testimony that would seem to show such animus.

This would only be an issue if the government misled the FISA court about the possibility of such animus. A NYT article from yesterday claims:

 

But a 10-page Democratic memo written to rebut the Republican document says that the F.B.I. was more forthcoming with the surveillance court than the Republicans say. The F.B.I. told the court that the information it received from Mr. Steele was politically motivated, though the agency did not say it was financed by Democrats, according to two people familiar with the Democratic memo.

If that is correct, I doubt this would be an issue for the court. "Hillary" and "DNC" might get all your personal alarm bells ringing, but I doubt that for an impartial court it would be a stronger warning than "politically motivated".

 

I believe the first warrant application being reported on in the memo was in October 2016. In January 2017, James Comey did a couple things that I think are germane to the memo. He made the President aware of the dossier and represented it as the kind of salacious thing out there. He also testified under oath to Congress that the dossier was unverified. It can't be both credible in October and of unknown veracity in the following January.

That's false. It can both be credible enough in October to warrant "probable cause" in October, but still be unverified the following January.

 

I guess what I don't get from your post is whether you think the FISA court was part of the partisan which hunt, or whether you think the court was materially misled about the Steele dossier.

[Al_U_Card]

"It doesn't matter who paid Steele, it's the facts that count...." but ad hom attacks work in here to color the "character" of the presenter, no?

 

Your political system is a cess-pool and the intelligence services are a series of snake-pits. Despite this, it is the best system in the world. Oy vey is mir! Russia, China and the Brits all spy along with the US because that is the way of this world and altruism and moral rectitude now depend on whose drones work best (the US for the moment....)

[Winstonm]

What is the over/under for Fredo commenting on this terror attack.