January 14, 2019

Holy cow. This NY Times story is just littered with seismic earth-shakers sure to rattle the windows

This is The Hoarse Whisperer..a thread that was hard to put together for our format...it says a lot...and in chronological order..

Holy cow. This NY Times story is just littered with seismic earth-shakers sure to rattle the windows at the White House. Yowza. My very quick first-blush take on the meaty nuggets... Let’s dive in!

In the days after Comey’s firing, the FBI opened a COUNTERINTELLIGENCE investigation of Trump himself. WOW! Unlike the initial Trump-Russia investigation (which was looking primarily at events in 2016), the counterintel investigation was basically surveillance in 2017+.

Naturally, deciding to basically turn your national security and intelligence magnifying glasses on the President of the United States is a BIG DEAL. The FBI didn’t enter into it lightly. 3/

But then Trump fired Comey... AND... did two more things that raised red flags. The first: he wrote a letter on Comey’s firing and mentioned Russia. The subtle Easter egg there: the FBI had the draft of the unsent letter. 4/

Now, tie that together with the fact that this story was broken by Mike Schmidt of the NYT. As I’ve said often in the past, I am of the belief that former White House Counsel Don McGahn is Schmidt’s source for these big bombshells.

If that is indeed the case, McGahn may very well have been working with Mueller months earlier than we ever knew. Somehow, the FBI had a draft of an unsent letter immediately. If not McGahn, it could well have been turned over by Rosenstein. Regardless, the FBI was on it. 6/

Moving right along, the implications of this are potentially enooooormous. Mueller didn’t just inherit ONE investigation focused on what happened before. He also inherited a second which was actively tracking Trump’s actions AS THEY WERE UNFOLDING. 7/

That counterintelligence investigation would have required approval at the DOJ. I can’t see how that would have been possible without Jeff Sessions’ buy-in, or at minimum, awareness. I’d be shocked if that all went down without Sessions even hearing about it. 8/

Maybe Rosenstein parlayed Sessions’ recusal into keeping all this a secret. If that’s the case, expect Trump to be looking for Rosenstein’s head on a platter any minute now. If he goes off on Rosenstein, Rod knew. Jefferson Beauregard didn’t.

Anyway, I digress. Another doozy of this now-revealed real-time counterintel probe of Trump itself: It basically served as a safety net the entire time we sat fretting about Trump firing Mueller.


The FBI was investigating potential crimes... while also monitoring the chief potential criminal in case he tried to interfere with their work. Think about that... the FBI’s counterintel resources were trained on the guy who had a “private chat” w Putin in Helsinki.

We don’t know what actions that investigation took. It is fair to assume it included mining ongoing intel from our own resources at the NSA, etc., as well as from allies. That would have the effect of putting relevant work-product of any ally’s spying in Mueller’s hands.


Meaning, even if we weren’t eavesdropping on Trump’s convo w Putin, his late-night phone calls, his admin’s back-channel contacts with Russians, etc... someone was. Whether it was the UK, Germany, Estonia, Spain, Israel, Australia or whomever, EVERYONE spies on Russia...

...and Mueller had an open folder just waiting to be filled with whatever tasty nuggets those eyes and ears happened to pass our way. Think: A real-time Steele dossier with updates baked fresh daily.

Bringing it down out of Tom Clancy “Hunt for Orange October” territory to a more modest, conservative takeaway, we can count on at least this much: The counterintel investigation makes it highly likely Mueller has obstruction charges nailed six ways to Sunday.


Why? The CI work was essentially spying or tracking from Comey’s firing foreward. At minimum, it would have provided intel on the obstruction effort as it unfolded... and, at minimum, that would have guided Mueller’s interviews.

Remember all those witnesses who came out of meetings w Mueller saying he knew EVERYTHING? He did. Erik Prince, Stone, Corsi, McGahn, et al. He knew everything when they walked in. He had people paying attention after they walked out. 17/


Okay, I’m spinning like a top here so let me bring this in for a landing: Trump has spent the last two years trying to obstruct an investigation into 2016 events... ...and little did he know, his biggest problem would prove to be what he was doing in 2017-2018.

I think we now better understand why Mueller never called in Kushner or Junior. They were caught up in a live counterintel sweep. Questioning them would have given that away. That earth-shaker is about to sink in for them. Their problems just got 10x bigger. 19/


Last comment. Sry for rambling. Knowing all of this, I virtually guarantee Mueller turned an insider or two. Flipped informants. Not just witnesses. Informants. Don McGahn is a prime candidate. Mueller likely turned someone in the Admin itself. I’d bet many beers on it.

The Hoarse Whisperer Retweeted The New York Times

Oops. Forgot the link. Here it is.

The Hoarse Whisperer added,
The New York TimesVerified account @nytimes
President Trump’s actions so alarmed the FBI after James Comey’s firing that it began investigating if he was working on behalf of Russia

Okay, okay, okay, I can’t stop. I’m too amped up now. I’m practically oscillating. Here’s a delicious little karmic dessert to round out this sumptuous info feast... Remember the guy who was president before the Marmalade Menace took office? This guy... #44. Obama


On his way out the door, we all were wallowing in our winter of discontent, Obama signed an executive order... It went largely uncovered but I noted it at the time. It was like when you’re watching Law & Order and they zoom in on a paperweight in Minute 5 of the show...

You just know that paperweight is gonna come back into play around Minute 55. Foreshadowing! Pretext! Other words meaning “that’s gonna matter!” Anyway, the point is... Obama signed an EO as a parting shot one week before leaving office.

The order revised the rules around intelligence sharing among our intel community. Specifically, it made the firehose of raw intelligence collected by the NSA directly accessible to the FBI and CIA. Instead of having to ask for intel and getting what they filtered down...

The FBI and CIA could directly access the unfiltered “SigInt” or signals intelligence. Intercepted phone calls, emails, raw intel from human sources. Everything our vast intelligence vacuum hoovers up, available directly... but only for counterintel and foreign intel purposes.

January 13, 2019

Trump stars in Season 3 of Putin's Apprentice, but the show is expected to be canceled mid-season.

Tea Pain
?
Trump stars in Season 3 of Putin's Apprentice, but the show is expected to be canceled mid-season.

ME Pain

God, let's hope so....

January 13, 2019

don't compare the FBI to Nazis the week you're inaugurated if you have stuff in your past

@JohnFugelsang


Perhaps the universal lesson here is to not to compare the FBI to Nazis the week you're inaugurated if you have stuff in your past you'd like to keep hidden.

January 12, 2019

"The reason his tweets are such gibberish is they are being translated from Russian to English".

8AM MSNBC Lizz Winstead just said perhaps "the reason his tweets are such gibberish is they are being translated from Russian to English".

January 11, 2019

If you think a freshman congresswoman who actually connects with people is the problem..

Anand Giridharadas
?
If you think a freshman congresswoman who actually connects with people and actually understands new technology is the problem with America, it may be that you are the problem with America.

January 11, 2019

you'd have to work for 200 years before hitting the cap at which $10,000,000 is taxed at 70%.

Jules Suzdaltsev
?
The average US salary is $50,000, which means you’d have to work for 200 years before hitting the cap at which $10,000,000 is taxed at 70%.

And yet somehow Republicans have convinced their constituents that this applies to them and they should oppose it.

January 11, 2019

Reporter challenged cop guy on breaking news presser about found girl in WI.

Reporter challenged cop guy on breaking news presser about found girl in WI....he replied with...Fake News and Hope and Prayers...anybody want to guess what his political lean is...and I want to tell you that not everybody in my state of WI says AKSED....

January 11, 2019

Trump is using the government as a bargaining chip - like a dictator would, Robert Reich

Trump is using the government as a bargaining chip – like a dictator would
Robert Reich

Trump’s entire presidency to date has sacrificed the means of democracy to preserve his personal power, and the shutdown over the border is no different

Thu 10 Jan 2019 12.31 EST Last modified on Fri 11 Jan 2019 09.58 EST GUARDIAN article


‘Trump’s norm-breaking is unsettling, to be sure, but his more fundamental offense is he continuously sacrifices means in order to preserve and accumulate personal power.’ Photograph: Jacquelyn Martin/AP

“I have the absolute right to do national emergency if I want,” Donald Trump told reporters on Wednesday.


The wonderful thing about Trump’s presidency (I never thought I’d begin a sentence this way), is he brings us back to basics. The basic difference between a democracy and a dictatorship comes down to means and ends.

Democracy is about means, not ends. If we all agreed on the ends (such as whether to build a wall along the Mexican border) there’d be no need for democracy.

But of course we don’t agree, which is why the means by which we resolve our differences are so important. Those means include a constitution, a system of government based on the rule of law, and an independent judiciary.

A dictatorship, by contrast, is only about ends. Those ends are the goals of the dictator – at a minimum, preserving and accumulating personal power. To achieve those ends, a dictator will use any means necessary.

Which brings us back to Trump.

The conventional criticism of Trump is that he is unfit to be president because he continuously breaks the norms of how a president should behave.

Trump’s norm-breaking is unsettling, to be sure, but his more fundamental offense is he continuously sacrifices means in order to preserve and accumulate personal power. He thereby violates a US president’s core responsibility to protect American democracy.


He is asserting power by any means possible. This is the method of a dictator

A president who shuts down government in order to get his way on a controversial issue, such as building a wall along the border with Mexico, offering to reopen it as a concession when his opponents give in, is not protecting the means of democracy. He is treating the government of the United States as a bargaining chip. He is asserting power by any means possible. This is the method of a dictator.
Advertisement

A president who claims he has an absolute right to order the military to take actions in the US that are the subject of intense political debate, and do so without congressional approval, is not acting as the head of government of a democracy; he is assuming the role of a dictator.

A president who spouts lies during a primetime national television address over what he terms an “undeniable crisis” at the southern US border, which is in fact no crisis at all, is not protecting democracy. He is using whatever means available to him to preserve and build his base of power.

The real international threat to the US is not coming from the southern border. It is coming from a foreign government intent on undermining our democracy by propagating lies, turning Americans against each other, and electing a puppet president.

We do not know yet whether Trump colluded with Russian president Vladimir Putin to win the 2016 election. What we do know so far is that Trump’s aides and campaign manager worked with Putin’s emissaries during the 2016 election, and that Putin sought to swing the election in favor of Trump.

We also know that since he was elected, Trump has done little or nothing to stop Putin from continuing to try to undermine our democracy. To the contrary, Trump has obstructed inquiries into Russian meddling.

The overall pattern is clear to anyone who cares to see it. Trump’s entire presidency to date has sacrificed the means of democracy to the end of preserving his personal power.


He has lied about the results of votes and established a commission to investigate bogus claims of fraudulent voting; attacked judges who have ruled against him, with the goal of stirring up the public against them; encouraged followers to believe that his opponent in the 2016 election should be imprisoned; and condemned as “enemies of the people” journalists who report unfavorably about him, in an effort to fuel public resentment – perhaps even violence – against them.

To argue, as some Trump apologists do, that whatever Trump does is justified because voters put Trump in power, is to claim that voters can decide to elect a dictator.

They cannot. Even if a majority of Americans were to attempt such thing (and, remember, Trump received 3m fewer votes than his opponent in 2016), the constitution prohibits it.


The choice could not be clearer. Democracy is about means. Dictatorship is about ends. Trump uses any means available to achieve his own ends.

We can preserve our democracy and force Trump out of office. Or we can continue to struggle against someone who strives to thwart democracy for his own benefit.

In the months ahead, that choice will be made, one way or the other.

January 11, 2019

Martin Scorsese to direct film about Bob Dylan's Rolling Thunder Revue..yippee

Years ago I bought a bootleg tape of this and it was just that...couldn't even tell who was on the screen...and it cost plenty...so this news has me very excited.....GUARDIAN article

Martin Scorsese to direct film about Bob Dylan's Rolling Thunder Revue

Netflix documentary will feature new interviews with the legendary songwriter about his celebrated mid-70s tour

Laura Snapes

Fri 11 Jan 2019 05.33 EST Last modified on Fri 11 Jan 2019 05.35 EST


Netflix has announced that Martin Scorsese will direct a documentary about Bob Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue tour. Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story will feature new on-camera interviews with the legendary songwriter.

The streaming platform says the film “captures the troubled spirit of America in 1975 and the joyous music that Dylan performed during the fall of that year.” It is due later this year.

Variety reports that the film will be less straightforward than Scorsese’s 2005 Dylan documentary, No Direction Home, which focused on the songwriter’s rise to fame, his move to New York and temporary retirement following a motorcycle accident in July 1966. “Scorsese provides the master vision,” wrote critic Roger Ebert on that film’s release, “and his factual footage unfolds with the narrative power of fiction.”

The Rolling Thunder Revue was a freewheeling multi-artist caravan that began in October 1975 and concluded in May 1976. Artists including Joni Mitchell, Joan Baez, Mick Ronson, Bette Midler, Roger McGuinn, Emmylou Harris and Allen Ginsberg joined Dylan on the autumn leg of the tour, which is said to be the focus of Scorsese’s film. Dylan’s mother also appeared. Dylan frequently performed in white face paint.


Netflix has announced that Martin Scorsese will direct a documentary about Bob Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue tour. Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story will feature new on-camera interviews with the legendary songwriter.

The streaming platform says the film “captures the troubled spirit of America in 1975 and the joyous music that Dylan performed during the fall of that year.” It is due later this year.

Variety reports that the film will be less straightforward than Scorsese’s 2005 Dylan documentary, No Direction Home, which focused on the songwriter’s rise to fame, his move to New York and temporary retirement following a motorcycle accident in July 1966. “Scorsese provides the master vision,” wrote critic Roger Ebert on that film’s release, “and his factual footage unfolds with the narrative power of fiction.”

The Rolling Thunder Revue was a freewheeling multi-artist caravan that began in October 1975 and concluded in May 1976. Artists including Joni Mitchell, Joan Baez, Mick Ronson, Bette Midler, Roger McGuinn, Emmylou Harris and Allen Ginsberg joined Dylan on the autumn leg of the tour, which is said to be the focus of Scorsese’s film. Dylan’s mother also appeared. Dylan frequently performed in white face paint.


It is one of the most noteworthy tours in rock history: “The Rolling Thunder Revue shows remain some of the finest music Dylan ever made with a live band,” wrote critic Clinton Heylin in his 1991 Dylan biography Behind the Shades. In 2002, an official recording of the tour was released in Dylan’s Bootleg Series.


Dylan engaged Sam Shepard as a screenwriter for a film about the tour, although the result was largely improvised. Released in 1978, Renaldo and Clara featured live footage, interviews and dramatised fictional portions about Dylan’s life. He was billed as Renaldo and his first wife, Sara Dylan, as Clara. It clocked in at almost four hours and was panned by critics.

Scorsese’s film is not the only Dylan feature in the works. Call Me By Your Name director Luca Guadagnino has said he is directing a film based on Dylan’s 1975 album Blood on the Tracks, to be written by The Fisher King and The Bridges of Madison County screenwriter Richard LaGravenese.

Dylan will perform a rare UK concert this summer, sharing the bill with Neil Young at London’s Hyde Park on 12 July. Scorsese’s next slated feature film is another Netflix production, The Irishman, about the mafia-union wars of the 70s.

January 10, 2019

'Cohen has tapes': John Dean explains Trump won't be able to dodge revelations from fixer's testimon

‘Cohen has tapes’: John Dean explains why Trump won’t be able to dodge revelations from fixer’s upcoming testimony

Noor Al-Sibai RAW STORY(entire article)
10 Jan 2019 at 16:32 ET

President Nixon’s former White House counsel explained to CNN Thursday why Donald Trump may be worried about his former “fixer” Michael Cohen’s testimony before Congress next month.

“Michael Cohen has deep knowledge and wide knowledge of President Trump and what happened during the campaign and so we’re finally putting a face on somebody who can talk with authority about these events,” John Dean said after news broke about the attorney’s February Congressional testimony.


Host Brianna Keilar noted that when Dean testified before Congress about Nixon, some dismissed what he had to say as “outrageous” — and the former White House counsel agreed.

“I was attacked not only by Nixon’s supporters and surrogates, I was attacked by Nixon in a number of his national addresses,” Dean said. “The tapes certainly resolved who was telling the truth and I’m not quite sure how it all would have turned out had there not been tapes.”

He then added: “I understand Michael Cohen has tapes as well.”

“I’m sure Trump doesn’t know which ones he does or does not have since it was Cohen doing the taping,” Dean said, adding, “I don’t know how many tapes there are, but certainly there’s no motive for Cohen to lie at this time about his work with Trump.”