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The Pitfalls of a Pit Bull Russophobe

By Ray McGovern | Consortium News | November 22, 2019

Fiona Hill’s “Russian-expert” testimony Thursday and her deposition on Oct. 14 to the impeachment inquiry showed that her antennae are acutely tuned to what Russian intelligence services may be up to but, sadly, also displayed a striking naiveté about the machinations of US intelligence.

Hill’s education on Russia came at the knee of the late Professor Richard Pipes, her Harvard mentor and archdeacon of Russophobia. I do not dispute her sincerity in attributing all manner of evil to what President Ronald Reagan called the “Evil Empire.” But, like so many other glib “Russia experts” with access to Establishment media, she seems three decades out of date.

I have been studying the USS.R. and Russia for twice as long as Hill, was chief of CIA’s Soviet Foreign Policy Branch during the 1970s, and watched the “Evil Empire” fall apart. She seems to have missed the falling apart part.

Selective Suspicion

Are the Russian intelligence services still very active? Of course. But there is no evidence — other than Hill’s bias — for her extraordinary claim that they were behind the infamous “Steele Dossier,” for example, or that they were the prime mover of Ukraine-gate in an attempt to shift the blame for Russian “meddling” in the 2016 US election onto Ukraine. In recent weeks US intelligence officials were spreading this same tale, lapped up and faithfully reported Friday by The New York Times.

Hill has been conditioned to believe Russian President Vladimir Putin and especially his security services are capable of anything, and thus sees a Russian under every rock — as we used to say of smart know-nothings like former CIA Director William Casey and the malleable “Soviet experts” who bubbled up to the top during his reign (1981 – 1987). Recall that at the very first meeting of Reagan’s cabinet, Casey openly told the president and other cabinet officials: “We’ll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false.” Were Casey still alive, he would be very pleased and proud of Hill’s performance.

Beyond Dispute?

On Thursday Hill testified:

The unfortunate truth is that Russia was the foreign power that systematically attacked our democratic institutions in 2016. This is the public conclusion of our intelligence agencies, confirmed in bipartisan Congressional reports. It is beyond dispute, even if some of the underlying details must remain classified. [Emphasis added.]

Ah, yes. “The public conclusion of our intelligence agencies”: the same ones who reported that the Communist Party of the Soviet Union would never surrender power peaceably; the same ones who told Secretary of State Colin Powell he could assure the UN Security Council that the WMD evidence given him by our intelligence agencies was “irrefutable and undeniable.” Only Richard-Pipeline-type Russophobia can account for the blinders on someone as smart as Hill and prompt her to take as gospel “the public conclusions of our intelligence agencies.”

A modicum of intellectual curiosity and rudimentary due diligence would have prompted her to look into who was in charge of preparing the (misnomered) “Intelligence Community Assessment” published on Jan. 6, 2017, which provided the lusted-after fodder for the “mainstream” media and others wanting to blame Hillary Clinton’s defeat on the Russians.

Jim, Do a Job on the Russians

President Barack Obama gave the task to his National Intelligence Director James Clapper, whom he had allowed to stay in that job for three and a half years after he had to apologize to Congress for what he later admitted was a “clearly erroneous” response, under oath, to a question from Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) on NSA surveillance of US citizens. And when Clapper published his memoir last year, Hill would have learned that, as Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s handpicked appointee to run satellite imagery analysis, Clapper places the blame for the consequential “failure” to find the (non-existent) WMD “where it belongs — squarely on the shoulders of the administration members who were pushing a narrative of a rogue WMD program in Iraq and on the intelligence officers, including me, who were so eager to help that we found what wasn’t really there.” [Emphasis added.]

But for Hill, Clapper was a kindred soul: Just eight weeks after she joined the National Security Council staff, Clapper, during an NBC interview on May 28, 2017, recalled “the historical practices of the Russians, who typically, are almost genetically driven to co-opt, penetrate, gain favor, whatever, which is a typical Russian technique.” Later he added, “It’s in their DNA.” Clapper has claimed that “what the Russians did had a profound impact on the outcome of the election.”

As for the “Intelligence Community Assessment,” the banner headline atop The New York Times on Jan. 7, 2017 set the tone for the next couple of years: “Putin Led Scheme to Aid Trump, Report Says.” During my career as a CIA analyst, as deputy national intelligence officer chairing National Intelligence Estimates (NIEs), and working on the Intelligence Production Review Board, I had not seen so shabby a piece of faux analysis as the ICA. The writers themselves seemed to be holding their noses. They saw fit to embed in the ICA itself this derriere-covering note: “High confidence in a judgment does not imply that the assessment is a fact or a certainty; such judgments might be wrong.”

Not a Problem

With the help of the Establishment media, Clapper and CIA Director John Brennan, were able to pretend that the ICA had been approved by “all 17 intelligence agencies” (as first claimed by Clinton, with Rep. Jim Himes, D-CT, repeating that canard Thursday, alas “without objection).” Himes, too should do his homework. The bogus “all 17 intelligence agencies” claim lasted only a few months before Clapper decided to fess up. With striking naiveté, Clapper asserted that ICA preparers were “handpicked analysts” from only the FBI, CIA and NSA. The criteria Clapper et al. used are not hard to divine. In government as in industry, when you can handpick the analysts, you can handpick the conclusions.

Maybe a Problem After All

“According to several current and former intelligence officers who must remain anonymous because of the sensitivity of the issue,” as the Times says when it prints made-up stuff, there were only two “handpicked analysts.” Clapper picked Brennan; and Brennan picked Clapper. That would help explain the grossly subpar quality of the ICA.

If US Attorney John Durham is allowed to do his job probing the origins of Russiagate, and succeeds in getting access to the “handpicked analysts” — whether there were just two, or more — Hill’s faith in “our intelligence agencies,” may well be dented if not altogether shattered.

November 23, 2019 Posted by | Deception, Russophobia | , | Leave a comment

The Kennedy Autopsy 2

By Jacob G. Hornberger | FFF | November 22, 2019

Fifty-six years ago today, President John F. Kennedy was shot dead on the streets of Dallas, Texas. The official story is that a lone nut named Lee Harvey Oswald, without any motive, committed the assassination. During the past several decades, however, the overwhelming amount of circumstantial evidence, much of which was intentionally kept secret, points to a national-security regime-change operation to oust Kennedy from office and elevate Vice President Lyndon Johnson to the presidency.

A key to understanding the assassination lies in a critically important event that occurred after the assassination. That event was the official autopsy that was conducted on the president’s body. By understanding the autopsy, one can gain a better understanding of the assassination itself.

That was the purpose of my best-selling book several years ago, The Kennedy Autopsy, which was a synopsis of a watershed five-volume assassination book entitled Inside the Assassination Records Review Board by Douglas P. Horne, who was a staff member of the ARRB in the 1990s.

The ARRB was the agency that Congress called into existence to enforce the President John F. Kennedy Records Collection Act of 1992, the law that required the CIA, the Pentagon, the Secret Service, and other federal agencies to disclose assassination-related records that such agencies had insisted on keeping secret since the day of the assassination. The law was enacted in response to the public outcry produced by Oliver Stone’s movie JFK, which posited that the assassination was a national-security regime-change operation carried out by the U.S. national-security establishment. At the end of the movie was a blurb pointing out the national-security establishment’s continued secrecy with respect to its assassination-related records.

The Future of Freedom Foundation recently published my new book The Kennedy Autopsy 2: Lyndon Johnson’s Role in the Assassination, which builds on the mountain of circumstantial evidence surrounding the president’s autopsy supporting the thesis developed by Oliver Stone in his movie and by Douglas Horne in his five-volume book. Specifically, my new book documents the circumstantial evidence pointing to the role that Lyndon Johnson played in the assassination.

Now, before anyone cries “Conspiracy theory!” which is the term that the CIA promoted early on to its assets in the mainstream press to dissuade people from questioning the official version of the assassination, consider the following:

The purpose of an autopsy is to determine the cause of death, which includes a determination of where the bullets were fired from. Since this was a state murder case, Texas law required that an autopsy be conducted on President Kennedy’s body. That duty fell to the Dallas County Medical Examiner, Dr. Earl Rose, who was one of the most competent pathologists in the country.

As soon as Kennedy was declared dead, however, a Secret Service team had the president’s body placed in an expensive, ornate casket and began taking it out of Parkland Hospital. Rose refused to permit them to do that, standing in their way, and declaring that he was required by state law to conduct an autopsy on the president’s body. In loud, screaming voices, the Secret Service team made it clear to Rose that they were operating under orders to take the body back to Washington without permitting Rose to conduct his autopsy. When Rose continued standing his ground, the Secret Service agents pulled back their suit jackets and brandished their guns. Screaming, yelling, and issuing a stream of profanities, they forced their way out of Parkland Hospital with Kennedy’s body, in direct violation of Texas law.

Waiting at Love Field was Lyndon Johnson, who was having seats removed from the back of Air Force One to make room for the casket. That meant that he knew that the casket was coming, which is virtually conclusive proof that he was the one who issued that order to that Secret Service team before he departed from Parkland Hospital.

Johnson himself was actually the very first conspiracy theorist in the Kennedy assassination. When he was at Parkland Hospital waiting to see if Kennedy would die and then later on the way to Dallas’s Love Field, Johnson raised the notion that the assassination might be the first step in a nuclear attack by the Soviet Union on the United States.

Yet, Johnson’s own actions establish that he knew that his conspiracy theory was bogus. When he arrived at Love Field, he had his personnel transfer everyone’s luggage from his plane — Air Force Two — to Air Force One, so that he could ride on the presidential plane rather than the vice-presidential plane. Yet, both planes were identical. He also took the time to find a federal judge to swear him in, despite the fact that the U.S. attorney general, Robert Kennedy, had advised him that no such swearing in was necessary. Johnson also took the time to wait for the casket to appear and be loaded onto Air Force One.

Does that sound like a man who was concerned that Soviet missiles might possibly be raining in on the United States, including one being aimed at Dallas, Texas? Wouldn’t a president who was genuinely concerned about such a possibility have gotten up into the air immediately in order to conduct America’s defenses to such an attack? Despite his words, Johnson’s actions indicate that he was certain that the Soviets played no role in the assassination. There could only be one reason for such certainty, even while promoting what he knew was a bogus conspiracy theory.

When Air Force One landed in Maryland, Johnson ensured that the president’s body be turned over to the military rather than to civilian authorities. Why? America isn’t a military nation. It’s a civilian nation. The United States wasn’t at war, and Kennedy hadn’t been killed on the field of battle. Why the military instead of a Maryland or Washington, D.C., medical examiner?

The reason is that a fraudulent autopsy was needed to disguise the fact that shots had been fired from the front of Kennedy. The accused killer, Lee Harvey Oswald, was in Kennedy’s rear and, therefore, could not have fired from the front.

Now, before anyone cries “Conspiracy theory!” consider the following:

After the House Select Committee Hearings on the Assassination, which reopened the investigation into the assassination, several enlisted men came forward and told a remarkable story. They said that they had secretly carried the president’s body into the Bethesda morgue in a cheap, military-style shipping casket similar to the ones being used to bring back bodies of U.S. soldiers being killed in Vietnam. They said that they carried the body into the morgue about 6:35 p.m., which was approximately 1 1/2 hours before the body was officially carried into the morgue at 8 pm in the expensive, ornate casket into which the body had been placed in Dallas. They said that military officials had sworn them to secrecy, forced them to sign written secrecy oaths, and threatened them with court martial and criminal prosecution if they ever told anyone what they had seen and done.

In the 1990s, the ARRB uncovered a written document prepared by a Marine sergeant named Roger Boyajean, which had been prepared soon after the autopsy. The document confirmed that the president’s body had in fact been secretly carried into the morgue at 6:35 p.m. Boyayean himself confirmed to the ARRB the authenticity of the document and the event itself.

Now, before anyone cries “Conspiracy theory!” consider the following:

One of the three autopsy physicians, Col. William Finck, later testified that on the evening of the assassination he received a telephone call from Commander James J. Humes, who was one of the other autopsy physicians. The purpose of the call was to request Finck to assist with the autopsy. The call was made at 8 p.m., which was the same time that the president’s body was officially being carried into the morgue in the expensive, ornate Dallas casket.

Finck testified that Humes told him in that call that they already had x-rays of the president’s body. The question naturally arises: How could they already have x-rays at 8 p.m. if the president’s body was first being carried into the morgue at 8 p.m.? Finck inadvertently confirmed the remarkable story that those enlisted men would disclose several years later.

Now, before anyone cries “Conspiracy theory!” consider the following:

The ARRB summoned a woman named Saundra Spencer to testify. On the weekend of the assassination, she was a U.S Navy petty officer working in the U.S. Navy’s photography lab in Washington, D.C. She had a top-secret security clearance. She worked closely with the White House on official photographs, including top-secret ones. No one has ever questioned the veracity, competence, and professionalism of Saundra Spencer. It would be virtually impossible to find a more credible witness.

Under oath, Spencer told the ARRB a remarkable story. On the weekend of the assassination, she was asked to develop photographs of the autopsy carried out by military officials on President Kennedy’s body. She was told that her role was a highly classified operation. For some 30 years, she had kept the secret.

The ARRB showed Spencer the military’s official autopsy photographs. She carefully examined them. She testified directly and unequivocally that the photographs were not the ones she developed on the weekend of the assassination. The ones she developed, she said, showed a massive exit-sized wound in the back of President Kennedy’s head, which implied a shot having been fired from the front.

Now, before anyone cries “Conspiracy theory!” consider the following:

After Kennedy was brought into Trauma Room One in Parkland Hospital, the treating physicians immediately began emergency treatment procedures. However, one of the treating physicians summoned the others to view the back of the president’s head. They saw a huge exit-sized hole in the lower back of President Kennedy head. At that point, they knew that there was no way that they could save his life. The statements of the treating physicians immediately after the assassination confirm what Saundra Spencer would tell the ARRB some 30 years later. See “RIP: Dr. Robert McClelland, the Most Important JFK Witness” by Jefferson Morley.

For much more on the events surrounding the autopsy as well as the events leading up to Lyndon Johnson’s dramatic announcement that he was dropping out of the 1968 presidential race, read my new book The Kennedy Autopsy 2: Lyndon Johnson’s Role in the Assassination.

November 22, 2019 Posted by | Book Review, Deception, Russophobia, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

The Civilian Government Doesn’t Owe Deference to Military Officers

By Ryan McMaken – Mises Institute – 11/20/2019

On Tuesday, Congressional impeachment hearings exposed an interesting facet of the current battle between Donald Trump and the so-called deep state: namely, that many government bureaucrats now fancy themselves as superior to the elected civilian government.

In an exchange between Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) and Alexander Vindman, a US Army Lt. Colonel, Vindman insisted that Nunes address him by his rank.

After being addressed as “Mr. Vindman,” Vindman retorted “Ranking Member, it’s Lt. Col. Vindman, please.”

Throughout social media, anti-Trump forces, who have apparently now become pro-military partisans, sang Vindman’s praises, applauding him for putting Nunes in his place.

In a properly functioning government — with a proper view of military power — however, no one would tolerate a military officer lecturing a civilian on how to address him “correctly.”

It is not even clear that Nunes was trying to “dis” Vindman, given that junior officers have historically been referred to as “Mister” in a wide variety of times and place. It is true that higher-ranking officers like Vindman are rarely referred to as “Mister,” but even if Nunes was trying to insult Vindman, the question remains: so what?

Military modes of address are for the use of military personnel, and no one else. Indeed, Vindman was forced to retreat on this point when later asked by Rep. Chris Stewart (R-UT) if he always insists on civilians calling him by his rank. Vindman blubbered that since he was wearing his uniform (for no good reason, mind you) he figured civilians ought to refer to him by his rank.

Of course, my position on this should not be construed as a demand that people give greater respect to members of Congress. If a private citizen wants to go before Congress and refer to Nunes or any other member as “hey you,” that’s perfectly fine with me. But the important issue here is we’re talking about private citizens — i.e., the people who pay the bills — and not military officers who must be held as subordinate to the civilian government at all times.

After all, there’s a reason that the framers of the US Constitution went to great pains to ensure the military powers remained subject to the will of the civilian government. Eighteenth and nineteenth century Americans regarded a standing army as a threat to their freedoms. Federal military personnel were treated accordingly.

Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution states that Congress shall have the power “to raise and support Armies …” and “to provide and maintain a Navy.” Article II, Section 2 states, “The President shall be the Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States when called into the actual Service of the United States.” The authors of the constitution were careful to divide up civilian power of the military, and one thing was clear: the military was to have no autonomy in policymaking. Unfortunately, early Americans did not anticipate the rise of America’s secret police in the form of the CIA, FBI, NSA, and other “intelligence” agencies. Had they, it is likely the anti-federalists would have written more into the Bill of Rights to prevent organizations like the NSA from shredding the fourth amendment, as has been the case.

The inversion of the civilian-military relationship that is increasingly on display in Washington is just another symptom of the growing power of often-secret and unaccountable branches of military agencies and intelligence agencies that exercise so much power both in Washington and around the world.

November 21, 2019 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Militarism, Russophobia | , , , | Leave a comment

Devin Nunes Exposes The Democrats’ 10 Most “Outlandish” Trump Conspiracy Theories

By Tyler Durden – Zero Hedge – 11/20/2019

“In their mania to attack the president, no conspiracy theory is too outlandish for the Democrats.”

Those were the ‘fighting’ words of a clearly frustrated Rep. Devin Nunes as he addressed the American public ahead of today’s latest round of farcical impeachment circus shenanigans.

With Democrats yawningly repeating endless hearsay and opinion as ‘fact’, Nunes – in a few brief minutes – exposed the whole house of cards by laying out succinctly the ‘facts’ of what Democrats have tried to pull in the last three years:

“Time and again, they floated the possibility of some far-fetched malfeasance by Trump, declared the dire need to investigate it, and then suddenly dropped the issue and moved on to their next asinine theory”

Nunes’ “Top 10” list of “asinine” Democrat attacks on Trump are as follows…

Trump is a long-time Russian agent, as described in the Steele dossier.

The Russians gave Trump advance access to emails stolen from the DNC and the Hillary Clinton campaign.

The Trump campaign based some of its activities on these stolen documents.

Trump received nefarious materials from the Russians through a Trump Campaign aide.

Trump laundered Russian money through real estate deals.

Trump was blackmailed by Russia through his financial exposure with Deutsche Bank.

Trump had a diabolical plan to build a Trump Tower in Moscow.

Trump changed the Republican National Committee platform to hurt Ukraine and benefit Russia.

The Russians laundered money through the NRA for the Trump campaign.

Trump’s son in law lied about his Russian contacts while obtaining his security clearance

“It’s a long list of false charges, all false, and I can go on and on and on,” Nunes concluded.

But, as Schiff would have you believe, this time is different – “we gotcha”.

November 20, 2019 Posted by | Deception, Russophobia | | Leave a comment

John Brennan’s CIA Trump Task Force

Could it become Obamagate?

By Philip Giraldi • Unz Review • November 12, 2019

There is considerable evidence that the American system of government may have been victimized by an illegal covert operation organized and executed by the U.S. intelligence and national security community. Former Director of National Intelligence Jim Clapper, former CIA Director John Brennan and former FBI Director Jim Comey appear to have played critical leadership roles in carrying out this conspiracy and they may not have operated on their own. Almost certainly what they may have done would have been explicitly authorized by the former President of the United States, Barack Obama, and his national security team.

It must have seemed a simple operation for the experienced CIA covert action operatives. To prevent the unreliable and unpredictable political upstart Donald Trump from being nominated as the GOP presidential candidate or even elected it would be necessary to create suspicion that he was the tool of a resurgent Russia, acting under direct orders from Vladimir Putin to empower Trump and damage the campaign of Hillary Clinton. Even though none of the alleged Kremlin plotters would have expected Trump to actually beat Hillary, it was plausible to maintain that they would have hoped that a weakened Clinton would be less able to implement the anti-Russian agenda that she had been promoting. Many observers in both Russia and the U.S. believed that if she had been elected armed conflict with Moscow would have been inevitable, particularly if she moved to follow her husband’s example and push to have both Georgia and Ukraine join NATO, which Russia would have regarded as an existential threat.

Trump’s surprising victory forced a pivot, with Clapper, Brennan and Comey adjusting the narrative to make it appear that Trump the traitor may have captured the White House due to help from the Kremlin, making him a latter-day Manchurian Candidate. The lesser allegations of Russian meddling were quickly elevated to devastating assertions that the Republican had only won with Putin’s assistance.

No substantive evidence for the claim of serious Russian meddling has ever been produced in spite of years of investigation, but the real objective was to plant the story that would plausibly convince a majority of Americans that the election of Donald Trump was somehow illegitimate.

The national security team acted to protect their candidate Hillary Clinton, who represented America’s Deep State. In spite of considerable naysaying, the Deep State is real, not just a wild conspiracy theory. Many Americans nevertheless do not believe that the Deep State exists, that it is a politically driven media creation much like Russiagate itself was, but if one changes the wording a bit and describes the Deep State as the Establishment, with its political power focused in Washington and its financial center in New York City, the argument that there exists a cohesive group of power brokers who really run the country becomes much more plausible.

The danger posed by the Deep State, or, if you choose, the Establishment, is that it wields immense power but is unelected and unaccountable. It also operates through relationships that are not transparent and as the media is part of it, there is little chance that its activity will be exposed.

Nevertheless, some might even argue that having a Deep State is a healthy part of American democracy, that it serves as a check or corrective element on a political system that has largely been corrupted and which no longer serves national interests. But that assessment surely might have been made before it became clear that many of the leaders of the nation’s intelligence and security agencies are no longer the people’s honorable servants they pretend to be. They have been heavily politicized since at least the time of Ronald Reagan and have frequently succumbed to the lure of wealth and power while identifying with and promoting the interests of the Deep State.

Indeed, a number of former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Directors have implicitly or even directly admitted to the existence of a Deep State that has as one of its roles keeping presidents like Donald Trump in check. Most recently, John McLaughlin, responding to a question about Donald Trump’s concern over Deep State involvement in the ongoing impeachment process, said unambiguously “Well, you know, thank God for the ‘deep state’… With all of the people who knew what was going on here, it took an intelligence officer to step forward and say something about it, which was the trigger that then unleashed everything else. This is the institution within the U.S. government… is institutionally committed to objectivity and telling the truth. It is one of the few institutions in Washington that is not in a chain of command that makes or implements policy. Its whole job is to speak the truth — it’s engraved in marble in the lobby.”

Well, John’s dedication to truth is exemplary but how does he explain his own role in support of the lies being promoted by his boss George “slam dunk” Tenet that led to the war against Iraq, the greatest foreign policy disaster ever experienced by the United States? Or Tenet’s sitting in the U.N. directly behind Secretary of State Colin Powell in the debate over Iraq, providing cover and credibility for what everyone inside the system knew to be a bundle of lies? Or his close friend and colleague Michael Morell’s description of Trump as a Russian agent, a claim that was supported by zero evidence and which was given credibility only by Morell’s boast that “I ran the CIA.”

Beyond that, more details have been revealed demonstrating exactly how Deep State associates have attempted, with considerable success, to subvert the actual functioning of American democracy. Words are one thing, but acting to interfere in an electoral process or to undermine a serving president is a rather more serious matter.

It is now known that President Barack Obama’s CIA Director John Brennan created a Trump Task Force in early 2016. Rather than working against genuine foreign threats, this Task Force played a critical role in creating and feeding the meme that Donald Trump was a tool of the Russians and a puppet of President Vladimir Putin, a claim that still surfaces regularly to this day. Working with James Clapper, the Director of National Intelligence, Brennan fabricated the narrative that “Russia had interfered in the 2016 election.” Brennan and Clapper promoted that tale even though they knew very well that Russia and the United States have carried out a broad array of covert actions against each other, including information operations, for the past seventy years, but they pretended that what happened in 2016 was qualitatively and substantively different even though the “evidence” produced to support that claim was and still is weak to nonexistent.

The Russian “election interference” narrative went on steroids on January 6, 2017, shortly before Trump was inaugurated, when an “Intelligence Community Assessment” (ICA) orchestrated by Clapper and Brennan was published. The banner headline atop The New York Times, itself an integral part of the Deep State, on the following day set the tone for what was to follow: “Putin Led Scheme to Aid Trump, Report Says.”

With the help of the Establishment media, Clapper and Brennan were able to pretend that the ICA had been approved by “all 17 intelligence agencies” (as first claimed by Hillary Clinton). After several months, however Clapper revealed that the preparers of the ICA were “handpicked analysts” from only the FBI, CIA, and NSA. He explained rather unconvincingly during an interview on May 28, 2017, that “the historical practices of the Russians, who typically, are almost genetically driven to co-opt, penetrate, gain favor, whatever, which is a typical Russian technique,” adding later that “It’s in their DNA.”

Task Force Trump was kept secret within the Agency itself because the CIA is not supposed to spy on Americans. Its staff was pulled together by invitation-only. Specific case officers (i.e., men and women who recruit and handle spies overseas), analysts and administrative personnel were recruited, presumably based on their political reliability. Not everyone invited accepted the offer. But many did because it came with promises of promotion and other rewards.

And this was not a CIA-only operation. Personnel from the FBI also were assigned to the Task Force with the approval of then Director James Comey. Former MI-6 agent Christopher Steele’s FBI handler, Michael Gaeta, may have been one of those detailed to the Trump Task Force. Steele, of course, prepared the notorious dossier that was surfaced shortly before Donald Trump took office. It included considerable material intended to tie Trump to Russia, information that was in many cases fabricated or unsourced.

So, what kind of things would this Task Force do? The case officers would work with foreign intelligence services such as MI-6, the Italians, the Ukrainians and the Australians on identifying intelligence collection priorities that would implicate Trump and his associates in illegal activity. And there is evidence that John Brennan himself would contact his counterparts in allied intelligence services to obtain their discreet cooperation, something they would be inclined to do in collegial fashion, ignoring whatever reservations they might have about spying on a possible American presidential candidate.

Trump Task Force members could have also tasked the National Security Agency (NSA) to do targeted collection. They also would have the ability to engage in complicated covert actions that would further set up and entrap Trump and his staff in questionable activity, such as the targeting of associate George Papadopoulos. If he is ever properly interviewed, Maltese citizen Joseph Mifsud may be able to shed light on the CIA officers who met with him, briefed him on operational objectives regarding Papadopoulos and helped arrange monitored meetings. It is highly likely that Azra Turk, the woman who met with George Papadopoulos, was part of the CIA Trump Task Force.

The Task Force also could carry out other covert actions, sometimes using press or social media placements to disseminate fabrications about Trump and his associates. Information operations is a benign-sounding euphemism for propaganda fed through the Agency’s friends in the media, and computer network operations can be used to create false linkages and misdirect inquiries. There has been some informed speculation that Guccifer 2.0 may have been a creation of this Task Force.

In light of what has been learned about the alleged CIA whistleblower there should be a serious investigation to determine if he was a part of this Task Force or, at minimum, reporting to them secretly after he was seconded to the National Security Council. All the CIA and FBI officers involved in the Task Force had sworn an oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States, but nevertheless were involved in a conspiracy to first denigrate and then possibly bring down a legally elected president. That effort continues with repeated assertions regarding Moscow’s malevolent intentions for the 2020 national elections. Some might reasonably regard the whole Brennan affair, to include its spear carriers among the current and retired national security state leadership, as a case of institutionalized treason, and it inevitably leads to the question “What did Obama know?”

Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org.

November 12, 2019 Posted by | Deception, Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia | , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Tulsi Gabbard Demands Clinton Retract ‘Defamatory’ Russia Smear

By Tyler Durden – Zero Hedge – 11/11/2019

Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI) on Monday demanded that Hillary Clinton retract ‘defamatory’ comments alleging that the 2020 presidential candidate is a favorite of the Russians, according to The Hill.

“Your statement is defamatory, and we demand that you retract it immediately,” wrote Gabbard’s attorneys in a letter, demanding that Clinton do so both verbally and via Twitter.

Last month Clinton peddled the conspiracy theory that Gabbard is being ‘groomed’ to split the Democratic party as a third party candidate, and that she’s the Kremlin’s top pick in 2020.

Speaking with former Obama 2008 campaign manager David Plouffe on his podcast, “Campaign HQ with David Plouffe,” Clinton said – without mentioning Gabbard by name: “I’m not making any predictions but I think they’ve got their eye on somebody who is currently in the Democratic primary and are grooming her to be the third-party candidate. She’s the favorite of the Russians.”

Of course, that’s “assuming Jill Stein will give it up – because she’s also a Russian asset,” Clinton continued.

“It appears you may now be claiming that this statement is about Republicans (not Russians) grooming Gabbard,” Gabbard’s lawyer wrote in the letter. “But this makes no sense in light of what you actually said. After you made the statement linking Congresswoman Gabbard to the Russians, you (through your spokesman) doubled down on it with the Russian nesting dolls remark,” referring to comments by Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill.

Gabbard has repeatedly denied that she will run in a third party bid for the White House.

November 11, 2019 Posted by | Deception, Russophobia | , | Leave a comment

CNN enlists help of fraudster Browder & Integrity Initiative ‘experts’ to fan Russia meddling claims in UK

RT | November 9, 2019

While the yet to be published report on alleged Russian meddling into Brexit is in the center of political drama in the UK, CNN got the scoop from pundits– usual suspects when it comes to Russiagate narrative.

The Russiagate in the US might have fizzled out, but CNN apparently has no intention to give up on the stale narrative – and is now peddling it across the ocean. The Saturday’s scoop delves into the testimonies submitted by “witnesses” during a UK parliamentary investigation into the alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 Brexit referendum and 2017 general election. While the report, prepared by the Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) has not been released yet, and previous reports failed to turn up any damning proof of Russia’s influence, CNN’s bombshell conveniently revolves around the testimony of Bill Browder, financier wanted for tax fraud in Russia and one of the leading champions of anti-Russian sanctions.

CNN says that Browder’s was one of two written testimonies the channel got its hands on, in addition to having been “briefed” on oral testimonies provided by two other witnesses.

While one might argue that Browder, a self-proclaimed “No. 1 foreign enemy” of Russian President Vladimir Putin, is a person whose words should hardly be taken at face value, especially, in matters related to Russia, CNN does not offer any critical analysis, but rather serves as a mouthpiece for the disgraced entrepreneur.

In his testimony, Browder paints the Russian government as a nefarious entity whose tentacles are reaching further than one could imagine. “The Russian state effectively uses the Western persons… taking advantage of their identities, skills, expertise and contacts in the West to infiltrate Western societies,” Browder says in his statement, while accusing the Kremlin of organizing a money-laundering scheme by recruiting Dubai-based UK citizens and warning that the network of supposed Russia stooges should be acted upon immediately unless “will have serious detrimental effects on the UK democratic process, rule of law and integrity of the financial systems.”

In addition to Browder, CNN also turns to  Edward Lucas with Institute of Statecraft, the NGO behind Integrity Initiative, a state-funded covert project exposed last year as a Europe-wide anti-Russian psy-op.

Perhaps, it’s no surprise that, according to CNN, Lucas cared enough to give a two-hour and 45-minute long oral testimony alongside Chris Donnely, the head of Institute of Statecraft, while calling on the UK authorities to band together with other countries to fight Russian “subversion.”

Among other veterans of the Russiagate who generously shared their expertise with the ISC was Christopher Steele, a former British spy, who compiled a dossier on US President Donald Trump, that was later used by FBI to surveil his camping despite being completely unverified and loaded with salacious gossip.

The 50-page yet unreleased report has become the talk of the town in the UK after opposition accused Downing Street of stalling its publication as rumors swirl that it could reveal Moscow’s sinister role in swaying the Brexit vote.

The report was submitted to the government on October 17, and was due to be published on Monday. However the report likely won’t be made public until after December 12 general election as it was not approved by PM Boris Johnson’s cabinet before the legislature was dissolved on Tuesday.

November 9, 2019 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia | , , , , | Leave a comment

Inconvenient Truths

Alarming things we have learned under Trump, but not always about him.

By Stephen F. Cohen | The Nation | November 6, 2019

Almost daily for three years, Democrats and their media have told us very bad things about Donald Trump’s life, character, and presidency. Some of them are true. But in the process, we have also learned some lamentable, even alarming, things about the Democratic Party establishment, including self-professed liberals. Consider the following:

§ The Democratic establishment is deeply and widely imbued with rancid Russophobic attitudes. Most telling was (and remains) a core “Russiagate” allegation that “Russia attacked American democracy during the 2016 presidential election” on Trump’s behalf—an “attack” so nefarious it has often been equated with Pearl Harbor. But there was no “attack” in 2016, only, as I have previously explained, ritualistic “meddling” of the kind that both Russia and America have undertaken in the other’s elections for decades. Little can be more phobic than the allegation or belief that one has been “attacked by a hostile” entity. And yet this myth and its false narrative persist in the Democratic Party’s discourse, campaigning, and fund-raising.

§ We have also learned that the heads of America’s intelligence agencies under President Obama, especially John Brennan of the CIA and James Clapper, director of National Intelligence, felt themselves entitled to try to undermine an American presidential candidacy and subsequent presidency, that of Donald Trump. Early on, I termed this operation “Intelgate,” and it has since been well documented by other writers, including Lee Smith in his new book. Intel officials did so in tacit alliance with certain leading, and equally Russophobic, members of the Democratic Party, which had once opposed such transgressions. This may be the most alarming revelation of the Trump years: Trump will leave power, but these self-aggrandizing intelligence agencies will remain.

§ We also learned that, contrary to Democratic dogma, the mainstream “free press” cannot be fully trusted to readily expose such abuses of power. Indeed, what the mainstream media—leading national newspapers and two cable news networks, in particular—chose to cover and report, and chose not to cover and report, made the abuses and consequences of Russiagate allegations possible. Even now, exceedingly influential publications such as The New York Times seem eager to delegitimize the investigation by Attorney General William Barr and his appointed special investigator John Durham into the origins of Russiagate. Barr’s critics accuse him of fabricating a “conspiracy theory” on behalf of Trump. But the real, or grandest, conspiracy theory was the Russiagate allegation of “collusion” between Trump and the Kremlin, an accusation that was—or should have been—discredited by the Robert Mueller report.

§ And we have learned, or should have learned, that for all the talk by Democrats about Trump as a danger to US national security, it is their Russiagate allegations that truly endanger it. Consider two examples. Russia’s new “hyper-sonic” missiles, which can elude US missile-defense systems, make new nuclear arms negotiations with Moscow imperative and urgent. If only for the sake of his legacy, Trump is likely to want to do so. But even if he is able to, will Trump be entrusted enough to conduct negotiations as successfully as did his predecessors in the White House, given the “Putin puppet” and “Kremlin stooge” accusations still being directed at him? … continue

November 8, 2019 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia | | Leave a comment

‘Russiagate’ may be over in the US, but in the UK it’s just beginning

Former Special Counsel Robert Mueller testifies before the House Judiciary Committee during a much-anticipated hearing about Russian interference into the 2016 election – EPA/JONATHAN ERNST / POOL
By Johanna Ross | November 8, 2019

‘It’s only a matter of time’ it occurred to me as I cast a glance over Dominic Cummings’ profile on Wikipedia a couple of months’ back. The mere mention that Cummings, Boris Johnson’s trusted advisor had spent several years in Russia, spoke Russian and enjoyed a bit of Dostoevsky was surely more than enough ammunition for the UK opposition, given the way ‘Russia’ has become almost a dirty word in itself over the last few years in the British and US political discourse. There was a half-hearted attempt to link Boris Johnson to Russian money in the Tory leadership race, but it didn’t gain much traction. But now with the Brexit election campaign kicking off, the gloves are off and we can only expect that every possible method of undermining each other will be used by the Conservatives and Labour parties alike.

We have perhaps not seen quite the hysteria over supposed Russian interference in elections here in the UK, as was in the US, but there were rumours of it after the vote to Leave the EU in the 2016 referendum. The general rule of thumb seems to be that if the result is not what the establishment wants or expects, then surely Russia must be to blame. After all, what could the alternative explanation be? That politicians are out of touch with the electorate? Surely not. This time, no sooner has the general election campaign begun, than the ‘Russia’ word has been used already to smear the Conservatives. The party has been accused by former attorney general Dominic Grieve of suppressing a parliamentary report into Russian interference in UK politics which it is said is being held up only by the PM’s office. Apparently the report normally takes 10 days to be cleared, but Johnson’s team has said it won’t be revealed until after the December election. Speculation is rife therefore about the contents of the report and how damaging they are to the Tory party. It has already been reported that the report details substantial donations made to the party by ‘Russians’.

This is where things get a bit ridiculous. For now the approach seems to be rather 2 + 2 = 5. Russians = Russian state sponsored interference. Anything remotely linked to Russia is automatically, thanks to the mainstream media and strategies used by UK foreign office initiatives such as the ‘Integrity Initiative’, branded as subversive and not to be trusted. Anti-Semitism is not to be tolerated at any cost within political parties but anti-Russian sentiments are, it seems, wholly acceptable.

There is an important aspect of Russian donations to the Conservative party which seems to escape most people. Most of the Russians in the UK, unlike other immigrants like the Polish community, are wealthy individuals who, like most affluent people, want to ensure that they retain their riches. The Conservative party is the very political party that represents their values and unlike Labour, does not threaten to raise taxes on their businesses. Any decision therefore by Russian businessmen to support the Tories ought to be taken at face value and not judged in the way that donations by other nationalities are also not judged. And yet, for political reasons, it seems that any possibility of linking politicians to ‘the Russian enemy’ will be utilised in what has become a very dirty game in recent years.

For once, you may say, it’s not Jeremy Corbyn who is being branded a ‘Soviet sleeper’ or ‘Putin propagandist’. Instead of Corbyn’s face being plastered over backgrounds of Red Square in a Russian-style hat in the media, it’s now Boris Johnson. While Labour has faced the brunt of such smear campaigns since Corbyn came to power, now it’s the Tories’ turn – they deserve it, you could say. But the reality is that, as the Russiagate saga proved in the US, with desperate attempts by the Democrats to link Donald Trump to Russia, it is a fruitless exercise in terms of influencing public opinion but on the other hand, greatly harms our relationship with Russia.

Coming back to Dominic Cummings, and already UK Shadow Foreign Secretary Emily Thornberry has written to the government asking questions about the time Cummings spent in Russia from 1994 to 1997 after he graduated, and whether he has been through appropriate ‘security checks’. It’s as if now, any individual spending time in Russia has automatically been up to mischief, regardless of how long ago it was. Thornberry was apparently approached by an ‘official-level whistleblower’ who raised ‘serious concerns’ about just what Cummings was up to back then. Well anyone who knows anything about Russia knows that in the 90s it was a dynamic and rather anarchic place, but a great place for business opportunities. A quick scan of Wikipedia suggests business ventures was exactly what Cummings was engaged in there, and I’m sure he had a fun time of it. But it was a very different place to Russia today, and to imply that just because he lived in Russia over twenty years ago he shouldn’t be trusted is quite frankly ridiculous.

But this is where we’re at now in politics. It’s been a while since UK politics was sensible. Now in the Brexit era, anything goes and Russia remains an easy scapegoat. And nothing one sees or hears suggests this is likely to change in the near future…

November 8, 2019 Posted by | Russophobia | | Leave a comment

The Media’s Obsession With Personalities

By Joe Lauria  | Consortium News | November 5, 2019

Jury selection began Tuesday in Washington in the trial of political operative Roger Stone on charges of obstructing justice and lying to Congress. But instead of focusing on those narrow charges, the corporate media is trying to make this about Stone’s personality while attempting to revive the discredited allegation of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.

The media has a long history of putting personality above facts. Judgement should be reserved to what people say and what they do. Instead we’ve seen character assassination of many people, including imprisoned WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange, rather than a truthful examination of his actions and the dangerous charges against him for practicing journalism. There is the same obsession with the personalities of Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, for instance, rather than objectively examining their actions, particularly on foreign policy. In the same way, Barack Obama’s personality was elevated to cover up for his foreign policy disasters in Syria, Libya, Ukraine, and Yemen and in building tensions with Russia.

Now Stone, by all appearances a sleazy operative in a town full of sleazy operatives for both parties, is portrayed by The New York Times as a “swashbuckling and abrasive political trickster for decades” and “eccentric and flamboyant.” Stone is still innocent until proven otherwise. It’s becoming harder to find, but serious reporting about a person on trial would ditch the adjectives.

The reporting on Stone has little to do with the actual charges against him, but rather serves the purpose of reviving a narrative the media falsely pushed for two years: that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia to turn the 2016 election.

Newsweek reported Tuesday:

“Stone, 67, is at the center of the question of whether the Trump campaign conspired or cooperated with WikiLeaks or Russia to leak stolen emails from the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s campaign during the 2016 election.”

At least The New York Times admitted,

“Mr. Mueller’s investigation found insufficient evidence to charge anyone tied to the Trump campaign with criminally conspiring with WikiLeaks or the Russians to damage the campaign of Hillary Clinton. But as documents released last week by the Justice Department underscore, Trump campaign aides were elated when WikiLeaks began publishing emails that the Russians stole from Democrats.”

Of course they were elated as any campaign would be if such damaging, and true, information came out about its opponent. Is elation now a crime?

The Democrats’ and the media’s allegation against Stone, though it is not in his indictment, is that he somehow knew about coming WikiLeaks releases and told Trump about them. Even if he did, is it a crime if he had nothing to do with obtaining the emails? Stone knew about the coming WikiLeaks releases because Assange had already announced they were coming. The Times reported: “Mr. Stone later insisted that he never had any inside information from WikiLeaks, and his claims were simply ‘posture, bluff and hype.’”

The Only Russiagate Crime

Aside from the technical charges against Stone on lying and obstructing justice regarding his alleged efforts to learn what WikiLeaks was preparing to release, the only crime in this whole story is the stealing of the DNC and Podesta emails. It has never been proven in court who did it, and probably never will, despite the Times and other corporate media saying flatly that Russia did it.

Earlier in Stone’s legal process his lawyers filed a motion to try to prove that Russia did not hack the DNC and Podesta emails. The motion revealed that CrowdStrike, the cybersecurity firm hired by the DNC and Clinton campaign, never completed its report, and only gave a redacted draft to the FBI blaming Russia. The FBI was never allowed to examine the DNC server itself.

In the end, though, it doesn’t matter if it were a hack or a leak by an insider. That’s because the emails WikiLeaks released were accurate. When documents check out it is irrelevant who the source is. That’s why WikiLeaks set up an anonymous drop box, copied by big media like The Wall Street Journal and others. Had the emails been counterfeit and disinformation was inserted into a U.S. election by a foreign power that would be sabotage. But that is not what happened.

The attempt to stir up the thoroughly discredited charge of collusion appears to be part of the defense strategy of those whose reputations were thoroughly discredited by maniacally pushing that false charge for more than two years. This includes legions of journalists. But principal among them are intelligence agency officials who laundered this “collusion” disinformation campaign through the mainstream media.

Faced now with a criminal investigation into how the Russiagate conspiracy theory originated intelligence officers and their accomplices in the media and in the Democratic Party are mounting a defense by launching an offensive in the form of impeachment proceedings against Trump that is based on an allegation of conducting routine, corrupt U.S. foreign policy.

Stone may be just a footnote to this historic partisan battle that may scar the nation for a generation. But he has the personality to be the poster boy for the Democrats’ lost cause.

Joe Lauria is editor-in-chief of Consortium News and a former correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, Sunday Times of London and numerous other newspapers. He can be reached at joelauria@consortiumnews.com and followed on Twitter @unjoe .

November 6, 2019 Posted by | Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia | , | Leave a comment

Russiagate is a cult, complete with unquestionable doctrine, dissent-shaming, and us-vs-them cosmology

By Helen Buyniski | RT | November 6, 2019

Americans still clinging to the idea that their candidate lost the 2016 election because of meddling by the Russian state have much in common with victims of brainwashing cults. For them, doctrine has eclipsed reality.

Russiagate true believers are already screaming about foreign interference in the 2020 election and it hasn’t even happened yet. Months after the long-awaited special counsel’s report failed to serve up the promised evidence of “Russian collusion,” they have held fast to their conviction that President Donald Trump is a Russian asset placed in office by Vladimir Putin, and the intelligence agencies that serve as their oracles have predicted further “meddling” will occur to keep him in office. Indeed, their beliefs only grow stronger the more contrary evidence is presented, to the point where they have more in common with a cult than any other political group.

Russiagaters are back in the headlines after the Justice Department, the Pentagon, and a cluster of intelligence agencies released a joint statement on “ensuring security” for the 2020 elections on Tuesday. But to be fair, they never really left. Just last month, they were pearl-clutching about Russians on Facebook targeting Democratic presidential frontrunner Joe Biden, and before that, it was a non-story about Trump supposedly telling Russian officials he wasn’t concerned about the (still-unproven, but who’s counting) Russian interference in the 2016 election.

There’s no such thing as a negative Russiagate story, and even if Trump is ousted from office and replaced with a safely Russophobic warmonger like Biden, the election will be presented as a narrow victory over the forces of Russian meddling. If Trump wins in the absence of Russian interference, Russiagaters will claim there was a coverup. If intelligence agencies claim there was, but fail to show proof, as they did in 2016, it will be because the proof has to stay classified. If they declare there was meddling, and show reality-based proof – which hasn’t happened yet for any of the elections deemed to involve Russian meddling – then, and only then, can the story be trusted. This is not how reality works.

Such unshakeable faith is typically the domain of religion, not politics. But three years after the initial claims of Russian meddling in the US election, with the sanguine early predictions Trump would be running home to Putin within months having thoroughly collapsed, Russiagate resembles nothing so much as a fringe religious cult. The devotees of high priests Rachel Maddow and Bill Maher may not have a deity, but they have their saints – former FBI director James Comey, former special counsel Robert Mueller, and failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, who continues to play the part of the martyr in interviews. On the side of evil is, of course, Vladimir Putin, portrayed as omnipotent – “Russia” is behind all domestic discord and will shut off your heat in the middle of the winter on a lark – and irresistible, with a few Facebook groups and clumsy memes somehow enough to induce black voters to elect a Russian asset.

Led by Maddow and Maher, certain mainstream media figures have set themselves up as a “priest class,” urging viewers to allow them to interpret primary sources such as the Democratic National Committee emails released by WikiLeaks in lieu of reading them themselves. CNN’s Chris Cuomo led the establishment of this caste, warning viewers the month before the election that they were not allowed to read WikiLeaks publications – that was for journalists to do. The media can thus smooth over any logical inconsistencies with the collusion doctrine and memory-hole the really inconvenient primary sources. Believers’ faith is thus protected, dissenting reports rejected (after all, if it was legitimate, it would be printed or discussed in the mainstream media), and doubters frozen out in a phenomenon cult expert Robert J Lifton calls “mystical manipulation.” In fact, most of the characteristics Lifton includes in his checklist for brainwashing cults are fulfilled by Russiagaters.

Cultists are kept from straying too far into “wrongthink” through thought-stopping techniques they are taught by other members early on. For Russiagate, this manifests in buzzwords like “fake news” and the smearing of all non-mainstream sources as unreliable. True cultists will cut entire websites out of their news diet, lest they be exposed to “Russian disinformation” carefully disguised as, say, American conservatism (Breitbart, Infowars) or peace activism (antiwar.com, the Ron Paul Institute). Even aggregators like Drudge Report have been smeared by the PropOrNot list later used, more disturbingly, by more authoritative voices like the Poynter Institute in an attempt to smear entire sections of the web as disinformation and “fake news.” Such “milieu control” keeps cultists safe in their echo-chambers.

By controlling a person’s information environment, it becomes much easier to control their thoughts. Brainwashing cults demand purity from their members, and both impure thoughts – perusing “fake news” or having civilized online chats with dissenters – and impure people must be jettisoned. If you can’t convert your friends (or family, or spouse!) to see things your way politically, ditch them, a surprising number of articles recommended around the 2016 election. This is no different than a cult demanding followers cut off family members who frown on its activities. Cults know that without a strong support system, it can be difficult to leave.

“Sacred science” is another hallmark of brainwashing cults, referring to unquestionable doctrine and the discouragement of questioning. Many elements of the Russiagate conspiracy theory – CrowdStrike’s assessment that the DNC fell victim to “Russian hacking,” delivered to the FBI without the actual server; the claim that the Internet Research Agency somehow changed voters’ minds with a few hundred thousand dollars’ worth of goofy memes, many of which were posted after the election – require a complete suspension of one’s critical faculties. The Hamilton68 “Russian bot” dashboard, cited by dozens of publications to support the claim that the Kremlin is steering political conversation on social media, has seen one creator largely disavow it (“I’m not convinced on this bot thing,” Clint Watts told Buzzfeed last year) and the other exposed as the leader of his own election-swaying faux-Russian bot armies. Yet the “Russian bots persuading people on social media” narrative persists, even when its targets reveal themselves to be humans.

The most disturbing element of a true brainwashing cult is “dispensing of existence,” the cult leader’s ability to determine who lives or dies (sometimes metaphorically, by being excommunicated, but sometimes literally). Russiagaters are quick to label their enemies traitors – former CIA director John Brennan infamously accused the president of treason last year, a crime that has a very specific meaning for an intelligence official who delivered “kill lists” weekly to the desk of former president Barack Obama. Brennan is not the leader of the Russiagate cult per se, but the investigation currently being conducted into the operation’s roots seems to point to the intelligence community, and recently turned into a criminal investigation.

Less powerful Russiagaters are fond of denouncing their enemies as Russians (and by extension less than human – recall former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper’s conviction that Russians are “genetically driven to co-opt, penetrate and gain favor,” unlike the rest of humans who are presumably trustworthy types who never lie under oath). Hawaii Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell, and Kentucky Senator Rand Paul have all been tarred with the Russiagaters’ brush recently, given cringe-inducing nicknames like “Moscow Mitch” and “Red Paul” for disagreeing with doctrine. In medieval times, heretics were burned at the stake; now they are “burned” on social media.

Perhaps sensing the cult’s days are numbered, Brennan recently backpedaled in his conviction that Russians stole the 2016 election. Russian meddling “changed the mind of at least one voter,” he hedged at the National Press Club last week, not long after an enthusiastic colleague caused him to cringe by cheering “Thank God for the Deep State!” Russiagate may not be over – the warning from the intelligence agencies suggests they are preparing yet another excuse in case they lose the election – but when it does end, it will be with the saddest of whimpers.

November 6, 2019 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia | , | Leave a comment

Nasty Russians harassed a sick American diplomat? That’s ‘fake news’ says Foreign Ministry

RT | November 3, 2019

The New York Times has spun a tale of Russian treachery based on its usual anonymous sources. Though the Russian Foreign Ministry stepped in to correct the record, the paper didn’t let facts get in the way of a good story.

According to the Times, the debacle kicked off in August, when Russian officials delayed a sick American envoy from leaving Moscow for treatment, part of a Cold War-style “harassment campaign” against US diplomats.

The man in question, a military attache at the American embassy in Moscow, fell ill and needed evacuation to Germany for hospital treatment. According to the NYT, his plane was delayed “for hours for no apparent reason,” despite protests from embassy officials and the State Department in Washington.

The story ticks all the ‘Russiagate’ boxes. Neither the State Department or the Pentagon would give details of the incident, so anonymous “officials” were quoted instead. The paper also fitted the story into a wider anti-Russia conspiracy, calling it “the latest episode of a long-running campaign of harassment against American diplomats in Russia.”

Even the newspaper’s subhead proclaimed that “Russian intimidation of American officials has reached levels unseen since the Cold War.” Evidently, delayed flights are comparable to the world’s biggest superpowers threatening each other with nuclear war.

A bold statement, were it true. In a response to the Times, sent before publication but selectively clipped, the Russian Foreign Ministry explained that five and a half hours before the attache’s flight, the airline announced a one hour delay. Upon arrival at the airport, the sick man’s entourage were fast-tracked through security, and were then found to have the wrong papers, due to an error with their earlier charter flight.

The paper mix up – which had the entourage identified as crew instead of passengers – was resolved in 20 minutes, and the flight took off five minutes before its scheduled departure time.

Little of this official explanation was included in the story, and Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova again decried the article on Sunday, calling it “fake news,” and “a scandal; a forgery in its purest form.”

And of course, a good Russia yarn wouldn’t be complete without some conspiracy-peddling from former US ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul.

“When I was ambassador, we felt like we were under siege all the time,” McFaul told the Times. He said that delaying a medical flight would be “the kind of classic harassment that for many years now, our people have been putting up with. It’s inexcusable, it’s horrible.”

This is the same Michael McFaul who once compared Russians purchasing Facebook ads in the runup to the 2016 election to the 9/11 attacks, warned American tourists to steer clear of Russia, in case they be jailed for spying, and penned a research paper in 2005 advocating American-led regime change in Moscow. Anti-Russia protestations are also big money for McFaul, who wrote a book lambasting Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin last year, while ‘Russiagate’ hysteria was at its height.

In her response, Zakharova reminded the NYT about the time a Russian diplomat in Washington was tasked with bringing cancer medicine to Moscow for former Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov some time before 2015. The diplomat was detained by American intelligence and had his belongings seized. The medicine was only delivered to Moscow when the then-Secretary of State John Kerry intervened.

“Relations between Washington and Moscow remain generally hostile,” the NYT’s article claims. That may be true, but the paper’s writers clearly didn’t pause to think that presenting Cold War spy fiction as news might just have something to do with it.

November 3, 2019 Posted by | Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia | | Leave a comment

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