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Death of the “17 intelligence agencies” canard

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It’s worth noting officially. NYT Finally Retracts Russia-gate Canard.

The New York Times has finally admitted that one of the favorite Russia-gate canards – that all 17 U.S. intelligence agencies concurred on the assessment of Russian hacking of Democratic emails – is false.

On Thursday, the Times appended a correction to a June 25 article that had repeated the false claim, which has been used by Democrats and the mainstream media for months to brush aside any doubts about the foundation of the Russia-gate scandal and portray President Trump as delusional for doubting…

…on Thursday, the Times…noted in a correction that the relevant intelligence “assessment was made by four intelligence agencies…The assessment was not approved by all 17…

The Times’ grudging correction was vindication for some Russia-gate skeptics who had questioned the claim of a full-scale intelligence assessment, which would usually take the form of a National Intelligence Estimate (or NIE), a product that seeks out the views of the entire Intelligence Community and includes dissents.

The reality of a more narrowly based Russia-gate assessment was admitted in May by President Obama’s Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and Obama’s CIA Director John Brennan in sworn congressional testimony.

Clapper testified before a Senate Judiciary subcommittee on May 8 that the Russia-hacking claim came from a “special intelligence community assessment” (or ICA) produced by selected analysts…

Clapper further acknowledged that the analysts…were “hand-picked” from [3 agencies,] the CIA, FBI and NSA. [ed: and DNI would count as four]

Emphasis added. Translation: It was politicized “intelligence”. Deep State wanted a pre-determined answer that would help them to dominate President Trump; as opposed to the real answer.

As to what those “hand-picked” analysts worked from: It’s worth remembering that, whereas Watergate began with a real burglary and police reports, Trumprussia began with the DNC actually blocking FBI investigators from the alleged crime scene and forcing everyone to operate off of a shoddy report from CrowdStrike. James “Leaker” Comey didn’t quite admit that in his testimony, but he came close:

COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN RICHARD BURR: Did you ever have access to the actual hardware that was hacked? Or did you have to rely on a third party to provide you the data that they had collected?

COMEY: In the case of the DNC, and, I believe, the DCCC [i.e. the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee], but I’m sure the DNC, we did not have access to the devices themselves. We got relevant forensic information from a private party…

Via ZH; the article goes on to explain in detail why CrowdStrike’s report was bogus.

Per Breitbart, the Associated Press joined the NYT in withdrawing the fake “17 intelligence agencies” claim.

Is Trumprussia boomeranging?

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As Rush, Hannity, etc. have been pointing out lately, eight months of baseless Trump-Russia collusion allegations seem finally to be blowing up in the faces of the Democrats, Controlled Media and Deep State.

In a recent poll, 73% of Americans said the investigations are causing Congress to lose focus, 64% said they’re hurting the country, 56% said it’s time to move on, and 52% said they don’t believe Trump did any collusion.

And the story itself is taking a few turns. First, I’d like to give the background on something called the Trump Dossier.

  • It’s a salacious report on candidate Trump that was put together (in 2015 or 16?) by a former British intelligence agent, Christopher Steele.
  • His work was sloppy, containing (among other things) provably-false tales of Trump associates meeting Russians in Europe, and probably-false tales of Trump doing bizarre sexual practices. (OK, tame practices by gay standards.)
  • Steele was paid to produce the dossier by a company called Fusion GPS.
  • Many suspect that Fusion GPS was paid ultimately by Democrats and/or #NeverTrumpers, and was hired precisely to do a hit piece (something shoddy and salacious).
  • The dossier was passed to the FBI and other U.S. agencies. Although they knew it was false in its most serious claims (or should have known), they appear to have used it as a basis for investigations on Trump and as a roadmap for questioning witnesses.
  • Also, some suspect that the Obama administration may have used the dossier to obtain their secret FISA warrants and/or NSA surveillance on Trump, during and after the 2016 campaign.
  • We need to know on that last point because, *if true*, it would be explosive: one would have to “connect the dots” of Hillary or DNC paying a foreigner for a bogus report on Trump, Obama using the report as a bogus reason to spy on candidate Trump, Susan Rice “unmasking” the data and distributing it within the Obama government, and then leakers possibly leaking Trump campaign secrets to media, DNC and/or Hillary. Quite a trick.

It’s backfiring on the Democrats because at long last, the Senate Judiciary committee is investigating Fusion GPS and who was behind the bogus dossier.

Next, I’d like to discuss The Washington Post’s blockbuster article last Friday on Russian election hacking, a game-changer.

WaPo is known for “burying the lede”: putting a title/frame on a story that tries to mask the important revelations within it. This article is titled “Obama’s secret struggle to punish Russia for Putin’s election assault”. Thus, WaPo’s frame is: Russian election hacking is real and isn’t Obama a lonely hero for having tried to punish Russia?

But the article’s details tell a different story.

  • Everyone agrees, still, that Russia didn’t change a single vote. In that respect, the 2016 election was perfectly fair and un-hacked.
  • The CIA did report to Obama in 2016 that Russia was trying to do cyber-crime on various U.S. targets, including both the DNC and RNC.
  • For five months, Obama dithered and considered various responses and, in the end, he did…nothing. Until after the election (when he expelled some Russian diplomats, tightened some sanctions, and fanned the flames of protest and questioning Trump’s legitimacy).

“It is the hardest thing about my entire time in government to defend,” said a former senior Obama administration official involved in White House deliberations on Russia [in the months before the election]. “I feel like we sort of choked.”

I want to make clear that I still do not take this “Russia hacking” narrative at face value. My reasons:

  • Still no evidence. The WaPo article doesn’t actually provide any.
  • After Wikileaks Vault 7 (including revelations that the CIA itself routinely hacks things and leaves Russian fingerprints), there is no reason to take the CIA’s word on anything – without evidence.
  • Also, Russia could have tried to hack into stuff – but with little or no effect.
  • In regard to the “DNC emails”, at least, it is still very plausible the leaker was Seth Rich, a DNC insider. Because Wikileaks dropped many hints about it. (At this point, yes I trust their hints more than the CIA’s.)
  • And it still doesn’t matter who leaked the “DNC emails” because they were 100% true and relevant information that American voters deserved. If it was Russia, they did not attack our nation or our democracy; only our 2 major-party Establishments. (Big difference.)
  • It is still exceedingly odd that the DNC denied FBI investigators access to their computers after the leaks. Instead, the DNC spoon-fed the FBI a report on supposed Russian hacking from another shoddy, DNC-paid company, CrowdStrike.

But let’s say it’s all true. Most observers agree that the major countries all try to hack each other (or spy), and to influence each other’s elections. And that Russia and the U.S. have been doing it to each other for 70 years or more. Why should 2016 be an exception? In that case,

  1. It is all the more strange and inappropriate that the DNC didn’t let the FBI in to look at their servers and network, after the alleged “DNC email” hack.
  2. It is strange and inappropriate that Obama didn’t defend the U.S. constitution (as his oath requires) by telling the American public. Obama was no stranger to stirring up trouble with Russia (see: Ukraine coup, 2014). Why wouldn’t he, here? Some guesses:
    • He’s just ineffectual?
    • The Russian interference was routine (see above); much less of a deal than WaPo is now making of it?
    • Obama didn’t want to draw attention to Hillary’s corrupt Russia dealings?
    • He didn’t want to draw attention to Democrats having serious problems with security; like, you know, Hillary’s e-mail scandal?
    • He didn’t want to draw attention to Hillary’s hypocritical interference in Russian elections?
    • He thought Hillary would win, and didn’t want any Russia messes tainting her presidency in the public’s mind? (This is WaPo’s theory. But then, when Trump won, Obama was suddenly OK with tainting the next President?)
    • Or: Deep down, Obama didn’t want Hillary to win? (This is Rush’s theory.)
  3. It is still strange and inappropriate that leading Democrats want to blame Republicans – and the American people – in all this. For example, from Rep. Adam Schiff:

    He said many groups inadvertently abetted Russia’s campaign, including Republicans who refused to confront Moscow and media organizations that eagerly mined the troves of hacked emails.

    In other words, damn the American people for opening their eyes and reading those 100% genuine DNC emails!

In short: If WaPo’s story is true, then instead of Trump-Russia collusion, we should be looking at Obama-Russia collusion and Obama-Hillary collusion. This is the game-changer.

Trumprussia was always “mostly bullsh*t”, as we learned Tuesday. The real story would be if the Russian government interfered in U.S. elections – and President Obama let them. Then made a big deal of it later – just to undermine President Trump. Now *that’s* attacking American democracy.

In every plausible version of this mess,

  1. Someone in the government spread around the fake Trump dossier (when they should have ignored/discredited it).
  2. The DNC hid an alleged crime scene from FBI investigators.
  3. Susan Rice wrongly “unmasked” data on domestic political opponents.
  4. Obama failed to do a thing about Russian interference; until it was time for him, and various Deep State leakers, to undermine a lawful new President whom they just didn’t like.

These Completely Nonpartisan Journalists Do Not Look Happy

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The CNN crew watches the results of the special election in Georgia’s 6th congressional district; where a defeat of a Republican by a Democrat with limitless funding in a purplish congressional district was supposed to signal the end of Donald Trump or something.

Republicans picked up a win in South Carolina’s 5th CD as well. Both of them were won by Republican establishment types who will slavishly do the bidding of the financiers and donor class. So, forgive me for not getting too excited.

Anyway, in Donald Trump’s Handmaid’s Tale America, Republicans have just sent another woman to congress. Sorry, narrative.

It is kind of fun that wealthy Democrats blew something north of $30 million to lose this election. Probably closer to or greater than $40 million. 95% of Democrat Job “Pajama Boy” Ossoff’s funding came from outta state; mostly New York and California.

I am just pondering the irony now that people in the throes of faux outrage about “Russian meddling” in American elections… spent millions of dollars and sent volunteers down to meddle in an election in a district none of them live in. Is that irony? Or is it just hypocrisy?

How fake is CNN? At least this fake (part 2)

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Just to follow up on part 1 about CNN openly staging a fake protest that they’d wanted, here’s a nifty list.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtP2wRyKiBs[/youtube]

Like all such lists, it suffers from being anecdotal and agenda-driven. And (in this case) badly mis-titled. Some (hi rusty 😉 ) won’t like it that the list comes from Cernovich.

But I’m interested in what’s in it. I have seen most of these instances myself, at one time or another. I think it’s silly to trust CNN. If people ask me why, here are some of the examples I’d point to.

  • The time CNN warned that it’s somehow illegal for ordinary citizens to look at the leaked DNC and Podesta emails. (It isn’t. So, look all you want.)
  • The time they had a camera man pose as a random guy on the street and broadcast his pro-Hillary rant.
  • The time CNN lied that Loretta Lynch had “recused herself” from any decisions on the Clinton e-mail investigation. (She didn’t. She should have.)
  • The time(s) CNN spread the fake “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” meme. (Shot of an entire CNN panel doing it.)
  • The time CNN, broadcasting from a studio with blue screen and fake wind, pretended it was on-location in the Gulf War.
  • The time CNN claimed that Muslim terrorist bombings in Europe are done by “false flag” right-wingers.
  • The time Jake Tapper told a Navy Seal he was interviewing, that his all buddies had died for nothing.
  • The time CNN let a guest claim that “rogue cops shoot black people for sport”.
  • The time a CNN anchor expressed joy at Sarah Palin’s children being assaulted.
  • The times that CNN edited #BlackLivesMatter activists, who were calling for rage and violence, to make it appear as if they were somehow peaceful.
  • The time a CNN anchor praised a cop-killer as “brave and courageous”.
  • The time CNN had 2 reporters in the same parking lot in Phoenix and faked it, split-screen, to pretend they were in different locations.
  • The time they did a voter focus group and openly stated the precise words that they wanted a certain voter to say next.
  • The many times CNN cut a guest’s satellite feed if they strayed too far from CNN’s preferred narrative.
    • The guy they cut for mentioning Jesus.
    • The time they cut Bernie Sanders after he jokingly referred to CNN as Fake News.
    • The time they cut a guest for mentioning Wikileaks.
    • The time they cut a reporter who started talking about Hillary’s negatives or “vulnerabilities”.
  • The way that, when CNN cuts a guest who strayed too far from their preferred narrative, they pretend it’s somehow accidental.

The list is incomplete of course. It didn’t even get around to some stuff like:

And more that I could probably find, if I searched GP archives.

President Trump should fire Special Counsel Mueller

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In the Watergate scandal of 4 decades ago, there were actual crimes at the heart of it.

  1. Five men, working for President Nixon’s campaign, broke into the other side’s headquarters to steal files and set up wiretaps.
  2. They were exposed and suffered consequences; but the consequences needed to reach up to Nixon as well, because he had known/approved their actions on some level, and lied to the nation (in denying his knowledge).
  3. In addition, the Nixon administration had spied on (and/or harassed) domestic opponents through the FBI, CIA and IRS.

In Bill Clinton’s impeachment 2 decades ago, there were actual crimes at the heart of it.

  • His conducting an affair with Monica Lewinsky in the Oval Office, while disgraceful, was not a crime.
  • But then Clinton and Lewinsky committed perjury – Lying while under oath, in sworn depositions in another matter (Paula Jones’ lawsuit). Also, they asked others to commit the crime of perjury. That’s what “obstruction of justice” looks like.

In both cases, there was something real to investigate and punish. In President Trump’s present situation, there isn’t. Trump’s only “crime” is that he won the election.

We already know because the Obama administration (like the Nixon administration) used the intelligence agencies against its domestic opponents. The Obama administration surveilled the living daylights out of the Trump campaign – using any excuse they could they could think of, “oh this is just incidental to surveilling someone else” – then carefully “unmasked” and circulated the data. That’s precisely why we have been treated to so many leaks to the media, these last several months, about who-met-when-with-whom.

And they’ve turned up nothing. There’s nothing there. No collusion with Russia. We know already.

The only other thing that Trump MAY have done (because we still have only one side of the story), is if he hurt the feelings of James “Leaker” Comey by expressing a polite “hope” that Comey wouldn’t prove to be a ridiculous butthole toward General Flynn. Big. Deal. Even by Comey’s account: No, Trump didn’t suborn anyone to wrongdoing.

As such, Special Counsel Mueller’s investigation into these matters is a waste of time and resources that would be much better spent investigating the crimes of the Obama administration. Not only the spying and other harassment of domestic opponents, but also the Obama administration’s collusion with Hillary Clinton in covering up (or failing to prosecute) her many crimes; such as the Clinton Foundation pay-for-play corruption, Hillary’s willful and large-scale security breaches (that should have been prosecuted and weren’t – why not?), and more.

The purposes of Special Counsel Mueller are entirely political.

  1. Have a monkey on Trump’s back, instead of Obama’s and Hillary’s backs where it belongs.
  2. Have a monkey on Trump’s back, so that he will be unable to accomplish his campaign promises (infrastructure rebuild, tax reform, Obamacare reform, immigration / The Wall, smashing ISIS).
  3. Throw 1,000 lawyers at Trump and his key associates, so that eventually they will trip up in some “process” crime of not having responded with utter perfection, every time.

That’s how the game works. You just keep adding lawyers until you create a problem. Humans are forgetful, sloppy and flawed by nature. If you add enough lawyers, you are 100% guaranteed to catch someone in some inconsistency, eventually. It doesn’t matter whom you’re looking into. In this way, you can subvert or reject the result of an election.

If Trump were to fire Mueller, the controversy would be enormous but a lot of people would understand. Now including myself.

Under present circumstances, it would be reasonable and just. Let the Democrats demagogue their violent, insane “base” about it, and let the other half(-plus) of the country get on with the grownups’ business.

UPDATE: A prediction from Newt Gingrich that before it’s over, we’ll need a Special Counsel to investigate the Special Counsel.

Does Camille Paglia’s example prove or disprove a notion that women shouldn’t vote?

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A commenter pointed us to this Weekly Standard interview with Camille Paglia. As in most of her work, she says true and fascinating things – on the way to wrong conclusions. As a sample, here she is on the election:

Hillary, with her supercilious, Marie Antoinette-style entitlement, was a disastrously wrong candidate for 2016 and that she secured the nomination only through overt chicanery by the Democratic National Committee, assisted by a corrupt national media who, for over a year, imposed a virtual blackout on potential primary rivals…

After Trump’s victory (for which there were abundant signs in the preceding months), both the Democratic party and the big-city media urgently needed to do a scathingly honest self-analysis, because the election results plainly demonstrated that Trump was speaking to vital concerns (jobs, immigration, and terrorism among them) for which the Democrats had few concrete solutions…

She has much more to say; RTWT. For example, she slams the transgender movement of today as dupes of Big Pharma:

…the pharmaceutical industry, having lost income when routine estrogen therapy for menopausal women was abandoned because of its health risks, has been promoting the relatively new idea of transgenderism in order to create a permanent class of customers…I condemn the escalating prescription of puberty blockers (whose long-term effects are unknown) for children. I regard this practice as a criminal violation of human rights.

And she covers President Trump’s recent “infrastructure” speech, which indeed was awesome.

But then, whom did Paglia support? (Disclosure: I supported no one; a registered Independent, I came close on Gary Johnson but even he wasn’t good enough for me.) As Paglia explains:

I am a registered Democrat who voted for Bernie Sanders in the 2016 primary and for Jill Stein in the general election. Since last Fall, I’ve had my eye on Kamala Harris, the new senator from California, and I hope to vote for her in the next presidential primary.

Which is downright silly.

In travelling the “alt” opinion world, one occasionally comes across a strange theory that women shouldn’t vote. Here is an example from the vlogger Black Pigeon Speaks (who is center-Left on many issues, but right-ish on immigration, culture and terrorism). For the record: I disagree with the theory (that is, I think women should vote). But I’m going to describe it.

The essence of the theory (which again, I think is a broken theory) is that biology has wired men to take stands on issues and to initiate projects in the world; while it has wired women instead to be concerned with immediate safety and securing benefits from the group (and/or some patron). Because of that, says the theory, women voters over time will drag a country toward both appeasement (of its enemies) and socialism. Which is not good.

Is Camille Paglia evidence for that theory? Here we have a woman with a talent for grasping and expressing truth, yet she still can’t see through the people-destroying ruse of socialism.

AG Sessions to Democrats: buzz off

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Sessions was grilled Tuesday over his supposed meetings with the Russian ambassador. Hint: There were none, except unremarkable receptions or conventions where nobody can remember the dozens of people they greeted.

Some extracts:

  • “Appalling and detestable lie”, here.
  • Testy exchange with Senator Heinrich about whether Sessions needs to report to Congress on his private conversations with the President, here. (A former Deputy AG says that Sessions was right to refuse, here.)
  • Senator Cotton mocking the Trumprussia “collusion” investigation, here.

Democrats are still doing their witch-hunt thing, pretending that Sessions is somehow in trouble, when of course he isn’t. I viewed some of those videos, they were stupid.

As usual, no one sums it up like Tucker. But Brit Hume is also pretty good.

And I gotta notice Marco Rubio, who more and more handles the press like a boss. His manner suggests quiet certainty of his own political power. But I digress.

It’s time for all of us to call a halt to the Democrats’ destructive McCarthyism. And to demand reform of our politicized, leaking, anti-democracy “intelligence” agencies – including the CIA, NSA and FBI.

Kabuki theater

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Figuring out what’s happening in Washington – under the surface, with the Deep State factions – is a guessing game. Highly uncertain. Of course I don’t “know anything”, in the sense of having sources. I read the tea leaves as best I can, and I guess.

When President Trump unexpectedly did a huge Saudi arms deal, I had a feeling that former FBI Director Comey’s testimony would then turn out as a net win for Trump. What’s the connection? Hard to explain. I’m going to say some stuff now which could easily be crap; feel free to shoot it down in the comments, or to add your own ideas.

[Read more…]

Much ado, part II

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I wanted to capture some details for future reference.

  • Comey affirms that NYT has been publishing false stories of Trumprussia collusion.
  • Comey admits to maliciously leaking his own memos.

    Hmm – does this put Comey in legal jeopardy? (UPDATE: Seems more and more like it should. Comey’s formal memos of what happened on his job are government property. Could they be privileged information? Even classified? Then who was Comey to take them out of the office when he was fired; much less, to leak them?)

  • Senator Jim Risch dismantles any ‘obstruction’ case against Trump:

    Risch: ‘I hope’, this is [Comey’s version of] the President speaking, ‘I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go…I hope you can let this go.’

    […]

    Comey: “Correct.”

    […]

    Risch: “Thank you for that. He did not direct you to let it go.”

    Comey: “Not in his words, no.”

    Risch: “He did not order you to let it go.”

    Comey: “Again, those words are not an order.”

    Risch: “He said ‘I hope’. Now, like me you probably did hundreds of cases, maybe thousands of cases charging people with criminal offenses…Do you know of any case where a person has been charged for obstruction of justice, for that matter of any other criminal offense, where they said or thought they hoped for an outcome?”

    […]

    Comey: “I don’t as I sit here.”

  • In other comments, Comey said that he interpreted Trump’s words as a direction, but that is, of course, B.S. Because
    1. Comey affirms above that he knew it wasn’t a direction, AND
    2. If Trump had given Comey a direction that Comey felt to be unethical or illegal, then Comey is in legal jeopardy for not having reported it sooner.
    3. Furthermore, per HotAir, Tom Cotton got Comey to acknowledge that he never threatened to resign over Trump’s behavior, as Comey did in a famous 2004 confrontation in John Ashcroft’s hospital room. Instead, and by his own admission, Comey told Trump “that I would see what we could do.”

    This exchange is stunning…ly bad for Comey:

    Rubio: Did you object to or inform the WH counsel about Trump’s “I hope” statement?
    Comey: “No.”
    Rubio: “Why not?”
    Comey: “I don’t know.”

  • We also have Comey and Trump both calling each other liars on certain points, which makes it he-said-he-said.

    Ever read Trump’s book? He has been dealing with lawyers day-in, day-out for DECADES. Figuring out how to influence people, without actually committing legal or ethical violations. His sister was a big-time Federal judge. The notion that President Trump would make inappropriate remarks to the likes of Comey, was always shaky.

  • Comey reveals that the Obama administration pressured him to downplay Hillary’s scandal. Call it a “matter”, not an “investigation”:

    LANKFORD: …the previous attorney general [Loretta Lynch] asking you about the investigation on the Clinton e-mails saying you were asked to not call it an investigation anymore. But call it a matter. You said that confused you. You can give us additional details on that?

    COMEY: Well, it concerned me because…the campaigns were talking about interacting with the FBI in the course of our work. The Clinton campaign at the time was using all kinds of euphemisms, security matters, things like that for what was going on.

    We were getting to a place where the attorney general and I were both going to testify and talk publicly about it I wanted to know was she going to authorize us to confirm we have an investigation. She said yes, don’t call it that, call it a matter. I said why would I do that? She said, just call it a matter…that concerned me because that language tracked the way the [Clinton] campaign was talking about the FBI’s work and that’s concerning…the attorney general was looking to align the way we talked about our work with the way [the Clinton campaign] was describing that. It was inaccurate. We had an investigation open for the federal bureau of investigation, we had an investigation open at the time. That gave me a queasy feeling.

    Where’s the outcry on that? Or, might it be coming? 🙂

UPDATE:

  • Alan Dershowitz – hardly a conservative – makes the interesting point that, if Trump ever had ordered Comey to stop an investigation, his actions would be totally constitutional. Worth viewing.

    Here’s what I got from it. A President can’t interfere with a judicial process. For example, he can’t tamper with juries or witnesses, end a prosecution (short of doing a presidential pardon), defy a subpoena or destroy evidence. But an FBI investigation is NOT a judicial process. Constitutionally, the FBI Director takes orders from the President. Past presidents have ended investigations they didn’t like. If Congress smells a rat, Congress can impeach the President; but that, too, is a non-judicial process (separate and political).

  • These exchanges settle a lot. Flaming skull time!

    Senator Burr: Are you confident that no votes cast in the 2016 presidential election were altered?
    Comey: I’m confident. By the time I left, I had seen no indication of that whatsoever.

    Senator Burr: Did the President, at any time, ask you to stop the FBI investigation into Russian involvement in the 2016 elections?
    Comey: Not to my understanding, no.

    Senator Burr: Did you ever have access to the actual [DNC e-mail] hardware that was hacked? Or did you have to rely on a third party to provide you the data that they had collected?
    Comey: In the case of the DNC…we did not have access to the devices themselves. [ed: which means, and as I’ve stated before, the FBI relied on a report by CrowdStrike, a discredited DNC-paid company]

    Senator Risch: While you were director, the POTUS was not under investigation [at any time], is that a fair statement?
    Comey: That’s correct.

    Senator Collins: I’m trying to understand whether there was any kind of investigation of the President under way.
    Comey: No.

    Senator Rubio: …the president agreed with your statement that it would be great if we could have an investigation…
    Comey: Yes, sir. He actually went farther than that. He — he said, “And if some of my satellites did something wrong, it’d be good to find that out.”

    Lefties: You are not living in reality, if you think Trump is in trouble on this set of issues.

They arrested a leaker

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…for a very recent offense. I would expect a more arrests to come. But for now, and via Breitbart, this one leaker:

Reality Leigh Winner, a 25-year old contractor with Pluribus International Corporation, was charged in federal court Monday for allegedly leaking a National Security Agency (NSA) report on Russian Election hacking to left-wing news site The Intercept…

She was caught only when [The Intercept] asked the [NSA] to comment on the document last Tuesday. Upon realizing the document was, in fact, classified material, the agency quickly enlisted the FBI for an internal investigation that pointed to Reality Winner…

Each count of 18 U.S.C. §793, the crime with which Ms. Winner is charged, carries a penalty of up to ten years in federal prison.

By the way, The Intercept is into Fake News, such as fake hate crimes:

Intercept writer Juan Thompson was fired last year for fabricating stories about the racially-charged tragedy at South Carolina’s Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, apparently to play up stereotypes of racist white southerners and smear Donald Trump supporters. This March, Thompson was the first person arrested for calling in threats to Jewish community centers as part of a nationwide intimidation campaign that was also widely [ed: falsely] blamed by the media on Trump supporters.

Getting back to Reality Winner: Please let me know your thoughts in the comments. I have mixed feelings. I do think that leaks can be in the public interest. Example: the DNC and Podesta emails that came out in 2016, via WikiLeaks.

Another example: Edward Snowden, who has said that he would be willing to return to the U.S. and stand trial, provided that he will be allowed to mount a public-interest defense (which a jury could then accept or reject).

Should Reality Winner be tried on similar terms – that is, should she be allowed to mount a public-interest defense? Why? Or, lock her up and throw away the key? Again why?

UPDATE: I missed this last week, but it seems relevant. DOJ has gotten a FISA warrant to surveil journalists who have been receiving leaks.

The journalists are not the target…Instead, the Trump administration is looking for the leaker. Who could it be?

Some in the administration are focusing on a retired, high-ranking military officer who held important posts in the intelligence service, according to the source.

The possibly high-ranking leaker was getting some of his information from people inside the White House who were holdovers from the Obama administration, the source said.

Cernovich claims that the retired officer is former CIA Director Petraeus, passing along information from his alleged ally, current NSA McMaster. If true, that would be some messed-up stuff. Game of Thrones-level intrigue.