FBI's Steele story falls apart: False intel and media contacts were flagged before FISA

That never actually happened, per Bryan York of the Washington Enquirer. It was one of among many political hoaxes that started this horrific shitshow that we're still trying to get out from under.

 

Byron

 

Break down those contacts ans eliminate the ones that were initiated by FBI spies. Then we can discuss the meager remainder.

 

I guess you mean this one where they took out lethal weapons?

 

And as you can see, it meant in the end categorically nothing. That did not, nevertheless stop the splurge of absolute morons from taking it to mean something more than it did.

We are here, right now in this time for taking rumor as fact, for taking speculation as evidence and we now have a former director trying to justify such reckless behavior as DIRECTOR of the federal bureau of investigations.

If people acted according to protocol, we're not here right now.

 

You mean for a professional British spy who claimed to discuss vital items with a consulate not to know that no such consulate exists? Considering that it indicates that he was lying to his bosses who in turn had to SWEAR to the FISA court that he was a reliable intelligence source . . . yes it is earth shattering.

 

Aside from any legalities/illegalities, lost in this a bit is how absolutely SHODDY the 'investigative' work is, to rely on the hearsay from someone who wasn't on the ground, or who can vouch for the sources on the ground(supposedly, we still don't know ANY of their identities which is frankly absurd.). Even if all of this did pass the smell test(and it doesn't), it shows that the FBI under Comey was not an investigative device worth using.

 

I don’t know, and neither do you.

This whole thread exists because a right wing hack tried to argue that the entire FISA warrant is illegal because it was incorrectly reported in a document from Steele that operations ran through the Russian consulate in Miami, which does not exist.

But it isn’t as if there aren’t plenty of Russian oligarchs and gangsters in Miami.

Aras Agalarov, one of Trump’s money laundering buddies, lives on Fisher Island. He’s the man who told Goldstone to reach out to Trump with the contact from the Russian “High Prosecutor” (that would be Ms. Vasilnitskaya) that the Russians wanted to hand over “dirt” on Hillary Clinton.

Also, the “dossier” was never the primary source for the warrant, as has been explained to you over and over again. The Steele information corroborated information the FBI already had, including many of the Trump campaign/Russian contacts that are detailed in the Mueller report.

So, there’s no point in trying to assert or pretend that these things didn’t happen. Because they did. If Trump managed to barely skate by and Mueller was no able to build a case for conspiracy to take to a Grand Jury, this did not mean that collusion did not take place.

Indeed, the confirmed record makes is crystal clear that if collusion did not take place, it was the Russians who didn’t go along, as the Trump people were eager and willing to use the assets of a rival government to advance their effort to run the United States.

 

At this point, collusion is something you want to believe. And if that's the case, have at it. There's 9/11 truthers who believe in a controlled demolition, there was the Obama birthers, etc. So have at it, there's nothing 'wrong' with it, it's just not true

 

As I said, enthusiasm for collusion was obvious, repeated, and well documented.

If there was no collusion, it was because the Russians were smart enough to not get themselves trapped into any situation there they might get caught in bed with Trump. After all, they have known for years that he couldn’t be trusted, and also the he was a total idiot.

Still, he makes and excellent useful idiot.

Trump and his cronies repeatedly reached out to the Russians throughout the campaign and beyond.

Of course, this gave the Russians a lot of comprimat on Trump, particularly as Trump and all his cronies repeatedly lied and tried to cover up their activities.

Trump has been acting like he has something to hide ever since he rode the escalator, and is now at a fever pitch of obstruction and cover up.

And saying “it’s just not true” (with an emoji) doesn’t make it so. Particularly when ALL of the known facts and evidence point right in the other direction,

 

"Everything points there, except the Special Counsel can't say so. Except to say hey, there were contacts and they were interested!" Too bad interest in a potential crime(and the crime is totally on the Russians BTW, for hacking and dissemnating the materials. Otherwise you, I and everyone else would be guilty for reading Wikileaks.) is not in of itself a crime

For two years, we spent 35 million dollars only to arrive at the same place the WP/NYT told you for about a $1-5 dollar subscription. Yes, it's that epic of a waste of money.(Well, not to you but just as you feel he colluded, I can feel as though it's a waste of money.)

 

I've been searching. Is this your YouTube channel?

 

and a 2 years 30 million dollars investigation proved you are full of crap

 

This is a political crime of the first magnitude,regardless of whether a criminal charges were laid.

Trump, and his henchmen offered to sell themselves to the Russians in return for their help in the US election.

That is treasonous. Period.

There is no question about that anymore. And the attempts of Trumpsters to dance past it with BS, celebrate it, or ignore it, are downright scary.

When you excuse a would be tyrant for attempting to destroy the institutions of your government, and usurp owner for his own sake (even if it’s for the venal purpose of short term self preservation, as it is with Trump), you are assuming that democracy will survive the damage in the long run. And that is a very dangerous assumption.

And that has nothing to do with the clear fact that Robert Mueller did not want to be the one to make the call, and made it clear that it was Congress’ to make.

And Congress won’t make it. They won’t make it because the GOP has lashed its hopes to the politics of resentment that was Trump’s appeal. They have sold their souls in return for power today. And their afraid of the Archie Bunkers and Richardson’s in their base.

As for the crime being entirely on the Russians, the available fact don’t support that either. The Russians didn’t make Trump want to collude (although they can make him do pretty much whatever they want him to ).

Yes, they did run a massive disinformation against the United States. It is still ongoing.

Trumpsters fell for it, and continue to do so. At the same time, Trumpsters tried to deny it was happening. Don Jr is still peddling the “a few Facebook ads” lie.

It must have been really strange when Sally Yates had to brief Trump on the fact that they know that Flynn was talking to the Russians, and had lied about it, making him a security risk. Strange because nearly everyone in Trump’s inner circle turned out to have done the same thing, over and over again. And strange, because she already knew that.

Trump did not have to reach out to the Russians.

No other candidate for public office would even have considered such a reckless and morally treasonous act.

Don Jr could have called the FBI. But he didn’t.

And, when Trump thought he has solved his Russia problem by firing James Comey, who did he run to to tell about it? Sergei Kislyak (who had been the head of station in the US).

And when Trump thought he had finally BSed his way past the Mueller Report, with no indictments in the White House, and Barr’s dishonest letter, who did he run to to tell about about it? Putin.

 

None of the facts have changed at all.

Every news report you denied about Trump and the Russians is true. And still true.

 

Oh for the love of god, you now believe the Trump Campaign egged the Russians onto interfering in our elections? There's nothing in the report to support that either, but as I've been saying: Have at it. And no, I don't think our democracy was under attack by facebook ads and twitter bots. In fact, I find the very suggestion preposterous.

And yes, I'm using aggressively intellectual words like preposterous on purpose. I'm tired of entertaining Nancy Pelosi, Al Green, Jerryd Nadler and the rest of the insufferable Americans on this ludicrous proposition. It was cute, at one point. Now it's aggravating, tiresome and simply not worth a prestigious first world nation like the United States.

Now, instead of making these bloating (to use your words) claims, the Senate Intel committee/DNC/RNC can do the following: Set up firewalls, verify accounts and Twitter/Facebook can do the same. Then your dreaded 'attack' on our democracy is nonexistent.

Or, as I said prior: You can ban all foreign IP's from US cyber space and basically go all Communist China on our asses.

But if they don't take any of those measures, then I guess the so-called attack wasn't as serious as the bloating leads us to believe. And so, it is not because they sold their souls for 'power'(power, in an increasingly disenfranchised country). It's because the US Senate must ponder political legacy, beyond the House's temper tantrum.

Impeachment was for high crimes and misdemeanors. Mueller refused to make the call. You said it, I said it from the start. He failed to pull the trigger. As a result, he's POTUS until January 2021.

 

Its cool, we'll wake you when the indictments drop. For some reason I have a feeling you folks will be aware and sacrificing everyone to save Obama...

 

Oh please do! I just hope you don't get your feelings hurt when your beloved leader and his AG can't deliver.

 

Where did you get the idea that the Trump campaign egged the Russians into interfering in our elections? I never said that.

Do you have the slightest idea what you’re talking about? Or do you just parrot the noise you see on the trash blogs.

The Russian cyber attacks on the US began well before Trump became a candidate.

The Mueller report makes it clear that the Russians let the Trump campaign know what they were doing. And the fact that the Russians told Trump that they were the ones who stole the DNC e-mails months before it was public knowledge, and that the TRump people did every thing they could to reach out to try and coordinate their efforts is also confirmed (despite months of loud, and often carefully parsed denials from Trumpsters).

Their man was running Trump’s campaign, and handing internal campaign data (stuff they would never want the DNC or the New York Times to see) right to Putin.

Not that coordination wasn’t going on. Cambridge Analytica had no shortage of ties to Moscow, including the fact that Moscow was responsible for building their data sets.

I don’t know where you get this high school drivel about “Senate Intel Committee to set up firewalls, verify accounts etc.

Trump has had McConnell block any Congressional investigation into Russian meddling. Devin Nunes certainly avoided the subject as Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.

And McConnell is carrying Trump’s water by spending the last three years block any and all efforts to investigate or enact legislation that would provide the resources and power to fight the Russian attacks.

Instead they continue, with the tacit approval of the Trump Administration.

 

"Trump, and his henchmen offered to sell themselves to the Russians in return for their help in the US election"

I see that you are, ever so slowly, starting to come around. It might take until the year 3,888 for you to get there but hey, bany steps.

 

What? My positions have not changed for over thirty years on the general subject of Trump’s corruption, greed, and incompetence. He is, and always was nothing more than a rich spoiled punk with a chip on his shoulder and a pocket full of daddy’s money (now Russian money, since he pissed away the last of daddy’s money 12 years ago).

My views on Trump and the Russians have evolved.

I did not think even Donald Trump was dumb enough to involve his campaign directly with Russian intelligence operatives during a US presidential campaign,

But as the evidence piled up, I saw that I underestimated Trump’s recklessness, stupidity and irresponsibility,

If you’re trying to promote the idea that it was his henchmen and not Trump who were responsible, forget it. That’s almost as lame as the Trumpster line that it’s all Obama’s fault for not exposing Trump before the election. ‘

Nothing happens in Trump world without Trump knowing about it.

Don’t insult anyone’s intelligence by suggesting that Trump wasn’t fully briefed in in advance of the Trump tower meeting with the Russians. He even bragged about the “dirt” he thought he was going to get in public in advance. He announced a press conference to tell all. And then never mentioned it again in public. (At least until the infamous “Russia, if you’re listening.....” remark.

We all know they were listening, and still are.

 

Your claims are false. All the major revelations about the Trump Russia affair are confirmed in the Mueller report. They are not “rumor” or “speculation”.

The Director of the FBI investigated a US presidential campaign because that campaign installed a man well known to have worked for the Russians as campaign manager.

Then the candidate himself announced that a man whom the FBI had previously interviewed in connection with being fluttered as a possible Russian intelligence asset as a “senior foreign policy advisor” (or at least, that’s what Trump himself told the Washington Post). That was about the time that Trump started attacking the Post. I’m not sure it was because of their head scratching discussion about the dubious qualifications of Trump’s “foreign policy advisors” or John Farenholt exposing Trump for pocketing the proceeds from the fake veterans fundraiser that he held in order to hide from debating Ted Cruz. I think the latter.

The FBI had received warnings from intelligence officials all over the world about the suspicious activities regarding Trump and his Russian gangster friends as early as April 2016. These included all the major characters in the Trump inner circle.

Contrary to your empty rhetoric about “protocol”, the intelligence services were protecting the national security of the United States. That’s their job.

The only moron in this scenario are the collections of losers and hangers on that Trump collects, and the millions of ordinary people who fell for his scams.

 

No, no tolerance. You're the FBI. There's a zero tolerance level for failure. You don't get to chase rumor and innuendo as FBI director. The moment you did that, is the moment you betray the bureau and its agents. I mean, I love how you use "possible" Russian agent to cover up the fact that it manifestly wasn't true, and there was no evidence to its truth.

No evidence, not even a "scintilla" of evidence. Having contacts is not evidence, it's not even evidence to open up an investigation. We don't investigate family members with mafia ties. Maybe you interview them to find out what, if anything they know but you don't key in on them as suspects of a crime they didn't commit.

They didn't protect the national security of the United States. They betrayed our nation's national security by taking rumor and innuendo into an investigation,and failed to protect the president's integrity. I will always and forever blame them and their inappropriate actions. They are traitors to our country.

 

Which persons named in the Steele dossier, were indicted for crimes alleged in the Steele dossier? Manafort's charges stemmed from Yanukovych "black ledger" which oddly enough was passed to investigators by Vicky Nuland. Carter Page, the target of this warrant wasn't charged with anything, and that's to the point. So is the fact that FISA apps provide a field for disclosure: derogatory information, pertaining to sources. Nuland's deputy's notes should have been recorded in that designated field. The crooks who submitted the fraudulent app claim it was insignificant, so why include it at all? Purposeful deceit is the answer.

 

Well, according to the Mueller Report that you didn’t read, It did.

The report mentioned J.D. Gordon, a one time Pentagon PR flack, who was the Trump campaign’s national security advisor at the time. The report gets vague on who talked to who. Trump may have been involved directly. He may not have. Trump did talk to Kislyak, who was at the convention at the time.

Gordon was also palling around with the Russian agent Maria Butina, who was busy slipping Russian cash into the NRA, so they could spread it around to various GOP candidates without them knowing it was Moscow’s cash.