—
We were warned.
Warned more than once.
Before the Warnings were abruptly stopped.
It seems Dear Leader does not like it, when the people are let into the Loop ...
Opinion by Max Boot, Columnist, Washington Post — August 8, 2020
[...] devastating New York Times Magazine article about President Trump’s attempts to politicize intelligence — in particular by preventing the intelligence community from speaking honestly about Russian attacks on our elections.
[...]
This was a follow up to an anodyne statement [William] Evanina [a career law enforcement official who was chosen by Trump as director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center,] had issued two weeks earlier warning that “Russia continues to spread disinformation in the U.S. that is designed to undermine confidence in our democratic process and denigrate what it sees as an anti-Russia ‘establishment’ in America.” Democratic members of Congress who were briefed on the top-secret findings begged for intelligence officials to be more forthcoming with the public. Evanina was — but only up to a point.
His Friday statement acknowledged that “Russia is using a range of measures to primarily denigrate former Vice President Biden” and that “some Kremlin-linked actors are also seeking to boost President Trump’s candidacy on social media and Russian television.” For example, he noted that “pro-Russia Ukrainian parliamentarian Andriy Derkach is spreading claims about corruption — including through publicizing leaked phone calls — to undermine former Vice President Biden’s candidacy and the Democratic Party.” Left unstated is that Derkach has met repeatedly with Trump’s lawyer, Rudolph W. Giuliani, as part of this effort, and that Sen. Ron Johnson (R.-Wis.) is now launching a politically motivated investigation based on the Russian propaganda against Biden.
[...]
Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), who has been briefed on the intelligence findings, suggests that the intelligence community is still concealing the full extent of Russian interference. He wrote in a Post opinion column that “the sophisticated tactics and techniques described in [a State Department] report make Moscow’s past interference and nefarious actions look like child’s play,” and “there is much more” information — "much of it even more chilling” — that has yet to be released.
[...]
Funny how another of one of his “security advisors” has had enough of the ongoing, dangerous Trump abuses of power too. So much so, that she is now publicly denouncing him; publicly stating she will now vote for Joe Biden in 2020.
But I digress … What is it Russia is up to in this Election? And why is it, that Trump does not want us to learn about it, before we cast our votes?
by Zachary Cohen and Manu Raju, CNN — Aug 7, 2020
[...]
"The intelligence services have come to very firm conclusions about what the Russians are up to and who is acting on behalf of the Russians," Sen. Chris Murphy, a Connecticut Democrat and member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, told CNN Thursday, referring to the 2020 campaign.
"In the briefings that I've received, there's no ambiguity about what the Russians' intention is and there's no ambiguity about what narratives they are pushing. And there's no ambiguity about the people they are using to push them," he added.
[...]
That aligns with Russia's broader strategy which is focused on influencing voter turnout for candidates based on preference, according to Michael Chertoff, a Republican who previously served as Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security under President George W. Bush.
"It's not so much that they necessarily think they are going to change your vote from one candidate to another. It's about depressing turnout for candidates they don't like and elevating turnout for candidates they do like," Chertoff told CNN.
Here are the sketchy details of the Russian disinformation, that Senator Ron Johnson will be investigating soon — if he gets his way (with no public uproar) ...
I think they’re gonna need a new catch phrase too … “What about his emails?” doesn’t quite have the same ring to it. Neither does “Benghazi-gate!” …
But onto the “sketchy details” of the foreign interference scheduled programming, slated to smear Joe Biden in the next 60 days …
by Christopher Miller, BuzzFeed News Contributor — July 24, 2020
[...]
Andriy Derkach was schooled at a KGB academy in Moscow. He became a Ukrainian lawmaker and is remembered for voting for a Kremlin-like set of anti-protest laws that passed during the country’s pro-democracy revolution in 2014.
[...]
To date, three collections of recordings have been released to the public by Derkach at sparsely attended press conferences inside Interfax-Ukraine news agency. They purport to capture phone conversations between Biden and former Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko while the two were in office.
Poroshenko’s office has called the recordings fake, and Biden’s campaign has denounced what it calls a coordinated effort to smear the Democratic candidate. A campaign spokesperson tweeted at Donald Trump Jr. that the contents of one recording amounted to a “nothingburger.”
[...]
Undaunted, the Ukrainians [Derkach, Kulyk, Telizhenko, and Onyshchenko] hope to take American media by storm before November and be taken seriously by Republicans in the Senate Homeland Security Committee, which has launched an inquiry into Biden’s Ukraine interactions even as Democrats have denounced the move as political.
[...]
Oleksandr Onyshchenko is a gas industry tycoon and former lawmaker in the now-defunct pro-Russia Party of Regions. Accused of embezzlement in his home country, he is now on the run.
Collectively, Onyshchenko said, they comprise “Team Giuliani.”
—
The four Ukrainian operatives certainly are not held in high repute in their home country.
“They can’t be trusted, as they are pursuing their own agenda and using all sorts of lies and manipulations for that,” Daria Kaleniuk, executive director of Ukraine’s Anti-Corruption Action Center, told BuzzFeed News about the Ukrainians.
2016 Fact One:
Vladimir Putin ordered the Russian effort to hack computer networks and accounts affiliated with the Democratic Party and leak information damaging to Hillary Clinton
plus 2016 Fact Two:
While the GRU and WikiLeaks were releasing hacked documents, the Trump Campaign sought to maximize the impact of those materials to aid Trump's electoral prospects.
plus 2016 Fact Three:
Trump and other senior Campaign officials specifically directed Stone to obtain information about upcoming document releases relating to Clinton and report back.
equals:
Yes — Collusion. Yes — Compromise. Yes — Corruption.
...
AND the ongoing muzzling of the DNI Intelligence briefings by the Trump administration in 2020 …
amounts to:
Yes — Collusion, Round 2. Bigger, better, badder.
… “even more chilling” as Senator Blumenthal puts it.
The American People have a right to know about this disinformation — this plot, this scheme.
The American Impostor in the White House says: Un-uh — not so fast …
… Not on my Watch. We will NOT be divulging the specifics of what Russia is doing to help me this time around.
The American News Media really needs to believe this guy, when he shows them who he really is, the first time around … (maybe write it on a Post-It note, or something?)
“It’s not an interference, they have information — I think I’d take it,” Trump said. “If I thought there was something wrong, I’d go maybe to the FBI — if I thought there was something wrong.”
“It’s called oppo research,” he added.
Stephanopoulos pointed out that FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress that a candidate should offer that kind of information to the agency, but Trump flatly rebuffed the notion: “The FBI director is wrong.”
“Give me a break,” Trump said, scoffing. “Life doesn’t work that way.”
www.politico.com — 06/12/2019
We are all about to see how Life really works, as Trump’s Rulebook continues to trample everything decent that preceded it … you know, his — falling ass-backwards into power.
Ala his Pal Vald.
Can you Hear me Now? ... Are you ready for Round Two, America?
