Tag: law

“A massive scandal brewing”

Thunder is beginning to rumble in the mainstream media:

During the financial crisis, the federal government bailed out banks it declared “too big to fail.” Fearing their bankruptcy might trigger economic Armageddon, the feds propped them up with taxpayer cash.

Something similar is happening now at the FBI, with the Washington wagons circling the agency to protect it from charges of corruption. This time, the appropriate tag line is “too big to believe.”

Yet each day brings credible reports suggesting there is a massive scandal involving the top ranks of America’s premier law enforcement agency. The reports, which feature talk among agents of a “secret society” and suddenly missing text messages, point to the existence both of a cabal dedicated to defeating Donald Trump in 2016 and of a plan to let Hillary Clinton skate free in the classified email probe.

If either one is true — and I believe both probably are — it would mean FBI leaders betrayed the nation by abusing their powers in a bid to pick the president.

More support for this view involves the FBI’s use of the Russian dossier on Trump that was paid for by the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee. It is almost certain that the FBI used the dossier to get FISA court warrants to spy on Trump associates, meaning it used the opposition research of the party in power to convince a court to let it spy on the candidate of the other party — likely without telling the court of the dossier’s political link.

Even worse, there is growing reason to believe someone in President Barack Obama’s administration turned over classified information about Trump to the Clinton campaign.

Notice that the headline is that “evidence suggests” rather than a reliance upon rumors, whispers, reports, or insiders. Which means that unlike the special investigator’s search for collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign, there is almost certainly a substantive there there.

An FBI informant has apparently informed Congress that a secret society at the FBI was holding secret meetings off-site after the election of Donald Trump. On Special Report with Bret Baier Tuesday evening, Senator Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.) called it “corruption of the highest levels of the FBI.”

So much for the FBI’s once-pristine reputation. The FBI is now circling the wagons, as is the NSA, despite what they once said about the Nixon White House and how the problem isn’t so much the original crime as the coverup. The problem in this case appears to be that the crimes are so bad, and so serious, that they are even worse than those that were subsequently committed in the coverup.

The “secret society”

Seditious parties in the FBI may be hiding text messages, but they won’t be able to keep the FISA memo under wraps:

There is serious talk on Capitol Hill about the appointment of a second special counsel amid several new bombshell revelations swirling around the Trump/Russia probe. First, there are the allegations of shocking and substantial government surveillance abuses under President Obama outlined in the FISA abuse memo. Secondly, the FBI lost five months of key text messages between the anti-Trump/pro-Clinton FBI officials Peter Strzok and his mistress Lisa Page. And now there’s talk of a “secret society” of officials within the FBI that apparently met the day after the election of Donald J. Trump to plot against the president-elect….

According to Fox News, Nunes, Gowdy and Goodlatte are in the process of going through the steps necessary to release the four-page FISA memo and intend to see it released to the public by early February.

The FBI has demanded to see a copy of the memo, but so far — understandably —  the Intelligence Committee has declined to show them their hand. Republicans believe that publishing the memo will but pressure on Attorney General Jeff Sessions to appoint a second special counsel, Fox News reported.

Reps Gowdy and Ratcliffe (R-TX) were on Fox News’ “The Story with Martha MacCallum” Monday night to talk about the latest developments.

Rep. Ratcliffe said that former FBI director James Comey needs to come back to Capitol Hill to testify again under oath on the question of when the decision to exonerate former secretary of State Hillary Clinton was made. The latest batch of text messages between Strzok and Page suggests that Comey was coordinating with Attorney General Lynch on the decision well ahead of his July 5 press conference.

“It’s really clear to me that the decision was made in May of 2016 — two months before the press conference,” Gowdy said. “Of course Loretta Lynch knew he wasn’t going to be charged. Everyone except the public knew that she was not going to be charged.”

“We knew that Strzok and Page had an intense anti-Trump bias and that’s okay so long as they check it at the door and do their job,” Ratcliffe said. “But we learned today in the thousands of text messages that we reviewed that perhaps they may not have done that.”

Ratcliffe went on to mention one particular text message that referenced a “secret society” at the Bureau. “We know about this insurance policy that was referenced in trying to prevent Donald Trump from becoming president,” he began. “We learned today about information in the immediate aftermath of his election that there may have been a ‘secret society’ of folks within the Department of Justice and the FBI to include Page and Strzok that would be working against him.”

This goes well beyond basic criminality. We’re getting into serious sedition, high crimes, and treason territory here. And yes, this is definitely Storm-related. The FBI and NSA aren’t “accidentally losing” hundreds of text messages and emails because nothing is at stake.

The Conservative Treehouse explains the strategy called “the Big Ugly”, of which the aforementioned FISA memo is a key part of informing the public in a manner it can digest:

Nunes, Grassley and Goodlatte are working in concert, each with a specific attack strategy that targets the larger swamp defense. This week they began the three-pronged attack we call “THE BIG UGLY“.

The Big Ugly is the wrecking ball that will shatter the front line swamp defenses and allow the draining to begin. The plan for this strategy was developed almost a year ago after Nunes realized how the compartmented intelligence would be used to block sunlight.

ODNI Dan Coats, the man who declassified the original FISA court opinion, NSA Director Mike Rogers, CIA Director Mike Pompeo, FBI Director Christopher Wray, Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Inspector General Michael Horowitz and Asst. AG Rod Rosenstein have each played a significant role in preparing the landscape and armory for this conflict.

Congressional allies like Jim Jordan and Ron DeSantis will be working toward messaging and clearing the fog from the media.

It is not accidental that Ron DeSantis has asked Speaker Ryan to declassify everything…. only a week before Devin Nunes announces his request for the full house to see everything declassified and without redaction. These are Big Ugly cannon shots into the heart of deception.  The summary of the classified FISA-702 abuse, and the subsequent unmasking therein, lies at the heart of the strategy to use a four-page summary memo to inform the public of the historic issues.

Release the memo!

More sound and fury signifying nothing? Or is the government shutdown, combined with what appears to be the imminent release of the FISA court abuse memo, the first thunderclap of the much-anticipated Storm?

All hell is breaking loose in Washington D.C. after a four-page memo detailing extensive FISA court abuse was made available to the entire House of Representatives Thursday. The contents of the memo are so explosive, says Journalist Sara Carter, that it could lead to the removal of senior officials in the FBI and the Department of Justice and the end of Robert Mueller’s special counsel investigation.

These sources say the report is “explosive,” stating they would not be surprised if it leads to the end of Robert Mueller’s Special Counsel investigation into President Trump and his associates.

A source close to the matter tells Fox News that “the memo details the Intelligence Committee’s oversight work for the FBI and Justice, including the controversy over unmasking and FISA surveillance.” An educated guess by anyone who’s been paying attention for the last year leads to the obvious conclusion that the report reveals extensive abuse of power and highly illegal collusion between the Obama administration, the FBI, the DOJ and the Clinton Campaign against Donald Trump and his team during and after the 2016 presidential election.

Lawmakers who have seen the memo are calling for its immediate release, while the phrases “explosive,” “shocking,” “troubling,” and “alarming” have all been used in all sincerity. One congressman even likened the report’s details to KGB activity in Russia.

Now we know why the Democrats have been so stupidly intransigent in shutting down the government over a few illegal aliens. They’re just trying to shift the media narrative away from the expected fallout from the release of the memo.

It’s important to keep in mind that all of these things – all of them – are interconnected. It’s sometimes hard to remember that since the media covers every story as if it appeared ex nihilo even when the same people are involved from one story to the next, but there is absolutely no chance that the Democrats just happened to dig in their heels over nothing at this particular point in time.

After all, no one expected the Swamp not to resist its draining. And right now, the illegal collusion between the Obama administration, the Clinton campaign, the FBI, and the DOJ is its weakest and most vulnerable point.

Who subsidizes whom?

California politicians are worried about their taxpayers’ new inability to offset against their Federal taxes:

The Republican-backed federal tax bill flipped the tables on a never-ending question for California politicians: Will high taxes lead the state’s wealthiest residents to flee the Golden State for the comparable tax havens of Florida, Nevada and Texas?

Republicans reliably raise that alarm when Democrats advocate for tax increases, like the 2012 and 2016 ballot initiatives that levied a new income tax on very high-earning residents.

But now, with the federal tax bill cutting off deductions that benefited well-off Californians, the state’s Democrats suddenly are singing the GOP song about a potential millionaire exodus.

“People with higher incomes pay a lot more money, and some of them may be tempted to leave,” Gov. Jerry Brown said when he unveiled his 2018-19 budget proposal last week. “This was an assault by the Republicans in Congress against California.”

That fear animates Senate President pro tem Kevin de León’s bill that would allow California residents to write off their state taxes on their federal returns as a charitable deduction, as well as other proposals that Assembly leaders have hinted they’re preparing to offer. De Leon’s bill cleared a second committee this week and is on its way to a vote on the Senate floor. Trump administration officials say it won’t pass muster with the IRS.

Democratic state lawmakers are worried because California relies so heavily on the income taxes it collects from high earners to fund government services. The state’s wealthiest 1 percent, for instance, pay 48 percent of its income tax, and the departure of just a few families could lead to a noticeable hit to state general fund revenue.

“It is a genuine concern and that’s why the legislatures in high-tax states are swinging into action immediately,” said Katie Pratt, a professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles who specializes in taxes.

The new federal tax law poses problems for high earners in the Golden State because it caps two deductions that Californians used to limit their federal income tax liability, restricting their ability to write off mortgage interest and their state and local taxes.

Come now. Every time the issue gets raised in Minnesota, the newspapers produce one argument after another to explain why people don’t move based on tax rates. Because great schools! And art! And people!

Of course, since liberals and progressives are totally incapable of keeping two thoughts in their head at the same time, the fact that moving a bunch of Mexicans and Somalis might degrade the value of those competing factors never occurs to them.

Winning: corporate tax edition

Say what you will about the God-Emperor, but his policies actually work as designed:

Apple just announced on Wednesday it will bring back hundreds of billions of dollars from overseas to fund investment in the U.S. and likely increase its capital returns.

“Apple, already the largest US taxpayer, anticipates repatriation tax payments of approximately $38 billion as required by recent changes to the tax law. A payment of that size would likely be the largest of its kind ever made,” the company said in the release.

Using the new 15.5 percent repatriation tax rate, the $38 billion tax payment disclosed by Apple means they are planning a $245 billion repatriation.

The tax overhaul, which President Donald Trump signed into law last month, also lowered the corporate tax rate to 21 percent from 35 percent.

After the repatriation tax payment, the company will have $207 billion left over from the move it can use for investments, acquisitions, stock buybacks or larger dividends. Apple said it plans more than $30 billion in capital expenditures in the U.S. during the next five years.

Apple had $252.3 billion in overseas cash as of the end of September quarter, according to SEC filings, so that means the company is paying tax on nearly all of that foreign cash.

$38 billion is a lot of money. And I note that it’s considerably more than the $21.6 billion the Department of Homeland Security said it would cost to build a big beautiful wall on the southern border.

Also, there are going to be some very sad European bankers and investment managers this morning. All those glorious fees gone in the blink of an eye. No wonder they hate the God-Emperor so much. It was very smart to make the repatriation fee even lower than the reduced corporate tax fee.

Berkeley riot pedos

Apparently By Any Means Necessary is connected to NAMBLA:

The left-wing activists behind the anti-conservative riots at Berkeley have ties to one of the nation’s most prominent pro-pedophilia organizations.

The Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, Integration & Immigrant Rights, and Fight for Equality By Any Means Necessary — more commonly referred to as By Any Means Necessary or BAMN — is one of the militant leftist groups waging a campaign against conservatives and Trump supporters in Berkeley. The group’s planned aggressive demonstrations against conservative commentator Ann Coulter and the students coming to hear her talk led to the cancellation of Coulter’s speech this week due to safety concerns.

BAMN’s parent organization worked directly with the North American Man/Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) in the years just before it founded BAMN, according to NAMBLA documents reviewed by The Daily Caller. In addition, a member of that parent organization said to have founded BAMN is an admitted member of NAMBLA, which she has described as the victim of a “witch-hunt.”

I suppose we should have known by the Star Trek uniforms. In other Berkeley riot-related news, two of the victims of the rioters filed suit in U.S. District Court last week against The Regents Of The University Of California, the President of the University of California, Janet Napolitano, the City of Berkeley and the City of Berkeley Police Department, as well as several named police officers and their two attackers.

This action seeks to protect and vindicate fundamental rights. It is a civil rights action brought under the Fourteenth Amendment against government actors responsible for creating dangerous conditions and exposing the Plaintiffs to physical harm caused by a violent mob of anarchists at a student-sponsored Milo Yiannopolous event (“Yiannopolous event”) scheduled to take place at the University of California, Berkeley (“UC Berkeley” and “University”) on February 1, 2017. Government actors took affirmative measures in preparation for and in response to the riotous mob that left the Plaintiffs in a situation more dangerous than the one in which they found the Plaintiffs.

Government actors are responsible for creating and exposing the Plaintiffs to the unlawful actions of an angry mob of violent anarchists by directing law enforcement officers to vacate locations in and around Sproul Plaza and the MLK Center at UC Berkeley, agitating the mob by issuing feckless disbursal orders and empty threats of arrest from a vantage point where they could ensure their own safety while leaving Plaintiffs exposed to violent assaults, erecting barricades in such a manner as to enable angry malefactors to surround Plaintiffs and assault them and to deprive Plaintiffs of an exit route, failing to enforce the law and by other affirmative actions. By their failure to intervene or employ reasonable tactical methods to ensure the safety of the Plaintiffs and the public, government actors conducted their official duties with deliberate indifference to the Plaintiffs’ safety, permitting hordes of violent rioters to swarm the university campus in a violent rage. By their failure, government actors are thus responsible for creating and exposing Plaintiffs to known and obvious danger.

This action additionally seeks relief from government actors who failed to exercise their duty of care to plan effectively for the foreseeable harms brought upon the Plaintiffs and from the perpetrators of unlawful assaults.

Photo-preening is wrong and illegal

You can’t say that I haven’t repeatedly warned you about the negative consequences of photo-preening online at your children’s expense:

An Italian woman has been banned from posting images of her teenage son on social media, and threatened with a 10,000 euro fine if she defies it.

The 16-year-old had made a court complaint about his mother’s social media habits, which included posting pictures of him on Facebook without his consent.

A Rome family court dealing with the mother’s divorce from the teen’s father, ruled in the 16-year-old’s favour. The court ruled that as per Italian copyright law, the subject of the photographs owns the copyright and the mother was therefore in breach.

It’s natural to be proud of your children. But they do not exist to serve your ego, and as a parent, you should be far more concerned about protecting their privacy and their futures than in trying to demonstrate to everyone what a wonderful father or mother you are, or how fabulous your genetic legacy happens to be, or showing the distant relatives they barely know what they look like. That’s what Christmas cards are for.

Posting your children’s pictures online without their consent is obnoxious, self-serving, and potentially dangerous. It is also illegal in an increasing number of jurisdictions. Just don’t do it.

The list grows

For those who wonder why “nothing is happening,” some perspective.

  • 1,077, normal number of annual sealed indictments
  • 4,188, sealed indictments as of 11/22
  • 9,274, sealed indictments as of 12/22
There are also an improbable number of elite individuals suddenly having fatal accidents, medical boots appearing on politicians – and switching from one foot to another – as well as various war drums beating. So, my best current guess is that the public announcements of the arrests is waiting for the start of the military conflict, which will somehow be connected to some of the individuals arrested.

And don’t forget, by the decree of the God-Emperor, January 2018 is National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month.

If all of this seems impossible to you, remember, Donald Trump was not supposed to win the presidential election. And the insurance the Deep State took out on the possibility that he might unexpectedly do so against the odds has proven worse than worthless.

“I want to believe the path you threw out for consideration in Andy’s office that there’s no way he gets elected – but I’m afraid we can’t take that risk. It’s like an insurance policy in the unlikely event you die before you’re 40.”
~FBI Agent Peter Strzok to FBI Lawyer Lisa Page

Let us be clear on what the “insurance policy” was.  The insurance policy was, in totality, the entire fraudulent Russian Conspiracy Narrative; and all of the accompanying –and subsequent– FBI and DOJ collaborative actions that were taken, under the auspices of an FBI counterintelligence operation, in order to generate an entirely false premise. The goal of using the “insurance policy” was to destroy, and possibly impeach, President Trump.

All of it.

Fake dossier used for FISA warrant

I very much doubt anyone will be surprised by this confirmation, but it is one more piece of the puzzle that will eventually lock up a number of the God-Emperor’s enemies:

Everyone suspected the sketchy Steele Dossier was what corrupt FBI and DOJ officials used to get the October 2016 FISA warrant against Trump. FBI and DOJ officials refuse to answer that question publicly.

Despite a hundred different ways congressional investigators have asked the question, and despite numerous on-camera questions to FBI and DOJ officials about the 2016 FISA process, no-one had definitively confirmed the Christopher Steele ‘Russian Dossier’ was the underlying evidence for the 2016 FISA application to gain wiretaps and electronic surveillance upon presidential candidate Donald Trump.   UNTIL NOW.

Senator Lindsey Graham just confirmed the sketchy Steele Dossier was used to get the wiretap and surveillance warrant from the FISA court.

Lethal Gamma rage

It is always a problem when a Gamma delusion bubble intersects with reality:

On Twitter, more than a dozen people who identified themselves as being in the gaming community told The Eagle that a feud between two Call of Duty players sparked one to initiate a “swatting.”

“I DIDNT GET ANYONE KILLED BECAUSE I DIDNT DISCHARGE A WEAPON AND BEING A SWAT MEMBER ISNT MY PROFESSION,” said one gamer on Twitter, who others said made the swatting call. His account was suspended overnight.

According to posts on Twitter, two gamers were arguing when one threatened to target the other with a “swatting.” The person who was the target of the swatting gave the other gamer a false address, which sent police to Finch’s home instead of his own, according to Twitter posts.

Andrew Finch leaves behind two children – ages 2 and 7. He is from Virginia and the family moved to Wichita in the mid-1990s.

I doubt the idiot gamma who swatted the false address given to him by the other gamer has any idea that his ever-so-erudite reliance upon wordplay isn’t going to get him off the hook for the man’s death, which was a direct consequence of his ridiculous action.

This is the problem with the run-to-mommy generation. They don’t even hesitate to appeal to authority over even the smallest, most easily resolved issues.