The Late, Great Russian Collusion Myth
By Victor Davis Hanson at American Greatness: https://amgreatness.com/2017/06/28/l...ollusion-myth/
Introduction:
Quote:
Incoming elected administrations, especially the Obama transition team of 2008 in the case of Russia and Iran, seek contacts with foreign diplomats before formally entering office.
Most presidential campaigns are staffed by at least a few free-lancing opportunists who see their candidate as a nexus for profiteering. There is no need for a reminder of the lucrative careers of Bill Clinton from 2009-2012, or of Hillary Clinton’s brother, or of the nature of some of John Podesta’s investments. And foreign governments, our own included as in the case of the Obama Administration’s entrance into the Israeli elections, are frequently accused of trying to sway or indeed interfere with another nation’s campaign cycles.
Yet what is strange about the charges of collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russian government is that those landscapes were concocted into something supposedly criminal and uniquely applicable to Donald Trump’s election and presidency. Indeed, one of the strangest events in recent political history was the post-election false news narrative that Trump and the “Russians” had colluded during the campaign to rob Hillary Clinton of a sure victory.
Highlights:
- FBI Director Comey informed President Trump on three occasions that he was not personally, the subject of any investigation about collusion with Russia
- Former DNI Clapper and former CIA Director Brennan admitted that there was no intelligence to their knowledge implicating Trump as a colluder with Putin to gain advantage over Clinton
- Former Homeland Security Secretary Johnson conceded that there was no evidence of any Trump campaign effort to persuade Russia to interfere in the elections
- President Obama, who had intelligence reports of Russian election-cycle hacking, dismissed the idea that any party could taint a U.S. presidential election and denounced Trump’s suggestion that the impending election might be “rigged”
- Poster's Note: read what Obama said in October 2016 regarding Trump’s claims of election “rigging”, which could refer to any type of voter fraud, suppression or “hacking”:
To Trump: “stop whining”
The voting process is protected because it is “so decentralized”
Trump’s claim is “not based on facts”
“I have never seen in my lifetime or in modern political history any presidential candidate trying to discredit the elections and the election process before votes have even taken place.”
“…if he [Trump] got the most votes, then it would be my expectation of Hillary Clinton to offer a gracious concession speech and pledge to work with him in order to make sure that the American people benefit from an effective government”
- Hillary Clinton lost because she was a poor candidate, her campaign was incompetent (wasting resources on red states rather than solidifying the “blue wall”), and because she did not offer a compelling story, other than the novelty of becoming the first female president.
- With respect to appeasement of the Russians, Obama launched a “reset” in reaction to Bush’s increasingly confrontational stance. Obama also was recorded explaining that he would need “space” from Putin until after the 2012 election, after which he could respond with “flexibility”. Lastly, Obama also in 2012 ridiculed presidential candidate Romney’s assertion that Russia was the primary threat to the United States.
- Republicans such as Nunes and McCain have denounced Obama for years, for not confronting Russian aggression in Ukraine, for various intelligence failures, and for not answering Russia’s information war against the U.S.
- VDH: “How the media was able in a matter of hours after the election to rebrand Democrats as anti-Russian hawks and Republicans as colluders with Putin is one of the strangest and yet most successful political fabrications in recent history.”
- Clinton seemed to be enjoying a comfortable lead in the last months of the 2016 campaign, but there were concerns that the DNC favoring her over Sanders, her private server and pay-for-play scandals were damaging.
- Putin was openly hostile to Obama, Clinton and Kerry, and believed that they had at various times meddled in Russia’s 2012 election and provoked the revolution in Ukraine in 2014.
- “Never Trump” Republican and Clinton campaign opposition research (e.g. the Steele Dossier) came to the attention of FBI Director Comey. Various bureaucrats later leaked salacious details of the Dossier to the press.
- Yet the media continued to largely ignore the Russian collusion story given that Clinton’s victory was almost a certainty. But then Trump won, despite losing the popular vote, and by crumbling the “blue wall”.
- Following Trump’s victory, the Clinton campaign needed to counter Trump (i.e. delegitimize and undermine) and to console itself, and revived the Russian collusion story. The media was eager for controversy and therefore public attention, and intelligence careerists who saw Trump as a threat to their “community” tried to authenticate the smear. The smear easily fit convenient stereotypes about Trump, Trump’s rhetoric and actions worsened the problem and Putin enjoyed watching Americans turn on one another rather than him. The smear also drowned out accusations that Obama leaked to the press or that Attorney General Lynch had obstructed the FBI’s investigation of Clinton.
Is Russiagate Really Hillarygate?
By Paul Roderick Gregory: https://www.forbes.com/sites/paulrod.../#2d4697945cf6
Introduction:
Quote:
According to an insider account, the Clinton team, put together the Russia Gate narrative within 24 hours of her defeat. The Clinton account explained that Russian hacking and election meddling caused her unexpected loss. Her opponent, Donald Trump, was a puppet of Putin. Trump, they said, “encourages espionage against our people.” The scurrilous Trump dossier, prepared by a London opposition research firm, Orbis, and paid for by unidentified Democrat donors, formed a key part of the Clinton narrative: Trump’s sexual and business escapades in Russia had made him a hostage of the Kremlin, ready to do its bidding. That was Hillary's way to say that Trump is really not President of the United States—a siren call adopted by the Democratic party and media.
Highlights:
- The most uncovered story of RussiaGate is the connection between the Clinton campaign, an unregistered agent of Russia in Washington, and the Steele Dossier. It is possible that Russian intelligence fabricated the Dossier as part of its overall disinformation campaign to sow chaos in the American political system. If Clinton’s associates ordered and paid for the Dossier, then RussiaGate becomes a story of collusion between Clinton campaign operatives and Russian intelligence. Only the Wall Street Journal, The Federalist and National Review have covered the possible Russian intelligence-origins of the Dossier.
- On March 31, 2017, Senator Grassley (R-Iowa) demanded from the DOJ documentation on “Fusion GPS”, a firm that managed the Steele Dossier. Sen. Grassley explained that it would be of concern for his Judiciary Committee because: “when Fusion GPS reportedly was acting as an unregistered agent of Russian interests, it appears to have been simultaneously overseeing the creation of the unsubstantiated dossier of allegations of a conspiracy between the Trump campaign and the Russians.”
- On May 3, 2017, before the Senate Intelligence Committee, former FBI Director Comey refused to answer questions about Fusion GPS and the Dossier (“I don’t want to say”).
- Russia SME David Satter wrote:
Quote:
Russian intelligence also acted to sabotage Mr. Trump. The ‘Trump dossier, full of unverified sexual and political allegations, was published in January by BuzzFeed, despite having all the hallmarks of Russian spy agency ‘creativity.’ The dossier was prepared by Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence officer. It employed standard Russian techniques of disinformation and manipulation…after the publication of the Trump dossier, Mr. Steele went into hiding, supposedly in fear for his life. On March 15, however, Michael Morell, the former acting CIA director, told NBC that Mr. Steele had paid the Russian intelligence sources who provided the information and never met with them directly. In other words, his sources were not only working for pay. Furthermore, Mr. Steele had no way to judge the veracity of their claims…Perhaps the time has come to expand the investigation into Russia’s meddling to include Mrs. Clinton’s campaign as well.
- Poster’s Note: Satter was expelled from Russia and one of the first journalists to claim that the 1999 Russian apartment bombings were a plot by Russian intelligence to bring Putin to power and provide a pretext for the Second Chechen War (Darkness at Dawn). If this was what truly happened, and I believe that it was, nothing the current president has said or done with regard to U.S.-Russia relations can compare to the naïveté of his two predecessors in attempting to cooperate with Putin in good faith.
- According to Vanity Fair, Fusion GPS was initially paid for opposition research by an anti-Trump Republican donor, but then paid by Democratic donors whose identities remain secret.
- The Fusion GPS-Steele Dossier link must be investigated by Special Counsel Mueller, and Steele interviewed himself...