All posts by thenewbostonteaparty

ANKLE BRACELETS WARRANTED

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Finally, the truth has come out – how, when and why? We are not of the uninitiated, we are well informed, knowing full well a bald face lie from the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. The guilty have been outed notwithstanding the Mueller investigation. By the way his investigation is a complete sham. He is a shill for Comey and company, protecting the guilty while harassing the innocent, therefore any indictments he brings or arrests he makes borders on collusion.

They have delved into areas that were never authorized, squeezed heads with far fetched codes, but they will never come clean on why they have failed to investigate the Russian colluding democrats under Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton, the Podesta Group head honcho Tony Podesta, Fusion GPS, Wasserman-Schultz, Huma Abedin, etc.  For instances bringing a charge against Michael Flynn for lying to the FBI is a farce. His whole investigation is built on animosity against the Republicans and specifically Trump. But we must move on because the real criminals are escaping from the grasp of the law.

Back to Attorney General Sessions – yes he recused himself from the Russian investigation, not relevant to what has to come, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have the power to arrest Hillary “jail the bird” Clinton, Wasserman-Schultz, Rice, Slick Willie, Anthony Weiner, Huma Abedin, Loretta Lynch, Koskinen, Strozk, McCabe, Tony Podesta and any other number of lying, cheating, thieving players in this scam of scams.

The question we have regarding Sessions; has somebody threatened to chemically alter his manhood?

COMEY CAUGHT HOLDING THE SMOKING GUN – THEN PAGE AND STRZOK COVER UP THE CRIME

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Fox News Channel logo.svg

 By | Fox News

The original script read like this,  “grossly negligent” when referring to Hillary Clinton’s crimes. Those pivotal words have a distinct legal meaning, and are drawn directly from a federal statute, 18 U.S.C. 793(f), which makes it a felony to handle classified documents in a “grossly negligent” manner. But what happened?

Under questioning, Comey admitted to the Inspector General Michael Horowitz that he authored the May 2 statement and penned every word of it himself. But then he offered the implausible claim that “he did not recall that his original draft used the term ‘gross negligence,’ and did not recall discussions about that issue.”

Metadata shows that on June 6, the FBI’s lead investigator on the case, Peter Strzok, sat down at his office computer to cleanse his boss’s statement of the vexing term, “gross negligence.”  With the help of his paramour and FBI lawyer Lisa Page, the words “extremely careless” were substituted to make Clinton appear less criminally culpable. Page told the IG that “to use a term that actually has a legal definition would be confusing.”

Strozk and Page also expunged from Comey’s statement his reference to another statute that Clinton had plainly violated. She should have been charged under the statute’s “intent” provisions.  With Comey’s consent and encouragement, the pair sanitized his findings of fact and contorted his conclusions of law. Clinton, who had not even been interviewed by the FBI yet, was free and clear. The investigation was a sham.

Comey may not have remembered writing the words that should have indicted Clinton, but he had complete recall of his inability to read the law. He told the IG he thought “Congress intended for there to be some level of willfulness present even to prove a ‘gross negligence’ violation.” If Comey had ever read the legislative history, he would have known that in 1948, Congress amended the original Espionage Act of 1917 to add a “gross negligence” provision that did not require intent or willfulness.

Just as Comey, Strzok, Page and company conspired to clear Hillary Clinton, they likewise concocted their “insurance policy,” a scam investigation of then-candidate Donald Trump. The FBI had no legal basis to initiate its investigation into Trump and his campaign. Facts were invented or exaggerated. Laws were perverted or ignored.  The law enforcers became the law breakers.  Comey’s scheme to leak pilfered presidential memos in order to trigger the appointment of his friend, Robert Mueller, as special counsel was a devious maneuver by an unscrupulous man. Comey’s insinuation that the president obstructed justice was another canard designed to inflame the liberal media.  Sure enough, they became his witting accessories.

Compare all of this – that there was never any credible evidence that Trump or his campaign collaborated with Russia to win the presidency – with the fact that there was ample evidence that Clinton had broken the law.

This is the story of “The Russia Hoax.”

HARRY REID – A CRIMINAL BY NO OTHER NAME – A VAIN ATTEMPT TO TAKE DOWN THE FREELY ELECTED PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES

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To protect Hillary “lock her up” Clinton in the run for the White House FAKE information given to pugnacious Senator, “Harry Black Eye” Reid was the meal ticket utilized to sabotage the Trump run for the Presidency of the United States.  JOHN BRENNAN! Yes Brennan, under the head of the CIA under Obama told Reid not to release it, but did he?

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) sends a letter to then-FBI Director Comey voicing concern over Russian interference in the election and asking Comey to open an FBI investigation.

By Rowan Scarborough – The Washington Times – Saturday, May 12, 2018

Then-Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid released a letter in the heat of the 2016 election alleging Trump-Russia collusion even though the CIA director at the time urged him not to, according to a person familiar with their conversation.

Mr. Reid’s Aug. 27 letter to the FBI appears to mark the first time a Democrat officially accused President’ Trump’s campaign of colluding with the Russian government to hack his party’s computers.

The letter has come to represent for conservatives the “deep state” — Obama loyalists leaking unproven allegations to the press against Mr. Trump and his people to ruin the campaign, the transition and the White House.

“The evidence of a direct connection between the Russian government and Donald Trump’s presidential campaign continues to mount,” Mr. Reid wrote to FBI Director James B. Comey.

Mr. Reid wrote and leaked his letter after receiving a secret telephone briefing from then-CIA Director John Brennan.

The retired senator has portrayed the letter as having the blessing of Mr. Brennan, a fierce Trump critic who suggests the president is beholden to Russian President Vladimir Putin for fear of blackmail.

But now the Brennan side rebuts Mr. Reid’s contention that the then-CIA director was actively trying to leak damaging anti-Trump information during the election.

Nick Shapiro, former deputy chief of staff for Mr. Brennan as CIA director, told The Washington Times that his ex-boss considered the information sensitive. He expressly urged Mr. Reid to confine the information to private discussions with Mr. Comey.

That August, Mr. Brennan was briefing the so called “gang of eight” congressional leaders on Russian computer hacking and on suspicious that Trump people were involved.

Mr. Shapiro, now a Brennan adviser, provided this version of the Brennan-Reid phone call:

“Brennan used the same exact notes to brief Reid as he used with the other members of the Gang of Eight. In fact, most of the conversation was spent with Senator Reid telling Brennan what he had heard about Russians and the Trump campaign. Senator Reid informed Brennan that he was in the process of drafting a letter to Comey about his concerns. When Senator Reid asked Brennan whether he could reference this information in the letter to Comey, Brennan said ‘no,’ as the intelligence was being tightly controlled and he was worried that the letter would get out into the public. Brennan told him that Comey had been fully briefed on the intelligence and if he wanted to, it would be better to talk to him about it in a secure manner when he returned to D.C. instead of putting it in a letter.”

Mr. Reid, Nevada Democrat, wrote the letter anyway. And it was leaked to The New York Times and then migrated throughout the mainstream media.

It contained references to a Trump aide traveling to Moscow and allegedly meeting with two sanctioned Kremlin figures — an allegation contained in the Democratic Party-financed dossier written by ex-British spy Christopher Steele. The unnamed person is Carter Page, who has denied under oath he ever met the two people named by Mr. Steele.

The dossier at that point had not been published. The FBI possessed copies and had opened a counter-intelligence investigation into Russia meddling the previous month.

Mr. Reid’s version of his phone call from Mr. Brennan is contained in the best-selling book, “Russian Roulette,” which embraces the Trump-Russia conspiracy and promotes the Steele dossier.

The book says:

“Reid also had the impression that Brennan had an ulterior motive,” the authors said. “He concluded the CIA chief believed the public needed to know about the Russian operation, including the information about the possible links to the Trump campaign. When Reid later was asked if Brennan directly or indirectly had enlisted him to push information held by the intelligence community into the public realm, he told an interviewer, ‘Why do you think he called me?’ “

Mr. Shapiro, Mr. Brennan’s adviser, said that specific book excerpt is inaccurate. He also told The Times that rather than trying to sell Trump-Russia collusion during the campaign, the Obama White House and Mr. Brennan stayed silent.

The Washington Times submitted questions to Mr. Reid’s associates at a public policy institute in Nevada where he serves as co-chairman. The queries went unanswered.

Mr. Reid did not stop his drumbeat on Trump-Russia. After Mr. Steele leaked his dossier narrative to selected reporters in Washington, Yahoo News, whose Michael Isikoff co-authored “Russian Roulette,” wrote a story.

But The New York Times dampened the narrative with an Oct. 31 story headlined, “Investigating Donald Trump, FBISees No Clear Link to Russia.”

Mr. Reid was furious

Adam Jentleson, his deputy chief of staff, tweeted, “I’ll say it: NYT interviewed Reid for this story. He said things contrary to the story. NYT discarded the interview.”

“Maybe some want to know why the NYT seemed to cover for Comey’s FBI? Maybe even some at the NYT? Maybe not? I’m just asking questions,” Jentleson said. The New York Times would go on to become one of journalism’s chief proponents of Trump-Russia collusion.

The Washington Times has examined Mr. Steele’s series of collusion charges and found that none has been confirmed independently and publicly at this point. Special counsel Robert Mueller continues to investigate.

However, the FBI’s investigation remained a secret during the campaign. Despite public pressure, including public letters from then-Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid on August 29 and October 30, 2016, the latter claiming that the FBI was concealing “explosive information about close ties and coordination between Trump and his top advisers, and the Russian government,” the FBI did not disclose its investigation until after the election. In fact, on October 31, 2016, The New York Times reported that FBI officials had not found evidence demonstrating links between the Trump campaign and Russian officials.
David Kris is a founder of Culper Partners LLC. He previously served as assistant attorney general for national security, associate deputy attorney general, trial attorney at the Department of Justice, general counsel at Intellectual Ventures, and deputy general counsel and chief ethics and compliance officer at Time Warner. He is the author or co-author of several works on national security, including the treatise National Security Investigations and Prosecutions, and has taught at Georgetown University and the University of Washington.

What to Make of the Carter Page FISA Applications

By David Kris

Saturday, July 21, 2018, 10:35 PM

The Carter Page FISAs are out via the Freedom of Information Act. Here are a few observations, relatively brief but still just a bit too long for Twitter.

First, a huge amount of information is redacted in these FISA applications, but they still represent a monumental disclosure to the public. The government considers FISA applications to be very sensitive—and their disclosure, even heavily redacted, may have long-term, programmatic consequences long after we’re finished with President Trump. The government seems to have accepted that FOIA applies to FISA. Without taking a position on the issue it made me recall this Lawfare post that argues to the contrary.

Second, for those who don’t remember, the controversy about these FISA applications first arose in February when House intelligence committee Chairman Rep. Devin Nunes released a memo claiming that the FBI misled the FISA Court about Christopher Steele, the former British secret agent who compiled the “dossier” on Trump-Russia ties and who was a source of information in the FISA applications on Page. The main complaint in the Nunes memo was that FBI whitewashed Steele—that the FISA applications did not “disclose or reference the role of the DNC, Clinton campaign, or any party/campaign in funding Steele’s efforts, even though the political origins of the Steele dossier were then known to senior and FBI officials.”

In response to the Nunes memo, the Democrats on the committee released their own memo. That memo quoted from parts of the FISA applications, including a footnote in which the FBI explained that Steele was hired to “conduct research regarding Candidate #1,” Donald Trump, and Trump’s “ties to Russia,” and that the man who hired him was “likely looking for information that could be used to discredit [Trump’s] campaign.”

Based on this back and forth between the HPSCI partisans, I wrote on Lawfare at the time that the FBI’s disclosures on Steele “amply satisfie[d] the requirements” for FISA applications, and that the central irony of the Nunes memo was that it “tried to deceive the American people in precisely the same way that it falsely accused the FBI of deceiving the FISA Court.” The Nunes memo accused the FBI of dishonesty in failing to disclose information about Steele, but in fact the Nunes memo itself was dishonest in failing to disclose what the FBI disclosed. I said then, and I still believe, that the “Nunes memo was dishonest. And if it is allowed to stand, we risk significant collateral damage to essential elements of our democracy.”

Now we have some additional information in the form of the redacted FISA applications themselves, and the Nunes memo looks even worse. In my earlier post, I observed that the FBI’s disclosures about Steele were contained in a footnote, but argued that this did not detract from their sufficiency: “As someone who has read and approved many FISA applications and dealt extensively with the FISA Court, I will anticipate and reject a claim that the disclosure was somehow insufficient because it appeared in a footnote; in my experience, the court reads the footnotes.” Now we can see that the footnote disclosing Steele’s possible bias takes up more than a full page in the applications, so there is literally no way the FISA Court could have missed it. The FBI gave the court enough information to evaluate Steele’s credibility.

There’s also more detail on the previous disclosure from the House intelligence committee Democrats’ memo on how Steele went to the press with the “dossier” when FBI Director James Comey sent his October 2016 letter to Congress disclosing the possible newfound importance of the Weiner laptop in the Clinton investigation. According to the FISA applications, Steele complained that Comey’s action could influence the election. But when Steele went to the press, it caused FBI to close him out as an informant—facts which are disclosed and cross-referenced in the footnote in bold text.

While I am sure people will try, my initial impression is that with all the redactions it is going to be very tough to figure out the full scope of information supporting the Court’s repeated finding of probable cause to believe that Carter Page was an agent of Russia. There is a mention of two Russians, one of whom pleaded guilty to being an unregistered agent of a foreign government and was sentenced to 30 months, but even that is disconnected from the redacted discussion that precedes it. Substantively, the government seems to have hewed as closely to the prior disclosures as it could in applying FOIA.

But it is worth noting that—and as the Democrats previously pointed out—the judges who signed off on these four FISA applications were all appointed by Republican presidents, including one George H.W. Bush appointee (Anne Conway), two George W. Bush appointees (Rosemary Collyer and Michael Mosman) and one Reagan appointee (Raymond Dearie). I know some of those judges, and they certainly are not the types to let partisan politics affect their legal judgments.

This illusion to the Republican appointed judges is in fact not telling the whole story because,  the FISA applications did not “disclose or reference the role of the DNC, Clinton campaign, or any party/campaign in funding Steele’s efforts, even though the political origins of the Steele dossier were then known to senior and FBI officials.”

OBAMA AND “OPEN MIC” A LOOK BACK IN HISTORY

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MEMORIES OF OBAMA AND RUSSIAN COLLUSION ON THE EVE OF TRUMP – PUTIN POWOW

OPEN MIC CLICK HERE

Former U.S. Army Special Forces member Jim Hanson said that the criticism President Trump is facing for meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin is hypocritical to what the Obama administration faced in 2012.

Hanson, during an appearance on “Fox & Friends,” specifically called out former President Barack Obama’s hot mic incident with then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and the lax media reaction to it.

Obama told Medvedev that after the 2012 election, he’d “have more flexibility.”

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The former U.S. president and Medvedev were talking about missile defense, Hanson added, saying that the world’s security was actually being put at risk.

“The media at that point in time had nothing to say,” he said. “Now, President Trump wants to make a less-antagonistic relationship with the Russians … and all of a sudden it’s the worst thing that ever happened. It’s glaring hypocrisy.”

Trump is set to meet with Putin on Monday in Helsinki, Finland.

Hanson said that the entire stature of Obama’s foreign policy was “cringing capitulation.”

“It was ‘America last,’” he said. “It ended up making the world a much more dangerous place.”

Hanson also recalled the 2009 meeting between then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, during which Clinton presented Lavrov with a physical “reset” button to signify resetting relations with Russia.

“Hillary walks into that meeting asking for nothing … she’s telling them ‘OK, you can have whatever you want from us,’” Hanson said.

Watch more above.

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“THE STING” – A POLITICAL SET UP BY PRESIDENT OBAMA et al- CLOAK AND DAGGER BY DEMOCRATS UNCOVERED

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Obama’s justice department in collusion with Russian apparatchiks sought to stop the election of Donald J. Trump where they continue in a vain attempt to bring down his presidency. This is a known fact,  Democrat operatives including Hillary “lock her up” Clinton, Wasserman-Schultz, Attorney General Lynch lied under oath to investigators who had animus against Trump. Look no further than the entrapment of low level operatives, who by the way thought they were bigger than their day job of waiters, foamed at the mouth but knew nothing, not even the  time of day. But this didn’t stop the insider collusion to entrap others and led to the Mueller illegal 20 month investigation costing $50,000,000 which has produced zilch.

But let’s not stop here because the guilty have not been investigated nor charged. For this reason we now call again, for the firing of Rosenstein and Mueller.  Rosenstein is a shill for the Democrats, Mueller a liar first rate who is protecting all of Hillary’s woman. And add this all up to Russian collusion by Clinton cabal who took millions from Russian companies tied to Vlad, gave Russian 20% of our uranium supply; Podesta Group who engaged with Ukraine and Russia was paid millions of dollars. So we know where the collusion was. Why no arrests? Bring in Christie now.

But FISA investigation was a fraud from the get-go. No collusion with the Russia, but Democrats under the Clinton aegis fraudulently planted evidence to get the FBI ball rolling.  To do that the FBI was politicized and for two reasons, to Stop Trump and two to see Hillary was elected and all evidence against her disappear. On the way to the party several events took place that placed suspicion on what set off the FISA warrant. In April 2016 Hillary hired Fusion GPS. Their orders were to find evidence, it didn’t matter is it was fake or not, on Trump. This was to sabotage his campaign. So they hired a low ranking operative who would do anything for money, by the name of Steele. Then this weasel took this fake doctored information to the FBI who swallowed it hook line and sinker. This was made to order for the animus individuals who supported Hillary with a vengeance.

Then take down setup called “Crossfire” was put into motion by the FBI to guarantee a Clinton victory; also don’t forget that the Steele dossier paid Russians for dirt against Trump – fake dirt, where there was not a scintilla of evidence linking Trump to Russia. But that hasn’t stopped Mueller. We had a bit player by the name of Papadopoulos (SEE BELOW). This guy fell for a dubious invite (setup) in London to meet with Australian Alexander Downer. Papadopoulos had too much to drink and ran with the mouth but said nothing about collusion. This did’t stop the likes of Harry Reid from spreading false rumors about Trump-Russia collusion.

Beginning in December 2015, Papadopoulos served on the National Security and Foreign Policy Advisory Committee for Ben Carson’s campaign for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination. He left the Carson campaign in February 2016. Following his indictment, he was described by HuffPost as “a little-known, little-qualified 30-year-old.”

According to court records, Papadopoulos was recruited to join Trump’s foreign policy advisor team in early March 2016 by Sam Clovis. In a meeting on March 6, the official told him that one of the campaign’s foreign policy priorities was to improve U.S.-Russia relations, though Clovis later denied having said that. Donald Trump identified Papadopoulos as one of his campaign’s foreign policy advisors on March 21, 2016, in an interview with the editorial board of The Washington Post. Trump said: “He’s an energy and oil consultant, excellent guy”.

At the time he was living in London, where he was approached by Joseph Mifsud, a professor with connections to high-ranking Russian officials.  Mifsud told him the Russians had “dirt” on Hillary Clinton in the form of “thousands of emails.” The two met on March 14 and 21, 2016. At the March 21 meeting Mifsud brought along a Russian woman, Olga Polonskaya, who posed as Putin’s niece.

Papadopoulos sent emails concerning Putin to at least seven campaign officials. Clovis, as Trump national campaign co-chairman, encouraged Papadopoulos to fly to Russia to meet with agents of the Russian Foreign Ministry, after being told that Russia had “dirt” on Clinton it wanted to share with Trump’s campaign. This occurred before there was public knowledge of the hack of Democratic National Committee and of John Podesta‘s emails, both of which U.S. intelligence agencies believe were carried out by Russia. In May 2016, Papadopoulos told the top Australian diplomat to the United Kingdom, Alexander Downer, that Russia had “political dirt” on Hillary Clinton, leading the Federal Bureau of Investigation to open a counterintelligence investigation into the Donald Trump presidential campaign.

GERMAN LEADERS ARE MORALLY CORRUPT – TRUMP DOES NOT PULL ANY PUNCHES

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The cat is out of the bag, we knew it would happen. Signing on to the Iranian deal by the Germans and French too, proved that both countries were out for the money, nothing else. They didn’t care about a nuclear Iran in the mid-east, they only cared about filling their treasuries with geld.

To prove once again that a morally correct Germany does not exist, one has to look no further than the recent German-Russian gas deal. Strengthening our adversaries while at the same time asking the United States to pay for their protection is ludicrous. 

Russia’s new pipeline will supply Germany with natural gas for years to come.

President Donald Trump on Wednesday had a testy exchange with the head of NATO when he asked about energy agreements between Russia and several European countries.

Trump repeatedly pressed Jens Stoltenberg, NATO’s secretary general, on why the U.S. continued to pay money to the military alliance while countries continue to purchase energy from Moscow.

Trump said of Germany: “We’re supposed to protect you against Russia and yet you make this deal with Russia.”

“Explain that,” Trump said. “It can’t be explained.”

“VD” DAY – THANKS IN ADVANCE TO HARRY REID AS JUDGE KAVANAUGH WILL BE SEATED

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UPDATE: Judge Kavanaugh is to be the next Supreme Court Justice. Last night President Trump, in an eloquent presentation, nominated the Judge to replace the retiring Kennedy. What better nomination can you get than Judge Kavanaugh. A man of integrity, judicial common sense and a record to boot. Congratulations to both the President and the Judge. Of course the Democrats will babble with the mouth, but in the end they will choke on their own words.

 

President Trump’s nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to replace retiring Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy has set the stage for a bruising confirmation battle, as Senate Democrats and liberal groups vowed to resist what could be a dramatic and long-lasting rightward shift on the Supreme Court.

Within seconds of Trump’s announcement in the White House Monday night, the far-left political action committee Democracy for America called Kavanaugh, 53, a “reactionary ideologue” whose confirmation would “directly lead to the deaths of countless women with the dismantling of abortion rights.”

Kavanaugh, who is Catholic and formerly served as a law clerk for Kennedy, has long said he would broadly respect legal precedent, including Roe v. Wade. In his time in the Bush White House and his twelve-year stint on the influential D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, Kavanaugh has variously alarmed both pro-life and pro-choice advocates.

PELOSI VOWS TO ‘AVENGE OBAMA’ IN SUPREME COURT SHOWDOWN

Top Senate Democrats, who have long said they would not seriously consider any of the candidates Trump was considering, also vowed to fight Kavanaugh, citing what they called an anti-abortion record.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., called for killing the nomination.

“If we can successfully block this nomination, it could lead to a more independent, moderate selection that both parties could support,” Schumer said.

 

Tonight the Democrats will squirm like little salamanders in the mud. VD day is at hand; ” Victory over the Democrats”- their ideology of legislating from the bench will suffer a near fatal blow; a day where the conservative legacy will be cemented on the Supreme Court; a day honoring our Founding Fathers by interpreting their tome as it should be. But before we rejoice we must wait a few months, say by the end of September when the latest nominee is confirmed. It is now Bader-Ginsburg’s turn to crash and burn. A very sweet scenario to look forward to.

TUNE IN TONIGHT TO SEE THE BIG SHOW! IT BEGINS AT 9 P.M. EDT. YOU WON’T BE DISAPPOINTED

TAKE THIS “CRYING CHUCK SCHUMER” – A SUPREME COURT JUSTICE WHO DOESN’T LEGISLATE FROM THE BENCH

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Monday will be a day of infamy! President Trump will be the prime focus when he announces the new Supreme Court pick. Three are in the running, but there is a high probability that a woman (Judge Amy Coney Barrett) will be the one. Nothing would be better than having another woman joining the liberal triumvirate – a conservative one for a change. How about that in “your face” Crying Chuck?

As you recall Schumer’s old time pal, Harry “the pugilist” Reid, was the one who rolled out the “nuclear option.”

Sen. Harry Reid, remarks on Senate floor, Nov. 21, 2013

After years of threats and retreats by both parties, the Democratic Senate majority on Nov. 21, 2013, enacted a controversial rule change called the “nuclear option.”

The change eliminated the filibuster — a blockage of floor action, typically by the chamber’s minority party — for executive branch nominations as well as judicial appointments short of the Supreme Court. Under the new rule, the Senate only needs a 51-vote majority instead of a 60-vote supermajority to end a filibuster and move to a final vote on a nomination.

Schumer, in mid-2007, even suggested that because Democrats were “hoodwinked” by the confirmation testimony of Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, no more nominees should be confirmed for the balance of George W. Bush’s term, even though he had 18 months left. The point was that it was the end of a presidency:

“For the rest of this President’s term and if there is another Republican elected with the same selection criteria let me say this: We should reverse the presumption of confirmation. The Supreme Court is dangerously out of balance. We cannot afford to see Justice Stevens replaced by another Roberts; or Justice Ginsburg by another Alito. Given the track record of this President and the experience of obfuscation at the hearings, with respect to the Supreme Court, at least: I will recommend to my colleagues that we should not confirm a Supreme Court nominee EXCEPT in extraordinary circumstances.”

Bottom line: it’s pretty clear the debate in 2016 revolved around nominations made in a presidential election year. Democrats are simply spinning a false narrative.

ERDOGAN – GIVE HIM THE BOOT FROM NATO

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United States coup accuser is punching above his weight. A diminutive mule, ERDOGAN, is waging a verbal war against the United States and is gearing up in the trenches for the ultimate fight against Israel. What has to happen here is two-fold, one being to throw the Russia confidant out of NATO and bring to bear all of the economic weight we can against this Muslim Brotherhood bed mate. Turkey is in a predicament,  the economy is in a tailspin, their currency cratering by the minute. Turkey is in big trouble today, but it will only get worse. Remember Turkey is now entering the age of an autocrat taking exclusive power of all levers of government; the legislative and judiciary, not counting the military which has been rationalized since the coup.

What is most important here is Turkey’s stance with Russia, as far as we can tell, Erdogan went to his knees begging for Russia’s help in countering the Kurds in Syria’s Afrin fight.

So why did Russia open the air space to Turkey for the Afrin operation? What does Russia aim to achieve by helping Turkey in this we?

I have come up with the following observations while seeking answers to these questions.

1) It suits Russia’s interests

Russia’s move is in line with the direction that Turkey-Russia relations have recently taken. Russia has considerable economic, political and regional interests in Turkey. By siding with Turkey in Afrin, Russia has actually done what is necessary to protect its interests. On the one hand there are Russia’s interests in Turkey and on the other hand there are its relations with the Syrian Kurds. Obviously the former outweighs the latter. Moscow also probably calculates that the gestures it extends to Ankara help it gain an upper hand and serve as a bargaining chip vis-à-vis Turkey. Indeed, there is no doubt that such gestures will boost the perception of Russia in the eyes of the Turkish public.

2) It shows that Russia is a playmaker

Russia has been an active party in the war in Syria since 2015, supporting Bashar al-Assad with its military power against opposition groups. The steps that Russia has taken towards Turkey will help to bolster its main strategy of strengthening the Syrian regime. Once again, Russia has asserted itself as the main playmaker in Syria. It has shown that all roads lead to Moscow and has prepared the ground for its political strategy of achieving a permanent Russian presence in the Middle East. This, in return, will help Russian President Vladimir Putin achieve his aim of making Russia a powerful global player again.

3) Russia wants Turkey on its side

Russia is also taking into account the possible benefits of maintaining close relations with Turkey because it is a key player in the region. At a time when Syria’s fate is being decided, Russia has taken initiatives – such as the recent peace conference in Sochi – to bring about solutions of its own choosing while maintaining close dialogue and cooperation with Turkey. All of this will give Moscow the upper hand at the table.

4) Turkey is drifting away from the United States

One cannot assume that Russia’s move is not a part of its policy against the U.S. The deepening of disagreements between Ankara and Washington, which has led to serious fissures within NATO, does not upset Russia at all. By facilitating the launch of the Afrinoffensive, which Russia knows the U.S. would be uneasy with, Russia has caused Turkey and the U.S. to drift further away from each other. From Moscow’s point of view, Turkey’s drifting away from the West will bring it within the orbit of Russia.

5) It curbs the U.S.’s Kurdish plan

At the same time, Moscow is trying to curb the U.S.’s plans to establish a permanent American presence in northern Syria and to create an area under its influence that could eventually lead to the emergence of a state. In doing so, Russia is showing the Kurds that cooperating with the U.S. in Syria comes at a price. If the Kurds do not get enough support from the U.S. in the face of the Turkish military operation in Afrin, problems could arise between Washington and the Syrian Kurds. This would also help Russia achieve its geopolitical goals.

6) Russia is trying to mediate between Ankara and Damascus

As a result of Turkey’s operation against the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), Turkey has made indirect contact with the al-Assad regime in Damascus. The fact that both sides have troops on the ground necessitates keeping communication channels open, at least to prevent any mishap. We can imagine that out of this necessity, Russia wants to help Turkey and Syria mend ties. Russia might try to strengthen the Syrian regime by helping Turkey and Syria normalize their relations through dialogue.

7) It eases the hand of the al-Assad regime in Idlib

The Free Syrian Army’s (FSA) engagement with the PYD in Afrin has another indirect consequence. The regime in Damascus will find it much easier to act in its plans for Idlib, which is currently held by opposition groups. At a time when the international community’s attention has turned to Turkey’s military operation in Afrin, al-Assad will feel less international pressure as he makes gains around Idlib.

MAXINE WATERS THE FACE OF THE DEMOCRAT PARTY

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Maxine Waters “Low IQ” is the  new face of the Democrat party. She has received another moniker from President Trump, that of “animal.” Now several Democratic colleagues are distancing themselves from “Low IQ.” In fact her behavior has caused disgrace to the House of Representatives; this is a no no!

(CNN)President Donald Trump mocked California Rep. Maxine Waters during a freewheeling speech Saturday night, saying she had a “very low IQ.”

It’s not the first time the President has attacked out Waters’ intelligence. Earlier this month at the annual Gridiron Club dinner, he said she should take an IQ test. Waters called Trump’s comment at the dinner a racist one.

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