Quote:Only a few weeks ago Hillary Clinton's campaign was denouncing Donald Trump as un-American for saying the election might be "rigged." We criticized Mr. Trump at the time. But now that Mrs. Clinton has lost, her campaign is claiming the election really was rigged, albeit for Mr. Trump by Russian meddling, and it wants the Electoral College to stage what amounts to a coup.
That's the only way to interpret the extraordinary statement Monday by Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta endorsing a special intelligence briefing for electors a week before they cast their ballots for President on Dec. 19. He released the statement hours after 10 members of the Electoral College sent a letter to Director of National Intelligence James Clapper seeking information on foreign interference in the election to judge if Mr. Trump "is fit to serve." One of those electors is House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi's daughter.
"The bipartisan electors' letter raises very grave issues involving our national security. Electors have a solemn responsibility under the Constitution and we support their efforts to have their questions addressed," Mr. Podesta said. "We now know that the CIA has determined Russia's interference in our elections was for the purpose of electing Donald Trump. This should distress every American."
What should really distress Americans is that the losers are trying to overturn the election results based on little more than anonymous leaks and innuendo. Whatever Russia's hacking motives, there is no evidence that the emails it turned up were decisive to the election result. Mr. Podesta is citing a CIA judgment that Americans have never seen and whose findings are vaguely public only because one or more unidentified officials chose to relate them to a few reporters last week.
Much of the press is reporting these as the gospel truth, though it isn't clear that the CIA's judgment is even shared across the intelligence community. The FBI doesn't share the CIA's confidence about Russia's hacking motive, and our sources say the evidence is thin for the CIA's conclusion.
Yet Mr. Podesta's demand is that those same unidentified leakers now give a secret briefing to the 538 electors, most of whom lack any experience in judging the nuances of intelligence. Those electors are then supposed to decide based on information Americans won't have seen whether they should invalidate the results of an election in which more than 128 million voted. Even Vladimir Putin at his most devious couldn't have imagined his cyber-spooks would provoke this much anti-democratic nonsense.
This effort is all the more pernicious because it poisons with partisanship the serious issue of foreign intelligence hacking, not least by the Russians. Foreign cyber-attacks have proliferated during the Obama years, but the President has never held any national government accountable. Even when officials fingered the Russians this summer for the hacks on the Democratic National Committee, Mr. Obama did nothing but wag a finger.
Yet now, at the end of his term, he has ordered a secret report on the election-related hacking to be on his desk before he leaves office on Jan. 20. Then the news of this report coincidentally leaks, along with the CIA's new conclusion about Russia's motive, a mere 11 days before the Electoral College votes. Did those leakersprobably including CIA Director and Obama confidant John Brennanact with White House assent?
This political farce is compounded by a press corps that spent Monday demanding that GOP leaders in Congress say if they too support investigations into the Russian hacking. Never mind that the Senate and House intelligence committees, both led by Republicans, have been looking into the election-related hacking for months, often with far too little cooperation from the Obama Administration.
Then the press reports as major news the non-story that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has endorsed an intelligence probe that has long been underway. Talk about fake news.
The entire spectacle looks more like a Democratic attempt to cast doubt on the legitimacy of the election than it does serious concern about cyber-spying. Democrats must figure they can't lose. They know the Electoral College isn't likely to throw the election to Hillary Clinton, but the headlines can help undermine public support for Mr. Trump's Presidency even before he takes office. And these folks blame Donald Trump for violating democratic "norms."
"There are three sorts of conspiracy: by the people who complain, by the people who write, by the people who take action. There is nothing to fear from the first group, the two others are more dangerous; but the police have to be part of all three,"
Quote:The Sunday Talk Shows are filled with various left-wing punditry using two media reports from the Washington Post and New York Times claiming anonymous, albeit transparently political, "intelligence officials" who state: the Russian government "hacked the U.S. election".
First, the media's choice of wording is critical within both reports.
It is impossible to "hack an election". What was hacked was the DNC email system, and John Podesta's email. WikiLeaks published the content of both "hacks".
Additionally, WikiLeaks has denied the source of the information was a foreign government.
Both The Washington Post and New York Times, simultaneously, published articles on Friday claiming anonymous sources within the CIA (note: intensely political CIA Chief John Brennan in charge) point to the Russian government as the originators of the hacking. However, both articles are written with very obtuse and non specific language intended to cover over the fact these reports are not actually stating the official intelligence community are making these specific claims.
All other media outlets subsequently take this illogically based presentation and spin their coverage whereby the "DNC hacked" becomes "the election hacked".
In essence, the MSM takes a politically manipulated original intelligence claim and pushes a political media angle within a manufactured story of their own creation.
When the media reports on their own media reports the concentric circle of a self fulfilling narrative expands toward the infinite horizon of nothingness.
Various Trump administration officials are then commanded to show up for interviews where they are asked to respond to the content of media reports which are based entirely on other manipulated media reports….. And that's where we are today.
However, if anyone could actually pause and call out this nonsense they might find it useful to reference the already well known politicization of the entire intelligence community apparatus. The politicization was/is so severe it led to an inspector general investigation:
More than 50 intelligence analysts working out of the U.S. military's Central Command have formally complained that their reports on ISIS and al Qaeda's branch in Syria were being inappropriately altered by senior officials.
The complaints spurred the Pentagon's inspector general to open an investigation into the alleged manipulation of intelligence. The fact that so many people complained suggests there are deep-rooted, systemic problems in how the U.S. military command charged with the war against the self-proclaimed Islamic State assesses intelligence.
"The cancer was within the senior level of the intelligence command," one defense official said. (link)
If, and that's a big IF, there is any substantive truthfulness behind the politicized CIA accusation obtusely outlined within the Washington Post report, there is every reason to believe the anonymous sources are the same manipulative "senior intelligence command" already under inspector general investigation.
It is transparent to everyone the net intention of this hacked election narrative' is to provide the professional political UniParty class in Washington DC with a fortified defense mechanism to thwart off the incoming swamp draining.
The use of corporate media to protect the corporate legislative body is as familiar, and predictable, as Senators John McCain (see: Keating Five), and Lindsey Graham, fighting against term limits and finance reform on behalf of their corporate interests/benefactors, Wall Street and global interests.
However, moving forward there is considerable room for previously outlined optimism. The corruption within the intelligence community officials appears so severe, the White Hats are rising up from within the Defense Department to tackle it head-on.
With General Mattis as Secretary of Defense, Michael Flynn as National Security Advisor, General John Kelly as Secretary of Homeland Security, a top-of-class West Point graduate in Mike Pompeo brought in to take over and undoubtedly purge the CIA, and a lame duck struggle breaking out over the NSA with Admiral Mike Rogers, the implications are pretty obvious.
The white hats we have needed within the national security and intelligence departments are responding from a select group within the Defense Department. This DoD surge appears to be why corporate interests are railing against "too many generals". The DoD generals also appears to be why all of those interests -within all of those corrupted political intel institutions- are going nuts thinking about what lays ahead.
Mounting evidence supports the ongoing thesis the Department of Defense has actually seceded from the political elites. A wonderfully patriotic soft coup has taken place; and with the election of President Donald Trump, the white hats are poised on the horizon to reconstruct a nationalist-minded defense, security and intelligence apparatus.
This is the fundamental paradigm shift many have quietly discussed, yet few imagined possible. Elevate your thinking… I mean REALLY elevate.
"There are three sorts of conspiracy: by the people who complain, by the people who write, by the people who take action. There is nothing to fear from the first group, the two others are more dangerous; but the police have to be part of all three,"
Quote:President-elect Donald Trump plans on Tuesday to nominate Exxon Mobil Corp. chief Rex Tillerson for U.S. secretary of state, setting off a confirmation fight that puts the oilman's ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin -- and Trump's own -- in the spotlight.
The nomination is sure to spark a high-profile battle in the U.S. Senate, where three Republicans and several Democrats have already expressed public misgivings about making Tillerson the nation's top diplomat, largely over concerns about his two decades of work with Putin.
Tillerson has accepted Trump's offer, according to a person familiar with the transition. He will reach Exxon's mandatory retirement age of 65 in March and, if confirmed, would be the first oil executive to lead the State Department.
Trump made clear in an interview on Fox News Sunday that he would not back away from defending Tillerson or his work in Russia, calling his global relationships an attribute. He called the executive "a world class player."
"And to me, a great advantage is he knows many of the players," Trump said. "And he knows them well. He does massive deals in Russia. He does massive deals for the company, not for himself, but the company."
Yet those ties aren't viewed as an asset by some of Trump's most prominent Republican colleagues on Capitol Hill. Senators John McCain of Arizona and Marco Rubio of Florida are among lawmakers who have questioned Tillerson's dealings with Putin. Rubio sits on the Foreign Relations Committee, where he could join with Democrats on the panel to block Tillerson's nomination from reaching the Senate floor.
"Being a friend of Vladimir' is not an attribute I am hoping for from a #SecretaryOfState," Rubio said in a tweet on Sunday that was signed with his initials.
Proxy Fight
Confirmation hearings also may become a proxy fight over Trump's position that Putin is an effective leader with whom he can reach agreements, a stance widely unpopular among lawmakers in both parties. Added to the mix is a looming inquiry into Russian meddling in the election, a conclusion reached by the intelligence community in October after investigating hacking of Democratic Party institutions.
Taking that investigation's conclusions further, The Washington Post reported on Friday that the CIA has told senators that Putin's government was actively seeking to help Trump win the election -- a step beyond earlier findings that the goal was to undermine the credibility of the U.S. political process.
President Barack Obama has ordered a full review of the evidence of Russian hacking. Trump has repeatedly rejected the idea that Russia has been pinpointed as the source of the hacks of Democratic Party servers, suggesting that the accusations are politically motivated.
As Exxon's CEO, Tillerson made at least 20 visits to the White House during Obama's two terms, including five after sanctions were imposed on Russia following the country's 2014 military incursion into Ukraine. A White House official at the time said Tillerson wanted to make sure Exxon's European competitors weren't advantaged by the sanctions.
Russian companies targeted by sanctions include Rosneft, the oil giant with which Tillerson's Exxon Mobil signed a strategic cooperation deal in 2011. Their cooperation was stalled by the sanctions regime. He has expressed skepticism of sanctions in the past, saying at a 2014 shareholder meeting: "We don't find them to be effective unless they are very well implemented."
Under Tillerson, Exxon amassed drilling rights across tens of millions of acres in Russia, making its holdings in the country larger than in the U.S., according to U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filings. When the Putin regime forced Royal Dutch Shell Plc and other foreign investors to cede control of a massive gas export project on Sakhalin Island in 2007, Exxon's holdings in the same region remained intact and untouched by the government.
Tillerson and Putin first met on Sahkhalin Island in 1999, and he was later awarded Russia's Order of Friendship, a high civilian honor for distinguished foreign nationals.
David Mortlock, a former director of international economic affairs on Obama's National Security Council, said a Tillerson nomination would extend a trend of the U.S. pursuing "economic statecraft" that began under Hillary Clinton, who Trump defeated in the presidential contest, when she was secretary of state.
Economic Statecraft'
"It ironically continues something that really started in the Clinton State Department which is economic statecraft and the fact that U.S. CEOs, U.S. companies have been some of our best diplomats overseas and the U.S. brand is an important part of U.S. diplomacy and U.S. representation," Mortlock said.
Tillerson is also certain to face questions about Exxon's environmental record. The company long questioned the science behind global warming, though it has recently acknowledged that humans have contributed to climate change and expressed support for the Paris accord on carbon emissions Obama negotiated last year.
"The risk of climate change is clear and the risk warrants action," Exxon Mobil says on its website.
However, the company is currently under investigation by Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey for allegedly misleading investors for decades about the possible financial impact of climate change on its business. Exxon Mobil says the probe is politically motivated.
"One of the critical tests at his confirmation hearings must be his demonstration of a true commitment to America's leadership on climate action, including fully supporting the Paris Agreement and honoring the country's international climate commitments," Andrew Steer, president and CEO of the World Resources Institute, said in a statement.
Kellyanne Conway, a top Trump adviser, said Friday on Fox News that those who were considered by Trump also included Alan Mulally, the former CEO of Ford Motor Co., former CIA Director David Petraeus, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton, and Representative Dana Rohrabacher, a California Republican.
Trump on Monday called former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, who he interviewed earlier for the post, to tell him he wasn't getting the job, according to one of the people familiar with the matter, who all spoke on condition of anonymity because the announcement isn't official. Romney acknowledged Monday night on Facebook that he's not the pick.
"It was an honor to have been considered for Secretary of State of our great country," Romney said in his Facebook post. "My discussions with President-elect Trump have been both enjoyable and enlightening. I have very high hopes that the new administration will lead the nation to greater strength, prosperity and peace."
"There are three sorts of conspiracy: by the people who complain, by the people who write, by the people who take action. There is nothing to fear from the first group, the two others are more dangerous; but the police have to be part of all three,"
Quote:On December 19, 2016 the electoral college will vote.
Based on the vote, Trump should receive 306 votes and Clinton will have 232.
However, it is possible for many electors to change their vote. They aren't bound by it.
There's currently a very well funded attempt to influence electors to flip their votes on December 19th to change the outcome of the election.
Despite expectations that it is far fetched, it has a high chance of success. As of today, there are enough electoral votes in play to flip the outcome.
The three outcomes in discussion right now:
Trump falls short of the electoral count (270) to become President and the election is sent to Congress for a decision.
Clinton gets more than 270 electoral votes and becomes the President.
A dark horse candidate (Kaisitch, etc.) would get the votes to become President.
In my view: all of these outcomes would end in a disaster.
Why? Most of the country sees this election as already decided.
The voters have spoken. Any change the outcome of the election at this juncture would be widely seen as illegitimate.
What would happen next would be worse.
Trump would claim this is a coup d'etat and gather widespread support. Most of the states (which are Republican dominated) would support him on this.
Until January 20th, chaos would ensue. Violent conflict would be widespread as groups (pro or against Trump) form and take action.
I haven't fully gamed this out but I suspect Trump would be able to gather enough support to become President regardless of the electoral college result (anything less would result in a messy street level civil war). Fear of continued chaos would force this.
The moment he is sworn in, he would invoke a state of emergency and quickly move to arrest anyone connected with the plot to nullify the election and anyone calling for violence.
By the end of March, thousands of people could even find themselves in Guantanamo. -labelled as terrorists/traitors they would be denied access to legal representation or any outside contact until the emergency is over.
Trump, strengthened by emergency powers and without an effective opposition (fear of being put on a list), would now be able to rule as a semi-dictator.
"There are three sorts of conspiracy: by the people who complain, by the people who write, by the people who take action. There is nothing to fear from the first group, the two others are more dangerous; but the police have to be part of all three,"
Paul Rigby Wrote:WARNING: An Electoral Coup is Underway
There's currently a very well funded attempt to influence electors to flip their votes on December 19th to change the outcome of the election.
Any change the outcome of the election at this juncture would be widely seen as illegitimate.
And far more provable than Russian hacking.
Paul Rigby Wrote:Trump would claim this is a coup d'etat and gather widespread support. Most of the states (which are Republican dominated) would support him on this.
Until January 20th, chaos would ensue. Violent conflict would be widespread as groups (pro or against Trump) form and take action.
I haven't fully gamed this out but I suspect Trump would be able to gather enough support to become President regardless of the electoral college result (anything less would result in a messy street level civil war). Fear of continued chaos would force this.
The moment he is sworn in, he would invoke a state of emergency and quickly move to arrest anyone connected with the plot to nullify the election and anyone calling for violence.
By the end of March, thousands of people could even find themselves in Guantanamo. -labelled as terrorists/traitors they would be denied access to legal representation or any outside contact until the emergency is over.
Trump, strengthened by emergency powers and without an effective opposition (fear of being put on a list), would now be able to rule as a semi-dictator.
Entirely foreseeable. Unfortunately.
"The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways. The point, however, is to change it." Karl Marx
"He would, wouldn't he?" Mandy Rice-Davies. When asked in court whether she knew that Lord Astor had denied having sex with her.
“I think it would be a good idea” Ghandi, when asked about Western Civilisation.
Perhaps it's only me who sees all of this as symptomatic that the great US neoliberal empire is crashing and burning and that its time is passing.
Nero, fiddle, fire.
::::thumbsdown::::boom::
The shadow is a moral problem that challenges the whole ego-personality, for no one can become conscious of the shadow without considerable moral effort. To become conscious of it involves recognizing the dark aspects of the personality as present and real. This act is the essential condition for any kind of self-knowledge.
David Guyatt Wrote:Perhaps it's only me who sees all of this as symptomatic that the great US neoliberal empire is crashing and burning and that its time is passing.
Nero, fiddle, fire.
::::thumbsdown::::boom::
Nope it's not only you. However I am stunned by how many politically aware people are hanging on to the fake CIA story. People who should know better. And of course the real story here is the content of those emails. That has been lost in translation. Hillary lost because she was outed for who and what she is. What the DNC did to Bernie causing many Bernie supporters to refuse to support her at the polls.
My perspective on the on the supposed "Russian hacking"
First, the US presidential elections has been a sham for decades. The president has been a function of the deep state since the death of JFK.
Second, that the Russians would find the flaw in the deep state selection of the potus to get their guy in has to be the least likely possibility. Therefore, we have to find other ways of putting these events into a coherent explanation.
Third, the current iteration of global capitalism is in a crisis and is adjusting. Global financial capitalism is quite robust will require a transition to global fascism, with the world divided up amongst various crime syndicates embedded in and dominating governments.
Fourth, there are two overall possibilities. First, if the Trump presidency is "stolen" from him, he will be the leader of a new Republican Party that will be akin to the pre-1933 Nazi party. Second, if Trump becomes POTUS, then the Fourth Reich telos will be within easy grasp.
Fifth, the context of the transition is the coming climate disaster. Will the the future be dominated to the final sacrifice of the children of the earth to Moloch?
"We'll know our disinformation campaign is complete when everything the American public believes is false." --William J. Casey, D.C.I
"We will lead every revolution against us." --Theodore Herzl
David Guyatt Wrote:Perhaps it's only me who sees all of this as symptomatic that the great US neoliberal empire is crashing and burning and that its time is passing.
Nero, fiddle, fire.
::::thumbsdown::::boom::
Nope it's not only you. However I am stunned by how many politically aware people are hanging on to the fake CIA story. People who should know better. And of course the real story here is the content of those emails. That has been lost in translation. Hillary lost because she was outed for who and what she is. What the DNC did to Bernie causing many Bernie supporters to refuse to support her at the polls.
Terrific articles Paul.
Yep, me too Dawn. Frankly, I'm staggered and it has opened my eyes quite a bit to the blinding effect of partisanship in politics. And yep, the whole point of the Russian did it campaign was, and remains, to deflect from the content of the emails. Now we have a new Russia did it campaign that also has zero factual validity and again the same people are falling over themselves to buy into that also.
::facepalm::
The shadow is a moral problem that challenges the whole ego-personality, for no one can become conscious of the shadow without considerable moral effort. To become conscious of it involves recognizing the dark aspects of the personality as present and real. This act is the essential condition for any kind of self-knowledge.
13-12-2016, 04:59 PM (This post was last modified: 13-12-2016, 05:27 PM by Tracy Riddle.)
Okay, I guess we should just ignore all of the Russophiles Trump is appointing, and the people on his team with business and personal ties to Russia. We should just ignore the fact that these leaks were timed during the last month of the campaign to be a daily drip of stories aimed at Clinton. If they came from a disgruntled Bernie supporter, you'd think they would have all been released at the time of the conventions, when they might have done some good and prevented her from getting the nomination!
The idea that this was never discussed until now shows that some people here haven't been paying attention.
Here's Trump's own running-mate - who I suppose was part of the CIA plot - before the election:
Mike Pence said in an interview aired on "Fox News Sunday" in October that Russia or any other country involved in hacking should face "severe consequences." "I think there's no question that the evidence continues to point in that direction," Pence said. "There should be severe consequences to Russia or any sovereign nation that is compromising the privacy or the security of the United States of America." In another October interview on NBC's "Meet the Press," Pence said "there's more and more evidence that implicates Russia."
On October 7th, a month before election day, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Department of Homeland Security issued a joint statement that began, "The U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of e-mails from US persons and institutions, including from US political organizations."
Prominent pro-Putin analyst Sergei Markov was jubilant at Trump's win and told the Guardian: "maybe we helped a bit with WikiLeaks."
"I will tell you this, Russia: If you're listening, I hope you're able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing" Trump at a rally in July 2016
Again, I urge you to watch the above clip of Rep. Joe Walsh, who was once so pro-Trump he Tweeted: "On November 8th, I'm voting for Trump. On November 9th, if Trump loses, I'm grabbing my musket. You in?"
Here's Marco Rubio: When stolen Democratic emails were released during the election, the Florida Republican refused to comment and said Republicans could one day be targets. "I want to warn my fellow Republicans who may want to capitalize politically on these leaks. Today it is the Democrats. Tomorrow it could be us," Rubio said in October. "As our intelligence agencies have said, these leaks are an effort by a foreign government to interfere with our electoral process and I will not indulge it."
Some of you here are so reflexively anti-CIA that you wouldn't believe them if they said the sun rose in the east. Others here are so rigidly anti-US Imperialism and pro-Russian that you're privately rooting for Trump because of the destruction and chaos he will cause. Fine, I guess I can understand that. But there are a lot of decent people in the US who have to live here and are trying to deal with this situation. Most of us didn't vote for Trump, and we don't support the national security state either.
And your alternative scenarios don't make any sense; they are counter-intuitive and go against everything we've observed all year. When you put together an alternative scenario that makes any fucking sense at all, I'll listen to it.
:::thumbsdown::::boom::
