THE Iraqi military’s hard-fought victory over the Islamic State group in Mosul marks a defining moment not just for them. It is also a key win for the US doctrine behind it.
...
Obama ordered air strikes and pursued a strategy — known in the Pentagon as “by, with and through” — to train local forces.
In the summer of 2015, coalition advisers started instructing Iraqis on conventional warfare — fighting in small units, setting up defenses, how to breech minefields and so on.
...
For Brian McKeon, a senior Pentagon policy official at the end of the Obama administration, the strategy worked, though not as quickly as had been hoped. The battle for Mosul first began on October 16, 2016.
Iraqi Kurds will push for independence after Mosul is freed — PM ... https://www.rt.com/news/364649-barzani-kurds-iraq-mosul/ Oct 29, 2016 - Iraq's Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) prime minister says the Kurds will renew their push for an independent state after Mosul is ...
The Battle Against ISIS in Mosul Could Lead to an Independent Iraqi ... www.newsweek.com/.../battle-against-isis-mosul-kurdistan-independence-511041.html Some Kurds worry about another American betrayal, but many still hope a victory over ISIS will lead to independence—or at least greater ...
The whole point of locking them up at Guantanamo was to neutralize terrorists and prevent them from harming anyone else. But the two previous presidents -- Bush and Obama -- bowed to pressure from human rights groups and began transferring the terrorists to other countries.
The administration will not be shipping terrorists to Guantanamo in the numbers sent during the height of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But certainly we will be using special forces to grab some of the more prominent terrorists around the world and will capture terrorists here in America.
It will be good to have a secure facility where they can be sent, confident that their days of killing innocents are over.
** Sweden’s Islamic rape epidemic: Almost half of the victims are children By Nicolai Sennels on Jul 09, 2017 09:16 am ------------------------------------------------------------ https://www.jihadwatch.org/2017/07/swedens-islamic-rape-epidemic-almost-half-of-victims-are-children
Rapes are rampant in Sweden, following years of Muslim immigration. An alarmingly high percentage of the victims are children. Rape in Sweden has been soaring since the country started to take in large numbers of Muslim migrants and refugees. According to statistics, 92 percent of all severe rapes (violent rapes) are committed by migrants and refugees. 100 percent […] Read in browser » (https://www.jihadwatch.org/2017/07/swedens-islamic-rape-epidemic-almost-half-of-victims-are-children)
Federal Prosecutors Step Up Probe Of Land Deal Pushed By Wife Of Bernie Sanders
....A half-dozen people said in interviews in recent days that they had been contacted by the FBI or federal prosecutors, and former college trustees told The Washington Post that lawyers representing Jane Sanders had interviewed them to learn what potential witnesses might tell the government.
The investigation centers on the 2010 land purchase that relocated Burlington College to a new campus on more than 32 acres along Lake Champlain. While lining up a $6.7 million loan and additional financing, Sanders told college trustees and lenders that the college had commitments for millions of dollars in donations that could be used to repay the loan, according to former trustees and state officials.
Trustees said they later discovered that many of the donors had not agreed to the amounts or timing of the donations listed on documents Jane Sanders provided to a state bonding agency and a bank....
What? Samantha Bee Producer: We Have No Liberal Bias, We Just Tell The Truth
You know those previews for that show with some really annoying woman telling very unfunny jokes about Donald Trump you see when you’re watching Seinfeld re-runs on TBS? That’s Samantha Bee. And for the first time ever, someone involved with TBS’ alleged comedy show Full Frontal with Samantha Bee was actually funny.
In a Vanity Fair profile of Full Frontal executive producer Jo Miller titled, “Don’t Call Full Frontal With Samantha Bee Liberal”, Miller explains that is inaccurate and “lazy” to label their extremely liberal program “liberal”.
“We are passionate about feminism, and civil rights, and justice, and black lives, and women’s lives-but we’re radical centrists. And we’re not party affiliated. I think you’ll find a lot of our values reflect left of center rather than right of center, but to characterize us as partisan or liberal is lazy and it’s just something that people do who don’t watch the show. And I think it’s also galvanized by the right wing trolls who do hate us, and want a clickbait narrative”, Miller said of the program that airs around the same time as the completely non-partisan Fox News show Hannity.
It’s the right-wing trolls and not the shows content that might lead some to believe they are partisan? We can’t judge a woman who once chastised her own network just for making fun of Hillary Clinton’s laugh as partisan?
According to Miller,”We have an office full of trained journalists here, and academics, who are very serious about following the truth wherever it leads us.”
That’s the old, “we would love to make fun of Obama more but it’s just so hard with him being almost perfect and all” defense. If only people like Nancy Pelosi or Maxine Waters ever did something we could make fun of...
Suicidal man doused in gasoline bursts into flames after police use Taser on him
A suicidal man who had doused himself in gasoline became engulfed in flames at an Arlington home Monday after an officer used a stun gun him, police said.
The officer who used the Taser on the man believed that the man was holding a lighter in his hand and was about to use it, police spokeswoman Sgt. VaNessa Harrison said at a news conference.
Harrison acknowledged the risk of using an electrical stun gun near gasoline, but said the man was “very frantic and erratic and became a danger to everyone in the room.”
“We realize that a Taser can have some other implications, but we also know he had something in his hand,” Harrison said. “It’s unclear at this moment whether he became engulfed in flames from the gasoline and ignitable object he had in his hand or from the Taser.”
The man was taken to a hospital. His condition was unknown.
Three police officers were also taken to a hospital for smoke inhalation. Their injuries were not life threatening, Harrison said.
Police were called to the home in the 1600 block of Carla Avenue about noon, where two women reported that a mentally ill man was attempting suicide.
The man had doused himself in gasoline and was threatening suicide, Harrison said. Officers arrived, got the women out of the home and began talking to the man.
While officers tried to calm the man down, Harrison said, he poured more gasoline on himself and was believed to be holding a lighter in one hand.
An officer used a Taser on the man “to subdue him,” Harrison said, but the man became engulfed in flames. Officers wrapped the man in a blanket to put out the fire and got the man outside the home.
Police were still investigating the incident Monday afternoon.
Good Grief. That's like shooting a man with a gun to his head in the head to prevent him from shooting himself in the head. *********
Here's why Doug went lava tube -
Hawaii News Growing homeless encampments prompt proposal for armed park rangers By Allison Schaefers July 9, 2017
“Dog,” left, who declined to give any other name, and Fabio sat in Kapiolani Park along Paki Avenue. Dog lives in the Land Rover behind him. They complain that the police harass and cite them for various violations.
Homeless encampments such as the ones seen here litter the Diamond Head Road area and have created problems for people who use the area for recreational purposes. A homeless man filled bottles with water using a fountain on the side of Diamond Head Road and walked down the ledge to his makeshift home last month.
A homeless encampment below Diamond Head Road overlooks the ocean. City Councilman Trevor Ozawa is working on a proposal that would create a new sector of armed park rangers who could enforce laws or rules within city parks....
Waikiki resident Jen Tema holds her breath as she jogs past the Diamond Head lookouts because most days the stench from the homeless encampments is overwhelming.
“We’re at the beginning of the toilet,” Tema said on a recent Friday as she passed by a garbage pile that spilled over the oceanside cliffs like a waterfall. “When it’s dead wind, you can barely walk by it. It’s a shame because this is one of the most beautiful places in the world.”
She quit jogging at night because she didn’t feel safe due to the security risks and health hazards that have surfaced since the neighborhood’s homeless residents began monopolizing public spaces. Her son doesn’t surf at the lookouts because homeless campers dump buckets of feces into the water there. Her kids wear shoes instead of slippers to the parks to avoid stepping on discarded drug needles and used condoms.......
************
That and the fact Doug's the only Republican in Hawaii.
July 10, 2017 Two presidents and their Marine attendants By Russ Vaughn
On Saturday. as the commander-in-chief was boarding Marine One, rotor turbulence blew off the headgear of an attending Marine. President Trump stooped, grabbed the hat, and replaced it on the stunned young Marine's head, patting the embarrassed, young serviceman on the arm. The hat immediately blew off again, and Trump went after it a second time, while the Marine correctly maintained his post, standing rigidly at attention. Trump this time handed off the hat to the Air Force colonel attending him and boarded the helicopter.
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has declared victory in the battle for Mosul, potentially ending Islamic State's (IS) three-year reign in the city in northern Iraq.
...
Mr Abadi travelled to Mosul in early July as it became clear the end of the battle was approaching.
...
"We are glad to see normal life return for the citizens. This is the result of the sacrifices of the (country's) heroic fighters."
He raised an Iraqi flag over the city.
...
State television showed Mr Abadi touring Mosul on foot alongside residents of Iraq's second-largest city.
But air strikes and exchanges of gunfire could still be heard in the narrow streets of Mosul's Old City, where the Islamic State has staged its last stand.
Amnesty International says it has identified a pattern of attacks by Iraqi forces and the US-led military coalition backing them in the battle for Mosul that violated international humanitarian law and could amount to war crimes.
...
Amnesty said the toll just in west Mosul from attacks launched by pro-government forces was very likely higher than the 3,706 estimated by monitoring group Airwars.
"The true death toll of the west Mosul battle may never be known," it said.
July 10, 2017 Report: Half of Comey’s 'private' memos on Trump conversations contained classified info By Thomas Lifson
If an anonymously sourced story published in The Hill is correct, James Comey could find himself with a big problem on his hands. John Solomon reports:
More than half of the memos former FBI chief James Comey wrote as personal recollections of his conversations with President Trump about the Russia investigation have been determined to contain classified information, according to interviews with officials familiar with the documents.
This revelation raises the possibility that Comey broke his own agency's rules and ignored the same security protocol that he publicly criticized Hillary Clinton for in the waning days of the 2016 presidential election. ...
[T]he revelation that four of the seven memos included some sort of classified information opens a new door of inquiry into whether classified information was mishandled, improperly stored or improperly shared.
Ironically, that was the same issue the FBI investigated in 2015-16 under Comey about Clinton's private email server, where as secretary of State she and top aides moved classified information through insecure channels.
This is the point at which the jokes about "intent" begin. And it is also where Comey's legal exposure begins. Comey is a smart lawyer, and no doubt has an argument on the classified information mishandling, just as Hillary did. And that is a problem of optics as well as of law. Comey also has his sworn testimony on June 8, 2017 to deal with on the matter of government property:
"So you didn't consider your memo or your sense of that conversation to be a government document?," Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) asked Comey on June 8. "You considered it to be, somehow, your own personal document that you could share to the media as you wanted through a friend?"
"Correct," Comey answered. "I understood this to be my recollection recorded of my conversation with the president. As a private citizen, I thought it important to get it out."
If he used classified information in the documents, he clearly appropriated government property:
FBI policy forbids any agent from releasing classified information or any information from ongoing investigations or sensitive operations without prior written permission, and mandates that all records created during official duties are considered to be government property.
"Unauthorized disclosure, misuse, or negligent handling of information contained in the files, electronic or paper, of the FBI or which I may acquire as an employee of the FBI could impair national security, place human life in jeopardy, result in the denial of due process, prevent the FBI from effectively discharging its responsibilities, or violate federal law," states the agreement all FBI agents sign.
It adds that "all information acquired by me in connection with my official duties with the FBI and all official material to which I have access remain the property of the United States of America" and that an agent "will not reveal, by any means, any information or material from or related to FBI files or any other information acquired by virtue of my official employment to any unauthorized recipient without prior official written authorization by the FBI."
Comey, the expert manipulator and game-player, has new peril on his hands. He maybe a wild card for Loretta Lynch and those who pulled her strings on the Hillary email investigation. He knows the drill when it comes to offering deals to the accused in hopes of getting them to testify against their superiors in a criminal enterprise.
Je suis Brigitte: Bardot’s shock interview on Islam
By Pamela Geller - on July 10, 2017
Brigitte Bardot is a national treasure. Despite relentless persecution by the French government for sharia-speech violations, Bardot continues to speak truth to Islamic power. France’s iconic blonde bombshell has been on trial five times for Islamo-criticism and “inciting racial hatred” (Islam is not a race).
And still she speaks out.
The shock interview of Brigitte Bardot
Thanks to Alexandre for the translation
The state of France “I was raised in honor, patriotism, love and respect for my country, and when I see what has become of me, I am quite desperate.” When I see what they have done, A country whose intellectual richness, the quality of language, of writing, the primacy of architecture, fashion, elegance and heritage radiated throughout the world, it depresses me. As my grandfather said , There is enough to take them and bite them! ”
To whom does it attribute this regression? “To the left, she hates anything luxurious, elegant, anything that comes out of the ordinary.” About communitarianism “I can no longer see them, the Islamists, that practically everywhere in France we see the burqas, it is inadmissible, that they behave as they want in their country of origin, but that they do not impose Customs, practices, discriminations of another age: France is not that. ”
The political personalities she appreciates “I love him very much and for a long time, but also François Fillon, I think he’s a good guy, I was horrified by this judicial and media lynching. As you know, a lot of respect for this virtue. ” The European Union “We have to get out of here. Brussels is breaking the balls.” The state of French cinema “There are only bearded and fat-haired actresses who are raped in the corners and find excuses for their assailants.There is only to watch the Ceremony of Caesar where nice zombies Thanked papa-maman, their concierge and their taxi driver, while launching the unavoidable appeal to human brotherhood and anti-racism. ” The French culture “I did not fight against French Algeria to accept an Algerian France, I do not touch the culture, the identity and the customs of the others.
This dog spent 9 months lost in the Idaho mountains. Here’s how she got home to Boise BY NICOLE BLANCHARD
Cheri Glankler has been rescuing dogs for 20 years — the last five of those spent in Garden Valley — so the elderly retriever that ended up in her care in late June was nothing out of the ordinary. At least initially.
From the outset, the dog looked rough. She was found collapsed on a ranch off Idaho 55 near Horseshoe Bend and brought to Glankler covered in fleas and ticks.
“Please share if you know someone is missing her,” Glankler wrote in a Facebook post in the Lost Pets Boise page.
But Glankler had a hunch about who might be missing the dog. And the internet did, too.
Right away, comments started pouring in on Glankler’s post: Could this be Mo, a dog lost in the area last fall?
Mo, a 12-year-old Chesapeake Bay Retriever, had gone missing September 13, 2016, between Horseshoe Bend and Placerville. A former hunting dog, Mo still accompanied her owners, Darwin and Cindy Cameron, on hunting trips and relaxed in their camper. Somehow on the September trip, Mo was let out of the camper and took off in search of Darwin.
For the next three months, the Camerons, who live in Boise, stayed in the area searching for Mo with no luck.
Mo or no?
Glankler, a fan of Chesapeake Bay Retrievers, or “Chessies,” had heard about Mo when the dog went missing months ago. She’d hoped to hear about the dog’s safe return, but after a season of heavy snow, she wasn’t terribly optimistic.
The past year’s hard winter would’ve been tough to survive in the wild, even for an animal in its prime, Glankler said. The dog she had rescued, though a hardy Chessie (a dog known for its wooly, oily coat that was bred for the extreme cold of retrieving in the Atlantic), was completely deaf and clearly pretty old. Glankler couldn’t be completely sure this dog was Mo.
Still, she tracked down the Camerons and reached out. They were apprehensive, Glankler said. In the past nine months, they’d had many false alarms, and each time they realized the dog in question wasn’t Mo, they hurt a little more. The last they had heard, a hunter in Jerusalem Valley had seen a brown dog in the forest, running from wolves.
“I was positive it was her,” Glankler said. “But I didn’t want to dash (Darwin’s) hopes.”
There was something about this dog that Glankler swore was a sign — and then there were the squirrels.
Glankler was walking the elderly retriever on her property one day when a squirrel streaked by. Despite how weak the rescued dog was, she “nearly ripped my arm off,” to chase the critter, Glankler said. Talking to Darwin Cameron’s brother, Glankler asked, “How is Mo with squirrels?”
With some persuasion, the Camerons made the trip to Glankler’s Garden Valley home from Boise, nervous but hopeful as they had been for the last nine months that somehow they would be reunited with Mo. Glankler warned them that, even if the dog she had was Mo, their reunion might not be quite what they expected.
“They all expect this kind of Disneyland response like you see sometimes in videos when veterans come home,” Glankler said. “And to be perfectly honest, that’s abnormal. People don’t understand that (the dogs) have gone into survival mode.”
This rescue dog had been through serious trauma, and even seeing a familiar face would take some adjusting to. When Glankler’s rescue dog greeted the Camerons, she was subdued — but there was a familiarity there.
“I knew right away,” Glankler said. “She went to Cindy and pushed her head into Cindy’s belly. Cindy was looking her over and looking for all the signs that this is Mo — a stitch in her right eye, her fatty tumor.”
Darwin sat down and the dog ambled over to him. She sat down squarely on his foot, “which is exactly what Mo does.”
“He wanted to believe it was her but he was afraid to believe it was her,” Glankler said.
The Camerons had one more way to tell. “Go get the bed,” Cindy told her husband.
They’d brought Mo’s bed with them, hoping the dog would recognize a sign from her previous life. When the dog started sniffing the bed, Glankler said, it was obvious. There’s a real difference in the way canines sniff their own scent and the way they explore the scents of other dogs, Glankler explained.
“I think you have your girl back,” she told the Camerons.
The Legend
When the Camerons left Garden Valley with the dog Glankler rescued, they were 99 percent sure she was Mo. After a few days’ time at home, they’re 100 percent certain, they said. Mo knew just how to get through the garage and the house. It was little details like that that made them sure.
Now, they said, their focus is on getting Mo back to stable health and making up for lost time. While she was gone, Mo lost about 50 percent of her body weight. It was clear that she had spent the entire time on her own in the wild, Glankler said.
“The way she looked, there’s no way someone was taking care of her,” she explained.
Darwin said another priority is thanking the hundreds of people who spent time looking for the lost dog.
“The sheriff’s office, the hunters who set aside their tags and their hunting trips to help look for a lost dog,” Darwin said. “Boy, we’re blessed to have her back.”
Glankler has a nickname for Mo after all the elderly canine went through: The Legend. She said she plans to start a new rescue in Mo’s honor that bears the same name.
It’s not often in dog rescue that Glankler gets a happy ending, she said. And Mo stole Glankler’s heart with her tenacity and bravery.
“Who saved Mo? Mo saved Mo,” Glankler said. “Even here when I would take her out on a lead, she was searching. She knew who she was looking for. She’s incredible.”
REAL LEGISLATION TO COMBAT TERRORISM Welcome to a bill that makes a crucial first step. July 7, 2017 Michael Cutler
The continuing threat of terror attacks committed by international terrorists in the United States requires meaningful, decisive and effective action that protects America and Americans.
Congressman Raul Labrador, a Republican from Idaho, has introduced legislation that would help address the issue of the lack of integrity to the refugee program. His bill is H.R. 2826 (Refugee Program Integrity Restoration Act of 2017) and addresses an area of critical importance, imbuing the refugee program with meaningful integrity to combat fraud in this program.
I am particularly gratified by Congressman Labrador’s efforts. I have repeatedly noted in my appearances before Congressional hearings and elsewhere that the lack of integrity of the immigration system created a national security vulnerability that international terrorists and transnational criminals and fugitives frequently exploited, often with deadly consequences......
It was part of a wider effort until it wasn't a few sentences later:
WASHINGTON — Before arranging a meeting with a Kremlin-connected Russian lawyer he believed would offer him compromising information about Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump Jr. was informed in an email that the material was part of a Russian government effort to aid his father’s candidacy, according to three people with knowledge of the email.
The email to the younger Mr. Trump was sent by Rob Goldstone, a publicist and former British tabloid reporter who helped broker the June 2016 meeting. In a statement on Sunday, Mr. Trump acknowledged that he was interested in receiving damaging information about Mrs. Clinton, but gave no indication that he thought the lawyer might have been a Kremlin proxy.
Mr. Goldstone’s message, as described to The New York Times by the three people, indicates that the Russian government was the source of the potentially damaging information. It does not elaborate on the wider effort by Moscow to help the Trump campaign.
There is no evidence to suggest that the promised damaging information was related to Russian government computer hacking that led to the release of thousands of Democratic National Committee emails. The meeting took place less than a week before it was widely reported that Russian hackers had infiltrated the committee’s servers.
It is unclear whether Mr. Goldstone had direct knowledge of the origin of the damaging material. One person who was briefed on the emails said it appeared that he was passing along information that had been passed through several others.
The Russian psychosis of the left continues. I believe it will all come tumbling down on them. If you want to know what the ALT-LEFT are up to, just look into what they are accusing the RIGHT of.
Russia Scandal: No wonder former FBI Director James Comey refused to press charges last summer against Hillary Clinton for her egregious security breaches: It turns out, he may have been guilty of the same thing.
As the inside-the-beltway political publication The Hill reported, more than half of the memos FBI Director James Comey wrote after having spoken to President Trump about the Russia investigation contained classified information. The Hill cites as its sources "officials familiar with the documents."
Not surprisingly, perhaps, Trump on Monday morning tweeted out an angry response: "James Comey leaked CLASSIFIED INFORMATION to the media. That is so illegal!"
He may be onto something there.
All told, Comey wrote seven memos based on nine meetings with Trump. In testimony to Congress, he asserted that he had made sure the memos in question didn't have classified material. But a subsequent investigation found markings on four of the memos indicating secret information, the kind that is not allowed to be routinely released to the public.
Comey has long maintained that the memos were his personal property, but virtually no legal authority agrees with that. Nor does the FBI, for that matter. The memos were created on government time and related directly to his work, so they were the property of government.
In short, it sounds like a game of cover-your-hindquarters he's been playing. Because Comey later let outsiders see those memos, and made sure they were leaked to the Trump-hating press, in this case the New York Times, so any protestations of innocence on his part sound more than a little weak.
Let's be very clear here: What Comey did is against FBI rules, and it's a violation of federal secrecy laws, on a par with the violation that Hillary Clinton committed when she decided to run the Secretary of State's office from a private, home-brew email server that was clearly illegal.
The agreement signed by all FBI employees says that "all information acquired by me in connection with my official duties with the FBI and all official material to which I have access remain the property of the United States of America."
It goes on to add that agents "will not reveal, by any means, any information or material from or related to FBI files or any other information acquired by virtue of my official employment to any unauthorized recipient without prior official written authorization by the FBI."
Hillary signed a similar agreement at the State Department. Yet, she routinely put classified information onto public servers, where it could be grabbed by unscrupulous actors, such as the Chinese and the Russians.
How does that compare to Comey, who asked a lawyer-friend at Columbia University, Prof. Daniel Richman, to leak his memos containing classified information to the news media?
The goal of the handoff was to generate stories so that a special prosecutor would be named to investigate Russian meddling in the U.S. election and, more to the point, Democratic rumors that Trump had colluded with the Russians to beat Hillary.
In short, Comey appears to have delivered classified information to the New York Times and other media for the sole political purpose of bringing down President Trump.
Comey's actions help explain a lot of things that people have puzzled over since last year. During last summer's campaign and the growing scandal over Hillary's cavalier treatment of U.S. secrets on her email server, Comey came to her rescue.
Yes, he said in July, Clinton's actions were "extremely careless." But stung by the criticism he received from the left, he later in the month said that Clinton's violations didn't rise to the level of a prosecutable crime.
On Oct. 28, he revealed that more emails had been found on an unsecured laptop belonging to former Rep. Anthony Wiener, estranged husband of top Clinton aide Huma Abedin. On Nov. 6, just two days before the election, Comey announced Clinton wouldn't be prosecuted. Case closed.
Comey's later actions suggest, if anything, he learned from Hillary's chutzpah. You can flout U.S. law, and as long as you have friends and political clout, get away with it — even use your illegality as a bludgeon against your political foes.
Moreover, a June piece by Fox News noted at least 14 stories written by the New York Times going back to Jan. 10 containing "confidential information related to Trump and the FBI, mostly sourced anonymously from senior officials in the FBI and DOJ." Comey, it seems, has been working overtime to sabotage Trump.
This calls into serious question the appointment of Robert Mueller as special counsel to look into the rumors of election meddling by Russia. Comey and Mueller are close friends.
At minimum, Mueller must recuse himself on the Trump matters now before him. His friendship with Comey makes impartiality impossible, and it's a clear conflict.
More importantly, Comey got Hillary off the hook last year from what appeared to be a slam-dunk prosecution. And please remember, no one thought at the time that Trump had any chance at all of beating Hillary.
Now, we find out Comey played a double game with the public and the newly elected president. A case of a deep-state operative, Comey, trying to sabotage Washington-outsider Trump? Or just someone with a fast-and-loose idea about following the law?
THE Iraqi military’s hard-fought victory over the Islamic State group in Mosul marks a defining moment not just for them. It is also a key win for the US doctrine behind it.
ReplyDelete...
Obama ordered air strikes and pursued a strategy — known in the Pentagon as “by, with and through” — to train local forces.
In the summer of 2015, coalition advisers started instructing Iraqis on conventional warfare — fighting in small units, setting up defenses, how to breech minefields and so on.
...
For Brian McKeon, a senior Pentagon policy official at the end of the Obama administration, the strategy worked, though not as quickly as had been hoped. The battle for Mosul first began on October 16, 2016.
Kurds did much of the fighting.
ReplyDeleteNow they will try to declare independence.
We should support them.
Iraqi Kurds will push for independence after Mosul is freed — PM ...
https://www.rt.com/news/364649-barzani-kurds-iraq-mosul/
Oct 29, 2016 - Iraq's Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) prime minister says the Kurds will renew their push for an independent state after Mosul is ...
The Battle Against ISIS in Mosul Could Lead to an Independent Iraqi ...
Deletewww.newsweek.com/.../battle-against-isis-mosul-kurdistan-independence-511041.html
Some Kurds worry about another American betrayal, but many still hope a victory over ISIS will lead to independence—or at least greater ...
Newsweek says so too.
Rufus kept moving his time line for the defeat of ISIS in Iraq.
ReplyDeleteFinally, it was 'before O'bama leaves office'.
Missed that by 6 months or so, too.
Who was Eva Ekeblad ????
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eva_Ekeblad
Did she invent vodka?
DeleteI think so.
DeletePotato vodka.
Just happened on her by chance.
She was a Swede.
Brought the Ruskie to his knees without firing a shot.
They are still drinking themselves to death to this day.
The whole point of locking them up at Guantanamo was to neutralize terrorists and prevent them from harming anyone else. But the two previous presidents -- Bush and Obama -- bowed to pressure from human rights groups and began transferring the terrorists to other countries.
ReplyDeleteThe administration will not be shipping terrorists to Guantanamo in the numbers sent during the height of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But certainly we will be using special forces to grab some of the more prominent terrorists around the world and will capture terrorists here in America.
It will be good to have a secure facility where they can be sent, confident that their days of killing innocents are over.
Guantanamo Again
** Sweden’s Islamic rape epidemic: Almost half of the victims are children
ReplyDeleteBy Nicolai Sennels on Jul 09, 2017 09:16 am
------------------------------------------------------------
https://www.jihadwatch.org/2017/07/swedens-islamic-rape-epidemic-almost-half-of-victims-are-children
Rapes are rampant in Sweden, following years of Muslim immigration. An alarmingly
high percentage of the victims are children. Rape in Sweden has been soaring since
the country started to take in large numbers of Muslim migrants and refugees.
According to statistics, 92 percent of all severe rapes (violent rapes) are
committed by migrants and refugees. 100 percent […]
Read in browser »
(https://www.jihadwatch.org/2017/07/swedens-islamic-rape-epidemic-almost-half-of-victims-are-children)
Jail 'em both -
ReplyDeleteFederal Prosecutors Step Up Probe Of Land Deal Pushed By Wife Of Bernie Sanders
....A half-dozen people said in interviews in recent days that they had been contacted by the FBI or federal prosecutors, and former college trustees told The Washington Post that lawyers representing Jane Sanders had interviewed them to learn what potential witnesses might tell the government.
The investigation centers on the 2010 land purchase that relocated Burlington College to a new campus on more than 32 acres along Lake Champlain. While lining up a $6.7 million loan and additional financing, Sanders told college trustees and lenders that the college had commitments for millions of dollars in donations that could be used to repay the loan, according to former trustees and state officials.
Trustees said they later discovered that many of the donors had not agreed to the amounts or timing of the donations listed on documents Jane Sanders provided to a state bonding agency and a bank....
http://hotair.com/headlines/archives/2017/07/10/federal-prosecutors-step-up-probe-of-land-deal-pushed-by-wife-of-bernie-sanders/
Bernie and Mrs. Bernie don't need all three of those lakeside vacation homes.
The People's Houses
Delete
ReplyDeleteWhat? Samantha Bee Producer: We Have No Liberal Bias, We Just Tell The Truth
You know those previews for that show with some really annoying woman telling very unfunny jokes about Donald Trump you see when you’re watching Seinfeld re-runs on TBS? That’s Samantha Bee. And for the first time ever, someone involved with TBS’ alleged comedy show Full Frontal with Samantha Bee was actually funny.
In a Vanity Fair profile of Full Frontal executive producer Jo Miller titled, “Don’t Call Full Frontal With Samantha Bee Liberal”, Miller explains that is inaccurate and “lazy” to label their extremely liberal program “liberal”.
“We are passionate about feminism, and civil rights, and justice, and black lives, and women’s lives-but we’re radical centrists. And we’re not party affiliated. I think you’ll find a lot of our values reflect left of center rather than right of center, but to characterize us as partisan or liberal is lazy and it’s just something that people do who don’t watch the show. And I think it’s also galvanized by the right wing trolls who do hate us, and want a clickbait narrative”, Miller said of the program that airs around the same time as the completely non-partisan Fox News show Hannity.
It’s the right-wing trolls and not the shows content that might lead some to believe they are partisan?
We can’t judge a woman who once chastised her own network just for making fun of Hillary Clinton’s laugh as partisan?
According to Miller,”We have an office full of trained journalists here, and academics, who are very serious about following the truth wherever it leads us.”
That’s the old, “we would love to make fun of Obama more but it’s just so hard with him being almost perfect and all” defense. If only people like Nancy Pelosi or Maxine Waters ever did something we could make fun of...
http://www.mediaite.com/online/samantha-bee-producer-we-have-no-liberal-bias-we-just-tell-the-truth/
Maybe the dog did it!
ReplyDeleteSuicidal man doused in gasoline bursts into flames after police use Taser on him
A suicidal man who had doused himself in gasoline became engulfed in flames at an Arlington home Monday after an officer used a stun gun him, police said.
The officer who used the Taser on the man believed that the man was holding a lighter in his hand and was about to use it, police spokeswoman Sgt. VaNessa Harrison said at a news conference.
Harrison acknowledged the risk of using an electrical stun gun near gasoline, but said the man was “very frantic and erratic and became a danger to everyone in the room.”
“We realize that a Taser can have some other implications, but we also know he had something in his hand,” Harrison said. “It’s unclear at this moment whether he became engulfed in flames from the gasoline and ignitable object he had in his hand or from the Taser.”
The man was taken to a hospital. His condition was unknown.
Three police officers were also taken to a hospital for smoke inhalation. Their injuries were not life threatening, Harrison said.
Police were called to the home in the 1600 block of Carla Avenue about noon, where two women reported that a mentally ill man was attempting suicide.
The man had doused himself in gasoline and was threatening suicide, Harrison said. Officers arrived, got the women out of the home and began talking to the man.
While officers tried to calm the man down, Harrison said, he poured more gasoline on himself and was believed to be holding a lighter in one hand.
An officer used a Taser on the man “to subdue him,” Harrison said, but the man became engulfed in flames. Officers wrapped the man in a blanket to put out the fire and got the man outside the home.
Police were still investigating the incident Monday afternoon.
http://www.sacbee.com/news/nation-world/national/article160587474.html
This comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteGood Grief. That's like shooting a man with a gun to his head in the head to prevent him from shooting himself in the head.
Delete*********
Here's why Doug went lava tube -
Hawaii News
Growing homeless encampments prompt proposal for armed park rangers
By Allison Schaefers
July 9, 2017
“Dog,” left, who declined to give any other name, and Fabio sat in Kapiolani Park along Paki Avenue. Dog lives in the Land Rover behind him. They complain that the police harass and cite them for various violations.
Homeless encampments such as the ones seen here litter the Diamond Head Road area and have created problems for people who use the area for recreational purposes. A homeless man filled bottles with water using a fountain on the side of Diamond Head Road and walked down the ledge to his makeshift home last month.
A homeless encampment below Diamond Head Road overlooks the ocean. City Councilman Trevor Ozawa is working on a proposal that would create a new sector of armed park rangers who could enforce laws or rules within city parks....
Waikiki resident Jen Tema holds her breath as she jogs past the Diamond Head lookouts because most days the stench from the homeless encampments is overwhelming.
“We’re at the beginning of the toilet,” Tema said on a recent Friday as she passed by a garbage pile that spilled over the oceanside cliffs like a waterfall. “When it’s dead wind, you can barely walk by it. It’s a shame because this is one of the most beautiful places in the world.”
She quit jogging at night because she didn’t feel safe due to the security risks and health hazards that have surfaced since the neighborhood’s homeless residents began monopolizing public spaces. Her son doesn’t surf at the lookouts because homeless campers dump buckets of feces into the water there. Her kids wear shoes instead of slippers to the parks to avoid stepping on discarded drug needles and used condoms.......
************
That and the fact Doug's the only Republican in Hawaii.
Sorry, lost the link.
Jeeze, I thought Dog The Bounty Hunter was doing well.
DeleteTrump Walks Out On 1990 CNN Interview
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEXqA1UUcxo
Two pictures, two Presidents -
ReplyDeleteJuly 10, 2017
Two presidents and their Marine attendants
By Russ Vaughn
On Saturday. as the commander-in-chief was boarding Marine One, rotor turbulence blew off the headgear of an attending Marine. President Trump stooped, grabbed the hat, and replaced it on the stunned young Marine's head, patting the embarrassed, young serviceman on the arm. The hat immediately blew off again, and Trump went after it a second time, while the Marine correctly maintained his post, standing rigidly at attention. Trump this time handed off the hat to the Air Force colonel attending him and boarded the helicopter.
Picture of Trump and Marine
Contrast that with this:
Picture of Obama and Marine
'Nuff said...
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2017/07/a_portrait_of_two_presidents.html
What's wrong with the Obama picture? I don't see anything wrong with it. So, the marine is holding an umbrella. So fucking what?
DeleteThey should be sharing the umbrella.
DeleteOr they ought to be both holding their own umbrellas.
What Commander in Chief lets his men get wet when it can be avoided ?
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has declared victory in the battle for Mosul, potentially ending Islamic State's (IS) three-year reign in the city in northern Iraq.
ReplyDelete...
Mr Abadi travelled to Mosul in early July as it became clear the end of the battle was approaching.
...
"We are glad to see normal life return for the citizens. This is the result of the sacrifices of the (country's) heroic fighters."
He raised an Iraqi flag over the city.
...
State television showed Mr Abadi touring Mosul on foot alongside residents of Iraq's second-largest city.
But air strikes and exchanges of gunfire could still be heard in the narrow streets of Mosul's Old City, where the Islamic State has staged its last stand.
Amnesty International says it has identified a pattern of attacks by Iraqi forces and the US-led military coalition backing them in the battle for Mosul that violated international humanitarian law and could amount to war crimes.
ReplyDelete...
Amnesty said the toll just in west Mosul from attacks launched by pro-government forces was very likely higher than the 3,706 estimated by monitoring group Airwars.
"The true death toll of the west Mosul battle may never be known," it said.
Heh heh heh
ReplyDeleteJuly 10, 2017
Report: Half of Comey’s 'private' memos on Trump conversations contained classified info
By Thomas Lifson
If an anonymously sourced story published in The Hill is correct, James Comey could find himself with a big problem on his hands. John Solomon reports:
More than half of the memos former FBI chief James Comey wrote as personal recollections of his conversations with President Trump about the Russia investigation have been determined to contain classified information, according to interviews with officials familiar with the documents.
This revelation raises the possibility that Comey broke his own agency's rules and ignored the same security protocol that he publicly criticized Hillary Clinton for in the waning days of the 2016 presidential election. ...
[T]he revelation that four of the seven memos included some sort of classified information opens a new door of inquiry into whether classified information was mishandled, improperly stored or improperly shared.
Ironically, that was the same issue the FBI investigated in 2015-16 under Comey about Clinton's private email server, where as secretary of State she and top aides moved classified information through insecure channels.
This is the point at which the jokes about "intent" begin. And it is also where Comey's legal exposure begins. Comey is a smart lawyer, and no doubt has an argument on the classified information mishandling, just as Hillary did. And that is a problem of optics as well as of law. Comey also has his sworn testimony on June 8, 2017 to deal with on the matter of government property:
"So you didn't consider your memo or your sense of that conversation to be a government document?," Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) asked Comey on June 8. "You considered it to be, somehow, your own personal document that you could share to the media as you wanted through a friend?"
"Correct," Comey answered. "I understood this to be my recollection recorded of my conversation with the president. As a private citizen, I thought it important to get it out."
If he used classified information in the documents, he clearly appropriated government property:
FBI policy forbids any agent from releasing classified information or any information from ongoing investigations or sensitive operations without prior written permission, and mandates that all records created during official duties are considered to be government property.
"Unauthorized disclosure, misuse, or negligent handling of information contained in the files, electronic or paper, of the FBI or which I may acquire as an employee of the FBI could impair national security, place human life in jeopardy, result in the denial of due process, prevent the FBI from effectively discharging its responsibilities, or violate federal law," states the agreement all FBI agents sign.
It adds that "all information acquired by me in connection with my official duties with the FBI and all official material to which I have access remain the property of the United States of America" and that an agent "will not reveal, by any means, any information or material from or related to FBI files or any other information acquired by virtue of my official employment to any unauthorized recipient without prior official written authorization by the FBI."
Comey, the expert manipulator and game-player, has new peril on his hands. He maybe a wild card for Loretta Lynch and those who pulled her strings on the Hillary email investigation. He knows the drill when it comes to offering deals to the accused in hopes of getting them to testify against their superiors in a criminal enterprise.
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2017/07/report_half_of_comeys_private_memos_on_trump_conversations_contained_classified_info.html#ixzz4mV5a9lnH
Ho ho ho ho ho !
DeleteCandidates for jail so far -
DeleteJim Comey
Loretta Lynch
Hillary Clinton
Bill Clinton
Barack O'bama
Susan Rice
Huma Abedin
Can you think of any others ?
I am giving Chelsea Clinton a break.
Ha ha ha ha ha
Delete
DeleteAdd Jane and Bernie Sanders to the list.
Quirk, but that assumed.
DeleteA French Treasure -
ReplyDeleteJe suis Brigitte: Bardot’s shock interview on Islam
By Pamela Geller - on July 10, 2017
Brigitte Bardot is a national treasure. Despite relentless persecution by the French government for sharia-speech violations, Bardot continues to speak truth to Islamic power. France’s iconic blonde bombshell has been on trial five times for Islamo-criticism and “inciting racial hatred” (Islam is not a race).
And still she speaks out.
The shock interview of Brigitte Bardot
Thanks to Alexandre for the translation
The state of France “I was raised in honor, patriotism, love and respect for my country, and when I see what has become of me, I am quite desperate.” When I see what they have done, A country whose intellectual richness, the quality of language, of writing, the primacy of architecture, fashion, elegance and heritage radiated throughout the world, it depresses me. As my grandfather said , There is enough to take them and bite them! ”
To whom does it attribute this regression? “To the left, she hates anything luxurious, elegant, anything that comes out of the ordinary.” About communitarianism “I can no longer see them, the Islamists, that practically everywhere in France we see the burqas, it is inadmissible, that they behave as they want in their country of origin, but that they do not impose Customs, practices, discriminations of another age: France is not that. ”
The political personalities she appreciates “I love him very much and for a long time, but also François Fillon, I think he’s a good guy, I was horrified by this judicial and media lynching. As you know, a lot of respect for this virtue. ” The European Union “We have to get out of here. Brussels is breaking the balls.” The state of French cinema “There are only bearded and fat-haired actresses who are raped in the corners and find excuses for their assailants.There is only to watch the Ceremony of Caesar where nice zombies Thanked papa-maman, their concierge and their taxi driver, while launching the unavoidable appeal to human brotherhood and anti-racism. ” The French culture “I did not fight against French Algeria to accept an Algerian France, I do not touch the culture, the identity and the customs of the others.
http://pamelageller.com/2017/07/bardot-shock-interview.html/
Go, Brigitte !
This dog spent 9 months lost in the Idaho mountains. Here’s how she got home to Boise
ReplyDeleteBY NICOLE BLANCHARD
Cheri Glankler has been rescuing dogs for 20 years — the last five of those spent in Garden Valley — so the elderly retriever that ended up in her care in late June was nothing out of the ordinary. At least initially.
From the outset, the dog looked rough. She was found collapsed on a ranch off Idaho 55 near Horseshoe Bend and brought to Glankler covered in fleas and ticks.
“Please share if you know someone is missing her,” Glankler wrote in a Facebook post in the Lost Pets Boise page.
But Glankler had a hunch about who might be missing the dog. And the internet did, too.
Right away, comments started pouring in on Glankler’s post: Could this be Mo, a dog lost in the area last fall?
Mo, a 12-year-old Chesapeake Bay Retriever, had gone missing September 13, 2016, between Horseshoe Bend and Placerville. A former hunting dog, Mo still accompanied her owners, Darwin and Cindy Cameron, on hunting trips and relaxed in their camper. Somehow on the September trip, Mo was let out of the camper and took off in search of Darwin.
For the next three months, the Camerons, who live in Boise, stayed in the area searching for Mo with no luck.
Mo or no?
Glankler, a fan of Chesapeake Bay Retrievers, or “Chessies,” had heard about Mo when the dog went missing months ago. She’d hoped to hear about the dog’s safe return, but after a season of heavy snow, she wasn’t terribly optimistic.
The past year’s hard winter would’ve been tough to survive in the wild, even for an animal in its prime, Glankler said. The dog she had rescued, though a hardy Chessie (a dog known for its wooly, oily coat that was bred for the extreme cold of retrieving in the Atlantic), was completely deaf and clearly pretty old. Glankler couldn’t be completely sure this dog was Mo.
Still, she tracked down the Camerons and reached out. They were apprehensive, Glankler said. In the past nine months, they’d had many false alarms, and each time they realized the dog in question wasn’t Mo, they hurt a little more. The last they had heard, a hunter in Jerusalem Valley had seen a brown dog in the forest, running from wolves.
“I was positive it was her,” Glankler said. “But I didn’t want to dash (Darwin’s) hopes.”
There was something about this dog that Glankler swore was a sign — and then there were the squirrels.
Glankler was walking the elderly retriever on her property one day when a squirrel streaked by. Despite how weak the rescued dog was, she “nearly ripped my arm off,” to chase the critter, Glankler said. Talking to Darwin Cameron’s brother, Glankler asked, “How is Mo with squirrels?”
“Game on,” he replied.
Game On
With some persuasion, the Camerons made the trip to Glankler’s Garden Valley home from Boise, nervous but hopeful as they had been for the last nine months that somehow they would be reunited with Mo. Glankler warned them that, even if the dog she had was Mo, their reunion might not be quite what they expected.
Delete“They all expect this kind of Disneyland response like you see sometimes in videos when veterans come home,” Glankler said. “And to be perfectly honest, that’s abnormal. People don’t understand that (the dogs) have gone into survival mode.”
This rescue dog had been through serious trauma, and even seeing a familiar face would take some adjusting to. When Glankler’s rescue dog greeted the Camerons, she was subdued — but there was a familiarity there.
“I knew right away,” Glankler said. “She went to Cindy and pushed her head into Cindy’s belly. Cindy was looking her over and looking for all the signs that this is Mo — a stitch in her right eye, her fatty tumor.”
Darwin sat down and the dog ambled over to him. She sat down squarely on his foot, “which is exactly what Mo does.”
“He wanted to believe it was her but he was afraid to believe it was her,” Glankler said.
The Camerons had one more way to tell. “Go get the bed,” Cindy told her husband.
They’d brought Mo’s bed with them, hoping the dog would recognize a sign from her previous life. When the dog started sniffing the bed, Glankler said, it was obvious. There’s a real difference in the way canines sniff their own scent and the way they explore the scents of other dogs, Glankler explained.
“I think you have your girl back,” she told the Camerons.
The Legend
When the Camerons left Garden Valley with the dog Glankler rescued, they were 99 percent sure she was Mo. After a few days’ time at home, they’re 100 percent certain, they said. Mo knew just how to get through the garage and the house. It was little details like that that made them sure.
Now, they said, their focus is on getting Mo back to stable health and making up for lost time. While she was gone, Mo lost about 50 percent of her body weight. It was clear that she had spent the entire time on her own in the wild, Glankler said.
“The way she looked, there’s no way someone was taking care of her,” she explained.
Darwin said another priority is thanking the hundreds of people who spent time looking for the lost dog.
“The sheriff’s office, the hunters who set aside their tags and their hunting trips to help look for a lost dog,” Darwin said. “Boy, we’re blessed to have her back.”
Glankler has a nickname for Mo after all the elderly canine went through: The Legend. She said she plans to start a new rescue in Mo’s honor that bears the same name.
It’s not often in dog rescue that Glankler gets a happy ending, she said. And Mo stole Glankler’s heart with her tenacity and bravery.
“Who saved Mo? Mo saved Mo,” Glankler said. “Even here when I would take her out on a lead, she was searching. She knew who she was looking for. She’s incredible.”
http://www.idahostatesman.com/news/local/article160290474.html
REAL LEGISLATION TO COMBAT TERRORISM
ReplyDeleteWelcome to a bill that makes a crucial first step.
July 7, 2017 Michael Cutler
The continuing threat of terror attacks committed by international terrorists in the United States requires meaningful, decisive and effective action that protects America and Americans.
Congressman Raul Labrador, a Republican from Idaho, has introduced legislation that would help address the issue of the lack of integrity to the refugee program. His bill is H.R. 2826 (Refugee Program Integrity Restoration Act of 2017) and addresses an area of critical importance, imbuing the refugee program with meaningful integrity to combat fraud in this program.
I am particularly gratified by Congressman Labrador’s efforts. I have repeatedly noted in my appearances before Congressional hearings and elsewhere that the lack of integrity of the immigration system created a national security vulnerability that international terrorists and transnational criminals and fugitives frequently exploited, often with deadly consequences......
https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/267203/real-legislation-combat-terrorism-michael-cutler
Rep. Raul Labrador is stepping down from the US House of Representatives to run for Governor of Idaho.
"Butch" Otter doesn't want another term. He's out after 4.
We are running a surplus here in Idaho.
"If that legislation was a horse, I'd shoot it"
Governor of Idaho "Butch" Otter
It was part of a wider effort until it wasn't a few sentences later:
ReplyDeleteWASHINGTON — Before arranging a meeting with a Kremlin-connected Russian lawyer he believed would offer him compromising information about Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump Jr. was informed in an email that the material was part of a Russian government effort to aid his father’s candidacy, according to three people with knowledge of the email.
The email to the younger Mr. Trump was sent by Rob Goldstone, a publicist and former British tabloid reporter who helped broker the June 2016 meeting. In a statement on Sunday, Mr. Trump acknowledged that he was interested in receiving damaging information about Mrs. Clinton, but gave no indication that he thought the lawyer might have been a Kremlin proxy.
Mr. Goldstone’s message, as described to The New York Times by the three people, indicates that the Russian government was the source of the potentially damaging information. It does not elaborate on the wider effort by Moscow to help the Trump campaign.
There is no evidence to suggest that the promised damaging information was related to Russian government computer hacking that led to the release of thousands of Democratic National Committee emails. The meeting took place less than a week before it was widely reported that Russian hackers had infiltrated the committee’s servers.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/10/us/politics/donald-trump-jr-russia-email-candidacy.html
It is unclear whether Mr. Goldstone had direct knowledge of the origin of the damaging material. One person who was briefed on the emails said it appeared that he was passing along information that had been passed through several others.
Russian government computer hacking that led to the release of thousands of Democratic National Committee emails.
ReplyDelete...Pederasta's Phishing Expedition.
The Russian psychosis of the left continues. I believe it will all come tumbling down on them. If you want to know what the ALT-LEFT are up to, just look into what they are accusing the RIGHT of.
ReplyDeleteIt's looking like Baby Charlie Gard is going to get his chance at treatment in the USA.
ReplyDeleteI'm happy for that.
Investor's Business Daily Editorial
ReplyDeleteRussia Scandal: No wonder former FBI Director James Comey refused to press charges last summer against Hillary Clinton for her egregious security breaches: It turns out, he may have been guilty of the same thing.
As the inside-the-beltway political publication The Hill reported, more than half of the memos FBI Director James Comey wrote after having spoken to President Trump about the Russia investigation contained classified information. The Hill cites as its sources "officials familiar with the documents."
Not surprisingly, perhaps, Trump on Monday morning tweeted out an angry response: "James Comey leaked CLASSIFIED INFORMATION to the media. That is so illegal!"
He may be onto something there.
All told, Comey wrote seven memos based on nine meetings with Trump. In testimony to Congress, he asserted that he had made sure the memos in question didn't have classified material. But a subsequent investigation found markings on four of the memos indicating secret information, the kind that is not allowed to be routinely released to the public.
Comey has long maintained that the memos were his personal property, but virtually no legal authority agrees with that. Nor does the FBI, for that matter. The memos were created on government time and related directly to his work, so they were the property of government.
In short, it sounds like a game of cover-your-hindquarters he's been playing. Because Comey later let outsiders see those memos, and made sure they were leaked to the Trump-hating press, in this case the New York Times, so any protestations of innocence on his part sound more than a little weak.
Let's be very clear here: What Comey did is against FBI rules, and it's a violation of federal secrecy laws, on a par with the violation that Hillary Clinton committed when she decided to run the Secretary of State's office from a private, home-brew email server that was clearly illegal.
The agreement signed by all FBI employees says that "all information acquired by me in connection with my official duties with the FBI and all official material to which I have access remain the property of the United States of America."
It goes on to add that agents "will not reveal, by any means, any information or material from or related to FBI files or any other information acquired by virtue of my official employment to any unauthorized recipient without prior official written authorization by the FBI."
Hillary signed a similar agreement at the State Department. Yet, she routinely put classified information onto public servers, where it could be grabbed by unscrupulous actors, such as the Chinese and the Russians.
How does that compare to Comey, who asked a lawyer-friend at Columbia University, Prof. Daniel Richman, to leak his memos containing classified information to the news media?
DeleteThe goal of the handoff was to generate stories so that a special prosecutor would be named to investigate Russian meddling in the U.S. election and, more to the point, Democratic rumors that Trump had colluded with the Russians to beat Hillary.
In short, Comey appears to have delivered classified information to the New York Times and other media for the sole political purpose of bringing down President Trump.
Comey's actions help explain a lot of things that people have puzzled over since last year. During last summer's campaign and the growing scandal over Hillary's cavalier treatment of U.S. secrets on her email server, Comey came to her rescue.
Yes, he said in July, Clinton's actions were "extremely careless." But stung by the criticism he received from the left, he later in the month said that Clinton's violations didn't rise to the level of a prosecutable crime.
On Oct. 28, he revealed that more emails had been found on an unsecured laptop belonging to former Rep. Anthony Wiener, estranged husband of top Clinton aide Huma Abedin. On Nov. 6, just two days before the election, Comey announced Clinton wouldn't be prosecuted. Case closed.
Comey's later actions suggest, if anything, he learned from Hillary's chutzpah. You can flout U.S. law, and as long as you have friends and political clout, get away with it — even use your illegality as a bludgeon against your political foes.
Moreover, a June piece by Fox News noted at least 14 stories written by the New York Times going back to Jan. 10 containing "confidential information related to Trump and the FBI, mostly sourced anonymously from senior officials in the FBI and DOJ." Comey, it seems, has been working overtime to sabotage Trump.
This calls into serious question the appointment of Robert Mueller as special counsel to look into the rumors of election meddling by Russia. Comey and Mueller are close friends.
At minimum, Mueller must recuse himself on the Trump matters now before him. His friendship with Comey makes impartiality impossible, and it's a clear conflict.
More importantly, Comey got Hillary off the hook last year from what appeared to be a slam-dunk prosecution. And please remember, no one thought at the time that Trump had any chance at all of beating Hillary.
Now, we find out Comey played a double game with the public and the newly elected president. A case of a deep-state operative, Comey, trying to sabotage Washington-outsider Trump? Or just someone with a fast-and-loose idea about following the law?
http://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/mystery-solved-now-we-know-why-comey-did-nothing-about-hillary/
The Pubs will wait for instructions on what to do from the NY Times.
ReplyDeleteQuirk would approve.
Bottomless dishonesty and corruption.
ReplyDeleteQuirk tried to get himself a position in the Trump Administration. Top Intelligence Dog I think it was.
ReplyDeleteBut he was turned down as being too unsteady and uneven in his work products.
I think they should have given the ol' Quirkster a try though.
The person routinely left out out of any story involving emails is Barack Hussein Obama.
ReplyDeleteow, ow.
Delete