COLLECTIVE MADNESS


“Soft despotism is a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville describing the state into which a country overrun by "a network of small complicated rules" might degrade. Soft despotism is different from despotism (also called 'hard despotism') in the sense that it is not obvious to the people."

Wednesday, March 14, 2018

The Clintons must have a copy of Obama's birth certificate




REVEALED: Obama Campaign Hired Fusion GPS To Investigate Romney

  • A new book claims former President Barack Obama hired Fusion GPS to dig up dirt on Romney
  • Obama used law firm Perkins Coie to hide payment to Fusion GPS
  • The Clinton campaign would later do the same thing to investigate Trump
The Barack Obama presidential campaign hired Fusion GPS in 2012 to dig up dirt on Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, according to a book released on Tuesday.

The Obama campaign hid its payments to Fusion GPS through its law firm, Perkins Coie. The arrangement is similar to the one that the Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee used to pay Fusion for its investigation of then-candidate Donald Trump in 2016.

Dossier ‘coincidences’ pile up
That contract led to the creation of the infamous Steele dossier, which was written by former British spy Christopher Steele.

“In 2012, Fusion GPS was hired to do opposition research on Mitt Romney for Barack Obama’s reelection campaign,” reads “Russian Roulette: The Inside Story of Putin’s War on America and Donald Trump’s Election.”

The book is written by Michael Isikoff and David Corn, two veteran reporters who met during the 2016 campaign with Steele and Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson. (RELATED: New Book Raises Questions About Steele Dossier Source)

“As had become standard practice in the shadowy world of ‘oppo’ research, the Obama campaign’s payments to Fusion GPS were never publicly disclosed; the money paid to the investigative firm was reported on campaign disclosure reports as legal bills to the campaign’s law firm, Perkins Coie,” the book reads.
The Obama for America committee paid Perkins Coie around $3 million during the 2012 election cycle, according to filings with the Federal Election Commission, A vast majority of the payments were earmarked for “Legal Services.”

It is not clear how the law firm paid Fusion GPS for its research on Romney, a former Massachusetts governor.

Perkins Coie received more than $12 million from the Clinton campaign and DNC during the 2016 election cycle. Fusion GPS was paid just over $1 million for its research on Trump. The oppo firm paid Steele just under $178,000 for his work on the dossier.


Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

56 comments:

  1. The GOP take a whipping in PA18,a "Safe" GOP district that Cadet Bone Spur won by 20 points.

    VA, AL and now PA
    A trend is evident.

    The issue of the day is not Obama and Clinton.

    LOSING is not winng.
    Out of the frying pan, into the fire
    Listen to the fat sizzling,.


    Promises Made - Promises Broken

    ReplyDelete
    Replies

    1. Beating a dead borse ...
      Never a winning strategy.

      Delete

  2. So ...
    Trump wins in Italy ...
    Loses in Pennsylvania.

    If Italy had votes in the Electoral College I'd be impressed, but it doesn't
    While Florida, with 250,000 new residents from Puerto Rico does.

    Neo-liberalism at work.


    ReplyDelete
  3. .

    Divide and Survive

    Both parties have proven neither are capable of governing effectively when they control all the power in D.C. Therefore, I'm hoping for a big Dem win in 2018. Realistically, that is not going to happen.

    There is faint hope of the Dems taking over the Senate. They will have half of their caucus' seats there contested this year. It would take a miracle for them to take control.

    They have a more reasonable chance in the House but it's still not good. They would need to gain 25 seats in the House to take control. Historically, that's not too bad for a mid-year election but the geographic split on the contested seats will make reaching that 25 seats a tough haul. At this point, I wouldn't bet on it.

    It's too bad.

    Checks and balances are a good thing.

    .

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. What difference does it make ?

      Aren't they all dicks ?

      Delete
    2. .

      Try reading the comment again, Bob.

      Slowly.

      .

      Delete
  4. The 3 stooges thought the Steel and Aluminum tariffs were a political masterstroke with the Penn election looming. They scraped out a tie in a solid GOP district. Doesn't bode well for the future. Time to Dump Trump!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Too many women voted for the young handsome Marine rather than the old dumpy grumpy fat guy.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They didn't have a primary. They just picked this young photogenic young Marine, put some more or less conservative ideas in his mouth, and the Pubs had an old dumpy grumpy fat guy.

      I don't think it bodes much about the future.

      Also, that district actually has more democrats than republicans, though the Pubs have won the last few times around.

      Delete
  6. Time to get out of here -

    Stephen Hawking's final warning to humanity: Legendary physicist believed we must leave Earth in the next 200 years or face EXTINCTION
    Professor Hawking believed life on Earth could easily be wiped out
    Dangers include asteroids, AI, over-population and climate change
    Making contact with aliens and human aggression could also spell the end
    Future generations must forge a new life in space if we want to survive, he said


    By Ellie Zolfagharifard and Phoebe Weston For Mailonline

    PUBLISHED: 03:51 EDT, 14 March 2018 | UPDATED: 06:31 EDT, 14 March 2018


    Humans must leave Earth in the next 200 years if we want to survive.

    That was the stark warning issued by Professor Stephen Hawking in the months before his death today at the age of 76.

    The legendary physicists believed that life on Earth could be wiped out by a disaster such as an asteroid strike, AI or an alien invasion.

    He also warned over-population, human aggression and climate change could cause humanity to self-destruct.

    He believed, if our species had any hope of survival, future generations would need to forge a new life in space.

    Scroll down for video



    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-5498731/Stephen-Hawkings-final-warning-humanity.html#ixzz59iuUYW6C

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. .

      So, I've got a 150 maybe 175 years before I have to start planning?

      .

      Delete
  7. I think Mad Dog Mattis is going to be gone soon too.

    Word is he's been slow walking the military options for North Korea that the President requested.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Breaking Alert for Quirk & Ash -

    Toys R Us is filing bankruptcy, closing all its stores.

    Big toy sale on starting immediately !

    33,000 lost jobs :(

    Just wanted to give you two a 'heads up' knowing how you both love silly diversions and non sense.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Who knows, they may even have 'Slinkys'.

      There's no more fun than that !

      Delete
    2. Slinky - Wikipedia
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slinky
      A Slinky is a toy precompressed helical spring invented by Richard James in the early 1940s. It can perform a number of tricks, including travelling down a flight of steps end-over-end as it stretches and re-forms itself with the aid of gravity and its own momentum, or appear to levitate for a period of time after it has been ...
      ‎History · ‎Physical properties · ‎Commercial history · ‎Slinky Dog

      Delete
  9. Meanwhile down in Venezuela -

    Venezuela Hyperinflation Breaking Deli Scales....DRUDGE

    https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-14/venezuela-s-hyperinflation-is-breaking-deli-scales

    ReplyDelete
  10. Obama Campaign Hired Fusion GPS To Investigate Romney

    .

    Both parties are the same.
    FBI Leadership is not corrupt.
    Mueller will straighten things out.

    .

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I really got a laugh, and some insight too, when I read that the O'bozo campaign had used Fusion to get dirt on Romney.

      I wonder if they got the info that he had parked some money down in the Caribbean that way ?

      Delete

  11. .

    The world is gray.

    .

    .


    Gray vs. grey - Grammarist
    grammarist.com/spelling/gray-grey/
    Gray and grey are different spellings of the same word, and both are used throughout the English-speaking world. But gray is more common in American English, while grey is more common in all the other main varieties of English.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies


    1. .

      Gray and grey are both Dicks.

      .

      Delete
    2. Obama Campaign Hired Fusion GPS To Investigate Romney

      .

      If it's not covered by the MSM, it doesn't matter to me.

      .

      Delete

    3. .

      Does anyone know whether what matter I have is grey or gray matter?

      And does it matter ?

      .

      .

      Delete


    4. .

      O well, no matter, never mind.

      .

      .

      Delete
    5. .

      Does anyone know whether what matter I have is grey or gray matter?

      And does it matter



      No. It doesn't matter. Not at the amounts involved.

      .

      Delete

    6. .

      Who can disagree with that ?

      .

      .

      Delete
  12. Just consider the last few comments as another retaliatory attack by 'the Twins', Quirk-O.

    You asked for it.

    ReplyDelete
  13. http://www.mcclatchydc.com/opinion/editorial-cartoons/article204978579.html

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. :)

      I agree about the elephants.

      Who would ever want to kill one ?

      Unless it attacks the village, as has occasionally happened in India.

      Delete
  14. What Was The Most Pointless Battle In History?

    However, a strong candidate for the most pointless battle of all time was a European skirmish that purportedly took place from Sept. 21 to Sept. 22 in 1788. In this altercation, there was no winner and no loser, as the victor and the defeated were one and the same — the Austrian army.

    It’s a confusing scenario that was equally perplexing to the Austrians, who, at the time, were engaged in the Austro-Turkish War, waged from 1787 to 1791 against the Ottoman Turks, author Eric Durschmeid, a former war correspondent for the BBC, wrote in his book “The Hinge Factor: How Chance and Stupidity Have Changed History” (Arcade Publishing, 2016).

    Austrian soldiers launched a deadly response to what was perceived as a Turkish attack, and the battle was joined near the town of Karánsebes (also spelled Caransebeș) in what is now Romania (then Transylvania). But when the smoke cleared, the Austrian army discovered that they had been battling themselves all along, though accounts vary about the scale of the carnage, according to Durschmeid....

    https://hotair.com/headlines/archives/2018/03/pointless-battle-history/

    ReplyDelete
  15. I didn't realize until just reading it now that Nikki Haley is the daughter of Sikh parents from India.

    Early life
    Haley was born Nimrata Randhawa in Bamberg, South Carolina, on January 20, 1972 to an Indian American Sikh family.[16] She had always been called "Nikki" by her family.[17] Her father Ajit Singh Randhawa, and mother Raj Kaur Randhawa, emigrated from Amritsar District, Punjab, India.[6] Her father was formerly a professor at Punjab Agricultural University, and her mother had received her law degree from the University of Delhi.


    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikki_Haley

    ReplyDelete
  16. Why the poor dear. I'm just weeping my little heart out -

    The sad plight of Hillary Clinton
    by Suzanne Venker
    | March 13, 2018 01:21 PM


    In this photo from June 5, 2017, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton speaks at a fundraiser in Baltimore, Maryland.

    Last weekend, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said white, married women voted for President Trump in 2016 because of an "ongoing pressure to vote the way that your husband, your boss, your son ... believes you should." (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)

    If there were ever a reason for women to reject feminism, this is it. At a conference in India last weekend, Hillary Clinton said the reason 52 percent of white, married women voted for President Trump is because they can't think for themselves. So, instead, they defer to their husbands and — this next part would be funny if it weren't so preposterous — to their sons.

    "We don't do well with married, white women [either]," she said. "Part of that is an identification with the Republican Party and [an] ongoing pressure to vote the way that your husband, your boss, your son ... believes you should."


    I suspect you're having a visceral reaction to this statement. But rather than get your dander up, may I suggest you feel bad for Clinton and women like her instead?

    Most elite feminists have one thing in common: They're lonely. They're very, very lonely. It's hard to go to sleep alone at night and wake up to a failed marriage, and to so much disdain for the country in which one lives. When you've spent your life being resentful of men, marriage, and motherhood, what else can one expect?

    Women like Clinton have spent their entire adult lives hating the society in which they live and wanting to change it. They've spent their entire adult lives trying to convince other women to hate the society in which they live and wanting to change it. How exhausting.

    So, after all that time, after all those decades of trying to get women to think as feminists do, imagine what it was like for Clinton to be rejected by more than half of the women who look like her (white). Even worse, she lost them to a white alpha male who (wisely) rejects the feminist label and who represents everything feminists have fought against for decades?

    It's hard for Clinton. It's painful to accept that most white women do, in fact, think for themselves — which is why they don't buy what feminists are selling. But to accept that is difficult, so it's easier to believe such women subordinate themselves to the men in their lives. After all, that's the message Clinton and her allies have been selling for years. We can't expect them to give up their life's work and surrender their beliefs just because most people don't share them.

    And to top it all off, Clinton has no real marriage to fall back on in her twilight years. So, it's only natural she'd lash out at women who have what she doesn't: women who are happy, married, and who know America isn't a patriarchy designed to hold women back and down.

    So cut Hillary Clinton some slack. Feel sorry for her, not mad at her. And be grateful your life looks nothing like hers.

    Suzanne Venker (@SuzanneVenker) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner's Beltway Confidential blog. She is an author, Fox News contributor, and trustee of Leading Women for Shared Parenting. Her fifth book, The Alpha Female’s Guide to Men & Marriage: HOW LOVE WORKS, was published in February 2017.

    https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/contributors/the-sad-plight-of-hillary-clinton

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. And be grateful your life looks nothing like hers

      Delete
    2. https://madworldnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/composite_15209435916291-678x356.jpg

      Delete
    3. Same sandals too ?

      After she slipped the sandals off she didn't have any further problem.

      She should always go barefoot.

      Delete
  17. Haley, for her part, compared the Skripal attack to North Korea’s use of a nerve agent to assassinate the half-brother of dictator Kim Jong-un — a murder that resulted in the designation of North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism. She linked the Salisbury incident to the increasingly-regular use of chemical weapons, especially in Syria, and urged Russia to “come clean” about the assassination attempt.

    “The Russians complained recently that we criticize them too much,” she said. “If the Russian government stopped using chemical weapons to assassinate its enemies; and if the Russian government stopped helping its Syrian ally to use chemical weapons to kill Syrian children; and if Russia cooperated with the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons by turning over all information related to this nerve agent, we would stop talking about them.

    We take no pleasure in having to constantly criticize Russia, but we need Russia to stop giving us so many reasons to do so.”

    ReplyDelete


  18. Does anyone know whether what matter I have is grey or gray matter?

    And does it matter


    No. It doesn't matter. Not at the amounts involved.

    .


    It is just a matter of fact.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Facts matter.


      Dossier ‘coincidences’ pile up

      The Barack Obama presidential campaign hired Fusion GPS in 2012 to dig up dirt on Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, according to a book released on Tuesday.

      The Obama campaign hid its payments to Fusion GPS through its law firm, Perkins Coie. The arrangement is similar to the one that the Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee used to pay Fusion for its investigation of then-candidate Donald Trump in 2016.

      http://dailycaller.com/2018/03/13/fusion-gps-romney-investigation/


      Obama’s Campaign Paid $972,000 To Law Firm That Secretly Paid Fusion GPS In 2016

      http://thefederalist.com/2017/10/29/obamas-campaign-gave-972000-law-firm-funneled-money-fusion-gps/

      Obama aide started Christopher Steele-FBI alliance

      https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/mar/13/obama-aide-started-christopher-steele-fbi-alliance/

      Delete
  19. It's looking like Andrew McCabe is toast -

    Andrew McCabe, a Symbol of Trump's F.B.I. Ire, Faces Possible Firing ...
    https://www.nytimes.com/.../andrew-mccabe-fbi-firing-recommendation-justice-departm...
    39 mins ago - WASHINGTON — Attorney General Jeff Sessions is reviewing a recommendation to fire the former F.B.I. deputy director, Andrew G. McCabe, just days before he is scheduled to retire on Sunday, people briefed on the matter said. Mr. McCabe was a frequent target of attack from President Trump, who ...


    Word is the I.G. found something big.

    ReplyDelete
  20. RUSSIA has vowed to strike back after Britain moved to banish 23 Russian spooks within a week in the wake of the spy poisoning scandal.

    Responding to Theresa May's announcement that diplomats who are really spies will be booted out, Moscow threatened its "response measures will not be long in coming".

    ...

    What we know so far:

    * Jeremy Corbyn was branded Vladimir Putin's puppet after refusing to accept Russia was behind the nerve agent attack.

    * Theresa May announced she would kick out 23 diplomats in the wake of the Sergei Skripal case.

    * The Russian Embassy has responded by calling the expulsion 'unacceptable, unjustified and shortsighted' - and said 'response measures will not be long in coming'.

    ...

    The PM also announced this afternoon:

    * New laws to help Britain defend itself from all forms of hostile Russian activity

    * Flights and goods from Russia will face extra checks to stop ill-gotten gains entering the UK

    * All planned talks with Russian officials, including a visit from the foreign minister, are cancelled

    ...

    A SENIOR Tory MP today vowed to lobby Theresa May to pull England out of this summer’s World Cup, which is being hosted by Russia.

    Bernard Jenkin said taking part in the tournament would give Vladimir Putin a “propaganda coup” and blasted the “odious and poisonous” Russian leader.

    ...

    And Donald Tusk, president of the European Council, vowed to debate the issue at a meeting of all EU leaders next week.

    He tweeted today: "I express my full solidarity with PM @theresa_may in the face of the brutal attack inspired, most likely, by Moscow."

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Plus, and this hurts, the English Royals are not going to the World Cup games in Moscow this summer.

      That should get the Muscovites out of Ukraine.

      Delete
  21. Facebook said on Wednesday it banned Britain First from its platform for breaking rules against inciting hatred, blacklisting a far-right group brought to global attention when U.S. President Donald Trump retweeted its anti-Islamic posts.

    ...

    "We do not do this lightly, but they have repeatedly posted content designed to incite animosity and hatred against minority groups, which disqualifies the pages from our service," Facebook said in a blog post.

    ReplyDelete
  22. Check out The Great One, Mark Levin, on Hannity tonight.

    He really takes Adam Schiff, the U.S. Representative for California's 28th congressional district, to the cleaners. Schiff leads the Democrats on the House Committee that was investigating the RussiaGate affair.

    Says Schiff is a shill for the Rooskies.

    ReplyDelete
  23. The congressional investigations are completely separate from special counsel Robert Mueller's criminal probe into Trump campaign ties to Russia and possible obstruction of justice, which is likely to take much longer. So far, Mueller has charged nearly 20 people as part of his investigation, including three Trump associates who have pleaded guilty.

    House Democrats signaled they were pinning their hopes on the Senate, and on Mueller.

    Texas Rep. Joaquin Castro, a Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, said they will continue to try to probe the meddling, but "we also hope the Senate investigation will go further, will get out more to the American people, and then of course special counsel Mueller will do his job."

    ReplyDelete
  24. My sources in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, escape playground of the rich and powerful from the swamp of D.C., are telling me The Donald is putting together a War Cabinet.

    John Bolton is going to be the new National Security Adviser, for instance.

    I am sworn to silence on some other changes for now.

    I am hoping this is only for the purpose of concentrating Kim Fatso III's mind and making him see reason.

    But that might not be so.

    ReplyDelete
  25. Gabriel Sherman reports on more likely personnel changes in the Trump administration. Here he confirms some depressing news that was first reported by Curt Mills earlier this year:

    Sources said Trump fired Tillerson partly because Tillerson opposed Trump’s oft-stated desire to scuttle the Iran nuclear deal—Trump even mentioned their disagreement when speaking to the press. And three sources told me that the next official likely to go is National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, who, like Tillerson, had advocated for remaining in the deal.

    ...

    Bolton has repeatedly advocated preventive war against Iran, and he has argued for preventive war against North Korea. His op-ed on North Korea called this pre-emption, but that is an example of how Bolton twists language and concepts to suit his purposes.


    Coming of Bolton

    ReplyDelete
  26. All might not be lost for Quirk & Ash -

    Toys R Us To Close Or Sell All 800 Remaining Stores
    JOHN SEXTONPosted at 9:21 pm on March 14, 2018


    The company filed bankruptcy last year with billions in debt so this doesn’t exactly come as a shock. Still, for those of us who grew up before the internet, this was the place you got to go for your birthday or the place your parents went shopping before Christmas. The chain’s iconic name may not be lost for long though. The Washington Post reports there is an offer being made which could keep up to half the stores going under different ownership:.....

    https://hotair.com/archives/2018/03/14/toys-r-us-close-sell-800-remaining-stores/

    ReplyDelete
  27. From the moment Donald Trump appointed Chief of Staff John Kelly last summer, he vented to friends and advisers that Kelly was too overbearing, preventing him from acting on his instincts and impulses, the things that got him elected president. To truly be himself, Trump turned to Twitter and Fox & Friends.

    ...

    Then there is the question of Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump’s futures. Trump has told people for months that he wants them to go back to New York.

    “Trump wants them out of there. He thinks they’ve been getting hit too hard,” a friend of the president said.

    ReplyDelete
  28. I think it was Quirk who said Trump had surrounded himself with 'yes men'.

    No, he hadn't.

    But it appears he may be doing so now.

    ReplyDelete