[Townhall] Conservative filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza claimed Monday that he was targeted in his 2014 prosecution for political reasons and that former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara acted as a "henchman" for the Obama administration.
D’Souza told "Fox & Friends" that Bharara’s office had been blocking a congressional oversight committee from obtaining his case file but Congress has now received it. The document, he said, shows "a revealing window into Bharara’s way of doing business."
"The first thing that's highlighted inside my case file is I’m a conservative. I am a prominent critic of the Obama administration. Now, this should be completely irrelevant in the decision about whether to prosecute me, it should be beside the point," he said. "But, of course, in Bharara’s case it was the point. So, there is evidence in this case file and -- and there is a lot more that this was a political prosecution conducted by Bharara as the henchman for the Obama administration."
In 2014 D’Souza was sentenced to five years’ probation, eight months in a "community confinement center" and a $30,000 fine after being found guilty of violating federal campaign finance laws.
#1
D'Souza got a raw deal. How many left-wing politicians have violated campaign finance laws with impunity? Obama did tend to punish enemies by weaponizing the government against them. There's a lot of "splaining" to do and things unaccounted for the past 8 years.
[Right Scoop] Ok this is a pretty incredible story from Judge Napolitano on Fox News. He alleges, via three intelligence sources who’ve come forward to Fox News, that Obama actually used the GCHQ ‐ the British Intelligence Agency who he says has 24/7 access to the NSA’s database ‐ to get spy on Trump’s phone calls during the campaign and his transition period to president. Need a small favour, it's those pesky Russians again.
Three intelligence sources have informed Fox News that President Obama went outside the chain of command. He didn’t use the NSA, he didn’t use the CIA, he didn’t use the FBI, and he didn’t use the Department of Justice.
He used GCHQ... They have 24/7 access to the NSA database. So by simply having two people go to them saying ’President Obama needs transcripts of conversations involving candidate Trump, conversations involving President Elect Trump’, he’s able to get it.
And there’s no American fingerprints on this.
Judge Napolitano goes on to explain how a ’wiretap’ works these days, which he says is all done electronically by computer. He explains that the NSA has 24/7 365 access to every mainframe of every telecom provider and computer service provider that does business in the US. And they share that information with other intelligence services like the GCHQ.
Then he adds "What happened to the guy who ordered this? Resigned three days after Donald Trump was inaugurated."
#2
There is one problem with this scenario: GCHQ is run by the US and UK 50/50. Therefore any request to the GCHQ would be considered "going through the chain of command" with all the legal liability that goes with it.
Also, why go through the trouble of getting a FISA Court warrant if you can just get an "informal" tap from the British?
More likely the answer comes from the recent WIKILEAKS dump: The CIA has a hacking/cyber warfare capability that dwarfs that of the NSA. However, they have declassified all of their code. If you can find it, you can use it. Everyone, from the DNC to contractors for the NSC to ex-MI6 can use the same suite of tools to hack Trump Tower.
Al
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
03/15/2017 13:19 Comments ||
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#3
The CIA has a hacking/cyber warfare capability that dwarfs that of the NSA. However, they have declassified all of their code. If you can find it, you can use it. Everyone, from the DNC to contractors for the NSC to ex-MI6 can use the same suite of tools to hack Trump Tower.
A binary extension of their gun running and shi* disturbance operations as it were.
#4
The CIA/NSA and MI5/6 have a long running agreement with each other: You spy on our citizens and we'll spy on your subjects, and then share all info equally.
That way nobody's violating laws against spying on their own people, technically.
Posted by: ed in texas ||
03/15/2017 19:27 Comments ||
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[Daily Caller] Scientists discovered a 400,000-year-old fossil human cranium in Portugal, altering the understanding of how humans evolved.
The cranium is one of the oldest fossils of its type ever discovered and the westernmost human fossil from the mid-Pleistocene epoch ever found in Europe. Other mid-Pleistocene fossils found by scientists are often poorly dated and lack a clear archaeological context.
"This is an interesting new fossil discovery from the Iberian Peninsula, a crucial region for understanding the origin and evolution of the Neandertals," Dr. Rolf Quam, an anthropology professor at Binghamton University, said in a press statement Monday. "The Aroeria cranium increases the anatomical diversity in the human fossil record from this time period, suggesting different populations showed somewhat different combinations of features."
The cranium was near abundant animal remains and stone tools, including numerous hand axes. Its proximity to these these things indicates the humans of the region were more modern and diverse than originally believed as they were hunting and using tools.
h/t Instapundit
[NationalReview] The Organization Man, whom we first met in 1956, is still very much with us. And his eccentric career since that time partly answers a question that mystifies many contemporary conservatives: Given that progressives profess to hate corporations, why are our corporate leaders so progressive? It is easy to understand their taking a self-interested stand against the Trump administration over things such as the H-1B program and visa waivers, which interfere with their access to workers and customers, respectively. But 130 corporate leaders -- including the CEOs of American Airlines and Bank of America -- getting together to come down on North Carolina over public-bathroom rules that annoy transgender activists? Together with business leaders who have no presence in North Carolina and nothing to do with the state or its politics?
Is it only cravenness -- or something more? Long but informative. IMO, People on top, don't really like vertical mobility
#1
I thought it was to have the government protect their ass...ets.
Posted by: Bobby ||
03/15/2017 7:21 Comments ||
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#2
OPM. Other People's Money. It is easy to enjoy the selfish glow of faux virtue when you can donate money that belongs to others. The shareholder don't need their dividends when it is for the children (but your golden parachute has to sparkle!)
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
