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Wednesday, August 26, 2020

DiGenova: Brennan A Witness Against Comey?

Joe diGenova gave a very interesting interview this past Monday on WMAL. In the interview--for which I've transcribed most of his remarks--he touches on a number of important points, some of which we haven't heard much about and some of which also contradict the conventional wisdom:

1. Joe argues strongly that Brennan is probably in the clear--unless he lied to Durham. But, he also argues, that almost certainly means Brennan will now, willy nilly, be a witness against Comey.

2. Joe also believes that Bill Priestap--who I previously thought may have cooperated with the investigation--is now in the crosshairs, because it was Priestap who lied to the Senate about the Danchenko interview. The fact that Priestap has refused to testify voluntarily seems to confirm this.

3. Joe further believes that John Carlin, who presented false certifications to the FISC, is also a target. I have to wonder whether that is just the tip of the DoJ iceberg in this Durham investigation.

4. Finally, Joe offers his view on the Chris Wray situation, arguing that Trump can't afford to fire Wray--much as he undoubtedly wants to. I think his position on this is pretty sound. It's one thing for the Dems to invent one hoax issue after another, all of which are pretty transparently bogus  to the bulk of the public. It's another thing for Trump to initiate a brouhaha when he's trying to focus on his positive achievements. That's been my position in the past--that Wray is safe through the election--and it still seems the best bet. After the election, all bets are off.

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Joe diGenova: Mr. Comey remains delusional to this day. I don't know whether he's a target or not. I can't conceive of the fact that he isn't, given the Kevin Clinesmith guilty plea last week. But there's no doubt that Comey is at the center of the investigation. The fact that he has not been interviewed and the fact that the FBI, it is obvious, is now the central focus of the Durham investigation. The fact that Brennan's representatives said that he was interviewed for 8 hours at the CIA by Durham and was told that he was not a subject or a target, I have to believe that. I can't imagine that his spokesman would make a false statement about the nature of the relationship with Durham which Durham could quickly correct. 

So, I'm assuming that Brennan is free. As a result of that he has become a witness against James Comey--not willingly, but I think he's been forced to become a witness. And I think it's pretty clear right now that, what they're doing is, they're following up on Bill Barr's prescription, which is: Not every abuse of power is a crime. And that is what Brennan got the benefit of. Assuming that what we were told is true, and I'm assuming that it is, that he's not a target, his interview at Langley was his "get out of jail free card" as long as he told the truth.

Now, if he lied to Durham he can be indicted for that--just ask Michael Flynn.

...

There's no doubt that James Comey views the entire world through a prism that neither you, nor I, nor any law abiding citizen can understand. He's a very strange man, he's a man bereft of a soul. He thinks he's the most soulful individual in the Western hemisphere. He's, in fact, a creepy guy--a very deranged dirty cop who destroyed the FBI on July 5th, 2016, when he exonerated Hillary Clinton illegally. But he's clearly the focus of the investigation. With Priestap in the center of the hairs along with him, who was the former head of counterintelligence, who clearly lied to the Senate intelligence committee about Christopher Steele's sources.

So, I think it's pretty clear now that Durham is focused on the FBI and the senior levels of the Department of Justice. Remember, we haven't heard anything about the senior DoJ people--that's Yates, the head of the National Security Division, John Carlin, who filed several false certifications with the FISA court. Watch that one! That's kinda coming out of nowhere. John Carlin was the Assistant Attorney General for the National Security Division under Loretta Lynch and Sally Yates. He filed regular certifications with the FISA court that everything that the FBI and the DoJ lawyers were telling the court were truthful. We now know--and the FISA court told us in a written opinion--that John Carlin's certifications were false. So, he may be sitting in the wings, waiting to be the next tree that falls in the forest.

...

The problem for the president is that he's boxed in. He can't fire another FBI Director right now. That might very well lose him the election. That would be the new issue, that would be worse than the coronavirus which is so stupidly being sold by the Democrats. But nonetheless it's being bought by a lot of people and so you have to be very careful what you do right now. The president is on an upswing. He's starting to look good. He doesn't need something like this to set him off.

16 comments:

  1. That’s what we come here for: astute & methodical insight.

    Thank you Sir! ;<)

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  2. I agree Trump is probably not going to fire Wray until after the election. There is no positive ROI on the political cost yet, and would be an unnecessary distraction from Trumps re-election campaign. Look at when Sessions was let go.

    Trump is showing a lot of ruthless focus and discipline right now, even with all the easy targets the Democrats are giving, such as Hillary's election comments.

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  3. I think Brennan would bear witness against his own mother if he thought it would save his bacon.

    As for the thrashing around by the restless - divide up the country, fire Wray, and on and on - is, IMHO, mindless. I second Boarwild in subscribing to Mark’s calm sanity. The Brits have two sayings: “early days” (we don’t know enough now, it will be revealed) and “in due course” (which means about what it sounds like - calling for patience as one waits for something to happen in logical order).

    Some believe patience is a sign of weakness. I don’t agree. Timing is often everything and some things must be allowed to happen in due course.

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    1. "Some believe patience is a sign of weakness."
      Much hinges on the range of available alternatives.
      How much fighting Wray would it take, to get him to deClass more sooner, at what price?
      Very few know enough key details to make that call, other than DJT himself.

      My guess is, that the evolution of the Flynn case (in the DC Circus, by 31 Aug.?) will clarify much of the state of play.
      I'm guessing that the DS is calling-in mega-chips, to get the Circus to force this case to SCoTUS, where it could languish thru 3 Nov.

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    2. You're right, of course, about Brits and “in due course”, but what if the course gets altered, as happened when the Left got to ambush everyone, by rolling out this virus BS?
      They killed numerous stones with that one ploy, incl. bulldozing Barr to delay GJs.
      It may've been the most successful psyop in history.

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  4. Thanks for transcribing diGenova's statement.

    It is becoming clear that essentially only the FBI was involved in this history.

    Counter-intelligence work has an occupational hazard, which is paranoia. I think that the FBI's CI Director Bill Priestap suffered from that occupational hazard. He really believed that he was uncovering a plot in which Russian Intelligence was using Donald Trump to meddle in US elections, infiltrate the US Government, fluoridate our water supply, and so forth.

    Priestap convinced Andrew McCabe, James Comey and a few other top FBI officials that such a plot was being discovered.

    The CIA had nothing to do with it and did not even know about it. The CIA did think that the Kremlin was meddling in our elections, but not that Trump was involved.

    James Clapper too was not involved.

    James Comey and Andrew McCabe had to be fired in order to stop the nonsense, because those two were true believers in the Kremlin-Trump plot. After those two were fired, Christopher Wray could have investigated and explained what happened.

    Essentially everything that happened was inside the FBI -- in particular, inside the Counterintelligence Division. Wray could have figured it out and issued a public report by mid-2017.

    The appointment of Robert Mueller as Special Counsel gave Wray a good excuse to do nothing himself.

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    1. Mike, while the FBI (and DoJ under Obama) is obviously the main focus of the Durham investigation, the notion that Priestap was the driving force is unwarranted by all that we know. If he were, I believe this whole thing would be over already and the Dems in Congress and the media would have been more than happy to offer up Priestap.

      "CIA had nothing to do with it." That is also a totally unwarranted conclusion. Nobody has claimed that "the CIA" was complicit, but Brennan clearly was. The difference is that Brennan may skate in terms of prosecution--probably because CIA has no criminal investigative or CI authority, so couldn't really engage in criminal misconduct. However, their ICA was a joke and probably an abuse.

      State was also involved, please read Felten today. Also diGenova's remarks re DoJ.

      The key re the FBI is that the FBI has the domestic investigative powers, both criminal and CI. That's why Comey can't defend himself by saying "Brennan wanted me to do it." The buck for these criminal abuses stops with Comey because he had the authority.

      As for Brennan, however, it's well documented that he was running around DC spreading the dossier to Dems and NeverTrump GOP. But he had no ability to open and investigation. Therefore what he was doing was reckless gossip as long as it stayed at that level, or abusive political involvement--but still probably not a crime.

      Back to Priestap. Priestap was not the final decision maker. That was Comey/McCabe. Note that diG is only saying Priestap is in trouble because of the Danchenko interview and his Senate testimony--not because of the FISA per se, which Trisha Anderson has testified was pre-approved by McCabe, Baker, and Yates. Not Priestap.

      It's not as simple as you make it out.

      Delete
  5. The fact that Brennan is not being charged indicates to me that the CIA had nothing to do with the Papadopoulos-Downer meeting or with the Papadopoulos-Mifsud meeting.

    I think that John Durham has found that both meetings were organized by FBI Counterintelligence in order to advance Bill Preistap's paranoid idea that Russian Intelligence was using Donald Trump as a witting agent.

    Priestap had his own CI resources in Europe. He could accomplish some acts there without involving the CIA.

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    1. You're wrong on this. Priestap did not have the authority on his own to operate outside CONUS. For example, that's why Gaeta's travel from Rome to London had to be approved by Nuland at State. That's also why the 'OCOUNUS lures' had to be approved by DoJ. FBI cannot act unilaterally OCONUS. You're jumping way ahead of the fact. Whatever we may later learn about Priestap, we need to stay within the facts as we have them.

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  6. 1) Mifsud has formerly served on an advisory board for the UK PM's equivalent of our President's national security advisor, as well as the foreign office. Most likely candidate for an intel agency tasking him would be MI6 not MI5, thus any US agency asking to "borrow" him would be CIA not FBI.
    2) Just finished reading Permanent Coup, Lee Smith's latest. Eric Ciaramella, the impeachment "whistleblower" was soliciting Ukrainian prosecutors visiting the White House for dirt on Paul Manafort in January 2016, weeks before the Iowa Caucus, and before Manafort had joined any of the Republican campaigns, indeed while he was still in rehab for alcohol abuse.

    IOW, the CIA (Ciaramella has apparently despite his young age worked directly with Brennan) was involved with the manufacture of the dossiers, and the dossiers had nothing to do with Donald Trump. They were going to be used against whoever the eventual GOP nominee was.

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    1. Good points. This is what I've been saying, that some of these assets were likely "loaned" to the FBI by the CIA. That's CIA involvement, but it likely wouldn't be prosecutable--FBI would be responsible for their own actions.

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  7. Oh, I got that. Just cause my buddies goaded me into getting in a fight with some dude at a bar doesn't make them liable for the assault and battery charges--that's on me. Does make them very very attractive witnesses for the DA to determine who threw the first punch though...

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  8. Wondering if this bears on the question of Brennan's role:

    >> https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EgdJf4oWoAEBMLl?format=jpg&name=large <<

    from Carter Page's book.

    If Trump Russia Hoax was purely a FBI investigation, how is it that people associated with the Intel Community were aware, in the late summer 2016, of CP being framed as part of it, and that it was being run by a law firm paying a London based outfit, on behalf of Hillary's campaign?

    IOW, this suggests IC knowledge, and possible involvement with, the Russia Hoax, well before the FISA warrant is granted in October. How could US IC know about the frame up of CP, unless elements of the IC were involved in the framing?

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    1. This is the important distinction I've been trying to make. Involvement is one thing--it was probably necessary, given the international nature of the Russia Hoax. But an actual "investigation" was also necessary, and that only the FBI could undertake.

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    2. The salient point, assuming CP's account is accurate, is that people in the US IC knew he was being "set up" and fed to the FBI by Steele, hired by Perkins Coie, on behalf of Hillary's campaign, as part of the Russia Collusion Hoax.

      IOW, the US IC knew the Russia Collusion was a HOAX before CP took his leave of absence in Sept. 2016.

      How did they know that, unless some part of US IC was actively involved in the framing of CP? It's not like the FBI is going to tell CIA: "don't mind us, but we're framing Trump Campaign guy for a Hoax allegation of campaign collusion."

      If they knew that by some intel coincidence, then they surely would have notified the FBI they were being lead around by their noses. But they didn't.

      Ergo, some part of the US IC had to be actively involved in the conspiracy to know about it and yet NOT warn the FBI they were being played by Steele.

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  9. "Involvement is one thing--it was probably necessary".
    I should hope that such conduct would be prosecutable, for Conspiracy to Deprive Rights.

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