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Friday, January 29, 2021

MULTIPLE UPDATES: The Deep State Is Laughing At America

Kevin Clinesmith got 12 months probation and 400 hours of "community service"--I think that means he has to work for Dem political campaigns for 400 hours. Or maybe donate the time to the Southern Poverty Law Center. If you want a laugh--at your own expense and that of our country--read about it here.

The Dem who performed the ritual wrist-slap on Clinesmith--some guy called James Boasberg--teared up during the circus proceedings:


James Boasberg on Friday during Clinesmith's sentencing hearing said Clinesmith had suffered by losing his job and standing in the eye of a media hurricane. 

Boasberg gave him 12 months probation, 400 hours of community service, and no fine. 

Government prosecutors had been asking for Clinesmith to spend several months in jail. 


No word yet on whether Bluto Barr or Bullsh*t Durham think Boasberg "betrayed his office." Nor any word on whether Boasberg shed a tear for another guy who suffered real financial hardship and found himself in the eye of a true media hurricane--the like of which Clinesmith certainly never experienced but to which Clinesmith contributed by his felonious conduct--Carter Page.

Really--it's almost as if Boasberg wants us to believe that Clinesmith found himself out of his cushy federal job and in the eye of a "media hurricane" by some sort of weird accident or coincidence. He pled guilty to a felony, for goodness sake! And not just any felony, but a felony that strikes at the very heart of our rule of law, our electoral system, our constitutional right to be free of unwarranted surveillance. He did this, committed this felony, in an underhanded, dishonest way--forgery--as an officer of the court. 

Here's an alternative take on this travesty, reported by Paul Sperry--DC Fails To Disbar Anti-Trump FBI Lawyer Despite Guilty Plea:


As the U.S. government seeks prison time for a former FBI lawyer who admitted falsifying evidence to spy on a former Trump aide, the District of Columbia Bar association hasn’t begun an investigation to strip him of his law license, records show.

The defendant, Kevin Eugene Clinesmith, is still listed as an “active” attorney in “good standing” with the Democrat-controlled D.C. Bar, despite his having pleaded guilty more than five months ago to illegally altering a document used for authorization to electronically eavesdrop on former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page as part of the FBI’s Russiagate probe.

A search of the D.C. Bar’s Office of Disciplinary Counsel database of "disciplinary proceedings" turns up no such proceedings against Clinesmith, even though his guilty plea was reported to the bar and the bar's board has received at least one formal complaint demanding his disbarment.

“The only appropriate sanction for committing a serious felony that also interfered with the proper administration of justice and constituted misrepresentation, fraud and moral turpitude is disbarment,” the National Legal and Policy Center said in a complaint it filed with the bar on Sept. 10. “Anything less would minimize the seriousness of the misconduct.”

The 38-year-old Clinesmith, a registered Democrat who sent anti-Trump rants to FBI colleagues after the Republican was elected in 2016, awaits sentencing on Friday.


I'm just shaking my head. But Bluto Barr should be hanging his.

UPDATE 1: Perfect:



UPDATE 2: From the belly of the beastly Estabishment:


FISA vs. Liberty

A surveillance judge clarifies that the FBI can falsify evidence without much fear of punishment.

The government employees of the “resistance” who never accepted Donald Trump as our president have finally performed a useful public service. Together with the judges of the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, they have demonstrated for all Americans how easy it is to turn the spying tools of the federal government against domestic political opponents.

Even after the Obama-appointed inspector general of the Department of Justice found “at least 17 significant errors or omissions” in a series of approved surveillance warrant applications to spy on Trump associate Carter Page—and even after a criminal conviction of an FBI attorney for doctoring an email to make it appear that the patriotic Mr. Page had never assisted U.S. intelligence—the FISA judges are still refusing to apply any significant punishment to the government officials who misled them.


UPDATE 3: I goofed up somehow (!). I thought that I had quoted Shipwreckedcrew's brief--so far--comment. I guess I was distracted juggling several things. Here's what he says that I found pertinent--Clinesmith never accepted responsibility for his criminal act, and Boasberg only gave him the wet noodle treatment anyway:


Prosecutors from Special Counsel John Durham’s office asked for a sentence of incarceration due to Clinesmith’s position of authority and responsibility as an FBI attorney who was obligated to provide accurate information, and the act of altering the email was inconsistent with that responsibility.  They argued further that by clinging to the excuse that he thought his alterations were consistent with the facts as he understood them, Clinesmith was not “accepting responsibility” for his criminal conduct as required by law to receive any leniency in his sentencing.


 There is simply no question but that Clinesmith committed a criminal act. And yet he continued with a totally BS claim that he "didn't mean to mislead". Nonsense. No sentient person accepts that.

UPDATE 4: From a WSJ editorial--what's not behind the paywall. Everyone is focused on the CIA email--understandably--but as I've been saying for lo these many months, it's just as big or bigger a deal that the FBI failed to disclose to the court that Page was a highly reliable FBI source until Spring 2016. Still, they're right--why should we take the FISC seriously? Or the FBI? Or DoJ? Or the Federal judiciary?


How can the American people take the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court seriously when it doesn’t do so itself? That’s our view of Friday’s sentencing of former FBI lawyer Kevin Clinesmith, who admitted to falsifying evidence submitted to the court for a warrant to spy on onetime Trump foreign-policy adviser Carter Page.

Federal Judge James Boasberg spared Mr. Clinesmith prison in favor of 12 months probation and 400 hours of community service. The judge said the evidence persuaded him that “Mr. Clinesmith likely believed that what he said about Mr. Page was true.”

In their brief, prosecutors made clear how unlikely this is. The evidence of Mr. Clinesmith’s animus toward Donald Trump is considerable. As for being an honest mistake, remember that Mr. Clinesmith changed an email confirming Mr. Page had been a CIA source to one that said the exact opposite, explicitly adding the words “not a source” before he forwarded it.

In their brief arguing for prison time, prosecutors contended that Mr. Clinesmith’s behavior “struck at the very core” of the candor the FISA court “fundamentally relies on” and “allowed the FBI to conduct surveillance on a U.S. citizen based on a FISA application that the Department of Justice later acknowledged lacked probable cause.” Prison time for Mr. Clinesmith, they said, was also necessary to “deter others from committing similar crimes.”

Friday’s sentencing will fuel cynicism about two-tiered justice. While George Papadopoulos served time in prison for making false statements to the FBI, and a federal judge refused to drop charges against former national security adviser Michael Flynn after the Justice Department said they had no basis, a top law enforcement official who abused his police powers while operating in secrecy escapes with probation.


48 comments:

  1. The federal judiciary can be lumped in with the FBI, DOJ, and CIA as anti-American institutions. Is it any wonder the political class is erecting walls and barricades for their self-protection when we witness these slaps on the wrists time after time while those entrapped by federal thugs pay the heavy price of legal fees and lost reputations? How much longer before the retribution against these criminals on the government payroll and those in the media begins?

    DJL

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  2. Meanwhile, Georgia Bar has informed Lin Wood he has to undergo a mental health exam in order to keep his law license - presumably because of comments Wood made re: Chief Justice Roberts. Go figure.

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  3. The corrupt prosecutors in the Ted Steven's case weren't even fired, or disbarred.

    The one prosecutor who committed suicide apparently didn't know he had nothing to worry about.

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  4. On another news a Florida man sentenced to 10 years jail time, for sharing memes in Twitter during 2016 elections.

    https://liberalsarenuts.com/2021/01/28/florida-man-arrested-over-2016-election-memes-designed-to-trick-hillary-voters/

    Two tiered justice.

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    1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_E6X-0y0teQ&feature=emb_logo

      Tucker Carlson eviscerated the story last night. He hasn't been convicted yet, only indicted, but it's plain he will go away for a long time. When I read of the possible ten year sentence my mind went to Solzhenitsyn's discussion of the automatic "tenner" for counter-revolutionaries in Stalin's Gulag. After Stalin, as the leadership became more enlightened, the automatic sentences increased over the years in increments of five until by 1970 it had become an 25er.
      Tom S.

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    2. @Tom S.; Unfortunately it's only a matter of time until Tucker is silenced. You watch and wait.

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  5. Ridiculous. An Obama judge strikes again.

    Oddly, Carter Page was at the sentencing & asked the judge to go easy on Clinesmith. The only way that makes sense is if Clinesmith cooperated with DOJ (which he was required to do as part of his plea deal) to finger higher ups in the food chain. Comey, McCabe, et al. are you listening?

    Thanks for the link to the RCI article. Shortly after Clinesmith pleaded guilty, I submitted an ethical complaint to the Michigan Attorney Grievance Commission. A month or 2 later I received a letter back saying they were aware of his plea. Nothing was said about his suspension or that they would investigate. I was not aware of his suspension until I read the RCI article.

    I presume the DC & MI bars will let him walk & that he'll end up in the Biden administration.

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  6. I read the news on Ace of Spades, shut down my browser session, and went out and did some yard work. After the last few days of storms in NorCal, it's a beautiful sunny day. I raked leaves and spruced up the yard for real estate showings later today.

    You see, my wife and I (two CA natives) have finally reached our breaking point and have put our home of 34 years on the market. Time to go somewhere where concealed carry is legal, decarceration, zero bail, and the property crime wave haven't spread from urban areas to the suburbs. Our little burg decided to convert a hotel into a homeless shelter, and now shopping carts full of junk, men screaming at the top of their lungs in parking lots, and panhandlers waiting outside of the grocery store and at many traffic lights are on the increase. We've had two home invasions near us in the past two years and our next door neighbor has been broken into twice. The city’s police have a reputation for toughness, but the criminals aren’t cowed anymore.

    My kids are dug in and have to stay for the time being. It is sad and infuriating what leftist policies have done to my home state—and increasingly—the country. It’s hard to believe that they will continue to get away with abusing half the population without paying a price. Given what we’ve done to Him in the past sixty years, maybe God really shouldn’t have a soft spot for the United States of America after all.

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    1. Where are you looking to move? (Asking for a friend)

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    2. Good for you, PD. If it's Texas stay away from Austin, Houston, Dallas, San Antonio and El Paso(home of beeto o'fulloshit. If you're looking for an urban center, best bet is Ft. Worth. Rural, take your pick.

      0311

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    3. We're off to AZ, where 1) you can get twice as much house in a gated community for half of CA Bay Area suburb prices 2) you can get a concealed carry permit and 3) political activism could still flip the state back red. If I were a younger man, I would have considered TX, but we wanted to shorter plane flights for visits to the youngsters.

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  7. Replies
    1. Well, two systems. One makes a stab at justice every now and then. The other, the dominant one, no longer even pretends.

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  8. As expected... The insututions protect their own. Watch him he able to have it expunged completely at the end of his probation. He will be back on the Bar in 14 months.

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  9. SWC has a different take on this.

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    1. "Different" i.e. wrong and misguided. Each extension of a FISA warrant is, in effect, a NEW warrant in that it allows for the search and seizure of new data. To claim that "the FISA warrant had been in place for 9 months" therefore is simply wrong. Moreover, Clinesmith's brazen forgery built on the concealment of the facts that were contained in the altered CIA email and had been made known to the FBI by the CIA before the original warrant was issued. Those facts should have been made known back at the beginning, and they were well known to Clinesmith and others. That's been made totally clear by the newly declassed docs.

      SWC needs to get out of his DoJ right or wrong pose. It only damages his cred.

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    2. SWC’s credibility was shredded weeks back. He’s the initial lawyer for the defendants in “My Cousin Vinny”

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    3. Mr Wauck
      Could you drop my comment on SWC. I stopped reading his writings several weeks back as to me he would be out front pushing an issue but then changed course at the end. He has an audience, I’m no longer in it

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    4. It seems that somebody got to SWC: "No more inside baseball gossip unless you toe the line, bud." I haven't read him in months nor have I included anything he has written to my email listserve since before the election. The DoJ is a hopelessly corrupt den of snakes. He seems fine with that.

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    5. I'm of the opinion that SWC is a willful agent of misinformation - he came out of absolutely nowhere, to quickly become a fairly authoritative voice in our little corner of the internet. He came out very forcefully against Sundance, when SD was trying to leverage what little influence he has to force Barr to do something pre-election. I called him out on it on Twitter once - he took the bait and called me a conspiracy theorist, which only compounds my suspicion.

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  10. Nonetheless, TRUST THE FBI!!!

    Suckers.

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  11. By discrediting the institutions so much, what will happen?

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    1. What always happens when a government rules through violence and fear, rather than legitimacy. It becomes a society adhering to the rule of law, the law of the jungle that is.
      Tom S.

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  12. OT

    ...but on the subject of our institutions...

    https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2021/01/29/understanding-the-institutional-protection-racket-via-congress-main-justice-doj-fbi-and-fisa-court/#more-207521

    Sundance does a good job (in his inimitable fashion) today reminding us of the utter corruption of the DoJ and, in particular, the Mueller/Weissmann investigation.

    As late as July 2018 the DoJ swore that Carter Page was unequivocally a Russian agent. Sundance shows exactly why DoJ knew this a lie. A lie sworn under penalty of perjury that Mueller and Weissmann were undoubtedly complicit in.

    Clinesmith was a bit player in this enormous fraud. Mueller and Weissmann, too, are laughing at us.

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    1. It's pretty obvious why Clinesmith got this sweetheart deal--so he couldn't be pressured into ratting out the likes of Mueller and Weissmann. As if Durham and Bluto Barr couldn't see this one coming when they delayed? This is why I'm just flabbergasted at SWC's bullshit article. Notice that he doesn't once place the whole thing in its real context or suggest that Boasberg should have done so. Unbelievable.

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    2. https://redstate.com/shipwreckedcrew/2021/01/29/about-the-clinesmith-sentencing-color-me-not-shocked-n318903

      What struck me was the whole "nothing to see here, business as usual" attitude. If this is business as usual then it is corrupt beyond redemption.

      As to wunderwaffen that Durham is going to bring in the "big cheeze" because, "Clinesmith obviously cooperated to get this sentence," I would say when pigs fly, but PETA has apparently outlawed the notion that pigs can't trans into birds, or some such.
      Tom S.

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  13. "As if Durham and Bluto Barr couldn't see this one coming when they delayed? This is why I'm just flabbergasted at SWC's bullshit article."

    Yup. So many questions...

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    1. SWC lost credibility over the summer and fall when he went (by my count) 0 for 9 on predictions Bluto and Durham would do. In addition, he recently commented on Twitter that he's losing followers and he often comments about "Lack of comments" to Twitter posts he shares. Like it's a new "Ah Hah" for him... Emotional Intelligence may be lacking.

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  14. Judge Boasberg replaced Judge Collyer as the presiding judge of the FISA Court. Interesting that the presiding judge of the FISC seems to be not so subtly signaling that it’s okay to lie under oath to the FISC.

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    1. Collyer's reactions to the whole FISA court thing was big on being a "blow hard" but little on "stick handling". She reacted bellicosely due to embarrassment IMO.

      Boasberg, well he showed his true colors before ever taking on his new FISC role. We can all thank SC CJ Roberts for all of this.

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    2. Interesting that the signal that FISA rules are more like guidelines goes out just in time for 75 million Americans to become surveillance eligible as "domestic terrorists".
      Tom S.

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    3. And therefore subject to--in the view of Nicolle Wallace and ex-FBI Clint Watts--drone strikes.

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    4. The perfect weapon just happens to have already been field tested.

      https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/munitions/agm-114r9x.htm

      Zero collateral damage. One account has an insurgent leader turned to goo in the back seat of a moving car while the other three passengers were not even scratched.
      Tom S.

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  15. "Interesting that the presiding judge of the FISC seems to be not so subtly signaling that it’s okay to lie under oath to the FISC."

    Yes. Let that one sink in. And then consider...

    For several years now Mark and many others, me loudly among them, have tried here to understand how and why this happened (and is happening) in America.

    Its not just that the presiding judge of the FISC has signaled that it’s okay to lie under oath to the FISC. Over four years ago, the Conspirators let Mrs Clinton off the hook for criminal recklessness. And then they cooperated in deceiving a nation with the Russia Hoax. And then they launched hoax after hoax and coup after coup attempt against Trump.

    What led them to cynically and mendaciously entrap Flynn and take him out, what led them to try repeatedly to impeach Trump based on lies, what led them to condone criminal violence throughout the Summer of 2020 and then rig a Presidential election?

    Who were they and why did they do it? Why did they sink to this level of treachery? What horrible crimes had they committed which they were covering up? What else could be the explanation?

    The Clintons? Bush? Obama? Biden?

    Who? Why?

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    1. After so many years of study and practice it turns out that the key to the law as it has devolved is really pretty simple: the ends justify the means.

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    2. @Mark

      "...the ends justify the means."

      If true, we're f**ked. Good and f**ked. The fundamental underpinning of our system of government and commerce is the rule of law.

      Equal rights. The enforceability of contracts. The Bill of Rights. Impartial courts. Limited government. Fair elections. All buttressed by the rule of law.

      Without the rule of law, we're f**ked.

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    3. "the ends justify the means" is ultimately a philosophical position, no matter how little interest the practitioners may have in philosophy as such. When it informs the public life of a society it has become a sort of civic theology--the Roman term for such matters.

      Rule of law is also ultimately a philosophical position that is based on reasoned belief in a God created order that is objectively knowable. Recovery of a reasoned belief in that order is an uphill climb that, in the past, has been a matter of centuries. It's what the left has labored to destroy and to ban from our schools and public life--with great success.

      Recovery can only come through organized religious life and philosophically based organized education.

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    4. @Cassender; Follow the money. The Clinton Foundation was taking in huge sums and my guess is "distributing" huge sums to all the stakeholders involved. Where's the audit? Oh, forgot we need to ask Sally Yates and Loretta Lynch nicely.

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    5. https://amgreatness.com/2021/01/29/civic-virtues-as-moral-facts/

      This is a good overview.
      Tom S.

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    6. I read that this morning and was thinking of doing something short, recommending it. My only real caveat is his take on Kant, who under the facade of stodgy professor was a real loon.

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    7. Agree with you on Kant, but Mahoney takes only a specific slice of him and gives a passing acknowledgement of the dirt road he sent his broader adherents down. I wouldn't characterize Kant as, "the great moral philosopher of modernity." He had parts of some good ideas, and some complete bad ones.
      Tom S.

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    8. I wish that he had elaborated on/ stressed more, on his reference to "moral facts and truths *inherent* in our nature".
      So much of today's clashes owe, to the denial that anything is inherent to our nature, despite, say, the extent to which Dunbar's Number (or some such) is accepted in the social sciences.
      For decades, (honest) Lefties have been struggling, to reconcile the implications of this Number, with their hopes for "Imagine No Countries", etc.

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    9. Actually I agree with that part, that Kant is "the great moral philosopher of modernity." His denial of any ability to know and understand what we call human nature--or even any reality outside our mind--provided the philosophical basis for justifying libertarian ideas--that men are atomistic individuals and society is a contractual arrangement rather than an organic and natural expression of human nature. The consequence--contrary to Kant--is total moral relativism. Which is what we see all around us.

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  16. IMO; all roads lead to SC CJ Roberts. He could be playing a much stronger hand but his Trump bias is very evident. I can only assume that if a 2024 Republican candidate gets involved that he "takes a liking too" will we ever see any presence from him and his stewardship of the SC and the FISC courts.

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  17. Wasn't Clinesmith named as a defendant in Page's lawsuit against the federal government and government (FBI/DOJ) officials that trampled on his constitutionally protected rights? If Page is successful, Clinesmith may be working for Page the rest of his working life.

    DJL

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  18. "The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, selfappointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny." - Madison

    None of this is new or unknown, it's as old as time... But it's also why Madison ranted and raved do much about the 2nd amendment, armed society and a government only adhering to the rule of law out of a fear of a armed population.

    That fear is gone and no matter the subject matter, without it you will always have these issues. That's the 800 lb gorilla in the room no one wants to talk about.

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    1. Not entirely gone. Some lingering doubts perhaps?

      https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2021/01/30/fncs-carlson-this-is-the-most-sweeping-and-audacious-assault-on-civil-liberties-in-american-history/

      Tom S.

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