What Kind Of Deal Could Comey Make?

Yesterday, commenting on a fine article by Shipwreckedcrew, I pointed out that in January, 2017, the FBI did two things that tied them firmly to the Steele Dossier:

1) At the beginning of the month they inserted a two page summary of the Dossier as Annex A to the Intel Community Assessment (ICA). This placed an Intel Community seal of approval on the Dossier, and drove all subsequent events in the attempted coup against Trump--especially the institution of the Team Mueller witchhunt. Even though Crossfire Hurricane had supposedly been predicated on the Downer - Papadopoulos bar conversation, the ICA in effect--although not in formal reality--superseded that narrative except for occasional tactical purposes when the Dossier came under fire.

2) Toward the end of the month, following Trump's inauguration, the FBI appears to have made the decision to take over operation of Chris Steele's notional "Primary Subsource" (PSS), Igor Danchenko. The FBI had known Danchenko's identity since before the 2016 election, which means they also knew that he was an employee of the premier Dem thinktank The Brookings Institute--then run by long time Clinton crony Strobe Talbott. Further, the vetting interview with the Washington based Danchenko confirmed definitively what the Bureau would have long suspected--that the Dossier was a hoax concocted by the Clinton campaign's "opposition research" arm (spearheaded by Glenn Simpson's Fusion GPS, for which Steele was simply a subcontractor, probably used as a frontman to insulate the US operatives). Danchenko appears to have been unproductive in the role of a FBI source, but this action again tied the FBI closely to the Dossier. They could not disavow the Dossier for purposes of the ongoing FISA operation as long as they were also trying to mine its supposed sources for more "dirt" on Trump.

This all plays into the very recent rumors that Comey has been interviewed by John Durham. I gave it as my view that Comey would never sit for an interview with Durham except as part of a plea agreement. That's simply common sense--there would be no benefit for Comey in submitting to an interview under any other circumstances. If here were called before a GJ he would simply be forced to take the 5th.

Thus, I wrote:

Why May Igor Danchenko--Steele's Primary Subsource--Be Important?

This brief tweet (below) by Stephen McIntyre hints at a web of connections involving Christopher Steele's supposed primary source for his fictional "dossier" and a variety of Deep State actors whose history would lead one to suspect that their views would be antithetical to those of Trump. Primary among those actors is Fiona Hill--a former National Security Council staffer under H. R. McMaster who also testified against President Trump's interests in the fake impeachment hearings. Further, Hill worked for George Soros' Open Society Foundation from 2000 - 2006:

not long ago, I saw a tweet that quoted an article in which Fiona Hill had been approached by Steele earlier in 2016 trying to contact a person who now appears to be PSS [Danchenko]. Can anyone give me link to tweet or article.

That Fiona Hill was acquainted with Christopher Steele and held him in high regard is well known, as is the fact that Hill was in touch with Steele during the 2016 election campaign. Hill is also very familiar with Igor Danchenko--they were colleagues at the Brookings Institute. It would therefore be natural enough for Steele to go through Hill to contact Danchenko.

The connections of these various Deep State actors to Steele and Danchenko as well as to Soros is tantalizing. The question is: What has John Durham been able to make of these connections? It seems likely that Danchenko's identity has been hidden this long because Durham has been tracking down all possible leads surrounding him and interviewing everyone with a connection. It's a sprawling investigation, but it could conceivably lead to direct connections between the original Russia Hoax and the later fake impeachment.

Interesting days await us.

Two Good Russia Hoax Reads, And ...

Here are the two good Russia Hoax reads:

1. The Pitfalls of a Pit Bull Russophobe

This is by Ray McGovern. McGovern was chief of the CIA’s Soviet Foreign Policy Branch during the 1970s. His target here is Fiona Hill:

Like so many other glib “Russia experts” with access to Establishment media, Fiona Hill, who testified Thursday in the impeachment probe, seems three decades out of date.

but also the entire Russia Hoax narrative, especially the Russia-meddled-ICA that Brennan and Clapper put out to validate the coup attempt against Trump:

As for the “Intelligence Community Assessment,” the banner headline atop The New York Times on Jan. 7, 2017 set the tone for the next couple of years: “Putin Led Scheme to Aid Trump, Report Says.” During my career as a CIA analyst, as deputy national intelligence officer chairing National Intelligence Estimates (NIEs), and working on the Intelligence Production Review Board, I had not seen so shabby a piece of faux analysis as the ICA. The writers themselves seemed to be holding their noses.  They saw fit to embed in the ICA itself this derriere-covering note: “High confidence in a judgment does not imply that the assessment is a fact or a certainty; such judgments might be wrong.”  

Not a Problem 

With the help of the Establishment media, Clapper and CIA Director John Brennan,  were able to pretend that the ICA had been approved by “all 17 intelligence agencies” (as first claimed by Clinton, with Rep. Jim Himes, D-CT, repeating that canard Thursday, alas “without objection).”  Himes, too should do his homework.  The bogus “all 17 intelligence agencies” claim lasted only a few months before Clapper decided to fess up. With striking naiveté, Clapper asserted that ICA preparers were “handpicked analysts” from only the FBI, CIA and NSA. The criteria Clapper et al. used are not hard to divine. In government as in industry, when you can handpick the analysts, you can handpick the conclusions. 

Maybe a Problem After All 

“According to several current and former intelligence officers who must remain anonymous because of the sensitivity of the issue,” as the Times says when it prints made-up stuff, there were only two “handpicked analysts.”  Clapper picked Brennan; and Brennan picked Clapper.  That would help explain the grossly subpar quality of the ICA. 

If U.S. Attorney John Durham is allowed to do his job probing the origins of Russiagate, and succeeds in getting access to the “handpicked analysts” — whether there were just two, or more — Hill’s faith in “our intelligence agencies,” may well be dented if not altogether shattered.

2. FBI Lawyer Referred for Criminal Prosecution by Horowitz Was Primary FBI Attorney on Trump-Russia Case

h/t on this one to Mike Sylvester. My feed on Jeff Carlson's blog seems slow to refresh. This showed up in my feed reader eventually, but not before Mike pointed it out.

This blog is all about Kevin Clinesmith. There's not a lot here that we haven't already heard, but it puts a lot of information at your fingertips in a readable way. Recommended. After reading it you'll have no doubts about why Clinesmith's situation--targeted by John Durham in a criminal investigation--could be a game breaker.

3. The Carlson blog on Clinesmith leads me to sundance's latest piece, in which he suggests that the "altered email" that Clinesmith used to bolster a woefully weak Carter Page FISA application was, in fact, an email from Page himself (complaining about death threat occasioned by leaks about him). I don't see how this could be true based on the information that we have at this point. According to the NYT, Clinesmith:

“took an email from an official at another federal agency that contained several factual assertions, then added material to the bottom that looked like another assertion from the email’s author, when it was instead his own understanding.”

If the email Clinesmith altered was, in fact, from "an official at another federal agency" then it wasn't from Carter Page.

OTOH, for separate reasons, I'm inclined to suspect that the renewal application to which this altered email was applied may well have been the final renewal, which was done for Team Mueller.

QUICK ADDENDUM: Ron Paul has a nice piece at Zerohedge. Nothing you don't know, but succinct--all about the "interagency consensus" or Deep State: The Real Bombshell of the Impeachment Hearings.

Uniparty Deep State

Paul Sperry has been tweeting up a storm today. Three pretty self explanatory tweets:

BREAKING: What was former RNC chief and Trump chief of staff Reince Priebus doing meeting Clinton operative Paul Begala for lunch in September? pic.twitter.com/8eF2nSxk7A

— Paul Sperry (@paulsperry_) November 8, 2019

BREAKING: On pp 176-177 of just-released transcript, Fiona Hill asked to name NSC analysts who worked under her heading Ukraine desk & she names Vindman, then Catherine Croft before suddenly forgetting "who was before her." The person she conveniently "can't remember" is Ciaramella pic.twitter.com/YtXnfQssTR

— Paul Sperry (@paulsperry_) November 8, 2019

BREAKING: Newly released transcripts show ex-Trump NSC official and Democrat Fiona Hill acknowledged in impeachment testimony she not only had a prior close working relationship with dossier author Christopher Steele, but had contacts with Steele during the 2016 campaign pic.twitter.com/2JCXQTBVWF

— Paul Sperry (@paulsperry_) November 8, 2019