Russiagate: Impeachment a Slow Train Coming

Before we get into the more recent contributions from Ukraine, some unfinished business in the Old Russigate. Larry Johnson at Sic Semper Tyrannis writes of Understanding What Sidney Powell is Doing to Kill the Case Against Michael Flynn by Larry C Johnson

The real problem for the Government's fraudulent case against Flynn are the 302s. There should only be one 302. Not at least four versions. The FBI protocol is to enter the 302 into the FBI Sentinel system within five days of the interview. In other words, the original 302 should have been put on the record on the 29th of January. But that original 302 is MISSING. The prosecutors claim they cannot find it.

But the prosecutors finally did provide the defense, after repeated requests, multiple copies of 302s. They dated as follows--10 February 2017, 11 February 2017. 14 February 2017 and 15 February 2017. WTF??? This alone is prima facie evidence that something crooked was afoot.

The final 302--dated 15 February 2017--painted General Flynn in the worst possible light. The "facts" of this 302 are not supported by the notes taken by Agents Strzok and Pientka. The conclusion is simple--the FBI fabricated a case against General Flynn. We now wait to see if Judge Sullivan will acknowledge this crooked conduct and exonerate the good General. Justice demands it.

These are not my facts. They are the facts based on documents submitted on the record to Judge Sullivan. I find it shocking that no journalist has had the energy or interest to cover this. Just one more reminder of the putrid state of journalism and investigative reporting.

From Red State, Dennis Prager Scores Interview With Gen. Flynn’s Alleged ‘Honeytrap’ And Her Story Is One All Americans Need To Hear. Truly a chilling interview. It's long but worth every minute. If our intelligence services actually carried this out as alleged, head must roll.



Thomas Lifson at AmThink, Is Lisa Page singing to Durham’s prosecutors? I hope so. Either that or she should go to jail for her role in massaging the Flynn 302s alone. And from Monica Showalter at AmThink explains how Impeachment witness Fiona Hill blows Steele dossier out of the water

Fiona Hill, President Trump's left-leaning former Russia adviser at the National Security Council, has pretty well blown the Steele dossier out of the water. According to the Daily Caller:

A former White House official who [sic] Democrats consider a key witness in their impeachment inquiry told lawmakers in October that she believed Russians likely planted disinformation about President Donald Trump with dossier author Christopher Steele.
Fiona Hill, who served as the White House's top adviser on Russia affairs until July, told lawmakers she was "shocked" to find out that Steele, a former MI6 officer, was the author of the dossier. That's in large part because when she had met with Steele in the years leading up to his dossier work, he was "constantly try to drum up business."
Hill, who was deposed in the impeachment inquiry on Oct. 14, said Steele's eagerness to obtain work made him vulnerable to Russian disinformation.

It was always garbage, and a good Russia expert such as herself could see it immediately.

The word on the street is that Adam Schiff has decided it's much too dangerous to his narrative to allow the original whistleblower, presumably  Eric Ciaramella, to testify. WaEx , Schiff signals he will reject GOP 'sham' witness requests,  The Guardian, Trump impeachment: whistleblower will not testify in public, Democrats say, and from sundance at CTH, Adam Schiff Announces CIA “Whistleblower” Will Not Be Called to Testify During Impeachment Effort Initiated by “Whistleblower”…. At Politico, Democrats find a Republican to love for a day as Texas Republican reiterates call to protect Ukraine whistleblower’s identity
"Will Hurd says it is important to safeguard the identity of those who would expose corruption", while streiff at Red State describes how Mollie Hemingway Turns Fox Studio Into HAZMAT Area As She Names The Whistleblower. Good for her! At Town Hall, Graham: 'I Think We Will Learn the Whistleblower Is from the Deep State' "So, if they don't call the whistleblower, this thing is dead on arrival in the Senate," Graham said."

From sundance again, Eric Swalwell: “These witnesses, for the most part, they’ve not been coordinating or talking to each other”…, which I interpret to mean they're co-ordinating just the right amount for his narrative. Also, Sunday Talks: NSA Robert O’Brien -vs- Margaret Brennan – Alexander Vindman Being Cycled Out of National Security Council…. Trump is also getting rid of a bloated NSC bureaucracy, which has clearly gone rogue and believe that it and not the President determines foreign policy.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Lieutenant Colonel Vindman, who has testified under oath, is serving on the National Security Council currently. Will he continue to work for you despite testifying against the president?

O’BRIEN: Well- well look, one of the things that I’ve talked about is that we’re streamlining the National Security Council. It got bloated to like two hundred and thirty six people from- up from 100 in the Bush administration under President Obama. We’re streamlining the National Security Council. There are people that are detailed from different departments and agencies. My understanding is he’s- is that Colonel Vindman is- is detailed from the Department of Defense. So everyone who’s detailed at the NSC, people are going to start going back to their own departments and we’ll bring in new folks. But we’re going to get that number down to around 100 people. That’s what it was under Condoleezza Rice. She came and met with me. I met with a number of my successors.

From Power Line John Hideracker explains how The Ukraine Scandal Spreads within the Obama administration. CBS, Trump says transcript of "second" Ukraine call will "probably" be released Tuesday, so they can begin spinning it. More Hot Air From AllahPundit who tries to make a bad thing out of the Report: Ukraine’s Military Aid Was Finally Released By The State Department, Days Before Trump Claims He Released It

And is this the real reason why Bolton finally resigned/was fired, because he had gone over Trump’s head in authorizing the release of aid that Trump was using as leverage on Burisma? Bolton is a hawk whose top priority would have been bolstering Ukraine’s military resistance to Russia, not enabling Trump’s quid pro quo. Maybe he figured that he was destined to leave the administration soon one way or another given how sour his relationship with Trump had become and figured an act of insubordination that would at least make life harder for Putin was one way to go.

On the impeachment, sundance wonders if the military has bought into the coup, The “Coup” Against a Sitting U.S. President Became Official on October 29th, 2019… A sad thing to consider on Veterans Day.

The word “coup” shifted to a new level of formalized meaning last week when members of the political resistance showed up to remove President Trump wearing military uniforms.

Not only did U.S. military leadership remain silent to the optics and purpose, but in the testimony of Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman he admits to giving instructions to ignore the instructions from a sitting United States President.

In the absence of push-back from the Joint Chiefs, from this moment forth, the impression is tacit U.S. military support for the Vindman objective.
. . .
To date there has been no visible comment from U.S. military sanctioning Lt. Col. Vindman for his decision; or correcting the impression represented by Vindman’s military appearance. The willful blindness is concerning, but it gets much worse.

Beyond the debate about the optics of the “coup“, within the testimony of Lt. Col Vindman, the witness readily admits to understanding the officially established policy of the President of The United States (an agreement between President Trump and President Zelenskyy), and stunningly admits that two weeks later he was giving countermanding instructions to his Ukrainian counterpart to ignore President Trump’s policies.

The coup against President Donald Trump went from soft, to hard.

Also, Sunday Talks: Kevin McCarthy -vs- Maria Bartiromo – “this is a calculated coup orchestrated by Adam Schiff”…



Roger L. Simon at PJ Media, What Impeachment? America's First 'Show Trial' Begins Wednesday. Reach any verdict you want, as long as it's guilty. Dan Sobieski, at AmThink, Schiff Goes Full Stalin "Give me the man, I'll find the crime". From Da Hill, the Dersh, Congress is trying to 'create crimes out of nothing' He is guilty of winning an election they had rigged against him.

“Whether you’re from New York or the middle of the country, you should be frightened by efforts to try to create crimes out of nothing,” Dershowitz said Sunday on John Catsimatidis’ radio show.

“Well, I spent the afternoon yesterday searching the federal criminal statutes from beginning to end. I couldn’t find the crime.”
. . .
“First they made up collusion… I searched the statute books. There’s no crime of collusion… with a foreign country. After that ,they said obstruction of Congress,” Dershowitz said.

“In a desperate effort to try to find crimes [committed by] President Trump, they’re just making it up. And that means we are all in danger.”

George Korda at Knox News has an interesting impeachment analogy, Impeachment poker: Hold ‘em, fold ‘em or leave the game? 

“I’ll fold on Russia, but I’m going to raise you on Ukraine.”

That’s essentially the poker hand House Democrats are playing in their zeal to do something, anything, to get rid of sometimes-bizarre President Donald Trump. Impeachment is the last card Democrats have to play, and they’ve thrown it on the table.

Al Hunt on Da Hill, As impeachment goes public, forget 'conventional wisdom' As a wise man said, Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way."  The same is likely true for impeachments. Don Surber posits, Impeachment is not why Democrats will lose. In their zeal, they've gone far left, and America, for the most part, ain't buying it. At Breitbart, Gohmert: Dems Will Drag Out Impeachment — Try to Get ‘Best Socialist’ Nominated for President. That's like the "best disease".

Patricia McCarthy, at AmThink, Is Pelosi finally sick of the terrible damage Schiff is doing to her party? by allowing Jim Jordan to be moved to Judiciary?  That may be giving her too much credit.

Perhaps Pelosi already knows what is coming and may just want the counterblast to fall on Schiff. But she cannot escape her role in the most consequential political scandal in U.S. history. She, and the rest of the impeach crowd, would have been wise to remember Robert Kennedy's observation that "what is objectionable, what is dangerous, about extremists is not that they are extreme, but that they are intolerant. The evil is not what they say about their cause but what they say about their opponents.

Sundance, Sunday Talks: Devin Nunes Uninterrupted… The first bit about Yovanovich is telling. Fox, Yovanovitch communicated with Dem staffer on 'delicate' issue after complaint, emails show, despite testimony. Perjury is not a good look for someone testifying in the impeachment probe.



The Wombat is back in business, with Rule Five Sunday: Black Widow and FMJRA 2.0: The Things That We’ve Learnt Are No Longer Enough.