Thursday, February 15.
STEVE BANNON SPOKE TO SPECIAL COUNSELOR MUELLER’S TEAM FOR 20 HOURS LAST WEEK
20 hours. That’s 2 and a half 8 hour days. Half a workweek. In other words, it’s a long ass time to spend talking to an investigator.
Steve Bannon, former Trump Campaign Manager and Chief Strategist in the White House, was fired by Donald Trump back in August 2017.
Steve connects the dots between Trump, the Mercers, the Racists and Nazis, and big data firms. I’ve talked about Steve having to sing like a bird to avoid the gallows, and it sounds like he did just that.
In contrast, he only answered a couple dozen pre-arranged questions from the House Intelligence Committee. Not a question or comment more. It’s almost like he knows that there’s a mole in the HIC that reports direct to Trump **cough**Nunes**cough**.
Last time we received reports like this, it was right before Mike Flynn pleaded guilty and turned States Evidence.
Rick Gates, Paul Manafort’s business partner and the Chief of Staff to the Trump Inaugural Committee Chairman Tom Barrack, had a Queen for a day interview.
Yes, I had to Google that, too. And no, I don’t think he was wearing a tiara and waving at crowds of passers by.
A Queen for a day interview is also known as a Proffer Interview. During this, the perp tells the prosecutors EVERYTHING. They answer any question asked, and they have to be truthful. In return, the prosecutor will not use what they found out against the perp, and the perp gets a plea deal.
Rick Gates can deliver EVERYONE connected to the money.
RUSSIANS USED MAINSTREAM MEDIA TO INFLUENCE ELECTION
From the “No shit, Sherlock” department…
After a study of the Russian Social Media activity, it turns out that the Russians used a lot of Main Stream Media to further their agenda.
The timing is the interesting part.
The bots and trolls would jump on a story they liked immediately. Like, it was just published, and already trending.
It’s almost like this was coordinated. More on that in the Rumor Mill.
FLORIDA SHOOTER WAS RED HAT WEARING MAGA WHITE SUPREMACIST
I refuse to speak his name. Speaking the name of a monster gives power to the monster.
According to reports, he was expelled from school and joined a group of White Supremacists who trained him to use an AR-15 and other weapons. He also took video of himself training wearing his MAGA Redcap.
I look forward to the time when I’m old hear tales of horror as the grandchildren of Trump Supporters find MAGA hats buried in the attic or the closet. The Redcap will earn its place in history next to the white hood and the swastika.
ONE YEAR AGO: TRUMP ENDED RULE THAT COULD HAVE PREVENTED MASS SHOOTING IN FLORIDA
This whole thing could have been avoided.
GUN LOBBY CONTRIBUTED NEARLY $6 MILLION TO GOP IN 2016, JUST OVER $100K TO DEMOCRATS
If you’re sick and tired of “Thoughts and Prayers”, vote out the Republicans.
Fuck the NRA. May those traitorous shits get the fate reserved for the worst of the sinners.
$26 MILLION FROM INAUGURAL FUND TO MELANIA’S FRIEND
In the middle of this tragedy, the Trump Inauguration Committee released their tax forms today. There were some pretty interesting answers to the question “Where did the money go?”
Well, looks like $26 million of that went to her friend.
One of the companies, WIS Media Partners of Marina del Rey, California, was created by a longtime friend of Mrs. Trump, Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, according to a person familiar with the firm. Records show that the firm was created in December 2016, but otherwise there is very little information available about it.
…
Also reaping payments for event production services was Hargrove, Inc., of Lanham, Md., a company that plans trade shows and other events, which was paid $25 million. David Monn of New York, who also is known for orchestrating society events and planned a state dinner for former President Barack Obama, was paid $3.7 million, and a company called Production Resource Group of New Windsor, N.Y., was paid $2.7 million, according to the tax return.
Other expenses for which the committee paid directly included ticketing, on which it spent $4.1 million, and promotional gifts, on which it spent $560,000.
It also spent heavily on payroll and administrative expenses, including spending $9.4 million on travel, $4.6 million on salaries and benefits for its 208 employees, $500,000 on legal fees and $237,000 on fund-raising.
Out of $107 million, nearly half of that went to two “event planners”, one of them being a company belonging to Melania’s friend that was started about a month before the inauguration.
This is a textbook case of embezzlement.
The friend, Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, was also paid $1.6 million on top of the $25 million. She now has an unpaid position in the White House, working for the First Lady.
So, I’m going follow up on my pledge that I recently made and blame evil white women. Let’s stop pretending that Melania is innocent in this whole ordeal. She may not be “Traitor to the Country” evil, but is at least “Let’s take the money and run” evil.
TRUMP TRAVEL BAN UNCONSTITUTIONAL
I know this seems like a repeat, and it is. Each and every travel ban, and each iteration of it has been struck down by the courts. It might have something to do with the obvious racist overtones…
Who the fuck am I kidding?
Trump flat out called for banning all Muslims from coming into the country, and wanted to kick out the ones already here.
This time, the ban was ruled unconstitutional because of the undue burdens it put on families of immigrants from countries on the ban by preventing Aunts and Uncles from visiting or gaining legal status.
Every American is an immigrant or descendants of immigrants. Whether it’s 1 generation, 2 generations, 10, or 10,000, we are all immigrants.
PRIEBUS ON CHAOS IN TRUMP WHITE HOUSE: ‘TAKE EVERYTHING YOU’VE HEARD AND MULTIPLY IT BY 50’
A new book is coming out talking about how the White House Chief of Staff shapes a presidency. Reince Preibus was interviewed regarding his time in the clusterfuck known as the Trump Presidency. He described it as, well, a clusterfuck.
Below is an excerpt from the book.
Priebus, who left the White House last summer, said Attorney General Jeff Sessions twice tried to resign, but he convinced Sessions otherwise, according to excerpts published by The Associated Press.
“I said, ‘You cannot resign. It’s not possible. We are going to talk about this right now,’” Priebus recalled telling Sessions.
The attorney general, who has faced periodic criticism from President Trump, later offered his resignation, but Priebus urged Trump not to accept it, the former chief of staff said.
Priebus also said he didn’t support Trump picking a fight over the crowd size at his inauguration, which was smaller than former President Obama’s. However, Priebus ultimately relented, saying it wasn’t worth “going to go to war over” with Trump
So, in some roundabout way, Preibus is the reason that Jeff Sessions is still the Attorney General.
Remember Monica Lewinsky and the Blue Dress? If you don’t recall, here’s the short version…
Monica blew Bill Clinton and he came a little on her dress. Instead of taking it to the cleaners, she kept it. At some point, the news came out that this dress existed.
Well, it looks like Stormy Daniels has her own…dress?
Somehow, she has proof. I don’t want to know.
RUMOR MILL: TIP OF THE ICEBERG
Circling back to the WaPo story about Russia using the MSM to push their stories, Countercheckist and Louise Mensch had some things to say about that. I linked to the Twitter thread right above, but here’s what’s going on…
I’ve described before how Louise said that the FBI is investigating Fox News as a company and Sean Hannity individually for pushing Russian propaganda. We’ve also seen how Julian Assange is getting information to him, and how the White House and Fox News orchestrated the Seth Rich story to distract from Robert Mueller being named the Special Counselor to investigate Russia. There’s a litany of other on-air personalities across multiple networks and journalists across the industry that were hacked by Russians.
Whether through blackmail or coercion, these people pushed the Russian agenda, often at the insistence and timing of Russia. They were compensated for their actions in Bitcoin. When a story favorable to the Russians would drop, they would target it with their bots and trolls to increase the noise level.
How would they get these stories to the journalists? Two ways.
First, semi-organically through Social Media. An anonymous post on 4Chan, 8Chan, or Reddit would get picked up by the bots on Twitter, and those bots would get enough traction so that sites like Breitbart (who has Yandex search engine optimization code on their site to the time of this post) or Daily Caller would write a story about the Twitter trend. A site on the left would write a counter piece, and eventually Fox News and MSNBC would pick up the counterpoints.
The other method was through lobbyists. These lobbyists, like Adam Waldman, would hire journalists and outlets to hire puff pieces on behalf of their clients, like Oleg Deripaska. These pieces would end up getting picked up by the bots, then the cycle begins anew.
I first mentioned Adam Waldman last week in Daily Check-In 02/09/2018 after his texts ended up on Fox News. If he was the contact between Deripaska and the media, Waldman should be very careful about where he gets his dinner for the next couple months.
Because of the Bitcoin usage, there will be a lot of tax stuff and money laundering charges coming down the pipe, but that is the least of the problems these people face.
Knowingly and willingly spreading propaganda of a hostile foreign power is Espionage at the least, Treason at the worst. Both are Capital crimes in the United States. That means the Death Penalty is an option.
On a brighter note, the Ex-President of Guatemala was arrested. He’s looking at corruption charges. This is the second Head of State in the last few days to face possible charges. Israeli Police recommend bribery charges against Benjamin Netenyahu. Netenyahu is deeply tied to Jared Kushner’s real estate empire, and was the recipient of bribes that came from money laundered through Kushner’s real estate.
When the Heads of State start falling, some serious shit is coming down the pipeline.
That’s it for today. Nothing extra witty, but I was thinking about all of the scandals that Trump faces right now, and their unprecedented breadth and speed at which they’re coming down. At first it was just a Watergate Speed Run, but now we’ve got the Lewinsky Speed Run, the Whitewater Speed Run, the Teapot Dome Speed Run, and probably a couple others as well. This is what happens when a career criminal gets thrust into the most scrutinized position in the world. Every single thing he’s done will come to light, and we’ve barely seen the tip of the iceberg.
Thank you, and have a good one.
“Without Journalists, it’s just propaganda.”
– Katy Tur
None of this is Normal 
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