Amaryllis
Amaryllis's JournalHouse Intel open hearing on Russia investigation - Comey & Rogers (director NSA) testify Mon. 10 am
House Intelligence Committee to Hold Open Hearing on Russian Active Measures Investigation
f t # e
Washington, March 17, 2017
The House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) will be holding an open hearing on its investigation into Russian active measures during the 2016 election campaign.
The hearing will be held at 10:00 am on Monday, March 20 in room 1100 of the Longworth Building. It will be livestreamed on the HPSCI website here. (go to link below for link to livestream. Should be on C-Span also.)
Who: House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI)
What: Hearing on Russian active measures investigation (Open)
When: Monday, March 20, 2017, 10:00 am – 1:00 pm ET
Where: Room 1100, Longworth Building
The hearing witnesses include:
James Comey, Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
Mike Rogers, Director of the National Security Agency
Media wishing to attend this hearing must be credentialed through the appropriate Congressional Media Gallery. Credentialed media will be allowed inside the hearing room from 9:00 am on a first come, first served basis.
http://intelligence.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=770
GOP intel chair: Very possible US intel gathered Russia surveillance directly involving Trump
“It’s very possible” Donald Trump himself might be personally involved as part of the “incidental intelligence” gathered during United States’ government monitoring of the communications of Russian nationals located here. Incidental intelligence is what the intelligence community (IC) calls information involving or about people who were not specifically targeted by intelligence or counterintelligence investigations.
This bombshell revelation came when the Chair, GOP Representative Devin Nunes, and Ranking Member, Democratic Representative Adam Schiff, of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence met with the press to discuss their investigation into Trump’s allegation that now-former President Barack Obama wire-tapped Trump’s phones during the presidential campaign.
Watch and listen to this exchange between NBC News Capitol Hill correspondent Katie Hunt and Nunes: (video link in article)
Hunt: “Do you have any reason to believe that the President himself or anyone working for him in the White House would be one of these names that may have been swept up in something that could then have ultimately been leaked, like what happened to Michael Flynn?”
Nunes: “Well, I think it’s very possible. But, like I said, we should know that by Friday.”
Hunt: “Do you think the President himself might be one of those people that was swept up in this?”
Nunes: “It’s possible. I mean look…”
More:
http://shareblue.com/gop-senator-very-possible-us-intel-surveillance-of-russian-officials-gathered-info-directly-involving-trump/
Theory on why it's taking so long for info to be declassified - the scope of corruption is so vast..
Of course there are the obvious political motivations for not wanting info to get out. But if the web of deception is as vast as we believe, and they keep finding more threads to follow, that takes one huge investigation - the scope of which we have never seen.
So maybe to prematurely reveal what they had would have compromised the pursuit of other threads of intel, resulting in driving people underground or leaving the country, cover up of evidence, more Putin initiated mysterious deaths... etc.
What do you guys think?
Edited to add: My thinking was prompted by seeing Feinstein's reactiion to the Comey meeting yesterday.
Stop Piling On Rachel Maddow For Not Taking Down Trump (HuffPo)
snip (lots of snip here)
But unlike a blog post, which can run 100 words or 1,000, Maddow has an hour to fill every show, and she used her hour to make a broader point: These two pages of tax returns are just one small piece of a bigger story, and journalists and Americans alike should continue to push Trump on the issue if he will not fall in line with the presidential precedent set before him.
Perhaps she waited too long to reveal the numbers. But had she had pulled them out in minute one, many people would have switched the channel soon after and missed her message. That prolonged opening segment, in fact, was very much in line with the typical Maddow episode ― a thoughtful, if winding, monologue that delves into a topic in a way Twitter conversations cannot.
“My priority is to get the story right and put it into proper context, and explain the weight of it and why it is important,” Maddow told the AP.
At the beginning of her lede-burying segment, Maddow said she hoped that the two pages of the return would lead to a conversation about where the reporting could head from here. She then discussed why it is so important that the U.S. find out if its president had foreign bank accounts and sources of income. Near the end, she explained that only more tax information can reveal that.
“We can’t know any of that without getting his tax returns,” she said. “That’s why presidents release their tax returns. That’s why there will continue to be unrelenting pressure to find Donald Trump’s tax returns, to expose Donald Trump’s tax returns.”
She added, “And that pressure will remain every single day that he remains as president ― unless and until he releases them, the pressure will never let up.”
It was the best point of the episode, and the best point she could have made with the documents she had. Unfortunately, by the time she made it, people had stopped listening.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/rachel-maddow-trump_us_58c95d96e4b01c029d780b71
PLEASE someone on EDT start Rachel thread with Details for us on left coast who get it 3 hours later
A TV watching thread like during debates and such...so we on PDT don't have to wait three hours to find out what is happening with tax returns!
Corporate America Just 6 States Short of Constitutional Convention- Pushed by ALEC and Kochs
March 14, 2016
Corporate America Is Just 6 States Short of a Constitutional Convention
If ALEC succeeds in rewriting the constitution to mandate a balanced budget, we’ll be stuck with supply-side economics for at least a generation.
BY Simon Davis-Cohen
In February, Republican presidential hopeful Sen. Ted Cruz (Texas) signed on to a call for a constitutional convention to help defeat “the Washington cartel [that] has put special interest spending ahead of the American people.”
Cruz, along with fellow Republican presidential aspirants Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.) and Gov. John Kasich (Ohio), has endorsed an old conservative goal of a Constitutional amendment to mandate a balanced federal budget. The idea sounds fanciful, but free-market ideologues associated with the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a secretive group of right-wing legislators and their corporate allies, are close to pulling off a coup that could devastate the economy, which is just emerging from a recession. Their scheme could leave Americans reeling for generations. A balanced budget amendment would prevent the federal government from following the Keynesian strategy of stimulating the economy during an economic depression by increasing the national debt. (Since 1970, the United States has had a balanced budget in only four years: 1998, 1999, 2000 and 2001.)
Article V of the Constitution lays out two routes for changing the law of the land: An amendment can be proposed by Congress or by a constitutional convention that is convened by two-thirds of the states (34). Either way, three-fourths of the states (38) have to ratify it. Previously, changes to the country’s founding document have been achieved by the first process. But as of today, 28 states—six shy of the two-thirds threshold required by Article V—have passed resolutions calling for a constitutional convention to consider a balanced budget amendment.
The ALEC-affiliated Balanced Budget Amendment Task Force (BBATF), which proffered the pledge signed by Cruz, is hoping to meet that 34-state threshold by July 4. BBATF is one player in an astroturf movement backed by the billionaire Koch brothers and embraced by right-wing state legislators.
A balanced budget amendment has long been a holy grail for the Right since the 1930s. In the 1980s, conservatives made a push for a balanced budget constitutional convention and, 20 years later, the idea was resurrected as part of the Tea Party platform. That’s when BBATF was formed to carry the movement forward. With 16 resolutions held over from the previous wave of conservative activism, BBATF has since passed resolutions in Alabama (2011), New Hampshire (2012), Ohio (2013), Georgia, Tennessee, Florida, Michigan, Louisiana (2014), South Dakota, North Dakota, Utah (2015) and West Virginia (2016), bringing the total to 28. This year, BBATF is targeting 13 states: Arizona, Idaho, Kentucky, Maine, Minnesota, Montana, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin and Wyoming. In six of these states Republicans control both legislative bodies and the governorship, making passage a real possibility and leaving BBATF one state shy of the magic 34.
More - important information:
http://inthesetimes.com/article/18940/alec-balanced-budget-corporate-constitutional-convention
Must be a patriot somewhere in IRS who'd leak the tax returns...but if T is laundering dirty money..
aren't there myriads of ways to keep dirty laundered money off tax returns? Aren't mob guys really good at that?
This way cool sign by Nasty Women Get Shit Done PDX is popping up all over Portland. You want one.
Yard signs, car/window signs, flags, more. Rep. Blumenauer had a town hall Saturday and had a huge one above him on the stage.
“We want this not to be a moment, but a movement,” said U.S. Rep Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) during a meeting with NWGSDPDX. He noted that women are the leaders who are stepping up to organize and lead grassroots groups all across the country.
All kinds of free downloads in 10 languages: https://www.nwgsdpdx.org/download
/v1/fill/w_1218,h_804,al_c,usm_0.66_1.00_0.01/a140c5_7db88045c5634cdeae074679fb4dd633~mv2.png
NWGSDPDX emerged to actively resist the xenophobia, racism, misogyny, ableism, anti-LGBTQ, anti-Muslim, anti-Semitic, anti-Earth platform and policies of the new administration.
Our strength lies in understanding that our fundamental rights and freedom are bound to justice for all. We strive to listen, learn and take the lead from people within marginalized and targeted groups.
We seek to understand the role of our own power and privilege in building a united and intersectional resistance.
Our monthly meetings include an educational component so that we can continue to learn ways to be allies within our community.
Mission Statement:
To support an era of activism, democracy and progressive politics in which we advocate for social, financial and environmental justice.
All proceeds from sales and donations are donated to local non-profits that support the values on the flag.
Go check out their site! THere is tons of good stuff to inspire you.
https://www.nwgsdpdx.org/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPuBU7df93MZDPHOQavO6fw
https://www.nwgsdpdx.org/press-lutheran
House Intel Chair Devin Nunes's One-Man War on the Pentagon; possibly more Russia stuff?
The powerful Republican is battling the DoD to move a massive intelligence complex to an isolated island in the Azores, at a reported extra cost of $1.2 billion. Why?
Air-traffic controllers waved off the plane carrying Representative Devin Nunes (R., Calif.) and several congressmen from the House Intelligence Committee as it descended toward the single runway at Lajes Field, a sleepy U.S. Air Force base perched along a windswept Azores island 1,000 miles from the European mainland. High winds sweeping in from the sea prevented the plane from landing, and the delegation was hastily diverted to an airstrip on a neighboring island 80 miles away.
After months of wrangling with the Defense Department, Nunes and his fellow lawmakers had come to Lajes last May to urge American officials to reverse a planned downsizing of the base. The lawmakers wanted Pentagon officials to instead move a massive, strategically vital intelligence center planned for the United Kingdom to the isolated mid-Atlantic base. The officials objected, citing a cost increase of $1.2 billion and serious operational and logistical concerns, including the base’s single runway and the area’s inclement weather, which the congressmen had experienced just the day before.
An after-action report from a Defense Department engineer shows that the group from Washington wouldn’t take no for an answer. “A few of the members and staffers were very confrontational,” the report reads. “One quote that was repeated several times was, ‘This is going to happen [relocating the intelligence facility to Lajes]. You better jump on board the train or you are going to get run over by it.’”
The incident was another skirmish in the increasingly nasty war between Nunes and his allies in Congress and a group of top Pentagon officials over the fate of the obscure airbase. As chairman of the powerful Intelligence Committee, Nunes has brought the full weight of his influence to bear on the issue, inserting provisions in four separate defense bills that would stop work on the planned U.K. base and accusing the DoD of “lying” about the intelligence complex’s Lajes price tag. Recently, the House Oversight Committee opened an investigation into how the military calculated the estimated cost of basing the project in the Azores.
snip
Pentagon officials’ qualms with Nunes’s plan go beyond its price tag. Some worry that an additional delay in the facility’s construction would make it harder to monitor Russian activity in Europe, and most are loathe to relinquish a close intelligence-sharing relationship with the British. “There are routine meetings that occur on an almost daily basis” between American and British intelligence agents, one official explains.
Lots more suspicious stuff:
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/421842/devin-nunes-pentagon-fight-lajes-air-force-base
And Nunes is the guy who decides what House Intel does with Russia investigation...
US Attorney Preet Bharara Was Investigating Fox News When Trump Fired Him
US Attorney Preet Bharara Was Investigating Fox News When Trump Fired Him
ZACHARY PLEAT
President Donald Trump’s decision to fire U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara happened as Bharara’s office was reportedly probing Fox News over its alleged failure to inform shareholders about repeated settlements for allegations of sexual harassment and assault by former Chairman and CEO Roger Ailes and other executives against female employees. Reports indicate Trump may pick one of Ailes’ former lawyers to replace Bharara.
Fox News Faced Numerous Sexual Assault And Harassment Allegations
Ailes Left Fox News Amid Flurry Of Sexual Harassment Allegations. In early July, former Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson sued the network’s CEO and Chairman Roger Ailes for sexual harassment. Carlson’s attorney told The Washington Post that 25 women had “come forward with what they describe as similar harassment claims against Ailes that stretch across five decades back to his days in the 1960s as a young television producer.” 21st Century Fox tasked a law firm with conducting a review of Ailes' conduct and “the initial findings were damaging enough that the Murdochs decided they had to escort Ailes out,” according to CNN’s Brian Stelter. New York national affairs editor Gabriel Sherman reported that sources briefed on the investigation said former Fox News host Megyn Kelly told investigators that Ailes had also sexually harassed her. [The Washington Post, 7/22/16; CNN, The Lead with Jake Tapper, 7/21/16; New York, 7/19/16]
Fox’s Culture Of Sexual Harassment Extends Beyond Ailes. The New York Times reported on July 23 that Fox News may have “a broader problem in the workplace,” that extends beyond Ailes after at least “a dozen women” told the Times that “they had experienced some form of sexual harassment or intimidation at Fox News or the Fox Business Network, and half a dozen more who said they had witnessed it. Two of them cited Mr. Ailes and the rest cited other supervisors.” [The New York Times, 7/23/16]
Fox Recently Settled With Former Contributor Over Sexual Assault Allegation That Resulted In Executive’s Firing. The New York Times recently reported that Fox settled with former network contributor Tamara Holder in February for more than $2.5 million after the said she was sexually assaulted by an executive at the company’s headquarters two years ago. The Times reported that Fox “investigated her claims, and the executive, Francisco Cortés, the vice president for Fox News Latino, was terminated, according to two people familiar with the matter.” [The New York Times, 3/8/17]
https://mediamatters.org/research/2017/03/12/us-attorney-preet-bharara-was-investigating-fox-news-when-trump-fired-him/215644
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