The FBI sent a spy to talk to Papadopoulos
Even the NY Times is reporting on this (taking time off from its hobby of publishing anti-Semitic cartoons):
The conversation at a London bar in September 2016 took a strange turn when the woman sitting across from George Papadopoulos, a Trump campaign adviser, asked a direct question: Was the Trump campaign working with Russia?
The woman had set up the meeting to discuss foreign policy issues. But she was actually a government investigator posing as a research assistant, according to people familiar with the operation. The F.B.I. sent her to London as part of the counterintelligence inquiry opened that summer to better understand the Trump campaign’s links to Russia.
They’re just seeking understanding. Note the date; this was during the campaign and under Obama’s watch.
The American government’s affiliation with the woman, who said her name was Azra Turk, is one previously unreported detail of an operation that has become a political flash point in the face of accusations by President Trump and his allies that American law enforcement and intelligence officials spied on his campaign to undermine his electoral chances. Last year, he called it “Spygate.”
And he was right.
The decision to use Ms. Turk in the operation aimed at a presidential campaign official shows the level of alarm inside the F.B.I. during a frantic period when the bureau was trying to determine the scope of Russia’s attempts to disrupt the 2016 election, but could also give ammunition to Mr. Trump and his allies for their spying claims.
“Could also give ammunition to Mr. Trump and his allies for their spying claims”—Ya think? Ya think, oh ye great gray lady?
Ms. Turk went to London to help oversee the politically sensitive operation, working alongside a longtime informant, the Cambridge professor Stefan A. Halper…
A spokesman for the F.B.I. declined to comment…
[Halper’s] job was to figure out the extent of any contacts between Trump campaign advisers and Russia. Mr. Halper used his position as a respected academic to introduce himself to both Mr. Papadopoulos and Mr. Page, whom he also met with several times. He arranged a meeting with Mr. Papadopoulos in London to discuss a Mediterranean natural gas project, offering $3,000 for his time and a policy paper.
The F.B.I. also decided to send Ms. Turk to take part in the operation, people familiar with it said, and to pose as Mr. Halper’s assistant. For the F.B.I., placing such a sensitive undertaking in the hands of a trusted government investigator was essential.
British intelligence officials were also notified about the operation, the people familiar with the operation said, but it was unclear whether they provided assistance. A spokeswoman for the British government declined to comment.
Mr. Trump has repeatedly claimed that British intelligence spied on his campaign, an accusation the British government has vigorously denied.
I suppose that if a candidate really was some sort of Russian tool, it would be good to know such a thing. But, as the article quotes Bill Barr as saying:
I think spying did occur. The question is whether it was adequately predicated.
“Adequately pedicated” is legalese for there had better be a really really good reason and really really good evidence that this is going on, before resorting to such extreme and suspect methods. And there has been zero indication that was true.
I wonder whether the Times is aware that their article makes Trump look better and better—and that it makes them look worse and worse.
Case in point—this article from nearly a year ago in the Times, entitled “With ‘Spygate,’ Trump Shows How He Uses Conspiracy Theories to Erode Trust”:
Last week, President Trump promoted new, unconfirmed accusations to suit his political narrative: that a “criminal deep state” element within Mr. Obama’s government planted a spy deep inside his presidential campaign to help his rival, Hillary Clinton, win — a scheme he branded “Spygate.” It was the latest indication that a president who has for decades trafficked in conspiracy theories has brought them from the fringes of public discourse to the Oval Office.
Now that he is president, Mr. Trump’s baseless stories of secret plots by powerful interests appear to be having a distinct effect. Among critics, they have fanned fears that he is eroding public trust in institutions, undermining the idea of objective truth and sowing widespread suspicions about the government and news media that mirror his own.
Students of Mr. Trump’s life and communication style argue that the idea of conspiracies is a vital part of his strategy to avoid accountability and punch back at detractors, real or perceived, including the news media.
“He’s the blame shifter in chief,” said Gwenda Blair, a Trump biographer. “Conspiracies, by definition, are things that others do to you. You’re being duped; you’re being fooled; the world is laughing at us. It goes to this idea that you can’t believe anything that you read or see. He has sold us a whole way of accepting a narrative that has so many layers of unaccountable, unsubstantiated content that you can’t possibly peel it all back.”
The irony is so thick, with so many layers of unaccountable, unsubstantiated content in the Times, that you can’t possibly peel it all back.
Just wait until it is revealed Downer was sent by the US or British government, too, as was Mifsud.
So, another preemptive report in which careful spin can lay the ground prior to the certain outrage to come? Just what we saw with the Clinton lawyer revealing the DNC/Clinton election committee hiring of Fusion when the Nunes committee had acquired Fusions’ bank records.
I would suggest reading “Judgment in Moscow.” after two decades its now in english
so.. there is no way to stop these things..
humans of lesser intelligence than the monsters, find saving themselves to be boring! which i guess is true, civil wars are a lot of things, but boring is probably no t one of them
Obama spied, Clinton colluded, DNC denied, and the press aided and abetted a multi-trimester cover-up through witch hunts, warlock trials, and disinformation.
Sounds like in pursuit of their holy grail, they burned a fair number of interesting and diverse agents (of several nationalities).
No matter: for these high-rollers, getting Trump was well worth it.
(And destroying their country?—as well as their party? Oh, but they were never going to get caught…. Should have taken out an insurance policy on their “insurance” policy!)
George Papadopoulos: https://mobile.twitter.com/GeorgePapa19/status/1124006816189489152
“I agree with everything in this superb article except ‘Azra Turk’ clearly was not FBI. She was CIA and affiliated with Turkish intel. She could hardly speak English and was tasked to meet me about my work in the energy sector offshore Israel/Cyprus which Turkey was competing with . . .”
Papadopoulos has just published a book called “Deep State Target: How I Got Caught in the Crosshairs of the Plot to Bring Down President Trump.” I haven’t read it yet, but have listened to most of a long CSPAN interview about the book and the political espionage operation mounted against him.
Papadopoulos is a little hard to listen to, because he’s constantly getting into the deep weeds, so the main issues are often lost, and the big picture is hard to see.
In a way, that’s a good thing, because it helps to convey the murkiness and confusion of the situation.
For a long time, neither Papadopoulos nor Trump nor any of their associates had any idea that Obama had directed the country’s security and intelligence agencies to treat them as enemies of the state. It was unprecedented. As they slowly realized what was being done to them, I can only imagine how they felt.
To be fair to the Democrats, they don’t DO spying or surveillance or whatever one wishes to call it. (Remember: They’re Democrats and, by definition, they’re squeaky clean and just don’t do things like that. They just don’t. No scandals. Full stop.)
What they do do is decide what’s true (or convenient) and then go out and “prove” it (with the help of their partisan lap dogs in the MSM).
In fact, such No-Scandals- here behavior is so ingrained that it’s hard to turn off:
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-05-02/hillary-clinton-asks-china-steal-trumps-tax-returns
Even when the NYT cries “Uncle” and pretends it’s FINALLY decided to “tell the truth”, it’s obfuscating and cannot be trusted.
Lee Smith provides a twitter feed that serves as a kind of “central clearing house” for what’s happening and also tells you just why you can’t trust anyone in the MSM:
https://twitter.com/leesmithdc
“…could also give ammunition to Mr. Trump and his allies for their spying claims”
That’s a hoot.
Yeah, I would say that the verified presence of an FBI spy is pretty good ammunition for a spying claim.
The old Soviet newspapers were less open about their adherence to the party line.
Funny. One only has to read a paragraph to understand why the NYTimes is covering this now. Barr’s announcement that he intends to investigate origins of the Collusion business has sent a lot of folks scrambling to create a new narrative to make yet another attempt to cover a multitude of sins. This is why we are seeing a set-up to try and color Barr as corrupt and force his resignation before he digs to deep. Sick world we live in. Real sick.
Mollie Hemingway: https://thefederalist.com/2019/05/02/new-york-times-admits-multiple-spies-deployed-against-trump-campaign/#.XMtWwPeuRL8.twitter
“The leak that fueled the Thursday NYT bombshell was likely placed in anticipation of the formal release of even more damaging information about how U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies potentially abused their authority to punish the government’s political enemies. The article specifically references the forthcoming release of an extensive inspector general review of potential improprieties at the Department of Justice (DOJ).”
even more damaging information
Damaging in whose eyes? Partisan Democrats have over the last six years shown they’re perfectly content with systematic abuse of power on the part of public agencies so long as their opponents are the object. How do liberals talk about Lois Fifth-Amendment Lerner? Most of them pretend it never happened and the rest choose from their quiver full of lies.
Where is Manju? Pining for the fjords?
Mark Wauck at Meaninginhistory.blogspot.com makes the good point that the NYTimes tells this entire story hoping you don’t notice that Stephan Halper was at the meetings, too. He explains that the reason the NYTimes ignores Halper is that the meetings with GP happened after Crossfire Hurricane started up. He says the NYTimes is hoping you don’t then ask what it was Halper was doing before a formal investigation was being opened.
This story today encourages me. This tells me that someone is starting to follow a paper trail of who sent who to meet with Trump officials during 2015 and 2016. I think we will likely find out that many of these so-called foreign contacts were honeypots set up by the US government. I don’t think this will be the first such story the NYTimes or WaPo publish- the other spies will be outed, too.
And note what wasn’t in this story- who sent Turk to that meeting. She reports to someone.
Just happened to see a story, out this afternoon, that said that the Wikipedia article on “Spygate,” which had said that Trump and his supporters believed in this “conspiracy theory” that had no basis in fact, suddenly disappeared today from the Web.
So much for having any belief in Wikipedia as a truthful source.
Why wasn’t the government of the United States obliged to tell the Trump campaign that the Russians were trying to interfere and help stop it? Because the Russians had nothing to do with it? The only two choices to explain what happened are dereliction of duty or active spying by the Obama administration and the need to cover it up.
Comey actively avoided informing the Congressional gang of eight intelligence members that a counterintel investigation on Trump and his people was underway. He had a duty to inform them but knew the Republican members would object and likely tell the Trump people what was up. So, he kept quiet.
Oh, and Comey blamed his decision on an underling who has denied it.
Yes, he put Priestap under the bus. The buck stopped somewhere else, apparently.
Trump knew about the spying on Trump Towers after being told by NSA boss Mike Rogers so the story goes. Trump got laughed at when he claimed he was “wiretapped,” yet we now know his campaign was spied upon. Kelley Anne Conway once said that the president had “information and intelligence that the rest of us do not”
Look, the guy was and is the President and not every intelligence agency and related agency employees are against him. Lots of them would gleefully rat out their bosses. Odds are he knows a lot of stuff he hasn’t specifically talked about for various reasons: saving it for the right time; unverified; classified, etc. But I suspect a reckoning is coming, especially in light of some of things Barr has said. And I mean beyond the various obvious criminal indictments we expect.
This is worthy of Stalin and his secret police.
Trump’s nominee for the Federal Reserve, Stephen Moore, has withdrawn himself from consideration due to the campaign of relentless and merciless attacks from the Left (and by some Republicans as well) that he has been subjected to—attacks made not against his economic views, but about remarks he made in jest 10 or 20 years ago or more, some of which Moore acknowledges were stupid.
According to Moore on Tucker Carlson’s show tonight, the Washington Post, CNN, and other news organizations even went so far as to get his 10 year old divorce papers unsealed so they could rifle through them, and his opponents even went trolling through his annual family Christmas letters, looking for some joking reference that they could use against him.
Those on the Left are taking a wrecking ball to our society, to our conventions of honesty, of fairness, of civility and decency, of limits, and, unless they are stopped, in their psychotic rage (see, for instance, Senator Mazie Hirono’s defamatory rant against AG Barr during yesterday’s hearing) they will wreck everything until, eventually, there will be nothing left.
These vicious, Leftist, Piranha-like attacks have to be stopped.
I missed this earlier (lifted from NYT story)
“Many people seem to assume that the only intelligence collection that occurred was a single confidential informant” and the warrant to surveil Mr. Page, Mr. Barr said. “I would like to find out whether that is in fact true. It strikes me as a fairly anemic effort if that was the counterintelligence effort designed to stop the threat as it’s being represented.”
Kind of like the remarks often seen on the right blogosphere: if Obama’s administration actually believed that Trump’s campaign was being infiltrated by Russian spies, why didn’t they warn him?
Or to paraphrase Instapundit: I’ll believe it’s collusion with Russia when the people who say it’s collusion with Russia start acting like it’s collusion with Russia.
Spy vs Spy except they were all on the same side.
If Barr committed to a briefing, it’s more than just “a possibility.”
https://www.theepochtimes.com/trump-spied-on-by-fbi-during-counterintelligence-briefings_2903695.html
BY GINA SHAKESPEARE
May 2, 2019 Updated: May 2, 2019
Attorney General William Barr committed on May 1 to brief congressional lawmakers on the possibility that senior FBI officials used counterintelligence briefings with President Donald Trump’s transition team to gather intelligence on the incoming administration.
Starting to scratch the surface:
https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/441892-ukrainian-embassy-confirms-dnc-
contractor-solicited-trump-dirt-in-2016
H/T Instapundit
(Add this to Biden’s son’s “business affairs” in the Ukraine, and hey, maybe someone will deign to notice a pattern?…)
Let’s have a look at Beau Biden’s business dealings in Ukraine – and Pop’s connection with them. Beau gets around.
Let’s have a look at Beau Biden’s business dealings in Ukraine – and Pop’s connection with them. Beau gets around.
I think you mean Hunter Biden, the degenerate 2d son. Beau Biden died several years ago.
The ATF/FBI had a spy during Waco 2, who might have been the one who instigated the initial conflict to justify the executions, or he might have been the one to fire the shot which created the SWAT over reaction.
The US President does not fire the Federal Reserve board. The Federal Reserve fires the US President. Haha.
Conservatives better be quiet and keep within their livestock boundaries or Else. Or else what? Or else you might get AUDITED again.
I’d like to have the underwear concession at the Capitol. Manju, come back!
Swallowell said “the evidence is hiding in plain sight.” Schiffter accused Tucker Carlson of carrying the Russian’s water. Nancy said there was “cold, hard evidence” of collusion. Right Nancy; only it wasn’t Trump who was colluding.
“only it wasn’t Trump who was colluding.” – Brinster
It’s beginning to look like Biden was doing quietly and under the table what the Clintons were doing relatively openly.
Maybe Uncle Joe isn’t the dimwit that he plays in public.
This cover story is stupid, which shows they never expected they would have to use it. They must be getting desperate.
Nevertheless, one simple test will show whether at the bottom of this big sack of lies there is some kernel of truth. Did they also investigate the Clinton campaign for Russian contacts? If so, did they tell Clinton about it or did they treat her as a potential suspect?
My guess: the investigation was conducted in cooperation with the Clinton campaign, in an explicit attempt to help her, and Clinton herself was never a target and was given weekly reports by President Obama.
Talk about “spying.”
One does not have to be a paranoid to notice and worry about the potential of the technology and connectivity described below to be turned into a massive Surveillance State here in the West; potential which is sitting right there, in the open, and is quite obvious.
Automating you home—tying all of your individual appliances together via the Internet, and uniting their various functions in one unit, under your control—seems like it would be very convenient, and besides being trendy and “very cool,” would give you all sorts of bragging rights.
But, by way of background I note, first of all, that private computer and router password security is reportedly very lax.
When you add—on top of this—reports that have revealed the breadth of the surveillance by the NSA, the DOJ, the FBI—and apparently several outside contractors—which they perverted, and employed illegally against their “enemies” during the course of this whole Russia collusion hoax.
Then, add to this, how those on the rabid Left are trolling through the things that those they believe to be their “enemies” have said, written, emailed, or put up on the Internet in the past.
Then, add to this information reports that Chinese companies (and probably other state and non-state actors, as well) have built in “backdoors,” giving them the capability to steal data that is entered into/processed by their electronic products.
(I note, too, the additionally worrying reports that the Chinese are also heavily invested in facial recognition systems that will give them greater ability to identify and to track people, and the beginning of their adoption of a mandatory, surveillance-based “social credit” system, which will estimate each citizen’s “trustworthiness.” A system of punishments (for things like dissemination of what the regime deems “fake news”) and rewards that will determine your access to things like credit, mortgages, housing, and educational opportunities.
It seems to me inevitable that some aspects of these developments will inevitably “bleed” into society here in the West. )
I note, too, that voice control gadgets, of necessity, have to be listening to you at all times to optimally function, and that some of these recordings have already been subpoened for use in criminal prosecutions.
Note, as well, that some camera and microphone equipped computers and televisions, (and cellphones?) also have the capability to be turned on remotely, and to record images and sound in your home.
There are also reports that even after you turn this function off, Google still tracks your location and time spent at each location.
I also note that there they now sell things like refrigerators, coffeemakers, and washers and dryers that can connect to the Internet, which could also be used for surveillance.
There have also been reports of indoor security cameras whose Chinese manufacturers have “accidentally” included microphones in them. An additional capability that they didn’t inform those who bought these surveillance cameras about.
According to one report I read, some Roomba-type robotic cleaners also report back to the company that manufactured them on the number, placement, and dimensions of each room they clean in your house.
Baby monitors and camera and speaker equipped doorbells can also be hacked, and turned into instruments of surveillance by some hacker.
Now, just this past week, I’ve seen advertisements on TV for a new camera on a stalk that will rotate to follow you as you move around and talk, say, in your kitchen, and record your every word and action.
All these developments obviously add up to a markedly new, more capable, and more detailed level of surveillance, all supposedly there to make your life and control over your house and life easier, and you and you family supposedly more “safe.”
Given all this, it seems to me that you should be very cautious in introducing any electronic gadget—especially one that does, or possibly can (and how can you know and really be confident that it can’t) connect to the Internet, record what you say and do in your home; can surveil and “spy” on you.
Obviously, it all depends on if, how much, what kind and, ultimately, who is doing the surveilling and what their motives for this surveillance might be—see the activities of the NSA, the DOJ, and FBI above.
The NAZIs and the secret police in the old U.S.S.R. could only dream about the capabilities for coverage, penetration, and surveillance that these new electronic gadgets can deliver.
Bottom line—Think very carefully about adding each and every electronic gadget—both inside you home and around your property—and be very cautious.
sdferr – just got around to reading Mollie Hemingway’s story. The NYT may complain about Barr being a hair-splitter, but they have him beat cold.
“Following months of angry claims by journalists and Democratic operatives that the Obama administration never spied on Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, The New York Times admitted Thursday that multiple overseas intelligence assets were deployed against associates of the Republican nominee.”
In that particular situation, they really didn’t spy on Trump’s associates — because they were rebuffed.
Aesop, we note (with only a brief spasm of hilarity) the new term of art “cloaked investigator”, and pass on.
https://mobile.twitter.com/seanmdav/status/1124417645313503232
Wait just a minute –
From the Times article of a year ago:
(emphasis mine)
Undermining the idea of objective truth? Like the Left has been doing for the better part of a century?
I think my irony meter just exploded.
“…irony meter…”
(Maybe Irony Man should be a new superhero?…)
A stupendous catch. At some point, the MSM is going to have to start doctoring—i.e., “cleaning up”—its archives…. (I mean, why not?)
They spied, they lied.
They’re finally about to be investigated for real! (I hope??).
They will continue to deny.
They are guilty. Will they be indicted? That’s what American justice needs.
George Papadopoulos was on Maria Bartiromo’s show in the last few days, telling her that—out of the blue—people called him to offer him an overseas job, and other suspicious people were also introduced to him/and met with him in Italy and London, all this starting well before he worked for Trump and, in fact, in 2016 when he was working on Ben Carson’s Campaign.
The implication is, of course, that more Republicans and their campaigns than just Trump and his organization were being surveilled, and that this surveillance probably started well before the currently reported date.
sdferr on May 5, 2019 at 7:09 am at 7:09 am said:
Aesop, we note (with only a brief spasm of hilarity) the new term of art “cloaked investigator”, and pass on.
* * *
I saw that. Andrew McCarthy riffed on the theme as well, in his latest post.
(are you sure you don’t mean a brief spasm of Hillary?)
Barry Meislin on May 5, 2019 at 9:15 am at 9:15 am said:
… At some point, the MSM is going to have to start doctoring—i.e., “cleaning up”—its archives….
* * *
I suspect some server (or thirty) is going to have a malfunction soon.
Make your screen grabs while you can.
Snow on Pine on May 5, 2019 at 5:50 pm at 5:50 pm said:
George Papadopoulos…all this starting well before he worked for Trump and, in fact, in 2016 when he was working on Ben Carson’s Campaign.
* * *
That part of the timeline did not register on me.
I don’t think any of the stories I’ve read called attention to it, even if they did mention the dates of the entrapment attempts.
So, did the insurance policy extend to cover ANY Republican nominee?
So in addition to the main, high level players, how many other people at the DOJ, FBI, NSA, State and—for all we know, at other Federal agencies—do we think were/are involved in trying to carry out this attempted coup d’etat—50, 100, 300, 500?
In the course of this story to date, how many leakers–inside the White House, in the Executive branch–have their been, how many FBI agents blabbing to reporters, and how many of those reporters were there?
Then, how many personnel from Fusion GPS and other contractors were also involved?
Add in, as well, reported foreign government actors in the UK, in Australia, and Italy.
Sum it all up, and this was an International coup effort that could possibly have involved—top to bottom—say, 700, or even 1,000 people in all.
If the total number of conspirators are even remotely as large as these speculative numbers, it is remarkable that there have been no major leaks.
Of course, there may have been attempts to leak, but I would suspect that the MSM—essential players in this conspiracy themselves—would not let them see the light of day.
Snow on Pine on May 5, 2019 at 11:26 pm at 11:26 pm said:
So in addition to the main, high level players, how many other people at the DOJ, FBI, NSA, State and—for all we know, at other Federal agencies—do we think were/are involved in trying to carry out this attempted coup d’etat—50, 100, 300, 500?
More factions and powers at work than you can imagine, Snow.
If the total number of conspirators are even remotely as large as these speculative numbers, it is remarkable that there have been no major leaks.
Back when the CIA and the fake news propaganda media started calling whistleblowers and anti government groups “tin foil hat wearing conspiracy theorists”, conservatives applauded that sentiment and backed it to the full tilt.
Now that the “conspiracy” is against Right wing Red interests, suddenly it is a lot easier to sympathize with conspiracies…. lol humans.