Glenn Greenwald: on January 6th and the FBI
Glenn Greenwald has written some must-read pieces about the January 6th Capitol incursion, and here’a another. This one focuses on the role of the FBI – how much the agency knew, and how involved it was in the planning and even the execution of the so-called “insurrection.”
Greenwald has a lot to say because he was part of the campaign against FBI entrapment of would-be Islamic terrorists during the post-9/11 years. A few days ago, before I read Greenwald’s piece, I mentioned something similar in my post on the FBI’s role in January 6th:
Entrapment is a constant possibility in situations in which agencies such as the FBI infiltrate terrorist or other suspicious groups, supposedly in order to monitor them. I noticed many years ago that some of the Islamic terrorist attacks that were said to have been foiled in this country while still in the planning stages involved either entrapment by government agents or reason to suspect entrapment. And as recently as this past October, the story of the arrest of six men planning to kidnap Gretchen Whitmer seemed to feature FBI entrapment of the accused perps, as well.
But Greenwald offers a lot more detail on the subject, and he points out the double standards and hypocrisy of the media and Democrats on the subject. They were terribly upset with the FBI when the FBI was going against Muslims who might be entertaining jihad, but now the FBI is their bosom buddy because it’s focusing its dubious attention on the right.
What would be shocking and strange is not if the FBI had embedded informants and other infiltrators in the groups planning the January 6 Capitol riot. What would be shocking and strange — bizarre and inexplicable — is if the FBI did not have those groups under tight control. And yet the suggestion that FBI informants may have played some role in the planning of the January 6 riot was instantly depicted as something akin to, say, 9/11 truth theories or questions about the CIA’s role in JFK’s assassination or, until a few weeks ago, the COVID lab-leak theory: as something that, from the perspective of Respectable Serious Circles, only a barely-sane, tin-foil-hat-wearing lunatic would even entertain.
This reaction is particularly confounding given how often the FBI did exactly this during the first War on Terror, and how commonplace discussions of this tactic were in mainstream liberal circles. Over the last decade, I reported on countless cases for The Guardian and The Intercept where the FBI targeted some young American Muslims they viewed as easily manipulated — due to financial distress, emotional problems, or both — and then deployed informants and undercover agents to dupe them into agreeing to join terrorist plots that had been created, designed and funded by the FBI itself, only to then congratulate themselves for breaking up the plot which they themselves initiated. As I asked in one headline about a particularly egregious entrapment case: “Why Does the FBI Have to Manufacture its Own Plots if Terrorism and ISIS Are Such Grave Threats?”
In 2011, Mother Jones published an outstanding, lengthy investigation by reporter Trevor Aaronson, entitled “The Informations,” which asked: “The FBI has built a massive network of spies to prevent another domestic attack. But are they busting terrorist plots—or leading them?” Aaronson covered numerous similar cases for The Intercept where the FBI designed, directed and even funded the terror plots and other criminal rings they then boasted of disrupting. A widely praised TEDTalk by Aaronson, which, in the words of organizers, “reveals a disturbing FBI practice that breeds terrorist plots by exploiting Muslim-Americans with mental health problems,” featured this central claim: “There’s an organization responsible for more terrorism plots in the United States than al-Qaeda, al-Shabaab and ISIS combined: The FBI.”
Please read the whole thing – it’s worth it.
One of the things that makes Greenwald’s pieces so good is that, whether you agree with him or not on each issue, he’s remarkably consistent in applying the same principles to each side. I value that, and it’s a practice I try to follow, as well. Greenwald also is a very clear writer, and he has a lot of information about the press in particular, from his many years as a regular journalist. He resigned from The Intercept, the outlet he founded, because the new chiefs wanted him to toe the party line much more and he wouldn’t do it.
One should place far more trust in the analysis of Greenwald, in the fine reporting of Julie Kelly at American Greatness on 1/6, and in the opinions of Tucker and Darren Beattie (Revolver) on Tucker’s program, than in the recent worthless commentary on this topic by the once-reliable Andrew McCarthy at National Review. McCarthy seems completely incapable of comprehending the level of corruption at Wray’s FBI and at the DOJ (a truly maleficent and malevolent quadrumvirate of Garland, Monaco, Gupta, and K Clarke). To trust anything emanating from our “alphabet agencies” is, in 2021, folly indeed, after year upon year of misbehavior and unethical conduct.
Related:
“All of this legal wanking about the specific term “unindicted co-conspirators” is completely beside the point.
“The real question is….”
https://twitter.com/DarrenJBeattie/status/1406267122997776386
and:
“Who is Ray Epps?”
https://twitter.com/DarrenJBeattie/status/1405932595582488577
j e:
McCarthy’s weak spot has always been that he gives those agencies the benefit of the doubt. He was affiliated with some of the groups and they still feature officials he once worked with in a cordial and respectful manner. He finally got past that with Mueller when the evidence of corruption and/or ineptitude became too powerful. But January 6th really shocked McCarthy, as did the Floyd case (he called it a murder nearly from the start), and now he seems to have reset to his original default position.
One great danger of an overzealous FBI is how it can sometimes engender real extremist incidents as a reaction to their various entrapments and chicanery. Would the Oklahoma City bombing have occurred if Ruby Ridge and Waco never happened?
Nonapod-
I am very familiar with FBI malconduct at Ruby Ridge and at Waco.
At Ruby Ridge an FBI sniper shot and killed Mrs. Weaver, the wife of the dude they were after, while she was feeding formula to a very young infant. Shot thru a window.
It took some years to bring that Fibbie to trial, and he was convicted. Of a felony, but not murder.
Waco was a slaughter by the law of a huge number of people, some 60 IIRC. Authorized by Janet Reno, Clinton’s Attorney general. No charges followed, only MSM sneers at the group’s leader and his “fundamentalist” followers. A number of young children died. I seem to remember that a NG tank was used to breach the wall of the large wooden building with its cannon, to inject a “tear” gas previously considered non-lethal but never before used by the FBI. Turns out it was toxic (again IIRC). The entire building burned down, which killed many in the flames.
The Ruby Ridge incident was written up in book form, titled “Every Knee Shall Bow”. Quite a book. Amazon still has it, 25 years later.
Ruby Ridge was triggered by FBI entrapment of Weaver for agreeing to shorten a gun barrel to less than the legal minimum length. Weaver won a judgment of >$1 mill against our government in a civil lawsuit.
Both events shocked the H out of me. Opened my eyes!
Andrew McCarthy’s establishmentarian commentaries are very weak sauce.
@Cicero
I am not at all expert about Ruby Ridge, but I did read the book you mentioned. I don’t see anything in Wikipedia about convictions of any FBI people.
“In 1997 Boundary County prosecutor Denise Woodbury indicted FBI HRT sniper Lon Horiuchi for manslaughter on state charges, just before the statute of limitations for this crime expired.[141][143][154] She appointed a special prosecutor to conduct the case. But in 1998 the trial was removed to federal court because Horiuchi had been acting in the line of duty as a federal law enforcement officer. Judge Lodge quickly dismissed the case on grounds of sovereign immunity.[14][155][156]
The decision to dismiss charges was reversed (6–5) in 2001 by an en banc panel of the Ninth Circuit, which held that enough uncertainty about the facts of the case existed for Horiuchi to stand trial on state manslaughter charges.[157][158][159] Boundary County prosecutor Brett Benson, who had defeated Woodbury in the May 2000 primary and won the November election,[160] decided to drop the case. He said he believed that it was unlikely the state could prove the criminal charges, and too much time had passed.[161][162] He also believed his decision would enable the process of healing in the county.[163] Attorney Stephen Yagman, based in San Francisco and who had been appointed as the special prosecutor, said that he vehemently disagreed with the decision. He suggested that the case could still be prosecuted if the Boundary County prosecutor later changed again.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_Ridge#Sniper_shots:_R._Weaver_wounding,_V._Weaver_killing
Greenwald, Andrew Sullivan (lately) and Bari Weiss all are liberal and all are gay journalists. Lately they have been publishing insightful pieces like above talking about CRT and its rebranded derivative Diversity, Inclusion and Equity (DIE). It is Totalitarian Marxism substituting race for class.
They understand that Totalitarians always needs ‘the other’. The other that the ones in power can point to explain away their failures. The other that they can have the mob engage in their five minute hate. Right now it is the Jews. But soon enough it will be the gays. After they go through the Jews, then the Deplorables it will be a normal gay person because they aren’t supportive enough about trans gender fluid identity which means that gay identity IS NOT GENETIC but a preference. So the whole foundation of gay rights “I was born this way” is a lie. Identity is now a choice. Don’t toe the party line and the hate unleashed by the mob will be visited upon you. Just like the Cultural Revolution the “four olds” will be whatever the ones in power will say it is.
The revolution always eats its own. These poor saps will discover that cold fact if we don’t stop it.
It sounds as if the lack of follow-up on incompetance has encouraged the Feds to go “intentional”. Think tactical. When in doubt, duck or get somewhere else.
Waco proved that intimidation has its limits. The Feds were “amateur league”, but the fires were apparently started inside. Ruby Ridge was a screw up, but the sniper was aming at an individual who ducked/fell/side-stepped leaving Mrs. Weaver to catch the incoming. If things go “pear shaped”, the best view is from near the floor, or from the stone basement. Don’t just stand there. Even if you are not the target, the effect is still the same.
Sort of like life in the Ghetto. If you hear “excitement”, be elsewhere and/or behind masonry or an engine block. The bullet don’t care who is “right”. Speeches and lawyers (spit) are later.
Baggins:
You are correct about Horiuchi, the FBI sniper. I recall the legal wrangling about him but failed to recall he was not prosecuted after all.
Thanks for refreshing my memory. Especially with respect to “sovereign immunity”. The eventual decision by the new county prosecutor to drop the case against Horiuchi was deemed “controversial.”