The memo's out

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Finally got round to reading the memo.  It's a nothingburger.

Boru

[Amarok]

If this same thing happened concerning Obama they would not be question the FBI methods .

[Minimalist]

Can we all agree that the bar for getting a FISA warrant is way, way too low and apparently easily manipulated? In the abstract this isn't about partisan politics but rather the degree to which we are willing to give up our rights to privacy and allowing surveillance of American citizens that pose negligible national security risks.

Tell me, genius.  What the fuck do you know about the "bar" for getting a FISA warrant.

Before you answer, do try to remember that the pissant little shit Nunes provided no substantiating evidence for his claim.

[brewer]

Can we all agree that the bar for getting a FISA warrant is way, way too low and apparently easily manipulated? In the abstract this isn't about partisan politics but rather the degree to which we are willing to give up our rights to privacy and allowing surveillance of American citizens that pose negligible national security risks.

How do you know it's to low? What is an acceptable security risk?

[Jane2d]

hmm.  From the memo itself:

4) .... Furthermore, Deputy Director McCabe testified before the Committee in December 2017 that no surveillance warrent would have been sought from the FISC without the Steele dossier information.

and this:

5) The Page FISA application also mentions information regarding fellow Trump campaign advisor George Papadopoulous, but there is no evidence of any cooperation or conspiracy between Page and Papadopoulous.  The Papadopoulos information trigger the opening of an FBI counterintelligence investigation in late July 2016 by FBI agent Pete Strozok... 

You are conflating two things: the FISA warrant, and the Russian investigation. The memo states that the Russian investigation began when Papadopoulos got drunk with an Australian diplomat and ran his mouth. The diplomat then reported this to the FBI. A lot of conservatives have been arguing that the Russian investigation began when Steele sent his dossier to the FBI, but that wasn't the case (if we believe this part of the memo).

The FISA warrant came later.

I'm not conflating, the FBI is conflating!!  The idea that the 'investigation' began with Papadopoulos is the newest CYA attempt by the 'investigating agency' to change the timeline because of the shaky nature of the formerly claimed basis, the Steele dossier, and its potential of  sinking the entire effort to discredit Trump.   And furthermore, the alleged Australian diplomat [Alexander Downer] is quite connected to the Clinton's. 

Being as you used the Nat.Review (different author) here's one back at you:

There’s another interesting word that does not appear in the Times’ extensive Papadopoulos report: surveillance. Despite being “so alarmed” by young Papadopoulos’s barroom braggadocio with the Australian diplomat, and his claimed Russia connections, there is no indication that the Obama Justice Department and FBI ever sought a FISA-court warrant to spy on him. No, the FISA warrant was sought for Carter Page, after his trip to Moscow. The trip the Times used to say incited the Trump-Russia probe.

Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/45...arter-page

There is also some talk in various media sources that a FISA warrent was applied for and denied in June 2016.  Was this a Papadopoulos investigation that evidence (an alleged drunken encounter with Downer) was sooo far-fetched a judge could not bring himself to sign onto?   It was also Strzok who opened this investigation; Strzok who has since been reassigned and removed from the 'investigation'.

There are many questions unanswered including how in the world did this unknown and inexperienced in foreign policy nobody (papadopoulos) get hooked up with one of the highest ranking diplomats from the AU, in a london bar of all places? 

A youtube vid which goes over the above and then some:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-cOBuuu...e=youtu.be

At the center of Smith’s complaints are former President Bill Clinton, former Secretary of State and 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, and multiple Australian government officials, including senior diplomat Alexander Downer, that government’s high commissioner to the United Kingdom.

https://www.lifezette.com/polizette/auss...own-under/

More on Steele.  We find out that the FBI's dealing with the impeccable source Steele covers exactly one thing.  Soccer.  Yep, the world class spy, with all his FBI credibility tied to Soccer.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/01/...ald-trump/

We can argue whether spying on American citizens is right or wrong, but that seems like a separate argument. Unfortunately in the world of espionage, it's a little complicated, because you don't know if an American citizen is working for a foreign power or not, without at least a little spying (or you get really lucky).

I don't agree with how that comment describes this as "spying on a political opponent". The political opponent in this was Donald Trump, and as far as I'm aware (please correct me if I'm wrong, with sources) there was never actually any spying done against Donald Trump himself. The targets of surveillance were people in his campaign, and in every case there was supposedly evidence to suggest that they had been compromised by the Russians.

I disagree vehemently with point 3 of the comment. The integrity of our democracy is paramount, it's more important than partisan politics. If, in 2020, the FBI got word that the Democratic campaign were trying to manipulate voting machines in swing states, do you think the FBI should sit back and ignore it, or investigate and (to use the commenter's phrase) "spy on a political opponent"?

Spying on American citizens, under the guise of nat. security, with secret courts and unsubstantiated evidence to commence these government efforts is an unreasonable search within the borders of the USA.  Working for a foreign power is fine if you have filled out the right paperwork.  Even retroactively as we saw with the Podesta's.

The warrent issued covered anyone Page contacted.  Not just Foreign Agents/Actors.   The known supposed evidence is 1. Steele dossier 2. Heresay

The manipulation of vote machines is unrelated to drunk talk and hearsay.

[The Grand Nudger]

You're still peddling talking points, rather than anything demonstrated by the memo..which was itself a fabrication.  In effect, lies told about lies.

[Brian37]

You're still peddling talking points, rather than anything demonstrated by the memo..which was itself a fabrication.  In effect, lies told about lies.

This memo is just the latest distraction.

I don't now how many times I can repeat this.

45 WAS ALWAYS DAMAGED GOODS.

[Pat Mustard]

There’s another interesting word that does not appear in the Times’ extensive Papadopoulos report: surveillance. Despite being “so alarmed” by young Papadopoulos’s barroom braggadocio with the Australian diplomat, and his claimed Russia connections, there is no indication that the Obama Justice Department and FBI ever sought a FISA-court warrant to spy on him. No, the FISA warrant was sought for Carter Page, after his trip to Moscow. The trip the Times used to say incited the Trump-Russia probe.

Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/45...arter-page

The magazine founded by one of the creators of the PNAC, the southern strategy, a man who spent most of his life looking under his bed for conspiracies?

Yeah the national review isn't exactly a bastion of good journalism or truthfulness.

And then you follow it up by quoting from the Torygraph whose last actual journalist quit a few years ago over the constant hard right politicial interference from its owners the wannabe absolutist rulers of Sark, the Weirdo Barclay Twins.

[A Theist]

No part of it. What they didn't disclose is that Steele was paid to produce the dossier by the DNC and the Clinton campaign.

I was responding to A Theist who said "they [the FBI] didn't tell FISC that they were using the Dossier as their source".

Whether they didn't disclose who paid is up for debate. The memo says they didn't, but apparently the Democratic one says they did. This has become a game of political he said, she said, unfortunately.

---

hmm.  From the memo itself:

4) .... Furthermore, Deputy Director McCabe testified before the Committee in December 2017 that no surveillance warrent would have been sought from the FISC without the Steele dossier information.

and this:

5) The Page FISA application also mentions information regarding fellow Trump campaign advisor George Papadopoulous, but there is no evidence of any cooperation or conspiracy between Page and Papadopoulous.  The Papadopoulos information trigger the opening of an FBI counterintelligence investigation in late July 2016 by FBI agent Pete Strozok... 

You are conflating two things: the FISA warrant, and the Russian investigation. The memo states that the Russian investigation began when Papadopoulos got drunk with an Australian diplomat and ran his mouth. The diplomat then reported this to the FBI. A lot of conservatives have been arguing that the Russian investigation began when Steele sent his dossier to the FBI, but that wasn't the case (if we believe this part of the memo).

The FISA warrant came later.

But thanks for the link. I love reading comments from readers. Like this one, which sums up what is wrong with Spying on Americans; which is the WHOLE POINT.

We can argue whether spying on American citizens is right or wrong, but that seems like a separate argument. Unfortunately in the world of espionage, it's a little complicated, because you don't know if an American citizen is working for a foreign power or not, without at least a little spying (or you get really lucky).

I don't agree with how that comment describes this as "spying on a political opponent". The political opponent in this was Donald Trump, and as far as I'm aware (please correct me if I'm wrong, with sources) there was never actually any spying done against Donald Trump himself. The targets of surveillance were people in his campaign, and in every case there was supposedly evidence to suggest that they had been compromised by the Russians.

I disagree vehemently with point 3 of the comment. The integrity of our democracy is paramount, it's more important than partisan politics. If, in 2020, the FBI got word that the Democratic campaign were trying to manipulate voting machines in swing states, do you think the FBI should sit back and ignore it, or investigate and (to use the commenter's phrase) "spy on a political opponent"?

---

1. Yes. The memo states that that it "formed an essential part" of the FISA warrants. It was the key element and the foundation for those warrants, which, in its "infancy", had only been "minimally" corroborated by the FBI. It was also testified by former DAG, Bruce Ohr, who had contact with Christopher Steele, that Steele said he was "desperate that Donald Trump not get elected and was passionate about him not being president". Christopher Steele, a British spy who was trying to undermine our election process along with others within the FBI who also was trying to undermine the Trump campaign and now his presidency. Also, Comey, briefed President Trump on the dossier, calling it, "salacious and unverified". Other sources for FISA warrants, a Yahoo news article that focused on Carter Page's trip to Moscow in July of 2016....and the source for that article, Christopher Steele..."This article does not corroborate the Steele Dossier because it is derived from information leaked by Steele himself to Yahoo News".  
So yeah, I would say that it was pretty much the basis for the FISA warrants. (bolding mine, for direct quotes from the memo).

See, for me the word "part" is key there. That implies there was other evidence used.

The fact that the dossier had only been "minimally" corroborated is also only relevant if they used uncorroborated parts to back up the FISA application. There is nothing in the memo that states the FBI did this.

The fact that Steele didn't like Trump is also only relevant if uncorroborated parts of the dossier were used to back up the FISA application. Whether someone is a supporter of a candidate or not doesn't change the veracity of claims. Also, playing devil's advocate here, but let's assume Steele believed every claim in his dossier. To him, Trump is compromised by the Russians. So it makes sense that he was passionate about him not being President.

As to the Yahoo News article, yes it uses Steele as a source, but again, it's only an issue if it wasn't corroborated. The memo doesn't state anything about this. It also doesn't state that the dossier and the article were the only pieces of evidence used.

2. If you have a "salacious and unverified" document that is intended to undermine a political opponent and that is only "minimally corroborated", it's not good enough. ( bolding mine, for quotes from the memo).

I hold that it *is* good enough *if* only the corroborated parts were used. I've seen nothing in the memo that suggests they attached the entire dossier as evidence in the FISA application, and doing that would make no sense anyway since most of the dossier wasn't about Carter Page. The dossier is a collection of claims, some are corroborated, some are not. Just because some claims may be untrue does not negate the claims that are true.

3. Yes. The original funding came from a Republican, (McCain ?), but it was abandoned only to be picked up by the Hillary Campaign and the DNC.

...and the memo fails to mention this. You asked for facts that were omitted. That's one. It was omitted (in my opinion) to keep up the narrative that the dossier is nothing but a partisan hit job, when it started out ironically enough within the Republican party.

At the very least it shows a level of incompetence by some higher ups within the FBI and the DOJ who hated President Trump to rush unverified evidence to the FISC to obtain FISA warrants.

Again, there's absolutely nothing in the memo that states "unverified evidence" was used in a FISA application. The memo is very cleverly written, it doesn't outright make that claim, it hints towards it in an ambiguous way, by saying that the dossier was "minimally corroborated". That fact, as I've pointed out, is irrelevant as long as the FBI only used corroborated claims from the dossier in the FISA application.

So really A Theist, you only have to do one thing to change my mind about all of this: show me that an uncorroborated claim from the dossier was used in the FISA application

Find that, and I'll change my mind, condemn the FBI, and write a 1000 word post here about why Trump is a great President. You have my word on that.

1. For me the words, "essential part" are key. That implies to me that the dossier was heavily relied upon to get the FISA warrants. As far as verification of so-called evidence in the dossier what was the corroborating evidence? Could it have been news stories that Steele planted himself, or maybe information that Steele was being fed from the Clinton campaign and from the Obama Justice Department that was possibly contained in a second dossier that Steele, (or possibly authored by Clinton hitman, Cody Shearer), had written? Any possibility that the actual FISA warrants could be released so the public can see what's in them and just what exactly the corroborating evidence was?  Just recently on the news over the last couple of days Senators Lindsay Graham and Chuck Grassley have sent a letter to the DOJ requesting a criminal probe of Christopher Steele.

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/dossie...le/2648099

2. Yes. The dossier is a collection of claims but what are those claims corroborated with? 

3. It was already common knowledge long before the memo came out that McCain first paid Fusion GPS for dirt on President Trump but he abandoned the dossier only to be picked up by the Clinton campaign. The only hit job I see is coming from the democrats and a few Never Trumper GOP establishment types, like McCain.

4. I'm just going by what Comey said, that the dossier was "salacious and unverified" and that the memo stated it "formed an essential part" for the FISA warrants. I'm going by that until we can see what was in the actual warrants. As far as to what is in the dems' and Shifty Schiff's response to the Nunes memo will be, I imagine that it will be just as partisan as those who are claiming the Nunes memo is.

5. Watched the news this morning and found why the FBI may have been so opposed the releasing of the Nunes memo. The U.S. has an agreement with Canada, Great Britain, Australia, and New Zealand to share intelligence with each other. Part of that agreement is that they can't recruit an agent from one of the other countries. Contrary to the agreement the FBI hired Christopher Steele as a paid informant. If it's found that Steele was working for the FBI while he was still an MI6 agent there could be serious charges filed.

[The Grand Nudger]

2. Yes. The dossier is a collection of claims but what are those claims corroborated with? 

Nothing that Devin Nunes ever read or had access to.......and in this way they're exactly like the subject of his memo.