Judge Andrew P. Napolitano -- Lessons From the Deep State

Lessons From the Deep State

By Judge Andrew P. Napolitano

August 04, 2016 "Information Clearing House" - On the eve of the Democratic National Convention, WikiLeaks – the courageous international organization dedicated to governmental transparency – exposed hundreds of internal emails circulated among senior staff of the Democratic National Committee during the past 18 months.

At a time when Democratic Party officials were publicly professing neutrality during the party’s presidential primaries, the DNC’s internal emails showed a pattern of distinct bias toward the candidacy of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and a marked prejudice toward the candidacy of Sen. Bernie Sanders. Some of the emails were raw in their tone, and some could fairly be characterized as failing to respect Sanders’ Jewish heritage.

The revelation caused a public uproar during the weekend preceding the opening of the Democratic convention in Philadelphia last week, and it caused the DNC to ask its own chairwoman, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, to resign. When she declined to do so, President Barack Obama personally intervened and implored her to leave. She submitted to the president’s wishes, gave up her public role as chair of the convention and eventually resigned as chair of the DNC late last week.

In order to take everyone’s eyes off this intrusive and uncomfortable bouncing ball, the leadership of the DNC, in conjunction with officials of the Clinton campaign, blamed the release of the DNC emails on hackers employed by Russian intelligence agents. Many in the media picked up this juicy story and repeated it all last week.

Clinton promptly named Wasserman Schultz as a campaign consultant and complained that the Russians are trying to influence the presidential election. She did not complain about the unfairness manifested in the emails, complete with their religious prejudice; she only complained about Russian President Vladimir Putin’s helping Donald Trump.

But the Russians had nothing to do with it.

Last week, William Binney, a 30-year career official at the National Security Agency turned whistleblower, revealed the unthinkable. Binney, who devised the software that the NSA has used to capture the contents of emails and cellphone conversations of all in America but resigned from the NSA because of the unlawful and unconstitutional manner in which the software was used, told a Philadelphia radio audience that the DNC hacking was most likely done by NSA agents.

Why would the NSA hack into DNC computers, and why would the NSA leak what its agents saw?

Here is where the deep state meets the political world. The deep state consists of intelligence, military, law enforcement and administrative agency personnel who aggressively protect their own interests, which transcend elections. Stated differently, many of these folks remain in opaque positions of power, and the governmental departments and agencies for which they work continue to expand, no matter which party wins the White House or controls Congress.

The deep state stays in power by a variety of means, some of which are lawful and not the least of which was visited upon the DNC last week. Binney knows the inside workings of NSA computers because he designed them. He knows how easy it would have been for any of the NSA’s 60,000 agents, many of whom have great antipathy toward Clinton, to employ their skills to frustrate her drive toward the presidency.

The intelligence community’s antipathy toward Clinton has two general sources. One is her misuse of emails containing state secrets. Among the top-secret emails that the FBI discovered on Clinton’s non-secure private servers were some that revealed the names of U.S. intelligence agents operating undercover in the Middle East. Because Clinton emailed secrets to others who the FBI found were hacked by hostile foreign intelligence services and because she used a non-secure mobile email device while inside the territories of hostile governments, her "extremely careless" use of her emails resulted in the termination of the undercover work of those whose cover she caused to be revealed. Many in the intelligence community also suspect that in some cases, U.S. undercover agents lost their lives because Clinton failed to keep their identities secret.

The other source of intelligence community antipathy to Clinton stems from her secret war waged against the late Libyan strongman, Col. Moammar Gadhafi. When she waged that war – using intelligence, not military, personnel – with the approval of the president and a dozen members of Congress, she exercised her authority as secretary of state to grant exemptions to a U.N. arms embargo of Libya. She wanted Libyan militias to have heavy-duty, military-grade arms with which to topple the Libyan government.

But the CIA and others warned her that she was arming terrorist groups, which was potentially lethal for some American intelligence personnel and which is a felony under federal law. One of those groups may have used Clinton-authorized, embargo-free weapons to assassinate Christopher Stevens, the U.S. ambassador to Libya, at Benghazi. Clinton disregarded the CIA’s advice and didn’t worry about anyone’s finding out about it because she thought her emails would remain secret.

Binney’s conclusion that the NSA and not the Russians hacked the DNC is further supported by official White House silence. Last year, when Chinese intelligence agents hacked U.S. government computers and accessed personnel records of millions of federal government employees, the White House lodged long and loud protests with Beijing. This time, there have been no such protests to the Kremlin.

What does all this tell us?

It tells us that Hillary Clinton continues to be the queen of deception. It tells us that some of those in whose hands we repose our freedom for safekeeping do not wish to see her in the White House because of her demonstrated lawlessness and indifference to their work. And it recalls to our attention the danger and power of the deep state and its willingness to break the laws it has sworn to uphold.

Dmitry Orlov -- Furious Sheep

Furious Sheep

By Dmitry Orlov

August 04, 2016 "Information Clearing House" - "Club Orlov" -  In all my years of watching politics in the US, never have I seen a presidential election generate such overwhelmingly negative emotions. Everyone hates Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, or, increasingly, both of them. This is creating a severe psychological problem for many people: they want to tell their friends and the world that Clinton is mentally unstable and a crook, but they are conflicted because they realize that by so doing they would be supporting Trump. Or they want to tell everyone what a vulgar, narcissistic, egotistical blowhard Trump is, but they are conflicted because they realize that by so doing they would be supporting Clinton. Some are abandoning the two-party duopoly in favor of minor parties, ready to vote for Jill Stein the Green or Gary Johnson the Libertarian, but are conflicted because voting for Stein would take votes away from Clinton the crook and thus support Trump the blowhard, while voting for Johnson would take votes away from Trump the blowhard and thus support Clinton the crook. There is just no winning! Or is there?

There is a long list of arguments for voting against either of the major candidates, some of them seemingly valid. At the top of the list of the seemingly valid ones are that Clinton is corrupt and a warmonger, while Trump is inexperienced and socially divisive. But there is hardly a single valid reason to be found anywhere why someone would want to vote for either them. Some have argued that Trump is less likely to cause World War III, because his instincts are those of a businessman, and he is primarily interested in making money, not war; but Clinton likes money just as much as Trump—just look at her gigantic private slush fund known as the Clinton Foundation! On the other hand, perhaps Trump will like the idea of peace only until the moment he is elected, at which point it will be explained to him that the US empire is an extortion racket, and that breaking legs (a.k.a. war) is how it comes up with the ink. And then he will like war just as much as Clinton does. None of this makes it easy for a lover of liberty and peace to vote for either one of them in good conscience.

John W. Whitehead -- If Voting Made Any Difference, They Wouldn’t Let Us Do It

If Voting Made Any Difference, They Wouldn’t Let Us Do It

By John W. Whitehead
August 01, 2016

“The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything.”—Joseph Stalin, dictator of the Soviet Union

No, America, you don’t have to vote.

In fact, vote or don’t vote, the police state will continue to trample us underfoot.

Devil or deliverer, the candidate who wins the White House has already made a Faustian bargain to keep the police state in power. It’s no longer a question of which party will usher in totalitarianism but when the final hammer will fall.

Sure we’re being given choices, but the differences between the candidates are purely cosmetic ones, lacking any real nutritional value for the nation. We’re being served a poisoned feast whose aftereffects will leave us in turmoil for years to come.

We’ve been here before.

Remember Barack Obama, the young candidate who campaigned on a message of hope, change and transparency, and promised an end to war and surveillance?

Look how well that turned out.

Under Obama, government whistleblowers are routinely prosecuted, U.S. arms sales have skyrocketed, police militarization has accelerated, and surveillance has become widespread. The U.S. government is literally arming the world, while bombing the heck out of the planet. And while they’re at it, the government is bringing the wars abroad home, transforming American communities into shell-shocked battlefields where the Constitution provides little in the way of protection.

Yes, we’re worse off now than we were eight years ago.

Stephen Lendman -- What Countries Will Hillary Attack if Anointed US President?

What Countries Will Hillary Attack if Anointed US President?

by Stephen Lendman

It’s terrifying to consider what actions an emotionally unstable neocon leader may do as US president, a notorious war hawk, a Wall Street tool beholden solely to powerful monied interests controlling her and husband Bill.

She’s militantly anti-Russia, anti-China, anti-Iran, anti-peace and stability. Ignore her gender and duplicitous rhetoric. A 2nd Clinton co-presidency would be disastrous - perhaps homeland tyranny and global war with nuclear weapons threatening everyone.

Nothing qualifies her for leadership, no redeeming features, plenty since the 1990s revealing her despicable record, pure evil by any standard - why she lacks credibility, popular support and trust, why common sense demands rejecting her.

I’ve said before and repeat again the disturbing likelihood of election rigging planned to make her America’s next president. She stole her party’s nomination from Sanders. Repeating grand theft in November may be baked in the cake.

Paul Craig Roberts puts it this say, saying “(t)he evil that rules America is determined to have in the White House its own servant, and that servant in Hitlery” - an important comment to take seriously.

Stephen Lendman -- Chelsea Manning: Victim of US Viciousness

Chelsea Manning: Victim of US Viciousness

by Stephen Lendman

Just societies honor heroic figures like Chelsea (formerly Bradley) Manning for exposing US crimes of war and against humanity - victims of US imperial ruthlessness. I’ve written numerous times about her ordeal before.

America punishes its best, honors its worst, mocks peace, equity and justice.

I dislike petitions because they’re ineffective. Still, I sign some, including one for Chelsea and urge readers to do the same thing: https://www.freechelsea.com/?source=direct_link&.

It takes signers to freechelsea.com. Having endured years of torture, other forms of abuse and wrongful imprisonment (a 35-year sentence in 2013) for doing the right thing, she tried taking her own life to end her pain and suffering on July 5.

The petition headlines “Urgent: Chelsea Manning is being charged for her own suicide attempt, faces indefinite solitary confinement,” saying:

“Tell the Secretary of the Army: Punishing Chelsea Manning for attempting to take her own life after systemic mistreatment is inhumane. Drop these new charges, and immediately give Chelsea access to adequate health care.”

No one can appreciate the horror of solitary confinement without experiencing it. I never have, but once wrote try imagine being isolated in a small windowless room with mat to lie on and enough poor quality food and water to survive.

Now try imagining these conditions longterm, perhaps decades or for the rest of your life. Death is relief compared to this type suffering - extreme torture by any standard.

Chelsea is wrongfully imprisoned, now facing serious new charges for attempting to end her pain and suffering. Quoted from freechelsea.com, they include:

“1. Resisting the force cell move team (Chelsea was unconscious when this team arrived, which makes this charge particularly absurd.)

2. Prohibited property (For the items she used to attempt to take her own life.)

3. Conduct which threatens (For somehow putting the prison at risk while attempting to take her own life, quietly, in her own cell.)”

If convicted of these “bizarre offenses,” she faces indefinite solitary confinement, perhaps for the rest of her incarceration, making her a “maximum security” prisoner, an outrage like something out of Orwell, Nazi Germany, Stalinist Russia or Occupied Palestine.

Constitutional prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment doesn’t matter. The United States of Viciousness does what it pleases, rule of law principles be damned.

Chelsea is a transgender prisoner, incarcerated with male prisoners, denied medical treatment for gender dysphoria, a condition making her suicidal.

She’s been brutally treated since arrested in 2010, multiple appeals for a presidential pardon and clemency ignored. ACLU staff attorney Chase Strangio called it “deeply troubling that Chelsea is now being subjected to an investigation and possible punishment for her attempt to take her life.”

“The government has long been aware of Chelsea's distress associated with the denial of medical care related to her gender transition and yet delayed and denied the treatment recognized as necessary.”

“Now, while Chelsea is suffering the darkest depression she has experienced since her arrest, the government is taking actions to punish her for that pain.” 

“It is unconscionable and we hope that the investigation is immediately ended and that she is given the health care that she needs to recover.”

Obama bears full responsibility for letting her suffering continue. With a stroke of his pen, he could free her, provide proper medical treatment she needs, and make full restitution monetarily and in other ways for the high crimes of state against her.

03.08.2016 Author: Jim Dean

Western Coup in Ukraine an Ongoing Disaster

Column: Politics

Region: Ukraine in the world

One of America’s most enduring political barbs is, “When you put lipstick on a pig, it’s still a pig.” The Western Ukraine coup has become a new version of that barb. No matter how the West tries to paint Russia as responsible for the implosion of Ukraine, it is the US, EU, and NATO color revolution Kiev coup that is the pure villain in this sad story.

Ukraine has joined the growing list of Western rape and pillage victims, intended victims or collateral damage ones under the guise of spreading freedom and democracy…like Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya and Yemen. The recent NATO meeting in Warsaw saw the lipstick being handed out as party favors in the continuing attempt to paint Ukraine’s problems on “Russian aggression”.

Female Terrorists in ISIS, al Qaeda and 21rst Century Terrorism -- Anne Speckhard Ph. D.

The deadliest identified female suicide bomber in history was Dzhanet Abdullayeva, who blew up a Moscow tube train in 2010, killing 38 people

Free PDF

http://trendsinstitution.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Female-Terrorists-in-ISIS-al-Qaeda-and-21rst-Century-Terrorism-Dr.-Anne-Speckhard.pdf