There’s an old saying in the intelligence world: “China wants to own us, Russia wants to destroy us.” It’s pretty accurate.
Comes now the revelations regarding the “trove of documents” found by new FBI Directors Kash Patel and Dan Bongino regarding the activities of Obama-era officials targeting Donald Trump with the “Crossfire Hurricane” investigation.
Is it legit? Was Hillary directing it? Or even Obama?
This is, as Chris notes below, a case that potentially makes Watergate look like a misdemeanor. We will be devoting a lot of space to keeping the facts straight going forward. This one matters, folks. And it’s not going away.
And the operative term above: FACTS.
We start with a screenshot of a simple breakdown of what certainly appears to have occurred, from Mike Taibbi at the Racket News substack:
At this stage, there does not even seem to be much push-back from the left occurring (or even possible). Let’s recall: It is a matter of FACT that Hillary Clinton’s campaign paid for the Steele dossier; the dossier was filled with bogus intel; cooler heads at the CIA appear to have known that, but John Brennan overruled them and used that intel to smear Donald Trump; James Comey and his FBI cohorts also used it to get a FISA wiretap on Trump campaign member Carter Page.
From that FISA wiretap grew a grander investigation, “Crossfire Hurricane,” which targeted Trump-world figures Paul Manafort, Michael Flynn, and George Papadopoulos. The case against Carter Page was so adverse the facts, he was never charged. The other three were.
FACT: The FBI lawyer who worked on the FISA wiretap application on Carter Page, Kevin Clinesmith, literally changed the wording in a CIA document in order to make it appear that Carter Page was a potential Russian spy. Clinesmith was later prosecuted, lost his job and his law license (which of course was swiftly restored).
FACT: The DOJ lawyer who served as liaison to Christopher Steele, the former British intel operative who authored the Steele dossier, was Bruce Ohr. Bruce Ohr’s wife worked for Steele and helped author the memos.
It’s now come to light that Bruce, his wife, and Steele actually had meetings during this period, despite Ohr being a lawyer and not actually Steele’s U.S. intelligence “handler.” In what DOJ itself described as a “shocking breach of protocol,” Ohr never informed his DOJ superiors of these meetings.
FACT: This bogus Steele dossier was used by CIA Director John Brennan in the widely publicized Joint Intelligence Statement regarding Donald Trump’s “collusion” with Russia — despite the fact that CIA analysts decried the intelligence as faulty. Brennan insisted on its use anyway, stating it had “the ring of truth.”
FACT: Any FISA application has to go through multiple levels of sign-off. In the case of a FISA on a presidential candidate, that FISA application HAD to go to the top. Some analysts opine that Comey might not have even read it, as his Deputy, Andrew McCabe, was effectively running the FBI’s day-to-day operations. But either way, there had to be an incredible level of willful blindness to pursue this FISA based on this intelligence. Has anyone even ASKED Kevin Clinesmith who else knew he changed the wording?
Either way: a bogus FISA was approved on the Trump campaign, leading to the Crossfire Hurricane investigation.
FACT: FBI Agent Peter Strzok led the Crossfire Hurricane investigation (reporting to Director Andrew McCabe). Before the 2016 election, Strzok promises his girlfriend, DOJ lawyer Lisa Page, that “we will stop” Donald Trump’s presidency.
Note that all the above occurs before the 2016 election.
FACT: Donald Trump, despite all this, wins the 2016 election.
At this point, it appears the officials who had been attempting to guarantee a Trump loss realize they might be investigated for all this — so they go all-in, using Congress and a willing media to continue to press these ludicrous allegations in an attempt to cover themselves.
As a result, Donald Trump spends most of his 2016 presidency on the defensive.
So: who directed all this?
Was It All Hillary?
As per mounting evidence which we will be examining going forward, it appears that, at the least, the Hillary Clinton campaign was involved in all of the above (lot of good it did her) (what an awful candidate). But — did Hillary direct it?
Here we encounter the one bit of actually sourced push-back from the left — courtesy, of course, of The New York Times, which is as culpable as anyone in this entire morass.
Per the Times, the two recovered emails currently being cited as evidence that Hillary directed Crossfire Hurricane are in fact bogus; the Times purports that the emails are forgeries constructed by… Russian intelligence itself.
The Times also alleges that an email from George Soros’ Open Society Foundation, which purportedly shows Soros’ executive Leonard Bernardo corresponding with Hillary regarding the plan to frame Trump, was also constructed by Russia.
To which we answer: So?
The Times article is being seized upon by the usual lefty apologists — many of whom abetted the Crossfire Hurricane myth — as proof that the entire slate of allegations re: “Russiagate” is bogus.
Sorry — nice try.
Even IF the Times article is accurate, it demonstrates only that the true “smoking gun” evidence of Hillary’s collusion in this affair — these particular emails — is questionable. But what is fact, as we cite above: the Clinton campaign paid for the Steele dossier. It was their product. And it became the basis for pretty much everything that occurred subsequent.
And Hillary never stepped up to stop it?
Now, to be clear: I do not accept the Times’ reporting on this (you can read it here, and you should). Despite appearing in the National News section of the paper, it is badly written, lapsing into editorializing whenever it suits the authors, and in several key moments pronounces speculation as fact.
But there is a key piece embedded here. The reporters state that John Durham, who investigated Crossfire Hurricane during Trump’s first term, “obtained emails from several liberal-leaning think tanks mentioned in the Russian memos and did not find copies of the messages supposedly written by Mr. Bernardo.” And so, the Times concludes, these emails must be fake.
Sorry, no. That’s not how it works. What should be obtained is the server that the emails would have gone through. Obtaining specific emails — whether by subpoena or consent — proves little-to-nothing. Dump the entire server, eliminate anything non-pertinent, and then decide (and by the way: release all that to the public).
Was that done by Durham? Were the Soros emails obtained by consent — thereby allowing the Soros people to pick-and-choose what they provided?
All that is currently under investigation — and rightly so. But to truly ascertain if this key evidence is legit or not: Get. That. Server…. (why do I suspect it’s at the bottom of a lake in Denver by now, along with 33,000 Hillary emails?).
Either way, and to return to the top: Russia is getting the chaos it wants. It’s time to get to the facts, and demonstrate them to the American public. Then let us decide for ourselves what happened.
And as for Obama?
We’ll get to that, soon enough.
“Russiagate” Is Actually Too Weak For This One
The true and horrifying scope of the anti-Trump Russia conspiracy is finally coming to light. If most of the evidence is true, it seems calling this scandal “Russiagate” is an understated moniker for the burgeoning scandal; Deep State Coup or Intelligence Agency Overthrow Attempt seems better. The “gate” is so frequently used it has lost its power. Not to mention that this criminal conspiracy makes Watergate seem like a campaign finance violation.
In hyper-partisan Washington it seems like it would take a miracle for both parties to truly work on something together – and this is not the fault of just one party; both are guilty. But in this case, while we may not get a miracle, perhaps these revelations of a deep-seated criminal conspiracy based in the very heart of our government might actually get enough cross-party outrage for real action (yeah, I know — dream on…).
To be clear: so far, we have none of that. But Democrats need to be shown the truth, and they won’t get it reading The New York Times and listening to corrupt leaders.
So what should happen? History offers a way forward.
In the 1970’s, Democrats and Republicans came together to investigate President Nixon for his involvement in the coverup of the break-in at the Watergate hotel. In the wake of the Watergate crimes, and in light of some unrelated (and terrible) abuses by the CIA and FBI, the Church Committee was formed.
Some of the greatest abuses of the federal government came to light in a bipartisan action that culled the power of the federal intelligence and law enforcement apparatus. The Church Committee was equally staffed by Republicans and Democrat Senators. And it worked – for a while. The FBI got back to fighting crime and the CIA got back to… well, who knows
Regardless, some power was taken from these agencies, and that was a good thing – they were out of control. But memories are short, and power corrupts. Twenty-five years later the CIA was running its own war in Afghanistan, and the FBI was back in the domestic intelligence game.
We need another Church Committee -– and fast. There needs to be a bipartisan and multi-branch reckoning for the Deep State. One that has teeth, oversight, and creates permanent change. Our government is in serious danger of losing its credibility and can no longer operate in the shadows. Less classified information – more accountability. That must come from Congress and the President – and the next Congress and the next President.
We cannot ever again tolerate what likely happened in the past 10 years if we wish to avoid becoming two nations, divisible, with liberty and justice for whoever is in power.
The stakes are that high.
How Low Can Our Media Actually Go?
I know some of you will slam me for thinking there’s a bar too low for corporate media to crawl under—but they’ve managed it again. As a cop, I’m supposed to be the most cynical among us, but even I got taken. I didn’t think they could keep lying so brazenly. I was wrong.
Last week, I wrote about the leftist corporate media’s blinders on the growing story of deep state collusion with the Clinton campaign to damage Trump. I figured they couldn’t keep ignoring it—especially as real journalists like Racket News and Glenn Greenwald began exposing the government’s crimes against its own people.
But days passed—and still nothing from the Washington Post, New York Times, or the rest of the decaying press. How long could they pretend this wasn’t the biggest political scandal in U.S. history?
Answer: Until they found the faintest glimmer of speculation that maybe—just maybe—it wasn’t as bad as it looked. Then they pounced, running stories dismissing the idea of a plot against Trump thanks to questions about two Hillary emails (see above).
The Times even published a letter from suspects James Clapper and John Brennan attacking Trump and vaguely denying wrongdoing. No tough questions. No demand for interviews. Just free PR for the accused.
Meanwhile, these outlets flooded the airwaves with Epstein gossip and imagined-catastrophes over Trump’s tariffs.
The media only touched the story because of a few lines in an annex to the Durham Report, which referenced a trove of documents handed to the FBI on eight thumb drives from a source known as “T1.” But instead of analyzing these emails, FBI leaders like Andrew McCabe quickly dismissed the data as “potentially” part of a Russian op—making it magically not worth even reviewing, despite potential threats to national security.
Then Durham investigators interviewed people whose emails were in the T1 documents — including the key emails involving Hillary. Surprise—they didn’t recall making the incriminating statements — so FBI agents claimed discrepancies and said the emails couldn’t be authenticated. No conflict of interest there!
In one case, there were even two versions of the same email. Was it a draft? A translation error? Russian meddling? Who knows. But the Times hung its hat on that to claim “Russiagate” was debunked. A joke.
And that’s what the legacy media is now: a joke. Anyone paying attention already knows it. The rest will catch up eventually—as these corrupt outlets get dragged to the ash heap of history.
Let’s help put them there. Thank God for outlets like substack!
Sunday Pod: A Conversation With David Mamet
If you missed it earlier this week: Join us for a wide-ranging discussion with one of the most agile and interesting minds in America these days — David Mamet, director of such films as Glengarry Glen Ross, The Spanish Prisoner, House of Games, and others.
David was also the screenwriter on The Verdict, The Untouchables, the series The Unit, and so many more classics.
His latest efforts are the con man movie, Henry Johnson with Shia LeBeouf, and the book, The Disenlightenment, a fascinating examination of where America is today, and where it’s going.
There are very few people who can expound on the future of Hollywood, the JFK assassination, AI, Barack Obama, and of course… Donald Trump.
None of it is what you expect. All of it is riveting.
Join us for a fascinating 50 minutes with David Mamet. You’ll see why.
Click below for a preview — and HERE for the whole thing!
The NYPD mourns… As Mandami Prevaricates
In another tragic act of violence by a mentally ill man, four New Yorkers were killed in Midtown Manhattan this week. In the very precinct where Paul and I began our careers, a gunman intent on targeting NFL headquarters went on a deadly rampage.
Among the victims was NYPD Officer Didarul Islam, a 36-year-old Bangladeshi-American. A newer cop but older in age, he was the head of a growing family, a hard worker, and by all accounts a good officer. He was working an extra shift to support his loved ones. He and the others didn’t stand a chance.
Cops die regularly in this country. It’s always tragic—but when it hits close to home, it hits harder.
As usual, the NYPD responded at its Finest—securing the scene, rushing into danger, comforting grieving families, planning funerals. We've been to too many. They're always painful. Credit to Commissioner Tisch for leading in the wake of her first line-of-duty death as head of the Department.
You wouldn’t know any of this listening to anti-cop voices like Zohan Mamdani, who portrays officers as jackbooted thugs violating the rights of the oppressed. In truth, NYPD cops respond to every shooting, every homicide, every unattended death. They're usually first on scene.
An infant dies unexpectedly—an NYPD cop comforts the parents. A loved one dies by suicide—an NYPD cop assures the family it’s not their fault. A father collapses—an NYPD cop explains what happened and what comes next. Then they move to the next call… and the one after that… hoping the day gets easier.
Mamdani, now posturing to be the next mayor, tried to walk back his anti-cop rhetoric. Too little, too late. Cops don’t forget statements like:
“We don’t need an investigation to know that the NYPD is racist, anti-queer & a major threat to public safety…” and,
“There is no negotiating with an institution this wicked & corrupt. Defund it. Dismantle it. End the cycle of violence.”
He said those things. And there’s no ascribing this to the ignorance of youth — he was nearly 30 at the time, and for the first statement a candidate for the NYS Assembly. For the latter, he was in the Assembly.
Cops remember these statements—and so should New York voters.
Rest in peace, Didarul Islam.
(And click the image below if you wish to donate to his family).
And Speaking of New York: Welcome, Caroline In The City!
Join us in welcoming to The Ops Desk Caroline Downey, staff writer at The National Review. Caroline will be providing video and commentary from the perspective of a young conservative (yes, they’re out there and vastly under-served).
Caroline’s voice is an important one in today’s media firmament. Not everyone under 30 thinks Zamdani should be Mayor and AOC should be President (thank God).
We welcome her and are thrilled to see her here! (Click HERE for Caroline’s latest).
According to the latest reporting, for the first time the Arab League has called for an end to Hamas’s rule over Gaza. In a surprise announcement, the League states that in order to achieve a Palestinian state, Hamas must disarm, hand its weapons over to the Palestinian Authority, and end its rule over the strip. This is new and surprisingly under-covered; it seems to indicate that Hamas has lost even “the Arab street.” If I had to guess, it means: a Palestinian civil war on the horizon….
Comey’s not the only one. A watchdog group called The Oversight Project just referred former FBI Director Christopher Wray to the Department of Justice, urging criminal charges over allegations that he misled Congress. Oversight, a political-action group, claims Wray downplayed the scope of a controversial FBI memo from the Richmond field office that labeled traditional Catholics as potential domestic threats, portraying it as a single, isolated incident. They also argue he misrepresented the FBI’s awareness of a Chinese effort to produce counterfeit driver’s licenses before the 2020 election. The referral accuses him of making false statements, perjury, and obstructing congressional proceedings.
This is a legitimate question: Why are these things cropping up everywhere?
And finally…
Our vaunted media… never missing a chance to miss a chance.
Perhaps the worst part of the whole cover-up fiasco is the ignorance of the general public. It is they who get their daily news from the main stream media. It is the news the general public sees and hears and regrettably it has turned out to be false. I wonder what percentage understand what has happened, what percentage doesn't care what happened and what percentage simply has TDS and refuses to believe the truth?