In Russia-related news, it's looking increasingly like "the memo" is some bullshit.
First, it's written by run-tell-daddy Trump partisan Nunes, based on documents he hadn't even seen, so I don't know how anybody who isn't as desperate as Sean Hannity would put much faith in its veracity.
And now... this: https://www.thedailybeast.com/devin-nunes-wont-say-if-he-worked-with-white-house-on-anti-fbi-memo
The Republican chairman of the House intelligence committee refused to answer when a colleague asked him if he had coordinated his incendiary surveillance memo with the White House, The Daily Beast has learned.
During Monday’s contentious closed-door committee meeting, Rep. Mike Quigley, a Democrat, asked Nunes point-blank if his staffers had been talking with the White House as they compiled a four-page memo alleging FBI and Justice Department abuses over surveillance of President Trump’s allies in the Russia probe.
According to sources familiar with the exchange, Nunes made a few comments that didn’t answer the question before finally responding, “I’m not answering.”
Spokespeople for Nunes and for the White House did not immediately respond.
If you didn't do it, you just say "no." Not-guilty means not-evasive.
Nunes probably crafted this memo with the aid of the White House. After all, he doesn't do
anything without them being in the loop, which is why he had to recuse himself. Nunes is likely coordinating with Trump to try to discredit the FBI and mislead the public, either to stop Mueller's investigation, or to get Trump's base to not accept its results. They
know something bad's going to be found out, and they want partisans (like our own resident shithead-who-shall-not-be-named) to dismiss what turns up as some biased witch-hunt or whatever.
And, Russian bots (and, of course, crooked piece of shit Sean Hannity) are helping them push this story, which will add another layer of collusion onto obstruction and conspiracy to circumvent the rule of law.
The FBI has come out swinging. https://shareblue.com/in-rare-public-rebuke-fbi-humiliates-gop-for-mueller-smear-campaign/#.WnIRSLdU9Kk.twitter
After meeting with Speaker of the House Paul Ryan and White House chief of staff John Kelly and beseeching them not to publicly release a dubious, GOP-concocted hit report on the FBI, the bureau went public with its “grave concerns” on Wednesday.
Clearing hitting the Republican’s ongoing smear campaign, led by Intelligence Committee chair Devin Nunes, that’s playing out against the backdrop of special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia and obstruction of justice investigation, the FBI statement stressed, “As expressed during our initial review, we have grave concerns about material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo’s accuracy.”
It’s extremely rare for the FBI to issue public statements regarding pending intelligence matters, let alone to pick a fight with the White House.
Then again, it’s extremely rare for a major political party in this country to wage a months-long campaign to destroy the FBI in hopes of protecting their president who remains the center of a special counsel investigation.
On Wednesday, moderate Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin from West Virginia lashed out on the pending GOP mini-report, which emerged from the House Intelligence Committee, calling it a “scam” and “asinine.”
The rare FBI statement was certainly approved by Christopher Wray, the bureau’s director, who was appointed by Trump last summer.
The extraordinary development, and the fact that the FBI feels it needs to now go public regarding its battle with House Republicans and the White House, comes one week after Trump’s own Department of Justice sent out a warning signal about the GOP’s smear campaign.
It “would be extraordinarily reckless for the Committee to disclose such information publicly without giving the Department and the FBI the opportunity to review the memorandum,” the DOJ stressed.
Democrats, members of the intelligence community, and officials at the DOJ and FBI have stressed that the smear memo, which is basically just partisan oppo research, does not provide an accurate description of how the FBI has functioned with regards to the Russia investigation.
And that’s precisely why GOP House members have refused to corroborate their report. Specifically, they refuse to share with anyone what the sources are for the cherry-picked memo. House Republicans won’t even share that information with Republicans in the Senate.
But the White House needs to create a massive diversion from the Russia and obstruction of justice probes, so they’re poised to join forces with House Republicans and publicly release the shoddy, reckless report.
And they’ll do it over the FBI’s “grave concerns.”
The Trumpkins have talked it up so much now that they'll pretty much have to release the thing, but if they're caught slipping as to its veracity, they're probably going to pay a big price for it. If it's some bullshit they cooked up, it's likely to hit the fan and spray right back at them. The FBI has far more credibility than can't-be-trusted-to-accurately-tell-you-what-he-had-for-lunch Trump. If it's Trump's word against anybody else's, Trump's going to lose.
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