Planning a Strzok post in a couple of hours
I’ve got to go do some errands now. But in the meantime I’ve been mulling over the vast and beckoning mystery that is Peter Strzok, and plan to write something later today. I’d also like to tackle the Trump announcement on Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, if I have time.
Till then I thought I’d put this open thread up so you can talk about those things (or whatever else you want), and to call your attention to this post on the first subject and this one on the second.
Trump: Man enough to do what former presidents couldn’t bring themselves to do: the right thing.
Pro or anti Trump we owe this guy alot, next up the sample that is through top of the FYI swamp
Lol not Strzok, Trumpy, nobody owns him, that’s Yuge.
Yikes first response should say, Next up the top of the swamp that is the FBI. (GRRR Spellcheck you $uck!)
I dunno, Molly, that first post of yours was very Zen-like.
This investigation (fishing expedition) is a serious matter as it seems to indicate a previous administration is attempting to destroy its replacement. There is collusion involved but the players are not djt or scary Russians.
Lol Brian. Very perceptive of you. My navel is looking more & more exotic to me…. ( i”d take a self ie to share with you all but that would be sexual harassment )
As some wag has said, “Strzok is the Forest Gump of the FBI.”
Strzok; the FBI’s own Chauncy Gardener, or Chauncy’s evil twin.
Parker at 6:20.
Exactly. And it seems the only guy that can end the investigation is the guy with the most interest in keeping it alive!
Mueller has it all. Unlimited budget, power and press.
Strzok is the face of DC corruption. He is the Swamp.
But know this, he was working for someone. Probably paid off in bitcoin by Podesta for the Clintons. Dead serious.
Some 40 year ago I read a Michener book about WWII. The protagonist was a young USNavy lieutenant who through enormous literary license, was presence at every historic moment of WWII.
The Strzok story is the same: every historic moment that concerns Trump in the past year has Strzok in the middle. He interviewed Hillary, Abedin and Mills (the last two after giving them immunity). Abedin and Mills lied under oath, BTW, just as Flynn did, but only Flynn was charged.
Strzok was the lead agent on the Clinton email investigations, during which he agreed not to subpoena Huma Abedin’s computer.
It was Strzok who changed “grossly negligent” to “extremely careless”, even before the investigation was completed.
He received the so-called Russia dossier, and when he couldn’t find any journalist who would print it, managed to make it newsworthy by shopping the story to a fly-by-night news blog that the president had been briefed about the dossier.
And then, of course, Mueller named him the lead FBI agent on the Russian collusion investigation, which, BTW, appears not to have uncovered anything after nearly a year.
But how is it possible that a single person keeps popping up for every new anti-Trump event? It defies credibility. Just like Michener’s lieutenant.
You are thinking of The Winds of War.
Thank you, Cornhead — that’s it.
Oh, and something I left out of the previous post is that no one seems to be talking about how the FBI’s reputation is being savaged by the clownshow that is going on now. It is sad that a venerable institution is being damaged so, but neither Mueller nor Comey before him realizes just how much damage they’re doing to the agency. That’s because they’re blinded by their hatred for Trump and their single-minded determination to bring him down. Sad, really. The FBI used to be a good brand. No longer.
Parker:
If Trump was being set up, as it appears likely he was, that doesn’t necessarily mean he didn’t play fast and loose in his prior dealings with the Russians. Before he jumped into the race he was first and foremost a shady businessman. Many of the big banks had cut off his credit and he sought financing where he could get it. His meetings with Russian oligarchs were about business deals – in his mind – not politics. The Russians themselves are another story.
Trump is a wheeler dealer without fixed moral guideposts. He’s also the epitome of a pragmatist. Whatever works to achieve his goals, and never mind the niceties, is what he will do. If it means cutting corners, stiffing suppliers, or dealing with underground or tainted sources of capital so be it. If Mueller delves deep enough he will undoubtedly find corruption. Despite what others here say, those who have accounting and law degrees, not all billionaires get their fortunes like Donald Trump.
Having said all that (and I’ve said much worse over the last 2 years) he is quite a surprise as president. I never thought he would follow through on his promises, just the opposite it would be all smoke and mirrors. I was wrong. He’s achieved the impossible in a great many areas. The latest example is the National Monument executive orders. This wouldn’t have happened with any of the other Republican candidates. Ditto the move to recognize Jerusalem as the capitol of Israel. Whatever else you can say about him, he’s got guts.
I’ve come the reluctant conclusion that maybe, just maybe, he was the only one who had the cajones to take on the entrenched establishment. If Mueller and the Democrats keep this up, and succeed, they will have unleashed all hell. I’m at that point in my life where I would almost welcome it. Maybe it’s time to get this over with once and for all.
The Forrest Gump analogy is brilliant. For younger audiences Strzok is like the winter soldier in the avengers movies, almost every notable assassination in the last 70 years after ww2 was committed by him. Wonder Woman too, secretly involved in every major conflict since ww1.
Read Herman Wouk’s Winds of War and War and Remembrance. In fact read everything by Wouk. Wouk is/was a giant of American fiction. His books centered on WW2 are well grounded in historical facts. Wouk makes you want to delve into nonfiction about the pivotal events that have repercussions that still define our present day circumstances.
WJC, GWB, BHO are small fry compared to those who came before. To my surprise DJT just might be a pivotal giant pointing out a new direction. (He might also prove to be a dangerous fool.)
Despite his bombastic nature, I, pro Cruz 2016, have come to realize djt may prove to be a game changer in a positive way. We’ll see.
The other chuck,
Well, I came to appreciate djt with great reluctance. There are aspects of his character that are difficult for me, but he now has my allegiance. First time after RR. I am a peasant born and bred to distrust the powerful, but I am beginning to trust djt biting my tongue all the way.
I am free, I am sovereign, I recognize no authority over me unless I trespass over obvious natural law boundaries. I do not need a permit to possess and carry arms, I do not need a permit to decide what I do on my property unless my actions case harm to others. I am free up until my actions willfully harm others.
And I owe no obligations except those I freely choose to commit to.
I do hope that the FBI can regain its reputation.
I have reason, through indirect personal experience, to respect that agency and the people who work there highly.
A few years ago when I was working at a community legal centre I was visited by a very pleasant but concerned elderly lady.
Her adult daughter, who had a history of serious drug abuse and violence, and from whom she was estranged, had taken off a few weeks before for the US in pursuit of her drug supplier baby-daddy.
My client was only concerned that her daughter had taken along with her my client’s infant grand-daughter.
My client, who was not at all well-off financially would regularly receive belligerent telephone calls requesting money “to feed the girl” and would send what she could until the calls suddenly ceased without explanation.
After weeks of not hearing anything and not knowing even what city or state the daughter and the little one were in my client was beside herself with worry as to what might have befallen the pair.
I wrote immediately to our department of foreign affairs and trade explaining my client’s very real concerns for her grand daughter and requesting that they make enquiries as to whether there were any official reports of either party being admitted to hospital in the US – or worse. We simply wanted to know if the little one was alive, well and being cared for.
The daughter really was bad news and had a history of overdoses and neglecting her child. My client’s concerns as to the welfare of her grand daughter I felt were justified in all the circumstances.
Just a few days after sending the letter my client attended to thank us for helping her. I said I had no idea what she was talking about since I had received no acknowledgement as yet and since it was a federal bureaucracy had diarised to chase it up not for a few days hence. (My view of the efficiency of government agencies is generally not a positive one).
The client, who looked very much better, said that she had received an angry telephone call from her daughter in the US in the early hours of the morning screaming abuse at her and telling her of her resentment at “the two FBI creeps standing here telling me to call you”.
She explained that they were refusing to leave until and unless she phoned her mother.
I have never forgotten the kindness of the FBI to a nice lady who wasn’t even one of their own.
Wow, indeed. Trump is bypassing the gatekeepers and forcing the status quo to the surface for public inspection. Its phobic response has been so exquisite, even requiring abortion of several highly placed pawns, in order to establish some semblance of credibility.
I am beginning to trust djt biting my tongue all the way
Trump is not God. He is human like the rest of us. Trust and verify.
I do hope that the FBI can regain its reputation.
If its principles (e.g. charter) are sound, then there is hope for a recovery. Also, if its principles are sound, then we should be careful to avoid painting the men and women with broad, sweeping strokes (“color of their skin”).
Stephen Ippolito Says:
December 6th, 2017 at 11:39 pm
I do hope that the FBI can regain its reputation.
I have reason, through indirect personal experience, to respect that agency and the people who work there highly.
* *
There is nothing more galling to principled professionals (such as in your example) than to be headed by unprincipled charlatans.
Some years ago, on the old Hot Air comment board, we had a fellow who worked at the IRS giving us the real picture of the rank-and-file, doing their best to follow often impossibly complex laws in service to the taxpayers.
Their view of Lois Lerner was not laudatory.
Points 10-12 on the PowerLine post are the most intriguing: what was the IG doing looking at Strzok’s personal emails in the first place?
Something reallybad happened down in the crypt.
AesopFan:
I’ve read that they weren’t “personal” texts, despite the fact that they dealt with personal business, because they were on official FBI phones, which are always subject to search. You’re not supposed to do personal business on them.
“…I’ve been mulling over the vast and beckoning mystery that is Peter Strzok, and plan to write something later today.”
Vast and beckoning, indeed….
But Andrew McCarthy has beaten you to it.
And, though this whole woeful episode reeks, it would be wise to heed him….
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/454413/fbi-agent-peter-strzok-justice-department
But aren’t all days “days of rage” for Hamas?
There are “days of rage,” and then there are “days of rage-rage.” Ask Whoopi.
In an early speech by DJT, he said ” I work for you”
Great to have a prez that no body owns !
The simplest explanation is that the FBI was colluding with the Democrats to sabotage Donald Trump. That explains a pattern of behavior, from everything with the 2016 election to current Director Christopher Wray’s non-testimony to Congress just today.