About those fourteen FBI whistleblowers
Whistleblowers from the FBI have come forward recently:
“Fourteen FBI agents have come to our office as whistleblowers, and they are good people,” Jordan revealed to Fox News. “There are lots of good people in the FBI. It’s the top that is the problem.”…
“It’s becoming a well-worn trail of agents who say this has got to stop, and thank goodness for them and that the American people recognize it, and I believe they’re going to make a big change on November 8,” Jordan quipped Sunday, obviously referring to the 2022 midterm elections behind-the-shed ass-whoopin’ the Dems are expected to incur in 72 days (but who’s counting?).
I wouldn’t count those ass-whoopin’ chickens just yet. I expect a lot more effort from the left to try to make that result less likely. Whether their efforts will bear fruit or not I don’t know, but never never ever count the left out.
Back to the whistleblowers, though. Fourteen doesn’t seem like so many to me out of the many many thousands who work there. On the other hand, whistleblowing on such a corrupt and powerful institution can’t be undertaken lightly. But still, fourteen seems miniscule to me – and, unless they’re willing to come out of the closet, not all that meaningful except as a conduit of information to us on the right. To actually reform the FBI, or dissolve it, will take the right getting a great deal more power and demonstrating more boldness than it has up till now.
Then again, fourteen might be a high figure if the actual number of agents working on the suspect political cases is purposely being kept small, and especially if those agents are selected for their political sympathies with the left. If only the most loyal party members are chosen, you’d hardly expect any whistleblowers at all. But whatever the case, the ones who are coming forward so far had better blow those whistles a whole lot louder.
The lunatics on MSNBC (in concert with almost all the other lackeys and lickspittles in the corporate media) are now decrying the justified anger towards and criticism of the Stasi-like FBI/DOJ when, a mere two years ago, they were encouraging the mindless destruction wrought by Antifa/BLM thugs and vandals while disparaging the members of local law enforcement in the cities mostly destroyed by the “mostly peaceful” protests. As long as federal law enforcement agencies can be used (whether FBI or Capitol Police) against Trump-supporters (“white supremacists” and “domestic terrorists”), they have the blessing of the leftist Establishment to behave as lawlessly as they wish, with no consequences (as in the case of Ashli’s murder) for their wickedness.
The only matter I wish to hear from Jim Jordan is his coming to tells us Kevin McCarthy is no longer a leader of the Republican caucus in the House. Likewise from any Senator vis a vis Mitch McConnell. Anything else amounts to an unacceptable status quo ante.
Unless Jordan produces said agents with good evidence, this is just more smoke blowing that will amount to nothing. I don’t see anyone in the GOP really on our side here at all.
Cynicism tripled
Osama is laughing somewhere. 9/11 turned the US into a security state. The seeds were there. A little known Eisenhower warning in his final address concerned the Military Industrial Security complex.
Ike’s warning remains relevant today, but much less heeded has been the speech’s second warning. Ike noted that the government’s need for ever more advanced defense technologies would mean a growing reliance on science and scientific advisors, noting:
Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades. . . . A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.
That trend, he noted, might change the nature of the “free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery.” Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity.” Economic and power considerations might influence scientific research and the reporting of its findings, leading to the “domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money” – a trend that should be “gravely … regarded.”
Mike K: “9/11 turned the US into a security state. ”
Yep. The Patriot Act was supposed to be used only against foreign enemies. The temptation to use it against political enemies is just too great. Obama and company could not resist.
The old saying about “gentlemen not reading other gentlemen’s mail” has long become a dead letter. We now know there are no gentlemen on the left. It’s time for the GOP to be willing to fight back – hard. Whistleblowers plants, spies, reading other people’s mail, and listening to phone calls could be part of it.
Stimson whose career went back to teddy Roosevelt and forward to the other Roosevelt should know better, if memory serves, this came in response to the publication of Herbert Yardley’s ‘the Black Chamber’ which was a expose about a proto NSA, of course the UK had Room 40, the French and Germans had their own outfit
Perhaps nothing will come of the Fourteen. OTOH perhaps they represent the thin edge of a moving wedge.
As I say, the country is changing. It seems more likely IMO the whistleblowers are a small aspect of that change and may well embolden more FBI agents to come forth or take stands.
Change always starts with a few. Perhaps that’s more obvious to me because I was on the Left for most of my life.
But I never imagined the Left would become so successful at changing America.
Still, what can change in one direction, can change in the other.
Where were all these whistleblowers during the Russiagate investigation? Playing ostrich?
Where were all these whistleblowers during the Russiagate investigation? Playing ostrich?
Steve Quist:
Mostly people stick with what worked before. That’s why people don’t change quickly or at all. There’s no mystery to it.
What’s different now is that the contradictions at the FBI have been repeated and become more obvious. Plus, as I say, the country is changing. More and more people are emboldened to say, “Hey! Wait a minute. I don’t agree with that.”
That’s why the Democrat polls are dropping.
Sure, one might wish it would happen faster, but the point is that it is happening.
What drew me to neo’s blog was her Change Story and her general interest in change, especially from the standpoint of a psychotherapist. She has some great posts on the subject. For example, this is the first of a series:
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Way back when I was in graduate school getting my Master’s degree, my fellow therapists-in-training and I (Democrats all, by the way) were forced to think long and hard (and to talk and talk and talk and write and write and write) about how it is that people change. Therapists are change-agents by definition, and it helps if a therapist actually believes that people can change. But every therapist knows a bitter truth, and that is that true and fundamental change is both difficult and rare, and that it is often exceedingly painful for the person who changes, and for everyone around him/her.
–“A mind is a difficult thing to change: Part One–Intro”
https://www.thenewneo.com/2005/02/21/mind-is-difficult-thing-to-change-part-2/
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neo is quite right and her posts in this vein are well worth reading or rereading.
The majority of conservatives, from what I can tell, have never made a fundamental change and don’t get the difficulty involved.
“Then again, fourteen might be a high figure if the actual number of agents working on the suspect political cases is purposely being kept small, and especially if those agents are selected for their political sympathies with the left.”
My general impression is that this is probably accurate. IIRC the line agents who interviewed Gen Flynn in 2016 determined he wasn’t lying, and it wasn’t until the 302s were essentially rewritten by their superiors that the conclusion turned the other way. The Hillary and Trump investigations were handled by many of the same people (Storkz was one IIRC). Didn’t the agent supervising the Whitmer kidnapping entrapment operation get moved the DC to head up the J6 inquisition? (it might have been the agent in charge of the field office that was running it). There seems to be a lot of use of informants and kinda-sorta contractors when political operations are run outside DC. My impression was the Whitmer deal involved several paid non-FBI personnel but only one or two actual agents. It maybe that these sort of ops are tightly compartmentalized, and that a general culture of strict OPSEC keeps other agents from feeling confident that they know enough to be whistleblowers.
If you’re someone who joined the FBI to investigate crimes and arrest criminals, and then you get assigned to do something that is a crime in itself, it probably disturbs you. You would probably try to do something about it.
But most of the time, the FBI seems to assign “politically reliable” people to their political stuff, and most of them have never not worked at their HQ. They signed on to do bad things, so it doesn’t bother them at all.
So either 14 is pretty good numbers of bad agents seeing the light, or they are pulling that many people off anti-crime work to mess around with politics.
If I were an FBI agent who wanted to blow the whistle on crime/corruption/malfeasance, I’d want to be assured that the effort wouldn’t be wasted.
As in, there would be a good chance that there would be a fair investigation leading to charges and change.
In todays environment, there is no such assurance.
So, 14 out of thousands may sound small, but how many are waiting in the wings for Congress to have their back.
If you have kids in school or if your pension hasn’t vested, you are more likely to keep your head down.
@ rbj1 > “If you have kids in school or if your pension hasn’t vested, you are more likely to keep your head down.”
I wonder if some or all of them have recently retired.