Against the backdrop of all things DC swamp, this move was entirely predictable. No-one takes over as chair of the SSCI without senate leadership having (blackmail) material on the appointee to have full control over their activity. Marco Rubio is fully compromised.
Today Mitch McConnell announces that Senator Marco Rubio will replace Richard Burr as chairman of the notoriously corrupt Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI):
MITCH McCONNELL – “I am glad to announce that Senator Marco Rubio has accepted my invitation to serve as Acting Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
“The senior senator for Florida is a talented and experienced Senate leader with expertise in foreign affairs and national security matters. Senator Rubio was the natural choice for this temporary assignment on the basis of accumulated committee service. His proven leadership on pertinent issues only made the decision easier.
Earlier today President Trump was again ‘subtle as a brick through a window’ in a tweet requesting the senate get serious in exposing Obamagate and the soft coup effort:
Unfortunately, due to the dynamics of the UniParty, Mitch McConnell is very unlikely to take any action to expose prior misconduct; it would be against McConnell’s interests.
The Senate was not a passive entity in the various hoaxes against President Trump. Factually, the Senate Intelligence Committee, and individual senators themselves, were active participants. As a result just like AG Barr knows any discussion of SSCI security director James Wolfe’s non prosecution would expose DOJ corruption, so too does Mitch McConnell know senate investigations would expose senate corruption in both parties.
Republican members like John McCain actively participated; and republican members like Richard Burr willfully allowed the framework to continue. Don’t forget it was Republican Senator Marco Rubio who first came to the defense of Democrat SSCI Vice-Chair Mark Warner when the covert communication with Chris Steele became evident.
Senator Richard Burr has suspended his role as chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) while he participates in a federal investigation into insider trading with his stock portfolio.
Last night a search warrant was delivered to Senator Burr’s lawyers and federal investigators scheduled a convenient time to pick up Mr. Burr’s cellular telephone from his Washington DC residence. It appears the cell phone is part of the ongoing review of Senator Burr’s stock trades.
With the investigation progressing, Mr. Burr said Thursday that he wanted to limit distraction to the Senate and informed Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell that he would temporarily step aside as chairman of the SSCI while the review was ongoing. Senator Burr will remain a member of the committee and an interim chair will be selected.
It likely takes a lot of main justice approvals to serve a search warrant for the device of the Chairman of the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI). The Chairman of the powerful committee also sits on the congressional oversight team known as the gang-of-eight.
According to the Los Angeles Times the FBI served a search warrant on North Carolina Republican Senator Richard Burr Wednesday. The warrant appears connected to an ongoing investigation on whether or not Burr violated a law that prevents members of Congress from trading insider information they learn from their work. According to the report federal agents seized Burr’s cell phone after they served the warrant at his residence in the Washington DC area.
The sketchy guardian of swamp secrets is retiring at the end of his term so he’s probably just willing to wait out the investigation and negotiate with the DC justice-tier to pay a fine and move on. DC has a totally different set of laws and outcomes than everywhere else. Any fine, and any resulting legal expenses, will likely be paid by a lobbying firm or political interest group who previously contracted with, and received benefit from, Senator Burr.
An interesting dynamic unfolds tomorrow as the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) will be holding the confirmation hearing for President Trump’s nominee, John Ratcliffe. As a result of earlier political moves the SSCI is between a rock and a hard place.
The SSCI is the drain-plug in the swamp. They use their corrupt oversight power and confirmation authority to control the intelligence apparatus (swamp guards) and ensure that no executive branch officer can disrupt or disclose their corrupt Senate schemes.
President Trump nominated Representative John Ratcliffe, an intelligence community reformer, for the position of Director of National Intelligence (DNI). The SSCI previously rejected Ratcliffe because his existence is adverse to their interests. However, in response Trump installed honey badger Richard “Ric” Grenell as the acting DNI.
The SSCI hates Grennel with the ferocity of a thousand supernovas because Grenell doesn’t give a f**k about their swamp life. Better yet, Grenell smacks them around publicly on Twitter whenever the SSCI dispatch the orcs from the deep swamp intelligence apparatus. Every time orcs poke their heads out of the DC labyrinth, Grenell smacks them with a billion mega-watt sunlight hammer. They shriek and retreat to the dungeon.
The good news for the SSCI is that Grenell can only stay in the ‘acting’ role until September of this year. However, the bad news is if the SSCI rejects John Ratcliffe then Ric Grenell gets another year to antagonize the corrupt senators, swing the sunlight hammer & expose the darkest secrets of their beloved swamp. {{Grumble – Grumble}}
Wall Street’s U.S. multinationals moved the majority of U.S. apparel manufacturing to southeast Asia for the past several decades; as a result they virtually wiped out major apparel hubs in the United States. Now those same multinationals are claiming their production shift to making masks and PPE in China means the tariffs on imports should be lifted; and they are sending their corporate lobbyists into DC to pitch that message.
Nonsense.
There are no tariffs on U.S. healthcare products made in the USA. If the apparel industry wants to avoid tariffs, then bring the manufacturing back home. Critical manufacturing in the United States is what U.S. consumers of those and other goods want.
President Trump should not lower tariffs on imported PPE, he should actually raise those tariffs as high as needed to shift that manufacturing back to the U.S.
The time is now to wage battle against the Wall Street manufacturers & K-St lobbyists.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Trump administration is “turbocharging” an initiative to remove global industrial supply chains from China as it weighs new tariffs to punish Beijing for its handling of the coronavirus outbreak, according to officials familiar with U.S. planning.
Ms. Maria Bartiromo interviews Senator Lindsey Graham, yet again, about the surveillance coup effort and the recent documents released in the Flynn case. Once again, Senator Graham claims he will use his position as Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman to initiate an investigation of those in the DOJ and FBI who have continually lied to the FISA court, the U.S. judicial system (various judges), and the America people.
Bartiromo calls Graham out on his lack of action; however, once again Senator Graham hides behind an “ongoing investigation.” This “I’m not going to interfere in an ongoing criminal matter” is the exact same excuse Graham used previously in: (1) the Mueller investigation; (2) the Horowitz investigation; (3) the IG review of the FBI FISA abuse; (4) the IG review of Andrew McCabe; (4) the IG review of Comey’s memos; and now the Durham investigation into the origins of Obama’s political targeting and Flynn.
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I will keep repeating this until the Hope-Porn sellers catch up. Graham cannot, and will not, take any investigation action within the Senate because senators were involved in the FBI/DOJ and Intelligence Community operations. His own chamber, and the Senators on his own committee, were participants in the schemes.
[John McCain, Richard Burr, Dianne Feinstein, Mark Warner, Lindsey Graham, Chuck Schumer, Mitch McConnell, Marco Rubio, and every person sitting on the SSCI know what happened and who was participating. The SSCI controls who is allowed to be CIA Director, NSA Director, FBI Director, Director of National Intelligence and Intel Community Inspector General. The nominees must pass through this committee. Senator Burr and Senator Warner are the Chairman and Vice-Chair respectively. Both blocked Ratcliffe.]
With congress saying they will not be returning to work next week, it appears Kentucky representative Thomas Massie has decided to use the opportunity to expose Washington DC’s biggest secret. Something 99% of American voters do not understand:
Oh dear, he’s telling secrets. You see, congress doesn’t actually write legislation. The last item of legislation written by congress was sometime around the mid 1990’s. Modern legislation is sub-contracted to K-Street. Lobbyists write the laws; congress sells the laws; lobbyists then pay congress commissions for passing their laws. That’s the modern legislative business in DC.
CTH often describes the background DC motives with the phrase: “There are Trillions at Stake.” The process of creating legislation is behind that phrase. DC politics is not quite based on the ideas that frame most voter’s reference points.
With people taking notice of DC politics for the first time; and with people not as familiar with the purpose of DC politics; perhaps it is valuable to provide clarity.
It is being reported the San Francisco Bay area will remain in a state of forced lock-down with an extension of the stay-at-home orders throughout May. Considering this is the home of Speaker Nancy Pelosi,… this decision highlights an expectation that the federal government will bail out local and state governments.
We anticipated this type of approach where Blue states & Blue regions will keep their economies closed as long as possible to inflict maximum political damage. Simply, if San Francisco were not confident they will gain a federal bailout they would not be keeping their economic system closed for another entire month.
CALIFORNIA – Public health officials in Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, San Francisco, San Mateo and Santa Clara counties say they will extend the shelter-in-place orders through May.
The biggest of all the bigger financial issues around the economic shut-down will ultimately come down to a battle this spring/summer over a massive bailout for state governments to replace their missing revenue. States like California, New Jersey, Illinois, Connecticut & New York have been struggling with financial issues for years.
“You never let a serious crisis go to waste. And what I mean by that it’s an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before.” ~ Rahm Emanuel
Long before the Wuhan Virus those states were near financial collapse. The only thing keeping them afloat was as expanding economy, and new revenue as a result of President Trump’s economic policies (making bigger pies).
The economic shut-down in those specific states makes their preexisting financial trouble exponentially worse.
Not only will CA, NJ, IL, CT and New York demand a bailout, a very massive bailout to cover their revenue shortfall, but they will almost certainly use the wuhan virus as an excuse to cover and bail-out preexisting budget deficits. Governor Andrew Cuomo hinted toward his intention weeks ago. He sees this as an opportunity to get federal money.
So when Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell throws a bucket of ice water in the face of blue state governors who were anticipating to “make money” by forcing the country to subsidize their overindulgent spending habits, obviously Cuomo is apoplectic. WATCH:
