The Bonnie and Clyde of US politics - by Publius Tacitus

Appears that Clinton Campaign Colluded with Ukraine and McCain in Bid to Destroy Donald Trump.

When the story of foreign interference in the 2016 U.S. Presidential election is finally told it will have little to do with Russia and a lot to do with how Democrats, some Republicans and critical parts of the intelligence and law enforcement community colluded in an effort to discredit Donald Trump and undermine his ability to function as President. What puzzles me is why the media is acting surprised with the latest news confirming that Hillary Clinton's campaign financed the infamous Trump Dossier. Thank you Captain Obvious. Who else would have commissioned such an effort once the Republican primary battle was settled?

Reporters from the Washington Post,  while not breaking new ground, provided clear documentary evidence to confirm the suspicion:

Marc Elias, a lawyer representing the Clinton campaign and the DNC, retained Fusion GPS, a Washington, D.C., firm, to conduct the research. Fusion GPS hired dossier author Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence officer with ties to the FBI and the U.S. intelligence community.

Elias and his law firm, Seattle-based Perkins Coie, retained the firm in April 2016 on behalf of the Clinton campaign and the DNC. Before that agreement, Fusion GPS’ research into Trump was funded by a still unknown Republican client during the GOP primary.

The Clinton campaign and the DNC, through the law firm, continued to fund Fusion GPS’ research through the end of October 2016, days before Election Day.

Fusion GPS gave Steele’s reports and other research documents to Elias, the people familiar with the matter said. It is unclear how or how much of that information was shared with the campaign and DNC, and who in those organizations was aware of the roles of Fusion GPS and Steele.

Let me remind you of the basic facts about the Dossier--It consists of 13 separate reports. The first is dated 20 June 2016. That date is important because it shows that it took a little more than two months for Fusion GPS to generate its first report on Trump's alleged Russian activities. If Fusion GPS already had something in the can then I would expect them to have put something out in early May. Eleven more reports were generated between 26 July and 19 October 2016. That tracks with the letter from Perkins Coie that the engagement by the Clinton Campaign ended at the end of October.

But there is a big problem and unanswered question--The Dossier includes a final report that is dated 13 December 2016. Who paid for this? Was it John McCain?

McCain??!! Why do I bring him up. Do you recall the case of Aleksei Gubarev?

I wrote previously about Aleksej Gubarev, a Cypriot based chief executive of the network solutions firm XBT Holdings, who filed suit against Christopher Steele and Orbis Business Intelligence Ltd, for defamation over their role in the publication of the Trump Dossier (which first  appeared in Buzzfeed).

Aleksej Gubarev, claims he and his companies were falsely linked in the dossier to the Russia-backed computer hacking of Democratic Party figures. Gubarev, 36, also is seeking unspecified damages from Buzzfeed and its top editor, Ben Smith, in a parallel lawsuit filed in Miami. 

 

Lawyers for Christopher Steele and Orbis Business Intelligence in the United Kingdom filed a response with the British court. Rowan Scarborough obtained a copy of the document and posted it on-line in April. The defense document is both illuminating and damning (I don't know how I missed this when it came out in April). This is a sworn legal document and it presents the following facts:

 

1. Orbis Business Intelligence was engaged by Fusion GPS sometime in early June 2016 to prepare a series of confidential memorandum based on intelligence concerning Russian efforts to influence the U.S. Presidential election process and links between Russia and Donald Trump (the first memo was dated 20 June 2016).

 

2. Fusion GPS is run by three former Wall Street Journal reporters: Glenn Simpson; Tom Catan; and Peter Fritsch. (According to the New York Times, Fusion GPS was originally hired by a Republican donor – who has not been publicly identified – to dig up dirt on Trump in 2015. After Trump won the nomination, the firm began working with Democrats and honed in on Trump's links to Russia.)

 

3. Senator John McCain, accompanied by David Kramer (a Senior Director at Senator McCain's Institute for International Leadership), met in London with an Associate of Orbis, former British Ambassador Sir Andrew Wood, to arrange a subsequent meeting with Christopher Steele in order to read the now infamous Steele Dossier. 

 

4. David Kramer and Christopher Steele met in Surrey on 28 November 2016, where Kramer was briefed on the contents of the memos.

 

5. Once Senator McCain and David Kramer returned to the United States, arrangements were made for Fusion GPS to provide Senator McCain hard copies of the memoranda.

 

6. After Donald Trump was elected, Christopher Steele prepared an additional memorandum (dated 13 December 2016) that made the following claims:

• Michael Cohen held a secret meeting in Prague, Czechoslovakia in August 2016 with Kremlin operatives.
• Cohen, allegedly accompanied by 3 colleagues (Not Further Identified), met with Oleg SOLODUKHIM to discuss on how deniable cash payments were to be made to hackers who had worked in Europe under Kremlin direction against the Clinton campaign and various contingencies for covering up these operations and Moscow's secret liaison with the Trump team more generally.
• In Prague, Cohen agreed (sic) contingency plans for various scenarios to protect the operation, but in particular what was to be done in the event that Hillary Clinton won the Presidency.
• Sergei Ivanov's associate claimed that payments to hackers had been made by both Trump's team and the Kremlin.

[Note--Michael Cohen denies he was ever in Prague.]

7. Christopher Steele passed a copy of the December memo to a senior UK Government national security official and to Fusion GPS (via encrypted email) with the instruction to give a hard copy to Senator McCain via David Kramer.

Here is the key takeaway. After the Clinton Campaign and the DNC ended their relationship with Fusion GPS, why did John McCain and his staffer enter the picture and start receiving derogatory information about Donald Trump? Was there any communication or coordination between John McCain and Hillary Clinton's people regarding the findings of Fusion GPS? Or was this a unilateral move by McCain?

The Washington Post reporters claim that, "After the election, the FBI agreed to pay Steele to continue gathering intelligence, but the bureau pulled out of the arrangement after Steele was publicly identified." Who told the FBI about the Fusion GPS effort and the Steele reports? Was it McCain? Was it the Clinton campaign? Was it someone connected with the CIA or the NSA? There are some significant unanswered questions.

This takes on greater importance once you comprehend how entangled Hillary Clinton was with foreign governments. The story about Hillary Clinton's role in helping approve the sale of U.S. uranium to a Russian company involves a lot of money flowing into Clinton coffers:

As the Russians gradually assumed control of Uranium One in three separate transactions from 2009 to 2013, Canadian records show, a flow of cash made its way to the Clinton Foundation. Uranium One’s chairman used his family foundation to make four donations totaling $2.35 million. Those contributions were not publicly disclosed by the Clintons, despite an agreement Mrs. Clinton had struck with the Obama White House to publicly identify all donors. Other people with ties to the company made donations as well.

And shortly after the Russians announced their intention to acquire a majority stake in Uranium One, Mr. Clinton received $500,000 for a Moscow speech from a Russian investment bank with links to the Kremlin that was promoting Uranium One stock.

 The story does not stop there. There also is Ukraine. This story was first reported by Politico:

Ukrainian government officials tried to help Hillary Clinton and undermine Trump by publicly questioning his fitness for office. They also disseminated documents implicating a top Trump aide in corruption and suggested they were investigating the matter, only to back away after the election. And they helped Clinton’s allies research damaging information on Trump and his advisers, a Politico investigation found.

A Ukrainian-American operative who was consulting for the Democratic National Committee met with top officials in the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington in an effort to expose ties between Trump, top campaign aide Paul Manafort and Russia, according to people with direct knowledge of the situation.

The Ukrainian efforts had an impact in the race, helping to force Manafort’s resignation and advancing the narrative that Trump’s campaign was deeply connected to Ukraine’s foe to the east, Russia.

 Smearing Russia with disinformation appears to be at the heart of the story that alleges Putin ordered and directed the hacking of the DNC emails. It is no coincidence that the firm and person behind that story, CrowdStrike and Dmitri Alperovich respectively, don't like Putin and Russia. 

. . .the only evidence that a break-in even occurred comes from a private cyber-security firm, CrowdStrike Inc. of Irvine, California, that the DNC hired to look into the breach.

Since when do the cops rely on a private eye to look into a murder rather than performing an investigation of their own? CrowdStrike, moreover, turns out to be highly suspect. Not only is Dmitri Alperovich, its chief technical officer, a Russian émigré with a pronounced anti-Putin tilt, but he is also an associate of a virulently anti-Russian outfit known as the Atlantic Council, a Washington think tank funded by the Saudis, the United Arab Emirates, the Ukrainian World Congress, the U.S. State Department and a variety of other individuals and groups that have an interest in isolating or discrediting Russia.

The Atlantic Council puts out a stream of anti-Kremlin articles and reports with scary headlines like “Distract Deceive Destroy: Putin at War in Syria” and “Six Immediate Steps to Stop Putin’s Aggression.”

Since the Atlantic Council is also a long-time supporter of Hillary Clinton, this means that the Clinton campaign relied on a friendly anti-Putin cyber-sleuth to tell it what everyone involved wanted to hear, i.e. that the Kremlin was at the bottom of it all. If this strikes you as fishy, it should.

The peeling of the onion only has begun. Still to be exposed in greater detail are the activities of the CIA, under John Brennan, and the NSA, under Mike Rogers, in searching for and disseminating information that would damage Trump and prevent him from taking office. I am told by knowledgeable friends that there is plenty of fire behind this smoke.

While the mainstream media is trying desperately to ignore this story, the weight of evidence of foreign meddling aided and abetted by Hillary Clinton and the Democrats is growing. The effort to smear Trump is losing steam, which may be a partial explanation for the hysteria demonstrated by Senators Corker and Flake yesterday. They are throwing wild verbal punches with a clear air of desperation and fear. The truth is that as this investigation of Fusion GPS unfolds that mainstream establishment Republicans, like McCain, will have political blood on their hands. Not likely to be a pretty picture in Washington, D.C.

Comments

[Eric Newhill]

PT,
Just to check my level set, as I understand it, Uranium One isn't exactly as Trump's dumbed down sound bite for mass consumption has it, yet it is, ultimately pretty bad.

What I [think] I understand; A Canadian company, Uranium One, controls significant Uranium mining rights all over the globe; including in the US. The Russians proposed, and eventually received, approval to purchase a controlling interest in the company. Clinton is a member of the committee that assessed the proposed purchase. Obama had the final say, but the president tends to rubber stamp a deal. During the time +/- the proposed Russian purchase of controlling interest was being considered by SFIUS (the committee) the Clinton Foundation began receiving large sums of money from Canadian sources related to the deal.

The Russians cannot actually take the 20% of US uranium they now control out of the country (though some reports are that they have). However, we (Americans) would have to have Russian cooperation to access 20% of Uranium in US soil. The real kicker here is that the Russians, through Uranium One, gained access to much larger uranium deposits in Kazakhstan and that Uranium can be moved to wherever the Russians desire. In fact, it is likely that access to that uranium is why the Russians were interested in Uranium One. So that was handed to them by the Obama admin. and Clinton.

Sound about right?

[Publius Tacitus]

Yep. That sums it up.

[DianaLC]

Great information. Thank you for lining everything out so clearly.

I have not read the Dossier, of course. I have read reports about some of its most bizarre contentions, especially those about Trump's supposed activities in Russian hotel rooms. Those made me wonder how anyone would take the Dossier seriously in the first place.

But then I thought to myself, "Isn't that stuff that Bill Clinton would find credible? And now that I think of it, it's also stuff that dirty old man McCain might also find credible.

Your reporting on the facts of the case is very helpful. But my gut reaction about the nature of Bill and John has also confirmed your conclusion. As for Hillary, there is nothing but gross ambition in her and no real moral compass. I can clearly seeing her doing this so she could try to explain "what happened" in regard to the loss of her chance to get back into the WH.

[Castellio]

This is from the wikileaks on Uranium One, and I quote it to bring in the name of Frank Giustra:

"In 2007 Uranium One acquired a controlling interest in UrAsia Energy, a Canadian firm with headquarters in Vancouver, from Frank Giustra. UrAsia Energy has interests in rich uranium operations in Kazakhstan. UrAsia Energy's acquisition of its Kazakhstan uranium interests from Kazatomprom followed a trip to Almaty in 2005 by Giustra and former U.S. President Bill Clinton where they met with Nursultan Nazarbayev, the leader of Kazakhstan. Substantial contributions to the Clinton Foundation by Giustra followed, with Clinton, Giustra, and Mexican telecommunications billionaire Carlos Slim in 2007 establishing the Clinton Foundation's Clinton Giustra Sustainable Growth Initiative to combat poverty in the developing world. In addition to his initial contribution of $100 million Giustra pledged to contribute half of his future earnings from mining to the initiative."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uranium_One

[Kooshy]

PT exelent work, unfortunately I don’t see MSM is willing to expand and spread this. From what I see they have already started to divert and contain it.

[SM]

Rinat Akmetshin was at Halifax Conference with McCain in December 2016.

[SM]

Kazakh official who transferred Kazakh uranium assets to Clinton's associates later sentenced to 14 years for corruption. Investigators need to look at who owned stock in acquisition.

[DavidKNZ]

It will be interesting to see how/if "The Establishment" manages to bury this unwinding scandal

The NY Times provided details in 2015, but so far, no follow up
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/24/us/cash-flowed-to-clinton-foundation-as-russians-pressed-for-control-of-uranium-company.html

John Helmer, an Australian reporter domiciled in Moscow notes:
http://johnhelmer.net/favour-for-hillary-clinton-did-she-take-money-from-russian-oligarch-oleg-deripaska-for-favour-in-general-motors-opel-deal/

Helmer ('Dancing with Bears') is worth watching - he regularly provides detailed references to the machinations of the Russian Oligarchy. These are a useful wakeup call to those overly idealise Putin / Russia

[TV]

After 9/11, the FBI should have been cleaned out for incompetence.
Now, it needs to be cleaned out for corruption.
And I don't mean most of the "feebs" in the field;they're just keeping their heads down to get to their pension.
It's the top that's dirty - and apparently no more competent.
Then the DOJ - an arm of the Democrat party - needs to be cleaned out, including the so-called "non-partisan career professionals".....LMAO.

[Peter AU]

Back when following MH17, I found it took leaps of faith to follow Helmer across the large gaps between solid facts.
your linked article appears no different, linking articles from guardian, NYT, and other similar publications as facts.
Rather than linking directly to a transcript of what Putin has said, helmer will link to a NYT or guarding article for their take on what has been said. This is why it is difficult to take Helmer seriously.

[Randy]

The first atom bombs used uranium as fuel. Hydrogen bombs use plutonium and hydrogen. Hydrogen bombs are an order or more of magnitude more powerful.

So the Russians got some uranium, big deal. Like everything else blown orders of magnitude out of proportion but the Clintons have their greedy fingers in everything they can make a buck at. They deserve to be taken down HARD!

Correct me if I am wrong.

[Peter in Toronto]

Does anyone here actually know what the deal with McCain is?

What is his purpose in this chicanery? How does he get elected in Arizona when he doesn't even serve his constituents, and is more often than not, pursuing some sort of war in a distant part of the world, or acting as an agent on behalf of the security interests of Israel?

[blue peacock]

PT,

What do your sources tell you about how compromised Mueller is? He's been around a long time in the midst of a lot of DC shenanigans. He seems to epitomize a Swamp creature.

For those sleuthing around, there is an interesting factoid. The Democrat law firm that paid Fusion GPS for the Steele dossier, also paid Crowdstrike to "investigate" the DNC email "leak".

The Clinton's have always been among the sleaziest politicians at the highest levels of our government. They have felt invincible as they have in many ways lead the Democrat party apparat for a long time and were in the same policy mindset as the top GOP establishment.

It was clear during the general election and during the transition that there was a concerted campaign to oust Trump through innuendo and media hysteria by top leaders of both political parties, key intel agency leaders and the entirety of the MSM. Why did they do this? What are they afraid of?

I am most interested in the role of the intelligence agencies in this soft coup as Col. Lang has labeled it. I have read earlier that McCain had discussions with Comey about the Steele dossier. The FBI seems to have paid Steele or a business associated with him. Clearly, Clapper and Brennan were media hogs pitching the "Russians subverted our democracy colluding with the Trump campaign" story. What role did they play and what role did the top echelons at the CIA and the DNI play. What were the arrangements between MI6 and US intel agencies? Steele was their guy. Why did they feel the need to interfere in a US election? There can be no doubt they did not act alone. It is an easy deduction that they worked closely with their US counterparts. Where was the NSA in all this? They hoover all electronic communications. How does the unmasking requests made by Susan Rice and Samantha Powers play into this? And finally what did Barack Hussein Obama know and what did he authorize?

This is not about Trump. This is about an attempted soft coup hatched and executed at the highest levels. This is the real subversion of democracy and our republic. The lid needs to be blown on this. And IMO, it will not come about through Mueller, Sessions, MSM, et al.

[blue peacock]

Frank Giustra comes up a lot. He's a key player and big funder of the Clinton Foundation. I have read that he setup a charitable trust in Canada where there is less scrutiny to funnel money to the Clintons and others.

The Clintons played an instrumental role with Kazakhstan. And there obviously was some quid pro quo. I believe what Nazarbayev got was international acceptance considering he was putting the screws on his political opposition through repression.

[different clue]

Randy,

The uranium might be for nuclear power. And if nuclear power remains much in use, the uranium would remain very valuable.

[TV]

McCain's constituents have had multiple chances to fix their original mnistake
They apparently like being represented by two "flakes."
And, BTW, my niece was a staffer on the Senate Armed Services Committee and had multiple interactions with McCain; he is NOT a nice guy.

[TV]

Especially NOT Sessions.
He apparently spends his days hiding underneath his desk.

[bks]

Utter nonsense. When Clinton does something every other candidate does (oppo research) conservative heads explode. As far as we know, every word of the Steele Dossier (originally paid for by the GOP) is true.

[mikee]

Plutonium does not exist naturally. It is created from Uranium.

[Aka]

So the Kremlin does not have enough money to pay their hackers?
I mean who come up with this info?

[Tidewater]

I disagree. Helmer is an old pro. He has a lot of reliable sources, quite obviously. And why shouldn't he? He's been in Russia and in the newspaper business a long time. Example is his article which Yves Smith published at Naked Capitalism-- "John Helmer: Parsing the Dossier on Trump's Alleged Bedroom Antics." Helmer may not be able to answer the question whether or not Steele is in step with MI-6 in pushing the dossier, but it seems to me he gives a good background picture as to why Steele, at 52, should be out in the cold. Helmer, in London, is able to get the evaluation of Steele privately held by a number of different intelligence officers who knew him, and knew his career, and the whole background, which is no mean feat for a reporter. Steele doesn't come out of Helmer's inquiries looking good at all. Which is not what the American MSM was saying. Which simply corroborates some of the visible facts of Steele's career. He was blown by 1996 and the Russian intelligence service told him so whenever it was (earlier?) that they stole his wife's favorite shoes before an important party. But he did get his pension after twenty and then was out. Which left him desperate to make some money, given his expensive style of life, a million dollar plus house, surely private school fees for his children, a new wife, etc. etc. Helmer is one of the best on the early revelations about Steele.

Then there is again on Naked Capitalism, and surely Dances with Bears, "JOHN HELMER: MH17--the Lie to End All Truths, and New Evidence." (September 19, 2015.) In this article --actually there were a number of them--Helmer scrutinizes the report of Dutch State Prosecutor Fred Westerbeke and certain evidence that Westerbeke lets slip, including the fact that there were only 25 metal fragments found in the victim's bodies. If a BUK had been used that is an impossibility.

Helmer also examines the report of the Coroners Court of Victoria, Australia, in some detail. He states that the Australians are withholding forensic evidence and that there is something badly wrong with the report.

Helmer's reporting is very good, very thorough, and he has worked hard to tell the West that there is something disgracefully wrong with the whole MH17 investigation. It is 'stonewall and coverup', as was said during Watergate. Further, Helmer makes the interesting claim that both Obama and Putin know what happened almost immediately.

Noone has refuted Helmer, to the best of my knowledge. The West has just let MH17 slide.

So in re Helmer: Credit where credit is due.

[Pacifica Advocate]

It would not be far-fetched speculation that the Russians' proposed purchase of interest in Uranium One was accompanied by an "or else--", either perceived or implied.

Kazakhstan remains firmly within the Russian orbit of influence, and it is run as a fiefdom by a vicious strongman. The payments that bought the company in Canada could just as easily have been delivered to the boss of Kazakhstan, and the same result we have now achieved--with the added bonus (for the Russians) of a critical hit to a Canadian company, as well as denial of access to U.S. and Canadian consumers. Seen that way, the purchase was almost certainly the best choice among a set of bad choices.

[Publius Tacitus]

You are indulging in utter nonsense. This was not oppo research. This was pure disinformation and smear. If you actually read the 13 reports you'd understand that. But it is clear you are intellectually dishonest and willing to make excuses for inexcusable conduct.

[JamesT]

How do you know that the leader of Kazakhstan is a vicious strongman (more vicious I take it than, say, the leader of UAE)?

[JamesT]

My personal working theory is that The Establishment has decided to toss Hillary under the bus. They can milk months if not years of "Russian criminal behaviour" from this story. My understanding is that bribes were paid, and I imagine some criminal conspiracy took place that involved some Russians.

Everyone is expendable to The Establishment, and perhaps (just perhaps) Hillary has outlived her usefulness.