GOP Holds Another Hearing to Berate the FBI, Ends Up Exposing Trump’s ‘Cesspool of Corruption’

FBI director Christopher Wray appeared before the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday to respond to Republican yowling about the agency’s investigations into Donald Trump and his ever growing rap sheet of crimes. The former occupier of the White House has already been indicted on over 70 counts ranging from obstruction of justice to mishandling classified documents.

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Jim Jordan, Biden's Emails

The Judiciary Committee, chaired by ultra MAGA minion, Jim Jordan, is seeking to slander the FBI for allegedly “weaponizing” the Department of Justice and persecuting poor beleaguered Dear Leader Trump. This is an objective that Jordan and the GOP have been attempting to pursue, with decidedly disastrous results, ever since assuming their bare majority in the House.

SEE THIS: New GOP Subcommittee Chair Openly Admits His Only Purpose is to ‘Make Life Hell’ for Democrats

The hearing on Wednesday provided Democrats an opportunity to counter the dishonest Republican narrative that federal law enforcement was conspiring to destroy Trump and his anti-American MAGA movement. Among the Democratic representatives who availed themselves of this opportunity was California Rep. Ted Lieu. His well composed litany of the cretinous nature of the Trump administration was both informative and chilling. And he made his points simply by asking Wray a series of simple questions…

  • Trump adviser Roger Stone was convicted in a federal court, correct?
  • Trump donor Elliott Broidy was convicted in a federal court, correct?
  • Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort was convicted in federal court, correct?
  • Trump’s former deputy campaign manager Rick Gates was convicted in federal court, correct?
  • Trump’s campaign foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos was convicted in federal court, correct?

Lieu actually left out a few of Trump’s most conspicuous criminal cohorts, including Rudy Giuliani, Jeff Clark, Peter Navarro, Steve Bannon, Tom Barrack, Michael Flynn, and Allen Weisselberg. However, he delivered a succinct summary that put the criminality of Trump’s tenure in perspective…

“What these facts show is that we don’t have a two-tier system of justice. We have one Department of Justice that goes after criminals regardless of party ideology. All of these folks were convicted under the administrations of three separate Republican attorneys general (Jeff Sessions, Matt Whitaker, and Bill Barr). It is not the fault of the FBI that Donald Trump surrounded himself with criminals. Donald Trump brought that on himself. Thank you to the FBI for exposing the cesspool of corruption of these Trump associates.”

And therein lies the root of the problem that Republicans have with law enforcement. Even when their own officials – including Wray himself, a Trump appointee – administer justice fairly and without political bias, Republicans will revolt if their own members are found to be crooks. That’s because they care more about their grip on power than about their country.

The undisputed champion of this malicious mauling of American justice is, of course, Trump himself. From his earliest campaign chants of “lock her up” directed at Hillary Clinton who had never been convicted or even charged with a crime, to his recent lament that Hunter Biden wasn’t executed for using drugs and not paying his taxes. Trump complained on his floundering Twitter ripoff, Truth Social, that U.S. Attorney David Weiss (another Trump appointee) was a “coward” because he let Hunter off with “a traffic ticket instead of a death sentence.” But to the GOP it is Democrats who are “weaponizing” justice. And they will continue to hold these sham hearings even though they inevitably just humiliate themselves.

RELATED: Scared and Desperate Trump Begs Congress to Save Him From the Meanies Prosecuting His Crimes

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McCarthy Threatens FBI Director with Contempt for Not Aiding His Petty Persecution of Biden

The Republican controlled House of Representatives has rapidly proven that it has no real interest in governing and is utterly unfit to do so. Since assuming the barest of majorities, its concerted efforts to smear Democrats have fallen flat as they held hearings that produced little more than rancid allegations with no basis in reality.

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Kevin McCarthy, House Speaker (Squeaker)

Nevertheless, the Republican crusaders continue to pursue their political theatrics with casts of dubious characters as witnesses and fantastical stories as testimony. James Comer, the chairman of the House Oversight Committee, leads the GOP’s Bogus Scandal Caucus with ludicrous hearings aimed solely at maligning President Biden and other Democrats.

SEE THIS: HOW CONVENIENT: GOP Oversight Committee Chair Says He Can’t Find His Star Witness Against Biden

On Tuesday House Squeaker Kevin McCarthy visited with his propaganda cohorts on Fox News to complain that FBI Director, Chris Wray, has declined to turn over a document that Comer seeks as part of his Biden persecution. McCarthy falsely insisted that he has jurisdiction over the FBI and demanded that they obey his dictate…

“I personally called Director Wray and told him he needs to send that document. Today is the deadline. So let me not tell just you, let me tell Director Christopher Wray right here, right now. If he misses the deadline today, I am prepared to move contempt charges against him.”

McCarthy threatened Wray and the FBI with contempt of Congress if they don’t comply with his petulant demand, saying that “they are not above the law.” Which is particularly ironic considering that McCarthy himself failed to comply with a congressional subpoena last year that was issued by the Select Committee investigating the January 6th insurrection that Donald Trump incited.

SEE ALSO: HUH? Squeaker McCarthy Admits that He Ignored Subpoenas in His Denial that He Ignored Subpoenas

To no one’s surprise, the FBI told Comer and McCarthy that they would not be providing the document in question. Consequently, Comer announced that his Committee “will now be taking steps to hold FBI Director Wray in contempt of Congress.” And you can bet that Wray is shaking in his boots. His boss, Attorney General Merrick Garland, is not likely to proceed with any legal action against Wray. And that’s not because of politics, but because there is no legal justification for it. For the record, the FBI rejected Comer’s original request weeks ago saying that…

“It is critical to the integrity of the entire criminal justice process and to the fulfillment of our law enforcement duties that FBI avoid revealing information — including unverified or incomplete information — that could harm investigations, prejudice prosecutions or judicial proceedings, unfairly violate privacy or reputational interests, or create misimpressions in the public.”

Wray also previously advised the Committee of “the importance of us protecting sources and methods and ongoing investigations.” And an FBI spokesperson told the Committee that “there are strict Justice Department guidelines about when that information can be provided outside of the FBI.” He further educated the GOP inquisitors that the document they seek (an FD-1023 form) is “used by FBI agents to record unverified reporting from a confidential human source.” He elaborated saying that…

“An FD-1023 form documents information as told to a line FBI agent. Recording the information does not validate the information, establish its credibility, or weigh it against other information known or developed by the FBI. The mere existence of such a document would establish little beyond the fact that a confidential human source provided information and the FBI recorded it. Indeed, the FBI regularly receives information from sources with significant potential biases, motivations, and knowledge, including drug traffickers, members of organized crime, or even terrorists.”

In other words, the GOP’s desired document might just be the dishonest ravings of a partisan player with a political axe to grind. It would be irresponsible to disseminate that information as it could defame others and irreparably damage reputations. Which is precisely why Republicans want it. It is their mission to defame and damage their political foes.

Wray knows that McCarthy and Comer cannot be trusted with unverified reports. They would just exploit them for political purposes. And their whining about not getting the information is brazenly hypocritical. During the course of their congressional hearings they have refused to provide information that would validate their accusations. They won’t even give that information to Democrats on the Committee, in violation of committee rules. Their sole objective is to attack Democrats in order to advance their own electoral prospects in the future. They have even said so explicitly…

SEE THIS: New GOP Subcommittee Chair Openly Admits His Only Purpose is to ‘Make Life Hell’ for Democrats

UPDATE: FBI director Chris Wray agreed to allow access to the FD-1023 form. However, even after doing so, Republicans maintained their threat to find Wray in contempt of Congress.

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Tucker Carlson Insanely Accuses the FBI of Orchestrating Trump’s Capitol Insurrection

Three weeks ago, Republicans in Congress blocked the formation of a bipartisan committee to investigate the circumstances that led to Donald Trump’s Capitol Hill insurrection. They did this despite the fact that the they themselves were the targets of violent insurrectionists.

Fox News, Tucker Carlson, QAnon

Never mind that they also did it to protect themselves and Trump from the disclosure that they were complicit in the deadly riots. And forget about their gaslighting allegations that the rioters were really members of the fictional Antifa group disguised as Trump supporters, which the investigation could have looked into. The GOP was too afraid of what the probe would reveal to allow it to proceed.

Meanwhile, Fox News has done it’s best to muddy the waters around the atrocities that took place on January 6th. And on Tuesday Fox’s Senior White Nationalist, Tucker Carlson, turned the crazy up to eleven. Carlson began his tirade with a story about a Black murder suspect who allegedly said that he was targeting white people. Which is just the sort of rare story that bigots like Carlson love to bring up, even though they they never talk about the much more common incidence of white racist hate crimes.

Carlson lashed out at Attorney General Merrick Garland, who he called “thoroughly craven.” He claimed that Garland said that “we must now use law enforcement and military force to arrest, imprison, and otherwise crush anyone who leads opposition to Joe Biden’s government.” Which, of course, Garland never came anywhere close to saying.

But this was just a teaser for his main subject that had nothing to do with his intro. Instead, he launched into a bizarre series of totally unfounded accusations that the FBI had orchestrated the insurrection (video below). There’s actually more evidence that the Trump White House was behind it. Ignoring reality, Carlson said that…

“We know the government is hiding the identity of many law enforcement officers who were present at the capitol on January 6 […and that…] According to the government’s own court filings, those law enforcement officers participated in the riot. Sometimes in violent ways. We know that because […] some people who participated in the riot haven’t been charged. Look at the documents. The government calls these people “unindicted co-conspirators.” What does that mean? It means that in potentially every case, they’re FBI operatives.”

HUH? Carlson is connecting dots in his warped imagination. First of all, there are no government court filings that say that “law enforcement officers participated in the riot.” But Carlson “knows” because of the existence of “unindicted co-conspirators,” who, for some unexplained reason, must be FBI operatives.

Carlson mistakenly believes that two people identified only as “unindicted co-conspirators” were, by some deranged logic, “almost certainly working for the FBI.” This is astonishingly stupid, even for Carlson and Fox News. The government isn’t in the habit of tagging their own operatives as unindicted co-conspirators. Also, that designation is most often used when suspects are cooperating with law enforcement, or when the case is still under investigation.

Carlson repeatedly, and falsely, asserts that government documents admit their participation in the insurrection. There are no such documents. What’s more, Carlson lied that “the FBI director admitted the bureau is infiltrating as many dissident groups as it possibly could.” Which the FBI director actually never said. According to Carlson himself, Director Wray only said that “Any time there is an attack […] we are focused very, very hard on how could we get better sources, better information, better analysis” to prevent it from happening again.

Carlson somehow stretched that innocuous statement into the wildly left field charge that the government was “paying people to organize a violent action.” And Carlson went on to reprise the crackpot conspiracy theory that the FBI was also complicit in the 9/11 attacks, saying that “They’re using the same tactics.”

It’s endlessly fascinating how the ridiculous right can reinterpret their own dishonest propaganda. They have claimed that the Capitol Hill insurrectionists were actually Antifa or Black Lives Matter. They have also claimed that the insurrectionists weren’t rioters at all, but just ordinary tourists. Trump said that they “posed zero threat.” So long as you don’t count the five dead, and dozens of injured, Capitol police. Carlson himself characterized the insurrectionists as peaceful protesters.

These are all positions that they share with Vladimir Putin. And now they claim that the whole affair was an FBI operation. They really need to make up their lying minds. Or maybe not. After all, Fox News has (successfully) argued in court that, given his reputation, “no reasonable person” would believe his bullpucky. Unfortunately, that doesn’t make him less dangerous or his goals, and those of Fox News, less onerous.

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Kayleigh McEnany Tells Fox News She Was SHOCKED By the Violence – that Trump Incited

On Tuesday morning the newest member of the Fox News family made her debut on the conservative propaganda network. Former Donald Trump Press Secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, sat for an interview with Fox’s Harris Faulkner. The segment was as jam-packed with the lies and worshipful adoration that was typical of her many prior appearances on Fox News and her infrequent, always hostile, White House press briefings.

Kayleigh McEnany, Donald Trump

McEnany’s interview aired while FBI Director Christopher Wray was testifying before the Senate about the January 6th Capitol riots. CNN and MSNBC were airing the hearing. Fox News apparently considered McEnany’s interview more newsworthy. Although the riots were a featured part of the interview:

“I think at the beginning of the day before everyone went to the rally, everyone was expecting peace. […] And then as those events transpired, it was disbelief, shock, somber, sad, horrified by the violence. and it was a very hard, difficult day in the White House, there was no doubt. It was a, I should say, widespread feeling, synonymous feeling, completely. A feeling that everyone felt just completely condemning the actions of that day.”

https://twitter.com/TVNewsHQ/status/1366523851300098050

If McEnany was “shocked” by the tragic events that resulted in five deaths and numerous injuries, she must have been in a self-induced coma. The FBI had issued warnings of anticipated hostilities prior to Trump’s inflammatory cult rally. According to the Washington Post

“A day before rioters stormed Congress, an FBI office in Virginia issued an explicit warning that extremists were preparing to travel to Washington to commit violence and ‘war.'” […]

“[T]he alarming Jan. 5 intelligence document was shared ‘with all our law enforcement partners’ through the joint terrorism task force, which includes the U.S. Capitol Police, the U.S. Park Police, D.C. police, and other federal and local agencies.”

What’s more, McEnany’s assertion that there were “synonamous” [sic] feelings of disbelief and horror doesn’t align with the reality as described at the time by former Trump aides who said that “Trump enjoyed watching the events unfold. He was ‘loving watching the Capitol mob.'” Trump himself, in reluctant remarks made hours after the riots began, told the rioters that “We love you,” and that “You’re very special.” The interview continued with Faulkner asking McEnany whether she thought Trump bore any responsibility. Guess what she said:

“No, no I don’t. […] What those rioters did, you know the left says he’s responsible, he’s incited this – or even other Republicans – What I would say to them, well these rioters, if they were so inspired by what the President was saying – they left the speech early because reportedly they showed up at the Capitol before the end of his speech – and then they did the exact opposite of what he said. He said march peacefully and patriotically, and they did the opposite.”

Of course, McEnany is highlighting a few incidental seconds in Trump’s speech at the rally. She’s leaving out months of Trump’s incendiary rhetoric as well as his exhortation at the rally that “if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.”

McEneny went on to describe some people she met months earlier during the campaign who were nice to her, as if that excused the actions of the Trump Insurrectionists. She insisted that the violence was done by people who “do not represent our movement,” despite Trump’s loving embrace of them. She also lied about the focus in the White House being on maintaining peace, contrary to reports by House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy who, in a desperate and profanity-laced phone call, begged Trump for more security, but was told by Trump that the rioters cared more about the election results than McCarthy did.

For the record, McEnany is contradicting Trump, who now says that he requested 10,000 National Guard troops prior to the rally. That, of course, is also a lie. If he had done so, they would have been there. And let’s not forget that McEnany is just as guilty of propagating the Big Lie about the election being “stolen” as Trump is. She also swore that the coronavirus would never come to the United States. Now she’s following her Trump administration colleague, Larry Kudlow, into the Fox News bubble where they can lie with impunity and get paid big bucks for it. Never mind the harm it does politically, and even physically, as we learned on January 6th.

The one truthful statement that McEnany made in this interview was that Trump “changed the Republican Party forever.” Curiously, she portrayed that in a positive light, despite his having presided over the loss of the House, the Senate, and the presidency, and being the lowest rated president in history. He even failed to impress the crowd at the Conservative Political Action Cult (CPAC), where he drew support for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination from only 55% of the attendees. And if that’s the best he can do in a made-for-Trump crowd, he’s looking at losing again in 2024, if he’s dumb enough to run (which he is).

UPDATE: McEnany has already been promoted to co-host of Fox’s Outnumbered>

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How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
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Attorney Genuflect Bill Barr has Fully Morphed Into a Fox News Trump-Fluffer

On Monday the Inspector General of the Justice Department released his report on the origins of the Russia probe. The top-line conclusion was that it “did not find documentary or testimonial evidence that political bias or improper motivation influenced the FBI.” Yet somehow Trump embraced the report with delusional glee. He even boasted that it was “one of our great achievements.”

William Barr, Donald Trump

Now Trump’s Attorney Genuflect, Bill Barr, is disputing the very same IG Report that a deranged Trump said was a victory for him. This is the sequel to the aftermath of the report by special counsel Robert Mueller, when Trump insisted that it “totally exonerated” him, while simultaneously disparaging it as a hoax and a witch hunt. It takes a mind that is either brazenly dishonest or severely dysfunctional to attack a report that you also claim vindicates you. But that is what Trump did then, and is reprising now.

Barr was interviewed by NBC’s Pete Williams on Tuesday morning (video below). The whole interview was a bizarre affair that exposed Barr’s flagrant biases and his abandonment of principle, integrity, and honesty. He demonstrated that he is not the Attorney General for the people of the United States, but a shill for private citizen Trump. His remarks reflected the glassy-eyed devotion of a cult follower whose adoration for Dear Leader is unflappable. Barr began by dismissing three years of criminality by Trump and Company:

“I think our nation was turned on its head for three years based on a completely bogus narrative that was largely fanned and hyped by a completely irresponsible press.”

Barr is forgetting that in the past three years many of Trump’s closest associates have been indicted and convicted, including Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, George Papadopoulos, Micheal Cohen, and Roger Stone. And there were dozens of other indictments that are still pending. Plus, Mueller’s report found at least 270 contacts between the Trump team and Russia-linked operatives. That is hardly the result of a “bogus narrative.”

By blaming his slanderous criticisms on the press, Barr is just parroting his White House Overlord and the glassy-eyed sycophants on Fox News. The AG continued in this vein sounding more like Sean Hannity and Alex Jones than the chief law enforcement officer of the nation. Barr made the ludicrous and unsupported assertion that Trump “was clearly spied upon” by the FBI. Then he continued saying that…

“From a civil liberties standpoint, the greatest danger to our free system is that the incumbent government use the apparatus of the state … both to spy on political opponents but also to use them in a way that could affect the outcome of an election.”

First of all, Trump was not spied on, he was investigated. Barr is using language that is deliberately prejudicial. No police officer engaged in collecting evidence would ever say that they were “spying” on a murder suspect. What’s more, the FBI wasn’t even investigating Trump. They were legitimately probing the suspicious activities of individuals connected to his campaign.

It’s also troubling that Barr refers to valid and justified FBI investigations as “the greatest danger” to our system of government. Apparently he thinks it’s worse than Russians hacking our elections and launching massive campaigns of propaganda in support of Trump. Barr also doesn’t seem concerned that Trump “used the apparatus” – not of the state – but of a foreign state “in a way that could affect the outcome of an election.’ This was evidently not a problem for Barr. In fact, he appears to think it’s commonplace and acceptable:

“Presidential campaigns are frequently in contact with foreign persons. And indeed, in most campaigns there are signs of illegal foreign money coming in.”

WHAT? That’s not only false, it’s insane. No campaign professional would agree that such contact occurs “frequently,” if ever. And if Barr has proof that “most campaigns” are receiving “illegal foreign money,” why on Earth isn’t he prosecuting anyone?

He went on to falsely state that “there was and never has been any evidence of collusion” with Russia. In fact, the Mueller Report said that, while he could not unequivocally establish such collusion, there was actual evidence. Just not enough to indict. What’s more, Mueller affirmed that Trump “welcomed and encouraged” Russian interference in the 2016 election, and then sought to cover it up. That alone should warrant his impeachment.

On Tuesday morning Trump relaunched his attack on the FBI. This time against Christopher Wray, the FBI Director that Trump himself appointed. Wray’s offense was to affirm the findings of the independent Inspector General. The one Barr that is discrediting and publicly humiliating. Bill Barr is a disgrace to the office of Attorney General. He deserves to be impeached and removed from office every bit as much as Trump does. He is purposefully reorganizing the Justice Department as the defense team and PR operation for a corrupt president. And isn’t that Fox News’ job?

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Trump Says Hollywood is Racist Because of Alleged Bias Against – Conservatives?

The rise of white supremacy and openly bigoted white nationalist groups has been going on for many years and has intensified since the election of Donald Trump. It’s so obvious that even Trump’s own FBI Director, Christopher Wray, gave congressional testimony warning that homegrown violent terrorism is the single biggest threat to the country. “A majority of the domestic terrorism cases we’ve investigated,” Wray told the Senate Judiciary Committee, “are motivated by some version of what you might call white supremacist violence.”

Donald Trump, MAGA

Tragic confirmation of that was evident in the massacre of innocent people, mainly Latino, in El Paso, Texas, last weekend by an avowed anti-immigrant Trump supporter. But the determination by Trump and the Republican Party to address this problem cannot be taken seriously. Neither Trump, nor his political confederates, have made any substantive effort to mitigate the violence and hatred that flows freely in right-wing circles. On Fox News, host Tucker Carlson actually devoted a segment to his theory that white supremacy is a hoax.

It’s hard to imagine that any solutions will be forthcoming from the Trump camp considering that he has been the chief spokesperson for the white nationalist movement and that most of their leaders – and followers – have endorsed him. They are his base and he has demonstrated his loyalty as well as his fear of offending them.

What’s more, Trump can hardly take a position against racism when he doesn’t even seem to understand what it is. In a response to a reporter’s question on Friday morning about political bias on Twitter, Trump awkwardly twisted his response into an attack on Hollywood. He began with a threat that “We’re gonna be very tough with them.” And it just got worse from there (video below).

“They’re treating conservatives very unfairly. Hollywood … is really terrible. You talk about racist … Hollywood is racist. What they’re doing with the kind of movies they’re putting out is actually very dangerous for our country. What Hollywood is doing is a tremendous disservice to our country. We have now, in a little while, all of the heads of the biggest companies coming in and we’re gonna talk to them. They treat conservatives, Republicans totally different than they treat others. And they can’t do that.”

This is representative of the paranoia that Trump and his GOP crybabies commonly exhibit. Everyone is always out to get them: Hollywood, Twitter, Facebook, the press, etc. Any form of media that exercises their First Amendment rights is regarded as dangerous. And their solution is bullying and intimidation. Where Trump gets the idea that he can dictate what Hollywood can and can’t do is pretty obvious. He gets it from his heroes Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un, whose unrestricted totalitarian control of their respective countries is something that Trump envies.

What makes Trump’s whining especially disturbing is that he’s flatly asserting that Hollywood is racist because they are allegedly biased against conservatives. What does that even mean? How would a bias against conservatives be racist? Is he suggesting that such a bias is a racial attack because conservatives are predominantly white and, therefore, any discrimination against them is due to anti-whitism?

Notice that Trump never bothered to provide any examples of the alleged racism he’s accusing Hollywood of engaging in. Perhaps he’s just upset that whenever there’s a racist character in a movie he is portrayed as a villain. Trump would probably like to see some balance where there are some racist heroes on the big screen. That would be consistent with his support for Confederate generals and the statues honoring them.

See? Trump is just a civil rights advocate who seeks equality for people who hate black and brown Americans. And he’s going to take measures to achieve that end. If it means forcing Hollywood to produce only certain types of movies, so be it. After all, If Vlad and Kim can do it, why not Trump?

[UPDATE:] Trump posted a couple of tweets on this subject:

The movie Trump is referring to (but refused to name) is The Hunt,” a satire that Trump, and the knee-jerk conservative pundits and politicians railing against it, clearly doesn’t understand. The plot features a group of wealthy, entitled liberals who hunt right-wing hicks for sport. But it’s not glorifying the liberals. Rather, they are portrayed as evil nutcases and their right-wing “prey” as the victims. The movie’s hero is one of the hunted who fights back.

But Trump’s tweets are pitifully stupid for another reason. He resists the label of “elites” being assigned to the movie’s rich villains. That’s because he considers himself elite and wants to retain that “privilege” for himself and his ilk. He seems to be more aligned to the wealthy villains in this movie than the poor conservatives he panders to. Also, there is absolutely no racial component to any of this.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

https://youtu.be/bBnCrSLGu8I

Trump’s Base: FBI Cites Right-Wing Conspiracy Groups Like QAnon as Domestic Terrorists

The incidence of racial hatred and violence has done nothing but increase during the administration of Donald Trump. In fact, the relationship between hate crimes and Trump is so tightly correlated that one study shows an increase in violence of 226 percent just in the counties where Trump has held a recent rally. And his ramping up of racist remarks aimed at congressional women of color surely isn’t helping.

Trump Charlotsville

Not surprisingly, the response to this flagrant bigotry from Trump’s Deplorables has been an outpouring of support. Polls show that Republican approval for Trump actually went up after his racist tirades. But within his own FBI, a new report is placing the blame for violence instigated by hate groups where it truly belongs:

“The FBI for the first time has identified fringe conspiracy theories as a domestic terrorist threat […] It lists a number of arrests, including some that haven’t been publicized, related to violent incidents motivated by fringe beliefs.”

Other non-partisan organizations have found similar evidence of this sort of violent activity, but this is the first time that it has been affirmed by the FBI with specific citations of the bad actors:

“The document specifically mentions QAnon, a shadowy network that believes in a deep state conspiracy against President Trump, and Pizzagate, the theory that a pedophile ring including Clinton associates was being run out of the basement of a Washington, D.C., pizza restaurant (which didn’t actually have a basement).”

“The FBI assesses these conspiracy theories very likely will emerge, spread, and evolve in the modern information marketplace, occasionally driving both groups and individual extremists to carry out criminal or violent acts.”

The report forecasts that “conspiracy theory-driven extremists are likely to increase during the 2020 presidential election cycle.” And FBI Director Christopher Wray (a Trump appointee) warned that “a majority of the domestic terrorism cases that we’ve investigated are motivated by some version of what you might call white supremacist violence.”

What the report leaves out is the link between these violent groups and Donald Trump. QAnon is built around a clandestine cabal of cultists who believe that Trump is heading up a secret society whose mission is to expose a child sex trafficking ring masterminded by Hillary Clinton. No really! And Trump has also been closely affiliated with conspiracy crackpots like Glenn Beck and Alex Jones of Infowars. However, the ability of law enforcement to reign in these organizations was greatly curtailed when, according to the Department of Homeland Security, “nearly all, if not all, the intelligence analysts focusing on domestic extremist groups” were eliminated under the Trump administration.

The publication of this report at this particular time has its own set of peculiarities. Most notable is the fact that Trump himself addressed the matter of domestic terrorism just last week, but from the completely opposite direction:

Bear in mind that there is no such thing as Antifa. There is no organization by that name, nor are there any acknowledged members. There are, however, people who are intensely anti-fascist, and they sometimes express that opposition with physical force aimed at the organizers and attendees of neo-Nazi rallies.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

You have to wonder why Trump chose to speak out for the first time on this subject five days before the release of an FBI report on violence by white nationalists. Did he get a heads up from the FBI? Was he attempting to sandbag the FBI’s study with his own phony narrative? Whatever the reason, the effect of Trump’s tweet was to excuse the documented brutality on the part of the people who make up his base of support. And you can be sure that Trump will never make a similar denouncement of the “gutless Radical [Right] Wack Jobs” who populate his rallies and on whose votes he relies.

Trump Breaks His Own Record for Lies-Per-Minute in Desperate ‘WITCH HUNT’ Frenzy

The constant pressure to perform must be excruciating for Donald Trump. As the most prolific liar in presidential history he needs to continuously up his game or risk falling behind rival liars like Sean Hannity and his own son, Don, Jr. But if anyone is up to the task, it’s the current (for now) Liar-in-Chief.

Donald Trump

In a spurt of surprising activity for the usually lethargic septuagenarian, Trump raised the ante for America’s liars by putting out an impressive number of unambiguous falsehoods Wednesday morning. He began with his forte, Twitter, to post some flagrantly egregious lies. Leading off was a tweet that implored his Deplorables to “Look how things have turned around on the Criminal Deep State.” Of course, there is no “Deep State” and the only things turning are his former friends and associates. For instance, the business partner of his personal attorney, Michael Cohen, who just copped a plea and will be cooperating with special counsel Robert Mueller.

That didn’t stop Trump from declaring that “Phony Collusion with Russia [is] a made up Scam.” Albeit one that has already produced dozens of indictments and five guilty pleas. He then deftly segued to an attack on the former Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper. Trump quoted Clapper as saying “Trump should be happy that the FBI was SPYING on his campaign.” But Clapper never said that. He actually said that Trump should be happy that the FBI investigated Russians infiltrating his campaign. Clapper made these comments on The View, but Trump didn’t learn about them until they were part of a segment on Fox and Friends. And that’s where Trump got his bastardized quote.

Finally, Trump went after one of his favorite enemies, former FBI Director James Comey. He repeatedly called Comey a liar who is in big trouble. But then he delivered one of his famous untruths that “a lot of [imaginary] people have said.” According to Trump:

“You go into the FBI, and a lot of those great people working at the FBI, they will tell you. I did a great service to this country by firing James Comey.”

The only problem with that statement is that it conflicts sharply with reality. In an annual survey of FBI agents and employees, Comey was given overwhelmingly positive reviews. The survey was taken just two months before Trump fired Comey and revealed that:

“Former FBI Director James Comey was widely admired by agents who worked for him, winning high scores in anonymous surveys for his values and trustworthiness, even as he became embroiled in controversies over investigations related to the 2016 election.”

Knowing this, would Trump still think that “those great people working at the FBI” are still great? And in addition to these brazenly false outbursts by Trump there was an epically succinct expression of his hostility to the truth in another tweet that said simply, but loudly (in all caps):

Never mind that Trump’s hand-picked FBI Director, Chris Wray explicitly denied in congressional testimony that there was any such thing as a witch hunt being conducted by the Bureau. And that Trump’s former CIA Director, and current Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, told Congress that there was no “Deep State” in the CIA, FBI, NSA, Justice Department, or the State Department. So the most senior members of Trump’s administration are joining in calling out the President as a liar. Which makes you wonder how long it will be before he’s calling them liars. Also, whether they will be part of the administration for very long. We’ll see.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.