Secret CIA source claims Russia rigged 2016 election

Huh. I really thought there might be something to all this, but I guess not.

Call off the hearings!

Whoa, that’s unequivocal. We are wasting our money!

Well worth listening to this.

I’m just confused and ignorant of the process. I thought the hearings were cancelled? If so, what are these then?

There are two lawmaking groups in America: a senate and a congress. The congressional hearings were cancelled. This is the other one.

Well yeah, I know that :-)

But how are their responsibilities shared for an investigation like this?

I’m not sure any responsibilities are shared; they’re (in principle) entirely independent.

Brilliant gif.

This is quite a gamble on Putin’s part is it not? I mean unless he has a foolproof plan of keeping Democrat’s from the levers of power forever he must realize that once they regain the WH and Congress they’re going to want heads on platters for 2016. If they can make life uncomfortable for Putin’s pals then there’s the potential of those oligarch’s turning against Putin. One day we might wake up to the headline of PUTIN DEAD: Polonium Enema Suspected.

Generally, the House and the Senate are independent when it comes to investigations like this.

Congressional investigations are actually carried out by established committees within each legislative body. The Senate hearings that are currently on-air are being held by the Senate Intelligence Committee. The House investigation was being conducted by the House Intelligence Committee (chaired by Nunes … who seems to have cancelled it.)

So you can have separate committees in the House and the Senate investigating the same thing.

And indeed you could have even more investigations than that, because there are many different committees within both the House and the Senate with overlapping responsibilities. For example, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee has had hearings on the cybersecurity threat Russia poses in the past, and might have more in the future as the situation develops.

Since Putin’s conception of the world is, “Whatever makes my enemies weak makes me stronger,” he sees all of this as a win.

If Donnie turned out to be a reliable puppet - great, he can use him to keep the US weak.

If Donnie is discovered and then thrown out of office - great, the political chaos caused by the power struggle will keep the US weak.

If Donnie turns out to be an unreliable puppet who’s more trouble than he’s worth - great, Putin will out Donnie himself, get him thrown out of office, and again benefit because the political chaos makes the US weak.

Meanwhile, there’s little the US can do to retaliate. Nobody wants a shooting war. And having US intelligence try to game Russia’s public opinion of Putin like Putin gamed US public opinion of US government isn’t really possible, because Putin can just throw any critics in jail, or kill them.

As for Putin having to worry about the oligarchs turning against him - he’s always been worried about that, first and foremost. It’s part of the job of being a Russian strongman. If you’re already leading your life assuming that those closest to you are plotting and planning to get rid of you, what does it matter if you add a bunch of disorganized and demoralized US intelligence agents to the list?

Oligarchs who turn against Putin don’t exactly have a strong record of surviving/staying out of prison. Generally the best they can hope for is emigrating and using some of the wealth they’ve stashed offshore to ingratiate themselves with the British government.

Until they die of natural causes subsequent to falling on a knife six times or from a tea overdose or by zippering themselves into a bag with no zipper on the inside and suffocating, as one often does.

Folks who gave intel to Nunes named, so Spicer’s briefing should be entertaining today

The “folks” in question being White House officials (one of which was brought in by Flynn.)

NY Times: 2 White House Officials Helped Give Nunes Intelligence Reports

And the other is the former general council for the HPSCI (I.e. He worked for Nunes until a few weeks ago). John Schindler called that one when it was reported that Nunes went to the WH grounds to view the info.

I had to stop watching. I can’t stand to listen to Spicer for more than a couple minutes, though watching him try to spin this would be entertaining

“Yeah, I hate it when that happens.”

(Older SNL-watchers will recall the phrase from the Billy Crystal/Christopher Guest sketches from the 80’s.)

So the committee was fun.

Meanwhile, this happened.

Which is well worth reading in the context of this story:

So Ellis - I believe a former staff member of Nunes? - and Cohen-Watnic - a Flynn appointee who was supposed to be moved on, from the suggestion of Trump’s new national security adviser, but for whom Trump refused on the advice of Bannon and Kushner - then leaked info to Nunes, who went and held a press conference about how he was briefing the president on this new information. That he got from some of Trump’s close advisers.

Right.

Thomas Rid to Kamala Harris: “If it’s on the Washington Post or the New York Times, it’s not fake news.”

what a cuck

Internet People are saying this could lead to obstruction of justice charges against Trump. I don’t believe it.