There's Some Common Thread Here, But I Just Can't Put My Finger On It

"The Mueller inquiry was an attempted coup--We should call things by their real names," writes Roger Stone. An excerpt listing some of the key figures in the attempted coup:

        One of the remarkable things about this story is how many people it involves and how long it has taken to get a full headcount of the anti-Trump team. Remember Joseph Mifsud? Stefan Halper? Peter Strzok and his alleged paramour, Lisa Page? Bruce Ohr, former associate deputy attorney general? It turned out that his wife, Nellie Ohr, worked for Fusion GPS, the company that hired Christopher Steele.

       And what about Steele? We first met him as a former British spy, the ‘highly respected’ operative who had the goods on Trump. We soon learned that Steele had been paid by the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary campaign, and that his dossier was not just ‘unverified’ and ‘salacious’, as James Comey said, but was nothing but scurrilous opposition research assembled from ‘random’ gossip from highly dubious sources. Nevertheless, it was the dossier, and nothing but the dossier that provided unverified ‘evidence’ for supposedly ‘verified’ FISA warrants to spy on Carter Page, an American citizen, and hence to spy on Trump’s campaign and, later, his administration.

       But Stone ignores one of the key figures, former CIA Director John Brennan. As Politico described Brennan earlier this year, "Brennan was CIA director during Trump's transition into the White House and left office the same day Trump was inaugurated in 2017. ... Since leaving office, Brennan has been a prominent critic of Trump, claiming there had been collusion between the president's campaign and Russia." Per the same article, "Sen. John Cornyn ... accused former CIA Director John Brennan of being on a 'search-and-destroy mission' to undermine President Donald Trump's administration."

       Attorney General Barr also testified before Congress in April 2019, saying that not only was the FBI involved with pushing the fake dossier, but that other intelligence agencies were involved. The author, Mollie Ziegler Hemingway, continues:

      There have always been indications that the operation went far beyond the FBI, however. For example, former CIA director John Brennan, now an MSNBC contributor, separately briefed Sen. Harry Reid, (D-Nev.) about the operation. Reid understood that move was undertaken so he could publicize the Russia investigation to influence the ongoing presidential election campaign.

      Former director of national intelligence James Clapper, now a CNN contributor, admitted to discussions with media outlets about the investigation. The U.S. embassy in London was used contrary to established protocol to funnel hearsay that was used as a pretext to officially launch a wide-ranging investigation against the entire Trump orbit. Clinton-connected officials in the State Department were also used to disseminate unverified gossip and allegations about Trump throughout the federal government.

The article adds: "The use of Stefan Halper, for example, a London-based American academic with longstanding ties to the FBI, CIA, and Defense Department, raises serious questions about whether CIA assets or resources were used against American citizens." The author concludes:

      The fact of the matter is that federal intelligence agencies spied on a rival political campaign. They illegally leaked information about that surveillance. They abused their authority to at best undermine the duly elected president and at worst to attempt a soft coup against him. They did so with the near-total cooperation of the American media establishment.

       This is a scandal of epic proportions. It is one that threatens the foundations of constitutional government. It is a direct attack on American democracy.

The Conservative Review similarly notes:

        Brennan’s personal role in the Trump-Russia collusion saga dates back to at least the summer of 2016 (and perhaps even earlier) when he met with a top British intelligence chief to discuss Trump’s supposed ties to the Russians. Around the time of that meeting, and following its conclusion, American and foreign spies began to make contact with members of the Trump campaign, with some claiming to have access to Russian secrets involving the Hillary Clinton campaign. Brennan later seemed to take credit and defend the espionage operation, which again, relied on the dossier to legitimize spying on Americans.

       Brennan, as CIA director, reportedly inserted the Clinton-funded-and-manufactured Steele dossier into a draft version of the highly scandalous Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) on Russian interference, which was published under the auspices of Donald Trump’s political opponents in early January 2017, just two weeks before President-elect Trump took office.

    But the Russia collusion story is old news--at least that is what the Left wants us to believe--and the new "hotness" is Trump supposedly requesting the Ukraine to reopen an investigation into John Biden's son, Hunter Biden, which investigation was closed down when John Biden, then Vice President, threatened to withhold U.S. aid unless the investigating prosecutor was fired. (More specifically, the Ukrain, prior to VP Biden's pressure, was investigating the Ukrainian gas company, Burisma, which, at the time, was paying Hunter Biden $50,000 a month despite Hunter's complete lack of credentials or qualifications in the gas industry). The Ukraine was already reopening its investigation of Burisma and possible corruption, but that isn't relevant to the Left's accusations. In fact, the Left simply doesn't want to talk about Burisma.

     But this is where things get sort of interesting. First, this became an issue after an unidentified whistle-blower, a C.I.A. officer who was detailed to work at the White House at one point, indicated that Trump has specifically requested that the Ukrainian President investigate Hunter Biden, although "[t]he anonymous whistleblower has also admitted to not having firsthand knowledge of the conversations between the president and Zelensky." Of course, the whistleblower's complaint was investigated, and it was determined that he was motivated by political bias against Trump and in favor of a political rival of Trump. One of the attorney's representing the whistleblower is Andrew Bakaj, the managing partner of the Compass Rose Legal Group. But Bakaj's history is more interesting: he interned for Chuck Schumer and Hillary Clinton in 2001, and his subsequent career included stints for the CIA and the Department of Defense.

     Second, in another interesting twist, someone decided to look into Mitt Romney's circle of advisers or friends after, as CNN put it, "For days, Utah Sen. Mitt Romney had been a lone Republican voice expressing concern about President Donald Trump's July phone call with Volodymyr Zelensky in which Trump asked Ukraine's President to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and his family." Well, it turns out that Mitt Romney's national security adviser in his 2012 campaign, Cofer Black, is a member of the board of directors of Burisma, taking the position February 2017, about 6 months after Hunter Biden left. And, wouldn't you know it, Black worked for the CIA from 1974 to 2006, rising to the level of Director of the National Counterterrorism Center from 1999-2002, and, because of his good work at stopping 9/11, was thereafter promoted to Ambassador at Large and Coordinator for Counter-terrorism by President George W. Bush in December 2002.

     (And do I even have to mention that Trump nearly lost Utah in the 2016 election because of Independent candidate, Evan McMullin, pulling votes from Trump; or that McMullin is a former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) operations officer?)