House Intelligence Committee Release Summary of Findings in RUSSIA Probe

Some of the more notable ones:

Findings #11-#4 discuss the insufficiency/inadequacy of the government's response to Russian trouble-making. Finding #14 says "The Executive Brach's post-election response was insufficient," which references both Obama's administration and Trump's.

In Finding #15, the House Intel Committee says most of the Intelligence Community's judgments "employed proper analytic tradecraft," but in Finding #16, they say the IC's judgments as to Russia's motives -- the IC declared they wanted to help Trump -- "did not employ proper analytic tradecraft."

We already had that finding tipped, as members mentioned that in interviews.

Finding #20 notes that thusfar none of Mueller's indictments relate to any "collusion, coordination, or conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Russian government."

Interestingly, Finding #21 is blank, and simply says "[classifed]."

I'm pretty sure it's something damaging to the Democrats' theory or else Adam Schiff would have leaked it to his palz at CNN already.

Finding #22 notes that General Flynn was charged with, and pled guilty to, making false statements to the FBI, though the agents actually interviewing hin "did not detect any deception."

Finding #23 notes that Executive Branch officials "did not notify the Trump campaign that members of the campaign were assessed to be potential counterintelligence concerns."

Interesting, that. This seems part of Obama's plan to hide information from Trump. They weren't looking to warn him about security concerns; they were willing to risk national security if they could get a good media leak out of it.

Finding #25 notes that none of the Russian nationals or Russian organizations indicted for interference in the election have "provided evidence of collusion, coordination, or conspiracy between the Trump campaign and the Russian government."

Finding #26 says there is no evidence of Trump's pre-campaign business dealings having anything to do with collusion.

Finding #27 states what's pretty obvious, to all but the most diehard CNN idiots and NeverTrumpers: Two fringey, flakey "foreign policy advisers" wound up briefly joining the Trump campaign precisely because the Establishment opposed Trump so stridently, and hence, Trump resorted to just looking for warm bodies.

Finding #28 repeats the debunking of the Rachel Maddow claim that the change in the GOP platform weakened the GOP's position on the Russian invasion of the Ukraine. In fact, as everyone who isn't a hack knows by now, the platform change strengthened the party's position on Ukraine. This was #FakeNews from the first.

Finding #29 says that there is no evidence Trump had anything to do with the theft of DNC emails, but does chide Trump associates for their "numerous ill-advised contacts with Wikileaks."

Finding #30 is similar, stating that Carter Page did not travel to Moscow for the Trump campaign, but fretting about his "seemingly incomplete accounts of his activity in Moscow."

Finding #32 says that George Papdapolous was unsuccessful in his own private goal of setting up a meeting between Trump and Russia.

Findings #33 to #34 note the "contacts" between Trump campaign personnel or surrogates with Russian officials, but deem them inconsequential or not even about US politics.

Finding #35 notes the obvious: Talk of setting up a "back channel" to Russia suggests that there was no collusion at all, as any kind of ongoing collusion would completely obviate the need for any "back channel."

You don't need a "back channel" when you're "colluding" on the front channels.

Finding #38 notes someone who did receive information from Kremlin officials -- Chistopher Steele. And of course, Finding #39 notes he he then passed that information on to Hillary Clinton, making Hillary Clinton the only candidate in 2016 documented to have received information from Russian government sources.

The next section concerns leaking against Trump. Finding #41 states that leaks about claims that Russia sought to help Trump increased "dramatically" after election day, whereas, as Finding #40 says, before election day, the leaks concerned Russian efforts to merely "sow discord."

Suddenly people like John Brennan, I guess, completely changed his narrative from "sow discord" to "help Trump."

Which was, coincidentally enough, the exact same determination Hillary Clinton's staff made the day after the election, according to Shattered.

Finding #44 is my favorite:

Former Director of Nation Intelligence James Clapper, now a CNN national security analyst, provided inconsistent testimony to the Committee about his contacts with the media, including CNN.

Let me tell you what that's about: Clapper or one of his flunkies was a source for the original CNN story, authored by Evan Perez, Jake Tapper, Jim Sciutto, and one other who I forget, reporting that Trump had been briefed about the "salacious and unverified" Russian dossier.

And then of course that coincidentally gave the media the pretext to run stories about that dossier, which they hadn't done previously, precisely because it was entirely unverified.

And Clapper gave "inconsistent" accounts of what he told CNN in his testimony to a Congressional committee.

No big deal -- he lies with impunity to Congress frequently.

That's the end of the findings; the document then turns to Recommendations.

I'll add more if I find more good stuff, but I need to get a post up, so I'm hitting publish.

posted by Ace of Spades at 01:00 PM

| Access Comments