Trump Orders Immediate Release Of All Text Messages, Carter Page FISA Application From Russia Investigation

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President Trump has ordered the Department of Justice to release all text messages related to the Russia investigation with no redactions, of former FBI Director James Comey, his deputy Andrew McCabe, now-fired special agent Peter Strzok, former FBI attorney Lisa Page and twice-demoted DOJ official Bruce Ohr.

Also released will be specific pages from the FBI's FISA surveillance warrant application on former Trump campaign aide Carter Page, as well as interviews with Ohr. 

WH: Trump has “directed the Department of Justice (including the FBI) to publicly release all text messages relating to the Russia investigation, without redaction, of James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, and Bruce Ohr.” pic.twitter.com/IdVYLvceYK

— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) September 17, 2018

The statement reads in full: 

"At the request of a number of committees of Congress, and for reasons of transparency, the President has directed the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Department of Justice (including the FBI) to provide for the immediate declassification of the following materials: (1) pages 10-12 and 17-34 of the June 2017 application to the FISA court in the matter of Carter W. Page; (2) all FBI reports of interviews with Bruce G. Ohr prepared in connection with the Russia investigation; and (3) all FBI reports of interviews prepared in connection with all Carter Page FISA applications.

In addition, President Donald J. Trump has directed the Department of Justice (including the FBI) to publicly release all text messages relating to the Russia investigation, without redaction, of James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, and Bruce Ohr"

***

As we reported last Monday, Trump had been expected to release the documents any time - with specific attention to the Page documents and the "investigative activities of Justice Department lawyer Bruce Ohr" - who was demoted twice for lying about his extensive relationship  with Christopher Steele - the former MI6 spy who assembled the sham "Steele Dossier" used by the FBI in a FISA surveillance application to spy on Page.

Republicans on the House Intelligence and Judiciary committees believe the declassification will permanently taint the Trump-Russia investigation by showing the investigation was illegitimate to begin with. Trump has been hammering the same theme for months.

• They allege that Bruce Ohr played an improper intermediary role between the Justice Department, British spy Christopher Steele and Fusion GPS — the opposition research firm that produced the Trump-Russia dossier, funded by Democrats. (Ohr's wife, Nellie, worked for Fusion GPS on Russia-related matters during the presidential election — a fact that Ohr did not disclose on federal forms.)
• And they further allege that the Obama administration improperly spied on Carter Page — all to take down Trump. -Axios

Ohr, meanwhile, met with Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska in 2015 to discuss helping the FBI with organized crime investigations, according to The Hill's John Solomon. The meeting with the Putin ally was facilitated by Steele.

Three weeks ago, Trump called Ohr a disgrace, while also tweeting: "Will Bruce Ohr, whose family received big money for helping to create the phony, dirty and discredited Dossier, ever be fired from the Jeff Sessions  “Justice” Department? A total joke!"

Will Bruce Ohr, whose family received big money for helping to create the phony, dirty and discredited Dossier, ever be fired from the Jeff Sessions “Justice” Department? A total joke!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 20, 2018

Trump's threat came one day after two tweets about Ohr, noting a connection to former FBI agent Peter Strzok, as well as a text sent by Ohr after former FBI Director James Comey was fired in which Ohr says "afraid they will be exposed." 

“Very concerned about Comey’s firing, afraid they will be exposed,” said Bruce Ohr. DOJ’s Emails & Notes show Bruce Ohr’s connection to (phony & discredited) Trump Dossier. A creep thinking he would get caught in a dishonest act. Rigged Witch Hunt!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 16, 2018

“The FBI received documents from Bruce Ohr (of the Justice Department & whose wife Nelly worked for Fusion GPS).” Disgraced and fired FBI Agent Peter Strzok. This is too crazy to be believed! The Rigged Witch Hunt has zero credibility.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 16, 2018

According to emails turned over to Congressional investigators in August, Christopher Steele was much closer to Bruce Ohr and his wife Nellie than previously disclosed. 

Steele and the Ohrs would have breakfast together on July 30, 2016 at the Mayflower Hotel in downtown Washington D.C., days after Steele turned in installments of his infamous "dossier" on July 19 and 26. The breakfast also occurred one day before the FBI formally launched operation "Crossfire Hurricane," the agency's counterintelligence operation into the Trump campaign. 

“Great to see you and Nellie this morning Bruce,” Steele wrote shortly following their breakfast meeting. “Let’s keep in touch on the substantive issues/s (sic). Glenn is happy to speak to you on this if it would help.”

"After two years of investigations and accusations from both sides of the aisle about what documents indicate, it is past time for documents to be declassified and let the American people decide for themselves if DoJ and FBI acted properly," Freedom Caucus chairman Mark Meadows told Axios earlier Sunday. 

In early August, journalist Paul Sperry tweeted that Trump may use his presidential authority to declassify "20 redacted pages of a June, 2017 FISA renewal, "and possibly" 63 pages of emails and notes between "Ohr & Steele," and FD-302 summaries of 12 interviews." 

Look this month for POTUS to declassify ...

-- 20 redacted pages of June 2017 FISA renewal

... and possibly ...

-- 63 pages of emails and notes b/t Ohr & Steele

-- FD-302 summaries of 12 FBI interviews w/ Ohr re Steele

... and watch Dems and media toadies become apoplectic

— Paul Sperry (@paulsperry_) August 5, 2018

On Thursday of last week, President Trump threatened to declassify documents - one day after the New York Times allegedly published an anonymous Op-Ed claiming to be from a White House official claiming to be part of an unelected "resistance" cabal within the Trump administration. 

"The Deep State and the Left, and their vehicle, the Fake News Media, are going Crazy - & they don’t know what to do," Trump tweeted Thursday morning, adding: "The Economy is booming like never before, Jobs are at Historic Highs, soon TWO Supreme Court Justices & maybe Declassification to find Additional Corruption. Wow!" 

The Deep State and the Left, and their vehicle, the Fake News Media, are going Crazy - & they don’t know what to do. The Economy is booming like never before, Jobs are at Historic Highs, soon TWO Supreme Court Justices & maybe Declassification to find Additional Corruption. Wow!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 6, 2018

Trump's threat comes as calls by frustrated GOP legislators to release the documents have hit a fevered pitch. Spearheading the effort are Republican Reps. Meadows, Jim Jordan, Matt Gaetz and Lee Zeldin - who have repeatedly asked Trump to declassify more of the heavily redacted FISA surveillance warrant on former Trump campaign aide Carter Page in late 2016.

At 12:45PM, I will be joined by @Jim_Jordan @RepMarkMeadows @RepMattGaetz & others to call on @realDonaldTrump to declassify & release the Page FISA apps, Ohr's 302s & more. The FISA court was misled & the process abused to spy on Americans. We have ZERO tolerance for any of it!

— Lee Zeldin (@RepLeeZeldin) September 6, 2018

In June, Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee asked President Trump to declassify key sections of Carter Page's FISA warrant application, according to a letter obtained by Fox News. 

Carter Page, the DOJ/FBI's person of interest, weighed in on the matter in late August, tweeting: "The Corrupt DOJ, co-conspirators in the DNC and their high-priced consultants correctly believed they had American democracy and the FISA Court over a barrel in 2016."

BREAKING NEWS (a.k.a. what most sane reporters and other observers realized long ago): The Corrupt DOJ, co-conspirators in the DNC and their high-priced consultants correctly believed they had American democracy and the FISA Court over a barrel in 2016.
https://t.co/Qqc3OmFdAV

— Carter Page, Ph.D. (@carterwpage) August 31, 2018

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US Diplomats Involved In Trafficking Of Human Blood And Pathogens For Secret Military Program

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The US Embassy to Tbilisi transports frozen human blood and pathogens as diplomatic cargo for a secret US military program. Internal documents, implicating US diplomats in the transportation of and experimenting on pathogens under diplomatic cover were leaked to me by Georgian insiders. According to these documents, Pentagon scientists have been deployed to the Republic of Georgia and have been given diplomatic immunity to research deadly diseases and biting insects at the Lugar Center – the Pentagon biolaboratory in Georgia’s capital Tbilisi.

This military facility is just one of the many Pentagon biolaboratories in 25 countries across the world. They are funded by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) under a $ 2.1 billion military program – Cooperative Biological Engagement Program (CBEP), and are located in former Soviet Union countries such as Georgia and Ukraine, the Middle East, South East Asia and Africa.

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Serial numbers of missile that downed MH17 show it was produced in 1986, owned by Ukraine - Russia

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The serial numbers found on debris of the Buk missile which downed Malaysian Airlines Flight MH17 over eastern Ukraine show it was produced in 1986, the Russian military said. The projectile was owned by Ukraine, they added.

There are two serial numbers found on fragments of the missile, which shot down the passenger airliner in June 2014 according to an international team of investigators led by the Netherlands. The numbers were marked on the engine and the nozzle of the missile.

The Russian military on Monday said they had traced them to a missile which had the producer serial number 8868720.

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City Replaced Corrupt Cops With Mimes Who Lowered Traffic Fatalities Far Better Than Tickets

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One of the most interesting experiments in traffic flow was pioneered by Bogotá mayor Antanas Mockus, who fired a large portion of the city’s cops and offered to retrain and rehire them as mimes.

“In a society where human life has lost value. There cannot be another priority than re-establishing respect for life as the main right and duty of citizens,” Mockus says.

Instead of writing tickets, the mimes were unleashed upon the city to direct traffic, while applauding good drivers and mocking bad ones. Surprisingly, the city saw a 50 percent drop in traffic fatalities, less congestion, and an overall better culture of driving.

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Elliott: "An Economic Recovery Based Around High Debt Is Really No Recovery At All"

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Authored by Larry Elliott via The Guardian,

As a profession, economists are absolutely hopeless at forecasting recessions. That is true not only in the years before a severe downturn. It happens when the storm is about to break. Back in 2008, the Bank of England failed to predict the biggest postwar slump in the UK’s history even after it had started.

This less than impressive record should act as a cautionary note in the current circumstances when the 10th anniversary of the collapse of Lehman Brothers has generated a thriving cottage industry devoted to predicting when the next crisis will occur. The honest answer is that nobody really knows. Meteorology has improved in the past 40 years, economic forecasting has not. When a weather forecaster says a hurricane is imminent, the public does well to take notice. When an economic forecaster gives a similar warning, the chances are that it is already too late.

This might be about to change. Just as satellite technology has made weather forecasting far more accurate, so machine-learning algorithms could bring economic forecasting into the 21st century.

Rickard Nyman and Paul Ormerod have compared economic forecasting by humans and machines in both the US and the UK, and come up with some stark conclusions. At the start of 2008 the survey of professional forecasters in the US failed to predict that within a year their country would be in a deep recession. Had US policymakers relied on machine-learning algorithms they would have been much better prepared for the trouble ahead. Even more impressive results using machine learning were obtained for the UK.

There’s more, however. Nyman and Ormerod sift through all the economic and financial variables that might have been responsible for causing the downturn and come up with a conclusion that explodes the myth that overspending governments were to blame.

“The evidence suggests quite clearly that public sector debt played no causal role in generating the Great Recession” they say.

“In contrast, the ratio of private sector debt to GDP does appear to have played a significant role, especially in the UK.”

In truth, the idea that state profligacy caused the Great Recession has never been credible. What really happened was that the expansion of the global marketplace led to cheap goods flooding the west. Inflationary pressure abated and that persuaded central banks to cut interest rates. Financial deregulation meant the only remaining constraint on excessive borrowing – high interest rates – was removed – and so credit was cheap and readily available. The private sector loaded up on debt, which was fine so long as the assets on the other side of the balance sheet were going up in value. When the markets turned, things went pear-shaped very quickly.

Only at that point, did public sector debt become a problem because governments sought to ameliorate the impact of the recession by cutting taxes and increasing spending. The debts incurred by the private sector were, to an extent, nationalised.

Bill White, then chief economist at the Bank for International Settlements was one of the very few who sought to prick the bubble of complacency in the boom years, making the point that periods of low inflation could still end in crisis. His warnings were not heeded.

The BIS remains concerned about debt levels, which is where the work of Nyman and Ormerod is relevant to the state of the world 10 years after Lehman.

Put simply, the cure for the Great Recession was for central banks to slash interest rates and to increase the supply of money by buying bonds from the private sector in the process known as quantitative easing. Debt levels in the private sector fell for a while as households and companies retrenched but have subsequently started rising again. Low interest rates were designed to provide incentives for investors to seek out riskier assets, which is what they have done. Money has flooded into emerging markets, where yields are juicier because the risks are higher. Turkey, where the central bank raised interest rates to 24% last week, is one example of what can happen in a world of footloose capital. Speculative money comes in from abroad. It finances a construction boom and drives up the exchange rate. Eventually, the trade deficit starts to balloon and inflation starts to rise. At that point, the speculators take fright and the exodus of capital triggers a fall in the exchange rate. At that point, the central bank has to raise interest rates to punitive levels to defend the currency and recession becomes inevitable.

The BIS says in its latest annual report that there are already material risks to financial stability.

“In some respects, the risks mirror the unbalanced post-crisis recovery and its excessive reliance on monetary policy. Where financial vulnerabilities exist, they have been building up, in their usual gradual and persistent way. More generally, financial markets are overstretched...

...and we have seen a continuous rise in the global stock of debt, private plus public, in relation to GDP. This has extended a trend that goes back to well before the crisis and that has coincided with a long-term decline in interest rates.”

Behind the dry official language, the message is clear. A recovery that is based around high and rising levels of debt is really no recovery at all. The world economy is, in all material respects, the same as it was in the run-up to the 2008 crisis. The necessary reforms to a flawed model have not taken place, which is why the BIS warning should not be ignored.

While it is not possible to say when the next recession will arrive, or where it will start, history is repeating itself. And you don’t need a machine learning-algorithm to know there are dangers involved in that.

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10 Years After The Crisis... They're Doing The Same Thing & Expecting Different Results

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Authored by Simon Black via SovereignMan.com,

“Holy Crap– turn on your TV! This is crazy!”

It was Sunday, September 14, 2008. Exactly 10 years ago to the day.

My friend Jeff called me and told me to turn on the television - where I saw dozens of people on the streets of Manhattan filing out of a skyscraper carrying boxes full of their office junk.

They were all employees of Lehman Brothers, one of the largest investment banks in the world.

Lehman was hours away from filing bankruptcy in what would go down as THE biggest bankruptcy in US history.

The next day the US stock market tanked. And for most of the next several weeks, all global financial markets were a roller coaster of surreal panic and chaos.

I don’t know if you can remember the general mood back then. I can. It was fear.

People were terrified of what was happening in the economy. The real estate market had dried up. The stock market had crashed. Some of the most hallowed financial institutions in the world went bust in the blink of an eye.

It’s now officially been a decade since the collapse.

And the typical sentiment among economists, politicians, and central bankers is that the economy has come roaring back.

There’s certainly a lot of evidence to support this assertion-

Several financial markets around the world have hit all-time highs. Stocks. Real estate. Bonds. They’re all generally selling for record high prices.

Earlier this week the US Census Bureau announced that median household income in the Land of the Free had increased by 1.8% between 2016 and 2017.

(That’s hardly a life-changing pay raise for workers… but it’s better than nothing.)

Governments around the world, from the US to Western Europe, are seeing strong tax revenue.

And the global economy is certainly growing.

In the US, for example, GDP has increased from $14.8 trillion just prior to Lehman’s collapse ten years ago, to $20.4 trillion today, an increase of 38%.

These are all good signs. And if that’s all you look at, it certainly seems like everything’s all good.

But remember that great F. Scott Fitzgerald quote:

“The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.”

So let’s look at the other side of things.

Sure, financial markets have increased. Wages have (barely) increased. Economic output has increased.

But what’s really increased?

DEBT.

Look at the Land of the Free as a classic example: US GDP is up 38% over the past decade. Great.

But over the same period, the US national debt has increased 122%!

In other words, in the last ten years, the US national debt increased by more than $3 for every $1 increase in GDP. It’s brilliant!

And it’s not just Uncle Sam. Overall government debt across the world has TRIPLED since Lehman’s collapse to $63 trillion…

...and that doesn’t count their unfunded liabilities (like pension obligations, or the $40+ trillion that the US government owes its taxpayers for future Social Security benefits).

Individuals are also loaded up with debt. Student debt. Consumer debt. Auto debt. They’re all at record levels. So is corporate debt.

And a lot of that new debt, by the way, is total garbage.

As we’ve discussed before, there are insolvent, money-losing companies that have NO hope of paying back their debts that are able to borrow money at super-low interest rates.

Plus there’s nearly $10 trillion of debt issued by insolvent governments at NEGATIVE rates. It’s absurd.

So what else has increased a LOT in the past 10 years?

Money. Literally, the amount of money in the financial system is near an all-time high.

Following Lehman’s collapse, the Federal Reserve and other central banks around the world created trillions of dollars out of thin air.

And in the process they slashed interest rates to historically low levels.

US interest rates were basically at zero for nearly a decade. In Europe and Japan, rates even turned NEGATIVE.

This is the really interesting part… because… these are precisely the factors that heavily contributed to the Lehman collapse:

In 2000 there was a big recession. The stock market plunged and unemployment jumped. Then 9/11 happened, and the economy sank even more.

So central banks started printing tons of money and slashing interest rates in the early 2000s.

And as a result, housing prices went through the roof. Stock markets soared. Money was cheap and plentiful… so EVERYONE started borrowing.

A mountain of debt soon followed. Mortgage debt. Corporate debt. Credit card debt. They even created new types of debt which quickly became some of the most popular investments among financial institutions (like Lehman Brothers).

And a lot of this debt was total garbage. Worthless.

People with no hope of paying their loans were able to borrow money for nothing.

There’s a famous story of a homeless guy named Johnny Moon who was able to borrow hundreds of thousands of dollars back in the early 2000s to ‘invest in real estate’.

It was totally ridiculous. Yet almost everyone was convinced that the economy was strong and the boom would last.

It didn’t.

And ten years ago the collapse took all the ‘experts’ by surprise.

Now, a decade later, the experts once again agree that it’s all rainbows and buttercups.

They believe they fixed a problem caused by too much bad debt by facilitating record levels of even worse debt.

They believe they fixed a problem caused by too much money in the system by injecting trillions of dollars of new money into the system.

They believe they fixed a problem caused by artificially low interest rates by slashing interest rates to the lowest levels we’ve ever seen in all of human history.

They also seem to believe that this time will somehow be different.

Frankly it seems a bit… oh, what’s the word… INSANE… to try the same thing over and over and expect different results.

And to continue learning how to ensure you thrive no matter what happens next in the world, I encourage you to download our free Perfect Plan B Guide.

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Whistleblower: It Was A Failed Coup, Mainstream Media Are Covering Up Phony DOJ Dossier

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-08-23/whistleblower-it-was-failed-coup-mainstream-media-are-covering-phony-doj-dossier

CNN Ratings Collapse, Losing To Nickelodeon And Fox News

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Trump's "fake news" nemesis, CNN, experienced a dramatic collapse in ratings last week compared to 2017.According to AdWeek, CNN viewership tumbled 41% in daytime TV ratings and tumbled 36% in primetime versus the same week last year.

"CNN ranked No. 6 across basic cable in total primetime viewers, and No. 5 in total day this past week. Despite the top 10 finishes, the network was -36 percent in primetime viewers, and -41 percent in total day viewers vs. the same week last year", AdWeek wrote.

The increasingly more partisan news network was once again beat by its traditional competitors: Fox News was No. 1 across the board for basic cable for the Labor Day week of Sept. 03, 2018 (No. 1 in total viewers across the 24-hour day for 35 consecutive weeks), while MSNBC came in second.

In basic cable, CNN placed fifth with ESPN and Nickelodeon placing No. 3 and No. 4, respectively as Sponge Bob suddenly emerges to be more popular/credible than Jake Tepper and Chris Cuomo.

In primetime, CNN ranked No 6. while ESPN secured the first ranking. Fox News, MSNBC, HGTV, and the USA network all placed higher than CNN for primetime views. 

The network has repeatedly seen embarrassing viewership losses compared to 2017. In August, the network lost 12 percent of its primetime viewers compared to 2017. During one week in August, the network dropped 23 percent during the day and 24 percent in primetime compared to the same week last year, said Breitbart News.

CNN's sharp fall might be the result of President Trump's relentless hostility towards the network in the last several years. 

Retweet if you are voting for @realDonaldTrump in 2020 and are tired of all the fake news!

25th Amendment lol pic.twitter.com/bImf4GzNYz

— Conservative Pets 🐶 (@ConservativePTZ) September 5, 2018

"These are just dishonest, terrible people," Trump says of the Fake News Media while speaking at Rally in Evansville, Indiana. pic.twitter.com/B4isVSK845

— The Columbia Bugle 🇺🇸 (@ColumbiaBugle) August 31, 2018

In which Donald Trump compares himself with Lincoln and says Honest Abe's Gettysburg address was HAMMERED by the 'fake news' like his own speeches. pic.twitter.com/VcS9iHkf1F

— Richard Chambers (@newschambers) September 8, 2018

.@realDonaldTrump to reporter: "YOU are fake news." pic.twitter.com/6nasXm99TK

— Fox News (@FoxNews) January 11, 2017

Of course, it may also simply be the result of increasingly more viewers switching over to other, less biased sources of news and information. 

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How to End the Autism Epidemic

https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2018/09/16/how-to-end-the-autism-epidemic.aspx

Days After 9/11 Tulsi Gabbard Slams "Betrayal Of American People" Over Syria

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In a rare and unprecedented speech delivered on the House floor just two days after the nation memorialized 9/11, Democratic Hawaiian Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard on Thursday slammed Washington's longtime support to anti-Assad jihadists in Syria, while also sounding the alarm over the current build-up of tensions between the US and Russia over the Syria crisis.

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