Author Topic: Strassel: The President Has a List  (Read 16772 times)

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #50 on: October 09, 2014, 09:17:25 AM »
James Risen is on the list.

NY Times Reporter James Risen Says 'Obama Hates The Press'
The Huffington Post     | By Catherine Taibi
Posted: 10/06/2014 2:51 pm EDT Updated: 10/07/2014 9:59 am

New York Times reporter and Pulitzer Prize winner James Risen said that he believes the U.S. government's crackdown on journalists and whistleblowers is a direct result of President Barack Obama's personal dislike for the press, the Morning Sentinel of Maine reported Sunday.

Risen has been targeted by the Obama administration for years in an attempt to get him to reveal information about sources for his 2006 book "State of War." The Department of Justice ordered him to testify against one of his alleged sources, former CIA agent Jeffrey Sterling, whom prosecutors think leaked details to Risen about a failed CIA operation in Iran. Risen has pledged over and over that he will not reveal the name of his source, and would rather go to prison than comply with what he believes is an attack on press freedom.

Speaking at the Lorimer Chapel at Colby College on Sunday, Risen said that today's government "treats whistle-blowers like criminals," and urged journalists to "fight back" against unfair government pressure. Risen was on campus to receive the Elijah Parish Lovejoy Award for courageous journalism.

When asked by one professor how much his own prosecution has to do with Obama's power, Risen replied that it has everything to do with him.

"I don’t think any of this would be happening under the Obama administration if Obama didn’t want to do it,” he said. “I think Obama hates the press. I think he doesn’t like the press and he hates leaks.”

Risen's words also echoed comments he made in August, calling Obama the "greatest enemy to press freedom in a generation."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/06/obama-hates-press-james-risen-new-york-times-leaks_n_5940960.html

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #51 on: October 09, 2014, 09:32:05 AM »
most corrupt ever

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #52 on: November 04, 2014, 12:20:01 PM »
Sharyl Attkisson is on the list.



Former CBS News Reporter Sharyl Attkisson Claims Existence of Obama Enemies' List
11/03/2014 by Paul Bond

"I kind of assume I'm on a list. I don’t think I'm the only one"

. . .

And why do you think they would target you as opposed to more partisan voices, like Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck?

The question carries the assumption that they haven’t targeted others. I kind of assume I’m on a list. I don’t think I’m the only one, along with James Rosen and the Associated Press, that garnered special attention. There’s probably a list of people.

So an enemies list, like in the Nixon administration?

I’ve been told there is such a list, yes.

And who do you suspect is on that list?

Well, there’s an internal email that indicated reporters who were working with leakers in government agencies or perceived as enemies of the White House are being targeted. So I think that’s probably accurate — anybody that they perceive as harmful to their agenda or working with leakers and whistle-blowers, which I did a lot of.

Do you have sources who told you the names on that list? Is Rush Limbaugh on that list, for example?

Another reporter told me — I can’t remember who — that they thought he was on some sort of target list, but I don’t know that to be the case. I have someone who told me the existence of a list but not the names on it.

. . .

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/cbs-news-reporter-sharyl-attkisson-745982

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #53 on: November 04, 2014, 04:30:14 PM »
He needs to be tried for treason

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #54 on: November 06, 2014, 09:40:32 AM »
This is chilling.  You should be very afraid of what your government can do to you.  I hope I never make it onto the president's enemies list.   :-\


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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #55 on: January 06, 2015, 10:51:34 AM »
Sharyl Attkisson sues administration over computer hacking
By Howard Kurtz
Published January 05, 2015
FoxNews.com

Former CBS News correspondent Sharyl Attkisson has sued the Justice Department over the hacking of her computers, officially accusing the Obama administration of illegal surveillance while she was reporting on administration scandals.

In a series of legal filings that seek $35 million in damages, Attkisson alleges that three separate computer forensic exams showed that hackers used sophisticated methods to surreptitiously monitor her work between 2011 and 2013.

"I just think it's important to send a message that people shouldn't be victimized and throw up their hands and think there's nothing they can do and they're powerless," Attkisson said in an interview.

The department has steadfastly denied any involvement in the hacking, saying in a 2013 statement: "To our knowledge, the Justice Department has never compromised Ms. Attkisson's computers, or otherwise sought any information from or concerning any telephone, computer, or other media device she may own or use."

In the lawsuit and related claims against the Postal Service, filed in Washington, Attkisson says the intruders installed and periodically refreshed software to steal data and obtain passwords on her home and work computers. She also charges that the hackers monitored her audio using a Skype account.

The award-winning reporter says she and her attorneys have "pretty good evidence" that these efforts were "connected" to the Justice Department. She said she was caught in a "Catch-22," forcing her to use the lawsuit and an administrative complaint to discover more about the surveillance through the discovery process and to learn the identities of the "John Does" named in the complaints.

"The Justice Department has not been very forthcoming with questions," she said. "The question is, will anybody ever be held responsible?"

The multimillion-dollar damage figure relates to her loss of privacy and that of her husband and family, she said.

Attkisson learned through a Freedom of Information request that the FBI opened an investigation of the hacking case in May 2013, but says the bureau never interviewed her or even notified her of the probe.

Attkisson resigned from CBS last March after complaining that she was increasingly unable to get her investigative stories on the air. She has published a best-selling book, "Stonewalled," about her battles against the network and the administration as she investigated stories on such subjects as Benghazi, Fast and Furious and ObamaCare.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/01/05/sharyl-attkisson-sues-administration-over-computer-hacking/

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #56 on: January 23, 2015, 11:48:29 AM »
Prime Minister Netanyahu is on the list. 

‘There will be a price’: Obama team reportedly fuming over Netanyahu visit
Published January 23, 2015
FoxNews.com

The Obama administration reportedly is fuming over Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plans to address Congress in March regarding the Iranian threat, with one unnamed official telling an Israeli newspaper he will pay “a price” for the snub. 

House Speaker John Boehner invited Netanyahu -- and the Israeli leader accepted – without any involvement from the White House.

In public, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest politely describes this as a “departure” from protocol. He also says the president will not meet with Netanyahu when he visits in early March, but has attributed that decision only to a desire not to appear to be influencing Israel’s upcoming elections.

But in private, Obama’s team is livid with the Israeli leader, according to Haaretz.

"We thought we've seen everything," a source identified as a senior American official was quoted as saying. "But Bibi managed to surprise even us. There are things you simply don't do.

“He spat in our face publicly and that's no way to behave. Netanyahu ought to remember that President Obama has a year and a half left to his presidency, and that there will be a price."

The anonymous quote was a throwback to when, last year, Atlantic magazine quoted another unnamed senior administration official calling Netanyahu a “chickenshit.”

Administration officials, including Earnest, did not deny the quote at the time, though the White House stressed the criticism did not reflect how the rest of the administration views Netanyahu. 

On Friday, Earnest once again was asked about tensions with the Israeli government. Asked if the decision to speak to Congress was a slap at the Obama administration, he said, “I certainly didn’t interpret it that way.”

As for the decision for Obama not to meet with his Israeli counterpart, he stood by the earlier explanation.

“This administration goes to great lengths to ensure that we don’t give even the appearance of interfering or attempting to influence the outcome” of democratic elections abroad, he said.

Meanwhile, Haaretz also reported that Obama had directly warned Netanyahu to stop urging U.S. lawmakers to back legislation teeing up new sanctions against Iran.

Obama has threatened to veto such a bill, saying it could derail delicate talks over Iran’s nuclear program – and Netanyahu’s visit to Washington could give him an opportunity to further encourage sanctions legislation.

Haaretz reported that Israel’s ambassador already has been urging members of Congress to support the measures. The newspaper reported that Obama told Netanyahu to stop during a Jan. 12 phone call.

On Friday, Earnest acknowledged that Obama and Netanyahu have a “fundamental disagreement” about the diplomatic talks with Iran.

“He doesn’t share [the administration’s] view,” he said. But Earnest also said the “differences of opinion” do not undermine America’s commitment to Israel’s security.

As Obama officials often do, he described that commitment as “unshakable.”

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/01/23/there-will-be-price-obama-team-reportedly-fuming-over-netanyahu-visit/

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #57 on: January 23, 2015, 11:57:03 AM »
If Boehner invited ISIS to the WH - they would all applaud

Prime Minister Netanyahu is on the list. 

‘There will be a price’: Obama team reportedly fuming over Netanyahu visit
Published January 23, 2015
FoxNews.com

The Obama administration reportedly is fuming over Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plans to address Congress in March regarding the Iranian threat, with one unnamed official telling an Israeli newspaper he will pay “a price” for the snub. 

House Speaker John Boehner invited Netanyahu -- and the Israeli leader accepted – without any involvement from the White House.

In public, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest politely describes this as a “departure” from protocol. He also says the president will not meet with Netanyahu when he visits in early March, but has attributed that decision only to a desire not to appear to be influencing Israel’s upcoming elections.

But in private, Obama’s team is livid with the Israeli leader, according to Haaretz.

"We thought we've seen everything," a source identified as a senior American official was quoted as saying. "But Bibi managed to surprise even us. There are things you simply don't do.

“He spat in our face publicly and that's no way to behave. Netanyahu ought to remember that President Obama has a year and a half left to his presidency, and that there will be a price."

The anonymous quote was a throwback to when, last year, Atlantic magazine quoted another unnamed senior administration official calling Netanyahu a “chickenshit.”

Administration officials, including Earnest, did not deny the quote at the time, though the White House stressed the criticism did not reflect how the rest of the administration views Netanyahu. 

On Friday, Earnest once again was asked about tensions with the Israeli government. Asked if the decision to speak to Congress was a slap at the Obama administration, he said, “I certainly didn’t interpret it that way.”

As for the decision for Obama not to meet with his Israeli counterpart, he stood by the earlier explanation.

“This administration goes to great lengths to ensure that we don’t give even the appearance of interfering or attempting to influence the outcome” of democratic elections abroad, he said.

Meanwhile, Haaretz also reported that Obama had directly warned Netanyahu to stop urging U.S. lawmakers to back legislation teeing up new sanctions against Iran.

Obama has threatened to veto such a bill, saying it could derail delicate talks over Iran’s nuclear program – and Netanyahu’s visit to Washington could give him an opportunity to further encourage sanctions legislation.

Haaretz reported that Israel’s ambassador already has been urging members of Congress to support the measures. The newspaper reported that Obama told Netanyahu to stop during a Jan. 12 phone call.

On Friday, Earnest acknowledged that Obama and Netanyahu have a “fundamental disagreement” about the diplomatic talks with Iran.

“He doesn’t share [the administration’s] view,” he said. But Earnest also said the “differences of opinion” do not undermine America’s commitment to Israel’s security.

As Obama officials often do, he described that commitment as “unshakable.”

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/01/23/there-will-be-price-obama-team-reportedly-fuming-over-netanyahu-visit/

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #58 on: January 23, 2015, 12:13:51 PM »
If Boehner invited ISIS to the WH - they would all applaud


countdown til reagan with talaben pic, or rumsfeld with saddam pic lol....

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #59 on: January 23, 2015, 01:17:05 PM »
Quote
Sharyl Attkisson sues administration over computer hacking
By Howard Kurtz
Published January 05, 2015
FoxNews.com

Former CBS News correspondent Sharyl Attkisson has sued the Justice Department over the hacking of her computers, officially accusing the Obama administration of illegal surveillance while she was reporting on administration scandals.

In a series of legal filings that seek $35 million in damages, Attkisson alleges that three separate computer forensic exams showed that hackers used sophisticated methods to surreptitiously monitor her work between 2011 and 2013.

"I just think it's important to send a message that people shouldn't be victimized and throw up their hands and think there's nothing they can do and they're powerless," Attkisson said in an interview.

The department has steadfastly denied any involvement in the hacking, saying in a 2013 statement: "To our knowledge, the Justice Department has never compromised Ms. Attkisson's computers, or otherwise sought any information from or concerning any telephone, computer, or other media device she may own or use."

In the lawsuit and related claims against the Postal Service, filed in Washington, Attkisson says the intruders installed and periodically refreshed software to steal data and obtain passwords on her home and work computers. She also charges that the hackers monitored her audio using a Skype account.

The award-winning reporter says she and her attorneys have "pretty good evidence" that these efforts were "connected" to the Justice Department. She said she was caught in a "Catch-22," forcing her to use the lawsuit and an administrative complaint to discover more about the surveillance through the discovery process and to learn the identities of the "John Does" named in the complaints.

"The Justice Department has not been very forthcoming with questions," she said. "The question is, will anybody ever be held responsible?"

The multimillion-dollar damage figure relates to her loss of privacy and that of her husband and family, she said.

Attkisson learned through a Freedom of Information request that the FBI opened an investigation of the hacking case in May 2013, but says the bureau never interviewed her or even notified her of the probe.

Attkisson resigned from CBS last March after complaining that she was increasingly unable to get her investigative stories on the air. She has published a best-selling book, "Stonewalled," about her battles against the network and the administration as she investigated stories on such subjects as Benghazi, Fast and Furious and ObamaCare.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/01/05/sharyl-attkisson-sues-administration-over-computer-hacking/

This should be a good one to follow.

And what she says about CBS, too. Man. If only we had media with legitimately competing interests, imagine the stuff that would be brought forth.

As it is, the CIA can monitor the computers of the Senate assistants investigating them, and the story won't even be pursued. Wow. But you'll be shown some dumb video that's "gone viral", and there's your news.

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #60 on: July 07, 2015, 10:21:15 AM »
Judicial Watch: New Documents Reveal DOJ, IRS, and FBI Plan to Seek Criminal Charges of Obama Opponents
JULY 07, 2015

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch today released new Department of Justice (DOJ) and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) documents that include an official “DOJ Recap” report detailing an October 2010 meeting between Lois Lerner, DOJ officials and the FBI to plan for the possible criminal prosecution of targeted nonprofit organizations for alleged illegal political activity.

The newly obtained records also reveal that the Obama DOJ wanted IRS employees who were going to testify to Congress to turn over documents to the DOJ before giving them to Congress. Records also detail how the Obama IRS gave the FBI 21 computer disks, containing 1.25 million pages of confidential IRS returns from 113,000 nonprofit social 501(c)(4) welfare groups  – or nearly every 501(c)(4) in the United States – as part of its prosecution effort. According to a letter from then-House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) to IRS Commissioner John Koskinen, “This revelation likely means that the IRS – including possibly Lois Lerner – violated federal tax law by transmitting this information to the Justice Department.”

The documents were produced subsequent to court orders in two Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuits: Judicial Watch v. Internal Revenue Service (No. 1:14-cv-1956) and Judicial Watch v. Department of Justice (No. 1:14-cv-1239).

The new IRS documents include a October 11, 2010 “DOJ Recap” memo sent by IRS Exempt Organizations Tax Law Specialist Siri Buller to Lerner and other top IRS officials explaining an October 8 meeting with representatives from the Department of Justice Criminal Division’s Public Integrity Section and “one representative from the FBI” to discuss the possible criminal prosecution of nonprofit organizations for alleged political activity:

On October 8, 2010, Lois Lerner, Joe Urban [IRS Technical Advisor, TEGE], Judy Kindell [top aide to Lerner], Justin Lowe [Technical Advisor to the Commissioner of Tax-Exempt and Government Entities], and Siri Buller met with the section chief and other attorneys from the Department of Justice Criminal Division’s Public Integrity Section, and one representative from the FBI, to discuss recent attention to the political activity of exempt organizations.

The section’s attorneys expressed concern that certain section 501(c) organizations are actually political committees “posing” as if they are not subject to FEC law, and therefore may be subject to criminal liability. The attorneys mentioned several possible theories to bring criminal charges under FEC law. In response, Lois and Judy eloquently explained the following points:

Under section 7805(b), we may only revoke or modify an organization’s exemption retroactively if it omitted or misstated a material fact or operated in a manner materially different from that originally represented.

If we do not have these misrepresentations, the organization may rely on our determination it is exempt. However, the likelihood of revocation is diminished by the fact that section 501(c)(4)-(c)(6) organizations are not required to apply for recognition of exemption.

We discussed the hypothetical situation of a section 501(c)(4) organization that declares itself exempt as a social welfare organization, but at the end of the taxable year has in fact functioned as a political organization. Judy explained that such an organization, in order to be in compliance, would simply file Form 1120-POL and paying tax at the highest corporate rate.

Lois stated that although we do not believe that organizations which are subject to a civil audit subsequently receive any type of immunity from a criminal investigation, she will refer them to individuals from CI who can better answer that question. She explained that we are legally required to separate the civil and criminal aspects of any examination and that while we do not have EO law experts in CI, our FIU agents are experienced in coordinating with CI.

The attorneys asked whether a change in the law is necessary, and whether a three-way partnership among DOJ, the FEC, and the IRS is possible to prevent prohibited activity by these organizations. Lois listed a number of obstacles to the attorneys’ theories:

[REDACTED]

She pointed to Revenue Ruling 2004-6, which was drafted in light of the electioneering communication rules before they were litigated.

Just prior this meeting, the IRS began the process of providing the FBI confidential taxpayer information on nonprofit groups. An IRS document confirms the IRS supplied the FBI with 21 disks containing 1.25 million pages of taxpayer records:

FROM: Hamilton David K

SENT: Tuesday, October 5, 2010  2:49 PM

TO: Whittaker Sherry [Director, GE Program Management], Blackwell Robert M

SUBJECT: RE: Question

There are 113,000 C4 returns from January 1, 2007 to now. Assuming they want all pages including redacted ones, that’s 1.25 million pages … If we get started on it right away, before the 10th when the monthly extracts start, we can probably get it done in a week or so….

The DOJ documents also include a July 16, 2013, email from an undisclosed Justice Department official to a lawyer for IRS employees asking that the Obama administration get information from congressional witnesses before Congress does:

One last issue. If any of your clients have documents they are providing to Congress that you can (or would like to) provide to us before their testimony, we would be pleased to receive them. We are 6103 authorized and I can connect you with TIGTA to confirm; we would like the unredacted documents.

“These new documents show that the Obama IRS scandal is also an Obama DOJ and FBI scandal,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “The FBI and Justice Department worked with Lois Lerner and the IRS to concoct some reason to put President Obama’s opponents in jail before his reelection. And this abuse resulted in the FBI’s illegally obtaining confidential taxpayer information. How can the Justice Department and FBI investigate the very scandal in which they are implicated?”

On April 16, 2014, Judicial Watch forced the IRS to release documents revealing for the first time that Lerner communicated with the DOJ in May 2013 about whether it was possible to launch criminal prosecutions against targeted tax-exempt entities. The documents were obtained due to court order in an October 2013 Judicial Watch FOIA lawsuit filed against the IRS.

Those documents contained an email exchange between Lerner and Nikole C. Flax, then-chief of staff to then-Acting IRS Commissioner Steven T. Miller discussing plans to work with the DOJ to prosecute nonprofit groups that “lied” (Lerner’s quotation marks) about political activities. The exchange included a May 8, 2013, email by Lerner:

I got a call today from Richard Pilger Director Elections Crimes Branch at DOJ … He wanted to know who at IRS the DOJ folk s [sic] could talk to about Sen. Whitehouse idea at the hearing that DOJ could piece together false statement cases about applicants who “lied” on their 1024s –saying they weren’t planning on doing political activity, and then turning around and making large visible political expenditures. DOJ is feeling like it needs to respond, but want to talk to the right folks at IRS to see whether there are impediments from our side and what, if any damage this might do to IRS programs. I told him that sounded like we might need several folks from IRS…

Democratic Rhode Island Senator Sheldon Whitehouse held a hearing on April 9, 2013, during which, “in questioning the witnesses from the DOJ and IRS, Whitehouse asked why they have not prosecuted 501(c)(4) groups that have seemingly made false statements about their political activities…”

The House Oversight Committee followed up on these Judicial Watch disclosures with hearings and interviews of Pilger and his boss, DOJ Public Integrity Chief Jack Smith. Besides confirming the DOJ’s 2013 communications with Lerner, Pilger admitted to the committee that DOJ officials met with Lerner in October 2010. Judicial Watch obtained new documents about these meetings in December 2014 showing the Obama DOJ initiated outreach to the IRS about prosecuting tax-exempt entities.

Following Judicial Watch’s lead, the House also found out about the IRS transmittal of the confidential taxpayer information to the FBI. Because of this public disclosure, the FBI was forced to return the 1.25 million pages to the IRS.

http://www.judicialwatch.org/press-room/press-releases/judicial-watch-new-documents-reveal-doj-irs-and-fbi-plan-to-seek-criminal-charges-of-obama-opponents/

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #62 on: December 18, 2015, 11:05:24 AM »
Chuck Hagel is on the list.

Hagel says he OK’d plan to strike Damascus after 'red line;' Obama told him stand down
Published December 18, 2015 
FoxNews.com
.
Then-Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel speaks to reporters in this April 4, 2014, file photo, while en route to Tokyo, from Honolulu. (The Associated Press)

Former Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel revealed in an extensive interview published Friday that he had approved plans to strike Damascus with Tomahawk cruise missiles after Syria’s Bashar al-Assad crossed the “red line” by using chemical weapons – but President Obama told him to stand down.

The interview with Foreign Policy comes nearly a year after his acrimonious exit from the Obama administration. Still smarting from the circumstances of his departure, Hagel told Foreign Policy that the White House tried to “destroy” him even after he resigned.

The interview explored the tensions between Hagel and others on Obama’s team, but offered particularly revealing details about the backstory to the president’s decision backing off his “red line” with Assad.

The former Pentagon chief said that decision in 2013 dealt a big blow to U.S. credibility.

“Whether it was the right decision or not, history will determine that,” Hagel told Foreign Policy. “There’s no question in my mind that it hurt the credibility of the president’s word when this occurred.”

While it is well-known that Obama chose not to go forward with any military action against Assad in 2013 despite drawing that line – and instead pursued a diplomatic path to have Assad hand over his chemical weapons stockpile – Hagel described the military option as robust up until the moment Obama nixed it.

According to the article, on Aug. 30 of that year, Hagel spent the day giving the OK to plans for a “barrage” of missile strikes on Syria’s capital. Naval destroyers also reportedly were awaiting orders to strike.

But then, while Hagel was at dinner with his wife in northern Virginia, the White House called to connect him with Obama.

The president, according to the piece, told Hagel to stand down and that the U.S. would not take military action.

“A president’s word is a big thing, and when the president says things, that’s a big deal,” Hagel said in the interview.

A senior administration official defended the decision to Foreign Policy, saying Obama was not prepared to take military action without consulting Congress first – and the diplomatic deal that had Assad relinquish his weapons resulted in a Syria “free of its chemical weapons program.”

In the interview, Hagel also complained about the allegedly extensive and meandering deliberations over Syria policy, including hours-long meetings that “were not productive.” He agreed with the reluctance to dispatch a large ground force to the region, but voiced frustration over the confusion about how far the U.S. would go to back rebels in Syria.

Meanwhile, Hagel fumed over how “certain people” were “vilifying me in a gutless, off-the-record kind of way” as he left the administration.

This was a reference to White House officials criticizing him anonymously to news outlets, including saying he didn’t speak up at key meetings.

“They already had my resignation, so what was the point of just continuing to try to destroy me?” he told Foreign Policy.


http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/12/18/hagel-says-ok-d-plan-to-strike-damascus-after-red-line-obama-told-him-stand-down.html?intcmp=hpbt1

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #63 on: September 27, 2016, 03:31:15 PM »
Peter Thiel is on the list.

PAYBACK: Obama Admin Sues Peter Thiel’s Palantir for Bogus ‘Racial Discrimination’

by Joel B. Pollak
26 Sep 2016

Palantir Technologies co-founder

Peter Thiel is evidently paying the price for backing Republican nominee Donald Trump, as the Obama administration has slapped his company with a frivolous lawsuit alleging “racial discrimination” against Asians.
The lawsuit, filed and announced Monday by the Department of Labor, threatens the complete cancellation of every contract Palantir has with the federal government — a penalty worth $340 million, the lawsuit claims, which would end the company.

The claims in the lawsuit are laughable. The Obama administration alleges that Palantir discriminated against Asians. But it has to admit that Palantir, in fact, hired many Asians — 11 out of 25 software engineers, for example. The government does not even bother to claim that Palantir deliberately excluded Asians. Rather, it argues that since only 44% of Palantir’s software engineers are Asian, but 85% of the applicant pool was Asian, Palantir must, statistically, have discriminated against Asians.

In other words: almost all of the software engineers at Palantir have to be Asian, or else it is guilty of “racial discrimination.” Apparently left-wing concern for “diversity” in the workplace is a flexible concept, based on political expediency.

(It is notoriously difficult for anyone, Asian or otherwise, to be hired by Palantir, which deals with very sensitive and advanced intelligence-oriented projects — a fact that is well-known in the tech, defense, and public policy communities.)

The lawsuit is obvious revenge for Thiel’s support of Trump. In his speech at the Republican National Convention in July, Thiel blasted the government for its technological backwardness: “[T]oday our government is broken … it would be kind to say the government’s software works poorly, because much of the time it doesn’t even work at all.”

Thiel’s government clients clearly did not take kindly to that — and wanted to send a message to other potential Trump fans in the business and tech communities.

One expert interviewed by the San Jose Mercury News was highly skeptical of the lawsuit’s merits:

“This is unusual,” said Buck Gee, a former Cisco executive who studies Asian diversity in Silicon Valley, said of the accusations against Palantir. “If it’s true, it would be an anomaly.”

But Gee said Asian employees are less likely to be promoted once they are hired. At Facebook, for example, just 21 percent of the company’s senior leadership staff is Asian.

As for the Palantir lawsuit, Gee is skeptical about the discrimination claims. The complaint leaves out key information, he said, such as what percentage of the company’s overall workforce is Asian. And the Labor Department didn’t explain how it determined which rejected applicants were qualified for the engineering jobs in question.

The Department of Labor hopes to weaponize the Supreme Court’s disastrous ruling last year in Texas Housing on so-called “disparate impact” discrimination to bully Thiel and others. Thiel, who was recently revealed as the main force behind a years-long battle against Gawker, probably has the guts to fight back. But others will not.

http://www.breitbart.com/california/2016/09/26/palantir-obama-admin-sues-peter-thiels-racial-discrimination/

Dos Equis

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #64 on: September 20, 2017, 05:31:47 PM »
Manafort and Trump were on the list.

It looks like Obama did spy on Trump, just as he apparently did to me
BY SHARYL ATTKISSON, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR — 09/20/17
TheHill.com

Many in the media are diving deeply into minutiae in order to discredit any notion that President Trump might have been onto something in March when he fired off a series of tweets claiming President Obama had “tapped” “wires” in Trump Tower just before the election.

According to media reports this week, the FBI did indeed “wiretap” the former head of Trump’s campaign, Paul Manafort, both before and after Trump was elected. If Trump officials — or Trump himself — communicated with Manafort during the wiretaps, they would have been recorded, too.

But we’re missing the bigger story.

If these reports are accurate, it means U.S. intelligence agencies secretly surveilled at least a half dozen Trump associates. And those are just the ones we know about.

Besides Manafort, the officials include former Trump advisers Carter Page and Michael Flynn. Last week, we discovered multiple Trump “transition officials” were “incidentally” captured during government surveillance of a foreign official. We know this because former Obama adviser Susan Rice reportedly admitted “unmasking,” or asking to know the identities of, the officials. Spying on U.S. citizens is considered so sensitive, their names are supposed to be hidden or “masked,” even inside the government, to protect their privacy.

In May, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and former Acting Attorney General Sally Yates acknowledged they, too, reviewed communications of political figures, secretly collected under President Obama.

Weaponization of intel agencies?

Nobody wants our intel agencies to be used like the Stasi in East Germany; the secret police spying on its own citizens for political purposes. The prospect of our own NSA, CIA and FBI becoming politically weaponized has been shrouded by untruths, accusations and justifications.

You’ll recall DNI Clapper falsely assured Congress in 2013 that the NSA was not collecting “any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans.”

Intel agencies secretly monitored conversations of members of Congress while the Obama administration negotiated the Iran nuclear deal.

In 2014, the CIA got caught spying on Senate Intelligence Committee staffers, though CIA Director John Brennan had explicitly denied that.

There were also wiretaps on then-Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) in 2011 under Obama. The same happened under President George W. Bush to former Congresswoman Jane Harman (D-Calif.).

Journalists have been targeted, too. This internal email, exposed by WikiLeaks, should give everyone chills. It did me.

Dated Sept. 21, 2010, the “global intelligence” firm Stratfor wrote:

[John] Brennan [then an Obama Homeland Security adviser] is behind the witch hunts of investigative journalists learning information from inside the beltway sources.

Note -- There is specific tasker from the WH to go after anyone printing materials negative to the Obama agenda (oh my.) Even the FBI is shocked. The Wonder Boys must be in meltdown mode...

The government subsequently got caught monitoring journalists at Fox News, The Associated Press, and, as I allege in a federal lawsuit, my computers while I worked as an investigative correspondent at CBS News. On Aug. 7, 2013, CBS News publicly announced:

… correspondent Sharyl Attkisson’s computer was hacked by ‘an unauthorized, external, unknown party on multiple occasions,’ confirming Attkisson’s previous revelation of the hacking.

Then, as now, instead of getting the bigger story, some in the news media and quasi-news media published false and misleading narratives pushed by government interests. They implied the computer intrusions were the stuff of vivid imagination, conveniently dismissed forensic evidence from three independent examinations that they didn’t review. All seemed happy enough to let news of the government’s alleged unlawful behavior fade away, rather than get to the bottom of it.

I have spent more than two years litigating against the Department of Justice for the computer intrusions. Forensics have revealed dates, times and methods of some of the illegal activities. The software used was proprietary to a federal intel agency. The intruders deployed a keystroke monitoring program, accessed the CBS News corporate computer system, listened in on my conversations by activating the computer’s microphone and used Skype to exfiltrate files.

We survived the government’s latest attempt to dismiss my lawsuit. There’s another hearing Friday. To date, the Trump Department of Justice — like the Obama Department of Justice — is fighting me in court and working to keep hidden the identities of those who accessed a government internet protocol address found in my computers.

Evidence continues to build. I recently filed new information unearthed through forensic exams. As one expert told the court, it was “not a mistake; it is not a random event; and it is not technically possible for these IP addresses to simply appear on her computer systems without activity by someone using them as part of the cyber-attack.”

Patterns

It’s difficult not to see patterns in the government’s behavior, unless you’re wearing blinders.

The intelligence community secretly expanded its authority in 2011 so it can monitor innocent U.S. citizens like you and me for doing nothing more than mentioning a target’s name a single time.

In January 2016, a top secret inspector general report found the NSA violated the very laws designed to prevent abuse.

In 2016, Obama officials searched through intelligence on U.S. citizens a record 30,000 times, up from 9,500 in 2013.

Two weeks before the election, at a secret hearing before the FISA court overseeing government surveillance, NSA officials confessed they’d violated privacy safeguards “with much greater frequency” than they’d admitted. The judge accused them of “institutional lack of candor” and said, “this is a very serious Fourth Amendment issue.”

Officials involved in the surveillance and unmasking of U.S. citizens have said their actions were legal and not politically motivated. And there are certainly legitimate areas of inquiry to be made by law enforcement and intelligence agencies. But look at the patterns. It seems that government monitoring of journalists, members of Congress and political enemies — under multiple administrations — has become more common than anyone would have imagined two decades ago. So has the unmasking of sensitive and highly protected names by political officials.

Those deflecting with minutiae are missing the point. To me, they sound like the ones who aren’t thinking.

Sharyl Attkisson (@SharylAttkisson) is an Emmy-award winning investigative journalist, author of The New York Times bestsellers “The Smear” and “Stonewalled,” and host of Sinclair’s Sunday TV program “Full Measure.”

http://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/351495-it-looks-like-obama-did-spy-on-trump-just-as-he-did-to-me

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #65 on: September 20, 2017, 07:40:32 PM »
Judicial Watch: New Documents Reveal DOJ, IRS, and FBI Plan to Seek Criminal Charges of Obama Opponents
JULY 07, 2015

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch today released new Department of Justice (DOJ) and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) documents that include an official “DOJ Recap” report detailing an October 2010 meeting between Lois Lerner, DOJ officials and the FBI to plan for the possible criminal prosecution of targeted nonprofit organizations for alleged illegal political activity.

The newly obtained records also reveal that the Obama DOJ wanted IRS employees who were going to testify to Congress to turn over documents to the DOJ before giving them to Congress. Records also detail how the Obama IRS gave the FBI 21 computer disks, containing 1.25 million pages of confidential IRS returns from 113,000 nonprofit social 501(c)(4) welfare groups  – or nearly every 501(c)(4) in the United States – as part of its prosecution effort. According to a letter from then-House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) to IRS Commissioner John Koskinen, “This revelation likely means that the IRS – including possibly Lois Lerner – violated federal tax law by transmitting this information to the Justice Department.”

The documents were produced subsequent to court orders in two Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuits: Judicial Watch v. Internal Revenue Service (No. 1:14-cv-1956) and Judicial Watch v. Department of Justice (No. 1:14-cv-1239).

The new IRS documents include a October 11, 2010 “DOJ Recap” memo sent by IRS Exempt Organizations Tax Law Specialist Siri Buller to Lerner and other top IRS officials explaining an October 8 meeting with representatives from the Department of Justice Criminal Division’s Public Integrity Section and “one representative from the FBI” to discuss the possible criminal prosecution of nonprofit organizations for alleged political activity:

On October 8, 2010, Lois Lerner, Joe Urban [IRS Technical Advisor, TEGE], Judy Kindell [top aide to Lerner], Justin Lowe [Technical Advisor to the Commissioner of Tax-Exempt and Government Entities], and Siri Buller met with the section chief and other attorneys from the Department of Justice Criminal Division’s Public Integrity Section, and one representative from the FBI, to discuss recent attention to the political activity of exempt organizations.

The section’s attorneys expressed concern that certain section 501(c) organizations are actually political committees “posing” as if they are not subject to FEC law, and therefore may be subject to criminal liability. The attorneys mentioned several possible theories to bring criminal charges under FEC law. In response, Lois and Judy eloquently explained the following points:

Under section 7805(b), we may only revoke or modify an organization’s exemption retroactively if it omitted or misstated a material fact or operated in a manner materially different from that originally represented.

If we do not have these misrepresentations, the organization may rely on our determination it is exempt. However, the likelihood of revocation is diminished by the fact that section 501(c)(4)-(c)(6) organizations are not required to apply for recognition of exemption.

We discussed the hypothetical situation of a section 501(c)(4) organization that declares itself exempt as a social welfare organization, but at the end of the taxable year has in fact functioned as a political organization. Judy explained that such an organization, in order to be in compliance, would simply file Form 1120-POL and paying tax at the highest corporate rate.

Lois stated that although we do not believe that organizations which are subject to a civil audit subsequently receive any type of immunity from a criminal investigation, she will refer them to individuals from CI who can better answer that question. She explained that we are legally required to separate the civil and criminal aspects of any examination and that while we do not have EO law experts in CI, our FIU agents are experienced in coordinating with CI.

The attorneys asked whether a change in the law is necessary, and whether a three-way partnership among DOJ, the FEC, and the IRS is possible to prevent prohibited activity by these organizations. Lois listed a number of obstacles to the attorneys’ theories:

[REDACTED]

She pointed to Revenue Ruling 2004-6, which was drafted in light of the electioneering communication rules before they were litigated.

Just prior this meeting, the IRS began the process of providing the FBI confidential taxpayer information on nonprofit groups. An IRS document confirms the IRS supplied the FBI with 21 disks containing 1.25 million pages of taxpayer records:

FROM: Hamilton David K

SENT: Tuesday, October 5, 2010  2:49 PM

TO: Whittaker Sherry [Director, GE Program Management], Blackwell Robert M

SUBJECT: RE: Question

There are 113,000 C4 returns from January 1, 2007 to now. Assuming they want all pages including redacted ones, that’s 1.25 million pages … If we get started on it right away, before the 10th when the monthly extracts start, we can probably get it done in a week or so….

The DOJ documents also include a July 16, 2013, email from an undisclosed Justice Department official to a lawyer for IRS employees asking that the Obama administration get information from congressional witnesses before Congress does:

One last issue. If any of your clients have documents they are providing to Congress that you can (or would like to) provide to us before their testimony, we would be pleased to receive them. We are 6103 authorized and I can connect you with TIGTA to confirm; we would like the unredacted documents.

“These new documents show that the Obama IRS scandal is also an Obama DOJ and FBI scandal,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “The FBI and Justice Department worked with Lois Lerner and the IRS to concoct some reason to put President Obama’s opponents in jail before his reelection. And this abuse resulted in the FBI’s illegally obtaining confidential taxpayer information. How can the Justice Department and FBI investigate the very scandal in which they are implicated?”

On April 16, 2014, Judicial Watch forced the IRS to release documents revealing for the first time that Lerner communicated with the DOJ in May 2013 about whether it was possible to launch criminal prosecutions against targeted tax-exempt entities. The documents were obtained due to court order in an October 2013 Judicial Watch FOIA lawsuit filed against the IRS.

Those documents contained an email exchange between Lerner and Nikole C. Flax, then-chief of staff to then-Acting IRS Commissioner Steven T. Miller discussing plans to work with the DOJ to prosecute nonprofit groups that “lied” (Lerner’s quotation marks) about political activities. The exchange included a May 8, 2013, email by Lerner:

I got a call today from Richard Pilger Director Elections Crimes Branch at DOJ … He wanted to know who at IRS the DOJ folk s [sic] could talk to about Sen. Whitehouse idea at the hearing that DOJ could piece together false statement cases about applicants who “lied” on their 1024s –saying they weren’t planning on doing political activity, and then turning around and making large visible political expenditures. DOJ is feeling like it needs to respond, but want to talk to the right folks at IRS to see whether there are impediments from our side and what, if any damage this might do to IRS programs. I told him that sounded like we might need several folks from IRS…

Democratic Rhode Island Senator Sheldon Whitehouse held a hearing on April 9, 2013, during which, “in questioning the witnesses from the DOJ and IRS, Whitehouse asked why they have not prosecuted 501(c)(4) groups that have seemingly made false statements about their political activities…”

The House Oversight Committee followed up on these Judicial Watch disclosures with hearings and interviews of Pilger and his boss, DOJ Public Integrity Chief Jack Smith. Besides confirming the DOJ’s 2013 communications with Lerner, Pilger admitted to the committee that DOJ officials met with Lerner in October 2010. Judicial Watch obtained new documents about these meetings in December 2014 showing the Obama DOJ initiated outreach to the IRS about prosecuting tax-exempt entities.

Following Judicial Watch’s lead, the House also found out about the IRS transmittal of the confidential taxpayer information to the FBI. Because of this public disclosure, the FBI was forced to return the 1.25 million pages to the IRS.

http://www.judicialwatch.org/press-room/press-releases/judicial-watch-new-documents-reveal-doj-irs-and-fbi-plan-to-seek-criminal-charges-of-obama-opponents/

I must have missed the story where these charges were filed


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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #66 on: September 20, 2017, 07:42:13 PM »
No way that a petty, vindictive, paranoid criminal like Trump would have a list like the one that Republicans imagined Obama had ..you know, the list he gave to his DOJ so they could prosecute his political enemies


Dos Equis

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #67 on: May 13, 2020, 07:54:09 PM »
No way that a petty, vindictive, paranoid criminal like Trump would have a list like the one that Republicans imagined Obama had ..you know, the list he gave to his DOJ so they could prosecute his political enemies

Bwahahahahaha!!

Do you ever get tired of making a COMPLETE ass of yourself?

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/grenell-releases-list-of-officials-who-sought-to-unmask-flynn-biden-comey-obama-intel-chiefs-among-them

AbrahamG

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Re: Strassel: The President Has a List
« Reply #68 on: May 13, 2020, 11:01:38 PM »
ODS is still strong on this board.