emptywheel

This is an incredibly backwards hot take.

The media has made many mistakes and continues to do so. But in the opposite direction.

In addition to the extraordinary number of people already indicted as part of the Special Counsel’s work, there is already ample documented public evidence of “russiagate.” Marcy Wheeler, the best reporter on this story, says “We know of at least five conversations at which various people entered into what I describe as a quid pro quo conspiracy.” 1

Russia and the Trump Campaign worked together to elect Trump as part of a quid pro quo conspiracy.

The media’s error was in anointing Mueller and his report as the savior and sword that would slay our villainous leader. The media has failed to convey reality to the public: in addition to crimes related to Russia, the president and his family have been shown to be awash in many, many kinds of crimes.

He cheated the non-profit system, lied about assets to secure loans, defrauded participants in his “university,” confessed on tape to a pattern of sexual assault corroborated by multiple credible first person accounts, committed tax fraud, helped his parents commit tax fraud, committed campaign finance violations, skirted White House anti-nepotism and ethics rules, publicly threatened witnesses, and has done many other things that are obviously disqualifying.

The failure of the press to convey the extent of Trump’s prolific criminal behavior before and after the 2016 election is this generation’s War…

According to this[1] it was more that the senate committee staffers found an internal CIA report (the 'Panetta review') that contradicted information CIA had made available to the committee (about their torture-enhanced interrogation practices, presumably, and their destruction of the video evidence on the same, under the rationale that transcripts in the cables provided sufficient detail so that the retention of the 'torture tapes' was unnecessary.)

A tit for tat escalation then followed.

As the article ([1]) puts it:

> All of which is to say the SSCI busted the CIA for lying in their official response to the Committee. And as a result, CIA decided to start accusing the Committee of breaking the law. And now everyone is being called into the Principal’s office for spankings.

There's some other interesting reading at the same site[2] about acting General Counsel of the CIA, Robert Eatinger, who referred the Senate Intelligence Committee investigators for investigation by the DoJ and helped provide legal advice on the destruction of the 'torture tapes'.

Even given this pretty lamentable story, it's still hard to understand Feinstein's new stance on privacy. Perhaps, as some have commented, it's all about getting the committee's report released in time for the elections?

[1] http://www.emptywheel.net/2014/03/05/operation-stall/

[2] http://www.emptywheel.net/2014/03/11/robert-eatinger-lawyer-who-approved-torture-tape-destruction-tries-to-intimidate-senate-investigators/

I might not have been clear enough -- Norton is the one claiming to have science and absolute truth on her side. It's brought up in The Atlantic article, and particularly in this blog/Patreon post:

https://www.emptywheel.net/2018/02/26/we-have-to-build-the-future-out-of-the-past/

> I want people to reach out to the abusive toxic men and senior executive vice presidents in their lives, because it’s the most scientifically sound way that we fight bad ideas...

> ...I have no need or desire to bring more hate and anger into this world. What’s more, I have science that can help me develop techniques to diminish the anger and hate that’s here now. Science, like all forms of truth, is a form of love.

And to reiterate, I, and most of her critics, don't have a problem, in theory, with the idea of faithful redemption. But in her writing (and her tweets about this), Norton argues, essentially from a priori, that she knows her approach is right because it is true to her values/heart/whatever. She doesn't have a response to the concern about how she knows she's not being an enabler of (or otherwise suckered by) weev, or that she's not creating any unwanted second-order effects, such as inaderdently creating the appearance of normalizing weev, which helps weev in his mission to recruit toward his cause.

Great Twitter thread here, in which Norton's friend says

https://twitter.com/tomcoates/status/968631133591109632

> We are arguing about tactics and approach, and I am suggesting…

Thanks for the close reading. I guess it depends what you think "no domestic intercepts" excludes, and how much you believe that everyone in the NSA follows the rules. Even if most of them do, a few have the tools to become a very big problem --- and the rest of the organization wouldn't necessarily know, since in an organization like the NSA, people aren't supposed to know what's happening in the office down the hall.

To start with the scope of what's available: it almost certainly includes data on US persons "incidentally" acquired in taps on an authorized target. I'm not aware of anything on DEA procedures there specifically, but as for the general rules, see here: http://www.emptywheel.net/2013/11/08/the-intelligence-communitys-wide-open-unprotected-back-door-to-all-your-content/

Of course, even if NSA analysts know that they have DEA "customers" (as they apparently call the recipients of their intelligence), it might be a breach of the rules to select overseas targets which would be likely to have domestic contacts of interest to the DEA. But given that knowingly breaking the rules in pursuit of an authorized goal seems to count in NSA audits as mere "lack of due diligence", and not classed as "abuse", I'm not sure how much comfort to take from that.

Analysis of NSA audit data from Marcy Wheeler here: http://www.emptywheel.net/2013/08/16/lack-of-due-diligence-the-nsas-the-analyst-didnt-give-a-fuck-violation/

... with further notes on the audit process, and…

Certainly seems odd, but it's not like the guy's dead or something. First, it was stored in a VeraCrypt encrypted container; if he believed only he had the keys, he may have thought it was safe. If he believes he was being framed for child pornography, I imagine he would shout it from the rooftops. Or at least try to shout it to the extent he could, to the point that there would probably be at least a little coverage of the framing allegation. Second, they found plenty of other things, too, (for example, the keys to various VeraCrypt volumes on his phone), so he clearly wasn't a total pro at wiping data.

For the record, the original allegation [0]:

>investigators discovered a single classified document as well as over 10,000 images and videos depicting child pornography including "sadistic and masochistic images and videos of children as young as a few years old who had been brutally sexually assaulted." The government found that Schulte had "neatly organized" this material "according to his preferences, and stored it for a period of years."

More details here, including IRC chat logs: https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.480183/gov.uscourts.nysd.480183.1.0.pdf

I'd recommend reading the whole criminal complaint. They'd really have to provide full, unedited chat logs in order to get a more holistic view, but from what they provided, it does seem somewhat ambiguous. Based on the chat logs and Google search results they found, it seems clear he did…

> But not convicted!

Nah, they all determined he did it. Republican Senators like Lamar Alexander were all quoted saying that both times, they just went on to say they didn't care or they think he learned his lessons.

> How many convictions have they gotten - after more than a year - of these "insurrectionists"? Zero. A few plea deals that are now unraveling. But sure, keep bang that "insurrectionist" drum.

Over 150 by my count. The Oath Keeper who was Roger Stone's bodyguard that day pled guilty to actual sedition!

It hasn't rolled up to Alex Jones and further up but it will, since he was intentionally leading people around to the east side for an attack on Pence by claiming Trump would "give a second speech" there.

https://twitter.com/emptywheel/status/1503855795951312898

If you wanted to actually follow this, which is kind of a waste of time but might be educational(?):

https://www.emptywheel.net/2022/04/04/the-evidence-needed-for-a-trump-prosecution/