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House Democrats' Counter-Memo Released, Alleging Major Factual Inaccuracies (vox.com)
Long-time Slashdot reader Rei writes: Three weeks ago, on a party-line vote, the U.S. House Intelligence Committee voted to release a memo from committee chair and Trump transition team member Devin Nunes. The "Nunes Memo" alleged missteps by the FBI in seeking a FISA warrant against Trump aide Carter Page; a corresponding Democratic rebuttal memo was first blocked from simultaneous release by the committee, and subsequently the White House. Tonight, it has finally been released.
Among its many counterclaims: the Steele Dossier, only received in September, did not initiate surveilance of Page which began in July; the Steele dossier was only one, minor component of the FISA application, and only concerning Page's Moscow meetings; Steele's funding source and termination was disclosed in the application; and a number of other "distortions and misrepresentations that are contradicted by the underlying classified documents". Perhaps most seriously, it accuses Nunes of having never read the FISA application which his memo criticized.
Vox argues the memo proves that no one was misled when the surveillance was authorized. "The FBI clearly states right there in the FISA application that they believe Steele was hired to find dirt on Trump... After the Schiff memo was released on Saturday, House Republicans released a document rebutting its core claims. Their response to this damning citation is -- and I am not making this up -- that the vital line in which the FBI discloses the information about Steele was 'buried in a footnote.'"
Among its many counterclaims: the Steele Dossier, only received in September, did not initiate surveilance of Page which began in July; the Steele dossier was only one, minor component of the FISA application, and only concerning Page's Moscow meetings; Steele's funding source and termination was disclosed in the application; and a number of other "distortions and misrepresentations that are contradicted by the underlying classified documents". Perhaps most seriously, it accuses Nunes of having never read the FISA application which his memo criticized.
Vox argues the memo proves that no one was misled when the surveillance was authorized. "The FBI clearly states right there in the FISA application that they believe Steele was hired to find dirt on Trump... After the Schiff memo was released on Saturday, House Republicans released a document rebutting its core claims. Their response to this damning citation is -- and I am not making this up -- that the vital line in which the FBI discloses the information about Steele was 'buried in a footnote.'"
I'm old enough to remember when Republicans said, "There were crimes committed, but President Nixon knew nothing about it!"
The question is, are you intelligent enough to see that that's a completely ridiculous comparison? The two situations have nothing to do with one another. Never mind your carefully avoiding the fact that the indictments of the Russians was explicitly accompanied by them telling you that nobody worked with them, wittingly. Which conspiracy is it that you're alleging that involves nobody actually working with the people indicted? You're also, in your indictment count, including indictments that have exactly zero to do with the period of time Trump was a candidate, let alone anything to do with collusion. Manafort's dodgy reporting on his earlier activities not only don't have anything to do with Trump or his campaign, they don't even have anything to do with Russians trying to influence the election. Again, which campaign conspiracy is it you're talking about? Was there some sort of time travel involved?
Meanwhile, you keep tap dancing right past the fact that the Dem memo doesn't even attempt to refute the central parts of the Republican memo: that the FISA judge was NOT told who spent money on the Russian fiction compiled by Steele (Hillary and the DNC), and more importantly, the Dems aren't contradicting the other memo's revelation that the FBI asserted there wouldn't have been any FISA request at all, without the novella that Hillary paid Steele to get Russian help writing. You want a conspiracy? Lift up that rock and look under it.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
"The FBI clearly states right there in the FISA application that they believe Steele was hired to find dirt on Trump
This was not a contention of the Nunes Memo. The problem was that the FBI knew that the Steele dossier was paid for by Hillary Clinton and the DNC, and the FBI knew about it, yet hid those facts from the FISA court, a major ethical breakdown to say the least.
Tell me again how great democracy is, when we all know that people in groups have trouble coming up with coherent answers to any question more complex than "what restaurant should we go to for lunch?" Clearly the Left is trying to conceal the fact that they launched a politically-motivated investigation, sort of like how they used the IRS to suppress Right-wing groups.
Alternative Right.