#Cabinet Committee on Security

[defencecapital]

20 Years Of India’s Nuclear Doctrine: Does Delhi Need To Reset Its Nuke Policy With Growing Economic & Military Might

By N. C. Bipindra for EurAsian Times India officially declared itself a nuclear weapons state in May 1998 following the ‘Shakti’ nuclear tests in the Rajasthan desert, popularly called Pokhran-II. But it spelled out its official nuclear doctrine for the first time publicly in January 2003 through a media statement issued by the Press Information Bureau (PIB) after a meeting of the Cabinet…

[merisarkar]

Govt Approves Nuclear Submarines and MQ-9B Drones for Military

Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) clears Nuclear Submarines, MQ-9B drones: New Delhi, India – The Indian government has given the green light for two major defense procurements: the indigenous construction of nuclear-powered attack submarines and the purchase of 31 MQ-9B remotely piloted aircraft from the US defence and aerospace giant General Atomics. These acquisitions will significantly…

[defencestar]

India Approves Nuclear Submarines and MQ-9B Drones

India Cabinet clears Nuclear Submarines, MQ-9B drones: New Delhi, India – The Indian government has given the green light for two major defense procurements: the indigenous construction of nuclear-powered attack submarines and the purchase of 31 MQ-9B remotely piloted aircraft from the US defence and aerospace giant General Atomics. These acquisitions will significantly bolster the capabilities…

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Sarah Jones at PoliticusUSA:

Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY) called for Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and CIA Director John Ratcliffe to be prosecuted for perjury after allegedly lying under oath about Signalgate, which became apparent after the text messages were released in full by the journalist whom the Trump administration has tried to bully into silence. “If the evidence initially presented by Jeffrey Goldberg weren’t damning enough, the latest tranche of messages revealed today make it clear that the Trump Administration has been lying—and continues to lie—about the confidential war plans shared by Secretary Hegseth in an unsecured Signal chat,” Nadler said in a statement. Nadler accused Gabbard and Ratcliffe of lying under oath: "The latest text messages confirm that in yesterday’s Senate Intelligence Committee hearing, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and CIA Director John Ratcliffe lied under oath in their testimony. Perjury is a crime, and they should be prosecuted.” Nadler points out what many have already said about this, which is that any other officer would likely face dismissal and “even a court-martial”: "Any other military officer who demonstrated such disregard for security protocols would likely face dismissal from service and even a court-martial. The Trump Administration appears to believe that cabinet secretaries and senior officials are immune from the law. They are not.” [...] But none of that has ever disturbed a hair on a Republican’s head. Hillary Clinton using a private server: unacceptable. Bill Clinton lying under oath: impeachable. Donald Trump guilty of 34 felonies: doesn’t matter. Donald Trump being charged with crimes related to his mishandling of classified documents: doesn’t matter. Tulsi Gabbard and John Ratcliffe allegedly lying under oath: doesn’t matter. Pete Hegseth: gross incompetence, imperiling of the U.S. national security, jeopardizing our troops safety: doesn’t matter. The theme here is that hypocrisy doesn’t matter to Republicans. They can’t be shamed over it because they are way past the point where they even acknowledge realities that don’t fit their narrative.

Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) calls on traitors Tulsi Gabbard and John Ratcliffe to face prosecution over national security dereliction in Signalgate.

[justgot1]

Archive link

I have never seen a breach quite like this. It is not uncommon for national-security officials to communicate on Signal. But the app is used primarily for meeting planning and other logistical matters—not for detailed and highly confidential discussions of a pending military action. And, of course, I’ve never heard of an instance in which a journalist has been invited to such a discussion...

...Conceivably, Waltz, by coordinating a national-security-related action over Signal, may have violated several provisions of the Espionage Act, which governs the handling of “national defense” information, according to several national-security lawyers interviewed by my colleague Shane Harris for this story...

...Waltz and the other Cabinet-level officials were already potentially violating government policy and the law simply by texting one another about the operation. But when Waltz added a journalist—presumably by mistake—to his principals committee, he created new security and legal issues. Now the group was transmitting information to someone not authorized to receive it. That is the classic definition of a leak, even if it was unintentional, and even if the recipient of the leak did not actually believe it was a leak until Yemen came under American attack.

All along, members of the Signal group were aware of the need for secrecy and operations security. In his text detailing aspects of the forthcoming attack on Houthi targets, Hegseth wrote to the group—which, at the time, included me—“We are currently clean on OPSEC.”

-----

Absolutely astonishing. Holy shit, the incompetence. In normal times, heads would be rolling. But let's watch as they do absolutely nothing. Incredible.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Jesse Duquette, The Daily Don

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

February 27, 2025

Heather Cox Richardson

Feb 28, 2025

Yesterday an unvaccinated child in Texas died of measles as nearly 140 people in Texas and New Mexico have been reported ill with the disease. This is the country’s first measles death since 2015.

Measles cases appear almost every year, but usually the government works to suppress measles, as well as other contagious diseases. It’s not clear the Trump administration intends to do that. Yesterday the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) abruptly canceled a scheduled meeting to select the strains of flu to be included in next season’s vaccines. This year’s flu season has been severe: according to NBC News health and medical reporter Berkeley Lovelace Jr., 86 children and 19,000 adults so far have died from the flu this year and 430,000 adults have been hospitalized. On February 20, Lovelace reported that a meeting of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, scheduled for February 26–28, was cancelled.

Speaking earlier this month in favor of confirming anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as secretary of health and human services, Senator Bill Cassidy (R-LA), who chairs the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions and who is a doctor himself, assured his colleagues that Kennedy had promised to notify the Senate before making changes to vaccine programs and that “[i]f confirmed, he will maintain the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices without change.”

Cuts from the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have made it hard for the country to confront the bird flu that is sweeping the poultry industry and now infecting dairy herds, as well. Marcia Brown of Politico reported today that the Trump administration is trying to rehire government employees who were working on combating the disease after widespread cuts to employees in the Agriculture Department during the first purge of government workers gutted research on it. Now some of the employees in the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, the National Animal Health Laboratory Network program, and so on, have been offered their jobs back, but those offers are haphazard, and not all employees are keen to take jobs that are clearly not secure.

Indeed, health does not seem to be a top priority of the administration. Apoorva Mandavilli of the New York Times noted today that during his remarks at the Cabinet meeting yesterday, billionaire Elon Musk, who the administration has claimed in court is only an advisor to the president and neither leads nor is employed by DOGE, admitted that DOGE had made some initial mistakes, such as when it “accidentally canceled very briefly” efforts to contain an outbreak of Ebola in Uganda. But Musk reassured his audience that mistaken decisions were quickly reversed. DOGE “restored the Ebola prevention immediately, and there was no interruption.” Except they didn’t: in theory, USAID workers could get a waiver to continue work, but in reality, money did not resume and much of the work was forced to stop.

The administration continues to insist it is cutting “waste, fraud, and abuse,” but the reality that it is cutting programs on which Americans depend is becoming clearer. During yesterday’s Cabinet meeting, Trump indicated that the next major round of workforce cuts will be at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), created by Congress in 1970 at the urging of Republican president Richard M. Nixon to protect clean air, land, and water. Trump said that 65% of the 15,000 people who work there will be fired; an official later clarified that the president meant that the budget would be cut by 65%.

Today, three former heads of the EPA warned in a New York Times op-ed that Americans would miss the agency “when it’s gone.” William K. Reilly and Christine Todd Whitman, who headed the EPA under Republican presidents, and Gina McCarthy, who headed it under a Democratic president, recalled how between 1970 and 2019 the EPA “cut emissions of common air pollutants by 77 percent, while private sector jobs grew 223 percent and our gross domestic product grew almost 300 percent.” The EPA minimizes exposure to dangerous air during wildfires, cleans up contaminated lands, and tests for asbestos, lead, and copper in water,, delivering health benefits that outweigh its costs, the authors say, by more than 30 to 1.

Trump administration officials claim they are enacting the policies their voters demand, but Melanie Zanona, Jonathan Allen, and Matt Dixon of NBC News reported Tuesday that the blowback on Republican representatives willing to hold town halls during the House recess was so intense that House leaders are urging them simply to stop holding constituent events. If they want to continue to do so, leaders suggest making sure they vet attendees to make sure there won’t be altercations that go viral on social media, as several have done recently. Leadership wants to stop what they say is a developing narrative that paints Republicans in a bad light.

Republican National Committee senior advisor Danielle Alvarez told the NBC News reporters: “The president's policies are incredibly popular, and the American people applaud his success in cutting the waste, fraud and abuse of their hard-earned taxpayer dollars…. Pathetic astroturf campaigns organized by out-of-touch, far-left groups are exactly why Democrats will keep losing.”

But today’s news is unlikely to quiet the blowback. The administration announced cuts of 800 workers at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which monitors ocean currents, atmospheric changes, and climate change and provides weather and ocean reports. It suggested further cuts tomorrow could bring the total to 1,000. NOAA’s weather reports and marine forecasts are vital to Americans. As climate scientist David Ho pointed out, for example, NOAA operates both of the U.S. tsunami warning centers. Employees from them were fired today.

Also in DOGE’s crosshairs is Social Security. Today the administration announced a major “organizational restructuring” of the Social Security Administration. This restructuring appears to mean large cuts to the agency, even though staffing is already at a 50-year low. It is not clear exactly how many positions will be cut; multiple outlets say half of the agency’s 57,000 employees will be let go, while an executive at the agency told Erich Wagner and Natalie Alms of Government Executive that the initial number of firings will be 7,000. At least five of the eight regional commissioners whose offices oversee and support the agency’s frontline offices across the country are leaving, and former Social Security administrator Martin O’Malley warned: “Social Security is being driven to a total system collapse.”

There are also rumblings of concern among business people about the Trump administration’s approach to the economy. Trump said today that the 25% tariffs on products from Mexico and Canada he paused for a month in early February will take effect on March 4. An additional 10% tariff on goods from China will also go into effect that day. Tariffs are expected to drive up prices, and Bloomberg reported that in this quarter’s earnings calls for 500 of the country’s most valuable businesses, when company managers, investors, and analysts discuss the company’s financial performance, mentions of tariffs reached an all-time high.

Selina Wang of ABC News reported the warning of economists that the mass firings and the Trump tariff threats are having a “chilling” effect on the economy. The tariffs make it hard to plan for future costs, so companies are holding back on investments, while people who lose their jobs or are afraid they’re going to lose their jobs stop spending money. A survey by the Conference Board, a nonpartisan nonprofit that provides insight for business, shows that consumer confidence is dropping dramatically.

When Stanford University announced today that “[g]iven the uncertainty, we need to take prudent steps to limit spending,” adding that “we are implementing a freeze on staff hiring in the university,” Carl Quintanilla of CNBC posted: “‘Here come the multiplier effects.’”

Voters and business people are not the only ones pushing back against Trump’s policies. Rachel Bluth and Melanie Mason of Politico reported today that the country’s 23 Democratic state attorneys general have been working together to stop Trump’s unconstitutional actions. Under the urging of then–attorney general Bob Ferguson of Washington state in February 2024, they began to prepare for cases based on Trump’s campaign statements, taking them seriously as potential policies, and on Project 2025, which they recognized would play a big part in a second Trump administration.

They worked together to figure out the most effective strategies for challenging the administration in court. As Trump issued executive orders at breakneck speed in his first few days in office, they were ready to respond.

Today, U.S. District Judge William Alsup ordered the administration, specifically the Office of Personnel Management, to rescind the mass firing of government workers with probationary status, ruling that the firings were probably illegal. Alsup pointed out that Congress had given personnel decisions to the agencies themselves. “The Office of Personnel Management does not have any authority whatsoever, under any statute in the history of the universe, to hire and fire employees at another agency. They can hire and fire their own employees.”

“Probationary employees are the lifeblood of these agencies,” the judge added. “They come in at the low level and work their way up, and that’s how we renew ourselves and reinvent ourselves.”

Meanwhile, Trump and his team appear to be trying to undermine the rule of law in the United States. Today, Rebecca Crosby and Judd Legum of Popular Information reported that the Securities and Exchange Commission has stopped its prosecution of Justin Sun, a Chinese cryptocurrency entrepreneur who had been charged in March 2023 with securities fraud. After Trump was elected in 2024, Sun bought $30 million worth of Trump’s World Liberty Financial crypto tokens, putting $18 million directly into Trump’s pockets. Since then, he has invested another $45 million in WLF. Altogether, Sun’s investments have netted Trump more than $50 million.

Crosby and Legum note that the SEC also appears to have dropped its case against the crypto trading platform Coinbase after the platform donated $75 million to a political action committee associated with Trump and donated $1 million to Trump’s inauguration.

And, after Trump issued blanket pardons to those convicted of crimes associated with the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, including those who attacked police officers, his administration now appears to have put pressure on Romania to lift a travel ban on social media influencers Andrew and Tristan Tate. The brothers were under investigation in Romania for rape, human trafficking, and money laundering and are under similar allegations in the U.K.

MAGA Republicans attracted followers by claiming they would stand up for law and order. So the arrival in the U.S. of the Tates was not universally popular among them. A number of MAGA Republicans rushed to distance themselves from the Tates. When news broke that they were headed for Florida, Florida’s attorney general said that Florida has “zero tolerance for human trafficking and violence against women,” and Florida governor Ron DeSantis appeared angry as he said he learned of the Tate brothers’ arrival through the media.

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[misfitwashere]

Rejected Cabinet Nominees

Some historical guidance

TIMOTHY SNYDER

JAN 16

Historically, nominees for cabinet positions have been rejected by the Senate or have withdrawn their candidacies in order to prevent that outcome. It is not common, but nor is it abnormal. The power of "advice and consent" granted to the Senate by the Constitution has been exercised in practice. 

A number of Trump's appointments are simply outrageous by historical, ethical, strategic, or any other standards. The ongoing confirmation hearings tend to normalize the bizarre (although Democrats and a couple of Republicans have asked meaningful questions.)

So a few examples of failed nominations might serve as one tool among others to keep the events of the moment in perspective.

Secretary of Defense

John Tower was the first George H.W. Bush nominee for secretary of defense. He has served in the Senate for more than twenty years, and had chaired its Armed Services Committee. He was an author of the Tower Commission report on the Iran-Contra Affair. He was questioned by Senators about his past alcohol use and womanizing.

Pete Hegseth, unlike Tower, has zero knowledge, experience, or qualifications for the of running the Department of Defense. His program, judging from his books, is to ignore foreign enemies, politicize the armed forces, and carry out a "Holy War" against Americans. Pete Hegseth's womanizing and alcohol use, by his own account, far exceed Tower's. Unlike Tower, Hegseth paid off a woman who filed a police report accusing him of sexual assault in circumstances that, by her account, strongly suggest the use of a rape drug. Hegseth had to resign from both of the advocacy groups he ran because of incompetence and drunkenness. He regularly had to be physically carried away from events because he was too drunk to stand. In once case he had to be prevented from joining strippers on a stage. He also displayed total financial and budgetary incompetence. In this connection it is worth mentioning that the Department of Defense has the largest budget of any government in history.

There is a disturbing tendency to forgive Hegseth everything because he is a veteran. This seems unfair to veterans who do not display his failures of character. But it also contains within itself the troubling idea that soldiers can do no wrong: an idea that Hegseth himself seems to hold. That way lies military dictatorship. In any event: Tower served in the Pacific Theater during the Second World War and was in the reserve for decades.

The Senate rejected Tower.

Director of National Intelligence.

This position was created relatively recently and elevated to cabinet rank still more recently. It is meant to oversee the work of all American intelligence agencies. So a relevant historical comparison will be to the position of director of central intelligence.

Anthony Lake was second-term Bill Clinton's nominee for the position of director of central intelligence. Lake was eminently qualified. He is one of the most accomplished American diplomats of the post-1945 period. Among many other positions he was Director of Policy Planning in the State Department under Carter, and National Security Advisor during Clinton's first term. His nomination ran into trouble because of two occasions when his deputies on the National Security Council failed to inform him of discussions with the chairman of the Democratic National Committee about donor access to the White House.

Tulsi Gabbard has no qualifications to be Director of National Intelligence. A very long list of Americans with national security experience regard her as a danger to the safety of Americans. She is known abroad as a supporter of two of the world's most violent dictators, Bashar al-Assad and Vladimir Putin. As a congresswomen she consistently made excuses for Assad, whose regime killed something like half a million people before it was overthrown. She proposed that the Russo-Ukrainian war could be ended "in the spirit of aloha" and repeats Russian propaganda tropes. Russian media refer to Gabbard as "comrade" and "girlfriend" and "our agent."

Under Senate pressure, Lake withdrew his candidacy.

Attorney General

Zoe Baird was nominated by Bill Clinton for attorney general at the beginning of his first term in 1993. She was eminently qualified professionally for the job. She had however hired undocumented immigrants in her household and had not paid Social Security taxes for them.

Pam Bondi is Donald Trump's nominee for the same position. As part of Donald Trump's legal team, she sought to justify his attempt to overturn the results of an election. As Florida attorney general, she accepted luxurious perks from relevant parties in cases she was considering. In that capacity she also failed to pursue a case against Trump University after a political group supporting received a check, an illegal donation, from Trump's foundation signed by Trump. As a lobbyist she represented a Russian money manager convicted in Kuwait and served as a public relations representative for the government of Qatar. She was paid more than $100,000 a month just for that assignment, which she left in order to defend Trump from conviction after his first impeachment. Then she went back to working for Qatar.

Under Senate pressure, Baird withdrew her candidacy.

Succeeding events created the closest thing we have to a historical standard for rejecting cabinet nominees by Republican Senators: the employment of undocumented workers.

After Baird withdrew, Clinton nominated Kimba Wood. She too was eminently qualified to serve as attorney general. It emerged that she too had hired an undocumented worker as a nanny. Wood did so at a time when this was legal, and she paid the appropriate taxes. Nevertheless, the mere fact that she had employed one undocumented person, entirely legally, stopped her candidacy. in 2001, President George W. Bush nominated Linda Chavez to be secretary of labor. She then withdrew her candidacy after it emerged that she had paid an undocumented person to work in her household.

So one might move beyond the obvious point that Bondi's scandals dwarf Baird's (and Hegseth's those of Tower, and Gabbard's those of Lake) and propose a pragmatic line of questioning that would apply to Trump's other nominees. Have they or their companies employed undocumented workers? It seems a reasonable question to ask, especially of the billionaires. Given the coming administration's oft-declared hard line on illegal immigration, this would seem to be a minimum standard for its cabinet nominees.

The Senate has a constitutional role, and in the past has exercised it. Some of the nominees presented to them this month are wildly inappropriate to the point of risking the integrity of American national security and calling into question basic principles of the rule of law. The history of failed nominations reminds us just how far some of these people fall below any reasonable standard.

[mariacallous]

Dr. Phil filming a ride-along with ICE agents, interviewing apparent migrants, and making it look like an episode of Cops feels like something I’d dream up after taking a little too much melatonin and scrolling TikTok before bed.

But instead, the “contentification” of President Donald Trump’s policy is indeed the logical next step for a team that won the election with the help of influencers and content creators. Following suit, Trump’s cabinet has basically created the White House’s own cinematic universe.

Only a few days after her confirmation, Kristi Noem, Trump’s Department of Homeland Security secretary, was filmed alongside Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents conducting an operation. “I’m here in New York City,” Noem told the camera in a vertical video, wearing a bulletproof vest and with a fresh blowout. “We’re getting these dirtbags off these streets.”

Back in December, I wrote that we should not only expect the government to continue its work with influencers but also to become influencers themselves. This week it became clear that this is what the Trump administration has been planning to do with its cabinet leaders all along. They’re not just leading the government, they’re making content while doing it.

Look at who Trump nominated for cabinet positions. Nearly across the board, these nominees have experience playing it up for the camera. Noem is a MAGA media veteran, often appearing on networks like Newsmax to discuss topics of the day. Linda McMahon, wife to former WWE CEO Vince McMahon, has gotten in the wrestling ring a time or two herself. Over the course of his presidential campaign, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. couldn’t get enough of the media, appearing on Joe Rogan’s podcast and anywhere else that would have him. And of course, Pete Hegseth is a former Fox News host. On Tuesday, CNN chief media analyst Brian Stelter wrote that these ICE raids were crafted with television and the internet in mind.

Before his first week in office, Trump had played casting director. Now, we’re getting the pilot episodes.

Still, it’s not like all that much has changed in terms of digital infrastructure at these agencies. It might just be that the GOP is doing it better—and giving their audience what it wants. Even under the Biden administration, DHS and ICE organized ride-alongs with the media, especially with MAGA-friendly broadcasters like Fox News. The agencies would often post photos of enforcement officers cuffing alleged migrants on platforms like X as well. Most of the multimedia staffers are career employees with few slots for political appointees, according to a source familiar with DHS’s public affairs office.

But as Stelter wrote yesterday, the tone of the content is different. And that’s likely a result of the onscreen talent. You’re going to get an entirely different product when working with media veterans like Dr. Phil and Noem. The only Biden cabinet secretary that could rival those two was Pete Buttigieg.

While all of this is happening, the Democrats are waiting to elect a new director before they can even think about casting. On Saturday, Democrats will be voting on their next party chair. There are nearly a dozen people running to fill the spot, but the election is mainly seen as a two-man race between Wisconsin party chair Ben Wikler and Ken Martin, a DNC vice chair.

Wikler, Martin, and many other candidates appeared on a virtual forum Tuesday night specifically focused on the DNC’s future in tech and media. For about an hour, they were asked how they would revamp the party’s data infrastructure and tackle new media. Many of them appeared anxious to take it on.

When I first started covering this beat, Wikler was constantly pitched to me as an example of a Democratic party official who was doing digital the right way. I spoke with him in December, where he reinforced that Democrats needed to respond to the changing media environment quickly if they planned to win elections in the near future. On Tuesday night, Wikler went on to suggest that the DNC create its own innovation lab focused on keeping up with their opposition.

“You need to build a culture of curiosity, innovation, experimentation, and iteration, knowing that many things won’t work,” Wikler said Tuesday night. “So you need to try even more things.”

Martin wants to do something similar by building an “Information War Room” more focused on fighting misinformation.

“That Information War Room will become the hub for better, ongoing, constant digital communications with real-time analytics and also with social listening, so we understand where the misinformation and disinformation is being pumped out, and as part of that, we need to recruit trusted messengers, influencers, creators, and their networks to communicate over the long haul,” Martin said.

That war room already exists on the right. The Trump campaign hosted influencers for special debate war rooms, and the same person who ran the Trump campaign’s war room has now been appointed “war room director” for the White House.

Faiz Shakir, a former Bernie Sanders adviser and the executive director of More Perfect Union, is also running for DNC chair, and he sees things differently. Instead of simply partnering with creators, he envisions a DNC that acts as its own media network. “You don't just sprinkle fairy dust on a Mobilize link or YouTube link,” he said. “We should be raising money right now for the national Meals on Wheels Association, Head Start for America, just raise money for them and build engagement. Do actions on the ground with people, send videographers. This is what I'm doing right now at More Perfect Union.”

On Saturday, Democrats will choose who they want leading the party and taking on what will likely be a massive digital rebrand. During Tuesday’s forum, many of the candidates promised to move past the “boom-and-bust” periods of investing in digital and then stripping programs down to the bones between election cycles.

But it’s hard to imagine they’ll be able to keep up. Republicans have invested in this for years, and Trump has clearly brought it all to the White House. Plus, season two has just begun.

[contemplatingoutlander]

The House GOP is a circus. The chaos has one source.

Republicans spent two years sabotaging the U.S. House. Another two years would be ruinous.

Dana Milbank does a masterful job of describing just how dysfunctional the House GOP members have been in the past two years.

This is a gift🎁link for the entire article. Below are some highlights:

The Lord works in mysterious ways. Six weeks after his improbable rise from obscurity to speaker of the House in late 2023, Louisiana’s Mike Johnson decided to break bread with a group of Christian nationalists. [...] “I’ll tell you a secret, since media is not here,” Johnson teased the group, unaware that his hosts were streaming video of the event. Johnson informed his audience that God “had been speaking to me” about becoming speaker, communicating “very specifically,” in fact, waking him at night and giving him “plans and procedures.” [...] Today, Johnson’s run looks anything but heaven-sent. In the first 18 months of this Congress, only 70 laws were enacted. Calculations by political scientist Tobin Grant, who tracks congressional output over time, put this Congress on course to be the do-nothingest since 1859-1861 — when the Union was dissolving. But Johnson’s House isn’t merely unproductive; it is positively lunatic. Republicans have filled their committee hearings and their bills with white nationalist attacks on racial diversity and immigrants, attempts to ban abortion and to expand access to the sort of guns used in mass shootings, incessant harassment of LGBTQ Americans, and even routine potshots at the U.S. military. They insulted each other’s private parts, accused each other of sexual and financial crimes, and scuffled with each other in the Capitol basement. They screamed “Bullshit!” at President Joe Biden during the State of the Union address. They stood up for the Confederacy and used their official powers to spread conspiracy theories about the “Deep State.” Some even lent credence to the idea that there has been a century-old Deep State coverup of space aliens, with possible involvement by Mussolini and the Vatican.

The above article was adapted from Dana Milbank's (2024) book: Fools on the HILL: The Hooligans, Saboteurs, Conspiracy Theorists, and Dunces Who Burned Down the House.

[See more below the cut.]

And this is on top of the well-known pratfalls: The 15-ballot marathon to elect a speaker, the 22-day shutdown of the House to find another speaker, the routine threats of government shutdowns and a near-default on the federal debt that hurt the nation’s credit rating. They devoted 18 months to a failed attempt to impeach Biden, which produced nothing but Marjorie Taylor Greene publicly displaying posters of Hunter Biden engaging in sex acts. One “whistleblower” defected to Russia, another worked with Russian intelligence and is under indictment for fabricating his claims, and still another is on the lam, evading charges of being a Chinese agent. As soon as Biden withdrew his candidacy, they promptly forgot their probe of Biden’s “corruption” and rushed to launch a new series of investigations into Kamala Harris (over her record on border security) and Tim Walz (over his military service and “cozy relationship” with China). After a number of failed attempts, they did impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas (the first such action against a Cabinet officer since 1876) without identifying any high crimes or misdemeanors he had committed; the Senate dismissed the articles without a trial. House Republicans created a “weaponization committee” under the excitable Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), but it was panned even by right-wing commentators when it produced little more than a list of conspiracy theories from the likes of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard. They lapsed repeatedly into fits of censure resolutions, contempt citations and other pointless acts of vengeance. In all of its history, the House had voted to censure one of its own members only seven times; in the two weeks after Johnson became speaker, members of the House tried to censure each other eight times. [...] In lieu of consequential legislating, they passed bills such as the Refrigerator Freedom Act, the Gas Stove Protection and Freedom Act and the Stop Unaffordable Dishwasher Standards (SUDS) Act. On the House floor, the Republican majority suffered one failure after another, even on routine procedural votes. Seven times (and counting), House Republicans voted down their own leaders’ routine attempts to begin floor debates — something that hadn’t happened once in the previous 20 years.

[us-cj]

Operation Condor

This outline is the story of how the FBI Counterintelligence Division and DOJ National Security Division were weaponized. This outline is the full story of what House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes is currently working to expose. This outline exposes the biggest political scandal in U.S. history. This outline is also the story of how one man’s action likely saved our constitutional republic.

His name is Admiral Mike Rogers.

I’m calling the back-story to the 2016 FISA 702(16)(17) political corruption by the Obama administration “Operation Condor”. Those of you familiar with the film “Three Days of The Condor” will note how the real life storyline almost mirrors the Hollywood film. For the real life version, NSA Director Admiral Mike Rogers plays the role of “Condor”.

“SCIF” – a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility. To understand the larger FISA 702(16)(17) issues in 2016 it is important to focus on the word “compartmented”.

Intelligence information is housed by compartments within the larger intelligence community network. Each intelligence unit holds intelligence unique to that compartment and task. The FBI Counterintelligence unit would hold the intelligence information specific to their task or assignment; the DOJ National Security Division would hold their own compartmented intelligence; again, specific to their task and objectives. So too would the DOJ, DoD (Pentagon), State Dept., or CIA.

This compartmented structure is what led to the creation of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, ODNI. The 911 commission recommended the office to serve as a hub able to ensure intelligence sharing; that is – to ensure intelligence was not intentionally withheld from other compartments when needed.

In 2016 the ODNI for President Obama was James Clapper.

It is doubtful the 911 commission ever gave thought to what might happen when intelligence is weaponized as a political tool. The DNI is a political appointment, a cabinet member, of the President. If the executive branch, the President, wanted to weaponize intelligence as a political tool, he/she would have control over such weaponization as an outcome of their political appointees within the: FBI (Comey, McCabe), DOJ (Lynch/Yates), CIA (Brennan), DNI (Clapper), or DoD (Ash Carter), etc.

The civilian (representative) oversight into the compartmented intelligence falls to a very select group known as the Intelligence Gang of Eight.

Four Democrats and Four Republicans (four minority party and four majority party political leaders) for a total of eight. Four from the House and Four from the Senate. –Understand the Gang of Eight (https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2017/01/02/united-states-national-intelligence-oversight-the-gang-of-eight/) – The Gang-of-Eight can, if they choose, interact with the intelligence product with the same level of security clearance as the compartment being reviewed.

Only these eight members can interact with the intelligence product in this way. This ensures their ability to conduct oversight.

It is critical to understand the difference between the House Intelligence Committee, the Senate Intelligence Committee and the Gang of Eight. Only two members from the House Intelligence Committee (chair and minority), and two members of the Senate Intelligence Committee (chair and vice-chair) are participants. The other four are Speaker of the House, minority leader of House, Leader of Senate and Minority leader of Senate. The latter four are not part of any other intel committee.

On March 20th 2017 congressional testimony, James Comey was asked why the FBI Director did not inform congressional oversight about the counterintelligence operation that began in July 2016.

FBI Director Comey said he did not tell congressional oversight he was investigating presidential candidate Donald Trump because the Director of Counterintelligence suggested he not do so. *Very important detail.*

I cannot emphasize this enough. *VERY* important detail. Again, notice how Comey doesn’t use FBI Counterintelligence Director WH “Bill” Priestap’s actual name, but refers to his position and title. Again, watch the first three minutes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=HlXXZQgh72Y

FBI Director James Comey was caught entirely off guard by that first three minutes of that questioning. He simply didn’t anticipate it.

Oversight protocol requires the FBI Director to tell the congressional intelligence “Gang of Eight” of any counterintelligence operations. The Go8 has oversight into these ops at the highest level of classification. In July 2016 the time the operation began, oversight was the responsibility of this group, the Gang of Eight:

Obviously, based on what we have learned since March 2017, and what has surfaced recently, we can all see why the FBI would want to keep it hidden that they were running a counterintelligence operation against a presidential candidate. After all, as FBI Agent Peter Strzok said it in his text messages, it was an “insurance policy”.

REMINDER – FBI Agent Strzok to FBI Attorney Page:

“I want to believe the path you threw out for consideration in Andy’s office that there’s no way he gets elected – but I’m afraid we can’t take that risk. It’s like an insurance policy in the unlikely event you die before you’re 40.”

FBI Director James Comey told congress on March 20th, 2017, the reason he didn’t inform the statutory oversight “Gang of Eight” was because Bill Priestap (Director of Counterintelligence) recommended he didn’t do it.

The originating intelligence agency agency, in these examples the DOJ National Security Division and/or FBI Counterintelligence Division, holds the proprietary intelligence they create in their SCIF. They may also receive intelligence products created for them, which they will also host in their unique SCIF. Thus, intelligence is compartmentalized.

In 2015 Sally Yates blocked any inspector general oversight of the DOJ National Security Division (SEE Pdf https://t.co/b2VmsRhQ42). The Office of Inspector General. Michael Horowitz, requested oversight over the DOJ National Security Division and it was Sally Yates who responded with a lengthy 58-page legal explanation saying, essentially, ‘nope – not allowed.’ (PDF https://t.co/b2VmsRhQ42) All of the DOJ is subject to oversight, except the NSD.

The White House -the executive branch- is also a host of intelligence information and consequently the White House has their own SCIF which holds intelligence products they would create (very little), or intelligence products created for them (the vast majority).

An example of a product created for the executive branch would be the President’s Daily Briefing (PDB).

The PDB as a whole product would only exist in the White House SCIF. Parts of the PDB would be hosted by the originating participant, ex. NSA, FBI, DOJ, DoD, CIA State Dept. etc., but only the White House would have the fully assembled product. After all, it’s assembled for the President.

Putting the “Oversight” structure together with the “Compartmented” intelligence security you will note that only a few people ‘could’ traditionally access the full PDB. However, under President Obama the President’s Daily Brief went to almost everyone at top levels in his administration. Regarding the Obama PDB:

[…] But while through most of its history the document has been marked “For the President’s Eyes Only,” the PDB has never gone to the president alone. The most restricted dissemination was in the early 1970s, when the book went only to President Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger, who was dual-hatted as national security adviser and secretary of state.

In other administrations, the circle of readers has also included the vice president, the secretary of defense and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, along with additional White House staffers.

By 2013, Obama’s PDB was making its way to more than 30 recipients, including the president’s top strategic communications aide and speechwriter, and deputy secretaries of national security departments. (link)

Pay attention to that last part. According to the Washington Post outline Obama’s PDB’s were going to more than 30 recipients including: “Deputy Secretaries of national security departments”. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/five-myths-about-the-presidents-daily-brief/2016/12/29/eeb4bbec-c862-11e6-8bee-54e800ef2a63_story.html?utm_term=.7590754fb293)

During an MSNBC interview about her unmasking U.S. citizens within intelligence reports, in April 2017, President Obama’s National Security Adviser, Susan Rice, defined the Obama national security departments to include: “State” – “Defense” (Pentagon includes NSA) and “CIA”….

So under President Obama’s watch Deputy Asst. Secretaries of Defense had daily access to the PDB. An example of an Obama Deputy Asst. Secretary of Defense, Evelyn Farkas. (https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2017/03/28/oh-my-president-obamas-own-defense-deputy-admits-obama-white-house-spied-on-candidatepresident-elect-trump/)

With dozens of people having access to President Obama’s PDB, Rice’s unmasking of names within the intelligence product gave dozens of people direct access to unmasked intelligence – including Obama officials who could, likely did, use the PDB for specific and intentional political purposes. This political outcome was essentially confirmed by Evelyn Farkas who was one of the downstream recipients of the unmasked intelligence. (https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2017/03/28/oh-my-president-obamas-own-defense-deputy-admits-obama-white-house-spied-on-candidatepresident-elect-trump/)

If the House Intelligence Committee, or Senate Intelligence Committee, as a whole – wanted to see the President’s Daily Briefing, they would have to request the individual components from the individual intelligence agencies because the PDB product was not created for them; it was created for the Office of The President.

Only the Chairman and Minority leader from each Intel committee could go to the White House to see the PDB end product. [Remember, they alone are four of the Gang-of-Eight.]

This is why Devin Nunes, who is a Go8 member, has to request the intelligence from each department (NSA, DOJ, FBI etc.) in order to share it with the oversight committee. Nunes can review the ‘executive SCIF product’ but cannot export or import intelligence product he did not create.

The Congressional SCIF would then hold the compartmented information after delivery for the committee members to review under very tight controls. The intelligence is removed/deleted after review. No systems are connected.

Our research indicates that in February and March 2017 Chairman Devin Nunes, a gang of eight member, reviewed intelligence reports (most likely PDB’s) that were assembled exclusively for the office of the former President (Obama). That is why he went to the Eisenhower Executive Office Building (EEOB) Information Facility to review.

The intelligence product would be delivered to that SCIF system for his review, most likely by the ODNI (Dan Coats) or NSA (Mike Rogers). It would be removed from that SCIF system after Nunes review, (no systems are connected). It is important to note here that President Trump nominated Senator Dan Coats as ODNI on January 5th, 2017 (https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2017/01/05/report-president-elect-trump-to-announce-dan-coats-nominee-for-director-of-national-intelligence/) – however, Democrats held up that nomination until March 16th, 2017. (https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2017/03/16/senator-dan-coats-accepts-his-presidential-commission-as-director-of-national-intelligence/)

It is not coincidental that immediately following DNI Dan Coat’s ability to provide that information Chairman Devin Nunes first reported his concerns. After Devin Nunes review the information March 22nd 2017, Nunes stated the intelligence product he reviewed was “not related to Russia, or the FBI Russian counter-intelligence investigation”.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman, Devin Nunes, then held a brief press conference and stated he has been provided intelligence reports brought to him by unnamed sources that include ‘significant information’ about President-Elect Trump and his transition team.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=VtEz57_KZGk

1.) …”On numerous occasions the [Obama] intelligence community incidentally collected information about U.S. citizens involved in the Trump transition.”

2.) “Details about U.S. persons associated with the incoming administration; details with little or no apparent foreign intelligence value were widely disseminated in intelligence community reporting.”

3.) “Third, I have confirmed that additional names of Trump transition members were unmasked.”

4.) “Fourth and finally, I want to be clear; none of this surveillance was related to Russia, or the investigation of Russian activities.

“The House Intelligence Committee will thoroughly investigate surveillance and its subsequent dissemination, to determine a few things here that I want to read off:”

•“Who was aware of it?”

•“Why it was not disclosed to congress?”

•“Who requested and authorized the additional unmasking?”

•“Whether anyone directed the intelligence community to focus on Trump associates?”

•“And whether any laws, regulations or procedures were violated?”

“I have asked the Directors of the FBI, NSA and CIA to expeditiously comply with my March 15th (2017) letter -that you all received a couple of weeks ago- and to provide a full account of these surveillance activities.”

Again, this is why the intelligence reports seem likely to have been political opposition research -that was part of Obama’s PDB– unless it was a separate intelligence product, apart from the PDB, which was created for the Office of the President. [I view the latter as highly doubtful because it would be too risky for the President to be asking for specific ‘stand alone’ intelligence against political adversaries, ie candidate Donald Trump.]

…Here’s where all the dots connect:

Fast forward to 2018 – Aside from the larger Russian conspiracy narrative, up to now the controversial media story has been around the origin of the 2016 FISA warrant(s).

As previously stated by all reporting there was a June 2016 FISA application that was denied (https://heatst.com/world/exclusive-fbi-granted-fisa-warrant-covering-trump-camps-ties-to-russia/), and an October 2016 application that was approved. (http://www.nationalreview.com/article/443768/obama-fisa-trump-wiretap) The current line of congressional inquiry surrounds the underlying content of the requested FISA warrant, and whether it was built upon fraud and manipulated content (the ‘Steele Dossier’) presented to the FISA Court (FISC).

Recently the media have been working frantically, against an entire year of prior support for the Steele Dossier, to distance the origin of the FBI counterintelligence operation from the dossier. The reason why reveals the bigger underlying story.

When Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes explained his concern in March 2017 about what he saw from a review of 2016 intelligence gathering, reporting and subsequent unmasking, the issue behind his concern was clouded in mystery. Indeed the larger headlines at the time were about demanding a special prosecutor and driving the Russia conspiracy narrative. (https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2017/03/29/understanding-the-nunes-paradox/)

In hindsight, and with information from our assembled timelines of 2016 though today, we can now revisit that concern expressed by Chairman Nunes with a great deal more perspective and information. Understanding the latest information will help us all understand the totality of Nunes original frame of reference. (https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2017/03/29/understanding-the-nunes-paradox/)

As many of you are aware, immediately following the 2016 presidential election NSA Director Admiral Mike Rogers traveled to Trump Tower to meet with president-elect Donald Trump. (https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2017/03/03/occams-razor-did-nsa-admiral-mike-rogers-warn-trump-on-november-17th-2016/) The day AFTER the Rogers visit, President-elect Trump moved his transition team out of Trump Tower to Bedminister New Jersey. (http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/nov/17/donald-trump-moves-transition-meetings-private-gol/)

We always suspected NSA Director Rogers gave President-elect Trump a head’s up of sorts.

Later, during the December 2016 and Jan, Feb, March, April 2017 Russian Conspiracy frenzy, when the entire intelligence community seemed to be collectively leaking against Trump’s interests, those suspicions gained even greater likelihood. However, what we learned in 2017 about the activity in 2016 almost guarantees that was exactly what happened. That back-story also ties into both the FISA issue and the Devin Nunes concern.

Admiral Mike Rogers became NSA director in April 2014.

Sometime in early 2016 Admiral Rogers became aware of “ongoing” and “intentional” violations of Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), Section 702 surveillance. Specifically item #17 which includes the unauthorized upstream data collection of U.S. individuals within NSA surveillance.

Section 702 – Item #17 “About Queries” is specifically the collection of emails, and phone call surveillance of U.S. persons.

The public doesn’t discover this issue, and NSA Director Rogers action, until May 2017when we learn that Rogers told the FISA court he became aware of unlawful surveillance and collection of U.S. persons. Put into context, with the full back-story, it appears that 2016 surveillance was the political surveillance now in the headlines; the stuff Chairman Nunes is currently questioning.

The dates here are important as they tell a story.

As a result of Rogers suspecting [FISA 702 (#17 – email and phone calls)] surveillance activity was being used for reasons he deemed unlawful, in mid 2016 Rogers ordered the NSA compliance officer to run a full audit on 702 NSA compliance.

Again, 702 is basically spying on Americans; the actual “spying” part is 702. Item 17 is “About Queries“, which allows queries or searches of content of email and phone conversations based on any subject matter put into the search field.

The NSA compliance officer identified several strange 702 “About Queries” that were being conducted. These were violations of the fourth amendment (search and seizure), ie. unlawful surveillance and gathering. Admiral Rogers was briefed by the compliance officer on October 20th, 2016.

Admiral Mike Rogers ordered the “About Query” activity to stop, reported the activity to the DOJ, and then went to the FISA court.

On October 26th, 2016, full FISC assembly, NSA Director Rogers personally informed the court of the 702(17) violations. Additionally, Rogers also stopped “About Query” permanently.

[Things to note: ♦Note the sequencing; ♦note that Rogers a career military person, followed the chain of command; ♦note the dates as they align with the Trump FISA application (https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2017/12/28/the-mistresses-of-mirrored-halls-looking-at-the-corrupt-doj-side-of-operation-trump/) from the FBI and DOJ-NSD, (ie. early October 2016); ♦and note amid this sequence/time-line the head of DOJ-National Security Divsion, John P Carlin resigns.]

IMPORTANT – WATCH The first two and a half minutes of this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=CIJGH9RS2Fc

The DOJ National Security Division set Admiral Mike Rogers up to take the fall for their unlawful conduct. They preempted Rogers by filing a notification with the FISA Court on 26th September 2016 (look at the pdf). DOJ-NSD head John P Carlin was setting up Rogers as the scapegoat while knowing the NSA FISA compliance officer was still reviewing their conduct. Carlin wouldn’t notify the court unless he was trying to cover something. Carlin then announced his resignation. The NSA compliance officer did not brief Admiral Rogers until 20th Oct 2016. Admiral Rogers notified the FISC on 26th Oct 2016.

October 2016 is a very important month:

♦DOJ Deputy Attorney Bruce Ohr was “demoted” in the summer of 2017 after the Inspector General discovered unreported 2016 contacts between Ohr and Russian Dossier author Christopher Steele, as well as contact with Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson, in October 2016.

♦Also in October 2016 the DOJ lawyers formatted the FBI information (Steele Dossier etc.) for the Trump FISA application; the head of the NSD, Asst. Attorney General John P Carlin, left his job. It would have specifically been John Carlin’s responsibility to ensure a valid legal basis for the FISA application submitted to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC).

♦In October 2016 the NSA compliance officer completes a review and briefs Rogers of FISA(17) violations, email collection and phone surveillance. Rogers informs FISC – [FISA Court Ruling Link]

Now Look At This – October 2016: On Friday November 18th, 2016, The Washington Post reported on a recommendation in “October” that Mike Rogers be removed from his NSA position:

The heads of the Pentagon and the nation’s intelligence community have recommended to President Obama that the director of the National Security Agency, Adm. Michael S. Rogers, be removed.

The recommendation, delivered to the White House last month, was made by Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter and Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper Jr., according to several U.S. officials familiar with the matter.

[…] In a move apparently unprecedented for a military officer, Rogers, without notifying superiors, traveled to New York to meet with Trump on Thursday at Trump Tower. That caused consternation at senior levels of the administration, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal personnel matters. (link)

clapper-comey-rogers-brennan-1

Important reminder. Remember, in 2015 Sally Yates blocked any inspector general oversight of the DOJ National Security Division (SEE Pdf HERE). The OIG, Michael Horowitz, requested oversight and it was Sally Yates who responded with a lengthy 58-page legal explanation saying, essentially, ‘nope – not allowed.’ (PDF HERE) All of the DOJ is subject to oversight, except the NSD.

There’s a pretty clear picture here.

Obama’s political operatives within the DOJ-NSD were using FISA 702(17) surveillance “about inquiries” that would deliver email and phone communication for U.S. people (Trump campaign). The NSD unit was working in coordination with the FBI Counterintelligence Unit (Peter Strzok etc.). In an effort to stop the activity NSA Director Mike Rogers initiated a full 702 compliance review. However, before the review was complete the DOJ-NSD had enough information for their unlawful FISA warrant which worked retroactively to make the prior FBI surveillance (began in July ’16 per James Comey) lawful. Rogers stopped the process on October 26th 2016. As a result of his not going along, Rogers became a risk; Clapper demanded he be fired.

Ten days after the election, November 17th 2016, Admiral Rogers travels to Trump Tower without telling ODNI James Clapper. Rogers likely informs President-elect Trump of the prior activity by the FBI and DOJ, including the probability that all of Trump Tower’s email and phone communication was being collected.

♦ On November 17th, 2016, NSA Director Admiral Mike Rogers went to see President-Elect Donald Trump in Trump Tower, New York. –SEE https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2017/03/03/occams-razor-did-nsa-admiral-mike-rogers-warn-trump-on-november-17th-2016/ – Director Rogers never told his boss DNI, James Clapper.

♦ On November 18th, 2016, the Trump Transition Team announced they were moving all transition activity to Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey. –SEE http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/nov/17/donald-trump-moves-transition-meetings-private-gol/ – Where they interviewed and discussed the most sensitive positions to fill. Defense, State, CIA, ODNI.

The transition team was set up in Trump Tower. The very next day, November 18th 2016, Trump moves the entire transition team to Bedminister New Jersey?

Does this make more sense now?

It would appear Obama’s Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, is up to his eyeballs in this; though he denies participating. The FBI counterintelligence unit was monitoring Trump through FISA 702(17) upstream surveillance collected by a DOJ National Security Division that had no oversight.

The information the FBI collected, and the stuff Fusion GPS was creating via Christopher Steele, was used to create the Russian Narrative and also to manipulate the FISC into giving them a FISA warrant. ie. “The Insurance Policy”.

Ultimately, the people within all of these intercepts is what Devin Nunes discovered when he looked at the “unmasking requests” which were a result of those FISA 702(17) collections on Team Trump. That’s why Devin Nunes was so stunned at what he saw in February and March 2017.

This is why Chairman Devin Nunes is currently gathering evidence.

source https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2018/01/05/operation-condor-how-nsa-director-mike-rogers-saved-the-u-s-from-a-massive-constitutional-crisis/

[tomorrowusa]

Are we more secure than we were three months ago? FUCK NO!

Despite having access to all sorts of state of the art encryption devices, Trump and his senior officials are using a chat app to plan military attacks.

The Trump administration has been accused of a stunning breach of security after the editor of The Atlantic was included in a group chat with top officials and cabinet secretaries outlining plans to strike the Houthis in Yemen. Two days before American warplanes struck targets associated with Iran-backed militants who’d been attacking cargo ships and bottlenecking international trade in key sea lanes, White House National Security adviser Mike Waltz appears to have started a group chat to talk about plans for the airstrikes with key officials. The former Green Beret turned Florida congressman, who resigned in January to serve as President Donald Trump’s top national security aide, used Signal, a common encrypted messaging app, for a group chat with colleagues on the National Security Council’s “Principals Committee.” Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Vice President JD Vance, the Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and CIA Director John Ratcliffe all appeared to be part of the group chat. Others seemingly included were Trump’s Middle East and Ukraine negotiator, Steve Witkoff, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, and Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy Stephen Miller. And somehow, Waltz appears to have added one more person: Jeffrey Goldberg, the veteran journalist who currently serves as Editor-in-Chief of The Atlantic. In an explosive report, Goldberg reveals how he unwittingly got an inside look at how Trump’s team began outlining their plans to bomb the Houthis in Yemen earlier this month on the encrypted app rather than any manner of official communications channels available to top government officials. According to Goldberg, he received a connection request on Signal from a user called Michael Waltz on March 11, presumably the very same Mike Waltz who serves as Trump’s national security adviser. The journalist wrote in a lengthy piece for The Atlantic that he didn’t assume it was the actual Waltz who sent him the connection request. Someone could have been “masquerading” as the senior Trump administration official to “entrap” Goldberg, the journalist writes. Accepting the connection request in case it was genuine, Goldberg received an invitation to a group chat on the app two days later, on Thursday, March 13, entitled “Houthi PC small group.”

It's a good thing it was just Jeffrey Goldberg and not somebody who could have jeopardized US service members.

Trump has always had a slipshod attitude towards national security. We remember how he stored nuclear secrets in insecure cardboard boxes in a guest bathroom at Mar-a-Lago.

The bizarre security breach is not the first time Trump administration officials have had trouble with national defense information. Trump himself was famously indicted for allegedly unlawfully retaining national defense information after federal investigators found hundreds of classified documents at his Florida home during the period in which he was out of government as a former president.

Remember how Hillary Clinton was lambasted by Trump for having a private email server? That was like a convicted felon fulminating against somebody for jaywalking.

Hillary responded to this Trump administration breech in military security.

Hillary Clinton Responds To Trump's Admin Using Signal To Discuss War Plans

Perhaps everybody in Greenland should get Signal accounts so they can learn of a Trump invasion well in advance.

[dorothylarouge]

What was the galaxy's political landscape like after the Empire lost its dominance - how much sway did it still hold, did a neoliberal New Republic get established etc.?

And did Luke reestablish the Jedi Order, if so what was his version like?

After the Battle of Endor, the Empire fractured, with a number of individual warlords carving out their own petty kingdoms and mini-empires, such as the warlord Zsinj and Treuten Teradoc, who formed the polity known as the Greater Maldroon and attracted Grand General Veers and Grand Admiral Sloane to his service. For a brief time, Mas Amedda ruled what remained of the centralized Imperial government in his capacity as Regent, but he was politically outflanked and removed from power by Ysanne Isard, director of the Imperial Security Bureau. Amedda fled for Byss at the center of the galaxy, where he formed an Imperial Royalist Confederation, which he continues to lead. Isard would continue to lead the rump Empire until its defeat by the Republic at the Battle of Coruscant, at which point what was left of the centralized Empire collapsed and Isard killed herself rather than be captured. Most of the Imperial warlords weeded themselves out, and only a handful of Imperial factions remain. These include the Central Committee of Grand Moffs, who rule Kessel and what was formerly Pyke space, dominating the galactic spice trade, and the Iron Triad, a criminal enterprise led by former Grand Moff Ubrik Adelhard, which became a major player in the galactic underworld after the collapse of the Hutt Cartel.

The largest and most successful Imperial remnant is the Pentastar Alignment, which nominally rules much of the galactic north. It was formed by Ardus Kaine, Grand Moff of Oversector Outer, in the months after Endor, and declared independence from Coruscant about a year after the Emperor's death. Defections from other warlord states caused the Alignment's ranks and territory to swell, and Kaine secured his place as the most powerful remnant leader after his defeat of Zsinj at the Battle of Dathomir. Soon afterward, he began his efforts to consolidate the Alignment as a state and cultivate a cult of personality by circulating the Pentastar Codex, a work of political theory he wrote that outlined the principles and policies of Kainism, a more cosmopolitan form of paternalistic national conservatism which replaced Palpatine's New Order as the Alignment's state ideology. These political efforts, as well as Kaine's marginalization of the Moff Council, rankled hardliners in the military and intelligence service, and in 10 ABY the New Order faction or the integralists, led by Dedra Meero and Gilad Pellaeon, launched attacks on Kainist positions, beginning the Pentastar Civil War, which remains ongoing.

The New Republic, by 10 ABY referred to mostly as simply the Republic, reorganized itself from the Rebel Alliance immediately following the Battle of Endor, and soon after the Senate convened its first session on the temporary capital of Chandrila. Elections were not held until following the Liberation of Coruscant, by which point clear political factions had had time to form in the Senate. From its founding to 8 ABY, the Republic was led by Mon Mothma as Chancellor. However, she was forced from power following a series of politically damaging incidents, including a poorly-conceived amnesty program for former Imperials, and she was succeeded by Leia Organa, who quickly pushed through political reforms to stabilize the Republic, including splitting the position of Chancellor into the offices of Chief of State and Prime Minister, and establishing a formal cabinet.

There are four major political blocs in the Senate, two in government and two in opposition. The largest parties in the Senate mainly began as the result of a split in the Progressive Party, the political arm of the Rebel Alliance. The blocs are:

The Organa Bloc, consisting of the Progressive People's Party, the Liberal Party, and the Federalist Party: center to center-left, with the PPP itself being a social democratic party under Leia's leadership.

The Iblis Bloc, consisting of the People's Union Party, Reform Party, and Libertarian Party: Led by Corellian firebrand Garm Bel Iblis, they are a left-wing to far-left grouping in coalition with the Oragana Bloc.

The Fey'lya Bloc, consisting of the Progressive Conservative Party, the Constitutionalist Party, and the Free Hyperlanes Party: Led by Bothawui Senator Borsk Fey'lya, they are a conservative, center to center-right grouping which serves as the official opposition who are steadily growing in popularity in part due to Fey'lya's populist appeals to alien unity against human hegemony.

The Mothma Bloc, consisting of the Galactic Unity Party, the Core Alliance, and the Anti-Jedi Party: A looser-knit grouping of mainly non-aligned right-wing parties, this group is nominally headed by Leida Mothma, daughter of Mon Mothma, who unlike her mother is a traditionalist conservative. Her party, the GUP, is often considered a successor to the Galactic Integralist Party, which had been the state party under the Empire, and is full of Imperial sympathizers, apologists, and outright former Imperials, and pushes for a normalization of relations with the Imperial successor states. The group also includes the Core Alliance, a group of important Core Worlds joined together to maintain their traditional privileges within the Republic, and Alyx J'onzz's Anti-Jedi Party, a fringe group of conspiracy theorists.

After Endor, Luke Skywalker went on walkabout for several years, exploring various Force traditions, discovering Jedi lore, and connecting with Force-sensitives, including surviving Jedi. He returned a Jedi Master, and formed the Order of the Jedi Knights, or New Jedi Order, in 8 ABY, with his Temple erected on the Jedi homeworld of Tython. The Order now has over a hundred members, and Luke leads the High Council with the title of First Master. Luke has reformed the Jedi in many ways, such as relaxing rules against attachments and distancing it from an official capacity within the Republic. These changes are disquieting to the Old Guard faction within the Jedi, led by Master Oppo Rancisis, who often makes his opposition to Luke's policies known in heated arguments in the Council chamber.

[vague-humanoid]

Britain’s Conservative government has issued notices to the media to suppress reports of the operations of the Special Air Service (SAS) in Gaza.

On Saturday, the Socialist Worker, newspaper of the Socialist Workers Party, revealed it had been sent a “D Notice” Saturday morning from the Defence and Security Media Advisory (DSMA) Committee requesting it not publish information relating to the operations of the SAS.

D Notices are used by the British state to veto the publication of news damaging to its interests. The slavish collusion of the mainstream media ensures that such notices function as gag orders. A high level branch of the state, the DSMA’s chair is Paul Wyatt, Director General Security Policy at the Ministry of Defence. Other committee members include the Deputy National Security Adviser, Cabinet Office; Director National Security at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office; Director National Security at the Home Office; and the Director National Security at the Ministry of Defence.

An article by Socialist Worker editor Charlie Kimber notes, “Specifically this ‘D notice’ concerned British special forces operating in the Middle East.” The e-mail to the media was from the DSMA secretary, Brigadier Geoffrey Dodds, he added.

Dodds states, “Reports have started to appear in some publications claiming that UK Special Forces have deployed to sensitive areas of the Middle East and then linking that deployment to hostage rescue/evacuation operations.

“May I take this opportunity to remind editors that publication of such information contravenes the DSMA notice code. I therefore advise that claims of such deployments should not be published nor broadcast without first seeking Defence and Security Media advice”.

He added, “This Notice aims to prevent the inadvertent disclosure of classified information about Special Forces and other MOD units engaged in security, intelligence and counter-terrorist operations, including their methods, techniques and activities.”

[gwydionmisha]

Cabinet Committee Hearings 1/21/24

Please contact your senators and ask them to reject dangerous and unqualified cabinet picks. I don't have a lot of hope at this point, but better to fight than roll belly up. If nothing else ask them to resist Pete Hegseth, Pam Bondi, RFK Jr., Russel Vought, Tulsi Gabbard, and Kash Patel.

Usually they just log for or against. If they want a reason, I've listed some below. Use reason for Democrats. For Republicans: Stress military readiness, national security, and the integrity and morale of the military, law and order, etc..

All of these are terrible. Complain about whatever you have energy for (most important bolded):

TUESDAY:

Doug Collins, Veterans Affairs - Very conservative Trump Loyalist. Could be far worse.

Elise Stefanik, U.N. ambassador, entirely self agendaed with zero principles. Could be far worse and gets her out of congress. Will likely sail through like shit through a goose as she has some democratic support. Don't waste your energy.

WEDNESDAY:

Russell Vought, Office of Management and Budget, is a Project 2025 person with absolutely disastrous plans. He plans to purge the civil service on political grounds and replace honest non-partisan people with right wing extremists as part of implementing autocracy. he also plans to overthrow Congress' power to allocate funds by illegally preventing the disbursement of Medicare, Social Security, EBT, Housing, Education, etc. funds in order to destroy the social safety net. He will likely get away with it as the SCOTUS are so in the bag for kleptocratic fascist autocracy that they've been declaring black letter parts of the constitution un constitutional and thrown out ideas like precedent and rule of law. This guy is terrifying and he's barely getting any coverage or notice.

"Russ Vought wants to make Congress obsolete:" https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/trump-cabinet-russ-vought-project-2025-rcna187838

THURSDAY:

"What to know about Brooke Rollins, Trump’s pick for agriculture secretary:" https://www.wnct.com/news/politics/ap-what-to-know-about-brooke-rollins-trumps-pick-for-agriculture-secretary/

Have something you want to tell your Congress Critters? If you can't safely contact them in person, here are some other options:

Five Calls to your critters: https://5calls.org/

Here is one that will send your reps a fax: https://resist.bot/

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from Robert Reich's Substack blog:

At the same time Democrats and progressives are justifiably enraged at Trump’s gonzo Cabinet picks, they’re all but mute about corporate America’s continued siphoning of economic gains to the top.

Yet this siphoning has created the stagnant wages and insecure jobs that helped propel Trump into the presidency and give Republicans control over both chambers of Congress.

Trump at least gave workers an explanation for what’s happened to them — although it was a lie: It isn’t undocumented immigrants or the “deep state” or transgender kids or any other Trump bogeyman.

It’s corporate greed.

The most recent example: On Friday, GM announced it was laying off 1,000 workers. These layoffs followed another round of GM layoffs in August, which saw 1,500 jobs cut. The cuts affected both salaried and hourly staff, including some United Auto Workers members.

Most of the workers being laid off Friday were notified via email early Friday morning. Some had been working for GM for over thirty years.

GM says it has no choice. It must cut costs.

This is what we hear again and again from corporate America. We’ll be hearing even more of this as Artificial Intelligence takes over white-collar as well as blue-collar jobs.

No choice?

GM is on track for making record profits this year, surpassing its 2022 record profit of $14.5 billion. In the third quarter of 2024 alone, GM made $3.4 billion. That’s a $200 million increase from the same period last year.

GM CEO Mary Barra’s compensation for 2024 is $27.8 million. This includes a base salary of $2.1 million, stock awards of $14.6 million, stock option awards valued at $4.9 million, an “incentive plan” compensation (as if she needed more incentive) of $5.3 million, other payment of $997,392, and perks (personal travel, security, financial counseling, company vehicles, and an executive health plan) valued at $389,005.

The ratio of Barra’s compensation to that of the typical GM employee is estimated to be 303-to-1.

In June, GM announced $6 billion in stock buybacks. This means $6 billion of GM’s record profits will be used to purchase its own shares of stock — thereby boosting share prices (and the portion of Barra’s compensation in stock grants and options) simply because fewer shares of GM stock will be in circulation.

Keep in mind that the richest 1 percent of American hold over half of the value of all shares of stock held by Americans, and the richest 10 percent hold 92 percent.

So, in fact, GM’s savings from axing 1,000 jobs will be transferred into the pockets of wealthy Americans (including GM’s CEO).

Why aren’t Democrats up in arms about this? I haven’t heard Joe Biden, Chuck Schumer, Hakeem Jeffries, or any other leading Democrat say a critical word about GM’s latest move.

Why isn’t Michigan’s Democratic governor, Gretchen Whitmer — who may be in the running for president in 2028 (assuming we have another election) — accusing GM of sacrificing jobs for profits that are siphoned off to big investors?

Why aren’t Democrats, who still control the Senate and presidency, moving more aggressively to outlaw stock buybacks — which were considered illegal stock manipulations before Ronald Reagan’s SEC gave them the green light?

Why aren’t they demanding that capital gains taxes be increased on the super-wealthy, whose stock gains this year alone have made America’s billionaires 30 percent richer?

Why aren’t they moving to increase corporate taxes on corporations whose ratio of CEO pay to their median workers is more than 50 to 1? And impose even higher taxes if the ratio exceeds 100 to 1? (Senate Budget Committee Chair Sheldon Whitehouse, along with Representatives Barbara Lee and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, have introduced just such a bill, but no one knows about it. Why isn’t the Democratic leadership loudly pushing this?)

The lesson of the debacle of the 2024 election is that big corporations and the wealthy have shafted average working Americans, whose wages and jobs have gone nowhere for decades and who are understandably frustrated and angry at what they see as a rigged system.