Memos, Spies and all of the Lies

I was originally going to write next about the Shutdown, but so much has happened so I'm skipping over that. Suffice it to say, the shutdown didn't fix anything, and another one will most likely be happening here shortly. Maybe I'll get to write about the next one! The next topic I want to tackle is the Trump/Mueller/FISA/Russia/everyone freaking out situation. I know, I know, very professional title...but it's such a mess, that's really what it should be called. So, here's the rundown in case you're super confused like I was. FISA stands for the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (I know, it should be FISC) and is a tribunal that decides "whether to approve wiretaps, data collection and government requests to monitor suspected terrorists and spies." CNN.com This article from 2016 is interesting because it explains a little more detail about FISA as well as details the fact that in 2015, FISA did not turn down any government requests for surveillance. There were 1,457 requests made, one was withdrawn by the government, but the rest of them were approved. This may be an important piece of information in light of the current situation. Remember this. The FBI opened a case in 2016 to investigate people tied to the Trump campaign and their connection to Russia. This was based on a Dossier (a collection of documents about a certain person) that had been compiled by a company called Fusion GPS and an ex-spy named Christopher Steele. (Yes, this is real life, not a political thriller). Ok, so it turns out that Steele and Fusion GPS were funded (for this assignment), by the Democratic party and Hillary Clinton. The Democratic party says that it was opposition research to find dirt on the Trump campaign for the election. The problem with the Dossier, however, is that almost none of it has been able to be verified. One part of the Dossier that may be true is that there was a Trump foreign policy adviser named Carter Page, who seems to have some ties to Russia. He has worked in Moscow for several years and co-founded a private equity firm called Global Energy Capital. The Dossier alleges that Page met with people close to the Kremlin and "confirmed" to them that "were Trump elected...then sanctions on Russia would be lifted". When questioned about his doings, Page changed his story multiple times. He was fired from the Trump campaign in December 2016 and the campaign claims he never actually met with Trump. A FISA warrant was issued to monitor Carter Page, as he seems like he may have had some ties to the Kremlin based on the Steele Dossier. As a side note, this is not the first time Page had been monitored by the FBI. It is inconclusive, however, to say that Carter Page was really acting on Trump's behalf, or that he had any information at all. He seems to be a very unreliable person, and it looks like the Trump campaign figured that out and sent him packing. In addition to this Dossier, FBI director Robert Mueller, who is currently running the investigation into the Trump/Russia situation, is running into some kinks of his own. In December, there were text messages released between two FBI agents working on the case that showed anti-Trump bias. The two agents, Lisa Page and Peter Strozk were having an affair with each other and sent over 5000 text messages (most of which were lost in a "glitch" until the FBI was pushed to recover them). Some of the messages recovered talked about having "a back-up plan" and how it was imperative that Trump not win the election. Conveniently enough, Strozk was also an agent on the case of the Hillary Clinton email cover up and is now known to have changed some wording in former director Comey's statement on Hillary's behavior. The two agents have since been removed from the case. Republican Devin Nunes of California recently came out saying that he had compiled a memo that would show abuse by the FBI surrounding the FISA warrant application for Carter Page. There was of course all sorts of drama around this memo. Democrats argued that releasing it would be detrimental to National Security, while Republicans were sure that it showed a "Secret Society" that needed to be exposed. The only problem with all of the claims were that no one but Nunes and the House Intelligence Committee had read the memo. Also, no one has seen the FISA application either which we really need in order to really know what's going on. The memo has since been released, and it basically says that the FISA court approved the application without checking into it at all. Also, another problem, they argue, is that they are approving an investigation of Trump based on information from people who are clearly biased against him. Which wouldn't be as much of an issue if the Dossier could be confirmed. But it hasn't been. Finally, Nunes has come out and said that this is not the end of the investigation from the House Oversight Committee. He reported that they are now looking into the State Department as being involved and this will probably bring Hillary Clinton into the discussion more. I just have to say that this smells fishy. I don't think it is a "deep state" problem, but there has definitely been some parties who have been up to something. I hope President Trump releases the FISA application so that we can have more transparency about what was disclosed by the FBI originally. Is the FISA court just approving every application without verifying any of it? Remember my earlier CNN article about how they approved all of them in 2015. If so, that's a problem. Also, it's interesting to note the lack of coverage this is getting in the news. This could be a big deal, or maybe not, but with all the moving parts, it should be something that reporters are more interested in sharing. It doesn't help with the idea of media bias when mainstream media outlets are not presenting all the information that is available.