MS. MOMOCRACY

Yesterday, Sally Yates, testified in a Senate hearing. Like Comey, it was understood that Yates would likely not be able to go into detail and divulge what we all so desperately want to hear—that Trump and his admin colluded with the Russian government regarding the US election and Russian sanctions –and that they are guilty of treason. We have to wait for the FBI investigation to conclude before we get that prize.

What we do know:

#1 Russia interfered in our election and Russia helped elect Trump. THIS IS NOT FAKE NEWS!

2. Obama cautioned Trump against hiring Flynn as National Security Advisor. Guess what, he did it anyway.

3. Yates in her role as acting Attorney General met with WH counsel Don McGahn in person on 2 occasions as early as January 26th and spoke with them via a phone call about her concerns with Flynn. She brought an intelligence agent with her to the meetings. They warned the WH that Flynn was compromised, that he had lied to VP Pence and that he was vulnerable to blackmail by the Russians.

“Yates explained that any official publicly repeating the lie that Flynn had not discussed sanctions with Russian ambassador to the US, Sergey Kislyak, was increasing the chance Flynn would be blackmailed.”

3. Yates was fired the day after she publicly declared she would not defend Trump’s travel ban–4 days after she met with the WH counsel regarding Flynn. Flynn was not fired for 18 days, not until the Washington Post published a report of Flynn’s interaction with Russian ambassador Kislyak. One could argue if it were not for the leak, Flynn may still be our national security advisor. I think it is also important to remember that it was first announced that Flynn resigned (he actually submitted a resignation letter) and Trump publicly defended his character after the announcement.

What I hoped would happen during yesterday’s Senate hearing is that Yates and Clapper would shine the light on Russia again and get more Americans to pay attention. Clapper’s opening testimony summarized Russian interference in our election and it is enough for any reasonable person to surmise that the legitimacy of Trump’s Presidency is seriously questionable.

One of the biggest concerns here is why doesn’t the sitting President care that Russia attacked the very fabric of our democracy? or care about their motive for doing so? Why doesn’t he care—-Well, because then Trump would have to admit that he was not fairly elected.

Here is some exerts from Jim Clapper’s testimony:

“..concern about the egregious Russian interference in our election process is so critically serious as to merit focus, hopefully bipartisan focus by the Congress and the American people.

Last year, the intelligence community conducted an exhaustive review of Russian interference into our presidential election process resulting in a special intelligence community assessment or ICA as we call it. I’m here today to provide whatever information I can now as a private citizen on how the intelligence community conducted its analysis, came up with its findings, and communicated them to the Obama administration, to the Trump transition team, to the Congress and in unclassified form to the American public.

…..

As you know, the I.C. was a coordinated product from three agencies; CIA, NSA, and the FBI not all 17 components of the intelligence community. Those three under the aegis of my former office. Following an extensive intelligence reporting about many Russian efforts to collect on and influence the outcome of the presidential election, President Obama asked us to do this in early December and have it completed before the end of his term.

The two dozen or so analysts for this task were hand-picked, seasoned experts from each of the contributing agencies. They were given complete, unfettered mutual access to all sensitive raw intelligence data, and importantly, complete independence to reach their findings. They found that the Russian government pursued a multifaceted influence campaign in the run-up to the election, including aggressive use of cyber capabilities.

The Russians used cyber operations against both political parties, including hacking into servers used by the Democratic National Committee and releasing stolen data to WikiLeaks and other media outlets. Russia also collected on certain Republican Party- affiliated targets, but did not release any Republican-related data. The Intelligence Community Assessment concluded first that President Putin directed and influenced campaign to erode the faith and confidence of the American people in our presidential election process. Second, that he did so to demean Secretary Clinton, and third, that he sought to advantage Mr. Trump. These conclusions were reached based on the richness of the information gathered and analyzed and were thoroughly vetted and then approved by the directors of the three agencies and me.”

Pretty strong opening, especially convincing for the many Americans who still buy into Trump’s fake news claim. Clapper goes on to define “unmasking” for Trump and the other bozos who don’t understand the idea, concept and appropriateness of government officials requesting certain names be unmasked in an effort to do their jobs (see Susan Rice).

Trump’s response:

You don’t understand the concept of gas lighting? Well, this is a great example. Trump claiming you did not hear what you just heard, that you do not see what is so clearly evident, trying to convince you that reality is not real. He is a master at this type of manipulation.

Clapper declared earlier that he was unaware of the FBI investigation and Yates could not comment on collusion—-so the collusion claim is still under investigation…

Clapper ended his opening remarks with a plea:

“I hope the American people recognize the severity of this threat and that we collectively counter it before it further erodes the fabric of our democracy.”

I don’t think Don the Con heard him or cares.

Sally Yates demonstrated pose and intelligence when questioned about the issue at hand, Russia, but Republicans decided to focus on the travel ban, her firing, leaks and Hillary emails.

Here is Yates’ exchange with Cornyn and she is brilliant:

“YATES: I appreciate that, Senator, and let me make one thing clear. It is not purely as a policy matter. In fact, I’ll remember my confirmation hearing. In an exchange that I had with you and others of your colleagues where you specifically asked me in that hearing that if the president asked me to do something that was unlawful or unconstitutional and one of your colleagues said or even just that would reflect poorly on the Department of Justice, would I say no? And I looked at this, I made a determination that I believed that it was unlawful. I also thought that it was inconsistent with principles of the Department of Justice and I said no. And that’s what I promised you I would do and that’s what I did.”

Then there were questions about the leaks. Yes, instead of focusing on Russian interference, Flynn, collusion, etc—–Gassley jumped right into leaks and guess what, under oath both Clapper and Yates stated they were not involved in leaking confidential information. It appeared as if Gassley did not care about what was leaked only how—-he definitely does not have his priorities straight.

Cruz, equally as ignorant, jumps into Hillary’s emails but when he questioned Yates about the legality of her actions regarding the travel ban, he got schooled.

We may not know whether Trump and his cronies colluded with Russia—-YET–but we do know that this election was a sham. Why isn’t EVERYONE questioning the legitimacy of this president?

Resources:

Obama Warned Trump About Hiring Flynn, Officials Say, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/08/us/politics/obama-flynn-trump.html

6 Takeaways From Monday’s Senate Hearing on Russia, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/08/us/politics/sally-yates-james-clapper-russia-hearing.html?_r=0

Michael Flynn Resigns as National Security Adviser, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/13/us/politics/donald-trump-national-security-adviser-michael-flynn.html

Full transcript: Sally Yates and James Clapper testify on Russian election interference, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2017/05/08/full-transcript-sally-yates-and-james-clapper-testify-on-russian-election-interference/?utm_term=.760710d8a571

Five things we learned from the Sally Yates hearing, http://www.cnn.com/2017/05/08/politics/sally-yates-hearing-russia-things-we-learned/