themarketswork

a common sense approach to a liberal world

Fusion GPS, the Trump Dossier, Russian Money & the Magnitsky Act

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Fusion GPS is the firm who commissioned the infamous – and discredited – Steele dossier on President Trump. Fusion GPS is currently stonewalling the Senate Judiciary Committee’s investigation into Fusion GPS ties to the Democratic Party. And Fusion steadfastly refuses to say who paid for the dossier.

Now, it turns out that Fusion GPS was employed by the Russian government – at the exact same time that Fusion commissioned the Trump dossier.

Stop and think on that a moment.

The FBI was actually utilizing propaganda potentially commissioned by Russia as a reason for launching the entire Trump-Russian investigation in the first place.Continue Reading

A Letter from Devin – Unmasking the Leakers

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Devin Nunes, Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, has sent a letter to Daniel Coates, the Director of National Intelligence regarding the issue of unmasking and intelligence leaking.

We have found evidence that current and former government officials had easy access to U.S. person information and that it is possible that they used this information to achieve partisan political purposes, including the selective, anonymous leaking of such information.

The committee has learned that one official, whose position had no apparent intelligence related function, made hundreds of unmasking requests during the final year of the Obama administration. Of those requests, only one offered a justification that was not boilerplate and articulated why that specific official required the U.S. person information for the performance of his or her official duties.

That unnamed individual is almost certainly former UN Ambassador Samantha Power.Continue Reading

14 Issues Worthy of Investigation – A House Judiciary Request

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The House Judiciary Committee issued a press release on July 27, 2017, stating that a formal request for the appointment of a second Special Counsel has been made to Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. The actual letter may be viewed here.

The Judiciary Committee members were specific in their request. They are asking for investigation into the following:

The members call for the appointment of a second special counsel to investigate grave concerns such as former Attorney General Lynch’s directive to former FBI Director Comey to mislead the American people on the nature of the investigation into former Secretary Clinton; the FBI and Justice Department’s investigative decisions related to the Clinton email investigation, including the immunity deals given to potential co-conspirators; selected leaks of classified information that unmasked U.S. persons incidentally collected upon by the intelligence community; and the FBI’s reliance on “Fusion GPS” in its investigation of the Trump campaign, among many others issues.Continue Reading

IT Intrigue – Imran Awan & Debbie Wasserman Schultz

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Imran Awan was arrested July 24, 2017 at an airport as he was attempting to flee the country. He was flying to Pakistan by way of Qatar – following his wife who had fled the country in March with $12,000 in cash. He has been charged with bank fraud and has pled not guilty. Imran and his brothers, Abid and Jamal, are under investigation by the FBI and U.S. Capitol Police for accessing congressional computers and stealing IT equipment.

The suspects had full access to the emails and office computer files of the members for whom they worked. A focus of the investigation by the U.S. Capitol Police is an off-site server on which congressional data was allegedly loaded without the knowledge of authorities.Continue Reading

A Corporate Takeover – Seeing Politics As Business

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“At the center of this movement is a crucial conviction, that a nation exists to serve its citizens.” – President Donald J. Trump

What do all these members of President Trump’s Administration have in common? Hint, the answer is not Goldman Sachs…

Steve Mnuchin – Treasury Secretary – Investment Banker, member of Management Committee and CIO at Goldman Sachs, hedge fund manager, purchased and salvaged IndyMac

Wilbur Ross – Commerce Secretary – Billionaire private equity investor, Leveraged Buyout (LBO), bankruptcy and restructuring expert

Gary Cohn – Chief Economic Advisor and Director of the National Economic Council – Investment Banker, President and COO at Goldman Sachs

Dina Powell – Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategy – Managing Director and Partner at Goldman Sachs

Carl Icahn – Regulatory Overhaul Advisor – Billionaire investor, Leveraged Buyout (LBO), bankruptcy and restructuring expertContinue Reading

Civil Asset Forfeiture, Equitable Sharing & Adoption

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Attorney General Jeff Sessions released policy directive 17-1 yesterday in which he announced a new Civil Asset Forfeiture program. What Sessions really did was reinstate the old Asset Forfeiture program that had been in place under AG Eric Holder. Allow me to explain.

Civil asset forfeiture – or civil seizure – occurs when law enforcement agencies seize property they suspect has been used in – or originates from – criminal activity. The item being seized is itself suspected of having been involved in a crime. It is literally a civil action against the property. Criminal charges against the owner of the property are not required – nor is an actual conviction.

In order to get the property back, the property owner must initiate a lawsuit, providing proof that the property was not used in – or acquired by – illegal means. Unlike a criminal trial, where “beyond a reasonable doubt” is the legal threshold – in a civil case, the “preponderance of evidence” standard applies. All the government need do is present enough evidence that makes the claim of illegality more likely than not.Continue Reading

Climate Change, CO2, an EPA Power Grab & Some Experts

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A study published in June 2017 titled, On the Validity of NOAA, NASA and Hadley CRU Global Average Surface Temperature Data & The Validity of EPA’s CO2 Endangerment Finding has found ongoing data manipulation issues within the Global Average Surface Temperature (GAST) data used in the Climate Models. The study is written by Dr. James Wallace III, Dr. Joseph F. D’Aleo and Dr. Craig D. Idso. Unlike much of the work presented by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, this study has been peer-reviewed – by seven different Ph.D. scientists – all with prestigious backgrounds and multiple degrees. From the study:

The objective of this research was to test the hypothesis that Global Average Surface Temperature (GAST) data, produced by NOAA [National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration], NASA [National Aeronautics and Space Administration], and HADLEY [University of East Anglia Climate Research Unit], are sufficiently credible estimates of global average temperatures such that they can be relied upon for climate modeling and policy analysis purposes.

It was found that each new version of GAST has nearly always exhibited a steeper warming linear trend over its entire history. And, it was nearly always accomplished by systematically removing the previously existing cyclical temperature pattern. This was true for all three entities providing GAST data measurement, NOAA, NASA and Hadley CRU.

The conclusive findings of this research are that the three GAST data sets are not a valid representation of reality.Continue Reading

The Strength of Opinions

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When was the last time you changed someone’s opinion?

Structurally and fundamentally changed another’s underlying position on an issue?

My guess is maybe never.

I’m not talking about shifting someone’s viewpoint. That’s easier. It can be done – sometimes. The introduction of new facts or an economic perspective – additive information that enables existing opinions to be reframed and enhanced – evolved. But that’s not a fundamental change of opinion. It’s simply the incorporation of new data into positions already held.

I’m talking about fundamentally reshaping a belief. A complete position reversal.Continue Reading

The Frankfurt School, Twitter & False Claims of Anti-Semitism

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The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist – Keyser Soze – (paraphrasing Charles Baudelaire)

An interesting series of events transpired over the last several days.

Australian journalist Chris Uhlmann delivered a critical on-air opinion of President Trump at the G-20 Summit on July 8. You can watch the 2 minute video here. I do not share Mr. Uhlmann’s views on this particular issue but that’s an entirely separate matter.

Mr. Uhlmann’s video was quickly seized upon by those on the Left and widely disseminated across various social media platforms. Mr. Uhlmann was swiftly and widely championed by the Left – the video held aloft as a shining example of international opinion.

Then this happened:Continue Reading