Donald Trump: establishment trojan horse?

Politics, History, & 'Conspiracy'
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Donald Trump: establishment trojan horse?

Postby Daglord » Thu Sep 29, 2016 5:30 pm

In addition to Bolton (above) & Richard Haas (mentioned earlier), Trump also named Col. Jack Keane as another "respected" foreign policy advisor.

“Mr. Trump, you’ve repeatedly deflected calls for specific national security or defense policy plans with the claim that you’ll ask the best people when you become president, and take their advice," said co-moderator Bret Baier. "So who are the best people? Can you reveal two or three names that you trust for national security?”

“I would get the best people, people that I’d be comfortable with. And we will do the right thing,” Trump replied, naming Richard Haass, General Jack Keane and retired Colonel Jack Jacobs. "I think Richard Haass is excellent. I have a lot of respect for him. I think General Keane is excellent. I think that there are — I like Colonel Jacobs very much."

Keane was one of the people that Hillary heavily leaned on to Intervene in Syria (see: How Hillary became a Hawk - below).

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Jack Keane: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Keane

John Keane is a retired four-star general and former Vice Chief of Staff of the United States Army, and a defense analyst currently serving as chairman of the board for the Institute for the Study of War (see below). Keane currently sits on the board of directors of General Dynamics, and is a consultant/strategic advisor Academi. He has also lobbied on behalf of AM General, the firm that produces the Humvee (another guy with a vested interest in wartime).

Institute for the Study of War: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_for_the_Study_of_War

The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) is a United States-based think tank founded in 2007 by Kimberly Kagan. ISW describes itself as a non-partisan think tank providing research and analysis regarding issues of defense and foreign affairs, but has been described by others as "a hawkish Washington" group favoring an "aggressive foreign policy". Though it had produced reports on the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, "focusing on military operations, enemy threats, and political trends in diverse conflict zones", it first gained widespread public attention in the aftermath of the Elizabeth O'Bagy scandal in which it was involved. The non-profit organization is supported by grants and contributions from large defense contractors, including Raytheon, General Dynamics, DynCorp and others. It is headquartered in Washington, D.C.

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Jack Keane is one of the intellectual architects of the Iraq surge; he is also perhaps the greatest single influence on the way Hillary Clinton thinks about military issues. A bear of a man with a jowly, careworn face and Brylcreem-slicked hair, Keane exudes the supreme self-confidence you would expect of a retired four-star general. He speaks with a trace of a New York accent that gives his pronouncements a rat-a-tat urgency. He is also a well-compensated member of the military-industrial complex, sitting on the board of General Dynamics and serving as a strategic adviser to Academi, the private-security contractor once known as Blackwater. And he is the chairman of an aptly named think tank, the Institute for the Study of War. Though he is one of a parade of cable-TV generals, Keane is the resident hawk on Fox News, where he appears regularly to call for the United States to use greater military force in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan. He doesn’t shrink from putting boots on the ground and has little use for civilian leaders, like Obama, who do.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/24/magazine/how-hillary-clinton-became-a-hawk.html?_r=0

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Postby Daglord » Thu Sep 29, 2016 5:40 pm

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Mike Pence: I'd model my vice presidency after Dick Cheney
http://www.businessinsider.com/mike-pence-dick-cheney-vice-president-2016-9

Indiana Gov. Mike Pence said his vice-presidential role model would be Dick Cheney.

"I frankly hold Dick Cheney in very high regard in his role as vice president," Pence said when asked in an interview with ABC that aired on Sunday who his vice-presidential role model would be. Donald Trump's running mate asserted that he would be "a very active vice president" like Cheney, who served under President George W. bush.

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Postby Daglord » Mon Oct 03, 2016 2:05 pm

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Postby Daglord » Mon Oct 03, 2016 2:45 pm

back on Mnuchin, Trump now plans on naming him Sec of Treasury if elected... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_Mnuchin

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Here Is Who Donald Trump Wants for Treasury Secretary
http://fortune.com/2016/07/19/here-is-who-donald-trump-wants-for-treasury-secretary/

Donald Trump has told prospective donors that, if elected president, he plans to nominate former Goldman Sachs banker Steve Mnuchin for U.S. Treasury Secretary.

That’s according to Anthony Scaramucci, a high-profile hedge fund manager and Trump fundraiser.

Mnuchin, who is a former donor to Hillary Clinton, spent 17 years with Goldman Sachs, where his father also had been a prominent executive. He later worked with investment groups affiliated with George Soros, including as chairman of controversial mortgage lender OneWest Bank Group (which would later be acquired by CIT Group). He also has spent time as both an art dealer and film producer.

Don’t Worry, Trump’s Hedge Fund Managing, Bailout Profiteering Treasury Pick Also Worked At Goldman
http://dealbreaker.com/2016/07/mnuchin-trump-goldman-sachs-treasury/

But don’t be sad, ye appreciators of Trumpism. Mnuchin is not another “Government Sachs” dude hoping to pass through the mythical revolving door between 200 West Street and 1500 Pennsylvnaia Ave. Sure, Mnuchin would be the fifth Goldman alum to move into Alexander Hamilton’s old gig, but get this: He would be the first to point to Goldman as the least controversial item on his resume.

That’s right, Steven Mnuchin could very well become the first modern Treasury nominee to use Goldman Sachs as a relative positive on his job application. Since leaving Goldman (where his dad, Bob, was a legendary rainmaker) Mnuchin bought what was left of IndyMac at a post-crisis FDIC auction and spun it into gold by reorganizing it and selling it off, started a now-defunct hedge fund and served as co-chairman of Relativity Media, which blew up in spectacular fashion relative moments after Mnuchin jumped ship in May of 2015.

While that checklist of activities shows Mnuchin to be at the very least a canny operator in the private sector, they combine to become a smoothie of optical poisons for a potential political appointee. Profiting from a bailout auction and managing to make money from Ryan Kavanaugh’s house of fraud without paying any back puts Mnuchin immediately into the Corzine bracket of Goldman employees turned public servants. They might have been great business decisions but they look terrible in a committee hearing.

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Now, none of this means that Steven Mnuchin isn’t a man with the necessary skills to run the Treasury Department or that he ever did anything actually wrong. In fact, he seems like a fun pick if we’re being honest, and might have the financial perspicacity that we’ve been sorely lacking in that role. What we’re saying is that he is carrying around such a fritto misto of political red flags that he’d be forced to use his time at Goldman Sachs as a positive.

But this is 2016. And while we’ve learned that nothing is impossible anymore, that Trump would be quasi-promising a Steve Mnuchin Treasury confirmation circus in July is – to put it politely – f@cking stunning.

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Mnuchin amassed a fortune estimated at over $40 million while working for Goldman Sachs, where his father had worked for three decades and had also made a fortune. In 2002, Mnuchin left Goldman and worked briefly for his Yale roommate Edward Lampert, chief executive of Sears. He also briefly worked for Soros Fund Management in their Private Equity division during the "Goldman" period with Jacob Goldfield and Mark Schwartz. After this stint, he founded RatPac-Dune Entertainment, which produced a number of notable films, including the X-Men film franchise and Avatar. Dune bought the failed housing lender IndyMac in 2009, buying it out of bankruptcy from the F.D.I.C. and renaming it OneWest with Mnuchin as Chair. According to The New York Times, OneWest "was involved in a string of lawsuits over questionable foreclosures, and settled several cases for millions of dollars." OneWest was sold to CIT Group in 2015.

From IndyMac to OneWest: Steven Mnuchin's Big Score
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-03-22/from-indymac-to-onewest-steven-mnuchins-big-score

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Steven Mnuchin never dreamed of running a regional bank. He didn’t ever imagine moving to Los Angeles. A true creature of Wall Street—a former Goldman Sachs partner and active hedge fund manager—he was making plenty of money in New York. Yet he had carefully weighed the risks of buying IndyMac Bank, the Pasadena (Calif.)-based lender that collapsed in 2008. IndyMac’s distressed mortgages and mortgage-backed securities had no place to go but up; the Federal Reserve, through its discount window, was practically giving money away; and Southern California was a rich, relatively underserved banking region. So in December 2008, Mnuchin put together a partnership and bought IndyMac.

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In the fall of 2008 very few institutions or individuals were looking to go long on mortgages and mortgage-backed debt. Mnuchin was one. He soon persuaded others, including John Paulson, George Soros, and Chris Flowers. Together they purchased IndyMac, whose primary assets were $23.5 billion in commercial loans, mortgages, and mortgage-backed securities. How risky was the investment? When the FDIC was looking to sell IndyMac, Mnuchin was the only bidder for all of the bank’s assets. He’s since turned OneWest into Southern California’s largest bank, with more than 79 branches and $27 billion in assets. His bet on IndyMac’s portfolio of troubled loans has proved to be a hugely profitable one, as the mortgage market has stabilized. It’s a success story he’s proud of, yet reticent about celebrating too excessively lest those protestors march back up to Bel Air.

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Postby Daglord » Mon Oct 10, 2016 2:25 pm

I am Jack's complete lack of surprise...

Leaked Emails Show Democrats Feared Rand Paul as GOP Nominee
http://thelibertarianrepublic.com/democrats-rand-paul-appeals/

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A new memo in the recent batch of leaked emails released by Wikileaks showed that the Democrats, or at least the Clinton campaign, feared Rand Paul. The memo was part of the “Podesta Emails” which were thousands of emails from the Clinton campaign’s chairman, John Podesta, to various Democrats and Clinton operatives.

The memo divided the GOP field into two groups. One was the “Pied Pipers” which were candidates that would only appeal to a certain set of voters. The Clinton strategy was to push the more established candidates to the right in order to make them the leaders.

These candidates included Ted Cruz, Donald Trump, and Ben Carson.

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'Our hope is that the goal of a potential HRC campaign and the DNC would be one-in-the-same: to make whomever the Republicans nominate unpalatable to a majority of the electorate.' It then discussed how one of the main paths to achieving all three outcomes was to promote 'Pied Piper Candidates'.

1) Operationalizing the Strategy: Pied Piper Candidates

We need to be elevating the Pied Piper candidates so that they are leaders of the pack and tell the press to take them seriously.'

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2) Operationalizing the Strategy: Undermining Their Message & Credibility

Their second goal was to undermine the candidates who would try and focus on “building a winning general election coalition.” These candidates included Jeb Bush, Scott Walker, Chris Christie, and Marco Rubio.

But perhaps the candidate that scared the Clinton campaign the most was Rand Paul.

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“What to undermine: the idea he is a “different” kind of Republican; his stance on the military and his appeal to millennials and communities of color,” the memo stated.

Paul ended up placing fifth in the Iowa caucuses and dropping out just a few days after. But the memo showed how Democrats feared Paul if he was to be the GOP nominee. Last year, before the start of the summer, Rand Paul dominated amongst independent voters against Hillary Clinton and was leading the GOP along with Scott Walker. Unfortunately for him, Trump entered the race and his candidacy all but evaporated.

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--------------------------------- June 2015

Sen. Rand Paul Sweeps Polls, Fares Best with Independents Against Hillary Clinton
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/06/02/sen-rand-paul-sweeps-polls-fares-best-with-independents-against-hillary-clinton/

GOP presidential candidate Sen. Rand Paul swept the competition in recent polls, which also indicates he is the best Republican candidate to go head to head against likely Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.

In fact, independent voters — often the votes that swing an election one way or the other — overwhelmingly prefer Paul over Clinton, according to a previous Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll. “Unlike the other Republicans, Mr. Paul significantly outpolled Mrs. Clinton among independent voters, by 45%-37%, reported The Wall Street Journal.

Not only are polls indicating independents overwhelmingly support Paul, but so do several national surveys comparing him to fellow GOP candidates in key states.

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Podesta Emails:https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/

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DNC memo on GOP candidates: http://thefreethoughtproject.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/150407-Strategy-on-GOP-2016ers-1-1.pdf

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what's wrong with this picture? when did we start listing losers first & winners last?

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when a PAUL is winning!

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Postby Daglord » Tue Oct 11, 2016 5:36 pm

regarding Rand Paul being viewed as a major threat & Trump being "elevated" above the other candidates, ensuring a Hillary victory...

makes perfect sense. Hillary HAD to know what she could potentially be up against after running in 12. she HAD to have imagined that a majority of them would be supporting Rand, while championing him & his father's message. Rand Paul, IMHO, was the only serious threat to the Clinton WH (& establishment). Enter Trump throwing shade on everyone & turning the debates into a battle of zingers instead of actual policy.

listen to her in awe @ the support Ron had & the enthusiasm of his supporters, starts @ 5:00:






"at the risk of going over my time, I just want to say you had the most enthusiastic supporters of anyone I ever saw. my goodness, everywhere I went they were literally running down highways holding your signs. your message obviously resonated with a lot of people" - HRC to Ron Paul

the previous 4:59 isn't too bad either:

"there needs to be a change in tone in our foreign policy. many have us have argued for more diplomacy & less threats. it goes back to the old saying "speaking softly & carrying a big stick"... but sometimes I wonder if that big stick doesn't get wielded a little too often" - Ron Paul to HRC

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remember, It was Rand Paul who called bullshit on Trump in the first minute of the first debate & said regime change is the most important topic we should be discussing, how long did that last once he dropped out?






"I think if you believe in regime change you are mistaken, it is a crazy notion. this is the biggest debate we should be having tonight, is regime change a good idea? has it been a good idea? there are still people, the majority on this stage, who want to topple Assad and then there will be chaos..." (interrupted)

and called out Trump for buying & selling politicians, possibly hedging his bets on the Clintons.






"this is what's wrong, he buys & sells politicians of all stripes. he's already hedging his bet on the Clintons"

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Postby Daglord » Tue Oct 18, 2016 12:25 pm

Thanks to Mega for the heads up on this one!

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Clinton’s former CIA director advising Trump on national security
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/09/james-woolsey-advising-trump-228026

James Woolsey, who served as CIA director in President Bill Clinton’s administration, will serve Donald Trump as a senior adviser on national security, defense and intelligence, the campaign announced today. Woolsey appeared on CNN shortly after the announcement, saying he joined the Trump campaign because he favors the Republican candidate’s defense budget proposal. Trump has proposed to lift the caps on defense spending. Woolsey also advised Republican John McCain's presidential campaign.

lift the cap on defense spending? LOL. was wondering who would address that pressing issue. anti-establishment? conservative? :roll:

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“He seems to be very much more so than his opponent in favor of a strong defense budget and we have got a lot of space to make up, problems that have been left in defense by the Obama administration,” Woolsey said on CNN Monday, adding that Trump is more willing to keep classified information private. “He seems willing to keep a secret and not to blab everything to the public and our opponents. You can't go yakking about everything you're interested in. You have to keep your counsel," Woolsey said.

Awesome! a former CIA director praising a President's willingness for clandestine operations & secrecy. what could possibly go wrong? :shock:

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Woolsey, a former Democrat, was never in the inner circle in the Clinton administration -- during his two-year tenure, he never once met with the president one-on-one -- and he has drifted rightward in recent years.

I guess that's cool... or further proof of a "deep state".






A day after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Woolsey speculated that Iraq might be to blame, and he vociferously supported the 2003 invasion -- even reportedly putting the U.S. government in touch with Iraqi defectors whose intelligence later proved unreliable. Woolsey is also a fervent advocate of “energy independence,” arguing that reducing America’s reliance on foreign sources of energy will help the United States break with oil-producing countries like Saudi Arabia who bankroll radical Islamic ideology. He also warns frequently about the dangers of climate change -- a phenomenon Trump has dismissed as a hoax invented by the Chinese -- and penned the foreward to the book “50 Simple Steps to Save the Earth From Global Warming.”

I'm OK with this... if it's not another NEPDG: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_Task_Force

The Energy Task Force, officially the National Energy Policy Development Group (NEPDG), was a task force created by then-U.S. President George W. Bush in 2001 during his second week in office. Vice President Dick Cheney was named chairman. The Energy Task Force was developed to decrease American dependency on foreign petroleum, which the National Energy Policy deemed would have a negative effect on the US economy, standards of living and national security

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Most of the activities of the Energy Task Force have not been disclosed to the public, even though Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests (since 19 April 2001) have sought to gain access to its materials. The organisations Judicial Watch and Sierra Club launched a law suit (U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia: Judicial Watch Inc. v. Department of Energy, et al., Civil Action No. 01-0981) under the FOIA to gain access to the task force's materials. After several years of legal wrangling, in May, 2005 an appeals court permitted the Energy Task Force's records to remain secret

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Postby Daglord » Tue Oct 18, 2016 2:05 pm

Robert James Woosley: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R._James_Woolsey_Jr

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** chairman of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundation_for_Defense_of_Democracies

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The Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) is a think tank based in Washington, D.C., focusing on national security and foreign policy. Its political leanings have been described variously as either nonpartisan or neoconservative. FDD holds events throughout the year, including its annual Washington Forum, briefings on Capitol Hill, expert roundtables for public officials, diplomats, and military officers, book releases, and panel discussions and debates within the policy community.

From 2003. Origins of the FDD. Deep. State.

Most Favored Democracy
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/most-favored-democracy/

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The images on the screen show American flags on fire, children dressed as suicide bombers, Saddam Hussein triumphantly addressing a throng of Iraqis, and grainy footage of the destruction wrought by a terrorist attack. These arresting pictures and the voice-over narration tell viewers that the war in Iraq, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and al-Qaeda’s attacks against the United States are all part of a larger war that Israel and the U.S. must fight together.

Congressmen and senators, White House aides and Pentagon officials, lobbyists and journalists are seeing the ad, which has been running on cable television in the Washington D.C., area. It is just one tactic used by an aggressive new neoconservative think tank, the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD), to shape American thinking on war, terrorism, and the Middle East. The Foundation is only two years old, but already the group is making its influence felt on the nation’s policymakers.

At first, Emet floundered, without an executive director or a well-defined mission. But that changed after Sept. 11, and Emet changed too, into what is now the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. The name is different, but the goal of influencing America’s opinion-forming classes remains. Emet became the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies thanks in large part to Clifford May, FDD’s president and an old hand at the spin game. From 1997 to 2001 he was the Republican National Committee’s director of communications. Before that he was a journalist—associate editor of the Rocky Mountain Daily News and earlier a reporter and Africa bureau chief for the New York Times. May’s vice president, Nir Boms, similarly has a background well suited to the group’s operations. Boms was an academic liaison for the Israeli Embassy in Washington and has served in the Israeli Defense Forces. He came to the group even before May, as Emet’s first hire.

The foundation’s activities under May and Boms have been more ambitious than those of the typical think tank. FDD has targeted its advertising campaigns very carefully, with the television ads that ran in Washington and a print campaign directed specifically at the Hamptons. Hollywood has been considered as another potential target, and the foundation has even discussed using country music as a means to win over the American heartland to FDD’s point of view. Universities are also of particular interest to the foundation. Like Emet before it, the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies wants to put to rout what it sees as anti-Israel, and indeed anti-American, bias on college campuses.

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The Long War Journal is a FDD project dedicated to reporting the Global War on Terror launched by the United States and its allies following the attacks of September 11, 2001. Under the direction of FDD senior fellows Bill Roggio and Thomas Joscelyn, this website covers stories about countries such as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia, Syria, and Iraq and follows the actions of al Qaeda and its affiliates. According to the Columbia Journalism Review, "Roggio's greatest service, then, may be the way he picks up where the mainstream press leaves off, giving readers a simultaneously more specific and holistic understanding of the battlefield".

There is that term again, "Long War". a favorite of neocons & one of Giuliani's campaign promises.

Giuliani warns of 'new 9/11' if Dems win
http://www.politico.com/story/2007/04/giuliani-warns-of-new-9-11-if-dems-win-003684

MANCHESTER, N.H. —- Rudy Giuliani said if a Democrat is elected president in 2008, America will be at risk for another terrorist attack on the scale of Sept. 11, 2001. But if a Republican is elected, he said, especially if it is him, terrorist attacks can be anticipated and stopped.

“If any Republican is elected president —- and I think obviously I would be the best at this —- we will remain on offense and will anticipate what [the terrorists] will do and try to stop them before they do it,” Giuliani said.

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“I listen a little to the Democrats and if one of them gets elected, we are going on defense,” Giuliani continued. “We will wave the white flag on Iraq. We will cut back on the Patriot Act, electronic surveillance, interrogation and we will be back to our pre-Sept. 11 attitude of defense.”

He added: “The Democrats do not understand the full nature and scope of the terrorist war against us.”

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For years, Syria has been a focus of FDD's research because of its alignment with Iran and support for organizations such as Hezbollah. In 2012, as the Arab Spring spread to Syria, FDD launched "The Syria Project" to support dissident efforts in removing the Assad regime. In that effort, FDD facilitated a Skype call between dissidents and U.S. journalists in 2012 and produced multiple studies and memos urging U.S. officials to act

**** Woolsey is a member of the Project for the New American Century (PNAC) and was one of the signatories to the January 26, 1998 letter sent to President Clinton that called for the removal of Saddam Hussein. That same year he served on the Rumsfeld Commission, which investigated the threat of ballistic missiles for the U.S. Congress.

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A conversation with R. James Woosley - American Enterprise Institute
http://www.aei.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/Conversation21.pdf

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American Enterprise Institute: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Enterprise_Institute

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Postby Daglord » Tue Oct 18, 2016 4:37 pm






What is the "deep state"? Is it some murky conspiracy that lurks in Washington's dark fringes? As guest Mike Lofgren, author of "The Deep State: The Fall of the Constitution and the Rise of a Shadow Government" points out, the deep state actually operates out in the open and is almost completely overlooked.

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Writers, journalists, political scientists and political activists in the United States have for decades expressed concerns about the existence of a deep state or state within a state, which they suspect secretly controls public policy, regardless of which party controls the country's democratic institutions.

According to Philip Giraldi, the nexus of power is centered on the military–industrial complex, intelligence community, and Wall Street, while Bill Moyers points to plutocrats and oligarchs. Professor Peter Dale Scott also mentions "big oil" as a key player, while David Talbot focuses on national security officials, especially Allen Dulles. Mike Lofgren, an ex-Washington staffer who has written a book on the issue, includes Silicon Valley, along with "key elements of government" and Wall Street, but emphasizes the non-conspiratorial nature of the "state".

The Deep State: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_state_in_the_United_States

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Controlled by shadow government: Mike Lofgren reveals how top U.S. officials are at the mercy of the “deep state”
http://www.salon.com/2016/01/05/controlled_by_shadow_government_mike_lofgren_reveals_how_top_u_s_officials_are_at_the_mercy_of_the_deep_state/

Well, first of all, it is not a conspiracy. It is something that operates in broad daylight. It is not a conspiratorial cabal. These are simply people who have evolved [into] a kind of position. It is in their best interest to act in this way. And given the fact that people would rather know about Kim Kardashian than what makes up the budget or what the government is doing in Mali or Sudan or other unknown places, this is what you get: a disconnected, self-serving bureaucracy that is … simply evolving to do what it’s doing now. That is, to maintain and enhance its own power.

New FBI Docs Expose "Shadow Government" Protected Hillary In Email Investigation
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-10-18/new-fbi-docs-expose-shadow-government-protected-hillary-email-investigation

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Ron Paul is often asked questions about who he supports in the presidential elections. In this segment, he discusses the big picture and how he comes to his conclusions as voting hysteria grips a vast majority of people.






Much is made of voting and elections in the US. But what if voting means very little, if anything? What if a permanent government is really in control of Washington that is not affected by elections? The existence of a "deep state" is no conspiracy theory. In fact members of the permanent government operate in the open. What can be done to bring back liberty and accountability?

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Postby Daglord » Wed Oct 19, 2016 6:00 pm

another DOD lifer with a vested interest in war, also served as Bush's fixer in the WH...

Donald Trump Lists Five Foreign Policy Advisers
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2016/03/21/donald-trump-lists-five-foreign-policy-advisers/

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Donald Trump, the GOP’s leading presidential candidate, listed five people Monday he said are advising him on foreign policy, with backgrounds in everything from energy to the Middle East. Mr. Trump, in a meeting with the Washington Post editorial board, said his foreign policy advisers included Walid Phares, Joseph Schmitz , Carter Page, George Papadopoulos, and retired Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg.

Joseph Schmitz: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_E._Schmitz

Joseph Edward Schmitz (born August 28, 1956) is an American lawyer, former inspector general of the United States Department of Defense and a former executive with Blackwater Worldwide. After working as a watchdog at the Pentagon for three and a half years, Schmitz left the defense department in September 2005 and was accused of poor leadership for preventing investigations into war contracts given to several George W. Bush administration officials and having conflicts of interest with lobbyists. He was named one of Donald Trump's foreign policy advisors for his 2016 presidential campaign.

June 2005: Pentagon Investigator Resigning
http://articles.latimes.com/2005/sep/03/nation/na-schmitz3

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WASHINGTON — The Pentagon's top investigator has resigned amid accusations that he stonewalled inquiries into senior Bush administration officials suspected of wrongdoing.

Defense Department Inspector General Joseph E. Schmitz told staffers this week that he intended to resign as of Sept. 9 to take a job with the parent company of Blackwater USA, a defense contractor. The resignation comes after Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) sent Schmitz several letters this summer informing him that he was the focus of a congressional inquiry into whether he had blocked two criminal investigations last year.

Grassley, chairman of the Finance Committee, accused Schmitz of fabricating an official Pentagon news release, planning an expensive junket to Germany and hiding information from Congress. Schmitz is the senior Pentagon official charged with investigating waste, fraud and abuse.

Trump’s Foreign Policy Advisor Teamed Up With Blackwater & A Saudi Prince To Arm Al-Qaida In Syria
http://www.mintpressnews.com/trumps-foreign-policy-advisor-teamed-blackwater-saudi-prince-arm-al-qaida-syria/219792/

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Joseph Schmitz, Donald Trump’s foreign policy advisor, is facing criticism for his involvement in a plot to arm Syrian rebels with close ties to al-Qaida.

The Republican nominee’s ties to Schmitz, whose reputation is also colored by his links to Blackwater mercenaries and corruption at the Department of Defense, seems poised to become the latest black mark against Trump’s reputation in a campaign full of questionable choices. Although Trump has claimed that President Barack Obama and Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton were responsible for the rise of Daesh (an Arabic acronym for the terrorist group commonly known in the West as ISIS or ISIL), Schmitz’s presence in Team Trump ties that campaign to terrorists, too.

“Trump’s own top foreign policy adviser, Joseph Schmitz, teamed up with a Saudi prince in a bizarre and illegal private initiative to arm rebels in Syria in 2013,” wrote Brad Hoff in an Aug. 12 report for The Canary.

In May 2014, The Wall Street Journal reported that Schmitz, at the time an executive at private military firm Blackwater Worldwide (since renamed Academi), had teamed up with an unnamed Saudi prince in the summer of 2013 in an effort to move 70,000 Russian assault rifles and 21 million rounds of ammunition from Ukraine to Syria, where it would be supplied to so-called “moderate” rebels in the Free Syrian Army.

“He told the Free Syrian Army’s leader at the time, Gen. Salim Idris, that his group had immediate access to a large supply of assault rifles in Ukraine and tons of ammunition in another Eastern European country,” wrote Dion Nissenbaum, a national security reporter for the Journal.

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Close allies of Idris openly bragged about the FSA’s ties to Daesh, and the general himself was later accused of allowing a warehouse full of weapons supplied by the West to fall into the hands of the Nusra Front (Jabhat al-Nusra), the former branch of al-Qaida based in Syria that’s now known as the Front for the Conquest of Syria (Jabhat Fateh al-Sham).

Hoff noted: “Schmitz described Idris to the WSJ as a ‘moderate freedom fighter,’ in spite of the fact that at the very time the plan was in motion, right-wing media was screaming about Idris’ multiple public statements suggesting an ambiguous battlefield partnership with al-Qaida.”

According to the Journal, Schmitz’s plan collapsed after a CIA operative approached him in Jordan and told him to “put the brakes on the plan.”

Prior to working with Blackwater, Schmitz served as the Inspector General at the Department of Defense, a role meant to serve as one of the main checks against fraud and waste in the military. But in September 2005, just over three years after taking office, Schmitz resigned in disgrace amid accusations that he’d helped shield key officials in the Bush administration from prosecution, and that he accepted improper gifts as bribes. According to a September 2005 report from Los Angeles Times staff writer T. Christian Miller, Schmitz resigned after “Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) sent Schmitz several letters this summer informing him that he was the focus of a congressional inquiry into whether he had blocked two criminal investigations last year.”

Grassley, who was the chair of the Senate Finance Committee at the time, also “accused Schmitz of fabricating an official Pentagon news release, planning an expensive junket to Germany and hiding information from Congress.”

Those weren’t the only accusations of corruption leveled against Schmitz, either. “In May 2006, the Project on Government Oversight (POGO), a nonpartisan watchdog in Washington, D.C., noted that Schmitz ‘resigned under a cloud of allegations that he had allowed inappropriate political interference in a Boeing tanker lease investigation by the White House, as well as other politically sensitive investigations,’” Newsweek’s Jeff Stein reported in March.

The Canary’s Brad Hoff contrasted Schmitz’s checkered past with claims, made by Schmitz and other members of Trump’s team, that Obama has close ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.

“As Trump continues to rail against perceived secret support of the Muslim Brotherhood and supposed jihadist sympathizers within American political ranks, he should look no further than his own foreign policy adviser,” Hoff concluded.






Dion Nissenbaum takes a look at the strange tale of an effort by private U.S. citizens, including some with ties to private security contractors, to arm Syrian rebels on their own.

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Secure Freedom Radio with Frank Gaffney: JOSEPH SCHMITZ, Former Inspector General of the Department of Defense:

**** An aborted attempt to provide arms to the Free Syrian Army, and the problems with arming Syrian rebels with weapons through proxy private groups
**** Trustworthiness of rebel groups such as the Free Syrian Army, which reportedly has weapons for only one in three fighters.
**** The transformation of an Inspector General’s role under the Obama Administration

Podcast: http://s72.podbean.com/pb/ae91774a6b9b73057f6a24b8aaff336b/5807ebdc/data4/fs18/266312/uploads/may19_seg1_Schmitz_11min.mp3


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