Free Republic

Joe Biden is bringing aboard Elliott Abrams – a regime change-obsessed neoconservative twice convicted of lying to Congress – to act as his new foreign propaganda chief. (snip) While in Ronald Reagan’s admin, Abrams became embroiled in the Iran-Contra affair. President Trump initially blocked Abrams from joining his government as Deputy Secretary of State in 2017, but he was eventually brought in by fellow hawk Mike Pompeo as a special envoy with responsibility for Venezuela.

“Those Cuban-CIA men (Bay of Pigs vets) were as tough, dedicated and impetuous a group of soldiers as I’ve ever had the honor of commanding,” wrote legendary anti-communist mercenary “Mad Mike” Hoare, commander of the “Wild Geese,” in his book Congo Mercenary. ''This is the history of a failure,'' said the oddly frank opening lines of Che Guevara’s Congo Dairies. “I stood above Che Guevara, my boots near his head, just as Che had once stood over my dear friend and fellow 2506 Brigade member, Nestor Pino. ‘We're going to kill you all," Che said to Pino.’ Now, the situation...

Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., once falsely accused President Ronald Reagan's CIA of all but causing urban cocaine dealing in the '80s. She claimed that Reagan, by working with Nicaraguan drug dealers to defeat the communists running that country, colluded with them to created the urban drug epidemic. Never mind that The New York Times, The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times all debunked Waters' claim. At a town hall meeting about these allegations, Waters shouted, "If I never do anything else in this career as a member of Congress, I'm gonna make somebody pay for what they've done to...

In a bombshell report by POLITICO‘s Josh Meyer, the Obama administration is accused of protecting Hezbollah drug and human trafficking rings to help ensure a nuclear deal with Iran was achieved. POLITICO reports: Project Cassandra reached higher into the hierarchy of the conspiracy, Obama administration officials threw an increasingly insurmountable series of roadblocks in its way, according to interviews with dozens of participants who in many cases spoke for the first time about events shrouded in secrecy, and a review of government documents and court records. When Project Cassandra leaders sought approval for some significant investigations, prosecutions, arrests and financial...

Adnan Khashoggi, a Saudi middleman-for-hire who amas­sed huge wealth and influence peddling everything from American weapons to favors for Riyadh’s rulers and CIA spymasters, only to see his fortunes collapse amid the Iran-contra affair and other scandals, died June 6 at a hospital in London. He was 81, by most accounts. The cause was complications from Parkinson’s disease, the family said in a statement reported by the Associated Press. Mr. Khashoggi’s name may have lost its luster since his peak in the 1970s and 1980s, but not so the list of misdeeds and abuses that remain defining events of the...

In Jan of 2017 Leahy was demanding an independent counsel for the Russia Russia hoax. One of the first to do so-- And NOW-- this sucker is going to preside over an ILLEGAL trial of impeachment for a private citizen. HE himself is a national security disgrace. As regards Trump's actions- he is and has uncovered the chi-com bought Senators and Congressment (of which Leahy is ONE-- on the chinese list-- for certain). And now he thinks he can judge to protect is own sorry slobbering drunken a@@. In the article: "Senator Patrick Leahy was annoyed with the Reagan administration’s...

Vindicating Larry Franklin ELI LAKE January 16, 2007 When President Bush announced the new Iraq strategy Wednesday evening, acknowledging that Iran was effectively at war with us in Iraq by supplying terrorists with advanced improvised explosives, my thoughts turned to Lawrence Franklin. Nearly a year ago, Judge T.S. Ellis III, sentenced this Pentagon Iran analyst to almost 13 years in a federal prison after he pleaded guilty to discussing classified information with two former lobbyists from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. The case, which is thus far the Bush administration's only successful anti-leaking prosecution, illustrates the strategic confusion of...

When the scandal finally broke, it was on the other side of the Atlantic, in a nation that millions of Americans couldn’t pinpoint on a map. Congress had made its intentions clear in the form of legislation, but the White House secretly ignored that to illegally pursue its own controversial agenda. Meanwhile, it was revealed that shady foreign-born middlemen were pocketing millions of dollars. The president’s approval rating plummeted, and it looked like an early exit. “I had hoped there would not be discovery of an impeachable offense,” the Speaker of the House said at one point. “I didn’t want...

Far from being the work of a single political party, intelligence agency or country, the power structure revealed by the network connected to Epstein is nothing less than a criminal enterprise that is willing to use and abuse children in the pursuit of ever more power, wealth and control. On August 10th, and for several days after, speculation swirled after it was announced that Jeffrey Epstein had been found dead in his cell. His cause of death has officially been ruled suicide by hanging. Epstein, the billionaire pedophile and sex trafficker with a myriad of connections to the rich and...

Former Justice Department inspector general and federal prosecutor Michael Bromwich and his consulting firm have joined the legal team supporting Brett Kavanaugh accuser Christine Blasey Ford. Bromwich tweeted Saturday that he was “honored to be joining” Blasey’s attorneys Debra Katz and Lisa Blanks as she prepares testimony for the Senate Judiciary Committee about her allegation that Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her when they were both in high school. Bromwich, who helped investigate the Iran-Contra scandal for the federal Office of Independent Counsel, is also representing former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe. McCabe, a frequent target of President Donald Trump, was fired...

One of the most influential Arab journalists in the world, Jamal Khashoggi, went missing after entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul last week. Turkish authorities have blamed the Saudis, but Riyadh has denied harming the veteran reporter.Jamal Khashoggi, 59, was born in Medina, Saudi Arabia, one of the holiest cities in Islam. Like many Saudis at the time, Khashoggi left to study abroad. He earned a business administration degree in 1983 at Indiana State University in the United States.Career in journalismKhashoggi began his career as a reporter for the English language newspaper Saudi Gazette. He went on to work for...

The White House is ramping up an 11th-hour effort to build support for President Trump’s pick to lead the CIA, just days before she is scheduled to face a grilling from the Senate Intelligence Committee over her role in the agency’s controversial detention and interrogation program. For weeks, the CIA has led the charge on promoting now-deputy director Gina Haspel—a forward-leaning PR campaign that some critics have said is inappropriate for the clandestine agency. Only late last week did the White House stand up the kind of broad-based press campaign typical of other high-stakes nominations, issuing a swath of laudatory...

Oliver North, the controversial retired Marine and former Reagan White House aide implicated in the Iran-Contra scandal, is on track to be the next president of the National Rifle Association (NRA). The organization on Monday announced that North will replace Pete Brownell in the role “within a few weeks.” The head of the NRA, Wayne LaPierre, called the appointment “the most exciting news for our members since Charlton Heston became President of our Association.” Heston served as the group’s president from 1998 to 2003, famously shouting, “From my cold, dead hands” as he held a rifle aloft during the NRA...

I don't post here much any more, but there seems to be a gap in the discussions on twitter about this subject from "Last Refuge," "Tom Paine," and "Jim Hoft." Freepers seem to be more clued into some of what I'm about to say. While everyone is focused on the Memo, the Inspector General Report, and Fusion GPS (and general FBI corruption), I think a powerful connecting link to much, perhaps all, rests in two locations: the House vault where they keep the payouts on the sex harassment funds, and the computer files of the Awans. Consider that when news...

On Monday, January 25, 1988, 30 years ago tonight, Americans across the country saw with their own eyes an early example of the ugly liberal media attack machine. Dan Rather, the anchor of the CBS Evening News at the time, laid a trap and attempted to ambush then-Vice President George H.W. Bush on live TV. Of course, Rather’s goal was to embarrass the leading Republican contender for the 1988 Republican presidential nomination.  The segment was supposed to be a “candidate’s profile.” Instead, Rather screamed at the Vice President over the Iran-Contra scandal, making it the sole topic discussed. Visibly angry, he berated...

My favorite Oliver North hearing video - Part 3 of Day 4 Afternoon, 10 Jul 1987. Dick Cheney questions Oliver North and gives him time to talk.

Day 5 afternoon (July 13, 1987) of the Oliver North Hearings, edited to questions and answers and minimal senatorial statements.

Whispers of "payback" are being directed at Hillary Clinton after she decried as "unprecedented" the surprise FBI revival of its probe of her email scandal. That's because 24 years ago, as former President George H.W. Bush was surging back against challenger Bill Clinton, a special prosecutor raised new charges against Bush in the Iran-Contra probe, prompting Clinton to claim he was running against a "culture of corruption."

Mike Allen reported over the weekend that "Gregory B. Craig, a well-known Washington lawyer who quarterbacked President Bill Clinton's impeachment defense, has been chosen White House counsel by resident-elect Barack Obama". Believe it or not, the time Craig spent shilling for Clinton may have been his most honorable days of work ... In the early 1980s, [Craig] was an attorney for John Hinckley, the man who shot President Reagan and three others. Craig helped put together an insanity defense that led to Hinckley's acquittal. Nine years later, he advised Ted Kennedy in the Palm Beach rape case involving the senator...

It’s not often that a U.S. government agency gets caught red-handed abiding by its charter and performing its publicly-avowed and legislatively-approved duties. But last week the AP "broke" a long and breathless story from Havana that nailed the USAID (United States Agency for International Development) for just that. In their own words, "a secret plan aimed at undermining Cuba’s communist government," was courageously exposed by the AP’s intrepid Havana bureau. Such is the magnitude of the scandal that a red-faced and snarling Senator Patrick Leahy is now chairing hearings on Capitol Hill where he grills USAID director Rajiv Shah on...