Free Republic

An American POTUS can LEGALLY authorize electronic surveillance 'without a court order...to acquire foreign intelligence information for periods of up to one year’. Yes, it's true. Obama had legal authorization to by-pass the normal court vetting process. 4. Such power lies in 50 U.S. Code § 1802 -

http://thehill.com/homenews/house/389210-centrists-on-cusp-of-forcing-immigration-votes-after-gaining-two

Alexander Ciccolo, 25, the son of a Boston police captain, pled guilty on Monday to plotting an Islamic State terrorist attack on a college campus. He will face up to 20 years in prison for charges of providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization, attempting to use weapons of mass destruction, illegal weapons possession, and assault with a dangerous weapon. The Berkshire Eagle runs down the details of Ciccolo’s case: Ciccolo was arrested July 4, 2015, after he allegedly accepted a small cache of weapons from an FBI informant. He had come to the attention of authorities after his...

Former Attorney General Eric Holder blasted President Donald Trump’s demand to investigate possible federal meddling in the 2016 presidential campaign as “dangerous” and “democracy threatening” in a message posted Monday afternoon. “Trump demand for DOJ investigation is dangerous/democracy threatening. DOJ response is disappointing,” Holder lamented on Twitter. “There is no basis/no predicate for an inquiry. It’s time to stand for time-honored DOJ independence. That separation from White House is a critical part of our system.” On Sunday, President Trump took to Twitter to demand that the Justice Department probe politically-motivated spying on his campaign. “I hereby demand, and will do...

The “deep state” is in a deep state of desperation. With little time left before the Justice Department inspector general’s report becomes public, and with special counsel Robert Mueller having failed to bring down Donald Trump after a year of trying, they know a reckoning is coming.

Former U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Sunday warned that “true civil discourse” is under threat around the world while speaking to graduates at NYU Abu Dhabi, an event that the school blocked journalists from filming. While obliquely criticizing President Donald Trump, Kerry did not mention the 2015 Iran nuclear deal he secured with other world powers, an accord of which Trump now has pulled America out. […] While never naming Trump, Kerry began his remarks by saying: “Given what’s going on today, I’m glad to be invited anywhere, folks.” He quickly added that the U.S. “needs to build...

New items added in blue on May 20, 2018 It’s easy to find timelines that detail Trump-Russia collusion developments. Here are links to two of them I recommend: Politifact Russia-Trump timeline Washington Post Russia-Trump timeline On the other side, evidence has emerged in the past year that makes it clear there were organized efforts to collude against candidate Donald Trump–and then President Trump. For example:

REYHANLI, Turkey – U.S. military equipment and ammunition, sent to Syria as part of a failed Obama administration plan to find and arm moderate forces to defeat ISIS, were instead simply handed over to an Al Qaeda group, according to the man who said he himself brokered the deal. “I communicated with Al Qaeda’s branch, Al Nusra, to protect and safely escort me and my soldiers for two hours from North Aleppo to West Aleppo,” Maj. Anas Ibrahim Obaid, better known on the battlefield as Abu Zayd, told Fox News from his home in the western Aleppo area. “In exchange,...

Democrats routinely express outrage over claims of collusion with a foreign power to undermine our democracy. So where is the outrage over revelations that former secretary of state John Kerry held not one but two secret meetings with Iran’s foreign minister to strategize over how to undermine President Trump’s plans to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal? An Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman confirmed the meetings after the Boston Globe broke the news, declaring , “We don’t see the U.S. just as Mr. Trump; the United States is not just the current ruling administration.” Think about what this means. Iran is...

This is just too rich. Seriously. From the insufferable Iran deal… to the appeasement “Russian Reset”… to the Libya fiasco… to the rise of ISIS… to installing the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt… to the explosion of terrorism in Yemen… to civil war in Syria… to the crisis in Ukraine… to the 2010 State Department apology tour (WikiLeaks cables scandal)… to their inability to stop North Korean nuclear ambitions and the rise of China as an influential power… there were/are zero foreign policy successes in eight years of the Obama administration. There was not a single Obama foreign policy initiative that...

After twice denying their existence – first lying to the ACLJ, and then once caught, claiming it had turned over all documents to the ACLJ – the FBI Deep State has just admitted in federal court that is has found new documents – 16 pages and 2 text messages – that it will be forced to turn over to the ACLJ by the end of the month. In recently filed court documents, the FBI finally admitted – on its supposedly third search attempt – that it has located another batch of documents responsive to the ACLJ’s Freedom of Information Act...

Two former Obama administration officials suggested in a New York Times op-ed published Thursday that European countries allied with the United States could expel American ambassadors in retaliation for President Donald Trump withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal. "Europe Doesn't Have to Be Trump's Doormat," wrote Steven Simon and Jonathan Stevenson. Simon served as the National Security Council's senior director for the Middle East and North Africa, while Stevenson served as the regional director for political-military affairs. "After months of swaggering hesitation, President Trump finally announced the United States' withdrawal from the nuclear deal with Iran, to which Britain, France,...

Mueller generated headlines with the February indictment, safe in the knowledge the 13 Russians were beyond U.S. jurisdiction. Therefore, there would be no trial — only sensational Russian collusion accusations. Mueller may now have to try the case, and Concord’s lawyers have put the special counsel on notice. The Russian company’s lawyers intend to invoke “discovery” to obtain U.S. intelligence about what they knew of Russian activities. “I guess Mueller thought it was a freebie, for sure,” former federal prosecutor Andrew C. McCarthy told The Daily Caller News Foundation after the court proceeding. “He thought it could make this association...

Jim Webb, the decorated Vietnam combat veteran, writer, and former US senator, wrote “Heroes of the Vietnam Generation,”which pairs well with an earlier essay, “Peace? Defeat? What Did the Vietnam War Protesters Want?,” published by the American Enterprise Institute, in 1997. Both are very useful, especially for those who didn’t live through the Vietnam era, for understanding some of that generation’s dynamics. Webb discusses how it was really the first time in US history when a lot of people argued not going into the military was actually a good thing, and this sentiment has guided how a lot of people...

The Obama scandal spin came in three phases when reacting to the truth. 1. It's a right-wing conspiracy theory 2. It's complicated 3. Everyone knew it all along and it's not a story Mazel tov to the Iran Deal which, with Netanyahu's revelations about Iran's nuclear weapons plans, which it had been hiding, has now graduated to the third phase. We've gone from, "Iran would never develop nuclear weapons" and "Iran only wants peaceful nuclear energy" to, "Of course, we knew Iran wanted nuclear weapons. That's why we need the Iran Deal."

Credit to Sean Davis at the Federalist for catching this today. The newly declassified report on Russia from the House Intel Committee states that Director of National Intelligence James Clapper was the person who leaked word of the dossier being briefed to Trump last January. When initially asked about leaks related to the ICA in July 2017, former DNI Clapper flatly denied “discussing the dossier [compiled by Steele] or any other intelligence related to Russia hacking of the 2016 election with journalists.” Clapper subsequently acknowledged discussing the “dossier with CNN journalist Jake Tapper,” and admitted that he might have spoken...

Joe diGenova appears on Fox News with Tucker Carlson to discuss the ongoing investigation into James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Sally Yates, Loretta Lynch and the politicization of the DOJ and FBI by former President Obama intelligence officials.

Four years ago, 32-year-old Sam Sally left her hometown in Indiana for a vacation in Turkey. The family went from a mundane life of sports cars and a delivery business to joining Islamic State fighters and seeing their son become the face of ISIS propaganda against America. During the trip, Sally claims her husband, Moussa, duped her and her children -- Matthew, 10; Sarah, 5; and her two youngest who were born in the so-called ISIS caliphate -- into joining Islamic State militants in Syria. Sally said, "All I saw was a bunch of drug-using thugs that came from their...

Sen McCain has been quick to jump on anything the President does, especially over the last few months. But can anyone state the last time we have seen him in public?

https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2018/04/12/Trump-directs-advisers-to-consider-return-to-TPP/4141523567648/