90 Miles From Tyranny

Saturday, April 21, 2018

Report: Memos Show Comey Himself Used Dossier to Set Up Trump

For James Comey, apparently, the fix was in.

Buried this week in the avalanche of details contained in the former FBI director’s memos about his personal meetings with Donald Trump is one line that indicates Comey and his cronies in the highest echelons of American government were setting up Trump for failure from the beginning.

And it’s Comey’s own words that hold the clue.

In an analysis published Friday by The Federalist, senior editor Molly Hemingway points out that one memo in particular indicates Comey and his circle could well have orchestrated one of the most important media leaks of Trump’s presidency.

In the memo, Comey recounted a Jan. 6, 2017 meeting with Trump in which he warns the then-president-elect that many media outlets were aware of the existence of the so-called “Trump dossier,” with its allegations of corruption and tawdry tales of Trump’s alleged romps with Russian prostitutes.

“I said media like CNN had them and were looking for a news hook,” he wrote.

Talk about a self-fulfilling prophesy.

Not a week passed before CNN — the very news outlet Comey cautioned about – was using the very meeting Comey attended with the incoming president to blare the scurrilous allegations contained in the dossier even before Trump put his hand on the Bible for the oath of office.

As CNN reported at the time:

“Classified documents presented last week to President Obama and President-elect Trump included allegations that Russian operatives claim to have compromising personal and financial information about Mr. Trump, multiple US officials with direct knowledge of the briefings tell CNN.” (Emphasis added.)

OK, allowing Comey the benefit of the doubt that he didn’t pick up the phone and call CNN about his own meeting with Trump (there’s really no reason to give him that benefit, but being charitable never hurts), the memo Comey wrote was dated Jan. 7, 2017.

It was written to Comey’s Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe, then-FBI General Counsel James Baker, and Comey’s Chief of Staff James Rybicki.

Any one of those men — particularly McCabe, whose penchant for leaking cost him his FBI pension — could well have been the source for CNN’s report.

Hemingway suggests another potential source, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, who Comey wrote originally suggested his meeting with Trump. This might come as a shock, but Clapper is now a national security analyst for none other than CNN.

But there were others, too. According to The Daily Caller, officials who knew about the meeting and could have leaked it to CNN are then-CIA Director John Brennan — a known leaker, a vociferous Trump critic and...

Lying, Cheating, Communist Leaning Democrats Get Get Called Out For Their Serious One Dimensional Chess Play...

WikiLeaks Drops Proof That NYTimes Colluded With Hillary Clinton

Assange: The Press Are "Opportunistic Snipers" That Publish Nothing More Than Very, Very, Very Inaccurate "Weaponized Text"

Assange says he is '1,000% confident' that Russia was NOT the source for hacked Democratic emails which were published by WikiLeaks

EXCLUSIVE: Ex-British ambassador who is now a WikiLeaks operative claims Russia did NOT provide Clinton emails - they were handed over to him at a D.C. park by an intermediary for 'disgusted' Democratic whistleblowers

Report: US Pressured Ecuador To Cut Off Assange’s Wikileaks Internet

WikiLeaks: Hillary Clinton Bribed Republicans to Influence Election

Julian Assange associate: It was a leak, not a hack and the DNC insider is NOT Russian

Why Hasn't Mueller Contacted Wikileaks About The DNC Hack Yet?

In The Entire History Of Wikileaks...

Deputies to hold no-confidence vote on Sheriff Scott Israel after Florida school massacre

The union that represents the deputies who responded to the Florida high school massacre is holding a no-confidence vote on the sheriff, with the labor group's leaders saying he should have accepted some blame for the shooting.

The Broward Sheriff's Office Deputies Association is conducting a poll of its members about their confidence in Sheriff Scott Israel, who strongly denounced the vote as a union tactic to get pay raises. The electronic poll ends Thursday night.

President Jeff Bell said Friday that Israel's handling of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting that killed 14 students and three staff members is a major component of the no-confidence campaign, saying he should not have put the full blame on Deputy Scot Peterson, the school's resource officer.

Video shows Peterson remained outside after investigators say former student Nikolas Cruz opened fire Feb. 14 inside the three-story freshman building with an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle. Israel said shortly after the shooting that Peterson should have rushed into the building to confront and kill Cruz. Peterson retired rather than accept an unpaid suspension.

Bell also has criticized Peterson, but said Israel should not have publicly singled the deputy and should have placed him on paid leave until an investigation into his conduct was completed. He said only deputies accused of crimes are placed on unpaid leave and Peterson has never been charged.

Israel issued a statement Friday saying it is "unfortunate and appalling" that Bell is using the school shooting "as a bargaining tactic to extort a 6.5 percent pay raise" for the union's members. The 3-year-old union represents the ...

Forget Rockefeller and Gates — 14th century Malian emperor Mansa Musa is likely the richest person ever.

Imagine how much money the richest person in history would have. Now add a couple hundred billion, and you’ve probably gotten closer to how much wealth Mansa Musa had circa 1324 A.D.

Economists have determined that the West African emperor’s vast wealth most likely positions him as the richest person in history. But just how much money did he have? And what did he do with it?

Mansa Musa’s Start

Emperor Mansa Musa I came to reign over the Malian Empire through somewhat strange means.

Before embarking on a long and somewhat arduous pilgrimage to Mecca (called a Hajj in the Muslim religion), then-emperor Abubakari II deputized Musa to temporarily assume his role. An “on-call” emperor was a common feature throughout the history of the empire. It’s somewhat comparable to the modern-day role of a vice president.

This arrangement worked out fine until Abubakari set out to explore the far side of the Atlantic Ocean and never returned. Musa, then, inherited the throne since he had been deputized. But Musa wasn’t a nobody: His great-uncle was Sundiata Keita, who founded the Malian Empire.

Interesting fact: Slavery in Mali exists today, with as many as 200,000 people held in direct servitude to a master.

As many a late night infomercial will tell you, there are lots of ways to attain wealth. Musa got his primarily through trading gold and salt, which were found in abundance in West Africa at the time. He also used the money to strengthen the country’s cultural centers, particularly Timbuktu, which he annexed in 1324.

It was when Musa made his Hajj to Mecca — an important part of the Muslim religion, which was very widespread in the region at this point in history — that the rest of the world became aware of the extent of his wealth.

Because he had so much to spend, his caravan throughout Cairo, Medina, and finally to Mecca had a procession of more than 60,000, including 12,000 slaves, dozens of animals, and plenty of gold. In fact, as they traveled, Musa and his entourage gave gold away to people in the streets.

They also bought lots of stuff — so much stuff, in fact, that they actually messed up the global economy for a while: The gold he spent circulated, and there was so much of it, that the value actually went down.

The disruption eventually evened out, in part because Mansa Musa began borrowing from lenders in Cairo (despite the high interest rate) and essentially single-handedly controlled the price of gold in the Mediterranean.

The Lasting Contributions Of Mansa Musa’s Wealth

So what did Mansa Musa do with all the money, aside from giving away bricks to random people in the street and using it to buy souvenirs?

He actually ended up using most of it to build a great number of mosques (legend says he built one every Friday of his reign), the most famous of which is the Djinguereber Mosque. He also commissioned many universities throughout the kingdom — many of which, along with the mosques, are still standing today, some 700 years later.

Musa quite literally put himself, and his empire, on the map when he made this journey — maps from Italian cartographers during his reign had artists add his likeness, holding a nugget of gold of course. He extended the reach of his trade ports and became one of the most powerful rulers of his time — if not in all of history.

Musa ruled for about 25 years according to historian’s best estimates: they believe he died in 1332, at which time his son inherited the throne.

In the spirit of other extremely wealthy people who ultimately become philanthropists, you might wonder how he stacks up against some contemporary billionaires, like Bill Gates, John D. Rockefeller, or Warren Buffett.

When adjusted for inflation, Mansa Musa’s wealth is believed to have been around $400 billion. The only person who comes close to Musa’s wealth is John D. Rockefeller, whom economists believe amassed a worth of around...

The antebellum South saw a great rise in the agriculture industry. This profitable commerce needed a labor force for working the fields, cooking and serving the meals, and for general labor. Slaves from Africa bore most of the burden, but slaves from countries like Ireland were also used. Irish slaves came to America and the West Indies as early as 1625 when James II sold 30,000 Irish prisoners as slaves to the New World. It is estimated that approximately 100,000 Irish men, women, and children were transported to the colonies as slaves.

Not to be called racist, Britain, in the 17th and 18th centuries, was an equal opportunity exploiter of human flesh, having sold over 600,000 Irish, Scottish, and Catholics into slavery. In early America, slavery was not a race issue, it was primarily a financial one. It was not until well into the 19th century, when the fusion of race, slavery, politics, and with the beginning of the ascension of the former white slaves, that people of African origin began to be known as Negros.

Slavery in America was not unique to this continent. It was almost universal at the time and goes as far back as 3,500 B.C. It was a way to get a cheap and plentiful labor force. It is only in recent human history that slavery has become totally illegal, at least on the books.

While liberals like to castigate Americans as inventing racism and human servitude, they fail to mention that slavery in early America is not American history at all, it is English history. Before 1776, there was no United States or United States law. It was a British colony under British law. In 1772, the Emancipation Act freed slaves in England, but with no thanks to Britain, it did not include its colonies.

The United States began with the idea that slavery would soon have to end. Ben Franklin was active in the Pennsylvania Society for the Abolition of Slavery and became its president in 1787. It was relatively early in the history of the United States that slavery was made illegal, and enforced in blood.

Today, the aristocrats of industry, the rich Hollywood types, the technocrats of Silicon Valley, demand the same advantages as the plantation owners of the 19th century…inexpensive labor…labor to work the fields, toil in their factories, clean their mansions, cut their lawns, cook their meals, or even fill their date books. These same people that donate millions to political parties expect something in return. For many, it is an open border…a plentiful supply of inexpensive labor.

For many Republicans, labor costs have been cut to the bone, or as President Bush said, “They do what Americans won’t do.” What he means is, Americans can’t live on those wages, but illegal immigrants can and will.

Democrats also want the cheap labor, but they are smart enough to see a new voting bloc in their future should they be successful in getting amnesty passed. If you can’t convince voters, get new ones.

Since the middle class has largely left the Democrat Party, new voters are needed to fill in the gaps. Locking in voting blocs is nothing unusual for the Democrats, after all, it was LBJ that used his ‘Great Society Program’ to lock in Black votes. According to...