90 Miles From Tyranny

Wednesday, April 10, 2019

Girls With Guns

The Long, Lost Scroll of Truth Has been Found!

US sails massive, F-35-laden warship in disputed South China Sea

In the latest show of military muscle in the South China Sea, the U.S. has apparently sailed its USS Wasp amphibious assault ship near a strategic reef claimed by Beijing and Manila that lies just 230 km (140 miles) from the Philippine coast.

Filipino fishermen near the site known as the Scarborough Shoal initially spotted what appeared to be the massive U.S. vessel on Tuesday, according to ABS-CBN News. It said planes were seen landing and taking off from the ship, some 5 km (3 miles) away from the fishermen’s boat. A video clip shown by the news network appeared to corroborate their account.

Contacted by The Japan Times, a U.S. military spokeswoman would not confirm or deny the Wasp’s presence near the collection of outcroppings that barely jut out above water at high tide, citing “force protection and security.” However, the spokeswoman did confirm that the Wasp “has been training with Philippine Navy ships in Subic Bay and in international waters of the South China Sea … for several days.”

Scarborough Shoal, which is also claimed by Taiwan, is regarded as a potential powder keg in the strategic waterway. It was seized by Beijing in 2012 after an extended standoff with Manila. China later effectively blockaded the lagoon, which is rich in fish stocks, and routinely dispatches scores of fishing vessels and government-backed “maritime militia” ships to the area to continue its de facto blockade.

The Wasp was taking part in the annual Balikatan U.S.-Philippine military training exercise “that focuses on maritime security and...

Embattled Chinese telecom giant Huawei hires Obama’s former director of cybersecurity

In the midst of the Justice Department’s prosecution of Huawei Technologies for violating sanctions against Iran, the Chinese company is teaming up with a new lobbyist to help minimize the fallout: Samir Jain.

Jain works for the lobbying firm Jones Day, but before that he served as director of cybersecurity policy for President Obama’s National Security Council.

“Embattled Chinese telco Huawei has hired a new lobbyist: Jones Day’s Samir Jain, formally the Obama National Security Council’s director of cybersecurity policy,” the Daily Beast’s Lachlan Markay posted to Twitter, along with a pic of Jain’s lobbying registration.

According to Jain’s Jones Day biography, the veteran cybersecurity and communications expert has a lot of connections at the Department of Justice.

Prior to joining Jones Day in 2017, Samir was senior director for cybersecurity policy for the National Security Council at The White House. He led the team responsible for cyber incident responses, chaired the interagency body that reviewed proposed cyber operations, directed evaluation of legislative proposals concerning reform of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, and regularly worked with international cyber counterparts, including leading an interagency delegation to India and coordinating the campaign to gain acceptance of U.S.-proposed international cyber norms.

Samir also served as associate deputy attorney general at the DOJ, where his responsibilities included overseeing the development of...

POTUS Trump schools dishonest media: ‘It was OBAMA who put migrant kids in CAGES!’

Earlier this week we took the “mainstream” media to task over its blatantly dishonest claim that outgoing Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen will forever be remembered as the Trump official who “put kids in cages.”

“Kirstjen Nielsen, I think, is a great example of what happens when you go to work for Donald Trump,” CNN chief ‘legal’ toadie Jeffrey Toobin claimed over the weekend. “He is the great reputation killer. Here is this woman who was a reasonably admired bureaucrat. For the rest of her life people will look at her and think, ‘Oh, that’s the woman who put children in cages.’”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) joined in too.

“It is deeply alarming that the Trump Administration official who put children in cages is reportedly resigning because she is not extreme enough for the White House’s liking,” said Pelosi.

“The president’s dangerous and cruel anti-immigrant policies have only worsened the humanitarian suffering at the border and inflicted vast suffering on the families who have been torn apart,” Pelosi said.

The outgoing DHS chief repeatedly pushed back against this blatant and cosmically irresponsible lie for much of her nearly two-year tenure at the helm of DHS. In congressional hearings and on cable news programs, she said time and time again that no, Border Patrol, ICE, and Customs and Border Protection agents were not...

They Both Use The Same Spin Cycle...

SECOND HASSAN STAFFER ALLEGEDLY HELPED AIDE STEAL MASSIVE AMOUNTS OF SENATE DATA

A former Senate IT aide to Sen. Maggie Hassan, Jackson Cosko, admitted he stole tens of thousands of documents, credit card numbers, Social Security numbers and the contents of the entire network drive from the New Hampshire Democrat.

Cosko allegedly used stolen private data about senators to “doxx” Republicans during the Brett Kavanaugh hearings.

In a plea deal, Cosko — whom Hassan had fired for other misconduct before the theft — said he worked with an accomplice who helped him gain access and wiped his fingerprints.

A court case has been opened against Samantha DeForest-Davis, a former Hassan aide who a source with knowledge of the situation said is the alleged accomplice.

A second onetime aide to Sen. Maggie Hassan is implicated in former IT staffer Jackson Cosko’s massive data-theft scheme that was ultimately used to “intimidate” Republican senators by “doxxing” them during a confirmation hearing for Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, prosecutors said.

Samantha G. DeForest-Davis, at the time a staff assistant to Hassan, was the aide who allegedly helped Cosko conduct his scheme, a source with knowledge of the situation told The Daily Caller News Foundation. Court records show a case naming her has been opened, and the source confirmed it relates to her alleged role in the data theft.

She filed an affidavit that can be used to assess her eligibility for a public defender, but she has not been charged with any crimes, court records show.

Cosko pleaded guilty April 5 to masterminding what prosecutors said was “an extraordinarily extensive data-theft scheme, copying entire network drives, sorting and organizing sensitive data, and exploring ways to use that data to his benefit.” He admitted to stealing tens of thousands of documents and emails from Hassan’s office, in addition to credit card information and Social Security numbers belonging to Senate employees.

The data also included a master list of senators’ private information that Cosko posted to Wikipedia out of “anger” at Republicans during the Supreme Court nomination hearings, prosecutors said.

Note from Jackson Cosko entered as evidence in court. (US District Court)

Cosko’s lawyer said drugs contributed to his admitted crimes. But a statement of facts prosecutors filed as part of Cosko’s plea agreement describes an elaborate, months-long scheme involving two people.

The data was stolen from Hassan’s office in months of late-night burglaries between July and October 2018 after Cosko was fired that May for different misconduct that Hassan, a New Hampshire Democrat, has declined to explain, according to the statement.

DeForest-Davis — identified in court documents only as SUBJECT A — allegedly repeatedly provided Cosko a key that he used to enter the office at night and install tiny devices that capture every keystroke, including passwords that were then used to access...

Allowing People That Hate You Into Your Country, Can Never Have Good Results...

Top FBI Lawyer Testified Rosenstein Discussed Removing Trump From Office

James Baker, the former top lawyer of the FBI, testified to members of Congress last fall that Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and other FBI officials discussed wearing a wire in meetings with President Trump and removing him from office, according to a transcript of Baker’s testimony released on Tuesday.

In a joint committee on October 3, 2018, Baker was questioned in a closed-door interview on his knowledge of the Christopher Steele dossier, classified information leaked to the media, and invoking the 25th Amendment against President Trump.

Baker’s testimony confirmed what former acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe previously said about national security officials strategizing to remove President Trump from office. Baker said Rosenstein made a serious suggestion to wear a wire when near the president in order to collect evidence that the president obstructed the investigation on Russian collusion. Baker also said he suspected Rosenstein was acting in response to the firing of James Comey, and that he felt he had been “used” by the president in his justification for firing Comey.

Baker said he was told that at the time “there were two members of the Cabinet who were willing to go down this road already,” regarding conversations about invoking the 25th Amendment.

Baker testified that he met with a lawyer for Perkins Coie, the law firm hired by the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign to do opposition research on Donald Trump, named Michael Sussmann. He said Sussmann did not provide him information about the...