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| “If I would know something I wouldn’t even tell myself.” |
One such unreasonable person is Mike Cernovich. Cernovich is a
right-wing author who promoted the "Pizzagate" conspiracy
theory. Therefore anything he says
must be viewed with a large amount of skepticism. Cernovich claims that Susan Rice, while still serving in the
Obama administration, requested the "unmasking" of incoming Trump
officials in intelligence reports. This is problematic. If there was no surveillance, how could
people be “unmasked?” The reason
is that this information was “incidentally collected.” In the normal course of spying on
foreigners, Americans were inadvertently recorded. Simple. It was
all very innocent. The Hill reporter has explained, “Former intelligence officials have
described unmasking as a routine part of the intelligence process, and no
reports so far have shown that Rice's request bypassed proper channels.”
The problem with The Hill’s narrative is that Cernovich’s claim
about “unmasking” was “later echoed by Bloomberg columnist Eli Lake.” The Hill makes no
mention of any bizarre ideas Lake may hold. The Hill article concludes with, “there is still no evidence
that surveillance of Trump occurred.”
In March Rice was asked by Judy
Woodruff, “We’ve been following a disclosure by … Devin Nunes that in
essence, during the final days of the Obama administration, during the
transition after President Trump had been elected, he and the people around him
may have been caught up in surveillance of foreign individuals and that their
identities may have been disclosed. Do you know anything about this?” Rice responded, “I know nothing about
this.” In a Washington Post op-ed that is a classic example of
chutzpa Rice stated, “False statements from the White House are part of a disturbing
pattern of behavior that poses real and potentially profound dangers to U.S.
national security.” She continued with her criticism of the White House’s
“vacation from veracity” and “compulsive mendacity,” claiming, “The United
States’ words matter. Critical calculations are based on our perceived
credibility.”
Rice’s defense will rely heavily on the contention that information
on the Trump campaign was collected “incidentally.” Americans who have been
incidentally spied upon include Congressman Dennis Kucinich, Senators Harry Reid and Dianne Feinstein and
Congresswoman Jane
Harman. Through some error on
the part of the intelligence community their surveillance of these prominent Americans
was exposed. How many other cases
have been successfully concealed?
The J. Edgar Hoover surveillance of Martin Luther King Jr. suggests that
such behavior has a long history.
Rice may have a serious problem with the inconsistencies in her public
statements. In her March 22
interview with Judy Woodruff, Woodruff asked, “We’ve been following a
disclosure by … Devin Nunes that in essence, during the final days of the Obama
administration, during the transition after President Trump had been elected,
he and the people around him may have been caught up in surveillance of foreign
individuals and that their identities may have been disclosed. Do you know
anything about this?” Rice
responded, “I know nothing about this.”
Who unmasked the names on the transcripts of wiretaps that don’t
exits? “NBC has learned that Rice didn't — and couldn't — ‘order’ the
unmasking.” They explain the
procedure for unmasking which can only be done by the agencies that gathered
the surveillance. However, in the
same article Rice explained, "There
were occasions when I would receive a report in which a U.S. person was
referred to, name not provided, just a U.S. person, and sometimes in that
context in order to understand the importance of that report, and assess its
significance, it was necessary to find out or request the information as to who
that U.S. official was." Rice
concluded, “"I leaked nothing to nobody and never have and never
would." To recap: Donald Trump and his staff were not
wiretapped. The names of the
people in those transcripts were not “unmasked” by Susan Rice because she did
not have the authority to do so.
And although he did request the names of Americans in the nonexistent
transcripts, she did not leak them to the press.
Democrats are clinging to their fake scandal ginned up by left-wing
media about the Trump campaign’s collusion with the Russians. This widely
discredited claim is unsubstantiated and based on unfounded accusations. There are literally tens of thousands
of sleuths hoping to make a name for themselves by bringing down a president. The Obama appointed heads of immense
intelligence agencies have been unsuccessful. So far they have uncovered one ludicrous dossier that even
Vice President Biden did not find credible.
In order to maintain a bogus story all of the participants must be
singing from the same sheet of music.
This requires that cooperation based on either fear or affection. Apparently Susan Rice does not inspire
affection. Former National
Security Agency analyst and counterintelligence Officer, John R. Schindler, described Rice as, “a deeply unpopular figure with our
Intelligence Community. Her abrasive personality and overall incompetence
grated on the IC. Her habitually coarse language was inflicted on senior
intelligence officials more than once, while nobody outside Obama’s inner
circle considered Rice even marginally competent at her job.” Schindler add, “Rice didn’t like to
play by the rules, including the top-secret ones. On multiple occasions, she
asked the NSA to do things they regarded as unethical and perhaps illegal.”
Susan Rice’s Sergeant
Schultz defense (“I know nothing about this.”) will not be effective.
