US intelligence community may be "out to get" Trump

Dennis Kucinich, a former presidential candidate for the Democratic Party, in an interview on Fox Business Network claimed that the US intelligence community was responsible for leaking information that led to the resignation of Mike Flynn.

Flynn was Trump's national security advisor. The leaked information showed that Flynn had discussed in secret with Russian officials sanctions imposed by the US. The discussing took place before Trump's inauguration. Kucinich argues that the goal was to worsen the relationship between Russian and the US. Trump has argued for improving US relations with Russia. Kucinich said:

“What’s at the core of this is an effort by some in the intelligence community to upend any positive relationship between the U.S. and Russia. And I tell you there's a marching band and Chowder Society out there. There's gold in them there hills. There are people trying to separate the U.S. and Russia so that this military industrial intel axis can cash in.”Kucinich even added that there are those within the intelligence community that are willing to separate the US and Russia in a way that could reignite the Cold War. It seems quite clear that the Cold War has been reignited ages ago especially since events in the Ukraine.

Investigative journalist Gareth Porter said:“Flynn is a figure with a dark side, but hype regarding an ‘illegal’ meeting with Russian ambassador never made sense. I’m glad he’s gone, but the leaks hinting Logan Act treason should be recognized as ‘intelligence community’ political manipulation. The Logan Act is a dead letter and even if it were not, the facts of this case don’t support its application. If it would apply to anything recent, the Logan Act would apply to the letter organized by Tom Cotton regarding Iran in 2015, but hawk Cotton never paid any price.”Glenn Greenwald noted in a tweet: “In January, Chuck Schumer warned Trump not to criticize the intelligence community because of all the ways they have to destroy people.” Schumer Democratic minority leader in the senate, said: “Let me tell you, you take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you.”

Another article claims:Make no mistake: we have just witnessed an operation by members of the CIA to take out a high official of our own government. An agency widely believed to have brought down democratically elected governments overseas is now practicing the same dark arts in domestic American politics. Almost certainly, its new head, Mike Pompeo, was not consulted.

You can observe psychological warfare being carried out in the media. While Trump media supporters talk about the heinous nature of the fact there were leaks, the liberal anti-Trump media will howl about the heinous conversations between Trump officials and the Russians. Those who broke the law and leaked the documents are heroes for revealing the close relation of some Trump officials with Russia. Of course a different approach is taken to leaks by Edward Snowden which revealed CIA illegal spying. He is supposed to come back to the US and be tried. David Goldman writes:… the CIA has gone out of its way to sandbag Flynn at the National Security Council. As Politico reports: "On Friday, one of Flynn's closest deputies on the NSC, senior director for Africa Robin Townley, was informed that the Central Intelligence Agency had rejected his request for an elite security clearance required for service on the NSC, according to two people with direct knowledge of the situation." Townley held precisely the same security clearance at the Department of Defense for seventeen years, yet he was blackballed without explanation. At DoD, Townley had a stellar reputation as a Middle East and Africa expert, and the denial of his clearance is hard to explain except as bureaucratic backstabbing.

Flynn had often criticized the CIA revealing intelligence and operational failures.

We can expect more and more revelations to back the narrative that not just Flynn but Trump have had treasonous dealings with Russia and Putin. The rush of establishment papers to print the latest revelations has little to do with news but everything to do with creating even more disapproval of Trump in the public mind. While there may be a degree of truth in the revelations about Flynn the leaking of the information is a sign that the intelligence community is attempting to control the political situation in the United States. They have plenty of experience overthrowing governments.

However, other parts of the deep state such as many in the Wall Street establishment may be hesitant to have the Trump administration go. It is after all a very pro-business government. Even today US stock markets again reached new highs. There are many members of the Wall Street elite within the administration. No doubt they hope that an accommodation can be reached between Trump and his administration with the intelligence community. However, it may be that Mike Pence is being prepared to replace Donald Trump.

Kucinich speaks out on extrajudicial killings

There seems to be a willingness to mute any criticism of policies which under George Bush would have led to huge liberal outcries. Cogent criticism of these policies have been left to people such as Ron Paul on the right and Kucinich on the left while mainstream liberals are silent. This is from the nation.

Kucinich: White House Assassination Policy Is Extrajudicial killings.

by JEREMY SCAHILL

April 15, 2010

There has been almost universal silence among Congressional Democrats on the Obama administration's recently revealed decision to authorize the assassination of a US citizen, Anwar al-Awlaki. Al-Awlaki, who now lives in Yemen, has been accused of providing inspiration for Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the alleged "underwear bomber," and Major Nidal Malik Hasan, the alleged Fort Hood shooter. In recent weeks, there has been a dramatic surge in US government chatter about the alleged threat posed by al-Awlaki, with anonymous US officials accusing him of directly participating in terror "plots" (his family passionately disputes this).

Several Democrats refused, through spokespeople, to comment on the assassination plan when contacted by The Nation, including Senator Russ Feingold and Representative Jan Schakowsky, both of whom serve on the Intelligence Committees. Representative Jane Harman, who serves on the Homeland Security Committee, said recently that Awlaki is "probably the person, the terrorist, who would be terrorist No. 1 in terms of threat against us."
One of the few Democrats to publicly address the issue of government-sanctioned assassinations is Ohio Representative Dennis Kucinich. "I don't support it--period," he said in an interview. "I think people in both parties that are concerned about the Constitution should be speaking out on this. I can't account for what anyone else doesn't do."

Kucinich told The Nation he has sent several letters to the Obama administration raising questions about the potential unconstitutionality of the policy, as well as possible violations of international law, but has received no response. "With all the smart people that are in that administration, they've got to know the risks that they're taking here with violations of law," he says.

Targeted killings are not a new Obama administration policy. Beginning three days after his swearing in, President Obama has authorized scores of lethal drone strikes, including against specific individuals, in Pakistan and Afghanistan, surpassing the Bush era numbers. The elite Joint Special Operations Command maintains a list of individuals, including US citizens, which it is authorized to assassinate. In January, Dana Priest reported in the Washington Post that the CIA had US citizens on an assassination list, but the Post later ran a correction stating that only JSOC had "a target list that includes several Americans." The policy of the CIA targeting al-Awlaki, a US citizen, for assassination, therefore, appeared to be a new development, at least in terms of public awareness of approved government assassinations.

"In the real world, things don't work out quite so neatly as they seem to in the heads of the CIA," says Kucinich. "There's always the possibility of blowback, which could endanger high-ranking US officials. There's the inevitable licensing of rogue groups that comes about from policies that are not strictly controlled and that get sloppy--so you have zero accountability. And that's not even to get into an over-arching issue of the morality of assassination policies, which are extra-constitutional, extra-judicial. It's very dangerous from every possible perspective."

He added: "The assassination policies vitiate the presumption of innocence and the government then becomes the investigator, policeman, prosecutor, judge, jury, executioner all in one. That raises the greatest questions with respect to our constitution and our democratic way of life."

Kucinich says the case of al-Awlaki is an attempt to make "a short-cut around the Constitution," saying, "Short-cuts often belie the deep and underlying questions around which nations rise and fall. We are really putting our nation in jeopardy by pursuing this kind of policy."

About Jeremy Scahill
Jeremy Scahill, a Puffin Foundation Writing Fellow at The Nation Institute, is the author of the bestselling Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army, published by Nation Books. He is an award-winning investigative journalist and correspondent for the national radio and TV program Democracy Now!. more...
Copyright © 2009 The Nation

Kucinich: Why I voted NO on the healthcare bill.

There is much attention paid to those on the right who are voting against the health care bill that recently passed through the US house but little to those such as Kucinich who also voted against it because it has compromised too much. As Kucinich points out health care provder stocks are happy about the reform bill, a sign that they are not being hurt no matter what happens to the US taxpayer and general public.


http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/11/08-0
Why I Voted NO

by Dennis Kucinich

We have been led to believe that we must make our health care choices only within the current structure of a predatory, for-profit insurance system which makes money not providing health care. We cannot fault the insurance companies for being what they are. But we can fault legislation in which the government incentivizes the perpetuation, indeed the strengthening, of the for-profit health insurance industry, the very source of the problem. When health insurance companies deny care or raise premiums, co-pays and deductibles they are simply trying to make a profit. That is our system.

Clearly, the insurance companies are the problem, not the solution. They are driving up the cost of health care. Because their massive bureaucracy avoids paying bills so effectively, they force hospitals and doctors to hire their own bureaucracy to fight the insurance companies to avoid getting stuck with an unfair share of the bills. The result is that since 1970, the number of physicians has increased by less than 200% while the number of administrators has increased by 3000%. It is no wonder that 31 cents of every health care dollar goes to administrative costs, not toward providing care. Even those with insurance are at risk. The single biggest cause of bankruptcies in the U.S. is health insurance policies that do not cover you when you get sick.

But instead of working toward the elimination of for-profit insurance, H.R. 3962 would put the government in the role of accelerating the privatization of health care. In H.R. 3962, the government is requiring at least 21 million Americans to buy private health insurance from the very industry that causes costs to be so high, which will result in at least $70 billion in new annual revenue, much of which is coming from taxpayers. This inevitably will lead to even more costs, more subsidies, and higher profits for insurance companies - a bailout under a blue cross.

By incurring only a new requirement to cover pre-existing conditions, a weakened public option, and a few other important but limited concessions, the health insurance companies are getting quite a deal. The Center for American Progress' blog, Think Progress, states, 'since the President signaled that he is backing away from the public option, health insurance stocks have been on the rise.' Similarly, healthcare stocks rallied when Senator Max Baucus introduced a bill without a public option. Bloomberg reports that Curtis Lane, a prominent health industry investor, predicted a few weeks ago that 'money will start flowing in again' to health insurance stocks after passage of the legislation. Investors.com last month reported that pharmacy benefit managers share prices are hitting all-time highs, with the only industry worry that the Administration would reverse its decision not to negotiate Medicare Part D drug prices, leaving in place a Bush Administration policy.

During the debate, when the interests of insurance companies would have been effectively challenged, that challenge was turned back. The 'robust public option' which would have offered a modicum of competition to a monopolistic industry was whittled down from an initial potential enrollment of 129 million Americans to 6 million. An amendment which would have protected the rights of states to pursue single-payer health care was stripped from the bill at the request of the Administration. Looking ahead, we cringe at the prospect of even greater favors for insurance companies.

Recent rises in unemployment indicate a widening separation between the finance economy and the real economy. The finance economy considers the health of Wall Street, rising corporate profits, and banks' hoarding of cash, much of it from taxpayers, as sign of an economic recovery. However in the real economy - in which most Americans live - the recession is not over. Rising unemployment, business failures, bankruptcies and foreclosures are still hammering Main Street.

This health care bill continues the redistribution of wealth to Wall Street at the expense of America's manufacturing and service economies which suffer from costs other countries do not have to bear, especially the cost of health care. America continues to stand out among all industrialized nations for its privatized health care system. As a result, we are less competitive in steel, automotive, aerospace and shipping while other countries subsidize their exports in these areas through socializing the cost of health care.

Notwithstanding the fate of H.R. 3962, America will someday come to recognize the broad social and economic benefits of a not-for-profit, single-payer health care system, which is good for the American people and good for America's businesses, with of course the notable exceptions being insurance and pharmaceuticals.

Kucinich: Occupation of Iraq is a Crime

Well at least one presidential candidate is not afraid of speaking the truth. However Kucinich's chances of winning are virtually nil unfortunately. I think that the word "immortality" in the quote from Kucinich should be "immorality". However, perhaps he meant that the forces would be there forever!
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Kucinich: Occupation of Iraq is a Crime, Smokescreen for Oil Control
By Dan Wilken
Democratic Presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich states that the president's announcement to keep U.S. forces in Iraq for Stability and Security beyond his term of office is a cover-up for the real reason. As stated by Kucinich, "the announcement is a smokescreen to cover the immortality and criminality of the real reason he took us to war and the reason he refuses to end it: oil."
Kucinich states that to facilitate and protect the smokescreen cover-up, Bush is willing to continue to facilitate and protect this scheme, willing to continue the U.S. occupation in Iraq, keep our brave men and women in the line of fire and risk an escalation of violence and regional stability.

Kucinich is the only democratic candidate who voted against authorization of the original Iraq War intent in 2002. He has continued down this road voting against supplemental funding appropriation by the government since. He states that the war is a crime of international proportions. It continues right under the noses of congressional members who refuse to listen, candidates who do not understand and the media who are virtually asleep at their desk.

Kucinich also states that the President and congress when discussing the progress in Iraq in meeting eighteen benchmarks is only interested in one arena. That arena is the privatization of Iraq's oil and is disclosed under the guise of a proposal parlayed to the nation as revenue sharing. He says the government is using the power of the U.S. military to its own advantage.

Earlier this year, on the floor of the U.S. House, Kucinich presented an exceptional speech providing details regarding the implications of the proposed hydrocarbon law and chronicling what are secret discussions and negotiations leading to the formulation of this law. In his speech, documents were provided dating back to 1999 disclosing international oil interest with representation from the Bush Administration. Dick Cheney along with others have been planning for years the methods to be used to allow exploitation of the Iraq Oil Industry by major oil companies. Kucinich also provided details that top oil executives have been secretively providing guidance to the government and Iraqi government as to how Iraq could end their state controlled oil industry and facilitate foreign investment.

Kucinich states, "That's why the President will not bring our troops home. It's exactly what I've been saying for five years: It's always been about oil."

Kucinich strongly encourages that everyone who voted for the war and everyone who voted to continue funding the war should be held accountable for the consequences. He advises those who voted to admit if they did not know what they were doing. In addition, he states that if they are blind to what is going on, their vision and judgment is impaired.

Sources:

Kucinich for President 2008

http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/09-14-2007/0004663113&EDATE=


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Dennis Kucinich on Iraq oil privatisation and benchmarks

The Benchmarks are of course what the US desires and the oil law is tailored to meet US needs and aims. There is no reason to think that his fellow Democrats do not know what is in the draft oil law. Maybe he is just being kind and giving them the benefit of the doubt.


While Washington Sleeps, Effort to Privatize Iraq’s Oil Continues

FLORIDA - MAY 18 -Today’s Washington Post had a headline story “Bush Open to Iraq Benchmarks.” Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) issued the following statement:


“The benchmarks include a provision, which would lead to privatization of Iraq’s oil wealth. The President is open to such legislation because it is his idea. He and the Vice President have consistently misled the Congress on this matter, attempting variously to mask the privatization scheme as ‘equitable revenue sharing’ and as a means toward ‘reconciliation.’ This is a grand deception.

“While the media is paying close attention to the process of negotiations between the Administration and Congress, very few are looking at the most substantive issue in all the benchmarks: The attempt to force Iraq to privatize its oil, a provision open for all who can read to see in the text of the bill before the Iraqi Parliament.

“Congress has had little or no examination of the consequences of the benchmarks which call for Iraq to pass a hydrocarbon law. It isn’t asking questions and the President isn’t telling.

“Of course the President isn’t ruling out punishing the Iraqi government for not reaching benchmarks, because his Administration has deceitfully linked concepts of reconciliation and equitable oil revenue sharing to passage of the Hydrocarbon Act which leads to privatization of Iraq’s oil wealth.

“Democrats have denied they are for anything which privatizes Iraq’s oil, which means they may be largely unaware of what is in the bill because of Mr. Bush’s deception.

“This entire matter about control of Iraq’s oil would be a farce, if it were not so tragic in its implication. First, Congress wanted benchmarks because the President wanted them. Now the President wants benchmarks because Congress wants them. Who is the father of this baby?!

“Meanwhile Congress prepares to continue to fund the war while the White House crafts a bipartisan consensus to force Iraq to show “progress,” meaning Iraq gives up control of its oil. This war will never end if Iraqis believe we are trying to steal their oil, and, given the substance of the Hydrocarbon Act, how could they believe anything else?”