It’s a good thing for House Republicans that they lack the capacity for shame. Otherwise, the revelation that Russian operatives have been leading them around by their dicks would cause them to die of it:
CNN — The former FBI informant charged with lying about the Bidens’ dealings in Ukraine told investigators after his arrest that Russian intelligence officials were involved in passing information to him about Hunter Biden, prosecutors said Tuesday in a new court filing, noting that the information was false.
Prosecutors also said Alexander Smirnov has been “actively peddling new lies that could impact US elections” after meeting with Russian spies late last year and that the fallout from his previous false bribery accusations about the Bidens “continue[s] to be felt to this day.”
Smirnov claims to have “extensive and extremely recent” contacts with foreign intelligence officials, prosecutors said in the filing. They said he previously told the FBI that he has longstanding and extensive contacts with Russian spies, including individuals he said were high-level intelligence officers or command Russian assassins abroad.
The GOP House committees have been a shit-show since they won their narrow majority and set off on multiple idiotic quests to make crackpot online conspiracy theories a thing in real life. They’ve been pantsed repeatedly, but they aren’t the only ones wearing egg masks.
Special counsel David Weiss is also facing a unique dilemma as both the erstwhile dupe and current prosecutor of Smirnov. Weiss is another Trump-appointed US attorney whom AG Merrick Garland chose to head up a politically fraught investigation, this time into the president’s son: (TPM gift link)
Hunter Biden’s lawyers are now claiming, as part of their effort to force new disclosures by Weiss’s office, that it was new or newly specific accusations from Smirnov which scuttled the plea deal which blew up as it was being agreed to in a federal court room. That point about the plea deal remains an accusation and obviously an interested one from Biden’s attorneys. But given what we’ve learned over the last week from the prosecution side — the folks who were repeatedly duped and took actions on the basis of disinformation directly from Russian intelligence — it seems to me highly likely that it’s true.
A semi-side note here is that I can’t see how Weiss’s office can manage its two cases at once. It’s prosecuting Smirnov for knowingly injecting Russian disinformation into U.S. law enforcement. He’s also prosecuting Hunter Biden for charges that appear to stem from the dissolution of the plea deal, which was itself quite likely tainted by Smirnov’s manipulation. How can you possibly do those two things credibly at once? Is Weiss going to take the stand at Smirnov’s trial as one of Smirnov’s marks and explain how he tricked him into blowing up Biden’s plea deal? While he’s also prosecuting the cases that stem from blowing up that plea deal? That seems absurd.
Yep, it sure does. Marshall also notes that mainstream news outlets haven’t covered themselves in glory either. After serving as a conduit for Russian operatives who sowed discord with hacked DNC emails, most MSM outlets hesitated to run with the Hunter Biden laptop story in the waning days of the 2020 election.
That’s what they should have done since the provenance of the laptop material was unknown and followed a well-established influence operation pattern. But in the days since, they allowed themselves to be shamed by clowns in the House GOP and fascism-adjacent oligarch Elon Musk into repudiating their original, correct decision. And they still aren’t connecting the dots.
The real issue, as I note above, is the reporters, editorialists and commentators, who vouched for and credited this whole edifice of lies and bullshit. Yes, they guffawed when James Comer came forward yet again with more revelations that never quite panned out. But they didn’t give up hope. They were always waiting for the next revelation. Comer and his Republican colleagues hadn’t provided “hard evidence” yet but there sure was a lot of smoke.
This entire thing has been based on Russian plants and intelligence operations from the start. Every bit of it. It’s been obvious. And yet, well … they’re all dupes. Somehow almost a decade after this whole thing started we’re shocked to see, wow, Weiss’s office was being led around by another cat’s paw of the Russian intelligence services. We’re shocked. But why are we shocked? Every last person among the serious people of the nation’s capital and the sprawling thing called elite received opinion has egg on their face. And it’s not even clear they fully realize it yet.
Putin has a lot riding on the upcoming election and much to gain from re-empowering his stooge Trump, so the disinformation onslaught will be fierce. To repeat a point made in another post about how our shitty political media actively sabotages democracy, we can’t count on the Fourth Estate to help us defend democracy. We’ll have to find a way to win with their dead weight strapped to our backs.
Baud
IIRC, Weiss was investigating Hunter during Trump, and is a holdover in that role.
Kay
We talk a lot about people who aren’t up to the current challenges – Josh Marshall is one person who is up to the current challenges. I wonder if it’s his history background. He seems so suited to these times. Instead of getting bitter and narrow as he gets older he gets more clear and confident in his own work. It’s a pleasure to read him.
cain
@Baud: Weiss is not covering himself in glory – clearly he was interested in having some kind of result – maybe to please Trump at the time?
I don’t know – but these people have political aspirations and are willing to bend the knee to get it and now he’s been pantsed and so he’s going after the guy that fucked him over.
Jackie
Heehee! The responses are brutal!
scav
@cain: A lot of people are ok with life being unfair — until suddenly the unfair they’re upholding is suddenly unfair to them.
Jeffro
The GOP – House members as well as trumpov – is
inchingleaping ever-closer to openly accepting Putin’s help, no matter what that looks like, or how silly their lies are when they’re busted accepting Russian disinfo. They just don’t care.There is going to be an absolute flood of foreign money into the GOP (national party as well as broke swing-state parties). Same thing with AI-driven propaganda.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: As it says at the link, Garland made Weiss special counsel, but you are correct that he had been investigating Hunter Biden during the Trump administration, hoovering up Russian disinformation all the while, apparently. From the link:
Oh well. The Jack Smith appointment has panned out!
hrprogressive
I think people need to start assuming that all of this working with the Russians to destroy democracy is intentional, instead of just being “pantsed” or that this is all somehow just a clown show.
They’ve made it pretty clear they want to destroy western liberal democracy. I think a lot of people still refuse to acknowledge that as a truth because of the implications of what it means.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
I believe the special counsel appointment was pro forma after the House Republicans made a stink about his lack of special counsel status. He would still be doing the same thing as US attorney if he were not special counsel.
Chief Oshkosh
@Baud:
No red flags there…
Butch
@Betty Cracker: I think Garland is a coward. He’s certainly been a disappointment.
Baud
@Chief Oshkosh:
Plenty of red flags. But what do you think would have happened if Biden or Garland had replaced him? We can’t even get the media to stop running frivolous stories about Biden being replaced on the ballot. You think we would have stood a chance against this perceived scandal, which mimics what a Republican would do.
catclub
I wish Garland would say: Now you are special prosecutor only on Smirnov and russian interference, somebody else does biden.
catclub
agreed. that was the gist of the TPM article. the russians for the past 9 years.
Baud
@catclub:
I’d prefer someone competent on Smirnov and russian interference.
Betty Cracker
@Butch: I wouldn’t go that far, but I think his obsession with appearing even-handed is a political consideration in its own right and hasn’t served us (Americans, not Democrats) well. If you want to depoliticize the DOJ, hire competent people who don’t have a political agenda. If it’s mostly Democrats who fill that brief, so be it.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
I agree about Hur. That ended up being a bad pick. I don’t see it with Weiss. I don’t consider that to be a Garland pick. Same with Durham. He was also a holdover.
mainsailset
Without a doubt Rep’s, Fox, Breitbart, Bannon, all the right wing entertainment channels and the RNC and Trump have made boatloads of $ off of the Biden Impeachment (not to mention HB scam) faux scandals. It would be nice if some intrepid journalist from WaPo or NYT, maybe Daily Beast or ProPublica took a dive into the email $ requests and campaign pleas that have resulted in monies forked over to the various members. My bet, the Biden faux impeachment was the biggest theme for all the donations.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Butch:
If Biden were dissatisfied with his performance, he would’ve asked for Garland’s resignation. He’s the one who chose him in the first place
Mr. Bemused Senior
Yes. We’re lucky their efforts are a bit ham-handed. Imagine if they were really sneaky.
Kay
@Baud:
I really think we’ve reached the point where concern about media coverage should not drive decisions.
There’s just not enough connection between what we do and the narrative they develop for our actions or inactions to impact coverage that much anyway.
terraformer
I’d imagine that the big press and media orgs extremely dislike Marshall and TPM, because as one of the few successful non-big-press-and-media outlets, it is free to report the news *with full context and nuance*, which is something the big boys just won’t do for reasons
TPM was the outlet that broke the attorneys-general scandal under the BushCo administration, and I’ve been a fan since. Indeed, TPM is the only outlet that I actually subscribe to and pay for, because I believe it takes its remit of reporting the news without fear or favor, holding the powerful to account, seriously
Chief Oshkosh
@hrprogressive:
I agree. There is just no way any of the GOP miscreants didn’t know that this was all disinformation from a Russian operative. Hell, most’ve ’em are probably getting straight-up pay-offs from Putin.
That said, I do have to agree with some of them: What in the ever-loving FUCK is the FBI doing? They now have a decade-long debacle on their hands. At what point is there a real house-cleaning of these incompetent simps? (And that’s being generous – it’s more likely that they are politically biased, or are on the take, or both).
When will we get an FBI chief who is not a Republican? Doesn’t even have to be a Democrat — just not a Republican.
catclub
Charging Smirnov may help him recover some dignity.
cain
@Jeffro: I expect a ton of AI generated propaganda especially from China who have the high end machines to do it at a large scale.
Not that Russians are slouches – both are really good at writing code.
RandomMonster
I’d like it to be the other way around. Weiss has every reason to be soft on the Smirnov investigation, since it proves he was a dupe.
Betty Cracker
@hrprogressive: I agree but don’t think Republicans’ determination to destroy democracy excludes pantsing incidents and general clown showmanship. They are clowns. Dangerous clowns. But clowns.
Betty
If, as it appears, Weiss nixed Hunter’s plea deal because of noise Comer and Jordan made about the Smirnov allegations, then it seems to me Weiss is not the person continue to handle Hunter’s case. The FBI said they had no reason to accept the allegations as credible. Looks bad now that Smirnov has been charged.
Chief Oshkosh
@Baud: Well, since you asked…
I whole-heartedly believe that the nation would have been better served to have top level DOJ and FBI positions, and other positions such as those occupied by Weiss, filled with Democrats, and if not Democrats, at least with not-Republicans. Period. The press would howl, Republicans would howl. But they did and continue to do that anyway.
Right now Biden should be polling way, way better based on his accomplishments and policy. Continuing with the same-old same-old, in this case, appointing people out of FEAR of what the howler monkeys will do, is how we got here.
Baud
@Kay:
There is still unfortunately a connection between what they report and what a lot of people believe. And firing a prosecutor who’s looking into your son wouldn’t exactly be an entirely fake scandal.
catclub
@RandomMonster: I see it differently. He will be motivated to prove he was not a dupe by going after Smirnov hard. He wins no prosecutor bonus points by saying “never mind on the Bidens, no charges”. let someone else do that.
Baud
@Chief Oshkosh:
Your assumption is that things couldn’t be worse, so we have no constraints on what we do. I disagree.
catclub
@Baud:
This is true. there was a report of even Democrats – a large number, possibly a majority – saying the media is too rosy on the economy. I have no idea where they get that.
Chief Oshkosh
@Baud: I disagree. It was a decision to allow those two to remain in those roles.
In a sense, this is all of piece with regards to the insurrection. You’ve got the adults in the room calling J6 an actual, violent insurrection. But those same adults treat the situation as something other than an attempt to violently overthrow our government and those same adults treating the wider group involved with the J6 insurrectionists as still being legitimate and trustworthy players. It’s akin to the adage about generals always fighting the last war.
I think Biden understands this now, and maybe did before. Pelosi and Schiff definitely understood even prior to J6. I am not confident that others, including Garland, do.
Baud
@catclub:
Sometimes I sympathize with Republicans who believe they have a divine right to rule us.
@Chief Oshkosh:
He definitely could have fired them but I don’t think we’d be in a better place. Well never know.
catclub
OT: the stock market is up a ton and there is a huge AT&T outage. Related?
Barry
@Chief Oshkosh: IMHO, half of these guys are working for Putin.
Mr. Bemused Senior
@Chief Oshkosh: @Baud:
I suggest all the clownishness coming out is for the best. Most people aren’t political junkies like us. This story is harder to ignore than most.
[ETA probably it wasn’t exactly planned this way but it looks good to me in retrospect. Or maybe it was planned by Dark Brandon 😁]
Betty Cracker
@Baud: Remember when incoming Trump AG Sessions demanded a mass resignation of U.S. attorneys? Here’s how that went in the media, per Wikipedia:
Of course, we can’t assume they’d be as tolerant of the same action by a Democrat, but there was precedent.
One of Garland’s top goals was/is to depoliticize the DOJ. Arguably, getting rid of the Trump-appointed hacks would have been a good first step. Or at least not putting them in charge of politically fraught investigations.
Chief Oshkosh
@Baud: And your assumption is that better decisions and actions were untenable. I disagree.
And since the previous poor decisions and actions resulted in the continued, ongoing failures that we’re experiencing now, I win. :)
But we all lose.
Chris
Thirty years of J. Edgar Hoover furiously insisting that there was no such thing as the American Mafia.
Whatever the hell that thing was with Whitey Bulger up in Boston.
Now most of a decade of being led around by the nose by Russian mobsters with Kremlin ties and still no end to that in sight.
What the fuck is it with the FBI and organized crime?
Baud
@Betty Cracker: Mass turnover with a change of administration is one thing. We’re talking about removing someone who was investigating the president’s son. The media would definitely not treat Dems and the GOP the same, but we certainly would look askance if the party affiliations were reversed and that happened.
Sure Lurkalot
I know one thing Merrick Garland could do in the interest of transparency and the nation… unredact the Mueller report and release it.
wjca
The question would be, which are on salary (or would it be piecework?) and which are merely useful idiots?
p.a.
Garland reminds me of the old Onion article: ACLU Defends Nazis’ Right to Burn Down ACLU Headquarters.
JoyceH
Here’s what I want to know. That FD-1032. That’s an internal FBI document. It is not to be released publicly because it’s raw intel, unvetted and possible entirely bogus. In this instance, yeah, it was entirely bogus. The impeachment committee only got their hands on it over strenuous objection by the FBI, and finally being poised to hold the FBI Director in contempt.
Okay… so how did the committee even know the thing existed? How did they know to ask for it? I saw mention on the news about Grassley, either having a copy or having seen a copy or having heard about it. So – who told HIM about it?
In other words – who within the FBI is working with the Putin Caucus to betray our country?
catclub
Also note about the Bush DOJ: wasn’t TPM the key discoverer of the Bush DOJ pressuring US attorneys with firing if they did not run political investigations and prosecutions in fall 2006?
hueyplong
@Baud: Agree.
Riffing a little on your other comment about Biden being free to ask for the AG’s resignation at any time, what tends to worry me is contemplation of what Biden might know that we don’t know that stays his hand when he’s doing one of a dozen things that people safely positioned in front of laptops call “feckless.”
The crap we do know is bad enough.
catclub
@Sure Lurkalot: I was just looking at that. There are LOTS of redactions.
Chris
@wjca:
IIRC, Adam Silverman once said the FBI’s New York office, at least, had had a bad reputation in the intelligence community for a long time, in the “they think they’re running their sources, but their sources are really running them” vein.
That was a long time ago, like 2016 or 2017, so I have no idea what the original post was (and I may be misremembering anyway). Might be worth asking him about in an evening thread.
Hoppie
@Kay: Also Marcy Wheeler, whose background is English Lit, hence very good at parsing meaning.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: Doesn’t mass turnover at the change of an administration by definition disrupt ongoing investigations, or at least change who is nominally in charge of them? Honest question—I don’t know how it works. But I assume the investigations continue, and the Hunter Biden one could have too, perhaps under the purview of someone who wasn’t dumb and/or corrupt enough to swallow Russian disinformation whole. Mass turnover would have removed Hur from the board too. Win-win! Oh well. It’s spilled milk now. But I hope future AGs take note.
@catclub: I think that’s right.
ewrunning
With regard to media cluelessness, I noticed NPR this morning chose to favor its listeners with interviews with Joe Manchin, Nikki Haley, and two twenty-something black Republican men from South Carolina. Way to tick all the boxes!
Baud
@Betty Cracker: I’m not sure we’ve previously had a situation where one of the investigations being handled by a US attorney at the change of administrations involved the incoming president or his family. Previously, there might have been handled by an independent counsel who wasn’t removable, but that law lapse decades ago
ETA: I thought Hur wasn’t associated with DOJ except for the special counsel role
Baud
@ewrunning: And they ask why media is failing.
Betty Cracker
@hueyplong: I don’t think Biden will ask for Garland’s resignation, but I wish he (Garland) would voluntarily retire in a couple of months so Biden could pick a replacement while Dems hold the Senate. IMO, Garland is a good guy, but it’s clear to me now that he’s not the best person for that job at this moment in our history. He got rolled hard by Hur.
@Baud: I thought Hur was a Trump-appointed U.S. attorney, but maybe that’s wrong.
Baud
@Betty Cracker: See my update. He resigned in 2021 and was in private practice when tapped as special counsel.
Soprano2
@Kay: I subscribe to his site because I think it’s important to support that kind of journalism. Plus, I learn a lot there.
Ksmiami
@Betty Cracker: Garland needs to resign yesterday. He really doesn’t get the seriousness of where we are. I’m so sick of him and sick of people making excuses for that limp dick
Ksmiami
@catclub: yes he connected all the dots and broke the story- it pretty much launched TPM as a better political investigative journalism beacon
Betty Cracker
@Baud: Even worse in a sense. The pick signaled that Republican framing, i.e., only Republicans can be trusted to investigate Democrats and Republicans, is valid. But you are correct to note that the mass resignation scenario wouldn’t have prevented the Hur debacle..
Baud
@Betty Cracker: Yes, I agree that Hur’s pick was a mistake.
West of the Rockies
@ewrunning:
All too typical for NPR. I find Mary Louise Kelly to be an especially irksome bothsider. The way she injects so many stories with her concerned mom voice is annoying: “The Democrats are saying that addressing climate change is important… but then the White House displayed a brightly-lit Christmas tree. Isn’t this confusing for voters who are simply trying to discern the truth?”
CaseyL
At this point, I do not for one instant believe the GOP – the entire GOP – is anything but a subvert-from-within organization.
Whether they’re in it for the grift, or in it to advance the cause of White Christian Nationalism, or are outright Russian assets, they are absolutely and without a doubt not remotely loyal to the US, nor the slightest bit interested in serving the public interest.
Corrupt and traitorous to the core.
And the MSM is hardly any better. It only offers infotainment (even the “good” pundits). Anything that drives ratings/clicks/whatever is their priority. I guess they think their status and salaries will shield them from the downsides of enabling autocracy for shits and giggles.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
If Biden were not satisfied with Garland, he would’ve asked for his resignation already
Ksmiami
@CaseyL: yep. There are no good Republicans and no reason to trust them or work with them. The only way America moves forward is by massively defeating them.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@West of the Rockies:
Fixed. ;)
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Ksmiami:
Aka The Gilliard Doctrine:
https://driftglass.blogspot.com/2011/03/gilliard-doctrine.html
Sadly, it looks like Steve’s old blogspot blog has been axed. I could probably find it on the Internet Archive but Driftglass has the essentials of Steve’s articulation way back in the day in that post:
Betty Cracker
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): I think a lot more goes into that sort of decision. The political ramifications, the “optics,” etc. Neither Biden nor Garland can possibly think the Hur report wasn’t disastrous. The honorable thing would be for Garland to submit his resignation after the furor dies down a bit. My guess is Biden would accept it while thanking him profusely for his service. But who knows?
M31
FBI NY Field Office is my guess, they’ve been a disgrace for a LONG time
rikyrah
Said it yesterday and will say it again.
We are so fortunate that Joe Biden is an honest man.
Since we didn’t have a MSM that was willing to call bullshyt, but, in their BOTH SIDES desperation, ignored, time after time, when their ‘ star witness’ fizzled out/was arrested/etc. And, they were pretending that, ‘ well, maybe they have something’
We had to through all these up and down and through the woods in order for FINALLY the truth to reveal itself.
Hoodie
@Kay: Probably more to do with TPM being independently funded. Marshall has worked hard to keep that enterprise going and resisting the urge to be acquired for a quick payout, probably because he knows the value of his site mainly lies in having a reputation for independence. The reporters for the big media outlets tend to be careerist hacks who mainly look for contrarian and similar takes that get them the right type of attention from their bosses and thus further their careers.
groveboy
@Butch: totally agree. Sally Yates in the AG role would have been a warrior
Frankensteinbeck
@cain:
Naah. Why bother? AI can’t generate creative stuff, and if you want to spam with repetitions of the same carefully crafted message you don’t need AI. The systems currently being called ‘AI’ don’t add anything to the process. Mind you, China might try anyway and start producing entertaining gibberish, because god damn are people in authority slavering to think they don’t need creative staff. Fire, find out ChatGPT can’t do the job, rehire is already a thing going on.
rikyrah
@hrprogressive:
I think more people than you think believe as you do.
The problem is….they don’t work in the MSM, who continues to NOT call a spade a spade when it comes to Russia, Russian Interference, and their involvement WITH the GOP.
How no MSM ever really questioned why 8-10 UNITED STATES SENATORS WERE IN MOSCOW ON JULY 4TH…
I am still pissed about that.
cain
@Baud: If Garland thinks of himself as an institutionalist then Hur has seriously harmed the reputation of the DOJ and himself. He should be removing Hur immediately as an embarrassment for his obviously politicizing of his role.
danielx
@Butch:
Ehhhh…Garland isn’t a coward, he’s just working according to an outdated set of rules in which he continues to act as though he needs to show “impartiality” towards people who could care less about the concept. You know, reasonable people who can be dealt with reasonably. I certainly don’t want him to be Bill Barr, but I do wish he would acknowledge the nature of his opponents.
I got news for ya, pal. They’re gonna nail us no matter what we do.
catclub
or all three!
moonbat
If Weiss were bought and paid for in this investigation why would he let it out that his star witness is a Russian asset, charge him for perjury or whatever, make himself look like a fool, and torpedo the Repub enterprise to tie Biden to his son’s dealings?
Just a question.
Sally
@catclub: My understanding from Marcy Wheeler is it should be the other way. He is a witness in the SMIRNOV case and indicted him to prevent discovery by Lowell that would implicate several people including Billy Barr (as she calls him). Weiss is up to his neck in Ru deals.
Sally
@moonbat: See Marcy Wheeler.
Sally
@Betty Cracker: I agree with this but Pres Biden needs to ensure he’s got the votes for a new AG while he’s got the Senate. If he has, Garland should go, if not, he has to stay.
Ksmiami
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: I just no longer think only defeating them is enough; they need to be forced back to the fringes of society or excised at this point. They’ve given up on Democracy. It’s high time we give up on them.
Miss Bianca
@Betty Cracker: you know, I’ve been very slow to climb onto the “Dude’s gotta go” bus when it comes to Garland, but I think I’m finally to the point where I’m going to say, “Biden’s next term? New AG.”
cain
@Frankensteinbeck:
AI is more about assistance technology – being able to generate somethign quickly with the human providing the creativity. Things like deep fakes on voice and what need to good enough for people to believe it.
Some are quite eager to just believe it and then you share and then it’s the messaging around it that gets augmented. You only need get a bunch of people to believe the lie to turn it true and it becomes common wisdom.
AI just helps make that messaging easier – it doesn’t have to be perfect. Just good enough.
AndyG
Josh is firing on all cylinders right now: https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/can-dc-reporters-overcome-their-trumper-shock-training/sharetoken/Gu1fMSVJ2KJD