RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/05/police_state_dry_run_a_huge_success.html

When the coronavirus landed on our shores, communist China came with it.

We have become part of a mass scale human experiment in government control and it turned out that stripping away our freedom wasn’t all that difficult. Under the guise of concern for our health and well-being, tyrants came out of the woodwork.  Our Constitution, our Bill of Rights, and our lives are being destroyed as the left solidifies and expands their oppressive powers. We’ve been herded around like cattle, threatened, isolated, confined, silenced, and arrested. You name it, it’s happening.

You tell me if what follows sounds like the United States, or China.

We’ve been told who can work and who can’t, with language that separates us according to who is and who isn’t “essential” as the almighty State supersedes individual rights and the family unit.

We’ve been physically and verbally harassed, threatened, fined, detained, arrested, jailed, and/or placed in forced quarantine. Business licenses have been revoked. Going to work without the permission of the government is now a crime. So is going to the park or a beach. Children playing together is also in defiance of the government. So is placing flags on the graves of veterans. The list of infractions goes on and on and on and on. Examples read like the manifesto of a demented madman.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/judge-sullivan-vs-justice-ginsburg-11589498942?mod=opinion_lead_pos2

“Justice Ginsburg’s argument is that the job of judges is to judge, not to substitute for prosecutors.”

In his zeal to convict Michael Flynn of something, federal Judge Emmet Sullivan is harming his own reputation. He’s also violating the law, as he’d know if he had read Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s opinion last week overturning the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

On Wednesday Judge Sullivan appointed an ex-judge to explore whether former Mr. Flynn should be held in criminal contempt for perjury even though prosecutors have sought to drop the charges against the former national security adviser. The relevant case is U.S. v. Sineneng-Smith, in which the Supreme Court reversed a Ninth Circuit ruling striking down a criminal statute involving immigration as unconstitutionally overbroad. The case was overturned because instead of adjudicating the issues raised by the parties, the Ninth Circuit panel invited outside groups to brief them about a defense the defendant never raised.

This is akin to what Judge Sullivan is trying to do with Mr. Flynn by asking outside parties to make new arguments for prosecution—and even appointing former judge John Gleeson, who has shown clear public bias (in an op-ed) against Mr. Flynn, to make the case. Judge Sullivan’s abuse is more egregious given that the real prosecutors now say they don’t believe they can honestly prosecute Mr. Flynn.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16025/judge-emmet-sullivan

In the Flynn case, the prosecution and defense both agree that the case should be dropped. Because there is no longer any controversy between the parties to be resolved, there is no longer any case properly before the judge. His only job is to enter an order vacating the guilty plea and dismissing the case with prejudice.

Under our constitutional system of separation of powers, the new prosecutor has no standing…. the separation of powers…. allocates the power to prosecute to the executive not judicial branch.

It makes no constitutional difference that Flynn pleaded guilty — even if his plea was voluntary, which is questionable in light of the threats against his son.

The Justice Department has the constitutional authority to dismiss a prosecution that it has brought at any time and for any reason, without being second-guessed by the judicial branch.

[Sullivan] is endangering our system of separation of powers and he should be stopped by a writ of mandamus or a motion to recuse. Judges, too, are not above the law or the Constitution.

Judge Emmet Sullivan’s decision to appoint a retired federal judge to argue against the Justice Department’s entirely proper decision to end the criminal prosecution of General Michael Flynn is designed to circumvent the constitutional limitation on the jurisdiction of federal judges. The Constitution limits this jurisdiction to actual cases and controversies. There must be disagreement between the parties that requires resolution by a judge. If the parties agree, there is nothing for the judge to decide.

https://thefederalist.com/2020/05/14/the-constitution-requires-judge-emmet-sullivans-lawless-amicus-order-against-michael-flynn-be-overturned/

The U.S. Constitution makes clear that the judiciary has no business second-guessing prosecutorial decisions. That’s what Michael Flynn judge Emmet Sullivan decided to do.

On May 13, Judge Emmet Sullivan issued a blatantly biased and unconstitutional order in the long-lasting Michael Flynn criminal case. To preserve the rule of law and our constitutional separation of powers, the Department of Justice has no choice now but to seek a writ of mandamus from the D.C. Circuit Court ordering the criminal charge against Flynn dismissed and reassigning the case to another judge.

On Tuesday, Judge Sullivan shocked court watchers when he entered an order stating that, “at the appropriate time,” he intended to enter a scheduling order permitting “amicus curiae” or friend of the court briefs to be filed in Flynn case. Flynn, who more than a year ago pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI, was seeking to withdraw his guilty plea when the Department of Justice filed a motion to dismiss the criminal charge against Flynn.

The government’s motion to dismiss highlighted new evidence uncovered by an outside U.S. attorney, Jeff Jensen, and detailed the government’s position that even if Flynn had made false statements to FBI agents about his conversations with the Russian ambassador, as a matter of law there was no crime because the false statements were not “material” to a legitimate investigation.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2020/05/14/dni_richard_grenell_deserves_the_nations_gratitude_143200.html

Before he was appointed U.S. ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell was a foreign policy expert and a media commentator, recognized for his insight and independent analysis. Now that he’s the acting Director of National Intelligence, Grenell is after one thing on behalf of the American people: the truth. In his role as the DNI, Grenell has used his power responsibly, thoughtfully, and constitutionally to find the facts about what happened across the intelligence agencies serving the American people and how they were weaponized for political purposes before and after the 2016 election. 

Although Grenell’s appointment earlier this year was always intended to be temporary, he has not taken the job lightly. Just weeks into his new role, Grenell began reforming the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to enhance transparency and accountability while implementing measures to protect our intelligence agencies from future political interference.  

In May, Grenell announced even more structural reforms designed to improve ODNI’s efficiency and effectiveness. “[M]ore changes to come…because there have been 4 studies in the last 2 years from other career IC officials asking for reforms,” Grenell tweeted, adding that these reforms “should have been done before I arrived.” 

But Grenell’s most important contribution to justice — and truth — has been his decision to declassify the list of former Obama administration officials who “unmasked” the identity of the former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. Thanks to Grenell’s efforts, Americans now know that the Obama administration abused its power during the 2016 campaign in order to illegally spy on Donald Trump’s associates.  

https://nypost.com/2020/05/13/the-scale-to-which-obamas-team-spied-should-be-focus-of-unmasking/

The presumptive Democratic candidate for president, Joe Biden, heads a list of more than a dozen Obama officials who spied on Donald Trump’s ex-national security adviser Michael Flynn.

Others senior officials include chief of staff Denis McDonough, CIA Director John Brennan, FBI Director James Comey, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew and UN Ambassador Samantha Power.

A list declassified Tuesday by Acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grennel shows that Biden and others asked to have Flynn’s name “unmasked” in transcripts of US intelligence intercepts of foreign officials. The names of US persons or entities incidentally collected by such intercepts are minimized to protect the privacy rights of Americans. Unmasking identities is not in itself illegal, nor even necessarily improper. Occasionally US policymakers will ask to unmask a US person to better understand the nature of the intelligence before them. Obama officials, however, gorged themselves like children at a candy store.

In an almost two-month period starting election day, Nov. 8, 2016, senior US officials made 49 requests to unmask the retired three-star general.

Flynn’s Dec. 29, 2016, call to a Russian diplomat in which they were alleged to have discussed sanctions on Russia was leaked by a senior US official to the Washington Post’s David Ignatius. His subsequent column ignited the Russia collusion scandal, which in time became the special counsel investigation. Flynn pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI regarding the call, and finally last week the Department of Justice withdrew its deeply compromised case.

https://ruleofreason.blogspot.com/2020/05/anti-social-social-distancing.html

“There’s no reason for increased penalties for reducing the 2  meter (6 feet) rule in the open air because viruses disperse in the open air; the rule isn’t applied when people are shopping in a supermarket and in many other indoor spaces where it can’t be policed.

“I think the govnmt is trying to avoid the formation of crowds and the potential for civil unrest.”  (4.02 PM 5/10)

Prolific writer, Christine McNultty, is often published in the Watford Obsever, in the UK. 

But rationality rarely enters the minds of power-lusters, with only the chance to use brute force whetting their appetite. Reason and force are antipods 

Some good news is that a Dallas Texas salon owner was released from jail after defying a judge’s decision to imprison her for violating the and “social distance” orders. The governor of the state ordered her freed.

Some awful, outrageous news it that an Australian woman in Sydney who was demonstrating peacefully against the lockdown was brutally arrested and her young screaming son wrested from her grip by the police. She was roughly put into the police van, still resisting her arrest. 

https://amgreatness.com/2020/05/13/obama-chief-of-staff-unmasked-flynn-day-of-crucial-white-house-briefing/

According to declassified documents released Wednesday by acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell, President Barack Obama’s chief of staff requested the unmasking of Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn on the same day as a crucial White House meeting that involved all the perpetrators of the Russian collusion hoax.

Denis McDonough, a longtime Obama loyalist and the president’s chief of staff during his second term, asked the NSA to unmask Flynn’s identity on January 5, 2017 related to an unspecified foreign intelligence report. That date is significant because it’s the same day that President Obama met with top aides including James Comey, James Clapper, Susan Rice, and John Brennan for the ostensible purpose of reviewing the Intelligence Community Assessment on Russia’s attempted election interference. (Vice President Joe Biden also attended the Oval Office meeting. Biden made an unmasking request on January 12, 2017, the day David Ignatius at the Washington Post first reported on the Flynn-Kislyak call.)

The real purpose of the meeting, as new evidence suggests, was to discuss how to set up the incoming president and entrap Flynn. After the general briefing, President Obama asked Comey and Sally Yates, the number two at the Justice Department who would serve as acting attorney general until Trump’s appointee was confirmed, to stay behind. (Yates and Comey, it’s worth noting, both signed the initial FISA application on Carter Page.)

That’s when Obama informed Yates about Flynn’s infamous December 29, 2016 phone call with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak about sanctions. “At that point, Yates had no idea what the president was talking about, but figured it out based on the conversation,” according to the special counsel’s 2017 interview with Yates. “Yates recalled Comey mentioning the Logan Act. It was not clear to Yates from where the President first received the information.”

It now appears that we know the source: McDonough. There are no other unmasking requests between Flynn’s call on December 29, 2016 and the January 5, 2017 meeting.

But that might not have been the only leak tied to McDonough. Mary McCord, former head of the National Security Division that was responsible for seeking the FISA warrants on Page, testified to the House Intelligence Committee in 2017 that “in theory” the leak to the Washington Post came from the Obama White House.

Igantius’ article first floated the outlandish Logan Act case against Flynn. “According to a senior U.S. government official, Flynn phoned Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak several times on Dec. 29, the day the Obama administration announced the expulsion of 35 Russian officials as well as other measures in retaliation for the hacking,” Ignatius wrote. “What did Flynn say, and did it undercut the U.S. sanctions? The Logan Act (though never enforced) bars U.S. citizens from correspondence intending to influence a foreign government about ‘disputes’ with the United States. Was its spirit violated?”

The illegal leak of classified government information is a felony punishable by up to ten years in prison. The “senior U.S. government official” who tipped off Ignatius about the Flynn-Kislyak call has not yet been identified or charged with a crime.

McDonough’s request is the closest tie between President Obama and the framing of Michael Flynn; as this massive scandal unfolds, Barack Obama still has not been asked a single question about what he knew or when he knew it.

https://issuesinsights.com/2020/05/14/obamagate-smashes-media-myth-of-scandal-free-administration/

Despite its many policy failures and foreign affairs disasters, the Obama administration always escaped serious criticism in the media because, we were told, there were no serious scandals during his two terms in office. As just-released documents show, President Barack Obama himself was neck-deep in the silent coup attempt by top U.S. officials at the FBI, Justice Department and CIA.

Another media myth, generated by left-leaning journalists to prop up their favorite politician, bites the dust. How do we know? #ObamaGate is now trending on Twitter, a sure sign of spreading interest in the scandal.

The latest document dump from the trove of secrets that the DOJ and FBI withheld from the public shows that the plot to undermine Donald Trump’s presidency by entrapping his National Security Adviser Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn went all the way to the top.

Among the documents is one from the Mueller investigation regarding alleged Trump campaign collusion with Russian officials.

In it, according to the Washington Examiner, former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates “told special counsel Robert Mueller’s team (in August of 2017) that she first learned the FBI possessed and was investigating recordings of Flynn’s late 2016 conversations with a Russian envoy following a Jan. 5, 2017, national security meeting at the White House. It wasn’t Comey who told her, but former President Barack Obama.

“Yates, who was briefly the acting attorney general during the early days of the Trump administration before getting fired, also laid out how in the ensuing days, Comey kept the FBI’s actions cloaked in secrecy and repeatedly rebuffed her suggestions that the incoming Trump team be made aware of the Flynn recordings.”

Let that sink in. Comey was investigating a key member of the incoming presidential administration, but didn’t inform the White House about the investigation, apparently at the behest of Obama.

Also attending that meeting, in addition to Yates and Comey, were Vice President Joe Biden, CIA Director John Brennan, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, National Security Adviser Susan Rice, and others.

Yates says Obama and Comey pulled her aside after the meeting ended to tell her what they were doing, and to keep it quiet.