"You Bumped Me So I Can Shoot You"

 

I suppose great minds think alike. I was going to propose an extreme hypothetical to illustrate Republicans' quota system for criminal justice, but Patterico beat me to it.

Patterico is that decidedly rare bird -- a genuine anti-Trump conservative.  He is tough on crime, skeptical of allegations of police brutality, opposed to affirmative action, cancelling student loans, most economic regulation, and all things California. He hates FDR and loves Calvin Coolidge and is deeply skeptical of all present-day Democratic politicians.  He is also a Russia hawk, a firm believer in the rule of law, and an implacable Trump opponent.  When Republicans whine about a "two tiered justice system," I call it quota justice.  Patterico calls it the "You bumped me so I can shoot you fallacy."

Move #1: Take an opponent’s arguably provocative act and declare it to be intentionally evil; and

Move #2: Propose a wildly disproportionate response to that act, and justify it by pretending that the “provocation” and the wildly disproportionate response are equivalent. Describing both at the highest level of generality possible (“they are both acts of violence”) is an excellent aid in drawing such false equivalencies.

To understand why the two sides are not equivalent and why the complaints of weaponized justice don't hold up, Patterico proposes the following hypothetical:

Ask yourself this: how would you feel if, after Jack Smith gave his short statement about the indictment, Biden followed it up with a speech declaring that he had ordered Smith to seek the indictment, because it was high time that a president personally see to it that evil men like Trump get what’s coming to them. At which point Biden led the crowd in a chant of “lock him up.”  I think everyone would be appalled.

And he points out that Trump supporters can't justify their determination to seek revenge on Democrats as a "reaction" to Trump's indictment because Trump supporters were chanting "Lock her up" well before there was anything to react to.

 Which leads to my admittedly extreme hypothetical, which I thought of before reading Patterico, but delayed posting until after.  Suppose Ron DeSantis sees his campaign sinking and decides that drastic measures are needed to revive it.  He has tried being more pro-COVID and more anti-woke than Trump, but it just isn't getting him anywhere.  So he concludes that the only chance he has to beat Trump is to claim to be more persecuted.  And given that Trump is facing 400 years, that doesn't seem easy.

But then it occurs to DeSantis that, for all the time Trump is hypothetically facing he hasn't actually done any time at all.  He has gone through the fingerprinting and booking process and been arraigned in court, but he hasn't actually been arrested or seen the inside of a jail.  So DeSantis decides he can outdo Trump on that.

Let us suppose in my hypothetical that one day Chuck Schumer is walking down the Washington Mall in front of Washington Monument when a protestor insults him.  Schumer insults the protestor back (always a mistake), a shouting match ensues, and Schumer ends up punching the protestor in the nose and making him bleed.  Scandalous, right?  The protestor files charges, Schumer received a criminal summons, and waives arraignment, entering a paper plea of not guilty instead (that is allowed).  He ends up pleading guilty to a misdemeanor count of battery and gets a fine and restitution, but no jail time.

Naturally, Republicans everywhere are scandalized and Democrats are apologetic  Republicans demand to expel Schumer from the Senate.  Democrats block the move in favor of censure, and remove him from his post as Senate Majority Leader.  Republicans are outraged that Democrats are protecting a criminal.

DeSantis sees his opening.  He goes strolling down the Washington Mall in front of Washington Monument late on Friday afternoon, after the courts have closed, but while it is still light out.  He looks around, makes sure the police can see him, and shoots a random bystander through both kneecaps. He carefully aims for a non-vital spot to avoid any risk of the victim accidentally dying and being charged with murder.  Bystander is maimed for life and will need knee replacement surgery!  DeSantis is arrested on the spot!  Because courts are closed for the weekend, he is not arraigned until the following Monday.  (If he is smart, maybe he chooses a long weekend).   The next working day, DeSantis is brought into court and charged with two counts of mayhem, each carrying a 20 year sentence (or whatever the law is in DC).  A bitter dispute ensured about bail, with the prosecutor calling DeSantis a flight risk, but DeSantis' lawyer arguing that his highly visible job will prevent flight.  In the end, DeSantis is ordered to surrender his passport and return to Florida.

After posting a high bond (paid by adoring supporters), DeSantis calls a press conference to denounce the country's two-tiered system of justice.  A Democrat who commits an assault in front of Washington Monument gets off on a misdemeanor plea and never sees the inside of the DC jail.  Yet a Republican is arrested on the spot, jailed for several days, and facing two felony counts and 40 years!  He probably also mentions all the January 6 insurrectionists he met in jail and how cruelly they are being treated.  Clearly the Biden Administration is weaponizing the criminal justice system against Republicans!  Crowds eat it up!

Republicans Favor Affirmative Action in Criminal Justice

 

Let Republicans rejoice in the Supreme Court's decision to ban affirmative action.  Affirmative action has never been my issue. But it should be noted that, after Republicans have spent decades deriding affirmative action as a quota system, they now seem to have come out in favor of a quota system -- in criminal justice.

When it comes to academic tests and job qualifications, Republicans have long insisted that disparate impact is not proof of discriminatory intent.  If black people don't do as well on a certain test as white people, or are less likely to meet a particular job qualification, Republicans have long insisted that it is not proof that the test or job qualification is discriminatory.  Republicans may grant that many black people come from disadvantaged backgrounds and begin with the opposite of a head start.  But, Republicans say, that is no excuse for reverse discrimination.  Instead of asking for standards to be lowered to meet their disadvantage, black people should put in an extra effort, work extra hard, pull themselves up by their own bootstraps, and meet that standard.

Criminal justice, until recently, was a different matter.

 There was a time when white liberals and white conservatives disagreed strongly on affirmative action in college admissions and hiring but agreed that criminal cases must be judged strictly on the individual merits.  In this they were opposed by certain Black activists, and certain radicals of all races who believed that the whole concept of individual justice was racist, and that verdicts should be entered on the basis of righting wrongs done to entire oppressed groups.

The bizarre police pursuit of OJ Simpson's van

Thus when O.J. Simpson went on trial for the murder of his ex-wife, the memory hung in the air of four while L.A. cops who were acquitted of a vicious beating of Rodney King, despite being filmed in the act.  There were people prepared to say that since four White cops were acquitted of beating a Black man in the face of all evidence, it was only fair that a Black man should be acquitted of killing his White ex-wife in order to balance things.  White liberals and white conservatives saw eye to eye in disagreeing.  While white liberals and conservatives generally agreed that the acquittal of Rodney King's attackers was an outrage, two wrongs do not make a right.  

The same applied to the murder of Meir Kahane, the Jewish ultra-nationalist who founded the terrorist Jewish Defense League in the U.S. and later moved to Israel to found Kach, a party that advocated theocracy and the expulsion of Israel's non-Jewish in habitants.  Kahane was murdered in New York by an Arab fanatic and possible terrorist and acquitted of the crime. He was convicted of illegal firearms possession and the non-fatal shooting of a Hispanic police officer, a verdict the judge described as "against the overwhelming weight of evidence and was devoid of common sense and logic."  Radical lawyer William Kunsler justified the verdict as the result of having "third world people" on the jury who presumably saw criminal justice in terms of group solidarity rather than individual merits.  And once again, white liberals and conservatives saw eye to eye, and agreed that, no matter how odious Kahane's political views, killing him was still murder and should be treated as such.

But now that powerful Republicans -- and regular folks acting on behalf of powerful Republicans -- are facing criminal charges, suddenly a careful balance between groups must be observed, and any powerful Republican charged with a crime must be matched with a powerful Democrat or we have a "two tier system of justice."*

Actually, so far the number of powerful Republicans the political affirmative action crowd is upset to see prosecuted is one -- Donald Trump.**  The quota system condemns that.  Donald Trump, a Republican candidate for President, is being prosecuted for mishandling of classified documents.  Hillary Clinton was investigated for mishandling of classified documents but not prosecuted.  Clearly, then, Trump, must not be prosecuted either, in order to keep things fair and balanced.  Trump and Clinton's respective actions are never treated as relevant to the decision whether to prosecute.

John Durham

Oddly enough (not!), when the news first came out that Trump had been under FBI investigation during his candidacy, no one seems to have said, well, the Democratic candidate was under FBI investigation, so the FBI had to investigate Trump in order to balance things. Instead, Republicans greeted news of the FBI investigation of Trump with general outrage and proclaimed that his status as candidate for president should have been an absolute exemption from investigation.  I will admit that so far I have only briefly looked at the Durham Report, but it should lay that allegation to rest at least.  The Durham Report makes clear that the FBI has a duty to investigate the sort of tips it received.  It does, however, often seem to indicate that in the interests of balance, counter-intelligence investigations of both campaigns should be treated exactly the same, without regard to trivial details like whether the Russian intelligence services were hacking one party's e-mails and releasing them in a manner calculated to cause maximum damage.

Admittedly, some Republicans are willing to dismiss the Hillary Clinton matter in the interest of letting bygones be bygones.  They prefer to match the prosecution of a powerful Republican (Donald Trump) today with the prosecution of a powerful Democrat (Hunter Biden) today.  And invariably, Republicans say that it is unfair and shows a two tier system of justice that Donald Trump is facing more serious charges than Hunter Biden. And I will admit that Republicans have made one realistically plausible complaint. The Hunter Biden investigation is led by David Weiss, Donald Trump's appointee as U.S. Attorney for Delaware.  The Biden Administration kept Weiss on to avoid any accusation of favoritism.  Some Republicans say this is not enough, and that Weiss should have been granted special counsel status to allow him to bring charges outside of Delaware. They may have a point there.

But the Republican quota system of criminal justice seems to be asking for something else.  Republicans seem to be asking for exactly equally serious charges against Donald Trump and Hunter Biden regardless of the facts in their individual cases.  Presumably Jack Smith, as special counsel investigating Donald Trump, should call up David Weiss, as special counsel investigating Hunter Biden and say that he has enough charges against Trump to put him away for 400 years and what does Weiss have on Hunter.  When Weiss says that Hunter is looking at a mere 20 years, Smith should call on him to make a serious effort to throw the book at Hunter.  And if no matter how severe the charges, Weiss just can't get all the way to 400 years, presumably Smith will have to dismiss enough charges to even them out.  Or suppose Hunter Biden's lawyers want to make a plea bargain.  Under a quota system of justice, Weiss would have to call up Smith and see if Trump was willing to make a deal.  If the answer was no, then no plea bargain for Hunter and both cases would have to go to trial.  Presumably even Republicans would acknowledge that there is no way to requires juries to reach the same verdict.  But judges presumably should coordinate to ensure that both defendants receive the same sentence regardless of the verdicts.

And yes, I am being somewhat facetious here, but honestly, what other conclusions can one make?

_____________________________________________

*I suppose it should not come as a surprise.  Republicans for some time now have been fans of a quota system in social media terms of service.   When social media's terms of service and bans on lies, or defamation, or hate speech keep affecting more conservatives than liberals, that could not possibly be because conservatives lie more, or defame more people, or express more hate.  No, obviously it proves that the terms of service are liberally biased.  There has been some talk of doing away with terms of service altogether, but as a practical matter that invariably leads to social media being overrun by pornography and spam.  So Republicans keep searching for the perfect term of service that will keep out spam and pornography but allow all right-wing speech, no matter how false, inflammatory, or defamatory.  Or, at a bare minimum, any political terms of service must be on a strict quota basis -- for every right wing post taken down, a left wing post must also be taken down.  If candidate A accuses his opponent of committing unspeakable acts with farm animals and social media takes the post down as false and defamatory, it must take down a post by his opponent as well.  The results of such a quota system are all to predictable and would create a perverse incentive for anyone making political postings to be as outrageous as possible -- in order to force social media to take down the other side's posts as well.

**That number may increase when charged come down for the attempt to overturn the election.  Any number of accomplices may also be charged.

Volume V: The Second Juiciest Part

 

If the first part of Volume V is the juiciest, the second part is a rather distant second. It purports to deal with the hack and leak, but also addresses Roger Stone's reaction. It covers pages 170 through 258.  Volume V concurs in the general intelligence consensus -- the hack and leak was ordered by Putin to undermine Clinton and promote Trump. The expectation was that Clinton would nonetheless win and be weakened in her presidency. 

Volume V also details Roger Stone's attempts to find out what Wikileaks was doing.  On the advice of Manafort (interestingly enough), the campaign refrained from reaching out to Wikileaks directly, but received regular information from Stone.  Stone, in turn, used intermediaries of his own to contact Wikileaks.  Communications between Stone and Wikileaks and the campaign and Stone were one way, with one notable exception.  Roger Stone sought to find out what Wikileaks was going to publish and pass it on the the campaign so they could plan their strategy accordingly, but they did not pass messages from the campaign to Wikileaks or give Wikileaks any advice.  Stone's role appears to have been a passive observer, seeking information on something beyond his control to pass on to the campaign for their use.

The Russians

One interesting thing I learned from the report was that separate units of the GRU (Russian military intelligence) were responsible for the hacking and the dissemination.  Unit 26165, which cyber security referred to as Fancy Bear, was responsible for the hacking.  Unit 74455 was responsible for dissemination, including creating the Guccifer persona (p. 176).  Rather than refer to these meaningless numbers, I will refer to Unit 26165 as Fancy Bear and Unit 74455 as Guccifer.

This distinction was not absolute.  It was Guccifer, not Fancy Bear, that made the attacks on state election infrastructure described in Volume I (p. ).  And it was Fancy Bear that created the DCLeaks website.  DCLeaks was launched on June 8, 2016, six days before the hack became public knowledge, although preparations were underway since Fancy Bear first breached the server  (p. 183).  The site garnered over one million page views before it was shut down in March, 2017, but never broke through to the general public (pp. 184-185).  

Guccifer was more successful.  The personal was created on June 15, 2016, the day after news of the hack became public, to claim that a lone hacker was responsible and was almost immediately fingered as a Russian front.. Guccifer appears to have recognized that the secret to success in spreading information was to find the right nodes to spread it, including Gawker and Smoking Gun (pp. 192, 209) and, most notoriously, the Florida blogger who received the Democrats' turnout model and said the information was  "worth a million dollars" and equivalent to a "the map to where all the troops are deployed."  He posted it publicly, presumably doing considerable damage to Democrats (pp. 193-194).*

Presumably at one time Guccifer's Russian ties would have tainted it irretrievably.  No longer. While I seem to recall contacts between Roger Stone and Guccifer, the report does not discuss them.

Wikileaks 

Wikileaks was actively fishing for damaging information on Hillary Clinton and did its best to create the impression that it had more than was actually the case.  Although Wikileaks did not receive information from Guccifer until July 18, 2016, as early as March, Wikileaks set up a searchable database of Hillary Clinton e-mails that were released pursuant to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests and broadly hinted that it had non-public information in order to attract such material (p. 207). Guccifer boasted from its first appearance that it has provided the materials to Wikileaks, a month before the transfer actually took place (pp. 189).  

One thing that I will admit to not remembering was that there were no Wikileaks releases between the July 22, 2016 release of DNC materials right before the Democratic Convention and the releases, beginning October7, of John Podesta material.  That means that Wikileaks fell silent throughout August and September.

Roger Stone

Roger Stone

Roger Stone repeatedly told the Trump campaign in April and May that Wikileaks was going to release damaging information on the Clinton Campaign.  He spoke to to Gates 67 times and Manafort 64 times throughout April and May (p. 223).  (Manafort and Stone are long-term business partners).  Manafort was initial skeptical, but when the July 22, 2016 materials dropped, he became convinced that Stone had an inside line to Wikileaks and encouraged Stone to use it.  At the same time, he warned that campaign to refrain from any direct contact with Wikileaks and let Stone handle it (p. 233). Roger Stone, by contrast, was a private citizen and not a member of the Trump campaign and therefore so far as I know it was not illegal for him to communicate with Wikileaks, although it was scandalous, indecent, and highly embarrassing. Stone did his best to conceal his communications with Wikileaks and, like Manafort, concealed well enough that the Committee was not sure what happened.  

Before the Wikileaks release, the Trump campaign was mostly focused on possible scandals surrounding the Clinton Foundation and Hillary's missing e-mails, which it was convinced were highly incriminating.  On June 12, 2016, two days before the hack became public knowledge, Julian Assange publicly announced plans to release information on Hillary Clinton. The Trump campaign welcomed the announcement.  It was equally enthusiastic when it learned that the DNC had been hacked (p. 225).  Volume V makes clear that the Trump campaign was completely taken by surprise when it learned of the DNC hacks, but eager to exploit them.  And, indeed, Guccifer began releasing information almost at once, which the campaign was eager to use to its advantage.  At least one campaign staffer ventured doubts as to whether the use of hacked documents was allowed and was told that once they entered the public domain, there was no prohibition (pp. 228-229).   

On the other hand, the campaign heeded Manafort's warning and refrained from contacting Wikileaks, relying instead on Roger Stone. 

Jerome Corsi

Stone first reached out for an intermediary in Jerome Corsi of World News Daily (WND, known on our side of the fence as Wing Nut Daily), probably on July 22 or 25, (pp. 233-234).  Corsi, in turn, contacted Assange through his own intermediatry (p. 234) and texted Stone on August 2 that "our friend" planned two more drops, one shortly after he (Corsi) returned from Italy and one in October.  He mentioned "more than Podesta to be exposed as in bed w enemy" and suggested that Hillary was in failing health and further scandals about the Foundation (pp. 237-238).  Notoriously, Stone tweeted on August 21 that, "it will soon the (sic) Podesta's time in the barrel."  A week earlier, he told the campaign to expect damaging leaks about Podesta, but said he did not know the "inner workings" (pp. 240-241).  Corsi, it should be noted, later denied contact with Wikileaks and claimed to have deduced the Podesta leak from Assange's comments. He took the Fifth when subpoenaed by the Committee.  (pp. 239-240).  

Randy Credico

In late August, Stone also began cultivating Randy Credico as an intermediary.  Credico's politics are apparently far-left,*** in contrast to the far-right Corsi, but the two are an example of horseshoe theory, both champions of Wikileaks and both eager to work with Stone to advance Trump's fortunes.  Credico interviewed both Stone and Assange in late August, making him an obvious choice as an intermediation (p. 242).  Credico appears to have sent a stream of messages promising an "October Surprise" that would be devastating the the Clinton campaign, which Stone passed on to the Trump campaign.  The surprise kept failing to appear.  Originally the date was set to be October 4 and Credico texted Stone, "Hillary's campaign will die this week." Stone again publicly proclaimed his inside knowledge of Wikileaks (p. 246).  Nothing was released October 4, and the date was pushed to October 5.  Nothing was released October 5, either. Nothing came down October 6, but Stone continued to promise "a devastating expose" (p. 249).  

On October 7, at about 4:00 p.m. the Washington Post published the Access Hollywood tape. Trump apparently learned about the release about an hour before it came out, presumably because the paper called him for comment (p. 249). Corsi appears to have learned of the tape earlier on the same day, at a WND phone call at 1:08 p.m. Stone spoke to Corsi at 1:42 and 2:18 that day and urged him to contact Assange and have him publish his material on Podesta "to balance the news cycle."  The Committee is uncertain how Stone learned that the Access Hollywood tape was about to drop, since he did not speak to the campaign that day, and he spoke to the Post, but not to any of the reporters involved with the tape. Though the Committee does not say so, Stone's conversations with Corsi appear to have taken place before the Trump campaign learned about the tape, leading to an obvious conclusion -- Stone probably learned about the tape from Corsi.  The urging to Wikileaks appears to be the only time Stone ever suggested an action to Wikileaks or acted as anything other than a passive recipient of its information. 

At 4:32, 32 minutes after the Access Hollywood tape was released, Wikileaks began releasing John Podesta e-mails (p. 250).  In all probability, Assange would have done exactly the same thing, whether Stone urged him to do so or not.  Wikileaks continued making regular releases until Election Day.  The material was nowhere near as powerful as Stone and his associates claimed, revealing no more than politicians behaving like politicians, admittedly not an edifying sight.  Nonetheless, the Trump campaign eagerly exploited the material that came its way, working it into their tweets, speeches, and press releases, unconcerned with their origin with a Russian hack, and doing their best to blame anyone else (pp. 252-254). In the end, Stone said that Trump should reward him for his work with Wikileaks, but then proceeded to destroy all his e-mail exchanged and do all he could to conceal his (indirect) contacts (p. 251).  

NEXT: The juice factor dies fast

__________________________________________________
*Roger Stone, it should be noted, dismissed the information as "Pretty standard" (pp. 195-196).
**I suppose it is possible that Wikileaks had advance knowledge of the hacks that Roger Stone learned of their plans in a distorted form.  But that is pure speculation unsupported by any evidence.
***Credico was director of the William Moses Kunster Fund for Racial Justice, founded by the radical lawyer William Kunster (p. 242).  Margaret Kunstler, widow of the late William Kunsler, was a member and served as a lawyer for Wikileaks and Assange (. 244). 

A Comment on the Supreme Court

 I know it is not a popular thing to say on my side of the aisle, but I am okay with the recent rulings coming out of the Supreme Court.  If you believe (and I do) that a strong democratic conservative party is essential to the health of democracy, then it is important to give some thought to what a democratic conservative party means.

And let's face facts.  A democratic conservative party won't always agree with us on all the issues.  Disagreements of this kind are normal  Democracy does not always mean that we will get our way.  A democratic conservative party is not a liberal party or even liberal-lite.

So what is a democratic conservative party?  I would say that it is a party that agrees on certain democratic structures, rules of the game, and individual rights and contests power within those structures and rules. First and foremost, that means accepting defeat and living to fight another day.  It means not trying to overturn election outcomes one doesn't like.  It means applying the rules of the game in an even-handed way. And yes, there is room to challenge the rules, to change them and contest them.  And yes, there is a certain amount of hypocrisy by all players on procedural matters.

But clearly, for instance, it is not compatible with being a true democratic conservative party to concentrate all power in the hands of state legislatures gerrymandered to ensure one-party rule regardless of the vote.  It is not compatible with stripping away all power from any actor who might challenge gerrymandered state legislatures -- whether statewide elected executive officials, judges, local authorities, initiative and referendum, or the federal government. It is not compatible with changing the rules every time you lose an election.  It is not compatible with using the power of the state to punish disfavored views.  And so forth.

But it is compatible with a wide range of opinions on appropriate levels of spending or government services, or on crime, or abortion, or affirmative action, and so forth.

And so it was with the Supreme Court.  the Supreme Court rejected the Independent State Legislature theory -- that state legislatures have the power to set (federal) election rules, unrestrained by governors, state courts, or even state constitutions.  It rejected the idea that states can sue to force the President to deport more immigrants, saying that government has limited resources and cannot possibly catch everyone who is in violation of our laws, and therefore has to have authority to set priorities. And it upheld our libel law making it difficult but not impossible for public figures to recover.  And all of these uphold the overall structure of democracy and democratic rules of the road.

But it rejected affirmative action.  And allowed website designers to refuse to publish certain messages. And it limited the President's ability to forgive student loan debt without an act of Congress. All of which simply means that the the Supreme Court is taking the conservative view on matters of policy. And really, affirmative action, the scope of religious exemptions, and loan forgiveness are the sorts of policy issues that we can in good faith disagree on, so long as the disagreement take place in the proper democratic framework.

So What Do We Make of THAT?!

So what do we make of THAT?  Paul Manafort, who served as the Trump campaign manager from June to August was, if not a Russian spy, a remarkably good imitation of one.  From May until August, he sent a steady, encrypted, stream of polling data and possibly other briefings to his translator, Konstantin Kilmmik, judged to be a Russian spy.  The communications were so well encrypted that neither Robert Mueller nor the Senate Intelligence Committee was able to figure out exactly what was sent, much less what became of the data.

The Committee has several pages, mostly redacted discussing the possibility of Kilmink's -- and even Manafort's -- "involvement" or "connection" with the hack and leak operation  Again granting that what is hidden is never as juicy as what the imagination fills in, and that it is wildly irresponsible to speculate, let me give some wildly irresponsible speculations.  First of all, to my untrained eye "involvement" and "connection" are not synonyms.  At least to my untrained understanding "involvement" implies some sort of participation, probably at a very minor or tangential level.  More central participation would be covered by a term like, "participated in" or "took part in."  At an absolute minimum, "involvement" would suggest advance knowledge of the hacks.  "Connection" could simply mean having some sort of tie to one of the participants, or even a tie to someone with a tie to a participant.  It seems wildly improbably that Manafort was in any way a participant in what appears to have been a highly secret and closely held operation.  As for whether he had some sort of direct or indirect ties to the participants, this can easily lead to playing a game of six degrees of separation, and that way lies paranoia.  

Paul Manafort

On the other hand, the Committee may be using "involvement" or "connection" to mean advance knowledge. It appears to believe that Kilimnik had advance knowledge and may be speculating whether Kilimnik passed this information on to Manafort, a thing the Committee has no direct evidence of.  Its redacted section may refer to Manafort behaving in a way that suggested advance knowledge.  It should also be noted that the GRU breached the DNC in April, 2016, that Kilimnik and Manafort met in person in May, and that the hack became public knowledge June 14, 2016. So possibly Trump's campaign manager may have known about the hack and started sending polling data to a representative of the organization responsible for the hack a month before the hack became public knowledge.  

The next and obvious question is what Kilimnik wanted with the polling data.  Neither the Mueller investigation nor Senate Intelligence Committee found any indication. Quite probably, Manafort himself did not know.  Operations of this type tend to be on a don't-ask-don't-tell basis.  Manafort was used to such things.  Rick Gates, Manafort's aide who testified against him, did not know the reason but speculated that Manafort may have been providing the information to prove that Trump had a chance of winning, and that Manafort could be useful in a Trump administration.  That could very well explain Manafort's motives, but why did Kilimnik, and whoever Kilimnik was reporting to, want the  information?  Were the solely interested in Trump's prospects?  There have been suggestions that the polling data may have been passed on to the Troll Farm to help them target their ads.  I suppose this is possible, although the trolls seem to have gotten quite a good understanding of how to navigate US politics by interacting with actual Americans. Nor is there any evidence, so far as I know, tying the Troll Farm to the hack and leak.  Another possibility, which I will discuss at greater length when commenting on the next section, is that the GRU may have used polling data to guide its direct release of information.  

And the other major question is what did Trump know and when did he know it.  So far as we can tell, he knew nothing whatever about these activities.  Manafort seems to have been a rogue player, acting for his own personal motives.  His motive appear to have been financial -- Manafort was in heavy debt to Deripaska and hoped that Deripaska would write off the debt if the data proved useful.  Nor is there any evidence that Trump willfully turned a blind eye on all of this.  Certainly that was my first thought.  If Trump's campaign manager was stealing polling data and using it for his own personal gain, one would expect Trump to be furious over the betrayal.  Or maybe not.  Maybe I am just not thinking like a patrimonialist.  Manafort, after all, offered his services to the Trump campaign for free.  But Trump could hardly expect Manafort, who was under serious financial pressure, to forego compensation altogether. Presumably he expected Manafort to make up the difference later on his own by influence peddling.   Maybe Trump, on learning of what had happened, decided that after all, data theft didn't hurt him any and was a small price to pay for Manfort's free services, and his silence.  

Alternately, it is possible that the Trump and Republicans in general never expressed outrage over Manafort's betrayal because, ensconced in their right wing media bubble, they never heard about it.

Look, I succumbed to paranoia over Trump and Russia once before and I really don't want to make the same mistake twice.  But Volume V is a positive invitation to, replete with invitations to connect the dots and play six degrees of separation.

And the following chronology seems -- troubling:

April 12, 2016    GRU successfully hacks the DNC server, starts making plans to release the contents

April 26, 2016    Joseph Mifsud, believed to be a Russian agent, approaches George Papadopoulos saying that the Russians have damaging information on Hillary in the form of "thousands of e-mails."

May 5-7, 2016    GRU agent Konstantin Kilimnik visits the US and meets with Paul Manafort.  After he leaves, Manafort starts sending regular briefings and campaign polling data.

Granted, this was about when the campaign season got started in earnest.  The timing could be related only in the sense that the campaign season was getting seriously underway.  But it still makes you wonder.

Drumroll! And Now for Volume V, Starting With the Juiciest Parts

 

Volume V is by far the longest of the Senate Intelligence Committee's reports on the 2016 election -- over 900 pages, and longer than all the other volumes combined.  Volume V deals with "Counterintelligence Threats and Vulnerabilities," which is really a euphemism for saying it is about what the Trump campaign was doing while Russia was interfering.

Significant parts of Volume V are also blacked out.  It is always good to remember when something is blacked out that what is hidden is never as juicy as your imagination fills in.  That is especially important in this case, because the report invites some very juicy imaginings indeed.  And it starts with the juiciest part of all -- Paul Manafort and his secret communications with Konstantin Kilimnik, presumed agent of the GRU a/k/a Russian Military Intelligence. 

Or, more accurately, it begins (pp. 1-26) with an introduction. The introduction explains the difference between its counterintelligence focus and the criminal focus of Mueller investigation. A criminal investigation determines whether there is enough admissible evidence to allow a jury to conclude beyond reasonable doubt that the defendant is guilty of an action expressly prohibited by law. A counterintelligence investigation considers all evidence, admissible or not,* and considers whether the evidence points to counterintelligence threat, whether or not the threat includes a crime.  The introduction also stresses the bipartisan nature of the investigation, to the point that witnesses being interviewed by committee staff could not tell which party the staffers worked for.  

The Committee only investigated events prior to the Trump inauguration in order to avoid issues of executive privilege.  This was on the assumption that only the Obama Administration would have standing to assert privilege over its own actions, which the Committee anticipated that it might.  In fact, the Committee found, Obama officials were quite cooperative.  The Trump Administration, by contrast, was highly obstructive and kept asserting executive privilege over actions that took place before it took office.  The Committee (p. 6) stated that they did not anticipate this obstruction, although I have my doubts as to whether this surprise was truly bipartisan. The Trump Administration also raised many dubious claims of attorney-client privilege.  This being the Trump Administration, it is hard to tell whether they actually had something to hide were simply interpreted any sort of investigation as a personal vendetta.  Either way, the obstruction does not reflect well on the Trump Administration and really should not have come as a surprise.

Oleg Deripaska

Now, on to the juiciest part.  The discussion of Paul Manafort extends from page 27 to page 169, with significant portions blacked out.  Manafort had done work since 2004 for Oleg Deripaska, a Russian oligarch, and for numerous pro-Russian Ukrainian oligarchs. Manafort served as an advisor to pro-Russian Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych of the Party of Regions.  This work came to an abrupt end in 2014 when Yanukovych's government was overthrown.  At this point, Manafort found himself unemployed, with large debts to Deripaska, with large amounts owed to him by the Party of Regions, which had no capacity to pay him. (See pp. 34-37, 44-47, including discussion of the Party of Regions' lack of a budget to pay Manafort and resort to collecting from oligarchs). Manafort nonetheless continued to be involved in Ukrainian politics on behalf of the remnants of the pro-Russian party in a vain attempt to get paid so he could pay off his debts to Deripaska (pp. 49-51).  About that time, Manafort offered to serve -- for free -- for the Trump campaign, an offer that should have raised an immediate suspicion of corrupt motive.  The report comments that the Trump campaign hired Manafort with no known vetting, p. 28, treating the offer to work for free as all that was needed, p. 54.

Manafort's translator was Konstantin Kilimnik, a former employee of the GRU (see pp. 40-42).  While the Mueller Report (p. 129) contents itself to say that "the FBI assesses [Kilimnik] to have ties to Russian intelligence," the Senate Intelligence Committee (p. 28), states flatly, "Kilimnik is a Russian intelligence officer."  Moreover, Volume V (p. 29) says that the Committee obtained information suggesting that Kilimnik may have been "connected" to the hack and leak operation.  This is followed by three paragraphs that are fully blacked out.  (And, FWIW, one paragraph appears to be about three lines, one about seven and a half lines, and one just under six lines). These three, highly tantalizing paragraphs, are followed by a paragraph that may be even more tantalizing for being (mostly) not blacked out:

While this information suggests that a channel for coordination on the GRU hack-and-leak operation may have existed through Kilimnik, the Committee had limited insight into Kilimnik' s communications with Manafort and [approximately one line redacted], all of whom used sophisticated communications security practices.

The Committee assesses that Kilimnik was likely serving as a channel between Manafort and the Russian intelligence services and represented "a grave counterintelligence threat" (p. 30).  In simple English, it appears that the Russians has a spy in the Trump campaign -- his campaign manager, no less.  Certainly Manafort behaved like a spy.  He communicated in person as much as possible and used encrypted applications and coded language for electronic communications, purchased pay-as-you-go phones, and found ways to share e-mails without sending them.  Although not mentioned, in the report, Manafort also had three passports.  Volume V (p. 31, footnote 90), quotes Kilimnik as saying that when he and Manafort worked in Ukraine, they routinely assumed they were being surveilled, so Manafort was used to that life.

Upon being chosen as Trump's campaign manager, Manafort asked Kilimnik to carry messages to three pro-Russian Ukrainian oligarchs letting them know and suggesting that he might be useful to them if Trump were to win.  He also asked Kilimnik to carry a message to Deripaska offering to brief him, presumably in hopes of persuading Desipaska to drop his lawsuits against Manafort's companies (pp. 58-60). He also continued to correspond with Kilimnik about current Ukrainian politics (p. 61).

Paul Manafort

Manafort was hired by the Trump campaign as convention manager in March, 2016.  Manafort and Kilimnik met when Kilimnik visited the US on May 5-7, 2016, purportedly for a wedding (pp. 67-70).**  In any event, Manafort and Kilimnik definitely met in New York and discussed Ukrainian politics.  It was at this time that Manafort began sending Kilimnik regular polling data. Rick Gates, Manafort's aide who testified against him, did not know the reason for the polling data, but speculated it was to convince his Russian and Ukrainian creditors that Trump really could win the election and that Manafort would be in a position to exercise influence on their behalf (p. 71). The Committee was unable to determine what happened to the polling data, nor were they able to access the content of the messages sent. Volume V goes on to say (pp 73-74) that Kilimnik seemed to have inside information about the campaigned, followed by one paragraph about the choice of Mike Pence and three paragraphs that were blacked out (5 1/2 lines, 7 lines, and 4 lines FWIW). 

And, of course, there was the August 2 meeting set forth in some detail in the Mueller report (pp. 74-76). The Committee was not able to determine what Kilmnik did with the polling data, but it did find one piece of information that could be a reflection of Kilimnik's actions after the August 2 meeting, though they could not tell if it was related to the polling data.  The relevant paragraph is so fully blacked out that one cannot tell the number or length of lines, but it appears to be five or six lines, not indented p. 82).  All of this appears to have been linked to a plan to end the war in Ukraine by severing the eastern parts of the country.***

The report then addresses whether Kilimnik was "connected" to the hack and leak operation, over about four and a half mostly redacted pages (pp. 85-89).  Unredacted portions include a reference to the preceding (redacted) material, to transferring the John Podesta e-mails to Wikileaks, to hacked and leaked conversations between US diplomats in 2014, and to "Cyper Berkut," a GRU persona that has hacked and leaked information on behalf of the Russian government.

Far more shocking and titillating is a statement (p. 89) that, "Manafort's involvement with the GRU hack-and-leak operation is largely unknown."  This is the first suggestion in any reputable source to so much as hint that Manafort had any role in the hack and leak whatever. Volume V then states that Manafort and Kilimnik were in contact throughout the hack and leak operation, but the Committee had no evidence that they discussed it.  

"Two pieces of information, however, raise the possibility of Manafort's potential connection to the hack-and-leak operations."  Naturally, those two pieces are blacked out, or nearly so.  One involves two and a half lines blacked out, followed by an indented portion of about seven lines, blacked out.  Next comes a reference to Jeffrey Yohai, former husband of Manafort's daughter, Jessica, which is distinctly odd.  Jessica appears to have married a man just like her father -- a California real estate developer and chronic fraudster, sentenced to nine years for repeated frauds, and suspected of witness tampering and intimidation. But I know of nothing linking him to Russian intelligence.  

The other piece of evidence is a quote, about eight lines long, origin and contents redacted.  The Committee says that it was unable to corroborate the report's account of [redacted], presumably referring to allegations about Manafort, but was able to corroborate most other aspects of the report (pp. 90-91).  This is followed by a redacted footnote of about 15 and a half lines.

The remainder of the report on Manafort is less juicy, with the possible exception of the redacted parts, which are extensive.  Manafort was apparently slated to be kicked upstairs even before the so-called "black ledger" of payments from the pro-Russian Ukrainian party came to light.  Once the payments were published, it was no longer possible to to make a face-saving arrangement for Manafort to stay on as a figurehead.  He had to go, and was replaced by Steven Bannon (for the nuts) and Kellyanne Conway (for the mainstream) as co-managers.  He nonetheless stayed in regular contact with the campaign, giving it advice, and also stayed in contact with Kilimnik, working on a plan to end the war in Ukraine by creating an "autonomous zone" in the Russia-occupied areas led by Viktor Yanukovych, the pro-Russian leader who Manafort had worked for.  There is also an tantalizing note that just before Manafort was fired, Kilimnik sent an e-mail to a (presumably American) journalist that he was in almost daily contact with Manafort and that Manafort was creating a parallel party structure, although he was not clear whether Manafort would have time to complete it (p. 92).****

There is also a section (pp. 106-120) about various persons, including Deripaska, Kilimnik, and Manafort, implausibly attempting to blame Ukraine for the hack and leak.  I never realized before just how much continuity there was between the Trump/Russia investigation and the first impeachment.

Finally, there is an extended, and largely redacted, section (pp. 137-169) about Manafort's ties to the Russian intelligence services.  Or more, accurately, to Desipaska's indirect ties to the Russian intelligence services, his associates Viktor Boyarkin and Konstantin Kilimnik's roles as direct agents of Russian intelligence, and Manafort's association with all three.  Their activities are mostly blacked out, but appear to be international (Thailand, Montenegro, and Guinea are all mentioned, but most of the account is blacked out).  There are about a page and a half blacked out about Desipaska's "connections" to the hacking operation (pp. 157-158) and also some suggestions (p. 165) that Manafort did not know if Kilimnik was a Russian spy, did not trust him, and would occasionally lie to him to see where the lie spread.

So, to repeat from the beginning, what is hidden is never as juicy as what you imagine.  But this report sure is an invitation to imagine some very juicy things indeed.

___________________________________________________

*Inadmissible evidence is not limited to evidence that was inadmissibly obtained, but also includes a lot of gossip, hearsay, speculation, and the like.
**Kilimnik also visited the US in April, but the Committee found no evidence that he met with Manafort on that visit. As for the wedding, the Committee was unclear.  Kilimnik did not attend a wedding at any time the Committee was able to trace his movements, but they were not able to trace all his movements.  The Committee offered as possibilities (1) Kilimnik may have attended a wedding some time they were not able to trace him, (2) wedding may have been some sort of code word, or (3) attending a wedding may have been an innocuous excuse to be in the US.  Take your pick.  
***The obvious question in the light of hindsight is whether this would have been a good idea.  Would it have staved off the 2022 Russian invasion or merely whetted Putin's appetite for more?  I suppose there is no way to tell.
****Also significant -- Manafort told he FBI he had briefed Trump about his work in Ukraine in case the subject came up, but did not go into detail because Trump did not seem interested.

Senate Intelligence Committee Reports Volumes III and IV: US Government and Intelligence Community

 So, on to Senate Intelligence Committee Russia Report Volume III and Volume IV.

Volume III

Volume III recounts the U.S. government's real time response to Russian election interference and finds it inadequate. At 53 pages, it is the shortest volume. The report found that Obama Administration hampered in its response by a highly politicized environment, concern that warnings would undermine public confidence in election results, fear that Russia might be able to manipulate vote totals, incomplete information, and limited time, and that these prevented an effective response.  The Administration was navigating uncharted waters.  Nothing of this kind had ever happened before.  And one party, after all, stood to benefit from the Russian intervention and therefore had a strong incentive to disbelieve in it and reject effective response.

Most Administration officials said they learned of the Russian hack of the DNC when they read about it in the Washington Post. (p. 5).  The intelligence community appears to have been aware of at least some sort of hack, but it is not clear whether they understood who was making the attempt (pp. 5-8).  

As soon as the hack became publicly known, the GRU (Russian military intelligence, Fancy Bear) created a front identified as "Guccifer 2.0" to claim credit as an individual. Cyber security experts almost immediately saw through Guccifer 2.0.  Guccifer immediately published some of the hacked documents and claimed to have sent others to Wikileaks for publication (p. 9).  Nonetheless, the intelligence community (IC) and policy makers generally saw the hack as intelligence gathering, rather than election interference -- undesirable, of course, but still within normal behavior. The general public became aware that something more was happening on July 22, 2016, when Wikileaks started releasing hacked information right ahead of the Democratic Convention.

But that alone did not truly alarm the Obama Administration and convince them that the hack was a serious threat.  Volume III, pp. 11-13 states that another piece of intelligence convinced the Obama Administration that there was a serious threat. The intelligence was so alarming that the Administration leapt into action within an hour or two. The intelligence was so sensitive that initially only nine executive officials other than the President and National Security Advisor were briefed.  At first, only top ranking intelligence officials were included and ever the Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff were excluded, although they were later let in (p. 14).  The House and Senate Intelligence Committees were not informed, but the Gang of Eight* were individually briefed throughout August and into early September.

The intelligence tip was also so sensitive that report blacks it out, so we do not know what it was.  But we can make a good guess.  In early August, 2016, Obama received an extremely classified report from the CIA that a confidential source in the Kremlin had reported that the hack and leak operation was ordered by Putin personally with the goal of electing Trump.  Compare the linked story with the report (pages 11-16), the overlap in dates and personnel, and see if Volume III could be referring to anything else.**

Volume III then goes over the perceived constraints (set forth above).  Very much contributing was Donald Trump's insistence in 2016, as in 2020, that the election was "rigged" and that if he lost it would be proof of fraud. Public claims by the Intelligence Community that Russia was in the tank for Trump would only strengthen the impression of a "deep state" plot.  Official also feared that if they exposed Russia's actions, the Russians might retaliate by hacking into state databases and either disrupting the election or altering votes.  The Administration therefore limited itself to admonishing the Russians and offering anti-hacking assistance to state election officials without explaining what the offer was about.  The Russians were unmoved, while state officials generally saw the offer and unwanted federal "interference."  Republican members of the Gang of Eight (including Senator Richard Burr, the Senate Intelligence Committee Chair portrayed above) were deeply distrustful. Only after the election did the Intelligence Community officially attribute the hacks and leaks to the Russian government and begin expelling Russian diplomats. 

Volume III concludes with additional opinions from the Republican members (pp. 47-49) rather hypocritically berating the Obama Administration for its weak-kneed response, and from Democrat Ron Wyden saying that the full Intelligence Committees should have been notified as to what was happening.

Volume IV

Volume IV takes up about where Volume III leaves off.  It is a review of an Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) completed after the election on December 30, 2016.  The overall report is favorable. It finds the ICA reviewed numerous sources, followed accepted analytic tradecraft, was free of political interference, and was well supported in its conclusions. The ICA had no policy recommendations, but this is standard practice in the intelligence community.  There was some criticism of open source analysis and historical analysis as weak, and some criticisms of the FBI, but overall Volume IV appears to endorse the ICA in its methodology and conclusions.

It is not possible for the general public to say much more about Volume IV, because, although at 158 pages Volume IV is the second longest report, the vast majority of it is blacked out.  Volume IV (p. 11) give the date that CIA Director John Brennan learned about Operation Crossfire Hurricane (the FBI investigation of the Trump Campaign), but the date is blacked out.  Volume IV also described in excruciating and unredacted detail (pp. 38-46) the feud between the FBI and CIA as to whether to include the Steele Dossier.  The FBI wanted to include the Steele Dossier as part of the report, while the CIA considered the  dossier worthless and contrary to their own human intelligence. The FBI did not want to be accused of hiding anything and finally compromised by including the Steele material in a two-page annex.  The NSA (National Security Agency, signals intelligence) played no part in the dispute. Probably somewhat significant -- Director of National Intelligence (DNI) James Clapper said that he first learned of the Steele Dossier on December 15 (p. 42).

Going over the report section by section, Volume IV generally endorses its conclusions except to say that its analysis of historical context was weak and the FBI failed to provide some sort of important material (blacked out). Almost not other details are shown.  

It is hard to tell, but Intelligence Community may not have been aware of the Troll Farm's activities at the time the report was written.  Reviewing the section saying the Russian attack was multifaceted, there were five sections, cyber espionage against political organizations, public disclosures, cyber intrusions on state election systems, propaganda, and another section that is blacked out entirely.  The report goes over these one by one, but does not have a section on the last, completely covered, category.

Finally, there is an opinion section by Senator Wyden that does some justified crowing that these reports clearly show that Russian interference was not a hoax.  What a shame that we, the public, are not allowed to see the proof!  Wyden also calls for paper ballots as backup to safeguard against election hacking, which has mostly been done.

Next up:  Volume V, the biggie.  That one will undoubtedly take multiple posts.

_______________________________________________

*Both party leaders in each house and the chair and ranking minority member of both intelligence committees.

**The WaPo story, it should be noted, had been published over two years before the report.  It is my understanding that the secret spy has been successfully exfiltrated and was later identified. Another possibility were reports by friendly foreign intelligence services of a suspicious volume of contacts between Trump associates and Russian figures, which appear to have come in about the same time.