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Consider the concept of circular reporting, where information coming from just one source is made to look like it's coming from multiple sources. Now consider what an intelligence or law enforcement agency might be able to do if it wants to convince, say, a court or the public about something. Plant the same "evidence" in multiple places in slightly different ways, and you can claim that it's being corroborated. Even more effective if intelligence agencies from multiple countries, like the US and its allies, are involved.
The "yellowcake uranium" evidence concerning Saddam Hussein's alleged efforts to get WMD is an example. This supposed evidence was relied on by the Bush administration to sell the war to the public and to the world. One of the pieces of evidence was a document that Italian intelligence sent to the US that later turned out to be forged. It was disseminated multiple times to the US by Italian intelligence. For all we know, it could well have just been a document they planted, in cooperation with western intelligence agencies. It was pretty much nothing more than an anonymous tip too. All used to drum up support for the Iraq War, by both the US and UK. Interestingly, the document made its first appearance in October 2001 - very shortly after 9/11.
The FBI probably used circular reporting in its FISA application for Carter Page. It cited a media report about the Steele dossier, treating the media report as separate corroborating evidence of the dossier itself. Of course, we don't know for certain whether the FBI knew that the media report was only based on the Steele dossier. But it seems likely the FBI would have known, or at the least they were being willfully blind to it. In the worst case scenario, they did it intentionally. And they were doing it with a former UK intelligence agent. We share a ton of intelligence with UK and Australia, so they probably knew about all this too.
If George Papadopoulos was set up in a sting operation, it's not circular reporting I guess but it's another kind of fake predicate. The FBI likely needed some sort of predicate beyond what they had on Trump/Russia in order to justify opening a formal investigation. Once they had an investigation going, it probably enlarged their investigative power and made it into an enduring thing. If it was a sting, they essentially manufactured a predicate. Oddly enough, Italian intelligence is right nearby to the story, since Mifsud was based in Rome. Mifsud was part owner of a university that trained western intelligence agents. Also, a reputable Italian newspaper is now reporting that, ever since Nov 2017 when Mifsud went to ground immediately after his identity went public, he has been living just a block from the US embassy in Rome.
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I'm not sure what you are trying to say. That intelligence agencies aren't dumb and that government organizations have influence on media?
I mean Fox, NYT and CNN could hardly be more partisan if they tried, right? "Quality journalism" is 100 feet under if it ever existed.
I guess those are nice cases in point if true.
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On April 24 2019 01:48 Archeon wrote:
I'm not sure what you are trying to say. That intelligence agencies aren't dumb and that government organizations have influence on media?
I mean Fox, NYT and CNN could hardly be more partisan if they tried, right? "Quality journalism" is 100 feet under if it ever existed.
I guess those are nice cases in point if true.
Ultimately the point is that it is possible that the Intel agencies under Bush and Obama engaged in illegal misconduct by manufacturing fake predicates so that they could take further action on something.
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Afraid they're gonna do stuff like this to attack Iran soon.
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On April 24 2019 02:56 Doodsmack wrote:Show nested quote +On April 24 2019 01:48 Archeon wrote:
I'm not sure what you are trying to say. That intelligence agencies aren't dumb and that government organizations have influence on media?
I mean Fox, NYT and CNN could hardly be more partisan if they tried, right? "Quality journalism" is 100 feet under if it ever existed.
I guess those are nice cases in point if true. Ultimately the point is that it is possible that the Intel agencies under Bush and Obama engaged in illegal misconduct by manufacturing fake predicates so that they could take further action on something.
Tbh my impression of intelligence agencies is that they collectively don't give a rats ass about law. A recent popular example would be that the NSA illegally observed thousands of US-citizens despite patriot act already giving them massive and imo unconstitutional powers.
Then there are all the cases where secret services stirr up shit in other countries proving that international law isn't worth the paper it's written on, so the Italian part would definitely fall under business as usual.
The only problem I see with your case was that the CIA without valid reason lied to the government they are supposed to serve, which imo is a serious crime. If the gov really didn't know/didn't get a report that is.
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The key to this is that if one western intelligence agency sends a cable to another containing some allegation, the latter has a predicate to initiate some sort of investigation within their own country.
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Circular reporting at work.
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Included there:
FBI went to Democratic operatives for corroboration. It is pretty dumb to go with the party that financed the document to spread oppo against Trump in order to verify the information within.
And tweets cited by Australian newspapers become reporting from Australia.
It’s not even well hidden circular reporting, or partially defensible “accidental” circular reporting.
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EPT
