RealClearInvestigations' Picks of the Week
Sept. 29 to Oct. 5, 2019

Featured Investigations:
'Straight Shooter' Justice Dept. Watchdog
Has Held Fire on Top Brass

The Justice Department watchdog's past high-profile probes of FBI cases involving Hillary Clinton, James Comey, and others show a pattern of kid-glove treatment and pulling punches for some powerful people, Paul Sperryreportsfor RealClearInvestigations.

That suggests Inspector General Michael Horowitz's soon-to-be-released report on FBI surveillance abuses could disappoint those hoping for a thorough, tough, and fair check on government wrongdoing from a man routinely portrayed within the Washington Beltway as a "straight shooter."

In a three-article package (sidebars are here and here), Sperry enlists Justice Department investigative veterans in a warts-and-all look at Horowitz's track record, including his notable tendency to cut important people slack within the institution he has long served.

• Horowitz let ex-FBI Director Comey slide in an apparent lie. Horowitz's old colleague Comey claimed, despite records strongly suggesting otherwise, that he was not told for weeks about an obvious hot potato: the discovery of new emails in the Hillary Clinton investigation.
• Horowitz also acceptedComey'sword that his leaking was not classified.AComeymemo of a conversation with President Trump was deemed merely sensitive - even though it concerned the FBI's counterintelligence investigation of the president's national security adviser.
• Horowitz took Bill Clinton and Loretta Lynch's word for it on the infamous Phoenix tarmac meeting.He didn't interview members of the ex-President and AttorneyGeneral's security details about what the powerful pair discussed just before Lynch'sDoJwas to rule on Hillary's emails.
• Horowitz took Andrew McCabe at his word too.The ex-FBI No. 2 testified that during the Clinton email probe, he knew nothing about a big cash infusion into his wife's state senate run arranged by a longtime Clinton ally, Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe - despite evidence McCabe met with the governor.
• Horowitz didn't demand Page andStrzok'sprivate emails. Anti-Trump FBI lovers PeterStrzokand Lisa Page worked and communicated while away from government-authorized devices in an apparent Hillary Clinton-like violation of department rules.
• Horowitz and his wife have supported Democrats.He worked on liberal Barney Frank's campaign while in college and in 2010 donated to Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet, an ex-colleague now running for President who has slammed President Trump for his coziness with Vladimir Putin. Alexandra Kauffman Horowitz is a former Democratic activist and now a Washington producer for CNN.

Assessing Horowitz's work, Chris Swecker, a 24-year investigative veteran of the FBI, said, "I see a pattern of him pulling up short and trying to be a bit of a statesman instead of making the hard calls." Tom Fitton, president of the watchdog group Judicial Watch, said the IG has exposed some critical facts, but his reports are "cover-ups at the same time."

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Whistlegate Reveals Some Very Chatty Minders of State Secrets
RealClearInvestigations
A CIA analyst's "whistleblower" complaint against President Trump shows a flouting of rules within the government against intelligence-sharing beyond the need to know, EricFeltenreports for RealClearInvestigations. And that could pose risks to national security.

Feltenreports:

• The whistleblower and his sources, however justified they felt, almost certainly violated regulations aimed at preserving state secrets, legal experts say.
• The basic rule is two-fold: 1) you don't share classified information with someone lacking proper clearance; and 2) you don't share with someone who doesn't have an official need to know the information.
• The CIA analyst behind the complaint didn't have sufficient clearance or a need to know. By his own admission, he relied on anonymous "officials" who did, not his own firsthand knowledge.
• If the "whistleblower" had had clearance, he could have accessed the intelligence himself, including the rough transcript of a call between Trump and the Ukrainian President at the center of the uproar.
• Coming by information in the normal course of business, as the CIA analyst claims, doesn't absolve the parties of over-sharing outside of one's level of clearance.
• The issue isn't just intelligence officials' disdain for President Trump; there has been a longstanding failure to rein in the intelligence community's rumor mill. 
• This talking out of school was made almost inevitable by the nation's recent experience with terrorism.
• Tough restrictions imposed aftersome of the biggest spy breaches in U.S. history fell by the wayside after 9/11, when government officials concluded that closer communication among agencies might have helped prevent the attacks.
• The government has been hesitant to punish top officials who share information, among them  former FBI Director JamesComey. 
• "What is truly endangered now is the ability to keep anything secret," says one intelligence scholar.

What Is the FISA Spy Court and Why Do People Keep Bashing It?
RealClearInvestigations
What if the irregularities in the court applications for surveillance of ex-Trump adviser Carter Page were not so irregular -- and Americans are routinely being wiretapped on flimsy national security pretexts?That's the provocative question Tim Cavanaugh poses in RealClearInvestigations as he unpacks the opaque workings of the FISA spy court-the focus of a highly anticipated Justice Department Inspector General's report on how the FBI ever got the green light tospy onPage.Cavanaugh reports: 

• Critics call the court a rubber-stamp body, pointing to its history of approving about 98% of the roughly 1,600 to 1,700 spy applications it receives each year.
• Although hundreds of warrants are approved each year, the public becomes aware of them only "10 or 20 times a year" when the government has to disclose FISA material used in court, an ACLU lawyer says.
• A lot of the court's critics are not Trump partisans but libertarians and stalwarts of the left like the American Civil Liberties Union and New York University's Brennan Center for Justice.
• They argue that it is too secretive and cozy with government authorities.
• The court has also been accused of allowing "mission creep," letting government agents rely more and more on FISA orders for surveillance rather than more appropriate, and restrictive, Title III criminal warrants.
• Unlike criminal wiretap orders, FISA orders allow the government to casta wide net, empowering agentsto collect communications from anyone in contact with the target as well as people communicating with those contacts.  
• The 11 judges on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, appointed to staggered 7-year terms, appeartohave a heavy workload: an average of over 30applicationsper week. The first Page application ran 66 pages, including footnotes. 
• But the judges have legal staff as liaisons withgovernmentlawyersto move things along -- out of public view. 
• Court defenders argue thatthings were evenworsebefore:Spying on U.S. citizens was not subject to any judicial scrutiny at alluntilthe Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Actof 1978.

The Trump Investigations: Top Articles

Trump Team's Texts Detail Pressure on Ukraine, Daily Beast
Trump Publicly Urges China to Investigate theBidens, New York Times
Intel Chair Schiff Got Ukraine ClaimsBeforeInspector General, New York Times
Ukraine Sources Detail EffortsAgainstBiden, Guardian
Once-Secret Memos Cast Doubt on Joe Biden's Ukraine Story,TheHill
Hunter Biden: The Timeline, National Review
Barr Asked Foreign Officials to Aid Inquiry of FBI, CIA, 2016, WashingtonPost
Dems Probe Ties of Trump, Giuliani, SamKislin, Ukraine, Daily Beast
Trump Hotel Mystery: Reservations Followed by Empty Rooms, Politico
New Hearsay Whistleblower vs. Trump ... From Inside IRS, Washington Post

Other Noteworthy Articles and Series

Feds Dramatically Expand Exposure to Risky Mortgages
Washington Post
It's déjà 3br/2ba rvr vu all over again. The federal government has dramatically expanded its exposure to risky mortgages, as federal officials over the past four years took steps that cleared the way for companies to issue loans that many borrowers might not be able to repay. Now, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Housing Administration guarantee almost $7 trillion in mortgage-related debt, 33 percent more than before the housing crisis. Because these entities are run or backstopped by the U.S. government, a large increase in loan defaults could cost taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars. This risk is the direct result of pressure from the lending industry, consumer groups and political appointees, who clamored for the government to intervene when homeownership rates fell several years ago.Numerous government officials, starting in the Obama administration, obliged, mistakenly expecting that the private market would ultimately take over.

Hundreds off Accused Priests Living With No Oversight
Associated Press
Nearly 1,700 priests and other clergy members that the Roman Catholic Church considers credibly accused of child sexual abuse are living under the radar with little to no oversight from religious authorities or law enforcement, decades after the first wave of the church abuse scandal roiled U.S. dioceses, an Associated Press investigation has found. Some among these priests, deacons, monks and lay people now teach middle-school math. They counsel survivors of sexual assault. They work as nurses and volunteer at nonprofits aimed at helping at-risk kids. They live next to playgrounds and day care centers. They foster and care for children. And in their time since leaving the church, dozens have committed crimes, including sexual assault and possessing child pornography.

Internet Full of Images of Child Sexual Abuse
New York Times
In 2008, lawmakers, the tech industry and many Americans were horrified by the fact that some one million images depicting child sexual abuse could be found on the internet. But despite the passage of landmark legislation that year, the problem has proliferated. Technology companies reported a record 45 million online photos and videos of the abuse last year. An investigation by The New York Times found an insatiable criminal underworld that had exploited the flawed and insufficient efforts to contain it. The Justice Department, given a major role by Congress, neglected even towrite mandatory monitoring reports, nor did it appoint a senior executive-level official to lead a crackdown. And the group tasked with serving as a federal clearinghouse for the imagery — the go-between for the tech companies and the authorities — was ill equipped for the expanding demands.

Story of Khashoggi's Murder, and How the World Looked Away
Insider
One year ago the Washington Post contributor JamalKhashoggiwalked into the Saudi consulate in Istanbul and never walked out. In the months that followed the facts of his disappearance and murder would emerge in fragments: an international high-tech spy game, a diabolical plot, a gruesome killing, and a preposterous cover-up reaching the highest levels of the Saudi government, aided by the indifference and obstinacy of the White House. Eventually those fragments came to comprise a macabre mosaic. This article, illustrated by Chris Koehler and told as a nonfiction narrative by author Evan Ratliff, draws on the Post's reporting, a UN report on the murder, hundreds of news accounts, video interviews and public testimony to detail what is known aboutKhashoggi'smurder.

Meet the Millionaires Helping to Pay for Climate Protests
New York Times
Washington residents snarled in the traffic jams created last month by climate change protesters might have asked themselves: "Who helps pays for this activism?"The answer is scions ofsome of America's most famous families- including Rory Kennedy, daughter of Senator Robert Kennedy and Ethel Kennedy; and Aileen Getty, a granddaughter of the oil magnate Jean Paul Getty. They are among the founders the Climate Emergency Fund - a nonprofit founded in July by wealthy donors who have long supported organizations like the Sierra Club and the National Resources Defense Council, but have now "concluded that these groups were taking a too-gradual approach to the fight against climate change and that the crisis demanded greater urgency." A separate story fromSmithsonian highlightsa study of 91 well-financed think tanks and advocacy groups that allegedly work to deny the science regarding climate change.

Eat Up: Scientists Report Red Meat May Not Be a Danger
New York Times
Drop that Impossible Whopper. Here, have a Triple Bacon Cheeseburger. At a time when climate alarmists forecast imminent global doom owing in part to flatulent cows, a new study challenges the longtime advice from public health officials that we should limit consumption of red meat and processed meats. If there are health benefits from eating less beef and pork, they are small. Already the findings have been met with fierce criticism from elite public health researchers. And the Wall Street Journal editorial board thinks it knows why: "Climate politics is now infecting even nutritional science."