RealClearInvestigations' Picks of the Week
January 10 to January 16, 2021 Before he leaves office next week, President Trump has declassification authority to clear up critical mysteries regarding the baseless Russian collusion allegation that dogged his presidency, Aaron Maté reports for RealClearInvestigations. And by the end of the week, there were indications that he would do just that. With Democrats taking the reins of power, Maté writes, there are no guarantees that the ongoing probe of Special Counsel John Durham will answer lingering questions such as these: - Did the feds have any proof at all that the Kremlin ran Joseph Mifsud, the vanished Maltese academic tied to a cryptic London barroom chat that supposedly touched off the FBI's Crossfire Hurricane probe? Why didn't the FBI grill him about his methods and contacts during their brief interview?
- What was the credibility or lack thereof of CIA Director John Brennan's Kremlin "mole" - supposed source of Brennan's hastily produced 2017 "Intelligence Community Assessment"? This is crucial because another foundational Russiagate document, the Steele dossier commissioned by the HIllary Clinton campaign, has already been discredited.
- Did Special Counsel Robert Mueller rely on ex-British spy Christopher Steele more than he let on? Mueller testified that his dossier was "outside my purview" but FBI notes suggested Steele's "information would be going straight to Mueller."
- What's the evidence for the Russian hacking of the Democratic National Committee? Democratic cyber-security contractor CrowdStrike's highly consequential allegation has been contradicted by subsequent disclosures.
- Was Guccifer 2.0 really with Russian intelligence? Mueller's final report quietly acknowledged that it "cannot rule out that stolen documents were transferred to WikiLeaks through intermediaries."
Progressives increasingly impose their will on big business through banks controlling the loan lifelines to the economy, John Hirschauer reports for RealClearInvestigations, and a new flashpoint has emerged in the final days of the Trump administration: - The proposed Fair Access to Financial Services Rule, which may not survive the Biden administration, represents major pushback against successful pressure campaigns waged by environmental groups and congressional Democrats.
- It aims to counteract refusals by every major American bank to finance drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, despite it being authorized by President Trump in 2017.
- The banks' cave-in on Arctic drilling highlights the wider power of progressive groups to goad corporate powerhouses into advancing their agendas from climate change to gun control - often beyond the confines of the legislature.
- Gun dealers, oil producers, payday lenders, and other controversial industries have had their access to capital stunted by these campaigns.
- Banks often cite "reputation risk" as a reason to deny loans - the risks associated with disfavor incurred by financing controversial projects.
- But critics call that discrimination against legal and vital business activity.
Trump, Biden and the Capitol Siege Rush to Judgment? 3 Questions on Capitol Siege Just the News
What Was Antifa's Role in Capitol Siege? Daily Caller
FBI 'War' Alert Undercuts Sudden-Riot Claim Washington Post
Inside the Deadly Capitol Siege New York Times
Trump and His Allies Set Stage for Riot Well Before Jan. 6 Wall Street Journal
Democrats Blocked Condemnation of Mob Violence Federalist
Biden Has Ties to 5 Major Tech Companies Daily Caller Other Noteworthy Articles and Series How Silicon Valley Destroyed Parler
Glenn Greenwald, substack.com
Parler - the Twitter-alternative created in part because of perceived Silicon Valley censorship - was the 10th most downloaded social media app in 2020, with 8.1 million installs. That success, Glenn Greenwald reports, was a problem for Big Tech, which is intent on dominating the flow of information. And so, using the Jan. 6 violence in the Capitol as justification ... ... three Silicon Valley monopolies — Amazon, Google and Apple — abruptly united to remove Parler from the internet. … If one were looking for evidence to demonstrate that these tech behemoths are, in fact, monopolies that engage in anti-competitive behavior in violation of antitrust laws, and will obliterate any attempt to compete with them in the marketplace, it would be difficult to imagine anything more compelling than how they just used their unconstrained power to utterly destroy a rising competitor. In a separate article - noteworthy only because it shows how some outlets peddle innuendo and propaganda as news - Gizmodo reports that "several users of the far-right social network Parler" were part of the group that attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6. The article does not establish that Parler was a key channel of communication (if only "several" members of the mob were using, it suggests it was not). And Gizmodo has does not examine whether the attackers used Twitter, Instagram or other platforms. In a separate article, the Washington Post reports that despite evidence that Trump supporters promoted the Jan. 6 march on the Capitol extensively on Facebook and Facebook-owned Instagram, Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg has sought to deflect blame by stressing the role of smaller, right-leaning services such as Parler and Gab. Fertility App Told Facebook When Women Ovulated
Wall Street Journal
As Big Tech ramps up efforts to police online speech, it continues to find new ways to violate personal privacy. This article reports that Facebook, Google and others bought data from Flo Health Inc., the developer of a widely used period- and fertility-tracking app, so they could target ads to ovulating women. Flo didn't stop disclosing this data until its practices were revealed in a 2019 Wall Street Journal article; it showed that Facebook software collected data from many apps even if no Facebook account was used to log in, and even if the end user wasn't a Facebook member. The Federal Trade Commission, which recently announced a settlement with Flo Health, suggested that more such cases could be coming. $1B to Settle Suits vs. NYPD Cops Who're Rarely Punished
ProPublica
New York City has paid more than $1 billion over the past five years to settle lawsuits against the NYPD. But, this article reports, accountability has largely stopped there. Again and again, the officers whose behavior led to the payouts faced minimal or no discipline. In one case, the city paid out $125,000 when officers allegedly fractured someone's cheekbone with a flashlight. The officers were not disciplined. In another case, officers allegedly bashed in a man's car window with a baton, then broke his ankle dragging him from the vehicle and charged him with resisting arrest. The charges were dropped and the city paid $460,000 to settle. The officers again faced no discipline. In the 45 cases ProPublica examined, the harshest penalty any officer received was a loss of 15 vacation days - for punching a teenager and knocking him unconscious in an incident caught on tape that went viral. The city settled that case for $200,000. Defund the Police? In Many Cities, Funding's Up
Bloomberg
The rallying cry to defund the police that erupted with George Floyd's killing almost eight months ago has come up against political realities, with most major U.S. cities unwilling to make meaningful cuts. This article reports that even as the 50 largest U.S. cities reduced their 2021 police budgets by 5.2% in aggregate - often as part of broader pandemic cost-cutting initiatives - law enforcement spending as a share of general expenditures rose slightly to 13.7% from 13.6%, according to data compiled by Bloomberg CityLab. And many cities like Minneapolis and Seattle have watered down or put on pause changes that were proposed or even passed at the height of the 2020 demonstrations against racism and police brutality. Police budgets will expand this year even in cities like Atlanta, Omaha and Phoenix, where Democrats picked up more votes in the 2020 presidential race versus 2016. Out of 42 major cities where Democrats gained share, 24 increased police spending for fiscal 2021, while 18 made cuts. I Survived Chinese 'Re-Education'
The Guardian
This terrifying, first-person account excerpted from a book describes how the Chinese government lured one its citizens, Gulbahar Haitiwaji, back to the country from France and then placed her in a re-education camp. Her crime: A picture of one of her daughters in Paris. She writes: "She was smiling, a miniature East Turkestan flag in her hand, a flag the Chinese government had banned. To Uighurs," an ethnic minority the woman's husband belongs to and which China is active repressing, "that flag symbolizes the region's independence movement." The woman spent months in police cells, where she endured interrogations and random acts of cruelty. Haitiwaji recalls her time in re-education camp: After a few days, I understood what people meant by "brainwashing". Every morning, a Uighur instructor would come into our silent classroom. A woman of our own ethnicity, teaching us how to be Chinese. … At her signal, we all stood up as one. "Lao shi hao!" This greeting to the teacher kicked off 11 hours of daily teaching. … Glued to our chairs, we repeated our lessons like parrots. They taught us the glorious history of China - a sanitised version, cleansed of abuses. On the cover of the manual we were given was inscribed "re-education programme". It contained nothing but stories of the powerful dynasties and their glorious conquests, and the great achievements of the Communist party. It was even more politicised and biased than the teaching at Chinese universities. In the early days, it made me laugh. Did they really think they were going to break us with a few pages of propaganda? But as the days went by, fatigue set in like an old enemy. I was exhausted, and my firm resolve to resist was on permanent hold. Coronavirus Investigations The Secrets to Israel's Coronavirus Vaccination Success Politico
The Ways Desperate Old People Are Getting Vaccines Daily Beast
Huh? Some Small Businesses Got $1 Relief Loans New York Times
Hollywood's Terrifying Covid Outbreak Daily Beast |
