Saturday, December 7, 2019

Conspriacy theories: plausibility, ignorance,and debunking

Revised and updated 12/10/19
A version of this was published in the Winter Park Times, Dec. 13, 2019
https://winterparktimes.com/opinion/columnists/conspiracy-theories-debunked/

Two conspiracy theories promoted by Donald Trump, CloudStrke and "deep state" got debunked lately, but if you listened to him or his Congressional supporters, and only supportive media, you may have missed it. Conspiracy theories can only take root if a number of people think something sounds plausible and it supports their preconceived notions or it serves their political agenda. Usually, if conspiracy theories are challenged and investigated, and the theory falls apart, people who once believed it, move on.  It is different from Donald Trump's s loyal followers. They declare evidence they do not like as fake news, simply disagree with conclusions without reason or presenting countering evidence,  or dismiss the findings as tainted because the accusers and investigators are motivated by some hatred or organized resistance. 

Announcing an investigation into CloudStrike" is one of those "favors" Trump asked of  Ukraine President Zelensky in the infamous July 25  telephone calls that did kick off the impeachment process. The CloudStrike theory is that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 US elections on behalf of Hillary Clinton instead of, or just like, Russia did. Ukraine persons may have expressed publicly their preference, but they did not conduct activities in the US like Russia’s. Trump and followers continued to tout the theory even after it was debunked by US intelligence and an NSC expert, Fiona Hill,  called a talking point Putin, a lie,   advanced to deflect Russian blame for active measures in 2016 to  Ukraine. FBI Director Christopher Wray was quick to verify they found no evidence Ukraine interfered in 2016. Trump and his supporters ignore the evidence and still promote the legitimacy of the theory as a way to justify the favor he asked of Ukraine.

 The investigation into Russian interference as detailed in the Mueller Report is still haunting Trump. While he was exonerated of collusion with the Russians because of a lack of evidence, he was not cleared of obstructing justice, regardless of how AG Bill Barr twisted the report. Mueller declined to indict him because of department rules. Trump and his advisors concocted another conspiracy theory to explain it away.  His response is that the "deep state" conspired to "get" him because they were politically motivated. Therefore, his logic follows, their claim of any evidence of Trump’s wrongdoing was suspect and tainted.

The Department of Justice's Inspector General released a report this month that shot holes into the"deep state" conspiracy theory. A two-year investigation found the FBI had not acted to start the Russian connection investigation because of political bias. In fact, there were those in the FBI who were very supportive of Donald Trump, thought Hillary Clinton was a crook, and also those who had opposite views. However, none had acted on their political beliefs. The IG reported the FBI  did not bug Trump's phones, did not launch the Russian investigation in 2016 without good cause, did not "spy" on the campaign, and the investigation was authorized in compliance with Department rules.  They opened up the investigation because of DNC being hacked, intelligence reporting frequent staff contacts with Russians, and the tip-off by an Australian diplomat.


The investigation began two months before the FISA warrant flap over Carter Page, who was never charged, and months before the Steele Dossier, neither of which affected the investigation. If there was no "deep state", the FBI was no angel, either, but what they did wrong was not politically motivated nor did it affect the final FBI findings on the Russian connection. That a lower level FBI agent had indeed misbehaved was not the reason the FBI opened the Russian investigation. However, department rules and the FISA warrant process were flawed. Trump's loyal Attorney General, Bill Barr, said he disagreed with the IG's conclusions (no specific reason was given). and he was quick to distort some results. and cherry-picked others. 

(added 12/11/19) I am listening to the Senate Judiciary Committee and Lindsey Graham try to hit back on the Department of Justice Inspector General report that knocked holes into GOP conspiracy theories: This is the same FBI staff in place when the FBI's publicly announced on again and off again criminal investigations into Hillary's scuttled Hillary Clinton's campaign while keeping the investigation about Trump's et al, contacts with Russians. The GOP had no problem with the FBI then...but when the same FBI finds negative stuff on Trump, we have Lindsey Graham banging the table trying to taint any negative evidence that hurt Donald Trump. What this is is a smokescreen to divert attention from the substance of the part of the IG's findings that hurt Trump. The smoke the FBI found fire justified opening the investigation. Their investigations resulted in Trump's associates landing in jail or pleading guilty and indictments of 12 Russians and identifying ten instances of Trump's obstruction of the FBI's ability to investigate the Russian meddling. .. However, IG found that the department had poor regulations and fault in the FISA process and a low threshold for opening investigations. That needs pursuing, but it should not drown out the findings that Trump did not like, which is what Graham is trying to accomplish.

That the Western leading Ukraine regime would want Hillary  Clinton to win in 2016 is understandable. That does make Cloud Strike sound plausible. Russia had grabbed their Crimea and invaded an eastern province in 2014. Russia was the enemy of the western leaning Ukraine government. In 2016 Donald Trump's campaign chair Paul Manafort was a close advisor of the ousted pro-Russian Ukraine president and his close business associate, Konstantin Kilimnik was suspected of being a Russian intelligence trained agent. Trump's foreign policy had taken a sharpened pro-Russian issue focus soon after Manafort joined Trump's campaign in the spring of 2016, including lifting promoting sanctions against Russia for invading and grabbing eastern Ukraine and weakening NATO, the main barrier to further Russian aggression,  calling it obsolete.   Fiona Hill, the NSC Russian expert testified in the inquiry hearings that the theory Ukraine interfered in the 2016 U.S. elections was a “fictional narrative” fueled by Russian intelligence because Putin wanted to get the heat on election interference transferred to another country, hoping to get sanctions levied against them for the meddling lifted.  Further ignorance upon which the supporters of the theory-based their belief was that the IT security company involved, Cloud Strike, was owned by a US-based Ukrainian, except the owner, was a Russian immigrant and not from Ukraine.

The attack on Joe Biden by Trump supporters hinges on their report that Biden got a prosecutor fired in Ukraine in order to protect his son Hunter. That makes no sense since Biden and the entire European Community and the Obama administration withheld an IMF loan because the prosecutor did not pursue corruption, not because he was not prosecuting Hunter.  https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2019/10/03/what-really-happened-when-biden-forced-out-ukraines-top-prosecutor/378562


https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/read-full-text-doj-ig-michael-horowitz-s-report-origins-n1098431

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/09/us/politics/barr-durham-ig-report-russia-investigation.html

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2019/12/09/fbi-director-wray-says-no-indication-ukraine-interference-2016-election/4380050002/


https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/12/impeachment-republican-party-russia/603088/?fbclid=IwAR2A7S1tYYqBAn65vUkG9SxIIjPKbSXlw3UbdAOkLk9t5hzClIS2qY0tuUE

 https://theweek.com/speedreads/882443/doj-inspector-general-horowitz-reportedly-shot-down-another-gop-theory-about-russia-probe

https://www.axios.com/impeachment-hearing-fiona-hill-trump-ukraine-testimony-49fbce41-bf1c-4b02-964c-701196d30d5c.html

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/sondland-trump-only-wanted-ukraine-to-announce-investigation-into-biden-not-a-real-inquiry

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/02/trump-followers-believe-lies-wall.html

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trump-thinks-his-supporters-are-the-most-gullible-people-on-earth-are-they-really/2019/03/07/1e79a4c4-41
 Cloudstrike:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/12/02/not-enough-pinocchios-trumps-crowdstrike-obsession

http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/republicans-turn-gaslighting-response-justice-dept-report?cid=sm_fb_maddow&fbclid=IwAR3I509xX3alDX30zcXZ0Ce0LK8diBRYMs6RyvwpNCFpvF6rjFCdchhXi9E

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