RUSSIAGATE: NOT A “WITCHHUNT,” BUT A COUP
February 28, 2019 in Columnists, News by RBN Staff
by: Harley Schlanger
Feb. 24 — From the beginning of our coverage of the “Russian meddling/Trump collusion” story, this news service identified the operations against President Trump as a regime change coup, designed to prevent him from reversing the dangerous policies of his immediate predecessors, Bush and Obama, especially towards Russia and China. This was confirmed in an interview featured on the popular American tv show, “60 Minutes”, which aired on February 17, in which one of the plotters of regime change, former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, acknowledged that he and top officials of the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the FBI met in May 2017 to adopt a plan on how to carry it out. While the role of British intelligence in instigating and directing the coup continues to be covered up, McCabe left no doubt that for the Obama DOJ operatives and intelligence officials, Trump’s removal was their goal.
McCabe stepped back a bit from his story in interviews over the next days, but he stuck to the main points of the “60 Minutes” interview. These were the belief that Trump ran for President “with the aid of the government of Russia”, which he described as our most dangerous “adversary”; that it is “possible” that Trump, as President, has been acting on behalf of Russia; that this represents “a threat to national security”; and that, to cover it up, Trump was “obstructing justice”, as when he fired FBI Director Comey on May 9, 2017, and subsequently, in his attacks on the investigation. McCabe charged that Trump “had gone to extreme measures to…negatively impact, possibly turn off our investigation of Russian meddling into the election and Russian coordination with his campaign.” In making these charges, McCabe seemed blissfully unaware that two-plus years of investigation into these charges, by his agency and by Special Counsel Mueller, has turned up no evidence to back them. Further, that Trump, as President, has the legal right to fire the FBI director, and that he has not acted to close down the Russia investigation, despite the lies against him and his administration, and the highly negative effect it has had on his presidency, and on national security, by thwarting his efforts to improve relations with Russia.
McCabe admitted that, in these meetings, concrete measures were proposed to remove Trump. One of these was to have Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein wear a wire in meetings with Trump, presumably to gather evidence which could be used to remove him. The other was to determine if it were possible to recruit a majority of the cabinet to agree to Trump’s removal, as required by the 25th Amendment for the removal of a President. McCabe said Rosenstein was “counting votes” to see if a majority to do so existed. Rosenstein has denied this.
Among those calling this “an attempt at a coup d’état” is prominent constitutional authority Alan Dershowitz, who added that any DOJ official who mentioned the 25th Amendment in relation to Trump “has committed a grievous offense against the Constitution.” Dershowitz explained that the 25th Amendment was drafted to address a case in which the President is physically or mentally incapacitated to serve, which does not apply in this case.
McCabe is among the original gang involved in coup efforts against Trump. He was part of the team set up by Comey in July 2016 — just after Trump won the Republican nomination and well before the November election — to discredit Trump. His team used the fake and discredited “dodgy dossier” compiled by top “former” British MI6 operative Christopher Steel in its filing before the FISA Court, to get warrants to surveil members of the Trump team. In their filing, they never mentioned that the dossier was paid for by the Clinton campaign. Two members of that team, FBI counterintelligence “expert” Peter Strzok and his mistress, Lisa Page, left a trail of text messages exposing the intent of Comey’s team. In March 2016, Page sent a text referring to Trump as “an utter idiot,” a “loathsome human being”. Later, in August 2016, Strzok texted, “I want to believe the path you threw out for consideration in Andy’s office — that there’s no way he gets elected — but I’m afraid we can’t take that risk.” “Andy’s office” confirms that McCabe was directly involved in their operation. Strzok later referred to the investigation as an “insurance policy”, that if Trump wins, they can remove him by charging his election was occurred only due to Russian intervention.
McCabe was fired from the FBI on March 17, 2018, on the recommendation of the FBI’s Office of Professional Responsibility, following a report from the DOJ’s Inspector General which cited him for lying and leaking. McCabe claims he was fired as “part of this administration’s ongoing war on the FBI and the efforts of the Special Counsel investigation.”
McCabe’s self-promotion — he is trying to sell his book, probably to raise money for future legal fees, as he is expected to be indicted — is part of the massive evidence that the whole narrative of Russiagate was a fraud from the outset, to protect the collapsing London-Wall Street neo-liberal/neo-conservative system from being replaced by President Trump. At the same time as McCabe’s latest offensive, the U.S. media is super-saturated with rumors that Mueller will soon release his report, and with speculation that House Democrats are preparing an impeachment offensive against the President. It is past time that this operation be shut down, and the perpetrators, including low-level operatives such as McCabe, face prosecution.