WILL BRENNAN BE CALLED BEFORE A GRAND JURY?

August 21, 2018 in Columnists, News by RBN Staff

by: Harley Schlanger
August 19 — The revocation of former CIA chief John Brennan’s security clearance by President Trump should just be a first step toward reversing the damage that he and his collaborators have inflicted on the United States.  There are calls for a special counsel to investigate the Russiagate fraud that he launched, with a guiding hand from the imperial forces of British intelligence.  Their campaign, which Trump calls a “witch hunt”, has constrained the President from proceeding with a decisive break from the old geopolitical doctrine of confrontation with Russia and China, a doctrine fully embraced by Brennan during his career.
What Brennan launched, in the spring of 2016, was not just a witch hunt, but a regime change coup, of the sort he often coordinated in the CIA.  And while the Mueller investigation continues, the anti-Russian forces in Congress allied with Brennan, Clapper and other Obama intelligence chiefs, are aggressively pushing policies against Russia which threaten to trigger a nuclear war.  These include new, potentially crippling economic sanctions, which Russia’s Prime Minister Medvedev warned, if passed, would be seen by Russia as a “a declaration of economic warfare,” and would be treated as such.
The lifting of Brennan’s security clearance was announced on August 15, with a press statement from Trump, charging that Brennan’s “lying and recent conduct characterized by increasingly frenzied commentary is wholly inconsistent with access to the nation’s most closely held secrets and facilities….Mr. Brennan has recently leveraged his status as a former high-ranking official with access to highly sensitive information to make a series of unfounded and outrageous allegations — wild outbursts on the internet and television — about this administration.”  (In addition to his hyper-active Twitter account, Brennan was hired as a commentator on the anti-Trump network MSNBC.)
Brennan and his collaborators launched Russiagate, during the presidential campaign, in an attempt to prevent Trump from winning the election.  He obviously favored the CIA-friendly candidate, Hillary Clinton, who worked closely with him in anti-Russian operations, as well as the coup in Libya.  Once Trump won, Brennan lied that “17 U.S. intelligence agencies” agree that Russia meddled in the election on behalf of Trump — a claim he continues to make, without ever presenting any evidence.  His most recent hyperbolic episode was his attack on the Helsinki summit between Presidents Trump and Putin, when he stated that Trump’s “performance…rises to and exceeds the threshold of ‘high crimes and misdemeanors.’  It was nothing short of treasonous.”
Trump’s decision triggered a barrage of vitriolic nonsense from Brennan and his allies.  Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, a close ally of Brennan in creating the Russiagate narrative, who is also on the list of those who may lose their clearance, called Trump’s action an “infringement of First Amendment rights.”  Brennan himself offered evidence that this charge is bunk, as he authored an op ed in the {New York Times} on August 17 headlined “President Trump’s Claims of No Collusion Are Hogwash.”  Further, on the weekend of August 18-9, Brennan gave two television interviews in which he said he stands by the “treason” charge he made against the President.  When asked by MSNBC host Rachel Maddow what can be done about it, Brennan said, “It’s called the Mueller investigation,” adding that the legal hitman for the coup, Robert Mueller, “is a real national treasure.”
That this vile op ed was published, and that he continues to be given a platform by mainstream media to rant against Trump prove that Trump’s actions do not infringe on his rights to free speech — just his right to receive classified briefings.  But Brennan is not just exercising free speech in his attacks on Trump.  He is continuing to coordinate the coup to remove him, largely on the grounds that he and his colleagues believe there can be no peace with Russia, and any effort by Trump to establish a productive dialogue proves that he is a “puppet” of Putin.  It is Brennan who is a security threat to the U.S., and he has no inherent right to receive classified intelligence.
Classified briefings are available to former intelligence chiefs based on the idea that agencies could continue to tap the experience of former officials, once they have left office.   But what advice could Brennan offer present intelligence officials: How to overthrow elected governments and assassinate their leaders?  How to lie to, and spy on Congress?  How to deliver lethal weapons to terrorist groups?  How to run false flag operations and produce lying dossiers as a justification for military actions? — for these are the areas of experience possessed by Brennan!
It is a sign of Trump Derangement Syndrome that so many in the media and in the Congress jumped to Brennan’s defense.  During his time at the CIA, he committed multiple crimes: he covered up, then defended torture, by his agency; he spied on Senate staffers investigating torture; he coordinated drone killings with Obama, including against American citizens and hundreds, perhaps thousands, of civilians.  And now, he is at the center of the web of lies and cover-up behind the attacks on President Trump.
Brennan should be called before a Grand Jury, to face these charges.  But don’t expect a proven, serial liar to come clean and tell the truth.