"Charles Freeman Jr.’s withdrawal of his acceptance of a high-level intelligence position in the Obama administration was a national-security drama more riveting than an episode of “24.” The moral was clear: even a president who owes his job to a progressive movement in American politics could not support a longtime public servant who had made the mistake of criticizing Israel. Fierce advocates of the Jewish state, notably Sens. Chuck Schumer and Joe Lieberman and Reps. Eric Cantor and Steve Israel, played important roles in Freeman’s exit, while present and former officials of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee flitted in and out of the wings.
The message to all office-seekers is obvious. “They want to kill the chicken to scare the monkeys. They want other people to be intimidated,” Freeman told The American Conservative just before he withdrew his name to be chairman of the National Intelligence Council. He went on, “If the administration does not stick with me, then it’s destroying the argument that the Israel lobby is only a mythic entity and does not control the public space. … It will show the world that it is not able to exercise independent thinking on these issues.”" Weiss
—————
I used to know Senator Joe Lieberman quite well. I met him in the course of my third or fourth career, this one as a fellow who introduced people. He is affable, polite, hospitable, and seemingly open to new ideas.
But there are a number of problems with the idea of making him Director of the FBI:
1. He is too old. The FBI Director works a very hard schedule and Joe Lieberman is 75 years old. His ten year term would end when he would be 85. This is out of the question.
2. He is a politician. His on again, off again love affair with the Democratic Party should, in itself, be a bar to appointment to head yhe US' most important national police force and counter-intelligence group. Would the Republicans other than his pals, McCain and Graham, ever trust this Democrat?
3. He was an ardent supporter of the disastrous Iraq War. He and the other Amigos, McCain the strange, and Graham the oddball South Carolinian, traveled endlessly to Iraq, usually stopping off in Tel Aviv going and/or coming for a "booster shot" in enthusiasm for the project. There surely should be some questioning of his judgment over this.
4. He has no police or investigative experience other than a period as AG of Connecticut a long time ago. He is not a cop. Nor is he a CI spook.
5. He is very close to AIPAC, the un-registered and IMO illegal Zionist lobby.
6. Ambassador Charles (Chas) Freeman is probably the most skilled US diplomat in the last century in regard to matters involving the Middle East and the Arab World. Joe was one of those who led the effort to block Freeman's appointment as head of the National Intelligence Council, a DNI function that writes all national intelligence estimates. Relentless resistance by what Freeman called "The IsraeliLobby" caused Freeman to withdraw from the process.
I URGE THE PESIDENT TO RESIST THOSE URGING HIM TO APPOINT JOE LIEBERMAN TO HEAD THE FBI. pl
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/freemans-fight/
Joe didn’t support an investigation of the 911 attacks either. Ponder that.
I agree. We do not need a politician as head of the FBI.
He’s a year older than Charles Freeman. Why don’t we make Freeman the head of the FBI.
I am shocked Lieberman’s name is even under consideration. It can only be intended to ensure that every Zionist has a get-out-of-jail-free card in their pocket no matter what crime they commit. And prosecute Hillary? Forget about it.
A lot of Democrats don’t trust Lieberman either, he having lost the 2006 Democratic primary election in Connecticut and won as the nominee of the “Connecticut for Lieberman” Party. And of course in 2008, he appeared at the Republican Convention and endorsed McCain.
It should be sufficient that Mr Lieberman has no real law enforcement experience — the Connecticut Attorney General does not have jurisdiction over criminal investigations.
http://www.ct.gov/ag/lib/ag/about_us/annualreport2015-16.pdf
He is a career politician, having been first elected to office at the age of 28 in 1970 and serving continuously in elected office for the ensuing 42 years, with only a 2-year break when he unexpectedly lost a congressional campaign in 1980. He has no discernible intelligence experience apart from his tenure on the Senate Armed Services Committee. His only administrative experience is his 6-year stint as Connecticut AG, which is a fraction of the size of the FBI.
It’s hard to view an appointment like this as anything other than a sop to Republican moderates and whatever is left of the center-right opinion elite, which honors Lieberman’s “integrity” as a genuine turncoat Democrat. As a fully paid-up member of the Senate “Club”, he is still an insider’s insider, but I suspect he is deeply distrusted by both the Right and the Left. I think the Bureau would be somewhat immobilized with Lieberman as its Director, but if the White House thinks he’ll get the FBI “under control”, it is overestimating Lieberman’s skill set and political influence.
If Lieberman is confirmed as FBI director they should just go ahead and lower the American flag and raise the Israeli flag over the Nations hijacked Capitol building and the White House. The takeover will have been completed.
Joe Lieberman, epitomizes a card carrying member of the Borg. A very dangerous move for Trump to install a viper at the head of the federal criminal investigation arm. He WILL be backstabbed!!
Joementum is back!
Lieberman works at the law firm that’s run by Trump’s personal litigation attorney. I can see why Trump would like that. Apparently they also “bonded” at the interview. Given what Benjamin Wittes has written about Trump’s repeated attempts to bring Comey into his orbit, I can see why Trump would like that as well. This has all the markings of a poisoned chalice. Drink up, Joe.
I think the Republicans would probably welcome this appointment more than the Democrats.
PL – Are you saying that no democrat should be allowed to head any agency trusted with law enforcement or counter terrorism?
Or no politician, regardless of their political party affiliation?
Spot on….
Joe Lieberman’s primary constituency is the media. They love that prick for some reason.
PM
No. I am saying that given his record no Joe Lieberman should be FBI Director. pl
If Trump picks Lieberman for the FBI director then he deserves to be impeached. Its hard to feel sorry for a guy who keeps surrounding himself with venous snakes. Trump is either stupid or a closet Neocon. I am getting close to jumping off the Trump train for good. Its getting tiring watching this shit show.
Trump’s appointment should reflect his willingness to fight back against the coup plotters.
For starters: He should appoint Eliot Spitzer as new director of the FBI and turn him loose on Wall Street.
I can almost hear the banksters howling already!
Trump needs to abandon the idea that these people can be appeased or reasoned with. If he wants to keep his job he’s going to have to lock horns with these deep state miscreants and show them who’s boss.
Spitzer is a good place to start, it’ll put the fear of god in them quick. Guaranteed!
He seems like a perfect choice for Trump, no experience in the position he will hold.
D—A WHOLE LOT of Democrats don’t trust Lieberman. He is a total opportunist…and, yes, he is too old and he has no ability to “lead” an organization like the FBI. Just another really bad judgement call by Mr. Trump.
This is a bizarre choice. Competence and ability appears to not even be a consideration.
Steve
Joe Lieberman was a registered agent of Libya–no problem!
Mike Flynn was a registered agent of Turkey–treason!
Of course there’s nothing wrong with registering as such, just noting the bias.
I guess they can’t find an American for the Job.
Tom,
not only ´get out of jail cards´ would be flying around, but a lot of new appointments as moles for AIPAC would be installed, and a lot of people who do not seem to be pro-Israel would be sacked, a soviet style “tshistka” (cleaning) of staff would happen, a calamity for generations to come. Complete control of the internal security by a foreign power.
Lieberman, we know is a close body of McCain and office wife, they are known as three amigos, McCain is strongly anti Trump, Trump campaign and possibly himself are under investigation for possible Russian connection. One wonders who’s shoving up this president’s behind with a body of his enemy as his chief of federal police. Does he understand what is he doing?
IMO Mr. Lieberman is more loyal to Israel first, APAC second, thirdly he will be loyal to US as long as US will guarantee security for his first two loyalties. Now days many American Jewish politicians have the same preference.
Joe also didn’t support an investigation of the New Orleans flooding at and after Katrina. Ponder that too.
Appointing Lieberman to direct the FBI might be intended to destroy the FBI from above and within, just as appointing Pruitt to head the EPA might be intended to destroy the EPA from above and within. It might be in line with Bannon’s goal of destroying much of the apparatus of government through appointing saboteurs and arsonists to direct each department which Bannon would like to see destroyed.
The temperature in hell has a long way to go before Spitzer gets the job.
All interested parties on the potential nomination’
Trump does not seem able to keep his mouth shut: http://tinyurl.com/ksy6vgp
The headline: “Trump Told Russians That Firing ‘Nut Job’ Comey Eased Pressure From Investigation”.
Is this potential nominee his tweet meant to ease his way through the visit to Israel?
As they say, DUAL loyalty would be an improvement.
Add Betsy Devoss and Jared Kushner to the list of destroyers.
A perfect reply to the J-Wall St-Comey memo chorus line too, that would be…wonder what Charles Ortel would make of that suggestion, too!?
Oligarchs have been successfully using divide and conquer M.O. for years….now demigods fight amongst themselves, given that the public is already bankrupt after their mass cannibalization leaving only the carcass (barely) intact.
Russia hysteria is an oligarchy schism, imo.
Maybe JL was DT’s public way of complimenting Rothschilds on Macron installation.
DC,
There are already plenty of saboteurs inside DOJ. Scrolling through the faceborg feed of mine I’ve seen quite a few folks in Detroit’s federal prosecutors office gleeful of pending impeachment of Trump to be followed by criminal charges for him and others in the white house. They didn’t have any such concern a year ago when Hilary’s email server issue or the tarmac meeting with AG Lynch happened. They are loyal to a political party not the Republic.
I contacted both my Florida senators and urged them to reject Joe Lieberman as director of the FBI. I also urged them to only consider anybody who had extensive experience with administration and law enforcement and avoid anyone with a political background. I hope they are paying attention.
lars
Good. I hoped you would all do the same. pl
So you trust NYT ?
Because ” an American official ” (?) gave them a ” document summarizing the meeting “?
What a joke !
A lot of FBI agents thought Comey was a nut job.
I wonder what proportion of the media’s sources exist and how many are just fabrications. Either way the Trump administration should ignore them as I do.
I would be amazed if Lieberman were appointed, sounds like a zionist media promotion campaign.
At risk of sounding like a conspiracy theorist is it not possible that Lieberman’s potential appointment is related to the Mueller investigation. The investigation has ‘identified a current White House official as a significant person of interest’. The Independent recently revealed this person to be Jared Kushner, who, according to numerous reports, was behind the firing of Comey.
The following article explores the reasons for this and the potential knee-capping of the investigation:
The Kushner-Comey Connection
https://www.emptywheel.net/2017/05/19/the-kushner-comey-connection/
“And Rod Rosenstein, the survivor, just picked a partner from the firm of Kushner and Ivanka’s lawyer Jamie Gorelick, Robert Mueller, to take over the investigation into Flynn.
Update: Sure enough, Reuters is reporting that Mueller, by design, may not be able to investigate Kushner or Paul Manafort.
From Reuters:
Within hours of Mueller’s appointment on Wednesday, the White House began reviewing the Code of Federal Regulations, which restricts newly hired government lawyers from investigating their prior law firm’s clients for one year after their hiring, the sources said.
An executive order signed by Trump in January extended that period to two years.
Mueller’s former law firm, WilmerHale, represents Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, who met with a Russian bank executive in December, and the president’s former campaign manager Paul Manafort, who is a subject of a federal investigation.
Legal experts said the ethics rule can be waived by the Justice Department, which appointed Mueller. He did not represent Kushner or Manafort directly at his former law firm.
If the department did not grant a waiver, Mueller would be barred from investigating Kushner or Manafort, and this could greatly diminish the scope of the probe, experts said.”
Should this fail to shut down the investigation, would not Lieberman, as FBI director, be in a position to influence and possibly direct the course of the investigation? He and Kushner are, after all, ‘fellow travellers’ so to speak. Both have an affinity for Chabad as well as having strong ties to Tel Aviv.
Plantman,
Love it. I haven’t forgotten his purchasing of services was exposed on the heels of investgating some on Wall Street.
I have read it posited that Mueller will, he has asked already, shut down the open congressional investigations thus killing the media feeding frenzy. That Mueller will have the authority to shut down any leaks of the investigations and that he is empowered to investigate all elements, which would include Democrat leakers, Obama spying etc. Is this a legitimate interpretation or wishful thinking?
I have a lot of respect for Marcy Wheeler, but how exactly did the Russian Vnesheconombank make it onto the US sanctioned banks list?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vnesheconombank
In July 2014 the United States Department of the Treasury imposed sanctions that prohibit U.S. persons from providing new financing to VEB after the 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine.[10]
OK, I do not understand VEB. Maybe I do if I look up the linked document:
https://www.treasury.gov/press-center/press-releases/Pages/jl2572.aspx
And there is evidence that the Bank was what exactly in that context? Having links into the region or sponsoring whatever type of resistance?
OK, I’ll take a closer look. Maybe you should too?
On the matter of FBI investigations and memos, a while back I briefly saw a congressman on television who seemed surprisingly stout, since almost all members of the U.S. Congress have spines made of yellow jello.
Jim Jordan is a Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Ohio. He participated in high school wrestling, and had a won-loss record of 150-1. He attended college at the University of Wisconsin, and competed in wrestling in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division 1, which is “major college” sports, as in the March Madness college basketball playoffs. He won the national wrestling championship two years in his weight class. He got a master’s degree in Education at Ohio State University, where he also was an assistant wrestling coach. He went to law school.
He ran for and won election to the Ohio house of representatives where he was from 1994-2000. He then was elected to the Ohio senate from 2000-2006. He was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2006 and started there in 2007, winning election five times.
http://www.wwca.org/page/show/1507318-jim-jordan
You can see a pattern developing.
Here is Jim Jordan, in the red uniform, winning the 1985 NCAA Division 1 wrestling championship in the 134-pound weight class–
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4erlbp21RXg
Around 28 years later, in 2013, Jordan took down not another wrestler, but FBI Director Robert Mueller, who was appearing before the House Judiciary Committee–
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-X76FP0PaM
Then, the other day, he cut through the usual loaded questions from Wolf Blitzer of CNN about the appointment of Mueller as “special counsel” to look into the issue of the Trump campaign and Russia, and the memo to the file by now former FBI Director James Comey about a meeting he had with president Trump. Jordan, among other things, wants to see the whole memo to the file and others Comey wrote on other issues–
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5GBfVvUsRA
Jordan was one of the founders of the Freedom Caucus of about 30 members of the U.S. House of Representatives. When the Trump administration was trying to push through the first revision of the Obama Care / Un-Affordable Care Act, it was being stymied by the Freedom Caucus. Trump them publicly attacked the Freedom Caucus. A word in the wind was that Jordan was too tough and too pricipled to be broken, and so Trump was trying to split off some of the members of the caucus to get the votes to pass the legislation, but failed, and he and House Speaker Paul Ryan pulled the bill away from a vote at the last minute.
Former FBI Dir. James Comey has agreed to appear after Memorial Day (29 May) before the U.S. Senate “intelligence” committee, or, as they are called, the “select” committee on intelligence–
http://journalgazette.net/news/politics/20170520/comey-to-testify-publicly-in-senate
Comey is lucky he is appearing before the senate committee and not the House Judiciary or Oversight and Government Reform committees. Jim Jordan might have a few specific questions for him.
“Lucopter” – a “closet neocon”?
Many of us looking on from afar had hoped that the Trump upheaval would presage an end to the mayhem in Syria and the ME. That wasn’t just some abstract foreign policy aim tacked on to whatever domestic policies we happened to like. A lot of people are getting killed or having their lives wrecked as a direct result of Western foreign policy. The argument that they spend their time murdering each other anyway loses its force when we consider that our covert or indirect support for the Jihadis, in pursuit of whatever convoluted foreign policy aims we’ve got in our heads at present, has upped the murder rate appallingly.
When you consider how long we’ve been at the intervention game in the ME, and how little hope of let up there is, then that rate is, without exaggeration, approaching Holocaust proportions. It was no naive or foolishly idealistic hope to think that the election of an American President seemingly opposed to such interventions would at least reduce that pile of bodies in the future.
Since then that hope’s been getting frayed. Khan Shaykhun and the sequel was a nasty jolt for those who’d stayed with it that far. TTG’s assessment a couple of articles lower down on this site was definitely not promising and was followed by this TTG comment “Now I have little doubt we plan on staying in this area permanently to seek the dissolution of the SAR”. That’s not a final dismissal of the hope, maybe, but it’s not looking as good as it was. And now a committed neocon is under consideration for high office in the American Administration.
So where are we now? The fact that Trump didn’t come out fighting immediately after the inauguration was a bit of a damper. Apologists are still trying to argue that it’s all tactics – that the neocon forces in Washington are immensely strong still and that Trump is boxing clever. He’s doing a reculer pour mieux sauter. We can see the retreat component of that strategy clearly enough from here, but even Americans in the midst of it all are struggling to see any sauter. Even the vivandieres are losing their sparkle – the Anne Coulter of today is not the Anne Coulter of the “America needs a little me time” euphoria of yesterday. The “closet neocon” thesis looks more likely than it did.
But there are a hell of a lot of people on that train you’re thinking of leaving and there don’t seem to be any other trains scheduled at present. That’s something to bear in mind even if the driver’s currently slumped over the controls. Maybe it’s not time to jump off quite yet?
D,
What is most interesting about that is how the Inner Party Democrats responded to Lieberman losing the Senator nominee-wannabe
Dem Primary in Connecticut. Here is a link to that story.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5629128
Lamont won that primary. He was the Official Democratic candidate for Senator for Connecticut. You would think the DemParty would have therefor supported Lamont. You would have been proven wrong.
The Inner Party Clintocrats all supported the newly-reminted-as-an-Independent Lieberman against the Democratic-voter-base-chosen candidate Lamont of their own party. This was another
clue to the clue-resistant base that the Clintonites were evil alien enemies in possession of their Democratic Party.
The same Clintonite filth which wants to annul and reverse the Trump election is the same Clintonite filth which Lieberman was a key member of, and the same Clintonite filth which wants to Clintonize the FBI by injecting one of its Clintonite agents into the FBI for actions against Trump.
That Trump is too stupid to understand this indicates that Trump is deeply deeply stupid. Pray the Sanderists are still bitter enough and filled with enough hatred in their hearts that they all seek revenge on Lieberman the Clintonite by agitating against his getting the FBI Directorship.
Fred,
But probably very few of these saboteurs are within the FBI itself. And making Lieberman the FBI Director would permit bringing a whole new raft of saboteurs into the FBI itself, as well as sticking spokes into every wheel the FBI has . . . if Lieberman can get away with it. So there is still good reason to oppose the Lieberman appointment.
As to the loyalty of people in the Detroit federal prosecutor’s office, I suspect its even worse and narrower than what you see. They are loyal to the Clinton Crime Family in particular and not even the Democratic Party as such in general.
pantaraxia,
I did not know all this about Mueller’s private-job connections to Trump-connected people. The more I learn, the more byzantinely impenetrable this all begins to seem. I wonder if all the various players themselves can fully keep track of all their various stacked and layered conspiracies within conspiracies within conspiracies.
Regardless, Lieberman should be prevented from getting the Directorship.
English Outsider
I said that Sonny Boy needs to go. MAKE IT HAPPEN!!
http://phibetaiota.net/2017/05/special-jared-kushner-working-for-israel-to-enable-saudi-arabian-nuclear-attack-against-iran/
DC,
That’s what happens when you don’t rig the primary. Hillary, with Donna Brazile and Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s help, made sure that didn’t happen in 2016. Voters? Who cares about them?
I am a Jew and a Democrat and from Connecticut. Joe is a has been, political figure, and supported the election of Trump…we do not need to drag this born again Republican, with his political baggage, to head the FBI…ps: you say AIPAC is illegal. How so?
fred
You are not the “fred” who is a guest author here. Use another name or I will ban you. 1. AIPAC is an un-registered illegal lobby of Israel. It was formed when the USG long ago demanded that the US Zionist Alliance or whatever it was called must register under FARA. Same people, same job. The FBI has been thwarted ever since by AIPAC’s political influence in ALL administrations. 2. AIPAC illegally controls the money and actions of many actual PACs acting on behalf of Israel. pl