Leaking Taps And Meltdowns

AND THE LATITUDE PHEASANTS ARE REVOLTING: ‘Reindeer rebellion’ in central Finland.

Mr. Market Has a Meltdown

Musing on the market swan dive yesterday.

OOPS: Somebody Just Leaked Every Phone Number and Address on Anthony Weiner’s Laptop: 639 Politicians and Media Personalities Doxxed.
... And here’s a direct link to the leak

CULTURE OF CORRUPTION, NASHVILLE EDITION: Mayor Megan Barry recommended city job for daughter of officer with whom she had affair.“The position as an entry-level city attorney was the first newly created job in Nashville’s legal department in two years. It was not part of the existing budget. Barry approved the new job opening. No other candidate was considered.”

YOUR GOVERNMENT AT WORK: Adam Schiff sent his staff to try and collect ‘classified materials for the FBI’ after Russian pranksters told him Putin has NAKED blackmail pictures of Trump.

DailyMail.com can disclose that after the prank, his staff engaged in correspondence with what they thought was a Ukrainian politician to try to obtain the ‘classified’ material promised on the call.

On an audio recording of the prank call posted online, Adam Schiff can be heard discussing the committee’s Russia investigation and increasingly bizarre allegations about Trump with a man who claimed to be Andriy Parubiy, the chairman of the Ukrainian Parliament. 

The call, made a year ago, was actually from two Russian comedians nicknamed ‘Vovan’ and ‘Lexus’ who have become notorious for their phony calls to high-ranking American officials and celebrities, including UN Ambassador Nikki Haley and Elton John.

Its existence was first reported by The Atlantic but not how a staff member working for the minority on the House Intelligence Committee pursued the information after the call.

Schiff’s office said the congressman suspected the call was ‘bogus’ from the beginning and reported it to authorities afterward.

But in a recording of the eight minute conversation, Schiff appeared to take the call seriously – or at least played along convincingly – and emails from the Democrat’s staff to the fake politician afterwards said he had found it ‘productive’.

Media Guru JC, call your office.

HMM: Russia’s retaliation for downed jet has just begun.

The downing didn’t make many headlines in the US, but the results might:

Franz Klintsevich, the first deputy chair of the Russian Senate Defense and Security Committee, didn’t mince words, saying he was “absolutely positive” the MANPADS, or man-portable air-defense systems, “had been supplied to the terrorists by the United States via third countries.” Also, he said, Western countries may be trying to provoke certain reactions.

“Today, we are undergoing a very complicated process, and provocations” are a useful tool. “The situation in the area is under Turkey’s control and [the downing of the jet] could have served to exacerbate the Russian-Turkish disagreements. I think Western intelligence services [also damaged] our further relations with the United States,” said Klintsevich, a hard-liner and a staunch critic of the United States.

“Our Defense Ministry is now conducting a serious investigation to find out who was behind this attack,” he said. “But in this complex configuration of military actions, the role of American intelligence is becoming clear. They want to discredit our work on the fight against terrorists, and such provocations will continue.”

This view is in line with earlier Russian statements regarding chemical attacks in Syria and possible US military action against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. There’s a firm belief in Moscow that Washington has been seeking to derail Russian political initiatives. A recent Russian Foreign Ministry press release said, “The US’ stubborn desire to enact in Syria the scenario previously applied in the former Yugoslavia, Iraq and Libya is glaringly obvious.”

Whoever shot down and killed Russian Maj. Roman Filippov and however they did it, Moscow is making anti-US hay out of it.