UPDATED: Was Seth Rich Julian Assange's "internal Source" At The DNC?
CTH has a new post up titled: "IMPORTANT – Video Confirms Butowsky Lawsuit Claim: Julian Assange Told Ellen Ratner DNC Emails Received From Seth Rich – Not a Russian Hack…"
This is what we discussed just a week ago in Seth Rich In The News Again . The CTH title is a bit misleading, as I understand this new information. Ellen Ratner does not state that Assange told her that Seth Rich was his DNC source who provided the DNC emails--Assange never identifies his confidential sources. Rather, Ratner does confirm that Assange told her that the DNC emails were not received from the Russians but instead were obtained from a source internal to the DNC . It could have been Seth Rich, but it could have been someone else . OTOH, and in all fairness, it might also have been the case that Assange was lying and that he did receive the emails from the Russians.
But here's the real problem.
Imagine yourself as a Special Counsel, charged with investigating claims that the Trump campaign colluded with "the Russians" to obtain help to win the 2016 presidential election. I key issue in your investigation is the claim--made by the DNC through their contractor, Crowdstrike--that the Russian government "hacked" the DNC server, stole a huge trove of emails, and gave those emails to Assange at Wikileaks. The issue for you is whether Wikileaks was simply a cutout, whether "the Russians" gave those emails to Wikileaks precisely so that Wikileaks could disseminate them publicly to help the Trump campaign. To assess that claim, you need to know:
1) Who actually took those emails?
2) How did the emails got to Wikileaks?
3) Was the Trump campaign involved in some, all, or any of this?
If you, as a Special Counsel, are named Robert Mueller, then you're a very unusual investigator. What makes you so unusual is that the only aspect of this issue that interests you is the third question--you're ready to move heaven and earth to develop some, virtually any , implication that the Trump campaign had knowledge of all this. However, you, as Robert Mueller, don't really seem to care about establishing--like, with real evidence --who "hacked" the DNC and what route the emails took to end up in the possession of Wikileaks. Rather, you're perfectly willing to accept the statements of Crowdstrike, a third party contractor hired by the DNC. And the DNC just might have an interest in suggesting Trump campaign's involvement. If, in fact, it can be established that "the Russians" were not the ones who stole the emails and sent them to Assange, that could drastically change the whole complexion of what happened, but you as Robert Mueller, don't care. You plow ahead, intent on somehow corroborating what the DNC and Crowdstrike have told you. You don't examine the original evidence, such as the DNC server, and you don't listen to recognized authorities who dispute the Crowstrike story. And you certainly don't fly to London to interview Julian Assange, even if he's willing. You fly to London and interview Chris Steele, but not Assange.
What makes this all the more incredible is that Ratner interviewed Assange for three hours on November 5, 2016--a few days before the election but over half a year before Mueller was ever appointed Special Counsel. Nor was this fact hidden. The interview with Ratner in which she recounts her contact with Assange (see below) was conducted on November 9, 2016, the day after the elections. It was uploaded to YouTube from the EmbryRiddleUniv channel on November 14, 2016. It was out there. How could Mueller possibly justify, in such circumstances, not following up on this information? It's not as if he was trying to spare the US taxpayers any expense! How, as a professional who presumably wishes to be taken seriously, can he justify making no effort to establish the basic facts?
For my part, unless someone can offer actual evidence that supports Crowdstrike and the DNC, I'll go with the analysis of professionals like Willian Binney and the statements of Assange. The Mueller inquisition stands revealed as ... a hoax, without a leg to stand on any more.
UPDATE: Paul Sperry's latest important reporting on the Russia Hoax big picture is getting a lot of play on the internet today--deservedly so. I'll be getting to that, but first here's a very nice blog by James Howard Kunstler that appeared today at Zerohedge under the title: Mueller, 'Meddling', & The Routing Of The RussiaGate Narrative . Kunstler's blog works well with Sperry's longer article, in offering a bit of the big picture. While Kunstler, unlike Sperry, doesn't offer us new information he does place current events in perspective. In particular, he highlights the way the twin pillars of "collusion" have toppled. He starts with the Concord Management trial--pointing out that that indictment was, itself, a hoax--and proceeds to Mueller's hoax "investigation" of Russian "hacking" of the DNC. However, he also points out the legal jeopardy that Robert Mueller may now find himself in. I have long wondered about that aspect. Do yourself a favor and follow the link. I was originally going to post an edited version but couldn't find a way to shorten it. However, to whet your appetite:
Just how dead is the RussiaGate story - and how brain-dead are the House Democratic Committee chairmen, Nadler (Judiciary Committee) and Schiff (Intelligence Committee) to haul RussiaGate’s front-man, Robert Mueller back into the spotlight where the next thing to roll over and die will be Mr. Mueller’s evanescent reputation? The entrapment operation that was the Special Counsel’s covert mission has turned out to be Mr. Mueller own personal booby-trap, ...
...
It would be interesting to hear Robert Mueller’s explanation for how come US computer forensic experts were never dispatched to take possession of the DNC servers. Surely a ranking member on either House committee would have to ask him that, along with many other embarrassing questions about the stupendously sloppy and disingenuous work of the Special Counsel’s team. It was only one glaring omission among many.
The whole affair now takes on tragic contours of Shakespearean dimensions. The Attorney General, Mr. Barr, is said to be an “old friend” of Mr. Mueller. They clashed pretty publicly after the release of Mr. Mueller’s long-awaited final report. Mr. Barr must at least be dismayed by the bad faith and deliberate deceit in his old friend’s final report, and he really has to do something about it. The entire Mueller episode smacks of prosecutorial misconduct. In retrospect, it can only be explained as a desperate act undertaken by foolishly overconfident political activists.