Badlands News Brief
Russia Collusion is Back ... Unlike Biden's Memories
The News Cycle is almost impossible to track these days. At least, to do so fully.
That’s where we come in.
In the Badlands News Brief, the Badlands Media team hand pick news items of interest from the previous days to give you an overview of the biggest goings-on relevant to the Truth Community.
Many items feature original (and subjective) commentary. Feel free to follow the corresponding link to see our writers’ Substack accounts and check out their other work.
Now, onto the news from Tuesday, February 13 …
CIA Had Foreign Allies Spy On Trump Team, Triggering Russia Collusion Hoax, Sources Say
Last year, John Durham, a special prosecutor for the Department of Justice (DOJ), concluded that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) should never have opened its investigation of alleged collusion by then-presidential candidate Donald J. Trump and Russia in late July of 2016.
Now, multiple credible sources tell Public and Racket that the United States Intelligence Community (IC), including the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), illegally mobilized foreign intelligence agencies to target Trump advisors long before the summer of 2016.
The new information fills many gaps in our understanding of the Russia collusion hoax and is supported by testimony already in the public record.
Until now, the official story has been that the FBI’s investigation began after Australian intelligence officials told US officials that a Trump aide had boasted to an Australian diplomat that Russia had damning material about Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.
In truth, the US IC asked the “Five Eyes” intelligence alliance to surveil Trump’s associates and share the intelligence they acquired with US agencies, say sources close to a House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HSPCI) investigation. The Five Eyes nations are the US, UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. — Public
Our Take: “Some of the best double takes we can do as Anons and citizen journalists and researchers are the sort that make us simultaneously wonder if we’ve traveled back in time while also inducing the sort of eye roll inherent in realizing that a ‘conspiracy theory’ this community has been discussing in excruciating detail for more than a decade (literally,) is now being massaged into the Collective Mind via ‘breaking news.’
That said, once you get past the requisite annoyance at just how far behind the central narrative is to the truth (at least, as close to it as we’ve been able to get,) the prospect that the Russia Collusion Hoax is re-entering the War of Stories in the meat of the 2024 election cycle—replete with seeding about Trump declassifications and more—gets a lot less annoying and a lot more tantalizing.
The Russia Collusion Hoax was a massive wake-up for many in the modern Truth Community … if we get more evidentiary Actuals on the table, imagine how many more awakening minds will begin to join our ranks as the establishment continues to give them reasons to look for a cognitive exit strategy from previously-held beliefs.” —
How Biden botched the border
Aboard Air Force One en route to tour the southern border in January 2023, President Biden sat at the head of his conference table and exploded with fury.
The president lit into his team, which included then-Deputy Chief of Staff Jen O'Malley Dillon, Homeland Security adviser Liz Sherwood-Randall and other immigration officials. He demanded obscure immigration data points — and vented when his staff didn't have them handy.
Why it matters: The previously unreported meeting, recounted to Axios by three people familiar with the events, is emblematic of the Biden administration's struggle with the border crisis during the past three years — infighting, blame-shifting and indecision.
Biden's fury subsided, and aides scrambled for the information he wanted. People in the meeting later told others in frustration that his winding process and irritability were making it more difficult to reach decisions about the border.
The White House counters that the meeting was "productive." Spokesperson Andrew Bates told Axios that "multiple firsthand participants of the meeting refute this description of the tone and outcome" of a conversation on "the specifics of this complex issue."
The rolling chaos along the border has grown to the point that Biden now is embracing immigration policies he ran against in 2020 — such as restricting asylum laws and suggesting he'll "shut down" the border — as the crisis threatens his re-election. — Axios
Our Take: “Are they setting up Susan Rice to be President in 2025? Hear me out.
When you hear, ‘The previously unreported meeting, recounted to Axios by three people familiar with the events,’ you know you’re receiving a narrative deployment.
Why was it unreported? Why is it being reported now? Why are the sources anonymous? There is something they want us to know, now, and it’s found in the second half of the sentence:
‘… is emblematic of the Biden administration's struggle with the border crisis during the past three years — infighting, blame-shifting and indecision.’
Oh my. The regime wants us to know that Biden’s administration is struggling and divided over the border crisis, and has been since the beginning of his presidency. So we’ve established what they want us to know, but why do they want us to know it? It’s definitely not because they started being journalists.
Buried deep in the article is a possibility:
‘The tension between Rice and Harris had origins in the summer of 2020, when both were being vetted for vice president.’
The Biden administration is deeply unpopular, but they maintain that Biden is the guy and will be the nominee. Maybe the play is to swap out the VP.
Rice can swoop in with a ‘strong approach’ on the border, Harris is given some respectful reason for leaving, and the campaign can pump up Rice‘s addition as a return to the Obama administration.
Say Biden/Rice get elected, and all of a sudden, the VP and a majority of the cabinet 25A Biden. In comes President Rice. It’s a lot to base on a single Axios article, but it’s a realistic and achievable plan for the next phase of Obama’s shadow presidency.” —
House Republicans impeach Homeland Security Secretary Mayorkas in historic, controversial vote
The Republican-led House on Tuesday night narrowly impeached Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas over what they claim is his failure to enforce border laws amid a "crisis" of high illegal immigration, which he denies as "baseless."
The historic move -- only the second Cabinet impeachment since the country's founding, after William Belknap in 1876 -- has been criticized by some Republicans and many Democrats as based on policy disagreements, not allegations of specific crimes. Conservatives have also sought to paint Mayorkas as incompetent.
The impeachment articles are expected to be rejected by the Senate's Democratic majority.
The House GOP tried and failed last week to impeach Mayorkas on the same accusations.
In a statement after Tuesday's vote, Speaker Mike Johnson blamed Mayorkas for "fueling the worst border catastrophe in American history."
"[He] deserves to be impeached, and Congress has a constitutional obligation to do so," Johnson said. "Next to a declaration of war, impeachment is arguably the most serious authority given to the House and we have treated this matter accordingly." — ABC News
Our Take: “If the above report by Axios is the shot, consider Mayorkas’ impeachment the chaser.
The border fiasco has been an albatross around the collectivist neck of the Biden admin since the 2020 televised debates, in which Trump baited his senile opponent into not just challenging the prospect of a strong sovereign border, but to openly deride the notion, going so far as to compel illegals to ‘surge’ to that very place during his coming tenure.
Of course, a ‘patriots in control’ mindset might lead one to believe all of these perfectly-seeded Narratives resulting in extreme Narrative Whiplash in a Crisis Cascade on the doorstep of the 2024 election is a BIT more than coincidence, but any way you slice it, the establishment has two unenviable choices in front of them as the collapse accelerates:
Get Biden out of the White House.
Go down with the ship.
No matter what they choose, I don’t think this is the way they drew it up.” —
Tony Bobulinski Puts President at Center of Foreign Influence-Peddling Scheme: ‘Biden Family Business Was Joe Biden, Period’
Former Biden business associate Tony Bobulinski claimed that Joe Biden was at the center of the Biden family’s shady overseas business dealings in his testimony before Congress on Tuesday.
Testifying behind closed doors before the House Oversight and Judiciary Committees, Bobulinski argued in his opening statement that the president was not only aware of the influence-peddling operation being conducted by his son Hunter and his brother James while he was vice president, but that he actively enabled the lucrative scheme.
“It is clear to me that Joe Biden was ‘the Brand’ being sold by the Biden family,” Bobulinski said in his opening statement, which was obtained by National Review. Bobulinski’s statement echoes the July testimony of former Hunter Biden associate Devon Archer. Archer and Hunter Biden were both board members of Ukrainian energy firm Burisma Holdings and once had a close relationship.
“His family’s foreign influence peddling operation — from China to Ukraine and elsewhere — sold out to foreign actors who were seeking to gain influence and access to Joe Biden and the United States government. Joe Biden was more than a participant in and beneficiary of his family’s business; he was an enabler, despite being buffered by a complex scheme to maintain plausible deniability,” Bobulinski added. — The National Review
Our Take: “It’s important to understand the self serving (Luciferian) mindset that dominates within the circles that make up the deep state.
While the bloodlines and organizations that make up their core operational efforts represent incredible coordination and collaboration, the service to self focal point is fully operational on the individual level at all times.
Biden’s collaborations with others in this shadowy group were only possible when it served to further his personal criminal initiatives, which is why we need to contrast Bobulinski’s depiction of Biden at the centre of these international crime operations with Biden’s current declining state of being.
When Biden was a coherent, functioning human, he was a high-level criminal.
These were complex forms of organized crime. Biden would have needed to be an intelligent human being to ‘be at the core’ of the Biden criminal enterprise.
Today his own DOJ claims his memory is so degraded that a court wouldn’t be able to convict him of willfully committing any crimes. His usefulness to the Deep State has changed to the extent that he was targeted for a new role. Now that he is incapacitated, he is being publicly sacrificed. He’s being drugged up and paraded around in a very sick scheme to overtake America.
For those of us who know the true nature of this enemy, the arc of Biden’s rise to power as a criminal, and his subsequent fall as a fake president, may just be symbolic of the self serving psychosis that will likely play a role in the downfall of the deep state itself.
How many of their own are they willing to sacrifice to protect their plan?” —
Get Used to It: Biden Isn’t Going Anywhere
The Republican refrain goes something like this: Democrats know Joe Biden can’t win in November and they — it’s always “they” — are going to replace him on top of the ticket.
Anyone around politics has heard it — and the assured predictions have reached a crescendo following the release of the special counsel’s report on Biden and the 2x4 to the head therein.
On Sunday even Nikki Haley, ostensibly the GOP’s Team Normal candidate for president, put down her cash at the window. “My bet is 30 days from now, I don’t think Joe Biden is going to be the nominee,” Haley told supporters.
She and other Republicans are about to look as bad as those who took the 49ers.
In the spirit of helping the GOP understand their Democratic counterparts, and to avoid any more bad bets, I’ve put together a primer for Republicans on why Biden will be his party’s standard bearer once more. I’ve also tried to get my arms around why one of the country’s two major parties continues deluding themselves even as Biden runs and Democrats stand with him. — Politico
Our Take: “What a delightful headline yesterday morning out of one of the key Narrative-setters in the political War of Stories.
In recent days, I've been commenting on the hand-wringing much of the MAGA base has been doing regarding the prospect that the Deep State could be looking to replace Joe Biden via the 25th Amendment route, specifically putting forth the Bicameral argument that they're screwed either way:
Replace Biden with someone worse and accelerate the mass psychological destruction of the Democratic party and the establishment media that propped him up on marionette strings; close ranks around him, and go down with the sinking ship as he continues to set legal and psychological precedents that will only help Trump going forward.
Now, the smarter voices within the Media Industrial Complex are guessing the game.
Do they know Biden is protected (just not by who you think,) and that they're stuck with him?
Is Biden 'our boy' in more ways than one?
Comfy cozy.” —
Biden's Upcoming Physical Exam Won't Include Cognitive Test: White House
Following a damning DOJ report which concluded that President Joe Biden is too senile to face charges for mishandling classified information, one might think that proving Biden's cognitive abilities are of paramount importance.
[…]
The DOJ report, released by special counsel Robert Hur, revealed that Biden couldn't remember basic facts about his own life and career, such as "when he was vice president." Biden also "did not remember, even within several years, when his son Beau died."
Doctors have called for a test
"Something isn’t right, and even if it’s minor, it must be explained to the public," Dr. Stuart Fischer, a primary care physician at a nursing home in the Bronx, told The NY Post.
"The horse is out of the barn. Not only does [Biden] have an infirmity of some degree, but he has delayed producing objective evidence," he added.
Yet, no test for Biden...
On Monday, the White House confirmed that Biden won't receive a cognitive test in his upcoming physical, as White House doctor Kevin O'Connor says he believes Biden proves his cognitive ability "every day [in] how he operates and how he thinks," according to White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre. — ZeroHedge
Our Take: “It’s hard to criticize the idea that we are ‘watching a movie’ when things like this happen. The Biden narrative has turned into ‘old man screams at sky.’ The emperor is naked, the tail is wagging the dog, and the White House refuses to acknowledge objective reality. Everyone can see it. Even normies are scratching their heads.
Day after day, the White House Press Secretary and some variation of a white dude authority — John Kirby, Ian Sams, Jake Sullivan, etc. — gaslight the press, who regurgi-gaslight the American people — that Joe Biden is a vibrant, commanding global leader. There is no evidence of this. All the evidence points to debilitating dementia and loss of basic bodily functions. Everyone in that briefing room plays along because they want to keep their seats.
Of course, these are the same people that tell us we want the Biden agenda and that the economy is good. Last week, Janet Yellen had the nerve to say that they don’t need to focus on lowering prices because wages are rising. From the messaging on Biden’s brain and broken borders to the equity economy and foreign fraud/aid, every narrative from the Executive Branch of the federal government is the opposite of truth.
This is reality collapse stuff.
This current moment is unsustainable. I expect there will be some sort of shake up soon.” —
Putin's suggestion of Ukraine ceasefire rejected by United States, sources say
Russian President Vladimir Putin's suggestion of a ceasefire in Ukraine to freeze the war was rejected by the United States after contacts between intermediaries, three Russian sources with knowledge of the discussions told Reuters.
The failure of Putin's approach ushers in a third year of the deadliest conflict in Europe since World War Two and illustrates just how far apart the world's two largest nuclear powers remain.
A U.S. source denied there had been any official contact and said Washington would not engage in talks that did not involve Ukraine.
Putin sent signals to Washington in 2023 in public and privately through intermediaries, including through Moscow's Arab partners in the Middle East and others, that he was ready to consider a ceasefire in Ukraine, the Russian sources said.
Putin was proposing to freeze the conflict at the current lines and was unwilling to cede any of the Ukrainian territory controlled by Russia, but the signal offered what some in the Kremlin saw as the best path towards a peace of some kind. — Reuters
Our Take: “So, let me get this straight:
Vladimir Putin conducts an interview with Tucker Carlson (and yes, that framing is intentional,) in which he claims the Western Hegemon have directly prevented peace talks with Ukraine from progressing, a claim the Global South and East have fully endorsed for two years, while the US rejects the claims without allowing Ukrainian leadership to comment on them?
Additionally, while ‘three Russian sources’ cited in the piece claim the above, the ‘one US source’ denies it, saying nobody from Ukraine has officially been involved in the peace talks, and they would not engage otherwise. Of course, they don't say that the Western Hegemon have been the ones preventing Ukraine from doing that very thing.
The Ukraine underdog Narrative is out of steam, while the Proxy War Narrative heats up as the Biden Admin spirals, so, as Russia continues to put its diplomatic money where its mouth is, how much longer before the MSM turns on the (Deep) State Department?” —
BONUS ITEMS
Air Force unveils command changes, wing plans in bid to outpace China
The Air Force said Monday it will create a new forward-looking capabilities planning command, refocus its training enterprise, and rethink how airmen deploy as part of a set of 24 initiatives designed to reorient the service to outpace China’s military ambitions and prevail in future conflicts.
The Air Force and Space Force’s top civilian and uniformed leaders unveiled the sweeping slate of plans at the Air and Space Forces Association’s Air Warfare Symposium here following a monthslong, department-wide review that began in the fall. Its results comprise one of the most significant reorganizations since the end of the Cold War.
Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said the goal is to prove the Department of the Air Force’s competitive resolve to U.S. adversaries — particularly Russia and China — and to execute those plans with urgency.
“We can no longer regard conflict as a distant possibility or a future problem that we might have to confront,” Kendall said. “The risk of conflict is here now, and that risk will increase with time.” — Air Force Times
U.S. Senate Passes $95 Billion Military Aid Package for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan After Rare All-Night Session
The Senate early Tuesday passed a $95.3 billion aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, pushing ahead after months of difficult negotiations and amid growing political divisions in the Republican Party over the role of the United States abroad.
The vote came after a small group of Republicans opposed to the $60 billion for Ukraine held the Senate floor through the night, using the final hours of debate to argue that the U.S. should focus on its own problems before sending more money overseas. But 22 Republicans voted with nearly all Democrats to pass the package 70-29, with supporters arguing that abandoning Ukraine could embolden Russian President Vladimir Putin and threaten national security across the globe.
“With this bill, the Senate declares that American leadership will not waiver, will not falter, will not fail,” said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, who worked closely with Republican Leader Mitch McConnell on the legislation.
The bill’s passage through the Senate was a welcome sign for Ukraine amid critical shortages on the battlefield.
Yet the package faces a deeply uncertain future in the House, where hardline Republicans aligned with former President Donald Trump — the front-runner for the GOP presidential nomination, and a critic of support for Ukraine — oppose the legislation. — TIME
House GOP in discussions with Biden special counsel Robert Hur for testimony
House Republicans have reached out to special counsel Robert Hur to discuss having him testify in front of the House Judiciary Committee about his report on President Joe Biden’s handling of classified documents, according to three sources with direct knowledge of the matter.
Hur’s report released last week did not charge the president with a crime, but it painted a picture of a forgetful commander in chief who failed to properly protect highly sensitive classified information – a depiction that could hurt Biden politically and that Republicans have seized on.
Hur has retained Bill Burck as his personal attorney. While there is no date on the calendar, they are looking toward the end of February, one of the sources told CNN. The Justice Department declined to comment. — CNN
We hope you enjoyed this brief look back at the major news items you might have missed in this ever-escalating and ever-accelerating news cycle as the Information War continues to rage on around us.
As always, if you have any thoughts on these news items or the MANY others swirling in the digital ether, drop into the comments below to share them with your fellow Badlanders.
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Before assuming Biden has suddenly lost his apparently considerable skills as a successful criminal (for decades) we would do well to consider the career of Vinnie Gigante, who evaded prosecution for 30 years by faking dementia in public while masterminding the NYC Mafia. Look for "The Oddfather."
Concerning the Passing of the Bill in the Senate that will fund Ukraine into the indefinite future that the Uniparty tried to pass on Super Bowl Weekend and in the dark of night so they could set the impeachment trap for Trump's next administration.
Everyone is losing their minds over Sen. Grassley, Cornyn, and Kennedy voting to make sure this Bill passed the Senate.
Think about it, if these Senators had not voted YES for this Bill then it would have failed, and we would never have learned about the impeachment trap hidden inside.
I think these Senators did like Trump and took some arrows for the team to make sure the Uniparty could not try and successfully sneak this impeachment trap into another Bill that is so well hidden we won't see it until it's too late.
I am not ready to toss Sen Grassley, Cornyn and Kennedy away just yet, I believe they still have very important roles to play in the future.