Bannon defied the House Intelligence Committee today as he refused to answer questions related to Russia that took place after Trump's election. Bannon cited "executive privilege" which is a pretty grey area I think considering his position. I wonder if he is hiding something or maybe he just hates the committee. Either way I find his contempt amusing. Let's see how cooperative he is with Mueller...

Did collusion we confirm yet plz?

KK tks.

Full Glenn Simpson testimony:
http://archive.is/GT2BA

The interesting bit that I immediately skipped to was the questioning on whether Christopher Steele was indeed paying his sources:



So yes, Steele paid his intermediaries for sure, and his intermediaries may or may not have paid their sources on an ad hoc basis. Simpson had a pretty clear self-interest to dodge around the question, and wanted to deny that sources were paid directly, but the money trail is still the same if Steele is paying Russian intermediaries who are themselves foreign actors, and may in turn be paying state actors.
That provides a money trail and information in return of:

DNC + Hillary campaign + Obama campaign -> Perkins Coie -> Fusion GPS -> Christopher Steele -> Russian intermediaries ~~ Russian sources
Money went down that pipeline, information came back up it. Hillary paid Russian agents for oppo on Trump.

I had no idea Obama was running in 2016.

Hillary paid for oppo research on her opponent, which included his foreign business dealings. That would require talking to foreigners. Lol.

What is Trump being accused of, colluding with Russia? We have a money and intel trail showing Hillary/DNC/Obama all paid russian operatives for (bogus) oppo on Trump. That's besides also having proof of colluding with the Ukrainian government directly via its embassy, that one was a doozy
And even you have to recognize how alarming it should be that they hid this money trail from campaign finance oversight by disguising it as millions of $ in ''legal services" to Perkins Coie that was then used to fund Fusion GPS and Crowdstrike. Those are the actions of someone who wants to keep their hands clean of the affair during the election and give themselves plausible deniability. Which only makes sense, given the sensitivity of paying russian sources (or at least, russian intermediaries who then one way or another get intel from those sources). Why weren't they just sending this money directly to Fusion GPS and Crowdstrike themselves? Why pass it through Marc Elias disguised as legal counsel?

But yeah the Obama campaign is an odd quirk, most people don't realize it but his campaign 'organizing for america' / 'obama for america' / 'organizing for action' still existed and rebranded after his 2012 election victory, at which point it was retooled as a political advocacy group in favor of his agenda. Same organization, three names, different structuring each time. It paid $972,000 to Perkins Coie alongside the DNC and Hillary's campaign for the same ostensible 'legal services'.
Specifically:



We know that HFA, DNC and OFA paid millions to Perkins Coie listed a 'legal services', who then in turn paid millions to Fusion GPS, who then in turn paid christopher steele, who then paid russian intermediaries, who may or may not have paid their sources on an ad hoc basis, who then passed information back to the intermediaries, who passed it to steele, who passed it to fusion gps, who passed it to perkins coie who passed it to the DNC/Hillary/Obama and the FBI, who then cited it while obtaining a FISA wiretap warrant on Trump's campaign manager, probably while he was still staying in Trump tower. And other Trump officials.

its so many scandals out of left field I can't even keep them straight

• Disguising campaign payments to Perkins Coie as legal services
  
• Paying Russian state actors and/or active kremlin agents for oppo against Trump
  
• Colluding with the Ukrainian embassy for oppo against Manafort
  
• Wiretapping Trump's campaign via FISA
  
• Citing the DNC manufactured political oppo for the FISA application
  
• Unmasking that FISA intel
  
• Weaponizing and leaking that intel to attack Michael Flynn
  
• Hillary's email scandal's FBI handling
  
• Hillary's JFA giving her total control over the DNC prior to the primaries (via Donna Brazile)
  
• The DNC scheming with HRC to influence the primaries (via leaked emails, I mean its kind of redundant with above but technically scandals happened a year apart)
  
• The media colluding with Hillary's campaign
  
• DNC only letting Crowdstrike see its breached servers, not the FBI
  
• Whatever was going on with Imran Awan and Pakistan

I'm sure I'm missing some

A subcontractor of a subcontractor of a subcontractor talked to someone. Boom, collusion lock her up.

You mean him?

You think that using layers of abstraction to distance themselves from their actions actually shields them from the consequences? That's some mighty magical plausible deniability, if it still remains plausible once its undeniable

Nice list