Mark Steyn on village and other forms of idiot. It wasn’t Alexander Downer after all.
The Mueller investigation was a conscious sham: an investigation into foreign interference in the 2016 US election created to cover up high-level domestic interference in the 2016 US election. Which is far more serious. Mueller’s report dutifully did its part, asserting belatedly that it was the so-called tip from a friendly ally (ie, Alexander Downer’s g&t with George Papadopoulos in the Kensington Wine Rooms) that led to the unprecedented “counter-intelligence” operation against a major-party candidate in the presidential election.
The ever expanding FBI/DoJ paper trail suggests otherwise. The FISA applications relied on Christopher Steele, and the FBI knew the Steele dossier was a crock even as they laid its garbage before the FISA judge. It’s not just a lack of candor before the tribunal, but outright perjury. Ten days before the Feds obtained their first warrant to spy on the Trump campaign, the Deputy Secretary of State, Kathleen Kavalec, had Steele’s number, and put it in writing:
Kavalec’s handwritten notes clearly flagged in multiple places that Steele might be talking to the media.
“June — reporting started,” she wrote. “NYT and WP have,” she added, in an apparent reference to The New York Times and The Washington Post.
Later she quoted Steele as suggesting he was “managing” four priorities — “Client needs, FBI, WashPo/NYT, source protection,” her handwritten notes show.
Indeed. He was a hopelessly conflicted MI6 guy. But a foreign spook obsessed with Trump was vital to the FBI – because they had nothing else. Perhaps the most pitiful yet damning part of Ms Kavalec’s memo is this:
She quoted Steele as saying, “Payments to those recruited are made out of the Russian Consulate in Miami,” according to a copy of her summary memo obtained under open records litigation by the conservative group Citizens United. Kavalec bluntly debunked that assertion in a bracketed comment: “It is important to note that there is no Russian consulate in Miami.”
We shall have more on this in the days ahead.
Law of Markets 
I always found it odd that on the first revelation of the Steele dossier, the news report was about Steele going into hiding.
“BBC News correspondent Paul Wood said he understood Mr Steele left his home on either Tuesday or Wednesday, before he was publicly named, and was now “in hiding”.
He said he had been told Mr Steele, a father of four, had asked his neighbour to look after his three cats.
Media captionDonald Trump said the information was ‘fake’
Our correspondent said he had been shown the memos about Mr Trump in October last year, when he was told Mr Steele was “in fear of his life”, having spoken out about potential Russian involvement in Mr Trump’s election.”
I really do hope the whole sordid story is opened up.