Day: October 2, 2019

The State Department’s IG Delivers a Package of Conspiracy Theories

We begin with the Inspector General of the State Department briefing three House Committees today and providing documentation which appears to be a pile of the bizarre conspiracy theories and ludicrous allegations behind Trump’s, Giuliani’s, Pompeo’s and Barr’s efforts to slime the Bidens. Meanwhile the Secretary of State Pompeo is closing ranks and forbidding the testimony of a former Ambassador to Ukraine who Trump trashed in his July 25 phone call with Zelensky which Pompeo finally had to admit he was listening in on. Scott Anderson, a fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution and a former U.S. diplomat who was an attorney-advisor to the U.S. Department of State on domestic and international legal issues relating to U.S. foreign policy and national security policy, joins us. We discuss what appears to be rank hypocrisy coming from Pompeo who is accusing the Democratically-controlled House Committees of being bullies when, as a Republican congressman, he relentlessly bullied Secretary Clinton in his jihad against her over the bogus Benghazi conspiracy. But now that the shoe is on the other foot, Pompeo is defending Trump’s absurd “Crowdstrike” conspiracy and is trying to cover up the extent of diplomatic support Trump’s lawyer Giuliani was afforded in pursuit of getting dirt on the Bidens.

Trump’s Escalating War Against the Whistleblower

Then we look into the history of whistleblowers from George Washington’s presidency to Donald Trump’s and speak with Allison Stanger, a professor of International Relations at Middlebury College whose latest book, just out, is “Whistleblowers: Honesty in America from Washington to Trump”. We  discuss Trump’s escalating war against the current whistleblower whose complaint has led to an impeachment inquiry and the president’s incitement against the unnamed individual whose lawyers are concerned Trump is putting their client’s life in danger. Having interviewed top NSA officials and Edward Snowden, Allison argues Snowden is America’s first “traitor-patriot”.

One Year After Khashoggi’s Murder, Has MBS Been Forgiven by Corporate America?

Then finally on the one year anniversary of the murder and dismemberment of the Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, we speak with Hassan Hassan, the Director of the Center for Global Policy and co-author of The New York Times bestseller “ISIS: Inside the Army of Terror”. He joins us to discuss how the big U.S. and global companies who boycotted last year’s “Davos in the Desert” are flocking back to Saudi Arabia as though all is forgiven and the extent to which Trump and Pompeo engaged in a cover up to protect the reckless and arrogant Saudi crown prince who after his oil facilities were shut down, has lost his swagger and is now bowing to Iranian hegemony in the Gulf.