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bountyofbeads · 5 years

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National Security Council official set to testify in impeachment inquiry is leaving his post

By Carol D. Leonnig, John Hudson and Reis Thebault | Published October 30 at 7:24 PM ET | Washington Post | Posted October 30, 2019 |

Tim Morrison, who is set to testify in the House impeachment inquiry about what he has witnessed as the senior National Security Council official handling Russian affairs, is leaving his White House post, according to people familiar with his plans.

Morrison has been on the job for about 15 months, having joined the security council during John Bolton’s tenure as national security adviser. Morrison could be a key witness in the inquiry into President Trump’s efforts to get Ukraine to investigate his political rivals.

“After more than a year of service at the National Security Council, Mr. Morrison has decided to pursue other opportunities — and has been considering doing so for some time,” a senior administration official said in a statement Wednesday. “We wish him well.”

Morrison’s departure was first reported by NPR.

William B. Taylor Jr., acting ambassador to Ukraine, testified last week that Morrison told him that Gordon Sondland, the U.S. envoy to the European Union, relayed to a top Ukraine aide that the country wouldn’t receive military aid money until the Ukrainian president agreed to pursue an investigation into Joe Biden’s son.

Morrison’s departure from the National Security Council removes an important vestige of Bolton’s tenure in the administration. Bolton handpicked Morrison to join the NSC because of his shared opposition to arms control agreements, which both men view as an unacceptable constraint on American power.

He is a staunch foe of nuclear nonproliferation advocates who view arms control accords as the only workable means to reducing the risk of nuclear war and managing defense budgets.

During his tenure, Morrison oversaw the U.S. withdrawal from the Reagan-era Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces and continued to look for ways the U.S. could pull out of other nuclear accords.

This summer, Morrison lobbied Republican offices to urge them not to support an amendment to a defense authorization bill encouraging the administration to extend a landmark nuclear arms reduction treaty known as New START, which expires in February 2021.

Anne Gearan contributed to this report.

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Ex-Rep. Livingston, player in Clinton impeachment, emerges as character in inquiry of Trump

By Mike DeBonis and Anu Narayanswamy | Published October 30 at 8:15 PM ET | Washington Post | Posted October 30, 2019 |

A pivotal but largely forgotten player in the last presidential impeachment effort suddenly made an unexpected appearance Wednesday in the latest one, this time in a radically different role.

On one of the most tumultuous days in congressional history — Dec. 19, 1998 — days before he was expected to claim the speaker’s gavel, Rep. Bob Livingston (R-La.) admitted to a extramarital affair and announced his resignation hours before the House voted to impeach President Bill Clinton for conduct related to Clinton’s own affair.

Now a prominent Washington lobbyist, Livingston has emerged nearly 21 years later as a behind-the-scenes player in the impeachment investigation of President Trump, allegedly urging at least one Trump administration official to oust the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine whose removal is a key episode in the probe.

Livingston’s role in pushing out the envoy was first revealed in testimony delivered Wednesday by State Department official Catherine M. Croft.

Livingston did not respond to messages seeking comment sent through his firm, The Livingston Group. Lobbying records indicate that Livingston has worked for multiple entities with ties to former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, who lost a presidential bid earlier this year.

Croft’s prepared testimony portrays Livingston as a player in a multifront effort to force the ouster of the ambassador, Marie Yovanovitch, and install a new envoy more sympathetic to Trump. Yovanovitch was ultimately removed in June, and her removal is among several key episodes in the impeachment investigation, which is probing allegations that Trump tied the delivery of U.S. military aid to Ukraine investigating certain political targets, including the son of former vice president and 2020 presidential candidate Joe Biden.

Croft describes receiving “multiple calls” from Livingston urging Yovanovitch’s firing during her time detailed to the National Security Council as a director from August 2015 to July 2017.

“He characterized Ambassador Yovanovitch as an ‘Obama holdover’ and associated [her] with George Soros,” she said in a written statement obtained by The Washington Post. “It was not clear to me at the time — or now — at whose direction or at whose expense Mr. Livingston was seeking the removal of Ambassador Yovanovitch.”

Croft said she relayed those contacts to her supervisor, NSC senior director Fiona Hill and George Kent, a senior State Department official. Both have already testified in the House inquiry. Croft testified she is “not aware of any action that was taken in response.”

Livingston’s motivation for wanting Yovanovitch removed is not fully known. But according to lobbying records, Livingston has a key business relationship with Tymoshenko, a gas mogul who has been on a years-long quest to regain political power in Ukraine after she lost the prime ministership in 2010. Part of that quest has been to build relationships in the U.S. with key government officials to burnish her reputation as a reformer despite suspicions of corruption in her home country.

Two groups with ties to Tymoshenko — Association of Enterprises UKRMETALURGPROM and Innovative Technology & Business Consulting — have both hired the Livingston Group, tapping a firm with a long record of representing foreign clients including the governments of Iraq, Egypt and Turkey.

The firm was first hired by UKRMETALURGPROM, a steel-industry trade group, in April 2018 for a three-month period and then hired again in Sept. 2019 on a one-year contract at a $20,000 a month retainer. And in June 2018, Innovative Technology & Business Consulting hired Livingston’s firm for a $50,000 a month retainer for a year.

Livingston’s firm played a key role in arranging a visit that Tymoshenko made to Washington in December, during which she met with administration and congressional officials.

In the months ahead of the visit, Livingston and his colleagues contacted the offices of about two dozen prominent House and Senate members, including the Republican chairmen of the committees dealing with intelligence and foreign affairs in both chambers, as well as Kevin McCarthy (D-Calif.), then the House majority leader, and Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.), the Senate minority whip. A key figure in arranging the trip was Christopher Anderson, a State Department official who also testified to House committees Wednesday.

During the early December visit, Livingston accompanied Tymoshenko to meetings with Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.), who is now chairman of the House Intelligence Committee and the leader of the impeachment probe, as well as Kurt Volker, the State Department’s special envoy to Ukraine. Volker testified before the House committees earlier this month and described working with Trump lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani on persuading the new Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, to cooperate with Trump’s request for investigations.

Tymoshenko also appeared at think tanks and did media interviews, including for a Wall Street Journal piece where she promoted her upcoming run for president and cast herself as a pro-western reformer who could be counted on to counter Russian aggression. She called attacks from pro-Russian groups, including those affiliated with former president Viktor Yanukovych and his political strategist Paul Manafort, “a badge of honor.”

Manafort would later become Trump’s campaign manager until he was embroiled in a Ukrainian corruption scandal himself.

It is unclear whether Livingston was acting in concert or at odds with Tymoshenko to oust Yovanovitch during the time frame Croft describes. A congressional aide knowledgeable about Ukrainian affairs but not authorized to comment publicly said it was possible Tymoshenko viewed Yovanovitch as an obstacle to the resurrection of her domestic political career ahead of the March presidential election.

Yovanovitch was recalled from her position in May following a smear campaign that included unsubstantiated allegations of opposition to Trump that were promoted by Giuliani and amplified by right-wing media outlets and Republican officials, including former Rep. Pete Sessions of Texas. Yovanovitch denied those allegations when she appeared before the House earlier this month.

Whether Livingston’s role is integral to the current impeachment probe remains to be seen. “I think he sounds rather peripheral, not really central to this, but again, I’m guessing there might be a difference of opinion among my colleagues,” Rep. Stephen F. Lynch (D-Mass.) said Wednesday.

Livingston played a much clearer role in Clinton’s impeachment, helping to push the process forward despite his own doubts in late 1998 as House Republicans warred internally over how to sanction Clinton and what to do about their divisive speaker, Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.).

Livingston launched a bold challenge to Gingrich after Republicans lost seats in the 1998 midterms and was chosen by his party to claim the gavel once the new Congress convened in 1999. But faced with the disclosure of his own extramarital affairs, he decided he could not credibly lead a party pursuing impeachment and announced suddenly on Dec. 19 he would not run for speaker and would resign his seat within months.

“I was prepared to lead our narrow majority as speaker, and I believe I had it in me to do a fine job,” he said in a dramatic floor speech that began with a call for Clinton’s resignation. “But I cannot do that job or be the kind of leader that I would like to be under current circumstances, so I must set the example that I hope President Clinton will follow.”

Since leaving Congress, Livingston has not only been an effective lobbyist but a trusted counselor for many prominent Republican officials. Among them is House Minority Whip Steve Scalise, who holds the suburban New Orleans seat that Livingston once held.

Scalise said Wednesday that Livingston is among a host of Clinton impeachment veterans whom he has spoken to in recent weeks to discuss the practices and procedures surrounding impeachment. But he said Livingston never lobbied him on Ukraine or discussed Yovanovitch with him.

“It’s not uncommon that a new administration removes people from the previous administration and puts in their own folks to carry out their own foreign policy, but I haven’t talked to him about that at all,” Scalise said.

Karoun Demirjian and Tom Hamburger contributed to this report.

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Republicans will have to face the truth on impeachment eventually

By Karen Tumulty | Published October 30 at 6:48 PM ET | Washington Post | Posted October 30, 2019 |

Republicans don’t know how to take yes for an answer.

For weeks, they dutifully echoed President Trump, baying that the House’s ongoing impeachment investigation is a “witch hunt” and a “sham.”

They have complained that the House never took a formal vote on proceeding with the inquiry (though there is no requirement for one), that it was being conducted in secret (though open hearings are promised) and that the president is not being offered an opportunity to respond to his accusers (though he does it constantly on his Twitter feed).

On Thursday, they will have the vote they demanded, along with a road map for how the inquiry will go from here.

The procedure as outlined strikes a reasonable balance between the need to collect evidence and testimony, some of which must be done initially behind closed doors, and the transparency necessary for the public to have confidence that something as grave as the impeachment of a president is done fairly.

There will be public hearings. Transcripts of testimony already gathered privately will be released. The arrangement also sets out procedures under which Trump’s lawyers can call and cross-examine witnesses, although that may be made contingent on White House cooperation with the House Judiciary Committee’s requests for witnesses and documents.

All of this will be an educational exercise for the American public, in which people will once again be reminded that when it comes to impeaching a president, the Constitution gives the House a role like the grand jury in a criminal case. It collects and hears the evidence and decides whether to bring charges. From there, the action moves to the Senate, which holds a trial to decide whether to convict and remove the president from office.

So far, the effort in the House has moved methodically. Nonetheless, Republicans continue to howl about process. The reason: It allows them to avoid talking about the actual substance of the allegations against Trump.

The essential unseriousness of their argument became apparent last week, when two dozen House Republicans burst like a clown car into the secure meeting room of the House Intelligence Committee, where a Pentagon official was set to testify.

They recklessly violated the security of the facility by bringing in their cellphones, which is prohibited, and ordered pizza as they staged a five-hour sit-in. The point of their stunt was not entirely clear, given that roughly 100 lawmakers — both Democrats and Republicans — were actually authorized to be there, by virtue of membership on one of the three committees conducting the inquiry’s preliminary phase.

In the meantime, polls show a plurality of Americans now support not only impeaching Trump but also kicking him out of office. A mountain of evidence — which includes the White House’s own version of the conversation Trump had on July 25 with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky — already makes a compelling case that he has abused the power of his office.

Even now, it is clear that the president pressed a foreign power to dig up dirt on a leading political rival and to provide information that would support a crackpot conspiracy theory that undercuts the conclusion of this country’s own intelligence professionals that Russia interfered with the 2016 presidential election. And whether the phrase “quid pro quo” ever crossed Trump’s lips, testimony gathered thus far indicates that he withheld $391 million in congressionally appropriated aid to Ukraine to coerce its government to do his bidding.

Asked whether all of that is sufficient fodder for articles of impeachment against the president, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) earlier this week told a group of columnists: “There’s no question about that, right? We’ve had enough for a very long time. No, I think we have enough. But as long as there’s corroboration, we might as well get some more.”

The bigger challenge, she suggested, may be deciding what not to include. One thing that is not likely to make the cut, she said, is Trump’s apparent violation of what he calls the “phony emoluments clause” — which is the Constitution’s very clear ban on government officials’ accepting gifts or payments “from any King, Prince, or foreign State.”

“How much drama can the American people handle?” Pelosi asked. “Where does the law of diminishing returns set in? Where is the value added not worth the time?”

Still, the speaker appears to be in no hurry to wrap this all up, even though an election year looms. “We will take as long as the truth insists,” she said. “And that will be its own agenda.”

The truth. Eventually, that is what Republicans will have to face.

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In Syria and elsewhere, Trump is making Russia great again

By Max Boot | Published October 30 at 5:31 PM ET | Washington Post | Posted October 30, 2019 |

What does Russian President Vladimir Putin want from his U.S. counterpart? Someone who will corrupt and discredit American democracy, turn on U.S. allies and give Russia a free hand abroad. President Trump, elected with Russian help, is giving Putin more than he could have dreamed of. We still don’t know exactly why Trump is acting as he is, but the consequences of his presidency are clear: Trump is bringing the United States to its knees and making Russia great again.

Until recently, the most effective response available to Trump’s defenders has been the fact that, under heavy congressional pressure, he approved lethal-weapons aid to Ukraine in its battle against Russian separatists. But that dog won’t hunt anymore, now that Trump held up that aid to force Ukraine to cough up dirt on former vice president and Democratic presidential contender Joe Biden and to exonerate Russia of election hacking in 2016. (The president still calls Russia’s attack a “hoax.”) The nearly $400 million in aid was released only after Congress and the media started raising the alarm.

Ukrainian soldiers on the front lines of a war that has killed 13,000 people told the New York Times that the aid interruption “took a heavy psychological toll . . . striking at their confidence that their backers in Washington stood solidly behind their fight to keep Russia at bay.” Oh, and those Javelin antitank missiles that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky asked for? The Times reports: “The Trump administration provided the missiles on the condition that they not be used in the war . . . lest they provoke Russia to slip more powerful weaponry to the separatists.” So what’s the point of providing them at all?

Trump is further undermining Ukraine by spreading the crazy conspiracy theory that it, not Russia, was behind the 2016 election hacking. Is this something that Putin told Trump during one of their top-secret conversations? I bet it is. Zelensky is fighting corruption but Trump is promoting it: He outsourced his Ukraine policy to personal lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani, who was in cahoots with a couple of sleazy operators who are linked to a pro-Putin oligarch and have now been arrested by the FBI. Trump put Zelensky in a no-win situation: Either smear Biden and alienate Democrats or risk the loss of vital U.S. aid. That’s not how you treat allies.

Trump is doing Putin another solid in Syria by pulling most U.S. forces out. Russian soldiers are entering U.S. bases and taking up the joint patrolling duties with the Turkish army that U.S. troops had been performing until recently. The fate of Syria was settled not in Washington but in Sochi — Putin’s favorite Black Sea resort. Trump has given Russia what it has sought for decades: a leading role in the Middle East. This is the biggest geopolitical shift in the region since 1972 when Egypt’s Anwar Sadat expelled Soviet advisers and aligned with Washington. Russian television had good reason to crow that “the United States has given a real gift to Putin.”

And the gifts just keep coming. By abandoning the Kurds, Trump confirms Russia’s arguments that it is a much more reliable ally. By keeping some troops in eastern Syria to guard oil fields, Trump is confirming Kremlin propaganda that U.S. foreign policy is motivated (just like Russia’s) by greed and self-interest, not by high-minded ideals. “Wow, what a great outcome!” Trump said. It is — for Russia.

Trump has sacrificed the high ground at home as well as abroad. He engages in blatant self-dealing — conditioning aid to Ukraine on political help for himself, operating hotels where foreign emissaries stay, paying off a mistress in violation of campaign finance laws, obstructing justice, etc. — and claims immunity from any consequences. His lawyer argues that Trump couldn’t be prosecuted even for shooting someone. This allows Putin to say: You think I’m bad? Everyone’s corrupt. Look at the United States.

Trump is further normalizing Putin by emulating the Russian leader’s strongman tactics. He calls opponents “human scum” and the media “the enemy of the people” while launching an investigation of the investigators who dared to probe his links with Russia. Trump is also helping Russia by denigrating the FBI, CIA, and even his own ambassador to Ukraine and one of his own National Security Council staff members as agents of a nonexistent “Deep State.” He is thereby undermining the individuals and institutions most dedicated to combating Russian designs. The leading Russian hard-liners — Fiona Hill and John Bolton — have already left the White House, no doubt to Putin’s delight.

“Russia likes seeing President Trump in the White House in part because it provides the Kremlin a chance to point to the ugly side of American politics — to say, just as they did with [President Richard M.] Nixon, look how sordid, how hypocritical,” former Russian foreign minister Andrei Kozyrev recently wrote in the New York Times. The only way to undo some of the damage, he argued, is to impeach and remove Trump. That would send a message to the world similar to the one sent by Nixon’s resignation: “Moral principles still matter in American politics and policy.”

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We’re polarized and fragmented at the same time. Trump likes that.

By E.J. Dionne Jr. | Published October 30 at 5:00 PM ET | Washington Post | Posted October 30, 2019 |

Why would President Trump’s hardcore defenders think the best way to defend a floundering leader is to hurl repulsive dual-loyalty charges at a decorated Army combat veteran who feels an obligation to tell the truth to Congress?

Why would British Prime Minister Boris Johnson gamble on forcing an election in Britain at a time when his Conservative Party is under 40 percent in the polls?

And why are German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s center-right Christian Democrats and her coalition partners, the center-left Social Democrats, suffering electoral losses even though a large majority of the country wants her to serve out her term through 2021?

The standard answer to such questions focuses on political polarization, and there sure is a lot of it going around: left vs. right, urban vs. rural, religious vs. secular, young vs. old, prosperous vs. left-behind, pro-immigrant vs. anti-immigrant.

Polarization is deepened because many of these identities reinforce one another these days. To pick just one example underscored by recent studies from the Public Religion Research Institute and the Pew Research Center: Christian conservatives rally to the Republican Party while the secular are overwhelmingly Democrats. Partisans don’t just disagree about politics. They are divided by some of the most fundamental questions about human existence.

But another factor that we talk about far less is feeding the chaos: fragmentation. If some identities are mutually reinforcing, we have other commitments that split us into ever smaller groups. This feeds a tendency toward niche politics, visible in all the democratic nations. Taken together, polarization and niche politics make it very hard to forge the consensus required to solve problems and move democracies forward.

Consider first the sliming of Army Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, who raised damaging questions about whether the White House summary of Trump’s phone call with Ukraine’s president omitted a reference to former vice president Joe Biden, whom Trump was pressuring the Ukrainian government to investigate.

Even before testifying Tuesday to House impeachment investigators, Vindman, the top Ukraine expert on the National Security Council, was subjected to attacks by Fox News and others on the far right because of his Ukrainian heritage. (He was brought to the United States by his refugee family when he was 3.)

Senate Democratic leader Charles E. Schumer (N.Y.) demanded Wednesday that Vindman be protected from retaliation. He “served our country for more than 20 years and is a recipient of the Purple Heart after being injured while serving in Iraq,” and yet “some have even gone so far as to call him a spy and question his loyalty to the United States.”

The vile assault on Vindman is designed to muddle a factual record highly damaging to the president. But it’s aimed at the Trump niche, roughly a quarter of Americans who will follow Trump’s lead on almost everything. This is a case of polarization and fragmentation reinforcing each other.

In Britain, the average of three recent polls gives Johnson’s party, pledged to leading Britain out of the European Union, just 38 percent of the vote. But Johnson has good reason to think he will win a majority of seats in the House of Commons, because his opponents are so fractured.

The Labour Party, broadly pro-E.U. but divided on the Brexit issue, is at just over 23 percent, while the passionately pro-E.U. Liberal Democrats stand at 18 percent. An additional 8 percent support pro-E.U. regional parties or the Greens, while the Brexit Party (committed to an even sharper break with Europe) polls at 11 percent.

This is a portrait of radical polarization (generally pro- and generally anti-E.U. parties are at roughly 49 percent each) and extreme fragmentation. Both make Britain harder to govern.

And in Germany, elections this past Sunday in the state of Thuringia saw both the Left Party and the far-right Alternative for Germany party gain ground — the left to 31 percent and the far right to 23 percent. The Christian Democrats and the Social Democrats each saw their vote reduced by a third, the Christian Democrats to 22 percent and the Social Democrats to a paltry 8 percent. The outcome in Thuringia is an extreme case of what’s going on in the country as a whole, but it is symptomatic of the broader decay of once unifying, middle-ground politics.

It would be nice to end on an upbeat note. But the economic and cultural forces pushing simultaneously toward polarization and fragmentation will be hard to overcome. And just when we need leadership that might promote solidarity and a degree of mutual understanding, the most powerful democratic country in the world is led by Trump, who thrives on chopping up our society into pieces.

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Only now do we understand the true cruelty of Trump’s family separation

By Editorial Board | Published October 29 at 5:59 PM ET | Washington Post | Posted October 30, 2019 |

BEFORE THE spring of 2018, U.S. Customs and Border Protection had no system in place to track migrant children who were separated from their families. That was the case even though, it now turns out, the Trump administration, in its first months in office, had already begun wrenching scores of babies, toddlers, tweens and adolescents from their parents to deter illegal border crossings. Then, beginning in April last year, the administration doubled down, systematically breaking apart migrant families upon apprehension at the border — still with no means of tracking and reuniting the families it had sundered.

Only now, 16 months after a federal judge ordered migrant families reunified, has the scale of the administration’s cruelty become understood. Most Americans thought the policy detestable. It was far worse than they imagined.

Having resisted demands that it compile a definitive listing of the families broken apart by its policies, the administration finally relented this spring when U.S. District Judge Dana M. Sabraw ordered a full accounting. Last week, hours before the deadline set by the judge, the government submitted the numbers to the American Civil Liberties Union, to whose volunteers it has fallen to clean up the mess created by President Trump, former attorney general Jeff Sessions, former homeland security secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and others.

No, it was not only the 2,814 traumatized children who had been separated and were in custody under the government’s policy of “zero tolerance” for unauthorized border crossers when Judge Sabraw ordered families reunified in June last year. It turns out that an additional 1,556 children had been separated in the preceding 12-month period, beginning in July 2017. Of those, more than 300 were 5 years old or younger.

Imagine, if you can, the suffering visited upon those children, including many still in diapers and requiring afternoon naps, by the administration’s cavalier brutality and incompetence — the anguish of little girls and boys removed from their parents for weeks or months because of a president lacking a conscience and a government whose data systems were not suited to the task of reunification. Those wounds won’t heal easily, or ever.

Incredibly, having shattered so many families, the administration threw up its hands and declared the task of reuniting them beyond its capabilities. Even now, volunteers working under the coordination of the ACLU are going door to door in Guatemala and Honduras, seeking to ascertain whether families have recovered their children.

More than 1,000 additional migrant children have been separated in the past 17 months on the grounds, the government says, that their parents or guardians endangered or abused them, or were unable to care for them, or were criminals, or were not actually their parents. The ACLU maintains that in some cases, those separations are also unjustified, triggered by minor offenses committed by the parents, such as shoplifting or driving without a valid license. It has asked Judge Sabraw to set a narrow standard for separations.

In all, the administration has taken at least 5,460 children from their parents. That is a stain on Mr. Trump, on the government he leads and on America.

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anarcho-smarmyism · 6 years

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“In 1955, during the national election campaign in Indonesia, the CIA had given a million dollars to the Masjumi party, a centrist coalition of Muslim organizations, in a losing bid to thwart Sukarno's Nationalist Party as well as the PKI. According to former CIA officer Joseph Burkholder Smith, the project "provided for complete write-off of the funds, that is, no demand for a detailed accounting of how the funds were spent was required. I could find no clue as to what the Masjumi did with the million dollars."

In 1957, the CIA decided that the situation called for more direct action. It was not difficult to find Indonesian colleagues-in-arms for there already existed a clique of army officers and others who, for personal ambitions and because they disliked the influential position of the PKI, wanted Sukarno out, or at least out of their particular islands. (Indonesia is the world's largest archipelago, consisting of some 3,000 islands.)

The military operation the CIA was opting for was of a scale that necessitated significant assistance from the Pentagon, which could be secured for a political action mission only if approved by the National Security Council's "Special Group" (the small group of top NSC officials who acted in the president's name, to protect him and the country by evaluating proposed covert actions and making certain that the CIA did not go off the deep end; known at other times as the 5412 Committee, the 303 Committee, the 40 Committee, or the Operations Advisory Group).

The manner in which the Agency went about obtaining this approval is a textbook example of how the CIA sometimes determines American foreign policy. Joseph Burkholder Smith, who was in charge of the Agency's Indonesian desk in Washington from mid-1956 to early 1958, has described the process in his memoirs:

Instead of first proposing the plan to Washington for approval, where "premature mention ... might get it shot down"...we began to feed the State and Defense departments intelligence that no one could deny was a useful contribution to understanding Indonesia. When they had read enough alarming reports, we planned to spring the suggestion we should support the colonels' plans to reduce Sukarno's power. This was a method of operation which became the basis of many of the political action adventures of the 1960s and 1970s. In other words, the statement is false that CIA undertook to intervene in the affairs of countries like Chile only after being ordered to do so by ... the Special Group. ... In many instances, we made the action programs up ourselves after we had collected enough intelligence to make them appear required by the circumstances. Our activity in Indonesia in 1957-1958 was one such instance.

When the Communist Parry did well again in local elections held in July, the CIA viewed it as "a great help to us in convincing Washington authorities how serious the Indonesian situation was. The only person who did not seem terribly alarmed at the PKI victories was Ambassador Allison. This was all we needed to convince John Foster Dulles finally that he had the wrong man in Indonesia. The wheels began to turn to remove this last stumbling block in the way of our operation." 12 John Allison, wrote Smith, was not a great admirer of the CIA to begin with. And in early 1958, after less than a year in the post, he was replaced as ambassador by Howard Jones, whose selection "pleased" the CIA Indonesia staff.”

-Killing Hope: U.S. Military and C.I.A. Interventions Since World War II by William Blum

#imperialism #capitalism #socialist #leftist #anarchist #killing hope #education multiplies power

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iamazadkhan · 2 years

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PM Modi Net Worth 2022: Cash, Property All Details Here, Know More

PM Modi Net Worth 2022: Cash, Property All Details Here, Know MoreHere is a breakdown of all the Prime Minister's assets, both movable and immovable, in terms of money.The majority of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi's assets, totaling more than 2.23 crore INR, are bank deposits.According to his most recent report concerning properties but doesn't own any real estate because he donated his ownership interest in a plot of land in Gandhinagar.According to information posted on the website of the prime minister's office, the value of his properties as of March 31st 2022 will be 2 2 3 8 2 5 0 4 INR.From a year earlier, the prime minister's movable assets increased by 26.3 lakh INR. But he no longer is the owner of the real estate.The fact that the Prime Minister only has 35250 INR in cash on hand as of March 31 is highly shocking.He has an NSC at the post office, which is valued 905105 Indian rupees. Additionally, he possessed a single-valued life insurance policy for 189305 INR.He has Rs 46555 on his State Bank of India Gandhinagar NSC branch bank account.Bonds, shares, corporate units, or mutual funds are not held by Prime Minister Modi. He just has savings like a middle-class Indian man.When he was Gujarat's Chief Minister in October 2002, he jointly bought the residential land with three other owners, who each held an equal part. Read the full article

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reliancesmartmoney · 3 years

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Know well about ITR forms

Who can file Income Tax Returns?

Individuals, HUFs, AOPs, BOIs, firms and companies are mandated to file the income tax return (ITR) if the income earned is taxable. Each of these taxpayers is taxed differently under the Income Tax laws of India wherein the domestic companies and firm have fixed a 22 per cent tax rate but the individuals are taxed as per the tax slabs.

Advantages of filing income tax returns (ITRS)

It has often seen that many individuals believe that if their salaries fall below the taxable bracket then they don’t need to file an income tax return (ITR). However, that is not true! Even if your earned income is not taxable, you should file ITR as it will benefit you in different ways. Listed out the following advantages of filing income tax returns:

Avoid Penalties:

Easy Loan Approval:

Address Proof:

Compensate for Losses in the next Financial Year:

Hassle-free Visa Processing:

Filing ITR timely can help you avoid penalties imposed by the Income Tax Department for belated return that could cost you extra interest.

In India, ITR is one of the important documents asked by banks in sanctioning a loan to an individual. Many banks and NBFCs ask for ITR receipts of the latest 3 years when applying for the loan such as home loan, car loan etc. Such lenders consider ITR as the most authentic document of verifying an individual’s income. Hence, an individual who is filing ITR on time can benefit from hassle-free loan approval.

Income Tax Return (ITR) receipts can serve as a residential proof as it is sent directly to your registered address.

If you are eligible to file ITR but didn’t then you would not be able to carry forward the losses of the current financial year to the next financial year. Hence, it is vital to file the ITR to claim the losses in the future years.

At the time of applying for Visa, the embassies generally ask for past ITR receipts to process the Visa application of an individual. So, filing ITR before the due date can help you in quick Visa processing at the time of Visa application.

Things to remember before filing an Income Tax Return

Income tax return filing is very important and if you have not filed your return yet, it’s a good idea to get going and try to do it as early as possible. Tax filing involves a lot of paperwork, confusion and queries. To ensure a seamless process, give yourself enough lead-time for a smooth and timely return filing. Unfortunately, there are penalties to be paid, if the deadlines are missed. These fines range between Rs. 5,000 to 10,000, depending on the delay.

You can get help from professionals to file your tax return who can advise you on how to save tax, the available deductions and exemptions under 80C and assist you with investment planning. But, if you are planning to file returns yourself, here are a few important things you could keep in mind.

First of all, make sure to collect all the required documents that you will need to file your ITR Form such as Form 16, Form 26AS, investment documents, premium payments, loan statements, salary slips, bank statements, and proof of capital gains (if any) that will help you in providing the details of tax deducted at source (TDS) and to compute the gross taxable income of yours in that financial year.

Similar to this, if you have redeemed mutual fund units within that year, you can reach out to your mutual fund house to provide you with the transaction statements and capital gain statements. Remember, if the gains exceed Rs. 1 lakh, you will be required to pay tax on LTCG. Once you finished computing your total income, the next thing is to calculate your tax liability by applying the tax rates as per your income slab.

Important Things To Remember While Filing Income Tax Returns

Know Your ITR Forms Well

The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has made few amendments in the ITR forms to ease the process of filing Income Tax returns. The number of forms to be used by taxpayers has been reduced from 9 to 7. For individuals with annual taxable income (from salary, interest, one house property) of up to Rs. 50 lakh, ITR 1 is required to be filed. Whereas, for individuals with annual taxable income of more than Rs. 50 lakh, ITR 2 is required to be filed.

Mandatory Disclosure

Following up on the Central Government's efforts on demonetisation, the Income Tax department has made it mandatory to disclose cash deposits of Rs. 2 lakh and more in bank accounts. This was first initiated during the demonetisation period and continues to this day. The Income Tax department requires a declaration in a separate column giving details of money deposited along with bank details in the income tax returns. To prevent being taxed at 60% plus surcharge and cess, tax payers need to explain all sources or forms of income or investment.

Carefully Select the Assessment Year and Financial Year

Assessment Year and Financial Year are not the same and you need to be familiar with them in order to correctly file your taxes. Financial Year is the period or year within which you earn the income, whereas Assessment Year is the period or year that follows Financial Year and it is in this year that you file your tax return. Every Financial Year and Assessment Year begins on the 1st of April and ends on 31st of March. Assessment Year always comes after Financial Year.

Since your income is taxed in the Assessment Year, you have to select Assessment Year while filing your income tax return.

Check For Deductions Under 80C

Section 80C entitles you to certain deductions from the gross total income, up to a maximum limit of Rs. 1.5 lakh. It is the most widely used option to save income tax. The investments and expenditures that qualify for deduction under section 80C are investments in National Savings Certificates (NSC), Kisan Vikas Patra (KVP), notified Equity Linked Saving Scheme (ELSS) of a mutual fund, five-year post office term deposits, five-year bank fixed deposits, contribution to Employee Provident Fund (EPF), Public Provident Fund (PPF), Superannuation Funds and premiums paid for life insurance, annuity plan and Unit-Linked Insurance Plans (ULIP), etc.

These investments can not only be claimed as deduction while calculating your total taxable income but can also generate good returns. Moreover, investment in PPF, superannuation funds, etc. also help in accumulating funds for retirement planning.

Check TDS on Form 26A

Form 26A is an important document for tax filing. It provides details of the income paid to you, the tax deducted on that income and the amount of TDS deposited by the payer with the Government. The form also contains details of any refund applicable to you. To check your tax deduction on Form 26A, you have to go to https://incometaxindiaefiling.gov.in and login to your account. Next, you have to go to ‘My Account’ and click on ‘View Form 26AS’ in the drop down.

Conclusion

While filing your income tax return, ensure that you know the relevant ITR forms well, make the necessary disclosures, select appropriate assessment year, take advantage of 80C deductions and verify your TDS from Form 26A. This will ensure a smooth and hassle-free tax filing process.

For reference: http://www.incometaxindiaefiling.gov.in/main/ListOfITRsAndOtherForms

#itreturn #tax filing #save taxes #wealth

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new-haryanvi-ragni · 1 year

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Govt Hikes Interest On Senior Citizen Savings Scheme, Post Office Savings Schemes, NSC, KVP - Details Inside

The new rate for the girl child savings scheme Sukanya Samriddhi has been increased to 8 percent from 7.6 percent. source https://zeenews.india.com/personal-finance/govt-hikes-interest-on-senior-citizen-savings-scheme-post-office-savings-schemes-nsc-kvp-details-inside-2589874.html

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moneycafe · 3 years

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General Provident Fund (GPF) interest rate for July to September quarter declared – Check details

Earlier, the interest rate for the post office small savings products such as Public Provident Fund (PPF), NSC etc were also kept unchanged. The government has declared interest rate on the General Provident Fund and other similar funds for the July to September quarter of the financial year 20201-22. The subscribers to the General Provident Fund and a few other funds, who are the government…

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political-fluffle · 4 years

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How Did a Trump Loyalist Come to Be Named NSA General Counsel—And What Should Biden Do About It? “Earlier this week, the Washington Post broke the story that Michael Ellis—a former staffer for Rep. Devin Nunes and current National Security Council (NSC) official—has been selected as general counsel of the National Security Agency. This set off alarm bells among commentators and those familiar with the agency, in part because it comes in the same week in which Trump summarily fired the top civilian leadership of the Department of Defense and installed loyalists and cronies in their places. (…) (…) selecting Ellis as NSA general counsel appears to be an attempt to improperly politicize an important career position. Relatedly, it appears to be an effort to “burrow,” or improperly convert a political appointee into a career position. And to make matters worse, the ample public record suggests that Ellis is particularly ill suited to discharge the essential functions of the office. While important details remain unclear, media accounts include numerous indications of irregularity in the process by which Ellis was selected for the job, including interference by the White House. At a minimum, the evidence of possible violations of civil service rules demand immediate investigation by Congress and the inspectors general of the Department of Defense and the NSA.” This is infiltration, this was an order from Putin.

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bountyofbeads · 5 years

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Impeachment Testimony: Read a Statement from the White House Ukraine Expert

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/10/29/us/politics/vindman-statement-impeachment.html

Read Alexander Vindman’s Statement on Trump and Ukraine

BY The New York Times | Published October 29, 2019 | New York Times | Posted October 29, 2019 |

Lt. Col. Alexander S. Vindman of the Army, the top Ukraine expert on the National Security Council, plans to tell impeachment investigators that he twice reported concerns about President Trump’s dealings with Ukraine, according to a draft statement obtained by The New York Times.

Opening Statement of Lieutenant Colonel Alexander S. Vindman

Before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, and the House Committee on Oversight and Reform

October 29, 2019

Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member, thank you for the opportunity to address the Committees concerning the activities relating to Ukraine and my role in the events under investigation.

BACKGROUND

I have dedicated my entire professional life to the United States of America. For more than two decades, it has been my honor to serve as an officer in the United States Army. As an infantry officer, I served multiple overseas tours, including South Korea and Germany, and a deployment to Iraq for combat operations. In Iraq, I was wounded in an IED attack and awarded a Purple Heart.

Since 2008, I have been a Foreign Area Officer specializing in Eurasia. In this role, I have served in the United States' embassies in Kiev, Ukraine and Moscow, Russia. In Washington, D.C., I was a politico-military affairs officer for Russia for the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs where I authored the principle strategy for managing competition with Russia. In July 2018, I was asked to serve at the National Security Council.

The privilege of serving my country is not only rooted in my military service, but also in my personal history. I sit here, as a Lieutenant Colonel in the United States Army, an immigrant. My family fled the Soviet Union when I was three and a half years old. Upon arriving in New York City in 1979, my father worked multiple jobs to support us, all the while learning English at night. He stressed to us the importance of fully integrating into our adopted country. For many years, life was quite difficult. In spite of our challenging beginnings, my family worked to build its own American dream. I have a deep appreciation for American values and ideals and the power of freedom. I am a patriot, and it is my sacred duty and honor to advance and defend OUR country, irrespective of party or politics.

For over twenty years as an active duty United States military officer and diplomat, I have served this country in a nonpartisan manner, and have done so with the utmost respect and professionalism for both Republican and Democratic administrations.

INTRODUCTION

Before recounting my recollection of various events under investigation, I want to clarify a few issues. I am appearing today voluntarily pursuant to a subpoena and will answer all questions to the best of my recollection.

I want the Committees to know I am not the whistleblower who brought this issue to the CIA and the Committees’ attention. I do not know who the whistleblower is and I would not feel comfortable to speculate as to the identity of the whistleblower.

Also, as I will detail herein, I did convey certain concerns internally to National Security officials in accordance with my decades of experience and training, sense of duty, and obligation to operate within the chain of command. As an active duty military officer, the command structure is extremely important to me. On many occasions I have been told I should express my views and share my concerns with my chain of command and proper authorities. I believe that any good military officer should and would do the same, thus providing his or her best advice to leadership.

Furthermore, in performing my coordination role as a Director on the National Security Council, I provided readouts of relevant meetings and communications to a very small group of properly cleared national security counterparts with a relevant need-to-know.

MY SERVICE ON THE NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL

When I joined the White House’s National Security Council (“NSC”), I reported to Dr. Fiona Hill, who in turn reported to John Bolton, the National Security Advisor. My role at the NSC includes developing, coordinating, and executing plans and policies to manage the full range of diplomatic, informational, military, and

economic national security issues for the countries in my portfolio, which includes Ukraine.

In my position, I coordinate with a superb cohort of inter-agency partners. I regularly prepare internal memoranda, talking points, and other materials for the National Security Advisor and senior staff.

Most of my interactions relate to national security issues and are therefore especially sensitive. I would urge the Committees to carefully balance the need for information against the impact that disclosure would have on our foreign policy and national security.

I have never had direct contact or communications with the President.

THE GEOPOLITICAL IMPORTANCE OF UKRAINE

Since 2008, Russia has manifested an overtly aggressive foreign policy, leveraging military power and employing hybrid warfare to achieve its objectives of regional hegemony and global influence. Absent a deterrent to dissuade Russia from such aggression, there is an increased risk of further confrontations with the West. In this situation, a strong and independent Ukraine is critical to U.S. national security interests because Ukraine is a frontline state and a bulwark against Russian aggression.

In spite of being under assault from Russia for more than five years, Ukraine has taken major steps towards integrating with the West. The U.S. government policy community’s view is that the election of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the promise of reforms to eliminate corruption will lock in Ukraine’s Western-leaning trajectory, and allow Ukraine to realize its dream of a vibrant democracy and economic prosperity.

Given this perspective and my commitment to advancing our government's strategic interests, I will now recount several events that occurred.

RELEVANT EVENTS

When I joined the NSC in July 2018, I began implementing the administration’s policy on Ukraine. In the Spring of 2019, I became aware of outside influencers promoting a false narrative of Ukraine inconsistent with the consensus views of the interagency. This narrative was harmful to U.S. government policy. While my interagency colleagues and I were becoming increasingly optimistic on Ukraine’s prospects, this alternative narrative undermined U.S. government efforts to expand cooperation with Ukraine.

April 21, 2019: PRESIDENT TRUMP CALLS UKRAINE PRESIDENT ZELENSKYY

On April 21, 2019, Volodymyr Zelenskyy was elected President of Ukraine in a landslide victory. President Zelenskyy was seen as a unifying figure within the country. He was the first candidate to win a majority in every region of the country breaking the claims that Ukraine would be subject to a perpetual divide between the Ukrainian- and Russian-speaking populations. President Zelenskyy ran on a platform of unity, reform, and anti-corruption which resonated with the entire country.

In support of U.S. policy objectives to support Ukrainian sovereignty, President Trump called President Zelenskyy on April 21, 2019. I was one of several staff and officers who listened to the call. The call was positive and President Trump expressed his desire to work with President Zelenskyy and extended an invitation to visit the White House.

May 21, 2019: INAUGURATION DELEGATION GOES TO UKRAINE

On May 21, 2019 I was directed by Ambassador Bolton and Dr. Hill to join the delegation attending President Zelenkskyy’s inauguration. When the delegation returned, they provided a debriefing to President Trump and explained their positive assessment of President Zelenskyy and his team. I did not participate in the debriefing.

OLEKSANDR DANYLYUK VISIT - July 10, 2019

On July 10, 2019, Oleksandr Danylyuk, the Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council for Ukraine, visited Washington, D.C. for a meeting with National Security Advisor Bolton. Ambassadors Volker and Sondland also attended along with Energy Secretary Rick Perry.

The meeting proceeded well until the Ukrainians broached the subject of a meeting between the two presidents. The Ukrainians saw this meeting as critically important in order to solidify the support of their most important international partner. Amb. Sondland started to speak about delivering the specific investigations in order to secure the meeting with the President, at which time Ambassador Bolton cut the meeting short.

Following this meeting, there was a scheduled debriefing during which Amb. Sondland emphasized the importance that Ukraine deliver the investigations into the 2016 election, the Bidens, and Burisma. I stated to Amb. Sondland that his statements were inappropriate, that the request to investigate Biden and his son had nothing to do with national security, and that such investigations were not something the NSC was going to get involved in or push. Dr. Hill then entered the room and asserted to Amb. Sondland that his statements were inappropriate.

Following the debriefing meeting, I reported my concerns to the NSCs lead counsel. Dr. Hill also reported the incident to the NSC’s lead counsel.

ELECTION CALL – July 25, 2019

On July 21, 2019 President Zelenskyy’s party won Parliamentary elections in a landslide victory. The NSC proposed that President Trump call President Zelenskyy to congratulate him.

On July 25, 2019, the call occurred. I listened in on the call in the Situation Room with colleagues from the NSC and the office of the Vice President. As the transcript is in the public record, we are all aware of what was said.

I was concerned by the call. I did not think it was proper to demand that a foreign government investigate a U.S. citizen, and I was worried about the implications for...

.... the U.S. government’s support of Ukraine. I realized that if Ukraine pursued an investigation into the Bidens and Burisma, it would likely be interpreted as a partisan play which would undoubtedly result in Ukraine losing the bipartisan support it has thus far maintained. This would all undermine U.S. national security. Following the call, I again reported my concerns to NSC’s lead counsel.

CONCLUSION

The United States and Ukraine are and must remain strategic partners, working together to realize the shared vision of a stable, prosperous, and democratic Ukraine that is integrated into the Euro-Atlantic community. Our partnership is rooted in the idea that free citizens should be able to exercise their democratic rights, choose their own destiny, and live in peace.

It has been a great honor to serve the American people and a privilege to work in the White House and on the National Security Council. I hope to continue to serve and advance America’s national security interests.

Thank you again for your consideration, and now I would be happy to answer your questions.

Produced by Josh Williams and Tiff Fehr.

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