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Jeff Sessions: 16 law and order moves where Trump is following Reagan
by Paul Bedard

President elect Ronald Reagan and his transition team leader Edwin Meese leave the Blair House in Washington December 10, 1980, en route to the Republican National Headquarters for a meeting with Bill Brook, chairman of the Republican National Committee. (AP Photo/Charles Tasnadi)

Attorney General Jeff Sessions celebrated President Reagan’s 107th birthday by demonstrating how President Trump has taken up Reagan’s campaign to restore the rule of law.

In a Tuesday evening speech at the Heritage Foundation to the Reagan Alumni Association, Sessions, who was a Reagan-appointed federal prosecutor, said, “Under President Trump, we are determined to advance President Reagan’s work of restoring the rule of law.”

He cited 16 law and order changes, listed below, where the administration has moved to crack down on law-breakers like illegal immigrants and drug users and end punishing governmental policies like those under former President Obama that tried to crush conservative groups.

“We provided legal counsel to end the unlawful DACA policy,” he said.

“We don’t think illegal drug use is ‘recreation.’ Lax enforcement, permissive rhetoric, and the media have undermined the essential need to say no to drug use- don’t start. And we are identifying pill mill doctors and sending large members to the slammer,” he added

And, he said, “Our Solicitor General filed an amicus brief in support of a Colorado baker who was sued for refusing to bake a cake for a same-sex wedding.”

In an advance copy of his address, Sessions recalled his days working for Reagan and former Attorney General Edwin Meese, still a towering figure in Washington. Sessions said he installed a portrait of Meese in her conference room.

“I especially want to thank Attorney General Meese for his service to this country. You led the nation’s fight against crime. You began the progress that reduced a long surging crime rate by 50 percent. It was an honor to have had you as my boss when I was a U.S. attorney.

“To this day there is nothing I am more proud of than my 14 years as a federal prosecutor. A large part of that time was under your leadership,” he said adding, “You are one of the greatest attorneys general ever to serve. You have been a role model for me. I keep your portrait on the wall of our conference room as a reminder of the example that you set.

“And I say that not only as a credit to you, but to President Reagan.”

Sessions recalled that Reagan was elected to restore law and order, even more than end the Cold War. In the end, he did both and restored the economy in a path Trump is trying to follow.

His list of 16 examples:

• First, President Trump, as you know, has nominated some fabulous judges. That’s critical to the rule of law. Last year, the Department finally settled 22 civil cases with 90 plaintiffs regarding the previous administration’s wrongful contraception mandate.
• We also agreed to settlement terms with nearly 500 plaintiffs in cases brought by groups who were targeted by the IRS when they applied for tax-exempt status, they were subject to inappropriate criteria that disproportionately impacted conservative groups.
• The Department also provided legal counsel to support agencies in this administration to end subsidies to insurance companies that Congress had not appropriated the funds for under the Affordable Care Act.
• The executive branch cannot spend money not appropriated by Congress.
• We provided legal counsel to end the unlawful DACA policy.
• Our Solicitor General filed an amicus brief in support of a Colorado baker who was sued for refusing to bake a cake for a same-sex wedding.
• We issued a memo to help set policy to protect the free exercise of religion.
• We are no longer allowing so-called “sanctuary” jurisdictions to nullify federal immigration law if they want to receive our law enforcement grants.
• In June, I ended the practice of third party settlements.
• Under the previous Administration, the Justice Department often required settling parties to pay settlement funds to third party organizations that were not directly involved in the litigation or harmed by the defendant’s conduct. Now those funds either go to victims or to the public treasury.
• Government lawyers and bureaucrats do not have constitutional authority to appropriate taxpayer money for their favored groups.
• We have ended regulation-by-guidance, where bureaucrats would impose regulations by simply sending a letter, going outside the process required by law. We have rescinded dozens of existing regulations that were created in this unjustified manner and are studying more.
• We are hammering violent groups- especially the vicious MS-13.
• We are not going to pretend that there is not a law against marijuana, or that it’s not bad for you.
• We also honoring a directive that Ed Meese first made as Attorney General by ending regulation-by-litigation, the sue and settle abuse. Now special interests can no longer sue an agency, then get the agency to impose a new regulation as a settlement.
• We don’t think illegal drug use is “recreation”. Lax enforcement, permissive rhetoric, and the media have undermined the essential need to say no to drug use- don’t start. And we are identifying pill mill doctors and sending large members to the slammer.

Paul Bedard, the Washington Examiner's "Washington Secrets" columnist, can be contacted at pbedard@washingtonexaminer.com

The Pentagon chief tells Congress to stop jerking around the military.

By The Editorial Board

Congress spent Tuesday working on a budget deal to avoid another government shutdown, and one adult on Capitol Hill was Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, who ripped America’s representatives for failing to provide reliable funding for the military.

Mr. Mattis testified at the House Armed Services Committee about the 2018 defense strategy, among other topics, but noted with some acidity: “Congress mandated, rightfully mandated, this National Defense Strategy—the first one in a decade—and then shut down the government the day of its release.” Without “sustained, predictable appropriations, my presence here today wastes your time,” he added.

Mr. Mattis said that stumbling into another year-long continuing resolution would mean: not recruiting 15,000 Army soldiers and 4,000 Air Force airmen to fill shortfalls; grounding aircraft thanks to a lack of maintenance and spare parts; and worse. “Let me be clear,” he said, “as hard as the last 16 years of war have been on our military, no enemy in the field has done as much to harm the readiness of the U.S. military than the combined impact of the Budget Control Act’s defense spending caps, worsened by operating for 10 of the last 11 years under continuing resolutions of varied and unpredictable duration.”

All of this should rattle Members obsessing over funding for this or that domestic account as a precondition for a deal that gives the military stable funding. Credit to Mr. Mattis for exposing this pathetic budget exercise, which has withheld resources from service members who have signed “a blank check payable to the American people with their lives.”

Senate Homeland Security Committee releases report on FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton

by Kelly Cohen

The report released Wednesday is titled "The Clinton Email Scandal And The FBI's Investigation Of It." (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)

The Senate Homeland Security Committee released troves of documents Wednesday highlighting the FBI’s investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server.

The near-three year investigation was spearheaded by Chairman Ron Johnson, R-Wisc., and the Republican majority, and specifically highlights text messages between top FBI counterintelligence official Peter Strzok and FBI lawyer Lisa Page.

The interim report released Wednesday — titled “The Clinton Email Scandal And The FBI’s Investigation Of It” — claims the text messages “paint a picture of bias and animus, and certainly raise questions about possible corruption," Johnson said.

The oversight investigation will continue, the report claims.

The report notes the 400 pages of texts released by Johnson do not include those exchanged between Dec. 13, 2016 and May 17, 2017 — a crucial time during the Russia investigation. Those texts were originally thought to be lost because of a technical glitch, but the Justice Department said last month they had been recovered.

Strzok and Page worked on the Clinton probe together, and were also engaged in an extramarital affair.

In one exchange between the two, Page texted Strzok in August 2016 that he was "meant to protect the country from that menace,” and linked to an article about then-presidential nominee Donald Trump’s so-called “enablers.”

“Of course I’ll try and approach it that way. I just know it will be tough at times. I can protect our country at many levels, not sure if that helps,” Strzok replied.

On July 1, 2016 — four days before then-FBI Director James Comey announced no criminal charges would be brought against Clinton — then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch said she would follow the FBI’s recommendation. Page messaged Strzok that “it’s a real profile in [courage], since she knows no charges will be brought.”

"Potus wants to know everything we're doing," Page texted Strzok on Sept. 2, 2016. That text was in reference Comey, who had been preparing talking points for former President Obama regarding the probe into the former secretary of state.

Text messages from late September 2016 also raise concerns about when senior FBI officials learned that there were emails related to Clinton on the laptop of Huma Abedin’s husband, former Congressman Anthony Weiner.

“Got called up to Andy’s earlier ... hundreds of thousands of emails turned over by Weiner’s atty to sdny, includes a ton of material from spouse. Sending team up tomorrow to review... this will never end...” Srzok wrote to Page.

On Oct. 21, 2016, Strzok again told Page that Deputy Assistant Attorney General George Toscas became aware of the new Clinton emails — a week before Comey told Congress the FBI was reopening its probe because of the emails found on Weiner’s laptop.

“[T]he American presidential election, and thus, the state of the world, actually hangs in the balance,” Page said in a message to Strzok on Nov. 4, 2016 as the FBI finished its review of the emails on Weiner’s computer.

Strzok and Page were later assigned to special counsel Robert Mueller’s team, who was appointed on May 17, 2017, to investigate Russian meddling in the 2016 election and possible collusion with the Trump campaign,

The two discussed the possibility of joining the team just two days prior, with Strzok telling Page he had a “sense of unfinished business“ and called the probe an “investigation leading to impeachment?”

The two also lambasted Trump on multiple occasions, including on Election Day when Page wrote, "OMG THIS IS F***KING TERRIFYING."

Strzok responded, "Omg, I am so depressed."

"I bought all the president's men. Figure I need to brush up on watergate," Page later replied.

The last message between the two came on June 23, 2017, when Page told Strzok, "Please don't ever text me again."

In a tweet Wednesday morning, Trump called the documents “BOMBSHELLS.”

It Takes Chutzpah to Call This the ‘Obama Boom’

Hundreds of thousands of Americans are moving from part-time work to full-time employment.

By Andy Puzder

Progressives are tying themselves in knots to avoid giving President Trump credit for anything positive. Take the economy. It isn’t really booming, they say, but even if it is, President Obama is the man to thank.

The claim doesn’t add up. In 2010 the Obama White House forecast gross domestic product growth would “accelerate in 2011 to 3.8%” and “exceed 4% per year in 2012-2014,” consistent with the 4.3% growth rate in the other 10 recoveries since World War II. That never happened. Actual post-recession growth averaged an anemic 2.1%. And Mr. Obama’s last year in office saw measly 1.5% GDP growth—hardly the springboard to our current expansion.

Former Obama administration economists have circled the wagons in an attempt to explain away their boss’s dismal economic record as a product of structural factors rather than policy. Austan Goolsbee has called Mr. Trump’s growth goals unrealistic. In May Larry Summers declared that accepting the Trump administration’s forecast of 3% GDP growth was like believing “in tooth fairies.”

These claims have made it difficult for progressives to explain the 3% average GDP growth rate during Mr. Trump’s first three full quarters in office. They’ve resorted instead to diminishing the president’s economic record by pointing to 2017’s full-year GDP growth of 2.3%—relatively close to Mr. Obama’s 2.1% post-recession average.

The problem for Mr. Obama’s progressive defenders is that analysts traditionally attribute the first quarter of a new presidency to the previous administration. President Bush, rather than Mr. Obama, got the blame for the negative 5.4% growth during the first quarter of 2009. What was fair then is fair now. The attempt to saddle Mr. Trump with responsibility for the economy’s performance during the first quarter of 2017 is disingenuous.

A bigger problem for progressives is that Mr. Trump’s numbers easily could have been much better. Two hurricanes held GDP growth down in the third quarter. In the fourth quarter, businesses were waiting to see if Congress would pass tax reform setting lower tax rates and enabling them immediately to write off 100% of their investments in plant and equipment. I was a CEO for 17 years; I would have waited too. This hampered fourth-quarter growth but should accelerate growth in the first quarter of 2018. The Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow model is forecasting first-quarter growth of 4%.

The jobs numbers are similarly positive. In 2017 the economy added approximately 2.1 million jobs. Progressives counter that job growth actually slowed from the 2.2 million jobs added in 2016. But job quality also matters. The Obama economy was a “part time” economy that failed to generate the full-time jobs Americans need.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the number of people working full time increased by 2.4 million in 2017, compared with only 1.6 million in 2016. In other words, the overall number of jobs added was lower in 2017, but only because hundreds of thousands of people left part-time for full-time jobs.

Both 2016 and 2017 set some year-end records. In 2016, BLS recorded the highest number of people working part time at year’s end since it began recording the data in 1968. In 2017, it recorded the highest number of people working full time at year’s end since 1968 and the fewest working part-time since 2011.

Regulatory relief and tax reform are bringing more growth and better jobs. It’s a Trump Boom, but Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer says the president should “thank Obama.” Perhaps, but only for setting economic bar so low.

Mr. Puzder is a former CEO of CKE Restaurants.

  Sarah Sanders Absolutely Destroys April Ryan During White House Press Conference

CNN reporter April Ryan has made a habit of trying to embarrass White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders. There’s just one problem: she’s not very good at it. At all.

Over Thanksgiving, Sanders shot down Ryan’s attempt to discredit her pie-baking skills. And on Tuesday, Sanders got the upper hand again when Ryan attempted to debate her at the White House press briefing.

Ever since the State of the Union, President Donald Trump has been critical of the un-American behavior of Democrat lawmakers; specifically, their refusal to stand during portions of his speech touting historic lows in black unemployment and his comments on the National Anthem. At the press briefing, Ryan attempted to school Sanders by explaining that it’s standard SOTU behavior for Democrats to sit throughout a Republican president’s address and vice versa. “What is so un-American about this, this year, after this has been going on for all of these years?” Ryan asked Sanders.

Unfortunately for Ryan, Sanders’s response was pure dynamite:

“I think its un-American not to be excited about the fact that more people in this country have jobs than they did before, the fact that more people in this country have higher wages than they did before, the fact that the economy is booming like it wasn’t before, the fact that ISIS is being crushed like it wasn’t before,” she flatly answered. “These are things that I don’t care what party you are from, these are things that every American should be excited about and be able to celebrate.”

Boom. Sanders 2; Ryan 0.

And as to the point about Democrat lawmakers not standing for Trump’s comments on historic lows in black unemployment — aren’t Democrats always the ones bragging about how they’re the party that stands up for minorities? I guess that’s just a figure of speech.

John Kelly in Trouble After Calling DACA Recipients “Lazy”

Democrats would love to give up to 1.8 million people amnesty by naturalizing so-called “dreamers,” but about a million simply haven’t signed up for the program. Approximately 800,000 people have benefited from the program, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, which means that most of the eligible haven’t signed up for the program.

Democrats tried to save the program during their government shutdown, but gave up that fight quickly.

According to White House Chief of Staff John Kelly, he doesn’t expect DACA’s protections to exist beyond March 5th. However, he did say that the government would not start deporting “dreamers” who don’t have criminal records, because “they are not a priority for deportation,” he told reporters.

It’s what Kelly said next that’s getting him into trouble. Axois reported that regarding the million-plus people who didn’t sign up, Kelly said:

“The difference between [800,000] and 1.8 million were the people that some would say we're too afraid to sign up, others would say we're too lazy to get off their asses, but they didn’t sign up.”

A source familiar told Axois it has been Gen. Kelly in at least one meeting who said they were too lazy, and a Democratic senator who countered that they were too afraid to sign up. The White House did not respond to requests for comment.

On cue, liberals are expressing outrage for Kelly’s explanation as to why most “dreamers” aren’t signing up for the program they’re defending.

Who knew our nation’s illegals were all working full work weeks while simultaneously taking six college courses?

MSNBC’s Joy Reid expressed sympathy for illegals because they don’t “get back” the taxes they don’t pay.

MoveOn.org’s Ben Wikler claimed that the reason “dreamers” are afraid to sign up for DACA is because they’re afraid of it being used as a “deportation list.” Given that it’s Wikler and his fellow liberals who’ve been hysterically portraying Trump as Hitler-esque for the past two years, aren’t they the ones responsible for this fear?

Seriously though, what is their excuse?

If Republicans created a program to help a certain demographic, and the majority of that demographic chooses not to opt into the program, wouldn’t Democrats portray the program as a failure?

In the case of DACA, it’s even worse, because it implies those who haven’t registered would rather remain illegal immigrants than naturalized citizens.

Kaepernick raises $20K in celebrity donations for group honoring convicted cop-killer

Assata’s Daughters named for FBI most-wanted terrorist Assata Shakur

By Valerie Richardson - The Washington Times

Colin Kaepernick said Friday he has raised $20,000 for Assata’s Daughters, named after convicted cop-killer Assata Shakur, through matching donations from his celebrity friends as part of his Million Dollar Pledge.

The former San Francisco 49ers quarterback announced that comedian Hannibal Buress and actress Yara Shahidi would both donate $10,000 to Assata’s Daughters, which says it “carries on the tradition of radical liberatory activism encompassed by Assata Shakur.”

The pledges were linked to a previous donation made by Mr. Kaepernick, who announced in April he would give $25,000 to the Chicago-based group as part of his campaign to give $1 million to organizations “working in oppressed communities.”

Ms. Shahidi, star of the ABC-TV comedy “Black-ish” and the spin-off “Grown-ish,” thanked Mr. Kaepernick for giving her the idea.

“I decided to donate to Assata’s Daughters, which is an amazing organization based out of Chicago,” said Ms. Shahidi in a video posted on Mr. Kaepernick’s Twitter feed. “And I just have to say thank you to Colin for such an amazing idea, but also in engaging all of us and helping to contribute to our world.”

The Colin Kaepernick Foundation has made donations to more than 30 organizations from community associations like Lower East Side Girls Club to left-wing advocacy groups like the Advancement Project, but none has been more controversial than Assata’s Daughters.

A “direct action” advocacy group, Assata’s Daughters drew its name from Assata Shakur, formerly Joanne Chesimard, a Black Liberation Army member convicted in the 1977 shooting death of New Jersey state trooper Werner Foerster.

After escaping from prison in 1979, she fled to Cuba and was granted asylum. The FBI has placed her on its “most wanted terrorists” list.

Trooper Foerster was killed in a shootout with three BLA activists on the New Jersey Turnpike that resulted in the death of BLA activist Zayd Shakur and bullet wounds to Assata Shakur and state trooper James Harper.

A third activist, Sundiata Acoli, was found guilty of firing the shots that killed the officer, while Assata Shakur was convicted as an accomplice. Both were found guilty of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison.

Shakur, who has argued that the jury was racist and that her trial was unfair, has since become a popular figure on the left and at universities, where her autobiography has been assigned on course reading lists.

The Officer Down Memorial Page described the Black Liberation Army as “a violent, radical group that attempted to fight for independence from the United States government in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s.”

“The BLA was responsible for the murders of more than 10 police officers around the country,” said the ODMP website. “They were also responsible for violent attacks around the country that left many police officers wounded.”

Assata’s Daughters, which identifies itself as an arm of Black Lives Matter, has called for shutting down police departments and prisons.

“In our direct action organizing, we bring Chicagoans together to address the many injustices in our city and the world,” said the group on its website. “We organize for abolition: of the police, prisons, and all other forms of anti-blackness. Collectively, we work to build up alternative institutions and the means for self-determination.”

Mr. Kaepernick wrapped up his Million Dollar Pledge last week after announcing he would donate a final $100,000 in $10,000 increments to 10 different organizations, all of which were matched by celebrity friends and supporters, including Snoop Dogg, Chris Brown, Nick Cannon, Meek Mill and Usher.

Other stars, including Sean “Diddy” Combs, Dr. Dre and DJ Khaled, said they would contribute to various organizations that Mr. Kaepernick had backed previously during the campaign.

A free agent, Mr. Kaepernick was the face of the 2016 NFL take-a-knee protests, but has yet to sign with a team after opting out of his 49ers contract in March 2017. He has filed a grievance with the NFL alleging that team owners have colluded against him.

“I started my #MillionDollarPledge to help organizations on the ground doing work in our communities,” said Mr. Kaepernick in a Jan. 31 post. “It was never for or about me - it has & always will be for the people.”

Trey Gowdy Strongly Hints Sidney Blumenthal Is the Trump Dossier Source

Rep. Trey Gowdy dropped a bombshell hint on Fox News Tuesday night. He strongly implied that the information used by former British spy Christopher Steele for false anti-Trump research was provided by longtime Clinton friend Sidney Blumenthal.

Blumenthal, a controversial figure, became central to the U.S. House investigation into the terrorist attack in Benghazi after emails showed Blumenthal consulted then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on the false allegation that an anti-Islam YouTube video started the attack. During his work for Clinton, he was also simultaneously employed by David Brock’s far-left organization Media Matters, earning at least $200,000 per year for his political activities. While never formally working for the Obama Administration, he worked in the White House of President Bill Clinton and for the Clinton Foundation during Obama’s tenure.

During the Fox News interview with host Martha MacCallum, Gowdy was asked whether “weeks before the election, somebody in the Obama State Department was feeding information from a foreign source to Christopher Steele.” This was after MacCallum previously asked if Gowdy knew anything about “a source who gave information to an unnamed associate of Hillary and Bill Clinton who then gave information to an unnamed official in the Obama State Department who then gave the information to Steele.”

That’s when Gowdy provided a jaw-dropping response:

“When you hear who the source, one of the sources of that information is, you’re going to think, ‘Oh, my gosh, I’ve heard that name somewhere before. Where could it possibly have been?'”

After confirming the source was domestic, Gowdy noted, “I’m trying to think of how Secretary Clinton defined him. I think she said he was an old friend who emailed her from time to time.”

When asked directly if the source was Blumenthal, Gowdy replied, “That would be really warm. You’re warm.”

Gowdy’s comments come just a few days after the Republican memo showing how the Justice Department relied on the Clinton-funded dossier from Steele to obtain a FISA warrant against Carter Page, a former campaign adviser to Donald Trump. It’s already looking like Hillary Clinton essentially purchased the warrant so the Obama-controlled federal government could monitor Team Trump during the heated 2016 campaign.

Research Suggests All Those Soccer Moms Might Have Picked A Dangerous Sport After All
Soccer may be the next sport to deal with the fallout of brain trauma and chronic traumatic encephalopathy concerns already breathing at football’s heels.
By Brian Willett

I recently discussed the threat of chronic traumatic encephalopathy to football, the National Football League in particular. While football faces the most immediate threat from CTE, it’s far from the only contact sport that must face this issue.

Soccer may be the next sport to deal with the fallout of brain trauma and CTE. Former Ireland and Colorado Rapids forward Kevin Doyle’s recent concussion-enforced retirement kicked off a new round of discussions regarding soccer and the brain.

Soccer may lack the constant blows of football, yet it still sees plenty of head injuries and concussions. Female soccer players suffer the most concussions in high school sports, according to the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons. Heading plays a big role in the sport and produces a similar sort of brain sloshing as subconcussive hits in football.

Too Little Care for Concussions

World soccer exhibits far too little caution over concussions. Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) didn’t even follow its own concussion guidelines at the 2014 World Cup, according to Canadian researchers. Players return to the field too often after serious head injuries, with Christopher Kramer at the 2014 World Cup final and Hugo Lloris in a Premier League match serving as recent high-profile examples.

Major League Soccer hasn’t avoided the issue either. Concussions remain a dicier problem for soccer than football, considering its substitution limits. Managers don’t want to burn one of their three substitutions if it’s “just a knock,” especially if it involves a goalkeeper like in Lloris’ case. They also don’t want to play down a man for too long so a player can receive a proper examination. So they generally fall on the side of playing rather than safety.

FIFA has implemented a three-minute break in a game if a brain injury is suspected. But that’s simply not sufficient to determine a concussion.

What’s Wrong with Heading

While concussions remain a serious issue for the sport, heading may cause the more widespread brain issues. Not everyone experiences a concussion while playing soccer. Everyone heads the ball, more often in practice than in games.

One small study found that frequent heading caused brain changes “resembling mild traumatic brain injury,” the kind that resembles the subconcussive hits of football. Other studies have found a connection between soccer or heading and “structural changes to the brain.”

Unfortunately, soccer hasn’t gleaned (or rued) nearly the brain data that football has. It also lacks the “big name” diagnoses, like a Junior Seau or Aaron Hernandez. Most studies use a small sample or rely on some self-reporting (as in, a player claims he heads the ball more than most).

The sport also hasn’t given scientists nearly the volume of actual brains to test for CTE that football has. Like football, additional data could show a link to CTE or no connection. The current consensus statement from the International Conference on Concussion in Sport in 2016 said “the potential for developing chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) must be a consideration” but that “a cause-and-effect relationship has not yet been demonstrated between CTE and SRCs (sport-related concussion) or exposure to contact sports.”

The Case of Patrick Grange

Former college and semiprofessional soccer player Patrick Grange, who died in 2012 at the age of 29, is considered the first soccer player to be diagnosed with CTE. Curiously, he died from Lou Gehrig’s disease, which typically doesn’t present until much later. Adding to that mystery, an Italian study found that soccer players were more susceptible to ALS. According to his parents, Grange suffered several concussions and he was “proud of his ability to head the ball.” The neuropathologist who performed the brain examination claimed he had “very extensive frontal lobe damage.”

Former English striker Jeff Astle was diagnosed with CTE many years after his death in 2002 at age 59. The coroner blamed “heading heavy leather balls” for Astle’s brain damage. The doctor said Astle’s brain resembled that of an 89-year-old. Another United Kingdom study found six former professional players had Alzheimer’s, with four of those having CTE.

Many former American soccer players have pledged to donate their brains for trauma research, including Brandi Chastain and Abby Wambach. Taylor Twellman also plans to donate. He retired because of complications related to at least “seven or eight concussions since he was 10 years old” and has since been a tireless advocate for concussion awareness.

The most interesting potential donor is 82-year-old Len Oliver. He played college and semi pro soccer in the 1950s and 1960s, suffering some head trauma despite never hearing the word “concussion.” So far, he has not exhibited symptoms of traumatic brain injury. He’s offered his brain in part “to combat the perception that heading the ball is dangerous.”

The Search for Solutions

Headgear remains the most popular and obvious solution. Yet its effectiveness has not been proven, despite the ability to “dissipate some force.” Also, like helmets in football, headgear conceivably gives players a false sense of security.

Perhaps the best option, however unlikely, to cut down on the subconcussive injuries is simply to cut out plays that regularly lead to heading, mainly goal kicks and punts. Banning heading outright seems nigh impossible, but these steps would significantly reduce its opportunities. Harsher punishments for flying elbows and other reckless behavior could at least reduce opportunities for contact injuries. The U.S. Soccer Federation has taken a step in this direction by banning heading for players under the age of 11 and reducing headers in practice for ages 11-13.

Soccer must also address the problem of what to do following an in-game head injury like a concussion. Current behavior by coaches will not change until a third party (presumably FIFA or a professional league) has the authority to remove a player from a game.

The biggest hindrances to any meaningful and institutional reform are FIFA’s notoriously change-averse nature and, to a lesser extent, the sheer number of professional and amateur leagues throughout the world. Football in America could implement policy changes with relative ease, with only two significant leagues (NFL and NCAA).

Soccer doesn’t quite have that luxury, unless FIFA implements changes itself. If they leave it up to the confederations or even leagues, it may take a while. Or, as with football, it may simply come down to fans, parents, and players accepting the long-term risk and getting on with it. Or perhaps Manchester United legend Roy Keane is right. Anyone worried about things like head injuries should play chess instead.

Brian Willett is a Federalist senior contributor and the publisher of fwd, a daily tech newsletter. He tweets sporadically @brianjwillett

         

Here’s The One Question Democrats Need To Answer In Their Memo, But Probably Won’t

They must address whether the FISA court was misled about the credibility of the Steele dossier

By Jason Beale

Democratic Reps. Adam Schiff and Jerrold Nadler have indicated how they plan to respond in their counter to the memo from House Intelligence Committee Republicans that alleges the FBI abused the FISA system to spy on the Trump campaign. They released a pair of unclassified press releases that clarify the concerns their memo is likely to highlight.

Taken together, the responses make it clear that the central complaint about the memo from Republican Rep. Devin Nunes involves omissions — an echo of concerns issued by FBI Director Chris Wray in a statement citing his “grave concerns about material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo’s accuracy.” The omissions appear to revolve around the foundational and source disclosure elements of the Nunes memo, which the Democrats will claim lacks context.

Schiff, the ranking minority member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI), issued his on behalf of the HPSCI minority, while Nadler, who holds the same title on the House Judiciary committee, appears to have issued his response directly to NBC News under his own name. Schiff presents his main argument here:

In order to understand the context in which the FBI sought a FISA warrant for Carter Page, it is necessary to understand how the investigation began, what other information the FBI had about Russia’s efforts to interfere with our election, and what the FBI knew about Carter Page prior to making application to the court – including Carter Page’s previous interactions with Russian intelligence operatives. This is set out in the Democratic response, which the GOP so far refuses to make public.

The authors of the GOP memo would like the country to believe that the investigation began with Christopher Steele and the dossier, and if they can just discredit Mr. Steele, they can make the whole investigation go away regardless of the Russians’ interference in our election or the role of the Trump campaign in that interference. This ignores the inconvenient fact that the investigation did not begin with, or arise from Christopher Steele or the dossier, and that the investigation would persist on the basis of wholly independent evidence had Christopher Steele never entered the picture.

The DOJ appropriately provided the court with a comprehensive explanation of Russia’s election interference, including evidence that Russian agents courted another Trump campaign foreign policy adviser, George Papadopoulos. As we know from Papadopoulos’ guilty plea, Russian agents disclosed to Papadopoulos their possession of stolen Clinton emails and interest in a relationship with the campaign. In claiming that there is ‘no evidence of any cooperation or conspiracy between Page and Papadopoulos,’ the Majority deliberately misstates the reason why DOJ specifically explained Russia’s role in courting Papadopoulos and the context in which to evaluate Russian approaches to Page.

Nadler echoes the general themes established in the Schiff response, and provides some color to the issues cited above. While his letter comprises four separate points of dispute, only the first two deal with the substance of the Nunes memo — the others describe Nadler’s understanding of the political agenda informing the compilation and release of the memo.

Those two issues Nadler presented are as follows:

“The FISA court found probable cause to believe that Carter Page is an agent of a foreign power. Nothing in the Nunes memo rules out the possibility that considerable evidence beyond the Steele dossier helped the court reach that conclusion.”

“Christopher Steele is a recognized expert on Russia organized crime.”

While their presentation may be different, the two Democrats agree on the central complaint: The Nunes memo was crafted in a manner that misleads the public as to the totality of evidence presented in seeking the FISA warrant. There were other factors that supported approval of the warrant, which were purposefully excluded from the memo in furtherance of a political agenda to cover for President Trump, and to distract from, and possibly undermine, the ongoing Mueller investigation.

Based on public statements by both Schiff and Nadler and the arguments put forward in their written responses, one can put together a fairly reliable picture of the nature of the evidence they believe to have been excluded.

It appears that the Democratic response to the Nunes memo will claim that the FBI and DoJ presented a case against Carter Page that involved four separate elements.

First, the association of his transition colleague, George Papadopoulos, with suspected Russian operatives, who orchestrated a dangle of derogatory information (“thousands of Clinton emails”) through an alleged cutout ostensibly working for Russian intelligence. This would have been presented to show Russian interest in, and demonstrated action against, Trump-associated transition officials, and would suggest that a similar approach to Page would be in keeping with a pattern. It would also support the Democrat point that the Papadopoulos notification was the event that triggered the investigation, not the Steele dossier.

Second, the Democrats will note the checkered counter-intelligence background of Carter Page, including his brush with a recruitment operation by a cell of Russian intelligence officers based in New York in 2013 and 2014. During the course of his interactions with these agents, Page provided one of them with open source energy industry documents, which the FBI reasonably interpreted as a precursor to more aggressive recruitment, at which time they approached Page and waved him off.

Page has not disputed this sequence of events, but has repeatedly and consistently denied knowledge of the nefarious intent of his Russian interlocutor until apprised of the situation by the FBI. Nevertheless, the inclusion of such prior contact with a foreign intelligence agency and his propensity for engaging, albeit unwittingly, in suspicious interactions with foreign intelligence agents merits inclusion in any request to further explore Page’s 2016 contacts and activities in Russia.

Third, the Democratic memo will likely more comprehensively address the events that led the FBI to initiate a full investigation into Russian contacts with Trump associates during the campaign and transition. While the Papadopoulos affair is believed to be the trigger, the Democrats may present additional factors, possibly involving intercepted communications prior to or concurrent with the Papadopoulos engagement, which compelled the intelligence community to take a harder look at the Papadopoulos information when it came across their transom.

The Steele dossier will represent the remaining element of evidence presented by the Democrats in their memo, but its prominence will likely be minimized to represent the dossier as of equal or lesser deliberative value to the FISA evidence packet, when measured against the other three evidentiary streams.

All of this is a completely understandable Democratic response to the compliance, disclosure, and evidentiary issues identified in the Nunes memo. It makes complete sense to flesh out the unreported details of the totality of the evidence in order to mute the impact of what is currently a disadvantageous political environment for the Democrats. The Nunes memo has raised questions regarding not only the FBI and DOJ’s posture related to evidentiary obligations in seeking government action against a citizen, but also in the posture of a political party which has been backed into a position of opposing the transparency that brought the issue to light, while defending against, or rationalizing, the allegations of malfeasance that populate the Nunes memo.

It’s important that they get this right, not only for the good of the Democrats working to reduce the boil on what is currently an uncomfortable period of scrutiny, but also for the good of the informed citizenry, who would likely rather fly to Washington and stand in line to read each FISA application individually than go through another three months of accusations and counter-accusations between the two parties, with no additional public information to clarify the very serious questions posed by the Nunes memo.

Unfortunately for all involved, if the Democrats follow a script similar to the one I’ve proposed above, they will fall short of that task, as there is one key element of this dispute which will remain unaddressed, at least in a comprehensive way, and that element is this: The principle issue at hand is not whether or not the Steele memorandum was used as a small, medium, or major part of the FISA package, nor is there any dispute that the subsequent 90-day reauthorizations required sufficient cause to show that the surveillance during that period had been productive.

That is all of interest, but not dispositive to the central question, which is whether or not any of the Steele dossier information had been corroborated prior to inclusion in the FISA request and, if not, whether the judge had been properly apprised of the unverified nature of that evidence. Absent a clear answer to that question, nothing else really matters.

“It wasn’t all verified, but there was plenty of other evidence to compel the approval even if we hadn’t used it” isn’t an acceptable response, nor will it be acceptable if the veracity of the Steele information was attested to based on his reputation and history of positive production to the FBI and DoJ. It appears that Nadler’s second point — that “Christopher Steele is a recognized expert on Russia and organized crime” — is a troubling foreshadowing of the likelihood that this characterization may be presented as dispositive, in lieu of corroboration of his reporting.

It is of little import to those inclined to believe the allegations set forth in the Nunes memo that the investigation has been ongoing since July, and that the Steele dossier isn’t officially recognized as the trigger that initiated the investigation. We know that the FBI had the Steele dossier prior to the late-July phone call from the Australian diplomat, and that the FBI subsequently met with and hired Steele as a paid source.

We know that Steele’s unreported or misrepresented interactions with the media led to his removal from the payroll prior to his first payment, but didn’t end his interaction and cooperation with the FBI and DOJ. We don’t know for sure, but are told that the explosive nature of the information and extensive list of contacts in the Steele dossier occupied a significantly larger percentage of FBI’s investigative interest and resources than the singular entanglement of Papadopoulos in his own web of nefarious characters.

Finally, while we appreciate the oft-stated reauthorization standard for FISA warrants — that the government must provide positive results from the collection period in order to gain approval for an additional 90-day window — we are also aware that the Steele dossier was also included in each of those reauthorization hearings. We want to know that each of those hearings involved a declaration that the evidence presented from that dossier was validated. Otherwise, we want to know why they felt it was necessary to include unverified information in a hearing in which technical surveillance evidence suggesting that Page was acting as an agent of a foreign power was not considered sufficient to gain approval for the extension without additional supporting evidence, which may or may not have been of questionable validity.

What we don’t want to hear is a declaration that the dossier information was indeed validated, only to be informed after further review that the validated data points consisted of verification that Page traveled to Moscow and made his speech on the dates noted in the dossier, that the FBI validated that Putin hated Hillary Clinton and wanted Trump to win, or that Russian individuals Page was accused of “meeting with” and secretly conspiring with were present in Moscow or at the speech during the time periods mentioned in the dossier, without further corroboration that he did indeed “meet with” and conspire with these individuals. A greeting in passing won’t do. Geographical colocation won’t do. We need to know that he did what Steele said he did — not that he was present where Steele said he was present.

So we look forward to the release of the Democratic HPSCI response to the Nunes memo, but we hope it will include a definitive answer to the only question that really matters — was the Steele dossier information presented to that court a finished product of the full vetting and validation process required by the FBI, DOJ, and FISA court, or not?

Absent a clear answer to that question, the Democratic response to the Nunes memo will only increase the rancorous division on this issue between the parties, and the public.

Jason Beale (a pseudonym) is a retired U.S. Army interrogator and strategic debriefer with 30 years experience in military and intelligence interrogation and human intelligence collection operations. He's on Twitter @jabeale.

G’ day…Ciao…
Helen and Moe Lauzier

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