Defending Manafort is not the point. Paul Manafort is rich enough to defend himself. The point is his blood in the water, his being attacked by the sharks who inhabit Washington and the media for no reasons other than to promote an anti-Russian policy and an anti-Trump coup. The point is that the Washington sharks are anti-Russian in the same way that their predecessors were anti-Communist. Anyone who had a brush with communists or communism was a target then. Anyone who has anything to do with Russia or deviates from the anti-Russian line can become an instant target today. That is the point. The point is an oppressive U.S. government and a dangerously expansive and anti-Russian U.S. government.
Not being anti-Russian and having been on Trump’s team, Manafort is a target for the sharks’ teeth.
Bloomberg News has put out an article titled “Paul Manafort’s Lucrative Ukraine Years Are Central to the Russia Probe”.
My takeaway is that Paul Manafort made a lot of money advising politicians in Ukraine who were not among those anointed by Victoria Nuland, the CIA and others. Was that a crime? Can an American not legally engage in political activities in foreign lands? Are there laws against this? Nowhere in this long Bloomberg recitation of Manafort’s work are any violations of any statutes mentioned or even hinted at. The closest we get to that are this statement: “…various U.S. authorities are once again asking questions about his financial dealings, particularly those involving Ukraine and his U.S. real estate investments.” For its part, Bloomberg writers attempt to draw blood on their own: “But the Manafort story—a tale of pro-Russia players, political tradecraft and cunning financial maneuvers—has never gone away.”
What state secrets did Manafort convey to U.S. enemies? Who were these enemies? What state secrets did he know and have access to? He was not employed by the U.S. government. After almost a year investigating Manafort, the FBI’s work has not led to an indictment of any kind against him, much less a leak or allegation that he betrayed secrets to an enemy.
Is his crime supposed to arise from his political money-making activities? Does political activity that Washington dislikes or that goes contrary to Washington policies “sell out” the country or endanger the state? Does it constitute spying? Is it aid and comfort to an enemy?
Why is the FBI investigating Paul Manafort? There is no genuine rationale other than a suspicion that he committed a crime or crimes. But he didn’t convey state secrets or breach national security in that way. What is left but the notion that he worked against the policies and interests of the U.S. government or portions thereof and that the FBI is acting as if this were suspicious? But is working against the policies of the U.S. government a crime? If that’s a crime, then the First Amendment is meaningless and Americans have no political liberty. We must kowtow to Washington’s party line. If the FBI isn’t engaged in an investigation that is fundamentally anti-constitutional by being anti-First Amendment, then why is it investigating Paul Manafort? That’s the crucial question. And Manafort is not alone. The same story holds for several other of Trump’s associates, like Carter Page.
Comey richly deserved to be fired, but that’s far from enough.
Trump had good reason to fire Comey, but he failed to expose these investigations for what they are and put an end to them. He called them a “total witch hunt”, but he didn’t stop them or even publicly explain what’s wrong with them. A police state conducts fishing expeditions that look for infractions against people committing “political crimes”, which are nothing more than working against the government’s policies or criticizing them or criticizing government itself. We have in FBI behavior a resurrection of portions of the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798.
The FBI investigation is at root a subversive attack on free speech and free political activity. It seeks to replace the existing system, which at least has a degree of openness and free expression, which allows dissent against government policies and the government itself, with a closed system run totally by insiders. This is the point, the libertarian point. The sharks circling Manafort are circling around anyone who dissents. They are enemies of dissent. As such they are enemies of the libertarian.
11:58 am on May 23, 2017
