During the Whitehouse Taskforce presentation on Thursday April 23rd, a senior official of the Homeland Security, Bill Bryan, presented the results from a scientific study. A research on Corona virus by the US Army biological lab showed that bleach kills coronavirus in about five minutes, and isopropyl alcohol destroys it even faster. Tests showed the virus in droplets of saliva survives best indoors and in dry conditions. “The virus dies the quickest in the presence of direct sunlight under these conditions” according to the official. It appears that several members of the task force including the President and the Vice President reacted positively to the study. This is because the study offered hope that the virus can be tamed in summer. Vice President Mike Pence called Bryan’s presentation “encouraging news about the impact of that heat and sunlight have on the coronavirus, which will increase the confidence that we feel about the coming summer.” The President then expressed optimism about finding a solution by research with the following or similar words:
“And then I see the disinfectant where it knocks it out in one minute. Is there a way we can do something like that by injection inside or almost a cleaning … it would be interesting to check that?”
“Suppose that we hit the body with a tremendous, whether it’s ultraviolet or just very powerful light and I think you said that it hasn’t been checked and you’re going to test it,” Trump told Bryan. “Suppose you can bring the light inside the body.”
The President was simply asking the official to look further in to it. But his words caused a major hoopla by the media and his political opponents implying that the President has suggested to the public that they can kill the virus by injecting dangerous disinfectants. Almost every one of them ridiculed his so-called cure and his lack of knowledge.
But the truth is what he said is not stupid or unrealistic. As you know, many people suffer from Asthma that is also a respiratory illness. Aerosol inhalers are widely used to get relief and prevent deaths. According to Wikipedia, one of the first inhalers developed in 1865 had the following ingredients:
Chlorine, Ammonia, Iodine, Tar, Turpentine, etc.
Chlorine is the active ingredient in bleach. When mixed with Ammonia, it creates a toxic gas but obviously the inhalers worked. Though toxic in the liquid form, when they are inhaled in small quantities, they take care of asthma. Very likely, the present-day inhalers contain ingredients that have been derived from the above disinfectants.
It also has also been reported that “a company out of Colorado announced that it is studying a new device that would embed LED lights that emit UV rays into the breathing tubes of ventilators, and that way you could actually attack the virus inside the trachea.”
So, what President Trump said made perfect sense. At this time, there is no cure or vaccine for this deadly virus. He was merely suggesting that scientists should further look in to finding a solution from what is known to kill the virus. For some, it may be difficult to understand his motives. Years ago, one of my family members was stricken with a deadly cancer and was given just six months to live by the Doctors because there was no cure. I was desperate and if some one I trust told me that Kangaroo blood is a possible cure, I would have gone to Australia to get it. Similarly, the President cares a lot about the Americans and fully understands their suffering. That is why he and his Covid-19 task force have been working so hard to contain the virus. It is shameful and regrettable that so many of his critics are mischaracterizing his words and trying to win political points. I should also point out that during the past few days, I heard no criticism of the real culprit, the Chinese Govt. (not the people) whose actions or inactions created this monster. Forget about criticism, hardly any one in the major media has brought up this issue since the invisible enemy has invaded our country more than three months ago. It is very sad to realize that all they care about is how to undermine the President.

Last week, Attorney General testified before Congress that “Spying did occur targeting Trump campaign”. This set off a big storm of criticism from almost all Trump opponents who still want to believe that there was collusion between Trump campaign and Russia or at the minimum an obstruction of Justice. Let us try to be neutral and look at the facts before reaching any sort of conclusion.
Almost all critics attributed this comment by Barr to FISA warrant obtained by the DOJ in October 2016 on Carter Page, a former Trump campaign advisor. This warrant was approved by a Judge and signed off by the Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein three different times. FBI then monitored the activities of Page for several months. The critics say there was nothing illegal about it and fully justified. They are right hundred percent. In my opinion, Barr was not referring to this spying. It appears that all the critics are focusing on the wrong Page!
It has been widely reported that two senior FBI officials exchanged highly biased anti Trump text messages between August 15, 2015 and December 1, 2016. The officials are Peter Strzok, head of counter intelligence and his good friend Lisa Page, a senior FBI attorney. Page expresses strong dislike for Trump and fear that he may get elected. Strzok tries to put his friend at ease with his responses. Some of the exchanges are:
Strzok called Trump an “idiot” in a text in August 2015
Strzok texted “Hillary should win 100,000,000 to 0″ in March 2016
Page frantically texted, “[Trump’s] not ever going to become president, right? Right?!” Anxious to soothe his friend, Strzok responded, “No. No he won’t. We’ll stop it.” in August of 2016
Strzok texted “I want to believe the path you threw out in Andy’s [McCabe’s] office—that there’s no way he gets elected—but I’m afraid we can’t take the risk. It’s like an insurance policy” in August 2016
Page texted “I am preparing the talking points for FBI Director because POTUS (President Obama) wants to know everything we’re doing.” in Sept 2016
It is obvious from the above texts that there was at best a strong dislike among FBI top echelon for Donald Trump to get elected as President. At worst, actions may have been taken to compromise his election. If the latter is true, spying was a definite possibility.
Consider the following facts, that were reported in the news media but did not receive much attention:
Hillary Clinton missing emails investigation:
March 2, 2016- FBI Director James Comey drafts a statement exonerating Hillary Clinton two months before she was interviewed by the FBI.
June 2, 2016- President Bill Clinton met with AG Loretta Lynch on Phoenix airport tarmac calling it just a social call
July 1, 2016- When her meeting with Bill Clinton became public, AG Lynch announced that “I fully expect to accept” the DOJ and FBI recommendations on the Clinton email probe”
July 1, 2016- Strzok said in a July 1 text message that the timing of Lynch’s announcement “looks like hell.” And Page appears to mockingly refer to Lynch’s decision to accept the FBI’s conclusion in the case as a “real profile in courage since she knows no charges will be brought.”
July 2, 2016-Hillary Clinton was interviewed by Trump hater Peter Strzok without swearing her to an oath to tell the truth and without recording her answers.
July 5, 2016- Comey exonerates Hillary saying she was extremely careless and no criminal charges would be filed.
Feb 19, 2019- Former FBI General Counsel James Baker told Congress that he thought former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton should have faced charges for mishandling classified information especially some of the most highly classified stuff. He further stated that he was talked out of it.

Crossfire Hurricane:
July 2016- Counter Intelligence investigation against Trump campaign begins. It is headed by Peter Strzok.
July 2016- A senior FBI official Bruce Ohr met with Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence officer who authored a Dossier on Donald Trump that was paid for by Hillary Clinton campaign. His wife worked in the same firm as Steele, a known Trump hater who expressed his hope that Trump would not be elected as President.
Summer of 2016- A top secret FBI informant, said to be a 73-year-old professor from University of Cambridge in the U.K., met with Trump campaign advisers Carter Page and George Papadopoulos on the pretext of giving advice. He is also known to meet with Sam Clovis, a campaign co-chairman with the same pretext. He never informed them that he worked for FBI.
October, 2016- FBI obtains a FISA warrant to begin surveillance on Carter Page even though he already left Trump campaign.
Dec 2016- After Trump’s victory in the election, Susan Rice, the National Security Adviser for President Obama unmasked the names of three transition officials Bannon, Kushner, and Flynn to expose their official conversations with UAE officials.
May 17, 2017- Robert Mueller appointed as a Special Counsel to investigate trump campaign collusion with Russia.
May 19, 2017- Strzok texted his friend Page “There’s no big there there,” implying that there was no collusion. This just two days after the Special Counsel was appointed! Yet he joined the Mueller team as the chief investigator.

Any one who looks at the above facts with an unbiased mind should come to the conclusion that AG Barr’s statement “Spying did occur” is grossly an understatement. I firmly believe that lot more than spying occurred. As I mentioned in my piece on September 29th, 2018, George Papadopoulos, after serving his sentence, made some startling statements in his TV interviews. Two main ones are:
1. When Papadopoulos was named as a foreign policy adviser to the Trump campaign in early 2016, Papadopoulos was working at some London International Institute. He was then asked to go to Rome to meet with one Prof Joseph Mifsud who was also connected to the institute. The Professor then introduced him to one young Russian lady calling her the niece of Putin. He then promised to arrange a meeting between Trump and Putin in addition to delivering the missing emails. Papadopoulos, being naïve, was obviously excited about the connection he made
2. It has been widely reported that the FBI investigation started after Papadopoulos boasted in a drunken state to the Australian High Commissioner to UK that he had access to the 30,000 missing emails from a Russian source. This information was then relayed to the FBI prompting the investigation. But according to Papadopoulos, it was Alexander Downer, the H.C. who reached out to him and arranged a meeting at an unlikely place, a London Bar, presumably to discuss foreign policies of Trump Presidency. Papadopoulos had just one drink and was not drunk. It was the HC who brought up the subject of Hillary emails (at that time the incident of missing emails was well known). Papadopoulos then mentioned that he recently met with Professor Joseph Mifsud who claimed he has connections to the Russian intelligence and access to those emails.
As it turned, Prof Mifsud was of Maltese origin and had no connections to Russia or Russian intelligence. In fact, he had connections to Western intelligence. And the young lady was no niece of Putin. The Australian HC was a good friend of the Clintons and arranged the largest donation of $25 million to the Clinton foundation. Once all this became public, Prof Mifsud went in to hiding. It is unknown if the Mueller team ever interviewed or tried to locate these two individuals. When the Mueller report is released, hopefully we will find out. It is suffice to say that all this sounds very suspicious. Obviously, there was lot more going on than just spying. For the sake of saving our great democracy, I hope someone will do a thorough investigation and find the truth and nothing but the truth.

The news that Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to the charge of lying to Congress, created a big hysteria among news media, political pundits, and all President Trump’s opponents. Special Counsel Mr. Mueller and his team have been investigating Russian intervention in the 2016 Presidential elections for over 20 months but so far have not come up with any evidence of collusion between Trump campaign and the Russian government. Now, with this guilty plea, most of Trump’s opponents including those in US Congress have called for the impeacment of President Trump for lying to the American people during the 2016 campaign that he has no business dealings in or with Russia. It is well known that Trump held the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow. That was just an event lasting less than a week. It has also been reported,correctly, that Trump was keen on having a Trump Tower in Moscow for a long time.
Before going in to the facts behind the Trump Tower in Moscow, it is important to note that Trump family has been developing Trump Towers for many years all over the world. They have over 33 such properties including in countries like Panama, Turkey, India, and Brazil. Their business model is similar to that Marriott and Hilton hotels with one exception. Trump Towers also have condos and office space. The local builder or businessman, who gets the license from the Trumps, acquires the land, obtains all permits and financing to build the tower. Trumps do not invest any money and collect a licensing fee, a percentage of condo sales and other revenues including hotel collections. Before signing a licensing agreement, Trump organization signs a letter of intent with the local party so that they can go ahead and take care of preliminaries such as acquiring land and lining up financing. Then they issue a license with a licensing agreement upon receiving an upfront payment. as been reported that Trump signed a letter of intent to develop Trump World Tower MoscThen they sign a ow, in October 2015 during the middle of his campaign. Michael Cohen had told a Senate committee, that was looking in to the Russian investigation, that the project was dropped in January 2016 because they couldn’t get the necessary permissions. However on November 29, 2018, Cohen admitted in a court proceeding that those statements were untrue, and that he had continued to pursue the possibility of a Trump Tower Moscow until June 2016.
Let us try to understand the facts behind Moscow Trump Tower and Cohen’s guilty plea. The deal was brought to the attention of Trumps by Michael Cohen and Felix Slater, an American Real Estate investor/developer who immigrated as a child from Russia. He is reputed to have a shady background including a felony conviction. They were acting as the middlemen or brokers between the Trumps and Andrey Rozov of IC Expert, a small-time developer in Moscow. In October 2015, Donald Trump signed a letter of intent but never got around to signing a licensing agreement. The problem was IC Expert did not own a lot in Central Moscow, as called for in the agreement and most important they did not have the financing needed to acquire the land and build the tower. Nor did they have connections with Kremlin that is needed to pull off a major deal in Russia. For all practical purposes, the project was dead at the staring gate. It is like a 90-year-old man who is determined to have his own child before his time is up. The problem is he does not have a wife or a girlfriend and nor financial resources to hire a surrogate mother. It is also uncertain if he still has the ability to produce a child. The odds of him having a child of his own blood are probably better than the trio of Cohen, Slater & Rozov. Trumps gave up on the deal by January 2016 if not even earlier.
Trump was truthful when he said in early 2016 that he had no business dealings in Russia. Though the deal never took off the ground, the middlemen Cohen and Slater still were hoping to pull it off perhaps because of the lucrative pay off they were going to get from the Moscow party. They may have thought that with Trump leading in the Republican nomination process, Russian govt. might be interested in developing a connection with him. At some point, they recruited a Russian national Evgeny Shmykov, a former spy who claimed to have connections with Kremlin and boasted that he could pull the deal of using “political synergy” with Trump campaign and “synergy at government level”. Shmykov told Slater that he could get financing through VTB Bank, a state owned large financial institution. He also promised to arrange a meeting between Putin and Trump. However, a VTB spokesperson said in a statement to BuzzFeed News “VTB never held any negotiations on any matter relating to the construction of the Trump Tower. We’d like to stress that no VTB group subsidiary ever had any dealings with Mr. Trump, his representatives or any companies affiliated with him.” Shmykov also reportedly sent visa papers to Cohen so that he and Trump can go to an upcoming International Trade meeting in St. Petersburg that was going to be attended by Putin. He offered to introduce Trump to Putin at that meeting. Obviously because of the ridiculous nature of the proposal, Trump did not take it seriously and turned it down. It has also been reported that Cohen and Slater may have contacted another Russian for the same effort. They may have continued their efforts at least until June of 2016, when Trump was on the brink of getting the nomination. It is obvious that Putin and his government never gave a damn about this Trump Tower. The guilty pleading by Cohen states that he once tried to contact Kremlin but his call was returned by one low level employee in the press office. If the Russian govt. really wanted to do a favor to Trump, for whatever purpose, they had the resources to make the Trump Tower happen by giving land, permits, and financing in a matter of days.
It should be noted that licensing Trump Tower has been an ongoing business for the Trump organization. There have been news reports that a builder in India signed a licensing agreement with the Trumps in early 2016, right in the middle of campaign. This party had all the resources including land and financing and finished the project in year and a half. Donald Trump, Jr. went to India in March of 2018 to inaugurate the sale of condos. During the campaign, candidate Trump talked positively about Indian prime minister Modi just as he did about Putin. This had nothing to do with the development of Trump tower because the Indian builder had all the resources and the Modi’s govt does not get involved with local building permits or financing.
It should also be noted that after his election, President Trump suspended the licensing of Trump Towers to avoid any charges of conflict of interest. Considering the lucrative nature of the business, attractive income in return for licensing the name, it is a great sacrifice.
All the above strongly suggest that project Trump Tower in Moscow was never a reality because there was no valid licensing agreement, the letter of intent very likely expired, and the Russian party simply had no resources to make it happen. The three middlemen and the company IC Text may have tried to pull it off, against all odds, even after letter of intent expired before giving up. That is why Cohen testified truthfully to the congressional committee that the project was abandoned in January 2016. When he met Mr. Mueller’s team for the first time, he repeated the same. As a representative of the Trump organization, he was right.
When Mueller’s raided Cohen’s office, home, and hotel room, they found ton of documents related to his taxi and other personal business that have nothing to do with Trump organization. They indicated serious crimes like tax evasion, bank fraud, etc. Cohen knew he was in big big trouble. He openly sought, through media, President Trump’s help perhaps after secret efforts failed. He obviously was seeking a pardon. When no such help came, he decided to cooperate with Mueller. Being a shrewd man he is, he quickly realized that he can minimize his troubles including avoiding jail time by offering something to the Special Prosecutor that implicates Trump. As he was not involved in the campaign, he could not offer anything on collusion. Instead he pleaded guilty to lying, by saying the Trump tower efforts continued till June of 2016 contradicting his prior testimony. It is unknown if he revealed that there was never any licensing agreement and as a result Trumps were not involved in those efforts.
There have been recent news reports that evidence has surfaced that proves that Michael Cohen was in Prague in Oct 2015 to pay off Russian govt’s aides for hacking DNC and Clinton campaign’s emails. If this is true, Cohen would have offered this lethal collusion evidence instead of some shady and iffy evidence about Trump tower that does not prove collusion in any shape or form.

In short, Cohen’s bombshell is a big dud. I sincerely hope that all those congressmen seriously look at all facts behind Cohen’s testimony before doing loose talk about impeachment.

It is becoming clear to people like me, who had an open mind when you started the Russian interference investigation, that there is absolutely no evidence of Trump campaign collusion with Russia. Yes, you have found evidence that there was Russian meddling, and hacking during the 2016 Presidential election. Hats off to you and your team for this success. At the same time, you have found no link between any one in the Trump campaign and the meddlers and hackers in Russia.
As per the indictment you got against the Russian team in St. Petersburgh, the meddling in the US election, primarily through social media ads, started as early as March of 2014 when two of their members came to US on a scouting trip. The planning for the misinformation campaign very likely started in 2013. This was long before anyone knew that Donald Trump would be a candidate. Hence it is false to say that Russia interfered in our election to help Donald Trump win. It is even falser to say that the Trump team sought the help of Russia to win the election. It is true that Vladimir Putin had a definite motivation to sow disharmony in American democracy and hope for the defeat of Hillary Clinton. There may be several reasons for this. Clinton, as Secretary of State, mocked Russian democracy under Putin not once but twice. When his party won the parliament, or Federal Assembly as is commonly known, election Clinton called it a fraudulent election. Again, when Putin was seeking the position of the President, Clinton openly encouraged protesters to storm his rallies. There may be another reason why Putin wanted Clinton to lose. He blames the passage of the so called Magnitsky act on her. The US sanctions against Russia, Putin and many of his Oligarch friends or supporters involved freezing of their assets and imposing other trade restrictions. Without any doubt, the act is hurting them. It was passed after a three-year campaign by Bill Browder, a wealthy dissenter of Russia and his US friends the Ziff brothers. Putin is very bitter about it and alleged as recently as July, at the Helsinki summit, that Browder made an illegal contribution of $400,000 to the Clinton campaign.
You and your team have obtained around 32 indictments or guilty pleadings with your investigation. Congratulations for this success! The national media constantly cites these guilty pleadings and indictments as proof of collusion between Trump and Russia. You very well know that this is not true. The 25 indictments against Russian citizens are for activities related to meddling or hacking. But at least as of now, you have not found any proof that any of the Trump team colluded with them. Out of the 7 guilty pleadings, 4 are from the Trump team. Michael Flynn pleaded guilty for making false statements to the FBI agents. He denied calling the Russian ambassador after the election during the transition (not sure why he lied when it was perfectly legal to call the ambassador as part of his new job). George Papadopoulos also pleaded guilty for lying to the FBI agents. He did not lie about any collusion but about the exact date when he met a Maltese Professor, who he thought had Russian connections based on his boasting. It later turned out that his Russian connections were dubious at best. Both Rick Gates and Paul Manafort pleaded guilty of charges that included tax evasion, money laundering and not registering as a lobbyist. All these charges related to their work in Ukraine that started as early as 2005 or eleven years before they joined the Trump team. The other 3 guilty pleadings are from individuals who were never part of the Trump campaign. A Dutch attorney Alex van der Zwaan, who did legal work for Manafort and Gates in Ukraine, lied about when he last communicated with Gates. A Ukrainian Konstantin Kilimnik was charged with obstructing justice in the Manafort tax evasion case. Finally, an American Richard Pinedo pleaded guilty to selling fake bank accounts to the Russians without knowing who they were.
I fully understand why and how you obtained the guilty pleas. You were hoping to get their cooperation in getting any information they had about the collusion. Most individuals would cooperate to avoid or minimize prison terms. Obviously, none of them have offered any information about the collusion for a simple reason. There was no collusion. I fully understand your reasons to keep your findings secret until the investigation is complete but please consider the following personal pleading from me:
I am almost as old as you are and very concerned about the country my grand children will be living in. I am not a partisan republican. Though I am a registered independent, all my life I have acted like a democrat. I have donated to around six democratic candidates, half of them running for President and not a penny to a republican. I have worked as a volunteer in Bill Clinton’s campaign, making phone calls and driving voters, with no transportation, to polling places. I am not a conservative. I consider myself a moderate with liberal social views. Having worked in the finance area, I fully understand the financial burden our country is facing. I am very concerned about how divided this country has become as a result of this investigation. I fully understand that even if there is no crime, there could be an obstruction of justice charge. Let me relate an experience I had in this area. When I first came to this country 50 years ago as a student, the University I attended was located in a state that was almost 100% white. The only black I saw was one basketball player. One of my classmates, also a nonwhite foreign student, bought a brand-new sports car with the money his wealthy parents sent. One day, he took a friend on a ride in his new car to a neighboring small town. On the way back, a white police officer started following him closely for a long time. This new car owner became very nervous and kept looking in the rearview mirror. His friend urged him not to look back and keep driving. But he would not listen and became erratic in his driving and crossed the center lane on the small country road. As soon as he did that, he was stopped by the police officer who then checked his license and car registration. Everything was in order but the officer gave him a ticket for erratic driving. Yes, he did commit an offence that he would not have if the officer did not follow him for no reason. I believe the same analogy applies here. Please also consider the views of Professor Alan Dershowitz of Harvard law school, who is considered a scholar in US constitution. Despite being a democrat and a Clinton supporter, he has repeatedly expressed his opinion on national TV that Trump’s actions and words in response to the investigation do not add up to the crime of obstruction of justice. The Professor strongly feels that the President has constitutional rights to fire any one including the FBI director.
We are facing a real crisis. If the voters in the upcoming elections mistakenly believe that they can have the President impeached by voting for his opponents, we are in big trouble. As you know, it takes a two thirds majority to impeach. That is next to impossible. But what is possible is the entire US govt including all three branches will be paralyzed for the next several years. The country will be further divided and we will become a laughing stock for the rest of the world. Already, China is eating us for lunch and very soon they will become the supreme power (they are already a super power) and we will be a third world country. This is what makes me lose sleep at night.
Mr. Mueller, I can not ask you to tip the investigation one way or the other or stop it. But you can disclose to the American people if those who pleaded guilty said anything incriminating about the collusion. If not, you can say no evidence of collusion has been found so far. At the same time, if there is something incriminating, please have it disclosed. I am sure there is a way of doing it legally. What is paramount is, the voters should be well informed when they go to vote. With the assist from the national media, American voters, in my honest opinion are totally misinformed. I am afraid, that is going to undermine our great democracy. Please think about it and do something before it is too late.

Whenever there is a discussion about Trump campaign’s collusion with Russia, invariably the Trump Tower meeting is brought up like magic. This was a meeting on June 9, 2016 at the Trump Tower in NY between a Russian attorney by the name Natalia Veselnitskaya and Donald Trump, Jr. and other members of the Trump campaign. It was arranged by a colorful music promoter Rob Goldstone who got to know Trump, Jr. at the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow. Mr. Goldstone did this at the request of his singer client Emin Agalarov whose father is a Russian Oligarch. The senior Agalarov and many other wealthy oligarchs were affected by the so called Magnitsky act, passed by the Obama administration in 2012, that froze their US assets and caused visa and other restrictions. Ms. Veselnitskaya was hired by the senior Agalarov and possibly by other oligarchs to lobby the US Congress and govt. to vacate these sanctions that was punishing them for no fault of theirs.
Rob Goldstone recently wrote a book called “How an email trumped my life” and made some TV appearances last week to promote his book and gave some interesting details about the meeting. He said he used some choice words, as suggested by the junior Agalarov, to get the attention of Donald Trump, Jr. The words he used include “Will provide the Trump campaign with some official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary [Clinton] and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father”.
The Magnitsky act US sanctions was passed after an extensive lobbying effort by a formerly US citizen and now a British citizen William Browder. He lived in Moscow from mid nineties to 2005 and made lot of money as a hedge fund manager. According to the Russian govt, he made over 1.5 billion dollars and did not pay any taxes to Russia. He had a long running dispute with the Russian govt on the tax issue. When his tax attorney Sergei Magnitsky accused some Russian officials of stealing the taxes they paid, he was jailed. After eleven months, he died in the jail either of gallstones and pancreatitis or beating by the guards depending on who you believe. Incensed by his death, Browder went on a three-year campaign to persuade US to pass sanctions against Russia as well as the Oligarchs connected to Putin. It is Putin’s contention that Browder contributed a large amount to the Clinton campaign with the help of his business associates the Ziff brothers who own a successful venture capital firm in the US. It is widely believed that Ziff brothers financed both the campaigns of President Obama and contributed over $5 million to Democratic party in the last ten years. In fact, at the Helsinki summit, Putin claimed in a joint press conference with Trump that Browder and Ziff brothers contributed over $400 million to Clinton campaign to get the Magnitsky act passed. Later he corrected the amount as $400,000. It is the belief of the Russian govt that this was an illegal contribution because it was actually Browder’s money who as a foreign citizen cannot contribute to a candidate in the US election.
The incriminating information on Hillary Clinton that Rob Goldstone promised Donald Trump, Jr. was actually documentation to prove that the contribution was illegal. But the Russian attorney was circulating the same documentation in Washington for couple of months. So, it was old news and there was no dramatic new dirt on Hillary Clinton. According to Goldstone, the Russian attorney talked only about the Magnitsky act and the resulting ban on Russian babies’ adoption during the entire meeting. According to a Russian American attendee, who was representing the Oligarch, the Trump people got bored soon and were looking for ways to end the meeting quickly.
Contrary to popular belief by the media as well as Trump opponents, the meeting had nothing do with Clinton emails. Still many in the media claim that Wikileaks released hacked emails (not the missing emails from Clinton server but from the DNC) just a week after the Trump Tower meeting as if there was a connection. It is obvious from the recent revelations that there was no magical Trump Tower collusion meeting. It was just a boring Magnitsky meeting.

As you all know, the Russia probe under the code name “Crossfire Hurricane” was started by FBI in 2016. It was started after a bar meeting in London between Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos and the Australian High Commissioner to UK Alexander Downer. In that meeting, it was alleged that Papadopoulos in a drunken state boasted that he knows Russians who have promised him dirt on Hillary Clinton in the form of missing Clinton emails. When the Australian government reported this to FBI, they started the investigation within days and eventually charged Papadopoulos for lying about his contacts with Russians. As it turned out, the Russian contact of Papadopoulos was actually a Rome based Maltese Professor Joseph Mifsud who simply disappeared in to thin air after his name became public. Papadopoulos was charged with lying about the time when he met this Professor whom he believed had Russian connections. Though the intent of FBI in charging him, for this relatively minor offense, was to get his cooperation in the Russian collusion investigation, obviously he did not provide any damaging information because he had no knowledge of any collusion. Few weeks ago, George Papadopoulos was sentenced to two weeks in prison.
After his conviction, Papadopoulos gave at least two TV interviews in which he made several shocking disclosures. Since he was already sentenced and is fully aware of the consequences of even minor lying, we have to assume that he was saying the truth in these statements that include:
1. It was the Australian High Commissioner, Alexander Downer, who reached out to him out of the blue and invited him to a meeting at the London bar on May 10, 2016. The purpose was presumably to gage Trump’s foreign policy towards Australia. Papadopoulos was surprised because he was a minor player in the Trump campaign and Australia could have easily obtained such information with their ambassador in Washington calling some one like senator Jeff Sessions who was in charge of foreign policy for the Trump team. As per Papadopoulos, he has no recollection of mentioning Clinton emails to the High Commissioner. Moreover, he only had one Gin and Tonic at the meeting and was not drunk. This totally contradicts what we have been hearing through the media that Papadopoulos bumped in to the Australian High Commissioner at a London bar and in a drunken state boated to him that he knows Russians who promised him the 30,000 missing emails of Hillary Clinton that can help Trump campaign.
2. It also has been widely reported that Papadopoulos met with Russians or people with connections to the Russian intelligence and discussed Clinton emails. As per Papadopoulos, who was working at the London center of International law practice, he was sent to Rome by the center where he met with Joseph Mifsud. Once Mifsud found out that he was with the Trump campaign and was trying to set up a meeting between Trump and Putin, he offered his help for this effort and tried to impress Papadopoulos about his connections to the Russian government. He even introduced him to a beautiful young Russian lady claiming she is the niece of Putin. As it turned out much later, she was not related to Putin at all. It was Mifsud, who is also connected to the London Center, who invited him to a lunch or breakfast at a London hotel and dropped bomb about Clinton emails. He did not offer them but simply said he has information that Russians have them and he found this out during his recent trip to Moscow. Papadopoulos says he was not surprised because it was widely known for several months that Clinton emails were missing and there were rumors that Russians may have hacked them before Clinton staff deleted them. To him, it was just a confirmation of rumors and that is why he did not bring it up when he later met with the Australian high commissioner. This again contradicts the widely held belief that Papadopoulos was working with the Russians in the hacking and release of Clinton emails to help Trump and hurt Clinton.
3. Sergei Millian is a Belarusian (formerly part of Russia) born American real estate broker/businessman who was well known in the New York real estate scene. He was a major player in bringing Russian investors to NY real estate projects including those of Trump. He was also rumored to be a key contributor of information to the now widely discredited Christopher Steele dossier (source for chapters D & E). According to Papadopoulos, Millian appeared out of blue and offered him a job paying $30,000 a month. All he had to was to remain part of Trump campaign. Papadopoulos says he did not take the offer because it looked very fishy. US Congress committees investigating Russian probe have been trying to subpoena Sergei Millian for months but he has disappeared from the scene and no one knows his whereabouts. However, he has tweeted several times after his disappearance indicating that he is hiding some place. It is still a mystery why he made a lucrative money offer to Papadopoulos and who was behind him?
4. In September 2016, Papadopoulos got an email from Cambridge University professor Stefan Halper, again out of the blue, and offered him $ 3000 and plane ticket to London to write a research paper on energy. When he met him in London, the professor placed his phone on the table (to record the conversation) and asked him questions about his Russian contacts, Clinton emails, and his communications with Trump campaign staff, etc. Papadopoulos thought the Professor was trying to make him confess about his Russian collusion. It was later learned that Professor Halper is an informant for the FBI and contacted Papadopoulos and learn about his Russian connections at the behest of FBI.
5. In early 2017, after failing to get a job with the new Trump administration, Papadopoulos was vacationing in Greece with his new girlfriend when he received an email invitation from an Israeli American Charles Powell to visit Tel Aviv right away to discuss a business proposal. He met Powell at an AIPAC (an Israel lobby) Chicago conference in July 2017. With the air tickets he was sent, he and his girlfriend made the trip to Israel. Papadopoulos was then offered $10,000 in hundred-dollar bills as an advance on a business project related to energy in Greece. Though he was not given specific details about the project, he took the money. Later when the Mueller team indicted him, he was threatened with a 25-year prison term for being an unregistered agent of Israel and receiving money from a foreign government among other things if he did not plead guilty and cooperate.
It is possible all the above incidents are mere coincidences. It may also be a coincidence that key players like Joseph Mifsud and Segei Millian disappeared from the scene and went in to hiding. It is perhaps a coincidence that Alexander Downer, the Australian High Commissioner, who played a role in the start of the FBI investigation, considers himself a friend of the Clintons and arranged one of the largest foreign donations, more than $25 million, to the Clinton foundation. It may also be a coincidence that Joseph Mifsud claims that he was on the board of Clinton foundation. For even someone like me, who does not believe in conspiracy theories, it sounds very suspicious. What is even more troubling is the fact that our media, whom I admired for a long time for their courage, independence, and investigative skills, has remained totally silent on these bombshell disclosures by Papadopoulos.

The Russia collusion probe presumably started when the 28-year-old George Papadopoulos bragged in a drunken state in a London pub to the Australian ambassador in July 2016 that he has some Russian contacts who promised him the missing 30,000 emails of Hillary Clinton. This Russian contact is not really a Russian but a Maltese Professor, Joseph Mifsud, who supposedly worked for Russian intelligence. The Australian ambassador conveyed the information to his government who then contacted Obama administration. Within days, FBI started the now famous Russia collusion probe with the code name “Crossfire Hurricane” and dispatched agents to London to interview the Australian ambassador.
Most Americans, including myself, believed that this was a legitimate probe that originated from very legitimate information.
Recent developments question the very origin of this probe, that has divided and paralyzed the entire nation. Here are some reasons for this dramatic conclusion:
1. Several news reports indicate that Joseph Mifsud has no connections to the Russian intelligence and instead has connections to Western intelligence. Both CIA and FBI have sent their officers to Link university in Rome that was cofounded by Professor Mifsud. According to a June 4, 2018 article in Epoch Times “Maltese academic, Joseph Mifsud, the man portrayed as the key shadowy broker between the Russian government and the campaign of then-candidate Donald Trump turns out to have been closely tied to people high up in European politics and intelligence circles, while his Russian contacts turned out to be shallow at best”.
2. To impress George Papadopoulos, Prof. Mifsud introduced him to a young Russian lady calling her the niece of Vladimir Putin. It turns out she is not related to Putin in any shape or form.
3. When his name surfaced, in early 2017, as the Russian contact of Papadopoulos, Prof Mifsud disappeared. It has been reported that Italian intelligence sent him in to hiding.
4. On Nov 1st, 2017 Republica, the Italian news organization, reported an interview with Mifsud in which he said “I don’t know anyone belonging to the Russian government. Dirt on Hillary Clinton? Nonsense! I never offered Papadopoulos or any one else secrets concerning Hillary Clinton. I swear on my daughter.” He added “I am a member of the European Council of Foreign Relations. And you know which is the only foundation I am a member of? The Clinton Foundation”.
Democratic National Committee, that has sued Trump campaign, Russian government and others including Joseph Mifsud for interference in 2016 election, has claimed on September 7th in a New York court filing that Joseph Mifsud is missing and may be dead. But Stephan Roh, a Swiss-German lawyer described as a close friend and adviser to Mifsud, told news media on September 10th that “I got it from really good sources. They say that he is alive, that he has another identity, and that he is staying somewhere, at a nice place.”
Where in the world is Joseph Mifsud?
If we can locate him, we will find lot of answers in this Russian probe. Mueller prosecution team should make an effort to find him instead of chasing stories like pay off to Stormy Daniels, that has nothing to do with Russian collusion. FBI, who has reportedly interviewed him once in early 2017, can seek the help of Italian intelligence to locate him. If they succeed in finding him, it can greatly help in resolving this collusion probe one way or the other.

Trump opponents cite the Trump tower meeting on June 9, 2016 between Trump people and Russian attorney Natalia Veselnitskaya & her associates as proof of collusion. The attorney was working for a Russian billionaire, Aras Agalarov, whose US assets were frozen as a result of the Magintsky act, a US sanction to punish Russia for its human rights abuse. In return, Russia banned US adoption of Russian orphans. She has been lobbying Washington for couple of years to get rid of the sanction that was punishing her client and other wealthy Russians for acts committed by their government. The meeting was requested by Rob Goldstone, a colorful British born music promoter for the billionaire’s singer son. In an email to Donald Trump, Jr., whom he had met at US Pageant in Moscow. Goldstone promised dirt or incriminating information on Hillary Clinton. Trump, Jr. then invited Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort to attend the meeting. In addition to Goldstone, the Russian attorney came with two Russian American men- one a translator and the other an agent for the billionaire and a Clinton supporter. From all accounts (including testimony by some participants), the Russian attorney offered no incriminating info about Clinton. Instead she talked only about the need to rescind Magintsky act and resume US adoptions. The promise of “Dirt on Hillary” was obviously a ruse by the intermediaries to set up the meeting. The dirt they wanted to give was solely about why Clinton got that act passed in return for campaign contributions by a US company affiliated with opponents of Putin. At the recent Helsinki meeting, Putin did bring up these contributions. It is reported that Kushner was so bored by the subject that he texted his assistant to pull him out of the meeting with a phone call. Manafort sat through the entire meeting going through messages on his phone. According to the testimony of some of the attendees, the meeting was a ‘Nothing burger’ The Russian attorney’s entire pitch was about the damage the Magintsky act was doing to her client and the need to cancel it and resume US adoptions. She did not even bring up the missing emails of Clinton. Nor did she give any documentation about contributions to Clinton.
Was the meeting a collusion? Answer is no for the following reasons:
1. Natalia Veselnitskaya is a private attorney and not a Russian govt. official even though she has some clients who have close association with Russian govt.
2. The Russian attorney did not bring any incriminating documentation including the missing emails to the meeting.
3. If she was planning to bring dirt on Clinton, she would not come to the meeting with a colorful music promoter, a translator who has been working for a long time with US State dept.
as a contractor doing Russian translation and a Russian American, a long time US citizen and reportedly a Clinton supporter.
4. Even if she gave incriminating information including the 30,000 missing emails, it is not a crime if the Trump campaign accepted the same. According to Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard law
professor and a known authority on US constitution, a political party has the same First amendment rights as the news media. If New York Times was offered the missing emails, it
would have grabbed them in a split second and no one would accuse them of a crime as per Prof. Dershowitz. Similarly, Trump campaign had a right to accept such information even
though none was offered.

Was the meeting a conspiracy? Answer is a NO and IMPOSSIBLE for a very simple reason- Timing.
Conspiracy is for anyone in the campaign to conspire with a foreign country, including Russia, to engage in an unlawful activity that can influence the outcome of the US presidential election. As per the indictment of Russian nationals by the Special Counsel Robert Mueller, Russian meddling in the US election began when two Russians arrived in the US in March of 2014 to do scouting. The process of planning, budgeting, picking a team, obtaining US visas, etc. must have started several months earlier. This has to be some time after a political party in US stuck a deal with the Russian govt. on meddling in the election and helping them win. That means the conspiracy, if there was one, must have happened sometime in 2013. At that time, no one, including Trump, thought Donald Trump would be a candidate. Until 2015 there was no Trump candidacy, no Trump campaign. The only way the people meeting on June 9, 2016 in Trump Tower could have agreed on a conspiracy to meddle in US elections is by getting in to a Time Machine (back to the future!) and gone back to 2013. If you don’t believe that, there was no conspiracy between Trump campaign and the Russians.

What about Hypocrisy?
All this debate about criminality of collusion or conspiracy came about because many think that the Trump campaign broke federal election campaign laws. What exactly are these laws? As per Federal Election Campaign Act 52 USC 30121, it is unlawful for a foreign national to make, directly or indirectly, a contribution or donation of money or other thing of value to a political campaign. However, an individual who is a foreign national may participate in campaign activities as an uncompensated volunteer.
Keeping the above law in mind, please look at the following activities, as reported by the news media, that happened during the 2016 election:

1. Nevada Senate race: “Harry Reid and the Democrats brought in Mexican soap opera stars, singers and entertainers who had immense in those communities into Las Vegas, to entertain, get out the vote and so forth,” Texas congressman Mike Conaway complained to news media. “Those are foreign actors, foreign people, influencing the vote in Nevada. You don’t hear the Democrats screaming and saying one word about that.” At least some of these foreign entertainers got paid for their time and or expenses.
2. Hillary Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee hired Fusion GPS and paid thousands of dollars to do opposition research on Trump. Its key employee Christopher Steele, a British citizen, who openly expressed his hatred for Trump, used his Russian sources to come up with a 35-page dossier with salacious details that were never confirmed. Among other things, dossier alleged that there was a conspiracy between Trump campaign and Russians to defeat Clinton. It is obvious Steele, a foreign national, did not volunteer his services.
3. It has been reported widely that Christopher Steele, after completing his dossier, was hired by FBI to continue research on Trump. It has also been reported that FBI partly relied on his findings to start the Russia collusion investigation. Obviously, Steele did not work as a volunteer for FBI
As a non-attorney, I find it difficult to understand why all these government resources are being spent on a desperate mission to pin collusion charges on President Trump by trying to stretch election law violations that may not have happened while totally ignoring election law violations by others that are clearly obvious to even lay people. I have no choice but to call it sheer Hypocrisy.

Without any doubt, Russians interfered in US 2016 elections. Their goals were:
1. Defeat Hillary Clinton
2. Promote discord and disunity in American democracy
What were their motives?
Vladmir Putin has several reasons to hate US and meddle in its elections. We may not agree with his reasoning but he was motivated to meddle in our elections. The foremost reason is US role in breaking up the Soviet Union. Remember the powerful message of President Reagan “Bring that wall down!” that Russian leader at that time Gorbachav heeded to. Also, Putin was not happy that contrary to the promises made by Reagan’s Secretary of State Baker, US and European nations were expanding the NATO to include some of the former Soviet territories. He was also not pleased by the opposition to his annexation of former Soviet territory Crimea. In addition, he was angered by US claims that his party election was fraudulent and that US encouraged protests at his election rallies. He wanted to show that US is divided with no unity and organized a team to sow discord in US democracy.
There were also reasons, that we may not agree with, why Putin wanted Hillary Clinton to lose. After he came to power and when his loyalists won parliamentary elections, Clinton as secretary of state claimed that the elections were fraudulent and undemocratic. When Putin was seeking reelection, Clinton, as Secretary of State, encouraged public protests at his election rallies. Finally, Clinton was instrumental in getting the so called “Magintsky act” passed that froze the assets of several Russian businesses and their principals. Russians claim this was an unjust action by the US for a matter that is their internal business and nothing to do with International affairs. It is Putin’s belief that Clinton did this as a favor to major donors of the Democratic party whose Russian business interests were being represented by the attorney Magintsky before his death in a Soviet jail. For sure, Putin wanted anyone but Clinton to win.
How did they fail?
It has been established by US intelligence that a team of Russian military officials operating out of Moscow hacked the emails of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and those of Clinton campaign manager John Podesta. The hacked DNC emails did confirm Bernie Sanders campaign team’s belief that DNC and its Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz were biased against Sanders and favoring Clinton. But the release of the leaked emails just before Democratic party convention was too late for Sanders. Clinton already secured the nomination and the only damage they caused was the resignation of Wasserman Schultz. If the emails were released two or three months earlier, when Sanders was gaining momentum, it could have been a different story. Also, the release of Podesta emails a short time before General Election barely caused a ripple. American voters were more focused on the missing 30,000 emails from Clinton personal server. Obviously, Russians did not have them and it appears their late efforts to retrieve them from Clinton related servers did not succeed. This may be because Clinton team performed a super job in destroying them.
Thirteen Russians working out of an office in St. Petersburg, Russia placed Facebook and other social media ads in addition to engaging in other disruptive activity between 2014 and 2016 with the primary motive of undermining US democracy. The ads placed by Russians dealt with topics like “Black lives matter”, “How the lands of Native Americans and Mexicans were stolen”, “What a hero SF quarterback Colin Kaepernick is for kneeling down during National Anthems”. It is clear very few Americans, including me, came across these ads and even fewer took any action as a result of these silly ads. Russians failed to create any significant discord in our democracy or disunity among us as a result of these ads before the election.
How did they succeed?
As stated earlier, American voters as well as all of the media were focused on the missing 30000 Clinton emails for a long time. Though they never saw daylight, the actions of James Comey, the then FBY Director played a big role in the election. First of all, FBI did not move fast enough to secure them after US Congress demanded them. Then, Comey publicly announced conclusion of FBI investigation after changing key words in the report from “Gross Negligence” to “Extremely Careless”. Gross negligence would have resulted in an indictment and forced Clinton to withdraw from the nomination. Both his public announcement and his decision not to refer the investigation to a prosecutor were unusual. Also, when US Attorney’s office in Manhattan discovered that the lap top of Anthony Weiner, husband of Clinton’s personal assistant, contained thousands of emails to or from Clinton, Comey did not take steps to investigate them for a whole month. All these actions, even if they were unintentional or based on misjudgment, would have made Comey look like he was favoring Clinton. Obviously, this was weighing on Comey when he suddenly announced few weeks before the election, when everyone thought Clinton was a sure shot to win, that FBI found some of Clinton emails and was going to investigate them. It appears that he wanted to protect himself from any accusations after Clinton victory that he favored her. Though he quickly reported the findings that the emails were not from the missing emails, the damage was done. American voters who had forgotten about the emails suddenly were reminded about Clinton’s major weakness. This may have very well changed the minds of some voters and made a difference in the election. Hillary Clinton herself blamed James Comey for her defeat. Without any doubt, Comey did not want his actions to cause her defeat. A good analogy is that of a star Soccer defensive player kicks the ball hard towards his own goal keeper that ends up in the goal resulting in a “self-goal”. In any case, Russians get no credit for Clinton’s loss, though that is what they wanted. All the credit should go to James Comey if the late announcement on emails made any difference in the election.
A more serious and tragic situation is the fact that we are a divided nation. There is constant criticism of President Trump and scrutiny of his personal affairs from years past. If we turn on any mainstream cable channel, we constantly hear the words collusion and impeachment even though no real evidence of collusion has surfaced yet. The so-called political pundits who frequent news channels as well as the hosts keep citing the five guilty pleas even though none of them has anything to do with collusion. The President is peppered with inappropriate questions about collusion and his personal affairs even in the presence of foreign leaders that is a total disgrace in my opinion. We constantly second guess his decisions and policies even though the voters elected him for exactly those policies. His opponents in Congress and Senate regularly poison the air waves with unsubstantiated charges. It has gotten so bad that even at home we have lost peace, with one spouse supporting Trump and the other opposing him on the issue of collusion. It is a very sad state of affairs. But Russians, with their silly ads in Social Media, get no credit for it. All the credit should go to main stream media, political pundits, and Trump’s political opponents in high elected offices

This report is based on a non-partisan, logical, commonsense analysis of publicly known facts about the so-called Trump campaign Collusion with Russia.
Before I go in to the reasons, let me state some facts that are important to the analysis. What is a “Collusion”? Speaking to any Russian, including those in Government, is not a collusion. Trying to set up a meeting with any Russian or trying to arrange a meeting between leaders is not a collusion. As far as I know, collusion is for anyone in the campaign to conspire with a foreign country, including Russia, to engage in an unlawful activity that can influence the outcome of the US presidential election.
Hacking of emails: Though all the emails are related to Hillary Clinton, there are actually three different sets of emails. The first and most important one is the group of emails sent and received by Hillary Clinton and saved on her personal server. When Congress and the FBI wanted these emails for their investigation, Hillary Clinton deleted and destroyed over 30,000 of them claiming they are personal in nature. Both high tech (using so called ‘Bleach Technology”) and low tech (hammering blackberries) methods were used in destroying making them impossible to retrieve. The second set of emails were from the DNC or Democratic National Committee. These were sent and received by the DNC including its chairwoman. The third set of emails were from John Podesta, Clinton’s campaign Chairman.
Friendly to Foreign Countries: At the very beginning of campaign, candidate Donald Trump stated his preference to maintain close relations with some countries if elected. These included Israel, India, and Russia. All three were selected primarily for peace reasons. Peace between Israel and Palestinians will lead to peace all over Middle East as well as peace in most Islamic countries. Hence, improving relations with Israel was a priority. Following the lead of Obama administration, Trump campaign thought India could be a god deterrent to China in Asia as well as for maintaining peace in Afghanistan when US forces leave that country. As for Russia, Trump thought they could help in bringing peace to Syria and in negotiating a nuclear deal with North Korea.
No Foreign Policy or National Security Experts would join Trump Campaign: No one thought Trump would get the nomination, leave alone getting elected as the President. When he started winning primaries, reporters started asking him who his foreign policy advisors were. He was forced to come up with some names in a hurry. One of his aides, Sam Clovis of Iowa, assembled a list. This included a 28-year-old George Papadopoulos and a former Merrill Lynch manager in Moscow Carter Page. They had absolutely no foreign Policy experience except for living abroad and dabbling in International business and relations that they highlighted in their resumes.
Ten Reasons:
1. Without any doubt there was Russian meddling in the 2016 election. Thirteen Russians working out of an office in St. Petersburg, Russia placed Facebook and other social media ads in addition to engaging in other disruptive activity between 2014 and 2016 with the primary motive of undermining US democracy. The meddling started with a scouting trip to US by two Russians in March of 2014 long before Donald Trump announced his candidacy. There obviously was no collusion by Trump campaign.
2. Vladmir Putin has several reasons to hate US and meddle in its elections. The foremost is US role in breaking up the Soviet Union. Remember the powerful message of President Reagan “Bring that wall down!” that Russian leader at that time Gorbachav heeded to. Also, Putin was not happy that contrary to the promises made by Reagan’s Secretary of State Baker, US and European nations were expanding the NATO to include some of the former Soviet territories. He was also not pleased by the opposition to his annexation of former Soviet territory Crimea. Thus, his animosity towards US and its democracy was set way before Trump became a candidate. Hence no collusion by Trump here.
3. Facebook and other Social media ads placed by Russians dealt with topics like “Black lives matter”, “How the lands of Native Americans and Mexicans were stolen”, “What a hero SF quarterback Colin Kaepernick is for kneeling down during National Anthems”. They definitely were not pro Trump ads.
4. There were also reasons why Putin wanted Hillary Clinton to lose. After he came to power and when his loyalists won parliamentary elections, Clinton as secretary of state claimed that the elections were fraudulent and undemocratic. When Putin was seeking reelection, Clinton, as Secretary of State, encouraged public protests at his election rallies. Finally, Clinton was instrumental in getting the so called “Magintsky act” passed that froze the assets of several Russian businesses and their principals. Russians claim this was an unjust action by the US for a matter that is their internal business and nothing to do with International affairs. It is Putin’s belief that Clinton did this as a favor to major donors of the Democratic party whose Russian business interests were being represented by the attorney Magintsky before his death in a Soviet jail. For sure, Putin wanted anyone but Clinton to win. If her opponent was Ted Cruz or Jeb Bush, Russia would have wanted them to win. It is not that they wanted Trump to win.
5. Even after Trump won nomination, it is not very clear that they were solely rooting for Trump. On the same day they organized a pro Trump rally in NYC, they also organized an anti-Trump rally across town. When Donald trump won the election, Russians organized “He is not my President” rallies! Clearly, their motive was to mock US democracy and elections.
6. It is clear Russians hacked both DNC emails and Clinton’s campaign manager’s emails. If any American colluded in these efforts, how did they do it? Russians as well as eastern Europeans are known for their technical and hacking skills. They did not need any help in that area. If Russians could organize meetings, place social media ads, acquire US bank accounts under false names by working out of a St.Petersburgh’s office, they did not need an American to tell them what DNC stands for or who the Clinton campaign’s manager was. Moreover, Russia had a diplomatic staff of over 700 in US at that time. It is an open secret that a good number of them are spies. If they needed local help, they had their own people. Most definitely, they would not have taken the help of any one in the disorganized and bumbling campaign organization of Trump. Trump, being a non-politician, had to organize on the fly.
7. The DNC hacking exposed the inner workings of the Democratic party campaign. Clinton’s chief opponent was Bernie Sanders. In late 2015 and early 2016, his supporters, including Congresswoman Tulsi Gabarrd, were complaining loudly that DNC and its chairwoman Debbie Wasserman were favoring Clinton over Sanders in issues like limiting the number of debates. The hacked emails confirmed the same leading to the resignation of Wasserman. Donna Brazile who took over as Chairwoman confirmed that the primary election was rigged in favor of Clinton. The hacked emails helped Sander’s cause though they were too late to help him win. Trump was no where in the picture as he was not contesting for Democratic nomination. Russians would have loved for Sanders to win partly because he is a self-avowed Socialist. It is ridiculous to even think that any one in Trump campaign colluded with Russians to hack DNC emails.
8. During the entire election campaign (both primary and general), there was lot of talk about the missing 30,000+ emails of Hillary Clinton. Many believed that Russia may have hacked her server before she destroyed these emails using some sophisticated high technology. The emails were thought to have some adverse information and the common thinking was Russians were holding them to blackmail her once she got elected. Trump in a televised public rally shouted out “Russia, if you have the missing 30,000 emails, please release them!” Many point this as proof that Trump campaign colluded with Russia. That is beyond ridiculous! If there was a collusion, it would have been done through a very secret channel. Trump would have used that channel to request those missing emails and not in a nationally televised public meeting.
9. Opponents cite the Trump tower meeting on June 9, 2016 between Trump people and Russian attorney Natalia Veselnitskaya & her associates as proof of collusion. The attorney was working for a Russian billionaire whose US assets were frozen as a result of the US sanction, Magintsky act, to punish Russia for its human rights abuse. In return, Russia banned US adoption of Russian orphans. She was lobbying Washington for couple of years to get rid of the sanction that was punishing her client and other wealthy Russians for acts committed by their government. The meeting was requested by Rob Goldstone, a colorful British music promoter for the billionaire’s singer son. In an email to Donald Trump, Jr., whom he had met at US Pageant in Moscow. Goldstone promised dirt on Hillary Clinton. Trump, Jr. invited Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort to attend the meeting. In addition to Goldstone, the Russian attorney came with two Russian American men- one a translator and the other an agent for the billionaire and a Clinton supporter. From all accounts (including testimony by some participants), the Russian attorney offered no incriminating info about Clinton. Instead she talked only about the need to vacate Magintsky act and resume US adoptions. The promise of “Dirt on Hillary” was obviously a ruse by the intermediaries to set up the meeting. The dirt they wanted to give was solely about why Clinton got that act passed. It is reported that Kushner was so bored by the subject that he texted his assistant to pull him out of the meeting with a phone call. Manafort sat through the entire meeting going through messages on his phone. Needless to say, this was no collusion meeting. If it was, it would have been conducted in a secret place among no more than two or three people. Instead, the meeting was in a public place like Trump tower that included a colorful British promoter, a Clinton supporter, and a man (translator) in hot pink color jeans and hot pink color shirt. Yes Donald Trump, Jr. may have been naïve in accepting the invitation but it was no collusion meeting.
10. We have heard repeatedly on TV, as well as in other media that more than 30
people have been charged with crimes related to the Russian probe and 5 of them have already pleaded guilty. This may be a very convincing argument to continue the probe. If we take a closer look at these charges, it will be anything but convincing. The five guilty pleadings are:
A) George Papadopoulos: The probe presumably started when the 28-year-old George Papadopoulos bragged in a drunken state in London pub to the Australian ambassador in July 2016 that he has some Russian contacts who promised him the missing 30,000 emails of Hillary Clinton. Papadopoulos pleaded guilty to making material false statements or lying to the FBI. What did he lie about? On March 10, 2016 he was informed by the Trump campaign that he will be one of the foreign policy advisors that was officially announced on March 23, 2016. On March 14th, he met a London Professor Joseph Mifsud, of Malta origin, who was running an International Institute there,. He stated to the FBI that he met this Professor before he joined the Trump team and not after. Papadopoulos may have honestly thought that when he met the Professor, he was not officially a Trump foreign Policy advisor and therefore should answer the way he did. Or, he may have been confused about the exact dates. In the worst case, he may have told a white lie. What difference does it make? In any case, the Professor did not brag to Papadopoulos that he has Russian connections and access to Hillary Clinton’s missing emails until much later and definitely not in their first meeting on March 14th. Whether this meeting was before or after he became an advisor is totally irrelevant. How can this be a materially false statement? Moreover, there is a big mystery about Prof. Mifsud who represented to Papadopoulos that he is a friend of Russian foreign minister and introduced him to a young Russian lady claiming she is a niece of the Russian president Putin. Mueller’s prosecution team has claimed in court papers that Prof. Mifsud has Russian intelligence connections. But when the investigation got hot, this Professor disappeared from the scene abandoning his live-in girlfriend and their child. A high official in Malta govt. accused this Professor as a fraud and snake oil salesman. Interestingly several news sources have stated that this man has CIA, FBI, and British intelligence connections but none with Russian intelligence and its government! It is more than obvious that Papadopoulos guilty plea has absolutely nothing to do with collusion with Russia.

B) Michael Flynn: The second key guilty pleading is that of Michael Flynn. He was nominated as the National Security advisor after Trump won the election. During the transition period President Obama expelled several Russian diplomats for meddling in the 2016 US election. It was widely expected that Russia will retaliate and take similar action. Two members of the Trump transition team, who were handling foreign policy matters, Kushner and Sessions asked Flynn to contact Russian Ambassador and request him not to retaliate that could have irreversible consequences. Accordingly, he called the Ambassador couple of times and there was nothing wrong with it. Logan Act prohibits private citizens from negotiating American policy with foreign governments. But General Flynn was named as the National Security advisor and he had every right to contact Russian or any other government on policy matters of the new administration. It is surprising that two FBI agents went to his office to question him about this and even more surprising that Flynn denied contacting the Russian ambassador. It is quite possible that he did not want to reveal the policies of the new administration and told them a white lie. For that, he paid a great price and lost his job. It has been reported that he pleaded guilty when the Mueller team threatened to indict his son for a prank call he made about Hillary Clinton. It has also been reported that Flynn could not afford, just as other people who pleaded guilty, to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees if he chose to fight. Obviously, his guilty plea has absolutely nothing to do with collusion with Russia.
C) Rick Gates: Another guilty plea is that of Rick Gates who is a longtime business associate of Paul Manafort. They both worked as political and business consultants in Ukraine after it gained independence from Russia. When Manafort became campaign chairman for Trump, he recruited Gates as his deputy. Gates continued to work in the campaign even after Manafort was forced to resign. He and Manafort made lot of money as consultants in Ukraine and took advantage of offshore tax havens to avoid US taxes. Both of them were indicted by Mueller team for tax evasion and similar charges. Calling it unfair Manafort decided to fight it and his case is still pending. On the other hand, Gates pleaded guilty and publicly stated that he is doing it simply because he can not afford to pay the legal fees that could have added up to hundreds of thousands of dollars. But his guilty pleading has nothing to do with collusion with Russia.
D) Alex van der Zwaan: He was a Europe based attorney with a large US law firm that did some legal work in Ukraine. Since he, Manafort, and Gates worked for the same client, the then President of Ukraine, they knew each other. When asked by the Mueller team, he denied that he had recent contacts with Gates. This was obviously a lie. He may have done it to avoid getting caught up in the legal mess of the Russian probe. When presented with evidence, he had no choice but to plead guilty of lying. But this guilty please has nothing do with collusion with Russia.
E) Richard Pinedo: The last person to make the list of guilty pleas secured by the Mueller team is one Richard Pinedo who has nothing to do with politics. He has been in the business of creating bank accounts with stolen identities and selling them to any one who has a need for fake accounts. The Russian team working out of St. Petersburgh needed US accounts to place Facebook ads and pay for other illicit activities associated with meddling in US elections. They obviously found Pinedo online who sold them fake bank accounts without knowing who they were. His guilty plea has nothing to do with collusion with Russia.

In addition to the five who have pleaded guilty, 13 Russians based in St. Petersburgh have been indicted for meddling in US elections. Just days ago, an additional 12 Russians were indicted for hacking But there is no evidence or even motivation that Trump campaign colluded with them for reasons already stated. The other important indictment is that of Paul Manafort, the former Chairman of Trump campaign. He was brought in to the campaign when Trump was losing delegates even after winning some primaries. Manafort had experience as a delegate counter and recruiter when he worked for President Reagan. He was not brought in because of his Russian experience. When Corey Lewandowski, the previous campaign manager was forced to resign because of an altercation with a reporter, Manafort took over as a manager for a short time before he too was forced out when his Ukraine and Russia connections became public. This would not have happened if he was involved in any collusion with Russia. In any case, he was charged, just like Gates, for tax evasion and money laundering issues that took place ten years before Trump even became a candidate. Konstantin Kilimnik, an office manager for Manafort in Ukraine, was also charged with similar issues for activities between 2005 and 2012. Needless to say, these indictments or guilty pleadings have absolutely nothing to do with collusion with Russia.

It is both disturbing and sad that the special counsel team has resorted to hardline prosecution tactics of threatening serious consequences if persons of interest do not confess and then using those confessions to elicit testimony against their real target even if that testimony is not truthful. Similar tactics by ‘win at any cost’ prosecutors all over the country have convicted scores of innocent people.
It is equally sad that main stream media as well as some prominent members of both US Senate and Congress are using the same indictments and guilty pleas to keep the ‘Collusion with Russia’ story alive. More than any outside threat our own people are causing serious harm to our great democracy. Hopefully, they will come to their senses before it is too late.