Russia business bears watching

I’ve been trying to get a handle on what’s going on with Trump and Russia, Hillary and Russia and all the dossiers, secret meetings and bipartisan obfuscation.

I did a little research and came up with this possible guide to the apparent components of what may be going on, maybe:

Trump-Russia

The key question: Did the Donald Trump campaign get illegal help from the Russian government in the process of electing Trump our president?

Robert Mueller is the special counsel in charge of the official investigation into that question. He’s not saying much while dodging the rocks thrown at him, but the probe keeps getting closer to the White House.

Hillary’s emails

Yes, they are still with us.

The question now is whether Russian government agents illegally sent Wiki-Leaks all those Hillary Clinton emails sent from her own server instead of the State Department’s when she was secretary of state.

Strzok-Page

A senior FBI agent named Peter Strzok and an FBI attorney named Lisa Page exchanged some texts that were sharply critical of President Trump. Strzok had worked the Hillary email case and was also working the Trump-Russia case. When the texts were discovered, Strzok was immediately pulled off Trump-Russia. The Republicans say this proves the FBI’s Trump-Russia probe is hopelessly biased.

The Democrats say no. Strzok was pulled to keep it honest.

The Steele dossier

The Steele dossier is a series of memos authored by former British secret service agent Christopher Steele, who now freelances. He was hired by the Democrats to investigate Trump and Russia. Some say you couldn’t grow a desert weed in the dirt he found. They say his findings were shaky and can’t be corroborated. Others, however, say it presents excellent reasons to continue the Trump-Russia probe.

Fusion GPS

This intelligence-gathering firm worked for never-Trumpers on both sides of the aisle. First, Fusion GPS worked for a conservative publication called the Washington Free Beacon to gather dirt on Trump and other Republican candidates. After the 2016 Republican primary, however, Fusion was hired by the Clinton campaign to continue mining for Trump dirt. Fusion then hired Steele and — voila — the Steele dossier.

FBI “secret society”

U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Tennessee, charged last week there was a “secret society” in the FBI that was out to get Trump, and they had meetings off-site.

What does that mean? For all we know, it could be that a couple of agents continued a discussion on Trump-Russia over lunch at a Schlotzsky’s a few blocks from Quantico.

Johnson himself has softened that charge, but not before right-wing radio ran with it and made it sound like a nefarious (of course), sweeping, high-level conspiracy.

The FISA memo

The FISA memo, authored by House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, R-California, may expose allegedly illegal intelligence work that President Barack Obama authorized and prove that Trump-Russia began on shaky ground. Or not.

It’s so secret it can only be seen by select Republican Congress members who all unsurprisingly say it’s ugly.

The Democrats, however, call it a smoke screen without knowing what’s in it.

FISA is the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978, Through FISA, “Congress sought to provide judicial and congressional oversight of foreign intelligence surveillance activities while maintaining the secrecy necessary to effectively monitor national security threats,” a federal Office of Justice Programs website says.

Overall, I think there are two bottom line questions:

1. Does the Steele dossier properly constitute even partial grounds for the Trump-Russia investigation?

2. Did Trump or his campaign collude with the Russian government to get Trump elected?

The above examination may or may not be helpful. I tried. With our unconventional current president, however, we cannot shrug this off as politics as usual. It bears watching from all sides.

Steve Hansen writes about our life and times from his perspective of a retired Tucumcari journalist. Contact him at:

stevenmhansen

@plateautel.net