By Sigrid Weidenweber
Lately, whenever I meet with friends who immigrated to the U. S. and became citizens, we speak fearfully of the changes in America. We find that once again we live in a country governed by an oligarchy of tyrants. The heavy hand of the Democrat party is felt by us much like the Communist cudgel which we escaped. None of us pay attention anymore to the papers, regular TV, or other news institutions, beholding to the progressive movement of the Democratic party. We lived too long with papers like Pravda and “Das Neue Deutschland,” not to know how the press serves the Democrat Party shamelessly. So, diving into other sources, one finds deeply distressing political matters.
If you have found the time and energy to follow the twaddle coming out of Washington, you probably got a bad feeling when reading about Mr. Schiff’s commandeering surveillance data from AT&T and other companies. This was metadata mining on private phone calls of ranking Intelligence Republican Devin Nunes, President Trump’s attorney Giuliani, Lev Parna, the white House, and John Salomon. They are all people Schiff wanted to investigate to find incriminating evidence for his impeachment narrative.
I remember well how outraged the Democrats were when the government collected metadata on foreigners concerning terrorism. Does anyone remember Edward Joseph Snowden? He was the whistleblower who had blown the cover of the data collection by the government on May 20, 2013. That’s when he absconded with the evidence of government intrusion into American’s lives to Hong Kong. He shocked all of us into becoming aware of the improper use of metadata. For that sin, he is still living in exile in Moscow. His crime: revealing classified U.S. government surveillance programs. Then, the Democrats claimed the government spied on “Americans.” Soon thereafter, in 2015, the NSA was barred from collecting bulk data. To investigate citizens the government must produce legitimate evidence to judges in order to obtain surveillance material from telecom companies.
Now, there is Adam Schiff, who is not an investigating lawyer investigating a crime, no, he is a law-maker, who heedlessly collects metadata about his colleagues, President Trump and the President’s lawyers without the consent of judges.
One can see, that with this act he breaches client -attorney privilege. Well, I am not an attorney, but I know good ones, and if I were in this position, I would sue the pants off him. Furthermore, there is the matter of Mr. Nunes, the intrusion into his private life. Mr. Nunes, as a citizen can talk whomsoever he likes, and Mr. Schiff has no authority to investigate his rival in Congress. Isn’t that the exact thing of which he accuses the President? Also, a very troubling precedent is set for the collection of data on every citizen the left does not like—much like the KGB, and Erdogan in Turkey and America.
If I know my constitution as well as I think I do, I foresee problems in Adam Schiff’s future. Now that he has had his 5 minutes of fame—he might have 10 hours of infamy.
I just finished my report on Mr. Schiff’s, in many opinions illegal, telephone data mining, when I read this Opinion piece by John Salomon—one of the surveilled persons—in the Wall Street Journal this morning, Tuesday, December 10, 2019. John Salomon writes and I quote verbatim, “The Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Investigations and Operations Guide, the bible for agents, has long recognized that journalists, the clergy and lawyers deserve special protections because of the constitutional implications of investigating of their work.” I will shorten the paragraph, summarizing the gist. Confessions to a priest, confidential material handed to a journalist and advice sought from a lawyer are protected by law and common sense.
Thus, it follows he writes, “The FBI and Justice Department have therefore created specific rules governing agent’s actions involving special -circumstances of professionals, which include high-level approval and review.” He then extrapolates that all these rules and safety-nets should also apply to Congress, but that the House Intelligence committee Chairman, Adam Schiff does not see things that way.
He writes further, “More alarming the released call records involve figures who have sometimes criticized or clashed with Mr. Schiff. I wrote a story raising questions about his contact with Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson, a key figure in the Russia probe, that brought the California Democrat unwelcome scrutiny.” Solomon then proceeds to point out that the other victims of Mr. Schiff’s data-breach also were antagonistic to Mr. Schiff’s false narrative and, therefore, had to be surveilled to find “dirt” to discredit them.
John Solomon then precisely laid out Mr. Schiff’s, breaches of the law and lies. He was harassed by Mr. Schiff’s phone record release to the point that sources who had always talked freely to him now only want to communicate by encrypted apps.
His article is long and filled with the most interesting facts that I cannot detail everything. However, I suggest to get the Tuesday Wall Street edition and find the opinion page.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official position of Citizens Journal.
Sigrid Weidenweber grew up in communist East Berlin, escaping it using a French passport. Ms. Weidenweber holds a degree in medical technology as well as psychology and has course work in Anthropology. She is co-founder of Aid for Afghans. Weidenweber has traveled the world and lived with Pakistani Muslims, learning about the culture and religion. She is a published author and lecturer. You can find her books on Amazon.com
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