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Open thread March 26, 2019

Dan Crawford | March 26, 2019 8:47 am

Comments (2) | Digg Facebook Twitter |
2 Comments
  • JimH says:
    March 27, 2019 at 1:31 pm

    Former CIA Director John Brennan worked at the CIA for 25 years. During much of that time he worked as an analyst. After he retired he became the CEO of The Analysis Corporation.
    See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_O._Brennan

    But now we see this confession from the former CIA Director:
    “Former head of the CIA John Brennan admitted on Monday that he may have relied on “bad information” for his relentless attacks on President Trump.”
    “Brennan — who once warned that “our Nation’s future is at stake” — told MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” that he may have been misled on the extent of Trump’s connections to Russia.”
    See: https://nypost.com/2019/03/25/ex-cia-head-brennan-on-trump-attacks-i-may-have-relied-on-bad-information/

    How does a trained CIA professional get fooled by an intelligence report done for profit? It appears that he was completely blindsided by the fact that casual conversations with Russians were not necessarily reliable. Were those Russian sources people who actually had first hand knowledge of the facts which they were relating? Is there any proof that they had first hand knowledge? Could that knowledge of the facts be verified by known good sources of intelligence? Were they grilled long enough to get enough detail to check for inconsistencies or lies? Did anyone actually check for inconsistencies or lies? Had a complete background report been compiled on these individual sources? Were they know to lie if it benefitted them? Were the sources’ information coming from written notes made at the time or were they just recollections. Were the sources inebriated at the time of the interview?

    Slapping an intelligence label on gossip does not make it anything other than gossip.

    Mr Brennan is a very intelligent man who worked for an intelligence agency for 25 years, yet he saw no reason to be cautious about what he was told or read.

    This what confirmation bias looks like in the real world. This should be a lesson to all of us.

  • EMichael says:
    March 27, 2019 at 2:08 pm

    Which brings up one question.

    WTF cares what John Brennan thought or thinks now?

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