So last night I decided to read Carter Page’s testimony to the House Intelligence Committee from last Thursday — all 208 mind-numbing pages of it — and [Colbert] I was highly impressed by his clarity, articulateness and deftness in not letting any damning evidence slip.
I’m just kidding! [/Colbert]
This guy has got to be the most idiotic, whiny, annoying, incompetent liar the right wing has ever produced. (Except possibly, as commenter RickBoston points out, one… who sits behind the Resolute Desk.) Doing his best to layer over the topic at hand with complaints about “the dodgy dossier” (in good Republican alliterative talking-point style, he referred to it that way every time), CT accusations against the “Clinton/Obama Regime” (I never knew Hillary was Prez and Obama was Veep), weaseling (“I possibly met with”… “not directly”… “it was just a greeting”), and pedantry slathered on with a trowel (comedic examples below), Page still allowed the sharp questioners on the Committee to get out of him that he:
- signed a non-disclosure agreement upon joining the Trump campaign at the direction of Sam Clovis;
- received "incredible insights and outreach from a few Russian legislators and senior members of the presidential administration here" during what he had originally said was a personal trip to Russia in July 2016;
- discussed this Moscow trip with Clovis both before and after taking it;
- told Corey Lewandowski, Hope Hicks, J.D. Gordon and JEFF SESSIONS he was going;
- spoke with Andrey Baranov, head of investor relations at Rosneft, the Russian state-owned oil company, which is under American sanctions, and in fact learned that “this event” (for which he travelled to Russia) was happening from him;
- with respect to a possible sale of a large portion of Rosneft (in return for lifting the sanctions, as claimed in the Steele dossier), talked with Baranov who “might have mentioned it” (lol!);
- on being asked by Adam Schiff whether he ever showed support for the idea of lifting the sanctions with Baranov, answered "Not — not directly, not directly.” (Note from Earth to Carter: “not directly” = “YES”);
- lauded members of the Trump campaign's foreign policy team on July 14 for their "excellent work" on watering down aid to the Ukraine against Russia in the Republican election platform;
- on being asked if he’d ever met George Papadopoulos’s Russian “Professor” contact, Joseph Misfud, answered: “No. ...I — you know, there may have been a greeting… I have no recollection of ever interacting with him in any way, shape or form...” (Translation: “YES”.);
- he suggested that Trump travel to Russia in a campaign event in May 2016;
- asked if he’d been interviewed by Robert Mueller, answered that he didn’t want to talk about that. (Translation: “YES”, and possibly also “I’m scarred for life”.)
In other words, he basically confirmed the dodgy lying slanderous dossier’s claim that he was key in carrying collusiony messages to and from Moscow.
This is big news but despite its seriousness it cannot be conveyed without a certain amount of merriment. Twitter obliged… (see below the ask).
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...in other words, “I don’t want to let you guys catch me lying through my teeth!” He said this over and over.
About a second trip to Moscow in December 2016:
What I gather from Carter Page’s own words is that he thinks he’s reeeally smart — so smart he doesn’t even need a lawyer! — and could easily outwit the dum-dums on the Intelligence Committee through certain oft-repeated tactics, all of which require a metric f**kton of words. And he kept throwing in irrelevant details like how he got a great deal on the airfare, kind of like your old half-senile great-uncle who just blathers out his stream of thoughts.
Of course the damning truth will slip out.
Tuesday, Nov 7, 2017 · 8:29:28 PM +00:00 · Karen Wehrstein
Eagle-eyed Dena (wife of Alan Grayson, for those who don’t know) has also spotted, via redactions… that Page has possibly had to testify for a grand jury or three. Because grand juries are secret, the redactions would be necessary.
(Mueller we already know he’s been interviewed by as he said he’d rather not talk about it.)