I really did mean to write this a few days ago. But, when I heard that FBI Director James Comey, and NSA Director Mike Rodgers were going to testify before the Congressional  House Intelligence Committee, I thought I’d wait. It felt like there was a lit fuse, waiting to ignite a bombshell. A game-changer…a “Holyfreakinshirt…this is HUGE” moment.

And there was.  Just not the “HFS moment” I (and most of America) hoped for or expected.

Yes. The news that the FBI is indeed investigating the Trump-Russia connection as a “criminal investigation” sent shock waves of glee/anger (depending on which side of the aisle you sit) across the globe.  But the HISTORY MAKER was watching a sitting President, not only refute the statements of his two highest heads of domestic and foreign intelligence…but actually lie… IN REAL TIME, using his favorite tool of self-deception, Twitter.

Which brings us to our final “Waking Up the Power of the People”- SOLUTIONS PART III

Just a warning…you probably aren’t going to like Part III any more than you liked parts I and II… because it requires you to do your own homework. And we all know how “grown adults” feel about homework.

My world looks like the picture at the top of the screen…it is a cluttered mass of messages from a seemingly never-ending source of information providers and creators.  Because of the nature of my business (part of which is providing new feeds to broadcasters across the country), I see all of the news…all of the time…in a variety of forms…with almost no recognizable semblance of consistency between them.  You don’t fully understand this, until you see a story “morph” at a local level (organic), to a regional feed (highly cropped) and if it has merit, make it to the national audience (usually in a highly modified and filtered form).  At least that’s how it used to be.

Now…with the proliferation of news sources, both real, and fake, and somewhere in-between (if you are viewers of CNN or FOX), you have to actually get most of the REAL national news through one of two places…C-Span, or the Google-Shere.

Yes. These are wildly disparate sources and methods.

The fact is, unless you have loads of time on your hands…and can sit through days and days of our elected officials bloviating to almost empty Congressional chambers, C-Span could actually be used as a form of torture at Guantanamo. But it is the ACTUAL Organic Source of most of the news we read in filtered forms.

Even more maddening, is the fact that if you use any single news source, including the “trusted news organizations” (CBS, NYTimes, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Columbia Journalism Review to name a few), you are only going to get a smattering of unfiltered, unbiased, organic news.  Why? Because with the news these days…when our country is being overwhelmed with “Fake News” from the very administration that is supposed to be protecting the truth, trying to disseminate the lies, from the half-truths (and that’s about as good as we’re going to get, folks) is almost a full-time job.

But, that is exactly what “The People” have to do…if we want to take back our country from the demigods,  bloviators, and liars that “We the People” have elected to office.

Ouch. That hurt my fingers to type.

The truth is…we did this to ourselves…by handing over our trust, faith, and futures to people who “Make Up the News.”  And let’s face it…nobody makes more news on a daily basis than our Commander in Tweet.

He was working overtime yesterday… (I’ll transcribe the tweets, so you don’t have to see his face a bunch of times in the Twitter feed).

@therealdonaldtrump – James Clapper and others stated that there is no evidence Potus colluded with Russia. This story is FAKE NEWS and everyone knows it!
@therealdonaldtrump – The Democrats made up and pushed the Russian story as an excuse for running a terrible campaign. Big advantage in Electoral College & lost!
@therealdonaldtrump – The real story that Congress, the FBI and all others should be looking into is the leaking of Classified information. Must find leaker now!
@therealdonaldtrump – Just heard Fake News CNN is doing polls again despite the fact that their election polls were a WAY OFF disaster. Much higher ratings at Fox
@therealdonaldtrump –  What about all of the contact with the Clinton campaign and the Russians? Also, is it true that the DNC would not let the FBI in to look?

And that was BEFORE THE HEARINGS STARTED…these all fired off within a couple of hours, at somewhere between 4:45a and 6:45a EDT.

When the actual hearing began…with Comey and Rodgers basically refuting every allegation the Trump kids made up last week about Obama’s wire-tapping, and leveling a couple of insinuations of their own, regarding the ongoing investigation into Russian ties and the Trump campaign (and administration?), things got REALLY weird.

Switching from his “@therealdonaldtrump” Twitter account (I’m guessing he keeps the password in the executive washroom, where he “unloads” every morning), to the official Presidential Twitter account, @POTUS  (Yes…you need to follow him here, too) …things just slipped into BIZZARO WORLD…

I BOLDED the lies to help you delineate the Gray area fabrications from the bold-faced disregards for what was ACTUALLY happening in real-time…during the hearings…on national TV…where anyone could watch.

@POTUS – FBI Director Comey refuses to deny he briefed President Obama on calls made by Michael Flynn to Russia.

@POTUS – The NSA and FBI tell Congress that Russia did not influence electoral process.

@POTUS – NSA Director Rogers tells Congress unmasking individuals endangers national security. (especially a sitting President???)

@POTUS – FBI Director Comey says classified leaks to the media have been “unusually active” recently. (as have the number of tweets coming from the executive washroom)

@POTUS – FBI Director Comey admits Obama’s White House had ability to “unmask” American citizens. 

@POTUS – FBI Director Comey: fmr. DNI Clapper “right” to say no evidence of collusion between Russia and Trump Campaign. #ComeyHearing

And finally….back on his “real Donald Trump Twitter account”-

@EricTrump- @LaraLeaTrump & I are excited to announce that we are adding a boy to #TeamTrump in September. It’s been an amazing year. We are blessed!
Donald J. Trump Retweeted Eric Trump
Congratulations Eric & Lara. Very proud and happy for the two of you! Donald J.

Ah….nothing says “Proud Dad and Grandpa” like a re-tweet!

For those of you of “a certain age” who lived through Watergate, I couldn’t help but read Trump’s tweets with the voice of Nixon saying “I am not a crook!” echoing in the background.

Let’s not mince words. Trump…and a load of his campaign staff are crooks, liars, and dismantlers of the truth. And that’s being gracious.

But, that’s not the only bad news for the American people.

The really bad news…is that this thing is going to take months…if not years…to come to a conclusion.

Remember the months, and months, and months, of investigations into Whitewater and how long it took to finally bring about the “smoking stained dress?”  And the result? Clinton did not resign. He STAYED in office…and weakened by his position with Congress and after losing trust of the American people, sold us off to Wall Street and the Gingrich Gang.

Remember how long it took to uncover, and prosecute Watergate?  Yes…there was a resignation when Nixon realized that impeachment was imminent… But Trumpski is NOT Nixon.  Trumpski makes Nixon look like a Boy Scout in comparison to his ability to lie, divert, and completely ignore reality. He will never resign. Ever. He is the Monty Python “Black Knight” of politics and business. His reality is completely counter to the REAL LIFE reality that everyone else sees and experiences. He is so deep in his own world…of his own making…that the concept of shame or repentance is completely beyond him.

We are in for a very long haul.

SO…why torture ourselves with trying to parse the truth from the News/Blogosphere?

Because…in the infamous words of that great American, Pete Townsend… WE WON’T GET FOOLED AGAIN!!

Unless we keep doing the same lazy stuff that got us here.

The choices we had for President this year were abysmal. And it was our fault.

The choices we make every day to let the pundits and talking heads “make the news in their own image” is OUR fault.  We have to get better.

The officials that we send to Washington, term after term, after term, are there because WE THE PEOPLE are too damn lazy to hold them accountable.  We need to stay energized and connected. Period.

I never said any of this was going to be easy.  But, we need to start slapping back…and if that doesn’t work, we need to turn those slaps into punches (as in punching the ticket in the next election). And finally…we need to start keeping track of the REAL news…as it happens…and reacting to it.

Your NEXT HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT…
***Read ALL of Representative Adam Schiff’s opening statement at the hearings yesterday.

http://time.com/4706721/comey-hearing-adam-schiff-transcript/

When news is made almost hourly by our Commander in Tweet…it’s important to take the time to do a chronological recap of the primary crimes we are dealing with here. Schiff did this perfectly.

We will break it down together in the next installment…because it is possibly the most important, salient, and clear list of questions that the American People DESERVE to have answered.

PICK YOUR NEWS SOURCES…then decide the facts for yourself.  It’s like picking a single, salient point from a sea of garbage. But, if you try…you can do it.