So Why Does the NSA Have 32 Pages of Secret/Top Secret Documents on Seth Rich?
Originally publisehd Oct 25, 2018
Most people probably missed this intriguing blogpost by Publius Tacitus which appeared yesterday.:
https://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/2018/10/dnc-emails-a...
Although this provides a good summary of what is currently known about the Seth Rich case, the intriguing new info in it is this:
“But now there is new information that may corroborate what the human sources quoted in the Fox article claimed about Seth’s role in getting the DNC documents to Wikileaks. Borne from a FOIA request filed in November 2017 by attorney Ty Clevenger, who requested any information regarding Seth Rich and Julian Assange. The NSA informed Clevenger in a letter dated 4 October 2018 that:
Your request has been processed under the provisions of the FOIA. Fifteen documents (32 pages) responsive to your request have been reviewed by this Agency as required by the FOIA and have found to be currently and properly classified in accordance with Executive Order 13526. These documents meet the criteria for classification as set forth in Subparagraph © of Section 1.4 and remains classified TOP SECRET and SECRET.
If NSA had come back and said, “No, we do not have anything pertaining to Seth Rich,” that would have been news. It would have been especially unwelcome news for those who believe that Seth was the source on the DNC emails. But now the opposite is true. The NSA says that it has documents that are classified TS and S. What do those documents say or prove? That remains to be seen.”
Although the letter cited here was dated October 4th, I had not seen any previous news about this, nor could I find this cited elsewhere on the web. When I and others queried the author (in the Comments section) about his source for this info, he responded:
“The source is the letter that the lawyer, Ty Clevenger, received from the NSA. I have seen the letter.”
Presumably Publius Tacitus knows Clevenger.
So the key question is this: why does the NSA have 32 pages of secret or top secret documents (which of course they refuse to release) pertinent to Seth Rich and Julian Assange?
The Deep State expects us to believe that Russian agents (presumably “Guccifer 2.0”) hacked the DNC and provided Wikileaks with the DNC emails they subsequently published. Hence, there would be no reason to think that Seth Rich was ever in touch with Wikileaks, and the NSA couldn’t have captured any correspondence between Seth and Wikileaks officials. Moreover, the FBI was at pains to deny rumors that they had examined Seth’s laptop soon after the murder. Though they didn’t say that specifically — rather, they said that they were not investigating the Seth Rich murder , as the FBI does not investigate murders. (After which the MSM had a good laugh at the absurd Seth Rich “conspiracy theorists”.)
https://www.newsweek.com/seth-rich-dnc-staffer-wikileaks-leaked-emails-f...
However,.what if the FBI was investigating Rich for espionage — rather than probing his murder? The FBI did not flatly state that they had not looked at his laptop.
The Fox News report — withdrawn at the insistence of the Murdochs — which prompted public concern about Seth’s laptop, was evidently based on info which Sy Hersh supplied to Ed Butowsky in a phone call that Butowsky secretly recorded:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gYzB96_EK7s
Although Hersh has refused to go public with this story (he likely has only one source for it), he had an opportunity to state that he had been BSing Butowsky — but refused to do so. Which likely means he was being honest when he told Butowsky about a source inside the FBI, considered highly reliable by Hersh, who described to Hersh seeing an FBI memo regarding an FBI analysis of Seth’s laptop. That analysis indicated that Seth had arranged with Gavin Macfayden of Wikileaks to provide DNC emails to Wikileaks via drop box in exchange for a payment.
Another pertinent issue has recently caught my attention. There is strong reason to suspect that Guccifer 2.0, far from being a Russian intelligence agent, is a Deep State creation meant to establish the hoax that Russian hackers were the source of the Wikileaks DNC releases.
https://caucus99percent.com/content/how-did-crowdstrikeguccifer-20-know-...
Yet it is clear that, as of June 15th, 2016, when G2.0 made his first appearance, he was aware that Wikileaks was planning to release DNC emails. On June 12th, Assange announced that Wikileaks would soon release “upcoming leaks in relation to Hillary Clinton”; he never mentioned the DNC. But, soon thereafter, Crowdstrike indicated that the DNC had been hacked, and Guccifer 2.0 claimed that he was the hacker, and had provided Wikileaks with DNC emails which he had purloined. This suggests strongly to me that both Crowdstrike and G2.0 (possibly one and the same?) had been tipped off by elements of the Deep State that DNC emails had been transferred to Wikileaks.
Since the NSA has ominiscient ability to intercept electronic communications, what is the chance that they weren’t carefully monitoring communications to and from the principals of Wikileaks — including Gavin Macfayden? If they were doing such monitoring, then they would have intercepted Seth’s offer to provide the DNC emails in a drop box to Macfayden. And this finding could then have been conveyed to the DNC. Almost as soon as Assange had confirmed that new material related to Hillary Clinton was soon to be released, the DNC and Crowdstrike quickly deduced that leaked DNC emails would soon be made public. And to distract attention from the incriminating content of the emails, they hit on the clever stratagem of “proving” that Russian intelligence hackers, bent on Hillary’s destruction, were the actual source of the emails. Almost as soon as Crowdstrike’s claim that Russian intelligence had hacked the DNC was made public, G2.0 popped up to claim that he was the hacker, and had provided his trove to Wikileaks. To prove his hacking credentials, he released a Trump Opposition Research document — cited by Crowdstrike the day before as having been taken by the hackers from the DNC — on which he had intentionally placed “Russian fingerprints” in the meta-data that he knew would lead cybersleuths to conclude that he was Russian. (The only small problem with this charade is that we now know that the opposition research document had been a file attachment to the Podesta emails; apparently we are dealing here with another “gang that can’t shoot straight”.)
If the NSA had unmasked Seth as the source of the DNC leak, and had provided this info to the DNC, this might be quite pertinent to Seth subsequent murder. (And possibly also the mysterious death of Seth’s confederate Shawn Lucas.) Although the Deep State could be confident that Assange wouldn’t reveal his source for the DNC emails, Seth Rich would have been in a position to destroy the Guccifer 2.0 hoax — as long as he was alive.
You’ll note that the alleged FBI analysis of Seth’s laptop claims that Seth had indicated he had friends who were aware of his drop box. One of these friends might have been Shawn Lucas, the process server for the lawsuit against the DNC. About a month after Seth’s murder, Lucas died mysteriously of a drug overdose involving multiple potent drugs. Quite a mysterious death for someone not known to abuse drugs. It has also been pointed out that the DNC made large payments to Crowdstrike the day after the murders of both Seth and Shawn. Sheer coincidence? Maybe.
Okay, so maybe Sy Hersh’s trusted source is actually just a lunatic, and there was no FBI investigation of Seth’s laptop. And maybe Seth never made any effort to contact Wikileaks, and the NSA therefore had no need to intercept his non-existent communications with that organization.
Which however then leaves us with the question: Why does the NSA have 32 pages of documents, marked Secret and Top Secret, pertinent to Seth Rich and Wikileaks?
Perhaps those who will be quick to deride this essay as “conspiracy theory” will have a clever answer for this. And will they also be eager for those NSA documents to be declassified and released, so that my crackpot suspicions can be put to rest? Perhaps I shouldn’t hold my breath.
Update Oct. 27th — Remarkably, I have been informed by Publius Tacitus that Sy Hersh was not a source for the Fox News story on Seth’s contacts with Wikileaks:
No, Sy was not the source for the Fox report. Two of the sources are closely tied to Julian’s lawyer.
If this is true, then there may be 3 sources vouching for the story.
Comments
Thank you for bringing this together so well.
I didn't know about the NSA files. And although the crude obviousness of the Guccifer 2.0 absurdity was pointed out as soon as it happened, I think you've said it very concisely:
I am a person who is not convinced, by all the evidence you and many others have provided, that Seth Rich was the DNC leaker. I see in the willingness to jump to that conclusion the same behavior that I see in those willing to believe the Russia hacking lie, a bit of wishful thinking because of the seriousness of the issues and the hopes of solving it all. I sure think it's possible he was the leaker. But I don't think that's been proven.
I do think it's more likely he was murdered because of his DNC voter database expertise, which amounts to the same thing, of course. A lawsuit filed the day after his death may have involved him as a witness:
I guess what I'm saying is that seeing Seth Rich as the DNC leaker focusses on the money laundering and voter suppression evident in the emails released by WikiLeaks. But focussing on Seth Rich's job and the knowledge he had about voter suppression begins to re-focus on the crime itself and the legitimacy of the entire election.
The NSA knows whether it was a hack or a leak.
But,they're not likely to tell us. But, that's also telling. Or, maybe they already have without saying as much. That, too, may be another layer of unprovable deception. The perfect murder.
Yes, you've said this so well.
That the NSA has 32 pages of classified documents on "Seth Rich and Julian Assange", i.e., the combination of those two people, has to mean something. Or it could have to do with Assange offering a reward for information about Seth's murder, which was not a secret in and of itself.
But that the NSA has these files, but has no evidence of Russia hacking the DNC, could also mean the NSA has evidence of someone like the FBI or private contractors engaging in surveillance of Seth Rich at the DNC, either under a warrant, or illegally, or under an illegally obtained warrant.
If that is what happened, they're accessories
after the fact. Or, before. No wonder we haven't been shown the raw intelligence.
About Seth Rich
I recall that Seth Rich was scheduled to provide a sworn statement on the Monday following his murder that was to be attached to the complaint. I don't know what he was swearing to, but I'm guessing it pertains to election rigging. He might have witnessed that on the data side without ever seeing the emails in question.
I have heard many times that there was some contact between Assange and Rich. I've heard it was facilitated by Kim Dotcom, who, like Assange, offered to testify before the House Investigation Committee if he could gain temporary immunity. Ditto Assange, who was negotiating with the DOJ for the same purpose.
I'm looking at another potential source through American University, where a cabal of former Obama Admin peeps were ensconced. It's loosely connected with the Mariia Butina affair. She and her classmates were analyzing all of the neferious NSA searches that Rice had pulled before she got shut down. Rice and Butina had adjoining offices. I've also located where Craig Murray picked up the thump drive he carried in his diplomatic pouch to London and gave to Assange. It was on or near the American University campus, which is a heavily wooded area.
I've heard various stories about Seth's laptop. I was wondering where it ended up. It's an open investigation, so the DC police would have it. I've heard they do not have it. I've also heard his brother has it. It's just a loose end.
I missed the Edison Media Research connection
...or didn't pick up on it at the time. Thanks, Linda. That is of particular interest to me.
I keep tabs on exit polling. It turns out that Edison Media Research monopolizes much of the nation's commercial exit polling — and they are the exclusive provider to all six news media monopolies on Election night. From their exit poll data, Edision can predict who wins which precinct, far in advance of ballot counting. That's how the news media monopolies can predict who wins a certain state when only 10 percent of the votes have been counted. Swing states are usually left open and uncalled (but the exit polling raw data has been compiled, so theoretically they could call those states, too. They just don't. They do not reveal the exit poll predictions and instead drag certain states out late into the night, waiting for actual ballot counting to end.
Think about it. Exit polling was not designed for commercial news media predictions, they were designed to confirm to the nation and the world that the US presidential vote is true — or to sniff out election fraud when the ballot count drifts more than a few points out of range from the exit polling data. But, if you wanted to rig elections, this is the perfect place to pull it off. (Literally, right in the CFR's living room on election night.) And, since one company has a monopoly on monitoring nation's exit polls... there's an opportunity there.
Regarding the lawsuit, apparently, someone got their hands on Edison's raw exit polling data from 2012, I believe. And, they noticed that in certain places, Edison was fixing the exit poll data to match the ballot counts. That way, the math would generate no out of range numbers and no voting irregularities. Who would know? You see the implication?
This may explain the dizzy confusion on election night, when everyone got it wrong. And explain the recounts jill Stein wanted that were blocked when they got to Michigan. Or, (was it 2012?) when Karl Rove lost his marbles on Fox on election night and refused to accept the count. I realize the lawsuit Seth was involved in is operating on a different theory. I'm describing evidence that I know of pertaining to the same defendant. Edison is headquartered in a New Jersey mansion.
I didn't realize Seth was the key witness to that.
This should go on someone's to-do list.
Yes, this whole area
of concern is fraught with problems. I was never a believer in exit polling per se, but when I became aware of how easy it would be to misrepresent the total results of elections, it occurred to me maybe the exit polls are more reliable than the official results.
But the controversy seems to be that, after glaringly questionable exit polling results over many years (both here and in the UK) called for a form of regulation, the exit polling contractor now actually admits to adjusting its results to match the official result. That's why the 2016 lawsuit asked for the "raw data," meaning the exit polling results before adjustment.
Here's a good discussion about this controversy: