It’s Impossible to Overstate How Terrible Mike Pompeo Is

When the director of the CIA, an unelected public servant, publicly demonizes a publisher such as WikiLeaks as a “fraud,” “coward” and “enemy,” it puts all journalists on notice, or should. Pompeo’s next talking point, unsupported by fact, that WikiLeaks is a “non-state hostile intelligence service,” is a dagger aimed at Americans’ constitutional right to receive honest information about their government. This accusation mirrors attempts throughout history by bureaucrats seeking, and failing, to criminalize speech that reveals their own failings…

Words matter, and I assume that Pompeo meant his when he said, “Julian Assange has no First Amendment freedoms. He’s sitting in an embassy in London. He’s not a U.S. citizen.” As a legal matter, this statement is simply false. It underscores just how dangerous it is for an unelected official whose agency’s work is rooted in lying and misdirection to be the sole arbiter of the truth and the interpreter of the Constitution.

– From Julian Assange’s Washington Post opinion piece: The CIA Director Is Waging War on Truth-Tellers like WikiLeaks

What’s most unique about Mike Pompeo isn’t the fact he’s a terrible human being, it’s the fact he’s so transparent and shameless about it. This became crystal clear last April when I read the transcript of a speech he gave at UAE-funded think tank, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).

I covered Pompeo’s commentary in detail in the piece, The American Empire Under Donald Trump Has Become Increasingly Desperate, Dangerous & Insecure, but let’s revisit in case some of you missed it the first time around.

First, he falsely characterized Wikileaks as a hostile non-state intelligence agency (despite lauding it during the election), and then used this false categorization to launch an attack on the First Amendment.

So we face a crucial question: What can we do about this? What can and should CIA, the United States, and our allies do about the unprecedented challenge posed by these hostile non-state intelligence agencies?

While there is no quick fix—no foolproof cure—there are steps that we can take to undercut the danger. First, it is high time we called out those who grant a platform to these leakers and so-called transparency activists. We know the danger that Assange and his not-so-merry band of brothers pose to democracies around the world. Ignorance or misplaced idealism is no longer an acceptable excuse for lionizing these demons.

Third, we have to recognize that we can no longer allow Assange and his colleagues the latitude to use free speech values against us.To give them the space to crush us with misappropriated secrets is a perversion of what our great Constitution stands for. It ends now…

Julian Assange and his kind are not the slightest bit interested in improving civil liberties or enhancing personal freedom. They have pretended that America’s First Amendment freedoms shield them from justice. They may have believed that, but they are wrong.

Pompeo went even further in the Q&A stating:

A little less Constitutional law and a lot more of a philosophical understanding. Julian Assange has no First Amendment privileges. He is not a U.S. citizen. What I was speaking to is an understanding that these are not reporters doing good work to try to keep the American Government on us. These are actively recruiting agents to steal American secrets with the sole intent of destroying the American way of life.

That is fundamentally different than a First Amendment activity as I understand them. This is what I was getting to. We have had administrations before that have been too squeamish about going after these people, after some concept of this right to publish. 

Glenn Greenwald responded to this assertion with the following:

Pompeo’s remarks deserve far greater scrutiny than this. To begin with, the notion that WikiLeaks has no free press rights because Assange is a foreigner is both wrong and dangerous. When I worked at the Guardian, my editors were all non-Americans. Would it therefore have been constitutionally permissible for the U.S. Government to shut down that paper and imprison its editors on the ground that they enjoy no constitutional protections? Obviously not. Moreover, what rational person would possibly be comfortable with having this determination – who is and is not a “real journalist” – made by the CIA?

Meanwhile, Pompeo spent a lot of his speech demonizing Julian Assange as someone who cozies up to dictators, saying stuff like the following.

We know this because Assange and his ilk make common cause with dictators today. Yes, they try unsuccessfully to cloak themselves and their actions in the language of liberty and privacy; in reality, however, they champion nothing but their own celebrity. Their currency is clickbait; their moral compass, nonexistent. Their mission: personal self-aggrandizement through the destruction of Western values.

It’s takes some nerve for Pompeo to say that considering the following, via Glenn Greenwald at The Intercept:

So how could Mike Pompeo – fresh off embracing and honoring Saudi tyrants, standing in a building funded by the world’s most repressive regimes, headed by an agency that for decades supported despots and death squads – possibly maintain a straight face as he accuses others of “making common cause with dictators”? How does this oozing, glaring, obvious act of projection not immediately trigger fits of scornful laughter from U.S. journalists and policy makers?

The reason is because this is a central and long-standing propaganda tactic of the U.S. Government, aided by a media that largely ignores it. They predicate their foreign policy and projection of power on hugging, supporting and propping up the world’s worst tyrants, all while heralding themselves as defenders of freedom and democracy and castigating their enemies as the real supporters of dictators.

Try to find mainstream media accounts in the U.S. of Pompeo’s trip to Riyadh and bestowing a top CIA honor on a Saudi despot. It’s easy to find accounts of this episode in international outlets, but very difficult to find ones from CNN or the Washington Post. Or try to find instances where mainstream media figures point out what should be the unbearable irony of listening to the same U.S. Government officials accuse others of supporting dictators while nobody does more to prop up tyrants than themselves.

This is the dictatorship-embracing reality of the U.S. Government that remains largely hidden from its population. That’s why Donald Trump’s CIA Director – of all people – can stand in a dictator-funded think tank in the middle of Washington, having just recovered from his jet lag in flying to pay homage to Saudi tyrants, and vilify WikiLeaks and “its ilk” of “making common cause with dictators” – all without the U.S. media taking note of the intense inanity of it.

If that’s not enough for you, on a separate occasion Pompeo called Edward Snowden a traitor who should be brought back to the U.S. and executed.

That’s your new Secretary of State, America.

Unfortunately, it gets worse. Much worse. For all his flaws, Rex Tillerson had a surprisingly sane take on the Middle East, at least relatively. He was known for being against the idiotic Saudi-UAE attempt blockade of Qatar, as well as in favor of keeping the Iran deal active. Pompeo shares no such sentiments.

As CNBC reported:

Pompeo, named as his pick for secretary of state by Trump on Tuesday shortly after he announced Tillerson’s departure on Twitter, has taken a notoriously tough stance on Iran in the past in his erstwhile role as director of the CIA.

Not only has Pompeo likened Iran to the Islamic State (ISIS) militant group, calling the country a “thuggish police state” in a speech in October, he has also promised to constrain Iran’s investment environment and “roll back” its 2015 nuclear deal.

“Thuggish police state.” Similar to Saudi Arabia then, which Pompeo had no problem bestowing with a CIA medal last year.

But there’s more…

In November 2016, when Pompeo was appointed to lead the CIA, he warned that Tehran is “intent of destroying America” and called the nuclear deal “disastrous.” He added that he was looking forward to “rolling back” the agreement.

Differences of opinion over how Iran should be treated are said to be the source of discord between Trump and Tillerson, whose firing followed a clash over the nuclear deal, the president said Tuesday.

“If you look at the Iran deal I think it’s terrible and I guess he thought it was OK … We weren’t really thinking the same,” Trump said in a statement outside the White House. He said he and Tillerson got on “quite well” but had “different mindsets.”

Iran has been increasingly marginalized during the Trump administration, which has sided with Saudi Arabia in the regional battle for influence in the Middle East.’

Here’s the bottom line. As I outlined multiple times last year, Trump is determined to have a war with Iran and Rex Tillerson was standing in the way. Putting unhinged war hawk Pompeo in place as Secretary of State is simply Trump getting his ducks in a row ahead of confrontation. Watch as the sales pitch for another war in the Middle East picks up considerably in the months ahead.

I believe this forthcoming war against Iran will have almost no international support. Probably just autocratic regimes in the Middle East like Saudi Arabia and the UAE, as well as Israel and possibly the UK depending on who’s Prime Minister when it gets going. The rest of the world will be against it, which will lead to spectacular failure.

It’s become increasingly clear that a huge military error, such as a new major confrontation in the Middle East is what will spell the end of the U.S. empire. Such a confrontation is now increasingly likely with Tillerson out of the picture

Oh, and the person Trump picked to head the CIA to replace Pompeo is Gina Haspel, a 33-year CIA careerist who ran a torture black site in Thailand.

Donny boy sure has a strange way of “draining the swamp.”

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In Liberty,
Michael Krieger

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15 thoughts on “It’s Impossible to Overstate How Terrible Mike Pompeo Is”

  1. “The bigger the lie, the more it will be believed.” Goebbels
    ‘Shameless’.. does this imply they are desperate and know the collapse is inevitable, so must squeeze us as dry as possible ASAP. So scary knowing all hope lies with the ‘american voter’. Again, I see secession as the only way forward.

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  2. Looks like Orange Julius wasn’t jawboning, he really is intent on war with Iran. To get there, we’d have to finish destroying Syria and probably start strikes on Lebanon (Hezbollah). What a mess. Shia people around the world would have every right to despise us forever.

    Maybe Pompeo and Netanyahu can draw Iran cartoon bombs together to convince the American sheeple to start yet another war. Bibi has been crying wolf on Iran since 1992, so why stop now?

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  3. Anybody notice how much Mike Pompeo looks like a reconstituted Dick Cheney? I mean, its scary.. And of course, he has the same ideology. We are on to something here. Where has Dick been the last 8 years?

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  4. Pompeo the Neocon, first in his class at West Point, all-around war monger will no doubt please the military-industrial-security complex in his new role while leaving the unaccountable CIA in the hands of Gina Haspel,32-year veteran of the agency.

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  5. How did someone who graduate first in his class at West Point with a Mechanical Engineering degree go off the deep end?

    The only good news is that the American Public won’t support a ground war in Iran. So I guess it will be Tomahawk missiles and Reaper drones…

    The appointment of Gina Haspel illustrates the way this administration is bypassing voersight by the People. Instead of Senate-confirmed candidate in key poitions, they are delgating junior poisiton and leaving the top open.

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  6. “What’s most unique about Mike Pompeo isn’t the fact he’s a terrible human being, it’s the fact he’s so transparent and shameless about it.”

    Replace “Pompea” with “Trump” and you’d be just as accurate. Let’s not forget who selected Pompea. Selection does not make one “terrible”, but it does say a lot of the character of the President (as if we needed any more). Trump consistently picks losers, and unqualified people for the jobs they’re given.

    Those of you still babbling about “Iran” are obviously not paying attention.

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  7. What concerns me the most is that Alex Jones and Co, the arguable father of the ‘truth movement’ of modern times, previously long time defender of civil liberties and nonpartisan, seems to have so completely drunken the Trump kool aid that he either censors, or appoints someone who censors, or allows people to censor his own Infowars comment sections whenever anyone criticizes Trump’s hypocrisy with anything other than a “token”/controlled opposition position.

    Sure you can post that you hate Trump, but if you intelligently reason or point out what he said in 2016 vs actions now, bang, you’re deleted. Over and over. I literally have had screenshots and tried to get people to run articles but nobody was interested.

    If the person who by and large helped push Trump into getting elected (over the last hump of resistance) can’t even hold him accountable to his original positions, regardless of his reason (I wont even bother to guess that I know) what can the rest of us even do? Not enough voice is given to legitimate concerns that need to be raised.

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  8. There may be more to this story on Pompeo replacing Tillerson. Here is the story in abbreviated form.

    1. The CIA rogue elements with the British MI6 and Tillerson were planning a false flag chemical attack in Ghouta as an excuse for the Pentagon to bomb Damascus
    2. The head of the Russian Chief of Staff Gerasimov went directly to General Dunford of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and told him the results of Syrian and Russian intelligence on a false flag.
    3. Dunford had this information confirmed by then CIA chief Pompeo who informed Trump on this conspiracy.
    4. Immediately Trump called Tillerson home from his trip to Africa and fired him. In a hurry Pompeo replaced Tillerson as Secretary of State

    So the replacement of Tillerson by Pompeo may not be as bad as we think. If true this is a positive development. It may be true that the British are the masterminds still of the empire and that Trump is also the target of this. The false flag event of the allegedly Russian nerve gas attach in Salisbury is made from the same British cloth.

    Here’s the article:
    https://russia-insider.com/en/four-days-declare-cold-war/ri22854

    Reply
    • Hi Gary, I doubt that very much. Tillerson does not at all seem like the sort of person who would be planning a false flag terror attack to escalate hostilities in Syria. There is no reason for me to believe such a thing.

      In contrast, it’s quite clear that Trump is belligerent toward Iran (always has been), and that Tillerson was more of a diplomat as seen by the Qatar affair. As such, I warned last year that Trump would surround himself with more insane war hawks to get things going. Pompeo is a perfect example of this.

      Thus, I think my thesis is far and away most likely. It fits into what we already knew, and it fits into where Trump wants to go with regard to Iran.

  9. Mike there are no good guys in this story on the US side but I think the situation is more complex than maybe you might feel. Tillerson and Pompeo are both not nice guys at all and are part of the ruling elite or deep state. Tillerson, contrary to what we may have been led to believe, was getting extremely belligerent to both Russia and Syria so that there was no difference between him and the Neocons. Although not an instigator or organizer he may have been in on a false flag plot. He definitely is not a diplomat but a tool to be used for Anglo American power. Was Tillerson set up to be the fall guy? Maybe or maybe not. We’ll probably never know. One thing I am sure is that there are splits within the deep state between those who want war with Russia and those who are not suicidal. I’m not saying for sure but possibly Trump and Pompeo, who both are very hostile to Iran, also at the same time know if that they push too far in Syria and elsewhere they will be at war with Russia. I seriously doubt that large sections of the non-neocon pentagon, the state department, the intelligence community and the national security apparatus want to take on the alliance of Russia, Iran, Syria, Hezbollah and even the Popular Mobilization Units of Iraq in a war that they cannot win. I don’t think they have what it takes to take on these powerful forces in a prolonged war. In addition the March 1 speech by President Putin detailing the very advanced weapons systems that are decades ahead of the west scared the bejesus out of the western elite and knocked some sense into at least the realistic forces.

    One more note of interest. Notice how the British ruling class is taking the lead on fostering hysteria with Russia by their own false flag event in Salisbury. So far Trump and Pompeo seem to be leaving Theresa May on a limb. Could there be some type of fight between the British ruling circles in collusion with elements of the US deep state and the Trump administration to end his presidency. I think we need to read between the lines and realize there is a lot of shadow boxing going on and lots of intrigue.

    Reply
    • A couple of observations. First, I don’t think you get to be the CEO of Exxon Mobil by being a boy scout, but at the same time I would not put Tillerson into the category of deep state, or shadow government. I covered integrated oil companies as an analyst for 10 years, including Exxon Mobil and met many a CEO. These people are generally of a very different temperament and ambition than someone like Mike Pompeo, who is an unhinged war hawk. Tillerson simply isn’t that.

      Thus, as I wrote, and as Rand Paul so well articulated, I think the odds of some disaster in the Middle East due to Mike Pompeo in the Sec. of State role goes up exponentially. Trust me, I would absolutely love to be wrong about that.

      Also war in Iran, just like war in Syria, is proxy war with Russia. The U.S. can just mosey on in to Iran without causing monumental global issues. Way, way bigger than Iraq, and in my view would end up collapsing the U.S. empire entirely. Pompeo wants it. Trump wants it. Not a good thing.

      I do agree that there are sane people in the U.S. military, like seen here: https://www.haaretz.com/amp/middle-east-news/top-three-stunning-admissions-from-the-top-u-s-general-in-the-region-1.5910066

      But Pompeo is one of the least sane people out there. He is a total thug on virtually every single issue and is a very dangerous person.

  10. Hi Mike,
    I didn’t realize until today that Trump replaced McMaster with war crazy psychopath John Bolton. This is not good at all. So we now have Pompeo and Bolton in Trump’s cabinet. I can’t imagine anything worse than this. With two choices facing the AngloZionist empire, to fold or double down, it looks like the latter is becoming more probable. Any attack on Iran will be an attack on Russia. You can take that to the bank. Russian chief of staff Gerasimov phoned General Dunford, head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, twice this month to read him the riot act on any threat against Russians in Syria related to a chemical false flag attack. We’re rapidly coming to a fork in the road. Will the sane people who are for self-preservation stay the hand of the neocon crazies or not.

    Reply

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