Huh? Reminiscent of Benedict Arnold?

Rep. Gowdy on fallout from the Helsinki summit Just In: Trey Gowdy Calls For Trump’s Advisors To Resign In Move Reminiscent of Benedict Arnold “Reevaluate Whether or Not [You] Can Serve In This Administration” [FB NEWS CYCLE] [Elder Patriot] Gowdy cited overwhelming evidence of Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election and President Trump’s refusal “to say that and act like it” for his reason to tell Trump’s advisers “to reevaluate whether or not they can serve in this administration.” “The president either needs to rely on the people he has chosen to advise him, or those advisers need to reevaluate whether or not they can serve in this administration, but the disconnect cannot continue. The evidence is overwhelming. And the president needs to say that and act like it.” It’s truly sad to watch Gowdy vacillate between defending the system and attacking the president.  The fact is it’s not as simple as Gowdy wants to make it. And President Trump understands that. "Reminiscent of Benedict Arnold." Good lord; how's that for hyper-bowly.  [Elder Patriot continues] Yes, Russia meddled in the election but the lack of candor about Russia’s meddling is outrageous and Gowdy has made no attempt to make that clear whenever he seizes the opportunity to criticize Trump. As we pointed out earlier today, the Russians hacked the Republicans just as aggressively as they did the Democrats.  Their primary intent to sow discord and create chaos in our political system.  And, to that end, Gowdy is helping them achieve that. Trump’s disdain for the special prosecutor, the DOJ and the FBI is well founded.  Remember, as Gowdy told us, the president knows as much or more about every aspect of our intelligence operations as anyone else.  That fact alone suggests Gowdy may be speaking out of turn. Keep in mind almost all highly sensitive intelligence is compartmentalized and the president is one of only a few people, if any others, to have seen it all.  And, Gowdy isn’t one of them. With that in mind, listen to former federal prosecutor, Andrew McCarthy who has a deep allegiance to the FBI and DOJ – he prosecuted Blind Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman and eleven others in 1995 following the first World Trade Center bombing – and who only recently has seen enough to conclude that this is a sham investigation. FOX Transcript BAIER So, do you agree with Congressman Hurd? Is the president being manipulated by Vladimir Putin? GOWDY: Well, Will has a background as a CIA officer. I defer to him on manipulation. I can tell you this, Bret, the president has access to every bit of evidence, even more than those of us on House Intel. And Will and I serve on Intel. He has access to Pompeo and Chris Wray and Dan Coats and Nikki Haley. The evidence is overwhelming. It can be proven beyond any evidentiary burden that Russia is not our friend and they tried to attack us in 2016. So, the president either needs to rely on the people that he has chosen to advise him, or those advisors need to reevaluate whether or not they can serve in this administration. But the disconnect cannot continue. The evidence is overwhelming and the president needs to say that and act like it. [..] But I do know this -- we got a classified briefing this week, Bret. There is no way you can listen to the evidence and not conclude, not that the Democrats were the victims, but the United States of America were the victims. We were the victims of what Russia did in 2016, and it ought to be a source of unity and rallying around the fact that we are never going to allow this to happen again and we're going to punish those who try to do it. And there was this equivocation during the press conference that I'm glad he corrected it, but when you're the leader of the free world, every syllable matters and you really shouldn't be having to correct it when you're the leader of the free world. So if you are Donald Trump and you see all of these people in positions of responsibility that think you ought to be -- that you're guilty of treason, a crime for which you can be put to death, by the way. That's what John Brennan said. BAIER: Now, the DNI released a statement last night apologizing, saying he didn't mean to be critical or disrespectful in his reaction and response. But do you think it's strange that "DAN COATS, DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE" didn't know about the invite before it went out? GOWDY: I do think it's strange. I also think this, Bret, I think that the United States of America sometimes has to meet with people that we don't have anything in common with. I think our president has to meet with the leader of North Korea. We have to lead -- meet with the leader from Iran. But it's very different to issue an invitation. This country is different. We do things differently. We set the moral standard for the rest of the world. BAIER: I want to return to the investigation. Overnight, responding to Freedom of Information requests, the Department of Justice released a heavily redacted FISA court request by the FBI, asking for permission to surveil or listen into Carter Page. A fairly low-level figure in the Trump campaign or orbit but one the FBI suspected, according to these documents, of colluding with Russian agents and may be being one. I know you read this months ago, but it's the first time one of these kind of documents is out in the public domain, even heavily redacted. What is your take on this? GOWDY: My take is that Carter Page is more like Inspector Gadget then he is Jason Bourne or James Bond. Trump never met him. Trump never had a conversation with him. I'm sure he's been on the FBI's radar for a long time, well before 2016. Here's what we'll never know, Bret -- we'll never know whether or not the FBI had enough without the dossier, the unvetted DNC-funded dossier because they included it and everyone who reads this FISA application sees the amount of reliance they placed on this product funded by Hillary Clinton's campaign and the DNC. So, that's point number one, is the dossier and its use. My take is that Carter Page is more like Inspector Gadget then he is Jason Bourne or James Bond. The other thing I hope my fellow citizens will take note of is the FBI missed a really good opportunity to tell the judge exactly who paid for that. If you look at the footnote, it takes a lot more effort to define it the way they did, where you have no idea who funded it, then just to come right out and say the DNC hired Perkins Coie who hired Fusion GPS who hired Christopher Steele. There, done. That's an easy footnote, everybody can follow it. But for whatever reason, the FBI decided not to represent that to a court. BAIER: : So, Carter Page is never indicted. He hasn't been brought in. Gowdy : Not yet. BAIER: He is still walking around. GOWDY: Yes, and that -- I mean, look, this is an investigation. All investigations don't lead to indictments. There have been two dozen indictments in this case but Carter Page is not one of them. BAIER: Are you equally adamant that the president is not -- has not colluded with Russia? GOWDY: I have not seen one scintilla of evidence that this president colluded, conspired, confederated with Russia. And neither has anyone else, or you may rest assured Adam Schiff would have leaked it. So, that's why they've moved off of collusion onto obstruction of justice, which is now their current preoccupation. BAIER: So, Trump supporters look at that, former CIA Director John Brennan, former FBI Director James Comey, what he said, what they've said. And they say they understand why the president feels a little inquisitive about where things are going. GOWDY: Yes, Bret, you don't even have to be a Trump supporter to be mindful of the fact that John Brennan thinks he's guilty of a crime for which he can be hanged, that John Brennan thinks he should be in the dustbin of history, that Jim Comey thinks impeachment is too good of a remedy and Jim Comey now thinks that everyone should vote Democrat so Bernie Sanders will be the head of the budget committee and Dianne Feinstein will be the head of intel. I mean, these are the people that were supposed to be dispassionately, objectively investigating a fact pattern and they have much animus against Donald Trump as anything I have seen in my eight years in politics. Add into that, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page and the other unidentified FBI agents who also wanted him to resign or be impeached or thought he was destabilizing. So if you are Donald Trump and you see all of these people in positions of responsibility that think you ought to be -- that you're guilty of treason, a crime for which you can be put to death, by the way. That's what John Brennan said. So, what I would encourage the president, those are all people from yesterday. You have your own people in place now and it is possible to conclude that Russia interfered with us and it still does not delegitimize your presidency. That's where I would encourage the president to go. Russia is not our friend. We need to be very careful dealing with them but that does not take away from the fact that he won the 2016 election, much to the chagrin of Brennan, Comey and all the rest. BAIER: thanks for your time today. I continue to see Gowdy as an exemplar. Period.  And shrewd.  His quip that  "guilty of treason,(is) a crime for which you can be put to death" serves notice to Obama, et al. Finally; Who is our most dangerous enemy?  Answer: China.  So, who would we like to see allied with us in the event of war?  That's right. History says Stalin.