ET Williams

The Doctor of Common Sense

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Scapegoat? CIA Whistleblower Now Accused of Hosting Child Pornography

Joshua Adam Schulte was convicted last week of receiving, possessing, and distributing child pornography in New York City, a conviction which will likely result in decades of imprisonment after his scheduled January 10 sentencing. He has been held without bail since 2018.

Schulte is accused of being the most prolific and important leaker of confidential intelligence community secrets, and the disclosures he revealed to the public were more consequential than other famous leakers and whistleblowers of the past, including Edward Snowden and Daniel Ellsberg. Schulte has said that he is being set up by the government as a scapegoat because of the embarrassing fallout from the disclosures.

In 2017, a major release exposed the critical tools used by the Intelligence community to subvert individuals, companies, and governments worldwide. These releases, called “Vault 7” and “Vault 8,” included ‘tools’ that could be used to:

    • Targeted malware to compromise computer systems

      Break into smartphones, computers and even Internet-connected televisions.

      • Compromise Skype; Wi-Fi networks; PDF documents; and even commercial antivirus programs of the kind used by millions of people to protect their computers.

      • Compromise Skype; Wi-Fi networks; PDF documents; and even commercial antivirus programs of the kind used by millions of people to protect their computers.

      • Targeted malware to compromise computer systems

      The scale of the digital criminality those tools described is unparalleled. Whereas Edward Snowden showed, through similar releases in 2013, the overall scale and scope of the “surveillance state,” the Vault 7 releases showed the actual tools used to illegally obtain evidence and intelligence. The government claimed to the New York Times that this was the “largest theft of confidential information in the Agency’s history.”

      Joshua Adam Schulte, age 34, was a programmer at the CIA who is accused of releasing these programs to the public. He started working for the National Security Agency in January 2010 while a student at the University of Texas at Austin. After a short period he then started working for the CIA, which lasted until November 2016. Schulte was prosecuted for ‘espionage’ in 2020 and 2022, resulting in convictions on four counts of espionage, four counts of computer hacking, contempt of Court, and making false statements to the FBI.

      During his trials in New York, Wikileaks complained about a near total media blackout on his case.

      The trial transcript from Schulte’s 2020 trial make clear that the classification regime prevented the defense from being able to conduct a thorough and fair investigation prior to trial. Many of the witness names were classified, for example. Defense Counsel David Zas, during the trial, tells the Judge, “I’m telling you as an officer of the court, not only was our investigation not reasonable, it was nothing,” due to the classification of names and documents critical to presenting an adequate defense to the criminal charges.

      The 2018 Indictment against Schulte includes allegations of espionage and child pornography, but also includes an allegation about criminal copyright violations, apparently because Schulte’s computer, after being subpoenaed, allegedly contained a large number of pirated movies.

      But the allegations against Schulte about child pornography are notable in that the government alleged that the possession and distribution of such materials happened during the entire 7 year period when Schulte was employed as an elite software engineer by the nation’s most powerful intelligence agencies.

      It strains credibility to think that the government was simply unaware of Schulte’s server side business which possessed and distributed such materials during the seven years he was employed by the government.

      The jury in his espionage case had originally deadlocked in 2020. When retried, the DOJ framed him as seeking petty vengeance on his former workplace instead of someone trying to educate the public about the criminal acts of its government. Schulte had also dismissed his public defender and decided to defend himself. Post-conviction, he now faces up to 80 years in federal prison.

      The government alleged they found an encrypted ‘cache’ of 3,000 images of child pornography on Schulte’s servers.

      The government had originally claimed there were 10,000 offending images of child pornography.

      The government never bothered to explain where the extra 7,000 offending images went.

      Also suspicious is that Mr. Schulte was employed by the CIA for several years in its “elite hacking” division  called the “Operations Support Branch” according to the government, but that background checks did not reveal that Schulte’s business renting out server space included compromising child pornography.

      Former CIA whistleblower John Kiriakou has complained about Schulte’s treatment while in prison, comparing it to torture.

Accused 2017 ‘Vault 7’ Leaker Convicted of Hosting Child Porn on Server Maintained While in CIA Employ

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Parents, Aunt Arrested After Infant Almost Dies From Over 50 Rat Bites

The parents of a six-month-old infant and the child’s aunt were charged in Evansville, Indiana, after police said that they found the baby inside the family’s “rodent-infested” home.

According to the arrest affidavit, Evansville Police Department officers responded to a 9-1-1 call on September 13th when the child’s father, David Anthony Schonabaum, said that his six-month-old baby was found face down in his bassinet with wounds all over his face and body.

David and his wife Angel Schonabaum reported that the baby boy had more than 50 bites on his forehead, right cheek, and nose.

According to reports, there was a deep flesh wound on the child’s left ring finger that exposed bone. Bite marks ran down his right hand that stretched from his hand to his elbow.

Police documents also stated that all four of the child’s fingers and thumb on his right hand were “missing skin” on top, revealing the fingertip bones, with the index and pinky fingers displaying the worst wounds.

Hospital records that were released to the press asserted that the infant suffered a “near fatal event.”

The father of the child reportedly told authorities that their rat-infested house had already been professionally handled. He presented service records indicating that the residence was treated numerous times, beginning in the spring of 2023.

David also said that he lived in the home with his wife Angel and their three children. Delaina Thurman, Angel’s sister, and her two children also lived in the home.

Angel had reportedly checked herself into a mental health facility on September 10th and she was released a day early on September 13th, due to the incident involving her son.

According to the affidavits, the other children had notified a teacher at school earlier this month that mice had bitten their toes while they slept, which prompted the Department of Child Safety (DCS) to visit the residence a few days later.

However, Thurman claimed to the DCS official that the marks on her children’s toes were caused by “scratching on the bed frame.”

The Schonabaums also reportedly had two previous encounters with DCS.

David and Angel were charged with maltreatment back in December 2022 after their middle child was harmed due to “lack of care.” Later, in June 2023, DCS validated an accusation of physical abuse against David by the same child, who was 3-years-old at the time.

On Friday, Police Sergeant Anna Gray told reporters that the baby had been released from the hospital and was placed in foster care.

David, who is currently facing three counts of neglect of a dependent child violations, and his wife Angel, who is facing five, are currently being held on a $10,000 bond. Thurman, the aunt, is being held on a $2,500 bond.

Parents, Aunt Arrested After Infant Almost Dies From Over 50 Rat Bites

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Christians Persecuted in Germany Are Now Being Deported From the USA

Romeike family

Uwe and Hannelore Romeike face a devastating predicament as their family faces deportation after 15 years of making a home for themselves in East Tennessee.

“They did not tell us anything. We don’t really know why [this is happening]. We wonder ourselves because we can’t understand,” Uwe Romeike told ‘Fox & Friends Weekend’ on Sunday.

Originally from Germany, the Romeike family fled to the U.S. after being fined for homeschooling their children in their mother country. Five years later, their asylum claim was denied, with authorities claiming they weren’t persecuted.

“The goal in Germany is for an open, pluralistic society,” the Justice Department wrote in a legal brief at the time. “Teaching tolerance to children of all backgrounds helps to develop the ability to interact as a fully functioning citizen in Germany.”

Their stay was indefinite, however, until now.

“[Homeschooling] is illegal [in Germany],” Hannelore Romeike explained. If they are sent back, they will face the same persecution as before.

Initially, an immigration judge found the Romeike family’s asylum claim appropriate.

“They found that the Romeike family did have a well-founded fear of persecution based on their participation in a particular social category, that being homeschoolers,” Kevin Boden, an attorney representing the family, said.

“The Obama administration appealed that to the Board of Immigration Appeals. That appeal court agreed with them, as did the Sixth Circuit, and the Supreme Court denied it…. We think this is, in fact, an asylum case. We do think they have a well-founded fear as we testified…

“I can tell you today, I talked to families today that have fear in Germany and the fight there, the persecution there, is very real today as it was 15 years ago,” Boden continued.

The Romeike family can stay in the U.S. and have done so for the past 15 years legally, Boden said, adding that the Biden administration and federal agencies can make it happen.

“We’re asking them to simply do just that,” he said.

“Fox & Friends Weekend” co-host Pete Hegseth said FOX News reached out to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for comment, but did not hear back in time for the segment.

https://www.foxnews.com/media/tennessee-family-deportation-15-years-fleeing-germany-homeschool-kids-well-founded-fear

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Losing Faith: Religious Identification Among Democrats Crashes 20 Points in 20 Years

The percentage of Democrats who identify as religious has dropped more than 20 points between 1999 and 2023, a recent Gallup survey found.

When Gallup first polled on the topic in 1999, 60 percent of Democrats identified as religious, as did 62 percent of Republicans. Since then, the percentage of religious Democrats has fallen 23 points to 37 percent.“During that time, the percentage of Democrats identifying as spiritual but not religious has increased 14 points, while the percentage saying they are neither has tripled,” the survey found.

At the same time, “there has been no meaningful change in Republicans’ self-identification as religious or spiritual,” and independents have only experienced a modest change. Sixty-one percent of Republicans identify as religious compared to 62 percent in 1999, and 28 percent say they are spiritual compared to 25 percent two decades ago.

The survey found that independents have become slightly less likely to say they are spiritual (from 37 percent to 32 percent) and more likely to say they are neither religious nor spiritual (from 13 percent to 21 percent).

Overall, 47 percent of Americans identify as religious, 33 percent say they are spiritual but not religious, and two percent say they are both. Notably, 18 percent say they are neither, which is twice the proportion Gallup measured when it first asked the question in 1999.

“Over the same period, the percentage identifying as religious has declined by seven percentage points,” according to the survey report.

“The decline in Americans identifying as religious is consistent with the trends for other Gallup measures of religiosity and religious practice, particularly in the past two decades. However, Gallup has documented steeper declines in formal religious practice (church attendance and church membership) than in belief in God and prayer,” the report states.

Indeed, a Gallup poll from June 2022 found that belief in God has fallen the most in recent years among young adults and people on the left of the political spectrum.

“These groups show drops of ten or more percentage points comparing the 2022 figures to an average of the 2013-2017 polls,” that survey found. “Most other key subgroups have experienced at least a modest decline, although conservatives and married adults have had essentially no change.”

“The groups with the largest declines are also the groups that are currently least likely to believe in God, including liberals (62 percent), young adults (68 percent) and Democrats (72 percent). Belief in God is highest among political conservatives (94 percent) and Republicans (92 percent), reflecting that religiosity is a major determinant of political divisions in the U.S.,” the survey report continues.

Similarly, a Wall Street Journal poll released in March found that while 49 percent of respondents say, “I know God really exists, and I have no doubts about it,” only 39 percent say religion is “very important” to them.

“Like patriotism, religion has seen a precipitous decline in ranking of importance: 62 percent of Americans said religion was “very important” in 1998, a sentiment which tumbled down to 48 percent in 2019 before hitting this year’s low percentage,” Breitbart News previously reported, continuing:

Younger respondents are less likely to rank religion as very important to them than seniors, 31 percent to 55 percent. Republicans (53 percent) are also more likely than Democrats (27 percent) and independents (38 percent) to say that religion is “very important.”

Gallup conducted the poll between July 3-27 with 1,015 U.S. adults. The margin of sampling error is ± four percentage points at the 95 percent confidence level.

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2023/09/23/losing-faith-religious-identification-among-democrats-crashes-20-points-in-20-years/

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Canada Honors Zelensky and Nazi SS Soldier

Ukraine has always been full of Nazis.

The speaker of Canada’s Parliament [above, left] has issued an apology after heaping praise on a former Waffen SS soldier, leading to the individual being feted with applause in the chamber by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau last week.

Speaker Anthony Rota introduced 98-year-old Yaroslav Hunka during a special session at Parliament Hill on Friday attended by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, describing “Ukrainian hero, Canadian hero” Hunka as one who had “fought [for] Ukrainian independence against the Russians” in the Second World War. Having done so, the chamber came to its feet — including Zelensky and Trudeau — and gave sustained applause with whooping cheers, twice.

Yet Hunka was quickly identified as a former member of the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (1st Galician), a notorious paramilitary formation which the Polish ambassador to Canada said on Sunday was “responsible for murdering thousands of Poles & Jews”.

Zelensky being seen applauding an SS volunteer is awkward for his nation’s cause, given the energy devoted by Russian propagandists to portray the Kyiv government as being the descendants of Second World War-era Ukrainian fascists. Russia tells its own people the purpose of what they euphemistically call their ‘special military operation’ is the ‘Denazification’ of Ukraine.

Despite using his prominent platform as speaker of the house to bring attention to Hunka, who he also said was a resident of his own electoral district, Rota has now pleaded ignorance as to who Hunka actually was. Calling the oversight “entirely my own”, Rota said he had “subsequently become aware of more information which causes me to regret my decision”.

Rota said calling attention to Hunka was entirely his own decision and “no one, including fellow parliamentarians and the Ukraine delegation” was aware of what he was going to do in advance. “I accept full responsibility for my actions”, he said, and Trudeau’s office has denied foresight.

The remarkable failure of due diligence came as even a casual knowledge of the European theatre of the Second World War would have flagged a member of the “First Ukainian Division” as being worthy of a second look before being celebrated.

Despite speaker Rota moving to take full responsibility, the leader of the Canadian Conservative opposition party Pierre Polievre alleged liberal Prime Minister Trudeau himself was more involved than initially revealed. Polievre wrote that: “Trudeau personally met with and honoured a veteran of the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (a Nazi division)” and was involved in the process to have Rota recognised on the floor.

Polievre claimed: “This is an appalling error in judgement on the part of Justin Trudeau, whose personal protocol office is responsible for arranging and vetting all guests and programming for state visits of this kind… Mr. Trudeau must personally apologize and avoid passing the blame to others as he always does.”

The Waffen-SS was a paramilitary fighting force of the NSDAP, which was led by the ideologically most devoted Nazis in the Second World War. As well as units manned by party-loyal ethnic Germans, it also created volunteer corps, divisions, brigades, and legions recruited from foreign nations and collaborationists. Some of these groups became notorious for being among the most brutal Nazi units and many were executed after the war.

The Canadian Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center said of the brewing controversy over the Nazi volunteer being honored in parliament that this act ignored “the horrific fact that Hunka served in the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS, a Nazi military unit whose crimes against humanity during the Holocaust are well-documented”.

Their statement said: “The fact that a veteran who served in a Nazi military unit was invited to and given a standing ovation in Parliament is shocking. At a time of rising antisemitism and Holocaust distortion, it is incredibly disturbing to see Canada’s Parliament rise to applaud an individual who was a member of a unit in the Waffen-SS, a Nazi military branch responsible for the murder of Jews and others and that was declared a criminal organization during the Nuremberg Trials. There should be no confusion that this unit was responsible for the mass murder of innocent civilians with a level of brutality and malice that is unimaginable.”

Rota responded to their call for an apology in his own statement Monday, saying: “I particularly want to extend my deepest apologies to Jewish communities in Canada and around the world.”

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2023/09/25/speaker-pleads-ignorance-after-leading-zelensky-and-trudeau-in-tribute-to-nazi-ss-soldier/

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How Our $70 Billion Gift to Ukraine Is Being Spent

Explosive 60 Minutes Report on US Funding of Ukraine: US Paying Salaries of 57,000 First Responders, Subsidizing Small Businesses in War Torn Country(Video)

In addition to the billions in military aid to help the country defend against Russia’s invasion, the U.S. has spent nearly $25 billion in non-military aid including paying the salaries of Ukraine’s 57,000 first responders and subsidizing small businesses to keep Ukraine’s economy functioning.