Posted on 11/01/2017 9:00:28 AM PDT by mojito
For George Papadopoulos, the path to politics—and to President Donald Trump —was a circuitous one.
The former Trump aide, who pleaded guilty in early October to lying to the Federal Bureau of Investigation about his contacts with Russians during the election campaign, entered the political world in 2015 with no campaign experience and little foreign policy background.
A onetime oil and gas consultant who then served as a research associate at the conservative Hudson Institute and touted his Model United Nations experience as a credential, Mr. Papadopoulos began the 2016 presidential campaign by working for Republican Ben Carson. He was hired in November 2015 by Barry Bennett, Mr. Carson’s campaign manager, after contacting Mr. Bennett on LinkedIn.
Mr. Bennett said in an interview that he hired Mr. Papadopoulos to serve on the Carson campaign’s foreign policy committee in the wake of the terrorist attack in Paris, which set off a mad scramble among campaigns to bolster their national security expertise.
Some on the campaign were initially suspicious of Mr. Papadopoulos’s credentials, according to a former campaign official, and brought him in to vet him. The campaign official didn’t recall whether Mr. Papadopoulos cited any connections to Russia in that vetting meeting.
Mr. Papadopoulos graduated from DePaul University in 2009, according to his LinkedIn page. He obtained a master’s degree from the University of London, before working as a research analyst for two Washington-based think tanks.
His oil and gas consulting work thus far had consisted of a few months’ work at Energy Stream, a London-based consulting firm.
Mr. Papadopoulos, 30 years old, didn’t respond to requests for comment.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
The left's war whoops end in salty tears once again.
Sorry, the WSJ is playing games again with their links, and the link I posted is blocked.
You can access the whole story if you go to Drudge: the story is in the left column (beneath the World Series game 7 photo).
The problem is he contacted others while wearing a wire.
George Papadopoulos LinkedIn Profile
“Along with the U.S. State Department nominating me as a top five finalist to represent the United States at the 2011 emerging leaders UNESCO forum in Paris, France, I have been invited to participate in business, policy and oil and gas conferences in the U.S., Europe and Middle East.”
https://www.scribd.com/document/363016712/George-Papadopoulos-LinkedIn-Profile
He wasn’t arrested until July 2017, and wouldn’t have been wearing a wire until after his arrest - although it’s not firmly established that he wore a wire, only suspected from certain language in the indictment.
No one of any importance in the Trump administration was talking with this idiot in July 2017 onward.
An incompetent, lying grifter doofus who Trump listed by name as one of his foreign policy advisors to the Washington Post in March of last year. It's hard to downplay his role in the campaign once Trump did that.
Trump questions need for NATO, outlines noninterventionist foreign policy
This clown was not worth an indictment. He’s a pathological liar and self serving opportunist. He has nothing to offer as far as credible evidence since he is now a convicted liar and a felon to boot.
By forcing him to plead guilty to being a felonious lying sack of $&&&, he is now useless in any investigation where his testimony would lead to anyone above him.
This was a show conviction. Something to put pressure on others and to try to squeeze someone else to get information that does not exist.
Hillary’s lies before Congress and to the FBI were a thousand times more damaging to the US and yet she is free as a bird.
WHERE is proof he wore a wire? Please send me source.
He’s connected to Sergei Millian from Fusion GPS.
He’s connected to Sergei Millian from Fusion GPS.
He’s connected to Sergei Millian from Fusion GPS.
He’s connected to Sergei Millian from Fusion GPS.
He’s connected to Sergei Millian from Fusion GPS.
He’s connected to Sergei Millian from Fusion GPS.
(Clinton’s campaign helped fund the research that led to the Russia dossier)
....Muller never intended to resolve any crimes staring him in the face...his job is to indite President Trump on something as trite as smiling at some foreign dignitary. Muller is just another political operative for the global anti-capitalism...as corrupt as the Clinton's.
This is a great illustration of the problem campaigns face – lack of money and need for volunteers, and the vulnerability they have. If a relatively unaccomplished fellow like this can insinuate himself into the campaign, at least enough to get glory-wall photos of himself within shouting distance of important folks, then completing campaigns can plant agents inside a campaign to generate later discoverable e-mail bombs and other problems.
I have worked on a lot of campaigns over the last 35 years, primarily as a volunteer. Most campaigns are so starved for help and organization that any available warm body will do, and there is not much screening applied.
The exception, in my experience, was Florida Governor Rick Scott’s 2014 re-election campaign. It was largely self-funded, and had oodles of cash available. If a normal campaign head count was 95/5 (95% volunteer, 5% paid employees/consultants) Scott’s campaign that year seemed to be 5/95. I volunteered for his election day war-room legal team, and was probably the only unpaid lawyer in the room.
Not all candidates have that luxury – and many are so focused on the critical fund raising and media appearances, they never have time or resources to spend on screening volunteers. With modern surveillance technology, getting people into an opposing campaign as “volunteers” is a large objective. The fellow who surreptitiously recorded Mitt Romney’s “47%” remarks in Boca Raton, ostensibly not part of an opposing campaign, did significant damage to Romney at almost no cost. Planted “volunteers” can be a huge problem.
Word up to organizers of campaigns, you should be on guard to the damage that supposed volunteers can do. Set up separate e-mail domains and addresses for volunteers. Carefully control permissions and access. Limit the campaign addresses that volunteers can access. A guy like this wants to make himself appear important by copying the candidate or top campaign officials (who will not have time or reason to read it), and that becomes a discoverable time bomb on the e-mail server.
In this instance, I’m not sure he was malicious, but by getting close enough to take the glory-wall photos (hey everybody, look how important I am!), he can insinuate he was much more important than he really was. Then, when he gets into trouble for lying to the FBI, he spills anything he knows, and some things he may make up to trade off against charges.
Yes, absolutely. What we will eventually learn is that Fusion GPS was coordinating everything: The Trump dossier smears, the attempts to entrap this doofus with insinuations of Hillary "dirt," and the Trump Jr. meeting with Natalia Veselnitskaya (who is also Fusion GPS client).
Thanks Wally, great comment.
me, I...
Did you read the article? It explains how this guy ended up linked to the Trump campaign. No one disputes that he had a role of some sort as a foreign policy “adviser.” The guy was clearly desperate to be some kind of big shot, but he was a incompetent neophyte.
Mike Mukeasey Former AG say Mueller has problems if he talked to anyone who was represented by an Attorney
How’d he learn to bullsh** so well in just thirty years?
Oh I read it; it was a comedy of errors. You had a guy with no foreign affairs background staffing the foreign affairs advisory group. It's no surprise that Papadopoulos slipped through. It's unfortunate that he slipped through, somehow got on Trumps radar screen, and was prominently listed by him as one of his foreign policy experts. A lot of time Trump is not well-served by the people he surrounds himself with.
He's getting better, notice how the leaks have stopped?
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