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Sean Hannity

BREAKING NEWS: 400 Pound Rogue Strikes in Turkey

October 19, 2018
by Peter Feinman
The Real Killer

Judges 19:26 And as morning appeared, the woman came and fell down at the door of the man’s house where her master was, till it was light. 27 And her master rose up in the morning, and when he opened the doors of the house and went out to go on his way, behold, there was his concubine lying at the door of the house, with her hands on the threshold. 28 He said to her, “Get up, let us be going.” But there was no answer… 29 And when he entered his house, he took a knife, and laying hold of his concubine he divided her, limb by limb, into twelve pieces, and sent her throughout all the territory of Israel. 30 And all who saw it said, “Such a thing has never happened or been seen from the day that the people of Israel came up out of the land of Egypt until this day; consider it, take counsel, and speak.”

BREAKING NEWS!  BREAKING NEWS!

The Sean Hannity Investigative Team has cracked the mystery of who killed Jamal Khashoggi.

The Sean Hannity Investigative Team is the foremost world organization in solving the major political mysteries that define our times. Its vast resources exceed those available to such inferior organizations as the FBI and the CIA. As a result it is able to resolve mysteries more quickly, more thoroughly, and more accurately than the traditional Deep State organizations. Nobody is better than connecting the dots than Sean Hannity. Truly he has a beautiful mind.

The Sean Hannity Investigative Team was the first to crack the mystery that Seth Rich was the true key to the Russian violation of the 2016 American presidential election.

The Sean Hannity Investigative Team was the first to crack the mystery that the true collusion was between Russia and the Democratic Party.

The Sean Hannity Investigative Team was the first to realize that no native-born white person has murdered another native-born white person in America since Donald Trump became president and that all such murders were due to illegal aliens.

The Sean Hannity Investigative Team was the first to realize that no native-born white person has raped another native-born white person in America since Donald Trump became president and that all such rapes were due to illegal aliens (except maybe in Hollywood).

Now the Sean Hannity Investigative Team has applied its superior analytical skills to solving the mystery that no one has been able to solve so far. While everyone shakes their heads in bewildered wonderment as to how anyone could have perpetrated this dastardly deed, the Sean Hannity Investigative Team has boldly gone where no one has gone before and identified the true murderer. The same 400-pound man first identified by our Dear Leader as the culprit for the alleged Russian violation of America has been found to be the culprit behind the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. Everyone in Saudi Arabia can breathe easily now knowing that the Sean Hannity Investigative Team has exonerated them of all culpability. Jared Kushner can breathe easily now knowing that his investments are safe. Even the President of the United States can breathe easily now knowing that his policy of putting himself first above the interests of the United States is not in jeopardy. Go ahead and try to relocate the FBI headquarters so another developer can encroach on my domain! Just try it!

The murder of Jamal Khashoggi provides a test case in critical thinking skills. Think back to when we first learned of Monica Lewinski. At that moment, the Republican reaction was “Duh! What else do expect from Slick Willie?” By contrast the Democrats denied any truth to the accusations claiming it was all a put-up job by the Deep State aka vast rightwing conspiracy.

As it turns out, the Republicans were correct in their assessment of the guilt of the Democratic President. However, “Duh! What else do expect from Slick Willie?” is not a legal argument. It would not hold up in a court of law. In time, a circumstantial case was developed. That led to a smoking gun aka stained-blue dress. That led to a confession of sorts. Finally at that point, the Democrats acknowledged that the President of the United States had done what he was accused of doing. The new defense was “So what.” The Democrats did not say that in January, they did in September. The process through which their thinking changed provides an excellent case study into how the human mind works.

Now and with the forthcoming Mueller report and indictments, we have another opportunity to observe the human mind in action. Here we have a case of a carefully planned premeditated murder under the auspices of the Saudi Arabian Crown Prince and defacto king Mohammed bin Salman popularly known by his street handle MBS. He and his associate assembled a team “Mission Impossible” style with a variety of skills needed to complete the task. The team operated with precision quickly entering and leaving the country with scarcely a trace of their having been in Turkey.

The Saudi strike force almost escaped undetected. An Apple may prove to be their undoing. Apparently Khashoggi was wearing an Apple watch when he entered the Saudi consulate.  It was linked to a mobile phone held by Turkish fiancée, Hatice Cengiz. This black Apple watch will now join the stained-blue dress and smoking gun as symbols of guilt.

By coincidence, it must be coincidence, right?, a New York Times  article dated October 3 began:

Apple opened a routine product-launch event last month with a gag. An establishing aerial shot of Apple’s new circular headquarters set up a “Mission: Impossible”-inspired video sketch: The keynote speech is about to start, and it’s an emergency. A young woman is summoned into action, clutching a metallic briefcase while running, jumping, tripping and sliding her way out of the sparsely inhabited mile-round structure where she works. This rush across Apple’s depopulated futurescape is interrupted by an Apple Watch notifying our hero that she had completed her activity goal for the day….

 Apple is still in the process — and still in charge — of guessing what most people could get out of an Apple Watch…. Apple is left still guessing, with more persistence than confidence, what customers might not yet know they want [from Apple watch]. Meanwhile, the market is watching, and coming up with its own answers.

Now we have one use that no one anticipated.

Ironically, as the mission itself unfolded, the news in the United States of a new version of the movie Halloween:

It’s been 40 years since Laurie Strode survived a vicious attack from crazed killer Michael Myers on Halloween night. Locked up in an institution, Myers manages to escape when his bus transfer goes horribly wrong. Laurie now faces a terrifying showdown when the masked madman returns to Haddonfield, Ill. — but this time, she’s ready for him.

Will people in the future believe that is just coincidence? From this point forward every slasher chainsaw movie will be dedicated to the spirit of MBS…and even include sounds from or mimicking the ones from the actually murder and dismemberment as recorded through the Apple watch

What will the political ramifications be?

What will happen when Republican candidates are asked who killed Jamal Khashoggi?

What will happen when Republican candidates are asked why the Very Stable Genius could not figure out what really happened?

What will happen when Republican candidates are asked why the President of the United States put his own financial interests first?

The answer is very simple. They will reply that the murderer was a 400-pound rogue. How do they know that? The Sean Hannity Investigation Team told them so.

1 Samuel 17:51 Then David ran and stood over the Philistine, and took his sword and drew it out of its sheath, and killed him, and cut off his head with it.

MBS is no David.

Critical Thinking: Fox, FISA, and Facebook

July 29, 2018
by Peter Feinman
“He is an egomaniacal, narcissistic buffoon. The MAGA agenda is but a vehicle for him to continue his years-old self-aggrandizement campaign,” said Michael Rubino, a top Trump advisor in Virginia who is close to Corey Lewandowski, the president’s former campaign manager. (“In Senate Bid, A Provocateur Evokes Trump,” NYT 6/18/18)

Critical thinking is one of those skills we pretend to consider to be desirable for citizens in a democracy. Theoretically, students are educated in this skill as part of the k-12 curriculum. In the beginning, students would be provided a document or primary source and then asked questions about it. Initially, all the questions asked can be answered solely from the data presented. No additional knowledge is required.

Over time, the process becomes more challenging. There may be multiple related documents such as the speeches of one individual. There may be multiple and contradictory documents such as opposing speeches. Students may have the option to draw on knowledge not presented in the class. There may be open-ended questions. Of course, there may be open questions about the War of Northern Aggression or should presidents be able to say they can kill someone in broad daylight on 5th Avenue and get away with it?

Situations requiring critical thinking occur frequently in the real world without always being designated by that term. For example, jurors are expected to be able to weigh often contradictory and incomplete data and arrive at a verdict. Voters also are asked to think but we know loyalty to one’s team often takes precedence over anything else.

I started thinking more about this issue on May 24 based on the front page of the New York Times, the newspaper that is home-delivered to me and read with two hands the way newspapers are supposed to be read. Three articles on the front page in particular caught my attention as examples of the way critical thinking does and does not occur.

Deep in Desert, Iran Quietly Works on Missiles: Researchers See Sign That an Old Program Has Been Revived

This article was good old-fashioned research and digging in the tradition of Sherlock Holmes to discover the truth. In fact, the article states some American weapon researchers watching Iranian TV “stumbled on a series of clues that led them to a startling conclusion.” It turns out that a second and secret facility in the remote Iranian desert had been constructed for the purpose of extending the range of Iranian missiles beyond the Middle East. The construction of this site was contrary to the public announcements of Iranian officials. The purpose here is not to detail the investigatory work which went into piecing the discovered data together, but to acknowledge the process. The situation was not a jury case where people are presented with a problem to resolve. Instead, it reflects an accidental initiative due to the chance of well-trained and knowledgeable people being alert to what was going on around them (in contrast, for example, to clueless wrestling coach Jim Jordan, who asserts he had no idea what was going on around him, an apparently chronic condition – added information not in the article).

Sandy Hook Suits Fabulist and Online ‘Post Truth’ Culture

This article from the same front page is about Alex Jones labeled “an online conspiracy theorist.” Alex Jones employs a method of investigation the exact opposite of Sherlock Holmes. In this instance, the question was his claim that the so-called Sandy Hook massacre was really an elaborate government-invented hoax supported by “gun-grabbers.” In other words, in the battle over the Second Amendment a staged event was perpetrated on the American people at this elementary school (just as it would be years later at a Florida high school – added information not in the article). The reporter notes that this fabulist has been praised as having an “amazing” reputation by the president of the United States (who has trumped over 3000-and-counting times since he became president –added information not in the article). Now the parents of the murdered children are seeking to hold accountable this individual in our “post-truth” world.” Subsequently (July 3 in my hard copy), the same reporter wrote an article “Lawyers of Neo-Nazi to Defend Fabulist.” More recently, CNNMoney reported on July 26: , Facebook suspended the personal profile of controversial InfoWars founder Alex Jones on Thursday, and removed four videos associated with his namesake page and that of InfoWars, a spokesperson for the social media company said.

The classroom activity in this example is to determine whether or not Alec Jones is telling the truth. As part of critical thinking skills, a student here might draw on an almost identical scenario involving a suit against Fox News and America First Media Group. These suits derive from the concoction of the Seth Rich conspiracy hypothesis: he leaked Democratic emails during the 2016 American presidential election. One is in awe on how Sean Hannity was able to piece together this story that none of the U.S. intelligence organizations were able to discover. Truly he has a beautiful mind. For students and voters seeking the truth, there is an excellent example to observe how the conspiratorial mind works in contrast to the weapons researchers in the previous example.

All Must Rise for Anthem, NFL Insists: Players Can Stand or Stay in Locker Room

With this type of issue, one moves from the more factual ones to the more open-ended one. The task here is not to determine whether or not Iran built a secret facility to improve missile range or whether Alex Jones (and Sean Hannity) should be held accountable for their concoctions, but what decision should be made on a cultural/social issue. The United States was born in debate. Our founders debated whether or not we should declare our independence. When we succeeded, they debated how we should govern ourselves. The writings from those debates as well as they documents they produced are part of American history studied not just at the k-12 level but into adulthood. In this issue, adult citizens have the opportunity to avail themselves of the great debates of American history. It could be considered a teachable moment for an intelligent discussion. I am sure our President is eager to lead such a discussion if only Fox and Friends would present the information to him. That way it wouldn’t just be a professional wrestling arena scrum as it is at present.

The critical thinking skills noted above have real-world implications. The three events in the articles all involve actions to be taken or not taken. What should the United States do about the secret facility Iran built to develop missile range? Should people be held accountable when they make up stories? What will happen in the NFL this season?

I raise these point because there are some serious political questions to be asked and answered on a legal basis in the national arena. We are witnessing the birth and development of source documents that will become lesson plans, essay questions, and term papers in the future perhaps even in law schools as well as in history and government classes. We have the opportunity to examine a series of documents and observe how different people responded and interpreted the exact same material.

The leading examples in question so far are:

1. The Nunes 4-page memorandum
2. The Senate testimony of Don, Jr.
3. The FISA applications

The Nunes and FISA documents provide excellent examples for a critical thinking exercise. In both cases, the existence and contents of the documents are not in question … although full disclosure of the latter has not occurred as of the time of this writing. In both cases, the interpretations of these documents are available and not in question. The blogs, op-ed pieces, media interviews, late-night comedian rants all exist for future students in a critical thinking class to examine.

Those students will discover that people today have responded to the exact same documents with diametrically contrary interpretations.

1. According to one view, these documents reveal one of the greatest corruption scandals in the history of the United States. They provide proof positive of the Deep State. For some of the fiercest advocates of this conspiracy theory, these documents vindicate the months of investigation into the workings of the Deep State. The entire witch hunt is based on unverified Russian lies fed to a Democrat-paid for spy. Ironically, Sean Hannity has admitted that he no more has proof of this hypothesis than Alec Jones has for any of his hypotheses. In fact, Hannity has urged Robert Mueller, witch hunter supreme, to do his patriotic duty, and prove that the real collusion was between the Russians and the Democrats just as the President claims. Hannity can’t prove that the Russians provided Steele with any information – he wants Mueller to do that. Hannity can’t prove that the information is lies – he wants Mueller to do that. Hannity doesn’t know that the information is unverified – he wants Mueller to do that…without realizing that Mueller may already have proven whether much of it is verifiable or not. On the Bulltrump network, this passes for the application of critical thinking skills. It has been exceedingly successful with one segment of the American population.

2.According to the second view, these documents are nothingburgers. They demonstrate two things: professional government officials at work performing their jobs in a responsible matter and the willingness of Flying Monkeys to see what they need to see and do what they need to do to prevent Robert Mueller, witch hunter supreme, from being successful.

Over time, as additional information becomes available and additional people are indicted, the material for this classroom exercise examining the interpretations of the exact same documents will increase.

A similar development transpired with the testimony of Don Jr. On one hand, his masterful testimony confirmed that there was no collusion or obstruction and obviously he had not perjured himself. On the other hand, the testimony seemed useless he was setting himself for a perjury charge.

The performance of Scott Jennings on CNN is instructive. He is a Republican but not a Flying Monkey. He took pains to repeatedly assert that people under oath should be given the benefit of the doubt and the testimony should be accepted as true. Here is where I fault Don Lemon for the inadequate job he did as a moderator. In response to Jennings protestations about a person being under oath, he should have asked Jennings to think like a juror where every witness is under oath. He should have asked Jennings to do some critical thinking where he can draw on additional information to render a verdict.

As a juror, what should Jennings have noticed about the testimony had he decided to think about it?

1. The witness had been counseled to say he didn’t remember again and again so he wouldn’t fall into the perjury trap.
2. The witness had been counseled to affirm that the only thing he did remember were the “facts” that revealed this was all a witch hunt: he never spoke to his father about it and the meeting was a nothingburger.
3. The odds are Mueller knows to whom Don Jr. made the phone call after the meeting.
4. The odds are Mueller has testimony from Hope Hicks who definitely does not want to go to jail ever.
5. The odds are Mueller has additional and alternate testimony from the other attendees at the meeting.
6. And everybody knows, Don Jr. ‘s father always knows what is going on in his building. The idea that he didn’t is prima facie absurd.

And all this is even before the Fixer decided to tell the truth.

Facebook has offered some “Tips to Spot False News.”  The last one is:

Some stories are intentionally false. Think critically about the stories you read, and only share news that you know to be credible.

Imagine if this rule applied in the White House.

Hannity versus Mueller: Who Is the Better Dot Connector?

January 29, 2018
by Peter Feinman
Two Down, One to Go (livetradingnews.com)

We humans need to bring order to chaos. We need to make sense of the universe we perceive. The challenge to do so is a never ending one as the universe changes. It has grown bigger in space, longer in time, more different in peoples, and more complicated in technology. Those who can connect the dots that make sense of the chaos have a revered place in human culture from Sherlock Holmes to Albert Einstein.

Now we are facing a political challenge to connect the dots. The Mueller investigation revolves around the ability to tell a believable story that connects the most dots. In this post, I present the examples of three different people with three very different abilities to connect the dots. At some point, We the People may be asked to decide who did it best and what the truth is.

The Two Dot President

About a year ago during an international conference, the President of the United States wandered off to chat with the Premier of Russia. It was an unscripted unplanned exchange with no aides participating. What did the leaders of these two nuclear powers talk about? According to the American leader the subject of their discussion was adoptions. The Russians had restricted the ability of Americans to adopt Russian babies and the American President sought to discuss that issue with his Russian counterpart. It certainly sounded innocent enough.

As it turns out like father, like son. The son also had had a meeting with the Russians and guess what? The topic he addressed also was adoptions. Here we had two meetings and both involved not collusion, not the removal of sanctions, and not the refusal to enforce sanctions, but a sincere effort to help unfortunate (white) Americans who can’t have children to adopt (white) children from Russia. What could be more noble and inspiring than to have the father and son team pleading for the Russians to help these Americans?

Two dots had been connected. When the President of the United States concocted this coverup story he did so by connecting two dots, his meeting with a Russian and his son’s meeting with a Russian. We would be remiss if we ignored how proud he was to make this connection, to have connected these two meetings into a single story. The Very Stable Genius was practically beaming with joy at this display of his mental prowess. All by himself, he had fabricated a story that linked two dots.

For our Two Dot President, this story represents the limit of his mental skills. He can’t go beyond the two-dot limit. It is the maximum of which he is capable. Think of his transactional foreign policy. It’s not just that he is incapable of a policy of win-win, two plus two equals five, and synergy, it is that he is limited by his mental capacities to only being able to think in binary terms. He genuinely is incapable of exceeding his two-dot limit. For higher order thinking to make sense of a large world, the Very Stable Genius needs to outsource his thinking to someone capable of connecting more dots, to Sean Hannity.

Sean Hannity, Multiple Dot Connector

Sean Hannity is highly skilled in the art of connecting dots. In his opening monologues, he exults in the number of dots he has connected. He invites the viewer or listener to come along with and as he connects the dots. What might appear to be a set of random or isolated points of data become part of a single chain or tapestry that he links and weaves together for those stay tuned to his show. His ability to connect the dots is truly remarkable. Perhaps not since future Nobel-Prize winner John Nash employed his mathematical genius to connect the dots for the U.S. intelligence service has any one individual been able to connect as many dots as Sean Hannity has done in revealing the mother of all conspiracies.

He is so good he was able to transform the unfortunate murder of a Democratic staffer into the key to unraveling the true conspiracy which has and is occurring. His ability to connect the dots makes the DaVinci Code seem simplistic by comparison. Is it any wonder that our Two-Dot President has outsourced higher order thinking to one so gifted as multiple-dot Sean? He must watch the show in breathtaking awe as Hannity explains what is really going on. Think of John Kelly informing the uniformed President who didn’t know that Lincoln had been a Republican that there is a river separating much of the United States and Mexico. Now magnify that impact a thousand fold. Naturally he suspected Crooked Hillary somehow was behind it all and with the aid of Sean Hannity, multiple dot connector, he can see clearly now.

Robert Mueller, Dot Collector Tsunami

With Robert Mueller, the situation is different. Now we are dealing not just with an individual but with a team of dot collectors. This team is gathering data on a scale that would make the head of the Two-Dot President spin. He has financial records. He has the testimony of those who have pleaded guilty. He has the testimony of those who haven’t but still may. He has the testimony of decent people who decided telling the truth was the best course of action to prevent being indicted. And he has the documents. He has mountains of evidence that roll like a tsunami (to mix my metaphors) over the Two-Dot President.

If there ever is an exchange whether as an interview or under subpoena, it will be one for the ages. It will rank with Daniel Webster and the Devil, with Clarence Darrow and William Jennings Bryan, with Tom Cruise and Jack Nicholson, with José Ferrer and Captain Queeg, and with Atticus Finch in to Kill a Mockingbird.

If there ever is an exchange between the Very Stable Genius and the Dot Collector Tsunami,

HOW MANY TIMES WILL THE PERSON WITH THE WORLD’S GREATEST MEMORY CLAIM HE DOESN’T REMEMBER?

HOW MANY TIMES WILL THE VERY STABLE GENIUS CLAIM EXECUTIVE PRIVILEGE BECAUSE THE INVESTIGATION IS A WITCH HUNT AND A HOAX?

HOW MANY TIMES WILL HE PLEAD THE FIFTH?

Has the betting line been established yet? Why not?

I wrote “if there is an exchange” because it is quite possible there will never be one. While Mueller has been collecting his tsunami of data mainly in secret, Hannity has been openly proclaiming his conspiracy with great gusto and vehemence. So far in the public arena, Sean Hannity is winning the battle of connecting the dots. His conspiracy theory is working. Now he has his first casualty in F.B.I. Deputy Director Andrew G. McCabe.  He promises more to come. The countdown on Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein has begun. Members of Mueller’s team may follow. Republicans are running for the hills into retirement, voting with their feet to save themselves.  Soon the Republican Party will be completely dominated by Rhinos.

Hannity is in his glory now. His advice trumps that of the lawyers. Why should the President of the United States play ball with the Special Counsel?

The President of the United States will defy a Congressional order to apply sanctions against Russia.

The President of the United States will defy a subpoena to testify since there is no there there and the hoaxed witch hunt is bogus and of no validity.

The President of the United States will reopen the whitewashed investigation of Crooked Hillary with the intention to lock her up.

The Republican Party will support the President of the United States in whatever he chooses to do and whatever he chooses not to do.

The President of the United States could stand in the middle of Pennsylvania Avenue and shoot somebody and he wouldn’t lose any Republicans.

It’s no longer a reality show, now it’s real.