{"id":12554,"date":"2020-08-06T06:00:05","date_gmt":"2020-08-06T13:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/?p=12554"},"modified":"2020-08-05T19:09:39","modified_gmt":"2020-08-06T02:09:39","slug":"steeles-dossier-clown-show-or-the-greatest-russian-coup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/steeles-dossier-clown-show-or-the-greatest-russian-coup\/","title":{"rendered":"Steele’s dossier: ‘Clown show’ or the greatest Russian coup?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The following article is from my colleague, Paul Roderick Gregory, in The\u00a0Hill<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The known details of the so-called Steele dossier point to a peculiar ambiguity. To expert analysts, it always appeared to be low-quality political opposition research. Yet, it turned American against American, paralyzed our government \u2014 and may be the greatest Russian disinformation coup in history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Jan. 10, 2017, BuzzFeed published<\/a> the dossier. Supposedly written by an ex-MI6 agent turned consultant, Christopher Steele<\/a>, it charged, among other offenses, that President-elect Trump was a longtime Russian agent and a pervert to boot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump\u2019s many opponents rushed to adopt the dossier as a road map to Putin-Trump collusion. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At about the same time, the FBI was interrogating<\/a> a 42-year-old Russian national working in Washington. The interviewee, Igor Danchenko, admitted to being Steele\u2019s primary source for the dossier. The \u201cclueless<\/a>\u201d Danchenko confirmed that he had collected the dossier\u2019s \u201craw material\u201d from talking with drinking buddies. For purposes of the dossier, Steele would transform Danchenko\u2019s \u201csources\u201d into high-level Kremlin insiders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read the full article here<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The following article is from my colleague, Paul Roderick Gregory, in The\u00a0Hill The known details of the so-called Steele dossier point to a peculiar ambiguity. To expert analysts, it always appeared to be low-quality political opposition research. Yet, it turned American against American, paralyzed our government \u2014 and may be the greatest Russian disinformation coup […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-3gu","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":10696,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/steele-dossier-farce-shows-why-trump-relies-on-twitter\/","url_meta":{"origin":12554,"position":0},"title":"Steele dossier farce shows why Trump relies on Twitter","author":"victorhanson","date":"October 27, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0 The Hill By Paul R. Gregory, opinion contributor \u2014 10\/27\/17 The media refrain on the Trump dossier has been that \u201cconsiderable amounts of it have been proven.\u201d No one had explained exactly what has been proven, however, until The Washington Post decided to answer the question itself. Per the\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12127,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-steele-dossier-bacillus\/","url_meta":{"origin":12554,"position":1},"title":"The Steele Dossier Bacillus","author":"victorhanson","date":"January 8, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review In 2016, Hillary Clinton presidential candidate hired an ex-intelligence officer and foreign national, British subject Christopher Steele, to use Russian sources to find dirt (\u201copposition research\u201d) on her then political opponent Donald Trump. So much for the worry about \u201cforeign interference\u201d in U.S. elections.\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":11012,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-paradoxes-of-the-mueller-investigation\/","url_meta":{"origin":12554,"position":2},"title":"The Paradoxes of the Mueller Investigation","author":"victorhanson","date":"February 22, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review They are numerous, and none of them are good news for President Trump\u2019s opponents. Special Counsel Robert Mueller has indicted 13 Russian nationals for allegedly conspiring to sow confusion in the 2016 presidential election. The chance of extraditing any of the accused from Vladimir\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Donald Trump"","block_context":{"text":"Donald Trump","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/donald-trump\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10926,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/did-the-fbi-vouch-for-the-crazy-russian-deal-from-the-steele-dossier\/","url_meta":{"origin":12554,"position":3},"title":"Did The FBI Vouch For The Crazy Russian Deal From The Steele Dossier?","author":"victorhanson","date":"January 31, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Paul Roderick Gregory \/\/ Forbes The media\u2019s promotion of an unverified dossier against Republican candidate, Donald Trump, failed to cement Hillary Clinton\u2019s expected victory in November. If that were the whole story, the dossier would have faded from public view, the new President Trump would not have spent his first\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "FBI"","block_context":{"text":"FBI","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/fbi\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12182,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/why-was-the-steele-dossier-not-dismissed-as-a-fake\/","url_meta":{"origin":12554,"position":4},"title":"Why Was The Steele Dossier Not Dismissed As A Fake?","author":"victorhanson","date":"February 6, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Please\u00a0read\u00a0the\u00a0following\u00a0article\u00a0by\u00a0my\u00a0colleague\u00a0Paul\u00a0Gregory\u00a0in\u00a0Defining\u00a0Ideas A cursory examination of the Steele Dossier should have convinced the CIA or the FBI that it was fake news. Any residual doubt would have vanished after learning that its author, Christopher Steele, was an opposition researcher paid by the Democrats to dig up dirt on Trump. That our\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":11070,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/scandal-questions-never-asked-much-less-answered\/","url_meta":{"origin":12554,"position":5},"title":"Scandal Questions Never Asked, Much Less Answered","author":"victorhanson","date":"March 22, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ American Greatness Sometimes the hysteria of crowds causes them to overlook the obvious. Here is a series of 12 questions that do not seem to trouble anyone, but the answers to these should expose why so many of the people today alleging scandals should themselves be\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Hillary Clinton"","block_context":{"text":"Hillary Clinton","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/hillary-clinton\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12554"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12554"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12554\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12555,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12554\/revisions\/12555"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12554"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12554"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12554"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}