Surveillance State: Nunes Memo Shows Gross FBI/NSA Abuse of FISA system

Published: Feb. 2, 2018, 11:53 p.m.

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker and John Kiriakou are joined by Dan Kovalik, a human rights and labor lawyer who is the author of “The Plot to Scapegoat Russia” and by Kevin Zeese, he is the co-coordinator of Popular Resistance.

The highly anticipated “Nunes memo” was released today, showing what appears to be serious abuse of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to conduct surveillance on the Trump campaign during the 2016 election based solely on an opposition research dossier prepared by former British spy Christopher Steele.

Today, US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis warned Syria not to launch chemical weapons attacks on civilians, noting, “you’ve all seen how we reacted to that” ... and this “would be ill advised.” He added, though, that there is no evidence that any attack has been committed. Brian and John speak with Rick Sterling, an investigative journalist and member of the Syria Solidarity Movement.

As the stock market suffers heavy losses, Bitcoin is headed for its biggest weekly loss this week since December 2013, with values dipping under $8,000 for the first time since November. In the jobs report, January saw 200,000 jobs added. Daniel Sankey, a financial policy analyst, joins the show.

Medicaid is one of the most important and innovative programs in government, helping millions of Americans--in both the lower and middle economic strata--since its creation. Now it’s under attack from Republicans, who see it as wasteful. We’re going to start about the state of Medicaid and what comes next. Leonardo Cuello, an attorney and the director of health policy for the National Health Law Program, and Dr. Margaret Flowers, a medical doctor and the co-coordinator of Popular Resistance, join Brian and John