Let’s say, for the sake of argument, that President Obama ordered phones in Trump’s offices in Trump Tower to be tapped during the campaign. If that was part of an official investigation and had warrants to back it up, that would still be pretty controversial. It wouldn’t necessarily be accurate to say the president had knowledge or was responsible, although he could have signed off on it. But there’s a reason the FBI shies away from investigating during campaign season.
If it was done off the books, however, it would be a legitimate scandal.
In the former case, it shouldn’t be hard for the new president to learn the truth and even to provide evidence to back it up. In the latter case, I suppose it’s possible that the people responsible in the FBI or NSA would try to hide what they had done, but that would involve insubordination and disloyalty.
Either way, Trump hasn’t yet provided any proof to back his allegation that this was done. And that’s leading to speculation that he isn’t basing his allegation on any first-hand knowledge:
Citing no evidence to support his explosive allegation, Trump said in a series of five tweets sent Saturday morning that Obama was “wire tapping” his New York offices before the election in a move he compared to McCarthyism. “Bad (or sick) guy!” he said of his predecessor, adding that the surveillance resulted in “nothing found.”
Trump offered no citations nor did he point to any credible news report to back up his accusation, but he may have been referring to commentary on Breitbart and conservative talk radio suggesting that Obama and his administration used “police state” tactics last fall to monitor the Trump team. The Breitbart story, published Friday, has been circulating among Trump’s senior staff, according to a White House official who described it as a useful catalogue of the Obama administration’s activities.
Obviously, I don’t know what is going on here. But if I were the president and this theory was suggested to me, I’d make some phone calls and probably dispatch a few aides to visit with senior management at the NSA and FBI. I’d try to figure out if it was true that phones in my business headquarters had been tapped, whose phones were tapped, and if it had been done in a legal way. And, if it was done in a legal way, I’d want to know what the targets had done to justify the taps in the eyes of the Bureau and the FISA court.
I’d be worried that it was politically motivated, but I’d also be worried that people in my organization might be legitimate security risks or possibly even criminals.
What I wouldn’t do is Tweet about it without having any of this information. After all, exposure of such an operation might make me look worse than the former president if it turned out to be justified.
We already know that the FBI sought and failed to get warrants on Trump officials sometime during the summer, and that they probably received approval for some taps in October.
The Guardian has learned that the FBI applied for a warrant from the foreign intelligence surveillance (Fisa) court over the summer in order to monitor four members of the Trump team suspected of irregular contacts with Russian officials. The Fisa court turned down the application asking FBI counter-intelligence investigators to narrow its focus. According to one report, the FBI was finally granted a warrant in October, but that has not been confirmed, and it is not clear whether any warrant led to a full investigation.
It’s not clear at all that these warrants would have applied to any phones in Trump Tower, although they probably would have covered cell phones of people who spent considerable time there. The four individuals are suspected of being Paul Manafort, Michael Flynn, Carter Page, and Roger Stone.
If that reporting is correct and the summer application was denied, then Paul Manafort was no longer Trump’s campaign chief by the time that he may have been tapped. The other three presumably did not have any dedicated lines in Trump Tower.
It’s important to understand that all four of these individuals were suspected of having improper communications with Russian officials and/or intelligence officers, and that the FBI wanted to investigate if they were colluding with the Russians’ hacking of voter files, the DNC email/chat servers, and John Podesta’s email, as well as WikiLeaks’ and DCLeaks’ disclosures of that pilfered information.
As far as we know, there wasn’t any separate operation aimed at spying on Trump without any probable cause or judicial review.
All of this should be investigated by an independent counsel or panel.
Trump’s tweets just make this more obvious.
I guess the controlled Trump of the State of the Union didn’t last long.
I’ll be interested to see if the commenters who have pooh-poohed all the allegations about Russian interference in our election apply the same standard of proof to these claims about Obama.
Naw, they’ll display the same level of skepticism they did to allegations about Hillary Clinton’s health.
But they were right. Hillary Clinton died mid-campaign and was replaced by a body double who was murdered by Bill on November 9.
Also, too, re. this sentence from BooMan’s post:
“But there’s a reason the FBI shies away from investigating during campaign season.”
LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL…
I’m a facts guy myself, and prefer a Truth rather than belief-based life in all aspects.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, a famous American scientist once said. But as for the anti-Putin claims and now this latest tweet-driven stuff from the Donald, I’d settle for just garden-variety credible evidence of the type that can be presented and tested in a court of law.
If it turns out, after actual evidence is presented, that my guy Vlad did arrange to hack into the DNC/Podesta files to try to influence our election, so be it. The Kremlin doesn’t pay me nearly enough at present for me to care one way or the other, and though it’s rare, I’ve been wrong before. But let’s see some actual evidence first, not just repetition of bare accusations presented as fact. (That includes long-winded biased pieces in The New Yorker …)
Similarly Donald’s accusations might pan out, per the author’s speculative scenarios above, but then again we’re dealing with accusations from someone not particularly known for dealing in the truth. Assertions from a well-known liar on the one hand, and charges from professionals of the IC who are trained in deception and disinformation wars on the other is what we have at the moment. No great surprise I remain a tad skeptical about both sides.
This is the best “both sides” take I’ve seen since Ron Fournier just compared Clinton’s emails to the administration’s responses to Sessions lying under oath.
I fully appreciate your skepticism regarding the hacking claims. What I wonder about is what you would consider proof. Even if it were possible to get, say, transcripts of NSA intercepts, I doubt you would be satisfied, and would claim those transcripts were themselves bogus. If an NSA analyst swore under oath that the transcripts were correct, would you accept that, or claim the analyst was a liar? Seriously, what is your standard of proof?
Again, just a legal standard used in court would be a good start. Your hypo wouldn’t satisfy me — the NSA guy may well testify truthfully but yet not be aware he was working with corrupted evidence from higher up the food chain.
I would want the best possible evidence in such a scenario — the tapes themselves. They could then be tested for evidence of authenticity/fraud by acoustic experts. Obviously the question of legality of the taping would be relevant too.
“Did Nixon order the break in at Watergate? We don’t know. Even if we have transcripts of Trump lying about matters involved with the matter equivalent to obstruction of justice, and even if we found money transfers between top confidantes and Russia, it still wouldn’t be enough. Because we don’t have explicit evidence of him ordering it.”
That’s what you’re saying.
The epistemological version of the 1% Doctrine?
Maybe a fusion of the two together, actually, because the only reason they’re grasping at straws like this is because you have two (or three, if you’re a Tankie) separate narratives involved in the same scandal: Russian espionage, the CIA and NSA and FBI which are bad, and the US — which is always bad — is getting it’s just deserts because we do it, too. Throw that in with the fact that there needs to be a way forward for Democrats beyond Trump bringing himself down, and this (could) be an easy way to not deal with that so enhanced paranoia.
Nobody ordered it — that’s the official story and all the participants have stuck to it from then to now.
(That would be John Dean who supported the Iraq War because he couldn’t believe that a President would lie about the need for war.)
However, executives set policy and his/her subordinates implement it. And Nixon, in his own words, did set this policy:
Thus, the mystery isn’t who ordered it, but what exactly Nixon believed was in the hands of his opponents and was desperate to get.
Wow, it’s like you continuously go out of your way to purposefully miss the point.
Your point? Beginning to a faulty premise, you mockingly alleged that Brodie is incapable of dealing with facts and evidence. That’s how Rush argues his “points.” It’s ugly, mean, and dishonest. That’s how believers of anything or anyone roll. (You may not be are far removed from that faith-based gene as you thought.)
Ah I’m glad you got to the actual point, which is that Brodie’s level of evidence required is likely impossible. Which is the point, move the goalposts. And then to compare me to Rush. So kind.
Not at all. Just suggesting a level of acceptance of evidence approximating what’s required in courts everyday. That there be some reliable way of testing the proposed evidence before it’s admitted, something a little stricter than everything is allowed. Nothing impossible there. Ways can be found to carefully protect those precious “methods” the intel guys use while still insuring what’s being presented for careful consideration hasn’t been fabricated in the basement at Langley or cobbled together with special disinformation software at NSA.
Once admitted into evidence, further probing by the duly constituted body will ensure authenticity or not, providing a solid foundation for a credible final report.
Nothing radical or impossible about that.
But we are talking high steaks here — a) accusing a major foreign power of deliberately trying to affect the outcome of our election, which some (like Mr and Mrs Lindsey McCain) consider “an act of war” (and normally a finding of an act of war has serious consequences for the aggrieved party), and b) the possible removal of our duly elected TrumpSteak, no small matter, which should require a higher bar of proof.
If that’s even Nixon’s voice on the tape.
Tapes? In the year 2016? I think you’ve watched too many episodes of The Americans with Boris and Natasha–sorry, I mean Phillip and Elizabeth–hiding cassette decks in odd places.
I blame it on all the Librul Media I’ve been consuming lately, and all their recent Watergate comparisons. Plus I blame it on viewing some recent Dan Rather infomercial for some Journalism School scheme he has cooked up, over on YT.
Ok, we’d need some computer/IT experts to be brought in to make sure that transcript is what was actually recovered, and not some script written by a modern-day E. Howard Hunt. Remember those supposed State Dept docs from the Kennedy era it was later revealed Hunt authored, the ones to blame JFK for the Diem assassination?
Point is, mere transcripts are usually poor secondary evidence in court — possibly excluded as hearsay I would think — unless the primary source cannot be produced or no longer exists.
Meanwhile, I’m going to take a short break here — gonna get into my Camaro to drop off some film at the local Fotomat. Might listen to some Creedence on my 8-track tape too. I really like their new song, Proud Mary.
I’m old enough to have actually heard that song on an eight track 😂
And in beautiful quadraphonic sound, no doubt!
I wouldn”t use the legal because useful evidence is excluded for any number of reasons
I would settle for any evidence one way or another
Right now it is a bunch of meaninglessness speculation
No not exactly tracking the court system, but approximating it. Thus the chairman of the investigating body, or with a co-chair, can have leeway to use their discretion (as they do anyway) to allow in evidence for consideration, irrespective of rules of evidence in a court.
I did want to rec a high bar because dealing with info provided by the IC, they could easily overwhelm and corrupt an investigation with false evidence, stuff that looks real but which isn’t.
Standard of proof???
In a false news world, there is no “proof” available.
We are living in a post-factual world now, JDW.
All of the things that we used to think we knew? The things we accpted as “true” due to our upbringing?
Our social programming?
Our schooling, our media brainwashing, etc.?
Gone down the rabbit hole.
Here’s when the truth about the truth finally came all the way out of the closet.
Until then, only a few people really understood how much “the truth” had been perverted in this country since at least Clinton I’s barefaced statement that he “…did not have sexual relations with that woman…” Go further back, to the assassination years. That’s when it started to get really heavy, this false news, postfactual, truthiness world.
And still, only a few people out of our many millions began to call out the lies.
Later on, only a few saw Watergate for what it was…a contest between liars.
The better liars won.
Duh.
On to this year…
Suddenly the truth about the lies…the lies about what and who Obama really was (a slick, neoliberal frontman) , the lies about neolib rule, the lies about goddamned near everything that our government says it is…began to penetrate the thick skull of the hoi polloi.
The result?
Trump.
He called the lies out, one by one. No matter that he too was lying…at least he was telling the truth about previous lies. His first big breakthrough? That line about Hillary Clinton, the money he gave her and her subsequent requisite appearance at his daughter’s wedding. He told the truth about the lies that lay behind what we had almost all been misedumacated into believing to be the way our system worked. It was like he threw a shrapnel grenade into the whole system. The splinters flew out, decimating all the liars with reach. Including…eventually…Trump himself.
Now nobody believes nuthin’!!! And well they shouldn’t. The whole curtain of lies has been torn down, revealing the one fact that we are all beginning to be able to see.
Our Grand Societal Wizards have no clothes on. They are just naked little hustlers, hiding behind a curtain of lying tailors.
Each and every one.
Will I once again be accused of being some sort of a nihilist here?
Maybe, but this is a positive development as far as I can see.
Recovery only begins when you realizes that you are sick.
Watch.
AG
P.S. I got yer “nihilist,” right here!!!
Wake the fuck up.
Well, yeah, AG, some might call you a nihilist, because you claim everything is smoke and mirrors and that there are no credible standards of proof. Some might also call you an anarchist, because it seems that you’re arguing for blowing up “the deep state” (or whatever the favored term du jour is) and starting over from scratch. I don’t know how to square those characterizations with what I’ve read about you–that you’re a Ron Paul devotee, something I’ve seen no evidence of in the relatively short time I have visited this blog.
Anyway, it’s interesting to me that when I pose the question of standard of proof, you laugh at the very idea, while brodie proposes the strictest sort of courtroom standard.
AG used to write long (what else) impassioned promotions of Ron, then Rand Paul as presidential timber and vociferously defended them from all criticism, till they subsided into irrelevance.
They ere the best available at the time.
Times change.
AG
The fascination with Ron Paul, and later Rand Paul among a thankfully very small faction of folks who might self-identify as leftist or progressive was always a bit mystifying. Ron Paul’s only marginal utility might have been is vocal opposition to the Iraq War when it was still just a twinkle in George W. Bush & Dick Cheney’s eyes. There were a lot of public figures who were opposed to that war, including a lot of very regressive individuals, as even a cursory glance at such sites as Antiwar.com would make clear. Beyond that, both Pauls advocate policies that are truly regressive and neoliberal to the extent that they would transfer wealth from public sector to the wealthy in the private sector, and at least with Ron Paul there is an explicit admiration for the Austria School of economics (think Hayek for example). These were neither the heroes we needed nor deserved.
Now a standalone post.
Life In PostFactual America
Please go there to post your comments.
Thank you…
AG
Are you seriously suggesting that Mohandas Gandhi was a nihilist? Good Lord, the man worked steadily for several decades toward the goal of Indian independence. He was a lawyer by training and used his understanding of the law to come up with tactics of civil disobedience. He surely did not accept the legitimacy of British rule in India, but he didn’t act as though British rule didn’t exist. I’d call him the opposite of a nihilist.
Forget it, he’s rolling…
No, JDW.
I was saying that I admire the man for insisting that “truth” actually exists and then standing behind that statement for his entire life.
“I got yer “nihilist,” right here!!!” was irony.
Sigh…
AG
P.S.
I too am experimenting with truth. With honesty.
And as Diogenes discovered, honesty is a rare commodity, and often severely mocked.
So it goes.
So…we both have a problem with people not realizing we are being ironic. Apologies, AG.
None required.
If I am not clear enough, it is because I am not writing to fit my readers.
AG
Question: Which “Court of Law” evidence standard is acceptable? Can it be the standard of evidence for a Russian Court of Law?
Van Jones could not be reached for comment. Period.
Remember, until sundown Ivanka and her husband are cloistered. So Trump gets one day a week to run wild with Bannon.
Speaking of the “controlled Trump” not lasting long: Looks like he’s heading for full-on meltdown at breakneck speed:
http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/04/politics/donald-trump-jeff-sessions-reince-priebus/index.html
Wonder how soon, and how many, people will be leaving to spend more time with their families?
From the article you linked to:
I’d say that they’ve gone beyond having a “mini-disaster” each week to full-blown clusterf*cks each week.
If the president is telling us he was wiretapped, I’d sure like to know why, wouldn’t you? More to the point, if it’s all just a scam to ignite WW3, as some on the Left claim, I’d like to know why the president doesn’t take the very usual upfront steps presidents have taken over the last 40 years to show us he’s in it to do right by us, like release his tax returns, put his businesses in blind trusts, and not treat his financial disclosure forms as a joke. Our President continues to be less than forthright on the most basic level about his financial interests with the American people.
Well before the hacking story and Russia connections reached fever pitch, the president’s need for financial backing from foreign sources was reported. That he was deeply over-leveraged and his past, unscrupulous business dealings were reported too. Is it really unfair, at this point, to assume he is running the office to benefit himself, even if that means doing favors for the Russian (or other) government irrespective of our interests or our ally’s interests? The man has literally done nothing to build credibility with the public, the exact opposite actually.
Sure, I’d like to know what evidence he has beyond Brietbart. But since when is something said by Trump and his toadies considered a potential truth before evidence is provided and proven not to be bogus?
Yes, even in the service of making a larger point about Trump’s incompetence, this hypothetical was a bridge too far in the benefit-of-the-doubt department.
He might as well written a post about “If I were Trump and I believed Obama was a Lizard Thing from the Fourth Dimension…”
You mean…
He’s not!!!???
AG
And in return…
Since when is something said by the Permanent Government/Deep State and thjeir toadies…the media…supposed to be considered a potential truth before evidence is provided and proven not to be bogus?
Tit for tat, Fr33d0m. it works both ways.
AG
The GOP has wanted to investigate Pres. Obama for 8 years. the donald has given them an opening…will they take the bait?
It would be a very hazardous investigation for them because an investigation would dig up the reasons the FBI wanted to wiretap those officials. These reasons will be very bad for the Trump campaign because otherwise the FBI would never have asked for the tap.
Trump is very unpopular for someone this far into his Presidency and a proven lair – now he is accusing, with no proof, an extremely popular ex-President of spying on him. Obama arguably had less controversies in his 8 years than Trump has had in his 6 weeks
Is Trump TRYING to start a civil war?
this instance.
Don’t get your knickers in a twist. The civil war is the crucible in which the Democratic Party will finally be melted down for scrap.
Once that’s done, the true American people’s republic of which we all have dreamed will, must emerge from the ashes.
It’s all in the Grundrisse…
Shorter Marx:
“Some burgers, some beers, a few laughs. Our f*cking troubles are over, Dude.”
Flynn and Kushner met with a Russian envoy in Trump Tower. They’re supposed to have taps on foreign diplomats because many are spies/spy recuiters/spy managers. I’ll bet that not the only meeting, too. So they should have tapped Trump Tower.
Interesting that this diversion took place in the wee hours after Rachel’s bombshell piece last night about the Russian ‘fertilizer king’s’ plane was identified as being on the tarmac with Trump’s during the campaign multiple times. She’s been doing great work and as Bannon once said ‘Rachel leaves marks’.
I’m not a big fan of Maddow these days — way too much of the usual MSM line-toeing on bashing Putin/Russia. Has she EVER in recent times presented a counter pov on Putin from, say, a Norman Solomon or Stephen Cohen or Patrick Lawrence or Rbt Parry?
Of course not. Presenting the other side of the story would be committing professional journalism. Can’t have that, not when the wonderful new Cold War with Russia, started by Poppy and Clinton and made even worse by Obama, is being threatened by a new president who, for whatever reason, perhaps just the stopped-clock one, had the right attitude about detente. She’s apparently more interested in proving her loyalty to the Deep Staters/fellow MSMers/corp bosses.
A shame. She used to be a good reliable soldier on many domestic matters. But here the formerly outspoken progressive has jumped into bed with the neocons. Wake me up when she allows a Cohen or Parry on her show.
All that said, I would like to see Donald’s tax returns for the past decade or so, because it is a puzzle why he could be wrong and badly wrong about all the rest yet get the Russia matter right.
It didn’t take long for me to tire of her harangues. And as by mid-2006 she’d shown her colors, she seemed as worthless as an information source as Fox.
Geez Louise, Marie3, I’ve read this sort of thing from you about one helluva lot of people….makes me wonder if you trust anyone else’s judgment.
Only her own, which is nearly infallible.
There, fixed that for ya.
Bear in mind that in order to be allowed into the Our Progressive Betters Club, one must be infallible.
It’s important to separate the nation and it’s people from it’s leader and government much like many did for us when the Bush administration was pissing off most of the world. I understand the need to avoid demonizing a nation and it’s people but it’s interesting that you think it’s unfair to criticize Putin. And..that’s really all it is. Criticism. Why does Putin need this defending as if he’s a victim?
There are few that want a war or new cold war with Russia and I suspect Russians don’t really want one with us either.
It’s great that you want professional journalism is great. But you represent the people that wanted to move on from this story when it is was a tiny blip on the radar in the summer. People that denied there was anything to it then and think it’s distraction from the real issues now.
I’ve never said it’s unfair to criticize Vlad. No doubt there’s quite a bit, mostly domestically, to criticize him for. It’s not mere criticism but demonization that is occurring. It’s getting dangerous and the constant blaming and provoking of the Big Bear needs to stop. I strongly suspect, as I noted months ago, that our IC is driving this in order to prevent Trump from getting any ideas about detente and improved relations.
So far, the disinformation campaign seems to be working. Just the other day the Donald named a rather hardline anti-Russian adviser to counsel him on east Euro and Russian matters. It appears he might have gotten the message.
As for journalism, my comments have been about fairness — you know, presenting the opposing perspective, at least occasionally — and accuracy, such as the utter lack of evidence presented so far in all these anti-Putin/Russia allegations energetically reported, across the board, in our MSM. Just wanted to point out that on this issue, Maddow has thrown in with the IC and MSM in unskeptically running with what Langley and its friends/assets at the NYT and WaPo dish out.
Progressives used to be skeptical about obvious info war efforts from our IC and corp media.
Jaap de Hoop Scheffer in interview this week – see my diary:
○ NATO Summit of Bucharest – A Declaration of War (Part 1) and Part 2 of today.
About ten times de Hoop Scheffer met with the Russian president, in the five years that he led NATO. It never was a warm relationship: discussions were invariably difficult, at most, if they had anything in common, only their two labradors. Low point: the summit in Bucharest in 2008, where NATO under De Hoop Scheffer’s leadership noted that Georgia and Ukraine would become NATO member. Putin took it as a declaration of war.
“Talking about that: it was not my finest hour, nor of NATO. In retrospect that was a moment of great consequences. ”
Exactly, a turning point in the relationship between Europe, America and Russia. The Atlantic Council outspoken policy: “We’ll make Russia a pariah state.”
○ Text of Putin’s speech at NATO Summit (Bucharest, April 2, 2008)
You’re absolutely conflating Putin with Russia and Russians when you make claims of demonization. Who was demonized? Trump is the main target of these criticisms, not Putin.
What’s going to happen if the
“constant blaming and provoking of the Big Bear” continues? Do you live in fear that the Russians might respond rashly?
Let’s rephrase that… do you think that the “constant blaming and provoking of the Big Bear” would be justified if there was sufficient proof both that Russia acted to get their preferred candidate elected and that Trump solicited and encouraged such efforts?
See my response to you in this thread. http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2017/2/18/115448/605
No one on this blog wants a war with Russia. Let go of this lie.
Last thing.. there’s more than two perspectives on any issue.
I hate to be the one to break it to you, but we’re already in a new cold war, have been for at least the last few years; Cohen says it’s since last decade. Wake up! (h/t AG) That station has already left the train. Are you waiting for an official declaration of a New CW from the Times?
What informed rational person who at least glances occasionally at how the Russians are responding so far wouldn’t be concerned we are heading for a dangerous military confrontation. Putin and others have already clearly expressed their grave concern and alarm at the various aggressive steps the US/Nato have taken towards them, especially militarily along their border — they consider it, not surprisingly, a direct threat to their security.
The Russian leaders have also vigorously and angrily rejected charges of official meddling in our election, rightly calling them unsubstantiated. When I hear foreign leaders reacting to charges in tones considerably harsher than the usual bland diplomatic dismissal, it gets my attention. We are playing with fire here, and payback of a fierce nature would seem to be in the offing in the not too distant future if we continue down this path of provocation.
Yes, let’s see some actual authenticated proof finally, after all these months. It would be a refreshing breakthrough in all the anti-Putin hysteria over here.
That would actually justify some public blaming and provoking, but proportionate to the influence wielded, which is difficult to measure. After all, Vlad didn’t arrange for Hillary not to secure her electoral situation in the upper MW and PN. He also wasn’t responsible for the GOP voter suppression effort in those states … although the IC/MSM might make that allegation soon …
No, they may not wish it, but they seem willing to risk it (because of a possible Trump impeachment reward) or at least seem recklessly unmindful of the risk of it, as they promote and cheerlead the latest unproven charges against Putin that appear weekly in our media. Rbt Parry at consortium news has been warning about this repeatedly for months as have a few of the other skeptics, so I’m confident I’m not overreacting here.
Yet another claim to take with a heavy dose of skepticism. I don’t need Snopes to remind me of skepticism regarding 45’s accusations, but it doesn’t hurt, especially when 45 and his inner circle seem to rely on third hand reports from what would have once been considered fringe media sources than actually communicating with those who might actually know something. Stunningly unhinged.
Further to your point:
http://nomoremister.blogspot.com/2017/03/old-trumpist-line-louise-mensch-is.html
The scenario I’m envisaging is Barack Obama saying, I’ll be happy to testify under oath before Congress, say, or as part of an independent investigarion by a special prosecutor.
My understanding is that at least one of the FISA warrants was to find out who was transferring money from Russian banks to the U.S. Presumably, the transfer was to someone in or affiliated with the Trump campaign or possibly to Trump himself. Trump’s relationship to Russian banks has been speculated about for a long time.
Punch, counterpunch, Booman.
Spy vs. Spy comics, only in what we laughingly call “real life.”
You write:
<bvlockquote>All of this should be investigated by an independent counsel or panel.
Oh, I totally agree.
Only…what counsel or panel that is currently extant in The Deep Sate/permanent Government would that be? “Independent?” Really? Independent of party affiliation? Independent of potential power plays from the top, the bottom or all 360 degrees of “sides?”
Show me one.
Oh.
Wait a minute!!!
I’ve got it!!!
Nominate me for the job.
I am the most “indpendent” mind I have found in years of looking.
What’s that you say?
I’m overqualified?
Oh.
Back to being a CostCo greeter, I guess.
Sigh…
The story of my life.
The story of this culture’s life as well.
If you are good enough to do the job really well…”independently,” as it were…you are overqualified.
So it goes.
Nevermind.
Yore freind…
Emily Litella
I’ll just leave this link here.
President-here’s-what-I’d-do-differently-from-Trump” post up today.
But see, you and Duncan are intelligent, sane, rational members of the Reality-Based Community(TM).
Trump . . . isn’t.
Have I suggested lately how very fucked we are?
Nor are Drumpf’s hardcore followers particularly keen on sane, rational, fact-based analysis. Although the jury perhaps is out for the time being on the extent to which we are or are not “fucked”, there is no doubt that we are as some Brits might say in a spot of bother. I wish I were confident that reason and evidence would win the day. Regrettably, even a cursory look at historical precedent would indicate outcomes contrary to my most earnest of wishes.
As something of a postscript to the preceding: The troubles we may face do not mean we simply give up. Rather, we continue to be as well-reasoned and evidence based as we can be from our side of the equation. And of course it should go without saying that we fight whatever battles we must, even if the odds may be long or appear long in the present moment. There are certainly people counting on us to do nothing less, and we owe them that much. Onward.
No surprise Trump is using this method of destraction. He knows his claims will be hailed as gosphel by his base, for they need no stinking facts. What it shows is he is running scared trying to deflect attn from his mounting problems.
Might depend on the definition of spying.
Isn’t “wire tap” from the analog/mechanical era of communications? Capturing telephonic communications in real time. Law enforcement agencies were only supposed to do with a warrant, but well … Intel agencies did it whenever and wherever they could. Then there was:
The constraint on the prevalence of government and private wire taps was the resources required which were considerable.
If the NSA — as we’re told — collects everything, the “taps” preexisted Trump&Co’s campaign. Inspecting/reading what the NSA already had is where it gets dicey, particularly absent probable cause. (Analogous to the Clinton/Abedin email file discovered on Weiner’s laptop. Legally, the FBI couldn’t look at them until after they secured a warrant which may not have been authorized if it hadn’t been established that a large number had been deleted before her emails were turned into State and her equipment turned over to the FBI.)
Would be interesting to see what that June FISA warrant application looked like. (Coincidentally at the same time as the DNC disclosed that it had been hacked and the allegation was the Russia did it.) As FISA warrant requests are rarely denied, that one must have been a total POS.
That denial, of course, didn’t prevent intel (or counter-intel) agencies from snooping on the communications of foreign agents/officers. But that’s secret stuff that doesn’t see the public light of day. It can, however, make its way into FISA applications. (Not that it’s known to have happened in the case of the October FISA warrant approval on Trump and/or his associates.) Was the second request a reformulation of the first or did some agency acquire probable cause on someone(s) in a Trump operation — business or campaign –over the interim three months between the two warrant requests?
Was that nothing other than Slate’s October 31, 2016 breathless reporting on a server in the Trump operation that received “pings” from two Alfa Bank? (The founder and current controlling owner, Mikhail Fridman is interesting.)
As Fortune pointed out on Nov 2, 2016:
As Trump wouldn’t know the difference between a hot dog and a server, was he informed of the investigation of the server? If so, did he comprehend what he was told? Or did it only recently sink in when the term wire tap was used? Then he predictably went ballistic.
>>Isn’t “wire tap” from the analog/mechanical era of communications?
yes (analog even if not mechanical). i think you have a good point that someone translated into old-school language for Trump to understand.
with a warrant, they’d just go to all the cell phone providers and the ISP, show them the warrant and plug in. And that by definition isn’t “spying”.
without a warrant, I assume monitoring cell phones would simply require a few antennas in the neighborhood.
But listening in on modern digital landlines without the company cooperating is a lot harder than tapping Nixon-era circuit-switched analog lines.
When did the Secret Service set up shop in Trump Tower? They would have access to monitor everything in the building.
Seems very obvious to me that Trump (via Breibart and Fox) either just learned of or more likely just started to comprehend what the FISA warrants we heard about weeks ago meant. And in his mind any investigation from the DoJ that resulted in those warrants had to have been directed by President Obama.
After all since he is trying to control independent investigations by the DoJ of course President Obama had to have done the same thing.
Add those two together and we end up with today’s Twitter meltdown.
Big news. Trump must have some very solid proof. It’d be insane to make this kind of accusation without being able to back it up. And it all fits. Bad week for Obama. First the $65 million book sale scandal, clearly a corporate payoff, and then this. And given the massive payoffs from the Saudis to the Clinton Foundation, including many during the course of the election, it’s only a matter of time before people start investigating Saudi involvement in the election, and how deeply Obama was involved in that. The Dems should never have opened up that can of worms. Big mistake.
Bwahahahaha. Trump has been making fact free claims forever.
Tell you what: we can have the grand-daddy of all investigations to keep every faction happen. Trump gets investigated over Russian ties; “the Clintons” over Saudi Arabia; Obama over… not sure, his book contract, I guess; and we had better investigate somebody over ties to Israel and the ZOG while we’re at it, plus to be even handed, someone else like Bannon should be investigated over ties to hate groups.
If this thread is actually about anything, will somebody let me know?
It started out as a post about 45’s latest paranoid outbursts on twitter accusing Obama of wiretapping 45, and from there devolved into something something something…Democratic Party sucks. You know…the usual.
Even if the Democratic Party does suck — what does that have to do with Trump’s latest round of bullshit?
Actually, what I was really thinking is this. The chances that Trump isn’t totally full of shit are vanishing close to zero. And that’s giving him the benefit of the doubt. So to me this discussion comes off something like “How many angels can dance on the head of a pin”? — except far less interesting.
I was thinking more along the lines of the outcome of a typical Jerry Springer episode (minus the chair throwing), but point taken.
Ask Donald Trump, he made the accusation. He’s a man child who doesn’t understand that what he tweets carries a lot of weight. Whether we like it or not. We now have commentators like Hugh Hewitt calling for an investigation of Obama (!!!) over unsubstantiated bullshit Trump read on Breitbart. All of this matters.
He doesn’t realize it carries a lot of weight? The only reason he does it because he thinks it carries a lot of weight.
But what you don’t realize is that it DOESN’T carry a lot of weight, because we’ve seen this crap 100 times before. It just makes a lot of noise.
But it doesn’t just make a lot of noise. Trump thinks he can just riff off and talk like he was on the campaign. He also thinks he can order people to “do” things — how the presidency operates he certainly does not understand. Now you have him suffering from delusions, and he’s going to order people around him to find evidence for his set of “facts”. At some point it’s not going to be just noise and his appointees are going to implicate themselves in crimes.
Trump’s not just ordering “people around him” to “do things”, thru his spokespeople this weekend he’s ordering Congress to investigate his claim that Obama ordered a wiretap of Trump Tower.
But here’s the thing: read carefully what the sitting President has said:
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
I’d bet a good lawyer could make a great case out of the fact that President Obama was tapping my phones in October, just prior to Election!
3:52 AM – 4 Mar 2017
If it’s a fact, why does the claim need to be investigated? Why doesn’t the President merely present information to Congress and the American people which justifies his claim? He can declassify anything he likes in order to provide that information to us.
Refusing (or, more likely, being unable) to do so leads to preposterous presentations like the one official White House spokesperson Sarah Huckabee gave in response to Martha Raddatz’s questions this morning. The talking point that Huckabee was sent out to forward was “If President Obama wiretapped Trump Tower this would be the biggest scandal in the history of the country!” Raddatz became so exasperated by this dissembling she started interrupting Huckabee with the quite reasonable point “You keep on saying ‘if, if, if,’ but the President isn’t saying ‘if’, he’s saying it’s a fact.”
It was an completely untenable position for Huckabee to hold, made all the worse by her unwillingness/inability to say that she had talked to the President or anyone at the White House in the last couple of days. When asked by Raddatz any question about what the White House is doing, she kept on referring back to the President’s tweets and her main talking point. Essentially, Huckabee was acting as if she knew no more or no less than the general public. It’s a helluva way for a White House spokesperson to operate.
Trump doesn’t know what the word “fact” means.
Well that’s fine with me.
Fun tweet:
But remember all that concern trolling about the Clinton emails?
Really dodged a bullet, eh? At least Pence would never…oh, yeah…but…better find a new distraction.