President Donald Trump claims that, as a Presidential candidate, he was a victim of illegal wiretapping ordered by President Barack Obama.
In fact, even without wiretaps, there were at least four instances where Federal law enforcement authorities could have utterly changed the outcome of the 2016 election.
Two of these dealt with purely domestic issues–
- The Trump University scandal; and
- Trump’s repeated threats of violence against Republican and Democratic opponents.
The third and fourth ones dealt with issues directly affecting the security of the United States.
It is unprecedented for an American Presidential candidate to repeatedly bestow fulsome praise on the leader of a foreign power hostile to the United States. And to receive equally fawning compliments in return from that leader.
Yet that is precisely what has happened between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.
Thus Putin on Trump: “He is a bright personality, a talented person, no doubt about it. It is not up to us to appraise his positive sides, it is up to the U.S. voters. but, as we can see, he is an absolute leader in the presidential race.”
Vladimir Putin
And Trump on Putin: “It is always a great honor to be so nicely complimented by a man so highly respected within his own country and beyond. He’s running his country, and at least he’s a leader. Unlike what we have in this country”–a clear attack on President Barack Obama.
Donald Trump
Case #3: The Justice Department did not invalidate the results of the 2016 election, despite overwhelming evidence that Russia intervened to elect Trump as Vladimir Putin’s chosen candidate.
- Admiral Michael Rogers, director of the National Security Agency (NSA) and US Cyber Command, said in mid-November that Russia made “a conscious effort” to sway the results of the Presidential election by the hacking of 20,000 emails from the Democratic National Committee.
- “There shouldn’t be any doubt in anybody’s mind,” said Rogers. “This was not something that was done casually. This was not something that was done by chance. This was not a target that was selected purely arbitrarily. This was a conscious effort by a nation-state to attempt to achieve a specific effect.”
- The Russians hacked the Democratic committee’s servers–but not those of the Republican National Committee.
- On December 16, FBI Director James B. Comey and Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper Jr. agreed with a CIA assessment that Russia intervened in the 2016 election in part to help Donald Trump win the White House.
Trump, however, has steadfastly denied any such role by Russia: “I think it’s ridiculous,” he told “Fox News Sunday.” “I think it’s just another excuse. I don’t believe it….No, I don’t believe it at all.”
Case #4: The Justice Department did not prosecute Trump for treason, even though he solicited aid from Russia, a nation hostile to the United States. And no major official of the government–including President Obama–publicly condemned him as a traitor.
At a news conference in Doral, Florida on July 27, Trump publicly invited “Russia”–i.e., Vladimir Putin–to hack Hillary Clinton’s emails: “I will tell you this, Russia: If you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing. I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
This was essentially treason–calling on a hostile foreign power to interfere directly in an American Presidential election. And it was seen as such by both Democrats and even Republicans.
- “This has to be the first time that a major presidential candidate has actively encouraged a foreign power to conduct espionage against his political opponent,” Hillary for America policy adviser Jake Sullivan said in a statement. “That’s not hyperbole, those are just the facts. This has gone from being a matter of curiosity, and a matter of politics, to being a national security issue.”
- “I find those kinds of statements to be totally outrageous because you’ve got now a presidential candidate who is, in fact, asking the Russians to engage in American politics,” said former CIA Director Leon Panetta, a Clinton surrogate. “I just think that’s beyond the pale.”
- Brendan Buck, a spokesman for House Speaker Paul Ryan, said: “Russia is a global menace led by a devious thug. Putin should stay out of this election.”
- Even Trump’s Vice Presidential running mate, Mike Pence, said: “If it is Russia and they are interfering in our elections, I can assure you both parties and the United States government will ensure there are serious consequences.”
FBI Director James Comey believed that Hillary Clinton’s emails on a private server were so dangerous to national security that he announced–11 days before the election–that he was re-opening an investigation he had closed.
That announcement erased widespread outrage over Trump’s unintended admissions of predatory behavior toward women–“Grab them by the pussy”–and reversed Clinton’s growing lead in the polls.
Yet the Bureau has not issued any such statements about the continuing reports of close ties between Trump and Putin, and Trump’s possible investments in Russia.
To their shame, the federal agencies charged with safeguarding America failed to take action against these abuses.
And, to their shame, the news media, to date, has failed to indict them for their negligence.
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IS HE CRIMINAL, CRAZY LIKE A FOX–OR JUST CRAZY?
In Bureaucracy, History, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on March 20, 2017 at 12:53 amOn March 4, in a series of unhinged tweets, President Donald J. Trump accused former President Barack Obama of tapping his Trump Tower phones prior to the election:
“Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my ‘wires tapped’ in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!”
“Is it legal for a sitting President to be ‘wire tapping’ a race for president prior to an election? Turned down by court earlier. A NEW LOW!”
“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!”
“How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!”
President Barack Obama
Trump offered no proof to substantiate his libelous claims.
There are three plausible theories about what prompted Trump’s accusations.
Theory #1: They were prompted by Right-wing media outlets that had been pushing wiretapping claims in recent days.
On March 2, Right-wing radio host Mark Levin claimed that Obama had used “powers of the federal government to surveil members of the Trump campaign.”
Referring to Attorney General Jeff Sessions and his newly disclosed meetings with Russia’s ambassador in 2016, Levin asked: “Today’s reporting on Sessions having a chance meeting with the ambassador–where did that information come from? Look at the timing of it. Was Obama surveilling top Trump campaign officials during the election?”
On March 3, the Fascist media site Breitbart News echoed that charge. Its story was based on Levin’s show and offered no evidence to back up its accusations.
Trump could have first contacted the directors of the FBI, CIA and National Security Agency–the agencies which are authorized to conduct such an operation. He could have asked them, “Did you wiretap me?”
They could have quickly and confidentially given him an answer. And if it was “Yes,” they would have been able to provide him with the records to document it.
That would have been the action of a rational President. But Trump chose to act like a child–or, worse, an unbalanced adult.
After reading the Breitbart story, Trump impulsively chose to go on Twitter and make libelous accusations.
Theory #2: Trump, under scrutiny for ties between his campaign and Russia, sought to deflect attention by making an outrageous accusation.
Donald Trump
Former White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest has his own take on Trump’s motivation. Appearing on the March 5 edition of ABC’s “This Week”, he said: “We know exactly why President Trump tweeted what he tweeted.
“Because there is one page in the Trump White House crisis management playbook. And that is simply to tweet or say something outrageous to distract from the scandal, and the bigger the scandal, the more outrageous the tweet.”
Earnest served as White House Press Secretary under President Obama from 2014 to 2017.
He added: Obama could not have legally ordered a wiretap: “The President of the United States does not have the authority to unilaterally order the wiretapping of an American citizen.”
Theory #3: Trump is too mentally unbalanced to hold the Presidency–and command of America’s nuclear arsenal.
Trump’s shoot-first-and-never-mind-the-consequences approach to life has been thoroughly documented.
From June 15, 2015, when he launched his Presidential campaign, until October 24, 2016, he fired nearly 4,000 angry, insulting tweets at 281 people and institutions. The New York Times needed two full pages of its print edition to showcase them.
Among these targets were:
And during his first two weeks as President, Trump attacked 22 people, places and things on his @realDonaldTrump account.
Trump’s vindictiveness, his narcissism, his compulsive aggression, his complaints that his “enemies” in government and the press are trying to destroy him, have caused many to ask: Could the President of the United States be suffering from mental illness?
One who has dared to answer this question is John D. Gartner, a practicing psychotherapist.
John D. Gartner
Gartner graduated magna cum laude from Princeton University, received his Ph.D in clinical psychology from the University of Massachusetts, and served as a part time assistant professor of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University Medical School for 28 years.
During an interview by U.S. News & World Report (published on January 27), Gartner said: “Donald Trump is dangerously mentally ill and temperamentally incapable of being president.”
Gartner said that Trump suffers from “malignant narcissism,” whose symptoms include anti-social behavior, sadism, aggressiveness, paranoia and grandiosity.
“We’ve seen enough public behavior by Donald Trump now that we can make this diagnosis indisputably,” says Gartner, who admits he has not personally examined Trump.
In 1965, Fletcher Knebel, the best-selling author of Seven Days in May, raised the then-unthinkable question: “What would happen if the President of the U.S.A. went stark-raving mad?”
He did so in his novel, Night of Camp David.
In 1965, the idea that an American President might become insane was thought so outlandish it could only appear in a novel.
Fifty-two years later, it’s no longer unthinkable. For millions, it’s a terrifying reality.
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