After Donald Trump blew the whistle on the eavesdropping of his 2016 campaign headquarters by Barack Obama’s administration, few in the media or elsewhere seem to be asking the obvious questions:
Was it legal?
Was it ethical – in the American way?
One thing is for certain: If the roles were reversed and the Trump administration bugged Democrats, you can imagine the media would take a much different view.
Let’s first take a look at how the media reported this travesty of justice, political decorum, the Constitution and American legal tradition:
- Washington Post: President Trump on Saturday angrily accused former President Barack Obama of orchestrating a “Nixon/Watergate” plot to tap the phones at his Trump Tower headquarters in the run-up to last fall’s election, providing no evidence to support his explosive claim and drawing a flat denial from Obama’s office.
- CNN: Trump’s baseless wiretap claim
- Atlantic: Trump’s Unfounded Claims of a “Nixon/Watergate” Wiretapping Scheme
- Huffington Post: Obama Refutes Allegation that He Wiretapped Trump Tower During Campaign
- New York Daily News: Trump’s poor understanding of national security investigations may prove dangerous
- New York Times: President Trump on Saturday accused former President Barack Obama of tapping his phones at Trump Tower the month before the election, leveling the explosive allegation without offering any evidence.
The emphasis of all of these “fake news” reports is disingenuous to say the least. Obama didn’t deny his administration wiretapped Trump. He said no one at the White House did. That is a virtual admission that his administration did, probably Justice Department, meaning the “apolitical Loretta Lynch” who just called for “blood and death” in the streets to stop Trump, much to the approval of Senate Democrats. It’s an obvious parsing of words by the slick Obama.
The accusation is indeed bigger than Watergate, which began with an attempt not to eavesdrop directly on Richard Nixon’s opponent in the 1972 presidential election, but on Larry O’Brian, the head of the DNC, whose offices were in the Watergate Hotel. He was the Debbie Wasserman-Schultz of his day, but she and Hillary Clinton campaign Chairman John Podesta didn’t bother securing their email communications, and you could read them all on WikiLeaks.
And that brings us to the excuse for Trump’s campaign being undoubtedly bugged – the elusive evidence for Russian hacking and interference in the 2016 U.S. election.
If you doubt there is no evidence, just carefully read every New York Times story on the fake scandal. Way down near the bottom of every story, the paper that has trumpeted this story the most admits there’s no evidence.
So, here’s the way this thing obviously went down.
Obama’s team first tried to get a broad FISA warrant to investigate the Russian fantasy. The judge turned it down.
It tried again with a narrower FISA warrant request. The judge turned it down.
Then it tried a third time, and the judge approved it in October. Coincidentally, that is the exact time Trump says the wiretapping began.
Not one of these big news organizations will tell you that.
It’s the attorney general who would request such wiretap authorizations for heavy-duty, politically charged requests such as this – not that any have ever been requested or authorized in the history of the republic.
Do news organizations really want to be covering up stuff like this? Don’t they understand the same tactics can be used against them? Obama, or (wink-wink) Lynch, just set the precedent.
Nixon never did anything remotely like this – and he was forced from office as a result. Obama or Lynch could well be prosecuted by the Trump administration. And one or both probably should be.
Misuse of FISA statutes is a clear violation of the law.
FISA can only be used for “foreign intelligence information” as the basis for surveillance to protect the U.S. against a “grave” or “hostile” attack, war-like sabotage or international terror.
Does anyone suggest such a thing with regard to Russian hacks?
That’s what makes this scandal, pardon the expression, “bigger than Watergate.”
Out of more than 35,000 FISA court requests, only 12 have ever been rejected. But two out of three requested by the Obama administration to investigate the Russia deal were. What does that tell you?
It tells me this was a political fishing expedition to build a case against Trump if or when he beat Hillary.
Since the election, the hysteria over Russia’s role in the election has only increased exponentially.
And that’s why:
- I believe Trump.
- I don’t believe Obama.
- I don’t believe the “fake news cartel,” which is all in for finding the elusive Trump-Russia link.
What we’ve got here at first glance is a prima facie case for “bigger and worse than Watergate.”
But the Washington Post and New York Times have already signaled they won’t be investigating. They are already publishing front-page editorials that stake out a rather shrill “see-no-evil, hear-no-evil, speak-no-evil” approach.
Was it legal? No.
Was it ethical in the American political tradition? No.
Is it one of the most dangerous developments in American political history? Yes.
Media wishing to interview Joseph Farah, please contact [email protected].
|
