Names keep surfacing and interaction between the Trump campaign and Russia keep coming to light.
The House and Senate Intelligence Committees are charged with investigating Russian involvement in the 2016 Election on behalf of Trump. They will be calling witnesses with knowledge of contacts between Trump and the Russian and collusion between them.
The operative hypothesis is that Russia sought to tip the election in Trump’s favor because Putin hates Hillary Clinton and views Trump as someone with a more favorable view of, and approach to, Russia. Trump has had long-standing relations with Russian banks which have funded his businesses. Trump and various of his key operatives also had knowledge of Russian hacking the Democratic National Committee and Clinton’s personal files. Trump and his operatives encouraged this activity during the 2016 campaign. Just how much and what kinds of Russian attempts to tip the election in Trump’s favor during the elections remain to be seen, but it is clear that there was activity of that kind.
It is apparent that Trump is not comfortable with the investigations being conducted by the Intelligence committees. It has always been his tactic to try and deflect negative attention from himself by accusing others of doing what he’s accused of doing or something similar. Trump uses lying to cover up his activity. He throws up smoke screens which temporarily distract attention away from his wrongdoing. This mechanism of lying to avoid scrutiny has been a hallmark of Trump’s character and behavior for his entire life. Unfortunately for him, his “secret” method (“lying”) for dealing with negative commentary on his character and behavior, is now being scrutinized much more intently than before. As President what he does and what he says are examined under a high-powered microscope. His actions and statements are constantly being recorded and reported. Under this intense scrutiny, Trump is running out of wiggle room. His constant lying to deflect attention from his bad character and behavior is beginning to stick to him like the smell of skunk sticks to a skunk.
Trump’s initial smoke screen was his accusation that Obama wiretapped the Trump tower in New York which was the site of Trump’s campaign headquarters. This accusation has been investigated by the FBI and FBI Director James Comey has stated publicly that there was no such wiretapping. Trump appears to be unfazed by Comey basically calling him a liar. I suppose, if you lie all the time and people say that you are a liar all the time, you become immune to being called a liar. Trump seems capable of convincing himself that his lie is true and that those who say it’s not true are the liars. In other words, Trump is so deeply dishonest, he has been able to convince himself that he’s honest.
With respect to Trump’s lie about the Obama wiretapping of Trump Tower, Trump may actually believe that Comey is lying. The man could well be sick enough to reach such a conclusion in his delusional mental state.
More recently Trump has thrown up another smoke screen. This is the so-called “unmasking” of Trump operatives by the Obama administration during the election campaign. That Trump has chosen to make this an issue is strange. Why couldn’t these Trump operatives stand the light of day if they were conducting legitimate campaign activity? Isn’t the more plausible explanation that any “unmasked” Trump operatives were conducting illegitimate, illegal, campaign activity involving Russian operatives.
That the FBI and NSA conducted surveillance of suspected Russian operatives during the election is not unusual or disputed. The FBI was concerned about Russian interference in the election and placed suspected Russian operatives under surveillance. During the course of that surveillance of the Russians, the FBI intercepted phone calls in which Trump operatives were mentioned. There were other tapes in which Trump operatives were actually recorded talking with the Russian operatives.
Obama’s National Security Advisor, Susan Rice, requested that she be supplied with the surveillance tapes and she released these tapes to a to a small group of cleared government officials. This was, and is, usual and customary practice on the part of the NSA.
Trump and his surrogates have howled like stuck pigs over the fact that the tapes of their operatives talking with the Russian operatives were released by Rice to the small group of cleared government officials. They should be howling, just not for the reason that they are.
Rice’s request for, and limited release of, the surveillance tapes was exactly what should have happened. Trump seeking to find something wrong with what Rice did is an asinine attempt at a smoke screen. It is asinine because it only draws more attention to the fact that there are tapes in which Russian and Trump's operatives are secretly conversing about the election campaign of Hillary Clinton.
What troubles Trump and his administration is, of course, that this “unmasking” involved his operatives being talked about by Russian operatives and being recorded talking with these Russian operatives. What is important, and what the Intelligence committees need to remain focused on, is what the FBI and NSA have in the way of real evidence in those tapes of Russian collusion with the Trump campaign. Do the tapes reveal what amounted to an illegal attempt, which may have been successful, to tip the election in Trump’s favor. Clearly, if the evidence reveals that this was the case, it will be very bad news for Trump. It could easily cost Trump the presidency he lied and cheated so hard to get. The worse case scenario for Trump and his operatives could be that they are found to be guilty of treason. Treason, even by the President, is, of course, a criminal offense punishable by imprisonment.