The Fake News Lie that makes Trump look like a Boy Scout in compariso

[Fenring]

Dude, Putin just obliterated the world's greatest economic superpower, the EU.  That's more than "nuisance and interference."  True that Russians don't have power to become king of the world, but they certainly have the powers of kingmaker and kingslayer.

Best I can tell Putin wanted healthy oil trade with Europe to compete with the Saudis, and was making headway when his efforts were busted up by the Ukrainian regime change, followed by the anti-Syria movement to get Saudi oil to go through to Europe to defeat Putin in the oil wars. And lo-and-behold, the ISIS forces attacking Assad, backed by the Saudis (and whose oil was proven to have been bought repeatedly by Turkey) were the ones attacking Assad by proxy. So yes, all of this was to prevent Putin conducting free trade of resources with Europe. You can blame the Saudis (and others who I won't name) for the EU getting shafted out of getting oil deals there. Was Putin involved? Yes, as a main competitor for trade, which is what nations are supposed to do.

So how do you figure that Russia has obliterated the EU? Do you mean Brexit?

[Seriati]

As an interesting thought puzzle, given what we know about the NSA's ability to record and listen to conversations, what do you think the odds are of this question being able to be answered in the negative?  "Are there any recordings of any conversations by a member of the Trump administration made while that person was in Trump Tower?"  Instead will get an answer to a question like this, "Is there proof that Obama signed a notarized letter directly ordering the emplacement of an illegal wire tap on Trump's person?"

As an interesting follow on, I'll report another rumor, which itself could be fake news, but that would make it entirely plausible that Trump is correct and no one in the Obama administration is directly lying.  Judge Napolitano is claiming that multiple sources (of course apparently off the record) are claiming that the President didn't illegally order any US department or spies to access the NSA database to get Trump communications, but instead asked a UK agency that has access to the NSA database to do so.

http://insider.foxnews.com/2017/03/14/judge-napolitano-why-there-may-never-be-proof-even-if-obama-spied-trump

I grant Judge Napolitano has claimed on multiple occasions to have better than average insight into deep government issues, but I haven't seen anything that directly contradicts any of the claims he's made on that front, so I'm still giving him the benefit of the doubt. 

I admit my own biases make me more inclined to believe something like this could occur, primarily because I don't believe President Obama has any principals other than the ends justifies the means, but that doesn't make it true just plausible.  I think we need to settle, once and for all, if the NSA really has a database and if that database really includes recordings from calls inside Trump tower.   Then we can decide if they were illegally accessed.

On another interesting side note, if you want to think of Trump as playing the deep game at a higher level, then the original tweet is actually brilliant.  In an environment of leaks by holdovers by the prior administration causing damage, he's just effectively taking all calls from Trump tower out of the leak game.  Any leak now from a Trump Tower conversation will prove that the Obama administration tapped his phones.  Not sure if I really believe he's operating at that level, but it's kind of brilliant in its simplicity.

[TheDrake]

If you were going to "quibble" about that, then I'd like to "quibble" about counting people as having insurance when they can't actually afford the deductible and are poorer than they were because they are forced to pay premiums.  Will that person really be worse off without insurance than with it?

There were a lot of people who considered their options in that way, and they generally accepted penalties rather than signing up for insurance they couldn't afford or use. Some gambled and won, some gambled and lost.

As to whether they are worse off, yes - if they needed major medical intervention. No if they needed an antibiotic for strep throat.

I paid in about $4000 for insurance under Obamacare for a year due to spotty employment. During that time, I never used the insurance. I don't regret it. I know that it would have been more expensive prior to the program for the scenarios that were important to me, and I didn't even get subsidies. Individual health insurance was pretty brutal, and I didn't have pre-existing disqualifying medical conditions. Now this is anecdotal, and moot since I now have employer health insurance.

[Seriati]

And I grew up in family with no employer health insurance.  To fit our budget we had effectively low cost catastrophe insurance, but handled our own medical needs largely out of pocket.  With after hours clinics and cash discounts this was a highly affordable and reasonable compromise.  Obamacare killed that low cost policy and the ability of a family to make a rational health choice.  Unwinding the mandates brings that back as an option.  Not to mention, that for a family of four the plan includes a refundable tax credit of at least $8000 (and possibly more depending on ages), which would have been more than enough for a catastrophic coverage plan and even some care during the year.  Make it legal and plans to fit any budget could arise again.

End of day though, there is no way to guarantee health coverage (which is far far different than health insurance) without requiring people to pay the full price.  If you consume $500,000 in health insurance over your life you need to pay a significant chunk of $500,000 in premiums.  If your insurance costs $12,000 a year it takes over 41 years to get there.  Are these reasonable numbers?  I found a study done in 2000 in Michigan (before 17 years of run away cost inflation) that set the per capita at $316,000.  When you consider that most people will spend a substantial chunk of time on a family plan the amount they pay in will be less than that (the average per capita including massive government contributions isn't even $11,000).  It looks like the average out-of-pocket per household is just over $4000. 

"Healthcare" is a massive unfunded pyramid scheme and pretending that Obamacare actually "solved" it when it didn't do anything about the gross underfunding is inherently deceptive.  Anything, including the Republican plan, that incentivizes lower cost providers to offer products is going to help this situation, but to fix it we need to get the government out of the darn price fixing racket with the whole concept that medicare/Medicaid will only pay part of the "rate" and that rates need to be artificially inflated to get to the right number.

[TheDrake]

I'm not going to argue for Obamacare as an excellent solution, it did have many flaws. The problems with letting insurers do whatever they want, is they are incentivized to find creative ways to disallow care. It also had various winners and losers - as you point out some people were very happy to have types of plans that couldn't be offered under ACA. On the other hand, some people who had an impossible time prior to ACA wound up getting access to care. I remember a colleague of mine being incensed at the loss of the old-style indemnity plan in favor of HMO/PPO.

Maybe it is best to acknowledge that some people will "lose" health care while others will "gain" it.

Possibly the best solution is to go the single payer way and essentially regulate healthcare as a necessary public infrastructure like utilities, because you do point out many of the essential problems. Another essential part of the solution would be to recognize that maybe not everyone can get access to care for the healthcare issues most likely to result in high cost.

Which is, of course, why HDHP catastrophic insurance is potentially more expensive overall. The more people who avoid treatment because of high pocket cost, the more expensive it generally gets. Insulin is cheaper than amputation, to use an extreme example.

Fundamentally, health access really doesn't fit the insurance economic model, primarily because of the consequences of not being covered. If you don't buy homeowner's insurance and your house burns down, the government doesn't step in and build you a new house. Incidentally, this was a big problem in auto liability. Which is why there is now a mandate that if you drive a car, you must carry liability insurance - to avoid people just shrugging off the $200,000 hospital bills by declaring bankruptcy.

But to the original point, yes I think in all cases of health policy we should be talking about how many lose care and how many gain. Even giving a net figure doesn't well communicate what is really going to happen, because people will think of it as just that many more or less people covered from the baseline, and not visualize people moving from one group to the other in both directions.

[Seriati]

Maybe it is best to acknowledge that some people will "lose" health care while others will "gain" it.

No.  I will acknowledge that most people will be free to choose the healthcare they want.  If there are those who will "lose" it, other than by choice, lets look at the circumstances that they are facing.

Possibly the best solution is to go the single payer way and essentially regulate healthcare as a necessary public infrastructure like utilities, because you do point out many of the essential problems. Another essential part of the solution would be to recognize that maybe not everyone can get access to care for the healthcare issues most likely to result in high cost.

This has been discussed endlessly.  There are plenty of problems with single payer.  Not least of which is that high end care ends up being the province of the super wealthy and politically connected to an even greater degree than in our system.  Waiting lists and health rationing become common place.  Innovation decreases radically.   

Which is, of course, why HDHP catastrophic insurance is potentially more expensive overall. The more people who avoid treatment because of high pocket cost, the more expensive it generally gets. Insulin is cheaper than amputation, to use an extreme example.

You know who's great at predicting the cost/benefit of whether an early treatment is cheaper than an bad result?  Insurance companies.  They are able to do it with great precision and accuracy.  In fact they used to just that and were the early innovators in providing things like annual check ups to lower their costs, when they had incentives to do so.  So what happened?  You know already, the government has been mucking with the rules for decades, constantly forcing the companies to add expenses after the fact that they didn't account for when they set the premiums. 

Pre-existing conditions?  Love that every one thinks this is a good idea, but why exactly is it reasonable to force an insurance company to pay for a million dollar treatment for someone who didn't pay them a dime until after they got sick?

I don't know what you do, but would it be reasonable for the government to assign you to provide your services to a client for the next 10 months, but only let you charge them the same fee other clients pay for a day's work?

Incidentally, this was a big problem in auto liability. Which is why there is now a mandate that if you drive a car, you must carry liability insurance - to avoid people just shrugging off the $200,000 hospital bills by declaring bankruptcy.

The problem in the auto insurance industry was not that you didn't carry insurance for your own damages (your health insurance is supposed to cover that), it's that people didn't carry insurance for the harms they caused to the other driver in the accident you cause.  Many states still only require that you carry insurance on the other guy.

But to the original point, yes I think in all cases of health policy we should be talking about how many lose care and how many gain.

Until you pay for the heath care the current policies mandate, which you never have, I don't think we should be talking about how many "lose" their fake coverage at all.  We should be talking about how we cause the costs to actually come down (and not just the stupid government manipulated price - ie the "premiums").

Even giving a net figure doesn't well communicate what is really going to happen, because people will think of it as just that many more or less people covered from the baseline, and not visualize people moving from one group to the other in both directions.

All focusing the discussion as you prefer does is lie to people.  You tell them someone's taking away their free lunch, when they don't have a free lunch in the first place.  Sounds scary though that all those "free lunches" are being "stolen."

[Pete at Home]

Dude, Putin just obliterated the world's greatest economic superpower, the EU.  That's more than "nuisance and interference."  True that Russians don't have power to become king of the world, but they certainly have the powers of kingmaker and kingslayer.

Best I can tell Putin wanted healthy oil trade with Europe to compete with the Saudis, and was making headway when his efforts were busted up by the Ukrainian regime change, followed by the anti-Syria movement to get Saudi oil to go through to Europe to defeat Putin in the oil wars. And lo-and-behold, the ISIS forces attacking Assad, backed by the Saudis (and whose oil was proven to have been bought repeatedly by Turkey) were the ones attacking Assad by proxy. So yes, all of this was to prevent Putin conducting free trade of resources with Europe. You can blame the Saudis (and others who I won't name) for the EU getting shafted out of getting oil deals there. Was Putin involved? Yes, as a main competitor for trade, which is what nations are supposed to do.

So how do you figure that Russia has obliterated the EU? Do you mean Brexit?

You think Brexit's the last exit?  Look more carefully at what's brewing in France, the Netherlands, and Germany.  Putin's intentionally driven refugees into Europe as part of his promised revenge for Kosovo.  That's what caused Brexit, what caused the ascendancy of Marine Le Pen who will torpedo NATO as well as the EU.

[Fenring]

You think Brexit's the last exit?  Look more carefully at what's brewing in France, the Netherlands, and Germany.  Putin's intentionally driven refugees into Europe as part of his promised revenge for Kosovo.  That's what caused Brexit, what caused the ascendancy of Marine Le Pen who will torpedo NATO as well as the EU.

I don't merely think this is off the mark, that would give it too much credit. What you're suggesting is about as realistic as the kinds of plans Destro and Cobra Commander used to come up with.

[Pete at Home]

I have no idea who "Cobra Commander" is supposed to be.

I don't think you can with a straight face deny either that (1) Russia's actions in Syria caused most of the immigration of single male military age Syrians to Europe or 
(2) that the disintegration of the EU benefits Putin's ambitions. 

With those two established, your argument is sort of like saying yes, Putin made a hole in one, but it was an accident; you can't possibly give him credit for meaning to do exactly what he wanted to do and happened to do.

[DJQuag]

It's easy to say that Russian imperialism isn't a big deal when you're living in the US. A bit less so when you're in eastern Europe or southern Asia.

[DJQuag]

How dare a military aged male want to escape a war zone hell hole where they're a target for conscription or murder. *censored*ed terrorists overrunning Europe, I tell ya.

[Fenring]

I have no idea who "Cobra Commander" is supposed to be.

You should Google him, he's an important literary figure.

I don't think you can with a straight face deny either that (1) Russia's actions in Syria caused most of the immigration of single male military age Syrians to Europe or 
(2) that the disintegration of the EU benefits Putin's ambitions. 

(1) Russia had little to nothing to do with the Syrian exodus, which began far before Russia even got involved. You might want to look towards policies such as "Assad has to go" when inspecting what conditions led to ISIS and other forces capturing Aleppo and other Syrian territory, turning the country into a warzone. "Assad has to go" wasn't Putin's policy, let's just put it that way. I'm sure there was collateral damage as Russia fight along with Assad to retake places like Aleppo, but I'd like to see you with a straight face tell me that driving out ISIS was a nefarious goal. Everyone forgets that a year or two before the "Russia caused the Syria problem" meme was invented, ISIS was being called the biggest threat in the world and both parties were issuing rhetoric about how something had to be done about it. 'Putin created the refugee crisis', my eye.

(2) What would benefit Putin the most would be for sanctions to be lifted from Russia and for the EU to guzzle up their delicious oil so that Russia can take in the $$. They gain zero by their EU market having economic problems, and even less by their trading partner being broken up into individual, weak countries. I know you still buy into the propaganda that Putin literally wants to militarily invade Europe and occupy the world with the Russian flag, so on this front I'm certain we simply won't agree, as all I think he wants is for Russian economic clout to grow so that it can be a competitor along with the U.S. and China.

[DJQuag]

I don't think Putin wants to invade Europe. Just the former USSR.

[Pete at Home]

Pete: I don't think you can with a straight face deny [] that (1) Russia's actions in Syria caused most of the immigration of single male military age Syrians to Europe

Fenring: (1) Russia had little to nothing to do with the Syrian exodus,

Let's try this again:

I don't think you can with a straight face deny [] that (1) Russia's actions in Syria caused most of the immigration of single male military age Syrians to Europe.

The exodus was ongoing, but the later sudden wave of toxic males resulted from Russia's backing of Assad.  And it's the latter that is ripping the EU apart.

Russia was the key to turning Syria into what DJQ correctly calls "a war zone hell hole where [single military age males] were a target for conscription or murder."  They had no choice but to leave, thanks to Russia, and anyone who has studied history of immigration knows that a wave of military age males traveling through foreign lands without their families is going to wreak havoc wherever they go.

[Pete at Home]

I don't think Putin wants to invade Europe. Just the former USSR.

Mostly agreed (I think he'll eventually want former client states such as Bulgaria), but like Hitler and the Kaiser before him, he understood that disabling western Europe is key to being able to march over Eastern Europe.

[DJQuag]

Why should miltary aged male refugees automatically be considered toxic? I personally know some living in my town; a town up north where the Conservatives send the refugees. They're fine. They're *people. * I'm not about to hold a dumbass racist view of them.

[Pete at Home]

They had no choice but to leave, thanks to Russia, and anyone who has studied history of immigration knows that a wave of military age males traveling through foreign lands without their families is going to wreak havoc wherever they go.

Why should miltary aged male refugees automatically be considered toxic?

They shouldn't.  I said that a WAVE of military age males in foreign lands wreaks havoc.  And I said specifically that the group has proven toxic in Germany.  I've already agreed with you that Syrians haven't created harm in the UK.  I agreed with your statement above that the Pakistanis are the ones that behave in the way that UK fears the Syrians will behave, and that the EU isn't to blame for the Pakistanis. 

That makes you as politically incorrect as I am, and most on the left would call you a racist for what you said about the UK Pakistanis.  As far as leftwashers go, the fact that you're actually correct is an aggravation for the charge of racism, not an justification.  Don't take out your issues on me.

 I don't think you're being intentionally obtuse, but your anger glasses makes you respond very stupidly to everything I say.  You screw up quotes, saying the opposite of what you meant, and you are completely unable to grasp that I'm actually agreeing with what you said here.  Save yourself the embarrassment and calm down before you respond to me further.

They're *people.

Well duh.  Nazis were people.  The KKK are people.  DAESH is people.  All monsters I have ever heard of were people.  All saints as well.  Not to mention all the people in between.  What I said is that very large groups of single military age males, traveling without their families, have a history of wreaking havoc.  And that many of the ones in Germany have proven toxic.  Proven is the opposite of "assumed."  Proven means established by facts and actions.  For frak's sake think harder.  Don't assume that someone that triggers your daddy issues is saying everything that you despise.

[Pete at Home]

I know you still buy into the propaganda that Putin literally wants to militarily invade Europe and occupy the world with the Russian flag,

You know wrong.  I believe that Putin wants to militarily invade many but not all of the former USSR states, plus to dominate some of the former USSR client states like Bulgaria.  Putin has also signaled fairly clearly that he's got his eye on Sweden and Finland, and if he gets Sweden, I'd worry for Norway as well.  But that's not all of Europe, and not even necessarily a military invasion outside the former USSR.

I don't think Putin wants to invade Europe. Just the former USSR.

Mostly agreed (I think he'll eventually want former client states such as Bulgaria), but like Hitler and the Kaiser before him, he understood that disabling western Europe is key to being able to march over Eastern Europe.

[DJQuag]

See, I might be willing to have a conversation with you on this, but you've got a hard on for me now, and everything has to have something to do with something that you imagined I once said about you and my father. (Which you still can't back up, pussy.)

I respect a lot of people who hold conservative opinions here. Sometimes, I even hold conservative opinions. When it comes to *censored* like this, you're really not worthy of a true response.

[Pete at Home]

See, I might be willing to have a conversation with you on this, but you've got a hard on for me now, and [personal attack and cowardly excuse]

I don't have a "hard on" for you and just in the last few hours during this conversation, I have agreed with and even "liked" a number of your more intelligible posts.  I only brought up your daddy issues when you made personal attacks on me out of nowhere and pretended you were "with ScoFi"s remarks on another thread.

I respect a lot of people who hold conservative opinions here. Sometimes, I even hold conservative opinions

I know that. I give credit where credit is due. Hitler created the Autobahn, and as far as politics goes, you are generally an open minded guy.  Your beef with me (unlike sci fi) has nothing to do with politics.  Your issues with me are daddy issues.

If you ever regain the balls to talk politics with me without making personal attacks or distorting what I said, I will reply in kind.  I have never been as hateful to you as you have been to me.

It's only your personal criticisms of me that I find inseparable from your mommy and daddy issues.

When it comes to *censored* like this, you're really not worthy of a true response.

Thanks for conceding that your responses to me have been phoney.  I think you may find that true responses take less effort.

[scifibum]

Seriati

What part of that strikes you as fear mongering?  Just the fact that he used the word "suicide"?  That's pathetic.  We have real examples of fear mongering everywhere, using descriptive language doesn't get there.  Particularly not in a quote where he references the Constitution at least four times.  It's called context.  Or do you think Rachel Maddow was "fear mongering" when she referred to "suicide" later in the same transcript?

He said the word "Constitution" a lot, sure, but I don't think he referenced any of its content. 

Rachel Maddow was talking about something else unrelated.  I think you're trying to distract.

You're not using logic or math either.  You seem to believe that there is some amount of terrorism we should agree to accept as a trade off for bringing in refugees.  The facts on the ground are that if you bring in enough refugees you will be brining in a future terrorist.  It's not a scare tactic to acknowledge that and address it.

So what is your acceptable incidence rate for Americans killed by refugees?  Is it one American dead per 1000 refugees admitted, or is it greater or lower?

Talk about arbitrary challenges...

It would be stupid to say that there isn't some amount of tradeoff between national security and other priorities in ANY policy that involves other nations.  I'm a bit surprised to see you implying that we should not accept any risk of terrorism as a result of allowing refugees to come into this country. 

I don't understand this fascination by the left to believe that prominent Republicans are dumb and its their advisers that control everything.  What do you get out of it?  Is it just the ability to make accusations against shadowy manipulators who you know don't have a platform to respond, or it something else?

As I have pointed out to you many times, Trump has a reality problem.  He frequently and stubbornly refuses to accept facts that are unflattering or otherwise bother him.  He also talks in absolutes and makes promises he can't keep.  These things reflect deficits in his intelligence.

I'm not talking about any other republicans here.  Just Trump.  Some of his advisers are obviously smarter than him.  Remember, Trump recently said that nobody could have known how complicated health care is.  Well, some of his team did know.  Trump didn't know.  He's not that smart. 

Well then, acknowledge the problem with your position and make a case.  What number of American citizens being killed by terrorism is reasonable per 1000 refugees? 

Why are you using the stupidest arguments possible?  Why don't you show a deficit in Obama administration vetting of refugees instead?

You should really do more research into the news, not just what's spoon fed to you.  He has specifically stated that the original 7 countries were selected and identified because they had been identified as having their records compromised.  Iraq was removed in the latest order specifically because the administration was assured their records could be trusted.

You're telling me to do more research than to rely on the news, then referring to the administration's press oriented spin.  In the meantime, the administration has offered no evidence about deficits in current vetting.  Neither have you. 

I'm going to posit, that you have no idea what it entailed, and that most likely you wouldn't agree to use it to evaluate a person who you'd have to trust with your life.

I'm basing my argument on accounts from people intimately involved with the vetting - which takes about 2 years and involves extensive interviewing and cross referencing, and who would dearly love to enhance the effectiveness of what they are doing but are not aware of any gaps that the Trump administration is trying to fill. 

What are the gaps the Trump administration is trying to fill?

Out of curiosity, how does it "misrepresent" BLM to point out that death by cop is far less likely and far more avoidable than death by gang member?  And that increased police presence is one of the few things that can lead to real decreases in that second point?

It misrepresents BLM by suggesting that BLM is about the leading cause of death, instead of about a particular kind of pattern of injustice.  And your point about "increased police presence" COULD be relevant, but you just introduced that.  And by doing so, you suggest that BLM is against "increased police presence", which they are not. 

It kind of demonstrates you're arguing with strawmen instead of real arguments.

No, it doesn't.  Pete doesn't seem to have read or understood my posts. 

Pete:

I've been here longer than youhave, Sci Fi, and I'm a lot nicer now than when you arrived.  I have changed for the better while you have changed for the worse.

You have not improved in your ability to read what I write and respond in good faith.  You haven't acknowledged the factual errors in your posts in this thread, and YOU attacked my integrity because I challenged your hasty and wrong conclusions. 

If you're going to pat yourself on the back for getting me to respond with incivility, enjoy that.  But if you ever want to convince me that I've misjudged you, it's going to take a whole lot less ignoring, distorting, and misrepresenting me.

[Seriati]

Seriati

What part of that strikes you as fear mongering?  Just the fact that he used the word "suicide"?  That's pathetic.  We have real examples of fear mongering everywhere, using descriptive language doesn't get there.  Particularly not in a quote where he references the Constitution at least four times.  It's called context.  Or do you think Rachel Maddow was "fear mongering" when she referred to "suicide" later in the same transcript?

He said the word "Constitution" a lot, sure, but I don't think he referenced any of its content. 

Rachel Maddow was talking about something else unrelated.  I think you're trying to distract.

Lol, your reference to that exchange as "fearmongering" was the distraction.  Trump was making a valid argument, that we need a travel ban in place to change how we are vetting refugees.  He said that against an express background of refugees in Europe causing any number of legal issues both because of lack of cultural similarity and because of express interest in doing so.  He said that against a background of refugees themselves killing other refugees over religious differences and raping women and children refugees in camps. 

That's just factual information.  Rather than address it, you tried to distract by calling it fear mongering because he used a trigger word that has been used enumerable times and is easily understandable in context.

You're not using logic or math either.  You seem to believe that there is some amount of terrorism we should agree to accept as a trade off for bringing in refugees.  The facts on the ground are that if you bring in enough refugees you will be brining in a future terrorist.  It's not a scare tactic to acknowledge that and address it.

So what is your acceptable incidence rate for Americans killed by refugees?  Is it one American dead per 1000 refugees admitted, or is it greater or lower?

Talk about arbitrary challenges...

It would be stupid to say that there isn't some amount of tradeoff between national security and other priorities in ANY policy that involves other nations.  I'm a bit surprised to see you implying that we should not accept any risk of terrorism as a result of allowing refugees to come into this country.

There is nothing arbitrary about my challenge.  We are not obligated to import any refugees.  International law requires refugees to apply for refugee status in the first safe country in which they arrive.  No part of it says there is any obligation by any nation to export those refugees thousands of miles for permanent relocation and incorporation into their citizenship.   I've repeatedly said we could help far more people for the same cost, with none of the same risks, if we supported efforts in countries closer to the country of origination. 

If you want an extraordinary solution to be implemented its on you to justify why would should be spending money inefficiently for no real gain to deliberately import refugees to intergrate into our country when we would not accept them as immigrants if they applied directly.
 
I'm not implying it.  I am flat out saying there is no obligation for us to accept any terrorism risk to allow refugees to come here.  You have to explain what level of risk is acceptable for the trade off of taking on this moral burden you bear, and why the death of your fellow citizens - since we all know you won't be the one killed - is just.  Own the moral implications of your decision and quit punting it.

I don't understand this fascination by the left to believe that prominent Republicans are dumb and its their advisers that control everything.  What do you get out of it?  Is it just the ability to make accusations against shadowy manipulators who you know don't have a platform to respond, or it something else?

As I have pointed out to you many times, Trump has a reality problem.  He frequently and stubbornly refuses to accept facts that are unflattering or otherwise bother him.  He also talks in absolutes and makes promises he can't keep.  These things reflect deficits in his intelligence.

It's funny, cause in my book what you said is true about every single politician.  Certainly, Obama, Pelosi, H. Clinton, Reid, all refuse to accept unflattering facts about policies they favor, they all talk in absolutes and make promised they can't keep.  Do these things reflect deficits in their intelligence?

Once again, I find it amusing that every Republican president is labeled as deficient in intelligence, and it's only their advisers who are smart people. 

Trump did not get where he is by being dumb, not at business, not in politics.  Is it 538 that's running a long string of campaign post mortems?  You should check it out, cause a lot of what Trump did that was uniformly labeled as dumb and naïve in the last election turned out to have been the right answer (and with 20/20 hindsight from 538 - almost obviously the right answer).  Does he do these things by accident or by artifice?  If the latter, your theory on his intelligence is just flat wrong.

I'm not talking about any other republicans here.  Just Trump.  Some of his advisers are obviously smarter than him.  Remember, Trump recently said that nobody could have known how complicated health care is.  Well, some of his team did know.  Trump didn't know.  He's not that smart.

Or he's doing what a President does and is talking to his voters and the American people.  You seem to be acting like the comments he makes for consumption are personal comments and only evaluating them like you were talking to him personally.   You should consider the impact he's looking to obtain instead.  You should also consider that to my knowledge there are absolutely no reports of him being stupid from those who've met with him or worked with him and who've had the best opportunity to evaluate them.  It's arm chair analysts who are pushing that meme.

One more example, his much lamented tweet about wire taps.  If you think of it from a certain point of view, it's brilliant.  If he's not concerned that there's any fire at the heart of this smoke (like for example if he knows he did nothing wrong), that tweet totally hamstrung the deep state leakers.  They can't use implication leaks (ie leaks with no details that imply something nefarious) for any conversations related to Trump tower - real or imagined - without proving and confirming that they tapped Trump tower.  We all know if they had the fire they would have already leaked it. 

Well then, acknowledge the problem with your position and make a case.  What number of American citizens being killed by terrorism is reasonable per 1000 refugees? 

Why are you using the stupidest arguments possible?  Why don't you show a deficit in Obama administration vetting of refugees instead?

Find a copy of them and I would be happy to review them.  What's that, not publically available you say? 

Did you miss, where both I (and the administration) identified 7 countries originally where their records were compromised by ISIS and subject to being forged or manipulated?  Did you discover someway to "vet" someone for whom there are no reliable governmental records, no internet history, no phone records, no records of associations other than what they tell you? 

I get why you want to burden flip, you have an impossible challenge to meet to show that virtually any of these refugees have been vetted to the extent that others would find reasonable.  But just because your burden is impossible doesn't make it mine.

I also want to remind you, that as of yet, not a one of you has explained why even if we disregard any threat of terrorism, we would want to bring in a large block of immigrants that come from a cultural background that is sexist, anti-gay, insular and absolutely inconsistent with American beliefs, freedoms and rights, particularly when we all know that any efforts to force them to adopt the common culture are also going to be opposed by the same people who want them to come as cultural imperialism.  Do you really think this country will be better with more sexist and homophobic voters?

[TheDrake]

What if rejecting refugees actually increases our risk of terrorism by alienating and radicalizing those already in the country?

"Extreme vetting" is really just a term that means none of them can ever be 100% safe, so nobody gets in. It would be like an "extreme road test" that keeps everyone from getting a license to drive an automobile.

[cherrypoptart]

" I've repeatedly said we could help far more people for the same cost, with none of the same risks, if we supported efforts in countries closer to the country of origination."

I just heard a Saudi official on the news supporting Trump's plan for the Saudis to shoulder some measure of the financial burden to establish and resettle refugees in safe areas in their home countries. I can only guess that Obama didn't want to do that because it was his goal to "fundamentally transform America". The left is using the refugee crisis the same way that ISIS intended to use it, in order to bring massive numbers of Muslims into the West. I like the idea of establishing safe zones in their own countries for refugees and treating them like any other immigrant and deciding whether or not to let them into America based on their qualifications and ability to avoid becoming a public charge.

"What if rejecting refugees actually increases our risk of terrorism by alienating and radicalizing those already in the country?"

That would prove beyond any doubt that it was huge mistake to let them into the country in the first place if that's all it takes to set them off. Better to set them off now than allow even more potential traitors into our country who will always be able to find one excuse or another to do what deep in their hearts they want to do anyway.

I would say bring them in based on their ability to do well economically in their jobs. We always hear that poverty is a breeding ground for violent discontent so we need to make sure we don't bring more of it here. Though that's no guarantee of safety as we can see from many recent cases of relatively well to do Muslims suddenly just going off, at least they won't be getting welfare and sucking the taxpayers dry until they set about killing them, adding insult to injury.

[TheDrake]

That would prove beyond any doubt that it was huge mistake to let them into the country in the first place if that's all it takes to set them off. Better to set them off now than allow even more potential traitors into our country who will always be able to find one excuse or another to do what deep in their hearts they want to do anyway.

You do realize that native born Americans have been involved in attacks too? I guess we should have kept their parents from moving here.

[Seriati]

You do realize that native born Americans have been involved in attacks too? I guess we should have kept their parents from moving here.

So what?  Seriously so what?  We can't have an immigration policy (which this is since there are non-immigration ways it could be handled) that disfavors people with radically un-American views because we haven't solved crime?  Is that really your position, that we must zero crime or else we can not exclude potential immigrants on a rational basis?

As a follow up to my comment the other day, here's a link to Judge Napolitano's right up on how those calls from Trump tower are almost certainly recorded and in possession of the government (common man's understanding of what "wiretap" means by the way), and could have easily been accessed without leaving much, if anything, in the way of discoverable finger prints.  Certainly, unless he's wrong, is proof of concept that this could have occurred.

https://www.creators.com/read/judge-napolitano/03/17/did-obama-spy-on-trump

[TheDrake]

No, my point is what we have right now is an equation. If blocking entry today causes a percentage of existing residents to become radical through improved recruiting, and that total is larger than the number of immigrants who would become radical under current conditions, we now have more total radicals in the country as a result of the policy.

Is your position that we have to zero crime committed by immigrants before we can allow any immigrants to enter the country?

[Seriati]

Is your position that we have to zero crime committed by immigrants before we can allow any immigrants to enter the country?

No, that's kind of a silly simple reversal.  I fully expect immigrants to commit crimes, generally within a standard deviation of the norm.  That's no argument for why we should accept immigrants that carry known extraordinary risks.  It's not a good reason for a different immigration standard than should apply if such persons were not refugees (we should help people remotely if they would not otherwise be welcome as an immigrant, rather than resettle them).

And again, unless you choose to keep ignoring it, it's absolutely no reason to bring in people who are culturally incompatible with our society, who don't believe in the equality of women or the rights of homosexuals.  I really can not think of one single legitimate reason to bring in people who don't meet that test.

No, my point is what we have right now is an equation. If blocking entry today causes a percentage of existing residents to become radical through improved recruiting, and that total is larger than the number of immigrants who would become radical under current conditions, we now have more total radicals in the country as a result of the policy.

If you have an equation it has thousands of variables not one.  I see no real evidence that changing our refugee policy to help ten times more people locally than we help by importing them would cause an increase in radicalization here.  If there is that high a risk of "radicalization" of people born and raised in our culture because of their pre-existing attitudes it completely undermines your rationale for increasing the number in our country, as you're effectively multiplying the radicalization ready group of people in the country.

Honestly, I don't see one bit of legitimate thought through logic there.  Can you actually explain how you weighed out all the factors in that analysis?

[Seriati]

On the wiretapping claim, which I agree so far is unsupported - though like I said, if Judge Napolitano is correct there are recordings of calls from Trump tower that can be accessed (which meets a layman's definition of wiretapping), how is it that if Justice won't respond until the 20th, two different Congressional committees have already stated there is no evidence of it happening (between 5 and 7 days earlier)?  Am I misunderstanding how an investigation would work?

[Wayward Son]

...though like I said, if Judge Napolitano is correct there are recordings of calls from Trump tower that can be accessed (which meets a layman's definition of wiretapping)...

Of course, there is a very simple explanation for that.

Trump Tower may not have been wiretapped, but someone from there may have called someone who was being wiretapped.

It will be interesting to see what the actual facts are.  (Not to mention what the contents of the calls were.)

One known fact is that Trump is talking out of his @ss.  Because even though he knows Obama had him wiretapped, he cannot (or will not) produce the evidence that convinced him of that, even to Congress.

And how is an investigation supposed to start when the accuser cannot provide the initial evidence that lead him to his accusation?

[Seriati]

No Wayward, if Napolitano is correct, the NSA has recordings of all the calls, cause they take them centrally and store them and then access them as needed after the fact.  That would mean that there are recordings or transcripts of every call, whether or not it's with someone who is being monitored.  If they exist then in my book there is a "wiretap."   Whether it's been accessed may or may not be determinable.  If they don't exist, then we'd need some evidence that there was a "wiretap" as that term used to be described.

Too many of the answers being provided are statements that could be literally true and yet mean nothing. 

Of course the preservation of the recording of all calls in the US is a direct violation of the Bill of Rights, but much of what the FISA court seems to be and do is violation to me.

EDITTED TO ADD:  Please take care here, cause whatever you think of Trump, if this kind of blanket recording exists and can be accessed without any real cause, it's going to be Trump that has the keys to it for the next four years.  We should be pursuing limits here that stop both Obama and Trump, not playing partisan games.

[Seriati]

So anyone noticing the wrinkles in the Flynn controversy today?  Flynn got paid speakers fees, including from that Russian station that everyone believes is a propaganda arm of the Russian government.  This is being headline as he received payments from Russian companies before his nomination (ie implying he was bribed or nefariously bought).  Anyone remember Clinton being disqualified from being President for receiving speaking fees ten times larger from Wall Street Investment Banks?  Me neither, were those bribes or nefarious implications of agency?  Is every politician, ex-politician or spouse of a politician that receives a speaking fee, now a bought and paid for agent of the payer of that fee (I could see a reasonable argument there, but the one sided pursuit of it is not okay). 

Also thought it was fascinating that the Rep who made the claims is asserting these are emolument clause violations, he may want to talk to the large number of people in both parties who would be surprised to hear that and have similar problems, if we recharaterize being paid for a speech as a gift (see above with respect to Clinton's half million dollar "gifts" if that's the case).

Lol, would it kill people to just be honest in reporting and let people draw their own conclusions, rather than attempting to "spin" everything and forcing people like me to react to the gross mischaracterizations?

[cherrypoptart]

Seriati

"No Wayward, if Napolitano is correct, the NSA has recordings of all the calls, cause they take them centrally and store them and then access them as needed after the fact."

That was my understanding from several years ago too but since nobody brought it up I wondered if I was mistaken. I heard that the NSA has server farms dedicated just to storing all of the information they are collecting and that includes recordings of every call made in several countries including the U.S. Of course they can't listen to but a tiny fraction of it but it's all there waiting to be accessed. If they can save all that data it will offer a treasure trove of insight into our society to anthropologists studying us tens of thousands of years from now, if there is a way to protect the data for that long. Perhaps advancements in data compression and storage technology will advance to the point that it can all be stored on a flash drive instead of in several buildings that show up on satellite photos as massive heat sources. Basically we are all tapped, all the time, everywhere.

[TheDeamon]

I'd forgotten about that. In that respect, Trump would be technically correct on him personally/his office in general being "wire tapped" because of the NSA/CIA monitoring of phone traffic going to or coming from a certain list of "nations of interest" even if it only consisted of archiving the recordings for the time being.

If Trump has business dealings in those nations, it would stand to reason those calls were "tapped" into and thus recorded. And because of security constraints, while Trump can fume about it having been done, he cannot go into detail on the how/why he knows about them, or the methods used, because "National Security" well, trumps it all.

[DonaldD]

In that respect, Trump would be technically correct on him personally/his office in general being "wire tapped" because of the NSA/CIA monitoring of phone traffic going to or coming from a certain list of "nations of interest" even if it only consisted of archiving the recordings for the time being.

That might be supportable only if you take what the president tweeted completely out of context and ignore half of what he wrote.

How exactly is it "sick" of then-president Obama, for the security services at the time to surveil adversaries of the USA?  Was Mr. Trump proposing a radical new foreign policy where it will, in the future, be considered unethical and verboten for any branch of government to spy on Russia, China, North Korea or ISIS, and that the administration should immediately be responsible for reigning in those activities?

[TheDeamon]

This IS Donald Trump we're talking about.

His objection isn't about other people being monitored. It was about his being monitored that he found to be sick.

In the vein of thought that the most important thing to Donald Trump is Donald Trump, that particular context(and tweet) makes perfect sense.

[scifibum]

Trump was making a valid argument, that we need a travel ban in place to change how we are vetting refugees.  He said that against an express background of refugees in Europe causing any number of legal issues both because of lack of cultural similarity and because of express interest in doing so.  He said that against a background of refugees themselves killing other refugees over religious differences and raping women and children refugees in camps. 

That's just factual information.  Rather than address it, you tried to distract by calling it fear mongering because he used a trigger word that has been used enumerable times and is easily understandable in context.

That's irrelevant factual information.  None of the bad things you listed are helped by the travel ban.  None of them are things that are ignored by the civil servants who are vetting refugees according to the current (carryover) policies.

I'm not investing more time in this, since you are engaging in apologetics.

[scifibum]

A few more quotes:

we have to stop people from pouring into our country.

...this is a problem that, if we don't solve it, it's going to eat our country alive. OK? It's going to eat our country alive."

"We have to stop the tremendous flow of Syrian refugees into the United States," Trump said this week. "We don't know who they are. They have no documentation and we don't know what they're planning."

“Altogether, under the Clinton plan, you’d be admitting hundreds of thousands of refugees from the Middle East with no system to vet them, or to prevent the radicalization of their children,”

Trump was lying that we are letting refugees in when they have no documentation.  He's also lying by using the words "pouring" and "tremendous flow".  He lied that Clinton proposed a system with no vetting, and even lied about the number.

Do you know what it's called when you use falsehoods and exaggerations to try to stir up public fear?  Hint for Seriati: it starts with f

[scifibum]

I get why you want to burden flip, you have an impossible challenge to meet to show that virtually any of these refugees have been vetted to the extent that others would find reasonable.  But just because your burden is impossible doesn't make it mine.

What's ironic about this is that the Trump administration had an opportunity in court to demonstrate the urgency of the executive order, and had nothing.  Because he has nothing. 


Your point about documentation is off target.  Your position appears to be based on the assumption that those administering refugee admissions were previously not aware of the potential problems with documents and were doing nothing about it.  This is not true. 

There are plenty of sources out there that provide some of the high level details of the existing vetting process.  One key point: when the vetting is inconclusive, people don't get in. 

And this "burden" is still of your own imagination.  I have no idea why you think I need to show this.  I'm not trying to dictate the finer details of refugee vetting.  My point is that DJT, during his campaign and after, was misrepresenting and exaggerating the danger of Muslim immigrants and refugees, and that was the context for comparing Islamist jihad attacks against other terrorist attacks.  The motive was to help keep such dangers in perspective, not to malign and endanger the American right.

[Seriati]

My point is not off target, the prior administration identified those countries as having compromised documentation, there's admission in the last weeks that vetting can't be assured of success when they are vetting refugees that don't have paper work, as they have been.

The only real difference here is one of ideology, the prior administration thought the risk was worth taking so they down played, the new administration doesn't so they don't down play it, maybe they even over play it. 

But all you can do with a legitimate objection that says we shouldn't be bringing in new immigrants, whether they are refugees or not, who are ideologically incompatible is to ignore it?  The travel ban does help, it has stickier component for refugees in particular, and I have no doubt that the newer vetting will be much tougher than the existing vetting if agree to take refugees at all.  Since you won't address why we should bring in culturally incompatible refugees its really you who are engaging in apologetics, you're trying to explain away an irrational policy of the left.

[Seriati]

On the wiretapping claim, which I agree so far is unsupported....

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/intel-chair-says-trumps-personal-communications-may-have-been-picked-up-through-incidental-collection/

Hmmm...  sounds like wire tapping has been proved (though he didn't give us the evidence either).  I don't accept the assertions that it was all "legally done" when the FISA court is involved, since it approves just about everything and it's very existence is a direct violation of the Bill of Rights. 

[DonaldD]

Well, no, that doesn't actually prove what Trump was claiming.

If somebody else has their communication surveilled, and Trump is then in contact with that somebody else via the surveilled communication method, then that particular piece of communication would have been picked up.  That's what "incidental" means in this case. This is, in fact, exactly what people have been saying likely happened with the others in Trump's camp whose communications were collected while communicating with Russian state agents.

You have to seriously move the goal posts, not just across the field, but into a completely different sport, to even pretend that's relevant.

Remind us how Obama is a "sick guy" for being president while the US federal government security organizations collect the communications of foreign competitors, some of which Trump was in contact with while they were being surveilled.

To be really, really clear - Trump's "sick guy" remark made it very plain that he was claiming that Obama ordered surveillance of him, the Donald, not just that the USA surveilled foreign state agents. You know this, Seriati.

[cherrypoptart]

https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/house-intelligence-chief-just-tossed-235601417.html

Nunes, the chair of the House Intelligence Committee, called for a sudden 1 p.m. press gathering Wednesday, with its subject unclear. But once it began, he fired off what sounded like a bombshell revelation: The intelligence community, he said, had "incidentally collected" information on the Trump transition team during the transition period.

The California Republican went on to say the collection occurred on "numerous occasions" and was not related to the FBI's investigation into Russian meddling in last year's presidential election.

"Details about US persons associated with the incoming administration, details with little or no apparent foreign intelligence value, were widely disseminated in intelligence community reporting," Nunes said.

The information he spoke of was collected legally, in his view, under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, and he did not know if the surveillance consisted of phone calls, but that the intelligence reports he had seen "clearly show" Trump and his team were "monitored."

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Even if President Obama didn't personally wiretap Trump by either ordering it or going over to Trump Tower himself, toolbox in hand, dressed as a maintenance worker while listening on his media player to the Mission Impossible theme song and soldering in a connection, Obama as the Commander in Chief is still ultimately responsible. We all know about how plausible deniability works.

[Fenring]

Even if President Obama didn't personally wiretap Trump by either ordering it or going over to Trump Tower himself, toolbox in hand, dressed as a maintenance worker while listening on his media player to the Mission Impossible theme song and soldering in a connection, Obama as the Commander in Chief is still ultimately responsible. We all know about how plausible deniability works.

I sort of agree with the spirit of this comment, but in reality I suspect the Potus has little real control over the CIA or its various activities. Also, when it comes to the NSA surveillance net, once the apparatus is in place it's probably easy for third parties to dip in and make use of it even if no one directly in the NSA hierarchy was directly responsible for such a tap. We could say that the responsibility of all of these trickle-down problems boils down to the President, but structurally the bureaucracy has made that an unreality since way back; even Truman said it was out of control shortly after his Presidency ended.

[DonaldD]

I'm just going to highlight the relevant portion of the quote Cherry dropped above, that shows his whole characterization to be misplaced:

The information he spoke of was collected legally, in his view, under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act

Gosh, the president is responsible for legal information collection of foreign, probably state, actors.  Since Nunes didn't actually describe the types of information collected, it's impossible to know under which part of FISA the activities were authorized, but still... Wow. A bomb shell for sure.

Ignoring the Drama! Drama! Drama! of Nunes' moment in the sun, what is being missed is what Nunes left unstated, but is necessarily implied: people in Trump's transition team were in contact with foreign nationals who were under surveillance by the USA security services.  Basically, it's a confirmation of some of the evidence that led to the need to investigate whether there was collusion between foreign state actors intervening in the electoral process and Trump's team - if these contacts were ongoing and preceded the election itself, of course.

[cherrypoptart]

Yes, but he also said that it looked like there were a lot of conversations listened in on and recorded that didn't seem to have anything to do with any of the concerns expressed about as justification for the wiretaps. I can't help but wonder why keep all of this extra information around, all of these recordings that apparently don't pertain to the Russians? Did it relate to campaign strategy that would have been of value in helping to keep Trump from winning the election? Was President Obama informed about any of it? How much of this President Obama kept in the loop on? Is Trump's voice on any of the recordings of the conversations?

I think it's obvious that Trump must have heard something that really freaked him out right before he reflexively tweeted out his accusation against Obama. My guess is that a recording of what he thought was a private conversation between himself and someone else could do that.

You do bring up a good point though Donald. If Trump was colluding with the Russians to rig the election, then the feds, or in other words Obama, SHOULD be wiretapping him. So why the surprise? Why the insistence from the media all this time that the whole idea is just absurd if not downright paranoid?  I would think that even if they didn't need Obama's approval they would at least need to keep him informed. We understand that he supposedly doesn't have the power to order a wiretap like this but would he have the power to cancel one once he found out about it? Would not canceling it out indicate tacit approval (admittedly that's quite a stretch to make just to blame Obama though)? Especially if he found out it was picking up campaign talk, perhaps even strategy, that had nothing to do with the Russians? We see how our government leaks information like a sieve leaks liquids, or like little girls who just learn a secret. We also see many elements and people in our government who hate Trump. Who always have, and always will. How much information got passed along to Hillary even if it ended up not doing her any good?

[Seriati]

DonaldD, I want to start by saying I understand your objections.  From a certain point of view they are even reasonable, but honestly, I think you have to make a few giant leaps to believe this doesn't stink.  I can't even imagine the outrage you'd be expressing, if there were evidence that a Republican administration had recorded the other side.  There is no amount of blame shifting that would ever let you let a Republican President slide.

The first big issue is the FISA court.  I don't know of any thoughtful analysis of its mandate that doesn't flat out say that it's a direct violation of the Fourth Amendment's prohibition on general warrants.  Certainly the NSA's program that Snowden unveiled is.  Relying on the backing of the FISA court is the ultimate in using abuse by government to excuse abuse by government.  It's no different than declaring an act legal because it is the king's will it be legal.

That aside, and that's a major aside, the charge here includes an unexplained violation of even those rules, whereby the identity of the US persons was widely unmasked illegally.  Do you really have no qualms about one administration using a secret court to obtain communications without probable cause, and then to violate even those government friendly rules to identify its US citizen opposition?  What reasonable purpose do you think such a policy serves?  This makes Watergate look like a kiddy operation, and you're defending it?

Well, no, that doesn't actually prove what Trump was claiming.

Trump made a tweet that the Obama administration had his offices wire tapped.  Records and transcripts from his offices of communications are direct evidence that this may be the case.  I get the legitimate dispute that these calls could have been recorded on the other end, but then they should have received the highest level of security because of the potential for abuse, and instead were widely unmasked and distributed.

When one does something "legal" for the purpose of revealing something it would be illegal to get directly, and that that person has a great interest in, it's fair to input that the "legal" action was a mere pretense for the illegal.

Never see a cop show, where one cop says to the other, "hear that crying baby" before they illegally enter a home without a warrant?

If somebody else has their communication surveilled, and Trump is then in contact with that somebody else via the surveilled communication method, then that particular piece of communication would have been picked up.  That's what "incidental" means in this case. This is, in fact, exactly what people have been saying likely happened with the others in Trump's camp whose communications were collected while communicating with Russian state agents.

True, yet the authorizations involved make it highly illegal to unveil those US persons on the call, which was not respected here, and it appears that calls that had nothing to do with Russia were also unveiled. 

Pretty much, the "explanation" you're running with looks like a flimsy story told to provide cover for what should properly be seen as an abuse of executive authority turned on the administration's political opponents.

Really, step back and ask yourself if this is really conduct that you think is okay, and that you want say the Trump administration to be empowered to use.

You have to seriously move the goal posts, not just across the field, but into a completely different sport, to even pretend that's relevant.

I've been reading posts about how Trumps tweet was rebutted.  The fact that it's not only not been rebutted, but looks as if is legitimately supportable - the mere existence of the transcripts make it supportable - is not a moving goal post.

I even happily concede that the recordings could have been made at the "other end" (which is a meaningless term given that there are no physical taps on the other side either), because what was done with the recordings from that point forward was most likely illegal.

Remind us how Obama is a "sick guy" for being president while the US federal government security organizations collect the communications of foreign competitors, some of which Trump was in contact with while they were being surveilled.

My personal view is that Obama is an autocrat.  I have no doubt he abused the power of the executive to try to punish his enemies.  Whether he did it through direct order, just through proxies or just by creating a culture that encouraged it and never punished it, I can't say.  But we have time and again seen that his administration had no problem with executive excess.   

To be really, really clear - Trump's "sick guy" remark made it very plain that he was claiming that Obama ordered surveillance of him, the Donald, not just that the USA surveilled foreign state agents. You know this, Seriati.

Given the illegal unmasking and the conversations that had no reason being recorded, not sure why you think there is a difference.

I've said it for a while, but I find it depressing that you guys seem to be trained to believe that a (Democrat) President is not accountable unless you have a direct order they signed admitting guilt.

[TheDrake]

If Trump really wants to do something, he should give a directive to eliminate FISA wiretapping and National Security Letter extraction of mass databases. I don't imagine that happening, though.

[DonaldD]

If Trump was colluding with the Russians to rig the election, then the feds, or in other words Obama, SHOULD be wiretapping him.

Uhh, no, whether Trump's team was colluding would have needed to have been an interpretation of facts gleaned from other surveillance - to get to the point where Trump or his team should have been directly surveilled (as opposed to getting swept up in incidental communication of foreign nationals) would have required that other evidence would have needed to exist, evidence sufficient to have shown probable cause that they were breaking the law.

That you think simple suspicion on the part of the president SHOULD be sufficient to allow him to break the law is more than a little Nixonesque, no?

[TheDrake]

If Trump was colluding with the Russians to rig the election, then the feds, or in other words Obama, SHOULD be wiretapping him.

Uhh, no, whether Trump's team was colluding would have needed to have been an interpretation of facts gleaned from other surveillance - to get to the point where Trump or his team should have been directly surveilled (as opposed to getting swept up in incidental communication of foreign nationals) would have required that other evidence would have needed to exist, evidence sufficient to have shown probable cause that they were breaking the law.

That you think simple suspicion on the part of the president SHOULD be sufficient to allow him to break the law is more than a little Nixonesque, no?

It would be, if it happened that way. If the FISA court or NSL was used, it wouldn't be breaking the law. Simple suspicion seems all that is needed when its a mosque or someone who happened to go to Pakistan to visit family. We're already living in a Hoover world which spanned many presidencies. The Nixon part, getting and using information on political opponents, is a far stretch based on what we now know.