The SCS ain't in the habit of making their capabilities nor actions public knowledge. Sooner or later, outing bad behaviour of the nsa, cia, and scs runs the risk of compromising classified capabilities and materials. So, we ain't likely to get a clear informative bottom line on this one. ................................................ To quote my old commander concerning some top secret noforn information (when I discovered/located one of site R's shadow sites): "Some things, (my name), we just never talk about".
That hasn't been an issue for some time, for Republicans ( Plame, for example), and never has been for Trump (he's been yakking to Russian mob guys about US government business on the same Android he uses for everything else). So in the absence of information, no evidence or indication at all, not even a sensible argument, you go with something Trump tweeted?
One of the standard comforts of the conservative conspiracy guys is the assumption that the real business is being handled by pros behind the scenes - that somebody, somewhere, who knows what they are doing, is in charge. That should never have survived Reagan, let alone W&Cheney.
snowden and some personal experience Just because they were outed by snowden doesn't mean that they have changed. Maybe its a bit like sexuality?
We should be so lucky... That worldview does fit with the concept of and belief in an omnipotent and omniscient sky daddy watching over us though - gee, I wonder if Conservatism and Fundamentalism correlate somehow... /*required disclaimer - that was a rhetorical question, not intended to be seriously addressed*/
So no evidence or indication whatsoever, leads you to believe in the tweets of Donald Trump - to accept their content as information. This in spite of the observable correlation between Trump accusation-tweet content and physical reality in those occasional instance where the two can be firmly and reliably compared, which is negative. If he tweets something, it becomes more likely to be the case for you - not only without evidence, but in defiance of what evidence you have. It brings up a bit of a mystery, for you: if Trump's central command was bugged by Obama for political advantage, where was the advantage? How did Clinton get caught flatfooted by the Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin vote in the election? How did the Clinton campaign get surprised by the email slanders? How was it that Clinton never beat Trump to the punch on anything?
<-------------does not tweet----- <-------------has never tweeted <-------------has never read a "trump tweet" first hand <-------------has worked where the nsa tried to spy on phone calls on the eastern seaboard(circa 1969) <-------------has never sworn a false oath <-------------has mixed feelings about Snowden(when i took the oath for the clearances, I meant every single word....so his whistleblowing went against that attitude). You, ice, seem to have an ironclad belief in your opinions without any evidence and or proof. Meanwhile: The SCS was created, by the nsa and cia, specifically to intercept wireless communications and has listening posts all over the world. I find it most likely, that the nsa and scs would spy on almost anyone including american citizens on american soil. So it is not beyond the realm of possibility nor probability that they would also spy on Trump. Did they? Ask the German prosecutors who gave up on finding evidence that they would take to court concerning the alleged SCS spying on Angela Merkel via her wireless phones. You might also consider Obama's 1/2 hearted denial of that activity.
So? You knowingly accept the contents of Trump tweets as information. There's no excuse. How you run across them is irrelevant - if you thought that info came from graffiti spray painted on a billboard or a fortune cookie message, those would at least be sources that have been occasionally informative in the past. What ironclad opinion are you talking about? That Obama did not have Trump's phones tapped for campaign advantage? That's not ironclad - show me some indication that he did that, sufficient to overcome the consistent and widespread indications that he didn't (Clinton's lack of key info during the campaign, for example), and I'm perfectly willing to change my assessment. Agreed. It's far more than that, even, in my world: if they didn't track at least some of his Russian dealings from at least the foreign end one would have doubts about their diligence and competence, and the step from that - or from his mob dealings in the casino business, his mob connections in the New York and Las Vegas real estate world, etc - to an FBI surveillance of his domestic operations, is very short. You know he's dirty, everyone knows he's dirty, right? Common sense. And that's just the legit side. But that's not the issue. That's almost irrelevant. There's all kinds of indications Obama did that, and no real problem with it other than the embarrassment of getting caught and the downside of screwing up relations with Germany more than the info helps.
Google doesn't work for you? Even your class of sources has that kind of info: http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/445504/obama-camp-disingenuous-denials-fisa-surveillance-trump
So, you are the President (Obama) of a nation that is on the brink of war with a country that a presidential candidate (Trump) is showing every indication of seriously colluding with. You already know that your security services have their ear to the ground...what do you do? Is asking your security services if they have any issues with Trumps alleged collusion, the same as ordering the tapping of his phone?
You are changing the subject a bit. That's not what Trump has asserted. Trump asserted that Obama had wire tapped his phones in Trump Tower. Thus far there has been no evidence of that, and people who are in the know have denied that happened. Tomorrow Comey will testify before Congress, and I'm sure that question will be asked of him. Two, there is the larger issue of collusion with the Russians to get Trump elected. There is a ton of circumstantial evidence to suggest that the Trump campaign did collude with the Russians, including Trump's own words. We know there is an investigation into collusion. Flynn, Trump's national security adviser was on the Russian payroll and he failed to report that he was on the Russian payroll. He held secret meetings with the Russian ambassador and he lied about those meetings. Trump's attorney general, also secretly met with Russian intelligence officers and lied about those meetings. So there is a lot of smoke here. And then there is the matter of Wiki releases where the Trump campaign released information before either Wikileaks or the Russians. In one case, the Trump campaign released the Russian modified document before it was released by Russia. Did the Department of Justice have enough evidence to get a FISA order to tap any of Trump's campaign staff, including Trump? I guess we will find out tomorrow when Comey provides his testimony.
That's a bit much, don't you think? The US was at the brink of war with the old USSR back in October of 1962, but not since. How do you define "brink of war"?
'OK the linked has no positive information. is about as close as they come This is not significantly different from much else that I have read. and I wouldn't classify any of your linked as definitive. Curious------why justice and not nsa? ............................... Without another Snowden, we will remain just guessing aka extrapolating from known data and patterns of behaviour. ergo " we ain't likely to get a clear informative bottom line on this one." however it does seem likely .............. So, you do believe that the Obama administration did request permission to surveil Trump and associates? And that that permission was eventually granted? If so: Does it not follow that the Obama administration did indeed surveil Trump and associates in 2016?
That's not the issue. I think, my personal opinion, that if nobody in the US intelligence agencies and nobody in the Federal law enforcement agencies was paying attention to that guy and his "deals" for the past few years and especially when he made arrangements to run for public office, the entire upper level management of all of them should be fired for extreme negligence. I would assume, regardless of evidence, that the NSA has been keeping tabs on what Manafort was up to, for example. But that's not what Trump was tweeting about.
I believe at the time Obama was attempting to work out what to do about the Syrian/Russian/Aleppo situation and what that would mean. The situation was very tense until Obama declined to increase USA intervention. The Aleppo and ongoing tragedy in Syria being the outcome.
Also, I expect we will get a lot of "I cannot comment on an open investigation, or even confirm the existence thereof." Tomorrow still has great potential for fireworks though...
