Appearing on CNN’s “New Day” Monday, Sen. Gary Peters (D-MI) talked about how Trump is using his wiretapping claims as a distraction from the “very serious news” of his ties to Russia.
Watch courtesy of CNN:
Dem @SenGaryPeters: Trump's wiretapping claims are a distraction from the "very serious news" about ties with Russia https://t.co/C1Pzl3zlnv
— New Day (@NewDay) March 6, 2017
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“It’s difficult to know what’s behind it. I know what it certainly appears to be, however, is just a distraction. He has put out really a very serious charge but with no evidence to back it up. And the curious thing about it is he certainly has the power to back it up. As president of the United States, he can ask that question very directly of the FBI, find out if there was a FISA court ruling that allowed a wiretap to occur. He has not offered that. And quite frankly, I think it’s just an attempt to distract from the very serious news where we have Attorney General Sessions recusing himself from what should be an independent and fair investigation of what’s going on with the Russians and the Trump administration.”
We are not going to get that, however, because as Evan McMullin said today and others have already repeatedly pointed out, Trump got his information not from intelligence sources (who like the press he has labeled his enemies) but from “far-right conspiratorial media outlets.” In this case, Breitbart News.
As Peters repeated what many of us have already said when he told Alisyn Camerota, where there is smoke there is usually fire:
.@SenGaryPeters on allegations of Russian ties: When you see smoke there is usually fire https://t.co/sBd7e0Ae8r
— New Day (@NewDay) March 6, 2017
“The American people need to have a clear evaluation of what exactly occurred,” Peters said. And we are clearly not going to have this based on the testimony of an outfit like Breitbart, which is the very definition of “fake news.”
We are being “distracted by all of this smoke” from the very real and serious problems we are facing, Peters said, and that smoke must be cleared by an investigation.
In the end, all Trump’s efforts to deflect are only making an investigation more urgent than ever. After all, as Jeff Sessions himself once said, “Honest testimony is required if we are to have justice in America.”
Just don’t hold your breath waiting for it.
Hrafnkell Haraldsson, a social liberal with leanings toward centrist politics has degrees in history and philosophy. His interests include, besides history and philosophy, human rights issues, freedom of choice, religion, and the precarious dichotomy of freedom of speech and intolerance. He brings a slightly different perspective to his writing, being that he is neither a follower of an Abrahamic faith nor an atheist but a polytheist, a modern-day Heathen who follows the customs and traditions of his Norse ancestors. He maintains his own blog, A Heathen’s Day, which deals with Heathen and Pagan matters, and Mos Maiorum Foundation www.mosmaiorum.org, dedicated to ethnic religion. He has also contributed to NewsJunkiePost, GodsOwnParty and Pagan+Politics.
