President Trump let fly a stunning poisoned-tip tweet this weekend:
Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my "wires tapped" in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!
He offered no evidence, not an iota of proof to back up the astonishing allegation against his predecessor – a charge that if true would constitute a constitutional crisis of the first order.
Where did he get his information? CIA? FBI? NSA? Breitbart News? Sean Hannity? He did not say. Instead, he continued to rant:
Just out: The same Russian Ambassador that met Jeff Sessions visited the Obama White House 22 times, and 4 times last year alone.
Is it legal for a sitting President to be "wire tapping" a race for president prior to an election? Turned down by court earlier. A NEW LOW!
How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!
We have here the most disturbing revelation yet into the president’s character and state of mind. He is no longer a candidate, he is the President, and he is still obsessed with the man whose legitimacy as an American citizen Trump did everything to undermine as he scrounged for an issue that would launch him into politics.
What’s behind this latest slander? Consider these possibilities: Trump has the proof but decided against disclosing it, bolstering his authority as Leaker-in-Chief.
But why would he do this, knowing his refusal to offer the evidence would further diminish his own battered credibility, more deeply divide the country between those who believe him no matter what and those who already consider him a pathological liar, and set off one of the firestorms he loves to ignite in a country already smoldering with anger and resentment?
Was his purpose to feed his ravenous base another full course of Obama hatred? Was it to distract his adversaries as the Republicans continue to enact the most regressive measures of policy and taxation since the 1920s?
For sure, this latest and most sinister rant will be the chief subject on the Sunday talk shows, not the creeping corruption spreading across Washington and the steady annihilation by his cronies of public safeguards, the social contract and the safety net taking place every day in Congress and the agencies of government.
Does Donald Trump in his fevered, ungovernable mind relish polluting the public with ever more abominable lies? Is he so unhinged he wants to take the republic down with him, like a raging, blinded Samson?
Is he delusional, the ultimate narcissist, seeing himself no longer as the mere center of the universe but as The Universe itself?
Who knows? But for sure our president is up to no good. As we are reminded by the evangelist Peter: “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.”
By coincidence, when these latest rants erupted earlier today, we were just about to post excerpts from a speech delivered Thursday night at McMaster University in Canada by Henry Giroux, who was being honored by his colleagues there for his prolific career as a scholar and author.
As the Global TV Network Chair Professor in McMaster’s English and Cultural Studies Department, Giroux has kept a keen eye on American culture in particular and the growth of authoritarian politics in general. After reading Trump’s latest rants, we thought these remarks more pertinent than ever.
Cross-posted from billmoyers.com
