Donald Trump Makes Sh*t Up, Justin Amash Misses a Vote, Steve King Disses Immigrants (Reason Podcast)

Nick Gillespie, Katherine Mangu-Ward, and Matt Welch talk about why the GOP is screwing up Obamacare replacement and much more.

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Donald Trump Makes Sh*t Up, Justin Amash Misses a Vote, Steve King Disses Immigrants (Reason Podcast)

In the newest Reason Podcast (archive here), Reason mag Editor in Chief Katherine Mangu-Ward, Editor at Large Matt Welch, and I discuss Donald Trump's evidence-free accusation that Barack Obama "tapped" his phones, why his presidential transition is taking so long, and whether his deregulatory moves will come to fruition. Also in the mix: What is wrong with former Rep. Steve King (R–Iowa), who can barely go a few days without insulting the children of immigrants ("other people's babies," in King-ese), why libertarian-leaning Republican Justin Amash finally missed his first vote in 4,000-plus votes, and why privacy is probably gone for good (and why that's not always such a bad thing).

Produced by Mark McDaniel.

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Comments

[SIV]

Donald Trump's evidence-free accusation that Barack Obama "tapped" his phones

Trump just got taken in by all those fake news reports in the lyin' media that reported he was wiretapped by the previous administration. He probably got duped by a bunch of highly unreliable intelligence reports that they showed him when he took office too.

[Damned]

All those fakes news reports came in from two places: Mark Levin's ass and Breitbart's coverage of the same

[MikeP2]

The NYT stated unequivocally that Trump Tower was wiretapped in regard to a server that was "in communication" with Russian banks.
This was in January.

Previously WP and NYT reported multiple times about the FISA warrants.

Mark Levin did nothing more than collect and summarize all the MSM reports.

Don't be ignorant.

[GILMORE?]

...the Obama Justice Department evidently returned to the FISA court in October 2016, the critical final weeks of the presidential campaign. This time, the Justice Department submitted a narrowly tailored application that did not mention Trump. The court apparently granted it, authorizing surveillance of some Trump associates.

It is unknown whether that surveillance is still underway, but the New York Times has identified ? again, based on illegal leaks of classified information ? at least three of its targets: Paul Manafort (the former Trump campaign chairman who was ousted in August), and two others whose connection to the Trump campaign was loose at best, Manafort's former political-consulting business partner Roger Stone, and investor Carter Page. The Times report (from mid-January) includes a lot of heavy breathing about potential ties between the Trump campaign and Russia; but it ultimately concedes that the government's FISA investigation may have nothing to do with Trump, the campaign, or alleged Russian efforts to interfere in the U.S. election by hacking e-mail accounts.

[Sevo]

"These can be summarized in the statement put out by Obama spokesman Kevin Lewis: A cardinal rule of the Obama Administration was that no White House official ever interfered with any independent investigation led by the Department of Justice. As part of that practice, neither President Obama nor any White House official ever ordered surveillance on any U.S. citizen. Any suggestion otherwise is simply false. This seems disingenuous on several levels."
http://www.nationalreview.com/.....ance-trump

"We didn't do that exact thing, and look over there, besides!"

[VG Zaytsev]

And no administration spokesman has ever lied to the public, just ask holder, Clapper or lynch.

[buybuydandavis]

No evidence at all! Lalalalalala I can't hear you!

Is Reason ever going to stop embarrassing itself with their Trump Derangement Syndrome?

[american socialist]

Nyt and guardian?

[DanO.]

I can't figure out why what's so obvious to Reason's partisan Republicans has thus far evaded the Trump Administration itself, forcing them to miss their deadline for providing proof for their unfounded accusation that Obama ordered Trump's personal phones "wiretapped."

Trump has not publicly provided any evidence for his wiretapping allegations, first made more than a week ago. Sunday night, Kellyanne Conway, a top adviser to the President, appeared to expand the allegations by suggesting to the Bergen Record there could have been even wider spying of the Trump campaign, including the use of microwaves and television sets. Like the President, however, she did not provide any evidence, and later said she was speaking generally about surveillance.

Reason's Republicans: Now more Kellyannish!
https://tinyurl.com/hdaor4g

[CooterBrown]

Why is he discussing the content of intelligence reports with the public? You SAD! cuck

[american socialist]

He should show evidence i think (im not sure what there is and if there may be a reason for not showing it). But it was not a good move

Anyway the nyt on 1 19 specifically talked about his associates wire tapped

Re: Trump accuses Obama of wiretapping him before election

"The F.B.I. is leading the investigations, aided by the National Security Agency, the C.I.A. and the Treasury Department's financial crimes unit. The investigators have accelerated their efforts in recent weeks but have found no conclusive evidence of wrongdoing, the officials said. One official said intelligence reports based on some of the wiretapped communications had been provided to the White House"

http://tinyurl.com/jsaud2h

[american socialist]

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/20.....a-contacts

"The Guardian has learned that the FBI applied for a warrant from the foreign intelligence surveillance (Fisa) court over the summer in order to monitor four members of the Trump team suspected of irregular contacts with Russian officials. The Fisa court turned down the application asking FBI counter-intelligence investigators to narrow its focus. According to one report, the FBI was finally granted a warrant in October, but that has not been confirmed, and it is not clear whether any warrant led to a full investigation."

[american socialist]

It isnt clear if the guardian is just taking heat st report

[Stickler Meeseeks]

Nick, I imagine trump got the idea by either reading the news accounts in the press himself or listening to others, i.e., Mark Levin, who did.

Forget trump's tweet for a minute and consider the fact the press has been peddling a story about tapping trump due to his links with Russians, that turns out to be essentially unsourced.

It looks like the Washington Pist, NYT, the Guardian and a few others have been making shit up.

[american socialist]

yea not a good look for them. imagine for trump it doesnt matter cause they already hate him anyway. but now this russian collusion story just took a nose dive. i think the dems are worried about what may be found implicating them if there was no evidence of collusion provided he was wiretapped

[Stickler Meeseeks]

Yep, and all the while reason is missing the real story.

[Memory Hole]

If it's true Trump was wiretapped it means FBI agents and James Comey presented a judge with an affidavit of probable cause to show Trump had committed a crime and that judge found the affidavit credible enough to issue the warrant. It means somewhere there's an affidavit alleging criminal activity with Trump's name on it.

[Sevo]

Memory Hole|3.13.17 @ 9:59PM|#
"If it's true Trump was wiretapped it means FBI agents and James Comey presented a judge with an affidavit of probable cause to show Trump had committed a crime and that judge found the affidavit credible enough to issue the warrant. It means somewhere there's an affidavit alleging criminal activity with Trump's name on it."

Uh, yeah, of course it means all of that. Absolutely!

[MarkLastname]

Why would a guy who purports to distrust the media so much incredulously blurt outrage most fantastical stories and dramatize them? I think it's clearly an attempt to keep people distracted from him, and it didnt really work.

In any case, maybe that's the media's revenge: they can say random shit and they know Trump will just repeat it; they'll have him stepping in shit nonstop for four years.

Donald really is turning out to be like a cartoonish version of Lyndon Johnson personality wise; and Johnson was already a cartoon.

[Fascist loofa-faced shitgibbon]

"Why would a guy who purports to distrust the media so much incredulously blurt outrage most fantastical stories and dramatize them?"

5 dimensional chess. Try to keep up.

[american socialist]

Uh it is bit different as they were pushing collusion based on intel gathering and sources. After those claims they started walking back that narrative as they realized it looks bad very bad for them if spied on

[DanO.]

Lyin' Don Trump fooled Reason's Republicans and others like them, and that's all that matters. They will never fully recover from the Obama trauma. This is their revenge on America: a perpetual, self-imposed delusion.

[Damned]

"Steve King Disses Immigrants"?

"David Duke embraces Steve King"

[Dark Lord of the cis]

"why the GOP is screwing up Obamacare replacement"

Because they're actually trying to replace it. What they should do instead
1. Kill it with fire.
2. Put the fire out with gasoline.
3. Rinse and repeat with the rest of the Federal laws as necessary.

[Rufus The Monocled]

Yeh. Scrap it, start over, and get input from both parties this time around.

[DenverJ]

Obamacare and the elephants:
1. Obama left them a ticking turd time bomb, but he was also well aware that, once an entitlement is over a year old, it's impossible to kill it
2. If the elephants don't deliver, their base will be pissed. They are already talking "rino, pussies, etc". There will be a bloodbath/insurrection/ new Ross Perot to split the vote and elect Elizabeth Warren
3. I was impressed with Trump. He said that, politically, it would be best for the Republican party to not touch Obamacare for a yr and let it collapse and premiums continue to rise, then replace it. But, he said, that would be bad for the American people, so it should be fixed now.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

How's this for marketing tagline for the replacement: "If you like your Obamacare, you can keep your Obamacare."

[buybuydandavis]

This is why the first move must be based on the reconciliation process. No Dem is going to take a straight up vote to overturn Obamacare.

Once Obamacare is gutted in key aspects with RyanCare, it will be easier to peel off Dem votes for a true replacement.

[DenverJ]

Is the login down at glibertarians? I'm having trouble logging in.

[DenverJ]

Nevermind 😉

[VG Zaytsev]

It's good to,see the Cosmos out themselves as proggies by getting the vapors over the allegation that the federal government spied on a private citizen

Cause the libertarian moment is all about blindly trusting top men in the federal government, especially the spies.

[yenowa]

just as Gerald implied I am in shock that a person able to earn $7711 in 1 month on the computer . go now??????O Big Job Big Currency

[Roger Wilco]

Why does it always take so long for these to hit itunes?