With Michael Flynn now officially taken out and the sweet taste of success fresh on their palate, the mainstream media is setting its sites on other current and former senior officials connected to Trump's White House and his campaign. As The Hill pointed out last night, The New York Times first reported that intercepted phone calls and phone records show that several aides and allies to President Trump's campaign were in repeated contact with senior Russian intelligence officials.
That said, in what has become the journalistic norm in the post-Trump era, the NYT's reporting was again anonymously sourced, devoid of facts and even admitted way at the end of the article that there was "no evidence" of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.Current and former officials that spoke with the Times would not give many details, and it's not clear exactly who, both from the U.S. and Russia, were part of the conversations or what they talked about, including if discussions centered on Trump himself.
Officials told the publication that they have seen no evidence of collusion in regards to hacking or the election.
Three of the four current and former officials who spoke with the Times said the contacts were discovered during the same time that U.S. intelligence agencies were investigating Russia's extensive hacking campaign, later determined to be aimed at helping Trump win the White House.
Alas, no lack of facts or tangible evidence is sufficient to slow the advance of the media's Russian-hacking narrative which now seems to be shifting it's focus to Paul Manafort, Trump's former campaign manager. As we noted back in August 2016 (see "Trump Campaign Chairman Paul Manafort Resigns"), Manafort abruptly resigned from Trump's campaign following media reports that he had funding links to the Ukraine.
Now courtesy of more evidence-free reporting from CNN and The New York Times, Manafort is once again having to answer for allegations that he "had been in frequent contact with Russian intelligence officials" during the 2016 campaign. Per the FT:
“I have never had any involvement with Putin or the Russian government on any matter,” Mr Manafort told the FT. “Furthermore, I have never knowingly spoken to Russian intelligence officers and I have never been involved in any projects that include the Russian government or the Putin administration or parties acting in concert with or on behalf of the Russian government.”
“Reports of my involvement in Russia or with the Russian government or its agents, directly or indirectly, before, during or after the presidential campaign are categorically false.”
Meanwhile, Trump has responded to the growing hysteria with yet another tweet storm this morning saying that "the fake news media is going crazy with their conspiracy theories and blind hatred" while once again noting that the "real scandal here is that classified information is illegally given out by "intelligence" like candy."
The fake news media is going crazy with their conspiracy theories and blind hatred. @MSNBC & @CNN are unwatchable. @foxandfriends is great!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump)
This Russian connection non-sense is merely an attempt to cover-up the many mistakes made in Hillary Clinton's losing campaign.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump)
Information is being illegally given to the failing @nytimes & @washingtonpost by the intelligence community (NSA and FBI?).Just like Russia
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump)
The real scandal here is that classified information is illegally given out by "intelligence" like candy. Very un-American!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump)
Unsurprisingly, Democrats and John McCain have seized on the opportunity to exploit the media's latest smear campaign to the maximum extent possible.
Democrats have pounced on the scandal as their first real opportunity to hammer the White House, while some Republicans have expressed unease. Senator John McCain, the Arizona Republican and a tough Russia hawk, said the episode was a “troubling indication of the dysfunction of the current national security apparatus” and raised “further questions about the Trump administration’s intentions toward Mr Putin’s Russia”.
Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee, said reports the White House had been briefed on Mr Flynn’s calls weeks ago raised “deeply troubling questions” and that the public needed to know whether Mr Flynn had been asked to make the calls. Roy Blunt, a Republican member of the committee, said investigators should pursue the case until “nobody wonders whether there was a stone left unturned”.
If only the New York Times and CNN could have been so diligent in their coverage of the actual facts surrounding Hillary's many scandals throughout last year, perhaps Bernie could have had a legitimate run at the White House.
