In Defense of Donald Trump -- The Flynn Affair

The forced resignation of national security advisor, Michael Flynn, has delivered to Trump the first major challenge to his presidency.  Up to now there's been a lot of ridiculous confrontations.  There's been the issue of the extent to which Trump should disengage from his many and varied businesses.  There's been his wife's women's fashion business and extravagant claims he's made regarding various matters more central to his presidency.  But the Flynn matter is more serious.

The Flynn matter concerns the conversations that Flynn had with the Russian government at a time when Obama was still president.  Those conversations violated an old U.S. statute that has never been subjected to court tests.  The second question is to what extent did Trump, then still not president, knew of Flynn's conversations with the Russians, thereby potentially becoming complicit in the violation of those laws.

These issues tie into the internal hacking of conversations of American leaders at the time leading up to the election and the extent to which Russia used those hacked conversations  in order to tilt the election in favor of Trump and against the Democrats.

The last issue strikes me as the easiest to deal with.  Sure, the Russians hacked into U.S. internet communications.  The Chinese also hack into our conversations as do other nations, and as also does the U.S.  If hacking is a crime, we find ourselves with a very long list of potential criminals.

Let's try to tease these issues apart.

1. Hacking is a hostile act.  It may under circumstances be justifies and under other circumstances not be justified.  But, it is an act unlikely to be ended by scolding perpetrators.  The only meaningful response is to do superior hacking of our enemies and to establish practices and technological defenses against hacking.  At the time of the elections, all parties  should have been keenly aware of the threat of hacking.  Hadn't Hillary occupied the position of Secretary of State?  Had she not been aware of this very real threat?  In the face of this well understood threat, why did she act so negligently?

2. The hacking of governmental conversations by entities within our government verges on treason.  In this category also falls leaking of state secrets.  The press and other opposition to Trump seems to glory in the practice of such hacking and leaking; especially, if it can generate ammunition to fire against Trump.

The Flynn matter revolves primarily around Flynn not being truthful to V.P. Pence.  But, why was Flynn being duplicitous?  Was it because he was trying to build a wall around Trump?  Had he been truthful with Pence, it would have implied that Trump knew what Flynn was doing.  Indeed, it might have suggested that Flynn was doing what Trump had asked him to do.  That would have created a problem for Trump, who, at the time, was only president-elect, not president.

But as Americans, we should ask ourselves what sort of a crime was this?  Note the following:
1. Presidents often usurp the power of Congress.  For example, only Congress can declare war.  However, Truman's police action in Korea was clearly a war despite not being declared that by Congress.  JFK sending military observers to Vietnam marked the entry of the U.S. into that quagmire.  However, it was not declared a war until well into LBJ's term as president, when Congress enacted the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution.

2. Presidents sometimes violate acts of Congress.  Consider the Iran-Contra matter: Pres. Reagan had two objectives (a) Fund the Contras fighting the Sandinistas.  This was, of course, in direct opposition to the wishes of Congress.  And (b) obtain the release of prisoners held by Hizbollah by supplying arms to Iran.

Reagan achieved a portion of some of his aims at a very high cost.  He did free hostages, but new ones were taken.  As for the Nicaraguans:  The Sandinistas prevailed.

What Trump tried to do with the Russians was to see whether a deal could be struck.  The opposition from Obama holdovers managed to throw a wrench into what Trump was attempting to find out vis a vis the Russians.  It is possible he may still arrive at a deal with the Russians, but there will be more testing on both sides.  Suffice it to say that the opposition to Trump in this matter has not been helpful to American interests.