When Lauer ran through just a few of Putin’s offenses, including his alleged involvement in the hacking of the Democratic party’s computers, Trump responded: “Well, nobody knows that for a fact. But do you want me to start naming some of the things that President Obama does at the same time?”
I take a backseat to no one as a critic of Barack Obama, but this is repugnant. Barack Obama has done some terrible, foolish, and deplorable things as president. But all of his transgressions are measured against the standards of our constitutional system and our political culture. For instance, in 2009, the Obama Justice Department outrageously monitored the phone calls and e-mails of my Fox News colleague James Rosen. In order to get the warrants, they hilariously named Rosen a “criminal co-conspirator” of one of his sources. That’s really bad. But it is not the moral equivalent of having Rosen gunned down in the street.
That Donald Trump cannot see such distinctions is no longer shocking. That many of his conservative supporters can’t either grows less shocking by the day.
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