Ah, the old air-quotes defense. According to Spicer's new argument, Trump didn't necessarily mean wiretapping when he said “wire tapping” — and reporters should know this because he put the phrase in quotation marks. By “wire tapping,” Trump could have been referring to any one among “a whole host of surveillance types.” Obviously.

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This is quite a remarkable standard Spicer is trying to set for his boss. None of the “several reports” Spicer referenced actually claim that Trump or his aides were wiretapped, despite claims to the contrary. Fox News Channel's Steve Doocy said on the air Monday morning that “there's no doubt about the fact that at least Michael Flynn was wiretapped,” and counselor to the president Kellyanne Conway said on CNN a short time later that “we know that General Flynn was wiretapped.”

Wrong. The Washington Post reported last month that pre-inauguration phone calls between Flynn, who resigned as national security adviser, and Russia's ambassador to the United States were intercepted by U.S. intelligence agencies because the ambassador was wiretapped. That's a key distinction that the president's aides and media boosters seem determined to obscure.

If Trump has evidence that Flynn or anyone else on his team was bugged, he has not produced it, and news reports do not support his charge against Obama.

But Spicer contended in the briefing room that Trump is nevertheless right by an incredibly loose definition of “wire tapping” that includes a wide range of investigatory tactics.