Lazy Saturday Reads: Temporary Burnout Edition
Posted: July 21, 2018 | Author: bostonboomer | Filed under: Foreign Affairs, morning reads, Republican politics, U.S. Politics |
Andrew Wyeth
Good Morning!!
Once again, I’ve hit a wall. I simply can’t take it anymore. Has this been the worst week in the Trump administration? I don’t know. Every week is horrible. I don’t think I can write anything coherent today, so I’ll just share some random stories that caught my attention this morning.
The Wall Street Journal describes White House staff efforts to get Trump to act like a president of the U.S instead of a dupe of the Russian government.
For much of the White House, Mr. Trump’s conduct at the news conference with Mr. Putin on Monday was wholly unexpected. Administration officials ahead of the summit had crafted a plan for Mr. Trump to confront Mr. Putin on Russia’s electoral interference, officials said.
Before the summit, Mr. Trump had authorized the Justice Department to release an indictment of 12 Russians who allegedly hacked into Democratic computers during the 2016 campaign, agreeing it would strengthen his hand when he raised the issue of election interference, a White House official said.
Afternoon in the garden-Diane Leonard
In preparatory meetings, Mr. Trump and his aides discussed using the indictment to forcefully make the case. The plan was for Mr. Trump to invoke the indictment both in private meetings and in the public news conference afterward, a White House official said. The idea, the official said, was to “shove it in Putin’s face and look strong doing it,” depicting it as hard evidence of Russian crimes against America’s electoral process.
“He did the exact opposite,” the official said. During the news conference, Mr. Trump appeared to side with Mr. Putin over U.S. intelligence agencies, saying he saw no reason why Russia would have interfered in the election. On Tuesday, he said he meant to say he saw no reason why Russia wouldn’t have interfered….
“It was a well laid-out plan. Unfortunately, he didn’t execute on it,” the official said.
Mr. Trump’s performance at the summit and afterward complicates plans for the midterm elections, a White House official said.
White House aides had begun preparations to make Mr. Trump the public face of planned efforts by the administration to stop election interference in the midterms. Mr. Trump would be shown presiding over meetings and making announcements about an administration-wide commitment to safeguard the 2018 elections. In the wake of the Putin summit, Mr. Trump may struggle to credibly make the case that he is spearheading the effort to protect U.S. election systems, the official said.
These people are either lying or delusional.
The Washington Post: Russia continues to shape narrative of Helsinki summit.
Russia provided additional details Friday of what it said were agreements made at the presidential summit in Helsinki this week, shaping a narrative of the meeting with no confirmation or alternative account from the Trump administration.
Not surprisingly, the Russian story line tended to favor the Kremlin’s own policy prescriptions, at times contradicting stated administration strategy.
Lucy Hessel Reading – Edouard Vuillard, 1924
Russia already has sent formal proposals to Washington for joint U.S.-Russia efforts to fund reconstruction of war-ravaged Syria and facilitate the return home of millions of Syrians who fled the country, following “agreements reached” by President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, Col. Gen. Mikhail Mizintsev, the three-star head of the Russian National Defense Management Center, said Friday.
Mizintsev, speaking in Moscow at a joint session of planners from the Defense and Foreign Ministries, said that Russia had already begun work I gon the ground in both areas but that additional resources and international coordination are needed.
Russia’s U.S. ambassador, Anatoly Antonov, said separately that Syria had been the primary topic in the Trump-Putin conversations, along with “the removal of the concerns that the United States has regarding the well-known claims about alleged interference in the elections.” [….]
Asked about Russian claims that agreements had been reached, a National Security Council spokesman said: “As President Trump stated, the two sides agreed that their national security council staffs will follow up on the presidents’ meetings, and these discussions are underway. There were no commitments to undertake any concrete action, beyond agreement that both sides should continue discussions.”
I guess Trump is still refusing to tell anyone what happened in the meeting. Maybe he can’t remember?
Vanity Fair: There Is A Reason We Tried To Kill This: After Helsinki, The Deep State Fears Trump Cannot Be Saved.
As much as official Washington has become numb to the daily offenses of Donald Trump, there was something uniquely disturbing about the president’s transgressions in Helsinki. After months of combating Trump’s attempts to align himself with Vladimir Putin, the president was alone and unguarded with the man he had long sought to meet. National Security Adviser John Bolton, among other Russia hawks, had traveled with Trump to Finland in preparation for the summit. But when Trump and Putin entered the gilded Hall of State at the Presidential Palace for a joint press conference, the result was a shocking display of servility. Repudiating the hardline positions of his aides and advisers, Trump exonerated Putin for hacking the 2016 election—and put the blame on “foolish” Americans for driving the United States and Russia apart.
Albrecht Samuel Anker
Days later, insiders who know Bolton are still struggling to explain how the man who’s advocated violent regime change in Iraq, Iran, and North Korea could have allowed his boss to bend the knee before one of America’s greatest geopolitical adversaries. “I’m stumped,” said a former high-ranking State Department official. “The John Bolton I remember from the past was a strong hawk. So either he’s changed, or the president isn’t listening to him or taking his advice on how to deal with Russia.” A second erstwhile colleague, also a former senior State Department official, concurred. “The John Bolton I know would have been more horrified than I am over what happened,” this person told me. “I mean, he must just be pulling his forelock practically out of his head in order to maintain the ‘Oh you’re so great’ and ‘Mr. President, oh you’re the best.’ That’s the only thing that works with this birdbrain, and he must be doing it over and over and over again.”
“Birdbrain.” I haven’t seen that synonym for “moron” lately.
Bolton isn’t the only senior Trump adviser who has been sidelined or subordinated. Defense Secretary James Mattis, an outspoken critic of Moscow, has not appeared in public or made any comments since Monday’s press conference, and the Pentagon has been unable to answer questions about the summit….
As the post-summit fallout continues, however, these foot soldiers of the Deep State are coming to a chilling realization: nobody has any control over Trump—including Trump himself. For the legion of national-security, diplomatic, and military officials trying to smile while white-knuckling through the Trump presidency, Helsinki was a wake-up call. As a current administration official explained, Trump seems to believe that he alone can sit down with dictators and strongmen like Putin and Kim Jong Un to remake the world order—and experts and advisers will only slow him down.
Hey, he told us at the GOP convention: he believes that he alone can fix it.
Paul Waldman at The Washington Post: The entire Republican Party is becoming a Russian asset.
In the past few days, President Trump has given at least some Republicans reason to express displeasure over his relationship with Russia. First he performed a pathetic ritual of subservience before Vladimir Putin, standing beside the Russian leader — after a private meeting between the two, which no aides were permitted to attend — and dismissing the copious evidence of a Russian attack on the 2016 election in deference to Putin’s word.
Asta Nørregaard (1853-1933) Woman Reading, 1889
Then we learned that Putin had suggested that we make Americans available to the Kremlin for questioning, including Michael McFaul, the former U.S. ambassador to Russia, in exchange for allowing us to question some of the agents who carried out the cyberattack. Trump had called it “an incredible offer,” and the White House said he was considering it, before finally backing down after the Senate unanimously passed a resolution condemning the idea.
But look past the modest number of Republicans saying that Trump has gone a bit too far here or there, and you see a very different picture. The truth is that the entire GOP is well on its way to becoming a Russian asset.
Read the rest at the WaPo.
Dana Millbank at The Washington Post: Trump sees dead people. And they talk.
A few weeks ago, while posthumously honoring a World War II hero, Trump gave the man’s family a report on their departed loved one. He was “looking down from Heaven, proud of this incredible honor, but even prouder of the legacy that lives on in each of you. So true.”
A few weeks before that, at what was billed as a celebration of patriotism at the White House, Trump reported to the crowd that fallen soldiers are pleased with his economic policies and increases in the stock market. “Many of them are looking down right now at our country, and they are proud,” he said.
Sometimes, Trump pinpoints the location of the deceased, using some psychic GPS. At an outdoor Medal of Honor ceremony in May for soldiers lost at a battle in Afghanistan, Trump pointed at a location in the sky and said, “They are looking down right now.” A week before that, outside the Capitol, Trump pointed to a point in the sky over his head and told the family of a slain police detective: “So she’s right now, right there. And she’s looking down.”
Long Liyou
Occasionally, something must get lost in the cloud and Trump receives a heavenly miscommunication. Speaking to a steelworker at the White House in March, Trump informed the man: “Your father, Herman, he’s looking down, and he’s very proud of you right now.”
“Oh, he’s still alive,” the steelworker said.
“Then he’s even more proud of you,” Trump said.
More examples at the WaPo link.
At The New York Times, Maggie Haberman whines about all the nasty people on Twitter who make her feel bad about herself.
I woke up last Sunday morning feeling anxiety in my chest as I checked the Twitter app on my phone, scrolling down to refresh, refresh, refresh. There was a comment I started to engage with — I opened a new post, tapped out some words, then thought better of it and deleted the tweet. The same thing happened repeatedly for the next two hours.
The evening before, I had complained to a close friend that I hated being on Twitter.It was distorting discourse, I said. I couldn’t turn off the noise. She asked what was the worst that could happen if I stepped away from it.
There was nothing I could think of. And so just after 6 p.m. last Sunday, I did.
After nearly nine years and 187,000 tweets, I have used Twitter enough to know that it no longer works well for me. I will re-engage eventually, but in a different way.
I really hope she just stays away. Haberman represents everything that is negative about the mainstream media and access “journalism.” I’ll keep right on ignoring her inane gossip columns whether she “reengages” or not.
That’s all I’ve got. I hope you all have a relaxing weekend.
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Mona (aka Wonk the Vote)
It is becoming almost untenable to watch, listen, and read the news without creating a sense of utmost anxiety within one’s self.
It has become a daily barrage of horribleness that I have ever witnessed in my lifetime. The very idea of checks and balances has become almost non existent as this bumbling fool staggers across the global stage saying and doing exactly what he wants without a barrier to rein him in.
Most striking of all are those who still defend and support this “birdbrain” who is the greatest threat to democracy and our way of life then anyone or anything that has come before. The GOP leadership has proven their complicity over and over to the point that summons our helplessness in what is transpiring before our eyes.
It is not only that he is incompetent, inexperienced, and unintelligent, it is that these descriptions are applauded and cheered by a segment of the population who refuse to question his behavior. Anyone else holding any job exhibiting these behaviors would be fired!
We are at the mercy of a man child too ignorant to recognize his own shortcomings to ever have been this position. He has no boundaries, no common sense, no interest beyond himself. He has put down every treaty, policy, and institution that we rely upon to shape our destiny. He has put the environment at risk. So too our trade agreements. He has insulted our allies and weakens our place in the world while praising dictators and murderers who wish us harm.
He is “befriending” a man he knows full well to have tampered with our election and kissed the ass of another man threatening us with nuclear war. He lies repeatedly and his word cannot be trusted yet we are told that 85% of the GOP voters still remain onboard with him.
I am at a point that I feel often enough to take a break from this insanity but I am drawn back hoping that maybe today the damn will break and he will be held accountable.
But truthfully I doubt that day will come. We are stuck in this quagmire that seems bottomless.
It is exhausting.
Birdbrain, pinhead and chowderhead are my favorite epithets.
I wish I had one tenth of the self regard of legacy hire Maggie Haberman.
She’s so full of herself. She start out at the NYT Post and probably got the NYT job because of her father Clyde Haberman. So many in the elite media are legacies.
https://www.nytimes.com/by/clyde-haberman
No “probably” about it! A perfect example of nepotism.
Roz in NJ/NYC
BB, is your mom out of the hospital?
Sorry, I meant to update my news. My mom is moving to a rehab facility today so she can get more physical therapy. They don’t know how long she will be there–from a few days to a couple of weeks maybe.
Sounds like a good thing. Best wishes to her and to you.
Thanks
Good that she’s getting more therapy, and much nicer to do it in a rehab facility instead of in the acute-care setting.
Dopes and dupes!
That WSJ article was stunning … haven’t they come to realize they need to just keep him on the golf course and away from anything related to doing the job of the President? And, can’t they keep him away from Putin.
Thank you for writing when you have so much pressure BB.
The word delusional came to me even before I read your text. White House staff are lying or in deep pathological denial.
The VF headline is hardly better. What ever made anyone in the administration think Trump could change.
These folks are lying or just not very bright.
Or both.
If Hillary thinks we should still be optimistic, I will try.
March 2016 call-in interview w/Morning Joe.
“I’m speaking with myself, number one, because I have a very good brain,” Trump said in a call to the show, inviting viewers to picture two poorly coiffed Trumps in deep conversation. “I’ve said a lot of things … I speak to a lot of people, but my primary consultant is myself, and I have a good instinct for this stuff.”
When Maya Angelou counseled, “when someone tells you who he is, believe him the first time” (paraphrase), not nearly enough of us believed her!
The thing that amazes me is that 30% of the adult population seemed to have completely lost their ability to sense a con game. I’m with Whitney and Dolly on this one … “I believe the children are our future …” They appear to be less bigoted than the old folks.