Ol' Man River

Trump on Comey:  Yesterday, Trump sat down for an interview with NBC’s Lester Holt.  Given the uproar around the firing of now ex-FBI Director Comey, Trump probably should have played golf instead.  Holt, on the other hand, was the beneficiary of fortuitous timing.   Trump dispensed with the fiction that Comey had been fired for mishandling Clinton’s emails, confirming it was his decision to fire Comey and that the nonsense about him acting on the advice of Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein was just spin.  He added that Comey was a “show boater” and a “grandstander,” was not up to the job, and was not respected by his FBI agents, before getting to the real reason:  that he was wasting time on the Russia investigation, because this “Russia thing is just a hoax," and a made-up story.  When asked if Comey had really assured him three times that he was not a subject of the investigation, Trump said absolutely and then recounted a conversation the two had at their introductory dinner where he says Comey asked to stay on as director and Trump in turn asked if he was under investigation.  Trump seemed not to realize that if the conversation really took place as described, then he can be accused of interfering in the Russia investigation by inferring that Comey would keep his job only if he kept Trump out of the probe’s cross eyes.  It was also reported that Trump asked Comey for his loyalty and that Comey instead responded that he couldn’t promise loyalty but would promise the truth.  Makes you wonder how Comey lasted as long as he did.  As to the other two times that Comey assured him he wasn’t the subject of the investigation, Trump was a little vague but did say that one of those times involved a phone call he initiated to ask Comey for an investigation update.  At last sighting Comey was puttering around his yard, but at some point he may shed light on his conversations with Trump.

Others on Comey:  Moments after the Holt interview, with Spicer still on reserve duty or on permanent hiatus, Sarah Huckabee Sanders held sway at a testy daily news conference where she was deservedly beaten up by the press corps for Wednesday’s lies about Comey’s dismissal.  Continuing with her audition for Trump’s next press secretary, she had no problem pivoting to the new justification.  She doubled down on Comey’s popularity by citing how she’d spoken with countless fictional FBI agents who were really happy to see him go.  Later in the day, Trump’s tentative plans to visit FBI headquarters to rally “his” troops were cancelled when he was told to stay away because the agents, largely Republican voters, were not all that interested in seeing him.  Senators Burr and Warner strongly pushed back on Trump’s suggestion that Comey was a “show boater” saying that if anything he was more of an earnest boy scout. Later they met with Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein in the SKIFF (cone of silence) where it was reported that Rosenstein said he would take appointing a special counsel under consideration.  A large part of his evaluation probably depends on how much he needs his job and whether or not he qualifies for his government pension. So far, no additional comments from Vice President Pence who advanced the Clinton email justification several times on Wednesday.  Either Pence is an accomplished liar or once again he was left holding the bag or both.  He was last seen humming the tunes to Showboat.  Some Republicans have suggested that Obama’s ill-fated Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland would be a perfect candidate for director of the FBI, but that is probably more a backdoor way of opening up a circuit court seat for another right wing judge than an endorsement of Garland.  

Commission on Mythical Voter Fraud:  The “skinny” budget includes sharp cuts for children’s after school meals but plenty for new commissions.  Yesterday, Trump signed another one of his Executive Orders.  This one directs the creation of the promised voter fraud commission. The “bipartisan” commission is supposed to also look into voter suppression but given its leadership that is unlikely.  It will be vice chaired by Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach,  a major proponent of stringent voter ID laws, some of which have been declared unconstitutional by the courts, who also claims that Hillary won New Hampshire because thousands of Massachusetts voters hopped buses to cast votes there during the 2016 election.  It’s not clear that anything concrete will come out of the commission or whether it is just gives Trump another “bragging point” for his 200 day celebration and a check mark for Bannon’s office white board.

Economics 101:  In an interview with the Economist, Trump showed that his understanding of the economy rivals his comprehension of the health care system.  He misstated the Canada-US trade balance, said the US had the highest tax burden in the world, we don’t, and took credit for coining the old expression “prime the pump.”  Though he acknowledged that his tax plan would increase the deficit, he said that the economy would grow so fast that the effect would last only two years, which conflicts with the expectations of his economic advisers who earlier proposed pushing their tax plan projection period out to twenty years because in a best case scenario that’s how long it would take for the US to grow out of the deficits his plan would create.  He also said that his plan wouldn’t result in tax cuts for the wealthy because he would be getting rid of so many of their deductions. His spin is great, but once again none of it is true.  Has he read the one page plan?  Has anyone sat down and explained it to him?