Testimony and Twitter

Upcoming Testimony:  Tomorrow former FBI Director Comey testifies before the Senate Intelligence Committee and Trump must be really concerned about what he is going to say.  In an attempt to raise doubts about Comey’s truthfulness, Trump’s political action committee has released an attack ad bashing his character and last night Trump had Republican Senators Rubio and Cotton, both members of the Senate Intelligence Committee, over for dinner with a side of backdoor persuasion.  Comey’s testimony isn’t Trump’s only problem. Today, a cast of characters including Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein, acting FBI Director McCabe and NSA Director Mike Rogers are scheduled to testify in front of the Senate Intelligence Committee.  Coats is expected to reveal that following another meeting Trump cleared the room of everyone except for Coats and CIA Director Pompeo, bashed the FBI Flynn investigation and then asked Coats to intervene with Comey to get him to drop the investigation.  It’s possible that Rogers will also have something similar to report and Rosenstein may tell the committee that he has to recuse himself from Mueller’s Russia investigation because of his involvement in Comey’s firing.  That will leave Special Counsel Mueller reporting to a senior judiciary attorney.    

Sessions is On The Outs:  Trump isn’t all that happy with his former buddy AG Jeff Sessions.  He hasn’t forgiven Sessions for recusing himself from the Russia investigation and holds him personally responsible for the events that led to the appointment of Special Counsel Mueller.  Trump has been bashing Sessions to the rest of the White House staff and the two have been overheard screaming at each other.  What an image, the large and doughy Trump going after micro-mini Sessions.  Sessions has even offered to resign which is astonishing given how much fun he has been having trashing civil rights regulations and imprisoning low level drug offenders.  To date Trump hasn’t taken him up on his offer but during yesterday’s press conference when asked about Trump’s commitment to Sessions, Spicer started to stutter and refused to say if the two were still BFFs.  Yesterday it was reported that after Trump tried to convince Comey to ease up on Flynn, Comey told Sessions that he didn’t want to be alone with Trump anymore.  Another great vision, teeny tiny Sessions serving as Trump blocker for the six foot eight Comey.   

Trump Tweets Away:  Yesterday Trump started his day by tweet smacking the “MSM” (main stream media) for questioning his twitter addiction. Then he took credit for Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the UAE’s decision to cut ties with Qatar by tweet, further inflaming the situation and hampering the efforts of  Secretary of State Tillerson who was trying to diffuse the crisis by more traditional diplomatic means.  No question that Qatar is a major source of terrorism funding but it is also the home to 10,000 US troops and a major US Air Force Base that serves as the launching pad for US efforts in the region.  Balance and subtlety are difficult to achieve with 140 character tweets. Unless his team can wrest his phone away or find a secure location with no reception, Trump plans to live tweet during Comey’s Thursday testimony.  So much for twitter restraint.

Those 27 Words:  When he gave his speech to NATO Trump was supposed to say “We face many threats, but I stand here before you with a clear message: the US commitment to the NATO alliance and to Article 5 is unwavering.”  The words were in every draft of the speech up until the end.  Trump’s last minute decision to omit the Article 5 commitment is still reverberating.  Trump’s foreign policy advisers have been spending a lot of time trying to convince international counterparts that what they say matters and won’t be contradicted by Trump.  And yesterday, neighbor to the north Canada said they may have to increase their defense budget to compensate for the diminishing role of the US.  

Trumpcare:  The Senate is all over the place on Trumpcare.  McConnell says he is pushing forward, others say nothing will come of the effort.  One interesting wrinkle that’s been brewing under the surface concerns the provision of Trumpcare that defunds Planned Parenthood.  The Senate parliamentarian, has to opine whether defunding Planned Parenthood is a policy issue or a budget issue.  If she concludes that it is a policy issue, defunding Planned Parenthood would require sixty votes instead of the lower fifty-one vote threshold for budget reconciliation issues.  McConnell knows he can’t get Democrats on board for the sixty votes so depending on the parliamentarian’s decision, he may have to drop the Planned Parenthood provision or separate it into an independent bill.  Just another one of those things that complicates stripping health care services from fifty percent of the population.   

Still No US Attorneys:  Remember when Trump fired all the US Attorneys, including his sometime nemesis Preet Bharara, because he was anxious to get his own team in place.  That was then, this is now.  He still hasn’t nominated a single replacement for any of the ninety-three open positions leaving all of the districts in the hands of acting officials who lack the power of duly-appointed US attorneys.  Another thing that is no doubt being blamed on those obstreperous Democrats.