Improv at Bedminster

Bedminster Improv:  Trump fielded questions from the press at two pop-up press conferences yesterday.  Between golf and a meeting with Vice President Pence, the first one they’d had since the NY Times ran the article that Pence was running a shadow campaign for president “just in case” Trump is impeached or otherwise occupied.  We didn’t hear their conversation, which must have been a wee bit contentious, but we did get to hear Trump opine on a wide variety of topics. Instead of walking back his threats to hit North Korea with “fire and fury” he doubled down, no alliterations this time, just a statement that “it may well be tougher than I said.”  He complimented Russia and China on their decision to vote for UN sanctions, but not before reminding China that they better do more or he will go after their trade imbalance.  He bashed Clinton, Bush, and Obama for failing to do anything about North Korea’s nukes, singling out Clinton who actually did manage to freeze North Korea’s nuclear progress until Bush unwound what he’d done, for some unwarranted extra criticism.  He slammed Senate Majority Leader McConnell, his scape goat du jour, for failing to repeal Obamacare saying he better try again, pass tax reform, and get infrastructure legislation in place, or else, adding that if necessary he will work with Democrats on infrastructure funding.  He kind of, sort of said that he wouldn’t fire Special Counsel Mueller even though the whole Russia investigation is a total waste of time because “everyone says there was no collusion,” the Russians didn’t want him to win and someone should be investigating Hillary, reminding us that he won the election because he ran a cost effective campaign and was the superior candidate.  When asked for a comment about Russia’s expulsion of 755 US diplomats and workers from the US embassy in Moscow, he didn’t say he was angry, didn’t throw shade at Putin, but did express his great appreciation to Putin for  cutting the US payroll, a comment that went over well with the few poor souls still working at the State Department.  Then before running out for another nine holes, he abruptly changed course on the opioid crisis declaring it an emergency and said that banning transgender soldiers from the military was the right thing to do and that all his military leaders know that, even if they say they don’t.  While Trump chattered away, his Chief of Staff General Kelly stood by gasping at many of his comments and his Press Secretary Huckabee Sanders desperately waved a large “one more question” sign in an effort to cut him off.              

Manafort Who:  Trump also answered a few questions about Paul Manafort, his former campaign manager, who he hasn’t spoken to in ages, unless of course you count their daily calls, but not before reminding everyone that Manafort, who was instrumental in his success and had an apartment in Trump Tower, only worked for him for a minute.  He said that he “always found Manafort to be a decent man,” even if he, like a lot of other people, made money providing consulting services to dictators and unscrupulous Russians. He did squeeze in that he thought it wasn’t very nice of the FBI to raid Manafort’s house so early in the morning especially in front of his family. Manafort’s problems continue to multiply, Special Counsel Mueller has subpoenaed all of his banking records.  With the vise tightening, late yesterday Manafort cut ties with his lawyer, a member of Wilmer Hale, Mueller’s former law firm, replacing him with Kevin Downing, from Miller & Chevalier, a law firm that specializes in complicated financial crimes.  An additional interesting factoid about Manafort, he takes credit for being the one who brought the meeting that Donny Jr famously arranged with the “Russian Lawyer” to the attention of the investigators at least two months before Jared Kushner amended his disclosure form to include the meeting.

Oh That Gorka:  Sebastian Gorka is like that cat who keeps coming back.  And right now he is back.  For some unfathomable reason the occasional Nazi is a deputy assistant to the President with a mysterious portfolio that includes all things international.  Yesterday Gorka dismissed Secretary of State Tillerson’s efforts to defuse the North Korean crisis, telling a BBC radio reporter that that “the idea that Secretary Tillerson is going to discuss military matters is simply nonsensical.”  Later in the day, after getting a lot of pushback for his nonsensical comment, Gorka said that the “surreal, horrifying” news reporter had twisted his words, he was really just criticizing that BBC purveyor of fake news for not understanding the difference between the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary of State.  When asked about Gorka’s comments Heather Nauert, the State Department’s Press Secretary and resident Cameron Diaz lookalike, sighed and pointed out that as Secretary of State Tillerson is fourth in line to the Presidency, he carries a big stick and right now that stick is looking for Gorka.        

Afghanistan Plans:  Trump still hasn’t decided what to do about his other inheritance, the seventeen year Afghanistan war.  His generals want more resources to break the current stalemate. Trump’s frustration with the Afghan quagmire is understandable, but his indecisiveness has left the military twiddling their thumbs while waiting for a strategy and is frustrating Senator McCain, Chairman of the Arms Services Committee, so in between chemo therapy and radiation treatments, McCain unveiled his plan to increase US forces in Afghanistan, a rebuke to Trump’s inaction.