American Tragedy

Tweet Confusion:  For Trump it was a normal day.  He got up early, opened a can of diet coke, turned on Fox and Friends and listened to his valued adviser, conspiracy theorist,  Judge Andrew Napolitano tell him not to reauthorize the FISA warrantless surveillance program.  The shrewd Napolitano, aware that he had Trump’s attention personalized the message, inaccurately informing Trump that his “woes began with unlawful foreign surveillance and unconstitutional domestic surveillance of you” authorized by FISA.  Convinced that Napolitano was right, the clueless Trump then tweeted “House votes on controversial FISA ACT today. This is the act that may have been used, with the help of the discredited phony Dossier, to so badly surveil and abuse the Trump Campaign by the previous administration and others.” House Speaker Ryan freaked, having reached across the aisle to Minority Leader Pelosi to craft the coalition needed for passing the reauthorization legislation, he saw his coalition crumbling.  Pelosi became so concerned that the vote would fail that she advised pulling it for another day.  The panicking Ryan worked the phones,  reminding the befuddled Trump that he, and Mike Pompeo his much loved CIA Director, were supportive of the legislation which covered the part of FISA that targeted foreign actors suspected of planning terrorist acts.  A concerned Chief of Staff Kelly ran to the House floor to reassure bewildered Republicans that despite his tweet Trump was fully on board.  To bolster his case, someone in the White House got Trump to send out another tweet, this one saying “With that being said, I have personally directed the fix to the unmasking process…we need it! Get smart!”  The vote went forward, the House agreed to extend FISA, passing the bill to the Senate but the damage was done.  Having spent days pushing back author Michael Wolff’s assertions that Trump is clueless, easily manipulated by the last person to whisper into his ear and dangerously impulsive, Trump instead proved once again that the Fire and Fury descriptions of him were scarily accurate. Later, an equally confounded Sarah Huckabee Sanders pulled a Sean Spicer by bitterly attacking the press when asked about Trump’s confusing tweet.  And the day had just begun.

Make America White Again:  For a while yesterday it looked like progress had been made on the DACA front.  Senator Flake announced that he, together with a bipartisan group of Senators including Republican Senators Graham and Gardner and Democrats Menendez, Durbin and Bennett, had reached an agreement on immigration that would save the Dreamers while satisfying Trump.  Two members of the giddy group, Graham and Durbin, dashed to the White House to bring Trump, who earlier in the week had publicly announced that he would support any legislation as long as it was infused with love, into the loop. When they arrived at the Oval Office Graham and Durbin were surprised to find themselves outnumbered.  Concerned that Trump would be swayed by “liberal” philosophy, his xenophobic aide Steve Miller had stacked the deck, inviting a group of Republican immigration hardliners, including Arkansas Senator Cotton, Georgia Senator Perdue, Virginia Congressman Goodlatte, Florida Congressman Diaz-Balart and House Majority Leader McCarthy to sit in on the meeting.  After Durbin and Graham detailed their proposal, one that would solve the DACA problem, provide some wall funding and cut the visa lottery that Trump despises, allocating a portion of those visas to some of the people from Haiti, El Salvador and Africa who had recently had their temporary protected status pulled, Trump erupted asking “Why are we having all these people from sh-thole countries come here?”  He then suggested that the US should instead bring in more people from countries like Norway, you know those blonde, tall, Aryan guys.  He went on to further slam Haitians, explicitly stating that he wouldn’t get on board with any deal that allowed anymore Haitians in the country, a statement consistent with one that the NY Times reported he made three weeks ago when he insisted that all Haitians have AIDS, but that also missed the point that the Haitians, like the others displaced by the end of their temporary protected status, were already here and had been for decades. It looks like the earlier NY Times story which had been widely denied by virtually everyone at the White House was accurate. This time no one in the White House denied the description of the immigration discussion or the terms used, instead, a White House spokesman released a statement saying “Certain Washington politician choose to fight for foreign countries, Trump will always fight for the American people.” None of this is surprising, after all Trump is on record hating lots of people who don’t look like him, he’s openly expressed his hatred of Muslims, he’s refused to acknowledge the exoneration of the black men who were wrongly convicted of the Central Park jogger attack, he has an affinity for the KKK and Nazis and believes that there are “fine people on both sides.” The timing of the “leak” about Trump’s racist comment couldn’t have been more perfect, he got the news that his sh-thole comment had gone viral while he was taping a statement to be released on Monday to commemorate civil rights icon Martin Luther King. Condemnation of Trump’s sh-thole comment from lots of Democrats and a smattering of Republicans, including the one Haitian member of Congress, poured in through the evening but Republican leadership remained largely silent, though right wing pundit Ann Coulter applauded the remarks. The DACA negotiations are back to square one and with funds running out soon, a government shutdown looms. And in case there ever was any doubt, Trump truly is a racist sh-t.
     

Human Resources: Since learning that his former BFF Steve Bannon called Don Jr’s meeting with Russian lawyer Natalia Vesilnitskaya a treasonous act, Trump has been looking for an opportunity to apply the treasonous description to someone on the other side.  He’s found his targets, the winners are Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, the senior FBI Agent and lawyer who were transferred off the Russia investigation due to their texts knocking Trump as well as Hillary and Bernie Sanders.  You’d think that Trump, who repeated his calls to change the libel laws would realize that calling Strzok and Page’s sexting treasonous was a step too far, their lawyers have already released statements attacking Trump’s “reckless” accusations. Possibly in response to Trump’s declining popularity, another potential Republican Senatorial candidate has decided not to run against a vulnerable red state Democrat, North Dakota Congressman Kevin Kramer is opting out of running against Senator Heidi Heitkamp.  Kramer had been heavily recruited by both Trump and Senate leader McConnell to run in the state where Trump won 63% of the votes but now has decided to stick with his secure Congressional seat.  With the support of McConnell, Hillbilly Elegy author JD Vance is edging closer to seeking the Republican nomination for Ohio Senator. However, he’s not alone, Trump’s political director, Bill Stepien, is supporting Ohio Congressman Jim Renacci, who just announced that he is running. Though a political neophyte Vance is viewed as the more populist choice, however, he didn’t support or vote for Trump in 2016.  Renacci on the other hand is a vocal Trump supporter, who is far less supportive of McConnell.  To the extent that JD Vance opts in, this could turn into another one of those ugly Republican infights.  The future of Geoffrey Berman, Trump’s pick to serve as US Attorney for the Southern District of New York is growing uncertain. New York Senator Gillibrand plans to use her “blue slip” prerogative to block his Senate confirmation and Judiciary Committee Chairman Senator Grassley, who previously announced that he wanted to do away with blue slips said that he will honor Gillibrand’s slip in this case.  Grassley’s willingness to go along with Gillibrand might have something to do with the fact that Berman previously represented Deutsch Bank, Trump’s only real estate lender.

International Relations:  That figure skating diplomacy appears to have gotten to Trump’s head.  He told the WSJ that he has developed a positive relationship with the Little Rocket Man saying “I probably have a very good relationship with Kim Jong Un, I have relationships with people.  I think you people are surprised.”  Kim Jong Un has a strange way of showing his affinity.  Yesterday North Korea’s government-owned press cited the huge sales of Wolff’s Fire and Fury book as evidence of Trump’s imminent demise and today it was reported that Pyongyang is readying another missile launch site.  Nevertheless to the extent that the Little Rocket Man wants to see Trump anytime soon, Trump may have an opening on his schedule.  His planned trip to London is now officially cancelled. The White House is attributing the change in plans to Trump’s disdain for the location of the new US embassy.  He was supposed to cut the ribbon at the building’s opening ceremony but has now decided that since the building is in a “crappy” location that he never would have selected, he’ll take a pass.  His change in travel plans has absolutely nothing to do with any planned anti-Trump demonstrations or the tepid reception he was likely to receive from the Queen.