King Donald the Last

The Memo:  Once again, the White House is playing games with public perception.  Over the weekend the New York Times published an article detailing the contents of a “leaked” letter that was written by Trump’s legal team and sent to Special Counsel Mueller in January.  Trump tweet attacked the leak but tipped his hand by complaining even before the article was published.  Since Mueller’s team never leaks it’s fair to assume that the White House was once again the source of the leaked information and that this time the leak was part of a strategy to get the administration’s points about presidential powers out in the open.   Crafted by current lawyer Jay Sekulow and former lawyer John Dowd, the letter states the view that since Trump is president he cannot be compelled to testify and goes on to say that, as president, he could not have committed obstruction of justice.  Their argument is that because the president is all powerful, he is constitutionally allowed to fire whoever he wants for whatever reason and that if he wants to end an investigation, even one examining his deeds or misdeeds, that’s just fine.  They also argue that he has the right to command the investigation of his enemies, so if he wants to initiate an investigation into Hillary Clinton, Jim Comey, Andrew McCabe or anyone else who crossed or crosses his path, so be it.  They also defend his pardoning powers, leaving the distinct impression that in addition to pardoning family and friends, he has the power to pardon himself.   To hammer all these points home, Trump’s lawyer/spokesperson Rudy Giuliani made calculated appearances on several of the Sunday morning talk shows.  Giuliani stuck to the Trump as King analogy, saying that Trump was entitled to do anything he wanted.  He did acknowledge that a self-pardon probably was not a good idea from a political standpoint because it could lead to impeachment proceedings but he said not to worry about that because Trump isn’t really considering pardoning himself right now.  He also asserted that Trump had no current plans to fire Mueller.  As to the self-pardoning thing former NJ Governor Chris Christie said the same thing, it would lead to impeachment.  The letter to Mueller also provided some revealing information about the Don Jr letter that was crafted to “explain” away the Trump tower meeting between Don Jr, Paul Manafort, Jared Kushner and Natalia Veselnitskaya and her merry band of Russian cohorts. Despite the fact that Sekulow had previously asserted on national TV that Trump had nothing to do with the crafting of the duplicitous Trump tower meeting letter, an assertion that was repeated by Sarah Huckabee Sanders,  the missive to Mueller admits that Trump dictated the contents of Don Jr’s explanation because as King, oops I mean president, he gets to do stuff like that.  It’s notable that Sekulow has no problem lying but knows better than to lie to Mueller.  As to lying, though the party line remains that Trump is considering meeting with Mueller and may even be practicing for an interview, the reality is that none of his lawyers think that would be a good idea mostly because they know that, unlike Sekulow, he would lie to Mueller, repeatedly.  They are prepared to take their argument that Trump’s testimony can’t be subpoenaed all the way to the Supreme Court, even if that means delaying the end of the Mueller investigation.  As to that investigation, Speaker of the House wannabee Kevin McCarthy, the Congressman who is likely to succeed Paul Ryan if the Republicans maintain control of the House, argued that the investigation has gone on too long, pushing the conclusions of the delusional and complicit House Intelligence Committee that there has been no collusion and no obstruction.  When asked about Jay Sekulow’s public lie about the drafting of the Trump Tower letter by CNN’s Dana Bash, McCarthy tried hard to ignore the question by smirking and pivoting to the economy and employment rate.  To her credit Bash called McCarthy’s attempt at a pivot out, repeating her question about the Sekulow lie several times.  McCarthy maintained his characteristic smirk but never responded. To the extent that he becomes speaker, McCarthy will be third in line for the presidency.                 

Singapore Summit: It’s looking more and more likely that the summit between Trump and Kim Jong Un will take place on June 12  as scheduled.  That said, expectations about the outcome have been downgraded from achieving denuclearization to the achievement of a historic and well-publicized meet and greet, one that will leave both leaders grinning from ear to ear.  Trump will look like a great deal maker, even though no deal is expected and Kim Jong Un will receive the validation and world recognition he so keenly wants, after all its not every day that the leader of a barely third world nuclear power gets a meeting with the leader of the free world.  Politico reports that negotiating with the North Koreans is a “buzzsaw” experience saying that you have to “expect lies” and “do your homework, because they will have.”  That you have to “choose your words very carefully” and have “Job-like patience.”  Lastly, they say that you have to remember that  Kim Jong Un considers himself a “supreme being.” With regard to the lies and the supreme being thing, Trump will be in familiar territory, it’s the preparation, choice of words and patience parts that will present him with a bigly problem.  At best, the summit will be the beginning of a series of meetings and a prolonged period of negotiation.  As to North Korea, reports are that the very visible shut down of their nuclear test site may have been mostly smoke and mirrors as initial scientific analysis indicates that the site has not been destroyed.  Despite all this, Trump is so anxious to see the summit take place, that he left John Bolton out of last Friday’s meeting with Kim Jong Un’s senior emissary, the Hermit Kingdom’s shrewd and murderous spy chief, to reduce the possibility of Bolton issuing an ultimatum or otherwise saying something that would cause meeting plans to go by the wayside.  It’s also reported that the White House is trying to figure out a way to subsidize Kim Jong Un’s hotel costs during his Singapore stay because the guy whose regime managed to come up with the funds necessary to build a nuclear arsenal is short of the hard currency needed to pay for his stay?  As to Kim Jong Un, he remains busy, last week he met with Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov and now reports are that he plans to host Syrian henchman Bashar al-Assad.  The optics of that are awful, two despicable and murderous leaders meeting in the run up to the summit while their respective citizens starve, suffer and are subjected to chemical poisoning.  It’s fair to surmise that their meet-up was orchestrated by Lavrov and Putin who want to make it clear that the Kremlin is still pulling some, if not all, of the strings.    

White House Intrigue:  Melania Trump, who has been MIA for over twenty days purportedly because she is in recovery from a minor kidney embolization procedure will not be accompanying Trump on his upcoming trip to Quebec for the G7 meetings, nor does she plan to travel to Singapore for the summit meeting with Kim Jong Un.  She also didn’t attend last weekend’s family soiree at Camp David, one that even included the frequently ignored other daughter, Tiffany.  Theories about her absence abound, with some suggesting that she’s moved in with the Obamas and others praying that she’s cooperating with Mueller.  A CNBC reporter said that he saw her walking around the White House sporting a pair of really dark glasses, a sighting that indicates she hasn’t jumped the Trump ship, yet.  In response to all the intrigue, the White House announced that Melania will attend a private meeting with Gold Star families today, one that won’t include cameras or press.  Reading between the lines, I’ll put my money on some sort of plastic surgery, rather than a sudden attack of conscience, an impending divorce, or serious illness as the reason for her prolonged absence from the cameras.  As to that meeting in Canada, something that is far more important than Melania’s status, expect it to be rocky.  None of the attendees are all that pleased with the Trump administration’s tariff plans.  Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau said that it is “unacceptable” and “insulting” for Trump to impose tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum by justifying them as necessary to protect US national security.  He rightfully points out that Canada is the US’s longest and most loyal ally.  He also points out that the two nations’ automobile industries are intertwined and that the tariffs will raise costs and negatively impact jobs on both sides of the border.   Trump, who previously bragged to donors about a conversation with Trudeau where he had made up a trade deficit with Canada that didn’t exist, responded with campaign rhetoric, saying that the days of Mexico and Canada “taking advantage” of the US are over.   As to the renegotiation of the NAFTA trade agreement, Trudeau reports that the countries were close to finalizing a deal until Trump’s team insisted on a five year sunset provision, something that Trudeau views as a no-go in part because it would be a deal killer to corporations considering Canadian capital investments.  Suffice it to say, that even if Trump is really planning to include Martha Stewart on his pardon list, it’s not a good thing to pick fights with your besties while cozying up to despots.