April 18, 2018: The Trump Administration Doesn't Know what the Trump Administration is Doing

  

4/18/18: We learn again today. The Trump administration has no idea what the Trump administration is doing. Sometimes we’re getting out of Syria quick. Sometimes we’re hitting Syria with missiles and talking tough. Most of the time, the president is focused on insulting James Comey and couldn’t care less how many of his own people Bashar al-Assad slaughters. 

Sometimes, U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley says we’re going to increase sanctions on Russia. Sometimes the White House says, yeah, we are. Then the White House says, no, we’re not, and the reason Haley said we were was that Ms. Haley got “confused.” Clearly, this is better than admitting Trump has no idea what he wants. 

Cue the idiocy! 

Out steps National Economic Council Director and Head Presidential Cheerleader Larry Kudlow to explain to reporters. Kudlow chooses to ignore reports that it was the president himself who stomped the brakes and suddenly canceled plans, already announced by the White House, to sanction the Russians. It was easy to sort out, said Larry. Haley “got ahead of the curve. She’s done a great job, she’s a very effective ambassador. There might have been some momentary confusion about that,” he explains. 

Ah, poor Nikki Haley, the little lady – she was the problem – it wasn’t President Bloato’s fault!

 

Clearly, getting blamed for the idiocy of others did not sit well with U. N. Ambassador Haley. “With all due respect,” she replied in a statement obtained by Jake Tapper on CNN, “I don’t get confused.” 

In fact, I think we can already see that any promises that might be made to foreign countries by this president are to be trusted to about the same degree as a Donald J. Trump wedding vow. (See: 4/19/18.)

May 12, 2018: A Swamp Filled with Russians

 

5/12/18: When it comes to draining the swamp the Trump administration may not be any worse than previous administrations. It’s definitely no better. And there seems to be a predisposition to help Russian individuals and entities whenever possible. 

CNN reports: 

A former senior campaign and transition aide to President Donald Trump recently inked a deal to help a Russian oligarch’s conglomerate shed sanctions the Trump administration slapped on them last month.

 

Bryan Lanza, who is in regular contact with White House officials, is lobbying on behalf of the chairman of EN+ Group, an energy and aluminum firm presently controlled by Oleg Deripaska…a billionaire who is close to Russian President Vladimir Putin and was the target of US sanctions imposed last month.

 

(Around the 5:30 mark in the clip, above, Lanza insists the Trump campaign had no contacts with Russians – and says U.S. intelligence agrees with that assessment. He’s either lying, or out of the loop entirely. Don Jr., Jared Kushner, Paul Manafort, Rick Gates and Roger Stone had already had serious contacts – they just hadn’t had to fess up in court yet.)

New alligators swimming in the swamp would include people like Corey Lewandowski, Trump's first campaign manager. He started his own Washington consulting business following the election. “Trump doesn’t make a decision without checking with me,” he has told clients who thirst for access. Brian Ballard, Trump’s longtime Florida fundraiser, has also come to town, as has Susie Wiles, who led his campaign in that state. 

And – we have more Russians! 

Former New York Republican Rep. John Sweeney has made more than $200,000 lobbying on behalf of a European pipeline venture owned by Gazprom, the state-controlled Russian natural gas company, according to federal lobbying disclosures. The New York Republican previously worked on Trump’s campaign and assisted with administration hires during the presidential transition.

 

The swampiest creature of all would be Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen. New documents show he began selling his services to the highest bidders almost as soon as Trump finished swearing to uphold the Constitution. Within 24 hours, AT & T had agreed to pay him at least $200,000, in hopes he could smooth a path to an $85 billion merger with Time-Warner. The Swiss pharmaceutical giant, Novartis, did Cohen better, forking out $1.2 million in return for his aid. Other companies chipped in various sums, bringing the haul to $4.4 million. 

By now, of course, we all know that no story about the Trump administration seems complete unless you sprinkle in some Russians. Cohen took $500,000 from a company called Columbus Nova and other entities controlled by Viktor Vekselberg, a close friend of Vladimir Putin. 

Drain that swamp.

BLOGGER’S NOTE (7/7/21): For an in-depth look at how some of these characters go about their business – selling access to foreigners to the U.S. government – and profiting handsomely, see: “Rudy Giuliani is Being Scrutinized for Foreign Lobbying,” by Open Secrets.

February 18, 2019: Stupidity Will Define the Trump Administration

 

2/18/19: Historians will note someday that stupidity was one of the defining features of the Trump administration. 

On Monday, Roger Stone, the latest Trump adviser indicted in the Russia investigation and currently free on bail, decided it would be amusing to post a message and picture on Instagram. It tickled Stone to label the Special Counsel as “Deep State hitman Robert Mueller.” 

Stone must have chortled to himself. So far, so good. This would class as free expression. Next, he posted a photo of the judge who will be handling his case, who had released him Friday on bail, but under a partial gag order. In the corner, crosshairs showed beside the head of District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson.

 

Internet sleuths discovered that this same picture could be found on – among others – a conspiracy website with an anti-Semitic perspective and a pro-Russian site called, “Russia News Now.” 

Russians!! Again! 

Stone soon realized his mistake, or at least his alarmed defense lawyers did. First, he photo-shopped the crosshairs out of the picture. Then he freaked and deleted the whole mess. 

Judge Jackson, however, had been notified. Stone has been ordered to grace her court again Thursday.

 

In other “proof-of-stupid” news, Trump spent the morning at Trump National Golf Club in West Palm Beach. Including Presidents’ Day, he has spent 172 days since taking office at various golf clubs, most of which he owns. This is not criminal stupidity. It is, however, gratuitous stupidity. Mr. Trump used to hate it when President Obama played golf “all the time.” 

When not busy lining up putts, the president tended to focus on tweeting, early, often, and late. One topic especially had him stewing: former Acting F.B.I. Director Andrew McCabe, who was popping up all over cable news. 

For that reason, at 7:15 a.m., in the president’s second tweet of the day, we had this: 

Wow, so many lies by now disgraced acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe. He was fired for lying, and now his story gets even more deranged. He and Rod Rosenstein, who was hired by Jeff Sessions (another beauty), look like they were planning a very illegal act, and got caught.....

 

Fifteen hours later, having spent the afternoon hinting he’d enjoy attacking Venezuela, Trump still had the red ass about McCabe. Trump turned to juvenile stupidity: “Remember this, Andrew McCabe didn’t go to the bathroom without the approval of Leakin’ James Comey!” 

See what he did! “Bathroom.” “Leakin’.” It’s like we have an immature 13-year-old in the Oval Office. 

As for Mr. McCabe, he spent a good part of Monday talking about his new book: The Threat: How the F.B.I. Protects America in the Age of Terror and Trump. First sentence: “Between the world of chaos and the world of order stands the rule of law.” There’s nothing juvenile about that line.

August 12, 2019: F**k Those Fish - Oil and Mining Lobbyist Heads Interior Department

 

8/12/19: The Trump administration decides to weaken protections for endangered species, including humans. 

 

The Trump Extinction Plan. 

First, immigrants who enter the U.S. legally, but are deemed likely to end up requiring government assistance, will be denied permanent residency. Wealthy immigrants will receive green cards and may stay. So, Russian oligarchs can come and buy Trump Tower apartments and other Trump properties with a combined value of $109 million, in laundered cash. 

If you have Irish ancestors, as an example, be glad this policy was not in place in 1848. Because your people – and this blogger’s people – would have been returned to Ireland to starve.

 

____________________ 

“The best available science” is out.

____________________

 

 

As for other endangered species, Interior Secretary David Bernhardt announces plans to gut the Endangered Species Act. First, it will be easier to remove “endangered species” from the list. (The new list will list them as, “Dead.”) 

Second, protections for “threatened species” will be weakened. 

Third, regulators will be allowed to factor in economic costs when deciding whether any species should be protected. 

In other words, people like Bernhardt, a former oil and mining lobbyist, will decide. Hey, these salmon are swimming in a river near where an oil company wants to drill! F**k those fish. 

Drill, baby, drill! 

Bernhardt is who he is, a shill for the oil and mining interests. If every grizzly and every bald eagle in America died, covered in oil, he wouldn’t mind.

What this place needs is an oil well.

 

Environmental groups explode at news of this bizarre new approach. The Sierra Club is blunt in its characterization: 

The Trump Extinction Plan would gut critical endangered species protections by making it much more difficult to extend protections to threatened species, delaying lifesaving action until a species’ population is potentially impossible to save; making it more difficult to protect polar bears, coral reefs, and other species that are impacted by the effects of climate change; allowing economic factors to be analyzed when deciding if a species should be saved; and making it easier for companies to build roads, pipelines, mines, and other industrial projects in critical habitat areas that are essential to imperiled species’ survival.

 

The Audubon Society condemns the changes, noting that since 1973, decisions to protect endangered or threatened species have been based, legally, on “the best available science.” Now “the best available science” is out. 

“These changes crash a bulldozer through the Endangered Species Act’s lifesaving protections for America’s most vulnerable wildlife,” Noah Greenwald of the Center for Biological Diversity warns. 

Other groups opposed to the changes include Defenders of Wildlife, the Endangered Species Coalition, Friends of the Earth, Wilderness Watch, The American Bird Conservancy, The National Parks Conservation Association, grey wolves, bison, most fish, monarch butterflies and honeybees.

 

The American Petroleum Institute is thrilled with the new rules.

September 14, 2019: Trump Administration Comes Up with Plan to Ruin Lives for 200,000 Children

 

9/14/19: In news you may have missed, the Trump administration is working hard to keep us safe from killer immigrants who want to slit our throats while we sleep, but in the meantime work construction. You know…people who tunnel underground to run storm water systems and subways.

 

____________________ 

“Now I’m scared every day. ”

Ever Guardado

____________________

 

 

New rules mean that 400,000 people from six nations, who were granted temporary protected status when their countries were hit by war, natural disasters, and waves of crime, may be asked to leave the U.S. 

Many have been living in the United States for twenty years. Most have deep roots in this country. Combined, they have nearly 200,000 children born here, all American citizens. 

Those 200,000 might have to abandon the only country they have ever known if they want to remain with their parents.

 

Mr. Guardado.

 

Ever Guardado, 38, is typical. He works in construction, pays taxes, owns a home in Sterling, Virginia, and has three children, all citizens by birth. “I thought I would be secure forever,” he told reporters. 

“Now I’m scared every day.” 

We can assume his children are equally scared. 

Who in the name of human decency thinks this is a good idea, to try to force these people to “go home?”

April 29, 2020: Boy Wonder Calls Trump Handling of COVID, "A Great Success Story."

4/29/20: Knowing that 30.3 million Americans had filed for unemployment in six weeks, it was jarring to hear Boy Wonder Jared Kushner offer his assessment of  the situation. If you missed it – because you were trying to log on to your state system and file for jobless relief – Kushner said he would call the Trump administration’s handling of the virus threat “a great success story.”

 

____________________ 

“A great success story.” 

Jared Kushner

____________________

  

What else have we learned in the last few days? We learned that whereas April is fast disappearing, the coronavirus is not, even though the Maestro of Misinformation, once predicted, in April, it would. 

We learned this week that the U.S. economy shrank by 4.8% in the first quarter of 2020. But the Maestro told everyone he wasn’t worried one bit. Even though economists warn that second quarter damage will be devastating, the president insisted, “We’re heartened that the worst of the pain and suffering is going to be behind us [emphasis added].” Trump also said he thought the “new normal” was going to be great and as of May 1, he said federal social distancing guidelines would be lifted. “I see the new normal being what it was three months ago,” he added. 

 

“It will go down to zero, ultimately.” 

Reporters pinned Trump down. Now that the U.S. had surpassed a million cases of the coronavirus, they wondered, had he been babbling when he said on February 26 that we had only a few cases and would soon have fewer? “When you have 15 people, and the 15 within a couple of days is going to be down close to zero, that’s a pretty good job we’ve done,” he famously said. 

No, the president insisted. He wasn’t babbling. He was right!! “It will go down to zero, ultimately,” he said. 

You could argue that if the entire population of the planet was wiped out by the coronavirus, we’d be down to zero, ultimately, too.