The chyron read, "crisis, chaos and confusion" as a description of the White House's current state under Donald Trump's leadership.
The chaos is being sown from the continual personnel exodus, President Trump's rash and ill-timed decisions made under duress and scandal after scandal the most significant this week centering around the president's senior advisor, and son-in-law, Jared Kushner who lost his top secret security clearance. Then the news broke that during the transition Mr. Kushner held meeting in the White House about securing financing for his Manhattan property, 666 Fifth Ave. basically self-dealing using the power of the White House to enrich himself. Given both, Mr. Kushner should have been out the door last week. The only advice to offer Mr. Kushner at this point should be to 'be polite and hold the door for your wife first on the way out.'
Insert "pot-shot with purpose" here: Where is Republican leadership with all this corruption occurring in executive branch of our government? The reason for this becomes more significant farther into the column.
The administration's confusion is obvious because clearly President Trump is confused about policy, history and his day to day statements which are constantly changing. Guns are just the latest example of this. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, in his interview today, said "What ever his final decision is, is what will happen. What he has said, he has said. If he says something different, he says something different. I have no reason he's going to change." For the love of God... He just said that the president changes his mind, so what, but to be sure he does not change his mind. And then when Chuck Todd challenged him on the ridiculousness of this, he rephrased it, but essentially repeated the same notion.
Here it is:
Not only that, but Mr. Ross's defense of the president's decision to raise tariffs on steel by 25% and aluminum by 10% bordered on senile, saying that retaliation has nothing to do with the cost of a can of beer. He also said that it wasn't a rash decision because the president had made this promise on the campaign trail. Fine, but the timing of such an announcement without any significant consultation qualifies it as just that, rash. The administration's top economic advisor, Gary Cohn, has threatened to resign.
Senator Angus King (I-ME) in his interview explained that there need to be extensive negotiations with the countries that are our trading partners, all of which are allies with the exception of China, before making this kind of decision. For his part, Mr. King did not say he was opposed to these tariffs, which is curious, but like all of us is questioning the random timing and ill-process of such a decision. Every state could be negatively impacted by this decision, especially ones where Mr. Trump's base resides. Also curious was the fact that Mr. King said he was not prepared to comment on whether or not Mr. Kushner was self-dealing in the White House, which must mean that his committee has concluded that he has.
All this because Russia is the reason for the crazy season. Communications Director Hope Hicks resigned this week because she didn't want to get any muddier from an investigation getting ever so closer to the Oval Office. Not to mention that when you're the White House Communications Director and it's leaked that in your congressional testimony that you tell 'white lies' for the president, let's just say it doesn't help you're long-term prospects on the job.
And you know what they say about 'white lies...'
Twice as sweet as sugar, twice as bitter as salt
And if you get hooked, baby, it's nobody else's fault,
So don't do it!
(OK, that's from Grandmaster Flash's "White Lines," but you get the idea.)
More seriously, Mr. Mueller and the special counsel's office have handed down indictments in regard to a cyber attack on our country and as Doris Kearns-Goodwin explained, the president is derelict in his duty to uphold the Constitution by not protecting our democracy. Here's something key to remember: If we've heard of a question that Mr. Mueller is asking of interviewees, he and his team already know the answer. So does Mr. Trump and that is the reason why there's so much chaos, crisis and confusion in the administration. Mr. Mueller's investigation is truly making Mr. Trump batty; 'unglued' is the term used in the press.
With all that is known, Mr. Trump has taken no initiative to defend the country. NBC's Katy Tur noted that NSA chief Admiral Mike Rogers has not received an direction from the White House in terms of responding to Russia's cyber-aggression. The president is blaming the Obama Administration for not having done enough when it was in power. You don't get away with arguing that your predecessor didn't do enough when since the time you've taken over, you've done nothing. Yet, fmr. Obama Administration White House Chief of Staff, Denis McDonough, was on to defend his former boss, and what was clear from the interview was that the Obama Administration could have done more, but got hamstringed. Mr. McDonough explained that there wasn't a sense of urgency on the part of the Republican members of the 'group of 8' leadership group with regard to Russian election activity, specifically from Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY). Senator McConnell's name always seems to come up when the country writ large gets let down. Once again, not speaking out and on the wrong side of a decision that would be beneficial to the country. Mr. McDonough reluctantly admitted that Mr. McConnell didn't want to sign onto a bipartisan statement outlining and condemning Russia. What that did was make any potential out front statement by President Obama political and then seen as trying to tip the scale in favor of Mrs. Clinton. Image if Mrs. Clinton had been elected with Republicans still in control of congress. Hearing would be going on right now about how the Obama Administration tipped the scale. But McConnell and Republicans did nothing. Interestingly, Mr. Donough explained that the Russians didn't do some of the things the Obama Administration thought they would because the face to face meeting Mr. Obama had with Mr. Putin, where the president got into the Russian's face had an effect.
Despite that of course, Mr. Trump has done nothing so we see Vladimir Putin still able to smirk at the Trump reality-TV administration as he denies any role or knowledge of in what these indicted Russians have done. He's given himself free reign as far as acting and facing no repercussions. As this, while Xi in China consolidates even more power. Without presidential leadership there's no direction and we're just a dog chasing its tail in an ever-maddening circle.
But hey, be optimistic, the other news this week was that Mr. Trump announced his reelection bid this week as well.
Panel: Katy Tur, NBC News; Tom Brokaw, special correspondent NBC News; Doris Kearns-Goodwin, presidential historian; Al Cardenas, Republican Strategist
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