Tuesday, July 25, 2017

Squirrel-Hair becomes more of a hot mess by the day

There was his address to the Boy Scouts National Jamboree in West Virginia. Not only did he not approach it as a chance to exemplify some dignified bearing to some 21st-century teens who are inundated with a grimly huge number of examples of a complete lack thereof, he exhibited an utter lack of focus. He meandered. He veered back and forth between whining and bragging. As others have pointed out today, it came off like one of last year's campaign speeches.

As I say, this was a perfect opportunity to show these young men that a US president prioritizes decorum. He blew that with the line, "Who the hell wants to speak about politics when I'm in front of the Boy Scouts?" And, of course, he then proceeded to speak about politics, taking the crowd back through the popular vote and electoral-vote numbers from last November, even getting into the arcane details of Maine's vote split.

He talked about "fake news." He tried to concoct an inspirational anecdote using a decades-old Manhattan cocktail party attended by "some of the hottest people in New York" as his material.

He made a point of pointing out that Obama never attended a National Jamboree.

He tried to make a veiled threat to HHS Secretary Tom Price's face funny, saying that if Price, who was onstage with him, couldn't use his influence in Congress to deliver enough votes for "A"CA repeal, he might just have to fire Price. Ha ha.

And that last embarrassment is just one of this still-young week's examples of the bad vibes he is befouling his cabinet with.

“If he can get treated that way, what about the rest of us?” one of the President’s Cabinet secretaries asked me with both shock and anger in his voice. I am told reports about Rex Tillerson (not who I talked to) are legitimate. He is quite perturbed with the President’s treatment of his Attorney General and is ready to quit. Secretary Mattis (also not who I talked to) is also bothered by it. They and other Cabinet members are already frustrated by the slow pace of appointments for their staffs, the vetoes over qualified people for not being sufficiently pro-Trump, and the Senate confirmation pace.
In fact, the Cabinet secretary I talked to raised the issue of the White House staff vetoes over loyalty, blasting the White House staff for blocking qualified people of like mind because they were not pro-Trump and now the President is ready to fire the most loyal of all the Cabinet members. “It’s more of a clusterf**k than you even know,” the Cabinet secretary tells me about dealing with the White House on policy. It is not just Tillerson ready to bail.
Then there are the tweets chiding Sessions and Congress for not looking into Hillary Clinton's Russia connections and other shady behavior. This, from the guy who said for Sessions not to pursue that because he "didn't want to hurt the Clintons."

And now he's even bad-mouthing the acting FBI director on Twitter.

Memo to the Stupid Party and the media figures who licked the Kool-Aid off the soles of S-H's wingtips in the summer of 2015: You clearly didn't give a flying f--- about seeing conservatism prevail. You could have put the energy you expended on this buffoon into any number of fine, principled contenders.

It is so very late in the day.




15 comments:

  1. I think Matis and Tillerson would have agreed to serve a Clinton administration, if asked, and, had they served, we would not be anywhere near the situation we are in now. As for Sessions, who'd want that henchman anyhow. I hope he leaves, never to be heard from again.

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  2. "Mattis supports a two-state solution model for Israeli–Palestinian peace. He says the current situation in Israel is "unsustainable" and argues that the settlements harm prospects for peace and could theoretically lead to an apartheid-like situation in the West Bank. In particular, he believes the lack of a two-state solution is upsetting to the Arab allies of America, which weakens US esteem amongst its Arab allies. Mattis strongly supported Secretary of State John Kerry on the Middle East peace process, praising Kerry for being "wisely focused like a laser-beam" towards a two-state solution."

    More at Trump's top Pentagon pick said settlements were creating 'apartheid' by Eric Cortellessa; November 20, 2016, 7:51 am, Times of Israel

    Jump up ^ Ex-US general: We pay a price for backing Israel by Lazar Berman July 25, 2013, 10:11 pm, Times of Israel

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  3. Well, he's wrong. There is no Palestinian body with which to negotiate peace. They all want to see Israel cease to exist.

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  4. By the way, Mattis's views on Israel are off-topic.

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  5. Not when we are talking about him (who the Dems like too) and others in a very largely internationally watched cabinet which cannot be held together by this leader of your former stupid party. Again I say, quite confidently, that this dog and pony show hurts our country bad. And we were so poorly perceived before, your former ilk claimed. Bull crap!

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  6. My former ilk? That's a head scratcher

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  7. No it's not, insert the Republican that you were and that Ted Cruz still is.

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  8. And you're wrong about Israel, many, including me conclude. We can't go down with their cement ship, I.e., hard line.

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  9. That, as I've told you, before, is not only a spiritually sick viewpoint, it will get Western civilization destroyed.

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  10. Spiritually sick, eh? Who granted you such authority to so audaciously contend?

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  11. A wish to see the last sliver of representative democracy (including demographic pluralism), full participation of women in society, material and technological advancement, respect for historical artifacts, but, most importantly, a national status based on reverence for the one true living God, eradicated and replaced by the madness of "Palestinian" ideology and the larger Arab-Muslim culture of which it is part, is spiritually sick.

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  12. I have no such wishes and you have no authority to so declare what is spiritually sick.

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  13. If a wish for peace in the Middle East is spiritually sick, then maybe I am, but it is not spiritually sick. What is sick is Israel's continued intransigence over a known bone of contention. This world and all within it must not blow. If it does, well, those causing it are indeed spiritually sick, nay, grotesque.

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  14. And Matis who knows a bit of history, believes the current situation is unsustainable. And so do many others. Calling us spiritually sick is ludicrous.

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  15. Who is Israel supposed to negotiate with? Fatah, which runs Judea and Samaria, names town squares after terrorists. It produces children's televisions shows in which cute mouse characters tell the kids that Israel must be wiped off the face of the earth and that Jews are dirty. Abbas still refuses a deal in which Israel's Jewish identity would be recognized.

    There is no "partner in the search for peace" for Israel to negotiate with.

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