The Mooch is out

Seems that Squirrel-Hair did it directly, but at new Chief of Staff Kelly's request.

Will no doubt have more to say later, but initial observations and questions:

• Who the hell are they going to find willing to take that job now?
• What does an egomaniac like Scaramucci do after the double whammy of his wife filing for divorce and getting canned after being sure his boss liked him making an ass of himself?
• What will the next move in the Kelly era look like?
• What will the water-carriers havre to say?

Newt Gingrich and my powers of intuition

Newt Gingrich is, to use a hackneyed phrase often trotted out to nod kindly in the direction of someone with serious character flaws, a complex man. He's a former history professor and was the architect of the 1994 Contract With America, which suited the national mood at the time and allowed the Republican Party to seriously contend once again with a long-dominant Democrat party at the national level. He demonstrated, at least for a brief period, that he could craft policy visions with a Democrat president without losing sight of his principles. On the strength of that, the country's welfare system was reformed and Bill Clinton submitted a balanced budget to Congress in 1999. He was instrumental in setting the stage for the largest capital-gains tax cut in history. Gingrich is a fellow at both the American Enterprise Institute and the Hoover Institution. He's made some interesting documentaries on a variety of subjects.

But I've always had a feeling about that guy. Part of it was his flaky marital track record, beginning with marrying his high-school math teacher and later divorcing her. His daughters from that marriage seem to have assimilated that disruption in their lives and now apparently regard their father warmly, but there's no getting around the selfishness of his behavior. He then cheated on his second wife with the woman who became his third. And there was his whining about not being seated near enough to President Clinton on Air Force One on a foreign junket. In his post-Congress life, policy-related inconsistencies began showing up, notably his support for the Medicare Part D prescription-drug benefit. There was his infamous 2011 statement, during a Meet the Press appearance, that he didn't "think right-wing social engineering [was] any more desirable than left-wing social engineering," referring to his opposition to Paul Ryan's plan to phase out direct Medicare payments to doctors and hospitals, a statement he had to try to walk back. One of the most infuriating instances of clouded vision on his part was endorsing Dede Scozzafava, a moderate, instead of conservative  Doug Hoffman in the special-election three-way race in New York's 23rd congressional district in 2009. Hoffman was closing on her in the polls at the time.

The hints were increasing that his wonkery was becoming just plain flakiness.

Then came his early and still-strong enthusiasm for Donald Trump. It's to the point where his frequent appearances on Sean Hannity's FNC show have become vomit-inducing gushfests.

And now a red line has been crossed.

Newt Gingrich is dead to me. He has negated every laudible accomplishment in his curriculum vitae with what he has had to say on John Catsimatidis's radio show:

Said Gingrich:

“President Trump is a New Yorker. He and Scaramucci sort of speak the same language,” Gingrich told John Catsimatidis in a pre-recorded interview on AM970 in New York City that aired Sunday. “And this way he has somebody that makes him kind of comfortable that he’s getting taken care of.”

“Scaramucci is an entrepreneur. He’s aggressive. Trump wants somebody willing to mix it up with the news media, get in the middle of the fight, try to get things done,” Gingrich said.

“I think that Trump is probably very happy with him right now and I think that’s good for Trump himself because part of the reason Trump gets so aggressive is he feels like nobody is defending him and he’s gotta go out and do it all himself,” he continued.

So what did Scaramucci say that Trump so identifies with, he, the one evangelicals to this day say is “God’s man”?

“Reince is a f—— paranoid schizophrenic, a paranoiac,” Scaramucci said in the interview.

He also went after chief strategist Stephen Bannon, saying, “I’m not Steve Bannon, I’m not trying to suck my own c—,” he said.

“I’m not trying to build my own brand off the f—— strength of the president. I’m here to serve the country,” Scaramucci continued.

And reports are that Trump was quite pleased with the outburst. Gingrich’s comments seem to confirm that.

“Scaramucci is a natural fighter. He likes being in the media, he likes being seen, and I think he’s having a good time, and I think all of that comes together in a way that is very positive,” Gingrich said.

There was nothing positive about how he behaved, what he said, or Trump pitting Scaramucci against Priebus, or anybody else in the White House for his own amusement.

I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating: Newt has lost his mind.

And people with his kind of influence who have lost their minds are dangerous.

History, the subject that drove Gingrich's interest in public policy, will not be kind to this dark figure.

It gets worse by the hour

Well, let's see.

I am on record as saying that in some ways, having to do particularly with the socio-sexual level of scouting's place in our culture, the Boy Scouts of America has gone adrift.

But Chief Scout Executive Michael Surbaugh is on the solidest of ground issuing a statement basically saying, "Sorry to Scouts, their leaders and families for the way the President of the United States of America got way out of line at our National Jamboree."

Then there is the latest column by Kurt Schlichter, a case study in the phenomenon of the formerly principled, deep, funny and articulate champion of conservatism becoming a pathetic apologist for the disgusting Donald Trump (and, once that Kool-Aid had permeated the subcellular level of his vital organs, Kid Rock). He actually finds it within himself to tell his idol to scale back at least one kind of stupid that DJT is going full-tilt on:

 . . . sometimes you need to lay down some real talk, and this comes from someone who supports the president’s efforts to defeat the enemies of normal Americans. So let me say it clearly.

Stop this nonsense about Jeff Sessions.

Stop it. 

Have some discipline and focus. The day you decided to start pummeling Sessions was supposed to be about health care. The fact that our cunning, turtlesque majority leader managed to drag the first vote over the finish line notwithstanding, all you did was annoy your allies. When pretty much every Twitter pundit and senator and Rush and Hewitt and Tucker and Breitbart and a bunch of other alt-righties are all on the same sheet of music, that’s an indicator that you’re stepping all over your Schumer.

And Sessions is your friend – you can’t diss a friend, or you won’t have any friends left. And you need friends, because the enemy is coming.

Then there is the Joint Chiefs of Staffs telling Squirrel-Hair: "We don't respond to tweets. If we're going to reverse the transgender policy put in place a year ago by the previous administration, it's going to be done according to official procedures."

And then there is the unfolding Scaramucci disaster. LITD brought you up to date as to where we were early today., but now comes the Ryan Lizza piece in The New Yorker:

Scaramucci was particularly incensed by a Politico report about his financial-disclosure form, which he viewed as an illegal act of retaliation by Priebus. The reporter said Thursday morning that the document was publicly available and she had obtained it from the Export-Import Bank. Scaramucci didn’t know this at the time, and he insisted to me that Priebus had leaked the document, and that the act was “a felony.”

“I’ve called the F.B.I. and the Department of Justice,” he told me.

“Are you serious?” I asked.

“The swamp will not defeat him,” he said, breaking into the third person. “They’re trying to resist me, but it’s not going to work. I’ve done nothing wrong on my financial disclosures, so they’re going to have to go fuck themselves.”

Scaramucci also told me that, unlike other senior officials, he had no interest in media attention. “I’m not Steve Bannon, I’m not trying to suck my own cock,” he said, speaking of Trump’s chief strategist. “I’m not trying to build my own brand off the fucking strength of the President. I’m here to serve the country.” (Bannon declined to comment.)

He reiterated that Priebus would resign soon, and he noted that he told Trump that he expected Priebus to launch a campaign against him. “He didn’t get the hint that I was reporting directly to the President,” he said. “And I said to the President here are the four or five things that he will do to me.” His list of allegations included leaking the Hannity dinner and the details from his financial-disclosure form.

I got the sense that Scaramucci’s campaign against leakers flows from his intense loyalty to Trump. Unlike other Trump advisers, I’ve never heard him say a bad word about the President. “What I want to do is I want to fucking kill all the leakers and I want to get the President’s agenda on track so we can succeed for the American people,” he told me.

He cryptically suggested that he had more information about White House aides. “O.K., the Mooch showed up a week ago,” he said. “This is going to get cleaned up very shortly, O.K.? Because I nailed these guys. I’ve got digital fingerprints on everything they’ve done through the F.B.I. and the fucking Department of Justice.”

“What?” I interjected.

“Well, the felony, they’re gonna get prosecuted, probably, for the felony.” He added, “The lie detector starts—” but then he changed the subject and returned to what he thought was the illegal leak of his financial-disclosure forms. I asked if the President knew all of this.

“Well, he doesn’t know the extent of all that, he knows about some of that, but he’ll know about the rest of it first thing tomorrow morning when I see him.”

I'm currently watching Sarah Huckablee Sanders on Martha McCallum's FNC show try to put lipstick on this pig. It's the lamest blob of boilerplate I think I've ever heard from a White House press secretary, and that's saying something. She is sticking with the our-focus-is-on-moving-forward-on-issues-the-American-people-want-us-to-resolve talking points that any halfway savvy observer can tell is a way to feebly attempt to disguise utter panic. Whatever they're paying her, it's not enough.

I won't finish with my usual rant against the fools, phonies and careerists who handed us this mess.

But I will say once again, Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio could have beaten Hillary Clinton and we wouldn't be covering our heads as the glowing red timbers fall around us.

Another day, more Trump White House chaos

New communications director Anthony Scaramucci made his big splash founding Sky Bridge Capital. Earlier this year, friends helped him get a job at the Export-Import Bank. It was always intended to be a short-term proposition, a means of bringing him into closer proximity with the the Trump orbit.

Well, now he's pretty darn near the orb around which everyone in Squirrel-Hair World orbits, and he seems to have gotten the hang of what you do in such a position: foment chaos and ill will.

He, of course, is on a rampage against leakers. He has been making Obama-era holdovers the focus of his inquiry into the matter.

But now, he wants to pin a big leak on Chief of Staff Reince Preibus - without a shred of evidence:

Scaramucci, it seemed, was trying to shoot the king—or at least publicly frame him. And he wasn’t shy about telling others at the White House that he believed Priebus had leaked the documents, though he couldn’t provide evidence to support his claims. Still, Scaramucci vowed to make Priebus pay.

The plan, however, had several flaws. The most significant: Scaramucci didn’t just lack evidence that Priebus was behind the leak—he lacked evidence that there had even been a leak in the first place.

As Peter Baker and Nicholas Fandos reported late Wednesday night in the New York Times:

Mr. Scaramucci filed the disclosure form in connection with his previous, short-lived job with the Trump administration at the Export-Import Bank. Under federal law, anyone can request such a report on a government website 30 days after its receipt.
Mr. Scaramucci’s report says it was filed on June 23, which means it could be publicly released by the bank on July 23, or last Sunday. Politico did not indicate whether it obtained the report through such a regular request.
Asked why he thought the report had been leaked illegally, Mr. Scaramucci responded by text: “They aren’t in process yet.” But when told his form could be released on July 23, he did not respond further.

There was a reason Scaramucci didn't respond further: There had been no leak. The Politicoreporter, Lorraine Woellert, obtained Scaramucci's disclosures by making a routine request to the Ex-Im bank for the form 278e that Scaramucci completed before working there. Woellert tweeted:"Mr @Scaramucci's Form 278e is publicly available from ExIm. Just ask."

If Scaramucci didn’t respond to the Times, he did respond—where else?—on Twitter. Scaramucci tweeted an Axios piece headlined: “Scaramucci appears to want Priebus investigated by FBI.” Scaramucci denied the claim: “Wrong! Tweet was public notice to leakers that all Sr Adm officials are helping to end illegal leaks. ‪@Reince45.”

This guy fits right in.

UPDATE: If you want a real taste of the Scaramucci style, check out this WaPo account of his sit-down with CNN's Chris Cuomo. And I thought Squirrel-Hair had a wild way of expressing himself.

That's quite a turnaround

Ed Willing at The Resurgent asks, "Am I the Only One Creeped Out By This?"

No, Ed, LITD is plenty creeped out, too.

Yesterday's gushfest at the White House was a sight to behold:

Some highlights from yesterday’s love session:

“The presidents a winner, OK? And what we’re going to do is a lot of winning.”

“I love the mission that the president has.”

“I love the president, I obviously love the country.”

“The President has very good karma, and the world eventually turns back to him.”

“He’s genuinely a wonderful human being.”

“I love the president. I’m very, very loyal to the president.”

“I love these guys. I respect these guys.”

“I love the president.”

“I’ll tell you what I find when I travel around the country, people love him.”

“The president is phenomenal with the press.”

“The president himself is always going to be the president.”

“I think he’s got some of the best political instincts in the world, and perhaps in history.”

“He’s done a phenomenal job for the American people.”

And the best zinger of the day…

“He’s the most competitive person I’ve ever met, OK? I’ve seen this guy throw a dead spiral through a tire. I’ve seen him at Madison Square Garden with a topcoat on. He’s standing in the key and he’s hitting foul shots and swishing them, ok? He sinks three foot putts.”

A somewhat different tone from that he was taking a few months ago:

President Trump is “going to be the president of the Queens County Bullies Association.”

“I don’t like the way he talks about women.”

“The politicians don’t wanna go at trump because he’s got a big mouth and they’re afraid he’s gonna light them up on FoxNews.”

“You’re an inherited-money dude from Queens County. Bring it on, Don. You’re an inherited-money dude from Queens County.”

“This is right out of Elizabeth Warren’s playbook. Are you a Democratic plant for Hillary Clinton and Elizabeth Warren? Stand here and prove otherwise.”

“He’s a class-divider.”

There's also his track record of donating to Democrat campaigns. Oh, wait, that's actually something he has in common with his boss.

Naturally, Scaramucci gave his first interview to Breitbart, talking about a string of desired "wins" that Steve Bannon has written on a wall.

And the business about how he hopes Sean Spicer "goes out and makes a lot of money."

These people are as hollow as jack-o'-lanterns.