Buy the ticket, take the ride--next stop: "Crazytown"!

Bob Woodward: Trump's aides stole his papers 'to protect the country'

President Donald Trump's closest aides have taken extraordinary measures in the White House to try to stop what they saw as his most dangerous impulses, going so far as to swipe and hide papers from his desk so he wouldn't sign them, according to a new book from legendary journalist Bob Woodward.

Woodward's 448-page book, "Fear: Trump in the White House," provides an unprecedented inside-the-room look through the eyes of the President's inner circle. From the Oval Office to the Situation Room to the White House residence, Woodward uses confidential background interviews to illustrate how some of the President's top advisers view him as a danger to national security and have sought to circumvent the commander in chief.

Many of the feuds and daily clashes have been well documented, but the picture painted by Trump's confidants, senior staff and Cabinet officials reveal that many of them see an even more alarming situation — worse than previously known or understood. Woodward offers a devastating portrait of a dysfunctional Trump White House, detailing how senior aides — both current and former Trump administration officials — grew exasperated with the President and increasingly worried about his erratic behavior, ignorance and penchant for lying.

Chief of staff John Kelly describes Trump as an "idiot" and "unhinged," Woodward reports. Defense Secretary James Mattis describes Trump as having the understanding of "a fifth or sixth grader." And Trump's former personal lawyer John Dowd describes the President as "a fucking liar," telling Trump he would end up in an "orange jump suit" if he testified to special counsel Robert Mueller.

"He's an idiot. It's pointless to try to convince him of anything. He's gone off the rails. We're in crazytown," Kelly is quoted as saying at a staff meeting in his office. "I don't even know why any of us are here. This is the worst job I've ever had."

https://www.cnn.com/2018/09/04/politics/bob-woodward-book-donald-trump-fear/index.html?adkey=bn


Read the whole article, it's scary and Woodward is about as reliable a chronicler of the Presidency as anyone I can imagine.

It sounds like the Executive branch is the result of some horrible congress between All the President's Men and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest!

A fifth or sixth grader comprehension.......well that takes care of the Panhandle and Alabama, but then he went on to call Jeff Sessions "a dumb southerner".....I got to see how long folks can stay on their knees.

I've been following politics--some might say obsessively--since I was a young teenager and Kennedy was in office. I never remember a time like this--to me it's scary. At some point, Congress is going to have to intervene.

I just hope the grown-ups in the administration can keep the lid on until after the new Congress is in office in January. What disturbs me most is special interests manipulating this President with the political equivalent of saying "Want some candy, little girl?"

Deus X wrote:I never remember a time like this--to me it's scary.

I thoroughly agree, Deus. But honestly, weren't you the one telling some of us deeply concerned anti-Trumpists early on that we were over-reacting, that the country would survive, not to worry? Or do I have you confused with someone else? Forgive me if so.

RealLindaL wrote:I thoroughly agree, Deus. But honestly, weren't you the one telling some of us deeply concerned anti-Trumpists early on that we were over-reacting, that the country would survive, not to worry?  Or do I have you confused with someone else?  Forgive me if so.

Yes, that was me, but now we're a year on and navigating unfamiliar territory. I never in my wildest paranoid imaginings thought it would get this far.

It puts me in mind of The Caine Mutiny. I completely expect to see Trump in a video, rolling ball-bearings in his fist while he rants about proving with geometric logic that the Democrats DID steal the strawberries.

The potential for some sort of Nuclear action is certainly not zero. If Trump represents a base of about 30% in the general population, it's not unreasonable to assume the same proportion exists in the military. We are now in undiscovered country.

A fifth grader making decisions on tariffs as trump zombies say.....just wait.....you will see............to me that is the scariest proposition.....the dumbest people in America elected the fifth grader.....and they cannot be impeached.

A friend of mine was telling me about a dinner with relatives he had over the weekend. He walked out early because the stupidity got to be too much for him, but his uncle was saying, "I like Trump but I wish he wouldn't tweet so much." Then his wife said, "I don't know how he has the time, with how busy he is!" (This is point number one in the conversation when my friend had to almost stab himself with a fork to stop from guffawing -- Trump does nothin' but watch TV and golf). Then the uncle said, "Did you know that man has an I.Q. of one hundred and seventy?!"

And my friend's having to stop himself from saying something like, "Actually, he has an I.Q. of lose-two-points-and-he'll-be-crapping-his-pants." Instead, trying to keep peace in the family, he asked, "Where'd you hear that?"

His uncle said, "I dunno, somewheres."

Honestly, Trump's I.Q. is closer to 70 than 170. He's the first president I think could probably be lured out of the White House with a shiny apple, or a corn-dog on a string. He's managed to use his dad's money to build a carefully-constructed facade of competence around himself, but dude could lose a game of Jeopardy to a potato, and he's shithouseratcrazy on top of it. I'm glad there are people acting as "minders" for him, because he needs them.

Face the Nation 11/14

HOST BOB SCHIEFFER: I’m wondering about the talk after this election, I think the president’s relations with the Democrats in the Senate may be as bad as his relations with the Republicans.

WOODWARD: That’s absolutely true. You get the Democrats in private, and they are on fire! Because he won’t spend the time, because he won’t listen. Peggy [Noonan] said yesterday in her column, and I think there is real truth here: humility is power.

Do you remember the vitriol directed at woodward after that book? Does it still apply?

Lol... no... i didn't think so. Hypocrite much?

Dumb Southerners............yea keep changing the subject. It is about Trump. Could you imagine Obama saying the same..........

Coming from Woodward, those words are harsh indeed. Maybe it has something to do with Trump's recent attacks on Bernstein.

Is he a hack or not?

https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748704116004575521921253945704

He probably deserves credit for getting his hands on what appear to be minutes of those sessions—although by now one supposes that all such documents are routinely cc'd to this Washington institution, Mr. Behind-the-Scenes. As usual, the reader has to take on faith that his reporting is accurate, because the sourcing is so vague ("background interviews" with "firsthand sources"). Faith is strained when Mr. Woodward, like a novelist, tells us what various people were thinking ("McConnell worried that the temptation of covert action might entrance Obama"). But even assuming that his "revelations" are largely accurate, it is hard to know what they amount to.

Mr. Woodward tosses out facts seemingly at random, with no context or analysis. At one point he recounts a dinner conversation in a Georgetown restaurant between Gen. David Petraeus and Richard Holbrooke. Suddenly they are interrupted by White House reporter Helen Thomas, who demands, with her usual subtlety: "What the hell are you doing in Afghanistan? . . . This is Vietnam all over again." Gen. Petraeus tries to explain, but Ms. Thomas "didn't feel reassured." The book then moves on, leaving us to puzzle out why this encounter was included. Does Mr. Woodward transcribe everything in his notebook? Or are we supposed to be disquieted by the fact that Helen Thomas thinks Afghanistan is another Vietnam? No one familiar with her wacky views could possibly take anything she says seriously. Yet Mr. Woodward presents her opinion deadpan, as if she were a sage worth quoting.

He does this, it must be said, with pretty much everyone else who wanders across his narrative. Thus we hear charges and counter-charges with no attempt to sort them out. This is particularly noxious when Mr. Woodward uncritically quotes Mr. Obama's aides complaining that the military is "boxing in" the president by not presenting him with serious alternatives to the war plan devised by Gen. McChrsytal.

In fact, as Mr. Woodward elsewhere makes clear, the deputy chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. James Cartwright, did cooperate with Mr. Biden's office to present an alternative—a small troop increase with most of the forces concentrating on a counterterrorist mission. The reason this plan didn't get the endorsement of senior Pentagon officials, or Mr. Obama himself, is that it wasn't realistic: A handful of commandos couldn't stop the Taliban from taking over Afghanistan. Mr. Woodward quotes Gen. Petraeus making this point, and he quotes Mr. Biden disputing it, but mostly he is concerned with the rivalry among these power players: Who dissed whom? To which one might respond: Who cares?

"Obama's Wars" would matter more if it changed one's view of the president. But it doesn't. Mr. Woodward shows a cold, calculating president overseeing a sometimes chaotic policy process and, by including a deadline for withdrawal, pandering to his base.

Floridatexan wrote:
Coming from Woodward, those words are harsh indeed.  Maybe it has something to do with Trump's recent attacks on Bernstein.  

Transcript: Phone call between President Trump and journalist Bob Woodward

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2018/09/04/transcript-phone-call-between-president-trump-journalist-bob-woodward/?utm_term=.389953e0a707&wpisrc=nl_most&wpmm=1

including a deadline for withdrawal, pandering to his base.

Yep, he got us out just like he said he would. Do you really want to compare Trump to Obama......really? When was Obama ever called a moron.....never.

PkrBum wrote:

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 God, it's predictable.  The consistency is amazing.  

After pondering the absurdity of this butttrumpet's behavior, I think I have finally figured it out, ya'll.  This is going to sound crazy, but hear me out -- it's really the only scenario that explains the single-minded obsessiveness of his absurdity:  

Pkr is stuck in a time warp.

Either he physically wandered into an actual rift in the time-space continuum (probably under his couch, encountered while looking for a lost opiate that rolled away during a period of withdrawl), or the trauma of Trump's embarrassing behavior - and knowing he did nothing to try to prevent the damage it's done to America's world standing - has snapped him psychologically,  driven him into a fugue state of denial that negates the idea that anything after the middle of 2016 never even happened!  

In this time warp, Obama is still president and Hillary is still running and both are EEEEEEEE-vul and must be stopped!   Thus, whenever the people who live in the present time (i.e. us) bring up anything about Trump, he has to bring up something about Obama/Hillary and try to fight that battle instead.  

It's all a desperate attempt to keep living in 2016, when things were better, and he could play offense instead of trying to mount a hopeless defense of a ridiculous man-baby president who governs by tantrum and lies as a means of respiration.   (Most of us voted just to avoid having to do that.)

Any mention of Trump triggers a "Quantum Leap" scenario where he springs backward two-to-ten years and re-mounts the Battle of Benghazi or whatever, rather than dealing with current events in any way.  

I know, that sounds nuts.  But, think about it:  

A. It explains why we have to keep debunking the same worn-out horseshit conspiracy theories over and over again -- he forgets it's been debunked because he's ported back to a time zone before somebody explained it to his dumb ass.

B. What else could account for the maniacal urgency to defeat someone who's already served two (highly successful) terms and another who is no longer a candidate and won't run again... unless in the time zone he inhabits, Obama's still president and Hillary's still running?

C. It explains why nothing related to Trump's presidency is ever addressed in the slightest.  It's because, in the world that nimnul here inhabits, the Trump presidency hasn't happened yet... and, thanks to denial, it never will.

D. It would keep us from having to accept the depressing idea that anyone is actually so freakin' stupid that they think "what-about-ism" is not only a good form of argument, but the only form of argument.

So, yeah.   I'm pretty sure this is a time warp.  Any other scenario is even more absurd.   So, everybody be nice and don't tell him how the finale of Breaking Bad turns out, don't wanna wreck it for 'im.

2seaoat wrote: including a deadline for withdrawal, pandering to his base.

Yep, he got us out just like he said he would.  Do you really want to compare Trump to Obama......really?  When was Obama ever called a moron.....never.

Yes... warmonger was his campaign cornerstone. That's why he's a Nobel laureate. Full of integrity.

Do you KNOW how loco he's going to get tonight when he goes up to the residence? I bet Hannity is on the way down from NYC with a snuggie and a tranquilizer gun.
Rick Wilson

polecat wrote:Do you KNOW how loco he's going to get tonight when he goes up to the residence? I bet Hannity is on the way down from NYC with a snuggie and a tranquilizer gun.
Rick Wilson

I'd laugh if it weren't so friggin' pitiful. White House inquisition, here we come -- and it won't be pretty.

You can elect a dumpling President as long as the dumpling hates Mexicans, Muslims, and Blacks..........in the end it simply is about hate. Crazytown can only happen when men of good conscience are cowardly.

2seaoat wrote: Crazytown can only happen when men of good conscience are cowardly.

....making them men (and women) of weak conscience.

"Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and I moved on her, actually. You know, she was down on Palm Beach. I moved on her, and I failed. I’ll admit it.
I did try and fuck her. She was married.and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, She wanted to get some furniture. I said, “I’ll show you where they have some nice furniture.” I took her out furniture —
I moved on her like a bitch. But I couldn’t get there. And she was married. Then all of a sudden I see her, she’s now got the big phony tits and everything. She’s totally changed her look.testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived, and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting-place for those who here gave their lives, Yeah, that’s her. With the gold. I better use some Tic Tacs just in case I start kissing her. You know, I’m automatically attracted to beautiful — I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything .That this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."
Grab ’em by the pussy. You can do anything.Uh, yeah, those legs, all I can see is the legs.
Oh, it looks good.
Come on shorty.
Ooh, nice legs, huh?
Oof, get out of the way, honey. Oh, that’s good legs. Go ahead.
The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.
You know what uranium is, right? It’s this thing called nuclear weapons. And other things. Like lots of things are done with uranium. Including some bad things.


trump or Lincoln?

Trump will be the worst American President in American history. It will not even be close. This idea that being President when a tax bill passes, or that a Supreme Court nomination brings with it some kind of unique success is just ignorant. No stupid.

2seaoat wrote:Trump will be the worst American President in American history.  It will not even be close.  This idea that being President when a tax bill passes, or that a Supreme Court nomination brings with it some kind of unique success is just ignorant.   No stupid.

For a long time I thought Dubya would go down as possibly the worst president ever... or at least a contender for the title.

It's amazing, but Trump actually makes Dubya look like a statesman in comparison. Dubya's still a terrible president, but if given a choice between keeping Trump or letting Dubya finish Trump's term, I wouldn't even hesitate to take Dubya back. Trump is that bad. Dubya was terrible, but compared to Trump it's not even freakin' close. I can't imagine the mess we'd be in right now if Obama hadn't left this clown a country that was in such strong shape. If it was too weak to take this beating, we'd be screwed already. And we may yet be, looking at the indicators.

My financial advisor used to be a Republican, and an ordained minister. She loathes Trump, calls him a "buffoon," and is having to shore up everyone's portfolios because she sees what economic trends are coming.