Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

One of our two political parties is a cult whose leader admires Vladimir Putin.

Come on, man.

There are consequences to being an arrogant, sullen prick.

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

Many life forms that would benefit from greater intelligence, sadly, do not have it.

“woke” is the new caravan.

The arc of the moral universe does not bend itself. it is up to us to bend it.

When do we start airlifting the women and children out of Texas?

Reality always lies in wait for … Democrats.

“When somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re gonna use it.”

Trump should be leading, not lying.

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

The fundamental promise of conservatism all over the world is a return to an idealized past that never existed.

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

Innocent people do not delay justice.

Rupert, come get your orange boy, you petrified old dinosaur turd.

Republicans don’t want a speaker to lead them; they want a hostage.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

It’s all just conspiracy shit beamed down from the mothership.

Hey Washington Post, “Democracy Dies in Darkness” was supposed to be a warning, not a mission statement.

You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Dolt 45 / Time for a Media Reset

Time for a Media Reset

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Someone sounds awfully worried about Sally Yates’ testimony before the senate today:

Yates will be questioned this afternoon about her warning to the Trump people regarding Flynn’s Russia problem. So Trump is preemptively intimidating her like a sub-literate mafia goon while simultaneously blaming the Obama administration for his own shitty personnel decisions.

President Obama FIRED Flynn before Trump picked him off the trash heap, wound him up and sent him on the “LOCK HER UP!” tour. And apparently Trump’s band of grifting idiots didn’t bother to vet the utterly compromised crackpot Flynn before sharing highly classified information with him as erstwhile NSA. But President “The Buck Stops Anywhere But Here” can’t be bothered with such details.

What are we to conclude from this, aside from the obvious, which is that the person who occupies the Oval Office is a lying, irresponsible, addled dolt — which we already knew? He’s worried about this Russia thing, which just won’t go away. Should he be?

I hope very much that the Russia investigation turns up a bombshell that removes Trump from office, but I have zero faith it will. Comey is a preening hack who seems convinced that hostility from Republicans and Democrats validates his “last honest man in D.C.” conceit. The GOP controls congress, and they’ve already sold out the country to a demented demagogue, so they’ll hamstring every investigation that could endanger their hold on power.

But 2018 hasn’t happened yet, and there’s still time to prevent the next round of interference. The Democrats have their role to play to stop a hostile foreign power from undermining democracy. The FBI and intelligence communities have theirs. And the media has a responsibility here too.

This might sound like a crazy suggestion, but maybe media outlets like the NYT, etc., could use recent developments abroad as well as upcoming events like the Yates testimony as an excuse to reset the way they approach the gigantic elephant in the room: a hostile foreign power’s ongoing meddling in U.S. elections. The way their colleagues in France dealt with a similar attempt by the same outfits to sleaze a fascist into power might be instructive.

Yates’ testimony is expected to directly contradict what Spicer and Priebus told the media about Team Trump’s handling of Flynn. Trump, knowing the testimony is likely to be damaging, implied that Yates committed a crime in the above tweet. We know Trump lied about President Obama’s “wire tapp” — the mainstream press was surprisingly forthright in saying so. I guess there’s a slim chance they’ll treat Trump’s slander of Yates in a similar manner.

I understand that ironic detachment and profitable horse race babbling are tough addictions to overcome, but it’s no exaggeration to say democracy is on the line. And while the Beltway hacks like to pretend they don’t want to be part of the story, the opposite is true: they glory in a scenario that allows them to be players rather than merely covering the game.

Well, here’s your chance, hacks. The Trump administration has lied to you and vilified you for months. You’ve refused to engage in serious introspection about your 2016 political coverage, but here’s a flashing red neon scandal that doesn’t even require that: a recognition that this meddling isn’t going away, and a chance to do something about it. Go be little Murrows. Your country needs you, God help us.

Reader Interactions

129Comments

  1. 1.

    schrodingers_cat

    The media is a subsidiary of the hedgefunders who run the R party so I wouldn’t get my hopes up too much that they will change direction. All that the hedgefunders care about is to make as much money as possible no matter what the social cost. They have less honor and smarts than the royal dynasties of yore.

    ETA: Are these portraits some alternate reality versions of the people in them? Last I looked they all looked much worse IRL. I don’t see the triple chins on T, for example.

  2. 2.

    SiubhanDuinne

    “W.H. Council”? Doesn’t he mean “Counsel” (Don McGahn)?

    On top of everything else, Trump doesn’t know his ass from his homophones.

  3. 3.

    Humdog

    How does this faint hope that news orgs get their shit together not founder on the demonstrable fact that half the country does not care what the truth is and would reject it if the news conveyed it? Sorry, woke up on the hopeless side of the bed this am.

  4. 4.

    opiejeanne

    From your fingers to the deity of your choice, Betty.

    I don’t think Trump has ever looked like that, and Putin looks like a James Bond in this portrait rather than the Bond villain he really is. Le Pen’s eyes look funny in this.

  6. 6.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @schrodingers_cat:

    I don’t see the triple chins on T, for example.

    I think that’s from the huuuuuge and very classy portrait that the Trump Foundation illegally bought and displayed at Mar-a-Lago several years ago. So it’s (a) not recent and (b) unduly flattering.

  7. 7.

    Major Major Major Major

    The hot take from the French election that I saw gaining the most steam (Weigel, Yglesias, probably more relevant people too) is that ethno-nationalist Putin-backed movements are easily defeated if the establishment right holds the line. So that’s good.

  8. 8.

    bemused

    He must be having bigly tantrums if rumor is true he was 45 min late deplaning last night because he was watching Obama accepting award and today Yates testifies. I’d feel sorry for his staff this morning but they wanted those shit jobs.

  9. 9.

    Spanky

    @schrodingers_cat:

    They have less honor and smarts than the royal dynasties of yore.

    The dynasties of yore were tied to the country they ruled. No such constraint on the billion dollar babies today. Sad!

    @SiubhanDuinne: No homophone! No homophone! You’re the homophone!

  15. 15.

    Brachiator

    “The media” ain’t a monolith. Also, the media is dying. The only real solution is to stop crying that you don’t get what you want from the New York Times, and support the media that gives you what you need. And this means real journalism, not preferred punditry.

    The French response:

    France Warns Media Not To Publish Hacked Macron Emails, Threatens With Criminal Charges

    After 9 gigabytes of Macron-linked documents and emails were released on an anonymous pastebin website on Friday afternoon in what Macron’s campaign said was a “massive and coordinated” hacking attack, France – fearing a similar response to what happened with Hillary Clinton after 35,000 John Podesta emails were released one month before the US presidential election – cracked down on the distribution of the files, warning on Saturday it would be a “criminal offense” to republish the data, and warning the French media not to publish content from any of the hacked emails “to prevent the outcome of the vote being influenced….”

    Domestically, in a similar reaction to the US media’s response to the Podesta emails, French TV news channels chose not to mention the hack, although the left-leading Liberation prominently featured the news on its website. Liberation author Cedric Mathiot wrote that the leak, and its timing, “wants to create chaos” adding that the information was distributed in an “unethical method….”

    But in the biggest parallel to the Clinton hacking, few have touched upon the actual contents of the documents, which some say confirm prior allegations of illicit financial dealings and offshore accounts, and instead merely sought to attack the messenger. Indeed, as journalist Kim Zetter noted overnight, “Telling journos to not report on hacked emails misses point that nearly all important leaks occur because someone broke law or a contract” and then followed up with the following rhetorical question, flipping the situation by 180 degrees: “If GRU, intending to assault dem., hacks Trump & publishes emails showing his direct connection to Russia, should journos report on those.”

    I don’t know that the French reaction was totally responsible. And there is a debate going on there among journalists. The prospect of government punishment for publishing this material is also a threat to democracy, especially if the news agencies can reasonably sort out true information from falsely planted material.

  18. 18.

    randy khan

    I generally take the position that I’m not going to fuss over spelling in tweets, Facebook posts, and online comments (except occasionally when they’re hilarious), but Trump’s Twitter feed has an unusually high number of misspellings for one from a public person. Usually people who know their tweets are going to be read by a lot of others are more careful.

    I’ve been pondering whether it’s intentional or not, and have come down on the side of not, but if nothing else it tends to confirm that nobody else reads his tweets before they go out.

  19. 19.

    clay

    @Spanky: Netherlands, Austria, now France… Europe seems to be waking up to a) how pernicious the Russian influence has been in underwriting far-right, nationalist movements; and b) how crappy such ideologues are at running a country.

    It’s a real shame that we had to be the canary in the coalmine, though.

  20. 20.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Brachiator: Oh for fucks sake, a herd mentality dominates the media coverage, where NYT leads other prestige media follow. If you believe that this is not a problem, look at the man in the White House right now. And blaming people for pointing this out is pretty rich.
    /end rant.

    ETA: Right now I don’t have a solution to this problem, but ignoring this dynamic is not going to make it go away.

  21. 21.

    germy

    The game plan:

    Political news site Axios got ahold of the Donald Trump administration’s playbook for today, and Brian Fallon from the Hillary Clinton campaign has posted it.

    Here are the three steps involved:

    1) Paint Sally Yates as a Democratic operative and a liar
    who was out to get Trump all along.

    2) Paint Michael Flynn as having had no real connection to Trump.

    3) Paint Flynn as having acted as a lone wolf.

  23. 23.

    JMG

    The biggest media story of the day is that Sinclair Broadcasting bought Tribune Media. Sinclair is as right wing as Fox, slants and censors its local news broadcasts and now is the biggest owner of TV stations in the country. Local news, BTW, is by far the biggest source of political information as cited by voters in surveys.

  25. 25.

    germy

    @JMG: Yes, our local sinclair station is beyond blatant about it.

    The national CBS evening news has been aggressive in fact-checking Trump, so I find they link to them less and less, and depend more on their own syndicated commenters for pro-admin spin.

  27. 27.

    amk

    caught the clip of creepy lordy, lordy unctuous scum that is comey in colbear show. what a shitweasel.

  30. 30.

    Sean

    Not hopeful that some direct smoking gun will surface but some of the campaign associates are likely to go down. Also more hopeful that NY AG can dig up enough to threaten the family business. Getting him to walk away is the higher probability play here.

  32. 32.

    Jeffro

    I think we should all hammer on the media to note how unprecedented it is for a sitting president to be preemptively slandering a former Attorney General who was looking into corruption tied to a hostile foreign power and his administration

    Off the looking glass and through the map we go…

  34. 34.

    Immanentize

    I hope the name Jefferson B. Sessions figures prominently in Ms. Yates’ testimony.

    And the idea that Sally Yates is some Dem operative is laughable. If she is a Democrat, which I doubt having met her, she is right of Manchin but way smarter.

  36. 36.

    bystander

    @Brachiator:

    France Warns Media Not To Publish Hacked Macron Emails, Threatens With Criminal Charges

    On the plus side, if we had this law, Andrea Mitchell would be rooming with Wretched Gretchen in Leavenworth.

  38. 38.

    SFAW

    This might sound like a crazy suggestion, but maybe media outlets like the NYT, etc., could use recent developments abroad as well as upcoming events like the Yates testimony as an excuse to reset the way they approach the gigantic elephant in the room:

    What, did Pinch die and Zombie Kay Graham became publisher? Because outside of something like that happening, the likelihood of the (FTF)NYT doing a “reset” is on a par with me winning the Olympic Marathon this year.

  40. 40.

    Marcopolo

    Good morning everyone. Going to an AHCA die in this afternoon at the local R congresscritter’s office (Ann Wagner MO-2). Haven’t done one of these since the AIDS protests. Tomorrow night is an absentee town hall for her. Hope we have a good turnout. Here’s a hat tip to everyone else around the country who is keeping up the pressure.

    I hope the folks testifying today share important information that moves the Trump/Russia investigation forward but honestly don’t see much coming out of the congressional efforts unless the house flips to Dem control in 2018.

  41. 41.

    Wjs

    Are the French currently being led by a Nazi? No. Good for France. They can deal with the rule of law and the Russians in their own good time now. Instead of nitpicking why not celebrate the defeat of evil? Ah but we always nitpick…

  42. 42.

    JMG

    NBC reports that In their Nov. 10 meeting, Obama warned Trump not to hire Flynn as Nat’l. Sec. Adviser. Wonder who the source was for that one.

  43. 43.

    Brachiator

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Oh for fucks sake, a herd mentality dominates the media coverage, where NYT leads other prestige media follow. If you believe that this is not a problem, look at the man in the White House right now. And blaming people for pointing this out is pretty rich.

    I’ve worked for newspapers and still know a shitload of journalists and editors. I still know a few publishers. The so-called dominance of the NYT is and always has been overrated. You are trying to put an argument into my mouth that I did not make, and totally reject.

    I also did not say that crappy news coverage is not a problem. But the number of good veteran journalists and editors who have been pushed out of the industry (or taken sweet retirement packages) as it struggles to re-invent itself is appalling, and has had a measurable impact on the quality of reporting. The increasing buyout of remaining papers and media outlets by right wing moguls also distorts the remaining coverage.

    The issue is more complex than you suggest, but if you want to insist simplistically that it’s just a matter of the herd following the New York Times, go right ahead.

  44. 44.

    germy

    Maybe Flynn, his loud & proud son, and all their friends and supporters will finally realize the potus does NOT have their backs. I think they were expecting loyalty. Instead he’s being disavowed.

    I recall the Peter Lorre scene in Casablanca: “Rick! Rick!!! Protect me Rick!”

  46. 46.

    amk

    @Brachiator:

    especially if the news agencies can reasonably sort out true information from falsely planted material.

    what a load of bs when the facts prove otherwise of the media spreading lies and spins every fucking day.

    your concern for democracy is duly noted.

  49. 49.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @ Major Major Major Major:

    The hot take from the French election that I saw gaining the most steam (Weigel, Yglesias, probably more relevant people too) is that ethno-nationalist Putin-backed movements are easily defeated if the establishment right holds the line. So that’s good.

    All the more reason to remind them that they are the self appointed keepers of patriotism and they can’t do that and support a cheesy clown who sold the country out for loan.

  52. 52.

    clay

    Is there an award for Most Blatant Example of Both-Siderism? Check out this gem from Axios, under an article called Washington’s Broken Climate Debate:

    The right: President Trump, his EPA administrator and almost all congressional Republicans refuse to publicly acknowledge that climate change is a problem. This position, fueled in part over the last seven years by deep-pocketed conservative advocacy groups and fossil-fuel companies, is becoming less common among everyone except elected Republicans. For example, most fossil-fuel companies are joining the rest of corporate America in backing global climate policy.

    The left: Many of the most influential Democratic and environmental groups, including at times the Obama administration, have pushed agendas that exclude conservatives who also want action on climate change. They do this by pursuing policies that focus almost entirely on renewable energy at the exclusion of other sources that are cleaner than traditional fossil fuels, including nuclear power and coal using technology capturing the carbon emitted. Political backers of climate action often downplay any uncertainty and play up potential catastrophic outcomes.

    So, to recap: the right is bad because they refuse to acknowledge that the problem exists, much less do anything about it. But the left is bad because their solutions don’t offer enough appeal to conservatives!!

  53. 53.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Brachiator: Herd mentality totally exists, some issues are reported over and over again, HRC’s emails for example. O’s speaking fees is another recent example. Someone starts a meme then everyone piles on. We should do a study of how many such anti-Dem memes were started and promoted by the Vichy Times, in say this century.

  54. 54.

    Gin & Tonic

    I know we use Wilmer here for a certain politician, but it’s starting to look here like Trump as Kasper Gutman and Flynn as Wilmer.

  56. 56.

    opiejeanne

    @Betty Cracker: Do you know the origin of the triptych? It looks like it was being assembled for a celebration of some sort. Le Pen’s victory party?

  57. 57.

    germy

    We should do a study of how many such anti-Dem memes were started and promoted by the Vichy Times

    I could be wrong, but I think decades ago Newt Gingrich made it easy for them (and other news organizations) by training his team to use certain words and phrases over and over, until the reporters finally copied them down without questioning.

  58. 58.

    Betty Cracker

    @Brachiator: I have friends who work for major dailies, and you’re right about the toll of the layoffs, etc., but I think you underestimate the power of the NYT as a model. That said, I should have made it clearer that I’m talking about Beltway political coverage — print and screen. With a few notable exceptions, it is terrible, IMO.

  60. 60.

    GregB

    Is Flynn a great patriot wronged by the fake media or is he a dangerous flunky given high level access by the Obama admin?

    The Trump Propaganda Ministry needs to know.

  61. 61.

    germy

    @opiejeanne: The triptych reminds me of those corny family portraits where everyone wears the same outfit and stares dreamily off to one side.

    Or they could be hipster backup singers for an indy band. White shirts, black blazers, harmonizing and doing subtle choreography with arm movements.

  62. 62.

    Adam L Silverman

    @JMG: Sinclair also cut a deal with Jared Kushner for favorable coverage of the Trump campaign in exchange for greater access. Sinclair is also where Boris Epshteyn was offloaded – he’s now the senior political analyst for Sinclair Broadcasting – when the White House had to get rid of him a month or so ago.

  65. 65.

    trollhattan

    @GregB:
    I caught perhaps five minutes of Flynn’s RNC speech at the time and thought wow, this guy is certifiable, somebody get a net. A month ago I watched the whole thing and concluded I’d been far too charitable.

    So, of course Trump hired him.

  66. 66.

    GregB

    @Cheryl Rofer:

    We now know for certain why Devin Nunes was throwing sand in the gears of the committee when Yates was first scheduled to talk.

  68. 68.

    LurkerNoLonger

    Hahahahaha! The afterglow from that beer bash at the White House lasted for a day and now Trump is back to defending himself against Russia. And I think a CBO score for Deathcare will be coming out this week. Its going to be a long week for Trump and Co. It couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of assholes.

  69. 69.

    Adam L Silverman

    @germy: Actually, by all reports, the President has been telling the rest of his staff to back off the “throw Flynn under the bus” schtick, continues to defend him, and doesn’t believe he did anything wrong.

  71. 71.

    Adam L Silverman

    @opiejeanne: It was created by a Russian artist several years ago. It got a big push by Maria Katasanova, a young, telegenic, female aid to a Putin ally in the Duma. She blasted it out, with a lot of other visual propaganda, on her social media feeds.

  72. 72.

    GregB

    The artist who created the co-opted by fascists Pepe the frog meme has killed Pepe.

    May that be a metaphor for the world wide fascist movement

    They are beginning their retreat, may it become a rout.

  73. 73.

    germy

    @Adam L Silverman: Oh, I didn’t know that. I thought he’d been distancing himself from flynn.

    It’s hard to keep up with all the conflicting statements that come out of that place.

  74. 74.

    hovercraft

    This might sound like a crazy suggestion, but maybe media outlets like the NYT, etc., could use recent developments abroad as well as upcoming events like the Yates testimony as an excuse to reset the way they approach the gigantic elephant in the room: a hostile foreign power’s ongoing meddling in U.S. elections.

    The Garbage Times will not change, ever. They have a narrative and they are sticking to it, Clinton blew the election by being the worlds worst candidate ever. Pesky little things like their coverage and Wikileaks and Russia were only incidental, a better candidate who wasn’t so hated would have been able to overcome that.
    Our media is lazy and determined to stick to whatever narrative they decide on. Twitler is never going to become “presidential” as they all predicted he would, so they simply move the goalposts to normalize him. He can’t move past his squeaker of a win so Hillary must also be just as unable to move on, hence this stupid editorial from the Vichy Times. ( Link to excerpt at Nomoremisterniceguy, I will not link to NYT)

    Six months on, both Mr. Trump and Mrs. Clinton are still waging last year’s campaign, undermining their promises to help America heal.

    Or, as the next few paragraphs explain, faced with questions from Amanpour on her views about Trump’s conduct in office so far, she perversely insisted on talking about Trump’s conduct in office so far. How rude, and divisive, is that?

    These fuckers will not change.

  76. 76.

    ? ?? Goku ? ?

    @clay:

    Many of the most influential Democratic and environmental groups, including at times the Obama administration, have pushed agendas that exclude conservatives who also want action on climate change.

    Who are these mythical conservatives who want action on climate change? And no mention of the scientific consensus I see. It’s as if science doesn’t exist in this writer’s world

  77. 77.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Cheryl Rofer:

    A senior Trump administration official acknowledged Monday that Obama raised the issue of Flynn, saying the former president made clear he was “not a fan of Michael Flynn.” Another official said Obama’s remark seemed like it was made in jest.

    What the what?

  79. 79.

    ? ?? Goku ? ?

    @hovercraft: The most annoying part for me about the NYT’s coverage is addressing Trump as “Mr. Trump”. “Mr.” gives him an air of respectability that he neither deserves or has earned

  80. 80.

    Brachiator

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Herd mentality totally exists, some issues are reported over and over again,

    Again, more complex than you allow.

    O’s speaking fees is another recent example.

    Good example. A great deal of the story here has been kept alive by “progressive” news sites that have their knickers in a twist over Obama taking money from banks, a sure sign of his lack of purity. This shit is not coming from the NY Times.

    Meanwhile, the right wing “herd” is flogging the shit out of the upcoming biography of Obama by David Garrow, who (surprisingly) seems willing to fall into the right wing trap. The conservative media jackals are making a huge deal about Obama having sex with, but not marrying, a white woman, and his supposed flirting with the idea of having a gay relationship with someone, which they are inevitably pushing as a sign of Obama’s inherent depravity. This crap is already out there, but it has not been pushed hard by the NY Times or most other mainstream newspapers.

    Someone starts a meme then everyone piles on. We should do a study of how many such anti-Dem memes were started and promoted by the Vichy Times, in say this century.

    Studies have been done. This is nothing new. The plain fact is that not only are there newspapers which play favorites, but also editors and reporters within newspapers.

    It was noted, for example, that the UK Daily Mail did not even mention the French election results in its editions for that day. The conservative Daily Mail was a big BREXIT supporter. The Daily Mail has its own agenda, which sometimes dovetails with that of other right wing media.

    It is simply insufficient to talk about herd mentality. You got to know who the players are.

  81. 81.

    Adam L Silverman

    @germy: Frank Luntz created a terminology manual for Gingrich to redefine common political terms and be used by Republicans and conservatives when speaking. Luntz would eventually go on and create the hasbara manual for the Israelis.

  82. 82.

    hovercraft

    @JMG:

    Sinclair is as right wing as Fox, slants and censors its local news broadcasts and now is the biggest owner of TV stations in the country.

    Actually I saw somewhere that the are considerably to the right of FOX, I think it was Gabe Sherman on Real Time with Bill Maher, and he pointed out the irony of Sinclair trying to do to FOX what FOX did to the MSM, paint them as overly “liberal” and make themselves the “true voice” of conservatives, they are more in line with Breitbart and their ilk. Bullshit Mountain wants to maintain the fiction that they are a legitimate news network, the far right not so much.

  84. 84.

    Gin & Tonic

    @germy: Still, it’s amusing that both you and I went to different Bogart movies for our reference.

  85. 85.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Brachiator: Are you saying that NYT coverage has not been a problem for the Democrats? They get a pass from your for their coverage of the 2016 election. They didn’t have a thumb on the scale for T?

  88. 88.

    ? ?? Goku ? ?

    @Brachiator:

    It is simply insufficient to talk about herd mentality. You got to know who the players are.

    I agree with this. You got know who these people actually are before you properly intimidate them

    /jk

  89. 89.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Cheryl Rofer: @Betty Cracker:
    Yep, and I think this second paragraph needs some explication:

    The reason that LTG (ret) Flynn was allowed to maintain his clearances is that we require that retired senior leaders maintain their clearances. It doesn’t matter if you retire, if you quit in protest, or if you are fired, once you reach a certain rank your clearances are maintained for a period of time post departure in case you need to be called back in and explain something that happened on the senior leader’s watch. Or something that changed because of a decision the senior leader made or were part of. All this means is that the TS/SCI is maintained, it does not mean that access is maintained. If the senior leader is called back in for a review, then they are read on to the clearance/clearances necessary for access to review the materials, decisions made, etc in order to provide insight for future decision making, strategy development, and policy formation. When LTG (ret) Flynn was appointed Assistant to the President-National Security Advisor he should have been rescreened by the White House Special Security Officer (SSO). As part of the process to be read on, which is done in coordination between the White House SSO, the FBI that conducts the clearance review, and the CIA SSO who oversees all senior administration intelligence appointments, LTG Flynn should have been required to fill out a Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI) checklist. This form asks if one seeking access has had contacts with foreign nationals who are officials of their country’s governments and/or military services. If the answer is yes, there is a subsequent question as to whether this was part of one’s assigned, official governmental duties. If the answer is yes, then there is a series of subsequent questions seeking clarification as to the nature of the interactions. Provided these forms are filled out accurately, let alone at all, this allows the SSO to make a fully informed determination of the risks of granting the specific applicant for access actual access.

  90. 90.

    Brachiator

    @Betty Cracker:

    I have friends who work for major dailies, and you’re right about the toll of the layoffs, etc., but I think you underestimate the power of the NYT as a model.

    I’ve previously mentioned, sometimes more obliquely, that I used to work for the LA Times. I’ve known editors, executives and some of the publishers at a shitload of papers. One of my co-workers at another job is related to the publishers of the NY Times. I do not claim to be a super knowledgeable insider, but i got a few sources. I know who was jealous of the NY Times and who didn’t give a shit about them, not just at the Times, but at a number of other papers as well.

    BTW, a lot of expensive interior remodeling at the LA Times came after the editors saw some of the display of the offices of the Washington Post in the movie “All the President’s Men.” Envy is odd, very odd, and not always related to the actual journalism getting done.

    That said, I should have made it clearer that I’m talking about Beltway political coverage — print and screen. With a few notable exceptions, it is terrible, IMO.

    I totally and absolutely agree with you here. The Beltway is a special, insular world.

  91. 91.

    PST

    @Major Major Major Major:

    The hot take from the French election that I saw gaining the most steam (Weigel, Yglesias, probably more relevant people too) is that ethno-nationalist Putin-backed movements are easily defeated if the establishment right holds the line. So that’s good.

    A good argument can be made that firm opposition by the establishment right would have prevented Hitler’s rise. It is tragic how wrong such people can be about whom they think they can use and discard.

  95. 95.

    ? ?? Goku ? ?

    @Adam L Silverman: Great stuff, Adam. But man you gotta break that down into smaller paragraphs. It’s big wall of text that’s hard to read.

    Anyway: so IOW: access does not = clearance and apparently this “Senior WH Official” didn’t know this. That’s troubling. We’re already 4 months in, when are they going to learn this shit? And how much classified info is going to be leaked in the meantime?

  98. 98.

    ? ?? Goku ? ?

    @Adam L Silverman: That’s her? She looks like a teenage girl! The poster is kinda ruined since Le Pen got denied yesterday. Russian tool

    Edit: is she a Law and Justice candidate?

  103. 103.

    Brachiator

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Are you saying that NYT coverage has not been a problem for the Democrats?

    Nope.

    They get a pass from your for their coverage of the 2016 election.

    Again, the media is not a monolith. I was not a big reader of the NY Times coverage.

    They didn’t have a thumb on the scale for T?

    No. People expected the Times to vet Trump. This was a bullshit expectation. And by the time that Trump had become a major force, people ignored Trump news stories, even past negative Trump coverage in the Times. A lot of people, including Balloon Juicers, forget how everyone (including some folks here) simply dismissed Trump early on. Nobody thought that his campaign was anything other than a joke. Until it wasn’t.

    What is more complicated is this aspect of the story. A lot of prior Trump coverage in NY came from the social and business section, and these people are lame politically. One source who should have been hit more was Maureen Dowd, who confessed in some interview that she knew a lot about Trump since covering him in the 90s, but had first been put on him by the society editors. Why she seemed to protect Trump, and why political reporters did not try to talk to her for more leads is unknown. The Post and the Daily News were not especially hard hitting either, but you got to come with something harder than herd mentality to get to the roots of this.

    The Times didn’t dig deep enough or hard enough. But they never had anything particularly good to say about Trump and did not endorse him.

    Similarly, New Jersey papers should have had a mountain of dirt on Trump and the phoniness of his casino operations. What happened here?

    And at a certain point, early on, Trump supporters simply dismissed, downgraded and ignored media stories about him. They didn’t care and there was no amount of vetting that was going to change their minds.

  105. 105.

    Adam L Silverman

    @? ?? Goku ? ?: Correct. I have active clearances. By this I mean I am in what is called scope. This means I have had a Senior Source Background Investigation (SSBI) done as part of a Periodic Review (PR) and an adjudicator has determined that I am eligible for access at the levels I have been cleared to review information at. Due to recent changes (as of the end of DEC 2016) in the time periods, clearances are now good for 7 years, with the Periodic Review to be started at the beginning of year 6 to avoid renewal delay issues. They were so backed up that they had folks who were submitted for PRs before the five year window closed, but didn’t receive their renewals for 14 to 24 months (or longer). This made it impossible for people to move to new jobs/assignments because as soon as they were read off where they were at for the new assignment they were out of scope and couldn’t be read on at the new assignment. This was causing significant problems.

    Anyhow, I have clearance. I do not have access unless I need to have it. If it is deemed that I need to have access, then I will be submitted for read on through the SSO at the site that controls access. That person has the final say as to whether one has access and the SSO’s determination process is, essentially, an additional, secondary screening process. Each SSO is a little different. None of them are known for their sense of humor. Or for their flexibility.

  106. 106.

    Adam L Silverman

    @? ?? Goku ? ?: That is Katasanova. She is a 21 year old aide to Evgeny Federov, who is a hard line member of Putin’s party in the Duma.

  109. 109.

    Brachiator

    @schrodingers_cat: Crap. A reply got moderated because I used the magic word c@sino. Maybe it will pop up soon.

    OT: On my commute I heard a movie podcast note that “Baahubali 2: The Conclusion” was in 6th and 9th place in the UK box office, apparently because there are 4 different language versions released. I think the Hindi and Tamil versions are the two most popular. I know next to nothing about Indian movies, but find it fascinating how different language communities are served. Kinda reminds me of Hong Kong films that would have English, Mandarin and Cantonese subtitles.

  111. 111.

    opiejeanne

    @Adam L Silverman: Wow.

    I kept thinking the stylized portrayals reminded me of something, and when you said Russian artist I realized that squarish-face thing is something I’ve seen in old Communist propaganda art. Also reminds me a little of Thomas Hart Benton’s work.

  116. 116.

    Adam L Silverman

    @amk: LTG McMaster can only announce his retirement and resign from his current assignment or be fired. My understanding is that LTG McMaster had been informed by the Army to prepare for retirement prior to being asked by the President to serve as the National Security Advisor. The Army had informed him there would be no follow on assignment beyond serving as Deputy Commanding General Training and Doctrine Command and Director of the Army Capabilities and Integration Center (ARCIC). I do not know what, if anything, he is considering. I do not know how accurate Lake’s reporting is. His recent reporting on this stuff has been horrid, largely serving as a conduit for quickly debunked, self serving garbage from Congressman Nunes and his former staffer now at the National Security Council.

    For full disclosure: LTG McMaster endorsed a proposal I made to TRADOC in Fall of 2014 (which TRADOC did not take action on) and has written a letter of reference for me.

  119. 119.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Brachiator: Hindi version is the dubbed version. India has more than 15 official languages, roughly 3 language families, derived from Sanskrit (most north Indian languages), derived from Tamil (4 south Indian languages), languages from the eastern hill regions (Bodo, Khasi etc). Hindi movies are the biggest in terms of economics but many regional film industries are thriving. Marathi films are known for their unflinching look at society’s evils and are less glossy. The Indian movie scene has really thrived in the last two decades.

  121. 121.

    Miss Bianca

    @hovercraft: btw, o/t – I took the verbage you gave me for responding to Cory Gardner re the AHCA, reworked it, and sent it to my repsrestantive Scott Tipton after the vote last week. I’m also going to revise it and send it to its original target. Thanks again!

  122. 122.

    Adam L Silverman

    @schrodingers_cat: I wouldn’t call him a friend. I had an idea that I thought was worthwhile. A senior leader who has mentored me knows LTG McMaster well and thought he would be disposed to not just considering it, but recommending it for action. Which he did. I provided some informal, pushed from me support to him when he was at ARCIC after that and asked for a letter of reference, which he agreed to do. That is pretty much it.

  123. 123.

    captnkurt

    @Spanky:

    Cleek’s Law is as inviolable as the law of gravity.

    Indeed. Trump’s argument should be, “Obama knew I would do the opposite of everything he recommended, so he should have insisted I re-hire Flynn”

  128. 128.

    geg6

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Very late to this thread, but this idea that the NYT isn’t some sort of leader in the new media or that we shouldn’t be bashing them for their total lack of journalistic integrity because there are other media out there who aren’t completely lacking in integrity (and by and large, those that aren’t lacking integrity tend to not to hold up the NYT as a model; in fact, just the opposite) is bullshit.

    I come from a family of journalists. I worked at a newspaper myself. I am still friends with numerous people in media. The NYT is always considered a model by most mainstream media. And the idea that we shouldn’t hold the NYT responsible for their horrid reporting is the biggest joke of all. What a load of crap.

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