Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Democracy is not a spectator sport.

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

75% of people clapping liked the show!

Republicans: slavery is when you own me. freedom is when I own you.

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

Not rolling over. fuck you, make me.

You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

“Just close your eyes and kiss the girl and go where the tilt-a-whirl takes you.” ~OzarkHillbilly

At some point, the ability to learn is a factor of character, not IQ.

I would try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.

Putin must be throwing ketchup at the walls.

Dear elected officials: Trump is temporary, dishonor is forever.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

A fool as well as an oath-breaker.

Well, whatever it is, it’s better than being a Republican.

You cannot love your country only when you win.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

Not all heroes wear capes.

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

Let’s bury these fuckers at the polls 2 years from now.

You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Dolt 45 / Open Thread: Leeroy Jenkins Lewandowski!!!

Open Thread: Leeroy Jenkins Lewandowski!!!

by | 147 Comments

This post is in: , , , , , ,

You can see why no competent people would want to join the current White House team: They know they won’t get paid, they won’t get credit (not even Johnny-Cochrane-post-OJ-style credit), and they’d have to deal with some of the most unpleasant and incompetent individuals currently not under court-mandated supervision. Not to mention, even the enthusiastic brigands might not meet Lord Smallgloves’ highly egocentric standards. But, jeez, Lewandowski again?

Jason Zengerle’s GQ profile actually came online early in May, before the latest bouts of Russiagate revelations. That makes the whole thing even more darkly comic, IMO:

… As unlikely a presidential candidate as Trump was 30 months ago, Lewandowski was an even more implausible pick to manage a presidential campaign. His experience in politics had been far from exemplary. When he hadn’t been failing in his own political ambitions—he managed just 143 votes in an unsuccessful attempt to secure the Republican nomination for a Massachusetts House of Representatives seat in 1994 and lost a race for the treasurer of his New Hampshire town 18 years later—he was coming up short on behalf of other politicians. Lewandowski had a stint working on Capitol Hill for an Ohio Congressman who’d later resign in scandal and serve 17 months in prison, and he managed the dismal reelection campaign of U.S. Senator Bob Smith of New Hampshire, who was the rare incumbent to lose a party primary. He eventually washed up at the New England Seafood Producers Association. For years, his closest brush with the big leagues of GOP politics came via his side-gig duties as a marine patrol officer on Lake Winnipesaukee, where Mitt Romney and his clan vacation. “He wasn’t even considered a B-teamer,” says one prominent Republican strategist, who first encountered Lewandowski on Smith’s campaign. “He was like a C- or D-level political operative.”

To the extent Lewandowski was thought of at all in broader political circles, it was because of his work for Americans for Prosperity, a group funded largely by the billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch, which in 2008 hired Lewandowski to serve as its New Hampshire state director. (“The Koch operation is the island of misfit toys,” explains the prominent Republican strategist.) It was propitious timing. Riding the Tea Party wave in 2010, AFP helped Republicans take back the New Hampshire legislature and the state’s two seats in the U.S. House. Lewandowski created his own momentum, as well. Noticeable for the fact that he was invariably wearing a suit—a rarity in New Hampshire politics—Lewandowski became famous for “debating” a life-size cardboard cutout of the state’s Democratic governor at political rallies. “It got attention,” says Greg Moore, a New Hampshire conservative activist who succeeded Lewandowski as AFP state director. “You have to have someone who’s out there and leading the charge, and Corey certainly was that.” After the 2010 triumph, Lewandowski was promoted inside AFP to a regional director.

But according to multiple sources, Lewandowski ultimately ran into trouble at AFP. One former Koch adviser says it was because of spending and management issues—including an incident in which Lewandowski threatened to “blow up” the car of AFP’s chief financial officer because of a late reimbursement check. (Lewandowski has denied making this threat.) A GOP political operative says the Kochs were embarrassed when AFP was accused of voter-suppression tactics after its North Carolina chapter, which Lewandowski oversaw, sent a mailer to voters there with incorrect voter-registration information. Another former Koch adviser says Lewandowski was simply one of many AFP apparatchiks whose heads were put on the chopping block after the group spent hundreds of millions of dollars in 2012 and Republicans failed to win back the White House or the Senate. Whatever the reason, these sources say, by the time Lewandowski met with Trump at the beginning of 2015, he had fallen out of favor at AFP.

But Trump, according to people close to him, did not realize that. Indeed, when he offered Lewandowski the job of campaign manager, he believed he was poaching one of the Koch Brothers’ top talents. “Trump thought he was getting somebody who left the Kochs to go work for him,” says Sam Nunberg, an adviser to Trump at the time who later clashed with Lewandowski. “He thought he was getting the Kochs’ shiny trophy, when he was really getting their dog shit.”
 
And yet, in some ways, Lewandowski was the perfect campaign manager for Trump—at least at the beginning. “Five of us, that was the whole team,” he’s recalled wistfully. “You could have put ’em in a minivan.” Unburdened by any previous national campaign experience, and eager for his new boss’s approval, Lewandowski didn’t try to force the candidate into a conventional box. Instead, his mantra was “Let Trump be Trump”—which turned out to be a singularly important insight, a strategic directive that ultimately propelled Trump to the White House. “Mr. Trump’s gut instinct is better than anyone I’ve ever seen,” Lewandowski told me.

While Lewandowski’s critics were quick to point out that his duties for Trump were less those of a traditional campaign manager than of an “advance man”—the political worker bee who ensures the rallies have the right number of flags—that particular job, given the nature of Trump and his campaign, was a crucial one. If Trump decided on the spur of the moment that he wanted to go campaign Philadelphia, Lewandowski would find the biggest arena; if an aide played the wrong walk-on music for Trump—like a live version of Twisted Sister’s “We’re Not Gonna Take It” instead of the studio one—Lewandowski made sure the mistake never happened again. “Trump really pays attention to how his rallies work,” says one reporter who covered his campaign from its inception. “Corey was very good at making sure the thing that mattered most to the candidate, and at that point the campaign, were top-notch.”

The problem was that, as the campaign progressed, Lewandowski didn’t grow along with it. “You’re looking at a guy who not only didn’t understand strategy,” says a Republican political consultant who worked with Lewandowski on the Trump campaign, “he didn’t have a clue what a tactic was.” Even worse, Lewandowski resented those who did—and he became increasingly preoccupied with, and paranoid about, the people who were joining the campaign and turning the Trump minivan into a bandwagon…

His fate was apparently sealed when Lewandowski ran afoul of Jared Kushner. According to multiple sources, Lewandowski was discovered not only shopping damaging stories about Trump’s son-in-law to reporters, but also trying to keep Kushner from talking to higher-ups at the RNC. On a Sunday in mid-June—Father’s Day, in fact—Ivanka Trump reportedly insisted to her dad that he get rid of Lewandowski. The next day, Lewandowski arrived at Trump Tower at six in the morning, as he typically did, and conducted his usual series of conference calls; at 9:30, he was summoned into an office, where Trump’s two sons, Donald Jr. and Eric, as well as a family attorney, were waiting for him. They told him he was being terminated from the campaign. “What am I being fired for?” Lewandowski asked. “We won!” Security guards then escorted him from Trump Tower and he walked out, alone, onto Fifth Avenue.

But Lewandowski had the good sense not to burn his bridges. That afternoon, he appeared on CNN (in what would turn out to be a job audition of sorts) to sing Trump’s praises. “Corey recognized it was an honor, it was a gift, and it was time to hand off the torch,” says Bryan Lanza, a Lewandowski friend who also worked on Trump’s campaign. “Corey’s a professional.”…

Reader Interactions

147Comments

  1. 1.

    Morzer

    He eventually washed up at the New England Seafood Producers Association.

    I knew there was something fishy about him.

  3. 3.

    Corner Stone

    He was not fired after assaulting a reporter. He assaulted a reporter and was also fired but the two most likely have nothing to do with one another.

  6. 6.

    SFAW

    @Gin & Tonic:

    Maybe now CNN will remove him from their payroll?

    My my my, aren’t WE the optimistic/naive sort?

    They’ll up his salary, as long as he guarantees more access to Shitgibbon.

  7. 7.

    Morzer

    Jared: The Trump lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over, but it can’t. Not without your help. But you’re not helping.
    Lewandowski: What do you mean, I’m not helping?

  8. 8.

    SFAW

    @Morzer:

    The Trump lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over, but it can’t. Not without your help.

    Wait a second — when did McConnell become part of this?

  9. 9.

    Gelfling 545

    Well, it’s not like the Trump regime has its choice of the brightest and the best so they can’t be too choosy. Lewandowski needed the job so can’t be choosy. Perfect match.

  11. 11.

    Corner Stone

    His fate was apparently sealed when Lewandowski ran afoul of Jared Kushner. According to multiple sources, Lewandowski was discovered not only shopping damaging stories about Trump’s son-in-law to reporters, but also trying to keep Kushner from talking to higher-ups at the RNC. On a Sunday in mid-June—Father’s Day, in fact—Ivanka Trump reportedly insisted to her dad that he get rid of Lewandowski. The next day, Lewandowski arrived at Trump Tower at six in the morning, as he typically did, and conducted his usual series of conference calls; at 9:30, he was summoned into an office, where Trump’s two sons, Donald Jr. and Eric, as well as a family attorney, were waiting for him. They told him he was being terminated from the campaign. “What am I being fired for?” Lewandowski asked. “We won!” Security guards then escorted him from Trump Tower and he walked out, alone, onto Fifth Avenue.

    Call me crazy, but I have the absolute best feeling about this.

  13. 13.

    Adam L Silverman

    Letting Trump be Trump is not going to help this situation. The problem is the President. It doesn’t matter who you put around him. Who you hire. As long as the President is allowed to be Trump the current dynamic will continue to exist and continue to get worse.

  15. 15.

    tobie

    You would think that Lewandowski was just a gal Friday, arranging things like the appropriate number of flags on stage, if he weren’t such a thug. Thanks, CNN, for keeping this jerk’s career alive.

  21. 21.

    Jeffro

    I’m far less concerned about Lewandowski, and more so by the fact that the CINC is a fucking moron: read between the lines here

    How Trumpov Consumes (or does not consume) Top-Secret Intelligence

    Jesus, this know-nothing blowhard…parse these couple of lines…

    Most mornings, often at 10:30, sometimes earlier, Trump sits behind the historic Resolute desk and, with a fresh Diet Coke fizzing and papers piled high, receives top-secret updates on the world’s hot spots. The president interrupts his briefers with questions but also with random asides. He asks that the top brass of the intelligence community be present, and he demands brevity.

    As they huddle around the desk, Trump likes to pore over visuals — maps, charts, pictures and videos, as well as “killer graphics,” as CIA Director Mike Pompeo phrased it.

    “That’s our task, right? To deliver the material in a way that he can best understand the information we’re trying to communicate,” said Pompeo, adding that he, too, prefers to “get to the core of the issue quickly.”

    Yet there are signs that the president may not be retaining all the intelligence he is presented, fully absorbing its nuance, or respecting the sensitivities of the information and how it was gathered.

    It actually gets worse…

    Trump prefers free-flowing conversations over listening to his briefers teach lessons. “It’s a very oral, interactive discussion, as opposed to sitting there and reading from a text or a script,” Pompeo said.

    Pompeo added: “He always asks hard questions, which I think is the sign of a good intelligence consumer. He’ll challenge analytic lines that we’ll present, which is again completely appropriate. . . . It is frequently the case that we’ll find that we need to go back and do more work to develop something, to round something out.”

    Trump will task his briefers with returning the next day with more information about a particular subject, or will turn to McMaster and say, “General, give me more information,” according to Coats.

    Here, let me translate that shit: “General, I’m in way, way over my head on the most basic of world events…feed me my lines, break it down, yes or no, CAN’T. A. GUY. JUST. GET. A. ONE-PICTURE, ONE-WORD. BRIEFING HERE?!?”

    Killer finish:

    When he took office, Trump signaled to his national security team that he favors concise points boiled down to a single page.

    “I like bullets or I like as little as possible,” he said in a pre-inaugural interview with Axios. “I don’t need, you know, 200-page reports on something that can be handled on a page.”

    Trump also has encouraged his briefers to include as many visual elements as possible. This is a reflection, aides said, of Trump’s career as a real estate developer who evaluated blueprints and renderings to visualize what a property eventually would look like.

    “Sometimes,” Coats said, “pictures do say a thousand words.”

    Yes…that’s IT! He’s a technical blueprint reader…why would we fuzz things up with all those words?

    “Dancing through life..
    Skimming the surface
    Gliding where turf is smooth
    Life’s more painless
    For the brainless
    Why think too hard
    When it’s so soothing?
    Dancing through life
    No need to tough it
    When you can slough it off as I do
    Nothing matters
    But knowing nothing matters
    It’s just life
    So keep dancing through…”

  22. 22.

    Corner Stone

    If I am J Kush. Aren’t you looking side eye at Trump and wondering just how far he’s going to cut you loose at this point? I’m supposed to go into battle with Corey? When my freedom is literally on the line?
    Man, dial 1-800-SNITCHS my man. Post haste.

  24. 24.

    Jeffro

    @Corner Stone:

    Call me crazy, but I have the absolute best feeling about this.

    LOL
    Kushner out, Lewandowski in? What could go wrong? Or as the kids say, “Hold my beer…”

  25. 25.

    p.a.

    Can this government of stooges, by stooges, for stooges survive 40% approval if vote suppression and intimidation (the next logical step) keep that party in control of the legislature? I’m afraid I think the answer is yes. On top of that, if they instigate a military incident or there is a major terrorist attack here (by the right sort or terrorists), you know there will be a ‘rally round the stooge’ effect, at first at least.

  26. 26.

    Morzer

    @Jeffro:

    General McMaster will soon be along to explain that Trump’s preference for crayons and coloring books is because of his bold, strategic thinking that dispenses with unnecessary nuances.

  27. 27.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Keith P.:

    Chris Christie is laaauuuughing his ass off right about now.

    I think he is. I hope he is.
    I also think and hope that Barack Obama is laughing his own sweet black ass off right about now.

  29. 29.

    West of the Rockies (been a while)

    @Morzer:

    LOL! Yeah, Lewandowski is a psychotic putz. “Don’t touch me!” he squealed like a brat child on CNN. This hire is sort of like someone naming Jeff George starting QB now.

  30. 30.

    Jeffro

    @Morzer: He’s just coloring frantically so that his presidential library will have content, major content available! for subscribers and visitors, some of whom might not be tripping on their own shoelaces and/or speaking Russian.

  32. 32.

    sm*t cl*de

    @Jeffro:

    Trump also has encouraged his briefers to include as many visual elements as possible.

    Animated cartoons are especially effective at capturing his attention.
    Your President wants his information in the form of Tellytubbies.

  34. 34.

    ruemara

    I think this title is an insult to the measured reasonings* of Leeroy Jenkins.

    *compared to every Trump administration member.

  35. 35.

    dmsilev

    @Morzer: I feel safe in guessing that Trump’s crayon box has 63 gold crayons and one Hair Orange for making self portraits.

  36. 36.

    West of the Rockies (been a while)

    Wow, Jeffro… that account reveals Trump’s diminished mental capacity. And drinking Cokes at 10:30? What is he, 16?

  40. 40.

    Corner Stone

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    I also think and hope that Barack Obama is laughing his own sweet black ass off right about now.

    Others may be but Obama is not. Whatever else Trump is doing/not doing, he is steadily erasing everything Obama ever did that can be done without new legislation.

  42. 42.

    p.a.

    What’s going on with storm, flood damage response? Is the admin telling red states to pull themselves up by their bootstraps?

  44. 44.

    Aleta

    Maybe this was mentioned already. But speaking of “bringing in the wrong guy to solve something” in Bizarro World:
    WTFUCK: Portland Republican says party should use militia groups after racial attack

    (Portland Oregon) As tensions continue in Portland following the racially charged murder of two men on Friday, the top Republican in the city said he is considering using militia groups as security for public events.

    Multnomah County GOP chair James Buchal told the Guardian that recent street protests had prompted Portland Republicans to consider alternatives to “abandoning the public square”.
    “I am sort of evolving to the point where I think that it is appropriate for Republicans to continue to go out there,” he said. “And if they need to have a security force protecting them, that’s an appropriate thing too.”

    Asked if this meant Republicans making their own security arrangements rather than relying on city or state police, Buchal said: “Yeah. And there are these people arising, like the Oath Keepers and the Three Percenters.”
    Asked if he was considering such groups as security providers, Buchal said: “Yeah. We’re thinking about that. Because there are now belligerent, unstable people who are convinced that Republicans are like Nazis.”
    Buchal ran for Oregon attorney general in 2012 and has stood for election to Congress and the state legislature. -from The Guardian

  46. 46.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Jeffro: So a little context here. You always tailor your briefing deliverables to your commander’s preferred format. That doesn’t mean you don’t prepare the in depth reports or backgrounders, but each decision maker digests information differently. It is a the sign of a good staff officer when this is realized and acted upon.

    So that part is completely normal and to be expected. How much the President retains, whether he grasps the nuance, whether he appreciates the need to hold this information closely and keep it compartmented, these are all separate issues from tailoring deliverable formats to the preferences of the decision maker/commander.

  49. 49.

    Jeffro

    @West of the Rockies (been a while):

    Wow, Jeffro… that account reveals Trump’s diminished mental capacity. And drinking Cokes at 10:30? What is he, 16?

    There’s a dozen hints in the article that the Prez is not all there…consumed by his morning talk shows until 10:30 (sometimes earlier!), briefings that consist of a picture and a couple of words (sometimes with an aside to McMaster: “Give me more info, General”)…it will be a horror show during a major crisis, but in the meantime it is a stain on his GOP enablers and all of their big money/dark money donors that they’d risk our country with this moral AND mental abomination technically in charge of the republic.

  52. 52.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Corner Stone:
    And there may be no one in the country who cares more about America being governed well. If Obama finds any of this funny, I suspect only as gallows humor.

    @Adam L Silverman:

    You always tailor your briefing deliverables to your commander’s preferred format.

    True, but the subtext of this and other articles like it is that this commander’s preferred format is ‘A is for Apple.’ Well, no, worse. It’s ‘BAM!’ ‘POW!’ ‘To the Trump Cave!’

  53. 53.

    SFAW

    @Aleta:

    people who are convinced that Republicans are like Nazis.

    Hey, if the shoe fits, you fascist motherfucker …

  58. 58.

    Jeffro

    @Adam L Silverman: I thought I focused mostly on the low-level capabilities of the CINC without disparaging the briefers’ flexibility in adjusting to his needs. The capabilities of the briefers are not in question, not at all. The cognitive level of the president, and the willingness of those around him to cover for that deficit, is.

  59. 59.

    Jeffro

    @Morzer: There’s increasing speculation that she’s (at a minimum) ga-ga over Orange Gropenfuhrer…there may be other angles to the story…

  60. 60.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Aleta:

    Buchal ran for Oregon attorney general in 2012 and has stood for election to Congress and the state legislature.

    So he’s 0 for 3, then?

  61. 61.

    bmoak

    Well, Steven Universe certainly dropped a lot of bombs in it’s four-episode season opener tonight

  62. 62.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Gin & Tonic: He was in charge of the transition well into December when he was forced out, supposedly at Kushner’s urging. This is alleged to have happened in December. Can I prove it was Christie? No. But it is something in character for him if he’s decided to settle scores. If I’m recalling the reporting correctly, the WaPo got a letter postmarked from NJ with the information in it and it has taken them about 6 months to corroborate the info.

    That said it could have easily been an allied/partner intel service that provided the info to the WaPo through a cutout.

  63. 63.

    Jeffro

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    True, but the subtext of this and other articles like it is that this commander’s preferred format is ‘A is for Apple.’ Well, no, worse. It’s ‘BAM!’ ‘POW!’ ‘To the Trump Cave!’

    He’s barely on time to those 10:30 briefings because he’s still playing at making bad words with his bowl of Alpha-Bits…

  64. 64.

    Morzer

    @Adam L Silverman:

    You always tailor your briefing deliverables to your commander’s preferred format.

    So the White House needs a golf course, a dozen scantily-clad teenage girls and a grotesque amount of gold leaf? And, of course, two scoops of ice cream.

  67. 67.

    NotMax

    Adam, thought this might interest you. Wheels within wheels within wheels.

    An Iraqi Shi’ite force backed by Iran said it pushed Islamic State out of several villages on the border with Syria on Monday, potentially reopening a supply route to send Iranian weapons to President Bashar al-Assad.
    [snip]
    But the territory is connected with land held by U.S.-backed Syrian Kurdish groups on the Syrian side, who are more focused on fighting Islamic State than Assad.

    It is not known whether the Syrian Kurds would allow the Iraqi Shi’ite force to use their territory to reach Assad’s troops, deployed further south and further west. Source

  71. 71.

    JerryRich

    In other news, He, Trump has hired Freddie Krueger to chaperone a teenage slumber party.

  73. 73.

    GregB

    The simplest way to convince people that you aren’t a Nazi is to hire Brownshirts.

  75. 75.

    mai naem mobile

    I am worried what this cornered animal is going to do as things get worse. He’s such a petty vindictive little twit.

  80. 80.

    Jeffro

    @Adam L Silverman: Same here (seriously). A line to that effect in my original comment would have helped. It’s not on the folks who are giving the briefings at this point, that’s for sure.

  82. 82.

    Suffragette City

    If it was Christie who sent the letter, who would have told him about the convo? Don’t see where he would have been allowed to be part of it. And I continue to wonder about Woolsey and just how much he knows in all this.

  85. 85.

    p.a.

    @GregB: well after all the Nazis Republicans don’t have their own militia. Oh wait… they have the US military and any number of armed fed departments.

  86. 86.

    Morzer

    @Suffragette City:

    It seems unlike Christie to send a letter postmarked New Jersey. I wonder if someone else sent it and decided to make Christie look like the sender.

  87. 87.

    Corner Stone

    @JerryRich:

    In other news, He, Trump has hired Freddie Krueger to chaperone a teenage slumber party.

    Ha! Too bad he doesn’t know anything about slumber parties! The first one to fall asleep gets sharpie marker all over their face!

  88. 88.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Jeffro: I can tell you with perfect certainty, that the DNI and DCI and DIRNSA (Director NSA) and Director DIA (DDIA) and Director FBI being present or not being present, the IC selects its best briefers on each specific topic and issue to go and deliver the briefings. Regardless of that briefers rank and/or experience.

  90. 90.

    mai naem mobile

    @Adam L Silverman: I don’t see Christie settling scores that quickly. I think he would have waited until it was clear he wasn’t going to get any position in the administration. I can totally see him adding fuel to the fire once things started going downhill.

  91. 91.

    Aleta

    (WaPo) Trump administration plans to minimize civil rights efforts in agencies

    The Trump administration is planning to disband the Labor Department division that has policed discrimination among federal contractors for four decades, according to the White House’s newly proposed budget, part of wider efforts to rein in government programs that promote civil rights. As outlined in Labor’s fiscal 2018 plan, the move would fold the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs, now home to 600 employees, into another government agency in the name of cost-cutting.

    The proposal to dismantle the compliance office comes at a time when the Trump administration is reducing the role of the federal government in fighting discrimination and protecting minorities by cutting budgets, dissolving programs and appointing officials unsympathetic to previous practices.

    The new leadership at the Environmental Protection Agency, for instance, has proposed eliminating its environmental justice program, which addresses pollution that poses health threats specifically concentrated in minority communities. …

    The Education Department’s Office of Civil Rights — which has investigated thousands of complaints of discrimination in school districts across the country and set new standards for how colleges should respond to allegations of sexual assault and harassment — would also see significant staffing cuts. …

    And the administration has reversed several steps taken under President Barack Obama to address LGBT concerns. The Department of Housing and Urban Development, for example, has revoked a rule ensuring that transgender people can stay at sex-segregated shelters of their choice, and the Department of Health and Human Services has removed a question about sexual orientation from two surveys of elderly Americans about services offered or funded by the government.

  94. 94.

    Suffragette City

    @Morzer:
    I was unaware of the NJ postmark. Would make sense to have Jared think it was Christie..actually that’s rather funny.

  99. 99.

    Jeffro

    @mai naem mobile:

    I am worried what this cornered animal is going to do as things get worse. He’s such a petty vindictive little twit.

    I think that’s a perfectly normal concern that many of us have in the back of our minds. There’s no good way to predict what Trumpov will do, except go on past performance. And based on that…
    – he’s likely to deny everything and lie to everyone & anyone about the Russia scandal, to the point of calling it all made-up, #FakeNews (he’s already doing this, that wasn’t really a bold prediction ;)
    – he’s going to be doing weekly rallies of his supporters…most likely in districts/states of Reps/Sens who appear to be wavering on their Trump-love…(the former they’ve already announced; the latter, they have not)
    – if and when the evidence becomes overwhelming, and as we get closer to the 2018 elections, he’ll start to turn on members of his own party for their statements that he finds insufficiently supportive
    – this will be accelerated if and when indictments of the Trumpov team start to drop…I expect the WH to go just about fully dark (other than Fox News and worse) in about 3 more months…

  100. 100.

    Adam L Silverman

    @p.a.: In the case of the civilians, the rank, SES, Senior Analytic Service (SAS), or civil service (GS) would not be transmitted or referenced.

  101. 101.

    Morzer

    @Jeffro:

    Trump is 70, obese, never exercises, obviously not as sharp mentally as he once was, prone to rage – you have to wonder just how long his health will hold up under the strain of 24/7 scrutiny by people who obviously want him to fall.

  103. 103.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Suffragette City: Given that it was sent in December, when the then President-elect was working from his Bedminster property to select White House staff and cabinet nominees, it could have been anyone involved with the campaign. Or it could simply be a misdirection.

  106. 106.

    SFAW

    @Morzer:

    Rabbi, is there a prayer for the Donald?

    “May the Lord keep the Tsar Shitgibbon …
    .
    .
    … far away from here.”

  108. 108.

    Jeffro

    @Adam L Silverman: Right…they are doing their best, given the ‘audience’ and somewhat/completely atypical briefing requests. I have no doubt these are some of the most flexible, high-EQ, psych-profile prepared folks around.

  110. 110.

    Suffragette City

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Given that it was sent in December, when the then President-elect was working from his Bedminster property to select White House staff and cabinet nominees, it could have been anyone involved with the campaign. Or it could simply be a misdirection.

    Ahhh the plot thickens!! How the heck do you remember all this stuff???

  112. 112.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Suffragette City: You don’t need to know.//

    More seriously, I have a garbage can memory. It isn’t eidetic, but stuff goes in and stays in even if it isn’t word for word.

  113. 113.

    Another Scott

    @p.a.: They probably don’t know what’s going on there, either. GovExec:

    Officials at the Government Accountability Office reported this week that an extensive hiring backlog at the National Weather Service has led to burnout among meteorologists at the agency, who are frequently shifting schedules and working overtime.

    NWS plays a vital role in tracking weather across the country, frequently sending out warnings and advisory alerts to Americans when severe storms are imminent. But the agency, which is a part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in the Commerce Department, has suffered from an acute hiring backlog stemming back to sequestration in 2013.

    According to a GAO report released Wednesday, as the sequester took effect, NOAA implemented an agency-wide hiring freeze, during which time NWS saw some attrition in its ranks.

    But when that measure was lifted in 2014, NOAA’s Workforce Management Office, which handles human capital issues, was ill-equipped to deal with the increase in hiring demand since it had seen more than half of the staff that handle hiring leave the agency during the freeze. In fiscal 2016, attrition at NWS outpaced hiring—191 employees left the agency, while the workforce management office was only able to hire 157 external candidates.

    […]

    I imagine it’s only gotten worse in 2017… :-/

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  115. 115.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Morzer: I can honestly, 100% state that I have not been in New Jersey since I gave a talk at Seton Hall in 2009.

  116. 116.

    Morzer

    @Jeffro:

    Add in an unhealthy diet and the fact he’s clearly an obsessive who watches his critics and you’ve got a good recipe for some sort of extreme health/mental health event.

  118. 118.

    Morzer

    @Adam L Silverman:

    And I can honestly, 100% state that I believe you and I certainly didn’t run into you at the post office on a day when neither of us were in New Jersey.

  119. 119.

    Suzanne

    @Keith P.:

    Chris Christie is laaauuuughing his ass off right about now.

    I have to admit that I am a small and shitty enough person that I fervently hope that Christie is somehow instrumental in sending Kushner to prison. God, that would be so funny.

    I really hope that they all turn on each other and that it is bloody and humiliating.

  121. 121.

    Lyrebird

    Maybe too late for you to see this, but Anne Laurie, you are on fire!!!

    Thanks also (I think it was your post) for sharing someone’s line about this administration ending in ICE or in FOIA…

    Appreciating the surreal is the only way I know to keep rolling forward with this going on.

  122. 122.

    mai naem mobile

    @Jeffro: he already cancelled the Iowa one for next week. I think he’s worried a bunch of protesters are going to show up and chant ‘Lock You Up! Lock You Up!’

  124. 124.

    Elie

    @Another Scott:

    Its the GOP and now Trump intent to destroy the government. No joke. Trump is just the final stage in destroying what is left of America as a “dream” and any kind of moral ideal. Its been stewing a while, but now it is here and we will have to fight day and night to prevent it from what they intend. The goal has been both Russian and US extreme right wing funded by Mercers and Koch. It worked perfectly under the noses of the Democrats who while in power at the Federal level, did not understand our risk for how weakened we were at state and local levels such that once we lost the presidency, we would not be in position to do much about the rest of it.
    I have to say, I have mixed feelings hearing and seeing photos of Obama laughing. Sure, he is free of this, but what’s so funny? I don’t expect him to do anything particularly — but to look relaxed and laughing is kind of a shock. We are in the fight of our lives and our weapons look meager to the task right now. If he can’t help, please do us the courtesy of at least being sober (meaning no pearly whites).

  125. 125.

    sukabi

    @SiubhanDuinne: pretty sure Obama is enjoying his life, and like the rest of us is looking at horror at the mess Drumpf and his clueless coterie are making of everything.

    ETA although at this point it would be nice if we could have an ex-presidents intervention to remove the mango malignancy and his family….

  126. 126.

    Jeffro

    @mai naem mobile:

    he already cancelled the Iowa one for next week. I think he’s worried a bunch of protesters are going to show up and chant ‘Lock You Up! Lock You Up!’

    Maybe. And maybe they also booked a good-sized place and got zero response. Or maybe his palace guard realized that as wound up as he is from his horrendous European trip and the Russia investigations, they don’t want him speaking off the cuff to a hall full of mouth-breathers just yet.

    Who knows with these folks? But I look forward to the loyalty pledges and NDAs that he starts asking for from his rally attendees, and his barring of all but the wing-nuttiest of wingnut media. It won’t change the minds of his hard core supporters. But that kind of dictator behavior won’t play too well with “independents” and the last remaining ‘moderate’ Republican*.

    *L.H. Puttgrass of BLOOM COUNTY, who, as noted in a thread a few days ago, was “signing off and heading for the hot tub” (likely due to all this Trumpov bullshit) ;)

  127. 127.

    Morzer

    @Elie:

    You shouldn’t ask Obama, or any of us, never to enjoy life or be happy so long as Trump is president. People need to take a break, they need to have some reason for going on – and if you take joy in life out of the equation you’ll end up with a lot of burned-out, angry people who retreat into despair, cynicism and nihilism.

  128. 128.

    randy khan

    This move makes perfect sense. I mean, in the context of an Administration that puts Jared Kushner in charge of Middle East peace negotiations and has Sean Spicer as press secretary. In any other context, it’s insane.

  129. 129.

    Anne Laurie

    @Jeffro: Hope Hick’s a 20-something marketing assistant from the white-bread Connecticut suburbs. She was brought into the Trump campaign by Ivanka, who thought Daddy needed something nice to look at (who wouldn’t threaten other peoples’ standings, ifyouknowwhatImeanandIthinkyoudo).

    She’s not even smart or experienced enough to be Fawn Hall. Fifty years from now (assuming the world and what we know of as civilization still exist) I can see her writing the sort of happily clueless memoir Hitler’s last secretary produced just before her death, a few months ago.

  130. 130.

    Elie

    @Morzer:

    “Thanks, I needed that ‘

    Actually, I need that… I have been pretty upset and filled with dread…

    I am working with the local Dems to get some good candidates and run in local races. Let me focus on that. This other is just making me nuts and cynical…

  131. 131.

    Morzer

    @Elie:

    We are all a bit more nuts and cynical since the Tangerine Scream began swinging a monkey-wrench at America’s civil liberties and international reputation. Remember that you are doing the right thing by working with the local Dems and getting good people to replace the fools, frauds and fascists that bob along in Trump’s turdly wake. Give yourself some happy time and let it make you stronger for the future. Hell, even Cole isn’t naked mopping alone these days!

  132. 132.

    Morzer

    @Anne Laurie:

    She’s not even smart or experienced enough to be Fawn Hall.

    But.. but.. she graduated from Southern Methodist University!

  133. 133.

    Anne Laurie

    @Morzer:

    Rabbi, is there a prayer for the Donald?

    Not a rabbi (or even Jewish), but my guess would be “Oy, gevalt!”

    From the Forward:

    …[T]he literal meaning of the Yiddish word gevalt (or gevald, as it is sometimes spelled) does not explain the expression. “Oy, gevalt!” (or just plain “Gevalt!”) has the sense of “Oh, my God!” or “Good grief!” as uttered when something unfortunate has happened — when you have just discovered, say, that you have locked your car keys in the car, or when your dinner partner has spilled wine all over you. Yet the word gevalt in itself means “force” or “violence”; to do something mit gevalt is to do it violently. What does the one thing have to do with the other?

    Another Yiddish expression with gevalt in it provides a clue. This is shrayen gevalt, “to scream gevalt,” which means to call for help, although it can also have the semi-humorous sense of English’s “to scream bloody murder.” (Gey shray gevalt, “Go scream gevalt,” is the Yiddish equivalent of “Tell it to the judge” or “Go do something about it.”) And indeed, just as “bloody murder” is a phrase that originally had nothing comic about it, so the exclamation “Gevalt!” once had in Yiddish — and sometimes still has — a darker tonality. When uttered in a tone of genuine alarm, “Gevalt!” is, like “Help!” in English, a cry for rescue in serious situations, as when you are being attacked, your house is on fire, you are in danger of drowning, etc…

  138. 138.

    Groucho48

    @Aleta:

    Nothing says “We are not Nazis” better than hiring Brown Shirts as security for your rallies.

  143. 143.

    No One You Know

    I just finished a detailed addendum to my latest Democratic Party survey. My “Additional Comments” ran five pages (but with nice formatting and name dropping, so hopefully it will get read). And a check, because C.R.E.A.M. May it be known that I borrowed some of the wisdom here while I tried to explain why I prioritized the way I prioritized. I am so glad for David and Richard and Adam and John and Mnemosyne and Cheryl and…oh, you know who you are.

    Also going to Saturday’s March for Truth. I’m still looking for a pink kitty hat. I don’t knit, but I thought it would be easy to just get some yarn and learn…but no. Pink is so in, it was out of stock. With my luck, some new symbol will be in…

  144. 144.

    AxelFoley

    @Elie:

    I have to say, I have mixed feelings hearing and seeing photos of Obama laughing. Sure, he is free of this, but what’s so funny? I don’t expect him to do anything particularly — but to look relaxed and laughing is kind of a shock. We are in the fight of our lives and our weapons look meager to the task right now. If he can’t help, please do us the courtesy of at least being sober (meaning no pearly whites).

    Fuck that noise. You expect him to go around moping and frowning so you won’t feel bad? Nah, again, fuck that.

    He bust his ass for 8 years for this country, and he got shit in return from the right and the far left. The right wants to fuck everyone over and the far left wants to burn everything down. Welp, both sides got what they wanted.

    Obama represented us finer than just about any President in our history. He and his family deserve to live their lives like they’re golden.

Comments are closed.