Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Joe Biden can go out like FDR, not by dying in office, but by crushing the fascists.

The frogs are rarely mistaken.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

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

I know this must be bad for Joe Biden, I just don’t know how.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

“That’s what the insurrection act is for!”

White supremacy is terrorism.

The gop is a fucking disgrace.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.

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

Don’t expect peaches from an apple tree.

“Loving your country does not mean lying about it’s history.”

No one could have predicted…

The revolution will be supervised.

I conferred with the team and they all agree – still not tired of winning!

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

They love authoritarianism, but only when they get to be the authoritarians.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

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

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

Republicans in disarray!

You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Dolt 45 / Wednesday Morning Open Thread: Everybody’s Scrabbling for the Exits

Wednesday Morning Open Thread: Everybody’s Scrabbling for the Exits

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Yeah, *that* went well…


.

Not hardly gonna make the WH hiring department’s job any easier…

White House aides have been told to decide before the end of January whether they intend to leave the administration or stay through the November midterm elections, an official said, a deadline intended to help bring a sense of order to an anticipated staffing exodus.

President Donald Trump is finding it difficult to recruit staff to fill the vacancies, several people close to the West Wing say, as he faces the second year of his administration with daunting political odds and an ongoing Russia investigation.

In recent months, top advisers on foreign and domestic policy have announced their departures. Additional aides are expected to make their exit in the coming weeks. Chief of staff John Kelly has embarked upon an effort to fill the ranks by the end of January. But the absence of willing and qualified replacements, paired with a lengthy hiring process, make it unlikely he’ll reach that goal…

While a revolving door is common in any administration, people who work inside the White House with previous West Wing experience say the exhaustion is magnified remarkably under Trump. The unpredictability and chaos, along with a fear of costly legal fees in the wake of the Russia investigation, have added to the fatigue.

“It’s been a year, but doesn’t it feel like a decade?” a senior administration official said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive nature of the personnel shifts…

Gosh, you mean it’s not just us normal people Democrats who feel that way?

… Grueling hours, cramped offices and political warfare take sizable tolls on aides’ personal and family lives. That reality has been exacerbated during Trump’s first year in office, which was marked by chaos, internal backbiting and the constant specter of special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe.

Unlike previous presidents, however, Trump has alienated large swaths of Republicans who might otherwise leap at the opportunity to work at the White House. Some of Trump’s allies, along with establishment Republicans, have voiced worry that a second wave of operatives and policy staffers does not appear to be waiting on the bench as aides announce their departures.

“There are still a lot of people who have said that they are unwilling to work in the White House and there are a lot of people that the White House is unwilling to have come in,” said longtime Republican operative Doug Heye…

Another factor giving potential hires pause is the ongoing Russia investigation, which has led to four indictments and could soon include an interview with Trump. Some of those who might otherwise work for Trump view a White House job as a potential “ticket to the grand jury,” one person familiar with the staffing challenges said….

The most gaping hole, according to multiple Trump allies inside and outside the White House, is that of a chief strategist who can channel Trump’s populist appeal while translating it into policy and political wins. Since the departure of Steve Bannon over the summer, that position has remained vacant, leading to grumbling from some of Trump’s allies at the state of his political operation…

Oh, that’s their problem — they need another Steve Bannon, but more personable!

Reader Interactions

212Comments

  3. 3.

    MattF

    Kelly knows that marching the front-line troops in and getting their bodies out is an essential aspect of military logistics.

  6. 6.

    Amir Khalid

    Can the White House actually reject resignations tendered after January? Because unless it can, I fail to see how Kelly plans to enforce that deadline.

  7. 7.

    JPL

    The release of the Simpson’s interview transcript should be the lead story, because it shows that the republicans are trying to protect the president. Instead we are talking about Trump’s comments on immigration and the possible exit of white house aides.
    @Amir Khalid: It appears that the administration can make whatever rules they want, because there is no oversight.

  8. 8.

    Mustang Bobby

    I watched that clip from the meeting. This wasn’t leadership. This was some old fart nodding and smiling through something he doesn’t understand at all because he’s more concerned about when he’s going to get his pudding.

  9. 9.

    Brent

    @Amir Khalid: I suppose it’s possible that we have reinstated slavery by executive order or something. But yeah, as far as I know, no one can be compelled to work anywhere. I suspect Kelly is probably threatening to ruin careers for the non compliant but really what could look worse on a resume than voluntarily working for trump?

  12. 12.

    Bostonian

    Dotard will just agree with whatever the last person said, and then the conversation about “what he really meant” swirls around him, carried by people with more active minds. It’s like the decline of a dictatorship, in fast forward.

  13. 13.

    bystander

    Moanin’ Joe did a nice job humiliating twitler by calling him “PawPaw”, and characterizing him like a, well, dotard. We’ll see if they find time to discuss Feinstein’s treachery and disregard for national security because both sides do it.

    ETA. Swear I hadn’t read Bostonian when I posted. I guess we are one in our devotion to The True Leader.

  21. 21.

    satby

    @Elizabelle: Good morning to you! When you coming back? I’ve been seriously thinking of spending an extended time next year in Spain and would love to get your input on that.

  22. 22.

    Gin & Tonic

    Fucking Ramesh Ponnuru, of all people, writing for Bloomberg:

    The second obstacle is that Trump does not appear to have any fixed position in these negotiations or to understand the positions of others.

    It is not entirely clear why the meeting was held and televised; perhaps to prove that White House meetings don’t look like footage of the Gorilla Channel.

  23. 23.

    raven

    I got 2 hrs sleep before the wheezing woke me up so I ate a hydrocodone left over for my hernia operation and I finally got some sleep.

  24. 24.

    ThresherK

    Hey, when did Tulsi Gabbard become Tulsi!, single-named entity like Cher, Madonna, or Prince?

    Already worried about folks who are calling her this.

  26. 26.

    Gin & Tonic

    @raven: Try taking generic guaifenesin – it’ll help break up the mucus. Dextromethorphan is a cough suppressant if you also need that.

  27. 27.

    satby

    @raven: this is the second day you’ve been taking antibiotics, right? If you don’t feel improvement and less wheezing after today I would tell the doctor. Too many antibiotic resistant germs out there, and a serious influenza is viral anyway. Pneumonia or serious bronchitis at our ages isn’t something to risk.

  30. 30.

    Elizabelle

    @satby: My input is: take me! And definitely see Andalucia in a cool season. It’s gorgeous. Had expected to return to US of Cray Cray next week, but wondering if I could stay a little longer. Am near Cordoba today, driving my marvelous Peugeot rental back to Barcelona. Fly back to friends in Germany on Saturday.

    You should definitely do Spain. It is waiting for you. Vamos!

  33. 33.

    MomSense

    @Mustang Bobby:

    And then he fell back on his real estate developer schtick about building under budget, blah blah blah. He said it a couple of times and it seemed to be the only thing he felt confident saying. And that stupid staged conference was supposed to reassure us about his mental capacity.

  36. 36.

    OzarkHillbilly

    So the author of Fire and Fury is very happy with the sales of his book. No, the other Fire and Fury, the 10 year old one by Randall Hansen on the “Allied Bombing of Germany, 1942-1945”.

    “I haven’t seen this level of interest since the book first came out,” said Hansen, a political science professor at the University of Toronto.

    He was in Washington on Friday when Wolff’s book was released and had joked with his colleagues about the book he had written long ago with the same title. After dinner on Friday Hansen logged into Amazon and found that his book – which explores civilian perspectives on the Allied bombing of Germany during the second world war – had edged back on to three of the site’s bestseller categories. “It amused me and part of me thought, can people really be that dumb to be confusing these books?”

    In a few cases, it appeared that this was exactly what had happened. “I had a couple of bitter comments,” said Hansen. “There was one tweet, he came forward and said, ‘I bought this book by accident and there’s no way I’m reading it,’ in kind of this accusatory tone. I thought well, ‘it’s not quite my fault, mate.’”

    Others had stumbled upon Hansen’s work during their search for Wolff’s book, and had bought the critically acclaimed book out of interest.
    …..
    While Wolff used fire and fury to reference Trump’s threat of war against North Korea, Hansen’s book delves into what fire and fury looks like in practice, exploring the horrific consequences war holds for civilians.

    “And we’re talking about that at a moment when we have this warmongering, unstable, deranged demagogue in the White House,” he said. “So that coincidence actually makes me happier than the sales.”

  38. 38.

    Amir Khalid

    What that video of Trump’s meeting says about him is that he doesn’t know what the fuck is going on — and this is about one of his supposed signature issues. It could be the consequence of Trump being too lazy to prepare for the Presidency, it could be all that “executive time” in his workday (so that’s what they call it when the President is goofing off), or it could be the suspected mental decline that has become too obvious to avoid.

  41. 41.

    satby

    @Elizabelle: well, this year (in two weeks, eeek!) Thailand and Cambodia, and I may be going to Costa Rica in late autumn on an eco-volunteer thing. So the international travel budget this year is allocated. But later next year should see some freeing up of my animal responsibilities (my herd is pretty elderly), and if so I want to test out whether I would enjoy a couple of years as an expat. The constant upheaval around health care access, plus the fact I will still be too young for Medicare may make me a health care refugee.

  43. 43.

    Elizabelle

    @raven: oh no. Glad you are under medical care. Although: it was still worth it to do the Rose Bowl trip. What a start to 2018.

  46. 46.

    ThresherK

    @raven: Not to pile on the armchair diagnostics, but where’s the wheezing coming from?

    Down deep in the lungs, or swollen nasal membranes w/itchy eyes, or both?

    (Spousal Ms ThresherK have bonded over sharing our treatment of various respiratory ailments and treating them.)

  47. 47.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @Amir Khalid: I was a bit surprised, mind you just a bit, when Wolff said in his book that Trump doesn’t know how to read a balance sheet. You’d think with that the “Great Student” at the “Best School” would have learned to read a fucking balance sheet, but Wolff also noted in passing that Trump never went to class or did any of the required reading.

  48. 48.

    Kay

    @Gin & Tonic:

    This is why:

    Dana Bash says “this is the presidency that a year ago we all thought Donald Trump was capable of… Just the notion of him being in command .. This is what people who had high hopes for the Trump presidency thought it would be, meeting after meeting like this.”

    He knew they’d rehabilitate him. I don’t know what it is with GOP men and the yearning among political press for them to “be in command” but it is a powerful thing. It’s more infuriating with Trump because all of the catastrophes they have him overcoming are self-created. He miraculously recovered from the disaster brought about by the release of a (true) account of his White House. For that he gets an A on this ridiculous grading scale.

    Wait until he threatens war with North Korea and then doesn’t attack North Korea! That’s an A+.

  49. 49.

    Elizabelle

    @Gin & Tonic: I will miss it this trip, but an extended return to Sevilla area is on the wish list. Really interesting area, w the Moorish influence. Didn’t get to spend much time at Alhambra in Granada. My friend was suffering from food poisoning, so we had to flee. (Bad empanada from an earlier town; very sad for her.)

  51. 51.

    Elizabelle

    @Kay: Dana Bash is a careerist jackass. What smart person actually thought Trump was ever up to the job? Media whore.

  52. 52.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    . I don’t know what it is with GOP men and the yearning among political press for them to “be in command” but it is a powerful thing. 

    This is true. It is something.

  53. 53.

    ThresherK

    @Kay:

    Bash: “This is the presidency that a year ago we all thought Donald Trump was capable of…”

    Okay, I thought this started out accurately enough. But after this sentence Bash started showing symptoms of contact dementia.

  54. 54.

    debbie

    @Mustang Bobby:

    I particularly liked the guy two seats to the right (can’t read the nameplate) who tried to steer Trump back to the GOP’s position. This was like watching balloon volleyball: Where will the balloon waft to next?

  56. 56.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @Baud: True, but I’m pretty sure in many cases these folk were told to get out and didn’t. There was quite a bit of that on the local news Monday night as the storm was coming in.

    ETA: We got 3.09 inches here at the cave(I have a weather station out front).

  61. 61.

    debbie

    @Kay:

    Hey, do you think Husted’s humiliation before the Supreme Court will be devastating to his political career? Imagine, his boyish good looks being ripped a new one for disenfranchising a military veteran while he served in Afghanistan and Iraq for six years!

  67. 67.

    NorthLeft12

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    “And we’re talking about that at a moment when we have this warmongering, unstable, deranged demagogue in the White House,” he said. “So that coincidence actually makes me happier than the sales.”

    Quintessential Canadian perspective^^^^^. I actually might buy his book as I have absolutely no interest in anything about Deadbeat Donald.
    One last point; is there anything really new coming out in Wolff’s book? Weren’t all these traits and tendencies of Orange Doofus already quite clear in 2015/16? I have to believe the only people surprised are all those voters and pundits who expected the grand pivot after November 2016. SURPRISE!

  68. 68.

    Baud

    @NorthLeft12:

    Weren’t all these traits and tendencies of Orange Doofus already quite clear in 2015/16? I

    They absolutely were. Nothing is a surprise to us.

  69. 69.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @Baud: It was in about 36 hours; yes it was quite alot. It rained really hard yesterday afternoon. The storm was getting moisture from the tropics so there wasn’t a whole lot of snow in the mountains. I still want to reprise the pictures I took last March from the Baldwin Hills west of Downtown, but I’ll have to wait for a colder storm(and a weekend to avoid traffic).

  70. 70.

    NorthLeft12

    @ThresherK:

    Bash: “This is the presidency that a year ago we all thought Donald Trump was capable of…”

    I think this is a perfect statement of fact.

  71. 71.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    “He IS TOO in command! Yes he is!” :)

    He agreed with everyone, no matter what they said. They know he doesn’t mean any of it. That’s not even a discussion let alone a negotiation. That’s why negotiations are hard- there’s disagreement. This one was easy because it wasn’t one.

    He can do this, agree with everyone, say anything, because his promises don’t mean anything anyway and they all know it. No one will be mad when he goes back on it, or they have to explain for him that he agreed with DiFi because SHE was using the actual definition of DACA and he was using some imaginary definition that includes a border wall, because DiFi knows it doesn’t matter what he says.

  73. 73.

    Adria McDowell

    @OzarkHillbilly: I would read the fuck outta that book. I should probably also read Wolff’s Fire and Fury, too.

    Also, too: Mini-Me is in Daisies- Girl Scout cookie time is inching near, people! If anybody wants some, let me know! ;-)

  74. 74.

    OzarkHillbilly

    New York City police solve 1994 rape case that newspaper called a hoax

    New York City detectives announced on Tuesday they had cracked a 23-year-old rape case that a newspaper columnist wrote at the time was a hoax.

    A woman was walking through Brooklyn’s Prospect Park during the daytime in 1994 when she was attacked by a stranger, who choked her from behind, dragged her up a wooded slope and raped her. The then 27-year-old Yale graduate had been out jogging and was heading home with groceries. She gave police a detailed description of her attacker but the NYPD initially cast some doubt on her account and shared its skepticism with the media.

    The late New York Daily News columnist, Mike McAlary, wrote that he had heard from a police source that the woman invented her story because, as an activist, she thought it would bolster a speech she was planning to give at a rally protesting violence against lesbians. The police soon reversed their stance and reported that semen had been collected from the victim’s body and clothing, although with the technology available at the time they were not able to separate it from the victim’s DNA and search for a possible match. They recently applied new technology and were able to match the sample from the rape kit with a known perpetrator on file.

    But, at the time, McAlary continued to write articles casting doubt on the victim’s integrity and calling for her to be arrested.
    …….
    Her lawyer, New York attorney Martin Garbus, said she was experiencing very mixed emotions. “She’s feeling a combination of pain, confusion and relief,” Garbus, who represented her at the time of the case, told the Guardian.

    She has asked the Daily News and the NYPD to issues apologies for how she was treated. Garbus said it was not clear if she had the right now to file any fresh lawsuits in the case. “We are examining all options,” he said.

    “The newspaper stories, which were relentless, day after day, were nearly as traumatizing as the rape itself,” Garbus said.

  78. 78.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    It ups the ante for Democrats though. Trump’s weak. They get Congress, they too can roll him. Which they know.

    He tends to veer more toward Democratic policy ideas anyway because he perceives that those ideas as more popular in the country as a whole and that’s often true.

  80. 80.

    debbie

    @Raven:

    Tessalon Perles? They’ll work if you take them correctly. Also, as G&T said, get guaifenesin (Mucinex is OTC).

    ETA: Read the instructions for those perles. Be careful not to bite down on them as you swallow.

  81. 81.

    Baud

    @OzarkHillbilly: Ok, at first I was like, the reporter was just conveying what the police said. But this

    The newspaper stories, which were relentless, day after day, were nearly as traumatizing as the rape itself,” Garbus said.

    Seems over the top and inexcusable.

  85. 85.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    It ups the ante for Democrats though. Trump’s weak. They get Congress, they too can roll him. Which they know.

    Absolutely. I hope our voters realize that and not think it’ll be two years of gridlock.

    He tends to veer more toward Democratic policy ideas anyway because he perceives that those ideas as more popular in the country as a whole and that’s often true.

    Trump veers towards Trump. He won’t, for example, support conflict of interest laws or tax increases, no matter how popular.

  87. 87.

    Barry

    @Brent: “I suspect Kelly is probably threatening to ruin careers for the non compliant but really what could look worse on a resume than voluntarily working for trump?”

    ‘It says here on your resume that you spent two years in prison’.

    ‘Yes, I was in prison. For crimes’.

    ‘You sure that you were not in the White House?’

    ‘No, prison. For criminals. Like me.’

  88. 88.

    bystander

    Moanin’ Joe spoke out in favor Feinstein’s treasonous treason. I need a second cup of coffee.

  90. 90.

    Brachiator

    @JPL:

    The release of the Simpson’s interview transcript should be the lead story, because it shows that the republicans are trying to protect the president.

    That the Republicans are protecting Trump is obvious. Hell, his supporters expect no less.

    As for the rats deserting this ship, after a lull I would not be surprised to see an even more craven, opportunistic bunch to soon sign on. The GOP will encourage and help with this. They need Trump and will not cut him loose.

  92. 92.

    OzarkHillbilly

    When Lindsey Vonn looked toward the Pyeongchang Winter Games, which kick off in 30 days’ time, the Olympic gold-medalist seized the opportunity to slam Donald Trump: “I hope to represent the people of the United States, not the president.” She added: “I want to represent our country well. I don’t think that there are a lot of people currently in our government that do that.”

    In a country where unquestioning deference to the office of the presidency is a presumed duty of citizenship, this was a remarkable statement. But was it a clarion call for athletes to become activists at this year’s Olympics? Fifty years after US track stars Tommie Smith and John Carlos raised their fists at the Mexico City Games to protest social injustice, will we see Winter Olympians taking a knee?

    WTF????? “Unquestioning deference”????? In all of my years, no matter who was president, I have never seen a time of “unquestioning deference”. Where the hell has this Oregon professor been keeping her head? Up Putin’s ass?

  93. 93.

    NorthLeft12

    I think the quality of the WH staff replacements will really decline, as those that are leaving will be people that are intelligent enough to see where this freak show is headed, and actually have prospects outside of Trumpworld.
    Those that stay will be the incompetent, the lazy, and/or the ignorant racists that are actually committed to the Republican agenda. Good luck with that Donny!

  94. 94.

    Kay

    @NorthLeft12:

    One last point; is there anything really new coming out in Wolff’s book? Weren’t all these traits and tendencies of Orange Doofus already quite clear in 2015/16? I have to believe the only people surprised are all those voters and pundits who expected the grand pivot after November 2016. SURPRISE!

    This is a mistake liberals make, though. Most people don’t follow politics like we do. I think they hear it as a kind of cacophony.

    I get it because I’m like this about sports. I have had sports on “in the background” my entire life but it simply doesn’t interest me. I used to think I sort of liked baseball but then I realize I like summer, and the sound of baseball reminds me of summer.

  97. 97.

    oatler.

    Meanwhile Jeff Sessions clings gleefully, maniacally, to his post, like Costanza refusing to quit after being exposed as a fraud.

  98. 98.

    Jeffro

    @Bostonian:

    Dotard will just agree with whatever the last person said, and then the conversation about “what he really meant” swirls around him, carried by people with more active minds. It’s like the decline of a dictatorship, in fast forward.

    Agreed. He’s like a walking Jedi mind trick – the victim/stormtrooper end, that is.

  99. 99.

    Baud

    @oatler.: He won’t quit and Trump won’t fire him. But sure we’ll be talking about Trump firing Mueller in about a week. It’s a habit.

  101. 101.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @Brachiator: The problem is that the administration is self limiting the people that it will even consider. If you weren’t supportive of Trump in the election, they won’t consider you for a position. Also Trump is lazy and will leave a lot of positions empty.

  102. 102.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    Trump veers towards Trump. He won’t, for example, support conflict of interest laws or tax increases, no matter how popular.

    That’s true.

  106. 106.

    NorthLeft12

    @OzarkHillbilly: Speaking as a foreigner, “unquestioned deference” to the person elected to be President by the majority of Americans, has been a thing for awhile.
    There has always been a minority of Americans who are the absolute flip side of that statement, but there has always been a substantial minority that even though they don’t support what the President does, continually gives him the benefit of the doubt regarding his motives and his ultimate goal of making America a better place for all citizens.
    And last, critics of the President [especially Republican Presidents] are always labeled as unpatriotic and divisive in the MSM and elsewhere.

  109. 109.

    Baud

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: Good for California.

    @NorthLeft12:

    “unquestioned deference” to the person elected to be President by the majority of Americans, has been a thing for awhile.

    It’s not true. Not a majority. I wish Obama had received a bit more deference in fact. We’d be in a better place.

  110. 110.

    NorthLeft12

    @Kay: This begs the question, Why would people not interested enough in politics to know this stuff during the campaign, all of a sudden be interested enough to read the book or even read or hear anything reported from it?

    I think it will be ignored by his base and they will be comfortable believing what Deadbeat Donald says on his twitter feed about it. SAD!

  111. 111.

    Kay

    Our public school “broke down barriers” between grades in high school – the idea is they’ll be in classes commensurate with their plans and abilities which sounds great but what happens is younger kids socialize with older kids. So my freshman son now has a junior girlfriend and he’s easygoing and smiley and she’s helping him with what he wears. He’s wearing white Adidas she chose, and button-down shirts rather than t-shirts and (he has longish hair) she has straightened his hair. With an iron so it’s reversible but still. Now, the truth is he does look better when she “helps” with this- she has good taste- but if he was a girl we would think this was controlling, right? Or would we? We would, probably. I think we should have considered the social life ramifications.

  112. 112.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Brachiator:

    They need Trump and will not cut him loose.

    Have to disagree. They don’t need trump when they have a President Pence waiting in the wings. What they need is for someone else to off trump because they can’t have their fingerprints on the Crime of the Century that will be the removal of the White Working Man’s Savior from office. The problem for them is they are the only ones with the power to do it. So they pray for an intervention from God, namely a stroke.

  113. 113.

    raven

    @ThresherK: It’s upon exhalation, high pitched sound. I’ve tried to feel around to she where it’s coming from and can’t. It’s loud enough that it keeps me from falling asleep.
    eta I’m listening to the recording I made and it really sounds like Chewy!

  118. 118.

    NorthLeft12

    @Baud: Yes, I believe that President Obama was an outlier for reasons that are too obvious to mention. I am still aghast over the abuse this man and his family had to put up with for eight years. On the flip side, he was probably sustained by the obvious affection and respect from the majority of Americans. Especially in his personal contacts.
    Reminds me of The Dark Knight; “Not the President you deserved, but the one you needed.”

  119. 119.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @raven: I had wheezing when I had the cold, but I smoke. It also wasn’t so bad that it would wake me or keep me from sleeping, the coughing on the other hand did sometimes wake me, then I’d take the Mucinex.

  120. 120.

    danielx

    @Brent:

    … Grueling hours, cramped offices and political warfare take sizable tolls on aides’ personal and family lives.

    They chose to work for Lord Shortfingers, Allah alone knows why. My sympathy quotient is…limited.

  124. 124.

    zhena gogolia

    @raven:

    I don’t know if you have the same thing I had (have), but mine started the night before Thanksgiving with constant coughing. It was diagnosed as bronchitis, I took antibiotics, but kept on coughing. Then I took a course of prednisone, kept on coughing, although the very day I took the last pill it sort of stopped. It stopped for a week or so and now it’s back, although once I take the cough syrup at night it stops and it doesn’t wake me up. But I can’t believe I’m still coughing enough to have to take cough syrup (not the mucus one, the other kind). So I’m afraid it might last a while, don’t be surprised. On the other hand, my husband’s lasted 8 days.

  125. 125.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @NorthLeft12:

    Speaking as a foreigner, “unquestioned deference” to the person elected to be President by the majority of Americans, has been a thing for awhile.

    If you mean the majority of Americans who voted for him, I agree. But there has NEVER been a time when there were not people loudly disagreeing with a president. And quite a few people at that. But then, I grew up in the 60’s when people were getting tear gassed and their skulls bashed in on national TV for not being deferential to the president.

  126. 126.

    Kay

    @NorthLeft12:

    This is my own crackpot theory but they I think they get a sense of a “good” President, eventually. We think they “turn on a dime” but it’s actually a compilation of events that leads to a general sense of “he’s a dud” or “he’s a crook” or “he’s nasty”

    I canvassed a lot for Obama in 12 and people’s sense of his decency as a person came thru really strongly. Less engaged voters still liked him. Their overall sense of him was “good person”. Not malicious or corrupt or mean. They didn’t “tip”. Obama had an interesting thing going with rock-solid Democratic white men. I noticed it because we have a labor presence here and they’re important -they’re still central to local Democratic politics. They connected with Obama on some level I never figured out. I think it might have been as a father. They always mentioned his family. They saw him as a father and they’re fathers,so “like them”, not that he’s THEIR father. It was fascinating. There was some connection he forged.

  128. 128.

    GeoWHayduke

    @Raven: those are tesslalon pearls. Work for some people, not for others. You may benefit from an albuterol inhaler if you have exploratory (breathing out) wheezing. Ask your provider.

    Also know, that antibiotics like azithrimycin take a little longer to show effect.

  129. 129.

    Patricia Kayden

    @JPL: We should also be talking about what happened to the four soldiers in Niger. We know very little about that operation and the circumstances under which they died. Much worse than Benghazi.

  133. 133.

    satby

    @NorthLeft12: @Baud: I think that the “unquestioned deference” is on the part of our pathetically bad media, which NorthLeft12 and other non-Americans rely on to understand this country’s politics.

  137. 137.

    oldgold

    Grueling hours, cramped offices and political warfare take sizable tolls on aides’ personal and family lives.

    Would it be a sacrilege to suggest the White House be turned into a museum and a new executive office/mansion be built?

    The Oval Office could be recreated, but as to the rest, we could do much better in terms of functionality.

  139. 139.

    JPL

    @Patricia Kayden: I know. Trump creates chaos in order to reflect from the real issues. What happened to Johnson is disgusting, and it will happen to other families unless they know why the mission failed.

    On the View Graham mentioned the hack of the RNC by the russians, and although they did not publicize of leak the findings, we don’t know whether or not they used the results. That would explain why Graham and others are in protect mode.

  140. 140.

    Jeffro

    @oldgold:

    Would it be a sacrilege to suggest the White House be turned into a museum and a new executive office/mansion be built?

    The Oval Office could be recreated, but as to the rest, we could do much better in terms of functionality.

    Not at all – this is a great idea. It’d be a great idea to separate the two, in fact (and I’m sure future presidents would appreciate not living above their office!) I’m sure there would be a fight over where to relocate both the residence and the Executive Branch’s ‘home office’ but who cares…the current building is pretty old and needs major renovations. Why not start fresh?

    Heck, you could do the same thing with Capitol Hill while we’re at it. Expand the number of reps and build them a much bigger facility with nice new offices, why not?

  141. 141.

    Baud

    @satby: I suppose the people gave too much deference to W. after 9/11. But that’s not the norm. Clinton, Obama, W’s second term, and even now Trump have not received unquestioned deference from a majority of the people.

  142. 142.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @oldgold: No, the problem isn’t an office space problem(overflow from the West Wing is accommodated by the Eisenhower Office Building and the New Executive Office Building), the problem is that Trump is a shitty manager. He doesn’t resolve these issues and won’t back up a Chief of Staff who tries to.

  146. 146.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Amir Khalid:

    Can the White House actually reject resignations tendered after January? Because unless it can, I fail to see how Kelly plans to enforce that deadline.

    Yes, how and why would force someone to work for you who doesn’t want to? While it is the government and doesn’t have to follow it’s own rules it’s not the military in a time of war.

  147. 147.

    donnah

    On the CBS morning show, the discussion turned to the talks yesterday at the White House and of course they spoke to a young Republican asshole who stated that Feinstein was “confused” when she proposed a clean DACA bill. He said she didn’t understand that they had already discussed a multi-pronged immigration plan that included a wall as well as surveillance and other monitoring strategies. I rolled my eyes so hard I could see the roots of my hair.

    And the statement Trump made about taking the heat…puh-leeze! He is the most sensitive, image-conscious idiot in the world. Taking the heat for anything is not a thing he can do.

    If this was staged to show Donald acting presidential, it was another fail.

  148. 148.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Gin & Tonic:

    It is not entirely clear why the meeting was held and televised; perhaps to prove that White House meetings don’t look like footage of the Gorilla Channel.

    David “I’m so white I am boring” Brook’s article was how his personal contacts in the White House were assuring him that Fire and Fury were all just fake news and the Trump administration was a well oiled machine and shown by their order to start drilling in Alaska. Of course Brooks does write for the New York Times…

  149. 149.

    satby

    @Baud: I agree with you that inside our country the lack of deference is fairly obvious, but outside the country people get their ideas of what’s going on from our stenographer, Bagdad Bob media. Which falls all over itself to be deferential to “strong Republican daddies” and undercut anyone who isn’t a white Republican.

  150. 150.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @MomSense:

    And then he fell back on his real estate developer schtick about building under budget, blah blah blah.

    Since when does any goverment project come in under budget? This isn’t a hotel Trump is talking about No one has ever tried anything like that silly wall idea in modern history so any estimate is an educated guess at best.

  151. 151.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Jeffro: Both the Executive branch and Congress already have separate buildings to house all their people.

    As to “tear it down, it’s old”, that is a uniquely American way of looking at things and one I can not disagree more with.

  152. 152.

    manyakitty

    @Kay: If the WWC men in your part of Ohio are similar to the ones in mine (which they almost certainly are), I think they connected to his Kansas roots. Obama learned from his earliest days how to talk/relate to those people. Plus, yeah, his inherent decency is impossible to deny. OMG I miss that man and his family.

  155. 155.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Elizabelle:

    We will converse in real life.

    I would love to join that conversation! I loved Spain during my two caminos there and am seriously considering a move to España or Portugal (which I haven’t actually visited yet) at some point. Ms. O is still working – so I have health coverage for now – but we’re both open to a change in a few years.

  156. 156.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @OzarkHillbilly: That is a sobering thought; if Trump’s gets his splendid little war at best it will mean a horrible deaths for thousands of North Koreans. Then again American conservatives never seem to get that it takes more than “We say so” to make a war another WWII. North Korea has never done anything Americans in general to justify massacring their population in a preemptive nuclear attack like the Japanese had done in the WWII.

  161. 161.

    magurakurin

    @OzarkHillbilly: after this presidency people will be ready to replace the White House with a building like the Tokyo Stock Exchange. A giant open hall with a few receptionists below a giant circular digital sign board. No people on the trading floor at…. everything run by computers. Only instead of prices it will be randomly generated policy tweets. Hell, it would have to be better than this bullshit happening now.

  163. 163.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @satby: @Elizabelle: @O. Felix Culpa: Spain has national health care, but IIRC only for those who have spent a life time working there or whose parents have. Not sure how ex-pats would go about signing up (I am sure they can, just not sure of the costs)

  164. 164.

    Jeffro

    @zhena gogolia: That sounds like what I had (which was eventually diagnosed as ‘walking pneumonia’). Two rounds of antibiotics, one round of steroids, and 8 weeks later, I’m almost back to normal.

  165. 165.

    Jeffro

    @Patricia Kayden:

    We should also be talking about what happened to the four soldiers in Niger. We know very little about that operation and the circumstances under which they died. Much worse than Benghazi.

    EXACTLY. Why did they die, why was that one soldier not accounted for, why was his widow lied to? For the eight millionth time: can y’all imagine the 24/7/365 if it had happened on Hillary’s watch??

  168. 168.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Kay:

    I don’t know what it is with GOP men and the yearning among political press for them to “be in command” but it is a powerful thing.

    Mediocre white guys all the way around. But I don’t see how it matters, Trump’s built his presidency on being a reality show, it’s that book that counts to his base, not boring meetings with Trump passively listing to Democrats (AKA Satan personified). In fact I bet the reason why those Democrat senators were willing to talk at length with Trump is they know that just makes a Trump base voters die inside when they see it.

  169. 169.

    Jeffro

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Both the Executive branch and Congress already have separate buildings to house all their people.

    All of which are old, cramped, and out-of-date/in need of renovation. Why not start fresh?

    As to “tear it down, it’s old”, that is a uniquely American way of looking at things and one I can not disagree more with.

    No one said “tear it down” – we were talking about making it into a museum. But more interesting is this offense of being ‘uniquely American’…had no idea I was guilty of that, but I’ll take it!

    Disagree away, it’s still a great idea to make the WH a museum and build something new and efficient and safer for our Exec to work in.

  171. 171.

    magurakurin

    @Jeffro: pretty sure the president sleeping above his office is a feature and not a bug. At least when there’s someone holding the office who gives a shit about the job. With Shitgibbon, better that he stays far away in Florida.

  172. 172.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @OzarkHillbilly: You can sign on to the national health insurance if you’re an EU citizen, but US citizens can’t. However, private health insurance is CHEAP compared to US costs, although preexisting conditions might be problematic for some:

    Private health insurance—which non-EU citizens must have to get their residence visas—tends to cost less than in the U.S. As a rough guide, a mid-range plan for a 65-year-old with Sanitas, the largest private insurer, can run under $150 a month. For a healthy 55-year-old, monthly premiums can be under $100. As with any private insurance, however, pre-existing conditions are likely to be excluded.

  174. 174.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: China has been very clear: if North Korea starts something, they’re on their own, but if the US starts something, China is on the DPRK’s side. Getting in a war with China would be monumentally stupid.

  175. 175.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: Or you can get the zak same stuff – labeled “mucus relief” or somesuch – in generic syrup or pill form at most major pharmacies for a lot less. Why yield Big Pharma a penny more than necessary?

  176. 176.

    satby

    @OzarkHillbilly: expats in many countries usually have to get private insurance there, but it’s usually considerably cheaper than private insurance here. The example I saw for Spain from 2017 was €60/ mth For those under age 65, and €157 /mth for those over.

  177. 177.

    satby

    @O. Felix Culpa: and in a post titled as above, how ironic is it that some of the people who may be scrabbling for the exits are average citizens just wanting to be able to get health care without bankruptcy.

  179. 179.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady): Don’t puzzle boxes usually print the “solved size” on the box? Maybe you ought to look there (& apply a tape measure to your table).

    You could always do it on the floor…unless you have pets, in which case you’d need a large enough room you can keep them out of.

  180. 180.

    Hellbastard

    You’d think a guy whose entire shtick is his business acumen would know some basics about proper meeting management. A couple dozen people sitting around a table the size of Rhode Island is not a good setting for a productive meeting.

  181. 181.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @Jeffro: Well, it does. The President’s office used to be in the residence. Seriously, where would you put it? The Eisenhower Building? What difference does a few feet make? Or do you want the President to commute to work, maybe somewhere in Virginia or Maryland?

  182. 182.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Jeffro:

    No one said “tear it down”

    You’re right, I read this as “tear it down”:

    the current building is pretty old and needs major renovations. Why not start fresh?

    Because in this country, when a building is so old it needs major renovations, people generally want to start fresh by tearing it down. I placed my past experience in these areas onto your statement, My bad. (sincerely)

    As too,

    All of which are old, cramped, and out-of-date/in need of renovation. Why not start fresh?

    I have never been in either of those buildings or the White House, but my 35 years in construction (including more than a few years renovating buildings that are as much as 200 years old) tells me that it is very rare a building is so “old, cramped, and out of date” that it can not be renovated/renewed to suit new purposes or old purposes better.

    Why not start fresh? One trip to Europe should answer that question.

    One last thing to say and then I got to go. I am prejudiced. I just spent a year stabilizing and resurrecting a 150 year old barn that was on the verge of collapse. The work I did there was little more than applying new carpentry techniques to the old post and beam construction, and compared to the mortise and tenon work those old Germans did it was little more than hackery. But I’m still proud of it because even if the Ghost of Old Man Farwig did try to kill me a couple times, his barn and the artistry that is the old carpentry they practiced will, Dog willing and the creek don’t rise (and the New Madrid don’t cut loose and tornadoes dance around it), have another 150 years of useful purpose.

    Like I said, I’m prejudiced.

  184. 184.

    SFAW

    @Patricia Kayden:

    We should also be talking about what happened to the four soldiers in Niger. We know very little about that operation and the circumstances under which they died. Much worse than Benghazi.

    I find it amazing, and amazingly evil, that Hitlary has been able to cover her tracks so well on this one. Perhaps Trey Gowdy and Devin Nunes will FINALLY get to the bottom of all this, after three years of investigation.

    @Jeffro:

    For the eight millionth time: can y’all imagine the 24/7/365 if it had happened on Hillary’s watch??

    It actually did, because she is part of the Deep State, etc. It’s just that the House Rethugs haven’t yet been able to invent uncover the evidence. But give them time. Of course, the closer it gets to 2020, it may turn out that it was Gillibrand who was pulling the strings.

  186. 186.

    SFAW

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    You do know that the White House was rebuilt in the early 1950’s and is a steel frame building?

    You DO know that the developer on that project was Shitgibbon, right? Yes, I know he was underage, but that just shows what a Sooper Jeenyus he was, and the most bestest hard-workingest person EVAH!

    What’s especially cool is that it would not surprise me if he were to claim credit for that.

  191. 191.

    ChrisS

    Considering how easy it is to roll him, I would sign up as a senior environmental policy advisor.

    Trumps admin, get in touch with me.

  192. 192.

    Chris

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Have to disagree. They don’t need trump when they have a President Pence waiting in the wings. What they need is for someone else to off trump because they can’t have their fingerprints on the Crime of the Century that will be the removal of the White Working Man’s Savior from office. The problem for them is they are the only ones with the power to do it. So they pray for an intervention from God, namely a stroke.

    I would think this would be the perfect time for an assassination. Not only do you knock off a troublesome pain in the ass, but you also do it without alienating his voters – they’ll all rally around you when you decry it as some sort of plot by hateful left-wingers, and you can probably milk that for a couple of election cycles.

  196. 196.

    SFAW

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    Which one?

    The first one, of course.

    And lest you try to pull that “he was only 18 months (or so) old” shit: he used Obama’s time machine to go back and oversee design and construction.

  199. 199.

    Ruckus

    @Kay:
    It’s overcompensation for what they see in the mirror every day, and can not admit, even to or especially to themselves. That they are fucking useless or in this case far, far worse. Those people that voted for him? They have the same disease. Lack of.

  201. 201.

    Tenar Arha

    @Kay: The thing is, almost everyone else knows that yesterday’s display was another example of how unqualified the man really is, yet they’re still giving him a tongue bath like the rest of us can’t see the difference.

    ETA it really does make me worried about why a large class of GOP men-in-general seem prone to getting hoodwinked like this.
    ETA added GOP for accuracy

  203. 203.

    Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho

    @debbie: Nothing irrational about the hatred of Husted. Of course I might be biased, since I share it.

  204. 204.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @satby:

    how ironic is it that some of the people who may be scrabbling for the exits are average citizens just wanting to be able to get health care without bankruptcy.

    Indeed. And to escape (somewhat) our national disgrace. I found Europeans to be both horrified by our Dotard-in-Chief and sympathetic to our plight during my trek through Spain. We might be welcomed as political refugees.

  206. 206.

    Brachiator

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    The problem is that the administration is self limiting the people that it will even consider. If you weren’t supportive of Trump in the election, they won’t consider you for a position. Also Trump is lazy and will leave a lot of positions empty.

    How is this a “problem,” or who is this a problem for, except America.

    You are just the guy whose brain I would like to pick on this. You read or are reading “The Fire and Fury,” right? I haven’t had a chance to read it yet, but I’ve always thought that Trump wasn’t just lazy, but that he is arrogantly ignorant and incompetent. He believes that he knows what he is doing, and does not take constructive criticism well, if at all. Does the book confirm or contradict this?

    Trump leans to loyalists and his own family to serve as place holders (wasn’t Jared going to be in charge of everything related to foreign policy for a while, and Ivanka supposedly unofficial domestic policy goddess?). So, if his administration is “self limiting,” as you say, isn’t this a direct reflection of Trump’s desires, tendencies and character flaws? He is not a politician, not a political leader, not a capable administrator. What we see is what we will continue to get. It could never be any other way.

    Does Trump try to hide in inadequacies in being able to seek out and hire capable staff by his paranoia (the deep state left by Obama is trying to get him) and by his lies that he is going to run a lean and mean government and get rid of redundant and unnecessary staff?

    So, as I mentioned earlier, this leaves the door wide open for the craven and the deluded true believers. Even if the GOP leadership tries to suggest or push through people who are loyal Republican foot soldiers, this may not long please Trump, who demands that people be personally loyal to him. This might prevent the Republican leadership from being able to tilt Trump towards doing what they want, but it in the end only adds to the instability and disorder of White House operations.

  207. 207.

    Brachiator

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    They need Trump and will not cut him loose.

    Have to disagree. They don’t need trump when they have a President Pence waiting in the wings.

    Hmm. I wonder. The money men are backing Trump hard. The Deplorables among GOP true believers love Trump, and don’t give two shits for Pence. GOP voters might go along if Pence became president, but might not enjoy it as much as they do with Trump.

    However, and this is the big thing, no matter how much Balloon Juice posters might love the idea, there is no “exit strategy” available to the GOP which would allow them to dump Trump without massively damaging themselves. None. Nada. Zip. Not even the 25th Amendment. So they can pray for a miracle, and we can all hope for one, but holding out for this is like assuming that you will buy the next winning power ball ticket.

  208. 208.

    MattF

    @Brachiator: I think there are, um, ‘factions’ in the WH.

    I suspect it’s like PKD’s novel “Clans of the Alphane Moons”, where several different kinds of schizophrenics lived on one little planet, and organized themselves into self-governing communities. There were the Paranoids, the Hebephrenics, the Catatonics. Maybe also the Polymorphic Perverse… Anyhow, my point is that the WH faction an applicant joins will depend on that applicant’s particular psychological pathology. I think, e.g., Miller belongs to the ‘Compulsive Reenactment of Trauma’ faction.

  210. 210.

    Brachiator

    @MattF:

    I suspect it’s like PKD’s novel “Clans of the Alphane Moons”, where several different kinds of schizophrenics lived on one little planet, and organized themselves into self-governing communities. There were the Paranoids, the Hebephrenics, the Catatonics. Maybe also the Polymorphic Perverse… Anyhow, my point is that the WH faction an applicant joins will depend on that applicant’s particular psychological pathology. I think, e.g., Miller belongs to the ‘Compulsive Reenactment of Trauma’ faction.

    Love the word “hebephrenic.” Used to joke that it was a rejected name for a 60s R&B group. The Delfonics, cool. The Hebephrenics, nope, does not work.

    Also, this sounds like a Harry Potter novel gone mad. I can imagine the Sorting Hat for newly hired White House staff.

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