I'm guessing this is Kelly giving him carte blanche.McMaster rolling heads today it seems.
Rich Higgins, head of National Security Council strategic planning, is also out, a White House official says - @kwelkernbc
I have a super, super hot take.
Scaramucci's communications plan memo actually seems...pretty good. Professional, reasonable, might have actually helped make things smoother for Trump.
It's just too bad he did all that coke I guess.
And I think that just exposes the whole charade there. It's always been just about giving the wealthy more money.
They don't want the Democrats involved because there might actually be something that benefits the lower and middle class. The horrors! And at the expense of letting some billionaire buy a third yacht.
I feel like their plan had *some* meat in it for the lower and middle class (aside from the efforts to eliminate a lot of deductions to screw over people like student debtors).
Give the average American a $4,000 check and i think enough people would be happy.
Rumor is Scaramucci will be setting up some kind of outside-the-whitehouse pro-Trump propaganda shop?
Rumor is Scaramucci will be setting up some kind of outside-the-whitehouse pro-Trump propaganda shop?
Rumor is Scaramucci will be setting up some kind of outside-the-whitehouse pro-Trump propaganda shop?
McMaster rolling heads today it seems.
Rich Higgins, head of National Security Council strategic planning, is also out, a White House official says - @kwelkernbc
NBC reporter just now on Hardsball says Trump is frustrated with Afghanistan policy and is in a "stalemate" with military generals. She says Trump told Mattis, "Why are we losing this war, I gave you authority to win?"...
What.The.Fuck.
NBC reporter just now on Hardsball says Trump is frustrated with Afghanistan policy and is in a "stalemate" with military generals. She says Trump told Mattis, "Why are we losing this war, I gave you authority to win?"...
What.The.Fuck.
Off-topic, but I was looking at polling for the Ohio senate race next year. Brown is down by 8% points to Mandel. I know it's way off, but Ohio's not already lost, right? It seems to be going further right than other rust belt states are.
NBC reporter just now on Hardsball says Trump is frustrated with Afghanistan policy and is in a "stalemate" with military generals. She says Trump told Mattis, "Why are we losing this war? I gave you authority to win"...
What.The.Fuck.
Off-topic, but I was looking at polling for the Ohio senate race next year. Brown is down by 8% points to Mandel. I know it's way off, but Ohio's not already lost, right? It seems to be going further right than other rust belt states are.
Me: "Is this good or bad?"
Report: NSC Staffer Fired After Writing Memo About "Globalists and Islamists"
Me: "Well, that answers that question..."
He was probably told Obama wouldn't let them win from watching Fox. Trump flipped the win switch."I know more than the generals, believe me"
Is it bad that I miss The Mooch?
He was probably told Obama wouldn't let them win from watching Fox. Trump flipped the win switch.
Why do folks assume Zuckerberg will run as a Democrat?
I assume he'll run as an independent, if at all. It fits with his actions of seeing and posting about all 50 states and espousing his diversity of thought with Peter Thiel.Why do folks assume Zuckerberg will run as a Democrat?
Rumor is Scaramucci will be setting up some kind of outside-the-whitehouse pro-Trump propaganda shop?
I assume he'll run as an independent, if at all. It fits with his actions of seeing and posting about all 50 states and espousing his diversity of thought with Peter Thiel.
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/02/john-kelly-trump-west-wing-241268When new White House chief of staff John Kelly huddled with senior staff on his first day at work, he outlined a key problem in President Donald Trumps White House that he planned to fix: Bad information getting into the presidents hands.
Kelly told the staff that information needed to flow through him whether on paper or in briefings because the president would make better decisions if given good information.
Trump Says U.S.Losing Afghan War in Tense Meeting With Generals
WASHINGTON President Donald Trump has become increasingly frustrated with his advisers tasked with crafting a new U.S. strategy in Afghanistan and recently suggested firing the war's top military commander during a tense meeting at the White House, according to senior administration officials.
During the July 19 meeting, Trump repeatedly suggested that Defense Secretary James Mattis and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Joseph Dunford replace Gen. John Nicholson, the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, because he is not winning the war, the officials said. Trump has not met Nicholson, and the Pentagon has been considering extending his time in Afghanistan.
Over nearly two hours in the situation room, according to the officials, Trump complained about NATO allies, inquired about the United States getting a piece of Afghans mineral wealth and repeatedly said the top U.S. general there should be fired. He also startled the room with a story that seemed to compare their advice to that of a paid consultant who cost a tony New York restaurateur profits by offering bad advice.
...
During the meeting, Trump criticized his military advisers seated around the table in the White House Situation Room for what he said was a losing U.S. position in the war, according to the senior administration officials. At one point the president directed his frustration at Mattis, saying Trump had given the military authority months ago to make advances in Afghanistan and yet the U.S. was continuing to lose ground, the officials said.
"We aren't winning," Trump complained, according to these officials. "We are losing."
One official said Trump pointed to maps showing the Taliban gaining ground, and that Mattis responded to the president by saying the U.S. is losing because it doesn't have the strategy it needs.
..
Told that Trump was considering firing Gen. Nicholson, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said, "I can't think of a good reason to fire the general. I think he's done an admirable job."
"If the president doesn't listen to the generals, like Gen. Nicholson and he goes down the road that President Obama went, Afghanistan is going to collapse," Graham said. "Here's my advice to the president listen to people like Gen. Nicholson and McMaster and others who have been in the fight."
Trump, however, appeared to have been significantly influenced by a meeting he'd recently had with a group of veterans of the Afghanistan war, and he was unhappy with the options presented to him.
Trump vented to his national security team that the veterans told him forces from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization have not been helpful, and he lamented that China is making money off of Afghanistan's estimated $1 trillion in rare minerals while American troops are fighting the war, officials said. Trump expressed frustration that his advisers tasked with figuring out how the U.S. can help American businesses get rights to those minerals were moving too slowly, one official said.
China purchased mineral rights in Afghanistan a decade ago, an investment the U.S. supported at the time. Beijing has since had teams mining copper outside of Kabul.
The focus on the minerals was reminiscent of Trump's comments early into his presidency when he lamented that the U.S. didn't take Iraq's oil when the majority of forces departed the country in 2011.
To underscore his view that the veterans who fought in the war may be better positioned to advise him on an Afghanistan strategy, Trump compared the policy review process to the renovation of a famed New York restaurant in the 1980s, officials said.
Trump told his advisers that the restaurant, Manhattan's elite '21' Club, had shut its doors for a year and hired an expensive consultant to craft a plan for a renovation. After a year, Trump said, the consultant's only suggestion was that the restaurant needed a bigger kitchen.
Officials said Trump kept stressing the idea that lousy advice cost the owner a year of lost business and that talking to the restaurant's waiters instead might have yielded a better result. He also said the tendency is to assume if someone isn't a three-star general he doesn't know what he's talking about, and that in his own experience in business talking to low-ranking workers has gotten him better outcomes.
...
Trump left the national security meeting without making a decision on a strategy. His advisers were stunned, administration officials and others briefed on the meeting said.
Two Pentagon officials close to Mattis said he returned from the White House that morning visibly upset. Mattis often takes a walk when grappling with an issue. That afternoon, the walk took longer than usual, the officials said.
Among those at the meeting were Trump's senior White House advisers including Steve Bannon, Jared Kushner, national security adviser H.R. McMaster, and then chief-of-staff Reince Priebus, plus Mattis, Dunford, Vice President Pence and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.
At one point, Dunford offered to set up a meeting for Trump with Gen. Nicholson in the hopes that personal interaction may soothe Trump's concerns about his leadership.
Mattis also defended Gen. Nicholson, an official said, adding that the conversation about the commander ended inconclusively.
...
That's the only way he could win?
Not that I think he would have much of a chance.
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/02/john-kelly-trump-west-wing-241268
No more fake Time magazine covers for Trump. Sad!
Also: Leaks!
Is it bad that I miss The Mooch?
NEW YORK (AP) New White House chief of staff John Kelly, in one of his first acts in his new post, called Attorney General Jeff Sessions to reassure him that his position was safe despite the recent onslaught of criticism he has taken from President Donald Trump.
He gonna block Fox and Friends from the WH tvs?
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/02/john-kelly-trump-west-wing-241268
No more fake Time magazine covers for Trump. Sad!
Also: Leaks!
Off-topic, but I was looking at polling for the Ohio senate race next year. Brown is down by 8% points to Mandel. I know it's way off, but Ohio's not already lost, right? It seems to be going further right than other rust belt states are.
Off-topic, but I was looking at polling for the Ohio senate race next year. Brown is down by 8% points to Mandel. I know it's way off, but Ohio's not already lost, right? It seems to be going further right than other rust belt states are.
So long as Trump keeps watching FOX it won't work. Kelly is going to need to take his phone and monitor his TV intake for this to have any effect. It won't last two weeks, no way does Trump put up with being babied like this.
Kirsten Gillibrand @SenGillibrand
We do not have to make compromises on protecting womens health to win back the House or Senate.
3:41 PM · Aug 2, 2017