Open Letter to GOP Members of Congress: Wake Up!

Dear Republican Members of Congress:

Wake up! You dismissed Michael Wolff’s book “Fire and Fury” and former “Apprentice” star and White House aide Omarosa Manigault Newman’s book “Unhinged” as irrelevant. They were just promoting their books, you said. You also ignored the significance of Bob Woodward’s book which was based on numerous interviews with White House insiders. In that   reported that said John Kelly referred to Trump as “an idiot,” and went on: “We’re in Crazytown. I don’t even know why any of us are here. This is the worst job I’ve ever had.”

From the NY Times review of “Fear” by Bob Woodward:

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis replied that the administration was trying to prevent World War III. After Mr. Trump left the room, Mr. Woodward wrote, Mr. Mattis told people that Mr. Trump understood the topic like a “fifth or sixth grader.”

In another episode, Gary D. Cohn, the former chief economic adviser to Mr. Trump, “stole” a letter from Mr. Trump’s desk that the president had planned to sign, withdrawing the United States from a trade deal with South Korea. Mr. Woodward wrote that Mr. Cohn told a colleague that he had to “protect the country.” Mr. Trump apparently never realized the letter had disappeared. NT Times

Now we have another insider revealing why Trump is unfit to be president who is a bit more difficult to dismiss as someone just trying to sell books. With his latest net worth reportedly $153.1 million I don’t think Rex Tillerson plans to write a book just for the money. Tillerson broke his post-firing silence with a jaw-dropping interview with CBS News’s Bob Schieffer in Houston.

Following the interview, Trump Tweeted about his ignominiously Tweet-fired Secretary of State Rex Tillerson that he “was dumb as a rock and I couldn’t get rid of him fast enough. He was lazy as hell.” This is the former head of Exxon Mobil he’s referring to. Dumb as a rock and lazy? A little psychological projection, here Mr. President?

Tillerson made the news when it was reported that he said Trump was a fucking moron on July 20, 2017, a comment which to his credit he never denied. It is crucial that the expletive not be deleted for the sake of online decorum because there is a huge difference between blandly saying someone is a moron and saying they are a fucking moron. The modifying adjective increases the power of the observation tenfold, just the way Trump wanted to increase the United States’ nuclear capacity:

“Trump and his military advisors that clarifies why Tillerson, the secretary of state, allegedly disparaged the president behind his back (by calling him a fucking moron). At the meeting, Trump reportedly astonished military leaders by saying he wanted to rebuild the nation’s nuclear stockpile to its peak level of the late 1960s—a tenfold increase that would violate international agreements the U.S. has adhered to since the 1980s. (Reference: The New Republic)”

According to NBC News:

The president was asked about Tillerson’s remarks after touring the University Medical Center in Las Vegas Wednesday and said, “I am very honored by his comments, it was fake news, it was a totally phony story.” Trump added that he has “total confidence in Rex.”

While it’s unclear if he was aware of the incident at the Pentagon, officials said Vice President Mike Pence counseled Tillerson, who is fourth in line to the presidency, on ways to ease tensions with Trump, and other top administration officials urged him to remain in the job at least until the end of the year.

In retrospect it is interesting that Trump’s new nomination to be the U.N. ambassador lied and said this after the remark was reported (file this under “Quote Without Comment”):

“In a briefing Wednesday afternoon, State Department spokesperson Heather Nauert said Tillerson did not use the word ‘moron’ to describe the president. The secretary did not use that type of language to speak about the president of the Unites States,” Nauert said. “He did not say that.” (NBC News)

Now Tillerson has revealed much more about Trump’s reckless uniformed style of governing. It is already old news. Suffice to say if any Republican member of Congress hasn’t viewed the video of Tillerson talking to CBS News’s Bob Schieffer in Houston or read the transcript they are being willfully negligent.

The former CEO of the 9th largest company in the world said that the president is ‘pretty undisciplined, doesn’t like to read’ and tries to do illegal things. Tillerson also said Trump “acts on his instincts; in some respects, that looks like impulsiveness. But it’s not his intent to act on impulse. I think he really is trying to act on his instincts.”

He also said:  “It was challenging for me, coming from the disciplined, highly process-oriented Exxon Mobil Corporation, to go to work for a man who is pretty undisciplined, doesn’t like to read, doesn’t read briefing reports, doesn’t like to get into the details of a lot of things, but rather just kind of says, ‘Look, this is what I believe, and you can try to convince me otherwise, but most of the time you’re not going to do that.’”

He is basically saying Trump is incompetent, unfocused, ignorant, and doesn’t care about the rule of law. Tillerson’s excuse that Trump what looks like Trump being impulsive (I would say recklessly impulsive) is (merely?) his trying to act on his instincts is a distinction without a difference.

It is time for you Republicans to pay attention.

Sincerely yours,

Hal Brown

A Concerned Citizen

Dec. 10, 2018 Update

Unlike Trump Republican in Congess know that the New York Times and The Washngton Post don’t pubish fake news. They would do well to read and head the reasons why Nick Ayers refused to take the Cief of Staff job and why others aren’t jumping at the chance to throw their names in the hat for considrration. From “The four reasons that even Trump loayalsts to not want to be White House chief of staff:

Advisers to Trump were “stunned” that Vice President Pence’s chief turned down the chance to replace John Kelly, claiming he wanted to spend more time with his family in Georgia, Maggie Haberman reports on the front page of the New York Times: “One former senior administration official called it a humiliation for Mr. Trump and his adult children, an emotion that the president tries to avoid at all costs. … Two people close to Mr. Trump said that a news release announcing Mr. Ayers’s appointment had been drafted, and that the president had wanted to announce it as soon as possible.”

1) Javanka cannot be managed.

Kelly clashed constantly with Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, the president’s daughter and son-in-law. They technically reported to him, but they had a direct channel to the president and maneuvered behind the scenes to replace him as chief.

2) Trump will not be managed.

A chief of staff must manage both down and up, but the 72-year-old in the Oval Office seems pretty set in his habits. Trump also wants it both ways. He wants his White House to run “like a fine-tuned machine,” as he’s said it does, but – ever the showman – he also likes the reality TV vibe, where people are constantly left wondering where they stand and if they’ll get written off in the next episode.

3) With so many storm clouds on the horizon, the odds are good that the next chief will need to retain his own lawyers.

House Democrats get their gavels, and subpoena power, in just three weeks. Whoever gets this job will almost certainly need to hire a personal attorney at some point with the White House under so much scrutiny from so many quarters, even if they do nothing wrong.

4) The risk of public humiliation is high.

Few who have gone into the administration at a senior level have emerged stronger from the experience. That’s not how it usually works. Typically a top White House job ensures a lifetime of lucrative opportunities. Some ex-Trumpers have struggled to get good jobs on the outside.

_______________________________________________________

Copyright © 2018 Capitol Hill Blue