Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House

[Shogun]

Rod Rosenstein, the author of the letter that ostensibly provided the justification for firing Comey, now stood in the line of fire. The fifty-two-year-old Rosenstein, who, in rimless glasses, seemed to style himself as a bureaucrat’s bureaucrat, was the longest-serving U.S. attorney in the country. He lived within the system, all by the book, his highest goal seeming to be to have people say he did things by the book. He was a straight shooter—and he wanted everyone to know it.

All this was undermined by Trump—trashed, even. The brow-beating and snarling president had hectored the country’s two top law enforcement officials into an ill-considered or, at the very least, an ill-timed indictment of the director of the FBI. Rosenstein was already feeling used and abused. And then he was shown to have been tricked, too. He was a dupe.

The president had forced Rosenstein and Sessions to construct a legal rationale, yet then he could not even maintain the bureaucratic pretense of following it. Having enlisted Rosenstein and Sessions in his plot, Trump now exposed their efforts to present a reasonable and aboveboard case as a sham—and, arguably, a plan to obstruct justice. The president made it perfectly clear that he hadn’t fired the director of the FBI because he did Hillary wrong; he fired Comey because the FBI was too aggressively investigating him and his administration.

Hyper-by-the-book Rod Rosenstein—heretofore the quintessential apolitical player—immediately became, in Washington eyes, a hopeless Trump tool. But Rosenstein’s revenge was deft, swift, overwhelming, and (of course) by the book.

Given the decision of the attorney general to recuse himself from the Russia investigation, it fell under the authority of the deputy attorney general to determine whether a conflict existed—that is, whether the deputy attorney general, because of self-interest, might not be able to act objectively—and if, in his sole discretion, he judged a conflict to exist, to appoint an outside special counsel with wide powers and responsibilities to conduct an investigation and, potentially, a prosecution.

On May 17, twelve days after FBI director Comey was fired, without consulting the White House or the attorney general, Rosenstein appointed former FBI director Robert Mueller to oversee the investigation of Trump’s, his campaign’s, and his staff’s ties to Russia. If Michael Flynn had recently become the most powerful man in Washington for what he might reveal about the president, now Mueller arguably assumed that position because he had the power to make Flynn, and all other assorted Trump cronies and flunkies, squeal.

Rosenstein, of course, perhaps with some satisfaction, understood that he had delivered what could be a mortal blow to the Trump presidency.

Bannon, shaking his head in wonder about Trump, commented drily: “He doesn’t necessarily see what’s coming.”

 

[Shogun]

double

 

[ADevilYouKhow]

double

How did the Comey firing sit with you?

 

[Shogun]

How did the Comey firing sit with you?

Honestly, one of the reasons I'm reading this book is because Trump doesnt make sense to me. He doesnt seem like a real person. I feel like it's too simple to just say he's an idiot, or he's crazy. That said, he just comes off like a crazy idiot, as usual...

Another thought I had was that his stupidity led to the special prosecutor, and the ramped up investigation. The book seems to suggest that he could have avoided all of it simply by not being a crazy idiot. I'm not sure if that means the allegations aren't that serious (and it's more the intelligence community looking to ruin him), or if it's really that easy for politicians (except Trump) to get law enforcement to look the other way on fukkery. Probably the latter.

 

[Robbie3000]

Brehs, chapter 22 and 23 when Bannon goes in is some of the best shyt ever.

Especially on Audio.


I need to look up more work by this narrator. This guy is fukking great.

 

[Robbie3000]

Brehs, chapter 22 and 23 when Bannon goes in is some of the best shyt ever.

Especially on Audio.


I need to look up more work by this narrator. This guy is fukking great.

The from Bannon for Trump, Jarvankar, Hope Hicks etc is gold!!

 

[StatUS]

Honestly, one of the reasons I'm reading this book is because Trump doesnt make sense to me. He doesnt seem like a real person. I feel like it's too simple to just say he's an idiot, or he's crazy. That said, he just comes off like a crazy idiot, as usual...

Another thought I had was that his stupidity led to the special prosecutor, and the ramped up investigation. The book seems to suggest that he could have avoided all of it simply by not being a crazy idiot. I'm not sure if that means the allegations aren't that serious (and it's more the intelligence community looking to ruin him), or if it's really that easy for politicians (except Trump) to get law enforcement to look the other way on fukkery. Probably the latter.

A lot of this Trump-Russia stuff just attempts to fill the 24-hour news cycle. You kind of have to separate the real from the propaganda no matter how much of a piece of shyt Trump is. It is common knowledge that some of the Russian collusion story was started by the Dems. That's not to discredit what could possibly be true though.

I think the consensus from reasonable people is that Trump fired Comey because he was going to get into his money laundering and financial ties. And many of them are Russian oligarchs. However, him firing Comey screamed obstruction of justice and just ramped up the Russia fears.

If he or his campaign knowingly conspired with the Kremlin during the election is something that we'll find out when Mueller releases what he found. This is just my POV though.

 

[Shogun]

A lot of this Trump-Russia stuff just attempts to fill the 24-hour news cycle. You kind of have to separate the real from the propaganda no matter how much of a piece of shyt Trump is. It is common knowledge that some of the Russian collusion story was started by the Dems. That's not to discredit what could possibly be true though.

I think the consensus from reasonable people is that Trump fired Comey because he was going to get into his money laundering and financial ties. And many of them are Russian oligarchs. However, him firing Comey screamed obstruction of justice and just ramped up the Russia fears.

If he or his campaign knowingly conspired with the Kremlin during the election is something that we'll find out when Mueller releases what he found. This is just my POV though.

I dont think he has the executive functioning skills to be behind all that. Seriously. It seems like, if the book is to be believed, that he did because Ivanka and Kushner were able to convince him.
Same as with the Syria strike.

It's a like a bunch people with different agendas trying to manage a 4 year-old president. Sometimes it works, sometimes he goes rogue.

 

[StatUS]

I dont think he has the executive functioning skills to be behind all that. Seriously. It seems like, if the book is to be believed, that he did because Ivanka and Kushner were able to convince him.
Same as with the Syria strike.

It's a like a bunch people will different agendas trying to manage a 4 year-old president. Sometimes it works, sometimes he goes rogue.

Wouldn't doubt it

 

[Shogun]

Most of America’s usual partners, and even many antagonists, were unsettled if not horrified. Still, some saw opportunity. The Russians could see a free pass on the Ukraine and Georgia, as well as a lifting of sanctions, in return for giving up on Iran and Syria. Early in the transition, a high-ranking official in the Turkish government reached out in genuine confusion to a prominent U.S. business figure to inquire whether Turkey would have better leverage by putting pressure on the U.S. military presence in Turkey or by offering the new president an enviable hotel site on the Bosporus.

 

[Shogun]

Casting aside, in very quick order, previously held assumptions—in fact, not really aware of those assumptions—the new Trump thinking about the Middle East became the following: There are basically four players (or at least we can forget everybody else)—Israel, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Iran. The first three can be united against the fourth. And Egypt and Saudi Arabia, given what they want with respect to Iran—and anything else that does not interfere with the United States’ interests—will pressure the Palestinians to make a deal. Voilà.

This represented a queasy-making mishmash of thought. Bannon’s isolationism (a pox on all your houses—and keep us out of it); Flynn’s anti-Iranism (of all the world’s perfidy and toxicity, there is none like that of the mullahs); and Kushner’s Kissingerism (not so much Kissingerism as, having no point of view himself, a dutiful attempt to follow the ninety-four-year-old’s advice).

But the fundamental point was that the last three administrations had gotten the Middle East wrong. It was impossible to overstate how much contempt the Trump people felt for the business-as-usual thinking that had gotten it so wrong. Hence, the new operating principle was simple: do the opposite of what they (Obama, but the Bush neocons, too) would do. Their behavior, their conceits, their ideas—in some sense even their backgrounds, education, and class—were all suspect. And, what’s more, you don’t really have to know all that much yourself; you just do it differently than it was done before.

 

[Shogun]

(This required some tutoring for Trump, who referred to the Chinese leader as “Mr. X-i”; the president was told to think of him as a woman and call him “she.”)

Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, the Egyptian strongman, ably stroked the president and said, “You are a unique personality that is capable of doing the impossible.” (To Sisi, Trump replied, “Love your shoes. Boy, those shoes. Man. . . .”)

 

[Shogun]

Honestly, one of the reasons I'm reading this book is because Trump doesnt make sense to me. He doesnt seem like a real person. I feel like it's too simple to just say he's an idiot, or he's crazy. That said, he just comes off like a crazy idiot, as usual...

“He’s not only crazy,” declared Tom Barrack to a friend, “he’s stupid.”

 

[Shogun]

Bannon judged Comey-Mueller to be as threatening to the Trump White House as Monica Lewinsky and Ken Starr were to the Clinton White House, and he saw the model for escaping a mortal fate in the Clinton response.

“What the Clintons did was to go to the mattresses with amazing discipline,” he explained. “They set up an outside shop and then Bill and Hillary never mentioned it again. They ground through it. Starr had them dead to rights and they got through it.”

 

[Serious]

You know I get the feeling that he's harmless, in sense of he's too stupid to get anything done, but I think he's also dangerous for the very same reason, because he's stupid with a lot of power, yet easily influenced.....

But it's pretty refreshing to know that he's not some complex individual but rather just some dumb idiot, who's as dumb as we think he is......