[quote] There is a fear among some of Mr. Trump’s senior advisers about leaving him alone in meetings with foreign leaders out of concern he might speak out of turn. General McMaster, in particular, has tried to insert caveats or gentle corrections into conversations when he believes the president is straying off topic or onto boggy diplomatic ground.
This has, at times, chafed the president, according to two officials with knowledge of the situation. Mr. Trump, who still openly laments having to dismiss his first national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn, has groused that General McMaster talks too much in meetings, and the president has referred to him as “a pain,” according to one of the officials.
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This is terrifying because as David Brooks points out.
He is thus the all-time record-holder of the Dunning-Kruger effect, the phenomenon in which the incompetent person is too incompetent to understand his own incompetence. Trump thought he’d be celebrated for firing James Comey. He thought his press coverage would grow wildly positive once he won the nomination. He is perpetually surprised because reality does not comport with his fantasies
He really wants to fire anybody that is smarter than him or knows more. (i.e. which is 75% of population and nearly 100% of folks in Washington) He seems to have some institutional respect for General but even that appears to be waning.
I feel sorry for McMaster is he quits Trump replaces him with somebody who is almost certainly going to be worse, but if pushes Trump too hard he’ll get fired.
Is CNN trying to argue that if Russia is allowed to be privy to classified information regarding a possibly terrorist attack, they should have been able to broadcast that information publicly? I’m not going to defend Trump’s actions, but that’s a pretty weak argument.
I’m just saying there are many reasons why it might be harmful to national security for a news organizations to make secrets public information, but OK to share with another foreign government.
The right wing is spinning this like, “the president sometimes needs to discuss classified things with foreign powers!”
That is true. But Trump did not do this for some national security reason. This was not a planned, considered move.
Trump was fucking bragging about shit. He was talking big to try and impress people, because that’s what he does. He a fucking imbecile, and for that reason, he cannot be trusted with this kind of information, because he is going to do stuff like this.
Yep. It wasn’t a calculated decision. Hell, even if it WAS one, sharing it with Russia? Still VERY iffy.
Now if he shared it with say the UK? Probably fine, though still likely to piss off Israel, which is why you generally don’t give anything specific enough for them to figure out who told you. Trump basically burned an Israeli agent by most accounts. That sort of shit does not fly and to do it with a hostile power? Yeah… no.
All so he could wave his dick to people everyone says he’s compromised by.
Yes, and while it is true the president can make anything he wants unclassified, this information came from an ally (Israel?) and wasn’t his to give without consequence. Of course, he probably hadn’t read the details closely enough to actually know that.
Yes, the President can legally declassify anything he wants. We got it.
The question is whether it’s a good idea, either strategically or politically. And I personally think we should be having a discussion about whether maybe we want to rethink allowing the President the power to willy-nilly go around declassifying whatever secrets pass through his idiot brain.
