• Security incident: ISF was recently accessed by intruders. Please change your password, and change it anywhere else you used it. Read more

NY Times editorial bombshell

Why the strikeout? It's more of a comma, and... sort of thing.

?

The unnamed functionaries take policy paper's off desks or wave fake magazine covers, in order to be Trump's Gremlins from the KremlinWhite House

ETA: I get it. Yes, may not be mutually exclusive. Could be all sorts of gremlins redirecting the Common Man's Hero there.

ETAETA:
 
Last edited:
?

The unnamed functionaries take policy paper's off desks or wave fake magazine covers, in order to be Trump's Gremlins from the KremlinWhite House

ETA: I get it. Yes, may not be mutually exclusive. Could be all sorts of gremlins redirecting the Common Man's Hero there.
Yeah, I personally think it's a somewhat complicated issue involving several different groups with power which are acting to further their own agendas.
 
Should anonymous make herself known? (I'm using that pronoun to cover all genders and non-genders.)

If anonymous were a cabinet level official like Pompeo or Haley, then, yes, she should have publicly broken with the administration. But if it's some no-name, UK-born Putin nerd, then this seems like THE way to maximize the resistance. A no-name person would not get nearly this much attention for writing the same exact thing. People want intrigue and mystery.

I remember my mom would add marbles and rice to wrapped Christmas presents, put smaller boxes inside bigger boxes, redistribute big things into several little things, etc. to throw me off the track. When we'd get to choose which one we wanted to open early, I'd carefully shake the package up next to my ear, "Hmmm.... sounds like disappointment." The answer will not be as beautiful as the mystery. It's like the philosopher Winnie the Pooh says his favorite thing is eating honey, then corrects himself and says, "No, it's the feeling right before eating honey."

Data points don't need to reveal their identity unless it's a legal matter. This is one data sample. More are in Woodward's book, and others.
 
I'm sure they tell themselves they "have the interests of the nation in mind", but I'm not sure I'd agree with them if I knew what their objectives are.

I really, really think they're not going public for political reasons primarily. "To save the country!" is a mere rationalization.

I mean, to a conservative, getting a rightwing SCOTUS judge is acting to save the country with the interests of the nation in mind.

I despise Kellyanne just as much as the next rational human being. But she's not making Dump any worse than he already is... although she is making him appear even more pathetic. That's a positive in my book.
 
I wonder what anonymous meant. or thought he meant, by his comments about sabotaging the Trump plans. (I don't remember if he actually used the word "sabotage". Whatever he said that he and his fellow conspirators were up to.)

A lot of people have made a great deal of fuss about this, saying that it makes his administration illegitimate, or something. Elizabeth Warren has said it's time to think about the 25th amendment, because he clearly can't discharge his duties if the administration is working against him. However, what does it actually mean?

Not passing memos to him? Talking about him behind his back? Secretly hoping Democrats get elected to Congress? I'm pretty sure that Mr/Ms anonymous isn't going to foreign governments and giving them passwords that might allow them to win a war against the United States. I'm pretty sure that they aren't siphoning allocated funds away from the destination mandated by Congress and/or the people who are even more senior than anonymous. What the heck are they talking about?

I guess they could sit in their office playing video games instead of working hard on that report that the cabinet secretary needs. Doesn't seem like 25th amendment stuff to me.It seems to me that anonymous is pretty full of himself.


I'm still looking for the significance of this whole story. CNN spent a lot of time on it last night, and I'm going to the gym again tonight, so I might see more about it tonight, but I'm just getting more and more confused about what the big deal is. Someone in the administration thinks Trump is a doofus? Well, yeah. Lots of people do. I think it was Tillerson who called him a moron. He's not the only one who has been in the cabinet that thinks that. I'm pretty confident that in their heart of hearts, most of his cabinet knows he's a bizarre person, with some major psychological issues, and I'll bet they all wish someone else had won the Republican nomination. So what? He got elected. It's the law. Maybe we can get rid of him in two more years, or maybe someone will dig up some real dirt and we can do it sooner, but for now, he's the guy in charge. What's the big deal in someone saying they aren't happy about it?


And I've lost a lot of respect for Warren because she went down that path.
 
Last edited:
With Trump elected as the dysfunctional aspect, it's a legitimate government with a bad, imcompetent dude in the oval office.

With a lot of the other admin officials working to sabotage the president, it's not a legitimate government at all. Not just dysfunctional - completely illegitimate, unless you want to coax some legitimacy out of the authority of the "steady state", whatever the hell that is.

Good lord.
My understanding is that the "steady state" means all of the unelected federal life-long bureaucrats who keep the government functioning while the president and cabinet and so forth are periodically replaced. I don't understand why now suddenly it seems to be a bad thing (by the Repubs I mean) except to try and further delegitimize the government by spreading even more fear and paranoia that the Democrats/liberals have gotten into position to subjugate and suppress Republicans/conservatives.

But my question is: cui bono?

Who benefits from this structural sapping and mining from within? So far, I have seen corporations benefiting for the past few decades and it only seems to be getting worse. I have not seen the people benefiting, that's for sure.
 
I'm pretty confident that in their heart of hearts, most of his cabinet knows he's a bizarre person, with some major psychological issues, and I'll bet they all wish someone else had won the Republican nomination. So what? He got elected.
Legally? There's an awful lot of doubt that the election was legitimate.


It's the law. Maybe we can get rid of him in two more years, or maybe someone will dig up some real dirt and we can do it sooner, but for now, he's the guy in charge. What's the big deal in someone saying they aren't happy about it?
Because this is unprecedented in the history of the country? Maybe it's because tRump is obviously incompetent at the job and is wrecking the country?
 
I wonder what anonymous meant. or thought he meant, by his comments about sabotaging the Trump plans. (I don't remember if he actually used the word "sabotage". Whatever he said that he and his fellow conspirators were up to.)

That was more of a Steve Bannon talking point, when he wasn't busy trying to shove white nationalism into the mainstream.

A lot of people have made a great deal of fuss about this, saying that it makes his administration illegitimate, or something. Elizabeth Warren has said it's time to think about the 25th amendment, because he clearly can't discharge his duties if the administration is working against him. However, what does it actually mean?

Hold it. What she actually said is that they should invoke the 25th amendment if the opinion piece were correct - ie. if the senior officials around Trump agree that he is entirely unable to perform his basic function as president.

And that's the point here - if the Joint Chiefs are simply going to ignore his direct orders, if his cabinet members are simply going to take documents off of his desk, and then give them to some journalist as proof of how far they have to go, and this is what they think they must do simply to keep him from destroying the country, then their constitutional duty is to begin the process of removing him from office entirely.

(Again, I think that the entire GOP failed when they decided to actually nominate him for the presidency , as he was clearly nothing more than a dimwitted, mobbed up, rapey, white supremacist, malignant narcissist con man who couldn't be left to run a Panera Bread for a few off-peak hours. Puts the cabinet in a tough spot, since the GOP has decided "We'll let this open racism and wrecking our reputation to ride, our money will be fine. Yay, tax cuts and oppressing women and nonwhite people!")

I'm still looking for the significance of this whole story. CNN spent a lot of time on it last night, and I'm going to the gym again tonight, so I might see more about it tonight, but I'm just getting more and more confused about what the big deal is. Someone in the administration thinks Trump is a doofus? Well, yeah. Lots of people do. I think it was Tillerson who called him a moron. He's not the only one who has been in the cabinet that thinks that. I'm pretty confident that in their heart of hearts, most of his cabinet knows he's a bizarre person, with some major psychological issues, and I'll bet they all wish someone else had won the Republican nomination. So what? He got elected. It's the law. Maybe we can get rid of him in two more years, or maybe someone will dig up some real dirt and we can do it sooner, but for now, he's the guy in charge. What's the big deal in someone saying they aren't happy about it?

Or maybe he'll cause a complete planetwide catastrophic war. Or, this could come to a head when he tries to toss his perceived enemies in jail, or tries to attack every Latinx US citizen, or causes the entire rest of the world to decide that the US cannot be the global currency.

I see it as insignificant, but only because Dolt 45 is who I thought he was. It's basically the latest scientist to conclude that yes, we are affecting the earth's climate. Yes, I know that already.

And I've lost a lot of respect for Warren because she went down that path.

I see no lies in what she said.
 
Maybe not, but I'm not so sure that the Congress is willing to act.

I'm totally not thrilled with the allegations from Woodward or the op ed writer. But I can't say for sure what these folk ought to do.

What they should have done was expose the collusion. Seriously. We already have overwhelming evidence Trump is a dangerous to our democracy POTUS.
 
what does it actually mean?

Not passing memos to him? Talking about him behind his back? Secretly hoping Democrats get elected to Congress?
It's right there in the article the official's NYT article: taking papers with crazy orders on them away from his desk so he doesn't sign them, and flat-out disobeying orders he does give, openly & explicitly in front of each other and their underlings; he soon forgets he ever wanted things done if they aren't, anyway, which is why he hasn't noticed it was happening.

It's why the armed forces did not, for example, invade Venezuela or (attempt to) assassinate Al-Assad. (Actually, the Venezuela thing came out a while ago, not just in this article, but they framed that at the time as "talking him out of it", which we all know is impossible with somebody who never listens to anybody else, so this article simply gives the proper context in which to now make sense of the Venezuela story.)
 
I see it as insignificant, but only because Dolt 45 is who I thought he was. It's basically the latest scientist to conclude that yes, we are affecting the earth's climate. Yes, I know that already.


That's a good way of putting it. Yes. He's a jerk. He's a terrible president. In my humble opinion, I would go so far as dangerous. That's what the op-ed said, but I knew all that before the op-ed.


It becomes significant if it actually persuades anyone that they ought to do something a little differently as a result of this memo. Maybe that means vote differently in the mid terms. Maybe that means vote differently 2 years from now. Maybe that means support impeachment in the event that they ever come up with something that is worthy of impeachment. Unfortunately for those who wish Trump ill, I don't see this op-ed being the thing that pushes them into the other camp.


If anything, I fear that it actually plays very well for Trump, by reinforcing his core narratives of "deep state" and media bias. There are an awful lot of people who still don't understand how Trump got elected. If they understood that, they might fear that this could help him.
 
But if the President is working to destroy it, isn't it nobler to do such things?

By undermining democracy yourself?

I get that it isn't probably technically legal and in some ways could be considered traitorous.

More to the point - it undermines democracy.

Does it honestly not bother you even a little that the US is apparently being run by a bunch of unelected, unaccountable officials, operating in secret?

Was it right for German citizens to attempt to assassinate Hitler?

Did they do so while working closely with Hitler because they didn't want to give up the taxs cuts Hitler brought?
 
On what grounds? That they don't like Trump's policy choices? That they don't like Trump himself?

You seem to think that the author is alleging more than he is actually alleging.

He's alleging that the cabinet thought Trump's behaviour was worthy of invoking the 25th Amendment, but decided not to do so.
 
As you said, resignation doesn't matter much, unless it actually affected the GOP led Congress. That seems unlikely.

How about "dozens and dozens" of resignations, each accompanied by a public, published statement that the reason for the resignation is that the president is dangerously unfit for office?
 
A lot of people have made a great deal of fuss about this, saying that it makes his administration illegitimate, or something. Elizabeth Warren has said it's time to think about the 25th amendment, because he clearly can't discharge his duties if the administration is working against him. However, what does it actually mean?

Going by the evidence, stealing papers off his desk so that he can't sign them, and wilfully refusing to obey direct instructions on major policy issues. All in the expectation, which appears to be borne out, that Trump doesn't know what he's supposed to sign, and will simply forget major policy decisions.
 
Last edited:
Does it honestly not bother you even a little that the US is apparently being run by a bunch of unelected, unaccountable officials, operating in secret?

The cynic in me thinks that it's pretty much always that way.

How about "dozens and dozens" of resignations, each accompanied by a public, published statement that the reason for the resignation is that the president is dangerously unfit for office?

Then Trump puts yes-men in those positions, and his popularity among GOP voters means he won't be impeached or 25th Amendment'd.
 
We're not in a crisis, though.

If the Op Ed writer is telling more truth than lies, or Woodward is, then it depends on whether you consider having an incapable president a crisis.
 

ISF - Join now!

Every member here is approved by hand. No bots, no spam, just people who care about evidence and honest debate.

Membership is free!

Create your free account

Back
Top Bottom