White House Push-Back Against Woodward's Book Is... Pretty Anemic

The Diplomat by Nancy Ohanian

You may have noticed that yesterday, Bob Woodward's book leaked and some of Trump's top aides made some very disparaging remarks about his stupidity and his character that make him sound as unfit for any office as many of us suspected all along.

Although many of the people Woodward interviewed, like Gary Cohn, Reince Priebus, Rob Porter, John Dowd, Steve Bannon, have jumped ship-- or were pushed overboard-- Chief of Staff Bill Kelly, John Kelly and others are still hanging around the White House, although probably not for long. Woodward was quoted as saying that Trump was "unhinged" and that "he's an idiot. It’s pointless to try to convince him of anything. He’s gone off the rails. We’re in Crazytown. I don’t even know why any of us are here. This is the worst job I’ve ever had."

At a National Security Council meeting on Jan. 19, Trump disregarded the significance of the massive U.S. military presence on the Korean Peninsula, including a special intelligence operation that allows the United States to detect a North Korean missile launch in seven seconds vs. 15 minutes from Alaska, according to Woodward. Trump questioned why the government was spending resources in the region at all.

“We’re doing this in order to prevent World War III,” Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told him.

After Trump left the meeting, Woodward recounts, “Mattis was particularly exasperated and alarmed, telling close associates that the president acted like-- and had the understanding of-- ‘a fifth- or sixth-grader.’”

Rudy Giuliani, Trump's personal p.r. man, scurried over to CNBC and told them "That’s the kind of disloyalty that leads to you leaving, not staying and undermining the president." He said the leakers "should be questioning why they are there” and said they should "get another job." Too late to fire Gary Cohn who was worried about Trump's judgment, reported the NY Times and took a letter from Trump's desk authorizing the withdrawal of the U.S. from a trade agreement with South Korea, according to Bob Woodward's new book. Cohn told an associate that Trump never realized it was missing." We're still in the trade deal.

Moments later, Huckabee's daughter tried to sound authoritative, saying "This book is nothing more than fabricated stories, many by former disgruntled employees, told to make the President look bad." Well, if that was their motivation, they certainly succeeded-- spectacularly.

Jonathan Chait had a somewhat different take than Sarah and Rudy: Everybody in the White House Considers Trump an Idiot. He refers to the book as "tales from the court of the mad king." A case could be made-- and Trump makes it-- that everyone in the U.S. except the Southerners he disparages as "dumb hicks," considers Trump and idiot, not just the people working for him.

Woodward confirms that Trump’s former secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, described him as a “fucking moron,” a fact that has been reported previously. He adds several more officials to the list of people who have blurted out this obvious conclusion.

...Jay Sekulow, tried to argue to Robert Mueller that Trump could not be asked to give an interview because he is a compulsive liar. They literally explained to Mueller how they conducted a mock interview with Trump, and he was so unable to tell the truth that they considered him mentally disqualified from testifying:

Jay Sekulow went to Mueller’s office and re-enacted the mock interview. Their goal: to argue that Trump couldn’t possibly testify because he was incapable of telling the truth.

  “He just made something up. That’s his nature,” Dowd said to Mueller.

It seems somehow unfair to let somebody remain on the job as president because he’s such a compulsive liar he can”t be allowed to testify under oath.

...However dumb and crazy you might think Trump is, the reality always turns out to be even worse.

Bizarrely, Trump didn't tweet about Woodward's book yesterday, at least not 'til the evening, when his self-control dissipated-- and not 'til he got written statements from some of his team. (I wonder who actually wrote the statements.) But that was  probably because, in his reptilian little mind, he didn't want to turn him into another Omarosa. Too late, Señor T; Bob Woodward is already more famous than that-- and way, way more credible (than either of you).