Yeah, I call bullshit on this. If you read the original reporting, you get the impression that Trump was too emotional, and his aides convinced him to stay out of the room during the operation because of his volatility. That's embarrassing enough, but he was still in the loop, getting real-time updates. And at that point, he'd already made the calls that needed to be made, so there was no need for him, anyway. The forces in motion were executing the orders he'd signed off on. At that point, the Situation Room is just a viewing gallery.
But the way it's being described by some of the rereporting, no way. There is no way the CIC was "barred" from the Situation Room. That's just patently ridiculous.
I think anyone who has worked for a boss who is "unhinged" has done their best to keep them out of the day to day execution of their assigned tasks. But you know the boss could show up at any moment to rant and rave, maybe even can you, but there's really nothing you can do to stop it other than get it done as quickly as you possibly can.
My operational defiintion of unhinged is not familiar with processes and procedures, so they get irritated at what they view as timelines being longer than what they think it should be. Zero patience for the realities of the situation.
Hope is not optimism, which expects things to turn out well, but something rooted in the conviction that there is good worth working for. - Seamus Heaney, Irish poet and likely Hoosier basketball fan.
POTFB
Trump is at the end of his rope.
For even the most propagandistic pro-Trump outlets, it’s just unspinnable. Gerard Baker’s timeline captures the madness of it all:
Unconditional surrender. Regime change. Partnership with regime for tariffing the strait. Close the strait. Open the strait. No nukes. Some nukes. No missiles. Some missiles. Civilization wipeout. Ceasefire. War. Peace. And if all that fails, we’ll take the JCPOA.
This is the art of the deal? Please. Day-by-day contradictions, countless red lines crossed and crossed again, weird declarations of total victory, followed by even weirder threats to blow everything up again: at some point, even Goebbels would give up. Five deadlines have been set and five deadlines have passed without Iran capitulating. We are burning through munitions so fast — a staggering billion dollars a day — we’re now exposed globally. The memes are just brutal. As Tim Dillon notes, the IRGC mullahs are actually beating Trump at shit-talking. He can’t even win at that anymore. And the Lego movies! My God, the Lego movies.
Trump is at the end of his rope.
For even the most propagandistic pro-Trump outlets, it’s just unspinnable. Gerard Baker’s timeline captures the madness of it all:
Unconditional surrender. Regime change. Partnership with regime for tariffing the strait. Close the strait. Open the strait. No nukes. Some nukes. No missiles. Some missiles. Civilization wipeout. Ceasefire. War. Peace. And if all that fails, we’ll take the JCPOA.
This is the art of the deal? Please. Day-by-day contradictions, countless red lines crossed and crossed again, weird declarations of total victory, followed by even weirder threats to blow everything up again: at some point, even Goebbels would give up. Five deadlines have been set and five deadlines have passed without Iran capitulating. We are burning through munitions so fast — a staggering billion dollars a day — we’re now exposed globally. The memes are just brutal. As Tim Dillon notes, the IRGC mullahs are actually beating Trump at shit-talking. He can’t even win at that anymore. And the Lego movies! My God, the Lego movies.
“Trump is completely out of his depth.”
Good piece.Trump is at the end of his rope.
For even the most propagandistic pro-Trump outlets, it’s just unspinnable. Gerard Baker’s timeline captures the madness of it all:
Unconditional surrender. Regime change. Partnership with regime for tariffing the strait. Close the strait. Open the strait. No nukes. Some nukes. No missiles. Some missiles. Civilization wipeout. Ceasefire. War. Peace. And if all that fails, we’ll take the JCPOA.
This is the art of the deal? Please. Day-by-day contradictions, countless red lines crossed and crossed again, weird declarations of total victory, followed by even weirder threats to blow everything up again: at some point, even Goebbels would give up. Five deadlines have been set and five deadlines have passed without Iran capitulating. We are burning through munitions so fast — a staggering billion dollars a day — we’re now exposed globally. The memes are just brutal. As Tim Dillon notes, the IRGC mullahs are actually beating Trump at shit-talking. He can’t even win at that anymore. And the Lego movies! My God, the Lego movies.
Good piece.Trump is at the end of his rope.
For even the most propagandistic pro-Trump outlets, it’s just unspinnable. Gerard Baker’s timeline captures the madness of it all:
Unconditional surrender. Regime change. Partnership with regime for tariffing the strait. Close the strait. Open the strait. No nukes. Some nukes. No missiles. Some missiles. Civilization wipeout. Ceasefire. War. Peace. And if all that fails, we’ll take the JCPOA.
This is the art of the deal? Please. Day-by-day contradictions, countless red lines crossed and crossed again, weird declarations of total victory, followed by even weirder threats to blow everything up again: at some point, even Goebbels would give up. Five deadlines have been set and five deadlines have passed without Iran capitulating. We are burning through munitions so fast — a staggering billion dollars a day — we’re now exposed globally. The memes are just brutal. As Tim Dillon notes, the IRGC mullahs are actually beating Trump at shit-talking. He can’t even win at that anymore. And the Lego movies! My God, the Lego movies.
I think it's more grasping at straws and looking for clicks. I use to buy arguments like Sullivans in 2016 and 2020, but at some point you have to admit you're wrong. MAGA isn't going away anytime soon. You might not like Trump, but that quickly changes when you match him up against whomever the Democrats run. The Democrats would have to win several elections in order to end MAGA, which would require them to have policy positions that work, they don't.
Sullivan’s trick is to present a critique of Trump and then conflate MAGA with Trump:
“That’s the first strike against MAGA: the decision to go to war at all.”
Trump created MAGA and tapped into its power to win the first election but MAGA has since existed, independent of Trump, as a belief system rooted in being an American and in all the founding aspects of America, the greatest source of power we have. MAGA is one thing Trump can’t throw under the bus. Sooner vice versa.
The only actual flaw in MAGA as a slogan is “again.” America is actually greater than ever. Our continuing challenge is to make it even greater. That’s a cause both parties can and should embrace, as should we all.
Sullivan’s trick is to present a critique of Trump and then conflate MAGA with Trump:
“That’s the first strike against MAGA: the decision to go to war at all.”
Trump created MAGA and tapped into its power to win the first election but MAGA has since existed, independent of Trump, as a belief system rooted in being an American and in all the founding aspects of America, the greatest source of power we have. MAGA is one thing Trump can’t throw under the bus. Sooner vice versa.
The only actual flaw in MAGA as a slogan is “again.” America is actually greater than ever. Our continuing challenge is to make it even greater. That’s a cause both parties can and should embrace, as should we all.
Trump didn't create MAGA, he just tapped into it. That's the part people like Sullivan still can't understand, even after 10 years. Nobody cares about Owen, Tucker, or the other people he listed. They're irrelevant in the bigger scheme of things. If the GOP loses bigly in November it will be because Trump went Neocon and not MAGA. Of course the MSM will sell it as the end of MAGA because that's what they want and it drives clicks. They'll be wrong, which is standard for them.
MAGA isn't going away anytime soon. You might not like Trump, but that quickly changes when you match him up against whomever the Democrats run. The Democrats would have to win several elections in order to end MAGA, which would require them to have policy positions that work, they don't.
The MAGA mindset has always been there, at least during my adult life. Trump just figured out a way to tap into it and label it as MAGA. It shows how far the both parties have shifted towards more gov't control, when a guy like Trump can be labeld as conservative and most people don't argue the point, but merely increase the volume of their rhetoric.
Hope is not optimism, which expects things to turn out well, but something rooted in the conviction that there is good worth working for. - Seamus Heaney, Irish poet and likely Hoosier basketball fan.
POTFB
@hooky Perfectly stated. And why calls for the old guard conservatives are pissing in the wind. The country moved
No kidding. Trump has redefined international relations. The old guard is left staring into the future with no old-style paradigms to rely on. Uncle Sam’s timidity that left Venezuela and Iran as incurable boils on the world’s backside is over. Trump’s Venezuelan effort that has left a friendly Delcy Rodríguez in charge was brilliantly conceived and executed.
It remains to be seen if he can pull a rabbit out of the hat in Iran like he did in Venezuela. There are a lot more moving parts and unknowns there. A couple things we do know, Irans days as the regional terror mother ship are over, and its nuke capability probably is.
What the Southern Strategy did to attract white voters to the GOP is what Trump did with MAGA in 2015 for the respective white voters throughout the US. That's the main consequential shift in the electorate. That's a net gain for the GOP independent of old-guard or new-guard conservatives. Trump will fade away, these GOP voters aren't going anywhere, call them MAGA or anything else. They'll vote for Vance, DeSantis or anyone else who doesn't drink alphabet brown Kool-Aid. They might well tend more conservative than Trump and I doubt they're Big GOvernment as hooky suggests. That's more of a DC corrupt political phenomenon.@hooky Perfectly stated. And why calls for the old guard conservatives are pissing in the wind. The country moved
I doubt they're Big GOvernment as hooky suggests.
I'm suggesting the 2 parties are Big Gov. The people wearing the MAGA label are anything but. That's why there's so much turmoil going on with his supporters. He's doing shit they didn't vote for like starting another middle east war, the Epstein file fiasco, etc...
Hope is not optimism, which expects things to turn out well, but something rooted in the conviction that there is good worth working for. - Seamus Heaney, Irish poet and likely Hoosier basketball fan.
POTFB
@co-hoosier i was actually referring to domestic matters. as to global to be honest i don't know. i really have never followed or know much about global affairs