Trump decides Breitbart chair Bannon knows more about natsec than actual professionals In case the first week of the White House of President Donald Trump hadn't scared you enough, alt.right news service Breitbart executive chair and now Senior Counselor to the President Steve Bannon has managed to insert himself into the United States' National Security Council. By order of a memo signed with President Trump's …
I suppose its really dependent on what will get him first. I think we should start a betting pool on what will happen to Lord Baby-hands in the next 4 years:
-- Resigns in the midst of one his tantrums
-- Impeached after one too many Constitutional violations.
-- Dies in attack by another nation
-- Assassinated
-- Dies in an accident (like choking on a pretzel or falling down a flight of stairs...)
-- Medical condition (He is 71, always angry, and eats a lot of red meat; not exactly the healthiest person)
After losing all but his ardent supports and having the economy tank for lack of negotiating skills the only popularity card he will have left is to start a war. What dispute he will trump up remains to be seen. With war his options for eliminating rights will grow exponentially.
Bannon is just the man to start a race or religion based war in an attempt to unify the "right" parts of the country. Wish us luck and I hope you readers are not the target.
Guys, if you're already this deluded and confused in the first weeks, I shudder to think of the state you'll be in when most of Obama's cherished PC 'achievements' are being ripped out by the roots in the coming months, like the weeds they are.
Oh, and the article mentioned this:
"Political operatives are usually not members of the Council."
Then Richard chose not to mention any exceptions to that statement. C'mon Rich, you really think you can try to cast this move of Trump's as "not usual" and just leave it at that? I beg to differ. Just how unusual is it? How many times did Obama do it? Other Presidents? Even if it only happened once or twice, that is a precedent.
YOU were writing this thing, so as a journalist you should have at least googled it. Why didn't you, hmmm? Say, maybe you did, and the answer clashed with your point, eh?
So, this is the vaunted British "we trash everyone" style of journalism? And it depends on leaving out certain kinds of information when trashing certain politicians? I kinda figured.
"Usually" there are certain things a President should not delegate to others. I daresay security briefings are one of them. I'm sure there's been some Presidents who did it at least once or twice during their term in office but not as a matter of policy like this.
Trump has commented in the past that he's a delegator.. and that will work for many things. The Security Council briefings though? Look at the ones deleted from membership... Director of National Intelligence and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. It is even more confusing when the Director of the Office of Management and Budget ahs been removed from membership but is invited to every meeting.
Very strange happenings... I hope you are right and he knows what he's doing. And let's not drag "look at who else did X" as just because someone else did it, doesn't make it right.
"So, this is the vaunted British "we trash everyone" style of journalism? And it depends on leaving out certain kinds of information when trashing certain politicians? I kinda figured."
I presume from the style and content of your post that you watch things like Fox News. The sort of right wing media outlets that depend on leaving out certain kinds of information when trashing certain politicians.
Still, you can always check the voting results so far on this comments thread to see how people are thinking here. Why not then post again condemning them as "voter fraud" or "fake news".? It's what your new hero would do.
> "Still, you can always check the voting results so far on this comments thread to see how people are thinking here."
I know how people are thinking here. This article is click bait for Trump haters, so I expect to be downvoted massively. I walk into this sewer knowing that what I say will clash with what most of you expected to enjoy, namely a jolly good Trump-thumping.
I feel someone must do it, just as a doctor must pump the occasional stomach.
Welcome to modern journalism. Once there would have been a presentation of facts. Now it is all just opinion and usually very biased towards what is wanted.
Best to accept this (it is universal... cnn, bbc, theregister... everyone) and treat all these articles for what they are... joke material
>if you're already this deluded
OK, BJ, I'll bite.
I get that global warming is a partisan thing. Ditto health care. Reps and Dems just don't see them the same way. Agree to disagree.
Now, can you explain the upside from a political campaign operative present on the National Security Council? Rather than the pros? Is that so that hard decisions about how to react to national security threats can benefit from a PR and spin perspective? Vetted for fitting your worldview?
Honestly, you couldn't make this shit up. Even Karl Grove's undue influence on post-invasion troop level planning in Iraq, with the disastrous impact thereof until the surge, does not at all approach this level of stupidity.
How can a Republican administration be this careless about national security? How partisan do you have to be before you think this is a good thing? What if Reps like McCain flag it as stupid, would that wake you up???
Bannon was also a navy officer serving on a warship for years, and then special assistant to the Chief of Naval Operations at the Pentagon for more years.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Bannon#Service_in_U.S._Navy
So he's military, which is normal for the National Security Council. And maybe President Trump sees Bannon as a multifaceted guy, eh? Okay, not that many facets, but some. Trump's whole shtick is hiring and firing, if we are to believe the buzz.
And remember, Trump is pledged to shake things up. That means hiring and firing, and actually going with the non-pros maybe. It COULD be that it's those "pros" who are the real problem. Personally I have not been too impressed the last few years, have you?
I never claimed that was enough. Presumably Trump sees something more in the man that recommends him. Hey, maybe it's all those video takedowns of the Left that Bannon produced. And I suppose that might also explain the visceral response from the Left at his appointment.
BTW, Karl Rove, George Bush's most evil advisor, was denied (by Bush) a seat at the NSC because Rove lacked any military experience. A Rove with Bannon's experience as a navy officer would have convinced Bush (a military vet) to let him on the NSC. And you pooh-pooh Bannon's seven years before the mast! Tsk.
Sigh. No - I'm not going to put the quote here. I'll put something else. How about 'impossible questions, 101'. Here goes:
Q1: Which of these three tenets do you hold most true?
A: Democracy leads to the greater good.
B: Democracy leads to the greater bad
C: Democracy is irrelevant, because nobody can agree WTF it means.
Answers that do not include a definition 'democracy' will get zero marks.
Answers that define 'electoral systems' instead of 'democracy' will get zero marks.
All students who actually try to answer the question will be submitted for immediate psychiatric evaluation.
Sigh. I know. I'm an Idiot... :-(.
I'm amazed how many people managed to forget Northern Ireland in the '90s. I was a kid in the US at the time, but I can still remember regular reports of car bombs (IEDs), cop killings, and people walking into buildings and just opening fire. If that doesn't count as terrorism, I don't know what does. And there weren't any Muslims there, just Catholics and Protestants.
Of course, there's tons of older examples, like Sherman's march to the sea. Where an American army burned every field, slaughtered any livestock and destroyed any home they could as they walked through the South. But some people would like to forget anything that happened 150 years ago.
Muslims, by no means, have a monopoly on terrorism. Terrorism (and other forms of asymmetric warfare) is the default strategy when facing an opponent with a vastly superior military and economy.
I'm amazed how many people managed to forget Northern Ireland in the '90s.
I was living in Londn, thats why I don't get the we should fear all Muslims thing, by all rights I should be terrirfied of anyone Irish, the sound of an Irish accent on a plane should make me worried they are going to hijack etc.
But I can see that realistically thats all bollocks, so dunno why Muslims are not getting treated with the same level of rationality.
This post has been deleted by its author
By the 90s they had largely stopped bombing in England as the political process started, leading to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998.
You should have grown up in England during the 70's and 80's to witness the real horrors - car bomb outside Harrods just before Christmas, Victoria Station in rush hour etc. Apparently 19000 (yes, 19 thousand) devises were exploded in the UK between 1970 and 2005 - from Wikipedia so treat with caution - It felt like there was a bomb every week when I was a kid so I can believe it.
At no time during this did we feel the need to spy on the whole population (ok, some Irish were probably incorrectly targeted), nor did we feel that we needed to wall off the border. In fact the general feeling was anger against the bombers, not fear of the Irish in general and they were not persecuted as a nation.
Born in 70's so lived through that in London, I was once standing at a station about 30 years later in Manchester when a little old (white) lady left a bag and wandered off, my first thought was she may be leaving a bomb. Being that paranoid about bags unattended had obviously filtered through.
It used to get boring as a kid being evacuated from various shops because of a bomb scare it was just part of a shopping experience.
Never grew up with a fear of muslims, when I was a kid there was no troubles with fundamentalist sects. Now there are fundamentalistic sects still don't equate that to the average muslim.
Well said mate, we just got on with it, didn't we? Terrorism was a real thing in England in the 1970/80s. Yet the UK still has an open border with the Republic of Ireland because the respective leaders actively tried to solve the problem. Not so sure it would happen now though.
"Well said mate, we just got on with it, didn't we"
I've had this discussion with someone at work recently - Though I was born in 82 so was too young to be aware of most of it I was most definitely aware of what was going on in the 90s.
Like many things (kidnapping, crime etc) the level of fear has gone up despite the actual incidents going down.
What are people afraid of in the UK at the moment? Terrorism. Has terrorism become more prevalent in the last 10 years? No, it has significantly reduced to the point that people born in the 90s don't really equate terrorism with anything other than Islam... which feeds nicely into the other thing that people are starting to fear in the UK (anyone with a slightly darker shade of skin than themselves - unless it was derived from a bottle or from a session at tanneriffe above the bookies)
> I'm amazed how many people managed to forget Northern Ireland in the '90s. I was a kid in the US at the time
In '89 or '90 I stayed one just night in Belfast on business and my hotel was bombed!
[Not badly I hasten to add - they weren't targeting the guests, just the hotel for non-payment of protection money.]
You know the feeling when you walk into a meeting for a new project. You look around and see maybe a couple of familiar faces amidst the sea of strangers, known obstructionists etc. You give each other a nod because you know you're going to be the ones doing the actual work.
Maybe that will happen here. The pros give each other the nod, convene an actual working meeting and do sensible stuff but keep telling the Trumpets that everything's going just the way that was agreed in the official meeting.
Meanwhile https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/171928 is heading towards the million mark. (Actually I think it ought to have said he should be held at the airport & deep-vetted before being allowed in, if at all.)
I think it ought to have said he should be held at the airport & deep-vetted before being allowed in, if at all.
If by "deep" vetted you mean the activity involving thick rubber gloves and optionally some stuff to reduce friction (if you're really really politely asking for it) I would agree.
After all, you can never be too sure.
Maybe Trump should ban Americans from entering America (and yes I know tomato/tomayto what with him already doing that to the ones with not quite white enough skin). American government officials did after all supply the IRA with weapons and funding during the Raygun and Bush 1.0 periods - openly holding fundraisers even, as did quite a large section of the American public.
That I guess is the "special relationship" for you. "Do as we say, when we say it and no complaining about US funding terrorists who try to kill and maim as many of you as possible. Oh? what's that? you want reciprocal trade deals and extradition treaties? LOL! yeah, we'll get right on that......"
having suffered merkin multinational governance (cough), the current head of the USSA is behaving exactly like any other CEO from that decaying empire. Image is all. Check reality at door or airport. Listen only to inner circle of yes droids.
One wonders if this is like living under god emperors, eg Pharaohs or Norks ? Will this initiate a plot by TLAs who feel slighted that they are not at all tables of power. A rerun of Praetorian Guards versus emperors in Rome internal power struggles perhaps as history repeats.
A conspiracy enthusiast might also wonder if the manufactured outrage is a diversion from something seriously nasty happening behind smoke. Our little bunch in Oz pulled this off over Xmas/New Year.
A conspiracy enthusiast might also wonder if the manufactured outrage is a diversion from something seriously nasty happening behind smoke. Our little bunch in Oz pulled this off over Xmas/New Year.
I was wondering the same - what's so special about the countries he selected, and what about the countries he "forgot"?
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