For a White House that normally has difficulty with messaging, this week has been a total circus. Everyone has a propensity to blame the communications shop, and why I agree that they aren't stellar, almost every crisis in this WH has directly been a crisis of Trump's making. Quite frankly, morale sucks right now. Spicer is desperately trying to earn the president's favor, but that is an impossible task for him: how does the President's mouthpiece successfully articulate what POTUS is thinking on any given day when POTUS can't even do that most of the time? With that said, I gave up feeling sorry for Spicer long ago - anyone with integrity would have quit long ago - he HAD (read: past-tense) the credibility and reputation that he could have easily found work elsewhere. At the very least, he should summon some inner fortitude and tell POTUS that no, he isn't going to go out and lie for him. In a position where credibility is everything, this communications shop is quickly approaching negative territory. It's gotten to the point that Spicer isn't even really trying to defend the President's falsehoods from the podium anymore. (No comment re: Comey tape threat, etc.) That's bad. The worst part is that there are still people depending this behavior and trying to shift blame to the media. Stop that. The media NEEDS to crucify this administration when they blatantly lie to the American people, just as they have with most every modern president. I have close friends that work in the media, and trust me, they would much rather be reporting on substance and policy... but there is none. So we're all stuck in this perpetual running in circles, fact checking every statement, wag the dog atmosphere.
Most of the White House staff legitimately want to do a good job representing this President, the problem is that nobody knows the end game. There is no road map, or as far as I can tell, even a destination. So time is spent scrambling around trying to put out fires as Trump starts them.
This got better for a period, namely when Kellyanne was benched from television. "Alternative facts" is still a running joke amongst the staff, by the way. What a ridiculous statement. There was a period of relative calm in which all of the advisors that were on television were the ones that knew how to keep their feet out of their mouths and mostly stick to the talking points. There were a few small fires and a bunch of Trump yelling at the TV, but nothing major. Then, James Comey made the suggestion that maybe he had something to do with the election and Trump came through with a flamethrower. That fire is still burning. It turns out it doesn't go away quickly when you terminate the guy that's investigating you and then say in an interview, "I thought about it and this whole Russia thing is fake." Who knew federal investigations were so complicated?
Now the White House is basically in "everything is on fire" mode. Morale is awful, nobody knows what the messaging is supposed to be because Trump changes it every two days, and nothing substantive is getting done besides trying to convince people that there's nothing going on with Russia. Best way to convince people of that? Let's bring Lavrov and Kislyak (you know, the assumed top spymaster in the United States) into the Oval Office. Oh, and let's exclude the American press while we're at it.
I don't see it getting better any time soon, especially with the reports that if Comey testifies, he wants it to be in public.
The GOP agenda is also now seriously in doubt. I have to point out that once again, Trump stepped on his relatively positive coverage following healthcare. Except this time, he stomped on it after dropping it from the Empire State Building. You're seeing Graham, McCain and Burr, arguably the three most prominent GOP senators, begin to distance themselves from Trump and his legislative plans. Collins is too, but she's never really been a fan.
With James Clapper's declaration that our institutions are under attack and eroding under the Trump administration, I boldly (ha) predict another week of damage control and turmoil in the west wing. But wow, strong words from the former DNI.
Speaking of James Clapper, I believe it was a serious miscalculation on the part of the administration to not send any senior staff to the Sunday shows. The narrative isn't going fl change itself. Unless we do something stupid like bomb North Korea. I don't have any imminent information on that happening, but it wouldn't surprise me at all.
Small side note on North Korea to wrap this up: The missile they launched yesterday was confirmed to be a KN-17 Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile (IRBM). This is their first successful KN-17 launch, and potentially a big problem for our allies in the region. For this test, they lofted the missile, which basically means they launched it almost vertically. There are several reasons for this:
1. It lowers the lateral distance traveled.
2. It gives valuable time to observe the flight of the missile and record data.
3. It gives them the opportunity to test the full flight path of the missile without shooting it over Japan and really pissing people off.
Here's a graph to explain. It is very concerning, because the range of the missile would have been approximately 2796 miles if it was launched on a normal trajectory. This is one of their newest missiles and shows an alarming progression in their missile program.
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