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Trump Cabinet Shakeup
Elki
get busyModerator, ClubPA Mod Emeritus
get busyModerator, ClubPA Mod Emeritus
So there's a lot of action happening in cabinet level and very senior advisor positions.
Rex Tillerson is out at State.
Mike Pompeo is leaving the CIA to be the new Secretary of State.
Gina Haspel is the nominee to take over the CIA job.
Reported to be on the way out by the Washington Post but still at this job, H.R. McMaster.
If you want to talk about why it's happening and what it means, this is the place for you. A bit from the article above.
Absolutely no "rumor on twitter is..." posts.
And try to be reasonable about what very senior means, I don't want to see daily posts about the third undersecretary of water management at Agriculture possibly leaving.
Have at it.
Rex Tillerson is out at State.
Mike Pompeo is leaving the CIA to be the new Secretary of State.
Gina Haspel is the nominee to take over the CIA job.
Reported to be on the way out by the Washington Post but still at this job, H.R. McMaster.
If you want to talk about why it's happening and what it means, this is the place for you. A bit from the article above.
Washington Post wrote:Trump is now comfortable with ousting McMaster, with whom he never personally gelled, but is willing to take time executing the move because he wants to ensure both that the three-star Army general is not humiliated and that there is a strong successor lined up, these people said.
The turbulence is part of a broader potential shake-up under consideration by Trump that is likely to include senior officials at the White House, where staffers are gripped by fear and uncertainty as they await the next move from an impulsive president who enjoys stoking conflict.
For all of the evident disorder, Trump feels emboldened, advisers said — buoyed by what he views as triumphant decisions last week to impose tariffs on steel and aluminum and to agree to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. The president is enjoying the process of assessing his team and making changes, tightening his inner circle to those he considers survivors and who respect his unconventional style, one senior White House official said.
Absolutely no "rumor on twitter is..." posts.
And try to be reasonable about what very senior means, I don't want to see daily posts about the third undersecretary of water management at Agriculture possibly leaving.
Have at it.
+2
This discussion has been closed.
Posts
https://www.axios.com/scoop-behind-closed-doors-kelly-says-trump-probably-contributing-to-staff-chaos-stories-76c76b7c-a4ac-406a-b174-ff54e36b5080.html There isn't a need to say Sessions is doing a good job unless Trump thinks he isn't doing a good job.
https://www.citizensforethics.org/travels-treasury-secretary-steven-mnuchin/
He has defended the need for military jets in the past saying “there are times when I need secure communications to be in touch with the president and the National Security Council”
I know he's technically on the National Security Council but uh...I think the Treasury Secretary can afford to be incommunicado for an hour or two when traveling.
Every Treasury Secretary in the modern era has flown commercial, prior to him.
Edit: Reposted from the Public Lands thread:
Why I Love My Fucking Home State, Please Allow Me To Apologize For My State Foisting This Bigoted Goose On You All Edition:
Today, Interior Secretary Zinke was at a hearing before Congress regarding his plans to shrink public memorials, when this exchange happened:
Nate McDermott is a reporter for CNN.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=741&v=8aRdjf5IHWc
I just...I'm so sorry that we brought this goose to national prominence by electing him. (No, I never voted for him.) This sort of disgusting response to his pushes to cut these memorials embodies the callousness of this Administration.
Why does Trump need someone else to provide performance assessments of Trump’s own direct report...
https://www.propublica.org/article/cia-cables-detail-its-new-deputy-directors-role-in-torture
So she still oversaw torture/waterboarding, and still destroyed evidence of it, but she was being quoted as using some particularly nasty and brutal language from what we now know is someone else. Rand Paul read some of those quotes that were attributed to her as part of his public stance against voting for her confirmation. I was wondering if the retraction had forced him to reconsider but it looks like he's standing firm:
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/congress/rand-paul-still-a-no-on-gina-haspel-as-cia-director-despite-retraction-of-torture-story
I thought it was a pretty shocking development since the original allegations were parroted so widely by the mainstream news. I think the retraction and correction is a good piece of journalism, and I still think she needs to be grilled at the confirmation hearing over her role in the other, subsequent torture(s) and in the cover-up of it. It would be really great if this all led to a greater de-classification of the entire era of 'enhanced interrogation'...
This piece is a must-read about what we do know went on there: https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2018/03/gina-haspel-black-site-torture-cia/555539/
http://lexiconmegatherium.tumblr.com/
I am petitioning you to put my I think appropriate graphic form the Mueller thread into the OP for this one? It seems more appropriate. https://i.imgur.com/97PgpzU.jpg
pleasepaypreacher.net
The only thing I could even think of would be if there was some sort of economic meltdown. And even then, at that point the treasury secretary couldn’t do much anyway.
pleasepaypreacher.net
Is there a cabinet member whose salary could not be considered a waste of tax payer money?
Completely opposite to the story released today that claimed he and Trump are on the same page now. So probably true.
pleasepaypreacher.net
Your political appointees are effectively supposed to be extensions of yourself; not merely your authority or those you delegate lesser tasks to, but people who are supposed to further your agenda (whatever that may be).
That trump has hired on a bunch of people he is consistently fighting with, repositioning them, firing them and delegating authority to family screams how there is no plan. There may be goals and idea's but there is no clear concept of how those things are meant to come to fruition.
Standards change with time, but this level of bureaucratic incompetence isn't something that should be considered accepable or defensible. Not if you want to have a rational and stable government.
I haven't heard anything about the Secretary of Transportation.
pleasepaypreacher.net
https://thedailybeast.com/john-kelly-rex-tillerson-was-on-the-toilet-when-i-told-him-hed-be-getting-fired Kelly is bad at his job and should be fired if he actually talked about this.
pleasepaypreacher.net
Wow that's some clear cut badness. But sadly in this cast of grifters and grafters not even a fucking blip. Like he's still better than who will likely replace him.
pleasepaypreacher.net
I don't think I've heard about any outright corruption from Rick Perry. Just that he's utterly unqualified for leading the DoE.
Bonus points when he's not even vaguely qualified for either job.
This fucking rules.
Still two fully disqualifying facts. Three, really, because even if torture were effective (it isn't!) and we secretly wanted to keep doing it (no thanks!), you need to weigh the international optics of appointing Sadie McTorture to head your most notorious foreign intelligence service.
Let’s remember that Trump didn’t expect to win and hadn’t assembled an actual transition team (it really was just a team of people who were very curious about getting access to useful information), and a number of folks were probably foisted on him because he didn’t give a shit, and another number of them are grifters taking advantage of Trump.
You could say this turnover is less because of bad judgment and more because the admin had to fill positions quickly and couldn’t properly vet people.
Which is infuriatingly stupid.
Yes, but now that it's been a year he feels like he has a pretty good handle on this whole "Presidenting" thing, so he's going to fill the government with as many racists as he can find.
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@TaramoorPlays
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She got into a fight with the NY/NJ delegation over facts regaring the Hudson tunnels and admitted the President is personally trying to get the Speaker to kill them. However, she's McConnell's wife and the only one with prior Cabinet experience so I doubt she's going anywhere.
Trump probably heard the anecdote and told Kelly to repeat it. Remember that he is intentionally cowardly and petty when firing people (see Comey)
pleasepaypreacher.net
Firing McCabe like this indicates to me that Sessions is less concerned with being fired than going to prison. If he's willing to step over that line (more like flying leap) to undermine a major factor in the Mueller investigation, that isn't about protecting his employment.
That's about protecting his literal freedom.
Origin: Galedrid - Nintendo: Galedrid/3222-6858-1045
Blizzard: Galedrid#1367 - FFXIV: Galedrid Kingshand
McCabe was retiring anyway, though.
Right, which is what makes Session's doing this particularly egregious, and a blatant hit job. McCabe said it himself, this is so overtly intentionally undermining him and his role in the ongoing Mueller investigation to undermine the investigation itself, that it is infuriating.
At minimum, in any other situation, firing McCabe like this would result in a lengthy lawsuit for wrongful termination. But that Sessions was willing to go so far as to deal with the fallout of not only that but the clear and obvious questions about how this relates to the investigation and his own role, says a lot about where it is already at, or is going, that the public isn't aware of yet.
I mean, it seems there are two options here. McCabe was a fuckup and deserved to get fired, or Sessions under pressure from Trump and fear for himself based on knowledge he is privy to, is risking some serious shit, to fend off other serious shit. Literally every single day of the past year and two months points to the latter.
Origin: Galedrid - Nintendo: Galedrid/3222-6858-1045
Blizzard: Galedrid#1367 - FFXIV: Galedrid Kingshand