Donald Trump is looking to clean house and replace his senior staff with people who will not try to rein him in. Uh oh!

Courtesy of Vanity Fair:  

With the departures of Hope Hicks and Gary Cohn, the Trump presidency is entering a new phase—one in which Trump is feeling liberated to act on his impulses. “Trump is in command. He’s been in the job more than a year now. He knows how the levers of power work. He doesn’t give a fuck,” the Republican said. Trump’s decision to circumvent the policy process and impose tariffs on imported steel and aluminum reflects his emboldened desire to follow his impulses and defy his advisers. “It was like a fuck-you to Kelly,” a Trump friend said. “Trump is red-hot about Kelly trying to control him.” 

According to five Republicans close to the White House, Trump has diagnosed the problem as having the wrong team around him and is looking to replace his senior staff in the coming weeks. “Trump is going for a clean reset, but he needs to do it in a way that’s systemic so it doesn’t look like it’s chaos,” one Republican said. 

Sources said that the first officials to go will be Chief of Staff John Kelly and National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, both of whom Trump has clashed with for months. On Tuesday, Trump met with John Bolton in the Oval Office. When he plans to visit Mar-a-Lago next weekend, Trump is expected to interview more candidates for both positions, according to two sources. “He’s going for a clean slate,” one source said. Cohn had been lobbying to replace Kelly as chief, two sources said, and quit when he didn’t get the job. “Trump laughed at Gary when he brought it up,” one outside adviser to the White House said. 

Next on the departure list are Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump. Trump remains fiercely loyal to his family, but various distractions have eroded their efficacy within the administration. Both have been sidelined without top-secret security clearances by Kelly, and sources expect them to be leaving at some point in the near future.

"He doesn't give a fuck."

Okay this article legitimately made my legs shake.

I think it is safe to say that Donald Trump is clinically insane.

And the only hope for this nation is that the people around him exert some control over his impulses.

If he simply fires those that are doing that, and replaces them with sycophants afraid to correct him or raise objections to his lunatic ravings, we are seriously fucked here.

Robert Mueller better put his investigation on the fast track because as long as Trump is in office this whole country, if not the entire world, remain in serious danger.

The war within the White House intensifies as top advisers assemble their own teams to push their own agendas.

Courtesy of Politico:

President Donald Trump won office on promises to shake up how Washington works, and so far that’s been most apparent in his own West Wing, where his top advisers have built up personal staffs to support their own agendas instead of using a traditional White House policy and messaging operation. 

Chief strategist Steve Bannon has two special assistants, a deputy assistant, an executive assistant and a body man working in his “war room” — plus his external press hand, something his predecessors under President Barack Obama, David Axelrod and David Plouffe, never had while working in the White House. 

Senior adviser Jared Kushner has two staffers working directly below him, as well as another five in the newly created Office of American Innovation who are focused on his portfolio of White House issues. Included in that mix is a communications adviser, Josh Raffel, a former Hollywood PR exec who previously repped Kushner’s real estate work. 

“It is a new development for a White House staffer to have their own individual PR people,” said Ari Fleischer, who served as White House press secretary during George W. Bush’s first term.

Guess who else has their own personal staff people.   

Senior counselor Kellyanne Conway, whose portfolio spans opioids, veterans issues and communications, has a chief of staff, Renee Hudson, who manages one person below her. Hudson, who has the title of deputy assistant to the president, was a chief of staff to Rep. Todd Rokita (R-Ind.) and is considered a strong policy aide to Conway, taking the lead on many of her issues, including opioid abuse and military spouse employment. Even more critically, she fills in for Conway at senior meetings when she’s traveling around the country advocating for Trump’s agenda at rallies. 

Ivanka Trump also has a chief of staff, Julie Radford, who holds the title of special assistant to the president and manages only a single person below her.

As Obama’s chief strategist, Axelrod had two special assistants and an executive assistant underneath him. Plouffe had a deputy senior adviser and two special assistants when he took over the role — half as many dedicated staffers as Bannon or Kushner have. 

The extensive personal offices also illustrate the distrust among top West Wing officials in the White House communications shop, which is stocked with loyalists to chief of staff Reince Priebus who used to work with him at the Republican National Committee. 

“There is no trust in the current structure to defend everyone equally,” said one White House official. 

Nothing says unified message like each member of a team hiring their own staff members to push through THEIR agendas.

Trump is running his White House like they used to structure those episodes of The Apprentice, which pitted contestants against each other.

But that was a stupid reality show, these are the people who are supposed to be solving problems and keeping the country safe.

There has been infighting in the White House before, but I think that this time there might actually be a body count. 

Trump White House becomes obsessed with Russian probe while Capitol Hill Republicans resign themselves to watching the presidency end in disaster.

Courtesy of Politico: 

President Donald Trump has been aggressively working the phones since returning this weekend from his foreign trip, talking to friends and outside lawyers as he obsesses over the deepening investigations into his aides and Russia. 

Two White House officials said Trump and some aides including Steve Bannon are becoming increasingly convinced that they are victims of a conspiracy against Trump's presidency, as evidenced by the number of leaks flowing out of government — that the crusade by the so-called “deep state” is a legitimate threat, not just fodder for right wing defenders.

Still, Trump and his aides are starting to take the probes more seriously, seeking to establish a communications team dedicated to dealing with questions around the probe and beefing up his legal representation. And they've become more rattled by the idea that they don't know where the scandals are headed and who may be ensnared next.

That could be good news for the country, since a Donald Trump obsessed with the Russian probes, is a Donald Trump not actively screwing up the country.

Apparently the White House staffers have no idea what plan, if any, Trump has for dealing with all of this either:  

Aside from bringing in additional aides to handle the Russia probe, the president's senior aides say that his strategy for confronting the crises — or for pushing a stalled legislative agenda — remains unclear. 

Senior aides and long-time confidants admitted not knowing who Trump would hire, how safe the jobs of top staff are, what the White House's agenda is for the coming days, or what — if anything — they can accomplish.

“We are letting others dictate entirely how we are perceived," one White House official said. “The calendar changes every day. There is no rhyme or reason to a lot of it.”

I would suspect that Trump has no idea what to do about any of this, and probably knows for a fact that things will only get worse from here.

And it is unlikely he will get much help from Capitol Hill.

Courtesy of The Atlantic: 

For the Republicans running the government, Capitol Hill has become a workplace with extremely poor morale. The moderates fear for their careers, while the conservative true believers see little to hope for. When the liberal magazine Mother Jones credited Representative Justin Amash of Michigan with being the first Republican to raise the possibility of impeachment, the office of Representative Carlos Curbelo of Florida called to request a correction: Curbelo had gone there first. 

But for the most part, his party has not openly turned on Trump. What would be the point? Behind closed doors, a longtime House Republican staffer told me, a few lawmakers still wholeheartedly defend the president; among the rest, there are differing degrees of fatalism. One group thinks it is possible to fight through the crisis, while another is resigned to “a long slow death,” as this staffer put it, potentially culminating in a Democratic-controlled House beginning impeachment proceedings in 2019. “This is like Reservoir Dogs,” the staffer said. “Everyone ends up dead on the floor.”

Well there's a graphic image for you.

However it also means that the Republicans, who immediately started pushing through policies to undermine and repeal various social programs, may become too uncertain about the future to risk putting their names on any new bills which might come back to haunt them in the next election cycle.

And that could be good news indeed.

Reports say that White House officials are purging their electronic devices in reaction to possible subpoenas coming their way.

Courtesy of the Independent:  

White House officials and members of Donald Trump’s transition team are reportedly “purging” their electronic devices to avoid being compromised by subpoenas, it has been claimed. 

 The accusation comes just weeks after government lawyers ordered the President’s aides to preserve any materials that could be connected to Russian interference in the 2016 election. 

One legal expert told MSNBC - the channel that first reported the allegations based on testimony from an inside source - there could be “legal ramifications” for staff who destroyed crucial evidence relating to ongoing investigations. 

I remember when Rachel Maddow broke this news a few days ago, and also saw Andrea Mitchell ask that legal expert what would happen if staffers did this after receiving direction to preserve their communications.

I believe prison was the answer.

But this is another of those things that you kind of already know is already happening even though the White House staff has been told directly not to.

Donald Trump simply does not believe in playing by the rules. And when you are working for somebody who is ethically challenged it becomes easy to follow their example.

I actually wonder if the cell phones and tablets had not already been purged back in February when Sean Spicer was conducting random checks to find the White House leakers.

However if these staffers actually think this will keep them out of the hot seat, or that it will stall the investigation, well then they don't understand Congressional subpoena power.

The phone company has a record of every call they have made, and as we know computer data bases are rarely ever completely wiped clean.

So if these people have actually done this they are only making things harder for themselves in the long run.

Donald Trump has a unique way to keep costs down, don't pay people.

Courtesy of Reuters:  

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has run an unusually cheap campaign in part by not paying at least 10 top staffers, consultants and advisers, some of whom are no longer with the campaign, according to a review of federal campaign finance filings. 

Those who have so far not been paid, the filings show, include recently departed campaign manager Paul Manafort, California state director Tim Clark, communications director Michael Caputo and a pair of senior aides who left the campaign in June to immediately go to work for a Trump Super PAC. 

The New York real estate magnate and his allies have touted his campaign's frugality, saying it is evidence of his management skills. His campaign's spending has totaled $89.5 million so far, about a third of what Democratic rival Hillary Clinton's campaign has spent.

Let's see free media, free campaign staff, free money from his donors going to his companies, let's face it Trump really knows how to do this campaigning on the cheap thing.

Trump actually has a long history of not paying his bills, or refusing to pay them in full.  Which does not bode well for these staffers.

And since his staff has signed those nondisclosure agreements they cannot even complain about this to the press.

I wonder what they will do when they find out the whole thing was just bullshit anyway and Trump is actually angling to start a media empire instead?

Not really news, but rather just a reminder that many members of Donald Trump's campaign staff are really, really racist!

Source

Courtesy of Time: 

Donald Trump’s paid campaign staffers have declared on their personal social media accounts that Muslims are unfit to be U.S. citizens, mocked how Mexicans talk, called for Secretary of State John Kerry to be hanged and stated their readiness for a possible civil war, according to a review by The Associated Press of their postings. 

The AP examined the social media feeds of more than 50 current and former campaign employees who helped propel Trump through the primary elections. The campaign has employed a mix of veteran political operatives and outsiders. Most come across as dedicated, enthusiastic partisans, but at least seven expressed views that were overtly racially charged, supportive of violent actions or broadly hostile to Muslims. 

A graphic designer for Trump’s advance team approvingly posted video of a black man eating fried chicken and criticizing fellow blacks for ignorance, irresponsibility and having too many children. A Trump field organizer in Virginia declared that Muslims were seeking to impose Sharia law in America and that “those who understand Islam for what it is are gearing up for the fight.” 

This article comes out at the same time that Mother Jones is reporting how Trump's new campaign chief created a haven for White nationalists over at Breitbart, and  on the heels of Rachel Maddow's report last night on essentially the same topic.

Yes I know this should not be terribly surprising considering these people are working for a candidate who launched his campaign by accusing Mexicans of being rapists.

But I thought he was supposed to pivoting.

Remember this?

Donald Trump to African-Americans: "What do you have to lose?" https://t.co/3tKdAJzqei https://t.co/a31oCRJjhz

— The Situation Room (@CNNSitRoom) August 19, 2016

Silly me for not realizing that he was pivoting toward being MORE racist.

CNN staffers in revolt over hiring of Donald Trump's former campaign manager.

Courtesy of Market Watch:  

Sources told Page Six on Friday that CNN’s “facing a near internal revolt” over Jeff Zucker’s hiring of Lewandowski as an exclusive commentator for the news network days after he was fired as Donald Trump’s campaign manager. 

“CNN is facing a near internal revolt over the Corey hiring,” said a TV insider, who described many in the newsroom as “livid.” “Female reporters and producers especially . . . They are organizing and considering publicly demanding” that Lewandowski be let go. 

The Post reported on Monday that the Donald’s daughter Ivanka gave her dad an ultimatum to cut Corey loose after she was distressed by news he’d grabbed reporter Michelle Fields by the arm at a Florida event, and by a Page Six report that he recently got into a shouting match on a Midtown street with campaign spokeswoman Hope Hicks. 

At CNN, the hiring of the former Trump campaign manager on Thursday didn’t only alienate women on staff. A source further said that “Latinos and others in the newsroom feel betrayed by an homage to Trump,” so “they may do a public letter” objecting to the move.

Good job CNN!

Now not only have you irreparably damaged your journalistic credibility, but you have also caused internal strife among your own people.

And the thing is the guy is still honoring a confidentiality agreement with his old boss, so what good is he anyhow?

The campaign of Tea Party favorite Ben Carson is apparently self destructing.

Courtesy of the Washington Post:  

The presidential candidacy of Ben Carson, a tea party star who has catapulted into the top tier of Republican contenders, has been rocked by turmoil with the departures of four senior campaign officials and widespread disarray among his allied super PACs. 

In interviews Friday, Carson’s associates described a political network in tumult, saying the retired neurosurgeon’s campaign chairman, national finance chairman, deputy campaign manager and general counsel have resigned since Carson formally launched his bid last month in Detroit. They have not been replaced, campaign aides said. 

The moves gutted the core of Carson’s apparatus and left the 63-year-old first-time candidate with only a handful of experienced advisers at his side as he navigates the fluid, crowded and high-stakes contest for the Republican nomination. 

Carson is a hot commodity on the right-wing speaking circuit and has fast become a leading candidate, winning straw votes at conservative gatherings and rising in public polls. 

But his campaign has been marked by signs of dysfunction and amateurism, alarming supporters who privately worry that Carson’s sprawling circle of boosters is fumbling his opportunity. And, they argue, the candidate has been nonchalant about the unrest.

I have little doubt that Carson will find more political leaches ready and willing to climb onto his campaign to nowhere, but I think the fact that this thing is ultimately going to crash on the rocks is already a foregone conclusion.

In fact my anticipation of Carson's self immolation during the first handful of debates is right up there with my anticipation of the new Jurassic World movie opening this week.

My only question is will he be the first to spontaneously combust or will he be preceded by the likes of Ted Cruz, Carly Fiorina, or Rick Perry?

All I know is that this is going to be some of the most entertaining television since Breaking Bad went off the air.

Former campaign staffer: “I’d rather go to Iraq than work for Carly Fiorina again.”

Courtesy of Business Insider: 

Twelve of about 30 people who worked on Fiorina’s failed 2010 California Senate campaign, most speaking out for the first time, told Reuters they would not work for her again. Fiorina, once one of America's most powerful businesswomen, is now campaigning for the Republican nomination in 2016. 

The reason: For more than four years, Fiorina — who has an estimated net worth of up to $120 million — didn’t pay them, a review of Federal Election Commission records shows. 

On the campaign trail, the former Hewlett-Packard CEO has portrayed herself as a battle-hardened business leader who possesses the best financial skills among fellow Republican presidential hopefuls. But some former staffers on her Senate campaign are now raising questions about that portrayal. 

Federal campaign filings show that, until a few months before Fiorina announced her presidential bid on May 4, she still owed staffers, consultants, strategists, legal experts, and vendors nearly half a million dollars. 

FEC records show, for example, that her former campaign manager Martin Wilson was owed $80,500; legal counsel Ben Ginsberg $60,000, and the widow of California political adviser Joe Shumate, who died during the final month of the campaign, at least $30,000. 

Yes this is exactly who we want running the country. A person who treats their staffers like indentured servants and does not pay their debts.

Not like she has a snowball's chance in Hades of being the nominee anyhow of course.

However the Republicans need to keep her in the race, because she has a vajayjay. And if they don't have at least one candidate with a vajayjay, and at least one candidate who is not blindingly white, they will get accused of being both sexist and racist.

Which of course they are, but they hate when people point that out.

So if for reasons like this Fiorina drops out of the race, before it even gets started, the Republicans will be forced to pull another potential presidential candidate with similar plumbing out of mothballs.

So somebody should probably start dusting Michele Bachmann and Sarah Palin off, because they might soon be on deck.