Look, we already knew that Donald Trump was a shitty human being. Anyone who paid any attention to him knew that his entire life was devoted to avarice and humiliation. He's garbage and has been for his entire selfish, pathetic time polluting the earth. And it was always obvious that he was a fucking idiot, an incurious dullard whose wealth gave him the illusion of wisdom because he was surrounded by people who pretended he was wise. I have never heard or read an interview with Trump where he said anything other than simple-minded statements, stupid jokes, and belligerent braggadocio.
So, except for the Steve Bannon shit, the New York magazine excerpt from Michael Wolff's upcoming book on the end of the Trump campaign and the beginning of the Trump presidency that reveals that Trump is a moron who didn't want to be president and who is desperate for any media attention isn't much of a revelation. It's pretty much just confirmation of what we all suspected, even if it turns out just a tenth of it is true. Oh, really? Trump's an erratic madman who has no business as president? Color us shocked.
More important is the New York Times editorial by Glenn R. Simpson and Peter Fritsch, the two former journalists who run the private research firm Fusion GPS, responsible for the dossier on Trump, funded by both Republicans and Democrats, put together by former British intelligence agent Christopher Steele. Sick of being attacked by Trump and his GOP congressional lackeys, Simpson and Fritsch lay out just how fucked up shit is.
Not only do they plainly state that Republicans on committees looking into Trump's ties to Russia are lying about Fusion GPS, but they clearly have no fucks left to give. In their telling, the Steele dossier is seen less as a sensationalistic fiction created to embarrass Trump with piss tales and more as a roadmap of our doom if we stay on our current path. It is not hyperbole to describe the entire Trump corporation as an elaborate money-laundering scheme for Russian oligarchs (and other criminals around the world). Even Ivanka Trump's diamond business is being investgated for money-laundering. It's all filthy.
This one line struck me like a wet slap in the face: "Mr. Steele saw this as a crime in progress and decided he needed to report it to the F.B.I." Steele had information from unpaid sources in Russia that the Kremlin was, in essence, working to get Trump elected.
I keep coming back to that idea, as I have ever since I first heard about the meeting between Donald Trump, Jr., Paul Manafort, Jared Kushner, and that Russian lawyer. If a foreign national tells you they have dirt on your political opponent, you go to the FBI. The very fact that they didn't says as much about the guilt of all these men as it does about their ease with dealing with Russian emissaries with skeevy motivations.
Which brings us back to the more interesting part of the Wolff book. An article in The Guardian reveals that Steve Bannon told Wolff that the Trump Tower meeting was "treasonous" and that Trump himself likely met with the Russian lawyer. The gist of what Bannon says is that Junior and the rest were so fucking dumb for having the meeting without their lawyers present, not that they should have gone to the FBI. In other words, they weren't evil enough for Bannon and now that has ended up biting them all on their asses.
So Bannon is either singing to Robert Mueller or will be soon. Cockroaches tend towards self-preservation. Trump's gotta know this, and that's what makes the end of another day of insane news just a little more insane. Because, see, Trump released a statement disavowing Bannon, who was once Trump's chief strategist and an equal with Chief of Staff Reince Priebus in the White House. "Steve was a staffer," Trump says, once again reducing a major player to another disposable worker bee. "Now that he is on his own, Steve is learning that winning isn’t as easy as I make it look," Trump continues by stroking himself vigorously, "Steve had very little to do with our historic victory." Bannon had used the Breitbart website to promote Trump as a viable candidate, but, sure, yeah, whatevs.
Of course, back in November 2016, shortly after the election, Trump was defending Bannon after hiring him to work in the White House. "I’ve known Steve Bannon a long time. If I thought he was a racist or alt-right, I wouldn’t even think about hiring him," Trump explained. Like I said, Trump's garbage, and he'll say or do whatever he needs to make himself look like he's in control, even if it's contradictory or even if it's just a goddamned lie.
Man, in prison, they're gonna love Trump talking about his electoral college victory.
