Thursday, June 25, 2020

Why The CIA's Best Really Have Little Use For "Mogul" - aka Trump

Central Intelligence Agency Hat or Lapel Pin


"Trump's claims of 'no collusion' are hogwash. Trump  clearly has become  more desperate to protect himself and those close to him which is why he made the politically motivated decision to revoke my security clearance....I've seen this type of behavior on the part of foreign tyrants and despots. I just never ever thought I'd see it in the United States. " Former CIA Director  John Brennan,  Aug. 14, 2018 on 'All In'

Watching John Bolton's recent interviews with Martha Radditz and Nora O'Donnell, where he refers to Trump as "a threat to the Republic"- I had to wonder which cave he just crawled out from . I mean, good grief, that's been known at least since 2017 with Yale psychiatrist Bandy X. Lee's terminal takedown of this walking refuse in her book, 'The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump'.   Therein she refers to him as:

 "A disruptive personality and a peril to our collective security each day he remains in office. "    

 That has proven prescient as we've beheld his subversive and even traitorous behavior ever since, including:  his siding with  top former KGB chief Putin on numerous fronts (against his own intel agencies), getting Barr in as his personal AG to work from the inside to take down the Mueller investigators and release co-conspirators (e.g. Roger Stone, Michael Flynn),  trying to use foreign powers to take down his political opponents,  like Joe Biden, and incessantly smearing and disparaging his own intelligence chiefs as well as their briefings.  None of this behavior can remotely be regarded as normal for a U.S. president - but it certainly is normal for a Manchurian candidate or enemy mole - catapulted into power with assistance from Russian assets and influence, i.e. in the 2016 election.


Tony Schwarz,  the ghost writer who wrote  'The Art of the Deal' for him, had this to say (p. 73, ibid.):

"His amygdala is repeatedly triggered...and his prefrontal cortex - the part of the brain that makes us capable of rationality and reflection - shuts down. He reacts rather than reflects - and damn the consequences.  This is what makes his access to the nuclear codes so dangerous and frightening."


This is not exaggeration and who can forget the infamous Helsinki meet with Putin where Trump agreed with him that U.S. agents and assets could rightfully be sent to Moscow for interrogation by the GRU, if the U.S. were to question Russian assets here.  Prompting this accurate depiction:

Max Boot, writing in the July 25, 2018 WaPo also noted:

Trump is willing, under duress, to briefly and begrudgingly admit that Russian “meddling” took place in 2016 before reverting to calling it a “big hoax.” But he always maintains that the plot against America had no impact; he describes it as a “Democrat excuse for losing the ’16 Election.”

Here is the intelligence community’s assessmentpartially declassified in January 2017: “We did not make an assessment of the impact that Russian activities had on the outcome of the 2016 election. The US Intelligence Community is charged with monitoring and assessing the intentions, capabilities, and actions of foreign actors; it does not analyze US political processes or US public opinion.” When then-CIA Director Mike Pompeo claimed last fall that “the intelligence community's assessment is that the Russian meddling that took place did not affect the outcome of the election,” his own agency rebuked him.

This brings us to today, and there is no question Trump is a walking, disruptive debacle and massive national security threat.  As I pulled out an extensive Denver Post piece from May 24 I was reminded why this mutt ("Mogul" is his Secret Service monicker) can't possibly be held in very high regard by the CIA.  Below are some of the things they've learned about him since - bearing in mind all his other transgressions with Putin, Kim Jong Un and others, as well as his traitorous lackeys like Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort et al.

- By the time of the Jan. 23 intelligence briefing, officials were already alarmed by the signs of a crisis in China where the virus first broke. But Trump balked at further measures - other than a travel ban - and the U.S. "lost its chance to more effectively mitigate the virus in the following weeks."

- Agency mainstays found Trump was "particularly difficult to brief on critical national security matters".  He lacked the interest or the attention span, as Bolton also noted in his interviews (Trump barely read one briefing per week and that had to be cartoon-ized). 

Repeatedly during the most critical briefings, such as after N. Korea missile tests, Trump would "veer off on tangents and getting him back on topic proved extremely difficult".  In addition, in the midst of critical agency points Trump "was unashamed to interrupt intel officers".  Instead he would "riff about gossip he heard from former casino magnate Steve Wynn, retired golfer Gary Player, or Christopher Ruddy, the conservative media executive."

- Agency officials found that Trump "rarely absorbed information that he disagreed with, or that ran counter to his world view."  Hence putting his ignorance and stupidity above the national security interest.  As one official put it:  "Briefing him was so great a challenge compared with his predecessors that the intelligence agencies had to hire outside consultants to study how better to present information to him."   (Many suggested cartoons, but that wasn't on and no one seriously considered it.  There was a limit to how low the information conveyance mechanism could be.)

- "Working to keep Trump's interest exhausted and burned out his first briefer, Ted Gistaro.  Gistaro didn't always know what to expect and would sometimes be forced to brief an erratic and angry president upset over news reports."

- Some Agency mainstays and vets believe "Mogul" is beyond redemption - a lost cause.   They recall and cite his "yearslong attack on the intelligence agencies" and in particular how he "publicly belittled his intelligence chiefs last year after a congressional hearing where they offered assessments at odds with the White House.".  "Mogul" was so infuriated at the evident contradiction that he roared the intel chiefs "should all go back to school". 

- During typical 30-50 minute briefings Mogul's most commonly used diversion was to ask the intel officials: "How do you know?"    At each point,  despite the extensive background info (which Trump never read) he chose to counter with his own deformed and erratic statistics.  Trying to steer him toward the proper and tested stats was akin to trying to teach a brain defective monkey to eat a proper banana instead of one full of fungus.    Worse, "any time the intel chiefs directly challenged Mogul and his bogus stats eroded his trust further and he stopped listening".

What we have here is a cumulative assay of betrayal, incompetence and wreckage on a national scale and driven by the putative "leader" of the nation. A mentally deranged buffoon and plausible puppet for an enemy state who - as Bolton noted in his book and interviews - consistently puts himself at the center of action, decision and response - never the nation.  In this sense he has betrayed his oath to the Constitution and is little more than a traitor, irrespective of his clownish reactions to intelligence briefings - which themselves show he needs to resign forthwith.  As WSJ columnist Peggy Noonan wrote in her recent (June 6-7, p. A13) piece:

"This will not end well. With his timing he'd know it. He should give an Oval Office address announcing he's leaving: 'America, you don't deserve me'. "


Joseph Maguire, former acting director of national intelligence (according to the Post piece) "told briefers they need to understand Trump honed his style on reality television".

Maybe. But even a nominally sane and intelligent person - especially one who had been elected president- should grasp that nuclear codes, warheads, cruise missiles and dealing with monster hurricanes and pandemics are not the fluff of reality TV.  Hence, the sane and intelligent person adapts to the new situation, especially given he took a freaking oath to defend the people and the country - from all enemies foreign and domestic. That 'Mogul"  hasn't processed that and needs people like Maguire to make excuses for him, shows how unfit he is to lead this nation.    This is especially given (ibid.):


"The briefer - always a top CIA analyst- delivers the latest secrets and best insights from the 17 intelligence agencies - and are based on the President's Daily Brief - the crown jewel of intelligence reports."


Can we now say these top class briefings- delivered to "Mogul"  - are the equivalent of casting precious pearls before an ornery swine? Yes, I believe we can. And a traitor to boot.  After more than 11 major takes (in assorted books) on "Mogul" as an unfit, reckless, willing pawn for our domestic enemies - no more is needed.  

We don't need another repeat of Bolton's (or Comey's, or Bandy X.Lee's, or Bob Woodward's, or 'ANONYMOUS et al) books to re-confirm what we already know:  the bloated, orange maggot is a threat to this nation and needs to be removed from office ASAP.   As Janice put it: "He shouldn't even get an extra two and a half months to wreak havoc after the November 3rd general election."

Indeed, we really need him gone now, but can only hope our democratic system (especially preserving the integrity of the vote) has sufficient resilience to withstand his coming attacks until November!  

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by Jaime O'Neill | June 25, 2020 - 7:57am | permalink

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