The Commentariat -- Nov. 18, 2018
Afternoon Update:
Felicia Sonmez of the Washington Post: "President Trump said he would not overrule his acting attorney general, Matthew G. Whitaker, if he decides to curtail the special counsel probe being led by Robert S. Mueller III into Russian interference in the 2016 election campaign. 'Look, it's going to be up to him ... I would not get involved,' Trump said in an interview on 'Fox News Sunday.'... Trump also essentially shut the door to sitting down with Mueller, telling host Chris Wallace that his written answers mean 'probably this is the end' of his involvement in the probe into Russian interference in the 2016 campaign. 'I think we've wasted enough time on this witch hunt and the answer is probably: We're finished,' Trump said. He said that he had given 'very complete answers to a lot of questions' and that 'that should solve the problem.'"
Deb Riechmann & Jonathan Lemire of the AP: "... Donald Trump said there is no reason for him to listen to a recording of the 'very violent, very vicious' killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, which has put him in a diplomatic bind: how to admonish Riyadh for the slaying yet maintain strong ties with a close ally. Trump, in an interview that aired Sunday, made clear that the audio recording, supplied by the Turkish government, would not affect his response to the Oct. 2 killing of Khashoggi.... Trump noted to 'Fox News Sunday' that the crown prince has repeatedly denied being involved in the killing inside the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul. 'Will anybody really know?' Trump asked. 'At the same time, we do have an ally, and I want to stick with an ally that in many ways has been very good.'"
*****
Trump Favors "Great Climate." Ben Poston, et al., of the Los Angeles Times: "Viewing the destruction of a wildfire that has killed more than 70 people, with 1,000 others still unaccounted for, President Trump vowed Saturday to help California recover from the devastation and work to prevent future catastrophic blazes. Trump toured the rubble of Paradise, where more than 10,000 structures were lost, with Gov. Jerry Brown and Gov.-elect Gavin Newsom. Trump said he was stunned by the level of destruction.... Though Trump and Brown have strong political differences, they struck a chord of unity. Trump praised the state's first responders and said he had productive discussions with Brown and Newsom. The president also avoided his criticism of California's fire and forest management that sparked controversy last weekend, even suggesting there was common ground on how to proceed. 'We do have to do management, maintenance. We'll be working also with environmental groups,' Trump said. 'I think everybody's seen the light. We're all on the same page now. Everybody's looking at that. It's going to work out well,' he added. Asked about whether his views on climate change had shifted, the president said no: 'I have a strong opinion; I want great climate.'... The president arrived in Southern California on Saturday afternoon for a similar tour of devastated areas in and around Malibu and Thousand Oaks." ...
... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: Luckily I was sitting down when I heard Trump say he would be "working with environmental groups." Dropped my jaw, though. ...
... You Can't Teach an Old Dimwit New Tricks. Thomas Fuller of the New York Times: "Mr. Trump repeated his view on Saturday that forest management -- the partial clearing and cleaning of brush from forests -- was partly to blame for the string of immense and deadly wildfires in recent years.... Experts said the president was wrong to point to forest management -- many wildfires in California, including the Woolsey Fire in the south, have started in shrub land, not forests. They also point out that forest management in California is largely a federal responsibility; around 60 percent of the 33 million acres of forests in the state is owned by the federal government. ...
... See also safari's commentary at the top of today's thread. As he points out, the difference in "civility" between the two parties' cheerleaders is profound. Safari reminds me that last week, in a sickening op-ed in the Richmond (Kentucky) Register, Mitch McConnell warned House Democrats they had best not "go it alone," but should be all bipartisany and also can the investigations (otherwise known as a Constitutionally-prescribed oversight duty). This is the same Scorched-Earth Mitch who vowed never to give President Obama a win, who refused to give Obama's Supreme Court nominee a hearing, then eliminated the 60-vote threshold in bringing up Trump's Supreme nominees for a vote, & has again & again thrwarted Democrats' and even bipartisan efforts to bring other legislation to the Senate floor. We have not just a two-party system but also a double-standard system.
Trump Says December "Is a Very Good Time" for a Government Shutdown. David Lynch of the Washington Post: "President Trump suggested Saturday he was prepared to shut down the federal government next month if Congress fails to give him the money he wants to build a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico. 'If I was ever going to do a shutdown over border security -- when you look at the caravan, when you look at the mess, when you look at the people coming in,' the president said.'... This would be a very good time to do a shutdown.' The president has asked lawmakers for $5 billion for new wall construction in fiscal 2019, but Democrats oppose the project, and a bipartisan Senate compromise earlier this year included just $1.6 billion for it."
Shane Harris & Josh Dawsey of the Washington Post: "President Trump on Saturday spoke with CIA Director Gina Haspel, who briefed him on the agency's finding that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. The Washington Post first reported Friday that the CIA had assessed with high confidence the Saudi leader's role, based on multiple sources of intelligence. But the president had already been shown evidence of the prince's alleged involvement in the killing, and privately he remains skeptical, Trump aides said. He has also looked for ways to avoid pinning the blame on Mohammed, the aides said. Trump spoke with Haspel and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo during his flight to California to tour areas damaged by the wildfires, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders told reporters aboard Air Force One.... Within the White House, there has been little doubt that Mohammed was behind the killing." ...
... Mark Mazzetti & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "On Saturday morning, President Trump demurred about whether he would publicly hold the [Saudi] crown prince responsible for the death of [Jamal] Khashoggi.... He said he had not yet been shown a C.I.A. assessment that Prince Mohammed had ordered the assassination and expected to be briefed later in the day. 'As of this moment, we were told that he did not play a role,' Mr. Trump said of the crown prince as he spoke to reporters outside the White House before heading to California.... But when Mr. Trump spoke to reporters from Malibu, Calif., hours later, he insisted that the C.I.A. had not 'assessed anything yet. It's too early.' He said there would be a report on Tuesday that would address what 'we think the overall impact was and who caused it, and who did it.'... A top White House official responsible for American policy toward Saudi Arabia resigned on Friday evening, a move that may suggest fractures inside the Trump administration over the response to the brutal killing of the dissident Jamal Khashoggi. The official, Kirsten Fontenrose, had pushed for tough measures against the Saudi government.... The exact circumstances of her departure are murky." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: The WashPo & NYT stories, read together, make clear that the Trumpster is lying about what Haspel told him about Mohammed's culpability. ...
... Juan Cole: "It seems obvious that CIA direct Gina Haspel is attempting to sabotage the bromance between, on the one hand, Bin Salman, and on the other, Trump and his son-in-law Jared Kushner.... It is not entirely clear to me why the CIA has it in for Prince Mohammed. The agency usually does what the president tells it to do and seldom has had independent policies like this one. In the past, it has often valued authoritarian allies over principles such as human rights or democracy. But the reason could be as simple as an assessment by agency analysts that Bin Salman is such a loose canon that he is damaging US interests in the region.... Khashoggi was a US resident,had two American-born children who are US citizens, and worked during the past year as a columnist for the Washington Post. If he can be murdered with impunity, anyone can be." --s ...
... Chris Rodrigo of the Hill: "President Trump on Saturday rejected reports that his administration is considering extraditing a foe of Turkish President Tayyip ;Erdoğan.... NBC News reported Thursday said that the Trump White House had directed the Department of Justice (DOJ) and FBI to reexamine a request from Turkey to extradite [Fethullah] Gülen.... Trump's comments on Gülen echoed those of other administration officials since the release of NBC's report." Mrs. McC: Maybe the NBC report was the result of an administration trial balloon that popped. (Also linked yesterday.)
This Russia Thing, Ctd.
Betsy Woodruff of The Daily Beast: "Robert Mueller has unanswered questions for a long-time associate of Roger Stone's. Randy Credico, a lefty comedian and activist who has known Stone for decades, testified before Mueller's grand jury in September.... Attorney Marty Stolar confirmed to The Daily Beast that [Credico] ... will speak withMueller in the future. Stolar said Credico has already met with the Special Counsel's team 'a number of times.' Credico's next interview with Mueller's investigators is expected to come after Thanksgiving -- a sign the Special Counsel's investigation of Stone will not conclude in the immediate future." --s
Frank Rich: "It has belatedly dawned on [Donald Trump] that (a) he lost the election he thought he won; (b) the Robert Mueller investigation has moved faster than his efforts to thwart it; (c) any of his legislative fantasies, notably the funding of his border wall, are doomed; and (d) and his pouting in Paris elevated his international image as a buffoon to a whole new level of notoriety.... That all this makes Trump panic at some gut level is visible not merely in his widely reported spells of rage and bitterness and in his increasingly empty official schedule. He is also stepping up his already impressive efforts to discredit and destroy those democratic institutions that might prevent him from escaping criminal jeopardy. And so he has returned to ridiculing ... the electoral process, by declaring elections that don't go his way a fraud; he has escalated his assault on a free press by barring a CNN reporter...; and, last but not least, he has appointed an acting attorney general, Matthew Whitaker, who has ridiculed the judicial system, been on the board of a fly-by-night company that practiced Trump University-style consumer frauds, and publicly attacked the Mueller probe in Trump's own language.... This is bunker behavior." (Also see Rich's commentary in the post on Chuck Schumer, Facebook & First Lady Melanie.)
Matt Naham of Law & Crime: "Inquiring minds want to know what acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker (or the Department of Justice) is hiding when it comes to his financial disclosure form. American Oversight, a non-partisan, nonprofit ethics watchdog..., sent a letter on Friday to Office of Government Ethics 'regarding DOJ's failure to share acting Attorney General Whitaker financial disclosures with the public.'... Whitaker, who was appointed as former Attorney General Jeff Sessions chief of staff, would have been required to file a public financial disclosure form months ago.... Former director of the United States Office of Government Ethics Walter Shaub [wrote on Twitter,] 'This is an outrage.' 'DOJ's refusing to release Whitaker's financial disclosure form is illegal, unheard of and highly suspicious. What is DOJ hiding?' Shaub asked. 'Bear in mind that DOJ is legally required to release these reports no later than 30 days after their filing....'" ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: As we know, Whitaker's financial forms -- if he's filled them out -- could be ... interesting. ...
... Maureen Dowd: "The big banks are bigger than ever and prosecution of white-collar crimes is at a 20-year low. And, cherry on the gilded cake, we put white-collar criminals in charge of the country -- elevating epic grifters to the presidency and powerful cabinet posts. Reading all the recent stories about the 10th anniversary of the financial crisis, it's easy to see the neon line leading from Barack Obama's failure to punish Wall Street scammers to the fact that Republican scammers are now infecting the entire infrastructure of government.... Donald Trump scooped up 'the forgotten,' promising to punish Wall Street for 'getting away with murder,' and pledging to break up the big banks and force bankers to pay higher taxes. But it was just another Trump con.... If you thought Trump's flimflam about his namesake university was bad, if you cringe that Commerce and Interior are run by men accused of grifting, check out our acting attorney general.... Like his new boss, Matthew Whitaker has a pattern of thuggishness, threats, scams and abusing the power of his office to wage partisan feuds.&"
Jane Mayer of the New Yorker: "For two years, observers have speculated that the June, 2016, Brexit campaign in the U.K. served as a petri dish for Donald Trump's Presidential campaign in the United States. Now there is new evidence that it did. Newly surfaced e-mails show that the former Trump adviser Steve Bannon, and Cambridge Analytica, the Big Data company that he worked for at the time, were simultaneously incubating both nationalist political movements in 2015.... The possibility that both Brexit and the Trump campaign simultaneously relied upon the same social-media company and its transgressive tactics, as well as some of the same advisers, to further far-right nationalist campaigns, set off alarm bells on both sides of the Atlantic.... The American investigations into foreign interference in Trump's election, and British probes into Brexit, have increasingly become interwoven."
Election 2018
Conservative "Thought". Addy Bairdof ThinkProgress: "Newt Gingrich blamed GOP losses in California, New Jersey, and New York on unions, during an interview with Fox News' Laura Ingraham.... 'I think we have to face the reality that in the largest state in the country, California, and the fourth largest state in the country, New York, the size of the union-based machines are now so enormous that we don't frankly know how to compete with them,' Gingrich said. ... Ingraham offered her own explanation for the Republican wipeout. 'There's mass immigration that's changed California, no doubt about it,' she said. And in many races, there's no Republican running at all. They're just basically two Democrats running against each other.'.... Ingraham's declaration that 'mass immigration' and no Republican in the race in California at all is simply untrue. In Orange County, traditionally a Republican stronghold in the Golden State, there was a Republican in every congressional race, and nearly every single one has lost.... The area, birthplace of Ronald Reagan conservatism, is not known particularly as a union stronghold." --s ...
... California. The Left Coast. Adam Nagourney of the New York Times: "California Democrats completed their sweep of the congressional delegation in Orange County on Saturday as Gil Cisneros defeated Young Kim, a Republican, to capture a fourth seat in what had once been one of the most conservative Republican bastions in the nation. The victory by Mr. Cisneros, a philanthropist, was declared by The Associated Press. It completes what has amounted to a Democratic rout in California this year.... With Mr. Cisneros's victory, Democrats now control all four House seats in Orange County.... The party also won supermajorities in the California Assembly and Senate, while the party's candidate for governor -- Gavin Newsom, the lieutenant governor -- easily turned back a Republican challenge. Democrats control every statewide elected position in California."
Florida. Elizabeth Koh of the Miami Herald: "Democratic nominee Andrew Gillum, for the second time, conceded the race for Florida governor to Republican Ron DeSantis on Saturday, three days after a statewide machine recount indicated DeSantis retained his winning lead and as contentious recounts in two other statewide races draw to a close. 'We said we would fight until the last vote is counted,' said Gillum with his wife R. Jai in a video livestreamed on Facebook Saturday afternoon.... Gillum had conceded on Election Night to DeSantis when it appeared the Republican former congressman had won by a narrow, if insurmountable, margin. But after that margin further narrowed in the days after the midterms to within a half of a percentage point, and a statewide machine recount was triggered, Gillum held a brief press conference last weekend in which he withdrew his concession and called for counties to 'count every vote.'"
Mississippi. Matt Viser of the Washington Post: "A U.S. Senate runoff that was supposed to provide an easy Republican win has turned into an unexpectedly competitive contest, driving Republicans and Democrats to pour in resources and prompting a planned visit by President Trump to boost his party's faltering candidate.... [Democrat Mike] Espy remains the underdog in the conservative state, but Republicans with access to private polling say [Sen. Cindy] Hyde-Smith's lead has narrowed significantly in recent days." ...
... The Gentlelady from Mississippi. Ashton Pittman of the Jackson Free Press: "U.S. Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith accepted a donation from Peter [Z]ieve, a businessman in Washington state known for his white supremacist views, just days after a video published by Bayou Brief surfaced in which she says she would be 'on the frontrow' if a supporter invited her to 'a public hanging' '#Zieve donated $2,700, the max donation an individual can make, to Hyde-Smith's campaign on Nov. 14. Progressive newsletter Popular Info first reported the donation.... Zieve donated over $1 million to Donald Trump in 2016." Mrs. McC: Hyde-Smith's campaign did not say whether or not it would return Zieve's donation. Trump evidently kept the money. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
It's Still the Economy, Stupid. The Denizens of Trumpland Are Not Doing "So Much Winning." Anthony Orlando in the Washington Post: "Consider the stark differences in basic measures of local economic performance -- employment and housing prices -- between counties where the majority of votes were cast for Donald Trump and counties where the majority voted for Hillary Clinton. The average Clinton county employs seven to eight times as many workers as the average Trump county, with nearly double the market value per single-family home. In part, this difference reflects the higher population density of the urban areas, which voted disproportionately for Clinton. But as my analysis shows, it has been growing over time, as the Clinton counties outperform their Trump counterparts.... The larger the Trump electorate and the larger the degree of Trump support, the worse the county's economic performance." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: While Orlando acknowledges that two years do not a trend make, his research does provide a tentative explanation of why Trump's "booming economy" did not register with voters when GOP candidates initially tried to make it their top campaign talking point. If a politician is boasting to you about how great the economy is doing under his party's leadership, you'll only feel worse if you yourself are still having trouble making ends meet. All the perplexed punditry about why voters didn't care about the economy was off-base; voters do care about the economy, but it's their own personal economy they care about.
"Capitalism is Awesome, Ctd." Addy Baird: "Pharmaceutical company Pfizer will raise prices on 10 percent of its prescription drugs in January, ending a brief period in which the company halted price increases in an effort to appease ... Donald Trump. The Wall Street Journal first reported the Pfizer news Friday.... Trump negotiated a price freeze with Pfizer CEO Ian Read in July of this year.... The price halt -- and its quick end -- comes after Pfizer reaped major rewards from the Republican tax cut passed last year.... Pfizer predicted that the company would receive a tax cut of over $1 billion in 2018 alone and that it would pay a tax rate of just 17 percent.... Pfizer did announce a plan to share the tax savings with employees, but only as a one-time bonus, not a wage increase, nor did they use the savings to create more jobs." --safari: Tired of winning yet? ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Maybe we should mention here that Pfizer gave $1MM to Trump's inauguration committee. And of course that doesn't count what-all Pfizer gave to all campaigns. The company can do what it wants. Pfizer's lobbying and its policies & pricing together provide a sterling example of what's wrong with the marriage between business & politics.
Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Addy Baird: "Sebastian Gorka, the former Trump aide with ties to a Hungarian Nazi party, is hosting a new must-run show for Sinclair about the 'dangers' of socialism.... According to Media Matters, the first installment of the series focuses on democratic socialists who have been elected in the United States, including Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), and Virginia state delegate Lee Carter, as well as socialist regimes throughout history that have gone wrong and grown violent." --s
Beyond the Beltway
Will Sommer of The Daily Beast: "Members of the far-right Proud Boys and their allies were vastly outnumbered by protesters at a rally [in Philadelphia] outside the National Constitution Center on Saturday, the group's first public appearance since New York police arrested some Proud Boys after a high-profile October brawl. Roughly two dozen people turned out for the 'We the People' rally.... Hundreds of protesters opposed the rally from across a police barricade, with chants and musical instruments that drowned out the conservative event." --s
Working While Black. Dannie Westneat of the Seattle Times: Bryron Ragland, a court-appointed visitation supervisor, was supervising a meeting between a mother & her son at a frozen yogurt store in Kirkland, Washington, a suburb of Seattle, where the mother had purchased ice cream for her son. His presence at the meeting was a legal requirement. Employees called the cops, who asked Ragland to leave. Ragland is black, and I guess everybody else in this story is white. So his skin made the employees uncomfortable. Mrs. McC: Guess what, white people. Our skin makes black people uncomfortable, but for good reason. Anyhow, if stop in at Menchie's, you'd better order the peachy-keen nonfat yogurt; ordering the pure chocolate is suspicious activity. The Kirkland cops need some remedial sensitivity training. Now.
Way Beyond
Joe Daniels of the Guardian: "A US navy hospital ship moored off Colombia has started giving free medical care to Venezuelan refugees, in a move likely to rile officials in Caracas who deny the existence of a humanitarian crisis in their own country -- and have long been suspicious of the close relationship between Colombia and the US." --s
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Reader Comments (8)
Trump's visit to California is another stark reminder of the differences between movement conservatives' "salt the earth", "burn the village to save it" strategy and the Democrats' playing the crucial role of upholding the mantle of civility and cordiality in politics.
Surely few people appreciate the Orange Ogre less than Jerry Brown. They have little to nothing in common and Trump has repeatedly berated Brown's governance in public, Brown responding in kind.
Beyond the tête-à-tête, never have we had so divisive a president* that he fanatically demeans and provokes the entire population of citizens that don't agree with his petty, race-baiting, short-minded shenanigans. If Republicans' lies were true about Democrats and liberals acting as "mobs", then Trump should've been met with screaming protests at every stop in California and the liberal pundit-o'-sphere should have been demanding Brown denounce Trump or at the very least not allow him to get any political points for showing up.
But alas, in a case of national tragedy and unprecedented destruction, Democrats and liberals alike put aside political differences and look to work together with a Republican president.
This natural catastrophe is the perfect example of the diametrically opposite ragegasm provoked by Faux News and hate-consumed conservatives when Obama was welcomed by Chris Christie in New Jersey after Hurricane Sandy. While Christie was cordial in welcoming Obama, conservative politicians and pundits alike were furious at the idea of humanizing Obama and showing him as a responsive President. They screeched at "handshakes" and even a "hug". The horrors!!
This article by Eli Saslow is on today's WaPo front page, print paper, below the fold. But it isn't easy to find on the electronic paper.
It is fascinating and pathetic at the same time. A guy in Maine blogs satirical fake stories (e.g. "Chelsea and Michelle give Trump the finger at WH event") every day. He labels his material as ALL FAKE. Thousands of people read his stuff and incorporate it into their belief-set, and share it as fact. The guy makes $ thousands a month on clicks, just making up stuff, but also says he started by hoping to educate people about critical thinking, credulity, etc.
The vastness of stupid in this country is revealed to be even vaster than I thought.
@Patrick: AAAaaagh!
@Patrick: If I knew how, I would forward the WaPo article to
our secretary of education. Looks like our schools need some
exercises in critical thinking. Or maybe just thinking. But guess
there's no money in that.
I rather like Bret Stephen's column today. He cites the tale from Plato's "Phaedrus" that he says is apposite into Facebook's dilemma.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/16/opinion/facebook-zuckerberg-investigation-election.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fopinion-columnists
Years ago on the PBS news the journalist Lindsey Hilsum was reporting from all over the world––there she was in Iraq, then in Iran, she seemed to pop up anywhere there was chaos in countries. She has resurfaced again in a long article she wrote for NYRB about Saudi Arabia, a Kingdom where journalists are more like praise-singers ( something Trump would dearly wish for) than in investigating anything. MBS is touted for his supposed opening up of such a closeted society, but here is what she reported about the lifting of the ban on women driving:
Less than six weeks before the lifting of the ban, a group of women's rights activists was arrested. Reporters had one hell of a time explaining why the women who had campaigned for twenty-eight years for this very same ban to be lifted were behind bars.
So––the wily prince came forward and said he wanted everyone to understand that women were being allowed to drive not because they had campaigned for it but because their rulers had issued a degree. The point was clear: civil disobedience will not bring results: changes will come ONLY from submission to a benign monarch who will decide what is best–-(so saith the Lord?).
Hilsum reports that European diplomats who want to see balance of power in the region, fear the combination of a young, ambitious crown prince and a belligerent US president* with no understanding of history or regional dynamics and a determination to crush the Islamic Republic of Iran.
No historical parallel is exact, Hilsum says, but the crown prince might want to study another royal ruler who tried to modernize a conservative Islamic country: the Shah of Iran. He, too, was backed by the West and supported by by a cosmopolitan urban middle class. He tried to to degree a change in people's way of thinking and became ever more repressive as he enforced his will. The Islamic Revolution that swept him away in 1979 was initially progressive, bringing together Communists and other leftist forces before they were crushed by the forces of Ayatollah Khomeini. And we are still living with this outcome, living with the large part we played in it.
Whether Trump understands any of this history appears not to have made a dent. He and his son-in-law will continue to play patty cake with MBS, provoke Iran, and deny or question that their cherished prince of perfumed pillows and soft shell crabs could be responsible for the murder of Khashoggi.
@PD Pepe: Thanks. I couldn't figure out why those women were jailed on the cusp of the potentates allowing women to drive, but what Hilsum writes makes sense (at least from the POV of MBS).
As for Trump, what he understands is short-term personal gain. As long as the Saudis keep spending money at Trump properties, they're his BFFs. (Well, make that BFs. If the bribes dry up, they're out.) Other considerations -- say, human rights -- be damned.
Here's a comment from BobinMinnesota on the Post article about Trump declining to overrule Whitaker. No links or sources provided. If this is all true, would like to see a piece connecting all these dots.
"Back in September 2017 Trump announced that he was nominating Jody Hunt, then Sessions chief of staff, to the position of AG in the Civil Division.
Before that nomination was announced, Leonard Leo, from the Federalist Society, recommended placing Whitaker in the position as chief of staff. This was shortly after Whitaker had appeared on CNN selling himself as a Trump loyalist.
Trump immediately removed Hunt from the position and placed Whitaker in as chief of staff. Trump had to find a “holding position” for Hunt because the he knew the Senate wouldn’t be able to confirm Hunt for another year (Oct. 2018).
So Hunt served one year as a Senior Advisor to the Office of Legal Policy until his confirmation in the AG Civil Division position.
This allowed Whitaker to serve the time needed to justify as a qualification for using the “Vacancies Act”.
There was no need to expedite Hunt out of his chief of staff position a year early unless Trump/Federalist Society had planned to move Whitaker after a year into Sessions’s AG position.
That also explains why Trump didn’t fire Sessions earlier."
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/11/18/trump-raking-wildfires-california-finland-1002526
Anyone foolish enough to talk to the Pretender runs a more than slight risk of having what he said gotten wrong.
But raking the National Forests sound like a good idea. Since the Forest Service's budget has been drastically cut and since most of what remains is devoted to fire fighting, maybe the Pretender plans to send the military, whose budget has been increased, armed with rakes...
.....once the new Democratic House has approved building the Wall, of course, and soldiers can be diverted from protecting us from brown people and assigned to other critical duties.