I hadn’t actually looked at the three tweet LGBT/military “executive order” on the current occupant’s twitter feed yesterday morning. Then, Mrs. Left pointed out to me that the language in the tweets didn’t sound like the usual unhinged ranting of the nominal tweeter in chief. When I checked them out myself, I agreed.
Aside: No wonder the top military brass freaked out, wondering who we’d be attacking next, during the long nine minutes between the first and second tweet. But the bigger question is who the hell’s lame-brained idea was it to put these words out into the World.
I sifted through the intertubes a bit, learning that there’s only been a smattering of examination of the question of who writes the President’s tweets, focusing on the available metadata. Actually asking the White House to tell us is a fool’s errant, of course, since no one there ever answers a straight question, and, when any of them does speak, they are lying. The published speculation has focused mostly on a bifurcated tweet stream, with one feed, a calm, collected @realDonaldTrump, blasting out routine announcements during normal business hours, focused on the White House equivalent of Post Office namings, using mostly an iPhone. Things like —
These tweets are less likely to use words like bad, crazy, crooked, etc. and more likely to include links and graphics. Meanwhile, in the early morning and late evenings, someone else, presumably the real, realDonaldTrump, usually using an Android phone, tweets more wildly expressed, inflammatory sentiments and disrupting distractions.
But a more important issue may be the question of who formulates the sentiments of the weird, inflammatory and disruptive tweets that are the epitomizing, mad voice of the Trump Administration, the tweets like those emanating from the aforesaid Android phone at odd hours. In this case, I find considerable circumstantial evidence that the words, in the unhinged LGBT/military tweets, actually belong to Steve Bannon.
First comes the evidence that Bannon “masterminded” Trump’s first controversial ban, the infamous Muslim Ban. Mr. Bannon likes banning. Why should Bannon like, any less, another poorly thought through, disruptive, unconstitutional and unenforceable ban.
Second, inciting hate and violence against LGBT people has helped to emblemize Mr. Bannon’s public career. Consider these alarming sentiments in the Washington Blade remarking on Bannon’s appointment to the West Wing by Donald Trump.
Cathy Renna, a lesbian New York-based public affairs specialist, said Trump’s selection of Bannon means “he’s gone from wearing a white hood to going into the White House, and I think that’s incredibly troubling for so many people.”
“I honestly think that this is a time where if you’re looking at someone like Bannon, we’re looking at someone who really targets so many different marginalized communities and minority populations and folks who have served as a target of discrimination and hate in this country, and what he does is he simply throws gasoline on the fire,” Renna said.
Led by gay Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.), a group of 169 U.S. House Democrats sent a letter to Trump on Wednesday calling on him to remove Bannon as chief strategist on the basis the selection undermines national unity.
Third, given the mobster-like atmosphere at work in what passes for chain of command in today’s White House, it could be that Mr. Bannon felt that Trump owed him something for having brought in Anthony Scramucci after Bannon had told the Mooch that he would get the White House job over Bannon’s, nevertheless, still alive “dead body”. Bannon, who could never be mistaken for the shy and retiring type, might not have hesitated to go to the boss asking a favor to make up for being “disrespected”. Bannon, who could never be mistaken for an honest and truthful person, might not hesitate to tell the boss that Bannon had heard from generals and military experts that a sudden, unexpected LGBT ban was just what our armed forces need. You know, to save money on icky medical stuff.
Fourth, there is no detectable reporting of any further dissent or particular backstabbing by Bannon since Anthony Scaramucci threw his sinister shadow over the West Wing. Has Bannon been somehow pacified about the matter?
I was a trial lawyer for 37 years before I retired. In my world, often, one piece of evidence was a curiosity; two pieces, a coincidence. Three pieces of evidence was a case made and four was a slam dunk. Hence, I conclude that Steve Bannon is probably the movant behind Trump’s ridiculous and despicable LGBT tweets.