Am I the only person who thinks that this administration is a form of a real life sequel to The Hunger Games series of movies? Like “The Hunger Games — White House Version” where we are watching the “dailies” before all the footage gets edited into the final film. Bear with me. This President’s “management” style has always been to create chaos around himself, with powers and privileges granted to those who “survive” the “trials” he creates. Ok, so surviving is mostly to do with kissing his ass and reinforcing his delusion that he’s the greatest, most awesomest person who ever existed and that all humanity will spiral into oblivion when his Twitter feed eventually goes dark. You get the point. The thing is, this President is running his administration the way he ran his businesses — pit people against each other. If he’d bothered to pay attention at Wharton he’d have learned this is not the most efficient approach to management and more often than not leads to lost profits and even bankruptcy. But consider who we are talking about. Nuff said.
The Prez likes seeing everyone around him fighting, competing with each other for the “right” to be at his side. Or behind him kissing his ass, and thanking him for the “privilege” of getting to do so. That btw includes his own family. Ivana did her best but when those three became adults they moved into daddy’s world, so it’s no wonder that whatever good their mom tried to instill in them growing up has been wrung out of them. It’s no wonder they’re so fucked up. Those three are a modern day version of King Henry II (I’m thinking of A classic movie — The Lion In Winter) sons willing to do anything up to and including killing each other to ascend to the “throne.” And then there’s son-in-law Jared Kushner who probably has a food tester to make sure Uday & Qusay don’t poison him! Is it any wonder this administration has been populated with people (with an increasing number of GOP Congress Critters horning in on the action) who go to extraordinary lengths to please “his un-majesty” by devastating agencies, the traditional workings of the White House and every institutional norm to create a reality where anything and everything lives or dies on this President’s whims?
Think about the number of departures from this administration in what’s only been just over a year. it’s unprecedented. By a lot. “Bigly” even. Some have happened because some folks stepped back for long enough to get some perspective and realized that they were covered in shit and if they didn’t get out like NOW they (or their career at least) would turn into actual shit. Others left because they’d screwed up all by their little selves and were devoted enough to not want to embarrass the boss. At least not any more than they’d already done. Some were fired because they had embarrassed the boss and having them around would embarrass him even more. And some were fired (or resigned before getting fired) because someone else undercut them. Just as this President has always expected people to do — fight amongst themselves and against each other in some “survival of the fittest” type of freaking game.
It’s been one giant, toxic cesspool. In a real world bit of irony the very agency that’s supposed to clean up toxic waste has been being systematically and ruthlessly destroyed. Just like the Prez wanted to happen.
Anyway, infighting amongst his underlings is something the Prez has enjoyed his entire life. I believe one of the things that’s been so hard for him (as in hurting his little feelings) is that in his private sector (truly private — he had no Board of Directors to answer to because his company wasn’t a publicly traded one) it was fairly easy to deflect bad press/PR. In an environment as large and boisterous as his beloved New York City there have always been multiple scandals brewing and the news usually moves on quickly. Like so many New Yorkers before him he believe to the core of his being that NO spotlight was as bright as the one that shone on his hometown. Alas, he’s found out that he’s in a fishbowl larger and more heavily illuminated than he ever could have imagined. The glare in the White House spotlight makes NYC’s look like a flashlight in comparison.
He’s confronted with the fact that not all scandals go away, even when new ones (and he’s good at creating “shiny objects” of semi-scandal to distract folks) come along. Sometimes others latch on to something and won’t let go — even when he huffs and puffs and threatens to blow their house down if they don’t take his word for things, shut up and go away.
We are in such a moment now.
The reason I started this diary is because when I sat down to eat lunch I turned on the news. Alex Witt on MSNBC was reporting that just fired staffer Rob Porter was decidedly not going gently into that good night. He was pushing back on the White House narrative! In the past day or so P.O.S. Chief of Staff John Kelly has been weaving a tale of personal woe. In Kelly’s version of events he never, ever had any notion that Porter had beaten his ex-wives. At least until he was confronted with evidence (the black eye picture) forty minutes before firing Porter. Of course from the get-go everyone knows that wasn’t true. So it seems Kelly has started to weave a tale of Porter having told him his background check would include one or both ex-wives saying their marriage was “messy.”
Take a minute to gargle and wash down your throat. That gunk you almost spit up is nasty.
Back? So Kelly has been working like hell to convince everyone that he had no idea, none whatsoever that Porter had done what he’d done. And that when he did learn “the full story” he immediately took action and forty minutes later Portman was sent out the door with his stuff in one of those cardboard boxes. His attempt to convince senior aides at the White House and get them to convince the rank and file of this was met with a collective “Are you fucking kidding me? So Kelly went to work trying to write some new details in the margins of the page — that yes, okay so Porter did in fact tell me his ex-wives might tell the FBI their marriage had been less than idyllic. That things had been “messy.” Kelly gave interviews and the whole nine yards to try and sell this new and “improved” version of bullshit.
Alas, there was something he and his boss didn’t count on. The Prez, the big (orange) Cheese himself gave a glowing statement for the cameras about what a terrific guy Porter was. Hell, he even followed it up with a tweet about “poor Rob Porter like others had his life ruined by ‘mere’ accusations AND didn’t get any ‘due process’” I’m sure both Kelly and his boss figured that was that and by today the press and the country would move on. But Porter either didn’t get the memo or flat out ignored it because Kelly’s latest attempt to spin his own (Kelly’s) appalling handling of this situation rather pointedly got in the driver’s seat of the proverbial bus and ran back & forth over Porter. Kelly said Porter gave him a line of incomplete and outright misleading bullshit.
And Porter has decided to fight back.
Porter has decided to say that Kelly DID know what his ex-wives might tell the FBI. Oops.
Porter is going to (quite deservedly) lose in all this. However, he’s apparently decided that if John Kelly is going to make a special effort to grind him into dust then he’s going to take Kelly with him. Even if it means putting even more focus on the President’s own misdeeds.
Beware the man who has nothing left to lose.
This is a version of the Hunger Games where the White House is the arena. And the President is watching up close & personal (he’s got a phalanx of Secret Service Agents to protect him) and it’s easy to imagine him as the totally fucked up son of the fictional President Snow. Who was so fucked up that Snow wanted him hidden away in an arena of a make believe world where the fucked up son was awesome. An arena that was supposed to contain him for life — no way was that kid to ever get out and become President himself! But he did. And made a bargain to take over and become “real President” himself and set about getting even for having been tricked all those years.
it feels we are watching something like that play out before our very eyes. Only one of the “contestants” didn’t die when he was stabbed, at least not right away. And that contestant wasn’t the usual idiot the President put in his arena. That contestant was smart — smart enough to build an enormous bomb. One he has decided to set off before he “dies.”
Stay tuned. Things could get even uglier than we’ve imagined this week.