The Days of Reckoning Began With Trump Ineptitude

Photo by Gage Skidmore/CC BY-SA 2.0

With the indictments and unsealed guilty pleas of Trump campaign associates on October 30, 2017, special counsel Robert Mueller let President Donald Trump know there's no denying facts. Few have been able to previously achieve such a feat. 

Mueller's detailed twelve count indictment against former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and his business partner and campaign associate Rick Gates include conspiracy against the United States, money laundering and being unregistered foreign agents. Both men pled not guilty to the charges largely emanating from their work with the pro-Russian Ukraine government.

But It was the guilty plea of George Papadopoulos, a former Trump campaign foreign policy advisor, that has opened the floodgates of information further than anyone expected at this point. Papadopoulos has admitted lying to the FBI. His cooperation with investigators is revealing critical details of the attempts by Russian intelligence services to contact him in an effort to gain influence in the campaign. Potential collusion is on the books. 

Who's swamp is being drained now? As a man who prided himself on being a brilliant businessman and Washington outsider who knows how to get things done, President Trump has seemingly failed himself. His choices as a candidate laid the groundwork for a presidency now forever married to the first criminal charges and admission of guilt in the investigation of Russia's meddling in the 2016 election. If he thought he could escape it by firing James Comey, he was wrong.

Donald Trump put together a campaign team who either knew less than he did about presidential politics, or whose questionable pasts were well known to anyone who cared to look deeply. He kept his children and son-in-law, Don Jr., Ivanka, Eric and Jared Kushner, closest to him even though they had no political experience. Trump chose Corey Lewandowski, a man who had never worked on a national campaign, as his first campaign manager. Lewandowski was a short-tempered divisive man who fed into Trump's darker side while alienating allies as well as Trump's children, and wrecking havoc with the campaign.

In June 2016, Trump fired Lewandowsky and named Paul Manafort as his new campaign chairman. Paul Manafort, viewed as a veteran Republican strategist, was originally brought into the campaign in March 2016 to assist with delegate count. In Manafort, Trump saw a wealthy man close to his age who had an apartment in Trump Tower. He seemed to look no further. But they had a past.

Roy Cohen, famed McCarthy era lawyer and Trump's mentor, originally introduced Manafort to Trump in the 70's. Trump was doing business with Manafort's old consulting firm, Black, Manafort, Stone & Kelly. In the Political & Otherwise piece written June 30, 2016  "Trump Wears New Clothes", Manafort is described as a man who "has a particular knack for taking autocrats and presenting them as defenders of democracy". Trump knew what he was getting. Until he didn't.

Trump asked for Manafort's resignation in August 2016 after new reports continued to surface about his past work for pro-Russian political elements in Ukraine. Rick Gates had come along for the Trump campaign ride as Manafort's long time business associate. But he continued to work for the campaign after Manafort left and stayed on through Trump's inauguration.

Steve Bannon became Trump's third presidential campaign manager/CEO. He had never worked in a national political campaign. Breitbart News, a far-right publication, was Bannon’s claim to fame along with being a controversial character. None of that seemed to bother Trump.

President Trump has continually lauded himself for running an unconventional campaign, and now an unconventional presidency. He has taken his love affair with choosing inexperienced people for jobs of political importance to the White House with seemingly little regard for the consequences. Trump has never really left campaign mode, and that now takes on an entirely different light.

The old adage that you're only as good as the people you surround yourself with rings loudly for President Trump. When poor judgement, bad decisions and recklessness become known as major hallmarks of a winning presidential campaign, something has gone terribly wrong.       

Special counsel Mueller's investigation has just begun. We have yet to learn all of the facts about Michael Flynn, Roger Stone, Carter Page and the family entanglements of Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump. The closer Mueller gets to the truth about Russian involvement in the 2016 presidential campaign, the louder the calls become for the investigation to end.

A Timely Trump Flashback

Recent history often provides clarity on the circumstances of today. Sometimes people change. Donald Trump does not.

One year ago on October 11, 2016, the second presidential debate between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton took place in St. Louis, Missouri. It was a tumultuous month in the historic 2016 campaign. Trump's campaign appeared on shaky ground, the U.S. announced that Russia was trying to interfere in the election, and WikiLeaks was dumping new controversy into the race. 

As we watched both candidates on the debate stage, Donald Trump laid out the pattern we see being played out today. Trump used distraction to cover up his lack of substance on issues, no matter what Hillary said. No matter what anybody said. Distraction remains his continued modus operandi with only one difference - Trump is now President of the United States and the world is his stage. 

Days before that debate, the now infamous Access Hollywood tapes had been released showing Trump's mentality and despicable behavior toward women. He had been exposed.  Rather than contrition, Trump carried his anger into the debate lashing out and using his physical presence to stalk Clinton on stage. He became the omnipresent bully.

Donald Trump is an angry man. We saw it in the candidate. We see it in the President. He's a man who believes that the way to succeed is to evoke intimidation and fear spreading anger wherever he can. There's no greater good in his mind other than what works for himself.

I described Trump as "seriously out of control" a year ago in the column appearing below. Tragically nothing has changed. In October 2017, time has become the controlling factor. How much time will it take for the Trump presidency to be brought down? 

Sex. Lies. Groping. Video Tape. and a Debate/ October 10, 2016  

St. Louis Debate

We have gone through many stages of Donald Trump during this 2016 Presidential Campaign, but we now have reached the numbing effect. He went to the bottom of the barrel in the St. Louis Presidential Debate and did not come up cleansed. In an attempt to save himself after the release of sleazy video and audio tapes of self described sexual ways and encounters, he stooped even lower in full public view. 

In a move few could believe, Trump brought four women, three of whom accused Bill Clinton of sexual misconduct in the '90's, to the Washington University in St. Louis campus shortly before the debate began. Donald Trump held a photo op with all of them. Then his friend Rudy Giuliani escorted the women to their seats in the main debate room directly in front of Hillary Clinton. Trump apparently felt that humiliating her in a cheap and tawdry way in front of a world audience watching the debate was the best way to redeem himself.

This is the same Donald Trump who told us after the first debate, "I'm really happy I was able to hold back on the indiscrestions in respect to Bill Clinton. Because I have a lot of respect for Chelsea Clinton." The same Chelsea Clinton who was now forced to sit rows apart from women who had played a very painful role in the Clinton family life when she was a young girl. The same Chelsea who was seated in the St. Louis audience next to her father, the former President of the United States. The same daughter whose good friend Ivanka Trump was also sitting close by next to her sibilings and Melania Trump. 

That's what Hillary Clinton saw as she looked out at the audience in the relatively small debate area that had been set up.

And that's exactly what it was. A set up. Trump had wanted to intimidate her.

The Debate was held on a fine midwestern college campus. In normal times, it would have been a great opportunity for students to have the presidential candidates debate on their campus. But what took place last night was something that should never have been seen by any of us as part of the presidential political process.

Donald Trump came on to the debate stage an angry man backed into a self made corner. You can no longer be dispassionate about Trump. His behavior at the St. Louis Debate was repulsive and wrong. He created what was too often an abusive encounter mixed with psychological warfare. He tried to make Hillary guilty for her husband's alledged indescretions. Trump showed continual disrespect for the former First Lady, Senator and Secretary of State, telling her if he were in charge "you'd be in jail."  He refused to stop interrupting and shouting at her. And this was a Presidential Debate.  

The one thing Donald Trump didn't do last night was offer the American people a major apology for his behaviors. Not the thirty second late night one quickly put together two days before. He wasn't man enough to do the right thing, and what many were waiting to hear. 

So much damage had been done to this debate by a defiant and arrogant Donald Trump that it was hard to focus on whatever substance there was. What we saw was a candidate seriously out of control.