Ex-George W. Bush aide and senior policy adviser Michael Gerson warned that the “time for panic and decision is upon us” because the “thin line of sane, responsible advisers at White House could break any moment.”
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Gerson, writing in the Washington Post, warned of Trump’s “fundamental unfitness for high office. It is not Trump’s indiscipline and lack of leadership, which make carrying a legislative agenda forward nearly impossible. It is not his vulgarity and smallness, which have been the equivalent of spray-painting graffiti on the Washington Monument. It is not his nearly complete ignorance of policy and history, which condemns him to live in the eternal present of his own immediate desires.”
Gerson, a man who was a part of Bush’s White House Iraq Group, wrote, “… Corker has given public permission to raise the most serious questions: Is Trump psychologically and morally equipped to be president? And could his unfitness cause permanent damage to the country?”
If you’re not shaking yet, “Much of the White House senior staff seems bound, not by loyalty to the president, but by a duty to protect the nation from the president. Trump, in turn, is reported to have said: ‘I hate everyone in the White House.’ And also, presumably, in the State Department, headed by a secretary of state who apparently regards his boss as a ‘moron.'”
Not impressed with what he called Speaker Ryan’s “bland complacency”, Gerson got right to the heart of the matter, “The time for whispered criticisms and quiet snickering is over. The time for panic and decision is upon us. The thin line of sane, responsible advisers at the White House — such as Chief of Staff John F. Kelly, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson — could break at any moment. Already, Trump’s protests of eternal love for Kelly are a bad sign for the general’s future. The American government now has a dangerous fragility at its very center. Its welfare is as thin as an eggshell — perhaps as thin as Donald Trump’s skin.”
Seeing as it is Fired Friday, so named because so many have left the Trump administration and often as a part of a Friday news dump, this warning is timely.
When and if Kelly, Mattis or Tillerson leave, the last speed bump slowing down Trump’s insanity will be gone. We can’t afford for any of them to leave, but of course Trump doesn’t do the right thing or take good advice and so ongoing conflict is guaranteed and we know Trump can’t handle criticism or conflict without lashing out.
Meanwhile, momentum is growing behind legislation that would strengthen the 25th Amendment, which would effectively make it easier to remove Trump from the presidency.
“It’s time to panic,” Gerson titled his piece.
Republicans who worked for George W. Bush are now panicking. It’s safe to say if you are not panicking, you’re not paying attention.
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