Robert Reich’s friend thinks the end is near.

This morning I phoned my friend, the former Republican member of Congress.

ME: So, what are you hearing?

HE: Trump is in deep shit.

ME: Tell me more.

HE: When it looked like he was backing down on the wall, Rush and the crazies on Fox went ballistic. So he has to do the shutdown to keep the base happy. They’re his insurance policy. They stand between him and impeachment.

ME: Impeachment? No chance. Senate Republicans would never go along.

HE (laughing): Don’t be so sure. Corporate and Wall Street are up in arms. Trade war was bad enough. Now, you’ve got Mattis resigning in protest. Trump pulling out of Syria,

So apparently Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter are running the country. Trump threatened a shutdown; he backed away; he flipped again.

So what caused Trump to flip back? Some have suggested that he bowed to backlash from high-profile conservative pundits — notably Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh — who lambasted the president for appearing to concede on the wall funding.

It may or may not be true, but it’s more plausible than it would be for any other president, even the most corrupt or dim-witted. (Isn’t it interesting that Trump is both crookeder than Nixon and dumber than Reagan and Bush 2? And meaner than anybody ever?)

Coulter, during a podcast on the Daily Caller, said Trump’s White

Maggie Haberman and Peter Baker tell us Trump is increasingly isolated and self-willed (as only a narcissist can be).

When President Trump grows frustrated with advisers during meetings, which is not an uncommon occurrence, he sits back in his chair, crosses his arms and scowls. Often he erupts.

He calls his aides “fucking idiots.”

For two years, Mr. Trump has waged war against his own government, convinced that people around him are fools. Angry that they resist his wishes, uninterested in the details of their briefings, he becomes especially agitated when they tell him he does not have the power to do what he wants, which makes him suspicious that they are secretly undermining him.

It’s weird that – assuming … Read the rest

Another one Trump has driven out:

Brett McGurk, the special presidential envoy to the coalition fighting the Islamic State, has accelerated his resignation, telling colleagues this weekend that he could not carry out President Trump’s newly declared policy of withdrawing from Syria.

A seasoned diplomat considered by many to be the glue holding together the sprawling, American-led coalition fighting the terrorist group, Mr. McGurk was supposed to retire in February.

According to an email he sent his staff, he decided to move forward his departure after Mr. Trump did not heed his own commanders and blindsided America’s allies in the region by abruptly ordering the withdrawal of the 2,000 troops stationed in Syria.

And for why? Because Erdoğan told … Read the rest

Let’s read the Mattis letter.

Dear Mister Prez, privileged to serve, proud of the progress, troops continue to provide.

One core belief I have always held is that our strength as a nation is inextricably linked to the strength of our unique and comprehensive system of alliances and partnerships. While the US remains the indispensable nation in the free world, we cannot protect our interests or serve that role effectively without maintaining strong alliances and showing respect to those allies…

Similarly, I believe we must be resolute and unambiguous in our approach to those countries whose strategic interests are increasingly in tension with ours. It is clear that China and Russia, for example, want to shape a world consistent

Well this is scandalous. CNN reports:

President Donald Trump has at least twice in the past few weeks vented to his acting attorney general, angered by federal prosecutors who referenced the President’s actions in crimes his former lawyer Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter.

Trump was frustrated, the sources said, that prosecutors Matt Whitaker oversees filed charges that made Trump look bad. None of the sources suggested that the President directed Whitaker to stop the investigation, but rather lashed out at what he felt was an unfair situation.

The first known instance took place when Trump made his displeasure clear to acting attorney general Matt Whitaker after Cohen pleaded guilty November 29

At least Putin is happy.

First, President Trump blindsided his aides and the rest of the world by deciding to pull the full contingent of some 2,000 American troops out of Syria, helping the Kremlin to confirm Mr. Putin’s gamble that intervening in Syria would revive Russian influence in the Middle East.

Mr. Trump followed that up by declaring that the United States would pull half its forces out of Afghanistan; the combined withdrawals prompted the resignation of Jim Mattis, the respected general who leads the Pentagon.

All that followed Mr. Trump’s already substantial effort to undermine NATO and the European Union by weakening the American commitment to its traditional alliances.

By among other things energetically alienating all … Read the rest

How Trump foreign policy decisions get made:

President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw American troops from Syria was made hastily, without consulting his national security team or allies, and over strong objections from virtually everyone involved in the fight against the Islamic State group, according to U.S. and Turkish officials.

Trump stunned his Cabinet, lawmakers and much of the world with the move by rejecting the advice of his top aides and agreeing to a withdrawal in a phone call with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan last week, two officials briefed on the matter told The Associated Press.

Well who ya gonna trust, your own aides or that nice Mister Erdoğan? He’s so good at that authoritarian thing, you … Read the rest

Meanwhile Trump is filling the last hours before he goes on his multi-week vacation doing his bit to take food stamps away from poor people.

The Trump administration is setting out to do what this year’s farm bill didn’t: tighten work requirements for millions of Americans who receive federal food assistance.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture on Thursday is proposing a rule that would restrict the ability of states to exempt work-eligible adults from having to obtain steady employment to receive food stamps.

The move comes just weeks after lawmakers passed a $400 billion farm bill that reauthorized agriculture and conservation programs while leaving the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which serves roughly 40 million Americans, virtually untouched.

Trump is … Read the rest

Bad news 2:

William P. Barr, President Trump’s nominee to be attorney general, wrote an unsolicited memo to top Justice Department officials in June objecting to the notion that Mr. Trump may have committed the crime of obstruction of justice.

And by “memo” they don’t mean a short note scribbled on an office pad with “Memo” at the top.

In a 19-page memo, Mr. Barr sharply criticized an apparent aspect of the investigation by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, that Mr. Trump may have committed a crime by trying to get the F.B.I. director at the time, James B. Comey, to quash the criminal investigation into his first national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn, and later by

It is so damn galling to hear the WH press secretary attacking the FBI for doing its job and catching a criminal in the act rather than being mad at the criminal who lied not just to the FBI, but supposedly also to people in the WH.

— Matthew Miller (@matthewamiller) December 18, 2018

CNN reports:

During the White House press briefing, a reporter asked White House press secretary Sarah Sanders to clarify if the White House was disputing that Flynn “is a liar.”

“We’re disputing any actions he engaged in had nothing to do with the President. Just because, maybe he did do those things, but that doesn’t have anything to do with the President directly,” Sanders said.

Laurence Tribe is profoundly aghast at the notion that a crook can crook his way into the presidency and then be untouchable on account of how the Justice Department Has Ruled that a sitting president can’t be indicted. The problem with that is obvious. If he got the position by committing crimes, how can it make sense to then make the very position he got by criminal means the thing that protects him from law enforcement? It’s absurd and it’s also…you know…a fucking disaster.

Pinned tweet:

NEW RULE:

Cheat & lie & commit enough felonies to become president — and you’ll get not just the office with all its powers, but a permanent get-out-of-jail-free card!

Retweet if you doubt Madison

Luciano Guerra voted for Trump and now he’s surprised and sad that Trump is shoving a border wall right down the middle of the wildlife center where Guerra works.

I work at the National Butterfly Center — which is along the U.S.-Mexico border — documenting wildlife and leading educational tours. Many of our visitors are young students from the Rio Grande Valley. When they first arrive, some of the children are scared of everything, from the snakes to the pill bugs. Here, we can show them animals that roam free and teach them not to be afraid. We talk about how we planted native vines, shrubs and trees to attract some 240 species of butterflies, as well as dragonflies, grasshoppers

Trump’s gilt palace overlooking Central Park and his golf resorts and solid gold shoes and all the rest of it comes out of the wallets of poor people. That tax scam meant fraudulently hiked rents.

They were collateral damage as Donald J. Trump and his siblings dodged inheritance taxes and gained control of their father’s fortune: thousands of renters in an empire of unassuming red-brick buildings scattered across Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island.

Those buildings have been home to generations of strivers, municipal workers and newly arrived immigrants. When their regulated rents started rising more quickly in the 1990s, many tenants had no idea why. Some heard that the Trump family had spent millions on building improvements, but they

Trump’s calling Cohen a “RAT” on Twitter is getting some lawyerly attention.

Sir, in mobster lingo, a ‘rat’ is a witness who tells prosecutors real incriminating info. Perhaps a different word? Searches of lawyer’s offices common enough that DOJ has a procedure for them. Here it yielded evidence of crimes you said he should be jailed for. You should stop. https://t.co/EV1txBYrhz

— Andy McCarthy (@AndrewCMcCarthy) December 16, 2018

My former colleague Andy McCarthy, one of the President's most steady and articulate defenders, is starting to take the measure of the man he has so vigorously defended. POTUS's language reflects the mentality of an at risk mob boss, not of a President.There is a reason for that. https://t.co/FXTVqt1Rdf

— Michael R.