The President Continues to Be Terrible at Everything: 5 Frightening Examples of Trump's Incompetence in Just the Last 72 Hours

It is not hard to imagine how much worse things will be when Trump meets with all those foreign leaders.

You didn’t have to be a political genius—or a genius of any kind, really—to see that Donald Trump was going to be a disaster at being president. He clearly has no interest in politics or policy and doesn't understand, or care to understand, the basics of the job. The Trump platform consists of unbelievable and unconstitutional lies all bound up with racist pipe dreams about how to Make America 1952 Again. To call Trump a con man is to insult hardworking, skilled con men and women the world over. Trump just recognized easy marks when he saw them, and told them what they wanted to hear. And what they wanted to hear was that someone else’s suffering would help them get ahead.

That’s how we got here. Sixty-three million ignorant, desperate and delusional Americans voted for a man uniquely unqualified to be president. Predictably, Trump has mucked up the task at every turn. On the rare occasions he shows up to work instead of golfing, Trump screws up with a frequency that can’t be measured by any currently available metric ...

... Here are five examples of news tidbits from the last 72 hours proving Trump is a danger to us all ...

1. Intelligence officials have to warn other countries not to tell him secrets.
2. NATO officials have to dumb down everything for him.
3. His staff is afraid he’ll blab stuff unless someone keeps an eye on him.
4. He is easily fooled.
5. Officials say he’s too incompetent and uninterested to give away any important details.

Alan Neuhauser
@alneuhauser

BREAKING: @SheriffClarke announces he will "accept an appointment as an assistant secretary in the Department of Homeland Security."

Brian Stelter
@brianstelter
MSNBC says "negotiations are ongoing" with @Lawrence O'Donnell. Here's my updated story

Katy Tur @KatyTurNBC

Reporters just now to Paul Ryan: Do you have full confidence in POTUS? Ryan: "I do."

Alex Wagner @alexwagner

Again, the allure of passing tax cuts is more powerful than anyone could have imagined:

I can confirm that MSNBC is ending the top rated “The Last Word” with Lawrence O’Donnell, the popular show that follows Rachel Maddow at 10pm. O’Donnell’s contract is up shortly, and the network has not made any overtures about keeping him on.

There is a fear that despite Maddow’s dogged liberalism, MSNBC is taking a turn to the right. O’Donnell would not fit into that model. But they’ve installed Fox News’s Greta van Susteren at 6pm, and more changes are coming. (This follows the disaster with Tamron Hall and the coming of Megyn Kelly from Fox News, too.)

It seems just like MSNBC to abruptly kill their own success. They’re finally beating CNN and Fox, so why not reverse course? Crazy. O’Donnell’s ratings have never been higher.

“The Last Word” has been on since 2011, and O’Donnell has been with MSNBC since it began. If CNN were smart, they’d pick him up right away. He’s one of the smartest guys in the room, and a pleasure to watch. Among his credits are writing for and consulting on “The West Wing.”

UPDATE
My NBC sources say that O’Donnell’s tireless criticism of Donald Trump is the cause of the trouble. O’Donnell calls Trump a liar on TV almost ever night. Says my observer: “Phil Griffin fought back Trump’s demands to Comcast chief Steve Burke that O’Donnell get fired for years. But now he’s president and now it’s Andy Lack’s decision and Andy has never run a single promo for O’Donnell and he wants access to Trump for Lester Holt interview and more.”

Morale at NBC News has been low for some time. My source says: “This version of NBC news would have handed the Pentagon papers back to the Pentagon. The New York Times and Washington Post remain our best hope.”

Article 1: Compromising the integrity of the presidency through continuing violation of the Constitution’s Emoluments Clause.

Article 2: Violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the duties of his office by disregarding U.S. interests and pursuing the interests of a hostile foreign power, to wit, Russia.

Article 3: Impairment and obstruction of inquiries by the Justice Department and Congress into the extent of the Trump administration’s conflicts of interests and Russia ties

Article 4: Undermining of the American judicial system through felonious intimidation of potential witnesses.

Article 5: Undermining of his office and the Constitution through repeated assaults on the integrity of the federal judiciary and its officers.

Article 6: Demeaning the integrity of government and its public servants, particularly the military and intelligence agencies, in contravention of his constitutional duties to serve as chief executive and commander in chief of the armed forces.

Article 7: Dereliction of his constitutional duty to faithfully execute the office of president by failing to timely appoint officers of the United States to administer the nation’s federal agencies.

Mr. Trump’s appetite for chaos, coupled with his disregard for the self-protective conventions of the presidency, have left his staff confused and squabbling. And his own mood, according to two advisers who spoke on the condition of anonymity, has become sour and dark, turning against most of his aides — even his son-in-law, Jared Kushner — and describing them in a fury as “incompetent,” according to one of those advisers ...

... Mr. Trump’s rattled staff kept close tabs on a meeting early Monday in which the president summoned Mr. Spicer; the deputy press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders; and the communications director, Michael Dubke, to lecture them on the need “to get on the same page,” according to a person briefed on the meeting. Even as Mr. Trump reassured advisers like Mr. Spicer that their jobs were safe at the morning meeting, he told other advisers he knew he needed to make big changes but did not know which direction to go in, or whom to select ...

... There is a growing sense that Mr. Trump seems unwilling or unable to do the things necessary to keep himself out of trouble, and that the presidency has done little to tame a shoot-from-the-hip-into-his-own-foot style that characterized his campaign ...

... In private, three administration officials conceded that they could not publicly articulate their most compelling — and honest — defense of the president: that Mr. Trump, a hasty and indifferent reader of printed briefing materials, simply did not possess the interest or knowledge of the granular details of intelligence gathering to leak specific sources and methods of intelligence gathering that would do harm to United States allies.

Trump, enraged and calling all his staff "incompetent," at White House under siege

I am reminded of these recruits, and many others like them, when I hear the Trump administration lavish praise on autocrats, when it tries to close our borders to refugees from war-torn countries and when Secretary of State Rex Tillerson proclaims that the United States must de-emphasize human rights.

This departure from decades of bipartisan foreign policy is rightly criticized for ignoring the critical role that “the American idea” plays in promoting our interests abroad, particularly when it comes directly from the president and the secretary of state.

But lauding autocrats, rebuffing refugees and downgrading human rights — as much as reports that Mr. Trump revealed highly classified intelligence to the Russians — also has a much more direct, palpable and unmistakably negative impact on our national security. Tarnishing the idea that America stands for something uniquely good makes it harder for the C.I.A. to recruit spies. The best arrow in the C.I.A.’s quiver — the arrow that has led to countless high-quality recruits signing up over the years — will not be nearly as sharp.

No one can say how many potential spies will decide that working for America is not worth the risk. But the administration’s rejection of the American idea will surely mean that some will say no. And that means intelligence that could have been collected for years to come will be lost to us.

That will harm our national security. The intelligence collected from human sources is distinct and potent. It is often the only way to obtain critically important information on plans, intentions, motivations and fears. Human assets can obtain specific information to answer key intelligence questions from policy makers. Trained spies can offer crucial insights into relationships and context, making other intelligence, such as information from intercepted communications, much more valuable.

Every asset who is not recruited impoverishes our understanding of the opportunities, risks and threats in the world.