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How does Stephen Bannon steer Donald Trump’s views—and where? Continuing his domination of reporting on Trump, the Washington Post’s David Fahrenthold, together with Frances Stead Sellers, analyzes a series of Trump’s appearances on Bannon’s radio show. The picture that emerges is of manipulator and manipulated. “In his questions, Bannon often began with praise for Trump,” Fahrenthold and Sellers write. “The flattery often came before a leading question.” And the questions could lead into some scary territory.
Flattery. Presentation of Bannon’s view of a topic Trump knows little to nothing about. Leading question. Agreement from Trump. It’s not that Trump never pushed back. It’s just that he pushed back on how big of a liar Ted Cruz was, not on the United States’ relationship to Turkey and NATO.
But it’s not only that Donald Trump is easy to manipulate: It’s also the content of what the master manipulator is pushing. When Trump expressed concern that immigration laws were making life difficult for Ivy League students, Bannon was not on board:
“When two-thirds or three-quarters of the CEOs in Silicon Valley are from South Asia or from Asia, I think . . . ” Bannon said, not finishing the sentence. “A country is more than an economy. We’re a civic society.”
And apparently, being a civic society means that even rich immigrants are a problem. The brown ones, anyway. This is the guy the media is busy normalizing. Take this gem from NPR, for instance:
Oh, well. If Bannon's editor in chief denies that Bannon is winking at racists, it’s obviously true! Case closed. Now can we get back to protecting our civic society from the Asians?