Charlie Rose interviewed Steve Bannon for CBS 60 Minutes, which was broadcast on Sunday, with an extended version available online.
Most revelations were teased in terms of the criticism of current Catholic church policy on immigrants.
The broadcast was more useful for considering the consistency of tone for Bannon in comparison to his session with Priebus at CPAC, as well as the recent interview with American Prospect.
The Bannon spin was that the opposition to Trump comes from a fictive GOP establishment, with loyalty and the Irish black book in force for “streetfighters”. Back to the “outsider” playbook of George Wallace and Ross Perot, except this time the dog caught the car.
The Senate GOP seems to be a current focus for his revenge, after the numerous legislative failures.
Apparently Trump’s use of Twitter “disintermediates” the media, according to Bannon. Because the 40 million fake followers apparently constitute the direct connection despite all those bots. That’s not democratic when Trump never replies to tweets, it’s autocratic.
The project of eradicating the permanent political class (K Street and the Beltway bureaucracy) makes sense to many actual libertarians, but it’s also thinning the oligarchy, which is what warlords do.
His real ire is laid upon the Bush administration, and his deflections on WH/NSC leaks were telling.
Apparently Bannon knows the Russians colluded because he hid behind a reason of classified intelligence reports.
His economic populism is based on citizenship, where documentation is the criteria for the current racist pandering. There will be for undocumented immigrants, no path to citizenship, no amnesty, and everyone undocumented needs to self-deport.
Similarly, Bannon apparently believes that immigrants and slaves played no part in the divisions of labor exploited under The American System.
Bannon sees “The American System” as the economic nationalist core (sans Whigs(sic)) of the Bannonist policy script that Trump continues to follow. Unfortunately we’re in the 21st Century and global trade includes actual modern economies under comparative advantage. Bannon is quite mistaken about using that 19th Century model.
The reality was that Trump is really quite clueless and that whatever policy outline he follows comes still from Bannon, whose combativeness probably gets more interesting with less makeup and more alcohol.
The more interesting takeaway is that the win was unexpected, and considering the “staffing-up” needed, supports the notion that the perfect storm of multiple active measures and the targeting of the Electoral College margins transformed an obvious 2016 defeat into the current WH disaster.
Bannon is, however his pretensions, a rather simple Trump booster, except he’s in the circle that gets to call him “Donald”.
Top quote: "The Republican establishment is trying to nullify the 2016 election. That's a brutal fact we have to face."
- On his relationship with the president: "I think I'm a street fighter. And by the way, I think that's why Donald Trump and I get along so well. Donald Trump's a fighter. Great counter puncher. Great counter puncher. He's a fighter. I'm going to be his wing man outside for the entire time, to protect [Trump]" and "to make sure his enemies know that there's no free shot on goal."
- On Trump's Charlottesville remarks: "I was the only guy that came out and tried to defend him."
- On Gary Cohn's critical interview with the Financial Times: "If you don't like what [Trump's] doing and you don't agree with it, you have an obligation to resign."
- On Republican criticism of Trump's national security strategy: "That's the geniuses of the Bush administration. I hold these people in contempt, total and complete contempt ... They're idiots, and they've gotten us in this situation, and they question a good man like Donald Trump," Bannon said, naming Condoleezza Rice, Brent Scowcroft and Colin Powell.
- On the Russia investigation: "It's a total and complete farce. Russian collusion is a farce."
www.axios.com/…
Apparently Breitbart claims CBS deliberately color-corrected (sic) Bannon to make him look… bad(sic).
Tuesday, Sep 12, 2017 · 4:36:01 AM +00:00 · annieli
Here’s the exchange that didn’t air.
Rose said “It’s been reported that Jared Kushner was in favor of firing James Comey. Was that correct?” Here is Bannon’s stuttering answer: “I have, you guys have to, they will have to find that out either through the media or the investigation. I don’t know.” From there, Bannon is asked whether it’s true that he opposed Comey’s firing. He again hesitates, wanting to take credit for having been right, but also wanting to avoid answering the question, because he doesn’t want to give an opening to Mueller.
Steve Bannon was so far inside Donald Trump’s inner circle back in May of 2017, when Comey was fired, it’s a given that he was in on the discussion about the firing. He surely would have been in the meetings when Kushner and other advisers were pushing Trump to go through with the firing. Now he just lied about it during the interview, giving Robert Mueller grounds to pursue him. At the least, Bannon is guilty of misprision of a felony (failing to report the obstruction felony he witnessed Trump committing), even as Kushner is guilty of conspiracy to obstruct justice. Bannon’s desire for the 60 Minutes limelight may have just sped things up.