I have been slogging through the morass (pronounced more ass) that is John Bolton’s revealed thought processes for three days now. It has not been a pleasant journey. Bolton is a thoroughly repugnant individual. His inclusion as a power player in the last three republican administrations says a lot about just how little republicans care about reaching consensus. Bolton’s go to method of diplomacy is issue maximum threats and drop bombs. In tRump he found a sometimes partner, perhaps depending on how gassy tRump’s belly was feeling on any particular day.
I’m only through the first nine chapters and Bolton has, by his own words, advocated war with North Korea and Iran. He’s advocated shows of force (and possibly more in Syria and Venezuela). I think we are lucky that tRump is a waffler and didn’t follow through on the most violent of Bolton’s schemes.
Some snippets and observations from the text:
Bolton agrees that tRump watches too much television — “under a president who spent a disproportionate share of his time watching his administration being covered in the press.”
“We endured this cycle repeatedly, always with the same outcome. Every few days, someone would inadvertently press a button somewhere, and tRump would be repeating his lines from the same movie soundtrack.”
Bolton describes a dysfunctional administration, subject to the fever dream whims of tRump, full of backstabbers jockeying for power and incapable of acting in a timely fashion. After Haley announced her upcoming resignation as UN Ambassador it took them five months to name a successor, although that person, Kelly Craft, had been the de facto choice for four months.
On the controversy surrounding the Belleau Wood commemoration of World War I that tRump skipped: “But the press didn’t understand that the rules for US presidents are different from the rules for the 190 other leaders who don’t command the world’s greatest military forces.”
Kelly said he had told tRump, “Whatever you do — and we were still in the process of trying to find someone to take my place — I said whatever you do, don’t hire a ‘yes man,’ someone who won’t tell you the truth — don’t do that. Because if you do, I believe you will be impeached.” — John Bolton quoting John Kelly
Stephanie Grisham: “I worked with John Kelly and he was totally unequipped to handle the genius of our great president.”
They hired Mick Mulvaney to replace Kelly.
Bolton: “There was a lot of evidence that Kelly’s hypothesis was entirely correct.
Chapter nine is all about the Venezuela fiasco. Bolton is once again the hero of the piece, coddling tRump to get approval for his meddling in Venezuelan politics. He is opposed by the ghost of Obama, the waffling of tRump, the idiocy of Mnuchin, the timidity of Pompeo, Cuba, Russia, Venezuelan power players and the vagaries of fate. Poor liddle John. He still holds out hope for a regime change in Venezuela. This attempt ended when Putin played the tRump fiddle again. Funny how Putin does a better job managing tRump from Moscow than Bolton does from the room where it happened.
Links to the earlier entries in this entirely too long Bolton Book Report (tomorrow should be the last day unless he puts me to sleep too many times):
Up the Resistance!
Memaliciousness
Cut and Paste Department. This is the regularly scheduled plea for readers. I’ve still only had to make two memes. You have it within your power to make me work. If you spread the word about Evening Shade and your spreadee announces themselves in the comments, you will become eligible to receive your very, very
special noprize of a meme of your very own. All you have to do is jump up and get out there and start carnival barking, cajoling, proselytizing (or pimping, if you are of an irreligious bent). You could even pester and push. Procrastination is not an option — it’s a way of life.