It's a super carrier! It can be in two places at the same time -- right? Trump's first 100 days -- continued

More on the first 100 days of Donald Trump's presidency.

Were there any disasters in Trump's first 100 days?  No, not really.  He has acted in ways that much of the country -- including yours truly -- thinks will be very wrong, maybe even dramatically wrong, for the nation in the long run.  And there's much of the country that thinks those same things are important and needed changes.  Those are political disagreements, not disasters.  But then came May 9 – what would that be?  The 110^th day?

What happened on May 9^th?  That’s the day that Trump fired FBI Director James Comey.  If Watergate was a disaster for Nixon – and it was – then firing Comey has the potential to be at least as bad a disaster for Trump. 

Why is that?  President Richard Nixon tried to hide his culpability in his reelection campaign operatives’ burglary of the Democratic Party’s offices at the Watergate office building.  He did this by firing Archibald Cox, the special investigator charged with determining the facts behind the burglary operation, when Cox’s work had arrived at a point where it was too close to the truth for Nixon’s comfort.  (Cox had subpoenaed the tapes that had recorded Oval Office conversations during the time period under investigation.)  Under threat of impeachment, Nixon resigned.  As FBI Director, Comey was the highest-level executive with oversight responsibility for the FBI investigation into the Russian interference with the 2016 election, and whether any part of Trump’s campaign might have colluded with Russia.  Depending on what happens in the next several days, we might start using the term “Kremlin-gate.”  (Don’t say it started here.)  The legality of Nixon’s firing of Cox was somewhat questionable; the legality of Trump’s firing of Comey is, however, not questioned.  Both cases, though, share the same glaringly obvious question:  “What else is there to know?”

Did Trump have campaign operatives?  Yes.  Many.

What could be the outcome of the current investigation?  It could simply reinforce what is already known, which is that Russia interfered in the American election, and that would probably amount to an exoneration of Trump and his campaign operatives.  Such a result would remove a dark cloud of suspicion over Trump and his administration that threatens to become darker.  Or, it might reveal unquestioned collaboration between the Trump campaign and Russian actions (which would imply a forecast of very stormy weather).  And, of course, it might conclude with something in between those two extremes (partly to mostly cloudy).

How will the next Director of the FBI feel about job security?  Probably pretty good if there is no energetic FBI investigation about Russian meddling in elections, or any other investigation that could yield results that would be unfavorable for Trump or those close to him.  And to maintain comfort about job security, the Director should certainly avoid giving testimony to Congress that shows independence from Trump or fails to provide unequivocal support for any position or accusation made my Trump.  But all bets on job security during the Trump presidency are off if we start to hear rumors that James Comey is writing a book to be titled “From Vlad the Magnificent, With Love.”

You mean there is some kind of private relationship between Trump and Putin?  No.  Maybe.  I don’t know.  What I mean is that Putin directed Russian meddling into last year’s presidential election for two reasons:  First, he feared the prospects of a Clinton presidency that would use his invasions and occupations of eastern Ukraine and Crimea to make his life miserable; second, Putin wants to do everything possible to show that Western democracy is an inherently unstable and chaotic way of running a country.  The events of the first months of the Trump presidency, including the firing of FBI Director Comey just days after he publicly contradicted Trump about Trump’s allegation of wiretapping, and perhaps requested something additional  from the Department of Justice for the investigation into Russian interference in last year’s election, can be used by Putin as evidence of the chaos and instability inherent in the American political and governing systems.  To make things worse for the U.S., Trump’s naturally chaotic and impulsive behavior plays into Putin’s thesis, and therefore right into Putin’s hands.  Oh, yes, Putin – whose admiration for Czarist Russia is public and runs deep, perhaps to the point of seeing himself as a spiritual reincarnation of tenth century ruler Vladimir the Great – is loving every episode of Trump’s newest reality show.

Is there a threat of impeachment for Trump if the findings show collaboration?  Yes.  If impeachment was justified for Nixon when the core offense was burglary of the offices of the opposition political party, then certainly impeachment would be justified when the core offense is collaboration with a foreign power to influence an election.

What about dropping a bunch of cruise missiles on Syria, and sending an "armada" to confront North Korea?  The President of the United States is the Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces.  Whether we like it or not, Trump is that person now.  Short of declaring war, he can deploy those forces pretty much any way he pleases.  But deployment is one thing, and gaining long-term results is something else again.  Unless the country is in some kind of immediate existential threat there has to be extensive diplomatic follow-up to any deployment in order to achieve meaningful, longer-term results.  Neither Syria nor North Korea presents an immediate existential threat to the United States, and there has been no extensive, sustained and strategic follow-up diplomacy.

What was accomplished by these two actions?  As of this writing, the answer to that has to be “not much” in the case of Syria, and “nothing good” in the case of North Korea.  Clearly, any U.S. President could have been provoked into a one-off military response by the Syrian government’s use of poison gas.  That part of Trump’s action was “normal.”  What would also be “normal” would be a major diplomatic follow-up in which State Department staff would present themselves to other governments all over the world in a coordinated effort to explain the American grand strategy for achieving a long-term settlement to the Syrian civil war, and to gain widespread international support for that strategy.  This apparently did not happen, and it did not happen for two reasons:  Trump and his Administration have not yet staffed the State Department to a level where it is capable of that kind of outreach, and there is no such American grand strategy.  These things are “not normal.” 

What about North Korea?  The North Korean adventure is also “not normal.”  Early in April, with concern building that North Korea was about to conduct a nuclear bomb test, Trump announced that a U.S. Navy “armada” (consisting of  the nuclear-powered super carrier Carl Vinson and three support vessels) was being deployed to the waters off the Korean peninsula.  Several days later it was revealed that the carrier and its escorts had actually moved in the opposite direction, away from North Korea.  (Did somebody neglect to inform Trump that even a “super carrier” cannot be in two places at once?)

It’s a big ocean; ships occasionally get misplaced, don’t they?  The Pacific Ocean is a mighty big place, and even a 100,000 ton super carrier and its escorts use very little of the available space, but come on now, isn’t it reasonable to expect the Commander-in-Chief to have at least a general idea of which direction those ships are heading when he says they are moving from “Point A” to “Point B?”  The admiral in charge took the blame for the “miscommunication.”  And that actually makes the situation worse.  Now we are left to wonder:  Who is in charge of the strategic deployment of these ships -- the admiral or the Commander-in-Chief?  Did anybody in the Trump Administration think to check in on where the ships were headed on the next day?  There are only ten of these super carriers in the world – they’re all American – and people in the Navy and the Department of Defense know where they are every minute of every day.  So, definitely not normal.

You seem pretty worked-up about this.  Maybe it’s just that you’re a sore loser?  This isn’t about me.  It’s about a behavior pattern in which Trump, as president, has presented himself to the world as somebody whose statements cannot be believed.  He has done this consistently and repetitively by asserting that he won the popular vote even though Clinton outpolled him by 3 million in the election; by accusing his predecessor Barack Obama of wiretapping him, while offering no evidence; by further accusing Obama of arranging to have an agency of the British Government do the wiretapping (again, no evidence); by saying he is supporting an ally with a military deployment (but without actually making it happen until several days after it was said); by trying to suppress an independent investigation of Russian interference in the election; the list goes on and on.  Trump wants everybody to believe that he is history’s greatest deal-maker, but if his public word is not to be trusted, then how can any other head of state make a “deal” with him when such an event would be equivalent to saying “I made the deal with Trump but I don’t trust him?”

 Lots of people start a new job and make mistakes as they are learning.  Why should Trump be any different?  Fair point.  But more than three months on the job, with assistance from hand-picked advisors and aides, plus the more than two month transition period that preceded the inauguration, adds up to half a year of education and experience for Trump plus a whole lot of other people who are supporting him.  At this point, Trump and his people have dug a bunch of holes for themselves.  Only by climbing out of those holes will they gain the trust needed to implement successful foreign policy with other nations.  Some of those holes are very deep.

What is Trump’s foreign policy?  Now we are getting back to slogans.  He says it is “America First!”  As I said yesterday, there is always going to be something puzzling to write about at another time.