Rachel Maddow catalogues just one day of news focused solely on the Trump- Russia scandal, saying
“Each one of them a big enough deal that in any other administration, it would be the focus of months of attention and scandal and congressional investigation, but in this administration, it’s all you can do to finish reading one of the huge scoops that broke this afternoon and this evening before another one comes flying down the barrel right behind it.”No Rump- ordered action to counteract ongoing Russian cyber warfare on our election systems, Rump naming a person directly involved in his compromised 2016 digital campaign, his former campaign deputy director about to spill the beans to avoid felony charges, etc., etc.
Then we have the ongoing "only the best people" Rump has hired to deconstruct our government. Dana Milbank labored in the swamp and snarked:
Because he has been hiring too few people related by blood, marriage or friendship, he has wound up with unreliable “professionals.” A study by Kathryn Dunn Tenpas of the Brookings Institution found that first-year turnover of senior Trump administration officials was 34 percent, much higher than under any other president in nearly 40 years.
The obvious solution: more use of the friends-and-family plan. A family-based system may not work for immigration, but it works perfectly for staffing a presidency. I have this from an independent authority: Eric Trump. He said last year that nepotism is “a beautiful thing.”Rump's jobs- for- friends- and- family efforts have placed a former Rump golf caddy, a former wedding planner, a home improvement contractor, a model and, of course, his incompetent, weaselly children and their incompetent, weaselly spouses in high positions in the government (when they're not grifting or colluding with Russia).
But, the most egregious hire may turn out to be Jared "Mr. Ivanka Trump" Kushner, the callow, entitled princeling who has apparently been the target of foreign governments who want to manipulate him to their advantage. Republican strategist Rick Wilson lays into Mr. Ivanka Trump:
The knowledge that every foreign intelligence agency in the world saw Kushner’s desperation for cash no doubt set America’s beleaguered counterintelligence community into a state of raw panic. The fact that Kushner is up to his hot-yogaed ass in dealings with Sergei Kislyak and was a key member of the infamous Trump Tower meeting in which Russia offered a quid for a still mysterious quo is just the icing on that cake.Steven Colbert also had his take on Mr. Ivanka Trump's security clearance issues and the lack of interest on Rump's part to counteract Russian meddling (see post below).
Firehose fatigue is setting in, but we have just enough energy to give you this Tweet from another Republican strategist, Steve Schmidt, reminding us that the rot extends beyond the Rump regime, throughout the Republican Party:
There has never been a President who refuses to defend America. Ever. He has been abetted by a deeply corrupted Republican majority in Congress and a profoundly dishonest right wing propaganda campaign. Their perfidy affronts the memory of all those who died so that we are free— Steve Schmidt (@SteveSchmidtSES) February 27, 2018
BONUS: Charles P. Pierce is living the same Groundhog Day nightmare.
