dagblog - Comments for "Bannon calls white nationalists ‘a collection of clowns’"

Steve Bannon’s claim to have

artappraiser — Fri, 18 Aug 2017 15:38:54 +0000

In reply to Bannon calls white nationalists ‘a collection of clowns’

Steve Bannon’s claim to have played the media with his bizarre interview is deluded

by Heather Timmons @ Quartz, Aug. 17

She goes over most of the related coverage after the article was published, including things like a tweet from Jay Rosen and concludes:

[....] perhaps he was indeed “daring him Trump to fire him”; as Bardella notes, if Bannon isn’t fired after so openly criticizing White House colleagues, he looks hard to dislodge.

However, Bannon’s words seem to carry little internal weight in the Trump administration. In the interview with American Prospect, he singled out Susan Thornton, the State Department’s senior person in Asia, saying he was “getting” her “out at State.” But Thornton’s job is secure, a State Department official told Quartz. “The Secretary asked Susan Thornton to lead in a very important role and he continues to rely on her to lead the State Department’s diplomacy in Asia,” he said.

Cohn, too, is not going anywhere, the White House said Thursday. “Nothing has changed. Gary is focused on his responsibilities as NEC Director and any reports to the contrary are 100% false,” an official told the press pool on background.

Haha! And to think he

Obey — Thu, 17 Aug 2017 20:53:42 +0000

In reply to Kuttner's confusion? Maybe

Haha! And to think he mentored those giants of online punditry Matt Yglesias and Ezra Klein. Think Spencer A(tta)ckerman went through there too. He now has fewer twitter followers than my nephew's local dance school.

Kuttner's confusion? Maybe

artappraiser — Thu, 17 Aug 2017 17:30:55 +0000

In reply to Interesting. But I'm still

Kuttner's confusion? Maybe doesn't hang out with the right crowd, I'm guessing.

Also an excellent point! He seemed very ivory tower liberal, types away at policy opinion, white-paper-type, from a book-lined hidey hole for a publication that few read anymore, ponders and ponders and maybe talks on the phone with Katrina Van Der Heuvel once in a while, gets her take on what's going on with politics....

Excellent use of Die Hard as

artappraiser — Thu, 17 Aug 2017 17:25:04 +0000

In reply to Interesting. But I'm still

Excellent use of Die Hard as allegorical story for the ages! Love it.

Interesting. But I'm still

Obey — Thu, 17 Aug 2017 17:24:48 +0000

In reply to you should have copyrighted

Interesting. But I'm still going with the massive-piles-of-cocaine explanation for this one. I run into enough sniffling dickhead finance guys in the local nightlife and I read Bannon and the Mooch in exactly that voice.

Insulting his boss's foreign policy, "I make the decisions around here" braggadocio, the exuberant confidence to think they can talk over that liberal academic over there. It's kind of like a reverse Die Hard, in that scene where cokehead Ellis thinks he can talk his way into a deal with Hans Gruber. (Bannon being Ellis, Kuttner being Gruber and Miller as McClane telling him "You don't know who you're dealing with!").

Kuttner's confusion? Maybe doesn't hang out with the right crowd, I'm guessing.

Oh forgot about this: it

artappraiser — Thu, 17 Aug 2017 17:12:53 +0000

In reply to p.s. on TV, Kuttner was

Oh forgot about this: it could not have been total whimsy on Bannon's part because he also went on the record for this New York Times piece published yesterday, whether they called him or he called them is not clear:

Trump’s Embrace of Racially Charged Past Puts Republicans in Crisis

By JEREMY W. PETERS, JONATHAN MARTIN and JACK HEALY AUG. 16

[....] Stephen K. Bannon, the president’s chief strategist, said in an interview that if Democrats want to fight over Confederate monuments and attack Mr. Trump as a bigot, that was a fight the president would win.

“President Trump, by asking, ‘Where does this all end’ — Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln — connects with the American people about their history, culture and traditions,” he said.

“The race-identity politics of the left wants to say it’s all racist,” Mr. Bannon added. “Just give me more. Tear down more statues. Say the revolution is coming. I can’t get enough of it.”[....]

So I interpret both pieces together this way: he told Kuttner that "they" would eventually have to crush the clownish white nationalists, but for now they were a useful tool to troll the identity people in the Dem party, and the identity politics people's reaction will turn off the general public to the Dem party, and that will cause a revolution, a new coalition to grow.

p.s. on TV, Kuttner was

artappraiser — Thu, 17 Aug 2017 16:56:28 +0000

In reply to you should have copyrighted

p.s. on TV, Kuttner was almost like reaching out to fellow journalists with: help me figure out why this happened.

you should have copyrighted

artappraiser — Thu, 17 Aug 2017 16:48:08 +0000

In reply to New OED entry: The Scaramucci

you should have copyrighted it right away, too late now:

Steve Bannon just pulled a Scaramucci @ Vice News, Aug. 17

The comparison by using the word actually brings up something that interests me, whether it is really accurate remains to be seen. Scaramucci clearly desperately wanted to work for and please Trump and be a Trump mouthpiece to the point of it ruining his marriage. He seemed genuinely clueless about his call to LIzza being on the record, and that in fact was a major reason he would be unqualified to be communications director--he did not even know the basic rules of the game for manipulating media.

I saw a panel last night on either CNN or MSNBC, all journalists, with Kuttner included, where they went into Kuttner's puzzlement with Bannon's call, the odd nature of it being right around the time of the Trump press conference, Bannon being in a good mood, him reaching out to a liberal journalist, supposedly on a whim. Kuttner pointed out: this is no newbie at media rules, this is Mr. Breitbart, he more than knows the rules about this all! That if you don't say this is off the record, it's on the record. Kuttner on air still seemed genuinely puzzled by the call, he still wasn't sure whether it was a Machiavellian Bannon politically move or an idiotically arrogant and clueless Bannon move. Precisely because it was reaching out across the divide. Especially because he dissed white nationalists.

Whatever the case, it is clear Bannon still believes there can be a new political coalition in this country across certain divides. What is really delusional is to think that Trump as president can make that work now! That would be the bubble effect of him being in the White House? I can't emphasize enough how Kuttner on TV last night still seemed puzzled by whether the call was Machiavellian or just plain stupid. It's all very interesting.

New OED entry: The Scaramucci

Obey — Thu, 17 Aug 2017 15:05:36 +0000

In reply to Bannon calls white nationalists ‘a collection of clowns’

New OED entry: The Scaramucci - Trump era government official committing accidental Hara Kiri by means of a cocaine-infused phone call to a journalist. Example: "Steve Bannon totally scaramucci'd that one".

I really hope CNN today keeps

Obey — Thu, 17 Aug 2017 07:01:10 +0000

In reply to Axios' Jonathan Swan talked

I really hope CNN today keeps talking about this part "He talked about changing personnel in a way that made him sound like the president"

That should go down well with Donald