Trump's Seeking "Unity" His Way or the Highway

In Trump's interview with Margaret Brennan of CBS' "Face the Nation," she asked him why he didn't trust American intelligence agencies, all of which have contradicted his statements like "We've eliminated ISIS," for example. (No we haven't, his intelligence agencies told Congress.) ISIS claimed credit for killing 19 people, four of them Americans, in Syria within weeks after Trump ordered the withdrawal of American troops from Syria because ISIS had been defeated.

Incredibly, Trump replied to Ms. Brennan, "I'm trusting the intelligence that I'm putting there."

Putting where? Is he talking about the delusional "intelligence" he's putting in his alternative universe, where he's got lots of little green plastic soldiers running around doing his bidding?Remember, he thinks he's "smarter than all [his] generals."

He's fired all those generals who used to be in his employ except for his Secretary of Defense, Gen. Jim Mattis, who chose to resign after Trump tweeted that he was pulling out of Syria immediately.

Pulling out of Syria leaves America's long-term ally the Kurds in the lurch. Turkey can't wait to annihilate the Kurds, who've been our loyal allies in more than one fight (like Iraq), when so many others have betrayed us (Pakistan, repeatedly, for example). When the Kurds asked us for weapons with which to help us fight in Iraq they were forced to go through Baghdad to get them. As if. The Shia government in Baghdad was reluctant to give weapons to the Kurds. When the Brits carved out the country of Iraq, they ignored the long-term tribal rivalries of the Sunnis, Shia, and the Kurds and blithely, ignorantly set up inevitable conflicts.

Of course with Trump, loyalty is a one-way street. He expects his friends and allies to be loyal to him, but he's never been loyal to anyone, not even his three wives -- especially not to his three wives. Has he been loyal to his children? Time will tell.

Yet he's entitled to a good, no a great story from the New York Times, he recently claimed, because the NYT is his hometown newspaper -- after all, he's from Queens, and he's president of the United States. Clearly, he doesn't understand the mission of what he repeatedly calls "the failing New York Times." Truth telling is a value he has little acquaintance with. Despite his call for comity in his State of the Union speech, he has rarely if ever demonstrated comity himself.

Expect another government shutdown February 15th or expect Trump to declare a state of "emergency," which he's talked about for weeks. It's possible that the Republican majority in the Senate will shut him down. A state of emergency can not be scheduled, so that maneuver would go straight to the courts.