May 15, 2017
BUBBLE BOY:
How Trump gets his fake news : The president rarely surfs the web on his own, but his staff have made a habit of slipping news stories on to his desk--including the occasional internet hoax. (SHANE GOLDMACHER, 05/15/17, Politico)
White House chief of staff Reince Priebus issued a stern warning at a recent senior staff meeting: Quit trying to secretly slip stuff to President Trump.Just days earlier, K.T. McFarland, the deputy national security adviser, had given Trump a printout of two Time magazine covers. One, supposedly from the 1970s, warned of a coming ice age; the other, from 2008, about surviving global warming, according to four White House officials familiar with the matter.Trump quickly got lathered up about the media's hypocrisy. But there was a problem. The 1970s cover was fake, part of an Internet hoax that's circulated for years. Staff chased down the truth and intervened before Trump tweeted or talked publicly about it.The episode illustrates the impossible mission of managing a White House led by an impetuous president who has resisted structure and strictures his entire adult life.
The real takeaway here is the low regard in which even his own staff holds him.
Posted by Orrin Judd at May 15, 2017 7:12 AM