In an editorial in today’s USA Today, Republican consultant and commentator Cheri Jacobus tells us that we should be concerned about how quickly and efficiently Steve Bannon’s professional life and prospects were ruined once he went on the record about defects in the president and his family.
It doesn’t matter who is the target, or that our disgust toward the likes of Bannon is appropriate and well-earned. The swiftness and robot-like precision with which Trump’s allies dislodged their lips from Bannon’s MAGA derriere, so they could effectively reach for their shivs upon orders from Trump, is chilling.
Her worry is not that there is some kind of injustice here, but that it sends a warning to any other would-be truth-tellers or whistleblowers. And that’s a fair point, as far as it goes.
But the defenestration of Steve Bannon was something earnestly desired by most elected Republicans, especially in the U.S. Senate. Bannon’s Breitbart News earned its audience not just by catering to deplorables but by pushing primaries against insufficiently deplorable lawmakers. For this reason, Bannon’s elevation to campaign manager in Trump’s campaign was met with revulsion and his placement at the right hand of the president was met with dread. He had few allies on Capitol Hill, and many of the people who acted like allies were really just protecting their right flank.
This is one of the reasons why it was so easy for Trump to cut him off at the knees. He was really the only person propping him up in the first place. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell not only applauded Bannon’s downfall, he could barely contain his glee.
Another point that’s worth making here is that Bannon wasn’t guilty of mere whistleblowing. He made personal attacks on the president’s family, calling Ivanka “dumb as a brick,” for example. I don’t imagine that David Axelrod would have had much of a future in Democratic politics if he’d said something like that about Sasha or Malia. In that sense, Bannon committed a form of career suicide.
So, yes, it’s troubling to think that anyone considering telling the truth about Trump from within his inner circle will now have Bannon’s sad fate to deter them, but he’s not exactly the best example to use for this purpose.
Besides, I don’t really believe the last chapter has been written about Steve Bannon. He will be back.
With respect to BooMan and (barely) to Jacobus, I just think this is ridiculous.
The immediate, lockstep precision with which the public elements of the Republican/Conservative aparatus lock onto a target and try to destroy it, hasn’t changed in decades, going back to Lee Atwater or Ailes in the Nixon days. The only reason she finds this “chilling” — or is even noticing it — is that the target, this time, is one of their own.
There are so many dozens of similar victims — from Hillary Clinton to John Kerry to Daniel Ellsberg to Willie Horton to Valerie Plame — over the decades, that are far more deserving of sympathy and whose destruction warrants far more self-examination than poor Steve Bannon.
Anyway, Bannon was asking for it, playing both ends against the middle as he’s been doing. The man practially announced that, like the Joker, he has no god but destruction. I don’t see how anyone could be surprised, alarmed or concerned.
Good point. I agree.
It’s only shocking or chilling to conservatives bc they see one of their own getting the same treatment meted out to Democrats or leftists in past.
Ironically, they even went after Atwater after he made his confession. Not by denouncing him but in one of two forms. There was, “Poor Lee, he’s really lost it.” And then there was, “Lee’s amazing. Showman to the end, he’s now conning the rubes into thinking he was really a great guy.”
Their tactic was successful in that it caused even most of those on the left to dismiss Atwater’s confession as insincere. And with that dismissal, an opportunity was lost.
Jacobus’s analysis only holds up if Bannon was more than a walking/breathing rock stupid right wing comment section. There was never anything there and that became obvious in less than 6 months.
He’d had been a late night punch line for a week if 77,000 votes went the other way. As sports metaphor, he’s a first round bust along the lines of Ryan Leaf.
I would say that the chance of anybody else in the inner circle telling the truth is pretty much zero anyway.
I confess that I haven’t read either Wolff’s book or even many article excerpts of it. I’ve read all the quotes that are getting the most “play” out there, and that’s about it.
No love lost on my part vis disgusting Bannon, but I really think another piece of the puzzle is the Big Money, aka the Mercers & Shelly Adelson, dropped a dime on Bannon at the same time. And they did it bc Bannon definitely overstepped his boundaries with what he revealed in the book.
Trump is just more valuable to the Big Money People than Bannon. And that’s the end of it.
I agree – as does just about everyone – that directly attacking the Trump family was the main cause of his downfall. Even to those of us who dislike and have no patience for the greedy grifting Trump spawn, it was somewhat shocking to read what Bannon said. I mean, Bannon put himself out there as Trump’s main advisor, etc, and then directly attacks Trump and his spawn? IMO, that’s pretty deadly teh stoopit, it burnz. And causes me to wonder even more about Bannon.
Of course, it doesn’t help that Bannon was backing some real LOSER candidates either.
So I think the lesson for anyone else deciding to write a Tell-All book would be to back off of direct attacks on Trump & his spawn… or at least say things in a better way.
Plus if you’re gonna attack Trump, you’d better have something more to back you up.
Frankly, from where I sit, Trump is nothing more or less than a loud & crude version of the Same Old, Same Old GOP politicians who’ve been in office for decades, if not forever. McConnell, Lindsay Graham, all the rest of them are Exactly. The. Same. except that they don’t say the quiet words out loud. Only difference.
Trump’s alleged “laws” are nothing more or less than bog standard GOP rip off the poor and middle classes and rape the environment, whilst giving the wealthy and corporations everything they’ve ever wanted and more. I see no difference.
Trump just gives the GOP a big skirt to hide behind. They can pretend that they are really “better than” Trump, so that the voters will continue to elect them. But here’s the deal: they’re not. They’re no better. They’re all the same. All greedy grifting amoral racist bigoted sexist homophobic nasty ugly mostly older white males hell-bent on screwing over anyone they can in order to enrich themselves.
It was interesting to see how very quickly they all lock-stepped together at Camp David last weekend. The damage control has been in full spin ever since.
So there is a clear warning to tread cautiously if you’re gonna “out” Trump & his family (even though, from what everyone says, there’s really nothing much new in the book; it’s what we all figured out on our own anyway), better use your words wisely. And better have another job lined up.
What else is new? Anyone who dares to do an expose of this nature – no matter of whom – is always going to be in the same boat. It’s often called Whistleblowing, and we’ve all witnessed a plethora of whistleblowers getting the shaft over the years.
Not much new under the sun, imo.
Bannon got his just deserts, at least in part because he behaved boorishly and stupidly. He deserves his fate.
However, I figure that, sadly, we haven’t heard the last of Bannon. He’ll sleeze around and find some other flim-flam artist to back him. Wait and see.
Had a thought when I read this: “So I think the lesson for anyone else deciding to write a Tell-All book would be to back off of direct attacks on Trump & his spawn…”
How much $$$ will Bannon get for his tell all book, if he follows in Wolff’s footsteps a little, and attacks the Trump administration. He’d attack it from the ‘right,’ but still. That’s an absolute goldmine … and a way to launch himself back to the top of the mountain.
There is that possibility.
Could be a good grift for Bannon at this point.
Time will tell…
Only if Democrats/liberals buy it. There’s a rightwing/GOP structure in place to drive up the sales of a “conservative” attacking “liberals” books. (The purchase and not the reading becomes sticking it to Democrats/liberals. These are very weird people.) That won’t be there for Bannon.
I don’t think there’s a road back for Bannon. Apparently even Rebekah Mercer figured out several months ago that he was all hot air and obviously was the reason Breitbart cut him loose (she and her father provide a large part of the funds they live off of). He’s supposed to be such a financial genius, let him go back to investment banking. Or producing movies.
Shorter RUKidding: Bannon behaved boorishly and stupidly, but hey, he did tell the truth.
I confess that I completely misread what the immediate consequences of Bannon’s indiscretion would be. I thought he was better positioned than he actually was, and that he had far more spunk than he actually did. He folded like a wet noodle.
But I too doubt we’ve seen the last of him.
Not a good bet. Breitbart News has always punched above its weight. Without the moneybags, it’s nothing and the moneybags saw how quickly subscribers/readers began to leave, choosing Trump over Bannon. The guy’s only electoral politics foray on his own cost them a Senate seat that a bottom-of-the-barrel GOP pol could easily win — but Bannon dug below the barrel.
Bannon’s next stop? The Joe Arpaio losing campaign?
He doesn’t care about the candidates — he cares about the donors. And the money isn’t for campaigns; its for him and whatever crazy “new kind of network news” or whatever he believes he’s going to create. Trump and Moore were always just stepping stones in his scheme — like (to over-use the metaphor) the Gotham crime lords were to the Joker; tools to use and then overcome.
That market is teeny and crowded.
Agreed. I never said he didn’t have delusions of grandeur. But then, to be fair, going from a seedy website to the Oval Office and the cover of TIME would give anyone delusions of grandeur.
Sort of like Palin only Bannon’s return trip ticket is on a super-express with no intermediate rest stops.
At least Palin was an elected official! I don’t know what the fuck Bannon is.
LOL — a creature of the deep that latched onto the tail of an improbable winner. So improbable that he didn’t have to compete with others to latch.
Sloppy Steve is about to go to Snitchin’ Steve in a hot minute, so I’m sure we’ll be hearing from him again plenty:
Bannon Lawyers Up; Russia Investigators Ready to Pounce
Same attorney as McGhan and Priebus.
The “pouncers” are the faux House investigation, not the real Mueller investigation, so it’s not clear what this means.
I wouldn’t be surprised if, when this whole Trump episode ends badly for the Republicans, they find a way to legitimize Bannon as the guy who somehow forewarned, or tied to. At that point, Republican interest in whitewashing the reality of wholesale complicity will align with Bannon’s interest in promoting Bannon.
This isn’t a prediction. In fact, I’d say it’s still farfetched. The future is impossible to see. I just wouldn’t be surprised if Republican interests align once more with those of old Darth Bannon.
Like a bad penny.
No he won’t. Bannon is in exactly the same position that many RW shithead politicians are in: They have LOTS of competition waiting impatiently in the wings. They have no distinguishing features EXCEPT the appearance of power. Without the $$$ and face time that comes of being an incumbent (or incumbent advisor as it were), you are just another Michael Savage crying in the wilderness.
Sessions will NEVER be elected to an office in AL again. He’s used goods and there are newer faces that say the same things.
Rick Perry is dead meat. Not that he was living that high to start with, but now? Fuggedaboutit.
The rest of the Trump crew? Haley .. no future in SC. Ben Carson .. never really had a future anyway. Tim Price .. thrown under the bus and is not expected to live. Dan Coats .. too much competition back home to overcome the “I’m no longer an incumbent” disadvantage.
Not with the same swiftness, but the GOP did a similar bail on Roy Moore, then quietly reinstated him into their good graces. A boot-licker like Bannon…he’ll find a way to weasel his way back in somewhere. He probably knows where some of the bodies are buried.
While Bannon’s quick banishment may be remarkable I don’t find it nearly as remarkable as the lack of follow up on the MSM of the ignoramus obviously not knowing the words to the Anthem at teh ballgame the other night. Had that been Obama, the right wing would have put the country up on sticks for months on end. They turn my stomach.
Right? They couldn’t even handle it when Obama wasn’t wearing a flag pin. But It’s Okay If You’re A Republican.
I never understood why anybody paid any attention to Bannon. Indeed, I wondered why anybody ever hired him. As somebody pointed out, he looked like he stayed up all night watching porn and then the alarm clock went off fifteen minutes after he went to bed. Same way I don’t understand why anybody pays any attention to Ted Cruz. I have never seen reported anything he said that was smart. Now that may just be because the media only report the dumb stuff he says, but so many people claim that everybody who has to deal with him hates him. how did he get so successful in politics? The world does not seem to work the way it is supposed to.