​The other day, I wrote on social media about an interview with Steve Witkoff, another of Trump’s billionaire members of his administration with no experience in his field of government service.  He’s a real estate investor and developer, real estate lawyer, and founder the Witkoff Group that deals with construction and rehab.  When taking office in January, Trump appointed him to be Special Envoy to the Middle East, and now to Russia and Putin.  Because…who knows?  He plays golf with Trump, and perhaps that qualifies as much as any reason.  (Hey, Trump appointed Fox host Mark Hegseth to run the Defense Department.  And see how well that’s worked out so far.
 
But back to his interview.  What stood out – and how could it not? – was when Witkoff said about Putin, "I just don't see he wants to take all of Europe...I take him at his word in this sense. And I think the Europeans are beginning to come to that belief, too. But it sort of doesn't matter."

File this under:  Monumentally naive and problematic dangerous.​ 

“I take Putin at this word” is a phrase that probably no American diplomat has ever used out loud, or even thought.  And the Witkoff follows that up immediately in his next sentence by suggesting that Europeans – who are so terrified of Russia’s plans for expansion that they’ve not only taken up the slack of funding Ukraine after U.S. support has dried up, but held an emergency defense conference in London without the United States involved – supposedly agree with him about Putin not wanting to take all of Europe.  A concept that’s almost inconceivable.  And the only reason it’s “almost” inconceivable is because what is inconceivable is his sentence after that – “But it sort of doesn’t matter.”  (I do love his “sort of,” as if that softens his idiotic statement and makes it palatable.  But no, it’s sickening, and one can’t even imagine European reaction when they read it.)  Three totally disqualifying, horrific, and terminally naïve sentences in a row.  That is some trifecta.

And add that there was of course no outrage or even anger by any MAGOPs in Congress, who are complicit in enabling every bit of un-American or naive or idiotic or fascist tripe that comes out of an anyone in the Trump administration.
 
After writing about this online, my longtime friend (as in “since grade school”) Don Friedman replied with a few possibilities of what Witkoff might have meant.  It was thoughtful and interesting, as conversations with Don always are – and I only wish that Witkoff had Don’s erudition.  But I disagreed with all those as possibilities.  Because this was Team Trump, after all – and the discerning insight of a Don Friedman does not stretch as far as Trump World.
 
To explain himself, Don wrote back:  “I float this as a possible explanation for his statement, but of course I have no idea whether that's right or whether he's just parroting Trump's beliefs or whether he's just an imbecile. I suspect it's the latter. I read elsewhere that, when he met with Putin, Putin kept him waiting for hours, which suggests Putin thinks he's an imbecile too (as well as his boss).”

I understood Don’s perspective completely. But I think the answer is pretty basic, and only one of the options he stated:  that Trump officials parrot his beliefs -- and orders. Witkoff might be an imbecile, too, in diplomacy, but that's only a byproduct.

Side note:  Supporting the "Witkoff is a diplomatic imbecile" byproduct concept, it was reported yesterday by Politico that (based on flight data) one of those government officials on the group chat texting classified war plans on an unsecured app without noticing a journalist invited by mistake...was actually in Moscow!! In fact, he was added to the group chat before meeting with Putin in the Kremlin. And that person was -- say it all together -- Steve Witkoff!

As I’ve discussed with Don, I know that he as an accomplished lawyer likes to look at all sides carefully to discover the evidence and balance the possibilities in uncovering the truth. But me, I just have long-since given up twisting myself in knots trying to divine the meaning behind what reprehensible things come out of the mouths of Trump and the officials who support him. "What he actually meant..." has become an empty bucket to me, with a hole in the bottom. Not only because it only serves to drag one down a tangled, dark cavern -- but also because we too often see that the actions that follow Trump and his minions’ words show they pretty much meant exactly what they said. And ultimately at this point, they've long-lost getting the benefit of the doubt. And if there is confusion in meaning, it's up to them at this point to explain it, not me or others to try hopelessly figure it out. (And by "explain" it, I mean clarify the truth -- not figure out some lie that can hopefully get them out of a disastrous mess.  Like “I didn’t know about it” or “I don’t know him.”  Or…worse -- )

One current example: the other day, Trump said he didn't sign the order invoking the Alien Enemies Act of 1798  to deport immigrants to El Salvador. When the actual document was found with his actual signature, the White House literally tried to say that "What he really meant was that he didn't sign the original order that created the law in 1798."
 
Yes, really.  That’s what I mean by just using words to lie doesn’t count as an “explanation.  Especially a lie that’s the equivalent of a six-year old child standing by a cookie jar with crumbs on his face saying, “I didn’t take a cookie.”
 
(And then adding, when asked to explain the cookie crumbs, “I meant I didn’t take a cookie in 1798.”)

And we're now seeing the result of MAGOPs who for years "reinterpreted Trump" and said, "Libs listen to what Trump says, but we listen to what he means." (Which always gets me rolling my head thinking how empty you must be to vote for someone as president who you can’t trust what he says.)  This is why we hear so many Trump voters now saying how they regret their vote for him in 2024 because they didn't think he meant what he said.  During all that time they tried to reinterpret what he “really meant” so that it fit their nice, false worldview and could claim they weren’t really fascist.  Without bothering to find out what “fascism” was.
 
Honestly, I’m not sure if Trump always knows what he means.  So, anyone else trying to explain it is on a fool’s errand.  It's an exercise in futility.
 
And trying to figure out what a Trump lackey really meant falls into the same trash bin.  The only starting point that anyone can truly count on is that they meant whatever it was Trump told them to say.
 
And in the end, they – like all the MAGOPs in Congress – make Trump’s words and policies and rants their own.  As they enable them and are complicit in everything.

If you didn't see Jon Stewart's Monday hosting of The Daily Show, his Main Story was about the egregious MAGOP hypocrisy when it comes to free speech.

I was SO glad to see it, since it's one of my big bugaboo's and something I've written about.  He hit all the points I've noted -- and more.  And much better and far funnier.
​

 
As numbingly reckless as the mess (the very polite term) is with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, in which Trump officials were not only discussing detailed war plans on an unsecured texting app -- but also accidentally invited a journalist into the group chat -- I love that it at least is getting the massive attention it deserves, including calls in Congress for an investigation (at least called for by Democrats, silence by the supposed national defense-loving MAGOPs), rather then being swept under the rug, overshadowed by other Trump disaster stories.  This is the Trump administration Disaster Story of the Day.

Oh, I should note Defense Secretary Hegseth's chat group discussing sensitive war plans over an unsecured text app included VP "Vance," Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and White House Chief of Staff Susan Wiles.  The gang that couldn't govern straight.
 
Beyond just the ghastly sloppiness of such an action and danger it risked putting the lives of military personnel in, as well as naming an active CIA agent, and the inclusion of operational details of strikes against Yemen, what the story overlaps with, too, is the Constitutional issue that it’s Congress who declares war, not the White House which the officials’ discussion suggests, the potential criminal issue of passing classified material on mobile phones outside of a protected SCIF (which doesn't allow mobile phones that could have malware or be hacked), and also the intense hypocrisy of MAGOPs weeping tears at Hilary Clinton using private email...while this, on the other hand, was discussing actual war plans!
 
Man, who could have imagined seeing this happening with Pete Hegseth…?!  The Secretary of Defense with zero experience running an organization anywhere near the size of the Pentagon, the former Fox TV host, the accused rapist, the guy whose mother wrote him about his irresponsible behavior, the guy who had such a widely-known drinking problem that he had to promise he wouldn’t drink if he was confirmed to be Defense Secretary – because, yeah, that’s how stopping a drinking problem works.
 
And what was Hegseth’s response when asked about the security breach?  No, not calling for an investigation into how this could happen and if there were any ramifications of it.  Instead, he made a rant attacking what he called this “so-called reporter” who he claimed writes hoax stories.  Never mind that The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg is a long-admired journalist and editor of the magazine – and that even the White House confirmed the breach.  Never mind, too, that Goldberg patriotically left out of his article all the specifics of the attack that he heard.  And even quit the chat group when he was able to confirm that it was real.

Trump, on the other hand, pled his traditional "ignorance."  Not terribly unbelievable, given the source, though still improbable given the national security risk.  And ludicrous to claim it since it's more damning if true that he wasn't told.  (But then, of course, he knew.  After all, in response to Trump's claim, Jeffrey Goldberg has said, "I alerted the White House shortly after 9 in the morning.")

Almost more adorable is Trump saying that National Security Advisor Mike Walz, the one who accidentally invited reporter Goldberg into the group chat, had "learned his lesson."  As if this was a third-grader caught calling a classmate a mean name.  And coming from someone, found guilty of 34 felonies, twice found liable of rape, and been impeached twice who has shown he has no concept of "learning his lesson."
 
Mainly, though, what I love most is that this adds to the perception that the Trump team is wildly incompetent and out of control.  And this is something very easy for the public to grasp – discussing war plans over an unsecure texting app and including a reporter by mistake.
 
Of course, there are many other serious issues at play here, high among them whether the chat group broke the law in what they were doing. 
 
“Most certainly it did,” said Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee. “And it reflects a general sloppiness and negligence in the whole approach of the administration as they've gotten started here.”
 
Raskin went on --
 
“If you look at what the underlying plan was, it's Congress that declares war on Venezuela or on Yemen. It's not the President of the United States. So it's both this tremendous operational negligence and sloppiness that has been shown, but also the idea that they act in complete defiance of what the Constitution says and what the rule of law stands for.”
 
And it didn’t escape Raskin’s memory of how this all overlapped with MAGOP “outrage” with Hillary Clinton.  “Well, it'll be child's play to go back and find all of the Republicans who were demanding congressional investigations, and that Hillary Clinton apologize and leave the campaign and so on, based over her handling of the information, most of which was not classified."  Unlike, well…y’know, discussing detailed war plans.  On an unsecured app.  With a reporter accidentally invited in.
 
The Hegseth breach transcends bizarre.  But it once again confirms the biggest problem Trump has:  that he is not surrounded by the best who can help him get out of the disasters the administration is creating.  He's surrounded by incompetents, with little to no experience, whose main qualification is kissing the feet of Trump and doing his bidding, no matter how incompetent, disastrous or criminal.

The other day, I posted a segment from the wonderful 1981 documentary about The Weavers, Wasn’t That a Time, culminating with their reunion concert at Carnegie Hall.  I was able to track down another segment.  This one focuses on Ronnie Gilbert, and begins with her and singer-songwriter Holly Near who talks about how influenced she was by Gilbert and her strong, soaring style.  And to drive that style home, the film cuts to a vibrant performance of Ronnie Gilbert singing lead with the other Weavers of “Nobody Knows You When You’re Down and Out” at a photo shoot for the concert.  But more to the point, the clip here leads to one of the more memorable sequences in the film, when Gilbert and Holly Near are just visiting one another and begin to sing an impromptu, extremely moving a capella version of one of Near’s song about the junta in Chile.