Trump Gunning to Increase America's Nuclear Stockpile

NBC News is reporting about a July 20th meeting between President Trump and Pentagon officials in which he  expressed an interest in greatly increasing America's nuclear stockpile.  This exhortation was prompted by a slide which showed that America's nuclear arsenal was at its peak in the late 1960s, which Mr. Trump approved.  

Rather than interpret this approval as a desire for a ten fold increase from today's nuclear levels, military officials appreciated it as the Commander-in-Chief wanting to increase America's military strength. This is consistent with Mr. Trump's pre-inaugural predilection to increase and expand America's nuclear capabilities. 

But the episode revived questions about President Trump's familiarity with America's nuclear triad. 

At one of the early Republican primary debates in late 2015, Hugh Hewitt questioned Mr. Trump's knowledge about the nuclear triad. Candidate Trump fumbled through the answer but insisted that while it is key to be careful about nukes, he would be well informed once in office and would concentrate on American strength not climate change and global warming.

This impetus to increase America's nuclear arsenal comes in the midst of a prospective conflict with a nascent rogue nuclear North Korea as well as the prospect of finding Iran being declared out of compliance with the Obama Iran Nuclear Deal. 

Several concerns come from this National Security leak.  Allegedly, after this July meeting, Secretary of State Tillerson was heard to call President Trump a "moron".  Aside from the insult, this episode illustrates how far Rex Tillerson is out of step with the West Wing.  It is reasonable to believe that once the crisis with North Korea cools down, Tillerson will no longer be at Foggy Bottom. There has been serious talk of a Trump Cabinet shuffle which CIA Director Mike Pompeo would move over to the State Department. 

Some arms control experts vex that increasing America's nuclear stockpile would spur an arms race with the Russia Federation as well as the Peoples' Republic of China.   Moreover, increases would challenge America's international treaty obligations.

As news about President Trump gunning to increase America's nuclear stockpile leaked out, Trump National Security Adviser Lt. General H.R.  McMaster stated: 

"But in recent years, in particular, the problem with leaks has become a real challenge to national security and so I think what is very important is that everyone who is involved in these sort of policy discussions understand the sacred trust that is placed in them, and they realize that speaking to the media about government deliberations is treasonous when it involves national security." 

Those are bold words, meant to quell an alluvia of embarrassing leaks meant to damage the Trump Administration. But Lt. Gen. McMaster upped the ante by intimating treason.  The question is whether the Trump Justice Department will be all talk and no action.  Attorney General Sessions has allegedly demurred from seeking prosecutions of Democrats concerning  Hillary Clinton's repeated mishandling of classified emails. Treason is a much more serious charge and more challenging to prosecute. 

Appraising the Impact of Tillerson at Foggy Bottom

Over the weekend, Trump Administration Secretary of State Rex Tillerson was accused of saying that the President, his boss, was a "f***ing moron". This exasperated expletive was alleged uttered after President Trump's rousing remarks before the 2017 Boy Scouts Jamboree. When these comments came to public light, Tillerson held a news conference which denied that Vice President Pence needed to convince him to stay at Foggy Bottom because he never considered resigning.  It is notable, however, that Tillerson did not back away from the original insulting allegation. This has led pundits to ponder how long Tillerson will remain as Secretary of State.

In the Politico Magazine, Rich Lowry wondered if anyone would notice whether anyone would notice if Tillerson left his position at Foggy Bottom.  In the Trump Administration, foreign policy leads seem more driven from the Oval Office (or perhaps Twitter postings) than from Cabinet officials. Secretary of State Tillerson has voiced policy positions, particularly on Climate Change and Qatar, which seem at odds with President Trump.  Moreover, @POTUS Trump has posted Twitter thoughts which undermine Tillerson attempts to achieve diplomatic solutions with North Korea.

During his nomination hearings, Tillerson was vilified for his role at Exxon and connections to Big Oil. But through these petrochemical connections, Tillerson was said to have cultivated good relations with the Russian Federation.  It does not seem that Tillerson has neither been effective in lessening tensions with Moscow nor distancing the Trump Administration from accusations of Russian collusion.

One of Tillerson's virtues was that he had more of a business background than a political resume, thus his organizational skills might be different at Foggy Bottom.  Perhaps this may be true on paper, but Secretary of State Tillerson seemed reluctant to clean house at the State Department. In April 2017, well after his confirmation, Tillerson indicated that he was in no rush to fill nearly 200 State Department posts.  In August 2017, Tillerson announced that there would be fewer promotions at State. These may have been an attempt at pruning an overstaffed State Department, but it also gave the opportunity for Obama Administration holdovers to exert undue influence in Foggy Bottom.

One of the major motivations for many loyal Trump voters is to "Clean the Swamp". In other words, to divest power from progressive elites who have burrowed their way into the bureaucracy.  This is especially true in the State Department. But this is impossible to achieve if the chief acts like a short termer.  In late July 2017, Tillerson confided with friends that he did not expect to last a year on the job.  Notwithstanding his recent denial of resigning over the moron kerfuffle, Tillerson is not taking the broad measures to clean house. The Iran Deal is an example in which the State Department has been enthusiastic in promoting and preserving, yet it is in conflict with Mr. Trump's campaign promises as well as inklings from the West Wing.  A cabinet official who is deemed a short termer will have little sway with the bureaucracy in aligning with the President's foreign policy predilections.

Secretaries of State can take different tacks to their job.  Henry Kissinger, who was Secretary of State under Presidents Nixon and Ford, took a leading role in formulating the realpolitik and detente foreign policies.  George Schultz, President Reagan's long serving Secretary of State, did not seek the limelight and was able to earn the loyalty of State Department officers by staffing for professionalism rather than political concerns.  Hillary Clinton, President Obama's First Secretary of State, did her bosses bidding by racking up frequent flier miles in visiting diplomatic outposts rather than take the lead on foreign policy.

Aside from trying to shrink the size of the State Department by attrition and to stop relying on special envoys, it is unclear how Secretary of State Tillerson is making a difference at his job.  Moreover, the friction between Tillerson and Trump on personal and policy fronts, makes his position tenuous.





At a time in which Americans have been distracted by ephemeral issues like the NFL Taking the Knee during the National Anthem and dealing with disasters, such as hurricanes and the Las Vegas shooting, there are serious foreign policy concerns brewing.  North Korea continues to be belligerent.  The world will no longer buy the peace through bribes for worthless promises of non-aggression or denuclearization.  While the United Nations has applied additional sanctions, this does not seem to be achieving the objective of de-escalation of tension or DPRK regime change.





Considering a prospective conflict with North Korea, it would be unwise to have Secretary Tillerson leave his Secretary of State post at this time.  However, presuming this situation with the Kim Jung Un regime comes to a head in the near future, it would be prudent to have a Secretary of State who is more in tune with the Commander-in-Chief's expectations for Foggy Bottom and who more accurately reflects (at least in public) the President's foreign policy positions. 

Hillary's Hiding EMails Continues to Haunt Her Reputation for Honesty

Prior to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's (D-NY) formal campaign announcement, there were questions about her emails while at the State Department . It was revealed that Mrs. Clinton exclusively used a personal email (HDR22@clintonemail.com) stored on a private server during her tenure at Foggy Bottom.  Additionally, Mrs. Clinton only turned over her emails in late 2014 with paper copies of the work emails that she deemed relevant.

Of course, there are plenty of questionable things already associated with the email imbroglio. Only using a personal email account was highly irregular and probably insecure.  Mrs. Clinton's lame rationale about using only one device associated with an email was lanced when it was shown that Hillary used both an Ipad as well as her trusty Blackberry.  State Department policy requires immediate surrender of all work materials to an archivist, who then determines what is personal. It was odd that Hillary printed out emails for the State Department rather than the electronic originals (making it difficult to do computer searches).  Then there is the oddity of months longs gaps in emails including when  Mrs. Clinton traveled to Libya and was photographs of her using her Blackberry, there are no record of documents.  Hmm.


 Now it has been revealed that House Government Reform and Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA 49th) had sent a letter to the State Department on December 12, 2012 which specifically asked if the Secretary of State ever used a personal email account to conduct official business.  Uh oh.

Well, Mrs. Clinton resigned from the State Department February 1, 2013.  The State Department did not respond to the House Government Reform Committee until March 27, 2013 and their response merely was a copy of the policy that all State Department employees : “should make it clear that his or her personal email is not being used for official business.”.

While the Lamestream Media sought to create a frenzy for Hillary's Mystery Machine Listening Tour road trip to Iowa, Mrs. Clinton is slipping in the polls in key battleground states to Republican challengers.  Quinnipiac Poll Assistant Director Peter Brown attributes this drop to the perception that Hillary Clinton is a dishonest politician, which can be attributed to the continuing email embarrassment.

If convicted, an official who obstructs or destroys federal documents could be barred from office. It is almost inconceivable that an Obama Department of Justice (under Attorney General Eric Holder or the stalled nominee Loretta Lynch) would ever prosecute or seek to convict such a high profile progressive politician.  But there are no such strictures in the court of public opinion.  Hillary for America intends to raise $2.5 billion for their campaign.  But she who raises the most cash does not always win (sic). In 1980, Governor John Connally (D R-TX) was considered a great orator and had a distinct fundraising advantage.  In the end, Connally spent $11 million and only garnered one delegate. How embarrassing.  Actually, not as embarrassing as Hillary's continuing email embarrassments.

h/t: Hot Air
      John Cole 

Stop Being Such a Groober!

Dr. Jonathan Gruber, PhD, the wunderkind Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) economist who was the co-author consultant of Obamacare finally had a chance to explain his "stupid" comments on Capitol Hill.  Government Reform member Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC 4th) had said that: "[W]hen you have an insomniac with Tourette's Syndrome, you let him keep talking..." in reference to the glib Mr. Gruber coming to Washington.  The arrogant elitist from M.I.T. did not disappoint.

Dr. Jonathan Gruber, Ph.D testifying before House Government Reform Committee 12/09/2014

Congressman Jim Jordan (R-OH 4th) asked Mr. Gruber how much he earned from his consulting for the Affordable Care Act (a.k.a. Obamacare).  The ordinarily adroit academic amazingly could not remember how much Gruber garnered from his Obamacare contracts.  The reality is that Dr. Gruber earned $400,000 from HHS,  $2.1 million from the National Institute of Health (NIH), $1.7 million from the Department of Justice (DOJ), $100,000 from the State Department and there were other state contracts in conjunction to Obamacare.  It figures that such a smart economist did not want to go on the record for how much he bilked American taxpayers and then called them "stupid".

When Congressman Gowdy got around to questioning Dr. Gruber, Gruber was impeached by his prior statements. Gruber's smugly tried to squirm from his statements by claiming that he was trying to make himself sound smarter than he actually was.  That is about as believable as President Obama's promise: "If you like your health care plan than you can keep it."

As Gowdy promised when Gruber's "stupid" comments finally caught the national attention in mid-November, the former federal prosecutor asked Gruber if he was sorry because he said it or because he meant it.  The economist's answer was as credible as the rest of his testimony.

While the Feinstein Intelligence  Report condemning decade old interrogation tactics by the CIA might have provided sufficient public cover for the day, the American people are not fooled by throwing one academic under the bus..  As more insured individuals are thrown into Obamacare and the Cadallac health care tax comes into being,  smarmy  delay tactics from the District of Calamity (sic)  will not salve the ire of the American body politic.  

However, Republicans should not rest on their laurels.  The GOP won an impressive victory in the midterm elections under the banner of rolling back Obamacare.  If those words were mere wind, the wintery winds of discontent from the middle class can easily make those political gains from the GOP- Cocktail Party may well also be gone with the wind, presuming that voters resist being groobered by bread and circuses. 

h/t: Jeff Darcy