Few can call me a fan of our current President. And just as few can call him a good President. Earlier in the week we wrote about impeachment and how the pressure is mounting up. Today I wanted to write about how Trump is continuing to play the media as he squirms his way through questions and his explanations.
The current strategy is to face the question of asking for help from a foreign government head on. Much like he did during the 2016 campaign, when he asked “Russia, if you are listening find the lost emails…”, he is claiming this is OK. Most recently, he’s asked China for help and earlier in the week the NYT reported a similar request to Australia’s prime minister.
The approach is smart, though not novel. If I have noticed this, so have the media. The media, however, behaves as though they have never seen this. So when Trump switches his strategy, you see reporters and correspondents switch their questions. They do this because there are repercussions if you do not switch up with the President.
Take for instance the reporter that was questioning Trump during the meeting with the President of Finland. That reporter asked Trump what he was expecting to get out of the conversation with the President of Ukraine. Until that point, Trump had not finalized his current “face it full-force” and “anti-corruption” strategies. Until then, the strategy was there had been nothing wrong with the call in the first place (remember? A perfect call). That reporter was chastised by Trump and though he stood his ground, he was not able to get nothing else out of it. Reporters know this and are faced with a decision; stick it out and never get called again, or play the game and hope Trump snares himself when you ask him a question.
The latter is wishful thinking. Trump is a professional liar and conman. He will NOT snare himself when you ask him a question he expects. He is the one that controls the agenda and if there is one thing a conman knows is how to answer a question he expects.
The impeachment train continues to chug along. If the house votes and passes articles of impeachment, it will go to the Senate. There, I am almost certain it will die. Until this happens, however, I can assure you that we are going to learn many more illegal things this President has done. And worse, he will create a blueprint for future leaders to follow in his corruption.
