Are we asking the wrong questions about the OpEd?

[lunatica]

I don’t care who wrote it because I think it was a collaboration. I want to know why they wrote it.

What are they hoping to get out of it? What is their motivation?

I would look to those who want power for themselves. I wonder if their motivation is to just make Trump crazy or to stop him, not from screwing with us, but because he’s no longer useful to them. Once they have the Supreme Court locked down why would they need to keep him? He’s becoming a liability with his growing erratic behavior and they’ve gotten everything they wanted from him.

Why go public with this letter? What do they think will happen because of this letter? Despots don’t have loyal followers outside their own families, and Trump’s family would be useless because they have so far been less than useless. Trump doesn’t have friends. He has people he uses who he discards at will. This letter only serves to push him further into madness, and does nothing to help us. We might be falling for something just because we like to hear it.

Who stands to benefit from this? It was written by Republicans. And I don’t know of any Republicans who would give Democrats an ounce of power.

I’ll admit I’m jaded, but I’m no fool. This simply doesn’t make sense as anything other than to destroy Trump and wrest power from him. I don’t believe for a second that they care about the American people, and they sure as hell don’t care about Democrats or the Constitution.

We will see. There is certainly a conspiracy in the White House, but for or against what?

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. Maybe this:

Whoever wrote this, or participated in it, is a committed GOPer who supports GOP ideas and programs. They made that very clear. I think they are trying to keep Trump from jumping the rails and starting WWIII while propping him long enough to get tax cuts passed and regressive Supreme Court justices appointed. They are bringing the chaos and dysfunction going on in the WH to the attention of the public instead of trying to invoke the 25th Amendment (a long shot but why not try?) to cover their asses in case they do lose control and the whole thing goes south in a particularly terrible way. They can say, "Hey, we tried to rein him in..." and wash their hands of the whole mess.

[GetRidOfThem]

2. I have a theory

My theory is that this editorial is a cry for help. He, or she, or they want Agent Orange to go away. It is a call for checks and balances - it may be timed for the upcoming mid-terms.

"Yes, we are holding the fort, but we can only do so much so long! Help us out, get a Democratic House to provide checks and balances!"

Or, to the current Congress: "Do something!!!"

There is also another aspect that nobody is talking about: The House has been backing the Idiot like no tomorrow, coming up with excuse after excuse for his behavior and doing nothing. It has made the Republican party look dismally bad. This op-ed might be the first signs of cracks in the Republican foundation supporting Agent Orange.

It was a shortsighted move - the witch hunt to get whoever wrote this op-ed will make life pure misery in the White House, worse than it already has been. And all the staffers will be suspecting each other, and be afraid that even if they were not involved they may be ratted out by some opportunistic colleague. And the writer/writers are not getting they sympathy they were hoping for from establishment Republicans. They already knew all of this, they are supporting Trump, already threw their weight behind him, no matter how bad it gets.

[global1]

7. My Theory - Does Ths Silent Army In The WH Really Oppose Him & His Policies Or.....

are they there to knock off his rough edges and still promote the policies and wishes of the Repug Party?

Sounds to me that Trump is being used by this silent army to accomplish what this silent army wants him to accomplish. They use him to that end. They are actually glad when he goes golfing so that they can work unimpeded.

This silent army strokes his ego. They humor him. They don't mind sending him around the country to these rallies that he likes to do. They feel that the people put up with his lies and outrageous behavior at these rallies because this is what the people expect of Trump and what the MSM has made the public to expect.

Working in the background they protect Trump - because Trump gives them the platform to work for the Party, Hence we get the talk of tax cuts for the rich; we get the Repug Party stacking the Judicial Branch and we get the work behind the scenes with Congress to knock off ACA; SS; Medicare; etc.

All neat and clean. Trump is the front man - which he enjoys. He gets his name out there all the time - and for Trump even negative publicity is publicity. If things happen to go south on anything this silent army attempts - they conveniently blame it on Trump the crazy guy by saying "Oh you know - that's Trump for you".

Everyday I wake up and think - what is going to sink this guy today? What will make this week worse than the week he had last week?

When I first heard of this OpEd in the NYT's I thought - this is it. This will surely sink him. But what happened - the MSM is focused on who Anonymous is versus the message that Anonymous was trying to convey - that Trump is unfit to be president.

I thought that finally the Repug Congress will take action. But instead it now looks like this was a message to pacify the Repug Congress. It was telling them - yeah - Trump is unfit - but we got the situation under control - so trust us. That's why in my humble opinion - the Repug Congress hasn't acted to do anything about this OpEd and are content with the way MSM is taking it - basically this guessing game as to who Anonymous is.

So no - this OpEd didn't sink Trump. Perhaps it only made Trump look stronger. Look at how he approached it last night in Montana. Not volcanic. His head didn't explode. He did what he always does. He talks about and takes credit for the good economy that Obama left him. He promotes himself. He sets up his deplorables to take the hit for the 'blue wave' we hope to experience in Nov. And he goes off on his merry way.

This is followed up by - good job numbers this a.m. Kavanaugh's confirmation proceeding along and looking by the day more of a sure thing.

So yeah - Trump's unfit to be president - but the silent army is running this country in the style that satisfies the Repug Party.

Now if there was only some way that this silent army can change the 'blue wave' into a 'red wave' - they'll be set for achieving all that they've hoped and strategized to achieve as they set us up and the perfect storm hit us with the election of Trump in 2016.

[mercuryblues]

8. I believe the exact opposite

The writers made it clear they support far right policies. Trump will sign anything into law congress passes. So will pence, without all the distractions. Republikkklans have made it perfectly clear they will defend and support trump to infinity. Kavanaugh is the evilgelicals dream and pence would also support his nomination, full bore. trump is in office because republikkklans want him there. Full stop.

The letter is intended to assure voters that grownups are in the room, so vote for them or else.... they lose the majority and rightwing policies go away. If the writers actually gave 2 shits about democracy they will be lining up at Mueller's office door. And congress would have done their job and had full investigations into trump's abuse of power and brought him up on charges if warranted. All of them have done nothing.

[lunatica]

9. You're making a good case for the less you do, the more you benefit

To the Republicans Trump is the goose that lays the golden egg. But writing this OpEd gives them wiggle room if their plans backfire on them.

[mercuryblues]

15. How many articles have we read

about those working in the trump WH can't get a date or how it is a job killer on a resume? This LTE is also an attempt to say he is crazy, but we aren't so don't hold it against us, we are heroes! Martyrs, even!

Self serving dribble.

[genxlib]

3. It's an alibi

When the shit goes down, they want to be able to claim they were on the right side all along.

"Yes your honor, I was in the bank with a mask and a gun when the bank was robbed. But I was trying to stop that other guy..."

[0rganism]

4. reality show nation

the op-ed just completes the transformation
my theory:
it's there to enable Trump to suck all the oxygen out of the room for the next month or two while he purges the entire cabinet.
Trump wrote it himself with considerable help from CoS Kelly.

[dlk]

5. Pence is Getting Impatient to be President

[Anon-C]

6. Ok. It's siphoned coverage from the Kavanaugh hearings and has allowed Trump to conflate this OP-ED

...who, and what's behind it with both the Mueller Investigation and his political opponents. If OP-ED presents a constitutional threat - a line 45 is advancing - then he's manufactured his casus belli.

Also, if you look at things from a strategic military standpoint, having the appearance of ambiguity or opacity at the highest levels could be quite useful.

[lunatica]

10. All the replies here have been well thought out and quite plausible

This is why I love DU. Every theory is quite plausible and the theme running through the replies shows we’re using our heads. I love the people here!

[haele]

11. My theory - it's just another distraction from the actual crimes.

At best, it raises questions about the administration.
At worse, it's another form of gaslighting - the idea that somehow, the Randriods and GOP corporatist lick-spittles are "just hard-working regular" folks who care about their country more than they care about the ROIs on their investments while in reality, they sit in positions of power just so they can affect those ROIs.
And maybe Trump is becoming too much of a liability to the bottom line and they want to cover their own bases when they finally have to take him down.

Haele

[shanny]

12. to mix a few metaphors, they think the wheels are coming off

and they are building lifeboats for the rats. Notice the timing? The Senate is about to ram through a suitably horrible justice who will keep the court in conservative hands for decades, they already have their tax cut and there is nothing more the cretin can do for them, except f@ck things up with trade wars and broken alliances. So it is time to cut the apron strings.

[Towlie]

13. This is a popcorn moment. It's a major internal conflict that will help bring down the presidency.

It doesn't matter who the anonymous author is or whether he or she is good or bad. Since the person is conservative and works for Trump, it's a pointless distraction to complain about how unethical or unwise that person is because that's a given. What's important is that the op-ed is credible to the point that even Trump himself accepts that it did in fact come from one of "the best people" who work for him, and it's making him even crazier than he already is.

So, perhaps for the first time on this website, the smilie most relevant to current events is this one:

[WhiskeyWulf]

14. My guess

I think there is a group of people who want to remove Trump via the twenty-fifth amendment. But Trump would resist, and Congress would have to decide the matter. With the current makeup of the Congress, it would be difficult to get a two-thirds vote to keep the new acting president in charge, so I think the purpose of the op-ed was to increase public support for Trump's removal so people would pressure Congress to vote to keep him out.