The most serious crime in Washington, D.C.
SATURDAY, MAY 20, 2017 08:00 AM EDT
Trump has shaken the capital's social elite to it's core. This is his most dangerous game
LUCIAN K. TRUSCOTT IV
Watergate veteran Bob Woodward has been in Washington a long time. It actually makes me feel old to realize it was 45 years ago that he and Carl Bernstein, at the time two cub reporters at the Washington Post, were biding their time one night when a call came over the police scanner that there had been a break-in at the Watergate office complex down by the Potomac. You know the rest of the story — they brought down a president, wrote a couple of books together, Carl went off to New York and Bob bought a spacious house in Georgetown. If you look up the word “establishment” in the dictionary at the Library of Congress today, you’ll find Bob’s picture there. The word “august” comes to mind, and I don’t mean the month after July. In Washington, D.C. terms, Bob Woodward is a very Serious Man. Think tanks know his whereabouts on a hour-to-hour basis. Every cable news booker in town has his email address bookmarked in case there’s a major event. Washington hostesses have him on speed dial and jockey for position trying to get him to their dinner tables. The only thing Bob’s missing at this point is one of those bronze roadside markers at the end of the Key Bridge reading “Georgetown: Home of Bob Woodward.”
The “Morning Joe” show sends a big black car over to Bob’s place in Georgetown when there are Major Events that need commenting on, and Friday was one of those days. It had been a very, very busy week: Monday, North Korea test launched a new missile. Tuesday it was revealed that Trump shared “highly classified” information with the Russian foreign minister only a day after he fired FBI Director James Comey over his investigation into Russian governmental ties to the Trump campaign. Wednesday, The New York Times revealed that Trump had asked Comey to end his investigation into former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, and then later the same day, Robert Mueller was appointed Special Counsel to investigate Trump’s Russia ties . . . including Flynn! And to top it off, Fox News strongman Roger Ailes died. What do you do after a head-spinning week like that? Call Bob.
So Bob shows up on Morning Joe, and he’s in a swivet. On the agenda: Trump. “He’s giving all of us gas pains,” intoned Woodward, sounding, as ever, like he’s running for student council presence at his junior high back in Chicago. “He’s giving the whole world gas pains. But the fatal problem is . . . at least it could be fatal . . . is the chaos.” The Grand Old Man of Georgetown has seen presidents come and go, and he knows The Way Things Should Work. “All administrations come into office not knowing things,” explained Bob. But the various White Houses he’s covered get together, “and they make a plan, but these guys can’t plan the next five minutes. It’s chaos.” Willie Geist chimed in from New York, agreeing with Bob: “He’s an ad lib guy, and we have an ad lib presidency.”
Man was I glad I got up at 5:30 in the morning and tuned in to “Morning Joe,” because if I hadn’t, I would have missed out learning what the problem has been with Trump. For Bob Woodward, the problem with Trump is that he hasn’t been able to organize his White House. There is chaos in Washington, and my goodness! We can’t have chaos in Washington, because we might have to skip a cocktail party in order to cover some chaos breaking at 7:00pm just as the white-jacket waiters are starting to pass around the canapes.
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http://www.salon.com/2017/05/20/the-most-serious-crime-in-washington-d-c/
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