Early Thursday, reports emerging form the New York Times revealed that a plan is in the works at the White House to oust Secretary of State Rex Tillerson from his post, replacing him with CIA Director Mike Pompeo, and replacing Pompeo with Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR).
As the White House and State Department were grilled on the plan by reporters, an initial blanket denial of the scheme quickly gave way to admission that the White House had deliberately leaked the plan to the New York Times as a way of “sending a message” to Tillerson about their increased hostility toward him.
Ironically, as this was going on, Gen. John Kelly, the White House Chief of Staff and apparent author of Tillerson’s ouster, was calling the State Department and assuring them that it wasn’t the case. In the end, officials would only say that no final decision has been made, and Trump absolutely refuses to express any public confidence in Tillerson any longer.
Tillerson’s position was long believed to be tenuous, with Trump undercutting his diplomatic efforts at every opportunity, and reportedly getting cozier with Pompeo, a hawk who has been largely critical of diplomatic efforts throughout his career in politics.
Tillerson assured North Korea the US didn’t seek regime change, Trump declared Tillerson to be “wasting his time” on diplomacy, and Pompeo has been advocating aggressive moves against North Korea, which fit more neatly into Trump’s “totally destroy North Korea” threats.
The loss of Tillerson might be felt abroad quickly, however, as he’s been fairly popular overseas, putting serious work into try to do damage control for Trump’s behavior. The administration was unlikely to appreciate all that Tillerson was doing to keep the international community at least sort of calm amid Trump’s screeds, but may feel his absence when Pompeo is America’s top diplomat.
Sen. Cotton taking over the CIA is also likely to be controversial, as Cotton is an outspoken supporter of torture. This too is likely to earn him favor with President Trump, who has repeatedly claimed torture “works,” despite assurances from experts to the contrary.
Good grief.
The Fed & International Bankers are purposefully boosting the US Economy so that Trump gets cocky (and careless) enough to place dangerous Neo-Cons & Warmongers in control of CIA & State Dept – recipe for World War 3.
Moving out Tillerson and moving in Cotton is a defensive move against the 25th amendment. Cotton is unlikely to support removing the President for mental incompetence when he’s crazier than the President is.
Torture “works”? It breaks the soul of all those who do it, condone it or suffer it. Kinda tells you who Mr. Trump is.
You must have a soul to begin with in order to break it.
Ha! Rims-hot!
thankyou, thankyou…I’ll be here all week.
The world watches as a mentally ill, marginally elected president slowly walks his people to war and infamy in the name of his misplaced sense of power and personal greed. Trump is becoming the Bond villain. Except it isn’t Spectre, but Trump’s America that wants to blackmail the world.
Let’s review – Tillerson is extraordinarily conservative. I recall supporting a pretty vigorous campaign to stop his appointment to the highest diplomatic job. The fact that he has been doing this job, and with some success, is pissing Trump off. The GOP usually maintains unity, to a fault. This level of public internal discord makes it hard to imagine that Tillerson will stay for long. And without him, the prospect of another Korean War goes from just foolish posturing to near inevitability. Will WWIII start because Trump can’t stand being called a moron?
That would be pretty petty…so, yeah, youbetcha.
I don’t think Russia and China will be in favor of USA attacking N Korea any more than they were in favor of NATO destroying Yugoslavia , Iraq Libya or Syria . Only difference now they are prepared to act on what they want ..
Is this part of “MAGA?”
It appears that you bothered to read the NYT because how else could you know what the issue is about?
My take of the NYT is its motto: “All the News that is Print to Fit”. It means that the NYT does not always lie but that its choice of news ought to fit its philosophy which creates biased news.
Since the “Saddam has a nuclear arsenal” was sold by all but some leftist news outlets, tell me which journal/newspaper I can safely read and which TV channel safely watch today. FOX?
“4000 dead” makes an excellent and simple point. Please do not obscure it, Dieter. The NYT peddles fake news on important matters, and it has “fired” Tillerson several times before. Let us wait and see.
If Tillerson is fired, it will be a disaster because Tillerson is the one who leads the forces in favor of negotiations with the DPRK and also with the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Let us wait and see what happens. I fear that the indictment of Flynn will bring further pressure on Trump to bend to the neocons and progressocons and dump Tillerson.
p.s. Some of the name calling in Ditz’s piece amounts to cheap shots reminiscent of the MSM. Not up to his usual standards.
This has been ongoing for some time and it hasn’t been limited to the NYT.
Of course it is not limited to the NYT. NYT, WaPo lead the way and the rest of the MSM follow. Look back to how the fiction of Iraqi WMD was put over on the American people.
Are you for real? I have a problem believing someone who reads this site could be ignorant of how all this works.
What in the f**k is your problem? Are YOU for real? There was no reason for you to interpret what I said the way you did. I was only pointing out that it was old news and wasn’t limited to the NYT. Somehow that means I buy into the MSM bulls**T?
Sorry if I got you wrong.
Trump only wants YES MEN, and it’s become painfully obvious that since he’s become President, he himself is a YES MAN to the MIC/NWO.
I remember people saying that Trump’s appointees were all just temporary so he could quite the neocon crowd. I remember specifically this being the case with Nikki the biatch. Lo and behold his replacements are turning out to be even more neocon leaning than the originals. So much for that.
We would have been better off with Mitt Romney.
You “remember people saying” ….
Is that even worth writing down?
Apparently I thought it was. I’m sorry if it offended you to the point you thought it was worth writing down what you wrote down.
It seems the only people safe from Trump in the White House are the Zionists.
“As the White House and State Department were grilled on the plan by reporters, an initial blanket denial of the scheme quickly gave way to admission that the White House had deliberately leaked the plan to the New York Times as a way of “sending a message” to Tillerson about their increased hostility toward him.”
What is this? Heathers? The next Secretary of State should be Shannen Doherty. I’m pretty sure she believes in torture too.
It is really interesting how much faith we put in a President’s ability to run anything, never mind a country. The fury after the election, the protests, Russia and what not, has been gradually morphed into ever tughter contril of the president. The process was systemic snd ruthless, while making sure that it all appears his doing. It is amazing how we do not notice obvious. Trump’s plan to give military more power looked like a good plan to take Cingress out of foreign policy. But it backfired when Kelly stepped in. From that point on, he is not allowed to have access to infirmation outside what is approved. Nobody can see him, not even Kushner. Kelly stated that Kushner reports to him. Having taken Trump completely out of decision making process, he is allowed ti randomly vent. Trump’s only choice — Tilllersin will be pushed out, and the old, fired hands will be back at State. Trump election proves several things. One, President can be destroyed easily, as everybody has a family, or a business. With the complete control of the oress, Congress, financial institutions — president is nobody. Except he is good for oratory skills like Obama to make the stench of imperial hubrus snell fragrant. And now have a character who threatened to upend all their power, and now they will use him beautifully — he will be the one responsible for all their nastiness. They made Trump give soeach to Tea Party — ling time ago put under total Republican neocon control. Everybody that paid attention to the campaign knows very well that it all hinged on the change of foreign policy. Getting America going required complete change, and this was articulated in Foreign Policy Strategy paoer if April 2016. It was repeated over and iver in hus campaign, and in at least two speaches. His Syrian plan for ISIS was immediatelly ignored, and Hillary’s plan with Kurds put in place. Even though he was obligatory very devoted to Israel, he is being nicely blocked on every turn when it comes to pushing for peace plan. His grotesquely over the top Nrth Korea pronouncements have twice stopped the neocon push — as democrats were anxious not to publicly endorse the nastiness — but Trump is now being portrayed as THE decidion maker, so nastiness is now OK. Is somebody going to argue that Congress who voted against Trump already on a number of occasions suddenly is powerless to stop expansion of authority in Syria, staying in Iraq against Iraqi will — cannot curb an attempt to start war in Korea? Nuclear war is what neocons want — they have screwed up the economy of this country, got addicted to money making through global wars — and are looking gor a BIG gamble to create glibal crisis — so we will forget their crimes, while pointing finger at an ideal fool who thought that having votes in sn election is all it takes to change the machinery put jn place by neocon deep state.
We will see what will happen in military ranks – thise active military and veterans that voted to stop the madness of wars, and for a change in priorities ftom wars and nation building — to domestic economic revival. The military top — Mathis, Kelly, McMasters Do not reflect the opinions of the force. The arrogance is breathtaking.
Voted Trump… Got Clinton.