The fired national security adviser engaged in intense coordination with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about military options against Iran ahead of an Oval Office meeting between the Israeli leader and Trump, two people said.
The episode has left some senior White House officials questioning the need for a traditional National Security Council and content to leave Secretary of State Marco Rubio, whom Trump on Thursday named as Waltz’s interim replacement, in a caretaker role for quite some time, a decision that will likely diminish an institution that has had a powerful role in shaping the foreign policy of modern presidencies.
Thinking back to Henry Kissenger, I not so sure this is a bad move. The National Security Advisor adds another conflicting competition between it and the Secretary of State. And our nation really doesn’t need an additional conflict with Ukraine & Gaza already on our plate. Time to show warmongers the door.
And kudos to the Pres for bringing back Signalgate into the news just as it was starting to die down some.
Also, apart from national security, the major issue of this group of clowns using Signal is the obvious avoidance of the Presidential Records Act provisions.
It’s funny you say that when they are talking about Attacking Iran in your article. It’s getting where the warmongers either don’t understand the definition or are clearly trying to blow smoke.
At minimum Signalgate was a careless blunder. How do you accidentally add a newsmedia person to an internal White House discussion? Yes, it immediately draws lots of media attention.
Was the leak intentional? How much careless incompetence can we tolerate? We certainly expect better.
Oh, didn’t you here that from a photo of Waltz phone he was using an app that would send all his Signal traffic to a repository where he could presumably preserve it … his plain text Signal traffic … i.e., if a foreign entity had bugged his phone, they would have access to all his Signal traffic despite the superb Signal encryption.
“How much careless incompetence can we tolerate? We certainly expect better.”
I certainly do not expect them to do any better. I fully expect that this admin continues to make a mockery out of security, and pretty much all other protocols and ethics that were a given in every other administration, regardless of party.
Not 1 previous admin was perfect, but compared to this ship of fools…
Is the “national security advisor” confirmed by the Senate? SecState is. If the advisor is not subject to confirmation, then the POTUS can appoint anyone he wants, to feed his impulses. iirc, Waltz is supposed to be nominated to take the seat at the UN. That seat is subject to Senate approval. Given the scandal, I would think that nomination is “dead on arrival”, unless TIG resorts to a recess appointment, to get around the Senate, the way #43 did, to put Bolton at the UN.
Many were concerned, but then we the people elected these scoundrels. I’m holding out for those who voted for this mess to publicly come clean and explain themselves. Political penance. Until that happens, there is no we the people.
Ayup. In an interview, a few days ago, the interviewer said words to the effect “people are saying they didn’t sign up for this”. TIG replied “they did sign up for this”.
This was/is the most obvious path/outcome of electing Trump. Anybody saying they’re surprised at what he’s doing is either willfully blind or lying.
But here we are.
Recent case study to compare this regime with is Brownback, former governor of Kansas who drastically “overhauled” Kansas. He failed, big time. It’s what I expect with current regime, if he’s allowed to proceed unchecked.
And it sure looks like Congress has given up their role in our system, so he just might be able to proceed unchecked.
People saying they didn’t sign up for what Trump is doing … well, I’ll leave it at that.
Only if you set Signal for that. One can choose any length of retention including no deletion. I do believe that the reporting is that at least one person did have it set for 7 days.
I doubt Brownback had the sense of self-entitlement of a real “JC”.
Recall, when asked, in 2020, if he would respect the outcome of the election, he said, repeatedly, he “would need to take a look at it”, as if it was up to his discretion.