WaPo | Trump, if he keeps this up, is heading for a collision with both sides
of the aisle in Congress and constant political fencing with the
intelligence agencies. If Cabinet nominees support Trump’s pro-Russian
stance, they run the risk of getting blocked. And worse, if and when a
national security crisis hits, the intelligence community will have
every reason to let it be known that the president was out to lunch.
Trump seems determined to prove his critics right — he is not
temperamentally or intellectually up to the job. His family and closest
advisers had better tell him to get a grip, or his presidency will have a
rocky start and may never fully recover.
Sen. John McCain
(R-Ariz.) will begin a hearing on Thursday looking into the Russian
attacks on democratic elections. Witnesses will include James R. Clapper Jr., director of national intelligence; Marcel J. Lettre II, undersecretary of defense for intelligence; and Admiral Michael
S. Rogers, commander of the U.S. Cyber Command and director of the
National Security Agency. When sober, experienced officials begin laying
out the case against Russia, the public may fully appreciate just how
absurd Trump is being. His reflexive defense of Russia will rightly be
seen as anything but “America First.”
