Trump To His NSC: "Peel Me a Muslim, Would You?"

Our narcissistic president does stupid shit because someone got to him and told him something that he chooses to believe, or which tickles his fancy, which is about all the concerted cogitation that the man can expend before taking potentially disastrous steps. That's what you put into office, America.

“I have spoken, as recently as 24 hours ago, with people at the highest level of intelligence and I asked them the question: does torture work?” he told ABC reporter David Muir. “And the answer was: yes, absolutely.”

People at the highest level of intelligence is one of those dismal Trumpian bites of word salad that might mean something but probably don't, because the man wouldn't name who those "people" were. We know by now what "many people are saying" means, which is squat.

So our president it talking openly about torture and how he's inclined to do it.

With that as hors d'oeuvre, what should "spill into public view" early yesterday but a draft Executive Order advocating  the reinstatement of CIA "black sites," secret prisons around the world where we, the American commonwealth, famously tortured prisoners under the presidency of Dick Cheney. The draft Executive Order evidently came out of Trump's National Security Council (NSC) and was distributed via email (oh boy!) to NSC members. I cannot for the life of me imagine that such a thing got written and distributed without the express or tacit approval of Trump.

The Trump people are embarrassed about the leak (as they should be!), are denying that they or anybody they knew wrote the thing or caused it to be circulated, but anonymous White House sources are saying the denials are simply a lie. Trump's people are embarrassed but not Trump. He goes on national tv and brags he's up for some torture as soon as his cabinet-level guys ask for it. And it'll be the best torture, like no one has ever tortured before. The best!

Gen. Michael Flynn,
Trump's NSC advisor

Whatever happens -- and so far (at least, for public consumption) Trump's Sec. of Defense and his new CIA director say they will not participate in torture -- whatever happens and ends up coming out into public view, we have a sonovabitch as president who is capable of absolutely anything, especially depending on who was the last sonovabitch who told him something he liked hearing.

Because he himself is incapable of thinking with any human insight or foresight or just plain sight that doesn't involve gilded walls and trophy wives.