GONNA FIND OUT WHO'S NAUGHTY AND NICE
Here’s a scenario for you. An incompetent commander, in over his head, issues orders that will surely end in disaster. His subordinates decide to take matters into their own hands. The commander is easily distracted, and the subordinates meet with initial success. Then the disobedience becomes too obvious, and it’s apparent that a full-scale mutiny is going on. When the commander realizes what has happened, he rants and raves, vowing to track down the culprits and hold them accountable. Sound familiar?
I just described, in broad outline, the plot of THE CAINE MUTINY, which was based on a real historical incident in World War II. Lt. Commander James Marks took command of the Navy destroyer USS Hull in Seattle in the fall of 1944. His reputation as an inexperienced and incompetent captain preceded him, and reportedly led twenty sailors to jump ship in Seattle rather than sail to the South Pacific under his command. The fears of the AWOL sailors soon proved to be justified.
On December 17, 1944, Admiral “Bull” Halsey decided to “see what they were made of,” so he ordered Marks to steer the Hull into the teeth of a massive typhoon in the Philippine Sea. That nearly led to the first mutiny in the history of the United States Navy, as the crew begged their officers to relieve Marks of his command. But the officers refused, and followed the fatal order. Over 200 sailors died when the Hull capsized and sank in the typhoon.
Herman Wouk based his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel (later a film starring Humphrey Bogart) on the Hull incident. But in Wouk’s novel, the crew actually does mutiny against the Caine’s commanding officer, Captain Queeg. The leaders of the mutiny are court-martialed, but are acquitted when Queeg reveals his obvious mental instability on the witness stand.
Today, we’re watching Donald Trump pace back and forth on the deck of the Caine, raging about stolen strawberries. Or rather, about “TREASON,” in the form of disloyal subordinates. First, the New York Times published excerpts from Robert Woodward’s forthcoming book, FEAR. They followed up that bombshell with an anonymous opinion piece, allegedly by a senior member of the White House staff, asserting that many of those closest to Trump think he’s insane, and have been working behind the scenes to thwart his craziest schemes.
The most remarkable thing about Woodward’s book and the anonymous op-ed piece is how much of it we already knew. Similar stories appeared in Michael Wolff’s FIRE AND FURY last January, and again last month in Omarosa’s UNHINGED.
Hey, guess what? Donald Trump is dangerous and incompetent. He’s lazy and ignorant. He’s unfit to be president, and his staff doesn’t respect him. They don’t respect each other very much either, and leak embarrassing stories about their colleagues as well as about Trump.
Predictably, presidential spokesmen denounced and denied everything. And yet reporters covering the White House agreed that their own inside sources had been telling similar stories from the very beginning of Trump’s presidency. Off the record, of course.
The only new thing we learned this week is that some White House staff have actually mutinied. These mutineers aren’t Deep State operatives that President Obama embedded to thwart Donald Trump. No, Trump’s own appointees – the Shallow State, as some have called them – are the ones who have been countermanding his orders. And the cherry on top is that until one of them spilled the beans in the New York Times, Trump didn’t even notice.
But now that he knows, he’s damned well going to find out who stole his strawberries. Trump’s minions are dutifully issuing denials. Famous libertarian Rand Paul has proposed a classic libertarian response: make everyone in the White House take a lie detector test. Atlas Shrugged, and Jesus wept.
The question before us now is whether this mutiny is a good thing or a bad thing. I have mixed feelings about the situation. Depending on precisely what the mutineers stopped, it could go either way.
What is clear, though, is that the anonymous senior official who wrote the Times article is at least partly trying to cover his own ass (and those of his fellow mutineers). He/she/they know that their building is on fire and the roof will collapse soon.
They’ll crawl out of the wreckage and start looking for new jobs. They know that a stint in the Trump White House will look about as good on their resumes as a drunk driving conviction. Ah, but if they were secretly part of the Resistance! That would put everything in a different light. Adults in the room, and all that.
I come down on the side of exhausting legal options before staging a slow-motion coup d’état. Dude (or dudes, plural, including dude-ettes), resign your job, go public with your information, and demand that Congress do its duty. Impeach Mr. High Crimes and Misdemeanors. Or – as the anonymous senior official in the Times suggested – make the case for invoking the 25th amendment because Trump is mentally incapacitated.
Would either strategy work? Not the first time. But if there are a lot of you, maybe the cumulative effect would generate change. At the very least, it will build momentum for regime change, starting with the November 6 mid-term elections.
#NeverTrump Republican Rick Wilson put it this way in a tweetstorm last night.
A quick memo for #DeepStateThroat, the WH NYT Op-Ed writer. First, golf clap. Half marks. You know what you're doing in service to Trump is morally indefensible, but you're trying to "But Gorsuch!" yourself out of the ethical hole. This tells me you at least have some vague survival instinct and know that you need a marker on the board for when the walls close in for the last time. I want you to apply that survival instinct and look to the near future.
Three things are coming, two of which you're sure. A) You know the system of subverting Trump you boasted about is marginal and unstable. Your wins were small, and now they're utterly over. B) You know Mueller is coming, November is coming, and all the easy days are over. C) Most importantly, you're going to get caught. I know. You were careful. The burner phone. The off-campus only contact. The careful opsec. You're still going to be caught. It's ok. You should welcome it. It's your chance to do the *actual* right thing, finally.
Before they bust you out, you need to build an exit message plan. You need to have a stack of stories. I know you do. You need to go public, fast. Get into the daylight as quick as you can, not like Omarosa, but like a true whistleblower. Now, here's the hard part.
Your only value now is in pulling down the entire system. First movers? Book deal. Last? "Welcome to Arby's." The value of the tenth asshole from the WH who says, "I saw all this crazy, terrible, illegal, dangerous stuff and still tried to help" is exactly zero. No one in the WH will help you. No one there *can* help you. The edifice is crumbling, the King is mad, and no amount of tweeting, no rally, no Fox filibuster will save it. Run before they catch you. Tell it all. Save yourself, and help save the country.