What Will Trump's Fake-News Habit Mean in a Crisis?
A president is only as effective as his staff, and a story in Politico Monday helps explain why Donald Trump has been such an ineffective president. Shane Goldmacher writes:
While the information stream to past commanders-in-chief has been tightly monitored, Trump prefers an open Oval Office with a free flow of ideas and inputs from both official and unofficial channels. And he often does not differentiate between the two. Aides sometimes slip him stories to press their advantage on policy; other times they do so to gain an edge in the seemingly endless Game of Thrones inside the West Wing.
Goldmacher tells several anecdotes that show the problems of this information ecosystem. In one case, K.T. McFarland, the deputy-national security adviser, reportedly gave Trumpcovers, one from the 1970s, forecasting a new ice age, and another, more recent one focusing on climate change. The problem was that the older cover was a hoax. Other aides scrambled to intercept the president before he spoke or tweeted about the bogus story.
