Trump: Clueless Negotiator

Another day, another story of how oblivious Donald Trump is. This time he was bragging to the Russians about firing James Comey:

President Trump told Russian officials in the Oval Office this month that firing the F.B.I. director, James B. Comey, had relieved “great pressure” on him, according to a document summarizing the meeting.

“I just fired the head of the F.B.I. He was crazy, a real nut job,” Mr. Trump said, according to the document, which was read to The New York Times by an American official. “I faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.”

Mr. Trump added, “I’m not under investigation.”

Trump sounds like an underling bragging to his boss about what a bang-up job he's doing. Not a great look for someone who's trying to not seem like a Russian puppet.

Trump told the Russians this the day after he fired Comey (as well as leaking Top Secret code-word intelligence from Israel). Meanwhile, the Internet and all news media were exploding with the story of the firing, making it clear to anyone who was breathing -- and the Russians in particular -- that no pressure whatsoever had been relieved by Comey's firing, and the move had totally backfired.

Has Trump ever sounded more clueless?

One of Trump's guys still tried to spin this blunder into gold:

A [...] government official briefed on the meeting defended the president, saying that Mr. Trump, whose discursive speaking style has hindered him in office, was using a negotiating tactic when he told Mr. Lavrov about the “pressure” he was under. The idea, the official suggested, was to create a sense of obligation with Russian officials and to coax concessions out of Mr. Lavrov — on Syria, Ukraine and other issues — by saying that Russian meddling in last year’s election had created enormous political problems for Mr. Trump. 

How naive are these people? Trump just made himself look like a fool by saying that firing Comey took the pressure off him, when the exact opposite was true. Trump looks even weaker and more foolish as his presidency is spinning faster and faster out of control.

Then told Lavrov he wasn't under investigation. A week later a special counsel was appointed, the former FBI director who brooks no nonsense. And now an advisor very close to Trump is suspected of directly colluding with the Russians. It sounds like it's Kushner, Sessions or Tillerson (my money's on Kushner, who has a history of playing pattycake with Russians and has been very cozy with Kislyak and Russian bankers).

Trump made himself look weak, stupid, oblivious and foolish right in front of the Russians. Does he think they'll take pity on him and give him something concrete because his administration is collapsing?

It's more likely that they'll put even more pressure on the weakened Trump, extracting hard-core concessions from the United States on NATO expansion, Ukraine and Syria and giving Trump purely cosmetic wins.

Because Trump is so weak and desperate to make it look like he's winning, the Russians have a huge negotiating advantage. Trump does not get it: any kind of deal that he makes with Russia will always be suspect because he's under investigation for colluding with Russia. Trump has been forever tarnished by acting as Putin's lapdog.

Most likely we'll see another gimmick like the bombing in Syria: after Syrian dictator and Russian puppet Bashar al-Assad used nerve gas on civilians, Trump had a Syrian airport bombed. But Trump warned the Russians before the bombing! Mere hours later Syrian warplanes were targeting civilians again.

Trump's "decisive" action against Syria was just for show and didn't hurt the regime at all.

Russia will want to draw out Trump's drama as long as possible to press their advantage, while pulling more dirty tricks in German election, creating confusion everywhere in the western alliance.

With this kind of negotiating "skill" it's no wonder that Trump drove four of his businesses into bankruptcy.

The longer Trump is in office, the longer the chaos will continue, and the more power Russia will accrue. The war in Syria will drag on. Russia will target anti-Assad forces and leave ISIS terrorists alone. More people will die in Syria and the mass exodus into the rest of the Middle East and Europe will continue. ISIS will infiltrate more terrorists into Europe and the United States.

Because that's been Russia's goal all along.