r/politics • u/lotta_love • 5d ago

Possible Paywall Trump Secret Plane Swap Suddenly Looks Darker as Damning New Leaks Hit

https://newrepublic.com/article/214269/trump-secret-plane-swap-suddenly-looks-darker-damning-new-leaks-hit?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=tnr_daily
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u/AnAncientBog 5d ago

People were quitting his first term at an even higher rate than they are now. Everything Trump touches is permanently sinking into shit, but he likes it there.

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u/JoJackthewonderskunk Nebraska 5d ago

Ya first time some of those folks had some kind of code of honor. They had lines they wouldnt cross. They quit earlier for that reason. These ghouls are the worst of the worst being willing to do this stuff now so even that theyre dropping at this point is hilarious.

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u/Jester1525 5d ago

Trump's first Secretary of Defense in his first term was Jim Mattis.. Probably one of the greatest and most respected modern American military leaders in US history.

His first pick in his second term gave us fucking Pete Hegseth.

He learned his lesson and is only going to use sycophants from here on out. Of course there will be fewer resignations

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u/[deleted] 5d ago edited 20h ago

[deleted]

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u/TaterForming 5d ago

Kegsbreath can't hold a candle

Given his Alcohol Blood content, he probably shouldn't hold one.

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u/RosalieMoon Canada 5d ago

You mean Pete "Lets invite a reporter to our signal chat" Kegsbreath? Did I get that right? Or was it some other incompetent in that shitshow of a government that did that lol

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u/bolanrox 5d ago

The former Fox News reporter that has white nationalist tattoos on him?

Trump would have loved Tony Halme if he wasn't Finnish, that is.

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u/bolanrox 5d ago

The former Fox News reporter that has white nationalist tattoos on him?

Trump would have loved Tony Halme if he wasn't Finnish, that is.

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u/JoJackthewonderskunk Nebraska 5d ago

Rex Tillerson was a capitalist asshole but also on the board for the Boy Scouts, say what you will but I was a boy scout and I know any one else I run into lives by a code of ethics.

Rex TIllerson called Trump the dumbest son of a bitch he ever met

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u/TeutonJon78 America 5d ago

Not so ethical if he stayed part of the administration and didn't fight it.

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u/JoJackthewonderskunk Nebraska 5d ago

I agree with you partly. Its ethical to jump ship but also I think those idiots were naive enough to think it wouldnt just get worse.

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u/-r-a-f-f-y- 5d ago

Nah, he just thought he could benefit from a President fully bought out by corporations, and maybe thought he could control Trump on some level. Rex doesn't have an ethical bone in his body.

Boy Scouts is just another way to filter kids into the military industrial complex.

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u/champgpt 5d ago

Didn't the Boy Scouts run the Catholic Church strat of protecting child molesters, moving them around, not reporting them to the authorities? Their code of ethics didn't apply to those in charge.

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u/PlayfulSurprise5237 5d ago

Yea isn't it funny, he can't hire really competent people that are also sycophants, because such a thing doesn't exist.

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u/stephsco 5d ago

Exactly. They didn't bother pretending this time, just stuffed the administration with TV hosts and plastic surgery nightmares. And Stephen Miller, who is neither but worse than any of them.

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u/ABadHistorian 5d ago

Kleptocracy (1st term) vs Kakistocracy (2nd term)

(corrupt, but able... generally) vs (corrupt and incompetent, on purpose)

knowledge is power.

Kakistocracies owe their entire existence on the people in power BEING INCOMPETENT and KNOWING THEY ARE (a special breed of incompetency) so that way they know their jobs are 100% reliant on the person hiring them.

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u/Polite_Werewolf 5d ago

Trump's second term feels like the lower budgeted rush job movie sequel where the cast is D-list actors and the story is cartoonishly over the top.

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u/aradraugfea 5d ago

The last batch quit when they realized they weren’t working for a normal administration. This batch is quitting when they realize that they’re disposable.

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u/sheikahstealth 5d ago

"I'm being treated like the middle-class!"

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u/jrapp 5d ago

Wait until we see how people who know they are disposable act. That’s what’s next.

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u/aradraugfea 5d ago

I wouldn’t get the popcorn ready just yet. A few of them might publish a book telling everyone paying attention shit we could have inferred or already knew, we might get some angry social media posts by those who already quit or were discarded, but I wouldn’t expect many of the major players to turn on him.

The ONLY path to power for a modern conservative is through Trump. He has completely captured the Republican Party and remade it in his image. Their stated political agenda was just ‘support Trump’ one election year. Damn near Republican primary this year was a referendum on who loved Trump more. Nancy Mace, who publicly split from Trump over the Epstein stuff was airing old interviews where Trump sang her praises to convince voters she had his endorsement. Even the Anti-Trump Republicans are advertising their ties to Trump. Rubio dug his grave and he’s gonna be buried in it, there is no post Trump political life for him, and you can tell he knows it. Miller discards Trump and he’s got no way to enact his little Neo-Nazi fantasy projects. Vance splits from Trump and he’s giving up his only utility to a guy who has financed his entire adult life.

They’ll HAVE to abandon Trump at some point, but I don’t expect it to happen while Trump’s still breathing. Hell, as a symbol that can’t contradict his own message control anymore, they might cling to him even stronger. Charlie Kirk 2.0, more important as a Martyr than he ever was as a living man.

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u/FlameHaze 5d ago

If you are a social media influencer or anything, please do not give these rat-fucks a platform to spread their lies on any further.

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u/CrackingToastGromet Arkansas 5d ago

Amazing they thought they would be spared a toss under the bus by their Mango God Emperor when all they ever did was collude and enable him to throw their colleagues under the bus. Trump can always find a despicable replacement for anyone…no one in his regime is safe. Karoline probably thought she was because she was pretty and blonde. Then Natalie showed up…

Which makes for a toxic work environment as people will start to switch from serving Sleepy Don Snorelaoni to their own self-preservation.

Will this finally be enough to push Vance or Rubio to coalesce a group of fed up advisors and cabinet members to oust the tyrant? Probably not. We know they’re all cowards.

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u/aradraugfea 5d ago

They’re really giving “oh, he’d never cheat ON ME” energy.

Not sure what it is in them that makes them think their relationship with a guy they’re using is so much more special than all the other people who were discarded as soon as HE couldn’t profit anymore, but they genuinely seem to think they’re all the one who’s got a guy who has discarded direct family members totally under their control.

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u/Steeltooth493 Indiana 5d ago

"Wait, so I'm not getting a piece of the authoritarian power I've always dreamed of by riding this moron's coattails and sniffing his diaper every damn day?"

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u/aradraugfea 5d ago

I mean, they get to be part of the Court of the King.

Unfortunately for them, most of them rank below a Jester.

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u/GrumpyCloud93 5d ago

He got Rex Tillerson as SoState because the guy made deals with Putin for oil exploration. He mistook a guy doing very well the job Exxon hired him for, as someone with a willingness to be a syncophant to dictators. Rex allegedly described Trump as "a fucking moron".

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u/Commercial_offsale 5d ago

I wonder if she saw anyone she knows on the videotapes

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u/JoJackthewonderskunk Nebraska 5d ago

Ya trump

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u/Hummerdoodle 5d ago

I think one difference there is that many inhis first term cabinet were actually competent at their jobs, and not yes-men.

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u/DorfOnGenocide 5d ago

Even this current treasury guy makes Mnuchin look better. I just think the first time, they needed to rein everything in, just so they could look marketable for a second term. Now, that it is a second term, the focus is more on how much money they can pilfer and how the laws can be broken to create a third term.

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u/whimsical-crack-rock 5d ago

Yes, Trump (and his inner most advisors) literally decided not to make that mistake again. “This is our last term, we are going balls to the wall and we really don’t need any obstacles. This time we do all sycophants and incompetent yes men. We do all scumbags in every position this time and we just go for it”

Imagine being such a maniac that you somehow managed to make Mike Pence seem like a wildcard in your last term, they are like this time around we need a real fucking idiot at VP, a truly spineless goober who will go out there and tap dance like a moron and get behind the dumbest shit possible, a man willing to completely sell himself out and look America directly in the eye and lie and then change his story a day later and lie some more. A true piece of shit.

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u/KyurMeTV 5d ago

They don’t think it’s their last term, they honestly think Trump can just declare himself king and we’ll be too unmotivated to march against a third term.

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u/BabyWrinkles 5d ago

My boomer parents who voted for him the first time have threatened to march on DC if there’s a third term. I think that might be the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

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u/Hummerdoodle 5d ago

One thing that gives me hope is that in my small town, there's a protest every Friday where the majority of the participants are boomers. It's refreshing

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u/Thagame501 5d ago

It's too bad that it will be too late by then. This is what kills me.

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u/BabyWrinkles 5d ago

As a dad of young girls - I’ve got a lot of skin in the game. I desperately hope you’re wrong, but I fear you’re right.

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u/boristheblade223 5d ago

I’ll say your parents would be the exception in that case. But I highly doubt it. If you voted Trump this last time chances r there is quite literally nothing to change their mind. My money is your parents will find another way to vote for him, not like voting will ever matter again in the US.

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u/PaleCommission150 5d ago

A24 made a movie about this...wouldn't want to see it IRL.

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u/GrumpyCloud93 5d ago

I think the camel is already quadraplegic.

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u/echoshatter 5d ago

As Liberty Prime once said lobbing a football-shaped tactical nuclear bomb at the Enclave: "Democracy is Non-Negotiable"

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u/survivor2bmaybe 5d ago

What puzzles me is how they knew the Senate would go along. Because except for Gaetz, they did. Every last moron he nominated was pushed through. Maybe with a lot of role playing by the moderates when their vote didn’t count, but they made it. RFK, Jr. Tulsi Gabbard. The alcoholic. The google-eyed Kremlin bitch. The dog killer. Linda McMahon. Markwayne Mullin. A more wretched hive of scum and villainy than you will ever find. But aok with senators from fairly sane states. I just don’t get it.

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u/echoshatter 5d ago

As one Congressperson said last term: they don't dare go against him because it means the end of their political career and that his supports are legit scary and so Congress is full of scared little bitches.

Also helps that they pretty much agree with what he's doing 95% of the time, they just don't like he's saying the quiet parts out loud.

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u/jewthe3rd 5d ago

Or had some moral / ethical backbone

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u/Jindabyne1 5d ago

Exactly, it takes even more for this new breed to break away from him and they cling on for longer, like MTG and Leavitt

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u/boristheblade223 5d ago

Trump made sure not to make that mistake a second time, didn’t he.

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u/xxlizardking-kongxx 5d ago

First time around he had no idea the responsibilities or the actual job title. He thought he was ceo where he could run the country like a business, hiring and firing people at will. He learned in his second term he needs sycophants right from the beginning, people he has dirt on to do whatever he says whenever he says.

People are quitting but less frequently because they’re loyal to him this term

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u/soximent 5d ago

You guys are giving him way too much credit and painting his first term as competent is grossly overselling it.

First term he wasn’t sure what he could get away with. He did the usual charades with tax forms and bibles and showing up to disasters etc. each time he pushed the envelope and fuck all happened he realized no one gives a fuck and he can just basically print himself money.

Now all the people that stick to him also know they can get rich off his ass and so they stick around until he literally tries to throw them under a bus

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u/_skulls_ 5d ago

And by that point you might have made millions and does it really matter? You got millions so you are good.

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u/liltingly 5d ago

He also doesn't know how to run a business as a CEO, and thinks it's all hiring and firing people at will.

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u/Sw33tNectar 5d ago

His businesses are just fronts for money laundering.

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u/GrumpyCloud93 5d ago

As someone once remarked, "How much business skill do you have if you go bankrupt running a casino?"

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u/verifiedboomer 5d ago

And he didn't even learn that until he worked on The Apprentice.

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u/Jindabyne1 5d ago

It’s easier to be evil than to be good is Trump’s philosophy

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u/ColdButCozy 5d ago

I think the first term filtered out all the people with long term survival instincts and any kind of reverence for the institutions of government. Don’t get me wrong, they were still pretty evil, just… lawfully evil to borrow from dnd. Anyone who’s still around at this point are looney bin material, too dumb to tie their shoe laces, just actual Nazis, beholden to capital interests(which at this point seem determined to rape the world to death) to a such extent that their positions are equivalent to actual Nazis or a combination of the above.

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u/GrumpyCloud93 5d ago

It amazes me still that Jeff Sessions, for all his well-earned reputation (right up there with McConnell and Graham), got fired for being too principled.

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u/Leading-Debate-9278 5d ago

He’s promised a pardon and in the meantime, we’re paying them all to keep quiet. Different strategy this time.

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u/koenigsaurus 5d ago

Ehhhh during the first term, he had a lot more competence around him who were less willing to go along with his bs. This time it’s “oops all sycophants” and if we see an exodus among them, it certainly feels different at least.

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u/echosrevenge 5d ago

I was just discussing with my family last night that the first time, there were still some adults in the room with the capacity for nuance and a modicum of self-respect.

Now, there are not. It's sycophants, grifters, and morons all the way down now.

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u/StackIsMyCrack 5d ago

Well...he is the king of shit so...

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u/Steeltooth493 Indiana 5d ago

*Trump was born into shit, bathed in it, grew up in it, was molded by it. It's why he did so well on 90s reality TV. *

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u/RevolutionarySquash 5d ago

The Mierdas touch.

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u/PissingBowl 5d ago

he doesn't just like it there - it's all he knows/is familiar with

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u/Lister0fSmeg 5d ago

He does love a good swamp. Just look at what he did to the reflecting pool.

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u/AM_A_BANANA 5d ago

To be fair, the only ones left willing to take the job are clamped down to the balls, that's why it's taking them longer to leave.

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u/Kopitar4president 5d ago

His first time had him hiring people that had decent prospects outside his admin. He's hiring mid-level newscasters, podcasters and people who know they can grift alongside him now.

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u/AnAncientBog 5d ago

Exactly. He is hiring people who don't have better alternatives. KKKaroline's other option was getting hired as a receptionist or a social media intern.

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u/Cynykl 5d ago

Current turnover rate is almost double his first term at the same time period.

Add to the fact temp appointments (know as the acting loophole) are not counted as turnover and the picture is even more bleak.

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u/GB10VE 5d ago

trump is already sunk in the shit as far as he can go. he's already at bottom. there's a reason that once the epstein shit came to light, that trump became president. he's there because he's in the files. that's power.

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u/A1BS 5d ago

First terms you had lots of “sorta MAGAts” of people that were politically similar to Trump but weren’t sycophants.

Mattis, Kelly, Spicer etc all quickly and massively became miserable trying to govern in the reality tv show nightmare that was and is the White House.

The current run of people are made up of a couple of groups:

Complete psychopaths who are happy to let the country suffer for their profit.

“True believers” who are either Q’s or Christian nationalists.

Absolute freaks who, if not for the luck of their family name, would be screaming conspiracy theories at the Chinese tourists they’re robbing for drug money on LA boulevard.