Bannon demoted
I didn’t know what to think of this at first, so instead I blogged about Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory
But according to this New York Times article, which seems to have a lot of inside information (too many loose lips in the White House), Bannon was demoted, and there are many theories about why Trump is mad at him.
This is bad news for Trumpism. This could be the beginning of a bunch of establishment Republican types taking over the administration steering wheel.
* * *
Mike Cernivich says that the NY Times story is “fake drama.”
Lion of the Blogosphere 
Still linking to fake news Carlos Slim’s blog.
Andrew E.
April 6, 2017 at 12:00 AM
the problem is fake news is still 95% of news
grey enlightenment
April 6, 2017 at 8:17 AM
Bannon is off the principals committee of the NSC, which he didn’t attend anyway, but still attends regular NSC meetings with Trump, including one today, after his supposed demotion. It’s hard to believe that Bannon would threaten to quit over that, I think the NYT’s sources are lying or nonexistent.
robpaul12345
April 6, 2017 at 12:06 AM
Bannon is a good man. But he’s surrounded by vipers. You can tell what they oppose by the enemies they choose. In Bannon and Trump, they have chosen the people. Because they are not of the people. They are not of the nation state of america even. This is why they ‘believe’ in proposition nations.
Surely our host and many commenters here of all people can figure out who the Wizard of Oz is? Hahaha.
The Philosopher
April 6, 2017 at 5:19 AM
This is why old men shouldn’t be allowed to run for president.
They get senile.
Trump in his 70s still had it in him to win the presidency. But he is no longer mentally agile enough to actually be president.
A president should be in his 40s or early 50s, tops.
jjbees
April 6, 2017 at 12:14 AM
“This is why old men shouldn’t be allowed to run for president”
If you’re too old to play Overwatch, you’re too old to be president?
Lion of the Blogosphere
April 6, 2017 at 12:51 AM
Anyone who wastes his life playing Overwatch is disqualified from being a president. Automatically.
Yakov
April 6, 2017 at 7:41 AM
agreed, never understood why we associate age with wisdom and judiciousness. to a point that is true, but it’s definitely not true for senile old dudes, guys in the 40s, mid/late 30s sure. old people have some of the worst and most incoherent opinions out there.
james n.s.w
April 6, 2017 at 2:51 AM
Trump’s not senile, but he’s malleable. During the campaign, he had constant ideological reinforcement from Miller and Bannon. Now they’re competing with establishment types. Which was inevitable, in that Trumpism is too new to have its own bench of staffers. It would be tragic if the GOPe steers Trump into a Syria quagmire so it can drain his energy from immigration and trade.
Dave Pinsen
April 6, 2017 at 2:58 AM
Maybe Trump is being blackmailed.
Blackmail is rife in DC.
gothamette
April 6, 2017 at 2:37 PM
I studied intelligence in college.
There are two real forms of intelligence, fluid and crystallized.
Fluid intelligence is your speed of thinking and ability to hold items in your working memory. This peaks in your early 20s and declines thereafter.
Crystallized intelligence is the sum of your stored lifetime knowledge for you to rely on. This could be called wisdom or experience.
There is a long period in a man’s 30s-late 50s where he has a large fund of crystallized intelligence to rely on, but his fluid intelligence has not declined precipitously enough to outweigh the benefits of so much collected knowledge. This is why middle aged men earn so much more than younger men… They know so much more, even if they can not win at overwatch.
I am a slower thinker than I was 5 years ago, but I am more capable than I used to be. I am much worse at video games now with slower reaction times.
Once men get old, their fluid intelligence declines rapidly, which I think has happened to Trump, in addition to small vascular damage in the brain that happens as you get older, collections of garbage proteins, all acting to make you a slower, poorer thinker. Strokes on a very small scale.
That’s why our leaders should be middle aged. There is a sweet spot. No one would trust a 10 year old who dominates at overwatch to run an ice cream cone shop.
Jjbees
April 6, 2017 at 7:23 AM
what about Reagan
soberrealist
April 6, 2017 at 8:14 AM
Reagan is the second the worst post war president (after Johnson) and the worst republican. He embodies the transformation of the party towards complete corporatism and plutocracy.
Magnavox
April 6, 2017 at 3:47 PM
Perhaps one had to live through the Reagan era to appreciate him.
Lion of the Blogosphere
April 6, 2017 at 3:53 PM
Maybe one has to have not lived through Reagan to have the proper perspective. But I do think you’re partially right in the sense that so many of his modern defenders undermine his legacy by defending their own crazy policies and viewpoints by invoking him. He wasn’t as crazy as his modern defenders are he was just as crazy relative to the average republican of his time as his modern defenders are to the average republican of our time.
Magnavox
April 6, 2017 at 4:04 PM
Perhaps one had to live through the Reagan era to appreciate him.
For the love of the Singularity can you ban Magnavox? He’s even worse than JS.
The Undiscovered Jew
April 6, 2017 at 5:52 PM
Supposedly he’s always been like this. Constantly being buffeted around and just repeating whatever he heard from the last person he talked to.
Magnavox
April 6, 2017 at 3:45 PM
Coincidence that all this is happening just as Ivanka comes fully on board? Awesome and brilliant she may be, but she’s infected with a certain type of liberalism thats somewhat incompatible with Bannon’s agenda.
gda
April 6, 2017 at 1:02 AM
Ivanka is not awesome. She is trash and always has been. The love people on this board have for her makes no sense. She is a terrible person and aside from her looks has no redeeming features.
Otis the Sweaty
April 6, 2017 at 10:01 AM
Exactly. What has she done that’s even remotely brilliant? It would be great to have a real economic liberal but her liberalism is the most boring and cliched kind of middle brow centrist nonsense.
Magnavox
April 6, 2017 at 3:50 PM
I agree this is no coincidence- there is no one with enough pull other than Ivanka and Kushner to get the inside lane on Bannon.
Interestingly Ivanka has also been exposed as having backchannel dealings with Planned Parenthood.
Lion of the Turambar
April 6, 2017 at 11:38 AM
1. There doesn’t seem to be any demotion. The media is trying to create that narrative but the media also lied and said that Bannon had his security clearance stripped when it was not.
Bannon remains a senior adviser and the most powerful person in Trump’s inner circle. The Left thinks they have a victory because they are delusional.
The Conservative Treehouse has an article about this: https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2017/04/05/a-funny-thing-happened-on-the-way-to-the-nsc-meeting/.
Not that TCT shouldn’t be taken with a grain of salt, but I agree with their analysis on this one.
2. Susan Rice is fucking hot for an older chick.
3. NeoGaf really fucking pissed about that Pepsi add. In fact, I strongly, *strongly* recommend that the Lion does an analysis of the Pepsi add to explain to us why the Left was so offended by it. I would have expected them to like it, if anything.
4. Trump approval up in Gallup and Ras. Gallup up to 42 and Ras at 46. The convergence of Gallup and Ras over the last month has made me feel more confident in their accuracy, I didn’t know who to believe when the spread between the two was so big and I strongly suspected Gallup of being rigged. Make sure to keep an eye on the GA-06 special election to see if Trump is hurting Republicans down ballot. The Democrat Ossoff is polling extremely well there and a very cucked out district.
Otis the Sweaty
April 6, 2017 at 2:07 AM
I have given the definitive analysis of the Pepsi ad in the post.
gothamette
April 6, 2017 at 2:38 PM
i still cant discern whether trump is shaping up to be a disappointment. one thing for sure though i can say is that its getting increasignly difficult to defend or characterise him as some sort of “peace” candidate when there seems tob e some threat emanating out of his administration every five seconds at iran/north korea/ some other country. doesnt mean these threats in anyway mean anything, but that doesnt make them any less lamentable..
james n.s.w
April 6, 2017 at 2:54 AM
Sometimes a “threat” is a real threat.
That’s how I view North Korea. Sure, it was all fun and games when their first nuke attempts screwed up, but here we are where they are making real progress on missile technology, so how long are we before they have a workable ICBM? A couple of years? Even if they only have one, that’s one too many since they’ve threatened the US specifically.
Syria however, is a threat to Syrians, and any other suckers who get sucked into that quagmire. I’m hoping Trump can resist the call of the establishment to get involved in a pointless war that will end badly. We’ve already done that recently so if we can’t learn from experience on that, then it may be impossible for Washington insiders to learn period.
Mike Street Station
April 6, 2017 at 4:07 PM
Conservative Treehouse has much better coverage of this matter.
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2017/04/05/a-funny-thing-happened-on-the-way-to-the-nsc-meeting/
map
April 6, 2017 at 4:54 AM
I’m always surprised in general reading naive reactions to these and other stories, not just here. I think its naivete and assuming others are moral or ‘decent’ or regulate themselves in some way that separates our beloved elite from the normal people. Its the perception that kills. Not the actual fact of psychopathy at the top level.
To me its obvious our beloved elite will do anything to stop nationalism. Including blackmail, bribery, brainwashing, beatings, kidnappings, counterfeitting, fraud, spying, betrayal and other things to keep power.
I would even go so far as to say the neocons would launch chemical and biological weapons on the populace to keep control of the surplus producing people if it came to it.
We’ve had many presidents shot at or removed in a coup. Politics is very dirty. The past 30 years under media consolidation, we’ve been made ignorant of the paedophile blackmail rings and the open bribery. Power draws flies like shit.
People who are ruthless get to the top.Its always been like this in politics. Democracy is a veneer for intrigue on the corridors of Rome. Hardly any player ‘believed’ in religion, or ‘chivalry’. Watch Game of Thrones or House of Cards for a PC view on how power works.
The only way to put a wrench in it is sunlight. A real free press. A real commentariat. An unbrainwashed circle of philosophers. No restrictions on scientific research beyond causing harm. Otherwise the creature that has infected the body politic will metastasize and kill the host, before moving on.
The Philosopher
April 6, 2017 at 5:08 AM
Best not to dwell on the swamp once you cotton on though. It’ll drive you mad. There are things in this world Horatio, that you or I have only dreamt of.
If you think Denny Hastert was bad….think about the people that traffic the boys to the pols. They have to kidnap them first….and runaways or whistleblowers have to be…silenced.
In the darkness, evil grows. We regulate to stop evil. Libertarianism of the variety of the virginal world of warcraft player would end overnight if you could see what they do. Especially foreign actors who do not subscribe to ‘liberty’. Did Nozick square foreign actors in his hermeneutic philosophy? No.
The Philosopher
April 6, 2017 at 5:15 AM
I’m not even sure it’s a demotion. I know fake news would like to present it as such, but maybe it’s, as the WH says, mission accomplished and Bannon is no longer needed there.
Mike Street Station
April 6, 2017 at 5:58 AM
Trump needs to go to war against PC. Those were his most consistent applause lines. He’s messing around too much with the Establishment.
Robert
April 6, 2017 at 6:51 AM
“This could be the beginning of a bunch of establishment Republican types taking over the administration steering wheel.”
I was thinking this a day or so ago when I read that the admin was criticizing Assad for allegedly using chemical weapons. First, I’m not sure he did, Second, I don’t really care if chemicals are used against ISIS. After all, they’re openly perpetrating mass rape, slavery, genocide and terrorism. So if they get gassed then that’s just dandy.
But I fear the neocons have gained the upper hand. Not only were neocons the ones who ran Bush’s disastrous middle east policies. But Obama kept them on to run his disastrous middle east policies as well. And apparently they’re still there. Whereas Trump campaigned on wanting to “knock the shit out of ISIS” he’s now criticizing Assad for knocking the shit out of ISIS. Neocons are the ones who support ISIS. So if Trump has switched then they’re now running his middle east policy as well.
Apparently even a strong-willed president who’s determined to follow a different path can be pressed by entrenched political forces. If that”s the case then it doesn’t bode well. But I don’t necessarily fault Trump. He’s been battling pretty much the whole world for the past two years. And one can only do what they can do. I always knew he’d have to make some compromises to get anything done. Compromise isn’t surrender. It’s just reality.
Anyway, this would dovetail with removing Bannon from the NSC position. But I’m not convinced he’s being sent to Coventry just yet. There are lots of benign reasons for removing him from the NSC. Regardless, the NYT are propagandists with an agenda. I wouldn’t believe anything they say without evidence. Time will tell.
destructure
April 6, 2017 at 7:48 AM
What’s happening with immigration? Where is the wall? Where is e-verify? I wanna see action or this country is furnished.
Yakov
April 6, 2017 at 7:52 AM
More disturbing is yesterday’s press conference in which Trump promised a major escalation of our efforts in Syria to overthrow Assad. It looks like the long-predicted war with Iran (and maybe Russia) is at hand.
bob sykes
April 6, 2017 at 8:15 AM
Not sure why anyone is too surprised that the ‘establishment’ is taking over . Trump promised more defense pending…the $ has to go somewhere
grey enlightenment
April 6, 2017 at 8:15 AM
At first the demotion didn’t bother me. But coupled with Trump’s drumbeat on Syria, we have reason to worry.
Why can’t we simply forget Syria? Bombs are going off all over the West. The idea that we need to invade a foreign country to experience war is absurd (and outdated).
SWPL2
April 6, 2017 at 8:28 AM
Who could do this other than Ivanna and Kushner?
Lion of the Turambar
April 6, 2017 at 8:42 AM
The reporting is not accurate. Lion, why are you reading that rag? Find some real news sources.
View at Medium.com
Dan
April 6, 2017 at 8:58 AM
Find some real news sources.
Like infowars and conservative treehouse? The times is still the best source there is for all its faults.
Magnavox
April 6, 2017 at 3:53 PM
Politico claims Bannon and Jared Kushner clashed and that lead to Bannon being removed from the NSC principals committee. Bannon is reported to have complained that Kushner is trying to undermine Bannon’s populist policies. There is also some indication that this is a story being pushed by Kushner supporters, so it may exaggerate Kushner’s role, although Kushner does appear to be in charge of everything at the moment.
The other speculation is that McMaster, the Flynn replacement as National Security Advisor, is trying consolidate his own authority and wanted Bannon off the principals committee.
It could well be that their is some truth to both these stories.
mikeca
April 6, 2017 at 9:38 AM
I have now seen reports that Bannon is being blamed for the failure of the Travel Bans. It is unclear to me why Bannon should be blamed for that.
I think the core problem with the Travel ban and a lot of other Trump actions is the Trump team lacks a real understanding of how the government works. As president of the Trump family business, Trump had absolute authority. The president of the USA has much more limited authority in domestic policy. Congress is responsible for setting policy priorities and funding government programs.
Trump started out apparently planning to only work with Republicans in Congress to get things done. The failure of the healthcare bill in the House was a wake up call. Trump complained that there was no Democratic votes for the bill, but Trump had not made any effort to even talk to Democrats. Trump now is turning to tax reform, but it is questionable that Republicans will be able get anything through Congress with just Republican votes. The debt ceiling needs to be raised soon and there are enough Republicans who will never vote to raise the debt ceiling that some Democratic votes will be needed.
mikeca
April 6, 2017 at 11:30 AM
I think the core problem with the Travel ban and a lot of other Trump actions is the Trump team lacks a real understanding of how the government works.
The decisions against his travel bans were both really outrageous. Although recognizing that we have an out of control judiciary is part of understanding how the government works, so…
Magnavox
April 6, 2017 at 3:57 PM
Debt ceiling is our bargaining chip. TPTB will give anything including immigration in order to keep the asset valuation ponzi going (ending that ponzi ends the global elite and their influence).
Paul Ryan's Sickly Old Lapdog
April 6, 2017 at 4:12 PM
Bannon was banned. I know this because Trump is now preparing for a pointless war in Syria.
Seth Long
April 6, 2017 at 11:03 AM
I am afraid that the NYC liberal faction, led by Jared and Ivanka, is taking over. I would have much preferred if they took over the business operations and Eric and Don jr get involved with the politics. Jared and Ivanka are bad news for Trumpism.
B.T.D.T.
April 6, 2017 at 11:25 AM
Andrew E.
April 6, 2017 at 12:34 PM
Look at what people do not what they say. Trump has not accomplished anything substantial (yet). Thank god he failed at the obamacare repeal. Had he succeeded, I would’ve assumed he was an evil idiot. Right now, my assumption is that he is simply a buffoon. Methinks it is gonna be business as usual in the corrupt backwaters of Washington for the next four years.
Nice blog, dude
April 6, 2017 at 1:31 PM