Strange tale of the phone call to Putin
DAVID A. GRAHAM MAR 21, 2018
... given Trump’s history with Russia, the statement sticks out. That history includes the president’s long history of complimentary statements about Putin; his notable reluctance to attribute electoral interference to Russia; Press Secretary Sarah Sanders’s tortured avoidance of statements critical of Russia, including her refusal Tuesday to say that the election was not free and fair; and of course the ongoing investigations into interference in the election, including the admissions by former Trump aides that they lied about conversations with the Russians ...
... Suddenly a story about Trump’s weird approach to Russia has become a story about White House backbiting and disorganization, which is hardly fresh ...
The new iteration of the story also makes way for Trump aides to reframe Trump’s response not as some sort of strange coddling of Putin, or even as imprudent dismissal of expert advice, but simply as another example of Trump being Trump ...
Trump’s refusal to take advice, disagreements between Trump aides—these are all old stories. They can briefly gain fresh energy when another weird incident, like Trump ignoring clear advice and then that fact being promptly leaked, occurs. At heart, however, they’re always going to be old stories, just more flotsam in the Trump flood. Meanwhile, the underlying substance, of the president congratulating Putin, sinks into the muddied waters.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/03/sausage-making-trump-russia/556118/
