OpEd: Donald Trump just threw his entire White House staff under the bus (2017)
www.cnn.com

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That thud you heard was Donald Trump driving the bus over his White House staff.

In an interview with NBC's Lester Holt Thursday night, the President directly contradicted the reasoning his staff -- as well as Vice President Mike Pence -- had laid out for his decision to fire FBI Director James Comey.

"I was going to fire Comey -- my decision," Trump told Holt. "There is no good time to do it, by the way. I was going to fire regardless of recommendation."

That assertion came fewer than 18 hours after Pence was on Capitol Hill telling a totally different story. "The President took strong and decisive leadership here to put the safety and the security of the American people first by accepting the recommendation of the deputy attorney general to remove Director Comey as the head of the FBI," Pence said Wednesday.

And he was far from the only one singing from that songbook -- which Trump promptly ripped up in his interview with Holt.

"The President was presented with a pretty clear and direct and very strong recommendation by deputy Attorney General (Rod Rosenstein)," said White House deputy press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders. "The deputy made the recommendation, the president made a swift and decisive action and let Comey go."

Then there was this from White House counselor Kellyanne Conway: "He acted decisively today, he took the recommendation of his Deputy Attorney General ... . I would really ask everyone tonight to read Mr. Rosenstein's memo. This is what he presented to the Attorney General, he presented to the President and the President took decisive action."

There is no amount of spin available in the world that would somehow make what Trump said Thursday night jibe with what his aides and his vice president said earlier in the week. It's simply not possible.

C-a-t doesn't spell dog. ...