3/20/2019

JOHN MCCAIN/KELLYANNE CONWAY/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “He is a ‘whack job,’ a ‘husband from hell,’ and a ‘stone cold LOSER.’ Those were just some of the insults President Donald Trump hurled on Wednesday at a once little-known corporate litigator who happens to be married to one of his top White House aides, Kellyanne Conway. With a single insult-filled morning tweet, tapped out from the White House residence before 8 a.m., the president extended his dispute with Conway’s anti-Trump spouse, George, into a bewildering second day. By the afternoon, Trump had complemented it with new attacks on a dead man: the late Republican senator and war hero John McCain. Speaking in Ohio, Trump declared that he ‘never liked [McCain] much … [and] probably never will.’ As the lurid disputes dominated cable news for several more hours, it was unclear whether Trump had any strategy in mind. Some people close to Trump speculated that he might be consciously trying to remake the news environment — creating a bizarre spectacle to displace criticism of his tepid response to the massacre of dozens of Muslims in New Zealand, the timing of the administration’s decision to ground Boeing’s 737 Max jets, and frenzied anticipation around the expected release of special counsel Robert Mueller’s final report.”

Eliana Johnson and Daniel Lippman, “Aides struggle to see strategy in Trump’s Conway, McCain fights,” Politico, March 20, 2019 8:18 pm