It is known that Trump's friends and confidants speak to him like ghosts to the little girl in Poltergeist — on television — since the president doesn't read briefs or much of anything else. Thus did the president's friend Chris Ruddy, Newsmax's CEO, say yesterday on ABC's "This Week" that "[Trump] thinks there’s nothing to [the Mueller investigation], and [says that] collusion never took place…. But Mueller is looking for much more than collusion; the indictments and pleas to date demonstrate that."
As is also known, every vague allegation of "collusion" is insubstantial. What Mueller is looking for is the firmer stuff of obstruction of justice. And Trump is handing it to him on a velvet pillow. On Saturday, the president further incriminated himself by tweeting that "I had to fire General Flynn because he lied to the Vice President and the FBI." Trump's knowledge of Flynn's crime was followed immediately by his request to FBI Director James Comey that he drop the Russia investigation. Presto. Obstruction. In Trump's own words.
Therefore, of course, the White House almost instantly denied that the tweet was the president's. "Trump lawyer John Dowd [pictured on the right as, no doubt, the life of Trump's tweeting parties] drafted the president’s tweet, according to two people familiar with the message," reported the Washington Post on Saturday night. "Its authorship could reduce how significantly it communicates anything about when the president knew that Flynn had lied to the FBI."
As Axios' Mike Allen — or should I say, even Mike Allen, journalism's most conventional of conventional thinkers, excluding Chris Cillizza — advised, "Be smart: The tweet, and this explanation, are just plain suspicious and weird." Or, as a person "close" to the president told Politico, "There’s no quarterback. There’s no strategy. They’re literally making it up as they go along. We're in very dangerous territory."
It could be that this presidentially close person said more than he realized. Trump now stands manifestly guilty of obstructing justice on two counts: firing Comey, and concealing his knowledge of Flynn's crime, which was secretly used by Trump as the reason for firing Comey. Given Trump's temperament, his next or imminent move could well be the firing of Bob Mueller, which would create the very environment that Trump himself predicted on the campaign trail, just days before his the election.
Reported Time magazine last June: "Trump said having a sitting president under criminal investigation would result in a 'constitutional crisis.' '[Hillary Clinton is] likely to be under investigation for criminality for a very, very long time to come,' Trump said during a Oct. 31, 2016 speech in Warren, Mich…. 'She’s not going to win the election, but I’m just saying. If Hillary is elected, she will be under protracted criminal investigation likely followed by the trial of a sitting president.'"
Which would include, with Trump as president instead, yet another charge of obstruction of justice: the firing of Special Counsel Bob Mueller — which will have brought about his predicted constitutional crisis.
Everything about Tump screams crisis; he thrives on crises. So it's hard to imagine him passing up this splendid, once-in-a-presidential-tenure opportunity for maximum chaos. His last hurrah, so to speak.