The Debrief: An occasional series offering a reporter’s insights
In 2014, Donald Trump sued to have his name taken off a pair of Atlantic City casinos he built three decades earlier that had gone bankrupt.“It’s really indicative of how we all know he thinks so in-the-moment and so off-the-cuff that it winds up being dangerous,” said Jack O’Donnell, former president of the Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino, one of the properties from which Trump removed his name.
.. “The whole idea of once things are going wrong, he takes no ownership — that’s just Trump,” O’Donnell added. “He does not own anything that goes wrong. The problem is, he’ll blame anybody. Obviously, it’s the Democrats in this situation.”
.. He alternated between insisting that Mexico would pay for the wall through a convoluted, and false, interpretation of a new trade deal and suggesting that the U.S. military and other agencies would find money in their existing budgets to build the barrier if lawmakers failed to deliver — despite restrictions on federal agencies reprogramming funding.
.. And the president even began rebranding “the wall,” parrying Democratic denunciations of a concrete monolith at the U.S.-Mexico border by announcing that his administration would build “artistically designed steel slats.” That quickly prompted widespread derision.
.. He even appeared to be conspiring with prominent conservative talk show hosts to help guide him. Rush Limbaugh boasted that Trump had “gotten word to me” that he would shut down the government if he failed to win the wall funding.
By Friday, a desperate Trump had seized on the “nuclear option” proposed by congressional border hawks to discard the Senate’s long-standing filibuster rules and approve with a majority vote a House-passed spending plan that included the $5 billion.
.. Aides announced that he had indefinitely postponed his winter vacation at his Mar-a-Lago resort in south Florida, which was scheduled to begin Friday evening.
.. In the case of his casinos, Trump had divested himself of control of the properties five years before he sued the new owners, having retained a 10 percent stake for the continued use of his moniker.
In his lawsuit to remove his name, Trump asserted that the properties, which twice under his management had faced bankruptcy, had fallen into disrepair and tarnished a Trump brand that “has become synonymous with the highest levels of quality, luxury, prestige and success.”
.. To O’Donnell, the episode was “classic Trump.” The president, he said, had taken ownership of the shutdown in the televised showdown with Schumer and Pelosi to demonstrate his toughness to his base — without a plan to deal with the aftermath.
“That’s really what this was: ‘I’m a tough guy. Don’t think I can’t handle the heat,’ ” O’Donnell said. “The fact is, he can’t handle it.”
Stop attacking the Fed, Mr. President
President Trump, do yourself a favor. Stop attacking the Federal Reserve and its chairman, Jerome H. Powell (yes, the same Powell you nominated). The result would be better for you, better for Powell and — most important — better for the country.
Unfortunately, Trump can’t seem to restrain himself.
“I will tell you, at this moment in time I am not at all happy with the Fed. . . . They’re making a mistake because . . . my gut tells me more sometimes than anyone else’s brain can ever tell me. . . . I’m not even a little bit happy with my selection of Jay. Not even a little bit.”
.. Until recently, there seemed to be a crude consensus among economists that the Fed should continue its gradual increases in interest rates to preempt higher inflation. The economy seems strong enough to tolerate tighter credit.
The unemployment rate of 3.7 percent is the lowest since the 1960s; inflation is around 2 percent; consumer confidence is high.
But the consensus may be fraying. There are signs of weakness.
- The stock market has fallen;
- housing sales and prices have softened;
- the trade war between the United States and China remains unresolved
.. On Nov. 26, the paper ran an op-ed by
- Harvard economist Martin Feldstein, a chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under President Ronald Reagan, urging the Fed to raise rates. The next day, the Journal ran an op-ed by
- Harvard economist Jason Furman, chairman of the CEA under President Barack Obama, counseling delay.
.. One danger for Trump is that the Fed, seeking to prove its “independence,” will deliberately oppose what the president prefers.
.. One danger for Trump is that the Fed, seeking to prove its “independence,” will deliberately oppose what the president prefers.
.. “President Trump has gone completely off the rails with his criticism of Fed Chair Powell,” says economist Mark Zandi of Moody’s Analytics. He “is using the Fed as a scapegoat for anything that goes wrong in the stock market and the economy.”
In Trump’s defense, he is not the first president to try to control the Fed and corrupt its independence.
- Lyndon B. Johnson lambasted then-Fed Chairman William McChesney Martin in the mid-1960s for raising interest rates against his wishes.
- Richard M. Nixon pressured Arthur F. Burns, Martin’s successor, to keep rates low. Likewise, President
- Harry S. Truman pushed the Fed to maintain easy money and credit.
.. But these and other cases occurred mainly behind closed doors. Trump’s brash innovation has been to take his complaints public; the apparent aim is to intimidate the Fed into doing his bidding. If the Fed resists, Trump might propose legislation curbing its powers. That would signal a real state of war between Trump and the Fed, with what consequences for financial markets and the economy, it’s hard to know.
.. It’s also true that attacking the Fed has long been standard operating procedure for members of Congress of both parties.
“Congress depends on the Fed both to steer the economy and absorb public blame when the economy falters,” write Binder and Spindel. A lot of this criticism is political theater, designed to impress voters but not to do much else. What’s not familiar is for the president to be leading the charge.
What Facebook Knew and Tried to Hide
Even when the Facebook leaders understood the problem, they tried to hide it.
Right after the election Zuckerburg was dismissive of the idea that Fake News influenced the election.
People within the company thought he was out of touch.
At the time Facebook was under pressure.
Trump had won the election using social media, but Facebook was dismissive.
Facebook employees saw the tip of the iceberg . They had been following Russian
Mark wanted to find a technical fix.
Sheryl was thinking about the legal risk and was wondering whether they would find out things they didn’t want to know. Sheryl was thinking about what the consequences would be.
Sheryl yelled at the security team for investigating Russian interference without formal approval.
The leadership was concerned that Washington was controlled by conservatives who would have an adverse reaction to an investigation or efforts to curb this activity. Conservatives already think Silicon Valley is a bunch of hippies.
There was pressure within Facebook not to publish anything linking activity back to Russia. Sheryl(?) also signed off on a policy not to take down the Russian troll accounts.
Mark Zuckerburg was traveling the country, milking cows, and acting as though he wanted to run for President.
Sheryl Sandberg was running her own “Lean-In” brand.
Alex Stamos (Security Chief) briefs the audit committee and the board’s response is to yell at Mark(?) and Sheryl(?)
The leadership holds a big meeting and Sheryl yells at Alex Stamos for
- not briefing her fully
- admitting that they hadn’t fully got a grip on the situation
- suggesting that Russia would likely do this again in the future
Alex has gotten in trouble in the past for being too transparent
The Cambridge Analytical Scandal illustrates:
- The consequences of surveillance capitalism
- The potential of Facebook to influence elections
Apple CEO Tim Cook castigates Facebook for their business model.
Facebook conducts an advertising campaign and privately goes on attack using the Washington PR opposition research campaign, which uses the NTK network which publishes propaganda.
Confronted with a Propaganda Scandal, they turn to a PR campaign to create their own Propaganda.
Attacks Apple and Tim Cook. Attack George Soros, arguing the Facebook’s criticism was masterminded by George Soros. In taking on Soros they are getting into the smear and conspiracy business.
Related:
Damage Control at Facebook: 6 Takeaways From The Times’s Investigation
With Facebook at ‘War,’ Zuckerberg Adopts More Aggressive Style
New approach causes turmoil, driving several key executives from the company and creating tensions with longtime Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg
Mark Zuckerberg gathered about 50 of his top lieutenants earlier this year and told them that Facebook Inc. FB -5.72% was at war and he planned to lead the company accordingly.
During times of peace, executives can move more slowly and ensure that everybody is on board with key decisions, he said during the June meeting, according to people familiar with the remarks. But with Facebook under siege from lawmakers, investors and angry users, he needed to act more decisively, the people said.
.. The 34-year-old CEO believes Facebook didn’t move quickly enough at key moments this year and increasingly is pressing senior executives to “make progress faster” on resolving problems such as slowing user growth and securing the platform, said people familiar with the matter. Mr. Zuckerberg also at times has expressed frustration at how the company managed the waves of criticism it faced this year... On Friday, that tension was on display when, during a question-and-answer session with employees at Facebook’s headquarters in Menlo Park, Calif., he blasted a fresh round of critical news coverage as “bullshit,” according to the people familiar with the remarks.One employee at the session asked if Facebook could deter leaks by publishing an internal report about how frequently offenders are found and fired. Mr. Zuckerberg said Facebook does fire leakers, but the root cause was “bad morale” perpetuated by attacks in the media.
.. He believes this tougher management style is necessary to tackle challenges being raised both internally and externally, according to a person familiar with his thinking... Mr. Zuckerberg’s new posture could trouble those who feel his “move fast, break things” mantra from Facebook’s early days contributed to many of the company’s current problems. It also has led to confrontations with some of his top reports, including Ms. Sandberg, who has long had considerable autonomy over the Facebook teams that control communications and policy... This spring, Mr. Zuckerberg told Ms. Sandberg, 49, that he blamed her and her teams for the public fallout over Cambridge AnalyticaMs. Sandberg later confided in friends that the exchange rattled her, and she wondered if she should be worried about her job... Mr. Zuckerberg also has told Ms. Sandberg she should have been more aggressive in allocating resources to review troublesome content on the site
.. The heads of some other key Facebook units didn’t survive conflicts with Mr. Zuckerberg.
.. The co-founders of WhatsApp likewise left after disagreements with Mr. Zuckerberg over how to generate more revenue from the messaging-service
.. More recently, Mr. Zuckerberg forced out Brendan Iribe, co-founder of Oculus VR, in part because of a disagreement about the future of the Oculus Rift virtual-reality headset
.. Facebook remains hugely profitable, with net income of more than $5 billion in the third quarter, but its margins are under pressure in part because of its increased spending on security.
.. Mr. Zuckerberg has said Facebook is in the midst of a three-year turnaround ending in 2019 to strengthen its defenses against the risks posed by having an open platform.
.. All told, about a dozen senior or highly visible executives disclosed their resignations or left Facebook in 2018. In May, Facebook announced a major reshuffling of top product executives in a way that helped free up Mr. Zuckerberg to oversee a broader portfolio within the company.
.. This turmoil at the top of Facebook has made it difficult for the company to execute on some product decisions and shore up employee morale, which has been sinking over the last year along with the stock price, which has fallen 36% since its peak. Many employees are frustrated by the bad press and constant reorganizations, including of the security team, which can disrupt their work, according to current and former employees.
.. Scrutiny of Facebook has only escalated in the past week after the New York Times reported its use of opposition-research firms tasked with exposing critical information about Facebook’s detractors, including one called Definers Public Affairs. Ms. Sandberg and Mr. Zuckerberg both said the decision to employ the firm was made by Facebook’s communications officials.