Trump Is a Chaff Machine -- and the Media Keeps Locking On...
Since this was written a couple of days ago, Natalie Harp's intensely personal letters to Trump have been published in full-- providing the media with another irresistible cloud of chaff while far more consequential actions receive comparatively little attention. Natalie Harp, Trump's executive assistant-- nicknamed his "human printer" because she follows him with a portable printer and a supply of favorable articles-- has become a nearly constant presence at his side.
Reports have described intensely devoted notes she wrote to him, her unusual Trump Is a Chaff Machine -- and the Media Keeps Locking On and influence, and her inclusion among the handful of aides taken with Trump when he secretly switched planes in Turkey. All this has fueled speculation about a romance, although no credible evidence has established that there is one. The Trump-Harp story has been all over the media.
New reporting says Natalie Harp worked inside the White House for more than a year without routine security clearance, although the White House says she now has appropriate clearance. That is a legitimate national-security story. Speculation about whether she and Trump are romantically involved still is not.
The distinction reinforces my point: when gossip and governance are treated as equivalent, consequential news disappears into the chaff. Trump's decision involving North and South Korea has also been reported, but it has received nowhere near the attention devoted to Natalie Harp. Trump ordered the Pentagon to "substantially reduce" joint military exercises with South Korea, adopting North Korea's description of them as inappropriately "hostile" and citing his "very good relationship" with Kim Jong Un. These exercises are central to maintaining military readiness within a 73-year-old alliance-- and North Korea recently test fired more missile.
This isn't particularly profound-- in fact, it may be profoundly simple. Trump may want Natalie Harp around for much the same reason he keeps Walt Nauta close: he enjoys their company. They are familiar, attentive and intensely loyal. Not every unusually close relationship is romantic. Sometimes people simply prefer spending time with those who make them feel comfortable.
I have my own perspective on the Natalie Harp story: I don't give a two-penny damn. Harp's extraordinary access to Trump and the influence she may exercise are legitimate subjects for reporting. It's now being reported that she's functioning as an unoffical Chief of Staff, the position Susie Wiles holds. This is legitimate reporting as long as it is presented as suppostion. Likewise whether she has become one of his primary policy advisors, an extraordinary role for someone this young.
Whether their relationship is romantic is gossip-- and, compared with the damage Trump is doing, remarkably inconsequential gossip.
I see it as chaff. The word can mean worthless material or trash, but its military meaning is especially apt: metallic strips released by an aircraft to confuse radar and radar-guided missiles. There is an irrelevant but irresistible irony here.
Chaff is probably among the defensive countermeasures carried aboard the regular Air Force One-- and may have been among the capabilities lacking from Trump's hastily converted Qatari gift jet. I have no idea whether Trump deliberately creates distractions to draw attention away from the truly harmful things he is doing.
I doubt that this particular story was planned. But he doesn't need to deploy chaff with the precision of a military pilot. His personality, behavior and endless appetite for attention produce a continuous cloud of shiny objects.
Trump generates the chaff. The media decides to chase it.
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