Politico is out with a piece that claims that Bolton is limiting access of the State Department and Pentagon to high level policy discussions .
It appears that several hands of the government are being left out high level policy …..
This would fit with how Donald Trump runs things…
He was a NYC Real Estate guy up to a year and half ago that operated with a small staff…
It has been shown that he has not adapted very well to the way the large staff that it takes to run a country with 300 million plus people and actually campaigned against the way the government is ran….
He prefer ‘s to make his his own views of how things should be ran….
This is complicated by the Republicans in Congress being afraid to go against him in public very much for fear that Trump’s supporters will go after then no matter how silly or crazy Trump might want to do….
Bolton works for the President…
It seems he only doing what his boss wants…
Trump does not have ability to absorb complex policy things….
That leaves the other agency heads scrambling to clean up after Trump mistakes , with no interaction with their boss…
It is NOT a way to run a government….
National security adviser John Bolton’s effort to simplify the administration’s decision-making process is frustrating Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Defense Secretary James Mattis and causing confusion about the United States’ position on major issues including Russia, according to officials familiar with the situation.
Mattis has gone so far as to draft a letter to Bolton requesting that he hold more gatherings of agency and department chiefs “to smooth the bubble” on thorny issues ranging from U.S. policy in Syria to North Korea, according to one senior administration official. In particular, senior officials are concerned about the dearth of “principals committee” meetings scheduled by Bolton, officials say. Principals committee meetings are traditionally key forums for relevant Cabinet bosses to prepare and recommend policy options for the president.
Of special concern is the U.S. relationship with Russia, especially since Trump’s July 16 meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin with only translators present. Officials across U.S. agencies have been trying to figure out what Trump and Putin discussed. Russian officials, meanwhile, have taken advantage of the U.S. confusion to make a series of announcements about what they say Trump and Putin agreed upon. Bolton did not convene any principals committee meetings to discuss the Trump-Putin summit ahead of time, and hasn’t held any such meetings on the issue since the event took place.
Bolton is taking steps that could assuage these concerns, convening at least three high-level meetings this week to tackle U.S. policy on Iran, North Korea and election security.
Defenders say Bolton, who held top national security positions during the George W. Bush administration, is simply cutting unnecessary bureaucratic red tape, pushing the nitty-gritty discussions to lower levels…..
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