Blowing off Joe Sixpack

Two days ago, it was reported that among the first things Trump did as president was to shut down the comment lines at the White House. Instead, an automated phone message told callers to use Facebook Messenger.

Now today, Variety reports that no such Messenger accounts exist.

I have never tried to call the White House, although from time to time I have written letters supporting or opposing presidential policies.

If it were some other administration, we might suspect a foulup among new staffers, with someone responsible for setting up the Messenger accounts not acting as fast as the person shutting down the phones. But that won't wash with this crowd.

One, they claim superior skills with social media.

Two, they had a social media director at the keyboard from midnight on the 20th shutting down social media outlets in several departments.

So we know what's going on. Trump isn't not listening to just the intelligence agencies, he's not listening to anyone, except maybe Putin, because he knows everything already.

This conclusion is reinforced by Conway's quick response to the We the People petition at WhiteHouse.gov (still functioning) that demands release of Trump's tax returns. The rules there are that if a petition gets 100,000 signatures within a few weeks, the White House will respond with 60 days.

Trump says nobody cares excet reporters. This morning there were over 300,000 signatures, more than there are reporters. But Conway had already said the returns won't be release.

It's the first thing I've seen her say that I believe.

A few days ago RtO said that Trump's Cabinet appointments were mostly imbeciles. At that time, they had not yet begun testifying to their senatorial review committees. Nor had some of them who are Cabinet-level or near that rank (and so do not have to undergo Senate review) begun performing. Now thay have.

RtO was wrong. They are not imbeciles. Quite a few are subimbeciles.  In that category, for sure now, are Flynn, Conway, Spicer, Perry, Carson, Price, DeVos, with a special mention for Crowley.

And a special special mention for the repellent Branstad, not an imbecile but a man who early in his political career (when I was in Iowa) was a decent, dull fellow. I didn't notice when it happened, because I was not in Iowa and not following its politics, but somewhere along the way he shed the decency.

Most of the leading Republicans in government are not imbeciles (although Rodgers is),  and even if I think they are either followers of an ideology that was proven unworkable before any of them were born or simply opportunists, they are intelligent enough to understand the minimum requirements necessary to keep a government functioning.

They cannot be sleeping well.

UPDATE

Additional evidence (though none is needed) that a social media directorate is managing the memory hole.