Precarious.
These are the dominoes.
A man of little curiosity and even lesser competence avoids regular briefings on national security, or when he attends these meetings he is focused on the business decisions of a department store that has elected to discontinue his daughter’s product line.
He authorizes a covert Navy SEAL raid in Yemen with less-than-optimal intel and lacking support, killing 30 civilians including children, as well as one of the SEALs, while letting the ostensible target escape. He is not even in the Situation Room to oversee how this happens and does not seem to learn anything from its errors. He then declares that any review or criticism of the mission is “disloyal.”
He institutes a travel ban on all people from seven Muslim nations, including current green card holders, which a majority of legal scholars consider ineptly written and poorly executed at all levels of its conception. When said ban is rightfully struck down by the courts, he insists that the judiciary is placing American citizens at risk. The attorneys speaking in advocacy of the ban center their argument around the notion that the president’s authority and expertise on national security is never to be questioned. When his own Supreme Court nominee is heard to find these attacks on the courts “demoralizing,” the president attacks those who heard these comments as liars and frauds.
He releases a list of “terrorist attacks on the U.S.” that he claims the media did not adequately cover, even though the record itself clearly shows otherwise and even though some of the attacks on this list are not attributed to “terrorism.” His appointed mouthpieces concoct attacks on Atlanta, GA and Bowling Green, KY and then blame the media for not understanding what they meant to say even though what they said could not in any way be interpreted as what they claim they meant to say.
In the meantime, recruiters for al-Qaeda and Daesh swarm the usual online gatherings to crow that they were correct all along, and that America is at war with Islam itself–after all, the Americans willingly elected this man who has now seen fit to single out all Muslims for persecution. Incidentally, now that you or your family members are trapped here in Syria with us, your options are clear: Join our campaign, or suffer.
Additionally, the president counts among his closest advisors white supremacists and conspiracy-addled members of the anti-Muslim fringe who previously wouldn’t have been taken seriously enough to be allowed in the door. The StormFront contingent and shambling pile of white linen David Duke spend their days pumping their fists and howling at a jaundiced, pockmarked moon about their glorious Fourth Reich to come.
Amidst the maelstrom of other tweets and appointments and angry outbursts, he signs a series of executive orders that enhance the authority and agency of police forces, which have been gradually militarized over time.
And again: The president is not paying attention to his security briefings.
The attack will not even have to achieve the scale of 9/11. That is how close we currently are to having the administration order internment camps.
Creative Control 