White House Says Anonymous 'Coward' Behind New York Times Op-Ed Should Resign (freerepublic.com)

Earlier today, The New York Times published an op-ed from an anonymous staffer in the Trump administration, who has "vowed to thwart parts of [President Trump's] agenda and his worst inclinations," citing the president's amorality. The staffer writes: "We want the administration to succeed and think that many of its policies have already made America safer and more prosperous. But we believe our first duty is to this country, and the president continues to act in a manner that is detrimental to the health of our republic. That is why many Trump appointees have vowed to do what we can to preserve our democratic institutions while thwarting Mr. Trump's more misguided impulses until he is out of office." An anonymous [coward] shares the response from the White House: White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders ripped the anonymous senior White House staffer who wrote an op-ed for The New York Times slamming President Trump's conduct. "The individual behind this piece has chosen to deceive, rather than support, the duly elected President of the United States," she said in a statement. "He is not putting country first, but putting himself and his ego ahead of the will of the American people. This coward should do the right thing and resign," she added. Trump himself called the op-ed's author "gutless." He tweeted: "Does the so-called 'Senior Administration Official' really exist, or is it just the Failing New York Times with another phony source? If the GUTLESS anonymous person does indeed exist, the Times must, for National Security purposes, turn him/her over to government at once!"

The New York Times op-ed page editor Jim Dao described the process behind publishing the op-ed, telling CNN that the official contacted him "through an intermediary." He said that the New York Times also spoke with the anonymous individual but there are only a "very small number of people within the Times who know this person's identity." Dao didn't provide a gender for the person, but the author was described in a New York Times tweet as a "he" earlier Wednesday. [The Times later said that the tweet was a mistake and that it "was drafted by someone who is not aware of the author's identity."] Furthermore, Dao "said there was no special effort to disguise the person's writing style, for example by rewriting the piece in some fashion," reports CNN. "'There's editing in everything we do,' he said, but it's based on making the person's views 'clearer' and adhering to style standards."

A separate CNN article highlights 12 senior Trump administration officials who may be behind the op-ed.

Comments

Re:Yes, they should

[DNS-and-BIND]

Boy, with hate-filled attitudes like that, you're certainly going to get people to vote for you.

It was precisely this contempt and bile for the people that got Trump into office in the first place. Apparently you have learned nothing. Here's something that bears repeating: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...

Once upon a time I was a liberal. Well, to be honest, less than a year ago I was still a liberal. I became a liberal because I felt I'd found a tribe whose values aligned with my own.

I staunchly reject racism of any kind. I reject the marginalization of any human being based off of their gender or sexual orientation. I reject tyrannical groupthink. I reject a system which allows an ambitious, misinformed, and dogmatic mob to suppress free speech, create false narratives, and then apathetically steamroll over the truth. I reject the acceptance of junk science and superstition to advance ideological agendas. I reject hate.

These are the reasons I became a liberal.

And these are the same reasons why I am now walking away.

For years now, I have watched as the left has devolved into intolerant, inflexible, illogical, hateful, misguided, ill-informed, Un-American, hypocritical, menacing, callous, ignorant, narrow-minded, and at times blatantly fascistic behavior and rhetoric. Liberalism has been co-opted and absorbed by the very characteristics it claims to fight against.

I have watched for years as people on the left have become anesthetized to their own prejudices and bigotry and the prejudices and bigotry of those around them who echo their values.

I have watched as formerly sensible people, who claim to reject racism, have come to embrace the principles of hating and universally blaming all of societies problems on all people who have white skin.

I have witnessed the irony of advocacy for gender equality morphing into blatant hatred and intolerance of men and masculinity.

I have seen the once-earnest fight for equality for the LGBT community mutate into an illogical demonization of heteronormativity, and the push to attack and vilify our conventional concepts of gender. These same self-proclaimed victims of intolerance now turning on the gay community that they attached themselves to to further their agenda- now calling gay people "privileged" and themselves "victims" of injustice.

I have watched as the left has willingly allowed themselves to become hypnotized by false narratives and conclusions, perpetuated by social justice warriors who intentionally misrepresent and misconstrue facts, evidence, and events to confirm their own biases that everybody who does not comply with their prejudicial conclusions and follow their orders is a racist, a bigot, a nazi, a white supremacist, homophobic, islamophobic, xenophobic, misogynistic- an "alt-right extremist".

And I have watched as they used these heartless and carelessly assigned labels to intimidate, threaten, bully, silence, attack, unemploy, black list, and destroy anybody who dares to fight back.

They'll come for me⦠and then they'll come for you.

And worst of all, The Democratic Party and the liberal media has embraced, affirmed, aided and abetted this cult ideology. In an effort to gain voters and maintain power the Democratic Party that I once loved has joined forces with the extremist left. The Democratic Party and the liberal media now believe their own ill-gotten conclusions and have ominously decided that they and only they know the remedy for society ills.

The left has decided that the solution to problems with race relations in America⦠is MORE racism.

The left believes that attacking, insulting, and dehumanizing one group of people elevates another.

The left now believes that there are no boundaries when telling lies, omitting the truth, or misrepresenting facts while reporting the news, because their end justifies their means.

Re:Yes, they should

[PopeRatzo]

Working for an employer you constantly seek to undermine is straight up bullshit.

Donald Trump is not the "employer" of the senior officials in the White House. We are.

And the anonymous senior official who wrote this op-ed (hint: his initials are "Mike Pence") believes that by circumventing this degenerate president, he is protecting our interests. It's exactly the kind of self-serving bullshit that you would expect from someone Trump hired. What you're seeing is the beginning stages of the GOP's exit strategy from the Trump Situation. Expect to see it reach fruition once Kavanaugh is sworn in. They can see the writing on the wall and it's in orange crayon mixed with feces.

I was just kidding about #Anonymous being Mike Pence, by the way. the op-ed didn't mention God or the fact that single women's vaginas have sharp teeth and are capable of swallowing a Christian man whole. But don't worry, we're going to find out who the anonymous official is within the next few days. Oh, these are fun times to be an American. And mark this down: Donald J. Trump will never stand for re-election. His roof is on fire and the GOP is chaining all the doors shut from the outside.

Re:Yes, they should

[PopeRatzo]

. Scratch a member of the DC establishment, and you find a would-be aristocrat who loathes the sight, the sound and the smell of common folk.

Be careful, when you scratch them, you might come away with a lot of orange fake tan under your fingernails:

"Trump said to a White House staff secretary, about the Attorney General, “This guy is mentally retarded. He’s this dumb Southerner. ... He couldn’t even be a one-person country lawyer down in Alabama.”

https://www.newyorker.com/news...

Re:ok, wtf is this doing on /.?

[guruevi]

Without looking, it's posted by either BeauHD or msmash. Political hitpieces by the left have become par for the course here on /.

Re:Yes, they should

[DNS-and-BIND]

Whataboutism. You did not refute anything that was said, you just tried to change the subject.

Re:Yes, they should

[AmiMoJo]

The phrase "deep state" makes you sound like a crazy conspiracy theorist. Do you really believe that such a thing exists?