4 • 714 Ratings
🗓️ 14 February 2017
⏱️ 9 minutes
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With Jacob Heilbrunn, editor of The National Interest. Presented by Freddy Gray.
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0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to The Spectator's Americano podcast, a series of discussions about American politics and the Trump presidency in 2017. |
0:13.6 | I'm Freddie Gray and I'm deputy editor of The Spectator. |
0:16.2 | I'm joined today by Jacob Halbrun, who is editor of the national interest. |
0:21.9 | And we're going to be talking about the resignation of Michael Flynn, who was Trump's national security advisor. Jacob, |
0:28.7 | what do you think we can tell about the Trump administration from the fact that Michael Flynn has |
0:34.1 | departed quite abruptly? Well, it is a further blow to Trump's pledge to bring in business practices into the United States government |
0:46.6 | and that he would be a far more effective manager than President Obama had been. |
0:53.5 | The blunt fact is that the administration has been in pretty much constant chaos |
0:57.9 | and has worked very little with Congress to pass any legislation so far. |
1:05.5 | It's relied solely on these flashy executive ed orders. |
1:10.4 | It's not clear that Trump even wanted to dispose of Flynn. |
1:15.9 | Flynn resigned because his position in the administration had become untenable. |
1:21.3 | I think vice president Mike Pence was reportedly livid with him for misleading or lying to him as you please about |
1:31.9 | his contacts before the inauguration with the Russian ambassador to the United States, Sergei Kislyak. |
1:41.0 | And those conversations reportedly centered on sanctions. |
1:47.4 | And Flynn's denial strained credulity that he now says that it was an inadvertent oversight. |
1:54.8 | The departure of Flynn, does it suggest that Mike Pence is perhaps a more influential |
2:00.3 | figure than we've thought in recent weeks? |
2:03.3 | Well, that's an interesting suggestion. |
2:06.2 | I always thought from the outset that Pence would be very influential. |
2:10.6 | And then as the administration proceeded, it's not clear because you have so many rival power centers. |
2:19.9 | And don't forget that the intelligence agencies were out to get Flynn, |
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