Trump, in his mind, doesn't trust anyone and he doesn't rely on anyone. "I'm the only one that matters." "I did it my way."
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And Schiller? The biggest hint of how Trump sees him is that he sent Schiller to fire Comey. Not as a "trusted lieutenant", of course...
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...because Trump trusts no one. Sending Schiller to fire Comey was "doing it [his] way". In Trump's mind, he did it personally.
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Direct quote from the article: "send it to Keith, he'll get it to me". Schiller was an interface between him and the world, an extension.
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So Trump can't help but take it personally when Schiller is called on the carpet to testify about Trump's 2013 Russia trip.
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Because it is personal. Congressional investigators are seizing him by the right hand, without so much as a by-your-leave.
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I don't think there's much chance of Schiller blabbing like Carter Page. He's still in the "discreet personal security" business...
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...so he can kiss his career goodbye if he doesn't keep his client's secrets, and by all accounts, he's still loyal to Trump.
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But even if he does nothing but back up his boss on the Hill, it's still going to have an impact..
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First, psychologically on Trump. As I said, he can't help but take this personally. And it's got to be making some minions squirm, too.
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Because they know if Schiller has to throw someone under the bus, it won't be Trump and it won't be himself.
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Second, any answers that Schiller gives about his boss's stay in Russia in 2013 on the record can create discrepancies with other evidence.
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Which could give Mueller's investigators an opening to tear the conflicting accounts apart.
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Remember the phrase "the cover-up is worse than the crime"? It's also, paradoxically, often more obvious than the crime.
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Twenty people honestly describing the same event will still have discrepancies, but nothing like twenty people separately lying about it.
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You can see this, if you've been following the people tweeting Carter Page's testimony. No coordination with Sessions or Lewandowski.
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The criminal conspiracy here consists of a bunch of arrogant, self-entitled slackers who never considered they might be called to account.
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Trump's official description of his 2013 trip is that he was barely there; basically touched down for the pageant, one short night, gone.
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I expect Schiller to back that up 100%. But he'll be doing so on the record.
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And any discrepancy between that and other accounts (including Trump's own wildly varying descriptions at different times) justifies digging
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Now, as the article points out, this is playing out while Trump is doing high-stakes diplomacy half a world away.
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It's kind of a perfect metaphor for Trump's own presidential nightmare, the disconnect between his expectation and reality.
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Trump thought he was going to be the King of America, the way he and others had built up Obama's stature to mythical levels.
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The media would fawn over him! The NYT would finally welcome him as a Manhattan socialite! He'd tell people what to do and they'd do it.
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When Trump said there will be a healthcare bill on his desk on day 1, he thought that was the whole job. Saying what he expected to happen.
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And he has since then said, in so many words, that he still doesn't understand why it didn't happen like that.
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He thought taking the presidency would be like acquiring a company. America, a division of the Trump Org. The White House a remote office.
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He'd still live in his penthouse, make some pronouncements, use the oval office and rose garden for photo ops and ceremonies.
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And keeping Schiller by his side, his fixer and his buffer between him and the world, was part of his attempt to hold onto what he knew.
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That's what that bit about having Schiller make McDonalds runs because the White House kitchen couldn't match them was about.
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All of Trump's much-derided food tastes come down to a single overriding concern: consistency.
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