What did Donald Trump do today?

He couldn't get away from the subject of his $400M "gift" plane.

Trump is on a three-country tour of the Middle East this week, visiting Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates. His family's wealth is deeply enmeshed with the ruling monarchies of all three of these countries. For example, Saudi Arabia gave billions of dollars to Trump's son-in-law's private equity firm even though their own analysis showed that it was probably a bad investment. (Once Trump was re-elected, other Gulf states, including Qatar, ponied up money for it as well.) And the UAE has, in recent weeks, been throwing money at several Trump business ventures, including real estate and cryptocurrencies.

In return, Trump has made a number of policy and diplomatic concessions to the rulers of these Gulf states, including ending sanctions on Syria and lavishly praising the de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. MBS, as he is known, orchestrated the murder of a Saudi-American journalist, Jamal Khashoggi, during Trump's first term. The brutal murder of Khashoggi was international news for months, forcing Trump—who was financially entangled with the Saudi royal family then, too—to pretend he didn't know that American intelligence agencies had definitively linked the murder to MBS. 

Today, in his remarks about MBS, Trump gushed, "I like him a lot. I like him too much. That's why we give so much, you know? Too much. I like you too much."

But the main symbol of Trump's willingness to sell access to him and to the levers of American power for this week remains the $400M ultra-luxury jet that the Qatari ruling family wants to gift him. 

Trump has insisted it's not really "for" him because it would be donated to his presidential library after he left office, but only he or his heirs would ever have control over its use, making it his property in all but the most technical sense. He's insisted that it's "free," although inspecting and retrofitting it to the military standards necessary for a plane carrying the president will cost far more than the plane is worth in its current form.

Trump has always been intensely emotional on the subject of the planes he uses almost every week to shuttle between his various resorts, particularly with respect to the age of the current Air Force One. Its airframe is, as Trump bitterly complains about, some 40 years old. But it is, in every conceivable sense, a far "newer" plane than most Americans will ever see. Trump spent a great deal of time during his first term trying unsuccessfully to finagle a new plane on a faster schedule—or at least a new paint scheme. 

Pressed yet again on the matter today, Trump resorted to one of the few subjects where he has bona fide knowledge: golf. 

There was an old golfer named Sam Snead, did ever hear of him? He was a great golfer, he won 82 tournaments, and he had a motto: When they give you a putt, you pick up your ball, say "thank you very much" and walk to the next hole. A lot of people are stupid. They say "no, no, I insist on putting it." Then they putt it, they miss it. And their partner gets angry at them. You know what, remember that. Sam Snead. When they give you a putt, you pick it up, you walk to the next hole and say "thank you very much."

Trump is referring to the golf custom known as a "gimme," where in friendly no-stakes games, very short putts are treated as having been made without the player having to actually take a stroke or sink the putt. Of course, in the actual sport, which takes its rules so seriously that many infractions result in disqualification even if there was no ill intent on the part of the player, this is completely forbidden.

The United States Constitution, which are the rules of the game for Trump as president, explicitly forbids the president or any other officer to receive any "present" from any "king, prince, or foreign state" without explicit approval from Congress. 

Incidentally, for a man whose cognitive function is regularly called into question, Trump's recollection of Snead's record is accurate: he did, in fact, win exactly 82 PGA tournaments. However, in an interview on board the present Air Force One today, Trump couldn't recall the name or title of the person trying to give him the new plane.

Why does this matter?

• Open, naked corruption is still corruption.
  

• Nobody who becomes emotionally distraught because one of the most advanced, luxurious planes in the world simply isn't good enough is fit to serve as president.
  

• No matter how much a president may like kings, the President of the United States is not a king.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He got confused about Syria again.

The Assad regime in Syria, which is allied with Russia, is rapidly losing ground to rebel forces and may soon collapse. Trump used the occasion to attack former President Barack Obama for not having intervened more strongly in the Syrian Civil War during his presidency—while simultaneously insisting that the United States should not intervene in any way.

He was apparently referring to Obama's decision not to get the U.S. military directly involved after Assad used chemical weapons on opposition forces in 2013. At the time, private citizen Trump demanded that Obama not take action, tweeting that the "VERY FOOLISH" Obama should under no circumstances intervene—which is the opposite of what he now says should have happened, but the same as his plan going forward.

If that sounds confusing, it's nothing new. The Syrian conflict is complicated, and the complexity often proved too much for Trump to keep straight during his first term. Among the notable events of that period:

• He launched an attack against a Syrian airbase that was so ineffective that it was out of commission for less than a day, rather than a more effective form attack that would have risked Russian lives.
• It later came out that the token effort to attack the pro-Putin Assad regime had literally been a bit of Mar-a-Lago dinner theater meant to impress visiting Chinese officials.
• He telegraphed his strategy for Syria, in an attempt to look tough on Russia, which gave Russia what they needed to be in a position to counter it.
• He "declared victory" in Syria as a result of a single airstrike on a munitions depot, which in no way changed anything about the status of the war.
• He forgot what side Russia was on in that conflict—which is to say, he forgot that the Putin regime was the enemy who wanted him to withdraw, which is what he did.
• He betrayed the allied Kurdish forces that had done the lion's share of fighting against ISIS in Syria, leaving them to be overrun by hostile Turkish troops over the objections of essentially his entire military staff
• James Mattis, his defense secretary, resigned over that betrayal of allies. Brett McGurk, the top official working on his administration's anti–ISIS efforts, also quit in protest.
• Overwhelming majorities in both parties passed a resolution condemning his abandonment of the Kurdish forces in Syria.

In practice, the United States not taking part in the post-Assad future in Syria means giving the Putin regime in Russia, to whom Trump personally owes many favors, the chance to dictate the future of the Middle East.

Why does this matter?

• At the very least, a president ought to be able to keep straight what side of a war he is on.

• Just letting hostile foreign powers do whatever they want isn't a great strategy.

• "The thing I wanted was right unless the person I don't like did it" is how a child thinks, not somebody responsible for the lives of American troops.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He celebrated peace between nations already at peace.

Trump held a signing ceremony today at the White House for an agreement between Israel and two other Middle Eastern nations, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates. Among other things, Trump credited himself with having "change[d] the course of history after decades of division and conflict."

In reality, however, Israel has never been in conflict with either Bahrain or the UAE—ever. Israel is almost a thousand miles from Bahrain and even further from the UAE, and the governments of all three countries have been generally within the American sphere of influence. There was already normal trade and unofficial diplomatic relations between Israel and the two Arab states.

The White House did not really try to deny that it was designed to provide Trump with a foreign policy "achievement" just before the election. It seems to be all that will come from Trump's assigning his son-in-law, Jared Kushner—a real estate heir with no experience in government, the region, or diplomacy—to come up with a Middle East peace plan.

The real external threats to Israel are Iran, and the Assad regime in Syria. Trump has done everything possible to provoke Iran, unilaterally withdrawing the United States from a treaty that was successfully dismantling the Iranian nuclear program. He also ordered the assassination of an Iranian general in what looked more like an attempt to stir up political support during his impeachment than to achieve any national security goals.

In Syria, however, Trump—who occasionally gets confused about which side of the conflict the United States is on—has done almost everything possible to allow the Assad regime to stay in power. While he's failed to bring American troops out of harm's way, he did order a sudden and hasty retreat that abandoned the United States's Kurdish allies to ethnic cleansing by advancing Turkish forces, and let Russian troops occupy American bases. The Putin regime, which Trump is personally financially entangled with, is pro-Assad. (Abandoning the Kurds in Syria also helped Iran.)

It's not clear if Trump really understood there was no "conflict" to resolve, or whether he simply thinks voters will believe there was. It's also not clear what the United States has had to give Bahrain and the UAE in order to get a signing ceremony on the White House lawn just before an election—because the White House wouldn't say.

Why does this matter?

• It's wrong to take credit for solving problems that didn't exist in the first place.

• Voters may not like Trump assuming they're dumb.

• Diplomacy is not a campaign stunt.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He complained that other countries weren't pretending the United States still had troops in northeastern Syria.

Trump tweeted what was probably intended as a warning to Russia, Iran, and the Assad regime in Syria, telling them not to kill "thousands if [of] innocent civilians in Idlib Province."

Idlib Province is in the northeastern quarter of Syria, the region where American forces used to be until they were suddenly relocated in October on Trump's order. The move allowed Turkey to invade, committing war crimes in the process against the Kurdish forces that had been fighting ISIS on behalf of the United States. 

Trump's tweet today also claimed, without evidence, that Turkey was trying to protect civilians in the region. In fact, the only recent news out of Turkey on the subject was that country's refusal to shelter any more of the Syrian civilian refugees that Trump was talking about.

Trump's order also meant that Russian forces took over the very same defensive positions that American soldiers abandoned. He later claimed that he was redeploying them to "get the oil"—Syria's oil fields are in the eastern part of the country—but American forces are simply doing guard duty over defunct wells at the moment. (The United States has no claim on the oil fields and would not be profiting even if they were producing.)

In other words, Trump is complaining that America's enemies in the Syrian Civil War are not acting as though he hadn't unilaterally abandoned the territory that they're now threatening civilians in.

Trump's insistence that the U.S. cut and run from the parts of Syria it was actually helping cost him a Defense Secretary (James Mattis), the top U.S. envoy to the anti-Assad coalition (Brett McGurk)  and a national security advisor (John Bolton), both of whom—among many others—warned that this would happen.

Why does this matter?

• When presidents are incompetent in military matters and refuse to listen to experts, innocent people can die as a result.

• The actual American military is a much bigger deterrent than a sternly-worded tweet.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He fired his Secretary of the Navy for not taking orders via tweet.

Earlier this month, Trump overturned a demotion issued to Navy E-7 Eddie Gallagher for a war crimes conviction, and pardoned or commuted the sentences of two other servicemembers accused or convicted of war crimes. Gallagher had been convicted of desecration of a corpse for posing for a picture of himself with a dead combatant, and was suspected of killing civilians. The other two were either convicted or awaiting trial for murders committed in Afghanistan. 

The pardons were not popular with veterans or serving troops, and seem to have been designed to change the conversation about Trump's deployment of forces in the Middle East. Trump has forced American troops to break faith with their warfighting allies in Syria, and has increased the number of servicemembers in the region even as he claims to be reducing them.

This week, Trump waded further into the Navy's internal discipline procedures, tweeting—but not ordering—that he would not be expelled from the SEALs. Richard Spencer, Secretary of the Navy, told reporters that he had received no such order from Trump and that the normal disciplinary process would continue until he was told otherwise. He also denied reports that he had threatened to resign in protest if Trump interjected himself into the process and allowed a convicted war criminal were allowed to keep his SEAL pin.

This afternoon, the White House put out a statement agreeing with Spencer's position, saying that the White House would not intervene in the review of Gallagher's status.

Then tonight, Trump fired Spencer and ordered that Gallagher keep his SEAL pin. 

Trump and the White House have put out conflicting stories about exactly why, but the gist of it appears to be that Trump was unhappy that Spencer had failed to shield him from the overwhelming opposition inside the Navy to his actions. 

Why does this matter?

• The military isn't supposed to be used as a political distraction.

• The fact that the military has to obey the president's orders doesn't mean those orders aren't stupid or harmful.

• It's bad if the President of the United States isn't strong enough to be able to hear opinions other than his own.

• It's a huge problem Eddie Gallagher is Trump's idea of what the military should look like.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He pretended he didn't watch the impeachment hearings he was clearly watching.

The White House today launched an all-hands effort to deny that there was anything to see at the first day of public testimony at the House impeachment hearings. Asked if Trump was watching the testimony of U.S. ambassador Bill Taylor and State Department Ukraine expert George Kent, seldom-seen White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham told reporters, “He’s in the Oval in meetings. Not watching. He’s working.” 

Trump then spent the day tweeting, 34 times as of 9:20 p.m. EST, about the hearings he supposedly wasn't watching. 

Trump's voracious TV appetite has frustrated his staff in the past, but he could be forgiven for spending the day in front of the tube today. His political life—and very likely his ability to avoid criminal charges after he leaves office—hang in the balance, and this public unveiling of the case for impeachment will weigh heavily in what happens next. Trump seems to have resigned himself to being the third U.S. president to be impeached, and is concentrating on avoiding being removed from office by the Republican-controlled Senate.

Speaking of Senate Republicans, Trump did spend some time away from his phone today, when he hosted some of them at a meeting with visiting Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Senators in both parties were outraged when Trump allowed Erdoğan to invade Syria and attack the United States' former Kurdish allies in the fight against the Islamic State. In front of reporters, Trump, who declared himself a "big fan" of Erdoğan, defended the Turkish president against the Republican senators' questions, and nodded along as Erdoğan called the Syrian Kurds that did the bulk of the fighting against the Islamic State "terrorists."

Why does this matter?

• Presidents who don't commit impeachable offenses don't get distracted by impeachment proceedings.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He took a victory lap for a military mission he did everything possible to jeopardize.

American forces carried out a raid last night that resulted in the death of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the notional leader of the Islamic State. This morning, Trump gave a long speech in which he credited himself, and then Russia and Turkey, for the success of the raid. When asked about the role played by Syrian and Iraqi Kurds, the United States' former allies in the fight against ISIS, Trump would only grudgingly say that they gave "certain support."

But as the day wore on, and military and Trump administration sources began reaching out to reporters, a very different story emerged. In reality, Russia and Turkey's role appears to have been to stay out of the American military's way, while Kurdish intelligence provided the United States with al-Baghdadi's whereabouts and details about his personal security. (He was found and killed in northwest Syria, which Turkey—apparently completely unaware of his presence—has controlled since 2018) 

Trump's sudden and still unexplained decision to allow Turkey to invade the region nearly torpedoed the mission altogether, as the New York Times reported this evening:

For months, intelligence officials had kept Mr. Trump apprised of what he had set as a top priority, the hunt for Mr. al-Baghdadi, the world’s most wanted terrorist.

But Mr. Trump’s abrupt withdrawal order three weeks ago disrupted the meticulous planning underway and forced Pentagon officials to speed up the plan for the risky night raid before their ability to control troops, spies and reconnaissance aircraft disappeared with the pullout, the officials said. 

Mr. al-Baghdadi’s death in the raid on Saturday, they said, occurred largely in spite of, and not because of, Mr. Trump’s actions.

What's the problem with this?

• It's bad if the commander-in-chief unnecessarily endangers the people under his command.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He suggested that Syrian Kurds ethnically cleanse themselves.

Trump today tweeted that the United States' Kurdish former allies against the Assad regime and ISIS should leave the parts of Syria they have lived in for centuries and "start heading towards the Oil Region."

By definition, this would be ethnic cleansing.

Since the White House didn't—and presumably couldn't—explain exactly what this meant, it's a little unclear what Trump thought he was saying. But the "Oil Region" of Syria is hundreds of miles away from the areas that Kurds are being forced to flee by advancing Turkish forces and Turkey-allied militias. 

There is no reason to think that literally millions of Kurdish refugees would be welcome in the Arab-dominated oil-producing regions of Syria, or that the region could support such a huge population influx, or that the several hundred American troops Trump plans to leave in the region could do anything to protect them.

Trump, who can hardly afford yet another foreign policy debacle, seems desperate to claim some kind of victory after inexplicably giving Turkey the go-ahead to invade northern Syria and launch attacks on the Kurdish population in the region. 

In the same tweet, Trump said he "really enjoyed" speaking with Mazloum Abdi, the leader of the Kurdish troops in the region, and that Abdi—again, according to Trump—"appreciates what we have done." In reality, Abdi has expressed horror at what the Kurds (and much of the rest of the world, and an overwhelming bipartisan majority in Congress) see as a betrayal.

Why is this a bad thing?

• Ethnic cleansing is a crime against humanity.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He sent Mick Mulvaney out to do damage control, with poor results.

Trump's acting chief of staff and OMB Director, Mick Mulvaney, has been in the spotlight since Thursday, when he inadvertently admitted that Trump conditioned military aid for Ukraine on that country performing a fake "investigation" of his presidential rival Joe Biden. Mulvaney walked back the comments later in the day, but the damage was done.

In fairness to Mulvaney, when he admitted that Trump made his political demands part of his willingness to release legally mandated military aid for Ukraine, he was only confirming what Trump himself had already admitted with the release of the White House memo of his call with the Ukrainian president. Still, with at least three major scandals breaking this weekend—his greenlighting the ethnic cleansing of a former ally in Syria, his demand for Ukraine to interfere in the 2020 election, and his awarding of the G7 summit hosting duties to himself—Trump sent Mulvaney out to do more damage control on the Trump-friendly Fox News Channel. That led to this exchange with host Chris Wallace:

WALLACE: He's decided that he's not going to hold it [the G7 summit] at Doral. He blames it on, quote, the "hostile media and their Democratic partners" but again, he was getting hammered by Republicans, so why did he cave?

MULVANEY: I honestly think what you saw in the tweet was real. The president isn’t one for holding back his feelings and emotions about something. He was honestly surprised at the level of pushback. At the end of the day, he still considers himself to be in the hospitality business.

As a factual matter, Mulvaney is correct: Trump, whose mysterious finances would be greatly improved if Trump National Doral stopped losing money for even a single month, is very much in the hospitality business. Every other president in the modern era has sold off their business interests before taking office in order to focus exclusively on the job of the presidency.

Trump's own (presidential) schedule today was once again blank, and he once again spent it on Twitter.

Why does this matter?

• The presidency is not a part-time job.

What did Donald Trump do today?

Twitter.

With golf ruled out by cool temperatures and the threat of rain, Trump had nothing to do today but tweet. (Virtually without exception, Trump does not do work related to the presidency on the weekends, or on weekdays before about 11:00 a.m., or on Friday afternoons, or during the free-floating "executive time" during the normal workday reserved for Twitter and cable TV.)

He tweeted and retweeted a lot, even by his own standards, shining a light his anxieties ranging from impeachment to Syria to Mick Mulvaney's seemingly accidental confession of the corrupt bargain with Ukraine that Trump himself has already admitted to.

But at 9:18 p.m., Trump actually tweeted something newsworthy: that he was backing down on his decision to award himself the multi-million dollar contract to host the G7 summit in 2020. Opposition to his choosing Trump National Doral, his failing Miami-area golf resort, for a major world summit during hurricane season has been overwhelming and bipartisan. 

In fact, it was such a blatantly corrupt act, it seemed possible it could become an article of impeachment all by itself, which may have been what scared Trump off. (Republicans have been extremely unhappy at having to defend Trump on this point.) He explained his retreat in three furious tweets:

I thought I was doing something very good for our Country by using Trump National Doral, in Miami, for hosting the G-7 Leaders. It is big, grand, on hundreds of acres, next to MIAMI INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, has tremendous ballrooms & meeting rooms, and each delegation would have........its own 50 to 70 unit building. Would set up better than other alternatives. I announced that I would be willing to do it at NO PROFIT or, if legally permissible, at ZERO COST to the USA. But, as usual, the Hostile Media & their Democrat Partners went CRAZY!....Therefore, based on both Media & Democrat Crazed and Irrational Hostility, we will no longer consider Trump National Doral, Miami, as the Host Site for the G-7 in 2020. We will begin the search for another site, including the possibility of Camp David, immediately. Thank you!

Trump National Doral, one of the few Trump-branded properties he actually owns, has been hemorrhaging money in recent years, especially in the summer months. By filling it for a month or more with foreign delegations, Trump would be reducing those losses to zero, even assuming that he really did bill them at cost. 

So what?

• Taking money from the treasury and putting it in your own pocket because you can is what tinpot dictators do.

• So is shaking down foreign leaders for bribes.

• Not getting to break the law doesn't make you a victim.

• There are actually more important things for a president to be doing.

• A better businessman wouldn't need to the presidency to try to rescue his businesses.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He said the Kurds he abandoned were "happy" with Turkey's "ultimate solution" for them.

In tweets and appearances before reporters today, Trump told a number of lies about the Turkey-Syria debacle.

Throughout the day, Trump referred repeatedly to a "ceasefire" between invading Turkish forces and fleeing Kurdish troops and civilians. But Turkey has agreed to no such thing—the Turkish government specifically contradicted Vice-President Mike Pence's use of the term yesterday—and continued shelling border towns in Syria.

Trump later called the attacks on the civilian population, which resulted in casualties, "minor."  This was in the same tweet where he spoke of Turkey's "ultimate solution" for its Kurdish problem, in a chilling but hopefully accidental echo of Nazi Germany's "final solution" for European Jews. (Turkey's government has long been hostile to its minority Kurdish population, and the U.S. military—which Trump didn't consult before his sudden decision to greenlight Turkey's invasion—believes it will commit acts of genocide against the Kurds.)

Trump then claimed that the "U.S. has saved the oil." He repeated the theme at a press availability later in the day, saying, "We’ve taken control of the oil in the Middle East — the oil that we’re talking about, the oil that everybody was worried about. The U.S. has control of that.”

Trump refused to explain what he was talking about, and nobody else was able to figure it out. He also claimed that ISIS fighters were "double secured" by both Turkey and the Kurds. This is even more baffling: ISIS detainees have already escaped from the prisons that had been guarded by the Kurdish SDF, until they were forced to flee by the invading Turkish force. 

In perhaps the most astonishing lie of the day, Trump said that Syrian Kurds were "very happy about the way things are going." The Kurdish military leader in the region told Trump that he was "leaving us to be slaughtered."

More than 10,000 Syrian Kurds have died fighting on behalf of the United States against the Islamic State in Syria.

Trump is no stranger to casual lies, having told more than 13,000 of them since taking office, by one count. In front of friendly rally crowds, he tends to make a game of it, making false claims and then mocking what critics will say in response. But rarely has he told such obvious lies in the face of furious opposition from Republicans, military servicemembers, and evangelical Christians.

Why should I care about this?

• Even by Trump's standards, these are obvious and outrageous lies.

• A president who won't or can't explain himself even when his closest allies are begging him to change course is either incompetent or corrupt.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He explained the situation in Syria as only he can.

Normally, presidential meeting with sports teams (when they happen at all) are not political. Today, however, Trump interrupted himself during a visit by the Stanley Cup-winning St. Louis Blues to try to explain his lack of response to the actions Turkey has taken in Syria since he gave them permission to invade last Sunday.

TRUMP: We want to bring our soldiers back home. And we're being very tough on Turkey and a lot of others. They have to maintain their own properties now. They have to maintain peace and safety. And we'll see what happens -- the delegation. We're asking for a ceasefire. We put the strongest sanctions that you can imagine, but they get a lot. We have a lot in store if they don’t -- if they don’t have an impact, including massive tariffs on steel. They ship a lot of steel to the United States. They make a lot of money shipping steel. They won't be making so much money.

American purchases of Turkish steel account for about three one-thousandths of the overall Turkish export market. What Trump has done so far—or rather, what he has threatened to do but not yet done—is to make that 0.3% more expensive for American consumers, which may force Turkish steelmakers to sell some of it elsewhere at slightly reduced profits.

This is no threat whatsoever to the Turkish economy, and the markets responded accordingly: the Turkish lira actually gained value against the dollar today.

In other Syrian news from today, Russian mercenary forces took over a base that American troops were forced to hastily abandon in order to try to find a safe retreat from the now-chaotic northern region. It may be the first time in history, including the Soviet era, that Russian forces have ever directly captured a military base from the United States military. Russian media arrived first and broadcast their arrival.

Trump is deeply financially entangled with both Turkey and Russia.

So what?

• Calling this "the strongest sanctions that you can imagine" is just an outright lie.

• It shouldn't be this hard to make sense of a president's military decisions.

• The most likely explanation for a president's military decisions shouldn't have anything to do with his private financial situation.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He increased the total number of American troops in the Middle East. 

When Trump suddenly capitulated to the Turkish president's demand that the United States abandon its Kurdish allies in Syria this past Sunday, he did so without consulting anyone else in his administration. The closest thing that he has offered to an explanation is that he wanted to get American troops out of "endless wars" in the region.

None of the approximately 1,000 American troops in Syria have actually left. In fact, Turkey shelled American forces in Syria today, ostensibly by accident. UPDATE, 10/12: American sources including an Army officer in the area now say that U.S. forces were deliberately "bracketed" by Turkish artillery, a hostile act.

But today, the Trump administration announced that almost 2,000 additional troops and two fighter squadrons would be deployed to Saudi Arabia. Those forces will help Saudi Arabia defend its oil infrastructure from attacks by Iran. (The destruction of the US-Kurdish alliance in Syria is very good for Iran.)

Until he became president, Trump was opposed to spending American money or lives on guarding the kingdom and said it should "fight their own wars."

As of two days ago, Trump still claimed to believe that the United States "GOING INTO THE MIDDLE EAST IS THE WORST DECISION EVER MADE."

Trump is deeply, personally financially entangled with both Turkey and Saudi Arabia. 

How is this a bad thing?

• It shouldn't even be possible to wonder if the president's military decisions have anything to do with his private business interests.

• Getting troops out of the Middle East means having fewer of them there, not more.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He explained his abandonment of the United States' Kurdish allies as only he could.

By the time it was morning in Washington today, Turkey had already commenced airstrikes and a ground invasion of the region of Northern Syria previously controlled by the Syrian Democratic Forces, a Kurdish military organization allied with the United States. Turkey regards the SDF—and the Kurdish ethnic group in general—as enemies. 

By this evening, there were reports of Kurdish fatalities as a result of the assault, including civilians.

This was the predictable (and predicted) consequence of Trump's decision to pull American troops out of Syria. The US-SDF relationship had been mutually beneficial: American troops safeguarded the SDF at virtually no risk to themselves, while the SDF acted as a front-line counter-terrorism force against the Assad regime and fighters allied with the Islamic State. 

Put another way, Trump's debatable claims that ISIS was defeated on his watch—at least in terms of controlling territory—are owed in large part to the work of the SDF.

Genuinely bipartisan outrage at the United States' betrayal of its Kurdish allies followed, forcing Trump to try to explain himself today. It's still not clear why Trump so abruptly gave in to Turkish president Erdoğan's demands—although Turkey does seem to be on the list of countries with suspiciously strong influence over Trump's actions. He began with a statement in which he called the Turkish invasion a "bad idea," but didn't even ask Turkey to pull back.

Later in the day, Trump told reporters that the SDF had been allied with the United States for, he implied, selfish reasons. 

The Kurds are fighting for their land, just so you understand. And somebody wrote a very, very powerful article today. They didn't help us in the Second World War, they didn't help us with Normandy, as an example.

Trump also complained about the cost of supporting the SDF's operations in Syria, which by any standard has been a bargain. When a reporter pointed out that ISIS prisoners that the SDF had been guarding were likely to escape, Trump replied, "Well, they'll be escaping to Europe."

Why does this matter?

• A president who abruptly and without explanation does things that help only America's enemies is unfit to serve, regardless of the reason.

• Presidents should be able to coherently explain why they did what they did.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He got his bluff called by Turkey in a humiliating fashion.

On Sunday, Trump announced—without having consulted anyone in the State Department or the military—that he was withdrawing American troops from their protective role in Syria. The effect was to abandon the United States' allies in the Syrian conflict, the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces. There was bipartisan outrage over the move.

On Monday, in an attempt to ease fears that the authoritarian government of Turkey (which is hostile to the Kurds) would attack the SDF, Trump tweeted a threat to "totally destroy and obliterate the Economy of Turkey" if they did "anything that I, in my great and unmatched wisdom, consider to be off limits." Turkey's vice-president responded that the country would "not react to threats."

This afternoon, in an attempt to undo the damage of the previous two days and demonstrate some control over the situation, Trump announced that he would welcome Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to the White House in November. 

Tonight, reports are coming in that Turkey is shelling SDF forces and that a ground invasion is imminent, in coordination with Russia. The SDF has announced that guarding prisons containing captured Islamic State prisoners is now a "second priority" because of the Turkish threat.

Trump profits from the licensing of his personal brand on property in Turkey* and admitted during the campaign that he has a "conflict of interest"—his words—where that country is concerned. Trump's election was accomplished with help from Russia, as a Republican-led Senate panel confirmed today.

Why does this matter?

• Countries that abandon their allies end up without allies.

• Anyone who puts their personal or political needs above those of the country is unfit to be president.

• Being disregarded like this makes Trump, and the United States, look incredibly weak.

* Trump licenses his name to Trump Towers Istanbul, but does not own them. A previous version of this post mistakenly identified him as a property owner in Turkey.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He accused TV cameras of being fake news.

On Tuesday, at a House intelligence committee hearing, Trump's lies or misunderstandings about subjects ranging from Iran to North Korea to ISIS were contradicted by his own appointees to intelligence services, including Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and CIA Director Gina Haspel.

On Wednesday, Trump found out about this, and blew up on Twitter, saying that the U.S. intelligence community was "wrong" and needed to "go back to school."

This morning, Trump was asked if he still had confidence in Haspel and Coats. He responded, "No. I disagree with certain things that they said. I think I'm right. Time will prove me right, probably."

This afternoon, after meeting with them behind closed doors, Trump changed his story, saying that Coats and Haspel had said that "they were totally misquoted and they were totally — it was taken out of context."

The hearings were televised live.

So what?

• Presidents who actually sit through intelligence briefings are less likely to be contradicted about intelligence matters by the people who provide him with intelligence.

• Inability to acknowledge that you've made a mistake is not a sign of good mental health.

• You can't misquote someone by broadcasting their words live.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He claimed to know more about intelligence than the intelligence services who brief him.

At a House intelligence committee hearing yesterday, Trump's own appointed intelligence chiefs publicly contradicted a number of Trump's own talking points. Among other things, CIA Director Gina Haspel confirmed that Iran is in compliance with the terms of the nuclear non-proliferation deal that Trump pulled the U.S. from last year, and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats testified that ISIS is still a significant threat in Syria and elsewhere. Coats also rejected any hope that North Korea was sincere in its promises to denuclearize.

By contrast, Trump routinely praises North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un and ignores evidence that it is expanding its weapons program. (He once declared that he had personally, permanently ended the nuclear threat posed by North Korea, although just today he said that there was only a "decent chance" that this was true.) Trump has already declared victory over ISIS in Syria, and his opinions about the Iran deal seem to be based almost entirely in fiction.

Today, Trump declared the entire U.S. intelligence community to be "naive" and said that they should "go back to school."

It's hardly the first time Trump has attacked the people who give him all of the information he has about the world—including much he never hears, because of his habit of skipping his intelligence briefings. Furious to learn how much they had uncovered of Russia's attempts to sabotage the 2016 election on his behalf, Trump compared American intelligence operatives to Nazis. Later, he openly sided with Vladimir Putin against U.S. intelligence agencies.

Why should I care about this?

• Believing you know more about everything than anyone else, including experts on any given thing, is not a sign of good mental health.

• Undermining faith in America's government is the job of its enemies, not its president.

• It's bad if it's this hard to tell the truth without infuriating the president.

• Literally everything Trump does or could know about the world comes from the very agencies he's attacking, not counting anything he may learn during occasional secret meetings with foreign intelligence agents.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He reversed his plan to abandon U.S. allies in the Syrian conflict (without admitting it).

Last month, Trump abruptly declared his intention to unilaterally withdraw U.S. troops from the Syrian conflict. The order came without warning, shocking American military leaders and forcing Defense Secretary James Mattis to resign in protest. 

The biggest winners from such a withdrawal would be Russia (which is allied to the genocidal Assad regime in Syria) and Turkey (which would be free to attack Syrian Kurds, the United States' ally on the ground in Syria). The move also alarmed Israel.

Given the enormous political blowback, Trump's handlers almost immediately began walking back the announcement (even as Trump walked it forward), insisting that the troop drawdown would take place over a much longer timeframe than originally planned. Today, Trump's national security advisor John Bolton took that process to its logical conclusion, saying that U.S. troops would be withdrawn only at an unspecified future time when certain conditions were met.

One of those "conditions," the actual defeat of Islamic State loyalists in Syria, is something Trump has already (falsely) declared victory on.

How is this a problem?

• Undoing bad policy doesn't undo all the consequences of making it in the first places.

• Anything that weakens allies' trust in the United States is a threat to national security.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He trashed an outgoing Cabinet secretary at a Cabinet meeting.

There was a Cabinet meeting today, the first since the resignation of Defense Secretary James Mattis—although Trump has now decided to call that a firing. Mattis resigned in protest last month over Trump's sudden insistence on a pullout of American troops from Syria, which would amount to an abandonment of vulnerable American allies in the region.

Trump's opening ramble eventually turned to Mattis, about whom he said: "What's he done for me? How has he done in Afghanistan? Not too good. Not too good. I'm not happy with what he's done in Afghanistan, and I shouldn't be happy."

What Mattis has "done for" Trump in Afghanistan is carry out the Trump administration's policy. But it's not entirely clear what that policy is—as Trump himself demonstrated in the meeting when he bizarrely praised the Soviet Union's 1979 invasion of the same country. This is what Trump said about his long-term Afghanistan strategy:

We're gonna do something that's right. We are talking to the Taliban, we're talking to a lot of different people. But here's the thing... Russia is there. Russia used to be the Soviet Union. Afghanistan made it Russia, because they went bankrupt fighting in Afghanistan. Russia. So you take a look at other countries—Pakistan is there. They should be fighting. But Russia should be fighting. The reason Russia was in Afghanistan was because terrorists were going into Russia. They were right to be there. The problem is, it was a tough fight and literally they went bankrupt. They went into being called Russia again, as opposed to the Soviet Union, you know a lot of these places you're reading about now are no longer part of Russia because of Afghanistan.

In other words, Trump is saying that the United States—which funded, under President Reagan, the Mujahideen opposition to the occupying Soviet force—was on the wrong side of the Soviet-Afghan War. He also seems to be saying that the United States should not simply withdraw from Afghanistan, but that it should do so specifically in order to allow the Soviet Union and Pakistan to take control. (Trump himself suspended U.S. military aid to Pakistan because of its support for the Taliban.)

Put even more simply, Trump is siding with two adversarial countries—one of whom is an ally of the United States' enemy in Afghanistan—against the policy of every presidential administration, including his own, for the last 40 years.

Put as simply as possible, virtually none of what Trump claims to believe about Afghanistan is true.

So what?

• It's bad when an American president takes sides with the Putin (or Brezhnev) regime against the United States' interests.

• Only incompetent leaders blame their subordinates when their plans don't work.

• It's useful for presidents to have some knowledge of history, including the parts they were middle-aged adults during.

What did Donald Trump do today?

He forgot why he was withdrawing U.S. troops from Syria.

Less than a day after Trump announced via tweet that he was suddenly withdrawing 2,000 U.S. troops from the conflict in Syria, he seemed to forget why he had made the order. His tweet on the subject is confusing, even in context, because no single part of it is true.

This is a lie. Russia has celebrated Trump's decision, in everything from its English-language Twitter account to a personal endorsement from Vladimir Putin. Iran's government has not made a formal statement, but individual Iranian strategists cheered the reduction of American influence in a region where Iran sees itself as the controlling power—a view shared by analysts elsewhere. 

The only Syrians unhappy about Trump's decisions are the ones who had been the United States' allies and protectees.

This is false, although Trump (who is famously attuned to Russian interests, and has gotten confused about which side the United States is on in Syria before) may actually believe it. 

To be clear: Russia, Iran, and the Assad regime in Syria were never fighting the Islamic State with the United States. The United States is on the other side of the conflict. 

This is just silly. The United States has had the "most powerful military in the world" since at least the end of World War II.

22 hours earlier, Trump seemed to think—incorrectly—that ISIS had been defeated in Syria.

Not coincidentally, Secretary of Defense James Mattis resigned today.

Why does this matter?

• This is not the sort of issue that the President of the United States can afford to be confused or compromised about.