Guess I’m dumb

....Knowing all of this, is anybody dumb enough to believe that I would say something inappropriate with a foreign leader while on such a potentially “heavily populated” call. I would only do what is right anyway, and only do good for the USA!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 19, 2019

I am reminded of the student who asked, “Do you think I’d be dumb enough to plagiarize from someone in the same class?” As it turned out, the student had done just that. X wrote a paper and gave it to Y, who used it as the basis for his paper. Then Y gave his paper to Z, who used it as the basis for his paper. I was able to put together the sequence by seeing how the writing worsened from X to Y to Z. You can change words here and there only so many times before things stop making sense.

But notice how Trump projects: not “Do you think I’d be dumb enough to” but “Is anybody dumb enough to.” I’m not dumb. You must be dumb. No puppet, no puppet. You’re the puppet.

Here is a thoughtful Twitter thread from Ned Shugerman, professor at Fordham Law School, on the sequence of events surrounding the whistleblower’s complaint.

My admittedly extreme guess as to “the promise”: “I will argue very strongly for the G8. And if not, they’ll be looking at the G6, that I can tell you.” Other perhaps more likely possibilities, suggested by journalists: a promise to turn over the recently extracted Russian spy, a promise to reopen Russian diplomatic compounds that were used for spying, a promise of better U.S.–Ukraine relations if only Ukraine would reopen its investigation of Hunter Biden.

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2:30 p.m.: And now The New York Times reports that the complaint is about more than a single call:

A potentially explosive complaint by a whistle-blower in the intelligence community said to involve President Trump was related to a series of actions that goes beyond any single discussion with a foreign leader, according to interviews on Thursday.

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7:21 p.m.: And now The Washington Post has more:

A whistleblower complaint about President Trump made by an intelligence official centers on Ukraine, according to two people familiar with the matter, which has set off a struggle between Congress and the executive branch.

[Post title with apologies to Glen Campbell and Brian Wilson.]