Tillerson Refuses to Deny He Called Trump a 'Moron,' Again

The “failing” New York Times continues to be President Donald Trump’s favorite newspaper, even if he would never admit it. In a pair of Sunday morning tweets, the president blasted the paper and its chief White House correspondent, Peter Baker, for failing to list in a recent article all the accomplishments of the Trump administration.

Baker, Trump said, “should have mentioned the rapid terminations by me of TPP & The Paris Accord & the fast approvals of The Keystone XL & Dakota Access pipelines. Also, look at the recent EPA cancelations & our great new Supreme Court Justice!” [sic]

The premise of Baker’s Times article is that on many of the big promises Trump made on the campaign trail—repealing Obamacare and ending the Iran nuclear deal among them—he has not followed through and put the blame or onus for the failures on Congress.

“In the case of health care, Mr. Trump is making a virtue of necessity. Having failed to push through legislation replacing the Affordable Care Act, he is taking more limited measures on his own authority aimed at chipping away at the law,” Baker writes. “On the other hand, when it comes to the Iran deal, he has the authority to walk away without anyone else’s consent but has been talked out of going that far by his national security team. Instead, by refusing to recertify the deal, he rhetorically disavows the pact without directly pulling out.”

Baker cites other issues, such as immigration, Cuban relations, and trade, on which Trump has not fully implemented his vision or reversed the actions of previous administrations. There’s a reasonable argument Team Trump might use to rebut much of Baker’s case: that sweeping campaign promises are required to declare a vision, but once in office presidents must be pragmatic to achieve that vision.