WH daycare trying to focus toddler POTUS on Asia, giving short briefings to avoid "overloading" him [View all]

[highplainsdem]

From Poltico this morning:

https://www.politico.com/story/2017/11/01/trump-asia-trip-korea-china-244398

President Donald Trump has been holed up in a series of rapid-fire briefing sessions on his upcoming 12-day, five-country tour through Asia — an effort the White House hopes will help avoid the kind of diplomatic snafus that have dogged his presidency.

The trip — Trump’s longest yet — comes at a tense moment in Asia, with the threat of the North Korea nuclear program looming. But some of Trump’s advisers believe the time away from Washington will offer the president, who leaves Friday, a brief respite from the Russia-related revelations that have consumed him in recent days.

Trump’s top advisers — including national security adviser H.R. McMaster, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer — have met with the president in recent days to go over details of the trip, including in an hourlong briefing Friday in the Oval Office, according to administration officials. Top aides have sought to keep the briefings short to avoid overloading the president with details but have scheduled dozens of them to plan public remarks and outline what he should say about North Korea on defense and China on trade.

“We’ve kind of tried to do it in pieces so it’s easy to keep up with,” said another administration official, adding that National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn and Defense Secretary James Mattis have also briefed the president.

-snip-

The president’s advisers acknowledge privately that Trump’s unpredictable behavior could complicate the trip in ways big and small, from potentially escalating the crisis on the Korean Peninsula to flouting complicated rules of procedure.

“You never know what he’ll say,” an administration official said, adding that the grueling schedule could heighten the risk of mistakes. An outside adviser to the administration concurred: “The potential for error is huge.”

Look, just wheel him out in a muzzle. Or put him in a giant playpen with some toys to distract him. And prerecord some fairly safe, innocuous statements that can be played at appropriate times.