A curveball in Trump’s Veep search: He’s seriously considering a retired general

[bsteadman]

A curveball in Trump’s Veep search: He’s seriously considering a retired general

The Washington Post
by Robert Costa
7/9/2016

Excerpt:

After weeks of focusing on a group of current and former elected officials in his search for a running mate, Donald Trump is increasingly intrigued by the idea of tapping retired Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn to project strength and know-how on national security, according to four people familiar with the vetting process.

Flynn, a registered Democrat but fierce critic of President Obama, previously ran the Defense Intelligence Agency.

The people who spoke with The Washington Post on Saturday did so on the condition of anonymity to discuss their private conversations in recent days with Trump’s confidants and campaign aides.

The turn toward a military figure is being driven by Trump himself rather than by his advisers, the people said, and comes as the real estate mogul is telling his friends that national unrest may demand a “tough and steady” presence alongside him on the ticket.

In Flynn, they added, Trump thinks he would have a partner whom he trusts, based on their close working relationship over the course of the campaign on policy. And he likes the image of a businessman and a general coming to Washington as outsiders.

The shift in how Trump is evaluating his short list has also been spurred by his growing sense that he does not necessarily want or need a running mate who will satisfy Republican insiders, in spite of long saying that he would probably go that direction. Instead, and after some testy exchanges with GOP lawmakers during his visit Thursday to Capitol Hill, Trump is more open than ever to a non-politician.

As multiple people explained, Trump is eager to rally the party around him but sees the convention and other parts of the campaign as integral to that goal, with the vice-presidential nod potentially more important in terms of what it broadly symbolizes to voters.
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...tired-general/

[bsteadman]

Trump Embraces Ex-Top Obama Intel Official

The Daily Beast
by Shane Harris and Nancy A. Youssef
3/9/2016

Excerpt:

The former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency says Muslims are dangerous and Putin is a great ally—views that have made him a go-to adviser for the Trump and Cruz campaigns.

As Donald Trump inches closer to the Republican nomination for president, he has faced repeated calls from rival candidates and the press to name the national security and foreign policy experts who advise him and who are helping to shape his views on critical questions that he would confront as commander-in-chief.

Last week, Trump—who has called for banning foreign Muslims from entering the U.S., killing the families of terrorists, and using torture—said in an interview with MSNBC’s Morning Joe that he would identify the members of “the team” he consults “very shortly,” and that “I don’t think there’s any rush… I just don’t want to do it now.”

But in interviews with current and former U.S. defense and intelligence officials, one name continues to surface as a trusted Trump adviser and go-to man on intelligence and national security: Retired Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, a well-known and outspoken critic of the Obama administration’s campaign against ISIS and its foreign policy.

In Trump, Flynn may have found a kindred spirit—a brash, candid provocateur who seems more interested in upending whole systems than in fine-tuning them. He is also the most prominent name to emerge of those who could help shape the nascent Trump doctrine. And that has made some current and former officials who know Flynn nervous.

They question why the retired general, who has earned criticism for his leadership style but has generally been regarded as a well-intentioned professional, would assist a candidate who has called for military actions that would constitute war crimes.

“I think Flynn and Trump are two peas in a pod,” one former senior U.S. intelligence official who knows Flynn told The Daily Beast. “They have this naïve notion that yelling at people will just solve problems.”

Flynn, who was forced out of his post as director of the Defense Intelligence Agency in August 2014 after clashing with other senior officials, has said that “political correctness” has prevented the U.S. from confronting violent extremism, which he sees as a “cancerous idea that exists inside of the Islamic religion.” Flynn has authored a forthcoming book that argues the U.S. government “has concealed the actions of terrorists like [Osama] bin Laden and groups like ISIS, and the role of Iran in the rise of radical Islam…” His co-author, Michael Ledeen, is a neoconservative author and policy analyst who was involved in the Iran-Contra Affair.

Trump, too, has said that sensitivity about religion has kept society from having a fuller debate about the nature of violent extremism, and broad criticism of Muslims is a rhetorical standard in his campaign. Such “outlandishness” in his speeches and pronouncements about U.S. foreign policy, and his willingness “to pull the pin on the hand grenade and see what happens is apparently attractive to Mike [Flynn],” the former official said.
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View the complete article, including image, at:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/article...-official.html

[bsteadman]

Fox News Exclusive: Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn (Ret.) Interviewed by Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday

Published on Feb 8, 2015 by 'Viewing Liberty"

[bsteadman]

Q&A with US frm. Director of Defense Intelligence Agency Michael Flynn on MidEast crisis

Published on Dec 28, 2015 by 'RTQuestionMore'

[bsteadman]

Gen. Flynn on Trump: "I Vote For Leaders," "I Vote For America"

Real Clear Politics
by Ian Schwartz
7/10/2016

Excerpt:

Retired General Michael Flynn, a possible vice presidential candidate for Donald Trump, appeared on ABC's This Week on Sunday to discuss why he supports the presumptive Republican presidential nominee. Transcript, via ABC News:

MARTHA RADDATZ, ABC NEWS: Let's talk about the next leader. You are being vetted, we are told, as a vice presidential candidate. Is that true?

RET. GEN. MICHAEL FLYNN: OK, I -- you're --

RADDATZ: You don't know?

FLYNN: (INAUDIBLE).

RADDATZ: Do you want to be vice president?

Would you like to be --?

(CROSSTALK)

FLYNN: I have said that, you know, service to this country is an honor. I am honored to be even in this discussion. It's amazing to me for --

RADDATZ: So it's a job you'd take?

FLYNN: -- from a -- for a -- (INAUDIBLE) little town in the smallest state in the union, Rhode Island, it's a pretty big deal. And I take it very seriously. If people are serious about it, you know, I have to be serious about it.

RADDATZ: You've been a registered Democrat, correct?

FLYNN: I grew up as a -- in a -- in a -- I grew up as a Democrat in a very strong Democratic family. But I will tell you that the Democratic Party that exists in this country is not the Democratic Party that I grew up around in my -- in my upbringing, not at all.

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View the complete article, including video, at:

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/vid...r_america.html