it s a little bit dodge y, the way it is written. it is almost as if it didn t want to be said that bluntly. but before donald trump left for mar-a-lago for the holidays, which was somewhere around december 23rd, 2020, that he had his last briefing with his regular pdb briefer, and said, i ll see you later. she wasn t planning on going down to mar-a-lago and briefing him during the holidays. later meant when he came back in early january. but the book says that he came back, and they were scheduled to have a briefing on january 6th, but they didn t have one and didn t have one until the end of trump s term. which adds up to almost a month of no intelligence getting to the president through the regular prbriefing process. this material also shows that even though the pdb would be delivered, he may have literally touched the book, as his first
s.e.a.l.s of the cia analyzing team, they understand about the topics there and they have to read what kind of person the president is. there s no doubt that different presidents have processed the intelligence in different ways. some are more readers and some want to do things verbally with the briefers. but the idea that a pdb briefer has to go in and somehow now speak truth to power because the president might not be able to handle it, might not be able to take it, might take umbrage, is ludicrous. it s got to be grinding of teeth for these folks, because that information is there, they re going to want to get the important stuff about russia up front. but if they feel like they have to hold back because the president won t be able to handle it emotionally, that s really horrific. it cuts against everything i think that most intelligence officers, you know, live for. it s to collect and get this stuff to the president who at the end of the day is really the ultimate consumer of this
different presidents process the intelligence in different ways. some are more readers and some want to get the briefing and do things verbally. but the idea that a pdb briefer and go in and somehow not speak truth to power because the president might not be able to handle it, might take umbrage is ludicrous. it s really got to be grinding the teeth of some of these folks because that information is there. they want to get this information up front, but if they have to hold back because they feel the president can t handle it the president at the end of the day is really the ultimate consumer of this material. according to the post white house officials told them the white house has adopted a tougher stance, we re pushing back against the russians.
when i was a pdb briefer there were days when we limited dissemination of things to very specific people. that s what you do with the most sensitive information that s out there. yeah. ken, there seems to be a paradox that comes out in this kind of article which is the catch-22 or the damned if you do, damned if you don t of dealing with a political attack like this in which it s a narrative where president obama was very concerned about not acting in ways that might be seen as trying to tip the scale in favor of the democrats trying to go to the election. so much so that the article details that by the end of it after everything they learned and after november 6th, they felt maybe they overdid that and yet isn t that one of the very reasons that other foreign powers used that kind of trick or tact because they know it can hurt the u.s. either way? well, look, i think it s been pretty clear for months that the obama administration mishandled this situation and this washington post