The Chaotic White House

Scaramucci’s dismissal reveals that Trump keeps taking shots in the dark.

Even though Donald Trump insists on projecting the image of a president who controls every detail, the cascade of events affecting his closest associates reflects the apocryphal vision of Nero playing the lyre while Rome burned. His statements − via Twitter, obviously − denying any chaos in the White House don’t mean anything when the actions coming from the building on Pennsylvania Avenue contradict them practically daily. That the person in the most influential political position on the planet seems not to care about organizational questions is very bad news for the United States and for the rest of the world.

The dismissal of Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci after only 10 days is part of the icing on the cake, each part harder to digest in the most chaotic, least professional presidential transition that can be remembered. Admired and praised by Trump, Scaramucci, a financial analyst, replaced Mike Dubke, who took over the role in February and resigned in May. Dubke also had a unique understanding of freedom of expression and, for example, prohibited the recording of White House press conferences. A few hours after being named, the new communications director caused the president to dismiss a key member of his Cabinet: Reince Priebus. Scaramucci also continued with serious insults and public shaming of White House personnel. In Priebus’ place, Trump named a general with a tough reputation: John Kelly. His first action? Get rid of Scaramucci. It’s going to take more than a few nighttime tweets for Trump to convince the rest of the world that he has his own house under control.

What happened over a few days in the White House is a prediction for the rest of the Trump administration. Many second-tier positions, not flashy yet indispensable for the presidential machinery to function, have been left unfilled. The same can be said about numerous embassies in allied countries, among them Madrid in Spain, and there doesn’t seem to be any attempt to fill them within a reasonable time.

At this point, Trump should already be discovering the big difference between running a private business and a large superpower. But while the rest of the world demands that he act more professionally, he insists on blaming his mistakes − and on occasion his incompetence − on any type of internal or foreign enemy. The one that stands out the most is the media. A famous question from the U.S. election campaigns asked voters which candidate they’d have more confidence in if the White House phone rang early in the morning and a major decision had to be made for the country. Based on what is happening, many Americans, and citizens from the rest of the world, are now asking themselves if there really is someone in the White House capable of answering the phone at that time of day.