First Read: “As we’ve said before, much of the public and the political world have become numb to all of the chaos in Washington. Earlier this month, the president’s former lawyer/fixer was sentenced to three years in jail; Trump got rid of his second chief of staff and replaced him with an acting third; and a judge delayed sentencing of the president’s first national security adviser. But after yesterday’s events, we’ve now reached DEFCON 2 on our readiness chart of political chaos – one step away from total chaos.”
“What’s been particularly striking is how Senate Republicans have split from Trump this week — on his decision to withdraw U.S. troops from Syria, by passing a clean continuing resolution to keep the government open and on Mattis’ resignation.”
“And we’ll leave you with this thought: On Thursday, Vladimir Putin cheered Trump’s decision to withdraw U.S. troops from Syria, and the secretary of defense resigned.”

