Everybody trusts an unidentified source

"Nobody believes the official spokesman... but everybody trusts an unidentified source."

Ron Nessen, President Gerald Ford's Press Secretary  

Excerpts from [Bob Woodward's] forthcoming account of Trump’s White House, first published Tuesday in The Washington Post, portray Mattis as scornful of the president’s intellect and judgment, and, in a boost to an already prominent narrative, as a vital check against the president’s dangerous instincts. Woodward depicts an agitated Mattis explaining to Trump in a meeting that the United States maintains a military presence on the Korean peninsula to “prevent World War III” and later deriding the president as “a fifth or sixth grader.” Woodward also claims that when Trump called up Mattis and suggested the United States “fucking kill” Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for using chemical weapons against civilians in 2017, Mattis played along but then hung up the
phone and told an aide, “We’re not going to do any of that,” and instead drew up plans for more limited air strikes that Trump ultimately authorized. (Both Mattis and Trump have denied this account.)

The Atlantic, five hours ago.

This all has the ring of truth to it, even though the idea that Mr. Trump would try to take out President Assad is exactly the opposite of the programme of America First on which he won election. 

Then comes the anonymous article in The New York Times "I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration".

The dilemma — which he does not fully grasp — is that many of the senior officials in his own administration are working diligently from within to frustrate parts of his agenda and his worst inclinations.
I would know. I am one of them.

To be clear, ours is not the popular “resistance” of the left. We want the administration to succeed and think that many of its policies have already made America safer and more prosperous.

But we believe our first duty is to this country, and the president continues to act in a manner that is detrimental to the health of our republic.
That is why many Trump appointees have vowed to do what we can to preserve our democratic institutions while thwarting Mr. Trump’s more misguided impulses until he is out of office.

The root of the problem is the president’s amorality. Anyone who works with him knows he is not moored to any discernible first principles that guide his decision making.

Despite Anonymous denying it this is the deep state at work. It even contains a paen to John McCain.

How I regret that the anonymous senior source leaked this. There is nothing here that is much different from what we all imagined was happening and yet the administration has on the whole been a success. On the economy, on Nafta, on North Korea, Syria and even Russia. Now the president is likely to become paranoid and will stop listening to advisers. The anonymous source claims to be trying to do his best for his country but is doing the opposite by this leak.