Count former President Bill Cinton Secretary of State Madeleine Albright among those ridiculing President Donald Trump as the marionette of puppeteer Steve Bannon, as she told CNN's "Fareed Zakaria GPS" on Sunday.
"Bannon is more than a strategic adviser," she told the host. "I think he's the person that's pulling the strings."
Democrats have been demonizing Steve Bannon as a Karl Rove-like boogeyman, as Politico wrote Sunday, and Albright piled on as she spoke about Bannon's controversial addition to President Trump's National Security Council this week.
"I think the influence generally of Mr. Bannon is passing strange, if I may say so, given his background and his approach to national security policy, his admiration for [Vladimir] Lenin," Albright told Zakaria's panel, which included former President George W. Bush's national security adviser Stephen Hadley. "A number of things that trouble me about him him in these all-important national security meetings."
Even Rove did not make it to Bush's NSC to avoid politicizing it, Hadley noted.
"Presidents do this differently," Hadley told Zakaria's panel before Albright countered. "I think in defense of what President Trump has done, Mr. Bannon is not just his political adviser — he is his chief strategist. We need some strategy in terms of national security making.
"I'm less concerned about it than a lot of folks. I think it's a broad table that Mr. Trump has set."
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