‘Still not ready for prime time’: GOP strategist terrified by Trump’s babbling golf course ‘rant’

President Donald Trump gave a rambling, off-the-cuff interview while golfing Thursday -- and reporters say that's what advisers are used to hearing every day in the White House.

The president spoke for about a half hour to the New York Times at his Trump International Golf Club, where he complained about the Russia investigation, the Justice Department and Democratic critics.

"It shows that this is a White House that is still not ready for prime time," Republican strategist Susan Del Percio told MSNBC's "Morning Joe." "This is a president who likes prime time and doesn't care how he's viewed in prime time, but just wants to be there but is not prepared for the consequences."

Del Percio said the interview signaled an alarming hostility to democratic institutions.

"We have to have a government that believes -- or a country that believes -- in our elections, our government, that believes in our Department of Justice, and that president in a wide-ranging interview is willing to trash everyone and everything and just promote himself, not the values of our country," she said. "It's easy to throw it out, like, oh, he just did this interview -- but there's real serious consequences for an interview like this."

Mike Allen, co-founder and executive editor of Axios, said the interview matches what aides the president talks about in the White House.

"It's like eavesdropping in the Oval Office," Allen said. "These rants, and there's no other words for them, are what advisers say they hear all day, and we see why it's so hard for people to bring the president bad news or convince him of reality or things that aren't true, and you see why advisers rise when they tell him what he wants to hear."