I know we have re-hashed the Michael - Tom relationship nearly to death, but something just struck me. When Michael tells Tom
he's not a wartime consigliere and things may "get rough with the move we're trying." Vito tries to comfort Tom by telling him he never thought he was a bad consigliere, but that Santino, rest in peace, was a bad Don. He goes on to say there are things in which he (Tom) must have no part. In the novel, Tom is the only person who has figured out that the Corleones are not as weak as they want everyone to believe because he sees that
money is being siphoned off so that Neri can build his secret regime. Vito compliments Tom by telling Michael something like "I told you this wouldn't miss his eye."

The next we see of Tom is at Vito's funeral. Rght after Tessio
talks to Mike about setting up the meeting in Brooklyn, Tom asks, "Do you know how they're going to come at you?" And Michael says on Tessio's ground whereI'll be safe." Tom instantly recognizes what Michael and Vito had been going over privately... that whoever came to Mike with a peace proposal from Barzini was the traitor, leading up to the famous "I always thought it would be Clemenza" line. This all shows that Tom had to have been aware that Michael and Vito were planning for some kind of violence, and that someone would betray Michael in the process because the traitor would fear the Corleones were too weak to survive.
From that point forward it is clear that Tom is pretty much in the loop on everything. Michael says he is going to be godfather to Connie's baby and "then I'll meet with" the heads of the five families. Tom is intimately involved with the whole schene to assassinate Tessio, and he also is aware that they are going to bring Carlo back to the house for a little
confession. He also had to know that Michael was going to "settle all family business."

In other words, Tom, who was no longer consigliere, did not have the option to advise Michael about what he was doing (he probably would have sought some kind of compromise) but he was surely aware of all of it, and Michael had no proplem trusting him with all this advance information....so how "out" was he really?

I think we touched on this once before.

In short, Tom was only out in the things that Michael wanted him to be out for and only when Michael wanted him out.

But Tom was also in on the things Michael wanted him in for and only when Michael wanted him in. When it was convenient for Michael.

"....because I admire you and I love you that I kept things secret from you."

BULLSHIT!

It was more about Michael than about Tom.

Another fine example of the egotistical user, control freak, that Michael had become.

Yes probably, but the decision to cut Tom out of the war planning was made by Vito AND Michael, so it is a little different, and my point is that Tom seemed to know what was going on in any case.

The key line in the "You're out, Tom" scene was "...besides, who's a better consigliere than my father?" I had the impression that, if Vito had lived longer, Michael would have dispatched Tom to Nevada to establish himself as a "legitimate" lawyer while Vito finished wiring his political connections into Michael--and then Michael would have moved on the other Dons, with Vito and the caporegimes advising him. But when Vito died, necessity became the mother of invention. Tom was back in because Vito's death incented Barzini to move up his schedule for whacking Michael. Michael needed Tom to act as go-between, and to enhance the image that the family had gone soft (Michael as weak Don, non-Sicilian Tom as consigliere).

But, as we saw, that was temporary. At Anthony's party, Tom is "our lawyer...he handles only some areas of the family business." Then necessity intervenes again after the Tahoe shooting. Tom suddenly is "the only one I can completely trust..." He's back in. But, after Michael vanquishes Roth and bowles out Fredo as the traitor, Tom's out again. Manipulative bastard.

Then of course in GF III Tom is dead and suddenly he is a "great lawyer."

How would Tessio have been killed? Would he have been garotted like Carlo- or a simple shot the head?

All of what you post confirms Michael as the ultimate user of people, even his family.