Wankery

Trump Caught Red-Handed Lying About Biden Using a Teleprompter

Posted by on September 23, 2020 at 12:24 pm. 2 Comments :

Catching Donald Trump in a bald-faced lie is about as difficult as bench pressing a pool noodle. Washington Post fact-checkers have already caught him telling more than 20,000 lies since his inauguration. However, there are times when his fabrications are so distant from reality that they require special attention, because they reveal the extreme lengths to which Trump will go in order to spread his political manure.

Donald Trump Angry

Early Tuesday there was just such a case. In Trump’s morning tweetstorm – that produced twenty-five tweets before noon – there was one post that declared triumphantly that Joe Biden was “caught red-handed using a teleprompter.” This is an allegation that the Trump camp has been unsuccessfully – and with blatant dishonesty – trying to peddle for months. It’s an ironic line of attack considering that Trump regularly uses a teleprompter, but still can’t speak coherently. He recently bragged about how the United States would soon land an astronaut on Nars.

Trump’s latest lame attempt to malign Biden came in the form of a retweet from Jason Miller, the senior advisor to Trump’s reelection campaign. Miller in turn was retweeting Eric Trump, whose superpower is being impervious to the shame of ignorance. What Eric posted was a video that he snatched from another Trump campaign shill that supposedly showed Biden reading answers to questions during a Telemundo interview. Eric’s comment accompanying the video was “Unreal!” Which, of course, it was. Here is the tweet posted by Miller and retweeted by Trump:

The reason Biden wasn’t “pretending” to look at the interviewer was that he was looking at a monitor from which he was taking questions from Telemundo viewers. CNN’s fact-checkers debunked the teleprompter fiction saying that…

“Biden was not using a teleprompter during the interview. Here’s what happened: Telemundo set up a screen, to Biden’s left, for viewers to ask Biden their own questions; Biden was looking to the left because he was addressing his answer directly to a woman who had asked him a question about deportations. Midway through the answer, the screen showing the woman went black, so Biden said, ‘I lost that line.’ Díaz-Balart responded that Biden could just talk with him on the subject.”

All of this was easily verifiable by simply watching the interview. But that’s too much like actual, honest journalism for anyone associated with Trump. So instead, they make up their own perverse version of reality and disseminate that to their dimwitted cult followers who are so cognitively challenged that they will believe anything, no matter how preposterous. These are the same Darwinian rejects who think that the coronavirus is a Democratic hoax.

Watching the Trump Klan go through these motions to disparage Biden as mentally unfit is becoming something of a joke. They are getting nowhere. In fact, in a recent poll by Fox News (yes, that Fox News) a majority of the American people said that it’s Trump who doesn’t have the mental soundness to serve. What’s more, Trump has been steadily trailing Biden in every national poll, as well as in most of the critical battleground states.

Trump’s vain determination to belittle Biden’s mental acuity is a strategy sprung from desperation. Trump knows he’s losing and is trying to claw his way out of the ditch he dug for himself. The problem is that these tactics are what got him there in the first place, and he’s only digging himself in deeper.

This will become all the more apparent during the first presidential debate next week. Trump has lowered the bar for Biden so much that Biden only has to show up and refrain from drooling. Meanwhile, Trump will exhibit his customary hostility, ignorance of facts, compulsion to lie, and tendency toward infantile outbursts. That’s not exactly a winning game plan.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Kayleigh McEnany’s Lame Attempt to Whitewash Trump’s Blame for 200,000 Deaths

Posted by on September 22, 2020 at 2:04 pm. 0 Comments :

This week the United States achieved another milestone under the “leadership” of Donald Trump. More than 200,000 Americans have died as a result of his negligence, incompetence, and deliberate malfeasance in responding to the coronavirus pandemic. Add to that the 6.7 million people who contracted the disease, many of whom will suffer permanent, debilitating disabilities.

Kayleigh McEnany, Donald Trump

This is unarguably a record of abject failure that translates into tragedy for millions of people. Yet somehow Trump gives himself a A+ for ranking near the bottom worldwide for managing this crisis. The only area that he concedes falling short is in public relations, for which he gives himself a D.

Trump deserves some credit for recognizing how terrible his White House communications operations are. For the most part they have ignored the traditional duties of conveying important information to the American people, choosing instead to conduct itself as an arm of Trump’s 2020 reelection campaign. And he has repeatedly been at odds with the medical experts on his Coronavirus Task Force. No wonder the cases and fatalities stack up even as other countries are returning to relative normality.

At the helm of Trump’s communications team is his press Secretary, Kayleigh McEnany. She’s an accomplished liar who is ably filling the shoes of her weasley predecessors Sean Spicer, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, and “alternative facts” spinner, Kellyanne Conway. As evidence of McEnany’s prowess for falsehoods, observe this response to a question from CNN’s Jim Acosta:

Acosta: The country has had over 200,000 deaths from coronavirus. What do you say to Americans who are outraged over this and blame this administration for so many lives lost in this country?
McEnany: Well, as you’ve heard several doctors on the task force note from this podium, we were looking at the prospect of two million people perishing from the coronavirus in this country. We grieve when even one life is lost, but the fact that we have come nowhere near that number is a testament to this president taking immediate action. After shutting down travel from China, when the other party, Democrats were saying that was xenophobic; for shutting down travel for Europe; for developing landmark therapeutics that are working, like Remdesivir.

There’s a lot to unpack in that brief commentary. To begin with, we were never “looking at the prospect of two million people perishing.” That was a baseline estimate of fatalities if nothing were done at all to mitigate the spread of virus. While Trump didn’t do very much, many governors and mayors took independent actions to shut down hazardous activities and to promote safe practices such as social distancing and the wearing of facial masks, both of which Trump dismissed and even mocked. The two million fatality estimate was never intended to be a benchmark for success. Trump himself used smaller numbers, beginning with fifteen and rising with reported deaths to 60,000. It’s now more than three times that, and growing. That’s a testament to failure.

Furthermore, Trump never shut down travel from either China or Europe. His restrictions were full of exemptions and he applied them too late, after the virus was already spreading in the U.S. The criticism of his xenophobia was connected to his focus on China – even calling it the China virus – despite the fact that most of the cases in the U.S. were traceable to Europe. And finally, McEnany summed up Trump’s accomplishments by giving him credit for developing Remdesivir, a drug developed by Gilead Sciences in 2009.

It’s easy to see why Trump’s PR operations are held in such low repute, even by him. In the exchange above, McEnany never even answered Acosta’s question. But Trump’s own efforts aren’t helping. Just this weekend he made some ludicrous and blatantly false remarks about the coronavirus and it’s potential for transmission:

“Now we know [the coronavirus]. It affects elderly people, elderly people with heart problems and other problems. If they have other problems, that’s what it really affects. That’s it. In some states, thousands of people, nobody young below the age of eighteen, like nobody. They have a strong immune system. Who knows? Take your hat off to the young, cause they have a hell of an immune system. But it affects virtually nobody. It’s an amazing thing.”

You’ll recall that just last week Trump was heard on recordings by Bob Woodward for his book, RAGE, saying that COVID-19 affects “not just old…older. Young people too. Plenty of young people.” That was in addition to his admission that he knew from the start how deadly it was, but was playing it down.

200,000 are a lot of “nobodies.” But it was always Trump’s intention to trivialize the massive amount of suffering for which he is directly responsible. That explains the fallacies disseminated by his PR team. However, it isn’t because they performed poorly. In fact, it was probably the best performing agency in his administration. That’s because they were saying precisely what Trump wanted them to say.

McEnany and company were lying on Trump’s behalf and at his direction. So it’s unfair of him to grade them with a D, when they were just doing what they were told. They may have been grossly misinforming the public and putting untold lives at risk, but they were doing exactly the job that Trump hired them to do.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Trump is Inciting His Deplorables to Commit Violence Against Journalists

Posted by on September 20, 2020 at 12:55 pm. 2 Comments :

No president in America’s history has been more hostile to the press than Donald Trump. He repeatedly refers to them in Stalinist terms as the “the enemy of the people.” That openly aggressive posturing is an unambiguous assault on the constitution’s First Amendment. And Trump’s vicious rhetoric has been cited as endangering the work – and lives – of journalists, not just in the United States, but around the world.

Trump Charlotsville

On Saturday Trump took another leap crossing over the line of decency and free speech during his latest Coronavirus Super Spreader event in Minnesota. Reading from his teleprompter, Trump told a story about a reporter covering Black Lives Matter protests in the state several weeks ago:

“I remember this guy Welshi. He got hit on the knee with a canister of tear gas and he went down. He was down. […] After we take all that crap – for weeks and weeks they would take that crap – and then you finally see men get up there and go right through… Wasn’t it really a beautiful sight? It’s called law and order.”

Like virtually every story that Trump tells, almost none of this one was truthful. To begin with, the reporter’s name was Ali Velshi, not Welshi. Perhaps Trump was using the Russian pronunciation. Secondly, Velshi was hit by a rubber bullet, not a tear gas canister. But those are relatively trivial misstatements by Trump who is rarely able to express himself coherently (which has not gone unnoticed by the American people).

More troubling was Trump’s celebration of this assault on a journalist by government goons as “a beautiful sight.” How any American “leader” can describe such an attack in those favorable terms is unthinkable. Trump is affirming his long held reputation as a fascist wannabe who aligns himself with the noxious philosophies of the authoritarian dictators he so admires (i.e. Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong Un, Xi Jinping, etc.). These are people who brazenly violate press freedoms and even torture and murder critical journalists. And Trump is moving more in that direction every day.

Trump elaborated on his praise for federal agents physically assaulting reporters in another speech later in the day in North Carolina. In that tirade Trump got Velshi’s network wrong, saying he was with CNN, rather than MSNBC. He also lied that Velshi was reporting from a “war zone” when the truth was that he was covering a peaceful demonstration. Well, except for the feds. The video of Velshi’s reporting proves that.

Velshi himself addressed Trump’s remarks about the incident when he was shot, and asks a relevant question that Trump will surely fail to answer:

Make no mistake, this was not an off the cuff commentary by a rambling lunatic. Yes, Trump is a rambling lunatic, but this wasn’t off the cuff. He was reading from a teleprompter. And he was deliberately sending a message to his glassy-eyed disciples that assaulting journalists is something that will earn his appreciation. Trump is overtly soliciting his cult followers to commit what can only be described as terrorism. And he is promising to reward them with compliments and praise for what a “beautiful” thing they’ve done.

These remarks by Trump pretty much guarantee that more reporters will be attacked just for doing their jobs. The assailants will feel justified because the president has given his approval in advance. And if there is any justice in this world, Trump will be charged criminally and civilly for any harm that comes to journalists due to his reckless ranting.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Trump Knows He’s Losing and It’s Driving Him Crazy(er)

Posted by on September 17, 2020 at 12:58 pm. 5 Comments :

There is an almost pitiable factor to the very public descent of Donald Trump into an abyss of anxiety and debilitating terror. His fragile mental state is so obviously decaying before our eyes as he unleashes ever more bizarre rants and transparent, implausible falsehoods.

Donald Trump Circling the Drain

There may never have been a more conspicuous case of a public figure sucked into a downward spiral of emotional decomposition than what we are witnessing with Trump. He has been reduced to whining about an election that he’s already concluded he’s lost even though it’s still more than a month away. By his own estimation, the election has been rigged against him and the results will therefore be invalid. And not a single person has yet to cast a vote.

Trump is venting his rage at having lost in advance in an avalanche of tweets that all say essentially the same thing: “I’m a hapless victim of people having the audacity to vote against me.” He is baselessly warning that the “election result may NEVER BE ACCURATELY DETERMINED,” and imploring to anyone who might be listening to “Stop Ballot Madness!” For instance…


So Trump wants to interfere with states’ rights in order to demand that all voters be forced to go to the polls amidst a deadly viral pandemic. He asserts that it would be “like always before” even though mail-in voting has been a part of the electoral process for decades.


For the second time Trump is threatening some unspecified “MAYHEM” if people vote the same way they have been for years. And he also repeats the vague admonition that these states had better obey him “before it’s too late.” Or what?


Now Trump is repeatedly alleging, without any evidence, that foreign countries will disrupt our election if voting by mail is permitted. But the only foreign interference that has been documented is that conducted by Russia with Trump’s cooperation. Also notable is that all three of the tweets above were flagged by Twitter for dispensing misinformation.


And to top it all off, Trump is now trying to persuade his cult followers to vote by mail themselves, after having declared the whole thing an invitation to fraud and espionage.

These attacks on mail-in voting are simply Trump’s way of priming his deplorable disciples for what he clearly realizes is a historic electoral defeat. Rather than display some measure of dignity and patriotism, Trump is determined to incite civil unrest as he advances his aspirations for authoritarian tyranny.

So it’s up to the American people to prevent such an outcome by producing the sort of landslide victory for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris (and Democratic senators and congresspersons and state representatives) that will make it impossible for Trump’s impotent accusations of fraud to be taken seriously. That means unwavering commitment and hard work. Because the clearer it is that Trump is a loser, the more insane his assaults on his political foes – and America – will become. Stay Strong!

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Fox News Spins Ludicrous Comparison of 9/11 to the Coronavirus

Posted by on September 11, 2020 at 2:43 pm. 3 Comments :

It’s the 19th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. It was a day that shook the nation, and the world, in a profoundly painful way that woke many up to the reality of our vulnerabilities. And on this solemn day there have been some respectful remembrances and thoughtful condolences for the victims, their families, and for the first responders who sacrificed so much.

Donald Trump, Fox News, Coronavirus

Of course, there have also been some grossly inappropriate attempts to hijack this day for political and/or personal advantage. Donald Trump was notorious for that when he bragged on the day of the tragedy that his building in Manhattan had just become the tallest in the city:

It should come as no surprise that Fox News joined in on the brazen exploitation of horror. On Friday morning the “Curvy Couch” potatoes of Fox and Friends aired a segment that drew a preposterous comparison between 9/11 and the coronavirus pandemic. Co-host Brian Kilmeade unleashed this nauseating rant (video below) that had no basis in reality or even sanity. “New York is attacked,” Kilmeade began. “America is under siege.” And he continued…

“But at the same time, New York kept moving. In a very short time the stock market was open. People were still getting into subways. People still went to work. At the same time keeping an ear to the news to find out what’s next as we would mobilize in a matter of months and kill almost every single person that was involved in this. The first generation of Al Qaeda.”

“That’s what’s different now. This, we stopped. And America looked around and go ‘What do we do?’ We knew who the enemy was then. Here we’ve got this invisible virus that the Chinese are responsible for, but it doesn’t look like that’s an attack. “

Kilmeade is earning his reputation for being the stupidest man on Fox News. He apparently doesn’t realize that people were comfortable returning to the subways after 9/11 because they were in no danger of contracting an airplane crash from another passenger. Their coworkers were unlikely to infect them with a collapsing skyscraper.

Kilmeade is likewise unaware that the reason we “stopped” this time is because COVID-19 is a highly transmissible infectious agent for which there is no vaccine or treatment. His attempt to draw parallels between these two events is simply pathetic, but not at all unexpected from Fox News.

In addition to his absurd correlations and xenophobic insults aimed at China, Kilmeade also made some blatantly false statements. While America was attacked, we were not under siege. There was no invading army and no subsequent assault. The stock markets remained closed until September 17, the longest shutdown since 1933, which Kilmeade characterized as “short.” We did retaliate against the Taliban that was harboring Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. However, we did not kill “every single person that was involved.” Al Qaeda’s leader, Osama bin Laden, wasn’t killed until ten years later.

Finally, Kilmeade’s description of Americans looking around wondering what to do utterly fails to explain why that’s so. It’s because we have a president who lied to the people about the peril this virus posed. Trump knew how deadly it was and purposefully withheld that information in order to advance his reelection prospects. He repeatedly downplayed the danger, oversold the development of a vaccine, and mocked those who advised and practiced safety guidelines such as social distancing and facial masks.

Trump also contradicted the experts and disseminated falsehoods about unproven cures such as hydroxychloroquine and injecting bleach. Even worse, he embraced quacks who ranted about “demon sperm” and spread crackpot conspiracy theories that only a fraction of those reported to have died from COVID-19 were actually its victims.

Is there any wonder why some Americans were baffled about what to do? Even now there are those who believe that the coronavirus is (as Trump has said) a hoax. Never mind the nearly 200,000 graves (6,400,000+ infected) and the grieving families and friends of those stricken. The confusion that Kilmeade referenced is almost entirely the fault of Trump. The remainder of the guilt lies with Kilmeade, and his confederates at Fox News, who continue to cover for him.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Trump is Running for Reelection as President of Fox News

Posted by on September 7, 2020 at 1:26 pm. 0 Comments :

Labor Day is often regarded as the official kickoff of the presidential campaign season. The party nominating conventions are over and many states are preparing to begin early voting and vote-by-mail operations. So it isn’t surprising to see Donald Trump abuse the power of his office to hold yet another “press conference” at the White House that is nothing more than a reelection rally at taxpayers expense (which the media really needs to stop covering).

Donald Trump Fox News

This alleged press conference was one of the most unfocused to date by Trump, who spent it unleashing a smorgasbord of familiar grievances. He ran the gamut from Barack Obama spying on his campaign, to the election being rigged, to Nancy Pelosi blocking pandemic relief, to Joe Biden being “clueless” and “stupid,” to the economy recovering, to coronavirus being cured. He even gave Vladimir Putin another pass for poisoning political opponent Alexei Navalny.

Virtually everything Trump asserted during the hour plus harangue was demonstrably false. The U.S. intelligence community has investigated the probes into Trump’s collusion with Russia and found that, not only is there zero evidence of Obama spying, there is ample proof of Trump’s misconduct. The only election rigging that has been uncovered is that done by Trump himself, who even committed a felony by telling his cult followers to vote twice. Pelosi passed a relief bill months ago that has been sitting on GOP Senate leader Mitch McConnell’s desk as he refuses to negotiate. The economy is in recession. The coronavirus is still taking the lives of more than 1,000 Americans a day. But Putin remains the only person in Trump’s world that doesn’t have a derogatory nickname.

Trump’s list of grievances should sound familiar to anyone who watches Fox news. It’s a rehashing of the core issues that dominate Fox’s daily programming. [To see just how integrated Trump is to Fox News check out Hoax: Donald Trump, Fox News, and the Dangerous Distortion of Truth by Brian Stelter] Not only do all of the Fox hosts and commentators disseminate the very same propaganda, but Trump is on almost as often as the network regulars to deliver the same spiel. And for the most part, Fox News is the only network that routinely airs Trump’s events live and uninterrupted. That is likely gnawing at the Narcissist-in-Chief who has become accustomed to being the center of attention all the time.

The result of this blanketing of Trump on Fox’s air alone is that his most brainwashed supporters are getting their brains an extra scrubbing on a regular basis. But his message isn’t going out to anyone else. That’s a big problem as the campaign season unfolds. In 2016, Trump didn’t have to spend much money because the media covered everything he did. Without that free advertising, 2020 is shaping up to be a much more difficult environment for him. There is even speculation that he is already running out of money.

Trump has recently pulled ads in critical battleground states. Joe Biden, meanwhile, just collected a record $364 million in donations in August. And he is outspending Trump for ads by more than 10-to-1. What’s more, it’s telling that Trump hasn’t even released his August financial reports yet. That generally portends bad news. Politicians don’t delay good news.

Trump apparently thinks he can win this race by appearing almost exclusively on Fox News and running on a platform developed by Fox’s most devoted Trump-fluffers. That’s a preposterous strategy. On its best night Fox draws about one percent of the nation’s population. If Trump is only seen on Fox News, whose viewers are already supporting him, he can’t possibly expand his base beyond the worshipful audience of Foxic true believers. And there aren’t enough of them to win an election.

However, Trump could run for President of Fox News. He has all the qualifications. He is obnoxious and arrogant and convinced of his own magnificence. He has a profound ignorance of the world and the issues that are most important to voters. He is completely at ease lying about things that are easily proven false. And he is comfortable subjugating himself to others with real power. The one thing that may stand in his way is all the times he has attacked Fox News and predicted their downfall. Not that Fox seems to mind. They take it like a battered spouse and ask for more.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Racist President Trump Terminates Federal Anti-Racism Programs

Posted by on September 5, 2020 at 11:56 am. 0 Comments :

This has been another terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week for Donald Trump. It began with a string of post-convention polls that show Joe Biden increasing his lead over Trump nationally, as well as in most of the critical battleground states. And it ended with an article that exposed his repugnant comments about fallen American soldiers being “losers” and “suckers,” which even Fox News independently affirmed.

Donald Trump, MAGA

Consequently, Trump has revved up his outrage in a desperate effort to change the subject to one he believes would be more favorable to him. But once again, he’s blown it completely.

On Saturday morning Trump unleashed a 20+ tweet barrage about an issue that is wholly an invention of his perverse imagination. It began with his ordering the White House Office of Management and Budget to terminate what it says are un-American training sessions on “critical race theory.” The memo written by OMB Direct Russel Vought began…

“It has come to the President’s attention that Executive Branch agencies have spent millions of taxpayer dollars to date ‘training’ government workers to believe divisive, anti-American propaganda.

“For example, according to press reports, employees across the Executive Branch have been required to attend trainings where they are told that “virtually all White people contribute to racism” or where they are required to say that they “benefit from racism.” According to press reports, in some cases these training have further claimed that there is racism embedded in the belief that America is the land of opportunity or the belief that the most qualified person should receive a job.”

The memo fails to cite any place in the federal government where these alleged trainings are occurring. It only asserts that their existence came to Trump’s attention via unidentified “press reports.” No one is likely to be shocked to learn that the press reporting this was Fox News. Tucker Carlson’s White Nationalist Hour has lately been harping on this non-issue. He has hosted guests claiming that “critical race theory” is behind this effort to “engender division and resentment within the Federal workforce.” And if anyone knows about engendering division and resentment it’s Carlson and Trump. The memo continued…

“The President has directed me to ensure that Federal agencies cease and desist from using taxpayer dollars to fund these divisive, un-American propaganda training sessions. Accordingly, to that end, the Office of Management and Budget will shortly issue more detailed guidance on implementing the President’s directive. In the meantime, all agencies are directed to begin to identify all contracts or other agency spending related to any training on ‘critical race theory,’ ‘white privilege,’ or any other training or propaganda effort that teaches or suggests either (1) that the United States is an inherently racist or evil country or (2) that any race or ethnicity is inherently racist or evil. In addition, all agencies should begin to identify all available avenues within the law to cancel any such contracts and/or to divert Federal dollars away from these un-American propaganda training sessions.”

For the record, critical race theory is not the bureaucratic horror story that the Trump regime is portraying it as. It is a scholarly “attempt to understand how victims of systemic racism are affected by cultural perceptions of race and how they are able to represent themselves to counter prejudice.” So naturally our viscerally racist president is opposed to it. After all, he is the same president who lauded neo-Nazis as “very good people,” and maligned Black Lives Matters as “domestic terrorists.”

Trump’s directive to terminate federal critical race theory trainings is also notable in that there aren’t any. None! Neither are there any trainings that teach that “the United States is an inherently racist or evil country.” What he may be targeting is diversity training intended to address and reduce racial and other prejudices in the workplace.

However, the purpose of his determination to concoct a phony controversy is obvious. He needs a diversion from the other horrendous news that is engulfing him and his floundering presidency. He is in a state of utter panic as his reelection prospects continue to wither. And his frantic morning tweetstorm is just further evidence of how desperate he has become.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Trump Insults Heroes as ‘Losers’ and ‘Suckers’ and Says Everyone Who Criticizes Him is ‘Dying’

Posted by on September 4, 2020 at 9:57 am. 3 Comments :

The Atlantic Magazine just published a spine-chilling story about Donald Trump and his abhorrent remarks about America’s veterans and war dead. “Why should I go to that cemetery?” Trump is reported to have said. “It’s filled with losers.” He later added that the 1,800 marines who lost their lives at Belleau Wood were “suckers” for getting killed.

Donald Trump

The article was well researched and contained testimony from four sources. It was corroborated by at least three other news organizations. And most of all, it’s entirely consistent with Trump’s prior public statements disparaging veterans and POWs, including the late Sen. John McCain. Naturally, Trump quickly denied these reports in terms typical of his substanceless, “slash and burn” character (or lack thereof):

Notice that Trump’s denial is simply an ad hominem attack on the messenger. That’s what he always does. He has no coherent defense based on facts or reality, so he goes for the throat with defamatory rhetoric that virtually no one believes, other than his glassy-eyed cult followers. What follows is a brief history of this psychotic, knee-jerk reaction to any critical news that riles Trump:

  • Fredo’s ratings are down more than 50%. People are tired of his act. @CNN IS DYING!
  • That is because they cover your favorite President relatively well. @CNN & MSDNC are dying in the ratings!
  • The good news is that @maddow is dying in the ratings, along with @CNN!
  • So much Fake News being put in dying magazines and newspapers. Only place worse may be @NBCNews, @CBSNews, @ABC and @CNN. Fiction writers!
  • The reporting at the failing @nytimes gets worse and worse by the day. Fortunately, it is a dying newspaper.
  • FoxNews is changing their theme from “fair and balanced” to “unfair and unbalanced.” But dying @WSJ is worse.Their phony poll is a joke!
  • Dopey @Lawrence O’Donnell, whose unwatchable show is dying in the ratings, said that my Apprentice $ numbers were wrong. He is a fool!
  • NYDailyNews, the dying tabloid owned by dopey clown Mort Zuckerman, puts me on the cover daily because I sell. My honor, but it is dead!
  • NicolleDWallace is really hurting @TheView. She is boring, predictable and has zero television “it” – show no longer has ratings, dying!
  • LateNightSeth I am not surprised that Seth is absolutely dying in the ratings! He is truly an awkward, mumbling jerk. Too bad!
  • VanityFair looks like a dying magazine! Really really boring, really really thin!

If every media enterprise that Trump said was dying actually died there wouldn’t be anything left but the National Enquirer. Oh wait. That died. Trump knows that there is no defense for what he said, so he resorts to these petulant tantrums in the hopes of persuading some of his dimwitted disciples that he isn’t a cretinous traitor.

Clearly, that isn’t working. Trump’s approval ratings continue to fall, and he’s getting crushed by Joe Biden in every national poll, as well as in most of the crucial swing states. And for the most despicable president in U.S. history, it’s all downhill from here.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Crybaby Trump Whines that Fox News Polls are Fake News

Posted by on September 3, 2020 at 3:12 pm. 3 Comments :

There is nothing more predictable than Donald Trump wailing like a colicky infant whenever he is criticized. His massive, yet fragile, ego simply can’t take the slightest bit of pushback, constructive or otherwise. So he throws petulant tantrums in the hopes that his critics will regret their offense and commit to unflinching adoration.

Donald Trump, Fox News, Fake

That’s a pretty accurate description of his relationship with Fox News. It’s a network that was built to disseminate right-wing propaganda. And in the Era of Trump it has transformed into the Ministry of Disinformation for the cult that he leads. It employs devoted Trump worshipers like Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Tucker Carlson, Maria Bartiromo, etc., who are also his the staff advisors of his shadow cabinet. And it is practically the only network that he will grant interviews to.

But apparently that it isn’t enough. When there is a rare critical commentary by a host or a guest, Trump lashes out mercilessly as if he’s been betrayed by a close confidant. That happens every time that Fox publishes a poll that isn’t as enamored with him as he is himself. Take for instance this Thursday morning…

First of all, Fox News polls were in the middle of that pack with regard to accuracy in 2016. Trump still refuses to accept that the national polling was largely correct, but did not reflect state-by-state returns that produced the Electoral College result. Secondly, Trump can “believe” that he’s “leading BIG” all he wants, but it doesn’t make it true. He is, in fact, getting crushed by Joe Biden nationally, as well as in the crucial swing states. And thirdly, his attempt to connect the Fox News poll with the stock market is just too preposterous to even respond to.

For the record, Trump has taken this stance before. Last year Trump cried about how Fox News polls “have always been terrible to me.” But in reality they have just as often been positive. And when they were, Trump noticed and celebrated their findings, as News Corpse observed at the time:

“What is abundantly clear is that Trump has been more than pleased with the results of Fox News polls in the past. But when one is less than adoring he flips out and insists that they have always had it in for him. That’s a sign of a severe mental infirmity consistent with narcissism, paranoia, and sociopathic disengagement from reality.”

Trump is a well documented malignant narcissist whose psychotic self-absorption twists his perception of reality. He can only accept flattering appraisals and glassy-eyed adulation from the media and even his personal relationships. Anything else is met with abject scorn and unqualified rejection. It’s a sickness that is putting this nation at risk. And if it isn’t brought to an end this November, the damage may be irreversible for decades.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Throwback Trump: If You Told a Republican to Vote Twice They’d Get Sick at the Thought of It

Posted by on September 3, 2020 at 1:10 pm. 3 Comments :

On Wednesday Donald Trump’s desperation and fear drove him to suborn felony voter fraud by telling his cult followers to vote twice this November. That would not only be a crime for anyone who tried it, it’s also a crime for Trump to make the solicitation. An honest Justice Department would indict him immediately, but the Justice Department of the Trump administration is nobody’s idea of honest.

Donald Trump Red Face

Not surprisingly, Trump has had fluid opinions on this subject that change whenever he perceives the opposite opinion to be more to his benefit. Or maybe he’s just to cognitively challenged to recall his own views from one moment to the next. He doubled down on these felonious solicitations Thursday morning on Twitter. But last May he was interviewed by Senior Fox News Trump-Fluffer Maria Bartiromo and he told her that…

“The level of dishonesty with Democrat voting is unbelievable. If you told a Republican to vote twice, they’d get sick at even the thought of it. And you have people that vote numerous times. What’s happening is crazy. So now they want to send out vote-by-mail. Who knows who’s signing this stuff?”

If what Trump said then was true, there are a lot of sick Republicans running around the country right now. Well … more than usual. And that isn’t even counting those with the coronavirus (which Trump thinks you can get from voting).

Due to the complicity of Trump’s traitorous Attorney Genuflect, Bill Barr, and the Senate GOP, Trump appears to be getting away with his crimes again – for now. But the record is clear and will be preserved for the next attorney general to investigate and prosecute. As is often the case, Trump documents his criminality on national television. “Let them send it in and let them go vote,” Trump said to the press. “And if their system’s as good as they say it is, then obviously they won’t be able to vote. If it isn’t tabulated, they’ll be able to vote.”

Trump’s babbling about how mail-in votes would be tabulated before in-person voting is pure nonsense. In some states that process doesn’t even begin until after the polls close. Anyone who takes Trump’s advice will be in a heap of trouble. This isn’t a gray area. Both state and federal statutes unambiguously state that even attempting to vote twice is against the law. And every reputable law enforcement official will affirm that. For instance…

Karen Brinson Bell, Executive director of the North Carolina State Board of Elections: It is illegal to vote twice in an election … Attempting to vote twice in an election or soliciting someone to do so also is a violation of North Carolina law.

Michigan Attorney General Nessel: Don’t try this at home. I will prosecute you […] Let me be perfectly clear: voting twice is illegal, no matter who tells you do to it. The president’s idea is a great one for people looking to go to jail.

Ellen L Weintraub, Federal Elections Commissioner: It is illegal in all 50 states and under federal law to vote twice. As any federal officeholder or law enforcement official should know.

Well, any federal officeholder or law enforcement official other than Barr. In an interview with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, Barr staggered around awkwardly as he tried to avoid contradicting his boss. He trotted out diversions about the point he thought Trump was trying to make, and absurd claims about not knowing state laws. Eventually, Blitzer had to educate him:

Trump was right about one thing. This is “crazy.” It’s so crazy, in fact, that it should trigger an indictment and his immediate removal from office. Or at least the 25th Amendment and a straitjacket. Unfortunately, Trump’s GOP confederates are as crazy as he is and wouldn’t hear of it. So we’ll just have to wait until November (actually January 20) to rid the White House of this madness. If we survive that long.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.