Month: January 2019

Trump Mindlessly Parrots Fox News’ Lies About Democrats ‘Having Fun’ During the Shutdown

Posted by on January 13, 2019 at 12:05 pm. 4 Comments :

The relationship between Donald Trump and his State TV media handlers, Fox News, has been a disturbing component of his presidency since before it even began. Trump, after all, had a regularly scheduled weekly segment on Fox and Friends called “Mondays with Trump” for years before his candidacy. And since his election he has given the vast majority of his interviews (40+ so far) to Fox News. That includes his latest on Saturday night with “Judge” Jeanine Pirro wherein she asked him if he has ever worked for Russia, and he conspicuously failed to deny it.

Donald Trump Fox News

On Sunday morning Trump rose early and immediately began work – or at least what he regards as the work of a Reality TV president. He grabbed his phone, ascended to his porcelain throne, and composed this inspiring message for posterity:

Poor Donnie is once again whining about his lonely confinement to that big, old, drafty, White House. However, his version of events is perversely distorted. This week the Democrats in the House of Representatives passed several bills to fund the government that is currently in the midst of the Trump Shutdown – the longest, bestest shutdown ever. It is Republican Leader Mitch McConnell who refuses to call the Senate into session and allow a vote on those bills.

What’s more, contrary to Trump’s fictional account, most of the Democrats are in Washington working. But Trump, who is obviously paying more attention to Fox News than his presidential duties, found a story he could use to falsely malign Democrats as loafers. The article on Fox’s website is titled “Democrats At Play,” with a lede that says “As shutdown drags on, pols take chartered jet to Caribbean, see ‘Hamilton.'” So in that brief headline Fox crammed in a array of criticisms from their portrayal of this as recreation, to neglect of the shutdown, to elitist travel arrangements, to exotic locales, to exclusive theatrical events. Not bad.

The only problem is that none of that is true. The delegation consisted of members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. They were visiting a part of the United States that has recently suffered a catastrophic natural disaster to assess recovery progress. They were in constant contact with D.C. in the event there was a breakthrough in shutdown talks. And the performances of Hamilton were being staged to raise donations for local Puerto Rican organizations still struggling in wake of Hurricane Maria. Also, that chartered jet was laden with 250 pounds of donated medical supplies.

So that’s what Trump and Fox News are characterizing as a vacation with lobbyists on sun-drenched Caribbean beaches. Meanwhile, Trump continues to refuse to open the government, or to ask McConnell to hold a vote. He continues to threaten to declare a national emergency so that he can act out his tyrannical aspirations. It’s funny that this “emergency” is so lacking in urgency that Trump can posture over it for weeks as he seeks to make political points. It’s also funny that Republicans aren’t aghast at the prospect of setting a precedent that would permit a Democratic president to declare a national emergency to address healthcare or climate change – two very real crisis situations.

What isn’t funny is Trump’s disingenuously referencing that “people await their pay” as this shutdown drags on. He has proven that he couldn’t possibly care less with his comments about them “adjusting” or his administration’s advice that they barter with their landlords, or take up babysitting and dog-walking, to make ends meet. And he pours salt in the wounds by baselessly asserting that the suffering federal workers support his idiotic vanity wall. They don’t.

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

All Trump has to do is sign the funding bills that he previously agreed to sign, and that the GOP Senate passed unanimously. But instead, he chooses to obey the dictates of his masters at Fox News and regurgitate their callousness and lies on his Twitter feed for his Deplorable cult followers who will believe anything, except the actual facts that expose Trump as a narcissistic charlatan and a stooge for Russia.

Poor Donald Trump is Crying Into the Void: There’s Almost Nobody in the White House But Me

Posted by on January 12, 2019 at 2:06 pm. 1 Comments :

Is this a cry for help? Donald Trump is plaintively wailing about his lonely bondage in the purgatory of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. He would rather be at his luxury golf resort in Palm Beach, but he’s suffering the hardship of languishing in the big, old, drafty White House alone, frightened, and depressed by his sad misfortune.

Donald Trump

After firing off a tirade of tweets about how he is being attacked from all directions by the media, law enforcement, and the people’s representatives in Congress, Trump immediately descended into the depths of despair and desolation. And all because the Democrats on the Hill refuse to play with him. This new Twitter tantrum is rife with the melancholy of a nasty playground bully who can’t understand why he is being shunned.

Take a look at what poor Donnie tweeted out in a fit of misery and abandon. Play close attention to the parts that read like the forlorn passages from a morose teenager’s angst-ridden diary, and try not to weep: “I am in the White House waiting for you!” – “Democrats come back!” – “Democrats could solve the Shutdown in 15 minutes!” – “There’s almost nobody in the W.H. but me.” – “You would have to understand the fact that I won the election.” – “I am in the White House ready to sign!”

Democrats should come back to Washington and work to end the Shutdown, while at the same time ending the horrible humanitarian crisis at our Southern Border. I am in the White House waiting for you!

3% of Federal inmates are illegal immigrants. Border arrests are up 240%. In the Great State of Texas, between 2011 & 2018, there were a total of 292,000 crimes by illegal aliens, 539 murders, 32,000 assaults, 3,426 sexual assaults and 3000 weapons charges. Democrats come back!

Democrats could solve the Shutdown in 15 minutes! Call your Dem Senator or Congresswoman/man. Tell them to get it done! Humanitarian Crisis.

I just watched a Fake reporter from the Amazon Washington Post say the White House is “chaotic, there does not seem to be a strategy for this Shutdown. There is no plan.” The Fakes always like talking Chaos, there is NONE. In fact, there’s almost nobody in the W.H. but me, and…

….I do have a plan on the Shutdown. But to understand that plan you would have to understand the fact that I won the election, and I promised safety and security for the American people. Part of that promise was a Wall at the Southern Border. Elections have consequences!

We have a massive Humanitarian Crisis at our Southern Border. We will be out for a long time unless the Democrats come back from their “vacations” and get back to work. I am in the White House ready to sign!

First of all, it should be noted that the Democrats are in Washington and passing bills to reopen the government. They’ve passed several already, but the likelihood that they will ever reach the President’s desk is small because his toady in the Senate (Mitch McConnell) won’t allow them to come up for a vote.

Secondly, Trump isn’t helping his cause when he deliberately misstates the federal statistics on crime and immigration. He is only making Democrats less interested in working with him because they know he can’t be trusted to deal in good faith or even use verified facts in his arguments.

Trump’s is complaining that the press is misrepresenting his administration as “chaotic.” But his explanation for why that isn’t true is that he’s alone in the White House. How is that better? A president who can’t keep his staff around while the government is supposedly in crisis is arguably a bigger problem than chaos.

Trump claims to have a plan to end the shutdown, but doesn’t say what it is. Although he does say that it only has meaning if you “understand” that he won an election two years ago. Well, that clears it up. And never mind that he lost an election two months ago, with Democrats making historic gains in the House. He continues by noting that during his campaign he promised to build a wall. But he seems to have forgotten that he also promised that Mexico would pay for it. He never promised to shutdown the government unless American were forced to pay for a wall that most say they don’t want.

Finally, Trump again implores Democrats, who are in Washington now, to “come back from their vacations” because he is “ready to sign!” Well, he also said he was ready to sign three weeks ago when the Senate passed a bill by unanimous voice vote. The House was about to pass the same bill, when Trump watched a report on Fox News that criticized him for not standing tough on the wall and changed his mind about signing anything.

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

If this pathetic melodrama didn’t bring you to tears, nothing will. Trump’s wretched fate is nearly as pitiful as that of the federal workers that he has driven from their jobs in order to force his idiotic vanity wall down America’s throat. His loneliness and abject fear of what he delusional imagines is an empty city is heart-wrenching. The sad shadow he casts could be brightened if only he would agree to reopen the government without making ridiculous and ego-driven demands. But alas, he is too stupid and vain to realize that.

Donald Trump’s Latest Psycho Tweetstorm: The Best Reason Yet to Invoke the 25th Amendment

Posted by on January 12, 2019 at 11:05 am. 1 Comments :

The rapidly declining mental state of Donald Trump has been the subject of untold numbers of articles and analyses, including by professionals who view the President as a malignant narcissist who is a danger to the nation and the world. But there is no better indicator of the hazards Trump’s psychoses represent than his own frenzied ravings on Twitter.

Donald Trump, Padded Cell

When Trump gets a full head of steam, it’s nearly impossible to keep up with the tsunami of lunacy that he unleashes. It’s pointless even to try. Take for example his outburst on Saturday morning. He was triggered by a report in the New York Times (which isn’t failing, it’s enjoying record success) that disclosed the existence of an FBI investigation into whether Trump was/is an asset of the Russian government.

There is abundant evidence to support that contention. Including his open infatuation with Vladimir Putin; his attacks on the media; his maligning of our allies in NATO and the European Union; his opposition to sanctions on Russia; his rejection of American intelligence in favor of information from Putin and the Kremlin; his refusal to accept that Russia interfered with the 2016 presidential election; his firing of FBI Director James Comey and others; his chumminess with Russian operatives in the White House; his threats aimed at his own cabinet for pursuing legitimate investigations into Russian espionage against the U.S.; and so much more.

However, to hear Trump tell it, it’s all a paranoid conspiracy against the greatest president of all time who who is being attacked for his awesomeness and purity of heart. After reading the article in the Times (or having excerpts read to him), Trump mounted his Twitter machine and disgorged a steady stream of manic gibberish, almost all of which he has previously unfurled in numerous episodes of derangement. But reading it all of a piece is shocking, and not a little frightening. So buckle up:

Wow, just learned in the Failing New York Times that the corrupt former leaders of the FBI, almost all fired or forced to leave the agency for some very bad reasons, opened up an investigation on me, for no reason & with no proof, after I fired Lyin’ James Comey, a total sleaze!

…Funny thing about James Comey. Everybody wanted him fired, Republican and Democrat alike. After the rigged & botched Crooked Hillary investigation, where she was interviewed on July 4th Weekend, not recorded or sworn in, and where she said she didn’t know anything (a lie),….

….the FBI was in complete turmoil (see N.Y. Post) because of Comey’s poor leadership and the way he handled the Clinton mess (not to mention his usurpation of powers from the Justice Department). My firing of James Comey was a great day for America. He was a Crooked Cop……

…..who is being totally protected by his best friend, Bob Mueller, & the 13 Angry Democrats – leaking machines who have NO interest in going after the Real Collusion (and much more) by Crooked Hillary Clinton, her Campaign, and the Democratic National Committee. Just Watch!

I have been FAR tougher on Russia than Obama, Bush or Clinton. Maybe tougher than any other President. At the same time, & as I have often said, getting along with Russia is a good thing, not a bad thing. I fully expect that someday we will have good relations with Russia again!

Lyin’ James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Peter S and his lover, agent Lisa Page, & more, all disgraced and/or fired and caught in the act. These are just some of the losers that tried to do a number on your President. Part of the Witch Hunt. Remember the “insurance policy?” This is it!

This sounds more like a mental patient who has been hospitalized after running through the streets naked shouting at random cars and store mannequins, than a president. He is consumed with paranoia and a devout belief in his superiority and goodness. And his perceived enemies are unambiguously evil, omnipresent, and determined to destroy him. That isn’t the profile of a world leader. It’s the diagnosis for a psychopath. And for the sake of the nation – and the planet – Trump needs to be removed from office and placed in a facility where he can either get medial attention, and be punished for his obvious crimes.

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

Trump’s Braintrust (Fox News) is Pushing Him to Declare a National Emergency to Get His Border Wall

Posted by on January 11, 2019 at 12:07 pm. 4 Comments :

The presidency of Donald Trump has distinguished itself for its hostility to the media and the Constitution’s protection of a free press. His tedious whining about “fake news” and his Stalinist references to the media as “the enemy of the people” are evidence of his desire to poison the public’s minds in order to suppress criticism of him and his administration.

Donald Trump, Fox News

That said, no president has ever been more closely intertwined with a media enterprise than Trump is with Fox News. Before his election he was a regularly scheduled contributor to Fox and Friends with a segment called “Mondays with Trump.” He limits his interviews to Fox News on a nearly exclusive basis. His administration is infested with former Fox News staffers. They include: Deputy Chief of Staff, Bill Shine, who was the president of the network before being fired for mishandling incidents of sexual harassment; ambassador to the United Nations nominee, Heather Nauert, a former Fox host; National Security Advisor, John Bolton, an ex-Fox contributor.

In addition, Trump employs current Fox News anchors as his de facto cabinet, getting advice on everything from the economy to military engagements, to taxes and more. Sean Hannity is reported to talk with the President almost every night before bedtime. Lou Dobbs is often on conference call during Oval Office meetings. Jeanine Pirro is a favorite consultant on legal matters. And Trump is frequently live-tweeting whatever he happens to be watching on Fox, day and night.

Recently, Trump was prepared to sign a bipartisan bill to keep the government open. But when Fox Newsies heard that it didn’t provide funding for his idiotic vanity wall, they went berserk. Subsequently, Trump reversed course, and now we find ourselves in what is about to become the longest government shutdown in history. Which makes it all the more troubling that many of Trump’s Fox faves are now imploring him to declare a national emergency as a tactic to fund the wall that has nothing to do with any emergency, and that most Americans oppose. For instance, as reported by Media Matters:

Sean Hannity: So, with the president speaking, I’m guessing he’s going to declare a national emergency. […] victims of crime happening in this country, that should be enough of a national emergency.

Lou Dobbs: This is the president of the United States. He says a wall should be built; that it’s a national emergency. At that point, the nation should rally behind him. […] It is a national emergency, it is a crisis, and there could be no rational disputation of that.

Lou Dobbs (again): I really believe that the way forward here is for him to declare a national emergency, and simply sweep aside the recalcitrant left in this country.

Stuart Varney: I think this total refusal to negotiate has pushed the president to the point where he has to declare an emergency on the border.

Rush Limbaugh: And so they empowered the executive branch with the National Emergencies Act. He can confiscate private businesses, if he wants. All he has to do is declare it a national emergency.

Gregg Jarrett: The National Emergency Act authorizes the president to declare an emergency, and nobody can second-guess him. He has unfettered authority. […] he can use the military, redirect them for construction of an unauthorized project, whatever it is, the president wants it to be. That can be the barrier wall, and nobody can stop him from doing it.

Bob Bianchi (Fox guest): To me, politically, it makes perfect sense. [for Trump to] invoke my powers as the president under the National Emergency Act and under one of these sub-acts that allows me to move funds around to build this border wall.

Tom Fitton (on Tucker Carlson Tonight): It is a national emergency when we have a thousand plus miles of unsecured border in our southern area without any ability to figure out who’s coming across. We know the terrorists are targeting [the] southern border.

Considering how gullible Trump is, and how easily influenced he is by his Fox News brain(?) trust, it’s a foregone conclusion that he’ll declare a national emergency. However, contrary to the ravings of Trump and Fox, he does not have unfettered authority to do so. It will undoubtedly be challenged in court. And since the facts don’t support any claim to a crisis, he’ll almost certainly lose. In the meantime, millions of people are hurt and the nation is stifled by Trump’s ignorance and ego. Hopefully that can all be avoided by Congress waking up and doing the right thing. But given the abdication of its civic duty, Mitch McConnell’s Senate has to be considered a long shot.

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

Trump’s Border Wall Scam: Who’s Benefiting from at Least Four Payments for the Same Wall?

Posted by on January 10, 2019 at 1:04 pm. 1 Comments :

There is a peculiar familiarity to Donald Trump’s pitch for his useless vanity wall on the southern border. Anyone who has seen a classic film about smarmy con artists will recognize the scheme that Trump is employing. Essentially he is seeking to get paid many times over for a single item. None of the victims of this scam will receive anything of value for their money.

Donald Trump, Border Wall

That’s precisely what Trump is doing. And he even reiterated it on Thursday morning as he left for a visit to the scene of the crime in Texas. His comments to the press swung between utterly dishonest and frighteningly incoherent. But in the end they were self-serving and disrespectful to the American people who suffer the burdens of his ignorance and hostility.

Notable in this tantrum were Trump’s denials that he ever said that Mexico would pay for the wall directly. He seems to think that because he didn’t specify that Mexico would pay by check, that he never meant that they would be responsible for paying directly at all. But when you repeatedly ask your cult rally followers “Who’s gonna pay for the wall?” and then join them in responding that “Mexico will pay for the wall,” that has only one meaning.

Additionally Trump actually did make statements that Mexico would pay directly. In fact, they are still on his website in a PDF position statement that says: “It’s an easy decision for Mexico: make a one-time payment of $5-10 billion to ensure that $24 billion continues to flow into their country year after year. There are several ways to compel Mexico to pay for the wall.”

More to the point, Trump has been making the case that the wall is either already being paid for by Mexico, or soon will be, for some time. In fact, he says explicitly that the wall is being paid for “many, many times over.” Let’s take a look at these alleged remittances:

Trump: “If we had the wall we would have tremendous savings. I really believe the barrier or wall would pay for itself every three or four months, and maybe even better than that.”

Here Trump is implying that savings from law enforcement activities amounts to payment for the wall. Of course those savings are in no way the result of any payments received from Mexico, directly or otherwise. What’s more, if Trump thinks that his wall is going to eliminate drug trafficking, and the costs associated with it, he’s dumber than we thought. After all, ninety percent of illegal drugs come into the country through legal ports of call. And by the way, so do most undocumented immigrants. His wall doesn’t address any of that. But then there’s also this:

Trump: “When I said Mexico will pay for the wall in front of thousands and thousands of people, obviously they’re not gonna write a check, but they are paying for the wall indirectly many, many times over by the really great trade deal we just made.”

No, they aren’t. That isn’t how trade deals work. Mexico pays nothing via these deals. It is the private businesses on both sides of the border who incur both the costs and benefits as stipulated in the agreement.

The problem with Trump’s arguments is that he’s admitting to financial fraud. It is illegal to request and receive payments from multiple sources for a single product. For instance, you can’t sell your car to six different people, collect all their money, and leave town. But the history of Trump’s remarks on payment for the wall indicate that he’s seeking compensation directly from Mexico, and also via law enforcement savings, and also by businesses engaged in trade. And finally by the American people, who he’s holding hostage to his ludicrous demands by shutting down the government.

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

That’s at least four payees for a single wall. How many times does he want to get paid for this boondoggle? And who’s getting all the extra money? And why is he even asking American citizens to foot the bill – and suffer the Trump Shutdown – when he says he has already secured payment?

The answers to these questions are likely out of reach because Trump will never provide them, or he will engage in a rambling, incomprehensible filibuster until people stop asking. But the bottom line is that, by his own admission, there is no need to get funds from taxpayers, and Trump’s efforts to do so are both immoral and unlawful.

Crybaby Trump’s Fear and Whining Loses to Pelosi and Schumer in Nielsen Ratings

Posted by on January 9, 2019 at 6:04 pm. NO Comments :

The most prominent character flaw of Donald Trump (among so many) is his dangerously malignant narcissism. He has an ego so large and fragile that its collapse could produce a tsunami big enough to wipeout much of the civilized world. The evidence of this is often revealed in his frequent bragging about things he undeservedly takes credit for, and his whining about failures for which he refuses to take any responsibility.

Donald Trump, Loser

Naturally, any poll that he can strain something positive out of, he will feature prominently on his Twitter feed. And among the surveys that he most likes to promote are those taken by Nielsen Media Research. Trump just gets giddy with excitement when he excels in the ratings. So the results of his Oval Office speech on Tuesday night are likely to bring a storm of rage due to his defeat at the hands of his Democratic foes, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer.

When Trump finds out that more people watched The Pelosi/Schumer Show than his pathetic babbling about steel barriers and beheadings, he may have a stroke. Sure, some Fox News viewers tuned out after he signed off. But the audience increased for the other cable networks enough to exceed the total for his audience. And the combined post-Trump total for MSNBC and CNN surpassed the number of viewers on Fox.

NETWORK TRUMP SCHUMER/PELOSI
FOX NEWS 8,221,000 7,864,000
MSNBC 4,025,000 4,461,000
CNN 3,390,000 3,742,000
TOTALS 15,636,000 16,067,000

If Trump was hoping to command a large audience of dimwits he could persuade with his oozing charm, he failed bigly. Not only did he give a presentation that induced narcolepsy, it lead to a Wednesday afternoon meeting with Democrats where Trump stormed out in a huff upon hearing that he still wasn’t gonna get the wall he wanted from Santa. Then he tweeted an insolent and incoherent message:

Trump seems to think that by agreeing to reopen the government, he’s entitled to total subservience from Democrats who still oppose the wall for a host of legitimate reasons. Those reasons don’t disappear because Trump finally behaves responsibly and Congress does the job they’re paid to do. And the wall isn’t his reward for releasing a hostage nation from his aspiring authoritarian grip.

There’s no way that Trump can win this argument because he’s relying only on an infantile insistence that everyone bow down to his demands. But Republicans in the Senate are already starting to fall away as they realize that deliberately hurting their constituents is bad politics. So it’s only a matter of time before Trump caves in with some face saving resolution that still denies him his precious wall.

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

What’s the Real Reason Trump Gave that Yawner from the Oval Office? (Hint: Think Russia)

Posted by on January 9, 2019 at 9:54 am. 6 Comments :

On Tuesday night Donald Trump gave a much anticipated address from the Oval Office, his first as President. There was rampant speculation about what he might say. Some pundits wondered if he might take the opportunity to declare a national emergency in order to reallocate federal funds to his idiotic and useless vanity wall. Others just considered it a ploy to get the public to pressure Congress to pay his ransom for reopening the government.

Donald Trump, Subway

As it turns out the speech was a tiresome affair that featured Trump solemnly reciting from his TelePrompTer and sniffling as he has been known to do after snorting Adderall. There was nothing that could be called newsworthy. Trump offered no solutions to the shutdown impasse. He made no overtures to Democrats on border security legislation. There wasn’t anything different about this speech than what he’s been saying for the past three weeks on this subject. And of course, that means he was repeating the same old lies that he and his surrogates (including Surrogate-in-Chief Mike Pence) have been foisting on the public since the Trump Shutdown began.

So there was no reason for this speech to be carried live by the news networks. No news value would have been lost by delaying it for half an hour so that it could be fact checked – a practice that should be in effect for everything Trump says or does. What the speech did contain was Trump’s now tedious routine of fear mongering and blame shifting to Democrats.

He amped up the emotionally charged fears of violence allegedly committed by undocumented immigrants with examples that included murders, rapes, and even beheadings. Never mind that this immigrant population is far less likely to commit these or any crimes than are native born citizens. The purpose of this overtly racist argument, as employed by Trump and his shills on Fox News, is to demonize people who are largely peaceful and law abiding.

So why did Trump take the extraordinary step of demanding primetime television access to the nation in order to bore them with rote repetitions of his commonplace cult rally ravings? He must have known that there was nothing in his remarks that would change anyone’s mind. Nor would it move the needle on resolving the shutdown problem. The only thing that it would be certain to do is dominate the news cycle for a short period of time. And therein lies a clue to what might have been his true intention.

Absent this speech, the most prominent stories that came out the same day concerned the ongoing investigations into Trump’s collusion and conspiracy with Russia. One of those stories featured the chairman of his presidential campaign, Paul Manafort, who was found to have been sharing proprietary polling data with a suspected Russian intelligence operative. That information corresponds with the sort of data used by Russia to interfere with the election, and links Trump’s campaign to the Russian conspiracy more closely than ever before.

The other story concerned the Russian lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya, who famously met with Manafort, Don Jr, Jared Kushner, and others, in Trump Tower. That was the meeting where they discussed acquiring “dirt” in the form of stolen emails from Hillary Clinton and her associates. Veselnitskaya was indicted yesterday for obstruction of justice in a case that revealed her close ties to the Kremlin.

Given the bombshell quality of these stories, it would have been a fortunate coincidence if something else arose that might distract the media and the public from focusing on them. Could Trump have been tipped off about these impending legal disclosures? Perhaps by Manafort or his lawyers who have already been discovered to have secretly briefed Trump’s legal team And might Trump have had an incentive to schedule a rare Oval Office address that was completely devoid of substance in order to execute that distraction? Can anyone supply another reason why the President would embarrass himself with that empty televised spectacle that was the oratorical equivalence of dropping his pants on the subway to draw attention away from a worse crime?

Who knows with this president? This might be a step too deep into conspiracy theory. But it is well within the bounds of plausibility for a president who is openly considering a declaration of a national emergency – which does not exist – just so he can build a wall that most Americans don’t want. It is not far-fetched for someone who lies with such ease about things as easily verifiable as whether past presidents told him that they should have built a wall; or that 4,000 suspected terrorists were caught crossing the southern border; or that Democrats request that Trump change his wall construction from concrete to steel.

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

None of those things were true. And that tendency for flagrant falsification is what makes anything possible with this president. Including a plot to wave a shiny Oval Office speech in front of the press to get them to ignore the fact that he’s pantless. But fortunately, it doesn’t seem to have worked. The other stories are still being sell covered (less so on Fox News) and are likely to make headlines on Wednesday and beyond. So Trump embarrassed himself, and wasted the nation’s time, in vain. The only problem with that is that it might make him more likely to actually declare a national emergency, out of anger and/or vengeance, in order to distract from the failure of this distraction. Stay tuned.

How Does VP Mike Pence Respond to Conclusive Evidence of Trump’s Lies? With Even More Lying!

Posted by on January 8, 2019 at 1:42 pm. 6 Comments :

On Tuesday evening Donald Trump will deliver his very first Oval Office address to the American people. And the critical subject matter that necessitates this extraordinary and urgent communication just happens to be a “humanitarian and national security crisis” that is being fabricated from thin air by Trump and his team of propaganda fabulists.

Mike Pence, Donald Trump

There is no credible evidence of a crisis at the southern border. By every metric that is measurable, undocumented immigration, drug trafficking, gang members, violent crime, etc., the incidence of illegal activity has been steadily declining for several years. But since Trump is badly losing the PR war for his idiotic and useless vanity wall, he has decided to take his case directly to the public. Which is a pretty terrible idea considering his historically low approval and the fact that he’s regarded by most Americans as untrustworthy. Even less trustworthy than the media that he despises.

Just who does Trump think he will convince that a wall that is decidedly unpopular, and the equally out of favor government shutdown he engineered to force Congress to pay for it, is really a great idea that everyone should embrace? If Trump thinks that his innate (albeit imaginary) charm will win over converts, he is going to be wallowing in a deep trench of disappointment.

Consequently, The administration sent their secret charisma weapon, Vice-President Mike Pence, out to save the day for Trump and company. He was interviewed by Jonathan Karl of ABC News. And one question in particular really hit the sweet spot for determining whether Trump’s TV ploy can succeed or not (video below):

Karl: How can the President’s word be trusted on this when he has said so many things that are just not true about this crisis? He said that Barack Obama had a ten foot wall built around his house here in Washington. You know that isn’t true. He said that some of his predecessors told him that they wanted to build a wall. But all four living presidents have now put out statements saying that they never had any such conversation with the President. And then you saw Sarah Sanders say that nearly 4,000 terrorists come into the country every year, and that’s not true either.

How can the American people trust the President when he says this is a crisis when he says things over and over again that aren’t true?

Pence: Well, the American people aren’t as concerned about the political debate as they are concerned about what’s really happening at the border. And that’s what the President’s been focusing on.

So Pence is spinning Trump’s flagrant dishonesty as “political debate”? This tells you something about how Republicans regard politics. And the absurdity of his contention that nobody cares about Trump lying is evident in Trump’s dismal approval polling.

When Karl tried to press Pence on the credibility question again, Pence launched into his robo-lie that 4,000 “known or suspected terrorists” were apprehended, still falsely implying that the southern border was their point of origin. Then he continued on auto-pilot with assertions about drugs pouring into the country, being deliberately deceitful about the fact that the vast majority come in by air or through valid checkpoints. And at this point you might be wondering what any of this have to do with the question about Trump’s lying? But finally, Pence painted Trump’s pathological fibs as simply his “passion” to “protect the American people”:

Pence: “The passion you hear from President Trump, his determination to take this to American people, as he will tonight in his national broadcast from the oval office, comes from his deep desire to do his job to protect the American people. And we’re gonna continue to carry that case forward until the Democrats in Congress come to the table and start negotiating. Not just to end the government shutdown, but to address what is an undeniable crisis at out southern border.”

It’s cute how Pence tries to evade the topic by shifting to a “blame the Democrats” posture, despite Trump being the immovable object who refuses to compromise, or even agree to the legislation that he previously agreed to. But Pence’s assertion of “an undeniable crisis” is especially ridiculous. That’s going to be a tough sell considering that even people like Fox News senior judicial analyst, Andrew Napolitan, denies it. He also denies that Trump has any legal right to move forward with his wall by declaring a national emergency. When his Fox colleague Maria Bartiromo asked this directly, Napolitano told her that:

“In a word, no. That’s not me saying no, because the Supreme Court said no when Harry Truman attempted to do that. […] the Supreme Court has made it very clear, even in times of emergency, the president of the United States of America cannot spend money unless it has been authorized by the Congress.”

None of this will prevent the circus that is going to unfold tonight for Trump’s Oval Office Reality TV episode. And his likely incoherent, lie-riddled speech won’t change the mind of a single viewer. Except for those who are finally disgusted enough by his ignorance and dishonesty and refuse to be further exploited by it. For Trump, this clown show is a lose-lose.

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

It’s ‘A Sad Day in America’ Trump Whines, as He Yells at ‘Crazed Lunatics’ in the Media

Posted by on January 7, 2019 at 1:33 pm. 3 Comments :

It’s as predictable as the sun rising over lobbyists at Mar-a-Lago. Whenever Donald Trump’s anxiety swells his otherwise empty cranium, he lashes out at the press with hollow insults and reckless characterizations as “enemies of the people,” a line he stole from Joseph Stalin. And now as the Trump Shutdown enters its sixteenth day, Trump is realizing that he has no leverage over the Democrats in Congress, and the American people oppose his vanity wall and the political stunts he employs to secure funding for it.

Donald Trump

Consequently, in his regularly scheduled morning tweetstorm, Trump focused intensely on the press that he despises so vehemently. It was a particularly harsh assault that was riddled with flagrant falsehoods and figments of his tortured imagination. He began, however, with some good old-fashioned (and undeserved) bragging about himself:

What Trump apparently means by “success” is the fact the government that he hates is shut down and hundreds of thousands of Americans are not working, or they are working and not being paid. It’s a condition that Trump absurdly said he can relate to. Really? Then he veers off to accuse the media of being “crazed lunatics who have given up on the TRUTH!” That might be a more convincing criticism if Trump weren’t the most dishonest president in history who has told more than 7,500 lies since his inauguration. But he wasn’t through:

Once again, Trump’s idea of “tremendous success” is a stock market that is down over 3,000 points in the last quarter, and was in the red for the year for the first time in a decade. His administration is crumbling with terminations and defections that have resulted in there being six cabinet members who are serving in an “acting” capacity because he can’t find any credible people who will work for him. He also asserts, without any factual basis, that the press is making up sources and publishing fiction.

But Trump is right that this is “a sad day in America.” In fact, it’s been a sad couple of years. That may change now that Democrats have the majority in the House of Representatives and there is some real oversight into Trump’s criminal activities. That, of course, is a big contributor to Trump’s ballooning anxieties. And it’s why he’s escalating attacks like these:

Trump is desperately trying to turn the American people against the free press so that they will dismiss reports of his collusion and conspiracy with Russia, his financial corruption, his unlawful initiatives, his submissive foreign policy, and his obstruction of justice. He’s fighting a losing battle on those grounds as most polls show that majorities of the people trust the media more than they trust Trump.

As if to affirm his own untrustworthiness, Trump posted a couple more tweets that were blatantly deceitful. In one he quoted Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA) as seemingly siding with Trump’s contention that he can declare a state of emergency as a means of funding the border wall:

However, Trump left out the second part of Smith’s comment wherein he hammered the President saying:

“…but primarily it’s been done to build facilities in Afghanistan and Iraq. In this case, I think the president would be wide open to a court challenge saying, where is the emergency? You have to establish that in order to do this. Beyond that, this would be a terrible use of Department of Defense dollars.”

In the other tweet, Trump went after the New York Times for correctly reporting that his statements regarding the removal troops from Syria changed drastically in a number of days. Unfortunately for Trump, the record of his original statements is preserved in his own Twitter feed:

Finally (we wish), Trump announced that he will “Address the Nation on the Humanitarian and National Security crisis on our Southern Border,” in a televised speech this Tuesday evening. We can expect this to be a thorough rehashing of the lies he has been telling for weeks in his defense of shutting down the government and begging the American people to pay for what he promised would be paid for by Mexico. And never mind that Trump has since insisted that the wall would pay for itself in a year, and that it would be paid for by the USMCA trade deal (that has not been ratified) So it’s actually being paid for twice, but he’s still asking taxpayers to fork over funds for it.

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

The media, however, should take a strong look at refusing to air this blatant propaganda by Trump. These Reality TV-style affairs are generally devoid of news and infected by Trump’s pathological lying. There is no reason they can’t be monitored and aired later with the fact checking that will surely be necessary. The media is under no obligation to grant scarce airtime to liars so that they can dispense fictional and self-serving distortions of reality.

And Here’s the Very First Contestant for ‘Stupidest Comment By a Fox News Shill’ for 2019

Posted by on January 6, 2019 at 2:51 pm. 1 Comments :

We are only six days into 2019 and we already have a contestant for “Stupidest Comment of the Year By a Fox News Shill.” The lucky winner is a veteran of the State TV Network who has contributed more than his share of idiocy in past years. And even though the year is young and there are no other contestants, this will be difficult to beat as the year goes forward.

Fox News, Brit Hume, Donald Trump

Brit Hume is currently a senior political analyst for Fox News. Prior to that he was the anchor of their signature evening newscast, “Special Report.” He is still seen frequently on Fox as a commentator and a member of news panels. But this Sunday morning he was triggered by an article in the Daily Beast that reported Donald Trump’s remarks to the press as he was departing for Camp David. Trump was asked whether he related to the hundreds of thousands of Americans who he has thrown out of work via his “Trump Shutdown” – the political tantrum he’s throwing to try to get his idiotic vanity wall on the southern border. Trump replied that:

“I can relate, and I’m sure that the people that are on the receiving end will make adjustments, they always do, and they’ll make adjustments. People understand exactly what’s going on. But many of those people that won’t be receiving a paycheck, many of those people agree 100 percent with what I’m doing.”

Let’s aside the absurdity of Trump’s response that he can in any relate to the tribulations of people living paycheck to paycheck. And never mind the fact that he’s shown zero consideration for these innocent victims of his ego-driven fetish for a useless and racist wall. And don’t even bother trying to figure out where Trump got the idea that the federal workers who are suffering and risking losing their homes agree that it’s all worth it to construct a wall that will accomplish nothing.

What bothered Hume was the notion that the author of the article wasn’t giving Trump the credit he deserves for the sacrifices he’s making:

First of all, it isn’t true that Trump accepts no salary as president. He does accept it, and then donates it to the federal treasury or some agency thereof. So Trump still gets the tax write off benefit for making a $400,000 charitable gift. That’s very different than declining the salary.

However, the larger point that Hume is woefully blind to is that foregoing the salary hardly translates into Trump being able to relate to the federal workers who are undergoing severe financial hardships. Trump was born into wealth and never had to struggle to make ends meet. He has millions (he says billions) of dollars in assets and whether or not he takes the presidential salary has no bearing on his welfare. Hume seems to think that Trump is experiencing the very same kinds of trials that the federal employees are. Does he really believe that?

What’s more, Trump’s refusal to pocket his salary doesn’t mean that he isn’t making any money from his stint in the White House. In fact, he’s making more than any other president in history. That’s because from day one he has monetized the presidency for his personal benefit. He schedules conferences by the government and the Republican Party at his hotels. He spends his vacations at his resorts (i.e. Mar-a-Lago, Bedminster, etc.) where the government pays the accommodations of dozens of staffers and Secret Service agents. He has even earned hundreds of thousands of dollars renting golf carts to his security detail when he’s on the links.

Of course, every president incurs costs for travel and vacations. But none of them have paid those costs directly to themselves. Until Donald Trump. And we haven’t even gotten to the money he makes from foreign governments and operatives who are lodging at his hotels for the stated purpose of incurring his favor. That’s potentially a violation of the Constitution’s Emoluments Clause, which is an impeachable offense.

It’s beyond insane for Trump to suggest that he can relate to people that have been involuntarily furloughed at one of the most expensive times of the year (holidays and taxes). Trump doesn’t have to worry about keeping his residence. He doesn’t have to worry about paying for medicine or healthcare. He isn’t troubled with expenses caring his children or their schooling. He won’t have any problem buying groceries or clothing. I wonder if Hume, the author of this tweet, is aware of any of that.

So even if Trump wants to pretend that he understands, or can imagine how it feels, he simply cannot relate to it. And sadly, that’s representative of how most of the Trump Republican Nationalist Party regards these matters. So for posting this asinine tweet, Hume shows that he can neither relate nor understand, And for that he takes the lead for this year’s Stupidest Comment.

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