On Orders from Sean Hannity (His Fox News Boss) Trump Will Sign Border Bill, Declare Emergency

After the unmitigated disaster of the Trump Shutdown last month, Donald Trump is taking steps to avoid another embarrassing loss to his nemesis, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Under Pelosi’s guidance, the bipartisan committee in Congress tasked with drafting a new funding bill has arrived at a consensus that does not include any money for Trump’s idiotic vanity wall. So the President is responding in the most ignorant and undemocratic way possible.

Fox News, Sean Hannity, White House

The Constitution of the United States makes clear that the Congress is responsible for all spending allocations by the federal government. Ordinarly, the president would be bound by the decisions of the Congress that is made up of the people’s representatives. But Donald Trump is in no way ordinary. It appears to be his intention to ignore – and even insult – the people (who polls show are overwhelmingly opposed to the wall) and do an unconstitutional end run around Congress to get funding for his precious wall.

Of course, Trump didn’t come to this decision on his own. That would require reading a bill that is over 1,000 pages and being able to grasp what it means. Instead, Trump is merely following orders from his superiors at Fox News who are accustomed to telling him what to do, and having him obey. It was only one day ago that Sean Hannity delivered his command to Trump in the form of commentary on his program. Hannity’s segment was built around this premise: “How Trump can take Congress’ garbage deal, and stick the wall down their throats.” That’s a particularly fascist tone to take with regard to presidential powers (something they are familiar with). What Hannity actually proposed was this:

“Step one: The president signs the deal, and uses the $1.375 billion as a downpayment for the wall. Step two: President Trump has identified some $900 million for additional construction that is already available for the administration’s discretion. That would bring the pot to about $2.3 billion. Step three: This needs to happen simultaneously, and it has the president declaring a national emergency. This is the time.”

So how did the White House respond to the bill that Congress is about to send him?

Gee. That’s exactly what Hannity told him to do. And this isn’t the first time. In fact, the Trump Shutdown was largely the result of Hannity’s insistence that Trump not agree to any deal that didn’t include wall funding. This time, however, they knew that a shutdown would only make matters worse for Trump, so they decided to try to turn the presidency into a dictatorship. But that’s isn’t going to work out any better them.

The emergency declaration will surely be challenged in court, where Trump will likely fail because there isn’t any emergency. And Trump’s own words and actions are the proof of that. He has repeatedly claimed that his administration has reduced illegal border crossings. He said that he already stopped two “caravans” of refugees at the border without any wall. And he has been putting off any executive actions on this for months. All of this affirms that no emergency condition exists.

Trump is engaging in pure theatricality in order to get his way, not to secure the nation, but to be able to say that he fulfilled a dumb campaign promise (that included Mexico paying for the wall, but now that’s been forgotten). No court in the nation will rule that Trump saving face over a campaign promise constitutes a national emergency. So Trump will lose in the end. But in the meantime he will have degraded democracy and divided the country even more than he already has. And that’s the Trump legacy that will endure long after he’s gone.

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

Too Close to Trump? Fox News Won’t Run Ad for Oscar-Nominated Anti-Nazi Documentary

The Trump-fluffing by Fox News has been going on for three years now. It hardly seems like news to point out new instances of their blatant bias and propaganda. But every now and then they achieve new lows of sycophantic sucking up that require special attention. And on Wednesday they had just such an achievement.

Donald Trump

A documentary about Nazis in America in 1939 has been nominated for an Oscar in the Documentary Short category.. It’s called “A Night at the Garden,” and tells the story of a rally in New York City by supporters of fascism. It’s a revealing, albeit disturbing, moment of truth from America’s past. And it’s something that all Americans should be aware of. To that end, the producers sought to run an ad for the film (video below) on fox News, but ran into an obstacle. According to the Hollywood Reporter

“Fox News has rejected a national advertising buy for a 30-second spot that warns viewers about the potential dangers of American fascism after an ad sales representative said network leadership deemed it inappropriate, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.”

“The spot doubles as a promotion of this year’s Oscar-nominated documentary short A Night at the Garden, which recounts a 1939 Nazi rally in New York City, and a warning — ‘It Can Happen Here’ – to Hannity’s largely conservative viewers about the potential dangers of President Donald Trump’s brand of populism.”

So Fox News doesn’t think this ad is “appropriate” for their network? You have to wonder what about this ad they considered inappropriate. It is almost entirely historical footage of the Manhattan rally. It never says anything political, other than the closing tag line that “It can happen here.” It doesn’t mention Donald Trump or any political party.

The only plausible explanation for rejecting this ad is that Fox News simply considered it too close to the sort of fascism that is recognizable in Trump’s rhetoric and demeanor. Without any direct or indirect references to Trump, Fox made this association on their own and decided to ban the ad for fear of shocking the tender sensitivities of Sean Hannity’s Trump worshipping audience.

While Fox News considered this ad inappropriate for their air, they didn’t feel the same way last year about an ad by Trump that literally accused Democrats of being responsible for every crime committed in the U.S. by undocumented immigrants. It had a truly fascist tone in saying that “Democrats who stand in our way will be complicit in every murder committed by illegal immigrants.” In addition to that disgusting attack, the ad was a flamingly racist assault on all Latino immigrants. But Fox news aired it anyway, until the public backlash caused them to reverse course.

In rejecting the documentary ad, a statement was released by Fox’s ad sales group that was troubling all by itself:

“A Fox News national ad sales representative told the distributor’s media-buying agency on Wednesday that CEO Suzanne Scott (“our CEO”) said the ad was ‘not appropriate for our air,’ according to email correspondence viewed by THR.”

Imagine that. The Fox News CEO actually stepped in to make sure the ad would not air. That’s highly unusual. Executives at that level rarely make decisions about advertising content. This shows how determined the network is to shield Trump from any potentially negative fallout.

Even though the ad doesn’t allude to Trump in any way, the top brass at Fox still made that association and nixed the ad. And in doing so they actually affirmed their own fears by acting like the fascists they are striving to disassociate themselves from. Good work, Fox.

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