In the wake of the 21st century’s most dreadful and diabolical act of international espionage – the Chinese Spy Balloon Affair – Donald Trump is displaying his famously fatuous and defiant demeanor. Always the measured stateman, Trump’s response to China’s brief and inconsequential incursion into American air space is typically distant from any rational version of reality.

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Trump’s first public comment on this pressing matter was a posting on his pitifully failing social media site, Truth Social, that said nothing but “SHOOT DOWN THE BALLOON!” Which was particularly asinine advice considering that he and his mouthpieces on Fox News believed that it might contain bioweapons that would spread for miles were the balloon to be shot down over the U.S.

RELATED: UH-OH: GOP Oversight Committee Chair on Fox News Fears a Weather Balloon is a Chinese Bioweapon

On Sunday Trump elaborated on his thoughts regarding the giant Chinese party favor. He posted a comment that refuted the documented reports by the Pentagon about the state of the military Spy Balloon gap. Trump babbled that…

“The Chinese Balloon situation is a disgrace, just like the Afghanistan horror show, and everything else surrounding the grossly incompetent Biden Administration. They are only good at cheating in elections, and disinformation — and now they are putting out that a Balloon was put up by China during the Trump Administration, in order to take the ‘heat’ off the slow moving Biden fools. China had too much respect for ‘TRUMP’ for this to have happened, and it NEVER did. JUST FAKE DISINFORMATION!”

First of all, wouldn’t “FAKE DISINFORMATION” be real information? Setting that aside, Trump’s tedious tantrums about President Biden and the Democrats are always describing one “disgrace” or another. In this case, Trump is adamant that nothing like this ever occurred during his tumultuous term in the White House. Unfortunately for Trump, the Pentagon disagrees. They issued a statement on Thursday that revealed that…

“It is not the first time that you had a balloon of this nature cross over the continental United States. It has happened a handful of other times over the past few years, to include before this administration.”

Not only that, Fox News reported the same thing with additional details, saying that…

“U.S. officials tell Fox it’s not the first time Chinese spy balloons have flown over the United States. About four months ago a Chinese spy balloon crashed in the Pacific near Hawaii. Others were spotted over Texas and Florida, dating back to the Trump administration, but never previously acknowledged publicly.”

Fox News Sunday, per U.S. officials on Chinese spy balloons: "Others were spotted near Texas and Florida, dating back to the Trump administration, but never previously acknowledged publicly." pic.twitter.com/7NvD2I4Xqs

— The Recount (@therecount) February 5, 2023

Sane observers know that Biden did the right thing by taking the advice of the military professionals and waiting to shoot down the balloon until it was over the Atlantic. They had already disabled the balloon’s surveillance capabilities. And having seen the seven mile long debris field validates the decision not to shoot it down over land, where the two-bus sized payload might have caused harm to people or property.

Trump is clearly unconcerned about these facts. And he isn’t bothered that the Pentagon refuted his factless and simple-minded denial. Neither is Fox News. Despite their own reporting, they have disseminated flagrantly false propaganda about the popping of the balloon. Fox host Maria Bartiromo asked an array of questions intended to invoke irrational fears…

“Did it drop and disburse surveillance products powered by solar energy to allow unlimited surveillance? And why did it take U.S. officials so long to shoot it down? Was it a test for the CCP to see if can send something into America’s airspace undetected? And how much surveillance is China performing on America right now?”

Maria: Did it drop and disburse surveillance products powered by solar energy to allow unlimited surveillance? pic.twitter.com/kz5nshFuRu

— Acyn (@Acyn) February 5, 2023

Note that Bartiromo was worried about the downing of the balloon because of the potential that it would “drop and disburse surveillance products,” but that she thought it should have been shot down sooner. She’s saying, in effect, that she wants China to have been able to collect more information.

Fox News also hosted Trump’s Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, who claimed to have been totally unaware of any of the Chinese spy balloon incidents during the Trump years. That’s comforting, isn’t it?

Additionally, Fox interviewed GOP senator Marco Rubio, who made a bizarrely contorted argument that China benefited by Biden not shooting down the balloon, and that China benefited by Biden shooting down the balloon. So according to Rubio, China wins either way.

How would this have been different during Trump’s term? He had the same options to either shoot down the balloon or not. And presumably the same win-win benefits for China. Of course, Trump took a third path wherein he did nothing at all and concealed the whole matter from the public. That was surely a win for Trump’s pals in China.

This is the sort of nonsense that passes for expert analysis on Fox News. And then they expect their audience to accept their dishonesty and foolishness. Lucky for them, their viewers have been primed to buy bullshit like this for many years. And that same cultist indoctrination paved the road for Trump to be able to lie so brazenly and profusely and still appeal to his glassy-eyed devotees.

It’s just a matter of time before the Kool-Aid is distributed. Or worse, he gives his StormTrumpers the orders to attack the rest of us. Which, actually, he has already done.

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