Polls

More Americans Say Trump is Mentally Unfit than Biden (Duh)

Posted by on July 14, 2020 at 3:28 pm. 2 Comments :

For several months Donald Trump and his Confederacy of Buttmunchers have attempted to paint an unflattering portrait of Joe Biden as suffering from cognitive decline. In the process they have produced deceptive messages, images, and videos intended to give a false impression of Biden. And Trump has repeatedly made disparaging remarks during his press harangues, and even in his TV ads.

Donald Trump, Mocking Disability

It’s an ironic line of attack considering Biden’s prolific and articulate oratory, contrasted by the abundant evidence of Trump’s own failing mental acuity. After all, it’s Trump who has advised people to inject bleach; who thinks he coined the phrase “Buy American”; who believes that testing for the coronavirus creates new cases; who asserts that doctors were amazed at how he “aced” a cognitive assessment test; who is hyper-focused on his TV ratings during a deadly pandemic and economic recession; and who struggles to answer questions coherently and can barely construct a sentence that is halfway intelligible.

The American people have observed Trump’s bizarre and aberrant behavior for three and half years now. And despite his furious efforts to malign Biden, they recognize a nutcase when they see one.

This is affirmed in a recent poll by Monmouth University. The survey asked “How confident are you that [Donald Trump or Joe Biden] has the mental and physical stamina necessary to carry out the job of president?”

The results reveal that the American people overwhelmingly regard Trump as unfit for the duties of his office. Only 35% said they are “very” or “somewhat” confident of Trump’s mental stability. A majority of 54% said they are “not to” or “not at all” confident. Biden’s numbers are the complete opposite with 52% saying they are “very” or “somewhat” confident, and only 35% saying they are “not to” or “not at all” confident.

These survey results are all the more striking considering the lengths that Trump has gone to mischaracterize Biden. He has posted numerous tweets alleging that Biden is “not all there.” In a recent ad Trump asserted that Biden’s agenda would make America “diminished and weak, just like Biden.” Never mind that it’s pure projection on Trump’s part. Whether consciously or otherwise, some part of Trump knows that he’s the one drifting in and out of lucidity. and he’s not the only one who’s noticed (see video below).

Where once these sort of attacks were considered out of bounds, Trump doesn’t even try to conceal his malicious intent. It must be frustrating for him that after all of his noxious and denigrating slander, it’s Trump who wears the mantle of mental infirmity according to a nation of worried citizens. And it isn’t likely to get any better for him if he persists in attacking Biden. The people get that his attacks are offensive and reflect more on him than on his rival. Which would turn whatever further efforts he directs at Biden into a downward spiral of self-destruction. The problem for Trump is that he is already too psychologically impaired to understand that.

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

Panic Sets In As Trump Sees America Overwhelmingly Rejecting Him

Posted by on June 24, 2020 at 12:56 pm. 3 Comments :

With just over four months until the 2020 election, Donald Trump is on bunker duty, forlornly devouring Fox News and tweeting frantically as his poll numbers slide ever further into the abyss of ultimate defeat. The stench of a loser emanates from his dialog and demeanor. And his fury is shooting out in all directions – at Democrats, the press, and his cowering staff and family.

Donald Trump Walking the Plank

The best evidence of Trump’s electoral peril is that his once cherished campaign rallies are shadows of the cultish festivals of messiah worship they used to be. In Tulsa, Trump spoke of a million ticket requests, but ended up with a pathetic crowd of only 6,200 (along with other problems). A few days later he took his traveling revival show to Phoenix, a city with four times the population of Tulsa, but drew half as many Trump-chumps.

Among the reasons for the desertions of these once rabid fans include the still spreading coronavirus. As infections and fatalities continue to mount, concerns about gathering in large crowds who ignore safety precautions (i.e. face masks) could be taking a toll on attendance. But that factor cannot be separated from Trump’s dismal approval ratings. After all, it is Trump’s negligence, incompetence, and even deliberate malfeasance that is the cause of the current COVID-19 spike. Even his supporters, at some level, have to know this.

In addition to the attendance decline at Trump rallies, his polling has fallen to new lows. He is losing to Joe Biden by double digits nationally, as well as in the crucial swing states. He is declining in critical demographic groups that he won in 2016 (such as evangelicals and suburban women). And Trump cannot whine about “fake” news (well, he can and will, but it doesn’t register as credible with anyone) being against him because his downward spiral is showing across a broad array of media sources, including Fox News (which drives him nuts). In fact, every one of the ten most recent polls as compiled by RealClearPolitics have Trump floundering with an average in favor of Biden that exceeds 50%:

RCP Average 51.0 40.9 Biden +10.1
Economist/YouGov 49 41 Biden +8
NY Times/Siena 50 36 Biden +14
Harvard-Harris 56 44 Biden +12
FOX News 50 38 Biden +12
Quinnipiac 49 41 Biden +8
CNBC 51 41 Biden +10
CNN 55 41 Biden +14
NPR/PBS/Marist 50 43 Biden +7
Emerson 53 47 Biden +6
The Hill/HarrisX 47 37 Biden +10

UPDATE! The New York Times just released a new poll of six swing states and things are just getting worse for Trump. Biden is now extending his lead: by 11 points in Michigan and Wisconsin, 10 points in Pennsylvania, 9 points in North Carolina, 7 points in Arizona, and 6 points in Florida.

As a result of this reality, Trump is lashing out with panic, fear, and delusion. He has proposed “slowing down” virus testing as a way of reducing the number of cases. Of course, the number would remain the same, but we just wouldn’t know what it is. He is also threatening to use “serious force” against Americans exercising their constitutional right to protest. He and his crony Attorney General, Bill Barr, are purging the Justice Department of career professionals in order to escape accountability for his crimes. He tweeted a couple of Internet videos of African-Americans committing random acts of violence. They have nothing to do with politics or protest. They are just intended to reinforce a racist fear of “scary” black men. And he is ramping up his bizarre attacks on Democrats and President Obama, who he has now publicly accused of treason.

These, and so much more, are examples of how deranged Trump has become as he recognizes that his political and legal future is virtually dead. And we can expect his crazed behavior and wild attacks to become even more extreme as election day draws nearer. For that reason, no Democrat or progressive can relax. The fierce determination of Trump and his GOP confederates will stop at nothing to retain power. That includes cheating, voter suppression, and recruiting help from foreign governments. He is already laying the groundwork to challenge election results when he loses. So this calls for vigilance, hard work, financial commitments, and enduring resolve to restore American values. We must not let this moment pass.

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

Trump Embarks on a Desperate Campaign to Frighten Suburban White Women

Posted by on June 12, 2020 at 12:50 pm. 3 Comments :

The prospects for Donald Trump’s reelection continue to sink into an abyss of his hostility, division, and lies. His mounting anxiety is threatening to submerge him into a deep and depressive self-delusional state as he retreats to his bunker, unable to comprehend the magnitude of hatred that America has for him.

Donald Trump, Woman, Fear

Every recent poll shows that Trump is significantly trailing Joe Biden nationally, as well as in the crucial swing states. And he’s even losing support from groups that he once regarded as reliable, such as evangelical voters. His own Republican party members are increasingly repulsed by his angry and childish outbursts. And now he’s worried about a demographic group from which he had support in 2016: Suburban women. Trump tweeted this plaintive yearning on Friday morning:

There’s a lot of wrong in that brief query. First of all, Trump is exacerbating the racist overtones of his candidacy (and his life) by overtly addressing a segment of the electorate that he believes is sympathetic toward him: white women. He’s blatantly fear mongering in order to scare people into voting for him. Secondly, Trump is clinging to the racial anxieties of white voters generally by referring to “defunding the police” without putting that phrase into context. Every Democrat in public life has affirmed their support for reforming police departments – not abolishing them – in a way that refocuses their duties and their budgets on crime and safety, leaving other more personal matters to the social workers, drug counselors, and mental health professionals who are better prepared to handle them.

Finally, Trump is ignoring the reality that the suburban women he relied on four years ago have long since left his camp. A recent poll by CNN found that among these voters Joe Biden is crushing Trump 63 to 34%. And for those who aren’t convinced that CNN’s pollsters are fair, the results were nearly identical in a Fox News poll, giving Biden a 57% edge over Trump’s 29%. In both polls Biden has a nearly 30 point advantage.

It’s difficult to see how Trump can overcome this deficit of support. Particularly when he is bleeding support from so many other critical voter groups. So he’s resorting to the sort of filthy campaign tactics that are familiar components of his diseased persona.

Trump is pretending to be the tough guy (while cowering in his bunker) by deploying the military against peaceful American citizens engaged in constitutionally protected demonstrations. He’s slandering Biden and other Democrats with infantile insults. He’s advancing bizarre conspiracy theories from the Internet’s most abhorrent cretins occupying its outer fringes. And this is how Trump thinks he’s going to appeal to a broad swath of the electorate in order to prevail in November? Yeah, right!

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

Crybaby Trump Obsessively Clings to Bogus 96% Approval

Posted by on June 8, 2020 at 1:43 pm. 4 Comments :

This is a good time to remember the old saying that repeating the same thing over and over, but expecting a different result, is the definition of Trumpism (aka insanity). And Donald Trump is helpfully continuing to affirm the wisdom of that proverb with tedious, all-caps repetitions of moldy oldies like “LAW & ORDER,” “MAGA,” “OBAMAGATE,” and the venerable “FAKE NEWS!”

Donald Trump Pacifier Fox

Among Trump’s most often regurgitated banalities is one that he is convinced will juice his popularity by the force of some imaginary crowd appeal. Trump believes that if he can convince people that others are bewitched by his irresistible charm, then they too will fall under his spell. So he tweets ad infinitum…

There are two very serious flaws in Trump’s logic. First of all, He doesn’t have 96% approval among Republicans, and he never has. It’s notable that as often as he tweets this, he has never once included a source or a link to any poll that would confirm it. And he tweets it quite often. He began this BS back in February of 2019, when the number he made up was only 93%. We’ve had some inflation. Just this year Trump has tweeted this phony stat 28 times (more than once a week). On 17 of those tweets the percentage of his GOP approval was 95%. The other 11 were inflated to 96% for no discernible reason other than ego gratification.

Secondly, Trump is placing undue significance on his GOP approval. The percentage of voters who identify themselves as Republican is a paltry 28%. So Trump could have 100% of them and it still wouldn’t amount to much. It certainly wouldn’t be enough to win an election.

For the record, a new CNN/SRSS poll puts Trump’s job approval among his own party members at only 88%. What’s more, the poll also shows Trump’s overall approval at a pitiful 38% (57% disapproval). And in a head to head match up with Joe Biden, Trump comes out behind by 14 points (Biden 55%, Trump 41%). That represents a gain by Biden of four points since last month’s poll, and a loss by Trump of five points.

Trump is desperately trying to dismiss these results. Naturally he condemns them as being the work of “Fake News” CNN, and goes further to add a wildly irrelevant assertion that “The Dems would destroy America!” That, of course, is from the poll in Trump’s diseased brain.

However, Trump wasn’t satisfied with throwing around his own unsupported malarkey. So he later tweeted that he had “retained [a] highly respected pollster” to “analyze” CNN’s survey. Needless to say, Trump’s pollster is a notoriously biased right-winger who mangles the numbers beyond recognition. Trump isn’t interested in conveying an honest presentation of reality. His only objective it to muddy the waters and pacify his anxious cult followers.

The truth is that, not just one, but every single poll, including Fox News and Trump favorite Rasmussen, shows Biden leading significantly. The RealClearPolitics poll of polls shows Biden with an average lead of 7.8%. And Trump’s support is cratering among Republican notables. There are presently eleven generals and/or admirals that have publicly renounced Trump (Mattis, Kelly, Allen, Powell, Myers, Dempsey, Thomas, Hayden, McRaven, Stvridis, and Mullen). And a growing number of former Trump voters are pledging to support Biden this November.

Nevertheless, Trump soldiers on in his belligerent, childish, egocentric way. He has no idea what a fool he’s making of himself as he ignores the tenor of the electorate by becoming ever more hostile. His proclamations of authoritarian rule are only thrusting him further into the abyss of political toxicity. His negligence, incompetence, and even deliberate malfeasance, is proving to be disastrous with regard to his handling of the social unrest, the coronavirus pandemic, and the recessive economy. And in his narcissistic stupor Trump refuses to see, or at least acknowledge, that for him 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.

Trump Tries to Demonize the Protesters Supported By 73% of the American People

Posted by on June 3, 2020 at 2:56 pm. 6 Comments :

The most consistent principle of Donald Trump’s public relations game plan (if you can call it a plan), is to flagrantly distort reality (aka lie) in order to shape it into a form that doesn’t frighten him. For instance, he insists that thousands more people attend his cult rallies than the venues can actually hold. He claims to have built hundreds of miles of walls along the southern border where there has been no new wall built at all. He boasts about being the best thing that ever happened to African-Americans. He celebrates his “progress” with the coronavirus despite more than 107,000 deaths due to his negligence and incompetence.

Trump Fear

Trump will lie about all things great and small, no matter how easily the truth can be validated proving his obvious dishonesty. These are lies rooted in fear of being seen for the fool that most people know he is. On Wednesday Trump posted a tweet that is emblematic of that behavior in the worst possible way:

This tweet begins by chastising the media (specifically his longtime nemises, CNN and MSNBC) for allegedly supporting a frightful array of evildoers who Trump asserts the media lavished with praise. Needless to say, that never occurred, and Trump doesn’t provide any evidence of his vile assertion. All the media did was to accurately report that those committing acts of violence or vandalism were in the minority, and that the vast majority of protesters were peaceful and devoted to positive change. Trump doesn’t want to hear that because it conflicts with his paranoid vision of a dystopian society where villains have taken control of the streets and his enemies are coming after him from every direction

What’s more, Trump is disgustingly maligning the honest, concerned Americans who are protesting real injustices as “killers, terrorists, arsonists, anarchists, thugs, hoodlums, looters, ANTIFA & others.” It’s a nauseating mischaracterization done purposefully to dehumanize good citizens for whom Trump has a deep seated, personal animosity. Notice that he doesn’t allow even a hint of any appreciation for the majority of people who are lawfully expressing their entirely justified anxiety with regard to systemic racism. Trump’s loaded rhetoric that accuses these protesters of being murderers and terrorists is way beyond the pale. And his invention of an Anti-fa(scist) organization is just another figment of his diseased imagination.

All of this is being done out of pure desperation on Trump’s part. He recognizes (or more likely has been told) that his approval ratings are in the sewer. Every poll shows that he is losing to Joe Biden nationally, as well as in most of the swing states. So he has embarked on a campaign of image restoration in order to plug his leaking ship of state. It’s what produced the travesty on Tuesday when he had protesters tear gassed in order to clear his way to a faux-religious photo-op that even some on his own staff found stomach churning.

What makes Trump’s PR plan all the more inept is that he is bucking popular opinion. A new poll by Reuters/Ipsos finds that…

“Three-quarters of Americans report they support the peaceful protests and demonstrations as a response to George Floyd’s death (73%). A majority of Democrats (86%) and Republicans (59%) report supporting the peaceful demonstrations.”

Also revealed in this survey is that those who strongly support the protests (43%) far exceed those who strongly oppose them (12%%). And that “Four in five Americans (82%) report that peaceful protests are an appropriate response to the killing of an unarmed man by police.” And that “Just 33% of Americans approve of how Donald Trump is handling the protests.”

In short, Trump is wrong the wrong side of the American people on everything. Yet, in his delusional stupor, he is still cranking out all-caps tweets shouting about some make-believe “SILENT MAJORITY” that he imagines is on his side. And this is how he thinks he will improve his standing in the polls and his prospects for reelection? Sure. Good luck with that, Bunker Boy.

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

Trump Flings Feces at Fox News for Poll Showing that America Favors Biden

Posted by on May 22, 2020 at 11:57 am. 6 Comments :

As the nation continues to endure a deadly pandemic, Donald Trump continues to be obsessed over his public image. The death toll is approaching a tragic milestone of 100,000 Americans lost to COVID-19 (coronavirus). And recent studies show that tens of thousands of those deaths could have been avoided had Trump not been so negligent, incompetent, and even deliberately dismissive of the threat.

Joe Biden, Donald Trump Baby, Fake News

Trump manages to turn every public appearance into an infomercial for his 2020 reelection campaign. He simply cannot address this crisis without ultimately referring to himself and what he regards as mistreatment by the media. For the alleged “leader of the free world” Trump sure seems to fall back into a state of paranoid victimhood every time he speaks.

For two days running Trump has also been lashing out wildly at his State TV network (aka Fox News). Anyone who is paying attention recognizes that Fox News is the unabashed propaganda organ of Trump’s presidency. But even with the unprecedented loyalty and adulation that Fox pours over Dear Leader, it can never be enough to mollify Trump’s acute narcissism. And when Fox is less than sufficiently adoring, Trump unleashes his wrath. For instance, on Thursday he whined that…

Trump apparently thinks that Fox “News” is obligated to “help Republicans, and me, get re-elected.” That’s how corrupted his concept of journalism is. Not that Fox practices much journalism. But you would have to believe that some of their “reporters” would take offense to being cast as Trump’s political lackeys. However, none of them have said so since this tweet was posted. And in Trump’s diseased brain, the difference between being “great” and “garbage” is the quality of your bootlicking. Any divergence from total obedience is not tolerated. That’s the deranged mindset behind Trump’s Friday morning tweet demanding that…

Naturally, Trump regards any negative polling results as “fake” and an offense that serves as grounds for termination. However, his complaint that he’s “Never had a good Fox Poll” is an easily provable lie. In fact, he’s had many, and he has effusively praised Fox on those occasions. That doesn’t mean he won’t forget that the moment there is a less positive poll. But Trump wasn’t through whining:

If Trump is really interested in examining a variety of polls, he might take a look at the RealClearPolitics poll of polls that averages the most recent published surveys. As of May 22, every single one of them has Joe Biden leading Trump, including CNBC and CNN. However, what’s particularly disturbing about this tweet is Trump’s shout out to the late Roger Ailes, the former Fox News CEO who was fired due to numerous accusations of sexual harassment and assault. Although, you can’t blame Trump for admiring someone so much like himself. And with regard to the findings in the Fox News poll, it is understandable that Trump would be worried. It shows that…

“…voters prefer Biden to Trump 48-40%. Biden wins on on health care by 17 points, coronavirus by 9, and relations with China by 6. Trump is trusted more on the economy by a slim 3-point margin.”

Trump’s outrage notwithstanding, he will surely continue to show favoritism to Fox News. He has done the vast majority of his television interviews on Fox. He regularly promotes Fox News Trump-fluffers like Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Tucker Carlson, Lou Dobbs, Jesse Watters, Maria Bartiromo, and the “Curvy Couch” potatoes of Fox and Friends. And while he will occasionally exploit other news sources (such as One America News Network – OANN – which some of his big donors have taken a financial interest in) in order to pressure Fox to be more subservient, he will always return to Fox for the ego stroking he craves. And Trump’s attacks will be passively tolerated because that’s what the Fox News Ministry of Propaganda was created to do.

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

ORANGE CRUSHED: More Americans Trust CNN than Either Trump or Fox News

Posted by on May 12, 2020 at 2:06 pm. 8 Comments :

In recent days Donald Trump has been exhibiting surging symptoms of acute paranoia, anxiety, and desperation. Two days ago he posted a near record 124 tweets in one day. They ran the gamut of his typical fetishes from ego-drenched bragging about imaginary achievements, to vicious insults aimed at his perceived enemies, to delusional assertions of non-existent crimes committed by political adversaries. If Trump were on a street corner reciting the content of his tweets he would be quickly escorted to the nearest asylum for observation.

Donald Trump, Coronavirus

On Tuesday morning the out of control tweetstorming continued with Trump posting another 32 twantrums, all before 10:00am. While this behavior is not unheard of for Trump, there is clearly something that has triggered this escalation of hysterics. And more than likely it has something to with his downward spiraling approval ratings and the polls that show him losing to Joe Biden nationally, as well as in most of the crucial swing states. Trump’s hijacking of the Coronavirus Task Force briefings backfired badly as his lies and belligerence turned off most Americans who were more interested in getting useful information about the raging COVID-19 pandemic.

A new poll is now affirming that what remains of Trump’s already tattered reputation has taken a series of severe blows. His overall approval is still underwater (45%) and has never exceeded 50% at any point during his accidental presidency. What’s more, a paltry 36% of the American people trust the information Trump provides about the coronavirus. That compares to 74% who trust the Centers for Disease Control, 67% who trust Dr. Anthony Fauci, and (and this has gotta sting) a majority of 55% who trust CNN, 19 points higher than those who trust Trump. That’s in line with previous polling that found the same preference for what Trump refers to is Stalinist terms as “the enemy of the people.”

There is some more worrisome news for Trump in the details of this poll. The support for Trump is tightly bound into his base, which at this point is more of a cult. How else would you explain that Trump’s glassy-eyed disciples trust him more (84%) than they trust Dr. Fauci (61%)? As reported by CNN…

“Republicans are more apt to say that they trust the information they get about coronavirus from Trump (84%) than they are to say they trust the information they get from Dr. Anthony Fauci (61%), the nation’s top infectious disease expert, or the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (72%). Among Democrats, just 4% say they trust the information they get from the President, well behind the 81% who say they trust Fauci or the 80% who trust the CDC. Overall, CNN (55% trust) inspires far more trust than Fox News (35%), with those figures also divided by party.”

Democrats are plainly more persuaded by science than by partisan hackery and political lie factories. Can’t say the same for Republicans. And the American people have made their choice with regard to news sources. While Fox News is still higher rated, that’s only because their audience is glued to the right-wing propaganda network day and night, while the majority of the country gets their news from a variety of more credible sources, both national and local.

Trump surely has many reasons to be mired in a crushing meltdown. His polling is in the gutter. His reelection prospects are fading. The Supreme Court is hearing cases that could result in his finally having to reveal his tax returns. And he is rightfully being held accountable for the suffering and death caused by his negligent and incompetent mishandling of the coronavirus pandemic. Not that he cares about that. What’s boiling his thinning blood is that, in addition to those other triggers, he knows that the American people – and the people of the world – see him as a failure and a clown who was never fit to be a leader. And that is the sort of judgment that weighs most heavily on narcissists with unchecked delusions of grandeur, like Trump.

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

Trump’s Worst Nightmare: More Americans Believe CNN than the Liar-In-Chief

Posted by on May 6, 2020 at 12:28 pm. 9 Comments :

Each day that passes, Donald Trump appears to be sinking ever further into the Mariana Trench of desperation and deceit. His rapidly unraveling mental state becomes more critical and evident to all who are paying attention. It’s an unprecedented public display of an emotional breakdown playing out before millions, not unlike his old reality TV game show performances.

Donald Trump, CNN

Trump is frantically trying to buttress his disintegrating psyche by lashing out incoherently at his many perceived enemies. He is cowering in a bunker constructed by a diseased, fearful, and paranoid mind, and refusing to engage with the “haters” that he is convinced mean him harm. And he consoles himself with increasingly deranged reassurances that he is beloved by everyone.

The truth, however, is surely going to result in even more outlandish outbursts from the fragile ego of our defective “president.” A new poll by Monmouth University asked respondents this provocative question: If Donald Trump and CNN gave conflicting information about the coronavirus outbreak who would you be more likely to believe – Trump or CNN?

Trump has made a point of broadly disparaging the free press for the past three years. He does this, as he openly admitted, in order to discredit them so that they they won’t be believed when they criticize him. And he has frequently singled out CNN as one of the primary targets of his wrath, calling them “fake” news and lying about their ratings.

Consequently, Trump won’t be thrilled about the response to the question above. The poll found that a majority of 51% say they believe CNN more than Trump. A mere 38% said they would believe Trump more. That’s a number that aligns with his dismal approval ratings. And as an indicator of how mired in cultism Trump’s supporters are, 82% of Republicans believe Trump over CNN. They even opt for Trump over Fox News (66% to 20%). These results are in line with previous polls on the same subject. In March respondents said that they trusted CNN more by 48% to 35%. They also said they trust MSNBC more by 45% to 32%. And for good measure, Monmouth’s national survey of the presidential race finds Biden expanding his lead over Trump (50% to 41%).

If anything gets under Trump’s notoriously thin skin it’s the prospect that people might be less than worshipful of him. He demands total loyalty, devotion, and unflinching support for his every word and deed. Should anyone be even modestly critical he will go after them like a starving piranha. He demonstrated this viciousness in a recent rage-tweeting episode directed at the producers of an anti-Trump political ad.

However, CNN is not just a another source of aggravation for Trump. He regards them as a mortal enemy. He harbors a deep hatred for the network and every person associated with it. He lobs infantile insults at their reporters, anchors, and executives. He lies about their ratings and finances (which are both hitting record levels lately). He threatens them in a manner that is censorial and flagrantly anti-constitutional. And he is even suing them.

Trump despises CNN so much that he can’t help but watch it obsessively. He knows all their anchors and is on top of their breaking stories about him. He has tweeted derogatorily about them 17 times in just the past month. So discovering that the American people prefer CNN to Trump is likely to trigger an acute aneurysm that could result in severe brain damage. Not that anyone would be able to tell the difference.

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

While Americans Suffer, Trump is Laser Focused On – His Polling?

Posted by on May 3, 2020 at 12:24 pm. 2 Comments :

The voracious ego of Donald Trump continues to run roughshod over our nation. He seems unfazed by the latest reports of 1.1 million Americans infected by the coronavirus, and more than 67,000 dead. And he’s equally unmoved by the news that more than 30 millions Americans have lost their jobs. Trump posted 19 tweets on Sunday morning and hardly mentioned pandemic or it’s consequences at all. So what did he mention?

Donald Trump

It’s all too apparent what is consuming the thoughts of our “president” these days. He makes his priorities known by expressing them unabashedly on Twitter. And on this Sunday morn he revealed that his primary interest is – as usual – himself. The most frequent subject of his tweets was his approval rate polling, with four addressing that one fetish:

It needs to be said that what Trump is bragging about repeatedly is a Gallup poll that is a conspicuous outlier. Most other polls put Trump in the low forties. It is also notable that Trump is excited about this being the highest number Gallup has posted for him, even though it is still below 50% which he has never achieved.

For some reason Trump tempers his giddiness over this poll with a swipe at the “Fake News,” “Lamestream” media that he refers to in Stalinist terms as “the enemy of the people.” But whining that the press “doesn’t show real polls” while celebrating a Gallup poll that the press always shows is a strange way to boast about his alleged popularity. He’s tearing it down even as he’s using it to lift himself up.

Additionally, Trump twice makes reference to a “96% Approval Rating in the Republican Party” that he fails to back up with a link or even a name for the pollster. The fact is, that poll doesn’t exist. Nor does Trump offer a source for his assertion that he’s beating Joe Biden. Which is likewise not supported by reality. Biden is shown ahead of Trump both nationally and in critical swing states.

For contrast, the rest of Trump’s morning tweetstorm was littered with tributes to himself and bizarre divergences from the matters that are of interest to most Americans. For instance:

  • Whining that George Bush didn’t speak out against his impeachment.
  • Some guy who wrapped his boat in a Trump ad.
  • How much he misses his cult rallies.
  • Two propaganda videos (here and here)
  • Mike Tyson (?)
  • An old propaganda video attacking Democrats.
  • A shout out to his Turnberry golf course in Scotland.

And then there’s whatever the heck this is:

So rest assured that Trump is on the case, working to ensure that the American people don’t suffer from any deficiency in impotent Trump exaltations and syrupy propaganda. This is how a reality TV game show president thinks governing is done. When he isn’t neck deep in mounds of his own PR manure, he’s maligning the free press or the political foes that he is so transparently afraid of. and naturally, he’s always upselling, such as with these Trump-branded coronavirus face masks. This would all make an entertaining social satire if it weren’t for the corpses that are piling up due to Trump’s negligence and incompetence.

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

Fox News Cultists – And Nearly No One Else – Believe Trump is Honest

Posted by on April 28, 2020 at 2:30 pm. 5 Comments :

The determination of Donald Trump to malign the credibility of the media has taken a toll. However, the impact has been felt mostly by his own devoted disciples. The American people by and large continue to have little respect for Trump as a trustworthy source of information.

Trump Lies

Trump’s problems are entirely of his own making. His frequent and shameless lying does not go unnoticed. He has been documented to have told more than 18,000 lies since his inauguration. And particularly with regard to the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic, Trump has repeatedly disseminated easily verified falsehoods. As a result, the majority of the American people don’t believe what he says about pretty much anything. Even more painful from Trump’s perspective, and after years of vilification, they believe the media more.

A new poll by USA Today/Suffolk University affirms these views. When asked if they think Trump is honest and trustworthy, only 31% said that he is, while more than twice as many (64%) said that he is not. What’s more, when the responses were broken down by preferences for news sources, the ideological divide was starkly revealing:

“According to the Suffolk poll, of the 31% of Americans who believe Trump is honest and trustworthy, nearly two-thirds of them say Fox is their favorite news source. Among Fox-first viewers – who comprise about 25% of Americans in the survey – 78% say Trump is honest and trustworthy, while just 15% disagree.

The imbalance is even more striking when you look at people who don’t trust Fox the most. Among the three-fourths of the population who don’t list Fox as their No. 1, just 15% say Trump is honest and trustworthy, while nearly 80% say he is not.”

Let that sink in. The poll shows, firstly, that only 25% of the American people say they watch Fox News. The number is actually smaller than that as the Nielsen ratings show that only about 1% of TV viewers are actually tuning in the right-wing network. The poll respondents are likely just giving credit to the channel that reflects their political biases.

Of the 75% of Americans who are not Fox News viewers, a measly 15% of them regard Trump as honest and trustworthy. That compares to 78% of the Fox cultists who are only a quarter of the total respondents in the poll.

Consequently, Trump is suffering a huge trust deficit from which he is unlikely to recover in the few months remaining before the election. And his recovery is all the more difficult since there is no sign that he plans to be more truthful going forward, or that is even able to be. Trump’s commitment to spewing self-serving fiction has been a key component of his character (or lack thereof) for decades. And the more he puts himself in from of the people, the more he lies, and the more his credibility sinks into an abyss.

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