Fox News

Trump Can’t Stop Whining About Imaginary Bias By Debate Moderator

Posted by on October 20, 2020 at 11:49 am. 6 Comments :

Perhaps the most prominent of the myriad character flaws of Donald Trump isn’t his pathological lying, his infantile name-calling, his glaring ignorance, or his raging hostility. Perhaps it’s the relentless whining and victimhood that gushes from him whenever he is faced with even a mild challenge. It’s a pitiful display of the cowardice that permeates his personality, or lack thereof. No wonder Trump has bragged about being “the most fabulous whiner.”

Donald Trump, Joe Biden, Debate Stage

This “feature” of Trump’s emotional frailty has been evident recently in his reaction to the upcoming and final presidential debate with Joe Biden. Note that the first of the scheduled debates resulted in Trump harassing both Biden and the the moderator, Chris Wallace, with repeated interruptions. That led to the Commission on Presidential Debates implementing a new rule wherein the mic of the opposing candidate will be muted during designated two minute periods at the beginning of each topical segment. The second debate was canceled altogether because Trump was afraid to participate remotely.

In advance of the final debate before the election, Trump is ramping up his griping about how unfair everyone and everything is to him. He has been complaining for several days that the debate, like the election itself, is “rigged” against him. And on Tuesday morning he took that complaint to Fox News so he could get some sympathy from the “Curvy Couch” potatoes of Fox and Friends.

During the discussion, co-host Ainsley Earhardt asked Trump about the new rule for muting the mic. Trump replied by calling the Commission “ridiculous” and then segued to accusing them of purposely muting his mic in the 2016 debates with Hillary Clinton (which never happened). He said they are “not good people” and that “a lot of funny things go on with them.” Then he shifted to maligning the moderator of Thursday’s debate, Kristen Welker of NBC News, in a rambling word salad with an overflowing jug of whine:

“I just went through Savannah Guthrie. I knew what I was getting into and it worked out fine. But she was out of line. She was totally out of line. And so was Chris Wallace. I know you’ll defend him, but so was Chris Wallace. He was terrible. It was like two on one, and that was just fine with me. But at least they should admit that it was two on one.” […]

“Kristen Welker is terrible, I mean she is totally partisan. Her father and mother are big supporters of Joe Biden for a long time. They’re supporters of the Democrat Party. And she deleted her entire account. […] “Kristen Welker is far worse than [CSPAN’S Steve] Scully, but I do it anyway, I do it anyway, But this is the way it is. It’s so set up.”

For the so-called “Leader of the Free World,” Trump sure behaves like a petulant toddler who doesn’t get his way. And needless to say, he is lying about Welker. She is a straight-down-the-middle journalist who doesn’t exhibit any political bias in her reporting. The party affiliations of her parents, even if true, are irrelevant. And she did not delete her Twitter account.

Trump made no effort whatsoever to support his contention that Welker “can’t be neutral at all.” What’s more, He falsely asserted that the Commission changed plans to make foreign policy the sole topic of the debate. That notion was birthed entirely in his warped imagination. The Commission’s only reference to debate topics came in their announcement on October 16, of the topics that were chosen by the moderator.

For the record, the topics are fighting COVID-19, American families, race in America, climate change, national security, and leadership. If those topics bother Trump it’s only because he knows he can’t discuss them with anything approaching coherence. Nevertheless, he sought to disparage Biden’s debating skills by telling his Fox friends that…

“There is a chain of thought, that there are a lot of people that say let him talk, because he loses his train, he loses his train, he loses his mind, frankly.”

If Trump actually manages to muster up the discipline to let Biden talk without interrupting (doubtful), he will be sorely disappointed as Biden demonstrates far a superior grasp of the issues and a relatable empathy for the American people. In fact, Trump’s strategy would work much better for Biden. Just let Trump talk. The more people hear him, the more they despise him. Every time Trump opens his mouth Biden’s lead in the polls gets bigger. So please proceed, Donnie.

UPDATE: Trump is proceeding with his manic media maligning. He reportedly stomped out of an interview for 60 Minutes with Leslie Stahl, and is now berating her as biased.

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

Trump is Aiding and Abetting Russian Propaganda to Smear the Biden Family

Posted by on October 19, 2020 at 1:17 pm. 5 Comments :

There is a new “scandal” brewing in Trump World as they desperately search for a way dig Donald Trump out of his political abyss. The recent rash of feigned outrage stems from an interview by Senior Fox News Trump-fluffer, Maria Bartiromo. She gifted her platform to the Director of National Intelligence, John Ratcliffe, a Trump appointee who has no experience in intelligence. And the the result was a made-for-State-TV segment intended to rescue a floundering campaign.

Donald Trump Vladimir Putin

The gist of the so-called scandal concerns a mysterious laptop computer that allegedly belonged to Hunter Biden, the son of Joe Biden. The New York Post reported that it was left with a computer repair shop in Delaware where the owner claims to have found “incriminating” e-mails that he passed on to Rudy Giuliani and the FBI.

The whole story was rife with contradictions, unverifiable claims, and outright falsehoods. It was so bad that when Giuliani first brought it to Fox News, they declined to air it with sources saying that…

“…the lack of authentication of Hunter Biden’s alleged laptop, combined with established concerns about Giuliani as a reliable source and his desire for unvetted publication, led the network’s news division to pass.”

Fox anchor Bret Baier called the story “sketchy,” and Chris Wallace said it was “suspicious.” Nevertheless, the primetime Ministers of Trump Propaganda (Sean Hannity, et al) were more than happy to jump feet first into the bogus hit piece.

During the Bartiromo interview, Ratcliffe sought to rebut the debunking that threatened to defuse the budding scandal. He insisted that there was no evidence that the information about the laptop, and the data supposedly found on it, were the product of Russian disinformation. He blamed the allegation of Russian involvement on Rep. Adam Schiff, but in fact, it came from the FBI that is currently run by Trump appointee Chris Wray:

“Federal authorities are investigating whether a Russian influence operation was behind the disclosure of emails purporting to document the Ukrainian and Chinese business dealings of Hunter Biden, the son of Democratic nominee Joe Biden, a person briefed on the matter said Friday.

“The FBI’s examination is tied to the New York Post’s reporting this week on the contents of a computer hard drive it obtained from President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani.”

What’s more, the associates who Giuliani relied on for his smear campaign have been positively identified as Russian intelligence operatives by Trump’s Treasury Department:

“Treasury secretary, Steve Mnuchin, declared, ‘[Andriy ] Derkach and other Russian agents employ manipulation and deceit to attempt to influence elections in the United States and elsewhere around the world.’ Previously, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence told Congress that Derkach is ‘spreading claims about corruption’ as part of the Kremlin’s effort to undermine Biden’s campaign. And he worked with Guliani to do so.”

The New York Post’s story has been the talk of the Trump Cult. Trump himself has tweeted about it repeatedly since its publication. He called it the “smoking gun” proof that Biden is “a corrupt politician,” and that it’s “the second biggest political scandal in our history!” But the actual reporters were less convinced by the material they had assembled themselves. They wouldn’t even allow the Post to attach their names to the story:

“On Sunday night, the New York Times reported that the New York Post had a difficult time finding a reporter to put their byline on the story amidst internal concerns about its dubious sourcing. The Times reported that the staff writer who mostly wrote the story, Bruce Golding, refused put his name on the report because he doubted its credibility.” […]

“The story’s bylines eventually went to Emma-Jo Morris, a former associate producer on Fox News show Hannity, who joined the Post as an editor this year and had yet to publish a story with her byline, and Gabrielle Fonrouge, a Post reporter since 2014. According to the Times, Fonrouge only learned her name was on the story after it was published.”

So this story is so untrustworthy that its own authors don’t believe it. It is filled with contradictions and implausible allegations that were sourced to Russian intelligence operatives. And this is what Trump and Fox News and the rest of the Confederacy of Deplorables thinks will bring about the end of Joe Biden. But it isn’t quite working out that way. In fact, they’re about to learn something about how the boomerang effect works.

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

Fox News Boss Rupert Murdoch Predicts Biden Will Beat Trump in a Landslide

Posted by on October 15, 2020 at 12:55 pm. 5 Comments :

In the closing weeks of the 2020 presidential election, the bad news for Donald Trump just keeps piling up. Every new poll that is published shows him falling farther behind Joe Biden, including those that are devotedly biased toward Trump. He’s losing in most of the critical battleground states. His crazed rhetoric keeps descending into an abyss of dementia. He’s even threatening to go to war against aliens (from Mars, not Mexico).

Rupert Murdoch Donald Trump

Now the chairman of Fox News, Rupert Murdoch, is predicting that Trump is going to lose to Biden in a landslide. This is an election year defection that should rattle the rafters of Trump’s campaign operation. Murdoch has been a reliable supporter of Trump for years (even if that support has been reciprocated). And his cable network is Trump’s de facto Ministry of Propaganda. According to the Daily Beast (via Talking Points Memo)…

“Media magnate Rupert Murdoch has predicted privately that Democratic nominee Joe Biden will defeat President Donald Trump in the presidential election in a landslide victory, the Daily Beast reported Thursday.

“The Australian-born billionaire who has been an influential supporter of the President in the past has remarked to close associates that Trump is his own worst enemy, according to the Daily Beast. Murdoch suggested to at least three Daily Beast sources that Trump has handled the COVID-19 pandemic poorly and ignored advice on how to better manage it, which has created a never-ending crisis for his administration.”

The suggestion that Trump has “handled the COVID-19 pandemic poorly” is a gross understatement. The deaths of more than 216,000 Americans, along with 7.5 million infected, many of whom will have permanent disabilities, is better described as mass murder. And it is Trump’s negligence, incompetence, and even deliberate malfeasance, that is directly responsible. And Trump’s newly adopted position on “herd immunity” would guarantee more than two million fatalities according to epidemiology experts.

Murdoch’s opinion on the likely outcome of the presidential race does not immunize him from criticism for his years of disseminating lies aimed at Democrats. He is not endorsing Biden. He is merely expressing his analysis of the direction of the campaign. But the harm that Fox News has done to the nation under his direction is immeasurable.

That’s especially true with regard to the coronavirus pandemic that Murdoch is suddenly so worried about. Fox News has been relentlessly supporting and advancing Trump’s tragically misguided view that COVID-19 is nothing to be concerned about. They say that it’s no worse than the flu and will disappear like magic (never mind that thousands are still dying every week). And they continue to air, and positively comment on, Trump’s Coronavirus Super Spreader Rallies wherein he recklessly repeats these lies that will undoubtedly bring more suffering and grieving.

What’s more, instead of reporting on the health crisis, Fox News is deflecting to ludicrous conspiracy theories about Biden and his family. Most recently they are obsessing over a baseless story in Murdoch’s New York Post that purportedly connects Biden to some sort of chicanery in Ukraine. Let’s set aside for the moment the fact that the story has no evidence of any wrongdoing, or even that what they allege is unlawful. The Post’s story has been documented to be aligned with Russian propaganda aimed at disrupting the U.S. election. So Murdoch, Fox News, and Trump (who has been tweeting about this and raising it during his cult rallies) are now actively abetting Russia’s efforts to interfere with our election. As reported by David Corn in Mother Jones:

“The key point of the article was predicated on false information that [Rudy] Giuliani has been spreading for a long time—and that appears to be linked to a Russian disinformation operation that the Post neglected to note in its article. That is, the Post piece, based on an unproven smear, is in sync with Moscow’s ongoing effort to influence the 2020 election to help President Donald Trump retain power.”

Corn poignantly notes that “The New York Post has provided all reporters a wonderful tutorial on how to be a useful idiot for Russia.” And the same goes for Fox News since they are plastering this story all over their air. Which makes Murdoch’s lament about Trump’s floundering reelection campaign utterly meaningless. It doesn’t immunize him from the guilt of having helped Trump to spread lies along with a deadly virus. He is as responsible for the tragic consequences as Trump, because he’s been right by his side as Trump led America down a deadly path. And if Trump does lose in a landslide, Murdoch can take at least half the credit for it. As well as the blame for all the harm that Trump’s has caused in the past four years.

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

NBC Joins Trump PR Team By Staging Town Hall Opposite Biden

Posted by on October 14, 2020 at 12:06 pm. 4 Comments :

Two weeks ago Donald Trump and Joe Biden faced off in their first presidential debate. However, Trump managed to succeed only in thoroughly embarrassing himself by repeatedly interrupting with incoherent and hostile remarks. So it came as no surprise that Trump subsequently chickened out of the second debate when the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD) announced that it would be held remotely in the interest of health and safety.

Donald Trump TV Set

Trump undoubtedly noticed that every post-debate poll showed him falling even farther behind Biden after the first debate, including the one by his favorite pollster, Rasmussen. So Trump jumped at the chance to use the CPD’s remote format as an excuse to bail out.

Shortly after Trump’s cowardice forced the cancelation of the second debate, Biden quickly accepted an offer by ABC News to have a town hall at the time the debate was originally scheduled. That has been promoted extensively and will air Thursday. Unfortunately, Biden is not being given the courtesy of speaking to the American people without Trump once again interrupting, this time with the help of NBC.

NBC has announced that they will be hosting a town hall at the same time and date as ABC’s Biden program. NBC had plenty of time to find another time slot, but appears to have made a deliberate decision to compete directly with Biden’s broadcast. This is a dreadful disservice to viewers and the American people as it forces them to choose between the two programs, rather being able to see both in order to make an informed judgment.

There are only two possible explanations for NBC’s abhorrent programming decision. They are either acting out of pure greed and self interest, or they have joined the Trump campaign’s PR team and are acting on their behalf. Or, of course, a combination of both. Either way, it exposes their utter disregard for the fair conduct of the election, the welfare of the nation, and the best interests of voters.

It’s worse than just the obvious gift that NBC is presenting to Trump as he uses them for his nefarious purposes. They are actually rewarding Trump for being a wimp and fearfully fleeing the Commission’s debate. NBC couldn’t be advancing Trump’s campaign objectives any better if they were on his payroll. And this should make people wonder if they are.

Every television news enterprise that uses public airwaves has a legal obligation to serve the public interest. NBC is affirmatively harming the public interest in order to boost Trump along with their bottom line. The American people should be appalled by this partisan counterprogramming. There are reports that even insiders at the network are angry and ashamed by their employer. As any journalist with an ounce of integrity should be.

The result will likely be that more television viewers will tune in to the Trump Hour of Lies and miss the more substantive discussion with Biden. That’s not because they support Trump, but because it holds the promise of a melodramatic meltdown that is the meat and potatoes of TV entertainment. It’s why people watch police car chases. It’s why more people watch the Kardashians than C-SPAN! And this is happening at a time when even Fox News has shown some restraint in declining to air Trump’s rallies live and uninterrupted as has been their practice in the past. Brian Stelter of CNN reports that…

“The president held a campaign rally in Johnstown, Pennsylvania Tuesday night, but Fox News only showed small portions of it. Fox took the same approach on Monday. So, for the second night in a row, Trump urged his Twitter followers to watch on OANN, Newsmax or C-SPAN – which indicates that he is aware of Fox’s snub.”

And now Trump can point his glassy-eyed cult disciples to NBC as well. NBC is taking it’s place alongside the ultra-rightist conspiracy crackpots of OANN and Newsmax. Is that really the company they want to keep? It’s despicable, unethical, and contrary to the principles of professional journalism.

The American people should loudly object to this media manipulation. And those of us who are offended by this programming stunt should boycott the Trump show on NBC Thursday and get their friends and families, and even strangers online, to join the boycott of NBC’s cynical, self-serving assault on journalistic integrity. Trump must not be rewarded for his cowardice. And NBC must not be rewarded for their partisanship and greed.

UPDATE: Rachel Maddow brought up this subject during an interview with Kamala Harris and indicated that a lot of people were mad.

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

Trump has Already Abandoned His Campaign and the Presidency

Posted by on October 13, 2020 at 1:01 pm. 6 Comments :

As election day draws nearer, the beads of flop sweat on Donald Trump’s wrinkled brow are turning into a tsunami of orange cosmetics running down his face and turkey neck. There is the unmistakable stench of defeat emanating from him as his tweets and public commentaries grow ever more unhinged from sanity. Not that they were ever particularly well connected.

Donald Trump

The fuming desperation that is the driving force in the final days of the Trump regime is producing behavior that ranks near the lows of his public life. He’s issuing ludicrous demands to prosecute Barack Obama and Joe Biden for imaginary crimes. He’s making wild, baseless claims about communist Democrats plotting the destruction of America. And he’s continuing to downplay the tragic consequences of the coronavirus that he allowed to spread uncontrollably across the country. And even after being infected himself, he attempts to cast it as a positive development and a sort of messianic sacrifice he took on.

Naturally, Trump’s Ministry of Propaganda (aka Fox News) has backed Trump every step of the way. They have been devotedly fulfilling their mission to defend Dear Leader from all criticisms, while viciously attacking his critics. And joining him on the front lines of this battle are the “Curvy Couch” potatoes of Fox and Friends.

On Tuesday morning the F&F crew was on the job. In a segment discussing the lopsided political horserace (video below), co-host Steve Doocy concedes that Biden is significantly outraising Trump. But he skims over that fact to extol the “enthusiasm” of the glassy-eyed disciples who populate Trump’s cult rallies. “You can’t buy that,” says Doocy, despite the fact that that’s exactly what Trump does by staging these ego-paloozas. Of course, Trump shares Doocy’s position on enthusiasm, as expressed in this tweet where he claims that “you win races with enthusiasm.”

Actually, Biden’s accumulated donations of massive amounts of money is a far better indicator of enthusiasm than getting unemployed hicks to show up for a free rally. Doocy then follows up by rattling off the names of cities to which Trump will be taking his Coronavirus Super Spreader Tour this week. Then he goes on to say that Trump’s tour schedule will soon expand into…

“…two or three events a day. And then in the final sprint – in the final week or so – he’s going to do half a dozen events a day. And think about it…if you are in those battleground states, and the President comes and gives one of those great big rallies, you’re gonna wind up with a lot of free media and a lot of excitement. And that is what he thinks got him over the finish line last time.”

What Doocy is describing here is the complete surrender of Donald Trump. It’s a surrender, first of all, from his duties as the alleged “president.” Apparently, he sees his only job now to be starring in pseudo-religious revival shows in airport hangers. Secondly, he’s conceding electoral defeat by abandoning any effort to persuade voters to back his candidacy. He’s focused solely on those who are already committed to the Church of Trump. And that isn’t nearly enough to win a national election.

What’s more, Doocy correctly notes that Trump’s 2016 victory was largely dependent on free media. Every news network irresponsibly and unfairly aired his rallies live and uninterrupted. But what Doocy – and Trump – fail to recognize is that 2020 is not 2016. This time around, the only network that is airing the Trump Show is Fox News. And, once again, the only audience he is reaching are the already converted and lost souls of Trumpism.

So Trump isn’t doing his job as president (which is a big plus for the country). And he isn’t doing his job as a candidate (which removes an annoyance from the airwaves). So what the heck is Trump doing? He’s laying the foundation for his post-presidency career on the road and in the media. But he may be in for a huge letdown.

How many of Trump’s “fans” will actually pay to see his smarmy, ego-logues over and over again? And his hostile, crackpot rants would likely wear out after a couple of episodes on TV. Which would leave Trump with nothing but his worthless name and a newly disinterested benefactor in Moscow. Oh, and a half dozen state prosecutors filing indictments for everything from tax fraud to crimes against the state. However, one thing is certain: With Trump circling the drain financially and legally, America will be great again.

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

COVID DELIRIUM? Now Trump is Threatening Aliens (UFOs)

Posted by on October 11, 2020 at 1:09 pm. 11 Comments :

The “stable genius” currently occupying the White House is exhibiting symptoms of severe mental distress. That isn’t anything new, however, it is dreadfully apparent that Donald Trump is descending to new and more absurd lows. The most likely reason for this is that it is getting closer to November 3rd and his prospects for reelection continue to hover somewhere between dismal and preposterous.

Donald Trump, Mars Attacks, Alien, UFO

The grievous stench of desperation is enveloping Trump like a dark and low-hanging cloud. It’s manifesting in his clinging reliance on his Fox News pacifiers. Trump has done five “interviews” with Fox hosts in four days, including Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson, Mark Levin, and Maria Bartiromo twice.

The second Bartiromo segment aired Sunday morning and featured Trump making bizarre comments that only offer further proof of his psychoses. For instance, after being asked, he was unable to coherently articulate a second term agenda beyond prematurely opening up the country and bashing Democrats. He claimed he was “cured” of the coronavirus and is now “immune,” neither of which is medically sound. What’s more, he said that he has a “protective glow“ that will protect others from any contagious threat he might pose. He also bragged that there have been “only” 214,000 deaths from the coronavirus, which he characterized as success.

These are the ravings of a madman. But Trump was just warming up for his answer to the final question of the segment. Bartiromo asked him if he could explain “why the Department of Defense has set up a UFO task force […] Mr President, as we wrap up here, are there UFOs?” Trump gave the question serious consideration and replied:

“Well, I’m gonna have to check on that. I heard that. I heard that two days ago. So I’ll check on that. I’ll take a good strong look at that. But I will tell you this, we have now created a military the likes of which we’ve never had before, in terms of equipment. The equipment that we have, the weapons that we have – and hope to God we never have to use them – but we have created a military the likes of which nobody has ever had. Russia, China, they’re all envious of what we have. All built in the USA.”

Isn’t it comforting to know that Trump is going to “take a good strong look at” the existence of potentially hostile UFOs? But more importantly, if those space aliens try anything they are gonna regret it. Trump is saying that he has built the most powerful military, not just on Earth, but in the entire universe. Those aliens, who despite having have mastered interstellar travel, don’t stand a chance against Trump’s Space Force. Never mind that everything Trump said about having enhanced the military is another of his flagrant lies about alleged achievements.

It’s episodes like this that make it impossible to ignore speculation that Trump is suffering from the psychotic side effects of the medications he’s been taking to combat the coronavirus. Steroids and the other immuno-response drugs that he has been prescribed are known to produce mood swings, anxieties, and delirium. And so much of Trump’s recent rantings have all the signals of mental infirmity. In recent days he has been both attacking and embracing Fox News. He accused Nancy Pelosi of being crazy. He claimed, Messiah like, that he got COVID-19 because he was “doing it for us.” And shortly after his visit with Bartiromo, Trump tweeted that…

That, of course, is utterly false. No verifiable study has concluded that having contracted the coronavirus produces immunity from either getting or giving the disease. Trump’s tweet was flagged by Twitter for “spreading misleading and potentially harmful information.” Not that telling obvious lies is out of character for Trump. But he may have to be more careful when he’s dealing with the aliens. They may have truth rays.

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

Trump Bashes Fox News Even While Cowering in His Fox News Bunker

Posted by on October 10, 2020 at 2:16 pm. 1 Comments :

The madness that consumes Donald Trump continues to manifest in bizarre and troubling ways. He’s making public demands that his Attorney Genuflect, Bill Barr, indict and prosecute Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Joe Biden. He’s holding coronavirus Super Spreader affairs at the White House, which he has already turned into a COVID-19 “Hot Zone.” And he insists that he’s way ahead of Biden in the “real” polls that are published in the crevices of his decaying grey matter.

Donald Trump, Fox News

If that isn’t enough, Trump is also attacking his Ministry of Propaganda (aka Fox News). This isn’t a new behavioral glitch. Trump has frequently lashed out at Fox News when he didn’t think that they were sufficiently adoring. It’s his way of “working the refs” to ensure constant adulation. But in the past couple of days it has reached a crescendo. For instance, during a marathon radio gabfest with Rush Limbaugh on Friday, Trump whined that…

“It’s a problem. Fox is a problem. […] When Roger Ailes ran Fox, I mean, Roger had a very strong point of view. It’s totally gone. And I think it’s influenced by Paul Ryan. […] They’re going the way of CNN, and they’re going the way of MSNBC, and it’s a shame. I mean, it’s a shame. When I watch it, I look at the people they hire. I mean, I could tell you some of the anchors, they’re so bad.”

First of all, Trump’s fond remembrance of the late Fox News CEO Roger Ailes is touching because they share so much in common. Particularly the fact that they are both serial sexual predators. But Trump’s complaint about Paul Ryan, the former GOP House Speaker who now has a seat on the Fox board of directors, reveals that Trump has no idea what a board of directors does. They are part time business advisors who have zero input into programming.

In addition to Trump’s comments on Limbaugh’s radio program, he made similar comments on the radio show of Fox News host Mark Levin. He was attempting to make a point about the differences between his 2016 campaign and the current one:

“One of the biggest differences is Fox. Fox is a whole different ballgame than it used to be. Fox was great. Fox was great. Fox is no longer great.”

Among the reasons that Trump has arrived at this conclusion are the polls that Fox News has recently published. The most recent one shows him trailing Biden by ten points. But trump has been upset with Fox’s pollsters for quite a while. And you can be sure he was driven to new lows by the one that found that a majority of voters say that he doesn’t have the “mental soundness” to serve.

What makes all of this even more peculiar is that while Trump has been amping up his attacks on Fox News, he has also been spending more time there. In the past four days Trump has done interviews on Fox with Maria Bartiromo, Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson (with Marc Seigel), and Mark Levin. And he has another “interview” with Bartiromo on Sunday. He apparently has no idea that he’s only reaching people that are already voting for him. It’s all for his ego and the lack of any notion of how he can rescue his floundering campaign.

The many hours Trump is devoting to Fox News is severely cutting into his golf and Twitter time. It also indicates that he has nothing else of importance to do. But most of all it shows that his whining about how disloyal Fox has been to him is just a charade. He knows that Fox News is his official State TV network and is vital to his nefarious schemes for the future. And he knows that Fox won’t punish him for his fake hostility toward them. They have a parasitic relationship wherein they are both addicted to each other. And while that may satisfy their immediate cravings for attention, it won’t keep Trump from circling the electoral drain.

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

PROJECTION: Trump and Fox News Attack Nancy Pelosi’s Mental Fitness

Posted by on October 9, 2020 at 1:15 pm. NO Comments :

The mental state of Donald Trump has been questioned for many years, even in the earliest days of his presidency. More recently, however, the signs of his cognitive lapses are impossible to ignore. His frequent incoherent ramblings, blatant contradictions, and unbridled hostilities are clear symptoms of a severe psychological breakdown. And it isn’t helping matters that, due to his COVID-19 diagnosis, he’s on several medications that are known to produce mood disorders.

Donald Trump

Not surprisingly, Trump is attempting to cast his cerebral decay onto his perceived political foes. It’s form of a psychotic response that seeks to “project” ones own faults onto others. Trump has been doing that for months to Joe Biden, but has utterly failed to make any of it stick. In fact, polls show that a majority of voters regard Trump as the one who “doesn’t have the mental soundness to serve.”

On Friday morning House Speaker Nancy Pelosi held a press conference to announce that she is sponsoring legislation that would codify the Constitution’s 25th Amendment, a key provision of which addresses how Congress can respond if “the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office.” Despite the fact that Pelosi explicitly stated that this bill would not go into effect until after Trump’s term is over, he nevertheless took it personally and lashed out predictably on Twitter:

Trump managed to demean both Biden and Pelosi in that childishly retaliatory tweet. Although he might not have understood exactly what he was he was saying because he’s actually conceding that Biden will be the president to whom the legislation will apply. But that didn’t stop Fox News from quickly agreeing and posting an article on their website with the headline, “Trump and others question Pelosi’s mental fitness after she suggested pres. may not be fit for office.”

Indeed, Pelosi has questioned Trump’s mental fitness, as have many others. However, the “others” mentioned in Fox’s headline as questioning Pelosi’s fitness consist of White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany and … well, that’s it. No one else is mentioned at all. Trump, however, has worked overtime to disparage Pelosi with another of his infantile nicknames, “Crazy Nancy.” He has used that derogatory label at least 33 times on Twitter just this year. That’s about once a week. But Trump has called many others on his enemies list crazy as well, including Robert Mueller, Bernie Sanders, etc.

Trump’s behavior bespeaks an inherent weakness of character. He is incapable of forming an intelligible argument to reply to his critics, so he resorts to these impotent and immature tactics out of frustration and fear. And these emotional anchors are only going to weigh on him more in the coming weeks as the election, and his impending loss, draws closer. Which might explain behavior like that he demonstrated while co-hosting Rush Limbaugh’s radio show on Friday. While discussing his foreign policy conflicts with Iran, Trump dropped an F BOMB on the national broadcast. And if that aint crazy…

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

Trump Chickens Out of Second Debate While Ranting Incoherently on Fox News

Posted by on October 8, 2020 at 11:11 am. 4 Comments :

Following his disastrous performance during the first presidential debate with Joe Biden, it isn’t surprising that Donald Trump has now declared that he will not participate in the second debate. He knows that every poll has shown him falling even farther behind Biden since the first debate, including the one by his favorite pollster, Rasmussen.

Donald Trump Chicken

Trump’s reelection prospects didn’t improve after Vice-President Mike Pence got creamed by Sen. Kamala Harris in their debate Wednesday night. So when the non-partisan Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD) announced that the next debate would be held with the candidates participating remotely, Trump jumped at the chance to use that as an excuse to bail out. The CPD made the change “In order to protect the health and safety of all involved.” That’s a perfectly reasonable adjustment considering that Trump is currently suffering from COVID-19 and has been recklessly exposing others to it.

There are at least 34 close associates to Trump who have contracted the coronavirus. It would be foolhardy to get anywhere near the SuperSpreader-in-Chief for the foreseeable future. But Trump’s exploitation of this is further evidence of his cowardice. He made his intentions clear on Fox News (of course) during an “interview” with Fox’s Senior Trump-Fluffer, Maria Bartiromo (video below), saying that:

“I heard that the [Presidential Debate] Commission, a little while ago, changed the debate style, and that’s not acceptable to us. I beat him in the first debate, according to the polls that I’ve seen. But I beat him easily. I felt I beat him easily. I think he felt it too. He wouldn’t answer any question and he had the protection of Chris Wallace all night long. I thought Chris Wallace was a disaster. But I beat him in the first debate.”

Trump’s psychotic delusion that he won the first debate is typical of someone suffering from Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Every poll taken after the debate found that it was Biden who had beaten his unhinged opponent. Yet Trump continues to imagine himself victorious, while whining that everyone, including Wallace, a 17 year veteran of Fox News, is against him. Following the first debate Trump made the ludicrous assertion that Wallace is “controlled by the radical left.” When Bartiromo sought to affirm that he would not participate in the second debate, Trump replied:

“No. I’m not going to waste my time at a virtual debate. That’s not what debating is all about. You sit behind a computer and do a debate. It’s ridiculous. And then they cut you off whenever they want. I have a host [Steve Scully of C-SPAN] who I always thought was a nice guy, but I see he’s a Never-Trumper.”

So just to be clear, Trump is saying that he is virulently opposed to doing remote communications in the midst of remotely communicating with Bartiromo for an hour long segment on Fox News. And he does these segments frequently with other Fox Always-Trumpers like Sean Hannity, Lou Dobbs, and the “Curvy Couch” potatoes of Fox and Friends. But doing essentially the same thing during a deadly pandemic for which he is Patient Zero in Washington, crosses the line for him.

There were some other batty moments deserving of some attention that occurred during his bit with Bartiromo, who has more than proven that she is a fully indoctrinated Trump cultist. For instance…

  • Trump says “I don’t think I’m contagious at all,”
    Which, not being a doctor, isn’t his call to make.
  • Trump suggested that he got Covid-19 from Gold Star families.
    Because why not blame it on the troops that he thinks are “losers” and “suckers”?
  • Trump tells Bartiromo he shut down stimulus talks because he didn’t “want to play games.”
    Which is, in fact, playing games.
  • Trump tells Attorney General Bill Barr that Clinton, Obama, and Biden should be indicted.
    For unspecified (and nonexistent) crimes.
  • Trump whines that his FBI Director Chris has “been disappointing.”
    Because he won’t go along with persecuting Trump’s enemies.
  • Trump lied (again) about getting $28 billion from China in tariffs.
    It was actually zero dollars.

And if that isn’t enough, Trump weighed in on the Harris/Pence debate with his trademark hostility and misogyny. After disparaging Harris as “a monster,” Trump lashed out in a thoroughly deranged frenzy saying that…

“I thought that wasn’t even a contest last night. She was terrible. She was…I don’t think you can get worse. And totally unlikeable. And she is. She’s a communist.”

Adding later that…

“Biden won’t make it two months as president. He’s not mentally capable of being president. You know that. Everybody knows that.”

It’s no wonder that Trump doesn’t want to debate Biden again. He knows that he can’t measure up to a sane, competent, and compassionate public servant who is popular with the American people. Trump knows that he doesn’t have control of the facts or the cognitive ability to engage in a substantive discourse with someone who does.

So Trump is running away. Which is his standard practice for dealing with difficult situations, particularly those that he can’t control. He is the proverbial bully who crumbles like a stale cracker when confronted. But in Trump’s case, unfortunately for America, he will try to leave as big a trail of destruction in his wake as he scurries off to his bunker.

UPDATE: Trump’s campaign manager, Bill Stepien, is now asking to move the second debate to October 22, and the third to October 29. But’s just five days before the election and Biden is probably going to be pretty busy then. This is a desperation move by Trump to recover from his cowardly attempt to bail out.

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

Business as Usual? Trump Returns Home to Spread Lies Along with the Coronavirus

Posted by on October 6, 2020 at 2:18 pm. 6 Comments :

The more that Trump sinks into electoral oblivion, the more desperate and bizarre he becomes. He’s like the wounded mama bear whose psychotic irrationality is triggered and acts out with sociopathic malice and jealous rage. Or something like that.

Donald Trump, White House

Trump’s behavior is further evidence that he should never have been discharged from the Walter Reed Medical Center. Despite his manic and lie-riddled propaganda video on Monday, Trump has learned nothing from his coronavirus adventure. Not only is he still a potentially deadly COVID-19 Super Spreader, he is mentally distancing from reality. A review of his Tuesday morning Twitter rant is all the proof that any competent psychiatrist would need to involuntarily commit to Trump to an institution for his own safety and that of others. For example…

No will be surprised that Trump is lashing out at the press that he so frequently maligns in Stalinist terms as “the enemy of the people.” But in this instance he is also insulting the American citizens participating in the NBC town hall with Joe Biden. After all, the people in the audience were undecided voters who were asking their own questions. And contrary to Trump’s whining, they were hardly “softballs.” The topics ranged from everything from Biden’s plans for reopening the country and schools to his age and mental health. He was also asked about defunding the police, domestic terrorism, abortion, and accusations that he’s a secret socialist.

What’s more, it’s hysterical that Trump would criticize this independent town hall as a disgraceful use of the “FREE public airwaves” when his own Ministry of Propaganda (aka Fox News) unloads rabidly biased and partisan commentaries 24 hours a day. And for much of those hours Trump himself is on their air to disseminate his lies. That time should be paid for by the RNC. But Trump was just getting started. He also tweeted that…

First of all, fatalities due to common influenza have averaged about 37,000 a year for the past decade. And the ten year high was 61,000. When asked about this tweet, Dr. Anthony Fauci contradicted Trump’s nonsense rambling, saying that COVID-19 is far more lethal than the flu.

It’s insane for Trump to suggest that we “learn to live with” COVID-19. Doesn’t he realize that the families and friends of the 211,000 Americans who have already died can hear him? And while he’s pretending that he has conquered the virus (it’s way to soon for him to say that), and that we shouldn’t be afraid, he also doesn’t get that he has access to medical care that far exceeds that of anyone else in the country.

Trump also tweeted an outright lie about Biden’s position on reproductive rights and Roe v. Wade. Trump falsely claimed that Biden supports late-term abortions. Then he tweeted that he’s looking forward to the next debate with Biden on October 15. Although Trump should not even be allowed in the studio. He and his entourage should be considered highly contagious and a risk to Biden, the press, and everyone else involved in producing the debate. He complained that the media “refuses to discuss how good the Economy” is doing. But the media only refuses to discuss that because the economy is in recession, more than 10 million people are still unemployed, thousands of businesses have gone bankrupt, and tens of thousands of Americans have been evicted or foreclosed on.

Finally, Trump tweeted that he’s terminating discussions with Nancy Pelosi and Congress for a pandemic relief bill until after the election. He claims that Pelosi is negotiating in bad faith, despite the fact that she has already lowered her proposal by a trillion dollars in a compromise with Republicans who want it to go down a trillion more. Trump says that he’ll resume negotiations after he wins the election. So that, presumably, will be never. Those tweets resulted in the stock market taking a nose dive in the last hour of trading.

Unfortunately, we can expect to see more of this aberrant behavior from Trump as election day draws near and his prospects for reelection continue to dwindle. It may even get worse after he loses. The American people and the press are going to have to be vigilant in order prevent further deterioration of our democracy. Trump is dangerously unstable and would like nothing better than to take the country down with him.

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