Impeach

Hysterical Impeachment Syndrome: Trump Issues Impotent Demands that Adam Schiff Resign

Posted by on September 27, 2019 at 1:11 pm. 5 Comments :

Donald Trump is previewing his regularly scheduled Weekend Tweetstorm with a special Friday edition. And the lengths he goes to to exalt himself and malign his critics is reaching new levels of hysteria and panic. If Trump thinks this sort of behavior is consistent with that of an innocent man, he is suffering from a deeper case of dementia than anyone previously imagined.

Donald Trump

Trump’s morning rant follows Thursday’s late night flurry of Fox News videos, many of which proposed a bizarre theory that impeaching Trump would hurt Democrats more. It’s clear from their nasty reactions, however, that they don’t really believe that. And Trump’s own response is escalating in animosity – and incoherence – by the minute. For example:

So much derp in one “liddle” tweet. First of all, Trump is outraged that CNN omitted an apostrophe from his infantile prefix to Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff’s name. So outraged that he forgot the difference between an apostrophe and a hyphen. He also forgot how to spell the word “describing.” And he thinks that this punctuation atrocity somehow changes his meaning in a “dishonest” way.

Trump then moves on to bash the New York Times White House correspondent Peter Baker (and for some reason his wife) for writing a story about Trump’s phone call with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky that clearly included an extortion threat. Trump has been denying the reality of that even after the incriminating memo summarizing the call was released. But the worst part of this tweet was Trump’s assertion that Baker “should not even be allowed to write about me.”

Trump continues to have the delusional impression that he’s a tyrannical monarch who gets to decide who and what is permitted in the free press that he repeatedly calls, in Stalin’s words, “the enemy of the people.” That burning hatred for the Constitution was further reflected in Trump’s next tweets that continued his attack on Schiff:

Apparently Trump doesn’t grasp the concept of paraphrasing with emphasis to make a point. That’s what Schiff was doing. He even prefaced his remarks (video below) by saying that Trump’s phone call “reads like a classic organized crime shakedown. Shorn of its rambling character, and in not so many words, this is the essence of what the President communicates.” So contrary to Trump’s brazen lie, Schiff was not “supposedly reading the exact transcribed version of the call,”

What’s more, nobody has to make Trump sound horrible or look guilty. Trump does an excellent job of that without assistance. Which makes his demand that Schiff resign all the more pathetic and shimmering with the impotence of a wannabe dictator who doesn’t know that he lacks the authority he imagines he has. But Trump wasn’t through with Schiff.

It’s ironic that Trump would call Schiff “sick” in a tweet where he once again makes an absurd demand that Schiff “must resign and be investigated.” Notice the backwards order that Trump puts those in: resign, then be investigated. Trump followed that up with an all-caps tweet that his conversation with Zelensky was “perfect.” If that was perfect, what kind of horror would mediocre be? (Note: Why does he keep saying “perfect,” a word that is generally reserved for things like hanging pictures or seasoning chicken dinner?) Trump also claimed that Democrats are “now to be known as the DO NOTHING PARTY!” Nevermind that they have passed more than 200 bills that Mitch McConnell is blocking in the Senate.

Finally (well, for now), Trump took a wild swing at the whistleblower, who he said without explanation “isn’t a Whistleblower at all.” That contradicts his own Acting Director of National Intelligence, Joseph Maguire, who told Congress under oath that the whistleblower and his account of the events, was credible and made in good faith. Trump, nevertheless, whined that the complaint was inaccurate and speculated baselessly that it was the work of either a leaker, a spy, or a partisan operative.

At this point Trump is just sending conspiratorial trial balloons into the polluted air that he’s making worse with the incessant and toxic exhaust from his own mouth. And the frequency and fury of his Twitter tirades is only exacerbating the public perception of his guilt. A poll on Thursday showed a thirteen point increase in Americans who think Trump should be impeached. And that’s even before many of these latest revelations had time to percolate through the mediasphere.

Long story short: Trump is revealing a measure of fear that is weighing heavily on him. But that may be the most sane response he’s had to any of this controversy to date. Fear would be precisely the right emotion under these circumstances. So if he’s scared it’s because he has good reason to be.

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

Trump’s Ukraine Phone Call Transcript Doesn’t Need a Quid Pro Quo to Impeach Trump

Posted by on September 24, 2019 at 2:22 pm. 3 Comments :

This has been a disastrous week for Donald Trump. With the emergence of a White House whistleblower disclosing that Trump illegally extorted the President Of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, the prospects for his impeachment have escalated exponentially. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi just announced that Congress is now “moving forward with an official impeachment inquiry.” And Trump’s deteriorating demeanor is showing the intensity of his fear and panic.

Donald Trump Impeach

Trump is so desperate that he has caved into demands that he release the transcript of his July phone call with Zelensky, that he previously refused to do, saying that it would set a bad precedent. While that’s a good start, it is not nearly sufficient to clear up this controversy. For one thing, Trump is still refusing to release the whistleblower’s report that his own National Intelligence Inspector General said contained “serious” and “urgent” allegations that impact national security. Without that report we don’t know what the whistleblower was referring to, or even if it involved this phone call.

As for the question of a “quid pro quo,” there isn’t any requirement that an explicit demand be attached to Trump’s threat in order to constitute a breach of law and/or ethics. The Mafia had a way of insuring that their victims knew what was expected of them without saying so directly. “Nice little country you have here,” Trump might say, “Sure would hate to see something happen to it.” And Trump has plenty of experience with that mobster mentality as a Manhattan real estate developer. In his announcement that he would be releasing the Ukraine phone call transcript he tweeted:

It remains to be seen if any transcript made public by Trump is actually unedited. As a documented pathological liar, nothing he says can be taken at face value. This is especially true on the day that he made remarks about the charges against him wherein he managed to contradict himself within a single sentence (video below). “There was no pressure put on [Ukraine] whatsoever,” Trump began. Then he continued, “but there was pressure put on with respect to Joe Biden.” Well, that’s crystal clear. There was no pressure except that there was pressure of a blatantly political nature.

Trump went on to say that “What Joe Biden did for his son, that’s something they should be looking at.” So even now he is still making improper demands on Ukraine that can still be regarded as ultimatums associated with future foreign aid. What’s more, the accusations aimed at Biden, that Trump is using to deflect from his his own crimes, have all been investigated and there was zero evidence of any wrongdoing. Biden was delivering a message to dismiss a corrupt prosecutor. It was the official policy of the U.S. government, not a personal matter involving Biden or his family. And it was also aligned with the policies of the Ukraine parliament, the European Union, the World Bank and other international institutions.

Trump also made the familiar and tiresome claim that he is the victim of a “Witch Hunt.” He said that Democrats are fixed on impeaching him because he’s leading in the polls and they can’t beat him any other way. That would be an interesting argument if it weren’t for the fact that most polls show him losing to every Democratic opponent, even the polls from Fox News. That’s the sort of “real” news that is driving Trump insane. And it’s another reason why he needs to be impeached as soon as humanly possible.

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

The ‘It’ Fracture: Crybaby Trump is Afraid of Joy-Ann Reid and Thinks Journalism is Showbiz

Posted by on September 14, 2019 at 1:14 pm. 1 Comments :

If it’s Saturday, it’s time for another regularly scheduled Donald Trump Tweetstorm. And the “stable genius” occupying the White House doesn’t disappoint. In fact, he even reminded everyone of his alleged stability in a tweet thanking some unnamed admirer for recognizing his alleged genius. In a normal world that would be sufficient proof that he’s a flaming fruitcake.

Donald Trump, Pennywise

Among the Twitticisms that Trump posted was a celebration that Republicans son a couple of seats in bright red districts that they were always favored to win. Although one of them was pulled out by a razor-thin two point margin. Another tweet bragged about his 94 percent support among Republicans, which in reality is only 83 percent. Which is irrelevant anyway because, contrary to his dementia, he isn’t running for president of the GOP. Then he dropped a couple of tweets that consisted only of his tiresome campaign quotes (MAGA, KAG) that he’s hammering into the numb skulls of his cult followers.

However, the most Trumpian eruption of the morning was one that attacked the media, of course. It’s his goto wankery when nothing on Fox News ignites his smoldering emotional tinder. And this time Trump lashed out at MSNBC’s Joy-Ann Reid for something that Trump didn’t bother to explain:

To answer Trump’s first question, Joy-Ann Reid has been a commentator and host on MSNBC for five years and currently hosts her own popular Saturday morning program, AM Joy. Not that Trump really needed this prompting. Despite pretending that he doesn’t know Reid, his own tweet goes on to reveal that he’s pretty familiar with her show, her reputation, her network, her reporting, and her ratings (she averages more than a million viewers each week). Although much of what he thinks he knows is wrong, as usual. Reid is also the author of a New York Times bestselling book that Trump surely knows about, but hasn’t read: “The Man Who Sold America: Trump and the Unraveling of the American Story,”

What’s troubling about Trump’s attack on Reid – besides being another assault on an African-American journalist – is his bizarre characterization of her as lacking “the ‘it’ factor,” something he asserts is “needed for success in showbiz.” That’s right, “Showbiz!” Because that’s what Trump thinks journalism is. In fact, that’s what Trump thinks his presidency is. His job before becoming president was hosting a reality TV game show, which he did for 14 years. That’s not a hobby, it’s a career. And he still sees everything from within that Hollywood bubble.

So what might have triggered this outburst by Trump? He frequently insists that he never watches MSNBC, but with all of the whining he does about it, it’s obvious he watches every day. And today Reid did an extended segment on impeaching Trump (full video below). Undoubtedly he was watching while getting drool all over his Egg McMuffins. And his tweet tantrum makes much more sense when we know what he was almost certainly responding to.

Reid’s guests itemized a long list of impeachable offenses by Trump, beginning with obstruction of justice and continuing through encouraging Russia to interfere with the election, exploiting the presidency to enrich himself, violating campaign finance laws by paying hush money to his mistresses and not reporting it, defying subpoenas and suppressing evidence, and much more.

It’s easy to see why Trump is so afraid and desperate this morning. He knows what he did, and he knows that the truth is coming out. And he knows that changing the channel to Fox News won’t prevent the inevitable accountability he will be forced to face. So he resorts to this sort of deranged panic-tweeting. Expect more of this madness as Congress uncovers more of Trump criminal behavior. And expect it to get worse before it gets better.

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

Pathological Liar Trump Sinks to Making Up ‘Quotes’ as His Impeachment Fears Grow

Posted by on September 12, 2019 at 1:03 pm. 1 Comments :

This week Congress returned from its summer recess and almost immediately got to work by voting to proceed with an inquiry into Donald Trump and the case for his impeachment. The House Judiciary Committee passed a resolution that set the procedures and rules for future impeachment investigation hearings. Committee chair Jerry Nadler made clear that Trump’s conduct “poses a threat to our democracy,” and that “We have an obligation to respond to this threat.”

Donald Trump Impeach

The dagger dangling precariously over Trump’s intellectually numb skull is having an impact on his already panicked temperament. Under ordinary conditions (if there were any) Trump would be behaving erratically. But with the looming prospect of impeachment he has leapt off the cliff’s edge and is hurtling into the abyss of his psychoses. That would explain his tweet Thursday morning that purported to be a quote by Rep. Al Green:

By now most American know that Trump is a pathological liar who has been documented to have told more than 12,000 lies since his inauguration. Most recently he outdid himself by lying about the path of Hurricane Dorian. He even altered official weather maps, bullied NOAA officials to concur with his flagrant falsehoods, and chastised the Fox News White House correspondent for not backing him up.

However, the tweet above goes much further down the rabid hole of paranoia and deceit. The words Trump attributed to Rep. Green as a quote were never said by Green. At best, Trump is wildly distorting comments made by Green four months ago when he was interviewed on MSNBC (video below):

Host Phillip Mena: Are you concerned that impeachment talk may actually help the President’s reelection?
Green: I’m concerned if we don’t impeach this president, he will get re-elected. If we don’t impeach him he will say that he’s been vindicated. He will say that the Democrats had an overwhelming majority in the House and they didn’t take up impeachment. […] We must impeach this president. If we don’t, it’s not the soul of the nation that will be at risk only, it’s the soul of the Congress.

So Green wasn’t saying that Trump couldn’t be beat, nor that impeachment was a response to the fallacy of him being unbeatable. He was merely answering the question by noting what Trump would say if Democrats didn’t proceed with impeachment. And he was acknowledging the possibility of Trump’s reelection, which any reasonable political analyst would concede exists. But no one could plausibly interpret those remarks the way Trump did in his wholly dishonest tweeting of a fake quote. And to drive that point home, Green replied to Trump’s tweet with one of his own:

Trump lies so often that it’s becoming a passe affair that gets ignored in the press. That should never happen. He’s still the President and such dishonesty is an abhorrent trait that must be called out as a destructive assault on democracy every time it happens. But inventing quotes by members of Congress takes his noxious behavior light years down the road to tyranny. It cannot be tolerated by patriotic Americans. And the fear that triggers this sort of moral fraudulence must be recognized as a dangerous manifestation of mental infirmity. By making up quotes about his impeachment, Trump is only affirming the necessity that he be impeached.

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

Trump is Terrified That He’s Losing the Senate, Paving the Way for Impeachment

Posted by on August 31, 2019 at 12:48 pm. NO Comments :

The best gauge of what Donald Trump’s paranoid, narcissistic mind is obsessed with at any given moment is his frantic and self-serving Twitter feed. Trump has no ability to give thoughtful consideration to what he tweets. He simply lets his innermost anxieties gush like a busted fire hydrant spewing unrestrained panic.

Donald Trump Impeach

On Saturday morning Trump was at Camp David where he said he was monitoring the approaching Hurricane Dorian as it lumbers toward Florida. Trump had canceled a previously scheduled diplomatic mission to Poland allegedly to manage preparations for the hurricane. However, he has already left Camp David for a golf outing in Virginia. But even prior to that he was paying much more attention to Twitter than to the weather forecast.

Trump’s tweets covered a couple predictable subjects that had to do with his obsession over former FBI Director James Comey, who he fired two years ago, and the firing of his personal assistant, Madeleine Westerhout, yesterday. Not surprisingly, Trump lied about Comey releasing classified documents, which his own Justice Department’s Inspector General said didn’t happen. And he threatened Westerhout with a lawsuit if she violated an alleged non-disclosure agreement. Of course, Trump cannot enforce any such agreement for White House staff because they don’t work for him. They work for the United States government.

However, Something else was consuming Trump’s pitifully limited attention span, and it exploded all over his Twitter feed. There were twenty-five (25!) tweets or retweets of Senate Republicans, along with Trump’s compliments and vague, insincere flattery. That’s an astonishingly large quantity of tweets by Trump on a subject that isn’t himself. So what might have triggered this uncharacteristic outburst of political angst?

Clearly Trump’s advisors are warning him of the harsh environment he’s facing in the upcoming election of 2020. His favorite pollster, Rasmussen, recently placed his favorability near his lows for the year. And even a Fox News poll shows him losing to every one of the top Democratic candidates.

The picture isn’t any better for the Republicans in the Senate. Next year they will have twenty-two incumbents on the ballot (including GOP Leader Mitch McConnell), compared with only twelve for the Democrats. And with people like Cory Gardner of Colorado, Susan Collins of Maine, and Martha McSally of Arizona, struggling to stay competitive, the odds of Democrats winning the majority in the Senate are increasingly likely.

Should that happen Mitch McConnell would no longer have the tyrannical hold on the upper body that he has been abusing for years. The 200+ bills passed in the Democratically-controlled House of Representatives would finally get a vote in the Senate. But most foreboding from Trump’s perspective is that there would no longer be any partisan protection from a possible impeachment. And if there is strong Blue Wave sweeping the GOP out of Congress, the remaining members might actually be concerned enough about their own futures to take Trump’s high crimes and misdemeanors seriously.

Even before the 2020 election, GOP senators who see the oncoming trainwreck might start to drift away from Trump in order to save themselves. Even if that means throwing him overboard. Consequently, Trump is lavishing attention and praise on the Republican senators he has for the most part ignored or treated as lackeys whose only purpose was to serve him. He now needs to gain their support and demonstrate that he’s willing to work harder for their reelection. Not because he really cares about either their political fate or even their agenda. But because he fears the consequences for himself without the safety net they provide.

Unfortunately for Trump, it’s too late for this selfish strategy to work. Anyone who supports Trump is already planning to vote the Republican line. He has no ability to attract new voters. In fact, he’s so polarizing that his presence will probably scare more voters away. So the desperation he’s showing with this tweetstorm is actually good news for Democrats and other patriotic Americans who are anxious to see Trump impeached. His overt expression of fear shows that he’s truly concerned that there’s a real possibility that he will be removed from office and prosecuted for his wrongdoings and betrayal. And for once, he’s right.

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

Trump Misreads Poll on Support for His Impeachment, Posts Absurdly Wrong Numbers

Posted by on July 23, 2019 at 2:47 pm. 1 Comments :

The President of the United States is presently the subject of a rare debate over whether he should be impeached for crimes committed by him and/or his associates. While other presidents have been accused of high crimes and misdemeanors, none have been suspected of treasonous conspiracies in conjunction with foreign enemies. This is a situation unique to Donald Trump.

Donald Trump Impeach

Consequently, public polling on whether Trump should be impeached has emerged as an important gauge of his ability to endure another term in office, or even complete his first. And his historically low approval ratings isn’t helping him any. That may be why he is now disseminating obviously false information that makes his situation appear somewhat less dire. On Tuesday morning Trump tweeted this:

Notice that Trump didn’t bother to provide a link to the poll he referenced. That’s a common tactic he employs to prevent people from discovering that he’s a lying jackal. This tactic works well among his Deplorables who will believe whatever he says, even when there’s proof that he’s lying. But for the rest of us, we have to try harder to find out what the heck he’s talking about.

In this case, there is only one recent poll regarding impeachment with an 11 percent result. It’s the YouGov survey published July 18. This poll asked “Do you think the U.S. House of Representative should or should not try to impeach President Trump?” The overall response was 36 percent YES, and 45 percent NO. So where did Trump get 11 percent? That was the number of Republicans who said that he should be impeached. Democrats favored impeachment by 64 percent. So Trump is trying to pass off the GOP-only number as the number for all Americans.

For a bit of contrast, a Twitter user replied to Trump’s tweet with a Twitter poll of his own. At the time of this writing, 77 percent of more than 22,000 votes favored impeachment, while 22 percent did not. Of course, this is not a scientific poll, but it’s revealing that such a large majority of voters on Trump’s own Twitter feed want to see him impeached.

This isn’t the first time that Trump has gotten poll results horribly wrong. On one occasion, Trump retweeted a Fox News report that put his overall approval at 55 percent. Fox later admitted that they made a mistake and that the real number was 43 percent. In a rare correction Fox took down their story but, three months later, Trump still has not.

On another occasion, Trump bragged about the results of a Fox News poll that doesn’t actually exist. He said that his approval among African-Americans in this imaginary poll among was 40 percent. That’s not even close. It’s actually in single digits. A recent Washington Post poll put the number at three percent.

And then there was the time that Trump boasted about a poll showing him with 52 percent approval. Of course that was also in error. The 52 was really his disapproval. His approval in this case was only 44 percent.

Almost everything else in Trump’s tweets is also wrong. He’s taking credit for economic success that is almost totally attributable to his predecessor, President Obama. Stock market and jobs stats increased more during Obama’s administration than in Trump’s. And his tax cuts, regulatory moves, tariffs, and trade wars, were demonstrably harmful to the economy and particularly working people.

It’s hard to say whether all of this misreporting was the result of his poor comprehension skills or deliberate deception. Neither is a very good option. But we have a very serious problem when the President of the United States can’t grasp the results of a simple survey, and has no interest in ever setting the record straight when he’s wrong.

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

What’s more, his attempt at mockery by saying “Gee, let’s impeach the President,” forms the core of his argument against impeachment. He thinks that if the economy is strong, there is no justification to impeach. But that’s nonsense. Impeachment is called for if the President is found guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors. And if he is, it doesn’t make any difference what the state of the economy is. A president who breaks the law during good times is still a criminal. But that’s just another simple concept that Trump is incapable of understanding.

The Fear in Trump’s Tweets is Off the Charts ‘Bonkers’ as the Mueller Hearing Looms

Posted by on July 22, 2019 at 1:43 pm. 1 Comments :

On Wednesday the Congress will finally hear from special counsel Robert Mueller. His first-hand account of the conclusions from the investigation he led should settle the debate on whether Donald Trump’s tedious mantra of “no collusion, no obstruction” has any basis in reality. What are the odds that Mueller will agree with Trump’s assessment of the probe as a “witch hunt” or a hoax?”

Donald Trump, Toilet, Bathrobe

In the runup to the hearings, Trump is behaving with a profound sense of dread. He is lashing out at critics, whining about “presidential harassment,” and reanimating insults and lies directed at Mueller, including those log-ago debunked about Mueller having had business disputes with Trump and being former FBI director James Comey’s best friend. He’s making painfully obvious attempts at distractions with harangues aimed at Democrats and bragging about his imaginary accomplishments. He’s also deploying his extraordinarily lame defense team to take up his cause in the press. Which is doing more harm to him than good.

In the latest Trump tweetstorm, he is proving that anyone who thought he had hit bottom was too optimistic. There either is no bottom for Trump, or he has a remarkable ability to keep digging. He began the morning with this wild-eyed rant:

So Trump is reviving his assault on the Washington Post which, for some reason, he keeps associating with Amazon, an online retailer that most Americans love. And naturally he calls it “fake news” only because he doesn’t like that it is reporting verifiable facts. However, this particular criticism actually boomerangs on him. He’s admitting that he either doesn’t have, or doesn’t listen to, any advisors. And he mocks his own lack of comprehension skills by deny that he reads “reams of paper” to educate himself about presidential matters. Why would he consider that a negative? Clearly he wants to avoid that anyone regard him as thoughtful and informed, which is why asks rhetorically, “does that sound like me?” No, it certainly doesn’t.

Then Trump continues with a tweet that accuses the media of being “out of control” and “bonkers.” He says they “constantly lie and cheat” and “no longer care what is right or wrong.” These, of course are classic examples of projection. They apply more accurately to him than to any of the media he is impotently targeting. And his criticism doesn’t even make sense. He’s complaining that the Democrats are trying hard to “get their views out their (sic) for all to see.” And that’s bad because…? He then follows that up with a tweet that simply repeats his tired Stalinist-inspired rant that the media is “the Enemy of the People!” And finally he gets to the root of his nightmares:

Trump is still afraid to let the American people learn about his potentially treasonous associations with Russia during his campaign and into his presidency. That’s odd considering he insists that Mueller’s report “totally exonerated” him. You would think he would be thrilled to have Mueller tell that story to the public. You might also think he’d tire of his perverse fetish with Hillary Clinton, her emails, and the outright lies about Strzok and Page.

The truth, however, is that the Mueller report did find evidence of conspiracy with Russia and multiple instances of obstruction of justice. No matter how many times he says otherwise, he can’t erase the facts. Even the chief political anchor at Fox News, Bret Baier, said that “This was not, as the president says time and time again, ‘no collusion, no obstruction.’” And Fox’s Senior Legal Analyst, Andrew Napolitano, said that “Mueller laid out at least a half-dozen crimes of obstruction committed by Trump [and that] ordering obstruction to save himself from the consequences of his own behavior is unlawful, defenseless and condemnable.”

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

That’s why Trump is afraid and flailing with distractions, lies, frothing diatribes, and the desperate embrace of Fox News and other fawning sycophants. He knows what he did. And he knows what the consequences will be when everyone else knows. So he has to shut down any dissent or disagreement with his cult-approved narrative. But unfortunately for Trump, the only people buying this are his Deplorables. The rest of the country is getting closer to demanding impeachment every day.

WOW! Fox News Lies About Their Lies About Their Own Poll on Whether to Impeach Trump

Posted by on June 19, 2019 at 11:31 am. 3 Comments :

One sign that the 2020 presidential campaign season is in full swing is that Fox News is pulling out all the stops for their State TV approved candidate, Donald Trump. Of course, Fox has consistently supported Trump since his inauguration, even through episodes where he took Vladimir Putin’s side on the election hacking, or declared that he and Kim Jong Un “fell in love.” And Fox News has unflinchingly defended Trump’s unsavory relationship with Russia and flagrant obstruction of justice, as revealed in the report by special counsel Robert Mueller.

BEST FOX NEWS “ALERT” EVER!
Fox News, Impeach Trump

Meanwhile, Trump continues to incriminate himself, as he did during his ABC News interview with George Stephanopoulos. And Fox News continues to cover up the impact of his increasingly severe, and often incoherent, meltdowns. Calls for Trump to be impeached are growing rapidly, with more than sixty Democratic members of Congress (and one Republican) voicing that view publicly.

So naturally, Fox News joined other media outlets in polling voters on that question. Their results could not have pleased Trump. The survey found that 43 percent think that Trump should be impeached and removed from office. Another 7 percent favor impeachment without removal. That’s a 50 percent majority versus the 43 percent who say he should not be impeached at all.

However, Fox News reported on these results with a graphic that said 50 percent oppose impeachment or removal. That’s a blatant lie that misrepresents their own poll. It was so egregious that it resulted in Fox issuing a rare “clarification“ to correct their error. Fox and Friends First host Heather Childers said that…

“We would like to make a clarification to a poll we aired earlier this week. The graphic that we showed had responses to the question ‘Do you think President Trump should be impeached OR removed from office?’ Well, the actual question question in the poll was ‘Do you think President Trump should be impeached AND removed from office?’ As seen on your screen right now.”

HUH? The wording was indeed wrong on the graphic, but that was hardly the main problem. Fox is deliberately trying to suppress the fact that most Americans want to see Trump impeached, and most of those want him removed as well. To be clear, there was another question in the poll that didn’t differentiate between impeachment and removal. It did find that 50 percent said “no.” However a follow up question found that 12 percent of them still wanted Trump to be impeached, but not removed.

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

So no matter how you slice it, Fox is mangling the results of their own survey in order to protect Trump from bad news. They are doing this to disinform the public as to how much support there is for Trump’s impeachment. They are also doing this to pacify the fragile ego of the Narcissist-in-Chief. And finally, they are doing this to avoid triggering an onslaught of outrage from their glassy-eyed, cult worshiping viewers. But in the end, they will fail on all three counts, because the American people are not as stupid as the subset of them who watch Fox News.

Aspiring Tyrant Trump Ponders Not Leaving White House, Accuses New York Times of Treason

Posted by on June 16, 2019 at 11:29 am. 2 Comments :

If it’s Sunday, it’s time for our regularly scheduled Sunday Morning Tweetstorm by the totally “stable genius” who is currently occupying what he thinks is the White Nationalist House. That’s right, Donald Trump is spending Father’s Day posting hostile attacks on anyone he doesn’t believe is sufficiently adoring. But not to worry, when he’s done he’s going golfing with Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-Sycophant), so his kids won’t have to suffer his repugnant company.

Donald Trump

In today’s episode of Trump’s Tweet Tirade, he is lashing out at the media, because not having done so since yesterday must be driving him crazy. And he is in a ripe mood that further illustrates the ravages of a mind consumed by paranoia and narcissism:

First of all, Trump’s proposal for a poll comparing his insults toward two nationally respected newspapers doesn’t really make any sense. A more interesting poll would be one that compares the honesty and deceitfulness of the press to Trump himself. Oh wait. Many polls have already been done on that and Trump comes out the loser every single time. The American people repeatedly say that they trust the media – whether it be the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, NBC, or any other news source polled – over our notoriously perfidious president.

It’s becoming a bit tedious to have to continually point out every time that Trump invokes Stalin to malign the press as “the enemy of the people.” But that’s just too grotesque an abuse of his position to let it go by. And speaking of abuse, Trump is also speculating about declaring himself Dictator-for-Life, just like his heroes Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, and Kim Jong Un. It’s a sentiment that he has expressed before, and continues to be abhorrent and terrifying. And he is pursuing a common path among despots to assume power by attacking the press, and even accusing it of crimes punishable by death:

For the record, the Times actually consulted with Trump’s national security team prior to publishing their story on U.S. cyberattacks against Russia. They responded to Trump’s tweet saying that:

“Accusing the press of treason is dangerous. We described the article to the government before publication. As our story notes, President Trump’s own national security officials said there were no concerns.”

So they were assured that there was no reason to withhold the story on national security grounds. Apparently Trump didn’t bother to check with his own people before calling the Times treasonous. What’s more, Trump also claims that the story isn’t true. So then how could it be treason to report something that he’s saying didn’t happen?

If these remarks by Trump cause you to be concerned about the welfare of the nation, you aren’t alone. There is a growing movement to have Congress begin an impeachment inquiry. And the more Trump displays this kind of mental impairment and animosity to American principles and institutions (including admitting that he would take dirt on political opponents from foreign enemies), the more people who will demand that he be removed from office and prosecuted for his many obvious crimes. And the sooner the better for the sake of the nation – and the world.

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

COLLUSION: Trump is Committing Treason in Order to Resuscitate His Floundering 2020 Campaign

Posted by on June 13, 2019 at 11:57 am. 10 Comments :

It is impossible to understate the profoundly evil nature of what Donald Trump told George Stephanopoulos on Wednesday. In an extended interview, Trump not only justified his prior collusion with Russia in the 2016 election, he also placed an open call for hostile foreign governments to do the same thing in 2020. It’s an unambiguous attempt to seek assistance from America’s enemies. This is Trump’s reelection campaign strategy.

Donald Trump Vladimir Putin

The interview was an astonishing performance by an unabashed traitor to American laws and principles. What follows are a few of the most egregious segments that are profoundly disturbing and utterly inexcusable.

Stephanopoulos: But should [Don Jr] have gone to the FBI when he got that email?
Trump: Okay, let’s put yourself in a position: you’re a congressman, somebody comes up and says, “Hey I have information on your opponent.” Do you call the FBI? You don’t– I’ll tell you what. I’ve seen a lot of things over my life. I don’t think in my whole life I’ve ever called the FBI. In my whole life. I don’t–you don’t call the FBI.

Actually, Trump has called the FBI at least twice according to FOIA documents, but only when it’s to his personal benefit.

Stephanopoulos: Al Gore got a stolen briefing book. He called the FBI.
Trump: Well, that’s different. A stolen briefing book. This isn’t– this is somebody who said, “We have information on your opponent.” Oh, let me call the FBI. Give me a break, life doesn’t work that way.

It’s not different. The information that Trump was seeking (Clinton’s and DNC emails) was also stolen information on his opponent. And calling the FBI is precisely the way it works, even according to Trump’s own FBI director, Christopher Wray. So Trump responded that…

Trump: The FBI Director is wrong. Because, frankly, it doesn’t happen like that in life.

Trump: If somebody comes into your office with oppo research– they call it oppo research–with information that might be good or bad or something, but good for you, bad for your opponent, you don’t call the FBI. I would guarantee you that 90 percent, could be 100 percent, of the congressmen or the senators over there, have had meetings–if they didn’t they probably wouldn’t be elected.

Here Trump is trying to conflate normal opposition research with his collusion with foreign governments, which is illegal. Then he cites some statistics that he’s pulled from his – assumptions and justifies the criminality because, as he says, everybody does it. So therefore it’s okay?

Stephanopoulos: Your campaign this time around, if foreigners, if Russia, if China, if someone else offers you information on opponents, should they accept it or should they call the FBI?
Trump: I think maybe you do both. I think you might want to listen, there’s nothing wrong with listening. If somebody called from a country, Norway, “we have information on your opponent.” Oh, I think I’d want to hear it.

Norway? It’s funny how Trump can’t bring himself to mention Russia. But more to the point, what he’s describing here is collusion, plain and simple. He goes on to say that he wouldn’t report it to the FBI because “the FBI doesn’t have enough agents to take care of it.” Sure, because there are only 13,412 special agents and 20,420 support professionals.

Trump may have point. 33,000 FBI agents might not be enough to investigate all of the crimes that he has committed. In this interview he said once that he might alert the FBI to unlawful communications with foreign governments. But he said four times that he wouldn’t. And he said it again in a series of tweets on Thursday morning:

Notice that the examples he uses are our allies. Once again, he refuses to implicate Vladimir Putin and his pals in the Kremlin. He also fails to mention whether these talks included getting dirt on his opponents. He is deliberately trying to deflect from the real issue. And unfortunately, that will work on his Deplorable followers and his shills at Fox News.

The bottom line is that Trump’s remarks are a direct invitation to our enemies to engage in hacking or other illegal activities and pass along what they steal to Trump. He has already told them that he’d listen. So why wouldn’t they do it? He is unambiguously soliciting a criminal act. And for that alone Trump should be impeached and imprisoned.

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