Joe Biden

Trump is Running for Reelection as President of Fox News

Posted by on September 7, 2020 at 1:26 pm. NO Comments :

Labor Day is often regarded as the official kickoff of the presidential campaign season. The party nominating conventions are over and many states are preparing to begin early voting and vote-by-mail operations. So it isn’t surprising to see Donald Trump abuse the power of his office to hold yet another “press conference” at the White House that is nothing more than a reelection rally at taxpayers expense (which the media really needs to stop covering).

Donald Trump Fox News

This alleged press conference was one of the most unfocused to date by Trump, who spent it unleashing a smorgasbord of familiar grievances. He ran the gamut from Barack Obama spying on his campaign, to the election being rigged, to Nancy Pelosi blocking pandemic relief, to Joe Biden being “clueless” and “stupid,” to the economy recovering, to coronavirus being cured. He even gave Vladimir Putin another pass for poisoning political opponent Alexei Navalny.

Virtually everything Trump asserted during the hour plus harangue was demonstrably false. The U.S. intelligence community has investigated the probes into Trump’s collusion with Russia and found that, not only is there zero evidence of Obama spying, there is ample proof of Trump’s misconduct. The only election rigging that has been uncovered is that done by Trump himself, who even committed a felony by telling his cult followers to vote twice. Pelosi passed a relief bill months ago that has been sitting on GOP Senate leader Mitch McConnell’s desk as he refuses to negotiate. The economy is in recession. The coronavirus is still taking the lives of more than 1,000 Americans a day. But Putin remains the only person in Trump’s world that doesn’t have a derogatory nickname.

Trump’s list of grievances should sound familiar to anyone who watches Fox news. It’s a rehashing of the core issues that dominate Fox’s daily programming. [To see just how integrated Trump is to Fox News check out Hoax: Donald Trump, Fox News, and the Dangerous Distortion of Truth by Brian Stelter] Not only do all of the Fox hosts and commentators disseminate the very same propaganda, but Trump is on almost as often as the network regulars to deliver the same spiel. And for the most part, Fox News is the only network that routinely airs Trump’s events live and uninterrupted. That is likely gnawing at the Narcissist-in-Chief who has become accustomed to being the center of attention all the time.

The result of this blanketing of Trump on Fox’s air alone is that his most brainwashed supporters are getting their brains an extra scrubbing on a regular basis. But his message isn’t going out to anyone else. That’s a big problem as the campaign season unfolds. In 2016, Trump didn’t have to spend much money because the media covered everything he did. Without that free advertising, 2020 is shaping up to be a much more difficult environment for him. There is even speculation that he is already running out of money.

Trump has recently pulled ads in critical battleground states. Joe Biden, meanwhile, just collected a record $364 million in donations in August. And he is outspending Trump for ads by more than 10-to-1. What’s more, it’s telling that Trump hasn’t even released his August financial reports yet. That generally portends bad news. Politicians don’t delay good news.

Trump apparently thinks he can win this race by appearing almost exclusively on Fox News and running on a platform developed by Fox’s most devoted Trump-fluffers. That’s a preposterous strategy. On its best night Fox draws about one percent of the nation’s population. If Trump is only seen on Fox News, whose viewers are already supporting him, he can’t possibly expand his base beyond the worshipful audience of Foxic true believers. And there aren’t enough of them to win an election.

However, Trump could run for President of Fox News. He has all the qualifications. He is obnoxious and arrogant and convinced of his own magnificence. He has a profound ignorance of the world and the issues that are most important to voters. He is completely at ease lying about things that are easily proven false. And he is comfortable subjugating himself to others with real power. The one thing that may stand in his way is all the times he has attacked Fox News and predicted their downfall. Not that Fox seems to mind. They take it like a battered spouse and ask for more.

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

Trump’s Fascist ‘Law and Order’ Rhetoric is Making Things Worse: POLL

Posted by on September 6, 2020 at 12:43 pm. 5 Comments :

The reelection prospects for Donald Trump have been mired in an abyss of doom for months. Joe Biden is crushing him in every national poll as well as in most of the crucial swing states. And the post-convention polling has only gotten worse for Trump. That, of course, is not a reason to become complacent or to work less vigorously. Victory is not assured until the votes are counted.

Donald Trump heil

Trump, however, has a real problem. He can’t campaign on the economy, which is in recession. He can’t campaign on his handling of the coronavirus pandemic, which has been a model of deadly negligence and incompetence with deaths nearing 190,000. He can’t campaign on character, because…well, because he’s Donald Trump. So that leaves only one path available for him to stagger down: Fear and division.

Consequently, Trump has wholly embraced a campaign theme centered on terrorizing the American people. The catch phrase most often associated with him is “law and order,” which he has tweeted 52 times so far this year alone. He is painting a hellish picture of the nation as being engulfed in flames with violent insurgents occupying vast territories of major cities and threatening to invade the serenity of white suburbia.

These dystopian delusions have been the core of Trump’s campaign strategy for weeks. He mostly has been maligning the demonstrations against police brutality and systemic racism. According to Trump “These are not acts of peaceful protest but really domestic terror.” And now we have some evidence of just how badly his tactics are failing. A new poll by ABC News/Ipsos has found that…

“Over half of the country — 55% … said they think Trump is aggravating the situation, while just over one in 10 Americans, 13%, said they think he is making it better.”

Thirteen percent barely amounts to a third of his base support, so even most of his cult followers don’t think he’s making things better. The poll goes on to ask a series of questions related to public safety and which candidate for president is best suited to handle the crises that the nation faces. The results show that “Between the two candidates, more Americans trust Biden over Trump to…”

  • Keep the country safe, 55%-42%
  • Keep their families safe, 56%-42%
  • Care more about them, 59%-38%
  • Unite the country, 64%-33%
  • Handle the protests across the country, 59%-39%
  • Address racial discrimination, 64%-34%
  • Manage the COVID-19 response, 60%-38%
  • Reduce violence in the country, 59%-39%

Nevertheless, Trump is still relying on an imaginary horror story about rampant crime to juice his campaign. An analysis by HuffPost found that out of “73,000 ads they aired from July 1 to July 26 … 85% of them dealt in one way or another with public safety.”

The fact that none of this is working for Trump may have something to do with his having pulled all of his television advertising. That’s a peculiar thing to do in the week following his national nominating convention and in the last lap toward election day. He either realizes that his campaign strategy is a complete bust, or he’s run out of money. Either way it’s a very bad omen for the future of his campaign and his presidency. Which, ironically, is a very good omen for America 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.

Crybaby Trump Whines that Fox News Polls are Fake News

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

There is nothing more predictable than Donald Trump wailing like a colicky infant whenever he is criticized. His massive, yet fragile, ego simply can’t take the slightest bit of pushback, constructive or otherwise. So he throws petulant tantrums in the hopes that his critics will regret their offense and commit to unflinching adoration.

Donald Trump, Fox News, Fake

That’s a pretty accurate description of his relationship with Fox News. It’s a network that was built to disseminate right-wing propaganda. And in the Era of Trump it has transformed into the Ministry of Disinformation for the cult that he leads. It employs devoted Trump worshipers like Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Tucker Carlson, Maria Bartiromo, etc., who are also his the staff advisors of his shadow cabinet. And it is practically the only network that he will grant interviews to.

But apparently that it isn’t enough. When there is a rare critical commentary by a host or a guest, Trump lashes out mercilessly as if he’s been betrayed by a close confidant. That happens every time that Fox publishes a poll that isn’t as enamored with him as he is himself. Take for instance this Thursday morning…

First of all, Fox News polls were in the middle of that pack with regard to accuracy in 2016. Trump still refuses to accept that the national polling was largely correct, but did not reflect state-by-state returns that produced the Electoral College result. Secondly, Trump can “believe” that he’s “leading BIG” all he wants, but it doesn’t make it true. He is, in fact, getting crushed by Joe Biden nationally, as well as in the crucial swing states. And thirdly, his attempt to connect the Fox News poll with the stock market is just too preposterous to even respond to.

For the record, Trump has taken this stance before. Last year Trump cried about how Fox News polls “have always been terrible to me.” But in reality they have just as often been positive. And when they were, Trump noticed and celebrated their findings, as News Corpse observed at the time:

“What is abundantly clear is that Trump has been more than pleased with the results of Fox News polls in the past. But when one is less than adoring he flips out and insists that they have always had it in for him. That’s a sign of a severe mental infirmity consistent with narcissism, paranoia, and sociopathic disengagement from reality.”

Trump is a well documented malignant narcissist whose psychotic self-absorption twists his perception of reality. He can only accept flattering appraisals and glassy-eyed adulation from the media and even his personal relationships. Anything else is met with abject scorn and unqualified rejection. It’s a sickness that is putting this nation at risk. And if it isn’t brought to an end this November, the damage may be irreversible for decades.

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

Trump Is Toast: Post-Convention Polls Show Biden’s Lead Growing

Posted by on September 2, 2020 at 12:24 pm. 1 Comments :

With both party’s nominating conventions over, the 2020 presidential campaign begins in earnest. There has been much speculation about how these unprecedented, pandemic-challenged conventions would impact the race. For most of the election season to date, Joe Biden has maintained a steady lead nationally, as well as in the crucial swing states. And now we have some early indication as to what effect the conventions will have on that.

Donald Trump Circling the Drain

There have been several polls released since the conventions concluded. Every one of them show that Biden still holds the lead by significant margins. However, it’s important to note that most of them show Biden’s lead actually growing. As reported by RealClearPolitics, four polls have Biden increasing his lead, two show the lead narrowing, and one remains unchanged:

Polls Date Biden Trump Spread Prior Spread
RCP Average 8/21 – 9/1 49.4 42.3 Biden +7.1
YouGov 8/30 – 9/1 51 40 Biden +11 Biden +9
IBD/TIPP 8/29 – 9/1 49 41 Biden +8 Biden +7
Emerson 8/30 – 8/31 49 47 Biden +2 Biden +4
USA   Today 8/28 – 8/31 50 43 Biden +7 Biden +12
Rasmussen 8/26 – 9/1 49 45 Biden +4 Biden +2
Selzer 8/26 – 8/30 49 41 Biden +8 Biden +4
The   Hill 8/25 – 8/28 47 38 Biden +9 Biden +9

This is bad news for Donald Trump who certainly hoped his “American Carnage 2.0” RNC speech would have helped him crawl out of his slump. It surely didn’t help that he lost in the ratings war with the Democratic convention drawing more viewers overall, and Biden drawing more viewers specifically. it also doesn’t help that Trump is incapable of articulating a second term agenda. And on top of that, Biden just pulled in some record breaking fund raising.

As a result, Trump has had to embrace a dystopian theme of fear and loathing, while seeking to encourage violence among his cult followers, which he cynically believes will benefit his campaign. And he will use anything to deflect from his failure to manage the coronavirus pandemic and the economic recession, both of which are the result of his negligence and incompetence.

The most prominent lines of attack that Trump has hurled at Biden have been insinuations about his mental faculties. That has never been true (except for Trump himself), but it hasn’t stopped Trump from incessantly repeating his infantile nicknames and insults. And now that Biden has easily outperformed the low bar that Trump set for him, Trump’s entire campaign strategy is out the window. All he has left is to chase after the racist, white nationalists that have been his most loyal base of support.

None of this, however, will dampen Trump’s resolve to lie and cheat his way victory. He will continue to malign Biden as being stuck in his basement (which is false), or being unwilling to hold press conferences (which he did today). Ironically, it’s Trump who is stuck in a media bunker wherein he only allows Fox News bootlickers to interview him. But whats really sad is that he fouls those up, even as Trump-fluffers like Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham and the “Curvy Couch” potatoes of Fox and Friends struggle to throw him lifelines.

Nevertheless, Democrats must remain determined to see this through until November 3, without any let up or over confidence. We must run like we’re behind 10 points behind. And we must not let Trump get away with any of his deceitful messaging and hate mongering. This is a marathon, not a sprint, and every day counts.

Trump and the GOP have not yet exhausted their capacity for dishonesty and criminality. They are unlawfully exploiting federal agencies from intelligence to the census to the Postal Service and more, in order to achieve their nefarious ends. And they still have Russia on their team. So stay vigilant. Stay strong. And stay committed to winning for America.

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

Trump Desperately Pushes a Phony, Racist Narrative of Rampant Violence.

Posted by on August 31, 2020 at 2:21 pm. 4 Comments :

Psychotic delusions are tricky to interpret. For instance, it’s hard to tell if Donald Trump truly believes that he is a beloved national leader who is a shoo-in for reelection, or if he realizes that he’s toast but doesn’t want to suffer the humiliation of admitting it publicly. Either way it is confirmation of an acute mental infirmity.

Donald Trump, MAGA

Consequently, in response to the clear evidence of his floundering campaign, Trump is angling to shape an electoral narrative that he thinks will give him some advantage. But he is painfully incapable of articulating a second term agenda. Obviously the topics that matter most to the American people – the economy, jobs, racial equality, climate change, healthcare, and the still surging coronavirus pandemic – are not working for him. He is losing in every national poll, as well as in most of the crucial swing states. and he wasn’t helped by his “American Carnage II” convention.

The position that Trump seems to have settled on is patently absurd. He is seeking to convince voters that the streets of America are awash in blood and that it is the fault of Democrats. Trump is calling this cataclysm “Biden’s America.” Never mind that it is actually – literally – happening in Trump’s America. His argument is that if he’s reelected all of this turmoil that he has created will magically go away, as if it were a deadly virus (oh wait…).

In order to get that narrative to take hold, Trump has been furiously posting tweets that portray the nation as embroiled in a raging and constant conflagration of bloodshed and savagery. On Sunday he unleashed an avalanche of horror stories on Twitter. More than half (58 out of 110) of his tweets were about allegedly rampant violence and Black Lives Matter “mobs” that he says are running wild in the streets. It’s an unambiguously racist campaign aimed at dividing the nation and firing up his white nationalist base.

According to FiveThirtyEight Trump has become “singularly obsessed with the topic” of crime, and HuffPost reveals that in July the vast majority of his campaign dealt in some way with public safety. He speaks in utterly bizarre hyperboles, like a five year old who has no realistic comprehension of the world around him. For instance he said Monday that “If I didn’t INSIST on having the National Guard activate and go into Kenosha, Wisconsin, there would be no Kenosha right now.” Really? The whole city of 100,000 would have disappeared from the face of the Earth?

There is, however, a small problem with this campaign theme. Crime in America is trending down. And the crime that occurs is taking place in both Democratic and Republican cities. So try as he might, Trump cannot blame lawlessness on Democrats, and certainly not on Joe Biden. However, Biden can, and does, make a rational argument for Trump’s culpability (videos below):

“I look at this violence and I see lives and communities and the dreams of small businesses being destroyed. And the opportunity for real problems on the issue of race and police reform and justice being put to the test. Donald Trump looks at this violence and he sees a political lifeline.”

Biden went on to note the absurdity of Trump running on the claim that “Quote ‘You won’t be safe in Joe Biden’s America.'” (video below)…

“And what is their proof? The violence we are seeing in Donald Trump’s America. These are not images of some imagined Joe Biden America in the future. These are images of Donald Trump’s America today. He keeps telling you, if only he was president it wouldn’t happen. If he was president. He keeps telling you if he was president you’d feel safe. Well, he is president, whether he knows it or not. And it is happening.”

“It’s getting worse. You know why. Because Donald Trump adds fuel to every fire. Because he refuses to even acknowledge that there’s a racial justice problem in America. Because he won’t stand up to any form of violence. He has no problem with right-wing militias, white supremacists, and vigilantes with assault weapons”

On a side note, the infantile, lying, cretins running the Trump campaign clipped the part of Biden’s speech where he said that “You won’t be safe in Joe Biden’s America,” and made it look like that’s his own opinion of himself when, in fact, he was quoting Trump. It has already been tagged as “manipulated media“ by Twitter. That’s actually the second Trump video so labeled just today. The other video showed Biden supposedly sleeping prior to a TV interview. But the real video was an interview of Harry Belafonte.

That’s the kind of dishonesty and craven lack of ethics that we have to look forward to for the next couple of months. But hang in there, and continue to do the hard work necessary to achieve a landslide victory and to send Trump back to civilian life and, hopefully, to prison.

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

Fear and Loathing in Trump’s America: A Tweetstorm of Lies and Desperation

Posted by on August 30, 2020 at 1:51 pm. 3 Comments :

It’s Sunday, so it’s time for another episode of Donald Trump’s Sunday Morning Tweetstorm. The rest of America is enduring the hardships of a deadly pandemic made worse by Trump’s negligence and incompetence. They are suffering through the Trump Recession, replete with record bankruptcies, foreclosures, evictions, and unemployment. And they are watching scenes of civil unrest incited by Trump’s craving for violence to justify his neo-fascist aspirations.

Donald Trump, Twitter

This Sunday’s Tweetstorm is jam-packed with Trumpian assholery. Beginning before sunrise at 5:49 AM, and for two hours and fifteen minutes after, Trump unleashed an avalanche of triggered tweets. There were 89 by 8:04 AM, when he had to quit in order to make his tee time (Really! He went from this to his golf resort). That’s one tweet every 1.5 minutes. Many of those 89 tweets were retweets (69) of sycophants and random Twitter trolls. [UPDATE: By day’s end Trump had tweeted a grand total of 110 times. Most of the later tweets were about Portland/violence or infantile attacks on Biden]

The most prominent subject for this morning’s Twitter tantrum was violence in the streets, particularly in Portland, Oregon. These tweets accounted for 41% (37) of the total tweets. Trump’s thinly disguised message to his cult disciples was that violence is good for his campaign so feel free to go out and stir some up. His Senior White House Counselor, Kellyanne Conway, literally said just that this week on Fox News. Trump himself praised the actual instigators, who came armed for confrontation with peaceful protesters, as…

Coming in second in Trump’s Tweet tirade (at 30%) was a parade of polling posts that purported to place Trump in the lead against Joe Biden. However, the 27 retweets were all from “PollWatch2020,” an unverified Twitter account and right-wing propaganda mill. The only polls they cited as sources for their data were the Trafalgar Group and the Democracy Institute. Both are rabidly partisan servants of conservative candidates and issues. Trafalgar has a C- rating by the analysts at FiveThirtyEight. And Democracy Institute isn’t even rated because they are considered to be a “fake” pollster. This blast of bullpucky is refuted by virtually every other poll available from credible survey organizations.

In addition to these putrid postings, Trump also retweeted an article from the Babylon Bee headlined “Biden: ‘If You Thought The Republican Convention Was Good, Just Wait ‘Til We Have Our Convention!” The purpose of this posting was to ridicule Biden for allegedly not knowing that the Democratic convention was held the previous week. However, the Babylon Bee is a wholly fictional, satirical website. It isn’t known if Trump was aware of that or not. However, it’s clear that many of his cult followers didn’t know. They replied to his tweet with laughter at what an idiot Biden must be. Who wants to tell them they are the idiots?

Trump also posted three tweets that falsely reported fatalities due to the coronavirus. All three tweets cited the conspiracy crackpot website, Gateway Pundit, run by Jim Hoft, the “stupidest man on the Internet” (seriously, Google the phrase). They made the claim that there have only been about 9,000 deaths. That number is drawn from the website of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) where it says that only 6% of the reported fatalities were due “solely” to COVID-19. Most of the deaths had comorbidity factors like pneumonia.

Of course, the presence of contributing factors doesn’t mean that COVID-19 wasn’t the cause of death. But that’s the asinine assertion by Hoft. And now Trump has joined in that idiocy with these retweets, one of which was by Jenna Ellis, the Senior Legal Adviser to the Trump campaign and personal attorney to Trump. [UPDATE: The original tweet making this false claim was removed by Twitter for having violated the rules regarding spreading misinformation. But the Ellis retweet by Trump is still live]

The upshot of this cavalcade of dishonesty and hostility on Trump’s Twitter feed is that Trump is determined to inflame tensions and encourage hateful and hurtful confrontations. He has cheered on violent agitators as “great patriots.” He has maligned Democratic leaders as supportive of atrocities. And he is affirming the position that Conway made with regard to such violence as being beneficial to his reelection campaign. It’s despicable and dangerous and it needs to stop.

Unfortunately, we cannot rely on Trump to abandon these abhorrent tactics. Se we need to be cognizant of his nefarious scheme and resist giving in to his cynicism and purposeful destruction of civil society. If we are to prevail, we need to keep justice in our heads, peace in our hearts, and our eyes on the prize. The only blood will be on the hands of Trump and his racist, hate mongering Republican accomplices.

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

Babbling Incoherently, Trump Promises Unspecified ‘Other Things’ in 2nd Term

Posted by on August 29, 2020 at 10:59 am. 8 Comments :

In his Republican Nationalist Confederation acceptance speech, Trump rattled off an array of objectives that were nothing but rehashes of what he’s been saying for nearly four years. Things like cutting taxes and regulations, defending the 2nd Amendment, and building the border wall. There was nothing new and nothing that he’s made any progress on. It was political boilerplate with no substance or commitment.

Donald Trump Angry

In the past few weeks Trump has been asked a question that is commonly asked of presidential candidates: What is your agenda for the next four years should you win? Trump has been asked this question at least four times, including by friendly “interviewers” like Sean Hannity of Fox News and the “Curvy Couch” of Fox and Friends, but has failed to give a comprehensible answer. You might think that after flopping once or twice, Trump would have an aide write up a response for him. But not Trump. On Thursday Peter Baker of the New York Times published his account of Trump’s answer to that question. And it makes even less sense than all the others that preceded it:

Holy shih tzu! Trump is descending even further into an acute state of mental infirmity, and the American people are noticing. He is not only unable to articulate an agenda, he is unable to complete a coherent sentence. Which may explain his bizarre nomination acceptance speech Thursday night. It was mish mosh of lies, boasts, and slanderous assaults of Joe Biden and Democrats generally. But not a single punch landed. That’s partially because it was all retreads of his past rants and so transparently false. CNN fact checker Daniel Dale documented at least twenty lies Trump told during his marathon 70 minute speech. That’s an average of one lie every three and half minutes.

Among the most loathsome untruths was Trump’s dismissal of the horror that America is suffering through due to his negligent and incompetent mishandling of the coronavirus pandemic. Trump has a perverse habit of downplaying human tragedies. For seven months he has pretended that the coronavirus was as trivial as the flu and completely under control. 180,000 deaths later it is still taking 1,000 lives every day.

So he is being true to form by beginning his speech with shameless bragging that “the casualties and damage [from Hurricane Laura] were far less than thought possible only 24 hours ago.” He doesn’t say what he considered possible, but there are six dead and estimates of total economic costs “in the neighborhood of $20 billion.” Hallelujah! What a success.

Trump’s speech was a meandering mess that checked off political boxes while ignoring the real world hardships Americans face. He demonstrated his priorities by mentioning COVID-19 only five times, but slandering Joe Biden 41 times. that included the ominous and hyperbolic assertion that Biden “will be the destroyer of American Greatness.” Trump also said that “For 47 years, Joe Biden took the donations of blue collar workers, gave them hugs and even kisses, and told them he felt their pain.” Trump emphasized “kisses” in an attempt to insinuate some sort of sexual aberration.

That’s an unbelievably brain dead attack considering that there have been no credible complaints of sexual misconduct by Biden in those 47 years. Conversely, there are dozens of credible allegations of sexual harassment and assault against Trump.

These are the kinds of vicious rhetorical bombs that Trump is going to be throwing for the remainder of this campaign. He has nothing positive to run on. He cannot defend his mangling of the pandemic response or the economic catastrophe that it produced. All of the obvious failures for which he is responsible will weigh heavily on his campaign. But in the midst of all of that, he still can’t tell voters what he would do if reelected. He can only mumble unintelligibly and whine about what a victim he is.

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

Trump’s RNC Speech Flops in the Ratings, Loses to Biden

Posted by on August 28, 2020 at 12:40 pm. 2 Comments :

Our reality TV game show host president has made it clear over the years that the most important thing to him are his television ratings. He cites them to validate the usefulness of his phony Coronavirus Task Force briefings. In his ego-soaked ignorance, he considers them to be “the real polls.” But now he’s going to have to live with the yardstick for success that he created.

Donald Trump

The overnight Nielsen ratings for Trump’s nomination acceptance speech at the Republican Nationalist Confederation were an unmitigated flop. Despite his illegally using the White House for his political campaign, and cramming a couple of thousand cheering sycophants into a small space with no face masks, Trump still managed to underperform. As reported by CNN…

“President Trump’s Thursday night convention speech making the case for his reelection was lower-rated than his challenger Joe Biden’s speech one week ago, according to overnight Nielsen ratings.

“About 23.8 million viewers watched coverage of Trump’s RNC address across thirteen cable and broadcast networks, down from 24.6 million viewers who watched Biden’s DNC address on twelve of those same networks.”

This is the method of measuring that Trump has insisted best reflects where the American people stand. He’s wrong! But since he’s made such a big deal of it, it would be unfair not to give it due consideration. Two million more people watched Biden, who Trump has maligned with infantile nicknames such as “sleepy” and “slow.” And the Democratic convention also beat the Republicans for the total four days combined. So where does that leave Trump now?

Even on Fox News immediately following Trump’s 70 minute harangue, Chris Wallace told the Trump cultists watching that the speech was “surprisingly flat,” “far too long,” and lacked substance. Yet somehow, in Trump’s delusional fantasy world, he posted a tweet that contradicted reality:

Seriously, where does he get this stuff? Are his aides purposefully lying to him? Are these his own original lies? Or is he suffering from an acute case of self-deception? Regardless, he is passing these blatant falsehoods on to his worshipful cult disciples who will believe whatever he says.

However, the American people aren’t fooled by any of this. Trump’s approval ratings have not improved since the convention began. In fact, Trump’s favorite pollster, the wildly biased Rasmussen, actually shows him dropping five points. And if that’s the story from the most pro-Trump pollster, guess where the rest of the surveys are going to wind up.

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

UPDATE: Naturally, Trump couldn’t keep his yap shut about this. But who would have expected him to completely defy reality by tweeting…

Well, actually everyone would have expected that. Trump lies like the rest of us breathe. But while it’s not surprising, it’s still shocking and disgusting.

Trump Approval Drops After Two Days of the Republican Nationalist Convention

Posted by on August 26, 2020 at 2:12 pm. 4 Comments :

What Donald Trump promised would be an optimistic and hopeful celebration of Republican leadership has predictably turned into a dystopian nightmare exalting an aspiring totalitarian dictator. The dark and hostile themes articulated by one speaker after another were unflinchingly foreboding and resolutely reverential of Trump and only Trump.

Donald Trump

This steadfast devotion to the Cult of Trump was intended to jump start his floundering reelection campaign. Joe Biden has been consistently beating Trump in both national and swing state polling for months. So the nasty tone set by Trump and his convention plotters was chosen in an attempt to boost his approval and to smear Biden in such a way as to bring him down to Trump’s level. They sent out their heavy artillery including four members of the Trump family (Eric, Don Jr, Tiffany, and Melania). They were fortified by notorious Trump-fluffers like Rep. Matt Gaetz, Rep. Jim Jordan, Nikki Haley, Mike Pompeo, and the screeching stylings of former Fox News host, Kimberly Guilfoyle.

However, early indicators show that this strategy is working about as well as everything else Trump has tried to do in his presidency (i.e. utter failure). One week ago Trump proudly tweeted that he had reached a peak approval rating of 51% as surveyed by the disreputable right-wing pollster, Rasmussen Reports. Rasmussen is without a doubt Trump’s favorite pollster and the only one who has ever shown Trump with a majority approval rating.

Now, after two days of RNC ranting, and worshipful characterizations of Trump as Messiah, Rasmussen has him at 47% approve, 51% disapprove. That’s a four point drop (and an eight point negative swing) that occurred in just the two days since the convention began. Additionally, Rasmussen has Trump with a 36% strongly approve rating, and 44% strongly disapprove. UPDATE: Another day, another drop for Trump as his approval on the Rasmussen poll goes down to 46%.

To repeat, Rasmussen is the most Trump-friendly pollster on the planet. For comparison, other recent polls show Trump with considerably worse numbers. RealClearPolitics’ average “poll of polls” has Trump in the red 10.6%. And his performance in the crucial swing states is particularly dismal. Biden is leading in six of the seven states considered as battlegrounds (Wisconsin, Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Ohio, and North Carolina). North Carolina is the only state where Biden is not ahead, but he is either tied or close. Biden is also challenging Trump in traditionally red states like Texas and Arizona.

Trump’s decline this week so far does not bode well for the remaining days of the convention, Ordinarily, a candidate could look forward to a game changing speech at the conclusion of the convention, But Trump has already played that card by casting himself in prominent roles every day. He even included official duties (the granting of clemency and a swearing in ceremony for new citizens) in his convention events, which many legal experts contend is a violation of federal law.

Consequently, the final two days hold little suspense. Firebrands like Kellyanne Conway, Ivanka Trump, Rudy Giuliani, and a parade of d-list members of Congress will be speaking. The remaining star power consists of Mike Pence, who is scheduled to give one of his always tranquillizing addresses on Wednesday. Then on Thursday, Trump will close the show with what will likely be a sequel to his infamous “American Carnage” inaugural horror story.

How any of that can be expected to move the polling needle is a mystery. But that’s all that the Trump camp has in store. Unless, of course, he surprises us with Hillary’s lost emails, a check from Mexico for the border wall, or a coronavirus vaccine he whipped up in the White House guest bathroom. Stay tuned.

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

Trump Turns the RNC Into Another Lie-Riddled Cult Rally

Posted by on August 24, 2020 at 2:40 pm. 15 Comments :

On Monday morning the Republican National Convention got off to rocky start. It was preceded by a week of bad news including the arrest of Trump’s White House advisor Steve Bannon for fraud, tapes of Trump’s sister calling him “cruel” and a “liar,” a federal court ordering Trump to hand over his taxes, and the resignation of his senior White House counselor, Kellyanne Conway. Not to mention the continuing tragedy of ever escalating illness and death due to the Trump Virus.

Donald Trump, Republican, GOP

The early morning schedule for the convention was dominated by the roll call to tabulate the delegate votes to renominate Trump for 2020. That tedious affair had some competition as Congress was concurrently holding a hearing to interrogate Trump’s new Postmaster General, Louis DeJoy. CNN and MSNBC aired the hearing, while in the Trump-friendly Fox News bunker they stuck to the terminally boring RNC roll call. Naturally, this infuriated Trump who tweeted his objections.

Shortly there after, it was Trump’s turn to take the stage. He is scheduled to appear on all four days of this ego-stroking, reality TV production. And today’s outing provided a glimpse into what the remaining three days will hold. What Trump had promised would be a convention filled with optimism and positivity, is already parroting the “American Carnage” the typifies Trump’s public addresses.

As anyone not in coma for the past four years would have expected, Trump went on a wild-eyed rampage against his stock crew of perceived villains, including Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, and Democrats in general. He lied brazenly about imaginary achievements, voting by mail (which Trump now contends will give you the coronavirus), the economy that is in recession, and the free press that he despises. CNN fact checker, Daniel Dale, noted that “There is way, way more dishonesty in this first convention speech by Trump than in every Democratic convention speech combined.”

But most of all, Trump went completely off the rails with delusional depictions of the state of the pandemic in America (video below). From the start, Trump has tried to downplay the horrific consequences that have burdened the lives of millions of people in the United States. He has belittled the suffering of the those most vulnerable. He has given false assurances to younger victims. And he has actually bragged that the death toll that is nearing 180,000 is something to be proud of. And not only is Trump proud, he has the audacity to criticize Joe Biden for deferring to scientists and doctors:

“Most of the country is right now doing very, very well. They’ve done an incredible job. And to have a man sitting on television the other day say ‘oh I’d shut it down. I’d shut it down.’ Like it’s easy. And oh, by the way, when you shut it down – and we did the exact right thing. We shut it down, then we reopened. And that’s what we’re doing now. We’re well into it. If we didn’t shut it down at that point we would have had millions of people dead. Millions of people.”

If you’re trying to make sense of any of that, stop. You might hurt your brain. Clearly, we are not “doing very, very well” right now. To the contrary, we are still seeing more than 1,000 deaths a day, and more than 50,000 new cases reported. What’s more, Trump never shut the country down. Not for a single day. Some governors took action to mitigate the spread, and they were attacked for it by Trump. And Trump is still dishonestly comparing the current death toll to estimates if nothing were done at all.

Following that tirade, Trump went into a rant blaming governors for all the of problems. You know, the problems he’s now saying never occurred because everything went so well. Apparently he was lying about that. The problems did occur, it’s just that, in his cartoon brain, none of it was his fault. Because it isn’t like he’s the one person who has the authority to manage a national crisis.

Sadly, the media appears to have learned nothing about how Trump takes advantage of them to promote himself. While CNN cut away after twenty minutes, MSNBC and Fox News carried the whole freakout live. Trump’s incoherent, stream-of-unconsciousness babbling on the first day of the GOP convention may look familiar. It’s precisely what he did for many months when he could jaunt around the country to perform at his ego-stroking cult rallies. And it’s what he did when assuming the starring role at his phony coronavirus Task Force briefings.

In short, it’s what he always does to exalt himself before his glassy-eyed disciples to soak up the adoration that he craves. And now he’ll do it for the next three days at the RNC, despite the fact that these displays of narcissistic indulgence and hostility only bring his already abysmal approval ratings down even more. And for that, I suppose Democrats should thank him. If it just weren’t so nauseating to watch.

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