Immigration

Shocker: Trump Embraces Obama and Clinton on Immigration, But Wildly Misquotes Them

Posted by on January 6, 2019 at 10:52 am. NO Comments :

The Trump Shutdown continues into its fifteenth day with no sign of resolution. Trump is actually becoming even more cemented into an increasingly bizarre stance that makes less sense every day. His raving tantrums on Twitter are filled with nonsense and lame memes that utterly fail to advance the dialog. Meanwhile, Nancy Pelosi and the new Democratic majority in Congress are ignoring his plaintive and desperate whining.

Donald Trump, Immigrant, Child

Trump’s recent comments claim that the idiotic vanity wall he’s so obsessed with will save billions of dollars. In addition to that, he insists that the new trade agreement (USMCA, which has not been ratified by the Senate) will effectively result in Mexico paying for the wall (or fence, or steel slat, or gold-tasseled drapery, or whatever). So the cost is being covered twice, but Trump is still demanding that Americans pay for it. He also claims that most of the people hurt by the shutdown support his position on the wall. But also that they are mostly Democrats. So he thinks that most Democrats are on his side of the great wall debate.

No one who has been paying attention really expects Trump to make sense anymore. It’s a given that he’s out of his mind and unfit for the office of a president (or a chicken coop). But on Sunday morning Trump went a bridge too far by embracing two of his most hated political foes: President Obama and Hillary Clinton.

You have to wonder what his Deplorables will think about him elevating the people that they have been trained to despise so vehemently for the past two years. Now Trump is hailing their vision and advocacy of rational immigration reforms. There’s just one problem. Trump is totally misrepresenting what both of them said and believe on the subject. For instance, here is what Obama went on to say after the out-of-context excerpt Trump posted. He was speaking in support of a 2006 immigration reform bill in the Senate:

“The bill the Judiciary Committee has passed clearly strengthens enforcement. To begin with, the agencies charged with border security would receive new technology, new facilities, and more people to stop, process, and deport illegal immigrants.”

Notice that there is nothing about a wall. He is advocating what all Democrats still want twelve years later: border security via smart reforms that actually address the problem. Not a wall that ignores the fact that the vast majority of undocumented immigrants enter the country through valid checkpoints.

Obama went to say that “while security might start at our borders, it doesn’t end there.” He made the case for an earned path to citizenship saying that “we must allow undocumented immigrants to come out of the shadows and step on a path toward full participation in our society.” That’s hardly the policy that Trump and his Republican Nationalist Party are proposing.

As for Clinton, Trump also misrepresented her remarks made during the 2016 presidential campaign. Although she was somewhat open to “a barrier,” her full answer to a question from a voter quickly diverted to our need to deal with undocumented immigrants already in the country:

“I do think you have to control your borders. But I think that it’s also true that we need to do more to try to, number one, deal with the people who are already here, many of whom have been here for decades.”

Clinton explicitly mocked the notion of a wall at one point saying that it wouldn’t solve the problem. “I don’t care,” she said, “how tall the wall is or how big the door is.” She went on to advocate for providing more resources to the immigrants’ countries of origin in order to improve living conditions, reduce crime, and obviate the need for them to leave in the first place.

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

If Trump was really interested in a rational, workable solution he would adopt the positions taken by Obama and Clinton, rather than distorting what they said for cheap political points. That would be the way out of the Trump Shutdown and relief for the hundreds of thousands of Americans who are the innocent victims of Trump’s ego-driven wall fetish. That is, if he actually cared about them.

OMG! Trump Has Been Whining Incoherently About Being Home Alone for Two Weeks

Posted by on January 3, 2019 at 9:53 am. 1 Comments :

It’s official. The President of the United States of America is a whiny little baby who can’t be left on his own without throwing an infantile tantrum. Actually, Donald Trump will do that with other people around also. But it’s especially noticeable when he is whimpering about his loneliness himself and in public, as he did at his first cabinet meeting of the new year.

Donald Trump, Home Alone

The White House get-together with his sycophantic assembly of bootlickers was an epic mess. Trump lied repeatedly about many subjects. He misrepresented the history of the Russia’s invasion of Afghanistan. He said that he fired his former Secretary of Defense, Jim Mattis (Mattis quit in protest). After insulting generals who have criticized him, he claimed he would have been a good general. Never mind that Cadet Bonespurs evaded the draft five times. And he went on endlessly about his idiotic vanity wall.

Among the bizarre episodes in this meeting, Trump, sitting behind a “Wall of Thrones” style poster on the table, complained about having been left home alone during the holidays. Although he didn’t go down to his golf resort in Palm Beach, he didn’t explain why Melania or other members of his family couldn’t have been with him at the White House, instead of partying at Mar-a-Lago. “I was here on Christmas evening,” Trump cried. “I was all by myself in the White House. It’s a big, big house.” But that wasn’t the only time that Trump expressed this sense of being forsaken. It began several days before:

Then he posted a video on Twitter where he sobbed that “While I’m at the White House working, You’re out there partying.” And he continued his snivelling in another tweet wherein he described himself as being “in the White House waiting for the Democrats to come on over.” This plaintive wailing was rather absurd since it was the Republicans, who controlled both houses of Congress at the time, that closed the session. Democrats had no say in the matter.

However, Trump’s relentless whining is just another indicator of how mentally unstable he is and how unfit to perform the duties of the presidency. Of course, he did proclaim with some pride that he is “The Most Fabulous Whiner.” And now he is providing even more proof of it – not that it was necessary.

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

Poor Donald Trump is Alone in the Big, Scary White House Tweeting About the ‘Witch Hunt Hoax’

Posted by on December 29, 2018 at 11:08 am. 4 Comments :

The saddest story of the year has got to be the tear-jerking saga of a lonely president who is desperate and frightened about the monsters under his bed. Donald Trump is once again rage-tweeting on a Saturday morning because he has nothing better to do – no presidential stuff, no holidays with a loving family. It’s enough to make you wanna take him in your arms and throw him into a jail cell where he can weep in the warm embrace of the other members of his crime family.

Donald Trump, Robert Mueller, Freak Out

Trump began his pre-New Year’s weekend digging back in time to when he whined plaintively about a report (that he undoubtedly saw on Fox News) that some texts between a couple of FBI agents were allegedly deleted:

Trump’s assertions that the messages were deleted and lost is totally and provably false. Not that the most lyingest president in history cares. The agency recovered and preserved all the messages after a temporary tech glitch. That, however, didn’t stop Trump from demanding all of the texts that the FBI already has, and insisting that there has been “Total Obstruction of Justice” – which is something he’s very familiar with. This triggered his knee-jerk outcry of “Witch Hunt” and led to more inanity in another tweet:

So Trump is saying that he’s in the White House waiting for Democrats who have already left town. That’s so sad it hurts. Picture him staring out of the window wondering if Chuck and Nancy have forsaken him on Christmas. He misses the “Presidential Harassment” that he soaks up because at least it’s some attention. By the way, the Democrats only left town because the Republicans (who still control both houses of Congress for a few more days) ended the session. Democrats had no say about that.

It’s also curious that Trump complained that Democrats “have little time left for things like stopping crime and our military!“ Did Trump really mean to say that he supports stopping our military? That would be consistent with his recent decision to abruptly retreat from Syria, leaving ISIS free to regroup and our allies to be slaughtered by Russia and Turkey. And Trump’s position on the shutdown is so incoherent that even Fox News has had to shore it up with extra-thick propaganda. That’s when Trump isn’t using it to evade justice and impeachment.

Next up is Trump’s pathetic and obvious attempt to change the subject away from those that are making him look so foolish and frightened:

Anyone who believes that Trump actually had a phone conversation with President Xi just now is terminally naive. First of all, at the time of the tweet it was midnight in China. Not only is that awfully late for a diplomatic phone summit, but it would be cutting into Trump’s morning appointment with whatever is on Fox News. And without that daily injection of hate mongering and fake news, Trump couldn’t get out of bed and face the ever-worsening fates that are crushing his spirit and producing these deranged tweetstorms.

And finally (as if there is ever a final tweet from this wacko-bird), Trump makes one the most ludicrous, blame shifting comments of his wretched presidency:

This is so absurdly far-fetched that it hardly needs a response. Other than to say that it is despicable that Trump would exploit these tragic deaths for such a brazenly partisan political purpose. But then again, that’s Trump. And his reasoning is ridiculous. People who are fleeing poverty and violence aren’t going to remain someplace where their lives are at risk because they might have to climb a ladder to get over a wall. Is he really that callous and stupid? (You don’t have to answer that).

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

Fox News Badgers Trump’s Chief of Staff Mulvaney to Take Even More Extreme Positions on the Wall

Posted by on December 28, 2018 at 11:21 am. 4 Comments :

It’s day seven of the Trump Shutdown, and Fox News is determined to hold Trump’s feet to the fire. Not for his responsibility for creating this havoc and hurting hundreds of thousands of Americans. But to insure that he doesn’t bend on the radical principles that Fox News holds dear.

Fox News, Donald Trump Baby

On Friday morning Fox and Friends interviewed Trump’s Acting (one of many) Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney (video below). For the most part it was a friendly get together among like-minded Trump shills. However, the “Curvy Couch” potatoes were fired up over the possibility that the President might commit the unforgivable crime of compromising with Democrats in Congress.

Mulvaney tried repeatedly to characterize the Democrats as having “left Washington” to avoid the debate on Trump’s idiotic and useless vanity wall. But this Congress is still run by Republicans. They control whether the Congress stays in session or not. And it is Republicans who made the decision to stop working until next year. Democrats had no say in the matter.

Yet Mulvaney still accused Nancy Pelosi of orchestrating the shutdown and leaving town because she doesn’t want to appear weak. That’s a classic case of projection when it’s Trump who is transparently afraid of looking weak in the eyes of Fox News. Both houses of Congress had previously agreed on funding bills to keep the government of open. But then Trump was triggered by Fox News reports that he was breaking his promise to build a wall. And even though he also promised that Mexico would pay for it, he still felt it necessary to punish American taxpayers by shutting down the government.

What stood out in the interview was the ferocity of the Foxies in pushing Mulvaney to take ever more extreme positions on the wall and the shutdown created to force it down the nation’s throat. Here are the questions that Mulvaney was hectored with by the Fox crew::

Pete Hegseth: He says he’ll close it all down because of these ridiculous immigration laws. Is he willing to go that far?

Mulvaney replied that Trump is willing to go all the way. We’ll see. But it was predictable that the first question was so full of anti-immigrant bias.

Hegseth: It was $25 billion dollars was possibly on the table. Now it’s five […] Mr. Mulvaney, a lot of Trump supporters feel like five is already a compromise, $5 billion. So to now float out there $2.5, $2.7, wouldn’t that look like a cave on this key issue.

Mulvaney surprisingly admitted that the $25 billion figure was “smoke and mirrors.” And the only real “cave” here is Trump to Fox News.

Griff Jenkins: Hold on. The American people wanted a wall. What deal then now is President Trump willing to accept that is anything short of that wall?

According to Mulvaney, nothing. “That’s why the government is closed.” As for what the American people want, a new poll by Reuters/Ipsos shows that only thirty-five percent said they backed including money for the wall in a congressional spending bill. And only twenty-five percent said they supported Trump shutting down the government for it.

Rachel Campos-Duffy: But let me ask this. We’re talking about money – $5 billion, $1.5 billion, $2.7 billion. Why isn’t there other things on the table? DACA for example. Is that being negotiated?

Mulvaney said that it is, but there’s no evidence of that from the White House. Plus it would be atrocious for Trump to exploit DACA applicants as bargaining chips for a wall nobody wants (even though he’s done that before).

Hegseth: Mr. Director, Nancy Pelosi calls the wall immoral ineffective, and expensive. We know it’s effective. We know $5 billion is not expensive in Washington dollars. In taxpayer real dollars we know it is. But the morality of it. Tell that to the family of Corporal Singh. Tell that to the family of Kate Steinle. The moral thing to do is to keep it shut down until you get a wall. Trump supporters are going to expect that. How attuned are you to the reality that a compromise that makes it look like Republicans are cavin’ again – Here we go. Democrats always … No. That is a real thing that has to be factored in.

Mulvaney insists that “We’re not compromising.” But this question was loaded with bigotry and lies. There are no credible experts that believe the wall would be effective. Most undocumented immigrants came legally through border checkpoints. And by raising the Singh and Steinle issues, Hegseth is once again implying that all immigrants are potentially murderers. The facts show that immigrants commit crimes a lower rates than American-born citizens. So Hegseth shouldn’t be talking about “the moral thing to do,” especially since he opposes all reasonable gun reforms to prevent the massacres of American citizens by American citizens.

Hegseth: The President’s floated the nuclear option. Is that a possibility in the Senate?

“I wish all options were open,” said Mulvaney. But even Mitch McConnell has ruled this out.

Campos-Duffy: If he’s there, why doesn’t he do an Oval Office address? […] Why isn’t he using all the tools at his disposal?

On this Mulvaney fired back saying that Trump knows what he’s doing, and how to do it, better than they do. Because Dear Leader is infallible and only wants to protect his weak and frightened children.

And that’s what passes for a fair and balanced interview on Fox News. The program’s hosts badger their guest with opinionated viewpoints aimed at pushing him toward their radical perspectives. And the guest complies with answers that feed right into the craziness of their right-wing agenda. But in the end none of this matters because Trump will only tweet something that contradicts them and himself and makes no sense. And his glassy-eyed cult followers will lap it up like gruel and be grateful for whatever morsels he tosses to them.

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

Senile or Surrender? Trump’s Rambling Tweets Don’t Mention Border Wall Funds to End Shutdown

Posted by on December 22, 2018 at 10:22 am. 2 Comments :

There has been considerable speculation for the past couple of years about whether Donald Trump is mentally stable or capable of performing his duties as president. His psychological condition has been questioned by mental health professionals and politicians from across the ideological spectrum. And now as the U.S. government is being shutdown over funding for Trump’s vanity border wall, those questions are getting harder to ignore.

Donald Trump

In a series of tweets on Saturday morning, the President predictably ranted about the shutdown that he previously took pride in creating. Even after saying on national television that he would take full responsibility for it, Trump tried to blame the Democrats who had already agreed to a Continuing Resolution with senate Republicans. It was only after wingnut rightist media cranks like Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh and the “Curvy Couch” potatoes of Fox and Friends complained that Trump reversed course and reneged on his word to sign the CR. But his morning’s tweetfest might be revealing some weakness in his resolve:

Setting aside the obvious lie that Trump is “working hard,” it’s notable how he is now tying the debate to only “Border Security.” Didn’t he leave something out there? Trump didn’t mention his wall in that tweet or the others that followed. And border security (minus the wall) has always been a part of the Democratic platform. Of course his omission may just be due to his inability to concentrate on anything for more than half a minute, unless it’s a mirror. But it might also be an indication that he recognizes that Democrats are not going to pacify his ego and allocate funds for a useless wall.

Trump later tweeted that he would having a big lunch with a bunch of people to discuss the matter. It’s comforting to know that he will be well fed while tens of thousands of Americans will not be getting paid this holiday season.

In addition to the border wall issue, Trump also tweeted about his intention to retreat from Syria. His remarks were especially reckless and dangerous:

First of all, ISIS is far from defeated. Estimates by his own administration say there are 30,000 ISIS fighters in Syria. On Friday his press Secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, said that Trump had destroyed 99.9 percent of ISIS in Syria. If you do the math, that would mean that they started out with thirty million – which is patently absurd because that’s almost twice the total population of Syria.

However, Trump’s remarks that Turkey “should be able to easily take care of whatever remains,” are even more troubling. He’s right if what he means is that Turkey will take care of (i.e. slaughter) our allies, the Kurds, as soon as we leave. And he doesn’t bother to mention the fact that our retreat will leave the country to Russia and Iran for the foreseeable future. Vladimir Putin even praised Trump’s decision to run away. And it’s among the reasons that Defense Secretary Mattis resigned in protest, along with the U.S. special envoy to the coalition to defeat ISIS.

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

So as usual, Donald Trump is doing everything he can to please our enemies (especially Russia), while working overtime to harm our allies. And his efforts on the domestic front are even worse as he shuts down the government for Christmas and shows no sensitivity for the plight of fellow citizens. With every day Trump demonstrates that he is working against the American people (who don’t want the wall), and solely on his own behalf. Including even more instances of obstruction of justice to escape accountability for his many criminal activities. It’s long past time for him to go.

How Stupid Are Trump’s Border Wall Supporters? Their GoFundMe Page Reveals a Mountain of Derp

Posted by on December 20, 2018 at 1:34 pm. 4 Comments :

The United States Congress is currently embroiled in one of the most ridiculous debates in its history. The government is about to be shut down for lack of a routine spending bill because Donald Trump is afraid of his critics on Fox News. Seriously. He was fully prepared to sign the Continuing Resolution until Foxies like Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, and Steve Doocy told him to keep his promise to shut the government down if he doesn’t get funds to build his idiotic vanity border wall.

Donald Trump

Setting aside the circus in Washington, Trump’s dimwitted Deplorables are mounting their own independent effort to pay for the useless, ineffective wall. And unless they are all from south of the border, Trump is still reneging on his most prominent campaign promise to make Mexico pay for the concrete joke. The Trump cultists have embraced an effort to raise money themselves to finance the wall’s construction. Their GoFundMe page for that purpose has already hit $6.2 million in just three days.

On the surface, that sounds pretty impressive. However, the numbers simply don’t work. First of all, the wall is estimated to cost about $25 billion. The page has a goal of $1 billion. So they have raised only 0.6 percent of their goal, which is less than 0.002 percent of the actual cost. If they continue to take in donations at the current rate (which is highly unlikely), it will take them five hundred days to hit a billion. They would have to have 16.4 million people donating an average of $61.00. They can never reach the total cost of the wall which would be twenty-five times more.

For 2018, the top ten GoFundMe pages raised a total of $58 million for all ten pages. The top fundraiser was for Times Up, a legal defense fund for survivors of sexual assault and harassment. They raised $22 million from 21,000 donors. That’s a far cry from a billion dollars or sixteen million donors. So the goal appears to be utterly unrealistic. And the page says they will refund all donations if they don’t reach their goal. Which makes the whole project appear to be nothing more than a PR gimmick.

What’s more, in the nearly unimaginable event that they reach their goal, what exactly do they intend to do with the money? They could donate it to the U.S. Treasury. However, they cannot earmark it for border wall building purposes. There is no government facility for citizens to offer to pay for specific federal infrastructure of any kind. If they simply turn it over to the Treasury, the government must spend it according to the legislation passed by Congress. The House of Representatives initiates all spending bills. That would be the House that Nancy Pelosi will be the Speaker of, and that is run by a Democratic majority. It’s doubtful that they would allocate those funds for the Deplorables’ wall.

Other than that, there is no plausible avenue for allocating those funds toward a border wall. They cannot build the wall with private resources and commercial builders. They couldn’t secure the land to build on or the rights to construct international barriers. And yet, Trump’s glassy-eyed followers continue to donate to this scam.

Somebody is probably making some money on the float (interest earned on the funds while being held for distribution). But none of this will result in a wall or a fence or even artistically designed steel slats (as Trump recently described his vision of the wall). And after wasting their time and money on this boondoggle, will they be willing to donate to Republican campaigns for 2020? We’ll see.

In the meantime, a counter offer is being pursued in the form of a GoFundMe page to raise money for Ladders to Get Over Trump’s Wall. They already have 25 percent of their more realistic $100,000 goal.

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

UPDATE: Media Matters is now reporting this about the border wall GoFundMe page: The guy behind the GoFundMe account for Trump’s border wall used a Facebook page network connected to fake news sites to boost his campaign. Brian Kolfage’s previous Facebook page network was banned for spammy behavior in October.

Fox News (and Ann Coulter) Pile On Trump for Lying About His Border Wall Being Built Already

Posted by on December 12, 2018 at 3:06 pm. NO Comments :

On Tuesday Donald Trump insisted that a meeting between himself and congressional leaders Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer be televised. That turned out to be a bad move for the President who behaved like a petulant child demanding that he get funds for his idiotic, useless border wall or he would shut down the government. He actually agreed to accept full responsibility for what Pelosi termed “the Trump Shutdown.”

Fox News, Laura Ingraham

In addition to the whining from Trump about Congress not submitting to his divine will, he repeated a flagrant lie that has been part of his stump speeches for months now. Trump wants to convince people that his wall is already being built and is near completion in some areas. That, of course, is pure fiction. He has never had funds allocated to it, and there has been no construction whatsoever. But he keeps saying this because he knows his glassy-eyed cult followers will believe whatever he says.

On this occasion, however, Some of the ordinarily loyal Trump-fluffers in the conservative media are falling off the wagon. Most notably, Laura Ingraham of Fox News, who addressed the subject on her program and told her Republican guests that…

“I must have missed the wall being built. What wall? That’s not a wall. Stop saying it’s a wall. There’s no wall … you gotta stop saying that.”

Coming from a primetime Fox News shill, that was rather surprising. Ingraham didn’t mince words either. And it was all the more significant since one of her guests was Steve Scalise, the third highest ranking Republican in the House. Of course, most of her other remarks during the segment were straight out of the Trump playbook (build the wall; stop the caravan; immigrants are criminals, drug dealers and disease carriers). But on the question of Trump lying that “A lot of wall has been built … big sections of wall,” she was spot on and uncharacteristically honest.

Ingraham was joined by another right-wing blowhard who usually shovels Trump propaganda by the barrel. Ann Coulter wondered whether Trump thinks his supporters are dumb in a tweet that called out his border wall lie:

Let’s just leave that business about what Trump thinks of his followers alone. It’s too easy. The important part of Coulter’s tweet is that she is not falling for Trump’s gaslighting of America with false claims that “People do not yet realize how much of the Wall … has already been built.” Coulter even posted a link to the Washington Post fact-checker who covered this issue earlier this year. Although, like Ingraham, Coulter swung back to her customary wingnut position. On the same episode of Ingraham’s show she unleashed a nauseatingly racist tirade against Democrats:

“We’re gonna be seeing a lot of these disputes in the Democratic Party base because they all hate one another. I mean you have the Muslims and the Jews and the various exotic sexual groups and the black church ladies with the college queers. The only thing that keeps the Democratic base together is for them to keep focusing on white men are the ones keeping you down. You must hate white men. It’s the one thing they have in common.”

So while these devoted sycophants for Trump can be relied on to spew hatred and lies on behalf of their Dear Leader, it’s nice to see that once in awhile they can recognize the inconvenient truth that Trump is a bald-faced liar. Although they have the luxury of knowing that Trump isn’t going to tweet nasty epithets at them, or make up infantile nicknames, the way he does if Maxine Waters or Hillary Clinton says the exact same thing.

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

A Brutal AP Fact Check Exposes Trump’s Intellectual Laziness and Hostility Toward the Truth

Posted by on December 1, 2018 at 6:44 pm. NO Comments :

If there is anything that we’ve learned from Donald Trump’s first two years in the White House it’s that he is utterly uninterested in educating himself about the issues a president is required to know. Even worse, he has a stifling aversion to the truth and will callously lie to advance whatever message he’s pushing at the moment.

Donald Trump

The Associated Press took inventory of some of the President’s recent public remarks and compared them to reality. The result is a pathetic and troubling expose of a man completely unfit to lead a remedial scout troop, much less the most powerful nation on the planet.

The AP described Trump’s failings as a “slippery grasp of science as well as trade policy.” But their observations go way beyond that, covering most of the subjects that will eventually touch every American’s life. What follows are a few choice selections from the article that illustrate just how dangerous Trump’s willful ignorance is:

TRUMP: “Billions of Dollars are pouring into the coffers of the U.S.A. because of the Tariffs being charged to China, and there is a long way to go. If companies don’t want to pay Tariffs, build in the U.S.A. Otherwise, lets just make our Country richer than ever before.”
THE FACTS: That’s not how it works. Yes, money from tariffs is going into the federal treasury, but it’s coming from U.S. businesses, not from overseas. Tariffs are paid by the importer, not the exporter or government in another country. Beyond that, tariffs paid by U.S. companies tend to result in higher prices for consumers. So a tariff is a transfer of wealth from business to government, and sometimes from consumers to government as well. It is not a foreign payment to the U.S.

TRUMP: (On the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Trade Agreement): “The USMCA is the largest, most significant, modern and balanced trade agreement in history. All of our countries will benefit greatly. It is probably the largest trade deal ever made, also. ”
THE FACTS: It’s not the largest trade deal ever made. It covers the same three countries as its predecessor, NAFTA.

TRUMP: “Our steel industry a year ago was dead, and now it’s one of the most vibrant anywhere in the world. Big Steel is opening and renovating plants all over the country.”
THE FACTS: Construction spending on factories has yet to take off significantly after having been in decline between 2016 and much of 2018. […] A year ago, the steel industry employed 141,200 people, says the Labor Department. Now, 145,100. That’s a gain of 3,900 jobs during a period when the overall economy added 2.5 million jobs.

TRUMP: “You look at our air and our water and it’s right now at a record clean.”
THE FACTS: Last year had the most unhealthy soot days since 2011. The number of days with unhealthy smog levels was down from 2016, but higher than 2015, 2014 and 2013.

TRUMP: (On the confrontation between migrants trying to rush into the U.S. and authorities who used tear gas to drive them back): “Three Border Patrol people yesterday were very badly hurt, getting hit with rocks and stones.”
THE FACTS: This didn’t happen, according to the account by the commissioner of Customs and Border Protection, Kevin McAleenan. He said there were no “reported serious injuries on either side of the border.”

TRUMP: (Retweet): “Illegals can get up to $3,874 a month under Federal Assistance program. Our social security checks are on average $1200 a month.”
THE FACTS: Wrong country, wrong numbers, wrong description of legal status of the recipients. The $3,874 refers to a payment made in Canada, not the U.S., to a legally admitted family of refugees.

TRUMP: “Obama had a separation policy; we all had the same policy. I tried to do it differently, but Obama had a separation policy. But people don’t like to talk about that.”
THE FACTS: Obama did not have a separation policy. The Trump administration didn’t, explicitly, either, but that was the effect of his zero tolerance policy, which meant that anyone caught crossing the border illegally was to be criminally prosecuted, even if they had few or no previous offences. The policy meant adults were taken to court for criminal proceedings and their children were separated.

The AP article (posted on the Fox Business website) goes into greater detail and has some additional examples of Trump’s lies. However, this is a representative sampling of how little regard Trump has for conveying facts to his dimwitted cult followers. It’s this sort of dishonesty that makes it difficult for average Americans to engage in rational discourse with Trump supporters. His glassy-eyed disciples live in a world of make believe that turns them into regurgitation machines for his deliberate falsehoods. And that blind devotion to Trump’s manufactured unreality poses serious risks for the future of the country – and the world. Which makes it incumbent on the rest of us to redouble our efforts to correct the record and spread knowledge.

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

Fox News Pushes for Lawless Tyranny in the White House: Tells Trump to Violate Judicial Rulings

Posted by on November 20, 2018 at 1:23 pm. 4 Comments :

The blatant biases of State TV (aka Fox News) have been well documented for many years. And particularly in the Era of Trump, their slobbering sycophancy has gone to extremes never before seen. But for most of that time they have confined their propaganda to slavishly supporting Donald Trump and falsely maligning his critics. Now they are upping their game.

Fox News, Lou Dobbs, Laura Ingraham

Throughout much of Trump’s presidency he has attempted to govern as if he had dictatorial powers. He has sidestepped Congress to issue more executive orders than any of his modern predecessors. He has interfered with ordinarily independent government agencies to impose his will. And he has implemented numerous policies that have been struck down by the courts as unconstitutional. And in all of these matters he insists that he has the ultimate power over whether his initiatives are carried out.

Now Trump is getting help from Fox News in his bid to become the American Fuhrer. A pair of court decisions has inflamed the network’s hosts to the point that they are openly advocating lawlessness on the part of the White House.

On Monday night, the embarrassingly brown-nosing Fox Business host, Lou Dobbs, presided over a discussion about the court decision forcing Trump to restore the press pass of CNN’s Jim Acosta. The White House’s original suspension of the pass was repudiated by most of the press corps, including the executives at Fox News (although not their on-air punditry). Following the court order, Trump issued a bizarre and unconstitutional decree that sought to enforce strict behavioral guidelines for reporters. But Dobbs and his guest Gregg Jarrett weren’t having any of it (video below):

Dobbs: Isn’t there a time where you have to just tell a district court judge to go to hell? I mean the idea that you have to follow the dicta of a district court judge and can’t make rules and can’t run the White House in the way that it has been run since time immemoriam.
Jarrett: There’s no freedom to be obnoxious and rude. There’s no freedom of the press to question the President. It’s a privilege to be there at the White House. And there are rules and norms that have always been followed. And now you’ve got a judge who has decided to expand due process beyond any resemblance of its intent.
Dobbs: He’s telling the President if the United States how to conduct business.
Jarrett: I agree with you. I would tell the judge to go to hell.

So these alleged “patriots” believe that “There’s no freedom of the press to question the President”? Apparently their constitutional education didn’t even make to the First Amendment. What’s more, they believe that they can simply tell judges to “go to hell”? That’s a form of ultra-rightist anarchy that is practiced in dictatorships, not constitutional republics. And now it’s openly advocated by Fox News, Trump’s designated media mouthpiece.

But that isn’t the end of it. Fox News host Laura Ingraham took a similar stand on different subject. Another recent court ruling found that Trump’s proposed restrictions on how and where immigrants can apply for asylum were unconstitutional. This pertains to the refugees that Trump falsely accused of being criminals and sent the military down to the border to prevent an imaginary “invasion.” In response to this ruling Ingraham lashed out saying that:

“These courts are out of control. […] Maybe it’s time to just defy these court orders and say, ‘Make me. Make me. We think your order is illegitimate.”

Once again, a Fox Newser is advising the President to violate the law, to act in contempt of court, and to impose his dictatorial will over the rule of law and the American people. This is beyond mere political advocacy. This is subjorning criminal acts. This is cheerleading for tyranny. This is profoundly disrespecting the principles enshrined in our nation’s Constitution.

And, not to be overlooked, this is being done with the full knowledge and approval of the network’s executives and owners. Fox News is acting in concert with the criminals in the White House and their accomplices in the Republican Nationalist Party.

This is a shockingly inappropriate abuse of the air waves and warrants an investigation by the FCC and the oversight committees in Congress. Just like yelling “Fire!” in a crowded theater is not protected free speech, compelling illegal acts on TV is not protected freedom of the press. If Sean Hannity were to look into the camera and tell his viewers to get their guns start shooting some Democrats he would be arrested immediately. This is the same thing. It’s a direct incitement to criminal activity. And Fox News needs to be held accountable.

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

HEY Trump Jr, Is Fox News Now Fake News Since They Nixed Daddy’s Racist Ad Too?

Posted by on November 5, 2018 at 1:35 pm. 2 Comments :

On last Saturday, Donald Trump, Jr posted a tweet that took CNN to task for declining to run a blatantly racist campaign ad for Daddy Trump. Lil’ Donnie wrote that “CNN refused to run this ad… I guess they only run fake news and won’t talk about real threats that don’t suit their agenda.”

Donald Trump Jr

Needless to say, the “real threats” to which he was referring were phony assertions that a “caravan” of poor and frightened Central American refugees were amassing to “invade” the United States to take your jobs and rape your daughters. But what Lil’ Trump was complaining about was the alleged media bias by CNN for refusing to accommodate the Racist-in-Chief by running the repulsive video. And his outrage was unambiguously expressed by condemning CNN as “fake” news with a presumably leftist agenda. But what will Trumpkin say now that Fox News has also banned the ad from both the Fox News and Fox Business networks? The announcement of this decision by Fox said that:

“Upon further review, Fox News pulled the ad yesterday and it will not appear on either Fox News Channel or Fox Business Network.”

This statement is something less than satisfying because it doesn’t bother to say what the “further review” uncovered that made the ad too objectionable to run. Also, Fox didn’t pull the ad until it had already aired fourteen times. But at least they eventually did the right thing and protected their audience from – well, from the rancid bigotry that their regular hosts disseminate every day anyway.

Trump was asked by reporters on Monday morning about the offensive ad and lied that he didn’t know anything about it. He literally tweeted it himself. Is he suffering from dementia? [Don’t bother answering that]. Elaborating, he said that:

“We have a lot of ads. They certainly are effective, based on the numbers that we’re seeing. … A lot of things are offensive. Your questions are offensive.”

So Trump is apparently conceding that he has a lot of offensive ads. But that’s alright as long as they are “effective” based on some uncorroborated (and probably fictitious) numbers. Then he goes on to play the child’s game of Rubber and Glue by calling the reporter’s questions offensive, without explaining why. Meanwhile, his child still hasn’t commented on the fact that their State TV affiliate (aka Fox News) banned the racist ad just like CNN did. I guess that news didn’t fit his wingnut, conspiracy theory agenda.

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