Of course he does. Trump makes his debut at the UN by threatening to destroy North Korea while at the same time calling Kim Jong Un by a ridiculous childish nickname. We’re living in a serial titled The Giant Toddler Who Destroyed the Earth.

“We meet at a time of immense promise and great peril,” Trump said in his maiden address to more than 150 international delegations at the annual U.N. General Assembly. “It is up to us whether we will lift the world to new heights or let it fall into a valley of disrepair.”

Oops. That was “despair,” Don. Do more rehearsals. The world is not a car that needs repair; it’s a little more complicated than that.… Read the rest

Frank Bruni is not amused by Sean Spicer’s gig at the Emmys.

[W]hat I and anyone else who tuned in to Hollywood’s latest self-congratulatory orgy on Sunday saw wasn’t good fun. It was bad news — a ringing, stinging confirmation that fame truly is its own reward and celebrity really does trump everything and redeem everyone.

Object of ridicule or object of reverence: Is there a difference? Not if you’re a household name, not if you’re a proven agent of ratings and not if you’re likely to deliver more of them. Our commander in chief took that crude philosophy to heart and rode it all the way to the White House. Sean Spicer took a page from the president and

Trump is off to the UN in the morning, because it’s General Assembly time.

…when Mr. Trump attends the first United Nations session of his presidency this coming week, all eyes will be on him as counterparts from around the globe crane their necks and slide through the crowd to snatch a handshake — and, in the process, try to figure out this most unusual of American leaders.

“The world is still trying to take the measure of this president,” said Jon B. Alterman, a senior vice president at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington and author of the speed-dating analogy. “For a number of leaders, this is going to be their first chance to see

Another low achieved.

President Trump retweeted a meme on Sunday morning that showed him hitting Hillary Clinton in the back with a golf ball, prompting another round of outrage from critics who felt the president’s tweets had once again crossed the line.

The animated GIF spliced together a clip of Trump swinging a golf club with footage of Clinton falling, apparently edited to appear as though a golf ball had struck her down.

The image was originally posted as a reply to the president by a Twitter user named @Fuctupmind, whose bio consists of pro-Trump, anti-Clinton hashtags.

“Donald Trump’s amazing golf swing #CrookedHillary,” the user wrote in the caption.

Yes, that’s what the US head of state should … Read the rest

It’s interesting how thoroughly terrible the protagonist of this character study is. The terribleness seeps everywhere and gets into all the corners and crevices and tiny little thumbtack holes. No possible terrible is overlooked.

Trump’s temper — honed over years as a public and political persona — hasn’t waned.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions bore the brunt of Trump’s most recently disclosed upbraiding. The New York Times reported this week that Trump, in front of multiple people, called his long-time supporter an “idiot.”

In the West Wing, Trump can be a temperamental commander-in-chief, prone to bursts of anger that dissipate as quickly as they came on. The rage is an extension of what many say they experienced on the campaign trail.

Trump probably got that stupid and venomous claim that the tube bombing was carried out by “sick and demented people who were in the sights of Scotland Yard” from Fox and Friends.

At 6:42 a.m., Mr. Trump tweeted that “sick and demented people who were in the sights of Scotland Yard” carried out the explosion, which left 29 people injured in the blast and ensuing panic. It was not clear where Mr. Trump had gotten that information, though 23 minutes earlier, “Fox and Friends,” a program Mr. Trump regularly watches, broadcast a report in which an outside security analyst said the London police probably already knew the identity of the attackers.

“Can someone tell Scotland Yard?” asked Brian Kilmeade,

David Graham at the Atlantic asks a necessary question – why is Trump so speedy at jumping to conclusions about what he takes to be Islamist terrorism and so slow and cautious about a bit of white supremacist terrorism caught on video?

For the second time in a month, President Trump has rushed to condemn a terrorist attack abroad as the work of Islamist terrorists, speaking out before the facts are known even to local officials. Trump’s remarks came just a day after he once again insisted he was right to cast blame on both sides after violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, in August. And they renew the question of why he is so quick to speak with such clarity in

Even Trump’s semi-friends, such as Theresa May, aren’t thanking him for his “proactive!” tweets.

British officials rebuked President Donald Trump on Friday for claiming that the individuals responsible for setting off explosives in the London subway had been “in the sights of” law enforcement who failed to be “proactive.”

Prime Minister Theresa May reproached Trump for his rhetoric in the wake of what police are investigating as a terrorist attack that injured at least 18 people.

“I never think it’s helpful for anybody to speculate on what is an ongoing investigation,” she said. “As I’ve just said, the police and security services are working to discover the full circumstances of this cowardly attack and to identify all those responsible.”

Trump is parading his id on Twitter again.

Another attack in London by a loser terrorist.These are sick and demented people who were in the sights of Scotland Yard. Must be proactive!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 15, 2017

Must be proactive! he says – meaning, no doubt, that once someone is “in the sights” of Scotland Yard (actually MI5), that someone should be arrested and held indefinitely, no matter how slim or shaky the evidence. Never mind human rights, never mind the law, never mind probabilities: when in doubt throw people in prison and leave them there.

Loser terrorists must be dealt with in a much tougher manner.The internet is their main recruitment tool which we must cut

Trump has returned to his “both sides” vomit.

Mr. Trump was characterizing his side of a conversation on Wednesday with Senator Tim Scott, Republican of South Carolina, during which Mr. Scott, the Senate’s only black Republican, said he confronted the president on his claim that “both sides” were responsible for the violence that followed a torchlight protest against the removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee.

“Especially in light of the advent of Antifa, if you look at what’s going on there, you know, you have some pretty bad dudes on the other side also,” Mr. Trump said, referring to the anti-fascist group that clashed with neo-Nazis and white supremacists.

But what you did not have was some … Read the rest