Oh christ. You think he can’t go any lower and then…

Our entire Nation, w/one heavy heart, continues to pray for the victims & their families in Parkland, FL. To teachers, law enforcement, first responders & medical professionals who responded so bravely in the face of danger: We THANK YOU for your courage! https://t.co/3yJsrebZMG pic.twitter.com/ti791dENTy

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 17, 2018

My god he is standing there grinning and doing a thumbs up gesture!

He’s standing by a victim’s hospital bed in a sea of forced grins for his photo op!

He’s clapping his hands!

He collected all the nearby staff and made them grin next to him and his horrible thumb!

And, to top it off, he … Read the rest

Trump is back at Mar-a-Lago, and on the way there he stopped off at a hospital in Pompano Beach that took in eight of the victims of Nikolas Cruze.

The president and Mrs. Trump, visited the Broward Health North Hospital “to pay their respects and thank the medical professionals for their life-saving assistance,” according to a statement related by a White House spokeswoman on Friday evening.

When asked if he met with victims, President Trump said: “Yes, I did. I did indeed.”

“It’s sad something like that could happen,” he said.

Mr. Trump did not respond when he was asked if gun laws needed to be changed. He then walked into another room.

The Trumps, according to the statement, were

Conor Friedersdorf reminds us that Trump specifically and explicitly promised that what happened at that Florida school yesterday would not happen under his regime.

In his inaugural address, Donald Trump declared, “This American carnage stops right here and stops right now.” He knew it would not. We know it did not.

“I’ll be able to make sure that when you walk down the street in your inner city, or wherever you are, you’re not going to be shot,” he declared during the campaign. “Your child isn’t going to be shot.” He has not been able to make sure of that––ask any parent whose children were caught up in any of the recent school shootings.

Trump gave those credulous enough to

Oops.

An adult film star who has been embroiled in allegations of an affair with President Donald Trump is free to tell her story, her manager has said.

Stormy Daniels is no longer bound by a non-disclosure contract after Mr Trump’s lawyer admitted he paid her, manager Gina Rodriguez says.

Mr Trump’s personal lawyer confirmed in a statement to media he privately paid Ms Daniels $130,000 (£95,000) in 2016.

Ms Rodriguez says that acknowledgement allows her client to speak freely.

Oopsie oops.… Read the rest

So Trump’s lawyer admits he paid Stephanie Clifford aka “Stormy Daniels” the 130k but says he wasn’t reimbursed by the Trump Organization or the Trump campaign. Ok but what about by Trump himself? That he doesn’t mention. Lawyers gonna lawyer.

Why, in his generosity, would Mr Cohen give $130,000 to Ms Daniels? The Wall Street Journal has reported that it was in exchange for a non-disclosure agreement about a decade-old affair between Mr Trump and Ms Daniels. Circumstantial evidence – that Ms Daniels had been in contact with media outlets prior to the transfer and has since gone silent – lends credence to this line.

But hey, maybe it was just a kind present from a nice man who wanted … Read the rest

The world according to Trump – science and scientific research should Just Go Away so that we can spend more and more and more billions on guns and subs and planes.

The Trump administration wants to eliminate a broad swath of the nation’s climate change research infrastructure, including satellites, education programs and science centers.

Though it has little chance of being enacted, the Trump administration’s budget proposal unveiled yesterday targets hundreds of millions of dollars in climate science, renewable energy research and climate mitigation efforts across a variety of federal agencies, including NASA, NOAA, U.S. EPA and the departments of the Interior and Energy.

Because why try to slow and mitigate the effects of climate change? Why not just party … Read the rest

Eugene Robinson at the Post underlines what we’ve always known: Trump was always lying to his “base.” Of course he was. Trump is a corrupt real estate marketer who defrauds his contractors; what does he care about the working class?

Voters who thought President Trump would at least try to fulfill his populist, America-first campaign promises were cynically and cruelly deceived. Trump placates these supporters with rhetoric, distracts them with cultural warfare and encourages them to seek refuge in cultural chauvinism. What he doesn’t do for them is deliver.

Well he does deliver on the racist rhetoric and policies. Maybe watching people being deported is compensation enough?

So is there more money for everybody? No, not for programs that

Oh look, Wray tells us that Trump and his gang have been lying about when they knew about Rob Porter.

Christopher A. Wray, the F.B.I. director, contradicted on Tuesday the White House timeline about the domestic abuse scandal involving Rob Porter, the president’s former staff secretary. Mr. Wray said that the bureau delivered to the White House a partial report on problems in Mr. Porter’s background in March, months earlier than the White House has admitted receiving the information.

In March. They’ve known for nearly a year.

Wray just contradicted WH timeline on Porter saying FBI “completed background investigation in late July.” WH spox Shah said last week background investigation was “ongoing.” pic.twitter.com/1keHbXUJZu

— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) February 13,

Of course. Trump and his gang want to get rid of food stamps and replace them with a box of “staples” of the kind that exclude all perishables i.e. fresh vegetables and fruit, milk, cheese, eggs – you know, anything you’d actually want to eat.

The Trump administration wants to slash food aid to low-income families and make up the difference with a box of canned goods — a change that Office of Management and budget director Mick Mulvaney described in a Monday briefing as a “Blue Apron-type program.”

“What we do is propose that for folks who are on food stamps, part — not all, part — of their benefits come in the actual sort of, and I don’t

These people.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders was tasked Monday with explaining President Trump’s sympathetic comments about alleged spouse abuser Rob Porter. It went about as well as might be expected.

Sanders beat back one question after another about why Trump has suggested that Porter might be innocent but has said nothing about the domestic violence of which Porter stands accused. Then she was asked why Trump opted to go even a step further and wish Porter success in his career — a comment that seemed odd given that this is a man accused of horrible things.

Behold the spin:

“I think the president of the United States hopes that all Americans can be successful in

Don’t forget, Trump knows nothing of Russia, never had any dealings with Russians, never did any business there, just dropped in for a few minutes to grope the pussies at the Miss Universe Pajjunt.

Whatever you do don’t retweet this video I found of Trump, it could make him furious. It’s him in Russia talking about building Trump Tower Moscow. He’s sitting next to a Russian billionaire who’s close to Putin. In 2013.#DworkinReport #DworkinDossier
pic.twitter.com/HoOISzAtq7

— Scott Dworkin (@funder) February 11, 2018

… Read the rest

I was thinking of Rachel Brand’s departure as another humiliation for Trump, but that appears to be wrong.

I admire #RachelBrand, but I can’t admire her leaving #RodRosenstein exposed to the corrupt, self-serving @realDonaldTrump for the private rewards of a multi-million dollar Walmart post, with SCOTUS prospects dangling like sugar plums in her future. I wish she’d stayed and fought

— Laurence Tribe (@tribelaw) February 10, 2018

Going to Walmart did seem like a squalid option, but I didn’t push it beyond that.

I agree. I can’t help but wonder if the WH secretly coordinated this “once in a lifetime” offer with Walmart as payback for the Tax Cut that benefitted the company and Walton family untold billions of

Trump today.

Peoples lives are being shattered and destroyed by a mere allegation. Some are true and some are false. Some are old and some are new. There is no recovery for someone falsely accused – life and career are gone. Is there no such thing any longer as Due Process?

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 10, 2018

A response.

CC: The Central Park Five https://t.co/ibVneLAdrA

— Ben Jacobs (@Bencjacobs) February 10, 2018

The Times on Trump and the Central Park Five in October 2016:

Donald J. Trump rarely apologizes. When it comes to the case of the Central Park Five, he has never even come close.

In 1989, after these black and Latino teenagers from Harlem were

Michelle Goldberg is forced to conclude that the Trump administration thinks violence against women just doesn’t matter all that much.

Even if you put aside questions of morality — which most people working for Donald Trump have already done — a staff secretary who can’t qualify for a security clearance because of his personal life is a serious security risk. Among other things, such a person could be subject to blackmail.

The staff secretary reads everything that goes to the president’s desk; it’s one of the most sensitive jobs in government. Rajesh De served as Barack Obama’s staff secretary from 2010 to 2012, after which he joined the National Security Agency as general counsel. “I was exposed to a

More thoughts on Trump’s parade-envy.

We should note that while Trump was impressed with the Bastille Day parade he attended in France, he has been hoping for a military parade for a lot longer. As Trump told The Post before taking office a year ago:

“That military may come marching down Pennsylvania Avenue. That military may be flying over New York City and Washington, D.C., for parades. I mean, we’re going to be showing our military.”

I remember that. I think I probably ranted about it here. I remember the disgust I felt.

The news of this urgent parade mobilization comes just after Trump complained at a rally that Democrats who failed to applaud sufficiently for him during the

Oh christ.

Trump wants a military parade.

President Trump’s vision of soldiers marching and tanks rolling down the boulevards of Washington is moving closer to reality in the Pentagon and White House, where officials say they have begun to plan a grand military parade later this year showcasing the might of America’s armed forces.

Just like China! And Russia! And Nazi Germany!

Shows of military strength are not typical in the United States — and they don’t come cheap. The cost of shipping Abrams tanks and high-tech hardware to Washington could run in the millions, and military officials said it was unclear how they would pay for it.

And why would we do it? What for? It’s well … Read the rest

The first Roosevelt president, Theodore, in May 1918, when Woodrow Wilson was in the office:

The President is merely the most important among a large number of public servants. He should be supported or opposed exactly to the degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the Nation as a whole. Therefore it is absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right. Any other attitude in an American citizen is both base and servile. To