Tag: Trump

  • He’s a deranged animal

    Trump tells more vicious disgusting lies about Obama.

    President Trump falsely asserted on Monday that his predecessor, Barack Obama, and other presidents did not contact the families of American troops killed in duty, drawing a swift, angry rebuke from several of Mr. Obama’s former aides.

    That’s a foul thing to say, especially for that puffed-up bladder of a man who insulted the parents of a Muslim soldier killed in action in Iraq during the campaign.

    I’m so sick of malicious lies. People have been telling malicious lies about me today so I’m in a filthy mood, but I’m sick of them anyway. Malicious lies ruin everything.

    Trump was asked why he hadn’t said anything in public about four soldiers killed in an ambush in Niger last week.

    Mr. Trump said he had written personal letters to their families and planned to call them in the coming week.

    “If you look at President Obama and other presidents, most of them didn’t make calls,” Mr. Trump said during a news conference in the Rose Garden with the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell. “A lot of them didn’t make calls. I like to call when it’s appropriate.”

    Mr. Trump’s assertion belied a long record of meetings Mr. Obama held with the families of killed service people, as well as calls and letters. Mr. Obama regularly traveled to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware to greet the caskets of troops, a ritual that began early in his presidency before he decided to deploy 30,000 troops to Afghanistan.

    “This is an outrageous and disrespectful lie even by Trump standards,” Benjamin J. Rhodes, a former deputy national security adviser to Mr. Obama, posted on Twitter. “Also,” Mr. Rhodes added, “Obama never attacked a Gold Star family.”

    Precisely.

    Another former aide put it even more forcefully.

    When Mr. Trump was pressed a few minutes later about his claim about Mr. Obama, he waffled.

    “I don’t know if he did,” the president said. “I was told he didn’t often, and a lot of presidents don’t. They write letters.”

    “President Obama, I think, probably did sometimes and maybe sometimes he didn’t,” Mr. Trump continued. “That’s what I was told. All I can do is ask my generals.”

    The lying rat.

  • Aides running around with red faces

    How the employees of the Pennsylvania Avenue adult day care center spend their days:

    When Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) described the White House as “an adult day-care center” on Twitter last week, he gave voice to a certain Trumpian truth: The president is often impulsive, mercurial and difficult to manage, leading those around him to find creative ways to channel his energies.

    Some Trump aides spend a significant part of their time devising ways to rein in and control the impetuous president, angling to avoid outbursts that might work against him, according to interviews with 18 aides, confidants and outside advisers, most of whom insisted on anonymity to speak candidly.

    Toys? Shiny things? Great big trucks? Trips to tropical islands?

    “If you visit the White House today, you see aides running around with red faces, shuffling paper and trying to keep up with this president,” said one Republican in frequent contact with the administration. “That’s what the scene is.”

    …

    One defining feature of managing Trump is frequent praise, which can leave his team in what seems to be a state of perpetual compliments. The White House pushes out news releases overflowing with top officials heaping flattery on Trump; in one particularly memorable Cabinet meeting this year, each member went around the room lavishing the president with accolades.

    That’s got to be massively demoralizing. It’s not possible to be compelled to do that kind of thing without feeling revulsion. They must feel like puking every time they do it.

    Especially in the early days of his presidency, aides delivered the president daily packages of news stories filled with positive coverage and Trump began meetings by boasting about his performance, either as president or in winning the White House, according to one person who attended several Oval Office gatherings with him.

    Thus helping to make sure that he has no idea of the truth of the matter, which is that more people hate him harder with every minute that passes.

    “I know for a fact that every single day at the White House, it’s a situation of trying to contain him,” Corker said, adding later that most GOP lawmakers “understand the volatility that we’re dealing with and the tremendous amount of work that it takes by people around him to keep him in the middle of the road.”

    Trump seems to hold many Republican lawmakers, and some members of his own Cabinet, in similarly low regard. Several people who have met with Trump in recent weeks said he has a habit of mocking other officials in Washington, especially fellow Republicans.

    In a meeting at the White House last month with House and Senate leaders from both parties, for instance, Trump upset Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) by cutting a deal with Democrats. In subsequent days behind closed doors, the president mocked the reactions of McConnell and Ryan from the meeting with an exaggerated crossing of his arms and theatrical frowns.

    His constant scowl, on the other hand, is dignified and Pwesidenshul.

  • Don 2 is outraged

    The Washington Post points out that Trumps seem to be peculiarly talented at bashing others for faults they excel at. Trump’s label “Crooked Hillary” is the classic of the genre but there are many.

    Two of the president’s children complained about the “viciousness” of politics, defending a father who redefined viciousness as a candidate. Trump himself accused San Juan’s mayor of politicizing tragedy, despite his own tendency to do the same — repeatedly. The White House said ESPN’s Jemele Hill should be fired for calling Trump a “white supremacist,” even as Trump had called President Barack Obama a racist. It has also said attacking Trump is “unpatriotic,” despite Trump’s questioning Obama’s very legitimacy as president. And on and on.

    It’s very grating, that kind of thing. We get tired of exclaiming “do you have any moral self-awareness at all?!”

    But even by its standards, going there on Democrats and Harvey Weinstein is pretty brazen.

    Donald Trump Jr. has been tweeting about Weinstein for the better part of the past week:

    Trump Jr.’s arguments seem to boil down to two things: 1) Weinstein is clearly guilty, given the volume of accusers, and 2) Hollywood and Democrats are too willing to stand up for — or at least too reluctant to criticize — Weinstein.

    Does that sound like anyone in Don Junior’s family? Why yes, it sounds like Daddy!

    Eleven women came forward before the 2016 election to accuse Trump of touching them without consent, and although many Republicans initially rebuked Trump, upon his election, the party has stood by him in almost total lock-step. There are plenty of other similarities, too, including Trump and Weinstein both allegedly abusing their public stature, as well as recordings of Trump and Weinstein talking about sexually harassing women.

    Maybe he thinks it’s like setting a fire to stop a fire. Or, more likely, he doesn’t think at all.

  • You can grab them by the pussy AMEN

    What do they even think they’re talking about? Values Voters, good old days, Creator, spiritual revival – what does any of that have to do with Donald you can grab them by the pussy Trump? What?

    But for many evangelicals and conservative Catholics, “Make America Great Again” meant above all else returning to a time when the culture reflected and revolved around their Judeo-Christian values. When there was prayer in public schools. When marriage was limited to one man and one woman. When abortion was not prevalent and socially acceptable. When the government didn’t ask them to violate their consciences. And, yes, when people said “Merry Christmas” instead of “Happy Holidays.”

    We know, but what does that have to do with Trump?

    Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, the conservative group that organizes the Values Voter Summit, says Trump’s greatest impact is legitimizing those people and views that have been marginalized. “Barack Obama used the bully pulpit and the courts to demonize those who held to the very values that made America great. And Trump is doing the opposite,” Perkins says.

    Really? What values? Racism? Racist murder? Did Obama use the bully pulpit to demonize those who held to the very values that made America great when he gave the eulogy for Clementa Pinckney in Charleston? Is Trump doing the opposite when he takes health insurance away from millions, when he insults people on Twitter, when he uses his office to enrich himself and his family?

    What does Tony Perkins even think he’s talking about?

    “It was never about the Ten Commandments; it was about the God who gave the Ten Commandments,” [Roy] Moore said. “We forget that what they really want to do in this land is remove the knowledge of God. That won’t happen, as far as I can see, because I think the people of God are rising up in this land today. In 2016 we were given a new lease, a new reason, and it’s upon us now.”

    A new lease? By the most cynical, self-serving, greedy, ruthless, belligerent, dishonest person most of us have ever seen in public office (or anywhere else)? What does Roy Moore think he means?

    Seated at the rear of the room, John and Jill Stabley nodded along. The older married couple from Delaware have attended the Values Voter Summit seven previous times, but this year feels different. “Suddenly hopeful,” Jill says. “We grew up in an era where people were thinking of others, and trying to do the right thing—.”

    And Obama turned us away from that, and Trump is restoring us? She thinks Trump is about thinking of others while Obama was not? Seriously?

    Many Christian voters embraced Trump not despite his provocative style but because of it, betting on a brash street brawler to win the culture battles they had been losing for generations. And their faith has been rewarded: From abortion policy to religious liberty to judicial appointments, Trump has delivered for social conservatives more than any other constituency, making them the unlikely cornerstone of his coalition.

    With political victory, however, has come the loss of moral high ground for a faithful whose church-averse champion personifies much of what their scripture condemns. It’s a trade-off plenty of conservative Christians, reeling from eight years in which they felt ostracized and demeaned by Obama, the media and popular culture, have proven eager to accept.

    So it’s not really the moral high ground they care about, it’s the domination. Helpful of them to make it so clear.

  • Downward

    The Guardian is watching Trump’s death spiral.

    Trump’s decision to go it alone with rapid fire announcements on healthcare and Iran reflects his boiling frustration with the limits of presidential power, analysts say.

    That’s just more of his stupidity. He should have learned something about presidential power before he decided to grab it.

    The US president made a brazen move on Thursday night to halt payments to insurers under Barack Obama’s healthcare law. Democrats accused him of a “temper tantrum” and spiteful attempt to sabotage legislation he promised but failed to replace…

    The one-two punch showed Trump straining to assail Obama’s legacy but stopping short of terminating either the Affordable Care Act, known as Obamacare, or the Iran nuclear accord. Both are back in the hands of Congress, a source of constant exasperation for the property tycoon turned novice politician, who finds himself isolated and lashing out.

    He apparently thought it would be like a fairy tale: give an order and the thing is done. He apparently never bothered to learn otherwise. He apparently walked into a situation he didn’t understand and is now in a rage with everyone else as a result.

    Since taking office 10 months ago as the first US president with no previous political or military experience, Trump has been given a crash course in the workings of government and the delicate balance of power between the White House, Capitol Hill and the courts. That his writ only runs so far has come as a rude awakening.

    It’s like signing up for a cruise and then exclaiming “It’s a big ship, it goes on the water!!”

    It shouldn’t have been a rude awakening to learn that he doesn’t have absolute power.

    The intervention [on subsidies], however, could backfire. It was condemned by Democrats including the House minority leader, Nancy Pelosi, who told reporters: “The president single-handedly decided to raise America’s health premiums for no reason other than spite and cruelty.” Senator Chris Murphy tweeted: “Trump’s decision to stop ACA payments is nuclear grade bananas, a temper tantrum that sets the entire health system on fire. My god.”

    …

    Trump has previously blamed the lack of healthcare fixes on Obama or Congress, but he now he risks being held personally responsible for cutting the system off at the knees. Robert Shrum, a Democratic consultant, said: “The healthcare thing is madness in both policy and politics. He’s wilful, he’s angry, he’s clearly lashing out.”

    And he’s lashing out by deliberately with malice making it much more difficult for not-rich people to pay for health insurance. He’s in a temper, so millions of people have to lose their health insurance. Seems fair.

    McMullin agreed that Trump seemed rattled by the recent criticisms from Tillerson, Corker and Barrack. “He probably understands their remarks represent a new stage of acceptance setting in across the country, even among his supporters, that he is unfit and incapable.

    “That, I think, is inspiring his accelerated efforts to throw red meat to his base to shore up their support. I expect that to continue, if not intensify, and to result in increasing political challenges for the GOP as 2017 and 2018 elections approach and in years to come.”

    In other words we’re in a death spiral. He’s doing worse and worse, so people are pointing that out, so he’s unraveling, so he “throws red meat to his base” i.e. does horrible things, so people say he’s more horrible than ever, so he unravels further, and down we spiral.

    It’s going to get worse and worse and worse.

  • Breaking ALL the toys

    The occupant of the Adult Day Care Center on Pennsylvania Avenue continued his campaign of destruction by “disavowing” the deal with Iran. The adults on the other side of the Atlantic are not filled with admiration.

    Iran, Russia and European leaders roundly condemned President Trump’s decision on Friday to disavow the Iran nuclear deal, saying that it reflected the growing isolation of the United States, threatened to destabilize the Middle East and could make it harder to resolve the growing tensions on the Korean peninsula.

    Russia. Cue hollow laughter.

    Though they avoided direct criticism of Mr. Trump, Prime Minister Theresa May of Britain, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and President Emmanuel Macron of France said in a rare joint statement that they “stand committed” to the 2015 nuclear deal and that preserving it was “in our shared national security interest.”

    “The nuclear deal was the culmination of 13 years of diplomacy and was a major step towards ensuring that Iran’s nuclear program is not diverted for military purposes,” they added.

    Yes but Trump is a brainless child, so he doesn’t care about that. He just wants to undo what the grownups did.

    Saudi Arabia, which has waged a proxy battle against Iran for supremacy in the region and was the first country Mr. Trump visited after taking office, said it welcomed what it called a “new U.S. strategy” toward Iran.

    Ah well as long as Saudi Arabia approves who cares what Germany, France, and the UK think?

    Some leaders declared that the deal, reached in 2015 between Iran and six world powers, including the United States, was not something that Mr. Trump could cancel, contending that Mr. Trump was essentially putting on a show for his political base.

    “The president of the United States has many powers — not this one,” the European Union’s top diplomat, Federica Mogherini, said at a news conference in Brussels.

    She said that there had been no violations of the agreement and that the world could not afford to dismantle an accord that “is working and delivering,” especially at a time of “acute nuclear threat,” referring to the standoff with North Korea over its nuclear program.

    Oh well. A few humans might survive.

  • A good time to remember each one

    Judd Legum:

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    End of list. Those are the women who have gone public.

  • Pious hopes

    Think Progress on a new report from Brookings on Trump’s likely probable apparent obstruction of justice:

    [T]he Brookings report — authored by Barry H. Berke, Noah Bookbinder, and Norman L. Eisen — argues that same wheeler dealer attitude coupled with Trump’s demands for loyalty, which helped make him famous on The Apprentice, could also land him in the hot seat and lead to obstruction of justice charges down the road.

    The report outlines the many ways in which Trump could find himself faced with such charges, due to his many alleged attempts to influence federal investigations into Russian interference in the 2016 election, as well as an investigation into former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. Notably, the report explains, those charges do not hinge on whether or not the president was successful in his alleged attempts.

    “Attempts to stop an investigation represent a common form of obstruction,” the report reads. “While those defending the president may claim that expressing a ‘hope’ that an investigation will end is too vague to constitute obstruction, we show that such language is sufficient to do so.”

    One would hope that such a claim would be too absurd to get any traction.

    Efforts to impede an investigation fall squarely within three U.S. Obstruction of Justice Statutes (18 U.S.C, Sections 1503, 1505 and 1512), all of which were drafted “with an eye to ‘the variety of corrupt methods by which the proper administration of justice may be impeded or thwarted’”, the report explains. In other words, Trump didn’t need to directly ask Comey to drop his investigations to be breaking the law, and vague expressions of “hope”, and of coming to a mutual understanding, do not override his intent.

    What’s more, the authors argue, it is essential to take into account the president’s position of power. “When a supervisor tells her direct report that she ‘hopes’ the employee finishes a task over the weekend…it is a directive,” the authors write. “Similarly when the president of the United States clears the room and tells the FBI director that he ‘hopes’ the director can ‘let go’ an investigation he has repeatedly disparaged…would appear to convey more than just the president’s idle fancies.”

    It seems to me that Comey made it very clear that that’s how he understood Trump’s “hopes.”

    Courts have repeatedly found the word “hope” does not excuse defendants from obstruction of justice charges. During the case of Jose Luis Bedoy, a corrupt Dallas Police detective, the court found that his statement to a prostitute of, “I’m just hoping that you haven’t told anyone anything…Like ya know, talking or anything like that”, was an attempt to impede an investigation into the officer’s corruption. In U.S. v.s McDonald, 1999, an obstruction of justice charge stuck when a defendant told his co-defendant “I hope and pray to God you did not say anything about a weapon when you were in Iowa.”

    The theory Trump is obstructing justice by “hoping” charges get dropped is further reinforced by his continual demands for loyalty, as well as his allusions to a quid pro quo with Comey (“We had that thing you know”).

    “Courts have held that statements emphasizing loyalty and urging it in return can constitute obstruction,” the paper reads. “Where a person suggests a benefit to someone for the purpose of impeding an investigation, or otherwise alludes to a quid pro quo relationship, it can be a contributing fact to determining whether conduct constitutes obstruction.”

    Meanwhile, though, the best HOPE is that Trump will be removed as unfit long before Mueller’s investigation is complete.

  • Trump orders us to say “Christmas”

    President Pussygrabber spent his morning at a thing called the “Values Voter Summit.” So I guess the Values in question include sexual assault, bragging about sexual assault, lying about bragging about sexual assault, lying about everything, ensuring that only the rich will be able to afford health insurance, calling people rude names in public, shoving people, bullying, fraud, cheating, theft, corruption, bribery, treason?

    Trump dove into America’s culture wars on Friday, touting his administration for “returning moral clarity to our view of the world” and ending “attacks on Judeo-Christian values.”

    Moral clarity. Moral clarity. That guy. That guy who insults and attacks – in full public view – anyone who challenges him or criticizes him or simply annoys him. That guy who lied all over tv for years about Obama’s birth certificate. That guy who said the white supremacists who marched in Charlottesville included good people. That guy who picked a fight with the mayor of San Juan during a natural disaster. That guy who told Puerto Rico FEMA would be withdrawn. That guy who lies about everything. That guy who talks about himself and his grievances and his awesomeness when he’s supposed to be talking about a hurricane or racist violence or nuclear war or any of a thousand things a president is expected to talk about. Moral clarity.

    And the audience at the Values Voter Summit, an annual socially conservative conference, didn’t fail to deliver.

    Why? Why didn’t they fail to deliver? Even as social conservatives, why would they cheer that man? That moral cesspool?

    Because Christmas.

    “We are stopping cold the attacks on Judeo-Christian values,” Trump said to applause, before slamming people who don’t say “Merry Christmas.”

    “They don’t use the word Christmas because it is not politically correct,” Trump said, complaining that department stores will use red and Christmas decorations but say “Happy New Year.” “We’re saying Merry Christmas again.”

    The comment drew thunderous applause.

    Well. One, that’s idiotic, because it’s so trivial and so irrelevant to morality or Moral Clarity.

    Two, it’s cynical, for the same reason.

    Three – he’s simply lying again. No, they are not “stopping cold the attacks on Judeo-Christian values.” They can’t. They don’t have the authority to do that; the Constitution doesn’t allow them to do that. Pussygrabber Trump can’t force department stores to put up Merry Christmas signs, and he can’t force us to say it. He can’t prevent us from saying we hate Christianity if we feel like it, or from explaining why. He can’t stop our thoughts and words cold.

    Editing to add a helpful screengrab to document his threat to abandon Puerto Rico:

    Image may contain: 3 people

  • Trump to Puerto Rico: drop dead

    Trump is also bullying Puerto Rico again, because why wouldn’t you bully 3 million people on an island devastated by a hurricane? What’s it all for if you can’t have that kind of fun?

    President Trump suggested again on Thursday that Puerto Rico bore some of the blame for its current crisis following twin hurricanes, and warned that there were limits to how long he would keep troops and federal emergency workers on the island to help.

    Mr. Trump, who has been criticized for a slow and not always empathetic response to the storms that ravaged the United States territory, sounded off in a series of early-morning Twitter posts. Angry about the criticism, he has sought to refocus blame to where he believes it belongs — the leadership of the island itself, which in his view mismanaged its affairs long before the winds blew apart its infrastructure.

    “‘Puerto Rico survived the Hurricanes, now a financial crisis looms largely of their own making.’ says Sharyl Attkisson,” he wrote, citing the host of a public affairs show on Sinclair Broadcast Group television stations. “A total lack of accountability say the Governor. Electric and all infrastructure was disaster before hurricanes. Congress to decide how much to spend. We cannot keep FEMA, the Military & the First Responders, who have been amazing (under the most difficult circumstances) in P.R. forever!”

    Yeah yeah yeah – but really it’s because they’re brown and Spanish-speaking. He can’t be doing with people who aren’t pale and English-speaking.

    While some sort of normalcy has been restored in San Juan, residents of the more isolated interior municipalities were still struggling with a precarious health situation and problems with aid distribution. Although 86 percent of supermarkets are now open, the government could not ensure that they were fully stocked with food and water.

    Despite Mr. Trump’s tweets, administration officials said the federal government would be helping Puerto Rico recover from storm damage for years. The Federal Emergency Management Agency posted its own message on Twitter: “.@FEMA will be w/Puerto Rico, USVI, every state, territory impacted by a disaster every day, supporting throughout their response & recovery.”

    It’s a fine thing when FEMA has to correct a president who claims we’re going to abandon people in peril after a hurricane.

    Other agencies were committed to long-term efforts as well. The United States Army Corps of Engineers, for example, is helping rebuild the electrical grid badly damaged by the storm, a construction effort that could take years. In addition, other agencies helping in recovery efforts, like the Coast Guard and Customs and Border Protection, have a permanent presence on the island and are unlikely to go anywhere.

    As for Mr. Trump’s assertion that he could not keep “first responders” on the island forever, one official called it nonsense. Such responders include police officers, firefighters and paramedics from localities around the United States who are not under the control of the president.

    Well maybe Trump can pass some kind of emergency decree to get them all sent home.

    Mr. Trump’s tweets left his advisers in the awkward position of trying to explain what he meant or distancing themselves from his apparent meaning. At a House hearing on Thursday, Ben Carson, the secretary of housing and urban development, seemed deeply uncomfortable under questioning from Representative Maxine Waters of California, a Democrat who pressed him on whether he agreed with the president.

    “So you don’t agree that it should be abandoned, is that right?” she asked.

    “Of course it should not be abandoned,” he replied.

    “Should they be shamed for its own plight?” she asked.

    “I don’t think it is beneficial to go around shaming people in general,” he said.

    Tell your boss.

  • In order to demean and denigrate

    So now the narcissistic no theory of mind jackass is actually complaining that the news media are demeaning and denigrating him. He of all people!

    “Such hatred!” Exclaims the biggest hater who has ever held that office – the shame of the nation – the meanest man I for one have ever encountered anywhere, let alone as president.

    It’s so repellent, this bleating and whining from the Chief Bully.

    • “Crooked Hillary”
    • “Pocahontas”
    • “Cryin’ Chuck”
    • “Liddle Bob Corker”
    • Alicia Machado
    • Jeff Sessions
    • James Comey
    • Duško Marković

    To name only a few.

    Action shot:

    NPR has a story from his past that illustrates further.

    Trump bought a golf course in Rancho Palos Verdes, California, in 2002.

    A year after he arrived in Rancho Palos Verdes, Trump sued the local public school district over a land dispute. The Palos Verdes Peninsula Unified School District had essentially been leasing part of its land to the previous owner of the golf course. When Trump took ownership of the property — and thus took over that agreement — he fought the district over how much that land was worth, and when the golf course would start paying fees. In late 2003, Trump sued.

    Ira Toibin, the superintendent of the school district at the time, says the district worried about the lawsuit’s effect on its budget, especially when the schools needed to make repairs to aging facilities. After almost a year, Toibin says, the lawsuit had cost the district at least $100,000 in legal fees — the equivalent of two teachers’ annual salaries.

    Trump could of course have decided not to sue a school district, because hey, school district.

    Attorney Milan Smith, who represented the school district in the lawsuit, “just rubbed [Trump] the wrong way,” Toibin says.

    Smith also had some choice words for the future president.

    In an interview at the time with the Easy Reader News, a small Southern California news outlet, Smith called Trump “pompous” and “arrogant.”

    “I have never had any contact with any human being who appears to be so self-absorbed and so impressed with himself,” Smith said, according to the Easy Reader. “He’s kind of like a big bag of wind.”

    Interesting, isn’t it? Because that’s how he strikes most of us now, too.

    They settled eventually.

    The money was settled, but for Trump, the grievance with attorney Milan Smith was not. And when Trump had a chance to revisit the lawsuit in front of the media, residents and local officials, he took it.

    It was supposed to be a day of celebration on Jan. 14, 2005: Trump was hosting a ribbon-cutting for new luxury homes at the golf club. About a half-dozen TV cameras from outlets like CNBC and E! Entertainment Television stood in the back of a packed room, their lenses on Trump, who sat alongside the hopeful and excited local mayor and members of City Council.

    Then Trump started talking about the old lawsuit and called Smith “an obnoxious asshole.”

    Again – that from him. Donald Trump calling someone else an obnoxious asshole.

    There was a debate over the size of the 70-foot-tall flagpole that Trump erected at the golf course in 2006 to fly the American flag. A year later, Trump grew 10-foot ficus trees to block houses he thought were ugly. Those plants blocked residents’ views of the ocean, which [affect] property values in the area.

    In an effort to mediate the shrubbery dispute, members of the City Council went with Trump to visit one of the homeowners. According to a former City Council member, who was not there but heard about the meeting through colleagues, Trump walked in, “looks around the place and he looks at [the homeowner] and he says, ‘This looks like shit.’ ”

    “And then he’s doing this, by the way, in order to get these people to accept his offer of putting up his ficus trees and being OK,” former councilman Steve Wolowicz says. “Gives you a little insight to the kind of person that he — he appeared to be.”

    Appeared to be, and was, and still is.

  • He hates us, precious

    Gabriel Sherman at Vanity Fair says the wheels are coming off. It’s seemed that way all along, but at the same time it’s also been steadily getting worse.

    He says Corker’s interview with the Times

    brought into the open what several people close to the president have recently told me in private: that Trump is “unstable,” “losing a step,” and “unraveling.”

    The conversation among some of the president’s longtime confidantes, along with the character of some of the leaks emerging from the White House has shifted. There’s a new level of concern…

    In recent days, I spoke with a half dozen prominent Republicans and Trump advisers, and they all describe a White House in crisis as advisers struggle to contain a president who seems to be increasingly unfocused and consumed by dark moods. Trump’s ire is being fueled by his stalled legislative agenda and, to a surprising degree, by his decision last month to back the losing candidate Luther Strange in the Alabama Republican primary. “Alabama was a huge blow to his psyche,” a person close to Trump said. “He saw the cult of personality was broken.”

    I hope it’s true. He has no theory of mind, though, so I’m not sure he’s capable of seeing that the cult of personality is broken. He thinks he’s awesome so he thinks everyone thinks he’s awesome, because everyone thinks what he things, because what else is there?

    According to two sources familiar with the conversation, Trump vented to his longtime security chief, Keith Schiller, “I hate everyone in the White House! There are a few exceptions, but I hate them!” (A White House official denies this.)

    Could be a new ratchet – or could just be more of the same.

  • It’s frankly disgusting

    Press conference, Oval Office. Justin Trudeau and the fucking moron answered questions. Trump said he thinks it’s frankly disgusting that the press gets to say whatever it wants to – you know, what the rest of us call freedom of the press, as spelled out in the First Amendment to the Constitution.

    Q: Do you want to increase the nuclear arsenal?

    PRESIDENT TRUMP: No, I never discussed increasing it. I want it in perfect shape. That was just fake news by NBC, which gives a lot of fake news, lately. No, I never discuss — I think somebody said I want ten times the nuclear weapons that we have right now. Right now, we have so many nuclear weapons. I want them in perfect condition, perfect shape. That’s the only thing I’ve ever discussed. General Mattis put out a statement, or is putting out a statement, saying that that was fake news — that it was just mentioned that way. And it’s, frankly, disgusting the way the press is able to write whatever they want to write. And people should look into it. No, I want to have absolutely perfectly maintained — which we are in the process of doing — nuclear force. But when they said I want ten times what we have right now, it’s totally unnecessary. Believe me. Because I know what we have right now.

    Bolding mine.

    Q: Mr. President, do you think there should be limits on what the press should write?

    TRUMP: No, the press should speak more honestly. I mean, I’ve seen tremendously dishonest press. It’s not even a question of distortion, like the question that was just asked before about ten times the nuclear capability. I know the capability that we have, believe me, and it is awesome.

    He’s bragging about knowing the secrets. “I know, believe me, because I’m that important.

    It is massive. And so when they make up stories like that, that’s just made up. And the generals will tell you that. And then they have their sources that don’t exist. In my opinion, they don’t exist. They make up the sources. There are no sources. Any other question?

    Yet Trump is a habitual liar, so why should we believe him here? Aaron Blake annotates the claim that Mattis put out a statement “saying that was fake news”:

    Mattis’s denial isn’t as complete as Trump leads us to believe. Mattis said Trump never “called for” the nuclear arsenal increase. NBC reported that Trump “said he wanted” such an increase, but that it was never acted upon.

    Quibbling, in other words.

    Q: Are you on the same page on North Korea?

    Meaning, as Tillerson.

    TRUMP: I think I have a little bit different attitude on North Korea than other people might have.

    Q: And your Secretary?

    TRUMP: And I listen to everybody, but ultimately my attitude is the one that matters, isn’t it? That’s the way it works. That’s the way the system is.

    There he is again, the toddler narcissist. Iym thuh bawss!

    But I think I might have a somewhat different attitude and a different way than other people. I think perhaps I feel stronger and tougher on that subject than other people, but I listen to everybody.

    He’s so unusual and fascinating, don’t you find?

  • Maybe we need to explain the whole world

    Ah so that’s why Tillerson said Trump is a fucking moron – it’s because he was shown a graphic of the reduction in the US nuclear arsenal and he promptly said ew that’s no good we need MOAR. I guess he’s not aware of the nuclear arms reduction treaty we have with Russia. Seems pretty basic for a president, but whatever.

    President Donald Trump said he wanted what amounted to a nearly tenfold increase in the U.S. nuclear arsenal during a gathering this past summer of the nation’s highest-ranking national security leaders, according to three officials who were in the room.

    Trump’s comments, the officials said, came in response to a briefing slide he was shown that charted the steady reduction of U.S. nuclear weapons since the late 1960s. Trump indicated he wanted a bigger stockpile, not the bottom position on that downward-sloping curve.

    “Line go up, not down. UP. BIG UP.”

    According to the officials present, Trump’s advisers, among them the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, were surprised. Officials briefly explained the legal and practical impediments to a nuclear buildup and how the current military posture is stronger than it was at the height of the buildup.

    Yes, I bet they were surprised.

    The July 20 meeting was described as a lengthy and sometimes tense review of worldwide U.S. forces and operations. It was soon after the meeting broke up that officials who remained behind heard Tillerson say that Trump is a “moron.”

    Just because he pointed at the graphic and screamed that he wanted MOAR?

    The president’s comments during the Pentagon meeting in July came in response to a chart shown on the history of the U.S. and Russia’s nuclear capabilities that showed America’s stockpile at its peak in the late 1960s, the officials said. Some officials present said they did not take Trump’s desire for more nuclear weapons to be literally instructing the military to increase the actual numbers. But his comments raised questions about his familiarity with the nuclear posture and other issues, officials said.

    They say, putting it as gently as possible. Trump of course is pitching a fit and threatening them on Twitter.

    Any increase in America’s nuclear arsenal would not only break with decades of U.S. nuclear doctrine but also violate international disarmament treaties signed by every president since Ronald Reagan. Nonproliferation experts warned that such a move could set off a global arms race.

    But, sadly for all of us, Trump is too stupid to understand that. The military people were unnerved to discover just how stupid.

    Details of the July 20 meeting, which have not been previously reported, shed additional light on tensions among the commander in chief, members of his Cabinet and the uniformed leadership of the Pentagon stemming from vastly different world views, experiences and knowledge bases.

    Moreover, the president’s comments reveal that Trump, who suggested before his inauguration that the U.S. “must greatly strengthen and expand its nuclear capability,” voiced that desire as commander in chief directly to the military leadership in the heart of the Pentagon this summer.

    Some officials in the Pentagon meeting were rattled by the president’s desire for more nuclear weapons and his understanding of other national security issues from the Korean Peninsula to Iraq and Afghanistan, the officials said.

    That meeting followed one held a day earlier in the White House Situation Room focused on Afghanistan in which the president stunned some of his national security team. At that July 19 meeting, according to senior administration officials, Trump asked military leaders to fire the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan and compared their advice to that of a New York restaurant consultant whose poor judgment cost a business valuable time and money.

    Two people familiar with the discussion said the Situation Room meeting, in which the president’s advisers anticipated he would sign off on a new Afghanistan strategy, was so unproductive that the advisers decided to continue the discussion at the Pentagon the next day in a smaller setting where the president could perhaps be more focused. “It wasn’t just the number of people. It was the idea of focus,” according to one person familiar with the discussion. The thinking was: “Maybe we need to slow down a little and explain the whole world” from a big-picture perspective, this person said.

    Dear god. Dear sweet baby Jesus on toast. Maybe we need to slow down a little and explain the whole world to this fucking toddler who is somehow the head of state.

     

  • Where he was been superb

    The BBC is also asking.

    Question: How often does President Trump talk about IQ?

    Answer: All the time.

    When Mr Trump recently boasted that his IQ was higher than Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s, it fit a pattern.

    In 2013, he tweeted that his IQ was “much higher” than Barack Obama and George W Bush.

    He has also claimed a higher IQ than comedian Jon Stewart and British star of The Apprentice, Lord Sugar.

    Despite this, Mr Trump has never revealed his own IQ. So can we work it out?

    Sure. We can work it out by watching him in action. We can compare him to other people in the same line of work. We can compare him to Clinton for instance, to Corker, to Warren, to Schumer. We can compare how they think on their feet, what they say in response to questions, how they behave in public situations.

    We can think back to the debates. The contrast was stark, and at the root of it was comparative intelligence. He can’t talk like an intelligent person; it’s that simple.

    Who were the smartest presidents?
    “I don’t recall ever coming across a list of presidents and their IQs,” says Dr Barbara A Perry, director of presidential studies at the University of Virginia.

    “But you can easily find a list of presidents inducted into Phi Beta Kappa in their universities.”

    Founded in 1776, Phi Beta Kappa honours “the best and brightest liberal arts and sciences undergraduates from 286 top schools across the nation”.

    Of the 44 presidents, 17 have been Phi Beta Kappa members. Bill Clinton, George H W Bush, and Jimmy Carter were the most recent.

    Phi Beta Kappa counts? And Trump isn’t? Cool, then we know I’m smarter than Trump. Neener.

    Professor Fred I Greenstein, professor of politics emeritus at Princeton University, lists six qualities that bear on presidential performance.

    They are: public communication, organisational capacity, political skill, vision, cognitive style, and emotional intelligence.

    There; that’s a much better framework to talk about it than “IQ.” Trump is abysmal on the first and last. The ones in between…I guess are debatable.

    “Trump scores low on emotional intelligence, cognitive style, vision, and organisational capacity,” says Dr Perry.

    “Where he was been superb, in order to win the presidency, is public communication and political skill.”

    Mmmmmmmno. Political skill, ok, but public communication, no. He succeeded with that not because he’s intelligent at it but because there are so many people who like the other kind. I don’t think it can really be called intelligent public communication when he can appeal only to angry racists and fails utterly at trying to talk to the rest of the world.

  • One of the highest

    Trump apparently thinks “IQ” is a straightforward synonym for “intelligence.” He also apparently thinks he has lots of both.

    In an interview with Forbes magazine published Tuesday morning, President Trump talks about his high IQ to explain away reports that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson referred to him as a “moron” over the summer.

    Said Trump: “I think it’s fake news, but if he did that, I guess we’ll have to compare IQ tests. And I can tell you who is going to win.”

    That’s funny, because pretty much everyone else in the world can tell you otherwise.

    This is hardly the first time that Trump has cited his reportedly sky-high IQ — and the relatively low IQs of his political rivals — to make a point or win an argument. In fact, it’s one of his favorite pieces of rhetoric. Below are 22 times he’s brandished his IQ as a political weapon.

    It contradicts itself! An intelligent person wouldn’t post a tweet like that.

    Also, I’ve seen few people in public life less compassionate than Donald Trump.

    Ha, no, again. We don’t know it and it isn’t true. He’s thick as a plank.

    Philip Bump at the Post:

    Trump both puts a lot of weight on IQ tests as an objective measure of intelligence (to which scientists probably would object) and believes that few, if any, people can match his own score. Trump uses his IQ like he uses his net worth: It’s always higher than you might assume and there’s no way to ever pin it down.

    To pin it down, maybe, but to draw conclusions based on what we see and hear? There’s plenty of way to do that.

    Like this for instance!

    Rochester, N.Y., April 2016:

    “In fact, this is the second record cold spell on the whole big section of the United States. It’s not just Rochester. The whole big section. It’s like record, record cold. And I keep hearing about global warming. Now they’ll say, ‘He doesn’t understand. This is a world-wide problem.’ Oh no, I don’t understand? Let’s do IQ tests.”

    “Good Morning Britain,” May 2016:

    PIERS MORGAN: Sadiq Khan is the first Muslim Mayor of London. He has attacked you for being ignorant. He says that if you’re president…
    TRUMP: Let’s do an IQ test.

    The evidence is in.

  • Deals that assure him a win

    Forbes suggests we need to get a grip and understand President Pinhead. He’s a “dealmaker”; he’s in it for maximum payoff for himself, and nothing else. At first glance that sounds to me like just Capitalism, but of course it’s not that simple.

    Donald Trump didn’t get rich building businesses, despite years of brand-burnishing via The Apprentice and millions of votes from people who craved exactly that experience. Instead, his forte lies in transactions–buying and selling and cutting deals that assure him a win regardless of the outcome for others. The nuance is essential. Entrepreneurs and businesspeople create and run entities that have any number of interested parties–shareholders and customers and employees and partners and hometowns–that in theory all share in success. Under Steve Jobs and Tim Cook, Apple has helped early shareholders multiply their investments nearly 400-fold, turned thousands of options-wielding employees into millionaires (swelling the local tax base), performed similar wonders for Taiwanese supplier Foxconn and made customers so deliriously happy that they wait all night to fork over hundreds of dollars for products that will be obsolete two years later.

    Dealmakers rarely seek that kind of win-win-win-win-win. Whether it’s a stock trade, a swap of middle relievers or optioning a real estate parcel, a deal tends to involve just two parties and generally results in one coming out ahead of the other (so much so that a “win-win” is considered a noteworthy aberration). “Man is the most vicious of all animals,” Trump told People in 1981 (and it merited a mention the first time he appeared in Forbes , a year later). “Life is a series of battles ending in victory or defeat.” It’s a mentality that remains hard-wired in President Trump.

    Nearly a year after the most stunning Election Day in many decades, pundits still profess to find themselves continually shocked by President Trump. They shouldn’t be: His worldview has been incredibly consistent. Rather than as an opportunity to turn ideology into policy, he views governing the way he does business–as an endless string of deals, to be won or lost, both at the negotiating table and in the court of public opinion.

    And, furthermore, the win is for him, not for the country or the people or even for rich people. Just for him. Him is all he cares about.

    This is why he loves numbers.

    Numbers offer Trump validation. They determine the winner or loser of any deal and establish an industry hierarchy. It’s why Trump, more than any of the 1,600 or so people who’ve been on The Forbes 400, has spent more time lobbying and cajoling Forbes to get a higher valuation–and validation.

    …

    He’s similarly proud of the GDP. “So GDP last quarter was 3.1%. Most of the folks that are in your business, and elsewhere, were saying that would not be hit for a long time. You know, Obama never hit the number.”

    When informed that his predecessor did, several times, Trump pivots immediately. “He never hit it on a yearly basis. Never hit it on a yearly basis. That’s eight years. I think we’ll go substantially higher than that. And I think this quarter would have been phenomenal, except for the hurricanes.”

    …

    For Trump, numbers also serve as a pliant tool. American business has fully embraced Big Data, Moneyball -style analytics and machine learning, where figures suggest the best course of action. But Trump, for decades, has boasted about how he conducts his own research–largely anecdotal–and then buys or sells based on instinct. Numbers are then used to justify his gut. He governs exactly that way, sticking with even his most illogical campaign promises–the kind other politicians walk back from once confronted with actual policy decisions, whether making Mexico pay for a border wall when illegal immigration is historically low or pulling the U.S. from the Paris climate accords, despite the fact that compliance is voluntary–citing whatever figures he can to justify his stances. When asked about Russian interference in the election, for example, he notes that he got 306 electoral votes and adds that the Democrats need “an excuse for losing an election that in theory they should have won.” For the greatest-ever American salesman (yes, including P.T. Barnum), statistics serve as marketing grist.

    When at a loss, just mention a number, however irrelevant.

    In any situation, Trump must be the alpha dog. Delegation isn’t his strong suit. Witness what happened when Tillerson apparently reopened a dialogue with the North Koreans. “He was wasting his time,” Trump now says. But doesn’t publicly upbraiding his top diplomat effectively neuter him? “I’m not undermining,” Trump says. “I think I’m actually strengthening authority.” It’s hard to see whose authority he’s strengthening, other than his own.

    In Donald Trump’s orbit, clearly, no one is off-limits. A decade ago, Donald Trump Jr. told Forbes this story about his now-presidential father. “I’d be going to work with my dad when I was 5 or 6 years old… .

    “Besides telling me again and again not to drink, not to smoke and not to chase women, he always told me: ‘Never trust anybody.’ Then he’d ask me if I trusted anybody. I’d say, ‘No.’ ‘Do you trust me?’ he’d ask. I’d say, ‘Yes.’ ”

    “And he’d say: ‘No! Don’t even trust me!’ “

    What a hideous little story. (Notice he heeded the advice about trust but not about not chasing women.) What a loathsome cold affection-killing story.

    All self, all numbers, no trust. Sums him up.

  • Temperamentally unable to exercise anything like mature judgment

    Corker spelled out that nearly all the Republicans in Congress know Trump is unfit. James Fallows says ok so what are they going to do about it?

    Senator Bob Corker, a Republican of Tennessee, deserves credit for saying in public this evening to The New York Times what most prominent Republicans have known and many have said (in careful privacy) over the past two years.

    Namely: that Donald Trump is irrational, ill-informed, impulsive, unfit for command, and increasingly a danger to the country and the world. The man who has ultimate authority over the world’s most powerful military, including its nuclear weaponry, is recklessly issuing threats to North Korea and others that set the nation “on the path to World War III,” according to Corker—who, for the record, is chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “I know for a fact that every single day at the White House, it’s a situation of trying to contain him,” he told Jonathan Martin and Mark Landler of the Times.

    This situation is not normal. It is not safe. And the group which for now has a monopoly on legislative and investigative power in Washington, Corker’s own Republican Party, has an obligation to the country’s past and its future to do something about it.

    It’s had that obligation all along, it had it during the campaign and after the election and after the inauguration, but it has it all the more with every hour of this maniac armed with nuclear weapons.

    I have heard, first-hand, from Republican senators, representatives, and other dignitaries that they view Donald Trump as a menace in his current role. It’s not (just) that they disagree with some of what he does. It’s that they consider him intellectually unaware of the cliffs toward which he is steering the country, and temperamentally unable to exercise anything like mature judgment. In these and other ways, including his personal and financial ethics, they know that he is outside the range of suitability to hold this job.

    Then they should remove him, without delay. I’m tired of seeing “But they never will, because their jobs.” The mismatch is grotesque. On the one hand a hopeless rage-prone lunatic in a position to destroy everything, on the other hand Their Careers. Come on now. Yes I know self-interest is a powerful drug, but come on now.

    For congressional Republicans, this is your moment in history’s eye. One of your colleagues, who has chosen not to run for office again, and who also was the object of one of Trump’s intemperate attacks this morning, has decided that he might as well tell the truth. It turns out that this is often the right way to go! As the (slightly altered) line from Mark Twain put it, by telling the truth you will gratify some people and astonish the rest. Perhaps Corker’s motivations are not the purest or most glorious. He was nice to Trump last year, when Corker was in the mentioning-cloud as a possible secretary of state, and he was part of the “respectable” Republicans who disastrous enabled Trump. Corker’s retorts todayfollowed personal attacks from Trump. Still, he’s doing more than his colleagues have.  And Corker has moved toward a better place for himself in the annals of Senate history than he would have had only 24 hours ago.

    This most definitely should not be the last step for Corker. If he believes what he says, then as the chairman of the relevant committee in the Senate he has important tools to use. He can issue subpoenas and summon executive branch witnesses as soon as he can get his colleagues back in town. He can draft legislation about the procedure, the grounds, and the justifications before the U.S. commits troops to war. He could urge his colleagues toward the next step through their stages-of-tragedy relationship with Trump. Stage one was carping and dismissal during the first half of 2016, when he was an entertaining long-shot. Stage two was Vichy-regime acquiescence to him during the campaign. Stage three was “support” early this year, toward the goal of the Gorsuch confirmation and the hope of a tax-cut bill. Now we see the inklings of stage four, with the dawning awareness of what Corker spelled out: that they have empowered something genuinely dangerous. It’s time for Corker to act on that knowledge, and his colleagues too.

    Do it. This is not a joke, and it’s not a drill.

  • He was a rock star

    Trump told us over the weekend what fun he had in Puerto Rico. That’s nice. It’s always good to see the misery of millions provide a little entertainment for a head of state.

    Over the weekend, President Donald J. Trump praised his response to the devastation caused to the island of Puerto Rico by Hurricane Maria, which left dozens dead and thousands without power or potable water.

    “I was having fun,” Trump said of his four-hour visit to San Juan, Puerto Rico’s capital, last Tuesday. That visit, most memorably, had him throwing paper towels to an audience gathered to see him inside a church. “They had these beautiful, soft towels. Very good towels,” Trump said. He claimed that the people of Puerto Rico also had “fun” during his visit. As he usually does, Trump dismissed critics while offering himself exceedingly high marks.

    “And I came in and there was a crowd of a lot of people. And they were screaming and they were loving everything,” Trump said of his visit to the Calvary Chapel, where the now-famous tossing of the paper towels took place.

    The comments came in a Saturday interview with Mike Huckabee on the Trinity Broadcasting Network, which offers Christian-themed broadcasting.

    Like for instance Donald “you can grab them by the pussy” Trump. Ok.

    In Saturday’s interview, Huckabee said that everyone but presumably liberal media outlets had described Trump’s response to the hurricane as “pitch perfect.” Trump agreed with this assessment. He dismissed all criticism as “fake news” while detailing the high praise he’d received.

    “We did a great job,” Trump said.

    “You were a rock star,” Huckabee agreed.

    Trump tweeted confirmation of these excellent reviews.

     

  • Mr Nomanners

    The Times has a Republican’s Guide to Presidential Etiquette that it has updated to take in recent incidents in correct behavior.

    Republicans used to care a whole lot about how a president comported himself, and whether he acted at all times with the dignity his station demands.

    “Is President Obama Disrespecting the Oval Office?” Fox News asked in 2010, with a link to images of Mr. Obama and his aides tossing a football, or eating apples just inches from the Resolute desk.

    “Wear a suit coat and tie,” said Andrew Card Jr., President George W. Bush’s former chief of staff, in reaction to pictures of Mr. Obama in shirtsleeves in 2009.

    I remember that shirtsleeves nonsense. I don’t think I knew there were complaints about eating apples. I have a feeling I blogged something about substance versus appearance, and the fact that wearing a tie at all times did nothing to disguise Bush’s lack of qualification for the job.

    “I do expect him to send the message that people who are going to be in the Oval Office should treat the office with the respect that it has earned over history,” Mr. Card said.

    But hey, that was then! In 2017, there’s a whole new bar for tolerable conduct by the commander in chief. Our original guide cataloged several dozen examples. Almost five months later, it’s clear that an update is necessary. This expanded list is meant to ensure that Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell and other congressional Republicans never forget what they now condone in a president.

    So, if you are the president, you may:

    • Call for the firing of “son of a bitch” athletes who choose to exercise their right to free speech

    …

    …

    • Deliver a speech to the Boy Scouts of America that includes mockery of a former president and winking references to sexual orgies, and then lie by claiming that the head of that organization called and told you it was the best speech ever delivered in Boy Scout history

    …

    And tweet tweet tweet, and lie lie lie. It’s a useful list.