On May 8, as CIA Director James Clapper and Sally Yates spoke to senators, Trump tweeted:
Director Clapper reiterated what everybody, including the fake media already knows- there is "no evidence" of collusion w/ Russia and Trump.
This morning "no evidence" of collusion has morphed into total innocence as Trump tweeted:
When James Clapper himself, and virtually everyone else with knowledge of the witch hunt, says there is no collusion, when does it end?
"Witch hunt?" As I understand it, the FBI is investigating whether Russia was involved in election hacking, but Trump sees the effort only as it affects him, casting himself as an unfairly accused victim. His statement also leads a reader to conclude that the "witch hunt" ends with Comey's firing: stall the investigation by throwing the FBI into a leadership crisis and install your own person in there to keep an eye on things.
Trump eventually offers a justification for Comey's firing--"James Comey will be replaced by someone who will do a far better job, bringing back the spirit and prestige of the FBI"--but mostly he condemns Democrats, who had been critical of Comey when he spoke about Hillary Clinton's emails in 2016, for now protesting his ouster.
Cryin' Chuck Schumer stated recently, "I do not have confidence in him (James Comey) any longer." Then acts so indignant.
The Democrats have said some of the worst things about James Comey, including the fact that he should be fired, but now they play so sad!
Watching Senator Richard Blumenthal speak of Comey is a joke. "Richie" devised one of the greatest military frauds in U.S. history. For....years, as a pol in Connecticut, Blumenthal would talk of his great bravery and conquests in Vietnam - except he was never there. When....caught, he cried like a baby and begged for forgiveness...and now he is judge & jury. He should be the one who is investigated for his acts. [Wait, is he calling for a witch hunt against Richie?]
Dems have been complaining for months & months about Dir. Comey. Now that he has been fired they PRETEND to be aggrieved. Phony hypocrites! [Trump fails to see--or doesn't want readers to see--that Dems may not be fans of Comey's statements about Clinton, but they smell something rotten in the timing of his firing.]
These tweets are followed with a video clip montage of Democrats calling for Comey's firing right after his statements about Clinton's emails and two tweets hailing Trump's EOs on cyber security and election integrity. [See, you don't need pesky FBI witch hunts, I can fix all this with a stroke of my pen.]
After several tweets about fake news weirdly juxtaposed with photos of his meetings with the Russian ambassador, Trump today began a series of threats aimed at the media and Comey:
As a very active President with lots of things happening, it is not possible for my surrogates to stand at podium with perfect accuracy!.......Maybe the best thing to do would be to cancel all future "press briefings" and hand out written responses for the sake of accuracy???
James Comey better hope that there are no "tapes" of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press!
It's unfair to base an opinion about anybody based solely on their Twitter feed. But the tweets from the last 48 hours suggest an executive who feels besieged, who lashes out with name-calling and absurd counter allegations, who is preoccupied with control, and who offers nothing substantive in the way of explanation for his actions, which chums the waters for political analyses (like this one). I'll pass over the fact that he occasionally tortures written standard English.
Perhaps as telling as Trump's tweets are the responses to them, which are almost overwhelmingly negative, insulting, and frequently obscene. Reading Trump is not just about tricking out who he is, but who we are as well.
It's not a pretty picture.
It's hard to try to find explanations for his behavior if we start with the premise that he is a rational adult. I don't think he's playing with a full deck.
ReplyDeleteWhat worries me is the fullness of deck of the 40% that steadily support him. I can't believe he isn't down to 10%. Must be the lead in the water. We need to sneak Aricept into the water supply.
ReplyDeleteI believe to the 40% it is a tribal thing. He was on "their side", so now they have to defend him. People have a hard time admitting they were wrong, that they were sold a bill of goods. So they don't. Admit it, that is. They will make up excuses for him until the cumulative damage is so bad that something pushes it over the top. Then it will be "look what you made him do". Maybe we should take some oriental lessons about how to save face and let other people save face (I hope that's not culturally appropriative!)
DeleteI have, very belatedly, concluded that his 40 percent hate coastal liberals much more than they love Trump. And as long as coastal liberals appear to be his main enemies they can overlook the drool and doubletalk they get from him.
DeleteI don't know if that's true. We don't think about the coasts much here in the Midwest, other than that we couldn't afford to live there and we wouldn't know anyone. There are a lot of people who believe the mainstream media doesn't cover the things they care about. But these things do not in themselves make Trump supporters. For those able to ride out the recession with jobs and benefits intact, things just did not get better under Obama. Wages remained stagnant, and the ACA looked like another bloated program that would keep wages down. People are dismayed at the number of "foreign" doctors moving in. Those who home school or send their kids to religious schools are increasingly resentful of paying public school taxes and tuition. Infrastructure repair projects didn't materialize along with the good blue collar jobs promised.
DeleteAnd then there was Hillary, who has never played well in the Midwest.
"Hillary never played well in the Midwest." But she was FROM the Midwest, born in the Hog Butcher to the World. (Sorry for the caps; I can't see how to do italics.) So how couldn't she play well? First Park Ridge, where she grew up, isn't Cicero any more than Grosse Pointe Farms is Dearborn. So there is that. Then she transplanted herself by her choice of college. Which makes her a traitor (an inclination she always had out there in Park Ridge) as well as a coastal liberal. The economy roared back under Obama -- Wall Street's and Silicon Valley's, which is how we measure on the coast. If you have problems in flyover country, you should have gone to Stanford, Cal or an Ivy. Everyone who knows anything knows that. If coastals still had lorgnettes, they'd look down them at you. Every Trump voter knows that in his heart (and is right),
DeleteHillary was FROM here, not OF here, if you know what I mean. Bill could have moved next door and fit right in. He'd have sat in his garage doorway in a lawn chair like everybody else, cooking brats on the gas grill with his bird dog running loose and barking its fool head off.
DeleteHillary is pretty much not Chicago...But for an exceptional few, Park Ridge is not Chicago. But I don't think that's why she lost.
DeleteNow reading "Shattered" about her campaign. If even half of it is accurate (which may be debatable), she ran a lousy campaign, which would be clear evidence that she is not "from" or "of" Chicago.
As a transplanted Chicagoan, I can attest that New York is different. But it's not that it's a liberal enclave, it's that it has a scrambled history and culture, just as Chicago does, but different than Chicago, definitely not better.
George F. Will believes Trump has a linguistic disability: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trump-has-a-dangerous-disability/2017/05/03/56ca6118-2f6b-11e7-9534-00e4656c22aa_story.html
ReplyDeleteJennifer Rubin takes on the possibility of insanity here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/wp/2017/05/02/when-is-it-okay-to-say-the-president-might-be-nuts/?tid=a_inl&utm_term=.04eb9d5184cc
I am not a mental health professional, so I'm only looking at what concerns and issues he responds to via tweets and how people respond to his Twitter feed.
What strikes me about Twitter and the tweets is how immature and juvenile it all seems. I guess I'm showing my age, but it doesn't come across as a serious means of communication. Mainly fit for teenage "he said; she said; and I was like...". Not for a head of state who is nearly 70 and wishes to be taken seriously.
DeleteI know, Katherine. Even climatologist Ph.D's like Michael Mann use it. Maybe because it IS what passes for communication and discourse and Mann feels he has to be in the mix. Sometimes I'll go to it to find out what one of these people think about some headline. But it is an awful invention, and to think that it made people rich.
DeleteI think my relatives who voted for him still think he's great. It's like his presidency has revealed the dark underbelly of human nature. All the people who don't care about the truth, who are completely self-interested, all who seem to me to be sociopaths, have a public and powerful avatar now. Even if he finally gets replaced, all those people will still be out there.
ReplyDeleteWell, it is clear that Trump is not comfortable with the written word (perhaps he is dyslexic?) because he specifically refuses to read in-depth briefings. He wants bullet points and graphics only. He also appears to be somewhat adhd, but is perhaps not being treated for it. He actually walks out of his own meetings at times.
ReplyDeleteThe pattern I see in his tweets and interviews is that for Trump everything is self-referential. Do people like him? Do people admire him? He still needs to have "rallies" because he is so anxious to get applauded.
He apparently thought he would win bipartisan praise for firing Comey and has been shocked that he hasn't received praise but instead has raised a firestorm of anxiety about whether or not this is another Watergate. It may be, because he is not as smart as Nixon, and Nixon still managed to hang himself. However, in the 70s, there were at least a few more Republicans with integrity than there are now, and it will take the Republicans to bring impeachment proceedings. I don't think this lot have the integrity or moral principles to do so.
Trump simply cannot deal with the "heat of the kitchen" of the presidency. He is obsessed with his ratings, as though he is still on TV. He has no principles, so he can support a healthcare plan that not only does not reflect his campaign promises, but which is not playing well with his own supporters. But he wants a "win", he wants to "prove" that his administration is not incompetent but is "the best ever" in its early days. This is a man who complained that his show didn't win an Emmy. He is going to waste countless millions of taxpayer dollars in a commission to study voter fraud because he simply cannot handle the truth that he lost the popular vote.
He continuously walks back his tweets and statements, but clearly, his emotional immaturity, and his extreme narcissism remain the ruling influences in what he says and does. Clearly his fans don't deal in reality either, because they don't care how often he is breaking his campaign promises, they still think he will bring the "change" that is needed and magically solve all their problems. I think a good number of the people of this country are borderline "insane" at this point since they still blindly support him.
I think you nailed it, Anne.
DeleteWhat Trump has is everyone's attention. After the totally cool and buttoned-down Obama, when whole days could pass without "news," we have "How could he say/do/repeat/contradict/threaten that?"
ReplyDeleteWhatever our diagnosis, and I'm with Jean in watching what he says.
Our question: How will this end?
Good question. Michael Moore, who agreed with me that Trump would win, says he's going to get us all killed.
DeleteGood question. Michael Moore, who agreed with me that Trump would win, says he's going to get us all killed.
DeleteIt can hardly end well--a quiet removal in a strait jacket by the secret service.
ReplyDeleteFollowing Jean's lead, Dana Milbank of the WashPost has an assessment of the Trump tweets on the Comey question of the moment.
ReplyDeleteIt also reports, "The very same president registering the approval of just 36 percent of the country in a new Quinnipiac University poll. When Americans were asked to volunteer a word that comes to mind when they think of Trump, the top answer was 'idiot.'”
Also stuff about the naif or patsy, Rod Rothstein, deputy AG. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/rod-rosenstein-has-one-chance-to-save-himself/2017/05/12/b361a86a-371c-11e7-b4ee-434b6d506b37_story.html?hpid=hp_no-name_opinion-card-b%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.8414e4707b32
Finally from someone close to Comey (his wife?) reports, apropos of Trump's threat that he has a tape of their conversation: Comey is glad to hear there may be tapes; that would clarify everything!!
Saw Kamala Harris, one of my senators, on CNN about the Comey firing ... https://youtu.be/xRypWHmzE3M
ReplyDeleteI urge people to follow Trump's Twitter fees for a couple of days and then look at the responses. His opponents don't look all that substantive either. What people write on his tweets is an underreported story. Maybe worth another post sometime.
ReplyDeleteAn interesting article in The Atlantic comparing Nixon and Trump ... Five Reasons the Comey Affair Is Worse Than Watergate
ReplyDeleteInteresting link, Crystal. I agree that this is worse than Watergate. But the attitude seems to be, "Nothing to see here, folks. Let's keep moving..." I also remember the Spiro Agnew scandal, which happened before the news about Watergate broke. Sketchy people appoint...sketchy people. I'm guessing this isn't the last scandal we'll see involving members of the Trump administration.
DeleteTrump's frustrations are boiling over after Comey dismissal
ReplyDelete"Several people close to the president say his reliance on a small cadre of advisers as he mulled firing Comey reflects his broader distrust of many of his own staffers. He leans heavily on daughter Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner, as well as Hope Hicks, his trusted campaign spokeswoman, and Keith Schiller, his longtime bodyguard. Schiller was among those Trump consulted about Comey and was tapped by the president to deliver a letter informing the director of his firing."
Trump is running the nation as if it were a family business.
"When the White House's defense of the move failed to meet his ever-changing expectations, Trump tried to take over himself. But he wound up creating new headaches for the White House, including with an apparent threat to Comey."
Trump is basically a media person. His expertise is neither in politics nor in business. He has always being running a media show about himself, which is how he is running the presidency.
Twitter allows Trump to keep all his old habits.
DeleteOtherwise he would have to deal with his staff, the Executive Branch, and the Congress. He can just bypass all them and deal with the public directly as he manages the Trump Show.
JFK ran his government like a family business to some extent, too. I suppose the difference is that his relatives were somewhat more competent and that he relied on his Brain Trust cabinet members as well.
DeleteJFK ran his government like a family business to some extent, too. I suppose the difference is that his relatives were somewhat more competent and that he relied on his Brain Trust cabinet members as well.
DeleteEvery time I think of JFK's "best and brightest", I think of McNamara. Was that guy ever right about anything?
ReplyDeleteCertainly an oddball. I watched that documentary about him, "The Fog of War" I think it was called. He was unable to give any satisfactory answers about Vietnam. Seemed like a man who had fooled himself for a long time about his role in keeping that outrage going.
DeleteHe thought the great power of the US military in combo with systems analysis couldn't be beaten. War isn't making an Edsel.
DeleteYes, Fog of War, Fog of Trump. Fog of War was a documentary made by Errol Morris, the man who brought us the documentary about Abu Ghraib. Wonder what he's up to now.
DeleteThis is a pretty good article. Speaking of the Comey firing: "We overanalyze Trump....the answer is pretty obvious. The implications are terrifying, but the motivations are not complicated. He did it because he was mad."
ReplyDeleteArticle is right--we desperately want to get a bead on this guy.
DeleteBut psyching out Trump at a distance is dangerous for the shrinks, never mind journos.
I think the picture is weird enough if you look at the bombardment of ever-shifting, contradictory messages and actions, and the utter inability to articulate a clear message. One of the bits I read explained what Trump means when he puts quotation marks around a term. When you have a prez whose punctuation idiosyncrasies have to be explained before you can understand him, you have a problem. You don't need to throw in the DSM.
One of the reasons I voted for Clinton was she was at least sane. I thought she was wrong and insufficient but perhaps she could be reasoned with, that there was some connection between her mind and the world. That she had the ability to change her mind in a coherent manner instead of like a random pinball machine.
ReplyDeleteApropos of twitter and the impact of internetism, etc., on manners and language, Molly Worthen has a piece in the Sunday Review, New York Times about her students and etiquette in the age of Twitter.
ReplyDelete"After one too many students called me by my first name and sent me email that resembled a drunken late-night Facebook post, I took a very fogeyish step. I began attaching a page on etiquette to every syllabus: basic rules for how to address teachers and write polite, grammatically correct emails."
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/13/opinion/sunday/u-cant-talk-to-ur-professor-like-this.html?_r=0
I enjoy teaching freshmen because I can establish appropriate email rules at the beginning of their college careers.
DeleteUnsigned emails, emails containing vulgarities, or emails that address me by my first or last name ("Hey, Raber!" is a favorite for some reason) are returned with the response, "Do I know you?"
Emails that fail to note the class section are returned with the response, "Are you one of my students?"
Long sad stories about why a student doesn't have his work done and ending in the question, "What should I do?" receive the response, "Write again when you have a solution to propose."
Students who send work via e-mail after the due date receive a copy of the syllabus, which outlines the penalties for late work.
Emails that are written in all caps, all lower case, or that are generally full of errors are returned for revision. (Sometimes, if a kid seems to be trying, I will also answer the query.)
Emails are generally better than they used to be. Perhaps high school teachers are interacting more on e-mail. Or perhaps texting is the new informal mode of communication, and students see emails as more formal missives now.
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