Search Results for: trump

Today's Bad News for Donald Trump
Where to start, where to start? The headline "House overwhelmingly votes bipartisan condemnation of Trump withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria" is pretty bad news, as if the news out of Syria and Turkey isn't itself bad enough. "[Trump] was shaken up by it," Nancy Pelosi said on the House's overwhelming vote. "And that's why we couldn't continue in the meeting, because he was just not relating to the reality of it." Meanwhile, Rudy Giuliani is, as he will be for some time, in more legal trouble than he was yesterday and less than he will be tomorrow.

Today's Outrage by Donald Trump
A letter that Trump wrote to Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan was making the rounds and every newsperson who saw it contacted the White House to verify it was legit. That's how daffy it was and you can read it here and about a thousand other places. It wasn't sane, it wasn't presidential and it clearly did more harm than good…but Trump gave himself an A+ for it because, of course, he gives himself an A+ for absolutely everything.

Today's Runner-Up Outrage by Donald Trump
On any other day with any other president, this would be one of the more shameful and wrong-headed moves ever. You all know about Anne Sacoolas, the American spouse of (maybe) a diplomat who killed 19-year-old motorcyclist on an English lane last August. Ms. Sacoolas fled the country, claiming diplomatic immunity and Dunn's grieving parents and many British agencies are trying to get her to return to the scene of the arguable crime. Trump summoned the parents to the White House and then sprang two surprises on them: He had Ms. Sacoolas in the next room and also had members of the press ready to film/photograph the parents meeting the woman who killed their son and he apparently thought some warm, huggable moment would result. The parents, horrified, refused to go along with it and…well, here. Read all about it. It was a crazy move engineered by a man to whom empathy and consideration are alien concepts and who thought a great photo-op with himself as the Great Peacemaker would result. Crazy.

And One Important Article
This could have been in the Bad News category but it was too crowded…

Documents obtained by ProPublica show stark differences in how Donald Trump's businesses reported some expenses, profits and occupancy figures for two Manhattan buildings, giving a lender different figures than they provided to New York City tax authorities. The discrepancies made the buildings appear more profitable to the lender — and less profitable to the officials who set the buildings' property tax.

This is illegal and as Paul Waldman notes, it probably demonstrates why Trump is battling so hard to keep his tax records secret. They've got to be full of this kind of thing.

Today's Bad News for Donald Trump
Ronan Farrow's new book revives the issue of Trump and/or his handlers paying off women to keep hush about affairs with The Donald.  If the National Enquirer really was shredding papers about those alleged affairs, that's something.  I mean, it's not like the Enquirer ever dumps a story because it's false…

Today's Outrage by Donald Trump
Trump announces that he will soon be "issuing an Executive Order authorizing the imposition of sanctions against current and former officials of the Government of Turkey and any persons contributing to Turkey's destabilizing actions in northeast Syria."  Oh, great.  Now Trump has to impose sanctions on himself.

Today's Bad News for Donald Trump
I'm putting the increasing bad news out of Syria in the next category so in this one, I'll just put it sure looks like Rudy Giuliani is in pretty deep legal trouble, which just contributes to the lawless rep of the folks Trump chooses to advise him. I don't think Trump will be able to get away with claiming he doesn't know Rudy but that doesn't mean he won't try.

Today's Outrage by Donald Trump
Things just keep getting worse and worse for the Kurds and for the role of the U.S. in world politics. Fred Kaplan explains.

An important article About Donald Trump
Jonathan Chait lays out the "full" case for the impeachment of Donald Trump. I put "full" in quotes because I'm thinking by the time this thing could get to a trial in the Senate, there'll be a dozen more charges in it.

Today's Bad News for Donald Trump
Trump keeps citing Gordon Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union, who in a tweet said there was no quid pro quo regarding the Ukraine call. But later this week, Sondland will reportedly testify that he wrote that there was no quid pro quo, not because he knew that to be the case but just because Trump told him.

Today's Outrage by Donald Trump
Did you catch any of Trump's rally last Thursday night in Minneapolis? There's more than a year until Election Day and he's hurling mud like an infinite number of monkeys flinging their poo. And he's getting it from the same place.

A Question About Donald Trump
Trump complained a lot about that Fox News Poll that showed that a majority of Americans want him impeached. He's been saying, "Fox News isn't working for us anymore," right? So what is he expecting? Is he angry that Fox News, having received those numbers from their pollsters, didn't just fib and adjust them in his favor? Is that what he expects of the news media? No wonder he doesn't like any of them.

Today's Bad News for Donald Trump
There are a couple of choices but I'm going with how it increasingly looks like Rudy Giuliani is in legal trouble. Yesterday, it seemed like Trump was going to drop Rudy as his lawyer and start claiming he barely knew the guy. Today, he looks like he's decided he's stuck with him.

Today's Outrage by Donald Trump
The commander of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, Gen. Mazloum Kobani Abdi, is being quoted as having told a senior American diplomat, "You have given up on us. You are leaving us to be slaughtered. You are not willing to protect the people, but you do not want another force to come and protect us. You have sold us. This is immoral." And indeed, the slaughter seems to be starting.

Bonus Article About Donald Trump
Here's an odd article by Alexander Hurst which compares ceasing to be a Trump supporter with fleeing from a cult. The author tells us a lot of interesting things about cults and the mentality of those who people them but he doesn't convince me it's that bad with most who voted for Donald and would again. There are those in this country who simply prefer the right-wing agenda and if Trump's the guy who's going to put it in power, fine. That's all they want him for.

If someone else could give them the same "win" without the pathological crap and the shady business history and the pussy-grabbing and insulting Bruce Springsteen, fine. What I think Trump fears most now is that some Republican — maybe Romney — is going to mount a credible campaign to offer the Trump agenda without Trump, and a lot of Trump voters will flee to that person. Once he starts looking like a loser — and he's lost a lot lately and been acting like a panicked loser — he's of no use to them. Cult leaders don't worry like that.

Today's Bad News for Donald Trump
Well, it looks like a three-way tie! In a 2-1 ruling, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit upheld a lower court ruling saying Trump's accounting firm must turn over eight years of his accounting records — i.e., his income tax forms. That's one. Then a federal judge in Texas ruled that Trump's "national emergency" declaration to build The Wall is unlawful. That's two. Then a different federal judge blocked the Trump's "public charge" rule, which would have made it harder for immigrants to obtain green cards. Had it not been blocked, it would have gone into effect next week. That's three.

Today's Outrage by Donald Trump
The Trump administration is sending 3,000 service members, two fighter squadrons, one air expeditionary wing, two Patriot Missile batteries and one THAAD missile defense system to Saudi Arabia to aid that kingdom. As Daniel Larison noted in a link yesterday, Trump is often praised by his supporters for his policy of getting us out of permanent foreign wars…but he hasn't actually done that yet anywhere. To date, he has escalated every war he inherited and he sure looks poised to create some new ones.

Bonus Article About Donald Trump
Trump keeps soliciting or applauding illegal or unethical actions done on his behalf. His followers claim that what he says in these instances are "jokes." But as William Saletan makes clear, they're not.

Today's Bad News for Donald Trump
Two associates of Rudy Giuliani were arrested today and "America's Mayor" may himself be in great legal jeopardy. That's all worse news for Rudy than it is for Donald but having his lawyer and most visible spokesperson in legal trouble sure won't reflect well on Trump. Giuliani keeps saying that when all this is over, he will emerge as "the hero." And that may be true — to those of us who want to see Trump gone.

Today's Outrage by Donald Trump
Trump's attacks against the Bidens are getting wilder, coarser and more hysterical. If he's at this level of mud-hurling with close to 13 months before Election Day, where is the public discourse going to be by Halloween of 2020?

Bonus Article About Donald Trump
Daniel Larison makes the important point that most of the folks praising Trump's foreign policy are hailing what he says he's going to do, not what he actually does. There's a very big difference.

Today's Bad News for Donald Trump
For the first time, a major poll shows more than half the country believes Trump should be impeached and removed from office. And it's going to be hard to dismiss this as some rigged Liberal-Democratic poll since it's the Fox News Poll.

Today's Outrage by Donald Trump
According to a new book, back in March, Trump was in a frenzy to stop immigration and he discussed shooting migrants in the legs, electrifying the border wall and fortifying it with spikes, and putting in a moat stocked with snakes or alligators. It's frightening to think how many of his supporters would have cheered these measures…and even complained they weren't harsh enough.

Today's Bad News for Donald Trump
Trump's decision to withdraw U.S. forces from Syria is not going over well with a lot of people. Among them, as Adam Edelman and Elizabeth Janowski report, are a lot of the kind of Republicans who, if Trump mugged an old lady would race to the microphones to praise him for it. Even Lindsey Graham couldn't bring himself to smooch butt over that one. And we also have Fred Kaplan explaining why it's such a wrongheaded move.

Today's Outrage by Donald Trump
Trump has this new, novel theory about how impeachment works. Jonathan Chait explains that it comes down to "Trump will cooperate with an impeachment probe if Democrats stop the impeachment probe." The man who criticized Barack Obama every way he could think of doesn't believe any criticism of him is legit.

I've decided that until Donald Trump leaves office — and maybe even after — I will feature one story each day about what he's doing to The World, America, The Rule of Law, The Dignity of the Executive Branch and himself. He, of course, is concerned only with the last of these. I've decided to also post one bit of bad news for him for that day. I'm fairly confident there will always be one. So here's today's…

Today's Bad News for Donald Trump
A Federal Judge has tossed outta court, Trump's suit claiming that he doesn't have to hand over eight years of his tax returns to an investigation in the state of New York.

Today's Outrage by Donald Trump
Trump and his Giuliani-grade legal team are trying a ridiculous argument: That it's unconstitutional to investigate the affairs of the President of the United States because he can't be punished except by impeachment. So not only would he be above the law but so would anyone who committed crimes in his service.

Donald Trump Jr. claims to be outraged that Hunter Biden may have profited from being related to someone in the White House. This is a little like Jeff Bezos saying it's wrong to make money online. Russ Choma lists some of the conflicts of interest of the Trump clan.

In the fifteen minutes a day I allow myself to talk and/or think about Trump, I had this thought: You know how furious and incoherent he's been this last week? Well for the rest of his days in office and a long time after, he will never be less furious or more coherent. That's just the nature of this guy and I doubt many of his supporters would even praise him for any ability to be calm and rational when under attack. The Ukraine matter will only go away or recede into the background if/when it is displaced by a bigger scandal and an even more impeachment-worthy crime.

Here's Frank Rich on Trump's increasingly-worse skills at Crisis Management.

Apparently, the pending/possible impeachment is not just the major issue on Donald Trump's mind, it's the only thing in the world that matters. Fred Kaplan takes us through some of the worldwide crisis situations that our small-p president is ignoring.

I've decided to reinstate this daily feature and I'll keep it until the day the man leaves office…and maybe even a while after that. I'll post it during the fifteen minutes a day I'm allowing myself to think about the guy in the White House.

Today's installment is this article by George T. Conway, an attorney who was once a stalwart "Everything Republicans Do Is Good, Everything Democrats Do Is Bad" advocate. What changed that? Trump did. Mr. Conway is the hubby of Kellyanne Conway, who is still an advocate of the "E.R.D.I.G.E.D.D.I.B." philosophy. Things must be a lot of fun at their house.

The piece explains George's belief that Donald J. Trump is unfit for public office just because of who he is and how he is incapable of certain things we want in a President like honesty, being in touch with reality, and caring about something other than himself. I am a bit uncomfy with Mr. Conway's belief that "Any intelligent person who watches Trump closely on television, and pays careful attention to his words on Twitter and in the press, should be able to tell you as much about his behavior as a mental-health professional could" but most of what the article says is tough to deny. Which is not to say Trump supporters wouldn't.

Anyway, there's a lot of interesting stuff in there about what the Founding Fathers intended for the Presidency and you'll learn a lot about narcissistic personality disorder and antisocial personality disorder. Here's that link again.

I haven't done one of these for a while…but why not? It looks like it's not going to be a very good week for Donald Trump. Oh, he'll score a point or two but he's going to spend this week — and probably the rest of his time in office — tweeting in hysterics about plots against him and Fake News and how he is absolutely perfect and everyone against him is lying, treasonous pondscum who hates him and America — in that order of importance. Here's some reading…

I have a pet peeve about people who vow they're going to pass a Constitutional Amendment and then drop the matter two days later. This is the case with about 999.99999999% of all promises to pass a Constitutional Amendment. In the same vein are accusations of Treason, usually by someone who thinks the definition of Treason is "doing anything I don't like." Dylan Matthews reminds us what Treason actually means.

Kevin Drum lays out the facts in the accusation of Biden wrongdoing in the Ukraine. So far, there's absolutely no case against either Joe or his son, and I suspect Trump and his minions know that. But you know, if you're Donald Trump and someone is running against you, you have to accuse them of tons of vile corruption if only so yours won't look so awful. Drum also reminds us how so many Republicans earnestly believe a lot of bad shit about Democrats.

Jonathan Chait explains why Lindsey Graham's defense of Trump is a pretty darned weak one, no matter how fervently he makes it.

Conservative columnist Rod Dreher thinks that "Trump's paranoia, à la Nixon, is going to destroy him."  I think that's happening right this minute. Maybe the ghost of Barry Goldwater will go to the White House and tell Donald it's time to get out.

And there are a lot of Conservative pundits and politicians who are acknowledging Trump probably committed impeachable offenses but who also think that impeaching him will hurt the country more than not impeaching him. Daniel Larison takes on one of them and explains why that's wrong.

Like I said, not a very good week to be Donald Trump. Or someone who has to go out and explain why every single criticism of him is a lie. Kellyanne Conway's on one of the cable channels right now trying to convince everyone in America and good luck with that, Kellyanne. You can't even convince everyone in your marriage.