Trump's Latest "Jaw-Dropping, Eyeball-Popping" Propaganda Event

If you were unfortunate enough to have seen any part of malignant narcissist Donald "I Don't Take Any Responsibility At All" Trump's coronavirus briefing propaganda event yesterday, you'll recognize the characterizations of these two reporters, which we're quoting at length:

BBC North America editor Jon Sopel:

This has been the most dizzying, jaw-dropping, eyeball-popping, head-spinning news conference I have ever attended. And I was at Bill Clinton's news conference in 1998 when he faced the press for the first time over his relationship with Monica Lewinsky.

I was at this president's first White House gathering when he called me "another beauty". I was in Helsinki when he had his first news conference with Vladimir Putin, and seemed to prefer to believe the Russian leader over his own security and intelligence chiefs on interference in the 2016 election.

I was in Vietnam when Mr Trump gave a news conference after his talks with Kim Jong-un had unceremoniously collapsed. So I've sat in on some corkers. [snip]

There are more than 23,000 Americans dead because of coronavirus and more than half a million infected - and remember that, in early March, Donald Trump was saying there were a handful of cases, but that would soon be down to zero.

Yet Donald Trump walked into the briefing room with scores to settle with the media. This wasn't about the dead, the desperately sick, the people fearful of catching the virus. This was about him. And more particularly his profound sense of grievance that the media has been critical of his handling of Covid-19.

If you think that is an unfair exaggeration, after a few moments he said he was going to play a video. It had been produced by White House staff, even though it bore all the hallmarks of a campaign video. If it was a movie, it would have been called "Coronavirus: Why Donald Trump is Great - and the Media Awful".

One of the reporters quoted in the film would complain immediately afterwards that her words had been taken out of context.

The Washington Post's Aaron Blake:

Near the start of his daily coronavirus briefing on Monday, President Trump made a statement that betrayed, better than just about anything, how he views the purpose of such briefings.

Before playing a campaign-style video intended to show his decisive action on the virus and to accuse his critics of being the actual culprits on downplaying the threat, Trump cued it up by talking about what he wanted to do after it played.

“Most importantly,” he said, “we’re going to get back on to the reason we’re here, which is the success we’re having.”

Trump’s self-promotion, falsehoods and use of dodgy medical advice in these coronavirus briefings have led to a dialogue about whether networks should carry them live. And on Monday, he seemed to be daring all of them to stop, turning the whole thing into a spectacle of government-produced propaganda and even more personal score-settling and grievances.  [snip]

Trump proceeded to downplay many complaints about the federal response, going so far as to say that there is no problem with the number of ventilators and other equipment available. The reality is significantly different, according to the states.

Trump also at one point maintained, “Everything we did was right.” When pressed on the claim, he declined to restate it but cast blame on governors for not stockpiling more ventilators.

It was soon noted that the video Trump had cued up left out a significant chunk of time in February — after the China travel ban and before Trump acknowledged the severity of the situation in mid-March — in which he didn’t take significant steps.

“What did you do in February?” CBS News’s Paula Reid asked.

Trump responded, “What do you do when you have no cases in the whole United States?” Reid rightly noted that there were actually cases in February, but Trump ignored it, refocusing on the lack of cases in mid-January. Pressed, he assured that the administration had in February done “a lot, and in fact we’ll give you a list."

We won't be holding our breath waiting for that list.

There's a main takeaway that should be as obvious as it is recurring:  Trump, being a malignant narcissist, has no interest in you.  He has no capacity for empathy.  His only interest is to shield and aggrandize himself above all others.  To the extent he's aware of others, it's simply to note how much he is worshiped and admired by them.

Another takeaway must be that the media stop showing these campaign propaganda shitshows live.  Not one minute.  If there's information on the medical front, it can be broadcast in the ensuing news programs that generally follow these sick displays.  But stop giving this dangerous, unhinged fool free airtime for his ax- grinding, grievance- laden, media- undercutting, lie- filled performances.

Monday Reading

As always, please go to the links for the full articles/ op eds.

Even members of his own team of bumbling charlatans can't bring themselves to back up pathological liar Donald "Cadet Bone Spurs" Trump's claim that one two three four U.S. Embassies were under imminent threat of attack by Qassem Soleimani:

Senior administration officials declined Sunday to confirm President Trump’s assertion that four U.S. embassies had been targeted for attack by Iran, while saying that Trump’s “interpretation” of the threat was consistent with overall intelligence that justified the killing of a senior Iranian general.

“I didn’t see one with regard to four embassies,” Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper said of intelligence reports. “What I’m saying is I share the president’s view that probably — my expectation was they were going to go after our embassies,” Esper told CBS’s “Face the Nation.”

"Probably." Take that to the bank!  (Esper also said Cadet Bone Spurs "believed" there were four embassies under threat.  That and closing your eyes, clicking your ruby slippers together and saying "There's no place like home" will make it all come true!)

"Oddly," that information was never part of the intelligence briefing for Congress:

“I didn’t hear anything about that,” Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), who has been sharply critical of the explanation, said of the threat to embassies.

“Several of my colleagues have said the same,” Lee said on CNN on Sunday. “So, that was news to me, and it certainly is not something that I recall being raised in the classified briefing.”

Now, NBC News is reporting there was nothing "imminent" about the Soleimani threat:

President Donald Trump authorized the killing of Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani seven months ago if Iran's increased aggression resulted in the death of an American, according to five current and former senior administration officials.

The presidential directive in June came with the condition that Trump would have final signoff on any specific operation to kill Soleimani, officials said.  [snip]

The timing, however, could undermine the Trump administration's stated justification for ordering the U.S. drone strike that killed Soleimani in Baghdad on Jan. 3. Officials have said Soleimani, the leader of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' elite Quds Force, was planning imminent attacks on Americans and had to be stopped.

As Aaron Blake sums it up:

... Asked to produce actual intelligence justifying the claims of an “imminent” attack by Soleimani, Trump has instead provided his own guesses. He has repeatedly suggested this was based on actual intelligence, even though Esper now says it’s not. And in the process of explaining Trump’s comment, Pompeo suggested the attacks on multiple embassies were in the intelligence shared with Congress. Esper now says not only that the multiple embassies aren’t in the intelligence, but that even the information that Soleimani was prepared to strike one of them wasn’t shared with the broader Congress.

Our own summation:  when you're defending a pathological liar's ever- shifting lies, you lie and, in the process, you become part of the sickness.  Something about "everything he touches dies."

It's no wonder the public isn't buying Cadet Bone Spurs' ever- shifting excuse for Soleimani's demise:

In a week dominated by increased tension with Iran and speculation over when impeachment articles would be delivered to the U.S. Senate, a majority of Americans said they disapprove of President Trump's handling of the situation with Iran and feel less safe, according to a new ABC News/Ipsos poll. [snip]

Overall attitudes about Trump and the consequences of his actions against Iran largely were driven by Independents, a critical target for both parties in electoral politics. The poll showed a majority of Independents, 57%, and all U.S. adults, 56%, disapproving of Trump's handling of the situation with Iran, with 43% of both Independents and U.S. adults approving.  [snip]

In the aftermath of the U.S. strike, only 28% of Independents, and 25% of Americans, said they felt more safe, while just over half, 51% of Independents and 52% of U.S. adults, said they felt less safe. 

Barry Friedman and Dahlia Lithwick write about how Republicans in our court system are bending over backwards to aid Trump in his impeachment obstruction and in delaying Republican lawsuits to kill the Affordable Care Act until after the 2020 election:

What’s stunning is the degree to which the courts are complicit in all this. The courts have aided and abetted the Trump legal team and Mitch McConnell by refusing to behave as if time is a factor in any of these proceedings. That’s evident in the decision to docket a pair of financial records cases no earlier than March and the meandering pace of the gamesmanship around a case seeking to end the Affordable Care Act through judicial fiat. But the real coup de grâce was the failure of the Supreme Court and lower federal courts to resolve congressional subpoenas around the impeachment process with alacrity when it was altogether plain what was needed. Had the courts signaled a willingness to act at a pace befitting the needs of the moment, Schiff might have made a different choice. Sometimes the appearance of studied deliberation serves nihilism and chaos, even as it pretends at neutrality and institutionalism.

More than anyone else, bone- deep- evil Moscow Mitch McConnell is responsible for packing the courts with Trump- friendly jurists (not to mention fixing the Supreme Court with Gorsuch and Kavanaugh).

We close again with the strong recommendation that you visit Infidel 753's blog, not only for his current link round- up, but also for his thought- provoking posts.  Go!