The Trump Presidency: Part 20

[Giordano]

The man lost money running a casino...….

Great point. That is impressive. A guaranteed % return based on simple statistics. Very popular form of entertainment. One would think it would be easy to plan and run a successful casino. Unless one was stupid and refused to accept the math and the advice of other, experienced people...

 

[Giordano]

I think he sniffs when he takes drugs before a speech. The more he's required to pretend to be presidential, the more drug supported and more monotone the speech.

Aides prep'ing Trump for speech:

1. Spray on tan - check!
2. Refresh color on hair - check!
3. Adhere hair (hare?) to scalp - check!
4. Brief with one Powerpoint slide containing one bullet point - check!
5. Create telepromoter script - check!
6. Provide drug of choice - check!
7. Prepare White House spokespeople, VP, and Republicans in Congress for having to walk-back, defuse, or otherwise "clarify" Trumps ad lib statements. - check!
8. Provide scapegoats if speech doesn't go well. Most likely Chief of Staff as they are among the most expendable. Check!


Afterward: hustle him off to bed. Try to hide texting device. Make certain TV only tunes Fox stations.

 

[Giordano]

I can only imagine how much Trump's enablers are terrified during every speech he gives. Plus every morning when they wake up to his night time tweets and have to defend whatever the great mind peed out.

 

[newyorkguy]

Great point. That is impressive. A guaranteed % return based on simple statistics. Very popular form of entertainment. One would think it would be easy to plan and run a successful casino. Unless one was stupid and refused to accept the math and the advice of other, experienced people...

Now you can probably understand it. The past three years everyone has had a front row seat to watch him work his 'magic.' What has always made him special. His real talent. Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

Trump built for the high-rollers, even though experienced gaming people told him he was making a mistake. His market was going to be the retired couple that comes to Atlantic City for a day. Play roulette, maybe a little black jack. "That's your market," they told him. "Don't over build. You'll get killed." But Trump never listens to "experts," whether they're military generals or casino operators. Because, as Donnie has pointed out many times, he somehow knows more than any of the experts will ever know.
.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Trump Tweets

Just had a great conversation with Prime Minister Abe of Japan. I told him that the just completed Olympic venue is magnificent. He has done an incredible job, one that will make him very proud. Good things will happen for Japan and their great Prime Minister. Lots of options!

108 countries are dealing with the CoronaVirus problem, some of which we are helping!

Sleepy Joe Biden was in charge of the H1N1 Swine Flu epidemic which killed thousands of people. The response was one of the worst on record. Our response is one of the best, with fast action of border closings & a 78% Approval Rating, the highest on record. His was lowest!

 

[Stacyhs]

Trump Tweets

Just had a great conversation with Prime Minister Abe of Japan. I told him that the just completed Olympic venue is magnificent. He has done an incredible job, one that will make him very proud. Good things will happen for Japan and their great Prime Minister. Lots of options!

108 countries are dealing with the CoronaVirus problem, some of which we are helping!

Sleepy Joe Biden was in charge of the H1N1 Swine Flu epidemic which killed thousands of people. The response was one of the worst on record. Our response is one of the best, with fast action of border closings & a 78% Approval Rating, the highest on record. His was lowest!

I know this will be shocking news, but Trump is lying yet again:

https://www.mediaite.com/news/one-d...against-joe-biden-in-misleading-twitter-rant/

 

[Ladewig]

Trump Tweets

Just had a great conversation with Prime Minister Abe of Japan. I told him that the just completed Olympic venue is magnificent. He has done an incredible job, one that will make him very proud. Good things will happen for Japan and their great Prime Minister. Lots of options!

108 countries are dealing with the CoronaVirus problem, some of which we are helping!

Sleepy Joe Biden was in charge of the H1N1 Swine Flu epidemic which killed thousands of people. The response was one of the worst on record. Our response is one of the best, with fast action of border closings & a 78% Approval Rating, the highest on record. His was lowest!

He appears to be incapable of simply saying, my performance was better than his performance. He has some sort of superlative-use disorder. Everything has to be “I am the very, very, very best ever! And you are the very, very, very worst ever!”

I find it so tiring.

 

[Delphic Oracle]

Trump Tweets

Just had a great conversation with Prime Minister Abe of Japan. I told him that the just completed Olympic venue is magnificent. He has done an incredible job, one that will make him very proud. Good things will happen for Japan and their great Prime Minister. Lots of options!

108 countries are dealing with the CoronaVirus problem, some of which we are helping!

Sleepy Joe Biden was in charge of the H1N1 Swine Flu epidemic which killed thousands of people. The response was one of the worst on record. Our response is one of the best, with fast action of border closings & a 78% Approval Rating, the highest on record. His was lowest!

The V.P. is in charge of this outbreak. Last time we put a V.P. in charge of an outbreak, thousands died (I know).

Sleep tight, America.

...ugh

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

He appears to be incapable of simply saying, my performance was better than his performance. He has some sort of superlative-use disorder. Everything has to be “I am the very, very, very best ever! And you are the very, very, very worst ever!”

I find it so tiring.

Yes, it's pathologic narcissistic personality disorder.

This is a crisis so severe incompetrump cannot BS his way out of it.

 

[Aridas]

That's pretty funny, in a ghoulish way- he's been bragging constantly for the last three years about how the stock market has soared thanks to him, without ever really being able to say specifically what he's done to cause it; and now that he has actually done something that affected the market, he clams up.

You give him too little credit. He's been messing with the stock market lots during his Presidency. China trade war, deal claims, and nigh inevitable disappointments, as well as the constant attempts to pick fights with Iran serve as prime examples.

We're up to, what, at least 75% of the worst stock market days in history under Trump and growing?

He ain't so popular in Europe after last night...

IMHO Trump hates the EU, and that is what is behind this.

And Trump's coronavirus travel ban excludes the countries where he has golf courses struggling for business. Despite the notably greater risk related to coronavirus.

The V.P. is in charge of this outbreak. Last time we put a V.P. in charge of an outbreak, thousands died (I know).

Sleep tight, America.

...ugh

...What's worse is that 1) the Vice-President is still overwhelmingly better than the President and honestly 2) that the President is likely not hands free on the matter, because that's Trump for you.

Early US testing failures may have occurred because Trump wanted numbers low, despite the contagion

Short version of the overall point?

"Trump did not push to do aggressive additional testing...because more testing might've led to more cases being discovered and the president made clear the lower the numbers on coronavirus, the better for the president."

Link includes a small roundup of other related news reports, too, that help further back up and underscore the point that the response to the Coronavirus was significantly hampered by both Trump and people trying to make Trump happy.

Oh, and for the fun of it...

The editor of Science magazine is pissed off

That takes excerpts from and links to this article. I would just link that reasonably worthwhile article there, but... the first link is to credit for the rather appropriate headline. With that said, I found -

Maybe we should be happy. Three years ago, the president declared his skepticism of vaccines and tried to launch an antivaccine task force. Now he suddenly loves vaccines.

to be particularly poignant.

With that said, at least we've got one political party trying to get things to happen quickly. The other, well...

Pelosi works to cut emergency deal. McConnell skips town till Monday.

Moscow Mitch continues to show his rank disregard for the US.

 

[Ladewig]

You give him too little credit. He's been messing with the stock market lots during his Presidency. China trade war, deal claims, and nigh inevitable disappointments, as well as the constant attempts to pick fights with Iran serve as prime examples.

We're up to, what, at least 75% of the worst stock market days in history under Trump and growing?



And Trump's coronavirus travel ban excludes the countries where he has golf courses struggling for business. Despite the notably greater risk related to coronavirus.



...What's worse is that 1) the Vice-President is still overwhelmingly better than the President and honestly 2) that the President is likely not hands free on the matter, because that's Trump for you.

Early US testing failures may have occurred because Trump wanted numbers low, despite the contagion

Short version of the overall point?



Link includes a small roundup of other related news reports, too, that help further back up and underscore the point that the response to the Coronavirus was significantly hampered by both Trump and people trying to make Trump happy.

Oh, and for the fun of it...

The editor of Science magazine is pissed off

That takes excerpts from and links to this article. I would just link that reasonably worthwhile article there, but... the first link is to credit for the rather appropriate headline. With that said, I found -



to be particularly poignant.

With that said, at least we've got one political party trying to get things to happen quickly. The other, well...

Pelosi works to cut emergency deal. McConnell skips town till Monday.

Moscow Mitch continues to show his rank disregard for the US.

From Holden Thorp’s editorial

” But do us a favor, Mr. President. If you want something, start treating science and its principles with respect.”​

I should think it would be rather obvious by now: President Trump is inherently incapable of treating science and its principles with respect.

If he believes he already knows everything, then he is incapable of learning new things. Even if science saved his life, he would not be capable of learning to respect it. Even if science doubled his fortune, he would not be capable of learning to respect it.

 

[Bob001]

Trevor Noah's commentary on Trump's speech includes clips from moments before and after when he thought he was off camera -- and wasn't.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWO6i8cH8SA

 

[Andy_Ross]

Obama and Biden handled the H1N1 swine flu epidemic by declaring a national emergency when there were only 20 confirmed cases of it in the US.

Trump still has not declared a national emergency that would activate FEMA.

 

[The Great Zaganza]

It is amazing to think that even a single person would be mollified by the claim that, because the previous administration didn't handle a crisis perfectly, botching the next one needs to be excused.
All that Trump is screaming into the Twittersphere is that he cannot be expected to do any better than Obama and Biden.

 

[varwoche]

Trevor Noah's commentary on Trump's speech includes clips from moments before and after when he thought he was off camera -- and wasn't.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWO6i8cH8SA

Funny!

 

[TurkeysGhost]

It is amazing to think that even a single person would be mollified by the claim that, because the previous administration didn't handle a crisis perfectly, botching the next one needs to be excused.
All that Trump is screaming into the Twittersphere is that he cannot be expected to do any better than Obama and Biden.

Americans out here picking the grocery stores clean and Trump yammering on about some **** from 2009.

Trump is so insecure about him being compared to Obama and it shows.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Trump Tweets

If you want to get money into the hands of people quickly & efficiently, let them have the full money that they earned, APPROVE A PAYROLL TAX CUT until the end of the year, December 31. Then you are doing something that is really meaningful. Only that will make a big difference!

 

[newyorkguy]

Business Insider reports that Trump's payroll tax cut is not getting a lot of support in Congress. Given the Republican's history of hostility to Social Security and Medicare, I don't like the sound of this-

At the heart of Trump's plan is a suspension of taxes on employee wages that would last until the end of the year. Those are taxes used to finance Social Security, with employees and employers each paying 6.2% on their wages scaling up to $137,700. Then an additional 1.45% from the employee's gross pay is used to fund Medicare. Link

Nor this-

A Trump stimulus bill would likely push the federal deficit above $2 trillion, well past its previous record of $1.4 trillion over a decade ago during the recession.

Over his career Trump has proven time and again that he invariably chooses the wrong strategies, he has a history of crashing anything he gets involved with. Now we're moving into the scenario I always feared most since his election. A crisis which requires action and a response from the president. The fear that Trump will do what he has a history of doing.

I saw this man utterly destroy the football league he took charge of, bankrupt the Trump Shuttle airline and watched his Atlantic City operations go down the tubes. He never seems to learn any lessons, never seems to feel any pain or self-doubt. He just antes up the bluster and arrogance. Very dangerous man to have in charge of anything.

The idea that Donald Trump -- of all people! -- has a large role in steering the destiny of this nation would be laughable if it wasn't so serious. It's a real life nightmare.

 

[JoeMorgue]

It is amazing to think that even a single person would be mollified by the claim that, because the previous administration didn't handle a crisis perfectly, botching the next one needs to be excused.

Tribalistic Nihilism, the zeitgeist of the age.

"Side A can't live up to a strawman idealized version of their morals perfectly, therefore Side B is, through insane troll logic, somehow better because they don't live up the Side A's morals at all or even try."

 

[shemp]

People can't get tested, but meanwhile the fat ******* Cheeto still insists that this is a conspiracy to ruin him:

Trump grows more irate as his attempts to contain coronavirus fallout fail

President Donald Trump has grown more and more irate as his attempts to contain the political fallout of coronavirus -- much less the health crisis itself -- continue to fall short, people close to him said.

Trump watched angrily from the West Wing Thursday as stock markets tumbled to their worst percentage loss since the 1987 Black Friday, casting blame on the Federal Reserve for what he increasingly believes is an attempt to ruin his presidency.

Hours earlier, Trump griped at a presidential-style address delivered by his likely election year rival, Joe Biden, complaining that Democrats won't band together to help him pull the nation from the brink.

That morning, aides were forced to inform the President that a person he'd come into contact with over the weekend -- a senior Brazilian official -- had tested positive for coronavirus, a revelation that led to two Republican senators entering self-quarantine.

The confluence of events has led to a sense of growing crisis inside the White House, even as Trump and his top officials continue to project calm.

That's all that matters to the big ********. Himself. Everyone who isn't with him is conspiring to get him.

I hope he and Pence both catch it and die at the same moment so that someone who knows what they're doing (Pelosi) can be President until Biden is elected.