Freak Out Friday – August 16, 2019

The presidency is often referred to as the bully pulpit, and that’s never been a more apt description than when Donald Trump has occupied the office since he is absolutely a bully.

MAYBE THEY CAN GO TO BETHLEHEM, PENNSYLVANIA

Trump took to Twitter to recommend that the country of Israel ban Representatives Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar from entering.  Because when someone expresses sentiments with which you disagree, naturally you don’t fight to the death for their right to say it.  No, you use all the power at your command to punish them.  And Israel happily cooperated, right up until it was clear that they were preventing Tlaib from visiting her ninety year old grandmother and so reversed themselves, at which point she turned around and told them to shove their permission.

I must admit that I’m as familiar with their opinions on Judaism in general and Israel in particular as I should be…possibly because they’re from Minnesota and Michigan and don’t represent me or my views.  It doesn’t really matter to me.  Mitch McConnell could be the most pro-Israel, pro-Jewish guy out there and I’d still think he’s an áššhølë.

But when you’re the president, you’re supposed to be everybody’s president.  That’s the aspect (well, one of the aspects) of the job that Trump does not get.  He’s supposed to represent everybody, not just the people he likes and the people who praise him.  The concept of singling out two representatives and instructing another country to boycott them is as unpresidential as it gets.

POT. KETTLE.  BLACK.

Trump, who is clearly the least fit president we have had in decades, had the nerve to select a guy at a rally and attempt to fat shame him.  “”That guy’s got a serious weight problem!  Go home!  Start exercising!” said the red haired tub of lard whose idea of a gourmet meal is a Big Mac, fries and a Coke.

It gets better. The guy he shouted at who he believed was causing a ruckus was actually a Trump supporter who was busy shoving protestors and their signs away from the site.  So you can be a Trump fan attempting to trample on the first amendment rights of Trump haters and he’ll still condemn you.  Here’s the capper:  the guy’s such a Trump fan that he laughed off the verbal assault because hey, it’s Trump, what else can you expect?

MAYBE THE MURDERER IS HIDING IN A PIZZA SHOP

When Jeffrey Epstein was found dead in his cell, naturally the conspiracy theorists went nuts. That’s to be expected.

Unfortunately we have a conspiracy theorist in the Oval Office, and Trump retweeted, i.e., endorsed a groundless, baseless notion that the Clintons were responsible for his death.  Because of course a couple who couldn’t keep a White House bløw jøb under wraps has managed to be so masterful in concealing their crimes that decades’ worth of investigation hasn’t resulted in a single charge (as opposed to the dozens of charges, crimes and sentences from Trump.)  

The fact that the autopsy confirms suicide naturally will shut down the conspiracy theorists just as Obama’s birth certificate managed to cease the endless claims that he was born in Kenya.  Trump, who has according to the Washington Post lied more than 12,000 times in the past two and a half years, lives purely in his demented world of falsehoods and lies. He is the literal personification of the old joke about  you can tell when he’s lying because his mouth is moving.

EMPATHY FOR ME, NOT YOU

Of all the disservices that the Trump administration is foisting upon the country, the most significant is this:  He and his people are rewriting what this country stands for.

That stems from Trump’s utter lack of empathy.

He has made it abundantly clear that he has no sense of empathy.  He doesn’t care about other people’s needs or wants, families or desires.  The notion that people want to come to this country to build a better life is the underpinning of our nation, but his non empathy renders him incapable of understanding that.

And he keeps hiring people who support that message.  The latest is his acting director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Ken Cuccinelli.  Cuccinelli is simply the latest of something that is all too typical for Trump.  He puts people in charge of agencies whose histories put them in opposition to the tasks of the agency.  He put someone who combated the environment in charge of the EPA.  If he could find a flat earther who could string coherent sentences together, he’d put him in charge of NASA.  Cuccinelli told NPR that he wasn’t a fan of the Emma Lazarus poem that has defined the country’s immigration ethos:  “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”  Cuccinelli disagrees, saying that it would be far more appropriate to declare, “Give me your tired and your poor who can stand on their own two feet and who will not become a public charge.”  

When my father came to this country, he was not rich.  Trump’s people would likely have been standing at the border, determined to stop him from coming in.  My mother’s dad was rich, so she would have been fine, but my dad?  Not so much.  

GREENLAND? REALLY?

Trump has floated the notion of buying Greenland.  Has anyone told him that three quarters of it is frosted over?  What’s he want it for?  To have a permanent supply of ice for his Coca Colas?

DID HE DO ANYTHING RIGHT THIS WEEK?

Not that I’m aware.