Let’s take a trip back to June 16, 2015, the day that Donald Trump announced he was running for president the first time. I’m taking you back that far because I want to see if I can find something…anything…normal about it. Not normal psychologically – we all know how that search would go – but normal politically.
Let’s go back to the late 1800s when the Old Money of NYC would have never allowed the likes of trmp into their parlors or at their dining room tables. Normally I loathe that kind of caste system in favor equality; however, there is a lesson to be learned here. Men who mock your values, seek to ruin your institutions, and rape your women are not fit to be even fair weather companions, and certainly not leaders.
Trump has never been allowed into those parlors and dining rooms--it's one of the foundational causes of his bottomless rage. Getting through the velvet rope of Studio 54 was nice, and got his name in the gossip columns, but it didn't help him at all with those he was desperate to join.
I remember that day in 2015 and thinking that the biggest clown on planet Earth had just told the least funny joke in history - that HE was running for President. Still shaking my head till it hurts.
I remember telling a high school buddy of mine (who became a prof at Northwestern) that I hoped Trump got the nomination because he was obviously an idiot and easy to beat. He emailed me back: "Be careful what you wish for!" Boy, was he right.
Perhaps you can’t easily disassemble fame with truths.
But what about withdrawing attention?
I’m so tired of seeing that evil face at the top of every news broadcast, and on the front of every newspaper, wrapped in the flag he has so desecrated.
I’m tired of hearing TV announcers of all stripes breathlessly referring to him as “the president” rather than an accurate descriptor. (There are so many possibilities: the disgraced ex-president, the criminally indicted MAGA boss, the sex offender who leads the Republican Party, the twice impeached loser of the 2020 election.)
But what I’d really like is seeing and hearing a whole lot less of him. Maybe a daily little perp summary on page 5 of respectable papers, same place every day, giving a quick summary of his latest lies, antics, new charges, or whatever. No photos. Seriously, we know what he looks like, or at least what he looks like slathered in make up.
I just have a sick feeling that in the name of news we’re pumping oxygen into a blast furnace. Can we stop? Would he even exist without that oxygen?
When I hear news of "the president" I still sometimes have to correct the image that forms, so often do tv types follow the trump team misapplication of the term to the wrong man.
Your words will be reaffirmed by MSM covering Trump LIVE at the DC Circuit Court rather than recording it, then playing it with commentary.
MSM is so addicted to Trump they would train a camera on an empty podium for as long as it took for Trump to appear during the 2016 campaign. Their own words gave them away, "we" (MSM) are waiting for Trump to appear.
It’s the $64,000 question: Why has Donald Trump spent the past month behaving in so many ways that seem transparently and irrationally self-destructive. To wit:
Packing together 150 maskless supporters at the White House in the midst of an ongoing pandemic.
Declining to wear a mask himself, even in public settings, and then contracting the coronavirus, along with dozens of others who work at the White House.
Resuming large campaign events, maskless and not socially distanced, just days after his release from the hospital, putting ever more Americans at risk.
Refusing to denounce white supremacy and QAnon.
Refusing to guarantee that he will accept the outcome of the election and leave the White House if he is defeated.
Trump is the poster child and the Superspreader-in-Chief for a deeper illness in America. It afflicts men and takes the form of patriarchy and toxic masculinity—a system in which (mostly white) men promiscuously wield their privilege and power to control others.
To counteract his own feelings of insecurity and inadequacy, Trump’s primary defense has long been the grandiose insistence that “Only I can fix it.” It’s a zero-sum game. If he doesn’t “win” in every contest, real or imagined, then he sees himself as a loser. If he isn’t in total control, he feels weak and humiliated. If he isn’t dominating, he is succumbing.
[ John Oliver Reveals Amy Coney Barrett’s Scariest Moments ]
This is what Trump believes it is to be a real man, and from that perspective, his recent behavior makes perfect sense. No disease is going to tell Trump what to do. He treats COVID as just another opponent he must squash—not by bringing the crisis under control for the sake of all citizens, but by minimizing and sneering at it himself. Likewise, no one is going to make him denounce the white supremacists who support him, and no defeat at the polls is going to force him to voluntarily give up the presidency, even if each of these stances make it more likely that he’ll lose the election.
Trump’s lack of empathy and absence of conscience have long given him the license to invent his own rules, define his own reality, defy norms, and break multiple laws. He lies without shame, and the more unacceptable he finds the facts, the more he dissembles. The volume of his lies has increased from five per day in the first year of his presidency, to 23 a day in the spring of this year, and almost certainly much higher during the past several months. In the 18 months that I spent with Trump to write The Art of the Deal, I never once saw him express affection or comfort to anyone, including his three young children. I saw no evidence that he ever had a single true friend.
****** Metanoia may come late to someone, but it's still right on time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metanoia - Who knows if Schwarz went through anything this extreme, but one way or another, he has come to terms with what collaborating with Trump has meant, it seems.
Developments
William James used the term metanoia to refer to a fundamental and stable change in an individual's life-orientation.[1] Carl Gustav Jung developed the usage to indicate a spontaneous attempt of the psyche to heal itself of unbearable conflict by melting down and then being reborn in a more adaptive form – a form of self healing often associated with the mid-life crisis and psychotic breakdown, which can be viewed as a potentially productive process.[2] Jung considered that psychotic episodes in particular could be understood as an existential crisis which might be an attempt at self-reparation: in such instances metanoia could represent a shift in the balance of the personality away from the persona towards the shadow and the self.[3]
A description of Donald Trump by a former senior official in his administration -
"He lacks any shred of human decency, humility or caring. He is morally bankrupt, breathtakingly dishonest, lethally incompetent and stunningly ignorant of virtually anything involving governing, history, geography, human events or world affairs. He is a traitor and a malignancy in our nation and represents a clear and present danger to our democracy and the rule of law."
Sally Tomato has found a way around that even in the joint, according to a friend of a friend. The thing of it is that friend isn't sure if she's a phony, or a real phony, you'd have to ask her yourself I guess.
Yet the very same people knowingly, willingly, and most of all loyally served Trump. That includes those who voted twice for Trump, voted not to impeach or not to convict.
So, when I read attributed and unattributed SELF-SERVING (CAP emphasis) quotes from Republicans and conservatives read it as more about their political and personal cowardice more than anything else.
What is worse than the quotes was watching Trump Administration officials during their 6Jan depositions or public testimony attempt to make self look like heroes waydafuq after the fact knowing full well the MSM will elevate them to that status due to MSM default of hero v. villain.
The record shows not a single senior member of the Trump Administration had the political of personal courage to stand up to Trump. That is what history will record rather than anonymous quotes way after the fact. Cowards, All!
Indeed! To me that maybe the most shocking thing of all - the obsequiousness of so many people who knew better and should have done something. Profiles in cowardice.
Exactly. People forget 100s served Trump all with various degrees of first hand knowledge of all his acts yet not one over 4 years stood up. In an unintended and in a perverted fashion affirms anything is possible. while simultaneously making the case Republicans are moral, political, and physical cowards. Then try to weasel their way into looking good for NOT doing the right thing at the right time and for the right reasons.
So, it ain't enough to rid the landscape of Trump. Must be applied to the Republican Party. Am not alone in that position. Former Republicans know it and have so stated. And none better than Matthew Dowd and Stuart Stephens including in his book, It Was All A Lie.
Agree it captures all Trump is and isn't. Indeed, as you wrote it is ~poetry~. Albeit unattributed. If it is worth saying or worth writing, then it is worthy of one's good name, no?
If (ret Marine 4S) Kelly wrote or said it, then as a Marine, as a former 4S, a decorated combat officer, and as a man of honor with nothing to lose, he shoulda' said/wrote it when it mattered most. The standard for a mil lifer is much higher than for civs.
Besides, the day in the Brady Room when he went off on non-Gold Star members of the press (punching down) will never ever be forgotten. Nor should it. So, if it is Kelly quote that best captures Trump, his scolding and talking down to the press best captures Kelly. Sadly, no member of the press fired back or challenged him.
As you can see have concluded the Trump's enablers lacked the same virtues and had many characters flaws, including being weak in judgment, which is the reason Trump selected them. To date there hasn't been a single exception.
It’s sad, when he was elected I thought that as a neotype politician he would have to surround himself with experienced, successful people, who would look out for the nation, to some degree at first he did, it seems that the ones who saw him the most were the first to leave. He’s poison ☠️
As a nation and as a people that was the prevailing view due to expecting the White House with all its history to be soberly absorbed into its next occupant as it had done so many times before.
Alas, one of the first signs that was not to be occurred when Trump called the White House a dump. Then went about a remodeling including filling its walls not with art rather teevees and desecrating the Rose Garden. Point being, the White House was not going to change him, he was going to change the White House's history, traditions, and norms.
What galled me most watching the 1/6 hearings was knowing that the former administration officials had important information to share -- and the reason they had important information to share was that they'd been willing to work for the most outrageously incompetent and dangerous president the U.S. has ever had.
Most people who've done important things, created important works of art, etc., never get that kind of platform. I never learn their names. But I recognize the names of all those Trump administration sycophants, just like I remember the names of all those Nixon administration scumbags from 50 years ago. They were cowardly, often amoral people, and I know all their names.
President Ford's pardon of Nixon was also a cowardly act rather than how he tried to see it as in the best interest of the nation. Presidential pardons are in direct contravention of we are a nations of laws, not of men. And for all the big talk of the Founders/Framers did not want a King/Queen, they knowingly gave a power previously exclusive to Kings and Queens, the pardon.
Now Trump attorneys want to add another power associated w/Kings and Queens, immunity. Fuqdatchit. Two wrongs a right not make.
I hadn't considered that connection -- that the pardon power was previously exclusive to monarchs. Cruising through Wikipedia I learned that the founders seem to have had mixed feelings about including the presidential pardon power in the Constitution. Alexander Hamilton was for it (why am I not surprised?), but "at the Virginia Ratifying Convention, the delegate George Mason argued against ratification partly on the grounds that 'the President ought not to have the power of pardoning, because he may frequently pardon crimes which were advised by himself.'" He got that right.
I also looked up pardons in my state (MA). Requests for pardons and commutations of sentence go to the state Parole Board and must be reviewed by the Office of General Counsel before they get to the governor. So the governor can't just pardon people because s/he feels like it.
Not surprised you dug deep well past the 2nd Constitution and the next layer, The Federalist Papers to state house/local level. That is where the action was truly at. And all too often constitutional attys never go, Sadly, sometimes apply to Judges/Justices at the US Federal Court level,
Yes, the Commonwealth instituted a rigid process for pardons and commutations. After all it was the one state in the nation that celebrates Patriots Day and situated signs declaring MA gun laws before or immediately after Welcome to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts signage. Don't know if those signs are still up. Do you?
Final note: can only shake me-noggin when R candidates for the office of president cavalierly state they would pardon Trump without knowing the full evidence against him.
I got my copy of DSM-IV when several MSWs retired from Hennepin County Volunteer Services and left their copies to whoever wanted them, it's all available online too. The
Bandy X. Lee edited book on The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump is another great source!
27 PSYCHIATRISTS AND MENTAL HEALTH EXPERTS ASSESS A PRESIDENT
EDITED BY BANDY X. LEE ‧ RELEASE DATE: OCT. 3, 2017
As with most anti-Trump books, this one will shore up the opinions of those already convinced of his lack of fitness for the...
Mental health professionals and others make the case that Donald Trump is mentally ill, dangerous, or both.
Editor Lee (Law and Psychiatry/Yale School of Medicine) asked for and received submissions for this book within a three-week period, and several of them show signs of being written in haste. Many of the contributors are leading psychologists or psychiatrists; others include journalist Gail Sheehy, Tony Schwartz, the co-author of Trump’s The Art of the Deal, and attorney and “political junkie” James A. Herb, who filed a petition in the Palm Beach County Circuit Court to determine Trump’s mental incapacity in October 2016, “based on the fact that Trump’s apparent lack of mental capacity to function could impact me and possibly the whole world.” The volume is aimed strictly at demonstrating that Trump shouldn’t be in office (admittedly a view held by tens of millions of other Americans) and that a panel of mental health professionals should be established to determine his lack of fitness. At the heart of many of the essays is the increasingly controversial 1973 “Goldwater rule” implemented by the American Psychiatric Association, which states that psychiatrists shouldn’t diagnose public figures without personally examining them. Also frequently cited is the Tarasoff decision made by California in 1976, which states that psychiatrists should speak out when they know that “an individual is dangerous to another person or persons.” Some of the essays border on self-parody: one author argues seriously that “post-Trump stress disorder” ought to be considered “as serious as PTSD.” Read collectively, the essays become repetitious: the contributors lean on the same definitions of narcissism and paranoia and cite the same tweets and passages from speeches, most of which will already be familiar to readers.
As with most anti-Trump books, this one will shore up the opinions of those already convinced of his lack of fitness for the job but won’t change the minds of his supporters, the vast majority of whom won’t read it. *******
October 3, 2018 - one year later to the day - NBC NEWS was reporting THIS about Trump's
WASHINGTON — More than 40 people with potential information into the sexual misconduct allegations against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh have not been contacted by the FBI, according to multiple sources that include friends of both the nominee and his accusers.
The bureau is expected to wrap up its expanded background investigation as early as Wednesday into two allegations against Kavanaugh — one from Christine Blasey Ford and the other from Deborah Ramirez.
But sources close to the investigation, as well as a number of people who know those involved, say the FBI has not contacted dozens of potential corroborators or character witnesses.
****** The article continues, as do the direct and a horde of consequential damages stemming from that "Walk Down the Golden Stairs to the Scene of Trump's Endless Future Crimes Against the United States" described so brilliantly in LKTIV's column!
If it was John Kelly, the man is a poet - that is the most succinct and dead-on description of the Mango Mussolini I have seen, a testament to the power of well-chosen words.....
Thank you for your very insightful comment and for these further illuminatibg references.
And Lucian, I’ll post my main thanks to you for today’s extraordinary commentary separately, but will just say here that with your gifts as a writer and an exceptionally perceptive and thoughtful political and social commentator, you have naturally drawn in other leading thinkers like Richard and created an actual salon online. Not the eponymous magazine, obviously, although they wish, but the real thing: a gathering of great minds. It is a privilege to be a fly on the wall.
trump is funny as you tell it. Fame is at the core of the American myth of having "Made It". In 2016 trump had three important things for a politician:
1. Name recognition (galore) i.e. fame
2. The guy can't be too stupid if he flies around in his own airliner and has 50 story towers in Manhattan named after him
3. He was not of Washington DC biz as usual and untested as a politician and Americans like to give ambitious people chances.
Now we know he's an autocratic criminal Democracy-wrecker:
1. More famous than ever
2. Still flying around in that airliner
3. Deeply tapped into primordial / vote-getting race exploitation-white supremacy (like Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson)
4. Continues to defy Washington and laws of the land.
5. A proven golden goose for ALL USA media corporations
I would never call him a genius. He was born to create chaos. He was allowed to do it at home and then as he got older. I would maybe called “creative devil”.
Great insights and history of the MAGAt cult leader. I observed him all through the 70s and 80s from SW CT - such an embarrassing megalomaniac. Let's hope we can avoid tRump II for the sake of truth and our democracy. I'm counting on all the excellent prosecutors on his tail to hold him culpable for all 91 charges.
Unfortunately, while I agree with you with respect to the value of fame with respect to Trump's victory, this piece is a simplistic distortion of his political success. Fame opened "Door Number Two" for him and he exploited it to tap into the anger of an electorate feeling itself ignored. His combination of what you wrote here and his con-man salesman ability is what propelled him. My father was a farm machinery salesman and when I was a teen I saw him in action with his clients, rich farmers who poor-mouthed non-stop. He played them like a fiddle. I was in awe at his skill. That is one of the reasons why I see through Trump. My father was an honest salesman. Trump was and is a con-man.
Just goes to show how fickle fame and its pursuit can be. Mostly it was the novelty of trump as the outsider that appealed to a lot of voters and to their disenchantment with the crop of professional politicians that were also in pursuit of the Presidency. Ever the conman, trump seized on the opportunity to become king of the hill and show the snobs of the social circle that he wanted to join that he could outshine them all and against most odds, he won the big prize, albeit by coming in through the back door thanks to the quirks of the Electoral College.
Ya know, a casting agent? This info I do not recall. That was likely due to the fact that back in 2015 I was much freer to ignore the orange furred rodent.
My brush with Trump was as a bond analyst at the now defunct Bear Stearn’s who agreed to underwrite bonds to finance his Atlantic City casinos. Wall Street bought into his “business acumen” gave him money which he sucked up personally and went bankrupt.
Another great article with a photo of NYC to pique our interest. What a great analogy of climbing Mt. Everest. Now we wait and see what the courts do to him, especially the Supreme Court.
He put SCOTUS on notice stating that the good justices whom he placed there would throw out that the illegal bans on his being on primary ballots. A mob enforcement tactic used by many other nefarious individuals. Goes from bad to worse in record time.
as we used to say in the olden days. But the Publicity Hound-in-question had a better idea.
Since being notorious was fashionable in the counterculture, why not beat the outsiders at their own game.!?
Open up your skeleton closet and for a price, sell yourself, warts and all! Prostitution, the oldest profession, as the saying goes, is a sure crowd-pleaser. Feature wannabes and have them compete for the job of apprentice to the chief ass-kisser.
What a concept! Only in America!
And by dividing the nation, you get to become a member of the elite cadre of history’s biggest losers!
I'm puzzled by the comment that Tony Schwartz "was interviewing Trump in order to co-write 'The Art of the Deal.'" Who was the other co-writer? Obviously, it couldn't have been Trump. Did you mean "ghost write" rather than "co-write"?
Let’s go back to the late 1800s when the Old Money of NYC would have never allowed the likes of trmp into their parlors or at their dining room tables. Normally I loathe that kind of caste system in favor equality; however, there is a lesson to be learned here. Men who mock your values, seek to ruin your institutions, and rape your women are not fit to be even fair weather companions, and certainly not leaders.
Trump has never been allowed into those parlors and dining rooms--it's one of the foundational causes of his bottomless rage. Getting through the velvet rope of Studio 54 was nice, and got his name in the gossip columns, but it didn't help him at all with those he was desperate to join.
YUP! Loser.
You are absolutely correct.
So sooooo true!
well-said, well-said, indeed
Anyone following the show The Gilded Age gets a taste of this. Seems even the worst of them had more honor that many modern equivalents.
I remember that day in 2015 and thinking that the biggest clown on planet Earth had just told the least funny joke in history - that HE was running for President. Still shaking my head till it hurts.
I remember telling a high school buddy of mine (who became a prof at Northwestern) that I hoped Trump got the nomination because he was obviously an idiot and easy to beat. He emailed me back: "Be careful what you wish for!" Boy, was he right.
I think that I and many others in 2016 overestimated the intelligence of the average American voter. I'll never do that again.
Yup. Here we are.
Perhaps you can’t easily disassemble fame with truths.
But what about withdrawing attention?
I’m so tired of seeing that evil face at the top of every news broadcast, and on the front of every newspaper, wrapped in the flag he has so desecrated.
I’m tired of hearing TV announcers of all stripes breathlessly referring to him as “the president” rather than an accurate descriptor. (There are so many possibilities: the disgraced ex-president, the criminally indicted MAGA boss, the sex offender who leads the Republican Party, the twice impeached loser of the 2020 election.)
But what I’d really like is seeing and hearing a whole lot less of him. Maybe a daily little perp summary on page 5 of respectable papers, same place every day, giving a quick summary of his latest lies, antics, new charges, or whatever. No photos. Seriously, we know what he looks like, or at least what he looks like slathered in make up.
I just have a sick feeling that in the name of news we’re pumping oxygen into a blast furnace. Can we stop? Would he even exist without that oxygen?
When I hear news of "the president" I still sometimes have to correct the image that forms, so often do tv types follow the trump team misapplication of the term to the wrong man.
Right! Why can’t they call him “The twice-impeached, defeated ex-president”? And perhaps add, “And bat-shit crazy!”
And convicted rapist.
Your words will be reaffirmed by MSM covering Trump LIVE at the DC Circuit Court rather than recording it, then playing it with commentary.
MSM is so addicted to Trump they would train a camera on an empty podium for as long as it took for Trump to appear during the 2016 campaign. Their own words gave them away, "we" (MSM) are waiting for Trump to appear.
One of your best!
EDIT: It occurs to me I should at least link to this,
too:
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/07/25/donald-trumps-ghostwriter-tells-all
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Schwartz_(author)
https://www.thedailybeast.com/i-wrote-trumps-the-art-of-the-deal-and-im-terrified-of-what-hell-do-next ******* EXCERPT:
It’s the $64,000 question: Why has Donald Trump spent the past month behaving in so many ways that seem transparently and irrationally self-destructive. To wit:
Packing together 150 maskless supporters at the White House in the midst of an ongoing pandemic.
Declining to wear a mask himself, even in public settings, and then contracting the coronavirus, along with dozens of others who work at the White House.
Resuming large campaign events, maskless and not socially distanced, just days after his release from the hospital, putting ever more Americans at risk.
Refusing to denounce white supremacy and QAnon.
Refusing to guarantee that he will accept the outcome of the election and leave the White House if he is defeated.
Trump is the poster child and the Superspreader-in-Chief for a deeper illness in America. It afflicts men and takes the form of patriarchy and toxic masculinity—a system in which (mostly white) men promiscuously wield their privilege and power to control others.
To counteract his own feelings of insecurity and inadequacy, Trump’s primary defense has long been the grandiose insistence that “Only I can fix it.” It’s a zero-sum game. If he doesn’t “win” in every contest, real or imagined, then he sees himself as a loser. If he isn’t in total control, he feels weak and humiliated. If he isn’t dominating, he is succumbing.
[ John Oliver Reveals Amy Coney Barrett’s Scariest Moments ]
This is what Trump believes it is to be a real man, and from that perspective, his recent behavior makes perfect sense. No disease is going to tell Trump what to do. He treats COVID as just another opponent he must squash—not by bringing the crisis under control for the sake of all citizens, but by minimizing and sneering at it himself. Likewise, no one is going to make him denounce the white supremacists who support him, and no defeat at the polls is going to force him to voluntarily give up the presidency, even if each of these stances make it more likely that he’ll lose the election.
Trump’s lack of empathy and absence of conscience have long given him the license to invent his own rules, define his own reality, defy norms, and break multiple laws. He lies without shame, and the more unacceptable he finds the facts, the more he dissembles. The volume of his lies has increased from five per day in the first year of his presidency, to 23 a day in the spring of this year, and almost certainly much higher during the past several months. In the 18 months that I spent with Trump to write The Art of the Deal, I never once saw him express affection or comfort to anyone, including his three young children. I saw no evidence that he ever had a single true friend.
****** Metanoia may come late to someone, but it's still right on time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metanoia - Who knows if Schwarz went through anything this extreme, but one way or another, he has come to terms with what collaborating with Trump has meant, it seems.
Developments
William James used the term metanoia to refer to a fundamental and stable change in an individual's life-orientation.[1] Carl Gustav Jung developed the usage to indicate a spontaneous attempt of the psyche to heal itself of unbearable conflict by melting down and then being reborn in a more adaptive form – a form of self healing often associated with the mid-life crisis and psychotic breakdown, which can be viewed as a potentially productive process.[2] Jung considered that psychotic episodes in particular could be understood as an existential crisis which might be an attempt at self-reparation: in such instances metanoia could represent a shift in the balance of the personality away from the persona towards the shadow and the self.[3]
A description of Donald Trump by a former senior official in his administration -
"He lacks any shred of human decency, humility or caring. He is morally bankrupt, breathtakingly dishonest, lethally incompetent and stunningly ignorant of virtually anything involving governing, history, geography, human events or world affairs. He is a traitor and a malignancy in our nation and represents a clear and present danger to our democracy and the rule of law."
And he couldn't let his name be known because of the fear of the revenge of his 'supporters' to his family and himself. OMG...where are we?
Terrified that this is what we’re to face: horrid if it wins and nearly as awful WHEN it loses.
The Mafia called it "omerta" - silence unto death.....
Sally Tomato has found a way around that even in the joint, according to a friend of a friend. The thing of it is that friend isn't sure if she's a phony, or a real phony, you'd have to ask her yourself I guess.
Yet the very same people knowingly, willingly, and most of all loyally served Trump. That includes those who voted twice for Trump, voted not to impeach or not to convict.
So, when I read attributed and unattributed SELF-SERVING (CAP emphasis) quotes from Republicans and conservatives read it as more about their political and personal cowardice more than anything else.
What is worse than the quotes was watching Trump Administration officials during their 6Jan depositions or public testimony attempt to make self look like heroes waydafuq after the fact knowing full well the MSM will elevate them to that status due to MSM default of hero v. villain.
The record shows not a single senior member of the Trump Administration had the political of personal courage to stand up to Trump. That is what history will record rather than anonymous quotes way after the fact. Cowards, All!
Indeed! To me that maybe the most shocking thing of all - the obsequiousness of so many people who knew better and should have done something. Profiles in cowardice.
Exactly. People forget 100s served Trump all with various degrees of first hand knowledge of all his acts yet not one over 4 years stood up. In an unintended and in a perverted fashion affirms anything is possible. while simultaneously making the case Republicans are moral, political, and physical cowards. Then try to weasel their way into looking good for NOT doing the right thing at the right time and for the right reasons.
So, it ain't enough to rid the landscape of Trump. Must be applied to the Republican Party. Am not alone in that position. Former Republicans know it and have so stated. And none better than Matthew Dowd and Stuart Stephens including in his book, It Was All A Lie.
I do not disagree at all, but it is still the best and most concise description of the guy I have ever seen.....
Agree it captures all Trump is and isn't. Indeed, as you wrote it is ~poetry~. Albeit unattributed. If it is worth saying or worth writing, then it is worthy of one's good name, no?
If (ret Marine 4S) Kelly wrote or said it, then as a Marine, as a former 4S, a decorated combat officer, and as a man of honor with nothing to lose, he shoulda' said/wrote it when it mattered most. The standard for a mil lifer is much higher than for civs.
Besides, the day in the Brady Room when he went off on non-Gold Star members of the press (punching down) will never ever be forgotten. Nor should it. So, if it is Kelly quote that best captures Trump, his scolding and talking down to the press best captures Kelly. Sadly, no member of the press fired back or challenged him.
As you can see have concluded the Trump's enablers lacked the same virtues and had many characters flaws, including being weak in judgment, which is the reason Trump selected them. To date there hasn't been a single exception.
True dat.
It’s sad, when he was elected I thought that as a neotype politician he would have to surround himself with experienced, successful people, who would look out for the nation, to some degree at first he did, it seems that the ones who saw him the most were the first to leave. He’s poison ☠️
As a nation and as a people that was the prevailing view due to expecting the White House with all its history to be soberly absorbed into its next occupant as it had done so many times before.
Alas, one of the first signs that was not to be occurred when Trump called the White House a dump. Then went about a remodeling including filling its walls not with art rather teevees and desecrating the Rose Garden. Point being, the White House was not going to change him, he was going to change the White House's history, traditions, and norms.
What galled me most watching the 1/6 hearings was knowing that the former administration officials had important information to share -- and the reason they had important information to share was that they'd been willing to work for the most outrageously incompetent and dangerous president the U.S. has ever had.
Most people who've done important things, created important works of art, etc., never get that kind of platform. I never learn their names. But I recognize the names of all those Trump administration sycophants, just like I remember the names of all those Nixon administration scumbags from 50 years ago. They were cowardly, often amoral people, and I know all their names.
Agree w/every word.
President Ford's pardon of Nixon was also a cowardly act rather than how he tried to see it as in the best interest of the nation. Presidential pardons are in direct contravention of we are a nations of laws, not of men. And for all the big talk of the Founders/Framers did not want a King/Queen, they knowingly gave a power previously exclusive to Kings and Queens, the pardon.
Now Trump attorneys want to add another power associated w/Kings and Queens, immunity. Fuqdatchit. Two wrongs a right not make.
I hadn't considered that connection -- that the pardon power was previously exclusive to monarchs. Cruising through Wikipedia I learned that the founders seem to have had mixed feelings about including the presidential pardon power in the Constitution. Alexander Hamilton was for it (why am I not surprised?), but "at the Virginia Ratifying Convention, the delegate George Mason argued against ratification partly on the grounds that 'the President ought not to have the power of pardoning, because he may frequently pardon crimes which were advised by himself.'" He got that right.
I also looked up pardons in my state (MA). Requests for pardons and commutations of sentence go to the state Parole Board and must be reviewed by the Office of General Counsel before they get to the governor. So the governor can't just pardon people because s/he feels like it.
Not surprised you dug deep well past the 2nd Constitution and the next layer, The Federalist Papers to state house/local level. That is where the action was truly at. And all too often constitutional attys never go, Sadly, sometimes apply to Judges/Justices at the US Federal Court level,
Yes, the Commonwealth instituted a rigid process for pardons and commutations. After all it was the one state in the nation that celebrates Patriots Day and situated signs declaring MA gun laws before or immediately after Welcome to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts signage. Don't know if those signs are still up. Do you?
Final note: can only shake me-noggin when R candidates for the office of president cavalierly state they would pardon Trump without knowing the full evidence against him.
That former Trump official was dead on, and comprehensively so.
Looks like John Kelly read the Personality Disorders material in the DSM-III, IV, or V?!
dsm.psychiatryonline.org/dsmPreviousEditions
I got my copy of DSM-IV when several MSWs retired from Hennepin County Volunteer Services and left their copies to whoever wanted them, it's all available online too. The
Bandy X. Lee edited book on The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump is another great source!
www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/bandy-x-lee/the-dangerous-case-of-donald-trump/
THE DANGEROUS CASE OF DONALD TRUMP
27 PSYCHIATRISTS AND MENTAL HEALTH EXPERTS ASSESS A PRESIDENT
EDITED BY BANDY X. LEE ‧ RELEASE DATE: OCT. 3, 2017
As with most anti-Trump books, this one will shore up the opinions of those already convinced of his lack of fitness for the...
Mental health professionals and others make the case that Donald Trump is mentally ill, dangerous, or both.
Editor Lee (Law and Psychiatry/Yale School of Medicine) asked for and received submissions for this book within a three-week period, and several of them show signs of being written in haste. Many of the contributors are leading psychologists or psychiatrists; others include journalist Gail Sheehy, Tony Schwartz, the co-author of Trump’s The Art of the Deal, and attorney and “political junkie” James A. Herb, who filed a petition in the Palm Beach County Circuit Court to determine Trump’s mental incapacity in October 2016, “based on the fact that Trump’s apparent lack of mental capacity to function could impact me and possibly the whole world.” The volume is aimed strictly at demonstrating that Trump shouldn’t be in office (admittedly a view held by tens of millions of other Americans) and that a panel of mental health professionals should be established to determine his lack of fitness. At the heart of many of the essays is the increasingly controversial 1973 “Goldwater rule” implemented by the American Psychiatric Association, which states that psychiatrists shouldn’t diagnose public figures without personally examining them. Also frequently cited is the Tarasoff decision made by California in 1976, which states that psychiatrists should speak out when they know that “an individual is dangerous to another person or persons.” Some of the essays border on self-parody: one author argues seriously that “post-Trump stress disorder” ought to be considered “as serious as PTSD.” Read collectively, the essays become repetitious: the contributors lean on the same definitions of narcissism and paranoia and cite the same tweets and passages from speeches, most of which will already be familiar to readers.
As with most anti-Trump books, this one will shore up the opinions of those already convinced of his lack of fitness for the job but won’t change the minds of his supporters, the vast majority of whom won’t read it. *******
October 3, 2018 - one year later to the day - NBC NEWS was reporting THIS about Trump's
SCOTUS appointment:
www.nbcnews.com/politics/supreme-court/dozens-potential-sources-information-have-not-been-contacted-fbi-kavanaugh-n91614
Oct. 3, 2018, 7:46 AM CDT / Updated Oct. 3, 2018, 1:14 PM CDT
By Leigh Ann Caldwell and Heidi Przybyla
WASHINGTON — More than 40 people with potential information into the sexual misconduct allegations against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh have not been contacted by the FBI, according to multiple sources that include friends of both the nominee and his accusers.
The bureau is expected to wrap up its expanded background investigation as early as Wednesday into two allegations against Kavanaugh — one from Christine Blasey Ford and the other from Deborah Ramirez.
But sources close to the investigation, as well as a number of people who know those involved, say the FBI has not contacted dozens of potential corroborators or character witnesses.
****** The article continues, as do the direct and a horde of consequential damages stemming from that "Walk Down the Golden Stairs to the Scene of Trump's Endless Future Crimes Against the United States" described so brilliantly in LKTIV's column!
www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Up1s8z7jH8
David Bowie - Fame 90 (Official Video)
1.7M subscribers
1,056,554 views Jun 15, 2018 #DavidBowie #Bowie #YoungAmericans
The official music video for David Bowie's - Fame 90.
Taken from Bowie's 9th studio album 'Young Americans' released in 1975, which featured the singles 'Young Americans' and 'Fame'.
If it was John Kelly, the man is a poet - that is the most succinct and dead-on description of the Mango Mussolini I have seen, a testament to the power of well-chosen words.....
That is a spot on description of the insipid clown.
Excellent
Thank you for your very insightful comment and for these further illuminatibg references.
And Lucian, I’ll post my main thanks to you for today’s extraordinary commentary separately, but will just say here that with your gifts as a writer and an exceptionally perceptive and thoughtful political and social commentator, you have naturally drawn in other leading thinkers like Richard and created an actual salon online. Not the eponymous magazine, obviously, although they wish, but the real thing: a gathering of great minds. It is a privilege to be a fly on the wall.
trump is funny as you tell it. Fame is at the core of the American myth of having "Made It". In 2016 trump had three important things for a politician:
1. Name recognition (galore) i.e. fame
2. The guy can't be too stupid if he flies around in his own airliner and has 50 story towers in Manhattan named after him
3. He was not of Washington DC biz as usual and untested as a politician and Americans like to give ambitious people chances.
Now we know he's an autocratic criminal Democracy-wrecker:
1. More famous than ever
2. Still flying around in that airliner
3. Deeply tapped into primordial / vote-getting race exploitation-white supremacy (like Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson)
4. Continues to defy Washington and laws of the land.
5. A proven golden goose for ALL USA media corporations
The guy's an evil genius
And Mark Burnett is just one of the guilty parties who delivered that 'fame'.
I would never call him a genius. He was born to create chaos. He was allowed to do it at home and then as he got older. I would maybe called “creative devil”.
Great insights and history of the MAGAt cult leader. I observed him all through the 70s and 80s from SW CT - such an embarrassing megalomaniac. Let's hope we can avoid tRump II for the sake of truth and our democracy. I'm counting on all the excellent prosecutors on his tail to hold him culpable for all 91 charges.
Unfortunately, while I agree with you with respect to the value of fame with respect to Trump's victory, this piece is a simplistic distortion of his political success. Fame opened "Door Number Two" for him and he exploited it to tap into the anger of an electorate feeling itself ignored. His combination of what you wrote here and his con-man salesman ability is what propelled him. My father was a farm machinery salesman and when I was a teen I saw him in action with his clients, rich farmers who poor-mouthed non-stop. He played them like a fiddle. I was in awe at his skill. That is one of the reasons why I see through Trump. My father was an honest salesman. Trump was and is a con-man.
Just goes to show how fickle fame and its pursuit can be. Mostly it was the novelty of trump as the outsider that appealed to a lot of voters and to their disenchantment with the crop of professional politicians that were also in pursuit of the Presidency. Ever the conman, trump seized on the opportunity to become king of the hill and show the snobs of the social circle that he wanted to join that he could outshine them all and against most odds, he won the big prize, albeit by coming in through the back door thanks to the quirks of the Electoral College.
Ya know, a casting agent? This info I do not recall. That was likely due to the fact that back in 2015 I was much freer to ignore the orange furred rodent.
A reporter was told by an actor that they got around $50 each to become a crowd cheering the lunatic.
Too bad the actors were desperate for work. Wonder if they regret that now.
Bravo.
My brush with Trump was as a bond analyst at the now defunct Bear Stearn’s who agreed to underwrite bonds to finance his Atlantic City casinos. Wall Street bought into his “business acumen” gave him money which he sucked up personally and went bankrupt.
Another great article with a photo of NYC to pique our interest. What a great analogy of climbing Mt. Everest. Now we wait and see what the courts do to him, especially the Supreme Court.
He put SCOTUS on notice stating that the good justices whom he placed there would throw out that the illegal bans on his being on primary ballots. A mob enforcement tactic used by many other nefarious individuals. Goes from bad to worse in record time.
We get what we deserve.
“Famous for being famous”,
as we used to say in the olden days. But the Publicity Hound-in-question had a better idea.
Since being notorious was fashionable in the counterculture, why not beat the outsiders at their own game.!?
Open up your skeleton closet and for a price, sell yourself, warts and all! Prostitution, the oldest profession, as the saying goes, is a sure crowd-pleaser. Feature wannabes and have them compete for the job of apprentice to the chief ass-kisser.
What a concept! Only in America!
And by dividing the nation, you get to become a member of the elite cadre of history’s biggest losers!
Here’s the pitch: The Supreme Court supports the insurrection clause. Trump can’t be elected. Nikki Haley clobbers Biden and pardons Trump. Perfect
NO please NO!
Neither my head nor my insides are able to comprehend.
the pitch was called a ball. Off the plate on the fascist side.
I can’t possibly like that 👎🏻
wow, lucian--if only that neil postman was still around to read that. well done & spot on, bro.
I'm puzzled by the comment that Tony Schwartz "was interviewing Trump in order to co-write 'The Art of the Deal.'" Who was the other co-writer? Obviously, it couldn't have been Trump. Did you mean "ghost write" rather than "co-write"?