Revelations
“The picture that perhaps emerges most starkly from the mountain of figures and tax schedules prepared by Mr. Trump’s accountants is of a businessman-president in a tightening financial vise.”
Idiot, traveler, chicken
Alexander Vindman characterizes Donald Trump*: a useful idiot, a fellow traveler, and free chicken.
“The scale of betrayal”
On Trump*’s COVID lies: "The scale of betrayal is almost beyond political analysis": Mara Gay of The New York Times.
#TrumpKnew
From the Lincoln Project.
Orange Crate Art:
“Let me be as honest and clear as I possibly can. Donald Trump is the wrong president for our country. He has had more than enough time to prove that he can do the job, but he is clearly in over his head. He cannot meet this moment. He simply cannot be who we need him to be for us. It is what it is.”
“In 1917 they say, right?”
“Just to set the record straight on your command of history: could you tell us when the Second World War took place, who was involved, and what its consequences were for the twentieth century?”
Trump* Axios interview
Our well-being is in the hands of a psychopath. Read the manuals!
A baseline preference
Virginia Heffernan writes in the Los Angeles Times about Herman Cain, Louie Gohmert, and opposition to face masks.
“Why should I?”
William Barr makes it easy to know what to think of him.
“I am someone’s daughter too”
Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) responds to Representative Ted Yoho (R-FL), who called her, on the steps of the United States Capitol, a “fucking bitch.”
John Lewis (1940–2020)
“My philosophy is very simple: when you see something that is not right, not fair, not just, you have to stand up, you have to say something, you have to do something. My mother told me over and over again, when I went off to school, not to get in trouble. But I told her I got in good trouble, necessary trouble. Even today, I tell people, ‘We need to get in good trouble.’”
Donald Trump*, desperado
Donald Trump* is a desperado, “one in despair or in desperate straits.” He is also a desperado, “a bold or violent criminal.” Commuting Roger Stone’s sentence is the act of a desperado.
Jared’s verbs
Jared’s verbs (and his demonstrative adjective) claim reality for what’s non-existent. The present king of France is bald.
A “lethal aversion to reading”
“It's not a stretch to say that if the president read, thousands of lives might have been saved”: in The Week, Windsor Mann writes about Donald Trump*’s “lethal aversion to reading.”
A variation on a theme
Trump* equals death.
TRUMP = DEATH
Not too extreme an equation.
A mind at work
it’s clear that we’re watching a failing mind at work.
The perils of inattention
The Washington Post reports that “U.S. intelligence agencies issued warnings about the novel coronavirus in more than a dozen classified briefings prepared for President Trump in January and February.”
Science must trump politics
Dr. Rick Bright: “Rushing blindly towards unproven drugs can be disastrous and result in countless more deaths. Science, in service to the health and safety of the American people, must always trump politics.”
Turtles all the way down
The paranoid style in American politics is never at a loss for explanations: another layer of theorizing can always be added to support a rickety conspiracy theory. It’s turtles, or theories, all the way down.
Making us worse
Tom Nichols, writing in The Atlantic, says that Donald Trump*’s matinee performances are making us worse people.
Got logic?
Hide the dishonesty, incompetence, misogyny, narcissism, racism, &c. so that he can have four more years in which to put them to use.
“Speak the truth”
Barack Obama: “The biggest mistake any us can make in these situations is to misinform, particularly when we’re requiring people to make sacrifices and take actions that might not be their natural inclination.”
Dilettantism and sociopathy
“This is dilettantism raised to the level of sociopathy”: Michelle Goldberg on Jared Kushner’s role in the White House’s coronavirus response.
No questions
When Trump* says that he’ll take questions from reporters, they should remain silent. And after a suitable silence: “We have some questions for Dr. Fauci.” No reporter is obligated to give a narcissist further opportunities to lie, exalt himself, and propagandize.
Intellectual prostration
Deborah Birx prostrates herself.
Feelings and beliefs
The Delphic orifice speaks.
Adults? Anyone?
The adults in the room must step forward — or, if necessary, leave the room — and tell the truth, plainly and clearly. There’s too much at stake.
“Opening up”
Donald Trump* just acknowledged that medical experts do not agree with his idea of “opening up” the country just weeks from now. The mind blanks at the glare, as Philip Larkin wrote.
Swabs, stocks, and stupidity
Three observations from Donald Trump*’s afternoon propaganda show.