Still no definitive plans about future ShrinkRap posts

Sorry about my indecisiveness about continuing ShrinkRap.

I'm still not ready to resume regular posts.   Dealing with some health issues -- as well as my just being so fed up with the current state of the Trump presidency that I could only be negative.  And we really don't need more of that.

All I can say is that, if and when I feel like resuming, I'll just start posting again.

Ralph

The Future of ShrinkRap

A friend and reader of ShrinkRap called me to ask if I am all right -- which led to my realization that some people who also know me personally take the appearance of new posts as indication that I am indeed still "all right" in terms of my health.   After all, I am 86 years old with known health problems.

The truth is that this current hiatus in postings did begin when I was hospitalized for three days for a relatively minor complication of my heart disease.   I've recovered from that manageable complication, but I just haven't felt motivated to get back into the political stuff I usually write about.

So let's just say that I'm suspending regular postings for an indeterminate time.  It may be short or prolonged.   I'm trying to let my interest in the news, rather than a compulsive need to be predictable, guide when I post.

Frankly, I find very little interest in the news right now.   I'm convinced we have an unfit man sitting in the Oval Office.  We have two different methods for removing him (impeachment and the 25th amendment) -- and neither responsible body seems willing or to have the will to carry out their role.

Perhaps the next Democratic debate (this coming Thursday) will spark an interest.

But for now -- let's just consider this a hiatus and wait to see what happens.    Suggest you check back in a week, and perhaps I'll have a more definitive message.

Ralph

Trump-FoxNews war heats up

Another Fox News host, Neil Cavuto, has defended himself and his network after a series of attacks from President Trump.   As reported by the Washington Post from Cavuto's own televised commentary:

"Earlier this week, Trump complained about his coverage on the network and griped that, "Fox isn't working for us anymore!"   He even encouraged his supporters to change the channel.

"But Cavuto fired back with a declaration of independence.

"First of all, Mr. President, we don't work for you.  I don't work for you," he said on Thursday.  "My job is to cover you, not fawn over you or rip you.  Just report on you -- call balls and strikes on you."

"Both Fox News and Fox Business feature numerous opinion shows where hosts routinely shower Trump with praise.   But the networks also have news operations that report on his plunging poll numbers, his failure to keep campaign promises and his many lies.  Cavuto shared some of those falsehoods on Thursday:

     "I'm not the one who said tariffs are a wonderful thing.   You are.   Just like I'm not the one who said Mexico would pay for the wall.  You did.  Just like I'm not the one who claimed that Russia didn't meddle in the 2016 election.   You did.  I'm sorry if you don't like these facts being brought up, but they are not fake because I did.  What would be fake is if I never did."

"Then Cavuto told Trump that he was not going to get a free pass in the network's news coverage.

"Hard as it is fathom, Mr. President, just because you're the leader of the free world does not entitle you to a free pass," he said.  "Unfortunately, just a free press."

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Beyond "Trump fatigue"

This was written by Frank Bruni, regular New York  Times columnist, edited for brevity.    It captures my feelings so well I want to share it.

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"Donald Trump Has Worn Us All Out"

Frank Bruni

New York Times, August 28, 2019

Donald Trump’s presidency has baffled me, enraged me and above all saddened me, because I’m a stubborn believer in America’s promise, which he mocks and imperils.

But last week his presidency did something to me that it hadn’t done before. It absolutely flattened me. . . .

Trump had yet again said something untrue, once more suggested something absurd, contradicted himself, deified himself, claimed martyrdom, blamed Barack Obama, made his billionth threat and hurled his trillionth insult. . . . 

I was sapped . . . .What I was feeling was beyond Trump fatigue and bigger than Trump exhaustion. It was Trump enervation. Trump enfeeblement.

And within it I saw a ray of hope.

Until now it has been unclear to me precisely how Trump ends. His manifestly rotten character hasn’t alienated his supporters, who are all too ready with rationalizations and fluent in trade-offs. They’re also unbothered by many of his missteps, because he has sold those to a cynical electorate as media fables and rivals’ fabrications. He’s so enterprising and assiduous at pointing the finger elsewhere that many voters have lost their bearings. Defeat is victory. Oppressors are liberators. Corruption is caring. Mar-a-Loco is Shangri-La.

But Americans of all persuasions recognize melodrama when it keeps smacking them in the head, and he has manufactured a bruising degree of it. . . . and they can’t lay their depletion on the doorsteps of frustrated Democrats and Fake News. The president’s tweets speak for themselves, in both volume and vitriol. . . . 

The turnover in his White House and the bloat of a Trump-administration diaspora can’t be dismissed as the detritus of . . .  an unconventional management style. They’re what happens when you place a cyclone at the Resolute Desk. Everything splinters and screams, and you can’t find a safe space.

“Even Trump’s Supporters Are Getting Tired of His Daily Drama” was the headline on Jim Geraghty’s Monday column in [the conservative] National Review. . . .  Geraghty wrote that the publication’s editors “are exhausted with presidential tweets, from asking whether Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell or Chinese leader Chairman Xi is the bigger enemy, to ‘hereby ordering’ private companies to look for alternatives to operations in China.”

He linked to a lament by the conservative writer Rod Dreher, who, he noted, “is exhausted from the president behaving like ‘a clown who refuses to meet with the prime minister of Denmark because she won’t sell him Greenland.’”

Notice a theme? Apparently weariness with Trump’s wackiness does something virtually unheard-of in the United States circa 2019: It transcends partisanship.
Trump’s instinct and strategy are to conquer by overwhelming. But there’s a difference between wearing people down and wearing them out. . . . a riveting spectacle devolved into a repellent burlesque, so unrestrained in its appetites that it devoured itself.

I wouldn’t be surprised if voters consciously or subconsciously conclude that they just can’t continue to live like this and that four more years would be ruinous, if not to the country as a whole, then to our individual psyches. By the time Election Day rolls around, they may crave nothing more electric than stability and serenity. That wouldn’t be a bad Democratic bumper sticker. It’s essentially the message of Joe Biden’s campaign.

According to Morning Consult’s tracking poll, Trump’s approval rating in vital swing states has declined significantly since he took office. Take Wisconsin: His approval rating in January 2017 was 47 percent, and his disapproval rating was 41, for a net plus of six percentage points. Now his approval has fallen to 41 while his disapproval has climbed to 55, for a net minus of 14.

Maybe that reflects voters’ economic worries. I suspect it’s just as much about their exhaustion. They’ve binged on Trump and now they’re overstuffed with Trump, and if Democratic candidates are smart, they’ll not dwell on his mess and madness, because voters have taken his measure and made their judgments, and what many of them want is release from the incessant drumbeat of that infernal syllable: Trump, Trump, Trump.

They’d like a new mini-series with a different cast, and Democrats aren’t giving them that if they keep putting Trump’s name above the title. On Saturday and then again on Sunday, I turned the whole damn show off and fled to the park for fresh air. I pray that’s some sort of omen.

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A-men.    Or, in a more secular vein:   yeah, man.

Ralph

Trump: "Fox isn't working for us anymore." Really. He said that in a tweet.

President Donald Trump became irate after Fox News anchor Sandra Smith hosted Democratic National Committee communications director Xochitl Hinojosa, during which they had an amicable discussion about the upcoming Democratic primary debates.

Trump said Smith should have pushed back and given Hinojosa a hard time.   He seemed especially incensed that she didn't challenge the accuracy of polls showing each of the leading Democratic candidates leading Trump in the polls.

And he ended this particular tweet storm with this:  "The New Fox News is letting millions of GREAT people down!   We have to start looking for a new News Outlet.  Fox isn't working for us anymore.!"

Then there was a quick twitter response from Fox News' senior political analyst Brit Hume:   "Fox News isn't supposed to work for you."

Former Sec. of Defense speaks about why he resigned.

Former Secretary of Defense in the Trump administration, Gen. James Mattis, who resigned in December 2018, is writing a book, with some preliminary thoughts published now in a op-ed piece today in the Wall Street Journal.

Here's the gist:

In the essay, Mattis suggested he left his post as secretary of defense amid concerns about “keeping faith with our allies,” warning that America “cannot go it alone.”
“Nations with allies thrive, and those without them wither. Alone, America cannot protect our people and our economy,” Mattis wrote. “At this time, we can see storm clouds gathering.”

He pointedly added: “A polemicist’s role is not sufficient for a leader. A leader must display strategic acumen that incorporates respect for those nations that have stood with us when trouble loomed.”

Mattis said he “did as well as I could, for as long as I could” as secretary of defense.
In one section, he essentially wrote that he resigned when he felt his concerns about those alliances were not being taken seriously.

“When my concrete solutions and strategic advice, especially keeping faith with our allies, no longer resonated, it was time to resign, despite the limitless joy I felt serving alongside our troops in defense of our Constitution,” Mattis wrote.

Mattis went on to note his deepest concerns "as a military man," noting they are "not our external adversaries; it is our internal divisiveness."

“We are dividing into hostile tribes cheering against each other, fueled by emotion and a mutual disdain that jeopardizes our future instead of rediscovering our common ground and finding solutions,” he wrote. “All Americans need to recognize that our democracy is an experiment — and one that can be reversed. We all know that we’re better than our current politics.”

He added: “Tribalism must not be allowed to destroy our experiment.”

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This excerpt from Jim Mattis, probably the most respected person serving in the Trump administration, continues my focus on the increasing number of centrist, rational, and restrained voices who are beginning to speak out about the increasing unfitness of Donald Trump to continue as our president.

Even when they do not explicitly call for his removal from office, whether by the 25th Amendment process, by impeachment, or by defeat at the polls, their message is clear.   We cannot safely endure another four years of this presidency.

Ralph

G-7 no longer sees Trump as world leader

Some observations from the weekend's G-7 Summit meeting in Biarritz, France. 

After President Trump's behavior at the last G-7, expectations of any real consensus was so low that the host, France's President Emmanuel Macron, decided to skip the signing of a final communique this year.    And it was obvious that the other leaders were treating Trump with the primary goal of not setting off his temperamental bad reactions.   They have learned to couch everything within a blanket of flattery for him and to avoid topics that upset him.

For example, the U.K.'s new Prime Minister Boris Johnson was the one who very very gently broached the subject of Trump's imposed tariff's on China.   But first he overly praised the U.S.s economy, giving Trump credit for the accomplishment and then sort of gently slipped in at the end that they didn't think tariffs were a good idea.

This description makes it sound like the other leaders were walking on eggshells;   but, actually, I think they've moved beyond fear of him -- because he literally does not have the power of the de facto leader any longer.  It's more that they are just moving on without him -- and, since he's there, they're trying to keep him from blowing up what the others are trying to accomplish.

The problem with this, however, is that the group rotates where they meet and who organizes and chairs the meeting.  And next year, the host will be the U.S. and Trump.

Peter Nicholas wrote further about the meeting for The Atlantic, as quoted below"

*     *     *     *     *

The most striking photograph to emerge from the G7 summit meeting in Biarritz, France, is one of an empty chair.

[Trump skipped the meeting where climate change was to be discussed.  He later told reporters he was not going to 'exchange America's wealth for windmills.' which don't work very well anyway, he claimed.]

The White House put out a statement that Trump was busy talking to German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and couldn’t make it—though both of those leaders found time to show up for the session. No one waited for Trump . . . .

Which is becoming the norm.

With Trump at odds with much of the free world, the free world seems to be moving on without him. At the G7, leaders seemed to have given up on the prospect of forging a consensus with him on trade, climate, and even whether Russian President Vladimir Putin is friend or foe. The summit appeared to be organized in ways that diminished the likelihood of a Trumpian tantrum.

Leaders ditched the tradition of ending the summit with a full-blown communiqué—a joint statement—reflecting common values and a strategy for confronting the most vexing problems. They may have been scarred by the blowup at the end of the G7 last year in Canada. 

Trump withdrew from the communiqué and, after leaving Canada, insulted the summit’s host, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, sending out tweets calling him “very dishonest and weak.”

Nothing like that happened in this go-round (at least as of this writing. . . .  Still, Trump’s counterparts made clear that if he wasn’t willing to be a partner, they might go it alone. . . . 

French President Emmanuel Macron, acting independently, invited the Iranian foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, to the summit for private talks aimed at defusing tensions with the West. Trump didn’t talk to Zarif, but Macron did. . . . 

“I did it on my own,” Macron said of Zarif’s appearance at the summit, adding that he kept Trump fully briefed on the diplomatic overture to Iran.

Trump had also sought to persuade his G7 counterparts to readmit Russia to the club, from which it was suspended following its annexation in 2014 of Ukraine’s Crimea. The leaders argued about it during a dinner Saturday night. Trump’s view is that Russia’s presence would be helpful in resolving disputes. . . . 

That argument fell flat. Even his newest G7 friend, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, was unmoved. “We are opposed because we see no evidence from recent Russian behavior which would warrant readmission to the G7,” a British official told me.

“There has been a pattern of malign behavior from Russia—whether it’s 2016 [U.S.] election interference, the chemical attack in Salisbury [England], the ongoing conflict in Ukraine, or actions supporting the Assad regime [in Syria]—which is at odds with the principles and broader ideas around the G7.”

Next year, Trump may have more sway. The G7 will take place in the U.S., and Trump, as host, is free to invite guests, including Putin.

“Would I invite him? Certainly I would invite him,” Trump told reporters.

Trump never seemed all that eager to be in Biarritz. He looked distracted at times. His aides had told reporters that climate change is a “niche” issue that shouldn’t be a particular focus, perhaps the real reason Trump skipped the meeting. . . . 

*     *     *     *     *

As host for the 2020 G-7 meeting, Trump is pushing the idea of holding it at his own Doral Golf Club in Florida.   But this would seem to be in direct violation of our Constitution's Emolument's Clause in that the president would benefit financially from the meeting -- an issue that has been ignored by the Trump organization now for three years.   But this would be even more blatant in that it would not just be people deciding on their own to stay at his hotels -- but our government would actually be hosting a major event at a Trump property -- with guest countries and all their entourages paying their expenses to the Trump Organization.

Something else for Rep. Elijah Cummings and his Government Oversight Committee to hold hearings on.

Ralph

AP Fact-checks the president on economy

The Associated Press put out this report after checking President Donald Trump's public claims about the economy.    As usual, they found that what the president says is not true.   He is lying to the American people.

================

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is painting a false picture of a U.S. economy unaffected by his trade war with China and other countries.

He describes a blue-sky world in which rapidly escalating tariffs have no impact on American consumers even as a raft of businesses and economists say otherwise, chastising those who caution of potential weakness in the economy as partisans.
"Our Country, economically, is doing great - the talk of the world!" he tweeted Sunday.

He's glossing over the facts.

Some economists have put the costs to an average U.S. household from Trump's pending tariffs on imports from China at $1,000 per year or more, not taking into account the most recent tax hike the president announced Friday of up to 30% on goods. Trump also insisted that economists don't believe his trade disputes with China could spur recession, but in fact most analysts believe a downturn could start in the next two years.

The claims capped a week in which Trump repeatedly misrepresented his administration's record, also citing false progress on veterans' health care, boasting misleadingly about his judicial nominations and blaming President Barack Obama for a policy of separating migrant families that he himself started.

A look at the claims:
ECONOMY
TRUMP: "I think our tariffs are very good for us. We're taking in tens of billions of dollars. China is paying for it." — remarks Friday night to reporters before leaving for the Group of Seven summit in France. . . . 

TRUMP: "The tariffs have cost nothing, in my opinion. ...And we're not paying for the tariffs; China is paying for the tariffs, for the one-hundredth time." — remarks on Aug. 18 to reporters in Morristown, New Jersey.

THE FACTS: Americans, in fact, are paying for the tariffs. . . . As he escalates a trade war with China, Trump refuses to recognize a reality that his own chief economic adviser, Larry Kudlow, has acknowledged.  . . .  In a study in May, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, with Princeton and Columbia universities, estimated that tariffs from Trump's trade dispute with China were costing $831 per U.S. household on an annual basis, before tariffs were recently escalated. . . . 

A report this month by JPMorgan Chase estimated that tariffs would cost the average American household $1,000 per year  . . . Trump has since bumped up the scheduled levies even higher. . . . 

==================

And these figures do not even address the economic effects on certain professions, like farmers, who largely lost their market for soy beans because of the tariffs Trump put on this major crop for Midwestern American farmers, sold mostly to China.   And, if farmers have no market, then merchants in our farming region will suffer too when our farmers have to reduce their spending on everything from farm equipment to new shoes for their kids.

Yes, our federal government has been giving farmers some monetary assistance to offset the lost income -- but it's never enough to compensate.

Ralph

One more voice flipping on Trump

Add another to my list of significant people who are beginning to speak out critically of President Trump.   The latest is the former chief political correspondent for Fox News, Carl Cameron.    I don't know his political persuasion, either now or in the past, but I am sure he did not say things like this on air at Fox News.

According to an interview by MSNBC's Ari Melber Friday,  Carl Cameron said that there was not "enough time in the day" to list all the problems President Trump currently faces.

Cameron, who left Fox News two years ago, told Melber Trump's problems are now impacting American's global standing.   "We like to think of ourselves as world leaders.   The president is not leading. . . .  The United States of America's reputation is at stake because the president is being irresponsible and violating our values and our traditions, Cameron said.

====================
And then Sunday's Wall Street Journal hit the stands, with its editorial highly critical of the president for his escalating trade war with China.

"The trouble with trade wars, like shooting wars," the Journal wrote in its editorial, is that once they start you never know how they're going to end.   The enemy gets a vote, and sometimes events escalate in ugly fashion.  Take Friday, which saw China retaliate for Donald Trump's recent tariffs, Mr. Trump blow a gasket, markets tank, and Mr. Trump impose even more tariffs."

"The newspaper said Trump then "began tweeting like a bull in a China shop,' and scoffed at his 'order' that American companies no longer have anything to do with the world's second-largest economy.

"'Order?  Somebody should tell Chairman Trump that this isn't the People's Republic of America."    The editorial then explains that have been trying to shift production out of China to avoid the tariffs;  but that supply chains supply chains developed over decades can't be changed overnight, and no other country has China's huge and relatively skilled workforce, infrastructure, and network of suppliers."  . . . 

"In a final dig, the editorial asks:  'What was that again about trade wars being easy to win?'"

Let me emphasize again:    This is the conservative editors of the establishment Republican Wall Street Journal.

Here's what Tea Party Republican Joe Walsh said about Trump

On August 15th, former one-term Tea Party Republican congressman from Illinois Joe Walsh had this to say about President Donald Trump in a New York Times op-ed titled "Challenge Trump From the Right."  Walsh was elected to Congress in 2011.   He served one term, then became a conservative talk-radio host.

Since writing this op-ed, calling for a primary challenger to Trump from the right,  he has decided to become that person himself.  So let's look back at what he said in the op-ed.                                      :

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Walsh says that he entered Congress in 2011 "as an insurgent Tea Party Republican.  My goals were conservative and clear:  restrain executive power and reduce the debt.  Barack Obama was president then, and it was easy for us to rail against runaway spending and executive overreach.

"Eight years later, Mr. Trump has increased the deficit more than $100 year over year -- it's now nearing $1 trillion -- and we hear not a word of protest from my former Republican colleagues.  He abuses the Constitution for his narcissistic trade war.  . . .  Mr. Trump's tariffs are a tax increase on middle-class Americans and are devastating to our farmers.   That's not a smart electoral strategy.

"It's one of the many reasons Mr. Trump is ripe for a primary challenge. . . . 

"Fiscal matters are only part of it.  At the most basic level, Mr. Trump is unfit for office.  His lies are so numerous . . . . 

"I didn't vote vote for Mr. Trump in 2016 because I liked him.  I voted for him because because he wasn't Hillary Clinton.   Once he was elected, I gave him a fair hearing and tried to give him the benefit of of the doubt.   But I soon realized that I couldn't support him because of the danger he poses to the country, especially the division he sows at every chanced, culminating a few weeks ago in his ugly racist attack on four minority congresswomen.

"The fact is, Mr. Trump is a racist arsonist who encourages bigotry and xenophobia to rouse his base his base and advance his electoral prospects.  In this, he inspires imitators.

"Republicans should view Mr. Trump as the liability he is. . . . In front of the world, he sides with Vladimir Putin over our own intelligence community.   That's dangerous.  He encouraged Russian interference in the 2016 election.  That's reckless.  For three years he has been at war with our federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies, as he embraces tyrants abroad and embarrasses our allies.  That's un-American. . . .

"He's reckless on fiscal issues;  he's incompetent on the border;  he's clueless on trade   he misunderstands executive power;  and he subverts the rule of law. . . .

"[Former Massachusetts Governor William Weld] is challenging Mr. Trump from the center.  But the president is more vulnerable to a challenge from the right. . . .  We need someone who could stand up, look the president in the eye and say:  'Enough, sir.  We've had enough of your indecency.  We've had enough of your lies, your bullying, your cruelty, enough of your insults, your daily drama, your incitement, enough of the danger you place this country in every single day.  We don't want any of this anymore;  and the country certainly can't stand four more years of it.'"

*     *     *     *     *

Joe Walsh is not someone I would want to vote for.   But he has Donald Trump pegged to perfection.    And he's unafraid to put it in print -- and, if he does run a primary campaign, he will presumably have a platform from which to broadcast it far and wide -- as a conservative Republican.

I think we're seeing the building of a movement among Republicans -- some like Justin Amash and Michael Steele, who are speaking clearly but with restraint;  and others, more likely to rant and rave, like Anthony Scaramucci and Joe Walsh.

But it's happening.

Ralph

Danes react to Trump's disrespect based on a whim

To further the meme I've been pursuing for the past week --- that there is beginning to be a groundswell of pushback from Republicans against Trump as being unfit for office and should not be re-elected -- I offer this editorial from the Washington Examiner.

Wikileaks describes the Examiner as conservative, envisioned by its creator as a competitor to The Washington Post.    Much of the journalistic talent was hired from the right wing paper, The Washington Times.    According to Politico, quoting one former employee, the publisher's instructions about the editorial page were explicit:    "nothing but conservative columns and conservative op-ed writers."     The paper endorsed John McCain in 2008 and Mitt Romney in 2012.

With that context, here are excerpts from a recent column in the Washington Examiner written by Quin Hillyer.

*     *     *     *     *

"Something is rotten in President Trump canceling his trip to Denmark.

"In yet another example of Trump's undiplomatic rudeness, the bumptious billionaire has canceled an already scheduled state visit to Denmark, apparently upset that the tiny, friendly nation won’t jump at his command.

"Invited to Copenhagen by Queen Margrethe II, Trump specifically had said that the visit was not dependent on Denmark’s level of interest in his idea of buying the vast island of Greenland from the Danes. Once both Danish premier Kim Kielsen and prime minister Mette Frederiksen said there is no chance of them selling Greenland, though, Trump gave the lie to his own earlier words by abruptly canceling the trip and specifically citing Greenland as the reason.

"To say Trump’s behavior here is childish is to insult children. Or at least, the worst of spoiled brats now have a new role model.

"Small though it is, Denmark is a valuable and longstanding ally. It allows the U.S. to operate the Thule Air Base on Greenland, which is of great strategic significance, on terms extremely generous to the U.S. Denmark stands with its larger ally when most other nations don’t, including in joining Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003. Denmark has no obvious direct interest in the Middle East, but it provides troops when asked — 43 of whom have lost their lives in American-led missions in Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan. (In terms of percentage of population, that would be the equivalent of U.S. losses of some 2,500 personnel.)

"Trump’s idea of buying Greenland might well be mutually beneficial to Americans and Danes, but it obviously came out of proverbial left field as far as the Danes were concerned. Obviously, nobody in the Trump administration had bothered telling them of Trump’s interest. It would be unreasonable to expect them to immediately comply, or even to comply at all. Even if Denmark decides it makes sense to sell, there are the desires of Greenland’s 56,000 inhabitants to consider. Because this state visit was arranged without any signal that a purchase of Greenland was on the agenda, much less even being considered, it is a nasty trick indeed to kill the trip just because Denmark isn’t jumping at the chance to relinquish its largest territory.

"Naturally and correctly, the people of Denmark and Greenland find Trump’s crude power play “deeply insulting,” in the words of former prime minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt. “Total chaos,” former finance minister Kristian Jensen wrote. “This has gone from a great opportunity for a strengthened dialogue between allies to a diplomatic crisis.” (Quotes from the New York Times.)

"The rotten smell to all this is emanating not from the state of Denmark, but from the current state of the Oval Office. The president’s diplomatic hygiene is abominable."

*     *     *     *     *

Now let's be clear about the context.   This was published in Washington's conservative newspaper.   It calls Trump's ploy "a nasty trick."   The author says to call Trump's behavior childish is an insult to children.   And he closes by referring to "the rotten smell . . . emanating from the Oval Office" as the president's "abominable diplomatic hygiene."

The ink on this story was hardly dry when there came the, perhaps leaked, information that former one-term Tea Party congressman from Illinois, Joe Walsh, was going to mount a presidential run to challenge Trump from the right in the Republican primary.

More on this in my next post, including an op-ed that Welsh wrote for the New York Times a few days before he announced, and in which he mounts a full-throated denunciation of Donald Trump and calls for someone to mount a primary challenge from the right.

Ralph

Has Trump gone round the bend?

Take two things President Trump said in the past 48 hours:

1.  In talking about the state of our economy and whether we need to worry about a recession, he says contradictory things.   First, he declares that our economy is strong.   But then he rants about what a big mistake it was for Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell to raise interest rates -- it's all his fault.

So how can the economy be both good -- and there is a villain who is responsible for f--king things up?   But that's not the "round the bend" thing.

In talking to the media about this, Trump painted himself as the savior.    It should have been fixed before by previous presidents -- but in fact, Trump said, looking up at the heavens with a magnanimous gesture -- "I was the chosen one" to come in a fix this.

Now, one can argue that he was joking.   But, underneath turning it into a joke, I have little doubt that Donald J. Trump really does believe that he is The Chosen One.

2.  This one is more serious because it involves international relations with an ally -- and it has far-ranging diplomatic and trust issues for our standing in the world.   President Trump had accepted the formal invitation from the Danish government to come for a state visit, and it was scheduled to take place on September 2nd and 3rd, less than two weeks away.   And, according to one source, Trump himself had requested the state visit.

Who knows what motivated the idea, but a couple of days ago, Trump floated the idea that we -- the United States -- should buy the island nation of Greenland, which is a territory of Denmark.   It is a massive island, mostly covered by ice, occupying a strategic space between the North Atlantic and Arctic oceans, with a population of about 50,000 concentrated along the lower coastal areas.    As the arctic ice melts and these waters become navigable, there could be important benefits to having control of it;  and we already have a military station there.

Denmark's Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen rejected the idea and, according to Trump, called it "absurd."   Now we don't know what they said in private -- only what has been reported by the media.    But it seems that Trump can't stand the humiliation of having a woman call his idea absurd.  So he has cancelled his state visit and called the Prime Minister's response "nasty" -- his favorite word for denouncing women who stand up to him.

Here's why this is perhaps the most disturbing example of Trump's erratic behavior.   Here he has caused an international incident based on his petulant response to his own whim.    No case has been made for trying to buy Greenland.  As Chris Hayes put it:   "It's like a guy in a bar leaned over and said to Trump, out of the blue, 'Hey, why don't you guys buy Greenland?"    And the president of the U.S. thought:   "Yeah, why don't we buy Greenland?"    Then, without further discussion with aides and experts, he tells the Danish P.M.   "We want to talk to you about buying Greenland."

Is there any constituency that is champing at the bit to own Greenland?   If so, it's a well-concealed secret.   Perhaps one of Trump's wealthy friends convinced him that there are valuable resources to be mined when the ice melts.    Or maybe some faction in the military thinks we need to own the real estate that we now lease from them for our airbase.    Nobody has given any reasons.   So it sounds like a whim.

And besides, the Danish Prime Minister may have, in private, called it an absurd idea.  But her public response was very measured, ending with this sobering thought:  "Thankfully, the time where you buy and sell other countries and populations is over.  Let's leave it at that."

We know which one was the adult in this incident.   Fortunately the consequences are not catastrophic -- only further erosion of the U.S.'s status as a trustworthy partner in the free world and in NATO.   But suppose it had been a showdown with Russia or North Korea or Iran involving nuclear weapons?

This kind of childish behavior from Trump is only getting worse as he seems to be coming unhinged.   I get the feeling that the forces are marshaling among a growing number of Republicans to address this.

Of course, Anthony Scaramucci began last week.   Then Michael Steele, the former Chairman of the Republican National Committee, began speaking out a few days ago.

Stay tuned.

Ralph

"Trump's scam is failing him, and he's in a panic over it." Washington Post

That's the title of an important Washington  Post article by Greg Sargent.   Here are some excerpts:

*      *      *     *     *  

"As President Trump prepares to run for reelection on the claim that his populist nationalist agenda has been a smashing success, it’s awfully telling that Trump and his advisers have now launched a frantic, multi-front effort to deny glaring truths about that agenda that are all right there in plain sight, for all of us to see.

"A new report in the New York Times documents an emerging pattern: Trump is increasingly explaining away warning signs of a potential recession by resorting to lurid conspiracy theories. Trump claims the Federal Reserve is working against him. He also says the “Fake News Media” is fabricating recession fears — and exaggerating the damage of Trump’s trade war with China, a key driver of those fears — to cloud his reelection chances.

"What we’re seeing here should be understood as panic. The Times reports this on Trump’s private ventings to advisers:

"Mr. Trump has been agitated in discussions of the economy . . . .

"Trump’s advisers are urging him to dial down the trade war with China . . . . 

"Trump falsely says China pays his tariffs . . . . But studies show otherwise. . . .
. . . . also undermined by the niggling fact that his own administration has secured billions and billions of dollars in aid to farmers harmed by China’s retaliations. . . .   [in other words, having the US government bail out our own farmers is proof that Trump tariffs have hurt our own economy.]

"On both these fronts, [tax cuts and job-creating investments] Trump’s economic agenda has failed to deliver for workers. . . .

"Meanwhile, the trade war wreckage continues to mount, damaging Trump’s own constituencies and, now, helping to threaten a possible recession. . . .

"[T]he bottom line is that Trump’s 'America First' nationalism is looming as an economically destructive factor to a far greater extent than Trump’s plutocratic tax cut is acting as an economic positive. . . .

"The story Trump told was that he would end the selling out of workers by “elites,” by shaking down China and other countries, forcing them to revamp trade deals that were robbing workers blind. Meanwhile, his tax cut would put tons of cash in workers’ pockets and fuel an explosion of trickle-down investment.

"But the former is threatening disaster. And the latter did a lot more for those hated elites than it has done for working people.

"Trump is still telling that same story. It’s certainly possible that this story might work among just enough Rust Belt voters to drive an electoral college win amid an even bigger popular-vote loss this time. But it’s clear that Trump himself fears his story is at serious risk of failing him. "

*     *     *     *     *

Perhaps we shouldn't laugh at Anthony Scaramucci when he says that Trump will give up his 2020 campaign by March 2020 and that he, Scaramucci, is trying to put together a coalition of former cabinet members that will publicly come out against Trump and help recruit a replacement.  "They know it's a crisis. . . . The guy is unstable.  Everyone inside knows it, everyone outside knows it.   Let's see if we can find a viable alternative."   That is what Scaramucci said to CNN's Alisyn Camerota on air.

Ralph

PS:   And if that isn't bad enough, Trump ended his week of golf vacation faced with news of an NBC/WallStreetJournal poll.   It asks who will you "probably or likely support" in the election?

     40% chose Trump
     52% chose "the Democratic candidate"

Yes, that's right.   In this poll, Trump would lose to anyone the Democrats chose.   That is stunning -- when just a week or so ago, polls showed him losing by just a few points to the Democratic front-runners.   Now, according to this poll, he'd lose to any Democratic candidate.

Maybe Scaramucci knows something.

Curiouser and curiouser

 In my prior post on Kim Jong Un's "beautiful letter," in which Trump claims Kim made "a small apology" for recent missiles launched, there was confusion and doubt about the truthfulness of Trump's statement.

And it's even more dubious now that Kim has done it again.   Even as Trump's praise of Kim's "apology" still rings in the news cycle, he's done it again.   Fired some kind of projectiles into the sea near Japan and South Korea again yesterday.

Kim also said, according to Trump, that he would stop firing the missiles when the US and South Korea ended the joint military exercises.    Apparently they didn't stop, so he fired more . . . something.

That just doesn't jibe with "an apology" for firing missiles.

Here's the only way this makes sense to me.   Kim now clearly has the upper hand in these negotiations.  Trump needs a third summit meeting more than Kim does, with the US election coming up.    So the shoe is on the other foot now.

Not in any substantive way.   Kim has no advantage nor any incentive to actually move toward denuclearization.   But Trump definitely needs to have something that he can distort into propaganda, pointing to success, for political purposes in the 2020 election.

Ralph

Kim Jung Un manipulates Trump again

This is based in part on an article in The Hill by John Bowden.

President Trump has announced what he calls "a really beautiful letter" from Kim Jong Un.   That's odd, because most of what Trump says about Kim's letter doesn't sound so beautiful.

It was, Trump says, "a long letter, much of it complaining about the ridiculous and expensive exercises" that we are currently carrying out with our military ally South Korea.     These regularly scheduled, 'war game' exercises help maintain military readiness for both the U.S. and the South Korean forces against possible aggression from North Korea.

Trump has no background for strategic planning and can only see the possibilities for economic development in North Korea -- golf resorts overlooking the coastal area;  high rises in the big cities.  So he tends to be more sympathetic toward Kim's position than to our own foreign policy establishment.

He did say that Kim "made a small apology" for the recent testing of short range missiles and said that "the testing would stop when the US/South Korea exercises end.   Kim adds further, according to Bowden's article:  "Pyongyang will judge the future of its relations with the U.S. on whether the Trump administration goes through with the joint exercises. North Korean officials have maintained that any joint operations between the U.S. and South Korea violate an agreement signed by Trump and Kim upon their first meeting last year."

This doesn't make much sense.  As recently as four days prior to Kim's letter, the North shot two more projectiles into the sea as a warning, making a total of five missile launches in the past two weeks.   Then suddenly Kim gets kudos from Trump for the "small" apology Trump says the letter contains about the missiles.   Where's the apology and what does Kim propose to do as penance?    Absolutely nothing.   He'll stop with the missiles if we stop violating the agreement, which Kim says he and Trump signed.    But apparently there's disagreement about that.

No wonder they get nowhere in negotiations.

Then Trump goes back to praising Kim's letter again.  It was a really long letter -- three full pages, all the way from the top to the bottom.    Just imagine!!!!   It must have really taxed Trump's powers of concentration to read it all.

Bowden's article gives us a little more clarity.   U.S. and North Korean officials have been engaged in negotiations toward setting up a third summit meeting.   Apparently there are more knowledgeable negotiators in that team than we would think from Trump's account of this letter.

I'm highly skeptical.   Kim is the smarter and more skilled manipulator than Trump, who would probably be satisfied with a meeting/photo-op that would contain something that Trump can then distort into politically useful propaganda -- like a break-through in negotiations that will eventually lead to a denuclearization of North Korea.

And Kim knows that's what Trump most wants -- bragging rights and political gain -- and he might just give it to him.    Not that it will lead to real substantive progress, but just enough for just long enough to benefit Trump in 2020.

But what will Kim's price be for that?   Because Trump will probably be willing to pay it.    He has precious little else to claim as "promises fulfilled."

Ralph

Bumper sticker I'd like to have

Saw online a bumper sticker I'd like to have:

"Literally, anyone else, 2020."   

Susan Rice on Donald Trump

Susan Rice was Ambassador to the United Nations and later National Security Adviser to President Barack Obama.   In a recent op-ed article in the New York Times, entitled "When the president is a bigot, the poison spreads . . . around the world and embolden our adversaries," Dr. Rice was very critical of President Trump in the wake of the white supremacy controversy.   Here are some excerpts of what she wrote:

*     *     *     *     *

"It’s hard to calculate the damage that President Trump’s overt racism and almost daily attacks on black and brown people are having on the fabric of our nation. With white supremacy bolstered from the Oval Office, hate crimes and domestic terrorism incidents are increasing, including, it appears, Saturday’s mass shooting in El Paso.

"At the same time, immigrants and native-born Americans live in constant fear of law enforcement officials emboldened to think they can act with impunity. Still, Mr. Trump revels in ripping off the fragile scab over the lingering sore that is our country’s historical racial divide, as if to ensure it never heals.

"The president’s appalling goal, quite simply, is to pit Americans against one another for crass political purposes as well as, it seems, to vent his unabashed personal prejudice. . . .

"Is there no floor to how low this president and complicit Republicans are prepared to go to divide America?

"Yet, the consequences of Mr. Trump’s raw racism are not contained within America’s shores. They ricochet around the world as far away as New Zealand, poison the international climate and undermine America’s ability to secure our global interests. . . .

"That allied leaders, whose countries’ partnership we prize because they share both our interests and our values, felt compelled to condemn the president’s racist comments marks a fresh nadir in global regard for America’s leadership. . . .

"In case anyone needs reminding: A majority of the world is populated by what we Americans call “people of color.” To fight terrorism or prevent the spread of pandemic disease, to stem weapons proliferation or organized criminal organizations, to address climate change or punish outlaw states, we need the willing cooperation of nations around the world. None of these transnational security challenges can be combated effectively by the United States alone.

"With the president increasingly alienating our allies and insulting potential partners as “shithole” countries, America is hardly well positioned to call upon the good will and cooperation of other states when next we need it most. . . .

"Most dangerously, President Trump is serving up to our adversaries an ever more divided and weakened America, one that is animated by suspicion, rived by hatred of the “other” and increasingly incapable of uniting in the face of external threats. Russia, above all, continues to exploit and exacerbate these divisions.

"During the 2016 presidential campaign, Russian trolls stoked American white nationalism while amplifying black anger about police brutality in an effort to suppress the African-American vote. . . .

"Our domestic fault lines remain our greatest national security vulnerability, and race is our oldest and deepest rift. When the president deliberately and repeatedly rubs salt in those wounds, while coddling the authoritarian opponents who exploit them, we must reluctantly ask ourselves: Is he playing on America’s team?"

*     *     *     *     *

We are entering a new era where people like Susan Rice are joining former CIA Director John Brennan in being openly and brutally honest in criticizing the inadequacies of President Trump.

Oh, course, in my view, she is absolutely right in what she says.

Add to such criticism from some high-level, former government officials this bit of news:   A group, Republicans for the Rule of Law with Bill Kristol as one of its directors, is sponsoring a TV ad that will run during Morning Joe on MSNBC, as well as Fox's Fox and Friends.   The ad urges voters to call Mitch McConnell's office and demand that he hold a vote on the House-passed election security bills he has been blocking in the Senate.   The ad also includes a clip of Trump dismissing Russia as a threat to our voting system and saying that, if they offered dirt on his opponent in the future, yes, he would take it.

Ralph

What's wrong with this man?

Donald J. and Melania Trump posing for a picture with a newly orphaned baby whose parents were killed in the shooting massacre in El Paso.   Baby Paul's grandfather said that Paul was brought to a hospital Trump was visiting at the request of two White House aides who came to their home.   [photographer not identified in the HuffPost reproduction].



Trump's grossly inappropriate grin and thumbs up gesture has been called obscene -- given the circumstances.  The photo has gone viral, after first being posted on the first lady's twitter account, adding to the tone-deafness of Trump's whole failure as Consoler-in-Chief.

CNN reporter Mary Papenfuss wrote that "The president's oddly jocular pose is a bizarre contrast to the tragedy of the baby's life."  And I would add, it seems even worse, given that the two month old is obviously too young to know how he is being exploited to give our narcissistic president what someone thought was a good photo op.

Tweeter Dan Moynihan summed it up:  "This child just lost both parents to a white supremacist who drove 10 hours to a WalMart to kill Hispanics because, like Trump, he was concerned about an immigrant invasion.    Why exactly are the President and First Lady smiling?   Why the hell is he doing the thumbs up sign?"

Former press secretary to Bill Clinton, Joe Lockhard, said it wasn't just the photo but the "unprecedented" way Trump "bashed critics and boasted of his own reception instead of placing the focus on victims and suffering communities."

Here's the thing:   The photo is merely visual proof of the inability of Trump to be what a president needs to be in a time like this.   During the whole trip to Dayton and then to El Paso, he kept up a running twitter war with critics, bashing his opponents and boasting of his own crowd size on his prior trip to El Paso.

Even White House staff members are acknowledging that the trip "did not go well."

Because Trump does not have any sense of empathy and can only think of himself, he turns the visit into a photo op for himself.   Dollars to donuts, this photo will appear in a campaign ad before we're done with Trump.

Now, on the other hand, and to be fair, Baby Paul's uncle, Tito Anchondo, who brought him to meet Trump, says that the baby's father was a Trump supporter and that he, himself, is Republican and wanted Trump to know that their family stands with the president.

Earlier, he had told NPR that he wanted to see Trump's reaction in person, "to see if he's genuine and see if he feels maybe some kind of remorse for statements that he's made."  He later told the Wasnington Post that Trump was "just there as a human being, consoling us and giving his condolences . . . [not] pushing any kind of political agenda."

Pardon my cynicism, but that sounds like a coached statement.  And apparently Trump did not acknowledge any responsibility for inciting the violence that left Baby Paul an orphan.  He was too busy grinning and acknowledging his "win" in getting such a good photo for the campaign ads.

Another family member, an aunt of the baby's father, Elizabeth Terry, declined to meet with the president,   She did speak with The Guardian newspaper, explaining that "There are families and real lives that were destroyed and shattered. . . . We need to focus on the healing . . .  and not get thrust into any type of politics.  It's a time to mourn and grieve right now."

"Was Trump's El Paso Visit a Turning Point?"

Opinion by Richard Parker, reprinted from the New York Times.

*     *     *     *     *

"EL PASO — If consoling the nation in a time of desperate need is a vital and yet simple task of the American presidency, Donald J. Trump failed miserably this week.

"From his flight on Wednesday to Dayton, Ohio, to this sprawling high-desert city on the Mexican border, the 45th occupant of the White House not only littered his consolation tour with petty insults — but just to rub salt in the wound, doses of renewed racism. Yet most striking was how alone and outnumbered the president was: rejected, ostracized and told to go home.

"The people who streamed the scene of the terrorist attack here — brown, black, white and every hue in between — defiantly defended the nation’s diversity. With no public appearances, the president seemed to shrink, ever more alone as he clung to his white nationalist politics and governance. But he and his supporters were grossly outnumbered. For perhaps the first time in his angry, racist and cruel presidency, the tables were turned in smoldering, righteous popular anger — and he was on the receiving end.

"You have to give this to Mr. Trump: He never backs off. He doubles down like a wild gambler in a casino, raising the stakes one more time demanding just a few more chips from the house. Leaving the White House on Wednesday morning, he said, 'I think my rhetoric brings people together,' adding he was 'concerned about the rise of any group of hate. I don’t like it, whether it’s white supremacy, whether it’s any other kind of supremacy.'

"As if there was some other kind of violent political ideology that has killed people — blacks and whites, Jews and Latinos — from Charlottesville, Va., to Pittsburgh, Dayton and El Paso. Leaving Dayton, Mr. Trump insulted the mayor and a senator from the safety of Air Force One and, of course, Twitter.

"Trump even jabbed a racist poke at El Paso, ridiculing the former Democratic Representative Beto O’Rourke’s Spanish first name, though he is of Anglo descent: [Trump tweeted:]   'Beto (phony name to indicate Hispanic heritage) O’Rourke, who is embarrassed by my last visit to the Great State of Texas, where I trounced him, and is now even more embarrassed polling at 1% in the Democratic Primary, should respect the victims and law enforcement — and be quiet!'

"While it was bad manners for a nation in mourning, it was more than that: It was a fresh dose of racism. In an era in which minorities are becoming majorities, as in Texas, and intermarrying with Anglos, who is Mr. Trump to judge people’s race and ethnicity based on their names? My last name is Anglo, but I am the son of a Mexican immigrant.

"At the makeshift memorial to the 22 killed for the hue of their skin while shopping at a Walmart on a Saturday, I spoke with a young soldier from the 1st Armored Division at nearby Fort Bliss. Big and burly in his camouflage uniform, Pvt. First Class Richard Riley, 20, stood with arms crossed, staring silently at the piles of flowers, plastic hearts and white crosses, one for every victim.

"But behind his dark glasses, his eyes welled up. 'I just can’t believe it,' he said. 'I’m Hispanic, too. And I can’t believe that these people were killed because they were.'

"In the dark hours after the attack, fear swept over my hometown. Lightning flashed on the horizon, illuminating empty streets and parking lots. Bars and restaurants shuttered their doors. Wherever I went, as I departed I heard this: 'Take care out there.' That was a phrase I’d never heard in this city in more than 50 years.

"Even at a public library, near the site of the attack, people openly advised each other to be careful, even exiting to the parking lot. . . .But in the human cycle of grief, the fear, disbelief and anxiety has transformed into a seething anger. El Paso is not a volatile, rioting city where the president could expect trouble. But he inevitably saw how alone he was in his toxic, racist politics, some throwback to a receding time in America.

"When Air Force One touched down, the temperature was soaring toward 104 degrees and just one single local official, Mayor Dee Margo, was there to greet him (Gov. Greg Abbott was there as well).

"Along the president’s route from the airport to a hospital, people lined the roads to greet him — largely with rejection. 'What’s more important?' Asked one man’s sign. 'Lives or re-election?'  American and Mexican flags sprouted together in the August heat. Signs with quotes bearing his name came back to haunt him: 'We cannot allow these people to invade our country.'  “Not Welcome' covered a stage at a park where people protested the president. The El Paso Times ran a black front page with this headline: 'Mr. President, We Are Hurting.'

"How people actually live here stands in stark contrast to Mr. Trump’s white nationalism, . . .  Six in 10 Americans here have family on the other side of the trickling Rio Grande, according to a study by the El Paso Community Foundation, while six in 10 Mexicans just across the border have family on the American side. . . .

"And what is usually forgotten is that racial violence in America has almost never been a two-way street. . . .  What whites have historically called 'race riots' have actually been one-sided assaults by whites: . . .

"As if to symbolize just how out of touch Trumpism is here and in much of America, a sole woman approached the makeshift memorial at the Walmart where 22 people died. She wore a bright red MAGA hat, and quickly over 30 people surrounded her chanting: 'Take it off! Take it off!' She refused, yelling back that the president should be accepted here — only to be drowned out. Later, young people appeared, dressed in black, chanting: 'white violence, White House.'

"Something is shifting. Mr. Trump may not have felt it during his few hours in town, but walking around, you couldn’t miss it. The El Paso massacre brought together the most active of America’s shifting tectonic plates: racism, assault weapons, a national Latino population of 60 million now with a target on its back, Mr. Trump’s white nationalism and his awful manners for a country in mourning.

"Another president might have been sensitive enough to sense the shift, and changed course accordingly — played the convener, the unifier. Instead, Mr. Trump displayed just how small he is, no matter how big his mouth or powerful his office. He never once appeared in public. By 6:01 p.m., after just a little more than two hours, he was safely aboard Air Force One again and it was wheels up into the sky. But he is a shrinking president, stuck in a racist past, flying over a changing America. And I think we — or most of us — are all El Paso now."

Richard Parker is the author of “Lone Star Nation: How Texas Will Transform America.”