Category: James Downie

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/04/donald-trump-liberate-tweets

Bess Levin writes in Vanity Fair:

LEVIN REPORT

Tweets, Deal With It

According to the VP, the president is simply “communicating” with the people when he whips protestors into a frenzy.

BY BESS LEVIN

APRIL 17, 2020

On Thursday night, perhaps having been zapped with some sort of taser that sent a momentary current of sense through his body, Donald Trump announced that despite previously, falsely claiming he had “total” authority to force states to reopen far sooner than experts say is safe, the decision would be left to the individual governors. “If they need to remain closed,” he said, “we will allow them to do that.” Then he went to bed and woke up the exact same lunatic we’ve come to know and fear over the last three-plus years, and decided to spend a portion of his day whipping anti-social distancing protesters into a frenzy, contradicting everything he had said less than 24 hours prior.

The three states Trump all-caps called out have the distinction of being run by Democratic governors who’ve had the temerity to insist that logic and science will dictate when and how they will get people back to everyday life, a plan that has been met by mobs of angry protesters who’d prefer to congregate in large groups ASAP, wildly contagious coronavirus be damned. While some of them, like Virginia’s Ralph Northam, dismissed Trump’s tweets as the ravings of an online troll, saying at a press conference that he’s “fighting a biological war” and “[does] not have time” to involve himself in “Twitter wars,” others were less inclined to let them slide.

The president’s statements this morning encourage illegal and dangerous acts,” Washington governor Jay Inslee wrote on Twitter. “He is putting millions of people in danger of contracting COVID-19. His unhinged rantings and calls for people to ‘liberate’ states could also lead to violence. We’ve seen it before.” He continued: “The president is fomenting domestic rebellion and spreading lies—even while his own administration says the virus is real, it is deadly and we have a long way to go before restrictions can be lifted…. The president’s actions threaten his own goal of recovery. His words will likely cause a spike in infections where distancing is working. That will further postpose the 14 days of decline his own guidance says is necessary to ease restrictions…. I hope someday we can look at today’s meltdown as something to be pitied, rather than condemned. But we don’t have that luxury today. There is too much at stake.”

Meanwhile, in a Friday call with Mike Pence, Senate Democrats questioned the vice president re: what the hell Trump is doing and if they can expect someone in the administration to sit him down and tell him to cut the shit. To which the answer was obviously no:

Senator Tim Kaine (D-Va.) pressed Pence on Trump’s Twitter feed at the end of the call, asking why the president was trying to incite division by tweeting “LIBERATE” Virginia, Minnesota and Michigan and aligning himself with protests in those states over their lockdowns. Pence said the administration is working with governors but that the president will continue to communicate with the American people as he always has.

So that’s something to look forward to.

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Trump sends an additional half a billion dollars to states to fight COVID-19

No, just kidding. That money’s actually going to his completely useless wall, per the Daily Beast:

In the middle of a pandemic that has killed 27,000 Americans and counting, the Army this week gave a politically connected Montana firm half a billion dollars—not to manufacture ventilators or protective gear to fight the novel coronavirus, but to build 17 miles of President Trump’s southern border wall. On Tuesday, the Army Corps of Engineers announced it awarded BFBC, an affiliate of Barnard Construction, $569 million in contract modifications for building “17.17 miles” of the wall in two California locations, El Centro and San Diego. That works out to over $33 million per mile—steeply above the $20 million-per-mile average that the Trump administration is already doling out for the wall. Construction is supposed to be completed by the end of June 2021.

On the bright side, it’s not like the money is effectively being lit on fire except, oh wait, that’s exactly what it’s like:

Smugglers sawed into new sections of President Trump’s border wall 18 times in the San Diego area during a single one-month span late last year, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection records obtained by the Washington Post via a Freedom of Information Act request…. The records do not indicate whether the one-month span last year is a representative sample of how frequently people are trying to breach new sections of Trump’s border barrier, which are made of tall steel bollards partially filled with concrete and rebar. The Post reported last November that smuggling crews armed with common battery-operated power tools—including reciprocating saws that retail for as little as $100 at home improvement stores—can cut through the bollards using inexpensive blades designed for slicing through metal and stone.

On Wednesday, a group of 66 representatives and 25 senators sent a letter to the administration calling for the halting of construction on the wall until the coronavirus crisis is tackled. “We should be using all resources and funding to combat this virus and protect Americans, instead of using critical funding and resources to continue the construction of a border wall,” the lawmakers wrote. “The construction of a wall puts workers, law enforcement personnel, and border residents in immediate danger.” Said letter will presumably be used as toilet paper in the West Wing washroom, but it was a valiant effort nevertheless.

. . . .

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You can read the rest of the “Levin Report” at the above link.

Meanwhile, over at the WashPost, James Downie weighs in on our spineless Veep:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/04/19/even-trumps-best-lackey-cant-defend-him/

When Donald Trump chose Mike Pence as his running mate in 2016, the obvious political benefit was that Pence, a former governor and House member who is famously Christian, could boost evangelical and conservative turnout to help Republicans up and down the ballot. But for the egomaniacal Trump, Pence had another key qualification: “He says nice things about me.”

Since being named to the ticket, Pence has repeatedly put his obsequiousness on display: Few on Team Trump are better at deploying up-is-down reasoning to spin news to Trump’s benefit. But during the vice president’s appearances on NBC’s and Fox News’s Sunday morning talk shows, it was clear that even Pence could not bootlick his way out of the lurch the president’s actions leave the rest of us in.

On Friday, Trump spoke out in support of protests against stay-at-home orders imposed by Democratic governors in Minnesota, Michigan and Virginia. It’s disturbing enough that the president would undermine the fight against the pandemic. Worse was his provocative call on Twitter to “LIBERATE” those states — and, in Virginia’s case, “save your great 2nd Amendment” — which caught the attention of far-right extremists. Washington Gov. Jay Inslee (D) rightly observed Friday, “The president is fomenting domestic rebellion and spreading lies — even while his own administration says the virus is real.”

Protests with honking horns, anti-shutdown signs and angry Americans continued in Maryland, Texas and Wisconsin on April 18. (The Washington Post)

[Full coverage of the coronavirus pandemic]

Naturally, hosts on both NBC and Fox asked the vice president to explain the president’s comments. After all, as Fox host Chris Wallace pointed out, “they’re protesting your own guidelines to stop the spread.” On Fox, Pence focused on bragging about the White House coronavirus task force. When pressed, he assured viewers that “no one in America wants to reopen this country more than President Donald Trump” — a line he repeated on NBC. In both interviews, he then turned to touting guidelines that Trump issued Thursday for reopening states. Pence omitted that the guidance leaves key decisions up to governors, who Trump has said should call the shots on reopening. Both are in keeping with this president’s refusal to take responsibility for the pandemic crisis or a national response.

. . . .

The simple truth is that Pence dodged because the president’s actions were indefensible. But Pence can’t say that, both because the protests are being cheered by Fox News and like-minded outlets and because Pence wants to stay in the good graces of a president who values loyalty to him above all else. So long as conservative media and egomania mean more to the president than Americans’ lives, the rest of the country suffers.

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Read the rest of Downie’s op-ed at the link.

Actually, Pence is the only person in the Trump regime that the Clown-in-Chief can’t arbitrarily remove from office for speaking truth. Sure, Trump can toss him off the ticket for November. But, there are other factors here:

• • In the best case scenario, it won’t make any difference because Biden will win;
  • Trump might still remove Pence from the ticket on a whim, no matter how much he sucks up;
  • At some point is being a coward/toady/apologist for the most corrupt President in U.S. history really worth sacrificing the health and welfare of our nation as well as your human dignity?

I guess for someone like Pence, toadyism has no limits. But, America needs and deserves better from its #2.

This November, vote like your life depends on it. Because it does! Throw the Clowns out!🤡

PWS

04-20-20