April 30, 2019--Trump Roast

Trump again Wednesday night absented himself from the White House Correspondents' dinner. The one where presidents traditionally are roasted but then have the last word. The chance to get even with the press and other attendees.

Most of the reporters claim that Trump avoids these affairs because he is still smarting from what Barack Obama said about him in his remarks at the 2011 dinner.

Recall that at the time Trump was still hustling his birther claims. That Obama was not born in the United States, rather in Kenya, and therefore should not have been allowed to run for the presidency. In other words, he was an illegitimate president.

Obama retaliated by mercilessly ripping Trump to pieces in front of the Washington establishment.

Here's a sample--

“I know that Trump’s taken some flack lately, but no one is prouder to put this birth-certificate matter to rest than the Donald. That’s because he can finally get back to the issues that matter, like did we fake the moon landing? What really happened in Roswell? And where are Biggie and Tupac?"

It could well be that Trump doesn't want to open himself to more mockery. But it also could be--and this is my view--that Trump totally lacks a sense of humor. Not just humor at his expense (though with his ego that can't be much fun) but any humor whatsoever.

Can you recall one instance, just one, where he said something funny or laughed heartily at someone else's amusing remark? At most with Trump we see an occasional frozen smile that is more grimace than chuckle.

In contrast, recall how much FDR, John Kennedy, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama enjoyed a laugh or two. Even those at their own expense.

Also recall that all of these presidents had dogs. Even humorless Nixon had one. Checkers. 

So Trump has no dog and no sense of humor.

It also may be that Trump's total lack of humor suggests he has Asperger's Syndrome (AS), a developmental disorder characterized by significant difficulties in social interaction and nonverbal communication, along with restricted and repetitive patterns of behavior and interests.

Humor, specifically jokes, involve cognitive capacities that are often challenging for individuals with Asperger's.  According to researchers who have studied the nature of humor, flexible thinking is important to understanding jokes. Punchlines in jokes are funny partly because they are unexpected. Additionally, according to these researchers, big picture thinking is essential in understanding jokes, as it allows the listener to understand how the surprising punchline coheres with the joke's set up. 

As individuals with AS often demonstrate rigid thinking, a desire for sameness, and difficulty with sustained thought, it seems that individuals with Asperger's would have difficulty reacting to and employing even simple forms of humor.

About humor, at the end of Annie Hall, Woody Allen looks directly into the camera and says--

"It reminds me of that old joke--you know, a guy walks into a psychiatrist's office and says, 'Hey doc, my brother's crazy. He thinks he's a chicken.' Then the doc says, 'Why don't you turn him in?' Then the guy says, 'I would, but we need the eggs.'"

Allen was talking about how no matter how crazy they can be we need relationships.

We also need humor. But when it comes to Trump, I wouldn't expect any eggs.

October 3, 2017--Jack: Trump's People

Jack called, which surprised me because he had taken to coming to the diner mornings when he wants to talk about "his boy," Donald Trump.

"That Betty has been busting my chops when I'm there. She's so full of anger about Trump that it's hard to have a conversation. So, I'm calling."

"I'm sure she feels the same way about you--she can't understand, nor can I, with few exceptions, how you're such a butt boy for him. He does all these outrageous and dangerous things and you act like his chief apologist."

"I see you're already in a swivet so I'll keep this brief."

"That's fine with me." In fact it was. I was trying to have another few days without Trump, or at least as little Trump as possible. It was my birthday week and I was trying to give myself a present. But then there was the National Anthem and Puerto Rico fracas. And of course North Korea. There's no way to screen him out.

"I was looking at Facebook the other day and there was something posted by a friend of yours that I assumed must have gotten under your skin."

"I'm not that into Facebook," I said, "So I'm not sure what you're referring to."

"I don't know how Facebook works but there was something posted on my homepage that somehow seemed to connect to you. Which I assume is how Facebook works--Facebook friends of mine may have some connection to you and if so I somehow see what they post."

"I thought you said this would be brief." I had things to do and didn't want the aggravation.

"I have the Facebook piece right here," Jack said. I could hear him talking to himself as he searched for the posting. He read it to me and later I looked it up to quote it correctly--

GONNA VENT HERE. I have lived through a bunch of presidents and NEVER in my lifetime have I ever seen or heard of a President being scrutinized over every word he speaks, humiliated by the public to the point of wanting to hurt someone, slander, ridicule, insulted, lied to, threatened to murder him, threatening to rape our Beautiful First Lady, and have his children also insulted and humiliated. I am truly ashamed of the people of this country. I am ashamed of the ruthless, hating, cruel, Trump-phobia people that have no morals, and feel they have the right to say and do things they are. 

Every other President after they were elected and took the oath of office were left alone, they weren't on the news 24/7 being dissected by every word out of their mouth.

ENOUGH is ENOUGH is ENOUGH, LEAVE THE MAN ALONE AND LET HIM DO HIS JOB FOR GOD'S SAKE.

Jack paused, waiting to hear what I had to say. Finally I said, "I did see that and it did upset me. Not because I disagreed with pretty much all of it but because it revealed such a false sense of history. I mean, to say that criticizing presidents as forcefully as Trump has been attacked never happened before is all wrong."

"I knew this is where you would go with this," Jack said, "I'm sure you'll want to say more about this since you're a big student of American history. But that's not my point or what struck me. But please, have your say."

"Though I don't need you permission thanks anyway." He was already agitating me.

"Let's start with President Kennedy. He was a Democrat--I mention this because critiquing presidents has always been a bipartisan affair. He was attacked politically and after 1,000 days in office was assassinated. Then Lyndon Johnson, another Democrat, took over and was hounded out of office because of his Vietnam policies. I was happy to see him go.

"After Johnson we had Republican Richard Nixon. We know what happened to him. He was impeached and resigned the presidency. His successor, another Republican, was Jerry Ford. He was ridiculed from almost day one. It was said that he wasn't too bright, that he played football without a helmet. Chevy Chase on Saturday Night Live lampooned him as much as Alec Baldwin ridiculed Trump.

"Ford lost to Democrat Jimmy Carter who was fiercely criticized by Republicans within months of his taking office and was handily defeated for reelection by Ronald Reagan, who, during his second term was almost impeached because of the Iran-Contra scandal.

"Next, his Vice President, the first George Bush, a Republican, was not reelected because he was savaged by critics for not paying attention to the economy. So Bill Clinton, a Democrat, was elected.

"We know what happened to him. Because of his sexual escapades and lying to the grand jury he was impeached and tried in the Senate.

"I could go on and recount how his successor, Republican George W. Bush, was treated because he failed to do anything to prevent the 9/11 attack and for getting us deeply into a quagmire of two wars in the Middle East. And how could I forget Trump's predecessor, Democrat Barak Obama who from before day one was undermined by Republican politicians and all sorts of right-wing media outlets. Then, of course, there was the whole birther thing, with Trump himself leading the charge, claiming Obama was not born in the United States and was a Muslim.

"That's what I have to say about the Facebook posting you brought up. That Trump being harshly criticized and every word of his being scrutinized is not unusual but the norm. It comes with the territory of being president. Complaining about it won't change that reality." 

I was clearly in a lather.

"I knew you would go there," Jack said, "And basically I agree with you. Your friend's posting is totally wrong when it comes to presidential history. As you said, all presidents get beat up. But this is not my point about Trump. Or what I took away from what she wrote."

"Which is?"

"That for her and all the millions of Americans who agree with her, the facts don't matter. What matters to them is that for the first time in their lives they have a president in the White House they can relate to. Viscerally. From Kennedy on down, all the presidents have had one thing in common."

"I can't wait to hear what they have in common."

"No matter their backgrounds, and most came from modest backgrounds--Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Clinton, Obama--because of the education they received and how they behaved as politicians they came across as part of the professional and political elites that run the country. And all these presidents, all of them are the kind of people Trump supporters hate. 

"Hillary Clinton called them "deplorables,' remember that, and our leaders have given off that vibe for decades. As a result, for their entire adult lives these 'everyday people' as Obama and Clinton referred to them, have felt they did not have a president who represented them. Not so much their interests but them as people."

I thought hard about that. For nearly two years I have been feeling Trump's appeal is cultural. It's not about policies or a legislative agenda.

Jack said, "One final thing--how would you feel if the president or a candidate referred to you as an 'everyday' person or thought about you as a 'deplorable'? By your silence I assume not very good."

"Though I still disagree with what my friend posted," I said, "I do agree that she and others like her do have a president they can relate to. Ironically, even though he was born wealthy and is now a billionaire. So, it's not about class or money or power. It's in this case how Trump makes them feel. He gives them sanction, permission to act out, to say whatever they feel no matter the consequences. Just like he does. They pride themselves in telling it like they feel it is, in being politically incorrect.

"They are thus unleashed, very much including all their accumulated resentments. A lot of ugly stuff can leak out. Like it or not, I think this is the truth. His people and he connect with each other. Where we go from here, I can only guess. One thing I do know, it won't be pretty."

"See you at the diner one day soon," Jack said, "It would help if you could tell me when Betty has the day off."

September 29, 2016--Sidney Blumen-Who?

During the last half hour of Monday's presidential debate, moderator Lester Holt asked Donald Trump the inevitable question about his many-years-long campaign to call into question Barack Obama's citizenship and thus eligibility to be president. The Birther business. And by posing it during the segment of the debate devoted to race, Holt upped the ante.

Rather than just apologizing for pressing the issue so hard for so long in an attempt to move on--as Hillary Clinton successfully did when asked about her emails, saying--"I made a mistake,"which effectively ended the matter--Trump stumbled on and offered an incoherent and defensive response that on reflection was interesting because of what was largely ignored--his mumbling something about "Blumenthal." Seemingly suggesting that "Blumenthal" had something to do with raising the Birther issue.

Neither Clinton nor Holt followed up vigorously, wisely in its own way as Trump was on his own momentum twisting in the wind.

I was half-asleep by then and did not think that much about it.

But later that night, on one of my after-midnight talk shows--"Red Eye Radio"--a caller referred to Sidney Blumenthal, a close Clinton aide, as the progenitor of the Birther movement. A movement, so called, populated mainly of middle-age racist white men. That must have been, I thought, what Trump was trying to say.

I remembered Blumenthal as a senior advisor to Bill Clinton during his presidency. I knew Clinton trusted his political instincts, especially when it came to launching political attacks. This very much included Blumenthal's trying to help Bill thread his way though the cyclone of the Monica Lewinsky affair.

I also remembered that the Obama administration would not allow Hillary Clinton, when she was named Secretary of State, to hire him as one of her senior advisors. David Axelrod and Robert Gibbs, for example, indicated they would resign their White House positions if Blumenthal was appointed.

Call me foolish, but also from the talk-show world, I thought this had to do with rumors that Hillary and Sidney were fooling around and Obama didn't want any of that going on on his watch.

To check my recollections and to see what Trump might have been attempting to say during the debate, I googled "Blumenthal Birther" and within a microsecond there was all sorts of stuff, ranging from ratings from the lunatic fringe to other postings that appeared credible. Especially one from McClatchy News' Website of September 16, 2016--a few days before the debate.

For the uninitiated, McClatchy is a major publisher of daily newspapers, 29 at the moment, including a number that they secured from the Knight-Ridder company. They have won 9 Pulitzer Prizes and the first  I.F Stone Medal for Journalistic Independence. So they are far from ideological.

Since before the 16th Trump yet again made Birther noises and mentioned Blumenthal, who since 2008 has been a close advisor to Hillary, on its Website on the 16th McCaltchy posted a piece about its role in the Birther controversy.

It appears that during the run up to the Iowa caucuses in 2008, before Trump was questioning Obama's legitimacy, when Clinton was opposing Obama for the nomination, a staffer from Iowa approached McClatchy with a tip--she claimed that Obama was not born in the United States. When the word about this got out she was quickly disavowed by the campaign and summarily fired.

Closer to the point, then McClatchy Washington Bureau Chief James Asher, at that same time was approached by Sidney Blumenthal with the same "news." They refused to run it but again the word began to leak out.

Then this past Friday, and then again on Monday, Asher was quoted as saying that, "Blumenthal did spread the story to him, and that he assigned a reporter to check it out."

Though this may appear to be a posting about Trump with the implication that he was doing his version of a good citizen's due diligence, it is anything but.

Trump has been despicable throughout, including the other night when he appeared to stammer that he didn't do what he was accused of doing (wrong) and that he had not been pressing the calumny recently (again wrong, in fact that is blatantly untrue).

What is also despicable is the cravenness of moderator Lester Holt not knowing, or pretending not to know, the true genesis on the Birther slander with Sidney Blumenthal front and center.

Trump may have been the principal mouthpiece and self-promoter in promulgating the Birther lie but it did not begin with him. More truthfully, it may have originated with Hillary Clinton's closest advisor.

If it took me five minutes to get this straight. Holt with his squadron of producers and assistants could have done the same thing in half the time. And surely Hillary or one of her people could have, should have done the same thing.

None of this is impressive.

September 20, 2016--Trump Is A Jerk II

In early June, not long after winning the Republican nomination, with a head of post-convention momentum, after delivering a decent acceptance speech that suggested he was about to pivot from outrageous-entertainer-candidate to become something resembling a more-or-less-serious, more-or-less-responsible general election candidate, Donald Trump revealed himself to be out-of-control without the temperament to be taken seriously as a potential commander in chief much less president when he attacked the Mexican-American judge who was presiding over the Trump University fraud case, slandering him repeatedly by mocking him as "that Mexican judge."

That's when I wrote my first Trump-Is-A-Jerk piece.

There was talk that Trump should either step aside and let Paul Ryan take his place (Ryan as a result tried to put on a presidential showcase) or be deposed by the Republican National Committee, turning the nomination over to Cruz, or Rubio, or even Jeb Bush.

This of course did not come to pass and Trump made attempts, with some success, to clean up his act and act presidential. He began speaking from TelePrompTers and it seemed that his genuinely-smart-and-savvy daughter, Ivanka, was writing his speeches and had him under a version of control.

For example, last week in the ballroom of the newly renovated hotel Trump Washington, or whatever it's called (the construction work also directly overseen by the now ubiquitous Ivanka) The Donald delivered a reasoned speech about his plans to revive the economy. Paul Krugman predictably took it apart but for a Republican it was a reasonable, less-draconion plan than, say, Paul Ryan's or either of the Bush president's.

A couple of days later, he delivered an even more responsible talk about child and eldercare. In regard to the latter, his, amazingly, is more generous than Hillary Clinton's since I can find no evidence that she has a plan for taking care of older adults who need assistance. She has hundreds of other plans but, as modest as Trump's is, none of this type.

National polls began to show Trump at least even with Hillary and in key states such as Ohio, Nevada, Colorado, and Florida that he was either within the margin of error or in the lead.

To boot, Hillary in public view on 9/11, collapsed allegedly from pneumonia which did two things--caused undecideds to think again if she is healthy enough to live through the unspeakable stress of serving as president (she has had a number of blood clots); and, related to that, since she tried to cover up whatever was ailing her, this contributed to the narrative that the Clintons are at a minimum not transparent and, to the conspiratorial-minded, fundamentally dishonest and crooked.

And, with rare political finesse, Trump said nothing much more that wishing her a speedy recovery and return to the campaign trail.

His numbers as a result continued to improve. Even the partisan New York Times began to have to report that his chances of actually being elected rose from single digits to perhaps 25-30 percent. Discounting the paper's political bias this more likely meant that the race was now a tossup.

But then Trump again blew it--

On his own momentum, with Barack Obama's favorables comfortably above 50 percent and Trump at the same time doing better with young voters of color, he stepped again into the Birther thing, declining when asked to pretend to be exasperated with the whole thing--"Of course he was born in America. Can we now turn to more important things such as growing the economy and providing childcare assistance to low-income [read, minority] families?"

Instead he let it sit and fester politically for a couple of days before finally appearing to be exasperated, saying, "Yes, he was born . . ." And then made matters worse when he tried to blame the whole Birther issue on Hillary.

No one any longer was talking about his plans for the economy or children. It was Birther 24/7.

Doubling down on outrageous talk, when trying to claim that Hillary Clinton would try to ignore or repeal the Second Amendment, he in effect cracked, "If she's so anti-gun, why not take the weapons aways from her Secret Service detail and see what happens."

This reminded commentators and voters of an even more outrageous, borderline felonious incitement back in August about letting "Second-Amendment people take care" of Hillary.

And this reminded me what a jerk he ultimately is and for this reason among others is unfit to be our president.

Sigmund Freud would have a field day with Donald Trump.