Category Archives: Donald Trump

Donald Trump

Once again: What damage has Brennan done?

A few congressional Republicans have joined their Democratic colleagues in criticizing Donald Trump for revoking the security clearance of former CIA Director John Brennan.

The president’s reason? Brennan has acted “erratically” with his criticism of the administration.

I need to pose this question one more (and perhaps final) time: What has the ex-CIA boss said that has damaged national security?

The Hill has reported on the reaction. Read about it here.

Yes, he’s been harsh. And, yes, he has been vocal in his criticism of the president. Perhaps he should dial it back a bit, but he need not go silent just because Donald Trump dislikes the nature of his criticism.

The president’s reaction is, in the words of some Democratic members of Congress, the stuff of a “banana republic.”

Donald Trump

Trump vs. Brennan: Gloves come off

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I have no idea whether this Twitter exchange had anything to do with Donald Trump revoking former CIA Director John Brennan’s security clearance …

But I wouldn’t be surprised if there is some linkage.

The president has exhibited a shameful display of petulance and idiotic pique at a man whose expertise on vital national security matters he has just tossed into the crapper.

And I have to ask: Why in the world would the president do this?

Oh, I know. It’s because he is a thin-skinned narcissist with delusions of grandeur/godhood.

Brennan’s tweet speaks to the equally idiotic language he used to dismiss Omarosa Manigault Newman, the former White House aide who chief of staff John Kelly fired.

Don’t misunderstand me here. I do not trust Newman, either. However, the presidency used to demand that its occupant demonstrate some level of dignity, decorum and “probity,” a term that Brennan used.

Whatever her beef with the president — or his with her — she didn’t deserve to be talked about in that tone by the head of state of the world’s greatest nation.

And this circles back — every single time — to the issue of whether Donald Trump is morally or intellectually fit to hold the office to which he was elected.

He is unfit at every level imaginable.

Brennan has been denied a security clearance. That, by itself, is a shame. The good news is that Trump’s petulance won’t silence this erudite critic.

Donald Trump, national news

Trump revives concept of ‘enemies list’

The sometimes-sinister spirit of Richard M. Nixon apparently has returned from the dead to whisper in the ear of Donald J. Trump.

The current president mirrored the former president’s enemies list by revoking the top security clearance of former CIA Director John Brennan. In a remarkable fit of petulance, pique and piggishness, the president did this to punish Brennan for what he called “erratic behavior.”

Did the former CIA boss reveal any national security secrets? Did he blab classified information to enemy states? Did he in any way compromise our ability to defend ourselves against foreign foes?

No to all of the above.

Brennan’s “sin” is to criticize the president.

What is wrong with that? Oh, nothing at all. It’s protected speech, according to the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. But you see, Donald Trump just won’t have any of that. He just cannot stomach the idea of a former CIA director, a man with immense national security chops — who could be of invaluable assistance to the president’s national security team — speaking negatively about administration policy.

The New York Times reported: In a tweet this week, Mr. Brennan criticized Mr. Trump for the language that the president used to attack Omarosa Manigault Newman, his former top aide, who he called a “dog.”

Mr. Brennan wrote, “It’s astounding how often you fail to live up to minimum standards of decency, civility, & probity. Seems like you will never understand what it means to be president, nor what it takes to be a good, decent, & honest person. So disheartening, so dangerous for our Nation.”

Years ago, President Nixon developed an enemies list comprising members of the Democratic Party, radical left-wing protest groups, certain members of the media and, frankly, damn near any prominent American who spoke ill of him in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Nearly five decades later, his most recent presidential descendant has resurrected that notion by revoking the security clearance of a dedicated public servant and a man with tremendous knowledge of all things relating to protecting this great nation.

Shameful.

Donald Trump, International news

This is a ‘disaster,’ Mr. President?

Take a good look at the graphic just below these few words. They tell me a fascinating story about the “disaster” Donald Trump says he inherited when he was sworn in as president of the United States.

It’s a poll conducted by the Pew Research Center. I get that some of Donald J. Trump’s “base” will dismiss the poll because of some phony “liberal bias” issue folks will say skew these numbers. In reality, Pew is a legitimate polling outfit and first-class think tank that offers analysis across the political spectrum.

Confidence among these five key allied nations of the United States has plummeted since Trump became president. The biggest decline in confidence comes from Germany, which registered an 86 percent approval rating during the Barack Obama years, but has fallen to just 11 percent during the Trump era. Might there be some German anger over the way Trump has treated Chancellor Angela Merkel?

It does seem a bit weird that Trump kept yapping about inheriting a “disaster” when took office. The polling here among these five key allied nations suggest something quite different. Make no mistake: It does matter what other nations think of this country and its leadership.

I’m led to conclude that Donald Trump brought the “disaster” with him into the White House.

Donald Trump, media news

No ‘guarantee’? So, what is the problem?

I feel the need to give White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders the benefit of the doubt on her latest skirmish with the press corps/”enemy of the people.”

She was pressed this week about whether she could “guarantee” that there would be no tape recordings of Donald J. Trump using the n-word in conversation.

Sanders said she couldn’t “guarantee” such a thing. Some in the media have gone a bit catatonic in their response to what I thought was a realistic answer. They have wondered how or why she couldn’t — or wouldn’t — offer a direct answer to a direct question.

Consider a couple of factors here.

First, as press secretary, Sanders very well might not know every tiny detail of every little occurrence within the West Wing.

Second, she serves in a presidential administration led by a pathological liar. Donald Trump cannot tell the truth to anyone, or so it appears, at least to chumps like me. I am quite certain Sanders didn’t intend to question the president’s veracity by making her “no guarantee” declaration.

Sure, Trump denies ever using the n-word. He says it’s not in his vocabulary. Do you believe him? I … do … not!

However, her answer sounded to my ears to be about the most honest response she has offered while speaking for the president.

Donald Trump

Now he’s gone to the ‘dogs’

Donald J. Trump long ago disabused anyone of considering him for the title of Dean of Decorum, or the Doctor of Dignity.

He hurls insults at his foes, attaching hideous references to them. If an opponent happens to be African American, then he or she is susceptible to a racially tinted taunt. Ah, but if you’re both African American and a woman, well, all bets are off.

Get a load of how the president has referred to Omarosa Manigault Newman, the current POTUS foe du jour.

Trump referred to her in a tweet as “that dog.”

Classy, don’t you think? No need to answer that one.

According to The Hill: Critics saw the tweet as racially charged given that Manigault Newman — a former contestant on NBC’s “The Apprentice” who has just published a deeply critical book about the president — was one of the few prominent African-Americans working in the White House.

This un-presidential president continues to amaze even his harshest critics. I consider myself among the hard-liners who cannot –and will not — support Donald Trump.

He keeps reaffirming what I thought of his newly minted politician  the very moment he declared himself a candidate for the presidency.

Donald Trump, national news

How can POTUS call anyone a liar? Really, how?

Donald J. “Liar in Chief” Trump is tossing the epithet of “liar” around a bit too loosely … if you ask me for my humble opinion.

His latest target is Omarosa Manigault Newman, the former White House special assistant who is alleging the president has used the n-word while discussing certain individuals.

You see, my issue here is that Trump has utterly zero moral standing to call anyone a liar. The man is the country’s pre-eminent lying politician. He cannot tell the truth. It’s impossible.

Any situation — big or small — is open to prevarication from the president.

So now he says Newman’s assertion that the future president’s use of the n-word while working on “Celebrity Apprentice” is false. He said the tape recordings that Newman alleges contain his use of the word don’t exist.

How in the name of Honest Abe am I supposed to believe a single utterance that flies out of POTUS’s pie hole?

I don’t want any misunderstanding here. Omarosa is no saint. She’s trying to sell a book. She got herself hired to work in the White House doing a job that no one has yet defined. She didn’t belong there. For all I know she well might have deserved to be fired.

But if you’re going to put her word against the Liar in Chief, well … I’m going with Omarosa.

Donald Trump

Do we need tape recordings to prove racist view?

Omarosa Manigault Newman has dropped a few stools in the punch bowl regarding her former boss and (apparently) former friend, Donald John Trump.

She says she has heard tape recordings of the future president using the n-word to describe “Celebrity Apprentice” contestants. He account has been backed up by illusionist Penn Gillette, who says he heard Trump say it in the moment.

She’s written a book about her time as a special White House assistant, a post she left when chief of staff John Kelly fired her. Newman recorded the termination that occurred in the Situation Room, which is a serious breach of national security protocol. That, however, is a whole other story.

But I have to ask: Do we really need to hear these recordings to verify what has been virtually obvious? I mean, consider the following.

  • Trump fomented the lie about our first African American president’s place of birth.
  • He also challenged Barack Obama’s academic credentials that admitted him to Harvard Law.
  • Trump denigrates the intelligence of U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters, CNN News anchor Don Lemon and pro basketball superstar LeBron James … all prominent African American public figures.
  • The president calls NFL football players protesting police brutality — the players are virtually all black — “sons of bitches.”
  • And all the while, he declines to issue a categorical condemnation of white supremacists, Klansmen and neo-Nazis.

Does the president refer to white critics as being less than intelligent? Why in the world did he continue to promote the defamatory lie that questioned President Obama’s constitutional right to seek the presidency? And why can’t the president bring himself to condemn hate groups such as the Klan exclusively? He recently watered down such “condemnation” with that sterile “all types of racism” qualifier.

Again, I ask: Do we really need to hear these recordings to validate what many millions of Americans — including me — believe about the man who’s been elected president of the United States of America?

This individual is a racist.

Donald Trump, national security

Waiting for GOP heroes to emerge

I am acutely aware that we’re likely still some distance away from determining potential guilt or innocence in the “Russia thing” investigation involving Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.

However, I want to ask something out loud: When might there be some Republican “heroes” emerging to tell the president that they’ve had enough of his lying; they have had their fill of the controversy that threatens to swallow the presidency whole?

The Watergate comparisons keep coming forward. President Nixon got ensnared in a coverup of the break-in at the Watergate complex in June 1972. Democrats, quite naturally, were raising a ruckus almost from the beginning. Republicans then remained more or less silent even as evidence of the coverup began to reveal itself.

Then the dam broke. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the president had to release tape recordings of White House conversations. The U.S. House Judiciary Committee approved articles of impeachment.

It was then that a delegation of Republican members of Congress trooped to the White House and confronted the president.

It fell to Sen. Barry Goldwater, the Arizona Republican, to tell Nixon that he had no support in the Senate once the House impeached him. He wouldn’t withstand a trial. The president’s list of supporters didn’t include Goldwater, the senator told him.

Nixon resigned shortly thereafter.

Are we heading to that point with Donald Trump? I have no clue.

However, the evidence of a cover-up keeps mounting in this case as well. Moreover, former aides and key advisers are talking openly about a president coming unhinged over the barrage of negative publicity.

And the president is lashing out at what he calls “fake news,” and uses Twitter to hurl bizarre insults at former allies who’ve become foes.

Where are the GOP heroes who are going to say, “Enough is enough”?

We need not get all the way to an impeachment deliberation for those heroes to emerge.

Donald Trump

Wacky, deranged? Why did you keep hiring her, Mr. POTUS?

Omarosa Manigault Newman might be all the things Donald Trump says she is: wacky and deranged, for example.

He’s angry with his former special White House assistant because she alleges the president used the n-word while he was running his TV show “Celebrity Apprentice,” where Newman first became associated with the future president of the United States.

Trump’s view of Omarosa has covered the pea patch. He has praised her and condemned her. She’s been alternately smart and sharp … and now she’s a dimwit, according to Trump.

The president now says the tapes of him using the n-word don’t exist. Omarosa says they do. Who’s telling the truth?

Hmm. Do we go with the man who’s been proven to have lied through his teeth or the woman who’s trying to sell a few books about her life and her work as a special White House assistant?

I’ll go with the former White House assistant.

What’s more, if Omarosa is as slimy and contemptible as Trump now says she is — why did he hire multiple times on his TV show before firing her and then hire as a White House special assistant?

This melodrama is a long way from its conclusion.