Media must expose Trump incompetence. Just listen to Trump's unhinged rhetoric

Echo Opinion by Jackie Calmes published in the Los Angeles Times: I watched a Trump rally so you don’t have to. 

But you need to know what Trumpzi is saying.

Donald Trump is spewing Fascism!

Donald Trump famously benefited from billions in free media in his 2016, campaign — way too much, as some in the business later conceded. 

1)

Back then, Trump was a ratings monster (or a 😨😩mobster❗); cable TV networks covered his rallies start to finish, as millions of Americans tuned in, out of horror or glee, at his shameless (and👺👹 ugly) shtick: What would he say next❓

Eight years later, the networks have pulled back. Even Faux News no longer gives the former president as much attention. 

Indeed, viewers have Trump fatigue, his opponents and supporters alike. Only obscure right-wing channels that cater to MAGA types carry the full rallies in real time; the rest provide video snippets, if that.

Yet voters shouldn’t ignore Trump on the stump, especially given that his and President Biden’s respective age and mental acuity are the overriding issue in their seemingly likely 2024, rematch. A majority, I think (hope?), would come away without a doubt about which of the two candidates is unhinged. 

Donald Trump is unhinged and proves it in his Nazi style beer hall crazed cult rallies

For those not inclined to stream an entire, roughly 90-minute bizarre Trumpzi show — even his fans often start walking out mid-rally — I watched so you don’t have to.

My selection was Saturday night’s performance in Waterford Township, Michigan., a working-class area north of Detroit. 

Against the cold at the airport there, Trump was in a full-length black coat and black leather gloves, recalling his appearance at the January 6, 2021, rally where he told the Capitol-bound crowd, “If you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.”

Much of his rhetoric and style was familiar as well — often incoherent ramblings, falsehoods, indecent asides (he took a swipe at 99-year-old Jimmy Carter, who just marked a year in hospice) and sophomoric insults of his many “enemies” in both parties.

Some Trump critics say he’s gotten worse in his hate-mongering, like his recent rally talk of political foes being “vermin” and of immigrants “poisoning” the nation’s blood. He didn’t repeat those Hitlerian echoes in Michigan, though the sentiment was there. However much he ratchets up his rhetoric, it hasn’t really changed — the bigotry, lies and disrespect for democratic norms and rule of law are all still part of the playlist.

One thing there is more of than in the past, despite the kids in the audience: profanity. And more than ever, given the scores of criminal charges and mountain of legal penalties he’s facing, there are his grievances. These aren’t rallies anymore. They’re pity parties.

After the first half-hour or so, what struck me most was not what Trump said, but how his audience responded. A Trump rally speech isn’t punctuated by applause like the thousands of aspirational addresses I’ve heard before from other politicians. 

Instead, Trump’s supporters emit constant catcalls, boos and their own favorite profanities, in approving response to his nonstop caterwauling (a shrill howling or wailing noise like that of a cat).

Just minutes in, for the first of many times, he assailed “Crooked Joe” and called Biden “the worst president we’ve ever had.” (Fact check: ✅An updated ranking of U.S. presidents just that day, by leading scholars, had Trump repeating as the worst; Biden debuted at No. 14.) Trump polled the crowd on whether to call Biden “crooked” or “sleepy”; the former won.

He name-checked “Birdbrain” (Nikki Haley); two prosecutors, “Deranged Jack Smith” (“He’s an animal”) and “Fawwny” (Fulton County Dist. Atty. Fani Willis); Nancy Pelosi (he suggested her wealth is somehow suspect); and Barack Hussein Obama. He’s still purposely mocking the Germanic pronunciation of retired Chancellor Angela Merkel’s name; he did so during an anti-trade tirade about “stupid” Americans buying so many German BMWs, Volkswagens and Mercedes-Benzes — most of which would have been made in South Carolina, Alabama and Tennessee, respectively.

Trump seemed to sap the crowd’s initial energy by whining at length about the previous day’s news that New York Justice Arthur Engoron — “a crooked judge,” he claimed three times — ordered him to pay about $450 million in penalties and interest for financial fraud. It’s “the weaponization of this horrible legal system,” he said, adding, “This is the real threat to democracy.”

It was all about him, just as his indictments and trials for fraud, sexual assault and defamation and election subversion are all his. 

Yet, Trumpzi wanted to have the adoring crowd believing his self-inflicted legal woes are theirs too.

“These are Democrats that definitely hate me,” he said of his antagonists, starting with Biden. “They hate you too, I have to tell you.” At another point: “We’re all in this together.” And an hour in: “Every time the radical-left Democrats, Marxists, Communists and fascists indict me, I consider it a great badge of honor. I am being indicted for you. Never forget.”

Trump’s continued denial of his 2020 defeat peppered his remarks throughout. “We won twice,” he blurted at one point. He blamed his failure to finish a border wall on the fact that “the election was rigged.” He repeated his lies about 2020 voting fraud in majority-Black Detroit, long-debunked by the state’s Republicans, Trump’s attorney general, courts and anyone who looked at the facts. (“We gotta watch Detroit. Boy, oh boy, oh boy.”)

“American carnage” was a big theme, just as in his 2017 inaugural address. “Every single one of our rotten cities are being run by Democrats,” Trump said, stoking the nation’s red rural-versus-blue urban divide. “We are worse than a Third World country. … Look at our airports,” said the man who repeatedly promised an infrastructure bill. (It was Biden who delivered😊; his bipartisan infrastructure law includes $25 billion to modernize U.S. airports.)

Trump returned again and again to blaming Biden for the crush of migrants at the southern border. “Welcome to the Congo, people,” he said, claiming Africans were coming from prisons and asylums. 

Trumpziism, the former guy promised (with Nazism 卐

enthusiasm 💀) “the largest deportation in history,” which would be economically calamitous, and took credit for a new phrase, “Bigrant crime” — as in, Biden migrant crime. “Oh, that’s good, that’s smart,” he said, pointing to his brain.

Non sequiturs were constant. Trump went from grousing about his Georgia case straight into unrelated, and chilling, talk of indemnifying police charged with misconduct once he is president: “You can stop [crime] in one day, in one hour, if you got really nasty and really tough.” And there was this: “The great capital, Washington, D.C., is under siege. I will always defend Medicare and Social Security — unlike Birdbrain.”

I kid you not. That’s what he said. If you don’t believe me, watch for yourself.

Spoiler alert: The man is not fit to be president. Trumpziism is Facism in the evil vein of Nazism.

@jackiekcalmes

MORE TO READ

January 6 must teach Americans to protect our democracy

This article is part of a collection on the events of January 6, one year later.  Echo essay by President Jimmy Carter  published in The New York Times.

President Jimmy Carter

One year ago, a violent mob, guided by unscrupulous politicians, stormed the Capitol and almost succeeded in preventing the democratic transfer of power. All four of us former presidents condemned their actions and affirmed the legitimacy of the 2020, election. There followed a brief hope that the insurrection would shock the nation into addressing the toxic polarization that threatens our democracy.

However, one year on, promoters of the lie that the election was stolen have taken over one political party and stoked distrust in our electoral systems. These forces exert power and influence through relentless disinformation, which continues to turn Americans against Americans. According to the Survey Center on American Life, 36 percent of Americans — almost 100 million adults across the political spectrum — agree that “the traditional American way of life is disappearing so fast that we may have to use force to save it.” 

The Washington Post recently reported that roughly 40 percent of Republicans believe that violent action against the government is sometimes justified.

Politicians in my home state of Georgia, as well as in other states, such as Texas and Florida, have leveraged the distrust they have created to enact laws that empower partisan legislatures to intervene in election processes. They seek to win by any means, and many Americans are being persuaded to think and act likewise, threatening to collapse the foundations of our security and democracy with breathtaking speed. I now fear that what we have fought so hard to achieve globally — the right to free, fair elections, unhindered by strongman politicians who seek nothing more than to grow their own power — has become dangerously fragile at home.

I personally encountered this threat in my own backyard in 1962, when a ballot-stuffing county boss tried to steal my election to the Georgia State Senate. This was in the primary, and I challenged the fraud in court. Ultimately, a judge invalidated the results, and I won the general election. Afterward, the protection and advancement of democracy became a priority for me. As president, a major goal was to institute majority rule in southern Africa and elsewhere.

After I left the White House and founded the Carter Center, we worked to promote free, fair and orderly elections across the globe. 

I led dozens of election observation missions in Africa, Latin America and Asia, starting with Panama in 1989, where I put a simple question to administrators: “Are you honest officials or thieves?” At each election, my wife, Rosalynn, and I were moved by the courage and commitment of thousands of citizens walking miles and waiting in line from dusk to dawn to cast their first ballots in free elections, renewing hope for themselves and their nations and taking their first steps to self-governance. But I have also seen how new democratic systems — and sometimes even established ones — can fall to military juntas or power-hungry despots. 

Sudan and Myanmar are two recent examples.

For American democracy to endure, we must demand that our leaders and candidates uphold the ideals of freedom and adhere to high standards of conduct.

• First, while citizens can disagree on policies, people of all political stripes must agree on fundamental constitutional principles and norms of fairness, civility and respect for the rule of law. Citizens should be able to participate easily in transparent, safe and secure electoral processes. Claims of election irregularities should be submitted in good faith for adjudication by the courts, with all participants agreeing to accept the findings. And the election process should be conducted peacefully, free of intimidation and violence.
• Second, we must push for reforms that ensure the security and accessibility of our elections and ensure public confidence in the accuracy of results. Phony claims of illegal voting and pointless multiple audits only detract from democratic ideals.
• Third, we must resist the polarization that is reshaping our identities around politics. We must focus on a few core truths: that we are all human, we are all Americans and we have common hopes for our communities and our country to thrive. We must find ways to re-engage across the divide, respectfully and constructively, by holding civil conversations with family, friends and co-workers and standing up collectively to the forces dividing us.
• Fourth, violence has no place in our politics, and we must act urgently to pass or strengthen laws to reverse the trends of character assassination, intimidation and the presence of armed militias at events. We must protect our election officials — who are trusted friends and neighbors of many of us — from threats to their safety. Law enforcement must have the power to address these issues and engage in a national effort to come to terms with the past and present of racial injustice.

Lastly, the spread of disinformation, especially on social media, must be addressed. We must reform these platforms and get in the habit of seeking out accurate information. Corporate America and religious communities should encourage respect for democratic norms, participation in elections and efforts to counter disinformation.

Our great nation now teeters on the brink of a widening abyss. Without immediate action, we are at genuine risk of civil conflict and losing our precious democracy. Americans must set aside differences and work together before it is too late.

Maine Writer P.S. - Thank you Mr. President! 

Kansas echo - the world waits it out: Donald Trump

Trump faces a slew of foreign policy challenges all at once- but the world appears to be waiting for administration turnover.

An echo opinion published in the Wichita Eagle by Andrew Malcolm special to McClatchy

Americans are not the only people who are closely following the 2020 presidential contest. And that reality is causing serious and growing challenges for Donald Trump.

A self-proclaimed world-class deal-maker, a perhaps overconfident Trump is confronting not one, not two, but a half-dozen serious foreign policy problems simultaneously. None of these escalating challenges, save perhaps Venezuela, are new. And solving them has stumped all other recent presidents.

But the timing and scale of some are of Trump’s own choosing or making, depending on your view of him. This accumulation of coincidental crises could be intentional or the result of an unorganized administration reflecting its leader’s sometimes impetuous inclinations.

But each one carries important consequences and threats for the nation’s foreign relations, peace and the president’s chances of capturing a second term next year.


In fact, the possibility — some would say likelihood — of a Trump with chronically unfavorable poll numbers joining George H.W. Bush and Jimmy Carter as one-term presidents seems to be a factor in recent decisions by China and North Korea to back off of previous commitments. Iran also has been willing to stir up more trouble, and the Taliban has dragged out peace talks on Afghanistan, awaiting perhaps a more friendly successor administration.

Waiting out the maximum eight-year life of an American administration unfavorable to their interests is a default option for many foreign governments, especially in Asia where one-man or one-party rule is common. Japan has been successfully employing protectionist trade policies this way for decades.

Last week, as he has long threatened, Trump imposed large tariff increases on Chinese goods when, he said, officials reneged on commitments already agreed to, including protecting intellectual property rights.

“I’m different than a lot of people,” an understated Trump said without admitting that includes many in his own adopted GOP. 

“I happen to think that tariffs for our country are very valuable.” (MaineWriter- another serial lie!)

Few beyond Beijing doubt the need for significant changes in Chinese cyber-espionage and trade

Refugees and progressive leadership

When the Vietnamese refugees arrived in 1975, to Subic Bay, Philippines, my husband and I were among the community of Americans who helped to receive them. To a person, these desperate refugees were traumatized.  There was no hesitancy in responding to their dire needs. Therefore, this particular essay is personal....

Vietnamese refugees wait to be taken aboard the amphibious command ship USS BLUE RIDGE (LCC-19).

When You Have an Administration that Wants to Welcome Refugees... "Vice-President Mondale’s diplomatic efforts and eloquent speech in Geneva, about Indonesian refugees, galvanized the world to respond."

An echo essay published in the History News Network (HNN) by Joel K. Goldstein

No historical analogy is required to be repelled by the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” immigration policy which involved the separation of thousands of children from their parents. 

Vice President Walter Mondale 

"Let us honor the moral principles we inherit. Let us do something meaningful—something profound—to stem this misery"

“Anybody with a heart would feel very strongly about it,” said President Donald Trump when he belatedly signed an executive order ending the policy his administration had imposed. Trump and his subordinates had previously blamed the Democrats, Congress and the courts and justified the approach as good policy with Biblical support. Trump’s executive order did not, of course, repair the damage his administration had already caused – to the parents and children separated from each other, to America’s international standing, to America’s commitment to humane values.

Jimmy Carter’s response to the Indochinese refugee crisis forty years ago illustrates a quite different attitude toward refugees and to governing. It provides a case study that illustrates how the Trump administration’s perverse substantive values and Trump’s governing approach produce such disastrous policy as intentional family separation.

Eric Schwartz, the President of Refugees International and a former dean of the Humphrey School at the University of Minnesota, has recently recalled, as an “alternative vision” of American humanitarian leadership, Vice President Walter Mondale’s remarkable speech 39 years ago last month to a special meeting of about 60 governments in Geneva at a United Nations Conference on Indochinese Refugees. The Geneva meeting had been convened to address a refugee crisis that stemmed from repressive and discriminatory actions against ethnic, religious and national groups by the Vietnamese government that caused hundreds of thousands of people to flee for their lives, often by sea in decrepit craft, as well as by actions creating land migrations from Laos and Cambodia. Camps in neighboring countries were bursting with refugees, boats were being turned away, refugees were dying at sea.

Mondale’s diplomatic efforts and eloquent speech at the Geneva meeting galvanized the world to respond. After spending the first daymeeting with representatives of China and American allies, Mondale delivered his powerful speech. “[S]ome tragedies defy the imagination,” said Mondale. “Some misery surpasses the grasp of reason that language itself breaks beneath the train.” Mondale recalled that 41 years earlier an international conference at Evian had failed to act to save the Jews of Germany and Austria, an indifference that emboldened Hitler. Mondale challenged the world not to repeat the tragic mistake of Evian. “Let us honor the moral principles we inherit. Let us do something meaningful—something profound—to stem this misery. We face a world problem. Let us fashion a world solution. History will not forgive us if we fail. History will not forget us if we succeed.”

Nine years ago I called Mondale’s speech “one of the truly eloquent speeches in American history” in an article that prompted Mondale speechwriter Marty Kaplan to provide some of the backstory behind it. 

Rereading Mondale’s speech never fails to move me; you can find it here.

As inspirational as the speech was, it succeeded because it was part of a process that reflected an enlightened and capable approach to governing, one altogether absent in the Trump administration.

Assistant Secretary of State Richard Holbrooke had communicated with Mondale about the crisis and the obstacles impeding the Carter administration from an optimal response in spring 1979. Mondale took the problem to Carter and, with his support, brought together an inter-departmental group to address the problem. Mondale persuaded Carter to denounce the repressive policies, deploy the navy to rescue refugees from sea perils, admit 14,000 refugees per month (168,000/year), and seek additional funding to establish refugee processing centers and to assist in resettlement efforts.

Mondale took these concrete actions to Geneva. There, his diplomatic and oratorical efforts produced a strong positive response. America was able to persuade other nations to respond because in addition to Mondale’s inspiring words, he offered a seven-point plan for international action and the United States led by example, doubling the refugees it would accept and committing resources to save and resettle others.

It is instructive to consider the factors that produced the leadership of Carter and Mondale in contrast to Trump’s disastrous policy. Professor Schwartz rightly offers Mondale’s speech as “an alternative vision of U.S. humanitarian leadership” that vindicates American interests and values. Carter and Mondale believed in the Biblical teaching that we are our brothers’ keeper as a tenet of personal and political behavior in contrast to Trump’s version of empathy which seems concentrated on himself and his wealthy friends. And Carter and Mondale believed in human rights as an essential aspect of American foreign policy leadership in contrast to Trump’s affinity for authoritarian leaders.

But the Carter-Mondale “alternative vision” succeeded because Carter immersed himself in information and prioritized making the right choices, not those that catered to a political constituency. Carter created an administration in which talented people were not afraid to raise problems and think about them holistically. By contrast, it was predictable that Trump’s zero tolerance approach would produce the inhumane results it did, but Trump and his subordinates either did not think about the problem in a comprehensive way or were not offended by taking children from their parents, or both.

Government officials knew that Mondale could influence Carter and that he was willing to fight for initiatives even when they ran counter to Carter’s concern to limit government spending. Therefore, it was not surprising that the challenges involving Indochinese refugees came to Mondale and that he took the issue to Carter. Mondale understood that America could only persuade other nations if it brought a plan and an example as well as prose to Geneva.

Mondale’s eloquent speech at Geneva did represent “an alternative” and far more attractive vision of humane international leadership. We can be sure that those the navy saved from perilous seas viewed America quite differently than will the children who were locked in cages and the parents and children many of who still remain separated because the government cannot figure out how to reunite some of the families that it tore apart. In stark contrast to today, America’s 1979 actions showed the world a nation committed to stopping suffering, not creating it.

That episode demonstrated the importance of values but also of having a president engaged with information, not one oblivious to it; one who invited and often received criticism and bad news from Vice-President Mondale and others, not one who encourages sycophancy and limits his news feed; and of an administration where highly capable public servants think about problems in their complexity with empathy, not one where officials are surprised by predictable outcomes or complicit in designing and implementing programs that embarrass decent Americans and spark outrage around the world.