Donald Trump cannot respond to "truth" so on national TV Meet the Press he behaved like a spoiled toddler

Echo editorial board opinion published in the Dallas Texas News:

Our expectations for Donald Trump’s sense of decorum have never been high, but even by his standard, he’s outdone himself  by hitting even a new low in his public persona. 

In an interview with NBC journalist Ms. Kristen Welker on Meet the Press that aired June 7, 2026, the Trump managed to distort the facts of record, sling insults and throw a spectacular temper tantrum unfitting of his office.

Much of the first half of the interview danced as reasonably close to the edge of normal as Trump is likely to get, with Ms. Welker pressing the president on the Iran war. As politicians are likely to do, he dodged around and only sometimes answered questions directly, infusing his responses with his trademark, pugnacious style.

As the interview progressed, though, thinks went thoroughly off rail.

Trump defended his 💲1.8 billion slush fund intended to cover legal costs for people deemed victims of "weaponization of lawfare" and said he wanted to get it approved. 

That led to a conversation about rioters who attacked the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, and whether Trump thought they should be able to get a tax payer funded payout, which he seemed totally open to.

Trump went on to claim how, "People were destroyed by dirty cops and by weaponization. Many of those people should be compensated". 😡

Trump claimed those who pleaded guilty to assaulting police officers only did so because they were frightened into it.

To pretend that the violence at the Capitol was a figment of the national imagination and that those who perpetrated it were, in fact, the real victims, is as insulting as it is insane. Sadly, it's not an unusual line to take in today's GOP (a.k.a. "Growing Old Party").

Later in the interview, Trump claimed the currently ongoing California elections were "rigged". Ms. Welker then asked Trump if he had proof❓ "All I have to do is to look and listen," Trump responded.

It was shortly after that Trump went into his immature temper  tantrum by railing against the "crooked" press and all the negative treatment he gets from it.

Trump went on to make wild claims accusing Ms. Welker's network knows all about the election rigging and he insulted her straight out.

"You're either crooked or stupid," Trump said. 

He cut the interview off shortly thereafter.  In a sarcastic tone, he said "Thank you darling," and walked off the set.  

In delusional Trump's cult world, everyone is wrong if they do not agree with him and corrupt if they do not coddle him. Facts are irrelevant to him, truth is a profanity in his mind and history is how he tells it.

Somehow, we have reached a point where it is not unreasonable to expect a toddler to behave with more decorum than the leader of the free world.  From the Dallas Morning News Editorial Board

Donald Trump's jealousy meter went berserk when Zelenskyy told the truth on Meet the Press

In my opinion, the Zelenskyy interview with Meet the Press host Kristen Welker caused the Trump jealosy meter to fly out of control. In responsse, the Trump-Lie-Meter was driven to upstage Zelenskyy's credibility.

'Flailing and thrashing around' Trump buried by conservative for Ukraine 'betrayal'. Echo report published in RawStory by Tom Boggioni:

"Trump is living in misinformation space", Zelekskyy 🌌🚀

Both Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio were raked over the coals by a longtime columnist for the conservative National Review for nothing less than their "betrayal" of the people of Ukraine.

National Review's Jim Geraghty reported Trump, and Rubio are getting played by Russian strongman Vladimir Putin, and getting nothing in return for turning their backs on Ukraine and the NATO countries that are battling Russian expansionism.

Reacting to comments from both Trump and Rubio on Tuesday, Geraghty wrote, "... so far in his second term, regarding the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Trump offered to Vladimir Putin that Ukraine will not retake all its annexed and occupied sovereign territory, that Ukraine will not join NATO, that there will be no U.S. troops on Ukrainian soil after the war, and that the U.S. will lift sanctions on Russia." before noting, "

And in exchange, Putin offered . . . well, nothing, really."

With that in mind, Geraghty singled out Rubio telling reporters he agreed with the Russian delegation to “lay the groundwork for future cooperation on matters of mutual geopolitical interest and historic economic and investment opportunities which will emerge from a successful end to the conflict in Ukraine.”

That led the conservative columnist to bluntly ask, "What 'mutual geopolitical interest' do we have with the regime that fired a missile into Kyiv’s main children’s hospital? " before adding, "Russia has killed more than 12,000 Ukrainian civilians, and more than 6 million Ukrainian citizens live under the brutal hand of occupying Russian forces, and our government is talking about 'historic economic and investment opportunities' with them?"

As he noted, Russian has little to nothing that America needs by pointing out, "Grain? Oil? Natural gas? We already have that stuff; there is more than we need, and plenty is available for export. I thought the Trump plan was to build us into an energy production superpower."

Reporting that Rubio also stated a peace settlement would be brought about in "a way that’s enduring and acceptable to all the parties engaged,” Geraghty questioned Rubio's wisdom.

"Does Rubio envision Putin recognizing Ukraine as a legitimate and independent country? He has never done that. Down to the marrow in his bones, Putin sees Ukraine as part of Russia that can never be allowed to pursue its own separate path," he wrote.

As for Trump's demands that Ukraine hold a new election as part of the settlement, Geraghty wrote that the mere thought of that being acceptable when nearly 20 percent of Ukraine is living under a Russian occupation is absurd by pointing out, "This would be akin to running an American presidential election with only 40 of the 50 states able to participate."

Noting Trump's claims that the Ukraine president is unpopular in his own country, the columnist concluded, "Trump’s absurd claim that Zelensky has a 4 percent approval rating is a hint that Trump is flailing and thrashing around, trying anything to justify his current de facto pro-Russian stance."  (Just a reality check on February 20, 2025 Trump has a 49 percent DISAPPOVAL rating and it continues to go down....he is "under water" and jealous about Zelenskyy's Ukranian populatiry.)

Secretary Clinton finally receiving overdue press support about email

Although I strongly support Secretary Clinton for president, the non-resolution about "forget the damn emails" should've been handled long ago. Finally, an article to support this truth.

In my opinion, the news media only reported on the Clinton email story to counter 24/7 (stupid) Trump coverage. 

As far as I know, there was no journalist who tried to print the truth about the emal story. In fact, the NBC reporter Kristen Welker seemed to create a personal cottage industry by reporting about Secretary Clinton's emails, without regard for the bottom line issue being "harm". There was none.

Secretary Clinton ideally should've put this email issue to rest long ago, but the news media were like the junk yard dog in persuit of a non-story.

In fact, the emails on Mrs. Clinton's server did no harm, contained nothing of importance and virtually no one was incrimiated. Obviously, the email server shouldn't have been in Mrs. Clinton's home but having it there did not break any law or violate any policy she was working under at the time it was installed.  Otherwise, if there were anything of substance to the email story, this news would have been revealed by now.  Kristen Welker needs to find another obsession. My advice to Welker is this, "If you're going to persue a person about one issue, then find out what harm was done before stalking your subject."
USA Today opinion column:
Given longstanding weaknesses in the State Department system, she made a rational decision.

NBC and MSNBC television journalist Kristen Welker was like the proverbial "junk yard dog" in her relentless pursuit of the non-email story and Secretary Clinton's home computer server. In fact, Ms. Welker rarely reported on what was found in the emails, because there was no "there there".

The pseudo-scandal over Hillary Clinton’s emails bubbled up again with the recent release of the State Department Inspector General’s report. Notwithstanding the usual hype, a close reading of the 42-page report (plus timely recommendations and appendices) reveals that the State Department system was susceptible to cyberattacks both before and after Secretary Clinton’s tenure. Some experts have suggested that Clinton’s server was as secure, and maybe even more secure, than the department’s system.

The subject of the investigation was Secretary Clinton’s personal email system, which she elected to utilize rather than the State Department’s existing unclassified system. The State Department system has a decades long history of failures, includingsuccessful intrusions by unauthorized personnel. Across our government, foreign hackers have gained access to millions of U.S. private records and pieces of sensitive information in recent years. It is no wonder that Secretary Clinton was not the first to choose to use a personal email account instead of the sub-optimal State Department option.

The report notes that former Secretary of State Colin Powell used a personal email, and staff of both Secretaries Powell and Condoleezza Rice periodically used personal accounts. Tellingly, the report makes no recommendation that Secretary Clinton or any other former Secretaries be investigated or punished.

Moreover, as a senior State Department official admitted, the department did not do a good job of making sure employees understood or implemented proper regulations. In fact, some of the most useful guidance was not issued until 2013, four years after Clinton became secretary.

What is clear from the IG report is that the department as a whole, and the Office of the Secretary in particular, not only have outstanding flaws related to their servers and cybersecurity, but they also have been slow to make the necessary changes.

The office tasked with ensuring compliance of the rules was underfunded, understaffed and ineffective for several years, beginning long before Clinton assumed her role.

Also clear is that the secretary’s use of her private email account and server was no secret to department officials. To the contrary, there were extensive communications, documented by the IG, between operations officials at State and the technicians in charge of maintaining security on the secretary’s private server. And when there was a perceived threat of a hacker probing her system, the security folks shut it down until the threat was addressed.

The IG reported that “longstanding, systemic weaknesses related to electronic records and communications have existed within the Office of the Secretary that go well beyond the tenure of any one Secretary of State.” Given that finding, can it be considered anything other than a rational decision by Secretary Clinton to continue the use of a system for unclassified emails that had proved secure and functionally sound during her service as a United States senator, rather than risk using the State Department system?

The popular appetite for branding every controversy or disagreement as a scandal — and accepting the notion of “equivalency” as precept of objective journalism — enables partisan mischief-makers to ply their trade. Those interested in truth and fairness will take the time to examine the facts. 

Or, as Bernie Sanders succinctly put it eight long months ago, “Enough of the emails!”

Richard Ben-Veniste was a member of the bipartisan 9/11 Commission. The views expressed reflect his personal opinion.

(Although Mrs. Clinton should've put this email issue into the "trash" folder long ago, the news media was responsible for preventing it from being permanently deleted.)

In addition to its own editorials, USA TODAY publishes diverse opinions from outside writers, including our Board of Contributors. To read more columns, go to the Opinion front page, follow us on Twitter @USATOpinion and sign up for our daily Opinion newsletter.

Republicans can't answer debate questons they are incapble of leading the free world

Americans are tired of of the Republican's circus.  

Frankly, we're increasingly sickened by the line up of clown car Republican candiates who want to win the 2016 nomination to be president of the United States. We've been exposed to insults, intimidation of our friendly and hard working immigrant populations and heard about the preposterous claim from Dr. Carson about how snake oil cured his prostrate cancer, plus other outragious stuff. 

Nevertheless, there hasn't been even one inspiring idea between the band of wanna-bee presidential candidates. As a matter of fact, during the third GOP debate, the only information we learned was that Dr. Carson endosed products supported by Mannatech, a snake oil marketing firm that endorses sugar pills.

GOP debate moderators Carl Quintanilla (from left), Becky Quick and John Harwood appear during the CNBC Republican presidential debate Wednesday night

In other words, there's virtually no leadership among the GOP line up. They simply don't know what they're doing. It's like the GOP candidates are thriving on personal put downs and can't rise to defend anything other than their own egos.  

As President Obama noted, the GOP candidates like to pontificate about comparing themselves with world leaders who can negotiate with President Putin of Russia, but they can't even answer simple question from TV debate moderators!  

When the candidates couldn't answer questions at the third debate, they turned on the moderators!

The candidates deflected quesitons into attacks on each other; they spewed stump speeches rather than ideas and dumped on the debate moderators.  Moreover, now they've even taken their stupidity into a closed door meeting where they decided on a debate format only they find appropriate. But wait!  Not even the closed door meeting solved anything. Now, it turned out,what was agreed to behind closed doors has now been "unagreed" to. 

This isn't funny anymore, although it never was, even though we've laughed about all of them.   

Do American voters realize how these stupid line up of Republican wanna bees will govern our nation like they behave at the debates?

Their chaos will create disaster for our nation and make us the lauging stock of the world.  President Putin of Russia should already be laughing his ass off.  (Putin must be saying, in Russian of course, "Those jokers are going to negotiate with me? You're surely not serious hahahahah!)

Instead of fighting with each other and with debate moderators, the GOP candidates must find a leader. Right now, their collective egos could provide enough energy to sail a blimp to the moon but their leadership skills are as tragic as the Titanic.  In the absence of a leader, the GOP will continue their political food fight into the National Convention next summer, where supporters and detractors will act out their negative differences all the way to election day.  

Meanwhile, Mrs. Hillary Clinton has shown enormous leadership. Her experience has shown how to manage crises. Even the relentless journalist Kristen Welker can't find anything else to ask Mrs. Clinton. Welker has been hounding Mrs Clinton with negative questions, now there just aren't any more left for her to ask.  

Unfortunately, the Republican party's chaos has driven the party faithful into devotional corners of support for their preferred candidates. Consequently, Americans aren't likely to see a Republican leader emerge until somebody with the authority of a referee declares the cast of loosers down for the count.  

As they line up now, however, none of them are qualified to be elected the leader of the free world.