Gun control advocates keep the pressure on the rich asshole for action
BY MALLORY SHELBOURNE - 03/04/18 02:13 PM EST
Gun control advocates and Democratic lawmakers are keeping the pressure on President the rich asshole and Republicans to act on gun reform even as other controversies threaten to consume the spotlight nearly three weeks after a school shooting that left 17 people dead in South Florida.
On Sunday, both Republicans and Democrats indicated the onus is on the rich asshole to lead the way on gun regulation reform — and suggested signs of optimism in the debate if the president takes a firm position.
But amid ongoing intense discussions on the issue, Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham (S.C.) on Sunday expressed a lack of clarity on where the president stands.
“Propose something, Mr. President. And I think Republicans have an obligation to work with Democrats to make it law if we can,” Graham said Sunday on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”
With midterms looming this year, Graham said that both parties would suffer if Congress does not take up some sort of gun legislation.
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) echoed his point during a separate interview with ABC’s “This Week,” suggesting to host George Stephanopoulos that a failure to act on gun reform could hurt the GOP in the upcoming elections.
“If [President the rich asshole] and Republicans don’t start showing some moving in the wake of Parkland, there aren’t going to be as many Republicans around for him come 2019,” Murphy said.
Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R) praised advocates pushing for stricter gun legislation and expressed optimism that there will be progress despite a Congress that has been slow to action.
“What I tried to do out here was to bring those who are very strongly pro-gun with those who, they believe in the Second Amendment, but think there ought to be limits, and come up with a package that we think could pass,” Kasich told Jake Tapper of his state.
“It's not enough to just say something. You want to pass something. So, I'm optimistic we will.”
“It's not enough to just say something. You want to pass something. So, I'm optimistic we will.”
The discussions continue, with a number of options on the table after the rich asshole hosted a group of bipartisan lawmakers last week for a televised meeting about guns. There, the president expressed support for several Democrat-supported reforms, including raising the minimum age requirement to purchase weapons like the AR-15 to 21.
But while the rich asshole demonstrated a diplomatic tone in the meeting, skeptics were quick to point out that the president took a similar approach to immigration negotiations, which have yet to reach a bipartisan solution.
Appearing on a panel for ABC, progressive commentator Van Jones said the rich asshole could easily change his mind on the gun issue later down the road, suggesting the administration holds a vacillating position.
“Because nobody believes a word [the rich asshole] says anyway. Everybody knows it, in 15 seconds it could be something totally different,” Jones said.
“That is more dangerous than any of these policy positions or personnel decisions, you now have a president of the United States who literally can say anything and nobody on planet Earth believes him.”
Murphy, who has for years has advocated for stricter gun laws, said the president is “trying to have it both ways” on guns, as the rich asshole courts both gun control advocates and the National Rifle Association (NRA).
But Murphy also said he thinks the rich asshole is aware of the issue's importance to voters.
“I think he knows that the mood of the country has shifted such that he and his party are going to pay a huge price at the polls in 2018 and 2020 if they don’t start supporting things like universal background checks,” Murphy said during the ABC interview.
But the gun reform push puts the president up against one of his most loyal supporters during the 2016 campaign: the NRA, which has shown no signs of altering any of its positions following the Parkland, Fla., school shooting on Feb. 14.
Still, the advocates have refused to back down and remain in the public spotlight, with growing support from the corporate sector. Multiple major retailers in the past few weeks have announced new restrictions on firearm sales, and several companies have cut ties with the NRA.
The high school survivors of the shooting have also emerged as outspoken backers of stricter gun laws.
“And the more they push, the better chance we have of getting something done to have greater gun safety and better protection for everybody in our country,” Kasich said Sunday of the young people pushing for reforms.
Read the rich asshole's remarks at Gridiron dinner
BY JULIA MANCHESTER - 03/04/18 04:59 PM EST
President the rich asshole on Saturday took part in the Gridiron Club dinner's tradition of presidential speeches filled with self-deprecating humor and casting barbs at his own White House and his usual targets.
You can read the rich asshole's comments below:
"Well, thank you very much. It's an honor to be here and, I must tell you, that Melania and I are really thrilled. We really looked forward to this. ... I didn't know what to expect, but it's really quality people ... quality people. So, thank you very much.
It’s been really another calm week at the White House. We finally have it running like a fine-tuned machine. It’s fine-tuned. It’s a beautiful piece of work. ... But before I get started, I wanted to apologize for arriving a little bit late. You know, we were late tonight because Jared could not get through security. ... Ivanka, you’ve got to do something, ... Jared—but I will tell you, he’s a good guy. He has—he has suffered. He is a great guy he really is.
I know the Gridiron is really an old tradition in Washington, been around a long time, and one that’s important to many of you in the media. So, I was very excited to receive this invitation and come here and ruin your evening in person. ... My staff was concerned heading into this dinner that I couldn’t do self-deprecating humor. They were worried about it. They said, ‘Can you do this?’ And I told them not to worry. Nobody does self-deprecating humor better than I do. ... In fact, Orrin Hatch, Orrin said that ‘some rich asshole is the best at self-deprecating in the history of America, better than Washington and better than Lincoln.’ ... Thank you, Orrin.
They told me my remarks tonight should be something like a late night routine. ... Late night—are they the worst, by the way? We’re finally going to get one that’s going to come to our side. They will get very big ratings if they do that. ... With all the television talent here, I think ... you’d have figured that out. But I have to tell you, in preparation, I did what any good late night comic would do these days. I called Chuck Schumer and I asked him for some talking points. Can you believe this? I also spoke to some of the funniest people around the White House starting with my number two, Mike Pence. ... Love you Mike. ... Some of you may think that Mike is not a comedian, but he is one of the best straight men you’re ever going to meet. ... He is straight! ...
I saw him the other day. We’re in line shaking hands with men and women. A woman came over to shake his hand and he said, ‘I’m sorry. I can’t do that. My wife is not here.’ I never saw anything like it. He’s ... years ahead of his time. ... Mike is doing a fantastic job as our vice president. He really is. He’s doing a fantastic job. Could not have asked for better. I really am very proud to call him, ‘The Apprentice.’
But lately what bothers me, I have to tell you, he’s showing a particularly keen interest in the news these days. He starts out each morning asking everybody, ‘Has he been impeached yet?’ .... You can’t be impeached when theres no crime! ... Mike, put that down! ... I thought that was going to get a much better … I said to Melania, ‘Do you think I should use that one? I don’t know.’ And then she said, Use it. It’s good.’ ... So much for humor. You never know about humor do you. ...
Steve Mnuchin ... we saw him and his beautiful wife on stage. ... When she asked whether or not she could sign the money also, I said, ‘Steve, you’ve got a lot to handle.’ I said, ‘You can’t do that Steve!’
America has a proud history of Treasury secretaries who sponsor the arts. Alexander Hamilton gave us so much. Andrew Mellon famously gave us the National Gallery—tremendous gift. Steve has given us the blockbuster movie ‘Lego Batman.’ ... See, now that one I didn’t think was funny at all. ...
But Attorney General Sessions is here with us tonight. ... I offered him a ride over and he recused himself. ... But that’s OK. We also have some of the leading lights of the media here including some folks from the failing New York Times. That sucker is failing! ... I know we have our differences, but I also know that you have a very special place ... in my heart. ... The other day they had five stories on the front page of the New York Times and every one of them was totally different and each one of them was bad.
After all, you the New York Times are an icon. I’m a New York icon, you’re a New York icon, and the only difference is, I still own my buildings.
I especially have a place in my heart for Arthur Sulzberger. ... Our stories are almost mirror images. I inherited a million dollars from my father—had a great father—gave me a million dollars and I turned it into billions. True story. Arthur inherited billions of dollars and he turned his into millions. Hello Arthur.
And it’s been a very tough year. Jeff Zucker’s here. ... CNN, it lost a tremendous amount of credibility this year, but they also lost one of their true stars, the guy who got you the most scoops, inside info ... your really very best reporter. There was nobody like him—Steve Bannon. That guy leaked more than the Titanic ...
As I’m sure you’ve seen, we’re now riding very high in the polls, which is hard to believe considering I never get good press. But I just hit 50 in the Rasmussen poll.
A lot of people said I wouldn’t be able to do so with ... losing my so-called chief strategist. ... I just lost my strategist. ... Just lost my strategist. It’s pretty bad, but somehow, we’re still doing great even without Omarosa. ... By the way, I always knew, someday, you’re going to fire her. Is that the worst? By the way, Omarosa, you’re the worst! ...
So many people have been leaving the White House. It’s actually been really exciting and invigorating. … I like turnover. I like chaos. It really is good.
Now the question everyone keeps asking is, ‘Who’s going to be the next to leave? Steve Miller or Melania?’ ... That is terrible honey, but you love me, right? ... I wont tell you what she said. ... She said, ‘Behave.’ ... Is that terrible?
By the way, she has been an incredible first lady. ... Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina, and all of them. There’s so many women in that audience. The women with signs, ‘We love our first lady.’ True, all of them, hundreds and hundreds of them during speeches, ‘We love high heels. We love everything.’ ... These signs, they have pictures of shoes. ... Remember when she was badly treated about wearing high heels when actually she had the sneakers in her bag? But they love our first lady.
I can tell you, despite what you’ve reported, we’ve had a lot of success this year. We really have … tremendous. Our tax plan has been a tremendous victory. ... That is really turning out to be popular. Melania is even getting some major benefits from it. She can finally claim me as an adult dependent. ...
And the White House is actually a warm, loving, and wonderful place. I’ve heard it’s cold. It’s not cold. It’s warm. It’s loving, you meet great people, wonderful people like yourselves. And I just don’t understand why everyone on the internet and in the media keeps screaming, ‘Hashtag Free Melania.’ Free Melania. ... Like a number one hashtag. Free Melania. She’s actually having a great time.
Yes, are you? Oh, good, she’s having a great time. You’re doing a good job. You know, you can’t do a great job unless you enjoy it. It’s true. You people know that as great reporters. You love what you do, and if you didn’t love what you do, you wouldn’t do it well. ...
Before we go any further, I want to just discuss the big financial story of the week. Ever since we announced our new tariffs, which actually is very popular with people because they’re tired of getting ripped off, many dying American industries have come to the White House asking for protection. They want help. They need protection. Unfortunately, I’m sorry, I fear it may be too late for the print media. That was pretty good though wasn’t it? ... That’s another bomb that I thought was going to be great.
It might be hard for you to believe, but I do enjoy gatherings like these. They give me a chance to socialize with members of the opposition party. ... Also great to see some Democrats here. ... The opposition party, I’ve seen a few of them applauding tonight including Sen. Joe Manchin, who’s here.
And don’t worry, Joe. ... He’s a good man. There aren’t any cameras this time Joe. And I won’t tell Chuck and Nancy what you’re doing. Because boy was he applauding me the other night. Right? At the State of the Union he was up there applauding. I don’t know who the hell he was catering to.
I thought my State of the Union address was actually extraordinary. One of the best ever given. in fact Luis Gutierrez was so overcome with emotion at how good this particular speech was that he had to leave the chamber. He left and wept.
I probably could have found a way to get the Democrats to stand and clap. ... They didn’t. They were like frozen. I said black unemployment is at the lowest point in history. No emotion. They sat other than Manchin. He stood up. Thank you, Joe. He’s still paying the price for that. I said Hispanic unemployment is at the lowest level in history, record. There was no emotion. But I decided I wasn’t going to change anything. I wasn’t going to get them to stand. I didn’t know how. ... I was not going to include a salute to Fidel Castro. They would have stood up. They would have cheered. ...
And I know Mayor Mitch Landrieu feels right at home in Washington coming from Louisiana. I love Louisiana. ... Not too bad right? Not bad Mitch! ... It’s a beautiful swamp. I like that swamp. ... That’s a much more legitimate swamp. But I have to say Mitch, that while you’re here in Washington, only one request. ... They already hit him on the statues. I was going to say, ‘Don’t touch our statues.’ But they’ve already hit you three times on the statues. ... But Mitch you did a good job tonight and honestly I love the way you finished. ... I really did. I thought it was very appropriate. ... Thank you.
And I never knew Tom Cotton was such a great comedian. We were laughing, the whole place. That was good tom. A rising star. How old are you now Tom? He’s 40. Wow, I better watch my back. You know ... he’s a friend of mine, but in politics, you just don’t have these guys. ... You were great tonight. I appreciate it. … Thank you Tom Cotton. And he is a rising star in our nation, not our party, in our nation. He’s got a great future—smart and a great guy.
I was hoping we’d also see Adam Schiff—wonderful guy. … Leaking Adam! … He’ll be in the middle of a meeting—what is he? In some committee, congressional committee, Mike what is it? Intelligence? Judiciary? What the hell committee? That’s the only thing, he doesn’t know what committee he’s on because he’s on the phone so much. He doesn’t have any time. ‘Hey, let’s call these guys.’ … Is that legal? Are you allowed to go to .. and just every half hour … ‘I got to go break the news.’ … Adam Schiff … He was going to come tonightand then he heard that this was not a televised event so he stayed home. He stayed home.
But Adam is constantly on television pushing the idea that somehow I would undermine democracy. … Undermine? I love democracy. But he thinks I’m going to undermine democracy. So, I have to tell him I have great respect for the various branches of government, the executive, the legislative, the judicial—very important—and last, Fox News. I have a lot of respect for Fox News. … Thank god for Fox News.
I often think that the Democrats would be better off if they learned a thing or two from us. They could learn from us. For instance, you might have noticed that some of the best lines from my campaign followed a certain pattern. ‘Drain the swamp!’ Remember that? … When I saw that I hated it. … Somebody brought that one down for me, I said, ‘This is so hokey.’ Drain the swamp. … This massive crowd, 25,000 people, and I said, .. Drain the Swamp!’ And they went crazy. I said, ‘Whoah.’ Then, I said It in the next speech, ‘Drain the swamp!’ And now, I love it. Drain the swamp!
But we had, ‘Drain The Swamp,’ we had, ‘Lock Her Up, we had, ‘Build The Wall.’ Build the wall! Nancy Pelosi has been trying to come up with a line that’s equal. And her line that she announced last week is, ‘Mow The Grass!’ It doesn’t work. ..
Mow the frickin’ grass. ... That’s going to stop MS-13. ... Mow that frickin’ grass! ... Man, she’s crazy, but she’s a fine woman. She is. I actually like Nancy Pelosi. Can you believe that? Her and Maxine Waters. How about that one? Maxine Waters, ‘He must be impeached!’ That’s all she knows how to say, ‘He must be impeached!’ Impeached! ... But he’s done nothing wrong. Doesn’t matter, they say. What has he done wrong? ‘I don’t know! You got to be impeached!’ … And then I say ... I get in trouble for this, ‘She has to immediately, take an IQ test.’ And people go crazy. They went crazy/ But Maxine and Nancy and these people, there’s a lot of hatred. There’s so much hatred we have to stop Mike. We have to stop the hatred.
And it’s true ... Nancy’s worth tens of millions of dollars and she’s a populist. … You know, she really considers herself that. And I really try to tell her that you can’t be a true populist unless you’re worth at least ten billion dollars ... people like you better.
I don’t know how the hell they like me, but boy I love those people. I love them. I really do. ... I understand that, in recognition of our massive tax cuts, Nancy suggested that—Oh, I’m not going to say this. The dessert should be crumb cake. Give me a break. You know, the word crumb is not working out well for Nancy.
On the way in tonight, someone asked me what I think about the Dreamers. I love the Dreamers. I do love the Dreamers. ... I’ll be honest. ... I really believe the Republicans want to solve this problem—DACA—more than the Democrats and certainly faster. So, we’re all working together and I hope that something’s going to happen. I really do. I hope that something’s going to happen. ...
We’re talking about the Dreamers and, quite honestly, Democrats can fantasize all they want about winning in 2020. Those are the Dreamers. ... I’m a Dreamer also. ...
There’s talk about Joe Biden, Sleepy Joe, getting into the race. You know what he said, ‘I want to take him behind the barn.’ ... Just trust me, I would kick his ass. ... Boy, would he be easy. Oh, would he be easy. ... But Joe—give me a break. The guy who keeps making outrageous statements thinks he has a shot at being president? Guy makes outrageous statements. ... He’s going to be president? He doesn’t have a shot.
And Oprah. Oh ... here’s my next one. Oprah, I don’t think she’s ever been hit verbally yet. Right? She’s led a charmed life. She’s done a great job. ... She used to love me …. I was on one of her last shows, ‘The the rich asshole Family.’ We’re going to have to replay that for her. We’re going to have to. ... She says she’ll run only if she gets the go ahead from the Almighty. All right Oprah, go ahead and run. ...
And then we have Elizabeth Warren. ... I watched her making a speech for Hillary. I said, ‘I think she’s losing all of the male vote for Hillary Clinton.’ It was brutal. It was mean and angry. Elizabeth Warren, who had a rough day last week trying to prove her heritage, She had a rough day. And she had a good suggestion though about easing world tensions. The world is quite tense. Some of this stuff should have happened over the last twenty years, but it didn’t. ... But she said that Rex Tillerson and I should sit down with the leaders of Iran and North Korea and smoke a peace pipe. ... I didn’t like that Pocahontas.
I won't rule out direct talks with Kim Jong Un. I just won't. As far as the risk of dealing with a madman is concerned, that's his problem, not mine. ... He must be a fine man. Do you think he's a fine man? ... Although, we did save the Olympics. President Moon gave us a lot of credit, said, 'It was—it was President the rich asshole that made the Olympics successful because there were a lot of people that wanted to go into that stadium with the potential of a problem—a big problem—and he gave us all a lot of credit. He said, 'Without President the rich asshole and his strong attitude they would have never called up and said, 'Hey, we'd love to be in the Olympics together.'
And that's true. ... Whether people want to hear it or not, they had a very successful Olympics. That was heading for disaster. They weren't selling tickets. ... It was heading for disaster and now we're talking. And they, by the way, called up a couple of days ago and said, 'We would like to talk.' And I said, 'So would we, but you have to de-nuke, you have to de-nuke.'
So, let's see what happens. Let's see what happens. You know when the media said … and when I said, 'My button is bigger than yours and mine works.' Everyone gave me a hard time, what a terrible thing. They didn’t say what he said. He said, 'I have a button on my desk and I am prepared to use it.' Nobody ever said that. So, my statement was in response, but maybe positive things are happening. I hope that's true and I say that in all seriousness. I hope that's true … But we will be meeting and we'll see if anything positive happens. It's been a long time. …. It's a problem that should have been fixed a long time ago … very far down the road. ...
i know there’s been a lot of talk about Twitter and social media this year. But it really can be an important form of modern day communication. If I didn’t have Twitter how would Gen. Kelly and Gen, McMaster know what it is that they’re supposed to say that day. They wouldn’t know. They’d have no idea.
There’s been a lot of criticism of John Kelly in the press, which i think is very very unfair. He’s doing an amazing job. He even told me he would let Ivanka visit the Oval Office when she gets home from representing us in the Olympics and she did so. Ivanka did you enjoy your visit? I hope so. That was very nice and by the way Ivanka did an incredible job representing our country at the Olympics. She did.
Many people have asked me how my time as a reality TV star prepared me for the presidency, the truth is there’s very little overlap between the two. Very little. In one job, I had to manage a cutthroat cast of characters desperate for TV time, totally unprepared for their ... jobs, and each week afraid of having their asses fired. In the other job, I was the host of a smash television hit. … Television’s so easy compared to this. ...
I know we all came here tonight to have fun and tell jokes, but I also think we need to discuss the issues. Issues are very important. ... For example, we’ve got a new plan to tackle global warming, one of my favorite subjects. We’re going to reduce the carbon footprint when we travel by shrinking the press pool so that we only have room for Sean Hannity, Lou Dobbs, and Judge Judy. ...
I better wrap it up. I have to be up early tomorrow morning—six o'clock—to be listening to Fox and Friends. ... But I do want to say this is one of the best times I can ever remember having with the media. This might be the most fun I’ve had since watching your faces on election night. ... I apologize. Years, years, years taken off your life. Oh, John King, with that beautiful red map. His hand was shaking toward the end. ... I love the way he uses that map. He’s good at it. ... And then it was Michigan. Remember they wouldn’t call Pennsylvania? There was one percent of the ... vote to go in Pennsylvania. It was like 11 o’clock. One percent of the vote to go, they wouldn’t call it. And if i lost even one of the votes, I won by a lot. They wouldn’t call it. So instead, they called Wisconsin. And then, John King, remember, ‘The Winner of the great state of Michigan.’ He’s going Michigan. He’s like, ‘Hey the rich asshole won Michigan, this can’t be happening.’ And that hand was up. ...
Look, whether you like me or not, you have to say that was good. That was exciting. ... Lot of tears were in this room. You’re not supposed to cry. Mike are they supposed to be crying? If somebody wins or somebody ... they’re supposed to be a little impartial. Let’s be a little bit more impartial. ...
But you know, I’ll tell you what, I do have a lot of respect for a lot of the people in this room. Even people that have been very strong opponents, I’ve developed a lot of respect. Fairness is important to me, but you know, you’ve got your point of view. And a lot of you cover things very squarely and there are few professions that i respect more. And I’d like to thank the Gridiron Club and Foundation—foundation does an incredible job—for this wonderful evening. I want to thank all of the amazing speakers and, really, performers. Some very good performers ... they really are. ...
I want to thank the press for all you do to support and sustain our democracy. I mean that. I mean that. Some incredible people in the press ... brilliant, powerful, smart, and fair people in the press. And I want to thank you. My greatest wish is that we can all work together to make America safe, and just, and free for all Americans. We have a great country and we all, together, will make it even better. Thank you all very much. This is a great honor thank you.”
Katrina Pierson goes down in flames trying to accuse Raw Story of ‘fake news’
Katrina Pierson (Screenshot/YouTube)
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During an appearance on Fox News Sunday, former spokesperson to President some rich asshole, Katrina Pierson, accused famous liberals and reporters of violently threatening Barron the rich asshole, the president’s youngest son.
The discussion was about the attacks on Ivanka, who serves in the West Wing as a senior aide to the president.
“Barron the rich asshole is a minor child and they do criticize him as well,” Pierson insisted. “I’m not talking about your random trolls on the internet, I’m not talking about your sideways bloggers or anyone on the fringe. I’m talking about mainstream reporters, mainstream Hollywood actors and actresses who advocate violence against this family.”
Raw Story wrote about the Fox segment highlighting Pierson’s struggle to give examples of such “violence” against the children, particularly the youngest son Barron. When the site posted the segment, Pierson retweeted it, claiming it was “#FakeNews” citing a BBC report and instructing Raw Story to google for information.
“So stupid! A simple google search goes a long way. //www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-41007191 … #FakeNews,” Pierson tweeted.
So stupid! A simple google search goes a long way. bbc.com/news/world-us-… #FakeNewstwitter.com/rawstory/statu…
Upon reading the BBC report she cited, it was revealed the attacks on Barron the rich asshole came from a conservative site and those that were defending him were liberals, including the daughter of the president’s former opponent Chelsea Clinton.
Barron Trump deserves the chance every child does-to be a kid. Standing up for every kid also means opposing @POTUS policies that hurt kids.
the rich asshole critic Kurt Eichenwald similarly defended the younger the rich asshole.
Jesus, they're even inhuman 2 their own. @Ford_Springer of conserv @dailycaller slams Barron Trump 4 his clothes. FORD! Kids are OFF LIMITS!
The BBC report was citing a Daily Caller article that attacked the teen for his completely normal clothing choices of khakis and t-shirts.
Pierson was quickly mocked by those on Twitter that did click the link and read it.
I would normally never pay any attention to you but I'm fascinated. Are you really using this BBC article in which it is reported the Daily Caller reporter criticized Barron to prove your baseless assertion that media "attacks" him? That is some kind of odd cognitive dissonance.
Chelsea Clinton defending Barron after attacks by a conservative website.
the article you linked to says it was a conservative website that criticized how Barron was dressed ...
Barron the rich asshole, unlike most of his half-siblings, is not an employee of the White House, nor has he inserted himself in any way into the campaign or politics in general. Past White House children came under attacks from the right as well. Chelsea Clinton was attacked mercilessly as she went through puberty and her awkward teen years while under the microscope of the media. Former President George W. Bush’s daughters also drew criticism while partying through college. Similarly, President Barack Obama’s two daughters were frequently attacked for rolling their eyes at their father’s “dad jokes” and for what they wore to official White House functions.
‘Typical Donald’: Biographer explains how tariff-promoting the rich asshole went ‘out of his way’ to use cheap Chinese steel
David Cay Johnson -- screengrab
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Appearing on MSNBC, the rich asshole biographer David Cay Johnson — who is also an economist — laughed at the president’s proposal to raise steel and aluminum tariffs and reminded viewers that during his real estate developing days the rich asshole always sought out cheap foreign steel.
Speaking with AM Joy host Joy Reid, Johnson said the rich asshole had no idea how his abrupt announcement will affect world’s economy and went on to say that the rich asshole really knows nothing about finance despite “being given” a degree in economics.
Host Reid noted, “Many people fear a prolonged trade war that could hamper the economy. What they’re doing right now is preparing for a trade war as some rich asshole is tweeting ‘When a country, USA, is losing million of dollars on every country it does business with, trade wars are good and easy to win.’ Is that true?”
“I think some rich asshole is channeling General George Custer,” Johnson scoffed. “Let’s go to war with no preparation and no idea of what we’re facing, and we all know how well that turned out for Custer’s troops.”
With Reid turning back to the the rich asshole’s steel tariffs, she asked, “We just put up the top suppliers of steel to the United States and, as you said, Canada, Brazil, South Korea and Mexico are one, two, three, four. For aluminum it’s Canada, Russia, United Emirates and China. Did some rich asshole use American steel, by the way, when he was building his buildings?”
A laughing Johnson replied, “He went to great lengths, as [journalist] Kurt Eichenwald sussed out to use Chinese steel.”
“This is classic Donald, ‘Do as I say and not as I do,” the biographer quipped, “And let’s keep in mind, Donald was given a degree in economics — I use that verb deliberately because he was given a degree in economics by Penn. And this and a lot of other things demonstrate he doesn’t have any idea what he’s talking about.”
After breaking down a history of tariffs that led to disastrous results, Johnson circled back to mocking the rich asshole’s intelligence.
“Donald doesn’t know anything, and I mean that literally,” he remarked. “He is completely ignorant about things like this and his ignorance is just appalling and it’s really damaging to us.”
Watch the video below via MSNBC:
‘She’s observed him up close’: Dem lawmaker wants adult actress Stormy Daniels to testify on the rich asshole’s mental state
Adult film actress Stormy Daniels (left, via Wikimedia Commons) and President some rich asshole (right, via screengrab).
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Taking to Twitter on Sunday morning, Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters (CA) called into question President some rich asshole’s increasingly incoherent management style and suggested that an adult actress with whom the president reportedly had an affair come forward and spill the beans on what she observed since she knew him intimately.
Waters, one of the rich asshole’s most vociferous critics, wrote, “For a president whose own staff & appointees have referred to him as ignorant, stupid, & whose own Sec. of State Tillerson has not denied calling him a moron, the rich asshole needs to get out of the name calling game.”
She then brought up the rich asshole’s alleged scandalous affair with Stephanie Gregory Clifford, who goes by the adult film name of “Stormy Daniels.”
“We might also inquire of Stormy Daniels about the rich asshole’s mental state since she has observed him up close. I’m sure she could give us a revealing interpretation of her observations,” she added.
Waters has previously called for the rich asshole to impeached.
You can read her tweets below:
By
Ranjeetha Pakiam and Betty Liu
March 4, 2018, 9:50 PM EST Updated on March 4, 2018, 10:17 PM EST
U.S. President some rich asshole is sticking to his push to impose across-the-board tariffs on steel and aluminum imports even as opposition comes from all corners of the globe, as well as a raft of corporate heavyweights such as Ford Motor Co. “Our friends and enemies have taken advantage of the U.S. for many years,” the rich asshole said in Twitter post on Sunday. “Our Steel and Aluminum industries are dead. Sorry, it’s time for a change!”
We’re following developments here. The time-stamps are for New York.
Don’t Forget, Metals May Be Followed by IP (10:01 p.m.)
While steel and aluminum are front and center at the moment, there’s plenty of scope for additional action on trade from the White House, according to Stephen Innes, head of Asia-Pacific trading at Oanda Corp. in Singapore. The push on metals may be only the early stages, with “far more critical decisions” coming up on China’s alleged abuse of intellectual property under section 301, Innes said in a note. That refers to a probe by the rich asshole’s top trade negotiator, Robert Lighthizer. “Life in the markets could get incredibly messy,” Innes says.
the rich asshole Risks ‘a Lot of Collateral Damage’ (6:15 p.m.)
the rich asshole’s wrong when he says trade wars aren’t a concern, especially when allies are targeted too, according to Richard Socarides, group head of public affairs at Gerson Lehrman Group, and a former senior adviser to President Bill Clinton. “It’s really uncharted territory,” Socarides told Betty Liu and and Yvonne Man on Bloomberg TV. “I think the opposite of being easy to win, I think it’s going to be very unpredictable, and could be very dangerous and there could be a lot of collateral damage.” Still, the president may yet rethink his approach, Socarides said. “He can announce something one day, and several days later, after he experiences the reaction, he can change his mind.”
Watch a Flabbergasted Chuck Todd Laugh Out Loud at the rich asshole’s Commerce Secretary Over Tariffs
When NBC’s Chuck Todd tried to get a straight answer out of Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross on President the rich asshole’s announcements of tariffs on steel and aluminum he got a great example of Trumpian logic. At one point the words coming out of Ross’ mouth were so hard to believe that Todd seemingly couldn’t help but laugh.
It all began when Todd pointed out that many Republicans and business leaders were against the new tariffs. “Should we believe this is actually going to happen?” Todd asked during an interview on Meet the Press. Ross didn’t hesitate and said that “you have to take the president at his word.” Why is it that we should believe a president who has never been shy about changing his mind? “He made campaign promises,” Ross said. “He’s pretty well proven so far he intends to keep his campaign promises.”
Todd let that obvious lie go but he really wanted to focus on the details. Are the new tariffs going to be implemented in the percentages the rich asshole outlined? Ross would not give a straight yes-or-no answer. “Whatever his final decision is is what will happen,” Ross said. So Todd read a little between the lines: “Meaning this isn’t a done deal.”
Ross pushed back at Todd’s obvious conclusion but with a quote that is likely to go down in infamy as an example of the strange times we’re living in. “I didn’t say that. I just said what he has said he has said. If he says something different, it’ll be something different. I have no reason to think he’s going to change,” he said.
That’s when Todd seemingly couldn’t hold it in any longer and laughed out loud. “What does this mean? You just said, ‘Well, he may say this, and he may say that’.” Ross was not having it and told Todd he was mistaken. “I said he is the one who makes the decision,” Ross said. “He has made a decision at this point, 25 and 10. If he for some reason should change his mind, then it’ll change. I have no reason to believe he’s going to change his mind.”
Lest anyone think this is a normal exchange between a public official and a journalist, Todd took to Twitter to comment on the interview. “Perhaps this should be a pinned tweet,” he wrote.
Ex-Obama chief of staff: Obama's Russia response was 'watered down'
BY LUIS SANCHEZ - 03/04/18 10:53 AM EST
A former White House chief of staff to former President Obama on Sunday said that the Obama administration’s response to Russian interference in the 2016 elections was "watered down."
Denis McDonough told “Meet the Press” host Chuck Todd that a few months before the 2016 election, the president asked the four party leaders to join the White House in drafting a statement to respond to Russia.
It was "dramatically watered down" on the insistence of now-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), McDonough said.
Former Vice President Joe Biden has in the past also blamed McConnell for weakening the bipartisan response Obama sought.
“So we went up and Mitch McConnell, who I get on with well and is a smart guy, Mitch McConnell wanted no part of having a bipartisan commitment that we would say, essentially, Russia is doing this — stop,” Biden said in January, CBS reported.
McConnell’s lack of cooperation, Biden said, kept him and Obama from speaking out publicly about Russian meddling in the 2016 elections.
President the rich asshole has criticized the Obama administration for not doing enough to stop Russian interference in the 2016 election.
"Obama was President up to, and beyond, the 2016 Election. So why didn’t he do something about Russian meddling?" he tweeted last month.
Have a great, but very reflective, President’s Day!
Chuck Todd laughs out loud at trade chief who says the rich asshole won’t change mind on tariffs — unless he does
Chuck Todd (NBC/screen grab)
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White House Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross insisted on Sunday that President some rich asshole would probably not change his mind on steel and aluminum tariffs.
“Should we believe this is actually going to happen?” NBC host Chuck Todd asked Ross during an interview on Meet the Press.
“I think you have to take the president at his word,” Ross replied. “He’s pretty well proven so far he intends to keep his campaign promises.”
“So this is going to happen this week for sure?” Todd pressed.
“Whatever his final decision is is what will happen,” Ross remarked.
“Meaning, this isn’t a done deal,” the NBC host observed.
“I didn’t say that,” Ross shot back. “I just said, what he has said, he has said. If he says something different, it will be something different. I have no reason to think he’s going to change.”
The commerce secretary’s logic left Todd to laughing.
“What does this mean?” Todd exclaimed. “You just said, well, he may say this and he may say that.”
“I didn’t say that,” Ross insisted. “I said he is the one who makes the decision. He has made a decision at this point… If he should for some reason change his mind then it will change.”
Watch the video below from NBC.
Downgraded clearance complicates Kushner's work in White House
BY MORGAN CHALFANT AND JONATHAN EASLEY - 03/04/18 08:30 AM EST
The security clearance for President the rich asshole’s son-in-law and top aide Jared Kushner has been dramatically reduced, a development that experts say is certain to hamper his ability to engage with his expansive portfolio of foreign policy duties.
The State Department insists that Kushner will continue his work on the Middle East peace process despite the downgrade in his clearance.
“I can tell you that the State Department works very closely with Mr. Kushner and others at the White House to advance one of the president's top priorities, and that is Middle East peace,” spokeswoman Heather Nauert said.
“That's a top priority for us and we expect Mr. Kushner to continue his work on that. It's something very important to the president.”
But former White House and State Department officials say it is highly likely that much of the materials relevant to Kushner’s duties are classified at the top secret or compartmentalized level, especially with respect to Middle East peace matters, and are now above his clearance.
“That role in particular is going to be almost impossible for him to do without access to highly classified information,” said Lisa Brown, a White House staff secretary to former President Obama, who regularly reviewed and vetted classified materials in her role.
Kushner’s temporary top secret/SCI designation once gave him access to some of the nation’s most closely guarded secrets. He is now reduced to a secret temporary clearance — a lower level of access — and there are questions about whether the Russia investigation and his extensive business dealings will prevent him from ever receiving a permanent clearance.
President the rich asshole could have intervened to preserve Kushner’s top-secret access but instead deferred to chief of staff John Kelly, who was under pressure to scale back access for those who are still undergoing a background review.
Kushner was not alone — dozens of White House officials have since had their security clearances reduced. But he was the most visible senior official to have his access restricted.
In a statement, Kelly praised Kushner and said he would “continue performing his duties.”
How that will work in practice remains to be seen.
Kushner has presided over a growing portfolio of responsibilities since his family entered the White House, including foreign policy issues related to the Middle East, China and Mexico.
Former officials say Kushner’s downgrade blocks him from reading information collected through intelligence operations that would be used to negotiate with foreign officials.
“There’s no reason you need top-secret clearance to meet with a foreign government official,” said Peter Harrell, a former State Department official under Obama, “and you can still read U.S. negotiations positions and background information.”
“[But] you clearly are going to have a negotiator who has basically got one hand tied behind his back going into these negotiations,” Harrell added, though he stopped short of saying the rich asshole needed to remove Kushner from leading the Mideast peace process.
Some question whether Kushner should continue to lead on matters where he does not have full access.
“He will be less informed than his peers and, in all likelihood, than his foreign counterparts,” said Austin Evers, who served as senior counsel at the State Department during the Obama administration. “It would be irresponsible for the president to task Kushner to lead on matters where he does not have full access.”
The loss of his top-secret clearance is not expected to impact Kushner’s work in the White House on domestic issues, which include a burgeoning push to modernize the federal government’s technology infrastructure. Kushner leads the White House’s “American innovation” office, which is focused on outreach to the private sector.
Kushner could be forced to put more of his focus on domestic issues, given that he will be prevented from reviewing high-classified documents and attending meetings on national security issues.
Those reporting to him on Middle East issues will also need to limit the material they put in writing for him, and be sure to exclude information at the top-secret level when speaking to him.
“You’re sort of handicapping the whole enterprise,” said one former official.
Larry Wilkerson, who served as former secretary of State Colin Powell’s chief of staff, argued that the clearance reduction is not likely to set Kushner back because the the rich asshole administration’s Mideast strategy is an open secret.
“This administration has no classified Middle East policy … the policy is fully out in the open: all-out support for Israel, crush the Palestinians until they relent, and go from there,” Wilkerson said. “What's classified about that?”
But Greg Thielmann, a former top U.S. intelligence official at the State Department, said the consequences of Kushner and his staff being kept in the dark on top-secret intelligence could open the door to foreign diplomats taking advantage of their blind spots.
Thielmann noted the growing scrutiny Kushner’s business dealings have attracted from the media and federal investigators. The Washington Post reported this week that several countries were looking to use Kushner’s extensive business ties to “manipulate” him, while other reports have alleged that Kushner may have used his influence to secure loans.
“All this leads me to conclude that the kind of problems, which have kept Kushner from keeping his TS/SCI clearance, should have resulted in the pulling of his secret clearance as well,” Thielmann said.
“If he is subject to blackmail or otherwise unreliable, his access to any classified information puts sources and methods in jeopardy. The only difference is in the degree of damage.”
the rich asshole boasts his Gridiron Dinner appearance is yet another accomplishment for ‘the American people’
some rich asshole speaks to press (Photo: Screen capture)
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Breaking an almost all-day Twitter silence, President some rich asshole boasted to his online followers that he was happy with his appearance at the annual Gridiron Dinner — and chalked it up as another one his administration’s accomplishments.
Saturday night, the rich asshole poked fun at himself at the televised forum, while also taking shots at his family members and his enemies alike.
On Sunday, the rich asshole reviewed his performance and was pleased with how he handled himself.
“The Gridiron Dinner last night was great fun. I am accomplishing a lot in Washington and have never had a better time doing something, and especially since this is for the American People!” he tweeted.
the rich asshole’s comedy turn comes after a week when his administration has been universally derided as “chaotic.”
You can read the tweet below:
‘I take objection’: Chris Wallace rips apart the rich asshole aide after he blames media for ‘fanning flames’ on trade wars
Peter Navarro speaks to Chris Wallace (Fox News/screen grab)
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Fox News host Chris Wallace on Sunday challenged White House trade adviser Peter Navarro about President some rich asshole’s plan to start a “trade war” by enacting tariffs on aluminum and steel imports.
During an interview on Fox News Sunday, Wallace noted that “the fact is” that the rich asshole’s tariffs would raise prices for American consumers.
“If you took, not just cars, but all the products that use imported steel or important aluminum, we’re talking about a tax on American consumers in the billions of dollars,” Wallace said.
“When you’re talking about this massive cost is a fact, well, it’s not,” Navarro replied. “There are no downstream price effects on our industries that are significant.”
“Wait a minute,” Wallace interrupted. “If it’s $175 per car and there are 17 million cars sold, that is a $3 billion tax.”
“We disagree about how to do math here,” Navarro opined. “$175 on a car is a fraction of less than one percent.”
“If you add it up, we’re talking billions,” Wallace challenged. “You agree that it’s billion of dollars in cost?”
Navarro, however, refused to agree.
Wallace observed that the rich asshole was attempting to enact the tariffs by claiming a threat to national security.
“How can Canadian imports be a threat to national security?” he wondered. “Under law, the Canadian industrial base is considered part of our defense, the American defense industrial base.”
When Navarro declined to give a straight answer as to whether the rich asshole would exempt Canada from the tariffs, Wallace pressed.
“Just to make it clear it’s a global imposition,” Wallace concluded. “The European Union say they have already assembled a package of tariffs, 25 percent tariffs on 3.5 billion of U.S. exports… Do you believe [the EU is] bluffing?”
“It would be helpful the media didn’t have all these crazy headlines about trade wars,” Navarro complained.
“Wait a minute, no, no,” Wallace interrupted. “Trade wars are good was a tweet from the president, Mr. Navarro. Would you agree [with the rich asshole] that trade wars are good?”
“I’m going to finish this argument,” Navarro said, ignoring the question.
“Do you agree that trade wars are good?” Wallace asked again. “I’m asking you questions and I take objection to the idea that the talk of trade wars is an invention of the media when the president tweeted out, ‘Trade wars are good and easy to win.'”
“You guys are fanning the flames,” Navarro quipped.
“I’m fanning the flames?” the Fox News host exclaimed. “I’m not the one who wrote the president’s tweet.”
Watch the video below from Fox News.
the rich asshole mocks Jared Kushner’s security clearance woes at annual Gridiron Dinner
President some rich asshole looks left toward the crowd as he delivers a speech at a "Thank You Tour" rally held at the Giant Center (Shutterstock)
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President some rich asshole took a few jabs at himself and immensely enjoyed jokes at his enemy’s expense at the annual Gridiron Dinner on Saturday night, the Washington Post is reporting.
The Washington D.C. gathering, which is not televised and is supposed to be kept off the record, gave the rich asshole the opportunity to let down his hair a bit and joke for the media, and he obliged while also making more ugly jokes about Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and other critics.
According to the report, the rich asshole acknowledged the reports of a chaotic White House, quipping, “So many people have been leaving the White House. It’s invigorating since you want turnover. I like chaos. It really is good. Who’s going to be the next to leave? Steve Miller or Melania?”
the rich asshole reportedly took some jabs at Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who he claimed was avoiding him, but once again referred to Warren as “Pocahontas” – a slur aimed at her claim of Native American heritage.
the rich asshole also delivered a backhanded compliment to House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), calling her, “crazy, but a fine woman.”
Additionally, the rich asshole even took a job at his Son-in-law Jared Kushner’s White House troubles, saying, “We were late tonight because Jared could not get through security.”
Coming from the other side of the aisle, New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu (D), took a few jabs at the rich asshole, joking “We’re both a little overweight and balding — I just have had an easier time admitting it.”
“I feel kinda out of place here,” Landrieu explained, before turning to the rich asshole’s cabinet. “More out of place than Mike Pence at a men’s figure skating competition. More out of place than Hillary Clinton in Wisconsin. More out of place than the Mnuchins in a Waffle House. More out of place than Jeff Sessions at the Department of Justice. More out of place than John Kelly. Period.”
You can read the whole insider report here
WATCH: SNL’s Hope Hicks gives giddy goodbye to White House and shares the rich asshole’s ‘inside joke’ about the Russians
SNL's Cecily Strong as Hope Hicks -- screenshot
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SNL gave departing White House aide Hope Hicks the giddy college girl treatment on Saturday night, portraying her as an airhead giving a valedictory farewell to the “bad boys” and her “BFF’s” in White House.
Appearing on ‘Weekend Update,’ cast member Cecily Strong, tossed her hair and over-emoted as Hicks, saying, “I really am going to miss all my friends from my semester abroad at the White House.”
Reading from a speech written on rumpled notepaper, Hicks proclaimed, “To Donny, I’ll always be your ‘Hopey,’ because that is what you called me when you needed help when your red tie touched the toilet water.”
She reminded “Donny” about their ‘little inside joke” about the Russians, saying a rich asshole Tower meeting attended by his son, Don Jr. with the Russians was about “Russian adoption” – delivered with a wink.
Hicks also lamented that she will no longer be around to be the rich asshole’s translator, interpreting expressions like “Donald slarngry,” — meaning the rich asshole is “sleepy, angry, and horny.”
Watch the video below via SNL:
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March 4, 2018
NBC's Katy Tur hit the nail on the head in her assessment of the rich asshole's increasingly unhinged behavior.
NBC’s Katy Tur hit the nail on the head in her assessment of the rich asshole’s frequent meltdowns: It’s all about Robert Mueller.
Because as Mueller is closing in, the rich asshole is breaking down.
The disastrous week for the rich asshole began with a fresh attack on his own attorney general. And it ended with a reckless and hasty announcement that could spark a disastrous trade war.
And on “Meet the Press” Sunday morning, longtime the rich asshole beat reporter Katy Tur zeroed in on the cause of the rich asshole’s unhinged behavior.
“At the bottom of every one of these scandals every week is the Mueller investigation,” Tur told host Chuck Todd. “And that’s what’s setting him off again.”
“The Mueller headlines this week alone were staggering,” Tur added. “I was on one of them. some rich asshole witnesses are now being questioned about whether some rich asshole himself knew about the Democratic emails, the hacked Democratic emails before the public did.”
Headlines like those show that “[the rich asshole] himself is still being investigated for coordination,” she added.
And one of the biggest concerns now is what happens the next time the rich asshole gets frustrated.
“What other things is he going to try to do?”
In addition to asking what the rich asshole knew and when he knew it, the FBI is reportedly looking into Ivanka the rich asshole’s business dealings. And the rich asshole’s son-in-law Jared Kushner finally lost his security clearance this week.
And as Tur noted, the rich asshole’s reaction to this kind of pressure escalated sharply with a rash decision that could have serious consequences worldwide.
Americans shouldn’t have to wonder and worry about the consequences of the rich asshole’s next meltdown. Mueller’s investigation may be causing the rich asshole to fray. Yet it may also spare the nation and the world further damage from the rich asshole’s unhinged behavior.
HOLY F*CKING SHIT: the rich asshole Announces He Intends To Be ‘President For Life’ In Private Speech
some rich asshole has finally reached the point that he’s not even hiding his true intentions anymore. While he used to deny being a fascist, he saw what just happened in China and announced he wants to do it too — and by “what happened in China,” we mean President Xi effectively making himself President for life by abolishing term limits.
This is something a person who believes in democracy would condemn, but the rich asshole? Well, he just thinks the idea is so nifty he wants to try it.
“He’s now president for life. President for life. No, he’s great,” the rich asshole said in closed-door remarks at the Mar-a-Lago ballroom that were obtained by CNN. “And look, he was able to do that. I think it’s great. Maybe we’ll have to give that a shot some day.”
And the crowd went wild.
So let’s get this straight: the rich asshole thinks being “President for Life” is a good thing. He regularly attacks judges who disagree with his fascist policies. He refers to unfriendly media as
Lügenpresse FAKE NEWS (just like Hitler did).
If it waddles like a big orange fascist duck and it talks like a bit orange fascist duck, it’s probably a big orange fascist duck.
Naturally, Fox News says he’s joking:
So the rich asshole’s supporters say it’s a joke? They’ve said that about every other horrible idea he’s eventually tried too. In any case, Imagine if Obama had expressed a desire to strike term limits from the Constitution so he could be in power forever.
Robert Mueller needs to hurry up with his investigation. the rich asshole deserves to “serve for life” — but not in the way he wants.
Fox segment goes off the rails when Katrina Pierson gets busted claiming reporters want the rich asshole kids violently hurt
Katrina Pierson, Rachel Campos-Duffy and Hamza Khan (Fox News/screen grab)
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A Fox & Friends segment took an unexpected turn on Sunday after former the rich asshole campaign spokesperson Katrina Pierson and Fox News host Rachel Campos-Duffy were unable to back up the claim that reporters are calling for violence against President some rich asshole’s family.
During a segment about the treatment of the rich asshole’s family, Pierson conflated “the left” with journalist, calling them “beyond despicable.”
Democratic strategist Hamza Khan pointed out that asking Ivanka the rich asshole tough questions about her father is fair game because she is a staffer in the White House.
“Barron the rich asshole is a minor child and they do criticize him as well,” Pierson insisted. “I’m not talking about your random trolls on the internet, I’m not talking about your sideways bloggers or anyone on the fringe. I’m talking about mainstream reporters, mainstream Hollywood actors and actresses who advocate violence against this family.”
Khan interrupted: “Katrina, can you give me an example where someone has actually advocated violence against the children?”
“I’m going to give you an example,” Campos-Duffy replied.
The Fox News host went to call out NBC’s questioning of Ivanka the rich asshole about sexual harassment claims against her father.
“But how is that violence?” Khan asked.
“Do you think Chelsea [Clinton] would have ever been asked about her father’s accusers?” Campos-Duffy wondered.
“Chelsea was a high school student,” Khan noted. “Ivanka the rich asshole was a full grown woman who has herself been subject to her father’s gross misogyny and has had to point that out more than once, including saying that she would use Mace on him in public.”
Pierson directed the conversation back to Barron the rich asshole.
“They criticize him all the time online,” Pierson said.
“Are you saying journalists are criticizing Barron?” Khan pressed. “I’m asking you a serious question here. Or are you just throwing this out to create some drama on TV?”
Watch the video below from Fox News.
SNL just smacked down the NRA in the best possible way: ‘The only thing that can stop a bad roach is a good roach with a gun’
SNL/Screenshot
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NBA great Charles Barkley has hosted Saturday Night Live four times, and this hilarious skit about solving a roach problem with armed roaches is pretty good evidence of why.
“You’ve tried everything and sprayed harmful chemicals, but nothing appears to work?” his character, Ned, says. “We know the only thing that can stop a bad roach ic a good roach with a gun.”
In this case, high-character God-fearin’ roaches carrying miniature AR-15s.
The roaches patrol the cabinets, stove and “wherever those roaches like to hide,” carrying a miniature AR-15.
“For really bad roaches you Ned’s Roach Away Max — with bump stock.”
Watch the video below.
Watch veteran anchor laugh at the rich asshole adviser’s nonsensical defense on trade
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NBC's Chuck Todd couldn't keep a straight face while listening to a rich asshole adviser's absurd excuses.
the rich asshole sent his senior advisers out to try to defend his reckless trade war on the Sunday shows. And even veteran NBC anchor Chuck Todd couldn’t hear the pathetic defenses without laughing out loud.
White House trade adviser Peter Navarro admitted to CNN’s Jake Tapper that the rich asshole ignored national security in favor of his donors. And Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross fared even worse on Sunday’s “Meet the Press.”
Todd asked Ross if the erratic the rich asshole would follow through on his hasty announcement of tariffs on steel and aluminum.
“Whatever his final decision is, is what will happen,” Ross replied.
And when Todd noted that meant it wasn’t a “done deal,” Ross tried to deflect.
“I just said what he has said, he has said,” Ross protested. “If he says something different, it’ll be something different. I have no reason to think he’s going to change.”
“What does this mean?” Todd asked with a bemused laugh. “You just said, ‘Well, he may say this, and he may say that.'”
Yet Ross again tried to deny it, and offered the flimsy excuse that if the rich asshole “for some reason should change his mind, then it’ll change.”
Ross already suffered humiliation while defending the rich asshole earlier this week, when Campbell’s Soup called him out for lying about the policy’s effect on consumers.
the rich asshole’s well-documented history of backing out of policy pronouncements shortly after making them renders even his top advisers unable to make sense of them. Just recently, the rich asshole has reneged on commitments on immigration reform and gun control.
The American people stand to suffer greatly as a result of the rich asshole’s trade war, so this would be the rare occasion on which a the rich asshole reversal would be welcome. But doing the right thing would put the rich asshole at odds with his donors, so it’s unlikely he’ll change his mind.
‘Focus on the results’: Reince Preibus claims the rich asshole doing a ‘great job’ after weeklong White House bedlam
Reince Priebus speaks to NBC (screen grab)
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Former White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus insisted on Sunday that President some rich asshole is doing a “great job” regardless of “distractions” in the White House.
On ABC’s This Week, host George Stephanopoulos reflected on a week in which the rich asshole son-in-law Jared Kushner was stripped of security clearance, the president upset Republican by announcing new tariffs and White House Communication Director Hope Hicks resigned after admitting she told “white lies” for the rich asshole.
Priebus downplayed Kushner’s security clearance.
“It takes time to get the clearances through,” Priebus said. “I was, by an example, I was the very first package to go through to the FBI and DOJ. I got my temporary clearance at the end of December. I didn’t get my permanent clearance until the end of April. I haven’t missed a mortgage payment. I’ve had one wife for 19 years. These things take time.”
“How it’s handled can reflect poorly on the president,” he continued. “And certainly, leaking against each other is something that’s terrible and it’s distracting and it’s embarrassing. But certainly when you have leaking against the president, it’s something that’s fireable. I think that he deserves better coverage for the things that he’s getting done.”
“And I just always try to focus people on the results as opposed to the distractions. Because I do think he’s doing a great job.”
Watch the video below from ABC.
SNL’s the rich asshole backtracks on his ability to save ‘everybody’: ‘I can only run into so many schools’
"Jeff Sessions and some rich asshole" on SNL -- screenshot
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Saturday Night is back from its Olympics hiatus and ready to pick up where season 43 left off.
A lot has happened since, and Alec Baldwin’s the rich asshole managed to touch on most of it in an opening skit that found the president talking about gun control, resignations and Black Panther.
the rich asshole has a bold plan for gun control: “Maybe we should take everyone’s gun away. Nobody is allowed to have a gun, not even whites.”
The alternative? the rich asshole overcomes his debilitating bone spurs in to save children while unarmed and facing down a crazed gunman with an AR-15.
“I can only run into so many schools and save everybody,” the rich asshole says. “I’m actually very fast runner, people don’t even know… I’d run to North Korea, totally unarmed… I’d pick up Little Rocket Man and throw him over the Great Wall of Korea.”
the rich asshole’s mood was dampened by losing some of his most trusted allies.
“I hate seeing her go but I love watching her walk away,” he said of Hope Hicks, who he loves like a daughter. “Jared Kushner’s probably the hottest chick left in the place and he’s going to jail soon.”
Baldwin’s the rich asshole is, if nothing, self-assured.
“I said I was going to run this country like a business. That business is a Waffle House at 2 am.”
Watch below.
Gun activists alarmed despite the rich asshole cave-in on gun control
the rich asshole's flip-flop on guns has angered backers and opponents alike.
President some rich asshole has backed down from his apparent endorsement of modest gun control measures, but his flip-flopping has done little to allay the fears of some ardent backers of gun rights, who have vowed to make the NRA stronger than ever to combat what they see as an unprecedented “level of opposition.”
On Wednesday, the rich asshole met with congressional Democrats and Republicans and appeared to back the idea of expanded background checks, age restrictions on buying certain weapons, and removing guns from the hands of the mentally ill.
But in a meeting with the NRA the next day, the rich asshole seemed to backtrack, siding with the organization in what White House counselor Kellyanne Conway referred to as “broad agreement,” according to The New York Times.
Posting in TexasCHLForum.com, a message board, last week, NRA board member Charles Cotton expressed the near panic felt by many in the gun rights community at the prospect of even the tiniest rollback of their expansive freedom to carry whatever weapons they choose.
“We’ve never had this level of opposition before, not ever … It’s a campaign of lies and distortion, but it’s very well funded and they are playing on the sympathy factor of kids getting killed,” Cotton wrote in the run-up to the NRA’s meeting with the rich asshole.
He was referring to the February mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School campus in Parkland, Florida, which resulted in the deaths of 17 students and teachers.
Cotton appeared outraged at the idea that bump stocks could be “taken away” and expressed concern that “the votes are probably there” in Congress to do so. Bump stocks are devices that, when attached to a firearm, are able to convert it to an automatic weapon.
He then issued a rallying cry to fellow gun lovers concerned over the prospect of laws that could put limits on the weapons they choose to carry.
“If you really want to make a difference, then start recruiting NRA members every single day. The NRA better be 15 million strong soon, or this is just going to get worse,” he wrote.
“The Parkland shooting was not the fault of the NRA or our 5+ million members. It was the fault of 1) the murderer; 2) the FBI; 3) cowardly Broward County Deputies, and 4) Broward County Sheriff [Israel],” Cotton added.
His comments reflect a widespread concern among NRA supporters, who view the rich asshole’s inconsistency as a serious threat, especially as corporate pressuremounts against the organization and gun control advocates continue to push the administration to take action.
On ABC’s “This Week” Sunday, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) said failing to take action to stem the flood of guns in the United States — where the number of firearms roughly equals the number of people — could hurt the Republican Party in the 2018 midterm elections.
“If [the rich asshole] and Republicans don’t start showing some moving in the wake of Parkland, there aren’t going to be as many Republicans around for him come 2019,” he said.
Reproductive health advocates say the rich asshole favors abstinence-only groups in family planning funds
The the rich asshole administration is making it more difficult for Planned Parenthood to receive family planning funds.
Reproductive health groups say they’re concerned about the the rich asshole administration’s approach to family planning funds, which prioritizes groups that favor abstinence, and its embrace of ideology over evidence-based policies.
Last week, the Department of Health and Human Services released guidelines for applications for Title X grants, which are dedicated to family planning and preventive health services. Planning services funded through Title X support testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections, cervical and breast cancer screenings, birth control, and contraception education.
The HHS document causing concern among doctors and reproductive health groups mentions “natural family planning” like the rhythm method and other tactics for preventing pregnancy that do not involve contraceptives, according tothe Associated Press, as well as other forms of “natural family planning” that don’t include contraceptives. A Planned Parenthood spokesperson told AP that it appears as if the the rich asshole administration is trying to lessen its role in the program through this document emphasizing family planning without contraceptives.
Instead, this document would give preference to groups focusing on abstinence and may halt progress in reducing teen pregnancies and unintended pregnancies, Clare Coleman, CEO of the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association, said, according to the AP.
These funds help provide health services to an estimated four million clients each year. The majority of Title X patients have incomes at or below the federal poverty level.
The administration already stalled the application process for Title X grants for four months. The process was supposed to begin in November and applications would be due in January. But in early February the application process hadn’t even started yet. Providers who depend on Title X grants said they were worried about keeping the doors open past the end of March.
The the rich asshole administration and Republicans in Congress have been focused on defunding Planned Parenthood and appointing people to roles in the Department of Health and Human Services who don’t believe in birth control or abortion access.
Last May, the the rich asshole administration tapped Teresa Manning, a law professor at George Mason University who is both anti-abortion and anti-contraception, for the position of deputy assistant secretary for Population Affairs at HHS. When she left her post this year, Valerie Huber, who is an advocate for abstinence education, took her place as acting deputy assistant secretary. Last April, the administration tapped Charmaine Yoest, for the position of assistant secretary of public affairs at the Department of Health and Human Services. Yoest is a well-known anti-abortion activist. In February, she left that position for the Office of National Drug Control Policy.
Last year, Senate Republicans got rid of an Obama administration rule that required state and local governments to distribute Title X funds to health providers without consideration of whether providers also perform abortions. Vice President Mike Pence cast the tie-breaking procedural vote to let states stop clinics that perform abortions from receiving Title X funds.
the rich asshole’s admiration of China for ending term limits is no joke
“He’s now president for life ... Maybe we’ll give that a shot some day.”
It’s no secret that President some rich asshole loves dictators. Over the course of his presidency, the rich asshole has expressed admiration for a slew of authoritarians, from Russian President Vladimir Putin to President Rodrigo Duterteof the Philippines to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The latest to receive such praise is Chinese President Xi Jinping.
In closed-door remarks to Republicans on Saturday, the rich asshole celebrated Xi for his recent consolidation of power and for getting rid of presidential term limits, according to CNN, which obtained a recording of the meeting.
“He’s now president for life. President for life. And he’s great. And look, he was able to do that. I think it’s great. Maybe we’ll give that a shot some day.”
If it weren’t for the rich asshole’s history of celebrating such strongmen, it might be easy to overlook his latest swooning over Xi as just a joke. Indeed, that’s exactly what Fox News wants us to do.
But the rich asshole’s obsession with dictators should worry us all — because he’s already started emulating them.
Take the president’s suggestion last week that the United States should use the death penalty on drug dealers, language that is eerily similar to the actions of Duterte, who has targeted dealers and users of narcotics with violent street executions — resulting in the deaths of about 10,000 people in the past two years.
And the rich asshole’s longtime disdain for the media and opponents echoes both that of Putin’s and Erdogan’s. Putin’s political rivals typically end up dead, disappearred, or in jail. And Erdogan has imprisoned about 150 journalists and over 1,000 members of the country’s police force, following his victory in a controversial referendum — for which the rich asshole congratulated Erdogan — that put Turkey on a sure path toward autocracy.
While the rich asshole has not jailed journalists or opponents, the rhetorical similarities between him and the Russian and Turkish presidents should not be overlooked. During his campaign rallies, and even after his win, the rich asshole and his supporters would frequently chant “Lock her up,” referring to Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.
Republican leaders, like House Speaker Paul Ryan (WI), have also begun adopting similar rhetoric. In January, Ryan expressed support for the release of the Nunes memo that claimed to detail FBI surveillance activity, telling Fox News, “Let it all out, get it all out there. Cleanse the organization,” a statement largely believed to mean that the agency should be replaced with the rich asshole loyalists.
Finally, the rich asshole’s targeted crackdown on immigrants and people of color have been compared to the “divide-and-rule” tactics used by some of the word’s most notorious rulers, such as Ugandan dictator Idi Amin, who often blamed his failures on immigrant communities.
But the strength of American democracy protects us from the horrors of authoritarianism, right? That’s the hope. However, a recent report by Freedom House found that the United States has seen a slow decline in political rights and civil liberties over the past several years, with the biggest drop in more that 40 years occurring in 2017, due to the actions of President the rich asshole.
The report highlights numerous developments that have weakened democracy in the United States, including the the rich asshole administration’s violations of ethical standards like the president’s failure to divest from his businesses and the hiring of his daughter and son-in-law as senior advisers, dwindling government transparency, and false statements by the president.
Against the backdrop of all these alarming developments, the rich asshole’s praise of Xi, it’s fair to say, is hardly something to laugh about.
On Saturday night, President the rich asshole was not having the sort of evening he prefers. For starters, he was dressed in white-tie finery, not the golf-ready khakis he favors on weekends. He was surrounded by the very members of the mainstream media he routinely derides. And rather than his beloved Fox News, his entertainment was skits and musical acts, some of which poked fun at him.
Nothing about the rich asshole’s attendance at the annual dinner of the Gridiron Club, an elite group of 65 top Washington journalists, made a lot of sense. But there he was at the Renaissance Washington Hotel, accompanied by the first lady, for the club’s 133rd annual gathering doing something he almost never does: observing the traditions that come along with the presidency, particularly the ones that involve performing social rituals.
Presidents since William McKinley, after all, have dutifully shown up at the Gridiron’s formal clambake, which has evolved into an evening of goofy entertainment by the journalists and jokey monologues by a prominent Republican and Democrat, and a mildly roast-y speech by the president.
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the rich asshole gamely turned some of the controversies plaguing his administration into laugh (or maybe cringe?) lines. Of the turmoil roiling the White House staff, he offered this quip: “So many people have been leaving the White House,” he said. “It’s invigorating since you want turnover. I like chaos. It really is good. Who’s going to be the next to leave? Steve Miller, or Melania?” (Miller is one of his senior advisers; Melania, of course, is his wife.) Ba-dum-dum.
And he joked about Jeff Sessions, his attorney general, with whom he’s been locked into a public feud over Sessions’s decision to recuse himself from the investigation into Russian influence in the 2016 election. the rich asshole told the crowd that he’d offered Sessions a ride to the dinner, “but he recused himself.”
(Full disclosure: The dinner is technically off the record, so we’re relying here on prepared remarks and spies inside the room — c’mon, it’s a room full of journalists!)
the rich asshole’s joke about meeting with North Korea was another close-to-the-bone quip. He mused that the country’s supreme leader, Kim Jong Un, faced “the risk of dealing with a madman” if such a confab occurred. Um, ha-ha?
He returned to the other usual subjects of his ridicule, including former vice president Joe Biden (of a possible 2020 campaign match-up with the Delaware Democrat, the rich asshole said “I would kick his ass like no other”); Sen. Elizabeth Warren, whom he again referred to as “Pocahontas”; and top House Democrat Nancy Pelosi, whom he derided as “crazy, but a fine woman.”
But the rich asshole found himself on the other end of the ribbing, too. Skits by Gridiron members included Fox News host Bret Baier making cracks about the Russia probe, singing to the tune of “You Can’t Hurry Love” with lyrics that included, “But how many Russians did the campaign meet?/Don Jr. in the rich asshole Tower, about ‘adoption’ – sure.”
the rich asshole, unsurprisingly, seemed to particularly enjoy the skits that took aim at his enemies. A dinner guest noted that the president got a good chuckle out of a song performed by CBS News’ John Dickerson about President Barack Obama’s luxurious post-White House life (set to the tune of “King of the Road”).
Other speakers also had some barbs for the rich asshole. Looking to find common ground with the president, New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu, a Democrat, observed that “we’re both a little overweight and balding — I just have had an easier time admitting it.”
Landrieu also took aim at the rich asshole’s Cabinet — and, in the tradition of these kinds of everyone’s-fair-game speeches, a fellow Democrat. “I feel kinda out of place here,” the Big Easy mayor said. “More out of place than Mike Pence at a men’s figure skating competition. More out of place than Hillary Clinton in Wisconsin. More out of place than the Mnuchins in a Waffle House. More out of place than Jeff Sessions at the Department of Justice. More out of place than John Kelly. Period.”
Other than the journalists whom the president has identified as “enemies of the state,” there were friendlier faces in the crowd of about 660, including Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and Sessions (though Sessions might be considered a rich asshole frenemy at the moment, with reports circulating that the president has been referring to his top cop as “Mr. Magoo”).
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the rich asshole’s daughter Ivanka the rich asshole and her husband, Jared Kushner, both top White House advisers, were there, as was White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders and National Security Agency Director Michael Rogers. Also in the audience? Rod Rosenstein, the Justice Department official who’s overseeing the Russia probe that the president has taken to calling a “witch hunt.”
the rich asshole’s previous forays into comedy haven’t been terribly successful. At the Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner in New York in 2016, he veered from the typical routine of self-deprecation and good-natured barbs and went after his rival and fellow attendee Hillary Clinton, calling her “corrupt.”
He skipped the 2016 White House Correspondents’ Association’s dinner, which has a similar format. the rich asshole was apparently convinced he would perform well, author Michael Wolff wrote in his book “Fire and Fury,” but his staff was “terrified that he would die up there in front of a seething and contemptuous audience. Though he could dish it out, often very harshly, no one thought he could take it.”
A day after some rich asshole called Alec Baldwin's impersonation of him "terrible," Baldwin returned as the President on "Saturday Night Live."
The NBC variety show came back from hiatus with Baldwin's the rich asshole delivering a prepared statement on gun violence while sitting next to Beck Bennett's Mike Pence and Cecily Strong's Dianne Feinstein.
"We have to take a hard look at mental health, which I have so much of," Baldwin as the rich asshole said, referring to one of the gun-related issues raised after last month's mass shooting at a school in Florida.
"I have one of the healthiest mentals. My mentals are so high."
Baldwin's the rich asshole then went back and forth on the debate saying that he loves the Second Amendment but that maybe we need to "take everyone's guns away."
"Don't worry, Mike. I met with the NRA, they gave me 30 million good reasons not to change a thing," Baldwin's the rich asshole said to the fake Pence.
On Friday morning, the President and Baldwin engaged in a Twitter feud after the President mocked the actor's impression of him.
"Alec Baldwin, whose dying mediocre career was saved by his terrible impersonation of me on SNL, now says playing me was agony. Alec, it was agony for those who were forced to watch," the rich asshole said on Twitter.
Baldwin responded on Twitter Friday by saying, "Agony though it may be, I'd like to hang in there for the impeachment hearings, the resignation speech, the farewell helicopter ride to Mara-A-Lago. You know. The Good Stuff."
On Saturday night, Baldwin continued to mock the rich asshole by having the President present his concerns over Wakanda, the fictional African nation from Marvel's "Black Panther."
"They're all beating us," Baldwin's the rich asshole said. "China, Japan, Wakanda. Wakanda is laughing at us. They have flying cars."
Baldwin's the rich asshole declared that he always said that he would run the country like a business, but that the business is a "Waffle House at 2 a.m."
"Crazies everywhere, staff walking out in the middle of their shift, managers taking money out of the cash register to pay off the Russian mob," Baldwin's President the rich asshole said.
He then wrapped up the sketch alongside Kate McKinnon's Jeff Sessions to say the show's signature phrase, "Live from New York ... It's Saturday night!"
‘Is Hillary a happy person? Do you think she’s happy?’ obsessed the rich asshole muses during Mar-a-Lago fundraiser
the rich asshole lurks behind Hillary Clinton in a presidential debate/Screenshot
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some rich asshole is still obsessed with Hillary Clinton.
Despite all his own troubles, the president is still talking to donors about his 2016 opponent, who spends a lot of time hiking in the beautiful woods near her upstate New York home.
“Is Hillary a happy person? Do you think she’s happy?” the rich asshole mused during a speech at Mar-A-Lago, which was recorded and passed to CNN. “When she goes home at night, does she say, ‘What a great life?’ I don’t think so. You never know. I hope she’s happy.”
Elsewhere in the speech, the rich asshole fantasized about the possibility of eliminating political opposition and becoming a dictator. Specially, he praised a power grab by China’s President Xi Jinping.
“He’s now president for life. President for life. No, he’s great,” the rich asshole said. “And look, he was able to do that. I think it’s great. Maybe we’ll have to give that a shot some day.”
the rich asshole also criticized his staff and mocked former president George W. Bush as “another real genius” for invading Iraq.
WATCH: Fox News can’t pretend all is well anymore, breaks down White House dysfunction in an amazing 7-point list
Chris Wallace (Screenshot)
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If you tune into Fox News, things tend to be sunny during the time of the rich asshole.
Through their colored lens, things are looking up—except for Democrats foiling ICE raids and the occasional deadly family spat over a ranch.
So it’s a little jarring to watch Chris Wallace and Shepard Smith pierce the bubble. And yet that’s exactly what happened when Wallace appeared on Smith’s show to break the whole mess down.
“Let’s just go through it,” Wallace said, before laying out a shockingly lucid analysis of the rich asshole’s troubles.
1. “Hope Hicks has quit. She’s the person closest to the president in the White House.”
2. “The president hates his attorney general.”
3. The deputy attorney general now has to defend the hated attorney general “from the attack by the president.”
4. the rich asshole’s top economic advisor is threatening to quit because of proposed tariffs, which he wasn’t consulted about.
5. “The president reportedly wants to oust his national security advisor,” the respected H.R. McMaster.
6. “Somebody is trying to get Jared Kushner.”
7. the rich asshole wants to be rid of Kushner, his son-in-law, but doesn’t want to do it himself and so he’s also asked his Chief of Staff, John Kelly, to “help me Kushner and Ivanka out of here.”
2. “The president hates his attorney general.”
3. The deputy attorney general now has to defend the hated attorney general “from the attack by the president.”
4. the rich asshole’s top economic advisor is threatening to quit because of proposed tariffs, which he wasn’t consulted about.
5. “The president reportedly wants to oust his national security advisor,” the respected H.R. McMaster.
6. “Somebody is trying to get Jared Kushner.”
7. the rich asshole wants to be rid of Kushner, his son-in-law, but doesn’t want to do it himself and so he’s also asked his Chief of Staff, John Kelly, to “help me Kushner and Ivanka out of here.”
“Other than that, it’s sweetness, light, puppies and unicorns here in D.C.,” Wallace said, wryly.
“Wow—that’s a nice clip for whoever picks up clips,” Smith said.
Indeed it is.
The clip is below.
Blistering column destroys ‘Princess Ivanka’ over ties to mobsters and shady business deals
Ivanka the rich asshole (CBS / Screengrab)
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An opinion column in the Los Angeles Times artfully lays out the case for Ivanka the rich asshole’s complicity in some of her father’s worst deeds.
“Oh, Ivanka. Her livelihood is as opaque as her full-coverage foundation, but she plays a critical role in her father’s administration—and in the broader danse macabre of corruption and legitimacy,” writes columnist Virginia Heffernan.
Heffernan draws a line between Ivanka’s “petroleum-based separates, many of them sewn for poverty pay in sweatshops” and Michael Flynn, the former national security advisor who has admitted that he lied to the FBI.
“[Ivanka] praised him for his ‘amazing loyalty’ and offered him his choice of positions at a transition-team meeting… It was like Princess Ivanka had laid the sword on Flynn’s shoulders and said, ‘Rise and go forth.'”
In addition to Flynn, as Heffernan points out, Ivanka was tied to Felix Sater, who pleaded guilty to a $40-million stock fraud scheme orchestrated by Russian mobsters, and the late Tamir Sapir, who was tied to a racketeering conspiracy with the Gambino crime family.
“It’s impossible to keep track of all the gangsters Ivanka has palled around with,” the column reads.
But, Heffernan argues, it’s the shady real estate deals that are “even worse.”
Read it in full here
Salma Hayek snipes at the rich asshole’s ‘sh*thole’ remarks during awards show presentation
Actress Salma Hayek (Shutterstock)
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Tonight is the Independent Spirit awards, a celebration of the year’s best indie movies which precedes tomorrow’s Oscars.
While presenting an award for the best international indie film of the year, Salma Hayek sniped at President the rich asshole for calling Haiti and some African nations “shithole countries.”
“This award has never gone to a shithole nation, because there are no shithole nations,” Hayek said on the show, which was broadcast on IFC.
The Mexico-born Hayak was one of the event’s bigger stars, but went home empty handed after losing Best Female Lead to Frances McDormand, who won for Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
the rich asshole spends 100th day at one of his golf clubs since taking office
President the rich asshole’s golf handicap is officially a 2.8, but to his critics, it’s now 100.
Saturday was the 100th day he’s spent at one of his golf clubs since he took office, according to an unofficial count kept by CNN.
Once a virulent critic of presidential golfing, the rich asshole mulliganed on the issue when he took office. He visited one of golf clubs on nearly a quarter of the days he’s been president.
His visits have been limited to four golf clubs, all of which he owns: the rich asshole International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, FL.; the rich asshole National Golf Club in Jupiter, FL.; the rich asshole National Golf Club in Sterling, VA; and the rich asshole National Golf Club in Bedminster, NJ, by CNN’s count.
It’s hard to know if he plays each time he visits a club, because White House aides don’t acknowledge that he’s actually on the links, CNN acknowledged. the rich asshole has used his clubs for meetings or to eat a meal.
But there’s no question that he takes plenty of swings.
Frequently, the rounds include guests, from pro golfers like Tiger Woods, Dustin Johnson and Brad Faxon, to Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul and South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham to Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
“President the rich asshole shot a 73 in windy and wet conditions!” Graham tweeted on Columbus Day, after golfing with him on the par-72 Virginia course.
The president’s golf games have drawn criticism, both because he frequently criticized former President Barack Obama for playing and because the trips to his own properties give a presidential-sized boost to those private businesses.
President the rich asshole Just Settled a Lawsuit for $5.4 Million
by Colin Kalmbacher | 12:47 pm, March 3rd, 2018
President some rich asshole, by way of his attorneys, just settled a lawsuit for nearly $5.5 million.
the rich asshole has made numerous, high-profile declarations that he doesn’t settle lawsuits. This is at least the second lawsuit the rich asshole has settled since taking office.
The multimillion dollar settlement brings an end to a long-running legal drama initiated by former members of the rich asshole National Golf Club in Jupiter, Florida—the northernmost town in Palm Beach County.
65 former members of the club—previously entitled to the lush surroundings of a course designed by golf celebrity Jack Nicklaus—filed suit against the rich asshole after he allegedly blocked their entry to the 7,242-yards of green and then refused to refund their deposits.
Those 65 former members were apparently upset when the rich asshole purchased the down-on-its-luck club from the Ritz-Carlton in 2012 for $5 million.
Their names were then placed on a resignation list. After buying the club, the rich asshole himself noted, “If you choose to remain on the resignation list, you’re out.”
Under the Ritz-Carlton’s old rules, members on the resignation list could still use the club’s facilities.
The would-be resigners then tried to access the links and drinks but were summarily denied. Next they requested their deposits be refunded but this was also denied. So, they sued.
U.S. District Judge Kenneth Marra agreed with the former member-plaintiffs. He said the club, currently operated by President the rich asshole’s adult son, Eric the rich asshole, breached its contract with club members.
During a trial in August 2016, Eric the rich asshole said:
You’re either a member of the club or not a member of the club. That’s just how the golf industry works. You have to choose your poison. You can’t stay on the resignation list and get all the benefits of a full member. It’s just not fair.
Fair or not, Judge Marra took the opposite position. He wrote:
With access removed from this equation, a person would have no Club membership. In other words, without a right to Club access, no membership would exist and this essential purpose of the membership contract would be nullified.
Such a state of affairs, according to Marra, meant the rich asshole and his company “committed a material breach of the Membership Agreement.”
Plaintiffs’ attorney Seth Lehrman said, of a previous $5.77 million judgment against the rich asshole regarding the lawsuit, “That is exactly to the penny of what we asked for.” The settlement agreed to by the rich asshole’s attorneys is just a few hundred thousand dollars shy of that previous judgment.
the rich asshole spokesperson Amanda Miller previously said, in an email to the Palm Beach Post, “We respectfully disagree with the Court’s decision,” and pledged the rich asshole would appeal.
That’s clearly no longer the case.
[image via SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images]
the rich asshole Grinned Like An Idiot When His Name Got Dropped At A Funeral
Many people would have a reason to smile at the funeral of “self-conscious fraud” and “disgustingly evil man” Billy Graham. As someone who grew up going to a Christian school that relied heavily on his teachings, I am one of those who wishes he could attend just so I could verify for myself that he is no longer poisoning society. And yes, it would bring a smile to my face. But the rich asshole?
Graham was disgustingly homophobic and spent a lifetime harnessing the power of television to preach his hate all while bilking his mindless believers out of their money. Graham called homosexuality an “ungodly spirit of self-gratification” and infamously said “we traffic in homosexuality at the peril of our spiritual welfare. Your affection for another of your own sex is misdirected and will be judged by God’s holy standards.”
Graham’s website features a section on gay conversion therapy, which is illegal in some parts of the country. He also spent years preaching that gay people are responsible for AIDS – -a viewpoint repeated in a 2013 sermon by a right-wing hate preacher who shares Graham’s hateful viewpoints (this preacher took Graham’s views to the next logical point and suggested curing AIDS by executing every gay man).
“Is Aids a judgment of God?” Graham once said. I could not say for sure, but I think so.”
This, of course, made him popular with conservatives (including Mike Pence, who follows the “Billy Graham Rule of not being alone with a woman unless his wife, whom he calls “Mother,” is present).
As the Stupid Part of America is the very group the rich asshole needs if he wants any hope of not losing by the most embarrassing margin ever in 2020, he attended Graham’s funeral Friday, where his fake mask of somber reflection slipped off briefly when someone mentioned his name.
“I have learned this week as never before, everybody has a Billy Graham story,” Graham’s daughter said in a speech honoring her father. “Even this week, President the rich asshole told us about his Billy Graham story. As a little boy, his father took him to Yankee stadium to hear my father preach. And he said this is a big deal.”
the rich asshole just couldn’t resist, allowing his trademark moronic grin to spread across his orange-hued face:
Then, he looked around and realized that everyone who wasn’t a gutless toadie (Vice President Mike “Mommy Issues” Pence in this case) next to him wasn’t smiling and fixed his expression.
As the world pretends that Billy Graham wasn’t a terrible excuse for a human being, the Russia investigation — like the atmosphere at the funeral while he was grinning like a fucking moron because someone mentioned him — seems poised to wipe the stupid smile off his face faster than his doctor, who forced him to give up his beloved Big Macs and start eating salads.
As Teen Vogue columnist Laura Duca said after Graham passed away, “have fun in hell, bitch.”
Opinion
THE CAPITAL last week was seized by the news that White House communications director Hope Hicks was leaving President the rich asshole’s side, the latest senior aide to depart a tumultuous West Wing. But as a symbol of what is wrong in Mr. the rich asshole’s Washington, Ms. Hicks’s activities just before her announcement were more potent.
Testifying before the House Intelligence Committee, which is investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election, she refused to answer any questions about anything that happened after Mr. the rich asshole was sworn in. She did not — indeed could not — invoke executive privilege, a power that only Mr. the rich asshole can wield to prevent disclosure of information to Congress. But she refused to answer anyway, as though executive privilege properly applied.
A self-respecting legislative branch would not allow executive-branch witnesses to so easily evade basic questioning, particularly when it concerns matters as important as the Russia investigation. Executive privilege’s scope remains a matter of debate, and every episode in which it is used — or abused — sets a precedent. But past presidents have accepted boundaries on executive privilege that should not be eroded, acknowledging that the power cannot be used to obstruct legitimate investigations of possible illegal or unethical behavior within the executive branch. Accordingly, President Ronald Reagan declined to invoke it during the Iran-contra scandal. It is unjustifiable to use executive privilege when the White House communications director is asked about, say, the president’s involvement in crafting a deceptive public statement about his son’s infamous 2016 the rich asshole Tower meeting with a Russian lawyer — or, for that matter, her own role in the episode.
At the very least, executive privilege should not apply presumptively, an all-purpose gag on executive-branch officials that need not even be affirmatively invoked. When past presidents sought to prevent or limit disclosure, they typically either invoked executive privilege or worked out a deal with congressional investigators before taking that formal step. Now, top the rich asshole administration officials are evading questions without the White House doing either.
The question is: Will Congress defend its prerogative as legitimate overseer of the executive branch? So far, the answer has been a dismal no. As The Post’s James Hohmann pointed out, Ms. Hicks’s behavior has not been isolated. Former the rich asshole strategist Stephen K. Bannon was similarly uncooperative. Before the Senate this past June, Attorney General Jeff Sessions explained that he could not invoke executive privilege but that his refusal to answer certain questions protected “the right of the president to assert it if he chooses.” Even Corey Lewandowski, who never worked in the White House, was evasive.
Lawmakers at least followed up by subpoenaing Mr. Bannon, a step they failed to take with Ms. Hicks when she testified. But she is as deserving of a subpoena. Meanwhile, the House should move to hold Mr. Bannon in contempt for his continued foot-dragging, which would require the assent of Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.).
Republicans held Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. in contempt when they were pursuing their trumped-up investigation of the “Fast and Furious” gunrunning scheme. Zealously defending the dignity of the legislative branch mattered to them when a Democrat was in the White House. And now?
the rich asshole jokes: Pence is too interested in news, keeps asking if I’ve been impeached
BY MAX GREENWOOD - 03/03/18 11:46 PM EST
President the rich asshole joked on Saturday that Vice President Pence begins each day by asking if the rich asshole has been "impeached yet."
"Lately he’s showing a particularly keen interest in the news these days. He is asking has he been impeached yet? I don’t like that," the rich asshole said at the annual Gridiron Dinner, according to Voice of America's Steve Herman.
Highlights now coming through via radio pooler @stevenportnoy of @POTUS remarks at #gridirondinner. He joked his staff was concerned he couldn’t do self deprecating humor. "I told them not to worry. Nobody does self deprecating humor better than I do."
On @VP: "I reallly am very proud to call him The Apprentice. But lately he’s showing a particularly keen interest in the news these days. He is asking has he been impeached yet? I don’t like that."
Some House Democrats have moved in the past year to bring impeachment articles against the rich asshole, though none have picked up the support needed to advance.
At the same time, the rich asshole has battled a special counsel investigation into whether his campaign conspired with Russia to help sway the 2016 presidential election and the possibility that he obstructed justice in the probe.
the rich asshole has denied any wrongdoing, and appeared to double down on that claim on Saturday.
"You can’t be impeached when there’s no crime," he said. "Put that down!"
If a president is impeached, it is the vice president that takes over, meaning that Pence is next in line for the presidency.
· By ALEXANDER MALLIN
President some rich asshole's reelection campaign is out with a new survey that asks supporters whether they fear the spread of Sharia law and whether English should be made the official language of the United States.
The 32-question survey, which is available on the rich asshole campaign's website, is titled "Listening to America: 2018." It begins with a set of general questions, asking participants about their location, their sense of safety under the rich asshole's presidency and whether they're optimistic about the direction of the economy.
The survey then addresses several topics currently in the news, such as whether schools across the country should be "hardened" in the wake of the Parkland shooting and whether supporters feel they've benefited from the recently passed GOP tax cuts.
Towards the end, the survey then polls on issues that relate to some of the more hardline anti-immigration rhetoric pushed by the rich asshole during his campaign.
One question for instance asks, "Are you concerned by the potential spread of Sharia Law?" The fear surrounding the spread of Sharia, or Islamic law, is a frequent campaign talking point among those on the far right including U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore, who falsely claimed during a 2017 special election run in Alabama that entire communities in the Midwest were living under Sharia law.
As a candidate, the rich asshole proposed the creation of a test for immigrants entering the country asking whether they believed "Sharia law supplants American law."
"Anyone who believes Sharia law supplants American law will not be given an immigrant visa," the rich asshole said in an August 2016 speech in North Carolina. "If you want to join our society, then you must embrace our society, our values and our tolerant way of life."
The campaign survey also asks participants whether they believe English should be declared the official language of the United States. Anti-immigration hardliner Rep. Steve King, R-IA, has repeatedly proposed legislation that seeks to make English the official U.S. language, but such attempts in the past have never gained significant traction.
the rich asshole jokes: I was late to Gridiron dinner because Kushner couldn't get through security
BY AVERY ANAPOL - 03/03/18 11:17 PM EST
President the rich asshole on Saturday night reportedly joked that he was late to the Gridiron dinner because Jared Kushner couldn't get through security.
the rich asshole spoke at the Gridiron Club's white-tie dinner, at which dozens of journalists and politicians gather to trade barbs. The Club extends a standing invitation to the president.
Highlights from #Gridirondinner: @realDonaldTrump suggested the US would be meeting with North Korea; and he joked that he came late to the dinner because Jared Kushner couldn’t get through security
Kushner, the rich asshole's son-in-law and senior adviser, has been under fire over his security clearance in recent weeks, which was downgraded from top-secret to secret as part of a policy overhaul by chief of staff John Kelly.
Kushner had been operating under an interim top-secret security clearance during his time in the White House, which was reportedly being held up by the Russia investigation. Kushner's foreign business dealings have reportedly become a focus of the investigation.
the rich asshole has not yet announced whether he will attend the White House Correspondent's Association Dinner this year. He skipped the dinner last year, during a particularly tumultuous period of his relationship with the press.
the rich asshole frequently attacks the media as "fake news," and has focused his ire specifically on CNN and the New York Times, which he often refers to as "failing."
BY MAX GREENWOOD - 03/03/18 09:35 PM EST
Special counsel Robert Mueller's team of investigators is looking into whether an adviser to the de facto leader of the United Arab Emirates has influenced White House policymaking.
The New York Times reported Saturday that Mueller's team is looking into a Lebanese-American businessman and adviser to the UAE's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan.
That businessman, George Nader, visited the White House frequently last year, according to the Times. That investigators are examining Nader's role in the White House's policymaking and asking about efforts by the Emiratis to influence the rich asshole administration suggests that Mueller's probe has broadened beyond Russian election meddling.
According to the Times, investigators have been asking witnesses about possible attempts by the Emiratis to buy influence in the White House by supporting President the rich asshole's 2016 campaign.
The revelation that Mueller's team is looking into possible Emirati influence and the role of Nader comes after Mueller unsealed indictments against 13 Russian nationals for their role in an alleged plot to interfere in the 2016 election.
Mueller also recently filed a superseding indictment against former the rich asshole campaign manager Paul Manafort, and secured a guilty plea from Rick Gates, a former the rich asshole campaign aide and associate of Manafort.
--Updated at 9:51 p.m.
CREDIT: JIM LO SCALZO/EPA-EFE/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK
WASHINGTON — President some rich asshole attended and address his first Washington media dinner on Saturday, telling jokes to the gathered crowd in an roast-like atmosphere that belied his public antagonism toward to news media.
The event was the Gridiron Dinner, a white-tie event held by the oldest journalism organization in Washington, the Gridiron Club, which dates back to 1885.
Just hours before, the rich asshole tweeted that “Mainstream Media in U.S. is being mocked all over the world. They’ve gone CRAZY!” He was responding to coverage of a chaotic week at the White House, including new questions raised about his son-in-law Jared Kushner’s handling of his official duties as senior adviser and his own real estate businesses.
But joined by his wife, First Lady Melania the rich asshole, he was in a much different mood on Saturday.
the rich asshole’s most controversial joke: “I like turnover. I like chaos. It really is good. Who is going to be the next to leave? Steve Miller or Melania?”
His wife was present, and he asked her is she still loved him. He said she told him, “Behave.”
At one point, the rich asshole joked that Vice President Mike Pence was a good, “straight man,” who begins every day by asking, “Is he impeached yet?”
On the reported talks with North Korea, the rich asshole quipped that it was Kim Jong Un who faced “the risk of dealing with a madman.” He said that North Korea had to “denuke” first.
the rich asshole skipped the dinner last year, and also declined to attend the higher profile White House Correspondents Association event. Just as he had during the campaign, the rich asshole routinely bashed the media, often calling it “fake news,” but also, at one point in a February, 2017, tweet, the “enemy of the American people.”
The event at the Renaissance Washington Hotel may be prelude to whether he decides to go to the WHCA event, which is slated for April 28. Michelle Wolf, who recently landed her own Netflix series, will be the featured entertainer, and she has said that she doesn’t plan to withhold from scathing humor about the president.
the rich asshole was roasted by Comedy Central in 2011, but he has not been as well received at other events that typically call for a mixture of light barbs about opponents and plenty of self-deprecating jokes. In 2016, just weeks before the election, he addressed the Al Smith Dinner along with Hillary Clinton. While he made some jokes, he also was booed when he used the platform to attack her.
LaVar was right: Report says the rich asshole had nothing to do with freeing UCLA players in China
In November, the rich asshole called Ball an "ungrateful fool" for doubting his involvement.
Approximately 100 news cycles ago, the nation was gifted with a feud that seemed inevitable: LaVar Ball, the most notorious sports dad in the United States, vs. some rich asshole, the President of the United States.
In November, Ball’s son, LiAngelo Ball, was one of three UCLA basketball players who were arrested for shoplifting sunglasses from a Louis Vuitton store on a team trip to China. At the time, the rich asshole took credit for intervening on behalf of the players to get them “out of a long-term prison sentence” and back to the United States, and called Ball an “ungrateful fool” for not giving the rich asshole credit for his kindness.
But, a new ESPN report reveals that in this case, Ball had the upper hand. While the rich asshole might have spoken to the Chinese president on the player’s behalf, he did not intervene until after everything was taken care of.
“The situation was already resolved by the time we heard about the rich asshole’s involvement,” a team source told ESPN. “That’s not to take away from the fact that he got involved, but the players already had their passports back and their flights booked to go home,” by the time the president stepped in.
The ESPN story directly contradicts a New York Times article from November 14:
In a New York Times story headlined “How the rich asshole Helped Liberate UCLA ‘Knuckleheads’ from China,” Kelly said the rich asshole’s intervention, as well as efforts by State Department diplomats, led to the reduction of the charges to the equivalent of misdemeanors as well as the release of the three players to their hotel where they were placed under temporary house arrest.“The players were already checked into the hotel before the public discovered they were arrested,” a team source said. “They also were not under house arrest. It was our decision to keep them at the hotel until the situation was resolved. The charges were dropped, they weren’t reduced, and that happened two days before we heard from (White House Chief of Staff Gen. John) Kelly.”
The ESPN report included a few other new details, including the fact that the players stole from two other stores in addition to Louis Vuitton. One player hid a pair of stolen sunglasses in the hotel room of UCLA coach Steve Alford, it said. The news story also recounted how UCLA and Pac-12 officials were able to bail out the students without committing an NCAA violation.
There are no real winners here, but considering how well the rich asshole reacted to Ball last year, it’s unlikely the President will be issuing any apologies, or showing any support for the Big Baller Brand any time soon.
‘Madness’: New report details White House’s ‘darkest days’ as the rich asshole rails about cable news and staff defections
some rich asshole (Photo: Gage Skidmore/Flickr)
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The mood inside the White House is bad and getting worse, according to a new report from the Washington Post.
The report is sourced to 22 “officials, friends and advisers to the president and other administration allies.”
“the rich asshole is now a president in transition, at times angry and increasingly isolated,” the story reads. “He fumes in private that just about every time he looks up at a television screen, the cable news headlines are trumpeting yet another scandal. He voices frustration that son-in-law Jared Kushner has few on-air defenders. He revives old grudges. And he confides to friends that he is uncertain about whom to trust.”
According to the report, things got worse with the announcement that Hope Hicks will be leaving. the rich asshole had considered her to be almost family, and since then longtime friends have reminded each other to call and check on him. One ally described the scene as “pure madness.”
“the rich asshole’s fundamentally distorted personality — which at its core is chaotic, volatile and transgressive — when combined with the powers of the presidency had to end poorly,” Peter Wehner, a veteran of the three previous Republican administrations told the paper. “What we’re now seeing is the radiating effects of that, and it’s enveloped him, his White House, his family and his friends.”
Among the more surprising details are that the rich asshole believes the Democrats colluded with the Russians, that he will not get caught up in the Russia investigation and that he was angry to learn that after the rich asshole attacked Attorney General Sessions he had dinner with Deputy AG Rod J. Rosenstein, who oversees the Russia investigation.
Read the full report here
Retired four-star general rips ‘KGB thug’ Putin — before warning about disastrous McMaster departure
Retired general Barry McCaffrey/Screenshot
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Megyn Kelly’s contentious interview with Vladimir Putin impressed a retired four-star general who was watching.
Gen. Barry McCaffrey said that Russia is weak and that Putin’s bluster is designed to appease his domestic audience before the upcoming elections.
“Putin is presiding over a disaster in Russia,” he said. “Their economy is smaller than that of California, their strategic armed forces are a wreck, particularly naval and air power. BA out the only thing they make are oil and natural gas, and the price of that is way down because of U.S. production… He’s in trouble.”
McCaffrey went on to discuss the fact that National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster appeared to be headed out of the White House. This will be an unfortunate development, he said, as McMaster “a defense intellectual,” and “one of the best tactical generals we’ve ever seen.”
The prospects for replacing McMaster look grim, McCaffrey said.
“They’ve got another one, Josh Bolton, a former U.N. ambassador from the United States, who will make Steve Bannon look like Nancy Pelosi,” he said.
Inside the White House, aides over the past week have described an air of anxiety and volatility — with an uncontrollable commander in chief at its center.
These are the darkest days in at least half a year, they say, and they worry just how much farther President the rich asshole and his administration may plunge into unrest and malaise before they start to recover. As one official put it: “We haven’t bottomed out.”
the rich asshole is now a president in transition, at times angry and increasingly isolated. He fumes in private that just about every time he looks up at a television screen, the cable news headlines are trumpeting yet another scandal. He voices frustration that son-in-law Jared Kushner has few on-air defenders. He revives old grudges. And he confides to friends that he is uncertain about whom to trust.
the rich asshole’s closest West Wing confidante, Hope Hicks — the communications director who often acted as a de facto Oval Office therapist — announced her resignation last week, leaving behind a team the president views more as paid staff than surrogate family. So concerned are those around the rich asshole that some of the president’s oldest friends have been urging one another to be in touch — the sort of familiar contacts that often lift his spirits.
In an unorthodox presidency in which emotion, impulse and ego often drive events, the rich asshole’s ominous moods manifested themselves last week in his zigzagging positions on gun control; his shock trade war that jolted markets and was opposed by Republican leaders and many in his own administration; and his roiling feud of playground insults with Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
Some of the rich asshole’s advisers say the president is not all doom and gloom, however. He has been pleased with the news coverage of his role in the gun debate and lighthearted moments have leavened his days, such as a recent huddle with staff to prepare his comedic routine for the Gridiron, a Saturday night dinner with Washington officials and journalists.
Still, the rich asshole’s friends are increasingly concerned about his well-being, worried that the president’s obsession with cable commentary and perceived slights is taking a toll on the 71-year-old. “Pure madness,” lamented one exasperated ally.
Retired four-star Army general Barry McCaffrey said the American people — and Congress especially — should be alarmed.
“I think the president is starting to wobble in his emotional stability and this is not going to end well,” McCaffrey said. “the rich asshole’s judgment is fundamentally flawed, and the more pressure put on him and the more isolated he becomes, I think, his ability to do harm is going to increase.”
This portrait of the rich asshole at a moment of crisis just over a year after taking office is based on interviews with 22 White House officials, friends and advisers to the president and other administration allies, most of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to candidly discuss the rich asshole’s state of mind.
The tumult comes as special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation of Russia’s 2016 election interference and the president’s possible obstruction of justice has intensified. Meanwhile, Kushner, a White House senior adviser, was stripped last week of his access to the nation’s top secrets amid increasing public scrutiny of his foreign contacts and of his mixing of business and government work.
the rich asshole has been asking people close to him whether they think Kushner or his company has done anything wrong, according to a senior administration official. Two advisers said the president repeatedly tells aides that the Russia investigation will not ensnare him — even as it ensnares others around him — and that he thinks the American people are finally starting to conclude that the Democrats, as opposed to his campaign, colluded with the Russians.
Still, the developments have delivered one negative headline after another, leading the rich asshole to lose his cool — especially in the evenings and early mornings, when he often is most isolated, according to advisers.
For instance, aides said, the rich asshole seethed with anger last Wednesday night over cable news coverage of a photo, obtained by Axios, showing Sessions at dinner with Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein, who oversees the Russia investigation, and another top Justice Department prosecutor. The outing was described in news reports as amounting to an act of solidarity after the rich asshole had attacked Sessions in a tweet that morning.
The next morning, the rich asshole was still raging about the photo, venting to friends and allies about a dinner he viewed as an intentional show of disloyalty.
the rich asshole has long been furious with Sessions for recusing himself from oversight of the Russia probe, and privately mocks him as “Mr. Magoo,” an elderly and bumbling cartoon character. But this past week the president was irate that his attorney general had asked the Justice Department’s inspector general — as opposed to criminal prosecutors — to investigate alleged misdeeds by the FBI in obtaining surveillance warrants.
On Friday morning, the rich asshole targeted his ire elsewhere. About an hour after Fox News Channel aired a segment about comedian Alec Baldwin saying he had tired of impersonating the rich asshole on NBC’s “Saturday Night Live,” the rich asshole lit into Baldwin on Twitter, initially misspelling his first name. “It was agony for those who were forced to watch,” the president wrote at 5:42 a.m.
“the rich asshole’s fundamentally distorted personality — which at its core is chaotic, volatile and transgressive — when combined with the powers of the presidency had to end poorly,” said Peter Wehner, a veteran of the three previous Republican administrations and a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. “What we’re now seeing is the radiating effects of that, and it’s enveloped him, his White House, his family and his friends.”
the rich asshole jetted Friday to his favorite refuge, his private Mar-a-Lago Club in South Florida, where he dined on the gilded patio with old friends — former New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani and wife Judith and Blackstone Group chairman Stephen A. Schwarzman, among others. the rich asshole tried to convince his companions that trade tariffs were more popular than they think, according to someone with knowledge of their conversation.
Shortly after 8 a.m. Saturday, he rolled up to the rich asshole International Golf Course for a sunny, 70-degree morning on the greens. Rather than firing off a flurry of angry messages as on other recent weekend mornings, the president tweeted only, “Happy National Anthem Day!” But then shortly after noon, once he returned to Mar-a-Lago from the golf course, the rich asshole tweeted that the mainstream media has “gone CRAZY!”
Christopher Ruddy, the chief executive of Newsmax and a rich asshole friend, said, “I’m bewildered when I see these reports that he’s in turmoil. Every time I speak to him he seems more relaxed and in control than ever. He seems pretty optimistic about how things are shaping up.”
the rich asshole is testing the patience of his own staff, some of whom think he is not listening to their advice. White House counsel Donald McGahn and national economic council director Gary Cohn have been especially frustrated, according to other advisers.
The situation seems to be grating as well on White House chief of staff John F. Kelly, who had been on the ropes over his handling of domestic-abuse allegations against former staff secretary Rob Porter but who now appears on firmer footing. Talking last week about his move from being homeland security secretary to the West Wing, Kelly quipped, “God punished me.”
Last Friday, Kelly tried to explain anew the timeline of Porter’s dismissal with a group of reporters — an unprompted move that annoyed and confused some White House staffers, who thought they were finally moving past the controversy that had consumed much of February.
“Morale is the worst it’s ever been,” said a Republican strategist in frequent contact with White House staff. “Nobody knows what to expect.”
Since the rich asshole entered presidential politics three years ago, Hicks has been his stabilizing constant, tending his moods and whims in addition to managing his image. Within the president’s orbit, many wonder whether the rich asshole has fully absorbed the impact of Hicks’s upcoming departure.
the rich asshole told one friend that Hicks was a great young woman, who, after three intense years, was ready to do her own thing. He told this friend that he recognized the White House was full of “tough hombres,” according to someone briefed on the conversation.
But other confidants said the president feels abandoned and alone — not angry with Hicks, but frustrated by the circumstance. Coupled with last fall’s departure of longtime bodyguard Keith Schiller, the rich asshole will have few pure loyalists remaining.
“Losing people is too much of a story for the president,” said oil investor Dan K. Eberhart, a rich asshole supporter and a Republican National Committee fundraiser. “It just seems like it’s imploding . . . the rich asshole had momentum with tax reform, the State of the Union speech. He should try to keep that going.”
On Capitol Hill, lawmakers were left in varying states of consternation by the rich asshole’s whipsaw on guns. He suggested publicly last Wednesday that he favored tougher background checks and would forgo due process in taking away guns from the mentally ill, but then sent opposite signals after huddling with National Rifle Association lobbyists the next night.
the rich asshole’s aides said his vacillation was a function of the controlled chaos the president likes to sow. the rich asshole recently has come to favor opening his meetings to the media — “It’s like his own TV show,” said one adviser — where he often chews over outlandish ideas, plays to the assembled press and talks up bipartisan consensus, even if it never leads to actual policy.
the rich asshole doesn’t see guns through the traditional prism of left vs. right, but rather as a Manhattan business developer, said one senior administration official, adding that he has told staff that he doesn’t understand why people need assault rifles.
The president’s decision last Thursday to announce steep new tariffs on aluminum and steel — and gleefully tout a possible trade war — caught almost his entire team, including some of his top trade advisers, by surprise.
Earlier in the week, Cohn was telling people he was going to continue stalling the rich asshole on tariffs. He described the tariffs as “obviously stupid,” in the recollection of one person who spoke to him.
“Gary said to him, you can’t do this, you can’t do that,” a senior administration official said. “The more you tell him that, the more he is going to do what he wants to do.”
the rich asshole’s allies say that in his past ventures he has thrived in chaotic environments, and he has replicated that atmosphere in the White House. Rep. Peter T. King (R-N.Y.) recalled visiting the rich asshole in the Oval Office for a bill-signing photo opportunity a few weeks into his presidency that was scheduled to last just a few minutes.
“We were in there over an hour, and every White House character was in there at one point or another. . . . It was like Grand Central station,” King said. “He has a way of getting things done. He had the worst campaign ever. On election night, he was the guy smiling and had won.”
the rich asshole on Chinese president abolishing term limits: 'Maybe we'll give that a shot someday'
BY MAX GREENWOOD - 03/03/18 07:43 PM EST
President the rich asshole on Saturday praised a move by China's Communist Party to abolish presidential term limits, and suggested that maybe the United States would "give that a shot someday."
"He's now president for life. President for life. No, he's great," the rich asshole told Republican donors during a closed-door event in Florida. A recording of the rich asshole's remarks was obtained by CNN.
"And look, he was able to do that," he added. "I think it's great. Maybe we'll give that a shot someday."
the rich asshole made the comments in a speech that was, according to CNN, filled with jokes and told in a lighthearted manner. It appears the comments were likely made in jest.
China's Communist Party announced Sunday that it intends to do away with presidential term limits, paving the way for the country's president, Xi Jinping, to remain in power indefinitely.
The move was a major break from the precedent set in the decades since the death of Mao Zedong, the communist revolutionary who ruled China for more than 30 years until his death in 1976.
the rich asshole has personally praised Xi, despite railing against unfair trade practices by China during his 2016 presidential campaign and first year in office.
Also in his remarks on Saturday, according to CNN, the rich asshole decried a "rigged system," a complaint that became a key theme of his 2016 presidential campaign, when he claimed that the electoral system was fixed against him.
"I'm telling you, it's a rigged system folks," he said. "I've been saying that for a long time. It's a rigged system. And we don't have the right people in there yet. We have a lot of great people, but certain things, we don't have the right people."
Just 408 days into his presidency, the rich asshole spends his 100th day on a rich asshole golf course
That's quite the milestone.
Almost fourteen months into his presidency, some rich asshole has reached a dubious milestone that none before him have achieved: He’s spent his 100th day at a golf club bearing his own name.
Considering he’s only been in office for 408 days, that means he’s spent almost 25 percent of his time at a the rich asshole-branded golf club, including during the funerals of Parkland victims, while millions of Americans remained without water and power in Puerto Rico, and for an entire week after Christmas.
The landmark was reached on Saturday at the rich asshole’s club in Palm Beach County, Florida. CNN reports that this is one of the four the rich asshole courses that the president has visited since he took his oath, in addition to the rich asshole National Golf Club in Jupiter, Florida; the rich asshole National Golf Club in Sterling, Virginia; and the rich asshole National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey.
the rich asshole was extremely critical of President Obama’s golfing habits. Before he got into office, the rich asshole infamously said that he wouldn’t have time to play golf if he was president. But since his inauguration, he has spent a staggering amount of time at his golf properties — and he is showing no signs of stopping any time soon. Around Christmas time, the rich asshole spent nine out of 10 daysplaying golf. In January, he spent Martin Luther King, Jr. Day on the golf course.
Sometimes, the rich asshole’s 18-hole excursions include famous golfers, such as Rory McIlroy or Tiger Woods. Occasionally, he’s joined by GOP lawmakers, such as Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC).
This is one of the most tumultuous times in the rich asshole’s perpetually volatile presidency. Many Puerto Ricans still don’t have power. In the wake of the Parkland shooting, the country is embroiled in a debate over gun control — and the rich asshole has offered no clear way forward. the rich asshole’s impetuous announcement of tariffs on steel and aluminum imports has left the economy and international relations in flux. This week, one of the rich asshole’s closest confidants, Communications Director Hope Hicks, announced that she will soon be resigning. Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference of the 2016 presidential election seems to be intensifying. His son-in-law and policy advisor Jared Kushner recently had his security clearance revoked.
Oh, and there’s the looming threat of nuclear war with North Korea.
Luckily for us, the rich asshole is taking the time to practice his chip shots.
Watch: RNC’s Kayleigh McEnany loses the plot — and claims Republicans love tariffs and gun control
Republican spokesperson Kayleigh McEnany/Screenshot
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Traditionally, the Republican party has stood for free markets and against gun control.
Not anymore! Or, wait—maybe?
some rich asshole has sent a series of confusing and conflicting signals on the subjects in the last three weeks. Today, Republican spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany went on MSNBC and attempted to explain how Republicans “stand with the president” despite the fact that many Republicans clearly do not stand with the president.
Specifically, she made the argument that tariffs would help American workers and that new gun control measures including a ban on bump stocks and a suspension of habeas corpus when cops want to seize guns from possible mass shooters.
“They’re strategic, they’re measured,” McEnany said of the rich asshole tariffs. “This is a long-awaited policy, this isn’t something that some rich asshole just brought out of the dark.”
“It’s clear that on this issue in particular they’re not standing behind the president,” the host said.
“He signaled a change in our party, and one that Republican voters clearly loved and bought into,” she said.
“But aren’t we seeing Republicans buying into it? When we see [Republican US Senator from Nebraska] Ben Sasse calling this kooky 18th century protectionism, it doesn’t sound like he’s buying into that?”
“Ben Sasse was always a Never the rich asshole Republican, we know that,” she said.
Then it came time to talk about gun control. President the rich asshole is a “vigorous,” “strong supporter” of the Second Amendment. But explained what the Republican Party now thinks.
“What’s the party position now on gun control now, in light of the variation we’ve seen in the last three weeks?” she said.
“Sixty-one percent of Republicans in that CNN poll support raising [the age of buying an assault rifle] to 21,” she said. “So our voters stand exactly squarely with the president.”
McEnany promised to meet the Parkland survivors. Which—well, it makes sense now that the spokesperson for the Republican party supports new gun control laws?
“That’s what this party is about, that’s what this president is about,” she said.
Seems cool.
Showtime’s Cartoon President loves ‘Coco’ at the Oscars: ‘There’s nothing like singing and dancing dead Mexicans’
Showtimes, "Our Cartoon President" delivering his Academy Awards monologue.
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Showtime’s Our Cartoon President paid tribute to some rich asshole and the Academy Awards in a new video. The new series was created by Stephen Colbert and began airing in February.
The skit imagined President the rich asshole stealing the limelight from Oscars host Jimmy Kimmel.
“I wanted to deliver the Oscars monologue,” the Cartoon President announces. “The Russian bots did their thing — and here I am!”
“I’m going to miss my Lady Bird, Hope Hicks,” he admitted. “Anyways, huge fan of Pixar’s ‘Coco’ or any movie about a bunch of singing and dancing dead Mexicans.”
When the rich asshole tried to get a movie role for “dipsh*t” actor James Woods, his monologue was interrupted by Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin.
“No, cast my wife, Louise Linton,” Mnuchin shouted. “She can play everything from an upscale door-knob to a load-bearing column.”
the rich asshole then introduced Vice President Mike Pence singing “Danny Boy” during an “in memoriam” segment dedicated to men taken down by allegations of sexual misconduct.
“James Woods?” I just saw him,” the rich asshole says, tearing up. “Makes you wonder how long I have.”
Watch:
the rich asshole nominee for top prisons job busted for racism against blacks and Asians
President some rich asshole has nominated William G. Otis for a seat on the U.S. Sentencing Commission.
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President some rich asshole has nominated controversial lawyer William Otis, with a troubling history of racist and “flatly ahistorical” remarks, to a coveted seat on the U.S. Sentencing Commission, The Root reported Saturday.
“the rich asshole’s pick for the U.S. Sentencing Commission, which determines what criminal sentences to dole out, has written that black people and Latinx commit more crimes because of their collective sub-standard values, and appears to think that selling an eighth of weed (a low-level offense) is akin to child rape,” The Root explained. “The comments Otis makes on his blog aren’t racist dog whistles. They’re the air-horn of racism. They’re also terrifyingly recent—all made within the last 5 years.”
NPR noted that Otis commented on a popular legal blog that “it is precisely because race and criminality have no causative relationship that our side cannot be cowed when the other side starts bellowing about racial disparities in imprisonment, and then claiming they are caused by racism. They are not caused by racism, and as you quite correctly say, they are not caused by race. They are caused by making choices.”
The Root dug up the full passage.
“This is the reason that, for example, Orientals have less incidence of crime than whites. Orientals were unquestionably the victims of long and rancid racial bigotry; coolie labor was little more than slave labor. And Yick Wo v. Hopkins is one of the most famous civil rights cases of all time,” Otis wrote. “The reason Orientals stay out of jail more than either whites or blacks is that family life, work, education and tradition are honored more in Oriental culture than in others.”
“This is not a person who will be guided by evidence and data,” Kevin Ring, the president of Families Against Mandatory Minimums told The Washington Post. “The Senate should reject this nomination.”
Otis was a counselor for the Drug Enforcement Administration under President George W. Bush.
Watch:
Teen shooting survivors leverage huge social media followings for gun control
BY ALI BRELAND - 03/03/18 08:05 PM EST
Teenaged survivors of the Parkland, Fla. High school shooting have amassed huge followings on social media in the weeks since a gunman attacked their school, assembling powerful social media tools in the national debate over guns and mass shootings.
Senior Emma Gonzalez, who now has more than 1.1 million followers on Twitter, has seen her audience expand by tens of thousands of new followers each day since Feb. 19 according to data from SocialBlade.
Gonzalez now has more Twitter followers than the National Rifle Association, which has more than 600,000 followers, as well as NRA spokesperson Dana Loesch, who has almost 800,000 followers.
Senior David Hogg and junior Sarah Chadwick, two other students who have made multiple appearances on national television, each have hundreds of thousands of followers as well.
The teenagers have built their followings in part by being able to engage in the kind of combative, often humorous tweets that get social media attention. Their curt responses to conservative media personalities have earned tens of thousands of retweets.
Experts on digital media say the students, who grew up around social media, have been able to use Twitter more effectively than their anti-gun control adversaries.
Mike Horning, a communications professor at Virginia Tech, said that teenagers like Gonzalez and Hogg have spent their entire lives on the internet.
“They’ve grown up in these digital worlds where they can jump from one platform to another. They can learn it quickly and they have,” he said. “That’s a unique phenomenon."
“During the election you talked about the enthusiasm gap between the rich asshole and Clinton. Now there’s an enthusiasm gap between students and the NRA by large amounts,” Rosenblatt said.
That gap has been most visible in students’ scathing responses to gun control opponents on Twitter. In many cases, their tweets accrue many more retweets and likes than the original posts they were responding to.
In one tweet, for example, the NRA said that it wouldn’t be deterred by companies that dropped their discounts for NRA members. Marjory Stoneman Douglas student Jaclyn Corin jabbed back, giving the organization a sarcastic offer of“thoughts and prayers.”
The NRA’s tweet netted 22,072 retweets and 51,251 favorites. But Corin’s response earned over 10,000 more retweets more and almost 90,000 more favorites.
Other students also use a biting humor that resonates on social media.
“We should change the names of AR-15s to ‘Marco Rubio’ because they are so easy to buy,” Chadwick wrote in a tweet that received over 80,000 retweets and almost 300,000 likes.
The survivors’ emergence as pro-gun control voices on social media is a new development in the response to mass shootings.
“They’re able to dominate the news cycle and discourse in ways we haven’t really seen after a shooting,” said Rosenblatt.
Social media researchers say that part of the students' viral resonance is explained by the raw empathy that the students evoke.
“The NRA gets into the minutiae of weapons and tells people they’re not experts and that they don’t understand what they’re talking about, while Hogg and others' rhetoric cuts right through that," Rosenblatt said. “His emotion and integrity overrides anything a gun policy expert can bring to the issue.”
Jason Kint, the CEO of media trade association Digital Content Next, said the students’ tweets succeed in part because of their authenticity.
“I think that there’s no doubt that authenticity captures more attention and works better on social media,” Kint said. “People want a real person on the internet.”
It’s unclear whether the students will be able to turn their massive social media presences into momentum for gun control.
“For the same reason that they can attract that following quickly, the public’s attention can change and they can lose interest quickly too,” Kint said.
Listen: Alec Baldwin calls into brother’s radio show as the rich asshole to hilariously mock president’s Twitter obsession with him
Actor Alec Baldwin as President some rich asshole on 'Saturday Night Live' (Screen capture)
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Actor and comedian Alec Baldwin called into his brother’s Syracuse-based radio show where he impersonated the president and mocked him for being obsessed with his Saturday Night Live impersonation.
According to Syracuse.com, the two Baldwins were responding to the rich asshole’s early Friday morning tweet –that includes multiple misspellings –and read: “Alex[sic] Baldwin, whose dieing (sic) mediocre career was saved by his impersonation of me on SNL, now says playing DJT was agony for him. Alex, it was also agony for those who were forced to watch. You were terrible. Bring back Darrell Hammond, much funnier and a far greater talent!”
With Daniel Baldwin saying he had a special caller to the show, his brother was already in character and immediately attacked — himself.
“First of all, everybody knows that Stephen Baldwin is the best Baldwin, OK?” Alec said while using the rich asshole’s voice, referencing the one Baldwin brother who is a supporter of the rich asshole.
Baldwin’s the rich asshole then proceeded to talk about all the great work he was doing when he wasn’t at the golf course while continuing to attack Baldwin for hurting America.
You can listen below via YouTube:
the rich asshole repeatedly tells aides he won't be swept up in Russia probe: report
BY MAX GREENWOOD - 03/03/18 05:50 PM EST
President the rich asshole has insisted to aides that he will not be swept up in the special counsel investigation of Russia's role in the 2016 election.
At the same time, the rich asshole thinks that the American public is beginning to fall in line with his claim that it was the Democrats – rather than his campaign – that conspired with Moscow during the presidential race, The Washington Post reported.
the rich asshole believes that even if special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation ensnares those around him, he will ultimately be cleared in the matter. One senior administration official told the Post that the rich asshole has been asking those close to him whether they think his son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner or his company could be guilty of wrongdoing.
The pace of Mueller's investigation has escalated in recent weeks. Last month he unsealed indictments against 13 Russian nationals for their alleged roles in a plot of disrupt and influence the 2016 election.
He also filed a superseding indictment of former the rich asshole campaign manager Paul Manafort, and recently secured a guilty plea from Rick Gates, a former the rich asshole campaign aide and longtime associate of Manafort.
the rich asshole has long insisted, however, that Mueller's investigation is a "witch hunt," and that neither him nor anyone on his campaign coordinated with the Russians during the 2016 election.
Mueller has also looked at Kushner as part of the Russia investigation. The president's son-in-law was present at meetings with Russians during the campaign and presidential transition that have been surrounded by controversy.
NBC News also reported Friday that Mueller is looking into whether Kushner's business arrangements have influenced the rich asshole administration policies.
The psychological condition that really explains some rich asshole’s twisted worldview
U.S. President some rich asshole sits at his desk before signing tax overhaul legislation in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, U.S., December 22, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
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the rich asshole’s ghostwriter put these words in the president’s mouth: “Money was never a big motivation for me, except as a way to keep score. The real excitement is playing the game.”
I believe it about the money, though not about playing the game being his real excitement. If that were true, the rich asshole wouldn’t be such a sore loser. He wouldn’t have said, on the last days of the campaign, that if he loses, “this will be the greatest waste of time, money and energy in my lifetime, by a factor of 100.” He wouldn’t have said of John McCain, “He’s not a war hero. He’s a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured.” And he wouldn’t have said, “That makes me smart,” when Hillary Clinton accused him of not paying taxes for 18 years.
the rich asshole’s sole value is being an impressive winner of the game. A neutral psychological assessment of his motivations wouldn’t rule out the possibility that he ran for president because he was frustrated to see other people winning more than he was. He saw dictators around the world who had amassed more billions and had more power than he did. He realized that if he really wanted to win, he might do the same.
The evidence is overwhelming; the rich asshole is a pathological climber. The self-declared “ratings machine” suffers from “impressive compulsive disorder,” a condition that is like hoarding, not of stuff but of impressive power.
You know that burning, sinking feeling you get when you’re around someone who’s more impressive than you? That’s the rich asshole’s sole driver. There’s nothing in him to upstage it, no greater good to temper it. Read between the lines, his worldview goes something like this:
Life is nothing but a dog-eat-dog game. The only value is being top dog. Winning is its own reward and the only reward. The power you gain by winning isn’t for anything else. Winners play the game undistracted by other values. All other supposed values are just means to that end. Duping others into thinking you care about other values, like welfare or making America great again, is how you play to win. Losers lose because they’re distracted by other values. To win, you need to use other people’s values against them. Other values are the loser’s handicap. You can get them to help you win by convincing them that you care about what they care about.
To winners, values are free lip-service bargaining chips. They’re free because lip service costs nothing; they’re bargaining chips in that losers value them. You can get people to help you win the game if you give lip service to those other values – just enough to keep them supporting you in the competition. That’s how the game is played and if you don’t know that, you’re naïve. I know it. That’s what makes me smart.
To understand why the rich asshole is a hypocrite and a liar, willing to say or do anything to climb, one has to pay attention to what’s missing in him. He lacks conscience. That may seem a moral accusation, but I mean it merely as a psychological diagnosis based on the evidence. Unconstrained by any other value, he’ll say and do anything to win. He is a gloataholic, addicted to gloating as impressive because no other value upstages that goal for him. We could call him a narcissist or sociopath, but it’s more than that. Not all narcissists and sociopaths need to keep gaining and hoarding power the way he does. He is Yertle the Turtle on steroids.
Source: Labeled for reuse, Pinterest.
All of us are hypocritical liars to some degree or other. We are willing to compromise here and there when there’s something to gain for it. Often what’s gained is personal and immediate, but often it’s a greater good of some sort, for example, saying what we know isn’t true as a way of encouraging others or ignoring our imperfections to make a stronger case against a greater evil.
Politicians have to be hypocritical and lie, in part because they have to appeal to a general public that is hypocritical and lying to themselves about how they (unlike other people) just want straight talk. Pandering is part of the politician’s job description. Downplaying one’s own flaws to draw contrasts with opponent’s flaws is part of the job description too. No politician can survive without doing these things. Great leaders do it. Lincoln did. What makes them great is that they do it both skillfully yet measuredly and always to serve a higher purpose. As Lincoln did.
the rich asshole is a skillful hypocrite and liar, but not a measured one. He has no sense of proportion. His hypocrisy and lying know no bounds. He has no higher purpose in mind, nothing to constrain his quest for ever more power.
We tolerate more hypocrisy and lying when we think it’s serving a higher purpose. That’s why many were willing to hold their noses and vote for the rich asshole even though they knew he was a hypocrite and a liar. They saw him as campaigning for the greater good. Some saw his character flaws as a cost outweighed by the greater good he would do. Others saw it not as a cost but a benefit because the only way to get the greater good done in our paralyzed system would be to deploy the unrelenting confidence the rich asshole showed. Either way, the greater good justified it and made him worthy of their votes.
Two months in, there are no signs of the greater good. He still gives it lip service, but that costs him nothing. Increasingly it’s evident that the rich asshole got away with justifying his unbounded hypocrisy and lying as serving a greater good that he never cared about. We have elected a rebel without a cause.
In a way, the rich asshole is highly evolved. Evolution has always been about maximizing the organism’s gain. It is a merciless competition among creatures indifferent to each other’s welfare except to the extent that it helps them. the rich asshole is the perfect animal. Not the perfect human, though. Humans have the foresight to be able to address the tragedy of the commons: If everyone is just out to win for winning’s sake, game over and everyone loses. That shouldn’t make us aspire to be selfless, but at least interested in keeping the game going by not winning so completely that we eliminate it altogether.
In a way, parasites recognize the risk of ending the game, though of course not consciously. They rarely kill enough hosts that the game is over for them. Work to win, but don’t blow up the game board winning depends upon.
the rich asshole isn’t the only pathological climber. What was once the Republican Party is now infested with them.
Because greater goods don’t matter to pathological climbers they can exploit any popular cause. There have been plenty of leftist pathological climbers, and religious ones too, people who will pay lip service to any cause if it helps them gain and hoard impressive power.
Business is the career path of choice for many pathological climbers since money is the most tangible metric of impressive power, as the rich asshole’s ghostwriter said, the way to keep score. Even those who enter business with a greater good in their hearts often end up just giving it lip service as a way to survive in business, since in intense power struggles, having other values ties one’s hands. Likewise, people enter law to fight the good fight and end up corporate lawyers just out to win. If they’re going to rise in power, they’re going to have to shed the weighty baggage of other values.
Both law and business are cultures prone to saturation with pathological climbers. The more there are, the more there will be, since competing with them is difficult when your hands are tied with other values. The traditionally pro-business Republican Party is the party likeliest to experience a surge in pathological climbing as it is today.
Social conservatism was a strange bedfellow, especially to libertarianism. How can you be for small government and yet want to impose social morality topdown? Cold War anti-communism and libertarianism slept well together since communism is the opposite of libertarianism. Still, one could hardly call the Soviet Union communist. It was communist in name only, much as the rich asshole’s campaign was really about making America great again. More accurately, the Soviet Union was game-killing crony plutocracy, as is Russia today.
And as the U.S. could be soon, if we don’t get better at identifying what kills the game. It’s not communism, which as a theory is very much a distracting value; and it’s not political correctness, globalization or regulation, which are game levelers. Rather what kills the game pathological climbing, impressive compulsive disorder, the source of runaway inequality and a return to animal impulse unfettered by humanitarian values.
References
Bueno, M. B., & Smith, A. (2011). The dictator’s handbook: Why bad behavior is almost always good politics. New York: PublicAffairs.
Baldwin calls into radio show as the rich asshole complaining about his impression
BY LUIS SANCHEZ - 03/03/18 05:17 PM EST
Alec Baldwin called into his brother’s radio show on Friday go address the rich asshole’s earlier criticism and to poke fun at the president while impersonating him.
Baldwin — who often plays the president on Saturday Night Live — and his brother Daniel Baldwin were responding to a tweet the President had sent earlier in the day criticizing Alec Baldwin for his “terrible impersonation.”
“Alec Baldwin, whose dying mediocre career was saved by his terrible impersonation of me on SNL, now says playing me was agony. Alec, it was agony for those who were forced to watch. Bring back Darrell Hammond, funnier and a far greater talent!” the rich asshole said in his tweet.
Alec Baldwin, whose dying mediocre career was saved by his terrible impersonation of me on SNL, now says playing me was agony. Alec, it was agony for those who were forced to watch. Bring back Darrell Hammond, funnier and a far greater talent!
During the radio show, Baldwin answered his brother’s questions as the rich asshole and also as himself. Baldwin responded to the rich asshole’s criticism by saying that he views his impersonation of the rich asshole as his “civic duty.”
"First of all, everybody knows that Stephen Baldwin is the best Baldwin, OK?” Alec Baldwin said as the rich asshole. "Stephen Baldwin is a great American who gets it."
When asked by Daniel Baldwin whether he didn’t have more pressing matters to attend to than social media attacks of Baldwin, Baldwin — in character as the rich asshole — said that he’s good multitasking.
“I got this. I’m the president, I won, I’m a multitasker. I’ve always been. I’m always having a lot of things. I’ve always had five or six girlfriends at the same time, I can handle a lot,” Baldwin as the rich asshole said.
Baldwin went on to speak to his brother as himself, commenting on his impersonation of the president.
“If impersonating the rich asshole and doing it by the seat of our pants here on SNL these last several months is the definition of meriocrody, then I’ll take it,” Alec Baldwin said. “We are doing our civic duty. We are doing the best we can with what we have. Here we have this guy who is probably the greatest presidential impersonator we’ve ever seen in history.”
Alec Baldwin also said the rich asshole lacks the empathy that other presidents, regardless of their wealth, have had.
“We’ve had wealthy men in this position before but they had some degree of empathy. Baldwin said. “It is just numbing to me that that’s missing to the degree that it is.”
Baldwin responded to himself as the rich asshole, saying: “I am empathetic. I am one of the most empathetic people that I know."
Holder predicts Mueller trying to bolster obstruction of justice case
BY JOHN BOWDEN - 03/03/18 09:34 AM EST
Former Attorney General Eric Holder said Friday that special counsel Robert Mueller likely already has a case for obstruction of justice against President the rich asshole, and is waiting to bring the case before a grand jury.
In an interview on HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher," Holder expressed faith that the sprawling Mueller probe would result in more charges.
"Well I think that you technically have an obstruction of justice case that already exists," Holder said. "I've known Bob Mueller for 20, 30 years. My guess is, he's just trying to make the case as good as he possibly can."
During his appearance on the show, Holder also defended calls from Democratic mega-donor Tom Steyer to make the rich asshole's supposed dereliction of duty on confronting Russia over election meddling a campaign issue.
"But I think that Steyer is absolutely right in the sense that the rich asshole is derelict in his duties," Holder said. "We were attacked. It wasn't a physical attack, it was an electronic attack, on our most vital of systems, and he's done nothing to prepare us for what is to come. Because they're still coming."
"And he's done nothing to hold the Russians accountable in spite of the fact that this dysfunctional Congress passed sanctions that he has refused to implement," Holder continued.
"And that for me is breathtaking, unforgivable, and ultimately something the American people have to hold him responsible for."
Mueller's probe expanded last month with the indictment of 13 Russian nationals for alleged efforts to interfere in the 2016 election by using fake social media profiles to spread disinformation and divisive rhetoric among Americans.
Holder, who served as attorney general under former President Barack Obama, warned the rich asshole in December that he could face mass protests if he chooses to shut down the Mueller probe.
"ABSOLUTE RED LINE: the firing of Bob Mueller or crippling the special counsel's office. If removed or meaningfully tampered with, there must be mass, popular, peaceful support of both," Holder tweeted in December.
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