As dumb as it is — and damn, is it dumb! — SharpieGate isn’t going away. Trump’s use of a Sharpie to make himself not-wrong on Twitter last week spawned thousands of memes, including this:
The Beltway press can’t get enough of it. 24-hour news has been on it for 24 hours.
Trump tweeted about it five times today (most recently about 20 minutes ago). His “press secretary” (who neither presses nor secretaries) waded into the fray, spotting an opportunity to curry favor with the boss by taking a whack at CNN — and getting politely curb-stomped by CNN for her trouble:
Thanks, Stephanie. Yes, we made a mistake (which we fixed in less than 30 seconds). And now we are admitting it. You all should try it sometime.
— CNN Communications (@CNNPR) September 5, 2019
Trump can’t let it go because he’s a walking collection of untreated personality disorders who relies on bullying and dominance to bubble-wrap his fragile ego. I think valued commenter Gin & Tonic was onto something yesterday when he noted (paraphrasing) that the media has glommed onto this because it’s both absurd and an easy story to cover.
I’m finding the story hard to let go too because it’s such a perfect example of the how the Trump presidency is ridiculous and frightening at the same time: this demented crybaby is inventing stories that would shame a fourth grader, and government officials are serving as props and defenders, as if this whole episode wasn’t bug-fuck nuts.
But maybe Mayor Pete Buttigieg has the right strategy here:
"I feel sorry for the President," Pete Buttigieg says on President Trump appearing to show an altered Hurricane Dorian trajectory map. “It makes you feel a kind of pity for everybody involved” https://t.co/jB9dijv8yU pic.twitter.com/ENma54ygE9
— CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) September 5, 2019
A snippet of the transcript (via The Hill):
“I’m really worried about that,” the South Bend, Ind., mayor and Democratic presidential candidate said on CNN’s “New Day.”
“I feel sorry for the president, and that is not the way we should feel about the most powerful figure in this country,” he said. “Somebody on whose wisdom and judgment our lives literally depend.”
“I don’t know if he felt it necessary to pull out a sharpie and change the map. I don’t know if it was one of his aides believed they had to do that in order to protect his ego,” he added. “No matter how you cut it, this is an unbelievably sad state of affairs for our country. If our presidency is not in good shape, then our country is not in good shape. And on one level it’s laughable, on another it is exactly why we got to do something different.”
Maybe pity is the right approach. Perhaps Trump’s opponents should discuss him in hushed, solicitous tones, as if the crazy racist uncle has graduated from demented email forwards to leaping out of dumpsters and screaming at passing schoolchildren about the Bilderberg Group. Because in a sense, he has.
Maysie and Big Tux Update: On Their Way!
Frankensteinbeck
Being hated hurts much less than being looked down on for anyone with insecurities. Mockery and pity both drive conservatives nuts.
Ruckus
Well his entire life has been one dumpster dive so really, why should we expect any different now?
Anyone want to argue about dementia now?
TenguPhule
@Ruckus:
For it or against it?
Leto
We’re witnessing our own madness of King George. Wether it’s narcissism or syphilis, doesn’t matter. He’s mentally incompetent to carry out the duties of the office in which he’s squatting. It’s not just a continual case for impeachment, it’s a case for the 25th to be used. But the Goopers are more than happy to keep the madness going because the grift keeps on flowing.
Brachiator
But Trump isn’t just a crazy uncle. The more we have to talk about him this way, the more we need to talk about 25th Amendment remedies.
We’ve read about princes and ministers propping up incompetent monarchs. This should not happen in a democracy.
tokyokie
@Ruckus: I’d argue that this episode is more likely the result of untreated toxic narcissistic personality syndrome than dementia, but either way, the man is mentally unstable and lacks the connection to reality necessary to carry out the duties of the office he holds.
Roger Moore
OTOH, I think David Frum has a reasonable point here:
The biggest problem with Trump is that there are more problems with his administration- corruption, incompetence, awful policy, etc.- than anyone can keep track of. It doesn’t do much good to follow the mini-scandal of the day unless you are trying to tie it to some bigger narrative about what’s wrong with Trump.
schrodingers_cat
Is Melania’s red outfit inspired by The Handmaid’s tale?
The Moar You Know
Depends what you want to get done. If you want Trump so enraged that blood comes squirting out of his whatever, it’s a good approach. NPDs HATE the idea that someone would find them so pathetic as to feel sorry for them. But they’re not above using it to fuck you over even harder.
Always…laughing at them is the worst thing you can do. The utter worst.
zhena gogolia
Brilliant response from Buttigieg.
ETA: With the added value of being true.
schrodingers_cat
OT: Balloon Juice Hive Mind: In yesterday’s thread about the history and philosophy of the Hindu right someone just left two overly long comments, longer than my post even of whataboutery. Should I answer them or ignore them?
Link here if you want to take a look.
https://balloon-juice.com/2019/09/04/guest-post-orange-fever-in-india/#comments
zhena gogolia
@schrodingers_cat:
Ignore! tl;dr is a great principle
RAVEN
A world become one
Of salads and sun
Only a fool would say that
A boy with a plan
A natural man
Wearing a white stetson hat
Unhand that gun begone
There’s no one to fire upon
If he’s holding it high
He’s telling a lie
I heard it was you
Talkin’ ’bout a world
Where all is free
It just couldn’t be
And only a fool would say that
The man in the street
Draggin’ his feet
Don’t want to hear the bad news
Imagine your face
There is his place
Standing inside his brown shoes
You do his nine to five
Drag yourself home half alive
And there on the screen
A man with a dream
I heard it was you
Talkin’ ’bout a world
Where all is free
It just couldn’t be
And only a fool would say that
Anybody on the street
Has murder in his eyes
You feel no pain
And you’re younger
Then you realize
I heard it was you
Talkin’ ’bout a world
Where all is free
It just couldn’t be
And only a fool would say that
https://youtu.be/06a19-S77F4
satby
@Brachiator: and Mayor Pete, while saying he feels pity for not just the *president but all of us, makes it clear that these daily episodes show that Trump is unfit for office. He doesn’t let any of them off the hook.
Roger Moore
@tokyokie:
I think it’s a toxic mixture of the two. The original stupid statement about the hurricane hitting Alabama was a result of him losing the ability to remember important details. The follow up, where everyone around him has to pretend he never made a mistake that he obviously did make is a result of his narcissism refusing to accept that he might be fallible. The combination is worse than either one separately.
John Revolta
@Roger Moore: This is correct. Trump is doing his job. He doesn’t care what we’re talking about as long as we’re not talking about all the corrupt shit he and the 1%ers are pulling behind the scenes.
zhena gogolia
@schrodingers_cat:
“Mr. Cat”
Droppy
Perhaps the best thing about Pete getting the nomination would be watching the republicans sputtering about how unqualified the young whipper-snapper is compared to ….
schrodingers_cat
@zhena gogolia: I is a Tom Cat, Mrrow.
Jay C
And astonishingly (not) – he was still at it late Thursday afternoon; tweeting gibberish about how he’s looking after Alabama, while the “Fake Media” is ignoring their plight. Or something.
Yarrow
I love this Sharpie story. It’s hilarious and easily shows just how thin-skinned he is, even at the cost of misleading the public on matters of public safety. It’s a winner.
Across the pond, the perfect hashtag for Boris has been found. You have to watch the short video to really get it:
#PleaseLeaveMyTown
MattF
I like this one:
https://mobile.twitter.com/carriesmith1123/status/1169355778957991938
And, on topic, Trump has been doing the crazy for years. Makes it hard to distinguish degrees of crazy, and, btw, why bother?
schrodingers_cat
For a supposedly wealthy billionaire T sure has some cheap tastes. Who writes with a Sharpie? His penmanship is pretty terrible too.
The Moar You Know
@Brachiator: But it does. A lot. This is the second time in my adult lifetime, and I’m only in my fifties, that hordes of people have run interference for an utterly incompetent president, gravely impaired by mental issues, who has no business being anywhere outside of a nursing home, much less having executive control over the United States.
Reagan post 1986 was too mentally incompetent to appear in anything but the most scripted of public appearances and even then he still couldn’t keep the plot. Didn’t matter. He was good for the grift, good for the party, and they weren’t going to let him leave.
Take it back a few decades and Woodrow Wilson spent the last two years of his final term doing a good imitation of a boiled turnip and nobody did anything.
It’s not like the public didn’t know, either. Certainly Reagan was widely acknowledged to have serious mental issues by the midpoint of his second term. Wilson less so, but enough people knew his wife and cabinet were running things that it was discussed in the media of the day.
Nobody did anything. And that will be the case with Sharpie Boy as well, even though I suspect his issues are not disease, but severe NPD.
mrmoshpotato
LOL
Ruckus
@tokyokie:
He’s had the same personality his entire life. He has been able to live (as a fucking asshole) with it. This is different. There are more things going on now that show that he’s not living/thinking even for normal in his narcissistic world. He has taken a big step into dementia, and while I agree with your point that his normalcy isn’t actually normal, I don’t think what we are seeing is because of his “normal” lifelong personality. This is something more and it looks like dementia that I’ve seen close up.
Brachiator
Yep. Good point. It is also hard to defend. I’ve seem comments elsewhere from conservatives reduced to saying that it is unfair to point out Trump’s silly behavior, or that of his staff in trying to provide cover for him.
The Moar You Know
@schrodingers_cat: absolutely IGNORE.
Roger Moore
@schrodingers_cat:
I vote ignore. If it were a regular poster who was substantively addressing your points, it would make sense to respond. But given that it’s a new poster who is just dumping a bunch of non-responsive crap, all you’d be doing by responding is giving them undeserved credibility.
rikyrah
????
Jeff Sharlet (@JeffSharlet) Tweeted:
@dartmouth Update: Word is there are indeed dogs, but the dogs are not boarding buses, and it seems to be CBP (Customs and Border Protection), not ICE, stopping buses here near @dartmouth college as international students are beginning to arrive on campus: https://t.co/1s2lpPtmOE https://twitter.com/JeffSharlet/status/1169698393159077888?s=17
jl
Yeah, 25th Amendment time. Been time for that for a while, but now Trump is so far gone, he is wading into golden gotchas of the sort the corporate media cannot resist, as BC noted.
To bad the Trumspters, and the 99 percent of the Congressional GOP which has been captured by the Trumpsters, have declared invoking a constitutional amendment treasonous.
I think some cognitive dissonance there, but maybe that is just me. Or, GOPers with their little pocket Constitutions walk around with them in their hip pockets expressly so that they can sit on them at their convenience.
dmsilev
The media likes it because (a) it’s really really easy to explain, easy enough that even a newspuppet can understand, and yet at the same time it crystallizes so much of the day-to-day dishonesty and gaslighting that has been one of the defining characteristics of the Trump administration. And it’s the sort of thing that will stick in people’s minds: “Remember the time Trump magic-markered a hurricane map?”.
Also, I almost kind of miss Sarah Huckabee Sanders as Press Secretary; I’m sure the rhetorical knots she’d tie herself into defending this would have been nearly awe-inspiring.
Steeplejack
@schrodingers_cat:
Your link doesn’t point to a specific comment. Nym of the person?
ETA: I guess it’s J.A.Bibi.
tokyokie
@Roger Moore: I think you’re probably right about this little story manifesting from a mix of mental illnesses. If only there were some mechanism for removing him from office………….
Ben Cisco
Look, bottom line is, Emperor Cartagia’s gotta go.
TaMara (HFG)
@schrodingers_cat: Ignore them, I did. ;-)
zhena gogolia
@Droppy:
inorite?
MattF
@Brachiator: The current WaPo column from Ed Rogers is just exasperated. I stopped reading Rogers a while ago, but this one caught my eye.
dmsilev
@MattF: CNN aired that image, and a few other similar ones (The Wall, a golf ball next to a hole, and a couple more as well).
rikyrah
@schrodingers_cat:
I saw it early this morning. Wanted to thank you for it.??
Jeffro
Pity’s too weak a response.
I prefer something like, “Don’t even white supremacists deserve a president* with half a brain?”
Or perhaps, “I’m shattered. I’ve been told by the president* himself that he is always innocent, and never wrong. LIES!”
LOLOL
I think he was fixated on Alabama because his cunning little lizard mind thought that somehow this incredible CONCERN of his for the good people of Alabama was going to translate into votes for whomever runs against Doug Jones. “Oh THANK YOU MR PRESIDENT FOR WARNING US ABOUT THAT THAR HURRICANE…here, let me vote for the pedo in order to increase your odds of not being convicted/thrown out of office”
mrmoshpotato
@schrodingers_cat: Penmanship? Since when is scrawl or printing penmanship? :)
rikyrah
@Brachiator:
Maddow’s segment on this made it clear to me why this bothered me so:ACTUAL LIFE AND DEATH DECISIONS ARE MADE BASED UPON THESE MAPS
Geoboy
@The Moar You Know: In the opening pages of The Screwtape Letters C.S. Lewis quotes Martin Luther and St. Thomas More on the need to take Lucifer lightly. Luther says, “The best way to drive out the devil, if he will not yield to texts of Scripture, is to jeer and flout him, for he cannot bear scorn.” For his part, St. Thomas More writes, “The devil…that proud spirit…cannot endure to be mocked.”
Ruckus
@Roger Moore:
This. Exactly this.
This is somewhat how he’s gotten through life though. Does stuff he can’t pull off, gets caught, bluffs or pays off his way out of trouble and moves on, never learning anything. But now he’s not even in the level of control he is used to, he’s not interacting with the real world, only that massively fucked picture that revolves around in his head. But he seems to be less and less connected to that massively fucked picture. And that means he’s lost some or all of what little connection he’s had with the real world. His money, however much or little he’s actually had, protected him somewhat from reality. He has the use of much more but has little to no idea what is going on or what is happening around him.
Jeffro
@Jay C: He wants…NEEDS…Doug Jones out of office. Very badly.
Roger Moore
@schrodingers_cat:
I think Trump likes the Sharpie in part because it conceals how his cognitive decline has affected his penmanship.
jl
I remember Trump in interviews during the 2016 campaign bragging that his odd behavior (outrageous hate mongering and lying and fantasizing, actually, but I want to be civil) was just an act. He said he could be whatever he wanted to be, and would adopt a very presidential comportment, mien, manner and demeanor (yes, I went to the online thesaurus) once elected.
But, heck, he didn’t even have to do that to get out of this jam. All he needed were common sense and three words: ‘Sorry, I misspoke’. Or a few more ‘In the rush of preparing the disaster I mistakenly recalled an out of date map’. And kept the sharpie in the drawer. (Edit: even the Trumpster brain trust could have hashed out those reasonable cover stories over a few hours, even it would take a minute for normal people. Maybe they did.. but… Trump…)
Something seriously wrong in the head with this guy. But, we knew that already.
Quinerly
@RAVEN: ?
Brachiator
@The Moar You Know: Yeah, Lincoln and Churchill had deep bouts of depression, but Trump seems to be gravely unfit. People who were there seem unwilling to talk honestly about Reagan. I was once at a dinner where the speaker, an LA Times reporter, hinted that everyone knew about Reagan’s problems, and I kept wondering why no one would write about it.
And of course, with Wilson, or FDR’s physical disability, people used to believe that discretion and simply carrying on was the better part of valor.
mrmoshpotato
@jl: He could be the bigliest at presidential!
ETA: and the nuclear! And the destruction is very important!
schrodingers_cat
@Brachiator: You had some really good and substantive questions in that thread. I answered some of them and am going to use that comment as a lift off point for another post. [email protected]rikyrah: I am glad you liked it. I am writing about history and people that are not familiar to most BJers, so I am never sure how much exposition is necessary and how much is too much.
SFAW
@schrodingers_cat:
1) If JA Bibi has useful info to digest, probably should read some of it. But that’s assuming the “Gateston Institute” (or whatever it was) is legit. If it’s a shill organization, then punt
2) What I want to know, Mr. Cat, is: how is husband kitteh doing re: your apparent sex-change (reassignment?) operation? I assume he was OK with it, but I realize it was completely your call.
Betty Cracker
@John Revolta:
Maybe you’re right, but I don’t think so. I’m convinced Trump is a malignant narcissist, and if that’s true, he cares very much about what other people think and say — his entire identity is based on it, and his sole motivations are attracting praise and avoiding shame. I don’t think he’s got enough strategic acumen to consciously try to distract us, at least not for a sustained period of time, and certainly not by deliberately making a fool of himself.
hilts
The media has glommed onto this story because it’s a hell of a lot easier to cover than violations of the emoluments clause or the other scandals swirling around this knuckle dragging neanderthal.
TenguPhule
@schrodingers_cat:
Only when it comes to food, clothing and accessories.
He pays top dollar for women and toilets.
Steeplejack
@schrodingers_cat:
Hmm . . . I read Bibi’s comments. My short answer is that there would be no shame in not responding.
That person has a whiff of the crank about them, with an arsenal of plausible statistics and links at the ready. Not saying they’re bogus, but in my experience that kind of commenter is a single-minded zealot who wants to draw you into the weeds of their chosen topic and invite you to “refute” each and every one of their points—which, obviously, they have spent way more time poring over than you have. It sounds like a prescription for disaster.
TenguPhule
@Betty Cracker:
After three years of observation contradicting that I’m gonna need to see some evidence first.
satby
If pity makes the tangerine traitor furious, then I can do pity in spite of how furious TT makes me. My real feelings run more toward contempt; but then Mayor Pete is a far nicer and calmer human being than I will ever manage to be.
MattF
@Brachiator: Also, the various crises we’re experiencing are all aggravated by Trump’s unfitness. In those earlier cases one could make a case for continuity being better than getting rid of the person in charge. Not here.
The Moar You Know
@Brachiator:
I can’t remember the event, but do recall I was 19, so 1986. Reagan was on TV. And he looked blown out. Lights on, but nobody home. I couldn’t have even spelled “Alzheimer’s” back then, never heard of it (the term was “senile” as I recall) but it was stunningly obvious that he had no idea what was going on or where he was. Freaked me out.
Back then, I was just some dumb metalhead kid who wanted to be a rockstar. If me back then could tell, everyone could.
zhena gogolia
@satby:
I occasionally feel a twinge of pity for him. Then I remember all the innocent people who are suffering because of him, and it goes away. They deserve my pity more.
SiubhanDuinne
Is the word “mumpsimus” new to you? It is to me, and it’s a perfect descriptor of the Canard à l’Orange. From Wikipedia:
Mumpsimus. This is going to be an important addition to my vocabulary, I can tell.
Mumpsimus. Trumpsimus.
Baud
It’s also a story that “nonpartisan” people can enjoy. The media loves those.
zhena gogolia
@Steeplejack:
It reminds me of Russian cranks. I don’t think it’s worth her time.
Steeplejack
@Jay C:
Reposted from downstairs: Dorian hits Alabama!
MJS
@TenguPhule: What do you think all the tweets are about? Why would he respond to Debra Messing, as an example, if he didn’t care very much about what she and those who follow her on Twitter, say? Why do you think he’s doing anything and everything, including stripping money from the military, to build his wall? Because he cares very deeply about what those who voted for him, and Fox News, and Ann Coulter, think and say about him. He does care, to the extent that those people are thinking and saying things about HIM.
satby
@zhena gogolia: yeah, mine is hatred and contempt. But if pity makes him furious, and if describing correctly the pathetic neediness and pitiable behavior starts to peel away the morons who swear that the TT “is a strong manly man sticking it to furious libs”, well, I can do pity for the greater good.
Just until that motherfucker is out of office. Then we’re moving to feeling vengeance.
MattF
@SiubhanDuinne: Note the origin story.
laura
@Ruckus: I’m always ready to argue about dementia. That his grifty criminal conspirator children and 3rd lady thought he’d be Jim dandy as President of our United States, when he’s unfit to serve in any capacity is well worth arguing about. Call those tools out along with every other Republican supplicant including the attorney general who’s chief task appears to be personal cover upper.
We ALL know trump sharpied the map. He signs everything with a sharply. That we didn’t see him hold it up for the fawning press like every other executive order is just a coincidence.
Does he have dementia? Does it matter?
He’s stupid, he sick and he’s a danger to self and others. And yet…. here we are.
The Dangerman
@Roger Moore:
I don’t know about the NPD, but I don’t think dementia is in play; if dementia WAS in play, Pence would find a 25th Amendment way of getting rid of the fucker in a heartbeat. I’m not sure that the 25th comes into play for being a raging narcissist…
…and his real problem, which is he is a truly ignorant POS. I think he thinks he can fool us with the Sharpie bullshit because, well, he’s an ignorant POS.
Ruckus
@hilts:
Most of the press also possibly knows that this just isn’t done. As people have said, people depend on these charts to help them make decisions about survival and he’s making a mockery of that, even if that isn’t his intent. Some things are just too real to be messing around with and hurricanes are one of those things. And after Katrina and all many people are not real happy with republican responses to their safety. Yes it’s easy, it’s also very important to a lot of people’s lives.
sdhays
@The Moar You Know: It’s my understanding that someone in the Cabinet claimed that they were gearing up to trigger the Amendment 25, but then Reagan walked into a Cabinet meeting and had a good day (or hour or whatever) and talk about the 25th Amendment just evaporated. It’s difficult to believe that they were so worried that he was so impaired that they were considering forcing him out, but were then convinced to drop it after one meeting, but that’s what they claim.
rikyrah
CVS and Walgreens said no more to the Open Carry folks
MJS
@laura: One of Trump’s tells that he’s lying (other than his lips are moving) is when he repeats himself. The “I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know” in rapid succession when asked who made the change on the map were a dead giveaway.
Brachiator
@schrodingers_cat:
Fantastic! Thanks very much.
There are tons that I do not understand about India, but I was impressed by the idealism of their democracy on obtaining Independence. They firmly told those who still had titles and princely states that those days were over, and they created a constitution and government that aimed to be inclusive. And at best India seemed to be a country so aware of the greatness of it’s past that it could confidently look to the future.
But this narrow, horrid nationalism seems to deliberately turn it’s back on that idealism and confidence. And of course we are seeing variations of this all over the world.
Roger Moore
@Brachiator:
There’s a huge difference between covering for FDR and covering for Wilson, Reagan, and Trump. The main job of the president is to take in information and use it to make decisions. That makes the president’s mental health much more of an issue than his physical health. A president who is mentally unwell, either from a personality disorder or as a result of general cognitive problems, is unfit for office in a way that one who suffers from a physical ailment is not. FDR’s need for a wheelchair didn’t affect his ability to make consequential decisions about the Great Depression or WWII; it didn’t even stop him from going to summit meetings in Tehran and Yalta. In contrast, Wilson, Reagan, and Trump clearly had their job performance affected by their mental problems.
chris
@schrodingers_cat: Ah, the old whatabout troll. Ignore.
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
I’ve felt sorry for the poor dumb fuck right from the beginning. From even before the beginning. I grew up outside Philadelphia. And Atlantic City is kind of part of the Philadelphia orbit, so when Trump was getting into gambling, we’d hear about it in the local news.
And it was plain even then, even to a dumb high school kid like me, that the guy was just all kinds of sad. He was so obviously desperately insecure and needy even then.
It’s hard not to feel at least a little bit sorry for such a pitiful guy. I mean, I know he’s fucking the country and the world over 53 ways every day, and so my pity is far outweighed by contempt. But the pity is in there.
Kay
@The Moar You Know:
SiubhanDuinne
@MattF:
Splendid Erasmus!
Dave
@zhena gogolia: I feel a degree of ugly pity for him. Pity is not often a kind emotion; ugly pity is of course worse. I pity him because he is so pathetic and desperate an obvious black hole. The closest I’ve seen to him experiencing anything resembling human joy is when he played big boy pretend in the truck.
That said I also have contempt and disdain for him there just isn’t anything to respect there. And his enablers that know better receive a double dose of that.
This story will fade eventually but maybe it’ll leave a modest but permanent mark and everyone of those helps. It is a simple small story that does perfectly encapsulate his pathology and the utter failure of those around him to act professionally, ethically, or even with a modicum of dignity. It’s just weird and pathetic in a way that is intuitive and easy to grok.
Yutsano
@zhena gogolia: He probably is suffering some internal and external tumults. The tumults he is directly causing others are infinitely worse. He’s very low on my totem pole for sympathy.
schrodingers_cat
The Hive Mind has spoken and I will obey.
On a more serious note, today is the second death anniversary of Gauri Lankesh who was killed for reporting the inconvenient truth.
SFAW
@RAVEN:
So are you now officially retired, a/k/a “a drain on society”?
If so: Congratulations!
kindness
Pity is fine but no substitute for throwing rotted vegetables. Of course then you have to dodge Secret Service. Decisions, decisions……
Ruckus
@laura:
I didn’t say excuse him because of it. Just explaining it as I see it.
There is no excuse for this asswipe. He is supposed to be in charge, and he obviously isn’t. So who is? At least some people voted for his ass, as stupid and ignorant as that was. Whoever is actually running the WH is doing a shitty job, and wasn’t voted in office to do so. We now have a country being run by a “family” member, just like a company is taken over by one of the kids when the parent can no longer do it. Someone, many someone’s are breaking the law, just like Nancy Reagan did.
Dave
@The Dangerman: Pence is too much of a natural toady amongst other things to make the 25th more than a passing thought in that places in same part of his his brain where he puts thoughts of being alone with a woman or the fine toned flesh of young people at the beach (I could be wrong about this but I’d be genuinely surprised if he manages to go there.)
lurker dean
omg, he just made an admiral issue a statement that alabama was originally at risk. LOL
SFAW
@Roger Moore:
You seem to be under the impression that his job was something other than the attempted destruction (aided and abetted by Moscow Mitch) of a(n) United States which acts similar to the ideals it used to profess. So, I’d say he’s been pretty effective.
chris
@SFAW: The Gateston Institute is a real thing and John Bolton’s former wingnut welfare stipend.
John Revolta
@Betty Cracker: Oh he’s a malignant narcissist for sure. Whether he cares about what the great unwashed think about him I don’t know. but it doesn’t matter really. His job is to distract us, whether
he knows it or not. And sadly, he’s good at it.
SFAW
@lurker dean:
What, Ronny Jackson wasn’t available?
Steeplejack
@SFAW:
Gateston Institute. Anti-Muslim and accused of putting out “fake news.”
Roger Moore
@Betty Cracker:
I think Trump is acting the way he acts because he’s simultaneously an blithering idiot and a malignant narcissist. I agree that he is not doing this stuff out of a deliberate plan to distract from the other stuff he’s doing, if only because it’s clear he wants to be allowed to openly parade his corruption. That said, his constant shit fusillade has the practical effect of focusing attention on him, him, him, which is very helpful in keeping the focus away from the way his supporters in the 0.01% are robbing the rest of us blind.
SFAW
@chris:
Thanks. I was suffering from Pantloadia — the disease where you’re too fucking lazy to do your own research.
lurker dean
@SFAW: maybe if it had been earlier in the day, at this time of day ronny is half in the bag, lol. plus, if there is anything the idiot is good at, it’s humiliating everyone around him. it must’ve been the admiral’s turn.
Steeplejack
@zhena gogolia:
Yeah, you can find the cranks in any subject that is even mildly controversial—and some that aren’t.
patrick II
I think what makes sharpie-gate so auspicious is its total detachment from any meaning other than Trump is acting like a ill-behaved second grader. Most stupid things he does have some purpose. Many people think trade with China needs adjustment even if trade wars is an inept way to manage change. Many feel we must manage immigration more strictly, and even Trump’s policy there stems from pathological meanness as much as stupidity. Even his personal vindictiveness has purpose: to dominate and subjugate. But sharpie-gate is like a scientific experiment where all other variables have been removed. His vapid stupidity stands starkly visible, isolated and alone from any possible context.
Brachiator
@Roger Moore:
Yes, totally agree. But part of my point here was that with Wilson and FDR, there was a tradition of respectful reverence that permitted a veil of discretion to be placed over presidents and high government officials. FDR was rarely if ever shown in photographs struggling to walk. But yes, until his last years in office, FDR didn’t have health problems that affected his ability to do his job.
Trump may be exploiting the remnants of this deference.
Dan B
The pity and sorrow approach for Trump and supporters is great, especially for the Koch related in laws. Pointing out facts to them results in pushback. Pitying their idol and feeling sad for supporters will put them on their heels. T’day and Xmas may be saved.
Jay
@schrodingers_cat:
It it’s a load of crankfest or Modi propaganda, make your case to a Front Pager and see if they are willing to delete the comments and banhammer the crank/troll/Modi bot?
SiubhanDuinne
@patrick II:
I totally heard this sentence in Narrator Voice.
RAVEN
@SFAW: Nah, I’m the hated white male, I eeeeeeeaaaaaannnnnned it!
FelonyGovt
@schrodingers_cat: Ignore. Anyone who responds to your thoughtful, informative post with “Google is your friend. Use it” can go pound sand.
schrodingers_cat
@Jay: It is pretty much that. Muslims is stealing our wimmen and conflating terrorists with the entire population of the valley.
patrick II
@SiubhanDuinne:
Thanks. I felt I was kind of hitting the nail on the head there. I wish had put that comment somewhere other than near the end of a dead thread.
debbie
I hope #SharpieGate goes on forever. Each instance will drive Trump madder and madder.
debbie
Trump’s going to need a giant fistful of Sharpies to get himself out of his pending Mideast peace “vision” fail.
HuCat
Pretty sure a concerned staff member located the South Florida Water Management District spaghetti plot in his defense, because I doubt that he could find https://www.sfwmd.gov/ if it was bookmarked on his preferred personal communication device.
laura
@Ruckus: my bad, I’m all in on Team Ruckus and apologize for the misunderstanding. It’s just that I have grievous anger at those who could/should have dissuaded him from running in the first place. I hope we’re cool.
Gelfling 545
@The Dangerman: Dementia could well be in play with Pence hoping to get him re-elected in 2020 and then boom! President Pence. As far as the raging narcissism, he was that before he was elected. Presumably his supporters, Pence included, saw it as no impediment.
Felanius Kootea
@schrodingers_cat: Ignore, “Mr. Cat.” What a waste of time it was reading those two comments.
Gin & Tonic
Jeez, go for a long bike ride and I get a front-page shoutout.
Brachiator
@schrodingers_cat:
I would definitely ignore the comments.
Roger Moore
@Gelfling 545:
The big problem with the 25th Amendment is that it was written contemplating the president being genuinely incapacitated, not him being mentally unfit for office but superficially functional.
Mo MacArbie
@Dave: I see what you did there.
Gin & Tonic
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.):
I’m managing.
Uncle Cosmo
@Brachiator: @Leto: @Brachiator: @jl:
WILL YOU GODDAMNED IMBECILES KINDLY READ THE FUCKING AMENDMENT FOR ONCE??!?!?!?!? Here’s the applicable text (Section 4):
So long as someone who can sign Twitler’s name for him (I’m looking at you, Stephen “Reinhard Heydrich’s Mini-Me” Miller) sends that notification to the designated recipients within the allotted interval, Wussolini (or more likely his marginally-competent staff) remains in charge until & unless 2/3 of both houses of Congress vote to sideline him in favor of the former Stupidest Member of the House of Representatives, i.e., Mikey Dense. Considering that the only chance GOP members of Congress have of surviving the election (or surviving at all, if some 27-percenter decides to invoke a Second Amendment solution to “treason against Trump”) is not to piss off Needy Amin’s base, what chance would there be of such a vote? It would be easier to impeach the mofo – you only need a majority in the HoR – & no more difficult to have him convicted & removed by the Senate.
TL;DR version: It’s harder to sideline a POTUS via the 25th Amendment than to impeach & remove him. And it was designed to be that hard in order to forestall a “palace coup” attempt by VPOTUS every other month.
debbie
@Uncle Cosmo:
Your tone is uncalled for.
Bill Arnold
@schrodingers_cat:
The commenter presumed that you are male which was a big tell in context. The actual content sounds like a cultural translation of the anti-islam talking points spewed by some of my right wing jewish acquaintances.
You’re on their radar now so might want to arrange for a ban hammer for future posts if and only if it continues to be abusive.
Brachiator
@Uncle Cosmo:
No shit, Sherlock.
I’ve consistently said that Trump has been and will continue to be protected by the GOP leadership. So, no impeachment or 25th Amendment relief will likely be called into play. So, I guess I could flash the snark sign or wave an irony flag every post, but I assume a certain degree of understanding from most folks who read these threads.
Gravenstone
@schrodingers_cat: Glanced briefly at the second post. The dude doesn’t even know your gender, so clearly not a regular reader. So consider them a troll with an agenda and move on.
schrodingers_cat
@Brachiator: Especially considering that they did that despite the body blow of the partition. .
ET
I think that the press is covering it because it perfectly incapsulates what is wrong with tRump in a way that is easy and graphic for the average viewer.
catclub
Mockery and pity both drive conservatives nuts.
My suggested talking point is “people are laughing at Trump”
“The world is laughing at the US for electing Trump”
because that is the only thing he is concerned about.