So for…reasons? I guess? So for reasons, the Trump administration has decided to take a hardline stance AGAINST breastfeeding, and on a GLOBAL scale. In fact, Trump reps went to the World Health Assembly, and flat out told the assembly, and many countries that despite decades of science backing up the benefits of breastfeeding, that the US was NOT okay with the Assembly promoting breastfeeding programs, and would retaliate against many countries who would seek to employ that goal within the World Health Assembly. There is a lot of speculation as to the why of all this. I mean, it’s pretty baffling. The popular rumor is that Trump is really trying to help the formula industry because…who knows. Whatever the reason, it’s a weird situation. Frankly, I suspect something more childish.
I’ve been watching with a bit of excitement the development of this Trump baby blimp that was successfully funded. It’s truly a wonder in the sky, and it’s getting ready for it’s world tour! But thankfully, it will be in England while Trump is there, and I can’t hope enough he sees it floating in the sky some day. Because as we all know, Donald Trump has brought back a certain prestige and respect to the United States. Where a mere two years ago the whole world was laughing at us behind our backs, No ONE is laughing now! Everyone thinks Trump is this super serious, formidable intellect that no one would dare make fun of!
So I was born just late enough to be on the cusp of ironically enjoying the idea of making something “Facebook official”. The term, if you’re not familiar, presumes that once something is cemented on Facebook, namely relationship statuses, that it is Officially official. Because as we all know, life is the most real when it’s lived through our social media. Now I point out all of this to say, I think Michael Cohen has OFFICIALLY washed his hands of Donald Trump. Not because of interviews and announcements regarding his Investigation cooperation, but because he dropped his title of “Personal Attorney to Donald J. Trump” from his Facebook profile. Making it Facebook official must have been quite the blow to the Social Media conscious POTUS. Then again, I’m sure in few days we’ll be hearing that Michael Cohen didn’t’ know anything, that he barely knew Trump, and that he never worked on anything significant for Trump.
Donald Trump recently put out a tweet defending his writing prowess. Not before everyone had a field day with his spelling error which caused him to remove and fix the mistake. I personally found the spelling error less funny than the content of the tweet. Trump suggested that he doesn’t Tweet anything without considering every word, every capital letter. While the media “pours” over his tweets, looking for mistakes, he claims they will find none, because he is a genius writer. As he reminds us all, he has written many books, and those books, by his estimation, are groundbreakers. All of them. Hmmm…even, if we accept at face value that his books are any good, the level of credit he can really get for writing them is…questionable AT BEST. We know, for a fact, that he had little to do with actually constructing art of the deal. Tony Schwartz, the “co-author” has gone on record about the process of how that book came into existence. Most of the story involves Donald Trump rambling incoherently, Schwartz trying to make sense out of what he could, then basically making up the rest as he went along. The idea that Donald Trump is some gifted writer is a bigger fib than his claims that his Access Hollywood tape was just “locker room talk.”
Donald Trump wants us all to know that he DEFINITELY has the upper hand in this whole trade mess. I mean, well respected economists say Trump’s trade policies harken back to policies undertaken in the 80s, namely with Japan, that grew the trade deficit by like 500% in 10 years, but Trump is totally confident, so we all should be too, right? When he says that every country is every day calling him to deal on trade, we can take that at face value, right? Though it has been pointed out that back in the 80s, when we were playing a similar game with Japan, and things got worse, that Japan largely played ball, unlike say China and Canada, who are definitely not, imposing large tariffs of their own. LISTEN! Clearly everything is under control! I mean, what reason can we possibly have to think that Donald Trump, master deal maker, doesn’t know what he’s doing?
Despite Donald Trump’s constant self back pats about his unprecedented success in North Korea, there seems to be a growing cause for concern that MAYBE Kim Jong Un isn’t as committed to de-nuclearizing the peninsula as he first might have seemed. In fact, intelligence reports seem to indicate the exact opposite, with him expanding nuclear research sites and funding into fuel for nuclear weapons. Basically the EXACT opposite of what Trump “negotiated”. Now, pettier people might go for a fun little “I told you so!” number complete with laughter and finger pointing, but I do feel like it’s appropriate to point out that he’s not the first guy to get that promise out of a Kim on the exact same thing that never came to fruition. Though it might ache a little harder for Trump considering he couldn’t help talking up how unprecedented this whole thing was. I just wonder how long Trump will feel it’s appropriate to stay in denial about it before he finally decides he’s been had?
So while Trump continues to toot the horn of Kim Jong Un, insisting that he’s a good, true leader with integrity and loyalty, Kim Jong Un continues to show why he is very much none of those things. Recently a story broke that Kim ordered the execution of a Lieutenant General. Not for insurrection or corruption. Not for going off the rails as a military leader. No, this man’s crime was feeding his soldiers and their families. The Fiend! Seriously, in case anyone had forgotten, Kim Jong Un is a cruel dictator who keeps his people scared, hungry, and traumatized. The very last thing anyone, most especially the leader of the free world, should be doing, is trying to sell the merits of a monster.
So I feel like Trump might be starting to get a taste for pardons, even if they don’t constitute a political maneuver. In the last month he’s commuted the Sentence of Alice Marie Johnson, a woman who was in prison for a non-violent drug offense, at the urging of Kim Kardashian after a fun little meeting, and he also posthumously pardoned boxer Jack Johnson, with a room full of celebrities including Sylvester Stallone. When discussing the pardons, he talked about the “thrill” of these pardons, and it makes me think it’s just one of those random Presidential duties he’s taken a liking to. That said, it seems like there is a risk of him going…rather overboard. He’s openly admitted that he has a list of about 3000 names he’d like to look at pardoning, and if we’re being honest…I don’t know that I necessarily trust his judgment when it comes to who is deserving.
So Monday night, Trump went on stage during a rally in South Carolina, and riffed the way in that magical way that only Donald Trump can. He talked about all the things bugging him, he talked weirdly about David Lynch, Trade Wars, his wife’s non-facelift, some North Korea stuff, and then he weirdly got into late night comedians. I guess there was thing with Fallon where he came out to say he might have regretted aspects about his interview with Trump, and how he would have handled things differently, and Trump wasn’t too thrilled, especially since late night hosts in general have really made mocking Donald Trump’s behavior and actions a regular part of their nightly monologues. He went on to say that these guys just aren’t funny. No, it’s not that he doesn’t have a sense of humor. Donald Trump has a great sense of humor. And he’d be in pretty big trouble if he couldn’t laugh at himself…really? I can’t recall a time prior to or after the election that Don too a moment to laugh at himself. In fact, in his Comedy Central roast, an event where the sole purpose was for him to laugh at himself…well Trump largely looked offended the whole night, and rather famously complained that people pegged him wrong or just weren’t funny. Sound familiar?
Mind the Exit 