Not sure if you’ve heard the news, but the president of the United States is old! Just look at him! That gray hair. Those pronounced forehead furrows. That slight forward tilt when he walks. And he sometimes stutters a bit—perhaps because of the lifelong stuttering problem he’s worked so hard to overcome. But let’s just pretend that’s “an age thing,” too, and he’s cognitively impaired!
Whatever are we going to do about it? Maybe we need a candidate three years younger, who thinks he ran against someone he never ran against, believes World War II is right around the corner, and is certain he can solve California’s seemingly intractable drought problem very easily, even though he didn’t lift a finger to help during the four years he was president.
Or … maybe not. You may have already seen that Donald John Trump gave a “speech” to the California GOP Friday night. And it was bad. Really bad. Even by Trump standards. It was like gaping into a yawning Icelandic hellmouth—or a chupacabra’s eyes as it takes a dump on your lawn.
Take your pick. It defies easy description—perhaps that’s why so few media outlets are bothering to describe it.
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Here’s a short list of the lowlights from Trump’s Anaheim adventure, courtesy of the enemy of our enemy, Republicans against Trump.
For the non-xweeters:
Imagine if Biden in just one speech:
-Mocked a Republican who was assaulted and got badly injured
-Said “MotherFu*ker”
-Said that people in OH smell
-Said he could win a state where he lost by 30%
-Claimed to have a solution to the fires in CA: “Dampen Your Forests”.
-Promised to prosecute his political opponents.
Why is the media not covering it as a huge story? Where’s the wall-to-wall coverage of Trump’s threatening to execute General Milley?
The media is failing to do its job. Just like in 2016.
That’s not the rough synopsis of a “Veep” episode. Those are actual things the actual former president of the United States actually said. In public. To fawning applause from some of the very same folks who perseverate about Biden’s supposed mental decline over copious servings of bleach tea and blueberry-ivermectin scones.
But hey, seeing is believing, right? And this really needs to be seen to be believed.
(Partial) transcript!
TRUMP: “We’re not going to lose by 5 [points]. We’re going to win, we would win. I don’t believe it when they say it, but the state is rigged. It’s a rigged election, it’s a horrible thing, and we have to turn it back. This is a state that the right Republican can win and I think actually win easily. … No way we lose this state in a real election. If this was a real election, there’s no way. If we had a real election with the real polling booths, if you had real polling—you don’t have any polling booths. You have people signing something and dropping it in the mail, and who the hell knows what happens after that? It’s ridiculous.”
He goes on, but you get the point. Of course, he is right about one thing. The right Republican can win California—and that Republican is George H.W. Bush in 1988. However, in 2020, Biden won the state by nearly 30 points, or roughly 5 million votes. Also—and check me if I’m wrong about this, as I’m not a California resident—but I’m fairly certain the state has polling booths.
Just a hunch.
Transcript:
TRUMP: “All the currently dry canals will be brimming and used to irrigate everything, including your own homes and bathrooms and everything. You’re going to be happy, and I’m going to get it done fast. They say that there’s so much water up north that I want to have the overflow areas go into your forests and dampen your forests. Because if you dampen your forests you’re not going to have these forest fires that are burning at levels that nobody’s ever seen before.”
Wait, water is fire retardant? Why didn’t anyone ever think of that? They might have saved the Notre Dame Cathedral if only they’d known what Trump discovered for the first time a little more than four years ago.
Or not:
Here’s the translation of that tweet if, for some weird reason, you’re not fluent in French: “#NotreDame @PompiersParis Dropping water by plane on this type of building could indeed lead to the collapse of the entire structure. Alongside #sapeurspompiers who are currently doing their utmost to save #NotreDame.”
But hey, there might still be a germ of an idea here. Water impedes forest fires. That’s a good start. Let’s apply the tried-and-true “yes, and” principle to this and say, “Yes, and … it’s clearly time to redeem my freshly harvested brain at my local Piggly Wiggly in exchange for two scratch-offs and a lifetime supply of spongecake.”
But Trump wasn’t done making promises to the Golden State’s redhats. Why stop at stealing even more water from “up north? when there are shoplifters to get off the streets?
Transcript:
TRUMP: “And we will immediately stop all of the pillaging and theft. Very simply, if you rob a store, you can fully expect to be shot as you are leaving that store. Shot!” [Bloodthirsty weirdos in the crowd scream wildly like they did back in the day when The New Kids on the Block recommended extrajudicial killings of teen shoplifters.]
Yup. He wants to murder children who steal Milk Duds. But nothing to see here, right?
Transcript:
TRUMP: “If you don’t like somebody, or if somebody’s beating you by 10, 15, or 20 points like we’re doing with Crooked Joe Biden, let’s indict the motherfucker! Let’s indict them.”
Gee, remember when Republicans thought it was an outrage when past presidents dared to criticize their successors? No, really. They were saying these things as recently as three years ago.
The Hill, May 12, 2020:
Obama’s comments — blasting President Trump’s handing of the pandemic and the Justice Department’s decision to drop the case against former national security adviser Michael Flynn — appear to be irking Trump and some GOP lawmakers.
The president lashed out at his predecessor over the weekend, spawning the term “Obamagate,” while Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has called Obama’s comments on the coronavirus outbreak “classless.”
“I always think it is in the best interest of the country if you don’t have the constant critiques from a previous administration,” said Sen. John Thune (S.D.), the No. 2 Senate Republican. “I would rather that they keep their comments to themselves.”
And then we had Casper the Friendly Milquetoast making that same argument roughly five years ago:
Vice President Mike Pence called it “very disappointing” that Obama broke with the recent presidential tradition of not criticizing successors, and in an interview on Fox News on Sunday he scoffed at “the same tired arguments that he and liberals have made over the last eight years” — though he was presumably referring to the last 10 years, since Obama’s first campaign. “The truth is, the American people in 2016 rejected the policy and direction of Barack Obama when they elected President Donald Trump,” Pence said.
A former president also just dropped the word “motherfucker” into a stump speech! And while that might not seem like much of an insult to Pence, it sure is to everyone else. Where the fuck are these pearl-clutching motherfuckers now?
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Trump also made a really funny joke about Nancy Pelosi’s husband getting violently assaulted with a hammer. And by “funny,” I of course mean “deplorable and unhinged.”
Transcript:
TRUMP: “And we’ll stand up to crazy Nancy Pelosi, who ruined San Francisco. How’s her husband doing, by the way? Anybody know? And she’s against building a wall at our border even though she has a wall around her house—which obviously didn’t do a very good job.”
Maybe it’s finally time for Trump, Vladimir Putin, and Kim Jong Un to launch their long-awaited Medieval Torture Collar Comedy Tour. (Disclaimer: There will be no actual torture, unless they’re lucky enough to book Mike Huckabee as their warmup act. But that’s just common sense.)
So, yeah, maybe the media could start to highlight the fact that the GOP’s presidential frontrunner is clearly unwell.
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Or maybe CNN could just set a day or two aside to show this video on a loop:
Weird, right? But hey, Trump still dyes his hair and trowels moist adobe onto his face every morning, so clearly he’s not too old for the job.
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