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      in Elections

      Five bizarre moments from Trump's interview with Laura Ingraham

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      Donald Trump

      In a particularly odd Fox News interview, the president riffed on Biden’s ‘shadow people’ and compared police shootings to golf

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      0:59

      ‘Dark shadows’ are controlling Joe Biden, claims Trump – video

      On Monday night, Fox News broadcast the first part of an interview between Donald Trump and Laura Ingraham. The primetime host is one of the president’s chief boosters, having spoken on his behalf at the Republican convention in 2016.
      But things did not go entirely smoothly.
      Echoing the fallout from recent one-on-ones with Chris Wallace of Fox and Jonathan Swan of Axios, much tougher interrogators, Trump’s rambling, confused, conspiracy-tinged answers swiftly dominated the news agenda. Even by his own standards, the interview contained some bizarre and outrageous statements.
      Part two is due on Tuesday night. But according to the influential Politico Playbook newsletter, “very many people in the White House who would like Trump to win re-election are against the sit-down TV interviews the president has been doing.”
      Here are five reasons why:
      1. Biden and the shadow people
      Amid an extended riff about the Democratic nominee being a “weak person” unable to deal with protests over racism and police brutality in many US cities, Trump said: “I don’t even like to mention Biden, because he’s not controlling anything. They control him.”
      Ingraham gave Trump a chance to develop the thought: “Who do you think is pulling Biden’s strings? Is it former Obama officials?”
      Trump didn’t think that.
      ‘People that you’ve never heard of,” he said. “People that are in the dark shadows. People that –”
      Ingraham interjected: “What does that mean? That sounds like conspiracy theory. Dark shadows, what is that?”
      “No,” said Trump. “People that you haven’t heard of. They’re people that are on the streets. They’re people that are controlling the streets.” More

    • 150 Shares159 Views

      in US Politics

      Melania Trump taped making derogatory remarks about Donald and Ivanka – report

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      Melania Trump will speak at the Republican national convention on Tuesday night, in the shadow of an extraordinary report that she was taped making derogatory comments about her husband’s adult children and even Donald Trump himself.On Monday the media reporter Yashar Ali cited unnamed sources in reporting that Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, a former friend and adviser, “taped the first lady” and plans to share the remarks in her book.They include “harsh comments about Ivanka Trump, the president’s elder daughter and a senior adviser”, Ali wrote.Melania & Me is out on 1 September.The US continues to digest the publication, by the Washington Post, of tapes of Donald Trump’s older sister, Maryanne Trump Barry, calling the president “cruel” and criticizing his character and behavior.Those tapes were made surreptitiously but legally by Mary L Trump, the president’s niece, who released a bestselling book in July, Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man.Simon & Schuster published Mary Trump’s book and one by John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser. It will publish Melania & Me.In publicity material, the publisher says Wolkoff, a long-term friend of Melania Trump “was recruited to help produce the 58th presidential inaugu­ration and to become the first lady’s trusted adviser”.“… Then it all fell apart when she was made the scapegoat for inauguration finance irregularities. Melania could have defended her innocent friend and confidant, but she stood by her man, knowing full well who was really to blame. The betrayal nearly destroyed Wolkoff.”Fundraising for Trump’s inauguration has been the subject of investigations by the special counsel and authorities in New York, New Jersey and the District of Columbia, which alleged fundraising was used to enrich Trump family members.The White House did not immediately comment on reports about Wolkoff’s book but last weekend, responding to his sister’s comments, the president indicated he has grown used to such news.“Every day it’s something else,” Trump said. “Who cares?”Evidently, publishing companies do. Melania & Me is the latest in a stream of tell-alls due out before the election in November. The former personal lawyer Michael Cohen and former campaign aide Rick Gates – both convicted in cases arising from the work of special counsel Robert Mueller, Gates a figure in the inauguration case – have books on the way. So does the former Mueller prosecutor Andrew Weissmann.HR McMaster, national security adviser before Bolton, has a memoir coming out this month. The Watergate reporter Bob Woodward also has a new Trump book coming.Melania has been the subject of previous books including Free, Melania by Kate Bennett and Melania: The Art of Her Deal by Mary Jordan.From Wolkoff, Simon & Schuster promises a “candid and emotional memoir” which will answer questions about many of the most scandalous and salacious moments of the Trump presidency. Among them: “How did Melania react to the Access Hollywood tape” – in which Donald Trump infamously boasted of grabbing women “by the pussy” – “and her husband’s affair with Stormy Daniels”, which Trump denies but which remains a cause of legal trouble and political jeopardy.“Does she get along well with Ivanka?” the publisher asks. “Why did she wear that jacket with ‘I really don’t care, do u?’ printed on the back? Is Melania happy being first lady?“And what really happened with the inauguration’s funding of $107m? Wolkoff has some ideas …” More

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      in US Politics

      Hoax review: Fox News, Donald Trump and truth v owning the libs

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      On Saturday night, the Washington Post reported that Mary Trump Barry had been caught on tape accusing her brother, the president, of being an all-purpose piece of work who even cheated his way into college. As framed by Trump’s older sister, a federal judge who retired under an ethics cloud of her own, the president has “no principles. None.”As for his relationship to truth: “The lying. Holy shit.”Barry did not, however, have the media to herself. As the Post’s scoop was breaking, Jeanine Pirro was extolling Trump’s virtues in a primetime flight into fantasy.According to Pirro, “Trump made his own money and he hasn’t asked the government for it and he doesn’t cut deals while he’s in the government for his son and his family.”According to Barry, Trump was incredulous to be told she read books and didn’t watch Fox News.Welcome to the parallel universe, where reality can take a backseat to ratings and resentments. Into the morass dives Brian Stelter with his latest book, Hoax. Under the subtitle Donald Trump, Fox News and the Dangerous Distortion of the Truth, the CNN media critic chronicles the symbiotic relationship between the 45th president and Rupert Murdoch’s most famous product.Fox News has access and influence, Trump a megaphone, both enjoy a devoted followingIt has been win-win. Fox News has access and influence, Trump a megaphone, both enjoy a devoted following.To illustrate: in the fall of 2019, Attorney General William Barr reportedly traveled to New York to ask Murdoch to “muzzle” Andrew Napolitano, an in-house critic of Trump. But according to Stelter, Barr was also there to discuss “media consolidation”, at a time when the industry was rife with merger mania.In other words, the attorney general went to the mogul privately rather than having him come to the justice department, where people could see him and notetakers could be present.Yes, Fox News has given voice to those voters Barack Obama derided for clinging to their guns and religion and Hillary Clinton branded as irredeemably deplorable. But Fox News has also promoted baseless conspiracy theories and unhesitatingly stoked racial and cultural animus – as Stelter makes clear.Although Fox News did not embrace Obama and “birtherism”, it did not discourage it, offering Trump a platform to trash a sitting president. Stelter captures Steve Doocy, a host of morning show Fox & Friends, egging the one-time reality host on, describing him as someone “who we all know was born in this country”.More recently, host Jesse Watters has credited the QAnon conspiracy movement with uncovering “great stuff”. Tucker Carlson, meanwhile, singled out Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion’s WAP for its vulgarity but a few years ago voiced his approval of an email sent by his brother, Buckley Carlson, to a woman he labeled “LabiaFace” while referring to “dick fright”, “spooge neck” and “pearl necklacing”.In Carlson’s words, “I just talked to my brother about his response, and he assures me he meant it in the nicest way.” Then again, Blake Neff, a Carlson writer, was recently dismissed for posting racist and misogynist messages online.As narrated by Stelter, Fox News has deliberately and repeatedly downplayed the threat posed by Covid-19As narrated by Stelter, Fox News has deliberately and repeatedly downplayed the threat posed by Covid-19 for the sake of making Trump look good, even as the pandemic took hold in Arizona, Florida, Georgia and Texas, ie: Trump’s base. Hoax describes in granular detail internal measures taken in early March, as Covid’s blight was descending, and contrasts them with the wisdom fed to viewers.Hand sanitizer stations were “added to every door at Fox”, in-person meetings were scaled back, travel was curbed. Yet Sean Hannity and other hosts were talking out of “both sides of their mouth” – this being the same Hannity who in moments of candor reported by Stelter would label Trump “batshit crazy” or ask: “What the fuck is wrong with him?”In Stelter’s telling, “one minute Hannity was saying the virus was ‘serious’” and in the next breath he was “accusing other media outlets of ‘sowing fear’”. Hannity also attacked Andrew Cuomo, New York’s governor, and Bill de Blasio, New York City’s mayor, for “politicizing this national emergency”, admonishing them to “stop”.Pete Hegseth, another host, announced that the more he learned about Covid, the “less” there was to “worry about”.Now, the US death toll is approaching 180,000. Contrary to the president’s assurances, the virus shows no signs of disappearing.Viewers have argued to the Federal Communications Commission that “the network had blood on its hands”. In its successful defense of a Covid-induced lawsuit, Fox rightly argued that first amendment free speech protections can also shield misinformation. More

    • 163 Shares169 Views

      in US Politics

      William Barr told Murdoch to 'muzzle' Fox News Trump critic, new book says

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      The attorney general, William Barr, told Rupert Murdoch to “muzzle” Andrew Napolitano, a prominent Fox News personality who became a critic of Donald Trump, according to a new book about the rightwing TV network.Barr’s meeting with Murdoch, at the media mogul’s New York home in October 2019, was widely reported at the time, with speculation surrounding its subject. According to Hoax: Donald Trump, Fox News and the Dangerous Distortion of Truth, by CNN media reporter Brian Stelter, subjects covered included media consolidation and criminal justice reform.“But it was also about Judge Andrew Napolitano.”Stelter’s in-depth look at Fox News, its fortunes under Trump and its links to his White House will be published on Tuesday. The Guardian obtained a copy.In early 2019 it was reported that Napolitano, a New Jersey superior court judge who joined Fox News in 1998, told friends he had been on Trump’s shortlist for the supreme court. But he broke ranks later in the year, labeling Trump’s approaches to Ukraine, seeking political dirt on rivals, “both criminal and impeachable behavior”.“The criminal behavior to which Trump has admitted,” Napolitano wrote, in a column dated 3 October, “is much more grave than anything alleged or unearthed by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, and much of what Mueller revealed was impeachable.”Citing an unnamed source, Stelter writes that Trump “was so incensed by the judge’s TV broadcasts that he had implored Barr to send Rupert a message in person … about ‘muzzling the judge’. [Trump] wanted the nation’s top law enforcement official to convey just how atrocious Napolitano’s legal analysis had been.”Barr has been widely accused of riding roughshod over the rule of law, in service of Trump and his own authoritarian view of the presidency.Though Barr’s words to Murdoch “carried a lot of weight”, Stelter writes, “no one was explicitly told to take Napolitano off the air”. Instead, Stelter reports, Napolitano found digital resources allocated elsewhere, saw a slot on a daytime show disappear, and was not included in coverage of the impeachment process.In Stelter’s telling, Napolitano thought he was being kept off air by “25-year-old producers” who didn’t think viewers could handle his analysis. Stelter, however, says an unnamed “twentysomething staffer” confirmed that one host, Maria Bartiromo, would only book Napolitano to discuss non-Trump topics, because he would upset Bartiromo too much if he criticised the president.Fox News’ audience remains loyal to Trump as his campaign for re-election continues. Some Fox employees, Stelter writes, “justified the benching of the judge by claiming that viewers hated him: ‘Why are we going to book someone who kills our ratings?’”Napolitano has continued to appear on Fox News and to publish opinion columns. He has remained critical of Trump, for example slamming the actions of federal officers sent to confront protesters in Portland, Oregon; opposing attempts to provide coronavirus relief without congressional involvement; and saying Senate Republicans should have called new witnesses in the president’s impeachment trial.He has also had harsh words for Barr, for example calling his conduct in the case of Trump ally Roger Stone “Stalinistic”; blasting his handling of the Mueller report to Trump’s advantage; and hitting him for “insulting” Congress.Napolitano did, however, back Barr’s attempt to drop charges against Michael Flynn, Trump’s first national security adviser who pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about contacts with Russian officials. More

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      in US Politics

      Trouble for Trump as Fox News praises 'enormously effective' Biden speech

      by

      Joe Biden

      Republican pundits accept success of Biden’s convention address as Trump’s bid to portray Democratic rival as radical leftist falls flat
      Iowa: Trump clings to narrow lead as Biden closes in

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      5:22

      ‘Light is more powerful than dark’: Joe Biden accepts presidential nomination – video

      Under pressure on the last day of the Democratic convention, Joe Biden “hit a home run” with an “enormously effective” speech that blew “a big hole” in Donald Trump’s efforts to paint him as a mentally faltering captive of his party’s left wing.
      And that was to hear Fox News hosts Dana Perino and Chris Wallace tell it.
      “It was a very good speech,” added Karl Rove, a Republican strategist respected and reviled on either side of the aisle.
      Democratic hopes were riding high that when Biden rose to accept the presidential nomination on Thursday night, he might deliver the kind of speech to get voters nodding their heads instead of nodding off, and cable pundits talking about “momentum”.
      Broadcast to tens of millions, Biden’s speech marked the first truly national moment of the 2020 campaign, with the formal conclusion of the Democratic primary on one hand, and the first clear picture of the presidential showdown – Biden v Trump, Uncle Joe v Maga Don – on the other.
      At a minimum, Democrats hoped, Biden would avoid the kind of verbal slips the Trump campaign has been using eagerly, if ironically given their own candidate’s cha-chas with incoherence, to attack him.
      But when Biden was done speaking on Thursday in Wilmington, Delaware, with one arm around Dr Jill Biden, fireworks in the background and his smile as wide as the country, Democrats were not alone in realizing that their nominee had not only connected – he had nailed it.
      “I went in there with expectations of adequate, and he knocked it out of the park,” said longtime Republican strategist Mike Murphy, a harsh Trump critic, on an overnight podcast Hacks on Tap. “It was so authentic to who Biden is, and … it caught the mood of the country, which is unity, steady, competence, ‘We can rise above this’.
      “I thought Biden had the moment of his life, and he ought to feel really good about that.”
      Trump sought to steal Biden’s big moment with campaign stops outside Biden’s home town of Scranton, Pennsylvania, that afternoon. After a speech at an airstrip the president visited a pizza parlor, where he was filmed hoisting a pie, without a face mask, as staff members, all wearing masks, snapped photos and waved excitedly.
      “They supposedly have the best pizza,” Trump told reporters. “We’ll let you know in about a half-hour.” More

    • 113 Shares119 Views

      in US Politics

      Newsweek apologizes for op-ed that questioned Kamala Harris’ citizenship

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      Magazine’s opinion editor and editor-in-chief ended note by saying op-ed would remain on the site Newsweek has apologized for an op-ed that questioned the California senator Kamala Harris’ American citizenship and her eligibility to be Joe Biden’s running mate, a false and racist conspiracy theory which Donald Trump has not dismissed.“This op-ed is being used by some as a tool to perpetuate racism and xenophobia. We apologize,” read Newsweek’s editor’s note on Friday, which replaced the magazine’s earlier detailed defense of the op-ed. Continue reading… More