Trump Was Treated Like The Reckless Child He Is – By His Own Staffers
The reality of Trump as a seditious, petulant, impulsive, self-serving, entirely childish, ketchup-slinging clown dictator continues to be etched into this infamous chapter in American history
by Bob Cesca
WASHINGTON, DC – You know those toy replica versions of steering wheels that can be attached to car seats, allowing kids to pretend like they’re driving, but they’re obviously not? I think we’ve all seen one. Maggie Simpson beeps the horn on her pretend steering wheel in the opening credits of The Simpsons.
It’s one of many ways we kindly deceive our kids into thinking something’s happening when it’s really not. Letters to Santa Claus are another commonly-known example of innocent parental trickery. Kids think they’re sending wish-list manifestos to the North Pole, when in fact it’s strictly an illusion.
Unsurprisingly, this is how administration officials handled some of Donald Trump’s most destructive decisions between Election Day 2020 and the insurrection.
During Tuesday’s January 6 committee hearings, new evidence was presented about things we already knew, and we learned a number of remarkable new details about the planning of this massive attempt to subvert democracy and overthrow the authority of Congress. Among them was further news that Trump has been engaged in alleged witness tampering, calling officials who’ve been subpoenaed by and testified to the committee about what they observed in Trump’s White House.
We also heard mindblowing testimony about how Trump signed executive orders that would authorize the Department of Defense to seize voting machines, while also appointing bottom-feeder, Diet Dr. Pepper addict, and Trump attorney Sidney Powell to be special counsel in charge of investigating the election. We had previously learned that Trump signed an order naming Jeffrey Clark as acting-attorney general after Bill Barr resigned.
One of the reasons why Barr resigned was because Trump wanted the Justice Department to seize the voting machines – without any legitimate probable cause, of course. When that was blocked, Trump tried the Pentagon. He believed the executive orders were real, but it turns out, both White House counsel Pat Cipollone and Rudy Giuliani were opposed to the Sidney Powell aspect of the plot, leading White House officials to never actually implement the plan.
From there, Rudy shopped the prong of the order about seizing voting machines to Homeland Security where it was also stonewalled.
Ms. Powell testified that she thought Mr. Trump had appointed her as a special counsel to investigate the election fraud claims. But the testimony played by the committee revealed that Mr. Cipollone strongly objected to such a move and essentially killed it by refusing to do the paperwork needed for such an appointment.
In other words, both Trump and Powell thought she was special counsel, much like Trump, for a time, though Jeff Clark was his new attorney general. The only reason it didn’t happen is because “Patsy Baloney” never actually filed the appropriate paperwork. In other words, Trump was driving with a toy steering wheel.
Rachel Maddow pointed out during MSNBC’s prime time coverage that all things considered, the White House undermined the authority of the president – but in this case, for a damn good reason. It also corroborates the article written by “Anonymous” (Miles Taylor) that there were staffers of conscience who had been doing that all along.
But I caution that we not deify these people as heroes. Many of them were around Trump for some of his most heinous trespasses against democracy, not to mention how not one of them spoke up while he bungled and sabotaged the response to COVID, leading to 400,000 deaths during his final year in office. Sure, some of them might’ve leaked information (real or fake) to Maggie Haberman. But none of them resigned or stepped forward to blow the whistle on their despotic chief executive.
Pat Cipollone, Cassidy Hutchinson, Bill Barr, Eric Herschmann, and the others may appear heroic now, and their testimony has surely been valuable, but bear in mind that they’ve been compelled by law and under penalty of perjury to tell the truth about what they observed – now, a year and a half after Trump skulked off to Mar-a-lago after failing to overthrow democracy.
Meantime, the myth of Donald Trump – his self-authored hagiography – continues to be immolated by the fiery evidence emerging from Bennie Thompson’s committee and it’s near-flawless work. The reality of Trump as a seditious, petulant, impulsive, self-serving, entirely childish, ketchup-slinging clown dictator continues to be etched into this infamous chapter in American history. And here’s hoping that process continues until he’s either imprisoned or forced to flee the nation under an assumed name.
Read the latest for Banter Members:
Joe Biden And The Hard Question
This is not the question anyone desperate to preserve democracy in America wants to answer. But they must.
by Ben Cohen
I have thought long and hard about writing this piece. Since Joe Biden won the Democratic primary back in 2020, I have defended him from the far left and far right for one primary reason: he was (and is) the only force preventing the collapse of democracy in America. I also like Biden personally and believe he is an extremely decent man..
To continue reading this piece, go here.
Lessons learned by Republicans: none. Just ask Rusty Bowers, AZ State Senate leader, self-proclaimed patriot, who would gladly vote for Trump after eveything that happened. The Idiocracy is here, and its Dear Leader awaits his re-election, by whatever means necessary.