Tag: Trump ego

‘Off the rails’: Inside Trump’s attempt to claim victory in his border wall defeat

After three weeks of pained negotiations to keep the federal government open, President Trump almost blew the whole thing up again on Thursday.

Headed for another defeat on his signature promise to make Mexico pay for a southern border wall, the president was frustrated after a briefing by Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and others on details of the final deal to avoid a shutdown, according to officials involved in the discussions. Trump threatened not to sign the legislation, the officials said, putting the government on the brink of another damaging shutdown.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) was on the phone with Trump at least three times during the course of the nerve-racking day, pressing him to stay the course and asserting that Democrats had actually lost the spending fight, two people familiar with the conversations said.

View the complete February 14 article by Robert Costa, Rachael Bade, Josh Dawsey and Seung Min Kim on The Washington Post website here.

Donald Trump’s Tan Result Of ‘Good Genes,’ Administration Official Tells NYT

Twitter users roasted the claim, with one calling it a “big lie.”

President Donald Trump’s famous orange-tinted tan is the result of “good genes,” a senior Trump administration official told The New York Times.

The official, who spoke to the Times on the condition of anonymity, was interviewed as part of an examination published Saturday of how the president maintains his carrot-colored complexion throughout the winter.

Aside from his genetic makeup, Trump relies on a powder (translucent, not bronzer, the Times noted) to achieve the look he wants ahead of TV appearances, the unnamed official said.

View the complete February 3 article by Hayley Miller on the Huffington Post website here.

Democrats and activists punish Trump with a new strategy: Ignoring him

The Washington Monument and President Trump are silhouetted on a snowy Monday as the president stops to talk to reporters at the White House. Credit: Jabin Botsford, The Washington Post

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, once one of President Trump’s biggest antagonists on Twitter, isn’t engaging the president these days — even after he went after the Massachusetts Democrat, her husband, and her beer. Trump didn’t come up in the Golden Globe Awards this year, a departure from the past two years where he was maligned repeatedly from the stage. A satirical cable show about him has been canceled. A group of rank-and-file House Democrats turned down Trump’s invitation to have lunch at the White House on Tuesday.

Trump, who recently pined about being lonely in the White House, is lately finding himself in a position he’s rarely been in over the past few years: Ignored.

His political cachet has been driven by an unerring ability to goad other people into fights that benefit him. The metric he cares about is owning the television ratings and national attention, more than polling or anything else.

View the complete January 17 article by Matt Viser on The Washington Post website here.

Donald Trump Googled Himself and Didn’t Like What He Saw

The following article by John T. Bennett was posted on the Roll Call website August 28, 2018:

Tech firms have ‘RIGGED’ search results against him, president alleges

President Trump lashed out at technology firms, singling out Google for what he says is biased search results intended to hurt him. Credit: Al Drago, CQ Roll Call file photo

President Donald Trump went after technology firms Tuesday morning, singling out Google by alleging its search settings are biased against him.

He used a pair of morning tweets to, as he often does, paint himself and fellow conservatives as the victims of a liberal conspiracy. In this incarnation of what is a running Trump narrative, he used this search topic to make his point: “Trump News.”

The president wrote that Google’s search is programmed to return “only the viewing/reporting of Fake New Media.” That means, in his view, the tech giant has its search function “RIGGED, for me & others, so that almost all stories & news is BAD.”

View the complete article here.

Military parades are about ego and power. Of course Trump wants one.

The following article by Ishaan Tharoor was posted on the Washington Post website February 8, 2018:

It’s unclear whether President Trump will get the military parade he so keenly desires. My colleagues first reported Tuesday that the White House is pushing the Pentagon to stage a grand spectacle down Pennsylvania Avenue in the same vein as France’s Bastille Day parade — which Trump not coincidentally attended and admired last year. In the same week we heard the president call his political opponents “treasonous” for not clapping at the State of the Union address, we now contemplate his excitement for the sort of martial display these days more associated with single-party states and irredentist autocrats.

Trump, who fondly refers to “my generals” and espouses a decidedly militarist agenda, now thinks it’s his turn. “We’re all aware in this country of the president’s affection and respect for the military,” Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said Wednesday. “We have been putting together some options. We will send them up to the White House for decision.” Continue reading “Military parades are about ego and power. Of course Trump wants one.”

Why Trump administration officials try so hard to flatter him

The following article by Xavier Marquez was posted on the Washington Post website January 10, 2018:

President Trump is accompanied by Vice President Pence, right, and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, left, at the first meeting of the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity in July. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)

We’ve been learning lately that people close to President Trump flatter him publicly, while apparently bad-mouthing him behind his back.

The flattery can seem over the top. On CNN on Sunday, White House aide Stephen Miller called Trump a “political genius.” In a December Cabinet meeting, Vice President Pence praised Trump so effusively that it prompted widespread mockery and comparisons to authoritarian cults of personality. And those weren’t the first. In June, national observers were similarly startledafter members of the Cabinet took turns praising him in barely believable terms.

Meanwhile, private opinions seem quite different, according to many reports — most recently Michael Wolff’s book, “Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House,” — which suggest that many White House staff actually look down on Trump’s capacities. Continue reading “Why Trump administration officials try so hard to flatter him”

It’s ‘very gold’: The presidential coin undergoes a Trumpian makeover

The following article by David Nakamura and Lisa Rein is posted on the Washington Post website December 22, 2017:

Virginia coin collector John Wertman with his official President Trump “challenge coin.” (Bill O’Leary/The Washington Post)

For two decades, the commander in chief has doled out distinguished-looking coins as personal mementos. Now, the presidential “challenge coin” has undergone a Trumpian transformation.

The presidential seal has been replaced by an eagle bearing President Trump’s signature. The eagle’s head faces right, not left, as on the seal. The 13 arrows representing the original states have disappeared. And the national motto, “E pluribus unum” — a Latin phrase that means “Out of many, one” — is gone.

Instead, both sides of the coin feature Trump’s official campaign slogan, “Make America Great Again.” Continue reading “It’s ‘very gold’: The presidential coin undergoes a Trumpian makeover”

Trump pays tribute to the military, the U.N. and Americans by paying tribute to himself

The following article by Philip Bump was posted on the Washington Post website September 18, 2017:

President Trump paid his first visit to the United Nations as the country’s chief executive Monday, making the 20-block trip from Trump Tower to meet with other world leaders and offer his thoughts on the future of the international organization.

He began his remarks in a way we no longer even find terribly surprising.

U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley introduced Trump, saying the president was “no stranger to change.” Continue reading “Trump pays tribute to the military, the U.N. and Americans by paying tribute to himself”

Matt Damon Reveals How Donald Trump Would Demand A Cameo If You Wanted To Film In One Of His

The following article by Dan MacRae was posted on the uproxx.com website September 2, 2017:

Matt Damon

As you might imagine from Matt Damon’s political philosophy, the man isn’t exactly a red-hatted Donald Trump devotee lining up to give a MAGA loyalty oath. In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Damon again provided his critique of Trump and shared a fascinating bit of trivia attached to Trump’s attempts to finesse his public image.

The Suburbicon star shared with THR a peculiar ego stroke that Trump allegedly made mandatory for productions looking to film in one of his buildings. Asked if he’d ever met Trump in person, Damon said no, but his first-hand experience dealing with Trump’s demands didn’t leave a positive impression at all. Continue reading “Matt Damon Reveals How Donald Trump Would Demand A Cameo If You Wanted To Film In One Of His”