Tag: Trump wants to be a dictator

‘That’s something dictators do’: Here are the 5 most explosive moments from Trump Jr’s ill-fated appearance on ‘The View’

AlterNet logoAlthough GOP activist Meghan McCain often butts heads with liberal co-host Joy Behar on ABC’s “The View,” they have something in common: both of them have been highly critical of President Donald Trump. And when the president’s son, Donald Trump Jr. appeared on “The View” on Thursday along with ally Kimberly Guilfoyle, he was called out from both the left and the right.

Here are five of the most explosive moments from Trump, Jr.’s appearance on “The View.”

1.  Abby Huntsman corners Don Jr. for outing the whistleblower.

“The View’s” Abby Huntsman gave Trump Jr. hell for outing the Ukraine whistleblower, asserting that such a move is designed “to intimidate someone, to threaten someone, and to scare other people from coming out.”

View the complete November 7 article by Alex Henderson on the AlterNet website here.

Media is starting to grasp the master narrative of the Trump presidency: His attempt to maximize presidential power

AlterNet logoThis article was co-produced with Press Watch, a new website that monitors and critiques American political coverage.

The critical mass of evidence that Donald Trump accepts no limits when it comes to serving his own interests has increasingly emboldened mainstream political journalists to situate the drip-drip of new revelations within the master narrative of Trump’s presidency: That he has consistently distended and abused the powers of his office.

That is essential context, because it explains the otherwise inexplicable — and because it ineluctably calls attention to the post-Trump imperative to rebuild and reinforce the constitutional barriers to presidential tyranny that Trump and his accessories in the Republican Party have so profoundly corroded.

Veteran White House correspondent Stephen Collinson, who now writes for CNN.com, provided a master class in contextualizing the news on Tuesday. His article was pegged to the testimony from former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch about how she had run afoul of Trump’s personal fixer Rudy Giuliani, who was secretly extorting Ukrainian officials to incriminate Trump’s political rivals.

View the complete November 7 article by Dan Froomkin from Salon on the AlterNet website here.

Trump Threatens Government Shutdown To Thwart Impeachment

President Donald Trump, speaking to reporters from the South Lawn of the White House Sunday afternoon, refused to rule out a shutdown of the Federal government if Democrats don’t end the impeachment inquiry.

The president took time to erroneously frame the impeachment inquiry, falsely claiming it is over just his July 25 phone call during which he attempted to extort the president of Ukraine.

Asked if he would “commit to no government shutdown,” President Trump refused.

View the complete November 3 article by David Badash from AlterNet on the National Memo website here.

The Trump administration’s obsession with an ancient Persian emperor

Washington Post logoPresident Trump and his lieutenants have a penchant for Middle Eastern monarchs. In close to three years in power, the administration has courted or hosted virtually all the region’s unelected potentates, yoking its anti-Iranian agenda in part to the concerns of a clutch of Arab sheikhs and princes. But looming above them all is a royal ghost from the past.

On Tuesday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo commemorated a moment more than 2,500 years ago. “Today in 539 BC, Cyrus the Great entered Babylon and freed the Jewish people from captivity,” Pompeo tweeted. “His respect for human rights and religious freedom inspired America’s founding fathers. The U.S. stands with the Iranian people, who are blocked by the regime from celebrating his legacy.”

Pompeo was referring to a rather famous event in history. According to sources including biblical scripture, Cyrus allowed the Judeans deported and exiled following the ravages of Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar II to return to their homeland. His conquest of Babylon cemented his dominion over much of the lands we now consider to be the Middle East, an empire that stretched from the Indus River basin to the Mediterranean Sea. Like any other ancient warrior king, he presided over massacres and pillage, including a notorious incident immortalized by the ancient Greek chronicler Herodotus where Cyrus burned a vanquished foe and 14 young boys alive on a funeral pyre.

View the complete October 31 article by Ishaan Tharoor on The Washington Post website here.

Democrats threaten contempt after White House official refuses to testify

The Hill logoHouse Democrats are threatening to charge a key witness in their impeachment investigation with contempt after he defied a subpoena and failed to show up at the Capitol Monday morning.

Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said the lawsuit filed by Charles Kupperman, a deputy to former national security adviser John Bolton, questioning his obligation to appear before Congress “has no basis in law” since Kupperman is now a private citizen. 

Schiff said Democrats will forge ahead with their impeachment investigation, vowing not to let the White House bog their investigation down in the courts.

View the complete October 28 article by Mike Lillis and Olivia Beaver on The Hill website here.

Trump suggests Schiff be arrested for treason for exaggerating call with Ukraine

The Hill logoPresident Trump on Monday suggested House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) be arrested for treason, a crime punishable by death or prison time, for exaggerating parts of the president’s call with Ukraine’s leader.

In a series of morning tweets, Trump ripped Schiff and the anonymous whistleblower who raised concerns about Trump’s conduct on the call with the president of Ukraine, the latter of which has accelerated a Democratic impeachment inquiry into Trump.

“Rep. Adam Schiff illegally made up a FAKE & terrible statement, pretended it to be mine as the most important part of my call to the Ukrainian President, and read it aloud to Congress and the American people,” Trump tweeted. “It bore NO relationship to what I said on the call. Arrest for Treason?”

View the complete September 30 article by Brett Samuels on The Hill website here.

Trump demands to meet whistleblower and leakers of his Ukraine call

President Donald Trump asserted on Sunday that he’s entitled to meet the whistleblower whose complaint has entangled his administration and led to the opening of an official impeachment inquiry.

“Like every American, I deserve to meet my accuser, especially when this accuser, the so-called ‘Whistleblower,’ represented a perfect conversation with a foreign leader in a totally inaccurate and fraudulent way,” the president wrote on Twitter.

The tweet followed a morning of network appearances by Trump allies aimed at discrediting the complaint and the impeachment process, after reports that the president asked Ukraine to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden, a leading candidate for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination.

View the complete September 29 article by Rishika Dugyala on the Politico website here.

Trump energy speech in Pennsylvania sounded more like a campaign rally

MONACA, PENNSYLVANIA — President Trump criticized the media, mocked his Democratic challengers, critiqued the Academy Awards, lamented losing money while president and boasted of his poll numbers while visiting a construction site here to give remarks about U.S. energy production.

The president spoke for more than an hour, meandering between his prepared remarks and a campaign-style speech listing grievances and currying votes. He touched on his 2016 victory in Pennsylvania, his love of trucks, “fake news,” China, trade, immigration, the Green New Deal, windmills, the Paris climate accord, former president Barack Obama’s $60 million book deal, Iran, veterans and New York energy policies.

Standing in a room full of construction workers in the middle of the day, many wearing their fluorescent work vests, Trump urged them to support his reelection and to convince their union leaders to do the same.

View the complete August 13 article by Toluse Olorunnipa and Colby Itkowitz on The Washington Post website here.

While bemoaning Mueller probe, Trump falsely says the Constitution gives him ‘the right to do whatever I want’

Washington Post logoPresident Trump believes the Constitution gives him a wide breadth of power. That’s the message he delivered ― not for the first time — on Tuesday while addressing a crowd of teenagers and young adults at the Turning Point USA Teen Student Action Summit in Washington.

There are numerous viral video clips from Trump’s 80-minute speech at the conference, but one of the most controversial moments came as he discussed Article II of the Constitution, which describes the powers of the president.

Trump lamented the duration and cost of the investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election led by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, which he has repeatedly said found “no collusion, no obstruction.”

View the complete July 23 article by Michael Brice-Saddler on The Washington Post website here.