If Donald Trump is so tough, why is he so afraid of the Washington Post that he revoked their press credentials?
About The Author

BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
Because his narcissism always overrides his testicular fortitude, … intellect, honesty, humility and of course his humanity.
It’s becoming clear that the Republicans who have endorsed Trump will be distancing themselves from their nominee’s irresponsible, counterproductive statements every week all the way to November, unless they pierce the fucker with a tranquilizer dart meant to bring down an elephant.
We could add a non-fiction sequel to The Bonfire Of The Vanities. It’d be longer than Wolfe’s later novels, and even more absurd.
We’re living in surreal times.
Priorities USA has begun running this ad, and has just expanded their buy, suggesting they’re seeing positive returns from it. I think it’s a punch in the gut to Trump that, okay, won’t get through to his diehards but will sway Republicans who are already ambivalent.
Forgot to offer the hat tip to Tom Hilton, guest-hosting at No More Mister Nice Blog. There’s at least one comment on the post suggesting it’s working with evangelicals whites.
http://nomoremister.blogspot.com/2016/06/demotivating-republican-base.html
Trump will mock this ad as “political correctness”.
His line: We used to be able in this country to tell cripple jokes and people would laugh, even the disabled. Now we have political correctness that tell me I can’t tell a cripple joke any more.
Trump sees himself as Archie Bunker come to life as a billionaire.
I don’t know about evangelicals, but it will address a lot of people who changed their views on disabilities as a result of the sitcom Life Goes On that ran in the George H. W. Bush era.
Well, he can try, but my gut (such a reliable source, eh?) tells me that’s not going to play well. I just don’t think that many people still see anything but mean-spirited nastiness in mocking the disabled — including veterans, wouldn’t you think?
In the NMMNB comment thread, Yastreblyansky linked to Trump’s initial riposte on Twitter, commenting that “It [ad] also got deeply, deeply under Donald’s “very strong, very thick” skin.”
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/741988371174699009
Although further Googling suggests this tweet was in response to another Clinton ad, “Who we are”, that also has a clip of the mocking, rather than the “Grace” ad.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3637635/Trump-makes-embarrassing-Twitter-blunder-trying-atta
ck-Clinton-new-campaign-advert-slams-billionaire-businessman-mocking-disabled-reporter.html
Whichever the case may be, he’s not doing himself any good.
I’ve sent a link to the video to a dear friend, a quietly but deeply religious person who’s about as close to an earthly (and hella earthy!) saint as I’ll ever meet, who for many years has taken in special needs foster children — the physically and mentally crippled, abused, children who have thrived and grown strong and healthy in her care. She’s an Obama fan surrounded by possible-to-likely Trump voters who respect her tremendously (and some of whom call her mom), and who are equally as passionate about kindness to the weak and crippled. It’ll be interesting to see if that changes some minds among them.
For most every disabled person out there, there’s a circle of family and friends who’d be incensed to see their dear one dissed like that. I think this is gonna leave a mark all right.
My oldest son graduated college with a degree in journalism eight years ago, and even then he felt the state of journalism was in decline.
Trump has absolutely no business being President. He’s unqualified, he’s an inept communicator, and his sense of decorum is nonexistant. He should have been laughed out of the race before he got anywhere.
The press, as with Sarah Palin, made him their darling. I don’t think anyone believed he could actually get anywhere and nobody asked hard questions. He should have been nailed to the wall last year!
So now he makes the rules for debates, interviews, rallies, and anything else. He wants absolute control of everything, and fingerprints are all over the whole mess. He has played us for fools, and we let him.
Every time he seems to foul up, says something so incredible that sane people gasp, it gets little blowback. If Hillary said any of the things Trump has said, she’d be hung out to dry. I admit, I never dreamed he’d go this far. But that doesn’t mean he should get to go all the way.
Someone will have to start hammering him on every bigoted, racist, nonsensical thing he says. Hammer him when he lies, hammer his policies, hammer his business history. If we don’t, he could go right into the White House. And that would be the end of us.
I could substitute HRC for Trump in your post with no problem.
I could substitute banana pudding for HRC in your post with no problem.
So now he makes the rules for debates, interviews, rallies, and anything else. He wants absolute control of everything, and fingerprints are all over the whole mess. He has played us for fools, and we let him.
The excuses? For the media, Trump was ratings gold because the public — right, left, and center — couldn’t stop watching him. How freaking many front page posts on right, left, and center blogs have bee devoted to Trump in the past year? However, there is a problem because Trump wiped out his GOP competition in the first debate last August. The pros that had spent years (some decades) in preparation for their time on the big stage had no game against a loud-mouthed, ignoramus with charisma.
Americans have always enjoyed freak shows.
They’re called “the press”, and the duty to do what you describe (and its crucial importance to the “informed consent of the governed” that’s the bedrock prerequisite for functioning democracy) is why the Founders gave them — unique among secular institutions — their very own special protective clause in the First Amendment.
In their current Corporate Media incarnation, they just refuse, abdicating that responsibility (all the while wrapping themselves up in that Constitutional shield, of course).
I dunno. But, I hope that they understand for them to do some actual vetting of this clown. the only paper who has been doing serious checking into the patterns of Trump’s ‘business’ dealings has been USA Today.
And if the Clintons are so damn smart, why are they expending so much time and effort on Big Don and the S’Trumpettes? Stripped down to his essence, he’s Rumpelstiltskin with one foot already stuck in the floor. Let him finish tearing his own ass in half, and get to the business of talking about our grandkids future.
Anytime now would be good . . .
Your grandkids won’t have a future if Trump gets elected. He needs to be defined, degraded, and destroyed so thoroughly that his defeat takes down with it the GOP’s stranglehold on Congress and sweeps in Democratic control of both houses — then we can get shit done.
Agreed. Now tell me again why that job falls to Hillary Clinton?
Because she won the primary battle.
Next question?