By reputation, as well as by the snippets I've seen online, President Trump's rant yesterday morning on Fox & Friends was one of his classic performances. On Twitter, Richard Hine says that the tone and coherence of the president's near monologue, which was delivered unsolicited when he called in to the program, may be gauged by the expressions on the faces of the peerless journalists who heard him out--the picture at the top of this post (from the start of the interview) compared to the one at the bottom (from the end). The transcript of the conclusion of the "interview" is, as Daniel Dale points out, pretty amazing:
Fox: Everyone. We could talk to you all day but it looks like--
Trump: Sure.
Fox: --you have a million things to do.
Trump: Well, you could have--
Fox: But I hope you can join us again, Mr President.
The president of United States calls their show and, after listening to him for awhile, the Fox hosts give him the hook. Surely he is too busy to be talking to them! He indicates that no, he really isn't. And the Fox host says, Talk to you again, thanks, bye!
Actually, I don't think the content of Trump's remarks was any worse than usual. The tone, however . . . "unhinged" is another of those journalistic clichés that has been overused in the Age of Trump, but you can see, or hear, why. Credit Adam Weinstein for finding a new way to say it: "Watch the barely veiled horror on the hosts' faces as the president of the United States spits into his phone like a senile pensioner calling late-night C-SPAN."
It's obvious to all but forty percent that our president is incapable of following a coherent strategy or even holding in his mind what he might have said yesterday or last week. Remember when the FBI "raid" on Michael Cohen's office and residences was a disgraceful violation of the sacrosanct lawyer-client privilege? Well, yesterday Trump told Fox & Friends that Cohen's legal work on his behalf amounted to a "tiny, tiny fraction" of all legal counsel he receives, and he repeatedly emphasized that Cohen is more a businessman than lawyer. Mike Scarcella points out that the prosecutors working in the US Attorneys Office, Southern District of New York, are not so slow on the uptake--the following is from a document filed with the court in the Cohen case yesterday afternoon:
But it's not as if Trump doesn't have his defenders. Right-wing talker Hugh Hewitt opined: "Listening to @realDonaldTrump having fun and swinging from the hips on @foxandfriends and wondering why he hasn't been doing this more. He's the best promoter of his record and people." When I first read this, my pedantic attention was drawn to the phrase "swinging from the hips." I think you "swing from the heels" (and "shoot from the hip"). But, whatever: the definitive response to Mr Hewitt came from someone with the online name Hoarse Whisperer: "Whenever Trump craps his pants, it's a race between you and Hannity to see who will get the corn."
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