John Colson: Riding the Trump merry-go-round again
Hit & Run
It’s been a nice three-week break from writing about the fraudulent, corrupt and demonstrably inept “elected” leader of the United States — President Donald J. Trump, if you really need to read his name again — but for some reason I just can’t stay off the Trump merry-go-round.
I read this week that Trump has canceled the White House subscriptions to the newspapers he hates more than any others — The New York Times and The Washington Post.
That’s OK, I guess. Since it has yet to be proven that the president can read, it is likely that not much will change as a result of his move to keep the “enemies of the people” off the front lawn at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. in Washington, D.C.
I must say, though, that proof is shown through tweets and incomprehensible press briefings that Trump has never mastered his native language, English, which might have something to do with his disinclination to read anything that does not contain his name in bold print.
It has been reported that the only newspaper he reads with any regularity is the Wall Street Journal, through I suspect he only reads the opinion section and even there only pays attention to op-eds by his cronies and sycophants.
This might have changed, however, as it was reported this week that the WSJ editorial board, in a pretty ham-handed effort to support Trump in his battle against impeachment, maintained he is too “inept” and “incompetent” to have managed to commit the high crimes and misdemeanors he is accused off.
This is really interesting logic, if it can be called that with a straight face.
As the Daily Kos online news organization put it this week, the WSJ argument amounts to a claim by Trump’s supporters that “even if their president did attempt grotesque high crimes, he was foiled by his own staggering incompetence and therefore must be allowed to remain in office.”
If that is the best expression of support they can come up with, at a news outlet known to be in Trump’s camp on many issues, Trump really should start looking for another job and a new address.
The truth is, testimony collected by the House committees working on impeachment has shown quite clearly that Trump did try to get Ukraine’s new president, Volodymyr Zelensky, to open up investigations into already-debunked conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, son of the former Vice President Joe Biden, and the younger Biden’s supposed corrupt activities on behalf of a Ukranian energy company.
Once again, we return to Trump’s relative illiteracy and refusal to read anything longer than a bubble-gum comic for an explanation as to why he is unaware that this particular conspiracy theory was found to be baseless by various news and governmental agencies here and in the Ukraine.
By withholding some $391 billion in military aid to the Ukraine in July, aid that was approved by Congress earlier this year and was supposed to have been sent soon afterward, Trump thought he was holding Zelensky’s feet to the fire. In fact he was lighting the match that would ultimately scorch Trump’s own tootsies.
The testimony by certain administration officials about the Ukraine matter shows that even some of Trump’s inner circle felt that Trump and his consigliere, Rudy Giuliani — the primary movers of Ukrainegate, as it is known — had gone beyond mere partisan chicanery and had entered into criminal territory.
All of this, I should note, plays into the idea that Trump is doing the bidding of Russian President Vladimir Putin for some reason. Putin is at war with Ukraine as part of his hardly secret desire to resurrect the old Soviet empire, and would like nothing more than for Trump to drag Zelensky and his country through the mud for a while.
And now, as if Trump has not done enough to prove he is in league with Putin on a variety of fronts, we have the killing of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, erstwhile leader of the Islamic State, or ISIS, over the past weekend.
Trump has admitted to informing Russia as well as several other nations of its plans to raid al-Baghdadi’s compound in Syria, before he informed the leadership of Congress, claiming that Congress “is a leak factory” that does not deserve a heads-up on so consequential a military operation.
Remember, if you will, that our Constitution gives Congress, not the president, the power to wage war, which should qualify congressional leadership as qualifying for such notice.
But Trump has made it clear that he is under Putin’s thumb for some reason, and that the Russian government has his allegiance.
Some say the reason Trump is subservient to Putin is the memory of the infamous though never substantiated “pee tape” of Trump cavorting with Russian whores in a Moscow hotel room. These prostitutes reportedly pissed on the room’s bed as a show of disrespect for former President Barack Obama and his wife, who were believed to have stayed in the same room (look it up on the web, don’t take my word for it) and for whom Trump has special loathing.
Well, maybe. But I think it far more believable that Trump’s allegiance to Russia has more to do with the fact that Russian money has bailed him out of several financial failures in his bankruptcy-ridden past, something he doesn’t want us to know about.
Maybe his tax returns will educate us, if we ever see them.
Email at jbcolson51@gmail.com.
