Adorable Animal Video: Cure-All Division
So, yesterday, I came across this brief video of Trump. And yes, I know there were a lot to choose from. Indeed, yes, I know that every day there are a lot to choose from. Like, for instance, I came close to using him slam the granddaughter of the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg by suggesting that she might have been lying about the dying message she said her grandmother wanted to be quoted for. Never mind that renowned NPR court reporter Nina Totenberg had earlier followed up on the quote to learn that others in room at the time (including Justice Ginsberg's doctor) confirmed what was said -- something Ms. Totenberg did at the time as a good reporter checking on a story, not because of Trump's idiot comment suggesting that maybe Adam Schiff or some other Democrats said it. But as offensive as that was about a granddaughter who'd just lost a grandmother, it was just Trump being cold, heartless Trump and got plenty of attention on its own.
Or the video clip of Trump saying about the coronavirus that "It affects virtually nobody," that it really only affects the elderly (who aren't "nobody," and he himself fits into the "elderly" group, and we not only know it's not true, but we know from Bob Woodward's recording that Trump himself says he knows it's not true.). And of course, we all know that the coronavirus has now killed over 204,000 Americans -- so far. But this is just too insane to waste too much time on. Not that it's just dismissed for being normal Trump, but dismissed for being too infantile to spend adult time on it playing his game.
Instead, this one caught my attention because at first it seemed like one of those tweet where the person posting it, in this case Aaron Rupar, paraphrased an idiot comment by Trump to translate into English in order to bring out its full stupidity in a way that was even more clear. But then when I watch the clip, it turned out that, no, the quote was actually what Trump said, word for word.
(You can a bonus. The tweet with the clip was linked to a clip of Trump defending his earlier comment ridiculing the granddaughter. That's the one on top. The main clip in question, about the poisoning of Russian dissident leader Alexey Nalvany is below.
What I would have loved is a follow-up question --
"Sir, could you let us know generally when that "another time" would be? Because Mr. Navalny was poisoned a month ago which should be plenty of time for you to have figured out an answer."
For me, this quote stood out because it encapsulated the Trump time in office. His refusal to criticize Vladmir Putin or Russia about anything, including the poisoning of a political opponent, which is about as fascist a thing as one could imagine, even if you were taking a test of fascism and it was open book so that could copy down anything that you thought was pure fascist. And then, Trump just pushed it off with a mumbled "We'll talk about it later" and of course never will, though hopefully he'll be asked about it again. And again. And again and again. The only surprising thing in the quote is that he didn't use his standard "in two weeks."
I have a lot more to say about that, but instead of being "outraged," (tm), I think I'm just going to embed a joyful video of a zookeeper in China trying her best to deal with a group of pandas.
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