Nothing Normal
This will be reasonably short. And it's old news from two weeks ago. And even minor by Trump Standards, which live in their own universe. But because Trump should never be normalized, which tends to happen since he says so many utterly lunatic things and it's too easy to roll your eyes and move to the next, I think this one is worth not letting it fall through the cracks. And even by Trump Standards, it pretty lunatic. By normal stands, the adjective "pretty" is not needed.
And there's nothing normal about it.
Back on August 15, Trump held an event at his Bedminster golf course. He called it a "press conference," though it wasn't. He did invite press, but he also brought in MAGA supporters. And then spoke for 40 minutes before taking a question.
Anyway, at one point, Trump said, "Virtually 100 percent of the net job creation in the last year have gone to migrants."
Now, by any standards, this is a ludicrous statement. It's so ludicrous that there's no need to say he didn't offer any evidence. No evidence is possible. Each new monthly jobs report created the past year demonstrates its foolishness, showing the industries where new jobs were created. It was never 0 in private education, 0 in health services, 0 in leisure and hospitality, 0 in wholesale trade, 0 in retail, 0.7 in construction, 0 in government, and 99.3% in farming.
(Never mind that it isn't illegal or even scary to be a migrant. So, even if they did get all those new jobs, well, congratulations to their skill and moxie!)
But the thing is, that isn't the "pretty lunatic" thing he said.
It was when, for reasons known only to himself -- because I've long given up trying to figure out what he's truly thinking and means -- Trump then decided to continue, and said he's heard that the real number could be "substantially more than — beyond, actually beyond that number of 100 percent. It’s a much higher number than that."
Yes, folks, not just more than 100%, but much higher.
"Actually."
I'm sure that his supporters and handlers had some explanation of what he "meant." But of course, the only explanation that even qualifies as an explanation is that, as MAGOPs like to say, it was just "Trump being Trump."
Yes, it was. And that is the problem.
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