Second Story Window

Yesterday, the Daily Beast had a very good story about Trump, and played it for all the well-earned snarky humor it deserved, making fun of someone who claims to be a billionaire, but who rushes to apply for the $65,000 pension he's owed.  

Wonderful and proper as their headline and snark was, they missed the overwhelmingly bigger, second story.  And as far as I can tell, so has pretty much everyone else in the media.  And by "pretty much," I mean everyone who I've seen or read.​

​Yes, it's funny that a supposed billionaire would rush to claim the $65,000 he's so-far owed.  After all, if you had a billion dollars and put it in a bank account that only gave you a paltry 1% interest, that would give you $10 million dollars in interest.

But as I said, they missed the much bigger story.

And the much bigger story is that for someone to claim the pension that is given to former president, that means they are acknowledging that they...are a former president!!!

All this folderol about how he's still "The President."  All his gumfumery stationary that's from his "office of The President."  And his pseudo "Presidential seal" that's he's had made up for himself.  All that is out the window by his own admission.

He wants his pension as an ex-president.

To be fair, the article notes that this is just a report.  To be equally fair, when they contacted his office, they refused comment.  And while "refusing comment" isn't the same as a "yes, it's true" -- these are people who had no trouble for four years lying about true stories supposedly not be true and "fake news."

The surprise about the Daily Beast is that the way their article began was the perfect phrasing for the much bigger story.  Which makes it all the more odd that they whiffed on it.  They began the piece --

"Donald Trump—the man who proudly claims to be a billionaire but has carefully avoided many opportunities to prove it—has reportedly taken tens of thousands of dollars in federal pension payments since January."

More to the point would have been -- 

"Donald Trump--the man who proudly claims he won the election is is still president--has reported taken tens of thousand of dollars in federal pension payments mandated specifically for former presidents."

That's the story.

Their story was very funny.  This story, the real one, is substantively meaningful.

It shows by Trump's own actions that the Big Lie is a Big Lie.  And takes all the wind out of every conspiracy insisting he's still president and undercuts this insane, harmful, fascist fake audit it Arizona -- and any fake audit that might come in other states.

By Trump's own actions.

​That's the story.