Partisan news sources paint rosy picture of Trump, allowing supporters to excuse his behavior
Editor:
A lifelong friend of mine just accused somebody of submitting or omitting factually incorrect material. Unfortunately it was clearly sourced from partisan sources and was itself incorrect.
The letter concludes there would be a huge number of illegals allowed in the country under Harris’s immigration proposal – the bipartisan act. It does not understand that the border would be shut down due to the number of “encounters.”
Encounters under the law occur when people are caught by the beefed up ICE and processed. It does not allow illegal immigrants to roam and hide as her source claims except as they are held in brief detention. The proposed Act finally increases funding for administrative processes and judges to handle and either return or properly admit people within days of the encounter.
It’s only when encounters become too large a number to process that the border is shut. (And besides also hiring hundreds of additional agents it also gives them the additional sniffer machines they want as fentanyl from Mexico, for example, is coming across in cars.)
The letter says that the ex-president did not go to visit our war dead in Normandy because the helicopter was grounded by rain. That indeed was the published excuse. But the helicopter worked for General Kelly. The letter ignores that General Kelly, Trump’s longest Chief of Staff, says that Trump did not go because Trump said he didn’t see the point of the “sucker’s” sacrifice because there was “nothing in it for them.”
Trump’s disdain for men in uniform is well documented. The writer points to hugging one or two disabled vets for the camera but that doesn’t demonstrate any charge of heart.
Further Trump cannot use the Alien And Enemies to remove people from the United States as the letter writer claims. It’s used during a declared war with another country.
There were four overlapping acts in 1798, three of which were almost immediately repealed in 1800 as they were uniformly condemned. The long repealed Alien Friends Act might have permitted such deportations.
To get it done – and many other dictatorial acts Trump has espoused like jailing people and revoking broadcast licenses – Trump more likely would use the Insurrection Act. Former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Staff Milley writes that Trump is a “fascist to the core” and that Trump and his advisors have considered using the Insurrection Act. Under it the military – which Milley headed at the time – would operate on US soil as Trump directs. Without declaring an insurrection mobilizing military operations on US soil is illegal.
I know that Biden is blamed for Afghanistan and it certainly was a terrible situation. There’s no escaping that! However, Trump negotiated the deal and failed to enforce the Taliban’s promises. Nevertheless he drew our troops down at each stage. The largest just before the 2020 election.
The final stage was left to Biden and if anybody recalls our generals said they did not have enough soldiers there to defend our people. We either had to run or immediately mobilize and restart the war from scratch. It was a disaster waiting to happen.
The letter blamed the lawyers for Trump not taking the stand for whatever that means. Innocence? In fact, there are three reasons not to take the stand. Insufficient evidence. Or they feel the client will make a terrible witness and incriminate himself. Or they actually and 100% can not call the defendant to the stand as the client has admitted guilt to them and his trial attorneys cannot knowingly call him and be a party to perjury. The usual reason is perjury.
About CBS, the letter neglected that from the get-go CBS put on its website both versions of actual words so that they could be compared and demonstrate that no substantive content was left out. CBS aired the shorter one.
IMHO Trump is losing it and is avoiding speaking in any setting he does not control. At least three times now one of his demands is that debates/interviews not fact check as a condition of his participation.
The good thing about my friend’s letter is that pretty much stays within the bounds of traditional, (mis)characterizations of a person’s position.
She does not claim, as does MGT, that the hurricanes were caused by Democrats to destroy Republican areas. And it did not claim that Republican areas were being ignored by our heroic first responders.
Both may have contributed to fatal decisions. It did not claim that speaking out is treason which should result in prosecution. It did not cross the line of decency and put people in danger like her hero does. It did try to draw into question jury verdicts.
The letter is an example that source materials are of huge importance.
With January 6th people who still believe Trump won have clearly never read the exhibits and source materials. Similarly people who still think Trump was a political target in his suits and prosecutions have never read the indictments and now the grand jury releases. They did not read all the appeal decisions and the real legal issues Trump lied about every time he got in front of a TV camera. That is the problem with partisan sources that at best pretend to report news. Go with sources with long tapes, full quotes, and that source material.
Note: Trump just threatened domestic use of the military against the “enemy within” and Democrats., i.e. use the Insurrection Act against people who say and report things he does not like. Change the channel. Try it. A flood of false narratives all ultimately originating from (or supporting) this unhinged, thin skinned, authoritarian and dangerous man result in wasting time on dangerous letters – sorry to say that.
With this sophisticated misinformation out there, this is why well informed people are concerned about the country falling into unhinged hands. The real news this week was our tremendously strong economy which is the envy of the world and not Trump nonsense. (See the current issues of The Economist from the UK and its four-part review of our economy. )
Conrad F. Cropsey
Albion
