Trump 34: Leading the Alternate Reality

[AmazonGrace]

It's all his greatest hits 

[Cartmann99]

 

[AmazonGrace]

There is nothing he won't lie about 

 

Does he know these things get videoed?

[AmazonGrace]

 

[Ali]

I find those children behind him at the worship service really disturbing. They are too young to understand what they are supporting. The girls have a heavy amount of make up on which makes them appear older. (Not that there is anything wrong with wearing heavy make up.) When I think about all of the accusations against the man, I can't help but worry about idiot followers sacrificing their underage daughters.

[mamallama]

Wow, I didn't even realize they were kids.  I thought, "look at that grown woman wearing a bow in her hair.'

 

[GreyhoundFan]

"At President Trump’s hotel in New York, revenue went up this spring — thanks to a visit from big-spending Saudis"

Spoiler

The general manager of the Trump International Hotel in Manhattan had a rare bit of good news to report to investors this spring: After two years of decline, revenue from room rentals went up 13 percent in the first three months of 2018.

What caused the uptick at President Trump’s flagship hotel in New York? One major factor: “a last-minute visit to New York by the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia,” wrote general manager Prince A. Sanders in a May 15 letter, which was obtained by The Washington Post.

Neither Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman nor members of the royal family stayed at Trump’s hotel, Sanders said: He said the Trump hotel didn’t have suites big enough to accommodate them. But “due to our close industry relationships,” he wrote, “we were able to accommodate many of the accompanying travelers.”

The previously unreported letter — describing a five-day stay in March that was enough to boost the hotel’s revenue for the entire quarter — shows how little is known about the business that the president’s company does with foreign officials.

Such transactions have fueled criticism that Trump is reaping revenue from foreign governments, even as he controls U.S. foreign policy toward those countries. Trump’s company has disclosed few details about the business it does with foreign customers, saying it already reveals more than is required.

Neither Trump Organization and the Saudi Embassy answered questions about whether the Saudi government paid for anyone’s stay at the hotel. Sanders did not respond to requests for comment.

For now, just a handful of foreign government clients at Trump properties have been publicly identified through media reports and statements from foreign officials.

But a broader list could eventually come out.

Last week, a federal judge in Maryland gave the go-ahead to a lawsuit alleging that by accepting government business at his properties, Trump is violating the Constitution’s “emoluments clauses” — dusty 18th-century measures meant to prevent presidents from putting their private bank accounts ahead of the public interest.

If it stands, the ruling could force the company to provide new details about its relationships with foreign governments, states and even federal agencies.

“This was how the Framers protected against corruption,” said Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh (D), who filed the landmark suit along with D.C. Attorney General Karl A. Racine (D), saying they intended for these answers to be public. “They wanted to make sure the president would put the country above himself.”

The Justice Department, which is representing Trump in his official capacity, has argued that the Founding Fathers only meant to stop presidents from accepting gifts from foreign governments — not to stop presidents from conducting private business.

Frosh has said he believes the case could end up eventually before the Supreme Court. So far, neither the Justice Department nor Trump’s private attorney has said if they will appeal the decision.

The White House did not respond to requests for comment.

Trump said he has given up day-to-day control over his businesses. But he still owns them and can withdraw money from them.

From the start of Trump’s administration, his company has said it sees nothing wrong with continuing to do business with foreign states.

“The renting of a hotel room from one of the Trump businesses is not correlated to President Trump’s performance of the duties of the Office of President,” Bobby R. Burchfield, a Republican attorney that the Trump Organization hired as an outside ethics adviser, wrote in a recent article in the Texas Review of Law & Politics.

Under pressure, the Trump Organization agreed last year to donate profits from foreign government clients to the U.S. Treasury. This year, it announced the amount of the donation for 2017: $151,470.

But it declined to say which foreign governments those profits had come from, or how much they had spent in total.

Officials with Trump’s D.C. hotel — the property that is the subject of the emoluments suit — have told The Post that they aren’t actively courting foreign business, but acknowledged they also are not turning it away.

The Embassy of Kuwait, for instance, has held its national day celebration twice at Trump’s hotel in downtown Washington.

This year, the Embassy of the Philippines also became a Trump customer, holding its Philippine independence day party in the Trump hotel’s ballroom. Trump has had warm relations with Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, even as human-rights groups have condemned Duterte for a crackdown on drug users that has left thousands dead.

“Having it at a hotel that happens to have [Trump’s] name . . . it’s a statement,” Jose Manuel Romualdez, the Philippine ambassador to the United States, told Philippine TV station ABS-CBN during the event. “It’s a statement that we have a good relationship with this president.” He said the embassy chose Trump’s hotel as a venue, but private donors actually paid.

Also, last year Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak was spotted at Trump’s D.C. hotel, along with a sizable entourage, during an official trip to Washington. (Najib was later ousted in an election.)

And the Saudi government spent $270,000 at Trump’s D.C. hotel last year, according to filings by a lobbying firm acting on the Saudis’ behalf. Press reports indicated that the money paid for hotel rooms, food and parking for U.S. veterans groups brought to the District to lobby against a bill the Saudi government opposed.

Beyond that list, there have been other events at Trump properties that had some connection to foreign governments — but the source of payment is unclear.

Earlier this year, Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club in Florida hosted part of a “Polish American Leadership Summit,” which was organized in part by Polish government ministries, according to the summit’s website. When The Post inquired about whether the Polish government had paid to rent the room, an embassy spokeswoman referred questions to the organizers of the event, who declined to comment.

In the case of the Saudi visit to New York earlier this year, a spokeswoman for the Saudi Embassy said that none of Mohammed’s official traveling delegation stayed at the Trump International Hotel in New York. But she said the Saudi Embassy did not know if the Saudi government had paid for anyone else’s stay at the hotel during the crown prince’s visit.

The crown prince visited New York from March 26 to 30, as part of a longer, multicity American tour.

Although Trump’s hotel in Washington has prospered during his presidency, some other properties — further from the seat of power — have struggled. In New York, for instance, Trump’s hotel in SoHo lost business, and last year its owners cut ties with the Trump Organization.

Trump International Hotel in Manhattan — the one remaining Trump-branded hotel in New York — saw room revenue drop from 2015 to 2017, according to figures obtained by The Post. So the Saudi visit was a welcome boost.

The D.C. and Maryland attorneys general hope to use their emoluments lawsuit as a kind of legal pry bar, cracking open the Trump Organization’s secrecy about its customers.

In last week’s ruling, federal Judge Peter J. Messitte sided with them in a long-running debate about what the Founding Fathers really meant when they banned presidents from taking “emoluments” from foreign states.

Messitte agreed that, in the modern context, this covered not just outright gifts from foreign states, but also regular business transactions — “even those involving services given at fair market value.”

Now — unless the ruling is overturned on appeal — that could allow the plaintiffs to ask the Trump Organization for a list of those transactions. Their search would be limited to the Trump hotel in Washington, but the plaintiffs are clearly hoping that their victory will inspire other suits aimed at Trump’s properties in places like New York.

The case may also bring new scrutiny on the Trump Organization’s business relationship with the U.S. government, which owns the building that houses Trump’s D.C. hotel. Before he became president, Trump won a long-term lease to operate a hotel there.

Democrats in Congress say this relationship is now a separate kind of prohibited emolument — an unfair benefit given to Trump by his own government.

A clause in the lease says that “No . . . elected official of the Government of the United States . . . shall be admitted to any share or part” of the hotel’s ownership.

But, after Trump was in office, the General Services Administration ruled that he could still keep the lease.

That decision is now being probed by two independent inquiries, from the Government Accountability Office and the GSA’s inspector general. Messitte could allow the plaintiffs to seek information about the lease.

Georgetown University law professor John Mikhail, who has been studying the emoluments clauses, said these inquiries together could shatter the veil of privacy that Trump’s company has maintained — even while its owner is in the White House.

“He has very constantly refused to conform to well-established norms about conflict of interest and corruption and the appearance of corruption,” Mikhail said. “At some point in time he may be told by a court — you lose. You have to comply.”

 

[Cartmann99]

Bless his heart, now Trump's lost his Pecker....

 

[fraurosena]

I have no idea in which thread to put this, but it's so uplifting to see what you can do when people stand together, that I simply have to share it. So as a big FU to the presidunce, I'm putting it in his thread.

Also, that commentary really is something 

[AmazonGrace]

They ramble on about a lot of stuff but the interesting bit to me was about ten minutes in  when they're saying that during the campaign they got the feeling that Trump is in declining mental state.

 

That's apparently also what Omarosa will be saying in her upcoming book.

[AmazonGrace]

it's maga now or never

i ain't gonna live forever

 

[onekidanddone]

6 hours ago, Cartmann99 said:

Bless his heart, now Trump's lost his Pecker....

 

Pecker? Really? Almost as good as Anthony Wiener

[fraurosena]

Wut? 

 

[Destiny]

Wut? 
 

Who the actual fuck is mike?

[AmazonGrace]

 

[AmazonGrace]

 

[Audrey2]

6 hours ago, Destiny said:

Who the actual fuck is mike?

I was guessing Michael Jordan, the very talented basketball player of the late 80s and 90s. although I don't follow basketball at all, I vaguely remember a Be Like Mike ad campaign. I can't remember what they sold though- I know there were Air Jordan tennis shoes but can't remember if that was part of the campaign or if it was selling something else.

[AmazonGrace]

 

[fraurosena]

Incoming tweet-storm ahead!

Obama created 272,000 more jobs than Trump in the same amount of time

Quote

July's jobs report, like Trump's entire term in office so far, was a disappointment.

Trump has been taking coasting on President Barack Obama’s economy, but after 18 months and a disappointing July jobs report, Trump still doesn’t measure up to his predecessor.

On Friday morning, that latest jobs report showed that 157,000 jobs were created last month, well short of the 190,000 jobs that had been expected. But that didn’t stop the official White House Twitter account from trying to take credit for Obama’s record of job creation.

They tweeted that there have been “3.9 million jobs added since President Trump was elected,” but half a million of those were added during Obama’s presidency. The graphic that accompanied the tweet showed the current 94-month streak of job growth, 76 months of which occurred during the Obama presidency.

And as several people pointed out on Twitter, Trump’s record of job creation falls well short of Obama’s.

According to Bureau of Labor Statistics, Trump created 3,432,000 jobs during the first full 18 months of his presidency, February 2017 through July 2018. During the last 18 months of his presidency, President Obama created 3,704,000 jobs.

And just last week, Trump and his minions were trying to brag about a single quarter of 4 percent Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth, a mark which Obama eclipsed four times during his presidency.

But Trump’s poor stewardship of Obama’s economy could be about to get much worse. That second-quarter GDP figure was inflated by a temporary increase in U.S. soybean exports, which were an attempt to blunt the impact of Trump’s trade war.

As other countries continue to retaliate against Trump’s tariffs, millions of jobs are being put at risk, in addition to the economic growth that was chugging along when Obama handed the keys to Trump.

Unfortunately for Trump and the GOP, Americans are not fooled by Trump’s lies about the economy, and largely credit Obama for the prosperity he left for Trump. That leaves only racism and failure to run on in November.

 

[Cartmann99]

Friday night: Trump watches Don Lemon interview LeBron James about the school LeBron started in his hometown of Akron, Ohio. Trump insults the intelligence of both men on Twitter.

All day Saturday: Trump is heavily criticized for his tweet. 

Saturday night: A bitterly angry Trump shows up for a planned rally in Ohio.

This won't end well...

[CTRLZero]

31 minutes ago, Cartmann99 said:

Saturday night: A bitterly angry Trump shows up for a planned rally in Ohio.

This won't end well...

The question is, does Mike like Trump?  I wonder if I should be investing in popcorn stock. 

 

[fraurosena]

Anyone disillusioned by the current state of affairs should watch this 10 year old speech by the last president of the United States. It still holds true today. 

  

[fraurosena]

Ah, this explains a lot!

Although we still don’t know who Mike is...

[onekidanddone]

4 hours ago, fraurosena said:

Anyone disillusioned by the current state of affairs should watch this 10 year old speech by the last president of the United States. It still holds true today. 

  

I sat in my Mom’s living room watching Obama’s acceptance speech and crying like crazy. Crying tears of joy and missing my dad. My dad died October 2006 and he should have been there with my mom and me. He would have been over the moon about Obama. On the flip side maybe it is a good thing he isn’t here to see the orange shit stain. 

[GreyhoundFan]