The Commentariat -- Dec. 26, 2018

"Trump's Christmas Message: 'It's a Disgrace What's Happening'" Katie Rogers & Emily Cochrane of the New York Times: "President Trump invited reporters into the Oval Office on Christmas morning to listen to him call military troops overseas. He then unleashed another demand for a border wall -- a $5 billion price tag that has stalled the federal government through the holidays -- and introduced a murky new claim that federal workers are happy to work for free until the wall is fully funded. 'Many of those workers have said to me -- communicated -- stay out until you get the funding for the wall,' Mr. Trump said. 'These federal workers want the wall.' Mr. Trump described immigrants as criminals and human traffickers, and espoused plans for his wall. But he declined to answer questions that invited him to be more specific, especially on a contract he said was signed Monday to begin construction on a lengthy section of the barrier.... Mr. Trump both insisted, without evidence, that the wall was being built and could be 'either renovated or brand-new by Election Day,' and reiterated his demand that Congress allocate billions of dollars for it." ...

     ... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: Read on for Trump's description of that contract he says he signed. You can be absolutely sure that either (1) he signed a contract Monday but has no idea what it was for, or (2) he didn't sign a contract Monday. (2) is much more likely. I seriously doubt the POTUS signs relatively minor construction contracts. (He might of course do so to show off progress on Great Wall of Trump, but since there was no big PR production associated with this supposed signing, I don't believe it.) At least it's good to know that God won't strike you dead if you repeatedly lie on Jesus's birthday. ...

     ... Full video of the press availability here. ...

... Eliza Collins, et al., of USA Today: "... Nancy Pelosi accused ... Donald Trump of using 'scare tactics' to build support for his proposed U.S.-Mexican border wall, which she joked had been reduced from a giant, cement structure 'to, I think, a beaded curtain.'" ...

     ... BTW, in the likely event you missed it, near the bottom of yesterday's page, there is evidence that Trump does sometimes tell the truth -- at least in regard to Santa Claus. To a seven-year-old. ...

     ... Update: Okay, so Trump was worse than we knew. Hannah Alani of the Charleston, S.C. Post & Courier reports that when Trump asked seven-year-old Collman Lloyd if she believed in Santa, she said, "Yes, sir." It was then -- after her affirmative answer -- that Trump said, 'Because at 7, that's marginal, right?' Perhaps it's fortunate that Collman had no idea what "marginal" meant. And likely neither did her five-year-old brother, who was listening in on the speaker phone. Mrs. McC: I just hope the Christmas Dickhead tradition is short-lived. ...

... Elyse Perlmutter-Gumbiner of NBC News: "By staying home on Tuesday, Trump became the first president since 2002 who didn't visit military personnel around Christmastime." Mrs. McC: As we know, Trump has "an unbelievably busy schedule" kvetch-tweeting, making up stuff & denigrating everyone who fails to show him sufficient deference. ...

... Michelle Boorstein of the Washington Post: "President Trump and first lady Melania Trump attended Christmas Eve services at one of the city's most prominent -- and liberal -- houses of worship, Washington National Cathedral, and heard a sermon about the Christmas narrative -- in particular, the use of power, human cruelty and the struggle of refugees who are turned away in 'their greatest hour of need.' Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde, Washington's Episcopal leader, said she learned of the decision by the Trumps and Vice President Pence and his wife to attend services shortly before they began and had written her sermon long before. She gave the same sermon to the 6 p.m. Service of Christmas Lessons and Carols, which the Pences attended, and the 10 p.m. Holy Eucharist, which the Trumps attended.'" ...

... Niraj Chokshi & Katie Rogers of the New York Times: "An 8-year-old boy from Guatemala died in United States custody early Christmas Day, according to the United States Customs and Border Protection. The boy died just after midnight on Tuesday at a hospital in Alamogordo, N.M., where he and his father had been taken after a Border Patrol agent saw what appeared to be signs of sickness, according to a news release from the agency. The boy's death comes just weeks after a 7-year-old girl from the same country died in Border Patrol custody.... In a Christmas morning question-and-answer session with reporters, President Trump touted his administration's immigration policies and demanded further funding for a border wall. While he castigated migrants, the president did not bring up the boy's death hours earlier." ...

... Feliz Navidad. Julian Aguilar of the Texas Tribune: "Hundreds of asylum-seekers spent part of Christmas Eve in a downtown parking lot [in El Paso, Texas,] without knowing where they'll end up next. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents began dropping off the migrants late Sunday at a local bus station without warning local shelters that usually take in large groups after they seek asylum and are released by federal agents. About 200 arrived Sunday, about 200 more arrived Monday and the total number could exceed 800 by Wednesday, according to U.S. Rep. Beto O'Rourke, D-El Paso. Normally, ICE would alert the Annunciation House, a local shelter that has taken in tens of thousands of migrants and has several locations across this border city. But that didn't happen Sunday night, O'Rourke said.... O'Rourke said when the shelters are full, there is a coordinated effort with the city's office of emergency management to set up temporary shelters and that ICE usually gives local responders 24 hours' notice. The shelters are at capacity but volunteers and workers are usually able to find temporary housing elsewhere if they are given enough notice.... O'Rourke said he and his staff have been in touch with ICE and Customs and Border Protection offices and are doing what they can to ensure the migrants are placed at shelters or hotels -- at least temporarily -- until they make their way toward their final destinations." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Beto is already a better president than Donald. ...

... Philip Rucker of the Washington Post: "The Christmas Eve grievances billowing from the White House on Monday formed a heavy cloud of Yuletide gloom. In his third straight day holed up inside the White House during the partial federal government shutdown that he initiated over his demand to construct a border wall, President Trump barked out his frustrations on Twitter: Democrats are hypocrites! The media makes up stories! Senators are wrong on foreign policy -- and so is Defense Secretary Jim Mattis! Trump said war-ravaged Syria would be rebuilt not by the United States but by Saudi Arabia. 'Thanks to Saudi A!' he tweeted, two weeks after the Senate unanimously rebuked the kingdom's crown prince for the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. As the stock market closed out its worst December since 1931, the president placed sole blame for the staggering sell-off on the Federal Reserve, likening the central bank to a golfer who 'can't putt.' That was all before noon. And then, at 12:32 p.m., came Trump's 10th tweet of the day, a plaintive complaint from a president who craves constant interaction and praise: 'I am all alone (poor me) in the White House waiting for the Democrats to come back and make a deal on desperately needed Border Security,' he wrote. Even for a president accustomed to firing at foes on social media, Monday's cascade of angry tweets on a day when many Americans were celebrating the season with their families was extraordinary." ...

"Birthmark on Both Heels." Steven Eder of the New York Times: "In the fall of 1968, Donald J. Trump received a timely diagnosis of bone spurs in his heels that led to his medical exemption from the military during Vietnam. For 50 years, the details of how the exemption came about, and who made the diagnosis, have remained a mystery, with Mr. Trump himself saying during the presidential campaign that he could not recall who had signed off on the medical documentation. Now a possible explanation has emerged about the documentation. It involves a foot doctor in Queens who rented his office from Mr. Trump's father, Fred C. Trump, and a suggestion that the diagnosis was granted as a courtesy to the elder Mr. Trump.... Elysa Braunstein said the implication from her father [-- podiatrist Dr. Larry Braunstein, who died in 2007 --] was that Mr. Trump did not have a disqualifying foot ailment." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: The Times has published a facsimile of Trump's Selective Service registration card, which is dated June 1964. Under "Other Obvious Physical Characteristics," the typed entry is "birthmark on both heels." You might be surprised to learn that birthmarks, which I think we can all agree are skin pigmentations, can attach themselves to bones & grow into "spurs." I'd guess the notation on the registration card was what gave Donnie the idea of claiming he had a disqualifying foot condition.

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold.... -- William Butler Yeats, "The Second Coming" ...

... Gene Robinson: "The chaos all around us is what happens when the nation elects an incompetent, narcissistic, impulsive and amoral man as president. This Christmas, heaven help us all. Much of the government is shut down over symbolic funding for an insignificant portion of a useless border wall that President Trump said Mexico would pay for. The financial markets are having a nervous breakdown that Trump and his aides are making worse. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, widely seen as having kept Trump from plunging national security off some vertiginous cliff, resigned in protest over the president's latest whim and is being shoved out the door two months early. The world's leading military and economic power is being yanked to and fro as if by a bratty adolescent with anger management issues."

Mark Hand of ThinkProgress: "Nowhere in an 1,800-word executive order to address forest management and wildfires -- quietly issued on Friday -- does President Donald Trump draw a connection between climate change and increased wildfire risk. Instead, critics say it looks like a potential handout to the logging industry.... As part of his wildfire fuel reduction plan, the president ordered the easing of regulations in order to allow for the harvest of least 3.8 billion board feet of timber -- a measure of volume of lumber -- from lands managed by the U.S. Forest Service and another 600 million board feet of timber on Bureau of Land Management (BLM) property.... In 2017 the Forest Service harvested more than 2.9 billion board feet of timber. And in 2016, the BLM harvested more than 233.2 million board feet of timber for sale.... But experts contend boosting the level of logging on federal lands will not help the growing wildfire threat. In fact, commercial logging and road building have been found to increase wildfire risk." --safari: No word on how many acres will be raked.

To those in the field or at sea, 'keeping watch by night' this holiday season, you should recognize that you carry on the proud legacy of those who stood the watch in decades past. In this world awash in change, you hold the line. Storm clouds loom, yet because of you, your fellow citizens live safe at home.... Merry Christmas and may God hold you safe. -- Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, in a Christmas message to U.S. troops

Declan Walsh & Eric Schmitt of the New York Times: "American fingerprints are all over the air war in Yemen, where errant strikes by the Saudi-led coalition have killed more than 4,600 civilians, according to a monitoring group. In Washington, that toll has stoked impassioned debate about the pitfalls of America's alliance with Saudi Arabia under Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who relies on American support to keep his warplanes in the air. Saudi Arabia entered the war in 2015, allying with the United Arab Emirates and a smattering of Yemeni factions with the goal of ousting the Iran-allied Houthi rebels from northern Yemen. Three years on, they have made little progress. At least 60,000 Yemenis have died in the war, and the country stands on the brink of a calamitous famine.... At the same time, American efforts to advise the Saudis on how to protect civilians often came to naught.... While American officials often protested civilian deaths in public, two presidents [-- Trump & Obama --] ultimately stood by the Saudis." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: Read on for the implications of Trump's naming Patrick Shanahan, a former Boeing executive, as acting Secretary of Defense. Trump & Shanahan are two guys who like wars that pay, the human consequences be damned.

** Jay Michaelson of The Daily Beast: "Most liberals would like to forget the nightmare of the 115th Congress. But its most lasting legacy will be with us until the 2050s: the 83 conservatives now serving lifetime positions as federal judges. In the aggregate, this cohort ... is the least qualified and least diverse in recent memory. According to an analysis by NPR, President Trump's nominees were 77 percent male and 82 percent white (compared to Obama's 57 percent male and 63 percent white nominees). An unprecedented six nominees, including one just confirmed by the lame-duck congress, were deemed 'not qualified' by the non-partisan American Bar Association.... Trump's nomination rate is more than twice that of his predecessor.... And while the Federalist Society claims 4 percent of America's lawyers as members, those members make up over 80 percent of Trump's appellate court nominees.... Here are ten of the worst[.]" --s

Simon Tisdall of the Guardian reviews 2018, highlighting the year of the autocrats & the year global order frayed. --s

Way Beyond the Beltway

... Watch it, if only for the boys' choir of King's College, Cambridge, before & after Elizabeth's remarks. It's a good speech. And a stunning contrast to the crude bleats & barks from the White House. ...

Merry Christmas from the guy with no off switch pic.twitter.com/Zm1LUX7A0u

— Arlen Parsa (@arlenparsa) December 25, 2018

Justin McCurry of the Guardian: "Japan is facing international condemnation after confirming it will resuming commercial whaling for the first time in more than 30 years. The country's fleet will resume commercial operations in July next 2019, the government's chief spokesman, Yoshihide Suga, said of the decision to defy the 1986 global ban on commercial whaling. Suga told reporters the country's fleet would confine its hunts to Japanese territorial waters and exclusive economic zone.... Japan will join Iceland and Norway in openly defying the ban on commercial whale hunting." --s

** Juan Cole: "2018 was in many ways a turning point for the position of Israel in the system of Western, liberal, capitalist democracies.... Israel at the end of 2018 is now unambiguously an Apartheid state, admired only in the US Deep South among those who are nostalgic for their own Jim Crow Apartheid. Its leaders deprived nearly a quarter of Israeli citizens of any share in national sovereignty. They sped up the colonization program in the Palestinian West Bank and coddled armed, violent squatters (who are often secretly subsidized by the Israeli state). But worse of all, the Israeli elite decided just to shoot down unarmed protesters in the thousands, a clear war crime.... 2018 was the year Israel finally went completely rogue and ensured that it can no longer be considered to be in the club of liberal capitalist democracies." --s

Chico Harlan of the Washington Post: "Inside the stone walls of the Trisulti monastery [in Collepardo, Italy, in the Appenines], for more than eight centuries, monks have lived in quiet seclusion.... But now, only one 83-year-old monk remains. A longtime chef-gardener still lives there, as well.... The other resident at Trisulti is the newcomer: a 43-year-old Briton who is one of Stephen K. Bannon's closest associates in Europe and who hopes to transform the monastery into a 'gladiator school for culture warriors.' One recent morning, Benjamin Harnwell, the Bannon acolyte..., said the monastery would be filled with students who wanted to master the tools of populist politics. The halls with centuries-old oil paintings would serve as classrooms where students could learn 'the facts' -- the worldview espoused by Bannon, who, since being booted from the White House and Breitbart News, has turned to fomenting right-wing populism in Europe and beyond." ...

     ... Mrs. McCrabbie: There are ironies within ironies here. But in the end, I suppose there is a certain gruesome symmetry in using a complex built for peaceful contemplation in medieval times to allow men will be used to house men bent on forcefully returning society to a medieval model.

Comments

[safari]

Hate to be so cynical just after Christmas, but in our distorted xenophobic modern America, a deplorable bell rings in the White House every time a refugee child dies at the border.

[PD Pepe]

ESCAPE FROM THE TRUMP CULT: Alexander Hurst

Millions of Americans are blindly devoted to their Dear Leader. What will it take it take for them to snap out of it. Hurst gives us some background and some sage advice from many sage advisors. He parses the theory of "cognitive dissonance," something that Barbara Tuchman talked about re: the Vietnam War. This theory states that when people with strongly held beliefs were presented with contrary evidence, rather than change their minds, they would seek comfort in "cognitive consonance" by convincing others to support their erroneous views.

Hurst ends his piece––which I think is definitely worth reading–-with this:

A noted Venezuelan economist who fled to Spain wrote this of his own country's experience of being caught up in an authoritarian's fraudulent promises.

"What can really win them over is not to prove you are right. It is to show that you care. Only then will they believe what you say."

And I say: This is a Herculean task of the first order. But sage advice is best taken seriously, especially if those sages have some proof in their pockets.

https://newrepublic.com/article/152638/escape-trump-cult

[Marie Burns]

@PD Pepe: Thanks. One thing Hurst doesn't discuss -- and there's no reason for him to have done so -- is something I sense in Trump voters: they took a high risk in voting for Trump, and like many a high risk, it did not pay off. I think many of them realize -- on some level -- that they made a terrible mistake by imposing this crude, incompetent charlatan on the country. But having taken that risk, a risk that defied common sense -- they are loath to admit it. Ergo, they must perform amazing, mind-bending jujitsu to reach "cognitive consonance."

I'm not saying Trump has made 40 percent of Americans as mentally unstable as he is; they were already pretty messed up. But he has certainly exacerbated their symptoms to the point I think he has driven many people over the edge. They do not think there is any value in making sense. I accidentally got into an online conversation with Trumpbots on a travel site, and I am stunned at how bonkers they are. One guy, who insisted Trump had made the U.S. economy (among other things) great, later insisted the economy was about to go into recession & Trump would win in 2020 because "only he could save it."

[Ken Winkes]

@Bea and PD

Sounds a whole lot like religion to me.

Think there's a common tread among all those who feel the need of a savior?

One of my favorite demonstrations of cognitive dissonance's power to explain human behavior was the experiment that had otherwise seemingly sane and functional human beings agree that a simple line was longer or shorter than it actually was when the experimenters arranged the necessary social pressure to persuade them. That pressure actually caused them to "see" things differently and other than they really were.

I never heard if the subjects were ever apprised of how they had been gulled, or if so they later felt they had been played for fools.

We don't construct only our social reality; much of our mental landscape is painted for us by others, too.

We would all be much better off if as children we'd attended the First Church of Skepticism each Sunday morn.