Our President-elect started his “victory lap” today in Indiana where he reportedly saved “thousands,” “1,000,” “800” some Carrier plant jobs from exile to Mexico. Of course, Vice President-elect Mike Pence, the outgoing governor of Indiana, got a little personal thanks since it was, after all, in the state where he will remain in office until, well, who really cares?
Trump is the new shiny object for the media so the national, especially TV media stars, must all sit up with their paws poised like little dogs ready to lap up the next treat. All the while, Trump gets his standard little, and yes it is very little, laugh, when he denounces the media.
I had the mostly misfortune of being thrown into the traveling media pool of White House reporters who were, they felt, thrown into Hell by covering President George W. Bush and his entourage in Crawford, Texas. Note to future presidents: Just because you bought a ranch in the backwater where August vacations are spent in 100-plus-degree temperatures, doesn’t mean that reporters will ditch you.
You can look back to many of the posts since I started this blog in the Spring of 2005 and you will tend to think I hated George W. “Dubya” Bush with an unbridled passion. That is far from the truth, however. The passion was, many times, bridled.
No, I will say that George W. handed me a lot to write about both as a reporter and as a blogger. You will probably find, if you search and not particularly hard, of my recounting when I interviewed “Shrub” before he was ever elected to office. I may have interviewed him twice without his press handlers or Secret Service agents. I can’t remember how many pressers I attended when Bush was governor. I do know I attended his events as governor at two different newspapers. I also covered four events at another newspaper when Dubya was president, one was at the “Ranch” and the others were at Fort Hood.
One particular policy put me at odds with Gee Dubya forever as president. That was his decision for us to invade Iraq. It doesn’t matter whether he was doing what his Daddy hadn’t at the end of Gulf War I, or whether he started a war because Iraq not-so-strong-man, the late Saddam Hussein, had reportedly plotted an assassination of George Herbert Walker Bush, or Bush Sr.
I was pretty ticked off at that decision to invade Iraq. I wasn’t very happy when his Dad invaded Iraq the first go-round. I thought Iraq I was fool-hardy. I though Iraq II was insane. My reasoning was that, even I — a former Navy mid-grade non-commissioned officer, and no big whiz in foreign policy — could see that Iraq II was a war from which we would never extricate ourselves, American + Allies. Perhaps one day but no time soon. Yes, I’ve been right about that so far.
This brings us to the most foolhardy president-elect in my lifetime. I thought Nixon would be the one. Then I figured Ronald Reagan would bring us to nuclear war. Then there was George W. Bush. Holy frijoles, man, none of those seem bad at all — compared with, The Donald.
We have this lucky con-man on deck, who lacks intellect and intellectual curiosity, Donald J. Trump. Unless a miracle happens and it is found out the 2.5 million-margin in popular voting somehow, crazy as it seems, finally elects Hillary Clinton, then Trump is our president.
And finally, it comes down to Trump and his, supposed animus for the media. Hell, Trump should kiss the ass of every reporter or photojournalist who graces his presences. Or at the very least, he should engage in ass-kissing of every news executive he knows. Trump won his primary contests against the top of the Republican candidate food chain — more or less. He probably spent a couple of thousand bucks for those cheap-ass “Make America Great Again” ball caps.
But the leaders of the big American media, led by a menagerie of gutless wonders, feel their lower-paid employees should let Donald knock the reporters into the water. Hell, we won’t get wet, those honchos would say.
I can only hope someone with the balls to do so, will foment a mutiny. Just stop covering that obnoxious son-of-a-bitch Trump at his “press” ops. That won’t prevent the news people from doing their jobs. I mean, I found out I didn’t have to worry about copying every word of a presidential speech. Why it was posted online, you just had to check spelling, etc.
Perhaps one day we might see a grovelling Donald Trump begging for news coverage. I doubt it. But, at least we can hope he will be indicted. Or maybe he will take his bro-mance with Vladimir Putin to even a greater extent. I can just see it. Donald breaks up with Melania, and he runs off to Moscow where the very odd couple will live in holy matrimony. Or macaroni. It doesn’t really matter does it?