The New York Times reports:
“I disagree 100% with Jeanine Pirro,” Mr. Trump wrote.
“I don’t know what she was thinking? To me, it was a pure case of VANDALISM,” he wrote, adding, “There may have been some contractor difficulty, but the major damage was caused by VANDALS!”
I love the image of Jeanine Pirro, the cartoon character of a U.S. attorney serving at Trump’s pleasure, for which the word mercurial hardly does justice, trying to explain this to Trump.
As so often happens (and speaking of cartoon characters), Doonesbury got there first.
What else does Trump disagree with?
In a Times piece about how Trump handles his dropping poll numbers, Peter Baker writes,
After a spate of bad polls earlier this summer, President Trump simply declared that they were not true. “MY REAL POLL NUMBERS ARE THE HIGHEST THEY HAVE EVER BEEN,” he wrote on social media, using capital letters as if they would shout away any contrary data.
I tend to go on about how much I appreciate the consistent fine writing in the Times, and from stylists like Peter Baker, and that last bit is exactly what I mean.
Back to that news analysis in the Times:
The latest surveys indicate that Mr. Trump is now all but the most unpopular second-term president at this stage of their tenure in the history of polling going back to the 1940s. The only exception is not one that would give Mr. Trump much solace: Richard M. Nixon had even less public support at this stage in his second term but at that point he was just days away from resigning over the Watergate scandal.
“He’s always going to project strength regardless what the numbers are and he’ll say they’re fake anyway,” said Douglas Heye, a longtime Republican strategist, adding that he did not expect any switch in political strategy. “Short of him screaming and throwing something at a staffer, that’s it.”
Mr. Trump himself has made clear that he sees a different reality than most independent pollsters and political strategists of both parties — and distrusts results that are not favorable to him.
The second-smartest thing I ever heard about Donald Trump, after that Maggie Haberman quote I hope, like me, you’ve memorized by now:
“Mr. Trump has treated his own words as disposable commodities, intended for single use, and not necessarily indicative of any deeply held beliefs.”
was that he doesn’t see the difference between things that are true and things that should be true.
This is why he’s so comfortable announcing peace deals in the Middle East that only exist in his imagination, or calling high prices being experienced by every American a hoax.
Trump “disagrees” with the law, nature, science, medicine, and the need for a president to care about other people.
While Trump always manages to disagree while being exceedingly disagreeable, he also finds time to “threaten,” “claim” and “warn” as I’ve been chronicling here.
August Update
“Trump threatens” About 38,300,000 results
“Trump warns” About 43,900,000 results
“Trump claims”About 221,000,000 results
That last number isn’t a surprise. “Claims” usually need some sort of basis, while threats and warnings can be emptier.
“Trump disagrees” is only at About 5,220,000 results today. But let’s all keep an eye on that one, along with the others. Share your progress in the comments.
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