Scarborough’s co-host and wife Mika Brzezinki is calling for President Donald Trump to be banned on Twitter after he resumed his bizarre pushing of a conspiracy theory that Joe Scarborough murdered an intern in 2001. I have long denounced the President’s use of the tragic story of Lori Klausutis as callous and wrong. There is not a shred of support for this claim and the constant tweets from the President only adds to this tragedy for the Klausutis family. As I noted yesterday, “politics ain’t beanbag” but it is also not a license for such malicious slandering of your critics. Having said that, I do not support the effort to ban Trump from Twitter. I have written repeatedly about the danger posed by calls from politicians for increased censorship on social media and the Internet. Indeed, I criticized Trump recently for such banning of opposing views from his Twitter account.
President Trump has been calling for an investigation into the death of Klausutis as a foil to use against Scarborough, one of his best known critics.
Despite many of us roundly condemning his use of this tragedy, the president returned on Sunday to the subject. He called again for an investigation in “Psycho Joe Scarborough.” He asked “So a young marathon runner just happened to faint in his office, hit her head on his desk, & die? I would think there is a lot more to this story than that? An affair? What about the so-called investigator?”
He also questioned the findings of the autopsy and suggested that Scarborough left Congress mysteriously after the death: “A blow to her head? Body found under his desk? Left Congress suddenly? Big topic of discussion in Florida…and, he’s a Nut Job (with bad ratings). Keep digging, use forensic geniuses!”
One does not have to search for “forensic geniuses” to reject this salacious and sad conspiracy theory. The autopsy revealed that Klausutis had an undiagnosed heart condition which caused her to pass out and hit her head as she fell. Not only did the coroner rule out a blow from another person, but Scarborough was not even in town. He was in Washington. Moreover, Scarborough had announced that he was leaving Congress a month before this death.
The President would be just as credible in arguing that Big Foot did it. There has to be some modicum of decency and civility left in our politics. Regardless of how some may feel about Scarborough and Brzezinski, this is beyond the pale for any person who believes in such values.
Thus, I do not blame Brzezinski for being angry. She has also been the subject of reprehensible attacks by President Trump. However, Brzezinski told her Twitter followers “A call is being set up with @jack and the GC,” referring to Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey and the company’s general counsel. “At what point is @Twitter a part of this?” Brzezinski tweeted and called on Dorsey to “TAKE DOWN TRUMP’S ACCOUNT – the world world [sic] be safer.”
This would not make “the world safer.” It would also not silence President Trump. It would further fuel the movement toward speech regulation and censorship. All of the parties involves are public officials or public figures. That comes with the sad reality of being the such of unhinged and unfair attacks. Over fifty years ago, the Supreme Court handed down New York Times v. Sullivan to add protections for such speech criticizing public officials, and later public figures. It is a protection of the free press and free speech that President Trump has often railed against. The “actual malice” standard requires a showing that the newspaper published a false report with either actual knowledge of its falsity or a reckless disregard of the truth. Imposing a high standard for proof of defamation, Brennan sought to give the free press “breathing space” to carry out its key function in our system. In his concurrence, Hugo Black stated: “The half-million-dollar verdict does give dramatic proof . . . that state libel laws threaten the very existence of an American press virile enough to publish unpopular views on public affairs and bold enough to criticize the conduct of public officials. The factual background of this case emphasizes the imminence and enormity of that threat.”
These tweets are opinion, which are protected under New York Times v. Sullivan — the very standard that Trump has denounced. As we have previously discussed, simply saying that something is your opinion does not automatically shield you from defamation actions if you are asserting facts rather than opinion. However, courts have been highly protective over the expression of opinion in the interests of free speech. This issue was addressed in Ollman v. Evans 750 F.2d 970 (D.C. Cir. 1984). In that case, Novak and Evans wrote a scathing piece that attacked a professor at New York University, Bertell Ollman. Judge Kenneth Starr wrote for the D.C. Circuit in finding no basis for defamation. This passage would seem relevant for secondary posters and activists using the article to criticize the family:
The reasonable reader who peruses an Evans and Novak column on the editorial or Op-Ed page is fully aware that the statements found there are not “hard” news like those printed on the front page or elsewhere in the news sections of the newspaper. Readers expect that columnists will make strong statements, sometimes phrased in a polemical manner that would hardly be considered balanced or fair elsewhere in the newspaper. National Rifle Association v. Dayton Newspaper, Inc., supra, 555 F.Supp. at 1309. That proposition is inherent in the very notion of an “Op-Ed page.” Because of obvious space limitations, it is also manifest that columnists or commentators will express themselves in condensed fashion without providing what might be considered the full picture. Columnists are, after all, writing a column, not a full-length scholarly article or a book. This broad understanding of the traditional function of a column like Evans and Novak will therefore predispose the average reader to regard what is found there to be opinion.
A reader of this particular Evans and Novak column would also have been influenced by the column’s express purpose. The columnists laid squarely before the reader their interest in ending what they deemed a “frivolous” debate among politicians over whether Mr. Ollman’s political beliefs should bar him from becoming head of the Department of Government and Politics at the University of Maryland. Instead, the authors plainly intimated in the column’s lead paragraph that they wanted to spark a more appropriate debate within academia over whether Mr. Ollman’s purpose in teaching was to indoctrinate his students. Later in the column, they openly questioned the measure or method of Professor Ollman’s scholarship. Evans and Novak made it clear that they were not purporting to set forth definitive conclusions, but instead meant to ventilate what in their view constituted the central questions raised by Mr. Ollman’s prospective appointment.
The same analysis would apply here. Brzezinski has over a million Twitter followers and a popular morning show on national television. She does not need to seek to bar people from speaking to address untruths. Indeed, the Trump tweets have led to a barrage of condemnations. including Republican members and Fox News journalists. It is an example of good speech correcting bad speech.
These tweets were, as I have said repeatedly, unspeakably wrong. However, compounding that wrong with a call for censorship is not the answer.
Once more we see openly leftist talking heads pushing for suppression of the 1st amendment. Interestingly enough…they don’t see it that way.
Twitter is not the government. The First Amendment has nothing to do with this discussion.
I wish you would have addressed the barrage of despicable comments both Mika and Joe have made about President Trump. You were hardly fair which surprised me as you usually are.
Ultimately, Mika is overreaching, certainly. Discussion needs to be had though. Twitter has a quick trigger finger and no sense of humor but they let Trump regularly violate their own rules…
Thing is, this is the type of argument that just plays to a Trump pivot to his base. Unintended consequences for Mika. The 35% just get whipped up and enraged on the way to a staggering loss in November.
Blue state lockdown blues.
Darren, great post on Truman. He might be a little rough around the edges but he had more integrity than current politicians.
I was taught about conspiracy theories today. For three and a half years Adam Schiff, Brennan, Clapper, Strok, Page, and the msm told me Trump was Putin’s puppet and guilty of treason and collusion.
Privately under oath, all the individuals all said it wasn’t true, that they had exactly zero evidence.
We can thank a few (R) congressmen, but without the new DNI, Powell and her team, they would have gotten away with it apparently forever. By the skin of our teeth, the truth was just revealed earlier this month. The declassified documents have proven Schiff and all of them were lying for years. Everyone told us big conspiracies just have too many people to control and they can never happen.
They were wrong. The democrats showed the entire world that very large and very evil conspiracies can run front and center for years. Be covered up. Be on the news every day as fact. Require gigantic expenditures of government resources and special prosecutor teams of lawyers and rip innocent but targeted peoples lives apart. Even convict people and then claim those convictions prove the conspiracy when they do not.
So now we know. Seth just tried to give a lesson on conspiracy theories, how they don’t really exist, but he was part of the big national years long Trump hate one we just saw unravel.
Above, below and all around, Trump is instantly derided for “a conspiracy theory” from the very people who went on an insane 3.5 year plus conspiracy theory binge.
So when some schmucko who hasn’t got clue one and is covered in eggs, tomatoes, and bird feathers from head to toe from almost a half decade of an absolutely debunked conspiracy theory, debunked right from the declassified lips of those who pushed it on stupid schmucko for many years, tells you Trump just spit out a horrible debunked lie in a tweet, a conspiracy theory, laugh in their faces. They had years to figure out the obvious and they absolutely failed. Now, the very next second they want to give lessons ?
Laughing !
Yes, thank you, you’re just the person(s) to help.
Wow. I guess I had better take a picture and some notes.
Shakdi, you sound like a Commenter known as Crazed Idiot.
All your posts are angry grievances: ‘Trump and his supporters are horribly victimized’.
You’re stewing with outrage. ‘Liberals will be sorry’. Righteous citizens like you are spoiling for a showdown. You’re the leader of a lynch mob marching up Main Street. Liberals better run if they know what’s good for them.
More fantasies, but you’re scared.
Don’t be so scared and intimidated, it’s just a blog.
Harry Truman was the last democrat. He is the last man to be elected president of the United States and not have a college diploma. He is also the last ex president that when he died, he did not die a wealthy man like the ex presidents that came after him. When Harry Truman had something on his mind he came right out and told you what he was thinking. Not unlike Trump. Bess Truman once said that she had a hard time to get him to say manure.
Truman is my husband’s favorite president…..He died on our honeymoon. Well, he wasn’t with us 😊, but the news of his death was broadcast at our hotel.. It was sad because his death was the end of an era, we felt.
Cindy Bragg – hope Truman’s death did not put a damper on your honeymoon
😍
I remember when I read that when President Truman retired, he returned to an ordinary living but had the disadvantage of having little money, much of this was a result of a business failure many years earlier that had wiped out most of his savings. At the time of his departure from politics, he received several high-paying offers to work for several nationwide corporations. He answered at least one to the effect of “You don’t want me personally, you want the title of president of the United States and that is not for sale.” Congress saw what was happening and voted to award him and successive presidents a pension after having served as president.
Harry Truman had more integrity then than does all present-day Members of Congress combined. Like most individuals his presidency had good and bad aspects of it, yet his virtue was one that draws at least my admiration.
#NotPresidential
# NotMinimallyDecent
Anon – #Notyourbusiness
Not his business??
I thought it was extremely decent – a few tweets of truth vs hours per day over years of known false accusations and lies of muh russia and all the rest…
Frankly I don’t understand why the press like those involved above haven’t had some awful accidents, too ? If they did who could possibly complain it wasn’t earned.
Shakdi D – you mean there might be an unexplained rash of New Yorkicides?
Like 2 years of of executable offense lies – manchurian candidate putin puppet election thief… knowing they lied, and did it anyway, for several years….
My cousin’s name is Claire. Her last name is Voyant. She predicts things well. Trump’s wife has convinced him to get out of office and turn it over to Pence. Old Joe will be running against some Repub who is only 62.
If Covid-19 had not thrown the country into a tailspin I would not have argued with your cousin. But the economy’s dive and citizen unrest over lock-downs, together with the possibility that a mentally declining man may be elected President because of unending propaganda by the MSM, have handed President Trump a challenge that I do not think he can resist. For his and his family’s sake I hope your cousin is right; for our country’s sake I hope she is wrong.
Honest……you DO know the cousin is not a real person, right? 🤠
Cindy Bragg – you do know he is married to you and you are responsible for all of his actions. 😉
Paul….Lol! He’s asleep!
Cindy Bragg – leave a Post-It on his forehead. 😉
Paul…hahahaha!!!! So funny!
The Death Of Lori Klausutis – Facts And Circumstances
Lori Klausutis had spent two years as a constituent services coordinator in Scarborough’s Fort Walton Beach annex. She was not a college intern, as some have claimed. She was not pregnant, either, as some have asserted. And she was not, as Trump claimed Sunday and others have before him, a marathon runner.
Klausutis had been married for four years to a 6-foot-3 civilian Air Force contractor named T.J. Klausutis. They lived in a town called Niceville where the population numbered about 11,000 people, many with jobs at nearby Eglin Air Force Base.
She grew up about 20 minutes outside Atlanta and graduated with honors from the University of Georgia with a degree in journalism. She was completing an MBA from the University of West Florida, sang in the Saint Mary’s Catholic Church choir and ran 2 to 4 miles about four times a week. She was on the board of the youth symphony and had just stepped down from the presidency of the Emerald Coast Young Republicans to become treasurer.
Klausutis died on a Thursday two weeks before her birthday. She told two people that day that she didn’t feel well. Her husband was out of town on business, and she’d planned to go to a girls’ night out, but she canceled. A second employee in the office was on vacation, so Klausutis was working alone. She last spoke to someone on the phone just before 5 p.m.
A security guard was supposed to check the doors of the Miracle Strip Parkway office complex that night but later admitted he probably skipped some. He failed to discover the unlocked office door or see the office lights were on.
Klausutis’s job was helping people in Scarborough’s district who needed assistance navigating bureaucracy. The couple who showed up Friday wanted a work permit. They found Klausutis lying near a desk and called 911. They told the local paper they saw no sign of an attack and assumed she had had a seizure and collapsed.
Police reported no signs of a robbery or a violent attack. When the medical examiner was slow to announce a cause of death, speculation began to swirl. The local Northwest Florida Daily News reported getting inquiries “from Massachusetts and Oregon and dozens of places in between.”
When one story mentioned suicide as a possibility, Klausutis’s father-in-law, Norm, wrote a letter to the editor: “Losing Lori was the most painful event in my life of 62 years. It was far more painful for her husband. . . . She was extremely happy with her life, job and family. For those who knew Lori, the thought of suicide, as your published reports suggested, is absolutely unthinkable.”
Finally, on Aug. 6, Assistant Medical Examiner Michael Berkland announced his findings. Klausutis, he wrote, “died as a result of an acute subdural hematoma which occurred as a result of a closed head trauma sustained in a simple fall.”
The position of the body and her hands showed she had made no effort to break her fall, he wrote, and the nature of her brain injury wasn’t consistent with an attacker hitting her. Her heart had a “floppy mitral valve,” suggesting she suffered from an abnormal heart rhythm that led to a fainting spell. It also explained why she had felt ill, he said.
At that point, her husband made his one and only public statement about the case, praising Berkland’s “thoroughness and attention to detail” and adding, “He did a wonderful job in finding the right answers without rushing to make a quick diagnosis,”
But Klausutis’s death occurred while the nation was caught up in speculation about the disappearance of Bureau of Prisons intern Chandra Levy and her ties to Rep. Gary Condit (D-Calif). Soon the stories merged in the public’s mind, with some labeling Scarborough the Republican Condit (who was never charged with any crime).
Edited from: “Florida Family Grieves As Trump Spreads Debunked Conspiracy Theory To Attack MSNBC Host”
The Washington Post, 5/24/20
MEDICAL EXAMINER EXAMINED AND CLEARED
IN WAKE OF KLAUSUTIS DEATH
Posts on such sites as Truthout and the liberal Daily Kos all but accused Scarborough of murder. Filmmaker Michael Moore talked about registering the domain name “JoeScarboroughKilledHisIntern.com.” Rumors claimed her death had something to do with the 2000 election or 9/11 or that it had prompted Scarborough to resign from Congress two months afterward — although Scarborough had announced his resignation before her death. He married his second wife, a Jeb Bush fundraiser named Susan Waren, shortly after his September resignation took effect.
Scarborough, who writes occasional opinion columns for The Washington Post, declined to be interviewed. His fullest comments came in a 2005 letter to Vanity Fair protesting a suggestion he had been caught in “a sleazy sex scandal cover-up.”
“Here are the facts,” he wrote. “(1) Lori worked in my annex office in Okaloosa County, Florida. (2) I met her no more than three times; I was never alone with her. (3) I didn’t leave Congress because of her death; I announced my retirement from Congress in May 2001 — she passed away several months later.” The magazine apologized for “any emotional distress.”
The “Scarborough scandal” picked up steam in 2012 thanks to an unrelated controversy involving Berkland, the medical examiner who had determined that Klausutis died from an accidental fall.
Berkland had failed to pay the rent on a storage unit he’d used for three years When opened, it turned out to hold more than 100 containers of human tissue, including brains, hearts and livers. Officials said the remains, kept in leaky cups and dinner boxes, were from private autopsies he had conducted, not ones he’d handled for the state.
Berkland, an osteopath, had somehow landed his Florida job despite being fired in Kansas in a dispute over his caseload and autopsy reports, including unproven allegations that he had fabricated some details. In 2003, he was fired from his Florida post for being slow to complete autopsy reports.
After the storage unit discovery, Berkland was arrested. Because this was his first criminal offense, he was eligible for a pre-trial intervention program. Upon its completion, prosecutors dropped the charges.
Despite Berkland’s unrelated troubles, no evidence has emerged to contradict his findings in this case. “That thing has been scrutinized by a number of other pathologists, and it’s a solid diagnosis,” he said in an interview Sunday. “There’s nothing to reopen.”
Edited from: “Florida Family Grieves As Trump Spreads Debunked Conspiracy Theory To Attack MSNBC Host”
5/23/20
So a totally corrupt medical examiner they let off the hook with dead body parts and a known corrupt non professional life.
Why, it’s like every time – every other government cover up it’s the same sick story, just the names change.
“all unrelated” as your stupid text says… his false reports on corpses
Laughing – the mental gymnastics are incredible.
It’s like a seedy crime/horror show.
“nothing to see here folks, move along…we democrats have declared a horror normal again”
And, Jeff Epstien committed suicide in prison? They laughed at Trump, when he said his phones were being tapped.
Let’s see how Seth did with his propaganda paste…
1. It’s a military city, crawling with intel and people who know how to kill and how make it look natural…hooked deep into the black squads – Niceville is anything but nice under the cute name. It’s filled with men trained to kill. Serious toxic masculinity.
2. hubby was “out of town on business” – very convenient, for Scarborough
3. Her co worker was magically “also gone on … vacation!”
4. Her last call was 5pm – so quitting time… why was she there later ? They don’t say where the call was made from or to. Very convenient.
5. The security guard- oh guess what – he was asleep at the wheel… just like Epstiens… wow what luck … lights on door open “he missed it”… quick, move on…
Laughing !
6. A horrible incompetent known corrupt medical examiner – as always, another stooge is conveniently in place, and of course the powers that be let the stooge off the hook for his crimes… because then birds don’t sing
7. the rest of pile of perfect idyllic doesn’t matter fluff, to give the impression nothing could possibly be wrong…
8. Berkland’s word is taken on Berkland’s mess, an amazing investigation by the press pattycakers, just ask Scarborough, he knows nothing and has nothing to do with it, that of course is good enough
Then they wonder why no one believes them.
Everyone’s out of town, the door is wide open the lights are on, the security guard blows it he’s asleep at the wheel, the medical examiner is a macabre crook they let off the hook…they can’t come up with a story fast enough and float a suicide trial balloon – finally a laughable ruse is proffered, and everyone please look away it’s just an unending string of bad luck….
Oh man.
Shakdi, you need a prosecutor to take the case and PROVE Trump’s accusations. The circumstances of ‘any’ crime can be twisted to imply a conspiracy.
Look at the O.J. Simpson case. Detective Mark Fuhman actually ‘was’ a straight cop. But Simpson’s Defense team made him into a ‘racist’. And that can be done with many crimes; murder especially. Chances are one of the cops, paramedics, examiners or ‘whoever’ can be portrayed as questionable. Conspiracy theories merely exaggerate those deficiencies.
Conspiracy Mongers like yourself will seize on those deficiencies and play them up as confirmation of a conspiracy. One can do that with any news story; just seize on certain aspects as highly sinister while presenting the conspiracy as a ‘no-brainer’. If your audience has no brains, they will probably buy it.
Peter – Mark Fuhrman was on tape as a racist.
A, racist in what context, Paul?
Do you believe O J was innocent?? If not why are you arguing?
Peter – OJ’s Dream Team had tapes of Fuhrman using the N word several times viciously.
Wait a minute conspiracy monger Seth, OJ was found innocent. Are you arguing he wasn’t ?
I thought you just said all I need is a prosecutor and to prove it ?
Amazing how quickly you reversed yourself.
OJ was still guilty. Furhman was working with a partner who could have been put on the stand to answer questions about the sequence of events at the crime scene. He was not. One problem at the OJ trial was that the 1st chair prosecutor wasn’t very good at her job, in spite of her handsome salary (to which she was at the time insisting her more impecunious estranged husband provide supplements).
This is Absurd…….the Bandstand video is a scream.
No I don’t need anyone to do anything. I did what I needed done.
Tell us more about Russia and the 2016 election.
Maybe get electroshock therapy first, then we have a chance of hearing a grunt that isn’t a lie or a bad joke or both.
RECENT TWEETS BY TRUMP THREATEN NORTH CAROLINA..
IF DEMOCRATIC GOVERNOR DOESN’T ALLOW PACKED GOP CONVENTION
@realDonaldTrump
6h
…to find, with all of the jobs and economic development it brings, another Republican National Convention site. This is not something I want to do. Thank you, and I LOVE the people of North Carolina!
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
6h
…made by many thousands of enthusiastic Republicans, and others, to head to beautiful North Carolina in August. They must be immediately given an answer by the Governor as to whether or not the space will be allowed to be fully occupied. If not, we will be reluctantly forced…
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
6h
…full attendance in the Arena. In other words, we would be spending millions of dollars building the Arena to a very high standard without even knowing if the Democrat Governor would allow the Republican Party to fully occupy the space. Plans are being….
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
6h
I love the Great State of North Carolina, so much so that I insisted on having the Republican National Convention in Charlotte at the end of August. Unfortunately, Democrat Governor, @RoyCooperNC is still in Shutdown mood & unable to guarantee that by August we will be allowed…
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
15h
MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
15h
OBAMAGATE!
Donald J. Trump
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
Here Trump insists that North Carolina allow Republicans to pack their convention hall at full capacity or the party will make immediate plans to relocate its convention. Never mind that even Republicans are concerned about the Coronavirus. Trump’s wants a packed convention hall cheering his acceptance speech.
Here we also see that Trump Tweets “Obamagate!” for no apparent reason other than to ‘keep the scandal alive’. Never mind that Attorney General Barr issued a statement last week that essentially dismissed the possibility of his participation in any ‘Obamagate’ prosecutions. Apparently Trump keeps tweeting and retweeting ‘Obamagate’.
Peter – Milwaukee has the same problem. How are they and the Democrats going to deal with it?
Paul, I believe the Democrats are considering a limit on attendees in the convention hall or possibly a virtual convention with online feeds.
No one can look ahead at this point and see how successful we’ll be in reopening the country. Hopefully everything goes smoothly. But we have to prepare for the possibility it won’t be so smooth. In any event a ‘packed convention hall’ might be inappropriate for either party. What’s more, recent polls indicate that even most Republicans have concerns about virus expose. It’s not the simple Culture Wars argument that Trump would like to claim it is.
One should also note that political analysts have been saying for years that party conventions are essentially a throwback to another time and aren’t completely necessary anymore.
Comrade Mikita Brzezinki enjoys the freedom of speech.
Americans enjoy the freedom of not listening to her hysteria and incoherence.
Who puts this rubbish, this woman, on the air?
Imagine, the American Founders provided women the freedom to grow the population sufficient to grow and defend the nascent nation.
Under the current communist regime, the U.S. population is imported, women are men and the fertility rate is in a “death spiral” causing
Americans and America to disappear.
Say good morning, communism.
Say good night, America.
Thanks, Professor, for criticizing Trump when he deserves it:
“The President would be just as credible in arguing that Big Foot did it. There has to be some modicum of decency and civility left in our politics. ”
Of course, I hate how many times the Dem media cover for Clinton lies, or false accusations by unnamed officials.
Most Trump supporters are not so keen on him fighting like this, sort of dirty – but not really any more dirty than the years of Dem defamations against him and Reps like Kavanaugh and even Sarah Palin where NYT defamed her, again.
Almost all Rep voters are glad that Trump, at least, is fighting. Fighting back.
Maybe the ONLY way the Dems will stop their uncensored defamation of Trump and Reps is if Trump and Reps defame them back?
Since, obviously, there is a big paying audience for endless Dem defamation against Trump … and Kavanaugh, Flynn, Palin, Bush … Reagan.
Some call it Trump Derangement Syndrome, but since it was before Trump and will continue after him, I label it Democrat Derangement Syndrome.
Tom, you live in Slovakia. Any relation to Melania Trump? If not, what’s your investment here?
TomGrey – Joe Scarborough, M.D. has been claiming on TV that Trump is killing people by taking the combination of drugs he is taking. Trump punches back. 🙂
Paul C 👍👍
Cindy Bragg – it is interesting that Joe has Mika fronting for him. 😉
Paul, explain how it’s the President’s job to ‘punch back’ at critics.
70 years ago Harry Truman said, with regards to his ‘own’ critics: “If you can’t take the heat, get out of the kitchen”.
Truman realized early that presidents become lighting rods for criticism. And obviously the critics will outnumber a president. A president can’t possibly punch back at every critic.
Instead of punching back, presidents can assume the posture of a statesman. They can act confident and mature while attempting to serve ‘all’ Americans.
Our Founding Fathers never envisioned the president to be spreading conspiracy theories in an effort to ‘punch back’.
It is madness to think the president should make accusations no court can support. That’s the disgrace here. No prosecutor has found any shred of new evidence.
Peter – Harry Truman ordered the dropping of TWO atomic bombs on Japan. Don’t talk about Harry Truman.
Paul C……..I guess Peterseth thinks that Truman was so “statesman-like” when he had the bombs dropped, obliterating thousands.
Cindy Bragg – I think Truman made the right decision. The other decision was the invasion of the Japanese islands. They had an army and home army ready to defend. Think Iwo Jima on a massive scale.
Paul C….oh I agree. My father fought in the Pacific.
But I’m amused by the current Lefties who are so delicate and would have to be sedated if they really thought about the historic events and actions, though justified, of their liberal heritage.
Cindy, just one comment earlier you ridiculed me for mentioning using Truman as an example. Then you turn right around and admit the A Bombs were necessary and that ‘lefties’ don’t understand that.
It goes to show, Cindy, that the Culture Wars become an endlessly stupid game where people attack the ‘other side’ when there’s actually no disagreement.
Peter – I had another teacher want me fired because I agreed with Truman on dropping the atomic bombs. What is your stand on the issue? For or against?
Seth/Peter…….You must be very young. Here is what I was getting at: You and your side of the corral think Trump is crass and uncouth, thuggish who “punches back!” Your side would rather have a President who adopts the “posture of a statesman” and acts mature.
So, I was imagining the statesman-like posture that you believe a president would have who is about to drop two devastating bombs in surprise attacks on two major cities filled with innocents. War is no place for statesman like behavior if you want to win! We needed to win to survive……which required thuggish attitudes like Trump possesses! Get it?!
Seth/Peter…….You must be very young
Yeah, once upon a time. As seen on TV!
P.S. seth…. Dropping the bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima?? That was called Truman punching back!!!-
Paul, if you think Truman was right on the bombs, why are you implying I was wrong to bring him up?
Yeah, an invasion of Japan would have been a giant blood bath. The 2 bombs were cleaner in that regard. But those A Bombs were a one trick pony the world might never tolerate again.
Peter – you brought him up with the wrong example.
Paul, EVERY president faces an army of daily critics. That ‘heat in the kitchen’ comment applies more than ever today. Cable News and the Internet have multiplied the critics. No president can possibly ‘punch back’ at them all. And only fools like Trump attempt to ‘punch back’ at everyone.
This explains why Trump can never get beyond the Russia Probe, Impeachment and charges of insanity. Trump is too busy trying to get even to ever move forward.
If a president’s only focus is ‘punching back’ at critics, he won’t have time for anything else. And that explains this whole presidency.
Peter – Trump has done more in 3 years than any other President and still has driven the media crazy.
70 years ago Harry Truman said, with regards to his ‘own’ critics: “If you can’t take the heat, get out of the kitchen”.
Peter has no conception of how verbally combative Truman was in his public statements.
Absurd, you’re presumptuous as usual. Truman was considered an ‘accidental’ president for most his first term (which was actually Roosevelt’s last term). In that regard Truman was skewered by the media of his day.
Nevertheless that ‘heat in the kitchen’ analogy remains just a true today as if was 70 years ago. Nothing has changed in that regard. If anything, cable news and the internet have created more critics that Truman ever imagined possible. Hitting back at everyone is absolutely mindless.
Sound familiar for the last 3 1/2 years? It’s not about the truth, it’s about the sensationalism of the accusation. If Joe can’t take it, maybe he and Mike shouldn’t dish it.
Gee, if I was bugging out I’d announce my leaving, like a month or two ahead of time, then the hottie would die from bumping below my desk…while I was out of town…
All the rubes in the world would say that settles it.
Laughing. I mean really laughing.
Trump must think you people are clueless.
Now you know why Trump constantly claims he’s brilliant.
His opposition is a joke.
“Joe Scarborough was out of town…”
Well, that settles it. Of course powerful Congressmen do their own hit jobs in person…
*rolls eyes*
Forest Gump is smarter than that.
It’s just a constant slam of stupid so long as it protects a democrat operative.
Shakdi D – I watch a lot of Forensic Files and it is interesting the number of people who are “out of town” for a murder who really are not.
I hadn’t noticed that about Forensic Files. That aside, he’s not Joe Blow from Pensacola. He was a member of Congress with an elaborate schedule maintained by staff and scads of events to attend. The number of eyeballs observing him in any given week would exceed the number observing an ordinary person in a year.
Nowadays, there are private security cameras here, there and the next place. I imagine they were thinner on the ground in 2001, but it’s not novel technology. If law enforcement had a mind to check, they could have asked the merchants near his district office to run their tapes on that particular morning.
DSS – Many of us remember the female astronaut who put on the Pampers and drove non-stop cross-country to kill her rival.
This is utterly hilarious after two years of muh russian puppet of putin.
They can knowingly dish out attacking, defaming, illegal lies for two solid years, but they can’t take a couple tweets.
Trump should threaten to pull their broadcast license(even if he can’t and needs Congress) like Hillary did with her 32 fellow signatures and letter to ABC when ABC had that movie that showed Clinton had 6 chances to kill Osama and refused them all. ABC wound up apologizing and changing the movie cutting out the scenes that Hillary demanded.
So Trump hasn’t gone as far as Hillary and her 31 other congressional signatories even when ABC was about to tell the truth and not muh russia conspiracies.
The democrats and their msm lackeys have really thin skin.
Once again, it’s one rule for them, and another for the opponent(s).
Here we have another unbelievable super twisted one sided load of sheepy doo doo.
I await the two year investigation into Scarborough, as he so richly deserves. We have to be fair after all.
“ These tweets were, as I have said repeatedly, unspeakably wrong. However, compounding that wrong with a call for censorship is not the answer“.
Turley gives a somewhat convoluted reasoning about trumps claims or “opinions”. What he doesn’t realize is that trump IS the president and he has a special place above all other citizens, he has power to influence, immunity from almost everything and his followers will rightly believe he is telling the truth. Because he is president his opinions hold far more weight and can do harm. Look at his “opinions” on taking hydroxychloroquine. He promoted this constantly and two people died because they took his “opinion” as fact.
Twitter CAN ban the president if it chooses. The constitution only prohibits government censorship of speech not private enterprises. Twitter has banned people like Alex Jones for his “opinions” too. If Alex Jones can be banned so can trump.
I hereby call for Mika to be banned! This demand has exactly the same weight as Mika’s.
No, the autopsy did not “reveal that she had an undiagnosed heart condition,” That was the conclusion of the coroner, who was found to be keeping body parts in a storage shed some years ago – https://abcnews.go.com/US/man-charged-100-body-parts-found-storage-container/story?id=17190455.
Yes, a young physically fit runner/jogger, perky… and the claimed generic medical issue is discovered after her death…
I don’t know it’s real common. young, physically fit, health nut, perky. Fall over hit head on desk and die. We’ve heard of it exactly once, never before and never after.
You’d have to be an idiot to buy it.
So we have Trump, and we have idiots.
Watch it Mika, morning Joe has already killed one lover
Gork – they have the same hair and body type. Mika needs too be very very careful.
Mika, blink three times if you are safe.
Paul LOL
But blinking might be out of the question because of years of botox abuse 😍
Cindy Bragg – I did not know you could abuse botox. Learn something new. You make a great point.
Twit twit bo bit .
Banana fanna fo for..
Fee fi Moe mit…
Quit!
If the first two twiiters are ever the same..
You drop them both and call em lame.
Like Trump! Bump!
Friggin f so lump..
And Barry Barry was a fairy…
Trump and Goldwater gave virus a new quantrary.
You should never do Shirley Ellis’s name game with Tucker Carlson’s name.