When One President Smears Another

[dalton99a]

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/05/opinion/when-one-president-smears-another.html

When One President Smears Another
By THE EDITORIAL BOARD | MARCH 5, 2017

Let’s begin with what the public can know for certain. President Trump had no evidence on Saturday morning when he smeared his predecessor, President Barack Obama, accusing him of ordering that Trump Tower phones be tapped during the 2016 campaign. Otherwise, the White House would not be scrambling to find out if what he said is true.

Just contemplate the recklessness — the sheer indifference to truth and the moral authority of the American presidency — revealed here: one president baselessly charging criminality by another, all in a childish Twitter rampage.

The Times reported on Sunday that the F.B.I. director, James Comey, was so alarmed by Mr. Trump’s fact-free claim — which implicitly accused the F.B.I. of breaking the law by wiretapping an American citizen at a president’s behest — that he was asking the Justice Department to publicly call it false. In other words, the F.B.I. director was demanding that Justice officially declare the president to be misleading the public.

This is a dangerous moment, which requires Congress and members of this administration to look beyond partisan maneuvering and tend to the health of the democracy itself.

[MFM008]

1. because birtherism

worked for the asshole.

[Igel]

3. Can't get worked up over it.

Take the correspondents' dinner. It used to be a kind of roast, but good natured. Presidents would entertain the news corps at their personal expense. Yes, they'd be self-deprecating.

Then again, for most of my life presidents tended to stay out of the limelight and make room for the next in line. And the next in line would treat the predecessors with either silence or respect.

After 2008, the dinner was used as a podium to politically humiliate political opponents. Those mocked weren't members of the administration--they had a very high opinion of themselves, it seems. But they could mock nearly everybody else. Deprecating, yes, but not of the self. At that point I tuned out. They want to fling poo at each other? Hey, why not. It's now tradition, and a lot of people liked it when the tradition became a bit more rough and tumble. It suited their demeanor. "Gentlefolk" they're not.

It quickly got to the point that not insulting somebody with the vitriol one could muster was taken as respect, and presenting a slightly less than completely offensive proposal was termed "compromise." Again, they had a high opinion of themselves.

[PdxSean]

6. Huh?

Seriously? You think the Obama administration "had a high opinion of itself" and used the correspondent's dinner to "mock" innocent Republicans like birther Trump?

Thus, you "can't get worked up" when Trump as President falsely accuses Obama of having ordered illegal wire taps because, um, roast at the correspondent's dinner when Obama was President, i.e. "after 2008?"

Nah. Shirley, I've misread your post.

[Progressive dog]

8. You must have been watching different correspondents dinners

than I did. The rest of your post seems to deviate even farther from reality.

[muriel_volestrangler]

9. Obama was frequently self-deprecating, at the dinner and elsewhere

Yes, he mocked Trump, but it was Donald Fucking Trump, who was trying to become a politician by pushing the absurd, and at base racist, birther crap.

[DFW]

5. I think it may actually be something as simple as that

Trump has not made the transition from TV show host to President, and still thinks that making up and promoting fictitious conspiracy theories will somehow be beneficial to him from a PR point of view.

Nobody mentions the 25th Amendment when a game show host makes up crap about a birth certificate. The whole nation pays attention when a sitting president publicly utters false accusations of criminal activity directed at his immediate predecessor. THAT is a serious indication of someone not playing with a full deck--a situation for which the 25th Amendment was composed.

The downside is President Pence, which would sort of be the equivalent of canceling the firing squad in favor of lethal injection.

[pkdu]

2. and yet , Sessions DOJ hasnt done so....Comey should resign Monday morning nt

[Kablooie]

4. Look beyond partisan maneuvering? Fat chance!

Republicans could care less about the health democracy itself.
They've been trying to eliminate it for decadesl

[Timmygoat]

7. Cannot wait

I cannot wait for Trump to come on national TV with a groveling apology to ex President Obama. Or maybe
a libel charge against him, he must not get away with this. Trump is getting away with too much stuff, no one is questioning his 3 day weekends away with all of his family at our expense, his son in law making policy etc.
I really think this man is not quite well enough to be in this position and everyone else, e.g family, Breitbart & Co
are running the country. Trump probably could not understand a policy paper or intelligence briefing if he tried.It seems very dangerous for the country.

[Nitram]

10. This: "This is a dangerous moment, which requires Congress and members of this administration to...

...look beyond partisan maneuvering and tend to the health of the democracy itself." C'mon , guys, what's the holdup? You still think you can salvage anything from this colossal train wreck of a Republican presidency?

[Panich52]

11. Lawrence Tribe says Trump's accusation is an impeachable offense.