Miscellaneous Trump (13 Viewers)

So many pilots like to fly drunk that the FAA used to have a special team of lawyers whose job it was to keep them from flying. That is, until Mump came along

Mr. Blue Sky said:

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That is what the old Bolsheviks used to say when they were arrested on order by Stalin.

Donald Trump’s move to take control of Washington D.C’s John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts has led to a staggering 50 percent drop in ticket sales, according to a report.

Trump fired the Kennedy Center’s leadership upon his return to the Oval Office and put MAGA loyalist Richard Grenell in charge of the famed institution.

In the week that followed the decision ticket sales halved, Kennedy Center staff members told The Washington Post anonymously for fear of reprisals.

And it is not just audience members who have deserted the Kennedy Center.

Actress and comedian Issa Rae was the first major artist to announce that she was canceling her show there.

“Unfortunately, due to what I believe to be an infringement on the values of an institution that has faithfully celebrated artists of all backgrounds through all mediums, I’ve decided to cancel my appearance at this venue,” she said in an Instagram story on February 13, with tickers being refunded.

Canadian mystery writer Louise Penny also pulled out of her scheduled appearance.

“In DC, but in the wake of Trump taking over, I have pulled out. It was, of course, going to be a career highlight. But there are things far more important than that,” she wrote on Facebook.….

Good article
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It has been a tricky week for conservatives who thought they could support both Donald Trumpand Ukraine.

On Tuesday, Trump falsely claimed that Ukraine, far from being invaded by Russia in 2022, had “started it”, and that the country’s president Volodymyr Zelensky’s approval rating was just 4 per cent(it is over 50 per cent).

Zelensky retorted that Trump was living in a “disinformation space” created by Russia. Trump fired back by calling Zelensky a “dictator” for not holding elections during wartime.

Some Trump admirers had enough integrity to point out that Putin was the actual dictator who had in reality started the war, but many vacillated.

Boris Johnson protested that Trump’s words were “not intended to be historically accurate” while Nigel Farage said they were not to be taken “absolutely literally”.

You can imagine what George Orwell, a crusader for linguistic precision and scourge of slippery euphemisms, would have made of that.

It is a massive cliche to invoke Orwell’s 1949 novel Nineteen Eighty-Four when discussing Trump’s assaults on reality, but it’s an unavoidable one when 77 million Americans re-elected a man who, according to The Washington Post’s Fact Checker team, made 30,573 “false or misleading claims” during his first term.

Back then, Trump’s breathtaking hostility to the truth could sometimes seem comical. His adviser Kellyanne Conway coined the phrase “alternative facts”, a risible substitute for “lies”, in response to something as trivial as the size of the crowd at his inauguration.

But there was nothing funny about his anti-democratic insistence that he had won the 2020 election, leading to the mob violence seen during the 6 January riots. Around two-thirds of Republicans currently believe this self-serving fiction.

As Orwell wrote, “The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”……..

Vice-president JD Vance recently caused jaws to drop by denouncing Europe’s restrictions on hate speech as “Orwellian”.

I would respond that deleting words like “climate” and “diversity” from federal websites is Orwellian, much as Orwell’s protagonist Winston Smith rewrites old newspapers at the Ministry of Truth or the architects of Newspeak seek to make certain thoughts inexpressible.

Banning the Associated Press from White House briefings for refusing to rename the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America is Orwellian.

Erasing any mention of trans people from the National Parks Service’s website about the 1969 Stonewall riots is Orwellian: they have become “unpersons”.

Denying an election is Orwellian. Pardoning the 6 January “hostages” is Orwellian. Blaming Ukraine for being invaded is Orwellian. In that context, Vance’s abuse of the word is as Orwellian as it gets……..

As Orwell explained, the standard political lie at least acknowledges that the truth exists but the totalitarian lie aims to demolish the very concept.

Fact-checking Trump or highlighting his hypocrisy therefore feels almost quixotic. His wild fantasies are a loyalty test for his followers – they must not just say, but truly believe, that 2+2=5 – and a means of fatiguing and overwhelming his opponents.

The bigger and more blatant the lie, the more effective it is as psychological warfare.

Phrases from Nineteen Eighty-Four have been part of the lexicon for 75 years – Big Brother, the Thought Police, the Two Minutes Hate – but Orwell’s most subtle invention was doublethink:

“The power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously and accepting both of them … To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them [and] to forget any fact that has become inconvenient.”

Johnson, Farage and Vance are all demonstrating varieties of doublethink.…….

It’s long past time to ask is this man fit to run hot dog stand?
A window into the brain of Donald Trump, visit the fabulous Trump Gaza Strip!! A Big Thummbs Up!

Isn’t this the guy who yelled “you lie!” at Obama during the State of the Union?
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South Carolina Representative Joe Wilson is drafting legislation calling for Donald Trump to appear on a new $250 bill to honor the president’s financial achievements.

The Republican lawmaker showcased what appears to be an AI-generated mock-up of the president’s portrait on the newly proposed bill, claiming that “Bidenflation” – where inflation peaked at 9.1 percent in 2022 during the previous administration – has forced Americans to carry more physical cash………

There is perhaps no band closer to the president’s ear than the U.S. Marine Band, long known as “The President’s Own.”

Founded in 1798 by an Act of Congress, it’s the nation’s oldest continuously active professional musical organization, with a stated, singular mission to “perform music for the President of the United States and the Commandant of the Marine Corps.”

The band’s repertoire, therefore, is subject to the president’s tastes, whims and, in the case of a May 4 concert that recently vanished from the schedule, executive orders.

Last week, “The President’s Own” quietly canceled a concert program originally billed as the “Equity Arc Wind Symphony.” The performance was to be the culmination of a “multi-day music intensive with musicians from ‘The President’s Own’” and high school musician fellows selected through auditions organized by the Chicago-based Equity Arc, a nonprofit organization that provides “specialized mentoring support for young BIPOC musicians and helps institutions take meaningful steps toward equity and inclusion.”

A spokesperson for the Marines confirmed in an email Tuesday afternoon that “the Marine Band’s participation in this event was canceled in accordance with recent Executive Orders.”

Equity Arc Executive Director Stanford Thompson and Associate Director Magee Capsouto confirmed in a phone interview that the cancellation affects up to 30 young musicians from across the country who earned their spots through competitive virtual auditions and who were to perform at the Rachel M. Schlesinger Concert Hall and Arts Center on the Northern Virginia Community College campus in Alexandria.

“We believe in the training and mentorship of these musicians, and being able to put them into spaces where they can learn what it’s like to be a professional performing musician,” Thompson said. “One of the things we’ve wanted to do is expose students to military careers, and we’ve seen nothing more powerful than when the musicians we work with have opportunities to sit side-by-side in rehearsal, performances and coaching.”

“The work that we’re doing is focused so much on the musicians, their level of talent, their dedication for what they do, and the amount of work that they put in,” Capsouto added.

Thompson also credited the U.S. Marine Band’s commitment to education as key to the partnership between the organizations, and expressed concern that military bands across the country may find these types of outreach programs harder to accomplish.

A previously released season announcement brochure is still available online, and it bills the original May 4 “Equity Arc Wind Symphony” concert as “the expansion of Equity Arc’s national programs for pre-college musicians of color.”

But on the official President’s Own Marine Band calendar, the Equity Arc concert has been replaced with a program of unspecified film music titled “May the 4th Be With You: Marine Band at the Movies.”

The original Equity Arc Wind Symphony program assembled a mix of traditional Marine Band favorites: John Philip Sousa’s “Nobles of the Mystic Shrine,” Percy Grainger’s “Lincolnshire Posy” and Samuel A. Ward’s “America the Beautiful” would be performed alongside works by living composers, including one piece titled “Let Freedom Ring,” by Lt. Col. Ryan Nowlin, who was slated to conduct at the concert (along with Capt. Darren Y. Lin and guest conductor Rodney Dorsey, a professor of music at Florida State University College of Music).

Also scheduled for the program was “Sweet Chariot,” a piece by Kennedy Center composer-in-residence Carlos Simon; “Bravado,” a 2023 work for wind band from composer Gala Flagello; Michael Brignolo’s wind arrangement of Grammy winner Gabriela Ortiz’s “Kauyumari”; and “Rising Light,” a work by Kevin Charoensri, a Thai American from San Diego who is studying music composition at the University of Texas at Austin.

Charoensri, 21, posted his own announcement of the cancellation to his Facebook page on Sunday.

“It has come to my attention that the program, one based on equity and diversity of voices, is no longer supported at the federal level under this administration,” the post reads, “and it was for this reason that the program and performance were canceled.”

“I look forward to the day where my music, and the diverse voices of composers like myself, will once again be welcomed on the national stage,” he added..............

Following executive orders, ‘The President’s Own’ Marine Band scraps concert​

Optimus Prime said:

Oscar-winning actor Tatum O’Neal reveals Trump’s re-election caused her to relapse

The Paper Moon star has struggled with drug and alcohol addiction at various points throughout her life

www.independent.co.uk

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The layoffs in DC are just shocking, slash and burn. Pain and suffering is the cure for Trumpitis. Unfortunately this won’t be a fast cure, it might even be an incurable fatal condition for some.

So, the Orange Menace is supposedly going to sign an executive order making English our official language. Wow, that is such an important thing that needed to be done…or not.

Prediction: executive order banning signs in any language other than English.

bird said:

So, the Orange Menace is supposedly going to sign an executive order making English our official language. Wow, that is such an important thing that needed to be done…or not.

Prediction: executive order banning signs in any language other than English.

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no signs, no paperwork, no translators

bird said:

So, the Orange Menace is supposedly going to sign an executive order making English our official language. Wow, that is such an important thing that needed to be done…or not.

Prediction: executive order banning signs in any language other than English.

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In Quebec signs must be predominantly French. This despite 63% of Canadians speaking English as their only language.

Canadians can be dumb too. That statement in no way defends Trump. Nationalism in a global economy is a bad idea today

Lying on a beach in Florida, attending fancy parties and playing regular rounds of golf; Thomas Mundy is living the life. In fact, he’s living the life of one person in particular – President Donald Trump, who he is paid to impersonate.

Business is truly booming, he tells The Independent from the sands of Fort Lauderdale. “I was always busy. But once he lost the election in 2020, people were so pissed, my business doubled. Once he got indicted, my business quadrupled…Now it's insane.”

For Mundy, 65, there is never a dull day, with his phone ringing off the hook with requests for “presidential appearances” at all manner of events – from parades to golf tournaments, and even children’s birthday parties.

A recent viral video, showing an unknown Trump impersonator arriving at a party for an excited young boy, caused a stir online. “Definitely not a cult that hires a Trump impersonator for a kids birthday party,” wrote the account that shared the video………

Optimus Prime said:

More than half of Americans believe Trump will try for a third term

President has repeatedly mused about running for a third term and referred to himself as a ‘king’

www.independent.co.uk

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I can see this happening sadly. He'll give a reason like we are at war and try to suspend elections

I actually think Dems should do this. Just walk out in a calm and dignified manner. Worth it to see Trump’s face go red with anger

Edit: evidently the post he is responding to isn’t going to show up here. It said they thought that Dems should all attend the SOTU, wait until his second sentence and then walk out en masse.