Donald Trump is a serious monster — an opportunistic, unprincipled, whatever-sounds-right or whatever-flatters-me sociopath. A selfish, loutish Queens-born salesman. A temperamental ADD-afflicted nine year old. Doesn’t read, can’t focus, hasn’t a clue, instinct-driven. But he wants the approval of the N.Y. Times, a paper that he loves, hates and holds in high regard, and so during yesterday’s lunch meeting with Times staffers Trump soft-pedaled his views. He spoke softly and behaved very politely. But deep down he’s an arrogant, pot-bellied dog who only wants to enrich his empire and that of his friends.
Donald Trump during yesterday’s lunch meeting with N.Y. Times staffers. Trump spokesperson Kellyanne Conway sits to his right.
To me his ridiculous views on climate change (i.e., that it’s highly debatable if not a hoax) aren’t all that different than General Jack D. Ripper‘s views about the Communist plot to fluoridate the U.S. water supply.
And yet when Trump shares his fuzzy-brain statements on this or that the mainstream media sounds like General Buck Turgidson, i.e. “We’re still trying to figure out the meaning of that last phrase.” To which President Merkin Muffley said, “There’s nothing to figure out, General…the man is obviously a psychotic.” To which the mainstream media today replies, “Well, we’d like to hold off judgment on a thing like that, Mr. President, until all the facts are in.”
During Donald Trump’s Tuesday chat with several N.Y. Times staffers, columnist Thomas Friedman asked for the President-elect’s views on climate change. Trump basically said “blah blah I don’t want to get into an argument with you guys so I’ll just I’ve just give you a little blah blah to obscure the fact that I’m not much of a sipper of climate change kool-aid.”
What he actually said was (as) “I have an open mind to it,” (b) “We’ve had storms always, Arthur [Sulzberger]” and (c) “You know the hottest day ever was in 1890-something, 98…you know, you can make lots of cases for different views.”
In other words, “Sorry, guys but naaah. I’m basically with the climate deniers. Because I think we need to get those fossil fuel industries rolling again…what matters to me is creating jobs for the bumblefucks who voted for me. The climate can wait. I’m a sociopath…whadaya want from me?”
Times editorial page director editor James Bennet asked Trump, “When you say an open mind, you mean you’re just not sure whether human activity causes climate change? Do you think human activity is or isn’t connected?”
To which Trump replied, “I think right now…well, I think there is some connectivity. There is some, something. It depends on how much. It also depends on how much it’s going to cost our companies. You have to understand, our companies are noncompetitive right now. About four weeks ago, I started adding a certain little sentence into a lot of my speeches, that we’ve lost 70,000 factories since [George] W. Bush. And it wasn’t a typo, it’s right. We’ve lost 70,000 factories.
“We’re not a competitive nation with other nations anymore. We have to make ourselves competitive. We’re not competitive for a lot of reasons. Because a lot of these countries that we do business with, they make deals with our president, or whoever, and then they don’t adhere to the deals, you know that. And it’s much less expensive for their companies to produce products. So I’m going to be studying [climate change] very hard, and I think I have a very big voice in it. And I think my voice is listened to, especially by people that don’t believe in [climate change]. And we’ll let you know.”
Translation: “The liberal pantywaist climate-change crowd isn’t calling the shots — we are. Real men are going to be running the government as of 1.20.17, and that, gentlemen, means jobs, factories, belching smokestacks and hundreds of tons of more fossil fuel pollutants pumped into the atmosphere for at least the next four years. And, one day, the disappearance of the North Pole. Which means more jobs and more stability for the upstanding, gun-owning, flannel-shirt-wearing Americans who voted for me. I’m sorry if Leonardo DiCaprio disagrees but, you know, tough shit for the time being.”
