{"id":137610,"date":"2019-01-08T23:24:56","date_gmt":"2019-01-09T06:24:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2019\/01\/08\/mr-trump-tries-to-foment-support-for-his-beautiful-wall.html"},"modified":"2019-01-08T23:24:56","modified_gmt":"2019-01-09T06:24:56","slug":"mr-trump-tries-to-foment-support-for-his-beautiful-wall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2019\/01\/08\/mr-trump-tries-to-foment-support-for-his-beautiful-wall.html","title":{"rendered":"Mr Trump tries to foment support for his Beautiful Wall"},"content":{"rendered":"

I will say this for the Donald — if you are teed up to believe the things he says, then when he is talking off-script he's an incredible salesman.<\/p>\n

But give him a script, put a teleprompter in front of him, force him to stick to the message, and he sounds like your great-grandfather on Prozac.<\/p>\n

Despite the low affect and wooden delivery (except when relishing the Immigrant Crime Porn section of his speech), what was actually more more remarkable was the endless array of inaccurate, misleading, deceptive, inappropriate, and downright deceitful statistics and assertions of fact that the Donald peppered his 10 minutes of public address fame with. <\/p>\n

From his laughable statement that he's deeply concerned over the migrant children crossing the border, to his ignoring his own DEA's confirmation about where heroin enters the country (hint: it's not in the middle of the desert), to his assumption that the only way to address this "crisis" is by shutting down the US government until the Dems are willing to build is Beautiful Wall … the attached fact-checking annotations to the speech by the WaPo are woefully inadequate in questioning almost every factoid Donald put forward.<\/p>\n

He was wise enough to avoid a number of previous statements that have had holes shot through them, e.g., his assertions that previous presidents had told him that they should have built a wall, or his suggestion that tens of thousands of terrorists had been caught crossing the Mexico border. But he still made some dubious assertions (that we have no room for migrants, or that the jobs they take are jobs that American minorities are dying to have), or that the Dems haven't supported any sort of border protections (let alone that he's actually spent every penny that's already been allocated to border protection, vs. less than the actual figure of 10%). <\/p>\n

To be fair, Schumer and Pelosi were so wooden and low-key in their rebuttal as to make Donald almost look animated in comparison. But they were at least 75% less fact-checkable than he was — which should<\/i> make a difference (even if it won't). <\/p>\n

Donald didn't actually say anything new tonight. But I suspect a lot of the people watching his speech haven't actually been following along the news on all of this (or, among his true fans, they've only been getting his statements through the Fox News filter). To that extent, I don't think this speech will dramatically change the debate or negotiations between the White House and the Dems — but it will create some rallying points for Donald's base, which was really the point of the exercise.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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\nwashingtonpost<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Original Post<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I will say this for the Donald — if you are teed up to believe the things he says, then when he is talking off-script he's an incredible salesman. But give him a script, put a teleprompter in front of him, force him to stick to the message, and he sounds like your great-grandfather on … Continue reading “Mr Trump tries to foment support for his Beautiful Wall”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[106],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-137610","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-plusposts"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":130809,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/06\/06\/when-youve-been-targeted-by-drug-cartels-donald-trump-is-chump-change.html","url_meta":{"origin":137610,"position":0},"title":"When you've been targeted by drug cartels, Donald Trump is chump change","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 6-Jun-16 11:23pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Here's a quick look at the career of Federal Judge Gonzalo P. Curiel, who Trump has said should step down from the Trump University case because he's \"Mexican\" (he's actually American-born), and also because he was nominated to the federal bench by Pres. Obama.'Mr. Trump repeated his argument in an\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":24810,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2011\/12\/24\/oh-look-the-donald-decided-he-hadnt-been-in-this-weeks-news-enough.html","url_meta":{"origin":137610,"position":1},"title":"Oh, look, The Donald decided he hadn't been in this week's news enough","author":"***Dave","date":"Sat 24-Dec-11 10:34am","format":false,"excerpt":"So he's decided to change from \"Republican\" to \"Independent\" -- hypothetically to allow for a third-party run (which he just may have a large enough ego to make), but more practically to make sure that he's making headlines. Again.I guess when you're rich enough, your fifteen minutes of fame are\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":136120,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2018\/04\/13\/trump-speaks-on-syria.html","url_meta":{"origin":137610,"position":2},"title":"Trump Speaks on Syria","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 13-Apr-18 7:24pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Okay, that little speech was weird. The man goes veering off into weird paths when he's not reading the teleprompter -- and you can tell every time he does, because his ability to read off the teleprompter (oh, the irony!) is bloody awful -- weird pacing, an inability to pace\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Trump-contemplative.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":131232,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/08\/09\/the-case-of-the-trump-and-the-murderous-dog-whistles.html","url_meta":{"origin":137610,"position":3},"title":"The Case of the Trump and the Murderous Dog Whistles","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 9-Aug-16 10:18pm","format":false,"excerpt":"As I noted earlier today, Donald Trump made some ostensibly off-hand comments at a speech today about how, if Clinton, as president, started making judicial appointments that threatened American gun rights, there would be nothing that the crowd of supporters in front of him could do. Though maybe, he added,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":130737,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/05\/23\/just-lie-back-close-your-eyes-and-think-of-reagan.html","url_meta":{"origin":137610,"position":4},"title":""Just lie back, close your eyes, and think of Reagan"","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 23-May-16 9:49pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC) was one of the most vehement and outspoken opponents of Donald Trump during the primary season, even after he dropped out of the nomination fight.\u201cHe\u2019s a race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot.\u201d\u201cHe doesn\u2019t represent my party. He doesn\u2019t represent the values that the men and women who wear\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":134415,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/08\/24\/tweetizen-trump-2017-08-24-surrounded-enemies.html","url_meta":{"origin":137610,"position":5},"title":"Tweetizen Trump – 2017-08-24: “Surrounded by Enemies!”","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 24-Aug-17 9:46am","format":false,"excerpt":"Hey, Donald. It's actually been a few days since I did one of these because -- well, frankly, your Twitter stream has been pretty boring. Most of it has been videos of the different speeches \/ events you've been at -- your Afghanistan policy speech in Virginia, your \"rally\" in\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Politics & Law"","block_context":{"text":"Politics & Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/trump-meme-unity-and-love.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/trump-meme-unity-and-love.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/trump-meme-unity-and-love.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137610","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137610"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137610\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}