President Trump thinks his is—-
(Before we dive into his most serious effort yet to destroy press freedom, we have to get off our chest the total disgrace our president has brought to the office and to this country with the proud display on his social media site and on the White House site of the AI-generated image of him as the next Pope. He might think it is funny but it is an international insult to hundreds of millions of Christians, Catholics in particular, and is unforgivable. How his religious right followers can find this acceptable in any way is beyond comprehension and their silence reveals a great deal about their—well, to use a word often used against the left—weaponization of religion to get and keep political power.)
And his use of his pen–or marker—to try to silence the pens of the press, in this case, National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting Service is clearly the pen of a frightened dictator, not a president.
Dictators are scared to death of the press or of anyone who refuses to swallow whole their statements or who opposes them whether it is on the streets, in the chambers of congress, or in the courts.
I am the press.
I am the mainstream media.
I am one of Trump’s “enemies of the people.”
And I have never been afraid of the minor league Trumps I have encountered on rare occasions and I shall not be afraid of this Political Sultan of Swat who wants us to fear him because he thinks he is bigger than the game. He is not.
I have often said that I never broadcast fake news but I have broadcast news about fakes and Donald J. Trump is deep in the second category, a man who knows much about power and cares little about service, who knows little about law and cares even less about courts, a president who swore to uphold the Constitution who tries daily to dismantle it, a billionaire to says lesser people, many of whom helped elect him, will just have to live with his tariff-triggered tax increases. His suggestion that children will have to live with just two dolls for Christmas instead of thirty is astoundingly arrogant and completely unfeeling.
From his relentless attacks on the press that dares to challenge his lies, to his snatch, grab, and deportation of people too often without regard to their citizenship status or near-status, to his disregard for legal process for all within our borders, to his unreasoning chainsaw approach to turning bureaucrats into burdens on our unemployment system, there is nothing about this man that indicates he is anything but a power-devouring plutocrat.
He is not man enough to deal honestly with those who differ with him, particularly with those who point to his dishonesty.
Whether you agree with government funding of news organizations, even those our own government has used to penetrate the darkness of dictatorships in other parts of the world, is less important than what is really behind his executive order on funding of PBS and NPR.
It is censorship.
His disrespect of our system of government is on blatant display here. We can expect legal challenges (likely to be accepted by judges who place law over loyalty) asserting his actions are obvious attempts to shut down media that he cannot control or that doesn’t parrot what he says. They need only to point to his disrespect for political process to prove their point.
The proper path to follow for a president who does not agree with something Congress has funded is to veto the bill or the line item in it. Congress then has the check on that power by having the ability to override the veto by two-thirds votes in each chamber.
But it’s too late to veto the funding this year and he doesn’t want to wait to veto it next year, so he’ll give some lawyers more billable hours when they challenge the latest executive order as unconstitutional. And there are plenty of law firms that he can’t bully who will protect the constitution that he seems to relish violating.
“Government funding of news media in this environment is not only outdated and unnecessary but corrosive to the appearance of journalistic independence,” said his order, an obviously hypocritical statement from someone who is, himself, corrosive to journalistic independence. s. He would not have signed his order if he did not fear reporting that does not fit his definition of loyalty and is thus is independent of him. That’s why the key phrases are “in this environment” and “the appearance of journalistic independence.” There is no room for journalistic independence in the mental and political “environment” he lives in and wants to force on our country.
First amendment protections of free speech and a free press be damned. This is another example of Trump’s disdain for two of the foremost parts of the foremost statement in the Bill of Rights.
The White House propaganda office put out a statement proclaiming, “President Trump Finally Ends the Madness of NPR, PBS.”
Here is one of the complaints:
- In 2021, NPR declared the Declaration of Independence to be a document with “flaws and deeply ingrained hypocrisies.”
And what does Trump KNOW about the Declaration? Apparently nothing that requires any thought. To hear him describe it in a recent ABC interview in his office where he keeps a copy of the document, he doesn’t know jack. He was asked what it means to him and his response clearly indicates it’s just a wall decoration.
“Well, it means, exactly what it says. It’s a declaration, it’s a declaration of unity and love and respect, and it means a lot, and it’s something very special to our country.”
Love of—–who? Not George III, although Trump can identify with him.
Respect for—-what? Taxes on imported goods? Using the army to enforce civil law?
It just “means a lot” and it’s “very special.” Too bad the interviewer didn’t ask him to quote his favorite line.
He has portraits of past Presidents on the office walls but when asked about their importance, his answers were disgraceful for someone who is their successor.
On FDR: “He was a serious president whether we like it or not. He was a four-termer and, uh, went through a war.”
On Lincoln: He was a great president. He went through a lot.”
(So says the great military genius who described the fight at Gettysburg as, “so much and so interesting, and so vicious and horrible, and so beautiful in so many different ways.”)
“James Monroe: “The Monroe Doctrine. I think the Monroe Doctrine is pretty important. That was his claim to fame.”
Not that Trump has ever read the Doctrine or understands why it was written. And it is not Monroe’s only claim to fame. Don’t ask Trump for any other things Monroe did.
To call him an empty vessel on such topics is wrong. He not an empty vessel. His is filled with himself nobody else is important to have any room in it.
As attorney Ron Filipkowski, also an editor-in-chief of Meidas Touch News, put it, “Trump has absolutely no clue what the Declaration of Independence is or what it says.”
We don’t know that Trump’s defunding of NPR and PBS is intended to intimidate other mainline media outlets, some of which he has sued because he didn’t like the tones of their voices. But it clearly shows a disregard for an important part of the constitution.
Unfortunately some media organizations as well as legal firms have buckled to his threats. This is no time to do that.
Long ago I was told the best thing to do with a playground bully is to slug him in the nose the first time you meet him. Some judges, even those he appointed, aren’t afraid to do that. More people including lawyers and media organizations should be unafraid, too.
It’s important in light of this obvious censorship effort that people fight back. We can fight back with donations to public broadcasting whether we agree totally or partially with what it says. Protecting the right to say things is being taken from those unwilling to punch a bully in the nose. Let it not be taken from us by whatever means he wants to take it.
He’s afraid of those who fight him. A scared little man with delusions of adequacy that will cost us our country if we tolerate him.
-0-