Juan
Wednesday, May 30, 2018
Something to Know 30 May
Juan
Tuesday, May 29, 2018
Andy Borowitz
White House in Panic Mode After TV Star with Racist Twitter Feed Loses Job
WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—The White House was reportedly in panic mode Tuesday afternoon, shortly after news broke that a television star with a racist Twitter feed had been fired.
According to a White House source, Donald J. Trump immediately huddled with close advisers to discuss the firing, which, staffers agreed, "set an ominous new precedent."
"We've been living under assumption that a TV personality could tweet out as many racist things as he or she wanted with no consequences," the source said. "Now, all of a sudden, our worst nightmare has come true."
White House staffers are reportedly combing through Trump's thirty-seven thousand tweets, searching for ones that could be deemed fireable offenses, and have so far flagged more than thirty-six thousand of them.
Many on Trump's team are urging calm, however, claiming that the dismissal of one racist TV star could be an "isolated example."
"The only people who can fire Donald Trump right now are congressional Republicans, and they don't have the high moral standards that TV executives have," the source said.
Juan
Saturday, May 26, 2018
Something to Know - 26 May
Juan
Wednesday, May 23, 2018
Something to Eat - 23 May
Juan
Monday, May 21, 2018
Andy Borowitz
Public Demands Investigation of Why F.B.I. Infiltrators in Trump Campaign Failed to Prevent Him from Being Elected
10:19 A.M.
WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—Millions of Americans are demanding an investigation into why, if F.B.I. operatives managed to infiltrate the 2016 Trump campaign, they utterly failed to prevent a nightmarish despot from being elected.
In interviews across the country, Americans expressed dismay and, in some cases, despair at the news that F.B.I. infiltrators might have had a golden opportunity to prevent the nation's current unspeakable nightmare from unfolding but did not get the job done.
"The thought of F.B.I. infiltrators being inside the Trump campaign but not sabotaging it is, in a word, devastating," Carol Foyler, of Akron, Ohio, said. "If it turns out to be true, I will totally lose my faith in F.B.I. infiltrators."
Harland Dorrinson, of St. Petersburg, Florida, agreed. "If F.B.I. infiltrators were in a position to derail the most heinous threat to democracy in American history but didn't succeed for some reason, that would be bigger than Watergate," he said.
Tracy Klugian, of Denver, Colorado, said that a "full and exhaustive investigation" is needed to "determine why our system of F.B.I. infiltrators preventing a horrific proto-fascist menace from taking office somehow broke down."
"We need to find out what went wrong and fix it before the 2020 election," he said. "I won't be able to sleep at night until I know that F.B.I. operatives are infiltrating Trump's reëlection campaign and irreparably crippling it."
Juan
Friday, May 18, 2018
Something to Know - 18 May
Juan
Wednesday, May 16, 2018
An Andy Borowitz Binge
Obama's Barrage of Complete Sentences Seen as Brutal Attack on Trump
April 24, 2017
CHICAGO (The Borowitz Report)—In an appearance at the University of Chicago on Monday, former President Barack Obama unloaded a relentless barrage of complete sentences in what was widely seen as a brutal attack on his successor, Donald Trump.
Appearing at his first public event since leaving office, Obama fired off a punishing fusillade of grammatically correct sentences, the likes of which the American people have not heard from the White House since he departed.
"He totally restricted his speech to complete sentences," Tracy Klugian, a student at the event, said. "It was the most vicious takedown of Trump I'd ever seen."
"About five or six sentences in, I noticed that all of his sentences had both nouns and verbs in them," Carol Foyler, another student, said. "I couldn't believe he was going after Trump like that."
Obama's blistering deployment of complete sentences clearly got under the skin of their intended target, who, moments after the event, responded with an angry tweet: "Obama bad (or sick) guy. Failing. Sad!"
G.O.P. Unveils Immigration Plan: "We Must Make America Somewhere No One Wants to Live"
November 19, 2014
WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell unveiled his party's long-awaited plan on immigration on Wednesday, telling reporters, "We must make America somewhere no one wants to live."
Appearing with House Speaker John Boehner, McConnell said that, in contrast to President Obama's "Band-Aid fixes," the Republican plan would address "the root cause of immigration, which is that the United States is, for the most part, habitable."
"For years, immigrants have looked to America as a place where their standard of living was bound to improve," McConnell said. "We're going to change that."
Boehner said that the Republicans' plan would reduce or eliminate "immigration magnets," such as the social safety net, public education, clean air, and drinkable water.
The Speaker added that the plan would also include the repeal of Obamacare, calling healthcare "catnip for immigrants."
Attempting, perhaps, to tamp down excitement about the plan, McConnell warned that turning America into a dystopian hellhole that repels immigrants "won't happen overnight."
"Our crumbling infrastructure and soaring gun violence are a good start, but much work still needs to be done," he said. "When Americans start leaving the country, we'll know that we're on the right track."
In closing, the two congressional leaders expressed pride in the immigration plan, noting that Republicans had been working to make it possible for the past thirty years.
Trump Orders Replica Nobel Peace Prize to Display on His Desk
12:27 P.M.
WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—Donald J. Trump has ordered a replica of the Nobel Peace Prize and is displaying it prominently on his desk in the Oval Office, the White House confirmed on Wednesday.
The replica of the Nobel medallion is mounted on what the White House described as a "tasteful black-velvet background" with an engraved plaque reading, "Donald J. Trump, 2018 Winner."
At the daily White House briefing, the press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, said that Trump "took the initiative" to award himself the Peace Prize rather than "waiting around" for the Nobel committee, in Oslo, to bestow it on him.
"What with his successes in Syria, Iran, North Korea, and whatnot, the President already knows he's a lock for the Nobel," she said. "It's just a formality at this point."
The fake Nobel was first spotted by Henry Klugian, a student who was on a White House tour with his seventh-grade class from Bethesda, Maryland.
"I thought it was kind of weird that he'd have something like that made up for himself, but whatever," he said.
Juan
Something to Know - 16 May
An Indecent Disrespect
The editorial board represents the opinions of the board, its editor and the publisher. It is separate from the newsroom and the Op-Ed section.
President Trump's rejection of the Iran nuclear deal has unleashed a rare fury in Europe. Following his withdrawal from the Paris climate accords, his tariffs on imported steel, the move of the American Embassy to Jerusalem, the rewriting of international trade agreements and all the other signs of disdain for the priorities of America's traditional allies, many Europeans are furiously proclaiming the trans-Atlantic relationship dead. However palpable the frustration, the question once again is whether Europeans are prepared to, or even able to, stand up to the bully across the sea.
Certainly this is what many Europeans would dearly love to do. Europe must not accept being the "vassals" of the United States, declared the French finance minister, Bruno Le Maire, whose boss, President Emmanuel Macron, so recently kissed and hugged Mr. Trump in a futile effort to influence him. "We have to stop being wimps," said Nathalie Tocci, a senior adviser to the European Union.
The cover of the German weekly newsmagazine Der Spiegel reflected a common sentiment in its depiction of Mr. Trump as a middle finger proclaiming, "Goodbye, Europe!" The fiery editorial inside called for "resistance against America."
"The West as we once knew it no longer exists," Der Spiegel's editors wrote. "Our relationship to the United States cannot currently be called a friendship and can hardly be referred to as a partnership. President Trump has adopted a tone that ignores 70 years of trust."
Then there are the hard facts. Europe's trade with the United States is incomparably larger than its trade with Iran, and even if Britain, France and Germany — co-signers of the Iran accord, along with China, the European Union, Russia and the United States — try to maintain the Iran deal and support their companies against so-called secondary sanctions by Washington, many European banks and industries would be wary of defying America's enormous economic clout, and especially the reach of its banking system.
Mr. Trump, who has long complained about Germany's trade surplus and Europe's low military spending, is not overly sympathetic to Europe's economic or security concerns, and even less so with the überhawkish John Bolton now as his national security adviser. In a phone call to British, French and German officials last Wednesday, Mr. Bolton said there would be no sanctions exemptions for European companies.
The anger in Europe, however, is not so much about the cost of renewed sanctions as about the total, humiliating disdain for the Europeans' arguments, and, by extension, for the trans-Atlantic alliance and all it has stood for since World War II. If Europeans allowed other powers, including allies, to make security decisions for them, "then we are no more sovereign and we cannot be more credible to public opinion," Mr. Macron said in a statement that echoed the sentiments of many of his European neighbors.
There have been bitter differences before, notably over the war in Iraq, but to Europeans, Mr. Trump's contempt is of a higher order, an arrogant mind-set that even on matters of paramount global importance, America will do what it wants without giving a damn for the interests of its closest allies.
That was made stunningly clear by a tweet from the new ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell, shortly after he presented his credentials last Tuesday, declaring that German companies doing business in Iran "should wind down operations immediately." To the Germans, that was an unacceptable order to fall in line, and Mr. Grenell's subsequent assurances that there would be no trade war did little to temper the outrage.
Roiled by its own internal crises and divisions, Europe lacks the big stick that would compel Mr. Trump to listen to reason. The sweet talk attempted by Mr. Macron has proved equally futile. But that does not excuse Europe, and especially Germany, Britain and France, from standing firm against Washington's bullying and making every effort to keep the Iran deal — and all the other aspects of the international order Mr. Trump has tried to destroy — from collapse.
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