news

Notes from the inauguration of Donald Trump as the 47th president of the United States

~ ianrandalstrock ~ 1 Comment

Senator Amy Klobuchar’s speech seemed a bit pointed. Wonder how many will catch it. Meanwhile, Donald Trump was looking at the ceiling

Reverend Franklin Graham’s invocation: “enemies”?!

After taking the oath, Trump talking with his children, Vance blends right in, looks just like another Trump son.

Trump’s speech: he can’t seem to stop campaigning. He spends too much time complaining about and insulting the government he will now be leading. Great presidents give inspiring, unifying, visionary speeches. Donald Trump gave a nasty, belittling, self-congratulatory speech. Donald Trump was not, and probably will not, be a great president. Guess he never read Winston Churchill: “In War: Resolution. In Defeat: Defiance. In Victory: Magnanimity. In Peace: Good Will.” There was nothing magnanimous about his speech, and very little good will.

Greatness is not a mantle a person can claim; it is an honor bestowed by others in retrospect.

He mentioned the assassin’s bullet that hit his ear, but there doesn’t seem to be even a scar.

Lines from Trump’s speech that caught my ear:

“The golden age of American begins right now.”

“We will not allow ourselves to be taken advantage of any longer.”

“Our sovereignty will be reclaimed.”

“The scales of justice will be rebalanced.”

“America will soon be greater, stronger, and far more exceptional than ever before.”

“We must be honest about the challenges we face. While they are plentiful, they will be annihilated.”

“My election is a mandate to completely reverse this betrayal.”

“We will begin the great restoration of America.”

“First, I will declare a national emergency at our southern border. All illegal entry will immediately be halted,” and we will begin the process of returning millions of criminals back where they came from.

“I will send troops to the southern border to repel the disastrous invasion of our country.”

“We will also be designating the cartels as foreign terrorist organizations.”

“And by invoking the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, I will direct the government to eliminate the presence of all foreign gangs and criminal networks.”

“As commander-in-chief, I have no higher responsibility than to defend our country from foreign threats and invasions.”

“I will direct all members of my cabinet … to defeat record inflation and rapidly bring down costs and prices. The inflation crisis was caused by massive overspending…”

“I will declare a national energy emergency. We will drill baby drill.”

“America will be a manufacturing nation once again.”

“With my actions today, we will end the green new deal and revoke the electric vehicle mandate.”

“We are establishing the external revenue service to collect all tariffs and duties.”

“My administration will establish the brand new department of government efficiency. After years and years of illegal and unconstitutional federal efforts to restrict free expression. I will sign an order to immediately stop all government censorship and bring back free speech to America.”

“As of today, it will henceforth be the policy of the United States government that there are only two genders: male and female.”

“We didn’t give the Panama Canal to China, we gave it to Panama, and we’re taking it back.”

“We will expand our territory…” manifest destiny…

“…plant the Stars and Stripes on the planet Mars.”

“In America, the impossible is what we do best.”

Trump’s second speech in Emancipation Hall to supporters—longer than his official inaugural speech in the Rotunda, but far more rambling and stream of consciousness:

“The first week, the fake news was hitting him [J.D. Vance] pretty hard.”

“The J6 hostages.”

Complaining about lack of voter identification requirements: “we would have won the state of California.”

Rambling and babbling about building the wall in Texas.

“2020 was a rigged election. It showed how bad they are.” “I got like nine million more votes than any other president.” “We made it too big to rig, but they tried like hell to do it. Around 9:02, they gave up.” Also complaining about polling in the run-up to the 2024 election. “We won all seven swing states. We won the popular vote by millions of votes, which is hard for a Republican.” He’s just been sworn in as president for the second time, for a second term, but he can’t let go of the previous election. He’s obsessed with rewriting the past.

Jimmy Carter’s funeral

~ ianrandalstrock ~ 1 Comment

I’m watching Jimmy Carter’s funeral. All the living presidents, four of the five vice presidents (Dick Cheney is not present), and all but one of the First Ladies (Michelle Obama is not present). For a man who has been out of office for so long (he retired from the White House 44 years ago), he continued to be an important world figure.

Gerald Ford’s eulogy—read by his son, Steven—was beautiful. Here’s the video of it: https://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/watch/steven-ford-delivers-carter-eulogy-written-by-his-father-gerald-ford-228888645527

Walter Mondale’s eulogy—read by his son, Ted—was an interesting political commentary, probably written during (and aimed at) the first Donald Trump administration. The text is available here: https://www.townandcountrymag.com/society/politics/a63374741/walter-mondale-jimmy-carter-eulogy-transcript/

And, since Ford mentioned it, here’s Carter’s eulogy for Ford, delivered eighteen years ago, which is also very good: https://www.cartercenter.org/news/editorials_speeches/ford_eulogy.html (the video is also available: https://www.c-span.org/clip/public-affairs-event/president-carter-eulogy-for-president-ford/5147274 ).

The decline of news interviews

~ ianrandalstrock ~ Leave a comment

As much as I’m annoyed by the double-talking, deflecting, lying politicians, the interviewers aren’t doing much better.

This morning, I watched parts of both NBC’s Meet the Press and CBS’s Face the Nation, and they both share the same problem.

On Meet the Press, the host/interviewer was talking with Senator J.D. Vance. She asked him, if he had been vice president on January 6, 2021, would he have voted to certify the election, or done what Donald Trump wanted. Each time, he deflected, noting that “it’s you who wants to keep talking about that election. We’re focused on the present and the future, and in the present, we have the massive border crisis,” and the drug crisis, and whatever else usually comes at the end of that litany. A perfect opening to ask “Okay, so as a member of the Senate, what are you doing to address that border crisis, and drug crisis, and all the rest?” But she just let the pitch go by, and went back to “But you might be on Trump’s list for vice president in the next campaign. What would you have done in 2021?”

On Face the Nation, the interviewer was talking with Speaker Mike Johnson. After four rounds of “President Biden doesn’t need any legislation to fix the border crisis,” without a return question of “then what do we need the Congress for?”, she showed several clips from Johnson in 2019 saying “an impeachment should not be a one-party action.” A great intro for the House’s current impeachment activity against Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas. “So why are you moving this impeachment now?” to which he responded, “Mayorkas has broken the laws. We’ve got three committees investigating,” etc. But there was no return question of “you’re going through all the motions, as the Democrats did before you, but it still looks to be a one-party activity.” Or the even easier question: “You say he’s broken the laws. Which laws?” As most interviewers these days do, she ended with “We hope to have you back, because there are so many more things to talk about.” Completely missing the irony of the fact that each question-and-response was repeated four times, so of course they couldn’t get to too many issues.

Mind you, I didn’t watch the entirety of either program, but I did also see that each also had National Security Council Spokesman Jake Sullivan. Meet the Press asked him if, in the ongoing response to the death of the three US soldiers in Jordan, we could expect attacks in Iran itself. He said “I’m not going to comment on our activities and plans on television.” The interviewer’s response to that? “So you’re not ruling it out?” And he responded, “I’m not going to talk about it on television.” Five times they went through that back-and-forth.

Yes, I understand that repeating a question can sometimes get the interviewee to break down, get angry, and snap out an unintended answer. But come on, people, listen to the responses you’re getting. You can follow them to even more interesting questions and non-answers. I’m disappointed in you.

Lamenting the Lack of News

~ ianrandalstrock ~ Leave a comment

I just watched the last 15 minutes of the local ABC news at noon broadcast, and I was disappointed that there was no news in it (though I guess at this point, I should be inured to the fact that programs which bill themselves as “news” are less and less actual news). There was a long piece that was just an ad for tonight’s episode of 20/20, and an even longer piece that—well, it was fairly recursive, so in that respect it was interesting, but it was not in the least newsworthy. Sandy Kenyon, their entertainment reporter, had a long story talking about a morning talk show’s (Live with Kelly and Ryan, I think is the title) preparations to do a special edition of their program in which they’ll be talking about a third special television program (the Oscars). What it actually makes me wonder is if they had teasers earlier in the broadcast for that story, which would have been wonderfully rabbit-hole-like. Throw in a couple of commercial blocks, and voila! Fifteen minutes of what is ostensibly a one-hour news program with no news. Guess that means in the future, I can turn the channel at 12:45 and not be any less informed about events of the world.