Mediaboss Marketing

Donald Trump, Jr. and Eric Trump attend the inauguration ceremeony for the Trump International Hotel and Tower in Vancouver, British Columbia, on Feb. 28.

AFP/Getty Images

Two weeks after Donald J. Trump clinched the Republican presidential nomination last year, his eldest son arranged a meeting at Trump Tower in Manhattan with a Russian lawyer who has connections to the Kremlin, according to confidential government records. Donald Jr. described the meeting as primarily about an adoption program. New York Times, July 8, 2017

Donald Trump Jr. posted his full exchange with a publicist for a Russian pop musician to Twitteron Tuesday, and the emails confirm previous reports that Trump Jr. was offered compromising information about Hillary Clinton specifically from the Russian government. The emails also say flatly that the Kremlin was working to help elect his father. Washington Post, July 11, 2017

The Russian American lobbyist who attended a meeting at Trump Tower last year is a former military officer long shadowed by allegations of connections to Russian intelligence. Associated Press, July 14, 2017

The June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower with Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner, and Paul Manafort included at least eight people. CNN, July 14, 2017

An audio recording of the meeting between Donald Trump Jr. and a Kremlin-connected lawyer may provide a clue as to the identity of the eighth attendee. In the brief recording, a knock can be heard on the door before a man says, Hi, its me, Paul Ryan. Just wanted to poke my head in and say Im cool with Putin paying Trump so long as I get to be the big tax-cutting boy. I also want to mention that I am not pausing for laughter here because this is not a joke. All right, have a nice day.Our team of audio experts is analyzing the tape in an effort to identify the man. CNN,July 16, 2017

The Times has obtained more than 200 emails sent by Eric Trump to various members of the Trump campaign. The messages were sent on June 9, 2016, and each carries an identical subject line: Hows the haking going? New York Times,July 17, 2017

In a stunning move, Eric Trump has posted 500 additional emails to Twitter after the Times reached out to him for comment. Each email contains the same body text: can i come to dons next thing? i like too hak to. New York Times,July 18, 2017

Colluding with a foreign power is the most American thing you can do, and the fake news media continues to ignore the fact that the great men who built this countrythe Founding Fathersdid so through collusion. Makes me sick. Sean Hannity on Hannity,July 19, 2017

Sources with knowledge of the meeting at Trump Tower have revealed that there was a ninth attendee, and they described this person's behavior as peculiar. Midway through discussions, the unnamed woman is said to have lifted up her entire torso from a seam at her waist to reveal another, smaller woman residing inside. This interior woman repeated the act to uncover yet another woman, and this continued until a final woman, roughly the size of a bowling pin, teetered and fell on the table in front of Donald Trump Jr., who exclaimed, I love it. The nationality of these women is unknown. USA Today,July 20, 2017

President Donald Trump announced today that he is intent on maintaining a smooth election process during the upcoming midterms, which is why the White House will be prioritizing a program that facilitates the adoption of Russian children. Washington Post,June 9, 2018

The rest is here:
Who Else Was in the Room? - Slate Magazine

Donald Trump is amazing. At this early point in his tenure, Trump is one of the most unpopular presidents ever. Political scientists and other experts will most certainly rank him among the worst presidents in the history of the United States.

Donald Trumps accomplishments as president are legion. He has surrendered Americas global leadership to China, Germany and Russia. Hehas also made America much less respected around the world. He is a plutocrat billionaire with fascist leanings who may have allied with Russia and Vladimir Putin to undermine American democracy and steal the 2016 presidential election from Hillary Clinton and her voters.

Trump is boorish, ignorant, bigoted, sexist and violent. He has encouraged such values among the American people. He and the Republican Party want to destroy the countrys already meager social safety net as a means of punishing the useless eaters.For example, their health care planwill potentially kill tens of thousands of Americans each year and leave millions more sick, in pain, homeless, financially ruined and otherwise miserable. Meanwhile Trump, his family and his closest associates are using the presidency to personally enrich themselves. They view it as a personal ATM and not as a means of serving the public good and the general welfare. Except for what he can force by fiat, Trump has accomplished none of his major campaign promises and in the case of building his amazing wall and draining the swamp he has all but admitted such promises were snake oil and outright lies to con the rubes.

Nevertheless, Trumps voters still enthusiastically support him. According to new polling data from the Economist and YouGov, Trump has an 88 percent approval rating among those people who voted for him last November a higher proportion than supported him a few weeks earlier.

How is this possible?

American politics is highly polarized because of the Republican Party and right-wing medias disregard if not utter contempt for consensus and compromise. Conservatives are also extremely tribal and authoritarian. Trump is their leader. He is not to be betrayed or abandoned.

The average American is not politically sophisticated. Moreover, Americans in general do not have high levels of engagement with or interest in politics and public policy. The average American also reasons backwards from conclusions he or she has already made about political matters, in essence selectively finding and processing information to justify decisions. Many Americans are also siloed: they self-select into groups and communities of like-minded people. This echo-chamber effect is especially pronounced among American conservatives and right-leaning independents.

Donald Trump and the Republican Party have mastered the use of white racism, white victimology and white grievance-mongering to win elections and shape public policy. Trump simply amplified the Republican Partys dog whistles into an air raid siren. Republican voters are trained to follow its beckoning.

There is an additional explanation for the slavish devotion shown by Trumps followers toward their Great Leader that is often overlooked by more traditional types of political analysis. Trumps followers may actually be in love with him.

Sociologist Jeff Shantz explores this troubling dynamic in his recent essay On the Messy Psychology of Trumpism:

It has been well remarked that Trump shows a contemptuous regard for truth or facts. He is appealing to the constrained who do not want to be hemmed in or constrained by facts either, as they are by so much else in their lives. This is related to the wish to win that Trump so effectively conjured during his campaign (with his repeated emphasis on America winning again, winning huge, etc.).

Primacy of the wish to win is related to the sense to which one feels dispossessed.

Trump tells an emotional truth for his supporters even if he is widely seen to be lying. This truth is his anger and the affirmation of his followers anger. This is the truth that comes to matter, a point rational critics generally overlook or misread. Omnipotent fantasy cannot be told the factual truth. There is a turn to emotional truth. Trust is based not on his truth claims but on the sense that he will do what really needs to be done. His supporters trust his promised power.

There is a libidinal investment of the masses in the leader. They have fallen in love with him. The crowd enjoys vicariously through the leader. Trump, on their behalf will restore the lost narcissistic idea of the nation. He will Make America Great Again.

Shantz continues by connecting this one-way love affair between Trump and his followers to the long tradition of anti-intellectualism in American culture:

Critical thinking isolates you and isolation is part of the problem in neoliberal societies. There is a pleasure in feeling free from thinking. It is partly presented as a reaction against the constant thinking through of political correctness (doing what you are supposed to do and thinking through the implications of all utterances, let alone actions). So-called political correctness (simple decency perhaps) is constructed as an artificial strategy that maintains hypocrisy.

Unknowing is derided but critics fail to see the enjoyment it can provide. Ignorance can indeed be bliss. Trump represents a poverty of ideas. He expresses a cathartic change. Trump is a grotesque character type. In the enactment of aggression, Trump is both a fool and a wizard.

Trump speaks the analytic session: be spontaneous; speak the repressed; no emphasis on truth; free association. Trump brings the language and posture of the analytic session. What of the return of the repressed? What is repressed is fear and hatred of the other.

Ultimately, Donald Trump has captured the hearts and minds of his followers. Is there any way for the Democratic Party, or progressives and liberals more generally, to win over these voters?

Trumps true believers are political dead enders. They are part of the presidents cult of personality and will not be torn away from him. Their self-worth and personal identity are intertwined with Trump in a form of mass psychosis.

What about the white working class, a group that has become an obsessive fetish object for the pundit classes and news media in the Age of Trump? At this point, it is solidly Republican and has been so for several decades. To chase these voters is a fools errand. This is especially true if winning over white working-class voters means that the Democratic Party risks alienating its base of support among African-Americans and other people of color.

And what of the fabled Obama to Trump voters? Perhaps they can be recovered if the Democratic Party follows cognitive linguist George Lakoffs advice about crafting powerful stories that leverage values and emotions to win over voters. The Obama-to-Trump subgroup is simply too small, however, to form the basis of an effective long-term political strategy.

In total, the emotions of love and fantasy ideation felt by Trumps voters for their champion points to a serious challenge for the Democratic Party in particular and American society in general. Trumps supporters and Republicans en masse could be described as post-Enlightenment thinkers whose political decisions and understanding of the world are driven by delusions that exist outside empirical reality. How does one defeat such forces? The Democratic Party, and all those who oppose Donald Trump and the larger project of the Republican Party, will need to find an answer quickly if they are to recover hope for the future of our country.

See the original post:
Donald Trump is a total love god at least to his supporters. How does the left fight that? - Salon

BANNER ELK, N.C.

Even the least popular presidents sometimes do great things.

What might Donald Trumps great thing be? He has unified a divided nation.

He has brought Republicans and Democrats together as only just wars can. Hes brought women, scientists, minorities, teachers, journalists, professors and no, theyre not all liberal out of their favorite laptop seats and moved them to march, protest and, most important, run for public office.

The pink-capped Womens March is familiar to all but the dead. On Earth Day in April, scientists around the world staged rallies to protest Trumps apparent lack of interest in research-backed facts.

A few prominent conservatives Post columnists George F. Will and Joe Scarborough among them have left the GOP, while Democrats have offered to take drastic action.

A majority say they would forswear drinking for life if it would mean Trumps impeachment, according to a story in the Hill. This seems a tad excessive, though given the increased alcohol consumption (anecdotally) since Trump took office, a long-term wagon ride might be just what the doctor would order. Relatedly, if not causatively, Nevada nearly ran out of marijuana products a few days after the state legalized recreational use.

When have so many Americans of so many stripes been so united in a shared mission? And, no, Woodstock doesnt count.

Other gifts from the president include an increased national interest in politics, civic participation and electoral office. Trumps name seems to be on the tip of everyones tongue, even among those who have never expressed any interest in politics.

Chris Clark, an artist in this mountain village, echoed the sentiments one hears several times on any given day. Im obsessed with the news, he told me during a recent visit to his gallery.

All I do is watch TV now, he said, laughing. Its like watching a train wreck, you cant look away. Its hard to go to work, really!

Meanwhile, countless Republicans and Democrats and independents, the nonpolitical, as well as scientists, teachers and, sure, a freshly emboldened outlier class (Jay-Z?), are considering running for public office, a goal previously not on the radar.

A newly formed political action committee 314 Action is urging scientists to Get Elected and offers help with funding and logistics. Hundreds have signed up. Similarly, Silicon Valley tech magnate Sam Altman president of Y Combinator, which invests in start-ups such as Dropbox and Airbnb is offering to fund good candidates for statewide office to create prosperity through technology, economic fairness and maintaining personal liberty.

Nationally, a centrist movement is gaining traction under the self-explaining name of No Labels, which may yet prove to be a counterforce in the zero-sum sport of current politics. The group organized in 2010 and is co-chaired by former Utah governor Jon Huntsman, a Republican, and former Connecticut senator Joe Lieberman, a Democrat (later independent).

More than 70 members of Congress from both parties have formed a bipartisan coalition called the No Labels Problem Solvers, pledging to work together on legislative initiatives. This month, the congressional group released its first bipartisan effort a Make Government Work! legislative package aimed at reducing government waste and inefficiency. In September, No Labels will host an international ideas summit to coincide with the U.N. General Assembly session in New York.

Thus, though our national political narrative is that were more divided than ever, a dispassionate second look suggests otherwise. Were not so much divided as stuck. Running in mud. Thats not the swamp draining; its the muck of money, greed, self-interest and one-upmanship Washingtons unique art of the deal.

We dont have only Trump to thank. The ecosystem of media-generated conflict and Americas penchant for spectator sports has ensured a persistent game of warring factions a perfect milieu for someone such as Trump, with his particular talents. He merely strolled to the lectern, called everybody else a loser, and plowed his way to the presidency on a whim and the most golden of promises to make America great again.

We have work to do. There is hope. A trend seems to be taking shape if momentum can be nourished. What an irony if Trumps presidency made America great again by inspiring people to get elected whose civilian lives have been circumscribed by the pursuit of knowledge, wisdom and truth, which is not, in fact, relative.

Trump would go down as one of the greatest unifying presidents in history the sooner the better.

Read more from Kathleen Parkers archive, follow her on Twitter or find her on Facebook.

Read this article:
Donald Trump, the great uniter? - Washington Post

At least that's the explanation Alex Jones, a right-wing radio broadcaster, was peddling on his show this past Wednesday. He argued that Trump Jr. should be praised, not ridiculed, for trying to protect America from hostile foreign intelligence. Jones is notably the same broadcaster who last month interviewed Robert David Steele, a man who claimed that the 2,000 children who go missing every day are being shipped to Mars to be used as sex slaves. It's easy to dismiss Jones' show and his cohorts as far-right conspiracy theorists, but his blog, Infowars.com, has over 3 million American viewers every month and his radio show, which is syndicated on more than 60 stations, is reported to have anywhere between 2 million and 5 million listeners daily. Most importantly, his show also has the backing of President Donald Trump, who has argued Jones has an amazing reputation and deserves a Pulitzer.

Going as far back as Joseph Pulitzer's and William Randolph Hearst's "yellow journalism," America has developed a tradition of sensationalist writers, broadcasters and fearmongers. But now we have a dangerous mix with a sensationalist president who tweets out his own form of yellow journalism and reinforces the credibility of unhinged thinkers like Jones and his cohorts.

Put simply, fact and fiction are morphing into alternative facts and gospel. Since the United States is the most powerful economy and military in the world, this is not just an American problem -- it has the potential to be a global problem, particularly if our government begins to make decisions based on falsehoods.

Yet the phenomenon of believing the absurd rather than critically questioning it is nothing new.

What can those of us who eschew the illusion of knowledge and seek the truth do? Charles Mackay wrote, "Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one." So go find a member of the herd. Appeal to his mind by listening carefully and creating an exchange, and then introduce elements of critical thinking.

Appeal to his patriotism by paraphrasing President Carter's reflection that "The best way to enhance freedom in other lands is to demonstrate here that our democratic system is worthy of emulation." (Tip: don't tell them that Carter said it.)

The whole world is depending on you.

More:
Donald Trump, Alex Jones and the illusion of knowledge - CNN

Evangelical voters put Donald Trump over the top to protect the unborn, but he has declared war on them instead.

For a start, the World Health Organization estimates that between 2030-2050, climate change will cause approximately 250,000 deaths every year from malnutrition, malaria, diarrhea, and heat stress.And that was before Trump pulled out of the Paris climate accord, putting the entire agreement at risk.

Of course, these arent the unborn children most religious conservatives mean.They mean fetuses and embryoseven miscarried fetuses, which as of last week may be issued birth certificates by the state of Florida. But as a rising generation of creation care Christians have emphasized, to be truly pro-life requires protecting human life in all its forms, not just before birth. And tallying up the Trump administrations war on the unborn is truly horrific.

Theres the 250,000 annual deaths caused by climate-related diseases as droughts increase, crops fail, and micro-climates shift. That number is the tip of the climate change iceberg, however.As President Obama patiently explained to Leonardo DiCaprio in a video that has since gone viral, the greatest human dangers from climate change will result from mass migration, as hundreds of millions of peoplemost of them poorflee coastal areas and newly desertified regions, choking cities and straining food supplies.

Imagine the Syrian refugee crisis, magnified by a hundredfold.

And while youre imagining Syrian refugees, remember that the Syrian conflict was also, in large part, a result of climate change.A 2015 report published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences showed that the unprecedented drought from 2007-2010 forced Syrian farmers to abandon their farms for the cities and caused a massive crop failure that led to food shortages, riots, overcrowding, instability, and civil unrest that led to government crackdowns.

This was no ordinary drought.Based on a century of data on precipitation, temperature, and sea-level pressure, the report concluded that anthropogenic climate change made the occurrence of a 3-year drought as severe as that of 20072010 2 to 3 times more likely than by natural variability alone.Its no wonder that the University College London Institute for Global Health stated that climate change is the biggest global health threat of the 21st century.

Oh, but there are others.

Next are the 24,000 Americans who will die each year for lack of health coverage if the Affordable Care Act is repealed, according to a number of studies that have tracked the health effects of insurance (or lack thereof). That number is probably too conservative.It is based on 20 million people losing insuranceless than the Congressional Budget Office now estimates and extrapolates from the impacts of expanded insurance coverage in Massachusetts.Extrapolations based on New York, Maine, and Arizona yield an annual death toll of 44,000. (Incidentally, none of these figures are based on the study cited in one attempted refutation of the projections.)

And then the unknown number of people, born and as yet unborn, who will get sick because of newly lax or eliminated water pollution rules, smog rules, power plant emissions regulations, fracking regulations, and pesticide regulations.Indeed, one of the first acts of the Scott Pruitt-led Environmental Protection Agency was to de-regulate chlorpyrifos, a pesticide that EPAs scientific studies conclusively showed to be a carcinogen.

Overseas, the popular UNICEF program is the worlds largest provider of vaccines to vulnerable children around the world1.5 million of whom die every year due to diseases that can be prevented by vaccination. But instead of increasing funding for UNICEF, the 2018 Trump budget zeroes it out completely, a loss of $132 million for the agency. The human cost?To be determined.

There are even 20,000 refugees with immediately life-threatening health conditions, according to the United Nations, whose entry to the United States has been held up by the administrations on-again/off-again travel ban.

Get The Beast In Your Inbox!

Start and finish your day with the top stories from The Daily Beast.

A speedy, smart summary of all the news you need to know (and nothing you don't).

Subscribe

Thank You!

You are now subscribed to the Daily Digest and Cheat Sheet. We will not share your email with anyone for any reason.

Then there are the numbers that are harder to quantify.We will never know how many people will get sick because government funding for scientific research has been slashed, for example.Nor can we know the effects of Trumps withdrawal from the international world order and the decline in U.S. global leadership.

And all of these numbers are only the health-related casualties of the Trump administration.The current pace of civilian deaths from U.S. airstrikes1,484 were killed in Iraq and Syria during the month of Marchwould blow away the Obama civilian death toll, and the count will likely rise higher as ISIS moves into urban areas.Trump is indeed bombing the hell out of ISIS, and, exactly as predicted, this has resulted in the deaths of thousands of innocent bystanders.

Needless to say, none of this includes any future death toll from wars in the Middle East, Iran, the Korean Peninsula, or wherever else the hawkish wing of the Trump administration turns its attention.

There is a coherent ideology tying together all of these statistics. It is the philosophy of tyrants past and present: that power is the greatest good, that life is a bitter competition among hostile combatants, that what matters are properties like strength, fame, money, possessions, and size.

And the worst things?Weakness, femininity, being a nobody, foolishly believing in nave myths of cooperation and compassion.Our vulgar, narcissistic president is a Nietzschean, an Randian, even though I am sure he has never read either of them.His only value is his own aggrandizement.

In their hearts, religious conservatives must know that Trump is not truly pro-life. Not simply because, as he said many times, he believes in the rights of women to make their own reproductive health care choices.But more broadly: because his adolescent, dog-eat-dog worldview is the very opposite of the biblical one, in which Jesus favored the meek, the outcast, the humbleprecisely those Trump would call losers and discard.

God says in Deuteronomy 30:19: I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live.Donald Trump has done the opposite.

See the rest here:
Donald Trump's War on the Unborn - Daily Beast