October 11, 2016

Anderson Cooper Begins Debate By Giving Trump Opportunity To Explain What The Fuck Is Wrong With Him

ST. LOUIS—Saying he hoped the Republican nominee could clear up the matter for American voters, moderator Anderson Cooper reportedly began the second presidential debate Sunday night by giving Donald Trump the opportunity to explain exactly what the fuck is wrong with him.

“I’d like to start tonight’s proceedings by asking you, Mr. Trump, to explicitly lay out to the American people what the hell is fucking wrong with you?” said Cooper, adding that it would be helpful if the business magnate would expound on the specifics of why in God’s fucking name he says what he says and behaves the way he does, and how he could even begin to think that’s okay.

“You are not a mentally well person, and there is clearly something very, very wrong with you on the most basic and fundamental level, so please, if you would, shed some light on what in holy hell is going on inside your fucking skull. I mean, for fuck’s sake.”

At press time, Trump was reportedly shouting over both Cooper and Hillary Clinton as his two-minute response time had elapsed without him coming close to finishing his explanation of how fucked-up he is.

http://www.theonion.com/article/anderson-cooper-begins-debate-giving-trump-opportu-54135

October 10, 2016

Predators in Arms

As many people are pointing out, Republicans now trying to distance themselves from Donald Trump need to explain why The Tape was a breaking point, when so many previous incidents weren’t. On Saturday, explaining why he was withdrawing his endorsement, Senator John McCain cited “comments on prisoners of war, the Khan Gold Star family, Judge Curiel and earlier inappropriate comments about women” — and that leaves out Mexicans as rapists, calls for a Muslim ban, and much more. So, Senator McCain, what took you so long?

One excuse we’re now hearing is that the new revelations are qualitatively different — that disrespect for women is one thing, but boasting about sexual assault brings it to another level. It’s a weak defense, since Mr. Trump has in effect been promising violence against minorities all along. His insistence last week that the Central Park Five, who were exonerated by DNA evidence, were guilty and should have been executed was even worse than The Tape, but drew hardly any denunciations from his party.

And even if you consider sexual predation somehow uniquely unacceptable, you have to ask where all these pearl-clutching Republicans were back in August, when Roger Ailes — freshly fired from Fox News over horrifying evidence that he used his position to force women into sexual relationships — joined the Trump campaign as a senior adviser. Were there any protests at all from senior G.O.P. figures?

Of course, we know the answer: The latest scandal upset Republicans, when previous scandals didn’t, because the candidate’s campaign was already in free fall. You can even see it in the numbers: The probability of a House Republican jumping off the Trump train is strongly related to the Obama share of a district’s vote in 2012. That is, Republicans in competitive districts are outraged by Mr. Trump’s behavior; those in safe seats seem oddly indifferent.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/10/opinion/predators-in-arms.html

October 8, 2016

Trump: ‘I Know That Was Pretty Bad, But Let’s Just Say You’re Going To Want To Save Your Energy’

Advising pundits, reporters, and the general public to rein in their indignation for the time being, Republican nominee Donald Trump admitted Friday that he knew his recently unearthed comments about groping women and attempting to engage them in extramarital affairs were pretty bad, but that everyone “should really save [their] energy” for what he was going to say next.

“I’m fully aware that what I was recorded saying about using my celebrity status to sexually assault women is extremely vile and disturbing, but I want you to know that you’re really best saving your outrage and disgust for some thoughts I still haven’t verbalized yet, believe me,” said Trump, noting that if everyone worked themselves into a frenzy at his assertion that he couldn’t help but make aggressive advances on every woman he finds physically attractive or his use of the phrase “grab them by the pussy,” they simply wouldn’t have the stamina to denounce a series of forthcoming statements that the candidate assured would be even more reprehensible.

“Look, I get it. What I said, frankly, should not be accepted in civil society, let alone by a major party candidate for president of the United States, but we’ve got another whole month until the election—I’m going to say a lot more unconscionably repulsive things. Trust me, you will be much more sick to your stomach with the stuff I’m going to say after this. It’s going to be so, so revolting.”

At press time, Trump was standing at 44 percent in the national polls.

http://www.theonion.com/article/trump-i-know-was-pretty-bad-lets-just-say-youre-go-54130

October 7, 2016

Desert Trip's dream lineup and sky-high prices are making history—and upending rock fest tradition

There’s a good reason many people are calling the Desert Trip music festival “Oldchella”: The average age of the audience is 51; for the headlining acts, it’s 72.

But if the punchline for the multi-weekend event featuring performances by half a dozen rock titans, including the Rolling Stones and Paul McCartney, involves sensible shoes and Viagra, the bottom line is even more complicated: An event aimed specifically at the commune-embracing “Steal this Book” generation will be the most lucrative music festival on record.

For many attendees, it will also be the most expensive, pointing to the evolution of the once-egalitarian ethos of rock and quite possibly a revolution in the price, shape and content of music festivals in the future.

Desert Trip, which kicks off Friday, is slated to take in $160 million over two consecutive weekends. That’s almost double the previous record of $84 million by the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival last year (both are promoted by Los Angeles-based Goldenvoice and take place on the same grounds in Indio).

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/music/la-et-ms-desert-trip-barrier-20161003-snap-story.html

October 7, 2016

OBAMA HITS RECORD-HIGH APPROVAL RATING DESPITE TURNING COUNTRY INTO JOBLESS CRIME-RIDDEN HELLHOLE

NEW YORK (The Borowitz Report)—Republicans on Friday expressed bafflement that President Obama had garnered a record-high second-term approval rating despite having turned the United States into an economically devastated, crime-ridden hellhole.

Appearing on “Fox & Friends,” the Trump surrogate Rudolph Giuliani said he was “dumbfounded” by the disconnect between Obama’s high approval rating and the President’s near-total dismemberment of a formerly strong nation.

“This country used to be a wonderful place to live,” the former New York mayor said. “Today, all you see is a hellscape of smoldering ruins.”

Giuliani blamed the mainstream media for not properly informing the American people about the destruction and havoc Obama has wrought since his first day in office.

http://www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/obama-hits-record-high-approval-rating-despite-turning-country-into-jobless-crime-ridden-hellhole

October 4, 2016

Donald Trump: Terroristic Man-Toddler

Donald Trump is a domestic terrorist; only his form of terror doesn’t boil down to blowing things up. He’s the 70-year-old toddler who knows nearly nothing, hurls insults, has simplistic solutions for complex problems and is quick to throw a tantrum. Also, in case you didn’t know it, this toddler is mean to girls and is a bit of a bigot.

It isn’t so much that he is a strict disciple of radical ideology, but rather that he is devoid of fixed principles, willing to do anything and everything to gain fame, fortune and power. He has an endless, consuming need for perpetual affirmation. This is a bully who just wants to be liked, a man-boy nursing a nagging internal emptiness.

He’s fickle and spoiled and rotten.

So, when he loses at something, anything, he lashes out. When someone chastises him for bad behavior, he chafes. This is the kind of silver-spoon scion quick to yell at those he views as less privileged, and therefore less-than, “Do you know who I am?”

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/03/opinion/campaign-stops/donald-trump-terroristic-man-toddler.html

October 4, 2016

The Trump Possibility

Donald Trump is a thug. He’s a thug who talks gibberish, and lies, and cheats, and has issues, to put it mildly, with women. He’s lazy and limited and he has an attention span of a nanosecond. He’s a “gene believer” who thinks he has “great genes” and considers the German blood, of which he is proud, “great stuff.” Mexicans and Muslims, by contrast, don’t make the cut.

He’s managed to bring penis size and menstrual cycles and the eating habits of a former Miss Universe into the debate for the highest office in the land. He’s mocked and mimicked the handicapped and the pneumonia-induced malaise of Hillary Clinton. His intellectual interests would not fill a safe-deposit box at Trump Tower. There’s more ingenuity to his hairstyle than any of his rambling pronouncements. His political hero is Vladimir Putin, who has perfected what John le Carré once called the “classic, timeless, all-Russian, bare-faced whopping lie.”

This is a man who likes to strut and gloat. He’s such a great businessman he declared a loss of $916 million on his 1995 tax return, a loss so huge the tax software program used by his accountant choked at the amount, which had to be added manually. His cohorts, including the former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, reckon this makes Trump a “genius” because he could offset the loss against many millions of dollars of income for years afterward and perhaps pay not a dime in taxes. All of which did a lot of good for the United States of America and all the working stiffs who did not know that losing about a billion dollars is a financial masterstroke.

And this man, with the support of tens of millions of Americans, is a hairbreadth from the Oval Office.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/04/opinion/the-trump-possibility.html

October 4, 2016

Trump’s Fellow Travelers

Donald Trump has just had an extraordinarily bad week, and Hillary Clinton an extraordinarily good one; betting markets now put Mrs. Clinton’s odds of winning almost as high as they were just after the Democratic convention. But both Mrs. Clinton’s virtues and Mr. Trump’s vices have been obvious all along. How, then, did the race manage to get so close on the eve of the debate?

A lot of the answer, I’ve argued, lies in the behavior of the news media, which spent the month before the first debate jeering at Mrs. Clinton, portraying minor missteps as major sins and inventing fake scandals out of thin air. But let us not let everyone else off the hook. Mr. Trump couldn’t have gotten as far as he has without the support, active or de facto, of many people who understand perfectly well what he is and what his election would mean, but have chosen not to take a stand.

Let’s start with the Republican political establishment, which is supporting Mr. Trump just as if he were a normal presidential nominee.

I’ve had a lot of critical things to say about Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, and Paul Ryan, the speaker of the House. One thing of which I would never accuse them, however, is stupidity. They know what kind of man they’re dealing with — but they are spending this election pretending that we’re having a serious discussion about policy, that a vote for Mr. Trump is simply a vote for lower marginal tax rates. And they should not be allowed to flush the fact of their Trump support down the memory hole when the election is behind us.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/03/opinion/trumps-fellow-travelers.html

October 3, 2016

CHRISTIE CALLS TRUMP GENIUS FOR PLAN TO BURN DOWN WHITE HOUSE AND COLLECT INSURANCE

NEW YORK (The Borowitz Report)—Governor Chris Christie, of New Jersey, called Donald J. Trump a “genius” on Monday for his controversial plan to burn down the White House to collect insurance money.

Appearing on Fox News, Christie said that Trump’s scheme to collect fire-insurance payments on the White House would “make a serious dent” in the national debt.

“It’s not just the White House,” Christie told Fox’s Sean Hannity. “That building is chock-full of priceless antiques, paintings, and rugs, all of which, when burned, would fetch a pretty penny.”

The New Jersey governor said that Trump’s “totally genius business acumen” would set him apart from all previous Presidents. “We’ve had forty-plus occupants of the White House, and not one of them ever considered the business advantages of burning it down,” Christie said.

http://www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/christie-calls-trump-genius-for-plan-to-burn-down-white-house-and-collect-insurance

October 2, 2016

When Donald Trump gets in a hole, he just keeps digging. And digging. And digging.

Look. Donald Trump wasn't particularly good in the first presidential debate on Monday night. He looked lost at times. He looked angry at times. He got beat.

But, he wasn't that bad. The people who were for him declared victory. Many establishment Republicans insisted to me he had driven the change-vs.-more-of-the-same argument that they believe to be his best message. If Trump had spent the rest of the week holed up in Trump Tower, things might not have been so bad — even with the debate loss.

He, um, didn't do that. Instead, starting Tuesday morning, Trump began an extended attack against former Miss Universe Alicia Machado, a woman Hillary Clinton had brought up in the debate to highlight Trump's past comments about her weight. "She gained a massive amount of weight, and it was a real problem," Trump told Fox News by means of explanation.

And he just kept going. And going. By the time most people got up on Thursday morning, Trump had unleashed a series of tweets about Machado and Clinton that, well, fell slightly short of presidential.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/10/02/when-donald-trump-gets-in-a-hole-he-just-keeps-digging/?hpid=hp_special-topic-chain_fix-digging-1107am%3Ahomepage%2Fstory