UPDATED: The King of Gaslighting
UPDATED:
We all saw it last week, Trump suddenly tweeting that he’s going to slap tariffs on all Mexican imports if Mexico doesn’t immediately stop illegal immigration into the US. He tanked stocks from manufacturers to grocery distributors, probably after he leaked the announcement to his cronies so they could short those stocks to make a tidy sum. Remember Carl Icahn dumping steel stocks just before Trump announced the steel tariffs?
Anyway, negotiators between the US and Mexico were supposedly in feverish negotiations to come to a border security deal, and yesterday, with great fanfare, Trump announced on the Twitter machine that he has cut a last minute deal with Mexico.
Then he announced that Mexico has committed to purchase large quantities of American produce:
All that is great, except for one thing. The deal he breathlessly announced yesterday was negotiated with Mexico…wait for it…last March. Some provisions in the agreement date back to December. This negotiation has been completed for months.
So let’s recap – Trump creates a gigantic economic crisis by demanding Mexico do what it has already agreed to do. He costs the US economy billions of dollars (probably creating a profit opportunity for his buds). He ratchets up the rhetoric during the D-Day commemoration, even while sitting in the US cemetery in Normandy. He berates Mexico, Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, and even Bette Midler (I still haven’t figured that one out). Then, with great fanfare, he announces that he’s saved the day by forcing Mexico to agree to a deal that had already been done.
Folks, this is gaslighting in its purest form. Lie and create a problem that doesn’t exist. Then lie again, claiming to have fixed a problem that really wasn’t a problem in the first place. Then take credit for fixing the problem that didn’t exist.
Jesus.
UPDATE:
Trump also lied about a new farm deal. This morning, he tweeted, “MEXICO HAS AGREED TO IMMEDIATELY BEGIN BUYING LARGE QUANTITIES OF AGRICULTURAL PRODUCT FROM OUR GREAT PATRIOT FARMERS!”
Three Mexican officials say, nope, no farm deal was negotiated; in fact, Mexico has no agricultural conglomerate to even do that. Another day, another lie.
“Build the wall!” “Who’s gonna pay for it?” “Mexico!” oh wait …. but the chumps are still chanting along with Donnie at their Reich rallies.
Great summary, El Jefe.
1“The Negotiator!”
2Starring Donald Trump.
(Prerecorded)
(Some locations filmed in Mexico due to favorable tax incentives)
If that’s so, who set it up? I don’t think Trump has the brains, not any more. Maybe he did once, but his cheese has slipped off his cracker. He’s fronting for somebody.
3The US corn crop rotted in the silos. The ground is too sodden for planting. If the weather pattern EVER normalizes, they MAY get a crop in before summer ends. Farmers will still take a hit.
The extortionist always returns for more and probably will because he doesn’t abide by agreements, this is his MO.
Ice has rounded up over 100K immigrants. Thousands more will pile up in Mexico without food, jobs or housing while waiting for adjudication of their entry requests.
Plan B summary = Massive failure built in to this thinking.
4megasoid@4, have there been any silo blasts? If so, we can thank Donnie. Like we can also thank his maladministration for the chemical plants blasts. The “thanks Donnie” campaign ads just write themselves. I’m not a “big government ___ ” (suspect that’s a RW nutjob meme), but at least I recognize there are some things like education, prisons, health care, courts, infrastructure, defense and benefits to our social order best done by government and not the private sector. Love the EPA and OSHA, too. But miss the union reps who always had a better grip on plant safety than visitors who if lucky actually visited.
5This comes from the Star Tribune, the Minneapolis paper:
“The deal to avert tariffs that President Donald Trump announced with great fanfare Friday night consists largely of actions that Mexico had already promised to take in prior discussions with the United States over the past several months, according to officials from both countries who are familiar with the negotiations.”
http://strib.mn/2Zj9p95
6Jane & PKM @5
If your referring to: “at least I recognize there are some things like education, prisons, health care, courts, infrastructure, defense and benefits to our social order best done by government and not the private sector.” There is this re: government.
Farmers await details on who’s eligible for the $3 billion from disaster aid bill.
EVANSVILLE, Ind., June 5 (UPI) — More than $3 billion of the $19.1 billion disaster aid bill awaiting President Donald Trump’s signature is earmarked for farms — but it is unclear which farmers will be eligible.
The Senate bill, which passed the House on Monday, instructs the U.S. Department of Agriculture to divide the aid money between the flooded Midwest, the fire-ravaged West Coast and hurricane-damaged Gulf Coast and Puerto Rico.
https://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/farmers-await-details-on-whos-eligible-for-the-3-billion-from-disaster-aid-bill/70008480
7megasoid@7, LOL, no. As you can see this maladministration and Republicons are the reverse of what government can and should do. Which farmers will receive money is an easy one – the conglomerates not our fellow citizens who deserve aid.
WTF? USDA deciding disaster relief? Then again probably just as inadequate as FEMA with this maladministration. Expect our tax dollars to find the path to a related trump pocket. Republicons are to governance what a trump is to charity.
8https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/5/25/18639904/gop-senator-chuck-grassley-farm-aid-trump-trade-war-china
9I’m pretty sure that most agreements between nations run 10’s or 100’s of pages, with lots of detailed specifics, not these vague 1 pagers that they put together to bamboozle the moron. The thing is I think his staff is playing him, right along with Mexico because both sides consider him an idiot who has to be tricked into thinking he got a win so he’ll go away and bother someone else.
10Me thinks many are missing the point.
11This wasn’t “gaslighting” per se, but that is a plus for demented donnie, rather this was kabuki.
His beleivers with faux, facebook, breibart etc, cheerleading how their demented strong man stared down Mexico and made them blink.
That this is a lie is irrelevent. His “true beleivers” ( Eric Hoffer) will accept as gospel what he says and just blame the media for trying to disparage his “success”.
This was aimed at his base. The more he is shown to be a liar the more his base will swear allegience to his delusions.
So as far as the right he is a winner twice over. Once for “forceing” Mexico to bend to his “iron”( at 2,800°F) will and then again for once more “owning” the libs.
This is in part why I say the d’s should just give up trying to appeal to the delusional thuglican party. They do not accept reality. They do not accept science. They do not accept documented facts.
Started with tricky dick “I am not a crook”,through addle ronnie ” trees cause pollution, through perjurer poppa “what diary’s oh you mean these diary’s, and then the twit who complained that his oppositions problem was they lived ” and when we act, we create our own reality. ” culminating with this doofus who’se administration connection with reality is purely coincidental.
The CNN buzz this AM is that he had to rebrand this “agreement” because the exact same thing was organized by Kirstjen Neilsen who he decided he didn’t like anymore. THAT started way back in December and the only thing he remembers is grudges.
12Honestly, I think this was all about market manipulation. Look at how the market tumbled when he began all this talk of tariffs with Mexico and how quickly it recovered when it blew over.
If only we had a gov’t agency which objectively looked into these kinds of things… I don’t know who all they’d catch, but if the last initial was “T” it wouldn’t surprise me.
13@Alan – We do. We have the SEC and the DOJ who continually monitor for insider trading and market manipulation.
14Trump is a dangerous psycho sh^thole, your average, everyday, textbook Malignant Narcissist and does EVERYTHING just for attention and/or praise.
15He purposely creates chaos then pretends to fix it, etc. etc.. Why chaos? Because Trump learned that chaos gets him the most immediate attention, good or bad, it’s attention which he craves . Any kind of chaos or lies, changing from one second to the next depending on the situation, solely to get attention so he can go watch himself on the TV.
I bet he has more TV screens in his bedroom then mirrors, but it’s a close call.
And yes El Jefe, somebody’s making a lot of money off this. The Market’s new normal is up 2-300 one day, down 2-300 the next.
16$$$ SOMEBODY’S doing this for a reason $$$
“GREAT PATRIOT FARMERS” is a phrase we used to see (and laugh at) in Soviet propaganda. And he seems to think he should get a “National Holiday” for lying about the trade deal that was worked out three months ago. Beneath everything is his gnawing envy of Obama and frustration that he will never measure up. It would be funny if we weren’t living through it.
17Insider trading? Just read this …
““My twitter feed is asking a legitimate question: are @realDonaldTrump’s businesses and family profiting from insider knowledge of his pending — market-moving — tweets, comments and bargaining stands?” Fineman wrote.
Fineman added: “My guess would be YES. The real questions are: who is doing it for him and how?”
18https://www.rawstory.com/2019/06/nbc-analyst-accuses-trump-family-of-insider-trading-with-early-knowledge-of-trumps-market-moving-tweets/
I’m not the only who thinks this: https://www.forbes.com/sites/stephaniesarkis/2019/06/09/trump-and-other-gaslightersnarcissists-create-crises-and-then-act-like-they-solved-them/#52b2e0ef60c2
19