Dismounting Rushmore

 “A Republic, if you can keep it.”

* When you are an uninformed, Russia-fawning authoritarian and you lose military credibility, your prospects are under siege and likely under water.

* President Donald Trump has stated that he will veto the $740 billion annual defense bill if military bases are renamed. It’s beyond ironic and cluelessly counterproductive that commander bone spurs would leverage the military budget to try and retain statues of traitors.

* It was, alas, vintage Trump at the foot of Mount Rushmore on the eve of Independence Day. It was an occasion to ponder America’s flawed but intrepid journey to a democratic republic. It came with an iconic backdrop and forum to address patriotic Americans blindsided by a pandemic and racial unrest. Then he delivered a discordant, “cancel culture” message that focused on disaffected white voters, his base. So much for unifying a dangerously divisive country.

“We will not be terrorized, we will not be demeaned, and we will not be intimidated by bad, evil people,” proclaimed the demeaner-in-chief to the crowd of mainly maskless supporters. It’s what you get when Trump is president, and Stephen Miller is his go-to speechwriter: hateful histrionics over history. At least “carnage” wasn’t referenced.

Speaking of unmasked supporters, how karmic, if not Faustian, that Donald Trump Jr’s Foxygirlfriend, Kimberly Guilfoyle, tested positive for opportunism, political harlotry and the coronavirus. Guilfoyle, a former Fox News personality, chairs the Trump Victory Finance Committee.

* “The Russian Bounty story is … all a made up Fake News Media Hoax started to slander me and the Republican Party.” Slanderer-in-Chief Trump.

* “The fact is the president himself is a hoax.”–House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

* 2020: Doesn’t November seem more like an intervention than an election?

* “Denigrating this luxury Avenue.” That was the denigrator-in-chief’s reaction to New York City’s plan to paint a Black Lives Matter mural on Fifth Street outside Trump Tower.

* “He’s losing. And if he doesn’t change course, both in terms of the substance of what he’s discussing and the way he approaches the American people, then he will lose.”–Former New Jersey Republican Gov. Chris Christie.

* “(Trump’s) really the campaign manager at the end of the day.”–Jared Kushner, underscoring the obvious.

* “It could easily be ‘election week’ rather than election day.”–John Lapinski, director of elections at NBC News, on the more time-consuming, ballot-counting process involved with mail-in voting.

* “Every nation gets the government it deserves.” We’ve all heard the adage, coined by 18th century French philosopher Joseph de Maistre, that typically applied to other countries.

* Kanye West for president? In the era of Trump precedent, nothing is unthinkable, including a West-Eminem ticket.

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