This sad, embarrassing wreck of a man; The Washington Post, July 17, 2018

George F. Will, The Washington Post; This sad, embarrassing wreck of a man

"Americans elected a president who — this is a safe surmise — knew that he had more to fear from making his tax returns public than from keeping them secret. The most innocent inference is that for decades he has depended on an American weakness, susceptibility to the tacky charisma of wealth, which would evaporate when his tax returns revealed that he has always lied about his wealth, too. A more ominous explanation might be that his redundantly demonstrated incompetence as a businessman tumbled him into unsavory financial dependencies on Russians. A still more sinister explanation might be that the Russians have something else, something worse, to keep him compliant.

The explanation is in doubt; what needs to be explained — his compliance — is not. Granted, Trump has a weak man’s banal fascination with strong men whose disdain for him is evidently unimaginable to him. And, yes, he only perfunctorily pretends to have priorities beyond personal aggrandizement. But just as astronomers inferred, from anomalies in the orbits of the planet Uranus, the existence of Neptune before actually seeing it, Mueller might infer, and then find, still-hidden sources of the behavior of this sad, embarrassing wreck of a man."

After a stunning news conference, there’s a newly crucial job for the American press; The Washington Post, July 16, 2018

Margaret Sullivan, The Washington Post; After a stunning news conference, there’s a newly crucial job for the American press

"Journalism, writ large, can be proud of the Associated Press’s Jon Lemire and Reuters’s Jeff Mason, who asked well-honed, incisive questions on Monday and asked them in just the right way. (Historical note: Lemire, back in October 2016, was thrown out of a room by Trump’s campaign people, as the candidate called him a “sleazebag” for asking tough questions about sexual misconduct claims against him.)

Mason and Lemire held Trump’s feet to the fire.

If any such pride is to continue in the hours and days ahead, news organizations need to step up to the job of driving home to American citizens the larger picture, too.

It’s not enough to offer such pallid assessments as those we’ve heard too often, that “this is outside the norm,” or “there’s little precedent for what we’re hearing.

Clarity of purpose and moral force are called for. They are not always in ample supply by a too-docile press corps.

Fallows called Monday’s news conference a “moment of truth” for Republican lawmakers

So, too, for American journalists."

We are a deeply stupid country; The Washington Post, July 16, 2018

Dana Milbank, The Washington Post; We are a deeply stupid country

"How foolish are we?

We brainlessly criticized Russia when it invaded Georgia and Ukraine. We idiotically protested when Russia poisoned people in Britain. Like dunces, we punished Russians for killing human rights activists. Morons that we are, we complained when Russia shot down a passenger jet. And then, revealing ourselves to be truly daft and inane, we blamed Russia for interfering in our election.

Standing at Putin’s side Monday, Trump let the world know just how doltish the people are who made this judgment, including the cretins at the CIA and the nitwits on the Senate Intelligence Committee. “I have President Putin; he just said it’s not Russia,” Trump announced. “I don’t see any reason why it would be” Russia."

Trump and Putin vs. America; The New York Times, July 16, 2018

Thomas L. Friedman, The New York Times;Trump and Putin vs. America 

"Listening to Trump, it was as if Franklin Roosevelt had announced after Pearl Harbor: “Hey, both sides are to blame. Our battleships in Hawaii were a little provocative to Japan — and, by the way, I had nothing to do with the causes for their attack. So cool it.”

I Was Fired for Making Fun of Trump; The New York Times, June 15, 2018

Rob Rogers, The New York Times; I Was Fired for Making Fun of Trump

"After 25 years as the editorial cartoonist for The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, I was fired on Thursday.

I blame Donald Trump.

Well, sort of.

I should’ve seen it coming. When I had lunch with my new boss a few months ago, he informed me that the paper’s publisher believed that the editorial cartoonist was akin to an editorial writer, and that his views should reflect the philosophy of the newspaper.

That was a new one to me.

I was trained in a tradition in which editorial cartoonists are the live wires of a publication — as one former colleague put it, the “constant irritant.” Our job is to provoke readers in a way words alone can’t. Cartoonists are not illustrators for a publisher’s politics...

The paper may have taken an eraser to my cartoons. But I plan to be at my drawing table every day of this presidency."

Trump is often depressing. This week, he was sickening.; The Washington Post, June 14, 2018

Ruth Marcus, The Washington Post; Trump is often depressing. This week, he was sickening.

"Trump’s consistent, unnecessary, escalating praise for Kim merits the word “sickening.” Diplomacy may entail saying nice things to bad people for good ends, but Trump’s language about Kim represents a nauseating betrayal of American values — and a telling exposure of Trump’s own.

“Hey, he’s a tough guy,” Trump told Fox News’s Bret Baier. “When you take over a country — a tough country, tough people — and you take it over from your father, I don’t care who you are, what you are, how much of an advantage you have. If you can do that at 27 years old, I mean, that’s 1 in 10,000 that could do that. So he’s a very smart guy. He’s a great negotiator.”

Baier persisted: “But he’s still done some really bad things.”

 Trump: “Yeah, but so have a lot of other people have done some really bad things. I mean, I could go through a lot of nations where a lot of bad things were done.”

Shades of Trump’s moral equivocating on Russian President Vladimir Putin (“There are a lot of killers. We got a lot of killers,” Trump told Fox’s Bill O’Reilly last year. “What, you think our country is so innocent?”), but so much worse. Consider Trump’s own words less than five months ago: “No regime has oppressed its own citizens more totally or brutally than the cruel dictatorship in North Korea.”"

ABC just took a moral stand on Roseanne. Spoiler alert: Donald Trump won't.; CNN, May 29, 2018

Chris Cillizza, CNN; ABC just took a moral stand on Roseanne. Spoiler alert: Donald Trump won't.

"ABC's decision to cancel Roseanne Barr's eponymous show following a racist comment she made about former Obama administration official Valerie Jarrett on Twitter was shocking for two reasons.

First, because it amounted to a TV network drawing a moral line in the sand -- insisting that no amount of money or ratings gave Roseanne the right to express views that ABC described in a statement as "abhorrent, repugnant and inconsistent with our values."

Second, because that decision to take a moral stand represents a stark contrast from the moral relativism preached by the president of the United States.

Donald Trump is different from anyone who has held the office before him in all sorts of ways. But, to my mind, the biggest -- and most critical -- difference between Trump and his predecessors is his total abdication of the concept of the president as a moral leader for the country and the world."

Comey book likens Trump to mafia boss 'untethered to truth'; The Guardian, April 12, 2018

Tom McCarthy and Martin Pengelly, The Guardian; Comey book likens Trump to mafia boss 'untethered to truth'

"The former FBI director James Comey denounces Donald Trump as “untethered to truth” and likens the president to a mafia boss, in an explosive new book set to bring fresh turmoil to the White House...

In an epilogue, Comey passes judgment on Trump’s character. Writing that “our country is paying a high price” for the 2016 election, he says: “This president is unethical, and untethered to the truth and institutional values. His leadership is transactional, ego driven, and about personal loyalty.”

The book, an instant bestseller, will be supported by a media blitz. In response, the Republican party has organized a Trumpian scheme to attack “Lyin’ Comey” – and has set up a rebuttal website."

As Sinclair’s sound-alike anchors draw criticism for ‘fake news’ promos, Trump praises broadcaster; Washington Post, April 2, 2018

Paul Farhi, Washington Post; As Sinclair’s sound-alike anchors draw criticism for ‘fake news’ promos, Trump praises broadcaster

"Tim Burke had a simple idea: Take clips of dozens of TV news anchors all spouting the same lines and mash them up into one video. The idea, he said, was to expose how one company, Sinclair Broadcast Group, had turned its many local newscasts into a national megaphone for its corporate views.

So Burke, the video director at Deadspin, pieced together video of anchors at 45 Sinclair-owned stations across the United States, all reading from a script that the ­Maryland-based company recently distributed to its stations about the perils of “fake news” and how it is “extremely dangerous to our democracy.”

The result was a massively viral video that sparked broad mainstream media attention, incited an angry tweet from President Trump, and prompted a national conversation about the perils of enabling companies such as Sinclair to control an ever-larger number of TV stations."

Donald Trump Sure Has a Problem with Democracy; New York Times, March 4, 2018

Editorial Board, New York Times; Donald Trump Sure Has a Problem with Democracy

"Though George Washington was elected unanimously, he was always a reluctant president. He pursued a second term in 1792 only at the urging of his cabinet, and in 1796, when he insisted it was time to step down, he famously warned that not to do so risked a return to the very tyranny Americans had fought to overthrow...

Mr. Trump was surely joking about becoming president for life himself. But there can be little doubt now that he truly sees no danger in Mr. Xi’s “great” decision to extend his own rule until death. That craven reaction is in line with Mr. Trump’s consistent support and even admiration for men ruling with increasing brutal and autocratic methods — Vladimir Putin of Russia, Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines, to name a few."

Never have we seen such chaos and corruption; Washington Post, March 1, 2018

Eugene Robinson, Washington Post; Never have we seen such chaos and corruption

"Any other president who displayed such cavalier disregard for previous policy positions and total ignorance of basic facts would have provoked an uproar. Trump barely gets a shrug. Nobody expects him to be consistent. Nobody expects him to know anything about anything. He is defining the presidency down in a way that we must not tolerate.

I spent years as a foreign correspondent in Latin America. To say we are being governed like a banana republic is an insult to banana republics. It’s that bad, and no one should pretend otherwise."

The Trump administration is in an unethical league of its own; Washington Post, March 1, 2018

Max Boot, Washington Post; The Trump administration is in an unethical league of its own

"One of the great non-mysteries of the Trump administration is why Cabinet members think they can behave like aristocrats at the court of the Sun King. The Department of Housing and Urban Development spent $31,000 for a dining set for Secretary Ben Carson’s office while programs for the poor were being slashed. The Environmental Protection Agency has been paying for Administrator Scott Pruitt to fly first class and be protected by a squadron of bodyguards so he doesn’t have to mix with the great unwashed in economy class. The Department of Veterans Affairs spent $122,334 for Secretary David Shulkin and his wife to take what looks like a pleasure trip to Europe last summer; Shulkin’s chief of staff is accused of doctoring emails and lying about what happened. The Department of Health and Human Services paid more than $400,000 for then-Secretary Tom Price to charter private aircraft — a scandal that forced his resignation. 

Why would Cabinet members act any differently when they are serving in the least ethical administration in our history? The “our” is important, because there have been more crooked regimes — but only in banana republics. The corruption and malfeasance of the Trump administration is unprecedented in U.S. history. The only points of comparison are the Gilded Age scandals of the Grant administration, Teapot Dome under the Harding administration, and Watergate and the bribe-taking of Vice President Spiro Agnew during the Nixon administration. But this administration is already in an unethical league of its own. The misconduct revealed during just one day this week — Wednesday — was worse than what presidents normally experience during an entire term...

Given the ethical direction set by this president, it’s a wonder that his Cabinet officers aren’t stealing spoons from their official dining rooms. Come to think of it, maybe someone should look into that."

Whatever Trump Is Hiding Is Hurting All of Us Now; New York Times, February 18, 2018

Thomas L. Friedman, New York Times; Whatever Trump Is Hiding Is Hurting All of Us Now

"Putin used cyberwarfare to poison American politics, to spread fake news, to help elect a chaos candidate, all in order to weaken our democracy. We should be using our cyber-capabilities to spread the truth about Putin —just how much money he has stolen, just how many lies he has spread, just how many rivals he has jailed or made disappear — all to weaken his autocracy. That is what a real president would be doing right now.

My guess is what Trump is hiding has to do with money. It’s something about his financial ties to business elites tied to the Kremlin. They may own a big stake in him. Who can forget that quote from his son Donald Trump Jr. from back in 2008: “Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross section of a lot of our assets.” They may own our president.

But whatever it is, Trump is either trying so hard to hide it or is so naïve about Russia that he is ready to not only resist mounting a proper defense of our democracy, he’s actually ready to undermine some of our most important institutions, the F.B.I. and Justice Department, to keep his compromised status hidden.

That must not be tolerated. This is code red. The biggest threat to the integrity of our democracy today is in the Oval Office."

We Asked Ethics Experts About Trump’s Worst Abuses During His First Year In Office : Here’s what they said.; Mother Jones, January 17, 2018

Andy Kroll, Mother Jones; We Asked Ethics Experts About Trump’s Worst Abuses During His First Year In Office : Here’s what they said.

"No president in modern history has run roughshod over the laws, guidelines, and norms of running an ethical and transparent administration like Donald Trump.

He’s refused to divest any of his business holdings or meaningfully separate himself from his company. He’s visited (and so promoted) his private properties and golf courses at a breathtaking clip: Of his first 362 days in office, Trump spent one-third of them—121 days—at a Trump property, according to NBC News. His business has cashed in on his presidency by hiking membership fees and peddling access.

His aides have promoted Trump family properties and products. A year in, it is fair to describe the Trump administration’s approach to clean, ethical government as, well, nonexistent.

Below, six experts in clean government, ethics, anti-corruption, and transparency who have tracked the administration describe what they see as Trump’s most egregious ethical failings from his first year in office."

Mr. President, stop attacking the press; Washington Post, January 16, 2018

John McCain, Washington Post; Mr. President, stop attacking the press

"Ultimately, freedom of information is critical for a democracy to succeed. We become better, stronger and more effective societies by having an informed and engaged public that pushes policymakers to best represent not only our interests but also our values. Journalists play a major role in the promotion and protection of democracy and our unalienable rights, and they must be able to do their jobs freely. Only truth and transparency can guarantee freedom."

‘Our democracy will not last’: Jeff Flake’s speech comparing Trump to Stalin, annotated; Washington Post, January 17, 2018

Amber Phillips, Washington Post; ‘Our democracy will not last’: Jeff Flake’s speech comparing Trump to Stalin, annotated

"For the second time in a span of several months, Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) took to the Senate floor to  call out President Trump. This time, Flake excoriated the president for launching a war on the media, comparing the president to Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin and warning his colleagues that nothing less than American democracy is at stake. It was all pegged to Trump's “Fake News Awards,” which the president said he was going to hand out Wednesday. Here's Flake's entire speech, annotated. Click on highlighted text to read the annotations."

What Flake got right — and wrong; Washington Post, January 17, 2018

Jennifer Rubin, Washington Post; What Flake got right — and wrong

"Flake gave an impressive and far-reaching speech indicting Trump’s web of lies and the damage his international pals (e.g., Vladimir Putin) are doing to freedom of the press. He correctly admonished his Senate colleagues that undermining truth strengthens the hand of despots. Give him credit — but only partial credit. Elected Republicans engage in much of the same anti-truth propaganda as the president does. The evening programming of an entire TV cable “news” network is dedicated to conspiracy theories, misleading information about immigrants and terrorists, and refusal to cover facts that contradict the president’s tropes.

Trump did not materialize out of thin air. He masterfully manipulated white grievance and anti-elite conspiracy-mongering. But the ground was plowed by many of Flake’s colleagues and by Republicans’ self-selected news outlets. Getting rid of Trump will help, but unless and until the mind-set that permeates the right is dismantled, the war on the truth will rage on."

Trump is Sarah Palin but better at it; Washington Post, August 17, 2017

Jane Coaston, Washington Post; Trump is Sarah Palin but better at it

"His fans weren’t dissuaded by his past support for Democrats (including his 2016 opponent), or his lies, or his personal liberalism, or his crudeness, or his long history of mistreating small-business owners of the kind he claimed to champion, because his fans weren’t voting for Trump. They were voting for what Trump meant to them personally.

In turn, his base will not leave him, because to abandon Trump would not be to abandon the current president but to leave behind deeply held beliefs of their own. His popularity is cultural, not political, resilient to the notions of truth and fiction and to Trump’s own failures. Even after his presidency, regardless of whether it ends in impeachment or in two consecutive terms in office, the image will remain undaunted.

At the 2015 Freedom Summit in Iowa, Palin gave a 35-minute speech described as confusing at best and career-ending at worst by conservative writers and commentators in attendance. The Washington Examiner’s Byron York even wrote that Palin “made a guy like Trump look like a serious presidential candidate.” How appropriate then that the student became the master."

There is a shriveled emptiness where Trump’s soul once resided; Washington Post, August 17, 2017

Michael Gerson, Washington Post; There is a shriveled emptiness where Trump’s soul once resided

"Every additional day of standing next to Trump — physically and metaphorically — destroys reputation and diminishes moral standing. The rationalizations are no longer credible. But resignation, in contrast, would be a contribution to the common good — showing that principled leadership in service to the Constitution is still possible, even in the age of Trump. When loyalty requires corruption, it is time to leave."

Trump is a cancer on the presidency; Washington Post, August 18, 2017

Jonathan Capehart, Washington Post; Trump is a cancer on the presidency

"Trump must be held accountable for his false moral equivalency and his willingness to exalt the treasonous Confederacy at the expense of our union. The “harsh penalty” that escaped him in 2011 must be visited upon him now. People of good conscience must speak up and stay vocal. More Republicans must stand up to him now and do so boldly. They have to put the country before party or some longed-for policy that pales in comparison to the preservation of our ideals. And if Trump succeeds in surviving this unbelievable affront to all we say we are, he will not be to blame. We will."