Wanna Hear a Good Joke: Watch and Listen to Trump and His Minions Live From D.C.

Now that’s funny but not ha ha funny

(Just don't ask people around him)

From the Washington Post via MSN.  

White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders returned to a familiar refrain this past week when asked about President Trump’s past praise for WikiLeaks and founder Julian Assange, who has now been charged in the U.S. with conspiracy to illegally obtain secret documents, saying in part:

“Clearly the president was making a joke during the 2016 campaign. The president was making a joke during the campaign and was talking about the specifics of the case at that moment.”

Noteworthy that statement: That was at least the 13th time in the past four years that Trump, his congressional allies, or minions close to him in the White House have downplayed his remarks with some variation of suggesting he was either joking, kidding, or just being sarcastic, including these flashes from the past: 

1.  Inviting Russia to find & release Hillary Clinton’s emails

2.  Praising release of hacked emails by WikiLeaks

3.  Shooting someone on 5^th Avenue and not losing voters

4.  Calling former president Obama the “founder of ISIS”

5.  Asking Americans to “sit up at attention” when he speaks

6.  Suggesting he could be “president for life”

7.  Calling Democrats’ refusal to cheer one SOU as “treasonous”

8.  Telling police officers not “to be too nice” with suspects

9.  Praising a congressman for assaulting a reporter

       10.  Saying “easy” to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act

       11.  Floating becoming more “presidential”

       12.  Touting a higher IQ than Secretary of state Rex Tillerson

       13.  Suggesting that “Second Amendment” people could stop      

              Hillary Clinton from appointing judges

It is similar to other rhetorical deflection tactics Trump routinely employs. Such as stressing the importance of nearly everything, claiming he is “looking into over two dozen policy proposals” and also evading reporter questions citing his “roaring helicopter.”

But unlike his more explicit deflections, it can be hard to tell when Trump is joking, and at times even he doesn’t seem entirely sure. For example from his 2016 Obama smear (a mere two days) after saying Obama was the “founder of ISIS” Trump said:  “Obviously, I’m being sarcastic. But not that sarcastic, to be honest with you” (he quickly added).

That Trump regularly clarifies his sarcasm could mean he is just bad at telling jokes, or that people take his words too literally. Regardless, it is an ambiguity Trump and his allies have embraced.

For example: Less than two months into office, former Press Secretary Sean Spicer was asked whether reporters could trust the president’s words, and Spicer said: “If he’s not joking, of course. Every time that he speaks, he’s speaking as president of the United States.”

My 2 cents: Trump and those around him stretch things the limit, hoping not to be held accountable. 

When caught, they dodge, duck, deny, or deceive from the original topic to something totally new and different and in most cases more explosive than the original story.

They will do, say, pay, try, lie, imply, or deny anything to keep everyone not in their circle off guard on their terms.

The problem is that we are smarter than they are and we figured them out a long time ago. But, their childish cat and mouse game continues one that Trump loves to play with his sustained nasty name-calling like “Fake News” even gets this wrong, too. Yeah, right…. LOL LOL.

Thanks for stopping by and sharing this oldie but goodie.