The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Trump

  • Celebrities Blast Trump over CNN Body-Slamming meme

    Celebrities Blast Trump over CNN Body-Slamming meme

    President Donald Trump of United States’ war against media took a dramatic turn on Sunday with several entertainers blasting him on social media.

    Trump, on Sunday morning, had tweeted a meme showing himself body-slamming and punching a man with the CNN logo superimposed over his face. The GIF, which first appeared on Reddit several days ago, was made from a clip of one of Trump’s visits to WWE back in the day.”

    CNN then replied Trump in a statement. “It is a sad day when the President of the United States encourages violence against reporters,” said CNN.

    “Clearly, Sarah Huckabee Sanders lied when she said the President had never done so. Instead of preparing for his overseas trip, his first meeting with Vladimir Putin, dealing with North Korea and working on his health care bill, he is instead involved in juvenile behavior far below the dignity of his office. We will keep doing our jobs. He should start doing his.”

    Recently, Trump blasted MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski on Twitter, claiming he refused to let them join him at Mar-a-Lago because Brzezinsky was “bleeding badly from a face lift.”

    Following his twitter spats, some celebrities including Mia Farrow, J.K. Rowling, John Legend and Chelsea Clinton over the weekend used expletives, jokes and unwholesome comparisons to dis Trump.

    • Seth Rogen (@Sethrogen) “The President in no way has ever promoted or encouraged violence”-WH “Who are you going to believe- me or your lying eyes?”-Groucho Marx https://t.co/rrpMHNe1Cn
    • Mark Hamill (@HamillHimself) 2017 – the year the office of the Presidency forever lost any significance or meaning. https://t.co/l7bxIwVX1Z
    • Josh Gad (@joshgad) How the fuck are you a president.
    • J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) I’m dying to know which staffers got to work on it. Who wrote the scheduling memo. Who did the briefing. How quickly comms signed off.
    • Mia Farrow (@MiaFarrow) I highly suggest you take a look at Donald Trumps terrifying last tweet. Its a video of him wrestling ‘fake news’ Its hard to accept as real
    • Andy Cohen (@Andy) White supremacy is such that it allows a clearly diminished man to post this and proceed, but blocked the dignity of Obama at every turn. https://t.co/W6HGiRhC4y
    • Ava DuVernay (@ava) 25th Amendment. https://t.co/KM4KeakQlI
    • John Legend (@johnlegend) Trump tweets picture of his dick with the caption YOURE ALL GONNA SUCK THIS
    • Ike Barinholtz (@ikebarinholtz) Isn’t pro wrestling fake?
    • Jim Acosta (@Acosta) What???? Please, someone. Get out the straight jacket. https://t.co/B8fUowmJx7
    • Kevin Zegers (@KevinZegers) He must be stopped before he wrecks it all. ?? He needs to go to the doctor. And we need a President. C’mon #Congress https://t.co/bJtPqHK0oR
    • Sunny Hostin (@sunny) If President Obama had did this, he would have been kicked out the WH with out a meeting…. https://t.co/NX3uJ5mZGa
    • Loni Love (@LoniLove) our president expressing his desire to murder the press https://t.co/9chGvY0nFS
    • Jemaine Clement (@AJemaineClement) Loool hey remember when Barack and Michelle did a fist bump and Fox called it a “terrorist fist jab” & said it had “violent undertones”
    • Arthur Chu (@arthur_affect) Now a good time to remind ourselves that Trump WAS A CHARACTER IN THE WWE, WHERE ADULTS FAKE WRESTLE EACH OTHER.
    • Steven pasquale (@StevePasquale) Note: If there were no Russia story…Trump’s behavior as president would warrant tossing him out on his keister anyway. Pronto.
    • David Rothkopf (@djrothkopf) We’re a couple polling points away from Trump tweeting a photoshopped dick pic.
    • andy lassner (@andylassner) There is a kid with a square little CNN head who is having a very hard time right now because he believes Donald Trump beat up his father.
    • John Levenstein (@johnlevenstein) “Guys, I just woke up from the weirdest nightmare” would work as the lede for pretty much every article about Trump
    • Josh Gondelman (@joshgondelman) Remember when they were all “have faith–maybe Trump will surprise you?” The only surprise has been the bottomlessness of hate and stupidity
  • Trump owes banks $315m

    Trump owes banks $315m

    United States of America President Donald Trump’s net worth initially put at $10 billion during his campaign for White House now appears to have been overblown.

    Latest disclosure puts his wealth at $1.4 billion and personal liabilities of at least $315.6 million to German, U.S. and other lenders as of mid-2017.

    Trump, according to a federal financial disclosure form released late on Friday by the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, had roughly $20 million in income from his new marquee Washington hotel.

    The hotel opened just down the street from the White House last September. Revenues also increased at Mar-a-Lago, the Florida resort known as the “Winter White House.”

    Trump reported an income of at least $594 million for 2016 and early 2017 and assets worth at least $1.4 billion.

    The 98-page disclosure document posted on the ethics office’s website shows liabilities for Trump of at least $130 million to Deutsche Bank Trust Company Americas, a unit of German-based Deutsche Bank AG.

    For example, Trump disclosed a liability to Deutsche exceeding $50 million for the Old Post Office, a historic Washington property where he has opened a hotel.

    Trump reported liabilities of at least $110 million to Ladder Capital Corp, a commercial real estate lender with offices in New York, Los Angeles and Boca Raton, Florida.

    The largest component of Trump’s income is $115.9 million listed as golf-resort related revenues from Trump National Doral in Miami, down from $132 million he reported a year ago.

    Income from many of his other hotels and resorts largely held steady. Revenue from Trump Corporation, his real-estate management company, nearly tripled to $18 million, and revenue from Mar-a-Lago grew by 25 percent, to $37.25 million. The private club doubled its initiation fee to $200,000 after Trump’s election.

    He earned $11 million from the Miss Universe pageant, after selling the beauty contest back in 2015.

    Revenue from television shows like “The Apprentice” fell to $1.1 million, down from $6 million a year earlier.

    His assets probably exceeded $1.4 billion because the disclosure form provides ranges of values.

    The document shows Trump held officer positions in 565 corporations or other entities before becoming U.S. president. His tenure in most of those posts ended on Jan. 19, 24 hours before his inauguration, and in others in 2015 and 2016.

    Most of the entities involved are based in the United States, with a handful in Scotland, Ireland, Canada, Brazil, Bermuda and elsewhere.

    Trump has refused to release his tax returns, which would give a much clearer indication of his wealth and business interests. But he has submitted federal forms disclosing his and his family’s income, assets and liabilities.

    “President Trump welcomed the opportunity to voluntarily file his personal financial disclosure form,” the White House said in a statement, adding that the form was “certified by the Office of Government Ethics pursuant to its normal procedures.”

    An Office of Government Ethics spokesman declined to comment on the contents of the report, other than to say that it was certified by the office, which is an ethics watchdog for federal government employees.

     

     

    Trump released a disclosure form in May 2016 that his campaign at the time said showed his net worth was $10 billion. Some critics disputed that figure as overblown.

    Before taking office in January, Trump was a New York real estate developer and television celebrity.

  • Trump’s attorney general to testify in public on Russia

    AS Attorney General Jeff Sessions will testify in public to the Senate Intelligence Committee on Tuesday on his role in the Russia investigation.

    Mr Sessions, who wrote to the Senate Intelligence Committee at the weekend, has asked that the hearing be open.

    He will face questions about undeclared meetings with Russian officials and the president’s firing of the FBI chief.

    Media reports last week said Mr Sessions had offered to resign because of tensions with the president.

    Who is Jeff Sessions?

    Mr Trump was angry that the attorney general had recused himself from the FBI’s Russia probe, according to US media.

    Tuesday’s hearing has been scheduled for 14:30 local time (18:30 GMT).

    America’s top justice official will be the most senior government official to testify before the Senate committee, which is looking into allegations that Russia had tried to meddle in last November’s election.

    It is one of several congressional panels that, along with a special counsel, is also investigating whether any Trump campaign officials colluded with the alleged Kremlin plot.

  • U.S quits Paris Climate pact

    U.S quits Paris Climate pact

    United States President, Donald Trump, announced on Thursday that his country would withdraw from the 2015 Paris climate accord.

    The U.S President said his administration  would negotiate a new global deal on climate change.

    “As of today, the United States will cease all implementation of the non-binding Paris accord and the draconian financial and economic burdens the agreement imposes on our country,” Mr. Trump said.

    Mr. Trump had said during last year’s presidential election campaign that he would take steps to help his country’s oil and coal industries.

    He complained that the deal,  signed during ex- President Barack Obama’s administration, gives other countries an unfair advantage over U.S industry and destroys American jobs.

    United Nations Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, had earlier appealed to Mr. Trump not to break the commitment – but said the battle against climate change would continue regardless of the U.S stance.

     

  • Osinbajo, May, Trump, others condemn Manchester blast

    Osinbajo, May, Trump, others condemn Manchester blast

    ACTING President Yemi Osinbajo yesterday joined other world leaders in condemning terrorist attack in Manchester, United Kingdom (UK).

    Other leaders who flayed the explosion that rocked a concert hall yesterday are: British Prime Minsiter Mrs. Theresa May, United States (U.S.) President Donald Trump, his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Queen of England Elizabeth II, among others.

    In a statement by his spokesman Laolu Akande, Acting President Osinbajo described the terrorist attack on innocent people in Manchester as despicable.

    The statement reads: “On behalf of the people and Government of Nigeria, Prof Osinbajo expresses heartfelt condolences and solidarity with the government and people of the United Kingdom in this period of grief.”

    Describing the attack as a dastardly act and heinous crime, Osinbajo assured Prime Minister May that the prayers and thoughts of Nigerians were with the British people as they mourned the victims, many of the them young people.

    It further reads: “Acting President Osinbajo is confident that light of the civilised world will always prevail against the darkness of depravity, and he trusts that Britons and citizens of other nations across the world will continue to show resilience and courage in the wake of such terrorist crimes.

    “He prays that God Almighty will comfort the bereaved families and also wishes a speedy recovery for the injured.”

    Mrs. May said security services were working to see if a wider group was involved in the attack, which fell less than three weeks before a national election. Campaigning was suspended as a mark of respect.

    She spoke to U.S. President Donald Trump, French President Emmanuel Macron and several other foreign leaders yesterday about the attack, her spokesman said. She also visited the police headquarters and a children’s hospital in Manchester.

    The White House said Trump had agreed with May during their telephone conversation that the attack was “particularly wanton and depraved”.

    Macron and senior French ministers walked to the British embassy in Paris to sign the condolence book.

    Mrs. Merkel said it “will only strengthen our resolve to…work with our British friends against those who plan and carry out such inhumane deeds”.

    The United Nations (U.N.) Security Council condemned “the barbaric and cowardly terrorist attack” and expressed solidarity with Britain in the fight against terrorism.

    Queen Elizabeth held a minute’s silence at a garden party at Buckingham Palace in London.

    Manchester remained on high alert, with additional armed police drafted in. London Mayor Sadiq Khan said more police had been ordered onto the streets of the British capital.

    Police raided a property in the Manchester district of Fallowfield where they carried out a controlled explosion. Witnesses in another area, Whalley Range, said armed police had surrounded a newly built apartment block on a usually quiet tree-lined street.

    Yesterday evening, thousands of people attended a vigil for the dead in central Manchester.

    British police do not routinely carry firearms, but London police said extra armed officers would be deployed at this weekend’s soccer cup final at Wembley and rugby at Twickenham. Security would be reviewed also for smaller events.

    In March, a British-born convert to Islam, ploughed a car into pedestrians on London’s Westminster Bridge, killing four people before stabbing to death a police officer who was on the grounds of parliament. The man was shot dead at the scene.

    In 2015, Pakistani student Abid Naseer was convicted in a U.S. court of conspiring with al Qaeda to blow up the Arndale shopping centre in the centre of Manchester in April 2009.

  • ‘Terrorists do not worship God’

    ‘Terrorists do not worship God’

    U.S. President Donald Trump has said that it was imperative for young Muslim boys and girls to know that terrorists were not worshipping God, but worshipping death. Trump, who made the appeal at the Arab Islamic American Summit in Saudi Arabia, enjoined young Muslims to grow up free from fear, safe from violence, and innocent of hatred. The U.S. President admonished them that rather than allow themselves
    to become terrorists, they should build a new era of prosperity for themselves and their people. According to him, some estimates hold that more than 95 per cent of the victims of terrorism are themselves Muslim.

    “Every time a terrorist murders an innocent person, and falsely invokes the name of God, it should be an insult to every person of
    faith. “Terrorists do not worship God, they worship death. “Therefore, young Muslim boys and girls should be able to grow up
    free from fear, safe from violence, and innocent of hatred,’’ he said.

    The U.S. President said that there was currently a humanitarian and security disaster in the Middle East that was spreading across the planet. Trump, who disclosed that few nations were currently being spared of terrorism, said that America had suffered attacks of Sept. 11, the Boston Bombing and killings in San Bernardino and Orlando.

    He also said that nations of Europe, Africa, South America, India, Russia, China and Australia, had at one time or the
    other, experienced “unspeakable horror’’ from terrorist attacks. Trump described the spate of terrorist attacks across the globe, as “a
    battle between barbaric criminals who seek to obliterate human life,
    and decent people who seek to protect it’’.

    The U.S. President urged Muslim nations to close ranks in putting an
    end to activities of terrorists in their countries.

    “Terrorism has spread across the world. But the path to peace begins right here, on this ancient soil, in this sacred land. “America is prepared to stand with you, in pursuit of shared interests and common security. But the nations of the Middle East cannot wait for American power to crush this enemy for them.

    “The nations of the Middle East will have to decide what kind of future they want for themselves, for their countries, and for their
    children,’’ he added.

  • Trump: Twitter as bully-pulpit

    SIR:  There is no gainsaying the fact that US President – Donald Trump has taken the use of social media to new heights. While previous presidents were known to have gone directly to the media to get their message out, Trump has turned to Twitter as his favourite medium. Throughout his campaign he used twitter to share his opinions with the American public, and it is a practice he has continued since his ascension to power.

    The New York Times actually carried out an analysis of Trump’s tweets from June to October 2016. An astonishing 281 tweets were found in this short period of time to be nothing but insults to people, and even things. During this period, Trump posted an insult about every 42 hours.

    On the other hand, it is unwise to ignore his tweets because that will definitely have consequences. For example, Trump tweeted in January about Toyota motors: “Build plant in U.S, or pay big border tax”. I bet Toyota motors thought it was just “a tweet “. Eventually Toyota’s stock promptly fell, as has the stock of other companies caught in Trump’s twitter crosshair. Because his tweets move markets, businesses are developing strategies on how to handle a Presidential social media attack. Subsequently, there is even an app that lets one know when Trump has tweeted negatively about a publicly traded company.

    Something similar is happening in foreign policy, South Korea has a military officer tasked with the responsibility of monitoring Trump’s tweets and assessing what it means for Asia.

    Trump’s Twitter activity has confounded not just the media and U.S. officials, but also foreign governments. Xinhua, China’s state-run news agency, recently declared, in reference to Trump, that “An obsession with ‘Twitter foreign policy’ is undesirable.

    The idea that Trump’s tweets can be ignored is based on a facile distinction between words and action. But a president’s words are themselves a form of action, because words spoken in high office carry great weight. This is perhaps even more true of an unconventional leader like Trump, whose words set his agenda because he’s not driven by party orthodoxy or a coherent ideology. As Trump’s former campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, told Washington Post, “Donald Trump’s Twitter account is the greatest bully pulpit that has ever existed. In 140 characters, he can change the direction of a Fortune 100 company, he can notify world leaders and he can also notify government agencies that business as usual is over.”

    Like them or not, Trump’s tweets are consequential. You can only ignore them at your own peril. “The medium is the message,” Marshall McLuhan argued a half-century ago. Today, we can take this further by saying the man and medium have merged: Trump’s presidency and his tweets are one.

     

    • Ejidike Chibuzor,

    Dutse Alhaji, Abuja.

  • Trump campaign had at least 18 undisclosed contacts with Russians

    Trump campaign had at least 18 undisclosed contacts with Russians

    Michael Flynn and other advisers to Donald Trump’s campaign were in contact with Russian officials and others with Kremlin ties in at least 18 calls and emails, current and former U.S. officials familiar with the exchanges told Reuters.

    The sources said the 18 calls and emails, took place in the last seven months of the 2016 presidential race.

    The previously undisclosed interactions form part of the record now being reviewed by FBI and congressional investigators probing Russian interference in the U.S. presidential election and contacts between Trump’s campaign and Russia.

    The sources said six of the previously undisclosed contacts described to Reuters were phone calls between Kislyak and Trump advisers, including Flynn, Trump’s first national security adviser, three current and former.

    Conversations between Flynn and Kislyak accelerated after the Nov. 8 vote.

    The two discussed establishing a back channel for communication between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin that could bypass the U.S. national security bureaucracy, which both sides considered hostile to improved relations, four current U.S. officials said.

    In January, the Trump White House initially denied any contacts with Russian officials during the 2016 campaign. The White House and advisers to the campaign have since confirmed four meetings between Kislyak and Trump advisers during that time.

    The people who described the contacts to Reuters said they had seen no evidence of wrongdoing or collusion between the campaign and Russia in the communications reviewed so far.

    The disclosure could increase the pressure on Trump and his aides to provide the FBI and Congress with a full account of interactions with Russian officials and others with links to the Kremlin during and immediately after the 2016 election.

    The White House did not respond to requests for comment.

    Flynn’s lawyer declined to comment.

    In Moscow, a Russian foreign ministry official declined to comment on the contacts and referred Reuters to the Trump administration.

    Separately, a spokesman for the Russian embassy in Washington said: “We do not comment on our daily contacts with the local interlocutors.”

    Sources said the 18 calls and electronic messages took place between April and November 2016 as hackers engaged in what U.S. intelligence concluded in January was part of a Kremlin campaign to discredit the vote and influence the outcome of the election in favour of Trump over his Democratic challenger, former secretary of state Hillary Clinton.

    Those discussions focused on mending U.S.-Russian economic relations strained by sanctions imposed on Moscow, cooperating in fighting Islamic State in Syria and containing a more assertive China, the sources said.

    Sources said members of the Senate and House intelligence committees have gone to the CIA and the National Security Agency to review transcripts and other documents related to contacts between Trump campaign advisers, associates, Russian officials and others with links to Putin.

    The U.S. Justice Department said on Wednesday it had appointed former FBI Director Robert Mueller as special counsel to investigate alleged Russian meddling in the U.S. presidential campaign and possible collusion between Trump’s campaign and Russia.

    Mueller will now take charge of the FBI investigation that began last July.

    Trump and his aides have repeatedly denied any collusion with Russia.

    In addition to the six phone calls involving Kislyak, the communications described to Reuters involved another 12 calls, emails or text messages between Russian officials or people considered to be close to Putin and Trump campaign advisers.

    According to one person with detailed knowledge of the exchange and two others familiar with the issue, one of those contacts was by Viktor Medvedchuk, a Ukrainian oligarch and politician.

    Sources said it was not clear with whom Medvedchuk was in contact within the Trump campaign but the themes included U.S.-Russia cooperation.

    Putin is godfather to Medvedchuk’s daughter.

    Medvedchuk denied having any contact with anyone in the Trump campaign.

    “I am not acquainted with any of Donald Trump’s close associates, therefore no such conversation could have taken place,” he said in an email to Reuters.

    The sources said in the conversations during the campaign, Russian officials emphasised a pragmatic, business-style approach and stressed to Trump associates that they could make deals by focusing on common economic and other interests and leaving contentious issues aside.

    Beyond Medvedchuk and Kislyak, the identities of the other Putin-linked participants in the contacts remain classified and the names of Trump advisers other than Flynn have been “masked” in intelligence reports on the contacts because of legal protections on their privacy as American citizens.

    However, officials can request that they be revealed for intelligence purposes.

    U.S. and allied intelligence and law enforcement agencies routinely monitor communications and movements of Russian officials.

    After Vice President Mike Pence and others had denied in January that Trump campaign representatives had any contact with Russian officials, the White House later confirmed that Kislyak had met twice with then-Senator Jeff Sessions.

    Sessions later became attorney-general.

  • This Trump democracy!

    Over the years the world had looked to the United States as the most redoubtable fortress of human and civil rights, with default insulation of its justice administration against political interference. But today that country’s beacon appears dimmed – tragically so for the free world, and its liberal credentials no longer seem inviolate as reputed. Forget now the official policy of xenophobia and substantial rollback by Washington on global engagement. Under President Donald Trump, the dividing line from despotic pretenders to civil rulership in backwater democracies is getting blurred, and the age-long sanctimony grossly depreciated.

    The US president last week gave the boot to Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director James Comey, who was at the head of a probe of suspected Russian links with the Trump campaign to influence the 2016 presidential election. Mr. Trump said he relied on a review by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein of Comey’s handling of the FBI probe into former Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton’s emails, and a recommendation by Attorney General Jeff Sessions to fire the FBI chief. He said he concurred with the judgment of the Department of Justice (DOJ) that Comey was not able to effectively lead the Bureau – in other words, Comey’s fate was the DOJ’s call – adding: “It is essential we find new leadership…that restores public trust and confidence.” Subsequent reports suggested though that the probe of Comey was at the president’s instance, and not the DOJ’s initiative as purported.

    Even though Mr. Trump stated that he was informed on “three separate occasions” by Comey that the president was not under investigation by the FBI, there is in fact an ongoing probe by the agency into suspected Russian interference to tip the 2016 election in his favour. Comey’s successor as Acting FBI Director, Andrew McCabe, confirmed the Russian inquiry at the weekend, telling a Senate committee in Washington that the firing of Comey had not affected the agency’s work. Despite the circumstances of his emergence in the FBI saddle, McCabe vowed to speak up if there were any political interference in future.

    Besides the Bureau, there are reports that Congress committees are pursuing separate inquiries into the Russia-Trump camp connection. At the last count, the Senate Intelligence Committee had issued a subpoena for documents from Mr. Trump’s former National Security Adviser, Michael Flynn, who was forced to resign in February for allegedly misleading the White House about his contacts with the Russian envoy before Mr. Trump’s inauguration in January. Flynn’s links with Russia are being scrutinised by the FBI and the US House as well as Senate Intelligence Committees, as part of a wider probe of Moscow’s interference in the presidential poll.

    Trump’s red card for Comey last week was poetic justice of some sort. The ex-FBI chief made the headlines in July 2016 with a letter to Congress pulling the curtains over the agency’s probe of Clinton’s use of a private server for classified mails during her time as Secretary of State. He, however, returned in October – mere days before the presidential election – to say more Clinton emails would be further investigated. That intervention is widely seen to have knocked the bottom from under Clinton’s Democratic candidature for the election, and it was hailed at the time by Mr. Trump as the Republican candidate. But early this month in another testimony before Congress, Comey hinted at some regret over the October 2016 disclosure. He said knowing he had an impact on the US election because he spoke about the Clinton probe, and not about Russian ties to the Trump campaign, made him “nauseous.” Unfortunately, he also made some inaccurate statements to Congress that apparently hazarded his official standing.

    Democrats were swift to dub Mr. Trump’s firing of Comey “Nixonian,” referring to the famous ‘Saturday Night Massacre’ in 1973 when former President Richard Nixon dismissed Archibald Cox as special prosecutor of the Watergate scandal. Nixon’s attorney general and deputy attorney general immediately quit their jobs in protest against the sacking of Cox.

    It may not be “Nixonian” yet on this ‘Trump Day,’ but having been once delighted by Comey’s inquiry into the Clinton emails, many found it curious that it was on this same score Mr. Trump pulled the trigger last week on the ex-FBI chief. And so, there is a strong suspicion that Comey was pushed overboard – not for his handling of the Clinton mails probe really, but rather for his riling investigation of the ties between the Trump campaign and Russia.

    What is our business here, you could ask, with all these? It is these: First, if the suspected motive for Comey’s firing has any semblance of truth, such presumptive exercise of presidential powers in the world’s most celebrated democracy should make lawless despots in democracy backwaters, especially in Africa, feel considerably saintly. Then, it is troubling that the reference points offered over the years by the American democracy appear to be thawing. Or, besides the suspected executive interference in justice administration in the Comey case, how do we understand emerging constraints on a vital democracy pillar like liberal press under the current dispensation?

    Trump’s White House birthed the notion of ‘alternative facts’ to counteract independent American media’s unfavourable but factual reportage of his inauguration in January. And following the announcement last week of Comey’s sacking, the president’s communication handlers were reportedly beleaguered by restive journalists for answers to obvious gaps in the official narrative. Those journalists, according to a report last Wednesday by The Washington Post, did not exactly get the answers they sought and had to make do with taciturn ripostes by White House press secretary Sean Spicer.

    But they were much luckier than another American journalist, Dan Heyman of the Public News Service, who was arrested on Tuesday night at the West Virginia Capitol for alleged “willful disruption of government processes” by shouting questions after two unresponsive Trump aides. Reports said Heyman had asked Health Secretary Tom Price and White House adviser Kellyanne Conway about coverage under the Republican healthcare plan, and had wanted to know if domestic violence would be covered as a pre-existing condition. When the presidency officials refused to respond to his questions, Heyman stuck to their entourage through the Capitol building, persistent in loudly asking. He was eventually apprehended by secret service agents and forced off the officials’ back.

    When journalists are now being apprehended and bounced off for persisting with unanswered questions in the world’s citadel of democracy, with what model do we rebuke overzealous Nigerian officials who expel reporters from Aso Rock for filing factual stories with their media organisations that they just happened not to fancy?

  • If elections were held now I would win by a lot more than I did, Trump declares

    President Donald Trump believes he stands a good chance to win by even more votes than he did last November if an election were to be held today.

    “I would win by a lot more than I did on November 8,” Trump boasted during an exclusive interview with NBC News at the White House.

    “And I think we’re doing a great job,” he added.

    Trump’s brash claims contradict recent public polls that show his already low approval ratings are falling even lower.

    “We had a group in the other day with poll numbers that were so good,” Trump said in a clip that aired on the “TODAY” show at the weekend.

    “That were so good, so strong, that if the election were held today, I would win by a lot more than I did on November 8,” Trump said.

    He did not identify the “group” that had those poll numbers.

    When asked if he missed campaigning in front of adoring crowds, the president admitted, “I liked it.”

    But, he added, referring to being president, “I like this even more.”

    “I love the health care,” Trump said of his efforts to replace Obamacare. “I love the process. I love the management of it. I love the governing of it.”

    Trump won the presidency after receiving 304 votes in the Electoral College to 227 for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.

    However, in the popular vote nationally, Clinton received 2.86 million more votes than Republican Trump.

    On Thursday, the new Quinnipiac University Poll found that just 36 percent of the public approves of Trump’s performance as president, with 58 percent disapproving.

    The poll last month found that Trump had a 40 percent approval rating.