Russia said
Trump has issued a public statement disputing the claims in yesterday’s news with his usual dignity and taste, as well as his usual epistemic caution. He chose Twitter as the best venue for this well-reasoned official statement.
Russia just said the unverified report paid for by political opponents is "A COMPLETE AND TOTAL FABRICATION, UTTER NONSENSE." Very unfair!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2017
Russia just said it’s not true, Donnie tells us. Ah well then – case closed. There is no possible way Russia could be lying about it, so we have no choice but to take their word for it and move on.
Russia has never tried to use leverage over me. I HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH RUSSIA – NO DEALS, NO LOANS, NO NOTHING!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2017
Donnie has NOTHING TO DO with Russia, he tells us. In all caps, he tells us. Ah well then – there’s no more to be said. Obviously he would never lie about it. Obviously he has shown himself to be scrupulously honest at all times and on all subjects. Obviously he has no reason to lie about this. Obviously we should believe him and forget all about this naughty story.
I win an election easily, a great "movement" is verified, and crooked opponents try to belittle our victory with FAKE NEWS. A sorry state!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2017
To drop the sarcasm now – “FAKE NEWS” – this terrible man has the gall to talk about fake news. He was a “birther” for years. There’s some FAKE NEWS if you like. He spent years spreading the FAKE NEWS that Obama wasn’t born in the US. He’s a bad malevolent lying piece of shit, and he has no standing to accuse anyone else of “fake news.”
AP quotes a Putin spokesman as saying Russia “does not engage in collecting compromising material.”
Apparently that means not just in this case, but ever. Which hardly makes for a convincing denial…
Why does he keep putting “movement” in quotation marks? What’s he trying to say?
Why does he anything??
Just trying to avoid the pottier words, here?
Don’t forget the masses of “fake news” he spread about Hillary, calling her “crooked” and a “liar”, where he has been infinitely more crooked and lied infinitely more often. He simply does not understand the difference between truth and lies, and cannot grasp that it matters.
Donny is one of those people that thinks quotation marks are for emphasis rather than to call into question the sincerity of the bracketed word or phrase.
I’ve no idea if one can use HTML on Twitter, but even if it’s possible I doubt Trump would use italics for emphasis. I’d say there’s a good chance that he thinks (sic) italics is what Italians speak.
Quotation marks might be his typographic version of the stupid pinch/air quote gesture he uses. And uses. And uses.
RossR said: “He simply does not understand the difference between truth and lies, and cannot grasp that it matters.”
Well, that just shows you haven’t been paying attention. He knows that True is good. Consequently, anything Trump says is true, at the time he says it, revoking and making null and void any previous statement on the same subject, but subject in turn to similar revocation in the future, at his convenience.Thus, Trump Truth is fluid. It’s a matter of determining what is currently true and what is (at the moment) not true. So any given statement he makes is both true and untrue depending on the needs of the moment and the needs of future moments. However, unlike Schrodinger’s Cat, this wave function does not collapse with a single observation but continues to be both true/untrue for an indefinite duration, likely coinciding with Trump’s own remaining lifetime, or that of his last surviving supporter, whichever is longer.
…and the Harlem Five were guilty, and climate change is a Chinese hoax, etc. etc… Trump himself has probably done more than anyone else to create a culture where whoever lies loudest and most wins and the truth counts for nothing. And now he’s complaining about reaping what he himself has sown. Well, boo hoo. For the record, mr. Pussygrabber, there is no lie that anyone could possibly tell about you that’s uglyier than the truth.