Trump Bumper Stickers - So Many Messages to Choose From!

God bless the Internets for things like Little Green Footballs' "Trump Bumper Sticker Generator"!

I spent some quality time with this fine tool, along with a variety of wonderful, absolutely tremendous, honest-to-God Trump quotes*, and came up with an array of options with which to bedeck one's automobile, laptop, fridge, cubicle or home office bulletin board, dorm room door, or what have you.

Regrettably, some of Trump's finest work defies attempts to be boilt down into a slogan.  Efforts will continue to force these more unwieldy expressions of wisdom into 52 characters or less.

Please enjoy - and feel free to share your own masterpieces in the Comments section!

*Note - due to the 52 character space constraint, some quotes have been modified in ways that do not distort their meaning.  For example, names of individuals he was referring to have been included (China) or substituted for pronouns (eg "Ivanka" for "her") or left out if it made the slogan too long (e.g., "Lyin' Ted.")   

But now - onto the bumper sticker mock-ups!  I'd love to see Dick Morris come up with beauts like these ...

Donald Trump: The Man. The Myth. The Fraud.

Donald Trump is not who he says he is.

Trumps are gonna trump / Gage Skidmore, CC BY-SA 2.0

C'mon, GOP voters.  

You can’t possibly be serious about nominating Donald Trump for President.  I know plenty of you are (reasonably) fed up with politicians who say one thing then do another.  But this man is a compulsive liar.  One analysis found that he lies, on average, once every five minutes.  He lies so much, journalists say they can’t even keep up with fact-checking it all.  His positions on major issues shift right along with his ever-changing moods.  Trump is quite possibly the least predictable Presidential candidate we’ve ever seen.  His word is infinitely less reliable than what comes from the many other politicians who’ve disappointed you so much.

“But,” I can hear you saying, “But he’s a successful businessman!  And a tough guy!  And super smart!  He tells it like it is!  He cares about working folks and putting a stop to illegal immigration!  He knows how to hire the best people!  He’ll bring jobs back to America!  And he’s even a Christian!  He’s just what we need in the White House!"

Baloney.

Donald Trump is none of the things he claims to be.

~~~

Trump is not an honest businessman.  He is a hustler and a con artist. Between alleged pyramid scheme Trump Network TM nutritional supplements, real estate education scam Trump University, shilling for nine years for pyramid scheme American Communications Network, and who knows what other as yet undiscovered scam, Trump has swindled (or helped swindle) tens of thousands of honest Americans out of their hard-earned money.  These were folks who were just looking for legitimate ways to make money, and who trusted these fraudulent business opportunities because Trump was involved with them. 

~~~

Trump is not free from special interest influence, nor is he “self-funding” his campaign.  In reality, he owes more than $265 million to a bunch of big banks, and it may be much more.  Trump has donated a mere $250,000 to his campaign, and has lent it more than $17 million.  Lending – rather than donating – the cash allows the campaign to raise money to repay him before Election Day.  His manager said he won’t seek repayment of the loan – but if that were true, wouldn’t he just donate the funds?  Trump and his staff have also told major donors they will start aggressively fundraising once he gets the nomination.

I don't believe I have been given any credit by the voters for self-funding my campaign, the only one. I will keep doing, but not worth it!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 2, 2016

Iowa GOP voters were right – Trump deserves no credit for “self-funding” his campaign

Trump Bags First Journo Trophies: Cokie Roberts & Michelle Fields

Our Overlord-In-Waiting clearly disapproved of Cokie Roberts' impertinent questions / YouTube Screenshot

This discussion between Cokie Roberts and The Donald on MSNBC news-talk program Morning Joe made Donnie plenty mad.  When asked whether he’s concerned that his rhetoric has inspired white kids and youth to engage in hate speech in at least a handful of widely-reported incidents, he ducked the question.  Instead, he angrily dismissed her question as “nasty.”

 

Sometime after this incident, a syndicated op-ed column Cokie and her husband had published about a week earlier, urging the GOP to do what they can to stop Trump – now, “was brought to NPR’s attention.”

So NPR inexplicably did this:

Which caused yours truly to do this: 

WTH, NPR?!? Taking positions on matters of public import is what Commentators DO.  It's THEIR JOB.  It was once my job (albeit at my college newspaper’s lofty wage of $0.75 per column inch.)  Why on Earth should a COMMENTATOR have to justify her commentary?

These BS maneuvers by NPR reek of "#Trump threatened to sue the HELL out of us so we're scrambling to limit liability [even though he has NO EFFING CASE]." Why the hell are they going to such lengths to, well, kinda humiliate Cokie-freaking-Roberts over no apparent wrong-doing on her part?  Don’t they realize that caving only encourages a bully?!?

But then I settled down some and decided to tackle the issue with a calmer, more well-reasoned approach.  So let’s examine the story’s more troubling elements one at a time.

Trump Celebrates Victory with Fake Trump Steaks and a Big Ole Raft O’ Lies

Youtube

Who on Earth buys another company's steaks and tries to pass them off as the product of his own long-defunct enterprise, because his ego is far too fragile to EVER admit that some of his business efforts just don’t pan out?

Donald Trump, that's who.

Donald Trump’s bizarre, rambling victory speech-cum-press conference last night was visually punctuated by large tables on either side of him, overflowing with Trump Wine, Trump Champagne, Trump bottled water, and what he claimed were Trump Steaks.  Except, they weren’t. 

It turns out that Donald Trump's lengthy defense of his business acumen contained a lot of other serious whoppers. But first, let’s look at the steaks.

Trump Steaks

Trump himself addressed the steak company in his “speech”:

“Trump Steaks. Where are the steaks? Do we have the steaks? Alright. We have Trump Steaks. [Romney] said ‘The steak company!’ And we have Trump Steaks. And by the way, if you wanna take one, we’ll charge you about, what, fifty bucks a steak.”

According to Yahoo News and former Trump Steaks purveyor The Sharper Image, the premium meats brand hasn’t existed since 2007.  The meats were also sold through home shopping network QVC that year.  That's NINE years ago.

Avoiding Trump Like the Plague, Netanyahu Cancels US Visit

PM Netanyahu / David Seaton, CC BY-ND 2.0

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was slated to come to Washington, DC to address the annual convention of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, in two weekends. Netanyahu was also to meet with President Obama while here, a meeting that Israel had sought and The White House had scheduled for March 18.   Now the Prime Minister's Office states that the trip has been cancelled. The White House meeting will not occur, and Netanyahu will speak to AIPAC attendees via satellite.

Plenty assume that Netanyahu's scheduling change has something to do with "frosty" relations between Likud-run Israel and the Obama Administration. Some scoff at the reasoning given by Netanyahu's office. I don't.

I'm reading the scheduling change as Netanyahu avoiding being in the same country as his "good friend" Donald Trump right now.  If true, that would make today an even bigger day for Trump and satellites.

Glenn Beck: Trump Goon Threatened My Friend's Life To Get Dirt On Me

Does this look like a man with a threatening goon squad? / Gage Skidmore, CC BY-SA 2.0

Some of y’all may have missed it, but Glenn Beck has been hammering Trump as a fake Republican and urging conservatives to vote elsewhere for MONTHS.  

I don’t want to surprise anyone, but according to Beck, Trump doesn’t seem to be taking his criticism so well.  But now Beck is alleging some next level stuff.

Here's Glenn Beck, yesterday, intimating that someone affiliated with Donald Trump threatened a Beck pal a few weeks ago, leaving the man in fear for his life if he doesn't provide them with some dirt on Glenn. 

The story starts at around 3:12 in the video below.

SMDH at Trump's Hands, Little Marco, and #Boogergate

Trump at CPAC 2011 / Gage Skidmore, CC BY-2.0

Dear Lord, I really can’t believe I’m writing any of this.

There were some interesting developments in terms of style and substance at last night’s GOP debate. But there were also three moments best dealt with on their own.  Two were some absurdities of a candidate’s own making (guess who?); the other, a case of the Interwebs going crazy with silliness.

First, there was this: Who needs a massive audience to reassure him that his hands aren't small at the start of a Presidential debate?! Donald Trump, that's who. 

In addressing his first question during the live debate, Donald Trump starts flashing around his hands, asking, “Do these look like small hands?”  He then assures us, the viewing audience, that “there’s no problem” with the size of “that other body part” – you know, the one said to correlate with a guy's hand and foot size.

Notice that, at first, the crowd is laughing and cheering, and then dissolves into choruses of boos as the shock wears off among the folks who aren’t die hard DT fans.

Donald Trump Shakes His Groove Thing on SNL

In case you missed (or forgot) it, take a moment to enjoy Donald Trump getting jiggy with it on Saturday Night Live about a decade ago.

The Trump House of Wings "ad" features Trump dancing in that middle-aged guy, biting his lower-lip and wiggling his hips kinda way.  Best comparison: Michael Douglas in that club scene in Basic Instinct.

Just picture these moves at a State Dinner ... =/

Frank Rich Is Right About Trump Candidacy's Upside

... and his critique of Hillary 2016's ham-handedness is spot on, too.

Donald Trump / Photo by Gage Skidmore, CC BY-SA 2.0

I don't always read Frank Rich, but when I do, I read this article from New York Magazine: "Donald Trump Is Saving Our Democracy"  

Top two favorite EXCERPTS (emphases mine):

[Trump's] impact on our politics post-2016 could be as serious as he is not. Unsurprisingly, the shrewdest description of the Trump show’s appeal has come from an actor, Owen Wilson. “You can’t help but get a kick out of him,” he told the Daily Beast, “and I think part of it is we’re so used to politicians on both sides sounding like actors at press junkets — it’s sort of by rote, and they say all the right things. So here’s somebody who’s not following that script. It’s like when Charlie Sheen was doing that stuff.” As Wilson says, for all the efforts to dismiss Trump as an entertainer, in truth it’s his opponents who are more likely to be playacting, reciting their politically correct and cautious lines by rote. The political market for improvisational candor is as large as it was after Vietnam and Watergate, and right now Trump pretty much has a monopoly on it. ...

A perfect paradigm of how lame old-school, top-heavy campaigns can be was crystallized by a single story on the front page of the Times the day after Labor Day. Its headline said it all: “Clinton Aides Set New Focus for Campaign — A More Personal Tone of Humor and Heart.” By announcing this “new focus” to the Times, which included “new efforts to bring spontaneity” to a candidacy that “sometimes seems wooden,” these strategists were at once boasting of their own (supposed) political smarts and denigrating their candidate, who implicitly was presented as incapable of being human without their direction and scripts. Hilariously enough, the article straight-facedly cited as expert opinion the former Romney strategist Eric Fehrnstrom — whose stewardship of the most wooden candidate in modern memory has apparently vanished into a memory hole — to hammer home the moral that “what matters is you appear genuine.”

America Is Too Great For Donald Trump's Hate-Mongering

This is not who we are as Americans.

Trump's just warming up to full-fledged rage. Photo: Gage Skidmore, CC BY-SA 2.0

     
Israeli columnist Chemi Shalev recently drew an interesting parallel between Donald Trump's current anti-Latino/Hispanic propaganda and European anti-Semitic propaganda of a century ago.  

I disagree with his column’s larger thesis.  But this example of old European anti-Semitic propaganda he included got me thinking about the fear-mongering propaganda we hear increasingly here in the U.S.:

Trump’s Fortune is Built on Undocumented Immigrant Labor (Exhibits 1 & 2) - So Why's He Suddenly So Mad About Them?

Americans deserve a more intellectually honest discussion about our immigration policies.  But Trump isn't the guy we want leading it.

200 undocumented Polish immigrants helped demo the building Trump replaced with Trump Tower / Photo: Brad CC BY 2.0

Donald Trump made most of his fortune in industries that employ substantial numbers of undocumented workers: real estate development, commercial real estate management, golf courses, and hotels/resorts.  So it seems likely that he’s made millions of dollars with the help of cheap labor from unauthorized immigrants. 

So far, a few stories have surfaced involving cases of Trump knowingly, if indirectly, employing unauthorized workers.  His employment of 200 undocumented Polish workers years ago.  His contemporary use of a number of unauthorized workers to build his new DC hotel.  More such stories seem certain to come.

Bounty Offered for Evidence That Trump's Employed Undocumented Labor

It may not be much of a bounty.  But I'm not Lars Larson or Mitt Romney - I don't have $10,000 to put on the line, particularly when I strongly suspect that the proof is out there, in myriad locations. 

So here it is:

I'll give a big kiss on the cheek to the first person who comes up with *credible* documentary or testimonial evidence that undocumented labor has been substantially involved with building or maintaining any US "Trump" property (whether his project, or a project he merely licensed the use of his name to.) 

Given the frequency with which we see crews of folks with limited to no English proficiency on construction sites, on landscaping crews, in restaurant kitchens, and on hotel housekeeping staffs, the odds that Trump has been personally enriched through the use of low-cost undocumented labor seems very, very good.  And given the frequency with which this has occurred in the past 15 or so years, it seems that someone who has Mr. Trump's passionate concern about illegal immigration would have ensured that his management and subcontractors ran each and every person employed through E-Verify for at least, what, the past decade?

It doesn't need to be proven that he personally, knowingly hired undocumented work crews.  It merely needs to be shown that he knew - or reasonably should have known - that his projects (or projects he rented his name to) were employing significant numbers of undocumented workers. 

Dems Need to Resolve Angst About Hillary, Stat!

Secretary of State Clinton / Photo: U.S. Embassy in London, CC BY-ND 2.0

I still have angst about the State Department email situation that is holding me back from enthusiastically supporting Hillary Clinton.  The arguments for the defense coming from Dems sound more like typical spin than thoroughly researched, credible arguments.  But so do the arguments being made by the GOP folks.  I'm feeling like I need to dig in, sort through the best info available, and sort out my feelings on this one right away.

UPDATE: Turns out I'm not the only Dem with such angst.  From today's New York Times: Hillary Clinton's Handling of Email Issue Frustrates Democratic Leaders

Donald Trump seems to be gaining on Hillary in head-to-head match-up polls.  She's still ahead, but he's moved a LOT in the last month or so.  All of the polls in June and July had her ahead by 12 to 24 points.  The results gauged in August have her ahead of Trump by just 4 to 6 points.

Trump: Best Wishes, Losers!

This was the best laugh of the day.  Or maybe of two months ago.  But who's counting?  Does a collection of The Donald's best Twitter beefs ever *really* become outdated?  

That Trump has such a graceful, almost poetic way with language ...

So glad Chris Moody of CNN found this and shared it as part of his terrific, ultra-classy, TREMENDOUS collection of some of the Donald's best ever Mean Tweets.  I have a feeling this'll be just one in a continuing series until Trump implodes (or worse ... SHUDDER.)

I Feel Glenn Beck's Pain (No, Really!)

Glenn Beck / Photo: Gage Skidmore, CC BY-SA 2.0

It's a weird day for me.  I just found myself agreeing with - and then relating to - Glenn Beck, of all people.  And just one day after I join other Portlandians in celebrating Beck's declaration that we live in The WORST City in America.  The very next morning, he goes and says something reasonable.

Screenshot / Selina Davis

 

 

 

Beck wrote a lengthy post on Facebook in the wee hours asking other conservative pundits about their support for Donald Trump.  Beck specifically calls out Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, and Michael Savage by name and asks why they support Trump when he doesn't seem to share the vast majority of their conservative principles, and when Trump's guiding principles seem to be whimsical and unpredictable, at best.  

Good for Glenn Beck.  He's probably voicing what a lot of other conservatives have been thinking, but have been too afraid to say.  

Upon searching the Internet to see if Trump had fired back yet, I learned that Beck's been gunning hard for Trump pretty consistently for months.  [I missed it - me fail.]  

But what I didn't see?  Trump mean tweeting Glenn Beck, or calling him a loser, or speculating where Beck may be bleeding from at the time.  It is hard to keep track of all of The Donald's Twitter beefs, so if I missed something, please share it in the comments!

But back to the FB post ...  In the final paragraphs, things got weirder.  I found myself feeling Glenn Beck's pain: