Quiet, Piggy

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

I received an email from my favorite cousin a couple of days ago recommending a particular podcast which she had just come across on YouTube.  The host was Joanna Coles, a journalist with The Daily Beast, and her guest was Mary Trump, a clinical psychologist who also happens to be Donald Trump's niece.  As you might suspect, the thrust of the show centered on Mary's professional insights into the actions and behaviors of her uncle - along with other insights into the Trump family historically and in general.  The interview, which lasts about thirty minutes, is mesmerizing.  I located it by googling "Joanna Coles, Mary Trump, podcast."  It is highly recommeded by this tired old typist.

One of my takeaways from watching that interview was the psychologist's recounting of her uncle's lifelong disdain for women.  Over the past week Donald Trump, who has a long history of behaving arrogantly and badly toward the press, exhibited two classic outbursts toward female reporters, one of which was so strongly rooted in misogyny that it should disqualify him from serving in any public office - much less the presidency!

Last Friday evening while flying to Florida for his weekly golf outing at public expense, Trump spoke to reporters during a mid-flight press gaggle.    Catherine Lucey, the White House Correspondent from Bloomberg News, asked a question regarding the release of the Epstein files which Trump responded to in his aimlessly wandering style.  When Lucey attempted a follow-up question she got as far as "If there's nothing incriminating in the files, sir, why not . . . " and at that point Trump interrupted her with "Quiet!  Quiet, piggy."

Most of the White House press pool declined to even mention the derogatory and misogynistic remark in their press coverage for fear that it would lead to the vindictive Trump barring them and their employers from future access to the elderly politician, a tactic Trump has not been shy about using in the past.  Consequently it took the incident several days to gain legs and make its way onto the national stage.  California democratic Governor Gavin Newsom turned the tables on the corpulent Trump and began posting memes that directed the remark back onto Trump - where it seemed to be a far more natural fit.

Yesterday, Trump took a viscous turn at ABC White house Correspondent Mary Bruce during a press briefing that he held in the recently gilded Oval Office along with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.  Ms. Bruce managed to get off a couple of quick questions.  The reporter's first question was to Trump.  She asked "Is it appropriate, Mr. President, for your family to be doing business in Saudi Arabia while you're President?  Is that a conflict of interest?"

Then the determined reporter pivoted to the Crown Prince.  "And you, your Royal Highness, the US Intelligence concluded that you orchestrated the brutal murder of a US journalist.   9/11 families are furious that you are here in the Oval Office.  Why should Americans trust you?  And the same to you, Mr. President?"

Right on cue, Trump exploded.  He began by calling ABC "fake news" and "one of the worst in the business."  Then he turned his attention to the murder of the American journalist who was assassinated at the Saudi Arabian embassy in Istanbul, Turkey, in October of 2018 and dismembered with a bone saw.  The US CIA, during Trump's first administration, determined that the murder had likely been committed at the direction of the Crown Prince.

In referencing the  American journalist who was murdered and butchered by ther Saudis, Trump said, "A lot of people didn't like the gentleman you're talking about, whether you like him or didn't like him.  Things happen, but he (the Crown Prince) knew nothing about it.  And we can leave it at that."

No pieces of the journalist were even returned to his family for burial.

Is not being liked by people grounds for murder?

Things happen?  (So it's no big deal?)

A few minutes later, the same reporter, Mary Bruce of ABC, managed to get in a quick question about the Epstein files:  "Mr. President, why wait for Congress to release the Epstein files?  Why not just do it now?

Trump, never the diplomat, responded to that by threatening to pull ABC's broadcast license.  In his diatribe he told Mary Bruce that she was "a terrible person and a terrible reporter."

And oink, and oink, and oink.

Quiet, piggy!