Editor’s Note: As The Donald Turns is an ongoing series, written by Tony Siracusa. It started during the 2016 presidential campaign as a satirical diatribe, with its title coming from the old television soap opera. It has since turned into a regular accounting, still somewhat satirical in nature, of the activities in and out of the Oval Office of one Donald J. Trump.

We are back with As The Donald Turns—today’s episode: Dishonest Media. They are everywhere. As someone who got a journalism degree, I will confess that my minor was “dishonesty.” Okay, it was actually Poli Sci, but if there was an option for “Dishonest Media,” I would have taken it.

As the Donald Turns: Dishonest Media

• Donald has had a busy media week. He went to Central Command in Florida on Monday to meet with military high brass about abut the unfortunate military attack in Yemen. When he later addressed the troops, he started by congratulating himself for winning the election. “We had a wonderful election, didn’t we?” I saw those numbers, and you like me, and I like you. That’s the way it works.” How long is he going to praise himself for winning 42% of the vote????

• Donald went on to talk about the “War on Terror.” A momentary sidebar—when I become POTUS #46, I am going to ban that phrase. Wars have a beginning and an end. The first act of terror was about 2,000 years ago. How we doing on eradicating it from the planet? Doesn’t mean we don’t try, but bumper sticker phrases don’t do the trick.

Ok, back to the here and now—Donald called the media dishonest (gee, that’s original), and said they under report terrorist attacks on purpose. “It’s gotten to a point where it’s not even being reported. And in many cases the very, very dishonest press doesn’t want to report it. They have their reasons and you understand that.” No, Donald, I don’t. What in the name of all that is holy are you talking about? What motivation does the media have to under report breaking world news? When asked to clarify what Donald was rambling on about, Sparkle Pony Spicer provided a list of 78 terrorist attacks that Donald deems to have been under reported. Here are some highlights:

o Each event has the city, country, date, target of the attack and alleged attacker.

o The word “attacker” is spelled incorrectly throughout the document, (thank goodness we have new Secretary of Education who does not believe in her own department’s existence).

o Whenever the attacker has a foreign sounding name, the name is used. When it is an American as the perpetrator, the document simply lists them as “US Person.” Yeah, no blatant racism there.

Among the terrorist attacks listed by the White House as under reported, (mind you Trump said under reported):

• October, 2014; New York City; Two NYPD officers wounded with a knife by a US Person. Seriously? No one deemed that to be terrorism.

• April 2015; Paris; One civilian killed in a carjacking….but the attacker had a Arab name so it was terrorism, instead of just a carjacking.

• June 2015, Boston, MA; One police officer lunged at with a knife. No casualties; US Person….but we’re supposed to consider that terrorist attack?

• Numerous more instances where even the local, state, federal or national government did not consider it a terrorist attack.

• The terror attacks in San Bernardino, Orlando, Paris, Nice, Berlin, and Brussels were all in there, (with San Bernardino spelled wrong). Is he serious? Every major news network went live from the scene for a week! What was under covered?

See it is when Donald and President Steve Bannon and the Power Rangers respond like this that they have ZERO credibility, and then they blame the press. Here is one for the Donald-istas—you know what terrorist attack was not on their wish list for more coverage? The Mosque shooting in Quebec, Canada last month. Why? Because it was done by an anti-immigrant, nationalist, Trump supporting white guy against Muslims. This white House and these people do not believe it was real terrorism. That would be “fake news.”

• Hey, speaking of “fake news,” (what a brilliant segue…who writes this stuff?), Donald says any poll that shows him doing poorly is fake news.

‏@realDonaldTrump Feb 6

“Any negative polls are fake news, just like the CNN, ABC, NBC polls in the election. Sorry, people want border security and extreme vetting.”

So bad news is fake but propagandist material saluting the “beloved one,” is ok. Check.

• Speaking of more fake news, (I’m on a roll here), the administration, which has more leaks than the Titanic, has let it get out that Donald is still in regular contact with Alex Jones. I have resisted giving too much publicity to this sub-human troll, but the fact that the POTUS talks to this guy regularly should bother everyone whom you know, has a pulse. Among the claims from this nut job:

o The shooting at Newtown did not happen. It was staged so that the government could come for your guns and no children died.

o 9/11 was a Bush Administration inside job.

o The New World Order, (the UN), intends to exterminate at least half of the world population and put most of the rest into concentration camps.

o The Boston Marathon bombing was staged by global intelligence agencies. Hey, wait a minute. That is on Donald’s list of under covered events.

o The government is controlling weather through a “weather weapon,” spraying chemicals into the air for “genocide and population reduction.”

o Beyoncé is a CIA operative who’s been deployed to cause mayhem in cities.

Ready for the best part? Jones’ site, InfoWars has now been given White House press credentials….yeah, but you know Donald is worried about fake news.

• Of course, Donald did the Super Bowl Sunday interview with that great purveyor of fact and reason, Bill O’Reilly. All of Bill’s books having “killing” in the title, so I would be worried. Donald, as everyone has seen by now, had no problem with Vladimir Putin killing his own citizens, because the US has done bad things also. Donald’s comments drew more criticism about his favoritism shown towards a totalitarian ruler and cause Donald to tweet:

‏@realDonaldTrump 13h13 hours ago

“I don’t know Putin, have no deals in Russia, and the haters are going crazy – yet Obama can make a deal with Iran, #1 in terror, no problem!”

Of course the problem is Donald always liked to speak in front of microphones and brag so there is this; May 2014: Speaking at the National Press Club, “I was in Russia, I was in Moscow recently and I spoke, indirectly and directly, with President Putin, who could not have been nicer, and we had a tremendous success.”

Donald was just giving fake news, either Sunday or in 2014.

• Lastly Donald has gone after my home state….yes, Donald thinks CA has gone off the rails. Some in the state and many outside the state agree. Of course, those outside the state have little real knowledge of how life is in The Golden State. I won’t debate that here.

What I will say is this: Donald threatened to cut off federal payments to CA if they maintain sanctuary cities for undocumented immigrants. Good luck with that Donald. The citizens of this fine state put more into the federal coffers than they receive. Last year, CA got $368 billion in federal funds, mostly for healthcare programs for the poor. Last year that state paid TO the federal funds $450 billion, money that was used to help fund projects in every state, as all states do when they pitch in.

Hey, Donald, since you owe us about $80 billion, cut off our funding and we will cut off yours. Get Sparkle Pony to explain that math to you.

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