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It's the afternoon of a day ending with "y", so you know that Donald Trump has already offended someone.
Look no further than Trump's interview in Fox News with Chris Wallace. A clip of this interview became viral earlier Sunday when Wallace asked the president to respond to comments from Bill McRaven, the former Navy SEAL who oversaw the operation, which ended on the death of Osama bin Laden.
McRaven had previously criticized Trump's frequent attacks on the media – particularly his portrayal of the press as "the enemy of the people" – as "the greatest threat to democracy" that he witnessed. The former SEAL again spoke in August after the seemingly punitive revocation of the security clearance of former CIA director John Brennan by Trump.
Before Wallace could even ask his question about McRaven – he was content to detail the service records of the man – Trump interrupted: "A fan of Hillary Clinton".
Wallace tried to continue, but Trump interrupted him again, his voice upset: "Excuse me, fan of Hillary Clinton."
Wallace continued and finished his question. Trump responded, first by describing McRaven as a "funder" of Clinton and Barack Obama, then hinting that McRaven is incompetent, stating "would not it have been nice if we had Osama bin Laden much earlier than that? "
(It went even further than that, and it was after that he boasted of everything he had supposedly done for the army.)
Trump on Navy's retired admiral, Bill McRaven, who described the president's attacks on the press as "the biggest threat to democracy".
"It's a supporter of Hillary Clinton and an Obama supporter." And frankly, would not it have been good if we had Osama bin Laden much earlier than that? " pic.twitter.com/tXsZHjJzaA
– Axios (@axios) November 18, 2018
Trump effectively downplayed and summarily dismissed the service of an American hero in the country because he could not accept a bit of criticism. He apparently also invented McRaven's political tendencies. The misguided comments caused an uproar, as you can imagine.
Bill McRaven was NOT a "support" for Clinton. He has never supported it, nor anyone to be president. He was also on the short list that Chris Christie (then Transition Planning Officer) gathered among the people who should be sought after for leading Natsec positions in a Trump administration. https://t.co/eFiw91oZTJ
– Karen Tumulty (@ktumulty) November 18, 2018
This morning's talk was a perfect distillation of Trump. In a few minutes, he says that no one has been "more with the army" than him, and then disparages Admiral McRaven as a pirate who did not catch Bin Laden fast enough.
– Sam Stein (@samstein) November 18, 2018
Trump, a coward dodging, does not like or respect our military. He uses them as political props.
Trump's petulant response lacks respect in the service of Adm.McRaven and countless other special operations heroes who serve honorably every day, despite politics.
Totally despicable https://t.co/fG6dpnq75i
– Tara Setmayer (@TaraSetmayer) November 18, 2018
A correction must be made to POTUS's comment that McRaven should have found Bin Laden earlier. The CIA made the "discovery". McRaven's special operators made the "recovery". They moved a few days after President Obama gave the order. https://t.co/7e79sDpENH
– Michael Morell (@MichaelJMorell) November 18, 2018
You had the idea.
A few hours later, as the noise surrounding Trump's comments to Wallace turned into a thunderous roar, the beleaguered president went to Twitter and dropped that mass of tweet. (Word game definitely intended.)
It's so amusing to see little Adam Schitt (D-CA) talk about the fact that Acting Attorney General, Matt Whitaker, has not been approved by the Senate, without mentioning the fact that Bob Mueller (who is very conflictual) has not been approved by the Senate!
– Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 18, 2018
He talks about Adam Schiff, US Representative for California, who is currently a member of the United States House Intelligence Standing Committee Standing Committee on Intelligence. As a top Democrat in the House of Representatives to investigate Russia's participation in the 2016 elections, Schiff was a wreck for Trump and a near-frequent target of president's rage.
And yes, he calls himself Schiff. Two F Not what Trump wrote.
Now, this could be a typo. The letters T and F are quite close to each other on the standard QWERTY keyboard used by most smartphones. Trump feasted on so many tweets every day that he could easily have typed in the wrong letters.
Or maybe it's an automatic correction problem. Is the President a secret fan of the Canadian comedy series, Schitt's Creek? He may have sent a text message long enough for "Schitt" to appear as a suggestion for automatic correction.
Of course, given Trump's representative, both as president and as human being, the most likely explanation is that he committed an intentional misprint in the name of juvenile humor. Who, hey, nothing against juvenile humor. But it may not be the right tone to use publicly when you are US President, especially when you use it in the context of a comment that some might interpret as an obstruction of justice.
Of course, this kind of ridiculous behavior of an adult adult would have get people talking about something other than the sadly serious Trump service of a largely apolitical military veteran.
But what do I know? Maybe it was a typo, or an unwanted automatic correction. While Mashable's Matt Binder was making fun of Slack when we were talking about this whole episode, "hard to say with our highly intelligent 150-dimensional chess board game".
Effectively.
Yet social media did their thing and assumed that Trump was acting with the worst of intentions. In fairness to social media, there is plenty of evidence to suggest that this assumption is safe. Get ready for Trump burns and word games. Even Schiff is joining him to try his luck.
BREAKING: Trump has just called Adam Schiff, Congressman, "Little Adam Schitt". It's so disgusting. A toddler for a president. Ridiculous. Absolutely crazy. He must resign yesterday. What a pathetic shame for our country. America deserves better than that bloody job man baby.
– Scott Dworkin (@funder) November 18, 2018
The Dems have the house. Schiff will replace Nunes on the Intelligence Committee. The Schitt will hit the Trump fan in the new year.
– Wajahat Ali (@WajahatAli) November 18, 2018
Politics in 2018 is a hell of a ride.
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