Cockamamie Wallace, Panel Freak Over Trump ‘Attacking’ ‘American Hero’ Mueller on D-Day

June 6th, 2019 6:58 PM

No matter the occasion, whether it be a funeral for a former President, hurricane, sitting Senator, or mass shooting, the liberal media will never stop trying to make news events about President Trump. On Thursday’s Deadline: White House, host Nicolle Wallace went ballistic (along with her panel) over the President “attacking” “American hero” and “Vietnam War veteran, Robert S. Mueller” on the 75th anniversary of D-Day.

And to further send fellow Resistance types to spend Thursday night hiding under their beds or doomsday shelters, the MSNBC panel argued that it was another horrid day for “many of us....living through his presidency with clenched stomachs” as he also “smeared Speaker Nancy Pelosi,” “rewr[ote] big pillars of America's history,” and offered takes worthy of the Central and Axis powers in World Wars I and II.

 

 

Wallace first opened the show by fretting that “[w]hat we got from Donald Trump today exceeded admittedly low expectations,” which consisted of “a respectful speech” marking D-Day, but it was still another awful day for those “living...with clenched stomachs.”

And why was that? Well, here’s Wallace’s nonsense (click “expand”):

He honored the heroes of D-Day, but it's never that simple, is it? There’s never a moment when he’s still not the Donald Trump we all know by now. This is why many of us are living through his presidency with clenched stomachs and today — today was no exception because in the hour before he delivered an address meant to honor the heroes of D-Day, he attacked another American hero as well as the highest ranking Democrat in this country. In an interview with Fox News anchor Laura Ingraham, taped with the graves of the heroes of D-Day in the backdrop, Donald Trump called Vietnam War veteran, Robert S. Mueller, whose service to his nation spans decades a fool. He also smeared Speaker Nancy Pelosi. That interview and Trump's remarks commemorating fallen soldiers delivered within an hour of each other. 

After two Trump clips, Wallace again elevated Mueller to sainthood and placed him beside those who fought on D-Day even though he wasn’t even born yet (click “expand”):

So, a reminder at the beginning of that clip he was calling Robert S. Mueller a fool. Robert S. Mueller is a former Marine, he didn't storm the beaches of Normandy but he seems like the type of soldier who might have. For his actions in Vietnam, he received the bronze star as well as a purple heart. He was shot and wounded and air lifted out of the jungle. He once said about his year in combat, “I'm most proud the Marine Corps deemed me worthy of leading other Marines.” And today Donald Trump called him a fool. And then Trump turned his fire on Nancy Pelosi. Here's what she had to say today while she was standing amid the graves of fallen heroes. 

Going to panelist Eddie Glaude, Wallace was apoplectic, declaring that “the attack on Mueller seemed so senseless, so mindless” and “startling” because Mueller “doesn't have a lot of political enemies” who defended America as FBI Director and as a veteran.

Having as much diversity as a Pravda news program, Glaude replied that “Trump lacks the capacity to exhibit solemnity in an number of different occasions” as well as “visceral knowledge of how to behave under such circumstances, because he's a draft dodger.” 

Again, they’re talking about Vietnam when it’s the 75th anniversary of D-Day. If they want to talk about Vietnam, fine. But don’t use one to make claims about the other.

After Wallace hailed Pelosi for being “normal” and having “deprived him of a political battle because she understood where she was,” liberal NBCNews.com reporter Heidi Przybyla agreed that “the contrast here was so sharp” with Trump’s lack “of basic decorum” to condemn Mueller and Pelosi in an interview with the Normandy cemetery in the background.

Turns out, however, that the liberal media spent over 24 hours doing that as well, so it’s beyond hypocritical to chastise the President.

At any rate, here was more from Przybyla (click “expand”):

What's so stark about this was behind him, moments — this was to come moments before what will be most likely the final ceremony for the men who saved us from the Nazis. From the men who probably this will be their last major attendance at a ceremony like this and I saw from our own Hallie Jackson who was tweeting that the timing of this was all the more outrageous just because it was as the ceremony was about to begin. This is where the President's mindset was, but there's just — there's something not there in terms of his capacity to filter and to organize his thoughts in that way...but in this case, split screen and contrast was one of the sharpest that we've seen. 

New York Times reporter Nick Confessore joined in by suggesting that the irony of the venue illustrating how White House believes they’re “under siege” and “even the most solemn moment is a chance and platform to carry the attack against your enemies.”

Check out the full transcript below, but here are other relevant excerpts (click “expand,” emphasis mine):

ROBERT COSTA: And if you listened to the President's speech today, he's making a war against international alliances. So much of this speech was framed with the idea of the nation. Not overt nationalism being underscored by the President. We were looking for that when he was over in England with Nigel Farage and other type, Brexit-type figures. But he's talking about the nation rather than the continent of Europe or international institutions and that's what what was a striking take away from his remarks today. A war against the typical U.S. view of international institutions and the European project. 

WALLACE: Robert Costa, that is an interesting piece of analysis. I've not heard that other can you talk about who surrounds him when those — this was obviously a speech written by somebody else perhaps with or without the President's participation....I mean, that is, Nick Confessore, the most sort of Manchurian analysis I've heard in this presidency that there are people that are taking these impulses and on a blank canvas that is a teleprompter speech for this President, really, rewriting big pillars of America's history.

(....)

WALLACE: And Nick, you and — you and Robert Costa are blowing my mind. Let me — let me try to throw out some examples of what you're talking about, shoving aside the leader of Montenegro, disparaging our allies on — on — in North America — disparaging NATO, turning it into a golf club for which he’s —

CONFESSORE: Encouraging Brexit. 

WALLACE: — encouraging Brexit. 

EUGENE ROBINSON: You know, in the speech he emphasized and seemed to go out of his way to emphasize sovereignty. Sovereignty of the insular, muscular kind that brought us World War I that wasn't fixed and that brought us World War II and then after World War II, they tried to fix it by establishing an international order, by establishing institutions that knit us together by establishing the principle of shared economic prosperity that if — if ruined Europe became rich and prosperous, that would be good for us. That would enhance our safety and that worked really well for 75 years and so now we have a President that doesn't believe in that and who wants to go back to a way of thinking about international relations that led to the — to the carnage and disaster of the 20th century. It just objectively did.

To see the relevant transcript from MSNBC’s Deadline: White House on June 6, click “expand.”

MSNBC’s Deadline: White House
June 6, 2019
4:00 p.m. Eastern

NICOLLE WALLACE: No one expected Ronald Reagan and the boys of Point du Hoc. No one expected Peggy Noonan’s soaring prose written 35 years ago for a very different man at a very different point in American history. What we got from Donald Trump today exceeded admittedly low expectations. He delivered a respectful speech. He honored the heroes of D-Day, but it's never that simple, is it? There’s never a moment when he’s still not the Donald Trump we all know by now. This is why many of us are living through his presidency with clenched stomachs and today — today was no exception because in the hour before he delivered an address meant to honor the heroes of D-Day, he attacked another American hero as well as the highest ranking Democrat in this country. In an interview with Fox News anchor Laura Ingraham, taped with the graves of the heroes of D-Day in the backdrop, Donald Trump called Vietnam War veteran, Robert S. Mueller, whose service to his nation spans decades a fool. He also smeared Speaker Nancy Pelosi. That interview and Trump's remarks commemorating fallen soldiers delivered within an hour of each other. We'll show you both. First his remarks at the memorial. 

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: They were young men with their entire lives before them. They were husbands who said good-bye to their young brides and took their duty as their fate. They were fathers who would never meet their infant sons and daughters, because they had a job to do. And with God as their witness, they were going to get it done. 

WALLACE: Here's that afore mentioned Fox News interview, taped minutes before he took the stage for those remarks we just showed you. 

TRUMP: Let me tell you. He made such a fool out of himself the last time he — what people don't report is the letter he had to do to straighten out his testimony because his testimony was wrong. But Nancy Pelosi, I call her nervous Nancy, Nancy Pelosi doesn't talk about it. Nancy Pelosi is a disaster, okay? She's a disaster. And let her do what she wants, I think they're in big trouble. 

WALLACE: So, a reminder at the beginning of that clip he was calling Robert S. Mueller a fool. Robert S. Mueller is a former Marine, he didn't storm the beaches of Normandy but he seems like the type of soldier who might have. For his actions in Vietnam, he received the bronze star as well as a purple heart. He was shot and wounded and air lifted out of the jungle. He once said about his year in combat, “I'm most proud the Marine Corps deemed me worthy of leading other Marines.” And today Donald Trump called him a fool. And then Trump turned his fire on Nancy Pelosi. Here's what she had to say today while she was standing amid the graves of fallen heroes. 

ANDREA MITCHELL [TO PELOSI]: We are so divided as a country right now. Do you worry about the politics right now, impeachment and everything on the table, and how they can further divide us. 

HOUSE SPEAKER NANCY PELOSI: With all due respect to your question, I'm not here to talk about impeachment. But I do say on the subject of our veterans, we always strive to work in a bipartisan way. So this is nothing — not a departure from what we said as a wherever we can, we try to be as bipartisan, non-partisan as possible. That's a comfort to veterans. 

WALLACE: [INTRODUCES PANELISTS] Robert, let me start with you, this is the daily, hourly, second by second existence of covering Donald Trump even when he manages to elevate himself for a few moments he's always, always, always, always Donald Trump.

ROBERT COSTA: That's exactly right and this is a split screen of a trip so far for President Trump stirring up all of this controversy from when he was in the United Kingdom to now when he is in France and even in Ireland. Yet at the same time, his public remarks when it comes to his scripted speeches are — have the trappings of what a President would usually say at times like this and he can't resist the pull of domestic politics at almost every turn. 

WALLACE: Eddie, the — the attack on Mueller seemed so senseless, so mindless, even for Donald Trump. I mean, Robert Mueller is a lot of things, a fool I've never — you know, Robert Mueller doesn't have a lot of political enemies. He doesn't have a lot of domestic political adversaries. He defended the United States as the director of the FBI for Democratic and Republican presidents, the only person in our country's history to have his term as FBI director extended to serve additional years. Before that, he was a decorated veteran. It was just startling to see anyone sit before graves at — at Normandy and call Robert Mueller a fool. 

EDDIE GLAUDE: Well, I mean, the one thing we do know is that President Trump lacks the capacity to exhibit solemnity in an number of different occasions, right and in a number of ways. The other thing I would say is that he doesn't have a visceral knowledge of how to behave under such circumstances, because he's a draft dodger, right? This is a guy who refused to serve. He didn't refuse to serve out of a principle, because of a principle reason for resisting Vietnam. He had bone spurs. He resisted because he was a coward and so the idea that he could then pass judgment against Robert Mueller, whatever you think about it, makes no sense to me. It is actually — it reveals how he stands in contradiction at every turn, it seems to me. 

WALLACE: And Nancy Pelosi wouldn't give him that duel today. She — she deprived him of a political battle because she understood where she was. She had some sharp comments for him and we'll get into them later on her way out the door, about seeing him in prison, but I think she just has this — and not — she's normal. I mean, like, again, I want to be careful not to praise her. She acted like a normal politician acts, like a normal human acts a day like this. He seemed either oblivious to where he was sitting. Laura Ingram didn't actually seem to goad him into attacking Mueller or Pelosi, he seemed willing to go there. 

HEIDI PRZYBYLA: She respects what every other lawmaker that you and I have ever interacted with in terms of basic decorum, but to Eddie's point the contrast here was so sharp. To be sure, we have seen many other instances of Trump on the international stage not respecting our customs and traditions, most recently just last week with his staff trying to remove the U.S.S. John McCain from a shot. This is regular, it happens all the time. What's so stark about this was behind him, moments — this was to come moments before what will be most likely the final ceremony for the men who saved us from the Nazis. From the men who probably this will be their last major attendance at a ceremony like this and I saw from our own Hallie Jackson who was tweeting that the timing of this was all the more outrageous just because it was as the ceremony was about to begin. This is where the President's mindset was, but there's just — there's something not there in terms of his capacity to filter and to organize his thoughts in that way. For instance, he was overseas when he was having discussions with Theresa May, meeting with the royal family and at 1:00 in the morning, tweeting about Bette Midler, so it is — the — the examples abound but in this case, split screen and contrast was one of the sharpest that we've seen. 

(....)

4:09 p.m. Eastern

NICK CONFESSORE: But, just to step back for one second. You know, he chose to give this interview to Laura Ingram at this moment and the White House chose to put him at that place with that host —

PRZYBYLA: With the gravestones in the background.

CONFESSORE: — that conversation was only going to go one way. To me that's a sign of a white house that sees itself as truly embattled and under siege, when every moment, even the most solemn moment is a chance and platform to carry the attack against your enemies, that’s not actually a great sign of strength and stability going into 2020. It's all warfare all the time. 

WALLACE: It's such an incredible insight, Robert Costa, from Nick Confessore, it's all warfare all the time. Just that language in a moment where he's literally on a battlefield on which Americans and our allies died in a real war. I mean, how much of this perceived war footing has just intoxicated everyone around him so nobody, nobody ran up to him and said, whoa, I just checked the shot, it's stunning but anything you say will be broadcast on televisions around the world, in front of the — the graves of Americans and our allies who died here? 

COSTA: There's an ongoing trade war as the president is overseas. He's fighting with Mexico about the tariffs, the deadline is Monday for that five percent tariffs on all Mexican goods to be put into effect, so he's fighting that war while abroad. And if you listened to the President's speech today, he's making a war against international alliances. So much of this speech was framed with the idea of the nation. Not overt nationalism being underscored by the President. We were looking for that when he was over in England with Nigel Farage and other type, Brexit-type figures. But he's talking about the nation rather than the continent of Europe or international institutions and that's what what was a striking take away from his remarks today. A war against the typical U.S. view of international institutions and the European project. 

WALLACE: Robert Costa, that is an interesting piece of analysis. I've not heard that other can you talk about who surrounds him when those — this was obviously a speech written by somebody else perhaps with or without the president's participation. Who are the architects of that cause what you're describing is almost a rewriting of our own history, who were the architects of that? 

COSTA: We so often hear about Stephen Miller, the president's speech writer, but the chief of speech writing is Vince Haley, a little known aide that once worked for newt Gingrich. And Gingrich is one of those people in the Republican Party who have tried to channel the president's nationalism and instincts and make some kind of doctrine out of it. Of course, the President does not usually articulate anything coherent in terms of nationalism that would make a clear point but his advisers like Vince Haley, Mike Pompeo, the Secretary of State to an extent, are always trying to take those instincts and make policy and a message that has — makes sure the presidency has some kind of take away from it. It's not always easy for them when you talk to people familiar with their work, as you would imagine but that is the — the aim of a lot of their efforts. 

WALLACE: I mean, that is, Nick Confessore, the most sort of Manchurian analysis I've heard in this presidency that there are people that are taking these impulses and on a blank canvas that is a teleprompter speech for this President, really, rewriting big pillars of America's history.

CONFESSORE: I mean, people have tried to build a Trump Doctrine from the day he arrived in the White House. It’s very difficult because he changes his mind a lot, but I do think it’s fascinating to consider the man who gave that speech in tribute to the alliances that led to the end of World War II is probably the world's most powerful source for disassembling those alliances and untangling that world order and taking it apart because he does not believe in it. So, it was a — it was a fascinating moment, perhaps a tragic one, to watch this president give what was basically a requiem for the alliances and the relationships that — the kind of made it possible to win that war and win that day. 

WALLACE: And Nick, you and — you and Robert Costa are blowing my mind. Let me — let me try to throw out some examples of what you're talking about, shoving aside the leader of Montenegro, disparaging our allies on — on — in North America — disparaging NATO, turning it into a golf club for which he’s —

CONFESSORE: Encouraging Brexit. 

WALLACE: — encouraging Brexit. 

EUGENE ROBINSON: You know, in the speech he emphasized and seemed to go out of his way to emphasize sovereignty. Sovereignty of the insular, muscular kind that brought us World War I that wasn't fixed and that brought us World War II and then after World War II, they tried to fix it by establishing an international order, by establishing institutions that knit us together by establishing the principle of shared economic prosperity that if — if ruined Europe became rich and prosperous, that would be good for us. That would enhance our safety and that worked really well for 75 years and so now we have a President that doesn't believe in that and who wants to go back to a way of thinking about international relations that led to the — to the carnage and disaster of the 20th century. It just objectively did.

CONFESSORE: This is a guy — this is a guy whose business career taught him in every deal there's a winner and a loser. There’s a winner and a sucker and he brings that idea to foreign relations with the effects we now see. 

GLAUDE: Let's be clear, this is — shouldn't be a surprise to us. The blueprint was given to us when Preibus — Reince and Steve Bannon sat down and Steve Bannon said there's three buckets,. We’re going to deconstruct the administrative state. We’re going to emphasize economic nationalism. Deconstruct the administrative state involved appointing people who were going to dismantle the agencies that they were over. Incompetence and ignorance throughout the government. Economic nationalism involved what? Tearing up NAFTA, dealing with globalist — globalist, right? In some ways through tariffs and the like. And then last was national sovereignty, rejecting the post-World War II consensus, right? So he doesn't pivot in that speech to the institutions that were built post the war and so what it really reflects is that — it is in some ways an ideological commitment that Bannon gave voice to that he's still consistently governing by. 

PRZYBYLA: Do you remember during the election there was one group that stood above all others in terms of their united opposition to Trump and it didn't matter what party you were in, it was national security experts and it was because they saw exactly this kind of a future, where our alliances would be frayed, perhaps permanently, and I think now if you look into the minds of potentially those leaders of Macron and Angela Merkel standing there, the question at this moment is what happens in the next election if Trump is re-elected. How — how — how much damage has been done that cannot be undone? How much of this is permanent?