Bezos: This shows that we’re fair and impartial
Trump:
Who ever could have predicted this reaction??
To be fair, if those papers had endorsed Harris, Trump’s response would be something along the line about how they are ‘fake news’ and their endorsement proves that Harris is a corrupt liberal with deep state tentacles in the ‘mainstream media’. Which still doesn’t excuse Jeff Bezos and Patrick Soon-Shiong from taking a stand in favor of journalistic integrity instead of inhibiting the papers they own from publishing endorsements. But whatever, these stupid papers are loss-leader vanity projects anyway, amirite?
Stranger
Indeed. If you can’t make a profit off your fascism-supporting position, then you’re doing it wrong.
That is the only reason he did this at all.
The Washington Post is a speck compared to Amazon and Blue Origin. He wants more power and profit from them, and a friendly dictator is a great way to make money. The deal was already made.
That’s my read, too.
As I said in one of these threads, I wish he’d sell the entity losing him money (the WaPo), perhaps to its staff. Or his staff plus a few public-spirited billionaires (Mark Cuban et al).
(But then, I guess, he’d be running the risk that the paper would report accurately on his Trump-courting doings.)
This is just the beginning of what “Titans of industry” will do to curry favor with fascists.
You think Mark Cuban is a “public-spirited billionaire”? I mean, he has recently made a counterplay by criticizing Trump, but go back seven or eight years and see the equivocation of a billionaire who clearly thinks he can manipulate Trump to his own ends. Fuck that guy, too.
Stranger
(Raises hand)
“Dog bites man” isn’t really news.
Is there evidence that they aren’t? It’s one thing to block an editorial, and another, much bigger thing to mess with the newsroom. (Don’t get me wrong–I think it’s a huge deal that he quashed the endorsement.) Some of the most revealing reporting on Bezos quashing the endorsement came from the WaPo newsroom (citing sources not authorized to discuss the matter, which I have to say, made me chuckle).
My prediction if Trump actually wins is that this time, he will get the tanks and troops military parade for his inauguration. It’s a great way to start from his perspective. He was talked out of it or blocked last time. He wants to up his authoritarian street cred – what’s the use of having a global superpower level military if you can’t show it off? It’s not illegal. It begins the process of the military serving Trump himself, and not the office of the president. And if he’s lucky, some of the people who are opposed to it will resign in protest or at least reveal themselves so that he can force them out or isolate them.
It’s about equally scary as the military splitting if he doesn’t win and disputes the election.
He could hire crisis actors and have photos of them in various clothing behind various bars or being driven (as with whips) through the border crossing.
Although all of the staging and security for the actual inaugural swearing in is paid for with public funds, the celebration pageantry (parades, decorations, use of the National Mall and other Park Service property, performances) is paid for with private funds and donated time, and managed by the Presidential Inaugural Committee. Private interests cannot, in general, ‘rent’ or use military equipment or personnel on a cost-reimbursable basis, nor can members of the military participate in obvious political displays in uniform except in otherwise performing normal duties. Trump could, of course, change all of this after he is in office but until then he has no authority to order anyone in military leadership to do anything in preparation for his hypothetical inauguration.
Stranger
If it was good enough for Ike …
President Dwight Eisenhower’s 1953 inaugural parade included 22,000 military service members. The marchers were joined by a cannon capable of firing a nuclear warhead. It was “the most elaborate inaugural pageant every held,” according to the Eisenhower Presidential Library & Museum.
Rumor has it, they were also followed by rows and rows of the finest virtuosos.
Maybe.
I’m amused at how people keep responding to my predictions about what Trump will do if he wins by telling me that it would be illegal or that the usual checks will occur, like the military refusing an illegal order.
I’ll grant that Biden could order the military to make no preparation for participating in the inauguration. But I also think, as I’ve mentioned before, that there are plenty of MAGAs in the military who would be happy to have troops do some “totally unrelated” maneuvers and will just happen to be prepared for an order after Trump is sworn in.
The thing is that Trump has zero authority to order the military to do anything as a private citizen (which, even as a hypothetical President-Elect, he is). The notion that some general would go off all on his own and scrape up the support (and budget) to put on an inaugural parade is unlikely to say the lead, if for no other reason that it would require more money than the limit you could charge to a P-card, and thus would require getting into the DoD procurement process with RFPs, justification for sole source procurement, et cetera. Even some completely pro-Trump senior officer wanted to do this, trying to get around the bureaucracy without ‘presidential priority’ is basically a non-starter.
After a presumptive Day 1 with President Trump (ugh!) all bets are off. He can basically order the entire Pentagon staff to perform handstands and chant his name, and replace anyone who refused to comply. But prior to being inaugurated he has no control, and even officers amenable to him have limited discretion in what they can practically do.
Stranger
Oh yes. There’s plenty of precedent in the history of Nazi Germany for corporate toadying to the dictator (and profiting thereby). There’s some in the history of Putin’s Russia, too. (Good Brennan Center citation.)
Well, if I were typing a description of him from scratch, I’d probably word it differently. But in a world without a relevant Trump—which I’m very much hoping will be the world we’ll be living in, in just a few weeks—having non-Bezos billionaires buy Jeff out of his WaPo ownership, would be a good thing. Even if they are not exactly altruists.
In re the discussion subsequent to your post: maybe not-yet-actually-President Trump would have trouble getting the military to commit those resources to his Inauguration.
But as many have pointed out in dismay over recent years, a lot of police forces have massive numbers of military tanks and other gear. I bet the Inauguration Committee would find plenty of them willing to cooperate with creating a very scary-looking parade of lethal hardware, all for the honor of the Great God-Emperor.
So we may have this to look forward to, after all!!!
I mean, sure, I hope I’m wrong, and better yet, I hope he’s not in a position to be inaugurated in the first place. But anticipatory obedience is real. If (private citizen) Trump says that, one minute after being sworn in, he (President Trump) will order the military to have a parade that includes tanks rolling through the district, are the military brass going to be prepared for that order, or is the first thing they say to Emperor Trump going to be, “yes, I know you told us in advance, but you had no authority to order us to be ready for when you would have the authority to order us to do it.”
The latter. Unless Biden OK’s their mobilization they aren’t moving.
This your first day in America?
Well done, Bezos. This is whaf trying to appease Trump gets you.