Commentary
Now They're Just (Hiccup) Trolling Us
- by Joe Mandese @mp_joemandese, February 17, 2025
In less than a month we've gone from the Musk/Trump administration simply saying the quiet part out loud, to unabashedly rubbing it in our faces.
As if claims on other nation's sovereignty -- Greenland, Canada, Panama, Gaza, and most likely Ukraine -- weren't enough, Musk/Trump have gone full dictatorship mode -- at least in their social media feeds.
First Trump posts a Napoleonic assertion that he's above the law.
And then Musk tweets that the team at CBS' "60 Minutes" deserves "a long prison sentence" for televising a report on DOGE's dismantling of USAID.
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It's not enough that they are unconstitutionally seizing power, working fast to dismantle much of our government -- not to mention others -- but the brazen public pronouncements is intended to reinforce their rapid grip, and demonstrate that they are not just above the law, but above what most Americans would consider reasonable norms.
I'm still convinced that the real damage isn't what they are doing transparently in public, but the ransacking they are doing under the hood, in private conversations with bad actors -- both foreign and domestic -- but my point is that if they can act with impunity while trolling us, lord knows what else they're up to.
Take Pete Hegseth's shot across the bow -- or was it over the lips and past the gums -- during his NATO press conference Thursday. It circulated on social media, but got nary any pickup in mainstream press.
It could be, as some social media commenters posed, that the amber liquid Hegseth was drinking was apple juice, but as someone who has thrown one or two back in my time, it sure looked as if he was sipping a more potent potable less than a month after vowing he would never drink on the job during his Senate confirmation hearings.
Maybe it's just me, but you can watch the clip above and judge for yourself.
My point is that if the new administration is willing to be so cavalier about such things in public, what are they doing behind-the-scenes.
Something to think about on this Presidents Day, which by next year may very well be renamed Co-Presidents Day, if not something even less American.
Joe Mandese is the Editor in Chief of MediaPost. You can reach Joe at joe@mediapost.com.
TDS is alive and well. Thanks for reminding us of that.
Hegseth took a sip of water during a press conference and that's against the norm somehow? This is somehow breaking a norm that has you triggered?
60 Minutes gets caught again fabricating another story (Kristina Drye did not work for USAID - she was a speechwriter who was a contractor hired by USAID. She wasn't handing out blankets and medicine to babies in poor countries.
There are real things to get upset about - no need to make stuff up.
You sound like you are mad at the people who show you how the sausage is made instead of being upset about how bad the sausage is...judging by recent poll numbers, the American public has decided it doesn't want anymore sausage now that they know how it is made.
@Dan Ciccone: You can assert whatever you want, but that doesn't make it fact. Which is why I posted the video -- not from social media, but from CSPAN's coverage -- so readers/viewers could judge for themselves what Hegseth was sipping. To my eye, it was a couple of fingers of amber liquid in a small glass, not a glass full of water, or a bottle of water.
Barring additional facts, the rest is in the eye of the beholder.
You can see it here:
https://www.c-span.org/video/?c5153836/user-clip-pause-refreshes
As for the rest of your comment, its just conflation.
But you're entitled to your opinion.
@Mandese - you have seriously jumped the shark or you've read Trump's book The Art of the Troll and are implementing what you read to get more clicks.
The "amber" color is shadow/reflection - how does the liquid start as clear and turn amber as he raises it to his mouth? I read that if you zoom in by 47x, you can see Elon over his left shoulder giving a Nazi salute. Did you notice that too?
You always dodge facts. The people 60 Minutes interviewies were contractors - these are facts - not conflation (and look up the definition by the way as you don't seem to actually understand what the word means).
Your column, your opinion. I get it. But you have a habit of amplifying the nonsense and "misinformation" you proclaim to detest and conveniently avoid facts when they are presented to you.
And clearly, you need new glasses.
Do better.
@Dan Ciccone: I've asked you in the past to refrain from personal attacks on other people, because that -- and hate speech, spam and inanity -- are the few rules we have for comments on MediaPost.
And I don't mind that you direct your invectives @Mandese, but I'd prefer if you could do so civily. You can disagree -- ideally citing actual, fact-based retorts -- or even just your feelings or personal opinions, but please don't be toxic about it. There are plenty of other places you can go to do that.