’This is serious. It’s going to be really bad.'

September 15, 2022 5:09 AM

'The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017-2021' Peter Baker and Susan Glasser's book (review, review) doesn't drop until Tuesday. But a lot of media outlets have advance copies.

NYT, in which Ronald Lauder tries to convince Trump to buy Greenland. WaPo, where he tells Jordan's King Abdullah II he's going to give him the West Bank. CNN, where Melania says he's blowing the covid response. The Guardian, where he won't pick Pence in 2024. And Axios, wherein John Kelly says "If you don't support John McCain's funeral, when you die, the public will come to your grave and piss on it."

posted by box (61 comments total)

FiNaLLy, tHe TrUMp TelL-aLL tHaT WiLL sHoW EvErYONe tHaT hE wAs A bAD, iNcoMpeTeNt PrEsIdEnT. WE GoT hIM!!!!1!
posted by Philipschall at 5:25 AM on September 15, 2022 [81 favorites]

To be fair, a lot of us are going to kiss in his grave regardless.
posted by MrGuilt at 5:29 AM on September 15, 2022 [4 favorites]

I'm making a time machine to bring all of these wonderfully brave people back to 2016, or 2017, or 2018, but I keep having to start over to make it bigger.
posted by Dashy at 5:44 AM on September 15, 2022 [45 favorites]

To be fair, a lot of us are going to kiss in his grave regardless.

Either the worst typo evar, or the worst idea evar.
posted by chavenet at 5:47 AM on September 15, 2022 [75 favorites]

What if we kissed in the Trump mausoleum
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 5:59 AM on September 15, 2022 [36 favorites]

MrGuilt: To be fair, a lot of us are going to kiss in his grave regardless.

Better bring some mints: that headstone is going to taste like urine if you kiss it, Blarney Stone-style.
posted by wenestvedt at 6:13 AM on September 15, 2022 [14 favorites]

Nothing is more important than New York Times reporters making their money by withholding stuff that could have been reported at the time.
posted by Gadarene at 6:18 AM on September 15, 2022 [78 favorites]

Piss on his grave? Sure, that's number one. But let's not rule out Number Two.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 6:24 AM on September 15, 2022 [75 favorites]

Piss on his grave?

Don't sink to their level of crude acrimony, take the high road and dance on his grave.
posted by StickyCarpet at 6:27 AM on September 15, 2022 [7 favorites]

The Guardian, where he won't pick Pence in 2024.

Well, yeah. I think even in the do-the-stupidest-thing world of current GOP politics, you wouldn’t want to be the bottom half of a ticket with someone who incited an angry mob to murder you. And from 45’s point of view this pairing is sort of Caesar/Brutus 2024.

Citing an unnamed person who worked with Pence, the authors write: “The most [he] would say of Trump was, ‘He’s like an untamed lion who came into the city.’

Not preciselythe right simile.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 6:34 AM on September 15, 2022 [2 favorites]

Nothing is more important than New York Times reporters making their money by withholding stuff that could have been reported at the time.

Not more important than affording this dumpster fire the same respect, discretion, deference, and neutral reporting they would for any other office holder while knowing all the inside details about how much of a country-destroying shitshow things are in reality?

BOTH SIDES!
posted by RonButNotStupid at 6:35 AM on September 15, 2022 [10 favorites]

Don't sink to their level of crude acrimony, take the high road and dance on his grave.

But only if you're in the union
posted by NoMich at 6:38 AM on September 15, 2022 [3 favorites]

Damn typo!
posted by MrGuilt at 6:41 AM on September 15, 2022 [4 favorites]

A typo will travel halfway around the internet before the correct selling gets its shoes on.
posted by achrise at 6:44 AM on September 15, 2022 [31 favorites]

Don't sink to their level of crude acrimony, take the high road and dance on his grave.

While pissing.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:46 AM on September 15, 2022 [15 favorites]

Piss on him for free?
posted by biffa at 6:49 AM on September 15, 2022 [12 favorites]

Don't sink to their level of crude acrimony, take the high road and dance on his grave.

I mean, when they go low we go high, I know, sure. It really depends on if you want to get it on the tombstone or not.
posted by gc at 6:51 AM on September 15, 2022 [2 favorites]

Piss on him for free?

Nah, there will be a charge - but it will be the best piss ever. Big league piss.
posted by nubs at 6:51 AM on September 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

Spare us the tell-alls that are mostly just tell-us-what-we-already-knews and prosecute the motherfucker. I can't be any plainer.
posted by tommasz at 6:54 AM on September 15, 2022 [28 favorites]

Metafilter: Just PTMF
posted by slater at 6:59 AM on September 15, 2022 [12 favorites]

But let's not rule out Number Two.

Yeah, Reagan's grave needs an occasional watering, too.
posted by slater at 7:02 AM on September 15, 2022 [4 favorites]

I feel like the "Trump doesn't possess even a basic understanding of the powers, limitations, or structures of the presidency or any other part of government, so he just yells stuff that he wants done and everyone around him nods sagely and then fucks off to not bother with it" train left the station no later than summer 2017, and publishing any "new" story in the year 2022 about how Trump yelled some particular thing that he wanted done and everyone around him nodded sagely and then fucked off to not bother with it is like releasing a new remix of "Mambo No. 5".
posted by Etrigan at 7:12 AM on September 15, 2022 [43 favorites]

Y’all trying to get me on film taking a piss on a place where the President sleeps… what are you the fucking FSB or something? Paging Dr. Steele !!!
posted by armoir from antproof case at 7:14 AM on September 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

withholding stuff that could have been reported at the time.

This seems a bit unfair. A lot of stories get shaken loose after someone dies, or after someone loses power. It's not weird that Trump lackeys might be bored and willing to gossip to journalists about Trump more than they were while he (and they) were in office.
posted by BungaDunga at 7:27 AM on September 15, 2022 [6 favorites]

releasing a new remix of "Mambo No. 5"

But people liked "Mambo No. 5".
posted by Servo5678 at 7:36 AM on September 15, 2022 [7 favorites]

Don't sink to their level of crude acrimony, take the high road and dance on his grave.

While pissing.

I would queue for that.
posted by Ashwagandha at 7:48 AM on September 15, 2022 [2 favorites]

Why didn't we get Trump Hotel Greenland... was it too expensive? It's green! It's in the name!
posted by kingdead at 7:59 AM on September 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

The more I think about it, the more I think when the day comes, I'll just load up on White Castle and Chipotle, wash it all down with a gallon of whole milk, and then express myself.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 8:13 AM on September 15, 2022 [2 favorites]

There is only one thing that could possibly ruin Celebration Day for me and that's if it happens before Kissinger's.
posted by flabdablet at 8:18 AM on September 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

But people liked "Mambo No. 5".

Did they, though?
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 8:28 AM on September 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

I mean, we did get Starr the other day. Maybe we're ramping up.
posted by snwod at 8:32 AM on September 15, 2022 [6 favorites]

Nothing is more important than New York Times reporters making their money by withholding stuff that could have been reported at the time.

The editors let them do this so they can pay them less, by saying if you do good here you'll get a lucrative book deal down the road where you'll make more than I could ever pay you.
posted by jmauro at 8:45 AM on September 15, 2022 [3 favorites]

I just had a horrifying thought:

Maybe TFG has been behaving this way because an eternity of people endlessly pissing on his grave is exactly what he wants.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:58 AM on September 15, 2022 [10 favorites]

as if they'll allow public access to his grave, hahaha
posted by gottabefunky at 9:06 AM on September 15, 2022 [2 favorites]

Piss on his grave?

Don't sink to their level of crude acrimony, take the high road and dance on his grave.

But don't wear your nice shoes.
posted by Greg_Ace at 9:08 AM on September 15, 2022 [2 favorites]

And tape a catheter to your inside leg.
posted by flabdablet at 9:10 AM on September 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

FiNaLLy, tHe TrUMp TelL-aLL tHaT WiLL sHoW EvErYONe tHaT hE wAs A bAD, iNcoMpeTeNt PrEsIdEnT. WE GoT hIM!!!!1!

At this point he COULD literally shoot a random person on 5th street and 1/3 of the country would believe it was self defense while the police dithered on arresting him.
posted by charred husk at 9:13 AM on September 15, 2022 [6 favorites]

wash it all down with a gallon of whole milk

This shoutout to your local milk people is seen and bigly appreciated.
posted by riverlife at 9:23 AM on September 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

There's a German word for celebrating someone's death before they are actually dead, I'm sure of it. Todesfreude?
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 9:42 AM on September 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

Members of the public will not be allowed within 100 meters of Trump's grave. It will be some gold and black mausoleum, probably in some corner of his golf course, gated off with razor wire and guard dogs, charging exorbitant fees to allow entry. In many ways a fitting monument to the man that was the living avatar of white privilege.
posted by LeRoienJaune at 10:01 AM on September 15, 2022 [3 favorites]

At the Guardian: Citing an unnamed person who worked with Pence, the authors write: “The most [he] would say of Trump was, ‘He’s like an untamed lion who came into the city.’
“When this person expressed pointed criticism, the vice-president would simply reply, ‘Well, we’re praying for him.’”

Not to accuse Mike Dense of subtlety, or wit, but I wonder if 'lion in the city' references Proverbs 22 or 26.
posted by Iris Gambol at 10:31 AM on September 15, 2022

Fuck The New York Times. I don't want to hear the inside scoop now.
posted by tiny frying pan at 10:39 AM on September 15, 2022 [14 favorites]

It will be some gold and black mausoleum, probably in some corner of his golf course, gated off with razor wire and guard dogs, charging exorbitant fees to allow entry.

And on it, in large raised gold letters:

Non est hic locus honoris.
Nullus honoratus mortuus hic commemoratur.
Nihil hic aestimatum est.
Quod hie periculosum ac repulsum est.
posted by Mchelly at 10:39 AM on September 15, 2022 [10 favorites]

At this point he COULD literally shoot a random person on 5th street and 1/3 of the country would believe it was self defense while the police dithered on arresting him.

In another of the more recent Trump books, Mark Leibovich's Thank You For Your Servitude, he expands on this a bit.

I'm paraphrasing, but it's something like 'If Trump shot someone, an Oath Keeper sheriff would refuse to arrest him and a Republican district attorney would decline to charge. Within an hour conservative Twitter would find a picture of the victim in a pussy hat or at a BLM march from five years ago, and Fox News would talk non-stop for days about how Trump stood his ground and shot this dangerous antifa domestic terrorist to protect his family.'
posted by box at 10:40 AM on September 15, 2022 [12 favorites]

He already did kill someone, literally on 5th Avenue. The world shrugged.
posted by Mchelly at 10:51 AM on September 15, 2022 [7 favorites]

I don't want to hear the inside scoop now

I think the reports should be cut a little slack. While it's likely they had some of the information at the time, it's also possible that they couldn't get corroboration until Trump was out of office, or they're willing to print things in a book with only a single source that the NYT wasn't willing to put in a story.

The advantage of all the tell-alls is that in aggregate, they show a consistent picture, even the pro-Trump authors can't disguise what a shit show it was.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 11:05 AM on September 15, 2022 [6 favorites]

NYT Pitchbot: Trump has a plan to destroy the world within the next week. To find out what it is, you'll have to wait for my book that comes out in April!
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:06 AM on September 15, 2022 [14 favorites]

I still don't see why people are assuming that these stories were all ready to publish 4 years ago and just weren't. There's lots of reasons why information can take time to come out! Other than "everyone knows" reporters sit on fully-reported stories just so they can sell books later, is this something that is actually attested to?
posted by BungaDunga at 11:24 AM on September 15, 2022

Yeah, I hear ya...but also, Fuck the New York Times? They've always had Trump's back.
posted by tiny frying pan at 11:32 AM on September 15, 2022 [5 favorites]

Trump also literally raped someone on 5th Avenue.

E Jean Carroll in the dressing rooms of Bergdorf Goodman, 754 Fifth Avenue.

Carroll is at least the 16th woman to accuse Trump of sexual assault.

Trump was a man about town in New York for several generations. The idea that the New York Times did not have several dump truck loads of dirt on Trump is utterly ludicrous. I’d bet they could have broken the Carroll story if they hadn’t been such cowards.
posted by jamjam at 12:10 PM on September 15, 2022 [24 favorites]

Why shit on the ink stained wretches at the NY Times? The NYC District Attorney was Cyrus Vance Jr. He had the real power to shut down Trump.
posted by Bee'sWing at 12:49 PM on September 15, 2022 [8 favorites]

Why shit on the ink stained wretches at the NY Times?

Probably because the NYT reliably traded access for coverage, which makes the journalists — as much as the editors and owners — complicit in keeping Trump in power long enough to launch an attack on the US Capitol.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 1:04 PM on September 15, 2022 [21 favorites]

I was shitting on Sulzberger because he's responsible for preventing the ink stained, and much more deeply stained by working for him wretches of the NYT from telling the truth about fellow scion of New York wealth Donald Trump.
posted by jamjam at 1:36 PM on September 15, 2022 [3 favorites]

Members of the public will not be allowed within 100 meters of Trump's grave

Ah, but will they control the air space? Drones have been very effective in Ukraine I believe.
posted by TWinbrook8 at 1:50 PM on September 15, 2022 [4 favorites]

I can't believe the thread has gotten this far without mentioning the piss tapes...
posted by ikahime at 4:45 PM on September 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

In a short thread on Twitter, Peter Baker says that they did not hold back any information while he was in office, everything new comes from research done in the last 18 months.
posted by jimw at 9:04 PM on September 15, 2022 [3 favorites]

Susan Glasser, one half of the writing team, does not work for the NYT.
posted by theory at 4:56 AM on September 16, 2022 [1 favorite]

I can't believe the thread has gotten this far without mentioning the piss tapes...

I alluded to them, albeit subtly.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:20 AM on September 16, 2022 [1 favorite]

Piss on his grave?

Years ago, I visited the spot where John Wilkes Booth was killed, which is now just an empty spot in the wooded median of U.S. 301 in Virginia. There was a marker and a pull-off, and when I parked, a couple from New York was returning back to their car. I asked them if there was anything to see, and the woman said, "Not really. The only thing there was a homemade marker praising Booth!"
I apologized on behalf of all Virginians and went to see myself, and sure enough, some dipshit Confederacy group had put a marker on the ground at the spot commemorating him. It was so long ago that I don't remember the exact wording, but they were definitely on his side. The marker also had a lot of pennies (all face down) spread out on it. I knew this was a tradition showing that someone visited the grave, and honored the deceased.
There isn't much on U.S. 301 near the site, so I hadn't had a chance to use the bathroom in a while. Since I was mad as hell, had to pee really bad, and the site was hidden in a small wooded area, I unzipped and pissed directly on the marker. It may have been the most urine I'd ever discharged at one time. When I was through, the entire marker was covered, up to the level of the pennies. It was the most satisfying piss I ever had.
When I visited the next year, the marker was gone, and there was a U.S. government sign warning against anyone leaving signage, and that the area was under video surveillance.
posted by Furnace of Doubt at 7:56 AM on September 16, 2022 [32 favorites]

At this point he COULD literally shoot a random person on 5th street and 1/3 of the country would believe it was self defense while the police dithered on arresting him.

Did they die of bullet or did they die with bullet?

It's just the common bullet.

The bullet is a crisis actor.

Obama loaded the gun.

Random people were going to die anyway.

The person just died to make Trump look bad.
posted by srboisvert at 3:55 PM on September 16, 2022 [1 favorite]

In a short thread on Twitter, Peter Baker says that they did not hold back any information while he was in office, everything new comes from research done in the last 18 months.

Still pretty damning that NY Times reporters now have to explicitly say this thanks to their newsroom culture.
posted by srboisvert at 3:58 PM on September 16, 2022 [4 favorites]