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Dusty Johnson Claims Trump Spoke with Sincerity, Intelligence, and Nuance

Dusty, Dusty, Dusty—don’t lie to us.

Republican candidate for U.S. House Dusty Johnson tells Todd Epp that he got to talk to Donald Trump in Sioux Falls last Friday about tariffs and E15. He offers this fantastic assessment of Trump’s verbal faculties:

Overall, I was struck by how sincere the President’s acknowledgment of our concerns was, and how well versed he seemed in the nuances of the issues [Dusty Johnson, to Todd Epp, “What Did They Talk to the President About?” KELO Radio, 2018.09.12].

Sincere? Well-versed? Nuanced?

Let’s review the latest addled impromptu babblings from the unprepared Commander in Chief, rambling yesterday at a ceremony intended to honor Congressional Medal of Honor Recipients:

Donald Trump looks at eclipse, August 21, 2017.
Not even well-versed about eclipses, never mind ethanol…

The Congressional Medal of Honor is the supreme symbol of American courage.  It is the ultimate tribute to American valor.  You are the strongest, the bravest, and the finest among us.  See?  My ego is not that big.  (Laughter.)  I admit.  I admit it.  Okay?  Right, General?  (Applause.)  I admit it.  True….

Before continuing, I’d like to provide an update on our preparations for the incoming hurricanes.  We have some really big situation confronting us.  It’s coming in fairly fast.  And it’s going to be one of the biggest to ever hit the East Coast, one of the biggest ever to hit our country.  Maybe something will happen, but it’s looking that like that probably won’t be taking place, unfortunately — meaning veering away from land….

A veteran of Operation Enduring Freedom, Leroy Petry has since devoted his life to supporting our wonderful veterans.  Thank you very much.  We have many people that are doing that.

We’re loving our veterans, I think, honestly, more than ever before.  We respect them so much.  There’s a whole different spirit over our country.  We respect our veterans more than we’ve ever respected our veterans.  So important.  We’re working so hard on that, and we’re doing the job [Donald Trump, remarks at Congressional Medal of Honor Society Reception, 2018.09.12].

Donald Trump can’t even keep straight within a ten-minute speech whether a hurricane is going to hit or not. Please, Dusty, don’t try to claim that Donald spent any time speaking intelligently about a topic that matters to South Dakota. When you talk about Trump as if he were some sort of effective leader, you only make clear that you’ll fall in line with der Führer’s lies just like the current crop of nation-wrecking Republicans in Congress:

Trump’s ridiculousness, his narcissistic ability to make everything about himself, the outrageousness of his lies, and the profundity of his ignorance can easily distract attention from the more lasting implications of his story: how easily Republicans in Congress enabled him, undermining the whole concept of checks and balances set in place by the founders; how a third of the country passively accepted his assaults on the constitution; how easily Russian disinformation took root in a culture where the teaching of history and civics had seriously atrophied [Michiko Kakutani, “The Death of Truth: How We Gave up on Facts and Ended up with Trump,” UK Guardian, 2018.07.14].

Dusty, you can make the voters proud of you for talking with Trump without blowing smoke up his skirt or ours. Stick with the facts. We all understand Donald Trump is an idiot. Just campaign on your own merits, and try convincing us you’ll be our guy, not The Donald’s, if you get to Washington.

24 Comments

  1. Jason 2018-09-13 07:14

    What gives you the expertise to judge Trump’s intelligence?

    You voted for HIllary who said corporations and businesses don’t create jobs.

    Do I need to remind you what happened to Obama when there was no teleprompter?

    You posted a link to an article about facts. Why didn’t you post about Harris and Booker lying the past couple of weeks.

  2. Dicta 2018-09-13 07:22

    It is pretty clear Trump lies so much that he is incapable of applying basic logic to himself, Jason. I dont know if that makes him dumb or a sociopath. To be honest, I dont care. The results are similar.

  3. Jason 2018-09-13 07:25

    What did he lie about?

  4. Cory Allen Heidelberger Post author | 2018-09-13 07:40

    Jason, the empirical evidence of Donald Trump’s inability to compose coherent policy statements is enormous. In no interview has he demonstrated the ability discuss policy matters with depth, evidence, honesty, logic (as Dicta notes) or attention. I provide on example above, in which he sends dangerous mixed signals to people in the potential path of a hurricane. Listening to Trump’s statement, one would not know whether to evacuate or not.

    The vast documented evidence supports the conclusion that Dusty Johnson lied, claiming that Donald Trump did something that Trump has shown no evidence of having the capacity or willingness to do.

  5. Jason 2018-09-13 07:56

    What message did he send?

    He said it was dangerous.

    He did not say to not evacuate.

    As for the hurricane, it’s already down to a cat 2.

    Why don’t you prove Dustly lied?

  6. mike from iowa 2018-09-13 08:20

    Jason- you don’t want conversation, you want confrontation.

  7. Dicta 2018-09-13 08:22

    All politicians lie, but one can argue that introductions of superlatives and subjectivity make them misleading, rather than blatant falsehoods. But Trump goes farther than that:

    ‘Member when Trump made the claim that Xi Jingping in China “instantly” agreed to allowing US beef into the country when Trump asked but that had already been agreed to under Obama? Pepperidge farm ‘members.

    ‘Member when Trump admitted to the “grab em by the pussy” tape, claiming it was locker room talk, and then openly opined later about how it was fake? Pepperidge farm ‘members that too.

    Or, or, ya ‘member in 2017 when Trump claimed the US murder rate was the highest it had been in nearly 5 decades but the murder rate had actually been falling steadily since the early 90’. Delicious and satisfying pepperidge farms ‘members that too.

    ooooooooh, member the fight over the size of the inaguration and even the white house undermined Trump’s claim that he had 1.5 million people by halving that amount? ‘Member that? Pepperidge farms has ya covered there too.

    Or ‘member his frequent claim on the campagin trail that Americans pay more taxes than anyone?
    Or that in his first six months in office he signed more bills than any President ever?
    Or that Clinton only won the popular vote because of the MILLIONS and MILLIONS of illegals who voted without a single shred of evidence to support the claim?

    Do you want me to keep going? And do you notice a common theme here? Most of these lies are about self-aggrandizement because he is a thin-skinned man-child who somehow has my party by the shorthairs and continues to pile national debt on in one the most strong bull markets in recent memory.

  8. Nick Nemec 2018-09-13 08:45

    Nuance? Dusty, you have to be kidding. Nuance? I’d like to shove a few bushels of $6.62/bu soybeans right up Donald’s keister and when I’m done with Donald I’ll shove a bushel or two straight up your keister too. But don’t worry I’ll do it with “nuance”. I wonder is a keister filled with $6.62 soybeans feels better than a keister filled with $9.50 (the local price way back on May 25) soybeans.

  9. mike from iowa 2018-09-13 09:28

    Mr Nemec, can’t hardly wait for wingnuts to accuse posters like yourself of being crisis actors.

  10. jerry 2018-09-13 09:37

    Down to a category 2? Like that is nothing, good call there knucklehead. Tell that to the good folks that are gonna get 40 inches of rainfall in a matter of hours. I’m sure they will be happy that republicans are so cavalier about their plight.

  11. jerry 2018-09-13 10:20

    Here is another nuance that Dusty seems to think is fine, concentration camps for another 12,800 children. trump and NOem have reduced FEMA by at least $10 million to fund ICE so they can put guards in the concentration camps. Side note, this also drains from the Coast Guard upon which hurricanes approach, who would have thought.

    “Even though hundreds of children separated from their families after crossing the border have been released under court order, the overall number of migrant children under detention has exploded to the highest ever recorded — a significant counternarrative to the Trump administration’s efforts to reduce the number of undocumented families coming to the United States.
    Population levels at federally contracted shelters for migrant children have quietly shot up more than fivefold since last summer, according to data obtained by The New York Times, reaching a total of 12,800 this month. There were 2,400 such children in custody in May 2017.” New York Times 09/11/2018

    Democracy turns around. The Warsaw Ghetto’s cannot be far behind.

  12. Porter Lansing 2018-09-13 10:21

    President Trump has 45% of American voters and 60% of South Dakota voters seeing their world through the “me filter”. At every decision it’s, how does that help me? How does that hurt me? What can I do to make things better for me? How much does that cost me? Why should I help you when what matters is me?
    The key to fulfillment is giving energy. Making others feel good about themselves. Obama knows this. Democrats know this. The “Dakota Contrary” card is no key at all.
    If it weren’t about me I’d be pleased that so many Republicans are angry, unhappy and unsatisfied, all the time. However, everyone should be satisfied, not just those that I agree with.
    Forty nine days more until we stop this train wreck.

  13. Rorschach 2018-09-13 11:20

    I don’t think Trump is stupid, but I do think he’s lazy. Intellectually lazy. I don’t believe he has in depth knowledge about anything policy related, but rather just gets the synopsis from advisers or Fox news, or whoever and wings it from there. The odds that he can string together 4 consecutive sentences above the 8th grade level with sincerity, intelligence and nuance are pretty slim.

  14. Porter Lansing 2018-09-13 12:18

    News To Irritate Tr2mp and the Continually Contrary … government data shows that the foreign-born population in the U.S. has reached its highest share since 1910, with Asians representing the largest group. ~ Making America Great Again … one immigrant at a time – woot woot

  15. mike from iowa 2018-09-13 13:28

    Drumpf accused Jamie Dimon of not being smart enough to be potus. Drumpf has zero room to question anyone’s intelligence.

  16. mike from iowa 2018-09-13 13:45

    How’z this for nuance- Donald J. Trump

    @realDonaldTrump

    3000 people did not die in the two hurricanes that hit Puerto Rico. When I left the Island, AFTER the storm had hit, they had anywhere from 6 to 18 deaths. As time went by it did not go up by much. Then, a long time later, they started to report really large numbers, like 3000…
    7:37 AM – Sep 13, 2018

    …This was done by the Democrats in order to make me look as bad as possible when I was successfully raising Billions of Dollars to help rebuild Puerto Rico. If a person died for any reason, like old age, just add them onto the list. Bad politics. I love Puerto Rico!
    7:49 AM – Sep 13, 2018

  17. jerry 2018-09-13 22:02

    FEMA director is under investigation on the eve of Hurricane Florence landfall. trump knows how to pick’m that is for sure. Another dead man walking pick to join Kavenaugh.

    “Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Brock Long is the target of an ongoing Department of Homeland Security inspector general investigation into whether he misused government vehicles during his commutes to North Carolina from Washington, according to three people familiar with the matter, including current and former administration officials.

    The actions by Long, the U.S. government’s lead disaster official as the country braces for Hurricane Florence, have been called into question by the inspector general over whether taxpayers have inappropriately footed the bill for his travel, an issue that has tripped up a number of current and former top Trump administration officials.” https://www.politico.com/story/2018/09/13/trump-fema-administrator-under-investigation-821231?nname=playbook&nid=0000014f-1646-d88f-a1cf-5f46b7bd0000&nrid=0000014e-f0fa-dd93-ad7f-f8ffe0400000&nlid=630318

    HAVE YOU HAD ENOUGH YET? VOTE DEMOCRATIC

  18. Cory Allen Heidelberger Post author | 2018-09-13 22:18

    Dicta, dare I draw a connection between Trump’s constant self-aggrandizing lies and Dusty Johnson’s unlikely characterization of Trump’s comments on South Dakota-specific topics? Could Dusty be getting on the Trump flattery train, thinking that if he blows smoke about how smart Trump is, Trump will pay attention and do something nice for South Dakota?

    If that’s what’s going on, if now we must butter up the emperor to get favors out in the provinces, our Republic has failed.

  19. Debbo 2018-09-13 22:37

    Last week Pootie’s Puppet made 2 stops in Montana. Per Wapo’s fact checker he lied, get this, 72% of the time he spoke.

    SEVENTY-TWO PERCENT of what came out of his mouth was LIES. Leaves me speechless. He should be.

    He’s not sane. He was not sane when his teeny inauguration happened. He’s been deteriorating since and the pace of that deterioration is accelerating.

  20. Cory Allen Heidelberger Post author | 2018-09-13 22:53

    I don’t know how a guy can lie that much and somehow manage to speak sincerely, intelligently, and with nuance to a South Dakota U.S. House candidate about South Dakota issues. It’s just not consistent with past public behavior.

  21. Jason 2018-09-14 00:28

    So far Cory hasn’t proved Dusty lied.

    As for Trump. All politicians lie and bloviate.

  22. chris 2018-09-14 02:02

    Trump told Dusty he did wery important work for future of Country in hosting innocent russian darling Maria Butina at republican teen camp.

  23. Dicta 2018-09-14 12:31

    Cory: I think so, yes. Further, I think it is pretty clear that pre-election, many GOP candidates are lining up to kiss the ring because what is most important to a large portion of Trump-supporting GOP voters is supporting Trump no matter what. Post-election, I think Dusty pretends he doesn’t exist unless directly pressed.

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