Did he or did he not say Coronavirus is the Democrat’s new hoax?
— NOS4A2

Calling it a hoax is to deny that it is a problem, and it doesn't matter who "their new hoax" refers to. The denial itself is the problem. — creativesoul

Just to be clear, I believe Trump is claiming that criticisms to his administration’s actions surrounding the issue (cuts to CDC funding etc.) is a hoax, or something like that, and not that the virus itself is a hoax.

That's more palatable. Everything contrary to Trump's beliefs is a hoax to him. I would go even further and say that there have been many things he knows to be true and still calls it a hoax, or fake news, or a witch-hunt. The man is a liar of the worst variety... a practical one. A means to an end. The end is an increase in his own wealth and power.

A spoiled rich kid who has never once had to pay for his own mistakes.

While in the process of politicizing the Coronavirus, Trump claims that the Democrats are politicizing it.

It's known as Munchausen's syndrome by proxy. All the populists are doing it, it's a well known snake oil salesmans trick.
To illustrate, I have experienced it myself, as I have a relative who suffers from the condition. She would walk up to me and knee me in the leg, then immediately fain a limp claiming that I had kneed her in the leg. The people witnessing the deceit, don't know who kneed who in the leg. But will believe the deceiver because they are skilled at reacting as the victim and the person they actually kneed is shocked and confused, so appears less plausible.

The populist Home Secretary in the UK government is doing it at the moment against the top civil servant in the country, leading him to resign and state that he is going to sue the government today.

Do you ever get tired of Trump's lies and those of his yes-men and women?

Just to be clear, I believe Trump is claiming that criticisms to his administration’s actions surrounding the issue (cuts to CDC funding etc.) is a hoax, or something like that, and not that the virus itself is a hoax. — praxis

Sounded this way to me also. Trump even went on to say that even if we haven't lost anyone to the virus, it doesn't mean the US couldn't lose people to it. (Which I think has now happened)

And lets put things into perspective: normal seasonal flew epidemics kill 1 000 people or so every season around the World. Coronavirus has killed about 3 000 people. The Ebola outbreak 2014-2016 killed about 11 000.

The Hong Kong Flu 1968-69 killed 34 000 just in the US and 1 million World wide. Malaria kills roughly about 400 000+ around the World annually.

Just to be clear, I believe Trump is claiming that criticisms to his administration’s actions surrounding the issue (cuts to CDC funding etc.) is a hoax, or something like that, and not that the virus itself is a hoax.

That’s right. He did not say Coronavirus is Democrats' 'new hoax'. So why would the NYT say that?

But yes, the Democrats have politicized the issue. They repeatedly accused Pompeo of not doing enough about it during a testimony on the Iran strike. Trump is right.

Do you ever get tired of Trump's lies and those of his yes-men and women?

I get tired of you parroting whatever the DNC wants you to. I tire of you lamenting a dystopian future that never arrives. How can you look at yourself in a mirror?

That’s right. He did not say Coronavirus is Democrats' 'new hoax'. So why would the NYT say that? — NOS4A2

I've pointed out that in the posted video there's a clip of Trump saying “and this is their new hoax.” Granted that it's not always easy to decipher his rambling nonsense, but are you claiming that he wasn't referring to Democrats and the coronavirus? If he wasn't then who and what was he referring to?

I was claiming the headline was false, fake news. I would also claim that what Trump said was true.

Democrats have distorted and politicized coronavirus in terms of lying about the response and giving us a pitiful panic among the fearful (see Tim Wood's response here).

AP FACT CHECK: Democrats distort coronavirus readiness

I was claiming the headline was false, fake news. I would also claim that what Trump said was true. — NOS4A2

It was fake but it's true? Lol.

So Bloomberg and Biden engaged in a little harmless hyperbole. Isn't that what you say when Trump lies? Pretty dumb to lie about it though when the truth would have been nearly as damming, that the Trump admin tried to cut CDC funding but was prevented by congress.

Did he or did he not say Coronavirus is the Democrat’s new hoax? — NOS4A2

Trump said "this" is their new hoax, using a demonstrative pronoun the referent for which was (demonstratively) unclear, coming, as it did, sixty seconds earlier in the speech.

It's not clear, to the less-than-savvy, what Trump's "this" was alluding to. It could easily be taken (again, by a person who doesn't spend a lot of time analyzing language) to be the virus itself: A - not atypical; one might even say Trumpian - lack of clarity the talking heads in the media - experts at the use and abuse of language - set ethics aside to take advantage of. Clearly a deception by leftists in the press. They know how to parse a sentence - or, in Trump's case, a string of sentence fragments.

Trump is guilty of a sophomoric, haphazard use of language in connection to a global crisis. That's about it. He can't help it. He never read a book. I doubt he even read the books he "wrote."

He can't help it. He never read a book. I doubt he even read the books he "wrote." — ZzzoneiroCosm

I love TDS. It is amazing watching the sheer delusion it creates. Who needs drugs when you have mass hallucinations.

I love TDS. It is amazing watching the sheer delusion it creates. Who needs drugs when you have mass hallucinations. — Nobeernolife

Funny, I felt like my response was "fair and balanced."

You do know that Trump's books were written by ghostwriters, I hope.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/07/25/donald-trumps-ghostwriter-tells-all

↪tim wood

Do you ever get tired of Trump's lies and those of his yes-men and women?

I get tired of you parroting whatever the DNC wants you to. I tire of you lamenting a dystopian future that never arrives. How can you look at yourself in a mirror? — NOS4A2

Do you ever get tired of Trump's lies and those of his yes-men and women?

I love TDS. — Nobeernolife

How about DDS (Democrat Derangement Syndrome)?

The playbook is old at this point. But for them to try to use a pandemic [coronavirus], and seemingly hope that it comes here and kills millions of people so that they can end Donald Trump's streak of winning, is a new level of sickness. — Lil Trump Jr.

How does one seemingly hope for millions to die, btw? I suppose that delusions may seem real. Maybe that’s what he means.

You repeated the same lie. Perhaps a little skepticism moving forward?

I'm surprised he hasn't said it yet, that coronavirus is a Chinese plot. If thousands of US citizens die, what will the spin become. Maybe, it's all for the fault of Congress, they tied my hands. Or thank the lord that I was able to reduce the deaths to only a few thousand.

And whatever the spin is his base will drink it up like the elixir of life. Drunk on the power without reason, or justification, just neat raw power.

You repeated the same lie. Perhaps a little skepticism moving forward? — NOS4A2

Now you're suggesting that Trump did not claim that criticisms to his administration’s actions surrounding the coronavirus issue (cuts to CDC funding etc.) are a hoax? You previously indicated that he did make that claim when you wrote: "That's right."

Two Democrats lying about something doesn't constitute a plot by the Democrats to oust the sitting president. I think we can agree on that.

Looks like we’re finally getting some action on the Biden front.

Senate Homeland Security Panel Chairman Wants to Issue Subpoena in Hunter Biden Probe

Sen. Ron Johnson (R., Wis.), the chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, wrote in a letter Sunday that he wants to subpoena Andrii Telizhenko, a former Ukranian diplomatic aide who worked for Blue Star Strategies, a Washington-based consulting firm. Mr. Johnson said he would schedule a committee meeting soon to vote on the subpoena.

Mr. Johnson’s committee is one of several in the Republican-led Senate that is investigating Hunter Biden’s service on the board of Burisma Holdings, a Ukrainian natural gas company, while his father was vice president and leading international anticorruption efforts in Ukraine.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/senate-homeland-security-panel-chairman-says-he-will-issue-subpoena-in-hunter-biden-probe-11583183194

Also, some of the same action is occurring on the Ukraine side.

A court ruling in Ukraine has forced state investigators to open a probe into alleged pressure by then-vice president Joe Biden that led to the 2016 dismissal of Viktor Shokin as the country’s prosecutor general, officials said Thursday.

Ukraine court forces probe into Biden role in firing of prosecutor Viktor Shokin

It’s about to get exciting, what with an election right around the corner.

Senate Homeland Security Panel Chairman Wants to Issue Subpoena in Hunter Biden Probe — NOS4A2

Hoax investigation, political theatre, etc. etc. All that stuff you were saying about the House investigation into Trump's impropriety, except this time it's true.

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/c-span-video-joe-biden-ukraine/

In the excerpted portion of the clip, Biden was discussing his efforts on behalf of the Obama administration to pressure Ukraine into to prosecuting corruption and firing Viktor Shokin, an ineffective prosecutor. That effort by Biden has been used by Trump supporters to argue, inaccurately, that Biden single-handedly had Shokin fired because Shokin was investigating Burisma, a Ukrainian group of energy exploration and production companies of which Biden’s son Hunter was a board member.

However, Shokin was not fired for investigating Burisma, but for his failure to pursue corruption investigations — including investigations connected to Burisma. And Biden wasn’t alone in the effort to push Shokin out, but rather was spearheading the Obama administration’s policy, which represented a consensus among diplomats, officials from various European countries, and the International Monetary Fund that Shokin was an impediment to rooting out corruption in his country

https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2019/may/07/viral-image/fact-checking-joe-biden-hunter-biden-and-ukraine/

There’s a strong case that Hunter Biden’s position with the company had nothing to do with Biden’s position on Shokin’s ouster. That’s because Western leaders and institutions were largely united in seeking Shokin’s removal, arguing that he was not pursuing corruption cases aggressively.

For instance, in early 2016, International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde said that "it’s hard to see how the I.M.F.-supported program can continue" unless corruption prosecutions accelerate.

Steven Pifer is a career foreign service officer who was ambassador to Ukraine under President Bill Clinton and deputy assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian Affairs under President George W. Bush. Pifer told PolitiFact that "virtually everyone" he knew in the U.S. government and virtually all non-governmental experts on Ukraine "felt that Shokin was not doing his job and should be fired. As far as I can recall, they all concurred with the vice president telling Poroshenko that the U.S. government would not extend the $1 billion loan guarantee to Ukraine until Shokin was removed from office."

Anders Åslund, a resident senior fellow at Atlantic Council, a think tank in Washington, agreed that criticism of Shokin was widespread

Shokin "failed to prosecute anybody of significance, protecting both the Yanukovych circle and the Poroshenko group," Åslund said.

Daria Kaleniuk, the executive director of the Anti-Corruption Action Center, a leading anti-corruption voice in Ukraine, tweeted earlier this month that Shokin’s firing was not about protecting the company Hunter Biden was working for. The firing "was obviously not because the prosecutor wanted to investigate Burisma & Zlochevsky," she wrote.

Meanwhile, accounts differ on whether Shokin was poised to prosecute Burisma at the time he was removed.

In an interview with the Ukrainian website Strana.ua this month, Shokin said the cases were indeed active.

However, Vitaliy Kasko, who had been Shokin’s deputy overseeing international cooperation before resigning in February 2016 citing corruption in the office, produced documents to Bloomberg that under Shokin, the investigation into Burisma had been dormant.

"There was no pressure from anyone from the U.S. to close cases against Zlochevsky," Kasko told Bloomberg. "It was shelved by Ukrainian prosecutors in 2014 and through 2015."

I’m not sure running to conclusions before the investigation is a bright idea.

You supported the Russia hoax and the Ukraine hoax, but when a little investigation is thrown Biden’s way we get all touchy.

You supported the Russia hoax and the Ukraine hoax, but when a little investigation is thrown Biden’s way we get all touchy. — NOS4A2

I supported the investigation into Russia's connections with the Trump campaign because the FBI believed there to be sufficient justification to open an investigation – a view supported by the Inspector General when he investigated the investigation – and I supported the investigation into Trump's withholding of aid to Ukraine because there was a formal whistleblower complaint on the matter that the Inspector General believed to be urgent and credible.

There's nothing like any of that for the Biden-Burisma hoax. Just Giuliani spouting rubbish and now Republican politicians latching onto it to help them in the next election.

You might want to read from the person who first reported on Biden's activity in Ukraine and Hunter's involvement with Burisma (in 2015):

I Wrote About the Bidens and Ukraine Years Ago. Then the Right-Wing Spin Machine Turned the Story Upside Down.

And of course the previous links to Snopes and PolitiFact.

The problem is Giuliani has documents and testimony, which I doubt you’ve seen or heard or even bothered to look at. Instead all you can do is post articles and fact-checks wherein they simply assert the opposite, without documentation or investigation. Luckily these documents are now with the DOJ, so we’ll find out one way or the other whether you’ll go zero for 3.

Interesting story here:

Trump’s election may have messed up the sex balance of babies

The ascendancy of the billionaire president may be linked to a decline in the number of boys born to liberal-leaning parents in Ontario, Canada.

According to a new study in the scientific journal BMJ Open, Trump’s election was associated with a temporary shift in the sex ratio of newborn babies. But this short-term decline in male babies was only apparent in politically liberal areas of the Canadian province and not in conservative parts.

A relationship between stressful events and the sex ratio of babies might seem implausible, but the pattern is actually well established. Terrorist incidents such as 9/11 and the 2005 London bombings saw a similar shift in the gender balance, which skewed towards girls over baby boys for a few months afterwards.

Good god.

The hypothesis needs further testing. I suggest you help elect Bernie Sanders to test whether the stress this induces in conservatives results in their bearing more females.

If true, it's ironic that Trump - the womanizer - is the cause of more women.

That wouldn’t be a good test because everyone knows that socialists eat their children.

Luckily these documents are now with the DOJ, so we’ll find out one way or the other whether you’ll go zero for 3. — NOS4A2

It won't be zero for three.

The GAO concluded that withholding aid was illegal and even Republicans like Romney and Rubio accepted that it was impeachable, with others like Alexander and Collins accepting that it was wrong. The fact that the Republicans (bar Romney) didn't vote to remove him from office just shows that they put party loyalty before their duty to conduct proper oversight of the executive, and doesn't affect the validity of my position. So I was right on that account.

The Inspector General concluded that the investigation into the Trump campaign was warranted, and Mueller laid out the many occasions that Trump obstructed justice as well as concluded that the Trump Tower meeting was a violation of campaign finance laws (although chose not to prosecute as apparently ignorance is an excuse). If you look back at some of my earlier comments in this discussion you'll see that I only ever said that the investigation was warranted, that Trump obstructed justice, and that the Trump Tower meeting was a violation of campaign finance laws. So I was right on that account.

So far I'm two for two, and I suspect that I'll be three for three once this investigation into Biden concludes.

Do you ever get tired of Trump's lies and those of his yes-men and women?

I get tired of you parroting whatever the DNC wants you to. I tire of you lamenting a dystopian future that never arrives. How can you look at yourself in a mirror?
— NOS4A2

Do you ever get tired of Trump's lies and those of his yes-men and women? — tim wood

3x asked, so far zero times answered.

You're zero for two. The GAO is an investigative arm of Congress with no power. It offers an opinion, or for democrats and their parrots, a piece of paper they can wave in the air to justify an unjust impeachment. The administration has offered the opposite opinion, that everything is done legally. You've merely accepted the song and dance of congress. Also, no criminal penalties are associated with violating the impound control act. Every administration has done it. So you're wrong on that account.

The Attorney General disagreed with that finding of the Horowitz report, that "The Inspector General’s report now makes clear that the FBI launched an intrusive investigation of a U.S. presidential campaign on the thinnest of suspicions". US Attorney John Durham, who is conducting a Justice Department criminal review of the investigation into Russia, said "Based on the evidence collected to date, and while our investigation is ongoing, last month we advised the Inspector General that we do not agree with some of the report’s conclusions as to predication and how the FBI case was opened". So according to those now investigating the utter failure of Crossfire Hurricane and the Mueller investigation, you're wrong on that account.

Nah. Michael's two for two. Barr's opinion counts for nothing as he's a Trump stooge.