Fox News trotted out former Indiana college basketball coach Bobby Knight to cheerlead Donald Trump’s deal with Carrier Corporation in Indiana. But Fox got more than it probably hoped for when Knight gushed over Trump and called him “Saint Donald.”
There are plenty of reasons to be unhappy or at least less than thrilled with Trump’s Carrier deal. As Ellen previously reported:
From Vanity Fair:
But while Trump took to Twitter to applaud himself for the deal, the president-elect neglected to mention the other reasons Carrier is likely keeping jobs in the country—or the economic fallout that might follow. While Carrier will give up some $65 million that it would have saved by moving production jobs to Mexico, where workers make in a day what the company’s U.S. workers make in an hour, that figure is tiny compared to the lucrative military contract that United Technologies enjoys with the U.S. government, the Times notes. The Pentagon is the American aircraft manufacturer’s single biggest customer, with government contracts accounting for roughly 10 percent of its annual $56 billion in revenue. In that light, Carrier’s decision looks more like the result of a shakedown, or at least a smart political play. In another, it looks like it is the incoming Trump administration that is getting played. In addition to increasing its chances of holding onto its military contract, United Technologies and Carrier get a tax break likely worth millions of dollars, not to mention a massive P.R. win. Should every company expect to get a deal with President Trump?
(Update: In an interview with the Indianapolis Business Journal, former Indiana Lieutenant Governor John Mutz said he didn’t think the incentive package was Carrier’s “major reason” for keeping the jobs in the state, and that United Technologies is “a company that is trying to be competitive and also wants to keep their business with the government.” In a press release issued on Wednesday, Carrier said, “The incentives offered by the state were an important consideration.” But another source, who remained anonymous, told The Indianapolis Star that “Carrier wants to stay in good graces with the federal government” and that “finalizing this deal was a show of good faith.”)
Furthermore, Vanity Fair notes, the deal signals that rather than address the underlying conditions that have caused the U.S. to lose so many manufacturing jobs, Trump has just signaled he’s open to corporate blackmail instead. That’s corporate blackmail paid for with our tax dollars, of course.
Knight appeared on Fox’s supposed business show, Your World, yet host Neil Cavuto didn’t mention any of those concerns about Trump’s deal. Instead, he complained, “Many in the media are picking it apart, Coach.” As if Fox would not have done exactly that and worse had this been President Obama’s doings. Remember the auto bailout that saved over a million jobs?
But Knight announced, “I’ll guarantee you there are as many idiots as there are good people” in the media.
Cavuto laughed.
Knight continued by suggesting that Trump critics and/or the media are ignoramuses
KNIGHT: Let’s concentrate on what Donald Trump wants to do rather than somebody that’s readin’ a Bugs Bunny funny book thinks he ought to do. You know, there’s nobody that I’ve ever been around in my lifetime, that’s 76 years now, that has a stronger feeling about what’s best for the United States than Donald Trump, and we’re going to see a guy, as he moves into this presidency, that is just something that we were hoping for and hoping for and you trust me, we’re going to get that from Donald Trump.
The fact is that Trump not only lost the popular vote but is one of the least popular president-elects or re-elected presidents since at least 1980. President Obama is more popular.
But, of course, Cavuto didn’t mention any of that either. He tried to turn Trump into a media victim. “Do you get a sense that he’s just not going to be cut any slack?” Cavuto asked.
“It’s so easy for somebody to write, ‘Well this isn’t the way it should be.’ Well, what do they know about it? They don’t know anything about it,” Knight insisted. Even though he seemed not to know anything about the Carrier deal beyond the fact that Trump made it.
KNIGHT: I’ll tell you this. Donald Trump is a very, very smart man, and that’s been shown and has been reshown and will be continued to be shown throughout his entire time in office. The guy is very bright, and the guy is so dedicated to the United States.
…His whole approach is, “Let’s see what’s best for the United States,” and then let’s get that done for the people of the United States, and he knows a hell of a lot more about it than anybody in any press report that I’ve ever read.
Dedicated to the United States? Putting aside Trump’s many, disturbing ties to Russia (and Mr. Patriotic is still hiding his tax returns), there are his unprecedented conflicts of interest.
Of course, Cavuto didn’t think any of that worth mentioning, either.
But Knight wasn’t done slobbering.
KNIGHT: I appreciate the opportunity to be able to talk about a man that I have spent a lot of time with. I’ve watched him, I’ve watched how he treated people, and I can’t think of anybody that I could consider that would be do more good, more things, and be better for all of us American citizens than Saint Donald.
Did Knight forget that “Saint Donald” is the guy who boasted about grabbing women’s private parts and who has been repeatedly accused of sexual assault? Or is that what makes this congenital liar a saint to Knight?
Cavuto didn’t question Trump’s sainthood. He merely said, “Good point.”
Watch this deceit below, from the December 2, 2016 Your World.
Once, during the Prohibition, I was forced to live for days on nothing but food and water.
It ain’t what they call you, it’s what you answer to.
I once spent a year in Philadelphia. I think it was on a Sunday.