Before bringing on his Beloved Donald Trump, Sean Hannity and his Trumpy pals Mark Meadows and Jim Jordan attacked President Joe Biden’s summit with Vladimir Putin while conveniently “forgetting” how Trump disgraced the U.S. during his Helsinki summit with Putin.
As I wrote when Mike Pompeo attacked Biden’s handling of Russia and declared, “there was no administration that was tougher on Russia” than Trump’s, this is how Fox/GOP gaslighting works. They pretend one of their own weaknesses is a strength, accuse the Democrat(s) of being weak on that same subject, then repeat, repeat and repeat and, eventually, the party faithful believe it’s true.
Sure enough, the “Biden is weak on Russia, unlike Trump” trope has been repeated ad nauseum by the right.
Hannity and his guests joined the gang last night.
First, Jordan accused Biden of colluding with Russia:
JORDAN: The president’s son gets paid by a Russian oligarch, by the wife of him, and you have Joe Biden taking off sanctions and approving a pipeline. I’m old enough to remember when the press called that collusion. But it is a whole different set of rules for this guy.
Jordan got that last part, about the “whole different set of rules for this guy” right. Because Jordan, Meadows and Hannity “forgot” that, in 2016, Trump’s campaign manager gave a Russian intelligence officer the campaign’s internal strategy and polling data, which the Russian turned over to his bosses at the Russian intelligence agency.
Meadows, Trump’s former chief of staff, had such a bout of amnesia, he said this, without challenge from Hannity:
MEADOWS: [Putin is] thinking there's a new day for him, a open door basically for him to do whatever he wants to do.
He didn't get that kind of response from President Trump. I can tell you, it was always firm, it was always America first, and candidly, that's not the message that Putin got tonight and it's a sad day for the American people when we have thrown up the white surrender flag when traveling abroad.
Predictably, there were no questions for Meadows about how he pressured the Department of Justice to overturn the 2020 election results on behalf of his boss. Because nothing says “America first” like working to sabotage our democracy on Trump's behalf!
Jordan joined the “Trump was tough on Russia” Liars Club:
JORDAN: You asked the right question, Sean, in your monologue. What did we gain [from Biden's summit]? What did America gain?
Absolutely nothing from this, and again, that's on top of what already happened with the sanctions and the pipeline.
Contrast this with President Reagan who said, Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall, with President Trump who said “America first” all the time. And now, Joe Biden who says, oh, what can we do about climate change? What do we need to do? What do we need to give up?
It’s telling that Jordan’s example of Trump toughness was a platitude, rather than anything he actually said to Putin. Because, as Jordan surely knows, Trump very publicly sucked up to Putin. Also from my Pompeo post:
Trump disgraced the U.S. by siding with Russia over the U.S. intelligence community in his 2018 meeting with Putin in Helsinki. He just sided with Putin over the U.S. again in a statement last week. Trump called the Helsinki meeting “great and productive,” told Biden to give Putin Trump’s “warmest regards” and sneered that Biden shouldn’t “fall asleep during the meeting.” As Forbes noted, Trump claimed in the recent statement he “won much” from that meeting, but what the two discussed in their closed-door meeting is still a mystery.
Surely, not even Jordan is stupid enough to think that Trump spent his secret time with Putin repeating “America first” over and over.
You can watch Jordan and Meadows pretend Trump didn’t bow and scrape to Putin below, from the June 16, 2021 Hannity.
I’ve given up trying to tell Trump followers that that’s the case.
I note that Mark Meadows never accomplished a single thing of note in the Congress, and he apparently intended to never accomplish anything. His entire purpose was to obstruct the Dems from doing anything. When he weaseled his way into the Pence White House, he simply continued that effort, culminating with his shocking displays at Nancy Pelosi last summer, where he refused to work on a stimulus extension in the peak of the pandemic and instead threw tantrums, pounded his fists on the table and stomped out of the room.
Regarding Jim Jordan, we must not forget that Pence’s childish spokesman besmirched the valuable Presidential Medal of Freedom by throwing it away on various despicable men, such as Jim Jordan, Devin Nunez, Ed Meese and Rush Limbaugh. The Medal of Freedom was meant to commemorate people who have made notable and meritorious contributions to the US and the world – and it normally goes to poets, inventors, innovators, artists and others who have worked to make the world a better place. It was never intended to be given to a vicious opportunist like Jim Jordan or to hatemongers like Limbaugh. It was intended for people like Mother Teresa.
At this point, I’m not certain that the Medal of Freedom can be continued, given how badly it has been tarnished by the Pence White House’s actions. The next Maya Angelou will not accept that award if it means that they must effectively share the stage with the likes of Limbaugh and Jordan. I fervently hope that the Biden/Harris White House will take the appropriate steps and redesignate the award with a new name – say, the Presidential Medal of Freedom and Decency. They could then grandfather in all prior recipients of the award, aside from Paul Harvey, Limbaugh, Meese, Nunez and Jordan. That way, we could continue to have this award mean something, and unhelpful individuals like Jordan could keep their now-worthless badge.