MY NOTES ON MEGYN KELLY'S INTERVIEW WITH TRUMP
First of all, kudos to Megyn Kelly for not giving Trump a fluffy interview like the "sit-down-with-a-pal" interview we got from Tucker. I found her to be fair and respectful to both Trump and to the audience of viewers who deserve to hear from Trump directly on some of the issues that never come up in any of Trump's rally speeches. Between all the cooking and canning I've been doing, it took me a while to get through all of this interview, because I also like to jot down my thoughts and observations as I watch these things. And this interview was one worth paying attention to, I think.
I'll share my notes here for anyone who wishes to read them, but because I am busy, they haven't been given much editing, other than to insert a few relevant video links where I think they are pertinent. If you are a Trump supporter, you probably won't be happy with my commentary and may be among those who continue to inaccurately label me a "Trump hater" for raising the concerns that I do. The truth is that I have a lot of questions that I would still like to hear Trump answer, and asking those questions doesn't make me a "hater." The questions and concerns that I raise are fair ones, and I never criticize Trump without explaining why.
The comments below were my initial impressions after having seen only a portion of the video having to do with Trump's response to questions about COVID and the vaccines. This was shared as a response to someone on Facebook who was recommending the interview.
Trump continues to point the finger of blame at everyone but himself. There is ZERO excuse for why Fauci should have held the influence that he did all throughout 2020. If Trump truly couldn’t have fired Fauci, he most certainly could have neutered him. But he didn’t.
And is Trump REALLY being honest when he says that he didn't really heed Fauci's advice? Total B.S. It was Fauci and Birx that Trump kept at the podium with him as representative of the advice that was coming from the White House. As President, the buck stopped with Trump, so it is absolute garbage for him to now point the finger at governors as if Trump himself weren't the one setting the tone for the entire nation through his words, actions, and who it was that he kept at his side. Again, the buck stopped with Trump.
In that interview with Megyn Kelly, he claims not to be blaming governors for getting it wrong (again, assuming no responsibility of his own), and yet it is laughable how often Trump has criticized DeSantis for FOLLOWING THE GUIDANCE COMING FROM THE WHITE HOUSE. Is he delusional? Trump has proclaimed himself "the father of the vaccine," and has claimed that it is HE whom we should credit for "that beautiful shot," and he thinks he can get away with criticizing DeSantis for ever having supported the shots that Trump spent all of 2021 telling people were safe and effective and that they should get?
And let’s talk for a minute about the excuse that Trump continues to give that makes no sense. Trump has repeatedly said, as if it is some sort of defense of him, that he didn’t mandate the shots. Okay. So what? Per Trump's own insistence in the past that it is HIM whom we should thank for the vaccines, there never would have been a COVID vaccine for Biden to have mandated IF NOT FOR TRUMP. He needs to acknowledge that there are daily news reports that the shots are causing harm. He still isn’t doing that. His answer is that he didn’t mandate it. But he is avoiding the fact that the shots that he claims to have been “the father of” are reportedly causing illness, injury, and death. Accepting his excuse that he didn’t force people to take the poison is the equivalent of claiming that a drug dealer isn’t doing anything wrong by providing street drugs to people because they are taking the poison of their own accord. But most people don’t think that way about drug dealers. Most people (though not all) think that drug dealers should be held accountable for supplying to people drugs that might kill them. And most people also expect for there to be some accountability on the part of those in leadership positions who have assured people that the vaccines were “safe and effective” to be made to answer to us if what they have told us wasn’t true. Many of the same people who want to hold vaccine manufacturers to account for not being transparent with us want to give Trump a pass for misleading people into believing that the vaccines were safe and effective. They have proven to be neither. And yet, Trump’s answer seems to be, “I didn’t make ya take it!”
But the thing is, many DID take it upon Trump’s recommendation, and CHILDREN are still being made targets of the shots (and COVID research studies). If Trump hasn’t the courage to speak up and do the right thing now by telling the TRUTH about the COVID shots, then why should we expect him to ever do to the right thing on any other matter. He is showing us who he is. And believe me, I’m as disappointed as a person could be. I was a die-hard Trump supporter. But anyone who still has the capacity for critical thought has to look at all of this and see that it doesn’t add up. Trump is not shooting straight with us. And I suspect that his avoidance of the debate stage is an indicator that he KNOWS it and doesn’t want to have to come clean.
Below are additional notes and they are sequential in order to how they were raised in the interview.
--Brief cheering that Mitt Romney isn't running again for the Senate --> Don't forget that Trump gave Romney his endorsement, even after we ALL knew what a POS Romney is. (Or should I call him "Pierre Delecto?")
--I think that people should take note of the fact that Trump is still resistant to the idea of holding bad actors in our government to account. What people need to realize is that Trump is framing the conversation in a way that will NEVER lead to justice being restored. He seems to have learned no lessons at all since he made the decision NOT to uphold his promise to seek justice with regard to alleged crimes committed by the Clinton crime family. Trump speaks of the Clintons (including alleged rapist Bill) more kindly than he does of DeSantis. One has to wonder if Trump has the ability to discern where the real threats are coming from. As I pointed out in a video that I shared some time back, if we listen to the things Trump says when he is asked about his intentions to hold bad actors to account, we will find that his answers indicate that he is a man who doesn't have it in him to follow through on the promises he makes to drain the swamp.
There is an arrogance that is displayed in Trump seeming to think that the decision of whether or not justice should be pursued should be left solely to him; however, such thinking only reinforces the two-tiered system of justice that has taken a stronghold in our government. For true justice to be restored, justice should be sought where harms are believed to have been caused. We feed the multiple-tiered system of justice when we allow Trump himself to speak outside of what we CLAIM to want the rule of law and order to be. When we applaud Trump for believing that it is up to him to decide whether or not justice should be pursued with regard to Hillary Clinton, Fauci, Biden, or anyone else, what we are doing is giving permission to the same kind of whimsical enforcement of the law that we criticize those on the left for engaging in. It is just as much an abuse of the rule of law to FAIL to hold people to account when the evidence suggests that it should be done, as it is to deliberately target people when the evidence simply isn't there. Wrap your head around that.
--Trump spoke about how he has shined a light on the "fake news." It is true that Trump has rightfully called out how deceptive the mainstream media is; HOWEVER, I would love to see an interviewer ask Trump why it is that he has never called out the dangerous and false propaganda narratives that have become every bit as entrenched in our nation as the "fake news" of the mainstream media. Perhaps the reason that Trump has failed to warn people about the dangerous propaganda is because Trump himself is the hero of those fictions that have taken a stronghold among many conservatives. At times I have wondered if Trump hasn't come to believe the propaganda fictions himself. He certainly has repeated the talking points that are found in them. A couple of examples of that would be Trump's argument (as a sort of defense of himself) that he didn't mandate the shots. I've discussed my opinion of that excuse above, so I will say no more about it here, other than to note that this excuse is a common talking point among those who have bought into the propaganda fictions. Another propaganda talking point, which Trump himself has repeated many times, is his claim that, when he was president, "everyone wanted the vaccine." This is verifiably untrue, and I have pointed to the evidence which debunks such a claim in other articles and videos on my website. Nonetheless, it is a talking point that has taken hold to such a degree that, even when the evidence of the actual facts of history are placed right in front of people, those who have adopted the propaganda narratives as the gospel truth will still continue to ignore the facts and to accept the lie. With regard to many things having to do with Trump, many conservatives are participating in a dangerous forgetting and rewriting of history.
--Trump says of those on the left that "it's really more about what they don't talk about than what they talk about." People should take note of this and look at what it is that Trump himself ISN'T talking about. The vaccines!
--Okay, Trump brags that his firing of Comey was "one of the great firings." BUT...anyone who was paying attention to politics prior to Trump's election in 2016 knew damn well that Comey was a snake and not to be trusted. Trump DID have the opportunity to dismiss Comey when he assumed the role of POTUS. And yet, inexplicably, the man who was sworn into office in January 2017 was a different man than we saw on the campaign trail prior to his election. The tough talk of holding people to account AND the repeated recitation of that "Snake" poem that Trump liked to recite, which made many believe that he was on guard not to trust those known to be dangerous snakes--well, all of that went by the wayside as soon as Trump received the votes he needed to put him in office. He never took seriously the warning of that "Snake" poem. If he had, he NEVER would have allowed Comey (who had just let Hillary off the hook, just as Trump himself did when he took office) to remain on as his FBI Director. Trump seems to be hoping that we are stupid and that we don't remember the facts of history. The TRUTH (fact check it to your heart's content) is that Trump made a terrible error in judgment in keeping that KNOWN snake Comey on as his FBI Director, for it was Comey's manufactured and "leaked" memos that kicked off the Mueller investigation. People forget--or perhaps never knew--how all of that came about. Trump has a long history of giving many "second chances" to known bad actors in our government. Hillary. Comey. Romney. Wray. Fauci. The list is actually quite long of instances in which Trump did not hold people to account (at the very least by neutering their power and influence) when he had opportunities to do so. Many now are critical of the job McCarthy is doing as House Speaker as well, but it should not be forgotten that it was TRUMP who voiced support for McCarthy to be installed as Speaker of the House. Trump's interference in influencing that vote resulted in shutting down a hopeful, inspiring, and much-needed pushback against the establishment. Yet, once again, Trump foolishly chose to side against the people. We'd have been a stronger nation right now if Trump had kept his nose out of it altogether OR if he had thrown his support instead behind those who were seeking to diminish the power of someone like McCarthy rather than to elevate his role in our government. I can only wonder what Trump supporters like Peter Navarro thought of Trump's endorsement of McCarthy, for Navarro had written (a year prior to McCarthy having been made House Speaker) that McCarthy (and also McConnell) were both "trash" that Trump should seek to throw out. Navarro comes with many of his own faults, but Trump has a long history of NOT listening to people who do offer good advice and of listening instead to those whom he should have known better than to trust. Simply put, Trump's judgement is crap.
https://www.voicesofnebraska.com/silent-no-more/where-we-were-a-year-ago-and-where-we-are-now
--Since I have already addressed (above) a lot of Trump's comments regarding his response to the plandemic, I won't repeat it here. I will add to my previous comments, though, by pointing out Trump's claim that "nobody knew" what was going on when the COVID virus first made it's way into the news. But the truth (and, again, feel free to fact check it yourself) is that Trump DID know--and he said so--back as early as February 2020, that the virus had a very low fatality rate and did not pose any tremendous threat. He also, at that time, insisted that the "cure" to the virus should never prove to be more harmful than the problem itself. But then look at what he later went on to do. It was AFTER Trump made those honest and truthful statements in February 2020 that he later went on to shut down our country and then later announce Operation Warp Speed, which didn't even happen until AFTER we had "flattened the curve." So we really do deserve to hear from Trump himself why it is that his story has changed from the one that he told back in February 2020 to the one he tells now about how the virus was so deadly as to have warranted lining the pockets of vaccine manufacturers in order to fast-track an experimental vaccine for a virus with a fatality rate of less than half of one percent. Trump isn't being honest when he says that "no one knew."
Many of the same conservative media outlets who now cover for Trump and allow him to avoid being made to answer for his role in the decisions made in 2020 are the very same media outlets who were reporting the truth all throughout 2020. The truth is that the threat of the virus was inflated by the overuse of unreliable testing and the unreliable reporting of causes of death that year. Many deaths were reported as being "with COVID," including, in some truly bizarre instances, deaths resulting from things such as a motorcycle accident. The books were cooked to try to support the reporting of a reality which did not exist. But Trump says NOTHING about any of that. Finally, I would just point to how much Trump's response to Megyn Kelly appears to be a planned talking point for him. What he tells Megyn Kelly very much echoes the answer he gave to a woman (in the video below) a few months back who had asked Trump about the vaccines and what he would do when the next virus comes along. Notice how Trump says in both his answer to the woman in Iowa and in response to Megyn Kelly that he isn't going to talk about the vaccines. And then remember what it is that Trump said earlier in the interview with Megyn--"it's really more about what they DON'T talk about than what they talk about." Trump never does say why it is that he isn't going to talk about the vaccines. He only states that he isn't going to talk about them. Given that Trump was extremely vocal in boasting all throughout 2021 that HE is the one whom we all should be thanking for "that beautiful shot," it would be nice to hear an interviewer press Trump to say why it is that he now wishes to NOT speak about the vaccines.
--Trump speaks of having to help others who have been indicted along with him, saying that they would be destroyed if they didn't have help. "Other people get dragged into these things and they would be destroyed if we didn't help them. We have to help them." I don't disagree with that, but I do know that there are a lot of people who showed up in support of Trump on January 6, 2021, who also "got dragged into these things" (for they ARE the exact same things--politically motivated abuses of government), and many of those people HAVE had their lives destroyed. Those people do deserve to be assisted as well, but there is some sting in hearing him say that about those close to him who have been indicted, because I have been disappointed that Trump has not done more to bring attention to the plight of those individuals incarcerated by our government for political reasons. Trump has said in the past that he would help political prisoners from January 6 AFTER he is reelected. But Trump is a man whose voice carries influence and reach even when he is NOT in an elected position. There is no good reason at all to wait until he is elected to "do something." And there is also no good reason for any of us to believe that there is going to be any free and fair election that might deliver to us ANY "winner" who is going to be willing to fight on behalf of the J6ers. I think it's naive and foolish of us to presume that our next election isn't also going to end in absolute chaos, for our election process has not been made secure. Pinning conditions upon whether or not or when Trump would do something to help J6ers is a disappointment. Trump DID call for people to get out and protest when HE was indicted. He should have been using his voice and influence to rally the people to protest LONG ago on behalf of the J6 political prisoners as well. Trump even acknowledges later in the interview with Megyn Kelly that, unlike other people who have become political targets, he "has a voice," but the "other people" he is referencing who he claims don't have a voice are not J6ers, but are people in politics. He says, "if other people get indicted, they're out of politics."
--I think Trump was spot on when he said that it is parents and not school boards who are the ones responsible for guiding and protecting children. I did think it was odd how he hesitated, though, in his answer when Megyn Kelly asked him if he believed that a man could become a woman.
--Trump's responses regarding questions about his keeping of classified documents were clumsy. And when the conversation moved on to Megyn Kelly pointing out that Trump has only been accused of keeping classified documents, and not destroying them as Hillary Clinton was alleged to have done, Trump repeated a lie that he has repeated so often that I wonder if he hasn't come to believe it himself. He referenced the use of Bleachbit software to destroy her emails and (yet again) falsely claimed that Bleachbit is a "very expensive process" and "nobody does it because it's so expensive." But that is absurd, and it is disconcerting to think that Trump apparently has no one around him to correct him on such simple and stupid mistakes. The story that Bleachbit is so very expensive is a lie that Trump has repeated for a very long time. If he did once believe that to be so, he should surely have had someone around him who would correct him on the matter by now, for allowing him to repeat such things makes him look foolish and uninformed. Bleachbit may be downloaded and used by anyone for FREE.
--Trump says in the interview that he is being targeted by the left in attempts to try to keep him from becoming the Republican nominee. That might be the case, but I think that there is equally as much reason to believe that the "witch hunts" against Trump might possibly be done deliberately by the left in order to push people's support and sympathy toward Trump. As Trump says in the interview, the focus has remained on him. In his arrogance, he is sure that the reason for it is because the other candidates are inferior to him; but I think people would be foolish to rule out the possibility that conservatives are being played by the left into supporting Trump. The policies of the left are stupid, but those who have so successfully gotten them to take hold in our nation are not stupid people. They are strategic and they are patient. I don't pretend to know what will happen, but I can guarantee you that we would be foolish not to entertain the possibility that those on the left are smart enough to know that every witch hunt only pushes people (and their sympathies) more toward Trump--a man who has proven in his first term to be someone who did NOT hold them to account when he had the chance and who has proven to be malleable to the wishes of those (like Fauci and friends) who seek to subvert our nation. Again, if we are smart, we shouldn't rule it out as a possibility that the left is herding conservatives. The idea is every bit as plausible (in fact, more so, I think) than the idea that "Trump is in charge" and that he has some sort of covert plan that we should trust.
--Trump talks at length about how DeSantis owes everything to Trump. I think anyone would agree that Trump's endorsement certainly opened the door for DeSantis, but I find Trump's calls for "loyalty" from those whom he believes he has helped (and wouldn't that be ALL of us?) to be very disturbing. Patriots are loyal to their country. Not to Trump. Trump's insists that his past endorsements of DeSantis should mean that we credit Trump for all of DeSantis's successes. Yet, now that DeSantis is a competitor in the presidential race, Trump has repeatedly attempted to show DeSantis as a failure. Trump wants to have it both ways with regard to DeSantis. If it is all thanks to Trump's endorsement that DeSantis got elected, then is it Trump whom we also should thank for this past endorsement of Romney? I know that it's recent news that Romney is not running again for the Senate, but Romney should have been sent packing LONG ago. If Trump wishes to be credited for installing people into positions in our government (for that almost seems to be how he views it), then he should also be willing to answer for the endorsements he has made which were truly God-awful.
Well, my neighbor just dropped off bucket of peaches, so I have work to get back to now. Megyn Kelly's interview with Trump was done well, I think. I do think that there are still some questions that Trump should be asked that he hasn't yet. I've listed some of them at the link below.
https://www.voicesofnebraska.com/silent-no-more/here_are_the_debate_questions_trump_should_be_asked