White House

Thursday May 11, 2017

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday May 11, 2017

Firing Comey won’t save Trump from the flames of the Russia scandal

“This is Nixonian” was the reaction of Senator Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, to the news that President Trump had fired FBI director James Comey.

Casey, echoed by fellow Democrats, was referring to the infamous Saturday Night Massacre, when President Richard Nixon fired the special prosecutor and attorney general who were leading the Watergate investigation. The massacre did not derail the probe. It only fueled calls for Nixon’s impeachment.

We know that President Trump has a stunning ignorance of history. He recently flubbed the basics of the causes of the civil war and seemed to think the famous abolitionist Frederick Douglass was still alive and had “done an amazing job”. It’s certainly possible that President Trump doesn’t know the lessons of Watergate.

The most famous lesson is that the cover-up is always worse than the crime.

We don’t yet know the full story of Russia’s meddling in the election, but the abrupt firing of the FBI director, who was leading an investigation into possible collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign, certainly reeks of a cover-up.

The firings did not save Richard Nixon from impeachment in the Watergate scandal and getting rid of Comey won’t save Donald Trump from the flames of the Russia scandal.

Comey’s abrupt removal as FBI director only brought calls for an independent prosecutor to a fever pitch. Senate minority leader Charles Schumer said unless such a prosecutor is appointed, “everyone will suspect cover-up.” (Continued: The Guardian)

 

Monday February 13, 2017

 

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Monday February 13, 2017

A face-to-face meeting is Trudeau’s best bet for dealing with Trump

Batten down the hatches. All the old Canadian insecurities are about to gust up to hurricane force.

January 11, 2016

A young, inexperienced, left-leaning Canadian prime minister, alone in the Oval Office with a NATO-chomping Republican silverback who will — not — shut — up — about how tough and smart and smart and tough and winning and tough and smart he is.

It’s enough to make you cover your eyes and peek between fingers. The kid’ll get eaten alive. There’ll be nothing but freshly picked-over bones of part-time drama teacher on the grassy floor of the Trump enclosure when it’s done. The Sun headlines write themselves.

There’ll be time for Kevin O’Leary to shout “Bambi vs. Godzilla!” 40 times before Justin Trudeau’s aircraft even leaves the tarmac at Ottawa airport.

Unless things work out differently. They could, you know.

November 12, 2016

Twenty days elapsed between Donald Trump’s inauguration and the announcement, Thursday morning, that Justin Trudeau will spend Monday in Washington. Surely that was plenty of time for the prime minister and his staff to go back and forth a dozen times over whether it’s even a good idea to get into the big guy’s personal space.

Maybe this whole relationship could be managed by telephone. Maybe they could tweet at each other. Maybe surrogates could do the heavy lifting. Harjit Sajjan, the defence minister, has worked with American soldiers. Chrystia Freeland’s been on CNN. Maybe Trump and Trudeau could meet, but just not quickly. Give everything a chance to settle down. What harm could there be?

Those sentiments seem to have put an extra week or two into the delay before Trudeau’s trip. But there are good reasons not to wait longer. (Continued: Paul Wells, Toronto Star)

 

Tuesday January 24, 2017

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Tuesday January 24, 2017

Welcome to the White House website, home of ‘alternative facts’

In just one weekend, the website has posted false statistics about rising crime, when crime has actually gone down over the last eight years and has ripped down sections about climate change, civil and LGBT rights

If the reader needs evidence that the White House is shifting towards a dictatorial, opaque administration, look no further than its own website

US Presidential Wall Chart by Graeme MacKay

Peruse the site at your own leisure; no need to access this evidence via the “dishonest” media.In just one weekend, the website has posted false statistics about rising crime, when crime has actually gone down over the last eight years. It has ripped down sections about climate change, civil rights and LGBT rights. It has also failed to update its website in a timely fashion, including the executive order section, despite the President having already signed several, including “easing the burden of Obamacare” which threatens millions of Americans with no health care coverage.

The President, his press secretary, senior adviser and chief of staff have all attacked the media in the last three days, saying they have been “deliberately dishonest”.

Press secretary Sean Spicer walked out of his first press conference on Saturday after an angry speech about how the media reported the crowd size at Donald Trump’s inauguration. He did not take a single question. The press briefing part of the website has not been updated.

Senior adviser and former campaign manager Kellyanne Conway defended her colleague, saying he provided the media with “alternative facts”.

The gaffes continue. On the White House’s official page of First Lady Melania Trump, staff added the name of her jewellery brand and then swiftly deleted it after they were accused of promoting her commercial venture.

The same page also reads that Melania Trump “paused her studies” at university to pursue modelling, whereas the campaign’s previous website said she had completed a degree in Slovenia.

Selective curation to advance a right-wing agenda is also being carried out on the website of the US government’s supposedly independent House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. In the “news section” there is an article by right-wing outlet the Washington Examiner, which accuses the director of the Office of Government Ethics, Walter Shaub, for making negative comments about Trump’s alleged conflicts of interest but failing to report alleged conflicts of interest under Obama. (Source: The Independent) 

 

Thursday January 12, 2017

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday January 12, 2017

Trump blasts explosive Russia reports as ‘phoney’ at wild press conference

President-elect Donald Trump angrily denied sensational claims about his relationship with Russia at his first news conference in 168 days, a wild Wednesday spectacle at which he also blasted American intelligence agencies, briefly acknowledged Russia as the culprit in hacking the Democratic party and announced a plan for his business assets that ethics experts say is unsatisfactory.

Trump spoke the day after the publication of two explosive stories about him. CNN and other outlets reported Tuesday that top intelligence officials had briefed him on the claims of Russian operatives to have compromising information on him. Later Tuesday, BuzzFeed published a dossier, compiled by a former British intelligence employee hired by Trump opponents, that included a series of detailed but unverified claims about what the material might be.

“It’s all fake news. It’s phoney stuff. It didn’t happen. And it was gotten by opponents of ours,” Trump said at Trump Tower in New York City.

The press conference was unusually chaotic. Reporters shouted to get his attention. Trump pointedly refused to accept a question from a persistent CNN reporter his team later threatened to evict if he interjected again. The event began with vice-president-elect Mike Pence and Trump spokesman Sean Spicer assailing media outlets as irresponsible and wrong; Spicer referred to BuzzFeed as a “left-wing blog.”

In the most colourful moment, the president-elect denied a claim in the dossier about Russia supposedly filming a hotel liaison between him and prostitutes. He said he had always been careful to warn his associates that they might be filmed by hidden cameras in foreign hotel rooms. He added, in denying a particular detail of the supposed encounter, “I’m also very much of a germaphobe, believe me.”

Asked about one of the most serious claims — that Trump’s team had regular contact with Russia during the campaign — he simply ignored the question and answered another. (Source: Toronto Star) 

 

Thursday November 11, 2016

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator Ð Thursday November 11, 2016 ObamaÕs legacy is on the line with TrumpÕs win President Obama urged the country to unify Wednesday and pledged to work with President-elect Donald Trump, a candidate who for months he blasted as unfit to lead the country and who will now be succeeding him in office. ÒIt is no secret that the president-elect and I have had some pretty significant differences,Ó Obama said of Trump in a Rose Garden address. ÒOne thing you realize in this job is that the presidency and the vice presidency is bigger than any of us.Ó Obama likened the presidency to a relay race, telling the hundreds of exhausted and emotionally shaken White House staffers who packed the Rose Garden that they were leaving the country in a better position than it was eight years ago. But for Obama, the election of Trump and the RepublicansÕ control of Congress puts at risk many of his signature policies over the past eight years. At the core of TrumpÕs campaign was a promise to repeal the Affordable Care Act and to scrap ObamaÕs executive actions on immigration and climate change. Trump also has promised to undo the presidentÕs deal to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon, the biggest foreign policy achievement of ObamaÕs second term. Many of the changes to ObamaÕs signature programs could happen quickly. Trump has vowed to pull out of the Paris Agreement to curb greenhouse gases and has promised to cancel an Environmental Protection Agency power-plant rule that is intended to cut emissions by about 30 percent over the next nine years, compared with 2005 levels. On immigration, Trump vowed to overturn ObamaÕs executive actions to grant work permits to millions of undocumented immigrants, including more than 700,000 younger immigrants already benefiting from the program. A Trump administration could also drop the governmentÕs defense of legal challenges to his executive actions on immigration. ObamaÕs pus

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday November 11, 2016

Obama’s legacy is on the line with Trump’s win

President Obama urged the country to unify Wednesday and pledged to work with President-elect Donald Trump, a candidate who for months he blasted as unfit to lead the country and who will now be succeeding him in office.

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator Ð Thursday July 28, 2016 Barack Obama to make case for Hillary Clinton, his legacy President Barack Obama's three Democratic convention speeches have, in succession, launched his national career, thrust him into the Oval Office and secured him a second term. On Wednesday, he'll work during his fourth marquee convention address to ensure those earlier efforts weren't for naught. In his prime-time pitch for Hillary Clinton, and during a heavy campaign schedule this fall, Obama plans to argue not only for the Democratic nominee, but for the progressive policies that he's spent the last eight years enacting -- an agenda that will depend largely on his successor to maintain. His message, according to those helping him prepare for the speech: Don't flush everything away with Donald Trump. Obama plans to draw on his long and complicated relationship with Clinton, which began as a rivalry but has evolved into what the pair hopes can become the first elected Democrat-to-Democrat presidential transition in modern history. In pre-convention interviews, Obama has been frank about his relationship with Clinton, admitting they aren't "bosom buddies.Ó "We don't go vacationing together," Obama said during a CBS interview Sunday. "I think that I've got a pretty clear-eyed sense of both her strengths and her weaknesses. And what I would say would be that this is somebody who knows as much about domestic and foreign policy as anybody.Ó "She's not always flashy. And there are better speech-makers," he said. "But she knows her stuff.Ó Many top Republicans skipped their party's convention last week, fearing links to Trump. But Democratic convention organizers had a wealth of willing speakers, programming prime-time speeches from high-profile and well-liked Democrats like Obama, Vice President Joe Biden (who also speaks Wednesday), first lady Michelle Obama, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth War

July 28, 2016

“It is no secret that the president-elect and I have had some pretty significant differences,” Obama said of Trump in a Rose Garden address. “One thing you realize in this job is that the presidency and the vice presidency is bigger than any of us.”

Obama likened the presidency to a relay race, telling the hundreds of exhausted and emotionally shaken White House staffers who packed the Rose Garden that they were leaving the country in a better position than it was eight years ago.

But for Obama, the election of Trump and the Republicans’ control of Congress puts at risk many of his signature policies over the past eight years. At the core of Trump’s campaign was a promise to repeal the Affordable Care Act and to scrap Obama’s executive actions on immigration and climate change. Trump also has promised to undo the president’s deal to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon, the biggest foreign policy achievement of Obama’s second term.

February 10, 2016

February 10, 2016

Many of the changes to Obama’s signature programs could happen quickly. Trump has vowed to pull out of the Paris Agreement to curb greenhouse gases and has promised to cancel an Environmental Protection Agency power-plant rule that is intended to cut emissions by about 30 percent over the next nine years, compared with 2005 levels.

Presidents of the United States of America | By Graeme MacKay 1789 - 2015 For sale at the mackaycartoons boutique President, USA, United States, America, Americana, politics, history, Executive, caricature, wall, chart, list, education, classroom, satire, cartoon

Presidents of the United States of America

On immigration, Trump vowed to overturn Obama’s executive actions to grant work permits to millions of undocumented immigrants, including more than 700,000 younger immigrants already benefiting from the program. A Trump administration could also drop the government’s defense of legal challenges to his executive actions on immigration.

Obama’s push to persuade Congress to ratify the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership, a massive trade deal that Trump savaged on the campaign trail, now looks dead. Trump has vowed to renegotiate other existing deals that are already in place. (Continued: Washington Post)