Scammers scamming a scammer
by Tom Sullivan
“I never understood wind,” the president began before launching into another incoherent monologue on wind turbines.
On construction sites across the South of my youth, such monologues from co-workers began, "Now, I'll tell you what's the truth...." You knew what came next would be a doozy.
“I never understood wind,” Donald Trump told the Turning Point USA conference Saturday. “I know windmills very much, I have studied it better than anybody."
Here we go. The rest was word salad.
Trump's puffing his encyclopedic knowledge of all things has brought him the allegiance of millions of credulous followers. So credulous, in fact, that he is not the only scammer scamming them. Dark money groups unaffiliated with his campaign have appropriated Trump's logo and likeness to raise $46 million so far that is not going into his campaign:
The groups mimic Trump’s brand in the way they look and feel. They borrow the president’s Twitter avatar on Facebook pages, use clips of Trump’s voice in robocalls asking for “an emergency contribution to the campaign” and, in some cases, have been affiliated with former Trump aides, such as onetime deputy campaign manager David Bossie. But most are spending little money to help the president win in 2020, POLITICO found.And for the country in general. Keeping critical-thinking education out of public schools works for predators until they have competitors. Most of the money comes from donors giving $200 or less.
The unofficial pro-Trump boosters number in the hundreds and are alarming the actual operatives charged with reelecting the president: They suck up money that Trump aides think should be going to the campaign or the Republican National Committee, and they muddy the Trump campaign’s message and make it harder to accumulate new donors, Trump allies say.
“There’s nothing we can do to stop them,” said Kelly Sadler, a spokeswoman for America First, the one super PAC authorized by Trump. “This is a problem for the campaign, as well as us, as well as for the RNC.”
Trump was apoplectic, yelling: You’re stealing my money! You’re stealing my fucking money! What the fuck is this?Trump really dislikes others making money off his brand.
Seeing Bannon, Trump turned on him and screamed: Why are you letting him steal my fucking money? Bannon and Christie together set out to explain to Trump federal law. Months before the election, the law said, the nominees of the two major parties were expected to prepare to take control of the government. The government supplied them with office space in downtown DC, along with computers and rubbish bins and so on, but the campaigns paid their people. To which Trump replied: Fuck the law. I don’t give a fuck about the law. I want my fucking money. Bannon and Christie tried to explain that Trump couldn’t have both his money and a transition.Forty-seven million dollars is a lot of staff, mister president. You should pay attention more.
Shut it down, said Trump. Shut down the transition.