THE DAILY NEWSLETTER  - TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 2020

Media Winners & Losers

MEDIA WINNER:
Jennifer Griffin

Fox News national security correspondent Jennifer Griffin doubled down on her previous reporting which claimed President Donald Trump disrespected veterans and war dead, adding that Secretary of Treasury Steve Mnuchin was in the room with the president when he disparaged four-star generals.

Griffin reported Mnuchin was at the Tank meeting in the Pentagon on July 20, 2017, when Trump allegedly called four-star generals “losers,” “dopes,” and “babies”– calling his claim to have never heard the president speak that way “patently false.”

“I confirmed with people who were present at the meeting that the president used those exact words in a meeting at the Pentagon,” she said. “I also circled back with my sources this weekend that confirmed that the president did not go, or did not want to go to the Aisne-Marne cemetery in France to honor the American war dead when he could no longer fly by helicopter and that one of the president’s favorite words that he uses when he’s angry is ‘loser.'”

What's more, resurfaced video bolsters Griffin's reporting and completely undermines Mnuchin's claim to have "never" heard the President talk this way.

Griffin has strongly defended her sourcing after Trump began trashing her and demanding her firing. Fox reporters and hosts pushed back repeatedly.

Griffin is refusing to be intimidated because that's what winners do.

 

MEDIA LOSER:
Francis Brennan

Francis Brennan, the Trump campaign’s Director of Strategic Response, posted a tweet on Sunday mocking Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden for “meandering along” instead of talking to reporters.

Biden was in Wilmington, Delaware on Sunday and attended the morning services at St. Joseph on the Brandywine Roman Catholic Church, and then walked outside. The video clip, posted by Brennan, shows Biden walking out of the church past rows of gravestones that surround the church as a reporter calls out to him. Biden waves and continues walking — to visit the graves of his family members who are buried there.

"Joe Biden just keeps meandering along," Brennan callously in the tweet sharing the video. And he faced swift and widespread backlash.

“Are you human?” asked Rep. Eric Swalwell in a reply that typified the responses.

"Joe Biden visits his son's grave after attending church this morning. Punk from Trump campaign ridicules him," wrote The Bulwark's Bill Kristol.

The Tweet remains on his timeline, without apology or clarification. But the Trump campaign director of "strategic" response has continued to tweet about Biden's mental acuity.

Maybe Brennan should have his own checked out. 

Just In

11 States Will Have Kanye West on the
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The A-Block

Condemning Antifa

Former Vice President Joe Biden specifically condemned violence committed by Antifa during the unrest that has gripped the nation for months. 

Toward the end of a brief interview, told WGAL’s Barbara Barr that he has condemned violent unrest from the beginning, and was specific when Barr asked, "do you condemn Antifa?"

Tuesday Tweet Rage

President Donald Trump was all over the place on Tuesday morning as he started the day by going on a Twitter rampage against all his political enemies.

In an online diatribe consisting of more than 50 tweets and retweets, Trump lashed out at the media, his former lawyer Michael Cohen, Vice President Joe Biden, the NBA, Black Lives Matter, and pretty much everything else that’s on his nerves.

Bromance

A new portion of Michael Cohen’s autobiography breaks down Trump's admiration for Russia's Vladimir Putin. Cohen says Trump was interested purely in the benefits his political campaign drew, and was unbothered by Russia’s election interference. Trump’s admiration for Putin, says Cohen, stems from his love of wealth, power, and "the ruling class." 

Everyone else on earth "was like an ant" to him, Cohen claims.

Bolton

Former Trump National Security Advisor John Bolton defended President Donald Trump against bombshell claims he insulted and disrespected the military during a trip to France in 2018, but he also called Trump out for disparaging the “top generals” at the Pentagon during a Labor Day White House briefing in a separate incident.

"Fear of Personal Safety"

Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic, whose bombshell story about President Trump last week has ignited untold outrage and furious denials by the White House, accepted the critique that his use of anonymous sources undermined the strength of his report. But he also defended the anonymity of the sources, saying there is "real fear of personal safety" in revealing negative news about Trump.

Gold Star Widow Hurt by Use of Son's Photo

Brittany Jacobs, a Gold Star widow, appeared on Fox News Monday morning to share her and her young son’s positive interactions, and to express their sadness at her son's photo being used in articles relating to The Atlantic's report.

Exotic

Netflix star and former zoo-owner Joe Exotic is reportedly asking President Donald Trump for a pardon from his 22-year murder-for-hire sentence, and his legal team is set to hand-deliver a copy of the application to the White House on Wednesday.

News Judgment

A very misleading tweet characterizing President Trump as being “lost and disoriented” and attributing it to “dementia” is being called out by journalists who say it is deceptive. Countless reactions have pointed out that the president was simply waiting for the First Lady ahead of boarding Marine One.

The original video clip posted to Twitter by Tom Joseph, which now has over 54,000 likes and over 25,000 retweets, floated that “Trump is lost & disoriented,” adding that “he’s deep into his degenerative neurological disease." 

Journalists quickly pointed out that the video was misleading, and that Trump was merely waiting for First Lady Melania Trump ahead of boarding Marine One.

 

Must See Clip

Oliver v Danbury

Continuing their light-hearted feudMark Boughton, the Mayor of Danbury, Connecticut, has accepted John Oliver’s challenge and committed to actually naming a sewage plant after the late-night host on one condition: Oliver has to attend the ribbon-cutting ceremony.

And he delivered the news at a port-a-potty.

Links We Like

The New York Attorney General’s postal service lawsuit is mostly junk mail
- Dan McLaughlin, via National Review
By the standards Trump set in that 2012 ‘Obama is fired’ vid, Trump would've fired himself
- Phillip Bump, via Washington Post

Democrats’ new strategy for winning the White House: Threaten riots if they lose
- Jonathan Tobin, via New York Post
Kyle Rittenhouse and the deadly wages of recklessness.
- David French, via The Dispatch
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