“’It’s very, very tough because it’s an island,’ the president said, asserting that his government received ‘A+’ marks for responding to storms in Texas and Florida. ‘The difference is this is an island sitting in the middle of an ocean — and it’s a big ocean, a really, really big ocean.’”— Donald Trump, as reported by The New York Times, discussing hurricane aid for Puerto Rico, which sits firmly in the Caribbean Sea, about 100 miles from the Dominican Republic, or about a 2.5 hour flight from Miami.
Brody
How knee-slappingly funny . . . almost as funny as Barack Obama thinking there were 57 states, or when he referred to Navy corpsmen as corpse-men, or when he stated Arkansas is next to Illinois, or when he declared Austrian was a spoken language . . .
This was hardly a gaffe worth peeing yourself over, guys.
Juanjo
How amusing, Brody is suing the old tu quoque logical fallacy or as it is also known, the 7-year old kid defense -“Bobby did it too”.
ladyvader
Obama misspoke, there were 57 primaries that year. The territories get a say in the process by being able to vote in the primaries.
Guam voted for Trump while Puerto Rico went with Rubio.
The more you know, the less likely you’re to look the fool.
BigWill
You are so dim Mo/Brody.
dwes09
Sorry, President Obama never thought there were 57 states, ans anyone other than a mindless regressive knows. He was referring to a period in which he had visited 57 states, or as people with brains understand: a few of them more than once.
Here is a link to the truth regarding the regressive innuendos and half truths you refer to:
http://www.factcheck.org/2011/06/obamas-bumbles/
It is probably too difficult for you to actually understand this, but there is a huge difference between attempts to impugn Obama’s intelligence and actual examples of Trumps lack thereof. Same for depth of education, vocabulary, sophistication and intellectual curiosity. Obama had them and demonstrated them. Trump does not and demonstrates that.
leobaga
You do know Queerty is Fake News, right?
Trump hates Muslim gay killers. That’s all that matters. MAGA!
Olivia Davis
I don’t know why people believe Trump can think. All I see is an unbalanced automaton running on a random internal program that may at some point decide to nuke a country – any country – because that’s what the program decided.
toronto
Hey;
Here is 4 weeks of Trump’s lies from January. I would need several pages to include all, but when he opens his orange shit sink, 95% are lies. Nice try there.
JAN. 21 “I wasn’t a fan of Iraq. I didn’t want to go into Iraq.” (He was for an invasion before he was against it.) JAN. 21 “A reporter for Time magazine — and I have been on their cover 14 or 15 times. I think we have the all-time record in the history of Time magazine.” (Trump was on the cover 11 times and Nixon appeared 55 times.) JAN. 23 “Between 3 million and 5 million illegal votes caused me to lose the popular vote.” (There’s no evidence of illegal voting.) JAN. 25 “Now, the audience was the biggest ever. But this crowd was massive. Look how far back it goes. This crowd was massive.” (Official aerial photos show Obama’s 2009 inauguration was much more heavily attended.) JAN. 25 “Take a look at the Pew reports (which show voter fraud.)” (The report never mentioned voter fraud.) JAN. 25 “You had millions of people that now aren’t insured anymore.” (The real number is less than 1 million, according to the Urban Institute.) JAN. 25 “So, look, when President Obama was there two weeks ago making a speech, very nice speech. Two people were shot and killed during his speech. You can’t have that.” (There were no gun homicide victims in Chicago that day.) JAN. 26 “We’ve taken in tens of thousands of people. We know nothing about them. They can say they vet them. They didn’t vet them. They have no papers. How can you vet somebody when you don’t know anything about them and you have no papers? How do you vet them? You can’t.” (Vetting lasts up to two years.) JAN. 26 “I cut off hundreds of millions of dollars off one particular plane, hundreds of millions of dollars in a short period of time. It wasn’t like I spent, like, weeks, hours, less than hours, and many, many hundreds of millions of dollars. And the plane’s going to be better.” (Most of the cuts were already planned.) JAN. 28 “The coverage about me in the @nytimes and the @washingtonpost has been so false and angry that the Times actually apologized to its dwindling subscribers and readers.” (It never apologized.) JAN. 29 “The Cuban-Americans, I got 84 percent of that vote.” (There is no support for this.) JAN. 30 “Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage.” (At least 746 people were detained and processed, and the Delta outage happened two days later.) FEB. 3 “Professional anarchists, thugs and paid protesters are proving the point of the millions of people who voted to MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!” (There is no evidence of paid protesters.) FEB. 4 “After being forced to apologize for its bad and inaccurate coverage of me after winning the election, the FAKE NEWS @nytimes is still lost!” (It never apologized.) FEB. 5 “We had 109 people out of hundreds of thousands of travelers and all we did was vet those people very, very carefully.” (About 60,000 people were affected.) FEB. 6 “I have already saved more than $700 million when I got involved in the negotiation on the F-35.” (Much of the price drop was projected before Trump took office.) FEB. 6 “It’s gotten to a point where it is not even being reported. And in many cases, the very, very dishonest press doesn’t want to report it.” (Terrorism has been reported on, often in detail.) FEB. 6 “The failing @nytimes was forced to apologize to its subscribers for the poor reporting it did on my election win. Now they are worse!” (It didn’t apologize.) FEB. 6 “And the previous administration allowed it to happen because we shouldn’t have been in Iraq, but we shouldn’t have gotten out the way we got out. It created a vacuum, ISIS was formed.” (The group’s origins date to 2004.) FEB. 7 “And yet the murder rate in our country is the highest it’s been in 47 years, right? Did you know that? Forty-seven years.” (It was higher in the 1980s and ’90s.) FEB. 7 “I saved more than $600 million. I got involved in negotiation on a fighter jet, the F-35.” (The Defense Department projected this price drop before Trump took office.) FEB. 9 “Chris Cuomo, in his interview with Sen. Blumenthal, never asked him about his long-term lie about his brave ‘service’ in Vietnam. FAKE NEWS!” (It was part of Cuomo’s first question.) FEB. 9 “Sen. Richard Blumenthal now misrepresents what Judge Gorsuch told him?” (The Gorsuch comments were later corroborated.) FEB. 10 “I don’t know about it. I haven’t seen it. What report is that?” (Trump knew about Flynn’s actions for weeks.) FEB. 12 “Just leaving Florida. Big crowds of enthusiastic supporters lining the road that the FAKE NEWS media refuses to mention. Very dishonest!” (The media did cover it.) FEB. 16 “We got 306 because people came out and voted like they’ve never seen before so that’s the way it goes. I guess it was the biggest Electoral College win since Ronald Reagan.” (George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama all won bigger margins in the Electoral College.) FEB. 16 “That’s the other thing that was wrong with the travel ban. You had Delta with a massive problem with their computer system at the airports.” (Delta’s problems happened two days later.) FEB. 16 “Walmart announced it will create 10,000 jobs in the United States just this year because of our various plans and initiatives.” (The jobs are a result of its investment plans announced in October 2016.) FEB. 16 “When WikiLeaks, which I had nothing to do with, comes out and happens to give, they’re not giving classified information.” (Not always. They have released classified information in the past.) FEB. 16 “We had a very smooth rollout of the travel ban. But we had a bad court. Got a bad decision.” (The rollout was chaotic.) FEB. 16 “They’re giving stuff — what was said at an office about Hillary cheating on the debates. Which, by the way, nobody mentions. Nobody mentions that Hillary received the questions to the debates.” (It was widely covered.) FEB. 18 “And there was no way to vet those people. There was no documentation. There was no nothing.” (Refugees receive multiple background checks, taking up to two years.) FEB. 18 “You look at what’s happening in Germany, you look at what’s happening last night in Sweden. Sweden, who would believe this?” (Trump implied there was a terror attack in Sweden, but there was no such attack.) FEB. 24 “By the way, you folks are in here — this place is packed, there are lines that go back six blocks.” (There was no evidence of long lines.) FEB. 24 “ICE came and endorsed me.” (Only its union did.) FEB. 24 “Obamacare covers very few people — and remember, deduct from the number all of the people that had great health care that they loved that was taken away from them — it was taken away from them.” (Obamacare increased coverage by a net of about 20 million.) FEB. 27 “Since Obamacare went into effect, nearly half of the insurers are stopped and have stopped from participating in the Obamacare exchanges.” (Many fewer pulled out.) FEB. 27 “On one plane, on a small order of one plane, I saved $725 million. And I would say I devoted about, if I added it up, all those calls, probably about an hour. So I think that might be my highest and best use.” (Much of the price cut was already projected.) FEB. 28 “And now, based on our very strong and frank discussions, they are beginning to do just that.” (NATO countries agreed to meet defense spending requirements in 2014.) FEB. 28 “The E.P.A.’s regulators were putting people out of jobs by the hundreds of thousands.” (There’s no evidence that the Waters of the United States rule caused severe job
Paul Nadolski
I’m not normally one to cut Trump any slack, but I would imagine most people would say Puerto Rico is in the ocean. Only serious geography nerds would specify that it’s in the Caribbean Sea.
Ari Gold
I was thinking the same thing. Just bevause you’re the president doesn’t mean your US geography must be A+ worthy.
ladyvader
No, there’s no excuse to not knowing.
Every hurricane that forms off the west coast of Africa tend to come through the Caribbean Sea and the weather reports do say specific countries with each update of said storm.
There’s no excuse for the leader of the country to not know where the country’s territories are located.
PinkoOfTheGange
But in comparison to any ocean it ain’t “really really big”.
And any way it is the context, in this comment, the entire disaster season, and since January.
RandyC
Well considering the hurricane warnings were for the Islands of the Caribbean Sea ,knowing Puerto Rico was in the caribbean wouldn’t be much of a stretch…..
ladyvader
Hurricane warnings are for specific islands in the Caribbean Sea. They’re not generic warnings. They are also for specific areas within the US.
My warnings in Jacksonville, FL for Irma were not the same as the warnings for the Keys or the southwest side of the state.
Eddie Jr
It must be close to Nambia, right?
dwes09
As I acrtuallysaid, and it is based on facts as opposed to political definitions and your personal delusions, Hawaii is part of no continent, regardless of its distance from any of them and i made that quite clear, it is the furthest outpost of the Polynesian culture, undeniably of Asian origin. NOWHERE did I make a definition based on its physical distance from anywhere. Perhaps you learned to read with “hooked on phonics”, and quite recently?
Of course, you probably think God placed Hawaiians there after destroying the tower of Babel, that seems the kind of “theory” that might appeal to you. And Trump said in the middle of a “big big ocean” when talking about Puerto Rico. Regardless of you imagination and odd need to make all his lies true, Puerto Rico is not in the middle of any ocean or sea, but quite close to the US mainland (much closer than, say, DC to Mar-a-lago).
It is funny, I defined my criteria, you seem unable to understand them, and your criteria shift by the second to suite your imagination and your adoration of Trump.
Tell me, as you seem to know intimately, what exactly DOES Trump’s asshole taste like, and how does it feel to be a toady to someone who does not give a shit about your life (if you are homosexual)? How does it feel to come here and disparage gay people, to support the erosion of our civil rights, how does it feel to be made fun of by us, to have your limited intelligence laughed at? What about that turns you on? You are not going to change minds as you have no real basis for anything you post. it is all based on imagination, myth, regressive lies and wishful thinking.
dwes09
(posted my response to “mhoffman” in the wrong place. Sorry about that!
mhoffman953
@dwes09
I assume you meant to respond to me but couldn’t figure out how to do that so you responded to Eddie Jr. (Hint: Queerty’s user interface isn’t that hard to figure out)
If you’re arguing that Hawaii is not part of any continent, then why are you defending a former President who said it was in Asia when never in any point in history has that area been considered part of Asia? Something tells me that if President Trump said the same thing, you’d condemn it but because Obama said it, then it’s okay in your mind.
Then you state, “Puerto Rico is not in the middle of any ocean or sea.” But then how does that explain this: https://i.imgur.com/0LiHTT7.png
If you want to pretend to be an expert on geography, please check a map before spouting off.
You can then go on your tirade of assuming my religious beliefs then accuse everyone you disagree with as being stupid when in fact I pointed out your partisan bias by giving those you like a pass when they misinterpret geography but citing the usage of “ocean” as a possible misinterpretation of geography when in fact it is not by the very definition. You sound like an angry old man.
mhoffman953
But by definition when someone vaguely says ocean, the dictionary defines it as: “a very large expanse of sea”
If this is the the reason people are finding to not support the President then they must have sad lives. But the detractors are the same ones who support Maxine Waters who thinks Putin is invading Korea. Or when Obama referred to Hawaii as Asia in a press conference in 2011.
You’re grasping at straws
dwes09
Actually that is you grasping. An island no further from Cuba than Cuba is from Florida is hardly “an island sitting in the middle of an ocean — and it’s a big ocean, a really, really big ocean.’” by ant definition.
As for Hawaii, geologically it is part of no continent at all, sitting squarely in the middle of the Pacific Plate. But historically and anthropologically and culturally (at least until it became a state) it is quite arguably more tied to Asia than to North America. There is a reason Asian-Pacific Islanders are considered an anthropologically related unit. But as usual, regressives cannot let reality intrude in their imaginary world.
And as for Maxine Waters, a more reasonable explanation for her gaffe is that she simply said korea when she meant crimea. I suppose you have never done that in your life? Again, not nearly as damning as not having any idea where a US colony/protectorate (that HE presides over) less than 250 miles away is. (as Trump the buffoon , or you, might say) SAD!
mhoffman953
@dwes09
LOL You’re alleging I’m grasping at straws but you’re defending Maxine Waters for not knowing geography. The same woman couldn’t even come up with the name Aleppo without help in her speech with Nancy Pelosi a few months back. She wouldn’t have even said Korea if it wasn’t for her assistants behind her whispering “Crimea” when she couldn’t even think of the place she was talking about which prompted her to blurt out Korea.
If you are going to defend that but nitpick over the definition of ocean which I provided to you, then you clearly have partisan bias in everything you say and don’t hold everyone to the same standard.
Then you go on to say, “it is quite arguably more tied to Asia than to North America” and allege that those you disagree with “cannot let reality intrude in their imaginary world”. I ask what imaginary world are you living in? Hawaii is not part of Asia. Hawaii is not closer to Asia than North America. There is no reason to associate Hawaii with Asia. If you want to be a stickler, Hawaii is part of Polynesia and Polynesia is part of Oceania.
Plus if you want to measure the distance from Hawaii to North America and Asia, you get the following:
Distance to California: 2,467 miles
Distance to Japan: 3,850 miles
Distance to China: 4,900 miles
Then you go on to mention “Asian-Pacific Islanders” but by definition from our own US Dept. off Labor Office, the Asian-Pacific Islands does not include Hawaii
Seems like you are the one living in an imaginary world
dwes09
As I acrtuallysaid, and it is based on facts as opposed to political definitions and your personal delusions, Hawaii is part of no continent, regardless of its distance from any of them and i made that quite clear, it is the furthest outpost of the Polynesian culture, undeniably of Asian origin. NOWHERE did I make a definition based on its physical distance from anywhere. Perhaps you learned to read with “hooked on phonics”, and quite recently?
Of course, you probably think God placed Hawaiians there after destroying the tower of Babel, that seems the kind of “theory” that might appeal to you. And Trump said in the middle of a “big big ocean” when talking about Puerto Rico. Regardless of you imagination and odd need to make all his lies true, Puerto Rico is not in the middle of any ocean or sea, but quite close to the US mainland (much closer than, say, DC to Mar-a-lago).
It is funny, I defined my criteria, you seem unable to understand them, and your criteria shift by the second to suite your imagination and your adoration of Trump.
Tell me, as you seem to know intimately, what exactly DOES Trump’s asshole taste like, and how does it feel to be a toady to someone who does not give a shit about your life (if you are homosexual)? How does it feel to come here and disparage gay people, to support the erosion of our civil rights, how does it feel to be made fun of by us, to have your limited intelligence laughed at? What about that turns you on? You are not going to change minds as you have no real basis for anything you post. it is all based on imagination, myth, regressive lies and wishful thinking.
Juanjo
Miss Hoffman is off on her tu quoque arguments. I do love you trotting out a statement made at an Asia Pacific conference where he made a reference to Asia as if it were the same as Trump’s drivel
PinkoOfTheGange
But the State Department includes HI as part of the region. And I can’t find the, what must be obscure footnote, that supports your assertion from the Dept of Labor.
But neither refute the truth of the history of migration in HI up till the mid 20th century as stated by dwes.
aaparker
dwes09…spot on!!
mhoffman953
@Juanjo & @PinkoOfTheGange
Obama made the following comment when in Hawaii, “When I meet with world leaders, what’s striking — whether it’s in Europe or here in Asia”. Are all of you suggesting that you now believe Hawaii is part of the continent of Asia? It has nothing to do with who has migrated to Hawaii in the past or the type of conference Obama was at. If Trump made the same gaffe, none of you would defend it like you are now. So let’s see who things Hawaii is part of Asia
Also on a side note, what’s with Juanjo constantly thinking that calling me “miss” or female pronouns is an insult? I guess Juanjo thinks referring to men as women is an insult because he finds women inferior. So much for respecting the pronouns…
Chris
I don’t care whether or not Trump knows where Puerto Rico is. I care that, to date, the federal government has done very little (to nothing) to help an American territory that has been devastated by two hurricanes within a month.
If I were living on that Island, I’d demand a plebiscite to determine whether to remain a US territory after this mess is over. Their value to the rest of this country is on display based on how we’re failing to help them in their time of desperate need.
leobaga
Blame the democrats. They’re obstructionists. Can’t wait for the midterm. They’d be obliterated.
PinkoOfTheGange
Let us not forget the US Virgin Islands are actually in worse shape.
aaparker
In response to leobaga:
If you are kidding, then I applaud your commitment to very dry sarcasm. If you are serious then I am disturbed by the utter lack of knowledge and thought in your statement. Tell me this, how can the Democrats obstruct something over which they have no power? The Republicans control the house, the senate, and the executive branch. In other words, the whole shebang. They literally have no one to blame but themselves at this point for any failure to govern. Please, please stop taking part in promulgating falsehoods and propaganda. Have whatever opinion you want, love the Republicans if that speaks to you, but start from a basis of truth.
DCguy
@leobaga
Please point out the aid package for Puerto Rico that any Democrats have obstructed. If you cannot directly respond to this, don’t bother.
mhoffman953
@DCguy
He’s talking about the hurricane tax relief bill that would’ve also extended funding for the FAA. Democrats voted against it with Nancy Pelosi citing that the Dream Act should’ve also been added to the bill. If House Democrats cared as much as you allege, then they can present a bill for relief as well without sneaky unrelated provisions added into it but they haven’t
DCguy
@mhoffman953
Awww, sweetie, how adorable, you’re defending your other screename.
As for the relief, you mean the fact that at the posting of this a hospital ship hadn’t been dispatched to PR? You mean the fact that the waiver for foreign flagged ships was waived for TX and FL but not for Puerto Rico?
Sorry screename #6, but that was all Trump and the GOP.
mhoffman953
@DCguy
Interesting that you act oblivious to how Democrats obstructed aid but then when I point out how they did, you completely disregard what I said by not even acknowledging it. Instead you peddle your multiple screen name conspiracy.
As far as the waiver for foreign flagged ships that was waived before you wrote your comment. I guess you’ll pretend that you weren’t aware of that either. Lay off the poppers and stick to what’s really happening.
Luna1979
Politics turn everything ugly. They always have and always will divide people who might otherwise be good friends. Trump’s statement is not worth all this debate. It sounds predictably him. As long as help is given, fine. I think we have all passed the point of expecting eloquence.
DCguy
So I see that in addition to Brody and MHoffman 953, Mo Bro is trying to add in a new screename. Shall we welcome ” leobaga” as another fake screename from the same right wing, anti-lgbt troll account?
:::::Clap Clap Clap:::::
leobaga
Um I’ve a member way before them. You do know 15% of gays voted for Trump, right?
Spike
President Dotard again reminding us that it turns out GW Bush isn’t the dumbest President ever, he himself is.
leobaga
You do know Hitler was the smartest, right? Ferdinand Marcos was second. What’s your point?
blackhawkdave
he couldn’t find his dick if he wasn’t such a big one
orlake
Puerto Rico is known officially as the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico AND is an unincorporated territory of the United States located in the northeast Caribbean Sea.
Puerto Ricans are by law natural-born citizens of the United States and may move freely between the island and the mainland. But because Puerto Rico is not a State, their citizens do not have a vote in the United States Congress.
canuckdave
Donald is a dangerous egomaniac who risks plunging the world into a nuclear war. God help us.
Maybeloan
It’s the opposite of empathy. Instead of mourning with and for those who lost their lives, Trump is using those who lost their lives as a way to make a broader argument that the media’s criticism of him is unfair and biased.
Trump seemed to see himself in a sort of Santa Claus role while handing out supplies to disaster victims. Here’s a bit of Liptak’s reporting: http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/03/politics/trump-puerto-rico/index.html https://maybeloan.com/