You really have to work hard to be as inept as the Trump administration. Yesterday’s press conference with Sean Spicer at the helm was a prime example. In an attempt to condemn Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for attacking a village with Sarin gas, Spicer compared him to Hitler but not how you would thing and it was incredibly bad for him:
“You had someone as despicable as Hitler, who didn’t even sink to using chemical weapons.”
One reporter gave Spicer a chance to redeem himself by asking if he would like to clarify that but Spicer just dug deeper:
“I think when you come to sarin gas, [Hitler] was not using the gas on his own people the same way that Assad is doing,” Spicer said. “He brought them into, um, the Holocaust center — I understand that. But I’m saying in the way Assad used them where he went into towns, dropped them down into the middle of towns, it was brought — the use of it — and I appreciate the clarification, that was not the intent.”
“Holocaust center”?????? Sean, they were called “gas chambers” for a reason. Sheesh!
Needless to say, everyone who watched that was shocked and outraged. To make matters even worse, yesterday was the first day of Passover.
But this shouldn’t surprise anyone who has been aping watching to Spicer from his day as Republican National Committee spokesperson to his first statement to the press on inauguration day. He is the perfect spokesperson for the gang who can’t shoot straight.
There are numerous calls for Spicer to resign coming from House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), the Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect and poliical writer for Esquire, Charles Pierce among others.
Since the news conference there have been three variations of a written apology from the White House and a few more by Spicer to explain himself. To give him some credit, eventually Spicer did figure out that he needed to unequivocally apologize and admit he had made an egregious mistake.
The problem for the Trump administration is that people are no longer surprised by its thinly veiled antisemitism by its close association with the KKK and white supremacist groups; the hiring of known anti-Semites like Steve Bannon and Sebastian Gorka; and the association with Holocaust deniers. They have also made several huge gaffs by failing to even mention Jews in the press release on Holocaust Remembrance Day; its luke warm denouncement of antisemitic acts and attacks, failing to even call them hateful and at times to even acknowledge them; and Trump’s absence from the White House Passover Seder. A News Max article on Assad and Hitler may have been the catalyst for Spicer’s comparison.
It’s doubtful that Spicer will lose his job. Some on the left even think he should not be fired, like Steve M. at No More Mister Nice Blog:
Spicer should stay. Sure, he’s ignorant and incompetent — but that means he’s the ideal voice of the president he serves. A competent press secretary would be as out of place in the Trump administration as a French-trained sommelier at Burger King.
I don’t think it much matters, the Trump administration is a daily disaster that hopefully won’t lead to World War III.