Hero dog Conan makes haters howl

When will it end? When will critics of President Trump finally be able to turn the page and simply accept the fact that not everything the president does is the handwork of the devil, Vladimir Putin, or worse?

If it was going to come to an end, it was not destined to be this week, as a minor ceremony in which a dog was honored for his role in a military operation was enough to set off many in the media.

Conan, the U.S. military dog, a Belgian Malinois who had a starring role in the killing of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, joined President Trump, the first lady and Vice President Mike Pence on the White House steps to receive a congratulatory proclamation from the commander in chief as well as a plaque, some head scratches, and petting.

As the lighthearted event went forward the president had a little fun with the media. “He’s not in a bad mood today,” Trump told the assembled press in the Rose Garden. “So you’re safe.”

That was all it took.

In a piece in Vanity Fair entitled, “Trump threatens to sic Conan the military dog on reporter,” columnist Bess Levin notes that the president “routinely denigrates ex-employees and other foes by comparing them to canines, tweeting that his enemies have “choked like a dog,” been “dumped like a dog,” been “fired like a dog,” and “kicked out of the ABC News debate like a dog.”

Joan Walsh, the national affairs correspondent at The Nation and a CNN political contributor, sounded the alarm in a series of tweets: “This is terrifying. Trump and Melania exude coldness to Conan the hero dog. Melania, whose coat is slightly macabre (to me, but others may find it lovely), moves away from Conan multiple times.”

She continued.

“Trump tells you how incredible ‘this particular type of dog’ is, repeatedly, but he clearly can’t remember the name of the breed or other details. He tells us he really wanted the dog to be muzzled, which tells you about his fear.”

She rages on, “‘Conan is a tough cookie,’ we learn. Still nothing about his breed. Trump repeatedly ‘jokes’ about siccing the dog on journalists. Also, again, his command of the language rivals (maybe) a five-year-old. Terrifying.”

CNN reporter Kate Bennett astutely noted that, “@realDonaldTrump talked about what a dangerous and vicious dog Conan was while @VP simultaneously petted it and put his hand near his mouth.”

A Washington Post opinion piece headline read, “Conan the dog is a hero. But Trump is using the canine for attention.”

What is wrong with these people?

So unacceptable and unpalatable is the very existence of President Trump that the media employs every skill and resource at their disposal to paint a “terrifying” picture of an absolutely anodyne event.

Remember, the media are supposed to be the cool-under-pressure conduits delivering the news of the day to the people. Instead, they distort the events in the process in order to prevent Americans from digesting any content that is not tainted or redrawn as anti-Trump on an apocalyptic level.

We deserve better than to have a media comprised of panicking propagandists. Their behavior only serves to foster a climate of fear and anxiety and that is not what the American people need. If they showed 1/1,000th of the composure Conan did, we’d all be better off.

from Boston Herald https://ift.tt/2rCSDWN