Donald Trump’s machinations with the press are beginning to cause whiplash for observers.
After initially scheduling a meeting with the New York Times editors and reporters, Trump abruptly cancelled via Twitter over “inaccurate” reporting and “nasty tone.”
Hours later, Trump changed course and announced the meeting would take place today.
Trump originally asked for the meeting with Times executives, and also agreed to meet on the record with reporters and columnists.
The Times announced the meeting on Monday. But on Tuesday morning, Trump said on Twitter that the “terms and conditions” had changed at the last minute — a claim The Times denied, saying it was in fact Trump who had tried to alter the conditions.
I cancelled today’s meeting with the failing @nytimes when the terms and conditions of the meeting were changed at the last moment. Not nice
A portion of the meeting will be an on-the-record interview, as the newspaper originally wanted.
“Mr. Trump’s staff has told us that the President Elect’s meeting with The Times is on again,” Eileen Murphy, head of communications for the Times, said in a statement. “He will meet with our publisher off-the-record and that session will be followed by an on-the-record meeting with our journalists and editorial columnists.”
After months of campaign rallies that included Donald Trump followers chanting “Lock her up! Lock her up!” and declaring in clear language that if elected he would appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Hillary Clinton for breaking the law, it looks like Trump Nation is going to be very disappointed.
During an appearance on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” top Trump aide Kellyanne Conway explained Trump would not be pursuing a Hillary Clinton investigation.
When asked if the announcement would be enough to convince Congressional Republicans from attempting their own investigation, Conway demurred.
“I think when the President-elect, who’s also the head of your party, tells you before he’s even inaugurated that he doesn’t wish to pursue these charges, it sends a very strong message, tone, and content to the members.”
Conway said that, in light of Hillary’s campaign defeat, Trump’s decision to not investigate was a benevolent gesture.
“If Donald Trump can help her heal, then perhaps that’s a good thing to do,” Conway added, saying Clinton “still has to face the fact that a majority of Americans don’t find her to be honest or trustworthy.”
Or – maybe – Trump knew all along Hillary has done nothing illegal, and he only used the insinuation as a way to fuel opposition against his opponent throughout the campaign.
Conway also alluded to the idea that perhaps other campaign promises were not going to materialize.
“I think he’s thinking of many different things as he prepares to become the president of the United States, and things that sound like the campaign are not among them.”
During the presidential campaign, Donald Trump said during a debate that he would, if elected, turn over his far-ranging business interests in a “blind trust” to be run by his children to avoid any sense of impropriety or profiteering via the presidency.
“If I become president, I couldn’t care less about my company. It’s peanuts. I wouldn’t ever be involved because I wouldn’t care about anything but our country, anything.” Thirteen days after being president-elect, Trump shows no signs of doing just that.
By the way, I should point out that handing your children your business with whom you communicate with on a daily basis does not constitute a “blind trust.” Can you really imagine his children won’t discuss ANY business in private with their father?
In any case, Trump has grown testy over news coverage of several eyebrow raising incidents that have occurred over the past two weeks including:
• His first meeting with a foreign head of state, the Prime Minister of Japan, included his daughter Ivanka Trump and son in law Jared Kushner, neither of whom have security clearances. And both are involved in his business dealings.
• His Washington D.C. hotel held an event last week pitching accommodations to foreign diplomats as a way to ingratiate themselves to the incoming administration
• During a congratulatory phone call with Argentinian President Mauricio Macri, Trump asked the president to clear some obstacles that have delayed Trump building an office building in Buenos
• Trump has asked UK politician Nigel Farage to help oppose a wind farm off the coast of Scotland near his golf resort because it would “spoil the views.”
After several news reports on the endless possible conflicts of interest, a defiant Trump took to Twitter to tell his constituents that this issue was basically priced into their vote.
Prior to the election it was well known that I have interests in properties all over the world.Only the crooked media makes this a big deal!
A group of 30-40 TV news executives and anchors were invited to Trump Tower today for what they thought would be a discussion with President-elect Trump about access their outlets could look forward to with his administration.
Donald Trump scolded media big shots during an off-the-record Trump Tower sitdown on Monday, sources told The Post. “It was like a f–ing firing squad,” one source said of the encounter. “Trump started with [CNN chief] Jeff Zucker and said ‘I hate your network, everyone at CNN is a liar and you should be ashamed,’” the source said.
“The meeting was a total disaster. The TV execs and anchors went in there thinking they would be discussing the access they would get to the Trump administration, but instead they got a Trump-style dressing down,” the source added. A second source confirmed the fireworks.
“The meeting took place in a big board room and there were about 30 or 40 people, including the big news anchors from all the networks,” the other source said.
“Trump kept saying, ‘We’re in a room of liars, the deceitful dishonest media who got it all wrong.’ He addressed everyone in the room calling the media dishonest, deceitful liars. He called out Jeff Zucker by name and said everyone at CNN was a liar, and CNN was [a] network of liars,” the source said.
The hour-long session included top execs from network and cable news channels. Among the attendees were NBC’s Deborah Turness, Lester Holt and Chuck Todd, ABC’s James Goldston, George Stephanopoulos, David Muir and Martha Raddatz,
Also, CBS’ Norah O’Donnell John Dickerson, Charlie Rose, Christopher Isham and King, Fox News’ Bill Shine, Jack Abernethy, Jay Wallace, Suzanne Scott, MSNBC’s Phil Griffin and CNN’s Jeff Zucker and Erin Burnett.
• Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean called Donald Trump’s newly named Chief Strategist, Steve Bannon of Breitbart fame, a “Nazi.” If it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck…
• North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory is laying the groundwork to have his state legislature hand him re-election.
I’m watching reports of the huge snow dump in upstate New York today making me wistful. In the fall of 1981, I began my college years as a freshman at Syracuse University. Aspiring to become a Broadway actor, the Syracuse University Musical Theatre program was one of the very best in the country at the time. I was lucky to be there. As I began classes that autumn, the professors informed us all exactly how lucky – a recent graduate Jim Weissenbach had snagged the leading role in the upcoming Stephen Sondheim/Hal Prince Broadway musical, Merrily We Roll Along. Sondheim and Prince were on a decade long roll of critical hits on Broadway including Company, A Little Night Music and Sweeney Todd.
Hal Prince (L) and Stephen Sondheim (R)
Well, of course, we all followed the news of what we expected to be the soon-to-be hit. Not only was it Sondheim (I mean, SONDHEIM!) but the show was about three idealistic young people whose story is told backward. Beginning with the audience meeting their older, cynical selves, the production journeys back to land at their beginning as dreamy, starry-eyed teens.
Yesterday is done / See the pretty countrysideMerrily we roll along, roll along – bursting with dreams.Travelings’ the fun / Flashing by the countrysideEverybody merrily, merrily – catching at dreamsRolling along, rolling along
How much more relatable could this have been? But just a few weeks into the fall semester came the crushing news at SU that Weissenbach had been replaced in previews. More negative rumors began making their way through the NYC (and Syracuse University) theater gossip as it was reported that audiences were walking out. Among various issues, the reverse chronology was difficult for theater-goers to grasp. Ultimately, the show ran for 52 previews and only 16 now-infamous performances before closing. But the SCORE! The score was incredible. Complex in its cynicism, boundless in its youthful optimism. You probably know the standout, achingly beautiful “Not A Day Goes By” from the show. If not, please run over to iTunes and check out the original Broadway cast recording here. Being the same age as the characters in the musical, and living vicariously through those young actors in NYC, I and my classmates were forever marked by the musical’s ineffable glory. Now, original cast member and acclaimed actor/director, Lonny Price has directed a documentary taking a long look at both the euphoria and disappointments of the one in a lifetime experience. The title takes a twist on one of the scores oft-repeated lyrics – BEST WORST THING THAT EVER COULD HAVE HAPPENED. Official synopsis:
One of the truly legendary musicals in the history of Broadway, MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG opened to enormous fanfare in 1981 and closed after sixteen performances.
For the first time, BEST WORST THING THAT EVER COULD HAVE HAPPENED draws back the curtain on the extraordinary drama of the show’s creation – and tells the stories of the hopeful young performers whose lives were transformed by it.
Directed by Lonny Price, a member of the original cast, the film is a bittersweet meditation on the choices we all make, and the often unexpected consequences of those choices — through success and failure. Featuring exclusive appearances by Stephen Sondheim, Hal Prince, Jason Alexander, Mandy Patinkin, Adam Guettel, Frank Rich and the original Broadway cast of MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG.
The documentary has garnered strong reviews at film festivals, and is playing now in NYC and opens in Los Angeles at the Laemmle’s Royal Theatre (1523 Santa Monica Blvd.) this Friday. I will definitely be making a point of seeing this.
Something is stirring, Shifting ground It’s just begun. Edges are blurring, All around And yesterday is done.
Check out the trailer for the upcoming biopic based on the early life of President Barack Obama from Netflix – Barry.
A young Barack Obama, known to his friends as “Barry,” arrives in New York City in the fall of 1981 to begin his junior year at Columbia University.
In a crime-ridden and racially charged environment, Barry finds himself pulled between various social spheres and struggles to maintain a series of increasingly strained relationships with his Kansas-born mother, his estranged Kenyan father, and his classmates.
Barry is the story of a young man grappling with those same issues that his country, and arguably the world, are still coming to terms with 35 years later.
Brandon Victor Dixon, one of the stars of the blockbuster Broadway hit, Hamilton: An American Musical, sat down with CBS This Morning to discuss the brouhaha surrounding Vice President-elect Pence’s visit to the show this past weekend.
After Dixon read a message to Mr. Pence during the curtain call – addressing him as “sir,” speaking in a calm, rational voice about their anxieties and concerns for the upcoming administration – Donald Trump angrily took to his Twitter account to denounce the cast and message as ‘harassment,” and demanded an apology.
Pence, himself, said he enjoyed the show very much and doesn’t feel the need for an apology.
When asked if there would be an apology forthcoming, Dixon said, “There’s nothing to apologize for. Conversation is not harassment.”
As I wrote over the weekend, if this is what sends our president-elect into a tailspin, he may need to consider taking a moment. Theater folks reading you a message is simple stuff, Donald.
You’ve got MUCH bigger fish to fry. Like explaining the $25 million settlement you just paid out in a class action lawsuit for fraud regarding the now-defunct Trump University.
