Trump Mocks Bill Kristol’s Plans and Hannity’s

Quote:

Trump Mocks Bill Kristol’s Plans and Hannity’s Man-Crush Fills to Overflowing

By Hrafnkell Haraldsson on Wed, Jun 1st, 2016 at 7:58 am

Donald Trump appeared on Sean Hannity’s show Tuesday night, taking the time to brag up Hannity’s ratings on Twitter first, of course. Hannity asked Trump about conservative columnist Bill Kristol’s plans for a third party candidate.

Kristol announced on Twitter that his candidate is “impressive” but the problem is, nobody has heard of him. David French, who recently urged Mitt Romney to run, is a constitutional lawyer and a veteran, but apparently everybody in the Republican Party is a constitutional lawyer these days, and we know how impressed Trump is with veterans.

At a news conference earlier in the day, Trump said,
“Bill Kristol is a loser. His magazine is failing, as you know. It’s going to be down — I don’t think it even survives. He’s getting some free publicity, but Bill Kristol, I’ve been watching this for two years.”

It was nothing unusual for Hannity to set Kristol up, having earlier in the month accused the columnist of wanting Hillary to win, and Trump happily continued in the same vein for the Fox News host, mixing insults with practicalities:

“I don’t think he has anybody because now he’s saying ‘it will come someday, it will come, you know, in the future.’ Well, if you read his tweet, his tweet was almost like it was imminent, like it’s going to be announced this morning. And then all of the sudden he announced ‘well, maybe not so fast.’ Who would do it?

Look, it’s a guaranteed loss. You can’t even get on in Texas because they missed their deadline, and now they’re missing other deadlines. And all he’s doing, I guess, is trying to get publicity for his failing magazine, I imagine.”

Of course, Trump was more interested in mocking Bill Kristol than anything else. And like all others who have stood up to Donald Trump, Bill Kristol is a failure, according to the reality star.

Key: Hannity = sycophant; Trump = authority figure.

Sean Hannity: One of the things that’s emerging, Bill Kristol for example, is saying he’s going to put up another candidate, you have a Libertarian ticket that has just been announced, all of which seems to be people willingly sabotaging an outsider who got more votes in the history of the Republican Party in terms of a primary.

What is your answer to that? Because to me, my answer is it seems like they only want to help Hillary Clinton get elected. That means Hillary will make the Supreme Court choices.

Donald Trump: Yeah. Well, Bill Kristol, he’s a sad case. His magazine is failing. It’s going to be out of business soon. And to be honest with you, I watched the guy on television for years now and he’s been saying Donald Trump won’t run and if he runs, he’s just going to have fun and he’s going to get out, and you know all of this stuff. And I’m saying to myself, who is this guy?

This seems to have been enough for Hannity to realize he needed Donald Trump in the White House, because the conversation then took an awkward turn, with Trump refusing to get specific about cabinet positions and Hannity fighting his growing man-crush:
Hannity: “I am not the corrupt press. I’m actually the conservative here.”

Trump: “You happen to be right about that.”

Hannity: “Yeah, well I’m an opinion show. I don’t hold back that I’ll be voting for Donald Trump in November.”

Trump: “Thank you.”

Hannity’s visible yearning to be embraced by Donald Trump, whether physically or metaphorically, was painfully apparent here, as was the pretense which followed, that Trump had ever given any specifics about his plans as president.

I’m sorry, but “I’m going to build a wall” isn’t a specific. It is this long-standing appeal to and reliance upon vague but emotionally powerful “talking points” rather than actual facts that made Trump’s rise possible.

Hannity and Trump no doubt had a good time at Bill Kristol’s expense during this softball interview. And Hillary Clinton’s. And people who demonstrate against him at his self-described “love fest” rallies.

This “let them eat loser cake” vibe seems to be catching on among Republicans. Trump just put into words, after all, what they’ve been thinking all along.

In the end, however, this was just one more very public and abject surrender by another Fox News host to Donald Trump’s cult of personality, and an official Fox News kiss of approval to Trump’s backside for the overwrought hyperbolic drama that is the reality star’s run for the presidency.