A Children's Treasury Of Good Thoughts About Donald Trump's Little Rapey Mistake

So now that it's looking like the only way Donald Trump can possibly put this latest uproar behind him will be to actually go out on 5th Avenue and shoot somebody,Yr Wonkette proudly brings you a selection of reactions to Trump's 2005 "grab them by the pussy" video and his truly excellent apology, which clarified how Bill Clinton is much, much worse. There's no hope of hitting all of them, but we'll start with Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, who Friday evening disinvited Trump from a Saturday rally in Wisconsin where the two were supposed to have campaigned together for the very first time. It was going to be a real feather in Donald's cap, but it suddenly turned into a great big black eye!

"I am sickened by what I heard today," Ryan said in a statement. "Women are to be championed and revered, not objectified. I hope Mr. Trump treats this situation with the seriousness it deserves and works to demonstrate to the country that he has greater respect for women than this clip suggests.”

Notice the suggestion that Trump can still salvage his campaign. That Paul Ryan, what an optimist! Ryan's statement added that Trump "is no longer attending tomorrow’s event in Wisconsin." Trump also issued a quiet announcement of its own that treated the cancellation as a mere detail of scheduling:

"Gov. Mike Pence will be representing me tomorrow in Wisconsin. I will be spending the day in New York in debate prep with RNC Chairman Reince Priebus, Gov. Chris Christie and Sen. Jeff Sessions, and then flying to St. Louis on Sunday for the 2nd Presidential Debate," he wrote.

(Well, it's been whole MINUTES, so nope, not Pence either!) 

You may also be astonished to learn that a Ryan spokesman didn't have any comment when asked if Ryan would be Undorsing Trump. That was not so much a problem for several other Republican elected officials, like virtually all of them in Utah:  Sen. Mike Lee -- who hadn't endorsed Trump in the first place -- released a video calling on Trump to drop his candidacy. Gov. Gary Herbert said he could not support Trump, as did Rep. Jason Chaffetz, who was all over the teevee Friday night saying Trump's comments were indefensible.

"It is some of the most abhorrent and offensive comments that you can possibly imagine,” Chaffetz told Utah’s Fox13. “That was an apology for getting caught, that was not an apology for the behavior.”

Neither Herbert nor Chaffetz actually called for Trump to drop out, but who knows, maybe Mike Lee has given them cover. Stay tuned for Utah to vote for Hillary Clinton? 

There were a whole bunch of other big Republicans decrying the video, like John McCain, Mitt Romney, Mitch McConnell, and RNC Chairman Reince Priebus, who we suspect may also have called Michael Steele to ask how he got that sweet MSNBC commentator gig. Rightwing pundit Hugh Hewitt, who was dead certain last week that Hillary Clinton would never live down having said some millennials lived in their parents basements, could feel which way the wind's blowing:  

Same goes for Carly Fiorina:  

Why, even one of Yr Doktor Zoom's own senators from Godforsaken Idaho, Mike "Stop Pronouncing It Like It's Spelled" Crapo, has joined the chorus of Undorsements, calling for Mike Pence to lose like a real conservative.

That list is going to keep getting longer as Republicans suddenly notice who exactly it is they nominated, and of course the R men will cry many tears for the horrible insult to their "wives and daughters," since apparently they're incapable of recognizing they should have been offended on behalf of basic humanity, and months ago. We'll hand this soapbox over to MSNBC's Chris Hayes for a moment:

Also, don't go holding your breath for Top Republicans to force Trump to drop out unless he drops out himself; The Washington Post explains that's even less likely to happen than Fetch.

Still, the condemnation was far from universal, because this is Donald Freaking Trump and some people can't quite suppress their Defend The Party reflex. Washington state Republican Party Chair Susan Hutchison issued a statement explaining how this was actually a WIN for Republicans:  

“Donald Trump’s comments in 2005 -- 11 years ago were made when he was a Democrat,” Hutchison said. “The hypocrisy of Hillary Clinton to say Trump does not belong in the White House when her husband defined this behavior.”

Super-Christian Family Values dude Ralph Reed of the "Faith and Freedom Coalition" went on NPR to defend Trump at length, because it was a long time ago, Trump apologized, and the Christian Right really needs to make sure the Supreme Court is packed with anti-abortion justices:

If you can't bring yourself to curdle the half n half in your coffee, here's the short version, which Reed delivered Friday night:

And then there was the initial stupidity all over teevee, simply the first dips of a veritable flood of derp that'll keep Yr Wonkette busy all week. How about this fun clip of Trump surrogate (a term with an increasing "ick" factor) Scottie Nell Hughes telling Ana Navarro to just for godssake stop saying "pussy," because it's so inappropriate:

Navarro: This is a disgusting man who has consistently disgusted me from the first day of this campaign. And I think that every single Republican is going to have to answer the question: "What did you do the day you saw the tape of this man boasting about grabbing a woman's pussy?" Period.

Hughes: Will you please stop saying that word? My daughter is listening.

Navarro: Don't tell me you're offended when I say "pussy," but you're not offended when Donald Trump says it. I'm not running for president, he is.

Hughes: Yes, and I said I was offended by him saying that too --

Navarro: OK, so then don't act outraged and offended when I say the word that you're not offended by the man who you are supporting is saying. That is just absurd.

The Official Wingnut Reply to anyone saying "pussy" is apparently that Trump was saying all that in what he thought was private, so STFU about quoting him. The children might hear! And he'll never ever say it in an Oval Office, probably, unless like the US beach volleyball wins gold at the Olympics again.

Also, it's the cuss that matters, and not the "bragging about sexual assault." Because values.

Then there was Sean Hannity, who brought on Radio Talker Gina Loudon to explain this was nothing compared to Hillary's real crimes, and Hypocrisy Expert Dinesh D'Souza to explain the media is in the tank for Hillary:

Loudon: Sean, I was thinking tonight, I wish we had one of your town halls that you used to do when you had all of the people in a room, because it would be interesting to ask a men full of -- a roomful of men if they have never said anything remotely like that, aside from maybe pastors and priests, right, in their lives, because I think that was locker room talk. Mr. Trump has apologized.

And then when you hold that up and look at what Hillary Clinton has done -- look in Mr. Trump's case, in the entire record of his life, Sean, no one was raped, nobody has died, no illegal servers were put in his -- I mean, the list goes on. [...]

D'Souza: Well, I think that what we are seeing, we have seen a biased media in my entire adult lifetime but never before have I seen the media so aggressively huffing and puffing to drag this crooked hag across the finish line.

That is their objective, and so to some degree we're seeing journalists who wear the label of journalism, but they're not really journalists, they're actually doing a political mission for Hillary in this election.

Lord knows when we're looking for moral clarity, we always start with Sean Hannity and convicted felon Dinesh D'Souza. Hannity also offered some thoughts from the Good Book to make it clear that Trump was actually A-OK! (Update: Media Matters went and misspelled Ms. Loudon's name as "Louden," which we have now corrected. Yr Wonkette regrets the error, because unlike some presidential candidates, we don't mind admitting when we're wrong.)

Sean Hannity goes biblical to defend Trump: "King David had 500 concubines for crying out loud" pic.twitter.com/IoKXNFtQ9j 

— BuzzFeed News (@BuzzFeedNews) October 8, 2016 

Said the almost-journalist, "King David had 500 concubines, for crying out loud!" And he grabbed any of them by the pussy any time he wanted, and God was good with it. (Nitpickers pointed out it was Solomon, whereas David did sex to the wife of a soldier who he then sent off to die in battle, and God was not cool with that. In case you're keeping score).

Crom only knows what other madness will emerge over the next few days; to paraphrase Lily Tomlin, we'll try to stay cynical, but it'll be hard to keep up. Just wait until the outtakes from The Apprentice start surfacing.

[ LAT / WaPo / Carly Fiorina on Facebook / WaPo / KING-TV / NPR / Media Matters / Media Matters again / MoJo ]