June 29 — July 5, 2016 Cover Story
[14] Yes, that’s right, he said aeroplanes. [15] So much for “The Snake.” [16] This oft-repeated statement by the candidate is misleading at best. As Politifact reported back in March, “Trump’s statement makes it sound like we’re cutting Iran a $150 billion check. In reality, the money is already Iran’s to begin with, just frozen under the many economic sanctions levied against the country.” [17] Politifact rated the claim as “false” on June 22: “We searched newspaper articles and television transcripts from 2002 and 2002 amid the debate leading up to the Iraq war. We didn’t find any examples of Trump unequivocally denouncing the war until a year after the war began.” Although Trump expressed skepticism about the invasion in an interview with Fox News’ Neil Cavuto in January 2013, his response to a question by shock jock Howard Stern about whether he supported the invasion in September 2002 was, “Yeah, I guess so.” [18] As Jim Geraghty points out in a July 2015 article in the right-leaning National Review, the two precepts are contradictory: “In 2007, Trump said that the US should ‘declare victory and leave’ Iraq, ‘because I’ll tell you, this country is just going to get further bogged down.’ Four years later, as Obama prepared to withdraw US troops from the country, Trump was more or less getting his wish. But then he appeared to be arguing that the US should maintain its troop presence simply to seize the Iraqi oil fields.” [19] WTF?! [20] Probably higher. Neta C. Crawford, a professor at Boston University, estimated the cumulative costs of the US wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan at $4.4 trillion in June 2014. [21] This windup is killing me. [22] And… back to the windup. [23] The News & Record estimated that about 6,000 people attended the rally. And judging by the number of times Trump had interrupted himself to acknowledge disruption, it appears that there had actually been three protesters.
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of us. We’re gonna go to the movie theater. We’re gonna go on aeroplanes [14]. We’re gonna lead our lives like we’re supposed to lead our lives. We’re gonna be straight down the middle. Everything’s gonna be fair. There’s gonna be total justice. But we can’t continue to live this way. We can’t continue to live this way. People are gonna be afraid to go out — they already are. I mean, if you think you feel safer now than you did eight years ago — I think there’s probably not anyone in this room that feels that way. So I just want to read something. Did anyone ever hear me do ‘The Snake’? I think maybe I’ve never seen a time maybe ever where this is so appropriate. It’s so appropriate. Now, you have to think of this in terms of Islamic terror. You have to think of it in terms of our border. You have to think of it in terms of all the people that are crossing, that are criminals, that are killing people and hurting people. We need borders. If we don’t have borders we don’t have a country. We need borders. We need to have our country back. We want to get our country back. We want people coming into our country, but they have to come in legally. They have to come in legally. [Crowd chanting, “Build that wall!”] “Don’t even think about it — we’re gonna build that wall. Don’t even think about it. And who is going to pay for the wall? [Crowd: “Mexico!”] Who? [“Crowd: “Mexico!”] 100 percent, okay? 100 percent. [15] You know, when I had the debates — the big debates, right? Now what did I know about debating? I’ve been building and employing and building up a great company and having lots of fun. I didn’t want to do this, folks, I’ll tell you. I don’t know about you, but up here it’s about 110 degrees right now. I didn’t want to do this. I would have been very happy had Obama been a great president. I would have been very happy. You know what? If he were a great president — I’m a Republican, I’m a conservative — had he been a great president, I would have been very happy, and most of the people in this room would have been happy. But you know what? He’s been one hell of a lousy president. He’s done a terrible job. Terrible job. He has done a terrible job. And we’re running through weakness, and people are laughing at us. All over the world they’re laughing at us. And when China has a trade deficit — we have a trade deficit with China. Think of it: We have a trade deficit: $505 billion a year. Mexico: $58 billion a year. Japan: So much we don’t even know what the hell the number is. Everybody. Vietnam is hot. They’re all hot. Every country does great. When you negotiate against the United States, if you can’t win you don’t have much goin’. You don’t have much goin’. And we have to turn it around. We’re gonna get the greatest — we have in our country the greatest negotiators in the world. We’re not gonna make an Iran deal where we give $150 billion. We shoulda never given that money back. [16] We shoulda never, ever given that money back. Those prisoners shoulda been released years ago before we ever started the negotiations, folks. Years ago.... The Persians are great negotiators. The Iranians are great negotiators. Not only, by the way, did they make a great deal there, but as sure as — and I was against the Iraq war from the very beginning. [17] You know, Hillary said, ‘Oh, can you trust him with the button?’ She’s the one that wanted to go into Iraq. I’ve been against it. I said, ‘Iraq, if you obliterate their military, you are going to totally destabilize the Middle East, and that’s exactly what happened. The Middle East became totally destabilized. And what happened? We got ISIS outta the whole deal. I mean, the thinking that we’ve had — for a long time — and the way [Obama] got us out. He gives a date: ‘We’re gonna be out by X date?’ Who the
hell would ever say the date? In fact, the other side didn’t believe him. Because they said, ‘Nobody could be so stupid to give a date.’ And then it turned out to be true. So he got out the wrong way. Came out the wrong way. If you remember a few years ago, I said, ‘Keep the oil.’ Shouldn’t-a been there, but keep the oil. [18] Well now, ISIS has the oil. Iran is going to have the oil. They’re all going to have the oil. And instead of just a surgical strike in Syria and Libya and all these different people — I mean, look at Libya — a surgical strike maybe. But the highest grades of oil in the world — who has the oil, folks? ISIS has the oil. We don’t even do anything to blockade them. They’re selling the oil. They’re making a fortune. They cannot believe how lucky they got. If I get elected, they’re not gonna be so lucky anymore, folks. They’re not gonna be so lucky. And when we get out we should have taken — remember this — when we got out she should have taken the oil. I’ll never forget, some of the pundits — most of them don’t have the brains they were born with — they said, ‘They’re talking about a sovereign country.’ Iraq! Crooked as hell. How about bringing baskets of money, millions and millions of dollars and handing it out? I want to know: Who’re the soldiers that had that job? Because I think they’re living very well right now, whoever they may be. [19] But think of it — the money that went out. We spent probably — probably — $4 trillion over the last 15 years in the Middle East. [20] We build a school; it gets blown up. We build it again, and again, and again. But if we want a school in Greensboro, if we want a school in Brooklyn, if we want a school in Los Angeles we have no money. We’re flat broke. No longer, folks. No longer. America first. America first. Remember that. It’s America first. It’s America first..... So, are you ready? So this is called ‘The Snake,’ right? Al Wilson. Great Al Wilson. And it’s really sort of amazing because it just works. What you have to do is think about what we’re getting into. We’re letting in hundreds of thousands of people into our country. We don’t know anything about ’em. We do know though it’s gonna be trouble. And again, it doesn’t take a lot. It doesn’t take a lot. It takes 2 percent, 1 percent. It takes two people. It doesn’t take a lot. But it’s gonna be much more than that. And we are gonna see things over the next number of years like you’ve never seen, I really believe — unless I’m elected president. I really believe that. Because we’re gonna be very, very smart. And we’re gonna be very strong. And we’re not gonna be the fools anymore. This is called — this is called ‘The Snake.’ Who, by the way — I rarely do it, but who has heard it? Should I do it again? So think of your border. Think of people pouring in. Think of people pouring in who you know are going to be trouble at some point, okay? You know they’re going to be trouble, alright? All right. Let’s go. Ready? Are you ready? [21] [Noticing a protester] That’s right, get ’em out. Get ’em out. [Audience: “Boo!”] I love our protesters. The only way the cameras show what massive numbers of people we have is if we have our protesters. Take care of our protesters. Please don’t hurt our protester. It’s a single protester. That’s right, go home to Mommy. Bye. Okay, let’s go. Ready? Think about your border, folks. Think about your border. Think about people coming into your country. We’re gonna protect our country. [22] [Reading from the text] ‘On her way to work one morning down the path along the lake, a tender-hearted woman saw a poor, half-frozen snake. His pretty, colored skin had been all frosted with the dew. ‘Oh well,’ she said, ‘I’ll take you in, and I’ll take care of you.’ ‘Take me in, oh tender woman. Take me in, for heaven’s sake,’