Trump's "Animals" Comment

Hey Trumpists! Congratulations! You finally caught the media in a verifiable mistake! The so-called Fake News Media said that your hero called immigrants "animals" when the context (determined by listening to the entirety of his remarks) indicates that he was specifically referring to members of the MS-13 gang.

Or does it?

Trump has consistently conflated immigrants in general, not just illegal immigrants, but all immigrants, with the  MS-13 gang (when Hispanic) or with terrorists (when Muslim). His barely articulated policy on immigration comes down to: Hispanic Refugees = Murderers & Rapists and Muslim Refugees = ISIS sympathizers; both categories are painted as hating America. It doesn't matter to him that while some people entering illegally from south of the U.S. are gang members, the majority are people fleeing gang violence, the percentage of MS-13 members who are deported is less than 1% of the total or that many MS-13 gang members are U.S. citizens. MS-13 is an American gang that has attracted many immigrants. It doesn't matter to him that the majority of potential immigrants from Muslim majority countries not only are fleeing violence in their own countries, but have been painstakingly vetted before receiving permission to emigrate to the U.S.

So, it's perhaps understandable that many news outlets jumped on the "animals" comment without providing the context, seeing how neatly it fit into Trump habits of speech. But unlike the President, who never admits his mistakes, and sticks to his misstatements and lies no matter how much video and audio evidence stacks up proving him wrong, media outlets backpedalled and corrected their earlier statements.

So even with the most unforgiving take on the media's motives, you've got one. One up against the almost daily lies that flow from the President's Twitter account, his press secretary's statements and the defenses by his lawyers and sycophants. Even though Trump regularly accuses the media of making up stories, attributing stories to nonexistent sources and having it out for him, an amazing number of stories have later (or sooner) proved true.

So, I'm not really willing to give Trump a pass on this. He's either a bigot, or feigns bigotry because he knows bigotry plays well with his most ardent supporters. Yeah, I'm willing to look at the context, the full context of two years of candidate and President Trump making bigoted and hateful statements.

And for you Trumpists - apparently bigotry and hatred aren't disqualifying characteristics.

What does that say about you?