Trump has a talent for kicking a guy when he’s down, and Starmer was not exempt. Meanwhile the reflecting pool duck death toll continues to increase. Here’s everything you need to know from a wild day in WashingtonTrump’s hair was on point today(Image: Getty Images)Donald Trump kicked Keir Starmer while he was down – and had a wild on-camera meltdown about his reflecting pool fiasco.As the first round of Iran talks wound down, those in Switzerland were cautiously optimistic of reaching a final agreement within the 60 day deadline. Trump on the other hand spent more time blustering about the alternatives if no agreement is reached.Meanwhile, a new book by the New York Times’ Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan has revealed a previously unknown personal service Trump offered Keir Starmer in the White House.Oh, and the White House thought it’d be hilarious to theme their ‘quantum computing’ PR day around…QAnon.Meanwhile in TrumpworldTrump kicks Starmer while he’s downTrump offered Starmer a personal service from one of his aidesWhite House sells ‘quantum’ with QAnon trappingsTrump’s gash in the reflecting pool keeps getting longerSeriously though, he’s really mad about the reflecting poolHe threatened ABC again…this time about the poolHere’s what you need to knowTrump kicks Starmer while he’s downWe should take a moment to mourn what used to be a very special relationship. Once renowned throughout Europe as the “Trump Whisperer”, Keir Starmer was occasionally deployed to try and eke out concessions on issues like Ukraine that no other European leader could secure. They managed to stay cordial and chatty. Starmer managed to briefly talk him round on a couple of things, but never quite grasped that Trump’s promises were only good until someone else got him on the phone.Anyway, Trump has a talent for kicking a guy when he’s down, and Starmer was not exempt.Asked about Starmer’s departure at an Oval Office event last night, Trump said: “I wish him well, but he’s got two problems energy and immigration and crime.”Trump claims Brits were angry when Starmer didn’t rush into Iran with himDiscussing the Iran war, Trump seethed: “Starmer wasn’t there – and you know what? The people of the UK did not like it that he wasn’t there. Starmer said no. Starmer said worse than no. He said “we’ll be there as soon as you win.” I said “we don’t need you as soon as we win. Before I went in we called him. He said “oh wow…we’ll be there.” – this was not Winston Churchill, that I can tell you. But Starmer said we’ll be there as soon as we win.”There are a number of things in those few sentences which are untrue – not least Trump’s suggestion that the US “won” the Iran war.But the most egregious falsehood is that people in the UK were anything but overjoyed that Starmer didn’t follow Trump into such an illegal, baffling misadventure. The UK holding back polled incredibly well among British voters, and it was listed as the single issue voters thought Starmer had handled the best.Content cannot be displayed without consentTrump offered Starmer a personal service from one of his aidesThere is exactly one cute anecdote about Keir Starmer to be found within Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan’s new book, Regime Change.In Chapter 17, the book mentions that Trump’s longtime aide and personal valet, Walt Nauta carries around “not just the usual personal items – makeup, hairspray, Tic Tacs – but also scissors so that Trump could snip his hair when he found that it was getting too long in the back, poking over his collar.”It adds: “Nauta would also have a steamer nearby to iron out the creases in the President’s suit as Trump stood before him. The President had once offered Nauta’s steaming services to British Prime Minister Keir Starmer.”White House sells ‘quantum’ with QAnon trappingsThe White House had a string of announcements on quantum computing today, which absolutely nobody paid any attention to – partially because while he was supposed to be talking about it, he kept talking about Iran and the Lincoln reflecting pool.Anyway, I only bring it up because someone in the White House’s communications shop cleverly noticed that the word ‘quantum’ begins with the letter Q. As does QAnon, the baseless, far-right conspiracy theory movement based on the idea that a secret cabal of Satan-worshipping sex-traffickers had taken over the world, and only Donald Trump could defeat them. QAnon has prompted acts of domestic terrorism, broken countless families and helped Donald Trump sweep to power twice.Anyway, the White House twitter account has been making funny jokes all day pretending to be releasing “Q drops”, but actually releasing information about the administration’s quantum computing strategy. It has been terribly tone deaf.Content cannot be displayed without consentThe gash in Trump’s reflecting pool keeps getting longerTrump is so desperate for it not to appear that his hand-picked contractors – and by extension he, himself – is to blame for the rapid disintegration of the floor of the Lincoln reflecting pool that he’s doubling and tripling down on his insistence that it’s the work of vandals.”No no,” he said. “We had vandalism. They went in there with a knife.” But asked how they would have got away with that, given there are National Guard and police patrolling the area 24 hours a day, he didn’t have a super good answer. Asked if he had photos or videos as evidence, Trump said: “Well, let’s put it this way, when you have a 350 – I think it’s 350, not 250, 350 foot slit from one end to the other, you think that’s proof?”Content cannot be displayed without consentFirst of all, that’s an increase of 100ft on the length he claimed yesterday. Second, I went there yesterday and looked for the slit. There is no slit. It does not exist.Trump went on: “Just go and see the parks department, they’ll show it to you.”The’ll have a job, because it doesn’t exist.”I saw it,” he lied – he hasn’t been to the reflecting pool since it reopened. The closest he’s been is flying over it on Marine One yesterday, while I was there. Again, there is no slit. “They cut it. They cut it very violently and then they lifted it. They pulled it. It is what it is.”No it’s not, Mr President. But while we’re on the subject, you know what substance is neither vulnerable to box cutters or peeling? Granite.”Somebody said fertiliser in the water,” Trump posited as a potential cause of the green that wouldn’t be his fault. “You put fertiliser in the water, you get algae…they did something to create the algae. But that doesn’t matter, it’s been purified. It’s dead.”The duck death toll has sadly risenSpeaking of things that have died – overnight the duck death toll in the reflecting pool has risen from one to three. DC animal rescue group City Wildlife has collected the bodies and taken them away for post-mortem examination.Seriously though, he’s really mad about the reflecting poolTrump was also asked why nobody’s talking about the fact that the shoddy job of work done at the reflecting pool overran by four weeks and cost about ten times what he promised. He didn’t answer, and just waffled something about Barack Obama’s project to clean up the pool.”I spent less than two months on the reflecting pool and I have a better product,” Trump lied. “I can’t help it if somebody goes in with a knife and starts hacking it up. We also have pictures of it.”Asked if the administration would release the alleged pictures, Trump said: “You’ll see it in court.”Bookmark this. I hereby predict we will never see the “pictures.”He threatened ABC again…this time about the poolLater, Trump threatened ABC News over their coverage of the reflecting pool debacle, which from what I’ve seen has been factual and fair. He said they “failed to report that their close “friends,” Dumocrats Obama and Biden, spent over 100 Million Dollars on the Reflecting Pool, and it never worked. In fact, it was rarely open due to leaks and “stench.””This is untrue. The Obama administration spent about two years renovating the pool, plugging leaks and repairing its filtration system. It was also re-engineered with a circulation and filtration system that uses water from the nearby tidal basin rather than city drinking water. It was also made slightly shallower to save water, and – funny thing…the bottom was tinted a slightly darker colour to better reflect the Washington Monument. All of which was accomplished without spraying blue rubber on anything. That project cost $34 million – not $100 million. And while the leak-fixing was not entirely successful, the pool has been open pretty much constantly since then.A project to more extensively refurbish the pool, replacing the granite at the bottom, had been in the planning for some time at an estimated cost of $100 million – or according to Trump when he set out on this little adventure, $301 million. The project did not progress during the Biden administration, presumably because of the cost.
