US Politics Mega-thread - Page 832

it was a press conference from february where they were more than midway through. Then at some point, there's a question from a reporter;

Q When you call it fake news, you’re undermining confidence —

THE PRESIDENT: No, I do that. No, no, I do that.

Q — in our news media.

THE PRESIDENT: Here’s the thing.

Q Isn’t that important?

THE PRESIDENT: Okay, I understand — and you’re right about that except this. See, I know when I should get good and when I should get bad. And sometimes I’ll say, wow, that’s going to be a great story, and I’ll get killed. I know what’s good and bad. I’d be a pretty good reporter — not as good as you. But I know what’s good. I know what’s bad.

And when they change it and make it really bad — something that should be positive. Sometimes something that should be very positive, they’ll make okay. They’ll even make it negative. So I understand it because I’m there. I know what was said. I know who is saying it. I’m there. So it’s very important to me.

Look, I want to see an honest press. When I started off today by saying that it’s so important to the public to get an honest press. The press — the public doesn’t believe you people anymore. Now, maybe I had something to do with that, I don’t know. But they don’t believe you.

If you were straight and really told it like it is, as Howard Cosell used to say, right? Of course, he had some questions also. But if you were straight, I would be your biggest booster, I would be your biggest fan in the world — including bad stories about me. But if you go — as an example, you’re CNN — I mean, it’s story after story after story is bad. I won. I won. And the other thing: Chaos. There’s zero chaos. We are running — this is a fine-tuned machine. And Reince happens to be doing a good job. But half of his job is putting out lies by the press.

I said to him yesterday, this whole Russia scam that you guys are building so that you don’t talk about the real subject, which is illegal leaks. But I watched him yesterday working so hard to try and get that story proper. And I’m saying, here’s my Chief of Staff, a really good guy, did a phenomenal job at RNC. I mean, we won the election, right? We won the presidency. We got some senators. We got some — all over the country, you take a look, he’s done a great job.

And I said to myself, you know — and I said to somebody that was in the room — I said, you take a look at Reince, he’s working so hard just putting out fires that are fake fires. They’re fake. They’re not true. And isn’t that a shame, because he’d rather be working on health care. He’d rather be working on tax reform, Jim. I mean that. I would be your biggest fan in the world if you treated me right. I sort of understand there’s a certain bias, maybe by Jeff or somebody — for whatever reason. And I understand that. But you’ve got to be at least a little bit fair. And that’s why the public sees it — they see it. They see it’s not fair. You take a look at some of your shows and you see the bias and the hatred. And the public is smart. They understand it.

Okay, yeah, go ahead.

Q We have no doubt that your latest story is (inaudible). But for those who believe that there is something to it, is there anything that you have learned over these last few weeks that you might be able to reveal that might ease their concerns that this isn’t fake news? And secondly —

THE PRESIDENT: I think they don’t believe it. I don’t think the public would. That’s why the Rasmussen poll just has me through the roof. I don’t think they believe it. Well, I guess one of the reasons I’m here today is to tell you the whole Russian thing — that’s a ruse. That’s a ruse. And, by the way, it would be great if we could get along with Russia, just so you understand that. Now, tomorrow you’ll say, Donald Trump wants to get along with Russia, this is terrible. It’s not terrible — it’s good.

We had Hillary Clinton try and do a reset. We had Hillary Clinton give Russia 20 percent of the uranium in our country. You know what uranium is, right? It’s this thing called nuclear weapons and other things. Like, lots of things are done with uranium, including some bad things. Nobody talks about that. I didn’t do anything for Russia. I’ve done nothing for Russia. Hillary Clinton gave them 20 percent of our uranium. Hillary Clinton did a reset, remember, with the stupid plastic button that made us all look like a bunch of jerks? Here, take a look. He looked at her like, what the hell is she doing with that cheap plastic button? Hillary Clinton — that was a reset. Remember? It said “reset.”

Now, if I do that, oh, I’m a bad guy. If we could get along with Russia, that’s a positive thing. We have a very talented man, Rex Tillerson, who is going to be meeting with them shortly. And I told him, I said, I know politically it’s probably not good for me. Hey, the greatest thing I could do is shoot that ship that’s 30 miles offshore right out of the water. Everyone in this country is going to say, oh, it’s so great. That’s not great. That’s not great. I would love to be able to get along with Russia.

Now, you’ve had a lot of Presidents that haven’t taken that tact. Look where we are now. Look where we are now. So, if I can — now, I love to negotiate things. I do it really well and all that stuff, but it’s possible I won’t be able to get along with Putin. Maybe it is. But I want to just tell you, the false reporting by the media, by you people — the false, horrible, fake reporting makes it much harder to make a deal with Russia. And probably Putin said, you know — he’s sitting behind his desk and he’s saying, you know, I see what’s going on in the United States, I follow it closely; it’s got to be impossible for President Trump to ever get along with Russia because of all the pressure he’s got with this fake story. Okay? And that’s a shame. Because if we could get along with Russia — and, by the way, China and Japan and everyone — if we could get along, it would be a positive thing, not a negative thing.