Corporate America basically has begun groveling to Trump. They’re going down to Mar-a-Lago, flying in, going down to kiss his ring and say how sorry they are about what they did, including giving $20 million to his opposition. They were calling him a Nazi and a freak and every other thing, but now, they’re ready to make nice because they’re terrified of Trump. Bezos is no different.
Transcript:
*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.
Mike Papantonio: Hi, I’m Mike Papantonio, and this is America’s Lawyer, where we dig in behind the headlines to give you the details and information that corporate media won’t give you because their advertisers don’t let ’em. As always, I’ve got Farron Cousins with me, the progressive voice. Honest to God, one of the best progressive voices in the business. The stories, they’re a big mix today. Let’s start off with talking about the Bezos story. Last, was it last week or two weeks ago?
Farron Cousins: It was last week.
Mike Papantonio: Our headline was corporate America basically comes groveling to Trump. I don’t remember the exact words that were used, but they’re groveling. They’re going down to Mar-a-Lago, flying in. There’s more jets flying into South Florida right now than ever going down to kiss his ring and say, yeah, we’re really sorry about what we did. I know we gave $20 million to your opposition. I know we were out there calling you a Nazi and a freak and every other thing, but we’re here to make nice now because they’re terrified of this guy. Bezos is no different. Go ahead.
Farron Cousins: Right. And Bezos may be one of the most dangerous because not only is Amazon a top military contractor, a top retailer, but also he owns the Washington Post. So Bezos obviously has a lot of kissing up to do because you’ve got Trump who says, maybe we’ll go after the media. So Bezos says, well, hold up. We actually love you over at the Washington Post. He did an interview a couple days after we talked about him being the next to go grovel and he did it, exactly like we said, he did it.
Mike Papantonio: It was pathetic.
Farron Cousins:It really was.
Mike Papantonio: I mean, it was pathetic. It was, all that stuff you read, we didn’t mean it. It was every week. I’m talking about during his first presidency, second, during the election, it was every week, you’re a Nazi Hitler, you’re a fascist, you’re a, they love this word, existential. If I have to read existential threat, the term existential everything now. The Washington Post is crazy with the term. It’s like MSNBC. But he was an existential threat to democracy. It was constant. And now do you think, is this kinda character, is this the personality that says, oh yeah, well, no problem? Don’t worry about it.
Farron Cousins: There were a lot of articles and op-eds in the Washington Post normalizing some of Trump’s most erratic behavior, a lot of conservative voices in there too. And so when Bezos did this interview and he’s talking about, oh, the press is not the enemy, but it’s up to us to prove it to him. We’ve got to do it. What Bezos is saying is that, listen, this Washington Post, we’re about to make a sharp right turn and I think we are going to see that with them. But more importantly, Bezos also gave up the game. He doesn’t give a about the Washington Post.
Mike Papantonio: No.
Farron Cousins: The Washington Post is his outlet to get on Trump’s good side, because at the end, he said that he was optimistic about Trump’s second term.
Mike Papantonio: I see that, yeah.
Farron Cousins: Citing the incoming president’s energy around deregulation. The Washington Post doesn’t need deregulation. Amazon and their cloud services and their military contracts, they do.
Mike Papantonio: Didn’t you do a story one time, maybe a year or so ago, and the amount of money the government pays to Bezos, it’s almost 60% of him income? Some crazy kind of.
Farron Cousins: Yeah. 60% I believe was the number, maybe a little bit higher, but that’s what people don’t understand. They think, well, Bezos is rich because everybody buys everything from Amazon. He’d be rich with just that. But the money that they’re getting from the Department of Defense, and most of it is just for cloud storage purposes, that is where the bulk of his money each year comes from, the federal government.
Mike Papantonio: And add to that, you’ve got Musk, who Musk and Bezos, they aren’t buddies. And so Bezos is watching, wait a second. My biggest competition, remember when they got into this fight about who was going to go to Mars first?
Farron Cousins: Right.
Mike Papantonio: You know, Bezos, matter of fact, right here in town, Bezos had one of his launch and recovery ships that he was going to compete with Musk.
Farron Cousins: And then Richard Branson beat ’em both.
Mike Papantonio: That’s right. That’s exactly right. But the point is, they hate each other.
Farron Cousins: They really do.
Mike Papantonio: And it’s got to be killing Bezos that Musk is like, he’s part of the cabinet, man. Musk is his right hand guy. He’s almost the president in extension, isn’t he?
Farron Cousins: He really is. Musk traveled with Trump to France this past weekend for the reopening of Notre Dame. To the point where you’ve got Republican senators that have done interviews that say, where the hell is JD Vance?
Mike Papantonio: I know.
Farron Cousins: Does he even exist? And that’s another thing too. It may be a conversation for another day.
Mike Papantonio: Yeah. We go to do a story on that. It’s amazing to me.
Farron Cousins: JD Vance is MIA and Elon Musk has taken over.
Mike Papantonio: It’s like they don’t understand there’s another election coming up in four years and they better get Vance developed. Anyway, this is pathetic.
Farron Cousins: It really is.
Mike Papantonio: It’s just so pathetic to see these groveling billionaires that understand, they know as they’re doing it, this is not the kind of guy that says, oh, that was yesterday. It’s okay, let’s move on. He’s going to punish him. He’s going to punish them.
