Donald Trump out for the count as pesky journalists start crunching the numbers

It can’t be denied that the US President’s press conferences are a bit different, a bit unusual.

Donald Trump at his press conference on Thursday (US time):

I put it before the American people, got 306 electoral college votes. I wasn’t supposed to get 222. They said there’s no way to get 222, 230’s impossible. 270 which you need, that was laughable. We got 306 because people came out and voted like they’ve never seen before so that’s the way it goes. I guess it was the biggest electoral college win since Ronald Reagan.

A little later at the same presser:

NBC News reporter Peter Alexander: Mr President, very simply you said today that you had the biggest electoral margin since Ronald Reagan. In fact, President Obama had 365, ­George Bush 426 when he won. ... My question is why should Americans trust you when the information you provide is wrong?

Trump: I was given that information. Actually I’ve seen that information around. But it was a very substantial victory. Do you agree with that?

Alexander: You are the President.

Trump: OK. Yes.

A little fleshing out from BuzzFeed:

Trump actually won 304 electoral votes, because two faithless electors refused to cast their vote for him when the electoral college met. That, it’s true, couldn’t top Reagan’s historic margin of 525 votes in 1984 — but quite a few other presidents have come closer than Trump. George HW Bush won with 426 electoral votes in 1988. Bill Clinton won with 370 votes in 1992 and 379 in 1996, and Barack Obama won with 365 votes in 2008.

Fox New host Shepard Smith getting a couple of things off his chest following Trump’s press conference:

This President keeps telling untrue things, and he does it every single time he’s in front of the microphone … It’s crazy what we’re watching every day. It’s absolutely crazy. (Trump) keeps repeating ridiculous throwaway lines that are not true at all, and sort of avoiding this issue of Russia, as if we’re some kind of fools for asking the question. Really? Your opposition was hacked, and the Russians were responsible for it, and your people were on the phone on the same day it was happening, and we are fools for asking those questions? No sir, we are not fools for asking those questions, and we demand to know the answer to this question. You owe this to the American people.

Words to remember. Malcolm Turnbull on the wavering George Christensen yesterday:

I’ve never seen any indication that he is anything other than a committed member of the Coalition partyroom.

Christopher Pyne on the Nine Network’s Today show:

George has confirmed that he’s remaining within the Coalition. He’s a valued colleague ... George is not going anywhere.

Gerard Henderson in Media Watch Dog yesterday:

Then there was your man (Ross) Cameron’s strange performance which focused not on the chosen topic of free expression but on homosexuality — with lotsa references to ancient Greece and all that stuff. You know, Hadrian and Plato and Socrates. Strange, don’t you think? These days Ross Cameron appears with Mark Latham and Rowan Dean on Sky News’ Offsiders (sic) program at 10am on Sunday mornings. This is how Mr Dean defended Mr Cameron’s somewhat off-message message last Sunday: “Well, I read the transcript through a couple of times. And I say, Ross, you missed your vocation — you should have been writing lyrics for Led Zeppelin. I mean, it was fantastic. I struggled to quite follow and understand where you were getting to. But after a couple of re-readings I got there.” Quite so. (Hendo) had a similar experience. He struggled to understand what your man Cameron was on about — or even on. However, after a couple of early morning triple gin & tonics, Hendo got there.