The Times: Inside Trump's White House bedroom, his battle for self-preservation

Cartoonists Steve Sack of the Minneapolis Star Tribune, above, and Jimmy Margulies, below, commenting on how Congress is bought and paid for or in the pocket of the National Rifle Association, which bribes elected officials with millions of dollars in campaign contributions to make guns easier to buy and own.

Margulies is the former cartoonist at The Record of Woodland Park, my local daily newspaper, which has gotten much worse since Gannett Co. bought the publishing company that puts it out in July 2016, and laid off more than 350 employees.

-- HACKENSACK, N.J.

By VICTOR E. SASSON

EDITOR

Based on interviews with 60 advisers, associates, friends and members of Congress, The New York Times on Saturday took us inside President Trump's White House bedroom and bathrooms in an online report that carried this headline:

"INSIDE TRUMP'S HOUR-BY-HOUR

BATTLE FOR SELF-PRESERVATION"

But you won't find a word about Trump tweeting while seated on the toilet -- an image that was popular after he took office last Jan. 20.

"With Twitter as his Excalibur, the president takes on his doubters, powered by long spells of cable news and a dozen Diet Cokes," according to reporting by Maggie Haberman, Glenn Thrush and Peter Baker.

"But if Mr. Trump has yet to bend the presidency to his will, he is at least wrestling it to a draw."

News media

Trump likely will be undone by the investigation of Russian meddling into the 2016 election, but this kind of coverage in The Times, Washington Post and and other news outlets isn't really damaging him.

"Around 5:30 each morning, President Trump wakes and tunes into the television in the White House's master bedroom," The Times begins. "He flips to CNN for news, moves to 'Fox & Friends' for comfort and messaging ideas, and sometimes watches MSNBC's 'Morning Joe' because, friends suspect, it fires him up for the day.

"Energized, infuriated -- often a gumbo of both -- Mr. Trump grabs his iPhone. Sometimes he tweets while propped on his pillow, according to aides. Other times he tweets from the den next door, watching another television....

"...He sees the highest office in the land much as he did the night of his stunning victory over Hillary Clinton -- as a prize he must fight to protect every waking moment, and Twitter is his Excalibur.

"Despite all his bluster, he views himself less a titan dominating the world stage than a maligned outside engaged in a struggle to be taken seriously...."

See: Trump appears to be winning battle with media

Steak and ice cream

Referring to Trump as a "lifelong hotelier," The Times says the president's "principal mode of blowing off steam is his nightly dinner in the White House residence..." with invited guests. 

"Mr. Trump has always relished gossiping over plates of well-done steak, salad slathered with Roquefort dressing and bacon crumbles, tureens of gravy and massive slices of dessert with extra ice cream."

For more, see TRUMP'S WAY.

James Comey

In today's column on former FBI Director James Comey, Mike Kelly of The Record betrays his dislike of Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton (Opinion front).

Most observers say Comey reopening the investigation into Clinton's handling of classified information on Oct. 28, 2016 (10 days before the election) hurt her campaign, and contributed to her defeat.

Kelly blames Clinton's defeat on "her own mistakes."

Today's Better Living section, which is filled with a couple of dozen photos of cookies, should have carried a warning label for the many older readers who are diabetic, and suffer from related heart problems. 

The author, Liz Johnson, is a "content strategist" at lohud.com and The Journal News, a Gannett paper that covers Westchester, Rockland and Putnam counties in New York.

"Lohud" is Gannett speak for "Lower Hudson Valley."

Al Franken

In the coverage of the resignation of Sen. Al Franken and other elected members of Congress accused of sexual misconduct, the news media are spending little time commenting on why Trump shouldn't also step down in view of his sexual harassment of women.

In an op-ed column on Friday, Editorial Page Editor Alfred P. Doblin swings wildly between the "powerful men who allegedly treated women, and in some cases, other men, as objects created for their enjoyment," and an ice cream store in Montclair.

I read the shop's name over and over before I got the play on words. Dairy Air Ice Cream Co. recalls derriere, the French word for buttocks.

But the problem is not the name, Alfred P. Doblin says; it's the logo, "a shapely bovine ... with her ample tush pushed out and tattooed with 'DA' in a heart."

Doblin calls the logo "obvious sexism," but Trump's "disrespecting women" is mentioned only in passing.

See a video of 16 women who accuse Trump of unwanted kissing and worse: 'He groped me'

In another Margulies cartoon, the lighting of the Christmas Tree in Manhattan's Rockefeller Center is compared to the restoration of electricity and lights in hurricane-ravaged Puerto Rico. "Amazing! That's more lights than in all of Puerto Rico," someone in the crowd says.