Pranked in Tulsa: It seemed suspicious when President Trump said a million people had applied for tickets to his Tulsa rally and it appears there was a reason for it.

 The NY Times reports that there was a social media campaign to get people to apply for tickets and not show. President Trump ended up speaking to thousands of empty seats in the 19,000-seat BOK Center in Tulsa. The Times  reports that users of Tik Tok and fans of Korean K-pop music sandbagged the President by registering for seats and leaving them empty.

  The Tulsa Fire Department says that the actual attendance was 6,200. Steve Schmidt, a longtime Republican strategist tweeted “The teens of America have struck a savage blow against @realDonaldTrump.”

  Trump is reported to have been stunned by the low turnout. Delivering a disjointed, and hate-filled speech, Trump looked unsupported by his base at his first big campaign event since the coronavirus crisis, which he referred to as the “kung flu.”  The President ranted about the price of new Air Force One jets, protesters in Seattle, the destruction of monuments, kneeling for the national anthem, defunding police, abolishing Immigration and Customs enforcement, the radical left, Hillary Clinton, and Joe Biden. He complained about maskless pedestrians in New York even while few people at his rally wore masks.

  Trump never mentioned police killings or the Black Lives movement by name.  

  Some samples:

• “And they never talk about COVID. They don’t talk about, when you see 25,000 people walking down Fifth Avenue or walking down a street of a Democrat run city, you never hear them saying, they’re not wearing their mask.”

• “I have done a phenomenal job with it … I saved hundreds of thousands of lives.”

• “We’re going to stop the radical left. We’re going to build a future of safety and opportunity for Americans of every race, color, religion, and creed. Republicans are the party of liberty, equality, and justice for all.” 

• “The unhinged left wing mob is trying to vandalize our history, desecrate our monuments, our beautiful monuments. Tear down our statues and punish, cancel and persecute anyone who does not conform to their demands for absolute and total control.” 

• “One thing about Air Force One, we got plenty of televisions. We have televisions in closets. You open up the closet, got a television. We got a lot of televisions. It’s a great plane. Great everything. By the way, we ordered new ones.”

• “If Joe Biden were to become president an emboldened left, will launch a full scale assault on American life. You know that. They’ll expel anyone who disagrees with them.” 

• “ They want to take away your guns through the repeal of your Second Amendment, as sure as you’re sitting there.” 

• “And they want to appoint Supreme Court justices who will utterly obliterate your Constitution.”

• “ Biden is a very willing Trojan horse for socialism.”

• “They should not get rewarded with an election victory on November 3rd, that shouldn’t happen. It’ll destroy this country. Our country will be destroyed.”

• “We’re a great country. You are so lucky I’m president, that’s all I can tell you.

Thirty Something: President Trump is beginning to drop into the high 30s in some national election polls. The latest Fox News poll has Joe Biden at 50 percent of the potential vote and Trump at 38. The Hill/HarrisX has it at Biden 47, Trump 37. The biggest spread is 14 points in the CNN poll; Biden 55, Trump 41.

Viral News: The White House says it expects a fall wave of coronavirus cases as new daily cases have hit records in 12 states and overall new cases have risen 20 percent over the last two weeks. 

  Peter Navarro, the White House director of trade and manufacturing policy told CNN’s Jake Tapper, “We are filling the stockpile in anticipation of a possible problem in the fall.” 

   This morning, 119,977 Americans are dead of the coronavirus. 

Firing Line: The US attorney for Manhattan relented and agreed to leave office Saturday after Attorney Gen. Bill Barr told him he’d been fired by President Trump. Although Trump said he knew nothing about it, Geoffrey Berman agreed to depart without a fight and leave the office in charge of his top deputy.

  Although it was unstated, Berman is believed to have been pushed out because of his investigations of Trump associates, including personal lawyers Michael Cohen and Rudy Giuliani. It appears to be part of a purge in many offices of people deemed insufficiently loyal to the President.

  Rep. Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat who heads the House Judiciary Committee, said, “The whole thing smacks of corruption and incompetence

Changing Images: Familiar memorials and brand names are falling fast amidst the racial protests in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.

  The statue of Francis Scott Key, who wrote “The Star-Spangled Banner” but was also a slave owner, was toppled by protesters in San Francisco. The equestrian statue of Theodore Roosevelt, accompanied by an African man, is being removed from the front steps of the Museum of Natural History in New York. 

 After nearly 100 years, Eskimo Pie ice cream is a brand name joining other big names on the racial and ethnic brand trash. “We are committed to being a part of the solution on racial equality, and recognize the term is derogatory,” a company statement said.

  Eskimo Pie joins Aunt Jemima, Uncle Ben’s, Mrs. Butterworth’s,  and Cream of Wheat in overhauling long-used names, images, and marketing strategies based on racial and ethnic stereotypes. 

  It’s amazing that these things have been on store shelves for a hundred years. 

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