Trump: Bobby, a lot of people seem upset about the fluoridation thing. The fluoride in the water. You want to get rid of the fluoride and people are saying that’s not nice.

Kennedy: You hate sharks, right?

Trump: Hate them.

Kennedy: Because they have such sharp teeth, right?

Trump: Yes, I hate the sharpness.

Kennedy: That’s because the oceans have fluoride in them and it makes their teeth sharp.

Trump: Fluoride is bad!

Kennedy: What I’ve been saying.

Trump: I can’t wait til you go wild on health.

“By stepping on rakes, Trump ruins his own ‘honeymoon’ phase

“..as MSNBC’s Chris Hayes summarized..“This does not seem like an unbeatable colossus at all. This seems like a pretty weak leader who is hemorrhaging political capital.”

It’s not uncommon for a president-elect to enjoy a “honeymoon” phase in the aftermath of a successful national election. It’s a period of time in which an incoming American leader is able to bask in his or her victory, welcome congratulatory wishes, and imagine a world of exciting possibilities before the real work begins on Inauguration Day.

In theory, Donald Trump could be enjoying his “honeymoon” phase. In practice, the Republican keeps stepping on rakes.

Take last week, for example. My MSNBC colleague Hayes Brown summarized:

Leave it to President-elect Donald Trump to take one Washington crisis and add another one on top. As a plan to keep the federal government over the holidays began to waver this week, Trump injected a new demand: pausing — or altogether abolishing — the debt ceiling before he takes office in January.

Throughout his first term, Trump had a habit of screwing up policy agreements with 11th-hour demands that didn’t make a lot of sense, and last week’s developments suggested that the president-elect learned very little from those experiences.....

The one thing Trump wanted was the one thing he didn’t get.

He didn’t have to suffer this embarrassment. In fact, he didn’t have to do anything. He chose to intervene, in the 11th hour, with an odd and unnecessary demand, which Republicans rejected and left Democrats wondering aloud about his mental health.

If this were a rare setback in an otherwise flawless transition phase, it’d be easier to overlook. But the opposite is true: In the seven weeks since Election Day, Trump and his team have careened from one failure to another, as part of a pre-inaugural process that can only be described as shambolic. What’s more, by some measures, it’s getting worse, not better.

The apparent point of the president-elect’s fixation on his illusory “mandate” is to present himself as a powerful political titan, poised to arrive at the White House with a head of steam and the backing of the electorate. But as MSNBC’s Chris Hayes summarized on Friday night, “This does not seem like an unbeatable colossus at all. This seems like a pretty weak leader who is hemorrhaging political capital.”

Why Elon Musk said a House Democrat ❝needs to be expelled❞ from Congress

When the billionaire called Rep. Rosa DeLauro an ❝awful creature,❞ it was a problem. When he called for the Democrat’s expulsion, it made the problem worse. ⤸

But in the case of Democratic Rep. Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut, a primary challenge apparently isn’t good enough for the billionaire: Musk wants her to be kicked out of Congress altogether.

As CNBC reported, at the heart of the story is a change made to the stopgap spending bill designed to prevent a government shutdown last week.

House Democrats Jim McGovern of Massachusetts and Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut say their Republican colleagues in Congress caved to the demands of Elon Musk, sinking a bipartisan government funding bill that would have regulated U.S. investments in China.

In the original, bipartisan spending agreement — the one that Musk helped kill — there was a provision designed to restrict U.S. investments in China, specifically related to investments in the artificial intelligence and technology sectors......

DeLauro went a bit further, writing a letter to congressional leaders questioning whether the change to the bill reflected some kind of behind-the-scenes corruption: Perhaps, the Connecticut Democrat alleged, the legislation was tweaked specifically to benefit Musk, who has, as DeLauro put it, “extensive” business interests in China.

It was, to be sure, a provocative allegation. But the billionaire megadonor responded with an online item of his own, calling DeLauro an “awful creature” and saying that he believes the Democratic congresswoman “needs to be expelled from Congress!”

For the record, members of Congress are allowed to raise concerns about possible corruption, just as they’re able to make allegations regarding prominent public figures. Whether the congresswoman’s allegations have merit or not, to suggest that an elected lawmaker be kicked out of office for criticizing a billionaire in ways he doesn’t like is, to put it mildly, unsettling.

Trump rediscovers his odd interest in U.S. ownership of Greenland: Greenland is not for sale, though Donald Trump continues to believe that it's "an absolute necessity" for the United States to buy it.

And then, of course, there’s Greenland.

In an item published to his social media platform, the president-elect announced his intention to nominate Ken Howery, the former U.S. ambassador to Sweden, to serve as the next U.S. ambassador to Demark. The statement probably wouldn’t have generated many headlines, were it not for one related point Trump added in the online announcement:

For purposes of National Security and Freedom throughout the World, the United States of America feels that the ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity.

Yes, we’re apparently back to the whole “let’s buy Greenland” thing again......

Blinken added that, as far as the Biden administration was concerned, the United States was not interested in trying to purchase Greenland.

About a month from now, that will apparently change.

It’s not altogether clear why, exactly, Trump sees owning Greenland as “an absolute necessity.” It might have something to do with oil, or perhaps the president-elect has some other undisclosed motivation.

Regardless, the morning after the Republican’s online statement reached the public, Trump confronted news he probably didn’t want to see. “Greenland is ours. We are not for sale and will never be for sale. We must not lose our long struggle for freedom,” the island’s Prime Minister Mute Egede said in a written comment.

If recent history is any guide, Trump will probably ignore the statement. Watch this space.

The Republican Party's line on Elon Musk was already weird.

But seeing a GOP congressman describe the billionaire megadonor as "our prime minister" clearly made a bad situation worse.

But around the same time as Hagerty’s appearance on CNN’s “State of the Union,” another congressional Republican was going even further. NBC News reported:

Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-Texas, on Sunday compared tech mogul Elon Musk to a “prime minister,” praising Musk for speaking out against an early version of a stopgap funding bill last week. “It’s kind of interesting,” Gonzales said during an interview on CBS News’ “Face the Nation.” “We have a president, we have a vice president, we have a speaker. It feels like as if Elon Musk is our prime minister.”

In context, as a video clip of the comments makes clear, Gonzales’ comments were not a complaint. Rather, the Texas Republican made the observation as if it were a positive development. The congressman added that he spoke with Musk “a couple of times” last week, amid the unexpected Capitol Hill drama......

So, a couple of things.

First, while parliamentary systems around the world vary, prime ministers invariably need to win some kind of election before claiming power. Being pals with a president-elect isn’t supposed to be enough to serve in a position of authority — in this country or any other.

Second, while Gonzales might see the world’s wealthiest individual as “the voice of the people,” there’s compelling evidence to the contrary. In fact, the latest public opinion research suggests that the American people aren’t altogether comfortable with an unelected billionaire exerting governmental influence.

The more Republican officials shrug their shoulders in response to such evidence, the more they invite a backlash.

Among the questions to consider as the Matt Gaetz ethics report reaches the public:

Did Trump not know or not care about the controversy when he chose him to serve as attorney general?

The Floridian tried and failed to get a restraining order to halt the release of the committee’s report, and soon after, the awaited document reached the public. My MSNBC colleagues Hayley Miller and Clarissa-Jan Lim reported:

The House Ethics Committee found that then-Rep. Matt Gaetz bought illegal drugs, paid multiple women for sex and had sex with a 17-year-old while he was serving in Congress, according to a final draft of the committee’s report released Monday.

The committee found “substantial evidence that Representative Gaetz violated House rules, state and federal laws, and other standards of conduct prohibiting prostitution, statutory rape, illicit drug use, acceptance of impermissible gifts, the provision of special favors and privileges, and obstruction of Congress,” the report says.

MSNBC has published the entirety of the 42-page document online, and it paints a rather brutal picture of a Republican who “regularly” paid women for sex during his tenure on Capitol Hill. The same report accuses Gaetz of using or possessing illegal drugs, including cocaine; accepting improper gifts; and helping a woman he was having sex with obtain an expedited passport......

So, what happens now? A few questions hang overhead.

1. Did Donald Trump not know about this or not care? In case anyone has forgotten, it was just last month when the president-elect announced his intention to nominate Gaetz to lead the Justice Department as the nation’s next attorney general. The result was a fiasco — Gaetz withdrew from consideration after just eight days — and evidence of a shambolic transition process.

But in light of the new allegations, Trump’s decision is even tougher to defend: He chose Gaetz to serve as the nation’s chief law enforcement official, despite the House Ethics Committee’s investigation. Did the president-elect not know about the probe and the possibility of brutal findings, or did he simply not care?.....

4. Why did House Speaker Mike Johnson try to keep the ethics committee’s report from the public? While the ethics panel has traditionally operated independently, House Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters in mid-November that he would “strongly request” that the committee keep its findings under wraps. The Louisiana Republican added that he was concerned about setting “a terrible precedent” by releasing a report on a former member of Congress.

In reality, however, Congress has already released ethics reports about former members — in both the House and the Senate — prompting questions as to why the incumbent House speaker was so adamant about shielding Gaetz.

Taken together, there’s no reason to believe the release of the House Ethics Committee’s findings will necessarily end the larger controversy.