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'That was my idea': How Trump claims credit for nearly everything including the word "caravan"
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/02/20/that-was-my-idea-how-trump-claims-credit-nearly-everything/?utm_term=.522d16f43ba3‘That was my idea’: How Trump claims credit for nearly everything
Forty-eight minutes into his freewheeling 75-minute rally last week, President Trump made a curious claim.
“How about the word ‘caravan?’ ” he said. “ ‘Caravan.’ I think that was one of mine.”
Claiming credit for a word first used in 1588 seems like another example of Trump’s braggadocio, and another indication that his 2020 strategy will revolve around touting real and made-up accomplishments that appeal to his base, as you can see in the video above.
In office, Trump has taken credit for solving crises he himself created and sometimes skirted responsibility when things go wrong. Things the president has claimed credit for include:
The economy (“I get no credit for it”)
Bailing out farmers affected by his trade policies (“That was my idea”)
Health care (“People haven’t given us too much credit”)
Reducing health-care premiums (“I don’t know if Obama is going to get the credit. I think we should get the credit.”)
Repealing the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate (“We got no credit, but that’s okay”)
A “great” White House staff (“They don’t get enough credit”)
Decades-old border barriers (“It has been very effective”)
Legislation (“I’m given no credit in the mainstream media”)
“Foreign” (“I’m getting a lot of credit for what we’re doing foreign”)
“Chemistry with all of the leaders” (“People have given me credit”)
“The Middle East” (“‘Trump gets no credit’”)
“Decimating” the Islamic State (“Everybody gives me credit”)
Stopping an attack in Syria (“Nobody is going to give me credit, but that’s okay”)
His relationship with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un (“We’re given no credit for it”)
Moving the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem (“Do I get credit for saving a billion bucks? Not really.”)
Getting NATO countries to pay what they had already been paying (NATO’s secretary general “gave me all of the credit”)
GOP’s retaining the Senate in 2018 (“I won the Senate — meaning we won the Senate altogether — but we get no credit for that.”)
Winning 41 percent of female voters (“Nobody wants to give me credit for that, as you know.”)
Inflating the cost reduction of Air Force planes (“Do they give me credit? No, but that’s okay.”)
Growth in Hispanic-owned businesses (“I’d like to take full credit … I wasn’t the one getting up at 5 o’clock in the morning to go to work, I know that.”)
An idea for something that was already law (“I said, ‘Oh, so it wasn’t my idea.’ But you know what? I’m the only one that got it passed.”)
Taking a company’s idea to add solar panels to a southern border wall (“Pretty good imagination, right? My idea.”)
A decade-long airline trend (“Since taking office I have been very strict on Commercial Aviation”)
Dismissing CEOs who had already quit his advisory council
Taking former president Ronald Reagan’s slogan (“He didn’t trademark it”)
The success of the 2018 Winter Olympics (“We’ve been given tremendous credit”)
The 2026 World Cup (“I worked hard on this”)
Playing an Elvis Presley song to honor Elvis (“That was my idea”)
Contributing to the crazy ending of the 89th Academy Awards (“I think they were focused so hard on politics that they didn’t get the act together at the end”)
The phrase “Merry Christmas” (“Only because of our campaign”)
A word first used in that sense in the 18th century (“One of the greatest of all terms I’ve come up with is ‘fake’ ”)
A word first used in the 16th century (“‘Caravan.’ I think that was one of mine.”)
A phrase first used in the 20th century (“Prime the pump … I came up with it a couple of days ago and I thought it was good”)
Abraham Lincoln’s political party (“People never give us credit for this”)
The president isn’t always eager to claim success, though.
When asked last month about the National Football League’s national anthem controversy, which he has repeatedly wielded as a political cudgel, Trump demurred.
“I don’t want to take credit for that.”
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it's easy to believe you discovered everything 
