Fact Check: Did astronaut restrain himself from punching Trump? – Florida Times-Union
Times-Union readers want to know:
I received a post via email that Buzz Aldrin said that his greatest achievement was successfully restraining himself from punching President Donald Trump. Did he really say that?
Trump signed an executive order on June 30 to re-establish the National Space Council, which was absorbed by the National Science and Technology Council in 1993. Aldrin, 87, who was the second person to walk on the moon after Neil Armstrong on the Apollo 11 mission, was at the signing. Trump’s exchange with Aldrin quickly went viral, according to Snopes.com:
“We know what this is, space. That’s all it has to say: space. There’s a lot of room out there, right?” Trump asked Aldrin.
Aldrin replied with a quote from the astronaut character Buzz Lightyear from the movie “Toy Story.”
“Infinity and beyond!” Aldrin said.
“This is infinity here,” Trump responded as Aldrin appeared confused. “It could be infinity. We don’t really know. But it could be. It has to be something — but it could be infinity, right?”
The next day, a website purporting to be the online arm of a publication called The Rochdale Herald published an article reporting that Aldrin said his biggest life achievement was restraining himself from punching Trump:
“Buzz Aldrin has surprised many today by saying that his greatest achievement is not punching Donald Trump. Mr. Aldrin attended an event where the president gave a rambling word salad of a speech.
“Mr. Aldrin looked visibly pained as he explained to the Herald, ‘At first I thought it was a joke or an Alzheimer’s awareness thing. As he went on, I realized it wasn’t Alec Baldwin [who does an impression of Trump on ‘Saturday Night Live’ but the actual president. How is that possible? I’ve met Nixon, Johnson and Obama and never experienced anything like that. Hell, even Bush used to be able to get words into the right order.”
Aldrin — who once punched a moon landing conspiracy theorist, according to various media reports — went on to say, “How the hell do you inspire kids with that? Who can honestly say being president is something to aspire to?”
The story is, however, fiction. The Rochdale Herald says that it publishes satire “from the world’s worst local newspaper,” and the website’s “About” page goes even further: “The Rochdale Herald is a satirical, spoof, parody commentary on current affairs, and stuff that annoys and amuses us. We make it up and it’s not intended, in any way whatsoever, to be considered factual,” Snopes.com points out.
“If you read a story on The Rochdale Herald, please take a deep breath before going off the deep end as we probably made it up, apart from the horoscopes, they’re all completely legit (no they aren’t, we make those up, too). We don’t spend much time checking facts or corroborating sources because, and we can’t stress this enough, we’re not actually journalists and are making most of it up. This is an entertainment site that may occasionally confuse some fact with fiction and vice-versa but ultimately we’re writing about the news to make you laugh. We also might talk about sex and swear a bit from time to time so if you’re under 18 please don’t read it.
“Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental, seriously.”
Although Aldrin never said that he had restrained himself from punching the president, he did exercise some frustration on Sept. 9, 2002, and subsequently made headlines when he punched conspiracy theorist Bart Sibrel, who was following him on the street. The man called Aldrin a “coward” and a “liar,” and said the moon landing was faked, the Huffington Post reported. Aldrin told the man to get away from him, and when he refused, Aldrin punched him in the jaw.
The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office did not file charges. The man tried to sue Aldrin, but the judge threw out the case.
Carole Fader: (904) 359-4635
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