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The fierce war of words between President Trump and ABC’s “The View” has long been a staple of the daytime talk show known for its spirited discussions about politics and pop culture.

But the signature “Hot Topics” segment that frequently blasts Trump has suddenly gone cold as speculation escalates that the Trump administration is considering taking action against “The View.”

Show host Whoopi Goldberg and her all-female panel has been conspicuously silent on ABC’s suspension of “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” in the wake of blistering backlash over Kimmel’s comments about slain right-wing activist Charlie Kirk. The late-night host said during the monologue on his show Monday that the “MAGA gang” was characterizing Tyler Robinson, the Utah man accused in the shooting death of Kirk, “as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it.”

FCC Chairman Brendan Carr has indicated that “The View” might be investigated to see whether it qualifies as “a bona fide news program,” which would exempt it from the agency’s equal time rule.

The absence of commentary since the news about Kimmel broke on Wednesday has been particularly glaring after late-night hosts Stephen Colbert, Seth Meyers and Jon Stewart criticized the decision by the Walt Disney Co.-owned network on their respective programs Thursday night. The network’s action has been largely condemned in entertainment circles, sparking major protests outside Disney headquarters and Kimmel’s Hollywood Boulevard studio.

MSNBC anchor Nicolle Wallace on Thursday called out the silence of “The View” during her “Deadline: White House” show, noting Walt Disney Co. had previously pledged $15 million to Trump’s library to resolve a defamation lawsuit over inaccurate statements about Trump by ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos.

“Those women are fearless, and the story didn’t come up,” Wallace said. “It’s obviously being felt and acted upon at ABC more broadly.”

Trump’s bitter campaign against “The View” and his desire to cancel it was highlighted last July after co-host Joy Behar declared that Trump was “so jealous” of former President Obama.

White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers fired back in a statement sent to entertainment venues calling Behar “an irrelevant loser suffering from a severe case of Trump Derangement Syndrome … She should self-reflect on her own jealousy of President Trump’s historic popularity before her show is the next to be pulled off air.”

In sharp contrast to the current hush about the president, Goldberg and her co-hosts unleashed a vicious attack on Trump after he blasted the show during a campaign rally last year.

“So I watched that stupid ‘View’ where you have these really dumb people,” Trump told the large crowd, which responded with boos.

Saying that “politics can do strange things to demented people,” he relayed how he had hired Goldberg as a comedian before his political career, “and her mouth was so foul. She was filthy dirty, disgusting … I said I would never hire her again.”

The opening segment of “The View” the following day showed the hosts entering as Christina Aguilera’s “Dirrty” played.

Addressing Trump, Goldberg said, “As a matter of fact, I was filthy, and I stand on that … How dumb are you? You hired me four times … and you didn’t know what you were getting? How dumb are you?”

Co-host and senior ABC News legal correspondent and analyst Sunny Hostin weighed in: “Donald Trump, I want to thank you for personally (sic) telling so many lies and committing so many alleged crimes and providing us with material on a daily basis. You help us do our jobs, and I am so appreciative.”

Noting that she was a former prosecutor, she added, “I admit, I may not have spent as much time in a courtroom as you have … And like Madam Vice President Kamala Harris, I’ve had a history of prosecuting sex offenders, so thank you for keeping people like us in business.”

Hostin concluded with an invitation to Trump to come on “The View: “I’ll even give you a free ‘View’ mug — not to be confused with a mug shot. Because that’s your area.”

Walt Disney World Resort, Florida is a family favourite, but social influencer Alex Dobson has dropped a video expressing his thoughts on the park – and it’s gone viral in just a day

With the summer holidays in full swing, many families will be embarking on vacations, whether that’s abroad or as part of a staycation. Some of those seasonal revellers will be lucky enough to be visiting ‘Mickey’s House’, AKA, Walt Disney World Resort, Florida.

It’s estimated that just under 1 million UK visitors travel to Orlando annually, with 80% of those visiting ‘the most magical place of earth’. However, while Disney World and Disney Land are widely loved by children and held with a fierce nostalgia by many parents (and non-parents), the reality can sometimes prove to be less than dreamy.

What’s more, one viral video recently popped the Mickey-ears shaped bubble with one deft swipe. Alex Dodman is a social influencer with roughly 450,000 followers across TikTok and Instagram.

The father-of-three is famous for his ‘real reviews’ of family days out, attractions and holidays, as well as viral trends and cultural events – and now his spotlight is firmly on the Disney resort.

Opening the review with a wry, “It’s almost like we’ve been programmed to think that this is the most magical place on earth”, while filming a motorway gantry leading into the theme park that proclaims the very same, Alex boldly claims that “it’s probably the most overpriced tourist p**stakes in history”.

As many a parent who’s been through the Disney World machine will attest to, the resort is not cheap. A Disney World holiday for a family of four from the UK, including flights, can range from around £6,500 to £15,000 or more, depending on the various packages.

And the repeated financial roundhouse kicks are not entirely conducive to a happy holiday between married people, either, with Alex saying it’s likely they’re going to “pretend they’re having a good time posting about it online, when in reality they’ve probably argued about 1,000 times, been on the brink of divorce, and each child has had an overstimulated meltdown every half an hour”.

According to the influencer: “A ticket to get in here for the day for two adults, two kids and a baby was $709 and because I actually wanted the kids to go on a ride this time, I got some lightning Lane tickets for three rides for an extra $136… How is this even allowed?”

‘Main Street’, the thoroughfare with full view of the Disney Castle, is one to swerve, says Alex.

Not impressed with people that “pretended to cry when they first saw the castle”, he cracked on to the rides – saying that “having some lightning Lane tickets did work well”.

He was less than impressed with the rides themselves, saying the ‘Barnstormer’ “lasted for 25 seconds”, ‘Peter Pan’s Flight’ was “basically pitch black” and ‘It’s a Small World’ was “everyone’s favourite nightmare”.

Conceding that he did understand why “this place is some people’s happy place”, Alex reflected that the ‘trap’ may lie in the fact that Brits have travelled all the way to Orlando.

For that reason, it’s tempting to give in to the cost to embrace a “once in a lifetime” trip. However, he went on to say that: “There’s no way you can enjoy this without having in the back of the mind how utterly screwed you’re being done by Disney”.

Summing up, Alex considered the pay off of such a pricey trip, saying: “Did the kids enjoy it? Yeah. But we also went to Clearwater Beach for the weekend, and they said they had a better time jumping in the sea there, which was free”.

He added: “However you chop it up, it’s way too expensive.”

Comments to the video were mixed, with some wholeheartedly agreeing and others fiercely defending the place that they deeply love.

Many pointed out that Alex’s big mistake was not booking park hopper tickets that make the experience a whole lot more affordable. Doing more research could have helped him to avoid the busiest queues, too.

One follower helpfully supplied: “Yeah, feels like you need so much insider knowledge to not be stung so much with Disney. Park hopper tickets are a better and cheaper option. Staying at Disney property helps for costs with parking for free and dining plans.”

Another person was keen to help too, saying: “Disney World takes a lot of research to do it well and paying for lightning lanes on these type of rides shows you didn’t complete basic training in Disney world trip planning. I think it’s to do with having really little kids too it’s so much fun in the bigger better rides with older kids”.

One poster was relived that they weren’t missing out, saying: “Thank you for blessing us poor who can’t get there that we aren’t depriving our kids and ourselves of the most magical experience on earth”.

And one full-blown fan was clear where her loyalty lay, expressing: “I’m in the Disney cult. Please don’t save me if I blink. They can take my hard earned cash from me so I can walk down that busy street, get tears in my eyes and reminisce of days gone by. “

By now, many Disney fans have had a chance to see the officially released images by the company as well as close-up pictures taken by park guests. There have been quibbles, to say the least, with many a fan showing snapshots of the animatronic side by side with pictures of a much younger Disney. It’s important to note that the figure captures Disney in 1963. Disney died in 1966 at 65.

The show has me thinking a bit on how the animatronic medium can be used best. Disney introduced its audio-animatronics in 1963 with the Enchanted Tiki Room, but elevated the form in 1965 with the “Great Moments With Mr. Lincoln” production. We have no filmed footage of Abraham Lincoln, meaning he exists to us largely in our mind. “Walt Disney — A Magical Life” contains a 15-minute documentary-like film, “One Man’s Dream,” which is narrated by Disney and Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Bob Iger, allowing us an instant comparison.

From my vantage point — again, about three-fourths of the way into the theater — the animatronic was a more-than-respectable approximation of Disney. It’s not perfect, perhaps — the face is a little bulky, the cheeks just a bit off — but that’s because I still think the medium is best suited for more fantastical characters and creations, shows and figures that let us use our imagination rather than aim to capture life. Audio, however, is taken direct from Disney’s speeches, with an emphasis on creative inspiration, and while it has been cleaned up, there’s no mistaking that it’s Disney’s voice.

Ultimately, Walt Disney Imagineering, the creative team responsible for theme park creations, deserves to be commended for this risk, as it has me eager to see how audio-animatronics will continue to evolve and elevate our immersive experiences. At its core, this is a robot, and no robot will directly capture human life, at least not yet, but this is as close as Walt Disney Co. has come.

The Walt Disney animatronic figure has been in the works for about seven years, according to Walt Disney Imagineering.

(Richard Harbaugh / Disneyland Resort / Image Group LA)

It’s all about a California (and high-growth) state of mind.

A park photographer, Kristin Wagner, photographs visitors as they enter Disney’s California Adventure, just below a recreation of the Golden Gate Bridge.

(Don Kelsen/Los Angeles Times)

In a period of grand expansion, Disneyland would start to become a proper resort — a metamorphosis that, while it didn’t work immediately, would be course-corrected and set up Disneyland for a new generation of growth. This era added Disney California Adventure, turning the destination into one that the Walt Disney Co. hoped would command multiday stays.

What was new

A former parking lot across from Disneyland was remade into Disney California Adventure, which would open in February 2001. The long in-development project was designed to honor California culture, but was pitched initially as a West Coast answer to Walt Disney World’s Epcot. The Times was kind in its opening coverage, praising the park’s change of pace from Disneyland and admiring how its architecture blurred fiction and reality.

The hang-gliding simulation Soarin’ Over California was an instant hit, and “Eureka! A California Parade” was Disney theatricality at its weirdest, with floats that depicted Old Town San Diego, Watts and more. But California Adventure’s prevalence of amusement park-like rides failed to command the crowds of its next door neighbor. Disney’s own documentary “The Imagineering Story” took a tough-love approach to the park’s early days, comparing some of its initial designs to those of a local mall. In time, however — with multiple makeovers and additions — California Adventure would become a beloved, world-class theme park, though it would stray from its initial California-centric conceit.

During this era, Disneyland also added the Grand Californian Hotel and its Downtown Disney District. A luxurious take on California’s Arts and Crafts movement, the Grand Californian remains the resort’s signature hotel and home to its finest dining establishment, Napa Rose, under renovations at the time of writing. Disney would also add a second haunted attraction with the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror in 2004. Over at Disneyland, Tomorrowland in 1998 would receive a transformation, one it has yet to fully recover from. The beloved People Mover would be no more, a Jules Verne-inspired art style would come and gradually go, and Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters would arrive in 2005.

The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh would in 2003 evict the Country Bears from their music hall.

Did you know?

This era is home to two of Disneyland’s shortest-lived major attractions. Superstar Limo at California Adventure was conceived as a ride in which paparazzi would chase celebs, a concept deemed in poor taste in the wake of the death of Princess Diana. It was refashioned as a sort of tour of Hollywood with heavily caricatured figurines of the likes of Whoopi Goldberg, Regis Philbin, Drew Carey, Cher and more, but would close within a year. At Disneyland, People Mover‘s replacement Rocket Rods could never consistently operate, and the ride would last just about two years. The tracks remain.