How Should We Talk about Trump?

And who is "we"?

I have noticed, both in the broader media landscape and specifically here in the comment section at OTB some disagreement about how to talk about Trump’s various moves and pronouncements. The debate seems to be a version of now nearly decade long debate about how literally and/or seriously to take Trump. The discussion also seems to evoke questions of whether he is an incompetent buffoon or a dangerous authoritarian wannabe.

I suppose my flippant response is: “Why not both?”

I agree that a lot of what Trump does and says is bullying buffoonery at least partially deployed in a semi-calculated fashion to elicit outrage from his opponents and to control the narrative. Naming someone like Matt Gaetz was, in part, trolling the media, the political class, and the opposition. But, by the same token, Trump would not have withdrawn the name on his own. That is: if the Senate would have been willing to confirm him, Gaetz would have been AG.

In other words, we should never forget thart Trump wold have actually installed Gaetz had he ben allowed to do so. As such, it seems more than appropriate to have been outraged by the Gaetz pick. Moreover, the fact that he will end up with Gaetz lite in Pam Bondi is being treated as more of an improvement than is warranted.

All of these appointments, especially to key departments, remain a serious concern in my view.

I also don’t think that the incompetence will save us. Does it mean that there will be no maximalist version of Trumpism? Sure, but that is not exactly comforting. Not getting Matt Gaetz but getting Pam Bondi instead doesn’t make the outcome a good one.

There are also various assertions as to how “we” ought to react. I am unclear on who “we” is supposed to be. Is it everyone? Democrats voters? Democratic office-holders? The Left (whatever that means)? The anti-Trumpers? OTB writers? OTB commenters? “We” contains multitudes.

One thing is for sure, a blog is definitionally a reactive medium. News happens and we comment. A sober analysis of the true consequences of the second Trump administration’s effects cannot come until sometime in the 2030s. The full effects may not be known until even later than that.

Let me note, and speaking solely for myself (although I am guessing there is a great deal of overlap between myself and my co-bloggers), I take Trump very seriously. I do not always take him literally, insofar as I am aware that he makes outrageous claims and threats (e.g., 100% tariffs on BRIC countries). Indeed, it is baked into my responses insofar as I assume the reader knows I don’t think he is going to do everything he asserts. Nonetheless, I think that such threats are dangerous, even if there is little chance that they will come to pass.

I take the very act of such threats, even if they seem hyperbolic, as a problem in and of themselves. If we are talking about the relationships we have built in the global and the relative stability of our behavior then just making threats is a problem. If a husband constantly threatens a wife with divorce every time they have an argument, even if he isn’t likely to go through with the threat, it almost certainly has a damaging effect on the relationship, even if the couple stays together until death do they part. Threats and fear of outrageous outcomes are no way to manage a healthy relationship. And while the international order is heavily predicated on power, it is also realtional.

Of the things that are a problem regardless of which policies threats are actually implemented, and to what degree, is the obvious intellectual and philosophical rot that has deeply taken hold in the Republican Party and therefore into large swaths of the general population.

The RFK, Jr. nomination, for example, has resulted in numerous GOP operatives and politicians parroting his vaccine skepticism. He is a person who was considered a fringe crank not that long ago. Indeed, had it not been for his last name and the fortune that came with it, he would never have risen above Weird Dude on the Internet status. Indeed, his mainstreaming (he just wants us to be healthy!) is a gateway drug into my more nonsense being taken seriously.

The fact that US Senators are defending Pete Hegseth is a great example of what Orwll wrote about in 1984: “The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”

For example.

And to my point about political allies and the contagion of stupid spreading into the general populace, note Larry Kudlow’s body language and general reaction.

Indeed, the GOP-o-sphere wants to pretend, in the main at least, that Trump’s picks are all normal and any concern about, say, and womanizing, possibly alcohol-abusing, TV host as SecDef is just normal partisan politics. Indeed, as CNN notes: Fox News ignores Pete Hegseth misconduct allegations as concerns over Trump pick mount.

Back to the notion that incompetence will save us, I continue to believe that we ain’t seen nothing yet when it comes to incompetence and while incompetence might well save us from some damage, just putting incompetent people, especially partisan hacks, in key positions will do major damage in and of itself.

Plus, some seem to have forgotten the first Trump administration. Here’s a trip down memory lane from the Center for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington: President Trump’s worst offenses. Note that the piece was from October of 2020, so the election denialism of November and December had yet to happen and January 6th was but a glint in the Proud Boys’ eyes. Side note: watching the swift reaction of the South Korean parliament to their situation has just underscored to me how remarkably unseriously January 6th has been taken in the US. The Republicans are the main malefactors there, but the country as a whole seems to have shrugged the whole thing off, more or less.

Here’s another list from CNN, which was done post-J6: Chronicling Trump’s 10 worst abuses of power. See, also this piece from the NYT about the first Trump term, As President, Trump Demanded Investigations of Foes. He Often Got Them.

All that is to point out that the clownish, buffoon with all his hyperbole and incompetence did a lot of damage the first time and that was with a lot of people standing in his way. This is, of course, why these appointments all matter so much.

But to bring this back around the what inspired this post in the first place, I think that we (there’s that word again, but I mean it quite expansively) are still struggling, even after all of this time, to know how to deal with Trump. I am at the point that while I can’t help but see him as a buffoon, I also can’t pretend like that will stave off many of his obviously dangerous political goals. Dismissing him and his administration is a mistake.

And I don’t know how else to write about the ongoing news save to call it as I see it until such a time as I have a solid reason to think otherwise.

To be clear, I still think that his approach to politics is fascistic, even though I know that sounds either hyperbolic or even hysterical to some but I will note that have tried to meticulously explain what I mean by that). Having said that, I have never made apocalyptic claims about his administration. I will admit that I still think that the mid-term elections will provide some level of corrective. I have some hope that 2028 will result in a shift away from Trumpism. But having noted that, the fact that I have to even say that (which is tantamount to saying that I believe that the sun will rise tomorrow–i.e., I shouldn’t have to say the obvious).

We don’t need the mass deportations of every single undocumented person, the cessation of elections, and 100% tariffs for Trump to do damage. While it is correct to say overreacting to Trump is a problem, so is under-reacting.

The entire discussion of pardons that James Joyner noted this morning just illustrates the corrosive effect of Trumpism on our politics. There would be no such discussion if Biden’s White House wasn’t taking Trump’s threats seriously, if not literally. And to be clear: I am not in favor of such pardons but cannot help but note that the entire discussion is the result of the already damaged norms surrounding the DoJ as created by Trump.

We are watching a profound and ongoing erosion of our political culture. I think we are watching a kind of Russification of our politics (as I noted here) wherein unreality is king, oligarchs are further empowered, and things like Justice are thoroughly politicized.

We have one of two major political parties having been largely taken over by the far-right. I have been reading Matthew Dallek’s book, Birchers: How the John Birch Society Radicalized the American Right as part of a broader research project. What is striking, and thoroughly depressing, is that way in which that which was considered truly fringe in American politics has been mainstreamed. To bring it back to RFK, Jr. for a moment, we are not only back to talking about fluoride in our drinking water, but now the call is coming from inside the house, rather than being shouted by a a weird dude with a placard on the street corner.

So, while I understand that utterly freaking out at everything Trump does and says is unwarranted (not to mention exhausting), I also think that they all have to be taken quite seriously. One of Trump’s skills is to make maximalist claims and get people to accept a less maximal, yet still pretty awful outcome. I don’t think we should accept the notion that “Well, it is not nearly as bad as what he initially said!” as some kind of solace.

But, I am also curious. How should we talk about Trump and what does “we” mean in this context?

FILED UNDER: 2024 Election, US Politics, , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Steven L. Taylor
About Steven L. Taylor
Steven L. Taylor is a retired Professor of Political Science and former College of Arts and Sciences Dean. His main areas of expertise include parties, elections, and the institutional design of democracies. His most recent book is the co-authored A Different Democracy: American Government in a 31-Country Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his BA from the University of California, Irvine. He has been blogging since 2003 (originally at the now defunct Poliblog). Follow Steven on Twitter

Comments

  1. Not the IT Dept. says:

    I think we should take him at his word, no matter how insane it sounds in the moment, and point out when (and how many times) he contradicts himself. Fred Wellman (former GOP consultant and military veteran) has an article posted on his Substack today – https://fpwellman.substack.com/p/what-if-someone-didnt-fuck-around – saying basically that the threats to slash or even eliminate veterans benefits entirely need to be fought because just because some/many veterans voted for Trump some/many didn’t and they don’t deserve to get nothing but the FAFO response.

    I hear what he’s saying and to a degree I support it, but I also think it’s necessary for American voters to really feel their lives being impacted by Trump’s election. There’s going to be pain and suffering, no question, but there’s also a lot of wishful thinking and fantasy out there. They need to confront what they supported and face real life. I know this sounds callous but they won’t believe anyone telling them anything and what else is left?

    Like my grandmother used to say when we did silly things, “well, some kids just need to touch the stove”. Well, some voters need a wakeup call, and if they find that trans Americans aren’t the main source of their pain, that would be a good first step.

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  2. Mr. Prosser says:

    @Not the IT Dept.: VA benefits could be low hanging fruit. I wonder if a loyalty oath or some such thing could be required to continue receiving benefits. The same could go for other entitlements.

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  3. Jay L Gischer says:

    For me, the most important thing to realize, and to adjust my communications to, is that so many of the needs and wants of the electorate that Trump addresses are, at core, things that I would like to tackle and improve. Just not the way Trump says to do it.

    He goes for the grand gesture – the sparkle. He doesn’t dig into the details, they don’t matter.

    The general electorate is probably racist, yes. I continue to assert that you can’t grow up white in America without soaking up at least a little racism. (*cough* this is true of other countries as well, I expect *cough*) However, the median white person in America is probably less racist than Trump is.

    So, I think my stance is more of “there’s a better way to do that” rather than “Trump is outrageous”. I think “Trump is weak” works much better politically than “Trump is outrageous”. Mind you, I think he’s outrageous. However, I also think he’s weak.

    It’s pathetic when someone has to threaten jail time for anybody who points out facts about one’s behavior. Jeez, talk about thin skin.

    Hegseth is a guy who shows up drunk for work at 6:30 AM. That’s a brilliant recommendation for someone to lead the DoD. Brilliant. He has multiple marriages, and a trail of wreckage in his wake. That’s just what we need to lead DoD, I’m sure.

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  4. Jay L Gischer says:

    @Not the IT Dept.: My version of what your grandmother used to say is, “some folks need to pee on the electric fence”.

    This is definitely a current (heh) in the culture at the moment. Distrust of scientific authority is very high. People can “do their own research” and get sucked down internet rabbit holes that are massive constructions of lies and conspiracy theories. Whether it’s flouridation or chemtrails or something else.

    I don’t really know what to do about it, but I am certain that yelling at them – the people who believe this stuff – and calling them stupid doesn’t work. They just dig in.

    Here’s something that does work, at least a little. Making bets. For instance, right after Obama was elected, a friend of mine – a gun owner – was moaning about “now there’s gonna be all this gun control legislation”. I said, “Let’s have a bet. I have 20 bucks that says a year from now, there will not be any gun control bill passed by Congress”. A year later, he walked up and gave me 20 bucks without a word.

    Americans get a lot more pragmatic when money is involved. I think we need to use that to our advantage.

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  5. Not the IT Dept. says:

    @Mr. Prosser:

    Didn’t they already swear a loyalty oath when they entered the armed forces?

    Musk and what’s-his-name wouldn’t be talking up slashing government spending if they were going to wimp out on a loyalty oath. They’re looking for screaming outrage when funding is cut. That will prove that they’re slashing costs. Hell, they’re not running for re-election so what do they care?

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  6. Jay L Gischer says:

    @Not the IT Dept.: As far as veterans benefits are concerned, withdrawal of funds can be reversed if it turns out to be unpopular, as we expect. And it’s something Democrats can run on.

    Remember all those times Republicans wanted to cut Social Security. Turns out the voters didn’t want them to do that, and it showed.

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  7. gVOR10 says:

    @Jay L Gischer:

    I think “Trump is weak” works much better politically than “Trump is outrageous”. Mind you, I think he’s outrageous.

    Is Trump a threat or is he a buffoon? My not remotely flippant answer is, “Both!” And whichever highly paid campaign advisers told Walz to stop saying “weird” cost us the election IMHO. Trump thrives on being thought strong. The whole “he’s a fascist and a threat to democracy” campaign was true, but made him sound strong.

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  8. Slugger says:

    We have to have a vision of the future we want to create and not allow Trump’s strategy of capturing the agenda and attention by making bizarre plans, tariffs, extraconstitutional DOGEs, appointments of Gaetz types, etc to control the national debate. This requires leadership which seems to be a scarce commodity.

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  9. gVOR10 says:

    @gVOR10: Took me three tries to get smart spell check to accept “Walz”. The man ran for VP of the United States FFS.

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  10. Joe says:

    Reading your OP, Steven L. Taylor, I am reminded of my time some years ago sitting with a therapist processing some very turbulent changes in my life, partly because of the OP’s length, but mostly because it is mulling over and over again the things we have been talking about years. It’s the process of coming to terms with the changes in our political lives.

    I get much of the same vibe from the comments so far.

    I am sure my therapist thought that a lot of what I said from week to week was territory we had been over before, but it nevertheless needs to be said to be considered and dealt with.

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  11. Mr. Prosser says:

    @Not the IT Dept.: Trump doesn’t give a flying feck about oaths we gave when we enlisted. He wants an oath to himself and he could make it happen just like the loyalty oaths during the communist scare in the late 40s to mid 50s.

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  12. @Joe: I think there is a lot of truth to your observation.

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  13. Paul L. says:

    @Not the IT Dept.:
    You failed to mention that Fred Wellman is part of the pro-democracy MeidasTouch BS network that is dismissed when I use it as an example representing progressives and Democrats.

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  14. steve says:

    My father was an avid John Bircher for a long time. He made me read a lot of their material including None Dare Call it Treason. I can still remember some, a few, of the words to the anti-communist songs that he played on the stereo. In my mind the Birchers were pretty much what the modern GOP has become in its methods, if not exactly having the same focus in whom they chose to count as enemies ie the reliance on conspiracy theory and extreme distortion of facts and data.

    There are a lot fo ways for us to think about Trump and you make good points. What I think you should add is that we should remember that he answers a specific and enduring need on the part of conservatives. They want/need that authoritarian, father figure who will make everything right for them, taking them back to some imaginary world that never existed. Importantly, that figure absolves them of all agency for their problems. He finds others on whom to blame their problems and identifies them (trans, gays, minorities, women) and tells them that only he can make things better.

    Steve

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  15. al Ameda says:

    First conservatives tell us to take Trump’s words seriously, then we’re told by those same conservatives, ‘Trump says a lot sh*t, don’t take it all literally and seriously.’

    Now we’re at a new Outrage Point, the latest rumor is that Biden is considering pre-emptive pardons for Liz Cheney and others. We know that during the campaign Trump openly suggested that Liz Cheney was guilty of treason and that she should be tried before televised military tribunals.

    So, what is it? This is just Trump trash talking us, it’s all a joke?
    Or, take him seriously, but we’ll just have to wait until Trump, Patel, and Bondi start the revenge on people like Liz Cheney and Anthony Fauci?

    Personally, I hope that Biden is just trolling Republicans, and does not intend to pre-emptively pardon anyone. Strategically, I hope that Democrats show no fear and do something perhaps create a legal defense fund as a contingency against the possibility that Cheney, Fauci and others may have to spend huge sums of money defend to themselves.

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  16. Not the IT Dept. says:

    @Paul L.:

    He wrote a grand total of three articles – that does not constitute being part of a network. As usual, you’re a fantasist.

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  17. Paul L. says:
  18. Charley in Cleveland says:

    Perhaps Trump should be spoken of as America’s program director, seeing his one true talent is garnering attention and making the media hounds chase squirrels. He clearly doesn’t know what he is talking about on almost every substantive issue, and he doesn’t have to when the Heritage Foundation and a cadre of wingnut lawyers do the detail work, and the GOP pols follow him with brooms and shovels like the boys who followed PT Barnum’s elephants. THE AMERICA SHOW….STARRING DONALD TRUMP!

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  19. gVOR10 says:

    al Ameda:

    Strategically, I hope that Democrats show no fear and do something perhaps create a legal defense fund as a contingency against the possibility that Cheney, Fauci and others may have to spend huge sums of money defend to themselves.

    There is precedent for the Party providing funds. The RNC gave a cut, off the top, of their fundraising to Trump’s legal defense PAC.

    But of course if Dems do it, it will be on the front pages of the MSM as a major norm violation.

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  20. Not the IT Dept. says:

    @Paul L.:

    Sorry I can’t understand gibberish. Try writing/talking like a normal human and maybe you’ll come across better.

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  21. Jay L Gischer says:

    @al Ameda: I have been thinking much the same thing. We didn’t pick a fight, but we’re in one. Blanket pardons affirm Trump’s narrative.

    Trump has not actually done well in court. He pretends he has. He skates because of a technicality or a friendly judge kicks the can down the road past the election. Then he says, “completely exonerated”. Just like he was in the rape defamation case, lol.

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  22. Skookum says:

    My inner dialogue:

    – Trump’s primary motivation is his personal self-interest.

    – Trump does not hold the values of the people who founded and fought for American democracy (with the exception of their treatment of the Black enslaved and Native Americans to advance the welfare of white European settlers); in other words, his family were not assimilated by shared American culture and values. His father’s primary motivation was his personal self-interest, ergo, DJ Trump.

    – Trump is not empathetic, nor will he ever be empathetic.

    – Once the rule of law is eroded, it is very hard to re-establish the rule of law. The rule of law will be a thing of the past unless Republicans and the Supreme Court stand up to him. I’m not holding my breath.

    – He is a mobster, and uses mob culture and tactics to advance his personal interests.

    – The country, after two recessions, inflation, and the pandemic are willing to support a demagogue that promises better times, regardless if it risks preservation of the norms that have sustained democracy in America.

    – Being a mobster, he will not personally ruin the lives of his political foes and the Others that he will blame for America’s woes. He will let his henchmen do the dirty work.

    IN SUMMARY: He’s a sociopath who is taking advantage of a populist movement to destroy everything and everyone that defies him so he can increase his personal wealth and perceived adulation.

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  23. JKB says:

    You wish to speak of Trump, but ignore the grassroot Americans that he saw coming.

    I saw links yesterday to Higher Ed and other sites about how wasting years in college. building lifelong debilitating debt for economically, and educationally useless degrees is no longer the most popular thing for this year’s 18 yr olds.

    But take heart, the greatest decline in enrollment is among white students, especially white men, so that good, right?

    “One way to read Trump’s second victory in three elections is that the movement for a post-American America with a successor ideology and post-Judeo Christian cultural and ethical foundation aimed at fundamentally changing American society has reached its sell-by date. Its social base, in a deeply dysfunctional upper-middle class, is too weak, too faddish, and too narcissistic for the hard work of remaking society. Too many of its concrete proposals are too unpopular or too unrealistic to bear fruit.”

    “The specter of a radically transformed America that hates Christianity, sees no difference between women and men, actively discriminates against whites and especially white men in the name of equity, and seeks to regulate every economic and social interaction with a puritanical fervor not seen since Oliver Cromwell has angered and frightened enough Americans to create a mass movement of resistance centered on the person of our new president-elect.”

    . Walter Russell Mead, Tablet Magazine

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  24. Jay L Gischer says:

    @JKB: The more I speak with Trump voters, the more I am convinced that they want the same things that I want, but have been convinced that somehow, people like me hate them and don’t mean it when we say we agree with them.

    Trump promises easy fixes where there are no easy fixes. People who want to believe in the easy fix want to believe him. In all likelihood, Trump will be long gone by the time they figure out that what he proposed just doesn’t work.

    Also, with regard to trans issues: This is my family at stake. My flesh and blood. Do you expect me to give up on this so easily?

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  25. Gustopher says:

    I also don’t think that the incompetence will save us. Does it mean that there will be no maximalist version of Trumpism? Sure, but that is not exactly comforting. Not getting Matt Gaetz but getting Pam Bondi instead doesn’t make the outcome a good one.

    I don’t think the incompetence will matter if it is enabled with lawlessness. In the end someone 20% less evil and 20% more effectively is roughly a wash.

    The reason to oppose Matt Gaetz is just to deny something to Matt Gaetz. Someone should also leak the House Ethics Report.

    It’s also a relatively easy victory and can possibly stir enthusiasm to oppose Trump where it matters, or grease the wheels of opposition or whatever, but mostly just deny something to Matt Gaetz.

    The next few years are going to suck, but at least we can deny something to Matt Gaetz.

    Also, I think there are a lot of elected Republicans hoping Democrats will stop the worst ideas of the Trump administration. I’m not sure we should.

    The fillibuster has allowed them to act like lunatics without the risk of actually facing consequences — the primary voters like the lunatic behavior, and the inability to get the big things done means they don’t have to face constituents after gutting social security, and simultaneously blame Democrats for opposing everything. Politics becomes as real as professional wrestling, except minorities and poor folks are getting kicked repeatedly.

    It would have been better if we killed the filibuster decades ago. But if the best time to do something is in the past, the second best time is now.

    At the risk of sounding like an accelerationist twit, we need to get that strong negative feedback of consequences back into Republicans politics.

    Let them touch the hot stove. Don’t turn up the heat first, maybe even try to turn it down a little bit, but not so much it doesn’t burn.

    America asked for this. A plurality eagerly wanted it, and a large swath didn’t bother to vote because they are ok with it. They need to feel some consequence.

    We can restore Social Security and MediCare the next time we have a trifecta.

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  26. Kingdaddy says:

    One might think that historical examples of putting the stunningly incompetent and slavishly loyal in positions of responsibility would give people pause. Take, for example, the price the USSR paid for purging competent generals, scientists, administrators, and others during the Great Terror. But, heck, we’re the United States, making us immune to these sorts of consequences, so everything will be OK.

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  27. Kathy says:

    Right after the election, I suggested a means to deal with the felon and his VP, but James deleted the comment. I suppose I shouldn’t bring it up again. I’ll just say I feel deontologically and consequentialistically justified.

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  28. Mister Bluster says:

    @JKB:..sees no difference between women and men,..
    “you can grab them by the pussy!”
    This is how your boyfriend Trump wants his minions to sort out American citizens.
    It is obvious that the Republican Party is in favor of Government Crotch inspectors.
    See Republican Arkansas state Sen. Matt McKee “do you have a penis?” and fearmonger Republican Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina.

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  29. Kathy says:

    @Kingdaddy:

    And during Lenin’s Red Terror.

    But, hey, they only lost a huge portion of the country and spent millions of lives taking it back. but the important thing, is Stalin suffered no adverse consequences, and even died a natural, if undignified, death decades later.

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  30. DK says:

    @Mister Bluster:

    It is obvious that the Republican Party is in favor of Government Crotch inspectors.

    Rapist felon Trump wants to keep the country distracted with this weird obsession over strangers’ genitalia so we don’t notice First Lady Musk and Ramaladingdong now have Republicans openly admitting they plan to assault Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and Obamacare to give Trump’s predatory billionaire oligarchs another tax cut.

    Most Democrats have thus far resisted taking the bait. I’m praying the left stays focused, unlike the low info voters who put Putin’s puppet back in power.

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  31. @JKB:

    post-American America

    I would ask why that means, but I am pretty sure I know.

    I am so very weary of people who talk about “America” but really just mean “white people like me who believe and act like I do.”

    I believe in an America that can find a way to accept trans people simply trying to exercise the individual freedoms and liberties that I once thought “conservatives” believed in.

    And I am sorry that your university experience was so negative, although IIRC, you work in an industry that required a degree, so on behalf of all of American higher education, you’re welcome for your current standard of living.

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  32. @JKB:

    but ignore the grassroot Americans that he saw coming.

    BTW: every four years people make the mistake of drawing large, comprehensive “lessons” that are not warranted.

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  33. DK says:

    So, while I understand that utterly freaking out at everything Trump does and says is unwarranted (not to mention exhausting), I also think that they all have to be taken quite seriously.

    Then you should be pleased with the anti-Trump response thus far, no?

    Harris isn’t filing dozens of lawsuits or calling for audits. Liberals aren’t harassing election workers screaming “Stop The Steal!” Leftist paramilitaries aren’t planning to storm the Capitol to assassinate Mike Johnson.

    What Republicans did after 2020 was a freakout. By contrast, the Democrats’ response to the 2024 vote has been the portrait of sobriety. Aside from the usual round of self-flaggellation and overbaked post-mortems, seems like anti-Trumpers are either a) checking out, a la the crash in CNN’s/NBC’s ratings or b) waiting to see whether or not voters enjoy the full Project 2025. Or c) abandoning X for BlueSky.

    Allegations of a freakout seem designed to bully liberals into blunting criticism of Trump, his Putinesque agenda, and his clown car of greedy billionaires and unqualified DEI-for-QAnon hires. But the critiques are valid, so they should keep coming — no matter how much they trigger MAGA trolls.

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  34. Scott says:

    @JKB:

    “The specter of a radically transformed America that hates Christianity, sees no difference between women and men, actively discriminates against whites and especially white men in the name of equity, and seeks to regulate every economic and social interaction with a puritanical fervor not seen since Oliver Cromwell has angered and frightened enough Americans to create a mass movement of resistance centered on the person of our new president-elect.”

    The problem with this argument is that it is just a fevered strawman against which to argue. It is an opinion and based on feelings and not facts.

    I could just as easily argue that it is change and the increasing rate of change that people are resisting. In fact, Alvin Toffler predicted this in 1970 in his book Future Shock. We are living his predictions.

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  35. JohnSF says:

    As little as possible?
    😉

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  36. Mu YiXiao says:

    Note that the piece was from October of 2022, so the election denialism of November and December had yet to happen and January 6th was but a glint in the Proud Boys’ eyes.

    The piece is from October 2020. 2022 was well after the things you mention. 🙂

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  37. Jay L Gischer says:

    @Scott: Liked for the reference to Alvin Toffler and Future Shock.

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  38. CSK says:

    @JohnSF:

    Wouldn’t that be wonderful? Unfortunately, Trump is in our faces every day.

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  39. Chip Daniels says:

    Most repressive regimes are actually a shambolic clusterfark of incompetence and brutality.

    The entire point of Trumpism isn’t to govern in any way. The purpose is to inflict cruelty on the hated outgroups while enriching themselves in the process.

    A lot of political pundits refuse to grasp this. They see the constant contradictions and erratic policy pronouncements as “eclectic” and see a deep mystery to be studied for clues of some understanding of American culture.

    But the only straight line that connects the collection of freaks and weirdos in Trumpism is a sulking resentment against some group, whether women or queer people or nonwhite people.

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  40. Jay L Gischer says:

    @Chip Daniels: If you think nobody cares about you, or people like you, it tends to have an impact on you regardless of how much money you might make.

    Judging by my working class male classmates, they might well feel like nobody gives a damn about them. That will drive both loneliness and resentment. This isn’t really a political problem at all, but it shows up in politics.

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  41. Kathy says:

    @JohnSF:

    As Matt says, in an ideal world that would be a very small fraction of a Planck second, which cannot be divided into smaller units. So we’d do a whole one, which is about three or four infinities longer than the subject deserves. But then I think such mild exaggerations are funny.

    How about then: silently and without pictures?

    I’d settle for without pictures.

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  42. Chip Daniels says:

    @Jay L Gischer:
    Play that clip for them of the Godfather, where Johnny Fontaine is sniveling about his troubles and Godfather slaps him across the face and tells him to act like a man.

    I mean this seriously. Is there any group of people more catered to and bestowed with unearned social capital than working class white men?
    Have they thought for one freakin’ second about what life is like for anyone not them?

    The sniveling wouldn’t be so unbearable except in a lot of cases, hardship causes people to grow a deeper sense of compassion and empathy for the troubles of others.
    For the Trumpists, any hardship, real or imagined, causes them to lash out like toddlers at people who are truly suffering.

    Alright, I’ll stop typing before I say something intemperate.

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  43. @Mu YiXiao: Thanks. A typo on my part.

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  44. Ken_L says:

    It’s a pity more attention hasn’t been given to Angela Merkel’s recent observation:

    “My impression always was that he dreamt of actually overriding maybe all those parliamentary bodies that he felt were in a way an encumbrance upon him, and that he wanted to decide matters on his own.”

    It’s not as if she had any axe to grind in making that statement.

    Appointing unelected migrants Musk and Ramaswamy to take over Congress’s constitutional responsibilities to fund the government is about as anti-democratic, authoritarian a measure as could be imagined in the contemporary American political circumstances. It’s completely consistent with Merkel’s remarks. Yet in typically misguided fashion, it’s the one Democrats and the media are treating as much less consequential than Trump’s appointment of a TV pundit to run the Defense Department (which let’s face it, would probably continue to run perfectly well for four years even if the Secretary’s position was never filled).

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  45. DrDaveT says:

    @Steven L. Taylor:

    I am so very weary of people who talk about “America” but really just mean “white people like me who believe and act like I do.”

    Not enough thumbs up in the world for this. Thank you.

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  46. Matt says:

    @JKB: For fcks sake 68% of this country still identifies as Christian…

    Maybe you should spend a little time reflecting on why that’s down from around 90% in the 90s…

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  47. Monala says:

    @Jay L Gischer: before the election, you said you had some thoughts you wanted to share about what’s happening with young men today and what can be done about it. When you have a chance, would you mind sharing that? I’m interested.

    Some such conversation today reminded me of something that happened a few years ago. A coworker and I were working late, and both our high school age children were at home. She had another meeting to go to after work, and was lamenting the fact that she needed groceries but had no time to stop to buy them.

    I said, “Text your son a shopping list and Venmo him some money. That’s what I do with my daughter.”

    My colleague laughed. “Expect my son to go grocery shopping for me? Ha! He’ll forget all about it and spend the money on something else.”

    When I got home, I told my daughter this story as an amusing anecdote, but she erupted in frustration. “Boys are never held to any expectations! That’s why they never live up to any!”

    I share this not to slight my colleague, who I think is a fabulous person. I’m also aware that a huge part of my success in parenting is due to having a very responsible kid, and everyone is not so lucky.

    But I want to point out that my daughter is still a representative of her generation, and that’s her impression: that boys are not being held to expectations.

    Anyway, looking forward to reading whatever you might share.

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  48. You can definitely see your expertise within the work you write. The arena hopes for even more passionate writers such as you who are not afraid to say how they believe. At all times follow your heart.

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