Trump v RTT (Reaction to Trump) have constantly battled for supreme idiocy. As bad as (some of) Trump's words and actions have been, RTT seems to always find a way to top him by being far more insane, unhinged and untethered to reality. Instead of a reasoned response, RTT is often just shrieking "Russian Interference", "Disinformation", "Hitler", "Oligarchs", "Autocracy", "Constitutional Crisis", among so many other hyperbolic reactions that alienate anyone who might be critical of some or even most of Trump's actions but are more worried with wild-eyed lunatics who don't seem tethered to reality and can only see red (or orange) with regards to the President. A sizable majority of Trump's statements are laughably ridiculous and demonstrably dumb whereas many of RTT's are the real roots of true autocracy seeking to silence all voices of opposition by any means necessary.
I actually agree that Trump critics can be hyperbolic. This was especially true early on (the 'fascist' argument was premature and now it holds no meaning). So maybe you can give me an objective assessment of Trump. How would you judge Trump on some of these issues?:
- Was the 2020 election stolen? Did Trump take any actions after that election that made you uncomfortable?
- What are your thoughts on Trump coin? Is this something a president should be engaged with?
- Are you fine with Trump using the DOJ and executive orders to target law firms and news agencies he doesn't like?
- How would you assess the tariff policy? Are high tariffs a way to onshore and protect US manufacturing? Or is it a negotiating tactic to ultimately reduce trade barriers? It can't be both...
"Stolen" is an imprecise word in regards to the 2020 election. However, the election was far from kosher. I'll leave it at that.
The Trump coins (there was also a Melania coin) were embarrassing, reputation-damaging grifts. They cannot and should not be defended.
Some "targeting" is legit. No one is above the law. And certainly nothing the Trump administration has done rises to the level of what was used against him. In particular, the temporary rescinding of the statute of limitations for the express purpose of pursing Trump. (A "temporary rescinding of the statute of limitations" is revealing. Straight from the pages of Animal Farm. Throws out the window the idea of equal treatment under the law.)
I don't have a view on tariffs other than the good and the bad are both being exaggerated. But Trump has certainly been inconsistent in his remarks.
You say the election was “far from kosher”, but it sounds like you don’t want to elaborate as to ‘why?’. Is this because it’s more of a gut feeling than an evidence based assessment? And were there any actions that Trump took that made you uncomfortable? If so, which ones?
It's a boring topic. Partisan Democrats are never going to change their minds, anyway. (Just as some Republicans will go the route of defending Trump and his meme coins.) They would lose their sense of purpose. Left without a hobby.
When the FBI vetted the Biden laptop in December 2019 and "51 former intelligence officials" come out in October 2020 pushing "Russian disinformation!!" it's manifestly a thumb on the scale. And do you remember all the last minute changes to vote by mail?
Any actions by Trump that made me uncomfortable? I'm sure there were, though I would not use "made me uncomfortable." "With which I disagree" is more fitting.
ChatGPT and Grok are fun tools to use to get a steel man response to one's views.
Let’s just cut to the chase: Do you think the 2020 election was stolen?
I’m happy to go through all the arguments. At this stage I think I’ve heard all the big ones (6 million missing votes, hacked Dominion machines, etc).
We can start with the laptop story. I actually agree with you: The laptop story should never have been censored. It was removed from Twitter for about 24 hours. Do you actually think this tipped the scales toward Biden though? This ended up being a huge boon for Trump. Not only did it make the story more viral but it also rallied people against big tech. You’d be hard pressed to argue that this swung the election in Biden’s favor.
And once we’re done sifting through all the ‘stolen election’ lies we’ll need to return to Trump’s actions. Have you read the Eastman memos? They’re short and outline the whole plot. If this had come from the Biden admin you would be calling for his head. Give it a read and let me know what you think.
And lastly, what’s with this chat GPT thing? Is my writing just a bit ‘too formal’ or something?
“Trepidation in the extreme”? What a coward. This ranks with Susan Collins being “Very concerned”. At least Lisa Murkowski admits she is afraid of retaliation. What did people expect? Trump said that he was the retribution. He said he would be a dictator. Trepidation in the extreme, please.
Trump supporters want to erase Black history. They are crafting legislation to prevent women and Blacks from voting. His supporters do not care about the Constitutional power of judges. A billionaire who receives $8M a day in government welfare takes a chainsaw to government agencies, Trump supporters cheer as their pockets are being picked.
Curtis Yarvin’s desire for an American monarchy is the ultimate goal of Trump supporters. As Byron Donalds said, “Daddy’s home”
This isn’t good enough Glenn. You thought it was unfair to criticize Trump because he was politically popular?? When Biden won the popular vote you didn’t shy away from criticizing him. This is a shallow excuse.
Maybe Trump was politically popular because people like you REFUSED to criticize him? If people like you held Trump to the same standard that you hold to Democrats to then we might not be in this mess.
YOU helped the ‘woke right’ ascend. Take some responsibility.
Oh, but of course. There's an entire industry built around criticizing Trump and there's really no way to escape its megaphone. But because Glenn held his tongue, this was enough to sway the electorate towards delivering a crushing defeat against the Democrats. Truly, Glenn was the linchpin in all of this. Him and his ilk! If he had just spoken up, democracy would still be intact!
People like Glenn, Ben Shapiro, or anyone from the GOP leadership know that Trump tried to overturn the 2020 election. They know his tariff policy is idiotic. They know that TrumpCoin is pure grift. They know we're in serious danger of a Constitutional crisis.
But do you know that? What % of Trump voters believe the 2020 election was stolen? How many Trump supporters know that his 'reciprocal tariffs' were really just computed from trade deficits? How much money will the MAGA faithful lose on Trump's scams? And how many 'conservatives' actually care about the constitution anymore?
MAGA has more in common with BLM these days than it does with any principled conservative movement. They're fueled by resentment and captured by conspiracies. And it's people like Glenn that let it get this way. No push back. No correction. He was happy to let this movement devolve as long as it led to the rebuke of the Democrats. Well, mission accomplished I suppose. But he let conservatism die in the process. He needs to own this fact.
Anyone remember that Libertarian candidate who got savaged for confusion over Aleppo? Contrast that to Biden not being able to find his way off a stage.
When it comes to Trump -- or anything else -- I'm starting to suspect Democrats will say anything they want with no adherence to logic or consistency. Makes them dismissible in my book. "Well, there's a one-in-a-hundred chance they might be saying something logical and consistent..."
You want consistency? Let me ask you a question: Is Trump implementing high tariffs in order to onshore and protect US manufacturing? Or is this a negotiating tactic to ultimately achieve very low tariffs? It can't be both.
And logic? What proof do you have that the 2020 election was stolen? Glenn doesn't believe this. Neither does Ben Shapiro. But Trump sure does. Why?
I can offer a number of substantive criticisms of Trump. I can list out the facts I base these criticisms on and walk you through my reasoning. But when people like you get backed into a corner you inevitably respond with 'TDS'. If you want to make an argument then go ahead. I'd be happy to rip it apart for you. But your flippant dismissal of any uncomfortable information is just a childish way of avoiding hard conversations.
Glenn is getting more worried everyday, understandably. His (irrational) exuberance at the crushing of the (supposed) woke left” in Harris’ defeat clouded his judgment on a Trump administration. Like Glenn, I don’t want to see Trump continue on his many illogical, unsound, evil, woke-right paths, and if that preserves his presidency from complete failure, so be it. I’m for the USA, not proving a point.
This makes sense to some degree. We should hope that the damage is minimized moving forward.
But a point needs to be proven here, doesn’t it? If the president has a willing VP are they allowed to organize fraudulent electors and use these as a pretense to crown themselves king? Should every politician establish a crypto coin? Should people’s/company’s tax exempt status, security clearances, licensing, government contracts, and tariff exemptions be solely dependent on how buddy-buddy they are with the President? Are we fine with ceding our due process rights to the executive branch? American’s need to understand how serious this is. If there are no consequences for these actions then what’s to stop the next administration from engaging in this same level of authoritarianism?
"Lia Thomas is a woman in every sense of the word" had nothing to do with Trump whatsoever. As far as the 2020 election, you can pick and choose whatever word you want, but when the FBI has already vetted the laptop as Hunter Biden's, it doesn't take Einstein to figure out the "51 former intelligence officials" wrote their letter in an attempt to change the election outcome. And when we hear, "Six Capitol police officers were killed on J6," when the reality is one guy died of natural causes the next day (I, myself, will personally acknowledge the stress of the day could have contributed) and the rest were suicides, some many weeks later, well, again, no honest and logical person would make such a claim. And how many false accusations of racism have we been through?
Regarding Trump, every word you say about him could be true, and it doesn't have any bearing on what I wrote. The Democrats have become a clown show and I'm not the only person who has noticed.
I’ll point out that what YOU wrote didn’t have any bearing on MY original post. You started this what-about-ary so it’s a bit of an odd criticism to make.
That being said, I’m happy to compare both sides. Biological men shouldn’t compete in women’s sports. The laptop story was wrongly suppressed (for less than 24 hours BTW, and this clearly worked out in Trump’s favor). And there’s no need to exaggerate the events on Jan 6 because it was REALLY, REALLY BAD. And you know what? I’ll throw the “mostly peaceful protests” and “keeping schools in lockdown for too long” onto my list of complaints. (ALL of this happened under Trump BTW, just an interesting side-note). I’m capable of holding both sides to account.
But you know what Democrats have never done? TRIED TO OVERTURN AN ELECTION!!! And you’ll probably say “oh you’re exaggerating the events of Jan 6”. Jan 6 wasn’t even the worst part. After LYING about voter fraud Trump turned around and organized fraudulent electors to misrepresent the votes. He then pressured Pence to use these as a pretense to BREAK the ECA and overturn the election. Ben Shapiro even said that Pence walked us back from the brink of a Constitutional crisis.
You convinced me. A bunch of unarmed civilian LARPers trespassing in an attempt to delay the sanctioning of the votes for a day or two constitutes a dangerous insurrection.
What ultimately flipped me was your anticipation of my argument of "oh you’re exaggerating the events of Jan 6." And those fake electors -- oh boy! We haven't seen that kind of chicanery since Kennedy challenged Hawaii -- and won.
You haven’t looked into this at all have you? The Hawaii race was too close to call and required a recount by state law. The Hawaiian governor certified Nixon’s electors (the current leader) and sent them to Washington, but it was well known that the recount was underway. When Kennedy ultimately prevailed the Governor then certified Kennedy’s and requested that these were used in the final count.
Hawaii’s actions in the 1960 election were all done openly, with the approval of the state legislature, and with the express goal of accurately representing the results. Trump’s fraudulent electors were organized secretly, none were certified by the states, and the goal was to misrepresent the underlying votes. These two situations are not comparable.
Have you read the Eastman memos? They’re petty short and outline the whole plot. If this memo had come from the Biden camp you would be LIVID. Can we maybe hold Trump to the same standard?
Your statement only holds up in Conservative circles. Those outside the Conservative bubble know that there ere weapons carried by the January traitors.
Thanks, I couldn’t have said it better. Who would want to live under an administration that takes pleasure in cruelty? If people are sent prison camps in foreign countries, they do not care. The administration threatens judges, lawyers, corporations, etc, and they don’t care. Black history ( which includes atrocities committed by whites), they want the discussion disappeared.
They have no counter arguments. They name-call. They will even suggest Blacks who disagree go “back to Africa”. The economy struggles, allies distance themselves from the United States, but they are fine as long as they get to own the Libs.
Trump v RTT (Reaction to Trump) have constantly battled for supreme idiocy. As bad as (some of) Trump's words and actions have been, RTT seems to always find a way to top him by being far more insane, unhinged and untethered to reality. Instead of a reasoned response, RTT is often just shrieking "Russian Interference", "Disinformation", "Hitler", "Oligarchs", "Autocracy", "Constitutional Crisis", among so many other hyperbolic reactions that alienate anyone who might be critical of some or even most of Trump's actions but are more worried with wild-eyed lunatics who don't seem tethered to reality and can only see red (or orange) with regards to the President. A sizable majority of Trump's statements are laughably ridiculous and demonstrably dumb whereas many of RTT's are the real roots of true autocracy seeking to silence all voices of opposition by any means necessary.
I actually agree that Trump critics can be hyperbolic. This was especially true early on (the 'fascist' argument was premature and now it holds no meaning). So maybe you can give me an objective assessment of Trump. How would you judge Trump on some of these issues?:
- Was the 2020 election stolen? Did Trump take any actions after that election that made you uncomfortable?
- What are your thoughts on Trump coin? Is this something a president should be engaged with?
- Are you fine with Trump using the DOJ and executive orders to target law firms and news agencies he doesn't like?
- How would you assess the tariff policy? Are high tariffs a way to onshore and protect US manufacturing? Or is it a negotiating tactic to ultimately reduce trade barriers? It can't be both...
My answers, if I may:
"Stolen" is an imprecise word in regards to the 2020 election. However, the election was far from kosher. I'll leave it at that.
The Trump coins (there was also a Melania coin) were embarrassing, reputation-damaging grifts. They cannot and should not be defended.
Some "targeting" is legit. No one is above the law. And certainly nothing the Trump administration has done rises to the level of what was used against him. In particular, the temporary rescinding of the statute of limitations for the express purpose of pursing Trump. (A "temporary rescinding of the statute of limitations" is revealing. Straight from the pages of Animal Farm. Throws out the window the idea of equal treatment under the law.)
I don't have a view on tariffs other than the good and the bad are both being exaggerated. But Trump has certainly been inconsistent in his remarks.
Great answers. I’d like to dig in a bit.
You say the election was “far from kosher”, but it sounds like you don’t want to elaborate as to ‘why?’. Is this because it’s more of a gut feeling than an evidence based assessment? And were there any actions that Trump took that made you uncomfortable? If so, which ones?
It's a boring topic. Partisan Democrats are never going to change their minds, anyway. (Just as some Republicans will go the route of defending Trump and his meme coins.) They would lose their sense of purpose. Left without a hobby.
When the FBI vetted the Biden laptop in December 2019 and "51 former intelligence officials" come out in October 2020 pushing "Russian disinformation!!" it's manifestly a thumb on the scale. And do you remember all the last minute changes to vote by mail?
Any actions by Trump that made me uncomfortable? I'm sure there were, though I would not use "made me uncomfortable." "With which I disagree" is more fitting.
ChatGPT and Grok are fun tools to use to get a steel man response to one's views.
Let’s just cut to the chase: Do you think the 2020 election was stolen?
I’m happy to go through all the arguments. At this stage I think I’ve heard all the big ones (6 million missing votes, hacked Dominion machines, etc).
We can start with the laptop story. I actually agree with you: The laptop story should never have been censored. It was removed from Twitter for about 24 hours. Do you actually think this tipped the scales toward Biden though? This ended up being a huge boon for Trump. Not only did it make the story more viral but it also rallied people against big tech. You’d be hard pressed to argue that this swung the election in Biden’s favor.
And once we’re done sifting through all the ‘stolen election’ lies we’ll need to return to Trump’s actions. Have you read the Eastman memos? They’re short and outline the whole plot. If this had come from the Biden admin you would be calling for his head. Give it a read and let me know what you think.
And lastly, what’s with this chat GPT thing? Is my writing just a bit ‘too formal’ or something?
Me: "'Stolen' is an imprecise word in regards to the 2020 election. However, the election was far from kosher. I'll leave it at that."
You: "Let’s just cut to the chase: Do you think the 2020 election was stolen?"
“Trepidation in the extreme”? What a coward. This ranks with Susan Collins being “Very concerned”. At least Lisa Murkowski admits she is afraid of retaliation. What did people expect? Trump said that he was the retribution. He said he would be a dictator. Trepidation in the extreme, please.
Trump supporters want to erase Black history. They are crafting legislation to prevent women and Blacks from voting. His supporters do not care about the Constitutional power of judges. A billionaire who receives $8M a day in government welfare takes a chainsaw to government agencies, Trump supporters cheer as their pockets are being picked.
Curtis Yarvin’s desire for an American monarchy is the ultimate goal of Trump supporters. As Byron Donalds said, “Daddy’s home”
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/18/magazine/curtis-yarvin-interview.html
Ross Douthat interviewed Jonathan Keeperman of the Woke Right.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/18/magazine/curtis-yarvin-interview.html
The Constitutional Crisis is upon us.
This isn’t good enough Glenn. You thought it was unfair to criticize Trump because he was politically popular?? When Biden won the popular vote you didn’t shy away from criticizing him. This is a shallow excuse.
Maybe Trump was politically popular because people like you REFUSED to criticize him? If people like you held Trump to the same standard that you hold to Democrats to then we might not be in this mess.
YOU helped the ‘woke right’ ascend. Take some responsibility.
Oh, but of course. There's an entire industry built around criticizing Trump and there's really no way to escape its megaphone. But because Glenn held his tongue, this was enough to sway the electorate towards delivering a crushing defeat against the Democrats. Truly, Glenn was the linchpin in all of this. Him and his ilk! If he had just spoken up, democracy would still be intact!
People like Glenn, Ben Shapiro, or anyone from the GOP leadership know that Trump tried to overturn the 2020 election. They know his tariff policy is idiotic. They know that TrumpCoin is pure grift. They know we're in serious danger of a Constitutional crisis.
But do you know that? What % of Trump voters believe the 2020 election was stolen? How many Trump supporters know that his 'reciprocal tariffs' were really just computed from trade deficits? How much money will the MAGA faithful lose on Trump's scams? And how many 'conservatives' actually care about the constitution anymore?
MAGA has more in common with BLM these days than it does with any principled conservative movement. They're fueled by resentment and captured by conspiracies. And it's people like Glenn that let it get this way. No push back. No correction. He was happy to let this movement devolve as long as it led to the rebuke of the Democrats. Well, mission accomplished I suppose. But he let conservatism die in the process. He needs to own this fact.
Or as I would phrase it: Take some credit, Glenn!
Anyone remember that Libertarian candidate who got savaged for confusion over Aleppo? Contrast that to Biden not being able to find his way off a stage.
When it comes to Trump -- or anything else -- I'm starting to suspect Democrats will say anything they want with no adherence to logic or consistency. Makes them dismissible in my book. "Well, there's a one-in-a-hundred chance they might be saying something logical and consistent..."
You want consistency? Let me ask you a question: Is Trump implementing high tariffs in order to onshore and protect US manufacturing? Or is this a negotiating tactic to ultimately achieve very low tariffs? It can't be both.
And logic? What proof do you have that the 2020 election was stolen? Glenn doesn't believe this. Neither does Ben Shapiro. But Trump sure does. Why?
I can offer a number of substantive criticisms of Trump. I can list out the facts I base these criticisms on and walk you through my reasoning. But when people like you get backed into a corner you inevitably respond with 'TDS'. If you want to make an argument then go ahead. I'd be happy to rip it apart for you. But your flippant dismissal of any uncomfortable information is just a childish way of avoiding hard conversations.
Glenn is getting more worried everyday, understandably. His (irrational) exuberance at the crushing of the (supposed) woke left” in Harris’ defeat clouded his judgment on a Trump administration. Like Glenn, I don’t want to see Trump continue on his many illogical, unsound, evil, woke-right paths, and if that preserves his presidency from complete failure, so be it. I’m for the USA, not proving a point.
This makes sense to some degree. We should hope that the damage is minimized moving forward.
But a point needs to be proven here, doesn’t it? If the president has a willing VP are they allowed to organize fraudulent electors and use these as a pretense to crown themselves king? Should every politician establish a crypto coin? Should people’s/company’s tax exempt status, security clearances, licensing, government contracts, and tariff exemptions be solely dependent on how buddy-buddy they are with the President? Are we fine with ceding our due process rights to the executive branch? American’s need to understand how serious this is. If there are no consequences for these actions then what’s to stop the next administration from engaging in this same level of authoritarianism?
"Lia Thomas is a woman in every sense of the word" had nothing to do with Trump whatsoever. As far as the 2020 election, you can pick and choose whatever word you want, but when the FBI has already vetted the laptop as Hunter Biden's, it doesn't take Einstein to figure out the "51 former intelligence officials" wrote their letter in an attempt to change the election outcome. And when we hear, "Six Capitol police officers were killed on J6," when the reality is one guy died of natural causes the next day (I, myself, will personally acknowledge the stress of the day could have contributed) and the rest were suicides, some many weeks later, well, again, no honest and logical person would make such a claim. And how many false accusations of racism have we been through?
Regarding Trump, every word you say about him could be true, and it doesn't have any bearing on what I wrote. The Democrats have become a clown show and I'm not the only person who has noticed.
I’ll point out that what YOU wrote didn’t have any bearing on MY original post. You started this what-about-ary so it’s a bit of an odd criticism to make.
That being said, I’m happy to compare both sides. Biological men shouldn’t compete in women’s sports. The laptop story was wrongly suppressed (for less than 24 hours BTW, and this clearly worked out in Trump’s favor). And there’s no need to exaggerate the events on Jan 6 because it was REALLY, REALLY BAD. And you know what? I’ll throw the “mostly peaceful protests” and “keeping schools in lockdown for too long” onto my list of complaints. (ALL of this happened under Trump BTW, just an interesting side-note). I’m capable of holding both sides to account.
But you know what Democrats have never done? TRIED TO OVERTURN AN ELECTION!!! And you’ll probably say “oh you’re exaggerating the events of Jan 6”. Jan 6 wasn’t even the worst part. After LYING about voter fraud Trump turned around and organized fraudulent electors to misrepresent the votes. He then pressured Pence to use these as a pretense to BREAK the ECA and overturn the election. Ben Shapiro even said that Pence walked us back from the brink of a Constitutional crisis.
Can you acknowledge any of that?
You convinced me. A bunch of unarmed civilian LARPers trespassing in an attempt to delay the sanctioning of the votes for a day or two constitutes a dangerous insurrection.
What ultimately flipped me was your anticipation of my argument of "oh you’re exaggerating the events of Jan 6." And those fake electors -- oh boy! We haven't seen that kind of chicanery since Kennedy challenged Hawaii -- and won.
You haven’t looked into this at all have you? The Hawaii race was too close to call and required a recount by state law. The Hawaiian governor certified Nixon’s electors (the current leader) and sent them to Washington, but it was well known that the recount was underway. When Kennedy ultimately prevailed the Governor then certified Kennedy’s and requested that these were used in the final count.
Hawaii’s actions in the 1960 election were all done openly, with the approval of the state legislature, and with the express goal of accurately representing the results. Trump’s fraudulent electors were organized secretly, none were certified by the states, and the goal was to misrepresent the underlying votes. These two situations are not comparable.
Have you read the Eastman memos? They’re petty short and outline the whole plot. If this memo had come from the Biden camp you would be LIVID. Can we maybe hold Trump to the same standard?
Your statement only holds up in Conservative circles. Those outside the Conservative bubble know that there ere weapons carried by the January traitors.
https://www.npr.org/2021/03/19/977879589/yes-capitol-rioters-were-armed-here-are-the-weapons-prosecutors-say-they-used
RFK Jr tried to spread the same lie.
https://www.poynter.org/fact-checking/2024/january-6-capitol-no-weapons-firearms-guns-evidence/
Thanks, I couldn’t have said it better. Who would want to live under an administration that takes pleasure in cruelty? If people are sent prison camps in foreign countries, they do not care. The administration threatens judges, lawyers, corporations, etc, and they don’t care. Black history ( which includes atrocities committed by whites), they want the discussion disappeared.
They have no counter arguments. They name-call. They will even suggest Blacks who disagree go “back to Africa”. The economy struggles, allies distance themselves from the United States, but they are fine as long as they get to own the Libs.
Biden is not President. Trump is the President willing to ignore the Constitution.