Trump Bashing

[mike]

We see the effect of this post-truthfulness all the time, including here on MN. It’s true that some people will not care.

Trump’s style as a politician is “Trumpian” — get attention by saying outrageous things, always fight and never concede, etc. What’s interesting is that other than Trump, this approach hasn’t worked as well for other politicians. Voters seem more willing to forgive behaviors in Trump, that they aren’t in others.

I think we've been in the age of post-truthfulness for awhile; a slow fade, getting worse. For example Bill Clinton's bad behavior in high office and his public dishonesty. Voters were pretty forgiving of all that.

I've heard commentators say that Republican voters got tired of running milquetoast candidates like McCain and Romney who get trounced by the Democrats, and Trump is basically a giant expletive, actually an exaggeration of what many of them despised in Democrats but what many of them came to believe a candidate must be in order to win these days. In other words, if the Democrats run corrupt liars, then fine - we will just run bigger corrupt liars.

It's a theory I guess. For the life of me I have no idea why they wouldn't have gone with somebody like Ron DeSantis or Nikki Haley who in my opinion would have made a better candidate in many ways. But they didn't.

[joshuabgood]

We see the effect of this post-truthfulness all the time, including here on MN. It’s true that some people will not care.

Trump’s style as a politician is “Trumpian” — get attention by saying outrageous things, always fight and never concede, etc. What’s interesting is that other than Trump, this approach hasn’t worked as well for other politicians. Voters seem more willing to forgive behaviors in Trump, that they aren’t in others.

I think we've been in the age of post-truthfulness for awhile; a slow fade, getting worse. For example Bill Clinton's bad behavior in high office and his public dishonesty. Voters were pretty forgiving of all that.

I've heard commentators say that Republican voters got tired of running milquetoast candidates like McCain and Romney who get trounced by the Democrats, and Trump is basically a giant expletive, actually an exaggeration of what many of them despised in Democrats but what many of them came to believe a candidate must be in order to win these days. In other words, if the Democrats run corrupt liars, then fine - we will just run bigger corrupt liars.

It's a theory I guess. For the life of me I have no idea why they wouldn't have gone with somebody like Ron DeSantis or Nikki Haley who in my opinion would have made a better candidate in many ways. But they didn't.

Trump represents the spirit of the age...and is who the voters wanted. He reminds them of themselves.

[Szdfan]

We see the effect of this post-truthfulness all the time, including here on MN. It’s true that some people will not care.

Trump’s style as a politician is “Trumpian” — get attention by saying outrageous things, always fight and never concede, etc. What’s interesting is that other than Trump, this approach hasn’t worked as well for other politicians. Voters seem more willing to forgive behaviors in Trump, that they aren’t in others.

I think we've been in the age of post-truthfulness for awhile; a slow fade, getting worse. For example Bill Clinton's bad behavior in high office and his public dishonesty. Voters were pretty forgiving of all that.

I've heard commentators say that Republican voters got tired of running milquetoast candidates like McCain and Romney who get trounced by the Democrats, and Trump is basically a giant expletive, actually an exaggeration of what many of them despised in Democrats but what many of them came to believe a candidate must be in order to win these days. In other words, if the Democrats run corrupt liars, then fine - we will just run bigger corrupt liars.

It's a theory I guess. For the life of me I have no idea why they wouldn't have gone with somebody like Ron DeSantis or Nikki Haley who in my opinion would have made a better candidate in many ways. But they didn't.

Trump represents the spirit of the age...and is who the voters wanted. He reminds them of themselves.

We do seem to be at an angrier, more resentful, more partisan moment when people want to be able to speak without the niceties of having to actually live with each other. I don't know if this is due to social media or something else.

[mike]

We do seem to be at an angrier, more resentful, more partisan moment when people want to be able to speak without the niceties of having to actually live with each other. I don't know if this is due to social media or something else.

What do you think the better moments of this campaign have been? I can think of a few. The Walz/Vance debate was a decently civil event from the bits I saw. Trump's McDonalds visit where he was just himself, had a great time, and wished Kamala a happy birthday. John Fetterman (a political opponent) saying Trump has a special place in Pennsylvania. Statements like that go a long way. Whether Trump or Harris wins, the country is going to have to live with them and get along with people who disagree.

[Szdfan]

We do seem to be at an angrier, more resentful, more partisan moment when people want to be able to speak without the niceties of having to actually live with each other. I don't know if this is due to social media or something else.

What do you think the better moments of this campaign have been? I can think of a few. The Walz/Vance debate was a decently civil event from the bits I saw. Trump's McDonalds visit where he was just himself, had a great time, and wished Kamala a happy birthday. John Fetterman (a political opponent) saying Trump has a special place in Pennsylvania. Statements like that go a long way. Whether Trump or Harris wins, the country is going to have to live with them and get along with people who disagree.

You're right that those were better moments of a campaign season that has been unprecedented in a lot of ways. I sometimes wish I lived in precedented times.

I often remember that most of my neighbors are conservatives and Republicans and most of the time, I get along with them. I spend more time talking about politics here than I do in real life. I often end up feeling uncomfortable when I'm around a lot of people who think the way I do.

And yet I do feel apprehensive about the election. When Trump calls Democrats "the enemy within," that scares me.

[ken_sylvania]

I often end up feeling uncomfortable when I'm around a lot of people who think the way I do.

That doesn't make you reconsider how you think?

[Grace]

And yet I do feel apprehensive about the election. When Trump calls Democrats "the enemy within," that scares me.

I would say the people who spur unbalanced people to attempt to assassinate Trump, ARE the enemy within.

[mike]

And yet I do feel apprehensive about the election. When Trump calls Democrats "the enemy within," that scares me.

I have certain fears no matter how the election turns out, but generally I'm good with whatever happens because it's not mine to decide. It's the world's kingdom. I am not that afraid of another Trump term even though I don't like a lot of things about him. I'm not all that afraid of a Harris presidency although much about it would be distasteful to me. We've been there before; I assume she would govern similarly to Obama and Biden.

I think that whichever one of them loses will get chewed up and spit out by their own party, even those who are propping them up now, and will forever lose any chance of success in politics - Trump because of his age and character, and Kamala because she should really have been able to beat Trump. If Trump loses, the Republicans will finally get to move past the Trump era and rebuild the party. If Harris loses, she is done, and who knows how the Democrats will move forward. Maybe a loss would be enough of a judgment on the far left radical aspects of the party that they would move back toward the center.

I just hope either way that it is a very clear win, although in that case the winner will just be that much more overbearing and hard to stomach. It's a lot to ask for but the winner in either case would be well served, as would the country, by being conciliatory and making attempts to unify the country. And the loser in either case should do precisely the same thing. Can you even imagine if Trump had taken his loss like a man in 2020 and spent less time foaming at the mouth at everybody? He appears to be winning this thing by a tight margin right now, I could see him running away with it if he would just have a little more decency and good character. But like I said earlier, the Republicans repeatedly tried running people with a little more decency and good character, and it didn't work out all that well for them. So we got Trump.

[Ken]

And yet I do feel apprehensive about the election. When Trump calls Democrats "the enemy within," that scares me.

I would say the people who spur unbalanced people to attempt to assassinate Trump, ARE the enemy within.

What about the people who put guns in their hands?

[Szdfan]

And yet I do feel apprehensive about the election. When Trump calls Democrats "the enemy within," that scares me.

I would say the people who spur unbalanced people to attempt to assassinate Trump, ARE the enemy within.

I grew up in West Berlin, literally in the shadow of authoritarianism in a society that was still trying to make sense of the Nazis. When Trump refers to his political opponents as "vermin" and "the enemy within," I hear the language of fascism. I'm not calling Trump a fascist, but he uses fascist type language and that scares me.