That’s the first thing. Here’s a second.
More from Trump’s Truth Social feed: “Does anybody really believe that the COCAINE found in the West Wing of the White House, very close to the Oval Office, is for the use of anyone other than Hunter & Joe Biden.” Hunter Biden wrote in his memoir that he’s been clean since 2019; but let’s face it, when one hears “cocaine in the White House,” he does leap to mind. But then, Trump throws Joe Biden in there. Who thinks Joe Biden does blow? It’s unhinged, and it’s a sign that Trump’s hold on reality, always tenuous, is vaporizing and that he’s even more emboldened now to say even more outrageous things than he said in 2016, which after all is the logic of outrage: It has to get more extreme in order to continue to have shock value. What even more unhinged thing might he be capable of saying on a debate stage next fall?
Combine these recent developments with the things we already know, we’ve already seen. I wrote in our June cover story that Trump’s toxic rhetoric far exceeded where he was going in 2016. If you can’t see the difference between “Drain the swamp” (2016, and something any right-populist could say) and “I am your revenge” (the words of a megalomaniacal authoritarian demagogue), then you need some history lessons. I think here also of the Trump we saw in that infamous CNN town hall. He was totally out of control. I kept watching that and thinking: Is there any chance, I mean any chance, that the centrist soccer mom from the Milwaukee suburbs who took a flier on him in 2016 against Hillary Clinton is going to want to see this deranged, blubbering, vain peacock back in the White House?
Leopold_Darkworth on July 9th, 2023 at 03:22 UTC »
His supporters literally could not care less. As one person said at a recent rally, he could shoot someone on the steps of the White House and not lose the guy's vote. These people are deranged. The more unhinged Trump gets, the more they like him because they think that demonstrates how he's fighting for them. Two indictments haven't shaken his approval ratings. He has a hard 30 percent of the entire electorate who will support him no matter what.
Oh, you might say, the Republican Party will cut him loose. Yeah, when? Will it be after his first impeachment? After he lost the 2020 election? After he attempted a legal coup to stay in office, and when that didn't work, called on a violent mob to attempt a physical coup? After his second impeachment, maybe? After he backed complete wacko candidates who lost in 2022? This idea that the Republican establishment is just seconds away from turning their back on him is a fantasy years in the making. The very same people who openly condemned him on the floor of Congress right after January 6 couldn't get to Mar-a-Lago fast enough, groveling "like a dog" as Trump might say, to beg for their Dear Leader's forgiveness.
The Republicans who will condemn him anonymously behind closed doors but praise him publicly are deeply, deeply afraid of him and his voters. They are beyond terrified that if they utter even the most milquetoast criticism, his rabid base will turn on them and primary them from the right. He's currently polling at least double the next closest primary opponent. Even if he is indicted in four different criminal cases, that's still no guarantee he won't be the Republican nominee.
Fynn_the_Finger on July 9th, 2023 at 02:09 UTC »
Took less than 6 years to go from Nixon to the election of Reagan. No matter how fucking dirty the GOP is, the voting public is always ready to vote them back into power.
DredditPirate on July 9th, 2023 at 02:07 UTC »
Complacency kills. Vote and get every last one of your friends and family to vote too. Otherwise, Trump absolutely can become President again, and the debacle might actually break everything. Prevent it. Vote.