TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 2024
Ezra sticks with "unhinged:" Ezra Klein has published a fascinating interview with Anne Applebaum. Before the actual transcript is offered, his overview starts like this:
Trump Kicks Down the Guardrails
Think back two months. Imagine it’s September. You’re reading the Substack of some resistance-era liberal. They’re ranting about the dangers of the Orange Man coming back. “Imagine what a second term is going to be like,” they write. “You’re going to have Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for Health and Human Services secretary. Tulsi Gabbard is going to lead the intelligence services. Matt Gaetz is going to be the attorney general. Maybe Donald Trump is going to make a ‘Fox & Friends’ host secretary of defense.”
I think most people reading that would have said: Oh, come on! Donald Trump might be a menace. He is a menace. But that’s a parody of what a Trump-hating liberal imagines a Trump administration is going to be. Let’s be real about this.
But here we are in the real, and that is not what a Trump-hating liberal imagines a Trump administration is going to be. This is what Donald Trump imagines a Trump administration is going to be. It is what he is trying to make it be.
One of the challenging things about covering Donald Trump is that it is hard to talk about him without sounding unhinged—and that is because he acts in ways that are by any reasonable standard unhinged.
According to Ezra, Trump "acts in ways that are by any reasonable standard unhinged."
Why would someone act in such ways? Is there some other type of word or words a straight-talking journalist might consider employing in some discussion of what Trump seems to be like—of what his peculiar behavior may perhaps seem to suggest?
As we've noted again and again, they've all agreed not to say what they think. These are the well-educated public voices of our flailing Blue America. These are our tribunes in action.
As became obvious in an earlier column, Ezra seems to have agreed to play by a certain rule. That said: as we noted above, his lengthy interview with Applebaum is compelling and disturbing.
"Let's be real about this," his one character says. Those words strike us as words to live by, though they may quite frequently be honored in the breach.
Is it "wrong" to play by that rule? We've reported, you get to decide.
Trump-haters are wasting their breath calling Trump unhinged. The rest of us are not buying it.
ReplyDeleteKlein mentions three appointees he doesn’t like as supposed proof of insanity. I don’t like these three either, but they’re not nuts. Every President makes some dubious appointments. Trump has also named a dozen or so good to excellent appointees.
He even has sane reason for Gaetz and Kennedy. He believes their areas are f—ked up, so he selected people who are loyal to him and who will shake things up.
No, Dickhead, he's fucked up. We want people loyal to the constitution, not the King. Go fuck yourself.
DeleteIt's like they've never met a fun or colorful or courageous person. Which is easy to believe.
DeleteAnyway Trump is on his way to Texas to see a SpaceX launch. What a joyful timeline we're living in. If you're not a sad sack Democrat.
SpaceX? Big fucking deal, maggot. I watched NASA put men on the moon. Many times. Elon has perfected going up and down.
Delete“ If you're not a sad sack Democrat.”
DeleteAdmirable restraint, anonymouse 6:11pm.
Musk loves him some government subsidies. That won’t be part of the 2 trillion deletion from the federal government. On the other hand, lunch pail Joe will feel some pain, cause we have to make America great again… for oligarchs.
DeleteThere's not enough imagination in the world to picture a Republican voter who cares about something other than bigotry and white supremacy. Even David in Cal's cousin stopped wondering why David is pretending he's a big fan of rapists.
Delete"Trump-haters are wasting their breath calling Trump unhinged. The rest of us are not buying it."
DeleteNo Republican voter chose Trump based on anything the Left has said or did. What could Democrats do to make Republican voters possibly care about something other than bigotry and white supremacy?
I'll tell you what. Nothing.
Of course he had sane reasons to chose Kennedy and Gaetz. Kennedy went behind his wife's back with a journalist (and others apparently), and Gaetz fornicated with a 17 year old he trafficked. They can share locker room stories.
DeleteTrump is breaking new ground. In the old days, scandals were unearthed after an appointee was placed in office. Now they are a prerequisite. Republicans have cornered the market on the number of indictments handed out to members of their administrations over the years. This is historical fact. They are now trying to run up the score, and it all seems so effortless. After this administration, it will literally take centuries of governing by any other party to match the volume of crooks the Republicans have placed in administration posts. And this does not even include Medicare fraudsters like Rick Scott. There need be no concerns about guard rails from within their party or fear of buyer's remorse from amoral rubes like DIC. Looking forward to the courtmarshalls and military tribunals. General Miley should get his affairs in order.
Delete"Trump-haters are wasting their breath calling Trump unhinged. The rest of us are not buying it."
DeleteDickhead, you will eat that BigMac and you will like it.
From The Guardian via Digby, here are suggestions for living in an authoritarian society and protecting yourself against whatever torments Trump implements:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/nov/17/how-to-survive-the-broligarchy-20-lessons-for-the-post-truth-world-donald-trump?CMP=share_btn_url
Are these suggestions things you can film yourself doing for an X audience?
DeleteOtherwise, no liberal women are going to care.
Too lazy to read them?
DeleteWhat's with that, Cecelia? They post videos of themselves having mental breakdowns while everyone else lives their lives. They obviously enjoy it. Weird hobby.
DeleteAnonymouse 6:13pm, yes. It’s too narcissistic to be a cry for help. I fear for their cats,
DeleteStill have nothing better to do, Cecelia, but respond to every anonymous commenter at an obscure blog? Talk about sad sack.
DeleteHey, Cecelia, why don’t you use your time more fruitfully, like bullying a transgender person? Advocating that they be arrested and rounded up into re-education camps? After all, it’s the most pressing problem facing our nation, more so than the price of eggs. You want to bully me? Do you? I dare you to do it to my face, asshole. Would you like my home address you contemptible piece of shit?
DeleteStay out of women’s spaces, sir.
DeleteAnonymouse 7:48pm, you’re responding to me.
DeleteI am transgender, I have expressed my opinion as to the contradictions in transgender theology. If you’re not man or woman enough to tolerate that sort of speech, perhaps you should just stick with your birth gender.
DeleteThe thing that calls itself Cecelia has thoroughly researched the subject of gender and comes forth with its opinion on the matter. Stay tuned for it to announce its positions on climate change, vaccinations, the origins of COVID, extraterrestrials and whether Dr. Anthony Fauci is a danger to society.
DeleteAnd the delightful delightfulness of leftist crybullys.
DeleteWhy would someone [Trump] act in such ways?
ReplyDeleteBecause no one has ever held him accountable for his wrongdoing, except long ago when he represented his father in housing court, against charges of treating black people in illegal ways. And when E.J. Carrolls sued him for defamation (for claiming he did'n't rape her and hadn't even met her, calling her accusations motivated by money), and when the AG of NYC charged and convicted him of 34 felonies for covering up his payoff to Stormy Daniels, the porn star he slept with while Melania was home with their newborn son. Most Trump gets away with whatever he does.
Now his criminal cases for interfering in the 2020 election, for planning and conducting an insurrection after he lost the election, and for stealing classified documents and showing them to unauthorized people, are being dismissed because he was elected president. Now the Supreme Court has said he has immunity for anything he does as an official presidential act (does that include unconstitutional acts -- that remains to be seen). Now he believes he has carte blance to do whatever comes into his mind, including things typically done by dictators in other countries. He has vowed revenged against his political and personal enemies (is that a presidential act?).
Our nation let Trump get away with unhinged acts whenever he wanted, without censure and without legal constraint. Now we are stuck with an out-of-control monster at the head of our goverment.
Those of us who voted for Harris are not responsible for Trump or what he has become. Those of us who worked toward her election are innocent but we will suffer along with everyone else. I lived in CA when Trump refused to send disaster aid after the wildfire that wiped out Paradise CA. I have no doubt he will treat other blue states the same way, whether Trump voters live there or not. His enemies list doesn't have to make sense.
Those who voted for Trump deserve everything he does to them (even inadvertently while targeting blue states or immigrants or union members). Somerby didn't fight for Harris's election. He showed disdain for her, criticized her at every opportunity, and only praised her smile. Even now, he has no respect for her campaign, which others have strongly praised. If Somerby couldn't bring himself to approve of Harris, then he helped elect Trump, because there are no fence-sitters in this situation. Somerby is one of the bad guys now (as it seems he ever was).
Calling Trump crazy or unhinged while sabotaging the Democrats is being a subversive on Trump's behalf. It is far from admirable behavior and, if there is any justice in the world, Somerby will suffer for it when Trump does his dirty work. But unlike others, Somerby will deserve his mistreatment.
Anonymouse 5:47pm, you sabotaged your party by denouncing Somerby in 2019 during the Democratic debates when he blogged test he had concerns over Biden due to his age. You called Bob every pejorative thing but an “anonymouse” , and accused him of being a Putin puppet.
DeleteThe very thing Bob feared came to pass. If you had an ounce of integrity you’d apologize to him.
I know, but Bob hadn't seen the drone shows.
DeleteHe was held accountable for defrauding Frump "University" students by a Mexican judge and for cheating on Frump Charities funds. Just the kind of sleazeball that attracts Republican loon voters.
DeleteDoes anyone think Dr. Oz is competent to run Medicare and Medicaid?
ReplyDeleteHarvard undergraduate. MBA as well as an MD from U Penn. Professor at Columbia U. That’s pretty impressive.
DeleteYou’re easily impressed, DiC.
DeleteWhere is the administrative experience?
DeleteProfessor at Columbia U
DeleteOne of those elite university faculty commie groomers? Eh, Dickhead?
You will notice Dickhead didn't actually answer the question on competence. Competence is secondary as long as he is a good ass kisser.
You didn't really think Republicans were against Ivy League elites did you?
DeleteThey aren't against anything. They're pro bigotry and white supremacy. That's all that matters to them, or ever did.
Never make the mistake of believing a Republican voter believes what they say, unless it is in service to bigotry and white supremacy. It's the only times they aren't kidding.
Delete6:05 The short answer is no. The long answer is no, no, no , no , no. Oz is an accomplished surgeon whose ego got the better of him after Oprah made him a television personality ( where have we seen that before?) and who began grifting by hawking products on air that had bad or no science to back their use. Columbia was petitioned by esteemed physician academicians to fire him for this activity. His story is well documented and easily accessible on the internet.
DeleteThe Unibomber was a Harvard graduate and the youngest faculty member ever at age 25 at UC Berkeley. What is your point? That you are clueless?
DeleteYoungest faculty member in the math department at UC Berkeley.
DeleteDr. Oz’s fall from grace in the medical community was surprising since he had an exemplary reputation as a cardiothoracic surgeon. I imagine that having his own show and needing to fill large time slots with health content was difficult. There’s limited appeal to being lectured about the Mediterranean diet repeatedly. Perhaps he needed to hawk worthless supplements to fill space; that would be a generous take on it. But there is this thing called integrity and what he had of that at one time disappeared when he misled his audience about the crap he was selling.
DeleteHe will be judged by the billionaires as good at his job when he transfers billions in health care funding to tax cuts for the richy rich.
DeleteMaybe he can enlist the gentleman from Florida , Senator Rick Scott, to root out Medicare fraud. I hear that he is an expert at it.
DeleteOprah really know how to pick them.
DeleteDr. Oz was called before congress for promoting as effective three supplements that had no scientific evidence for effectiveness, and for which he was publicly chastised. He was interviewed by Larry King promoting the use of hydroxychloroquine as an effective treatment for COVID, which studies showed ineffective or harmful. People choosing to use that drug on the advice of Oz, Fox pundits and Trump often did so as an alternative to the dreaded vaccination. This was in many cases a deadly decision. Oz is a narcissistic charlatan at this point, and the medical community knows this.
Delete