Someone with the monicker “Orcinus Orca” (the Latin binomial of the killer whale) writes in to comment on a post and reader comments: “It’s hard not to be happy with the job we’re doing.“, a short critique of Trump’s mishandling and circumlocution of the coronavirus pandemic in the U.S. I’ll write Orcinus after I post this informing the person that I’ve posted it. You are welcome to respond to “Orcinus” in the comments, and perhaps I’ll let this person respond. But be assured that the person will know of this post and of readers’ responses. Note that this person claims not to be a Trump supporter.
Apropos, a comment from someone else, which I didn’t post, claims that I am a hypocrite because I used to call out “Trump Derangement Syndrome” but am now criticizing Trump vigorously.
But here’s what Orcinus wrote:
I’m really disappointed by the comments here. Like it or not, Trump is your president. He certainly deserves a lot of criticism, but people need to consider how to work with him so that he does a better job. It’s not helping that the media are being very antagonistic towards him. He deserves criticism, but a lot of it is overboard. Recently, Dr. Fauci asked the media to stop trying to create division between him and Trump. Fauci said that he doesn’t always agree with Trump’s choice of words, but that he has always listened to his advice and hasn’t contradicted him.
Similarly, it probably wasn’t the best idea to hype up chloroquine so much, but it’s a stretch to blame him for people ingesting fish tank cleaner. I’m seeing some of his quotes taken out of context. He is probably naive to think that people will be back in public by Easter, but he didn’t say that they were definitively going to do so. Recently, a journalist accused him of starting a eugenics program aimed at letting certain groups die (as if being elderly is a heritable trait). She was a writer for many highly regarded publications.
Think about how someone like Trump will react to this stuff. He’s stubborn and more likely to double down. He’s less likely to listen to reason the more that he is antagonized. Yes, a lot of people want him to lose the next election (myself included), but this pandemic shouldn’t be exploited to do so.
Lastly, there is a lot of nastiness directed at Trump supporters here. Calling them stupid and ignorant doesn’t help anything. A lot of Trump supporters are poor working class people. It’s a bad look when upper middle class people look down upon the lower classes for being too stupid to vote the right way. While I think that a democrat would make a better president, Biden doesn’t seem to be a great candidate either.
NOTE: Orcinus sent several comments defending him/herself, but also noted that he’s posted here under another name as a “regular commenter”. Investigating that (which is a banning offense), I found that he has posted under at least three different names (not as a “regular commenter”) I therefore have booted him off the site for violating Rule #4 of Da Roolz:
If you try to post under more than one name in an attempt to circumvent moderation or pretend you are more than one person, you will be banned. Stick to one name. If you have to change your posting name for a good reason, let me know by email.
________________________
And, in case you’ve been in Ulan Bator and haven’t seen this “perfect” imitation of Trump, I’ll add it to
God only brought one guy back from the dead on Easter. Trump is here to bring back the whole economy on Easter 2020. Enjoy this clip (possibly, like, the best ever), share and be sure to subscribe to Making Podcasts Great Again (@TrumpPod) – new every week! pic.twitter.com/aUifVWRzfh
— J-L Cauvin (@JLCauvin) March 24, 2020
There is a time when someone throws the dye, fiddles with some ball bearings, and shuffles off the bridge that the First Officer takes over – oh wait.
Everyone knows this but I’d add :
Killer whales are also called Orcas and are in fact in the family Delphinidae – dolphins! Amazing!
Just sayin’
Sorry, Orcinus, but you are being the tone police. Even most of the Republican governors have mentioned how out of touch Trump is from reality.
I think the media criticism has been mild. We need more of them calling out Trump’s constant lying, fabrications and criminal activity. His administration will now allow industry to pollute more.
His attempt at justification of more deaths so that the economy can return is a crime against humanity.
All Trump Creature supporters and enablers are united in one way:
For whatever reasons, valid or invalid, they want to destroy the United States of America out of pure nihilism.
They are well on their way to achieving this goal.
A lot of questions there
😁
“Orcinus wrote:
‘I’m really disappointed by the comments here . . . people need to consider how to work with him so that he does a better job.'”
Your disappointment is congenially noted.
Who hasn’t considered how to work with (and endure) Trump? How often does Trump consider how to work (and get along) with others? Does Orcinus hold up Pence as a role model, extolling Trump’s virtues as Pence does in every third sentence uttered in public?
Trumps protectors in all political offices will constantly lie, disimmulate, and gaslight. Pick any 5 minutes from the impeachment hearing when any one of them was speaking. 3.5 years ago they were, with the rest of us, speaking out against this noxious clown, and now all they do is Oscillate his tRump.
I will calm down a little when they show some backbone and respect for the truth.
Yeah, Mike Pence: Ass-kisser in Chief! 😀
How do you work with a fuckwit?
cr
One psychological features that may explain why some people support Trump would be a kind of bias “of least expectation” added to confirmation biases. These people know that Trump is not competent (he his a showman) so they expect that he will fail regularly and, thus, they judge him only by his successes, apparent or real. And they don’t want to listen to people trying to show is failures because they are not important.
Other subject:
Recently, Trump’s administration cancelled a deal with GE for the production of ventilators. To justifiy his decision, he said:
“You go into major hospitals sometimes, and they’ll have two ventilators. And now all of a sudden they’re saying, ‘Can we order 30,000 ventilators?’”
(see https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/26/trump-ventilators-coronavirus-151311 )
This “all of a sudden” suggests that he does not realize the size of the epidemic in the USA. Another possibility is that he wants to punish Cuomo because he puts his ego before common good. Anyway it is hard to understand why D. “the economy must go on” Trump declined a chance to help the economy.
Killer Whale’s post is in reality so damning to Trump, it has that whiff of sarcasm…are you sure it is not written by Titania?
No, I think it’s serious.
I agree that it is damning, and I doubt that he is as supportive of Trump as he claims.
The fish tank cleaner that the man from Arizona fatally ingested was chloroquine phosphate. His wife, who also drank some but survived, specifically referenced Trump’s frequent mentions of chloroquine as the reason behind their misadventure. https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/man-dies-after-ingesting-chloroquine-attempt-prevent-coronavirus-n1167166
I would not really blame Mr Trump here, although he should/would take some of the responsibility if he were a man… Oh wait..
Yes for some reason I find Trump’s role less of a “stretch” than Orca. He exonerates Trump, but presumably would reject explanations based on Trump’s supporters being “stupid and ignorant”. So where does Orca place the blame for this regrettable incident?
Short but nice analysis!
As for Trump, other things aside, he talks and tweets too much. One of his predecessors (forgot which one) said that nobody made a fool of himself by being silent.
Sounds like something that Calvin “Silent Cal” Coolidge would have said.
Trump could learn a lot from Coolidge: “The words of a President have an enormous weight and ought not to be used indiscriminately”.
‘Trump could learn a lot from Coolidge: “The words of a President have an enormous weight and ought not to be used indiscriminately”’
I recall that when Bush the Elder let it slip that he did not care for broccoli, the Broccoli Growers Association (or whatever they call themselves) had a pallet of it delivered to the White House. Such a cruciferous kerfuffle.
Thanks! Maurice Switzer put it well: “It is better to remain silent at the risk of being thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt of it”.
tRump has long since removed all doubt. Tragically for our nation & the world, there are too many other fools who adore him because of his foolishness.
Hi, Orca.
Who gives a shit?
Where to even start with this person…
First, I won’t support ANYONE who lies the way Trump does. But unlike the thousands of other lies that have come from his pooched lips, the things he has said and continues to say about the virus are costing and will continue to cost human lives. It’s simply immoral and evil.
Second, he absolutely DID make it sound like chloroquine was a miracle cure even as Fauci corrected him over and over again. Again, a lie that has cost lives and deprived those who actually need the medication from acquiring it. Reckless and immoral.
“Exploiting” the pandemic? Wow. I don’t even know how to respond to that? Calling out lies that are harmful is not exploiting anything.
Lastly, I’ll call out anyone that lies, ignores evidence, or endangers others. That includes Dems, Repubs and family members. A lot of his supporters are also NOT poor working-class people. A vast majority are vile people who ignore his lies and get a chuckle out of it if it means that they can “own the Libs”. And even a Joe Biden with dementia would be better than Trump. Joe would respect and represent the office of the POTUS with dignity. He also has empathy, something Trump can’t even spell. He’s not my first choice but he would be heads-and-shoulders above Trump in a scenario like what we are currently experiencing.
Orca, I don’t think you are paying attention.
There’s a fair probability tRump will end up killing more Americans than Osama bin Laden ever managed.
cr
I’d say certain, if 9/11 is your sum total for Osama, and if you could blame Trumpism for half the ultimate deaths from the virus. I think that would be about 3,000 versus 10,000, if my earlier at least 20,000 deaths from 2 million cases is at all close for US.
If US deaths per million population works out to double Canada’s, I think ‘blaming’ him for half the deaths is quite reasonable. Let’s hope the answers are known finally by Sept. 2020, not 2021 or 2022. Right now it’s 5/million in US and 5 times less in Canada. But those numbers are going to go way up for both. Not nearly so much up in Norway, which is now 4/million.
You should post a link instead to the website where you stole this content.
That’s not what DRM is. DRM is a technology to stop you from doing stuff with intellectual property that you are not allowed to do e.g. read it.
Reposting other people’s copyright material requires something else: a copyright licence. If you do not have a copyright licence, you do not have permission to republish the material. If you do have a copyright licence, ideally you would post some sort of evidence or acknowledgement.
A simple link would have sufficed. I strongly suspect that this pleasant fellow plagiarized the content at his own website then did so again here.
“… Biden doesn’t seem to be a great candidate either.“
I think this is the whole point of Killer Whale – to cast uncertainty and doubt about voting.
I don’t think Orca is what I would call a Trump-ite, as that would be a Trump supporter. The person seems more a kind of accommodationist.
Trump Derangement Syndrome is the condition where one rails against the man even when he does something agreeable or is not directly at fault. Our failure to be prepared in advance of this plague comes from many mistakes at all levels, but they absolutely do include Trump. But our system of exacting retribution is so broken now, I doubt there will be any.
I have spoken to quite a few people like this, people who are evidently reasonably intelligent but who constantly praise Trump, slam his critics, parrot his talking points, etc.
And I’d say about 90% of them claim not to be Trump-supporters. It’s bullshit. They want to have their cake and eat it; they want to be able to support this moron and share in the catharsis of owning the libs…but also they want to keep thinking of themselves as intelligent and ethical people and not sully their reputation by aligning themselves with Trump and his supporters.
It’s just cowardice and intellectual squeamishness.
Think of them as intelligent design advocates, while other Trumpites are basic young-earth creationists.
I’m an old-fashioned lefty and more than happy to pour scorn on the more absurd pretensions of PC pomo SJW’s. But I’m disconcerted when tRump or tRumpites do the same. I do NOT want my position to be discredited by association with a gaggle of brainless loons. It’s a bit like holding a rally and having the Young Nazis turn up in ‘support’.
And I’d never try to make excuses for tRump, I think defending such a self-evident idiot just destroys any credibility I might have. I just don’t see how anyone who thinks of themselves as ‘intelligent and ethical’ (your words) could defend tRump, or would want to.
Maybe this reflects a large gap in my comprehension, since evidently some do.
cr
That is a kind and generous-minded defence of some guy down the pub who some people have been laughing at because of his views.
OK. I’ll stop criticizing tRump. I also will refrain from saying anything bad about serial murderers because it might antagonize them and what good would that do?
Actually, there have been (and still are) a number of countries with serial murderers for presidents, and everybody there has refrained from saying anything bad about them, for obvious reasons.
Is that comment somehow pertinent?
Orcinus makes two points. They are both worthy of discussion and should not be dismissed immediately. The first is that criticizing Trump in an acerbic fashion will only antagonize him and make him behave more irrationally. The second is that there is no point in attacking his working class supporters as being stupid and ignorant.
We are now in the midst of a pandemic that will change this planet (and not for the better) for many decades to come. How bad things will become will depend in large measure by the actions that Trump takes. We need to acknowledge that Trump is a mentally ill malignant narcissist. The actions he takes are often determined by whether he feels he is being liked or not. If he feels he is being attacked, he will seek revenge against those he considers his enemy. During this crisis, it is imperative that Trump make rational decisions based on the best professional advice. Perhaps many thousands of lives will be lost if the schoolyard bully gets enraged.
So, among the anti-Trump political class a very difficult choice has to be made – continue the attacks on Trump that he so richly deserves or mute the criticism with the hope that in a tranquillized state he will make decisions that can save a multitude of lives. My choice would be to go with the latter and save the frontal attack until September when we can hope that the worst of the pandemic will be behind us. This course of action will be admittedly an attempt to thread the needle – mitigate the pandemic while doing little to enhance Trump’s re-election chances.
It is very tempting for anti-Trumpers to vent their frustrations on his cult, which is largely composed of the white religious, who feel psychologically threatened by a changing world that threatens their values. Yes, they are either ignorant of or don’t care that almost everything Trump has done has had the effect of diminishing the quality of their lives. There is no reason that academics should not be studying them to better understand why they are what they are. But, from a political perspective it is a waste of time and resources to try to get them to change their minds. The evidence is overwhelming that nothing can be done to break Trump’s hold on his cult. Democrats should be expending their energies on persuading the undecideds and increasing anti-Trump turnout. This strategy worked in 2018 and can work in November.
Regarding the two points…
1) tRump will behave irrationally no matter what. “Don’t antagonize him” is a tiresome trope used also in attempts to shut down critics of religion. It has no more legitimacy here than it does there.
2) I’m afraid his supporters are stupid and ignorant. But I’ll agree with you to the extent that this is true for all of them, not just the working class ones.
I agree with GB James here, but most importantly on point #1. You have to be blind to think that muting criticism of Trump will suddenly cause him to behave better. He behaves narcissistically and irrationally no matter what people say.
I don’t spend a lot of time attacking Trump supporters so I don’t feel strongly about #2 as far as posting here is concerned. I do think that anyone who believes he’s a good President is severely deluded.
I find myself in wholehearted agreement with GBJ and PCC here (and that doesn’t happen very often 😉
Before Trump was elected I hoped that he might have the self-awareness to appoint some good advisers and let them do the heavy lifting while he just played the Presidential figurehead. It didn’t take long for that hope to fritter away.
Dunning-Kruger applies too, I think.
cr
The big question is whether Trump can be “guided” to make the correct decisions. In our current situation of a worldwide pandemic where tens of thousands of lives are at stake, I think it worth the risk of not pounding on him for a couple of weeks in the hope that he will do the right thing. If this strategy doesn’t work, it can be abandoned instantly.
I’m sorry. I just don’t believe in make-believe.
First, do you feel better attacking Trump? I certainly do. But, what has it accomplished in terms of changing what he does? The answer Is nothing for the good in the policies he supports. In a normal time, I have no problem attacking him as hard as possible. But, this is not a normal time.
Second, you and everyone else who thinks that Trump doesn’t change his views or actions based on flattery are totally wrong. You seem to have forgotten Kim of North Korea. At first, Trump threatened to destroy North Korea. Then Kim wrote him a “love letter.” Suddenly, Trump was now his best friend. Trump can be manipulated. The idea is to implement the best strategy to manipulate him to do the right thing.
No, I won’t play the role of sycophant. Have at it. Tell us how it works out.
If you should lay dying because of a lack of a ventilator maybe you would have a different view.
I’m afraid you’re engaged in magical thinking. I don’t expect to convince you at this point and will leave it here.
Yesterday 246 people in the USA died as a result of COVID19.
“A couple of weeks” of that is 3,444 dead people and that assumes the death rate doesn’t go up.
You don’t have a couple of weeks. You didn’t have a couple of weeks at the beginning of March as it turned out.
“Trump supporters are stupid and ignorant”
I think it is worse than that. Trump is supported by a huge pyramid of people. This includes the senior members of the Republican party who understand full well how dangerous and deranged much of what he says and does is and how ethically suspect. Despite this, with few exceptions, they have continued to give him their full support from the day he became candidate. These people don’t have the excuse of poor education and shitty lives to justify supporting Trump’s bullshit, they simply are prepared to jettison all decency in order to cling on to power.
Power and money – virtually everyone I know who supports Trump are worried that the Democrats simply want to take their money and give it to the worthless Democrat constituency. This ranges from my uber-wealthy orthopedic surgeon cousin to my cousins who work in factories. Hell, even my cousins who are on welfare and Medicaid support Trump and his enablers even though the Republicans would like to throw them under the bus.
This is why I like to call the GOP the Party of the Selfish. Virtually all their policies seem to be about putting Number One ahead of others. This is also the common thread that binds pre-Trump GOP to the Trumpians.
Agree, unfortunately not pointed out often enough.
This is a pretty good distillation of (current day) Republicanism. Nicely put.
Bullseye. Most especially Moscow Mitch. (I will never refer to him in any other manner for the rest of my life).
I pretty much entirely agree with you GBJames.
I might quibble a bit on #2 in that being delusional may be a distinction worth making between stupid and ignorant. Or may be not. But in my experience quite a few Trump supporters are delusional in that they simply ignore reality and substitute their own which leads them to make judgments about Trump, Republicans and Democrats that bear little resemblance to reality.
You say potato I say po-ta-to.
His RICH supporters are not stupid or ignorant. Pretty smart really. Just thoroughly evil and black hearted.
I do not think Orcinus is a Trump supporter. I think he believes that the pandemic is so serious that we should cease antagonizing Trump in order to deal with the problem more effectively. That would be reasonable, normally, but Trump thrives on slash and burn politics. It is what he wants. There is no reason to think he would act any differently.
I’ve heard “I’m not a Trump supporter but”/”I didn’t vote for him but”/”I don’t agree with a lot of the things he says but” far too many times to take this person’s word for it.
Intelligent Trump supporters who care about the way they’re seen by other are faced with a dilemma. They don’t want to admit to supporting him…but they love all that lib-owning and vicarious ‘winning’, and they love all the ‘tough stances’ Trump takes on immigration, race and making fun of disabled journalists. So invariably they massage the truth.
Historian, I enjoy your thoughtful posts but I disagree with your reasoning here.
Trump is a bullshitter and I’ve worked with quite a few like him. These kind of people don’t actually believe anything they say. When they’re talking, whatever they communicate is only self promotion. Whatever comes out of Trump is what he thinks, at that moment, makes him look good.
So criticism, widespread and vicious, will change his action. Let’s take his return to work by Easter annoucement. If a few prominent public health officials indicate his position isn’t well supported, he’ll ignore them. If there’s a firestorm of protest claiming he’s out to slaughter Americans, he’ll retreat and claim he never held his previous position.
If we want sound policy, it has to be with a mallet.
You make a good point. There seem to be instances when he does respond to pressure. But, there are also instances when he responds to flattery, such as his dealings with Kim of North Korea. If this is true then the problem is to try to determine what is the best approach to utilize. People who try to influence him, such as confidants and politicians, lack a deep enough insight into his warped psyche to always make the right guess. My point is that if intense criticism doesn’t move him then the opposite approach could possibly work. There would be nothing to lose. In this time of pandemic, actions to save lives are crucial. I am totally pragmatic in this situation. The correct actions are necessary and I don’t care particularly what approach is used to achieve them.
Our “Orcinus Orca” has fallen prey to the “golden mean fallacy” — that the Goldilocks zone where one ought to be is halfway between the thin-skinned, petulant, dangerously inept soi-disant Leader of the Free World and those who call him out for precisely what he is.
Very nicely put, Ken.
Yes, well said.
Orcinus is right that people are being pretty hard on Trump for his coronavirus response but of course he deserves it. He didn’t just suddenly become an incompetent lying moron.
But I really would rather address Mr Orcas’ last paragraph wherein he wonders why some are so hard on Trump supporters.
Mr Orcas, I can’t speak for others but if you voted for the man after seeing the video of him ridiculing a disabled reporter then you are, by my definition, a person with extremely poor character. That incident alone is sufficient, though there are plenty to choose from, to exclude that man from any public office. He should have been driven from politics and public life and yet you voted for him. Why shouldn’t we be hard on Trump supporters? Knowing what this man is like it is Trump supporters who must first demonstrate a moral character; we cannot assume it is sound. Support for the man is prima facie evidence that it is not.
I entirely agree and have written paragraphs very much like yours many times over the past few years, some of the phrases nearly word for word.
Judging Trumps fitness for office is not hard. The evidence is clear and unambiguous. As you say, there are many widely available examples that by themselves alone clearly demonstrate that he is not fit for office in any society that decent human beings would want to live in.
This absolutely does indicate something of importance about the character and mind-set of the many people who support this scumbag.
I voted for Sanders, even knowing that he was not going to win.
I guess I did that out of stubbornness or protest. Had I not, I would have had to choose between Trump and Clinton.
There were no viable candidates who were the sort of people I would want to have anything to do with. If I had to choose one of them, I would have chosen the one who I predicted would do the least damage to my family and way of life.
“you are, by my definition, a person with extremely poor character.”
I live in an incredibly conservative area (except for the “back to the land” hippies). I know exactly one person who strongly supported Trump from 2016 to the present, and he is a Jewish New York native.
It is not right to assume that people support Trump because of his bullying nature and speech issues. A lot of people support him despite his obvious flaws, because they considered the alternative worse for them personally.
Also, lots of people here in the sticks know what “irredeemable” means.
I am amused that the Trumpians are all “FU Libtards!” until it becomes obvious even to the oblivious that Trump is killing people and the Trump Crime Family is robbing the country before their very eyes.
They they want to group hug and sing Kum-Bah-Yah.
Sorry, Trumpians, you were offered Cake or Death and you chose Death.
I don’t see ant evidence that Trump supporters have noticed “that Trump is killing people and the Trump Crime Family is robbing the country before their very eyes” or, if they have, they don’t think it is as important as being able to say “FU Libtards!”
Trump’s approval rating has increased by about 5% since the coronavirus crisis started. He’s actually gaining support.
Exactly right. In fact, I still see plenty of Trump supporters who are willing to disregard the advice of medical experts and risk their lives for their FU Libtards! cause. After all, this virus is just a conspiracy against Donald…right? Maybe it really is a death cult.
Orc, you do have some pertinent points, like upper middle class people looking down upon working -or non working- class people.
It is the ‘basket of deplorables’ trope that hurt Ms Clinton so much.
However, Mr Trump did quite a few things I’d consider very bad, unpresidential and cowardly. He is a weak POTUS.
– He uses quite confusing, unstructured and populist language, always with some nasty insinuation or snipe to one or other group or individual (disabled, prisoners of war, gold star families, Mexicans, reporters, governors, you name it) when he is on the rails. Appealing to his cult (Yes, it is a cult)
– Contrary to most, I do not think he really lies very often, but just off the rails, bullshitting in other words: did not rain during his inauguration, the biggest inauguration crowd, airfields during the Revolution, hurricane sharpies, virus will be zero in two weeks, and a thousand other instances.
– He has shown and still shows extremely weak leadership during the present crisis. A Hoax, will be over by April for nearly six weeks, contradicting his experts, etc.
And when finally ackowledging the crisis not taking necessary measures and shirking responsibility. (A real leader takes responsibility, even if he is not the main cause to blame). The pandemic should maybe not be used to get rid of him, but what else to do with someone who so profoundly bungled -and still is bungling- it?
Mr. Stempels, you do know that bullshitting is just another name for lying, right?
Bullshit and lies are actually different. This book is short and interesting read on the subject.
“Bullshit and lies are actually different.”
Viggo Mortensen’s character in “Green Book” makes a similar distinction:
Tony Lip: Who said liar? I said bullshit artist.
Dr. Don Shirley: And what’s the difference?
Tony Lip: Because I don’t lie. Ever. I’m just good at talking people into, you know, doing things they don’t want to do, by bullshitting them.
Thank you Mr. James. I’ve actually read some reviews of Frankfurter’s book ere now. It’s a clever argument, but really, in the end, it’s a distinction not a difference. As you say, potato/poh-tah-to.
ELWOOD: Well, what was I gonna do? Take away you’re only hope? Take away the very thing that kept you going in there? I took the liberty of bullshitting you, okay?
JAKE: You lied to me.
ELWOODIt wasn’t lies, it was just bullshit.
I disagree, lying is knowingly telling a falsehood, bullshitting is just telling anything, regardless of the truth, not even knowing, or interested in- what the truth is.
I mean revolutionary airfields, wind-turbine sounds causing cancer, Covid-19 will quickly go from 15 to 0,? Those are not really lies, but they are bullshit.
There is this theory that Mr Trump believes in positive thinking: if you think it hard enough an believe it strong enough it will become true (need I point out that that comes close to: if you repeat a lie often enough…. (The Goebbels doctrine))
“Like it or not, Trump is your president.” Yeah, that’ll be the day.
I think I’ll give this narcissistic, racist, misogynistic president the same kind of respect he gave Obama, which, in case “Orcinus Orca” has forgotten, was exactly zero.
Everything Trump touches dies, including the citizens he was “elected” to serve.
I both agree with most of Orcas’s letter (I don’t agree with the implication that Trump is susceptible to change) and admire our host for posting it without ridicule.
“He certainly deserves a lot of criticism, but people need to consider how to work with him so that he does a better job.”
I have seen no indication at all that Trump will do a better job if we would only give him less criticism. Orcinus seems to be engaging in wishful thinking here.
In fact, we’ve seen just the opposite play out in the past. He floats one of his stupid ideas to see if anyone salutes it. If he gets a fierce enough response against it, he drops it or is forced to modulate it away from disaster. This is surely what’s going to happen to his “re-open the country on Easter” idea. The virus isn’t listening and the local governments will not go along with it, except perhaps in the most Trumpy places.
A President doesn’t deserve respect just because they are President.
Nor is it “just his way of talking” if he incites violence, repeats conspiracies, incites people to self harm, lies almost constantly, ridicules others and denigrates media, many of which give him far more leeway than he deserves in the name of ‘balance’.
Trump is dangerous.
He has almost all the worst defects a leader can have. He thinks he’s smarter than everyone else. He thinks all deals are zero sum games. He is a narcissist, he surrounds himself with toadies and yes men, he refuses to learn (or is incapable), he’s lazy, he lies constantly, he appears to be only concerned with himself, he makes snap judgments based on god knows what. He is a con man, he has stolen from his ‘charity’. He has directly incited violence among his followers. When he’s wrong he refuses to take responsibility. In fact he refuses to take responsibility for anything. He either believes conspiracies or repeats them for his benefit. He is persuaded by the last people/person he listens to, rather than by evidence. He is so self involved and narcissistic he is easily manipulated. Trump is obnoxious when he is given evidence of his lying, misinformation, of his being wrong.
Trump appears to be only representing, or caring, about his own voters to the detriment of a large section, perhaps the majority of the citizens.
Trump is financially benefiting his businesses.
Like Bush Junior, he has filled agencies with political cronies and ideologues who don’t know what they are doing. That is what happened during the Iraq War (and reconstruction) which turned out to be such a mess. That is what is happening to America as policy is made by whim rather than by evidence based science.
Trump said he was trying to protect the ACA’s “previous condition” clause, many times, yet in reality his administration is in court trying to quash it.
If I pointed out all his lies I would literally be typing all day and all night.
As for refusing to work with Trump, Democrats have attempted to work with him, as the 2 trillion dollar stimulus package shows, they do work with him. On the other hand Trump (and Republicans) have repeatedly stonewalled Democrats legislation. Democrats have worked with Trump only to have Trump give them the middle finger when his information source, often Fox News talking heads, says it’s a bad deal.
Yes, it appears that Trump values Fox News talking heads over his own agencies, which he accuses of being ‘deep state’ that are trying to get rid of him.
As for Trump supporters, I have yet to see a Trump supporter make intelligent rebuttals to any serious criticism of Trump.
Because they can’t. The facts are the facts. Trump lies almost all the time, his lies are plain to see for anyone who is paying attention, but Trump supporters are willfully blind, willfully ignorant, willfully siloed in an information loop that is continually creating misinformation, conspiracies and are continually being told anything else is fake news. That loop is becoming ever more extreme.
They willfully believe nonsense and Trump’s lies without bothering to check.
When confronted with reality that Trump is doing exactly the opposite of what he promised they ignore reality.
Trump is not a king, he is an elected politician in a position that can literally mean the difference between life and death for many Americans. Citizens do not need to treat him like a fragile snowflake.
It is our right AND DUTY to criticize elected officials.
He wanted the job. He has the job. It isn’t our fault he isn’t the least bit suitable for the job. If he can’t do it, if he can’t take the smallest amount of criticism he can and he should RESIGN.
Because he isn’t fit for the job.
This could be literally hundreds of thousands of words long. This was just a tiny rehash of many much longer articles widely available that describe Trumps lies in detail and his many, many glaring faults.
“Who could have known health care was so complicated.” Trump
Feb. 26: “So we’re at the low level. As they get better, we take them off the list, so that we’re going to be pretty soon at only five people. And we could be at just one or two people over the next short period of time. So we’ve had very good luck.”
“This is a pandemic,” President Donald Trump said at a March 17 press conference. “I felt it was a pandemic long before it was called a pandemic.”
Yes. Thanks for saying what needed to be said. If that’s TDS, so be it. Sign me up.
X 1000
This about sums it up Mr Orcas, even though Mr Danielson barely scratched the surface of Trumps malignancy. If you respond at all here, this would be the place.
Everything you say about Trump is true. But, until at least January 20th of next year we are stuck with him. In a time when the life of every human being on the planet is in danger, we must ask ourselves as to whether we can move Trump to do the right things to help mitigate the pandemic. It seems that many of the commenters here have succumbed to total resignation arguing that nothing can be done to get Trump to change his views and policies. I disagree with this total surrender. I argue that we cannot just give up. We must try to get him to change knowing that we may not succeed. As I have stated in previous comments above, due to his mental illness, Trump craves being loved and adored. This is why he held so many MAGA rallies. This is why Kim of North Korea is now his best friend. So, if saying a few nice things about him can get him to agree to send more ventilators to NYC, so be it. What I am proposing is cynically manipulative. There is no harm if it doesn’t work. But, certainly, the current policy of hurting the feelings of the mentally ill schoolyard bully hasn’t worked, and the death toll will continue to mount.
If you think Trump is reading this website or cares what I and others like me think, I would like to sell you shares in Trump University. I can print up as many as you are willing to buy. 😉
The problem with your plan is Trump is surrounded by toadies, yes men or Republicans who would gladly sacrifice people (and do) for the sake of power, the sake of their masters power and wealth, or for ideology. Many are part and parcel of the information loop I mentioned, extremism personified or self serving manipulators in an all consuming quest for power.
A few people who have his ear are serious people trying to do their best. Many are not and Democrats don’t appear to have his ear.
Trump has decided that Democrats are his enemies, as is the ‘deep state’. He doesn’t seem to be the live and let live type. He doesn’t seem like the forgiving type. His behavior shows him to hold a grudge and is petty and vindictive and is not above hurting others, including average citizens if it hurts his enemies.
In other words, I doubt the success of such an endeavor, but even so one can do both, it isn’t an either or scenario. If Democrats, governors, local politicians can get Donald’s ear, they should take that opportunity while others rightfully criticize his actions and lack of action.
In the past such coddling and fake endearing has worked, right up until someone else talks to him or he watches Fox News.
I don’t think America is going to avoid catastrophe in the next few months. I think it’s already to late considering the political realities, Trump’s nature, conservative/right wing/religious media and the nature of exponential growth.
I very much hope I’m wrong and I wish you and any rational person who can get Trump’s ear, the very best of luck. I think we need all the luck we can get.
Time to walk the dog, I’ve spent too much time here and he’s staring at me, silently pleading for me to get my ass in gear.
Trump *does* seem to listen to certain people, like Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity. Apparently, Carlson met with Trump and got him to take the Corona Virus more seriously. If some of those people were to flatter Trump’s ego, they might persuade him to change his policies. They could say something like, “Mr. President, our great nation is facing a very serious threat right now and if you can defeat it, you’ll be remembered as the *Greatest President Ever*. This is your opportunity to make history” or some such thing (they have to lay it on a bit thick!).
But I don’t think it matters what the non-Fox media or mainstream political establishment says — Trump doesn’t listen to them anyway.
Excellent, but I’m not sure he actually wanted the job, I think Mr Putin cs cajoled him into it, and as vain (and indebted to them) as he is he couldn’t resist.
Trump’s lies and misleading statements (>16,000 since taking office).
There’s a rare species of troll, named a “concern troll”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_troll#Concern_troll
… I’ve seen only one on WEIT before. Fascinating, this might be one!
“There’s a rare species of troll, named a ‘concern troll’.”
Wow! I didn’t know there was such an animal. Now I’m wondering whether I is one.
Tone-trolling is similar, though not quite the same. Either one is an easy charge to level against anyone who dissents from the general consensus of opinion.
No offence intended, but sometimes your posts do seem a little like that (though I tend to put it down more to a sort of contrarianism or eagerness to debate points). I’m acutely aware I’m in danger of being personal here and I hope that won’t be taken the wrong way. As in all discussions, everybody skates around the edges of this from time to time. I just mentioned it ‘cos you asked the (rhetorical?) question. 😉
cr
Just to make you feel bad, infinite… I agree with you.
Sorry to be so slow in responding, but I just came across your reply to my post. No offense taken, certainly—I can’t say that I ever take offense. My question about whether I was a “concern troll” was not rhetorical: it occurred to me, after reading the definition, that I might be.
As I understand it, however, the idea behind “concern trolling” is that you pretend to be an ally in the hope that your opponents will take your arguments more seriously. Now, I don’t think I’ve made any bones about the fact that many of my views run counter to those of the majority on this site—e.g., I’ve admitted that I voted for Trump and that I believe in God. Would I use the same tone or tack on a site where I knew the audience to be sympathetic to my views? Maybe not, so to that extent perhaps I’m guilty as charged—I’m probably not the best judge of that.
if I come across as “contrarian,” it’s because—both by temperament and as a by-product of my Jesuit training—I can’t see an opinion expressed (even my own) without immediately seeing good arguments for the other side. I’d make a terrible activist.
Bottom line is that I’ve learned a lot from people on this site who have challenged my views and hope to continue to do so as long as our host sees fit to tolerate my presence here. Thanks for your honesty.
Gary
Love the way you pick the smallest things to defend, but ignore the outright lies.
“It’s a hoax.”
“Everyone can get tested.”
“The ventilators have shipped.”
This is not “it probably wasn’t the best idea’, this is not “naive,” but outright, calculated lying.
Lies that will continue.
Peter Wehner:
+1
I’m pretty sure it is apparent to most of us that you can’t work with Trump. You’re either his roadie or fired.
toadie!
That’s one of the best examples of autocorrect gone rogue that I’ve seen in quite a while! 😁
A roadie for The Donald Trump Experience. Or maybe Donnie Stardust and the Shysters from Mars.
The Man Who Sold the World?
We have a winner!
Ha! Or Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps)
Brilliant!
Sub haha
“Like it or not, Trump is your president. He certainly deserves a lot of criticism, but people need to consider how to work with him so that he does a better job.”
It does not seem to occur to this person that quite a number who contribute here are not citizens of US. If I understand anything about this sort of USian, his/her immediate response will be ‘None of your business’. My response to that, and the stuff about USians not trying to use this dreadful situation to get rid of this monster, is simply that I have and shall have grand, great-grand etc. children whose lives in the next 4 or 5 generations will be made miserable and cut short by the dreadful environmental policies of this monster, one who is being possibly enabled by his/her screed–assuming we are all not consumed in a thermonuclear war the monster starts.
Many other things could be said, and have been said by me and others. But let me be more mercifully brief than usual and just write this:
Once there are more than 20,000 deaths and 2,000,000 verified cases in the U.S. (that will happen, I assure you, maybe much worse), many more than would have occurred under any other feasible leader, even a faithful Republican, let us take another look at this screed. I am sure the writer will not then come out of hiding, if as likely he/she has not already ‘shown his/her face’. Many respondents here are quite openly public, if one spends any time reading this non-blog and its more common respondents.
True leadership often requires sacrifice. Putting the needs of the people ahead of personal or political gain.
This is a pandemic. Saving our people requires economic sacrifice. Economic sacrifice may cost votes come November.
A partisan leader would blame others and try to avoid political fallout.
A good leader would bite the bullet and do the right thing.
A great leader wouldn’t even pause to consider the political ramifications.
Which do you honestly think we have right now?
The Trump imitator was too coherent and didn’t praise himself enough.
Quite frankly, I think everyone here is proving Orca’s point. There are times for politics and times for bipartisan action. Trump is an incompetent buffoon but the democrats’ response was political not beneficial. Trump’s response to the democrats’ was political not beneficial. And so on down the rabbit hole.
I really wish some national politicians had stepped up and created a bipartisan front for intelligent action but we got politics as usual. Trump causes derangement on both sides of the aisle.
I listen to governor Cuomo blame everything on Trump but he conveniently forgets that he is in charge of the state with the worst outbreak. I understand that NYC has unique problems but Cuomo delayed closing down schools after it was obviously necessary. Trump was incompetent. Cuomo was incompetent. I understand that both were in unique and difficult situations but both failed their constituents.
What bothers me most is that BOTH sides continue to blame the other instead of working together. Unfortunately, the same blaming is going on here.
BOTH sides. What a tired old trope. There’s only one side that spent two months pretending the deep state, democrats, and the media were engaged in a great hoax.
The federal government ships 400 and then 2000 ventilators to New York. Instead of thanking the government, Cuomo shows his colors by complaining that he received only 400. Perfect way to ensure further cooperation Trump publicly questioned the need for ventilators. Two bozos in a pod.
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/26/trump-ventilators-coronavirus-151311
Did eg. Mr Inslee do that? Despite being called a ‘snake’.
You have a severe case of both-sideism here. Cuomo makes one or two little mistakes and you make them equivalent to Trump’s disastrous positions? What about his refusal to deal with testing? His suppression of data? His “open up the country by Easter” policy? Surely I don’t need to go on.
“..Trump is an incompetent buffoon”
No, he’s an incompetent monster, who will soon be responsible for the deaths of 10,000 and the sickening of a million.
Yes, I have a case of both side-ism. Please name 5 national politicians on either side who have publicly gotten together in bipartisanship to put the country first.
Some governors have done a good job. Inslee democrat from Washington and DeWine republican from Ohio head my list.
Name a Republican other than Mitt Romney and a few others who actually want to work with Dems. I truly believe that most Dem politicians would love to work with the other side if they put in a good faith effort.
Republicans 1, Democrats 0, Partisan hacks 99. That sound about right in these days.
That is embarrassing whataboutery.
And as far as I can see absolutely no-one on the Democratic side has behaved with even a fraction of the shameful dishonesty, incompetence, malice, cowardice and arrogance of Trump. Never mind all the obvious examples of staggering, jawdropping professional incompetence that others have mentioned BTL, this is the president who has demonstrated his character by making sneering jokes about the possibility of Mitt Romney dying from this virus.
The chutzpah it takes to compare him with Cuomo is absolutely typical Trump Apologetics 101: doesn’t matter how absurd the false equivalence is, draw it and then move on quickly to another subject and angle of attack.
Breathtaking, isn’t it?
Democrats DID just join with Republicans to pass a bill. It was in all the news.
Last I heard the Republican controlled senate was sitting on close to 500 pieces of legislation brought forward by Democrat controlled congress. Legislation Mr Turtle said he would continue to block. Just as Republicans blocked Obama’s SCOTUS appointment, just as they blocked many other of Obama’s judicial appointments, appointments to the ATF and other agencies.
When Trump wanted billions for his wall, Democrats obliged giving him a sizable fraction to border security. Trump said good enough for now. After Fox News talking heads complained Trump backed out.
That wasn’t the first time that happened nor was it the last.
When Obama was elected, before he was even sworn in Republicans swore they would prevent him from getting any successes, they had a meeting and made it policy. They only backed down a few times when it was clear the country was turning against them, otherwise they mostly managed to block Obama, even though Obama consistently tried to offer his hand in bipartisan fashion.
Republicans are duplicitous. When out of power they demand fiscal restraint of Democrats. When in power they raise the deficit and debt and say it doesn’t matter.
During Obama’s presidency Republicans shut down the government over a funding bill. They had no demands, no exit strategy, just a desire to obstruct.
Republicans were putting through a bill right up to the point Obama said he liked it. They immediately withdrew it.
Republicans held about 60 pointless theatrical votes against the ACA. Republicans promised a health care bill (one of a half dozen ‘proposed’ bills) but faced opposition from their own party. So much so they abandoned any attempt but continue their attempts to destroy the ACA while stating they are going to protect Americans and keep the pre-existing clause even while they attempt it’s repeal by the courts. Just as Trump does the same.
Democrats are far from perfect and have their own idiots but they are leagues away from the obstructionist extremists Republicans have evolved into.
It isn’t just Democrats who see this. There are many ex-republicans who left or were forced out of the party because of it’s extremism and obstructionism. Now they are called RINOs by Republicans for not being extreme enough.
If I may suggest:
“It’s Even Worse Than It Looks: How the American Constitutional System Collided With the New Politics of Extremism” by Thomas E. Mann & Norman J. Ornstein
Quote (from Washington Post interview):
…it [Republican party] has become “an insurgent outlier — ideologically extreme; contemptuous of the inherited social and economic policy regime; scornful of compromise; unpersuaded by conventional understanding of facts, evidence and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition . . . all but declaring war on the government.”
Republicans have only become more extreme since it was published in 2012.
Exactly!
I would also point out that Republicans held the house, the Trump presidency and the senate (for two years?) yet still managed to get very little done because of obstructionism from their own party.
Democrats helped to pass them some of the few bills they did pass. Once Democrats gained control of Congress Republicans and Trump started blaming Democrats as if Republicans didn’t just have control for two years.
I’d say the current bill is pretty good bipartisan work.
And I do credit Trump for falling in line with it. Just as I blame him for all of his BS, lies, etc.
He hasn’t signed it yet. Wait until someone tells me his family’s businesses are specifically prohibited from taking any bailout money.
On a related note, he is evidently balking at the $1B to make 80,000 ventilators quoted by Ford, GM, etc. I don’t know the going price for a ventilator but $12,500 sounds pretty reasonable considering all the one-time costs that they’ll incur for setting up and tearing down an assembly line. Of course the heart of the story is Trump thinks the price is more important than the timing.
Yes, on the ventilators.
My company just donated all the ones we had on site. Not very many but each one may mean several lives saved.
We are also hard at work converting lines to produce ventilator parts.
Way to go! Ignoring the moral imperatives, do you know if the $12,500 price is reasonable, or an attempt to gouge the Feds as Trump seems to think? Or perhaps he is not objecting to the price per se but thinks it is too much money to save the life of a mere citizen who might even be a Trump-hater?
12K is very reasonable.
Trump and his cult repeatedly pushed for the Hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin “100% cure rate” even after experts warned that the French study was extremely limited in scope. Most notably that the “100% cure rate” was based on just 6 (six) patients who took the two drugs.
Every time I point this out I am attacked by the Trump cult.
The Trump cult (and GOPers in general) have no use for data.
It’s all magical “thinking”.
Trump imitator brings a smile. Thanks.
Trump has lived most of his life in public view. There is nothing about him that should surprise anyone. There is nothing about him that would give the slightest hope of him acting thoughtfully or reasonably, or taking good advice in the crisis, or showing the least empathy. We are going to have to live with what we have.
Republican Senators,who failed to even allow a real trial with evidence and testimony,this current situation is all on you.
Trump voters and enablers, this is doubly all on you. We will not forget. I can imagine what the history books decades from now will say about what has happened to America and democracy, if indeed there is a civilization to write and read history books.
Here’s a wee spot of good news. A bit OT; but there it is.
I help design live-saving, life-sustaining medical devices. The company I work for therefore has a fair bit of medical equipment and expertise.
I found out today that my company has donated all of the respirators we have on site (not that many, fewer than 20; but hey, every one may mean several lives saved!)
The company has donated huge amounts of: Gloves, masks, etc.
We are converting some of our lines to very rapidly produce respirator components to help support increased production at a company producing respirators.
Many at the company are putting their minds to work on how we can help in broader ways. (We are already practicing severe social distancing. I’ve been working from home for three weeks.)
President Obama already ran the experiment you propose, and came up short every time. Remember Merrick Garland?
The result was exactly as Barry Goldwater predicted.
Barry Goldwater as the voice of wisdom and sanity? My, haven’t we come a long way (and not in a good direction). 8-(
cr
Hope you read the quote. All should know that one anyway.
As a Brit, it was new to me. Goldwater made the point well – it just goes to show how far towards the religious right the Republican party has moved.