Every time Donald Trump presses the send button on a social media post, often in the middle of night to Truth Social or X, the defeated ex-president seems to be engaging in self-destruction. Does a man telling a basket of his perceived enemies to “ROT IN HELL” in a Christmas message have the temperament to be president? And when Trump tells America that if he does not win the presidency in 2024, the country will suffer a severe depression, what is he doing? Is he not-so-subtly trying to intimidate you into voting for him?
Therein is the question of why Trump posts tweets that if posted by anyone else would immediately end their presidential campaigns. In 1968, when Senator Ed Muskie cried in Maine, his quest for the White House ended. When Mike Dukakis, wearing a helmet, was photographed awkwardly driving a tank, he was toast. And when Barry Goldwater told America that “Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice,” LBJ’s election was all but guaranteed.
Trump is not yesterday’s presidential candidate—and hopefully not tomorrow’s. He is not even the Trump of 2016. The Trump of eight years ago tweeted but had not yet mastered the art of the angry rant. Eight years ago, Trump’s tweets included calling Senators “embarrassments” and calling critics and media outlets names, but did not include calls to execute, incarcerate, or institutionalize critics (or the judges and prosecutors working to hold him accountable). Can we say that Trump has evolved?
Trump is headed somewhere with his tweets, but is it to insanity? If that is the case, a third of American voters, probably more, are comfortable with a lunatic in the White House. I do not want to believe that. But equally clearly, given Trump’s obsession with returning to power, he is onto something. One theory is that the Trump tweets and campaign speech rants that many of us find disqualifying are the essence of his campaign.
If Trump were to stop tweeting, or even tone his tweets down, his audience would evaporate. His tweets would be run of the mill political blather, boring and predictable. They could pass for something that Mike Pence might write.
When many of us, including “Never Trumpers,” see a headline referencing a new Trump social media post, we read it because it is outrageous. It is not every day that a presidential candidate calls a Black state attorney general “racist” or a governor from his party in a swing state “a stiff” for vetoing a bill.
Maybe the American electorate has lost faith in traditional politics. They hear Joe Biden talking about good news on the economy, but the message is boring, and they don’t listen because Biden is “too old.” They hear Nikki Haley call for “new leadership” (how original!) and yawn. But when they read a Trump tweet or listen to the highlights of one of his long-winded rally speeches, too many of us hear something worth talking about. Democrats remind each other that Trump is the deranged one and is going to jail anyway. MAGA cultists chuckle to each other that Trump has done it again—he has put the leftists in their place, reminding them of who’s boss and done so with something funny.
Trump, I think, knows that his tweeting, and the same rhetoric when delivered in a speech, works. He does it intentionally. Many tweets may be reckless, such as calling the Special Counsel prosecuting you for insurrection and obstruction of justice “deranged,” but Trump has concluded the benefits outweigh the risks. He believes that if he is elected president, Special Counsel Jack Smith, New York Attorney General Letitia James, Judge Arthur Engoron, and his other tormenters go away, one way or another.
Trump may also have concluded that without the tweets, his campaign would not fly. Dare I call that genius?
J.E. Dean is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant writing on politics, government, and other subjects.
Mickey Terrone says
Happy New Year, John. The only “genius” displayed by Trump is most likely a reflection of one or more of his close advisor’s (like Bannon, Miller, Epshtyn, et al) degeneracy. The goal of these people is to bring down the US system of government by any means, including violence. They desperately need some military authority(ies) to mobilize in their likely failure to win enough electoral college votes in the 2024 election.
Trump’s failure to plot and scheme to remain in power despite planning and executing the January 6th, 2021 Insurrection, was simply a lesson for these fascists, and one for which, thus far, they have avoided prosecution.
The “evolution” of Trump’s rhetoric is more a reflection of his utterly desperate position. Many of the political opponents whom he threatens to execute or incarcerate, including the judges and prosecutors working to hold him accountable, are Republicans. Many witnesses who will eventually testify against him are his own former staff are Republicans. Many, including his own former cabinet members, have openly disqualified him for any elected position with public responsibility.
The death threats are not idle chatter. They have been and continue to be made by Trump’s more unhinged supporters. The danger to our American democratic republic and way of life is clearly on the ballot. If Trump is nominated, he will claim that if he loses, the election will have been rigged. His supporters are conditioned not to require any evidence to believe his claims. A vote for Trump is a statement on behalf of establishing fascist, authoritarian and extraconstitutional power, which any post-Trump president will also be open to use and abuse. Trump has claimed that he is the “only” person today who can make America great again. I suppose many of his true believers are willing to hand Trump near dictatorial power, as if the 77-year old is immortal. Yet the damage to our American traditions and values could well be fatal.
Trump’s desperate efforts to avoid the ignominy and disgrace of guilty verdicts in courts, he and his henchmen will attempt to intimidate and delegitimize his opponents, while constantly bringing his followers to the edge of violence, standing back and standing by for his call to arms. We can expect that his tweeting rhetoric will intensify until his least sensible followers are indeed excited to violence.
Average Republicans, as opposed to Trumpist Republicans, have the best and perhaps only opportunity to make things right by rejecting the Trump candidacy. Thus far, however, rationality among Republicans remains muzzled. Its almost painful to think so many well educated citizens and good people could possibly buy into such overt demagoguery.
John Dean says
Mickey, as always, an insightful comment. Thank you for it.
Barbara Lee Jefferson says
No. Not genius. Not even close. Demonic, narcissistic, corrupt, dangerous, evil. He needs to be behind bars for life.
Barbara Lee Jefferson says
Well said.
David Lloyd says
Scary but so very well written — and, again: SCARY!!!!
John Dean says
Thank you for your kind words. Much appreciated.
Paul Rybon says
Far from unhinged, Donald Trump seems to have hit a raw nerve in so many concerned voters who are fed up with electioneering, harvesting voting, graft at the highest level, and discretionary malarkey that are making it harder and harder for the working class to just break even. It must feel like bonk-the-mole that he keeps up the resolve through it all for the good of us sufferers.
Barbara Lee Jefferson says
Seriously? He is demonic. Self absorbed
disgusting POS. He is a criminal, stick him behind bars. Loose the key.
There are much better, safer, smarter choices.
Mickey Terrone says
Trump certainly has hit a raw nerve by trying to throw out the results of the 2020 election by the violent attack on the US Capitol and trying falsify the election results in numerous close states that he lost. As for the unhinged, they are the ones who believe that somehow, Trump made it easier for the working class to “break even”, as he handed the wealthiest individuals and corporations $1.9 Trillion in tax cuts. The National Debt grew by $7.8 Trillion during the “King of Debt’s” term as president.
Yet somehow, despite all Trump’s clear demonstrations of unchristian bigotry, ugly racist comments, praising murderous dictators, threatening America’s public health by his early underestimating the danger of COVID 19, handing this country’s most closely guarded security secrets to those who seek to, Seeking to create public distrust in our FBI, CIA, IRS and our Department of Justice, Trump’s presence in the country undermines our national security and the rule of law. As a candidate for president, Trump is nothing less that Public Enemy #1 to the American way of life.
Yet to his mesmerized idolators, they are willing to sacrifice everything for which this country has stood for and what has actually made America so great for so long. Those Republicans who are set to testify against Trump understand his lack of patriotism, and their role in his treasonous acts. They seek lighter sentences by testifying truthfully in court. Many other Republicans fear violence from Trump’s militias if they don’t vote to support him. This is how Trump has already begun turning the United States of America into a third world s**thole. He will most certainly try again violently to overturn the election of 2024 because he has already indicated that if he loses again, it would only be because the election was rigged. The nearly complete absence of courageous Republican elected leadership is possibly the most damning reflection of how that organization has collapsed at the local, state and national levels under the corruption of Trump. His closest associates and supporters have been reduced to serving as his co-conspirators or accomplices. His former cabinet members have now warned the country unequivocally of the dangers Trump poses to our freedom as Americans.
Rudolph Guiliani, Kenneth Chesebro, Sidney Powell, John Eastmen, Jeffrey Clark are all facing charges. Some of these racketeering defendants have already testified under oath on their complicity in the plot to falsify the election results in Georgia. Ellis, Powell and Chesebro, among others, have sought plea deals and their public testimony clearly acknowledges their involvement in Trump’s heinous crimes. Mark Meadows may also have testified to his criminal involvement. All of these people are Republicans who have been confronted with the evidence, chose to admit their guilt and implicate others, including Trump.
Those Republican operatives who are trying to minimize their legal jeopardy are exposing Trump’s electioneering, vote harvesting, graft, grift and other malignant reflections of his vile presence for which Americans are fed up.
Sharon Kamp says
You know who is deranged is Biden and the democratic party, they are ruining this country. Biden and Democrats don’t care about the citizens of this country all they care is being in control of this country.
Mickey Terrone says
Its Ms. Kamp’s right to refer to Joe Biden as “deranged” and that the Democratic Party is ruining this country. The fact that she provides no details suggests a blind resistence to reality. President Biden’s leadership has brought the US economy back strong to the point where we have likely avoided a recession and lowered unemployment while the Dow reached it highest value in American history in recent days. As interest rates come down over the next 6 months, the fight against inflation will have a positive effect on average Americans’ wallets. Its far from perfect, but solid and headed in the right direction. And its far from deranged.
But speaking of deranged, Trump and his Republican co-conspirators and accomplices continue defending the former president’s deranged claims that he won the 2020 election. Isn’t it deranged to keep repeating this Big Lie despite losing all those court cases? Isn’t it deranged to play the victim when there are mountains of evidence that Trump tried to overthrow our country’s sacred democratic ideal of our electoral process? Isn’t it deranged to foment a riot at the US Capitol and then deny the very video taped words you uttered publicly? Isn’t it deranged to expect honest people to believe your Big Lie despite the reality that many of Trump’s own co-conspirators and White House aides have testified under oath against the former president? How is it not ruining our great country to set up fake elector schemes in Georgia and elsewhere just to be in political control of the country by illegal means? How deranged is it for a man who took his oath upon the bible to uphold the US Constitution to knowingly and willfully attempt to seize power without respect for the democratic institutions that have and have kept our country so great?
Yet, the bigger question here is how deranged is it for some Americans today to ignore Trump’s obscene abuse of political power and support this fascist and his accomplices. Clearly, the Trump-controlled Republican Party has devolved into an extremist, and yes, deranged group, oblivious to reality and decidedly mindless of our American heritage and institutions. And why? Is it just because this petty dictator says so? Talk about deranged!