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Has the Trump Meltdown Begun?
Many pundits wondered what would happen if Trump fell behind in the polls. Would he mellow a bit, lash out, or meltdown completely. Now that Dr. Ben Carson is running neck-and-neck with The Donald and has led in several surveys, we’re beginning to see what a desperate Trump looks like. According to Washington Post reporter Jenna Johnson, the marathon speech he gave in Fort Dodge, IA, Thursday night was something to behold.
Donald Trump looks and sounds exhausted tonight. Voice is scratchy. This is his fourth state in four days.
— Jenna Johnson (@wpjenna) November 13, 2015
At the last few rallies, Donald Trump has been more controlled and composed. Not so tonight. He’s on a tear — one angry rant after another.
— Jenna Johnson (@wpjenna) November 13, 2015
Donald Trump in Iowa: “I know more about ISIS than the generals do. Believe me.”
— Jenna Johnson (@wpjenna) November 13, 2015
Here’s how Donald Trump says he would fight the Islamic State: “I would bomb the [expletive] out of them.” Then he would take their oil. [unredacted link]
More foreign policy: Donald Trump says if he is president no one will dare touch the United States “because I’m so unpredictable.”
— Jenna Johnson (@wpjenna) November 13, 2015
Trump debates aloud if he should share more complaints about his rivals. Crowd cheers him on. First up: Marco Rubio, “weak like a baby.”
— Jenna Johnson (@wpjenna) November 13, 2015
Hour and 20 minutes into Trump’s speech, stage audience gives up and sits down on risers: pic.twitter.com/eV8zQD7cs3
— Jenna Johnson (@wpjenna) November 13, 2015
Trump moves onto Ben Carson: “If you’re pathological, there’s no cure for that.” Then compares being pathological to being a child molester.
— Jenna Johnson (@wpjenna) November 13, 2015
Donald Trump says Ben Carson’s story about a belt buckle stopping a knife he stabbed at a friend doesn’t make sense. He then acts it out.
— Jenna Johnson (@wpjenna) November 13, 2015
Donald Trump acts out Ben Carson’s alleged stabbing: “Anybody have a knife and want to try it on me?”
— Jenna Johnson (@wpjenna) November 13, 2015
Trump on Carson’s changing stories: “How stupid are the people of Iowa? How stupid are the people of this country to believe this crap?”
— Jenna Johnson (@wpjenna) November 13, 2015
Hour and 35 minutes after starting, Donald Trump is done. He promises to visit again soon. That was like sitting through a therapy session.
— Jenna Johnson (@wpjenna) November 13, 2015
Either Trump was having an off night, he popped an Ambien before the speech, or the meltdown several people predicted has begun.
The question is, do his polls shoot up five points or 10?
Published in General
Of course, that’s why everyone should vote for him.
Because he’s so unpredictable.
So, why does no one think that, once elected, he won’t throw out the welcome mat to all eleven million illegal immigrants, and hire them on as gardeners and housekeepers at Trump Towers (at less than minimum wage, of course)? And so on, with everything else he’s promised to do, or not do.
I mean, unpredictable, right?
This is why I find it astonishing that so many of the people who support Trump do so because ‘he’ll do what he says he’s going to do,’ and they’re just totally fed up with politicians who are never held accountable for flip-flops, inaction, or general incompetence.
Here’s a guy sending a very strong signal, in fact, he’s explicitly saying that he cannot be trusted.
And folks are lining up to support him in spite of it.
I completely understand the disaffection and frustration of the voters. I just can’t understand, in light of these sorts of comments, why Trump is seen as the solution.
Maybe it’s just me…but I really don’t want to see a candidate of any gender jostling with their own belt buckle. I don’t think that comes off as terribly presidential.
That Ann is eager to fall in love again, and quite a talker. I wonder who she’ll love next?
Who cares?
Well folks, nice thread. Trump is where he is because not one other candidate has convincingly said they will stop the illegal immigration flow. You can mock him, you can mock his supporters but one thing is very clear. If the republicans want to win, they better have some other candidate you like that can be as convincing as Trump that they will fix the problem.
He may drop out but if no one grabs his issue, the GOP will lose. Then Rubio the newly anointed will wonder where all those voters were on election day. The blue collar folks know they are being screwed and hearing about the need to be nice to the people taking their jobs and crowding their schools is not a real good formula. If both parties will do that, they might as well vote for the one that promises more free stuff.
By the way, trashing the voters as subhuman morons does not paint a pretty picture of the person who seems to delight in the trashing . The subhuman morons know based on years of observation that all the candidates except Carson and Trump will deliver the goods to their donor base over the best interest of the American people. Carson and Trump may screw them , but that’s better odds than the others who have and will screw them. Maybe they are not morons after all.
It is not mocking Trump’s supporters to point out (correctly) that they are supporting someone so unqualified by temperament, knowledge, and experience to be president just because they think (incorrectly) that he will solve the only problem that they think matters.
The reason to criticize, not mock, Trump’s supporters is that fail to understand that the issue confronting us today will not be the issue that confronts us tomorrow. Trump demonstrates none of the qualities that indicate he would be able learn, adapt, and choose wisely.
Finally, it is important that the American president be someone who does not alienate most of the American people. We continue to suffer through two terms of such a man. We don’t need another.
Now along comes a fact to disrupt the media narrative.
Trump’s number in the Reuters/Ipsos rolling daily poll has surged to 42%.
Even if you discount this poll for a smallish sample size, Trump’s steady rise to this peak within Reuters/Ipsos over months suggests that he is not losing momentum.
It is important to distinguish the fact of Trump not losing momentum (assuming it is a fact) from the issue of whether we are better off if he loses momentum.
Sounds like mocking to me just because they do not agree with you.
Immigration has been an issue for decades. It will be with us tomorrow. Just because you think it is unimportant does not make it unimportant for others.
Did I say I think it’s unimportant? Show me where.
Where is the mocking? Does that word mean what you think it means?
Now you attempt to mock me. Very well, have a good day. There are many folks here who know how to converse and challenge in more effective ways.
Good day to you, too.
Why do you get to decide for us and everyone else what the correct temperament, knowledge and experience is to be for a president?
So you believe immigration will ease to be an issue? Obamacare? Trade? Foreign relations? And Trump certainly seems to have learned enough about politics to prove that the establishment’s darling Jeb! isn’t up to the job.
Why?
Barry seems rather successful, and no one cares if the conservative rank-and-file of the GOP is alienated- certainly not the GOP establishment.
Why, from the same source of authority that allows you to decide who is in the establishment and who isn’t. I thought that was obvious. :)
I make no attempt to decide who is establishment and who isn’t, but I do recognize that those terms and the implied distinctions are in wide use and generally understood.
Except by establishment types, who are as usual completely mystified.
I make an attempt to identify the qualities a president should have, to analyze which candidates have those qualities, and then to express the results of my analysis and my opinion thereof.
I insist that you and all others who read these words must agree with me. Just kidding.
There is a world of difference between expressing my opinion with confidence and dictating what others must believe, which, for some reason I don’t comprehend, you have accused me of doing. Why don’t you just disagree instead of accusing me of some sort of megalomania in which I get to decide what you should believe? That strikes me as a way of avoiding having to deal with the arguments head on. I’m happy to debate each and every point I made. Are you?
Did you read what you wrote?
Did you read what you wrote?
I thought I was debating you by expressing my disagreement with your assertions about the various attributes a president should have and your claim that Trump lacks them, as well as disagreeing with your opinion about Mr. Trump’s capacity for learning, and also your belief about the issues we will face in the future, which I believe will resemble the issues we face right now.
I eagerly await your arguments, when you choose to make them, and look forward to addressing each of them in turn.
Yes.
Yes.
I missed your arguments.
What are the attributes you think a president should have?
What makes you think Trump has them?
I must have failed to read see your arguments that you say you made. Maybe you can quote yourself so not to have to write it all again.
I’m still awaiting your arguments. You made a swarm of unsupported assertions, aimed against Trump.
I disputed the validity of your assertions, and invited you to make arguments in support of them.
Please. Do so.
Your arguments should include statements (with accompanying explanations) such as “Trump lacks the temperament to be president because argument.” And “Trump makes complaints about the issues we face today, but they aren’t relevant because argument.” And “Trump can’t learn because argument.”
Again, I look forward to your actual arguments. You assertions, not so much.
Trump’s knowledge:
(continued)
(continued)
Trump’s temperament:
The issues:
Your turn.
I think it is hard to argue with what you are saying and with what TKC1101 said. Immigration is such an important issue that it can’t be ignored or given the pat answers of the past. Marco Rubio is so insincere on the issue that he has made himself a joke. I don’t think he is salvageable no matter how clever he is in debates, or handsome, or great temperament, or youthful, or Hispanic. Our donor class along with the politicians and lackeys that so greedily gobble up their money have created Donald Trump and he won’t go away by calling his supporters stupid. I wish this would focus some minds but it doesn’t seem like that is happening much. Maybe Cruz is showing some signs of life. I hope so.
Scott Adams’s theory is that what looks like erratic behavior to most people is actually evidence of a deliberate strategy using the tools of the Master Persuader. Regarding this particular speech he predicts that: “[…] this speech will be replayed in college classrooms for years as an example of best practices in persuasion.”
http://blog.dilbert.com/post/133133670296/trump-on-carson
Scott, whom I like, seems to be in love with Trump. He loves every utterance and every gesture.
I listen to him and it makes my skin crawl.
He may be persuasive to people who don’t see or don’t want to see what he is doing, but he is engaging in character assassination and demagogy as his main strategies to get people to support him. He is mostly demonstrating to me that he is not a good man.
My point is that if Adams’s hypothesis is correct, it doesn’t help Trump’s rivals to keep pretending that Trump isn’t a serious contender for the nomination. They need to learn from him.
Sun Tzu put it best:
Here’s how I see it: if Trump is just a buffoon performing the Trump schtick, and he doesn’t actually know himself, then one of the other Republican candidates will win.
On the other hand, if Trump actually knows himself, and he knows what he is doing, and he understands the other Republican candidates, he will win because the other Republican candidates refuse to understand Trump.
My take is that if Trump wins it’s because the American people don’t understand Trump. Or they don’t understand the seriousness of the historical moment we are in, and the need for a serious man in the presidency.
Or they have concluded that among the candidates, Trump is the most serious. And depending on what issues voters find the most important, this conclusion is not far-fetched.
This is what causes me the most problems with Trump and his supporters.
Trump has been mulling a presidential run for the last few years. A serious man seeking the presidency would have taken the time to become as conversant as possible with the constitutional order, the history of our country the government’s role in it, economic principles, foreign relations, and so many other things. I don’t feel that Trump has done that, therefore, I see him as not serious.
A serious candidate would act with personal dignity and grace toward his opponents and toward those in the media who criticize him. Trump doesn’t, and so I see him as not serious.
I don’t want to rehash all my complaints. I’ve written them too many times on this site. But since you mention it, perhaps much of it can be summarized by the simple notion that he is not serious in substance nor in style.
Man With the Axe:
Agreed. I know someone who told me they registered to vote because of Trump, but they later said they wanted to hear more the usual bluster. Me too. I said in one of these Trump threads that he had time to get up to speed- but his time is running out.
Disagree. I’m not interested in having a president who never says anything bad or mean or unpleasant about anyone. I want potential political enemies to expect to pay a price if they- for example- shriek that Trump betrayed the country, as Al Gore did about Bush. I don’t Trump would have ignored that like Bush did, nor should he.
Disagree. Trump’s positions on immigration and trade are what makes people overlook his other myriad flaws, because he’s been politically incorrect enough to make people believe he means what he says. Thing is, immigration is an issue that no one believes the GOP party leadership is telling the truth about- no one.
That goes for the other candidates too, in general. The GOP worked hard to earn that distrust, and they earned it honestly.
Trump is their reward.
About trade- I saw Rubio endorse the TPP on camera, while Clinton backed away. Since I don’t believe China or Japan or elsewhere will ever have to buy things from us with those fancy pieces of paper…
tbc…
…because they’re only fancy pieces of paper with no intrinsic value.
I eagerly await watching the GOP endorse the TPP, as I’ve watched Marco Rubio do. Let’s see how well that does, politically. I expect poorly.
As to the rest, I’m rather tired of GOP candidates being expected to be combination Jeopardy champions and debate club presidents, while democrats aren’t even expected to write their own memoirs.
Although as I’ve said I’m growing weary of Trump’s bluster, I’ll give him a pass for now.