In Response to Dennis Prager: Yes, the Tweets Matter

 

I need to take issue with something @dennisprager said in his recent appearance on the Ricochet flagship podcast.  He was there as part of the larger conversation around his recent National Review piece about why conservatives continue to attack the President.  At 44:48, Prager spoke of his puzzlement about why conservatives fixate on what the President says. Specifically, the President’s tweets. Prager said, “I don’t give a hoot what he tweets,” and explained that it matters what he does, not what he Tweets.

Okay, so here’s the problem with that: We can’t just ignore Donald Trump’s tweets. They matter because each tweet is a public statement by the President of the United States. What he tweets cannot be separated from what he does because public statements are part of what a President does. This isn’t something overheard at a cocktail party or caught on a hot mic, these are public statements the President makes under his own name.

So when Donald Trump publicly accuses his predecessor of illegally wiretapping him in a manner akin to Watergate, it’s the President of the United States doing that. When Donald Trump publicly threatens a former FBI director, it’s the President of the United States doing that. When Donald Trump makes easily disprovable, factually incorrect statements, or threatens foreign nations, it’s the President of the United States doing that. If some underling did this, even in error, they would be fired. It is only the fact that they continue to come in such rapid succession that we’re not fixating on each incident for months at a time.

And this was an entirely foreseeable turn of events. Those of us who opposed Donald Trump tooth and nail did so because we understood that he was and remains unfit to be President. That he lacks the common sense or the impulse control (or both) to keep from saying these things in public is part of the reason why he’s woefully unfit to be President. The fact that he continues to make these statements says something either about the sycophants he surrounds himself with and their inability to control him.

Donald Trump is no longer just some crank with a Twitter account picking fights with beauty queens and Gold Star mothers. He’s the leader of the Free World. He’s sits atop the most powerful military ever created by man. He commands troops and planes and ships and missiles, enough to devastate the entire world. His public statements matter.

To choose to ignore his public statements is to choose to neglect our civic responsibility hold this man to account for his actions.

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  1. She Member
    She
    @She

    For some reason, I am irresistibly reminded of a favorite limerick of my childhood:

    Had I more facility with words, I would attempt a rewrite for current times.

    • #1
  2. Franz Drumlin Inactive
    Franz Drumlin
    @FranzDrumlin

    Odd that Mr. Prager, primarily a writer, would say that words don’t matter. Not a deal-breaker, though. He’s still one of the good guys.

    • #2
  3. Brian Wolf Inactive
    Brian Wolf
    @BrianWolf

    Can’t disagree with this.  Besides Trump’s tweets matter because they can undermine his efforts to do good things and it gives fuel to his enemies.  If his tweets don’t matter than Prager should be the first to say he should stop tweeting.  According to Prager there is no positive and only negative consequences of his tweets so in Prager’s world  we should ignore them because they have a negative effective.  The world will not follow Prager’s advice.  So the best thing would be for Trump to stop it!  Just stop!

    • #3
  4. Max Ledoux Coolidge
    Max Ledoux
    @Max

    Trump’s tweets do matter. And I think he should continue.

    • #4
  5. Chuckles Coolidge
    Chuckles
    @Chuckles

    Up until the last three paragraphs @fredcole is stating what should be intuitively obvious.

    The last three, unless he just likes to fight, he might edit out as being needlessly provocative – in which case they are fine.

    I did particularly like Bridging The Abyss by @susanquinn

    • #5
  6. Valiuth Member
    Valiuth
    @Valiuth

    Today Trump chose to tweet about the upcoming supreme court review of his Executive Order restricting travel from certain countries. The arguments of the lower courts hinge on discerning an ulterior intent for the orders based on his previous utterance during the campaign, about banning Muslims. Now as president he tweets that the EO is really a ban and that the one being defended is watered down and that he wants them to go with the first one.

    Whatever one thinks of the merits of the EO in and of itself or its legality, if the whole argument of the other side is hinges on Trump’s past inconsiderate utterances, why give them more recent and current ones to make their case with? His own lawyers are arguing this is not a travel ban, but Trump publicly declares that it is.

    There is a Romanian saying that translates to.

    “If he’d just shut up he’d be a philosopher.”

    This applies to Trump in spades.

    • #6
  7. Max Ledoux Coolidge
    Max Ledoux
    @Max

    Fred Cole: he was and remains unfit to be President

    He’s the president. Deal with it.

    • #7
  8. Max Ledoux Coolidge
    Max Ledoux
    @Max

    Valiuth (View Comment):
    Whatever one thinks of the merits of the EO in and of itself or its legality, if the whole argument of the other side is hinges on Trump’s past inconsiderate utterances, why give them more recent and current ones to make their case with? His own lawyers are arguing this is not a travel ban, but Trump publicly declares that it is.

    But it doesn’t. That may be the insane Left’s argument, but it’s completely irrelevant to whether the order is legal (which it is).

    On what do you base the statement that his lawyers are arguing it’s not a travel ban? Are they? (I’m not sure.) The constitutionality of the order does not rest on whether it’s a “ban” or a “pause.”

    • #8
  9. Gumby Mark Coolidge
    Gumby Mark
    @GumbyMark

    This morning Scott Johnson at Powerline captured the problem with these tweets:

    As someone who would like President Trump to succeed in his achieving most of his own professed objectives, I think he is his own worst enemy. The tweet below presents something of a case study. He trashes his own team. He undermines his own authority. He aids his opponents (both legal and political). He sounds like a prisoner in a Chinese fortune cookery factory. That’s not all, but that’s also a lot to get wrong in fewer than 140 characters.

     

    Here’s what the president tweeted last night:

    The Justice Dept. should have stayed with the original Travel Ban, not the watered down, politically correct version they submitted to S.C.

     

     

    • #9
  10. tigerlily Member
    tigerlily
    @tigerlily

    Valiuth (View Comment):
    Today Trump chose to tweet about the upcoming supreme court review of his Executive Order restricting travel from certain countries. The arguments of the lower courts hinge on discerning an ulterior intent for the orders based on his previous utterance during the campaign, about banning Muslims. Now as president he tweets that the EO is really a ban and that the one being defended is watered down and that he wants them to go with the first one.

    Whatever one thinks of the merits of the EO in and of itself or its legality, if the whole argument of the other side is hinges on Trump’s past inconsiderate utterances, why give them more recent and current ones to make their case with? His own lawyers are arguing this is not a travel ban, but Trump publicly declares that it is.

    There is a Romanian saying that translates to.

    “If he’d just shut up he’d be a philosopher.”

    This applies to Trump in spades.

    I think this is the tweet you’re referencing, and yes it matters.

    • #10
  11. Valiuth Member
    Valiuth
    @Valiuth

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):

    Valiuth (View Comment):
    Whatever one thinks of the merits of the EO in and of itself or its legality, if the whole argument of the other side is hinges on Trump’s past inconsiderate utterances, why give them more recent and current ones to make their case with? His own lawyers are arguing this is not a travel ban, but Trump publicly declares that it is.

    But it doesn’t. That may be the insane Left’s argument, but it’s completely irrelevant to whether the order is legal (which it is).

    On what do you base the statement that his lawyers are arguing it’s not a travel ban? Are they? (I’m not sure.) The constitutionality of the order does not rest on whether it’s a “ban” or a “pause.”

    I don’t know what to say Max other than this was clearly a critical point in lower court rulings. It is the argument that the opponents are pushing in court. I don’t know what the justices of the supreme court will think of their arguments. I do know that his latest tweet on the matter only helps their theory of the case. Which is that Trump really just wants to ban Muslims and that his EOs are really just a method of haggling legally about how many he can ban. The first EO was a disaster because it was written poorly and over broadly. This presumably was why they wrote a second EO. Now Trump tweets that the first was his real intention the second was just a legal maneuver. If 5 justices on that court think Trump is not credible and that his EO was motivated by animus and the wording is just his attempt to get his malice against Muslims enacted however partially they will side with the lower courts. I think there are at least 4 on the court who could be easily persuaded. How does Kennedy feel about this? If he is on the fence about this argument has Trumps latest tweeting helped or hurt?

    You can’t simply dismiss the arguments of the plaintiffs so easily as to say they are leftist. You need to take them seriously because so far many judges have taken them seriously enough to rule based on them. Trump needs to take them seriously too.

    To me as a basic matter of argumentation you want to be able to disprove the theory of the other side, on top of making your own case of the merits of yours. Otherwise you invite people to simply choose which argument has higher priority. And instead of making a case that is 100% they have to rule for you you make it a 50/50 choice about which argument they think is more important.

    • #11
  12. Umbra Fractus Inactive
    Umbra Fractus
    @UmbraFractus

    Chuckles (View Comment):
    Up until the last three paragraphs @fredcole is stating what should be intuitively obvious.

    The last three, unless he just likes to fight, he might edit out as being needlessly provocative – in which case they are fine.

    I did particularly like Bridging The Abyss by @susanquinn

    I was going to say the same thing. In fact, I think not understanding how much weight his words carry is the source of 90% of Trump’s problems. He shoots his mouth off and forgets, as Fred says, that this is the President of the United States speaking.

    It’s too bad Fred had to go and turn this into typical Fred Cole belligerence, because it’s a point that needed to be made.

    • #12
  13. Chuckles Coolidge
    Chuckles
    @Chuckles

    Valiuth (View Comment):

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):

    Valiuth (View Comment):
    Whatever one thinks of the merits of the EO in and of itself or its legality, if the whole argument of the other side is hinges on Trump’s past inconsiderate utterances, why give them more recent and current ones to make their case with? His own lawyers are arguing this is not a travel ban, but Trump publicly declares that it is.

    But it doesn’t. That may be the insane Left’s argument, but it’s completely irrelevant to whether the order is legal (which it is).

    On what do you base the statement that his lawyers are arguing it’s not a travel ban? Are they? (I’m not sure.) The constitutionality of the order does not rest on whether it’s a “ban” or a “pause.”

    I don’t know what to say Max other than this was clearly a critical point in lower court rulings. It is the argument that the opponents are pushing in court. I don’t know what the justices of the supreme court will think of their arguments. I do know that his latest tweet on the matter only helps their theory of the case. Which is that Trump really just wants to ban Muslims and that his EOs are really just a method of haggling legally about how many he can ban. The first EO was a disaster because it was written poorly and over broadly. This presumably was why they wrote a second EO. Now Trump tweets that the first was his real intention the second was just a legal maneuver. If 5 justices on that court think Trump is not credible and that his EO was motivated by animus and the wording is just his attempt to get his malice against Muslims enacted however partially they will side with the lower courts. I think there are at least 4 on the court who could be easily persuaded. How does Kennedy feel about this? If he is on the fence about this argument has Trumps latest tweeting helped or hurt?

    You can’t simply dismiss the arguments of the plaintiffs so easily as to say they are leftist. You need to take them seriously because so far many judges have taken them seriously enough to rule based on them. Trump needs to take them seriously too.

    To me as a basic matter of argumentation you want to be able to disprove the theory of the other side, on top of making your own case of the merits of yours. Otherwise you invite people to simply choose which argument has higher priority. And instead of making a case that is 100% they have to rule for you you make it a 50/50 choice about which argument they think is more important.

    Yes.  And in this case, the ship sunk by the loose lip could be the ship of state.

    • #13
  14. Casey Inactive
    Casey
    @Casey

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):

    Fred Cole: he was and remains unfit to be President

    He’s the president. Deal with it.

    I think he is.

    • #14
  15. Tom Meyer, Common Citizen Member
    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen
    @tommeyer

    So, I’m of several minds on this:

    1. Some of the president’s tweets are inexcusable, not because of their tone, but because of their substance. His threat to dispatch federal troops to Chicago; threatening Comey regarding the tapescalling for the jailing of flag burners; misrepresenting how the Obama administration listened in on his transition team; making the Freedom Caucus out to the bad guy in the ACHC; this recent spat with the mayor of London. These were all substantive, unforced errors.
    2. I do think his tone in his tweets is often inappropriate for a president, but that’s a distinct issue.
    3. Back to the substance, Trump clearly doesn’t feel obliged to follow-up on this stuff, assuming he doesn’t forget it immediately. When there is a conflict between his tweets and his actual behavior, I agree with his defenders that his actual behavior is vastly more important than his words.
    4. That said, when Trump tweets on matters that he has not yet taken action on — i.e., that flagburning should be prosecuted — it’s perfectly rational to take him at his word.
    • #15
  16. Mate De Inactive
    Mate De
    @MateDe

    Fred Cole: he was and remains unfit to be president

     

     

    • #16
  17. Fred Cole Inactive
    Fred Cole
    @FredCole

    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen (View Comment):
    Back to the substance, Trump clearly doesn’t feel obliged to follow-up on this stuff, assuming he doesn’t forget it immediately. When there is a conflict between his tweets and his actual behavior, I agree with his defenders that his actual behavior is vastly more important than his words.

    So, two things:

    1. If a President of the United States makes random public statements that he doesn’t follow up on, that’s a problem.  He’s the President, not the drunk mailman at the end of the bar.  The latter’s words have no greater significance than the squealing of kittens in a box.  The former makes world headlines.
    2. The fact that there are often conflicts between his actual behavior and his public statements is a problem.
    • #17
  18. Tom Meyer, Common Citizen Member
    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen
    @tommeyer

    Fred Cole (View Comment):
    If a President of the United States makes random public statements that he doesn’t follow up on, that’s a problem. […] The fact that there are often conflicts between his actual behavior and his public statements is a problem.

    I agree entirely. Someone — Melania, probably — needs his phone away from him.

    Regarding the conflicts, I also agree it’s a problem. However, the reality on these things tends to be better than the words. If there’s got to be a problem, I’d prefer it to be that way.

    Shorter version: Trump says dumb things and shouldn’t. That said, he often does not follow-up on the dumber things he says which is something of a relief (though still not a good thing).

    • #18
  19. Max Ledoux Coolidge
    Max Ledoux
    @Max

    Valiuth (View Comment):
    You can’t simply dismiss the arguments of the plaintiffs so easily as to say they are leftist. You need to take them seriously because so far many judges have taken them seriously enough to rule based on them. Trump needs to take them seriously too.

    The judges are Leftists who don’t care about the rule of law.

    • #19
  20. Fred Cole Inactive
    Fred Cole
    @FredCole

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):

    Fred Cole: he was and remains unfit to be President

    He’s the president. Deal with it.

    Hey, I fully recognize that Donald Trump won a majority of the America

    a majority of those who voted

    a plurality of those who voted

    just enough people in the right combination of states to eek out a victory.

    However, you should realize that “Deal with it” isn’t some magic trump card.  And barely winning an election, despite 74 million people voting against him, doesn’t magically make the man fit for office.

    • #20
  21. Gumby Mark Coolidge
    Gumby Mark
    @GumbyMark

    Fred Cole (View Comment):

     

    He’s the President, not the drunk mailman at the end of the bar. The latter’s words have no greater significance than the squealing of kittens in a box. The former makes world headlines.

    He’s not?

    • #21
  22. Fred Cole Inactive
    Fred Cole
    @FredCole

    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen (View Comment):
    Shorter version: Trump says dumb things and shouldn’t. That said, he often does not follow-up on the dumber things he says which is something of a relief (though still not a good thing).

    Yeah, except, and this is where the “seriously but not literally” thing completely breaks down, when the people around him try to translate his cartoonish proposals into policy.  A good example is how his OMB director tried turn his absurd pronouncements into a budget proposal.

    • #22
  23. Jager Coolidge
    Jager
    @Jager

    When Trump gets two scoops of ice cream that is not just a rich guy who likes desert, That is the President of the United States doing that. When everything is terrible, nothing is terrible.

    I really don’t have it in me to get worked up about the Tweets. I wish he wouldn’t tweet so much, but whatever. This is a known thing. Trump was tweeting like this when Republican Primary voters chose him to be the Nominee. The Trump that was nominated and won the election is the same guy who is President.

    I am more interested in his actual actions, good or bad, than in anything he says on social media. His actions (not his words) have a much better chance of affecting my personal life, than any weird tweet.

    • #23
  24. Tom Meyer, Common Citizen Member
    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen
    @tommeyer

    Jager (View Comment):

    I am more interested in his actual actions, good or bad, than in anything he says on social media. His actions (not his words) have a much better chance of affecting my personal life, than any weird tweet.

    Again, agreed. Actions are more important than words.

    But when the president (elect) indicates an intended action or policy such as:

    I don’t see why we should have to wait to see if he means it in order to condemn it.

    • #24
  25. Fred Cole Inactive
    Fred Cole
    @FredCole

    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen (View Comment):
    I agree entirely. Someone — Melania, probably — needs his phone away from him.

    The fact that no one has, including Melania, including his staff, is a serious problem.  It indicates that no one can control him.

    • #25
  26. MarciN Member
    MarciN
    @MarciN

    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen (View Comment):
    That said, when Trump tweets on matters that he has not yet taken action on — i.e., that flagburning should be prosecuted — it’s perfectly rational to take him at his word.

    I was just going to say something to that effect.

    The executive branch enforces the laws that Congress passes.

    Trump is not in a debating society. He is in the law enforcement side of the building.

    What he says can be considered a legitimate threat.

    I don’t see him as understanding that part of his new role and life. His best friend is Conrad Black, who has been burned badly by the American jurisprudence system. Trump himself has a small battalion of lawyers at the ready in his private life. He is used to playing defense, not offense.

    I like the tweeting. It shows his supporters that he is still there with them, just as he was on the campaign. It makes him seem approachable and like one of us, here at the bottom of the pyramid.

    But someone needs to get it into his thick head that when he tweets and speaks now, he is tweeting and speaking as the chief law enforcer of the nation.

    His life as president will get very messy when private citizens act on something he has said or tweeted and what they do is illegal.

    • #26
  27. Valiuth Member
    Valiuth
    @Valiuth

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):

    Valiuth (View Comment):
    You can’t simply dismiss the arguments of the plaintiffs so easily as to say they are leftist. You need to take them seriously because so far many judges have taken them seriously enough to rule based on them. Trump needs to take them seriously too.

    The judges are Leftists who don’t care about the rule of law.

    And yet you still have to convince them to rule in your favor if you are one of Trump’s lawyers. So again I say Trump isn’t doing his attorneys any favors with his tweets.

    • #27
  28. Tom Meyer, Common Citizen Member
    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen
    @tommeyer

    Valiuth (View Comment):

    Max Ledoux (View Comment):

    Valiuth (View Comment):
    You can’t simply dismiss the arguments of the plaintiffs so easily as to say they are leftist. You need to take them seriously because so far many judges have taken them seriously enough to rule based on them. Trump needs to take them seriously too.

    The judges are Leftists who don’t care about the rule of law.

    And yet you still have to convince them to rule in your favor if you are one of Trump’s lawyers.

    Perhaps a “Deal with it” is in order? ;)

    • #28
  29. Damocles Inactive
    Damocles
    @Damocles

    • #29
  30. DocJay Inactive
    DocJay
    @DocJay

    Trump is more fit to be president than Obama was.    Trump is more fit to be president than Hillary was.

    Trump has issues and they are bothersome.  Very bothersome.   I wish he would get better at some parts of his job. He may not.

    Having enemies everywhere doesn’t help childish narcissists.  Obama would have done far far  worse if part of his own party and most of the press wanted him gone and relentlessly had at him.  Exaggerating issues or making up stories doesn’t help.

    • #30
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