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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.
Published in General
Hillary & Donald were the two most likely to be elected President. Many people rejected the binary choice argument, I pulled the lever for the most fit of the unfit. Ranking them aided my decision; although I hoped for the best I thought they both were rank.
This is very likely not true. Rubio received more votes in Florida than Trump did. Ron Johnson, a very normal and very boring conservative Republican running for US Senate in Wisconsin received more votes than Trump.
So, it’s likely that a less obnoxious nominee would have outperformed Trump. But we will never know for sure.
We do know that in California, Republican candidates for the US House received more votes statewide than Trump did. This despite the fact that due to California’s jungle primary system, in many US House races, the voters had no Republican candidate to vote for.
In 7 California House districts, Trump lost to Hillary Clinton, but the GOP House candidate won.
Will Trump force a new standard into existence: one of taking what a POTUS says with a grain of salt, or some such? A standard of waiting and seeing? A standard of ignoring until he acts?
Me too. Unlike Fred I voted for the guy but always knew this would be like watching a high-wire act. The tweets are only part of it. The indiscipline, lack of attention to detail (Hugh Hewitt’s recently written of the difficulty folks in the White House have in getting him to listen to briefings), lack of knowledge and interest in how government works (you need to know if you are going to be effective in changing it), and failure to staff the agencies is going to make this a continual challenge which could go completely off the rails at any time. Hopefully it will not or have otherwise long-term negative impacts and we get a few decent things done. On the other hand, we’ll always have the feckless GOP Congressional leadership.
That is the bright side.
We did? I must have missed it, and don’t understand what makes it silly.
I won’t be able to change anything he does. (So far,) I’m glad he won instead of Hillary. That, and happiness with Gorsuch, is all the assessing that’s in me so far. Maybe every year or so, I’ll turn around and look back and integrate my assessment function over the past year to see what I think so far.
I’ll try. It is silly because whether Fred answers yes or no, it doesn’t have any relevance to the comment you were responding to.
I’m sorry. I have to disagree with this. He won, just barely, despite being that kind of guy.
Two things:
From the OP – “To choose to ignore his public statements is to choose to neglect our civic responsibility hold this man to account for his actions.”
Before the election, there were many people abstaining from voting by pointing out that it’s not a binary choice. The outcome would be binary, but… this, that, and others. And since I chose the lesser of two evils, that meant something about my integrity, or lack of it. Ok. Whatever.
Now, if I understand the OP correctly, there can only be two choices in response to President Trump’s silly tweets – either one must loudly condemn him, or else guilty of neglecting one’s civic responsibility. There’s absolutely no room for a neutral position, such as ignoring a behavior that was well-known before the election.
If I bought a bruised apple because it was the least rotten apple, I really can’t complain about the bruised part, can I? And no, I am not saying that the bruised part is awesome, but neither am I going to dwell on it. Thus, I must be a bad citizen.
Yes. This.
Please tell me about the “bright side”.
What on earth?
My saying that Owen’s point is a bright side isn’t saying that Gorsuch is not, or that I wasn’t pleasantly surprised on that score.
You just have these screen caps hanging around or what?
No, I have access to all of my previous posts and responses to them.
What are you trying to prove? That before the primary was even finished (after all, that screenshot does mention Trump hadn’t secured the nomination yet), I was very pessimistic about Trump, like a lot of us were, with “odds updatable as more information comes in” (that is, I was already admitting willingness to rethink my pessimism), and I am happy to have been pleasantly surprised by Gorsuch?
How is that a bad thing, from your perspective? And what’s bad about my thinking that a little more waiting and seeing, and a little less of everyone scrambling to hastily interpret every utterance that dribbles out of a president’s mouth (or phone), might actually be a good thing?
I’m casting doubt on your odds-making prowess. You were unfairly pessimistic, but you weren’t alone. Many anti-Trump people here were irrationally pessimistic about Trump early on and remain so. What, is confronting members with their own past statements a CoC violation?
OK, but what odds am I making here?
10% that Trump nominates someone better than Hillary would. That was irrationally pessimistic. We waited, we saw. Now, it’s just a little hard to take more irrational pessimism from anti-Trump people who were so wrong in the past. At least you didn’t predict he’d start a nuclear war, like some here did.
I am not making that odds anymore. You’re making a logical error if you think dragging up an estimate of my state of belief from before the primaries were done is an odds I’m making now.
You’re also making an error in judgment if you believe I believe I’m particularly good at predicting politics: I don’t believe I am. I was using the number to estimate my (dis)belief at the time, which is different from having a lot of confidence in that estimate (which I didn’t – and usually don’t, when the subject is politics).
I will admit my error in judgement if you admit that many Trump skeptics have erred too far on the side of skepticism when it comes to the conservatism of Trump’s governance thus far.
1) Yes presidential statements are actions. Some of his statements are uniformed or stupid. They should not be ignored Actions however are far more important: see Obama, Barack.
Obama’s overt serial lies and deceptions were less important than his covert Anti-American executive actions and laws.
2) I believe Obama’s minions spied on Trump far far worse than Watergate. To suggest he was spied on ( wiretapped being an old fashioned equivalent ) is not insane. In fact , history will most likely prove this true.
OK.
How about the old bromide, “It’s better to keep your mouth shut and look like a fool, than to open it and remove all doubt.”
Here’s the thing, I’m probably one of the few libertarian minded Conservatives in favor of the travel ban- I even think it should be broader and more restrictive. Even when I agree with a policy he supports I have the hardest time defending it because the messaging is normally so poor. The President is undermining his own ability to push through legislation and regulations because he constantly says something stupid or easy to attack.
If the President would just get out of his own way, he could see some success, and his popularity which he cares about would only improve. It’s no surprise that on his overseas trip his numbers rose- I have no doubt that staying out of controversy and avoiding tweeting was helping him. Rasmussen had him at 48% approval following the trip, which is obviously better than hovering around 40, which is normally an indicator that the party in power is going to get massacred at the ballot box.
Towards the end of the general election, I heard that his campaign staff actually took away his phone so he couldn’t tweet. If only he could understand that not making a fool of himself and simply being more popular will help push through some of the policies that he wants to establish. He doesn’t have to win a verbal spat with some idiot on twitter, it’s better if he avoids commenting on everything and stays out of the spotlight. It’s also no surprise that the media heat was lessened while he was overseas. He needs to be more Presidential and dignified. It would go a long way towards helping his presidency.
They are not testimony. They may be evidence, however.
Except the Obama administration did intercept Trump campaign communications and unmask the people doing the talking- in violation of the very freedoms you profess to believe in. Makes the Watergate break-in seem like kindergarten.
Seriously, not literally and certainly not pedantically.
It’s in the constitution…
Looks very much like Obama was spying on Trump and many others.
And we have another cognitive dissonance winner! Scott Adams, can you explain?
Absurd Absolute
An absurd absolute is a restatement of the other person’s reasonable position as an absurd absolute. For example, if your point is there is high crime in Detroit, the absurd absolute would be your debate opponent saying something such as “So, you’re saying every person in Detroit is a criminal.” When your debate opponent recasts your opinion to include an “absolute” word, such as every, always, never, all, completely, universally, and the like, you are seeing cognitive dissonance.
http://blog.dilbert.com/post/160696999931/how-to-know-you-won-a-political-debate-on-the
Wait, now you’re confusing us… are you pro-Trump or pro-constitution?
Yeah I’m not sure telling what someone perceives as truth and has evidence to support their opinion merits the term “insane”. Insane people have numerous delusions , by definition false fixed beliefs.
What I believe happened here is that Fred picked a not insane statement , yet one he disagrees with , in order to bait some fool like me to say something.
Jay law number 3 is now in effect. When someone makes an absolute statement about an obviously debatable item then it’s best to not discuss it with them because they are either baiting you or delusional.