Food for thought from the New York Times as we watch the Trump train circle the drain. Columnist Frank Bruni has long been one of the smartest writers and observers of the American scene. He has an interesting take on the escalating war of words, and the desire by the Democrats, or anyone in opposition to the current regime, to match anger with anger. You will lose.
- “You’re right that Donald Trump is a dangerous and deeply offensive man, and that restraining and containing him are urgent business. You’re wrong about how to go about doing that, or at least you’re letting your emotions get the better of you.
- “When you answer name-calling with name-calling and tantrums with tantrums, you’re not resisting him. You’re mirroring him. You’re not diminishing him. You’re demeaning yourselves. Many voters don’t hear your arguments or the facts, which are on your side. They just wince at the din.”
Bruni points to the “eye for an eye” exchanges started by Robert DeNiro with his “F*** Trump” rant at the Tony awards, which was predictable as the sun rising, soon followed by a Trump response.
Trump punched back at Robert De Niro with a series of tweets implying De Niro may have brain damage https://t.co/1qEChQ8GJL pic.twitter.com/5HWHljKC8T
— Variety (@Variety) June 13, 2018
But as Bruni points out:
- “I get that you’re angry. I’m angry, too. But anger isn’t a strategy. Sometimes it’s a trap. When you find yourself spewing four-letter words, you’ve fallen into it. You’ve chosen cheap theatrics over the long game, catharsis over cunning. You think you’re raising your fist when you’re really raising a white flag.”
And add to this a president who grows more hostile by the day toward the press, using his most inflammatory language yet, saying the fourth estate is “our country’s biggest enemy.”
So funny to watch the Fake News, especially NBC and CNN. They are fighting hard to downplay the deal with North Korea. 500 days ago they would have “begged” for this deal-looked like war would break out. Our Country’s biggest enemy is the Fake News so easily promulgated by fools!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 13, 2018
Which brings us to this. We are still months from election day and it’s not just Trump who can set a trap. Witness this exchange last night between CNN’s Chris Cuomo and Corey Stewart, the neo-Confederate-Trump loving, GOP Senate candidate from Virginia:
“I take support from whoever wants to give it me. That doesn’t mean I support their views”
GOP Senate candidate Corey Stewart defends reported associations with people who have demonstrated racist, bigoted and anti-Semitic views, in a tense exchange with anchor @ChrisCuomo pic.twitter.com/yriSO30mcy
— Cuomo Prime Time (@CuomoPrimeTime) June 14, 2018
We bet that was not an accidental performance by Mr. Stewart, instead a well-rehearsed strategy that will play to his base. Sound familiar? Get ready for a lot more of this coming this summer and fall as GOP candidates take a page from Trump’s book on being brusque. Hey, it worked for him. But Bruni says he’s encourage by some Democratic candidates for Congress he’s met who actually want to talk about issues, not just yell and demean.
- [Trump is] the most exhaustively chronicled and psychologically transparent president in the lifetimes of most American voters, who already know how they feel about him. What they’re less certain about are their alternatives. If you want to make sure that at least one chamber of Congress is a check on Trump, talk to them about that.