President Trump has Subtle Thoughts on Never Trump
The president has some subtle and nuanced thoughts for folks of the Never Trump persuasion.
The Never Trumper Republicans, though on respirators with not many left, are in certain ways worse and more dangerous for our Country than the Do Nothing Democrats. Watch out for them, they are human scum!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 23, 2019
The Republican opposition to Trump has existed as long as he has been in politics. Several prominent GOP lawmakers and pundits have staunchly opposed Trump and have offered consistent criticism of him throughout his presidency, floating possible third-party candidates or a vote for a Democrat as a means to remove him from office.
Some top people associated with the Never Trump movement in the GOP include Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, Michigan Rep. Justin Amash, journalist Bill Kristol, and host of The View Ana Navarro. Some lawmakers, like Sens. Lindsey Graham and Marco Rubio, initially opposed Trump as a presidential candidate but have since given him support.
The tweet slamming Never Trumpers comes just days after a Cabinet meeting in which the president encouraged congressional Republicans to band together and resist the impeachment inquiry. “Don’t forget, many of these people were put there during Obama, during Clinton, during the Never Trump or Bush era,” Trump said during a Cabinet meeting on Monday. “You know, you had a Never Trump or Bush. You have heard of those? Those people might be worse than the Democrats — the Never Trumpers. The good news is they’re dying off fast.”
Hey he called them human! That is probably more than he thinks about me for being a (((Democrat))).Report
Obligatory-
Downfall Of Trump in his bunker, raging about traitors. And his enormous…hands.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7La25O1UR7sReport
loathe though I am to say this – I sort of agree with his characterization of Never Trumpers. While Kristol and Navarro have spent some of their public capitol on criticizing him through out, few of the Never Trumpers on the Hill have done the thing that needs doing – bringing their anonymous colleagues out of the shadows. Current Republicans keep making the case that they can’t cross the President for fear of their base, but these folks seem to think they can . . . sort of . . .ish. Seems ot me if they got EVERYONE out of the closet then they could accomplish something.
But for now, yeah, Never Trumpers on the Hill are on life support.Report
For most of the NeverTrumpers, their position can be summed up by that meme of a guy staring at two buttons in nervous indecision.
The buttons would be :
1. Protecting the Constitution and liberal democracy;
2. Tax cuts/Gilead/Ethnic CleansingReport
Its even simpler – they want to keep power, they just don’t like the optics of HOW the President is doing it.Report
When you peel off the labels made with your 1970’s Ronco Label Maker… the 2nd button says:
MMT/Brave New World/Slaughter of the Innocents
I think that heightens the contradictions a little better.Report
Ehh, I don’t think that’s quite right since Pence is a perfectly serviceable conservative who’d prevent MMT and the slaughter of the innocents just as well as Trump does. Even better, probably, since Trump has a penchant for not dancing with those that brung him. Sometimes he’ll even greenlight military attacks on them.Report
…is the only pitch worth making.Report
(checks URL) no I didn’t type Balloon Juice by accident, what’s going on here? Is it Website Switch Day and they forgot to tell me or something?Report
Looks like the White House’s position is that people who oppose Trump are “just bad”.
I expect no one will be able to explain why this is OK but calling half of Trump’s supporters “deplorable” was awful, and for that matter I expect that this will inspire no significant degree of outrage from the Very Serious folks who threw an axle over Hillary’s “deplorable” comments.Report
Trump seems to be doing everything he can to even turn his allies off.
Quite honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised if this turns into a huge impeachment conflagration.
(Like, to the point where I’m wondering if that’s what he freakin’ wants.)Report
The guy who has been impulsive, narcissistic, creepy and a bombastic loudmouth with many failures to his name throughout his life must have something tricky up his sleeve when he acts likes he has his entire life.
To be fair, ageing his made him a bit worse. But that won’t get worse of course.Report
It’s one of the few arguments in favor of the Trump Is A Genius Manipulator Playing Ninety-Fourth-Dimensional Chess viewpoint; the idea that he knows an impeachment at this point will fail, so he’s doing everything he can to encourage one starting, thus wearing out everyone who might be motivated to do one for real once there’s actual evidence of knowing criminality.Report
I don’t know if that can compete with his on-point meme game.Report
1. In Group/Out Group is different… that’s why its different.
2. As JB notes below, still has the potential to conflagrate stuff, but not if you spray the Deplorable Dampener(TM) on it, so… shhh.Report
I mean the in-group/out-group part is given, but a lot of the folks who got somewhere between very concerned to downright ornery over the “deplorable” comments weren’t Trump supporters or even conservatives.
As for keeping it hush-hush, well, I don’t have quite that much commitment to Sparklemotion.Report
If Trump does something that makes it less likely that he gets elected, I find myself unmoved.
If Clinton does several things in a row that make it less likely that she gets elected, I find myself not only complaining about it but finding myself boggling that I am surrounded by people who will not only disagree that it’s a mistake but start arguing what a great candidate she is.Report
but a lot of the folks who got somewhere between very concerned to downright ornery over the “deplorable” comments weren’t Trump supporters or even conservatives.
Exactly right. Call it “the revenge of PCism”. Clinton’s statement about the deplorables was newsworthy, and scandalous!, precisely *because* liberals make such hay about language and categories and stereotypes and so on. Liberals present themselves as being above those types of brutish categorizations.Hillary’s comment was a foul and she was called on it. Alternately, the GOP can call people human scum and (sorta) get away with it because there is no cultural identity norm which is being violated.
There is no double standard in play, btw. This sort of thing results from liberals imposing a standard only to see it backfire on them.Report
I expect no one will be able to explain why this is OK but calling half of Trump’s supporters “deplorable” was awful,
Easy peasy: attacking Dems for calling me and mine “deplorable” serves our interests just as calling never-Trumpers “human scum” serves our interests. If you want a “higher reason” there is none.Report
The House is voting on Impeachment*!
*inquiry proceduresReport
Official story is that it’s to eliminate a GOP procedural talking point and eliminate an excuse by subpoenaed witnesses to not testify.
My own take is that Pelosi and the caucus are feeling much more comfortable about where impeachment numbers have moved to in the swing districts and are not worried about centrist members going on record as voting for impeachment anymore.Report
She often plays right into Trump’s hands, even when he tells her, in public, exactly what to do. He needs the Democrats to record their impeachment votes before the other shoes start dropping, so they can’t back away from it later when they’re campaigning.Report
And even Salon agrees with George:
Republicans aren’t flailing or desperate: Their attack on impeachment is strategic — and might work
https://www.salon.com/2019/10/28/republicans-arent-flailing-or-desperate-their-attack-on-impeachment-is-strategic-and-might-work/Report
Then again:
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/pelosi-says-house-will-vote-this-week-on-resolution-formalizing-impeachment-procedures
So, no. She still hasn’t shat or gotten off the pot.Report
Oh yes, plus it’s basically the only play they can make that doesn’t involve conceding on Trump. There’s nothing like having no options to focus the Republican mind.Report
Mmmhmmm, she was playing into his hands when she wouldn’t hold the vote; now she’s playing into his hands now that she is holding a vote. Once thing you can be counted on for, George, is consistency.Report
Nancy refused to hold the vote and Trump demanded that she hold the vote. Then he said he would withhold any materials she asked for and said he wouldn’t turn over anything until she had the entire House vote on it. That’s pretty clearly demanding that she hold the vote, when she kept saying she would not hold a vote.
Well, now she’s going to hold a vote.
Who do you think won that face off under your scoring system?Report
The one who is going to receive the materials?Report
Which will amount to less than the Mueller nothingburger. That’s why Trump didn’t even bother to figure out what he was withholding.
MSN running a WSJ piece on why this impeachment is a sham
Among the many other obvious problem is the lack of a crime or offense. So Democrats have to pretend that something every President does every week regarding foreign policy is actually a criminal offense, or opposition research is a criminal offense, or investigating criminal activities is a criminal offense.
Even more amusing, they have to pretend that Senate Republicans will be willing to pretend, too, and they won’t, at least not if they want to stay out of the witness protection program, and they know it.
And then what the Republicans will dig into the whistle blower, who worked for John Brennan and one of Obama’s special advisors, and apparently has worked with Schiff’s people since way back. Various communications between some of the folks involved seem to describe the potential of a seditious conspiracy to undermine and overthrow the government of the United States, which is a criminal offense under US Code. That’s why Schiff is so desperate to hide the whistle blower. It’s not going to work.
Trump is just getting the Democrats to sign their own arrest warrants. ^_^Report
In which it is explained that impeachment does not require criminal acts;
And that the President has admitted openly to everything contained in the whistleblower report;
But yes, certainly, if he wants to defend himself by saying that bribing foreign governments with taxpayer money to purchase opposition research is not an abuse of power, well…please proceed, Governor.Report
If Nancy holds the vote and loses? Point Trump. Otherwise? Point Nancy.Report
I think we should try to get ahead of this now. They are going to have the vote, it will pass, then the R’s and the Anti Anti crew will have to come up with new Most Principled Process Arguments Evar. So what will they be?
I’m guessing they will lean heavy, well even heavier, on executive privilege. We can’t depose all the same people they are trying to depose now because they all had some nebulous exec branch role. On the other hand i’m sure i am not being creative enough. Of course they will octuple down on extortion is fine.
So what will the new arguments against cooperating be?Report
The flag didn’t even have a gold fringe on it, now did it?Report
Of course i forgot to mention that it is within 53 weeks of an election which by custom means any impeachment is invalid.Report
Maybe they’ll bring up Judge Bork again. That’s a perennial favorite.Report
Hmmm….that would be really stupid which does make it more likely to occur.Report
Maybe they’ll bring up Judge Bork again. That’s a perennial favorite.Report