Ever since the National Review came out with it's Against Trump issue, it's been sort of amazing watching the sturm und drang in the media, both left and right. But I wonder -- was this envisioned by the editors of NR when they came out with this issue?
The collaborators in the issue run across a spectrum of conservative and libertarian thinkers. So it wasn't just the usual guys/gals at NR putting this out. And since the issue hit the stands, I've seen more folks from NR on television than I've ever seen before. And the upshot of this is that they get to repeat their stance on Trump before an even wider audience than before.
The pro-Trump forces at FOX are in full attack mode -- Greta was on Friday saying she thought the attack on him would backfire, giving him ammunition because she "...just think[s] he's so clever." She said this beaming like a high school freshman cooing about the varsity quarterback.
ugh Get a room, why don't you?
But for all the talk about how this is going to backfire and end up helping Trump, I doubt that will happen. The 30% of Republican voters who are simply blinded by their fealty to Trump won't change their views. And believe me, I've gotten a close look at that in the comments sections at various websites where I dared speak against His Hairness. But as more undecideds look at Trump's candidacy and see it for the empty shell it is, they may gravitate to other candidates.
And with out-of-touch dinosaurs like Bob Dole coming out against Ted Cruz, and others in the Washington insider world bashing Cruz, he may end up picking up some support.
So I'm thinking -- did the editors assume this was going to happen . . . a firestorm of publicity that pushes their view on Trump into every conversation? Or was it an unintended consequence of them simply doing what an opinion magazine is supposed to do -- put forth an opinion?
I guess we'll see.
And a word about these comment sections . . .
Wow! And I thought the Paulians were brutal!
I went to Conservatives4Palin an independent website set up after the 2008 election to promote Sarah Palin and support her, initially on the thought she would make a run for office at some point. I used to comment there pretty frequently back in the day. But as she has slipped more and more into celebrity mode, I rarely go back there. But after her endorsement of Trump, I posted a comment about how Trump was running on a plate of empty rhetoric, just as Obama had, and I thought Palin had backed the wrong horse this time. That was it. Holy cow, you'd of thought I had personally attacked her. I was called a liar (?!), one guy challenged me on the empty rhetoric point by saying Trump had a plethora of policy statements on his website. I was tempted to respond that, as my college comp teacher told me once -- don't use a $10 word when a 50¢ will do just as well, you end up looking like a fool. Which is to say I don't think that word means what you think it means.
There was also a posting after the National Review article came out by Steve Fleisher wherein he claimed the editors were just money grubbers hoping to sell a few more issues. Nice. I'm sure Dana Loesch and Thomas Sowell and Glenn Beck and Dana Pavlich are pleased to be disparaged like that simply for having an opinion of their own.
I'm also impressed by how many commenters comment at NR and seem to hate the magazine, the writers, and everything they write. I don't usually troll the comments sections, but looking at the stuff in these articles, it's about 90% against and 10% for. I'm in the minority. Again. sigh
But do these guys simply go there to bitch and whine? Honestly, what a miserable life they must have. And the complaints are so juvenile. Kevin Williamson wrote today that the rise of Trump is due to fact that people simply don't read, that their attention span has been reduced to sound bites and one or two word slogans -- hope and change, make America great etc. The backlash was brutal -- elitist, intellectual superior, don't tell us what to think, etc. Ridiculous.
Williamson made a great point -- you don't ask a surgeon to do your taxes. The guy might be smart, but he's not an accountant. Asking a businessman to run the most powerful country in the world with no background in politics, world affairs, or domestic policy is not wise. Why is asking someone to question their motives for backing Trump so bad? And when the opposition response devolves into name-calling, I wonder if those doing the name-calling are not as secure in their beliefs as they claim to be.
Whatever happens over the next months, it certainly isn't going to be boring. That's for sure.
3 comments:
I am in the minority as well. I have noted in the recent past that the only real experience Trump has with other politicians running for office is the massive ego and that the only real difference between the representatives of 'hope and change' and 'make America great' is the color of their skin.
Everything the National Review has laid out against Trump has been dead on. No one can refute that. His supporters are reduced to ad hominem attacks and lashing out at the magazine and various contributers as elitist and out of touch. It's truly astonishing, it's like we (actually they, the Trump supporters) are validating every charge ever leveled against us by the liberal media and politicians.
Very sad :-(
I don't I would say "reduced to". Trump's campaign has been largely made up of the ad hominem attack and the dismissive joke. So many political arguments go there already that Trump has been able to make an entire campaign that started right there. It is just well disguised at politispeak, because even talking head pundits usually end up at the ad hominem.
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