Staff writer at
@TheAtlantic
. Curmudgeon. Cat guy. Democracy enthusiast, defender of experts. Legacy blue check who'd have paid more for a better Twitter.
If you'd a like a signed copy of the NEW edition of "The Death of Expertise," here's how to get one. (Or, if you have the book, and would like a bookplate.)
One thing that genuinely does mystify me, with no snark: Trump is one of the least masculine, least adult people in public life. Needy, whiny, defensive, pleading, scared of women, terrified of more powerful men.
I am at a loss about why his base sees him as manly or strong.
The President is tweeting like a mean girl at a rogue nuclear state while we argue over whether a guy in Alabama who dated teens as a grown man should be a US senator.
We had a good run, America.
That mook in Costco saying he didn't have to wear a mask inside of someone else's place of business because "I woke up in a free country this morning" is everything you need to know about how some of us only understand "freedom" at the level of a toddler.
If there were an ounce of decency left in the GOP,
@senatemajldr
would assemble a group of senior Republicans, call
@MarkMeadows
, go to the Oval, and together tell Trump to stop planning a coup or he'll be removed from office in accordance with the Constitution. But there isn't.
Watching the news and seeing that Biden is going to cut off Trump from his intelligence briefings. Separating Donald Trump from classified information makes my vote worth it right there.
If it turns out that U.S. Senators were using inside knowledge of a pandemic to protect their financial holdings while bullshitting the rest of us and putting us in peril, that's not just a crisis for the GOP, but for our system of government. That's enormous.
Biden just now, when asked why he apologizes when Trump says a ton of offensive things and never apologizes: “If I say something offensive, I should apologize.” I remember when this was the way normal adults thought about life.
To the anti-anti-Trumpers who for years told the Never Trump people that we were overreacting, that we were being alarmist and silly, that our objections to Trump were elitist and out of touch and "aesthetic:"
F*** every one of you.
Trump is emotionally ill and does what he does. But remember all of the GOP enablers around him now helping to splash his dirt all over the electoral system and what's left of the dignity of the office. Remember them, and never let them pretend that they weren't part of it.
Hi, all, Dr. Buzzkill here. Remember:
1. There will be no GOP rebellion
2. Trump will be acquitted
3. The good arguments of the Democrats won't matter. Fox will chop up everything into crazy sound bites
Only hope? The GOP loses in November. That's all I got.
Someone better let the President know he's threatening war crimes.
- 52 sites for purely symbolic reasons would be a war crime.
- Striking cultural sites without military necessity would be a war crime
- Striking in revenge is a war crime
- Targeting civilians is a war crime
The United States is facing the greatest danger to its constitutional system since at least the 1950s, if not the *18*50s, and millions of people are like: Yeah, but gas, man
No medical professional should ever agree to do this. Never. It elevates the conspiracy guy, demeans the medical professional, and will only convince the kooks out there that RFK is right because a real doctor took the time to debate him.
Never debate a conspiracy theorist.
Also: AOC should not debate MTG. There are people who should not be taken seriously as members of Congress, and whatever my policy disagreements with AOC, elevating MTG's profile is a mistake.
If you saw that presser today and still think that you can't vote for Joe Biden to end this nightmare, maybe you should think about what kind of person you have become.
After tonight, I never want to hear another Democratic voter complain about not feeling "energized" or "heard" or "enthused" or "excited." Vote for your primary choice, and then be ice-cold in your determination to show up at the polls and vote for the nominee, whoever it is.
The President of the United States just told brown-skinned members of Congress who were born in this country to go back home to where they came from. This should be the only news story of the day and in a better country, it would be.
The President of the United States is threatening the Georgia Secretary of State in order to flip an election and reverse the votes of the citizens of Georgia.
This is an impeachable offense and for anyone enabling it, a criminal conspiracy.
As usual, I am astonished to realize that millions of people saw the President of the United States completely lose his shit on live television, say things that a 12 year old would know are stupid and dangerous, and are still saying "Oh, yes, he's my candidate in 2020."
Local GOP candidate just knocked on my door. Couldn't process it when I said that as a Never Trump Republican I am not voting for any Republicans in this cycle. At all. And will actively vote against Republicans gaining even one local seat until this madness is over.
Before any of my *own allies* yell at me again, I think this is one of the most important hearings in U.S. history. No, I don't think it will change MAGA minds - but I hope it stirs the rest of us to get off our asses and save our democracy.
The President's Twitter feed is now indistinguishable from the craziest MAGA trolls. It is the evidentiary record that he is mentally unstable and unable to execute the duties of his office.
Six months to go. The Trump people are going to unleash a blizzard of bullshit, including selective releases and declassifications and leaks, and if the media chases every one of these as bombshell, they're going to end up being a functioning arm of the Trump campaign. Again.
The President of the United States is an ignorant, babbling, gibbering, racist, cognitively impaired sociopath, and about 40 percent of the country is fine with that.
Go ahead, Republicans. Defend this. Tell us all why this man should be Commander in Chief. Tell us why any of you who enabled and rationalized this obscenity should not be driven from office in shame.
I just watched a completely clueless President proclaim a special bond with one of the most ruthless murderers in the world, whom he thinks is “a talented man” who “loves his country.” If I cringed any harder my spine would snap.
This is the second or third time that Wallace has tried to placate Trump by saying “Mr. President, you’re going to be very happy“ by the topic they’re moving onto. This isn’t debate moderation, it’s daycare for a giant man-baby who needs his nap.
#Debates2020
Wow. Lt General Michael Flynn, a lifelong military member and a three-star general, took the fifth amendment when asked if he believes in the peaceful transfer of power in the United States, a question one might assume would have been part of his oath.
#January6thHearings
The only good thing about these two competing town hall events is that they show how much Biden is held to a different standard as an actual rational human being while Trump just has to get through an hour without lighting a bucket of mice on fire
Dear Media:
Please stop getting this story wrong.
IT DOES NOT MATTER IF THERE WAS A QUID PRO QUO. THE REQUEST ITSELF IS THE IMPEACHABLE CONDUCT.
Thank you for coming to my Ted shouting at the top of my lungs Talk
Like I keep saying, at some point this isn't about politics; when you're saying a lazy old man whose day is mostly golfing and rage-tweeting is almost "superhuman," you're in North Korean territory and there shouldn't be enough money in the world to make you say stuff like that.
So, I wake up today, and I think: I'm pretty worried about this Dem field. Biden's old, Pete's young; Harris is opportunistic, Warren's too far left.
Then I see Trump yukking it up with Putin at the G20, and I think: Any of them. Any one of them will do.
Listen, if Democrats want to torch Northam over this, okay by me. This wasn't some teenage prank.
But the people supporting the Trump GOP suddenly developing a conscience about racism are not people to be taken seriously.
Even if Trump loses in November - and I say "even" because he could still win - whatever civic illness brought us to this crisis won't be over. Defeating Trump won't be the end of it.
The networks are afraid to call the election, while the president’s staff are afraid to tell him that he lost. We are all dragging this out because of one dysfunctional sociopathic man-child.
We're all having a laugh about how unbelievably stupid the President is, but I wish just for a moment the Trump voters in those states would take a moment to think about the reality that he has no idea where they live and couldn't care less if they fell off the edge of the earth.
The President of the United States just sent out a doctored video of the Speaker of the House.
With the exception of a lone congressman, not one Republican has, or is going to, lift a finger to stop this madness. There are no patriots left in the leadership of the GOP.
Hi. As a certified political scientist, I can assure you that Joe Biden was not in charge of the US government in 2020. That was actually Donald Trump. Let me know if I can help with any questions.
@hodgetwins
@micsolana
Twitter acting by itself to suppress free speech is not a 1st amendment violation, but acting under orders from the government to suppress free speech, with no judicial review, is
If you can read that letter from Trump, including attacks on Pelosi’s faith and its open attempt to incite civil disorder, and still be an enthusiastic supporter of Donald Trump, you are a morally disordered person.
It’s not about politics, it’s about your lack of character.
I am not interested in dumb comments like “they were always like this“ or “you just didn’t notice it“ or any of that crap.
I am watching people I once knew, whom I knew to be intelligent and reasonable people, become completely delusional crackpots and authoritarian paranoids.
I don’t agree with the president about everything, but I am constantly overwhelmed by how great it feels to have a normal, non-mentally ill, non-sociopath as the commander in chief.
This is how Americans now interpret freedom: Not as a political condition in a democratic society, but as a constant chant of "you're not the boss of me." This is not freedom, or at least not freedom in any political sense. It's a child-like understanding of autonomy. /1
This is deeply, deeply weird. It really is Jonestown-level stuff. These people are worshiping a real estate developer from Queens who can barely hold a thought in his head.
This is beyond un-American. It's psychotic.
Schiff is laying out a narrative that is so clear - and undeniable, because it is rooted in a huge amount of documents and testimony - that the President’s defenders only have the choice now of looking complicit, stupid, or immoral (or all three) in rejecting it.
I am not kidding when I say I feel pity for Ann Coulter. Imagine what her life has to be like to have sent that tweet about McCain, as he lies in state and his family grieves.
There isn't enough fame and money in the world to fill the empty place that came from.
Right now, about 40% of the American public thinks the president is doing a good job of handling this crisis. This says something terrifying about us as a country.
Meanwhile, two guys in a bar in Indiana explain to a reporter how they felt forgotten until there was a president who finally had the courage to sell out to the Russians while closing down their factory with pointless tariffs
“I always knew that pandemics were a bad thing... You don’t want pandemics.”
This is the most palpably stupid human being ever to occupy the White House.
Mayor Bowser is asking the residents of DC not to engage with the pro-Trump protesters. This is excellent advice. Ignore them. Let them march around in circles and yell at each other.
MAGA world seems less angry about immigration and more pissed that DeSantis's expensive and hateful stunt of sending people to an off-season island didn't own the libs, who instead did the Christian thing and took in the strangers and made sure they had food and shelter.
I have never made the case for impeaching Trump, despite my belief that he has long merited impeachment. Until now. Telling Ukraine to investigate Biden was a gross abuse of power, as I argue in
@TheAtlantic
:
There is a kind of karmic hilarity to the fact that in order to protect Trump, his staff centralized the materials that could doom him in a highly classified system that can't be erased or manipulated without a record of access by a very small number of people.
We all beat up on the administration when they get things wrong. So we ought to give them credit when they are successful: Biden’s handling of the Ukraine crisis has been the most successful American foreign policy intervention since the fall of the Berlin Wall. -
@JVLast
If a black guy walked into Kenosha from out of town with an assault rifle and killed two people while severely wounding another we would have had a very different verdict.
I think I’m a pretty good writer, but I am having trouble finding the words for how much I don’t care about Djokovic and how right the Australians are.
Our country has a rich history of presidents who respected the power, decorum, and influence of their office.
Unfortunately, that rich history ended the day Trump became president.
Watching this report on perfectly healthy middle-class Americans who won’t get the vaccine purely for political reasons, we really need to stop calling it “vaccine hesitancy“ and start calling what it is: aggressive, malevolent narcissism
Former WH COS John Kelly has told friends, about Trump: “The depths of his dishonesty is just astounding to me. The dishonesty, the transactional nature of every relationship, though it's more pathetic than anything else. He is the most flawed person I have ever met in my life."
TRUMP: "When you test, you have a case. When you test, you find something is wrong with people. If we didn't do any testing we would have very few cases."
If the choice is between living under liberals in a constitutional republic under the rule of law, or getting conservative policies from authoritarians subverting a constitutional republic and the rule of law, I will live under the liberals and fight within the system. /1
"I would take help from a foreign adversary against U.S. citizens running against me and not notify the FBI" is about as clear a violation of the oath to protect and defend the Constitution, against all enemies foreign and domestic, as there could be.
I don't care if it's tiresome to say it: if a Dem president were acting this way, Republicans would be calling for SEAL teams to seize the White House.
Trump has just been asked, as no president has ever had to be asked in the modern era, whether he will commit to a peaceful transfer of power.
Trump says: We will have to see what happens
This one moment by itself is an impeachable offense.
Bill Barr is on
@CNN
right now explaining how, despite Trump's insane outbursts, he never questioned Trump's fitness for office, and that the Democrats are a totalitarian menace.
Which leads to the bigger question: Why is Bill Barr on any show anywhere.
This really just happened: I asked my doctor about a lab result from an exam yesterday, and he sent me a message that said: "It's fine, not really an issue, but you can fix it by eating more Indian food"
I am still laughing. My doctor is awesome.
Reading about Ukrainian operations around Kharkiv, I am struck yet again by the reality that the biggest conflict in Europe since World War II is taking place because a not-very-bright mid-level KGB guy thought he could recreate an empire that's already failed at least twice.