# The Trump Administration: The Clusterfuck Continues (Part 2) **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Tags:** trump\ **Created:** [December 1, 2025, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298 "2025-12-01T20:32:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 67
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1321 "2026-01-08T14:03:23Z")
> [@Toxgoddess](#): > > Trump doesn’t want to be Putin. He wants to be Kim Jong Un and the US to be North Korea. This is absolutly true and absolutely horrifying. I’ve read many books about life in NK. How do you feel about eating bark and grass? > [@Toxgoddess](#): > > This Congress will be vilified by history as the ones who abdicated their duty and let it happen. ^ 100% We know Trump is a raving lunatic, DO SOMETHING. I’ve written my congressmen ~5 times. I don’t get a peep out of them. They are Colorado (D)'s . They should be hollering from the mountain tops about this complete and total mess. ---
**Author:** ![Great\_Antibob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Great\_Antibob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Antibob)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1322 "2026-01-08T14:09:02Z")
> [@Toxgoddess](#): > > Trump doesn’t want to be Putin. He wants to be Kim Jong Un and the US to be North Korea. Nah, he doesn’t see the difference between them. That would require more thought and introspection than he has ever shown the capacity for. It’s not like he’s actually bothered to learn what the life off the average Russian or North Korean is like. He just sees what Kim and Putin have shown him, plus his own native reliance on stereotypes and bigotry, and riffs on that. ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1323 "2026-01-08T14:23:11Z")
> [@enipla](#): > > We know Trump is a raving lunatic, DO SOMETHING. I’ve written my congressmen ~5 times. I don’t get a peep out of them. They are Colorado (D)'s . They should be hollering from the mountain tops about this complete and total mess. Maybe this is a naive question. Why the fuck isn’t every Democrat in Congress – both houses – standing up and shouting at the top of their lungs that the president is destroying the country? I mean on every talk show, to every columnist, in every bit of social media that they participate in? Can anyone explain this to me? ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1324 "2026-01-08T14:28:52Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > Can anyone explain this to me? I’d love to know. The highest running opinions seems to be: They are cowards, afraid of Donny two-scoops being mad at them They are afraid for their very lives from armed and angry MAGAts They think this is just “business as usual” and they think government is like that song: “Today you be the boss, and tomorrow, I’ll be the boss” They are as detached from normal Americans as the Repugs, and really don’t see what is going on They are in on “the game” and there really aren’t two sides, and everyone in Congress, repubs and dems, are working together to enrich themselves while fleecing the rest of us. ---
**Author:** ![Great\_Antibob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Great\_Antibob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Antibob)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1325 "2026-01-08T14:37:00Z")
My own take is: why do people assume the Democrats are some kind of monocultural political party like the Republicans? Sure, the Republicans aren’t totally monolithic, but if I take a poll of what people instantly think when they hear “Republican”, they’re going to look pretty similar - largely white, male, evangelical, on average older and wealthier, etc. And they act largely in lockstep, with objectors either falling in line or staying quiet. The Democrats aren’t nearly as monolithic. There are still some conservative Dems, some progressives, some corporatists, etc. Rather than a single party, it’s really more a loose coalition of 4 or 5 parties. There’s no single strategy, no single leader, and certainly no falling into that non-existent line, and if anybody thinks there’s some mythical ur-Democrat from which they all descend and can find a single leading figure, I’ve got several bridges I’d be willing to sell. I mean, did anybody think AOC and Joe Manchin were remotely on the same strategic page? For what it’s worth, some are screaming and shouting and doing those sorts of things. But what people actually seem to be asking is one of two questions: (1) why aren’t all the Democrats doing what I personally think they should be doing? and (2) why isn’t any of it getting any traction? (1) as above (2) Non-MAGA, non-Republican Americans are just as monolithic as the Democratic Party, i.e. there’s no plurality opinion on what they want other than “not Trump”. And that’s not a cohesive or inspiring message or strategy. What you personally think they should be doing, there’s going to be millions of other “not Trump” people who disagree. Bit of a problem, and there’s no easy solutions for the issue that the Republican Party as it currently stands, warts and all, actually does represent the opinions of at least a plurality of the American people. That doesn’t speak well of our nation, but why should it? ---
**Author:** ![Folacin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/folacin/32/3195_2.png) [@Folacin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Folacin)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1326 "2026-01-08T14:49:57Z")
> [@Great\_Antibob](#): > > It’s not like he’s actually bothered to learn what the life off the average Russian or North Korean is like. He doesn’t care about the average Russian, North Korean, or American. Life at the top in NK is pretty good (I assume and certainly relative to the masses), and that’s where he and his toadies see themselves. ---
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1327 "2026-01-08T15:09:09Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > Can anyone explain this to me? Me too @ThelmaLou . Even the explanations don’t fit for me. I guess that congress is just full of some of the nastiest people on earth. They. Just. Don’t. Care. Shit, Melania had that on her coat. What more do we need to know when a model and gold digger on her way to visit children after a disaster says “I don’t care, do you” I wrote both my Senators this morning. Again. I hope we will still have a country and will be able to reflect on the Trump years as the worst thing to happen since the civil war. I hope we will still be around. Not sure. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1328 "2026-01-08T16:38:55Z")
> [@enipla](#): > > We know Trump is a raving lunatic, DO SOMETHING. I’ve written my congressmen ~5 times. I don’t get a peep out of them. They are Colorado (D)'s . They should be hollering from the mountain tops about this complete and total mess. Same, except I get responses crowing about their accomplishments as if it were business as usual. > [@ThelmaLou](#): > > Why the fuck isn’t every Democrat in Congress – both houses – standing up and shouting at the top of their lungs that the president is destroying the country? > > I mean on every talk show, to every columnist, in every bit of social media that they participate in? My Rep is a woman with a transgender sibling. I would not blame her for resigning her seat if she felt she wasn’t safe speaking out, but if she’s going to hold it, she should speak out. I went looking for anything she’s said this month, and this is all I found, from [here](https://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/local/san-diegans-offer-mixed-reactions-to-u-s-operation-in-venezuela/3955279/), was a post on X (still using X!) with wishy-washy disapproval. A news search on her name shows that she made $1.4 million in the stock market last month, which may go some ways to explain why she isn’t shouting from the rooftops: conflict of interest between personal wealth and duty to one’s constituents. I don’t know what to think. Her policy positions are quite left of center, and she DOES speak out, sometimes. Maybe it’s not money, but career: she’s still pretty junior, and if she wants to be a senior Congressperson, perhaps she feels she can’t go too far and upset the more powerful Ds in Congress? ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1329 "2026-01-08T16:41:27Z")
> [@doomtastic](#): > > The only reason I say a decade is that it takes time to disentangle from a coalition like NATO. That’s if you want to disentangle it in a sensible, mature manner, that leaves what’s left in reasonably good condition. Why ever would you think Trump, et al., would ever go about it in such judicious fashion? What’s most likely going to happen is that Trump will declare every US base in other NATO countries to be “Sovereign Territory of the United States”, and order them to close their borders to those evil other countries. He won’t give a shit about how badly that will screw everything up. When those bases start to collapse, and can’t project the force he demands of them, he’ll blame the Democrats and Europeans for the failure, for not adequately kowtowing to the Democratically Installed Sovereign Great US Trump Military Enclosures (DISGUSTMEs). ---
**Author:** ![Ellecram](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellecram/32/18948_2.png) [@Ellecram](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ellecram)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1330 "2026-01-08T16:41:57Z")
> [@Dr.Drake](#): > > Same, except I get responses crowing about their accomplishments as if it were business as usual.. I have had the same experience and I am not wasting energy on this anymore especially since one of my Congress critters is John Fetterman. ---
**Author:** ![Sylvanz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/fbc32d/32.png) [@Sylvanz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sylvanz)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1331 "2026-01-08T17:00:56Z")
I’m so sorry for you and his other constituents. ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1332 "2026-01-08T17:02:24Z")
> [@Great\_Antibob](#): > > My own take is: why do people assume the Democrats are some kind of monocultural political party like the Republicans? My question was not based on this naive assumption. It’s obvious the Dems can’t get together on much of anything. But as you said later in your post, _"there’s no plurality opinion on what they want other than ‘not Trump.’”_ I’d like to hear the ones who feel that way shouting it from the rooftops. > [@Great\_Antibob](#): > > For what it’s worth, some are screaming and shouting and doing those sorts of things. There aren’t nearly enough of them screaming it loudly enough. ---
**Author:** ![doomtastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/8c91f0/32.png) [@doomtastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doomtastic)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1333 "2026-01-08T17:17:27Z")
I hadn’t even considered the Trump regime trying to blow it up deliberately (or accidentally). I was thinking about it from the PoV of other NATO treaty members looking outside of NATO for their security guarantees. Presumably they (non-US countries) would want to do it in a sensible and mature manner. ---
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1334 "2026-01-08T17:25:43Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > It’s obvious the Dems can’t get together on much of anything. I think they are together, but just sort of mumble and look for belly button lint. ---
**Author:** ![Great\_Antibob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Great\_Antibob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Antibob)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1335 "2026-01-08T17:34:37Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > There aren’t nearly enough of them screaming it loudly enough. Again - monoculture. You think this. Other people think so. But clearly not all the “not Trump” people think this, much less all such people in Congress. You want some kind of agreement on strategy (the one you want, naturally) that assumes there’s more unity among Democrats than has ever been the case and if that doesn’t happen, then “they aren’t doing anything”. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1336 "2026-01-08T17:43:34Z")
> [@Dr.Drake](#): > > A news search on her name shows that she made $1.4 million in the stock market last month, which may go some ways to explain why she isn’t shouting from the rooftops: I think this goes a very, VERY long way to explain the silence from Republicans and Democrats alike in Congress. They are complicit, and are simply in it for themselves, making money hand over fist while the country collapses. They think that things won’t get too, too bad, and they themselves will be on top of the pile with enough money to insulate themselves from the worst of the fallout. ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1337 "2026-01-08T17:43:48Z")
> [@doomtastic](#): > > Presumably they (non-US countries) would want to do it in a sensible and mature manner And if you look, you’ll see they’re already starting to do that. Having multilateral talks over Ukraine, for example, that are largely ignoring the US. Turning such into a formal alliance as a successor to NATO is something I’m sure they’re all thinking about. And that’s just what we know about publicly. Who knows what they talk about behind closed doors? ---
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1338 "2026-01-08T17:55:28Z")
> [@Horatius](#): > > Who knows what they talk about behind closed doors? Show me the money. That’s pretty much it. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Winston\_OBoogie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.winston_oboogie/32/2945_2.png) [@Dr.Winston\_OBoogie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Winston_OBoogie)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1339 "2026-01-08T17:57:59Z")
> [@enipla](#): > > How do you feel about eating bark and grass? You know, many parts of a pine tree are edible! (Yeah, I’m showing my age. Anyone else remember Eulle Gibbons ads for Grape-Nuts in the 70s?) ---
**Author:** ![carrps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carrps/32/2957_2.png) [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2026, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298/1340 "2026-01-08T18:28:54Z")
I can hear his voice saying it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298.md?page=66) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-administration-the-clusterfuck-continues-part-2/1025298.md?page=68)