One can only hope!
I’ve pretty strongly felt that Barron is off limits for public commentary and criticism because he’s been underage and it’s not his fault that he’s Trump’s son. The way the media and the culture treated Chelsea Clinton and the Bush twins was disgraceful.
But as a legal adult, if he voluntarily makes himself a political figure then all bets are off.
Being 18, and growing up the last few years surrounded by the sorts of people who support Trump, I wonder how deeply he might be in the whole alt-right “man-o-sphere” kind of mind set. He’s the kind of kid they’d love to get their hooks into. Time will tell if he’s smart enough to see through that.
I was gonna give my impression of Barron, but while I’m at it, worst to best:
Junior: Fucking dickhead bruh moron piece of shit. Self-reflection-free goon. Taste-free, like his father. The worst of the kids by far.
Eric: LMFAO. Dweeby dumbfuck zero-IQ trash. An inept enabler of his father.
Ivanka: Fake to the max. Fake glam, fake manner, fake facial expressions. Along with her husband, a scammer, grifter, and taker. Not a good person and a Trump enabler. The biggest waste of the kids, since she doesn’t seem like an actual idiot.
Barron: Always seemed shlubby and out of it, but he was a kid. If he’s going to serve as a delegate now for the fascist GOP, then he too has become enabling trash.
Tiffany: Seems dumb but, aside from appearing with her shit dad on stage, has not seemed to enable him too much.
Oh, and, to state the obvious, Melania is a gold-digging, Trump-enabling, Eurotrash garbage human being.
Moderating:
You’re in P&E, not the Pit. Save this sort of commentary for there. Also, you’re off topic for this thread. Stop now.
Yes, too many conservatives seem willing to feed the beast because “we can’t have Biden and his liberal ways - he will ruin the country”. They like his tax policy, that he got them three justices, that he feeds their fears about brown foreigners and caters to their persecution complex. So even if they aren’t MAGA nutjobs and manage to have some awareness that Trump is a criminal, a conman, a terrible example of behavior for people to admire and emulate, and a narcissist with no empathy, they still will say, “he’s the GOP candidate, so I’ll vote for him.”
We have to hope liberals do the converse. There are a lot of liberals dissatisfied with Biden, over the Palestinian situation and the continued support for Israel despite their indescriminate tactics, for his handling of the withdrawal from Afghanistan and abandonment of to the people who aided our operations at personal risk, and even for slow- walking weapons types for Ukraine. We have to hope they see the same logic - “I may not prefer Biden and I’m not enthused, but I can’t risk Trump winning.”
Kos staff article on the Haley problem:
“They no longer feel at home in the party,” Drucker explained. “It wasn’t just about Trump, it was about the new people he had attracted to the party—the populist right, which has ascended within the Republican coalition.”
This is why I’m hopeful. I used to vote Conservative here in Canada, and it was exactly this kind of thing that eventually drove me away from that party about 10 years ago. The GOP has a bigger hold on its voters, but even with that, at some point at least some voters will eventually realize that the party has moved on from what they actually support, as I did.
It feels like these Haley voters are where I was. I actually joined the Conservative party at one point, so I could vote in the leadership contest that year. That didn’t make a difference. And it was that vote that made me finally accept that a large majority of the people voting in that leadership race fundamentally disagreed with me on almost every major policy issue. That divide has only gotten wider since then, and I can’t imagine what they could actually do to win me back as a voter. It would require them reversing decades of increasingly bad policies, which is never going to happen.
I’ll add myself as another data point. I’m 63 years old, and prior to 2016 I had never voted for a Democratic presidential candidate. I would have described myself as center right. Trump and his movement first had me jump out of the conservative circle, and next, catapulted me significantly leftward.
I don’t see myself drifting back rightward. Too much self-reflection, too much soul searching, too much regret for prior positions (though I was never a frothing-at-the-mouth right winger). But I’m certain there are millions similar to me who just want a sane Republican Party again, something pre-Gingrich. A candidate who actually matches their values and doesn’t make them ashamed of their party.
a brief hijack - and now we have mini-Trump wannabe
Exhibit #1 if why I’m probably never going back.
It’s almost-literally sickening.
I’ve said this a dozen times — as a lifelong Democrat, I’m one of those millions, because it’s not good for the Democrats to have an insane opposition. The Dems benefit — can have sounder policy positions, can avoid overreactions like “defund the police,” etc. — when the other side can counter their arguments with sane ideas.
(I would still find most of the GOP ideas wrongheaded, but I’d learn something from them, and be more critical of certain Dem positions. At least the Pubs would be wrong within normal parameters, as the famous PJ O’Rourke phrase goes — though he was referring to Hillary Clinton).
The GOP has to decide how much they like Trump yet again-vote for someone who voted to impeach him, or someone who disagrees with that vote:
While I still think Trump will be the GOP nominee, he lost a delegate a few hours ago:
Barron Trump Will Not Be a Delegate at the G.O.P. Convention After All
Okay, it’s not quite so funny as that, but I’ll take it:
The safe bet is, dad tried to make it happen without really caring about the son’s wishes, and mom intervened.
What a nice healthy family.
That was my gut read as well.
Agreed.