How Trump is poisoning public discourse

‘Idiots,’ ‘criminals’ and ‘scum’ – nasty politics highest in US since the Civil War

Thomas Zeitzoff, American University

Former U.S. President Donald Trump at the Moms for Liberty
Joyful Warriors summit in June 2023 in Philadelphia. 
Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images

Joe Biden, “together with a band of his closest thugs, misfits and Marxists, tried to destroy American democracy.”

This is what Donald Trump said to his supporters hours after pleading not guilty in federal court in June 2023 to his mishandling of classified documents.

The indictment of a former president was shocking, but Trump’s words were not. Twenty years ago, his rhetoric would have been unusual coming from any member of Congress, let alone a party leader. Yet language like this from the leading Republican presidential candidate is becoming remarkably common in American politics.

It’s not just Republicans. In 2019, New Jersey Democratic Sen. Cory Booker appeared on a talk show bemoaning Trump’s rhetoric and the lack of civility in politics. But he then went on to call Trump a “physically weak specimen” and said that his own “testosterone makes me want to” punch Trump.

How bad have things gotten? In my new book, I show that the level of nastiness in U.S. politics has increased dramatically. As an indication of that, I collected historical data from The New York Times on the relative frequency of stories involving Congress that contained keywords associated with nasty politics such as “smear,” “brawl” and “slander.” I found that nasty politics is more prevalent than at any time since the U.S. Civil War.

Particularly following the Jan. 6. insurrection by Trump’s supporters, journalists and scholars have focused on the rise of the politics of menace. In May 2023, U.S. Capitol Police Chief Tom Manger testified before Congress and said that one of the biggest challenges the U.S. Capitol Police face today “is dealing with the sheer increase in the number of threats against the members of Congress. It’s gone up over 400% over the last six years.”

Mageau again tries to defend the indefensible

Argues that no one should criticize Trump for pushing the US toward war with Iran

By Will Collette

Charlestown’s preeminent historian, political scientist and seer James Mageau wrote yet another letter to the Westerly Sun, this time to lambast anyone who would dare criticize Donald Trump’s unilateral decision to assassinate Iran’s top general.

The drone killing of General Qassem Soleimani on January 3, took the US campaign against Iran to a new level. 

The US and Iran have been enemies since the 1979 Iran hostage taking crisis though never actually at war even after the US shot down an Iranian passenger jet in July 1988 killing 290 people.

Until Trump came along, the United States and other world powers had reached a state of relative albeit nervous peace with Iran after the 2015 signing of an agreement that halted Iran’s march toward acquiring nuclear weapons. The deal was signed by China, France, Russia, United Kingdom, United States, and Germany together with the European Union.

According to our allies and the international arms inspectors who went on-site, Iran was abiding by the terms of the agreement to take no action to build nuclear weapons. Nonetheless, Trump decided the US would pull out of the agreement largely because Trump cannot tolerate (or is it “toleride?) any policy that bore President Barack Obama’s name.

Since Trump’s sabotage of Iran nuclear deal, it’s been all downhill as fighting has intensified all across the Middle East from Yemen to Syria mostly involving groups backed variously by the U.S., Russia, China and Iran. Turkey has gotten into the act after Trump sold out the Kurds, our best allies in the fight against ISIS.

Fox News

Soleimani’s job was to coordinate Iran’s side in all these conflicts similar to the way the US Central Command coordinates US troops and forces backed by the US.

In no way do I praise Soleimani who by all accounts directed countless attacks – including acts of terror – against US interests and US citizens.

But I do criticize Trump’s decision to escalate and to push us closer toward war against Iran with no sign of any planning, forethought, intelligence or consultation. 

I do criticize the complete lack of evidence that Soleimani posed such an imminent threat that we needed to risk war to take him out. I do criticize Trump’s constantly changing story about why he did it. Even his own top officials can’t back him up as he pulls new rationales out of his butt.

Trump's story changes from day to day. One day, he says Iran was going to hit four US embassies. His Secretary of Defense says he saw no such intelligence...and no embassies were notified. 

Then Trump says, finally, "It doesn't really matter" after apparently running out of stories to tell.

Here is Mageau's letter to the editor with my comments in Bold Red.

Trump May Have Already Sparked A Wildfire In The Middle East

The Aftermath of the Suleimani Assassination Has Barely Begun

By Terry H Schwadron, DCReport Opinion Editor

It’s much more than a massive escalation of war tensions in the Middle East that Donald Trump achieved in ordering the single rocket attack that killed Qassim Suleimani.

By killing the top Iranian military commander and hated foe, intentionally or not, Trump managed in his single swath of a sword to set an already uneasy world on edge.

Just as we were suddenly supposedly withdrawing all U.S. troops from the region, we’re sending thousands more.

Everywhere we look, the fundamental questions seemed widespread and the same: While taking out Suleimani has been a longtime goal, are Americans, in fact, safer today?

Is there a strategy here? Or did Trump just act without thinking through the effects? Does this move us any closer to a renegotiation to end Iran’s nuclear weapons development?

Consider these other effects from the same strike:

It’s time for an intervention

Trump is dangerously crazy

By Bandy X. Lee

If Donald Trump were not president, he would have been held and evaluated long ago.  Mental health professionals have deemed this a “no brainer” since early 2017.  

Dangerousness is more about the situation than the person, and we ask questions such as whether the environment, including others, can constrain the person and whether one has access to weapons.

The concerns expressed at an ethics conference at Yale and in the public-service book, The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump, unfolded over the past two years with exactitude: incitements to violence, cruel policies against children that lay the groundwork for future violence, and the fostering of a culture of violence both domestically and abroad.

With the impeachment hearings, Trump’s behavior has grown even more erratic … his psychological structure makes him especially prone to violent revenge in the face of humiliation.

With the announcement of an impeachment inquiry, we warned of our entering “a very dangerous state” and the need to handle the situation adeptly from a psychological point of view.  We wrote an urgent letter to Congress members gathering 250 signatures.  

Three days later, without informing his advisors, the president unleashed Turkish forces on our allies and handed over advantage to our enemies.  These are predictable and therefore preventable events.

2019, The Year Trump Made A Hash Of U.S. Foreign Policy

Just one of those things that happen when you have a crazy person in charge

By Terry H. Schwadron, DCReport Opinion Editor

Trump actually curtesied to the King of Saudi Arabia, despite 11 of the 12
9/11 suicide bombers who were Saudis (and likely supported by some
Saudi leaders) and the murder of Jamal Khashoggi

End of year proves a good platform for looking back to sum up administration achievements or missteps over the year, as well as how certain we are about the directions in which our nation is moving.

Americans looking at foreign policy and our relationships overseas will find this year deepened U.S. isolationism, widened support for authoritarian governments, made American primacy in trade the weather vane for our thinking, as opposed to, say, human rights,  and continued Donald Trump’s role as a worldwide disrupter.

A foreign policy built on tariffs and the threat of tariffs creates and maintains an underlying sense of uncertainty among investors.

The only person Trump has NEVER criticized is Vladimir Putin (BBC)

The year will start and end with Trump’s confusing meld of domestic political gain toward his reelection with the formation of the people and policies of America’s standing with the rest of the world. 

The impeachment proceedings that hang over the end of the year are a textbook on using the levels of official policies and rogue personal political desire for dirt on political enemies with interference in domestic elections by foreign governments.

Overall, our foreign policy year is a mixed record at best, even if you somehow subscribe to American boorishness in the china shop of diplomacy.

Who loves ya, baby?

Trump's real war on xmas

A brief guide to how the US trade wars will affect your holiday shopping
Charles Hankla, Georgia State University

Some gifts may soon get more expensive. imtmphoto/Shutterstock.com 

With more tariffs on Chinese imports set to take effect this month, holiday shoppers in the U.S. face a dilemma: buy the Apple iPhone 11 or Hasbro toy action figures now or risk facing higher prices later.

On Dec. 15, in the middle of the holiday shopping season, the Trump administration plans to slap new 15% tariffs on US$160 billion of electronics, toys, clothing, power tools and many other consumer goods.

U.S.-based importers have to pay the extra tax before bringing those products into the country. Whether or not they pass the bill on to consumers is hard to predict, but a recent report put the cost for the average household at $1,000 a year once the newest tariffs take effect.

As a political economist, I usually write about how President Donald Trump’s trade policies affect things like industrial production, employment and international relations. But with the China tariffs and even a 100% tax on imports of French champagne and cheese looming over holiday shoppers, I thought it would be helpful to offer a short guide on how these issues affect consumers.

Congress Must Weigh Trump’s Poisonous Narcissism As Well As His Corruption

Psychological factors need to be considered as well as legal considerations in this impeachment

By Bandy X. Lee

Leading psychiatrists and I, along with more than 650 other mental health professionals, submitted a “Petition to the Judiciary Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives,” to include our statement on the psychological dangers of the president. 

It reads: “We are speaking out at this time because … as the time of possible impeachment approaches, Donald Trump has the real potential to become ever more dangerous, a threat to the safety of our nation.” 

We believe we have an ethical obligation to warn of the danger that Mr. Trump poses as the impeachment process proceeds and have offered ourselves for consultation.

The World Mental Health Coalition was formed to step in where we believe our own professional associations have failed in leadership. 

The American Psychiatric Association’s own ethics guideline states: “Psychiatrists are encouraged to serve society by advising and consulting with the executive, legislative, and judiciary branches of the government.”

We are deeply concerned about the president’s mental instability, which continues to go unmanaged alongside his unchecked proximity to nuclear weapons and other war-making powers

Trump is getting nuttier

Trump’s 53-minute Fox rant is another dangerous sign of his worsening mental state: Yale psychiatrist

By Bandy X. Lee, DC Report @Raw Story

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the White House doctor said of Donald Trump’s recent, sudden visit to Walter Reed Hospital: “Despite some speculation, the President … did not undergo any specialized cardiac or neurologic evaluations.”

You don’t have to be a medical professional to recognize that the patterns of the unscheduled visit, interrupting the weekend on a Saturday evening, conform more closely to a medical emergency than a routine check-up.

Just as the reality of Mr. Trump’s corruption and criminality is catching up with him through the impeachment hearings, the reality of his mental and physical condition cannot help but catch up with him.

Some of this was on full display in his highly concerning, 53-minute breathless outpour of grievances that his interview with Fox and Friends on Friday morning became.

He reverted to conspiracy theories—as he often does under stress—of Barack Obama’s wire surveillance of him, a coup in the works from the beginning, and the claim that Ukraine, not Russia, interfered in the 2016 election and had a secret DNC server.

These are the very self-defeating, blatantly abnormal signs that have raised alarms for psychiatrists and neurologists for years.

Who are the Kurds and why should you care?

Why there is no Kurdish nation: Trump wasn't the only one who sold them out
John Broich, Case Western Reserve University

Flag of Kurdistan on military uniform. Bumble Dee/Shutterstock.com 

Since U.S. troops left their region, roughly 180,000 Kurds of northeastern Syria have been displaced, and over 200 have been killed.

Those Kurds, soldiers who’d battled the Islamic State and families, had hoped to secure a future Kurdistan state in areas now targeted by Turkish warplanes and patrolled by Russian mercenaries.

This is only the latest reversal for the Kurds, a group of around 40 million who identify with a regional homeland and common historical background, but are now divided between four countries. 

Despite their many attempts, they have never won and kept a Kurdish nation.

There’s A Secret ‘Deep State’ Army Quietly Uncovering Trump’s Corruption

Inspectors General alert Congress to abuses in government, from the Pentagon to ICE

By Tom Buerkle

Our government’s Inspectors General pose one of the biggest threats to Donald Trump’s presidency. The IGs’ unique status as independent watchdogs who report both to their own agencies and to Congress make them powerful tools to root out presidential abuse, fraud and corruption.

The Intelligence Community Inspector General triggered the House impeachment investigation by bringing forth the anonymous whistleblower complaint revealing that Trump pressured Ukraine’s new leader to publicly declare the country was digging dirt on Joe Biden.

Multiple IG inquiries now bear down on Trump’s maladministration of our government, each gathering facts about Team Trump’s disregard for the rule of law.

Abuse of asylum seekers on our southern border is in the sights of the Department of Homeland Security’s IG. In a July report, he called on officials to take immediate action to alleviate “dangerous overcrowding and prolonged detention of children and adults” in the Rio Grande Valley.

Team Trump’s conduct makes clear it wants to suppress or distract attention from critical inspectors general reports

The number of people border patrol agents apprehended there more than doubled to 223,000 from October 2018 and May 2019, compared with the same period a year earlier.

‘Egregious Violations’ and Little Discipline

A separate report the previous month cited “egregious violations” of standards at Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facilities in California and New Jersey. Yet another reported on a lack of oversight of misconduct and discipline.

In an August report, the Pentagon’s inspector general warned that without American troops in Syria the combined forces of Iraq’s army and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces would be “unable to sustain long-term operations against ISIS militants” at a time when that Islamic group was increasing its attacks in the region.

That didn’t stop commander-in-chief Trump from abruptly tweeting a major change in Mideast policy on Oct, 7 that endangered both our national security and our elite troops in northern Syria. 

Trump tweeted without notifying the generals and blindsided even White House national security officials.

Turkey’s invasion forced our soldiers to flee so quickly that they left half-eaten meals, 
prompting Russian state television to mock our troops. American warplanes had to bomb our own nearby munitions dumps to keep the weapons from hostile hands.

Fierce criticism from Republicans led Trump to retreat and use American forces to prevent ISIS from gaining control of Syrian oil fields and perhaps seize them, which would be a crime under international law.

Curious Cloud Contract

The Defense Department Acting IG is investigating the Pentagon’s awarding of a $10 billion cloud computing contract to Microsoft. Amazon had long been considered the favorite to win the business because it provides cloud services to the CIA. Trump has long attacked Amazon’s founder, Jeff Bezos, accusing his Washington Post of spreading fake news.

Even Trump’s trade wars are getting close scrutiny. The Commerce Department’s IG office late last month warned Secretary Wilbur Ross that lax procedures mean favored companies and industries could improperly influence department officials to win exemptions from the Trump’s steel and aluminum tariffs. 

And only days earlier IG Peggy Gustafson told Ross she lacked the staff to properly vet the huge increase in foreign investments into our country that the Trump administration is demanding to blunt China.

Team Trump’s conduct makes clear it wants to suppress or distract attention from critical IG reports or even just making documents available to Congressional investigators. Last April Trump ordered his entire administration to largely ignore Congressional oversight, a core function of Congress under our Constitution’s system of checks and balances.

Inspectors General Unite

After Trump’s Justice Department tried to silence the Ukraine whistleblower in October, 67 of the 73 IGs rallied to the whistleblower’s defense.

The Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel had tried to silence the intelligence whistleblower, whose complaint triggered the impeachment inquiry. That drew a sharp rebuke from the Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency.

The IG’s letter warned that such suppression efforts “could seriously undermine the critical role whistleblowers play in coming forward to report waste, fraud, and abuse across the federal government.”

Brave Bureaucrats

Significantly, the first of 67 signatures on the Oct. 22 letter came from the Justice Department’s own IG, Michael Horowitz.

That united public defense was an act of “bureaucratic bravery,” John Hudak, deputy director of the Center for Effective Public Management at the Brookings Institution, told DCReport.

There’s no small irony in the activism of the IGs. Congress created these watchdogs in all cabinet departments and federal entities under a 1978 law, part of a wave of clean government legislation passed after the Watergate scandal forced Richard Nixon to resign rather than face impeachment.

The inspectors general are unlikely to thwart administration policy, at least in the short run.

To Trump they provide a convenient foil, embodying what he claims is a “deep state” of unelected bureaucrats, a claim that fuels conspiracy theorists and fringe elements who claim our federal government is a criminal organization.

And they can’t force change, but their reports can motivate Congress and the White House to act. The Office of Personnel Management’s IG calls for tighter data security went unheeded until 2015, when during the Obama administration OPM revealed suspected Chinese hackers had stolen sensitive information including Social Security numbers of nearly 20 million people who applied for government background clearances.

IG Budget Cuts

IGs have a unique independent status, reporting both to their executive agencies as well as to Congress. They also deliver real value, generating $14 in cost savings and fraud recoveries for every dollar they spent in fiscal 2018. That gives them clout and allies on both sides of the political divide.

Team Trump has cut IG budgets, as did Obama. They declined more than 7 percent over six years, to $2.5 billion in fiscal 2018, even as overall federal spending rose by more than 16 percent, to $4.1 trillion. That may explain why IG induced savings and recoveries fell to $36.2 billion, down 22% from $46.3 billion.

Today nine cabinet departments lack a Senate-confirmed IG, including the CIA, the Pentagon, Education and Health and Human Services. A president who knows that IGs dig up facts which he has tried to keep hidden is, predictably, in no hurry to plug that gap.

The Emperor decides

By David Horsey

For Russia, Trump is the gift that keeps on giving

Trump Gives Vladimir Putin A Winning Ticket

By David Cay Johnston, DC Report Editor-in-Chief

"Give us a kiss."

Vladimir Putin must be smiling – even laughing out loud — at the bungling Donald Trump’s crazy mess in Syria.

Putin is the clear winner in Trump’s blood-soaked disaster. 

By tweeting without telling the generals his signal for Turkey to invade Syria, Trump forced American troops to flee half-eaten meals so they could escape alive. 

His inept (to be kind) actions then required our Air Force to bomb America’s weapons storage base in Northern Syria.

This 100% Trumpian disaster in the Middle East is unfolding so fast it’s easy to get lost in details. So, let’s walk through the significance of Trump’s incompetent actions. They came about for a simple reason. An ignorant, mentally disturbed, play-acting president has no idea what he is doing.

Trump brought this all on his own. We need to make sure Trump owns responsibility, especially when the next American is killed by any of those escaped prisoners.

As Speaker Nancy Pelosi says, ‘All roads lead to Putin.

Yeah, tell them

Thoughts and prayers

What kind of "stable genius" writes this kind of letter?

The BBC reports that after receiving this letter, the Turkish leader threw it in the trash.