On the menu today: The U.S. has real problems, and the Republican Party faces an enormously consequential choice about its presidential nominee in 2024. And yet, judging from former president Donald Trump’s Truth Social feed, the Trump of this cycle will be like that of 2020, only “moreso,” — even more erratic and focused on juvenile name-calling and personal insults. You know, America, if you wanted to see Trump hurling Don Rickles-style insults on another prime-time reality show, I’m sure some network or streaming service would be happy to organize that. How about we leave the presidency to the grown adults who actually want to do the work?
If Biden Is Almost Senile . . . What Is Trump?
This is an actual Truth Social post from former president Donald Trump yesterday:
Have you heard that “Rob” DeSanctimonious wants to change his name, again. He is demanding that people call him DeeeSantis, rather than DaSantis. Actually, I like “Da” better, a nicer flow, so I am happy he is changing it. He gets very upset when people, including reporters, don’t pronounce it correctly. Therefore, he shouldn’t mind, DeSanctimonious?
These are apparently the sorts of thoughts that consume the mind of one of the four people most likely to take the oath of office on the steps of the U.S. Capitol on January 20, 2025. (The other three are Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, and Ron DeSantis. While some other figure could surprise us all by leaping to the Democratic or Republican presidential nomination, or even by mounting a competitive independent bid, right now, all other figures are extreme underdogs.)
By the way, the next evidence that DeSantis “gets very upset when people, including reporters, don’t pronounce it correctly,” will be the first evidence.
Trump, however, is not alone in spending time and energy contemplating the proper pronunciation of “DeSantis.” The New York Times ran a two-byline column, “Deh-Santis or Dee-Santis? Even He Has Been Inconsistent,” although they at least acknowledged that it is a “highly inconsequential matter.” Axios also believed that this topic was worth spending time, energy, reader attention, and some of humanity’s presumably finite supply of neurons on. (In Mike Allen’s newsletter today, the “How do you pronounce DeSantis’s name” section is above the section about the House passing the debt-ceiling deal. Smart brevity! All the news you need, if you have the attention span of an over-caffeinated ferret.)
The former president seems to think it is a real power move to call the Florida governor “Rob.” I suppose this is a demonstration that DeSantis is so unimportant that Trump can’t be bothered to remember his first name. But this demonstration of DeSantis’s alleged unimportance is undermined by the fact that Trump’s Truth Social feed is an endless tirade against DeSantis. If you genuinely don’t care about someone, you don’t spend a lot of time and energy talking about them. Trump’s social-media activity makes him look obsessed with DeSantis, not above him. Trump is still sharing memes about the failure of the Elon Musk–DeSantis Twitter Spaces event. It’s been a week, and DeSantis has done a full schedule of events and interviews. The world has moved on. Trump hasn’t.
Beyond these two men, the ever-expanding Republican presidential field is now set to feature (deep breath): Nikki Haley, Tim Scott, Mike Pence, Chris Christie, Vivek Ramaswamy, Chris Sununu, Doug Burgum, Larry Elder, Asa Hutchinson . . . and perhaps a few others.
These candidates will attempt to win your vote by laying out proposals on how they would counter the rise of China, secure our border and build an immigration system that works, roll back the federal bureaucracy and administrative state, make sure schools are preparing our children for the challenges of the future economy, stem and roll back the rising tide of crime and chaos in our cities, deal with the ever-increasing federal debt, and address the ominous indicator of a shrinking birth rate and a general darkening pessimism about America’s future.
And then there’s going to be Trump, who may well spend part of a debate mocking DeSantis for allegedly not knowing how to pronounce his own name.
Way back in the prehistoric times of my high-school years, I had a drama teacher who loved using the word “moreso.” (As the Grammarist explains, “Though the phrase more so is conventionally spelled as two words, the one-word moreso gained ground in the late 20th century and continues to appear despite the disapproval of usage authorities and of spell check.”)
The 2024 cycle Trump will be the Trump of 2020, only “moreso.” More insulting, more raging, more unhinged, more obsessed with irrelevant minutiae and what the media is saying about him — why would any American president get so worked up about what Don Lemon or Mika Brzezinski are saying about him? — and even more reflexively lashing out against anything he perceives as a slight or disloyalty. (Lord knows I’ve had disagreements with Kayleigh McEnany, but she was about as hardworking and dedicated a staffer as Trump had in his administration. Trump served up an out-of-the-blue tirade calling for Fox News to fire McEnany — calling her “milktoast,” his spelling — because she cited a poll he didn’t like. It’s a sign that during the 2024 campaign, Trump will turn against and lash out against anyone for anything. When a guy runs around saying “I am your retribution,” it’s a sign that he gets up in the morning hungering for his own retribution.
Why is Trump attacking DeSantis as an advocate of lockdowns during the pandemic, when we all remember the opposite? (The Editors set the record straight today.) Because the truth doesn’t matter to him, and he’ll just grab whatever argument sounds or feels effective at any given moment, often ignoring the fact that he’s said the opposite recently. (Notice that DeSantis’s announcement video included the line, “truth must be our foundation.”)
But the other dirty little secret is that Trump doesn’t really know what he thinks about a lot of topics. Regarding Disney, back in April, Trump argued that DeSantis was being too combative with the entertainment conglomerate and recklessly endangering his state’s economy:
DeSanctus is being absolutely destroyed by Disney. His original P.R. plan fizzled, so now he’s going back with a new one in order to save face. Disney’s next move will be the announcement that no more money will be invested in Florida because of the Governor – In fact, they could even announce a slow withdrawal or sale of certain properties, or the whole thing. Watch! That would be a killer. In the meantime, this is all so unnecessary, a political STUNT! Ron should work on the squatter MESS!
That . . . is not aligned with the thinking of many Republicans who see Disney as an aggressive colossus in the culture wars that needs to be reined in — one whose quasi-governmental status under the Reedy Creek Improvement District agreement was long-overdue for revision.
Now, Trump’s argument is that Disney is too woke, and it’s somehow DeSantis’s fault for not stopping it earlier:
Disney has become a Woke and Disgusting shadow of its former self, with people actually hating it. Must go back to what it once was, or the “market” will do irreparable damage. This all happened during the Governorship of “Rob” DeSanctimonious. Instead of complaining now, for publicity reasons only, he should have stopped it long ago. Would have been easy to do — Still is!
Trump doesn’t spell out how he would stop Disney from becoming “woke,” but he merely asserts that it would be, and will be, easy to do. Probably just as easy as ending the Russia–Ukraine war in one day. Or as easy as ending birthright citizenship within one day.
You notice Trump keeps telling us about all these seemingly difficult and challenging tasks that he will get done in no time, that for some reason he never got around to doing during the four years he was president.
I’m going to let you in on a not-so-little not-so-secret. Trump has little to no idea how to do any of these things. He likely thinks he can just write executive orders, and hopes they’ll survive judicial review — assuming he thinks about judicial review at all. Trump never bothers to do his homework, and thus has no idea how anything works. We see this over and over again. While attempting to repeal Obamacare, he fumed at House Republicans, “Forget about the little s***.” The alleged little s***” were key details of the proposal — “language that would leave Obamacare’s ‘essential health benefits’ in place, the community rating provision that limited what insurers could charge certain patients, and whether the next two steps of Speaker Paul Ryan’s master plan were even feasible.”
This isn’t a preference for looking at the big picture; this is a lack of patience or interest in the details of policy — which can be enormously consequential. Trump and his administration spent years “renegotiating” NAFTA, only to end up with something that was hard to distinguish from the original trade agreement. Trump cares a lot more about getting a deal-signing ceremony than what’s actually in the deal he signs.
Early in his presidency, he whined, “Nobody knew health care could be so complicated.” A few months later, he complained, “This is more work than in my previous life. I thought it would be easier.” In office, Trump’s daily schedule grew lighter and lighter, year by year. Vast swaths of weekdays were set aside for “executive time,” which was a euphemism for “unstructured time Trump spends tweeting, phoning friends, and watching television.”
But hey, Trump turns 77 this month. I’m sure he’ll work harder and be sharper, more focused, and more diligent and detail-oriented than he was four years ago.
There is a good chance that the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee will be Joe Biden — an 80-year-old man who mumbles and struggles to maintain anything close to the traditional presidential schedule. As Axios reported:
White House officials say it’s difficult to schedule public or private events with the president in the morning, in the evening, or on weekends: The vast majority of Biden’s public events happen on weekdays, between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m.
Which Republican figure do you think offers the best contrast with Biden?
ADDENDUM: In case you missed it yesterday, the Trump campaign attacked Ron DeSantis for issuing a statement in 2017 in support of Trump’s nomination of FBI director Christopher Wray. Hey, if issuing a statement of support for Wray is somehow disqualifying . . . what should Republicans think of the guy who picked Wray in the first place?
I had missed that earlier this year, Trump said that he had picked Wray because he was recommended by Chris Christie and Democrats liked him. You would think that a president who believed a deep state was out to get him would be a little more wary of appointing an FBI director who was endorsed by “people from the other side.”