What Happened Last Night?
Trump's unpresidential speech.
Really, do we have to do this?
Do we have to pretend that last night’s ritualized self-stroking performative bullsh*t and blather was some sort of meaningful or revealing moment in our politics?
Or can we just admit that for 100 minutes on Tuesday night, America collectively realized that it had picked a very bad week to stop sniffing glue?
Happy Wednesday.
Here’s a modest suggestion: why don’t we give up the insanity for Lent; and remember that we are not the crazy ones.
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Last night’s speech was not a State of the Union, or even a simulacrum; it was a rambling, invective-infected rally speech and, frankly, Democrats would have been better off staying away. No real news was made; no insights delivered; there was no memorable rhetoric. At one point Trump seemed to suggest a reset in relations with Ukraine, but you know how these things go. Check back tomorrow.
Let’s not pretend that the speech was presidential. Despite the trappings, Trump did not give a speech that any other president would have given to an anxious nation. What we got instead was the MAGA id, a fetid stew of culture war, name calling, cock-splaining, Fox News cliches, insults, threats, and… oh for chrissakes you’ve heard all this before…
It was, quipped Anne Applebaum, “90-plus minutes of bad moments — a typical Trump medley of fabrications, provocations and insults.”
And we are all dumber for it.
In response, Democrats jeered, waved signs, brandished canes, laughed, walked out, and generally reminded us that they have not yet figured out how to counter this firehose of abnormality.1 (Elissa Slotkin was a bright spot; which we will get to in a moment.) But let’s not pretend that anything changed.
**
Context is usually the first casualty in events like this.
Donald Trump returned to the scene of the crime last night — the Capitol he incited a mob to attack — as a convicted felon actively assaulting the rule of law; ripping through constitutional guardrails; and stoking a market-rattled trade war — less than a week after he switched sides in the great struggle for democracy. As usual, notes Susan Glasser, he strutted his more-than-an-hour-and-a-half on the stage with “his by-now-standard mix of braggadocio and self-pity, partisan bile and patently absurd lies”.
Predictably, the GOP cult gawped and clapped; while the ball-and-strikes pundits tried to tell us that Trump “delivered a master class in viral moments,” as if all politics is now merely a stream of dumbed down memes, and all of Trump’s lies are simply the harmless accessories of showmanship.
But, as Glasser — who was my guest on yesterday’s podcast — noted. “It turns out that even the most unhinged of Presidential speeches can seem kind of boring if it goes on long enough.” And, indeed, it did go on — becoming the longest as well as the most mendacious address of its type.
For Glasser, the defining moment of the night came as Trump “walked down the aisle and was, briefly, confronted by a Democratic congresswoman from New Mexico, Melanie Stansbury, wielding a small, hand-lettered sign. ‘This is Not Normal, it said.”
Almost as soon as she flashed it, a Republican congressman from Texas, Lance Gooden, ripped the sign out of her hands and threw it in the air.
Call it the Trump era’s new normal, where members of Congress fight like toddlers on the House floor while Putin gloats over the greatest self-own in modern history.
It’s a golden age, of bunk.
The Response
Then there was Elissa Slotkin, the newly elected Democratic senator from Michigan who delivered the official response. My friend Tom Nichols thinks Slotkin “failed to capture the hallucinatory nature of our national politics.” But I thought she struck the right note for the evening— and the reviews were remarkably good.2 She was calm, measured and direct; and she appealed to shared American values — and even invoked Ronald Reagan to shame Trump’s Republican fluffers.
Some highlights:
On the Economy and Musk:
Look, President Trump talked a big game on the economy, but it’s always important to read the fine print. So: do his plans actually help Americans get ahead? Not even close.
President Trump is trying to deliver an unprecedented giveaway to his billionaire friends. He’s on the hunt to find trillions of dollars to pass along to the wealthiest in America. And to do that, he’s going to make you pay in every part of your life.
Grocery and home prices are going up, not down — and he hasn’t laid out a credible plan to deal with either.
His tariffs on allies like Canada will raise prices on energy, lumber, cars — and start a trade war that will hurt manufacturing and farmers.
Your premiums and prescriptions will cost more because the math on his proposals doesn’t work without going after your health care.
Meanwhile, for those keeping score, the national debt is going up, not down. And if he’s not careful, he could walk us right into a recession.
And one more thing: In order to pay for his plan, he could very well come after your retirement – the Social Security, Medicare, and VA benefits you worked your whole life to earn. The President claims he won’t, but Elon Musk just called Social Security “the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time.”
While we’re on the subject of Elon Musk, is there anyone in America who is comfortable with him and his gang of 20-year-olds using their own computer servers to poke through your tax returns, your health information, and your bank accounts? No oversight. No protections against cyber-attack. No guardrails on what they do with your private data.
We need more efficient government. You want to cut waste, I’ll help you do it. But change doesn’t need to be chaotic or make us less safe.
The mindless firing of people who work to protect our nuclear weapons, keep our planes from crashing, and conduct the research that finds the cure for cancer — only to re-hire them two days later? No CEO in America could do that without being summarily fired.
National Security/Ukraine
President Trump loves to promise “peace through strength.” That’s actually a line he stole from Ronald Reagan. But let me tell you, after the spectacle that just took place in the Oval Office last week, Reagan must be rolling over in his grave. We all want an end to the war in Ukraine, but Reagan understood that true strength required America to combine our military and economic might with moral clarity.
And that scene in the Oval Office wasn’t just a bad episode of reality TV. It summed up Trump’s whole approach to the world. He believes in cozying up to dictators like Vladimir Putin and kicking our friends, like Canada, in the teeth. He sees American leadership as merely a series of real estate transactions.
As a Cold War kid, I’m thankful it was Reagan and not Trump in office in the 1980s. Trump would have lost us the Cold War.
Donald Trump’s actions suggest that, in his heart, he doesn’t believe we are an exceptional nation. He clearly doesn’t think we should lead the world.
Look, America’s not perfect. But I stand with most Americans who believe we are still exceptional. Unparalleled. And I would rather have American leadership over Chinese or Russian leadership any day of the week.
Because for generations, America has offered something better.
Exit take: More please. You can read the whole thing here.
Meanwhile:
BREAKING: “The Supreme Court voted 5-4 against the Trump administration’s effort to freeze foreign aid.
The Supreme Court rejected President Trump’s emergency request to freeze nearly $2 billion in foreign aid on Wednesday morning, saying a lower court judge “should clarify what obligations the government must fulfill.” Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justice Amy Coney Barrett joined the three liberal justices in a 5-4 vote. The case focuses on the U.S. Agency for International Development and Aid the administration halted on Mr. Trump’s first day in office.
Lech Walesa’s Message
ICYMY: former polish President Lech Walesa — joined by prominent pro-democracy dissidents — responded to last Friday’s Oval Office fiasco with an open letter. It is very much worth your time:
After the US decision to suspend supplies to Ukraine, if the answer was in my gesture it would be "Let's do our part" not a step back. AMEN.
This is the text we signed:
Your Excellency Mr President,
We watched the report of your conversation with the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenski with fear and distaste. We consider your expectations to show respect and gratitude for the material help provided by the United States fighting Russia to Ukraine insulting. Gratitude is due to the heroic Ukrainian soldiers who shed their blood in defense of the values of the free world. They have been dying on the frontline for more than 11 years in the name of these values and independence of their Homeland, which was attacked by Putin's Russia.
We do not understand how the leader of a country that is the symbol of the free world cannot see it.
Our panic was also caused by the fact that the atmosphere in the Oval Office during this conversation reminded us of one we remember well from Security Service interrogations and from the debate rooms in Communist courts. Prosecutors and judges at the behest of the all-powerful communist political police also explained to us that they hold all the cards and we hold none. They demanded us to stop our business, arguing that thousands of innocent people suffer because of us. They deprived us of our freedoms and civil rights because we refused to cooperate with the government and our gratitude. We are shocked that Mr. President Volodymyr Zelenski treated in the same way.
The history of the 20th century shows that every time the United States wanted to keep its distance from democratic values and its European allies, it ended up being a threat to themselves. This was understood by President Woodrow Wilson, who decided to join the United States in World War I in 1917. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt understood this, deciding after the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941 that the war for the defense of America would be fought not only in the Pacific, but also in Europe, in alliance with the countries attacked by the Third Reich.
We remember that without President Ronald Reagan and American financial commitment it would not have been possible to bring the collapse of the Soviet Union empire. President Reagan was aware that millions of enslaved people were suffering in Soviet Russia and the countries it conquered, including thousands of political prisoners who paid for their sacrifice in defense of democratic values with freedom. His greatness was m. in. on the fact that he without hesitation called the USSR the "Empire of Evil" and gave it a decisive fight. We won, and the statue of President Ronald Reagan stands today in Warsaw vis a vis of the US embassy.
Mr. President, material aid - military and financial - cannot be equivalent to the blood shed in the name of independence and freedom of Ukraine, Europe, as well as the whole free world. Human life is priceless, its value cannot be measured with money. Gratitude is due to those who make the sacrifice of blood and freedom….
Lech Wales, b. political prisoner, Solidarity leader, president of the Republic of Poland III
Wednesday dogs
Eli and Pete
Al Green waved his cane, yelled, and got kicked out. That will likely make him a hero of the Resistance. I’m guessing that most Americans thought it was pretty cringey. Bottomline: More Slotkin. Less Green.
Compare Slotkin to last year’s “response” from Senator Katie Britt:
Thank you..I did not watch it because I cannot tolerate his voice/nastiness even for a minute.
At least Al Green showed some spine.