So, Donald Trump and his loyal minions on social media have launched a campaign to define and disqualify Ron DeSantis.
This is ‘fair game’ in politics, and it’s clearly a coordinated effort by Trump and his team...who are recruiting all sorts of trump diehards into the effort on social media: as we know-some trump fans will believe anything that comes out of his mouth and quickly pivot and ‘turn on’ anyone who trump now tells them is an enemy.
That’s what Trump is expecting to happen here.
But....it isn’t lost on me that-yet again-we see Donald Trump fall into this self-destructive pattern of just a few hours or a few days after he has had a ‘good bit of PR’....turning around and harming himself with more eye rolling nonsense.
It was just Monday that I was giving Trump credit for having a good weekend-giving two very good, content heavy, speeches. Talking about how he’d stand up for the American people and change things in 2025...
And then, within hours on Monday....Trump was posting more ugly sentiments on truth social- related to everything from Ron DeSantis ....to Stormy Daniels’ horse face....
Huh.
He sure is a man who makes it hard to like him, isn’t he?
And yesterday- sparked by Trump comments on Sunday and follow-up posts on Monday- in which trump lies to the masses and misrepresents his own role in the covid lock downs- and the fact that he -he- urged Ron DeSantis to close Florida when DeSantis didn’t want to-
This wider war between the two sides breaks out. Trump and his team have decided to ‘define’ Ron DeSantis, and apparently, by lying about his record-and Trumps- which I find remarkable.
The biggest trump attack yesterday was how Ron DeSantis temporarily closed Florida in the early days of covid- and he did- but only after Donald Trump insisted, he do so- from the white house.
The conversation was well-documented at the time. We can get to this later if we have time-but the truth is: Gov DeSantis wanted to keep Florida open, but buckled to trump’s pressure, after trump called and lectured him on the number of people who might die.
Folks-the truth is- both trump and DeSantis were working off the best information they had on covid and the time-and made hard choices.
Neither man is to blame for the calls they made-in the early days of a pandemic.
But if trump-really-wants to use this to slam DeSantis, then it’s trump who is being disingenuous and lying-because it was trump who essentially forced DeSantis’ hand and caused the Florida lockdown.
And now-over the last few days-Trump is going to pretend that he was the one urging Florida remain open, and DeSantis wanted to lock it down?
That’s just lying...and I’m not going to pretend otherwise. All sorts of conservatives on social media were simply going back yesterday and posting old tweets from trump...and news articles confirming that it was trump who was pushing for a Florida lock down.
As one blue-check conservative put it:
I’m not mad about Trump trying to define DeSantis. But please don’t think I’m one of the dullards who will believe this. Trump is on record being very pro-lockdown. Even ripped Kemp and Swedes for opening. Don’t try this on me. This is for the low-information voters.
Yep. This show host, Jesse Kelly, even included a tweet from 2020- in which trump was touting his brilliant support of lock downs...and slamming the Swedish govt. for not doing so. Trump tweeted quote.
Photo: JON, GREGORY
Trump is simply lying to his supporters now, when he claims DeSantis is the one trying to rewrite history on the covid lockdowns. It is-trump- that is doing so. We have a mountain of receipts on it.
How threatened is Donald trump-by DeSantis-that he’s trying to turn facts and history ‘upside down’ on the governor?
And I get what trump is trying to do: his biggest weakness with voters, especially older voters, is in how -he-trump- handled covid. I thought he did so brilliantly, at the time, along with mike pence. They worked with the information and resources that they had and developed vaccines in blazing speed- but ‘America at large’ has convinced themselves that trump made mistakes...
And one of the largest...according to anti-vax conservatives....is that Trump pushed the vaccines. Still stands behind the vaccines.
Meanwhile, gov DeSantis was wary of the vaccines and-forced-vaccination, practically from day one. That is now the more popular ‘take’ with most members of the GOP grass roots.
And so- now Trump and his team are trying to take one of DeSantis’s biggest strengths and try to turn it into a weakness. I get the technique. I just don’t approve of the naked lying, to do so.
As Jesse Kelly says: Trump’s team here is trying to dupe the low-information voters and recruit their small army of unquestioning Trump loyalists into believing and spreading the lies.
That sort of thing drives me crazy. I call out the democrats when they do it. I’ll call out trump on it, now.
Then we get to the bitter name calling in tweets and the ‘disloyalty’ crappola...that I find especially irksome.
And I’m telling you, this is the stuff that’s going to turn off 2/3 of republican voters in the primaries.
This is the stuff that’s going to keep Donald Trump from being nominated, if anything will: his obsession with ‘destroying anyone’ who he doesn’t like in any given moment, or who he feels betrayed him. Wasn’t loyal to him.
It is the ‘line of attack’ on DeSantis, or any other fellow republican, that I find the most moronic and ludicrous, coming from Donald trump.
Donald trump-did not- ‘make’ Ron DeSantis’ political career. DeSantis was -not- going to lose until trump stepped in. And now, years later, having Ron DeSantis wanting to run for president -is not-some betrayal of Donald trump...and if you think so...grow up.
Ron DeSantis is his own man, who built his own career. And in one gov’s race-trump endorsed him. That’s it.
That is the sum-total of Donald Trump ‘making’ Ron DeSantis. And so, what sort of egomaniac is Donald Trump...to claim DeSantis owes him his career?
Moreover, anyone in this country can run for the President of the United States if they want to-and any time they want to-and anyone who wants to tell you otherwise is wrong... And anyone who insists that someone else needs to ‘wait their turn’ ...is a dope: that pattern has led to some of America’s worst candidates and worst presidents-
And anyone- anyone- in the political arena who is going to act like a king...and demand fealty...and talk in terms of ‘loyalty and betrayals’...is too much of a blowhard to be listened to.
Really- gloves off: Donald Trump...with this ‘loyalty’ crap is irksome. And it sure is situational, isn’t it?
Trump is encouraging some of his own former staffers to run.... like Nikki Haley and Mike Pompeo...and he sure would argue that he ‘made them’...even though he didn’t.
But he’d insist that he ‘made them’ too, or at least put them in the position to run for president. So why isn’t he trashing Haley and Pompeo as disloyal?
Meanwhile- there is no one in his administration who demonstrated more loyalty, took more indefensible positions, and ate more crap for it than mike pence. Pence was an incredibly loyal and stellar VP and Trump now hates him, too, because Pence wouldn’t violate the constitution when trump asked him to.
So-if you are buying into this trump ‘loyalty’ crap, take another look at your position-and trumps.He is the one who is disloyal to people-and he can change on a whim.
How insane is it-to demand loyalty-like a king?
He’s not a king. He hasn’t been usurped or lost his throne.
He was elected president once and lost in his second attempt. And yes-a lot of us will always have questions about the legitimacy of the 2020 election results- but either way-Donald Trump has no ‘right’, birth right, or victim’s right to a second term in the white house...and if he thinks he does- then he’s the one being delusional.
Moreover- his attacks on DeSantis are far more likely to backfire on him-then benefit him.
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