An honest question: If Donald Trump were trying to lose the presidency, what would he have done differently? Not much, if you ask me. No, I’m not suggesting Trump wants to lose so he can be a martyr and quit having to do any real work. This theory, which I see as the triumph of hope over optimism, continues to persist (at some points, the hope […]
Matt Lewis
27 posts
It was another balancing act for Joe Biden tonight, and if Donald Trump hadn’t killed our outrage receptors, many of us would probably find the confusion truly alarming. Even if you’re convinced that Biden is, by far, the lesser of two evils, it’s still worth taking a minute to stop to consider what we might be getting ourselves into with Biden and the Democrats. It ain’t […]
In Amy Coney Barrett’s America, the Supreme Court will take health care away from millions of people during a deadly pandemic. That is inevitable, at least, if you believe what Democrats had to say on the first day of Barrett’s confirmation hearing. Democrats had plenty of visual props to reinforce this point: Photos of people with pre-existing conditions on easels, which had the effect of making […]
Donald Trump is headed toward a massive defeat—at least, if any of the polls (or our eyes) are to be believed. What is more, there’s a decent chance a massive blue wave could do the unthinkable, sweeping even “safe” Republicans like South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham out to sea. If that happens, there will be a window of time, however fleeting, for sane Republicans to try […]
The news that President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump contracted COVID-19 serves as a reminder: This is why having an irresponsible man-child as president is a bad thing, irrespective of everything else. It’s not that the president tested positive; that could be any president. But just two-and-a-half days ago, at the presidential debate, this president, who went months without ever wearing a mask, said […]
Tuesday’s “debate” was a trainwreck. A national embarrassment. A disgrace. If Joe Biden were looking for a pretext to skip the next two debates, he found it. It would be hard to blame him for concluding this is simply a waste of everyone’s time. We’ll see. From the start of this debate, Donald Trump interrupted Biden. Repeatedly. For a while there, it looked like Biden was […]
Amy Coney Barrett, the smart young nominee, accompanied by her young family (including seven children—two of whom were adopted from Haiti), entered the fray today. Noting the number of justices on the Supreme Court, she joked: “I’m used to being in a group of nine—my family.” It was a beautiful scene in the Rose Garden. The flags were flying—God knows there were plenty of flags—but, more […]
When I look at the smears already being aimed at potential Supreme Court Justice nominee Amy Coney Barrett, I’m left with one conclusion: This is how we got Donald Trump. Long before Trump took that now-famous escalator ride, conservatives were regularly attacked in pretty unfair ways. The closer to an election or confirmation vote, the more vicious the attacks. In recent years, decent, mainstream conservatives have […]
If you want to know who will win the presidency in 60 days, the real question may be this: What crazy story will dominate the news between now and then? In politics, the battle isn’t just over which candidate you prefer. Often, that determination is downstream from a more urgent question: What issue are you thinking about when you go to the ballot box? This explains […]
Donald Trump’s alleged comments that Americans who died serving our country are “losers” and “suckers” probably won’t matter—unless it is the first salvo in a larger battle. If elections are about who’s on offense on who’s on defense, then the biggest thing about this military story may be another lost cycle for Trump where he’s responding to a story not of his choosing, and as he’s […]
If you don’t think Donald Trump could still win this election, then you’re snorting better Xanax than I am. Trump is a preternaturally gifted demagogue with riots and a bully pulpit to exploit. He has three debates still on the calendar, a history of stunning everyone, and a couple of months to work his magic. Counting him out at a time when cities are on fire […]
Donald Trump’s acceptance speech Thursday night was interminable, sprawling, and littered with superfluous lines. But it also included some finely tuned themes that were repeated over and over during the four-night infomercial called the Republican National Convention, starting with the timely issue of law and order. “If the Democrat Party wants to stand with anarchists, agitators, rioters, looters, and flag-burners, that is up to them,” Trump […]
Eight years ago, Bill Clinton earned the title “explainer-in-chief” when his speech at the Democratic National Convention made a very persuasive case for reelecting Barack Obama. Mike Pence earned that title this year, after Bubba was all but sidelined by his party, in his renomination acceptance speech Wednesday night that connected all the dots and laid out the brick-by-brick argument for why Donald Trump deserves four […]
In one day, John Kasich managed to make AOC and Donald Trump mad at him. I guess we know why his is the road less traveled. Standing at a literal crossroads (or was it a fork in the road?) the former Ohio governor did the unthinkable for a man once thought of as a conservative Gingrich Republican: He spoke at the Democratic National Convention on behalf […]
Wilmington, we have a problem. It appears that this election is Joe Biden’s to lose. His last hurdle is a low one: demonstrating that he is, in fact, still alive and up to the task. All he has to do is show that this isn’t a “Weekend at Bernie’s” scenario, and he’s golden. But can he do it? The verdict is still out. On Thursday night, […]
Has Donald Trump officially become a laughingstock? I guess it depends on which channel you watch. On Wednesday morning, Trump phoned in to “Fox & Friends,” where he talked ad nauseum, for over an hour, only occasionally stopping his ramblings to field “questions” about what a great job he’s doing and how lousy his enemies are. The phoner may have been intended as a chaser to […]
This spring, I thrilled my newfound liberal readers by voting for Joe Biden in the Super Tuesday primary. Unfortunately, the honeymoon was short-lived. The praise ended almost immediately, when they read past the headline and discovered my plans to (again) abstain from voting in the general election. With less than 100 days left, it’s probably time to more fully explain my rationale. Why is it that […]
Donald Trump’s Tweet Thursday morning “just asking” about delaying the presidential election might be a shark bump ahead of him devouring democracy, but it seems much more likely it is the pathetic last gasp of a desperate, losing politician: The moment where Trump publicly came to grips with the fact that his reelection campaign is swirling down the golden toilet. There’s no cavalry coming this time. […]
Campaign shake ups are overrated. This is especially true of a presidential campaign where the candidates have 100 percent name recognition. The real manager of Donald Trump’s campaign is Trump. He can hire Brad Parscale or Bill Stepien or Mother Teresa and it won’t make a bit of difference. In this regard, the main reason for switching campaign managers (aside from Trump’s desire to self-soothe) is […]
If you need proof that Donald Trump’s tenure will leave Republicans worse off—collectively and individually—than when they found him, please allow me to introduce you to Jeff Sessions, whose political career came to an abrupt close Tuesday night. Six years ago, Sessions was a powerful U.S. Senator. He had run unopposed for his fourth senate term, and Jesus Christ might have had a hard time defeating […]
For much of Donald Trump’s presidency, the phrase “Imagine if Obama had” served as a reminder of the double standards and hypocrisy required to defend Trump’s rhetoric and actions. But when it comes to the most recent example of hypocritical corruption, the pardoning of his longtime friend and “partner-in-crime” Roger Stone—who was convicted of lying to Congress and witness tampering in the course of Special Counsel […]
Photo Illustration by Sarah Rogers/The Daily Beast / Photos Getty Are you better off now than you were four years ago? For Republicans, the answer is decidedly “No.” Consider this startling stat: Dave Wasserman, House editor for the Cook Political Report, recently noted that “when President Trump took office in January 2017, there were 241 Republicans in the House. Since then, 115 (48 percent) have either […]
It started with an underwhelming crowd, which only matters because of how he’s hyped and exaggerated expectations for them. To paraphrase the movie Spinal Tap, Trump’s popularity isn’t waning, his appeal is just becoming more selective. But even the crowd who did show up seemed to be more subdued than normal. Sure, they applauded. Sure, they cheered. But it seemed like they were going through the […]
Democrats might have stumbled into nominating the only Democrat in America who is immune to being canceled or woke: Joe Biden. While many activists and Democrats were embracing the suicidal “defund the police” slogan, Biden called for policing reforms and firmly stated he does not support defunding the police. Then, he stuck by his guns, defending his decision on The Daily Show. Whatever progressives mean when […]
If you’ve ever tried to cram for the SATs after partying all senior year, you know how desperate Donald Trump’s current situation is. He is running for his political life. He’s running out of gas. And he’s running out of time. Meanwhile, Joe Biden is calm, cool, and collected—and seemingly cruising to victory. What gives? Source link
During an interview with Fox News’ Jeanine Pirro this weekend, Donald Trump’s son Eric suggested the COVID-19 shutdowns are a “cognizant strategy” meant to hurt his father’s re-election chances. “You watch, they’ll milk it every single day between now and November 3,” he said. “And guess what, after November 3, coronavirus will magically, all of a sudden, go away and disappear and everybody will be able […]
If you were holding out hope for 2020 to be any less horrible, consider that the donning of protective face masks in the midst of a pandemic has emerged as the symbolic dividing line in the culture war. This is both stupid and sadly predictable. Controversy erupted on the right this week when Rusty Reno, editor of First Things, a once highly respected conservative religious journal, […]