The shutdown is strategic for Trump. No Republican is working to end the shutdown. It’s a test of how much chaos we can endure. How much before constituents urge the senate to use the nuclear option and they grab all the power and officially end democratic process.
I'm not sure it would be accurate to call Trump a sadist, but he's certainly lacking in the kind of empathy and kindness that most humans are imbued with. His malignant narcissism leaves him virtually soulless.
trump is an amoral sociopath, he is unmoved by any kind of human emotion. He is obviously capable of using inflicted pain without any thought to anything but what he can gain from inflicting or relieving it, he simply cannot care.
Hunger is being used as political leverage. I can think of other governments that have used the threat of starvation to keep people under control. Hint: works out especially badly for kids, people with disabilities and older adults on fixed incomes, and families whose employers don't pay enough to cover basic bills.
Excellent as always Will. The unfortunate part of Johnson’s daily lies is that he is in front of media every day spouting them. While we get the occasional Shumer or Jeffries sound bite the Republicans are executing strategy every day. I hope the people are smarter than that because the Dems haven’t learned much about fighting them
Just wish you mentioned his mental health. When viewed from the prism of the DSM-5, there is no doubt this man is and has suffered from personality disorders from birth. As the Brits say, he's fucking mental. And everyone knows it's true.
Is it because of no official diagnosis yet? The Goldwater rule is outdated, like analog in a digital world. There is more than enough publicly available information to make an online diagnosis. It has already been done. Perhaps every article, posting etc. to mention that at least in passing. My powerless opinion.
You are 100% correct. Dr. Bandy Lee wrote a book about Trump's mental pathology, and was fired from Yale for doing so, for having violated the Goldwater Rule, as laid out many years ago by the American Psychiatric Association. That originated in a lawsuit by Goldwater that the APA had caused him to lose the 1968 presidential election. You can research these events. Her book, which includes indicting opinions from many other psychiatric professionals is available on Amazon. This man's mental pathology is almost too much to grapple with, for obvious reasons. Nightmare.
Trump doesn’t “feel our pain.” He engineers it. The shutdown isn’t collateral damage, it’s the point. This is political sadism masquerading as governance. He’s not running a country; he’s running a hostage situation with 330 million people inside. Every quote in this piece reads like a Bond villain monologue, gleeful, self-satisfied, and utterly detached from the suffering he causes.
Republicans like Mike Johnson want to sell you the fairy tale that Daddy Donald is “protecting” America. But no one protects the house by setting it on fire. SNAP frozen. Veterans unpaid. Infrastructure gutted. These are not mistakes, but explicit choices. It’s Project 2025 in beta, a test of how much pain the public will tolerate when cruelty is labeled efficiency.
>>> "He’s using the shutdown to hurt Democrats and the people they represent."
Trump is also hurting Republicans, and the people Republicans represent, too. Trump, Johnson and Thune are all willing to hurt lots of people to help the wealthy people who give them money.
Your essay, Will, hits like a punch straight to the gut; paragraph after paragraph, sentence after sentence, you make clear and evident the truth of what transpires. I want to call out one paragraph so it is not otherwise passed by in the sheer momentum of your narrative...
"It’s comforting to imagine that a president feels our pain. But Johnson can’t hide the truth: Trump is a sadist, and his strategy in the shutdown has been to break the Democrats’ will by hurting the people they represent."
Have truer words ever been written? So poignantly? So pithily?
You are The Bulwark's golden secret. Never did I understand why the Bulwark plays these publishing games - criminy, they hoard you like Smaug guards his treasure - but as long as they continue to publish what you write, I will continue to search high and low for it. Thank you for today's essay.
He's such a moron. Shutting down construction projects doesn't hurt the Democrats, it totally screws over all the blue collar working people who were counting on that employment. Just in time for no more food stamps or health insurance subsidies. All of which he's killing himself to take credit for and as usual the Democrats cannot get their act together and hammer a few simple truths home to the public, day in, day out, as several others have already suggested
Republicans: end the filibuster and you'll end the shutdown. And then you'll own the consequences. Is that a problem?
Democrats: As Robert J Danolfo suggests have a press conference every day and explain how the repugs can end the shutdown anytime they want. The filibuster must go.
So which narrative is breaking through? The Democratic or the Republican? What messaging measures are DEMS taking in response to Johnson's daily pressers? I've read and heard people blame GOP more than DEM since GOP controls Executive and Legislative Branches; however, 60 vote threshold in Senate used by GOP to blame DEMs for not passing House bill, so toss up? Unfortunately, too few are willing to do what Rand Paul suggested, 1-month CR, Senate committee of 6 (3 DEM 3 GOP) to hammer out longer term CR or budget proposal. And how much do the Epstein Files play into this as if House comes back for any reason, AZ rep must be seated and there are now 218 votes for discharge petition.
Will, Thanks for the reporting and commentary. Explain to me why Democrats aren't having a press conference everyday explaining what Trump & Co. are really doing like taking money from foreign governments, pardoning criminals, raising the cost of living, trashing the rule of law, ignoring the Constitution and my favorite, murdering people in the Caribbean a thousand miles away. Then they could play clips of his insane talk on a loop that would never end. Then they could remind the Republicans and the American people that the President has betrayed his oath of office, you know, to protect and serve ALL of the American people.
Who would report it? What TV news program, besides public TV would cover a Democrat explaining whats going on? Maybe some Newspapers, but who reads those anymore? The people who need to hear it aren't reading the Bulwark.
Bravo! You hit the nail on the head. We have no voice, no leadership that is capable and eager to argue every damn day against the Republican lie machine. We must not cave, but I think we all know that Schumer and Jeffries are the wrong people at the wrong time. Who can speak for us and galvanize us? My money is on Barack Obama. It doesn’t matter that he can’t run again. What matters is to create a strong social identity for Democrats and Independents to hold onto. If not, who else.
Who would watch it? That’s always been the unsolvable problem. During the Obama years any time Republican leadership gave off hand comments to any reporter Fox News covered it all day. However they never showed any comments by Pelosi or Reid unless they could spin it.
The right wing echo chamber encompasses half the country without any solution. The Democrats need their own celebrity but right now there is no one that has the presence, willingness and charisma.
I agree with what you have said Rajeev. I think it is because the Democrats are 'normal'. If you listen to their common sense message of wanting to help the people they serve and compare it to the screeching hate and lies of the republicans, who do you hear first? Who excites people the most? Who hits below the belt like common schoolyard bullies - and remember - these are grown men and women. They are capitalizing on the fear and the hatred and the secret schoolyard bully their supporters hold in their hearts. It's simplistic and childish and dangerous.
I'm not sure that legacy media covers Democrats much at all and certainly social media isn't interested in that unless there is something to make fun of or to arouse outrage about.
Mike Johnson isn't wrong. He's lying. He's got an agenda to push--religion. There's a reason Mike doesn't look particularly pained by any of this. Thing are going really well in his estimation. The government and President are deteriorating in real time. Win win for Mike Johnson.
Speaking of religion, a late buddy would joke about how the preacher said "We got $50,000 in pledges, and $3 in cash." For MAGA voters, it's the "pledges" that are their "fix." When, not if, they don't get the "cash," they parrot their cult leaders and blame the Dems, the "radical left," etc. Deep down, like their cult leaders, most of them know they're lying. But they need their "fix," so telling the truth would only make their "withdrawals" unbearable.
Does the Bulwark have any stats on the political affiliation of its subscribers and non-subscriber readers? Does Substack? I'd love to get a sense of who the audience is.
The shutdown is strategic for Trump. No Republican is working to end the shutdown. It’s a test of how much chaos we can endure. How much before constituents urge the senate to use the nuclear option and they grab all the power and officially end democratic process.
I'm not sure it would be accurate to call Trump a sadist, but he's certainly lacking in the kind of empathy and kindness that most humans are imbued with. His malignant narcissism leaves him virtually soulless.
trump is an amoral sociopath, he is unmoved by any kind of human emotion. He is obviously capable of using inflicted pain without any thought to anything but what he can gain from inflicting or relieving it, he simply cannot care.
Hunger is being used as political leverage. I can think of other governments that have used the threat of starvation to keep people under control. Hint: works out especially badly for kids, people with disabilities and older adults on fixed incomes, and families whose employers don't pay enough to cover basic bills.
MAGAt Mike Johnson wakes up everyday and dreams of how to jump-up the Mad King.
Excellent as always Will. The unfortunate part of Johnson’s daily lies is that he is in front of media every day spouting them. While we get the occasional Shumer or Jeffries sound bite the Republicans are executing strategy every day. I hope the people are smarter than that because the Dems haven’t learned much about fighting them
All totally true.
Just wish you mentioned his mental health. When viewed from the prism of the DSM-5, there is no doubt this man is and has suffered from personality disorders from birth. As the Brits say, he's fucking mental. And everyone knows it's true.
Is it because of no official diagnosis yet? The Goldwater rule is outdated, like analog in a digital world. There is more than enough publicly available information to make an online diagnosis. It has already been done. Perhaps every article, posting etc. to mention that at least in passing. My powerless opinion.
You are 100% correct. Dr. Bandy Lee wrote a book about Trump's mental pathology, and was fired from Yale for doing so, for having violated the Goldwater Rule, as laid out many years ago by the American Psychiatric Association. That originated in a lawsuit by Goldwater that the APA had caused him to lose the 1968 presidential election. You can research these events. Her book, which includes indicting opinions from many other psychiatric professionals is available on Amazon. This man's mental pathology is almost too much to grapple with, for obvious reasons. Nightmare.
1964.
Trump doesn’t “feel our pain.” He engineers it. The shutdown isn’t collateral damage, it’s the point. This is political sadism masquerading as governance. He’s not running a country; he’s running a hostage situation with 330 million people inside. Every quote in this piece reads like a Bond villain monologue, gleeful, self-satisfied, and utterly detached from the suffering he causes.
Republicans like Mike Johnson want to sell you the fairy tale that Daddy Donald is “protecting” America. But no one protects the house by setting it on fire. SNAP frozen. Veterans unpaid. Infrastructure gutted. These are not mistakes, but explicit choices. It’s Project 2025 in beta, a test of how much pain the public will tolerate when cruelty is labeled efficiency.
https://twvme.substack.com/p/when-the-cupboard-is-bare-we-shut
>>> "He’s using the shutdown to hurt Democrats and the people they represent."
Trump is also hurting Republicans, and the people Republicans represent, too. Trump, Johnson and Thune are all willing to hurt lots of people to help the wealthy people who give them money.
Your essay, Will, hits like a punch straight to the gut; paragraph after paragraph, sentence after sentence, you make clear and evident the truth of what transpires. I want to call out one paragraph so it is not otherwise passed by in the sheer momentum of your narrative...
"It’s comforting to imagine that a president feels our pain. But Johnson can’t hide the truth: Trump is a sadist, and his strategy in the shutdown has been to break the Democrats’ will by hurting the people they represent."
Have truer words ever been written? So poignantly? So pithily?
You are The Bulwark's golden secret. Never did I understand why the Bulwark plays these publishing games - criminy, they hoard you like Smaug guards his treasure - but as long as they continue to publish what you write, I will continue to search high and low for it. Thank you for today's essay.
Wow. Thank you so much, David.
He's such a moron. Shutting down construction projects doesn't hurt the Democrats, it totally screws over all the blue collar working people who were counting on that employment. Just in time for no more food stamps or health insurance subsidies. All of which he's killing himself to take credit for and as usual the Democrats cannot get their act together and hammer a few simple truths home to the public, day in, day out, as several others have already suggested
The Democrats and I am one drive me nuts !
Republicans: end the filibuster and you'll end the shutdown. And then you'll own the consequences. Is that a problem?
Democrats: As Robert J Danolfo suggests have a press conference every day and explain how the repugs can end the shutdown anytime they want. The filibuster must go.
So which narrative is breaking through? The Democratic or the Republican? What messaging measures are DEMS taking in response to Johnson's daily pressers? I've read and heard people blame GOP more than DEM since GOP controls Executive and Legislative Branches; however, 60 vote threshold in Senate used by GOP to blame DEMs for not passing House bill, so toss up? Unfortunately, too few are willing to do what Rand Paul suggested, 1-month CR, Senate committee of 6 (3 DEM 3 GOP) to hammer out longer term CR or budget proposal. And how much do the Epstein Files play into this as if House comes back for any reason, AZ rep must be seated and there are now 218 votes for discharge petition.
Will, Thanks for the reporting and commentary. Explain to me why Democrats aren't having a press conference everyday explaining what Trump & Co. are really doing like taking money from foreign governments, pardoning criminals, raising the cost of living, trashing the rule of law, ignoring the Constitution and my favorite, murdering people in the Caribbean a thousand miles away. Then they could play clips of his insane talk on a loop that would never end. Then they could remind the Republicans and the American people that the President has betrayed his oath of office, you know, to protect and serve ALL of the American people.
Who would report it? What TV news program, besides public TV would cover a Democrat explaining whats going on? Maybe some Newspapers, but who reads those anymore? The people who need to hear it aren't reading the Bulwark.
Unfortunately, we learned in the last election that a slight majority of Americans don't give a shit that Trump is a liar, cheat and thief.
We are told that they were more concerned about the price off eggs, but honestly I'm not sure any more.
I feel quite certain that most of them are unaware that their rights under the Constitution are being quickly eroded. And I'm not sure they care.
The Democrats are timid, they wouldn't want to violate any rules or norms.
Bravo! You hit the nail on the head. We have no voice, no leadership that is capable and eager to argue every damn day against the Republican lie machine. We must not cave, but I think we all know that Schumer and Jeffries are the wrong people at the wrong time. Who can speak for us and galvanize us? My money is on Barack Obama. It doesn’t matter that he can’t run again. What matters is to create a strong social identity for Democrats and Independents to hold onto. If not, who else.
Who would watch it? That’s always been the unsolvable problem. During the Obama years any time Republican leadership gave off hand comments to any reporter Fox News covered it all day. However they never showed any comments by Pelosi or Reid unless they could spin it.
The right wing echo chamber encompasses half the country without any solution. The Democrats need their own celebrity but right now there is no one that has the presence, willingness and charisma.
I agree with what you have said Rajeev. I think it is because the Democrats are 'normal'. If you listen to their common sense message of wanting to help the people they serve and compare it to the screeching hate and lies of the republicans, who do you hear first? Who excites people the most? Who hits below the belt like common schoolyard bullies - and remember - these are grown men and women. They are capitalizing on the fear and the hatred and the secret schoolyard bully their supporters hold in their hearts. It's simplistic and childish and dangerous.
Just a sad opinion.
Or platform, fox is Goebbels dream come true.
I'm not sure that legacy media covers Democrats much at all and certainly social media isn't interested in that unless there is something to make fun of or to arouse outrage about.
To: Mike Johnson,
Mendacious Prevaricator Extrordiaire…
Speaker of the House of Spin…
Republicaurus Disengenious…
The Sultan of Smarm!
Open the People’s House and do your damn job! Swear in the Lady from the Great State of Arizona and then Release the Files!
Mike Johnson isn't wrong. He's lying. He's got an agenda to push--religion. There's a reason Mike doesn't look particularly pained by any of this. Thing are going really well in his estimation. The government and President are deteriorating in real time. Win win for Mike Johnson.
Speaking of religion, a late buddy would joke about how the preacher said "We got $50,000 in pledges, and $3 in cash." For MAGA voters, it's the "pledges" that are their "fix." When, not if, they don't get the "cash," they parrot their cult leaders and blame the Dems, the "radical left," etc. Deep down, like their cult leaders, most of them know they're lying. But they need their "fix," so telling the truth would only make their "withdrawals" unbearable.
I'm reminded of the Country & Western song singing about the TV evangelists. They tell you to send your money to Jesus but give you THEIR address!
Does the Bulwark have any stats on the political affiliation of its subscribers and non-subscriber readers? Does Substack? I'd love to get a sense of who the audience is.
I'm a 70 year old pro worker FDR Democrat, a subscriber who is interested in the people who lost their party.