Here comes the Trump lunatic brigade

| 9:09 am EST December 14, 2024
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Full disclosure, I’ve been under the weather since yesterday and I’m writing this article from bed, so forgive me if it’s scattered in nature. But as you know, I’m not a fan of taking days off – now more than ever. In any case I think it’s time to talk about the oncoming Trump lunatic brigade, and address it soberly, and consider what it might mean politically. Why now? Because the lunatic brigade is now quickly showing its true colors to the dumb voters in the middle who thought they were getting something else.

We all saw Donald Trump admit earlier this week that he’s probably not going to be able to lower grocery prices after all. This is no surprise to anyone who understands basic economics. But it’s going to come as a shock to these dummies who honestly believed it when the media helped Trump float the lie that he could magically bring down consumer prices without triggering deflation and wiping out the economy.

So these dummies in the middle are about to be upset. Keep in mind I’m not talking about Trump’s base. I’m never talking about Trump’s base, because they’re the most irrelevant group in all of politics. They always have been. Trump’s base is not why he won in 2016. They’re not why he lost in 2020. They’re not why he won in 2024. They’re just sort of there, a minority whose votes are baked in. These past three elections have been decided by the voters in the middle, who as I said are dumb, but are also capable of belatedly waking up and doing the sensible thing for one election cycle (2020), if only to then go right back to sleep (2024).

These dummies in the middle will turn against Trump, and it will cripple his presidency when they do. The only question is when. How long until the average suburban moderate realizes that prices never did come back down? This spring? This summer? A year? I won’t even try to guess. But it’s coming. And now there are some other developments that could make these dummies in the middle wake up more quickly.

For instance, there are already scattered reports of family farm owners becoming worried that Trump might actually deport their workforce. That’s right, they voted for Trump after he said these things, because they were counting on him… lying? This is why I refer to voters in the middle as “dummies.” They just are. But like I said, they do wake up from time to time.

It’s also being reported that RFK Jr’s lawyer is trying to get the FDA to shut down the polio vaccine. There’s really no way to predict whether or not RFK Jr will be confirmed to Trump’s cabinet. But if he is, and if crucial vaccines suddenly get yanked from the market, millions of suburban moderate parents (who just voted for Trump) are about to be up in arms about the Trump regime.

Then there are the reports that Elon Musk is seeking to get his Tesla vehicles exempt from government safety testing and reporting. You always have to take these kinds of media reports with a grain of salt, because sometimes it’s an actual thing that Trump and his people think they really can pull off, and sometimes they’re leaking something that’s impossible just to try to make themselves look powerful. But let’s say the Tesla reporting is true. How long before Teslas start causing deadly accidents and it becomes a national scandal as the roads become unsafe? How many moderate voters is that going to alienate?

You see where I’m going with this. If Trump and his lunatic brigade do get their way on this kind of thing, everyone – from family farmers, to parents of young children, to people on individual health insurance plans, on down the line – is going to come to hate Trump pretty darn quickly.

That’s when Trump’s approval rating will bottom out, and that’s when his political muscle will dry up. Once Trump is facing an approval rating in the thirties, House and Senate Republicans facing close 2026 reelection bids will start thinking more about their own futures than about Trump’s agenda. The media will decide that the shortest path to ratings is to play up just how unpopular Trump has become, which in turn will make him more unpopular. It’s a vicious downward cycle that a President almost never gets out of. All it takes is a low approval rating, which Trump and his loons seem to want to hand us on a silver platter.

To be clear, this is not some rah-rah thing. What I’ve laid out is not a good scenario. At all. We’re talking about tragedies like family separation, kids dying of previously eradicated diseases, and too many other nightmares to even think about. We’ll do everything we can to stop Trump and his goons from making these moves. But if we end up not being able to stop them, we’ll need to be aware enough of the political fallout to make something out of it.

Now if you’ll forgive me, I think I’m going to rest up for the remainder of the day. The road ahead is long. None of us can afford to run ourselves into the ground before we even get underway. That goes for you too. Take care of yourselves.