Not sure what’s happening with Donald Trump in his (maybe) post-COVID campaigning. Is it the drugs? Is it a creeping realization of impending doom? Or maybe it’s just Trump being as inexplicably random and weird as always. Because for a man who has obsessed over appearing strong and in command, his campaign trail rhetoric is weak and defeated, replete with loser talk.
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Remember, he needed to get to the hospital as soon as he could, clearly before it was wise, because of fears that he would demotivate his base. So why is he openly talking about losing?
If he’s strong and winning and the polls are rigged, why is he talking about the possibility of losing? There is nothing more demotivating to a campaign’s supporters than to hear their candidate talk about losing, and then threaten the audience with taking his ball and going home.
I’m truly surprised he’s letting himself sound this sad and pathetic. It’s loser talk. Begging, on his knees, the same women he once bragged about, unapologetically, of grabbing their you-know-what. The power dynamic is now fully inverted, and Trump’s best argument is “I don’t have time to stop being an asshole, which is why I lost your vote, but I could do it if I wanted to, just trust me, even though I’ve never done it.” And then, for emphasis, one hour later, he tweeted this:
Got it? He doesn’t have time to be nice, since he’s too busy insulting white seniors—literally his most loyal demographic outside the Proud Boys scene.
And more loser talk.
Trump is literally saying that he could lose to “the worst presidential candidate of all time.” If that’s the case, what does that make Trump?
So in one night, Trump betrayed fear that he was losing to “the worst candidate of all time” and begged suburban women to like him, while refusing to do the thing that he knows would help him with those women (i.e. not be an asshole).
But to be fair, Trump’s rallies weren’t all loser talk. There was some of that well-honed famous Trump message discipline:
“Be nice? Nah. Gotta punch some seniors. No time to be nice. But how about an extended soliloquy on the television situation on Air Force One? Will that work?”
Nope.