Sh*t My President Says: The Illustrated Tweets of Donald J. Trump

[history79]

17 pages of 119

Comments

[cyberghostface]

List price for this is $15. Sheesh.

[velador]

Though propably not the cartoonists intention, this actually illustrates what icks me about this kind of gotcha Trump-bashing pretty well.
Like, you have this enormous collection of stupid and sometimes outright nasty tweets from Mr. Trump, there's basically no better evidence one could hope for to make a case against him as a political leader - and yet, and YET, all this apparently didn't isn't shrill enough yet in the minds of some manichean culture warriors LARPing as resistance.
Let me repeat this: Despite the sheer number of baffling, megalomaniac and/or outright nauseous things Donald Trump has said or done, people still find the need to lie about him on a regular basis, exaggerate or raise ridiculous allegations, so that even when he does a positive thing, however basic or inconsequential, it's still somehow an embodiment of evil or the like (see: the amazing case of Melania Trump and the racist Dr. Seuss library books)

A glaring example here, which sparked this comment, is this cartoons choice to include the Holocaust Day Statement - which, in itself, is quite good and made me wonder at first what the "gotcha" is supposed to be, then I looked down to the caricature of Trump wiggling his finger and raising his leg(?) at Mexican stereotypes.
Unless I'm seriously misunderstanding the implication, and in that case please correct me, this is supposed to highlight the "hypocrisy" of enforcing immigration laws on the one hand and mourning the Holocaust victims on the other hand, which... seriously??...just...seriously???...for real?? This is not in ANY way the same thing and a slap in the face of actual Shoah survivors. Had Hitler merely send illegal immigrants to live in Israel, would that alone have made him history's greatest villain? Like, WTF???

All this hyperbole just robs the attacks on Trump of any credibility and makes his critics appear even more lunatic than he is, which is no small achievement in itself, thereby completely obstructing any attempt of rational discussion.
The best argument for Trump are his opponents. The best argument against Trump, however, is Trump itself.

So, in conclusion: Everybody loses. Hooray!

[sadoeuphemist]

Yes, it's supposed to highlight the hypocrisy of 'making love and tolerance prevalent throughout the world' compared to his scapegoating of Mexican immigrants and his desire to impose a 'Muslim Ban' that includes Syrian war refugees. You don't have to compare him to Hitler, you can compare this to the actions of the US in the lead-up to WWII, where they turned away German Jewish refugees due to grossly unfounded national security fears.

Also, the statement is not 'quite good.' Its language is extremely generic. "...to ensure the forces of evil never again defeat the powers of good. Together we will make love and tolerance prevalent throughout the world." Is this supposed to be about the Holocaust, or is it a line from a children's cartoon show? The full statement also includes the line: “Yet, we know that in the darkest hours of humanity, light shines the brightest,” which is another cliche that is not really applicable to the Holocaust. What is this 'brightest light' of the Holocaust supposed to be?

[velador]

Well, the "Righteous Among The Nations" came to my mind, for example.

[wizardru]

"Unless I'm seriously misunderstanding the implication, and in that case please correct me, this is supposed to highlight the "hypocrisy" of enforcing immigration laws on the one hand and mourning the Holocaust victims on the other hand, which... seriously??...just...seriously???...for real??"

I think you're missing the context. Setting aside the toothless statement about the Holocaust which somehow fails to mention Jews or anti-Semitism on a day specifically intended for it, the day that this was released was THE EXACT SAME DAY that Trump signed his executive order for the travel ban. It's that stark contrast that the cartoon picture is mocking.

The statement is NOT "quite good". It was a surprising departure from previous Republican and Democratic presidential statements, issued every year, that placed anti-Semitism, genocide and the Jewish people as a visible part of the statement. Trump's full statement includes no references to Jewish, homosexual or Roma victims...just 'innocent people' in three paragraphs (and veers off-target into vaguely thanking people who risked helping them). Like so many 'no-brainers' that the administration was presented with, they fumbled the ball on this and then spent the next several days explaining/defending it.

In a longer term context, given the President's defense of neo-Nazis in Charlottesville and the presence of people like Sebastian Gorka and Steve Bannon, it's not as hard to guess WHY there was no mention of the Jews.

[velador]

That is kind of the thing I was talking about, because now we have gone from saying "the statement was cliche and vague and there could and should have been a better one instead" (fair and rational criticism) to implying Trump is secretly antisemitic and dogwhistling to Jew-haters.
The man whose grandchildren are Jewish, by the way, alongside with Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner.
Just like according to Tariq Nasheed, Ben Shapiro is a white supremacist? Is "defense of neo-Nazis" nowadays identical to "scolding them alongside Antifa"? Because those seem like two different things to me which deserve two different kind of responses.
If anyone right to Obama is declared a white supremacist, this only helps the real white supremacists to go mainstream since equivalence goes both directions, after all. And especially to fans of superhero fiction it should be obvious that when everything is a grade-A apocalyptic event deserving of the superlative, nothing really is anymore.

[alicemacher]

One can like, even love, selected individual members of a group while still hating the group as a whole. The two phenomena are not mutually exclusive.

Edited to add: That said, I don't think Trump himself is anti-Jewish. I do however suspect that by omitting any mention of Jewish victims of the Nazis, he's playing up to the substantial portion of his most hardcore supporters who do openly hate Jews.

[kamino_neko]

The overlap is extremely common in fact. 'I have <insert group here> friends', 'you're a credit to your race', etc.

[thanekos]

Putin in a tracksuit.

Way to apply that cliché.

[zachbeacon]

At least he has a shirt

[lissa_quon]

Not sure exactly what the draw of this booki s supposed to be. I can cringe at Trumps tweets for free. The illustrations are not really enough to draw any sort of reaction.

[katefan]

There is a market out there of people who hate Trump so much I think they will buy the book on reflex, then realize it probably isn't worth the price tag. I'm not saying it's a large number but I'm sure the publishers will make some decent coin off of them.

[walkingthroughforest]

Wow, tough crowd.

[icon_uk]

I think it's indicative of the situation the US is in at the moment.

Mocking Trump has little effect on swaying anyone (his detractors loathe him, his supporters would support him regardless of ANYTHING), and should really be an unnecessary exercise when one considers the vast swathe of actual evidence of his complete unsuitability for the job he holds.

Making fun of his tweet history, when that history all by itself should have guaranteed that he never got near public office, seems almost desperate I think.

[ozaline]

Honestly I can see some value in this book for Luddites who might not have exposure to these tweets. Especially those that are organized along common themes over years (like the Kristen Stewart example).

I am not a Luddite, in fact I'd rate my computer knowledge above average (though far from expert), but I am a total novice when it comes to twitter. I very rarely use it, and often find websites detailing amusing faux twitter feuds or the importance of certain discussions by public individuals to be frustratingly incomplete in their coverage.

Now I have no specific desire to own this book, but I feel a paper copy of his tweets can help keep the electorate informed, even if the bombastic title doesn't help overmuch.

[balbanes]

Yeah, anyone who isn't mainlining conservative Kool-aid knows Trump is staggeringly incompetent, and that his narcissism ensures that he will never ever improve. Highlighting a bunch of silly tweets is like insisting that fire is hot while the forest burns around you.