No Time for Iowa
Trump gives Iowans 45 minutes before spending his Sunday with the lunatic fringe
Does Donald Trump even want to be president again? Because he sure as hell isn’t acting like it.
This weekend, Trump put the golf clubs aside long enough to put in a brief 45-minute appearance at the Iowa State Fair before climbing back into the limo for the airport.
Why bother going at all?
How much does it cost the campaign to take his donor-funded refurbished plane from Florida to Iowa and back for a 45-minute visit in which most of the campaigning was done by the gaggle of Florida politicians he brought with him?
The dude spent more time on Donor Force One than on the ground in Iowa.
Within minutes of Trump fleeing the Iowa State Fair, the usual army of Trump surrogates A) took credit for the built-in crowd and B) declared the primaries "over."
There is no doubt that Trump wants the primaries over, mostly because he’s a lazy sod who doesn’t want to put in the time, money, or effort.
Admittedly, Trump can't afford a primary campaign since most of his donor cash is going to legal bills, refurbishing his plane, and covering the costs for Melania's stylist.
This is why he is holding so few of his trademark rallies and is opting instead to attend events with a built-in crowd, like the Iowa State Fair.
Iowa voters are supposed to fall in line simply because he deigned to grace them with his presence for less than an hour.
The absolute cheek of this entitled pillock.
It's Hillary Clinton all over again.
Trump doesn't believe he should have to campaign at all. The nomination should be handed to him on a silver platter because why aren’t you loyal and we owe it to him and he was robbed in 2020 and stuff!!!!
Trump doesn’t want to campaign to win over voters. Instead, he expects to be crowned the nominee based on polls taken six months ahead of the primaries that show him in the lead.
I know it’s old-fashioned, but I think primary voters should decide the nominee, not the 46% of respondents in a national poll of 500 registered voters who said they prefer Trump. What’s more, I think presidential candidates should have to work to win our votes.
Republicans mocked Hillary in 2016 for so confidently believing that she had the election in the bag that she expended minimum effort campaigning for votes.
Most of Hillary’s time was spent, not with voters, but at fundraisers with celebrities and well-connected billionaires. Trump would be copying Hillary on that front as well if donors weren’t fleeing from him like he’s Typhoid Mary.
While he might not be doing Hillary-level fundraisers, Trump has adopted Hillary's condescending attitude toward voters.
When Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds invited each GOP candidate to the State Fair to participate in a "Fair-Side Chat" with her, Trump turned her down flat.
The nerve of Kim Reynolds expecting Donald Trump to campaign like everybody else! Doesn't she know who he is?! She'd be nothing without him! Nothing! So disloyal!
If Donald Trump finds campaigning so distasteful, why the hell is he even running for the nomination?
Okay, I know why. Those legal bills won’t magically pay themselves.
This is why Team Trump is so quick to declare every drive-by appearance by their guy as "proof" that it's "over."
They need it to be "over" because the 77-year-old Donald Trump can neither afford a competitive primary campaign nor endure the rigors of it.
I mean, look at him.
Old Don is starting to look as decrepit as Grandpa Joe.
But it's also arrogance and entitlement, two other qualities Trump shares with Mrs. Clinton.
Team Trump believes that their guy should be treated as the de facto incumbent, even though he isn't the incumbent but the former incumbent who lost to a broken-down old crock who barely left the basement.
And while Trump could only deign to give Iowa voters 45 minutes of his time, he spent his entire Sunday palling around with MAGA’s very own Conspiracy Barbie.
Good heavens. Would you look at that guy?
I’d say Trump looks like someone’s lesbian grandma, but I don’t want the West Yorkshire Police to turn up at my door and arrest me for hate speech.
Unless Iowa Republicans start peddling conspiracy theories about Casey DeSantis faking her breast cancer or whining about how much they hate living in America while slavishly kissing Trump’s ass on social media, they will never get the kind of attention from Trump that he showers on an unstable lunatic like Loomer.
As Dave Reaboi remarked on Sunday:
Loomer is only the most recognizable lunatic lowlife whose access to Trump is directly related to how nasty she is, and how ostentatiously she lies. It’s what he loves about her.
Trump’s embrace of crazies like Loomer or her pal Nick Fuentes is just one of the many reasons Trump’s base has contracted dramatically since the 2020 election.
Trump fans act as if the last two-and-a-half years never happened. They’re still claiming that there are 74 million Trump supporters who will only support Trump in 2024.
In reality, many of the 74 million Americans who voted for Trump in 2020 ages ago kicked the dust of the Trump train off their shoes.
And can you blame them? Between his embrace of the kook fringe and his 2+ year tantrum over the 2020 election, not to mention the multiple felony indictments and the hideous riot at the Capitol, many of those 74 million voters would prefer it if Trump hit the bricks and took his mountain of baggage with him.
More than half the country views Trump unfavorably. And while a majority also view President Biden unfavorably, old Joe doesn’t evoke the same deep loathing and visceral disgust that Donald Trump inspires.
If Trump sincerely wanted to win the White House, he would be campaigning like hell to win back the many 2020 voters who have kicked him to the curb while trying to make inroads with Americans who have never voted for him.
In short, Trump should run a hale and hearty campaign to inspire the country and expand his voter base rather than seek the comforting, sycophantic embrace of the crazies.
But if this weekend is any indication, that is never going to happen.