Is the backlash against Trump... overblown?

[Yukaphile]

Obviously I am NOT defending him, since he is a morally bankrupt character, but with that said, I do have to wonder if, objectively speaking, the push-back has been a tad overblown, and get a discussion going on this. I know a lot of it is politically fueled, to motivate the base to get people to turn out and vote, but I honestly cannot claim Trump is worse than Bush except perhaps in one way, which is that he's pushed the political discourse into encouraging rampant crude remarks and belittling of one's enemies and mocking vulnerable groups, which is certainly terrible and will have longer-ranging effects, but even so, I can't compare him to the man who took a surplus, a thriving economy, strong middle class, no wars, what the Clintons had termed "broad-base peace and prosperity," and pissed it all away on two illegal wars, tax cuts for the rich, and destroying the sense of optimism we had leaving the 1990s. That's a seriously huge accomplishment that I think outshadows anything any president has ever done past the truly awful ones like Andrew Jackson and his trail of tears. So again I must ask, from an objective standpoint, is the backlash against Trump a tad bit overblown? Just playing devil's advocate.

[sayla0079]

Honestly with all the things he has done I don't think its overblown.

[Darth Wedgius]

Some of the more extreme reactions were certainly overblown. The biggest thing thrown at Trump is that he's continuing policies put into place by Obama. But the most fervently anti-Trump people don't really care about facts, and will continue to say that Trump thinks all Mexicans are drug dealers and rapists, or that Trump banned Muslims.

[Mecha82]

Based on some of his policies and things that he has said I would say no it's not overblown. While Bush was rather bad he is nothing compared to Trump and seems like lesser of two evils.

[Admiral X]

Trump Derangement Syndrome is definitely a thing.

I also think people forgot what it was like under Bush, which gave us the Patriot Act, "love it or leave it," and started the government against photographers, because someone apparently got it in their head that terrorists would be taking pictures of landmarks before attacking them and not just something normal tourists would do.

[Riedquat]

Speaking as an outsider, I think so. A lot of the anti-Trump stuff is about the level that they accuse him of being at at any rate, instead of serious criticism. It makes it hard to take his detractors seriously. Unfortunately that seems to be the state of modern politics worldwide, two sides of squabbling children calling each other names.

[ChiggyvonRichthofen]

There's a huge number of Trump criticisms that are completely fair, and that some conservatives disingenuously defend. But Trump also has a way of riling people up enough that they blame him for everything, including things that he a) doesn't think/isn't responsible for, and b) could potentially be a legitimate criticism but that other presidents have always gotten a pass for. This has the effect of energizing Trump's base and in the minds of many delegitimizes all the criticism and the media itself.

To borrow a baseball analogy, there are a lot of strikes of Trump. But if you never call a ball, then you aren't a good umpire. At this points the two sides have become so entrenched that there's really no way to change that.

I sympathize with those conservative voices that didn't vote for Trump and advocated even-handedness and courteous, bipartisan discourse, but that would be a losing strategy. Trollish tweets and "poisoning the well", honestly if he provokes enough anger it works out pretty well for him, not in making him more popular overall but in keeping support where it counts.

[CharlesPhipps]

It depends on what you think the backlash of Trump is.

The Obama child-separation policy is, for example, manifestly different from Trump's because the children were never going to be returned to a lot of them while they were under Obama. Trump was deporting people away without their kids that were being fostered out to other families.

And even if they were exactly the same, the policies are shit and should be stopped.

I'm no fan of Obama's foreign policies as I think he was neck-deep in drone stirikes and undeclared wars but my opinion of Trump is that his isolationist, dictator coddling policies are poorly thought out. I hate that he withdrew from the Iran Nuclear Agreement, I think that his withdrawal from the Paris Accords were stupid, and I also think that his handling of trade deals have been abyssal.

I think his handling of refugees in the country is disgusting and they're being treated as criminals when he doesn't seem to realize it's entirely legal and the proper way to do thing. I do support the fact that he's actually sincerely committed to staying out of wars unlike Bush who got hundreds of thousands of people killed as well as so botched the Middle East that it's now in several wars.

So whenever people cry Trump is the worst President ever, I point out he's not even the worst in our immediate lifetime.

Then again, I'm a Kentuckian and I know a huge amount of what's wrong with this country isn't Trump but Mitch Fucking McConnell.

[Yukaphile]

Well, tbf, Darth, Trump DOES think that. He said so.

[Darth Wedgius]

Well, tbf, Darth, Trump DOES think that. He said so.

To be even more fair, he didn't. He was talking about illegal immigration from Mexico, and here's the full quote:

It’s true, and these are the best and the finest. When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re not sending you. They’re not sending you. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.

So (1) it doesn't mean all Mexicans, and (2) it acknowledges that even some of the illegal immigrants are good people.

But not matter how often this is pointed out, NPCs will continue to claim it means Trump is racist. Because, IMHO, the facts stopped meaning anything to them in favor of their fantasy world where they're fighting a huge tide of white supremacy.