John Harwood Profile picture
Aug 24, 2019 5 tweets 1 min read Read on X
conservative columnist Megan McArdle on Trump’s behavior:

“This is not normal. And I don’t mean that as in, ‘Trump is violating the shibboleths of the Washington establishment.’ I mean that as in, ‘This is not normal for a functioning adult’ “ washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/…
“I’m not trying to perform amateur diagnosis of Trump as narcissist, psychopath, or early-stage dementia patient. I’m not Trump’s doctor. possibly it’s simply a terminal case of ‘billionairitis,’ where very rich people lose ability to tolerate anything except obsequious flattery”
“But I don’t need a diagnosis to know that symptoms are worrying. If your company owner abruptly pulled out of a conference w/important partner because the other CEO said something mildly unflattering, would you defend it as a cunning move? Or start looking for another job?”
“If your mother canceled a family visit because your cousin wouldn’t sell her the bedroom, would you get mad at your cousin for slighting your mother’s honor? Or would you try to arrange a neurological consult?”
“Hopefully, you wouldn’t just smile and say, ‘No, really, everything’s fine,’ when it’s very obviously not.

The longer you humor people who have clearly gone off the rails, the more time they have to damage themselves and those around them.”

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More from @JohnJHarwood

May 6
"Given that both Russian and Chinese actors now blend in so easily with the MAGA messaging operation, it is hardly surprising that the American government has difficulty responding to the newly interlinked autocratic propaganda network." theatlantic.com/magazine/archi…
"A part of the American political spectrum is not merely a passive recipient of the combined authoritarian narratives that come from Russia, China, and their ilk, but an active participant in creating and spreading them.
"Like the leaders of those countries, the American MAGA right also wants Americans to believe that their democracy is degenerate, their elections illegitimate, their civilization dying."
"The MAGA movement’s leaders also have an interest in pumping nihilism and cynicism into the brains of their fellow citizens, and in convincing them that nothing they see is true. Their goals are so similar that it is hard to distinguish between the online American alt-right and its foreign amplifiers, who have multiplied since the days when this was solely a Russian project."
Read 5 tweets
Mar 27
new ⁦@jonathanchait⁩:

"The (GOP) project was based on a delusion that Obamacare was a 'train wreck' and some conservative alternative could supply a better system without horrific costs. when you set out to brainwash others, you brainwash yourself." nymag.com/intelligencer/…
"Conservatives spent years attacking Obamacare for a series of mostly imagined design flaws - death panels, higher costs, failure to reduce the number of uninsured.

"None of these predictions came true.

"The cost of health care has come in significantly lower than forecast."
"This has been a recurring conservative pattern on social policy.

"Every new advance of the welfare state is met with hysterical doomsday predictions.

"When those fail to come true, conservatives skip any self-examination and move on to their next doomsday predictions."
Read 4 tweets
Feb 19
no one has explained the mindless (and pointless) irresponsibility of current press coverage as well as this from ⁦@Dahlialithwick⁩,
so it requires a 🧵 slate.com/news-and-polit…
"ask yourself why Biden, who is stipulated #Old, has managed to helm the most successful presidency in modern history.

"the reason: he has for the most part surrounded himself with experts, genuine scientists, respected economists, effective governmental actors and advisers."
"Governance is not an action film.

"There is no psychodrama w/someone in a black T-shirt mincing along the ledge of a skyscraper, ninja-kicking his way down to the stairwell, where he karate-chops the baddies and then crawls his way into a vault where the nuclear reactor sits."
Read 10 tweets
Feb 6
.⁦@davidfrum⁩:

"if no deal results, what'll we learn?

"First, Republicans don’t much care about the border. A real 'existential threat' can't wait.

"People who perceive one don’t delay. Many Republicans are happy to let laborers cross the border." theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
"A 2nd truth concerns what Republican priorities really are.

"Speaker Johnson told Biden Dec 5 that Ukraine aid depended on 'transformative border security laws.'

"When Senate negotiators produced them, Johnson reversed his demands.

"No aid to Ukraine is the true priority."
"A 3rd truth: the very act of negotiation is mistrusted.

"House Republicans radically altered their position from 'new law' to 'no new law,' from Biden 'must sign our bill as we wrote it” to 'must act by executive authority only.'

"The true goal revealed is failure and chaos."
Read 5 tweets
Nov 15, 2023
important point below:

the overwhelming majority of dysfunction in Congress - the extremism, the childish immaturity, the detachment from reality, the lack of interest in basic governance much less active problem-solving - comes from Republicans in Congress
and this, as @NormOrnstein and Tom Mann detailed a decade ago before the American political community was ready to deal with it, has been true for a long time
@NormOrnstein an influential chunk of the political world - rich individuals and business executives - has been willing to look past this fact because they crave tax cuts and reduced regulations
Read 4 tweets
Sep 23, 2023
"What Trump did was select (AG Sessions) on the basis of loyalty, fired him failing to pay obeisance, replaced him w/the more pliant Barr, drove Barr away w/demands to help overturn election results, and sought to replace him w/(an active participant)." nymag.com/intelligencer/…
"What Biden did was to appoint an attorney general, Merrick Garland, who had a legal rather than a political background and was widely respected by both parties, and proceed to studiously refrain from influencing his decisions.

"It is the literal opposite of Trump’s behavior."
"The reality staring Republicans in the face is that Biden is making a good-faith effort to respect DOJ independence in the most painful possible circumstance — at the expense of a son whose drug addiction led him into a series of incidental criminal offenses."
Read 4 tweets

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