When I rooted for Reagan in the 1980s, it was a movement with intellectual heft. Back then, I thought that was the new conservative normal. But what if it was an aberration?
Op-ed by Matt Lewis @ DailyBeast.com, Aug. 15
This week’s news about Omarosa secretly taping chief of staff John Kelly and President Donald Trump is yet another reminder of something about Trumpworld: Politics has always attracted eccentric opportunists, but people in this administration are especially weird. In the case of Omarosa [....], we are talking about a melodramatic reality star who lies constantly and brought a recording device into the Situation Room. But she’s just the latest example of the motley crew Trump has made famous.
Take, for example, the president’s campaign manager, Paul Manafort [....] Or Trump’s former senior adviser, Steve Bannon [....] And let’s not forget Rob Porter [....] Seb Gorka [....] Scott Pruitt [....]
Only the best people?
Clearly, Trump likes casting people who are not just interesting characters, but who are also cartoon caricatures. There’s Rudy Giuliani, the bulging-eyed former “Mayor of America” who has become a parody of himself. There’s Mooch (Anthony Scaramucci) [....] And Michael Cohen, the Trump lawyer who watched Goodfellas one too many times. And Corey Lewandowski [....] And even Stephen Miller’s own uncle thinks he’s a schmuck. I could go on [....]
Trump seems to have a similar affinity for casting archetypes. One can imagine his campaign desperately searching for “an Atwater, a Joe Pesci, two Himmlers, not to mention a Robin Quivers.”
I miss the good old days when the best weirdos were on the other side of the aisle [....] Liberals, still wedded to mainstream media outlets, are (for now) more moored to reality [....]