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Culture War Roundup for the week of April 6, 2026

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Chuck Norris jokes as policy announcements.

Does it not tire you to maintain this disaffected persona chuckling at "lib" overreaction? Do you really believe that the proper treatment of POTUS's words is "unhinged and obviously non-credible bullshitting", but also that this kind of person deserves to be POTUS?

Does it not tire you to engage in this constant catastrophizing? It's been ten years. How are people still driving themselves into madness like this?

Four years of ineffectual flailing due to political sabotage, 4 years out of power, and now a bit over a year of uninterrupted and unprecedented shitshow. The list of his follies is very long, but an American consumer is very rich, so can ignore it for a time. Still, it hasn't been a long time. What did you mean by ten years?

uninterrupted and unprecedented shitshow.

No, everything has been between "basically fine" and "awesome, actually". This is what I mean by catastrophizing.

What did you mean by ten years?

That's how long Trump has been dominating our political conversation. That's how long lefties and NeverTrump types have been having crashout meltdowns EVERY. SINGLE. WEEK. about whatever new calamity is making the rounds on TikTok or BlueSky. How many times has Trump DESTROYED THE ECONOMY?!!/1 How many times has Trump STARTED WORLD WAR THREE!!!!1? How many times have we seen THE END OF DEMOCRACY!!1?

(They screamed, on their national television shows where they will definitely never suffer consequences for open, deranged antipathy for the purported fascist king of America. Unlike Europe, where complaints about being raped by migrants or criticizing politicians gets people jailed for longer than the migrant rapists.)

And no one ever stops and recalibrates. No one ever pauses to take a sanity check. They just lose issue after issue, fact pattern after fact pattern, and dive straight into the next hype cycle.

Remember the other day when all those idiots thought he was dead?

LMAO.

It's certainly flailing and I want to call it ineffectual, but at this point the sheer staying power of the moral panic / doomsday cult mentality is honestly impressive. Terribly unhealthy, but impressive.

I mean just to pick something that has had a very personal impact to people I know, the NSF and related science cuts have basically been Covid-level fallout for higher education and related research. The fact this was done on purpose and even lauded is nauseating. For every person like my friend’s wife whose half-bullshit psych masters degree got derailed by a year or two, there’s two people like my aunt who got laid off from her incredibly important job at a primate research lab that does a ton of stuff on both infectious disease and cancer research, where the whole lab is probably going to close. For all the whining Republicans did about Covid pummeling K12 education with knock on effects for another decade or more, it’s extra astonishing none of them seem too concerned at all that the same thing is happening in slow motion at higher levels.

Trump has caused hundreds of billions in damage with Liberation Day tariffs, attacked Denmark and forced EU allies to orient towards China, basically wrecked NATO by this point, foolishly escalated against the same China and got humiliated in Busan, exposing American industrial ineptitude (particularly to Korea), is about to lose Taiwan, and is in the process of shaving off 1% or so off the global GDP growth. That's just the big foreign policy stuff I care about, domestic policy is discussed daily here.

That loyalists conveniently forget such issues or reframe them into WINS is unsurprising.

That loyalists conveniently forget such issues or reframe them into WINS is unsurprising.

Exactly. The hysteria and delusion is off the charts.

Trump has caused hundreds of billions in damage with Liberation Day tariffs

Not seeing real justifications for this claim, even from virulently anti-Trump outlets.

attacked Denmark and forced EU allies to orient towards China

No, they're just quislings who were already sucking up to China because China is an asshole that thinks they're subhuman.

basically wrecked NATO by this point

What good was NATO, in a post USSR world? Europe is a sick old man.

foolishly escalated against the same China and got humiliated in Busan

Genuinely laughable after 20 years of watching every national level Democrat get rolled like a middle schooler in their first poker game.

exposing American industrial ineptitude (particularly to Korea)

Better to hide it and let it get worse?

is about to lose Taiwan

See, this is exactly what I mean. China is retrenching and reconsidering Taiwan plans after watching their tech fail the last four months. 2027 is going to come and go with no Taiwan invasion, and you will never, ever, ever remember this failed prediction, just like the other failed predictions from every single one of the last 500 weeks.

Hey, wake up! You've been in a coma ever since Mueller had Trump arrested back in 2018 after THE WALLS CLOSED IN!

No, they're just quislings who were already sucking up to China because China is an asshole that thinks they're subhuman.

I hope you realize this sounds a bit unhinged.

Europeans here have commented plenty on the asinine degree of hatred the MAGA crowd had suddenly developed for them. I think it's a reaction akin to jealousy, and it's always ugly and pitiful. Little more to say. Except:

China is retrenching and reconsidering Taiwan plans after watching their tech fail the last four months

Nothing of the sort happened, the only active "Chinese tech" I'm positively sure has been defeated was HQ-2 that dates to, like, Cultural Revolution. Xi is currently negotiating with KMT representative, in China. They're feeling really comfortable. You seem to inhabit a thick MAGA bubble. This is unhealthy. Try to check out alternative sources, and preferably not the outgroup but some professional ones.

The person who deserves to be POTUS is the person who gets enough votes to be POTUS. This is the horrible truth, the thing from which you desperately struggle to avert your gaze. The United States is a democracy and Donald Trump is its democratically elected president. His legitimacy derives from the people.

Donald Trump did not trick his way into office and then surprise everyone by acting in a manner unbecoming of a president. The people of the United States of America decided to elect someone who breaks all the rules of what a president is 'supposed' to do. They don't care what the president is 'supposed' to do, they care whether the president is doing what they want him to do. For quite a long time, through many administrations, the president has not been doing what the people want him to do.

Donald Trump did not trick his way into office and then surprise everyone by acting in a manner unbecoming of a president

He apparently surprised Catturd and other major boosters who were celebrating NO MORE FOREIGN WARS upon his election. That said, they've quickly pivoted, now foreign wars are Based.

The people of the United States of America decided to elect someone who breaks all the rules of what a president is 'supposed' to do. They don't care what the president is 'supposed' to do, they care whether the president is doing what they want him to do.

This is mostly sophistry, but I suppose you are making a sharp point: the problem is not Trump, it's the American people.