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Visit Dr. Naomi Wolf’s Substack.com.
Today is a new low for an America that is being dragged through every humiliation, in its re-christening as a thoroughgoing Banana Republic.
I’ve long argued that symbolic degradation of the US is part of the psychological war being waged against us. No President checks his watch multiple times at a military funeral without that act being scripted. No Vice President organically departs from talking points to repeat herself randomly, and to create the trademark “word salads”, devoid of linear meaning, that Vice President Harris produces. That public, symbolic demonstration of meaninglessness at the highest levels of our government, is itself central to the script.
And the abuse of our grand jury process, in the effort underway now to imprison the leading opposition candidate for the Presidency of the United States, is not about the actual grand jury process.
A Georgia Grand Jury handed down an indictment on August 14, 2023, presenting President Trump and his colleagues with felony racketeering and conspiracy charges, among other charges. This drama of President Trump’s indictment now — the fact that he must detour from the campaign trail for appearances before prosecutors, or must divert energy from speech preparation and consulting with campaign staff, to spend time with lawyers to prepare their responses to these charges — is itself the symbolic drama.
Again, speaking as someone who was in the background when both Vice President Gore’s and George Bush Jr’s lawyers were instructed to find ways to locate the votes to get their Principal over the top, and when both campaigns sought to coordinate their efforts closely with grassroots get-out-the-vote organizations and with state level leadership figures on both sides — I am appalled that one accusation presented in the indictment, was that President Trump — essentially tried to do a similar thing.
The description of what is requested for the months ahead should resonate with anyone who has studied the history of show trials: there will be a trial requested for within the next six months — that is, during peak campaign season — and the goal is for all of the defendants to be tried together.
That’s how Premier Stalin and Chairman Mao presented their show trials and public confessions, in 1936-1938 and in the 1950s, respectively, as well:
“Fulton county district attorney Fani Willis said that all 19 defendants would be tried at the same time and that she would be asking for a trial within the next six months.”
What this is about is not criminality but about the timing of a targeting that demonstrates the subversion of our democracy. The opposition leader, fewer than five months before the Iowa caucuses, is drained of the time, focus and resources to make his case to the American public. He must worry about trying to stay out of jail, even as precious dates are cancelled from the campaign calendar. This is exactly what happens in banana republics. The opposition leader is imprisoned or indicted under inflated charges while he or she is on the campaign trail.
Whatever becomes of this indictment, no future opposition leader will dare to challenge a contested election, as I noted earlier. With the indictment on August 14 2023 of many of President Trump’s colleagues as well (also as in the 1930s and 1950s in the Soviet Union and in China), a precedent has been established that non-legacy, that is, non-”anointed” candidates, will not be able to find help for their campaigns, as speechwriters, lawyers, fundraisers and campaign staffers will fear future lawfare.
Here I disclose that I actually went to hear President Trump in person — last month, at an event in his private Trump National Bedminster Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey. I was given the opportunity to attend by a friend, and, while I hesitated, it was only for a moment. No real journalist should give up the chance to hear a former President, and current candidate for that job, in person.
So I agreed, and Brian and I set out.
That experience took me aback as it made me rethink many of my reflexes — reflexes that even I recognize have been engineered by propaganda and repetition, as I too am only human; reflexes engineered in me to make me “hate Donald Trump.”
First of all, the physical setting, to which we arrived a day before the speech, as we were hosted overnight, led me to question some preconceptions. I’d been conditioned to believe that the Trump Inc empire was about poor taste. As I reflected on my cultivated aversion to the man and the brand, I realized that a huge part of the animosity directed at him was a class-based dog whistle system. People “with taste” — that is, the global elite, the liberal elite — “us” — were asked to hate and disdain someone who had been labelled as a “vulgarian” (indeed, a “short-fingered vulgarian”) since the days of Spy magazine.
All of the coverage with which I had been familiar, showcased the apparent crimes of Donald Trump’s bad aesthetic taste. He was a parvenu, was the implication. Not “our kind.”
As a student of Edith Wharton, though, and of New York City social history, I had always been skeptical of this line of attack. For a hundred and fifty years, the New York elite who are already established have been fighting tooth and nail against the generational ascendancy of “new money.” They always revile it.
The old Dutch families fought off the ascendancy of the robber barons, as Wharton documented in her New York Stories, which spanned the years 1891-1934; and then the children of the robber barons, a generation later, sought to fight off the newly minted heirs and heiresses who were the children of sewing machine fortunes and retail and film fortunes — the children of immigrants. That class-driven battle raged right up into the pages of Tom Wolfe’s 1987 Bonfire of the Vanities. Was Donald Trump’s purported bad taste, an actual moral crime? I was never fully persuaded.
But at Bedminster, I was moved, before I even heard the man, by the decisions made by his team, about the physical surroundings. This elegant private club — and you can have your legitimate questions about the very existence of elegant private clubs — was not a monument to ostentation or showy excess. It was, rather, built to remember and celebrate a moment in America in which America was perfect to some people. Everywhere you looked — the rolling lawns edged with untouched wilderness, in the heart of New Jersey; the spacious blue swimming pool, ringed with quiet guest rooms; the fountains in classical shapes, and the plantings that provided old-school decoration around them; the clocks that looked straight out of 1915, that studded the outdoors gathering areas; the architecture that invoked a 1920s American vernacular — white clapboard and grey stone; clocktowers overlooking campus-type quads; ivy and tennis courts, and a soft wind blowing — all of it gave me a pang.
I recognized this landscape, these buildings, this moment in the American dream.
This was America between the wars, before the Depression. It was Jay Gatsby’s Long Island — it was F. Scott Fitzgerald’s vision; it was the life for which that writer had always longed. It was the green light at the end of the dock, the future toward which Gatsby was always racing and for which Fitzgerald himself was always longing; it was the imaginatively perfected, if not real, America that Fitzgerald initially saw: affluent, gorgeous, dreaming, unspoiled.
Now, you can deconstruct that vision all you want. You can point out the lynchings and segregations of the the 1920s; you can point out any number of flaws in our nation at that time. But I recognized this vision — many Ivy League universities were built up at this same time period, using this same romantic iconography — and there are not only crimes in our past, though the crimes are real; there were hope and innocence and idealism for our nation, and for all of our people, in our past too.
Trump’s choices in this miniature world he had created — were not vulgar. They were aspirational, and they encapsulated a memory of an aspirational America. I felt that the physical surroundings, whoever had actually drafted and executed them, helped me to understand his thinking a bit better.
We found ourselves, the following day, at the event itself. This event too was a surprise. It was a small, fairly private gathering, hosted and attended by leaders of the Jewish community, in a well-appointed but not over-the-top dining room.
These were not the Jewish readers of The New York Times, or the inhabitants of the Upper West Side. These were not the liberal Jews from whom I descend.
These were stalwarts of the few Zionist organizations left in America; and they were representatives of the orthodox communities, including one of the most orthodox. The women around me were not dressed in showy, revealing cocktail gowns, as in Las Vegas. Rather they were modestly dressed, as Orthodox Jewish women choose to be; with long sleeves and ankle-length gowns, their hair covered by wigs or scarves. The secular men wore suits, but those from the ultra-orthodox community wore the traditional black suits and hats, and were bearded.
I was surprised to see that it was this ultra-Jewish community that so passionately welcomed this President — a man so often depicted as racist, a white supremacist, and so on.
There appeared the man himself. He was welcomed, and he took his place at a low, informal podium. For a moment I had an eerie experience: this man — the target of white-hot hatred from everyone in my former life — was standing about ten feet away from where we were seated.
There was his height, more notable in person than on camera; the characteristic slight swagger in his body language; there was his dark blue suit, his signature red tie, and his face, itself so familiar from the media that it all felt a bit surreal. His formerly orange hair was more muted and more silvery, and a less unusual shape. His formerly orange complexion was also toned down. He did look more statesmanlike than previously, and more appropriately his age. Whoever was advising him, those were effective choices.
I was surprised to see how beloved he was by the ultra-orthodox rabbi who welcomed him, and who gave the blessing – in Hebrew and in English, as I recall. I was surprised too to see how comfortable President Trump seemed, surrounded by Hebrew prayers, by rabbis in felt hats, by an award that evoked the decorations around Torah scrolls. He seemed extremely familiar with this community, and very much at home.
I heard from their remarks, why they so loved him. He had, in their view, staunchly defended the State of Israel. These were people who remembered how we had been run out of Europe, and had been massacred. While I did not share their politics regarding Israel’s policies, I too was moved at my coreligionists bearing the bloody history of Europe so vividly in mind as they enumerated the ways in which Team Trump had, in their view, “stood with Israel.”
Then President Trump himself spoke. I did not record his remarks so my summary here is impressionistic.
First, he struck me as being much smarter in person, than he appeared to be in public events, as they were filtered through the national media. For over an hour, he spoke, departing from notes, often in long, detailed, extemporaneous riffs. His intelligence struck me as being strongest in perceptiveness and intuition, as many successful businessmen’s and women’s intelligences are, as opposed to being detail-oriented, or theoretically analytical. In other words, like other effective business leaders, he grasped both the essence of, and the leverage points in, a conflict or a predicament, quickly and accurately, and acted accordingly with decisiveness.
This set of reflexes and habits was mocked in legacy media as stupidity — I recalled that news outlets had made fun of him for asking for a one-pager from his staffers, rather than a massive briefing book.
But as I listened to him, I explored those stories within another context. In business, and in media, if someone can’t explain a pitch in a one-page summary, it is just not actionable. I understood why his leadership style would demand this kind of executive summary, and given the list of achievements that he also shared with us, I could see how my liberal policy-wonk “tribe’s” tendency (against which we all struggled in the Clinton era) to theorize, to pontificate, and to exhaust a reader with policy details, could actually lead to a weaker performance from, and could even generate more confusion for, any Commander-in-Chief.
President Trump segued into a long list of his achievements. There was a certain pathos when he did so, as it was clear that he used speeches to list achievements that he felt the legacy media had elided altogether.
In his list of accomplishments from his prior tenure as President, he impressed me as being extremely street-smart about geopolitics. In anecdote after anecdote, he described a geopolitical conflict that threatened the United States, and then, his quick action to give our country the upper hand. For instance, he described Mexico’s reluctance to keep mentally ill or criminal people from crossing our borders. He told the story of how he threatened to withdraw aid from Mexico, and then described the fact that he immediately obtained the outcome he had sought. Similar stories recounted his pushing back on what he saw as irrational, excessive demands for money or military help from Europe, or his resisting global treaties that he thought weakened the US.
He described moving the US Embassy to Jerusalem, for instance, and recognizing that city, against international opposition, as the capital of Israel — as well as his administration’s recognizing as part of Israel, the long-contested Golan Heights.
In each case, I recalled how the media had portrayed what he had done: he was a bully, a unilateralist, a child, a thrower of tantrums.
But while I did not agree with all of the outcomes in his list – the Golan Heights recognition as being part of the State of Israel, for instance, arguably violated international law — I felt, to be frank, again, a pang.
He was a bully. But I saw, I’ll confess, as he spoke, that he had been our bully — menacing, intimidating and threatening others on the world stage, with financial or military carrots and sticks, on behalf of what he saw as the wellbeing of the United States of America, and her inhabitants.
As I listened, I realized that I missed having someone in that role on the world stage.
You can dislike such a figure personally. But when I reflected on where we were now — with more accommodating and “gentlemanly” figures, such as Anthony Blinken (whom I knew in the Clinton era — “one of us”) trotting, hat in hand, head bowed, to supplicate at the feet of tyrants around the world, who all enjoy abusing the United States in their pronouncements; now, with our prestige, power and global reputation in tatters, endangering us all existentially — I felt a certain nostalgia for a President who — okay, I’ll say it: Put America First.
I thought, as he spoke, about how I had been trained to “hate” him. He pointed out that he was a rare US President in that he had not started any war. And he said that he had brought our men and women in uniform, home.
I remember thinking — Wow, so he did. Aren’t we – meaning we, the Left, or Independents, or Americans in general — supposed to like that? To want that?
Same with his mention of the Abraham Accords. Like bringing our men and women in uniform home — this was, objectively, a Big Deal. Remember the unattainable goal of “peace in the Middle East”? Well, this accord was truly an achievement, no matter what personal animosity anyone might hold.
I realized that my “hatred” was based on conditioning, repetition and propaganda. It was also a fact that this guy remained in many ways — to me personally — unlikable.
But I also know perfectly well that Presidents who present as very likable, can be total sociopaths (that is how they get so good at that presentation of being charming). I know too that anyone who is that close to power, is going to become at some point obsessive, or aggressive, or a bully, or a seducer, or will find him or herself in some way damaged, distorted, or flawed in character.
Liberals, and legacy media, I realized, who since 2016 have focused my attention on the “toxic narcissism” or “psychopathology” of President Trump, or on his other supposed character or “mental health” flaws, really have not hung around with a lot of leaders of nations. There is not one of them who cannot be diagnosed with some personality disorder, or some severe moral failing.
I realized that I had been told that President Trump was unlikable, indeed hateful, for so long that aversion was my conditioned reflex; almost Pavlovian.
There were two issues, though, on which President Trump misjudged, in my opinion, if he wishes to be reelected by a wide enough margin to overcome electronic voting machines’ hostile or unverifiable algorithms. One issue is the “woman issue.” When President Trump mentioned Rep Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, he said something offhandedly, and without presenting evidence, such as, “She doesn’t know anything.” This got a huge wave of laughter and applause from the friendly audience; but it reminded me of my “issues” with President Trump that will not go away if he does not take certain steps to repair the damage caused by the past.
In his dismissive tone, he sounded to many women, no doubt, including me, like that 70-something guy in the most senior role at your firm at your first job, or the guy running your college or your graduate school, who will never ever ever treat women, and especially not young women, meritocratically. It felt old-school, and not in a good way.
This of course echoes other appalling earlier mis-steps from President Trump related to gender, from “blood coming out of her wherever” to the infamous “grab them by the p—y.”
I found later, though, that in many cases, President Trump’s worst moments are actually phrases taken out of context by the press. The full Megyn Kelly quote is:
‘“Certainly, I don’t have a lot of respect for Megyn Kelly. She’s a lightweight and y’know, she came out there reading her little script and trying to be tough and be sharp. And when you meet her you realize she’s not very tough and she’s not very sharp.” Then, came the kicker: “She gets out there and she starts asking me all sorts of ridiculous questions, and you could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her … wherever.”’
President Trump asserted later, after a media firestorm saying that he was referring to menstruation, that he did not mean to refer to menstruation. “Trump himself has insisted that he did not, in using the word “wherever,” actually mean to suggest that Kelly was on her period. Rather, as he later told the Today Show and CNN’s Jake Tapper, he meant that she was so angry that she seemed to be bleeding from some other orifice—like, say, a nose, or an ear.” And arguably, his quote was indeed not directly saying what the media universally claimed it said.
I myself had a similar experience of systematic distortion from the media and from the opposition – I advised Vice President Gore during his own campaign to showcase his policies as a potential Presidential candidate, rather than acting most prominently in the supportive Vice Presidential role. This common-sense advice was distorted everywhere in the media as my allegedly giving him “lessons in being an Alpha male,” whatever that means.
The same decontextualizing by the media was in play in the horrible “grab them by the p—-y” video from 2005, that surfaced during the 2016 campaign. Most of the media I read implied that Trump stated that his fame allowed him to “grab women by the p—y”. As I have explained at other times to his supporters, this alleged quote was the reason that I, a rape survivor, could not bring myself to vote for him.
Not until I took another look recently, though, did I see that the full quote was: “[T]hey let you do it […]. Grab them by the p—-y.”
‘“Trump: […] And when you’re a star, they let you do it. [Italics mine] You can do anything.
Bush: Whatever you want.
Trump: Grab ’em by the pussy. You can do anything.”’
Now, this is still not a nice thing at all for a man to say; it is not what any self-respecting woman wants to hear from any man.
It’s gross and vulgar and demeaning and offensive — it is all of the things.
But — if I am being scrupulously honest — the actual quote is not exactly the same quote as the one that was presented to the world as being that of an unrepentant and violent sexual predator.
Why do I bring these uncomfortable subjects up? Because candidates are surrounded by yes-men and yes-women, who want to pretend to the Principal that there is no problem with that person’s persona or with the public perception of that person. And I am pointing out that the Trump campaign and the candidate himself, have to face real damage done, through accurate reporting or not, when it comes to women voters. This damage must be addressed if he is to win over the female suburban swing voters in battleground states, without which no candidate can win the Presidency of the United States. There are lots of constructive, positive ways to do so.
The second issue on which President Trump needs a better message than the one I heard, is regarding the environment. He made a disparaging joke about liberals buying up oceanfront properties, and implied that, hence, global warming is not a serious concern. Again, his audience roared with approval, but I knew that this message would not do well outside of private walls. The second reason I could in the past never vote for President Trump (or for Republicans in general), was due to this sort of casual disregard for the real trouble, however you may define that trouble, in which our planet finds itself.
Even if President Trump offers a mixed portfolio of fossil fuels and renewable energies, or provides a different set of policies than the reviled “Green Agenda,” with which he proposes to protect our planet, he needs to signal that he is actually serious about fighting environmental degradation, if he is to, first of all, sound consistently like a serious person, and second, to bring over the independents and even Democrats whom he needs in order to win.
And why am I bothering to point out these two shortcomings in his otherwise disturbingly impressive presentation?
I will just say it (I have to, as you recall, since I promised the Universe that I would write what I most feared to write, if I might only survive my recent illness).
I am bothering because, while I must remain nonpartisan, as an objective observer of the terrible crisis in which the United States finds itself, I believe that a ticket of two reviled outsiders — okay, I will go there: a Trump-RFK Jr ticket (again, I promised to write what I am most afraid to write) — is the one chance we have at this historical moment, at circumventing the murderous plans that the WEF and The WHO have for us.
Some leadership pairings solve existential personality problems. When Al Gore and his wife joined Bill Clinton and his wife on the campaign trail, many voters sighed with relief. Bill Clinton was all Id, and here was a grown-up to balance him out — a Superego. Together they made a comprehensive leadership team.
The same sigh of relief was experienced by many voters when the adolescent-seeming George Bush Jr was joined by VP prospect Dick Cheney. I personally think Mr Cheney is an appalling character, but at the time he was presented as the VP pick, I saw the genius of placing someone whom voters read as being mature and steadying, next to the mouthy Texan boy wonder.
I hope both candidates’ teams will consider, for the good of the country, what I am recommending, with nonpartisan concern for our very survival as a free nation, here.
I hope everyone will reflect in general on whom they are being asked reflexively to hate, or to dismiss, or to disdain; and reflect deeply on why that might be.
****
President Trump accepted his award, and thanked the black-clad men and modestly-dressed women around him, and left.
I went to take a picture with Brian. We stood against a beautiful formal fountain; against the profusion of dahlias and ivy that clustered around it; as a reddish-gold sun set over the pristine, elegiac landscape.
I mused, as we went back to our room, amid the crickets’ voices that sounded and the velvety night that deepened — on President Trump’s life choices. He was leaving one beautiful, profitable property, to go, no doubt, to another; he had a beautiful wife and young family at home.
He was 77 years old.
And yet he was running for re-election, with all of the rigors that that entailed; with the risk, now a certainty, of legal challenges, if not worse. If he had just faded into obscurity as a private citizen, for sure he would not be facing a Grand Jury indictment, as he is right now.
So I wondered a month ago, as wind soughed softly on on that warm New Jersey evening: why is he doing this?
As he often notes himself — he has a great life, and he does not need to run again.
And I could not help, though it was against every conditioned reflex of many years, considering:
Maybe he is doing this because he loves his country.
If he loved his country he remained mostly ignorant.
That is about the most ignorant comment you could make. Wow.
Sadly, you have been conditioned and brain washed by the liberal media and your friends.
go back to sleep ya worthless, limey wanker!
I am a limey and a Trump supporter,like your use of a good old British expletive there.
Spoken like a true Democrat who doesn’t particularly care for his country.
You’re a cretin. Why don’t you go quietly into the night and do us all a favour!
A fool aloof is sure to goof allowing us to laugh at his every gaffe. However, if he be she, Adam wants his rib returned.
very good article, thank you.
One point: the climate “crisis” is not about “environmental degradation”, You can want clean rivers and clean air. and still believe quite reasonably that fossil fuels will be necessary to bring electricity to the 3 billion people who don’t have access.
The conflation of “pollution” with “carbon” is part of the propaganda machine you are talking about, and freeing yourself from.
It is insane that carbon and carbon dioxide is a pollutant, it detracts from any real pollution that occurs.
But without it climate change scientists couldn’t justify their job.
What is the normal rate of “donation” to the politicians and bureaucrats, besides 10% to the Big Guy, to get this approved?? The US Department of Energy said on Friday it would invest up to $1.2 billion (€1.1 billion) in two Direct Air Capture (DAC) facilities — in Texas and Louisiana — to suck carbon from the air.
$1.2 billion?? For carbon sucking? Hell, just plant trees. $1.2 billion buys lots of ’em.
There is no such thing as fossil fuels.
Abiogenic petroleum origin theory. There is a lot of evidence to support this theory. Oil is not derived from the fossils of plants and animals, it is formed within the mantle of the earth and pushed upward into permeable strata.
There is no evidence to support this insane theory. None. Zero evidence. It makes no sense.
There’s no evidence you have working brain cells
http://viewzone.com/abioticoilx.html
BINGO!
At the World’s Fair (as I recall) in 1893 (or 1883) John D Rockefeller bribed his, and other scientists to call oil “fossil fuel” to give it the impression of scarcity, to raise the value of it.
So the story goes, and an old video or two.
If Rockefeller really thought oil came from fossils, why didn’t he name his company, Standard Fossil Fuel instead of Standard Oil?
Oily to bed, oily to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, wise, and stealthy. And he doesn’t squeak when he speaks.
Excellent point. I don’t know of any conservative who supports dirty water, polluted air, overfishing, or driving animal species into extinction. Most support recycling and probably some use of wind, solar, or geothermal energy. What we oppose is the climate alarmism which grossly overstates the role of anthropogenic CO2 in climate change and which uses that lie to strip us of our basic freedoms and utterly destroy our way of life.
On hearing Trump and drawing no inspiration from it whatsoever.
Una, you are too obvious. No one is taking your bait. Maybe, just maybe, you are not good at this.
The real people that want to kill people are those who demonize CO2. We don’t have enough in the atmosphere. The last glacial period(we are in an ice age) we came close to a mass extinction event because below 200 ppm CO2 life as we know it ends. 280 ppm is far to close to the edge for life as we know it. People who push the climate change hoax are anti human and anti life!
All of those who feel there is way too much CO2 in the atmosphere CAN LEAD THE WAY by inhaling and HOLDING IT!
Speaking for the rest of us, we love our plants and trees!
This is nonsense. We are not in an ice age, and “we” did NOT “come close to mass extinction because below 200 ppm CO2 life as we know it ends.” Do you even know the variety of “life as we know it”? You just go online and write whatever nuttiness occurs to you?
You don’t know your geologic history.
Naomi Wolfe is a little bit of too much of too little too late. A Wolfe in Wolfe’s clothing.
How much damage has this woman done to America? I don’t accept her mea culpa and change of heart.
What damage has she done?
Seems like she drank the leftist koolaide for years and fell for the global warming/climate change hoax.
She certainly fell for the anti Israel propaganda.
Look around the last 2 1/2 year and you will see plenty of damage done. Open Borders, People arrested due to policial differences and jailed, citizens barely holding up with record inflation due to high prices in everything now.
I strongly recommend that Wolf take a long hard look at a map of the region of Israel that abuts the Golan heights. International law dictates that one country not try to annihilate another. Yet that is precisely what our neighbors tried to do in 1967. So we took part of the Golan Heights and annexed the land to protect our country. Doesn’t international law allow us to do that in the face of existential threat? The Golan Heights will not be returned to Syria any more than Jerusalem will be divided. Wolf needs to do some homework on the realities Israel faces. Until she does, she really has nothing intelligent to say about the Middle East.
I respect and admire people who have the courage and confidence to admit past mistakes/impressions/beliefs. Kudos to Naomi Wolfe for a beautifully written article. Regardless of her political affiliation this Conservative admires Ms Wolfe.
He does love his country, in his way, but he’s a narcissist. He should step aside and let DeSantis run
Almost all politicians are narcissists.
“Almost all politicians are narcissists?” That’s like saying “almost all water is wet.” Where, pray tell, is the dry water or the selfless politician?
Cincinnatus and Washington are possible to consider. Also a narcissist with sufficient character and ability can serve his country.
Nope. No one else can attack and dismantle the Deep State. You’re “going wobbly” as Maggie Thatcher would say.
So the GOPe can continue to cave to the left?
DeSantis is a Bush creation. Doubtful he will deconstruct any component of the Deep State.
Let’s see. Certainly somewhere in those indictments it mentions that’s he’s narcissistic?
Pretty much anybody who aspires to be President is a narcissist. Maybe everybody who gets into politics is, as well.
It’s to late Ms. Wolf.
I’m sure there are millions of Russian, Chinese, Iranian and other communist countries
citizens who now regret there decision to follow the leaders they have now into the hell they now live. Regrets are not easily taken back when the boot of the tyrant is on your neck.
Sorry lady but your responsible along with the rest of your Cabal in helping to destroy America.
Get over it, Joe. Your rebuke is justified, but it won’t help us prevail. Converts make good allie’s, and with her writing skills, Naomi can persuade many of our enemies to defect. My advice is that you forgive her and try to help her spread the truth.
Kennedy wants to jail “climate deniers” , he would turn into Justin Trudeau when elected.
If he thought the truth would win in an open market, he wouldn’t dream of doing such a thing. People who believe that the truth will win in an open market believe you can say that the earth is flat, the moon is made of green cheese, the Holocaust didn’t happen, Elvis is alive, and Bacon wrote Shakespeare
I’m just a schlub from middle America that saw the essence of Donald John Trump in 2016. The fact Naomi felt the need to meander through shrubs and golf courses to explain her revelation some 8 years on clears up a lot of leftist TDS. But her admonitions concerning women and President Trump’s comments are straight out of the victim hood meme. The guy treats mouthy women just as he would equally treat a mouthy man and hot damn he’s a sexist. The final nonsensical muse about RFK being on a President Trump ticket is as nuts as it sounds. Never gonna happen. Other than that welcome to the fight for a free and prosperous America Naomi.
It is amazing how so much of our population has been convinced that Trump uses nasty speech and is a threat to Democracy. I go back to Truman and no President in my lifetime has been nastier or more of a threat to democracy than Biden. He castigated those opposing his proposed federal takeover of election laws in ways that would allow for massive cheating as the heirs to “Bull” Connor. He’s the one who regulary accuses his political opponents as being “semi-facists” and “threats to democracy.” As far as actually being a threat, he tells colleges to ignore Supreme Court rulings and overrode our immigration laws, adopted by Congress and signed into law by Presidents, by fiat. He calls “journalists” stupid for asking perfectly reasonable questions. Objectively, he is so much worse than Trump in all these regards. And that’s not even mentioning his insane substantive policies.
Thoroughly enjoyed this article, Naomi! I’ve been thinking along the same lines about Trump-RFK. It is going to take all of us to restore our Republic to greatness. RFK, Jr. to work on the environment and NIH, Trump to handle international relations, trade and restoring our cities. I’d approve Tulsi Gabbard for Secretary of the Army or Joint Chiefs in a heartbeat. Kash Patel on Intel. Jeremy Clark and Ken Paxton to clean up DOJ, if that’s even possible at this stage. We have a lot of young Americans deeply committed to restoring the Republic, and I, for one, am praying for them. I was very moved by the comments from the young man, Oliver Anthony, who sky-rocketed to fame world-wide with his “Rich Men North of Richmond” song. He said it’s not just for the working class, but for all of us who have been affected by mental illness, drugs/alcohol, job loss, and feelings of hopelessness. And, God bless him, he didn’t take the millions thrown at him! Perhaps there really is a Great Awakening happening.
What to say…. is there anyone here without flaw? Without some personality trait that rubs people the wrong way.
My President…. who here could take the abuse, the slings and arrows he has? Self inflicted wounds… many. Many I can never forgive him of.
But he has put himself out there on the front line. He has never taken a step back. Balls the size of soccer balls.
What I see in him is that maleness that is seriously lacking in the men of today.
He his standing for what we all know is a better world.
Sackless, balless men everywhere you look.
That is why we are where we are today. Men meekly conceding ground. Men groveling in the dirt. Men pissing away there right to assert their will in things we know are not true, Things we know will harm our entire circle of influence. Shameful behavior!
Back to Naomi. Bits and pieces of Naomi’s value system do not resonate with me.
But… I appreciate her candor to admit she is capable of change. She has things as we all do that are hills we will die on. Right?
She is the type of person I want to have a sit down with. Have honest discussions with. Yes we will disagree about many things but as she alluded to… the bygone days where you could agree to disagree that is where the heart of America lies.
Let’s face it…. normal is not coming back. All we can do is do our best to keep this ship from completely sinking.
Politicians are not going to fix anything. This is our burden to carry.
Question is will we? Will we step up? Will we be able to look our grand children in the face and say we fought the good fight or bury our heads in shame?
As for me I am glad Mrs. Wolf has crossed the Rubicon to our side of the aisle.
What say you?
Your grandchildren will be brown-skinned and beautiful, and will think your “normal” was backwards and ignorant.
I can accept her mea culpa — live and let live — but some of her ideas are just as wacky as ever.
Nicely said, Ms. Wolf. Our only hope is that enough people likewise examine their own conditioned hatred of DJT, to give him a fair chance. We have to rectify what’s been done.
I get really tired hearing about concerns about the environment and how -we- must change. Fact, China and India comprise about 2.5 billion people. Some of the most polluted rivers come from China and India. Everyone in the United States and Western Europe can start riding bicycles tomorrow and sit in the dark and it will not change the numbers until China and India change as well. They will not do so because it is bad for business.
You may be able to spin the Georgia case and argue that Trump and the codefendants were just exercising their First Amendment right to question the results of the Georgia vote. They may be able to argue that they truly believed Trump won and that they were challenging the results as other candidates have done in the past.
You may be able to spin the January 6 speech and argue again that Trump was just exercising his First Amendment rights to claim to his supporters that he won the election and that his supporters should go to the Capital to protest “peacefully and patriotically,”
But I don’t see how you can spin the Florida Classified documents case. Trump took boxes of highly classified documents. The fact that Biden and Pence also had classified documents IS NOT A DEFENSE TO WHAT TRUMP DID. Although his supporters will always make that argument.
Trump has lived his life with one rule and one thought: Rules that apply to others simply do not apply to me. I do what I want and I say what I want and I don’t listen to anyone who tells me that I cannot do something that I want to do. That philosophy has always worked for him up to now. It got him elected President of the United States, so in his mind he is right and will always be right. But now that philosophy has come back to bite him on the butt.
The Clintons have the same mentality. They both think they are so smart and so special and that the country needs them so badly the rules that apply to everyone else simply do not apply to them. Maybe that is the mentality you have to have to run for and be elected President of the United State. I hope not.
My big fear is that Trump loses primary or loses the general election because of these indictments, and then goes to trial and each case and is found not guilty on all of them. If that happens this country is in a lot of trouble. Then everything Trump is claiming now about these indictments just being politically motivated to keep him from being elected will be true.
If that happens we may never be able to have an election where the results are generally accepted and there is peaceful transfer of power again. Our tradition of a peaceful transfer of power after an election is the best thing about America and rightfully the envy of the world. If we lose that, we lose our country.
I don’t recall a particularly “peaceful transfer of power” when Trump took office. Dozens of Democrats boycotted the Inauguration. Protest rallies took place on the Mall with Madonna musing about blowing up the White House, all because Trump would be residing there. People screamed “Not my President”. And on the streets of Washington there was violence, with over 200 arrested for felonies. (Most of the charges were dropped and the arrests expunged, of course.) One prominent Democrat activist tweeted, “The move to impeach Trump starts today”. For months we had people proudly declaring themselves part of the Resistance. And of course, within the Deep State, some were conspiring to take out the duly elected President. So there was nothing “peaceful” about that particular transfer of power.
Obama stood there and peacefully transferred power to Trump. Trump served four years as President. Yes, he was impeached twice (deservedly), but under Constitutional rules was not convicted and not removed from power.
When Biden beat Trump, by contrast, Trump refused to accept the results, actively sought to reverse it, in ways that his Cabinet members and vice President told him were illegal. He refused to attend Biden’s inauguration. He still has not admitted he lost the election.
And “the election was rigged” is not a legitimate excuse. The election was not rigged. The evidence is clear and Trump knew it.
Do you think that by repeating the lies propagated by the MSM and Democrappers that you’re convincing anyone that you are anything other than a sock puppet? Good luck with that Mick!
Interesting that you didn’t address all of the emails that Hillary “lost”., or all the documents that have been found in Biden”s home garage and office – many that are “classified” from his days as VP. Absolutely NOTHING is being done about them. Or the fact that he and his son have colluded with the Ukraine, made millions from that, and had it all squashed in the media. And there was literally hundreds of pieces – eyewitness statements, film coverage, etc., of election corruption in all the contended states. And yet, none of them were allowed to see the light of day because of leftist control of the government, big business, and mainstream media (funded by VERY left companies/ organizations). That 2020 election was the last election we will ever see, I’m afraid. Since the left was able to get away with it completely, we will never ever have an election again and this is why Trump has been indicted – not for what he did, but for who he is – a genuine believer in America’s greatness.. They can’t risk his support base taking away their power!
You should open your eyes mate, perhaps even do a little research. Every election the Demoncrats have lost for decades have been contested as well as many state elections. Your elections are hardly the envy of the world anymore after the last 3 or 4 and the fraud is now firmly set in place by the Liberals and being defended to the death by any foul piece of lawfare and dirty tricks possible.
Naomi Wolf is a classic case of a narcissistic dumbbell. The last to figure out what so many of us have known at least since 2015 she needs to reassure us that she is still the smartest girl inside her own head.
Far as I know the left gives Ms Wolfe has a lot of credibility and this article might allow some on that side the cover to finally sheepishly admit that JB is horrible and things were way better under Trump. Probably that is what RFK, Jr would bring to the table also – cover for the left. I would hope he would get over the climate hysteria which IMO is entirely manufactured for profit. I do agree with protecting the environment – we should not be polluting our earth and our bodies.
To me DJT’s private comment about women and what they will allow, while a bit crude, is true. He’s is a rich well known alpha and plenty of women will do ANYTHING to snag a guy like that.
Lastly, I dispute that AOC is not an idiot. Everyone who didn’t get a great paying job at Amazon New York should agree.
Most voters today are looking at (candidates who are of sound mind, not petty and self-centered, ) those who have the ability to CORRECT problems, (not make them worse,). work for the people of their own country, not send trillions of dollars to fight wars in foreign countries, putting the United States in debt, and on a track of no return, as well as endangering their citizens with open borders, deadly drugs, child abuse, lawlessness, and destroying jobs Americans used to have. Look at REAL medical science…..the kind that actually enhances life, and the medical specialists who aren’t trying to decrease civilization.
Do any of the people who are critisizing RFK jr. and Naomi Wolf have any knowledge of medicine, virology, immune systems, statistics of over vaccinating the public and children, and how many died from the Covid vaccine and lack of government allowing Ivermectin or Hydroxychloroquin to be used as an anti-viral remedy?
I believe the bigger issue, and, not what he says or how he “sways” people into thinking he is for them is what he actually does. He did the opposite of what he campaigned on in 2015.
He spent more than 0bama, he let felons out of prison instead of “giving us law abiding neighborhoods, no balanced budget, he filled the swamp instead of draining it, he did not stop the invasion even though he had full Presidential authority to do it, I could go on for many more but that;s the gist of it.He is either incompetent, or part of the deep state.
He is the best Reality TV con man in our time.
I voted for Trump twice but now he is a distraction. I think he and Brandon should step aside. I am glad that Wolfe is finally getting some common sense but she is too much into the Green issue. It is the environmentalists who helped destroy part of Hawaii with their ridiculousness water rationing, etc. Also, she needs to realize that upper Westside liberals are truly insane.
The cynic in me thinks this is merely a “law of averages” comment to re-build Wolfe’s neutrality chops in anticipation of 2024. As the old saying goes, she’s attempting a pre-season All-American campaign. However, we all know home runs hit in spring training and touchdowns scored prior to the regular season count for nothing. I fear the (self-labeling) elites have gotten too attached to the strategy of buffering biases in the “off-season” and then returning to them during presidential campaigns. The dyed in the wool establishment intelligentsia can then point to these mile marker articles/comments to market their Switzerland perspective to those voting rubes outside of New England. The confirmation bias attached to her environmental comments alone out her for who she truly is. She honestly thinks Trump’s environmental messaging would not do well outside of private walls? Can you out yourself as a liberal northeasterner anymore than that comment? So let me let me get this straight; you approach the internal biases of your two major issues: the woman issue and the environment. You couldn’t stomach the thought of a man using undignified words toward women and his environmental policy did not match your fervent beliefs. You could have gone anywhere with this article, but the Law of Priority took you back to style over substance and virtue signaling. Yes… by all means… you shall be christened as the purest of all free thinkers in the next election cycle. And I know just the media outlets who will pay extra for this off-season work. Best of luck.
I voted for Trump twice. (Not sure my vote the second time was counted!)
because… he was not afraid to tell the truth to the public in spite of what the media would report; he had a working knowledge about how the integrated system of public, private, non-profit organizations and media operates to position favored candidates in office; he made most of the 16 GOP contestants look foolish and exposed the true nature of Hillary; most of all, he was willing to risk his life, fortune and sacred honor for American principles against entrenched-entitled-elitist, globalist, marxist, unelected agencies and bureaucrats to Make America Great Again for the people.
My husband embraces all the negative reports promulgated against Trump, especially the “grab women by the p—y” indictment. He doesn’t understand WOKEness or how it has gained such traction, but he sees the culture disintegrating.
I would not only embrace a Trump-RFK, Jr. ticket, I would campaign my heart out for the only chance to unite and save America from the self serving, corrupt, deceitful, unConstitutional uni-party.
Naomi Wolf is only partway on her journey out of the Democrat party and its enslavement of her mind and soul. But I don’t think she will ever realize the depth of the harm she and her crowd have done. But she is no longer its slave, so two cheers for that.
I strongly suspect that Wolf never bothered to actually watch a Trump rally on television. There have been many, most recently those carried live on Newsmax. Had she done so – even if she had watched only one – I daresay that she may have undergone a paradigm shift far sooner than she has. What, I wonder, would she have heard Trump say that she would have found politically untenable or contemptible? Her visit to Bedminster and her opportunity to hear Trump directly, at first hand, unfiltered by hostile pundits, was, to her an eye- opening experience. But she could have had the same epiphany, in the comfort of her own home, had she merely watched any of Trump’s numerous presentations when he was a candidate in 2016, during his presidency, and afterward. I assume she never did, and, if so, condemn her for her laziness.
Whenever the media quotes Trump … or more likely _explains_ what he has said to you … you would be well served to find the original transcript and read for yourself. They are more often than not prevaricating.
Get ready for the Globalist One Worlders. to try and advance their agenda by Climate Change lockdowns or another plandemic of some kind. The Truth is not their friend and they continuallly try to block it out. Remember the Big Box stores , Wallmarts, and Targets, made lots of money while the small businesses and small towns with family owned businesses lost money or closed.
Highly educated, easily influenced and driven by emotion and political orthodoxy, the authoress makes a great case for the repeal of the 19th Amendment, which will ultimately prove to be America’s Death Knell.
A liberal is always a liberal. Neomi got mogged by reality during covid scam. But she still doesn’t grab the true state of The USA. Marxist left has declared war on America. She is in the middle of not only legal but cultural and economic battles. And climate change is one of those hoaxes Marxist are using as weapon against The USA.. Neomi asks why he’s doing this? Because he loves his country. Sure he does. so are other people. What differentiates Trump from the rest is his ability to understand the peril his country is in. He knows what would happened if America continues on the path she is in. Everything on this universe have an expiration date. Trump doesn’t want The USA to expire while he is alive. Is that simple.
Ms Wolfe agrees that women should be treated in the same manner as men but when somebody like Trump mentions a truth like AOC knows nothing this is called sexism, so what part of equality am I missing here?.
AOC is as dumb as dumb can get.
When Trump bragged about the pussy thing he was speaking Male Locker Room talk to an idiot as men often speak in such a manner to impress other men, Im a man and so I know this for a fact, however I know one American woman that told she would be happy if Trump grabbed her by the pussy and she told me women speak like that about men all the time.
THE most narcissistic US President ever was that Born Again Christian who changed his Christian name, Barry, to a full on islamic name, Barak Hussian, when he embraced Jesus as his Lord and Savor as the first time I seen him walk up to the Podium he looked like a Negro Coke Head Pimp I often seen around 42nd St in NYC back in the early 1980s. … How can those ”Of The Left” be against the ONE and ONLY President that said… ”We must get out of these endless Wars”… ”We must bring back our Troops from foreign lands where they are protecting others for their enemies while we have enemies of our own”… Trump ended that disgraceful mess in Afghanistan, brokered Peace Deals with various islamic Nations and Israel and yet those singing Give Peace a Chance call him the most dangerous man in America and indeed the World…
Am I missing something here or what?.
Naomi,
You observed in person something that I too have noted, and that is that President Trump seems to one of the perceptive leaders we have ever had when it comes to international affairs and economics. If he could also turn down his New York arrogance, my perception, he could be much more effective. Also, if he doesn’t become more perceptive in his choice of support staff, he will again be battling foes within and without. However, I can truly say that he has revealed who many of our foes are both within the Republicans and the Democrats.
If he makes better choices with his speech and on the environment, the battle with how he is presented in the press will continue because they support the globalist elite agenda, and this is the major reason they and government deep state oppose and hate Donald Trump. They can’t control him and he is not one of them..
There is more but not enough time. I do believe he is doing this because he loves this country and what it can be. He respects the friend we have in Israel and wants them to survive and prosper. The globalist are attacking populists around the globe, Brazil, Argentina, Italy, Israel, because their goal is control, their control. They may truly believe that only they can save this planet. As a believer in God and his word, I don’t believe man or woman has that power. We are to be good stewards of what he has given us, but our lifestyles cannot go on without the prudent use of fossil fuels, at least until their replacement is found, solar and wind cannot do this. They can only be supplements to our energy needs.
God bless you. Trump has helped all of us (well many of us) to see more clearly.
looks like naomi pressed a few buttons !! i don’t live in america so my comments are gleaned from what i have read and interviews i have watched . reading matter , v d Hanson , ” the case for trump ” the dying citizen ” kimberly strassel ” resistance at all costs ” mollie hemingway ” rigged ” ” ball of collusion ” by andrew mc carthy . just to name a few , all american writers . then interviews of v d hanson , and thomas sowell . both learned and credentialed academics one white one black . when those that take time to over ride their TDS and study the form of candidates trump on his worst day is hands down better than dementia joe and cackle o harris . contrary to crone hillary bad mouthing half of trump followers , like all voters in both camps that could be applied but at your peril . i was a pariah for awhile and still are to some acquaintances when i said trump would be elected over hillary . i have made it my mission in life to ignore all media and their lying narrative . miss wolf may have had an epiphany of sorts but even that doesn’t erase her prejudices .
Looks like Naomi will be soon experiencing the JK Rowling-cancellation effect in 3…2…1…
“I’d been conditioned to believe that the Trump Inc empire was about poor taste. As I reflected on my cultivated aversion to the man and the brand, I realized that a huge part of the animosity directed at him was a class-based dog whistle system.”
And yet now the global elites embrace ugliness in all its forms, from the garishness of drag shows and cross-dressers, to the twerking of obese female entertainers, to the ugliness of avant-garde art, to pink and green hair and body piercings and mega=tattoos, to bodies disfigured by gender reassignment surgeries, to the garishness of avant-garde clothing designs, to the misogyny and crudity of rap and hip-hop. And these people lecture us about fashion and good taste?
The left gives us “Rachel” Levine, Dylan Mulvaney, Sam Brinton, and Lizzo while lecturing us about good taste.
NO JFK vp. he is a lefty for sure. i like him for the most part but i know what he is. they will assassinate trump to install a democrat.
Thank you for the article Dr. Naomi.
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