Ramona's picture

    Why It Means Something When De Niro Says It

    You could spend many wasteful hours going back through at least 30 years of my public utterances--blogs, essays, articles, comments--but you'll never find an F-bomb in any of them. That's not me. It's not my most hated word--that would be the C-word--but it's right up there.

    I shake my head a lot, signalling uninvited disgust at the thousands of times I see it on Twitter, on Facebook, in blogs, in real life. I don't get how "F--- you!!!" adds to any argument, other than making the user feel mighty, mighty good. It's used so much it's lost whatever luster it might have had.  As slings and arrows, they're even kind of laughable.

    But last night at the Tony Awards Robert De Niro dropped the F bomb--twice--against Donald Trump, and I, an audience of one in my own living room, found myself cheering like a maniac.
     



    So what's the difference? The difference, as I see it, is in context, power, and visibility.

    Context: Trump had just come off of a lunkheaded one-man burlesque at the G7 Summit held in Canada. At the meeting where leaders from the top industrialized countries gather to work on equitable alliances,Trump's dual roles as chaos creator and spoiled brat became clearer with every word and deed.  The Ugliest American embarrassed us once again, and put us in a far weaker position world-wide than any president had ever done before.

    Trump is headed today for talks with the North Koreans. It's a clown show, with Dennis Rodman as the frontman. Trump will know in seconds whether or not it's going to work, because "It's what I doooo." The two dictators will have a private 45-minute sit-down, again unprecedented, the need for secrecy way too suspicious.

    Then there's that whole flap about refugee kids in cages, literally torn from their parents' arms, all in the name of "new and tougher immigration policy". The program is so rotten the UN's Human Rights Commission felt compelled to condemn the United States of America for "arbitrary and unlawful separation of family life...a serious violation of  the rights of a child".

    It adds up.

    Power: Robert De Niro is a world-famous actor known for his no-bullshit take on our politics. Every one of us would have been surprised if he had taken the stage and said nothing. He did what he came for, and he did in New York City, where businessman Trump is and always has been a pariah. De Niro did it in front of an audience of creative mavericks there to celebrate the freedom to dream, to endure, to interpret the human condition. Trump--no surprise--is the antithesis of all they hold sacred.

    Visibility: De Niro got a standing ovation. How awful if he hadn't, coming off of that powerful performance by the still-grieving students from Parkland--those same students now working to bring the NRA to its senses before more children are killed, and getting ugly heat, even from members of Trump's administration. The optics were inescapable: De Niro could have been every furious parent, every furious student, every furious human being capable of horror at the violence perpetrated on us all.

    The ceremonies are broadcast all around the world. Millions of people saw De Niro pump his fists and say those words, and, for everyone who sniffed "blasphemy", claiming, bizarrely, that it could only help Trump, there were countless others who did as I did--cheered the hell out of it. Pumped! We were pumped.

    We need that kind of anger, that kind of power, that kind of visibility, and let's face it--it means more when it comes from a celebrity than when it comes from a policy wonk or a relative nobody. Celebrities have sway. They get quoted. Their names and faces mean something. Witness the fuss this morning over what De Niro said. We're talking about it. Not just the words but the reasons for them.

    And that, my friends, is a Big Effing Deal.

     

    (Cross-posted at Ramona's Voices and Medium)
     

    Comments

    It's like when Superman regained his powers and returned to save the planet from General Zod. Welcome back, Mona!


    X2!


    Thanks, Mike. Trump is better than any spring tonic. Gets my blood to boiling. Had a little bout with iron deficiency anemia but I'm taking my iron, so I guess that makes me Iron Woman. Not as good as Man of Steel but it'll have to do.  cheeky


    Also, Iron Woman has a better ring than Anemia Girl


    You got that right!


    Thank you, Ramona, for saying this. For too long we have just rolled our eyes, expressed frustration, asked why the GOP is complicit with this corruption, treason, and buffoonery.  I have been reading a bit on the “Red Scare,” that was similar in many ways to what trump is doing now.  McCarthy used the same tactics, and without the internet or social media.  It was pernicious and everyone was afraid of him.

    in this case, I honestly think the GOP is supporting him because they are getting their dream-come-true message:  Government is the Enemy.  I wonder what they will do when their Russian Wolf-Hound catches the car?  Do they really think they are so smart they will stay above the fray, (and rich?). I guess they do.

    Who will be the Mr Welch to calmly confront them: trump’s GOP fixers,  trump’s cabinet; and the Ugliest American  himself —-

    “Have you no sense of decency?”

    This is how it went down...

    http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/6444/

    This is what we need.  Will it be Mueller?  It will certainly not be anyone in the media.  

    This is what we need and we need it now, to show that our Democracy is real.  When it happens, everything trump has done has to be nullified, including his bogus Supreme Court shill.

    (ps)  I’ve missed you.  Thinking about you!

     


    Thanks, Jan. I've missed you, too. You may have hit on something--besides Mueller's investigation, maybe it's time for another televised un-American Activities hearing, this time with Trump and his cohorts in the hot seat. I could see Adam Schiff playing the part of Joseph Welch and maybe Elijah Cummings as the Grand Inquisitor. 

    Or Hillary.  Ha!

    We could put Angela Merkel in the peanut gallery and she could  glare daggers at Trump. Or maybe Melania. She's pretty good at that and she's motivated.

    It would be quite a show. Trump loves shows. He outta be right at home.  This could be a thing!


    Why anyone cares what an actor says about anything is a mystery to me. All they are are people who lie so convincingly that they can convince us that they are people they are not. I've seen no evidence any of them know any more than I on any political issue.

    I don't care what words people use, I'll use any word I want anytime I want. Fuck is a strong word with a huge shock value, nothing more than that. It doesn't make an argument, it doesn't say anything meaningful.  I might say fuck that or fuck them in the midst of an argument but never as a stand alone statement.

    From the so called creative class the most creative thing De Niro could think of to say was "Fuck Trump." Really? That's the best he could do? But then actors aren't known for depth or intelligence. They're famous for convincingly parroting the words others write for them. Writers with more wit and intelligence. De Niro should have found some author to write his Oscar speech for him. I'm sure there are many writers out there who could have come up with something better than Fuck Trump. And I'm sure De Niro could have repeated what ever they wrote in a thoroughly convincing manner.


    Agree completely. Politics is too much like booing or cheering your "team."

    It would have been better to say fuck Putin, and called Trump his little sock puppet, a traitor to America.  Intent and busy destroying truth, decency and the letter and spirit of the Constitution, what the greatest generation and others fought and died to preserve. Trump is robbing America's piggy bank and debasing its soul, for Putin and corrupt Republican donors.


    It's true that De Niro could have come up with a whole bunch of sentences, but if you ever watch award shows, it's been done. All it took was a two-word phrase spoken in his best tough-guy voice and they're still talking about it late in the day. 

    And by the way, it wasn't an Oscars speech, it was The Tony Awards--in NYC--and De Niro was doing an intro for Bruce Springsteen, who won a special award. De Niro is a New Yorker with long-held animosity toward Trump. He knows his tricks. Sure, a good writer could have written a dandy speech but it turns out those two words were more than enough.

    That's kind of my point.


    De Niro could have just said "Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck" without mentioning Trump at all and we'd still be talking about it late in the day. I realized after I hit send it wasn't the Oscars but I care so little about what an actor says I couldn't see how it mattered.

    Yeah it's all been done before but doing it again would still be better than blurting out fuck Trump. Lady Gaga could have just come out and said, "Fuck rapists." Instead she did this.

    Which do you think would have been better?


    Do I really have to choose? Who sez? I loved what Lady Gaga did there, but I loved what De Niro did, too. Different causes, different reactions. Whatever it takes.

    On De Niro and how he said it: It was a dismissive slap at Trump. The F-word fit.

     

     


    No, of course you don't have to choose.  Choose between what?  Expressions of passion, for sheer passion's sake, are not only personal for those who make them but for those who participate in either absolute agreement or utter disgust.  Either way, it's about what we feel in a genuine moment that is all about the gut - we argue about it later when the head gets in the way.  So ...

    Fuck Trump!


    I have no more respect for De Niro blurting fuck Trump than I  have for Peter calling us snowflakes. I can dish it out and I can take it. I'm fine with a rough and tumble dialog. But I'm interested in more than exchanging ad hominems. To gain my respect you have to do more than shout out an insult. A blog praising someone for just  yelling an insult is a joke.

    Recently you took a stand and told me you thought I was better than a comment I made. You thought I crossed a line. And really, agree or disagree what I said had more substance than if I had just said "Fuck you Aaron." You made  a choice. A choice for what you saw as greater substance and truth. Do we have to choose? Apparently not, but I've made a choice. A choice for an argument better than just  "fuck Trump."


    ocean-kat, are you saying De Niro had access to magic words, words that would have changed everything, but he blew it?. Or are you saying because he's an actor, he should just sit down and shut up? 

    We spend inordinate amounts of time on "substance and truth". Nothing changes. Sometimes we just need that energizing rah-rah moment when we can stick it to the guy who's making us miserable. It won't change anything, either. We know that.

    If you didn't feel it, no big deal. It's enough to me that I did.


    To quote De Niro in one of his movies (Capone?): "Fuck me? No, fuck you". OK's point is well taken. Why won't this just turn into another elites vs deplorables chant, we feel good, they respond in kind. And as Amanda Rivkin notes, De Niro is still invested in Little Russia in Miami and tied to the Agalarovs - but he gets to be a hero by investing 2 words. (Jeff Flake in Congress has been tweeting real hard against Trump - apparently the pinnacle of a congressman' resistive abilities these days?)

    Alyssa Milano's been tweeting, organizing, going to places like Alabama to rouse the masses and get out the viteote. For 1 1/2 years now if not more. Besides responding to Trump she's set up a site to focus new ideas, to be proactive. Despite falling on bad times financially. But hey, Bobby gives us his gruntface mobster routine...


    It's great what Alyssa Milano is doing. A lot of others, too. They're all working in their own way and the more powerful voices out there, the better.

    What De Niro did won't change a thing, but it came at a moment when I needed a big voice yelling at Trump. I love the Tony Awards, and Sunday night seemed to be the night for energizing those of us who are pretty demoralized by all that's going on with Trump.

    It was a moment. Nothing more. I'm not even a huge De Niro fan, but it surprised me that I could be cheering for a word that I hate. Simply put, I needed it, I loved it, I wrote about it. I do that.


    Well here's the great F-You compilation for those trying times... (the one i was looking for was from Jim Jarmusch's "Dead Man")

     


    And your point is...?  What does that have to do with Trump, or anything even close?


    Huh? It's a compendium of famous movie FU's, in honor of De Niro (though Joe Pesci is a bit more proficient at it)


    Lol. You don't know me very well, do you? The  last thing on  earth I would want to watch is a video made up  of nothing but FUs. Did you miss that part in my blog?


    Oh, I just like translating it into other languages - new subtleties in the subtitles. Come to think of it, I hear the Big Lebowsky has a great .srt - Donny especially.


    Okay, I have no idea what you just said. None.


    Welcome back.

    The inscrutable Peracles


    Thanks.

    I  think...


    A blog praising someone for just  yelling an insult is a joke.

    It's about more than that, and it's written by someone who understands more than that.

    Ocean-kat, you're right that an uninspired f-you is an uninspired use of language.  I'm not going to continue defending its use - that would be a waste of my own words - but I'm also willing to acknowledge that a one-finger salute is on occasion worth it's slight weight in gold.  Remember this?

     

     

    Sometimes less is more.  And sometimes, like the choice I made about the comment(s) that you referenced, too much that's said lessens the "substance and truth".


    Perfect!


    Aaaah Dear Ramona. All I could think of following a reading of your blog was:

    BASEBALL

     


    De Niro says F-U to Trump. We are supposed to be weak and apologize 

    Samantha Bee makes a joke, we apologize.

    We showed Franken the door.

    Last night Virginia Republicans selected a white supremacist for the Senate

    In South Carolina, a Republican who criticized Trump was replaced by a Pro-Trump Republican for a House seat,

    Perhaps De Niro and Bee are not the problem here.


    Apologize, don't apologize, I don't care about that show and that's not what this thread is about. Are you claiming saying fuck you is an indication of strength? If all I had to say when I disagree with you was Fuck rmrd no one would be praising me for it. No one here would be telling me it was impressive and praising my bold commentary. People here would consider me too stupid to make a strong rational argument and then I'd get a tos warning. For a site that prides itself on it's astute and rational debate praising someone for blurting out "Fuck you" is pretty inconsistent.


    I’m saying that De Niro’s fuck you doesn’t make a fucking bit of difference to wingnuts. Wingnuts are going to be upset. De Niro is not the reason that we can’t have debate with wingnuts. Wingnuts survive on alternative facts.

    Edit to add:

    Fuck you does energize some Progressives

    Calling people snowflakes energizes wingnuts.

    2nd Edit to add:

    There will not be a rational discussion with Trump supporters. I give you Sarah Huckabee Sanders, Kellyanne Conway, and Fox News are prime examples. 

    The working class is suffering economically. Why vote in people who want to trash your health care and allow financial advisers to lie to you? If a person believes abortion is murder, asking them to support abortion is asking them to vote against their moral code. You are not going to have your desired debate.

    So fuck it, energize your base.


    Gee, when I use these words people complain I have a potty mouth. I'm just trying to energize my base. And all ur fuckin bases are fuckin belong 2 us.


    Fuck you PP

    By way of explanation in this case I'm using Fuck more literally in that I agree with you and I hope you get laid.


    Well, you can disagree with me and I'll still get laid, but I appreciate your concern - *that's* why we need an energized base - to watch/wash our backs.

    Or perhaps you meant the old retort, "Nah, you wouldn't like it - I just lay there". Which is true.


    Why not just cheer on Trump saying fuck you back to DeNiro, really ramp it up, then we can get on with the real civil war, some on both sides of the aisle seem to be craving a do-over. And in the end isn't rock em sock em kill the other guy what all trolls are really after? Ergo > Trump wins. Divisiveness and tribalism uber alles, attack attack attack...


    P.S. Peace after all is: boring. And war makes for big ratings.

    Edit to add: also to consider, Bully Theory 101 is don't feed the troll:

    and the old canard, "an eye for an eye leaves everyone blind."

    Myself, I now think of DeNiro as an ass when I used to admire him. He got there in steps, though, it's not the first time I've been disappointed.


    You are free to do outreach to all the people who voted for Trump that you want. I think your outreach will produce zero results.

    Last night the Republicans in South Carolina rejected a Trump critic. In Virginia, Republicans elected a white supremacist, 

    The Democrats went high, the Republicans went low. Trump won.


    Excuse me, you're talking to the wrong person, I don't believe in "outreach." I've not liked either political party since I registered as an Independent in 1980. But then I think having to do outreach to get people off the couch to vote, something that many others have fought and died for, is outrageous. Outreach is like bribing people to vote, it's part of the corruption of our system. Promise them their favorite thing, i.e., be against abortion, be against the Pentagon, whatever, in order to get them to vote for you.I don't like the idea of having to bait people to vote with special interest promises. People with such passionate special interests should be running themselves, see if they get a majority interested in what they believe so strongly in. Or not. Go to the courts then instead, argue your case there.


    It is 2018.There are midterms. Seats in Congress will be filled by Republicans or they will be filled by Democrats.


    From Frank Bruni @ NYTimes:

    Dear Robert De Niro, Samantha Bee and other Trump haters:

    I get that you’re angry. I’m angry, too. But anger isn’t a strategy. Sometimes it’s a trap. When you find yourself spewing four-letter words, you’ve fallen into it. You’ve chosen cheap theatrics over the long game, catharsis over cunning. You think you’re raising your fist when you’re really raising a white flag.

    You’re right that Donald Trump is a dangerous and deeply offensive man, and that restraining and containing him are urgent business. You’re wrong about how to go about doing that, or at least you’re letting your emotions get the better of you.

    When you answer name-calling with name-calling and tantrums with tantrums, you’re not resisting him. You’re mirroring him.

     You’re not diminishing him. You’re demeaning yourselves. Many voters don’t hear your arguments or the facts, which are on your side. They just wince at the din.

    You permit them to see you as you see Trump: deranged. Why would they choose a different path if it goes to another ugly destination?  [....]


    Democrats went high in 2016 and lost.


    Nonsense - we won, but our law enforcement and intelligence service turned around and lost it for us. Nothing says playing dirtier would have helped us do better. But not stopping them hurt us much. But we simply need the law, not a bigger cannon.


    No.  "We" won the popular vote, but Trump won the Electoral College vote - which is how the law regarding elections works.  So unless you're arguing to change that specific act of law enforcement by stopping it (which is a debate we need to have as a country), simply needing the law didn't help.  Perhaps this time a bigger cannon will.


    No, they didn't "win" the Electoral College vote - they cheated, big time - grossly illegally. I don't cry over sharp elbows, I've played hockey & football. But this is wholescale treason. And our intelligence agencies dropped the ball big time on this - worse than 9/11, since that was a one-shot, hard to defend against. This was a years-long effort.

    And the worst thing is that people like you still believe we lost, meaning we should have cowed down and done something even worse to have less effect based on all the illegal activities, the full-court press going on. Nope. We won. And they stole it. And worse, they planned the steal for years. It wasn't about whether Hillary went to Wisconsin or campaigned in Michigan or said "deplorables". They knew they were going to have a skinny percent whatever happened, and they knew the states would never recount the votes or check the machines properly, and they knew they'd kick X number of people off the rolls as needed, etc., etc., etc. Look at the Stormy Daniels "settlement" - they had her lawyer talking to Trump's lawyer behind her back. It was a total setup, and she's coming back pissed - now she has Avenatti, he's coming for blood. And that should be what we do too - blood. She's not questioning herself. We shouldn't be questioning ourselves - even this week we had Trump mouthing lines Putin put in his mouth. This is war, not a fairly lost election. Money funneled through the NRA, money funneled through different banks, magically appearing in hotels, Giuliani's rogue group with the FBI, etc., etc., etc


    And that should be what we do too - blood. She's not questioning herself. We shouldn't be questioning ourselves - even this week we had Trump mouthing lines Putin put in his mouth. This is war, not a fairly lost election. Money funneled through the NRA, money funneled through different banks, magically appearing in hotels, Giuliani's rogue group with the FBI, etc., etc., etc

    Exactly.

    And when did I say it was fairly lost?  Facts are that Trump is our president and Hillary isn't, and whatever it takes to make sure we don't get outsmarted, outfoxed and out maneuvered again works for me.  We can shout at clouds about 2016 until we lose our voices or we can make damn sure it doesn't happen again.  And if that means a "Fuck Trump" on television at an awards show, a lawyer like Avenatti shitting documents all over Twitter or a long time, respected Dagger using her voice for something more than whining then count my voice with theirs.

    We lost the election, Peracles.  It's done.  Saying it wasn't fair does what, exactly?  If we're truly lucky as a country Trump will fail without destroying us in the process and history will record something at least close enough to the truth of it to satisfy those of us still around to appreciate the effort.  'Til then, we have to fight for it, throw those sharp elbows and bring on the blood, because if we don't start playing on the same field they're on - all of them - history will tell a far different story.  


    "Saying it wasn't fair does what, exactly?" - uh, it keeps us focused and angry and realistic - why we need the Mueller investigation to continue, why they want it to stop, why the "bipartisan" went away, why they're doing scorched earth on policy, why they'll cheat again in November if we don't stop it, why they'll get us to cripple an Al Franken with no sense of irony, etc. This election was stolen. November isn't just a mid-term - it's an accounting on top of a long long rapsheet including an act of war by a foreign power. 


    Comey used private email - as does the Trump gang (and private unsecured phone). Only a problem when the bitch does it, and even Democrats are hypocritical about that - what was ffairly obvious, common (but in her case contained) was made a scandal, and none of the Democrats who got upset about this will scream about Trump and Comey's use, because IOKIYAR. It was even ok for Bush and Trump to delete and not maintain records - but then Dems get anal about their own crew where every foible matters. Suckered again, bigtime.


    If we're disagreeing about something here, I'm missing it.


    Agree, PP...see..link for whole thing.

    These days the Right no longer has even a rudimentary moral exoskeleton capable of holding it upright against the gravitational pull of its own depravity   And the Both Siderist crutch the media has been using for 20 years to prop up the corpse of the GOP into a grotesque caricature of relative respectability is steadily disintegrating.   
     
    The Fall of the Right has arrived. 
     
    And as they fall, they are trying to drag as much of the rest of the world down with them, which means we are now fully within the interregnum, and the only thing that remains to be decided --  the only thing that remains within our power to change -- is how long with this period of Conservative barbarism will last and how catastrophic it will be?

    You said this better than I have ever seen in print. Thank you. 

     


    I don't buy it. What De Niro did had nothing to do with strategy and everything to do with hyping up the troops. Trump is a different kind of enemy. We've never seen anything like him, and yesterday's tactics aren't going to work. We can talk ourselves to death, but nothing is going to change unless millions of voices get out there and send messages that resonate. This may not have resonated with you or Bruni, but it did with a lot of us. That's how it works. One effort doesn't negate the others.

    I can listen to Bobby Kennedy's brilliant, sublime speeches and be heartened; I can listen to De Niro's blunt rant and see both of them as a call to action. Spending this much time telling De Niro to shut up seems more than a bit off to me.


    Corker admits that the GOP is a cult.

    They cast votes for a brothel owner in Nevada

    They rejected Sanford who voted with Trump 86% of the time because Sanford had the audacity to critize Trump.

    They cast votes for a white supremacist in Virginia.

    The Republicans on the Supreme Court Aires’s to purge voters

    Republicans ignore the Russian Cyberwar

    Trump took us to the brink of nuclear war with North Korea

    Trump severs ties with Canada and our European allies

    People see all of this and conclude the big problem is four letter words from De Niro and Bee.


    Yes, we're in huge trouble and the troubles mount daily. It's easy to feel overwhelmed and demoralized. Whatever it takes to get us going works for me.


    As this HuffPost article notes, the De Niro speech did not make anybody Pro-Trump.

    https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/opinion-signorile-robert-de-niro-tony-awards_us_5b21c8e7e4b09d7a3d7a1263


    "They were expressing their anger too, not only at Trump but also at the whole “They go low, we go high” philosophy — much as they love and respect Michelle Obama. They realize it didn’t work in 2016, but more so, they’re expressing their passion now in an organic way. None of this is forced or false. People are genuinely riled up, and for a political movement, that is lightning in a bottle. Anger in politics isn’t always so neat in the way it bubbles up, but it is essential to create action. Those of us who in years past were involved in groups like the AIDS activist group ACT UP know that very well.

    The worst thing anyone can do right now is to try to suppress that energy, which is basically what New York Times columnist Frank Bruni told progressives they should do in a column headlined “How to Lose the Midterms and Re-elect Trump,” in which he chastised De Niro, Samantha Bee and others. It was the quintessential call for moderation as the tonic that will save the day. But that notion, right now, is completely out of touch."

    Exactly. 


    It is amazing, and somewhat indicative of the times, that nearly (more than?) as much ink has been spilt about De Niro's two words as about Trump's responses to whether or not Kim is "a killer".  Somehow our president saying that a ruthless dictator does bad things, but lots of people do so what's your point? gets less attention that a televised F-you.


    Misplaced anger is the horse Trump rode in on. You would think we'd learn.


    Here or in the media in general? I've seen much more commentary about the Kim meeting and what Trump has said about it than about De Niro in the media. Here, there's few of us writing blogs and the rest of us dialog about what the bloggers choose to write about. When I read about De Niro's comment I simply thought "What a moron" and thought no more about it. Until Ramona brought up the topic and decided to laud praise upon him for his witty and totally meaningful rendition of "Fuck Trump." That's why we're spending ink on it here.


    When I read about De Niro's comment I simply thought "What a moron" and thought no more about it. Until Ramona brought up the topic and decided to laud praise upon him for his witty and totally meaningful rendition of "Fuck Trump." That's why we're spending ink on it here.

    You spent a lot of time here. Did you think you could change my mind? Did you think you could insult me? With all those words maybe you should have written your own blog. I'm fine with mine.


    Almost no one almost never changes anyone's mind in a debate. I never expect to change anyone's mind, not ever. Barefooted seems to think " It is amazing, and somewhat indicative of the times" that we're spending so much time discussing De Niro's two words instead of what she implies is more important topics. I simply pointed out that most people here don't blog and those few who do set the agenda. It's indicative of nothing more than that. It seems like a pretty obvious statement of fact to me. I don't see how you imagine that it's an attempt to insult you.

    You always seem to get quite testy when ever someone disagrees with you. You really don't like being challenged. I suggest that you're wasting a lot of time responding when the better more powerful reply would be to just post, "Fuck ocean-kat." That will really put me in my place and could be most the the other dagbloggers would give you a standing ovation.


    So now you're even telling me how I should comment?  Honestly, I'm laughing too hard to get testy. 

    Bye.


    Just a suggestion based on your own words from your own blog about what makes a powerful response to disagreement.


    The media in general is what I had in mind when I wrote my comment in response to something Ramona had written just above.  And from her response to me in return I think she got it.  'Nuff said (unless you want to carry on, in which case feel free).


    Back up for Bruni (and troll fighters of all kinds):

     

    Via @peterbakernyt and @katierogers, Trump’s critics try to outdo him, and sometimes punch themselves in the face in the process https://t.co/DuI06geJvJ

    — Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) June 21, 2018

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