Don’t conflate Trump with the things Trump supporters want. Trump was a disaster as a candidate, is a disaster as a pres-elect, and will be a disaster as a president. We are playing into his hand if we think we need to sugar-coat that in order to somehow win over his supporters. You can sugar coat your dislike of Trump all you want and you will not win over his supporters.

What may win over his non-fringe supporters (of which there are some) is substantive progress on real issues that have a real effect on people’s lives.

My most favorable interpretation of this election is this: no one supported the person Trump is; they supported him because he was a Rorschach inkblot of indeterminate nothingness onto which they could project the things they wanted, and they were rebelling against a political system that no longer really represents the people.

At the same time, though, there does seem to be a change lately, in the past year or few. I’ve read this blog for years and until recently had never seen you stoop to using profanity. Not trying to be a finger-wagger and I wouldn’t even bring it up otherwise, it’s just that you used to almost never use it regardless of the article or response. It’s like you’ve been losing your composure lately or something. I’m not telling you what you should or shouldn’t do, I was just making an observation. You’ll do what you choose, I just thought you might want to know how you’ve been sounding lately, is all, since changes like that can affect how readers see you and what you say. Text has no tone of voice, so it’s all in the words you choose. How you say something is often as important as what you say. I realize also that this is an opinion site, but it also has a reputation for being accurate, and how those opinions are presented affects how readily people will or may accept them. Just thought you should know.

Mike, you’re entitled to your own opinion but not your own facts, like the old saying goes. “Chilling effect” has a particular legal definition and argumentation, and cannot simply be argued however it may be convenient like you do in this article.

While correctly argued in your opinions of Trump’s libel threats, you’ve also erred trying to mangle it to cover pretty much any 100%-First-Amendment-protected stated counterpoints to media reports (“attacking”) or any (B.S.?) claims of negative business performance that politicians may make.

Rather than appearing the proud patriot defending liberty you usually are with the fantastic TD coverage we all love and expect, here you somehow manage to come off as a unfactual whiny hack who somehow managed to miss the grand irony of his own Trump critiques. We know this isn’t your real quality level nor the website you want TD to be, and you are simply burned out from this year’s politics like the rest of us are.

I’m an anti-Trump voter who greatly welcomes his B.S. being called out, but it’s become impossible for me and the apparent majority of TD commenters to not notice some glaringly substandard politics articles this past year. Even a simple opinion piece like this one seems unnecessarily aborted with invalid logic and spurious evidence that seems more ruled by emotion than reason (perhaps in line with the TD swear word increase that other keen commenter observed — about which I otherwise honestly wouldn’t “give a flying fuck”).

Be as callous, snarky, angry, happy, or sad to others as you want to since I 100% agree with you that nobody’s feelings/bubble should be protected as sacred or any coverage off-limits; however, please don’t forget to check that each article has the usual TD diligence that we fans esteem and the polity sorely needs.

Thank you and keep up the good work!