While we are still counting the 2022 votes, former President Trump kicked off 2024 last night.
Buckle up for two years of noise.
The first question is this, was the timing right or too soon?
In my opinion, way too soon, but the messenger is always about himself and not the greater need.
Was the message right?
Well, l it was certainly mellow toned as opposed to his past presentations.
It was low key and restrained, as it needed to be. The post election 2022 results required that. He is not in the same position he was before last Tuesday. I know the results surprised him and took some of the air out of the moment.
No elected officials were in the room. His son Donald Jr. and daughter Ivanka weren’t there either.
Some called the hour long speech “low energy.”
In fact, Jeb Bush Jr. tweeted this:
“What a low energy speech by the Donald. … #SleepyDonnie.” How funny is that?
No need for me to get into the details except to say he did not address the Jan. 6th events that hang over him, especially as his VP’s book is released and Pence lays out the failures of leadership that day.
No addressing all the charges against him and the family business.
At some point he needs to address the former for us all.
Now, he’ll never get a fair shake from the media.
Here are some examples from yesterday that may surprise you:
Did you see any coverage that a US judge dismissed a lawsuit by Trump’s former lawyer and employee, Michael Cohen, that accused Trump and AG Barr of abruptly returning him to prison in retaliation for writing a tell-all memoir?
We saw lots of coverage when it was announced, but not yesterday.
Did you see that a NY judge dropped charges from his niece in her inheritance lawsuit?
It sure got a lot of coverage when she accused him of stealing her money.
Did you see that prosecutors dropped charges against Rudy Giuliani over his work on issues related to Ukraine?
Well, they did, and you sure heard a lot about it back when they brought the charges.
Kind of ironic that post-election all these charges are dropped, isn’t it? It could make one a skeptic and reminds me of the famous statement by Raymond Donovan after all charges were laughed out of court:
“Which office do I go to to get my reputation back?”
There’s So Much More Noise In The News
There’s lots more news to cover, but most of it is noise.
Russian missile strike? It turns out to be something else apparently.
Republicans meet and McCarthy does not have 218 votes. Just noise. When the joint vote is held he will.
Scott is challenging McConnell. Just noise, the status quo will emerge.
So let me leave a thought on the issue we started with, Donald Trump and his message.
I saw Majority Leader Schumer tell Republicans to change their message if they want to win.
I don’t think it’s the message. I think people are fine with America First, energy independence and border control.
I think it’s the messenger and not the message, and Schumer is wrong.