Live from the Orange-Haired Baboon Cage: Dan Drezner: Six different ways of looking at a Trump tweet: "Many people are saying that Trump's tweets do not matter. I say they contain some very interesting insights... https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2017/04/24/six-different-ways-of-looking-at-a-trump-tweet/
...The Heritage Foundation’s James Jay Carafano has been one of the Trump administration’s most stalwart defenders.... Carafano further argues that the appearances are confusing.... "Pundits err when they give every presidential utterance equal merit. A joint address to Congress ought to carry a lot more weight than a 3 a.m. tweet about the Terminator."... [But] when foreign populations react to some of Trump’s more careless words, I think it’s a thing. More importantly, sometimes a single tweet of Donald Trump’s can tell us a great deal about the man and how he is doing as president. So... let me offer six different ways of looking at a Trump tweet from yesterday:
Eventually, but at a later date so we can get started early, Mexico will be paying, in some form, for the badly needed border wall.
What can be inferred?... I would argue, contra Carafano, quite a bit! In ascending order of importance: 1) Trump cannot write his way out of a paper bag.... 2) Trump lies a lot.... 3) Trump won’t honor many of his campaign promises.... 4) Trump continues to make promises that he will not be able to honor.... 5) Weirdly, Trump’s tweet steps on one of his few tangible policy accomplishments.... 6) Trump is explaining—which means that he’s losing.... His poll numbers suggest that he’s keeping his base and alienating everyone else.... Since Mexico ain’t paying for the wall, he’s going to constantly be on defense. Many people are saying that Trump’s tweets do not matter. The hard-working staff here at Spoiler Alerts concludes that, on the contrary, Trump’s tweets contain multitudes.
