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The Public Is Growing Tired of Trump's Tweets, Says Voter Survey (arstechnica.com)

President Donald Trump is the tweeting president. His @realDonaldTrump handle has 31.8 million followers and "35K" tweets. While the president claims to use Twitter to "get the honest and unfiltered message out," many Americans aren't so fond of his favored form of communication. According to a new voter poll (PDF), the public is growing tired of Trump's tweets. Ars Technica reports: A Morning Consult, Politico survey published Wednesday found that 69 percent of voters who took the online survey said they thought Trump tweets too much. That's up from 56 percent from December, months before Trump took office. The survey said that 82 percent of Democrats polled thought Trump tweets too much, up from 75 percent in December. Republicans came in at 53 percent saying the president used Twitter too often, an 11-percent increase from December. Overall, 57 percent of voters who took the survey said Trump's tweets are hurting his presidency. Another 53 percent said his Twitter use undermines U.S. standing in the world. The poll found that 51 percent of all voters said Trump's tweets imperiled national security. What do you think of Trump's tweets? Do you think they are getting old, or do you find them particularly useful?

12 of 489 comments (clear)

  1. Maybe but... by burtosis · · Score: 5, Funny

    100% of late night comedians think he tweets just the right amount or not enough.

    1. Re:Maybe but... by msauve · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's not that he tweets too much, it's what he tweets. Twitter could be the modern fireside chat, except Trump has no sense of history, no communications skills, and no philosophical foundation for his political beliefs. He's more likely to have read John le Carre than John Locke.

      --
      "National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
    2. Re:Maybe but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      > no communications skills

      The dude literally bullshitted his way to the presidency. He might not have a real foundation for his believes, but his communication and persuasion skills are top notch.

    3. Re: Maybe but... by lgw · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The news media has been interested in every president, but it hasn't been this obsessed with a president since JFK, and perhaps not ever. CNN and MSNBC are, from what I can tell, 24/7 Trump coverage for the past 6 months. It's bizarre.

      Trumps tweets are equally bizarre in that they're honest, as far as I can tell. Honest in a "yes, honey, that dress does make you look fat because you're fat" kind of way (socially dysfunctional, but honest). An honest politician is so outside my experience that it's almost hallucinatory.

      --
      Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
    4. Re: Maybe but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      While Trump dumb tweets like a maniac, the rest of the republicans sell parts of your country to the highest bidder and destroy the last shred of a social security system. And when you impeach Trump, you get Pence. The US is really fucked. Sorry.

    5. Re:Maybe but... by Xest · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Yep, engaging in an online flame war with the Mayor of London for trying to reassure Londoners right after a terrorist attack really won us Brits over too, top notch communicator you have there. When we'd heard about how 48 people had been butchered, 8 of which were killed the first thing we thought was "You know what? It'd be great to hear Donald Trump's view on this, especially if he blames the Mayor of London and start slagging him off", so we're glad that he focus on a multi-day flame war, rather than just shut the fuck up or offer something nice, but obviously his mother failed as a parent and never taught him the adage that if you have nothing nice to say, then don't say anything at all.

      I'm engaging in British sarcasm here if you didn't get that. He's probably the worst communicator of any world leader I've ever seen because his comments are ill thought through, often barely literate, and usually just objectively wrong. He's basically on par with the rhetoric filled drivel that spills out of fat Kim's mouth over in North Korea.

      All hail King Covfefe, king of the uncommunicators.

    6. Re:Maybe but... by Maritz · · Score: 5, Funny

      Say all you want about Trump, but one thing is for certain, he doesn't shy away from who he really is.

      Trump has no fucking clue who he really is. All he knows is that he's the fucking greatest.

      --
      I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
  2. Just proves democrats aren't that smart by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Trump keeps making a fool of himself. Why would anyone opposed to his agenda want to muzzle him? Even with both feet in his mouth, he keeps proving that his mental faculties are questionable, that he doesn't understand how the real world works. and that Republicans nominated and elected the worst-qualified president in history.

    The Saudis are now laughing at how easily he was manipulated.

    Even William Henry Harrison, the 9th president, had a better first 100 days in office, and he died after one month.

    --
    "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
  3. I think they are great! by Gravis+Zero · · Score: 5, Insightful

    They have been particularly good at exposing how petty, dimwitted, bigoted and foolish he is, not just as a president but as a person. I think it's important for people to understand just kind of a person they vote for, even if it's after the fact.

    --
    Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
  4. Re:Questionable by RyoShin · · Score: 5, Informative

    Okie dokie, here ya go. Table POL17 starting page 164, I included select "conservative" breakdowns to give a better idea of potential bias.
    Do you think President Donald Trump uses Twitter
    Demographic | Too much | Not enough | About the right amount | Don’t Know / No Opinion | Total N
    Registered Voters | 69%(1372) | 4%(79) | 15%(308) | 12%(241) |1999
    PID: Rep (no lean) | 53%(361) | 6%(38) | 30%(205) | 11%(77) | 681
    Ideo: Conservative (5-7) | 57%(394) | 4%(25) | 28%(194) | 11%(75) | 689
    2016 Vote: Republican Donald Trump | 51%(400) | 6%(50) | 30%(240) | 13%(101) | 791
    Strongly Approve | 39%(161) | 8%(35) | 42%(176) | 10%(43) | 415
    Somewhat Approve | 58%(267) | 4%(18) | 20%(94) | 18%(84) | 462

    BONUS! Table POL18, starting page 167.
    And, do you think President Donald Trump’s use of Twitter is (POL18)
    Demographic | A good thing | A bad thing | Don’t Know / No Opinion | Total N
    Registered Voters | 23%(456) | 59%(1172) | 19%(372) | 1999

    I leave the breakdowns as an exercise for the reader. (This formatting brought to you by the characters /.)

  5. Re:They're very useful by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Which of his own schemes has he sabotaged?

    A few examples:

    1. Trump fired the FBI director for reasons that appeared to be tantamount to obstruction of justice. His staff defended his actions, and said the reasons for Comey's firing had nothing to do with the Russia probe. Then Trump tweeted that he did indeed fire Comey for the exact reasons that his staff had denied.

    2. Trump outed an Israeli intelligence asset in Assad's inner circle by blabbing to the Russians about it. Several of his staff said they were in the meeting at the time, and no such information had been discussed. Trump then cut them off at the knees by saying that he did indeed blab to the Russians during the meeting, and that he had a right to do so (and legally, the president probably does have the right to betray an ally).

    In these tweets he admitted to actions that were at the least stupid, and possibly criminal, but were also incredibly disloyal to subordinates that went out on a limb to lie to the American people in an attempt to defend him.

  6. Re:They're very useful - agreed. by quantaman · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The rest of us know (and Trump himself knows) that the tweets are meaningless and valueless in and of themselves, but they distract the MSM from what is really going on, and in a way that makes the left look like gibbering imbeciles.

    He's been doing this since about *a year* prior to the election, and your side hasn't caught on even yet!

    Has Trump tweeted as a distraction? Definitely, there's some evidence that he was deliberately doing outrageous things to grab media attention during the primary.

    But for the most part Trump is usually Tweeting nonsense and usually involved in policy actions that are really bad news, that the two often coincide isn't by design, it's just math.

    But this image of Trump as some brilliant schemer who plays the fool is nonsense.

    There's a model of Trump that does a really good job of explaining pretty much everything he's done.

    1) He's a pure bullshitter, you talk to him and he'll tell you everything you want to hear, regardless of its connection to reality.

    2) He has an extremely short attention span. He doesn't know the first thing about major policy issues because he can't dedicate sufficient attention to understand them. This also makes him impulsive because he can't resist the instant gratification of saying (or tweeting) something stupid. (This may not apply to real estate or certain aspects of business that do genuinely interest him, but I don't have sufficient information for that.)

    3) He has no ideals. His only reason for running for President was to do well in the primary (and then the general election). He probably doesn't have a single policy he wouldn't flip if you surrounded him with the right set of advisors. And because he doesn't have ideals he evaluates people through extremely shortsighted personal measures, like choosing personal loyalty over competence and adherence to duty.

    4) He is at least partially aware of 1-3, and he's extremely insecure about it.

    That really is about all there is to Trump and it was pretty obvious from the start.

    The relevance of the Tweets is they show his current train of thought, and because of his impulsiveness that train of though can turn into policy.

    --
    I stole this Sig