Big Shake Up At Trump Campaign

Corey Lewandowski and Tulsi Gabbard are IN. It’s not clear whether anyone in particular is out, although rumors have had it for at least a week that Trump is furious with campaign co-managers Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita. According to RT:

Lewandowski will be joined by Taylor Budowich, Alex Pfeiffer, Alex Bruesewitz, and Tim Murtaugh, who were described by Wiles and LaCivita as “veterans of prior Trump campaigns”.

More from RT:

Trump makes key campaign changes

Former US president Donald Trump has re-hired key members of his 2016 campaign team, hunkered down for debate prep with ex-Democrat Tulsi Gabbard, and tapped his sons and major donors to lead his official transition team, as polls show the Republican neck and neck with Vice President Kamala Harris.

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Trump and Harris are currently even in most polls, with Harris holding a lead of less than 1% over the former president, according to data compiled by RealClearPolitics. Amid rumors that Trump blames his campaign staff for the erosion of his four-point lead over President Joe Biden, he has enlisted the help of ex-Democrat Tulsi Gabbard ahead of his upcoming debate with Harris, the New York Times reported on Friday.

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Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt confirmed that the former president met with Gabbard, claiming that he “does not need traditional debate prep but will continue to meet with respected policy advisors and effective communicators like Tulsi Gabbard, who successfully dominated Kamala Harris on the debate stage.”

No word yet on whether Trump will change his current campaign theme, which seems to run something like, “I luv Jews and the other guy is a Palestinian.” Bringing an effective communicator on board seems like a good first step toward, um, an effective campaign. Speaking of which …

Yesterday commenter Cassander linked to a bracing discussion of the Trump campaign and the presidential race generally, featuring Tucker with Dave Smith. Smith, a rabid libertarian, had some extremely sensible things to say, along with the usual libertarian twaddle about everyone doing their own thing. I encourage all Trump supporters to give it a listen, with your critical thinking caps on. You may not—I hope—agree with all of it, but both Tucker and Smith make numerous trenchant observations.

Among Smith’s key points:

• Trump needs to run an anti-establishment campaign. You know—like in 2016. Stop doing very dumb things like, attacking Joe Rogan? Why? Anti-establishment types are on your side. Your base loves those types. Instead, Smith argues, Trump he seems to be running a “me too” campaign in many respects, especially with regard to war.

• Embrace his anti-war base. Americans don’t want war and they don’t like genocide—knock it off with the pro-genocide stuff! Threatening to deport the majority of Americans who happen to abhor genocide—labeling them as somehow “anti-semites”—is a very dumb thing to say. Americans aren’t that dumb, and that talk turns them off. As it should. Embracing the genocidal fringe elements who want to conduct a censorial search and destroy campaign across America is not the way to goose the turnout that you need. A me-tooist embrace of censorship is a losing issue.

OK, as I wrote yesterday, Trump has been running an ambiguous campaign, in which he seems to speak out of both corners of his mouth—a trick nobody ever seems to pull off convincingly. He seems to think that he can fool more people by leaving them scratching their heads over what he really stands for. For example:

I encourage Netanyahu to stop killing all those people for God’s sake, even if they are only Palestinians—but, hey, go for the victory.

I want to be friendly with Iran. Maybe.

C’mon, which is it? What would you do to stop the genocide—or would you do anything beyond offering “encouragement”? You’re running for POTUS, for God’s sake, for CinC. Enough of the coded lingo. Yes, these are complex issues, but surely there are better, more effective, ways to talk about them than the way Trump has gone about it. Who was it that said something about vomiting the lukewarm out of his mouth? Well, Smith and Tucker had a lot to say about that. Trump seems to have forgotten that it was his seeming straight talk that got him elected before. I would add that the impression of being a straight talker is what can goose the turnout among leaners—and a Trump victory, now as in the past, will be about turnout.

Smith also said something that I harped on in the recent past, and it brings us back to Trump’s me-tooist flirtation with censorship of normal Americans for the donor class. In addition to running an anti-war campaign, Trump should be making a huge issue about government and big tech/media censorship. Instead he has almost nothing to say about that huge issue and even promises to implement it—for his preferred donors. This, even though big tech/media censorship affects him and his base more than anyone else. What’s up with that? How hard can it be to identify an issue like that that will resonate with lots of people? How hard can it be to avoid identifying yourself with such fundamentally un-American ideas?

Something that neither Smith nor Tucker bring up—perhaps because of their libertarianism. A week or so ago I listened to a long interview with Tulsi. I wrote here about what an effective communicator she is, and especially when she talks about issues that appear to be genuinely close to her heart. Like families and not using drugs and surgery on children to enhance their cross dressing experiences. I get that people are suspicious of her based on her past, but she does actually appear to have some identifiable convictions that she’s not afraid to enunciate. Those convictions just happen to put her where normal people live, and so far she hasn’t wavered. In a two hour interview, Tulsi repeatedly returned to the issue that she’s been all over for years now—the whole T agenda. Back a week or so ago I urged that bringing Tulsi on as the face of the Trump campaign for social issues generally would be a very smart move—even with her somewhat checkered past. Bringing her on board for debate prep is a good first step, but Trump needs more of that type of communication out front and center.

Speaking of which.

Good news/bad news.

VICTORY: U.S. Supreme Court BLOCKS Biden Regime’s Sick Title IX Rule in Several States, Which Would Have Forced Women to Allow Men In Their Locker Rooms and Bathrooms – Justice Gorsuch Joins Libs in Dissent

Tucker and Smith had a good exchange on the Dem meme of “weird”, contrasting the real world weirdness of Kama Sutra and Tim—kissing your spouse with a mask on, shaking your spouse’s hand—with the normality of Trump and Vance. That was all good, but here’s Gorsuch—who does write some excellent opinions—once again siding with Sotomayor and her gang. How weird is it for a highly educated adult male, husband, and father of daughters to vote for forcing women to allow men into their locker rooms and bathrooms? It’s very weird. It’s every bit as weird as any of the stuff KS and Tim have done. And that should tell you all you need to know about the danger of allowing libertarians like Gorsuch into critical decision making positions. I suggest unleashing Tulsi on Gorsuch. She could find a way to do it even though he was a Trump appointee.