KELLYANNE CONWAY: “…you just want that to go viral. You wanna say the word ‘President Trump’ and ‘lie’ in the same sentence.”
JAKE TAPPER: “No, I would like him to stop lying, quite frankly.” https://t.co/F7Ckc2KSFi
— Sarah Lerner (@SarahLerner) May 6, 2018
In behaviorist-speak, an ‘extinction burst’ is what happens when a long-standing behavior is no longer rewarded. When pecking the red button no longer produces a food pellet, or whining in the checkout line no longer produces a candy bar, the pigeon frantically attacks with button with a flurry of non-stop pecks — or the toddler throws a full-scale screaming tantrum. It’s important, when this happens, not to reward the increased activity; difficult as it may be, you have to steel yourself to let the kid scream until he runs out of breath, although you may have to pick him up and carry him outside for the sake of the other shoppers.
Trump, and his fellow Repubs, are used to getting very well rewarded for their bad political behavior. It got them media attention, oligarch funding, votes — everything they wanted. Suddenly the rubes are catching on to the kayfabe, and the Repubs’ only response is to intensify the ugliness. Politico:
President Donald Trump may be historically unpopular. He may be under the shadow of a sprawling federal investigation that has already led to guilty pleas from some of his top associates. And he may be facing increasing questions about a $130,000 payment to a porn star with whom he allegedly had an extramarital affair.
But on Friday, before die-hard supporters at the National Rifle Association convention in Dallas, Trump found silver linings wherever he could: in tough questioning of the special counsel’s team by a federal judge, in praise from rapper Kanye West and, once again, in reliving his 2016 election victory.
“We have great love going on,” Trump told the crowd, which repeatedly interrupted his speech with long ovations. “We had a great time, and I think we’re doing better now than ever before.”
For Trump and his supporters, reality is not about to get in the way of having a good time. A spate of mass shootings went unmentioned as Trump instead said looser gun laws in France could have prevented a 2015 terrorist attack in Paris (gun deaths in France are significantly less common than in the United States). In Trump’s telling, and the crowd’s appraisal, job growth consistent with the trend of the past half-decade is instead a historic departure that could never have been predicted. Polls that underestimated Trump’s support in 2016 were actually a deliberate attempt at “suppression.” And a years-long federal investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election that has led to multiple indictments is nothing more than a “witch hunt.”…
“That’s his fix,” said Rick Tyler, the former communications director for Sen. Ted Cruz’s presidential campaign. “It’s like an addiction and he’s always looking for the next fix, and the next fix is who can adore me and who can praise me, and big crowds can do that.”
“But it was a colossally bad week,” Tyler added, “and that’s saying a lot, because one seems to follow the next.”…
As i said on @ThisWeekABC to give some perspective: “Benghazi was a 4 year investigation, there were zero indictments. The Clinton emails was a 2 year investigation, there were zero indictments. The Mueller investigation has been 14 months, there have been 23 indictments.”
— Matthew Dowd (@matthewjdowd) May 6, 2018
Monday Morning Open Thread: Extinction Burst (We Hope)Post + Comments (203)