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I’ve changed my mind. For a while, I was anti-Trump. Then, during the first days of the administration, I flirted with being anti-anti-Trump. Then for a while I was in the anti-anti-anti-Trump camp. But gosh darn it, I’m fed up with the anti-anti-anti-Trumpers, so now I’m anti-anti-anti-anti-Trump. So wait, where does that put me, exactly?Welcome to the tangled web of stupid partisan bickering in 2017.The term anti-anti-Trump was introduced a few months ago by Jonathan Last, who defined it as “an emerging group of conservatives who seem reluctant to criticize Trump, but who aren’t particularly interested in defending him, directly. Instead, they tend to focus on the media reaction to Trump and the antics of the left.” There’s something to this. There’s a definite temptation to find yourself siding with Trump all of the time just because a fair number of his critics are so thoroughly detestable and make such a terrible case for their views. But supporting someone just because you hate his enemies is a form of intellectual corruption and needs to be resisted . . .. . . [L]et’s get rid of this whole ridiculous terminology. At the end of the day, I am not anti-Trump. I’m not anti-anti-Trump. I’m not anti-anti-anti-Trump. I’m not even anti-anti-anti-anti-Trump. Being for or against a single person is not an ideology, and it’s not a stand on principle. It’s the opposite of ideas and principles. It’s only about personal loyalty or enmity. It is not principled, for example, to vigorously oppose the Paris Agreement—then flip-flop on it simply because Trump opposes it.It’s certainly valid, even necessary, to arrive at an overall estimate of Trump as a leader and as a person. I recently declared him to be foolish and reckless, and I’m sure I’ve said much worse in the past. But if it’s a form of intellectual corruption to be tempted to defend him constantly just because you hate his critics, it’s also an intellectual corruption to attack him constantly, or to give his critics a free pass, just because you don’t like him.The unions used to have a saying: no permanent allies, no permanent enemies, just permanent interests. We should adapt that into a better form: no permanent allies, no permanent enemies, just permanent principles. Then feel free to judge both sides by how well they live up to, or—since this is 2017—how far they fall short of those principles.
What I want to know is, Who called that fellow a piccolo player?
I was wondering about the tuba player myself.
My English teacher said a double negative makes a positive, so don't four of them make it a positive too?Maybe this guy was also taught by Sister Stella.
