A former Republican strategist catalogued the "obscenity" he witnessed in Donald Trump's congressional address, but he saw at least one "glimmer of hope."
Steve Schmidt, who worked on GOP campaigns for George W. Bush, Arnold Schwarzenegger and John McCain, lamented on his Substack page the "decay" he saw in his former party as it fully surrendered to the president,
"The spectacle of the evening evidences America’s decay," Schmidt wrote. "The MAGA side of the room is a gang of teenagers, overcome with their fandom for an idol who has become their golden calf."
"Donald Trump is their king," he added. "They will do anything for him. They will tolerate any abuse, corruption, treachery, betrayal or injury to the American people or humanity to remain by his side, and have the opportunity to rise up and down and up and down and clap and clap and clap like Mike Johnson."
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He noted the series of blatant falsehoods uttered by the president in his lengthy and "insanely boring" address and the cheered by his GOP sycophants, and Schmidt said that Trump was ritually humiliating his secretary of state Marco Rubio.
"The entire evening was an obscenity," Schmidt wrote. "Please remember that all over the world there are soon going to be starving children dying, while American aid rots on warehouse shelves so that we can be 'great again.' The catastrophe is coming. Let us hope that it will be long remembered in the aftermath, lest it be repeated anytime soon."
Schmidt was sickened by Trump lionizing his billionaire backer Elon Musk, but he took heart in the Democratic response offered by Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI).
"The Democratic Party must find its way back to the American people and normalcy," Schmidt wrote. "This is what normalcy looks like. Donald Trump is at the height of his power. It must be brought to heel. The way to do that is with a full-throated embrace of American values, ideas and ideals."