President Biden is currently in Europe, in the midst of his first trip abroad since he took office. So the folks at Pew Research decided it was a good time to see how America is now viewed by the rest of the world (or the countries with advanced economies that were surveyed, at any rate). The answers are exactly what you'd expect them to be -- America's standing in the world has dramatically improved, now that a sane adult is in charge of the country once again (instead of an unstable and temperamental toddler).

Before we get to the numbers, though, a quick summary from Politico captures the feeling perfectly: "When we talk to European diplomats and officials, they all say the same thing -- the Biden presidency is a 'sigh of relief' after the 'near-death experience' of Trump." Of course, European diplomats are not the only ones who feel this way, as tens of millions of Americans have indeed had similar feelings since January. Perhaps the biggest beneficiaries (on a day-to-day basis) of this renewed respect for the United States are the American expatriates living in Europe and elsewhere around the world. No longer will they have to be regularly embarrassed by their own country's president. No longer will they have to hang their heads in shame when their friends ask how America could ever have elected such a buffoon to lead it. No longer will twentysomethings enjoying a Eurail Pass feel the need to sew Canadian flags on their backpacks and add "...eh?" to the end of all their sentences, to put it another way.

First Lady Jill Biden is perhaps the best ambassador of this newfound feeling of goodwill. On the trip with her husband, she wore a jacket with the word "LOVE" prominently emblazoned on the back. Many were quick to compare this sartorial choice to Melania Trump's contemptuous jacket (which she wore while travelling to visit children separated from their parents at the border due to her husband's cruel policy) with the cold-hearted message: "I really don't care, do U?" displayed for all to see. Just to rub in the stark difference even more, Jill Biden released a photo of her poring over a thick briefing book in preparation for the trip, since neither one of the Trumps is exactly a noted reader of important information (and that's putting it mildly). Jill's message couldn't have been clearer, which she even reinforced to reporters: "I think that we're bringing love from America. This is a global conference and we are trying to bring unity across the globe and I think it's needed right now, that people feel a sense of unity from all the countries and feel a sense [of] hope after this year of the pandemic."

No wonder America's standing has improved so dramatically. How dramatically? From that poll:

Trust in the U.S. president fell to historic lows in most countries surveyed during Donald Trump's presidency, according to Pew.

Under [President Joe] Biden, it has soared. In the 12 countries surveyed both this year and last, a median of 75 percent of respondents expressed confidence in Biden to "do the right thing regarding world affairs," Pew found, compared with 17 percent for Trump last year. Sixty-two percent of respondents now have a favorable view of the United States vs. 34 percent at the end of Trump's presidency.

"The election of Joe Biden as president has led to a dramatic shift in America's international image," the Pew report reads.

. . .

The United States' favorability rating grew at least 23 percentage points from last year in France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom, and a majority of respondents in all four view the country positively.

Among all 16 publics surveyed this spring, German Chancellor Angela Merkel ranks just ahead of Biden in the percentage of respondents who said they trust the leader's decision-making on world affairs, with a median score of 77 percent. But Biden, with 74 percent, garnered higher rates of confidence than French President Emmanuel Macron, [Vladimir] Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping.

More Biden/Trump numbers from the raw data, in head-to-head comparisons: 77 percent of people agreed that Joe Biden was "well qualified," while only 16 percent would say this about Trump. And only 14 percent called Biden "dangerous," while a whopping 72 percent applied the label to Trump. The biggest disconnect? Biden was called "arrogant" by only 13 percent of people surveyed, while an astounding 90 percent agreed that Trump was arrogant.

Biden is using "America is back!" as his message for the trip, but he could just as easily have claimed he was "making America respected again." That's probably closer to the truth of the matter.

Biden's message was ostensibly tailored for the Europeans, but it's also a pretty powerful one domestically as well. Before he departed on his trip, he wrote an opinion piece for the Washington Post where he touted his own record so far:

Thanks to the American Rescue Plan and our domestic vaccination strategy, our economy is now growing faster than at any time in almost 40 years. We have created more jobs in the first four months of our administration than under any other president. Wages are increasing for American workers. And, as America's economic recovery helps to propel the global economy, we will be stronger and more capable when we are flanked by nations that share our values and our vision for the future -- by other democracies.

Also announced right before the trip: 31 million Americans are now covered because of the Patient Protection And Affordable Care Act -- another record-setting number.

Unlike Trump, who loved to brag about how superlative his presidency was (usually without anything to back up his empty braggadocio), Biden is already setting impressive records. Which is pretty worthy of respect no matter where in the world you live.

Let's see, what else is going on over on this side of the Atlantic? Right before Biden left for his Europe trip, he formally withdrew from the talks with Senator Shelley Moore Capito over a pie-in-the-sky bipartisan infrastructure bill. Another group of Republicans jumped in, in an attempt to waste even more time hunting the elusive bipartisan unicorn, and they even grandly announced they had a deal. Of course, there was no actual deal, since the two sides have irreconcilable differences over how any of it should be paid for. Republicans want to raise the gas tax while Democrats are adamant that no taxes be raised on anyone making less than $400,000 a year and instead want to tax only people making more than that, as well as giant corporations. This is the circle which cannot be squared in all of this bipartisan Kabuki, and it shows no signs of being resolved at any point. Reportedly, the Democrats are now moving forward on passing Biden's entire economic package using budget reconciliation rules which prohibit the filibuster, so at least they're not sitting around waiting on the non-existent bipartisan fantasy any more.

This is what bipartisanship gets you, in fact -- the Senate just released a report on the January 6th insurrection (which leaves plenty of enormous questions unanswered), but to get the Republicans on the committee to sign on to the report they had to not actually call it an insurrection. This is funny, after all the noise Republicans have been making of late over Democrats insisting on using "woke" inclusive language. It seems Republicans only get "woke" when they have to euphamize an insurrection attempt against Congress, the U. S. Capitol, and American democracy. What snowflakes!

We have two items for the "you just can't make up how stupid Republicans are, at times" files this week. The first was Louie Gohmert proving vying for the "stupidest member of Congress" title (a competition he regularly used to win, but now has to up his game since people like Marjorie Taylor Greene arrived to challenge him). In a hearing, Gohmert asked the supervisor of the National Forest Service the following question:

I understand from what's been testified to, the Forest Service and [Bureau of Land Management], you want very much to work on climate change. I was informed by the past director of NASA that they have found that the moon's orbit is changing slightly, and so is the Earth's orbit around the sun, and we know there's been significant solar flare activity. And so is there anything the National Forest Service or B.L.M. can do to change the course of the moon's orbit or the Earth's orbit around the sun? Obviously, they would have profound effects on our climate.

The astonished official managed not to laugh in Gohmert's face, and instead politely responded: "I would have to follow up with you on that one, Mr. Gohmert." She deserves a raise or at least a fat bonus for not blurting out: "Holy mackerel, are you really that stupid, Congressman?"

But these days, as we noted, the competition is fierce. Representative Mo Brooks is being sued by Representative Eric Swalwell for his key support for the 1/6 insurrectionists. Everyone else Swalwell is suing has accepted the lawsuit's existence, but Brooks has been doing a hide-and-seek routine for months, to avoid being served with the court papers. So Swalwell's process server served his wife instead. Brooks had a public hissy fit afterwards because apparently the process server walked into the (open) Brooks family garage to serve Mrs. Brooks with the court papers. Brooks tweeted out a photograph of his computer screen (not a screenshot, which was apparently too complicated for a member of the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Cyber, Innovative Technologies and Information Systems to manage), which was displaying the state criminal code entry on trespassing. The only problem was, Brooks forgot to take down notes taped to his screen which revealed a PIN and what appeared to be his email password. And it took him over 20 hours to realize it and take the photo down. So Gohmert's got all kinds of competition these days!

And we end this week's roundup with two amusing footnotes about what is bugging Biden on his trip to Europe. Literal bugs, in fact. First the press plane accompanying the president was delayed for seven hours after too many cicadas flew into the engines, and then Biden himself was attacked by a rogue cicada on the tarmac. Biden calmly brushed the huge insect off his neck, turned to the reporters and made a joke about it. Or, to put it another way, nothing really bugs Biden all that much -- even actual giant bugs!

We found two minor news items noteworthy this week, but didn't think either one of them rose to the level of the Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week award. The first was the news out of Washington state, where the state government officially sanctioned a "Joints For Jabs" program that hands anyone who gets vaccinated on-site a free pre-rolled marijuana cigarette. Of course, we had to write about this one earlier in the week (with our apologies, once again, to Cheech and Chong), just because it was one of those things pretty close to the top of our "certainly never thought we'd live to see this" list: a governmental agency legally passing out free weed. We've come a long way, baby, as the (tobacco) cigarette ads used to say....

The second wasn't even on our list of highly-improbable things, but perhaps should have been. Here's the story, for those who may have missed such important political news this week:

A New Mexico sheriff who is running for mayor of Albuquerque was interrupted while on stage at a campaign event by a flying drone with a sex toy attached to it and a man who punched him.

Bernalillo County Sheriff Manuel Gonzales' campaign said the Democrat was unharmed and "will not be intimidated."

The Albuquerque Journal reported that a video posted on Facebook shows Gonzales answering questions from the audience while standing on a stage at an events center when the drone bearing the sex toy started buzzing near the stage.

A sheriff's office report said the owner of the event center grabbed the device.

Not exactly impressive, but was certainly worth pointing out, don't you think?

Sex (toys) and drugs aside, though, we do have a rather impressive collective winner of this week's MIDOTW award: the Texas Democratic Party. They are fighting back against the effort to pass Draconian voter-suppression laws in perhaps the best way possible: by putting their money into a massive voter registration drive. What is particularly notable about this effort -- which follows the admirable path Stacey Abrams laid down in Georgia -- is how early they are starting. This is not some last-minute thing a couple months before an election, this is instead much broader and more foundational. The New York Times had the full story:

The Texas Democratic Party and a coalition of allied progressive groups announced a major voter registration program on Tuesday, pledging to focus on registration in racially diverse communities at a time when the Republican-controlled Texas Legislature is vowing to pass a host of new voting restrictions, many of which would disproportionately affect communities of color.

The plan, which aims to register at least one million Democrats out of the state's three million unregistered eligible voters, will be a combination of old-school field operations, mail outreach, digital ads and door-to-door canvassing.

. . .

Gilberto Hinojosa, the chairman of the Texas Democratic Party, said that the program would most likely cost $13 million to $14 million this year, making it the single biggest investment in voter registration by the state party in its history. And the party is embarking on the effort in an off-year for national elections, an often sleepy time with a disengaged electorate and a recharging political base.

. . .

"We have historically had turnout issues in Texas, particularly with the Latino community, which is a big part of our base," Mr. Hinojosa said.

The program will take a targeted, nearly voter-by-voter approach to registration. If a voter lives in an apartment building and has no phone number on record, the first outreach will probably be an in-person visit or a flyer left by a volunteer with registration information. Younger voters will be targeted with online ads. And a new app called Register Texas (different from a 2020 web tool by the same name) will allow activists to sign in and find canvassing opportunities to register for.

The effort follows the blueprint laid out by Stacey Abrams in Georgia, with Texas Democrats aiming to cover every corner of the state to find voters to register.

"We got clobbered in the rural areas and in West Texas," Mr. Hinojosa said. "So we've got a lot of work to do, but we think we can do it. Because the payoff for the Democratic Party nationally is great. If you're able to take back the State Legislature, put yourself in the position of winning the next U.S. Senate race and also the governor's mansion, then Texas is well on its way to becoming the battleground state that everybody wants it to be."

Republicans are plotting to suppress Democratic votes? Then overwhelm them with so many votes it won't matter. The success Stacey Abrams managed in the two Georgia Senate races did not happen overnight, it was the direct result of years of hard work signing people up to vote. That's what it takes -- a sustained and very broad effort. And that is precisely what Texas Democrats are attempting.

Now, there are those who are pretty cynical about the perennial pipe dream of turning Texas blue, mostly because no matter how high people have gotten their hopes up in the past, it just never seems to materialize (over and over and over again).

But then, that's the way we all used to see Georgia, too. And Virginia, before that. And Arizona. And Colorado. It can work, in states with quickly-changing demographics. So it is not completely out of the question that it could eventually bear fruit in the Lone Star State as well.

For making such a monumental effort to do so -- for putting up an impressive amount of money, and for doing so early -- we have to give a group Most Impressive Democrats Of The Week award to the Democratic Party of Texas. Well done, and we all wish you luck in your effort!

[Congratulate the Texas Democratic Party on their official website, to let them know you appreciate their efforts.]

There were some things that didn't exactly fill us with glee this week from the Democratic side of the aisle, but we're going to ignore all the minor ones to beat the same drum, once again.

Senator Joe Manchin wrote an opinion piece for a hometown newspaper this week where he explained his newfound love for the filibuster -- a love so deep it is now more important than several of the things he used to care quite a bit about.

His logic (if you can call it that, it's a lot closer to "magical thinking") is that protecting voting rights simply must be done in a bipartisan manner -- which totally ignores the fact that one of America's political parties is now fully dedicated to destroying voting rights in as many places as possible. These efforts, where successful, have all passed on strictly partisan lines, which only heightens the irony.

Manchin's piece has many "if I doesn't laugh, I thinks I'm a-gonna cry" lines in it, our favorite being: "our party labels can't prevent us from doing what is right." This, as he argues that doing what is right simply must have the correct party labels attached to it, or else it somehow shouldn't happen. If party labels don't matter, then who cares whether the vote is partisan or not partisan? Caring about this aspect is doing nothing short of making party labels the centerpiece, rather than "doing what's right," which is truly the important thing. This point flies far over Manchin's head, obviously.

Again, Manchin actually admits this within his piece:

Unfortunately, we now are witnessing that the fundamental right to vote has itself become overtly politicized. Today's debate about how to best protect our right to vote and to hold elections, however, is not about finding common ground, but seeking partisan advantage. Whether it is state laws that seek to needlessly restrict voting or politicians who ignore the need to secure our elections, partisan policymaking won't instill confidence in our democracy -- it will destroy it.

As such, congressional action on federal voting rights legislation must be the result of both Democrats and Republicans coming together to find a pathway forward or we risk further dividing and destroying the republic we swore to protect and defend as elected officials.

In other words, the Republicans are allowed to "seek partisan advantage" which will "destroy" our democracy -- but to combat this, a certain amount of Republicans simply must be on board with the effort or else everyone should just sit back and allow the republic to be divided and destroyed because to fight partisanship with partisanship is even worse. Worse than our democracy being destroyed, mind you.

Salon ran a very interesting article which explored what might actually be going on with Manchin, seeing as how he used to actually be for the bills he is now singlehandedly blocking:

Sen. Joe Manchin, the West Virginia Democrat famous for his vow to maintain the Senate filibuster and thereby scuttle much of President Biden's agenda, recently published an op-ed opposing the For the People Act, Democrats' whopping voting-rights bill. That article strongly echoed talking points from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce -- and appeared shortly after the influential pro-business lobby resumed donations to Manchin's campaign after nearly a decade.

Manchin, who co-sponsored the sweeping voting rights legislation in 2019 and has supported filibuster reform in the past, became the first Senate Democrat to oppose the bill this week while reiterating his opposition to changing the filibuster, a key roadblock to voting reform. Skeptical members of Manchin's party have questioned the reasons for his opposition, especially after after a recent poll found that a majority of West Virginia voters support changing the filibuster rules and that 79% of the state's voters -- including a large majority of Republicans -- support the For the People Act.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., suggested that Manchin's opposition to the proposal and filibuster reform may really be about measures in the bill aimed at cracking down on lobbyists and dark money.

That certainly makes a lot more sense than any reasons Manchin has offered up for his change of heart.

The best take on the situation we read this week didn't exactly pull punches in the language used:

Sen. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.) has the right to live in a make-believe wonderland if he so chooses. But his party and his nation will pay a terrible price for his hallucinations about the nature of today's Republican Party. And even this sacrifice might not guarantee that Manchin can hold on to support back home.

Manchin's declaration Sunday that he will vote against sweeping legislation to guarantee voting rights nationwide and that he "will not vote to weaken or eliminate" the Senate filibuster is a huge blow to President Biden's hopes of enacting his ambitious agenda. There's no way to spin this as anything other than awful.

. . .

Manchin did say he supports another proposed House bill, the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, which would essentially restore provisions of the landmark 1965 Voting Rights Act forbidding some states to change election laws without obtaining preclearance from the Justice Department. The original preclearance rules were struck down by the Supreme Court in 2013.

But Manchin wants this, too, to win bipartisan support. Unless Manchin changes his position on the filibuster, 10 Republican senators would have to cross the aisle and join with Democrats. So far, there is one -- Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska). The other nine must be in some parallel dimension, visible only to Manchin, where all the leprechauns, tooth fairies and unicorns are hiding.

Leprechauns indeed.

Manchin's fellow Democrats were also not exactly pulling punches, either, in their reaction to Manchin's article:

At the heart of their frustration is that Manchin is not asking for policy concessions but that legislation must have bipartisan backing to garner his support. Many Democrats view the idea that there are bipartisan deals to be struck on major parts of the Biden agenda as hopelessly naive, and that anger bubbled over on Sunday.

"Manchin's op-ed might as well be titled, 'Why I'll vote to preserve Jim Crow,'" Rep. Mondaire Jones (D-N.Y.) tweeted.

"We didn't need an op-ed to know you're unwilling to protect our democracy," Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.) tweeted.

Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) said his office had reached out to Manchin's several times to discuss how they could move forward but had not heard back.

"Sen. Manchin isn't interested in engaging in a conversation on the filibuster," Bowman said. "He's interested in serving a corporate agenda."

But Manchin did get some praise for his stance this week. From Donald Trump (who conveniently seems to have forgotten how hard he pushed Mitch McConnell to scrap the filibuster rule when he was in office). If the only person who agrees with your political position as a Democrat is Donald J. Trump, then (to state the obvious) perhaps it is time to rethink your position?

For his announcement that easily half of Joe Biden's agenda should now officially be considered dead, this week's Most Disappointing Democrat Of The Week was a no-brainer this week. And you can take that "no-brainer" remark any way you wish.

[Contact Senator Joe Manchin on his Senate contact page, to let him know what you think of his actions.]

Volume 622 (6/11/21)

Another mixed bag this week, with a few Donald Trump items thrown in just for fun at the end. As always, enjoy responsibly.

   Did I blink and miss it, or what?

Maybe he was trying a new career as a standup comedian? That's the only possible explanation we can think of....

"Mitch McConnell sanctimoniously declared this week that, quote, it's pretty clear the era of bipartisanship is over, unquote. To which I respond: um, excuse me? Mitch? Just when, exactly, did this golden era of bipartisanship begin? Because from what I can remember, Mitch McConnell has been actively destroying any vestige of bipartisanship for over the past decade, at a minimum. This is the same McConnell who forced every single piece of legislation to clear the 60-vote filibuster hurdle, in an unprecedented maximization of partisanship. The same McConnell who turned judicial confirmations into a partisan take-no-prisoners battleground -- remember when he refused to even hold hearings on a Supreme Court justice for a year, and then turned right around and hustled one through in weeks when his own party was in charge? Does anyone else remember that? Because I do. Remember when he swore a vow to do everything in his power to make Barack Obama a one-term president, no matter what that meant for the success of America? OK, that was a while ago, so let's instead remember just last month when he swore a new oath to devoting 'one-hundred percent of our focus... on stopping this new administration.' That's the same Mitch McConnell, right? Who just declared the 'era of bipartisanship' to be over? I'm sorry, Mitch, but I must have blinked and missed it, because if there was any actual era of bipartisanship it must have lasted about a nanosecond -- because for the last decade and more, you have been the absolute world champion at killing any hint of bipartisanship in the Senate stone cold dead. So please, spare us the gaslighting now, will you? Unless you're trying to make us laugh."

   Tax the rich

An idea which just gets more and more popular over time.

"There was an exposé published this week which showed how little the wealthiest Americans paid in federal taxes -- a tiny, tiny percentage of what an average blue-collar worker pays. Some of these billionaires actually wound up paying zero income taxes at all in some years, while they went right on amassing fortunes worth billions of dollars. Democrats think this is wrong, and want to make them pay their fair share. They've wanted this for a while now, but now we have actual proof of why this is such an important goal. When a billionaire pays not only a lower tax rate but less absolute dollars in taxes than a nurse or a firefighter, then something is seriously wrong with the system. This is precisely why making billionaires pay a fair share is so wildly popular with the public. Stop the free ride for the one percent!"

   Republicans want you to pay more for gas

This one is kind of tricky, because there are a lot of Democrats who think raising the gas tax is a good idea too. But let's make absolutely sure everyone understands who is now proposing it, and what the other option on the table is, because that puts it into some needed perspective.

"Don't believe all those reports you may hear about some sort of 'bipartisan infrastructure deal' being struck between Democratic and Republican senators. While they may be able to agree on how much to spend and what to spend it on, the two sides are as far apart as ever on how to pay for it all. Which brings up a big point the Republicans really don't want you to know. Democrats -- led by Joe Biden -- have insisted that taxes will not be raised on people making less than $400,000 per year. Democrats want to tax big business and the ultrawealthy to pay for infrastructure improvements. Republicans, on the other hand, have drawn a red line and say they simply cannot vote for increasing taxes one penny on billionaires or gigantic corporations. Instead, they want you to pay for the whole thing. They want to raise the tax on gasoline that we all pay at the pump. Of all the possible ways to raise money, that's the one they chose -- making you pay more for gas. Democrats are against this because it would hit the poorest drivers the hardest. Instead, Democrats want the wealthiest to pay more taxes, not the poorest. That's the difference between the two sides, and it doesn't seem to me to be a difference that either side is willing to budge on, no matter how they may promise they've got a deal. I'll believe it right after I see 60 senators vote for it, in other words."

   Tax the rich, help American families

Democrats really need to stop allowing Republicans to even use this word with a straight face.

"Everyone calls Donald Trump a 'populist' and says that the Republican Party has somehow realigned itself to be a populist party now. This is utter hogwash. Republicans are the ones fighting hardest for the richest among us and they want to stick it to the average American family every chance they get. A study just out proves this beyond a shadow of a doubt. If Joe Biden's economic plans were enacted into law, it would dramatically hike taxes on only the tippy-top of the income scale, while it would cut thousands in taxes from the average American family -- especially those families with children. That is true economic populism, folks. Helping the little guy and making the fatcats pay. What could be more populist than that? And not a single Republican is for the idea, which only goes to prove they're about as far from real populism as you can get, ideologically. The GOP is the party of the elite, just as they've always been. Democrats are the true economic populists, and if the Biden agenda is passed we will prove it to every American family in the nation."

   Wrong yardstick

Please point this out with every chance you get, because so many people are drawing erroneous conclusions from meaningless data.

"When you hear economic numbers for approximately the next year's time, please take them with a grain of salt. Because the normal way of measuring progress simply does not work right now. In normal times, one month's figures would be compared to the same month from the previous year. This would show the change, over time. But let's everyone please remember where we were one year ago -- in the grips of a pandemic, a lockdown, and the economic crisis it caused. Obviously, those numbers are pretty meaningless in the grand scheme of things, when you're trying to measure inflation or any other economic marker. To get an accurate picture, you need to go back two years, and treat 2020 as the aberration it really was. Is inflation up last month from the same month in 2019? No, it really isn't. So stop fearmongering about the change since 2020, since it is the equivalent of Noah measuring how rainfall patterns have changed exactly one year after the Flood. It just makes no sense at all, in terms of understanding what is truly going on."

   Trump's lies keeping insurrectionists in jail

The irony is so thick with this one you can cut it with a knife.

"Many of the people charged with participating in the January sixth insurrection against Congress are now trying to convince judges to let them out before their trial dates, rather than having to stay in jail. They are arguing that it was a one-time event that is not likely to be repeated in the future. But many judges are denying these motions for a rather astonishing reason -- because Donald Trump won't shut up about his Big Lie. Because Trump is out there still fanning the flames of revolt and refusing to accept the incontrovertible fact that he lost the election, the judges have decided that similar insurrectionist attempts are clearly possible in the near future. What this means is that these people probably would have been given the benefit of the doubt and let out before their trials but Trump himself is essentially keeping them locked up. The irony would be pretty amusing if this weren't such a serious subject."

   Definitely on fire, that's for sure

Poor, poor, pitiful Trump.

"Donald Trump gave his first public speech in months last weekend, and it was the usual rant about his Big Lie and all his mountain of grievances against anyone who has ever said a bad word about him. In fact, it was a lot lower-energy than usual, for Trump. He barely raised his voice, which you've got to admit was pretty un-Trumpian. He looked downright sleepy, in fact. But that's not what anyone was talking about the next day, because the internet was consumed with the question of whether Trump had actually put his pants on backwards or not before his speech. And whether he was actually wearing an adult diaper or had just gained a whole lot more weight. Now, there were disagreements on both these points, but the one thing that everyone could agree on was while Trump's pants may or may not have been on backwards, as usual, his pants were definitely on fire throughout his entire speech."

-- Chris Weigant

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant

Cross-posted at: Democratic Underground