A Note About Trump’s Tweets

I feel like I need to remind people of this periodically:

Donald Trump’s tweets are not aimed at you and me, and analyzing them as if they were will lead you badly astray. They are aimed solely at his core supporters in the electorate and the media.
In other words: don’t think of them as endlessly outrageous and provocative (“How can he say something like that?!?”). That gets you nowhere because you’re starting from the wrong premise. Think of them instead as routine communiques that Trump thinks are necessary to retain his base support. This allows you to analyze their meaning both more accurately and far more interestingly.

That is all.