Literally or Seriously?

I've seen it said that those opposed to Trump take him literally but not seriously, and those who support him take him seriously but not literally.

There's some truth to that, but I don't think it is quite right. The problem is that "taking him literally" is done very selectively.

Just try to get any Trump hater, especially a woman who's face betrays her disgust as she calls him an illiterate pig, to actually literally parse his "grab them by the pussy" comment. Vulgar? Yeah. But accurate - if you recall that what he's describing are groupies. There are certainly more than enough women who'll sell themselves for fame, power, and access to those who have it.

These people literally cannot look at the trail of broken careers and failed attempts to take him down, and realize he's either the luckiest asshole on the planet, guided by divine providence, or he's not an idiot. They see his bragging and arrogance, and think he's a moron - or suffering from dementia (even as they'd vote for Biden).

Sure, he's not nice, or dignified - and if that's what you consider to be the end-all be-all of "presidential, then I guess he's not presidential either. "He makes fun of handicapped people and attacks people on twitter."

Yeah, so?

I don't consider "nice" to be a virtue.

The tweeting bypasses a media that actively and overwhelmingly hates him, and has taken opportunity after opportunity to butcher video to make him look bad. It also makes him remarkably transparent.

Biden's on-videotape confession of strongarming a government into dropping an investigation into companies that just happened to have his son, and the sons of other politicians on them? I'm told it pales in the face of the money Trump is raking in from using Trump tower and hotels for meets.

Remember, it's bad to get money for the connections one has as a senior politician - if you're a Republican. Please be to forget Hillary selling off teh Uranium, or the Clinton foundation getting money from the Russians.

Oh, and Trump and his father/etc. are "racists" - by modern standards - but no, why do I bring up Margaret Sanger or Woodrow Wilson or FDR and what they believe? Too far in the past? Let's try Hillary Clinton.

One comment I heard that surprised me was hearing one of the Trump-haters I know tell me "even the military hates him" - and listing off the officers he knew that thought the guy was an idiot/moron/disgrace. On second thought, it didn't surprise me, knowing that person's circle of friends and some of the ex-military we both know, who were mostly O5 or higher and solidly voted Democrat. No, the people named didn't surprise me - but the utter dismissal of copious evidence of servicemembers who weren't political-grade officers that loved him because the handful of (rare, liberal-leaning) military they knew (other than me) hated him too.

Yes, they actually think our military servicemembers think Trump is a laughingstock - I'm willing to concede the upper political ranks, the "leadership", are part of the establishment and may do so.

In the end though, it comes back to believing the lies, believing him to be an idiot so that they take puffery as literal language, and rooting that in disgust at his behavior which isn't what they consider proper/presidential for the upper class.

You don't logic/use dialectic to break someone out of a position taken on the basis of visceral disgust.