Teddy Roosevelt once said, “profanity is the parlance of the fool.” Democrats appear to be increasingly finding relief from both reality and sanity in profanity. Democratic members have been complaining that left-wing groups have been targeting them to be more aggressive and “fight harder” in the face of the fast-paced actions of President Donald Trump. Their response appears to be ratcheting up “rage rhetoric” with profanity and violent language. Last week, Rep. Maxine Dexter (D-Ore.) captured the new norm by yelling at a rally that “I don’t swear in public very well, but we have to f**k Trump. Please don’t tell my children that I just did that.”
The key, it appears, is for her constituents to hear it. She is not alone. (Warning: profane language)
Politicians and pundits have seemingly tried to outdo each other in proving their bona fides to the far left. MSNBC host and former Biden press secretary Jen Psaki pledged on Jon Stewart’s “The Weekly Show” podcast that she has “retired from the world of Democratic messaging” and ” speaking in a manner that was so academic and Ivory Tower.” She promised to drop “the disconnected academic Ivory Tower elite language that is too often used by Democrats, sometimes on cable television.” Instead, Psaki called on the left to “break some s–t.”
This is not a new trend. Law professors and legal pundits have long struggled to maintain a certain decorum and professionalism. However, during the Trump years, there was a similar race to the bottom as figures like Harvard Professor Laurence Tribe regularly engaging in name calling and profanity.
Just last week, a professor was restored to his teaching duties after being suspended for profane attacks on Trump. It is now considered required virtue signaling to use violent or profane language to show that you are no milquetoast moderate.
Many on the far left like former CNN anchor Don Lemon have turned the same profanity of members of the media who are not sufficiently aggressive and open in opposing Trump.
What is most striking about this race to the bottom is that it is a concession to the far left that writes off any effort to appeal to moderate and independent voters who supported Trump. The Democrats found their party captured by the most extreme elements of their base and alienated most of the country. Now, politicians and pundits are rushing to protect themselves by joining the mob.
In some cases, the effort is painfully awkward like Schumer’s effort to become a rabble-rousing populist. Even CNN has been unable to hold back:
When Democrats are not stringing together lines of profanity, they appear to be creating a new unintelligible language:
George Washington once referred to cursing and swearing as a “foolish and wicked practice” and a “vice so mean and low” that no self-respecting politician would stoop to use such language.
The rise of rage rhetoric is a measure of how politicians are now surrendering to the most extreme voices in their party. It is a matter of simple survival. These politicians believe that they cannot stay in office if they allow anyone to move to the left of their positions. To maintain their power, they are willing to join the mob before it turns on them.
We saw the same pandering with members embracing the violent group Antifa. Former Democratic National Committee deputy chair Keith Ellison, now the Minnesota attorney general, once said Antifa would “strike fear in the heart” of Trump.
It will not work. Today revolutionaries often become tomorrow’s reactionaries. As rage and violent rhetoric become normalized, the expectations of the far left simply shift to demand greater demonstrations of fealty. As figures like Psaki call for Democrats to “break some sh*t,” the ruin and rampage is unlikely to end with a marginal increase in ratings at MSNBC. At some point, breaking stuff becomes insatiable and uncontrollable.
That is the point, discussed in my new book, where rage rhetoric becomes state rage where free speech is often the first casualty.
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro professor of public interest law at George Washington University and the author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage.”
Vulgarity is enshrined in the first amendment. It doesn’t mean I can’t draw conclusions about the speaker.
Having served in the army, I’d lay down my life for someone’s freedom of speech.
I’m concerned about the statements like “break some shit”. Is that an incitement to riot? The left tried to charge President Trump when he said march over to the capitl (while ignoring his next sentence about peaceful and patriotic demonstration). To tell a mob to “break some shit” tells me they want people to commit acts of violence and vandalism. That isn’t protected by the first amendment.
Most people know enough to walk the other way when they hear break some sh!t.
I’m with Spongebob and Patrick on the cursing subject. The Sailor Mouth episode might be their best, though The Carnival is in Town episode is pretty funny too🤣
I believe I’ve misjudged today’s Democratic party. While I do agree that Donald Trump broke them, it was Barack Obama that fundamentally transformed them. Pre-Obama, politicians brought to the table more than the minimum constitutional requirements to hold office. Obama barely met the minimums, but he compensated that with Biden. His election ushered in candidates to the party that resemble Thomas Jefferson Johnson played by Eddie Murphy in The Distinguished Gentlemen. The difference is even Murphy’s character was appalled by the amount of corruption within the political class. While today’s Democratic party is still the party of foreign and domestic welfare, they function more like graduates of the Obama school of Leftist political activism. And with the Trump administration and DOGE exposing the waste, fraud and abuse of our “welfare state”, these elected political activists have nothing left to sell, other than their rage rhetoric.
https://babylonbee.com/news/democrats-vow-to-fight-doge-by-wasting-more-money-than-ever?
#1. Gee, if I’d known I would have applied for a grant and then filed bankruptcy. Could have done a Haitian cultural center in Ohio. Maybe a Moroccan pottery class… oh, transgender center in Wichita.
Poster on the wall in my high school. “Profanity is the effort of a feeble mind to express itself forcibly”.
aka ‘brain fart’
Profanity is the failure and absence of intellect.
Dear Prof Turley,
Take it easy. Jen & Jon (although more Jen than Jon), saying they’re going to break some sh!t is hardly a call to arms. .. not sure it even qualifies as ‘rage’ rhetoric.
I’m not scared. Behind this smooth, cultured literary facade, I was raised in hell home boy. My grandma has more attitude than they do.
*gangster’s paradise
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/2mpq3xRt2FE
Shit Turley, the US is now a fascist country. I am going to use any language I want.
The fact you have to use profanity AND think America is a fascist country just goes to show how low your IQ really is.
How marvelous!
Excellent. In very few words you have summed up exactly what I was trying to convey in my comment that you liked.
This is much better, Much more effective.
Thank you John! I take that as quite a compliment.
To the Dims, the 2024 POTUS election was never about exposing Trump’s supposed corruption; it was all about hiding their corruption. This crime syndicate financed their near-destruction of America with our money. And.We.Are. Pissed. And like ever criminal caught in the act and now having to publicly answer, they lash out. Have the baliff’s take them away kicking and screaming. We’ve got a country to save, traditions to honor and a general mop up of the filth they’ve left.
#1. This rage rhetoric is extortion. If you don’t give us what we want we’ll break some sh!t. They want their money laundering employees or they’ll take to the streets. RICO
that’s democratic unity for you
I have a couple cousins who despise Trump and believe ridiculous things about him: “the assassination attempt was faked” type of insanity and who address me with foul-mouthed arguments and threats.
When I chide them by saying no argument is strengthened with foul-mouthed expletives I get a string of more of them.
This seems to be some sort of habit or mental impairment seen almost exclusively on the Left, as if being a Democrat comes with Tourette’s syndrome. Very strange. And ugly. And repulsive.
Young,
I think it comes from a under developed mind. Lack of emotional maturity and letting their emotions drive their actions. I would not put it past them to do something truly violent. But this time, they will not have Democrat slush funds to bail them out.
@Upstate
I think so too, my brother is yhe same (and he assures me he is NEVER going to change). It isn’t that he is not intelligent, just that he hasn’t paid much attention to anything at all over the past 30 or so years and seldom ventures outside of his comfort zones. Over decades that can get calcified. Not impossible to change, just very, very tough. 🤷🏽♂️
Having fat finger syndrome today entering info. It’s Blue avatar James, not green. Sorry about that.
James,
Dont fret! I can recognize when someone fat fingers. It happens, especially on mobile devices. To your response to mine, yeah, my sister is like that i.e. not going out of her comfort zones. I have been sending her articles from The Free Press of Democrats who, like the good professor, are calling out their own party on the stupid.
Upstate-
Certainly their emotions are driving their mouths and that can lead to actions.
I finally told one I am printing his texts and emails for a file [I’m not] and that I thought he was beginning to sound like a danger to himself and others. Thankfully the messages stopped.
As for the broader cohort of lunatics I am relieved that the slush funds are being capped. Brilliant move by Trump and Musk! I mentioned before that maybe the Democrats can’t afford their Brownshirts in the streets anymore and that civilization may get a break from them for awhile–maybe for a long while. Too many American cities were beginning to evolve into Port-au-Prince. Time to build rather than destroy.
#1. They’ve always lived as blackmailers, extortionists, thieves, murderers and kidnappers…
Elliot Ness was part of the Treasury, too. Secretary Bessent is auditing the auditors. He can. The federal reserve might tip their hats when he passes by.
The more that those on the left violate norms (and laws), the easier it is to beleive claims that they have violated norms and laws.
John,
I absolutely believe they stole the 2020 election. The desire to cheat is likely behind their efforts to block any attempt to protect the integrity of elections, like voter ID. I hope Trump is able to provide for more secure elections. Or else bad things will happen.
It’s free speech in its purest form. Cursing and name calling which happens often here is all part of free speech. Turley doesn’t mention the fact that regardless of how offensive and vulgar some rhetoric is it’s still protected speech. The constitution has no requirement for anyone to be civil, respectful, or that decorum must be observed in order to exercise free speech. We’ve seen republicans use decorum and civility as excuses to stifle the free speech of others. Trump and his supporters use name calling and foul language to rage against the left all the time. Even here.
This faux indignation over foul language and rhetoric is just an excuse to justify chastising the left for exercising the free speech rights and avoid fully defending it because it would make Turley look bad in the eyes if his MAGA readers.
George Carlin famously made this point.
if you read carefully, he never said it was unlawful. He said it was ridiculous.
George, Your post is a “straw man.” No one is arguing that foul language is not protected speech. What they are arguing is that Democrats who resort to foul language reveal a frustration borne of a lack of a meritorious argument. There is no indignation here as you assert; rather there is disbelief and amusement by posters who recognize the vacuity in the profane Democrats’ rebuttal.
The right to free speech including vulgarity is critical because it is both how we communicate and even how we think.
Vugarity IS protected speech.
The commonplace use of Vulgarity is INEFFECTIVE free speech.
Turley is not calling for restricting vulgarity
He is correctly pointing out that it is not working.
“The constitution has no requirement for anyone to be civil, respectful, or that decorum must be observed in order to exercise free speech.”
Correct, we are civil and respectful or uncivil and disrespectful because SOMETIMES those are effective in communicating.
unjustified and constant disrespect and incivility are counterproductive.
But keep them up as much as you want.
“We’ve seen republicans use decorum and civility as excuses to stifle the free speech of others.”
We have. But today those seeking to restrict speech are nearly all from the left.
“Trump and his supporters use name calling and foul language to rage against the left all the time. Even here.”
They do. Sometimes it is effective. Sometimes not. Left or right you are FREE to chose to use it.
I do not think today it works for me. It does not work for you, but it is especially ineffective for those on the left.
The left’s problem is that their vulgarity is NOT providing emphasis for an argument.
It is the ONLY argument.
I personally do not think Turley needs to call out those of you on the left – except when you are actually using or threatening to use force.
As Sun Tzu says – when your enemy is making a mistake – do not interfere.
If you think that Democrats are successfully making their argument and persuading people – go for it.
Turley is correctly pointing out that you are wrong about that.
But he is NOT telling you that he is prepared to use FORCE to thwart you.
George Carlain – and before him Lenny Bruce were effective because vulgarity was uncommon and that meant their use of it drew attention to their points.
That is no longer true.
George Carlin would be boring today.
John Say,
Great comment!
The framers should have had a surgeon general warning in the script of the first amendment.
Free Speech can be hazardous to your health. When you resort to insults, threats, lies and other vitriol you should be fully aware that you can get your azz kicked out. The framers knew this, there was a caning on the House floor, there were brawls around Andrew Jackson. Perhaps the assault and battery laws should provide more latitude for broken noses and black eyes.
Sun Tzu also said:
“An evil man will burn his own nation to the ground to rule over the ashes.”
Definitely relevant to what Trump is doing.
Definitely relevant to what Trump is doing.
You say that with such confidence. Surely you can lend some credibility to that opinion by citing examples.
OLLY,
Well said! Yet, they cannot cite examples. Just more, as the good professor points out, their inability for sanity and reality. Some 86% of Americans, to include sane and normal Democrats, approve of Trump, Musk and DOGE efforts to end fraud, waste and abuse in the the federal government.
How marvelous!
Yet, they cannot cite examples. Just more, as the good professor points out, their inability for sanity and reality.
Absolutely Upstate! And this is the base the Democratic party appeals to.
Here’s a fun thought experiment. Imagine if political power for each member of Congress was tied to the civics literacy of their constituents. Require voters to take the 10 question exam every 5 years. When voters register to vote their active score is added with all other registered voters in their districts/states to a calculated % . The winner of that district will carry the voting power of that % into the House. Senators will carry that into the Senate.
Turley is assuming vulgarity is not effective. It’s still is because conveys one’s emotions in its purest form. Turley argues naively that vulgarity or name calling isn’t effective only when it comes to the left. But it’s Trump and his supporters and even those here who use it on a daily basis and Turley says nothing. It’s an excuse to make the left look bad and that’s the point of his article.
Invoking civility and decorum is used to shut down free speech by republicans and those on the right.
“The constitution has no requirement for anyone to be . . .”
But self-respect does.
George-
George Carlin was funny and skewered everyone and yet he was closer to the truth than most politicians especially Democrats. Yes he used the dirty little words that he was told to not use but that was the whole point. He was like an Avant Garde Prof Turley and he was projecting the power of the 1st amendment which our Dem brothers were suppressing in every way possible. Leave Carlin out of it. His memory deserves better than you.
Jonathan: It’s Saturday and time for my wrap up of some of the news this week. For starters, WH press secy Karoline Leavitt told the press corp that her boss had the right to rename the Gulf of Mexico. She told them “It is a fact that the body of water off the coast of Louisiana is called the Gulf of America, and I’m not sure why news outlets [AP] don’t want to call it that”. AP reporters had questioned Leavitt about the renaming since the rest of the world still calls it the Gulf of Mexico and has for the last 400 years. As a result AP reporters have been banned from WH briefings. Isn’t that a violation of press freedom, Jonathan? Why are you strangely silent in the face of the WH’s attacks on the First amendment rights of journalists?
Then, the Muskovite world was in the news a lot this week. Musk is slashing and burning his way through the government. But one item in the press caught my attention. The New Republic is reporting yesterday that the DOGE website has already been hacked. According to 404 media two coders infiltrated the site and left this message: “This is a joke of a gov site. THESE EXPERTS LEFT THEIR DATA BASE OPEN”. According to the Guardian “This will be unsurprising to anyone who has visited the DOGE gov. website since its inception–it looks like a high schooler could’ve made it. 404’s Jason Koebler previously referred to it as ‘just a WordPress theme placeholder page'”. So much for cyber security at DOGE. That’s what happens when you put 19 yr olds in charge!
Finally, Cheryl Crow has had it with Tesla. Variety is reporting the Crow is saying “So long Tesla”. She was once a big supporter of Musk and Tesla for being environmentally friendly. She even bought one of his cars. She even interfaced with Musk. But now Crow is alarmed by Musk’s turn to the right and his quest for dictatorial powers. So she
has posted a video of her standing in the street while her Tesla was being towed away. She has sold her car and is donating the proceeds to NPR.
In a statement Crow said “My parents always said…You are who you hang out with. There comes a time when you have to decide who you are willing to align with. So long Tesla”. Kudos to Crow for not wanting to take s**t from Musk anymore!
#1. Before that it was called the big mud puddle?
Nobody gets a seat at the White House press conference that is guaranteed. And as every White House before it, they can choose who gets a seat. That is not a violation of free speech. Are you alleging that if Kamala Harris doesn’t go on Joe Rogan‘s podcast or other media that she is violating free speech because she’s being selective?
Dennis, Mr. Obama declared, by sole/unilateral and politically-motivated EO, to rename Mt. McKinley “Denali.” (EO 14172)
Second, Cheryl Crow has always been a wokish left-leaning person. NO surprises here. So what is your point? Would you like me to name a few Hollywooders or Grammyists who are 100% all-behind Musk?
Third, DOGE preemptively declared that its work was open to public scrutiny and critique. Thank you to you and your cohorts for helping. your truly, lin.
Lin,
As always, an epic take down of Dennis with such grace!
p.s. I liked alot of Cheryl Crow’s music. I’m able to separate and accommodate opposing viewpoints without selling my car because the car salesman was gay or Woke.
Lin,
I too like Cheryl Crow. Saw her in concert. I might like what Musk is going, I am not going to buy a Tesla.
I have a friend with a Tesla – great car.
Not suitable for the driving I do. So no Tesla.
Dennis – you are free to call anything whatever you want.
Trump can try to change the label people use, and he can direct those in govenrment to do so.
You and AP are free to use other terms.
You tell us all that people can identify as they please AND FORCE others to refer to them by that label.
The first part is true, the later is false.
But Trump has the actual power to direct how the govenrment will label things.
Personally – he is just very successfully trolling you – and pointing out how stupid your efforts to control labels are.
The DOGE Website does not have top secret or confidential information on it.
Thwarting hackers is purely about embarrassment.
Exactly Why does DOGE need to secure a public web site that serves no purpose beyond informing the public of fraud and waste that they have found ?
These 19yr ols are far more accomplished then you are.
No, they really did put up classified information. Number of employees in the intelligence agencies is classified.
” Cheryl Crow has had it with Tesla.”
So ?
I do not have to like her other choices to like her music.
Sheryl Crow is 62.
I would hope by now she has developed her own moral values and need not constantly ask “what would my parents do”
She’s a Canadian is she not?
Presidents name things. Obama changed the names of things. Biden changed the names of things.
Trump is changing some, and changing others back.
Politicians love to name things – Especially after themselves.
I drive down roads named after dead public figures I have never heard of all the time.
Biden and Obama changed the name of a mountain in Alaska to return it to it’s original name. The rest of the name changes were to remove the names of traitors from military bases. It makes no sense to name military bases after people who fought against the US. The Gulf of Mexico “change” was all about whim and ego and is just stupid.
Dennis,
Cheryl Crow? The two square toilet paper limit Cheryl Crow? Serves her right for buying an EV, fuggem.
“rename the Gulf of Mexico”
That gulf has had numerous names: Sea of the North, Mexican Sound, Gulf of New Spain, Gulf of Florida.
And now it has a new, honorable name: The Gulf of America.
Every time Trump does something that expresses pride in America, the Left goes berserk. I wonder why.
Wasn’t Crow married to Lance Armstrong, the biggest fraud in all of sports? She was “aligned” with the Bernie Madoff of cycling and we’re supposed to believe she was unaware of the massive fraud he was committing?
Trump survives an assassination attempt. He gets up, raises his fist and shouts “Fight! Fight! Fight!”
Democrats are losing their slush fund, their corruption being exposed and they use profanity.
I can’t decide whether the dems provide side-splitting humor or fear-inducing disgust. Could it be both? Either way the dems are verging on schizophrenia.
They’re remaining engaged. Maybe irrelevant but engaged.
How many more moderate democrats and independents can the Democratic Party afford to lose before it becomes a footnote in American history? The race to the bottom cannot be fast enough for those democrats who hate Trump so much that they will relinquish their self-respect for it.
The fact these people are against exposing and curtailing government fraud, waste and abuse, and for biological men invading women’s spaces such as locker rooms and showers, and beating the crap out of women in competitive sports – and taking away their awards and scholarship opportunities – tells you all you need to know about how mentally ill they are.
OldManFromKS,
Well said. And they are for mutilating children as a activist judge supports and is blocking Trump from protecting those children.
Thank you…
It’s not classy and we frown on it in public discourse. But cursing is not the big problem. It’s just the frustrated reaction of very sick individuals who advocate the removal of healthy genitals from children and celebrate the murder of babies on hospital birthing tables. They welcome taxing people and spending the money on foreign countries and here we go aliens here. They destroyed our border as long as they could – we see how easy it could have been fixed – The weekend our military and made racism and same climate/globalism the mission of our military. There are no words so foul that would not apply to them. But online, I may do it fascist. Because that’s really what they are and everyone should use it for them. You can never let these people in power again.
#1. Vocabulary is the limit of ideas. Obviously their focus is fvck . Not too many ideas. They’ve even tried to stretch that idea by adding new words to it … how about that psycho in France and his poor wife.
This west coast nerd doesn’t even know how to use the profane in it’s proper context. I assume she meant to say that they need to “F” Trump up and not that they need to “F” Trump. The city streets where I grew up teenagers know how to use the ignorant and week profanity yet this week piece of garbage doesn’t.
Just look at the picture of Dexter and then ask yourselves why it is that the Democrats have lost male voters. Look at the weak Democrats like David Hogg and Tim Walz and think about what has happened to the party of JFK.
As for profanity I agree that it is a sign of either a lack of intelligence or a pathetic attempt to be something you are not. Do you ever remember William F. Buckley swearing? Ronald Reagan? JFK? FDR? CHURCHILL? Dean Acheson? George Marshall? Daniel Patrick Moynihan? Even Obama. Remember Obama’s face when the idiot Biden whispered in his ear “this is a big ‘F-ing’ deal”? Obama didn’t like it back only 15 years ago.
Think of the communication skills of those I mentioned above and compare it to the oratorical skills of todays Democrats. It really is a shame.
$1. The word f— has no real meaning. These are fvcking good donuts.
It’s the same meaning now given to reproduction-no meaning at all. It’s just a meaningless action.
Republicans should be saving the tapes of these comments for the next mid-term elections. They should play them all back in commercials around the country that say: “If you elect Democrats, these are the people who will be running the country.”
Trump luckily has those who can speak intelligently for him, ie, Vance, Musk. Trump knows nothing! It’s amazing to me how he ever got elected to the presidency in the first place! It’s going to be a long 4 years. Carol Ortiz
^ Retard troll. Ignore. ^
Harris’s 60 Minutes interview was so bad, they had to heavily edit it to make her look like she spoke intelligently.
It’s pretty pathetic. It makes me think they are just pandering to younger voters again though (mirroring trends that are common in modern entertainment), having given up on winning the rest of us over (‘minorities’, anyone?) after November.
The modern left is still shallow, transparently insincere, and incapable of self-reflection, this is the same old boosheet. They just don’t seem to get it’s their ideas that are the issue, they are in fact, the ‘bad guys’. I don’t see how anything has changed with them since the days of the old aristocracy, for them to call anyone ‘oligarch’ is hysterical; real original, critical thinking would make their ‘educated’ heads explode like a big string of fire crackers. They are fake to the core, with the double whammy of also being prodigiously arrogant and petty.
They are the only ones shocked by their losses, and their behavior has become irredeemably trite and predictable, but more importantly – fatal to free societies.
*James