President Biden’s reelection campaign has dubbed former President Trump “Broke Don,” taking a strategy out of Trump’s playbook that his political rivals know all too well.

Trump has used nicknames — from “Little Marco” to “Crooked Hillary” to “Lyin’ Ted” — to put down a variety of opponents. For much of 2020, Biden’s moniker, courtesy of Trump, was “Sleepy Joe.”

Now, the Biden team is seeking to turn the tables in attempting to make one stick to Trump while it worked this week to highlight the former president’s lagging fundraising numbers in the 2024 race.

    • jaspersgroove@lemm.ee
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      9 months ago

      If you think this is the first time in American history that our politicians have resorted to petty name calling I’m going to have to assume your lessons in American history stopped sometime in the third grade, right after you traced your hand and colored it in with crayons to look like a turkey.

        • jaspersgroove@lemm.ee
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          9 months ago

          Hey, democrats tried “when they go low, we go high” for 40 years and look where that got them.

          Now they’re trying “when they go low, we knee them in the fucking face.” I say good on them for trying something different for a change.

  • fubarx@lemmy.ml
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    9 months ago

    Ugh. If you’re going to go low, workshop the name-calling. Go with alliteration or rhyming. And nothing too fancy, like Destitute Don.

    At least make it flow a bit, like Broke Donny.

    Or go sing-songy, like: Donny Chapter 11, Don-o Busto, or Donny The Cheat.

    But if you really want to get under his skin, you can’t go wrong with: Dirt-Poor Donny.

    Repeat 1000 times.

    • Stupidmanager@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      You can’t use big words here. The right that are smart enough to know the word destitute, know why they’re voting republican. Broke Donny would be my choice though. I already call him Donny or orange Jesus, to aggravate my parents when they start to talk about all the good he’s doing now. It’s Easter Sunday next week, I look forward to testing each variation.

  • hark@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    I don’t know if that’d go over well with the many struggling broke Americans.

    • MagicShel
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      9 months ago

      Yeah, broke might really anger Trump, but it’s a bad look for a wealthy guy to be calling someone broke as an insult. I don’t know that Trump could capitalize on it, but his surrogates in the media might.

      Biden is playing to an audience that gets upset when Trump attacks folks who are disabled or checks notes have a son killed in Iraq. I doubt it will hit the same, especially when so many Democrats are also broke.

      • GreyEyedGhost@lemmy.ca
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        9 months ago

        Even broke people tend to feel a fair amount of pity and disgust when someone goes broke because of their own stupid decisions. When those stupid decisions include breaking the law, the ratio tends to have more disgust and less pity. Now top that with the person in question being notorious for disparaging broke people, and I think the only people who will get their hackles up about this are his rabid supporters.

  • Boddhisatva@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    He called himself “Honest Don” on Truth Social. Biden should just play on that and go with Dishonest Don.

  • Wrench@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Deadbeat Don refuses to pay his bills after service has been rendered. Just ask his former lawyers.

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    9 months ago

    I know I’m in the minority on this but I’ve always felt like Trump truly won when we started adopting his shithead name-calling habits.

    1. Its doesn’t accomplish anything and reduces every argument to finger pointing and smirking.

    2. He’s so much better at it than anyone else cause his supporters don’t care what he does and the rest of us aren’t that beholden to a single politician to proselytize their every word

    • PugJesus@kbin.social
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      9 months ago

      Namecalling appeals to morons who have trouble parsing anything more complex.

      Morons are a non-negligible proportion of the US electorate.

      • the_crotch@sh.itjust.works
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        9 months ago

        Yeah, just look at all the people on lemmy and reddit who focus on Trump’s skin color instead of his myriad crimes, piss poor performance as president, and attempted coup.

        • PugJesus@kbin.social
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          9 months ago

          Namecalling as a strategy and namecalling as a means of releasing pent-up frustration are two different things, I’d argue.

          Hell, I’d even put namecalling as provocation as different from namecalling as a strategy for garnering support.

    • mPony@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      it’s just so disappointing that the GOP literally has no standards, while the Dems get called out for literally everything they do. Those criticisms can fuck off. The fascists are at your doorstep, you fools.

      • the_crotch@sh.itjust.works
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        9 months ago

        God forbid the party whose entire platform is “at least we’re not the Republicans” be held to a higher standard than the republicans

        • Zaktor@sopuli.xyz
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          9 months ago

          The standard of “don’t hurl childish insults at bad people” isn’t a standard I care terribly much about. Neither the name calling nor the pearl clutching are important in any way.

    • neptune@dmv.social
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      9 months ago

      Unfortunately this is where the undecideds of our country are. Imagine not knowing who you’d vote for this year.

  • paddirn@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Should go with ‘Brokeback Don’, just because Conservatives would hate the implication.

  • taanegl@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Incidentally, Broke Don is also my rap name.

    I got songs like “I’m bad at trapping”, “The In$urance Biz got me fucked”, “IKEA drip” and “all my money (alimony)”.

  • Anise (they/she)@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    9 months ago

    I think slinging mud about how much money one’s opponent has is a little tactless when so many Americans are struggling financially. The Dems get accused of being deaf to the problems of the rural poor enough without leaning into the rich urban elite stereotype.

    Also, where are the “lock him up” chants?