201 Comments
User's avatar
Anita Petitt's avatar

It's not just Trump that foreign leaders distrust. They're also aware that a large percentage of Americans are uneducated and easily misled by disinformation. The fact that Trump was elected twice, implies that electing another authoritarian can happen at any time. All of our treaties and agreements are up for grabs, and other countries know it.l

Expand full comment
Kwaipoh's avatar

Trump elected twice? Don't be so sure.

There is reason to believe that the 2024 election was rigged.

https://substack.com/inbox/post/165658733

Expand full comment
Steve 218's avatar

Rigged or not, we're now suffering under the S.O.B.'s regime. Call it what it is.

Expand full comment
Chris Martin's avatar

Oh please. We're supposed to be better critical thinkers than MAGA. The assertion the 2024 election was "stolen" from Harris is complete and utter nonsense started by Substacks looking for publicity.

NONE of the irregularities in Rockland County are sufficient enough to even change results within the county, much less the Electoral College.

https://www.newsweek.com/2024-election-lawsuit-advances-2083391

Expand full comment
It's Come To This's avatar

Truly, this is rabbit hole stuff for lefties. Have fun down there. Count me out. It just distracts from where we are and what we have to do now, right this very minute.

Expand full comment
Chris Martin's avatar

Honestly, until I saw the post I had *no idea* 2024 election denialism even existed.

I guess we can at least be happy that unlike MAGA, 99.9% of Democratic elected officials aren't giving this nonsense oxygen.

Expand full comment
Daniel Solomon's avatar

Did Trump admit that Musk stole Pennsylvania?

Interference is a crime. If only one person was intimidated, it's a crime.

Expand full comment
Chris Martin's avatar

LOL! Elon Musk didn't do anything in Pennsylvania he didn't also do in Wisconsin. The only difference is in Wisconsin he failed spectacularly. According to Citizen's United, and a judge in Pennsylvania, what Musk did was legal.

Anyone who believes the election was stolen from Harris is as gullible as MAGA voters.

Expand full comment
Daniel Solomon's avatar

Start with Trump...He SAID IT. In the trade, we call that an admission.

Musk is not immune. BTW, there are a lot of other allegations....

Expand full comment
Susan Constable's avatar

The absurdity of any of our past presidential elections were “stolen” perpetuates a statement made by a moron of leader(read unfortunately) who incited a insurrection against the members of Congress whose job it was to verify the election results which led to the election of Biden as our president.

Can we, as a nation remember that insurrection as it was instead of” tourist attraction “ dumpty dumpt insists it was.

Let us also remember that he pardoned those people who committed acts of treason against our democracy!

Expand full comment
Jack Kimbell (John)'s avatar

Don't be so sure. Let's see it play out as there is more the Rockland, NY...

Expand full comment
Ann's avatar

Your right about the suggested findings and any votes for Harris being enough to turn over the election let alone the fact the she did win NY state anyway. I think the possible findings may be viewed as an indication to even more irregularities. And if there was tampering with the ballots what that might mean for upcoming elections. However skepticism in this case is a healthy thing and critical thinking always a necessity!

Expand full comment
Kwaipoh's avatar

Well, you have been primed to be in denial about election interference in the U.S., despite the fact that many European countries know full well what Putin and the tech bros are capable of. Musk admitted conversations with Putin. About what?

https://www.politico.eu/article/russia-hacking-us-election-what-we-know/

Expand full comment
Kwaipoh's avatar

"NONE of the irregularities in Rockland County are sufficient enough to even change results within the county, much less the Electoral College"

Your link contradicts your assertion.

The point is not to overturn certified elections.

The point is to learn what methods and strategies were used in 2016 and 2020 so they can't be repeated in 2026 or any other future election, to thwart the will of the voters.

We cannot exist as a democracy if our elections can be rigged.

Expand full comment
David Gardiner's avatar

See Greg Palast's "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy."

Expand full comment
Marc Panaye's avatar

Grow op kwaipoh.

Expand full comment
Kwaipoh's avatar

Enough with idiotic snark. All it demonstrates is a closed mind.

Every Trump accusation ('the 2020 election was stolen") is an admission

Remember the Mueller Investigation?

Remember the findings?

Putin, Trump, and the rightwing oligarchs are working hand in hand.

Expand full comment
Jacque DeWolf's avatar

and the trump administration especially Little Marco!

Expand full comment
Carole Langston's avatar

Bullseye 🎯

Expand full comment
Carole Langston's avatar

Bullseye 🎯

Expand full comment
A doc reads's avatar

Well said, Anita!

Expand full comment
Hiro's avatar

You raised a key concern about Americans in general.

Expand full comment
Susan Constable's avatar

So sad/ but so true

Expand full comment
Rabbi John Rosove's avatar

Jen - I read this before checking who wrote it, and then was delighted to look back and learn that it was you.

Great piece - concise and moral and spot-on right. And we've only had 5 months of Trump's chaotic leadership.

What will America look like at the end of his term? It's a dystopian image if I've ever seen one.

Keep writing - you are really good at this! But, why am I not surprised?

Expand full comment
Daniel Solomon's avatar

Meanwhile, the fight is in the senate.

“To my friends in the Senate, lock yourself in a room if you must, don’t go home, and GET THE DEAL DONE THIS WEEK,” Trump wrote Tuesday on Truth Social. “Work with the House so they can pick it up, and pass it, IMMEDIATELY. NO ONE GOES ON VACATION UNTIL IT’S DONE.”

Every Congressional Democrat opposes the Big Crappy bill.

Concentrate on convincing the Congressional Republicans who can stop the Trump agenda.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/house-gop-moderates-tell-leadership-191817923.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cueWFob28uY29tL25ld3Mvd3JvbmctaGF3bGV5LXdhcm5zLXNlbmF0ZS1nb3AtMjExOTU4Njg3Lmh0bWw&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAEwKvocTvBzJk_nUOD7CRf-U3G2fnmStBpK1s6MeNQTliOtN6fvngpIyKuqacBuHmTJFlzjIpChTiE9COQkHlmLFYTxqIfVZHJBHHEpgZHM4VIu8jL3ZAjaVIdjSrCIGFFJL84V1n43Ru23s5LFqn81OF3P9BcQcK01Wdq_SkuXV

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/08/us/politics/breaking-with-trump-bacon-says-he-wont-follow-his-party-off-the-cliff.html

Expand full comment
Jason's avatar

Rubin is good when writing about things she likes to write about.

It is amazing and really disappointing that The Contrarian has not published one single article about the NYC mayoral primary. This was a huge upset that made international news by a young progressive who has shown Democrats a blueprint to take back heir party...but not a word in The Contrarian.

Why is that? The Contrarian wrote dozens of pieces about the Wisconsin State Supreme Court race including live interviews with the candidate and her supporters.

It's not likely a coincidence that in this case, the victor is a Muslim who is critical of Israel's war crimes.

Expand full comment
Marliss Desens's avatar

The Wisconsin Supreme Court race had national implications as any disputes about voting in that state in national elections would have national implications since Wisconsin is a swing state. It was also important to demonstrate that Elon Musk's money only goes so far.

I wish New York City well and am glad that Cuomo won't be mounting a national comeback from the mayor's office. For some enlightening thoughts on the NYC mayor's race, read Paul Krugman's Substack column today.

Expand full comment
Jason's avatar

The NYC mayoral elections have national implications as NYC is the country's largest city, with more people than dozens of entire states. This race has been reported on across the country and around the world. It has huge significance for the Democratic Party.

I read Krugman's article; that is a case in point. Everyone is writing about this...except The Contrarian.

The Contrarian has reported on the mayoral race in Boston as well as many smaller local elections of less importance than this one.

There is simply no good reason why The Contrarian would not publish even a single article about the stunning victory of a young progressive over the scion of one of New York's most powerful political families, who has backed by virtually the entire Democratic Party machine, as well as plenty of billionaire donors.

The most obvious explanation is that Jennifer Rubin refuses to give any support or even attention to a democratic socialist who is not afraid to be critical of Israel's war crimes. It is that simple.

Expand full comment
Gordon H DeFriese's avatar

Thank you for this cogent analysis. It should be required reading in every high school civics class, and shared with every registered voter in America. Trump is the greatest existential threat we face in the current era! Our kids and grandkids will ask us “How did we let this happen?”

Expand full comment
Catherine Blanche King's avatar

. . . "How did this happen?" Because we got sidetracked in education--some ignorantly, some intentionally, and didn't insist on giving our young people in public education a good POLITICAL education for decades--not propaganda, but an education where students understand the difference between fascism, kingship, and democracy and where they can and often will choose democracy on its merits. Even the people in the White House have demonstrated that they have no clue about what democracy is and means.

For instance, the judges are not trying to "take away executive power," they are only mediating the law as it stands, which tends to point to Trump's breaking of it.

Expand full comment
John's avatar

“Who would ever make a deal with him?” Well, there’s one group you missed, Jen, who will deal with him to the depths of hell and back; his MAGAT cult. No matter how often he rubs their noses in his shit, no matter how hard his “policies” make their miserable lives even more miserable, no matter how many promises he breaks to them they’ll deal with him all the way. Even today, he still gets a 40% approval rating. There are your dealmakers.

Expand full comment
It's Come To This's avatar

It's more complicated than that. Jennifer quotes Schake who claims we are becoming too nuts to be trusted. But then she makes a mistake by claiming we are also "too irrelevant" to matter. I do not know why she would say that because the opposite is true. The world can't ignore us any more than Canada can get in bed with an elephant and not turn over when it does (to paraphrase a famous quote by Justin Trudeau's father, Pierre).

What we do matters greatly. Why else would the Europeans baby him, coddle him, give him a lollipop and tell him what a great big strong boy he is, albeit while sniggering behind his back?

We live in a world where the indispensable nation has gone off its meds. The consequences will damage us and the while world for a generation, if not longer.

Expand full comment
Renee Shapiro's avatar

Agreed. This country, " led" by Trump and his minions, is way to dangerous to be irrelevant.

Expand full comment
James M. Coyle's avatar

I wish I'd seen this before I posted. Agree completely

Expand full comment
Elle's avatar

But cult worshippers aren't voting rationally. They're essentially part of a death cult. Ought to be treated as incompetent and institutionalized. Or certainly not allowed near a polling place until they're deprogrammed.

Expand full comment
Steve 218's avatar

It's an oxymoron to use cult and rational in the same sentence, paragraph, or world.

Expand full comment
patricia's avatar

but the price of eggs....

Expand full comment
It's Come To This's avatar

Honestly, when he mocked a disabled reporter, I thought 'that's it.'

-When he tried to make John McCain sound like a loser, I thought 'he's done for.'

-When the pussygrabber tape got played, I thought 'his wee hour on the stage is up.'

-When he tried to blackmail Zelenskyy and got impeached TWICE for obstruction of justice, I thought 'iacta alea sunt (the die is cast) .'

-When he tried to choke a Secret Service agent who wouldn't let him lead an insurrection, I thought 'you are f-in toast, asshole.'

-When he stood at that debate lectern shrieking about Haitian cat and dog recipes, I burst into laughter louder than Kamala's.

Yet here we are.

There's a song by the late, great Malvina Reynolds, whose chorus simply goes:

"There's a low below the low you know, you can't imagine how far you can go....

...

DOWN."

Expand full comment
Nancy's avatar

I'm glad you laid all of this out! I, too, have thought many times, "this is it"! But, clearly, we haven't reached "it." If there is no "it" for our country, no line too low, we are in a very dark place and the flashlight batteries are drained of power.

Expand full comment
Hari Prasad's avatar

Donald Trump is a typical mafioso, a gangster. Here is his threat to Spain: "They are doing very well. The economy is (doing) very well. And that economy could be blown right out of the water with something bad happening."

America has achieved a rare distinction - it has elected the first gangster in its history to be president of the country.

Expand full comment
Phyllis Logan's avatar

Migrants are passing the word to their families, don't go to the U.S. - go to Spain where immigrants are welcome and have no fear of being arrested. Spain is proving migration pays huge dividends in economic growth - something Trump is too stupid and stubborn to understand.

Expand full comment
Hari Prasad's avatar

That's another of the reasons MAGA cultists hate Spain - they want Europe to treat migrants like Trump and Noem in America.

Expand full comment
Phyllis Logan's avatar

Exactly.

Expand full comment
A doc reads's avatar

Yes, Phyllis. Well said.

Trump has engineered the death of a country.

The author/boys of Project 2025 had no interest in the US functioning as a country.

Expand full comment
Anne-Louise Luccarini's avatar

Spain's long, long history is worth studying. They survived long-term invasion, kings, a dictator, and have got it all into place with a democracy/constitutional monarchy. But they fought, oh how they fought to get there.

Expand full comment
Phyllis Logan's avatar

Thank you Anne-Louise. Yes, and they are still working hard to keep going in the right direction.

Expand full comment
Kathleen Pirquet's avatar

Somehow, I don't see any evidence that economic growth or the necessity for immigrants to be an important part of that, are in any way part of Trump's considerations. He's a bigot and lives in a silo of mirrors. I wish someone would explain to his ignorance that with the current American replacement rate of 1.2 children for every two adults in the US, we NEED immigrants just to sustain our current population and keep the economy ticking over! To actually grow our economy and have a functional government paid for by taxes, we need rather a lot of immigrants.

YEAH, Trump is clueless, and blinded by hatred and the thrill of cruelty.

Expand full comment
Michelle Jordan's avatar

Despite the information from the nuclear bombing sites in Iran showing they are minimally affected Trump believes they’ve been obliterated. His denial of the facts is part of his problem. If you can’t believe the facts in front of you then how can you make a deal on anything? His detachment from reality is the problem. He will never make a deal because nobody wants to waste time with a lunatic.

Expand full comment
A doc reads's avatar

There is no discernible truth in anything Trump says.

How can any organization proceed, let alone an entire county proceed in any endeavor, in any direction if there is no truth?

Expand full comment
James M. Coyle's avatar

And this lack of truthfulness now permeates his entire administration. Nothing our government now asserts can be considered to be true. All governments spin, withhold information from their citizens, and sometimes just plain lie. But the current US government has brought this down to new depths. We now have to start our thinking about issues of concern to us from the position that nothing they tell us is true.

Expand full comment
Anne-Louise Luccarini's avatar

Anyone who looks the way he does at 79 is incapable of facing facts.

Expand full comment
Gammyjill's avatar

I’ve just listened to Pete Hegseth berate participants at the Pentagon press briefing. He was cold, cruel, and deliberately provocative as he - seemingly- lied about the efficacy of the raid. No one has questioned the bravery of the members of the military who carried out the raid, as Hegseth alleges.

This is just one example of the Trump administration’s venal attack on our great country.

Expand full comment
It's Come To This's avatar

He's a little boy so out of his depth it isn't funny.

Expand full comment
Yvette's avatar

Throw in a red herring to upset the course. Hegseth and Trump must keep cheat sheets in their pockets to direct questions in a nonsensical (lie) direction. Then they call the reporters “nasty” for asking.

Expand full comment
Anne-Louise Luccarini's avatar

It's like one of those dear little Swiss chalets that used to forecast the weather depending on whether the little man came out or the little lady. Trump would label them "Great job" and "Nasty".

Expand full comment
Jane Bouvier's avatar

This is true for the future as well. After Trump, what safeguards can be put in place re: impeaching a president who breaks treaties?

Expand full comment
Stephen Webb's avatar

For DJT, the backbone of his refusals to honor any agreements or to negotiate lies in the stupid (VERY stupid) SCOTUS agreement to give him blanket immunity for any and all past, present, and future crimes he may commit. A pure 'get out of jail card.' Could the courts really refuse to enforce this stupidity? Would they cut off the money troughs that donnie has created for himself and for his support? I don't believe for a minute that this could take place, and to make fundamental changes to revert to a truly open democracy, the Congress would have to be restructured as well. There are way too many ass kissers there now to make this happen.

Expand full comment
Anne-Louise Luccarini's avatar

Ask Norm Eisen, for starters...

Expand full comment
Buddy Friend's avatar

The republican candidates saw from the get- go in his first term the person he is. Ask Rubio, ask Cruz, ask Graham as examples.

They despised Trump. Tossed him under the bus literally. And now they act that all is well, and he goes about destroying our country only for his satisfaction. We are paying a huge price, my friends, for our leaders not living up to their beliefs about this man. Very sad to say the least.

Expand full comment
James M. Coyle's avatar

If they had tossed him under the bus literally, we would all be a lot happier and wouldn't be having this discussion.

Expand full comment
Joseph M Becker's avatar

Including ‘Trump’ and ‘lie’ in the same sentence is grossly redundant.

Expand full comment
Wendy Shelley's avatar

Spot on, Jen, as always. As another Substacker has proclaimed, many times: “everything Trump touches, dies.“ “ETTD“. We already know that he will not abide by any treaty he signs, so why would one be signed with Iran? And so on …..

Expand full comment
A doc reads's avatar

Yes, Wendy,

“everything Trump touches, dies…”

That is the observable truth.

Expand full comment
John DesMarteau's avatar

Here’s the definition of psychotic disorder: “A mental disorder characterized by a disconnection from reality.” Every president stretches the truth at least once during their presidency. However, Trump is often disconnected from reality in the same sentence and often multiple times in the same paragraph. You can’t trust anything coming from a psychotic person. I’d bet at least some other countries’ leaders have psychiatric advisers telling them exactly that about Trump.

Expand full comment
Andrew Goldstein's avatar

Trump as POTUS is using and abusing the gravitas and respect of the office to cloak his behaviors, so well articulated by Jen.

Expand full comment
Kathleen Pirquet's avatar

He's not cloaking anything. What he's done is convince, through incessant and redundant lying, a large constituency of the bigoted, the ignorant, the disappointed, the envious, the frustrated and the bigoted, that he and only he can give them the "good life of abundance" that they deserve. Of course, he has no intention of doing that for anyone but his own self. He has nothing but disdain for his supporters. They are just a means to achieve his own fever dreams, which he will won't, because he is incompetent, lazy, infantile, and surrounds himself with traitors.

This, too, will pass, but it will leave a wide, long trail of destruction. Will we as a nation learn this time?

Expand full comment
Fran Grogan's avatar

A great article and so true. We have to keep talking facts to anyone who will listen. It does amaze me the number of people who are not paying attention. Waiting for the time when it has a personal effect on them will be too late. Thank you for this.

Expand full comment
Steve 218's avatar

Exactly. Waiting for the words of Martin Niemoller to come true isn't a good tactic to take.

Expand full comment
laura's avatar

You lost me at "loss of credibility", which admittedly was a quick loss. As if there ever was a time when this insult taking up space in our broken hearts and driving our fears was in any ballpark of credible, reasonable, rational or logical. As if he ever had a right to any of the positions of power he's been in. Suggesting that he somehow has "fallen from grace" is rewriting history and inserting a false premise that made sense of any of this.

Expand full comment