In which we use 8 measures to objectively analyze whether Trump is winning the fight. With a numerical scorecard and everything!
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It occurs to me at this juncture to ask whether or not Trump is ahead on points at this stage of the fight. He has thrown a manic flurry of punches but hasn’t landed any knockout blows so far as I can tell.
So it’s not altogether clear to me who’s ahead; sometimes it’s not even clear to me who is in the ring. But it seems like an important question. So we’ll examine it from a multitude of angles. And put some numbers on it.
Angle #1: Trump Uses Courts to Fight
The courts are kinda sorta supposed to referee any legally conducted fight. So it seems reasonable to see what the referees say.
There are an awful lot of current court cases involving Trump, so I decided to ask AI.
Google Gemini basically said ‘OMG, there’s so many goddamn cases, how the hell can anyone keep up? He’s won some and lost some, but it looks like the Supreme Court is his bitch and the lower courts hate his fucking ass.’ Gemini didn’t exactly say it that way, but it’s what they meant. Which basically means that Google tried to waffle.
Another AI LLM I asked said ‘I’ve got a tally through July and that has Trump at 31% wins, 60% losses and 9% mixed. That seems plausible and not like waffling.
Some of Trump’s cases winding their way toward full consideration by the Supreme Court. Which means the Supreme Court is going to have to decide whether to go all in on bitch mode or whether to reduce Trump’s winning percentage even further.
Which means it’s still damn difficult to assess whether Trump’s ahead in the fight or behind. Sigh.
OFFICIAL SCORECARD: We’re going to go with the official sounding tally.
Trump: 31
Not Trump: 60
Mixed: 9
Angle #2: Legislative Scorecard
This seems like a fair thing to judge a president on. It should be a major part of Trump’s fight. Theoretically. How does the man fare?
Trump’s legislative scorecard? Um, that’s 100%. Mike Johnson’s House of Representatives does what Trump wants 100% of the time. That kind of winning led to the passage of the budget reconciliation bill that is central to Trump’s goal to raise the deficit by a few trillion dollars over the next decade. That’s major winning!
He hasn’t really gotten anything else accomplished legislatively and it took a long-ass time to get a bunch of his nominees approved and also the government is shut down. But who cares about any of that shit when you’re on track to raise the deficit by a few trillion dollars! No one cares.
OFFICIAL SCORECARD: In the legislative arena, Trump 100, not Trump 0.
RUNNING TALLY: Trump 131, not Trump 60. Mixed 9.
ANGLE #3: Standing with the American public.
Obviously this one wiggles around some from day to day. Right now it seems to be running right around 42% approve of Trump and 56% disapprove. Could be worse for Trump and maybe it will be. But right now, he seems to be about 14 percentage points under water.
For the record, Trump is not winning that fight.
OFFICIAL SCORECARD: Trump approval rating: Trump 42. Not Trump 56.
RUNNING TALLY: Trump 173. Not Trump 116. Mixed 9.
ANGLE #4: Trump’s Fight for International Approval
Trump is really quite unpopular around the world, at least as far as we can tell. He runs at around 63% lack of confidence, which is impressive. 34% do have confidence, more or less, so that’s not nothing. Although the people who do have confidence seem to live in Nigeria, Hungary, and Israel.
Even Argentina, which just played him in the soybean arena by getting a bailout that they used to undercut American soybean farmers, has little confidence in him.
There’s a caveat to these numbers, which is that they do not include Russia and China. They do include India, which is largely supportive of Trump. It’s doubtful Trump would do as well in Russia and China but we don’t know for sure.
Russia – Why Do Weirdos Love It So Much?
OFFICIAL SCORECARD: International standing: Trump 34. Not Trump 63. Mixed 3.
RUNNING TALLY: Trump 207. Not Trump 179. Mixed 12.
ANGLE #5: Resigned or Otherwise Been Removed From Office?
Nope, not yet. Still awaiting for an official announcement along those lines.
I’m not going to count out the possibility that will happen though. Why?
Because when Trump loses, he loses in dramatic fashion. And he loses a lot. Historic, bigly losses. Spectacular bankruptcies. Wins, such as they are, are followed by losses. And Trump has a lot of experience with the fight against being removed from office.
I don’t know what the over/under on Trump not making it until the next election is. But I ain’t making no big money bet he’ll still be president on election day 2028.
Resignation. 25th Amendment. Cardiac arrest. Impeachment. Lost in the jungles of the Congo. Guillotine. Assassinated by Putin’s henchmen. Casualty of World War III. There really are quite a few possibilities.
Not yet though.
OFFICIAL SCORECARD: Trump 1. Not Trump 0.
RUNNING TALLY: Trump 208. Not Trump 179. Mixed 12.
NEXT SET OF ANGLES. TRUMP FIGHTS AGAINST SPECIFIC GROUPS, WIN OR LOSE?
ANGLE#6: TRUMP FIGHT AGAINST A FREE PRESS IN THE US.
Trump or his social media company has sued 29 press outlets as far as I know as I write this. Of those 29 lawsuits, 2 count ‘em 2, big-ass corporate conglomerates have forked over multiple millions of moolah.
The first settlement, by ABC News, was led by Bob ‘the coward’ Iger, CEO of the parent company of ABC News. Bob’s cowardice is both world famous at this point and seemingly deeply personal. His wife Willow is so upset with him lately that’s she taken to calling him Bob ‘Pussy’ Iger. Which makes the two of them Pussy and Willow.
Maybe. There are rumors. I have my sources but of course cannot independently verify the gossip.
The other coward was CBS and its parent company Paramount. Guess it’s paramount to bow down before tyrants, isn’t it big-ass corporate media? Ho ho ho.
At any rate, despite the publicity the craven corporate cave-ins have gathered, Trump’s record on this front is not that good numerically at this point. It might improve but right now it’s dismal.
OFFICIAL SCORECARD: Trump 2. Not Trump 27.
RUNNING TALLY: Trump 210. Not Trump 206.
Damn, we have a closer fight than I was anticipating!
ANGLE # 7: TRUMP FIGHTS TECH COMPANIES AND LATE NIGHT HOSTS
I bundled these 2 together because for some reason I couldn’t bear to create separate categories for them. Trump’s record in this hybrid category is actually pretty good.
He’s gotten Alphabet (Google), Meta, and X to cough up cash in the multi-millions for being real mean to him after random rioters tried to hang Mike Pence on January 6, 2021. Apparently getting peace officers killed isn’t a good enough reason to tell someone to shut the fuck up.
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As far as late night hosts go, Trump has a mixed record in his fight to get rid of all of them. Lots of people think he got Stephen Colbert fired for being real mean to him or being real mean to Paramount for being a boot-licking Trump sucker and handing over the protection money.
On the other hand, he has not yet gotten Jimmy Kimmel or anyone else off late night. Indeed, blowback against Bob Pussy Iger for taking Kimmel briefly off the air was so fierce that it singed the company’s stock price and probably its reputation with A-list talent for good.
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Blowback didn’t just hit the formerly ‘woke’ company, even far right figures took aim at Trump’s lackey on the FCC. Took aim so hard he had to pretend he hadn’t said the dime store Mafioso shit he actually said. Which is just par for the course.
OFFICIAL SCORECARD: Trump 4. Not Trump 1. Mixed 2 because the public hit back so hard on this one that even ultra-conservative Sinclair media company had to put Kimmel back on the air. Whoops! The Nexstar and Sinclair media companies are only Trump adjacent though. So we can’t put them in either the Trump or the Not Trump categories.
RUNNING TALLY: Trump 214. Not Trump 207. Mixed 14.
Non-Scoring Editorial comment:
Bob the spineless submissive Iger and his broadcast brethren at CBS have let down the entire nation by treating their responses to Trump’s fight against the first amendment like a business decision instead of a moral one.
That’s probably because big business in has no morals. There may be no atheists in foxholes, but there are also apparently no heroes in corporations, at least not in the C-suite.
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ANGLE #8: RANDOM OTHER TARGETS OF ATTACKS
8.1 Immigrants.
I’m gonna go easy on Trump in his highly publicized fight against immigrants. He said he was gonna deport 20 million people. I’m gonna reduce that figure to 14 million to be generous. That’s closer to the number of non-citizens in the US. I’m also gonna be generous in calculating how many have actually been deported so far this year and put it at 210K. In spite of the showmanship involved, it’s possible that the current Trump administration is actually deporting fewer people than Biden did.
Don’t mess with Democratic presidents by the way; they just do shit without talking about it. Whether the shit be drone attacks or deportations Democratic presidents zip their lips and get it done. Whether you want it done or not.
Anyway, let’s do an official tally.
OFFICIAL SCORECARD: Trump 210,000. Not Trump 13,790,000. Mixed: unknown number of people who don’t have to be deported cuz they just fucking left.
Uh oh. The numbers on this one really tilted the scorecard away from Trump’s favor.
RUNNING TALLY: Trump 210,214. Not Trump 13,790,207. Mixed 14 + unknown.
Yikes, that’s a big deficit to overcome. And it’s even harder (I think) given that only about 14% of people want Trump to deport immigrants who have children born in the US (unless they’ve committed a violent crime). That’s not an impressive show of support for the policy given that 14% of Americans also believe that Hitler was the guy who invented Mountain Dew. Or something like that.
8.2. The US government and its employees.
Let’s give Trump a chance to catch up. DOGE or Doggie or whatever it was took a metaphorical chainsaw to government employees. So the numbers are gonna look good for Trump on that, right? Even if it didn’t save trillions of dollars. Let’s tally it up.
As of September 30, 2025 about 300K federal employees have left the government one way or another. But then 25,000 were reinstated and some hundreds were rehired. We’re not gonna get nitpicky on Trump, though, we’re gonna give him a cool 275,000 here – which is more than have been deported.
And you thought he was anti-black people. In reality, he’s anti-white people. White collar people! Ahem.
OFFICIAL SCORECARD: Trump 275,000. Not Trump 2,920,000. Mixed 1,300,000. Yup, there are 2,920,000 civilian employees left in the federal government. Damn, and this was such a good chance for Trump’s numbers to improve!
The mixed by the way, are the 1.3 million members of the military. We could count them against Trump, but we are bleeding hearts, so we won’t.
RUNNING TALLY: Trump 485,214. Whoo hoo! Not Trump 16,710,207. Mixed 1,300,014 plus an unknown number of people who fled the US.
Bonus Category – DOGE Savings.
DOGE claims it saved the American people $206 billion. On the other hand, verified savings are closer to $1.4 billion. We could give Trump 1.4 billion points here. But this is a battle so if we do that we have to give government spending that still exists its points. So that would amount to at least 7 trillion dollars. I’m not going to give the not Trump side 7 trillion points, no matter how much not Trump deserves it.
But you’re welcome to do what you like with your own tally sheet!
8.3. Autism.
Unlike Nixon who declared war on a disease that killed people (cancer), Trump declared war on a disorder that doesn’t kill anyone. Nevertheless, Trump took a wild swing at autism by threatening to withhold Tylenol from it. As of this writing, autism still exists. To the tune of about 5.4 million people on the spectrum.
Now I could be nice and just score this as autism 1, Trump 0. But I don’t feel like updating the tally with such small numbers, so I’m adding in the 5.4 million people who were not in the least affected by Trump’s salvo against ASD.
OFFICIAL SCORECARD: Trump 0. Autism 5,400,000. Mixed 1. The mixed represents the fate of Tylenol, a tangential casualty.
RUNNING TALLY: Trump 485,214. Not Trump 22,110,207. Mixed 1,300,015 + unknown people who fled the US.
8.4 American inner cities.
Recently, Trump spoke to the American military brass and informed them of something important. To wit: “In our inner cities, which we’re going to be talking about because it’s a big part of war now.” Now, by inner cities, Trump means black people. Or he means that inner cities are the next weapon the US is going to be sending to Israel. Or he doesn’t actually mean anything comprehensible. Hard to tell. At any rate, black people and inner cities continue to exist for the moment.
OFFICIAL SCORECARD: Trump 0. Not Trump 0. Mixed 0. Crazy shit like this cannot currently be quantitatively measured, so we’re gonna have to put a bunch of doughnuts on the board. (mmmmm, donuts!). So the running tally is unchanged.
8.5 The English language.
As indicated by the quote above, Trump has fought the English language and fought it hard. The two mighty foes have repeatedly wrestled each other to the ground and bloodied each other up. However, neither opponent has acquitted itself well enough in the bout so far for me to be able to award any points. So this one is still just a draw at love all.
8.6 Sleepiness.
Trump seems to have been fighting sleepiness lately and fighting it in public. His entire speech to the military brass was a harrowing battle against exhaustion. The losers in that case were the members of the audience. Still there have been quite a few public skirmishes in the battle against elder fatigue and there is no clear winner at this point. So I am not able to award points. Another draw at nil.
8.7 People who protest the genocide in Gaza.
He’s made a big show of fighting them. But deportation orders have been overturned. I’ve actually folded this into Trump’s war on universities. 3 universities have caved: Columbia, Brown, and the University of Pennsylvania. But no one else has yet.
And as for public opinion about the genocide in Gaza it’s running at about 50/50 between ‘this is horrific genocide that is tearing my heart into unbearably painful pieces’ on the one hand and on the other ‘what genocide? Besides, what about Hamas, huh? What about Hamas? And anti-Semitism which is totally about saying truthful things about Israel and not even slightly about saying terrible things about Jews.’
At any rate, even the Israelis have not stopped protesting (400,000 in August), so I can’t say Trump is winning on this one. Even after the announcement of a ceasefire agreement, there is still protesting (including within Israel). However, I cannot award points for anything about genocide. This one just has to be designated a heartbreaking human tragedy in every dimension. So let’s soberly move on to other things Trump seems to be fighting.
8.8 Other stuff. Drug cartels! Venezuela! Canada! Greenland! Inflation! Trade deficits! Democracy! Political enemies! Bruises on his hands! His hair! Zelensky! Putin! Iran! Kilmar Abrego Garcia! NPR and PBS! Civil liberties! Law firms! Foreign aid! Poor people around the world! Science!
I may have left out a few things. But all of the things he fights seem to still exist. And you can’t really call the fight in Trump’s favor if the opponent is still standing.
OFFICIAL SCORECARD: Trump 0. Not Trump 20.
RUNNING TALLY: Trump 485,214. Not Trump 22,110,227. Mixed 1,300,015 + unknown number of ex-residents of the USA.
Maybe this is all wrong.
Maybe Trump isn’t really fighting any of these things. He’s quite explicit that one of his primary concerns (if not his only concern) is how things look. He does things for show. Show. Show. Show.
He referred, in his exhausted speech to the military leaders, to a ‘war within.’ As usual, Trump is talking about and to himself.
Trump has been fighting a war within for so very long. He’s been fighting against reality, fighting against truth. The only foe that could kill him, when assassins and external defeats cannot. I don’t know exactly what it is that Trump thinks the truth is that is so lethal that the war against it must never end. Regardless, lying is Trump’s very raison d’etre, so the truth will always be the number one enemy.
TRUMP VS. TRUTH FIGHT RECAP: Man, this has been one bruising battle. Trump has warped the truth with incredible ingenuity. He’s like a massive object distorting space-time and forcing wayward objects into his orbit. He has changed the shape of reality, twisting it into novel shapes and preventing it from reaching into the recesses of his followers’ minds.
Those achievements are so impressive that I almost want to call the battle on behalf of Trump and give truth and reality time to sit in the corner and tend to the nasty cuts over their eyes.
But I can’t. Truth and reality are still staggering forward, indomitable. They take a licking and they keep on ticking. Nothing can stop them. They have no choice but to keep lunging toward their enemy until the enemy expires.
What a titanic struggle.
It would be an insult to the sheer artistry and intensity of this never-ending story to sully it with a scorecard. Let’s just draw the curtain on this one and let the enemies grapple in peace.
FINAL SCORECARD: Trump 485,214. Not Trump 22,110,227. Mixed 1,300,015 + an unknown number of ex-American residents.
Well, will you look at that. For all the show, Trump is not even close to winning. He is, in fact, 21,625,013 points behind. Turns out that, even if you can make some individuals suffer greatly, it is difficult to completely dismantle a large and grumpy country like the United States of America.
Remember that the next time you decide to get all pessimistic and gloomy. Or arrogant and giddy for that matter.
Peace out.
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