Let’s Diagnose the Madness
Are you constantly shouting at your TV every time the orange guy from Mar-a-Lago shows up? Have you ever drafted an angry tweet at 3 a.m. about covfefe? Do you see “Literally Hitler” every time Donald Trump waves? If so, you might have Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS)—and don’t worry, there is a cure…but it might be a bitter pill to swallow for liberals.
TDS wasn’t born in a lab—it evolved naturally in the hallowed halls of legacy media and the ivy-covered sanctuaries of liberal academia. It started as a low-grade fever in 2015, as Trump descended that infamous golden escalator. By the time he uttered the phrase “Make America Great Again,” liberals across the country were breaking out in cold sweats, clutching their pearls, yelling for their smelling salts and Googling “how to move to Canada.”
If you’ve ever watched someone shriek at the sky while screaming, “NOT MY PRESIDENT!” then congratulations—you’ve witnessed TDS in its purest form.
What Exactly Is TDS?
According to the ever-reliable Urban Dictionary, TDS is “a mental condition in which a person has been driven effectively insane due to their complete dislike of Donald Trump, to the point at which they abandon all logic and reason.” In layman’s terms, it’s when your politics take a vacation from reality and start sending postcards from Crazytown.
The folks at CNN actually covered this in 2018. Justin Raimondo from Antiwar.com broke it into three stages:
- Stage One: Proportions? What Proportions?
Victims lose all sense of proportion. Each Trump tweet is treated like a five-alarm fire, as if every 140-character post is a code for some earth-shattering plot. We’re talking DEFCON-1 for every typo.
If the mainstream media were a person, they’d be that one guy in your group chat who sends ten-paragraph texts at 2 a.m. to CNN, MSNBC, and The Washington Post (which were ground zero for TDS hysteria) turning every Trump tweet into a five-alarm fire. Remember when he served fast food to college athletes? Or drank Diet Coke in the Oval Office? These non-events were treated like Watergate 2.0.
The media convinced themselves that every Trump action—down to the number of scoops of ice cream he ate—was part of some elaborate scheme to destroy democracy. “Trump sneezes in public,” they screamed. “Could this be the beginning of fascism?”
- Stage Two: Apocalyptic Vocabulary Takeover
Vocabulary undergoes a makeover. Hyperbole becomes the language of choice, and suddenly, describing Trump without apocalyptic terms is like speaking in a whisper at a rock concert.Everything is the end of the world. “He’s destroying democracy!” “He’s dismantling the Constitution!” “He’s eating two scoops of ice cream!” (Okay, that one might be fair.) If you’re not using at least three synonyms for “apocalypse” in every Trump-related sentence, are you even trying?
Elected Democrats took their cues from the media, turning Congress into a circus of performative outrage. Who could forget Nancy Pelosi dramatically ripping up Trump’s State of the Union speech? (Someone get her an Oscar for “Best Overreaction in a Political Theater.”)
Then there was the impeachment parade. Not once, but twice, they dragged the country through the political equivalent of an off-off-Broadway drama production, all while ignoring little things like inflation, border security, and the fact that their constituents still couldn’t afford gas.
- Stage Three: Goodbye, Reality
Reality gets thrown out the window. No action, no smile, no wave could possibly be innocent. If Trump pets a puppy, you can bet someone’s writing an op-ed on how it’s a ploy to distract from his secret plan to abolish puppies altogether. At this stage, Trump could cure cancer, save a basket of puppies from a burning building, and donate his entire net worth to build schools for underprivileged children—and they’d still find a way to spin it. (“Why didn’t he save more puppies?!”)
As TDS spread, everyday liberals began exhibiting symptoms. Thanksgiving dinners were ruined as woke cousins lectured their families on how Uncle Bob’s MAGA hat was a hate crime. Suburban moms swapped out their yoga classes for anti-Trump resistance groups. Hollywood celebrities, not content to simply entertain, became self-appointed thought leaders, shrieking into their iPhones about “the literal end of the world.”
And then, of course, there were the protests. Whether it was the Women’s March, the Climate Strike, or some random Tuesday, liberals marched in the streets chanting, “Orange Man Bad,” armed with signs that read, “Love Trumps Hate” (while screaming obscenities at police officers).
The Origins of TDS
TDS didn’t just pop up out of nowhere. Its roots go back to 2003 by the late Charles Krauthammer. He described it as the acute onset of paranoia in otherwise normal people in reaction to the policies, the presidency — nay, the very existence of George W. Bush. When Krauthammer coined the term “Bush Derangement Syndrome” to describe the meltdown over—gasp!—George W. Bush’s very existence, the liberal knee-jerk apoplectic response to anything that offended their delicate sensibilities, was still in its infancy. But compared to the Trump era? Oh, Dubya looks like a guy selling Girl Scout cookies.
Fast forward to today, and some Trump supporters could rightfully argue that TDS has reached levels even Bush couldn’t dream of. Conservative pundit Bernie Goldberg wrote in Real Clear
Politics in 2017:
Before the election, TDS victims routinely compared Donald Trump to Hitler. Guess
what? They’re still doing it. Professors from prestigious universities are practically
begging us to understand that Trump’s presidency could very well be the end of
democracy as we know it.
Heck, this same group had Hitler on the cover of Time Magazine in 1933.
On election night in 2016, TDS hit its peak: some fainted, others vomited, and many more
vowed to leave the country—yet shockingly, they are still here.
As Trump might say in a tweet: “Sad!”
Hitler Comparisons & Hollywood Tantrums
Before Trump was even inaugurated the first time, the TDS crowd had already gone full “Hitler.” (Pro tip: If you compare literally everyone you don’t like to a genocidal maniac, the term kinda of loses its impact.) Prestigious professors from Ivy League schools claimed his presidency would be the literal end of democracy. And yet, four years later, democracy was… still trucking along. Weird how that works.
Let’s not forget election night 2016—the Super Bowl of liberal meltdowns. People fainted, cried, screamed at the sky, and vowed to leave the country. Yet mysteriously, they all seem to still be here, clogging up Starbucks lines and writing angry Facebook posts.
Even Charity Isn’t Safe
TDS runs so deep that when one San Francisco university donor turned out to be a Trump supporter, a staffer reportedly screamed, “We don’t need that f*****g donor’s money!” Sure, because who needs scholarships when you have moral superiority?
Liberal Lunacy Went Viral, But America Refused the Kool-Aid
Let’s face it: Trump Derangement Syndrome has been the most contagious political pandemic of the 21st century, infecting liberal elites, the media, and elected Democrats faster than free avocado toast spreads through a Brooklyn brunch spot. Yet, despite their best efforts to turn America into an echo chamber of hysterical doom, the 2024 elections showed that the American people are shockingly immune to the nonsense.
After years of watching this political disease spiral out of control, the American people decided they’d had enough. The 2024 elections were a resounding rejection of the lunacy. Voters across the nation delivered a reality check, handing conservatives a sweeping victory that left liberal elites clutching their fainting couches.
Turns out, Americans are pretty good at spotting hypocrisy. They saw through the media’s nonstop hysteria, recognized the performative outrage from politicians, and decided they weren’t going to let coastal elites dictate their values.
Where Does It End?
Spoiler alert: It doesn’t. The TDS sufferers are so committed to their outrage that even if Trump spent his retirement quietly playing golf and painting (a la Bush 2.0), they’d probably accuse him of plotting a coup using watercolors. The only possible remedy to Trump Derangement Syndrome would be for liberals to consume a healthy dose of common sense daily – as already noted, this would be a pill perhaps too bitter for such low-information lemmings to swallow.
As Trump himself might say: “SAD!”
Despite their electoral losses, the liberal elite hasn’t learned a thing. They’re doubling down on the same strategies that alienated the American people in the first place. They’re still whining on social media, still holding endless hearings on how Trump’s hair color is a threat to democracy, and still pretending that anyone outside their bubble takes them seriously.
But here’s the thing: the rest of America has moved on. We’re out here building our communities, raising our families, and voting for leaders who actually care about real issues. Meanwhile, the TDS crowd is still stuck in 2016, yelling at their TVs like it’s going to change anything.
So, if you or someone you love suffers from TDS, remember: it’s okay to laugh about it. The rest of us sure are.
Final Thoughts: Trump’s Legacy and Liberal Tears
If Trump’s presidency proved anything, it’s that the American people are tougher, smarter, and more resilient than the media and liberal elites give us credit for. While the TDS sufferers continue to spiral into irrelevance, the rest of us are focused on what really matters: protecting our freedoms, strengthening our country, and, yes, enjoying two scoops of ice cream if we feel like it.
As Trump might say: “Winning never gets old.”
Tara Dodrill is a self-reliance author, educator, and patriot homesteader in Appalachia. She studied journalism at Ohio University and previously served several terms as a town council member in her hometown. Dodrill worked as the editor of her county's newspaper before shifting her focus to writing books and hosting the largest hands-on homesteading, survival, and bushcraft annual event in the United States.
