Trump is 'being a complete idiot' and it's OK to criticize him: conservative

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U.S. President Donald Trump gestures during the White House Faith Office Luncheon at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., July 14, 2025. REUTERS Nathan Howard

Conservative writer and podcaster Charles C. W. Cooke tells the National Review that it’s okay to call out an idiot like President Donald Trump and still be a conservative.

Cooke referenced Trump responding to the murder of Hollywood director Rob Reiner by blaming his death on “Trump Derangement Syndrome,” and attaching “rude and self-serving plaques” beneath the portraits of former presidents on display at the White House. He also cited Trump “blaming the public’s fears about the economy as a Democratic plot.”

“Here’s a friendly tip for the confused and apprehensive among us: Whatever the loudest and most intrusive voices within the firmament might like to insist, you don’t actually have to defend Donald Trump when he’s being a complete idiot,” said Cook. “Donald Trump is being a complete idiot today [emphasis Cooke's]. … There. That was easy, wasn’t it?”

Cooke argued that “uttering these words does not make you less conservative or change any of your opinions on taxes or guns or abortion or immigration, or reduce your willingness to fight for the things you believe.”

He acknowledged that some conservatives worry that criticizing Trump, they could undermine the conservative “movement,” but asked “In any other aspect of your life, do mindless and belligerent defenses of your position tend to persuade or to repel other people?”

“When arguing with your spouse, does it help or hurt to insist that you are correct in every particular? When making your case at work, does it aid you or limit you to claim that your proposal is perfect down to the last detail?” Cooke reasoned.

Moderation in politics is not always a virtue, said Cooke, but he argued the matter was not about moderation, but human nature.

“No person is impeccable, and that rule applies to Donald Trump as much as to anyone else who has ever lived. In a country such as the United States, which was founded atop a deep distrust of the regnant political class, sycophancy toward a politician strikes observers as being unutterably weird,” said Cooke. “… The duty of the free man is to offer his earnest appraisals of others, be they chief, magistrate, priest, or anyone else. If, for whatever reason, one cannot manage that obligation, one ought at least to avoid becoming a minion.”

Read Cooke's National Review article at this link (subscription required).

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