Archive
Mudline Archive
STICKS, STONES, BROKEN BONES
During the 2000 Bush-Gore presidential race, we began collecting negative soundbites and posting them weekly on a MUDLINE ticker, as a temporary election feature. But in the aftermath of that tumultuous contest we realized that the tone of public discourse was unlikely to improve, and elected to continue the feature. Unfortunately, we were right; two decades later, incivility is hotter than ever. If you just can’t get enough snark on social media, this mud’s for you.
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March 21, 2016
Donald Trump on the media: "The most dishonest human beings on earth."....Trump on NBC's Katy Tur: "Little Katy, third-rate journalist."....Trump on Politico's Ben Schreckinger: "A dishonest, third-rate reporter with a failing outlet that will soon be out of business, hopefully."....Sen. Elizabeth Warren on Trump: "A loser...Petty bullying, attacks on women, cheap racism, and flagrant narcissism."....Trump on Warren: "Her whole life was based on a fraud."....David Brooks on Trump: "Precisely the kind of scapegoating, promise-making, fear-driving and deceiving demagogue [the Founding Fathers] feared....Perhaps the most dishonest person to run for high office in our lifetimes."....Trump on Brooks: "A clown with no awareness of the world around him...One of the dumbest of all pundits."....Ross Douthat on Trump: "Transparently unfit for office."....Trump on Mitt Romney: "A jealous fool and not a bright person."....Trump on Hillary Clinton: "Pathetically weak."....Trump: "I have zero respect for Megyn Kelly...A total whack job...No talent."....Glenn Beck on Trump: "So thin skinned that he must belittle, abuse, and threaten women."....Trump on Mitt Romney: "A mixed up man who doesn't have a clue."....Gilbert Gottfried on Trump: "Hitler without the warmth."....Bill Maher on Trump: "The white Kanye West.".... -
March 11, 2016
Ted Cruz on Obama: "Has made the presidency and has made, sadly, his administration, a laughingstock in the world."....Trump on Obama: "Has not done anything for African-Americans in this country...He got a free pass."....Cruz on Obama: "Believes he's above the law...Behaves as an emperor."....Cruz on Trump: "Has a generous relationship with the truth."....Nicholas Kristof on Trump: "America's Ahmadinejad."....Louis C.K. on Trump: "A messed up guy with a hole in his heart that he tries to fill with money and attention."....Michael Gerson on Trump: "A Rembrandt of demagoguery...The guy your Founding Fathers warned you about."....Cruz on the IRS: "Corrupt."....Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Trump getting the GOP nomination: "We'll drop him like a hot rock.".... -
March 4, 2016
Matt Taibbi: "In less than a year Trump has succeeded in turning the USA into a massive high school."....Marco Rubio on Trump: "His pores are clogged from the spray tan...Make America Tan Again!"....Trump on Rubio: "Little Marco Rubio, the lightweight no-show senator from Florida."....Chris Christie on Rubio: "Desperate."....Trump on Rubio: "Not as smart as Cruz, and may be an even bigger liar."....Mitt Romney on Trump: "A phony, a fraud. His promises are as worthless as a degree from Trump University."....Rubio on Trump: "Has spent his entire career sticking it to the little guy."....Rubio on Trump: "The worst spray tan in America...He should sue whoever did that to his face."....Trump on Rubio: "A lowlife."....Rubio on Trump: "Friends do not let friends vote for con artists."....Former Mexican president Vicente Fox on Trump: "Reminds me of Hitler.".... -
February 26, 2016
Donald Trump on Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz: "This guy's a choke artist, and this guy's a liar."....Rubio on Trump: "A con artist."....Trump on Cruz: "Holds up the Bible and then lies."....Cruz on Trump: "We can't be fooled by P.T. Barnum."....Sen. Lindsey Graham on GOP: "Has gone bats**t crazy."....Rubio on Trump: "If he builds the wall the way he built Trump Towers, he'll be using illegal immigrant labor to do it."....former Mexican president Vicente Fox: "I'm not going to pay for that f***ing wall. He should pay for it. He's got the money."....Trump: "I don't believe anything Telemundo says."....Lindsey Graham on Trump: "He's just generally a loser as a person and a candidate."....Rubio: "If he hadn't inherited $200 million, you know where Donald Trump would be right now? Selling watches in Manhattan."....Trump to Hugh Hewitt: "Very few people listen to your radio show. That's the good news."....Minority Leader Harry Reid on Senate Republicans: "Obstruction that is on steroids."....Judiciary Committee chairman Chuck Grassley on Reid: "Childish tantrums."....Fox News' Dana Perino on Reid: "An absolutely poisonous figure...A disaster for the country."....Ben Carson: "The IRS is not honest, and we need to get rid of them."....Trump on Rubio: "I watched him melt down, and it was one of the saddest things I've ever seen."....Washington Post on Trump: "A bullying demagogue."....Jack Shafer on Trump: "Mr. Mouth Almighty."....Cornel West on Hillary Clinton: "The Milli Vanilli of American politics."....Glenn Beck on Trump: "Is grooming Brownshirts."....Matt Taibbi on Ted Cruz's face: "It looks like someone sewed pieces of a waterlogged Reagan mask together at gunpoint."....Bill Maher: "Ben Carson's resting face is the same face the dog has when watching his owner have sex.".... -
February 19, 2016
Donald Trump: "Ted Cruz is a totally unstable individual. He is the single biggest liar I've ever come across, in politics or otherwise, and I have seen some of the best of them."....Rep. Pete King on Trump: "A drunken uncle at a party."....Bernie Sanders: "I am proud to say that Henry Kissinger is not my friend."....Trump on Cruz: "The definition of sleaze."....George W. Bush on Trump: "Strength is not empty rhetoric. It is not bluster. It is not theatrics...The strongest person isn't usually the loudest person in the room."....Trump: "How can Ted Cruz be an Evangelical Christian when he lies so much and is so dishonest?"....Glenn Beck: "Too many people right now are looking at a guy like Trump and believing that that man has ever opened a Bible. That's the biggest crock of bullcrap I've ever heard. We all know it."....Cruz on Trump: "When you point to his own record he screams, 'Liar! Liar! Liar!'"....Trump on Cruz: "This guy will say anything. Nasty guy. Now I know why he doesn't have one endorsement from any of his colleagues."....Bush on Trump: "A man who insults his way to the nomination."....Trump on Cruz: "The worst liar, crazy, or very dishonest. Perhaps all three?"....David Denby: "If more people had read Mark Twain, Donald Trump wouldn't have gotten anywhere, because that kind of blustering egomania con artist is all through Huckleberry Finn, and you would recognize that this guy doesn't have any idea what he's talking about."....Gov. John Kasich on GOP: "I think we're fixing to lose the election to Hillary Clinton."....