Folks, this is what a personality cult looks like:

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

This scrap of lunacy appeared in my morning paper (which is owned by billionaire Republican Glen Taylor). This is what we're dealing with. Apparently the fact that this loon likes Trump means anything a news organization publishes that is critical of him must be fake news. He's got the talking points down: fake news, failed New York Times, the whole thing. This is an example of the sort of people that are really and truly unreachable. They've drunk the Trump/Fox News kool-aid by the barrel. He gets slammed in the Comments section, but sadly there were others who agreed with him. You can't convert these people. Any criticism, or even a presentation of actual facts, is dismissed as fake news.

We can only hope there are more of us than than there are of them, and that we all get out and vote.

TO THE STAR TRIBUNE …

I don’t like you or your readers. I like Trump. He’ll win again.

Hello, poster child for fake news. I am continually surprised by your high percentage of under­informed readers and editorials. Fake news promulgated by fools like your fake newspaper — you print whatever the failed New York Times and Associated Press dictate to your paper.

You do not realize that every time you print this fake news and your totally underinformed readers write, we conservatives gain new voters ­— thank you!

Looking forward to your fake coverage of the POTUS speech next week in Duluth (“Trump to hold rally in Duluth June 20”).

Heads up to your readers — Trump will be re-elected in 2020 and will win Minnesota. Write it down.

[dameatball]

1. I doubt that many Trump supporters have EVER purchased a copy of the NYT....much less read it.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. That doesn't matter. The New York Times is fake and failing because Trump says so.

The fake, failing Minneapolis Star-Tribune gets all of its stories from the fake, failing New York Times. The end.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

3. The truly scary thing is that Trump may well be re-elected.

Supposedly his approval ratings are rising, and if the Democrats do some stupid shoot-themselves-in-the-foot in 2020 (and I wouldn't put it past them) and if Republicans effectively disenfranchise enough voters (which could happen), we'll be looking at 8 years of this horror.

I keep on thinking about Nazi Germany, and remember that it took a catastrophic world war and the near complete destruction of that country for them to return to democracy. I wonder what we'll have to go through.

[scarletwoman]

4. "...we conservatives gain new voters" They are NOT "conservatives" - they are just assholes.

And because they are assholes - ignorant, close-minded, bigoted, racist, totally unself-aware - they are easy marks for a con man.

They are not "conservatives" they are suckers.

[Sugarcoated]

5. And I don't buy for a second

that printing factual information "wins votes" for The Traitor.

[scarletwoman]

6. The thing is, factual information does absolutely nothing to break the trumpsters out of their cult.

I see no reason to disbelieve that those who are firmly convinced of the "fake news" meme will, in fact, be inspired to double down their efforts to "Make America Great Again" by vehemently opposing all those who oppose Trump.

[Sugarcoated]

8. I agree

however, I'm speaking to the claim in the editorial/letter that conservatives gain new voters when the paper prints news. I'm adding a thought to your post not challenging it.

[JI7]

7. That's why these people need to be ridiculed

Not coddled and begged to for votes.

[scarletwoman]

9. Yes, ridiculed - and also fought tooth and nail.

I'm so totally fed up with their whiney crap!

They feel like they're losing the "culture war." Well, damn right! There IS a culture war, and they are on the wrong damn side!

They reject the Enlightenment principles which infused the founding of this country. They reject science, they reject reason, they reject empirical proof, they reject the whole of the philosophical underpinnings of the Western world.

They would destroy every norm of civil behavior, destroy all the institutions built up over decades, destroy the very rule of law, in order to satisfy their lust for mocking the "elites".

I would consider them pathetic - if they had not so willfully chosen the path of ignorance, fear, and hate.