By: David L. Bahnsen – nationalreview.com – February 25, 2025

For the Trump critics, for the Trump supporters, for those hysterical about either: Remember the virtues of wisdom, grace, and restraint.

At some point in my adult life, much later than I wish it had been, I learned that a person worth emulating is a person who possesses poise, calm, and sobriety. As fun as it can be to be excitable, or to be around excitable people, I have not often observed unchecked zeal to be the stuff that Super Bowl champions — or good portfolio managers, or good friends, or productive adults — are made of. Sound and fury can be useful, but grown-ups have to be people of sound judgment and judicious restraint if they are to maximize their God-given potential.

The current political environment brings this reality for individuals into the public realm. The Trump moment generates excitability and, in some cases, outright hysteria. It does so for good reasons (there can be bad things and good things worth being excited about), and it does so for awful reasons (many people are simply unhinged) — but it does so also because we are in a time defined far more by emotional exuberance than rational discourse (online and otherwise).

In the first five weeks of the new administration, I have seen opponents of President Trump rehash the Hitler line, news reporters assure us that free speech is a weapon that can cause genocide, and otherwise-intelligent people claim that the president is setting up a corrupt government which he intends to never leave. Much of it falls on deaf ears because these folks have overplayed their hand for nine years running, but the noise and smoke are excessive, and to say they lack measure is to be a little too nice.

I would be lying if I did not say that there is an equal level of hysteria from some Trump supporters, which in some ways is more disturbing, mostly because it is less expected. Reasonably credible people have uttered things like, “What President Trump has done in the last five weeks is nothing short of Churchillian, Reaganite, and Lincolnesque, if those three could be combined and exceeded.” The hyperbole about prudent executive orders that seek to undo the absurdity of DEI is, shall we say, over the top. I love a good executive order of common sense as much as the next guy, and I believe that rhetorical and executive efforts to promote American energy independence, to push back on a transgenderist ideology, and to reawaken a meritocratic sensibility in public life sans critical theory and identity politics are all good and noble. They are also easy orders to sign, lacking in stickiness, and natural (popular) actions given the current state of the culture. Hear me correctly here — they should be celebrated! But analogies to “winning the Cold War” and things like the Gettysburg Address and the tax bills of the 1980s are simply preposterous.

But the hysteria of Trump haters and the hysteria of Trump lovers is not the subject of this article. My primary caution is for those tempted to be hysterical about the hysterics. We are living in a time — post-Covid, post-DEI, post-woke, post-BLM, post-Biden — when, until very recently, many on the right felt they were marginalized to the fringe of society, and they lacked faith in the walls of America’s DNA and civic order to hold the line. Election losses depress people, and cultural losses depress people even more. Much of the cheerleading of the past month is excessive, a little unhinged, and more than a little silly, but much of it is certainly understandable from the vantage point of people who psychologically need it to be true. I am projecting onto readers a bit, so forgive me, but I cannot survive the next four years, personally, if I become hysterical about all the hysterics around me. Many of the folks doing this are simply like the fans of a team that had been losing forever and got a new star player — they have to overstate the case for the new star because they so badly want him to be Michael Jordan. Disappointments will come, and sober judgment will materialize, but along the way, some human excess has to be treated with grace. I don’t say this to sermonize — I recommend it as a therapeutic approach. Dealing with the hysteria will be much easier with an anti-hysterical approach.

There is a lot of sound and fury right now, both from those who believe Trump is Hitler and those who believe he is Jesus. There is some legitimacy in sound and fury. There is also way, way, way more noise than substance. Anything you see from DOGE that is not ratified by Congress is transitory. It may be beneficial for public relations. It may save some dollars for a quarter or a year. And it may usher in new outrage from the people for congressional change. But no matter how much the anti-constitutionalists on the left and the post-liberal anti-constitutionalists on the new right bang drums about these things (for different reasons), anything that lacks ratification from Congress is a short-term event, period.

I am well aware of polls that show the Trump peak fading, and everyone can feel a certain exhaustion with some of the chaos. I am also aware that many of the actions of the new administration over the last five weeks have been wildly popular with the American people. Improved border security is going to be popular. The deportation of those who have committed crimes is going to be popular. Marginalizing the administrative state is not only popular but desperately needed. Some of the actions regarding federal employees are popular, some are questionable, and some will generate pushback because of the amateurish nature of their execution. Some are even creating splits within the administration itself. That internal palace-intrigue factor is going to pick up. (Thus far, the administration has mostly presented a united front, but there are so many people in the administration or adjacent to it who hate each other’s guts — this is simply not going to stay kumbaya for long.) But again, coverage of the “state of affairs” lacks rationality, balance, and good measure, and it should be taken with a grain of salt.

The need of the hour for our political scene is the same thing we all needed when we became adults — wisdom, grace, and restraint. Calm people are impressive people. What we ought to emulate in our personal lives is what is needed in political punditry. My best advice, as someone who is laser-focused on short-term victories (tax reform, deregulation, meritocracy) that do not violate our long-term mission (the constitutional order, a country of character, conserving the American ideals of freedom and virtue), is that you do your best to ignore the hyperbole and hysteria on all sides, to call balls and strikes (there will be plenty of both, I assure you), and to stay calm in your own response — both to the administration and to the hysterical responses of others. This, too, shall pass.

To see this article in its entirety and to subscribe to others like it, please choose to read more.

Source: Trump Critics and Supporters Should Remember Virtues of Wisdom, Grace, and Restraint | National Review