The Globe’s Tal Kopan has provided me an opening to write about something that’s been on my mind for a while now, to wit: how Donald Trump is often right on various issues — and then consistently takes things way too far, i.e. he’s often 10 percent right on issues, then goes 90 percent overboard. It’s sort of a Trump rule-of-thumb I’ve been mulling in recent weeks after hearing Bill Maher saying roughly the same thing.*

As for Kopan’s perceptive Globe piece (“Republicans had the upper hand on immigration and the campus antisemitism debate. Then Donald Trump got involved”), he basically reports Dems are now scoring points on immigration and campus antisemitism issues precisely because Trump has gone “too far” on those issues, as numerous polls now show. But there’s a catch that needs to be emphasized: If Trump has gone too far on some issues, the description suggests he was right on issues till he crossed some sort of line. Right on what issues? On issues Dems themselves went “too far” on, providing Trump with that 10 percent opening he’s now trying to exploit and expand.

You can go right down the list of issues where Trump was right then wrong, and inversely where Dems were wrong then right:

Immigration – Right about the southern border, wrong about non-lawful immigrant arrests and deportations.

Campus antisemitism – Right to crack down on campus antisemitism and left-wing campus extremism in general, wrong to arrest people for their opinions, wrong to cut medical research funding in the name of fighting antisemitism, wrong to demand a say in campus curriculums, hirings and firings.

Tariffs – Right to oppose unfair trade deals and right to impose limited tariffs on countries engaging in unfair trade practices, wrong to impose massive world-wide tariffs that recently brought the global economy to the brink of meltdown.

Foreign policy – Right to demand that Europe pay its fair-share of its own defense and right to question the over-extension of NATO; wrong to destroy an alliance that’s worked for 80 years and wrong to abandon democratic Ukraine while cozying up to dictators like Putin.

The same right-wrong pattern applies to other issues as well, including DEI, federal budget cuts, transgender policies, etc. They’re all issues that were taken “too far” by Dems, then in turn taken off-the-charts “too far” by Trump.

Of course, there are many issues in which Trump is simply 100 percent wrong. Like his insulting attitude towards Canada. … Canada? … And his crypto meme-coin exploits. See post below. … And his disgraceful pardons of Jan. 6 rioters. … But don’t get me going on all his numerous faults. It only leads to TDS.

* Note: I’ll try to find and provide the Maher quote later.