Coffee With Scott Adams — Knowledge Archive May 24, 2026
Scott Adams Philosophy Archive
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ke you're flying blind. So you don't need to change your opinion that it's completely political because I think there's enough obvious evidence for that but if you think you proved it because of this I don't see it. You're going to have to do better. I'm just going to guess what he would say. Here's what I guess. We tried to do speedy trials and not waste money and I tried to skip an unnecessary…

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is but against the top players let's say he's playing somebody who has the best backhand in the world. They like oh my God you don't want to hit to their backhand. Do you know what he would do? Hit to their backhand because it was their best shot. Because if he could break it down there was nothing left. Because if he takes their best shot by winning more points on their best shot than they win on their best shot their entire architecture of confidence crumbles. So he can beat people in the first few games right. It's like maybe you have to win three out of five sets but he can win in the first three games. All he has to do is go right at their strongest shot until he wins more points than they won on their strongest shot and then they're dead. They're absolutely dead and then the rest of it is just bayoneting the wounded basically.

Now you have to be so good that you can beat their best shot so I mean it's not like so much a strategy as you know he's so good but he could have very easily tried to go to the weak shot which would tell the other person that they have a really good shot because he's really staying away from my forehand. So you don't give him any confidence. You just go right at their best shot you break it down and then they got nothing. They have nothing left after that.

Now what is the Democrats' best shot on Trump? Well clearly they've completely abandoned anything like policy. Just you is he's a dictator and you fill in the blanks. We have some new Democrats who have added some new dictators. So an anti-Trump group is now comparing him in some kind of ad to Mussolini or Orban. Orban is the leader of Hungary right yeah. So they're comparing him to other leaders that they think are totalitarian. Now let me mock this. They actually have to add more dictators. So saying that Trump was like Hitler wasn't getting him any traction so here was their strategy I think. We don't have enough dictators. Okay they're not buying the they're not buying Hitler. What if we add Mussolini? Well now you're talking. Now you're talking that's two dictators. Wow I wasn't too concerned when you compared Trump to one dictator but oh my God now two. Orban three. Three. Oh no oh no three dictators. How about Putin? Oh no it's Putin. Oh four dictators. Oh do you know what this makes me think of when they keep adding dictators? See if this doesn't make you laugh. I'm waiting to see if anybody said it yet in the comments. You're not there yet. Two words. You ready for it? More cowbell.

Yeah what do you think? More cowbell. Do you know why that's funny now? First of all it comes from Saturday Night Live and what was the name of the actor who's got the yeah Christopher Walken in some skit. He's doing some musical skit and he's insisting that there'd be more cowbell. Now cowbell is usually the you know sort of the least respected instrument you except maybe the tambourine you know that when the lead singer like does the tambourine because the lead singer can't play an instrument but beyond the tambourine the probably the cowbell is the least respected of the instrument parts. But I just think of more cowbell every time they add a new dictator and I feel like just saying that it's like well he's like Hitler. Go on. Well he's also like Mussolini. More cowbell. Well he's also like Orban. More cowbell. Well he's also like Putin. More cowbell. Well he's also kind of like Pol Pot. More cowbell. Well he's also like Thanos. More cowbell. So just yell more cowbell every time they add a dictator. It'll be funny.

So here's why Trump might be smarter than you think. He goes for energy and he's breaking down their strongest their strongest stroke. This is their backhand. Well I'll call it their forehand because forehand usually stronger. This is the Democrats' forehand. He's going at their forehand. He's so aggressive which is why people like him. Like he doesn't it would be easy for him to back down from this and say you know we love the immigrants we love them love the immigrants but you know we need to do a little more on the border. That's not really going to make you excited or even believe he's going to do much but if he goes further than he's supposed to go to the point where his opponents are calling him Hitler more cowbell Mussolini more cowbell Orban then he's got him right where he wants him. What are you thinking about when Trump is going too far on the border? What do you think? Thinking about where's your brain go? That it'll get the job done but by making you think that he'll go too far it makes you think well at least he'll get the job done. His persuasion is not exactly how I would do it but like I always say you can't compare him to any other human or animal like Trump is just his own entity. Like comparing him to anything is just a waste of time. He's just his own and I think he's going right at their forehand because he wants to break it down.

Now let me

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ask you if they compare him to every dictator in the world and it's all they have between now and election day who wins? If it's all they have it's just more cowbell. It's going to sound like people will just be used to it and it'll just look stupid. Yeah so let me give you a good general rule for persuasion or for spotting a dishonest argument. Here's a good rule. Somebody who has an honest argu…

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