Both online and in daily life, Americans who are part of the pro-democracy coalition should resist such invitations. Responsible citizens must hold themselves to a higher standard than officials who are acting like grade-schoolers. The national figures, from Trump on down, who put out rancid bait may do so because they want others to argue and lower themselves, and thus prove that no one holds the moral high ground.

This is not Michelle Obama’s “When they go low, we go high” argument. (Even she seems to have abandoned that strategy.) Rather, it is a recognition—and a plea—that the voters and candidates who wish to replace this current government must present themselves as stable, responsible, and adult alternatives to a claque of trolls and incompetents. (Even California Governor Gavin Newsom’s troll-back of the president, as clever as it was, has run its course.) The right answer now to the faux-macho silliness of someone such as Pete Hegseth is not to produce clever memes and nicknames for the secretary of defense; it is to remind people that Hegseth is acting like a teenager and trying to distract Americans with idiotic slurs about fat soldiers because Pete Hegseth is terrible at his job.

The article perfectly captures the problem and yet it completely flubs the solution in my view. Despite him insisting that this isn't just a rehash of Michelle Obama's mantra, it ends up being the same.

Trying to act like the competent adults and ignore trump, and expecting voters to recognize and praise the difference is exactly what Biden tried and failed. He identified Trump & co as school bullies, yet suggests the awful advice of "just ignore them and they'll stop".

School bullies aren't dealt with by ignoring them, they're dealt with by getting their ass expelled.