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It is not just Trump. It is whole conservative project that is behind him. He truly represents the republican party and works towards its goals.

by watwut 1y ago

AlecSchueler 1y ago
This is it. It's not uncommon to see people on this very forum defending many of his policies, so the hope that the population has simply been duped and everything will right itself in a few years is a hard one to hold. One begins to question so much of America and see how much we had actually been turning a blind eye to since the end of the war.
- gnz11 1y ago
  I kid you not but some of the Silicon Valley elites believe themselves to be philosopher kings and wish to lord over the rest of us in some bizarre techno-monarchy system.
  - fakedang 1y ago
    Weren't they planning to make their own techno-monarchic sovereign state? I remember reading up about one venture that actually received funding from your usual VC suspects. Even the folks in Wall Street weren't this dystopian, come on.
  - TedHerman 1y ago
    You might enjoy the book "Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism" (interview: In Conversation With Yanis Varoufakis - on YouTube).
- thrance 1y ago
  Yes, it has to get much much worse before it can get better. Another half-competent democratic presidency now would only result in an even worse republican one next.
  - maeil 1y ago
    That this gets downvoted shows that people have still not learned a single thing. You're spot on, it's tragic that so very few people understand this, based on how incredibly little I see it voiced online. In fact, you're the first I've seen voice it in ages. E.g. if Harris (another, at best, incredibly mediocre candidate) would've won, the post-Harris Rep presidency would've been even worse than the current one. Until there's a competent non-Rep president, every single subsequent Rep government will be worse, until there will be no more fairish elections - and likely we're already there. Someone like AOC - not policywise, people don't vote on policy, it doesn't matter. Attitude-wise. It's abundantly clear the DNC hasn't learned (or more likely, doesn't want to learn), so the next president will be another Hillary/Biden/Harris candidate who will either lose or make the next Rep win even more decisive.
    - AlecSchueler 1y ago
      I think maybe it gets downvoted because it comes across as victim blaming and has echoes of abusive reasoning. The left must change what they want because otherwise the right will throw a hissy fit and start opening concentration camps? Maybe I'm misunderstanding. It could be helpful to point to actual policy failings of Harris rather than handwaving about mediocrity.
      - tim333 1y ago
        When Harris actually completed to be presidential candidate she came in fifth. She was on stage a couple of times saying 200 million Americans died of covid - you have to be fairly thick to not realize that isn't so - she'd misread 200,000. They had to keep her away from interviews to stop similar stupid leaking out.
        AlecSchueler 1y ago
        Misreading a number seems incredibly insignificant to the number of outright idiotic things Mr Trump says on a daily basis. Why the disparity in expectation/response?
- crote 1y ago
  > It's not uncommon to see people on this very forum defending many of his policies From what I've seen on the wider internet, the support for Trump is mostly a personality cult. The policies are getting support because they are his policies. They are on the Good Side, and the woke leftists are on the Bad Side. If Trump changes his views, most of his voter base will change with him. The big question is: what's going to happen when Trump isn't in power anymore? Will he be able to motivate his voter base into a JD Vance presidency? Don Jr.? He's not getting any younger either - what if he dies? With Trump off the stage the Republican party will almost certainly fall into a state of crisis. The traditional conservatives have been decimated, and the fringe extremists won't be able to rally the moderates. The entire Republican electorate will be up for grabs, and it won't be pretty.
  - watwut 1y ago
    It is not just that. He works on support of the whole ecosystem - from heritage foundation through tech leaders to fox news. The ecosystem will keep existing and will find a new preacher. The same people who use their talking points now will keep voting for the same set of policies. Just about only exception are tariffs in their current implementation - those are genuinely the Trump thing. But everything else is Trump executing long known conservative goals that are accepted by conservative voters. > With Trump off the stage the Republican party will almost certainly fall into a state of crisis. The traditional conservatives have been decimated, and the fringe extremists won't be able to rally the moderates. The entire Republican electorate will be up for grabs, and it won't be pretty. Trump represents traditional conservatives. With exception of tariffs, he is doing exactly what they wanted for years. Likewise, republican moderates never disagreed or opposed Trump policies, they just wanted someone more presentable for it.
  - AlecSchueler 1y ago
    > From what I've seen on the wider internet, the support for Trump is mostly a personality cult. I agree with you but the point I'm trying to get across is that a disturbing amount of seemingly right minded people actually support him now on a policy level. Maybe they always did and feel comfortable to say it out loud now? I don't know. But the deportations, skipping due process, defunding science, excluding foreign students, dismantling aid programs, cutting ties with Europe and Canada, stripping trans people of their rights, pulling support from Ukraine, not following the Paris Climate Accords, etc. etc. It's all stuff I've seen people here genuinely argue for.
- const_cast 1y ago
  The people largely have been duped by populist messaging. If you notice the people who defend Trump or his policies don't even really believe them. Half the time the defense is, "well he's not really going to do that" (Trump is a liar). Or, "that's not actually happening" (deporting citizens or permanent residents). While these defenses are completely delusional, it at least highlights that most Trump supporters consider him untrustworthy. They support Trump because they're living in an alternate reality where everything is great and nothing bad has happened yet. Everything is always just around the corner, but they kick the can down the road in their head.
crote 1y ago
There's a big difference between claiming to want something, and actually wanting it. The primary goals of most politicians are staying in power and self-enrichment, which in practice means doing whatever corporate America wants and handing out tax cuts (Republican) or subsidies (Democrats) to the rich. All the other stuff they claim to care about? That's literally only done to get more votes, most of them really could not care less about it. Outlawing abortion, mass deportation of immigrants, killing foreign imports? Great to claim on election rallies to motivate your voter base, but it was never meant to be achieved. It's far more efficient to milk a "the Democrats want to murder babies" tag line for a few decades than to actually ban abortion and have to deal with the fallout when their voters see women they know dying because they can't get the healthcare they need. Claiming to do something about immigration is more efficient than actually doing it and losing all support from the companies relying on immigrant labor. Claiming to be tough on China is far better than losing votes due to tariffs making all prices skyrocket. Traditionally the Republicans wanted to get in power, do nothing, and blame the Democrats for their failures. Trump screwed this up by actually doing the stuff he claimed he was going to do, and it's either going to end in an electoral bloodbath for the Republicans or a fascist theocratic dictatorship.
- thrance 1y ago
  I generally agree with your analysis but it ignores the switch that happens to every failing democracy: when populism ceases to be a tool and becomes the actual goal. It's difficult to imagine how those tariffs benefit the oligarchs behind Trump and the GOP. They also seem very much ready to actually ban abortion federally this time, and carry out massive deportations. No matter how destructive to the country and their image these policies could be. And here's pure speculation on my part: when you listen to interviews of the current administration it's like they don't even try to make what they do look good, or defend themselves. They are acting with the same shamelessness you would see in Russia, meaning they probably don't fear the next election day that much. As for the democrats, they're basically controlled opposition at this point. The geriatric establishment only cares about retaining enough donor money, and will absolutely not put up a fight against the republicans.
- BobbyTables2 1y ago
southernplaces7 1y ago
The boot lickers, self-interested cynics and useful idiots currently in the Republican party are indeed what's sustaining Trump. They could end his ambitions in a week if they collectively worked to, or at least if a sizeable minority of them did so, but so far, they'd much rather focus on their own benefit or personal partisan idiocies than realize that they're helping establish normalizations of deviant governing (such as it is) that will have repercussions for decades, and could later badly bite off a big bleeding chunk of their collective asses. It's stupid and self-serving nearly through and through among the deplorable pile of garbage that is most of the modern MAGA-GOP. None of this is to defend the democrats much either. They have had their heads up their asses politically in so many crucial moments that they did a lot to facilitate the voting in of this bullying orange buffoon, and currently, they're just barely raising the bar from a bare minimum of effort in trying to fight some of this president's more destructive policies. Then there are the top-level Tech CEOs and how they're so grossly bending over and presenting their asses to the new administration. With Musk at least there's an element of authenticity to it since he's been espousing the views he currently shows off for quite a long time, but with people like Bezos and Zuckerberg, and others, the cynical and fundamentally cowardly about-face is particularly grotesque to watch.

It is not just Trump. It is whole conservative project that is behind him. He truly represents the republican party and works towards its goals.

by watwut 1y ago

It is not just Trump. It is whole conservative project that is behind him. He truly represents the republican party and works towards its goals.

AlecSchueler 1y ago

This is it. It's not uncommon to see people on this very forum defending many of his policies, so the hope that the population has simply been duped and everything will right itself in a few years is a hard one to hold. One begins to question so much of America and see how much we had actually been turning a blind eye to since the end of the war.

gnz11 1y ago
I kid you not but some of the Silicon Valley elites believe themselves to be philosopher kings and wish to lord over the rest of us in some bizarre techno-monarchy system.
- fakedang 1y ago
  Weren't they planning to make their own techno-monarchic sovereign state? I remember reading up about one venture that actually received funding from your usual VC suspects. Even the folks in Wall Street weren't this dystopian, come on.
- TedHerman 1y ago
  You might enjoy the book "Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism" (interview: In Conversation With Yanis Varoufakis - on YouTube).
thrance 1y ago
Yes, it has to get much much worse before it can get better. Another half-competent democratic presidency now would only result in an even worse republican one next.
- maeil 1y ago
  That this gets downvoted shows that people have still not learned a single thing. You're spot on, it's tragic that so very few people understand this, based on how incredibly little I see it voiced online. In fact, you're the first I've seen voice it in ages. E.g. if Harris (another, at best, incredibly mediocre candidate) would've won, the post-Harris Rep presidency would've been even worse than the current one. Until there's a competent non-Rep president, every single subsequent Rep government will be worse, until there will be no more fairish elections - and likely we're already there. Someone like AOC - not policywise, people don't vote on policy, it doesn't matter. Attitude-wise. It's abundantly clear the DNC hasn't learned (or more likely, doesn't want to learn), so the next president will be another Hillary/Biden/Harris candidate who will either lose or make the next Rep win even more decisive.
  - AlecSchueler 1y ago
    I think maybe it gets downvoted because it comes across as victim blaming and has echoes of abusive reasoning. The left must change what they want because otherwise the right will throw a hissy fit and start opening concentration camps? Maybe I'm misunderstanding. It could be helpful to point to actual policy failings of Harris rather than handwaving about mediocrity.
    - tim333 1y ago
      When Harris actually completed to be presidential candidate she came in fifth. She was on stage a couple of times saying 200 million Americans died of covid - you have to be fairly thick to not realize that isn't so - she'd misread 200,000. They had to keep her away from interviews to stop similar stupid leaking out.
      - AlecSchueler 1y ago
        Misreading a number seems incredibly insignificant to the number of outright idiotic things Mr Trump says on a daily basis. Why the disparity in expectation/response?
crote 1y ago
> It's not uncommon to see people on this very forum defending many of his policies From what I've seen on the wider internet, the support for Trump is mostly a personality cult. The policies are getting support because they are his policies. They are on the Good Side, and the woke leftists are on the Bad Side. If Trump changes his views, most of his voter base will change with him. The big question is: what's going to happen when Trump isn't in power anymore? Will he be able to motivate his voter base into a JD Vance presidency? Don Jr.? He's not getting any younger either - what if he dies? With Trump off the stage the Republican party will almost certainly fall into a state of crisis. The traditional conservatives have been decimated, and the fringe extremists won't be able to rally the moderates. The entire Republican electorate will be up for grabs, and it won't be pretty.
- watwut 1y ago
  It is not just that. He works on support of the whole ecosystem - from heritage foundation through tech leaders to fox news. The ecosystem will keep existing and will find a new preacher. The same people who use their talking points now will keep voting for the same set of policies. Just about only exception are tariffs in their current implementation - those are genuinely the Trump thing. But everything else is Trump executing long known conservative goals that are accepted by conservative voters. > With Trump off the stage the Republican party will almost certainly fall into a state of crisis. The traditional conservatives have been decimated, and the fringe extremists won't be able to rally the moderates. The entire Republican electorate will be up for grabs, and it won't be pretty. Trump represents traditional conservatives. With exception of tariffs, he is doing exactly what they wanted for years. Likewise, republican moderates never disagreed or opposed Trump policies, they just wanted someone more presentable for it.
- AlecSchueler 1y ago
  > From what I've seen on the wider internet, the support for Trump is mostly a personality cult. I agree with you but the point I'm trying to get across is that a disturbing amount of seemingly right minded people actually support him now on a policy level. Maybe they always did and feel comfortable to say it out loud now? I don't know. But the deportations, skipping due process, defunding science, excluding foreign students, dismantling aid programs, cutting ties with Europe and Canada, stripping trans people of their rights, pulling support from Ukraine, not following the Paris Climate Accords, etc. etc. It's all stuff I've seen people here genuinely argue for.
const_cast 1y ago
The people largely have been duped by populist messaging. If you notice the people who defend Trump or his policies don't even really believe them. Half the time the defense is, "well he's not really going to do that" (Trump is a liar). Or, "that's not actually happening" (deporting citizens or permanent residents). While these defenses are completely delusional, it at least highlights that most Trump supporters consider him untrustworthy. They support Trump because they're living in an alternate reality where everything is great and nothing bad has happened yet. Everything is always just around the corner, but they kick the can down the road in their head.

crote 1y ago

There's a big difference between claiming to want something, and actually wanting it. The primary goals of most politicians are staying in power and self-enrichment, which in practice means doing whatever corporate America wants and handing out tax cuts (Republican) or subsidies (Democrats) to the rich. All the other stuff they claim to care about? That's literally only done to get more votes, most of them really could not care less about it. Outlawing abortion, mass deportation of immigrants, killing foreign imports? Great to claim on election rallies to motivate your voter base, but it was never meant to be achieved. It's far more efficient to milk a "the Democrats want to murder babies" tag line for a few decades than to actually ban abortion and have to deal with the fallout when their voters see women they know dying because they can't get the healthcare they need. Claiming to do something about immigration is more efficient than actually doing it and losing all support from the companies relying on immigrant labor. Claiming to be tough on China is far better than losing votes due to tariffs making all prices skyrocket. Traditionally the Republicans wanted to get in power, do nothing, and blame the Democrats for their failures. Trump screwed this up by actually doing the stuff he claimed he was going to do, and it's either going to end in an electoral bloodbath for the Republicans or a fascist theocratic dictatorship.

thrance 1y ago
I generally agree with your analysis but it ignores the switch that happens to every failing democracy: when populism ceases to be a tool and becomes the actual goal. It's difficult to imagine how those tariffs benefit the oligarchs behind Trump and the GOP. They also seem very much ready to actually ban abortion federally this time, and carry out massive deportations. No matter how destructive to the country and their image these policies could be. And here's pure speculation on my part: when you listen to interviews of the current administration it's like they don't even try to make what they do look good, or defend themselves. They are acting with the same shamelessness you would see in Russia, meaning they probably don't fear the next election day that much. As for the democrats, they're basically controlled opposition at this point. The geriatric establishment only cares about retaining enough donor money, and will absolutely not put up a fight against the republicans.
BobbyTables2 1y ago

southernplaces7 1y ago

The boot lickers, self-interested cynics and useful idiots currently in the Republican party are indeed what's sustaining Trump. They could end his ambitions in a week if they collectively worked to, or at least if a sizeable minority of them did so, but so far, they'd much rather focus on their own benefit or personal partisan idiocies than realize that they're helping establish normalizations of deviant governing (such as it is) that will have repercussions for decades, and could later badly bite off a big bleeding chunk of their collective asses. It's stupid and self-serving nearly through and through among the deplorable pile of garbage that is most of the modern MAGA-GOP. None of this is to defend the democrats much either. They have had their heads up their asses politically in so many crucial moments that they did a lot to facilitate the voting in of this bullying orange buffoon, and currently, they're just barely raising the bar from a bare minimum of effort in trying to fight some of this president's more destructive policies. Then there are the top-level Tech CEOs and how they're so grossly bending over and presenting their asses to the new administration. With Musk at least there's an element of authenticity to it since he's been espousing the views he currently shows off for quite a long time, but with people like Bezos and Zuckerberg, and others, the cynical and fundamentally cowardly about-face is particularly grotesque to watch.