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Crazy how for a guy so obsessed with self image and legacy, Trump is leaving behind a world where he'll be known for making everything shit that it was before h
by joe_mamba 7mo ago
Crazy how for a guy so obsessed with self image and legacy, Trump is leaving behind a world where he'll be known for making everything shit that it was before him. Amazing. How does this happen?
- gilleain 7mo ago... but have you considered the new ballroom?
- ahartmetz 7mo agoStupidity - the most destructive force in the world. Evil at least benefits someone.
- citrin_ru 7mo agoTrump net worth is $3 billion more than it was before he become a president. Likely more money was made via insider trading by his friends and family. So it's not like no one did benefit. Net loss for the country and the world is orders of magnitude higher though.
- worldsayshi 7mo agoThe more I see the stock market dropping due to idiotic mistakes that should've been very preventable, the more I think how beneficial it must be to be one of the insiders that accidentally let those idiotic things slip through. Are we as small savers just idiots feeding this idiot machine?
- buellerbueller 7mo ago>Are we as small savers just idiots feeding this idiot machine? Yes. 401k should never have been the main retirement plan.
- lotsofpulp 7mo agoI assume you mean low cost broad market index funds when you write 401k, but what other mechanism has offered financial security to so many other than having lots of productive and well networked kids that believe in helping you when you are old? There is, of course, taxpayer funded retirement benefits, but that is just taking from others’ kids.
- buellerbueller 7mo agoUnions + Pensions
- lotsofpulp 7mo agoThe pensions that are so underfunded (either due to corruption or bad math) they need repeated bailouts from federal taxpayers? Hope you’re in a sufficiently politically influential union. https://apnews.com/article/biden-business-united-states-government-and-politics-retirees-09d93d2af8cc68de47eccda4a9ef0250 https://apnews.com/article/biden-business-united-states-gove... https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/08/covid-relief-bill-gives-86-billion-bailout-to-failing-union-pension-plans.html https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/08/covid-relief-bill-gives-86-b... If federal taxpayers are going to bail out old people, might as well be the whole stock market so it’s not just a few politically influential unions that get bailed out. Union members not in an insufficiently influential union can have their benefits cut: https://www.pbgc.gov/employers-practitioners/multiemployer/introduction/pension-reform-act https://www.pbgc.gov/employers-practitioners/multiemployer/i...
- buellerbueller 7mo agoBail out individuals, not the wealthy. Certainly not corporations. The stock market is rigged in favor of corporations and wealth.
- vkou 7mo agoWhat do you think pension funds invest in if not the same things as my 401K? Pensions are useful to individuals, because they support you until you die (while your 401K will either run out before you die, or will 'waste' money in the bank if you die before it runs out). But they aren't a magic money tree. They are the exact same formula. Money in, money out, it just gets distributed a little better.
- ahartmetz 7mo agoI might be wrong, but it seems to me that Trump would prefer to be loved / respected / feared and remembered as the greatest US president in history over increasing his net worth.
- delfinom 7mo agoThe man bankrupted a casino.
- theshrike79 7mo agoIt turns out you can't run a country the same way you run a New York construction business.
- scns 7mo agoYou can, into the ground.
- seydor 7mo agoYou can read his book, it's full of things he would do (even if he didn't write it). Typical sales tactics and nothing more sales than tactics even after the snake oil has been exposed.
- RealityVoid 7mo agoOh, yes, I agree. But I now know that they were written by a ghost writer so I'm not sure it it's completely accurate to credit him with all in the books. The ghost writer deff gives it its own flair. But, yes, when Trump was first elected, I've have friends tell me I don't get it, I am hating him because I was told to, I'm not looking past the noise, and I had to clarify to them that no, I have despised him since I read his book "The art of the deal" and came across with the idea he is a corrupt crook. I read it as recommendation and went in with the expectation to read something good, but was not impressed at all. So, yes, all of this was painfully obvious. But here we are.
- deleted 7mo ago[deleted]
- CoastalCoder 7mo agoMy working theory is that Trump is best understood as an epically tragic character. So desperate to be valued and liked, that he desperately grabs at anything and everything to get the acclaim that, under normal circumstances, would signify that. His besetting character flaws foreclose any possibility of attaining the actual approval he seeks. And so, with his misguided approaches to getting praise and love, the harder he tries the further they are from his reach. Adding to that tragedy is that a 180-degree U-turn is still within his reach. He could do it today, and probably get some of what he most deeply wants. But I think the most likely outcome is that he'll keep his current trajectory for the rest of his life.
- RealityVoid 7mo agoInteresting reading, but hard to have sympathy when he causes suffering for so many. I also don't think changing his behavior is within reach. His narcissism prevents him from growth and, like the scorpion in the tale, he can't help but sting.
- CoastalCoder 7mo agoThanks. FWIW I wasn't trying to imply that we should have sympathy for him. My only point was that so much of this suffering, both for himself and others, could be avoided but for his choices and flaws.
- weavie 7mo agoI don't think it's so clear cut. The problem is that his personality defects have allowed him to be influenced by people who are truly malevolent. Those people lurk more in the shadows and so avoid the condemnation that they deserve. Trump is their obvious useful idiot with the target painted on his head.
- deleted 7mo ago[deleted]
- mapontosevenths 7mo ago
- voxic11 7mo agoHim and his family will be richer and more famous than ever. I don't think he cares about legacy beyond that.
- JKCalhoun 7mo ago(I think you meant infamous.)
- jghn 7mo agothis and people underestimate how many people in the country still think he's doing a great job.
- GJim 7mo ago> how many people in the country still think he's doing a great job. 'In the country' being 'in the USA'. Everybody else outside the boarders of the USA is thinking "how the mighty have fallen".
- dartharva 7mo agoYes, that's what "in the country" means.. It is also exactly these same people of the USA whose thinking is going to matter for determining what happens next, not anyone else. It is immaterial what "everyone else outside the borders of the USA" thinks in the context of the country.
- jghn 7mo agoYes. And for the context of this conversation, the people in the USA are what matters. It's not like this regime is going to give up just because other countries dislike them. Their core fan base think it's going gangbusters.
- IAmBroom 7mo agoThe USA is so overwhelmingly powerful, the phrase is apt: "When it sneezes, the world gets a cold." The nation that owns the majority of nukes is run by an actual idiot with dementia, and his corrupt picks. The nation with the majority of aircraft carriers and submarines... The nation with the largest GDP... The nation that makes the tech most of the world runs on... It is terrifying, the international implications that a collapse of my country would cause, but even that pales to the malicious damage it can cause.
- maplethorpe 7mo agoI'm still holding out for this being some 4d chess move that's way over my head. If he really is this foolish, then why did we all vote for him?
- nancyminusone 7mo ago"World's most successful con man successfully fools 77 million people" is honestly not that surprising. He is a professional after all.
- Jeremy1026 7mo agoDefine, "we all".
- deleted 7mo ago[deleted]
- RealityVoid 7mo agoI have an answer to that, but you won't like it.
- CoastalCoder 7mo agoI'm guessing that one reason we got Trump is that the Democrats presented two poor alternatives in a row. It was clear that Biden was mentally slipping. Even if you were a fan of his general politics, 4 additional years of mental decline while in office was a scary prospect. And then Kamala Harris was given very little time to sell herself to the voters. I'm wondering if Trump would have won had the Democrats presented someone more appealing earlier in the campaign.
- boringg 7mo agoThis is what happens when sales is the leader of your organization.
- jrs235 7mo agoAnd compensation is based on revenue not profit. A top sales person brings in $5 million of revenue, but it's going to cost the company $7 million to deliver the goods/services. Sales person hit their top goal and will earn his bonuses while making the company worse off.
- deleted 7mo ago[deleted]
- callmeal 7mo ago>How does this happen? Well, you see a black man became president. And what's worse, he was a really good one, articulate, kind, humble, and emodied all the values we cherish. And that broke people so much they would rather burn everything down than build on what he did. Don't forgot how long Trump and other republicans went on about "birth certificates" during Obama's first term.
- virgil_disgr4ce 7mo agoThe key insight is that Trump is doing what Trump supporters (and fascists in general) want most: punishing The Enemy/Other. Everything else (including gas and grocery prices, etc) is irrelevant. As long as "immigrants" (the "illegal" facade is done by now) and "liberals" are beaten to death by ICE, Trump supporters will honestly and proudly proclaim that he's doing a fantastic job as president.