Current Affairs Donald Trump POS: Judgement cometh and that right soon

[Sassy Colombian]

I’m starting to become a pessimist about these people. They are just so brainwashed that there is nothing that can be said or done to change their mind. Like a former Republican strategist recently suggested the US needs to ‘go all in with the Democratic Party to guard our Republic.’ The GOP is now the party of autocracy, lies and alternative facts.



Call me the Wet Blanket of the Gods, but I despair of ever making common cause with people who volunteer to live in Bedlam. From IPSOS:

Former President Donald Trump’s stronghold over the Republican party remains. His refusal to concede the 2020 election and calls of widespread fraud have raised doubts about the integrity of its results among his Republican base. Consequently, 56% of Republicans believe the election was rigged or the result of illegal voting, and 53% think Donald Trump is the actual President, not Joe Biden.

There is no longer any reason to try to “understand” these people. Nor should there be any compunction about doing whatever we can to read them out of American politics, because they clearly have opted out on their own. They should be considered anathema, as should the entire Republican Party and the modern conservative movement that animates it. Anything that can be done without including them should be done for the good—to say nothing of the sanity—of the country. Raw political power should be used to push through whatever of this administration’s policy priorities can be passed without any Republican help whatsoever. Majoritarianism should be invoked without mercy, and by whatever legitimate means necessary, and the window of opportunity to do that is closing fast.

It doesn’t matter if 53 percent of them say they believe the former president* is still the president* because they actually believe it, or they say it because it makes them one of The Elect. The effect on democracy is the same. They are poison in the bloodstream. And they’re proud of it.

Only 30% of Republicans feel confident that absentee or mail-in ballots were accurately counted, compared to 86% of Democrats and 55% of independents. As a result, 87% of Republicans believe it is important that the government place new limits on voting to protect elections from fraud. Finally, 63% percent of Republicans think Donald Trump should run for President again in 2024, compared to only 8% of Democrats and 23% of independents.

This is beyond the beyond. There is no compromise with this. There is no common ground. There is no deal to be struck. Millions of our fellow citizens are lost in rebellion against reality, and the only solution for the common good is to isolate them from decision-making and hope enough of them find their way back to make the country governable again. I’m not optimistic.

 

[LinekersLegs]

love him, hate him, or in my case neutrally fascinated by the push/pull of that love & hate: he is the most reported-on figure in world history, surpassing even Hitler. Caveat to that is his Presidency was around in an age where we have the most news/comment-possibilities than ever before, but it seems unlikely anyone else will be generating that kind of attention.

He is the kind of figure who, before even winning the Presidency, an established liberal mainstream newspaper can publish a video of his effigy being burnt while coolly reporting on its artistic quality:

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/video/2016/nov/06/donald-trump-effigy-bonfire-night-video


Trump is either Emmanuel Goldstein or Big Brother: accompanied by two-minute (and the rest) Hate sessions from one half of society, while the other half love him with almost Jesus-like Fervour.

Got to admit, it's interesting!

As is pointed out in the Guardian article that effigy was not of Trump alone, Clinton was also represented so seems a bit odd to draw some particular message from the reporting of it that just applies to Trump.

 

[dholliday]

Donald, where's you're troosers ?

we live in Clownworld.

Sod it ill give you a proper response



If someone believes the election was rigged and uses screencaps of YouTube likes to seriously support this theory then they 100% deserve to be called dangerously thick. In-fact scrap that… anyone claiming its still rigged for any reason deserves to be called dangerously thick given the complete lack of any evidence and the fact no court (even ones with republican judges) would give Trumps lawyers the time of day.

You also seem to have forgotten that Trump is the most polarising president in recent history, for all the worshippers he has he is also absolutely loathed in equal numbers. Similar to how Man United are very popular but also very unpopular. Biden doesn’t need to have a diehard fanbase like Trump, he just needs to not be Trump to gain a huge chunk of the votes.

Then there is the fact that Trump has the worst approval rating of any recent president by a sizeable amount. Also there was the midterms in 2018 which showed a swing towards the democrats… why ignore all these factors which show that lots of people were not happy with him and instead focus on very specific social media likes/dislikes to support the narrative that its hard to believe he lost ?

Speaking of social media… Twitter is overwhelmingly anti Trump, the amount of negative trump tweets to pro trump tweets is massively lopsided, conservatives are completely outnumbered as they are on reddit. Yet im not about to claim that this is a sign that everyone in the US hates Trump as social media is not an accurate reflection of society as a whole. America has been more or less split down the middle between conservative and liberals for yonks, the idea that all of a sudden one of the most divisive presidents managed to flip that long standing narrative in their favour is delusional.



That wasn’t my counter argument though was it, my counter argument was that the left don’t tend to worship politicians the way the right currently worship Trump and also that you don’t need to be a fan of someone to vote for them.



How is one organisation giving him an award proof that the left worshipped him ? It’s disingenuous to suggest he was worshipped to the same level Trump is. Yes Obama was well liked by large portions of the left and will have had some people who worshipped him but it never got to full blown cult like levels the way it has with Trump.

Do you think there would have been an insurrection if Obama had lost to Mitt Romney in 2012 ? Do you think Obama supporters would have got involved in a movement like Qanon and spread the belief that Obama was here to save us from paedophile deep state Republicans ?

Why is grift culture so prevalent on the right relative to the left ? Because it relies heavily on people who are balls deep in partisanship, people who love their side so much they will hand over their hard earned money just so they can hear people say what they want to hear.

Trump was a phenom in terms of connecting with his base, look at the level of loyalty they have for him, its unrivalled. He is worshipped by his followers/base to a level I've never seen before.

I gave you a like for effort.

Are we seriously sitting here debating Trump vs Biden’s YouTube numbers?!? Six months ago we all went to the actual polls and 7 million more of us preferred Biden to Trump.

Let's wait 'n see what the Maricopa-audit brings.

To the first bolded point, unemployment numbers were low, but wealth inequality was and continues to trend towards pre-French Revolution numbers, which obviously isn’t great.

To the second, I doubt he was capable cauhing Stalin/Mao levels of death. However, the rhetoric he used regarding Latinos coming to this country in terms of being an infestation is historically very dangerous territory. When he’s managed to get his supporters into a headspace that they are defending children being separated from their families and locked in cages, or alleged forced sterilization of migrant women, then he’s probably done 90% of the work to having them look the other way if in fact actual death camps were set up along the border, which is terrifying.

The Democrats are doing that too, under Obama as well as Biden. And to the other bolded bit: emphasis on 'alleged'. Anyone can allege anything and the anti-Trump press will gleefully pick it up: "...according to sources familiar with the situation"

It’s why this guy is the greatest musician this world has ever known. Science, basically.

He's not the greatest, his one song however is one of the world's most popular songs.

Trump’s popularity on YouTube may be growing (although many of those viewers could be the same ones looking at the clips over and over) but his TV ratings are certainly going down hill. A couple of weeks ago his interview in Newsmax got beaten by other cable news programs according to Nielsen Media Research data. So his popularity is definitely declining among Republicans, those that still follow him are just crazy people that can’t accept reality.

View attachment 129689

Trump's Newsmax Interview on Tuesday Got Half as Many Viewers as a 'Chopped' Rerun

The former president's sit-down on "Cortes and Pellegrino" drew only 295,000 viewers

www.thewrap.com

i bolded your ad hominem, for reference.

I’m starting to become a pessimist about these people. They are just so brainwashed that there is nothing that can be said or done to change their mind. Like a former Republican strategist recently suggested the US needs to ‘go all in with the Democratic Party to guard our Republic.’ The GOP is now the party of autocracy, lies and alternative facts.

View attachment 129690

Call me the Wet Blanket of the Gods, but I despair of ever making common cause with people who volunteer to live in Bedlam. From IPSOS:

There is no longer any reason to try to “understand” these people. Nor should there be any compunction about doing whatever we can to read them out of American politics, because they clearly have opted out on their own. They should be considered anathema, as should the entire Republican Party and the modern conservative movement that animates it. Anything that can be done without including them should be done for the good—to say nothing of the sanity—of the country. Raw political power should be used to push through whatever of this administration’s policy priorities can be passed without any Republican help whatsoever. Majoritarianism should be invoked without mercy, and by whatever legitimate means necessary, and the window of opportunity to do that is closing fast.

It doesn’t matter if 53 percent of them say they believe the former president* is still the president* because they actually believe it, or they say it because it makes them one of The Elect. The effect on democracy is the same. They are poison in the bloodstream. And they’re proud of it.


This is beyond the beyond. There is no compromise with this. There is no common ground. There is no deal to be struck. Millions of our fellow citizens are lost in rebellion against reality, and the only solution for the common good is to isolate them from decision-making and hope enough of them find their way back to make the country governable again. I’m not optimistic.

Bolded it again. If you genuinely want to understand the other side, then you must first accept they are saying exactly the same thing about your side: that you're brainwashed and cannot be reasoned with.

You can't both be right. Perhaps you also both can't be wrong. Think of it like the unstoppable force meeting the immovable object.

If both sides aren't willing to budge, then the pressure will continue to build. Do we want that?

As is pointed out in the Guardian article that effigy was not of Trump alone, Clinton was also represented so seems a bit odd to draw some particular message from the reporting of it that just applies to Trump.

Note how the headline, and the video, focussed on the Trump effigy. It's a media-communications technique (aka propaganda) to program the public into despising Trump. The disclaimer that a Clinton effigy was also present is a defensive 'subroutine' against the claim i'm making, which you just fell for.

i.e. Fact-Check: was just a Trump effigy burnt? Mostly-false, there was also a Clinton effigy.

 

[LinekersLegs]

Note how the headline, and the video, focussed on the Trump effigy. It's a media-communications technique (aka propaganda) to program the public into despising Trump. The disclaimer that a Clinton effigy was also present is a defensive 'subroutine' against the claim i'm making, which you just fell for.

i.e. Fact-Check: was just a Trump effigy burnt? Mostly-false, there was also a Clinton effigy.

Or I just don’t think you can make a wider media communication message out of that particular data point. Iirc we discussed it in 2016 and we didn’t agree on its meaning then either!

If you want to display evidence of “propaganda to program the public into despising Trump“ think there are much better examples you can use to make the case than a Guardian article from 2016 about a UK Guy Fawkes display that includes both presidential candidates.

For a truly neutral take you would also have to compare it to media handling of Clinton herself and other politicians and see it was significantly different.

 

[dholliday]

Or I just don’t think you can make a wider media communication message out of that particular data point. Iirc we discussed it in 2016 and we didn’t agree on its meaning then either!

If you want to display evidence of “propaganda to program the public into despising Trump“ think there are much better examples you can use to make the case than a Guardian article from 2016 about a UK Guy Fawkes display that includes both presidential candidates.

Quite...there are many many, countless, examples of this. I just chose the one where they focus on symbolically burning him to death.

 

[LinekersLegs]

Quite...there are many many, countless, examples of this. I just chose the one where they focus on symbolically burning him to death.

Meh, even if you discount that Clinton is also being burnt I can’t see much difference to the tenor of the 2016 Guardian article to this more recent Fox (generally Trump supporters) one a Trump effigy alone being burnt

Protesters in Mexico burn Trump effigy at border, urge Americans to vote Biden

Protesters at the U.S. border in Mexico torched effigies of President Trump and a border patrol agent on Saturday while calling on voters to elect Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, according to a report.

www.foxnews.com

Politicians get burnt in effigy quite a bit, newspapers generally report it as it has good visuals, to me it isn‘t some great statement on media bias but will we clearly don’t agree.

 

[dholliday]

to me it isn‘t some great statement on media bias but will we clearly don’t agree.

Do you think it's accurate to say that the non-conservative media have been unfairly critical of Trump during his Presidency, or you think the reporting has been - generally - fair and balanced?

 

[LinekersLegs]

Do you think it's accurate to say that the non-conservative media have been unfairly critical of Trump during his Presidency, or you think the reporting has been - generally - fair and balanced?

No I don’t think much reporting of Trump has been “fair and balanced” but that goes for both conservative and non-conservative media - he is more polarizing than marmite.

Some of that will be individual journalistic bias but some will be the (either conscious or unconscious) knowledge of what your audience wants to read. You seem to think that media drives people’s views of Trump whereas I believe he was such a widely known figure prior to his presidential run that people already had pretty set views on him and would therefore seek out that media that agreed with their view and there was a feedback loop.

I don’t think Clinton’s coverage was particularly “fair and balanced“ either.

 

[dholliday]

he was such a widely known figure prior to his presidential run that people already had pretty set views on him and would therefore seek out that media that agreed with their view and there was a feedback loop.

I don’t think Clinton’s coverage was particularly “fair and balanced“ either.

we agree on both those bits

 

[LinekersLegs]

we agree on both those bits

Better leave it there then lol

 

[Prevenger17]

Do you think it's accurate to say that the non-conservative media have been unfairly critical of Trump during his Presidency, or you think the reporting has been - generally - fair and balanced?

He was a complete incompetent and a dangerous clown, most of his worst coverage were the words that came from his mouth. And welcome back D

 

[dholliday]

He was a complete incompetent and a dangerous clown, most of his worst coverage were the words that came from his mouth. And welcome back D

thanks Prev, hope you 'n yours are fine x

i'll be off again after tonight. limiting my GOT-time to a few frenzied days per year.

unless Everton make me feel something again...Dunc would need to get the job for that to happen, i reckon.

 

[LinekersLegs]

 

[McBain]

Omg his pants. I'm dying.

 

[TN Toffee]

Omg his pants. I'm dying.

He also got his word salad of cliches mixed up at one point and actually said we need to “defund our freedoms”.