Wannabe Dictator
-
There is a pattern among senior officers who worked either directly with Trump or close to him. To a man, they pretty much despise him not only as a leader but as a person as well.
-
I've said it before, but I've never seen the level of enthusiasm there was for Trump during the 2016 election, and this was in Massachusetts, FFS. When they had a little rally for him in the middle of town the number of pickup trucks driving by blaring their horns and carry MAGA flags was really noticeable.
Those folk don't just think he's better than the other guy. The woman who kept his sign up on the lawn after the election, but erased Pence's name wasn't just saying 'Meh, he's ok...'.
@Doctor-Phibes said in Wannabe Dictator:
I've said it before, but I've never seen the level of enthusiasm there was for Trump during the 2016 election, and this was in Massachusetts, FFS. When they had a little rally for him in the middle of town the number of pickup trucks driving by blaring their horns and carry MAGA flags was really noticeable.
Before Trump (and even now) there is the "silent majority" per se... These are the conservatives, the traditionalists, the folks in the city, the folks in the country, folks like me to be honest, folks that have seen for years, even decades, a media that runs to a left-leaning beat. The movies, the shows, the magazines, the newspapers, the headlines, the celebrities... aka the loudest voices constantly blaring left-leaning policies. I think inherently, a liberal mindset is much louder and more protest-y than the conservative mindset, which is quieter and doesn't capture the headlines.
You take all that... and the silent boiling annoyance that you're not represented in what you see and hear, and in 2016 you get someone who makes you feel... heard. He represents the anti-woke, anti-liberal, uber-patriotic, unfiltered ideas that you've discussed at the kitchen table for so many years. So Trump captures this unrepresented energy and wins in 2016. It's why all the polls were wrong about Hillary winning. The silent majority lived up to its name, but the votes proved what the reality was behind the headlines.
-
@Doctor-Phibes said in Wannabe Dictator:
I've said it before, but I've never seen the level of enthusiasm there was for Trump during the 2016 election, and this was in Massachusetts, FFS. When they had a little rally for him in the middle of town the number of pickup trucks driving by blaring their horns and carry MAGA flags was really noticeable.
Before Trump (and even now) there is the "silent majority" per se... These are the conservatives, the traditionalists, the folks in the city, the folks in the country, folks like me to be honest, folks that have seen for years, even decades, a media that runs to a left-leaning beat. The movies, the shows, the magazines, the newspapers, the headlines, the celebrities... aka the loudest voices constantly blaring left-leaning policies. I think inherently, a liberal mindset is much louder and more protest-y than the conservative mindset, which is quieter and doesn't capture the headlines.
You take all that... and the silent boiling annoyance that you're not represented in what you see and hear, and in 2016 you get someone who makes you feel... heard. He represents the anti-woke, anti-liberal, uber-patriotic, unfiltered ideas that you've discussed at the kitchen table for so many years. So Trump captures this unrepresented energy and wins in 2016. It's why all the polls were wrong about Hillary winning. The silent majority lived up to its name, but the votes proved what the reality was behind the headlines.
@89th said in Wannabe Dictator:
It's why all the polls were wrong about Hillary winning. The silent majority lived up to its name, but the votes proved what the reality was behind the headlines.
I have to disagree, a bit, on this.
Hillary won the popular vote, and the polls were right. Trump won where he had to win to secure the Electoral College.
-
According to Trump he won the 2016 popular vote, as well. It was just that there was 'tremendous cheating'.
He's also won the Trump family's 'the sexiest man alive' competition for 30 years straight, and has a golf handicap of -50.
-
And weighs 215
-
@Doctor-Phibes said in Wannabe Dictator:
I've said it before, but I've never seen the level of enthusiasm there was for Trump during the 2016 election, and this was in Massachusetts, FFS. When they had a little rally for him in the middle of town the number of pickup trucks driving by blaring their horns and carry MAGA flags was really noticeable.
Before Trump (and even now) there is the "silent majority" per se... These are the conservatives, the traditionalists, the folks in the city, the folks in the country, folks like me to be honest, folks that have seen for years, even decades, a media that runs to a left-leaning beat. The movies, the shows, the magazines, the newspapers, the headlines, the celebrities... aka the loudest voices constantly blaring left-leaning policies. I think inherently, a liberal mindset is much louder and more protest-y than the conservative mindset, which is quieter and doesn't capture the headlines.
You take all that... and the silent boiling annoyance that you're not represented in what you see and hear, and in 2016 you get someone who makes you feel... heard. He represents the anti-woke, anti-liberal, uber-patriotic, unfiltered ideas that you've discussed at the kitchen table for so many years. So Trump captures this unrepresented energy and wins in 2016. It's why all the polls were wrong about Hillary winning. The silent majority lived up to its name, but the votes proved what the reality was behind the headlines.
@89th said in Wannabe Dictator:
uber-patriotic
I agree with pretty much most of what you wrote, but I am wondering what is your definition of "uber-patriotic" means
-
Great post, 89th.
I don't know if "uber-patriotic" is anything more than immense pride in what the founding fathers' put together in the evolution of mankind, and the pride at what the people had to sacrifice at the time. Put that in a good movie and smoke it. Gives me goosebumps. -
@89th said in Wannabe Dictator:
uber-patriotic
I agree with pretty much most of what you wrote, but I am wondering what is your definition of "uber-patriotic" means
@taiwan_girl said in Wannabe Dictator:
@89th said in Wannabe Dictator:
uber-patriotic
I agree with pretty much most of what you wrote, but I am wondering what is your definition of "uber-patriotic" means
Good question. Whether he is sincere about it, his platform and marketing had a USA FIRST message. That resonated with a lot of people, including me, that thought our country's attention was a bit too much on foreign affairs, foreign wars, being soft on illegal immigration, and so forth. We are certainly a world player, and world leader, but prior to Trump, there was a general approach that it's xenophobic to be so openly proud of your own country.
-
Not sure about that. US has a long tradition of paying high respect to patriotism. At times even elevating that respect to exaltation. The US also has a history of eschewing nationalism or, at least the nationalism that was expressed through much of Europe in the 19th and first half of the 20th centuries.
Somehow though in the past twenty years populist nationalism has wormed its way into the tradition of patriotism. The Trump movement has picked up on that and has redefined patriotism to include those elements of populist nationalism. That is how I understand what you mean by Uber-patriotism.
-
If they were really patriotic, they wouldn't use a German word to describe how patriotic they are
-
If they were really patriotic, they wouldn't use a German word to describe how patriotic they are
Well, there’s that too. Never thought of that.
-
Or maybe they feel as though they've been driven to be patriotic by somebody else.
-
Of the ride-or-die Trump supporters, how many of them are uncomfortable with their circumstances?
- They feel okay with what they're able to provide for their families and don't feel financially threatened.
- They don't feel vilified by large numbers of liberals
- They feel free to pursue their values, interests and beliefs in public without having to put up with some asshole judging them for it.
And yet everyone's so perplexed and baffled by Trump's popularity.
-
Yep. Punching down and the glee therein for the mainstream virtuous set, has never been more obvious than in the Trump era. It’s because there’s an “existential threat”, so they’re cornered into being sneering assholes. They really don’t want to be. Never mind the drool, they just have rabies.
-
Frankly, I believe that populist Jacobins on the left and
MAGATspopulist ersatz conservatives on the right are both rabid drooling beasts that the pose an “existential threat”’ to liberty and the common good. Together they deserve punching down with equal derision and sneering glee at their misinformed ideas, political illiteracy and rather unhinged minds. -
There is a pattern among senior officers who worked either directly with Trump or close to him. To a man, they pretty much despise him not only as a leader but as a person as well.
@Renauda said in Wannabe Dictator:
There is a pattern among senior officers who worked either directly with Trump or close to him. To a man, they pretty much despise him not only as a leader but as a person as well.
And some more from John Kelly
https://www.salon.com/2024/03/11/he-said-hitler-did-some-good-things-ex-chief-of-staff-says-praised-hitler-in/Former President Donald Trump praised German dictator Adolf Hitler while in the White House, former chief of staff John Kelly told CNN.
Trump repeatedly praised authoritarian leaders while serving as president, Kelly and other former senior advisers told CNN’s Jim Sciutto. Trump praised Chinese leader Xi Jinping, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Russian President Vladimir Putin, the former aides said. But his most unnerving praise was for Hitler.
“He said, ‘Well, but Hitler did some good things.’ I said, ‘Well, what?’ And he said, ‘Well, [Hitler] rebuilt the economy.’ But what did he do with that rebuilt economy? He turned it against his own people and against the world. And I said, ‘Sir, you can never say anything good about the guy. Nothing,’” Kelly recalled, according to Sciutto. “I mean, Mussolini was a great guy in comparison.”
“It’s pretty hard to believe he missed the Holocaust, though, and pretty hard to understand how he missed the 400,000 American GIs that were killed in the European theater,” Kelly added. “But I think it’s more, again, the tough guy thing.”
It wasn’t just Hitler’s economic policies, Kelly said. Trump also expressed admiration for Hitler’s hold on senior Nazi officers as he lamented his own lack of staff “loyalty.”
“He would ask about the loyalty issues and about how, when I pointed out to him the German generals as a group were not loyal to him, and in fact tried to assassinate him a few times, and he didn’t know that,” Kelly recounted. “He truly believed, when he brought us generals in, that we would be loyal — that we would do anything he wanted us to do,” Kelly added.
-
Ah, yes. Pearls of wisdom from Salon.
Carry on...
“Cry havoc and let slip the DOGE of war!”
Those who cheered as J-6 American prisoners were locked in solitary for 18 months without trial, now suddenly fight tooth and nail for foreign terrorists’ "due process". — Buck Sexton
-
@Jolly Are you saying the the article is misquoting John Kelly and he did not say that?
Here is from the guy that spoke directly with John Kelly.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/11/politics/trump-despots-advisers-sound-alarm/index.html
“He thought Putin was an OK guy and Kim was an OK guy — that we had pushed North Korea into a corner,” retired Gen. John Kelly, who served as Trump’s chief of staff, told me. “To him, it was like we were goading these guys. ‘If we didn’t have NATO, then Putin wouldn’t be doing these things.’”
“He’s not a tough guy by any means, but in fact quite the opposite,” Kelly said. “But that’s how he envisions himself.”
-
@Jolly said in Wannabe Dictator:
Ah, yes. Pearls of wisdom from Salon.
You're shooting the messenger? I'm surprised at you, Jolly.
