The Grand Illusion
Those are the basis of Trump’s campaign, but what lies behind the rock-hard support of his strongest supporters is even uglier. Trump’s character and appeal rest on an authoritarian personality manifested by hatred and condescension toward minorities, women, and immigrants, compounded by a belief that no method is too base to be used for his benefit, an absolute assertion that might, whether legal or illegal, makes right, and that no one should question the Great God Trump.
Trump supporters will deny this. They’re lying as much as he is, and that’s saying a lot. Those supporters are, for the most part, throw-backs to a time that never was. They think that the fifties were the glory days of American democracy, when women, people of color, and immigrants knew their place – well below imperial white males, but they refuse to remember that was also when factories belched out so much pollution that people couldn’t breathe and filled the waters with so many chemicals that rivers caught fire and that even bottom feeding fish couldn’t survive.
It was also a time when American policy was to suppress popularly elected governments in other lands, if there was any suspicion whatsoever that such a government might infringe the profits and powers of U.S. multinationals, and a time when nuclear weapons tests spread radiation across the entire U.S. southwest, leading to thousands of “downwinder” cancer deaths, if not more. It was a time when unrestricted and unregulated coal mining poisoned the lungs of hundreds of thousands of miners who would later die or be crippled by black lung disease. It was the time when leaded gasoline dumped thousands of tons of lead particles on inner cities, causing massive health problems, including stunting children’s growth, mentally and physically.
Anyone who supports Trump, no matter what their professed rationale, is in effect supporting a government based on hatred, lies and misinformation, a government that has taken step after step to restrict the votes of people of color, a government that systematically devalues women, and, which, if returned to office, will continue along that path.
Make no mistake about it. If you vote for Trump, that is what you support.
Where I live, most people are hoping for Trump to pull out a victory tomorrow. A lot of them just want things to be the way they used to be, especially the industry part. There’s a lot of racial distrust and dislike. Also, there’s a lot of internet fearmongering going on about anything “liberal”. For whatever reason, Trump appears like a good fix for these problems. This man is a narcissist, egomaniac and whatever else combo. He can’t fix anything. The Trump people don’t seem to want to really see this man. You have put down the reality of it in blunt terms. They don’t care. I hope this whole situation resolves into something besides a train wreck the next few weeks.
100% !! Too many of us are reluctant to call out unethical behaviour and that’s what they’re counting on. It’s almost like, if nobody stands up and publicly points out what’s going on, they’re allowed to pretend that they’re not behaving the way they are
What really saddens me is the fact that we’ve seen this all before. This piece prompted me to hunt out Hunter S. Thompson’s “eulogy” for Nixon – https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1994/07/he-was-a-crook/308699/ – when they said that the price of freedom is eternal vigilance, I don’t think they were thinking of the corruptors within ( at least, I hope not )
I hope that, regardless who wins, the US can manage to pull back from the precipice
The heart of the problem is that if there isn’t a simple external solution, the trump supporters would have to admit that they have some responsibility for the less than desirable situation in their lives. Once they admitted that they would have to do something about it besides complain. The lies are easier to stomach than admitting they don’t have the lives they want or think they should. The hard part is that a lot of these people are suffering from poor choices, corporate lies, and failed policies. Their pain is real but the way they express it is unfortunate and counter productive. By supporting trump they are continuing the same poor choices and bad policies that got them into the situation they are in.
The TDS is STRONG within you. What we Trump voters are opposed to are things like Critical Race Theory (i.e. It’s All Whitey’s Fault), loser basement pansies engaging in riot LARPing, foreign invaders (not invited immigrants), and idiot pipe-dream ‘green’ fantasies that would be absurd even in one of your books. It’s always fascinating when lefties make sweeping generalizations about literally half the country. However, now that the DNCMSM has driven the country into the current predicament it will be interesting to see if President Camel-Toe can unite the country and solve all of our problems. If not, what will the excuse be? Probably ‘It’s All Whitey’s Fault’.
At least we have the democratic instrument of the vote to correct our mistakes.
Trump was making America great again by almost completing his removal of this opportunity for all of the nation, (not just half of it) to carry out our responsibility to vote for what we think is best for all of us.
He has not lost yet and the Department of Justice and the Senate are still within his grasp as President.
If I did not have children and grandchildren here I would wish “Trump voters” another four years of the Trump Presidency they voted for. I would remain here to see the result first hand.
As usual, you don’t get it. The continuation of slavery and oppression of minorities was indeed “Whitey’s Fault.” So was the oppression of indigenous Americans. None of the European immigrants were invited. They were the invaders, and now you want to deny that fact and call later immigrants invaders, but not your forbears, just like Trump wants to deny the earlier cast ballots [which were merely counted later] as fraudulent. As for the current predicament… it wasn’t created by the Democrats, but by the greed of both parties, and worsened by Trump’s mishandling of the pandemic. But facts don’t seem to matter much to you and the other Trumpists when they conflict with what you want to believe… and, unhappily, some of the same, but not to the same extent, is true of Democrats.
Ah, yes, the ‘white people invented slavery’ canard. Throughout human history, when a militarily superior culture intersected one vastly inferior, the loser was totally wiped out. Indigenous Americans were essentially a stone-age culture. The fact that they still exist is a tribute to the mercy and generosity of ‘white’ people. And, of course, lets equate events of hundreds of years ago to the present day. Looking ahead, it’s conceivable that, some time in the not-so-distant future, PETA and the vegans (how’s that for a Rock Band?) will claw into power and equate the owning of animals with the owning of humans. Soon after that, everyone who now owns a pet will be vilified as evil, their legacies will be obliterated, and some sort of dated projecte fraud will win a Pulitzer.
Sure, slavery has existed in much of human history. We can improve, though. I would not want to live in much of history. This shouldn’t be a blame game; we should be trying to improve the world for everyone, regardless of who caused what in the past. If you’re so worried about being judged, quit judging others and name calling.
Bill… I’d appreciate it if you’d stop re-writing history. The Romans didn’t wipe out every culture they subjugated. Neither did the Persians, Egyptians, Assyrians, Chaldeans, or the British Empire. Second, I never said whites invented slavery; I said they perpetuated it and continued the oppression after slavery was legally ended. You can disagree with my conclusions, or my viewpoint, but it’s exceedingly dishonest to misstate facts… and that’s one of the reasons why you’re pissing off so many people.
And the “Wingnutso” is hate-strong within you too by far.
How’s that “winning” thing your dear Fuhre…erm, Leader whines…em, speaks often of to you tRUMPbots coming along?
Let’s see if he can game…I mean, win his way through the system this time.
Comments like this exacerbate the problem of division. Disagreement should be encouraged; disrespect, not tolerated. Don’t sink to your opponent’s level.
Every time I am exposed to the theory of Evolution I am bothered by the number of dead branches on the ‘Evolutionary Tree’.
Alternative roads not taken? or mistaken?
With the divisions alienating us all perhaps Congress will go back to basics and apply The United States Constitution to governing our problems as a nation.
Now that we have President-Elect Biden (thank God!!) what do you think will happen to Trumpism, Lee? Will it wither away and die because The Donald has been defrocked? Or will it continue and even grow in the underground with continued tweets and rallies after he leaves office? As much as I love seeing where the Electoral College went, there are still 70 million Americans who scare the living shit out of me. Is there any hope for us as a society?