Oh no…the Leopards ate my face thread

That likely has more to do with gerrymandered congressional districts than anything specific the Dems have or haven’t done. It isn’t entirely rational how we elect our congresspeople, and the Senate of course is inherently undemocratic.

 

I often go back to the Adam Serwer article “The cruelty is the point”. The whole article explain this clearly “ Trump and his supporters find community by rejoicing in the suffering of those they hate and fear”
What we are seeing is the perfect illustration of this concept.

 

They'll all go to the same place where the opponents of drone strikes went when Trump was elected the first time.

 

You could have just said the All Blacks during the McCaw Era.

 

I did, although it was a close thing. I know you are wondering why it took me this long to read a 165 page book. Well, it's the first book I've read in 10 years so I kind of forgot how. And I made a commitment to finish a model by a certain date so that is also taking my free time. And the book I've been reading is so dense with ideas that I keep taking notes and thinking which slows things down a lot.

But in any case, my book report to the class is on The True Believer by Eric Hoffer, which I was clued into from a totally different context but I thought would apply to my understanding of the Trump situation, and boy howdy did it. This is an amazing, amazing book. You read this and you know you could never ever have written this but it says things that explains so much and you are thinking things beyond the book and you realize that a good book makes you more knowledgeable but a great book makes you smarter and I know I am rambling but I'm just excited about this.

The True Believer is about the kind of people that make up popular movements headed by charismatic leaders (like the communist movements, fascisms, rebellions, reformations, so on). The basic idea is that the follower of a mass movement is someone that is frustrated about something within themselves that make their present lives worthless (like failure to achieve what they expected to) and lose themselves into a movement that seeks to change them and everyone else to bring about a promised future where those frustrations don't happen any more. So people that are content or self-actualized or so poor they don't have time for self-contemplation are not fodder for movements. This also blows up horseshoe theory - it's not that the far left and the far right are actually close to each other, but that the kind of person that follows movements will always be that kind of person and will switch movements easily but almost never become a independent person. So Bernie-bros easily switch to MAGA and the very religious easily switch to the side of the antichrist I mean Trump. People join a movement to be free of personal responsibility, to be free of personal failures and meaninglessness of individuality.

There is sooo much more to this, and I could go on and on, but I wanted to point out some ramifications on the MAGA movement and what might happen. First, if things get economically worse don't expect support to wane. Followers will always discount the present for some imagined future. And believers want to see others brought low, not themselves raised up so if others get it worse than them they are happy. The big thing we don't have an answer for is how much of Trump's support is MAGA movement and how much independent thinkers (or whatever passes for that in 202x America) that expect something tangible in the here and now. We have to wait to see what the reaction is. Another is that Trump's placement of crazy people into the cabinet is purposeful, as those who value themselves and ethics and facts first dull the revolutionary movement. Note that Trump did not apply that to money (in the form of the head of the Treasury), as Trump still values that part of the present.

Also, I believe Trump is the first kind of leader of a movement (the "man of words") who demolishes faith in the current system and paves the way for the eventual fanatic that builds the actual movement and then the "practical man of action" that keeps it going after it gains power. Trump doesn't have the drive to be a true leader, and his wealth interests kind of preclude enacting a true chaotic upheaval. I think what he wants is to be recognized for his great understanding of the world, which is man of words modus operandi. But the man of words is usually superseded by the fanatic, so we have that possibility to look forward to. Another scary thing is that the people around Trump correctly understand that persuasion and propaganda are nothing compared to physical coercion in terms of converting those that can and oppressing those that won't.

 

In passing I also wanted to mention another work I've been studying to understand the MAGA movement. While I've been working on my model I've been rewatching Babylon 5, and what in the 1990's seemed to me to be an unlikely but interesting chain of events now seems frighteningly prescient and insightful.

 

That's an excellent choice.

 

Well, that was my point... it seems basically pretty unfair to expect her to provide an entirely balanced and coherent view when the damn adults can't do it but, like I say, there were people arguing along similar lines and, in any event, it the argument itself that's the important thing. Not the individual.

 

... your point being?

The argument was NEVER that nobody got done for some of the more egregious and, bluntly, idiotic white collar crime. That's ALWAYS been the case.

The point was that things that are damaging to society are still allowed to continue and nothing is done about it and NOT just in terms of out and out financial crime but in terms of how capitalism is structured and finance impacts on everyone's life. That has been one of the main driving factors in the increase in inequality.

 

I mean, you're describing it as if it's been handed down on tablets of stone from some higher power. As I keep asking, (rhetorically!), if the democrats can't do anything about a gerrymandered system even when they ARE in power, what's the point of them?

 

But you're not too sure why, or...???

 

The fact that Biden continued to aggressively support Israel probably lost him a few votes among liberals and the second two, (which seem to be essentially the same), HAS impacted on low paid workers and the unemployed, as I pointed out.

 

Reread Master and The Margarita and read No Country for Old Men. Plowed through the latter in less than a day. Haven't done that in a while.

 

This is not the defense you think it is.

 

Good article...


With Pete Hegseth Among the Post-Nominated

It seems all but certain that Pete Hesgeth’s nomination to lead the Pentagon is doomed. Yesterday he was reduced to promising not to drink on the job if he’s confirmed for Defense Secretary. You may not like him, but don’t deny him this: he’s going to have the best story ever when he introduces himself at his first meeting and explains what brought him to AA. It’s probably best to refer to Hegseth on Thursday afternoon as one of the “post-nominated.” Trump is already sounding out Ron DeSantis for the job. But he’s happy to let Hesgeth twist in the wind a bit longer. And in a paradoxical kind of way I appreciate his doing that. This of course will be Trump’s second top-tier nominee to go down in flames, and the third overall.

Has this gone well for Hesgeth? I don’t mean in terms of getting the job. I mean in the general sense of reputation, dignity, etc. I’d say it’s gone … well, pretty badly? Kind of the fate of everyone and everything who locks up with Trump.

DeSantis is much like Marco Rubio, a generally clownish figure, if somewhat more malevolent, but in the overall ballpark of the kinds of people who get these jobs. He’s served in Congress. He’s been governor of the one the country’s most populous states. Given the type of people Trump often hires for these jobs, the country could do so much worse.

So does it matter that Hesgeth goes down the tubes?

It does.

All political power is unitary. A president isn’t weak domestically but powerful on foreign policy — powerful on health care policy but hanging by a thread on interest rates. It’s all of a piece. The damage a president takes anywhere affects him or her everywhere. So having these absurd nominations go down in flames actually does matter. It’s not just the same as if Trump had nominated DeSantis or Pam Bondi in the first place.

That brings us to a broader point. If the political opposition is most worried about what a President will do on issue X, that doesn’t mean the opposition should necessarily focus its attacks on issue X. They may ignore issue X entirely. Maybe issue X is actually popular. Maybe nobody cares about issue X. So no one will pay attention. An opposition will focus its attacks on the President’s most vulnerable points because that is where his or her power can be reduced most effectively. And all political power is unitary.

It’s mostly a fool’s game trying to figure out just what Trump was trying to achieve nominating this group of clowns for most of the top Cabinet positions. Simple loyalty was a big factor, people who won’t flinch from doing whatever Trump says. They’re also all good on TV, or, at least, what Trump thinks is good on TV. But really it was a power play. It’s Caligula appointing his horse to the Senate. The absurdity is the point. I can do anything. Make the Republican Senate line up and approve a roster of manifestly unqualified nominees. But they’re going down one after another.

They’re doing it in a particular GOP senator way — all through winks and shadows, pregnant sighs. As far as I know, no Republican senator said they wouldn’t vote for Matt Gaetz, just as none has said so about Hegseth. On the pod Kate and I recorded this afternoon, we noted that if this were Biden’s or Harris’ transition, watching the top nominees go down in flames would be treated like the presidency itself was DOA. But not having a fancy Times or Politico columnist say it doesn’t make it any less so. Trump’s ability to just dictate isn’t quite panning out. And that matters.


https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/among-the-post-nominated

 

Nichols's argument that using children as an appeal to emotions can get dangerous quickly. He also argues that using young people, especially children as celebrity activists is also dangerous and that they will try to maintain that notoriety.

The pro-life movement does this with children as a way to short circuit debates.

 

One of my favorite books, M&M. And the parallels to today are incredible.

 

It's wonderful. I read it in college after learning that it was the inspiration for the song Sympathy For The Devil. I reread from time to time but I might have to reread it yearly.

 

The ability to have civil conversations about politics is gone and why people stay in bubbles. White America did that, not black or any other minority. You don't get real progress without tough questions, difficult answers and awkward silence.

 

There’s a time and a place. My BiL wasn’t political at all when we were younger and we hung out like brothers. My FiL was though, I remember him reading Buchanan and listening to Limbaugh, and me, as a Santa Cruz liberal student, we talked politics for years and it got pretty heated, from Day #1 really, my Mil and soon to be wife were often afraid it would boil right over. But we always reeled it back in. This went on for years…we would sit up late into the evening, talking politics, arguing, disagreeing, but we held it together and still managed to have a great relationship.

When the internet came along and some of our conversation moved on line, it got pretty bad. I have some regrets about that. We could still get together and have long conversations but gradually the online stuff (email back then) took a toll.

Once my FiL died, all he of a sudden my BiL becomes a big tea party guy, he’s bashing Obama everyday on FB, we’re going around and around, publicly, other friends and family jumping in, everyone getting wound up, tense. Or people withdraw, but it strained relationships all around.

It’s still that way. I rarely talk to him anymore or other Trumpy in laws, old friends, etc (we’re closer to our liberal friends nowadays where that stuff was less divisive somehow years ago) …but my wife is infinitely patient, she’s a peacemaker, she shares my views but family means the world, and so we put it away for the holidays, we get together and we don’t talk politics.

It’s the only way we can do it. I’m not changing any minds at this point and we all know how volatile this stuff can get.

If the time and place was right, maybe, but I’d have to think it might be helpful in some way and wouldn’t do more harm than good.

 

So, I agree we’ve lost that ability, I don’t know that it’s helpful or accurate to say that White America did that…you’d have to explain that one.