Yeah, the overt and explicit undercutting of public confidence in government began with Reagan. (Technically you can trace this back to Barry Goldwater but he was premature in appealing to the public at large on a fear of government overreach.) Every president since Reagan through W. Bush (yes, even Clinton who presided over the dismantling of the “Great Society” programs without doing anything to replace them and accelerated the trend of deregulation) surfed the crest of public opinion in distrust of the federal government.
And to be fair, there is good reason for responsible voters to have a healthy skepticism of the government; agencies can become sprawling bureaucracies that do little to serve their ostensible purposes, pork-barrel projects can be funded and expanded supporting influential polities to the expense of everyone else; and of course the intelligence establishment and in particular the Central Intelligence Agency has often been used as a shadow arm of foreign policy to influence affairs in sovereign nations in ways that were of little benefit to the US as a whole but were extremely advantageous to powerful interests, e.g. the United Fruit Company or in support of a domestic political agenda.
Trump, of course, sees the government as just another patsy to give him easy money, and the Presidency as a way to get media attention. If he were actually any good at the former he would have made wiser investments than just packing the federal courts with Mitch McConnell’s favored jurists and charging the government for Secret Service agents staying at his properties, and he’s so focused on the latter that he doesn’t actually understand how to use the media to advance any agenda he might accidentally come up with, not that this stopped them from trying to tease meaning and intent from every 3am shitter-tweet he squeezed out.
I have advocated this forever. The ridiculous primary (and even worse, “open primary”) system is how we get krunks like Trump, or locally to me, David Clarke.
Does anyone know how many other modern democracies have primaries?
Having parties nominate candidates would certainly eliminate the possibilities of more Trumps but a change to the system should be paired with lower levels of entry for third parties to prevent an even grosser accumulation of power by party insiders. That would encourage major parties to be more accountable, when the electorate has more choices.
I think primaries have been a disaster. They were supposed to enhance democracy, but have mainly served to encourage extremism. Here in Canada, candidates are generally nominated in riding associations, that the local membership in the party, and must be confirmed by the national leader. That is usually automatic, but not always. The national leader is chosen by vote of the party membership, so I suppose a Trump-type could be chosen leader. But you actually have to a dues paying member of the party to vote.
Do you think the system would be improved by having more voices up front?
It is obviously easier to cover several individual primaries on a national level if they are weeks apart, it also weeds out those candidates without tons of funding. What if Super Tuesday came right after New Hampshire? What if Nevada and South Carolina moved to March 5th with only the Iowa Caucuses and the New Hampshire Primary before hand? There would still be a little run-up to Primary Season but South Carolina would not so singularly important if it is only one of many.
Then move the March 12th and April 2nd Primaries to the 19th of March? Campaigns would have to allocate money more judiciously, and every single serious nationwide candidate would have to establish a presence in many states at once. This might eliminate the long-shot barely funded candidate from contention, but it will make the voters think for themselves and rely significantly less on what previous states have done. It can also give candidates who don’t do well in early states an opportunity to play to their constituents in better states for them.
A serious minded friend of mine has been advocating for a “one national primary voting day” system for a decade or more. The problem I see with that is regional favorites perhaps even extending the infighting. A Southeastern favorite, a Midwestern candidate, a New England power candidate, a West Coast darling of the party, etc. Plus no candidate in a primary can be in every state campaigning because of money AND time.
I say let only Iowa and New Hampshire have their historical roles as early trend setters, but then give many states a chance to influence! Some candidates might skip those first two entirely, or at least one of them. That might not have stopped Trump entirely, but it would have given other voices a chance to be heard before the tide had turned. The entire GOP might not have been subverted if other states had the opportunity to vote for more mainstream candidates.
The effect of such tweaking is impossible to predict, and even in retrospect the effect it had will be debatable.
I do like the Canadian system. Then, I’m not a Republican in any sense of the word.
P.S. Dues paying party member? Now that Canadian bit won’t work for me. Maybe make it that you can’t vote in a primary for one year after changing registration, to prevent an operation chaos.
I believe it is not impossible for better candidates to be chosen when more voices in more states are part of the process. I don’t think it is fair for some guy who can sit and have coffee (or even covfefe) with two dozen people in a small state a dozen times a day to be a front runner without regard for policy or ability. The current system is custom built to appeal to charm more than complex plans to solve problems just like a high school popularity contest. (Otherwise people like Liz Warren would always win those early states!)
The fact of the matter is that a very few states select which very few candidates there are for the rest of us to choose from. The candidates like it because it is cost effective and they get to spend lots of one on one time with the relatively few voters who settle the matter.
Making candidates appeal in more than one state at a time is MUCH more likely to demonstrate how they would govern than how many hands they can shake, how many babies they can kiss, and how much coffee they can drink. It would show organisation and ability to build a staff and how many heavyweights they attract up front. By Super Tuesday, half of the candidates are out and a million low level operatives are hired to round out the staff of the leaders. Your “A” team cannot be in fifteen states at one time, they would have to muster some kind of presence in multiple states and if they can’t lure those people to their campaigns until there are only two or three candidates left that tells you something.
Sorry, much to long an answer for a one sentence reply. But I would like to see something attempted that is likely to bring the best candidates forward. Frankly, if I could snap my fingers and make one thing happen- I would put Aaron Sorkin in charge of every single presidential debate.
(But what do I know, Joe Biden was a complete no show until late in the last primary season and he was the very best candidate for the entire nation then and now despite challenges he is currently facing. I love the guy and was so very eager to vote for him, but I am not sure he would have survived my suggested system.)
I agree with you, I cannot imagine anyone more loathsome than Trump. I have never watched a moment of any of his pre-politics TV appearances, neither his show(s?) nor his commercials, zero interest in them and he was never that famous, very easy to miss without ever trying. But others must find him fascinating.
There are dozens of similar artists, even one I can think of whom I admire. People have made a big deal over Dolly Parton and by all accounts she is pleasant and kind, wise and forgiving, and she smells really, really good. In the last year or two I have come to realize she is a talented songwriter, but if she was giving a concert across the street in my neighbors driveway I would not bother to do more than open the blinds to see which neighbors attended. For that matter, if the entire Kardashian Klan was staying right next door, I wouldn’t bother to glance over at them.
Not only is Trump not charming (even as a very reluctant consumer of pop culture I know that), he would never shake lots of hands or kiss babies. Rallies where there is a gulf between him and the unwashed masses is his home field advantage. In 2020 he didn’t need to campaign during the primary season, he was unopposed. I don’t believe he hit his stride in 2016 until he was on a stage in a debate where he could bully others and say shocking things. That is when he broke away from the pack and started his rallies. If he ever had to do retail politics in New Hampshire he would never ever be in contention.
Trump believes he is a master-debater (*) and he may be right. That is the arena in which he gutted Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, and Ted Cruz among others. Then he went to rallies where he never had to be near the dirty bodies who idolized him and made him a star.
Trump’s appeal is not that he is charming, quite the contrary. His appeal is that he is the loud, clueless douche who talks back to the teachers and doesn’t have to listen to authority – but HE gets away with it! He is charming like the Sam Kinison persona is charming, he is distracting and vulgar. His appeal is still based in high school dynamics – people love him because he causes such a ruckus he gets you out of the third period pop quiz - not because he is actually charming.
(*) I understand Karen McDougal and Stormy Daniels pronounce it slightly differently.
He definitely is not a good debater. Those who idolized him for his so-called debating skills loved the fact that the insults he tossed were the very ones they would use in private but after his entry into politics, they use them in public.
Exactly!
Not only are they high school level smears and jabs – they are dumb slacker high school hi jinks. Every time I hear a Trump supporter speak, I have a knee jerk reaction that includes a law that before anyone can vote they have to take an information test. Not an intelligence test- none of them could pass one, but an information test just to prove they know anything at all about any subject. Yes, I know this starts to sound like Jim Crow laws but damn it I see those Jimmy Kimmel videos of complete idiots who cannot name a single president and I remember the Jay Walking clips from when Leno hosted the Tonight Show.
Some people are just too damn stupid to vote in my humble opinion. I am neither smart nor well educated in any sense-- but compared to the Trump voters I bump into all over Arizona I am a freaking genius! They cannot even figure out when they hold two opposite and mutually exclusive ideas at the same time. They (at one time) believed the pandemic was both made up and non-existent, AND the result of a weaponized program from China! That is some serious, next level quantum shit I am incapable of following – or utter bullshit. Their more recent series of justifications for unfounded beliefs are just as crazy and contradictory.
They are so small minded in my observations, and despite the fact that they are factually challenged they are willing to fight and die over these positions that cannot be supported at all. They believe things because they WISH they were true and their sources are a friend of their sister’s roommate who reads a lot. (They do not mention he mostly reads the National Inquirer or Daily Star, but boy are they devoted to what he says. Almost like Trump telling intelligence officers they don’t know what they are talking about because they don’t read the internet like he does.)
Announce it tomorrow, in order to vote in the primary and general elections- each voter must pass the citizenship test immigrants take to become citizens. Test must be completed one month before the first day of voting by any method. If you fail, they give you a crayon and a child’s menu from Denny’s when you show up to vote. If you pass, you get a genuine ballot and a marker which then gets fed into the tabulation machine. All of the menus are slipped into the slot in a cardboard box that has stickers on it which say “Property of Hugo Chavez” or “Kracken”.
Seriously, if you cannot name an ocean or a continent, if you can’t name a few planets or a few former presidents, if you cannot perform simple arithmetic or point out Europe on a map – you are just not well enough informed to vote in this country. I would personally say that if you believe Donald J.Trump is smart, or rich, or powerful then you are not smart enough to vote. But that would disenfranchise about 74 million red hat wearing “good Christian Americans”.
I really should not post this late at night, bound to go too far and I am sure I just did!
Seriously, am I the only one who thinks making a very accurate and realistic biopic of Trump would serve this country well? You would have to option the actors and director for a sequel in case any of the dozens of lawsuits he is facing turns interesting.
It seems to me a slice of life movie far more accurate than a mockumentary could dare to be, based solely on documented events that genuinely happened would be a huge hit. It should run in prime time on every broadcast and cable network and local channels as well at 8pm Eastern Time, and again at 8pm Pacific Time one night. Then it should run on a loop for a whole month on the history channel and the learning channel. Let people see what Mr. Trump is like behind the scenes for real. No one else thinks this would be worth doing? Really? Is it too soon?
IMHO campaigning against Trump should not be Democrats and progressives lambasting his horrible personality or odious presidential record of divisiveness - that will not reach anyone other than existing non-Trump people.
Instead, use video of Trump himself saying things that are factually wrong, lies, and those divisive comments, as there is so much of that already widely available. Find the clips of him insulting Latinos, Gold Star families and veterans, Black people, Asian people, government workers, and so on. Get the clips of him lying, of which there are so many.
“Don’t take our word for it, or the MSM! Watch and listen to Trump 's own words from his own face-mouth lying to you and telling you that you are worthless and don’t matter.”
Paging The Lincoln Project for such an ad campaign!
I’m kind of surprised they haven’t already laced his Diet Coke with something that would bring one on. But actually, it’s too soon – late '23 would probably be the ideal time.
I’m of two minds concerning a Trump biopic. As others have noted, MAGAt’s would perceive the faithful depiction of actual events as nothing but a ‘political hatchet job’ (e.g.“that isn’t it all how it happened. Trumps phone call to Zelensky was “perfect” I heard him say so dozens of times”). Those who are already familiar with the facts surrounding the aforementioned phone call (e.g. money to help Ukraine military had already been appropriated by Congress when Cheeto asked for a “favor”) already understand the criminal intent underlying the action. The other part of me wants to believe that maybe, just maybe, there are a number of people who have the capacity to maintain an open mind and might be appalled by what they see when it is played out before their eyes on screen. Seeing something on screen makes it all more ‘real’ to their understanding. The possible downside is that even if it makes something seem more ‘real’ it may run the risk of further normalizing this type of criminal behavior if one is already predisposed to being a Believer.
And I think the idea that DeSantis is somehow going to step into Trump’s shoes at some point and command the same level of adoration is absurd.
Most people who voted for Trump weren’t voting for him because he was the GOP candidate like they might have voted for Mitt Romney or John McCain, they were voting for Trump the man, because they liked all that bullshit he did, and his public persona. DeSantis isn’t so… charismatic.
The worst situation I foresee is Trump choosing not to run, but playing kingmaker with someone more competent than himself. A situation where he doesn’t run, but anoints some other candidate, who then gets the nomination AND a lot of reflected Trump glory, and is in a position to potentially be more damaging to the system than Trump was.