I don’t think Berlusconi was as bad as Trump, but that is who people compare him to. Granted, I do not know a lot about Berlusconi, but wasn’t he an actual self made billionaire (implying he had some business sense)? He was controversial and prone to crime and corruption, but he wasn’t jaw dropping stupid I don’t think.
Could any other wealthy, developed country have a candidate as transparently deranged, dishonest and unqualified as Trump, and still win major office? Or is that American exceptionalism?
There are controversial candidates out there like Le Pen, but I don’t think I’d call them unqualified the way Trump is.
Trump is a mix of a wide range of negative traits.
Emotionally unstable. Immature. Mentally deficient, Extremely arrogant, corrupt, prone to crime, dishonest, plays on people’s darker motives, etc.
But a variety of politicians hit some of those things. Berlusconi was prone to crime and corruption. But he wasn’t totally unqualified mentally and emotionally to be prime minister.
Putin, to my knowledge, is not totally unqualified either. People may not agree with Putin’s leadership, but he doesn’t seem to give off vibes of being mentally and emotionally unqualified to lead. Even Rob Ford in Canada, he may have had problems but was he unqualified? Yeltsin was a drunk, but I don’t think he was unqualified.
I can’t think of anyone in a modern nation to compare Trump to, or think if it could happen anywhere else.
True. Austria, France, and Italy are experimenting with extreme-right candidates that make Trump look almost rational.
But in the U.S., we’ve never had anything close to this bad. This colon-hammer makes James Buchanan, Andrew Jackson, Richard Nixon, and GWB look decent in comparison.
Please explain why 16 years of service in the KGB wouldn’t qualify someone for higher levels in government. Then explain why George H.W. Bush’s service as Director of the CIA didn’t disqualify him.
Besides his service in the KGB, Putin had almost 10 years of political experience in Leningrad and in Yeltsin’s administration before being elected President. He was far more qualified than Trump when he was elected. But it’s almost impossible to be less qualified than Trump.
Putin was a Lieutenant-Colonel in the KGB, although some claim he was a Major, and 2nd-in-command at the Dresden KGB Residency when the USSR collapsed. That is a very respectable rank, but whilst I cannot find how many colonels, lieutenant-colonels and majors the KGB had, I’m gonna guess that since the entire body had nearly half a million people, there was a metric ton-load.
He wouldn’t have gained government experience in the KGB, any more than the average army officer or CIA person; and he really wasn’t a very important person in 1989, let alone, as some nutters believe, the Head of the KGB. I imagine he’s just naturally skilled at what he does.
Most people are not geniuses and most people are uninformed on most topics. Any system which allows the popular vote to determine the winner of a major office is completely open to a similar result.
The US has probably largely been saved by the parties, who nominate candidates from within their ranks. Trump lucked out that the Republican platform is so strict that the more candidates put forward, the more it splits the vote, during the primaries. There’s insufficient room to allow for professionals to really distinguish themselves. Trump would have lost if there had only been one traditional party nominee to compete with.
Presumably, some similar occurrence could manifest in another country.
Given the general move towards creating populist democracies and away from maintaining technocratic republics, we should expect similar events to occur with greater frequency. Merry Christmas.
Anyway, there is tremendous consolation for the rest of the world, in the spirit of Innocent Fun.
For the next four years and eternity, we are able to meet Americans, pump their hands enthusiastically, and say: "You very lucky. Only in America ! Mr. Trump he very good man. We have nothing like him in my country."
As I said, he had almost 10 years experience in government in Leningrad and the Yeltsin administration before he became President, which is 10 years more than Trump has.
Come to think of it, Trump and Yeltsin could be cousins if not brothers — first time I connected them. Wonder if they ever met when Boris came over to fraternise with Bill.
Of course, Mr. Trump is a teetotaller, whilst Yeltsin was not. Which presumably saves us from seeing him drunkenly wandering the White House lawns in his underwear waving a bottle as did the Russian president when needed.
a) He came close enough that I wouldn’t put that down as a systemic success.
b) If we assume that 5% of the country is literally off-their-rocker, then our expectation would be that, at most, Trump could have secured 5% of the vote and overall had a 0% chance of winning the election. That is very far from the reality.
c) There was nothing to stop an equally poor candidate from running on the Democratic side.
Absolutely no chance that an equivalent Trump figure could get elected to the highest office in the UK.
I know that the world has been a very strange place this year but no, It could not happen.
Any one of the hundreds of horrible, hateful things that Trump said would see an equivalent UK candidate horsewhipped on the steps of their club. Pussygate alone would have been the end for him. Plus Trump could never withstand the heat of PMQ’s or command the loyalty of their own members of parliament.
Trump lost the popular vote by 2.8 million votes, the largest deficit in US history. How is that remotely close? That is more than five times bigger than the 544,000 by which George W. Bush lost to Al Gore in 2000. To say he came close enough is ludicrous. He’s President because of the electoral college, but that is in no way a measure of popularity.
If someone like Trump aimed at being prime minister of Norway he’d first have to establish a political party or be elected, by the party members, to be their candidate for prime minister. Next he’d have to get enough people to vote for that party and, most likely, get other parties to support his government. Highly unlikely someone will ever do that without at least gaining some political qualifications along the way.