Still better to be in the position of Cheney endorsing Harris than Gore endorsing Trump.
Well, sure. I’m not saying it’s a terrible thing. Just that it’s not really much of a plus, either. Not worth celebrating, anyway.
It’s surprising, but maybe it shouldn’t be. Trump is good at appealing to immature, less-educated, hypermasculine types of people—like many young men, WWE fans, and police (for which their largest labor union just endorsed him).
Young women are better-educated and evidently more discerning than their counterparts.
Possibly.
But the fact that the GOP’s plank is basically anathema to any young woman looking to secure her own health or security or rights may also have a little to do with it.
Less so for many young men, for whom “hey, we’re going to make things terrible for everybody else but y’all will make out pretty well by comparison” sounds pretty good.
People can be terrible. We’re often less concerned with what we stand to gain and more concerned that somebody else gets it worse.
As far as I know, they haven’t been on speaking terms since W refused to fully pardon Dick’s chief of staff, Scooter Libby in 2009. Ironically, it was Trump who finally pardoned Libby.
I hope this part is widely publicized. Before Donald Trump, Roy Cohn was the mentor and chief counsel for the notorious Joe McCarthy, directly responsible for the “Red Scare”, one of the darkest periods in American history. Trump is following exactly in those footsteps, for the same purpose of achieving personal power with a scorched-earth policy against everything and everyone that stands in his way.
McCarthy was eventually stopped because even then, with paranoia about the USSR and hugely exaggerated perceptions about the spread of communism, McCarthy was eventually seen as promulgating lies and fabricated scare tactics solely for personal gain. Today, thanks in part to social media and the decline of responsible journalism, Trump gets away with what McCarthy could not, though the subject has shifted from “communism” to “the economy” and “immigration”, but the lies are much the same, and Trump has even managed to revive the “communism” angle.
.
No.
I’ve been hearing a lot recently about a supposed crisis among young men. And this is on places like NPR, so it isn’t an anti-woke thing. The argument goes that young women are outcompeting young men in the workforce and universities, partly because they mature earlier. I’m not saying this is true, but if it is, it would certainly explain why young males might be attracted to someone like Trump.
I don’t know. How can Trump win? Some sort of cult maybe.
georgehtakei
Donald Trump went on a tangent during a Fox News town hall on Wednesday about how he understands nuclear weapons ‘maybe better than anybody’ simply because his uncle was a professor at MIT.
“Crisis” seems hyperbolic. Politically the simple fact though is that there are now more women completing college than men, and men without college degrees lean Trump.
Trump’s biggest play is to resentment. Other groups moving up and passing you in status that your group had previously been granted by identity alone is a big source of that resentment. Even non-college educated GenZ who explicitly endorse many feminist values may bristle some inside despite that of all the orders they have to take from higher educated bosses, just more so when they are women. Heck even some college educated Gen Z men might.
McCarthy’s rise (“I have here in my hand a list”) and fall (Senate censure) took just under five years. Trumpism has been bigger and worse and much longer. Will next Tuesday night be the “have you no shame” moment where Trump loses his alure? I hope so, but after each new rhetorical low, DJT still roughly ties in polls and forecasts.
Harris has had a good run since Biden endorsed her and there may not be any more upside. That’s not a prediction, just an all-too-plausible speculation.
The media continues to disappoint with their toothless treatment of trump. The Today Show was on in the background this morning, and Cheney’s endorsement of Harris came up as a topic. I said to my wife “watch this” thinking they’d show the “money quote” from Cheney that trump can “never be trusted with power again”. But they just made a vague reference that Cheney said he considered trump a threat and did show a pull quote from Cheney, but a pretty mild one.
Now this is what I love about this place. I did not know about the Roy Cohn connection or step to Joe McCarthy. Now Trump’s shift from Dem to Rep and choice of marketing strategy makes more sense. He went back to what he learned early.
More on that younger voter gender gap - it isn’t new. Bigger sure, but look at these numbers from Obama v Romney.
Specifically that the gender gap was second largest among the youngest voting group with only whites who attended church monthly to yearly having a bigger gender gap.
Trump’s explicit appeal to resentment exaggerates the young male move towards the GOP but it precedes him.
“A midget standing on the shoulders of giants” as it were.
Although as demagogues in US history go, trump is certainly outstanding in his field.
More’s the pity.
I went to college a little later in life and graduated with by BA in History in 2008. There were more young women in my anthropology courses and probably a few more men in my history classes. When it came to campus activities run by the history or anthropology departments, women absolutely dominated. They were running the show as the officers and they made up the bulk of volunteers. I was VP of our chapter of Phi Alpha Theta and I was the only man among the officers. When we took group trips to see exhibits the participants were overwhelmingly women. There were a few times I was the only guy.
At the time I wondered why there were so few men involved in these kinds of campus activities. I was more concerned with my studies than I was in answer that question though. But for whatever reason, it looked to me like young men had no interest in participating. I know this isn’t true for everyone, it was just my observation from my own limited point of view.
Yeah, don’t forget this gem: A Trump voter hurt by the shutdown’s incredibly revealing quote | Vox
“He’s not hurting the people he needs to be hurting.”
This is the mentality many of those troglodytes share.
So… just had an interaction with two people, one almost certainly a Trumper, and one possibly so: my real estate agent and her friend, who is helping with my mother’s estate sale. Note that these are two very likable, non-idiot-seeming sixty-something women.
So the friend was going on and on about migrants being put in hotels by the government in Lake County, Indiana. Said that large numbers were getting off a bus at Cracker Barrel. No idea of the truth value of this. But the talking points and attitude were undisguised Trumpism. I mean, she was explaining the whole thing by saying Venezuela was emptying out its prisons and insane asylums, so, umm, yeah.
My real estate agent did not oppose what the friend was saying and was chiming in a little bit. She has also said a few things in the past that hinted at a Trumpian attitude. So I’m not completely sure but would not be surprised.
So let’s focus on the friend, since she’s a clearer case. I think what we see here is someone buying into the Trumpian template for viewing things and just running with it. There is also clearly a lack of compassion for the people in question. But there is some underlying story to deal with, probably.
And I think that’s how Trumpism works for a lot of people. There is some actual thing in their lives or things they heard about on TV or online that they don’t like, and instead of trying to figure out the actual truth, the Trumpian talking points are good enough, and Bob’s your uncle. Ready-made worldview purchased and displayed. Usually the talking points involve getting pissed at the Other, so you have a little bit of stupid and a little bit of evil, mix in peer pressure and influence, and you have a mild Trumper.
Yes, I had not know the connection to McCarthy. Very interesting!