Goddamn, dude. Is it possible for conservatives to criticize Trump without somehow working in a dig at the left in the process, or is there some rule that you have to make those snarky asides in order to keep your Conservative Card?
Yeah-“I’m kinda sorry for what my President is doing…you sorry sack of shit” just doesn’t seem very sincere to me.
I would not say that he manipulated stupid people.
He is a con artist who has swayed investors into his schemes in the past and I do not think that it required intelligence in the way that such a phenomenon is normally judged.
Sociopaths manipulate people all the time without being particularly brilliant because the sociopath displays all the cues of a person who is emotionally active without actually feeling any emotion. I am not accusing Trump of being a sociopath, but he appears to have a number of similar features, permitting him to manipulate other people despite lacking anything one would identify as serious intelligence.
People operate much more on emotion than on thought and Trump manipulates that quite well. A number of analysts have pointed out how his investments are under performing by any reasonable measure, but he has gotten ahead by conning other people into providing the capital he then stole, leaving them with the debt. He is not particularly stupid, but he is hardly brilliant.
Do you have any specific examples of what he has done to con anyone since being sworn in as POTUS? Most of the news I hear is of people being pissed off that he is rapidly, through executive orders and some use of the bully pulpit, following through on his major campaign promises.
Or are you saying that his approach will not lead to the ultimate result of a “better” America he claims it will, and he is conning people that way?
Irrelevant to the point of the discussion.
The observation was posted that even if he is manipulating “stupid” people, (not my description), he has to be smart to accomplish that.
My response is that he has a proven record of manipulating people to his own purposes, even people who would normally be regarded as intelligent–his investors. He has done so not through brilliance, (as most financial analysts have regarded his actions as sub-par), but through his ability to overcome emotional resistance to his confidence games.
I have made no observation in this thread regarding his claims that he will make America “better.” He will not because his vision of America ends at the front door to his house and nothing he has said or proposed indicates an actual “better” future for the country, only more wealth and adulation (in his perception) for him.
That, however, was not the point of my remarks.
So why then go on about how he is a con man, and has conned people in the past?
You are making the statement that he is a con man in a thread specifically about his strategy and then asked for details you claim it’s irrelevant:confused:
Are there people who believe he had a big crowd at inauguration? Are there people who believe that his anti-immigrant executive orders have made people safer? Are there people who believe that the standing ovation at his CIA speech was due to support from the intelligence community, rather than from a combination of his bringing his lackeys along and his never inviting his audience to take a seat?
I don’t doubt there are; and, of course those would be examples of Trump conning people.
That is different than the type of con that I believe Tomndebb is suggesting - in your examples whatever con job Trump is doing is to further the agenda his supporters, or those invested in him politically. Tomndebb is suggesting that Trump is somehow not delivering what he said he would to his supporters.
The OP is asserting that Trump lies as part of his strategy for furthering an agenda - and this is the same agenda he was voted in for. One point of agreement I seem to see from any media source - left or right - is the belief that Trump is doing exactly the specific things he said he was going to do. If there are specific major policies he is moving forward with that are at odds with what he campaigned on, i’d be interested to know what they are.
Follow the conversation back: ITR said it takes brains to manipulate stupid people, and that’s what Tom responded to. My examples are examples of his continued manipulation of stupid people.
If all you’re saying is that he’s following through on his proposal, there’s a different sort of con going on there. He hasn’t had much time, but sure enough he’s claiming that taxing Mexican imports will constitute making Mexico pay for the wall; meanwhile it looks like it’s gonna be added on to your and my income tax bill, or else onto the deficit.
But who are the “stupid” people being manipulated in this situation? Even though he lies, exaggerates, mocks, ridicules and generally offends the sensibilities of many there seems do be little dispute that trump is actually taking the exact actions he promised to all along.
The Atlantic had an article positing that Trumps supporters take him seriously but not literally and his detractors take him literally but not seriously. If this is what’s going on then the case that he is conning those who have supported him does not seem particularly strong.
He promised to build a wall. Who did he say would pay for it?
Who is he planning to make pay for it?
Does that match his campaign plan?
Is this what people expected him to do?
I guess you could say that if he hasn’t fulfilled every campaign promise within 10 days of being sworn in that he has effectively conned his supporters. I don’t agree with that assessment, I feel it lacks proper context, and does not establish a proper basis for evaluation.
I agree however that what you say is certainly factually true. He has not built the wall and Mexico has not paid for it, those are indisputable facts.
You misunderstand. He said, "What are we gonna build? (A WALL!) Who’s gonna pay for it? (MEXICO!)
What plan has he put in place? (BUILD A WALL!) Who’s gonna pay for it (THE UNITED STATES, THROUGH BUDGET APPROPRIATIONS CONGRESS IS GONNA MAKE!)
It’s not that he hasn’t finished, it’s that he’s changed the plan, and he’s lying about the change.
This is the third time I’ve explained this, though, so if you still disagree, I’m unlikely to try a fourth time. You quoted me in your previous post talking about how the plan has changed, and then you acted as though I was saying he hadn’t completed the plan, so I’m not real sure you’re trying to understand what I’m saying.
You seem to be getting very mad, and I apologize if I am coming across as obtuse. I really am interested in the factual basis behind what people are asserting here. If he does not get Mexico to pay for the wall, then sure that is a promise he will have gone back on. Like I said before, the notion that Trump is not following through on his campaign promises is not something I am hearing much about from any news source.
Impatient and bored with the back and forth, yes. My anger has more important targets than you right now :).
Occam’s Razor. Trump is nothing more than a low-class git who is now out of his league and does not know what he’s doing. The notion that he may be some sort of genius mastermind is laughable, to say the least.
I think that Ben Carson already demonstrated how one can be a genius at something, but be hopeless in almost all other endeavors.
I think that many should give up on the idea that Trump was not successful in business. The focus should had been on how he became successful. Many times it was because he was a genius at identifying people that could be conned at the highest levels.
Indeed. I knew one of the top brain surgeons in Thailand, and he was a true idiot in all other realms of his life.
It’s not a question of whether he succeeds at this effort, it’s the fact he has abandoned the effort (that we all knew, and Mexico said, was impossible). That’s the “factual basis.” He’s asking the United States Congress to pay for the wall.
Ok, I can see where that is clearly a campaign promise that has changed.
I still think the OP’s idea holds water though. If he made 10 campaign promises and kept 9 and then then 10th one he changed part of is that really solid evidence he’s swindled his supporters? It seems a forest and trees situation.
In my saying this, the charge can be leveled that goalposts are being moved, but to my mind the goalposts have not even been established. I don’t see any attempt to establish any context within which to evaluate Trump’s actions. For example, as far as I know, no president kept every campaign promise.
If I were to be convinced the the OP’s hypothesis has no merit I would have to see at least a few specific actions that show a general trend of going against Trump’s proposed platform.