Ahhh, I wasn’t aware:
It also depends on who controls the House, where there’s still a slim possibility that the Democrats take control. Yes, not looking good, but not yet a done deal for the GOP to hold it.
If by some miracle the Democrats do regain control of the House and do their best to rein in the worst of the right’s efforts, you can bet Trump et al. will blame everything that goes wrong on the evil Deep State demon Democrats.
One thing I keep thinking about - 73 million Americans voted for Trump, which is a mere 21% of the population. Apathy was the worst enemy of the Democrats. But if Trump implements his plans, and there is no reason to suspect that he won’t, inflation is going to skyrocket and people are going to start to hurt. I see that apathy potentially dissolving before the midterms. And no matter what Trump’s plans may be, if he loses the House and Senate in 2026, he is effectively neutered. We need to be laser focused on 2026.
I fully agree. I hope he gets his fucking tariffs and inflation surges back. A bit of short term pain for the long term gain.
“Immigrants” is just racist code for “people who aren’t white Christians”; as long as his followers can look around and see anyone who isn’t white they’ll have somebody to blame as an “immigrant”. So for that target alone he could deport or kill nearly 40% of the American population before running out. And of course there’s also women, non-Christians, Democrats, LGBTQ people; by the time he runs out of people to blame the nation would be outright depopulated.
I can’t say I’m familiar enough with Kierkegaard to hazard a recommendation. I merely take the notion that belief is an act of will from him, which googling tells me originates in the Philosophical Fragments. The more pertinent reference is William James’ The Will to Believe, which expounds on the notion that it may be reasonable to adopt a belief even while having no evidence of its truth, as for instance such evidence may only become available upon adopting this belief. (A simplified example is the belief that one will do well in delivering a presentation: this belief may be instrumental in actually doing so, and hence, a reasonable one, but prior to its adoption one may not have had any compelling justification.) (Both Kierkegaard and James talk about belief here in the sense of religious faith, but the idea has broader applicability.)
Then let’s hope its not like rabies, where once the disease is manifest, there’s pretty much no more hope for a cure.
I mean, they’re not really trying anymore, are they? Project 2025 isn’t some leaked secret document, it’s an out in the open plan for rolling back decades of social progress. They are now increasingly saying the quiet parts out loud, and find that it helps rather than hinders them.
I mean, sure—just on the same day Trump was reelected, here in Germany, our government coalition effectively self-destructed, and it was announced that the attempt to find a state coalition for the state of Saxony had failed, in large part due to the gains of extremist parties. So yeah, things are shitty all around—but how is that supposed to be a point of comfort? Seems like a sane world could at least offer some stabilizing influence on the US, but with modern interconnectedness, every local instability exacerbates the instability of the whold.
The thing is that in order to ‘solve the problem’, it’s all too easy to claim to need more and more power concentrated on the executive—“I would kick out the immigrants/build the wall/uproot the deep state, but they are still too powerful”. And once enough power has been consolidated in this way, there’s no real need for any sham problem that only existed to facilitate this consolidation in the first place anymore.
How many effects of his numerous heinous, incompetent, and downright illegal acts has Trump suffered, though? He’s literally tried to overthrow the government, and still was elected president a couple years after. His mismanagement of the Covid pandemic alone should’ve been enough to make him a political nonperson permanently. It might be that inflation would be the straw to break the camel’s back, but so far, it’s been an incredibly fucking sturdy ungulate.
Wnell, many have perceived his remarks regarding Ukraine as essentially threatening to cut off all aid, and let’s not forget that he previously held back aid for Ukraine in the hopes of pressuring them to launch an investigation into his phony claims regarding Hunter Biden, leading to his impeachment, so there may be a personal axe to grind there as well.
Regarding Palestine, not to get too far into it, but here’s a telling reaction:
“The threat of a Palestinian state is off the table,” Yisrael Ganz, the head of the umbrella settler organisation the Yesha Council, declared on Wednesday in a statement welcoming Trump’s election. “This is a historical moment and opportunity for the settlement movement … Now, with the election of President Trump, it is time to change reality in Judea and Samaria [the West Bank] as well, to ensure it will for ever be a part of Israel and to ensure the security of the Jewish state.”
Plus, with Trumps history of defunding UNRWA, recognizing Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights in defiance of 52 years of UN consensus, recognizing the West Bank settlements as legitimate, and moving the US embassy to Jerusalem, thereby recognizing it as the Israeli capital, make it quite clear where he stands on the matter.
I mean, he has literally called the current American leadership class a ‘tumor’ that should be ‘ripped out’. That’s not going to buy him too much goodwill, I’d think. But you may be right that he’s just looking for whatever next bandwagon to hop on to, after all, in 2016 he famously called Trump a reprehensible idiot. Let’s hope he’ll be faced with enough of a headwind to turn his flag again sometime soon.
Actually, I think more-or-less natural and inevitable economic cycles are such that we’ll have some kind of downturn* over the next several years, whoever is in power** – so maybe the “positive case for Trump 2.0” is that Harris and the Dems avoid “owning” this downturn, and will reap this benefit in 2028 (like Bill Clinton in 1992 or Barack Obama in 2008). Cleaning up the Republican mess, yet again.
(*It could be inflation-driven, but I think unemployment will be more of the effect. Of course, voters have shown that they are okay with not having a job, as long as the price of Corn Flakes stays exactly the same forever.)
(**Of course, since Trump won and the GOP hold Congress, the downturn will be made much worse by Republican policies, as they always do, going back to Hoover).
Maybe not be on the net so much or on doomer feeds.
Agreed.
This is an interesting question. Is Trump going to do this just to do it, regardless of the consequences? If consequences start hitting, will he do nothing?
I think we need to divide Trump’s bad ideas into two piles:
- Those that would at least deliver what his side wants.
- Those that would hurt everyone, including his side.
A huge across-the-board tariff is definitely #2. Mass deportations would look like #1 at first but quickly turn into #2.
See, I don’t think Trump or the GOP want to fail per se. They do not IMO want to come in and immediately make inflation and job numbers worse. Home affordability, etc. They want to make these better while doing a bunch of stuff that we don’t want. Again IMO, this is a key factor if we want to predict their behavior going forward.
Yes, tariffs are the one thing that Trump can actually do, that will directly (negatively) impact the economy. Prices will rise, and when other countries retaliate, exports will drop, leading to job losses. That’s a double-whammy on the economy.
If he does try to follow through on his deportation plans, that will make it even worse. We may see a day when the sitting president really is responsible for most of the economic problems the US faces.
That’s the thing; he doesn’t actually have a side, he just has himself. His followers are all utterly expendable; he won’t care if they go hungry any more than he cared if they died of COVID. They are not Trump, and are therefore worth nothing.
I heartly endorse this post.
Sort of… but sort of not?!
I saw or read a pundit saying that Trump has brought together a coalition of working-class whites, Blacks, and Latinos with a male focus. I saw someone else saying that, having talked to a lot of Latinxs, the number of them that are pissed about immigration is quite large. (Quick anecdote, I was on a dating site, maybe in 2020, and was talking to a Black woman who had a lot of political opinions, and she herself was raging against immigrants, saying that they end up competing with African-Americans for jobs. So maybe Trump’s “Black jobs” comments, as crude as they were, had some salience with Black people. Any Black Dopers care to comment?)
I think one brilliant thing Trump has done–and the numbers absolutely prove it IMO–is stoke the rage anxiety of downscale whites while managing to bring in a large number of Black and Latinx people.
So this factor is important, IMO, in how he will be able to blame people and go nuts.
I myself think that Trump is going to be more subdued this term. Not just because of his mental and physical state but because he really wanted to win again to regain the status of POTUS and evade legal consequences. I don’t think he’s Hitler in 1933, genuinely eager to implement an ideology and completely remake the country.
Maybe… but the people around him will be pols and players with their own agenda. As one example, JD Vance wants not just to be president (after Trump is incapacitated, if that happens) but be elected president in 2028.
Trump is not a god who can just wave his hand and make things happen. He needs people to help him. They may be bad people, but they have their own vision of “success.”
And while he’s consistent about always playing for himself, he can be inconsistent on what the play is.
True!
Short Version-I asked a Hispanic/Latino friend why so many Hispanic/Latino voters voted for Trump when he clearly hated them so much. I gave many examples of Trump’s hatred and bigotry. I was shocked to learn that the friend I was talking to was a Trumpist. He said that he and others had voted for Trump because he could ‘make things affordable again’, He also called all my examples “made up lies” and suggested I ‘should stop reading such warped media’ and ‘do my own research’. I explained that I had seen the “Good people on both sides” clip, the clip of a comedian at a Republcan event calling Puerto Rico “a floating island of garbage” and the clip of Vance saying he could not comment on that joke or the comedian because he had not seen it and Vance saying ‘But sometimes humor is offensive and we should just get over it’ on the loca news. The rest of the examples were taken from Trump ads that had Trump endorsing the message at the end. My friend said he did not care. It would not affect him or his family. He would be safe.
That false belief is I think common among many groups who voted Trump. ‘He only hates illegal immigrants. I am here legally. Therefore, I will be safe’ Other false beliefs include thinking wealth, popularity, or belonging to the correct political party will keep you safe. Any non white person living in America is in for a very bad time.
Or any LGBT+ person or woman of reproductive years or person with disabilities or reliant on Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid, SNAP, or non-Christian.
I cannot disagree with your post, mostly on account of it being the truth. I have said many times and in many places, LGBTQ rights will almost immediately to pre Stonewall. Florida has had DeSantos’ “Don’t Say Gay” law on the books for some time now. Other states have passed law requiring, for example, all school personel to inform a student’s parents if-
They begin going by a name that does not match their birth certifcate
They claim to be a different gender than the one on their birth certificate
They wear clothes that do not match the gender on their birth certificate
etc
I expect Conversion Therapy to become legal again.
Transitioning to another gender in any way will be a criminal offense. HRT will only be covered by insurance, and legal for cis gendered patients only and only for certain conditions. Any licensed provider of medical services who helps a patient transition will permanently lose their license, be heavily fined, and face a long term in prison.
Things just get worse from there.