Trump and Americans

Politics & Elections
21

I hate Trump’s presidency, yes, but I’m rather sure I would have hated Ted Cruz’s presidency almost as much, and maybe more. It’s the Republican party that is sick – Trump is the symptom.

I don’t think that you can reduce human character down to a single vote – ignorance can lead to malice but it doesn’t necessarily do so. Whether someone voted for him as ‘bad’ is something I’d judge on a case by case basis. But in an ideal world, I’d take their right to vote away. They’re badly misinformed citizens at minimum.

22

I agree with a lot of what is being said here. I will add that literally everything that comes out of his mouth or Twitter account is a lie or at the very least suspicious. It’s like whatever he says, the opposite is true, and whatever he accuses others of doing, he is doing that very thing himself.

As for what to make of Trump voters, pretty much what What Exit says, and this…

23

As far as I’m concerned he’s a gangster, a mobbed up guy with a barely legitimate business. He ran a scam (Trump University) designed to bilk seniors and the desperate unemployed out of their life savings. The only reason he didn’t go down for it was he did what he always did when he got caught committing fraud, he gave everyone their money back in order to not be found guilty.

There was another case (Trump Soho) where his kids were caught running a scam, and they returned everyone’s money as long as they agreed not to cooperate with the Manhattan DA’s criminal case - it pissed off the DA but Trump gave him a campaign contribution to calm him down.

Everyone seems to think that Trump is always being unfairly maligned, but I don’t know why there hasn’t been more attention paid to his mobbed up past and his association with felons like Al Pirro ( yes, Jeanine’s hubby ) Did you know when she was Westchester County DA that sensitive information her office handled kept being mysteriously leaked to the mob? That’s one reason she quit politics and went into entertainment.

So I dislike Trump because he’s a gangster and a conman and everyone that voted for him was gullible enough to vote for for a gang boss and a conman. He has less than zero respect for the law, law enforcement has been his decades long avowed enemy.

That’s why I don’t care about what Trump says, he’s a con man running a game. The debates were a farce, like listening to Warren Buffet and Bernie Madoff pitch their investment strategies.

24

Two things:

  1. A significant – but not the biggest – problem with Trump is that he has no policies. “Building the wall” and “banning Muslims from shithole countries” and all the rest of his twittereha are not policy positions of any kind, they’re fantastical rantings of a geriatric racist asshole. Trump has and never did have any policy positions or visions for what changes would make the country better or benefit its citizens. The only thing he cares about, and he has made this abundantly clear, is 1) enriching himself and his family, preferably at the expense of the US taxpayer, and 2) punishing / hurting / denigrating those he feels are inferior to him (which is pretty much everyone). If he did have actual policies, he has no idea how (or interest) in working with congress to move his agenda forward. He believes that he can rule by decree via Twitter, and that’s the end of it. In other words, he’s a really shitty leader and politician. Before 2016 I often heard people pine for a president who wasn’t a politician, but obviously being a politician takes experience and skill, and frankly (as we’re seeing with Trump) pretty much is a required qualification if the president is going to be able to do even a half-assed job (see Bush II).

  2. He’s cut from the same bolt of cloth as Mao Zedong, Kim Il-sung, and Adolf Hitler (yes, I went there). He’s an overt racist who managed, mostly through luck, to get into a position of power. He has used this position of power to denigrate “others,” champion his supporters, and deliberately divide the country – his people on one side of the demarcation line, literally everyone else on earth on the other side. And that is all he has ever fucking done. He’s a one-trick pony and his only trick hatred and bitterness. When he called for the summary execution of innocent people and the extrajudicial imprisonment of his political rivals, he crossed the line from being a overtly opinionated but otherwise somewhat normal wannabe politician to wannabe despot and tyrant. What separates him from the above mentioned monsters is his abject stupidity and laziness. What he has managed to do though is get ~70MM people to come out of the woodwork and openly support someone who’s only schtick is, like the angry grandpa at thanksgiving dinner, yelling and bitching hateful and racist screeds. While they all have their own reasons for supporting him, the end result is a massive number of people openly supporting the destruction of American democratic norms and constitutional protections, even if its indirectly. He’s managed to bring out the worst in millions on top of millions of people, and get powerful news networks to a very large extent march to the beat of his drum For instance witness Sean Hannity, who personally despises Trump but will publicly bend over for him at every opportunity.

Trump is a soulless monster who managed to become, for four long years, one of the if not the most powerful person on Earth. And we will be dealing with the negative effects of that for generations to come. It is not an exaggeration to say that Donald Trump may very well have been the catalyst that brought America to its knees.

And that’s why I hate him.

Define “dismiss.” A lot of Trump supporters I know support him because he’s the Republican president. He’s on “their” team and since the mid-90’s Republicans have been browbeating their members that anyone who was not a Republican is an actual enemy of America. Remember during the Iraq war when Bush said that if you weren’t with him, you were against him and Fox started taking that literally? Or when Obama became the Marxist Kenyan Muslim? Republicans have been told for decades that their policies, their platform, and their opinions are the only valid ones the US. So when Donald Trump became their standard bearer they had no choice but to fall in line: to do so otherwise was treason – literal treason. To not support Donald Trump was to not support the Republican party and by extension not support America as an ideal, freedom loving republic. So they supported Trump because, due to years of propaganda, that was literally their only option. So I would dismiss them as having poor critical thinking and analytical skills. But a MAGA-hat wearing douchebag standing on the streetcorner waving a “STOP THE STEAL!!!” sign? The Proud Boy-types that advocate violent resistance to minor inconveniences suggested by Democratic politicians? I want nothing to do with those morons.

There’s also the segment of the population that still suffer the delusion that the Republican party supports fiscal conservatism, independent personal liberties, lower taxes, and the usual Regan-era talking points. Clearly that hasn’t been actual Republican policy (despite what they claim) for decades, but some people just don’t see that. Those people… I just roll my eyes and change the subject. Because while you might be able to fight ignorance (Hi, Cecil!), you can’t fix stupid.

25

As others have said “hate” is too strong a word but there are many many reasons I do not like the Trump administration. Some important ones:

  1. His attempt to get Ukraine to pretend to be investigating Biden.
  2. Downplaying COVID (and trying to blame the Democrats for hyping it) when he knew how serious it was.
  3. Publicly lobbying for his DOJ to arrest his political opponents.

I don’t hate Trump voters. For a subset I understand how they can convince themselves that a vote for Trump is better than a vote for Biden. I do not understand at all those who think Trump is doing a good job. A conservative baboon could have done better at pushing the GOP agenda.

26

I would go a step farther with this: Republican voters have been told for decades that their policies, platform and opinions are what God demands. The marrying of the religious right to the Republican Party has been arguably the significant political event of the last half-century in the United States. It started before Trump and will still be a problem for this nation long after Trump is gone, I fear.

27

I don’t hate Trump only because to hate something requires an emotional investment in it, and I can’t bring myself to do that in his case.

My feelings for people who vote for him range between pity and fatigue. I believe most supporters either (A) just don’t have enough information to realize what he’s doing and what he says is so reprehensible or (B) hate what he is against so much that they are willing to overlook it. Probably a combination of the two. I really think it’s a minority of people who are well-informed and still honestly support him and his policies.

28

This. The man is just utterly despicable, and I hate him with bile and venom. (Memo: don’t invite him and me to dinner at the same time. It won’t go well.)

29

We’re really doing this?

With Trump, to find why people are disgusted with him, we only need to look at the current news, since he manages to produce fresh outrages on a regular basis.

Right now it’s disputing the election. No president in modern history has refused to concede an election. (In 2000 the election was close enough that recounts were requested in Florida, but at the end of that process, despite being incomplete, Gore conceded).
An incumbent refusing to acknowledge an election result is normally a call for sanctions for that country – it’s a clear wannabe dictator move, and something we just don’t see in the developed world. Trump has made countless baseless claims about voting machines and fraud that has whipped his base into a fury – based on nothing. And used every lever he can, legal and otherwise.
Once again, he puts his own ambitions above the well being of american citizens and the country itself. I think we can all agree at this point, he will never concede.

If his only scandal was refusing to concede and spreading harmful conspiracy theories about the election, it would already be a big scandal for the history books; bigger than Watergate IMO. But for Trump, it’s just one among many.

30

For me it’s easy.

Corruption flourishes when not kept in check. You can’t have just a little. Corruption is an existential threat, our relative lack of it up and down the govt bureaucracy is an important part of what allowed this country to actually be great. This is a corrupt administration.

You can talk about pardons in exchange for political favors, exploiting loopholes that relied on decency and common sense, demonizing intellectuals, or just treating the office as a four-year cash-grab, it’s all corruption to an extreme new to this country.

To achieve it, he has cynically appealed to the very worst in people, dividing the country to gain political leverage. Most of the awful policies he’s signed are to further that goal, not to actually improve anything.

31

Incompetence, criminality, corruption, pandering to the worst in people, authoritarianism, treason, child molestation, rape. The list of reasons to dislike Trump is very very long. Someone once said Trump didn’t have a personality, just a collection of negative personality traits. Thats very accurate, Trump is basically the seven deadly sins combined in one person.

I dismiss everyone who voted for him as either ignorant or immoral. Either you lack something important mentally or emotionally to vote for someone like him. I have respect for Trump voters who understand how deranged and evil he is, but who voted for him anyway due to things like abortion, judges, tax cuts, etc. If you can look at what a disaster Trump is, understand it and vote for it anyway I have more respect for people like that than people who are oblivious to what a trainwreck he is.

However you can’t look at Trump w/o seeing how deranged and immoral he is. If someone can’t see it and voted for him they are either irresponsible or they are morally defective.

I disagreed with Bush, mcCain, romney, etc on the issues but I never loathed them or loathed their voters the way I loathe Trump and his enablers.

32

Because he had no plan. He downplayed the severity of the virus because he didn’t want to alarm the public. He hosted crowded campaign rallies where few people wore masks. He promoted questionable treatments such as chloroquine and injecting oneself with bleach. He denounced the top doctors on his coronavirus task force as a bunch of idiots. He rejects the science and since the election he has done nothing but sit with his thumb up his ass and post whiny tweets about how the election was stolen from him. It all comes down to his narcissism and how in his mind, he has all of the answers and no one else has a clue.

33

Ah I missed that quote

It’s not Trump’s “immaturity” making people angry, it’s 326,000 dead and 18 million sick.
Think of how many lives could have been saved had the US set up extensive federal testing and tracing early on, mandated mask use as soon as scientists suggested so, encouraged local lockdowns and provided adequate PPE.

It’s true that there are other countries that responded poorly, and their citizens should be angry too. But the US is the cherry atop the poop emoji.

34

The biggest problem that has persisted throughout this administration is that he has encouraged people to be ignorant assholes. He cheers the worst qualities in people and denigrates decency. This is how he got into the whitehouse, and he has carried it forward enthusiastically.

The Republican Party has been playing to the basest instincts of its base, and this guy just one-upped them, using their own game to great advantage, and they have been afraid to challenge his mastery of them, thus letting him drag them even lower.

I really hold nothing against stupid people and think that sometimes society treats them much worse than it ought to, but I also do not think stupidity belongs in positions of power. Add obnoxious to that and, well, we have seen the result.

35

With every word he’s spoken, every action he’s taken since he rode that fucking escalator in 2015, he has radiated contempt for every worthwhile value the United States of America has ever aspired to.

Fine.

He hates America; this American hates him right back.

And I disdain any American who voted for him this year (and most of the ones who did in 2016). Why? Because now that they’ve seen him in action for four years, they’re either as contemptuous of America as he is, or they’re too stupid to care about.

36

None of that was put in place in the UK either until much later on. Johnson and his team haven’t come in for any hate, or even major criticism, not really. Same elsewhere.

How much better would covid have been handled in the US with a different president In office?

37

Firstly I disagree that all that stuff applies to the UK; eg we did advocate for masks after scientists started recommending them.

Secondly, I forgot stuff like spreading dangerous advice and conspiracy theories, and disbanding the pandemic response team, none of which applies to the UK.

Finally BJ has come in for criticism, indeed, widespread calls to resign. It’s true that covid is only one part of that, but I think it would be very misleading to imply he has avoided criticism.

38

But masks weren’t compulsory in public in the UK in public for a long time, despite clear evidence and common sense in support of them. Government too scared to offend people by making them compulsory.

Johnsons had much less criticism than I expected to be honest.
UK gov advice has been contradictory all the way through. Their actions have been entirely self serving.

39

There’s a difference though between masks not being compulsory and actively disparaging masks, making it a political issue.
Mr_Hoogly, are you British? If you’re a Brit surprised that Trump is so loathed, then I find that surprising.
Most people I know, even spectator-subscribing lifelong Tory supporters generally can’t stand the man. Because outside of the fox and uber-fox media bubble, which most Brits are, you can’t help but notice what a scumbag Trump is. Such that even having the world’s worst response to corona is just another note on a long list of fuckups and outrages.

40

Let’s also see Trump not only for the toxically narcissistic individual that he is but more so for what he represents.

Let’s not forget that Trump actually had a previous foray into presidential politics in the 2000 election and failed so badly he was barely an afterthought. This was after his rise in the 1980s and appearing on Oprah and other shows in which he was flattered with questions wondering whether or not he’d ever run for president. He failed not only because he didn’t win as a Reform Party candidate; he failed because…nobody took his message seriously. As in 2015, Trump in 2000 didn’t really have a message except for one thing, which was “I’m not like these doofuses, I’m a tough guy who will stand up for you.” In 2000, we had alerady vanquished the Soviet Union and communism. We were living in peace time. We had middle class stabilization. People didn’t want the system challenged. They thought the guys in those spiffy suits up in there ‘Warshington’ were basically dishonest and sleazy, but effective. They at least stayed out of our way.

Between 2000 and 2015, we had 9/11, an invasion and occupation based on manipulated intel, and a financial crisis that crushed the middle class. We had persistent wage stagnation that began in the 1970s and income and wealth inequality not seen in a century. The system that once created a stable working class was now responsible for inequality.

Looking at this from a purely ecological viewpoint, we had a population that was able to grow and acquire an extremely high standard of living – this was true even among the lower rungs of our middle class. A middle class person in the developed world would have the lifestyle of comparable to an extremely wealthy high-level bureaucrat in many parts of the world, even if he/she lacked the same degree of political deference. What the average person in America was once able to possess with minimal debt to income ratios was impressive, and this abundance was something every American came to expect to at least have the opportunity to achieve. Our industrial production and the efficiency of our distribution made this a reasonable expectation, but more so, it was the fact that American labor, the individual’s employment, was tied to directly to that capital output and wealth creation. So was his income.

All of that changed gradually over time, through automation and through outsourcing. As the American economy became more effective - almost perfect - at increasing the margins of profitability and efficiency, the individual laborer’s actual physical work became less tied to that growth of output and wealth. Capitalist production was there, but its separation from individual American laborer’s or job-seeker’s work became less sustaining for the American household’s income and way of life.

The American household was taking repeated knees to the groin from the billionaire class. Donald Trump saw that and exploited it. Because he is a fake billionaire and not a real one, and he knows that everyone in the elite class knows it, he is man filled with a lifetime of personal grievances of having not been taken seriously by certain members of the elite class, and he was uniquely suited to channel his own fury into a campaign that Americans identified with.

Donald Trump’s presidency has been bad, and it will have lasting consequences, not the least of which is the fact that right now, somewhere out there, is not another Donald Trump but a monster – a monster who would love to be able to capitalize on increasingly fragile political and economic system and tear it apart to rebuild a society in his own image. We are lucky that Donald Trump is not an ideological extremist. We won’t be so lucky next time, I fear.