One such theory – persistent but flimsy – is that Trump, or Lindsey Graham, or some other senior Republican is behaving the way he’s behaving because the Russians, or some other shadowy entity, are blackmailing them with kompromat.
Honestly, I can’t fathom why Republican politicians are behaving this way either. But 90 percent of them are behaving the same way! (And with fanatical popular support.) Are they all being blackmailed? That’s a lot of damp mattresses.
I think that theory is really giving them the benefit of the doubt. I can’t think of any other reason why Graham would be so beholden to Trump, who he previously loathed and ranted against. So, either Graham is an insane toady or someone has something on him that’s keeping him in line. To me, the second choice makes more sense and puts him in a better light.
Similarly, with Trump, why would he bend over so hard for Putin, even to the point of pissing off other Republicans and our allies? The only thing that makes sense to me is that he needs them to keep him afloat or they have something on him. Otherwise, he’s acting like a traitor for nothing.
ETA: I’m not saying that it’s true that there’s kompromat on them – how would I know? I’m saying that theory actually makes them look better.
If Trump has kompromat on Lindsey Graham, that’s got to be the least surprising kompromat in the history of kompromat.
I think he might have at one point, via the National Enquirer. Because there is credible reporting indicating that Trump sent the National Enquirer after people that he felt were wronging him, not only to find dirt but to legally harass his victim under the guise of journalism.
But I’m not sure what happened to anything Trump might have had once Trump’s friend David Pecker parted ways with the magazine. And I don’t think he needs it now for Lady G. Because we saw what happened, if LG crosses Trump, dozens of people will follow him everywhere he goes, screaming traitor, traitor. Also, he’ll lose his job.
I used to be a big proponent of the theory that Trump was blackmailing everyone, but I think his base is so strong now that they are all the threat he needs towards elected officials.
Please don’t do that. Lindsey Graham is a man. He clearly identifies and presents as a man. He has affectations that many perceive as effeminate, but that doesn’t make him a woman. Nor do rumors about his sexuality. Mis-gendering is wrong, regardless of the political orientation of the target.
I think one of the premises is that Vlad collaborates with the Russian oligarchy (a gaggle of absurdly wealthy individuals many of whom gained their wealth/power in the chaos that followed the collapse of the USSR) in order to maintain his, essentially, regency.
Because of how the oligarchs amassed their wealth/power, one might infer that they see disorder as fertile ground for gaining even more. And they see the US as a major resource for doing that, as well as a country that is ripe for destabilization. Thus, they employ their operatives (e.g., Putin’s SVR, the non-domestic arm of the former KGB) to promote instability in the US, so that it might collapse, allowing them to swoop in and grab as much as they can.
Since Reagan, the rational function of the Republican Party has been steadily declining. Their appeal has been more and more idward, which means that their membership has trended that way as well. They have for the most part become simpletons, which makes them easy targets for manipulation. If you do not ken why they behave the way they do, that is probably not helped by the fact that neither do they.
(How is that for an out-there left-wing CT? I am not sure that I really believe that, but I am also not sure that I do not.)
(eta: well, that is weird: now, right above my post, I see an ad for Русское ТВ – 200+ каналов!)
People in poorer nations, whether left-wing or not, have been buying into antivax conspiracy theories since well before the CIA’s poorly-considered bin Laden-hunting vaccine program.
For instance, the idea that tetanus vaccination is a plot to sterilize women goes back to at least 1990.
Belief that Covid-19 vaccination sterilizes women and They are covering it up extends to developed nations and is not to my knowledge confined to one part of the political spectrum.
For what it’s worth, I remember rumors about every president back to Nixon, saying he was about to declare martial law. None of them did so, but I expect to hear the same thing about Biden. So, maybe martial law theories aren’t so exceptionally weird.
Yeah, and there’s nothing really “Left Wing” about them. They’re mostly a phenomenon of the nutty fringe that’s always existed, which never had a clear association with one party or one political wing. The nutty fringe just applies the same old CTs to whoever is in office, regardless of party.
I don’t see anything right- or left-wing about them. Carter created FEMA in '79, and every administration since has been accused of preparing concentration camps as misuse of FEMA.
Qanon blames Masons for DC landscaping force lines. Is that right or left?
All the predictions of imminent martial law/canceling elections that I can remember were from extremist opponents of the sitting administration. Hippies would accuse Nixon, militia types would accuse Clinton. It seemed to serve as a rhetorical tactic to express their martyrdom status at the hands of this evil president.
But about a week after the Capitol riot, a friend of mine was told by his MAGAt sister-in-law that Trump would soon be declaring martial law and the military would be conducting a “do-over” of the election. The SIL darkly suggested that my friend might want to get out of town, the way a gunfighter tells the general store owner that he and his wife might want to take a stroll right before the shooting starts.
More proof that Trump’s fans aren’t like other nut groups. They want to make martyrs of their opponents.
To paint with a broad brush, new-age medical quackery seems to be left-of-center. During the pandemic you do not hear a lot from the crystal healing set.
Covid-19 has been a gold mine for quackery purveyors, including the “crystal healing set”. Who knew for instance that yellow calcite is a “multivitamin for the soul”? Even supposedly respectable media outlets fall for this crap.
Maybe “crystal healing” is an endeavor favored by those to the political left, but medical quackery overall is a bipartisan affair.