Traitor Watch - The 45 & 47 Thread

[Axaday]

He's such a toad.

I expected him to say something rude when Jimmy Carter died, but he actually issued a nice statement. It was Presidential. But he can't stick his landing. No one is going to be disappointed to have the flags at half-staff at the inauguration. No one is going to feel it diminishes anything. Except Trump.

When someone does this sort of thing it reminds me of an anecdote I noticed in high school world history. When Lenin died, his body was preserved and put on display. It is still there. When Stalin died, they did the same for him. But after a few years Khrushchev removed and buried Stalin. He did it in the name of Stalin having done a lot of bad things. And it's true. And he was worse than Lenin and Khrushchev, but they were bad too. Kruschchev did it actually to lift himself up. Well, I don't know how many people care whether they'll be mummified and put on display perpetually after death. That would probably creep most people out. The end of the story is that Khrushchev had lost power before he died 7 years into retirement and Brezhnev gave him no state funeral and certainly didn't preserve him. And maybe wouldn't have under his circumstances anyway, but it wasn't Brezhnev that broke the precedent. Kruschchev did this to himself.

Does Trump not care whether there will be honors for him when he dies?

 

[wonko the sane?]

Does Trump not care whether there will be honors for him when he dies?

Probably not. I doubt he's even considered dying (despite the repeated "attempts" on his life.) because he's not capable of understanding the world without him in it. He's a narcissistic sociopath with a messiah complex.

 

[Axaday]

There are few Presidents, Prime Ministers, or Premiers who don't have at least a strong tendency to narcissism. The well-ordered person does not think they are the solution to the world's problems. Possibly Trump cannot connect the dots or cannot pay the today cost of giving attention to someone else, but the more narcissistic you are the more your correct strategy is to heap honors on a dead President who cannot do anything to harm you. His statement when Carter died was perfectly crafted by someone who is not him:

"I just heard of the news about the passing of President Jimmy Carter. Those of us who have been fortunate to have served as President understand this is a very exclusive club, and only we can relate to the enormous responsibility of leading the Greatest Nation in History. The challenges Jimmy faced as President came at a pivotal time for our country and he did everything in his power to improve the lives of all Americans. For that, we all owe him a debt of gratitude. Melania and I are thinking warmly of the Carter Family and their loved ones during this difficult time. We urge everyone to keep them in their hearts and prayers."

See what he did there? On the surface it is Presidential and generous and collegial. But it is ALSO "I have also been President", "I understand things other people don't", "Being President made me VERY SPECIAL", "Being President is harder than you think it is", "Covid wasn't my fault", and "If you have a good life, thank a President"

 

[Rhinox]

Yeah, it reiterates that he's above the 'common' folk. But, I think that's about as nice a thing I've ever heard in a Trump statement. I'm sure it wasn't actually written by him.

 

[Ungnome]

Most definitely wasn't written by him, it's actually coherent. You are right that those who seek power are generally at least a little narcissistic. It goes with the territory, unfortunately. It's why Plato wrote 'Only those who do not seek power are qualified to hold it.' It's also why we'll never convince Jon Stewart to run for president.

 

[Ceir]

I hate that this is, like, my first actual post on this board incarnation, but I don't have a lot of places to vent about this, and I've been stewing on it since November. Hopefully I can make this ramble somewhat coherent.

I don't like politics, I don't understand politics. I never have, at least as they are practiced in reality.

I don't understand how any person with even a shred of respect and empathy for others can buy what the loudest-screaming voices in what calls itself the GOP are selling - because what they're selling is hatred, discrimination, and censorship. Unless you're a rich white dude, apparently. Otherwise, their list of things what are disposable includes "environmental protection", "business regulations", "health services", and "basic human rights and dignity". Y'know, things that would benefit everyone, instead of the Angry Orange planting his ass back in the Big Chair and the cadre of nutjobs riding his coattails.

Oh wait.

any person with even a shred of respect and empathy for others

Found part of my problem. That expectation. Call me naive and childish, but I simply can't comprehend how so many people can be so relentlessly, viciously cruel to so very many others.

Sometimes I feel like the stupidest person on the planet.

 

[Tuxedo Prime]

Call me naive and childish, but I simply can't comprehend how so many people can be so relentlessly, viciously cruel to so very many others.

To answer a question with a question... How long have you interacted with online fandom?

 

[abates]

The 80s incarnation of the Twilight Zone had an episode in which a mysterious dude presents a couple with a box with a button on it and tells them that if they press the button, two things will happen: they will receive a large sum of money, and someone who they don't know will die.

I'm increasingly convinced that there are a large number of people who would press the button without hesitation.

 

[Sjogre]

The percentage of the population that would push that button has always been uncomfortably large.

I'm more concerned about the percentage that would push the button if it killed someone that they did know.

 

[Ceir]

To answer a question with a question... How long have you interacted with online fandom?

To take this question seriously: many years. But fandom typically isn't capable of escalating to a literal matter of life and death for those involved.

 

[wonko the sane?]

The 80s incarnation of the Twilight Zone had an episode in which a mysterious dude presents a couple with a box with a button on it and tells them that if they press the button, two things will happen: they will receive a large sum of money, and someone who they don't know will die.

I'm increasingly convinced that there are a large number of people who would press the button without hesitation.

No only is the percentage large: they would repeatedly slap the button in hopes of continuing payouts. I'm sure at least a few of them would try to steal the button and were making plans to hire an illegal solely to push the button for them.

 

[Rhinox]

No only is the percentage large: they would repeatedly slap the button in hopes of continuing payouts. I'm sure at least a few of them would try to steal the button and were making plans to hire an illegal solely to push the button for them.

"It was never about the money . . . . "

Seriously, the GOP base is narcistic and ignorant. I truly believe most do not understand why voting for the GOP is voting against their interests. The entrenched conservative media has spent the last 40 years brainwashing everyone who listens to AM radio and Fox, which is most people in rural areas. They're fed bullshit like candy and by this point they lap it up because that's what they've always done.
Even when confronted, they're so entrenched that they fall for the fallacy of sunken costs and refuse to accept that they've ever been wrong.

 

[Paladin]

Four years ago we watched an outgoing president incite an insurrection and the then incoming administration was so incompetent they couldn't put him in jail for it OR stop him from winning another election.

 

[Rhinox]

I wouldn't call Biden or his administration incompetent. Rather I'd say they were stuck in the past where the high road and trying to rise above was the path most would take. I'd call them ignorant or late to the party because they haven't yet realized just how much has changed and how vigorously they needed to fight against the plague that is the MAGAts. The administration hamstrung themselves thinking they would follow the playbook of bygone days because that is what they've always done.
They missed the bus, clearly. Things changed massively and they didn't change with it. And so we have an outgoing administration of doddards who failed to protect the country from the machinations of a cult that has taken over popular culture. And we all will suffer for that.

Another failure to hang on the head of the boomers. They really do want to take it all with them to the grave.

 

[wonko the sane?]

And to be fair: the job to stop trump was merrit garland: and he simply refused to do it. Biden could have replaced him: but on a technical level; garland didn't do anything wrong. And I guarantee you that if biden has just replaced AG's until one of them went after trump like they needed to: the republicans would have been screaming about it being their favorite thing.

 

[Rhinox]

True. Neither Garland nor Biden did anything wrong, but they didn't do the right thing either. They seemed content to sit back and let things take their course. Something that may have worked 20 years ago. But that is not where we are anymore. Their inability to recognize the societal change has damned us.

 

[Paladin]

Twenty years ago the sitting president started an illegal war for oil profiteering and installed an apparently-permanent police-state monitoring citizens in the name of "preserving freedom."

And we learned ******* nothing.

 

[CoffeeHorse]

They might have sincerely believed there was no way Trump could come back and win a non-consecutive second term even if they did nothing.

 

[Axaday]

And to be fair: the job to stop trump was merrit garland: and he simply refused to do it. Biden could have replaced him: but on a technical level; garland didn't do anything wrong. And I guarantee you that if biden has just replaced AG's until one of them went after trump like they needed to: the republicans would have been screaming about it being their favorite thing.

You have momentarily forgotten most of the punctuation rules.

 

[wonko the sane?]

You have momentarily forgotten most of the punctuation rules.

Meh. No other rules seem to apply anymore, why should punctuation?