Circus Maximus MMXVI: Do ya like it like that?

9 03 2016

Five and a-half years ago I worried about the color of the sky in Sarah Palin’s world; half a year ago I suggested that Trump would only triumph* were he to keep on keepin’ on banging his own weird can.

So, two things: One, Ezra Klein is among the latest commentators to note that “he lies constantly and fluently about what his policies actually are.” Klein thinks this is a problem, and it is—just not for Trump.

It doesn’t matter that he lies or that he lies about his lies.

And. . . I don’t really know how one counters that.

*Well, okay, not really: I did say that he’d ultimately lose.

~~~

Of course, one reason that lies don’t matter, is that all too often truth = agreement and lies = disagreement.

May I give you New Hampshire State Rep. Susan DeLemus (R):

“I believe Donald. I am telling you, he says what I am thinking,” DeLemus said during a CNN focus group of Trump supporters that aired Thursday morning.

“We’ve got people in positions of power who I know for a fact are liars, liars,” she continued. “My president comes on the TV and he lies to me. I know he is lying. He lies all the time.”

Now, the Honorable Representative DeLemus is inarguably a nutter, but she’s saying plainly what others will only politely (or not so politely) suggest.

~~~

What this (not so politely) suggests, then, is that attacking a liar for lying will do little to peel support away from him.

So he has to be attacked from another angle. Senators Cruz and Rubio have done a bit of this, going after Trump for his business failures, which does seem to get to His Greatness. I’d guess dismissing him or openly mocking him would also rattle his bones.

The real question, however, is whether a rattled Donald is a Donald who loses support or, as some tiny bit of me still believes might happen, flips the table and flounces away.


Comments : 1 Comment »
Tags: , , , , ,
Categories : Politics

Circus Maximus MMXVI: Damned I am

2 03 2016

I was wrong. Wroooooooooooongity wrong wrong WRONG.

I never thought Trump would get this far, or that the hated Ted Cruz would end up his main challenger.

I’ll hang on to my skepticism about him actually winning the nomination, but I must admit that the evidence is running ahead of my skepticism.

As to the general clusterfuck that is the GOP presidential process, I can only say: Y’all deserve this, every last bit of it.

And no, I ain’t helping you out, especially not with Dan Quayle lite.

As John Scalzi notes,

But somebody needs to do something! Well, yes. Those “somebodies” should have been the GOP, but it didn’t want to, and then when it wanted to it couldn’t, because it realized too late that its entire governing strategy for the last couple of decades, but especially since Obama came to office, has been designed to foster the emergence of a populist lectern-thumper like Trump. The GOP has made its electoral bones on low-information, high-anxiety white folks for years now, but has only ever looked at the next election, and not ever further down the road, or where that road would lead too. Well, it led to Trump.

And now the GOP wants a bailout, and people like Beinart and Strain are arguing we should give it to them, because the GOP is apparently too big to fail (and yes, this means that Trump is a festering ball of subprime loans in this scenario). And, well. …

… Saving the GOP from Trump doesn’t change the fact that the GOP is by conscious and intentional design primed to create more Trumps — more populist demagogues who will leverage the anxious discontent of scared and aging white people into electoral victories. That won’t be fixed. The GOP doesn’t want it fixed. It just wants the demagogue to be someone it can control.

Let it also be noted that Trump’s 1 1/2 main competitors hold terrible, terrible policy positions, so it’s not clear exactly why I should be worried that the hair-piece-of-racist-shit might beat the other two pieces-o’-shite. They’re all terrible.

No, my only interest is in beating whoever the GOP eventually barfs up, not in sticking my finger down my own throat.

h/t Shakezula, Lawyers, Guns & Money


Comments : 3 Comments »
Tags: , , , , , ,
Categories : Politics

Circus Maximus MMXVI: What’s goin’ on?

17 02 2016

I don’t understand. Many things, I don’t understand.

For example, I don’t understand why I’m so lukewarm about Bernie Sanders and somewhat defensive about Hillary Clinton.

I mean, I’m glad he’s in the race, I’m glad he’s yelling about the banksters, and I’m glad that he’s pushing Clinton to the left.

But I also think she’d be a better president than him. I think all some of the shit that turns people off about her—namely, her practicality and willingness to deal—are precisely what would make her a relatively effective executive.

Bernie’s reliance on a ‘political revolution’ to get shit done is. . . not going to happen.

But then I think, Kissinger—Kissinger!

And then I think, well, absurdist, y’all about the realism.

So, whatever. I don’t even know if I’ll be able to vote in the NY primary: I think you have to register for a party approximately 17 years before the primary in order to be eligible.

I should look into that.

And this, this I do not understand:

I mean, I get it, it’s a riff on Reagan’s ‘morning in America’  ad—

—but it. . . doesn’t work. At all.

I don’t know, maybe I’m missing the appeal because I’m not a  Republican primary voter, but, man, I don’t know why it would make someone want to vote for Rubio as opposed to, say, miss Ronald Reagan.

Also, I don’t understand why none of the other Republican candidates have figured out how to take Trump down. I don’t know why they’re afraid of him.

Yeah, he gets mean, but so what? You turn that against him, keep going after him and after him until he loses his fucking mind.

Well, okay, yeah. I should say: until he flounces off a huff, maybe overturning a table or smashing a chair on his way out.

Finally, do whole- (unlike me, half-) hearted Bernie supporters understand that if he wins the nomination he’s going to need everything that horrid Democratic establishment can cram into his campaign, and then some, if he has even a shot of getting elected?

I still think Clinton will be the nominee, but if it’s Sanders, then he’s going to need all of the help, all of the corrupting, connected, money-infested help, that he can get?

Because nobody, nobody enters–and exits–the colosseum without getting dirty.


Comments : 4 Comments »
Tags: , , , , ,
Categories : Politics

Circus Maximus MMXVI: If you believed they put a man on the moon

13 12 2015

Trump is not a fascist and the US is not Weimar, 1930 or 1932.

Ah, fuck it. I was going to write a big, long post on what is fascism and what was Weimar, but, shit, I don’t think Trump will get the GOP nomination and while the US is a too-violent society, including too much political violence, the parties don’t have paramilitaries which members regularly assault and assassinate one another.

I mean, I might at some point post on Weimar—keee-RIST what a fascinating period!—but the thought of tying that fascination to an explication of the not-fascism of someone who will not be the GOP nominee just makes me tired.

I will say the main reason I don’t think Trump is a fascist is the main reason I don’t think he’ll win: the lack of organization.

Italian fascists: organized.

Nazis: organized.

Trump? Well, he has staff, some of them quite interesting, and apparently a great many paid organizers in Iowa, but how many of those staff and organizers actually know what they’re doing? Even Molly Ball, in a piece generally credulous about Trump’s organization, notes that

To be sure, Trump’s campaign isn’t totally standard: Few of his hires have presidential campaign experience; his Iowa chairwoman is a former contestant on his reality show, The Apprentice. He doesn’t have a pollster or a super PAC. Though his press secretary, Hope Hicks, occasionally tangles with the media, he frequently gets on the phone with reporters to speak for himself in articles about him, rather than deploying a spokesperson.

(She thinks that latter bit is “refreshing”, and that “more candidates should do it”—which, Jesus, is wrong—and thinks that the fact that “Trump just found a bunch of people he liked and hired them, and it’s working out great” means that his organization is up to snuff. Ask me sometime what I think of Molly Ball’s analytical skills.)

He is doing well in the polls, sure, but can he translate that into primary votes? According to this Tim Fernholtz piece, as of October he hadn’t yet purchased data on voters:

“The voter file is a foundational piece for any grassroots campaign in Iowa and New Hampshire,” Patrick Ruffini, a veteran GOP operative who founded digital agency Engage, told Quartz. “If Trump’s campaign were not using any voter file, even after being offered it by the RNC, that would be a pretty shocking statement.”

He and his staffers can talk all they want about his “unconventional” approach, but primary (and general) election voting is a grind: You have to identify people who are likely to vote for your candidate, make sure they actually will vote for your candidate, and get them to the polls. If you lack a voter database, you can’t identify your likely voters, can’t reach out to them, and can’t make sure they actually show up to vote.

Trump staffers are, apparently, getting “bushels” of voters’ names, and they’ve apparently been grinding through them, but it’s not clear how well those names grabbed at rallies and restaurants match up with voter files, and thus, not clear how well his staffers will be able single out those who are willing to say “Go Trump!” to a pollster and those who are willing to spend several hours locked in a room on a Monday night in February.

And even if the rest of the primaries aren’t caucuses, that is, that they do only require a quick jaunt behind the curtain, there are 50 more of them; does he have infrastructure—and is he willing to pony up the money for the staff—to make it to through Super Tuesday, much less to June?

I do recognize that I could be wrong about all of this, that Trump may have figured out how to crack the delegate-gathering process the same way he’s figured out how to crack into the campaign itself. It’s entirely possible that I, in following Jonathan Bernstein, Nate Silver, and the rest on the durability of the old model of successful primary campaigns, am getting it wrong.

But I don’t think so.

~~~

And fucking hell, I just wrote an entire fucking post on this man, even after saying I wouldn’t bother.  Sucked y’all in with that ‘fascism bit’ and taking a turn at ‘organization’. Man. Sorry about that.


Comments : 3 Comments »
Tags: , , , ,
Categories : Politics

Circus Maximus MMXVI: We are the sultans

7 12 2015

Now, I’m not one of those who thinks Trump is a fascist*, largely because I have a(n overly?) strict definition of fascism, though I do concede that he’s plucking those führer chords pretty hard.

Still, this is brilliant:

h/t Jeffrey Goldberg

*At the most basic level, I think fascists are highly ideological, which Trump is not: he’s merely opportunistic. This isn’t to say one can’t be a cynical fascist—Göring comes to mind—but he lacks any ideology beyond “winning” and himself.

I think the better descriptor for his politics is Juan Linz and Alfred Stepan’s concept of sultanism:

[A] sultanistic ruler characteristically has no elaborate or guiding ideology. There may be highly personalistic statements with pretensions of being an ideology, often named after the sultan, but this ideology is elaborated after the ruler has assumed power, is subject to extreme manipulation, and, most importantly, is not believed to be constraining on the ruler and is relevant only as long as he practices it.

Doesn’t that sound like Trump to you?

But like I said, still a brilliant photo crop.


Comments : 1 Comment »
Tags: , , , ,
Categories : Uncategorized

Circus Maximus MMXVI: Sh’ dooby

15 09 2015

Yes, yes, yes!

I was yelling at someone a week or so ago that the way to take Trump out is by mocking him.

I mean, Jesus, is there anyone more mockable than The Donald? Mr. Winning?

I mean, someone else must have thought to put a picture of Charlie Sheen next to him, with WINNING! the caption, right?

(I would do this if I had any ability to, uh, splice separate photos into one image. And caption it. But I don’t. I am not a WINNER.)

If asked about him, condescend. If in a debate with him, laugh at him. Be amused, not angry, and if Trump gets angry, laugh some more.

He wants to be taken seriously, so do not under any circumstances take him seriously.

This is not elevated political discourse, I know, but if you’re dealing with someone who so gleefully breaks the rules of electoral decorum, then you have to follow him through that breach and break him. Poking at someone until he explodes may not be edifying, but with someone as gassed up on ego as Trump, it can be effective.

Now, I think Trump’s gonna deflate before the first primary anyway, but if I’m a competing candidate, why take that chance?  More to the point, why not get the lift from sending that particular hot air balloon careening off into the treetops?

But, whatever, Republican candidates. If you’re afraid to take on a mouthy real estate developer with zero political experience, then, again, you’re the losers Trump says you are.


Comments : 2 Comments »
Tags: , , , ,
Categories : Politics

Circus Maximus MMXVI: We will we will rock you

30 08 2015

Trump will not be the nominee of the Republican party.

I’m not much for predictions, but I feel pretty good in making this one: he’s peaking too soon—the nomination fight won’t be decided until next spring, at the earliest—has little support among party elites, and, most crucially, lacks the infrastructure to win the nomination.

He has an audience, not an organization.

That said, I do get why some folks on the right are excited by him: he lays it out there with, as the saying goes, no fucks to give.

That’s what I’ve liked about Hillary Clinton—I keep posting that photo of her banging her fists at one of the endless Benghazi hearings, and head any post about her with “Army of me”—and I’m not the only one. And think about the delight some of us are taking in President Obama’s willingness to plant his flag where’er the hell he pleases.

No more fucks to give, indeed.

It’s just tribalism, a part of the passion of the partisan, and it’s neither pathological nor puzzling: we want our guy or broad to win, and we want to see our guy or broad want to win. And we want them to win for us.

Oh, sure, I’m all about policy and the common good and all that, but, goddammit, I’ve also chosen a side, and I want the candidate on my side to be glad s/he’s on this side. I don’t want someone who’s sorry that s/he’s taken a side.

And I think that’s what those crowds like about Trump: he ain’t sorry for nothin’.

That’s not enough to get him the nomination, but it is enough to get folks to show up and cheer.

And hey, as long as Trump keeps eating away at the base of this fucking guy, I’m all for it.


Comments : 1 Comment »
Tags: , , , , , ,
Categories : Politics

Circus Maximus MMXVI: Send in the clowns

18 08 2015

Note: I really don’t think this will end up being the case, but. . .

If the other Republican candidates can’t figure out how to beat as manifestly unfit a candidate as Donald Trump, then they really are a bunch of losers.


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , ,
Categories : Politics

Circus Maximus MMXVI: Keep on keeping on

6 08 2015

Sorry I haven’t been around much: a combination of delayed after-effects of an antibiotic and a tough week at work has left me in tatters.

But: tonight is the GOPpers first [set of] debate[s], and I wanted to get in a quick hit about Trump before this thing is over:

I think he’d do best not to behave.

There are rules for debates, formal and informal, and while he may be forced to follow the formal rules (whatever they are), there’s likely nothing the moderators can do if he decides to spin off dispatch after dispatch from his own, alternate, universe.

Half a decade ago I considered the possibility of a Sarah Palin run for the presidency, and wondered “how do you fight against someone concerned only with her own creation of the truth?” As I embedded a clip from an old NewsRadio episode (which you can view here; the crucial bit begins around 9:20) as an example of how someone willing to crash through the most basic expectations of argument will beat the person who abides by those expectations.

As I noted then

You can deal with a reality-manipulator, because the manipulator has to have some sense of that reality before she warps it to her own ends. And even that Bush staffer who sniffed to the NYTimes reporter about those stuck in the ‘reality-based community’ and the ability of the Bush admin to create its own reality nonetheless still gestured to reality. They did, in their own baleful way, seek to create new facts on the ground.

[. . .]

So how does someone avoid the physics of politics, the inevitable grinding down and peeling back and failure associated with all political action? You don’t accept that there are any rules, any downs on the other side of up, any nulls to one’s hypotheses; there is only the rabbit pulled out of the hat and the declaration that this is, indeed, magic. And that magic is real.

A Trump who tries to whittle himself down to fit into the role of the “serious candidate” is a Trump who whittles himself down into nothing at all.

No, for Trump to triumph he should keep doin’ that Trump thing.

Won’t help him win the nomination, of course, but it might keep him in the game a while longer.

 


Comments : 3 Comments »
Tags: , , , , , ,
Categories : Politics

Our nation turns its lonely eyes to you.

26 05 2015

Don’t ever change, Donald.


Comments : 3 Comments »
Tags: ,
Categories : Quick hits

« Previous Entries Next Entries »