In the wake of the immense turnout for NO KINGS day, I’ve been feeling cautiously optimistic. Not about the facts on the ground, which are increasingly horrific–Trump’s war of choice, his open corruption, his governing collection of fools, ideologues and incompetents, the complicity of Congress and the Supreme Court…America is clearly in a world of hurt, and will be for some time.
But it’s awakening.
I keep thinking about a conversation I had with a friend after the 2016 election. We were having a gloomy brunch, gobsmacked by Trump’s win, and she said something that was truly prescient: the only thing that will save us is his incompetence.
Charlie Sykes–a former Republican Never Trumper–recently confirmed her prediction, noting that the past 14 months have been an “extraordinary chronicle of political self-destruction.” He asked us to consider what academics call a “counterfactual”–the elements that might have made Trump’s second term a political success.
He inherited a growing, reasonably healthy economy, the public was broadly supportive of his immigration policies, and he had just assembled an impressive electoral coalition that included young voters and large numbers of people of color, including Latinos. He dominated the man-o-sphere and had broken the Democrat’s hold on the working class. When he took office, the opposition was demoralized; one institution after another surrendered; the oligarchy embraced him; and the Democrats were both in disarray and demoralized.
A normal president might have capitalized on that. Trump threw it all away. On tariffs, terror, and war.
Instead, even Republican-friendly polls show that he’s lost the support of the Latinos and young men who had given him his win margin. Sykes tells us that “the man-o-sphere has finally figured out that Trump is really full of sh*t.” His support has cratered on the issues that had generated his votes: the economy and immigration. His war of choice was unpopular from the outset, and is more unpopular every day.
The only people sticking with him are the racists he cultivates and encourages.
A general public that has long been characterized by apathy and disinterest in politics has awakened to the consequences of electing a venal, aging ignoramus.
Sykes encourages us to consider what might have been, had Trump has exercised “even a modicum of restraint and prudence.”
On immigration, he could have focused on border security and have ICE target “the worst of the worst.” No Brute Squads, no masked thuggery, no murders of Americans in the streets. On the economy: What if instead of massive and erratic tariffs, he had been content to cut taxes and watch the Dow explode past 50,000? And what if he had actually meant “America First,” instead of threatening to invade and bomb countries across the globe? What if he had not taken steps that sparked inflation and strangled the job market? What if he had paid as much attention to the cost-of-living as to his obscene new ballroom?
Of course, Trump is incapable of restraint or strategic thinking. It’s not just that he’s a psychopath–it’s that he’s a profoundly stupid psychopath. I’ve previously referred to the Dunning-Kruger Syndrome, a cognitive bias that describes the overconfidence of people with limited knowledge or skills–people who believe they know much more than they actually do, and who lack self-awareness and the ability to accurately evaluate their own performance.
Trump is Dunning-Kruger on steroids.
We are in this situation thanks to a lethargic citizenry that has ignored civic duties in favor of a focus on personal interests. We are going to pay a heavy price for that lethargy. When we finally get rid of Trump and the assembly of cranks and buffoons he’s installed, it will no longer be possible to ignore or downplay the magnitude of the necessary reconstruction.
Internationally, America will never regain the trust we once enjoyed–but ultimately, that may lead to a safer world where other nations pick up the slack. Domestically, the sheer extent of the damage is operating as a wake-up call. Had Trump been less stupid, less incompetent, less psychotic, had he pursued the strategy Sykes outlined, Americans would probably have continued down a path of complacency, ignoring the massive economic and social disparities that were tearing at our civic fabric. We might have failed to recognize the morphing of the GOP into a fascist cult until it was too late.
Trump has made our social problems and injustices impossible to ignore. The task of repair will be formidable, but millions of people have been awakened to the challenge.
What’s that old saying? You don’t appreciate what you have until it’s gone….
Fundamentally, Trump is too stupid to know he’s stupid. And I’m not kidding. He honestly doesn’t know.
I guess when everyone around you spends all day telling you otherwise, you believe it? Still, what I wonder about is all the people who don’t recognise that he’s stupid. What’s up with them? Also stupid? Just accepting of it (because they like the bigotry so much)?
In addition to arrogance, incompetence and ignorance, Trump lives by the Roy Cohn rule: all errors are someone else’s fault. He has alienated Europeans, Asians, Canadians, Evangelists, the Pope, Islam, immigrants, academics and more. Now he’s blaming his hand-picked staff. Who’s next? Patel? Hegseth? Leavitt? Vance?
A friend posted a meme from FOX ( of course it was FOX) that attempted to take down the legitimacy of the protests, throwing in big words like Marxist to describe the protests, dismissing the accurate description of “fascism” to describe the administration, noting the pre-printed signs but ignoring the far more numerous, and often cleaver & creative, home made signs, and attempting to link protest funding to an American billionaire living in Singapore with ties to the CCP. Of course they also tried to paint the protesters as paid. The major networks ignored the protests on the talking head shows Sunday morning, which is shameful. The take over of the major news outlets and fear created by trumps frequent baseless lawsuits is helping minimize or ignore the very real concerns of the protesters and many who do not protest but share our concerns.
Is it possible that Trump isn’t lying to us?
Could his feeble mind be so far off the tracks that he actually believes the garbage constantly drooling out of his mouth?
Good God America. Are we finally waking up to this abomination?
When nearly fifty percent of the voting population thought it ok to vote for a convicted felon, a liar, a cheat, a racist, a bully, and now it appears a pedophile, then what the country needs before any kind of a rebuilding of its government is a moral revival.
We are a nation divided along the lines between good and evil, between truth and lies, between love and hate. As Lincoln put it, such a nation so divided cannot stand, so before we put the nation back together again, we need to put the soul of the nation back together again.
Well stated, Sheila. All good comments. Changing heads of departments and top command of our ground forces in middle of a war not good optics.
Very well-stated Ms. Bowers. Our current situation isn’t a “Trump problem”. It’s a problem created by every politician who abets and encourages the hate and moral rot that defines today’s Republican Party.
After hearing his comments about his attendance at the SCOTUS arguments regarding birthright citizenship, his slurred speech, standing in front of a podium fronted by a golden eagle, al a the Third Reich, calling justices “Republican” and stupid people, hearing the audience laugh at his comments, it is clear that he is a dangerously incompetent criminal with declining mental faculties. “Pam” was with him only to be fired later in the day, not in person, but by social media.
How far we have fallen is surpassed only by how little so many seem to care.
RESIST.
Propping up all of the damage is Citizens United. Creating the fiction that financial entities are supra-equal to people paved the way for the lethargic citizenry to be swayed by the national religion of capitalism.
Bigotry and tribalism, I say, support this Malignant Narcissist. Bigotry, because “Everyone not like me is evil,” and tribalism because “Youse guys even think like me!”
Let us not forget that this man who has lost so much that had been, in effect, handed to him, is the same man who lost three, count them, three, gambling casinos! How does one do that? By focusing on grift, skimming off the top, until the bottom falls out. His whole life has been one long scam.
Jim, does he believe his garbage? I suggest that he might not, when he says it, when it pours, unabated, from his maw, but, once having said it he takes it as gospel, because…of course, he said it! His idiocy about there being no global warming is really about paying the fossil fuel people back form the money they poured into his campaign coffers. Does he believe it, hey, he said it.
We have ourselves a truly crazy situation, in which a most incompetent person, stupid beyond belief, has been able to win the presidency twice, (okay, his hero, Putin helped the first time) enrich his family big time, have an entire branch of gov’t shamelessly cower, our highest court kiss up, while he physically, and cognitively, falls apart.
This is because Trump has never wanted to govern. He is a sociopath that instictively picks out his victims and situations to exploit well. EVERYTHING he does is motivated by nothing more than his sociopathic need for more money and power. Its insatiable, and he destroys everything he touches. Everything. Now he is destroying this country and world order. The only thing we can do now is salvage whats left and start rebuilding – with real representatives from both political parties. Thats why I have stepped up in a way I could never have imagined 10 years ago.
I think that most of us agree that Trump is an amoral psychopath and/or sociopath, who is stupid and doesn’t accept that reality. He is either a demented babbler or a compulsive liar (or both). I tend to believe that he is more of the former.
The question is, and remains, do the Democrats (and others in a future anti-Trump coalition) have the backbone to do what needs to be done, like Sheila’s post of a couple of days ago.
I like Biden, and to be honest, he accomplished a great deal, but he failed in deciding that the response to Trump I was a “return to normalcy”, as if something truly unprecedented had not occurred. We might (or might not)) have been spared a lot of pain if Biden had set the DOJ to prosecute the law breakers to the full extent of the law and not worry about “how it might look”.
Of course, this goes back to Ford pardoning Nixon, showing that justice is not the same for everyone. I used to live in Illinois. a number of our former Governors ended up in jail, and the state survives o this day.
trump definitely displays actions and confabulated speech that show that he has no interest in helping US but only in helping himself to the bounties of the American people while causing mayhem and chaos. He’ll keep ramping up on his dark destructive ways as long as he has presidential power.
id think about all the ways project 2025 will thwart the 11/26 elections. supreme court anyone? i believe somehow,someway,they other than trump will make the move. polling via ice? natl guard,martial law. that was easy in 1966 during the Newark riots. tech will lead the way,wall street is funding it by the lack of price controls,profits being gathered like snow flakes.theres alot of double dealing and corruption in plain site. our military is taking a mercinary stance,via mid east bribes. seems no one worries about The Hague.
euro makes small noise agast about trumps,er,,given the media tuned to retribution trade will be the hangmans noose. hormuz will be now,, its your problem. just like hitler in the final days, as he rode his train thru towns he pulled the curtain on the people as he passed thru. there is no supportin this travisty,and he will find the high co$t or our survival his retribution for not kissing his ass. get out and get others registered to vote. the only way if the save act is implemented. there will be no time for the courts..
the “task of repair” will not be taken up – americans are too stupid and lazy. The experiment has failed and Balkanization is certain.
Your entire column, Sheila, and the other voices present in it, and commenting on it, confirm what we all know about that final line:
“What’s that old saying? You don’t appreciate what you have until it’s gone…“
My take? We know what we’ll appreciate when Trump is gone: That he is gone! And with his departure, so much else, including those who clung to him for their own profit; those who saw value—and purpose—in hate; the “news services” that spread his lies and offer explanations/excuses for behavior that is reprehensible in order to preserve their ratings; benefits for billionaires; tax policies that hurt those most in need and benefit those who simply add ‘strength’ to their 1% standing; policies that harm health; the grift and corruption that enriches Trump, his family, enterprises… …….and on and on. And, on the positive side, restore regulations that keep people safer and more secure and military leadership that honors its country’s Constitution….you know the list. And, let’s hope, the Trump era will end with his trial and conviction, along with those who aided and enabled it.
Many, many are saying do something – THAT IS something. Starting with Citizens United and the Electoral College. He WILL be gone and there is No One corrupt enough, venal enough, shameless enough to fill his boots . . . BUT does The Body Politic have enough memory, ‘lesson learning,’ to raise the hue and cry for prosecution!?