(October 23, 2024 at 11:57 pm)AFTT47 Wrote:(October 23, 2024 at 6:44 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: There's another long list of counterexamples to address this, too. Vance, Greene, Speaker Johnson, and so on.
Add me to the long list of us experiencing anxiety over the possibility of Trump winning and even the possibility of MAGA persisting if he loses.
I'm with Fake Messiah though in that I have a hard time seeing anyone replacing Trump.
I always think of Trump as an evil Obi Wan Kenobi at Mos Eisley in the the original Star Wars movie in 1977. I assume almost everyone knows the scene:
Kenobi: You don't need to see his identification.
Storm Trooper (can't you see him wearing a MAGA hat?): We don't need to see his identification.
You know the rest. An astounded Luke doesn't understand what just happened and Kenobi explains, "The Force can have a strong effect on the weak-minded.
Trump supporters are unquestionably weak-minded. But they are not so gullible that anybody can manipulate them the way Trump does. We've seen others who had this kind of power. Adolph Hitler, Charles Manson, cult leaders like David Koresh. Thankfully, it is very rare.
I think we'll be okay if Trump loses but we are fucked if he wins.
I think he's changed the conversation enough that it makes Trump 2.0 possible. The political conversation in this country the last nine years allows for shitbagging going forward to be accepted as "discourse". We have a huge swath of people primed and ready for more racist, sexist, xenophobic statements that even ten years ago would have been unacceptable. Yet now 70+ million Americans find it votable.
We're definitely fucked if he wins. But even if he loses, those seventy million aren't going to catch a bad case of dying. They will still be here. This is not a one-and-done election. Smarter, quieter acolytes are sitting in the wings and studying the mechanics Trump has shown. Evolution is a fact.
