Quote:
Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop
No. If Trump becomes a dictator, it is because he and his supporters wanted that power, not because people saying stuff somehow made it happen. This is the worst sort of conservative-enabling nonsense, that people support conservatives because liberals are mean to them. Please stop it.
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Would be dictators are cheap and numerous. The circumstances in which they might blossom into actual dictators are rare. They involve a silly public, misinformed, overwrought, easily manipulated.
And there has to be fear, ignorance, and paranoia on both sides of the debate.
The lunatics in the "resistance" are enabling this guy to a second win. The media is gifting him one.
Trump's brand is conflict. A sub-category of it is "these lefties are fucking crazy." The Russia nothing-burger (that's what the relevant perception turned out to be, regardless of what perceptions outliers like us might have) fed him and strengthened him. Now you've got a hopeless impeachment (Rs are cornered and have no option but to acquit) that will leave a shitstain on Biden as the primary issue rolling into 2020.
You think the voting public cares about the Ukraine thing. They don't. You are out of touch. Your views, and the views of most here, are the exception, not the rule. They don't care about your arguments about the sanctity of rule of law, and they hear most lurid voices on the left scream about fascism and break Godwin's Law and think, "man, these people in the 'resistance' really are fucking nuts."
See, most people in a country with a median wage of $50k or something like that, are in a different place in Maslow's Hierachy than people like us, and the media we consume.
The average person cares about issues that hit him in the pocketbook. (Even the Hispanic and Latino vote cannot be captured in full solely based on the immigration arguments of the left... Why? Because a lot of them vote their economic interests first, like a lot of everyone else.)
Warren and Bernie are talking issues. But they're relegated to opening acts for the "Great Impeachment Election of 2020." The "Resistance" in the public and the media have instead made it this an election about Ukraine.
Putin probably has a hernia from laughing.
I'm not enabling anything. Taibbi's not enabling anything. I'm Vin Scully here, and I'm telling you, you're the enabler. You don't impeach a guy who has no platform on issues. You ignore him him and run on issues. You don't exhaust the public with endless investigations that they perceive as political bullshit.
The general public reaction to this stuff is a "pox on both their houses," "politicians doing what they do," and "President Clown versus a clown car of incompetent Torquemadas." (Well, they don't use that last reference, but you get the point.)
But... If you must choose to fight him - if you've really got to try to capture defeat from the jaws of victory - do it coolly. Make fun of him, only reference him quickly, with a roll of the eyes. Biden actually gets this. He's dealing with Trump the right way. So are Bernie and Warren to a lesser extent. The problem is the media, and the people who are invested in taking down Trump but can't wait until the election to do so. The media wants a fight, so they're attacking Trump relentlessly, which gifts him free airtime. And they're overreaching, emotional as all fuck, and it makes them look ridiculous. (This Ukraine thing? Probably not going anywhere... and no one, not even sane Democrats, believe it's about wanting to "save democracy." It's all about power, and Schiff's a garden variety ambitious politician, not much better than Trump, which everyone sees.)
You can't appeal for "justice" in the political realm with a straight face. That demands a level of credulity too high even for the common American voter.
The enabling is the extreme wing of your party's silly behavior for the past two years. Trump can be easily beaten at the ballot box. Trying to beat him as you are - with overwrought freakouts about everything the buffoon does and hopeless littany of investigations (look at any media outlet this morning and you'll see at least two hyperbolic, frothing denunciations of Trump, as you will every day he remains in office) - is simply enabling and strengthening him. Conflict is what Trump wants. And it's what his base wants. As you've noted, those sorts are all about "owning the libs."
Keep frothing. Keep giving Trump nation, and Trump, what they want if you like. Keep preaching to the choir in blue states, ignoring the Electoral College. Keep relearning the definition of insanity. Just don't get chaffed about people like Taibbi telling you that you and the media on which you gorge are helping him get re-elected.
