All animals communicate among each other in some fashion. It may be by making sounds, gestures, or even very involved behaviors such as the dances of bees but it’s communication nonetheless. One of the differences between human language and the communication of animals is that using human language it’s possible to make utterances that have no referents, that is that do not actually refer to any observable phenomena.
Lately I have seen a lot of complaints about Trumpism. Other than support of Donald Trump, what is it? Does it have a referent?
As I have said before I think that Trump is completely transactional in his approach and employs a decision function that utterly baffles me. That makes me suspect that Trumpism is so closely involved with the person of Donald Trump that it is unlikely to have a referent other than support of Trump.
Much is being made these days of Joe Biden’s having received nearly 80 million votes in the election. Trump has apparently received nearly 74 million. If being the president of all Americans or reconciliation have any referents themselves, wouldn’t they mean treating both those who voted for Biden and those who voted for Trump with equal consideration?
Just for the record I do not support Donald Trump. I have never voted for him and do not intend to. I do not think he has been a good president. I do not support Trumpism whatever it might be but, then, I also do not support Obamaism, Bushism, Clintonism, or Reaganism if those have any referents.
Its largely a cult of personality on an unprecedented level, but it does tap into pre-existing trends in conservatism. Much the same stuff that gave us Palin. Victimhood. Disdain for facts. Perpetuating fears of religious persecution. Identity politics in spades. Redefining elites so that you can then campaign against them. Conspiracy theory dominating over policy. Talk radio and TV personalities as their thought leaders. Pretending to care about the working class while continuing tax cuts for the rich. A lot of this will persist as it existed before Trump but without him I dont expect such extremes.
Steve
unprecedented:
For that you’d have to have never heard of Benito Mussolini , Il Duce, The boss. Even wealthy Nebraska farmers support Trump, they feel powerless against Leftist media elites, talking down to them. Trump fights back, especially against the sweeping social changes now popular.
Celebrate transgender awareness week. Women in the military claiming sexual harassment when they don’t belong in that especially masculine environment anyway. Constant media diatribes about the superiority of immigrants to natives. Television commercials putting Black men on top of white women consistently and literally. (note my capitalization here).
Am I good liberal or what?
Trump’s an ass. But that’s what it takes to speak truth to power these days. There’s no other Republican leader who won’t be just a toadie to liberal totalitarianism.
Anyone else notice AOC has begun an enemies list?
Want’s to ban and dox all Trump administration employees?
Petitions circulating at ivy league colleges to ban them from speaking, teaching, and ATTENDING those colleges?
What kind of leader do you think has a chance against the Marxist juggernaut?
Mr. Rogers?
How would you define “cult of personality”, steve?
My definition would require official propaganda. Examples: Mussolini, Hitler, Stalin, Mao. I can’t think of any in the U. S. If you mean the centrality of the leader, I could see it but then I’m not sure how you’d distinguish between the treatment of Trump with that of Obama, Kennedy, or FDR. As I tried to suggest in the post I don’t approve of the centrality of the leader regardless of who the leader is.
Grey Shambler:
How do you define “Marxist juggernaut”? My definition of a juggernaut would be an enormous irresistible force. IMO the “democratic socialists” in the Democratic Party are presently punching above their weight. They’re noisy but not actually that influential. We’ll see what what the Biden Administration will bring.
I’m talking about the media and the flavor they must maintain to retain their jobs.
I’m talking about Barrack Obama who’s paddling below the surface to push socialism. And, most dangerous of all, he makes it attractive to the young.
Talking about college campus where it’s now forbidden to even speak about slowing down the abolition of century old traditions and norms.
The only way left for Americans to retain the values of our fathers is now isolation or violence.
I don’t much care for the alignment of media outlets with political parties. IMO if we’re going to have media like the UK’s, we should have libel laws like the UK’s.
I honestly don’t know how the transition will play out WRT the media outlets. I’ve seen predictions that little will change; media outlets that have been castigating Trump for five (or more) years will continue to do so and treat the Biden Adminstration with kid gloves while media outlets that have supported Trump will continue to do so and criticize Biden.
It seems to me that’s a formula for self-immolation for the major news outlets but if you look at the stock prices for either the NYT Company or the Fox Corporation they’ve prospered by that playbook.
” they feel powerless against Leftist media elites, talking down to them.”
See, this is why I list victimhood. The Republicans lost the presidency but still control the states and did control the presidency 12 of the last 20 years. Likely control the Senate if they dont decide to shoot themselves in the in the foot. But by God they are powerless because someone out East they dont know occasionally says bad things about them. (As if they never say bad things back.)
Dave, I think that when a party rejects a lot of its prior core values in order to support the leader then they have a leader based on personality. It certainly isn’t based upon policy. The GOP of old embraced free trade. It thought competence was important. It embraced things like family values. They didn’t have leaders who made fun of handicapped people, in fact they often defended some of the most defenseless (Schiavio, Downs kids). The party long understood that we couldn’t cave in unilaterally to Israel, then Trump did it. We valued those foreign countries with whom we worked with for a long time and had common interests.
Then there has been the constant defense of even his pettiest lies. No other GOP president would have advocated for cilia use of the military like Trump did and not gotten major pushback from his party. While I think the GOP lionizes the military for its own ends, as did Trump, there was always respect for that line between civilian and military. GOP leaders dont speak out publicly against Trump even when he is acting out against cherished values. I guess McCain did for a while, but he knew he was going to die. And now we have him and his supporters suggesting that electors should vote for hm even if he lost. And GOP leaders saying they agree. When has that happened before in the modern era?
Steve
Ever watch committee hearings on C-span?
The feelings of the legislators are real and personal, you can’t make common cause with people who hate you. Break ranks and they will use that advantage as a wedge.
Progressives are getting more and more progressive, that’s a bad thing.
They’re confident they can destroy all opposition with academia, entertainers, and the press on their side. They don’t need to compromise.
But if Trump had been a little less Trump, if he had shut up about McCain in AZ, if he had simply been civil in the first debate, he probably would have won. That should frighten progressive socialists. The harder they push their agenda, the more they separate from average Americans.
Trump’s the model, maybe in three years, a personable and articulate conservative will pick up his mantle and the Left will lose it all.
If you can fake sincerity you’ve got it made.