I’ve lost count of the times in the past year when pundits have proclaimed dismal poll numbers for Trump - numbers that seem unrealistically rock solid to me. How can Trump’s support remain so steady is my question. The fact that his numbers aren’t much, much worse than the polls reveal is another clue to how we got here. Too many Americans are completely clueless, and probably locked in to right wing media.
Trump's die-hard loyalists probably sit somewhere between 30 - 35%, and it's very rare you see numbers dip below that 30% mark. It's been that way since 2015, and actually it's probably since he took ownership of Birtherism. That alone should tell you all you need to know about your fellow countrymen. They are racists, closeted and less so. Pure and simple, they want a return to the era of pure, American whiteness... with a wifey at home, barefoot, pregnant, fretting over nothing but what she's going to serve for dinner. Try as anyone might, my sense is that 30 - 35% will never waver, at least not when it matters.
It's the other 15 - 20% who are a mix of centrists holding their noses to save a buck and the Bari Weiss types who are convinced that ends justify means, regardless of how cruel and historically unthinkable those means may have been for the past 80 years. Try to get any one of them to square their choices now. That line Mr. Kristol wrote about "averting their eyes"? That's the shame they're starting to feel but won't articulate because it would mean admitting they got into bed with literal Nazis... willingly, self righteously, and to all of our detriment.
There are Democrats, too, who share a lot of blame, the somewhere around 5% who stayed home in '24 because... I have no damn clue. They are actually the ones I'm most pissed at (that's saying something because I'm pretty pissed). If/when I hear lefties hemming an hawing about purity tests this summer (or in '28), my head might quite literally explode.
Right, there's a bit of schadenfreude about what's happened to the economy, and I do genuinely feel shame in that while quite aware that the moderates/centrists likely needed their choices to blow up in their two-faces to wake them up. Feeling the economic pain, sadly, is what the doctor ordered I think.
For that matter, though, I was also conscious during Tiny's first administration. Even before we look at the diaper-dumpster-fire that was 2020, I don't recall some golden age his first 3 years in office. There were actually a lot purchases put on the American credit card, and let's not forget the plan Biden's team executed for the Afghanistan withdrawal was signed by Trump himself as *required* in 2021. Shame on Joe for not pumping the brakes, but when has Dear Leader been good at running anything in his entire life? He singlehandedly put Atlantic City into a depression, ffs.
Excellent summation. I remember when my children were in early 20s, a few of their cohorts acted like voting was for naive losers who didn’t understand the game was rigged. Now they have families, and I suspect they vote.
And don’t get me started on purity tests! And identity politics! I really want to challenge some of those adherents: “Would you say it was worth it back then, if you knew Trump would be the result?”
On the other hand, some of this “purity” and identity is deliberately manufactured or jacked up by the right. I know a trans woman in her 70s, and she says nobody in her community gives a rat about participating in sports. But it was a very effective non-issue for reactionaries to blast out for predictable effect.
There were a lot of white people who were okay with what proved to be ethno-nationalist authoritarianism so long as a non-white wasn't elected, again.
There were a lot of males (irrespective of race) who were okay with that, so long as a woman wasn't elected (.for the first time). Male identity outweighed racial identity--bros before hoes.
There was also the issue that people were generally unhappy with the way things were (for various reasons) which gives rise to anti-incumbency (and Harris was, to all intents and purposes, the incumbent).
These three things gave Trump the win. That is what the data from the 2024 Presidential election is telling me. (disclaimer: I worked with election and attitude polling/measurement and analysis of said data back in the day when I was thinking about going into political consulting--a choice that my conscience is glad I moved away from).
You had a shift in white and male voting patterns that was sufficient to give Trump the slight edge that was necessary. There was also a depressed turnout overall for potential Harris voters. But the killer was the shift in white and male patterns.
The general dissatisfaction provided an excuse/rationale for votes that were rooted primarily in racism/sexism (more generally, "Otherism." The reality is that, as much as people talk about economic issues, they are not primary motivators in most cases--the motivator in that mix is not the specifics of economics, not any rational issue WRT economics, but the emotional background that the PERCEIVED economic conditions generate which bleeds into or rationalizes/excuses choices rooted in other motivaters.
The fact that there wasn't actually any plan or policy put forward by candidate Trump WRT how he was going to make the economy better--and that what little that WAS put forward was idiotic--points to two things:
General voter ignorance as to how the economy actually works; and
The basically non-rational role that economics plays in voting decisions.
Shifts in white voting patterns (given the demographic distribution) can be large enough to drown out effects from minority vote pattern shifts. That is basic math. That is also the reason why Democrats became more moderate in many cases as compared to the Democratic party of the early 20th century WRT economic policy. Cold War= Socialism bad (not that socialism is actually good, objectively).
It is why they chase the white vote. They HAVE to do that in order to be electorally viable at the national level--period, end of story. Democrats could get 100% of the minority vote and would still lose w/o a substantive chunk of the white vote. Again, it's just math.
2024 is the story of how becoming too entangled in "minority" issues can bite them in the butt in an environment where culture and shifts in culture are the primary voting determinants.
The reality is that, unless or until people actually get burned by the hot stove, they will ignore the danger of the hot stove. The hot stove is later and a matter of maybe/maybe not. Their feels in the moment drown that out.
Also, the hot stove usually has to get pretty hot before it has an impact--pretty hot means substantive PERSONAL impact, not things happening to other people who they do not know or empathize with. Things that MIGHT happen in the future. Might not (though odds/history/experience says they will).
So there are a lot of people with varying levels of regret or shame right now--but that level isn't high enough to drive anything because many are not directly affected in a negative way. It isn't PERSONAL. They are not (as the feel) actually doing any worse--or enough worse. These people are the people just waiting it out, going along to get along. This too shall pass is their motto.
Unless or until ICE breaks down THEIR door--or something similarly impactful happens.
In other words, White supremacy is still paying off benefits. As it does. And we have to stop denying that. For some people, White supremacy carries more benefits to their families than a cohesive American community would, especially if their church community insists on White supremacy.
I think the 15 - 20% of "centrists" you mention took a look at the bed with Nazis in it and thought, "What can I do about it?" and "Looks plenty comfy to me." and are all too happy to jump right in...cowards, every damn one of 'em.
Or if not ride or die, they are complacent in the belief that they won't be hurt and so they ignore it all. Remember when democracy was the thing to run on in 2024 and many people stayed home because they don't like either candidate or party? They were sure they wouldn't be hurt or hurt any worse than they fancy themselves to be no matter who won.
I'm concerned that it's worse than that. I think a significant portion of maga knows it will be hurt, but doesn't care because that population believes the scales are hopelessly tilted against them no matter what. These people want to inflict as much pain and suffering as possible on the "libs" as they circle the drain.
Suffering for cause, when you're choosing to do so, is self-sacrifice. MAGA knows ruin and pain is coming, but so has anyone when they're heading off to war or sending their kids off to war.
Many of us know these people--people for whom it has been demonstrated that there is literally nothing this guy can do that would change their minds.
Based on my voting, I suppose they could say the same about me and Democratic candidates. The difference is I have not been tested nearly as extensively as they. I hope I never will be, but who knows
The difference between us and them is we can explain, in detail with facts why we support candidate X, not candidate Y. MAGA have been trained to vote (R) no matter what.
Yes! They have been groomed by the GOP for generations to vote against their own best interests. As my father told me, "Never underestimate the stupidity of a working class Republican".
That isn't quite it. They haven't been groomed to vote against what others see as being their best interest. They have been groomed into seeing their best interest DIFFERENTLY than what the people who aren't them are saying what their best interests are.
Their best interests (as they see them) are rooted in culture, not economics.
They can explain it in detail for hours. After Hour Two of the trans people are coming for your unborn children, though, it gets tiring. Delusions can be quite long winded.
I am with you. These guys always move the goalposts. I’ve been joking that I want to start betting $20 with the “that will never happen!” crowd. I don’t expect many takers.
Can I suggest that you find a republican to vote for somewhere? I keep myself honest by reading through every candidate and finding one I don’t object to. If nothing else, it will give you a rejoinder who those who suggest you have TDS or whatever.
I remember feeling “tested” when Bill Clinton lied about Monica Lewinsky. I still struggle with that. But at least there was the mitigating detail that he was managing the country well. Trump is orders of magnitude worse, morally, all while destroying our democracy and making the world less safe. So not quite an apples-to-apples comparison, but I’m glad you brought it up.
Funny, isn't it? Bill Clinton's personal failings with consenting adults disqualified him from the Presidency in many minds. Donald Trump, convicted felon, adjudicated rapist, and suspected pedo gets a free pass on his personal behavior.
I refuse to buy into the framing that the slightest foible in Democratic is a political death sentence (hi, Senator Franken) while the GOP gets a free pass on everything.
The double standard feels unbreakable. And it’s been going on since Reagan, at least. It’s really hard to avoid the suspicion that the legacy media has always leaned conservative and has manipulated public sentiment more than just reporting facts. I remember vividly my confusion at how Reagan was feted as having charm and vision. I felt such an evil vibe coming off him; cognitive dissonance that has persisted as the media favors right wing darlings, while dressing them up to be presentable.
That double standard is baked in...these folks have minds that are (likely) wired differently. It's a bit like asking a fish to breath air, it's just not something that they're capable of doing.
David French in NYT explained it well; Evangelicals are a political movement, not a religious movement. He would know, since he is Evangelical himself, and has been chased out of his congregation for his liberal apostasy. In other words, they had no use for that ragged old lib - Jesus.
There are the 25-30ish percent who are all-in with Trump, intoxicated by the vast right wing noise machine. The rest are the petit bourgeois small biz owners who will support anyone purporting to be Republican, to minimize confiscation of their hard-earned dollars by the leftist socialist McGovernment.
What also repulses me is that Republicans still poll better than Democrats overall, I guess because Dems get hate from both Republicans and their own? It's lunacy that this country can look at these two parties and think Democrats are somehow worse; Democrats are actually pretty good! They aren't perfect, but they're pretty good and they're sure as Hell not Republicans. What media are people in this country consuming? What sort of people are they talking politics with?
The Amurican public is frighteningly, and more importantly, stubbornly ignorant. They believe dump when he says America has been used by Europe and the rest of the world, because they have NO understanding of what Pax Americana has given back to America. Have we helped the world? Yes, but to think that it was all one-way and altruistic is dumb.
And when one is that ignorant, it follows that they have no idea how ignorant they are. Dunning-Kruger. And it’s dangerous.
I remember during the campaign of Hillary vs Trump, a reporter was in Ghana interviewing high school students about our election. Those young people knew so much more than the average American adult about American politics! They were incredibly well informed. It was impossible not to see the writing on the wall, of America’s slow demise.
I recall urging my friends to "understand" and "sympathize" with people who support Trump. "They have different values and experiences than we do and not as many advantages," and that sort of bleeding heart stuff. Now, I'm just enraged that we're being destroyed by this monster and have no sympathy whatsoever for people who are stupid and vengeful as he is. Not good for my mental health, but can't seem to help it. Anyone able to talk me down from this?
"If you really love your God / You’ll love your fellow man"
That's all I got. We're still the same types of humans who waved palm leaves at Jesus one day and screamed for his crucifixion the next. Haven't changed much.
I certainly can't, my only saving grace from the same thing is that I start work in office next week and will no longer be able to doom scroll or doom watch all day. It's really going to be a relief I think, once I get use to it. Pace yourself on information is all I have to offer, but that's tough with new scary situations coming in every hour it seems.
I've stopped looking at anything that could be political, including my email, after about 6 in the evening. I see it similar to how I can't eat anything after about 6 to keep my 75-year-old digestive system from horrible discomfort.
I started doing 500 and 1000 piece jigsaw puzzles. I used to think they were nice, but not something I could get into. I get them for Christmas from my kids. Well, now I am doing them and it is such a tremendous relief to have my mind preoccupied this way. You might try something like that. Involve your brain in something totally other. It's not a cure, but it helps.
Yes. It was fairly recent that someone was quoted, after Trump’s win, at the joy of being free to use the N word again, and also “pussy”. If that’s their metric of “freedom” then well . . . Here we are.
And for that reason, with respect to “advising the Europeans,“ I would say, “this is America today. This is the only America that you have to deal with now. You must oppose it in every way and not try to achieve balance in your approach. Trump doesn’t recognize balance. He only recognizes strength.”
Yes. I was hoping for more backbone from the Europeans, even knowing it might hurt my own finances. But who knows what went on behind closed doors? The video clips I saw of Trump in the public spaces at the end of the day showed a deflated, depleted version of the usual bombast.
It's not a metaphor or an exaggeration to say MAGA is a cult. Not every Trump voter is part of the cult, but a significant portion is. And they have far too much sunk cost to abandon their leader at this point.
The “sunk cost” feature is the basis of the familiar saying, “It’s easier to fool a man than to convince him he has been fooled”. Apparently the “con” is the least reported crime because that would involve admitting to being stupid. (Although I’ve wondered how they know it’s the least reported crime . . .)
In my historically purple county a yahoo with spray-painted yard signs has been able to garner a good 35-40 percent of the vote. That may sound like a lot of clueless voters, but it still adds up to being a landslide defeat.
Someone made a lot of money on the TACO trade the past couple of days. And it would be great if we had an independent SEC capable of investigating who made that trade. Good on Europe for standing firm. I’m waiting on Italy to revoke Rubio and Vance’s visas for the Olympics.
It’s fascinating then that Newsom is the only Democrat really challenging Trump every day. He’s in Davos right now going full Jim Halpert during a Bessent panel. Bashear is trying to get in on the act too. And these are governors that are actually going to need the federal government at some point or another. Why Senate Democrats haven’t found their spines is a mystery to me.
Got to end the episodes with a cliffhanger, which the legacy press that breathlessly reports his every move falls for every time. What if they tried ignoring every truthsocial posting, or stopped sending their reporters to every single 'briefing' from Lyin' Leavitt?
I'm less concerned about the Democrats being as strong as the Europeans and more interested in seeing them come up with an actual focused, dedicated game plan for how to take back power and keep it against a movement that has virtually nothing positive to say or do for the average American. How hard can it be? We've known who and what That Guy and That Movement are for the past decade and more. We know their priorities. We know their playbook. We know their tactics. How hard can it be to connect those dots and come up with a viable response? Yet here we are, still watching them debate what to do and how to do it.
Two suggestions from an amateur at such things: 1) consider lifting an old page from the GOP and come up with a Democratic Contract With America. Tell the people what you want to do and why. Tell them how it will benefit them and make their lives better than now. Tell us all what you are for instead of just what you are against. And promote the hell out of it, with as big of a marketing blitz as you can afford ahead of the midterms. It's pretty easy to do if you just look around and see what matters to the biggest number of people. 2) Whether he runs for President or not, send Pete Buttigieg out there at every opportunity to talk to America. He is a remarkably good communicator at a time when we need better messaging and a better approach to reaching those average Americans. Let him set the table, and whoever runs can use that as a template for how to make friends and isolate enemies.
Bonus take ... on ICE, now that we are veering toward a time when actual warrants and law don't matter anymore, how long until the regime simply says, "oh, to hell with it, let's just go grab anyone we don't like"? (translation: the rest of us) It doesn't take a genius to see that there is a very large gulag population waiting to be harvested around Year 3 of this administration at the rate things are going. One question, among many: who does the work, supports private sector businesses small and large, and pays the tax bills if about half the nation is locked up for badmouthing The Leader and The Movement? Food for thought. Fodder for discussion. Let's not assume anymore that it can't happen. The train has started down the tracks.
ICE is pretty much grabbing anyone they like just not keeping them — the logistics for that are still not there — but they don’t seem particularly concerned about who they nab off the streets.
One burden European leaders don’t share with our feckless Democrats is the risk of getting shot in the street by a run-of-the-mill gun toting angry American. European leaders are free to actually . . . lead. With less fear of a fatal attack from someone who has no idea of truth. European leaders can call out Trump’s antics without a death sentence.
Same with news organizations; I like to check the BBC for a bold comparison with our scared legacy media, in the topic of Trump. They have no need to “sane wash” our mad king. Ironic.
The BBC sanewashes Trump. Their competition is Murdoch, and if they stray too far from the fever dreams Murdoch broadcasts, their audience gets upset, just like here. It makes me wish I was bilingual.
We now know that Elon Musk’s DOGE illegally shared social security information with at least one outside political group to try and interfere with the election process which the DOJ is not interested in investigating, but what others are lurking? What does this mean for November 2026 and what else did Elon Musk do with our social security numbers and who has them?
If and when the Democrats are back in power they should seriously look a denaturalizing Elon Musk for what he has done.
Someone on the Bulwark staff, maybe JVL, once broached the idea of starting this by nationalizing SpaceX for national security reasons since it's in the control of such an unstable individual. Worth a discussion.
JVL has advocated for the nationalization of SpaceX. The latest revelations should be grounds for that based on the national security implications he can’t be trusted with government data. At yet here we are installing his AI in the military. The next administration will need to do something about this, and I don’t want to hear the argument he is too big to fail.
I would generally agree, and have never argued for denaturalization before. If the shoe were on the other foot, what would Musk be saying? We know that when he started his businesses in this country he was an illegal alien. He is now arguing for deporting people in the same condition he was. The difference is that Elon Musk’s lily white, aryan skin has protected him from the consequences inflicted on those with more melanin.
Undoubtedly. Still, rather than an eye for an eye and legitimizing denaturalization I'd rather legitimize taking obscenely wealthy peoples' money so whatever their personal brand of shittiness happens to be cannot infect the rest of the body politic. No one should be able to be that rich.
I would like the Dems to haul him in for a public hearing and just ask him: "What do you know?" Even if this DOJ were predisposed to investigate him for this particular illegal activity (and they're not), they'd be reluctant to do it; he had free rein in government databases. He surely has blackmail material on anyone in the administration who might be inclined to go after him.
When he and Trump were feuding over the passage of the Big Shitty Bill, and Trump was threatening Musk's contracts while Musk was threatening to fund challengers to anyone who voted for the bill, Musk tweeted that Trump was in the Epstein files, and not long after that, the two suddenly managed to reconcile their differences.
The next administration’s should refer an investigation to a grand jury and suspend all his government contracts until their work is finished — and that would be the minimum.
The MRI (or imaging whatever) of "Oh, not my head!" or his abdominal tract. Is it wrong to hope that Trump's Brazillian buddy Bolsonaro's malady of OBS (Obstructive Bowel Syndrome) is contagious? So full of....
As someone who has been shouting for 10 god damn years to PUNCH THE BULLY IN THE FACE, i'm so fucking glad our European allies FINALLY GOT THE GOD DAMN MESSAGE.
You don't appease a bully. IT NEVER WORKS. Kudos Europe. Now stay the fucking course.
So Bill, what you're trying to say is it's up to the Dems to clean up after yet another GOP shit storm! Your beloved GOP had at least two chances to avoid the destruction of the US by trump. Those craven, cowardly, bootlicking Republicans clutched their pearls hoping that the Dems could clean up that mess too.
Where the F is Chuck 'Stern letter' Schumer??? We need the Dem Senate to stand up and call out their Rep colleagues. The invasion of Greenland is literally the ball on the tee. You know, Tee Ball, that my five year old played. Get a bunch of Senators, hold the floor and call out this obvious bullshit. And how about Dems deploy some money and run some ads along the theme 'have we lost our minds'? Don't normalize the daily Trump meltdowns.
I would cut the Europeans some slack if their anger at Trump spills over onto the rest of us. After all, we elected him. Hopefully we as a people can earn back some of that trust lost internationally, but it won't be easy.
We had a sane person in Joe Biden. We re-elected the sociopath, and surrounded himself with people who are equally sociopathic. It’s going to take more than one preceding sane person to convince them the American character isn’t permanently altered for the worse.
is it too negative to wonder if the "sensitive social security data" downloaded by DOGE and conveyed to others included our NAMES and SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBERS?
It was reported by WIRED earlier on that DOGE spent the entire weekend copying an unknown number of government data bases, and writing API's* to link them together for purposes of data mining.**
*Application Programming Interface. A set of rules, protocols, and tools that allows two different software programs or systems to communicate and exchange data with each other.
The damage has already been done. I forget who originally did this comparison (David Frum?) but what Trump is doing to our allies is no different than what a physically and emotional abusive man does to his wife. She may stay with him, but there will be no trust nor affection going forward. Our erstwhile allies have to do what's in their best interests going forward, and that means detaching from us.
All because 77 million people voted for a sundowning, narcissistic sociopath.
Trump TACOd again, yet the NYT and WSJ still portrayed it as him somehow “winning.” I was thrilled at the swift freeze by Europe and Canada’s hard line in the sand. Too bad the Democrats can’t seem to do the same.
Meanwhile, my family is prepping for possible ICE threats—a father in the Seattle area, who was picking up his child from school—was disappeared by ICE. My sibling, a vet and naturalized citizen (along with many foreign born adoptees) is worried about being detained by ICE, and we already have a plan in place, including the phone number of an immigration attorney. Im a retired attorney, this is utterly illegal—but it doesn’t keep people from being disappeared. Especially when the courts in MN failed to uphold the restraining order preventing “administrative warrants” to search private homes.
Everyone needs to understand that we are all at risk from Trump’s version of the Brownshirts.
At some point countries are going to remember that they have enormous leverage over Trump personally thanks to his and his families’ enormous corruption. It doesn’t even have to rise to the level of sanctions or seizures (though both of those are clearly possible); investigations and snarling things up with red tape will give him plenty of headaches. Seriously, what are the chances they could get him to give up on Greenland by just threatening to surround his golf courses with windmills?
It surprises me sometimes just how naive and foolish Trump actually is. It shouldn't: this is a man who lost money running CASINOS for goodness' sake, and left a trail of failed companies in his wake. And while you're surely right that he thinks doing business with Saudis and Qatar makes it untouchable, the idea that it actually IS is laughable. He so rejects the concept of trustworthiness that he winds up trusting the worst possible people. Or maybe he truly believes that he will never lose power, and they will never dare use their leverage over him?
I’ve lost count of the times in the past year when pundits have proclaimed dismal poll numbers for Trump - numbers that seem unrealistically rock solid to me. How can Trump’s support remain so steady is my question. The fact that his numbers aren’t much, much worse than the polls reveal is another clue to how we got here. Too many Americans are completely clueless, and probably locked in to right wing media.
Trump's die-hard loyalists probably sit somewhere between 30 - 35%, and it's very rare you see numbers dip below that 30% mark. It's been that way since 2015, and actually it's probably since he took ownership of Birtherism. That alone should tell you all you need to know about your fellow countrymen. They are racists, closeted and less so. Pure and simple, they want a return to the era of pure, American whiteness... with a wifey at home, barefoot, pregnant, fretting over nothing but what she's going to serve for dinner. Try as anyone might, my sense is that 30 - 35% will never waver, at least not when it matters.
It's the other 15 - 20% who are a mix of centrists holding their noses to save a buck and the Bari Weiss types who are convinced that ends justify means, regardless of how cruel and historically unthinkable those means may have been for the past 80 years. Try to get any one of them to square their choices now. That line Mr. Kristol wrote about "averting their eyes"? That's the shame they're starting to feel but won't articulate because it would mean admitting they got into bed with literal Nazis... willingly, self righteously, and to all of our detriment.
There are Democrats, too, who share a lot of blame, the somewhere around 5% who stayed home in '24 because... I have no damn clue. They are actually the ones I'm most pissed at (that's saying something because I'm pretty pissed). If/when I hear lefties hemming an hawing about purity tests this summer (or in '28), my head might quite literally explode.
I get that racists are going to racist, but the rest of them - the sell-outs who actually know better - are the true deplorables to me.
Right, there's a bit of schadenfreude about what's happened to the economy, and I do genuinely feel shame in that while quite aware that the moderates/centrists likely needed their choices to blow up in their two-faces to wake them up. Feeling the economic pain, sadly, is what the doctor ordered I think.
For that matter, though, I was also conscious during Tiny's first administration. Even before we look at the diaper-dumpster-fire that was 2020, I don't recall some golden age his first 3 years in office. There were actually a lot purchases put on the American credit card, and let's not forget the plan Biden's team executed for the Afghanistan withdrawal was signed by Trump himself as *required* in 2021. Shame on Joe for not pumping the brakes, but when has Dear Leader been good at running anything in his entire life? He singlehandedly put Atlantic City into a depression, ffs.
Me in 2015: Look at Atlantic City. Why do you want to be like that?
Me in 2020: Look at Atlantic City FFS.
Me in 2025: Atlantic City! Why won't you look?!
Me in 2026: Oh, the elites WANTED us to look like Atlantic City.
To these guys it’s always someone else’s money they’re playing with and they could care less about the suckers and losers.
I didn't realize the 1950s were so glorious.
Excellent summation. I remember when my children were in early 20s, a few of their cohorts acted like voting was for naive losers who didn’t understand the game was rigged. Now they have families, and I suspect they vote.
And don’t get me started on purity tests! And identity politics! I really want to challenge some of those adherents: “Would you say it was worth it back then, if you knew Trump would be the result?”
On the other hand, some of this “purity” and identity is deliberately manufactured or jacked up by the right. I know a trans woman in her 70s, and she says nobody in her community gives a rat about participating in sports. But it was a very effective non-issue for reactionaries to blast out for predictable effect.
Anyone is better than Genocide Joe! Remember?
There were a lot of white people who were okay with what proved to be ethno-nationalist authoritarianism so long as a non-white wasn't elected, again.
There were a lot of males (irrespective of race) who were okay with that, so long as a woman wasn't elected (.for the first time). Male identity outweighed racial identity--bros before hoes.
There was also the issue that people were generally unhappy with the way things were (for various reasons) which gives rise to anti-incumbency (and Harris was, to all intents and purposes, the incumbent).
These three things gave Trump the win. That is what the data from the 2024 Presidential election is telling me. (disclaimer: I worked with election and attitude polling/measurement and analysis of said data back in the day when I was thinking about going into political consulting--a choice that my conscience is glad I moved away from).
You had a shift in white and male voting patterns that was sufficient to give Trump the slight edge that was necessary. There was also a depressed turnout overall for potential Harris voters. But the killer was the shift in white and male patterns.
The general dissatisfaction provided an excuse/rationale for votes that were rooted primarily in racism/sexism (more generally, "Otherism." The reality is that, as much as people talk about economic issues, they are not primary motivators in most cases--the motivator in that mix is not the specifics of economics, not any rational issue WRT economics, but the emotional background that the PERCEIVED economic conditions generate which bleeds into or rationalizes/excuses choices rooted in other motivaters.
The fact that there wasn't actually any plan or policy put forward by candidate Trump WRT how he was going to make the economy better--and that what little that WAS put forward was idiotic--points to two things:
General voter ignorance as to how the economy actually works; and
The basically non-rational role that economics plays in voting decisions.
Shifts in white voting patterns (given the demographic distribution) can be large enough to drown out effects from minority vote pattern shifts. That is basic math. That is also the reason why Democrats became more moderate in many cases as compared to the Democratic party of the early 20th century WRT economic policy. Cold War= Socialism bad (not that socialism is actually good, objectively).
It is why they chase the white vote. They HAVE to do that in order to be electorally viable at the national level--period, end of story. Democrats could get 100% of the minority vote and would still lose w/o a substantive chunk of the white vote. Again, it's just math.
2024 is the story of how becoming too entangled in "minority" issues can bite them in the butt in an environment where culture and shifts in culture are the primary voting determinants.
The reality is that, unless or until people actually get burned by the hot stove, they will ignore the danger of the hot stove. The hot stove is later and a matter of maybe/maybe not. Their feels in the moment drown that out.
Also, the hot stove usually has to get pretty hot before it has an impact--pretty hot means substantive PERSONAL impact, not things happening to other people who they do not know or empathize with. Things that MIGHT happen in the future. Might not (though odds/history/experience says they will).
So there are a lot of people with varying levels of regret or shame right now--but that level isn't high enough to drive anything because many are not directly affected in a negative way. It isn't PERSONAL. They are not (as the feel) actually doing any worse--or enough worse. These people are the people just waiting it out, going along to get along. This too shall pass is their motto.
Unless or until ICE breaks down THEIR door--or something similarly impactful happens.
In other words, White supremacy is still paying off benefits. As it does. And we have to stop denying that. For some people, White supremacy carries more benefits to their families than a cohesive American community would, especially if their church community insists on White supremacy.
Well said.
I think the 15 - 20% of "centrists" you mention took a look at the bed with Nazis in it and thought, "What can I do about it?" and "Looks plenty comfy to me." and are all too happy to jump right in...cowards, every damn one of 'em.
Same, it is baffling, but the conclusion that I have to make is that a solid 42% (ish) of my fellow citizens are all in, and ride-or-die with Trump.
And that is not enough to solidly knock him and MAGA out.
Or if not ride or die, they are complacent in the belief that they won't be hurt and so they ignore it all. Remember when democracy was the thing to run on in 2024 and many people stayed home because they don't like either candidate or party? They were sure they wouldn't be hurt or hurt any worse than they fancy themselves to be no matter who won.
I'm concerned that it's worse than that. I think a significant portion of maga knows it will be hurt, but doesn't care because that population believes the scales are hopelessly tilted against them no matter what. These people want to inflict as much pain and suffering as possible on the "libs" as they circle the drain.
Just as long as the people they hate are hurt more, they're all for it!
Suffering for cause, when you're choosing to do so, is self-sacrifice. MAGA knows ruin and pain is coming, but so has anyone when they're heading off to war or sending their kids off to war.
Indeed. I have 2 people who work for me (2 out of 5), so 40% who are all in.
I think they’re just, like the citizens of Rock Ridge, you know morons.
So, true. LMAO. The toll booth scene just came to mind. "Has anybody got a dime?"
https://youtu.be/hYTQ7__NNDI?si=mSdOkocb8NlijC-U
Many of us know these people--people for whom it has been demonstrated that there is literally nothing this guy can do that would change their minds.
Based on my voting, I suppose they could say the same about me and Democratic candidates. The difference is I have not been tested nearly as extensively as they. I hope I never will be, but who knows
The difference between us and them is we can explain, in detail with facts why we support candidate X, not candidate Y. MAGA have been trained to vote (R) no matter what.
Yes! They have been groomed by the GOP for generations to vote against their own best interests. As my father told me, "Never underestimate the stupidity of a working class Republican".
That isn't quite it. They haven't been groomed to vote against what others see as being their best interest. They have been groomed into seeing their best interest DIFFERENTLY than what the people who aren't them are saying what their best interests are.
Their best interests (as they see them) are rooted in culture, not economics.
They can explain it in detail for hours. After Hour Two of the trans people are coming for your unborn children, though, it gets tiring. Delusions can be quite long winded.
I am with you. These guys always move the goalposts. I’ve been joking that I want to start betting $20 with the “that will never happen!” crowd. I don’t expect many takers.
Can I suggest that you find a republican to vote for somewhere? I keep myself honest by reading through every candidate and finding one I don’t object to. If nothing else, it will give you a rejoinder who those who suggest you have TDS or whatever.
I remember feeling “tested” when Bill Clinton lied about Monica Lewinsky. I still struggle with that. But at least there was the mitigating detail that he was managing the country well. Trump is orders of magnitude worse, morally, all while destroying our democracy and making the world less safe. So not quite an apples-to-apples comparison, but I’m glad you brought it up.
Funny, isn't it? Bill Clinton's personal failings with consenting adults disqualified him from the Presidency in many minds. Donald Trump, convicted felon, adjudicated rapist, and suspected pedo gets a free pass on his personal behavior.
I refuse to buy into the framing that the slightest foible in Democratic is a political death sentence (hi, Senator Franken) while the GOP gets a free pass on everything.
The double standard feels unbreakable. And it’s been going on since Reagan, at least. It’s really hard to avoid the suspicion that the legacy media has always leaned conservative and has manipulated public sentiment more than just reporting facts. I remember vividly my confusion at how Reagan was feted as having charm and vision. I felt such an evil vibe coming off him; cognitive dissonance that has persisted as the media favors right wing darlings, while dressing them up to be presentable.
Hell, that double standard is still present at times in Bill's commentary.
That double standard is baked in...these folks have minds that are (likely) wired differently. It's a bit like asking a fish to breath air, it's just not something that they're capable of doing.
And it is those purveyors of morality the good Christians of this country who are giving him a free pass.
David French in NYT explained it well; Evangelicals are a political movement, not a religious movement. He would know, since he is Evangelical himself, and has been chased out of his congregation for his liberal apostasy. In other words, they had no use for that ragged old lib - Jesus.
"Get that woke, lib, Jesus nonsense out of mah church!"
The fault is not in our stars but in ourselves...
There are the 25-30ish percent who are all-in with Trump, intoxicated by the vast right wing noise machine. The rest are the petit bourgeois small biz owners who will support anyone purporting to be Republican, to minimize confiscation of their hard-earned dollars by the leftist socialist McGovernment.
That is a fundamental difference; they see taxation as confiscation; whereas we see taxation as the fee required for civilization.
It's amazing how many people have lost the connection between taxes and the things underneath their tires.
Someone else should pay! All of these folks are little better than spoiled children.
It's amazing how many people pretend to lose it.
You know who I've been hearing all my life are overpaid and underworked? Teachers. MAGA's billionaires.
ha! I'd not yet seen your post.
They're also the first ones to bitch about the pot hole in the street in front of their house...
What also repulses me is that Republicans still poll better than Democrats overall, I guess because Dems get hate from both Republicans and their own? It's lunacy that this country can look at these two parties and think Democrats are somehow worse; Democrats are actually pretty good! They aren't perfect, but they're pretty good and they're sure as Hell not Republicans. What media are people in this country consuming? What sort of people are they talking politics with?
Really. I have a problem understanding how even one person could approve of this shit.
The dumbing down of America by the GOP.
The GoP didn't do it (though they acted as enablers). Americans were happy to do it to themselves.
The Amurican public is frighteningly, and more importantly, stubbornly ignorant. They believe dump when he says America has been used by Europe and the rest of the world, because they have NO understanding of what Pax Americana has given back to America. Have we helped the world? Yes, but to think that it was all one-way and altruistic is dumb.
And when one is that ignorant, it follows that they have no idea how ignorant they are. Dunning-Kruger. And it’s dangerous.
I remember during the campaign of Hillary vs Trump, a reporter was in Ghana interviewing high school students about our election. Those young people knew so much more than the average American adult about American politics! They were incredibly well informed. It was impossible not to see the writing on the wall, of America’s slow demise.
It's a lot easier to fool someone than to convince them they've been fooled. Also, it's a cult.
I recall urging my friends to "understand" and "sympathize" with people who support Trump. "They have different values and experiences than we do and not as many advantages," and that sort of bleeding heart stuff. Now, I'm just enraged that we're being destroyed by this monster and have no sympathy whatsoever for people who are stupid and vengeful as he is. Not good for my mental health, but can't seem to help it. Anyone able to talk me down from this?
"If you really love your God / You’ll love your fellow man"
That's all I got. We're still the same types of humans who waved palm leaves at Jesus one day and screamed for his crucifixion the next. Haven't changed much.
I certainly can't, my only saving grace from the same thing is that I start work in office next week and will no longer be able to doom scroll or doom watch all day. It's really going to be a relief I think, once I get use to it. Pace yourself on information is all I have to offer, but that's tough with new scary situations coming in every hour it seems.
I've stopped looking at anything that could be political, including my email, after about 6 in the evening. I see it similar to how I can't eat anything after about 6 to keep my 75-year-old digestive system from horrible discomfort.
It helps some.
I started doing 500 and 1000 piece jigsaw puzzles. I used to think they were nice, but not something I could get into. I get them for Christmas from my kids. Well, now I am doing them and it is such a tremendous relief to have my mind preoccupied this way. You might try something like that. Involve your brain in something totally other. It's not a cure, but it helps.
I think there is a hard, hard core of folks who are autocrats to their core...which includes being racists and homophobes
Yes. It was fairly recent that someone was quoted, after Trump’s win, at the joy of being free to use the N word again, and also “pussy”. If that’s their metric of “freedom” then well . . . Here we are.
And for that reason, with respect to “advising the Europeans,“ I would say, “this is America today. This is the only America that you have to deal with now. You must oppose it in every way and not try to achieve balance in your approach. Trump doesn’t recognize balance. He only recognizes strength.”
Yes. I was hoping for more backbone from the Europeans, even knowing it might hurt my own finances. But who knows what went on behind closed doors? The video clips I saw of Trump in the public spaces at the end of the day showed a deflated, depleted version of the usual bombast.
It's not a metaphor or an exaggeration to say MAGA is a cult. Not every Trump voter is part of the cult, but a significant portion is. And they have far too much sunk cost to abandon their leader at this point.
The “sunk cost” feature is the basis of the familiar saying, “It’s easier to fool a man than to convince him he has been fooled”. Apparently the “con” is the least reported crime because that would involve admitting to being stupid. (Although I’ve wondered how they know it’s the least reported crime . . .)
Way too many people are simply not capable of seeing beyond their own selfish desires. Clueless is one way of describing it, stupid AF is my choice! 😉
Stupid Af is correct!
2 words: Drug addiction.
In my historically purple county a yahoo with spray-painted yard signs has been able to garner a good 35-40 percent of the vote. That may sound like a lot of clueless voters, but it still adds up to being a landslide defeat.
Someone made a lot of money on the TACO trade the past couple of days. And it would be great if we had an independent SEC capable of investigating who made that trade. Good on Europe for standing firm. I’m waiting on Italy to revoke Rubio and Vance’s visas for the Olympics.
It’s fascinating then that Newsom is the only Democrat really challenging Trump every day. He’s in Davos right now going full Jim Halpert during a Bessent panel. Bashear is trying to get in on the act too. And these are governors that are actually going to need the federal government at some point or another. Why Senate Democrats haven’t found their spines is a mystery to me.
Re: "Ruling Out" the use of force: If a person has stated that he does not believe in rules, then any statement "ruling out" anything is meaningless.
It's stay tuned next week for the next exciting show. We saw shades of that in the press conference before he left for Davos.
Got to end the episodes with a cliffhanger, which the legacy press that breathlessly reports his every move falls for every time. What if they tried ignoring every truthsocial posting, or stopped sending their reporters to every single 'briefing' from Lyin' Leavitt?
I don't think the legacy media is in those briefings anymore. They report based on video of the event.
OH! But haven't you heard...he's guided by his own morals. s/
Morals similar to those of a case of clamydia.
Ooops...You're right. I meant he is guided by his own morel. You know, his little mushroom
I'm less concerned about the Democrats being as strong as the Europeans and more interested in seeing them come up with an actual focused, dedicated game plan for how to take back power and keep it against a movement that has virtually nothing positive to say or do for the average American. How hard can it be? We've known who and what That Guy and That Movement are for the past decade and more. We know their priorities. We know their playbook. We know their tactics. How hard can it be to connect those dots and come up with a viable response? Yet here we are, still watching them debate what to do and how to do it.
Two suggestions from an amateur at such things: 1) consider lifting an old page from the GOP and come up with a Democratic Contract With America. Tell the people what you want to do and why. Tell them how it will benefit them and make their lives better than now. Tell us all what you are for instead of just what you are against. And promote the hell out of it, with as big of a marketing blitz as you can afford ahead of the midterms. It's pretty easy to do if you just look around and see what matters to the biggest number of people. 2) Whether he runs for President or not, send Pete Buttigieg out there at every opportunity to talk to America. He is a remarkably good communicator at a time when we need better messaging and a better approach to reaching those average Americans. Let him set the table, and whoever runs can use that as a template for how to make friends and isolate enemies.
Bonus take ... on ICE, now that we are veering toward a time when actual warrants and law don't matter anymore, how long until the regime simply says, "oh, to hell with it, let's just go grab anyone we don't like"? (translation: the rest of us) It doesn't take a genius to see that there is a very large gulag population waiting to be harvested around Year 3 of this administration at the rate things are going. One question, among many: who does the work, supports private sector businesses small and large, and pays the tax bills if about half the nation is locked up for badmouthing The Leader and The Movement? Food for thought. Fodder for discussion. Let's not assume anymore that it can't happen. The train has started down the tracks.
I like the idea of 1) but I fear trust in government and in the party has degraded so far that no one will take such a campaign seriously.
I am very concerned about the seizures in violation of the 4th Amendment. I hope the ACLU and other groups jump on the courts over this.
ICE is pretty much grabbing anyone they like just not keeping them — the logistics for that are still not there — but they don’t seem particularly concerned about who they nab off the streets.
Gives the impression they just count the number of grabs in meeting their quotas, doesn't it?
One burden European leaders don’t share with our feckless Democrats is the risk of getting shot in the street by a run-of-the-mill gun toting angry American. European leaders are free to actually . . . lead. With less fear of a fatal attack from someone who has no idea of truth. European leaders can call out Trump’s antics without a death sentence.
Same with news organizations; I like to check the BBC for a bold comparison with our scared legacy media, in the topic of Trump. They have no need to “sane wash” our mad king. Ironic.
The BBC sanewashes Trump. Their competition is Murdoch, and if they stray too far from the fever dreams Murdoch broadcasts, their audience gets upset, just like here. It makes me wish I was bilingual.
You’re right; I think it’s a matter of degree.
Not quite true about the BBC. He's suing them too.
We now know that Elon Musk’s DOGE illegally shared social security information with at least one outside political group to try and interfere with the election process which the DOJ is not interested in investigating, but what others are lurking? What does this mean for November 2026 and what else did Elon Musk do with our social security numbers and who has them?
If and when the Democrats are back in power they should seriously look a denaturalizing Elon Musk for what he has done.
Someone on the Bulwark staff, maybe JVL, once broached the idea of starting this by nationalizing SpaceX for national security reasons since it's in the control of such an unstable individual. Worth a discussion.
JVL has advocated for the nationalization of SpaceX. The latest revelations should be grounds for that based on the national security implications he can’t be trusted with government data. At yet here we are installing his AI in the military. The next administration will need to do something about this, and I don’t want to hear the argument he is too big to fail.
And Palantir.
JVL also used to consign people to a Falcon Heavy.
Denaturalizing I don't like. Throw him in a cell and throw away the key after taking all his money and auctioning off his shares though!
I would generally agree, and have never argued for denaturalization before. If the shoe were on the other foot, what would Musk be saying? We know that when he started his businesses in this country he was an illegal alien. He is now arguing for deporting people in the same condition he was. The difference is that Elon Musk’s lily white, aryan skin has protected him from the consequences inflicted on those with more melanin.
Undoubtedly. Still, rather than an eye for an eye and legitimizing denaturalization I'd rather legitimize taking obscenely wealthy peoples' money so whatever their personal brand of shittiness happens to be cannot infect the rest of the body politic. No one should be able to be that rich.
I would like the Dems to haul him in for a public hearing and just ask him: "What do you know?" Even if this DOJ were predisposed to investigate him for this particular illegal activity (and they're not), they'd be reluctant to do it; he had free rein in government databases. He surely has blackmail material on anyone in the administration who might be inclined to go after him.
When he and Trump were feuding over the passage of the Big Shitty Bill, and Trump was threatening Musk's contracts while Musk was threatening to fund challengers to anyone who voted for the bill, Musk tweeted that Trump was in the Epstein files, and not long after that, the two suddenly managed to reconcile their differences.
The next administration’s should refer an investigation to a grand jury and suspend all his government contracts until their work is finished — and that would be the minimum.
After holding him and dragging out some answers.
"....he has three more years in office....
Yeah, unless all those Big Macs, Filet-o-Fish, and Quarter Pounders do the right thing.
The MRI (or imaging whatever) of "Oh, not my head!" or his abdominal tract. Is it wrong to hope that Trump's Brazillian buddy Bolsonaro's malady of OBS (Obstructive Bowel Syndrome) is contagious? So full of....
As someone who has been shouting for 10 god damn years to PUNCH THE BULLY IN THE FACE, i'm so fucking glad our European allies FINALLY GOT THE GOD DAMN MESSAGE.
You don't appease a bully. IT NEVER WORKS. Kudos Europe. Now stay the fucking course.
So Bill, what you're trying to say is it's up to the Dems to clean up after yet another GOP shit storm! Your beloved GOP had at least two chances to avoid the destruction of the US by trump. Those craven, cowardly, bootlicking Republicans clutched their pearls hoping that the Dems could clean up that mess too.
The entire world got to see the President of the United States going full Veruca Salt over Greenland, which he confuses repeatedly with Iceland.
“All we’re asking for is to get Greenland, we need right, title, and ownership.” -Donald Trump, Jan. 21, 2026.
“All we need are 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Come on, gimme a break, fellas.” -Donald Trump, Jan. 2, 2021.
“I do whine because I want to win and I’m not happy about not winning,. And I am a whiner and I keep whining and whining until I win.”-Aug. 11, 2015
And now on to watching Jack Smith answer the questions of a pack of red jackals. God help him. Gym Jordan is bloviating at him now.
"BUT I WANT GREENLAND NOOOW!!!!!"
This is moment when you shove a pacifier child’s mouth and tell them to self soothe.
"going full Veruca Salt" made me laugh.
Yeah. That Jack Smith is having to sit in a room with Gymbo is sorta deflating.
Where the F is Chuck 'Stern letter' Schumer??? We need the Dem Senate to stand up and call out their Rep colleagues. The invasion of Greenland is literally the ball on the tee. You know, Tee Ball, that my five year old played. Get a bunch of Senators, hold the floor and call out this obvious bullshit. And how about Dems deploy some money and run some ads along the theme 'have we lost our minds'? Don't normalize the daily Trump meltdowns.
I would cut the Europeans some slack if their anger at Trump spills over onto the rest of us. After all, we elected him. Hopefully we as a people can earn back some of that trust lost internationally, but it won't be easy.
We will only earn that back when we elect a sane person who nominates qualified personnel.
And fix our system of governance to prevent a repeat.
Agreed.
We had a sane person in Joe Biden. We re-elected the sociopath, and surrounded himself with people who are equally sociopathic. It’s going to take more than one preceding sane person to convince them the American character isn’t permanently altered for the worse.
It's going to take more than one preceding sane person to convince ME that the American character isn't permanently altered for the worse.
Agreed.
Hell, I'm an American and I hate Americans, mainly magats and those to stupid to take an interest in preventing the downfall of our country.
is it too negative to wonder if the "sensitive social security data" downloaded by DOGE and conveyed to others included our NAMES and SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBERS?
It was reported by WIRED earlier on that DOGE spent the entire weekend copying an unknown number of government data bases, and writing API's* to link them together for purposes of data mining.**
*Application Programming Interface. A set of rules, protocols, and tools that allows two different software programs or systems to communicate and exchange data with each other.
** As was employed in the Global War on Terror
The damage has already been done. I forget who originally did this comparison (David Frum?) but what Trump is doing to our allies is no different than what a physically and emotional abusive man does to his wife. She may stay with him, but there will be no trust nor affection going forward. Our erstwhile allies have to do what's in their best interests going forward, and that means detaching from us.
All because 77 million people voted for a sundowning, narcissistic sociopath.
Trump TACOd again, yet the NYT and WSJ still portrayed it as him somehow “winning.” I was thrilled at the swift freeze by Europe and Canada’s hard line in the sand. Too bad the Democrats can’t seem to do the same.
Meanwhile, my family is prepping for possible ICE threats—a father in the Seattle area, who was picking up his child from school—was disappeared by ICE. My sibling, a vet and naturalized citizen (along with many foreign born adoptees) is worried about being detained by ICE, and we already have a plan in place, including the phone number of an immigration attorney. Im a retired attorney, this is utterly illegal—but it doesn’t keep people from being disappeared. Especially when the courts in MN failed to uphold the restraining order preventing “administrative warrants” to search private homes.
Everyone needs to understand that we are all at risk from Trump’s version of the Brownshirts.
At some point countries are going to remember that they have enormous leverage over Trump personally thanks to his and his families’ enormous corruption. It doesn’t even have to rise to the level of sanctions or seizures (though both of those are clearly possible); investigations and snarling things up with red tape will give him plenty of headaches. Seriously, what are the chances they could get him to give up on Greenland by just threatening to surround his golf courses with windmills?
It's why they are doing so much business with the Saudis and Qatar. To make themselves untouchable.
It surprises me sometimes just how naive and foolish Trump actually is. It shouldn't: this is a man who lost money running CASINOS for goodness' sake, and left a trail of failed companies in his wake. And while you're surely right that he thinks doing business with Saudis and Qatar makes it untouchable, the idea that it actually IS is laughable. He so rejects the concept of trustworthiness that he winds up trusting the worst possible people. Or maybe he truly believes that he will never lose power, and they will never dare use their leverage over him?