President Trump: Part II

[Emily's Cat]

I am genuinely baffled by your failure to grasp reality.

TRUMP WON. HE DID NOT "TREAT PEOPLE WITH RESPECT".

But he did pick up more states in the EC by being nasty than Clinton picked up by being either nice or nasty.

What you're arguing is a lie: the formula for electoral success wasn't "respect", it was being nasty to the right people. And what you are attempting to do here is legitimize that nastiness, and reframe the election as being "Clinton was disrespectful". Because she wasn't nasty to the right people the way Trump was. If she'd been more like him, with his racism and sexism and xenophobia, she'd have won?

The thing is, her supporters wouldn't want her to win if that's the winning formula. It's backwards: you don't change your entire philosophy so "your" candidate wins, you pick your candidate because they are closest in agreement with your philosophy. I wouldn't want a Trump-style Clinton.

Trump was nasty to Clinton. Trump was nasty to foreigners. Trump wasn't nasty to the people that he was trying to convince to vote for him. He played the numbers, he played to people's most base fears and most immediate concerns.

During his campaign, Trump didn't express sexism. He didn't express racism. He did express xenophobia, and he used that to his advantage. The fear of terrorism is a real fear. The fear of sharia law is a real fear. It might be unfounded when you only look at numbers and statistics... but the scars left by the Twin Towers, by Charlie Hebdo, by some of the attacks on women and the threat to women's rights in Europe are legitimate fears. The loss of jobs and the competition with illegal immigrants is a legitimate fear. There are all sorts of arguments for why a wall won't change the economic shifts we're experiencing, but that doesn't assuage the anxiety. He leveraged the "other" to speak to some of the most basic worries that a large number of people have. He absolutely and without question exploited that appeal to emotion, fairly successfully too.

Honestly, this is game theory. This is negotiation. This is absolutely how propaganda and narratives work.

Game theory, negotiation, and narrative are fundamental aspects of winning elections. It is now, and always has been.

 

[Ethan Thane Athen]

Trump didn't actually criticize any americans directly. He criticized non-citizens who could be cast as threats to the average american. He criticized groups of people who can easily be spun as being a threat to citizens, both physically and economically. What he didn't do was actually criticize american citizens and cast them as unworthy and incapable of saving.

I think your memory may be letting you down, he insulted plenty of Americans including veterans, a disabled person etc.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Actually one minor quibble here. Trump did in fact criticism some Americans directly. He routinely dumped all over the press, the intelligence community, and was less than cordial toward the Khan family. I'm still in shock that that last one, combined with the crap he said about McCain, didn't push more military / veterans away from him.

Fair point.

Trump is a buffoon, but he's also a fairly savvy showman. He knows how to resonate with a crowd.

Hell, the popularity of Reality TV ought to give you pause on this one. What he did with this election... he turned the election into Reality TV. I still recall when The Learning Channel actually had stuff on it to be learned. I lament it's loss. But it's what plays to a huge number of Americans.

 

[TragicMonkey]

Trump was nasty to Clinton. Trump was nasty to foreigners. Trump wasn't nasty to the people that he was trying to convince to vote for him. He played the numbers, he played to people's most base fears and most immediate concerns.

During his campaign, Trump didn't express sexism. He didn't express racism. He did express xenophobia, and he used that to his advantage. The fear of terrorism is a real fear. The fear of sharia law is a real fear. It might be unfounded when you only look at numbers and statistics... but the scars left by the Twin Towers, by Charlie Hebdo, by some of the attacks on women and the threat to women's rights in Europe are legitimate fears. The loss of jobs and the competition with illegal immigrants is a legitimate fear. There are all sorts of arguments for why a wall won't change the economic shifts we're experiencing, but that doesn't assuage the anxiety. He leveraged the "other" to speak to some of the most basic worries that a large number of people have. He absolutely and without question exploited that appeal to emotion, fairly successfully too.

And you're okay with all that?

Contrary to your premise that Trump's supporters deserve respect you are characterizing them as fools who fell for a snake oil saleman.

You are all over the map here--first Clinton lost because she was nasty, then she lost because she wasn't nasty in the right way, Trump's supporters deserve respect, Trump's supporters voted for him because he exploited their fears and emotions...It's almost sounding as if you don't have a coherent argument at all, you're just scrabbling to justify attacking Clinton.

 

[Stacko]

Trump proposes a religious test for refugees on holocaust remembrance day.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Actually one minor quibble here. Trump did in fact criticism some Americans directly. He routinely dumped all over the press, the intelligence community, and was less than cordial toward the Khan family. I'm still in shock that that last one, combined with the crap he said about McCain, didn't push more military / veterans away from him.

Fair point.

Those are all really small segments, and at least one of them (the press) is a view shared by a pretty big chunk of citizens. At a minimum, I think everyone would agree that either Fox or MSNBC (or both) are fundamentally biased and present skewed news.

As for the Intelligence Community... that's an interesting one for me. I've got family in that community, so I pretty much take anything ever reported by the media about it as way off base and clueless. That said, I also note that there was a fair bit of lambasting the intelligence community when it was Bush in charge and there were no actual WMDs.

The handful of americans that he attacked represented small segments that have shaky credibility and trust already. Not generous or nice of him, but not ones that threaten his voter base. He played to beliefs already held by a large number of people, he played to their fears, and he did it well.

Trump is a buffoon, but he's also a fairly savvy showman. He knows how to resonate with a crowd.

Hell, the popularity of Reality TV ought to give you pause on this one. What he did with this election... he turned the election into Reality TV. I still recall when The Learning Channel actually had stuff on it to be learned. I lament it's loss. But it's what plays to a huge number of Americans.

 

[Giz]

You are all over the map here--first Clinton lost because she was nasty, then she lost because she wasn't nasty in the right way

Really? I thought it's always been: don't insult major voting blocks (i.e. see Romney's 47% comment).

 

[Ethan Thane Athen]

Not at all. At least not in my state. WA was so incredibly solidly blue, with a zero chance of going red, that I can confidently say I did not contribute to Trump's win in any fashion whatsoever.

I was actually completely shocked when I woke up the next morning and he had won. I didn't even watch the election, as far as I was concerned, he hadn't an ice cube's chance in hell. I spent the next week waiting for the punchline.

Well, I also spent the next week being appalled by the magnitude of hatred and contempt being indiscriminately leveled at conservatives. I'm still a bit shocked by the complete lack of empathy and consideration being shown by the party that I have traditionally associated with compassion and a willingness to fairly consider the perspective of others.

I do get where you're coming from, though disagree with your ultimate conclusion. Surely people should call out scummy or really seriously idiotic behaviour and support of same? As I say, this is not a minor difference in economic policy, this is a man who is advocating torture, wants to regress laws back to the 1970's, and thinks putting a tariff on Mexican imports means Mexico is paying for the wall. I would suggest, yes some may be taking it too far and maybe you've gone too far down the understanding route and the truth, as mostly, is somewhere inbetween but now I'm in danger of being reasonable and I didn't intend that

 

[Beelzebuddy]

The message she was trying to get out is that her side needs to reach accross the aisle to some of Trump's supporters.

She truly failed to get that message out. And I have to sift through some enormously offensive judgments in order to get to it.

BTW - why do you feel justified in trying to make me play your game?

Because you keep saying things at odds with the above interpretation.

Things like

If you want to win votes, if you want to sway people to your thinking, then you need to treat them as if they're capable of understanding your point, and you need to treat them with respect.

If you indiscriminately treat people as if they're worthless and their views are of no value, you will NOT be able to gain their support.

when that is EXACTLY what Clinton was getting at.

This sort of heavy-handed "you need to prove you understand it" crap is just that - crap. I answer in the spirit of perhaps making headway here, but it's overall in ineffective strategy.

Possibly, I don't know, it's just how I work. First I want to make sure I understand them, then I want to find the premise or assertion at the root of where we differ and address that directly. I don't like playing along with the partisan blinkers that people seem to don, that allow them to knowingly take things out of context whenever convenient.

This thing you're doing, where Clinton's description of some of Trump's supporters as irredeemable is horribly offensive to you when it suits you, but then you're a moderately conservative independent who shouldn't be tarred with that brush because you're above all this party politics when it doesn't suit you? I don't like it.

 

[Emily's Cat]

And what is the winning strategy? You keep suggesting it's "reaching out" and "being respectful".

1. Who won this election?
2. In what ways did he or she demonstrate "being respectful"? Was it when they mocked a disabled reporter? Boasted of "grabbing pussies"? Suggested a woman was "bleeding out of her wherever?" Said Mexicans were "rapists and criminals"?

It is either insanity or hypocrisy to continually claim that the "winning strategy" is X when the winner did precisely the opposite of X.

We can really get into who said what if you want. We can dig through and analyze it until we both start bleeding from the ears. Alternatively, we can talk more broadly about strategy. About when the offenses occurred. About who they were directed at. At how they resonate with the public.

And about the actions and tactics taken by each of their respective supporters, which I contend is the lever that shifted the election.

The offenses that Trump took are definitely disrespectful, I'm not arguing that. But the worst of his offenses were far in the past, dredged up to discredit him. Clinton's supporters brought up things from 12 years ago and later. It simply doesn't carry as much weight as you might think. Consider things you might have said, views you might have held 12 years ago. Is it possible that any of them might be considered offensive? Would you consider it reasonable to treat comments from 12 years ago as credible reasons to dislike you now? I rather suspect I said some stupid things 12+ years ago that don't accurately reflect who I am now, and what I believe now. I strongly suspect that a dozen years in the future I'll find that I've changed position on something I believe now.

Most of the remaining offenses made by Trump were directed at foreigners. They were directed at outsiders. They weren't directed at the current citizens of the US, they weren't directed at potential voters. Trump leveraged legitimate fears and concerns held by people to his advantage. "He said bad things about the people that you perceive as a threat to your job" simply doesn't create as much antagonism as you might think . "He insulted people that you associate with attacks on innocent civilians" doesn't turn off as many people as you might expect.

Trump didn't need the votes of illegal aliens and foreign nationals. Clinton did need the votes of roughly a quarter of the voting public.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

... Here's what you keep missing - this is not about Trump being a good choice. (I agree that Clinton was a safer/saner choice than him.) The point is: instead of reaching out across the aisle to build a broad coalition, you are lashing out with scorn and invective. If you care about the country, this is a time to start winning back the states that were lost. To do that, your sales pitch shouldn't be "you deplorable scum bags shouldn't get a vote!!"... even if you feel that way, even if you think that is justified... it's not going to make things better.

I highlighted what looks to me to be projection.

First, I'm not campaigning here. Where did that come from? Oh that's right, from Emily's Cat telling people they should be nicer to the other side. Never mind the boggling irony, who the hell is campaigning?

I don't have a sales pitch. I'm asking the people responsible for POTUS Trump if they have yet recognized what they've done? Or are they still under the magic con artist spell that Trump will step up and be Presidential any day now?

I'm curious how the cognitive dissonance is going.

Then the thread got sidetracked with blaming Clinton, or the Democrats for their supposedly 'flawed' candidate. That ran the gamut from the fact she was under a bogus FBI investigation to her "basket of deplorables" comment.

No, Clinton was not flawed. She faced the con artist king of a post fact world.

I'm not interested in campaigning at the moment. I will be when the 2018 election comes into focus next year. What I am interested in is the human condition that allows a mentally ill POTUS to get elected. I'm interested in just how far a third of the country has descended into the post truth world.

That includes to some extent, people who deny they contributed to Trump's election, those who have a dozen excuses/rationalizations for why they bear no blame but someone else does.

 

[dudalb]

Trump proposes a religious test for refugees on holocaust remembrance day.

Trumpy never read the first sentence of the First Amendment, apparently.
I suspect this another Trump statement that walked back very quickly.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Yeah I get that, though you took it further than I was saying. Being careful who you associate with is not specifically saying you are as bad as them but that you may be lending them undeserved credence or respectability, that in joining with them, you may be helping them take forward some views you may not particularly agree with just because you overlap in some other area. It was an exhortation that, yeah, we know you're hurting but joining with those people is not the way to go 'cos that's not who you are.

Got distorted by the media into 'Oh my god she insulted some people' despite it being meagre fare compared to the stuff Trump was coming out with.

As stated though, I'm more than happy to insult everyone who voted Trump and many if not all those who voted 'not Clinton'.

Have fun with that, I guess. I personally find that being happy insulting about half the people I interact with doesn't really move any of my objectives forward

 

[Emily's Cat]

Conway said she wants a "fair and free" press, implying we don't have one now.

To be honest, while we have a free press in terms of government infringement, I do not believe we have a fair press at all.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

... Well, I also spent the next week being appalled by the magnitude of hatred and contempt being indiscriminately leveled at conservatives. I'm still a bit shocked by the complete lack of empathy and consideration being shown by the party that I have traditionally associated with compassion and a willingness to fairly consider the perspective of others.

How dare we blame the GOP for the GOP candidate winning?

No, I don't have empathy at the moment. Did you notice how the first week has gone? Why are conservatives off the hook? Because they didn't mean it? They aren't really like that? They're really all mellow pot smoking Libertarians?

It's the Democrats fault because Clinton called out the bigots supporting Trump?

 

[dudalb]

Michael Moore famously predicted before the election that Trump would win. First on his list of reasons is the bitterness felt by ordinary workers who suffered the collapse of the Rust Belt economy, and who hold Democrats and Republicans equally responsible. Trump offered them what looked like a lifeline; Clinton gave them a sneer. And here we are.
http://michaelmoore.com/trumpwillwin

The Democrats have had a Blue Collar problem for along time; this is not the first time it has bit them in the butt.
Problem is that Trump's lifeline is fake.
Real problem is no politicans to tell the Blue Collars workers the Truth:The manfacutirng jobs are gone due much more to automation then going overseas;and they are not coming back,and then to offer them a REAL lifeline in the form of programs to retrain them for other jobs.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Michael Moore famously predicted before the election that Trump would win. First on his list of reasons is the bitterness felt by ordinary workers who suffered the collapse of the Rust Belt economy, and who hold Democrats and Republicans equally responsible. Trump offered them what looked like a lifeline; Clinton gave them a sneer. And here we are.
http://michaelmoore.com/trumpwillwin

Much as Michael Moore is my hero, he was a Sanders' supporter who also bought into the baseless trashing of Clinton.

She didn't sneer at the rust belt. That was the false narrative painted by the right wing.

 

[dudalb]

Trump proposes a religious test for refugees on holocaust remembrance day.

It will be fun if he tries to actually tries to get this in paper as policy.

 

[Emily's Cat]

And you're okay with all that?

No, which is part of why I didn't vote for him.

But me being okay with it is completely separate from me being able to understand how it played out, how it affected an audience, and how it was perceived by the public.

I'm not very good as an orator, and I'm not very good at composing persuasive speeches. Language isn't my medium of choice when it comes to communication. But I do understand influence and the effect of language and appeals to emotion fairly well. I can recognize them, and I acknowledge the role they play in public interactions.

Contrary to your premise that Trump's supporters deserve respect you are characterizing them as fools who fell for a snake oil saleman.

How so?

You are all over the map here--first Clinton lost because she was nasty, then she lost because she wasn't nasty in the right way, Trump's supporters deserve respect, Trump's supporters voted for him because he exploited their fears and emotions...It's almost sounding as if you don't have a coherent argument at all, you're just scrabbling to justify attacking Clinton.

I don't care about attacking Clinton. That is not my objective.

It's possible that I'm failing to make my argument effectively, and that I'm failing to paint the overall comprehensive picture. That's certainly plausible.

But I do see all of these things as being part and parcel of the same thing. Clinton made disparaging remarks toward people whose vote she needed to win. She insulted a very large swath of voting citizens. Trump was nasty toward his opponent, and he made disparaging remarks toward foreign people. He spoke to the fears and concerns of the people whose vote he needed to win.

Clinton made voters feel as if they didn't matter to her, and as if they were disliked by her. Trump made voters feel as if he understood and sympathized with their worries.

In addition, Clinton's supporters spent a lot of the election criticizing, insulting, and trying to offend Trump's supporters. Trump's supporters spent a lot of the election criticizing, insulting, and trying to offend Clinton.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Trump was nasty to Clinton. Trump was nasty to foreigners. Trump wasn't nasty to the people that he was trying to convince to vote for him. He played the numbers, he played to people's most base fears and most immediate concerns.

I take it you weren't paying much attention because this is nonsense.

What was amazing was how people int the groups he attacked managed apologetics and rationalizing how he didn't really mean them.

[snipped alternate reality stuff].