The Trump Presidency, Season 2

[detrius]

Scotland 'welcomes' Trump.

Gotta love tae Scots...

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

Californian gouvernour GOP asshole candidate Kyle Langford has a vision how to end unemployment.

 

[Noodles]

The Republican Party everyone.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

The Republican Party everyone.

How ‘owning the libs’ became White House policy

 

[Innula Zenovka]

This explained a lot to me:

Why Isn’t Trump (Even More) Unpopular?

It’s not because he’s magic.

www.everythingishorrible.net

Trump’s 42.5% approval is bad. It should be worse. But his numbers aren’t resilient because he’s a brilliant campaigner or a genius speaker or a uniquely charismatic figure. His numbers are resilient because Americans don’t pay attention to politics; because when they do pay attention they tend to do so through a partisan lens; and finally because a lot of Americans like fascism.

 

[Free]

and finally because a lot of Americans like fascism.

That's called burying the lede.

 

[Free]

I'm tired of Trump cooking up shit for his base (Christian fundies) to eat up. I'm also tired of political fiat by Post-it note.

Trump memo allows federal workers to persuade coworkers their religion is ‘correct’

The Trump administration released a memo Monday that aims to protect religious expression among federal workers, outlining that employees can attempt to persuade co-workers about why their religiou…

thehill.com

The Trump administration released a memo Monday that aims to protect religious expression among federal workers, outlining that employees can attempt to persuade co-workers about why their religious beliefs are “correct.”

The memo outlined conduct that should not result in disciplinary or corrective action, including displaying in the office bibles, religious artwork, jewelry, posters displaying religious messages and other indicia of religion “such as crosses, crucifixes and mezuzah.”

The memo also said one or more employees should be allowed to engage in individual or communal religious expressions and that employees can engage in conversations on religious topics “including attempting to persuade others of the correctness of their own religious views, provided that such efforts are not harassing in nature.”

When I worked for a few months at a USPS distribution center, there was this guy who believed the government was protecting space aliens, and he would regularly complain about it, to everyone. And to think I found THAT to be annoying...

 

[Free]

So Trump connected one of Epstein's known victims, Virginia Giuffre, to himself. Which likely means he was employing teen (and possibly pre-teen) girls for "one of the best spas in the world" at Mar-a-Lago.

Trump says Jeffrey Epstein 'stole' Virginia Giuffre from him when she worked at Mar-a-Lago spa

"He took people that worked for me. And I told him, 'Don’t do it anymore.' And he did it," Trump told reporters.

www.nbcnews.com

 

[Beebo Brink]

This explained a lot to me:

The popularity of fascism in America is one of those blatant truths that everyone conveniently "forgets" by focusing on our actions in World War II after we belatedly joined the fight. Until the attack on Pearl Harbor, the U.S. population favored neutrality, but there was a substantial amount of pro-German rhetoric as well.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

The popularity of fascism in America is one of those blatant truths that everyone conveniently "forgets" by focusing on our actions in World War II after we belatedly joined the fight. Until the attack on Pearl Harbor, the U.S. population favored neutrality, but there was a substantial amount of pro-German rhetoric as well.

I was aware of that, but the point that I hadn't fully appreciated before was how little people who aren't interested in politics and current affairs know about what's going on. The point about not being interested in sports made me appreciate that. I mean, I vaguely understand what the Super Bowl is, but that's about as far as my knowledge goes. Same with soccer over here. I'm not particularly interested, so unless a team has just been on the national, rather than sports, news because it's won a championship, I'm unlikely to know how it's doing, or who the captain and manager are, let alone who plays in what position.

But yes, fascism was pretty popular in the US before WW2, and while the scandals surrounding the Second Klan pretty much destroyed it as an organisation, its sympathisers simply gravitated to other far-right movements, and finally to the first America First party, led by Charles Lindbergh and the US promoter of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, Henry Ford. WW2 probably changed the minds of some of their supporters about fascism, but I suspect many of them continued to hold the same basic ideas, even if they thought Hitler went a bit far and, as to Mussolini, Italians aren't really white anyway (or weren't at the time).

On which subject, I'm always a bit mystified by the admiration many of the US far right (particularly the political "trad Catholic" far right) express for General Franco. I mean, if the dictator of Spain wasn't "Hispanic," then who is?

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

the first America First party, led by Charles Lindbergh

During WWII Lindbergh tried to reactivate his Army commission out of "patriotic duty" but was refused because right up until the US formally joined the war he had been openly promoting the Nazis as the right side.

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

On which subject, I'm always a bit mystified by the admiration many of the US far right (particularly the political "trad Catholic" far right) express for General Franco. I mean, if the dictator of Spain wasn't "Hispanic," then who is?

Actual Spanish from Spain is "proper" white European, I think. Spanish-speaking people in the Americas are indigenous peoples, blends of white Europeans with indigenous peoples, and in some cases blends of formerly enslaved Africans with indigenous. So to them it's a big melting pot of "miscegenation".

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

I was aware of that, but the point that I hadn't fully appreciated before was how little people who aren't interested in politics and current affairs know about what's going on...

Yeah.... it's baffling to us, but even some of the smartest people ever just let this kind of thing sneak up on them. Consider Alfred Tarski, a very famous logician and certainly not an idiot:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Tarski

Oblivious to the Nazi threat, he left his wife and children in Warsaw. He did not see them again until 1946. During the war, nearly all his Jewish extended family were murdered at the hands of the German occupying authorities.

Even some very smart people just have their heads in the clouds. Combine that with extreme poverty and no access to education and you can get a deep level of not being aware of what isn't right in front of their face. From what I've seen, many voters go purely on "vibes" with absolutely no knowledge of the issues.

 

[Casey Pelous]

... On which subject, I'm always a bit mystified by the admiration many of the US far right (particularly the political "trad Catholic" far right) express for General Franco. I mean, if the dictator of Spain wasn't "Hispanic," then who is?

Oh, my. You think the far right can connect "Hispanic" with "Spain."

That's very gracious of you.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

Kamala Harris announced NOT to run for governor in California 2026. Instead she wants to keep the door open for a 2028 presidential run.

This decision is supposed to be months in the making. Also Harris should have really battled with herself, but in the end she wants to have the biggest impact possible.

Governer Newsome has reached his term limit, so cannot run again.

Kamala Harris decides not to run for governor of California

The former vice president gave "serious thought" to a campaign but opted against it. A person close to her said her decision "does keep the door open" for a potential 2028 presidential run.

www.nbcnews.com

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

Oh, my. You think the far right can connect "Hispanic" with "Spain."

That's very gracious of you.

True enough. I have seen far right people go back and forth with each other if Spain was white European or latino etc. Dakota Tebaldi is of course correct that most racists consider Spain to be white.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

Up to WWI most of Southern and Eastern Europe was considered non-White by Americans, especially to Klan members. Catholic and Orthodox countries aside from France and Germanic Catholics were suspect.

 

[Free]

FactPost (@factpostnews.bsky.social)

Former Prosecutor: It seems to raise questions about Mar-a-Lago being a place where Jeffrey Epstein and Maxwell were able to find young women. Virginia Giuffre was one of the most prominent victims. The one thing that you didn't hear from Trump was acknowledgement that she was victimized by Epstein

bsky.app

FactPost (@factpostnews.bsky.social)

Reporter: What did you think Epstein was stealing those women for? Trump: *ignores, walks away*

bsky.app

 

[Zaida Gearbox]

Up to WWI most of Southern and Eastern Europe was considered non-White by Americans, especially to Klan members. Catholic and Orthodox countries aside from France and Germanic Catholics were suspect.

My Irish grandfather had an Italian girlfriend when he was young. His parents threatened to disown him if he didn't break up with her because they didn't consider Italians to be white. They barely considered my Cajun-French grandmother white, and to hear tell of it, my grandfather's mother was always putting my grandma down for not being Irish.

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

My Irish grandfather had an Italian girlfriend when he was young. His parents threatened to disown him if he didn't break up with her because they didn't consider Italians to be white. They barely considered my Cajun-French grandmother white, and to hear tell of it, my grandfather's mother was always putting my grandma down for not being Irish.

Yeah.... nobody with any sense thinks racists make sense. They've always had spectrums and hierarchies of what is and isn't okay. I don't think racists have ever had a clear binary of okay or not okay. And many racists who aren't white also have very complex hierarchies of which peoples they are and are not okay with.