Grey Champions and the Election of 2016

[Kinser79]

(05-08-2016, 06:46 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: I can agree with this.  The 'starting to come to the conclusion' part could be worded stronger.  

Actually I worded it pretty strongly, well for me. I've said some things of this nature before privately in a more wishy-washy fashion and there was some concerns that I might be losing my grip on reality.

Quote:I note that Romney recently warned the American People about demagogues, with Trump and Sanders being examples of demagogues.

Romney is a milquetoast and that is one of the reasons he lost. He couldn't excite the base and what he offered was the same failed policies of so-called Bush Republicanism. It is interesting to note that today Pat Buchanan (a paleocon) has proclaimed the death of Bush Republicanism.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/article...30497.html

Quote:  I'm definitely with you more than Romney.  Trump and Saunders are going after the Establishment.  Trump has had a stronger impact, nigh on destabilizing the Republicans.

I took my mother out for sushi for mother's day. We both love the shit. Took the boy and the BF with us too. Naturally we discuss politics. I told her that Trump is pressing the reset button on the GOP. What comes after this campaign is likely to be a different creature.

The fact is that I think Trump will be able to cobble together the cultural libertarians into the GOP and keep them there for long enough that the nature of the party will change (if he gets in, barring his health or an assassination I see no reason why he can't do 2 terms, unless he completely effs it up). Should this happen, the Democrats will end up with all the cultural authoritarians, the theocrats, the PC Speech Police, the folks that want to police video games all of them.

Quote:However, he seems to me to be working a personality cult thing, using the abundant anger at the main line Republicans more than presenting a true alternate vision.  To me Saunders has a more coherent platform / values set, but he looks to be falling short.  Either way, we've got the Establishment Romney fighting a rearguard action against something or other.  The status quo is becoming more and more recognizable as bankrupt.

The Status Quo in both parties has been bankrupt for a long time. I think Sanders had difficulties in cobbling together a meme team to unleash memes on the internet (the main form of communication for those under 50), what young people he did have was confined to mostly white college kids. Someone once said something about if one isn't liberal at 20 they have no heart, and if one isn't conservative at 30 he has no brain.

The most important meme that Trump has unleashed is not the Trump Brand (which I think is the Personality Cult thing you're alluding too...I actually would call it branding and in this case he's selling himself and the images of success, America, greatness, and being an alpha/winner) but rather the "cuck" meme, and especially for the Establishment GOP the "Cuckservative". Cuck is a shortening of the word cuckold. It is used metaphorically.

Quote:The problem is not in identifying capitalism and democracy as practiced currently as flawed.  The problem is building an agreement on something better that can be implemented and that works.  Trump rouses a good deal of emotion.  Sanders talks better policy from my perspective.  Seems like both are apt to fall short.

Honestly Trump does have a policy...they are all policies that can be implemented with minimal involvement from congress.

--Fixing the trade. Ending these so-called free trade deals that hurt American workers, depress American Wages, and make America weaker by lessening our economic strength. This is all foreign affairs and the President initiates foreign affairs.

--Tackling Immigration and boarder security. Largely this can be accomplished by enforcing existing laws, and tweaking some of those existing laws. Such as making the fines for being caught hiring illegals much much higher. It would remove those fines from "cost of doing business" to "oh shit better not do that".

--Disentangling from entangling alliances. The President is commander in chief of the armed forces, he can close foreign bases at whim should he want to (none so far have since the Washington consensus is we need those bases for ... reasons). As for alliances, again foreign policy is at the President's initiative.

--Infrastructure. This will require funding from Congress, but some of it can be done through public-private partnerships within the states.

Where there is compromise and deal making is the exact form that accomplishing those task will take. Even if he does win two terms (as I expect him to should he win one--seriously the Dems are running HRC cause they got no body) I still fully expect him to only be able to accomplish much in the first six years, by which time he will be pushing 76 and he'll have to slow down just due to age.

I will expect him to be somewhat of a delegation style president too. So I'm less concerned about Daddy himself and more concerned about the people Daddy hires for his team. Though I'd love to see Milo as press secretary. That would be fun.

I can see it now:

White House Press Conference Room:

Milo stands at the podium.

Milo: Daddy has decided he isn't answering your questions today. I'm going shopping, put your comments in the box.

Milo sashays out of the press conference room.