- Joined
- Jan 5, 2016
- Messages
- 6,917
- Reaction score
- 2,930
- Location
- Richmond, VA
- Gender
- Male
- Political Leaning
- Liberal
Why did an autocrat win the Presidency? This seems to me the abiding question as Trump’s inauguration draws near. He was “the lesser of two evils”, went a popular pre-election argument.
Was he? Trump was the bigger liar, the lesser informed, the least issue oriented toward ordinary voters as between himself and Hillary. His not so secret weapon was, and is, his obvious autocratic leanings. He ran an autocratic business enterprise for decades. His television fame was as an autocrat, hiring and “firing” the hopefuls who put their futures at his mercy before national audiences. No wonder Trump admires Putin and probably envies him, un-shackled by a Congress and a Supreme Court like what awaits a Trump administration.
Trump won the election because many Americans have given up on democracy. These are Americans who want an autocrat. Trump didn’t fool his voters. He wooed them, enough of them to make the difference. He wooed them with a call to autocratic rule. So now when Trump says he won an historically close election in a landslide, they agree against the clearest of evidence that it was a landslide. When Trump praises Putin, many suddenly fund Putin worthy of praise. The mainstream press is on to Trump, more or less, and that means Trump’s sycophantic followers don’t believe and don’t like the mainstream press. It’s a good question whether these people even still like the First Amendment if they ever consciously did.
We are entering a dangerous time for democracy in the United States.
Was he? Trump was the bigger liar, the lesser informed, the least issue oriented toward ordinary voters as between himself and Hillary. His not so secret weapon was, and is, his obvious autocratic leanings. He ran an autocratic business enterprise for decades. His television fame was as an autocrat, hiring and “firing” the hopefuls who put their futures at his mercy before national audiences. No wonder Trump admires Putin and probably envies him, un-shackled by a Congress and a Supreme Court like what awaits a Trump administration.
Trump won the election because many Americans have given up on democracy. These are Americans who want an autocrat. Trump didn’t fool his voters. He wooed them, enough of them to make the difference. He wooed them with a call to autocratic rule. So now when Trump says he won an historically close election in a landslide, they agree against the clearest of evidence that it was a landslide. When Trump praises Putin, many suddenly fund Putin worthy of praise. The mainstream press is on to Trump, more or less, and that means Trump’s sycophantic followers don’t believe and don’t like the mainstream press. It’s a good question whether these people even still like the First Amendment if they ever consciously did.
We are entering a dangerous time for democracy in the United States.