Donald Trump never suffered a great catastrophic fall as many of his enemies hoped he would. Having grown up with the Hollywood Action movie model many Americans wished for a clear-cut ending where the bad guy goes away to prison, and millions rejoice in him being banished to where he can never hurt this country again. Unfortunately, reality is very rarely as neat and tidy as a film script, and several years were wasted while American politicians and media pundits hoped that Trump might finally give up his irate and bumbling behavior, and start behaving like a mature and responsible adult, who respected Presidential and Constitutional norms.
To quote former President Obama: “Donald Trump hasn’t grown into the office of the President, because he can’t…” Trump is a stupid, irate man-child whose only real talent is appealing to the base instincts of people who are just as ignorant, petty and short-sighted as he is. During the 2016 election, the firm Cambridge Analytica, with the help of researcher Chrisopher Wylie developed a method of using “likes” on Facebook to develop a “Five-Factor personality profile” on millions of Facebook users. Individuals who were found to have a strong tendency towards Authoritarian thinking were then targeted with agitative propaganda developed by Russian intelligence agencies. The design of that propaganda appears to have been guided largely by studies and observations of authoritarian tendencies by reseachers and authors such as T.W. Adorno and his associates on the American Jewish Committee, Gregory W. Allport, and Hannah Arendt. All three of the authors listed pursued their studies in hopes that their work might reduce the potential for something like the rise of Nazi Germany to ever happen again. Unfortunately, one of the truest signs that someone is a social scientist of extraordinary talent, is that evil people use your observations for their own malignant ends. No one recognizes talent and ideas faster than a criminal. To put it simply: Russian intelligence agencies used over fifty years of research on Authoritarian personality traits to design propaganda that would appeal to the economically and socially frustrated, Cambridge Analytica designed the targeting system, and Facebook looked the other way and pretended to have no idea how their social media network was being used.
To understand how to beat Trump we must look at the example of doomsday cults. When a cult leader predicts that “the world will end on this day,” and that day comes and goes, the cult rarely dissolves completely after that first failed prediction. Instead, a handful peel away, and the cult members go about trying to recruit replacements.
“Suppose an individual believes something with his whole heart; suppose further that he has a commitment to this belief, that he has taken irrevocable actions because of it; finally, suppose that he is presented with evidence, unequivocal and undeniable evidence, that his belief is wrong: what will happen? The individual will frequently emerge, not only unshaken, but even more convinced of the truth of his beliefs than ever before. Indeed, he may even show a new fervor about convincing and converting other people to his view.” (Festinger, L. et al., 1956)
Historically, leaders of Doomsday cults have been able to repeatedly predict the end of the world, without ever losing all of their followers. Ultimately, the deciding factor of when a cult leader must give up with when loss of adherents due to rapid waves of disconfirming evidence leads to a shedding of adherents which overwhelms the group’s ability to recruit any followers. With Trump, we must assume the same is true. Every time that he suffers some great setback, there will be a small group that pulls away from him, but his most ardent followers will hold even tighter to the myth of Trumpism, and try to recruit new followers. The only way to beat the phenomena of Trumpism, is for the movement to suffer wave after wave of setbacks and loss, until the entire stinking edifice comes crashing down. Trump has already precipitated a series of disconfirming events on his own. Every time there was a demonstration of juw how corrupt he really is, or his most ardent followers engaged in actions that repulsed more moderate Republicans, Trump’s chances of winning re-election were diminished. The key to getting past the “Trumpism without Trump” phase that the GOP seems to be currently stuck in, will be for the Republican Party to face a similar series of consequential events, or demonstrate behavior that is repellant to the majority of Americans.
The firing of James Comey on May 9th of 2017 was a glaring example of Trump’s corruption, and it set in motion a series of events that ultimately led to the creation of the “Never Trump Republicans” movement, and eventually contributed to Trump’s re-election loss. This series will begin with that firing, and then proceed through a series of other self-inflicted wounds for Trump. We will eventually reach the Storming of the US Capitol by pro-Trump militants on January 6th of 2021, and if Republicans manage to sabotage themselves in a truly spectacular manner through their greed and corruption, we’ll add articles for those incidents as well.
Tuesday, May 9th, 2017
?? Trump fires FBI Director Comey
?? Democrats demand special prosecutor after Comey firing
?? Sally Yates says she warned White House that Flynn was a blackmail risk
Wednesday, May 10th, 2017
?? Behind Comey’s firing: An enraged Trump, fuming about Russia
?? Democrats halt Senate action to force debate on an Independent Counsel to investigate Comey firing
?? President fumed and raged over news of Russia Investigation before firing Comey
?? Trump bars US Press, but not Russia’s, at meeting with Russian officials
?? Sean Spicer hides in the bushes to avoid reporters
Thursday, May 11th, 2017
?? Lester Holt’s interview with Donald Trump
?? White House’s FBI story unravels
Friday, May 12th, 2017
?? FBI officials challenge Trump’s account of dinner meeting with Comey: report
?? Trump Tweet Suggests His Conversations With Comey Might Have Been Recorded
?? Comey is ‘not worried about any tapes’
?? NBC News First Read analysis – “The White House’s Explanation for Firing Comey Crumbles”: “This isn’t the first time, of course, that Trump and his team have been caught in contradictions, inaccurate statements, and outright whoppers. (Remember the inaugural’s crowd size? Or Trump’s claim that Barack Obama wiretapped him?) But it’s amazing on a matter that’s so important – and that was executed by the White House on its own timetable – that the Trump White House can’t tell a straight story here. So what happens when there’s a story outside the White House’s control (like war, natural disaster, or another kind of tragedy)? Those are times when a president and White House will need a deep reservoir of credibility with the American public. But what happens when that reservoir is empty?”
Saturday, May 13th, 2017
?? Comey willing to testify but only in public
?? CBS News: CIA director calls WikiLeaks Russia-aided “non-state hostile intelligence service”
Sunday, May 14th, 2017
?? Did Trump Raise Mike Flynn’s FBI Troubles at Comey Dinner?
?? Just 29 percent approve of Trump’s decision to fire Comey
Monday, May 15th, 2017
?? Trump revealed highly classified information to Russian officials
?? “Highly damaging”: Ex-CIA deputy director on report Trump revealed classified info
Tuesday, May 16th, 2017
?? White House defends Trump on classified intel report
?? Comey, Russia and a ‘smoking gun’: a roundup of Trump’s current woes
Wednesday, May 17th, 2017
?? Comey “most definitely” wants to testify before Congress – and he wrote more memos
??Justice Department names Special Counsel for Russia investigation
Danny Devito’s Magnum Dong • 4 years ago
Yea, threatening the guy you just fired for investigating you is gonna look great.
Fri, 5/12/2017 8:38 AM on ‘Trump warns Comey: Better hope there are no tapes of our meeting’