Oh, for Fuck's Sake. Trump Again? Or Still?

If we ignore this guy's trajectory again we repeat history and that cannot be pretty...

I wrote in Literate Ape back in 2017:

"To misquote the oft-quoted meme, Donald Trump is not the president we need but he is the president we deserve.

As we stare at this overwhelming mistake occupying the same chair as great leaders of our past, we see ourselves reflected back in spades.

We see narcissism and unceasing self promotion.

We see a cracked sliver of an inability to admit when we are wrong.

The mirror shows a thin skin and a pathological need to use social media to punish those critical of us.

Donald J. Trump is like someone (probably Roy Cohn) took every aspect of being an American that represents us at our worst—greedy, conniving, emotional, jealous, lazy, racist, sexist, xenophobic, two-faced—stuck them all in a blender and pressed purée. He is us at our most base and unattractive in a thick milkshake of Ugly American.

The Great American Mirror shows us a man who wants other people to do the work while he takes the credit.

The Reflecting Pool of the United Stares presents us with someone who truly represents our careless disdain for those who look or think differently from ourselves and the casual racism of prejudging people by the color of their skin.

We see him fail to drain the swamp of DC and, just over our shoulder in the sightline, we see our own swamp of bottom feeders, abusive exes, shitty managers and cloying sycophantic followers that we forget to drain."

In the ensuing years, what has changed about us?

I'd suggest nothing. In fact, I'd further suggest that our addiction to narcissism and self promotion is worse than it was, our inability to see nuance in our world and to change our minds based on information is more calcified, and our skin is thinner than ever.

So, the Donald has announced, improbably but inevitably, that he is running for his second term. This despite being twice impeached, investigated for everything from tax fraud to treason, and almost universally blamed by GOP leaders for sinking what should have been a blow out for Republicans in the midterm elections. The thinkpieces tell us there's no way this motherfucker could possibly win again but the thinkpieces by the same idiots told us there was no way he'd win in 2016.

If you were to watch any of the footage of Trump with the sound off you’d see a fat, old businessman who lost his second term. You’d see one of the least presidential men on the planet. You’d be rightly mystified that he won in 2016 as so many of us were. Turn the sound on and there’s something indelibly charismatic and awful at play. He claims to be amazingly popular, that his inauguration was attended by more people than any previous and, while we know he’s full of shit and is merely blustering, we kind of wonder if he’s maybe not. Some of us in spite of all evidence to the contrary believe him.

Phineas T. Barnum was a snake oil salesman most of his time on the planet. He was a small business owner in his early twenties and founded a weekly newspaper before moving to New York City in 1834. He embarked on an entertainment career, first with a variety troupe called "Barnum's Grand Scientific and Musical Theater," and soon after by purchasing Scudder's American Museum which he renamed after himself. He used the museum as a platform to promote hoaxes and human curiosities such as the Fiji mermaid and General Tom Thumb. In 1850, he promoted the American tour of Swedish opera singer Jenny Lind, paying her an unprecedented $1,000 a night for 150 nights.

Barnum was not a promoter for the rights of the marginalized in his hey-day (although later he was a known abolitionist and anti-slavery legislator). Barnum was a shyster. He put his name on all he owned as the name "P.T. Barnum" was synonymous with his grandiose bullshit artistry. Surely, people knew the Fiji mermaid was a fake yet still people loved it. Certainly, his larger than life pronouncements were seen as just that but some of us, a lot of us, believed him.

In the mid-1850's, Barnum went broke from a series of bad investments, serious litigation, and public humiliation yet years later emerged as a temperance speaker and elected official.

Barnum remains a mythic American figure. The Zoomers will even think of him as a champion of freaks due to the Hugh Jackman musical.

Trump is just a modern equivalent. A bullshit artist who puts his name on everything he can, a reality TV star who campaigned for and was elected our 45th President, the guy who almost single-handedly destroyed the Bush/Clinton dynasties of the 1980's and 1990's. We may hate everything he stands for (if we could even figure out what that was) but we better not underestimate him.

What we should not do is attack him. He is impervious to attack. He is most effective when his opponents are equally as crooked as he is and he strikes them with junior high insults and blunt slogans ("Lock Her Up"). The only way we defeat this political savant is to elevate an opponent who unifies the middle, a moderate who inspires. Trump destroys inspiration and feeds on rage so the only garlic and cross for this vampire is someone we can collectively believe in.

That means discarding the politics of division, of identity, of racialized animus. It means maybe truly getting away from social media. It means acting like someone we'd vote for. That's how democracy works—find the candidate most like the person you aspire to be and vote for that person. If Trump's behavior is a mirror image for your own, the choice has been made.