Continuing coronavirus happenings (Part 4)

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I am just certain it will be a thorough and objective, scientifically based review. The conclusion will not be foreordained at all! (/s)

The MAGAts have their new messiah. FFSā€¦

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and heā€™s more of a fascist than the orange asshole.

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I understand where youā€™re coming from, but the orange asshole took minority children away from their parents and threw them into concentration camps along the border. I wonā€™t give him a pass as being somehow less than full fascist. Theyā€™re all monsters who need to be stopped.

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I wasnā€™t trying to give the orange asshole a pass, DeSantis just frightens me more, maybe because he seems like heā€™s more competent.

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Thatā€™s the difference. Il Douche was too stupid and self-centered to actually get anything done competently. MoRon is more able to execute evil than Il Douche ever was. That is terrifying.

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I donā€™t know if he actually is, or if heā€™s just been able to get away with more shit, since itā€™s FL? Itā€™s hard to tell.

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Thatā€™s a very reasonable point.

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I think if he decides to run for President, weā€™ll get a much better sense of if heā€™s a more competent bigot than Trump or notā€¦ I donā€™t know if anyone can run on a Trumpian platform and win like Trump did. I donā€™t know that Trump can win again (I wouldnā€™t count it out, but he keeps losing and backing losers at this point).

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Thatā€™s the difference but I donā€™t know what to make of it.

Trump energized the worst parts of the party by being Trump, incompetence and all. He won by shouting ā€œbuild the wallā€ and ā€œlock her upā€ which were completely inane. America is still suffering the effects of him not knowing how to win, rig, or admit defeat in an election. True, he wasnā€™t quite competent enough to pull it off the resulting coupā€¦but I donā€™t think many competent men would have tried.

If Desantisā€™s competence is scary, so was Trumpā€™s lack thereof, like a mad bull in a preschool. Ultimately I think what makes fascists dangerous has nothing to do with whether they are smart.

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Meme Reaction GIF by Robert E Blackmon

That is a concept that needs to go, that fascists are some brilliant tacticians, when in reality, they are just bullies who can appeal to enough people with their cruelty.

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Trump was more like a kind of traveling improv show than a traditional political movement :thinking:

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I think age is an important factor here too. Trump is just too old to be anything but a symbol now. DeSantis is young and energetic. If I were plotting a fascist takeover of the country, Iā€™d get DeSantis on the ballot and keep Trump as an outsider symbol in the background, and maybe increase his legal troubles and other ā€œvictimizationā€ in order to rally the masses around him while DeSantis actually executes the items on the agenda.

I donā€™t know about brilliant tacticians, but charisma is definitely a huge part of it. Hitler had a lot of charisma and was very good at energizing a crowd. So is Trump. His body count isnā€™t quite as high yet, but give him another 4 years, and weā€™ll see what happens.

Well if youā€™re going to go with that line of argument the Trump supporters could accurately point out that heā€™s 4 years younger than the current incumbent. Besides, Francisco Franco managed to cling to power until shortly before his death in his eighties so age alone doesnā€™t necessarily stop fascists.

Thatā€™s not really how a cult of personality works. Itā€™s non-transferrable by definition.

Plus, those two will never share power; ten pounds of narcissism in a five pound bagā€¦

Pass Thumbs Down GIF by Tinashe

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I honestly hope that Biden doesnā€™t run again, for that reason and many others (his handling of COVID is very high on that list). Alas, it doesnā€™t seem like the Democrats have anyone else to offer.

Which does not address whether or not he can win over the hard-core Trumpers.

And where have we seen any republican actually standing up to Trump on a national level, though? You canā€™t just swap people in and out of a cult of personality, because itā€™s built on adherence to an individual as ā€œdear leaderā€ā€¦

Which does not take smarts, and is really in the eye of the beholder. Some might find Trump charismatic, but I sure as shit do not.

Fascism is built on bullying, on a massive scale, backed by a take over of the media.

Yeah, letā€™s fucking not.

jinx!

coca-cola cola GIF

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Reagan and Biden have proven that America is OK with old men as leaders, even with visible and possibly age-related mental deficits

Trump is ā€œoldā€ in the sense that heā€™s not new anymore, though, and he canā€™t be shocking and scary again as a former POTUS and known loser

Part of what Trumpā€™s supporters liked was that nobody knew what he would really do in office, and DeSantis sure has that going for him :grimacing:

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Word is he has zero charisma. And terrible interpersonal skills.

Thatā€™ll come out on the national stage. Hopefully weā€™ll get a really divided Republican primary with several candidates and they all tear each other apart.

Go into the general divided, demoralized and angry at each other.

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