Been mulling this a lot lately. It’s not just that smart people mostly want nothing to do with Trump or Trumpism, it’s that incompetence is an actual asset, because these are folks who know with absolute certainty that Trump is their only chance of achieving anywhere near this sort of success. - ThreadSky

normative.bsky.social • 27 days ago

Been mulling this a lot lately. It’s not just that smart people mostly want nothing to do with Trump or Trumpism, it’s that incompetence is an actual asset, because these are folks who know with absolute certainty that Trump is their only chance of achieving anywhere near this sort of success.

Reposted from Thor Benson

This Hannah Arendt quote feels appropriate right now

"Totalitarianism in power invariably replaces all first-rate talents, regardless of their sympathies, with those crackpots and fools whose lack of intelligence and creativity is still the best guarantee of their loyalty."

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oldohman.bsky.social•27 days ago

Dorothy Thompson hit on a similar point in "Who goes Nazi."

oldohman.bsky.social•27 days ago

Dorothy Parker, 1941: "...the frustrated and humiliated intellectual, the rich and scared speculator, the spoiled son, the labor tyrant, the fellow who has achieved success by smelling out the wind of success—they would all go Nazi in a crisis."

khoragos.bsky.social•27 days ago

Improving people's lives is a bad bet for an authoritarian regime because it can't be guaranteed to continue. The safe way to maintain power is for everything to keep getting worse—as long as it gets worse for the regime's opponents faster than it does for supporters.

theonlythx1138.bsky.social•27 days ago

Take the initiative away from Trump: General Strike.

Every town, every state. Paralyse the oligarchs. Show them where the true power lies.

geomanks.bsky.social•27 days ago

True, but are they after success? How about power, financial gain, or notoriety?

captainheartless.bsky.social•27 days ago

Keep in mind authoritarians are also less likely to gracefully accept criticism and refinement of their ideas. And that Trump's ruling coalition is based on contradictions that are obvious if they try to act, so they have to keep everything ambiguous, which...is bad for top down control!

shaym114.bsky.social•27 days ago

This is the best shot that the dumbest dickheads from 9th grade will ever get.

individualangst.bsky.social•27 days ago

I had thought that incompetents like Hegseth lacked the self-awareness to understand SecDef was too big a job for his inexperience. But perhaps his self-awareness is that if he declined, he would be discarding his only chance at "greatness". Blind to the reality that he will fail or be fired.

b1uecruz.bsky.social•27 days ago

Possibly friendly-fired, depending on how stupid he gets.

pauldu.bsky.social•27 days ago

Trump is controlled by money and ego. The billionaires like Elon know how to manipulate under those rules

brewtowne.bsky.social•27 days ago

You just hit on THE ENTIRE BASIS for White folks' ongoing, complicit silence in regards to our awful white supremacist doctrine, aka the long game.

It helps to keep mediocre White folks one notch higher... forever. In return for this, they will vote with blinders on. Every. Fucking. Time.✌🏻

anaphoristand.bsky.social•27 days ago

Achieving loyalty via promoting the compromised and achieving loyalty via promoting the incompetent are two sides of the same coin.

hubba8088.bsky.social•27 days ago

I saw someone say that Elon and Trump types aligned with the Republican Party because they know those voters are easiest to manipulate

lbr1981.bsky.social•27 days ago

Exactly

normative.bsky.social•27 days ago

Talented people might want to preserve their reputations for the sake of future careers independent of MAGA, and are therefore a risk.

hbadger.bsky.social•27 days ago

i think about the phrase "engineered incompetence" a lot
https://lucid.substack.com/p/pete-hegseth-and-the-autocratic-strategy

angelaisms.bsky.social•27 days ago

I’ve been thinking along those lines too. https://bsky.app/profile/angelaisms.bsky.social/post/3lgvtneqddk2c

grumplekrumble.bsky.social•27 days ago

This is basically the history of US police unions

odeecs.bsky.social•27 days ago

Engage with any MAGAt influencer, and this becomes immediately evident.

robertfiore.bsky.social•27 days ago

Sort of like the way the communist insurgents in Vietnam would assassinate the honest and capable South Vietnamese officials and leave the corrupt and incompetent ones in place, except that here's it's a self-inflicted insurgency.

krisarmstrong1.bsky.social•27 days ago

📌

saienx.bsky.social•27 days ago

Kiss the ring, get a title.

andycraig.bsky.social•27 days ago

Chaos is also how you break and destroy institutions much more effectively than with any methodical apparatchik.

closereading.bsky.social•27 days ago

Yes, so this way the probability of having to rebuild it in a completely different way is high. Conflagration is the goal. Hiring young, malleable, ignorant officers into the new order (Vance, Hegseth, Vought, Gabbard, etc) is also indicative of intent to shift the U.S. paradigm over the long term.

closereading.bsky.social•27 days ago

Boebert, MTG, Tom Cotton, Josh Hawley, Ted Cruz, etc - all tools, playing cultural politics - are likely ignorant to the broader scope of things. The fear establishment Pubs feel in countering the Trump puppet is due a media-absent violent white supremacist cohort to which they have exposure.

closereading.bsky.social•27 days ago

The January 6 riot/insurrection was a signal. The capacities for mortal violence coming from people who believe the USA has become insufficiently white and/or white christian is very real. The Republican Party has built this cultural-political machinery since devising the Southern Strategy.

closereading.bsky.social•27 days ago

The Southern Strategy has become so deeply codified in Republican politics that people who should know better can barely recognize what they’re saying or worse what they’re refusing to say. Think Joe Scarborough or David Brooks or Bill Kristol or, up until 2016 ‘intellectuals’ like George Will.

babsblue.bsky.social•27 days ago

I couldn't figure out why anybody WOULD work for a psychopath who'd pull their security detail, exposing them to violence. We've seen this three times now: Bolton, Pompeo, and now Milley - all of whom are now at risk precisely because they worked for Trump.

This seems like the answer.

mathewlowry.bsky.social•27 days ago

Funny thing, I went to bed last night thinking that conservative politics have evolved from Thatcher/Reagan's "the cruelty is the point" to Trump, for whom "the imbecility is the point".

And this morning I wake up to...

https://bsky.app/profile/kenwhite.bsky.social/post/3lgwof7pabc2a

15c3po.bsky.social•27 days ago

Hats off to the mediocrities who want nothing to do with him, then, like me

shonanchris.bsky.social•27 days ago

Yup, I’m perfectly fine being bang average yet not dumb enough to be conned by Trump

15c3po.bsky.social•27 days ago

I am waking up to the heroism inherent in our stance

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