Wheat/“/“/“ wrote: ↑August 1st, 2020, 10:39 pm
I will be voting for Trump as of now, as much as I detest his character. I wish there was another choice, but Biden and The Democratic Party does not address the issues I care about. Trump does.
The overriding issue for me is he may be the last president capable of keeping the country from sliding into socialism. if we reach that tipping point, I’m afraid there is violence and revolution in this country’s future.
I’ll be happy to reply to anyone who wants to try and convince me to change my mind, or question my choice, as time permits.
As a western NC mountain hermit, I have very little in-person contact with people, so I’ve never attempted to persuade a Trump supporter to change. I do converse with people online, such as here. Trying to convince you to change your mind is very likely a fool’s errand. But, I have time on my hands just now, well after midnight.
Further to justify my foolishness, I will pretend that you and I are debating. My assumption about debaters is that their goal is not really to convince the opponent, but to make the more persuasive case to the presumably neutral audience.
1. You detest his character. Do you detest it for the same reasons that I do? Do you agree that he’s all of the following: sociopath, extreme narcissist, pathological liar, racist, serial sexual predator, lifelong cheating businessman. On which of those categories would you say the jury’s still out? If you (even mostly) agree, do you think it remotely possible that we have ever had a President as unscrupulous, dishonest, amoral, conscienceless, corrupt, shameless, and untrustworthy as he? Do you think his “detestable character” insufficiently detestable to deter you even in the slightest from supporting him a second time? In terms of character, personality, competence, commitment to our Constitution and the rule of law, and normal human decency, do you think Trump and Biden are guided by even roughly the same moral compass?
2. What, as exactly as possible, does socialism mean to you? State control of the economy? Federal government interference, via over-regulation, in a mythical “free enterprise system?” Too many bureaucrats? Re dangerous ideologies, do you concede that Trump is a fascist? Or do fascists simply make a silly mistake in celebrating that he’s one of them? Do you agree that he ran a fascist-themed campaign in 2016 [great nation in decline, threatened by inferior Others, national revival led by strongman, etc.] and has continued to echo these themes of “American carnage” to this very day? Do you think that socialism more than fascism is a greater existential threat to the survival of our constitutional democratic republic?
2a. That is, to cite your concern about a “tipping point,” do you deny that we are already at a tipping point, and we’d still be at exactly the same perilous point no matter whom the Dems nominated? Say they had nominated, from their original lineup of 20-25, one of their other centrist options, say, Michael Bennett, Amy Klobuchar, Michael Bloomberg, Seth Moulton, Pete Buttigieg, John Delaney, Tim Ryan. Do you find Biden more susceptible to “socialist tendencies” than these folks?
3. Do you associate the potential for “violence and revolution” with liberal protesters, but not with reactionary populist militias? Or is your concern a surprising one, that if Trump loses, such radical gun-rights absolutists will assume that Biden “will take away our guns,” so we should play it safe temporarily, and not let loose the forces of right-wing violence — a sort of “unfortunate-but-necessary” blackmail theory?
4. You say Trump cares about the same issues as you do. There’s no evidence over the entire course of his lifetime that Donald Trump has ever cared about anything other than his own fame and fortune. It is more accurate to say that some Republicans who might share some of your concerns have found in Trump a “useful idiot,” someone whose appeal can be manipulated to serve their ends. William Barr, Stephen Miller, and Mike Pompeo are three culture warriors who come easily to mind. As does Vladimir Putin, a revanchist global warrior and terrorist to whom Trump has been a manipulable chump beyond his wildest dreams.
5. I’m skeptical that you “detest Trump’s character.” I’m skeptical that you “wish there was another choice,” that had the Dems nominated some other centrist than Biden, you’d vote for that Dem. I’m skeptical that you have thought much about the radical right-wing terrorism, the actual clear-and-present danger of “violence and revolution,” that Trump invites over and over. And I am deeply distressed to have come to the unnerving, soul-wrenching view that tens of millions of my fellow Americans, in this moment of world historical civic responsibility, inhabit a different moral universe than do I.
