The Donald Trump Score Card

YouTube video:

SNL - Fox Harris Interview

 

Exploring the personality of Donald Trump's personality cult

excerpt:

"We suggest, then, that Trump exerts a personality cult over his followers that may account for his continued political appeal. That a personality cult may exist in democratic political systems should be a topic of discussion among political scientists working on such systems. It is a phenomenon we ought to account for in our attempts to understand U.S. politics since 2016. Personality cults could also elsewhere take democratic systems in a more authoritarian direction."

 

NYC Mayor Adams tells Harris, not Trump, to dial down the temperature.

Adams has been indicted for bribery.

Trump has taken sides with Adams, saying that the federal government is trying to get rid of him.


Mayor Adams refutes Kamala Harris, says Trump is not a fascist as he urges Dems to 'dial down the temperature'

 

3 theories for why Donald Trump’s popularity is rising
Trump’s favorability has ticked up with many Americans and soared with some traditionally Democratic groups.
by Christian Paz
Mar 21, 2024, 11:00 AM UTC

3 theories for why Donald Trump’s popularity is rising

excerpt:

"Something confounding is happening in America: Donald Trump, once the least liked presidential officeholder and reviled by nearly two-thirds of the country by the time he left office, is getting more popular.

For the loyal Vox reader, that statement may be hard to believe. Yes, the twice-impeached, multiply indicted former president is still generally disliked: The latest New York Times/Siena poll places his favorability rating at a “weak” 44 percent. But that’s still higher than his Democratic opponent, Joe Biden, who is viewed favorably by just 38 percent of registered voters. As views of Biden have been getting more negative, views of Trump have also been getting more positive.

Across multiple kinds of polling and public opinion surveys, Trump’s favorability appears to have stabilized at a higher place than three years ago. Views of Trump have been modestly improving for most Americans and have actually increased significantly among Black and Latino Americans, younger voters, and working-class people."

 

Trump's RCP favorable rating is currently about 45%. That's the best RCP rating he's had since he took office in January 2017.

RCP using a running average of various scientifically run surveys.

 

Trump’s Personality Cult Plays a Part in His Political Appeal
By Ben Goldsmith & Lars J. K. Moen
June 4, 2024

Trump’s Personality Cult Plays a Part in His Political Appeal | Scientific American

excerpt:

"Support from a “personality cult”—something his would-be successors lack—has, we believe, been essential for Trump’s political success. In new research, we argue that there is an identifiable hard core of extremely loyal Trump supporters that comprise his personality cult. Members of such a cult show unquestioning loyalty to a strong leader, such as Argentina’s Juan and Eva Perón or Italy’s Benito Mussolini, whom they perceive as infallible and truthful. Their devotion has religious parallels as they consider their leader a savior with unique ability to protect society against internal or external threats. Trump has himself embraced such a status in relation to his followers in statements such as “I am your voice” and “I alone can fix it,” both of which he declared at the 2016 Republican convention."

 

Trump has upped the ante in the 2024 campaign to include perceived internal threats that he calls 'the enemy within' in addition to his usual perceived external threats that he has proferred since 2015.

He's threatening to use the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 and other government-related approaches to deport as many as 15 to 20 million people in the U.S. He rhetoric about it has grown increasingly intense and angry. His speech at Madison Square Garden this weekend is an example.

 

Trump isn't a therapist. He's the-rapist.

 

Half of America sees an obscene display of unvarnished bigotry as a virtue.

 

Cults rely on the religious model.

Look at video on YouTube where Carl Sagan explains why we must leave religion behind to survive as a species. Eye opening.

 

https://www.politico.com/news/2024/10/28/trump-rally-puerto-rico-pennsylvania-fallout-00185935

excerpt:

"Donald Trump has a serious Puerto Rico problem — in Pennsylvania.

Many Puerto Rican voters in the state are furious about racist and demeaning comments delivered at a Trump rally. Some say their dismay is giving Kamala Harris a new opening to win over the state’s Latino voters, particularly nearly half a million Pennsylvanians of Puerto Rican descent.

Evidence of the backlash was immediate on Monday: A nonpartisan Puerto Rican group drafted a letter urging its members to oppose Trump on election day. Other Puerto Rican voters were lighting up WhatsApp chats with reactions to the vulgar display and raising it in morning conversations at their bodegas. Some are planning to protest Trump’s rally Tuesday in Allentown, a majority-Latino city with one of the largest Puerto Rican populations in the state."

 

Trump advisors propose bypassing FBI background checks for his appointees.


Trump advisers propose bypassing FBI background checks for appointees

 

Donald Trump’s New York Rally Has Been Condemned. I Saw Something Different From Most.

excerpt:

"Life goes on. Fascism bleeds into a venue better known for hosting the Knicks, but you still have to get your kid a Halloween costume. You still have to stand in line at CVS for ointment. You still catch a glimpse of your reflection in a bus and think, “Should I get bangs?” (You still should not.) In 1939 we found mundanity in the fear too: The Times story about the Bund ran next to an ad for the “sportswoman’s indispensable” double-breasted coat with pearl buttons. Your TikTok Shop has some fall fashion for you to consider too. There’s always a cognitive dissonance through our dystopias; how else would we survive them?"

 

Trump hasn't been known to be favorable to Puerto Rico.

He thought it was out in the middle of a very big ocean, far from the U.S.

This week Trump had a comedian on his stage referring to Puerto Rico as a garbage dump in the ocean.

Article from September 2017.


The Distance Between Donald Trump and Puerto Rico

excerpt:

"How far away is Puerto Rico, from President Donald Trump’s perspective? “This is an island sitting in the middle of an ocean. And it’s a big ocean, it’s a very big ocean,” he said, on Tuesday morning, before a meeting with House members. Puerto Rico is, indeed, an island, but it is also an American island, inhabited by three and a half million United States citizens who are in immediate danger, owing to the havoc wrought by Hurricane Maria."

 

The enemy within.


https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2024/10/28/fiona-hill-explains-trump-musk-putin-00185820

excerpt:

"You’ll notice that Trump isn’t really talking about external adversaries. He’s saying that the biggest adversary to America, the worst people of all, are the vermin, the people inside, or the enemies within, the Democrats. Whoever it is, it doesn’t really matter. It’s creating this sense that America is under siege from the inside and he wants to divide people, because he controls them if he pits them against each other. So both Putin and Trump want America to be divided to exercise power for themselves."

 

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2024/10/28/fiona-hill-explains-trump-musk-putin-00185820

excerpt:

"Is that one of the things that is different in 2024 compared with 2016 or 2020?

Yes. You’re starting to see that newspaper owners are worried about the other parts of their business and how that will be affected by a Trump who might be vengeful against them. That’s one of Trump’s hallmarks. He’s already talked about the media as the enemy of the state, but he has also targeted their owners in the past. He has already made an example of Jeff Bezos, who was punished for his criticisms when Trump was in power previously by Trump trying to deny Amazon major government contracts. That’s exactly a hallmark of an oligarchy or of an autocracy."

 

Many of Trump's followers are small business owners who are concerned about inflation.

Some think Musk and Trump are going to save them.


https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2024/10/28/fiona-hill-explains-trump-musk-putin-00185820

excerpt:

"The big billionaires tend to just totally dominate their sectors. That’s true with Musk and that’s the same with Amazon and Jeff Bezos. You know, we can go on and on with examples. But what this all means is that small businesses have tended to suffer. Small entrepreneurs who wanted to stay afloat, either in the online space or the mom-and-pop stores have found it impossible to compete. In an oligarchy, you see even more of that.

We’ve had consolidation in grocery chains, right? And in all kinds of different areas of the economy that hit the consumer. The average American, in an oligarchy, you’re not likely to see your grocery prices go down, right? People have been extraordinarily concerned about inflation. And you know, the sad fact of inflation is that prices tend to stay up, even if inflation slows down or disappears. And in an oligarchy, that’s even more the case for consumer goods. The less competition, the higher prices go."

 

Trump: Republican Party has become party of inclusion

excerpt:

Former United States President Donald Trump said that the Republican Party "has become a party of inclusion," pointing to the various religious beliefs found among the party's supporters.

"Jews and Muslims and Catholics and Evangelicals and Mormons are all joining our cause in large numbers, larger than what anyone has seen in this country before," Trump exclaimed during his rally in Madison Square Garden in New York.

 

How a Racist Joke About Puerto Rico Could Impact the Election

excerpt:

“This reinforces what we already knew—that Puerto Rico is not a priority for Trump,” he says, noting that as President he withheld about $20 billion in hurricane relief for Puerto Rico following the devastating aftermath of Hurricane Maria in 2017. “This sets the tone, and this is definitely going to have an impact on many Puerto Ricans and other Latinos across the United States when casting their votes.”