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PaperclipPerfector  5d ago (text post)   19761 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 20, 2025

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Steve Bannon is back in another interview asserting that Trump will get a 3rd term. Like previous times where he's said this, he doesn't really go into too much detail, besides saying they have a plan and they're working on it. I get this is Bannon's schtick lately and he's a political operative and so maybe this is just something he bangs on to rile up the base, but for fun, I want to consider here what the actual plan could be.

Bannon does give away more here than I've seen in other interviews where this has been brought up. I'm going to focus on 2 statements that I think start to give the plan away. When the interviewer says the 22nd Amendment makes it clear that Trump cannot have another term because he's on his 2nd term already:

At some point in time, we will make sure we go through and define all those terms

To me, this is a point in favor of the theory that's been floated around already that their plan relies on some very literal reading of the 22nd Amendment.

No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once.

Key word: elected. Fairly straightforward, and again, not anything that hasn't been brought up before. Trump runs as some other GOP candidate's VP, they win, and that candidate immediately steps down, making Trump president despite not having been "elected to the office of the President". He's been elected twice, but the 22nd says nothing of being President more than twice. The usual objection to this is that the 12th Amendment prevents this by barring someone who is ineligible for the presidency to be VP, but you can also play word games with this. If you interpret the 12th Amendment's "constitutionally ineligible to the office of President" to just mean "doesn't meet the requirements laid out by Article II", then Trump is still eligible to be President. He's just ineligible to be elected.

But isn't this against the spirit of the 22nd Amendment? Bannon:

If the American people, with the mechanisms that we have, put Trump back in office, are the American people tearing up the Constitution? Would the American people be going against the spirit of the Constitution?

It's one thing for Trump to lose the election and then try to still hang on for a 3rd term. But it's another if--given he's able to get on the ballot as VP for 2028, which I think he probably could in enough states--he and his Presidential candidate do actually win. Then the messaging becomes much easier. But how can Bannon be sure enough that the American people will elect Trump in this manner? Simply rig the election. Many say this is too difficult because you'd have to rig so many individual elections, and the states control elections, and if it's easy then why don't we see evidence of it being done in the past, etc. I'll admit this is probably the weakest part of the plan. But if you step back and say, "What steps would be required for this to be doable, and are they doing them?" then there are definitely signs. Dominion was recently bought by a Republican operative, and Trump's people are already signaling they want to mandate election rules for states in time for the midterms in 2026. A Trump DHS appointee who will be in charge of election infrastructure told all 50 states at a recent meeting that they

should plan to use 'fusion centers', which are hubs for collaboration across intelligence and state, local, and federal law enforcement, for election matters

Even if they can't pull off mandating election rules at the federal level, Trump may have enough state legislatures in the bag that they might just take enabling actions "independently" of any top-down federal enforcement.

Also, you know, he could just actually win legitimately, that's completely possible with the state the Democrats are in right now.

So yeah, this isn't really anything genius. Win the election or rig it so that you do + creatively interpret the 22nd and 12th Amendments. Some quick responses to possible objections:

  • The courts, or SCOTUS if the case makes it there (which it probably would), would strike this down

Lower courts yes, SCOTUS I'm 50/50 on. There are smart people who know the legal world far better than I do who are certain that even the current SCOTUS would rule 9-0 against Trump on this, so maybe. But smart people have been wrong about many matters involving Trump, and SCOTUS has disappointed me before. I don't care that "such-and-such legal scholars have written X about the interpretation of the 22nd/12th Amendment" because at the end of the day it's just SCOTUS that matters. I've seen a theory that SCOTUS has been forgiving to Trump in recent rulings because they know this day is coming, so they want to build up credibility with him for when they inevitably have to rule against him on this. That just seems far too giga-brained for me.

  • Paper ballots, other election security measures

I never really bought the claims that "2020 was the most secure election in history" even though I don't think it was rigged. I just think if someone really tried, they could. Voting machines are repeatedly shown to have security flaws, and I don't think that all the swing counties that matter will use paper ballots and do risk-limiting audits to verify the results.

  • The military would step in

Maybe, although by 2028 Hegseth may be able to fire enough people and appoint loyalists in their place to make this a non-issue. Someone with deeper knowledge of the US military can comment here. I don't take the "swearing an oath to the Constitution, not the President" thing too seriously, because while I think it may hold at the top, I don't think it holds all the way down the chain of command, and that's what matters if it comes to having to forcibly remove Trump from the Oval Office. However the Courts rule also plays into this, if it can be framed that this whole thing actually isn't violating the Constitution.

  • This isn't in anybody's interest, Congress doesn't want it, Trump is too old, MAGA is dying, why would the elected President willingly step down?

Congress continues to abdicate its powers in favor of letting the executive do whatever they want (both parties) and I don't see this changing anytime soon. The only defectors from the GOP we see right now are MTG and Rand Paul. Trump is still going strong despite his age, and I think the people in the MAGA-sphere surrounding him have sunk too much into it to do anything other than milk it until he dies in office. I've completely given up hope that anybody in the White House or Congress will take a principled stance on this. Democrats will continue to be very concerned and maybe organize a No Kings march to no effect.

It's dumb and sad and shameful that Bannon is spouting this shit... but perhaps also shortsighted that the writers of the 22nd amendment solely used "elected," rather "elected... or hold office," spreading this question across three amendments that now need to be read together, still not entirely answering the question. Then again, this level of bad-faith interpretation was completely taboo, Before Trump. I'd hope SCOTUS would rule 9-0 "pfft, no - fuck off," but perhaps it's an Originalist-Textualist schism in the making and I just don't know it...

Edit: we-have-Claude-at-home weighed in: "After careful review, I found no definitive 21st-century scholarly endorsement of the multiple-term-via-succession interpretation from top-tier legal scholars or federal judges."

Then again, this level of bad-faith interpretation was completely taboo, Before Trump.

What is your take on Wickard v. Filburn?

There's a great deal of overlap between my view of FDR and my view of Trump. More precisely, this kind of thing was taboo, between the 22nd Amendment being written (there was obviously sufficient recognition that Presidents needed reining in, post-FDR, to both introduce formal term limits and move the inauguration date forward) and Trump.

But when they decided that this sort of thing wasnt good, they didnt roll back that result, nor change the letter of the constitution to match the practice. So, on the plain meaning of what you said, no, we have been doing an interpretation thats this bad-faith the entire time.

There are ways to address this, by setting up a construct of what you mean by "the constitution" where it is true (like, that the New Deal counts as changing the constitution even if it didnt really do that but come one, you know what I mean). I think its reasonable to do this, and to think its relevant to our current situation. But its important to remember that what youre talking about there is a very different kind of thing than people usually believe "the constitution" is (even while they also in practice do the same thing), and not to be too surprised if they dont see it the way you do.

perhaps also shortsighted that the writers of the 22nd amendment

Honestly I think their biggest sin was writing in the passive voice. The amendment text is rather unclear as to who is empowered to keep such a person from becoming elected by the electoral college. To be fair, it's a bit of a problem with the qualifications listed in the original text too: SCOTUS had to weigh in on whether each of the states got to decide that independently (apparently not, at least for those details). It's unclear what is supposed to happen if some state decides to put him on the top of the ballot (I suspect SCOTUS would weigh in, but I don't know what they'd decide), the voters choose him, and the electoral college convenes to elect him.

This would all be much clearer if it included something like the 18th's "The Congress and the several States shall have concurrent power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation." And if such legislation had been drafted and passed, I suppose. Then we'd get an answer to "which birth certificate forms can [state A] expect to certify that a candidate was born a citizen in [state B]?" (or even the John McCain case) and similar seemingly-trivial-but-devil-in-the-details questions like "Are you sure this is the same Donald J. Trump born in 1946 that was president previously?".

The writers of the Twelfth Amendment are also to blame; they include at the end "But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States", but that's all they say about ineligibility. Nothing about what happens if the electors choose an ineligible candidate. The original presidential election clause also shares this flaw.

Nothing about what happens if the electors choose an ineligible candidate.

Answered much later by the 20th Amendment: "If the President elect shall have failed to qualify, then the Vice President elect shall act as President until a President shall have qualified."

Thanks, I hadn't thought to check that one. So it seems that if an ineligible President is selected, he does not take office and (if his VP also is ineligible) presidential succession law is triggered.

Nothing about what happens if the electors choose an ineligible candidate.

I mean, literally by definition, the electors cannot choose an ineligible candidate: ineligible means “not able to be chosen”

If you’re asking “What happens if the electors do the thing they are specifically prohibited from doing?”, I don’t really know what to tell you. For starters, the electors would be in violation of the supreme law of the land and thus should be held criminally liable and prosecuted accordingly; but would they be? Big picture, the whole point of the Constitution is to explicitly lay down the limits of the federal government’s powers, including, in this case, the powers of the electors—but at the end of the day, the Constitution is only as good as the people’s collective agreement to abide by it.

Asking the Constitution itself to contain answers to questions of the form “What happens when people ignore the Constitution in [specific way]?” is a bit like asking a board game rule book to include rules on what happens when the players ignore the rules: if you’re ignoring the rules, then you’re simply not playing the game, and if you’re not playing the game, why would you even care what the rule book has to say?

I mean, literally by definition, the electors cannot choose an ineligible candidate: ineligible means “not able to be chosen”

Yes, that's the etymology. But clearly such a thing could happen; nothing keeps an elector from writing Barack Obama, Donald Trump, or Lorde down. The term actually merely means "not permitted to be chosen".

For starters, the electors would be in violation of the supreme law of the land and thus should be held criminally liable and prosecuted accordingly; but would they be?

Well, no, because there'd have to be a penalty defined, and there is not.

Asking the Constitution itself to contain answers to questions of the form “What happens when people ignore the Constitution in [specific way]?” is a bit like asking a board game rule book to include rules on what happens when the players ignore the rules: if you’re ignoring the rules, then you’re simply not playing the game, and if you’re not playing the game, why would you even care what the rule book has to say?

I am fairly sure the rules of baseball and the rules of golf both include rules on what happens when the players ignore the other rules. The Constitution could has well.

The rules of baseball have notably failed to punish the NBA for failing to enforce the foreign substance rule. Theyre not supposed to, of course, because the association is the authority which dispenses punishment on others. But the "constitutional rules" dont want anyone like that.

There is a certain theory of the separation of powers, where the constituition is supposed to act as a sort of trap-equilibrium, that would force all the people in it to go along via some complicated conditional punishment instructions to everyone, without anyone uncontrolled "above". This is a pipedream, and hasnt really been attempted, but neither did they just say "well the buck ends here, whatever those guys do is correct". They just told them what to do. Do you have a reason why this specific constitutional provision should carry punishment, thats not just "they should in general"?

Then again, this level of bad-faith interpretation was completely taboo

That it was not. The equal protection provisions of the 14th and 15th amendments being used to support special extra political representation rights for minority groups comes immediately to mind, because it came up recently.

Then again, this level of bad-faith interpretation was completely taboo, Before Trump. I'd hope SCOTUS would rule 9-0 "pfft, no - fuck off," but perhaps it's an Originalist-Textualist schism in the making and I just don't know it...

I think you underestimate the power of the emanations of penumbras. Or to put it another way, I am not kidding around when I say that the Constitution is dead. I do not believe it is capable of protecting me in any meaningful way from any number of bad things. Why should I expend effort to see it afford protections to those who are not me and not particularly like me either? I invite those to cleave to the document to continue sacrificing value in its name. I choose otherwise.

The number of moving parts on this are insane. Even if you could technically do this, there’s huge problems of coordination, defection, etc. that you can’t get rid of.

If the guy actually elected refuses to step down what plausible mechanism does anyone have to force him to go along? I’m gonna go out on a limb and say that a contract specifying that person X is to run for president in place of Trump who can not be elected and step down is likely to be unenforceable. So Marco Rubio runs for president saying he’s going to resign and Trump will be the real president. He doesn’t. What’s the next move?

You also have the related issue of convincing Trump voters that this scheme is the real deal, that Trump will actually be the President and that the other guy is a ringer. That might not work. There’s only the Mel Carnahan senate race where that actually worked and people voted en mass for a candidate they didn’t want to win (he was dead at the time) and even then there was a bit of pushback because the GOP thought this was illegal. And the democrat voters had no assurances of exactly who would fill that seat. Democrats will absolutely push back on a candidate who is running on being a ringer. They would almost certainly sue, they might try to not certify the results, or have alternate slates.

Rigging elections is hard just because so much is happening in local precincts. Even if you have control over the dominion systems, not everyone votes by machine. If you have the machines down, then 2000 votes show up by voting machines, you have a problem. Even having the numbers right, you have to match the exit poll numbers (which you won’t have, as they’re taken after voting begins. You have to be pretty close to the poll’s already released, at least close enough that the media looking at the numbers buy the election results as plausible. You have to pay attention to down ballot races and issues as a wide discrepancy between the numbers for president and the numbers for senators, representatives, ballot issues etc. would raise eyebrows. You also have to have the final numbers seem random enough that statisticians are okay with the results.

I don’t think anything like this is plausible, but watching someone try to do it and fail would be pretty wild.

All true, and that doesn't even begin to touch the strategic issues. I don't think the GOP is going to clear the field for Vance or any other candidate, which means a competitive primary, which in turn means that some candidate would have to run as Trump's stooge, which might in and of itself cost that candidate the primary. Or Trump could run Don Jr. or someone as a crypto-stooge, but if they aren't clearing the primary for Vance there's no way in hell Vance or any other credible candidate would step aside so Don Jr. can run as a stand-in. And even if the GOP was on board with the whole scheme, it's still a huge risk. Once Trump is named as the vice presidential nominee, the whole eligibility thing is going to overshadow anything else about the election. There will also be a wave of litigation in every state to keep him off the ballot. What happens if this litigation is successful? If the entire selling point is "Trump will still be president", will voters be willing to back a stooge replacement on his own? If the outcome is that he isn't on the ballot in Pennsylvania but is everywhere else, do you find a replacement? What if the Supreme Court rules him ineligible at the worst possible moment? What if the GOP goes along with the scheme and Trump stays on the ballot in all states, but voters are so disgusted with the GOP that he loses in a landslide and the Democrats win large majorities in both houses? And sitting Republicans are primaried out next go around because of it?

There's been a lot of discussion on here in the past about why Trump always seems to outperform his poll numbers, and the most popular explanation is a "shy Tory" effect, but I think it has more to do with what I call the "Trump Constant". One of the big stories about Trump when he first entered politics was his appeal to disaffected people who normally wouldn't vote. Since they're on the margins of political discourse they don't participate in polls and they don't vote in elections unless Trump is involved, though they will vote Republican down ballot if asked to. These are the people who started flying Trump 2028 flags in January and don't really give a shit about the Constitution, or decorum, or any of the other things that Trump seems to have a disregard for.

I don't mean to toot my own horn, because this idea hadn't crystalized yet at the time, but I more or less predicted Ron Desantis's downfall when he was the toast of the "smart set" of the Republican party and of a lot of people on this board. If you remember, in early 2022 Trump's viability going forward was in question after the election nonsense and January 6, and Desantis was trying to portray himself as the future of the party. But there were still a ton of people doing MAGA. He was trying to walk a tightrope where he'd keep his distance from Trump without openly criticizing him. At the time I argued that this would only work if Trump declined to seek reelection, but that he painted himself into a corner because his unwillingness to cozy up to Trump and his image at a fighter meant that he couldn't just not run and yield the nomination. But if he ran he couldn't directly criticize Trump either, and I predicted that his campaign would turn into an incoherent mess, which is exactly what happened.

But when I made this argument to bona-fide Republicans, they dismissed it, and kept pushing the Desantis line. If the "Trump Constant" had been a theory at the time, the media and everyone else wouldn't have been so bullish on Trump, because it would have been clear that Jesus Christ himself wouldn't get the same boost Trump got, especially in a primary. He was so far ahead at the outset that he didn't even bother to debate, and he was so untouchable that none of his opponents save Christie would even dare criticize him. It was the stupidest primary election in history. The theory also explains why the GOP underperformed in 2022; by that time pollsters were making adjustments to account for the "shy Tory" effect or whatever, but they misapplied it since Trump wasn't on the ballot. Normal polling would have predicted the modest GOP pickups. It explains why Conor Lamb ended up beating "Trump before Trump" Rick Saccone (nice guy; I voted for him when he represented my district in the state house) in a District that was Trump +18. It explains why polling in 2016 and 2020 was so awful.

And it explains all this third term nonsense. Trump is convinced that the "Trump Constant" represents the majority of voters. In the past, Trump has convinced the GOP to go along with ideas that would have seemed unthinkable a few months prior. And thus far, he's proven that there are no political consequences for doing so. So it stands to reason that he might be willing to give this a try. But he has to remember that he's not invincible. He's never won as an incumbent, and for all the upheaval of 2020, it was nowhere near the level it would be if he was blatantly trying to circumvent the constitution to retain his hold on power. People in the GOP who would say that this is a bridge too far may ultimately backtrack if this nonsense becomes a reality, but Trump's only holds the office based on a margin of a few points in a few states. It doesn't take much for things to tip back in the other direction, and if he loses he will be done for good, and there's no way he is making a comeback at 86. I don't think he'll seriously pursue a third term, but I wouldn't entirely be surprised if he did.

Who could you even find would agree to this nonsense scheme? Who is going to become president and just be like lol I'm stepping down?

And I don't think there's any way such a ticket could even win the primary. Whoever is on the ticket is going to have to do debates and whatever, and you think he can just say lol maga I'm gonna step down and make Trump president?

I think the OP os largely posting nonsense but if you wanted someone you’d probably pick family to lower the risk (eg Don Jr)

Well, last election there was only one presidential debate. The norm prior to that was three. Maybe in 2027 we won't have any.

There were two debates.

The norm also had been to have a President who can figure out where to walk and where to sit without cue cards written IN BIG FRIENDLY LETTERS and his handlers literally leading him by hand. But all the norms went out of the window with Biden. Hopefully whoever will be the candidate next time, at least they would be able to walk and talk independently.

That's a cute trick, but I don't believe any cute trick like that would work. I voted for Trump twice, and haven't regretted it (at least so far), and I wouldn't vote for such shenanigans. I am pretty sure I am not alone. As a mental game of "how Trump could stay the President forever" it is interesting to play with, but as a realistic scenario it's just not. And to be honest, if the Republican Party's best play is to rely on Trump alone until he literally dies, the party is dead already and needs to be replaced. I sincerely hope it's not that bad.

I can't take Bannon saying this to mean anything or indicate anything serious. He's just talking out of his ass from a position of no authority. Furthermore, Trump will be way too old to run next time. Furthermore, if they actually tried to run a strategy like this for any length of time, as opposed to just talking about it, that would push every centrist like me, who doesn't take anything Trump says about himself seriously nor takes anything Trump's detractors say about him seriously, into a realization that Trump is in fact a threat to American democracy. It would prove every leftist correct, that Trump is the worst thing ever, a wannabe dictator, the whole thing. Then Trump would lose in the biggest landslide ever.

is in fact a threat to American democracy

There are people out there who still think "American democracy" exists? Who TF cares about 'democracy' unironically.

that would push every centrist like me, who doesn't take anything Trump says about himself seriously nor takes anything Trump's detractors say about him seriously, into a realization that Trump is in fact a threat to American democracy. It would prove every leftist correct, that Trump is the worst thing ever, a wannabe dictator, the whole thing.

Strongly disagree. I think there's probably very few people who aren't already convinced of this that would then become convinced by him trying a 3rd term. He already tried to hang on to power after an election whose results he disagreed with via very legally dubious means. I don't get the reasoning that sees the fake electors plot and concludes "Yeah, now that he attempted that and faced no consequences, won reelection, and has a Supreme Court ruling now saying he can't face any criminal liability for his actions as President, he probably won't try anything like it again".

I've only voted for Trump harder each time he came up on the ballot, but I'm not going to vote for him again. I'm happy with what he's done so far but it will be the time for him to pass the buck on to someone else. There's no way I'm supporting a trump for life ticket.

Why not? Why pass up an opportunity to keep blue tribe under the heel of your boot? “My rules > your rules fairly > your rules unfairly…”?

I certainly would react as @haroldbkny describes. I have argued for 8ish years that Trump is not actually a big deal and people are freaking out over nothing. I thought the Jan 6 riot was a complete nothingburger and I think the "insurrection" talk is coming from a place of fearmongering rather than any actual basis in Trump's actions. If he tried to actually run for a third term, that will show that the left has been right about him the entire time, and he actually is a threat to democratic government in this country. I'll vote for literally anyone the Democrats run against him.

What's your opinion of FDR?

I hate him, though not for the fact that he ran for four terms if that's why you ask. That was legal at the time, so whatever (I am not one who believes that custom should be given serious weight like that). I hate him because he wiped his ass with the constitution and largely destroyed the original vision for this country by centralizing so much power within the federal government, power that it constitutionally could not (and still cannot) have. Only extremely disingenuous motivated reading of the commerce clause (with Wickard v Filburn being the prime example) allowed it, and everything he did under that aegis should be walked back. That won't happen of course, because a strong federal government is actually pretty popular with the masses.

But yeah, in short I think FDR was one of the worst presidents the US ever had.

It would have been better if the New Deal had been implemented with a constitutional amendment; however, the state governments were not capable of responding to the Depression on their own, and had Washington continued to do nothing, the nation would have had little prospect of avoiding a far more blatant rejection of the Constitution, as the desperate masses turned to either a Red or a Brown alternative.

I agree, but the general consensus does not impress.

I actually think Trump running again would be an extremely bad idea for a number of practical reasons. But more and more, I'm flatly unwilling to engage in the pretense that there's some civic foundation that future norm violations are supposed to be undermining, that even a single stone of those foundations still rests upon another. This perspective doesn't necessarily resolve in endorsement of further violations, but if I'm going to oppose them, I'm going to oppose them for real reasons, not fake ones.

Yeah, I know people rate FDR highly. It's one of the things that lowers my level of hope for this nation: that a president can make his entire policy platform to do blatantly unconstitutional stuff, thoroughly destroy the original social contract on which the nation was founded, and be rated as one of the greatest leaders in the country's history (rather than as one of its greatest villains) as a result. George Lucas was a little on the nose with the Star Wars line "So this is how liberty dies: with thunderous applause", but he also was basically correct imo. When freedom is taken away from a people, it is popular to do so (until it's gone too far and then it's too late to stop it, let alone reverse it).

I'm not saying that Trump is committing the first serious norm violations in our country's history. He isn't. We have been steadily eroding those norms for a century. But I am saying "two wrongs don't make a right", and I'm going to fight Trump just as hard on constitutional principles as I would've fought FDR back in the day had I been alive. Not that it means much, of course - Trump doesn't even know I exist, much less care what I think. But to the extent I can do something if he goes down that road (i.e vote against him, rather than for someone I would prefer), I will.

I'm not saying that Trump is committing the first serious norm violations in our country's history. He isn't. We have been steadily eroding those norms for a century.

A century?

People accused George Washington of abusing presidential power.

There has not been a president in history who was not at some point accused of exceeding his authority and violating the Constitution. Granted, some of these accusations were more bad faith and politically motivated than others, but still- I'm not even disagreeing with @FCfromSSC at this point that the Constitution is literal paper, but "norms" have always been a nebulous fuzzy thing manipulated by the politicians of every era. Just as the Supreme Court has always been in a sort of "dialog"/adversarial relationship with Congress and the Executive branch, making rulings as much to uphold their own legitimacy as to interpret the Constitution in some theoretically "objective" way.

There was never a period in American history when the political class was treating the Constitution as a rulebook that could not be deviated from to their own advantage. Some individuals treated it so- even some presidents! But they were not the norm.

To the degree I have been in more-or-less continuous disagreement with FC and other "America is dead" drumbeaters over the years, it's not with the facts before us today but rather whether these facts actually represent a meaningful difference from the past.

Where my own thinking has changed is that I think we may be the generation that sees the bill come due, the inherent instability in the system reach the breaking point, the ruin in the nation exhausted.

At this point, my optimistic hope is that the nation outlives me. Just need to eke out another few decades.

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But I am saying "two wrongs don't make a right", and I'm going to fight Trump just as hard on constitutional principles as I would've fought FDR back in the day had I been alive.

Do you believe that "Constitutional Principles" protect you or anything you care about now, or will at any point in the forseeable future? Do you perceive your position to be one of enlightened self-interest, or is it more a terminal values thing?

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Personally, back in '37 I thought he was a Supreme Court packing Bolshevik.

Seriously though, I couldn't possibly know what I would have thought at the time. He wasn't going against the Constitution, but rather a very strong precedent. He had some serious arguments for why he might need to break that precedent. And I know he had his detractors, but I'm sure he did not have half the country saying every day since he put his name on the ballot in 1932 that any day now he was going to try to become the dictator of America.

A lot of people at the time really, really hated FDR and did see him as a would-be tyrant. Obviously less than half the country given that he kept winning elections, but he wasn't uncontroversial. I've yet to meet anyone who refuses to ever even utter Trump's name, whereas my great-grandfather supposedly referred to FDR only as "that man" until his dying day.

'The Orange Man' 'Drumpf' 'Cheeto'

Sure, every figure gets insulting nicknames, but I personally have yet to run into anybody who will literally not say the word "Trump", even if they prefer those (and I think "that man", said with appropriate venom, manages to be a lot more cutting...)

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I meant more your present retrospective. I've been told my whole life by the authorities that he's a solid contender for best president of all time, only marginally edged out by Lincoln.

Yeah, but I mean, i think my present retrospective doesn't mean much, if we are trying to make a comparison to Trump trying to run a third term. I'm living in the Trump era surrounded by contemporary opinions about him, and I could never have that for FDR.

I am a centrist and while Jan 6 didn’t bother me, this would. I interpret Jan 6 as mere bluster that nobody (including his supporters) took seriously. If he actually became president for a third term this would cause me to admit that the left was actually correct about the seriousness of Trump’s antidemocratic tendencies.

The American meltdown over Jan 6 was hilarious.

Century of toppling foreign governments, some of which were democratically elected by their people? I sleep

A bunch of Gen X wander around a government building for a few hours, largely make fools of themselves, and then nothing happens? Literally worst thing to happen to America since 9/11 / pearl harbor / the civil war.

I see this “They just walked around a government building for a few hours” thing all the time and I think it’s a pretty dishonest way of downplaying what happened. Was it a real insurrection attempt that had any chance of working, like the most hysterical people on the left say? In my opinion, no. But a police officer died probably as a result of it, and by all outward appearances it was intended to stop the certification of the election. And intentions do matter. Republicans would rightly freak out if a mob of libs tried the exact same thing and entered the Capitol during the certification of Trump’s win in 2024, even if it didn’t work.

And because the BLM riots always get brought up as a counterexample, yeah, those were also bad and did much more damage. There is a lot of hypocrisy in how these two events were covered and the subsequent reactions to them. I don’t have a problem saying both are bad, and we should be honest about what actually went down in both cases.

But a police officer died probably as a result of it

No, he didn't.

Republicans would rightly freak out if a mob of libs tried the exact same thing and entered the Capitol during the certification of Trump’s win in 2024, even if it didn’t work.

They did similar shit during the Kavanaugh hearings. Republicans freaked a little, no one else cared.

That's fair

It was a legitimate attempt, just a horribly executed one.

It definitely makes it funnier to play it down to contrast the CIA coups vs "Gen X morons walking around and dying of heart attacks". But that was biased.

The meltdowns still hilarious though.

A bunch of Gen X wander around a government building for a few hours, largely make fools of themselves, and then nothing happens?

I am convinced that the outrage in Congress was a reaction to the immense shame they all felt for blowing the chance of a lifetime: whoever went out and confronted the mob and pulled a calm, collected "have you no shame, have you no decency" response would've been elected President in 2024. Instead, they all ran away, and that knowledge will burn them forever.

I think it's truly the most banal of explanations - all those other riots, those didn't put them at risk. They saw the burning but the burning was for other people. But this one? Oh god that impacts me! Add a media class that identifies as part of the same DC elite that was terrified, and then you get the push.

I think there are a lot of people even just in this forum who would disagree with you about what centrists would and would not take seriously, and I'm speaking as one of those centrists.

I think Trump crossing the well established and easy to understand bright line in the sand that has existed in spirit since 228 years ago, and in law since 74 years ago would be far more of a damning behavior than the 2020 election craziness. It ultimately likely comes down to the plausible deniability of Trump's actions, whether it could be seen in any light as (yet again) something that was potentially taken out of context, just his enemies ganging up on him to make it seem like he's doing something worse then he is. Seeing language on Wikipedia claiming he "devised a scheme" doesn't do much to convince me of the neutrality of the sources reporting on it.

I consider myself pretty much a centrist. I don't like the left and I don't like the right. And I think Trump's actions during the 2020 election are inexcusable and, if not legally, then morally, disqualifying for holding the office of President. That was basically the line in the sand for me and my registered Republican family members who voted for him the first time around. They didn't vote for him again (as far as I know), and they might have if it weren't for 2020. So I do think I have at least some knowledge of what centrists think.

Seeing language on Wikipedia claiming he "devised a scheme" doesn't do much to convince me of the neutrality of the sources reporting on it.

This seems overly uncharitable to me. Of course we can never truly know, but say he had done what the Wikipedia article says. What language would you expect or want them to use? "Devising a scheme" is just straightforwardly what one would call that.

"crafted a plan"

to be frank, there are many ways to more neutrally describe someone communicating with a group of people to come up with a plan to accomplish something

that you cannot even think of a way to describe such a thing without the negative connotation demonstrates what wikipedia is being accused of (which you're apparently blind to)

And I think Trump's actions during the 2020 election are inexcusable and, if not legally, then morally, disqualifying for holding the office of President.

Let's assume the 2020 election was illegally stolen. What should Trump have done?

What he initially did: make his case in court, where he had the opportunity to show evidence of vote tampering or other forms of fraud significant enough to change the outcome of the election. It was his right to do that, and it's good that we allow it in our justice system. After he lost all these cases, he should have conceded and let it be. Instead he continued to pursue hanging onto the office via other means with much less legal justification behind them.

The contingent/alternative electors were appointed before he lost all of those court cases and their appeals. If they had not been, they would have missed the deadline for appointing electors and he would have lost even if the courts ruled in a way that would make him the winner. If you think court cases should have the power to affect the outcome even after that deadline, that implies support for appointing the "fake electors" (or for the more extreme measure of trying to outright ignore the deadlines and appoint them after the fact).

There's a reason Gore's lawyers were considering doing the same thing in 2000 before the Supreme Court rendered it moot. The whole complaint about the "fake electors" seems to me like something people ended up focusing on because it was easier to use as a pretext for prosecution of him and the electors themselves, because the thing he actually did wrong (be a conspiracy theorist who falsely believed the election was stolen) isn't illegal.

Okay, so if the courts refused to look at evidence, and even refuse to put a statutorily required hearing to see that evidence onto the court schedule (e.g., in the case of the Georgia election contest), then still he should do nothing else?

He should just allow the illegal election be stolen and allow the criminals who stole it to gain power and wreak further havoc on the country?

Instead he continued to pursue hanging onto the office via other means with much less legal justification behind them.

Using the process explicitly defined in the Constitution of the United States to contest electoral counts from states who unconstitutionally and illegally conducted their elections resulting in fraudulent outcomes does have plenty of legal justification behind them.

I don't believe the fake electors plan falls inside of that explicitly defined process. The memos and testimony we have now show:

  • Trump's team knew the plan conflicted with the Electoral Count Act of 1887
  • Pence’s own counsel told him he lacked the unilateral authority to pick or reject electors as the plan would have required
  • The fake electors did meet and draw up their own certifications, showing that this was more than just some idea they dreamed up, they really did intend to go through with it
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Very well, you may be a centrist, I may have misjudged the validity of your centrist card. You're just a different one from me. But I still stand by the fact that many people in the forum may agree with me but not you. The vice versa may also be true.

I just also want to put out there that I do specifically know people who claim to be centrists but always align on the leftist position. I'm guessing they do this to try to gain cred with people like me. I can't say if you are that or not, because I haven't seen your track record.

What language would you expect or want them to use? "Devising a scheme" is just straightforwardly what one would call that.

Sorry, but I just absolutely disagree with you here. Never ever use the phrase "devise a scheme" unless they're Snidely Whiplash. For reporting on real world events you say he "planned to" or "was alleged to" or about a hundred other obviously neutral ways. Let actions speak for themselves on neutral sources. "Devise a scheme" is loaded loaded language.

Is Bannon actually in the authority position for this to mean much? Like hail Trump, hail victory. Bring on the red caesar, it would be very good for my ingroup. But Bannon could well be a loudmouth, and in fact seems to generally be a loudmouth. I would put higher odds on Vance taking the throne by assassination after the midterms than on Trump actually doing this- I dunno, could be wrong. But he's just really old to try to make your long term dictator, and the people that would need to cooperate in it have to know this.

it would be very good for my ingroup

Would it? Do you anticipate your country being ran better in the long run once this happens? Sure it'll be a nice sugar high, but what happens once it's 10 years from now and the rot and corruption that always (always) sets in once groups are established? Especially in cases where the usual checks and balances to prevent anyone from getting too comfortable or destructive?

Will your in group be doing well when your country's bureaucracy runs even worse than it does now, business investment (with knock on effects on the equity market) is more hesitant due to the increased risk from crony capitalism, and the USA has lost its mandate of heaven leader of the free world and the associated advantages like preferential trade deals and the world reserve currency?

Leaving aside the assertion that democrats would do any better of a job running the country(and Biden definitely did not- we can probably take him as a generic democrat due to his senility giving outsized power to the staffers), there is no right wing authoritarian regime which can be in power without taking care of conservative Catholics.

Leaving aside the assertion that democrats would do any better of a job running the country

Don't think I ever said this?

My assertion is that an administration who creatively interprets the constitution to give itself more power would do a worse job than the status quo.

there is no right wing authoritarian regime which can be in power without taking care of conservative Catholics.

Doesn't matter. Your life gets worse when the overall economy gets worse due to shitty leadership and capital flight, no matter how much the administration loves Catholics.

Would it? Do you anticipate your country being ran better in the long run once this happens?

Run better than what? If the alternative is Joe Biden's people, or Kamala Harris, or Zohran Mandami, or Gavin Newsom, then yes.

A crony capitalist quasi-autocratic (maybe we need a less inflammatory word that "autocratic" but my point is more "no longer a very democratic form of government that has even less pretense to listen to its citizens or be run well for fear of losing elections") is in no way going to run better than the USA currently.

We know this because the USA is still ran better, today, than the vast majority of counties on Earth. And it is very definitely ran better than the currently crony capitalist quasi-autocratic countries that exist right now.

Also again, what about when the shoe is on the other foot? What if Trump rips a third term, then the American people are so deeply upset with it that they not only elect Kamala Harris (lmao), but they elect her for 12 years straight using the same trick? Would you accept 12 years of Kamalapocalypse in exchange for an extra Trump term? Because that's implicitly an outcome here.

If your response is "well we'd simply ensure the Democrats never win again by cementing red-tribe rule forever" I again direct you to my question of "do you seriously actually think places like Assad Syria or El Salvador are ran better than California?". Governments that no longer need to worry about securing votes go off the rails really fucking fast, every time.

We're talking about Trump getting a third term, not a "crony capitalist quasi-autocratic" government; that's just a bunch of noise that gets thrown at Trump, and it doesn't even make sense alongside one of the other things thrown at him, which is "populist".

Also again, what about when the shoe is on the other foot? What if Trump rips a third term, then the American people are so deeply upset with it that they not only elect Kamala Harris (lmao)

Why would they be so upset, when they voted for Trump (or someone they knew would yield to him) for that third term?

Right, but a third term is in flagrant disregard to the democratic principles the country was built around. So presumably if you're willing to torch constitutional articles in the pursuit of more power, that won't be the only roadblock in the pursuit of more power.

This administration also has a rapidly growing resume of moves to increase its power despite rules or norms that say "no you can't". So this isn't even a conjecture it's just the continuation of an existing pattern of behavior.

I actually chose the words "crony capitalist quasi-autocratic" somewhat carefully, although I'm open to "autocratic" being the wrong word. They have a clear streak of being crony capitalists (TikTok deal, Merger approvals, Intel stake, Nvidia bullshit, etc). And doing that always, always results in shitter outcomes than letting the free market work. It also results in playing favorites and trading political and business favors back and forth.

The quasi-autocratic is again, because if you start undermining the fundamental principles of a democratic government to increase your political power, I really don't know what to call that.

Why would they be so upset, when they voted for Trump (or someone they knew would yield to him) for that third term?

Don't get too caught up in my lazy hypothetical. The thesis there is if you're okay with your team bending rules to increase its power, but there's a credible chance the other team will have a chance to bend those rules as well eventually, you are implicitly accepting that the other team gets to do it as well.

Unless of course you're only fine with your team bending the rules if they also simultaneously destroy the other team completely, in which case "quasi-autocratic" is only wrong because "autocratic" is better lol

Right, but a third term is in flagrant disregard to the democratic principles the country was built around.

LOL. No, no it isn't. The two-term limit was just a tradition up until FDR broke it. And the backlash for that is he got a FOURTH term as well. And a Democrat was his successor. And law or norm, it is anti-democratic.

They have a clear streak of being crony capitalists (TikTok deal, Merger approvals, Intel stake, Nvidia bullshit, etc).

This amounts to a Gish Gallop. The TikTok deal was the result of a bill passed during the Biden administration. Not sure which merger approval you mean, but the idea that there was any cronyism involved in the Nexstar approval was just speculation. Neither the Intel stake nor the Nvidia bullshit are "crony capitalism"; they're attempts at industrial policy. Trump didn't put his buddies on the board or anything; it's the US government that got a stake.

Right, but a third term is in flagrant disregard to the democratic principles the country was built around.

With whom does one submit a ticket to get an action or interaction with the government registered as recognizably, fully-legibly "in flagrant disregard to the democratic principles this country was built on", such that one can then make such appeals here? It seems a very useful imprimatur to have in one's back-pocket when disagreements arise. Note that I am not even necessarily disagreeing with you that Trump running for a third term should be labeled such! The problem is that if others are going to ignore my judgements on what constitutes "flagrant disregard to the democratic principles this country was built on", I am not clear on why I not ignore their judgements in return.

Reciprocity is the basis for most human relationships. There are some that can operate without it: husband and wife, parent and child, brothers, sisters and true friends. But you are not my wife, my parent or my child, nor a brother or a sister, nor a friend. Outside such bonds, even the Rightful Caliph could do no better then advocate coordinating meanness.

Why would they be so upset, when they voted for Trump (or someone they knew would yield to him) for that third term?

51% of the popular vote (for one given election) does not translate to "the entirety of American voters", as you surely understand. You're talking as if "a Democrat getting elected after a Republican" is something that has never happened in the history of U.S.A. After all, if the American people liked the Republican so much they elected him, why ever would they change their mind?

Or do you mean to say that if Trump gets the third term, that'll be the end of the Democrat party?

I'm saying if Trump gets a third term, there is no particular reason to believe "the American people" will be "deeply upset" with it. Sure, a Democrat could win afterwards, but that could happen if J.D. Vance won or even if a Democrat won in 2028. If Trump gets a third term it will because he is extremely popular -- popular enough that a majority of voters were not only willing to vote for him but also willing to overlook the irregularities it took to get there. It won't be deeply upsetting to the American people; they'll have basically given the middle finger to the term limit already.

As it happens, I don't think this will happen. I do not believe Trump will actually try to run again and if he does I believe he will lose. But if he does and wins, there will not be popular backlash to him doing so.

Bannon's a shock jock who lasted less than six months in the Trump administration. Trump called him "Sloppy Steve". He says crazy shit because it gets him an audience.

As for Trump trying to play sneaky tricks with the Constitution to get a third term, this ignores the elephant in the room: the MAGA base. A double-digit % of Trump voters would go along with it, I'd think, out of hatred/fear of the Dems, QAnon-style theories, and personal loyalty, sure. But, contra what it looks like to some incurious people in blue bubbles, Trump supporters aren't mindless sheeple blindly following the cult leader. They're following a leader, because they believe that in the big picture their leader wants what they want and fights for it, and what they want is for America to get back to being a great country because that's normal for America and what America should be. If nothing else, those sort of shenanigans are too complex to appeal to anybody but political obsessives, they inherently turn off normal people. "Red Caesar" is a fantasy of blue tribe right-wingers; it's not even on Joe MAGA's radar.

In my view it's precisely because this would be complex that Trump supporters would be fine with it. Anyone opposed could be cast as a lame nerd quibbling over boring legal language.

They're following a leader, because they believe that in the big picture their leader wants what they want and fights for it, and what they want is for America to get back to being a great country ... If nothing else, those sort of shenanigans are too complex to appeal to anybody but political obsessives, they inherently turn off normal people.

a. ) I don't think this is incompatible with him trying to get a 3rd term? If he's fighting for them, why would they want him to stop? Bannon basically says as much in the interview I linked. They have a vision, the base likes the vision, and they need at least 4 more years after this term to complete it.

b.) Many, many things Trump does inherently turn off normal people, and it hasn't seemed to matter much.

In my view it's precisely because this would be complex that Trump supporters would be fine with it. Anyone opposed could be cast as a lame nerd quibbling over boring legal language.

I'd be fine with it for the exact same reason I've never heard a Democrat get all high dudgeon at the suggestion that Michelle Obama run when everyone and their dog knows who would actually be executive.

Leaders I like having power is a good thing, actually.

But if progressives and "centrists" want to cite the Constitution about it, then they have a half-century edifice of utilitarian jurisprudence to exorcise before they get to be taken seriously in those concerns.

More realistically, I'm 99.9% sure that nothing like this is going to happen. Trump is not the dictator that idiots think he is. He does not value hard power for it's own sake, or he would have gone into politics 50 years earlier.

a) Because a movement can have a successor to the leader who carries on fighting for the same principles. There are diehards who won't accept that anyone else is the Real Deal, but they're a tiny fraction, oddballs like Bannon on the fringe of MAGA. It doesn't preclude Trump trying to get a third term, but makes it unnecessary, and a huge chunk of his base will feel that way. It also means Trump can step down without his movement dying and him and his family imprisoned/dead.

b) A large portion of Trump voters are, by definition, normal people. Certainly more normal than anyone posting here. Maybe they don't have your norms, but they're clearly not turned off by his media antics all that much (I do think there's probably a notable divide in opinion between the Trump voters who love his antics and those who like him but wish he'd tone it down a bit, but it's just an opinion).

Red tribe normies mostly do not like Trump's personal behavior, but they have a strong divide between 'I wish he'd stop tweeting' and 'I like it, he tells it like it is'. The latter group is a minority, but not a small one, and it is very very male.

Yeah, I thought about including something like "he tells it like it is" in parentheses there. I also hear a bit of ambivalence from some red tribe normies, a sort of "well, I can't personally agree with his conduct (but, well, it's working?)"

I would include a third constituency - those who find his antics juvenile, appalling and unbecoming of the Presidency, but who dislike/distrust the Democrats more.

Oh, sure, probably should have said "supporters" instead of "voters" for that reason.

So, on the one hand, this just strikes me as bizarre wishful thinking or rallying the troops ahead of some pretty important off season elections. Are we even sure Trump is going to be in good enough health to serve out this term? I mean, he's looking better than Biden did, but he's still old, and sometimes people really go off a cliff. His "weave" is nowhere near where it was in the 2016 election.

On the other hand, despite supporting many of his policies, and not even being particularly bothered at the prospect of a 3rd Trump term so he can finish remaking the institutions and the culture in his image, I believed many of the arguments that the system of checks and balances would restrain Trump. So while being personally for tariffs, and mass deportations, and slamming the border shut, I could make with a straight face the arguments necessary to moderates that their worst fears would not materialize. "The system" would restrain Trump in a way it utterly failed to restrain the lawless Biden administration. Now much to my glee, "the system" has failed in many ways to check Trump, but it also means, maybe, juuuuuust maybe, it fails to restrain him in this way too. So it's a bit harder for me to make that argument in all sincerity.

So I donno. I'm not against Red Caesar. Just don't get my hopes up.

Trump is too old for this to be serious. I don’t understand what sort of play Bannon is making, maybe just trying to get himself back in the news if nothing else.

It's bizarre to advocate for an 80 year old man with three and a half grown sons to run for a third term. If Trump were a monarch, any reasonable monarchist would be advocating for him to abdicate and retire in favor of one of his children.

Back when ruling monarchs were a thing, abdicating in your old age was the exception and not the rule - remember that the King was anointed by God. If the King and heir were aligned, then the heir gradually took over more responsibility as the King declined. If the King and heir were opposed, then you got Biden-style scenarios where the King's courtiers tried to conceal the decline to prevent authority leaking to the heir and his courtiers.

[Old age abdication was common for Japanese Emperors, but they were never ruling monarchs]

Sure but that's not modernity. Life and healthspans were different, expectations of the ruler were different. Were King Donald a modern king and I a modern monarchist, I would advocate for his abdication, or at least for stepping back in favor of the heir. Fwiw, I think Charles should do the same, you don't want to end up with a long run of men who wait a lifetime to be king. I'm not sure monarchy really works without early and violent deaths intervening on occasion, you wind up with gerontocracy.

We see this very pattern in our best example of a ruling monarch today, King Salman of Saudi Arabia who has largely abdicated in favor of MBS. Salman recognized the danger of the Saudi throne being passed from aged brother to aged brother, a gerontocracy where crown princes died of old age, and skipped over many heads to get MBS next in line and passed him power to get things moving.

Given Donald's age, he should be putting one of his two and half grown sons on the ballot. Absent that, I think even mooting running Donald is evidence that MAGA, or at least some interpretations of MAGA, is a lot more fragile than it may appear.

We see this very pattern in our best example of a ruling monarch today, King Salman of Saudi Arabia who has largely abdicated in favor of MBS. Salman recognized the danger of the Saudi throne being passed from aged brother to aged brother, a gerontocracy where crown princes died of old age, and skipped over many heads to get MBS next in line and passed him power to get things moving.

But critically, Salman is still King and MBS is Crown Prince, Prime Minister and de facto regent. That is the point I was making - ruling Kings who are aligned with their heirs hand over power gradually but don't actually abdicate due to old age and infirmity. Voluntary abdication due to old age is a feature of 21st century constitutional monarchs.

Also it was on the tip of my tongue, Charles V abdicated from ruling half the world and lived out his life in a monastery.

I would respect the King for doing this, though as a general principle I think you need to wait long enough for them to be a reasonably known quantity. Certainly not younger than maybe 35. If the throne had been passed to Prince Harry ten years ago, you could have had the entire monarchy being led around by the nose to please a Californian socialite with a grudge.

Would it even be legally possible for Charles to abdicate without legal changes in each of the countries that claims him as head of state? I remember reading that the abdication of Edward required Parliament to write it into law and that law to become law in Australia, Canada, etc. Even given Charles's shaky popularity and Williams's solid popularity, I can't see that being an easy process especially with how independent all the various countries have become legally.

British monarchs have definitely abdicated before, even in the twentieth century.

Only once, since the days when they were "abdicating" under force of arms.

The Commonwealth doesn’t have any legal say on the matter AFAIK. There’s always the issue of whether they would accept William or demand that another country’s leader gets to be head of the Commonwealth, but that’s a separate matter.

My impression is that Charles is generally quite well-liked, at least in Africa, since he cares a lot about commonwealth and he’s quite internationalist. William is probably something of an unknown quantity.

The Commonwealth doesn't get legal say, but the Commonwealth realms absolutely do.

Currently, Charles is King of the United Kingdom, King of Canada, King of Australia, King of Barbados, et cetera. Each of those offices is legally a separate office, governed by law in each of those separate countries, so any abdication would require a statute law passed in each of those countries. (There're several like Papua New Guinea where it wouldn't, but several more where it would.) Similarly, any change to the royal succession would require a law in each of those countries.

That's rather difficult, so I don't expect it'll happen unless it's very much needed.

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If the throne had been passed to Prince Harry ten years ago, you could have had the entire monarchy being led around by the nose to please a Californian socialite with a grudge.

I think much more likely would be a second Edward VIII situation. Maybe marrying a divorcée is not such a big scandal today, but Meghan would be totally unacceptable as queen consort. If, in this scenario, William is the younger brother and married to Kate, he would be seen as more suitable and pressure would be put on Harry to either give up Meghan or abdicate.

Also possible.

Prince Harry the heir is different man that Prince Harry the spare. He never married Meghan Markle, he married a black American divorcee specifically to avoid being compared to his brother.

William, by contrast, is certainly ready to be king. He's had 20 years of adulthood to prepare! And it would be great for the UK! The last time they had a monarch that young was 1968! Shake the cobwebs off and dance!

Sure, I would happily cheer for King William V!

Prince Harry the heir I wonder about. I think his constitution is just a bit tricky innately - I kind of assume that somebody who lets themselves be led around like that has a sort-of innate weakness of spirit that will manifest in one way or another. Maybe he would have been a slave to popularity, or in thrall to certain courtiers, or who knows, but I don't think he would have been a good king even if he hadn't been the spare.

It's just hard to separate the role from the psychology of the man where the difference is so stark. Decades ago Harry was known for his impulsiveness, his wildness, for his refusal to be led around by anyone.

But this is a philosophy of personality question. I don't think personalities exist absent context. The starting quarterback and the backup quarterback on the high school football team have different personalities, but the backup is only the backup because of the existence of the starter.

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[Old age abdication was common for Japanese Emperors, but they were never ruling monarchs]

Sort of? AFAIK it was considered a big thing when Emperor Akihito abdicated in 2019 (since the emperor is also anointed by God, or possibly is a god, I forget) and nobody had done it for 200 years. I'd be interested to hear more background on this.

I am not an expert, but under the Shogunate the (non-ruling) Emperors normally abdicated after about a decade. The official reason was that the religious duties of the Emperor were so tedious that it was unreasonable to expect someone to do the job for life, the actual reason was presumably to prevent the Emperor becoming a threat to the Shogun. Following the Meiji Restoration in 1868, the Emperor officially became a ruling Emperor again (in fact it was a UK-style constitutional monarchy and the elected Prime Minister held more real power than the Emperor) and the abdications stopped.

That’s very interesting, thanks for explaining.

I always wanted to try studying Japanese history in the original, without preconceptions, but my la gauge ability didn’t really develop fast enough to make that viable, so I’m more ignorant than I’d like to be.

Japanese emperors in a certain period would abdicate to gain more power, and the current ruling Emperor would be just a puppet.

Making any sort of play for a Trump 3rd team would open the door for Obama to throw his hat as well, and nostalgia+vibes would almost certainly grant him a victory, so this would not be on the interest of the right (especially as Obama is still young for a politician, only being 67 years old at 2028)

I notice that Obama has been more visible lately, and him and Trump are sniping at each other more than usual. I think it’s being considered as a back up plan in case this actually happens.

Trump, partly driven by the jokes Obama made at his expense during the 2011 White House Correspondents' Dinner, ends up becoming president. Obama, spurred by efforts to enable Trump to serve a third term, returns to office himself. It's like poetry, sort of. They rhyme.

2011 White House Correspondents' Dinner

One of my favorite things about Trump is his ongoing refusal to go to the dinner. It's delightfully petty, but I also think it's good policy, that being so buddy-buddy with the press (like Obama was) actually is a bad thing for the office.

Not to mention good for the press.

If the Trump camp telegraph this way ahead of time, maybe. The Democratic Party machinery would have to spin up a whole campaign around Obama, assuming he even wants to do it, and assuming the Democrats actually want to play into further cementing that precedent. I see a scenario where Trump somehow gets a favorable ruling in 2027 and Democrats hold off on running a 3rd term candidate so that in the event they do win, they can work to cement the law to really make the spirit of the 22nd Amendment an unambiguous thing without looking like they're pulling up the ladder behind them.

Another possibility is the Democrats don't see this coming, Trump brute forces it with some help from favorable state legislatures to get on the ballot, wins, and then the SCOTUS ruling in his favor comes through post-2028 when he's already secured the presidency. Then the Democrats have the option to run Obama for 2032, but that's too far out to really reason about. Who knows what happens if we get to that point.

The Democratic Party machinery would have to spin up a whole campaign around Obama, assuming he even wants to do it, and assuming the Democrats actually want to play into further cementing that precedent.

Hillary III (or IV, depending if we count the 2012 second term of Obama as being what stymied her trying again then) - this time for sure! 🤣 In 2028 she would be a sprightly eighty years old, mature enough for the job!

The Democratic Party machinery would have to spin up a whole campaign around Obama

Remember a person named Kamala Harris? They'd do the same thing. They'd just declare it's the current thing now, and significant percentage of their base is trained to embrace the current thing immediately on declaration. Except that Obama is much more visible and prominent figure that can stand on his own and hold the audience (at least if the teleprompter is not malfunctioning) and has people who are genuinely like him, not because the Party told them so. So it'd be very easy to do this if they'd need to. Of all the obstacles, this is the least one, they've done it before.

significant percentage of their base is trained to embrace the current thing immediately on declaration

Unlike Republicans of course, who have never once changed their opinion on supporting Ukraine, or the efficacy of the free market, or the efficacy of free trade, or how small government should be, or if state owned enterprises are good, or anything else in the last ~9 months.

There's still discussion among the Republicans on Ukraine. Some think we should do more, some think we should do less. It had been like that before the election, it had been after the election, it is now, it will be in the future. It's not like today all Republicans put up Ukrainian flags on Twitter, and tomorrow every single one forgets about it and puts up Hamas flags or whatever instead. There's also disagreement between libertarian wing - which supports free trade - and populist wing - which is more skeptical about it. I don't think there's a lot of disagreement about cutting the government, though again populist wing wants much more government intervention than the libertarian wing. So yes, there are different wings among the Republicans, and I am sure some Republicans may, on occasion, change their minds and move from one wing to a different one. That's normal too. What's appears to me less normal is when almost the whole party starts in unison (sometimes literally using the same words, there were many examples) discussing the same topic in the same way, only to drop it and switch to another one immediately. Nobody cared for any renovations in the White House ever, and suddenly starting a couple of days ago it's a sacred symbol of the nation where one can't move a nail without being literally Hitler. And in a month nobody would remember it, moving on to the next current thing. It works like that.

You could literally just take your comment, replace "Republican" with "Democrat", and it would be true

You say the Republicans don't literally all move as one, sure. Neither do the Democrats. You'll always find exceptions, congratulations. You can find them for Dems too.

https://globalaffairs.org/research/public-opinion-survey/dramatic-rise-republican-support-ukraine

This article shows 20%+ swings in opinion in a very small timeframe, which satisfies the "significant percentage of their base is trained to embrace the current thing immediately on declaration" that I quoted.

I don't even disagree, the Dems also do this bullshit. I hate both groups, you're fucking morons, please pull your collective heads out of your collective asses and wake up to the fact that China is eating your fucking lunch and western society has become so sclerotic and myopic it can barely meet the needs of its people.

I miss when Western society was the pinnacle of human civilization, and not an ouroboros of rent seekers cannibalizing itself for short term returns at the cost of long term prosperity.

What is even supposed to be the upside of this idea for Trump himself?

Not getting thrown in jail for the numerous crimes you committed (either real ones, or the ones they will pin on you, like those sexual assault and felony fraud convictions)?

This was juat a way to prevent him from running. They won't do it if he doesn't run to start with.

JD Vance will not prosecute Trump.

Being President is more fun than being a very rich political has-been?

I'm not actually sure that's true. I mean the power, yes, but Trump had been able to execute significant amount of power even not being the President. And maybe having quarter of the power and zero responsibility would suit him fine too.

Maybe this is why he's the president, and I'm just a pleb, but surely, when you're pushing 80 and already have 2 terms behind you, you might want to just chill and hang out with the grandkids?

I 100% agree with you, that is what I would do

But the kind of person who has the conviction, determination and drive to become the president of the USA is also not the kind of person to kick up their feet and cruise control.

I constantly wonder why Elon Musk does anything he's been doing, he seems pretty unhappy and stressed out a lot? If I was worth 100s of billions I'd be living full time on a tropical paradise island that I built into some kind of funhouse compound and I'd have my friends and family rotate in and out to keep me company. Maybe spice it up by going on international trips every other month. I'd be SO MUCH happier than Elon if I had his money.

But Elon is Elon because of that drive. He wouldn't be worth 100s of billions if he didn't have it.

I see it with "retired" successful consultants who then just keep working semi-privately. Their millionaires, why are you still doing this shit? Because they have insane drive and the insane drive is also why they're millionaires. If they could fuck off and relax, they wouldn't have been the massively successful consultants they were/are.

He can chill with the grandkids while living in the White House, shutting down large parts of the country for "security" when he turns up to play golf, and hearing "Hail to the Chief" when he rocks up at a public event while Susie Wiles and Steven Miller run the country. Given who Trump is, I think he would find this more fun than chilling with the grandkids as a private citizen.

Some people say this has already happened.

Well, if you actually believe any of this, my offer to bet about him running for a third term is still open.

Presumably the same as whatever the upside was for him running for his 2nd term?

I think what he was getting from his second term was revenge / general "up your's" against the people who messed up his first term. Right now he is being treated as a more or less normal president, so I don't see a reason for him to double-down on spite. Maybe if he actually had a clear and specific vision for the future of the country, I could imagine him desperately clinging on to power to ensure it's correctly implemented. The problem is that:
a) He does not strike me as the kind of man who would have such a vision
b) Even if he was, the safest way to get this sort of thing done is to groom an heir to pass the torch to, and JD Vance is a pretty good candidate for that, and he has a whole bunch of kids and other relatives.
c) If for whatever reason there is no acceptable heir, the only way these sorts of gambits work out, is when you have popular support north of 80%, and I'm pretty sure he knows it.

The same reason Caesar crossed the Rubicon: Survival.

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