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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   28885 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 6, 2026

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The final resting place of TDS: acceptance that it was just aesthetic snobbery all along. The greatest political actor in the US since FDR, vanquished both parties, slew the Bush and the Clinton dynasties, co-opted the Kennedies, rewrote the political playbook and realigned the party system, the international treaty system and US policies more generally. One day they'll probably teach this little banger in 300-level poly-sci classes, in the same chapter as the Fireside Chats.

So gauche!

My problem with TDS is that it conflates three different things. The original meaning was hating something purely because it was done by Trump (and the assumption that people would have approved of a policy if it was enacted by their tribe). This is the true aesthetic snobbery, which probably happens more than we would like to admit. There are two other factors at play though.

1 - Genuine dislike of Trump's goals. This is certainly the case with true believers on the left. They like the bureaucracy that is getting axed. They like the world order that is being dismantled. They like the identity politics and moral panics, etc. I wouldn't say they have TDS. I'd say they don't like change.

2 - Approval of Trump's goals but dislike of his methods. I'd say the vast majority of objectors fall into this category (myself included). I do support a bunch of what Trump wants to do (at least from a very high level). But his ways of doing those things are some combination of a) incompetent or b) designed primarily for the aesthetic appeal. This makes sense from an electoral perspective, but it's not a long term strategy. Eventually the underlying reality of the world (ex: oil and gas economics) catches up. And at that point, you end up causing a crisis and delivering the government back to the very people you wanted to remove from power. You put on a flashy show, but just end up as a small detour in Cthulhu's leftward swim.

Yeah. This has long been my position about the Trump rhetoric and phraseology. It’s brilliant politics, and honestly fair game, but transitions very poorly to governing where people actually do expect government officials to utter things with a stronger relationship to truth. Take Trump’s recent threat about ending civilization in Iran. Facially, that’s a nuclear bomb threat. The fact we cannot tell if that’s what he means or if it’s pure vibes is dangerous. Even if we assume it’s pure politics, it degrades the future ability to rationally assess the official positions of the government and facts on the ground. What particularly grinds my gears is some of the most ardent defenders of Trump around here have taken the simultaneous and cognitively dissonant position that Western civilization is in trouble because it is losing high trust social dynamics. But no, it’s the darn immigrants and their trust-caustic culture that is at fault, or maybe the darn liberals and their moral purity crusades, it can’t possibly be something as simple as the loss of trust from a direct attack on institutions or a President who lies and exaggerated as easily as he breathes.

I'd say they don't like change

In other words, they're "conservatives". They don't like that name because in their worldview (informed by a memeplex that began in the '60s that they applied despite its ideas being objectively too advanced for them) it means they're the bad guys.

I think the term TDS is perfectly appropriate for both dislike of the man and dislike of the change, because the former is how conservatives launder the latter.

The problem with (2) is that I would not say the vast majority of objectors fall into that category, because if it was you'd find quite a bit more measured discourse rather than, y'know, what we see right now. And half of these also tend to fall back into TDS by going "Trump stupid, reeeeee", which you can see in every thread that talks about the guy on this forum, to say nothing of what happens in the wider world.

And at that point, you end up causing a crisis and delivering the government back to the very people you wanted to remove from power. You put on a flashy show, but just end up as a small detour in Cthulhu's leftward swim.

That's just kind of the nature of government, though. However, I would mention that Cthulhu swims rightward- towards the conservative and the local maxima of corruption (International SJWery, at present)- not leftward, which is more just general chaos.

The problem with (2) is that I would not say the vast majority of objectors fall into that category, because if it was you'd find quite a bit more measured discourse rather than, y'know, what we see right now.

It's an issue of granularity. If you take the 10k foot view "I want to improve boarder security / decrease illegal immigration", the vast majority of people are okay with that. Only like 20% of the population truly wants open boarders. It's only an issue because a bunch of political thinkers buy into the whole "people are fungible and we need as many as possible in an era of negative population growth" ideology. So 80% should in theory agree with Trump. But each time you get more specific, you lose people. Do you want ICE roaming around picking up criminals? A decent size chunk of people are okay with that. How about just general illegals? Eh...probably less. Do you want them doing performative raids with face coverings and tactical gear in quiet suburban neighborhoods and occasionally detaining or killing a citizen? Your average person is probably not happy anymore. It started hitting way too close to home.

Basically any Trump policy has this shortcoming. Because when you come to the fork in the road where you can choose pragmatism/results on one path and showmanship on the other, Trump always chooses showmanship. In the end, it is just aesthetics. It's what Trump lives for, what he derives his support from, and what keeps him from actually getting anything done.

None of that is true; is the thing. He is a gross capering clown who leads a populist interregnum; he does things that are stupid and counterproductive to his own goals while still doing normal neocon things. He is Bush 3: Bush harder, just worse in every way.

The things you attribute to him are just end process that began with regan and thatcher, the rotting away of the state and of society into atomized citizens and neoliberal incentives.

I think the idea of TDS is a kind of prion some people ate that is stopping them from looking at the fat, senile lunatic they have decided is a master manipulator and realizing: Holy shit, our guy is a silver spoon moron!

He is a gross capering clown who leads a populist interregnum

LOL. Nice choice of words for someone who has been protested by a group called "No Kings".

For anyone else like me who needed to look up the root, interregnum, as in, regal, rex, king. Inter, between, so if Trump is the leader of the populist interregnum, we are definitionally between the reign of two kings (Obama in this case being one king).

I like words.

To be unnecessarily nitpicky, it's inter regnum, and regnum means 'kingdom', 'reign', or 'authority'. As Etymonline notes, the term was used in the Roman republic, to mean a time between consuls. As such, though it is etymologically related to rex, 'king', I think both the Romans and ourselves validly use the term to mean any interruption in political authority.

Constitutionally, the American system is designed to never have an interregnum. If the president dies, the next person in the line of succession instantly becomes president - the office is never vacant. Western monarchies often work the same way - "the king is dead, long live the king". The throne is never empty. The presidency is the monarchal element of the American constitution (America being a Polybian mixed constitution), and it too is never empty.

That said asdasdasdasd is clearly using the term more informally, to just mean something like 'interruption'.

His opposition including some stupid people who can't get their narrative straight is not a particularly strong point in his favour.

Sure it is; in the land of the blind the one-eyed man is... err, there's that word again.

Does the one-eyed man get to be king of the properly sighted just by presenting some blind people he would be comparatively fit to lead, though?

I don't think the metaphor you chose works here. In the end, you are just trying to force the parent poster to answer for some incompatible view espoused by unrelated people who happen to agree with him on the "Trump bad" part, which we can maybe consider to not be completely invalid if you also take responsibility for the "support Israel to position the set-pieces for the Rapture" camp on your side.

It so happens that if you are too stupid and malicious to consider consequences, you can do a hell of a lot as the president of the United States of America. You can do great things indeed. The greatest. It's a tremendous force, this office.

For example, you can kill a whole civilization.

You can realign everything into a crooked parody of itself. You can throw a temper tantrum and wreck international treaties, replacing them with your preferred club of third world kleptocrats. Easy-peasy. The hard part is getting into that office, but thankfully even the smart Americans have grown tired of treating things seriously, and so happily elected a random moron.

What insightful commentary. Do go on.

Trump killed a civilization with a tweet. Hysterical. Chuck Norris jokes as political analysis.

The US President making a thinly veiled threat to commit genocide is, in fact, a bad thing. Even if he's practically guaranteed to TACO and just do some airstrikes on civilian infrastructure at worst. The fact that Trump does it through Twitter does not reduce its badness since Twitter is basically an official communication channel these days.

It wasn't Twitter, it was Truth Social. Which is where Trump rants.

Sure, but Truth Social is just a reskin built to be Trump's personal Twitter. The fact it has a different name doesn't really matter since people will still see his posts if they're controversial enough.

They are two entirely different entities.

... that does not make it better.

Chuck Norris jokes as policy announcements.

Does it not tire you to maintain this disaffected persona chuckling at "lib" overreaction? Do you really believe that the proper treatment of POTUS's words is "unhinged and obviously non-credible bullshitting", but also that this kind of person deserves to be POTUS?

Does it not tire you to engage in this constant catastrophizing? It's been ten years. How are people still driving themselves into madness like this?

Four years of ineffectual flailing due to political sabotage, 4 years out of power, and now a bit over a year of uninterrupted and unprecedented shitshow. The list of his follies is very long, but an American consumer is very rich, so can ignore it for a time. Still, it hasn't been a long time. What did you mean by ten years?

uninterrupted and unprecedented shitshow.

No, everything has been between "basically fine" and "awesome, actually". This is what I mean by catastrophizing.

What did you mean by ten years?

That's how long Trump has been dominating our political conversation. That's how long lefties and NeverTrump types have been having crashout meltdowns EVERY. SINGLE. WEEK. about whatever new calamity is making the rounds on TikTok or BlueSky. How many times has Trump DESTROYED THE ECONOMY?!!/1 How many times has Trump STARTED WORLD WAR THREE!!!!1? How many times have we seen THE END OF DEMOCRACY!!1?

(They screamed, on their national television shows where they will definitely never suffer consequences for open, deranged antipathy for the purported fascist king of America. Unlike Europe, where complaints about being raped by migrants or criticizing politicians gets people jailed for longer than the migrant rapists.)

And no one ever stops and recalibrates. No one ever pauses to take a sanity check. They just lose issue after issue, fact pattern after fact pattern, and dive straight into the next hype cycle.

Remember the other day when all those idiots thought he was dead?

LMAO.

It's certainly flailing and I want to call it ineffectual, but at this point the sheer staying power of the moral panic / doomsday cult mentality is honestly impressive. Terribly unhealthy, but impressive.

I mean just to pick something that has had a very personal impact to people I know, the NSF and related science cuts have basically been Covid-level fallout for higher education and related research. The fact this was done on purpose and even lauded is nauseating. For every person like my friend’s wife whose half-bullshit psych masters degree got derailed by a year or two, there’s two people like my aunt who got laid off from her incredibly important job at a primate research lab that does a ton of stuff on both infectious disease and cancer research, where the whole lab is probably going to close. For all the whining Republicans did about Covid pummeling K12 education with knock on effects for another decade or more, it’s extra astonishing none of them seem too concerned at all that the same thing is happening in slow motion at higher levels.

It's hard to have sympathy for people who felt absolutely no need to gatekeep the integrity of their institutions.

Trump has caused hundreds of billions in damage with Liberation Day tariffs, attacked Denmark and forced EU allies to orient towards China, basically wrecked NATO by this point, foolishly escalated against the same China and got humiliated in Busan, exposing American industrial ineptitude (particularly to Korea), is about to lose Taiwan, and is in the process of shaving off 1% or so off the global GDP growth. That's just the big foreign policy stuff I care about, domestic policy is discussed daily here.

That loyalists conveniently forget such issues or reframe them into WINS is unsurprising.

That loyalists conveniently forget such issues or reframe them into WINS is unsurprising.

Exactly. The hysteria and delusion is off the charts.

Trump has caused hundreds of billions in damage with Liberation Day tariffs

Not seeing real justifications for this claim, even from virulently anti-Trump outlets.

attacked Denmark and forced EU allies to orient towards China

No, they're just quislings who were already sucking up to China because China is an asshole that thinks they're subhuman.

basically wrecked NATO by this point

What good was NATO, in a post USSR world? Europe is a sick old man.

foolishly escalated against the same China and got humiliated in Busan

Genuinely laughable after 20 years of watching every national level Democrat get rolled like a middle schooler in their first poker game.

exposing American industrial ineptitude (particularly to Korea)

Better to hide it and let it get worse?

is about to lose Taiwan

See, this is exactly what I mean. China is retrenching and reconsidering Taiwan plans after watching their tech fail the last four months. 2027 is going to come and go with no Taiwan invasion, and you will never, ever, ever remember this failed prediction, just like the other failed predictions from every single one of the last 500 weeks.

Hey, wake up! You've been in a coma ever since Mueller had Trump arrested back in 2018 after THE WALLS CLOSED IN!

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The person who deserves to be POTUS is the person who gets enough votes to be POTUS. This is the horrible truth, the thing from which you desperately struggle to avert your gaze. The United States is a democracy and Donald Trump is its democratically elected president. His legitimacy derives from the people.

Donald Trump did not trick his way into office and then surprise everyone by acting in a manner unbecoming of a president. The people of the United States of America decided to elect someone who breaks all the rules of what a president is 'supposed' to do. They don't care what the president is 'supposed' to do, they care whether the president is doing what they want him to do. For quite a long time, through many administrations, the president has not been doing what the people want him to do.

Donald Trump did not trick his way into office and then surprise everyone by acting in a manner unbecoming of a president

He apparently surprised Catturd and other major boosters who were celebrating NO MORE FOREIGN WARS upon his election. That said, they've quickly pivoted, now foreign wars are Based.

The people of the United States of America decided to elect someone who breaks all the rules of what a president is 'supposed' to do. They don't care what the president is 'supposed' to do, they care whether the president is doing what they want him to do.

This is mostly sophistry, but I suppose you are making a sharp point: the problem is not Trump, it's the American people.

For example, you can kill a whole civilization.

Have you made similar objections towards "death to America" or "death to Israel" coming from Middle Easterners, including Iran? Or is this one of those "America isn't civilized, so it's fine to destroy America, but Iran, whew, that's civilized" ideas? Or is the reasoning perhaps that it's hyperbole when Iran says it but serious when Trump says it?

Well, I had higher expectations of the USA than Iran personally. Makes sense to me people would find such rhetoric coming from the POTUS more notable than similar rhetoric coming from a mob in a third world country or from a notorious extremist theocracy.

I note that at least going back to the Bush administration (and probably back into the mists of time, but I haven't checked) that there is a significant subset of people who simultaneously want to claim moral superiority and seethe at being held to any kind of standard.

  1. yes, it is hyperbole in the case of Iran. This has been covered enough. Iranians have, in fact, never had the genocide of Americans or even collapse of the American state to be their policy.
  2. Iran cannot credibly threaten death to America, or even Israel, for it has no means to inflict such death. On the other hand, the US can credibly send Iran to the Stone Age, or whatever, with near-complete impunity.
  3. I do have double standards. An ostensible vanguard of the Western Civilization cannot conduct itself like an insular theocracy it says is ruled by "crazy mullahs".
  4. This victim posturing is exactly what I've been talking about, it's unbecoming of a superpower.

Iranians have, in fact, never had the genocide of Americans ... to be their policy

Where has America had the genocide of Iranians to be its policy?

Iran cannot credibly threaten death to America, or even Israel, for it has no means to inflict such death.

Which is why it was working on nuclear weapons.

Their nuclear program was completely obliterated less than a year ago.

Obviously not, since they still have the enriched uranium, a nuclear reactor, and other parts of said program.

...or because they don't want to be regime changed.

Ali Khamenei made those objections already, stating that it means opposition to U.S. government policies, not the American people. Hard to imagine a greater authority on the matter.

Besides that, rhetoric coming from a protest or some mass gathering is slightly different than rhetoric coming from world leaders. 'Glassing the place' became a common term for what many Americans said should be done to the middle east, I don't suppose you think that's the same as an official statement from a national leader? Though Trump has now narrowed that gap.

Ali Khamenei made those objections already, stating that it means opposition to U.S. government policies, not the American people.

If that counts, it should exonerate Trump too; Trump said in the same statement that he didn't want the civilization to die. It's even above in the link!

I'm not sure if claiming to oppose a regime and expressing intent to bomb a civilization into oblivion are the same thing. That was kind of the game the US was playing with 'Regime Change'. Or the US claiming to stand for global order, instead of Hegseth going out there claiming no quarter would be given, which is just a random declaration of wanting to commit war crimes.

That being said, I'd accept the terms, if only to not ever have to listen to someone claim that Iranians shouting 'Death to America' represents an existential threat, rather than just being the same kind of empty bluster US officials are now want to put out on social media, assuming it's empty, of course.

A major difference is that right now the US bombing Iranian cities and has the capacity to inflict catastrophic damage on civilian infrastructure while Iran is not bombing American cities and on their best day could inflict minor damage.

So is it ok to threaten genocidal destruction so long as you don't have the capacity to actually carry it out?

From a Banksian perspective, aspirational Fully Automated Gay Space Communism says "yes", but still has to manage "real threats" (ideally non-kinetically, but not always). I don't think we're there (yet?), so I wouldn't call that a fair expectation in 2026.

I don't know how you inferred that from what I wrote, but I want to raise two points.

Firstly, and this is unbelievably important: evil behavior from others does not excuse your own evil behavior. There's a kind of self-conscious human orc who feels the need to justify their own brutal impulses by pointing to the depravity of others, but they don't actually seek to resolve anything.

Secondly, power implies responsibility. The fact that one party can act on their threat and the other cannot is absolutely a reason to care more about the one than the other. You should not be threatening genocide, period, but you definitely shouldn't be doing it when you are currently in the process bombing the shit out of the people you're threatening to exterminate.

Firstly, and this is unbelievably important: evil behavior from others does not excuse your own evil behavior.

I say it does (or rather, that that prevents it from being evil to begin with.)

Shooting someone out of the blue is wrong. Shooting someone in self-defense is not wrong. What's the difference? The difference that makes it okay is precisely that the other guy did it first.

If Trump just picked a random country out of a map and said it needs to be destroyed, that would be bad. But that's not what he did. He picked a country that used similar threats against us first. It's the equivalent of self-defense, only with words instead of shooting people.

You are also ignoring that in the very next sentence, Trump said that he didn't want it to happen, and who knows, maybe it won't happen. When BigObjectPermanenceShill only quoted the first sentence and hoped that nobody would follow the link to see what Trump actually said, the effect was to mislead.

There's also the question of exactly what he meant. He didn't say "kill all the people". I'm sure he wants the regime to fall.

The fact that one party can act on their threat and the other cannot

Come on. Iran has also said "death to Israel". And they absolutely could genocide Israel (through bankrolling Hamas and Hezbollah or through nuclear weapons) if they aren't stopped.

I don't know how you inferred that from what I wrote

You were replying to someone who asked if you raised similar complaints over Iran calling for death to America for decades with the argument that a big difference between the two is that the US is currently bombing Iran and has the capacity to inflict significant damage while Iran currently isn't and cannot. I'm not saying anything excuses anything else here, I'm just replying to the argument you made.

I'm just replying to the argument you made.

No, you're not.

  1. BigObjectPermanceShill raised objections to genocidal threats from Trump.
  2. Jiro responded with whataboutism about Iranian rhetoric.
  3. I respond to Jiro saying that the comparison is off based because the circumstances are radically different.
  4. You imply that I think threatening genocide is okay as long as you can't do it.

The problem is that nowhere in my post do I say or even imply that Iran's rhetoric is acceptable.

The problem is that nowhere in my post do I say or even imply that Iran's rhetoric is acceptable.

But you do say that it's different than Trump's genocidal threats, with Iran's capacity to act on what they said being the only difference you mention. I'm really not sure what you're going for here bro.

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It's not okay, but it's self-evidently better. With great power comes great responsibility etc.

He actually can't kill the civilization. Islam did that already.

Islamic Persia has produced a huge amount of architecture, art, poetry and literature. They were the intellectual elite of the Caliphate. And have existed in that form since before England was a country.

So I guess all of these domestically manufactured missiles and drones that are currently raining down on the Middle East are the product of some other civilization that happens to inhabit the same geographical location?

Yes.

Can't argue with gigachad responses.

A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again

This is genocidal rhetoric. What do you even say at this point? We are clearly in the wrong. Trump has disgraced America more than anyone before him. The Republican Party may be over for the next decade. Perhaps endless immigration will simply be our punishment from God for allowing the bloodthirsty to occupy the government.

The Republican Party may be over for the next decade.

Democrats are currently polling worse than anyone except Iran itself.

Going to log the prediction that the polls in 2 months are substantially identical to the ones from February.

Remember when Trump ended everything with that horrible tweet about Robert Deniro?

Did it take everyone a minute to dredge up the memory and substitute the correct actor?

Democrats are currently polling worse than anyone except Iran itself.

Well, either the pollsters are delusional or the Democrats are, because they're already counting the money from the wealth tax and all the other taxes they're going to put in after their landslide.

Also, Iran seems to be winning if you read the NYT, Economist, Free Press, etc.

Oh, for sure. "The Democrats" poll insanely poorly because their positions are mostly insane troll nonsense, but "John Normalson [D], who spends the campaign talking about nice, moderate things and never taking tough questions before getting elected and voting like Mao" will poll and perform pretty well in the general.

Have we forgotten that polls are inaccurate when it comes to predicting actual voters?

Do you think this is actually calling for genocide, or is it just strategically useful for you to call it genocidal?

When Trump refers to the "civilization" dying, do you sincerely think he's referring to mass-murdering the civilians in the region, rather than the obvious reading that he's referring to the society and regime?

If so, why didn't he just say that?

Deliberately inflicting on a group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in (substantial) part is an act of genocide, and I don’t see another means by which Trump can cause “a whole civilization” to “die” “never to be brought back again” without inflicting such destruction. You can’t bring an entire nation to “the Stone Age” because “they’re animals” without consciously inflicting such destruction on the members of the group.

rather than the obvious reading that he's referring to the society

If Iranian “society” is defined as a national or ethnic group, or, in its Shia adherence, a religious group, then you can’t aim to destroy the “society” either. If Trump’s actions are designed to destroy a substantial part of the Iranian population according to nationality, ethnicity, or religious identification, through (say) targetting enough civilian infrastructure that it necessarily destroys a substantial part of the population, then that’s an act of genocide. We also don’t have to use words with a specific connotation; we can just say that it’s not in the interests of the human race to do such things because it’s an act that is unnecessary and really bad for wellbeing, and thus those who do it should face a Nuremberg-style tribunal as deterrence for future defectors of the norm.

If so, why didn't he just say that?

Why didn’t he just say “regime” or “political party”? Why did he choose the word civilization, which has never been used to refer to a regime before? I’m having a hard time imagining how you can destroy a civilization forever, without intentionally destroying a significant portion of the members of the civilization.

Google gives me this for the definition of "genocide":

the deliberate and systematic killing or persecution of a large number of people from a particular national or ethnic group with the aim of destroying that nation or group.

This comports with a couple of dictionary definitions I checked.

The key part, and the part you're trying to emotionally invoke, is the killing of people. That's the central concept of genocide, and it's what people who say "genocide" are trying to lean on. When people hear "genocide", they're supposed to think "murdering an ethnic or national group"; they're supposed to think "sending people to the gas chambers".

Is that what you think Trump is threatening? If so, where does he say anything remotely like that?

If, instead, you think Trump is threatening something that's still bad -- such as regime change that will inherently come with collateral damage, or the destruction of civilian infrastructure -- then say that. It will still be bad! But calling those things "genocide" is co-opting a stronger word purely because it's a stronger word. I don't believe you actually believe Trump intends to murder "a significant portion of the members of the civilisation" (please tell me if I'm wrong), so I don't take that as a sincere defence of using the word "genocide".

https://www.un.org/en/genocide-prevention/definition

The problem with trying to use a non-robust definition of genocide is that it allows someone like Hitler to cause the same destruction simply by thinking cleverly for twenty minutes. This is why you need to work with robust definitions of terms of art here. Imagine, for the sake of argument, an Egyptian Hitler in the year 2040ad. This hypothetical Führer may declare that he will “destroy Jewish civilization forever” because they are “animals”. What would we intuitively understand is being referred to by these remarks? And if our Pharaonic Führer proceeded to target with his air superiority the civilian infrastructure, medical institutions, technical instititions, scientists, and so forth, all while threatening water desalination plants and the electric grid, I don’t think anyone would doubt his genocidal intent. It’s pretty clear he would be intent on destroying in substantial part the population of his victims.

I don't believe you actually believe Trump intends to murder "a significant portion of the members of the civilisation" (please tell me if I'm wrong)

He threw his support behind a plausible genocide just last year. Why would you doubt that he would do it this year? Causing starvation and preventing infant formula from entering the Gaza Strip is, also, a textbook act of genocide, as it is “imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group”. Trump supported this. Why would he not support it against Iranians, whom he has already dehumanized?

Chronologically speaking, it's more like allowing the openly bloodthirsty (previous Presidents probably weren't saints in that regard, but generally kept their mouths shut) to occupy the government is the punishment for allowing endless immigration.

The Republican Party may be over for the next decade.

Press X to doubt. 2 reasons:

  1. Any foolishness from the side of Republicans will be seized on by the Dems to be more foolish themselves. It'll allow them greater leeway to hang themselves politically by supporting nonsense like defacto open borders or wokeness 2.0 or whatever else they can cook up with. Then that'll alienate more people, and we'll be back to equilibrium.

  2. MAGA voters could choose to end this war at any time by aggressively protesting what Trump is doing, threatening to withhold support, etc. Trump listens to them in broad strokes, and becomes much more TACO-y when he senses the ground shifting beneath him. So far though, MAGA has not done this. It's going along with the Iran war despite the massive hypocrisy of many MAGAs of previously being isolationist. There's a few tiny cracks and some softening support here and there, but Trump's base remains relatively united behind Trump.

A lot of major conservative names have actually defected here. Here's Candace Owens calling for the 25th amendment over his comments. Tucker Carlson is calling on troops to disobey these types of orders. Theo Von has been extremely against the war in Iran (I havent yet seen any comments on this recent but specifically)

They're the 3rd, 7th and 11th most listened to podcast on Spotify in the US.

It's not just the traditional podcasters either, for example here's Alex Jones. You can find plenty of major conservatives, many who have been conservative way before Trump even was, who oppose this war.

You're correct that there have been some defections, but even Tucker Carlson has been pulling his punches, going more for the "bad boyars" critiques rather than directly criticizing Trump. And polling has shown that most of the rank-and-file support the war, at least as of a few weeks ago. Self-reported MAGAs were 92% in favor of continuing the war.

If Trump called for the slaughter of the first-born, self-reported MAGAs would poll 92% in favour of it. I'm not sure if this is because 92% of Trump's supporters are sufficiently keen to give the loyal answer to pollsters that they would claim to support the slaughter of the first-born, or whether it is because former Trump supporters who can't bring themselves to claim to support the slaughter of the first-born stop self-reporting as MAGA.

MAGA didn't always mean "cult of personality around Donald Trump". It's a relatively new phenomenon in the wake of Trump's re-election. MAGAs theoretically had some principles like low immigration and being anti-war. And when a group has principles, it's theoretically possible for an individual to break them.

I'm surprised that no one brings up the option "MAGA are Trump supporters by definition, so you're more likely to see the group itself shrink, than to see the percentage of positive responses drop".

That is what I was trying to say with my second option. Thanks for putting it more clearly.

It is true that Candace Owens, Tucker Carlson and Alex Jones have large audiences, and that most of these audiences are Red Tribe.

It is also true that they are opposed to the war with Iran, and yet we are having a war with Iran, and at least to date that war is overwhelmingly popular with Red Tribe.

I do not see how it is possible to claim that Red Tribe is both taking Owens, Carlson, and Jones' arguments as authoritative, and also overwhelmingly supporting a way they vehemently oppose.

So let us speak plainly here: is it your argument that Red Tribe should be taking Owens, Carlson, and Jones' arguments as authoritative? If so, why do you, yourself, personally, think that would be a good idea?

Bonus Question: One of your more notable posts, in my opinion, was your extensive arguments that Red Tribe is increasingly converging on anti-semitism of the Fuentes/groyper variety. I believe I've previously noted that I consider this one of the worst arguments I've seen on this forum in quite some time, but have not yet had the time for engaging with the substance of your arguments in detail (or indeed with most other arguments, sadly.) Still, pursuant to such engagement, could you elaborate on your personal understanding of the nexus between Israeli government influence and Trump's decision to go to war with Iran?

It is also true that they are opposed to the war with Iran, and yet we are having a war with Iran

Opposition to the war doesn't really matter that much, especially when there's a disconnect between the average politician and the voters anyway. It's the politician who decides until their time is up and they might get replaced, and as we're seeing with the midterms Trump is increasingly losing influence in that area.

at least to date that war is overwhelmingly popular with Red Tribe.

Confidence and support are still falling and that's despite the selection bias that people who change their minds don't always show up as mind changers, because they retcon it to begin with. The increased dissatisfaction among independents isn't just independents turning sour, but also sour republicans who turn more independent. And independent registration is at the highest ever because of dissatisfaction by otherwise Dem and GOP leaning voters. People who are upset leave, the tribe shrinks and election chances get worse even if the inner tribe circle jerking gets stronger.

Bonus Question: One of your more notable posts, in my opinion, was your extensive arguments that Red Tribe is increasingly converging on anti-semitism of the Fuentes/groyper variety

It's simple, Israel is not the average Jew, especially the average American Jew. I believe in personal responsibility and some random Joe Stein who works in accounting or whatever holds absolutely zero responsibility whatsoever for the Israeli government's influence on US politics. Antisemitism, like all bigotries, is mostly based around blaming groups instead of individuals.

Like imagine a world where Nazi theories were correct and powerful secret elites did control Germany and were corrupting it, and those elites were all Jews. Even if that were true, it would not suddenly make it ok to round up a bunch of random Jewish people, including many children, and just kill them. There is no world where literal babies and newborns could have done anything wrong, and yet they died too.

Confidence and support are still falling and that's despite the selection bias that people who change their minds don't always show up as mind changers, because they retcon it to begin with.

I voted for Trump because he promised no foreign interventionism and I thought Trump 1 was better than Biden, and have regretted it immensely. Unfortunately, there aren't many people who are willing to listen to this; strong Trump supporters hold this to be traitorous, and Democrats don't provide much of a runway for people who had reasons to support Trump but feel betrayed, because they were already on the bandwagon of anyone who voted for Trump is evil. Retconning your vote is basically the only pathway to being respected, so it's not surprising people are doing it. Trump is a phenomenon that has to be survived, because he has a stranglehold on his base. Hopefully the country survives.

That said, unfortunately the anti-war movement on the right has coalesced around antisemites and undesirables like Carlson and Owens, who oppose this war, like the local antisemites, because they believe Iran is a necessary counterweight to Israel which is the country they actually care about. I'm anti-war for reasons that rhyme with leftist views; I hate the American foreign policy apparatus, I believe it is a force for evil in the US, and I believe it does damage to the world while not aiding actual American interests. So it's frustrating to see that the right's anti-war impulses are being redirected into a shape that blames the problems of American foreign policy on THE JEWS!!! and not, for instance, the military-industrial complex, the blob, and the deep state.

I listen to Carlson regularly. He’s quite specifically criticizing Israel and specific political groups. Not Jews. I’d reccomend you look into it a bit more.

Unless Jews and Israel are synonymous to you. Which would seem to be an obvious error.

I don't agree with you must of the time but the GOP won't be over for the next decade. I know it feels that way in the present but it isn't true. You're looking at him through the prism of seeing a sitting American president. The people that elected him elected a wrecking ball, not a suit that focus group's every third sentence. That isn't what they wanted. When people say "... but Kamala's platform was better than Trump's...," that presumes there's political will and integrity behind the candidate and their administration. People need to touch and feel tangible results in their own life to believe that the political system is working for them. Saying "fiscal spending is going to increase $200 billion for clean energy initiatives," is empty when compared to a $1,200 COVID stimulus check that shows up in people's bank accounts.

Will need some kind of truth and reconciliation process after this. Can't have another weak Democrat administration pretending it never happened.

Yes more than actual genocidal presidents.

Netanyahu is not an American president.

I know you hate the joos but I was referencing the the trail of tears

Supposing that Jackson’s actions did constitute genocide, there are 200 years of moral progress separating our era from his, which I think does make Trump’s threat of eternal civilizational destruction more shameful.

I think that's exactly what he's talking about:

... I was referencing the the trail of tears

That's "at the expense" and tail end of things that sits on a pile of injustices and atrocities where the flag of "progress" gets planted.

Right. The reason that Trump has disgraced America more than Jackson, implying that Jackson’s conduct is considered genocidal, is that we are 220 years of moral progress away from Jackson, and everyone should know that destroying an entire civilization forever is wrong. Though I find the comparison inexact for other reasons (low total loss of life by Jackson; the aggressive raids of Indians; that Indians did not actually have a valuable civilization unlike Iran; that Indians were given reservations; that Iran is filled with 90mil people; that the conduct does not provide America any benefit or expansion).

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