* <<FAK.0116>> Make America Great ...Again?

Donald Trump is running his campaign on the promise of "mak[ing]
America great again."  The obvious implication is that America is no
longer great, that America has lost its greatness and is losing it to
the likes of China and Mexico.  This is coming from a very rich man,
a man who is purportedly richer now that he has ever been before, and
a man very vocal in his contempt for "losers".  This rich American
businessman who loathes losers is telling 300 million Americans that
they're losing – they're in grave danger of becoming losers – but
he assures them that they once were winning, and if they make the
right choice at the ballot-box, they can start winning again and be
winners.

This works on a remarkably large number of people.  It works on
people who feel like they are losing, but also feel that they are
winners at heart; people who feel that their losses are no fault of
their own, and that they need someone at the top to come down hard on
all the losers who are making it impossible for hard-working winners
like themselves to get ahead; ...

..

I have a hard time swallowing the idea that The United States, the
most powerful national economy in the world with an armed forces
budget the size of the next fourteen largest militaries combined, and
with totally unprecedented influence over global culture, is no
longer great.  America is not perfect.  America has never been
perfect.  America has social and cultural problems, it has diplomatic
problems, political problems, and it has economic problems.
Regarding the latter topics, the chief problem is that wealth is
becoming the property (rather than the posession) of the wealthy, and
that a kind of plutocracy is forming...

..

Socialist civil-libertarian atheists aren't usually the guys at
monster-truck rallies chanting "U-S-A! U-S-A!" but I know that others
of my ilk – as much as we like to grouse about the status quo –
agree on this point: America is fuckin' great.

Donald Trump is an idiot.

..

He's making you a sales pitch, and you're buying it.  He's saying,
look at me, I'm rich, I'm powerful, I'm a success, I'm a winner –
and you're not.  But don't worry, it's not your fault.  It's the
government, it's the immigrants, it's the communists and the ...brown
people.  I'll take care of the govermnet, the immigrants, the losers
– I can handle all of them, I am a man who knows how to get things
done!  Just look at my skyscrapers!  I'm a winner, and you can be a
winner like me, too; all you have to do is put me in charge.

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Excerpted from:

PUBLIC NOTES (F)
http://alph.laemeur.com/txt/PUBNOTES-F
©2015 Adam C. Moore (LÆMEUR) <[email protected]>