What does a TRUMP presidency look like?

[Richard Hakluyt]

What I hated so much about 2017-2021, and is even worse now, is that the news just becomes all about what these assholes say and how they act instead of things that actually matter.

Trump says this!
Musk tweeted that!
Zuck did this dumbass thing!

Like we are courtiers obsessed with what ruff Robert Dudley wore when he danced with the Queen or which lady in waiting Henry VIII banged yesterday.

Everything about it is infuriating and it distracts from the actual bad things these dudes are doing and feels very undignifying for a republic...not that dignity seems anybody's concern anymore.

It is a distraction, blood and circuses for the masses. Meanwhile the oligarchical takeover of your republic continues.

Completely agree btw, the sheer stupidity and fatuity of most of what passes for political commentary these days is infuriating.

[Norgy]

What I hated so much about 2017-2021, and is even worse now, is that the news just becomes all about what these assholes say and how they act instead of things that actually matter.

Trump says this!
Musk tweeted that!
Zuck did this dumbass thing!

Like we are courtiers obsessed with what ruff Robert Dudley wore when he danced with the Queen or which lady in waiting Henry VIII banged yesterday.

Everything about it is infuriating and it distracts from the actual bad things these dudes are doing and feels very undignifying for a republic...not that dignity seems anybody's concern anymore.

It is an excellent way to redirect the attention from "hey, we are becoming an oligarchy" to the trolling, intentional or not, that these guys do. It is just noise, and loud.

I will, however, bet quite a substantial sum that very few editors or staff in the media will resist the temptation to write about outrageous comments or tweets rather than look beneath the surface.

Will Trump still play the victim? It may not sit well. And how long can these huge egos co-habit in the corridors of power? Trump 1 wasn't exactly known for the long tenures of various people that were recruited.

[Barrister]

It is a distraction, blood and circuses for the masses. Meanwhile the oligarchical takeover of your republic continues.

Completely agree btw, the sheer stupidity and fatuity of most of what passes for political commentary these days is infuriating.

I have to disagree somewhat.

When Trump talks about stuff it can definitely happen.  He did try to "built the wall".  He did try to ban Muslim immigrants.  He did (apparently) try to order troops to combat protestors.

The problem is that when Trump says shit it isn't meant as a distraction - it's more of a Bannon-esque "flood the zone with shit" strategy.  Try to say or do 10 outrageous things at the same time and public attention can only focus on one or two.

We've seen it with the appointments - so many of them are outrageous.  But so much focus went on (just as one example) Matt Gaetz, that when he was replaced with Pam Bondi she seems to be going without comment - despite her key role in election denialism in 2010.

[Sheilbh]

Yeah as I understand it foreign leaders are not invited to US inaugurations.  Fair enough - it's a US-only thing.

But if you are going to invite foreign leaders - but only invite those who somehow politically align with you - and not your closest allies historically - well that's very Trumpy isn't it.

Yeah - I mean the framing here was very much a crisis for Starmer and the "special relationship" (which is primarily expressed through insane neediness) that he wasn't invited, rather than the norm.

It is Trumpy. But in terms of stuff to ignore and consider courtier nonsense that doesn't matter I'd put seating charts at the inauguration fairly high on the list

Total aside but I find the Milei-Trump thing kind of interesting though because their politics are kind of polar opposites, they just align on vibes - and maybe that's all that matters now. We're splitting politically not along ideology or content, but "adults in the room" v "populist disrupters". It feels Marshall McLuhan-y, perhaps we're so media saturated the style is the content.

Yeah, usually the big symbolic international gestures are who you will visit for your first state visit (e.g. German chancellors often visit France shortly after taking office) or who will come to visit you first.

Yeah I don't think there's a fixed destination for a new UK PM - although in recent PMs they all do a very early trip to Kyiv.

Also I think it's slightly complicated by the regularity of international summits now. So I think Sunak became PM like a week before COP, followed by a G20 - I think Starmer more or less immediately had a G7 and a NATO summit. I feel like they're meeting other leaders a lot more than even when I was a kid in the 90s (admittedly, pre-G20, before PMs would attend COP etc).

When Trump talks about stuff it can definitely happen.  He did try to "built the wall".  He did try to ban Muslim immigrants.  He did (apparently) try to order troops to combat protestors.

The problem is that when Trump says shit it isn't meant as a distraction - it's more of a Bannon-esque "flood the zone with shit" strategy.  Try to say or do 10 outrageous things at the same time and public attention can only focus on one or two.

Yeah - also Trump doesn't really care as long as people are loyal to him. So there's a lot of working towards Trump and trying to be as demonstratively loyal as possible by doing what you think will get his approval (when, in reality, perhaps Stephen Miller's approach is right and the key to getting his approval is possibly not getting his attention because that means you're on TV and he's not).

I think courtiers cared because those things mattered and they still do.

I would, however, exclude Zuck from that. Trump is President, Musk is involved in the state (and states are dependent on his companies).

I think Zuck's just a weathervane opportunistically saying what needs to be said. In the same way as I'm not convinced Zuck was a huge believer in establishing a disinformation board or appointing Nick Clegg as his Euro-whisperer, or for that matter really felt such personal devotion to Xi to warrant asking him to name his daughter - it's just that's where power was flowing at that point. Now power's flowing in another direction so he's ditched all the disinformation (and DEI) stuff, replaced Clegg with an American conservative and positioning Meta as an American champion v Europe and China.

[Crazy_Ivan80]

Will Trump still play the victim? It may not sit well. And how long can these huge egos co-habit in the corridors of power? Trump 1 wasn't exactly known for the long tenures of various people that were recruited.

better expect a tightly run ship this time round. With luck it isn't and nothing gets done. Though I doubt it'll stop the installation of the oligarchy. The US has been on that route for decades now.