Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[garbon]

I am not sure but also we cannot just ignore such an insult. If you react the worst outcome is that needle doesn't move. If you don't react then the non-movement of the needle is the best possible outcome.

You are right this means this demented fucker gets to live rent fee in our head, but that's a given now until he dies in about 20 years.

Sure but I've been trying to suggest that the size of the reaction is disproprtionate to the triggering event.

I don't see why the BBC needed to run Harry's reaction as the top new story, nor a top section on multiple articles discussing the reactions to his comments.

[Jacob]

Who cares if it's disproportionate? In what way does it matter?

[garbon]

Who cares if it's disproportionate? In what way does it matter?

Why are we drowning ourselves in Trump? And the very minimum time that could be spent productively is not spent in that manner. It also feels like it just reinforces more Trump content being pushed at us.

[garbon]

Andy Burnham seeks permission to stand in MP by-election and says he wants to back government "not undermine it"

[Sheilbh]

Good.

[mongers]

Who cares if it's disproportionate? In what way does it matter?

Why are we drowning ourselves in Trump? And the very minimum time that could be spent productively is not spent in that manner. It also feels like it just reinforces more Trump content being pushed at us.

On a practical level, blanket coverage isn't good for individual's and the nation's mental health.

[Sheilbh]

I get that we are at the end of a very contentious week and hackles are raised but I also think a lot of the reaction overstates the significance of his Afghanistan comment. Let's remind ourselves what he said:

[...]

Is it ugly, is it disrespectful? Certainly. Was he making a considered critique of NATO troops and their sacrifices? I don't think so. I think he was rather continuing with his already established argument that America's allies are dispensible/worthless. Maybe a little bit of an additional stinger thrown in given how he had to climb down from his sabre rattling.

Responding to that by cataloguing casualties and the operations allies participated in strikes me as assuming a level of historical engagement and moral seriousness that simply isn't there with Trump. It is taking his provocative rhetoric and making it more elevated than it actually is. This isn't Trump disrespecting veterans because he's weighed their service and found it wanting, its Trump not really thinking about them at all. 

That's not to downplay how people, especially veterans, might feel or suggest they should toughen up. Far from that as I hate the idea of society becoming enured to Trumpian behaviour and accepting it as normal. But after having spent the last couple weeks rightfully indignant about Trump on Greenland it all feels a little 'surprised pikachu' to get all lathered up again about rhetoric in a Fox News interview. Are we just going to be angry forever?

I don't know if this will stick those individuals who have still been Trump-inclined in Europe. He has said many morally repugnant things which have been accepted. I'm not sure this 'incident' will have the heft to enter into people's long term memory. And these are people that were already 'okay' with Trump doing down their militaries.

So I get what you're saying and I kind of agree.

But I wonder if some of this though is also that we are posting on Languish - and I suspect we are vastly more aware of Trump's other remarks than most. I think the UK is America-brained and we live on the American internet. But in the same way as most people don't really pay any attention to politics or the news. Especially with Trump I think a lot of those remarks are basically white noise. It's not that this is worse or more pikachu surprise than anything - it's that it has cut through to a very broad public in a way that most of what Trump says/does doesn't. I think Greenland did in general (see the "leave Greenland alone" heckle at the London NBA game), I think this and the bullying of Zelensky did etc.

I also think in terms of disproportionate coverage, I think that's a fair criticism but I also think part of that is that it's catnip for the British press. Different sections of the press will have different sections to get excited about but you've got an insult to veterans/"our boys", why won't Starmer do a Love, Actually moment and then Prince Harry wading in. That is a story that feels almost designed to engage the pathologies of about 90% of the British press

But also I'm not sure that we should bring to what Trump says the level of historical engagement and moral seriousness that he is bringing. I don't think it is elevating to him to think, engage and take things seriously. I think not doing that can too easily lead to a risk of a glib "nothing matter" nihilism.

I really don't get this bit. Am I missing something about the significance of Davos that puts it symbolically on par with Arlington Cemetery or the Arc de Triomphe?

Fair - and I possibly over-egged that. But a British PM does not matter in the way a US President does. So an off-hand remark by the President has a higher salience to the rest of the world.

Well I think it did move the needle within Europe or at least the UK. Obviously not in America.

But America is not the Brits' fight to save. Trump shitting all over the Union Jack is worth driving home.

Yes. It is difficult to overstate how unpopular Trump is in the UK. I think even a majority of Reform voters disapprove of him. But there was a significant shift in opinion after the Zelensky meeting - because the overwhelming majority of British people are very pro-Ukraine.

It doesn't matter really because we're not American voters - but I think part of why it's been big news is it's not just the sort of story that Rest is Politics listeners care about but is picked up on an Express frontpage too.

[garbon]

Well he has now said that UK soldiers in Afghanistan were 'among greatest of all' so well done team?

[mongers]

Well he has now said that UK soldiers in Afghanistan were 'among greatest of all' so well done team?

Is like dealing with someone who has constant diarrhea, by taking the shit and trying to shape it into turd like objects and then saying 'hey look this one looks like a normaly shaped one'. 

[Jacob]

While I'm absolutely sympathetic to the "I'd like to ignore Trump's BS as much as possible for my own mental health" point of view (and it's something I do myself), I think that persuasive nationalist and persuasive populist arguments against the Trumpists and their fellow travellers are an invaluable part of resisting them.

[Jacob]

What is the level of outrage in the US at the murder?

I mean, I get that decent Americans are horrified, obviously. But is there some sort of narrative building that this is too far in the mainstream or even among the right? Or is this successfully being framed as "both sides" and "cracking down on disorder"?

[HVC]

When my algorithm shows me the right side of the world it's being portrayed as a terrorism incident that was successfully thwarted.

[Jacob]

I think Trump and his clique are trying to provoke strong reactions with ICE, to justify even stronger responses from their side. The fiction of "liberal cities in chaos" furthers the narratives they use to keep their own base on board. It also justifies one vector of blatant election interference. Finally it trains cadres of paramilitaries for a possible scenario where they want to use force to fight political opponents directly at some point in the future.

Internationally, I think - in addition to feeding Trump's ego and trying to satisfy the dreams of the paint-the-map-strategy-gamers among his advisors and sponsors - the administration is looking for a war that's big enough to create a rally-around-the-flag effect amongst Trump's base and the more apolitically patriotic demographics, but not so big it creates real domestic problems.

I expect that in the upcoming elections - midterms 2026 and the 2028 presidential election - they will go all in on swinging the scales to maintain power. The scope of the manipulation will depend on how much genuine popularity they have, but I expect they'll look to maintain the fiction of democratic legitimacy as much as possible along. Basically they're looking at the playbooks of Putin, Orban, and the like. I expect blatant voter suppression up to and including force, massive social and traditional media manipulation, and outright - but at least superficially deniable - fraud.

The critical points in the timeline, I think, are going to be the following:

• Whenever the violence inflicted on American cities and citizens reaches a breaking point and the counter response comes.
• Whenever (if) Trump commits to a non-superficial foreign military adventure.
• The two elections, depending on how clearly overwhelming the opposition is (if it is, of course) and on how blatantly Trump's clique cheats (including a potential 3rd term for Trump if he's not dead).
• Whenever there's a succession for Trump - if there's a new presidential candidate in 2028 or whenever Trump dies or becomes incapable even as a figurehead. How disciplined will the succession be, and what will the aftermath look like?

The question at each of those times is how much legitimacy Trump has among the institutions that will keep him in power at those times. Popular protests can play a part in that, as can the kind of civic organization and opposition Oex has recommended IMO.

I'm not super optimistic, to be honest. The deck is kind of stacked against the opposition, given how social media ownership (and much traditional media ownership also) is part of Trumps extended clique. But neither is there no hope, IMO.

Things that could help tip the scales against Trump, in my view:

• Economic meltdown (especially if shaped in a way that it impacts his core supporters directly)
• A military humiliation on a sufficient scale
• Some sort of "holy fuck, you went to far" moment that resonates with the wider American public (but the current ICE killings are apparently not it)