But now the people around Trump have spent four years plotting to dismantle everything that stopped Trump the first time. That’s what Project 2025, and the nearly 20,000 résumés it reportedly vetted, is really all about. That’s what Trump’s inner circle is spending its time and energy doing. Don Jr. told The Wall Street Journal, “We want people who are actually going to follow the president, the duly elected president, not act as sort of unelected officials that know better, because they don’t know better.” From this overly long Ezra Klein essay. We’ve seen how it plays out, but isn’t there a pretty solid argument to make that this time’s different? That the GOP inhibitors are replaced with Yes Men this time around? Because the cabinet picks sure seem to me to be that way. Donald “let’s get the army to shoot protestors” Trump doesn’t seem to have people who will stop him at his worst anymore. Donald “I like the oil industry because they gave me money” sure seems to pave the way for special interests to screw everyone else over. I don’t think it’ll get to mass deportations, but I highly doubt Trump will be able to resist his inhibitions to ruin the country in favor of golf this time around - because it won’t be as frustrating for him as the last time.The best argument you can make about Trump’s first term is that there was a constructive tension between his disinhibition and the constraints of the staff and the bureaucracy and the institutions that surrounded him. Yes, some of his ideas were bad, dangerous and unconstitutional. But those mostly didn’t happen: They were stopped by his aides, by the so-called deep state, by the courts, by civil society.
There's this idea that the guys behind Project 2025 are the Spectre of conservatism, a crack team of evil visionaries blessed with the intellect and fortitude to shake the foundations of democracy. this despite the fact that the entire world watched everyone with a little intelligence or skill get sidelined by loyalists. There's also this idea that the Republican Party is hell-bent on serving Trump's ends, rather than being hell-bent on their own survival. Trump tried to overthrow the government - it didn't work - his voters wish it did - let's move on. The through-line of everything written about the Republican Party under Trump is they're a bunch of feckless yes-men who wring their hands in private and rubber-stamp everything Dear Leader says. There's a simple reason for that; they want to keep their jobs. Nobody has written any articles about how much better Trump's team is this time around. It's all been about how they're more subservient. And nobody has written any articles about how Trump has broadened his appeal and is more willing to work with his own party. It's all been about his enemies list. So there should be some introspection about what, exactly, the various and sundry feckless Republicans get out of a second Trump term. Who's the heir apparent? JD Vance? Vance was chosen for the exact same reason as Pence - he's a lickspittle supplicant bereft of charisma who won't outshine Trump. Don Jr? Puhleeze. DeSantis? We watched how that went. What else you got? Who's the more-charismatic demagogue that will step into Trump's shoes? Because he's already coming apart at the seams. there's this idea that they'll 25A his ass and do whatever they want through Vance and allow me to say with no quaver in my voice that Reagan was absolutely coming apart in his second term and nobody thought to prop up George Bush. As a reminder, here's the electoral map from '84: I think it will absolutely get to "mass deportations." I guess what sets me apart is I expect it to be an unpopular clusterfuck. I am absolutely at a loss as to why this is a minority opinion.
Isn't the argument not about Trump and his team being better, but about them being more effective? I don't think they need to be any better than last time to wreak more havoc, just simply not being inhibited from almost every branch of government due to subservience will probably be enough. To draw a parallel to our extreme-right Wilders government coalition - 3 out of the 4 coalition parties are objectively incompetent at governing. The Farmer's Party managed to be so incompetent they gave away €20B in farmers' subsidies during coalition negotiations in exchange for nuthin'. The party who ran on better governance managed to admit to hide documents in their third week. It is absolutely a clusterfuck, it absolutely leads to stupid and ineffective policies. There's a debate now about whether we can impose border controls again, which we can't and everyone knows it but Wilders wants his version of The Wall anyway. There, however, will also be inhumanely policies because that's what we're now facing: things like taking away passports from second or third generation immigrants, things like changing visums to be for a few years at most, things like making refugee camps so sober the line between camp and prison is almost entirely blurred. I thought we couldn't go this inhumane, this low. I hoped their incompetence would prevent them from hurting too many people. But we can go this low, they'll dare you with how low they can go, and there's little we can do but watch in pain and hope. And the general public doesn't seem to mind, or is happy that something is being done even if it doesn't work, will never work, will be hard to undo and repair. So I'm not so sure about that 'unpopular' part of the clusterfuck.
The argument is that Trump 1 didn't understand how to work the system properly to accomplish their mayhem which kept them from being truly effective, but now that the heritage foundation has published a playbook and thought about it super-hard everything will be super effective. Allow me to introduce you to Grover Norquist. Ole Grover there founded the Americans for Tax Reform. Since 1986, you have to pledge to oppose tax increases in any way shape or form or you get no money from any Republican cause. On May 25, 2001, he famously told NPR "I don't want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub."Isn't the argument not about Trump and his team being better, but about them being more effective?
I agree with you on all counts, I guess I just don't see why that precludes them putting the thumb on elections heavily, or calling for the military to do deportations and break up protests etc. I also think that when it's predictably unpopular, they'll need to be more undemocratic to stay in power
sigh Most of the election workers who ended up getting terrorized by Trump were Republicans Most of the military who kept Trump in check were Republicans We're three comments deep on how it's all about self-interest and you persist in assuming Trump has god-like powers
I feel like that is why their appointments now are about being maximally subservient, over other priorities like basic competence. If you think that there's a lot of Rep voters that wanted a coup, I'm not sure why you think its so hard to find one that's willing to get appointed. I don't think Trump has godlike powers! But he has the pretty complete backing of the courts and a new interpretation of Executive Privilege, and control of who is assigned leadership of every part of federal government.