I'd take a degree of 'standard' politician-level Corrupt from Hillary, even if I thought it was significantly more so than pretty much any of the alternatives, given that she'd also be Competent. For some reason, Trump shrugged off the former tag and managed to wing the latter tag, with people who really didn't care and were just anti-Hillary* willfully believing the usual expected (and extraordinary!) self-publicising of one side while being sceptical of the usual expected (and, by now, done to death) self-publicising of the other. Right now, Competence is a mythical beast, seen only by those who will themselves to see it.
People who scream about how places like Snopes is a tool of MsM/The Liberal Conspiracy/NWO/whatever. People who insist that only Republicans of good standing are being Shadownbanned from social media. People who perpetuate that Obama's economy was failing and that it is only, now turning round. And deride all evidence to the contrary as being as fake as all the things I would deem fake (and they would claim, honestly or otherwise, as the Truth).
I think I'd have been happy with Bernie at the helm. Perceived as less Corrupt than Hillary (whether or not he was) he is certainly less so than Trump is shown to be. Perhaps perceived as less Competent than Hillary, I'd guess he would have been better in the political sphere than Trump. He'd have been just as disliked by the Trumpettes, so no loss of votes there, I don't see Never-Bernie people being quite so polar opposite to vote against him (maybe stay away in droves, but that's some of Hillary's problem), and current protest-vote defectors to 3rd-Party might have swung back.
And I could have believed one or other of Cruz/etc getting good showing at the top-end. Losibg some rabid Trump support, but getting the traditional Reps out anyway and if Hillary (or Bernie) was really as bad as they were supposed to be then it shouldn't have been a problem to line them up against a proven contender.
What Trump got was the "Flip the card table! Rewrite the rules! Burn down the whole casino!" bonus. People for whom the current (mildly exciting, but mostly staid) system just isn't entirely working for them and (once they've been sated insofar as the current chaos) they hope that they'll get things to work entirely as they want them to (forgetting that, in a democracy, it's always a pot-luck blend, most of the time not very much to your exact liking but probably not all exactly like you dislike either). You can recognise them mostly in the "it will be <idealistic situation>" statements, as if there's any reason for it necesarioy to be so. As if there aren't very goid reasons (e.g. plenty of people on the other side of an equation whose preference would be for it not to be so, meaning some proportionate compromise - if any agreememt at all).
(I could say the same for Brexit, but it'd be off-topic.)
But while the chaotic 'transition' is still seen to be being in progress, eberyone can wilfully ignore that the brighter future isn't yet obviously here because it will be, and everyone they know (who even wants to talk to them about it, and who isn't dismissed as a slave to the old system) agrees this! Even if they don't, because they want to flipped card table to land back on its feet with the straight flush in front of them (and can still see it happening) instead of you.
* Repubs, for one, because "party over all" let them work with someone who isn't even a confirmed Republican. And Never-Hillary supporters of Bernie probably fought harder than Never-Trump supporters on the red side, from what I've seen. Die-hard Third-Partiers had their own reasons for voting for neither, but were only ever going to get one or the other anyway, it turns out.
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Topic: AmeriPol thread (Read 4451715 times)