A Big Balloon Of Hot Air and Ignorance: America's Biggest Crisis May Be Trump's Lack of Substance. Anybody Got A Pin?

Could it be a Learning Disability?

 The Shallowness Of A Know-Nothing President. 

There is no depth, no substance to the 45th President of the United States. He provides no details, no resources, no factual basis, not even any continuity of any sort to his rhetoric. He seems to think that he doesn’t really need to present any substance, just what he calls “common sense” and “gut instincts” punctuated with “I know more about _____________(fill in the blank) than anyone”. 

Witness:

        

Oh yes, and “I’m very smart”, “I’m a genius”. Apparently no one has ever told him that truly intelligent people almost never talk about their own intelligence - they possess confidence in their cognitive abilities -  and that only intellectually insecure people boast about their brainpower. He boldly states “facts” and figures, gives examples, tells stories as if plucking them out of thin air. So much so that people surmise he knows next to nothing about anything. 

This Just In (1/27/19):

Trump Invents 14 Million Additional “Illegal Aliens”

“We’re not sure how the president is sourcing his number and really wouldn’t want to speculate,” said David Ray, communications director for FAIR.

FAIR is a staunch supporter of Trump.

His “allergy to reading” (as one journalist put it) is acute and telling: Trump’s lack of knowledge with regard to any given topic has even prompted staunch supporters like Tucker Carlson to call him ignorant. Some (like David Packman) even call him functionally illiterate. 

On his aversion to reading PDBs (Presidential Daily Briefings):

"I don't have to be told — you know, I'm, like, a smart person," Trump said. "I don't have to be told the same thing and the same words every single day for the next eight years. It could be eight years — but eight years. I don't need that."

One person who interviewed him put it in frightening terms: “An existence unmolested by the rumbling of a soul.” 

An empty mind accompanied by an empty heart. That may be a bit too harsh an analogy, but there are times when Trump seems to have a small conscience overshadowed by gigantic self worth. Or as one friend of mine put it: "elephantiasis of the ego." 

So how did this shell of a man come to be? 

"When I look at myself in the first grade and I look at myself now, I’m basically the same. The temperament is not that different." 

Think of a rich, spoiled bully, totally uncontrollable: one whose father fostered his narcissism saying “everything he touches turns to gold” while pumping money into his son’s projects and bailing him out repeatedly out of failures. Think of a kid who thought studying anything was pointless, because he was already rich and knew that if he stuck with his father he would become richer. Think of a kid who developed a fantasy world where he would never apologize because he was so very entitled. And think of a kid-turned-teen-turned man who eschewed reading anything past a headline because reading anything was difficult, boring and a waste of time. 

And besides, anything worth knowing was on TV where money was king and news was encapsulated for his benefit. Sitting in front of a television instead of reading a book is for many Americans more enjoyable, but in Trump’s case, watching TV substituted for formal education. Attending schools like Wharton was a necessary nuisance: he had to go to classes for appearances sake, but gleaning anything from instructors and books was as useless as interacting  with classmates who were not in his class of "smart". One professor called Trump "the dumbest student I ever had." And some classmates recall him asking rather clueless questions in class. 

“I went to an Ivy League school. I’m very highly educated. I know words, I have the best words,” he said at a rally last December; Wharton, he said on Meet the Press, “is probably the hardest there is to get into,” adding, “Some of the great business minds in the world have gone to Wharton.”

"I know words. I have the best words." Statements like that have led Penn State to distance itself from Trump.

As for Trump's Wharton degree of Bachelor of Science in Economics, the man who told Larry King that before The Apprentice, he "didn't know what demographics were," may not have actually earned it - at least not in economics. Fred Trump's money may have helped him get out of  Wharton as well as into it. In the meantime, others may have earned cash for taking his tests and writing his term papers. 

A "very stable genius"?? Consider Randy Rainbow's hilarious take on that statement (see below). Such self indulgent over-the-top statements from Trump have invited, no, encouraged mockery. But encapsulated in his own clueless world, he doesn't see how ... or why. The same goes for the response to his address at the U.N. - "I wasn't expecting that."   Trump's development summed up: he has probably suffered from a rare form of learning disability which one might facetiously label PECD - Progressive Entitlement Cognitive Deficiency resulting in an aversion to reading and learning ... anything. PECD also causes disdain for people with higher intelligence while building up a feeling of superiority. In short: a person with PECD is apt to know nothing while bragging that he knows everything. Sounds snarky, but when it comes to Trump ...

Trump's brag about his performance on "The Apprentice" led producers who worked with him on the show to set the record straight: 

A TV producer who oversaw the first five seasons of President Trump's former reality television show “The Apprentice” says those working behind the scenes often “struggled to make Trump seem coherent.” 

“He wouldn’t read a script — he stumbled over the words and got the enunciation all wrong." 

“The Apprentice," helped pave Trump’s path to the presidency by ending a downward slope in his professional life and giving him the appearance of a tycoon.

“Most of us knew he was a fake,” Braun, who worked on six series of the show, told The New Yorker. “He had just gone through I don’t know how many bankruptcies. But we made him out to be the most important person in the world. It was like making the court jester the king.”

Braun also told Bill Maher Trump told him he should tell people he was #1 in the ratings even though he hadn't been #1 for five years: "Jon, you tell them, they'll believe it."

 Narcissism, Distrust and.. And Vulnerability

It has long been known that there are certain facets of Trump's life in which he switches to a fantasy level that is unthinkable to the rest us. This fantasy world developed in early stages when he thought he knew more than teachers. Later, when he left the real world of boring learning for the fantasy world that his ego had created, along with help from his father, he encapsulated himself - enshrined himself so to speak- in a world where he was always the winner and that he was a man with a greater destiny than anyone else, especially when it came to money and power. Conning people to go along with his bravado became easier: they didn't need details - they could get those from  underlings and no one questioned his sincerity. If his rich father said he was the "golden boy", they believed it. When Trump said something was "the best", it just had to be. After all, wasn't the real estate game just solid bullshit? 

Trump as the Real Estate Boy Wonder aka Never too young to start peddling bullshit

It is significant that so many voters seemingly believed Trump’s I-Know-Everything narrative, especially after red flags were raised (like not releasing his tax returns). Watching the above video, it seems impossible to believe in such a braggart. Such egotism is usually put down quickly and permanently. Has the U.S. fallen for a hollow con man because it is hollow itself? Exceptionalism is, in itself, a form of narcissism. Or maybe, just maybe its education is complimentary to his disability: an education built on chyrons and  showmanship along with distrust of politicians and, more importantly, truly intelligent people.* To some, it may (flippantly) sound as if we're saying that half of America was home-schooled in a trailer park, but the lack of scrutiny in the American public is really a serious matter: once the dye is cast and they vote for someone like Trump, they have bought into the "America first/Make America Great Again" exceptionalism/narcissism and refuse to believe they made a mistake. Opposition to their decision is tantamount to treason. In other words, they lack the depth to believe in anything but the man who himself lacks depth.  

Just as some Americans distrust intelligence, so does Donald Trump. His administrative picks have depended on loyalty through flattery and monetary support, not experience and knowledge of the appointment's focus. Trump's  "gut instincts" about people involve cronyism because cronies are people who have proven their loyalty by donations in one form or another. They also involve the trappings of beauty no matter how skin deep. For example: Katrina Pierson. Here was a beautiful female who could spin, but not very well (remember her "novelty tradition" statement defending Trump's unwillingness to release his tax returns?). 

And it is this narcissism, this distrust of intelligence that lends itself to the kind of gullibility Russia preyed upon: the Moscow Project shows how early Russia had started to cultivate Trump, seizing upon his desire to develop business in Russia, funneling money-laundered loans to him when American financial institutions would not lend him a dime. Putin was wise to let Trump be Trump from the beginning and up through the campaign, all the while amassing payback and means of intimidation. Trump's inexperience and ignorance would serve him well. But Putin was surprised in how very ignorant and erratic Trump's narcissism made him. He knew Trump was ignorant, but not THAT ignorant ... and inept. Poor Putin, he had to keep reminding Trump how much he owed to Russia and how easy it would be for him (Putin) to pull the rug out from underneath everything. And how he, not Trump, controlled the world.

Putin makes Trump jealous ... and a bit intimidated

The secrets of Helsinki screamed "We OWN you!

An aside:

To get the latest full picture of Trump's long time involvement with Russia, read The Moscow Project. Yes, it's long and involved, but also thorough in it's analysis of the collusion, of all the operations and operators involved, of all the implications and possibilities. It also outlines a man who's vanity and ambition was used to the fullest extent by Russia. Putin had knowledge of all of Trump's "successes" and most certainly of his failures. After all, he was a top KGB officer (Lieutenant Colonel) when Trump made his foray into Russian business dealings. He knew of Trump's peccadilloes and vindictiveness and used them to add weight to his (Putin's) demands. "What does Putin have on Trump?" is one of  today's headlines proffered by Nancy Pelosi.

The Wasted Month

In the eyes of some aides and outside advisers, an entire fruitless month has passed that cannot be recouped, a waste of the most valuable asset a White House has: the President's attention and time.

A month ... for the entire country as well. A month of a temper tantrum resulting in lost jobs, no paychecks, almost catastrophic airport delays and terminal closures, market plunges and an approval rating on the skids. All by a man who could not consider the consequences against his need to keep his base happy and uphold his self image as a winner. A victim of his own vain fantasies and lack of regard for learning

The wall/shutdown situation and Trump's collapse against reality proved just how clueless Trump is about the rest of human nature outside of his inner world. He will, of course, take solace in the spin of some supporters:

"This is for three weeks," Trump adviser turned Fox analyst Sebastian Gorka told Dobbs. "As far as I'm concerned, this is a master stroke."

Trump can retreat into his fantasy world with supporters like these and leave only his hollow shell for the rest of the world. 

All together, Trump and his supporters may be the REAL CRISIS America faces today.  

A Last Word:

To some, ending this writing on a humorous note might lessen seriousness of Trump's lack of substance, but believe me when I say if we can't take a moment to laugh at Trump's disastrous treatment of the Presidency, we deserve it.

In a few short years, Randy Rainbow has become a YouTube internet sensation with over 250,000 subscribers waiting anxiously for his next take on the country's right-wing political hypocrites and scam artists. His articulate artistry and creativity can only be described as bi-products of genius - sort of like a concrete definition of what Trump thinks he is. And perhaps his best parody is a take on Trump's "very stable genius" tweet. 

Set to the song I am the very model of a modern major general from Gilbert & Sullivan's The Pirates of Penzance, Rainbow's parody beautifully captures the absurdity of Trump's temperament and how much of the world sees him. Enjoy!

*One particular anecdote concerning Adlai Stevenson could be an example: Stevenson was considered an egghead" in his day and America was very suspicious about cerebral candidates who thought things over quietly and in depth. Once when Eleanor Roosevelt was campaigning, someone shouted "Stevenson's an ass!" and without missing a beat, Roosevelt said "...nevertheless" and continued speaking, lauding Stevenson. 

Peace on Earth? Good Will Towards Men? 2017 Was The Antithesis Of The Christmas Spirit. Thanks, Mr. President.

7 Days until Christmas. 8 Days until we're bombarded with reminders of what 2017 brought. Certainly no "Peace on earth nor "Good Will toward Men. "Retrospects" of the year’s events will abound, and for most Americans the pictures won’t be pretty. 

This week may be a time for people to slow down, look inward, meditate before the onslaught of memories of the year.  This is especially true for people in the LGBTQ, Muslim, immigrant, Hispanic and African American Communities. Actually for people in any vulnerable group. And the Year of Trump has created a lot of vulnerable communities.

“Peace on Earth”? "Good Will Towards Men”? These Americans have to make their own Christmas sentiments because they cannot in all conscience join Trump's America for Christmas. 

To be more direct: There is absolutely no way one could link those phrases to a Trump Christmas. From before last Christmas, when Trump almost single-handedly erased 50 years of U.S.- China relations with a diplomatic blunder worthy of Dan Quayle.  Peace on earth? ...

through internal bickering and firings. petty tweets, lies and deceit, to an air thick with treason and corruption polluting the Presidency- Good will towards men? 

This Presidency, this political aberration is a mockery to Christmas and the true Christmas spirit.( Link to old article)

Of course, Christmas is bright- for the gullible and believers in Trump’s fantasy. For the Alt Right and White supremicists who’ve never such a forceful “voice” befor. For the Christian Right who envision abortion and gay rights  fading from their  worldview/Christofascist    spectrum of self-righteousness. 

For all others, the brightness, the joy, the altruism of Christmas must be scaled back, must go inward, must be more quiet. Yes, it must recede into its own shell so that it can emerge clear and bright (and even a bit tacky/glittery) in the New Year. 

My husband stand and I believe in what you might call “snuggle therapy”: we hold our bodies close and together for a long time and sometimes we whisper “you and me against the world”. We wanted our Christmas angel-bear tree ornaments to reflect snuggling instead of kissing, but it would have been difficult to position them  on the tree without looking like they were doing something else. But notice that they are definitely focusing on each other while engulfed in the glitz of what could be a metaphor for a Trump Christmas.

Maybe American communities need a form of "snuggle therapy" this Christmas: holding themselves closer, quieter. Sheltering themselves. Observing (but not necessarily participating in) the raucous - and fake - Trump Christmas. Meditating upon the past year. 

Healing.

While meditating on 2017, HOPE should still be an element. Many of Trump's supporters are finally waking up to the fact that Trump and his administration are nothing like what they thought it would be. HOPE has always been a powerful coping mechanism. In my case, for example, it can divert the angst over the year with some humor, so here's my Christmas wish for 2018:

Since Trump has decreed that there will be more visits to the Moon - "What would we do without space?" - what better Christmas present for him next year than to make him the first person to colonize it? With an attractive plan to build a hotel/casino/golf course and, of course, a boutique for Ivanka, he would make a killing!

And the sweetest thing about this gift: we could send The Donald off with a blessing:

"May God bless and keep you, Mr. President -far away from us!*

7 DAYS

This week, individuals, families, whole communities should practice their forms of "snuggle therapy" by being as close to each other as possible. And safe, for the time being, from the onslaught of "retrospectives" and thoughts of more ugly scenes to come.

This following video Christmas card was produced primarily for the immediate neighborhood and friends, featuring a Garden everyone views as a community-builder. From the Meditation Station to the acrylic rock heart, it is looked upon as a sanctuary - a place of peace and reflection. It represents the Christmas spirit all year round. It is our building;s "snuggle therapy." Notice that the Christmas tree is lacking a star on top - that's because the true light of Christmas comes from within.

It serves as my Christmas card to everyone.





 Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

* a line borrowed from Fiddler on the Roof the story of which has some odd parallels to our present situation.

Gimme That Ole Time Corruption: Pat Robertson in the Schemes of Jay Sekulow and Donald Trump

Power does not corrupt men; fools, however, if they get into a position of power, corrupt power. - George Bernard Shaw

The Three Self-Dealers: Another Unholy Trinity Formed Around Trump?

President Trump solidified his ties to the Christian Right by appointing Jay Sekulow as his lawyer to handle the Trump-Russia-Collusion-Obstruction problem. Came highly recommended from the likes of Pat Robertson. And for several reasons:

1. Sekulow is chief attorney for the ACLJ - the Christian Right legal defense team founded by Pat Robertson

2. Sekulow's web of self-run non-profits funnel money to Pat Robertson's shadowy Advocacy Services

3. Sekulow is just as corrupt as both Robertson and Trump (primarily in his self-dealings and family-filled "non-profits") and and is just as much of a showman.

Washington Post

Since 2013, CASE [Sekulow's Christian Advocates Serving Evangelism] has forwarded $500,000 each year to a small charity called the Law and Justice Institute that has no employees and relies almost exclusively on CASE for its revenue,tax filings show. Sekulow is president of the Law and Justice Institute. The Law and Justice Institute, in turn, has paid $500,000 each year to Advocacy Services. Robertson is president of that firm, according to Virginia state records. Robertson’s spokesman did not address written questions about the payments from The Post. [emphasis mine]

And he's as bombastic and tenacious towards his enemies as Trump is:

First, Sekulow is at home in the spotlight. He hosts a daily radio show that airs nationally and online. He has been a regular contributor and on-air guest at Fox News. And his bombastic personality has stood out to several other attorneys in the Christian legal movement – asking to remain anonymous, one lawyer told me Sekulow “spends an inordinate amount of time tooting his own horn.” Judging by his past, appearing on various Sunday morning shows to defend Trump is a natural act for Sekulow.

What is Sekulow getting out of all of this? It's possible Trump may not pay Sekulow: he has a history of not paying legal fees (unless they're paid by the Trump Foundation). In fact, one of his former legal teams has liens against his properties.* It's possible that Sekulow - ever the media hound - has an agenda involving power over the media.

Trump is certainly no stranger to self-dealing and eager to appease the Christian Right via Pat Robertson, so again, Sekulow is a perfect match. Robertson has also defended Trump:

Lest there be any doubt that Christian televangelist Pat Robertson supports President Donald Trump, the longtime host of the 700 Club declared that God put Trump “in this office.”“He’s God’s man for the job,” Robertson said this week, as Right Wing Watch reported.

Pat Robertson was really angry with FBI Director James Comey, this morning: "Once again that clown that is in charge of whatever you call those people, FBI, is in charge of the headlines."

This last statement is ironic, since both Comey and Mueller came to the aid of Robertson's good friend and spiritual colleague John Ashcroft when he was in the hospital being besieged by Bush's White House staff.

About the only real difference Robertson has with Sekulow and Trump is that he really, really hates Russia.*

RECIPROCITY


Note: pictured above with Trump, Robertson and 

Sekulow is Gary Marx, leader of the Faith and

 Freedom Coalition - the entity involved in the 

Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal. Birds of a feather...

So dirty money and favors flow between these three seemingly opportunistic con men. In Pat Robertson's world, it's called "reciprocity," but without the God factor.

God has little to do with this trio of corruption.


Reciprocity. Corruption. Perhaps the best depiction of the two intertwined is in this scene from "Chicago."

*USA Today:

One law firm that fought contractors over payments and other issues for Trump — New York City’s Morrison Cohen LLP — ended up on the other side of a similar battle with the mogul in 2008. Trump didn’t like that its lawyers were using his name in press releases touting its representation of Trump in a lawsuit against a construction contractor that Trump claimed overcharged him for work on a luxury golf club.

As Trump now turned his ire on his former lawyers, however, Morrison Cohen counter-sued. In court records, the law firm alleged Trump didn’t pay nearly a half million dollars in legal fees. Trump and his ex-lawyers settled their disputes out of court, confidentially, in 2009.

In 2012, Virginia-based law firm Cook, Heyward, Lee, Hopper & Feehan filed a lawsuit against the Trump Organization for $94,511 for legal fees and costs. The case was eventually settled out of court. But as the case unfolded, court records detail how Trump's senior deputies attacked the attorneys' quality of work in the local and trade press, leading the firm to make claims of defamation that a judge ultimately rejected on free speech grounds.

*Again, Irony:
Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill I apparently agrees with U.S. preacher Pat Robertson that Haitians brought the earthquake on themselves:
Kirill, speaking during a weekend visit to Kazakhstan, said the Haitian people bore responsibility for the calamity because they had turned away from God.

Embracing Evil: Christofascism's Love For Trump, Putin and Prince Tips Its Hand In The Game Of Religion and Poltics

First, The Sanctimonious Hypocrisy

Yesterday, President Trump's attendance of Easter services at his local Episcopal Church in Palm Beach was hailed as the sign that Donald Trump was indeed the most religious President ever.

According to the Christian Right.

The fact that his attendance at church was the first since his inauguration matters not. Why? Because, according to self-prophet and Christian Leader, Mary Colbert, Donald Trump is "The Chosen One" and all of his opponents will be cursed (plus their children and their children's children).

Colbert's religious whitewash of Trump is not new - the extreme pretzel-twisting reasoning of the Christian Right `began well before Trump's campaign. It only got more ridiculous as Trump's lies, scandals and ineptitude became increasingly apparent.

Colbert called Trump "not perfect." Forget "pussygate" and Russian prostitutes peeing on each other, as a leader of the free world, he has exhibited many many vices (sins), so we know he's not perfect, but  here's what "not perfect" includes in Donald Trump:

The sin of Pride: BRITAIN: Trump Demands Royal Carriage Procession For October Visit Despite UK Security Concerns

Secrecy is not necessarily a virtue:
White House says it won't make visitor logs public

Donald Trump has a problem keeping promises:
Trump Flips On Four Campaign Positions In One Day: NATO, Janet Yellen, Chinese Currency, The EXIM Bank

The sin of Greed: Washington Post’s David Fahrenthold wins Pulitzer Prize for dogged reporting of Trump’s philanthropy

A Champion of conspiracy: Guardian Report Claims U.S. Has “Concrete Evidence” of Trump-Russia Collusion

Added to the above is the fact that Trump has continued to disappoint (sometimes enrage) his stalwart supporters:

Last night Ann Coulter appeared on the Fox News show of Trump sycophant Lou Dobbs, where she angrily denounced Trump’s strike on Syria, saying, “I feel like I’m watching Dr. Strangelove.” Dobbs then moved the conversation to Trump’s other failing campaign promises including the Mexican border wall, prompting Coulter to sneer, “I didn’t know we elected Jeb Bush.”

So why is Trump still "The Chosen One" among people like Colbert? 

Enter Putin and Prince

In some ways, Vladamir Putin is like Trump (with more intelligence): he is considered a con man who declares himself to be deeply religious and totally family-oriented. He is also secretive ... and greedy (no one knows his net worth)

Money:

Figuring out the Russian president’s net worth has long been the holy grail of spooks and hacks around the world. But the personal wealth of Putin—a former KGB agent—is nearly impossible to decipher, and is likely distributed across a secret web of company holdings, real estate, and other people’s accounts. In fact, at a time when his political motivations are under scrutiny across the world, the struggle to pin down Putin’s riches reveals something about the covert ways in which he wields his authority over Russia.

Putin, however, is perhaps THE most Christian of all world leaders because he openly hates gays - or so says Bryan Fischer:

Erik Prince

If Putin's friendship makes Trump look shady, the presence of Erik Prince makes the picture look positively sinister. 

Esquire:
On any list of loathsome Americans, Erik Prince has to be right at the top. He got rich behind Blackwater, the renegade mercenary army that is responsible for a great deal of the hatred directed toward this country in the Middle East. (Privatized hatred was Blackwater's primary gift to the world.) Since his brand cratered (Blackwater was renamed Xe, pronounced, I believe, "Kill." It is now known as Academi. Why? Who knows?), Prince has become an International Man of Sleaze, taking on clients from China to the UAE, which is probably how the meeting in the Seychelles came about, since it was brokered by the UAE government, and since prying Russia and Iran apart is something that the UAE would love to see happen. But what in the hell is Erik Prince doing negotiating on behalf of the United States government, even given the fact that administrations of both parties have done business with him overseas?

Erik Prince's exploits have been chronicled here and here at OpEdNews, and the articles make the point that Christfascism is ripe for conspiracy: Erik Prince is considered Islamophobic in the extreme, wishing to rid the world of Islam by brute force. His ties to both Trump and Putin are the stuff of spy novels. And let's not forget that he's Education Secretary Betsy DeVos's brother. 

An Unholy Trio

So in Putin and Prince, we have men who voice Christofascism's main concerns and the man who can implement their goals. It doesn't matter that the man is destroying American principles left and right. 

After all, he's The Chosen One. 

Jesse Would Be Soooo Proud!: Proposed Budget To Cut AIDS/HIV Research and Programs by Whopping 1.23 Billion

Joe. My.God

President Donald Trump’s administration has proposed cutting $1.23 billion this fiscal year from research funded by the National Institutes of Health, according to a White House document sent to congressional appropriators.
The reduction is part of $18 billion in cuts that the administration wants in fiscal 2017, which ends in October. Most of the proposed reductions at NIH would come from research grants, with $50 million specifically taken from a program meant to support biomedical research in states that typically get less agency money.

When I read this, I thought immediately about Jesse Helms.

Huffington Post 7/21/2008 (when Helms died):

Beyond his hateful words, Helms’ bigotry was shown by his political aims. He led the opposition to the federal Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, supported the apartheid regime in South Africa, and consistently opposed civil rights legislation. For nearly two decades, he fought tooth and nail against expanded federal funding for AIDS research, and exploited gays and lesbians as convenient scapegoats in his constant fear-mongering crusade. (Emphasis mine)

One of my San Francisco co-workers said: "Trump's rolling back the clock, isn't he?" 

Yes, but not to a kinder, gentler time.

Hero Or Nero? Is Trump The Worst Thing To Happen To America In 156 Years?

"I don't think he goes away. I -- you know, this is a Caesar crossing the Rubicon moment. He's got an army. What's he going to do with that army?"

"I think he's going to be the Che Guevara of deplorables," - Bill Maher on CNN

Or maybe one of history's greatest deplorables - Nero. The problems with this Nero is that his loyal followers act more like unwashed bourgeois French Revolutionaries or revolutionaries of the June Rebellion of 1832.
Nero Nero On The Wall ...

We have all been witnessing a candidate for President of the United States who lives in an alternate reality and has convinced a great many people to follow him and do the same. To them, he is a cult hero who speaks the truth but is demonized by the media elite. They listen to him and only to him. Lies! False accusations! All by a rigged system rife with conspiracy! He alone can fix things! He cares for this country! 

But more importantly, he cares for THEM. With him "WE HAVE A VOICE!"

Believe it or not, the Roman emperor Nero was very popular with Rome's lower class. Yes, the one who "fiddled while Rome burned."*

wikipedia:

"Over the course of his reign, Nero often made rulings that pleased the lower class. Nero was criticized as being obsessed with personal popularity." (emphasis mine)

Nero also considered himself quite the entertainer, giving performances in song and poetry to the public. 

For all his likability with the lower classes, however, Nero had a penchant for political power and vengeance:

"To consolidate power, Nero executed a number of people in 62 and 63 including his rivals Pallas, Rubellius Plautus and Faustus Sulla.[61] According to Suetonius, Nero "showed neither discrimination nor moderation in putting to death whomsoever he pleased" during this period."

Vengeance Before Country

And before outlining the list of actions he plans to take after his inauguration, Trump first announced what he intends to do immediately after the election: sue each of the women who’ve publicly accused him of sexual assault, unwanted groping, kissing and other inappropriate behavior.

Parallels to Trump even extend (albeit slightly) to the physical:

"Suetonius describes Nero as 'his hair light blonde, his features regular rather than attractive, his eyes blue and somewhat weak, his neck over thick, his belly prominent, and his legs very slender."

Suetonius, however, didn't say anything about small hands.

Never Concede, Never Surrender

This turbulent election season has fanned the flames of racism, xenophobia, homophobia, sexism and bigotry. Hate speech that typically resides in the dark recesses of the Internet has bubbled into the mainstream and onto Twitter, a popular online hangout for journalists and politicians such as Trump, who has millions of followers there. - Jessica Guyin, USA Today

Both Republicans and Democrats are now becoming fearful of the aftermath of a Clinton win: if he doesn't concede (or gives an oddly-worded concession speech), Trump may continue with the presumption that he had actually won and those die-hards of his deserve a leader to fight for their rightful place in America.

In Lisa Belkin's "Donald Trump's Fine Art of Losing" Donald Trump has never actually admitted defeat in anything. Instead, he just "moves the finish line" to where it appears he has won, or that he has achieved his goal since it was his true goal all along. 

So after the election, it would be criminal - in Trump's mind - to concede. In fact, he will count it as a win: so many millions of people in America will, of course, agree with him that he can now do exactly what he wants: create another persona while creating another empire (like Trump TV). 

The Revolution Of The Deplorables. 

Carl Bernstein:

"... I think the most interesting thing going on right now is Trump saying that he may not go along with the results of this election. What does it really mean? It means, I think, that he is setting himself up as the head of again, I'm going to go back to that neo-fascist term, of a real neo-fascist movement and media empire with the people from Breitbart. His businesses are going into the tank as a result of where he has come out in this election, and there are talks going on... about a media empire. Is there going to be remneants of a neo-fascist movment that he leads after this election? We're in a dangerous place.

Breitbart. The KKK, Paramilitary groups. Neo-Nazis**. Pick just about any (or all) of the Southern Poverty Law Center's list of hate groups, and you have a substantial number of loyal Trump supporters. How many? Election results will show you just about the total who either believe Trump or dismiss his lies for compliance with their interests. In other words, the election may show us how many people are either bigots or gullibly desperate. Is there any other group besides these two? Of these, we can deduce that the people who can cause the most harm is of considerable size. 

Some say up to 25 million.

25 million people - very angry people.

USA Today 

This turbulent election season has fanned the flames of racism, xenophobia, homophobia, sexism and bigotry. Hate speech that typically resides in the dark recesses of the Internet has bubbled into the mainstream and onto Twitter, a popular online hangout for journalists and politicians such as Trump, who has millions of followers there.

David Brooks of the New York Times:

Two weeks ago, I was in Idaho, and I ran into a guy who said, well, obviously Trump is going to win because everybody I know is voting for him. And I tried to persuade — argue with this guy, well, if you look at the polls, he is actually not leading.

And this guy just wouldn’t accept that. That was not part of his lived reality. And you got the sense a guy like that, if Trump does lose, will be very angry and disbelieving and may be sensitive to the idea that the election was rigged.

David French, a writer for National Review who was briefly considered as an independent candidate for President, criticized our beloved Ann Coulter(geist) in a column. Immediately the tweets started:

"I distinctly remember the first time I saw a picture of my then-seven-year-old daughter’s face in a gas chamber. It was the evening of September 17, 2015. I had just posted a short item to the Corner calling out notorious Trump ally Ann Coulter for aping the white-nationalist language and rhetoric of the so-called alt-right. Within minutes, the tweets came flooding in. My youngest daughter is African American, adopted from Ethiopia, and in alt-right circles that’s an unforgivable sin. It’s called “race-cucking” or “raising the enemy.”

French's wife who also writes for the blog, Patheos, received even more violent tweets with grisly images and, at one point,

"... an angry voice actually broke into a phone conversation between my wife and her elderly father, screaming about Trump and spewing profanities. My wife was on her iPhone. Her father was on a landline."

Then there's David Riden, a delegate to the RNC:

Riden told Mother Jones in an interview that US leaders who violate the Constitution may have to be done away with: "The polite word is 'eliminated,'" he said. "The harsh word is 'killed.'"

Trump TV

"His businesses are going into the tank as a result of where he has come out in this election, and there are talks going on... about a media empire. Is there going to be remnants of a neo-fascist movement that he leads after this election? We're in a dangerous place."

Carl Bernstein may have hit on something: speculation about a "media empire" is rife on social media. Trump, Steve Bannon of Breitbart and Roger Ailes (formerly of Fox), coupled with 25 million rabid fans could become a force to be reckoned with And although some think it highly unlikely***

The Aftermath

Upon a likely Trump loss, we can deduce several things: Trump will probably not concede, claiming the election is rigged (and insulting America's very foundation), reactions may be violent - certainly as ugly as Trump's rhetoric ... and Donald Trump will not go away quietly, if at all, resulting in a difficult tenure for Clinton and even a chaotic four years in our government. 

We face more years of Donald Trump's inflated ego screaming at every political process, every politician, every American who cries for respite from Donald Trump. And we face his rabid cult supporters. 

America's Civil War began 156 years ago. It was arguably the worst time in America's history. Along with battling Islamic terrorists worldwide, can we afford another one?

 ***

Deplorables Unite Video
The YouTube description (complete with a much younger/thumbnail picture of Trump):

Published on Sep 19, 2016

Over 200k Views! Original!

All over the world - the spread of the Trump revolution continues for a free people and sovereign nations free from the clutches of globalism and Islamic terrorism. If being nationalistic, patriotic, and free people who enjoy the riches of modern civilization is considered "deplorable" then count us in and consider us UNITED!

*Another myth dispelled: 

According to Tacitus, upon hearing news of the fire, Nero returned to Rome to organize a relief effort, which he paid for from his own funds.^[101] Nero's contributions to the relief extended to personally taking part in the search for and rescue of victims of the blaze, spending days searching the debris without even his bodyguards.^{[citation needed]} After the fire, Nero opened his palaces to provide shelter for the homeless, and arranged for food supplies to be delivered in order to prevent starvation among the survivors.^[101]

**To no one’s surprise, America’s most popular neo-Nazi website, the Daily Stormer, has officially announced its support for Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election. Predictably, the endorsement praised the numerous racist statements in Trump’s announcement video, especially his “willingness to call [Mexicans] out as criminal rapists, murderers, and drug dealers.”

*** To the dismay (and embarassment) of Trump and his supports, the domain name of Trump.tv has already been picked up by someone at auction. Trump plans to sue, of course, but the person openly mocks such a feeble attempt.

Sticking To The Lecherous Mad Guard Dog: Christian Leaders Want Protection And Revenge - Not Morals

The Lecherous Mad Guard Dog has never mentioned God in the debates, but no matter. 

For Trump, the second Presidential Debate with Hillary Clinton was really no better than the first: fidgeting, interrupting and sniffling, Trump piled on falsehood after falsehood (see Associated Press' running critique of the debates) and "throwing as many attacks against Clinton as possible." He even wrangled with debate monitors Martha Raddatz and Anderson Cooper, implying that they were partial to Hillary Clinton. Throughout the debate, his morality was questioned, not only with the scandal of leaked tapes and his mysogenist views, but with his handling of the debate. For example:

- Was it moral to dig up Bill Clinton's past even before the debate? And in such as seemingly vicious way?

Associated Press:

Donald Trump unexpectedly appeared live on his Facebook page with women who have accused former President Bill Clinton of rape and unwanted advances. They didn't take questions but repeated some of the claims they made against Clinton years ago.

- Was it moral to lie as much as Trump did during the debate? He lies so badly that it seems as if he's mocking fact-checkers with lies that have been exposed months ago (see above).

- Was it moral to be so vengeful?

The Atlantic:

"If I win, I am going to instruct my attorney general to get a special prosecutor to look into your situation,” adding that if he were in charge, “you would be in jail.” While the campaign has seen numerous incidents of Trump aides suggesting the sort of political retribution more common in banana republics, the specter of one candidate promising the prosecution of the other was unprecedented.

If We Don't Care, You Shouldn't Either
With the Christian Right and today's politics, morals take a back seat to agenda: it goes deeper than the hypocrisy of demonizing Bill Clinton for his affairs.  By supporting Trump, the Christian Right has laid bare it's real agenda. 

And it's not to save souls.

Donald Trump has attacked everything the Christian Right wants to be destroyed and they see him as the snake oil salesman of their dreams: with a cult-like following of proud "deplorables" he can manipulate, they can transform his "movement" into a model of David Barton's Seven Mountains theology.

They look back upon his campaign as a necessary inconvenience, with promises like "I will protect gays" as hopefully disingenuous as his promise to be "presidential" when the time comes.


Tony Perkins (Family Research Council)

"We don't share the same type of values. We don't see the world the same way, although we do have some shared concerns," Perkins said.
He explained that Hillary Clinton has made it clear she would appoint liberal, pro-choice Supreme Court justices if she's elected president.
Perkins said that Trump, although he has his share of issues, will be a better president for people who are concerned about religious liberty.

Ralph Reed

In an email to the Washington Post, Reed — head of Trump’s advisory board and the Faith and Freedom Coalition — the comments were “inappropriate,” but pivoted to attacking Clinton.

"I think a 10-year-old tape of a private conversation with a TV talk show host ranks pretty low on their hierarchy of their concerns,” he said.

Michele Bachmann

Bachmann dismissed Trump’s comments as “bad boy talk.” She has not rescinded her support.

Robert Jeffress

While the comments are lewd, offensive, and indefensible … they are not enough to make me vote for Hillary Clinton,” he said, adding he would “not necessarily choose Donald Trump to be a Sunday School teacher” but he still supports him.

The list goes on: James Dobson, Jerry Falwell, Jr., "Bishop" Harry Jackson, Pastor Mark Burns - plus a plethora of known Christian Right leaders, whose silence on the matter is deafening. Even Trump's own spiritual advisor, prosperity gospel preacher Paula White is mum.

Charisma News

Since Trump's initial comments, he has rededicated his life to Christ. Prominent Christians like James Dobson and Jentezen Franklin stand behind the candidate, as do dozens more as part of his Faith Advisory Board.

Dr. Ben Carson, who has been serving as a top surrogate for Trump since ending his own presidential campaign, told Yahoo News that Trump prayed with James Robison, a televangelist and founder of the Christian relief organization LIFE Outreach International.

Onward Christian Guard Dog
So it seems that Trump's following among the Christian Right is quite unshakable; if they can manipulate him (rather a fantasy of theirs), they can win and Seven Mountains Theology will emerge triumphant.

They will continue their dream until November 8.

***

On A Lighter Note:

Donald Trump's "locker room banter" gave the euphemistic term "p*ssy" new life: there was a time when the term "p**sy was looked upon as a light, almost frivolous euphemism. The English comedy Are you Being Served played fast and loose with Mrs Slocum's "pussy".