A guide to U.S. Politics

Hail to the Chief?

Valerie Plame Affair Supply-side economics Tim Pawlenty Infrastructure policy of Donald Trump Know Nothing Jerry Falwell Jr. Jimmy Carter

Persons of interest

Scooter Libby Bob Barr Howard Dean Thomas Dewey Roy Moore A. Philip Randolph v - t - e

“”We've had vicious kings, and we've had idiot kings, but I don't know if we've ever been cursed with a vicious idiot for a king!

—Tyrion Lannister, Game of Thrones

“”They promised they were going to take on corruption in Washington. Instead, they've racked up enough indictments to field a football team. Nobody in my administration got indicted, which, by the way, is not that high a bar.

—Barack Obama at a rally for the 2018 midterm elections.[1]

“”Yet when the difference between the public and the private collapses, democracy is placed under unsustainable pressure. In such a situation, only the shameless politician can survive, one who cannot be exposed. A work of fiction such as "Donald Trump, successful businessman" cannot be shamed because it feels no sense of responsibility for the real world. A work of fiction responds to revelation by demanding more. As a candidate, Trump did just this, calling on Moscow to keep searching and exposing.

—Timothy Snyder.[2]:232-233

Donald John Trump, Sr. (1946–), is an American businessman, reality TV host, and conspiracy theorist who was the forty-fifth President of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Due to his involvement in an attempted self-coup after losing reelection, he has the infamous dishonor of being the first president in American history to be impeached twice by the House of Representatives,^[3] with the most bipartisan impeachment standing in US history.^{[4][note 1]} More proof of his self-described "very stable genius"^[5] comes from being the first one-term president since George H. W. Bush in 1992.

His public life and career read like a Greatest Hits album of everything wrong with American society. Once calling himself the "Chosen One and the King of Israel",^[6] he is infamous for being a bizarrely unsuccessful businessman,^[7][8] brash television personality,^[9] neo-Nazi sympathizer,^[10][11][12] con artist,^[13] honorary Russian Cossack,^[14] heel wrestling personality,^{[note 2]} sexual-assault enthusiast,^{[15][note 3]} demagogue,^[16] fascist personality-cult leader,^[17][18] and an aspiring strongman,^[19] Nobel Peace Prize nominee,^{[note 4][21]} and subject of extensive false equivalency.^[22][23] Thanks to the confluence of his legendary narcissism and propensity for self-promotion, minimal attempts by his Republican supporters to moderate his malignant impulsivity, and four years at the tiller of perhaps the world's most influential public platform with an itchy Twitter finger, he holds the distinction of having likely told more public (and demonstrable) lies than any other person in human history.^{[24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32]}

Elected against all odds, Trump's presidency was an unmitigated disaster. Responsible for numerous human rights violations and outright crimes against humanity, he was condemned by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights,^[33] for taking migrant children from their parents at the Mexican border and putting them in literal cages.^[34][35] His inflammatory rhetoric, defense of his antagonistic or outright homicidal supporters,^[36] endorsement of police killings on leftists,^[37] bragging that his government assassinated leftists and antifascists (and heavily implying under his direct orders),^{[38][39][40][41][42][43][44]} and vicious scapegoating of minorities directly inspired multiple acts of violence,^[45][46] and even actual politically-motivated murders by his supporters.^[47][48][49]

For many, his presidency could be summed up by a very simple phrase: "the cruelty is the point."^[50] Nothing mattered to Trump or his supporters more than crushing any and all opposition. Not pride, convenience, practicality, nor pragmatism, just pure unadulterated suffering. All of this would lead to predictable results.^[50]

But first...

Some insight into Trump can be gleaned from his past. Indeed, he was raised by a literal sociopath^{[51]:24,26,43} and complete racist, but that doesn't answer the full question. Trump couldn't just sail into power in a hypothetical, politically stable America. Of course, there is some history to the far right in the United States, which clarifies the picture:

Going back a few decades

Despite the party's origins, mid-20th-century Republicans believed they could improve their electoral odds by winning the South. Barry Goldwater first accomplished this in the 1964 US Presidential election, sweeping the Deep South.^[52] He managed this primarily because of his record voting against anti-racism legislation, whereas incumbent Lyndon B. Johnson campaigned for civil-rights expansion. This proved to the Republican Party that they can win the South, and when your next nominee is the Tricky Dick himself, anything for votes! While Nixon initially failed to win the Deep South,^{[note 5]} he succeeded in 1972 when he destroyed George McGovern. However, this was only the beginning of the GOP's rapid descent.

Enter Ronald Reagan, working alongside racist ratfucker, Lee Atwater, who started his 1984 presidential campaign in fucking Mississippi.^[53] His Reaganomics genius,^{[note 6]} anti-fact social conservativementality, and perfection of dog-whistle politics^[54] massively accelerated the rightward shift already imposed by the Southern Strategy,^{[citation needed]} which Reagan himself used to get elected.

Scummy business

“”In 1995, when he offered this company, if a monkey had thrown a dart, at the stock page, the monkey on average would've made 150 percent. But the people that believed in him, who listened to his siren song, ended up losing well over 90 cents in the dollar. They got back less than a dime.

—Warren Buffett on Trump's Atlantic City hotels business[55]

Complete Incompetence

“”When it comes to great steaks, I've just raised the stakes! Trump Steaks are by far the best tasting, most flavorful beef you've ever had. Truly in a league of their own.

—Donald Trump on his Trump Steaks™ partnership with Sharper Image (an electronics store).[56]

“”The net of all that was we literally sold almost no steaks. If we sold $50,000 of steaks grand total, I'd be surprised.

—Jerry Levin, CEO of Sharper Image, Trump Steaks™ post-mortem.[56]

It's always been a bit of a mystery just how much Trump buys into his own bullshit. He estimates his net worth at "OVER TEN BILLION", which is impossible for him to prove, but also impossible for anyone to disprove.^{[note 7]} This isn’t just based on his assets (which are not terribly liquid), but also how he feels about his worth daily.^[57] In truth, the record shows a middling businessman with many structural advantages, who came out on top because of how rigged the system is.^[58] It's not hard to make a lot of money in New York real estate, especially when your rich daddy gives you a big head start. In fact, over time, it becomes practically impossible to lose money.^[59] This is relevant to his claim that he can do an exceptional job of running the US government, since he hasn't been truly tested in a situation with no fawning yes-men or training wheels. Oh fuck.

Really, the Trump Brand still exists and is fiscally solvent because of his daughter Ivanka.^[60] Supposedly, his sons are both dumbasses, but she is scarily intelligent. It was her idea to start selling off the name in exchange for royalties without putting up the capital costs of construction and running a property; Donald originally opposed this, but it is now the cornerstone of the company, since it's effectively free money. In 2016, Ivanka was apparently worried about damage to the Trump brand, trying to spin out a separate sub-brand; she's the one who staged a family intervention and convinced dad to fire his campaign manager.^[61]

Trump's record on predicting economic trends is also laughably lousy:^[62]

• In 1999, he predicted an economic crash worse than the Great Depression.
• Then, in 2001, he reversed his position and claimed the US market was strong right before a minor recession hit.
• In 2005, he claimed the real estate market was strong and followed this up with the launching of "Trump Mortgage" in 2006. Trump Mortgage subsequently went out of business when the housing market crashed the next year.
• In 2011, he predicted massive inflation, suggesting the price of a loaf of bread would soon be $25.
• And he has been predicting another recession since 2012 ... though this has been silent since his election.

Criminal connections

“”That may be Trump's one skill – performing so many outrages that he gets us to sideline some of them while we try to deal with the worst/most recent.

—Ophelia Benson[66]

His connections with mob figures are old and run deep, according to journalist Wayne Barrett; they're mostly associated with his casino and huge erections, including but not limited to buildings.^[67][68][69] In 2015, the details became public of Trump's involvement with Colombo crime family figures during the making of Trump's first name-branded product: a Cadillac limousine in 1988.^[70] Trump will never willingly release his tax returns, and Ted Cruz suggests those returns could show the extent of his mob dealings.^[71] Trump and some of his spawn have been named as material witnesses in a massive tax-avoidance scheme by mob-connected Felix Sater.^[72] As an aside, it has been reported that Trump himself paid no income taxes in 1978, 1979, 1984, 1992, and 1994.^[73]

The tax schemes have apparently caught up with the Trumps: in 2018, the New York Times reported that Trump and his siblings engaged in vast tax fraud starting in the 1990s; the allegations are based on confidential tax returns and financial records.^[74] Following the Times' report, New York state tax officials began their own investigation into the Trumps' alleged tax fraud schemes.^[75]

Trump's connections to organized crime go back to shortly after his first forays into Manhattan real estate.^[76] Trump made friends with Roy Cohn, formerly Joseph McCarthy's lawyer during the McCarthy Senate hearings, but who by then was a mob lawyer.^[76] Cohn likely introduced Trump to Genovese crime boss Anthony Salerno.^[76] In his 1997 book, The Art of the Comeback, Trump denied that there was any association between asbestos exposure and cancer, stating "I believe that the movement against asbestos was led by the mob, because it was often mob-related companies that would do the asbestos removal. Great pressure was put on politicians, and as usual, the politicians relented."^[77][78] Ironically, it was Trump's hiring of organized crime-controlled companies that enabled his demolition contractor to hire the illegal workers that were exposed to asbestos.^[76][79] Trump is still pushing asbestos denialism in 2018 via his EPA director Scott Pruitt, who announced that the EPA would cease evaluating asbestos hazards in the environment.^[77] This is some four decades after the last known time that the asbestos industry itself engaged in denialism.^[80]

In 1979, Trump hired a demolition contractor to take down the building at the future Trump Tower site.^[76] The contractor used undocumented, non-union Polish workers who were exposed to asbestos.^[76][81] Though the site was a union site, there was no picket because it was a mob-controlled union; Trump was fully aware that the Polish workers were in the country illegally.^[76] It came out in 2017 after a judge released the documents that he paid $1.4 million to settle the resulting class-action lawsuit.^[82] Trump used overpriced concrete from companies controlled by Salerno and Gambino family crime boss Paul Castellano to build Trump Tower and Trump Plaza.^[76]

When Trump sought to build casinos in Atlantic City in 1982, he could hide his mob connections by persuading the New Jersey Attorney General John Degnan to only investigate him for the prior six months.^[76] At least one Trump company has been exposed as having ties to international money laundering from an ex-Soviet Union state,^[83] and it has been speculated that the Trump casinos may have been used for laundering before bankruptcy.^[84] Trump bought land in Atlantic City at an inflated price from hitmen connected to Nicky Scarfo, of the Philadelphia crime family, as well as purchasing or leasing other land that likely benefitted the Scarfo mob.^[76]

In 1994, Trump was videoed having a conversation with Robert LiButti, an associate of the infamous "Teflon Don" John Gotti.^[85][86] Although Trump denied personally knowing LiButti, LiButti's daughter says her father was a personal friend of Trump and was granted personal use of the Donald's private helicopter, and that Trump was invited to her 35th birthday party.^[87] LiButti was also a regular at the Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino, which received a hefty fine in 1991 for having shuffled black and female casino workers to keep them away from LiButti, a noted racist.^[88][86] He was convicted of tax fraud the same year he and Trump were seen together,^[89] so you can see why Trump liked him so much.

A Saudi prince claims he bailed Trump out twice when the mogul got into financial difficulties. Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal bought up a private yacht that Trump was forced to cede to creditors during the 1990s and later helped buy a NYC hotel when Trump was short of funds a second time. Said Saud is now embarrassed by the association.^[90][91]

On January 1, 2017, Trump hosted and appeared on stage with Joey 'No Socks' Cinque at Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate.^[92] Cinque is a Gambino crime family affiliate who was convicted of felony possession of a trove of stolen artwork.^[92]

Trump has lied on numerous occasions about his connections to organized crime, including under oath.^[76][93]

At a photo op in 2022 Trump was seen with former Mafia hitman John Alite, although it's unclear whether Trump knew who he was.^[94] The DJT has also posed for photos alongside Joey Merlino, the alleged leader of the Philadelphia crime family who has previous convictions for racketeering and extortion.^[95]

To summarise the summary and return to this section's opening quote: Donald Trump's life and career have essentially been one decades-long Gish Gallop through the ethical badlands.

Golf

Meanwhile, on the other side of the pond, the real-life Auric Goldfinger has been trying to build a golf course on (what used to be) a protected wetland habitat.^[96] He tried to have several of his Scottish neighbors evicted, including a local farmer by the name of Michael Forbes, who refused an offer on his property. For this, Forbes was awarded the "Top Scot" award in 2012.^[97] His actions were parodied in this song.

Since then, the Scottish government's plans to increase wind turbine capacity (Trump's opposition to which even led to a heated discussion over Twitter with the host of the British version of The Apprentice, Lord Alan Sugar)^[98] have encouraged Trump to cancel his plans, proving once and for all that they are worth every penny. Trump reported to Scottish authorities that he lost millions on the project, whereas in his US presidential disclosure, he claimed that the project was highly profitable.^[99]

Trump University

“”People don't know how great you are. People don't know how smart you are. These are the smart people. These are the smart people. These are really the smart people. And they never like to say it, but I say it and I'm a smart person. These are the smart; we have the smartest people. We have the smartest people. And they know it. And some say it, but they hate to say it. But we have the smartest people. Government will start working again. Fixing things.

—Giving people hope[100]

Trump University was essentially a diploma mill, a scam in which people were promised an education in real estate by hand-picked experts in exchange for exorbitant "tuition". Salesmen were told to apply high-pressure tactics on vulnerable people. Some students were given instruction on raising their credit card limits to pay, others had to cough up their disability money, etc.^[101] In return, they received bare-bones real estate education from people Trump never even met, though he was very much involved in the marketing aspects.^[102] He got a cut in return for these "institutions" being allowed to use his name.^[103]

An even bigger issue lies with the name Trump University itself and its claims to offer certain degrees: graduate, postgraduate, and doctoral. This is in violation of New York law, which requires you to obtain a charter to call yourself a university. In 2014, the New York Supreme Court held that Trump was personally liable for running an unlicensed school and making false promises through his "university", the Trump Entrepreneur Initiative;^{[note 8][104][105]} this was confirmed by the testimony of a former salesperson and the court-released "Trump University Playbook".^{[106][107][108]} About 8000 former students sued Trump U. in two separate class-action lawsuits, one of which involved the RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations) Act.^[109] In August 2016, Judge Curiel ruled that Trump must face a civil trial for fraud and racketeering under RICO, which automatically requires triple damages.^[110]

This is the case in which Trump attacked a “Mexican” judge's ancestry (he's actually from Indiana) because he made a judgment Trump didn't like.^[111] But all this shows is that Trump is willing to do anything to help us make him realize his American dream, even if it means ruining us financially.

“”Why isn't this man in jail for fraud? In addition to his phony Trump University, there was also a Trump Institute that used plagiarized materials to peddle real estate advice.

—PZ Myers[112]

Trump managed to settle the Trump University lawsuits for a fraction of the damages.^[113][114] No, we're not sure how this works.

The multilevel marketing company

In 2009, Trump "partnered" with the founders of Ideal Health International (est. 1997), a multilevel marketing business, rebranding this pyramid scheme as The Trump Network.^[115] "Partnering" in this case is just another Trumpian term of art. It was yet another Trump brand rental where he claimed not to be involved with the company's operations, even though he, company representatives and advertising for the network implied there was an actual partnership "that was certain to lift thousands of people into prosperity"; after the brand rental came to an end in 2012, its assets were bought off by a Canadian and rebranded.^[115]

The "business", which consisted of selling a urine test device with customized vitamins,^[116][117] not only made investors lose money buying the highly overpriced products, but also buying customized infomercials on local TV channels.^[115]

"Charity"

Donald Trump has been called "the least charitable billionaire in the world".^[120] Take, for example, his donations to 9/11 charities: $1,000 (his own backyard, no less). The donation went to the anti-psychology Scientology front group, the "New York Rescue Workers Detoxification Fund", which was co-founded by Tom Cruise.^[121][122] Trump, who owns 40 Wall Street, actually received $150,000 for damages due to 9/11 from a special federal fund earmarked for "small businesses", even though the building wasn't damaged.^[123]

Many of Trump's larger donations are on their face self-serving, in the form of donations to:^[124][125]

• His sons' schools
• Golf-related charities^[126]
• Celebrity-related charities
• Land donations with golf easements
• Asbestos-contaminated land from failed golf-course projects ("Donald J. Trump State Park")^[127]

To prove his anti-vaxx bona fides, Trump's foundation gave $10,000 to Jenny McCarthy's "charity" Generation Rescue.^[125]

As for real charities, Trump has a pattern of stiffing them:^[128][129] The Donald J. Trump Foundation had actually received more donations from a single other donor (World Wrestling Entertainment) than Trump himself contributed during the period 1990 to 2009 when he gave a paltry $3.7 million.^[121] In 2014, Trump personally gave $0 to his own foundation.^[130]

The office of Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi was reported to have been considering an investigation of Trump University just before requesting and receiving a $25,000 political donation from Trump himself.^[131] The donation allegedly came illegally from a non-profit Trump family foundation, which is not allowed to make political donations because of its tax status.^[131] It's also come out that he may not have been donating the proceeds of several business ventures to charity as he had promised to do, which could amount to fraud. This is aside from the veterans' charity snafu.^[132] These include Trump U, Trump Vodka, and his new book Crippled America, all high-profile activities with profits supposedly going to benefit charity. The harsh spotlight of a presidential run was suddenly not working out for him.^[133] The Trump Foundation has been illegally soliciting money in the State of New York because it is not registered to do so as required by law.^[134] On October 3, 2016, the Trump Foundation was ordered to cease and desist fundraising immediately by the New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman's office.^[135] The charity did not register properly as it should have and investigations by the Washington Post suggested Trump benefited personally from spending by the charity.^[136] Additionally, the New York tax-collecting agency opened an investigation in July 2018 into the Trump Foundation, which could result in criminal charges.^[137]

Become president, give nothing back

The question naturally arises, does this have anything to do with his presidency?

Yes! Trump used his office to enrich himself and his associates, retaining ownership of his businesses in violation of the US Constitution.^[138] He had the gall to charge the Secret Service for the "privilege" of protecting him,^[139] golfed more than 500 times at his own clubs on taxpayer money,^[140] and raking in cash from foreign governments through the Trump International Hotel in Washington DC.^[141] Trump's businesses brought in $1.9 billion in revenue in the first three years of his presidency.^[142] Perhaps not the most intellectually inspired choice voting for a person who is completely out of touch with ordinary people, but Trump himself hasn't cared about intellectual matters; he is a master in conning people, a skill he frequently operated on during his tenure as president.

Tax returns

Donald Trump is the only presidential candidate in four decades other than Gerald Ford who hasn’t released his tax returns; Ford published a summary of his instead.^[143] Although the chances of the bill passing are low, Democrats are proposing legislation requiring presidential candidates to release ten years of tax returns. In support of forcing Trump to release his tax returns, the organization Americans for Tax Fairness argued that this would shine a light on the means by which wealthy people evade taxes in general and on Trump's potentially illicit business interests in particular. Trump has been accused of using public office to enhance his private business interests,^[144] which we can easily see as valid given the above evidence.

According to legal experts, Special Counsel Robert Mueller, who investigated Trump's ties to Russia, almost certainly had Trump's tax returns. However, he could not release them unless they were relevant to a criminal case.^[144]

Rhetoric, deceit and overall behaviour

Donald Trump is notorious for his rabble-rousing and inflammatory, pernicious rhetoric, especially as used toward his political opponents and journalists. He frequently uses coarse language, and has the verbal ability of a grade-schooler on a broken record: no big bad words or nuance. This makes a dangerously convincing combo with the power of repetition, especially when Trump speaks to his audience's racist, anti-semitic,^[145][146] xenophobic, or sexist insecurities. This is why people claim that he says it "as it is" when he does nothing of the sort. In fact, the incoherent and often perfidious way he talks (such as labeling news he dislikes "fake news"^[147]) muddies understanding of his real thoughts and is open to interpretation; it also frequently sets off political fact-checkers like Politifact, FactCheck.org, and Snopes. For instance, his claims that "when Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their best" and "they're animals" set off a debate over which group he's really referring to. His poor English is exacerbated when other countries try translating what he's saying.^{[citation needed]}

Psychologists at the University of Texas and Princeton University studied over three million texts dating back to 1789, belonging to political leaders of Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States, plus news stories, books, movie subtitles, and cable news transcript. They noticed a clear trend of politicians speaking more simply but with greater confidence. Donald Trump accelerated that trend. In fact, he ranks first on confidence, but last on analytical thinking compared to all other U.S. presidents. John Quincy Adams topped the U.S. chart with just under 99 points in analytical speech while Trump scored only 16 in a 2015 debate. The average for U.S. presidents is 90, with everyone other than Trump and Barack Obama scoring above 70. In speaking with confidence, Trump's score is 89; the average for U.S. presidents is 64.^[148]

The Harvard Republican Club refused to endorse Trump, which is the first time in 128 years they would not endorse the Republican candidate. "He isn't eschewing political correctness. He is eschewing basic human decency."^[149]

Trump thinks that slurs are "just words".^[150]

Perhaps the most enduring phrase from Trump's 2016 has been his slogan, Make America Great Again. While Trump claimed to have coined the phrase, the similar Let's Make America Great Again was famously the slogan of Ronald Reagan's 1980 presidential campaign, and the phrase was also used in speeches by Bill Clinton in 1992.^[151]

Compulsion to lie

“”Never has more ignorance been stuffed inside one head.

—Laurence Tribe, professor of constitutional law at Harvard Law School[152]

Trump's near-total disdain for the truth has been characterized as either gaslighting everyone he speaks to,^[153] or as pathological lying,^{[154][155][156]} though not in a clinical sense.^[157]

The alarming nature of Trump's continuing behavior has gotten so bad since the election that psychologists have been breaking the so-called Goldwater rule in the American Psychiatric Association's code of ethics against giving a clinical analysis of someone who is not their patient. In 2017, John D. Gartner, a psychotherapist who formerly taught at Johns Hopkins University Medical School, has explicitly broken the rule without caveat to warn the public of Trump's dangerousness.^[158] Gartner said, "Donald Trump is dangerously mentally ill and temperamentally incapable of being president."^[158] Gartner diagnosed that Trump has "malignant narcissism", an extreme mix of narcissism, antisocial personality disorder, aggression, and sadism.^[158] Many other mental health professionals have also expressed their concern over Trump's mental state.^{[159][160][161]} Dr. Allen Frances, The chair of the DSM-IV taskforce, the one that wrote the definition of narcissistic personality disorder (NPD), stated that while Trump "may be a world-class narcissist", he does not have NPD.^[162][163] Dr. Allen went further to state, "He can, and should, be appropriately denounced for his ignorance, incompetence, impulsivity and pursuit of dictatorial powers."^[162]

Possible medical issues

By 2019, Gartner has called for a professional examination of Trump's mental health because of apparent worsening of Trump's speech patterns that could indicate dementia: confusing people and generations, semantic paraphasia, and tangential speech.^[164]

Later, he totally did not have a series of mini-strokes before his unexpected visit to Walter Reed Medical Center.^[165]

HS quarterback

“”He's like that right-wing uncle you dread seeing at Thanksgiving, just with a national media profile – and your uncle couldn't be happier about it.

—Paul Waldman[166]

A significant Overton window shift has been anyone believing that Donald Trump is "anti-establishment".^{[note 9]} Liberals and conservatives are just wired differently. Republicans generally respond better to displays of strength and forthrightness, whereas Democrats typically respond better to bipartisanship and compassion.^[167] For better or worse, Trump looks at life like buying a used car. You go in with bluster and threaten to walk if they don't give you what you want.

With that in mind, it's no surprise that the candidate with the best “tell it like it is” game on Twitter and in debates won. It's a strategy in touch with the perceptions of the GOP base. Many still think that Romney had the general election sealed up, but choked. It's why Don's portrayal of his opponents as boring, dumb, nerdy,^[168] losers,^[169] low-energy,^[170] chokers^[171] or "choke artists"^[172] has been so effective.

In the minds of the base, it's never been the case that the country has become more progressive, or that 12 years of Bushes were more regime change and Reaganomics than voters ever wanted. Nope, the perception is that McCain, Romney, Bush, Rubio – these candidates all “choked”, in concert with the American people wanting them all to be President but just not knowing it yet. They're all presumed guilty of giving the country two more Democratic terms based on supposed personal and strategic failures, never on a disconnect between what voters wanted and what these candidates were selling. The RNC propping up Romney (again!) in opposition to Trump shows that they can't even grasp this basic fact about their own voters.

Idiocracy

Donald Trump is neither an intellectual nor someone interested in deep thought or reading, both of which are crucial when running a country. Indeed, he has been accused by many of being the Dunning–Kruger effect incarnate,^{[173][174][175][176]} and it becomes rather hard to argue when David Dunning himself tends to agree.^[177]

Unclear yet present danger

“”He's always been that guy, and you denied it and ignored it and hand-waved it away and made excuses every step of the way because you were convinced that you were so much smarter than the rest of us. You were so certain that you had received some superior wavelength giving you special insight into the Donald; only you could tell that it was all an act. Only you could grasp that his constant courting of controversy was just to get attention from the media. Only you could instinctively sense that his style would play brilliantly in the general election and win over working-class Democrats. (SPOILER ALERT: It isn't.) You insisted that you could “coach him”.

—Jim Geraghty[178]

Human beings are really bad at processing information that falls outside of their heuristics and reconciling information that seems contradictory on the surface-level. Consequently, if a candidate does not fall squarely into one of the two buckets we associate with politics – "conservatism" and "liberalism" – then he must be in the middle, despite not logically fitting as a "moderate" in any sense. And because many people subconsciously believe in the golden mean, Trump is using the same strategy almost every authoritarian populist has used to craft a successful coalition: pair radical ideas from one end of the spectrum with ones that either come from the other extreme end or are appealing for their "moderation".^{[citation needed]} For example, pair your extreme views on immigration with opposition to trade or rhetoric opposing "hedge fund guys" and other selected wealthy capitalists who are unpopular across the board. This becomes a net win for Trump. He "tells it like it is" or "calls out both sides". Donald is an empty suit, and he invites us all to try him on:

Debate Trump: Taxes too high, wages too high. We're not going to be able to compete against the world.^[179]

Gasbag Trump-on-the-stump: The influx of foreign workers holds down salaries, keeps unemployment high, and makes it difficult for poor and working-class Americans . . . to earn a middle-class wage.^[180]

Subtext: To those of you working 2-3 jobs at $8.00 per hour, once I deport all the illegals you're still going to be making $8.00 per hour. F**k you very much.

Feud with HBO and Last Week Tonight

In March of 2013, Trump attacked Jon Stewart on Twitter for changing his name from Leibowitz to Stewart, tweeting:^[181]

“”If Jon Stewart is so above it all & legit, why did he change his name from Jonathan Leibowitz? He should be proud of his heritage!

Two years later (in 2015), while spending a portion of May 31 embarrassingly trying too hard to flame Stewart,^[182] Trump also insisted that the original tweet quoted above never took place while repeating the accusation, tweeting:^[183]

“”All the haters and losers must admit that, unlike others, I never attacked dopey Jon Stewart for his phony last name. Would never do that!

Trump then proceeded to weave the tale that John Oliver (Stewart being the former boss and colleague of Oliver) had tried to get Trump to appear on Last Week Tonight,^[184] something which Oliver maintains has never happened.^[185] Oliver even checked to make sure nobody had accidentally invited him, and nobody had.

In response to all of this, on February 28 of 2016, Oliver started the #makedonalddrumpfagain campaign, explaining:

"Trump" does sound rich – it's almost onomatopoeic. "Trump!" is the sound produced when a mouthy servant is slapped across the face with a wad of thousand-dollar bills. "Trump!" is the sound of a cork popping on a couple's champagne-iversary, the day the renovations in the wine cellar were finally completed.

The very name "Trump" is the cornerstone of his brand. If only there were a way to uncouple that magical word from the man he really is. Well, guess what – there is! Because it turns out, the name "Trump" was not always his family's name. One biographer found that a prescient ancestor had changed it from – and this is true – Drumpf. Yes; fucking Drumpf! And "Drumpf!" is much less magical.

It's the sound produced when a morbidly obese pigeon flies into the window of the foreclosed Old Navy. "Drumpf!" It's the sound of a bottle of store-brand root beer falling off the shelf in a gas station mini-mart. And it may seem weird to bring up his ancestral name, but to quote Donald Trump, "he should be proud of his heritage" – because Drumpf is much more reflective of who he actually is.

So if you are thinking of voting for Donald Trump, the charismatic guy promising to make America great again, stop and take a moment to imagine how you would feel if you just met a guy named Donald Drumpf. A litigious serial liar, with a string of broken business ventures and the support of a former Klan leader who he can't decide whether or not to condemn. Would you think he would make a good president, or is the spell now somewhat broken? And that is why tonight, I am asking America to make Donald Drumpf again!^[186]

Oliver also revealed that HBO had even officially filed paperwork to trademark the name "Drumpf". HBO has also purchased the domain donaldjdrumpf.com and released an official Chrome browser plugin called the "Drumpfinator", which changes every instance of "Trump" to "Drumpf" in the browser.^[187]

Now, for people who don't know about that little spat, the Drumpf meme might come across as Oliver making fun of Trump's German ancestry. Crucially, however, the serious thought underlying the (entirely overtly satirical) relabeling of Trump to Drumpf is that Trump's image and persona are based on the Trump brand – and thus, if people instead knew him as Donald Drumpf (the way his family's name was spelled before the Thirty Years' War),^[188] then hopefully people would stop automatically knee-jerk associating him with the fame and fortune attached to the Trump brand, and instead see the man (Donald) for who he really is as a person.^[189] The Trump fortune was in fact predicated upon Fred Trump's lying to Jewish customers about his German ancestry and claiming that he was Swedish, a lie repeated by Donald in The Art of the Deal.^{[190][191][192]}

Credentialism

During his 2016 campaign, Trump frequently referred to his degree from the University of Pennsylvania as "super genius stuff", and claimed that it was difficult to get admitted to Wharton.^[193] At the time of his admission (1966), Wharton admitted 40% of applicants, fairly high.^[193] James Nolan, an admissions officer and friend of Trump's brother Fred Jr., was leaned on by Trump's father to get him admitted.^[193] Nolan was unimpressed by Trump, stating later, "I certainly was not struck by any sense that I'm sitting before a genius. Certainly not a super genius."^[193] Later, it was alleged by Trump's elder sister Maryanne, that his friend Joe Shapiro was paid to take his college entrance exam (SAT).^[194] Elsewhere, SAT fraud has resulted in criminal charges,^[195] and could result in the rescinding of a degree.^[196] But no worries, Trump has rightfully earned a B.S. in B.S.!

Pretending to be religious

“”Can you believe that bullshit? Can you believe people believe that bullshit?”

—Trump, in private after a laying on of hands by evangelical leaders[197]

“”"[It] was the theo-political equivalent of money laundering. Dobson and his gang are making Trump clean so that he is worthy of evangelical votes.

—John Fea, history professor at Messiah College[198]

Of course, winning votes and popularity among the US conservatives requires you at least masquerading as a religious person. He pulled in Mike Pence to give him a hand there.^{[note 10]}

It should not have surprised anyone that Trump embraced prosperity gospel-types, particularly heretic/charlatan Paula White. Both the Trump family preacher, Norman Vincent Peale, and the prosperity gospel concept were rooted in the 19^th-century New Thought movement.^[199] Trump has frequently cited Peale, who was described as a 'Christian libertarian', as an influence.^[199] James Dobson of Focus on the Family believes that Trump was recently born again, but not everyone agrees.^[200]

When asked the inevitable leading question, "What is your favorite book?" Trump answered with the usual pandering reply, "The Bible!", although he couldn't provide a favorite verse.^[201] Eventually, Trump found one: "Two Corinthians" (he meant Second Corinthians, which incidentally is a book, not a verse), which earned him an endorsement from Jerry Falwell Jr.^[202] With a bar that low, who needs legs to get across? It also leads one to wonder how frequently he takes holy communion, despite Trump's claim of "as often as possible"^[203] – quite the dedication to drinking wine for someone who is also a teetotaler.^[204]

Regarding the prospects of electing a hypothetical born-again Trump prone to fiddling with the nuclear football when bored or intoxicated, Hemant Mehta remarked that:^[205]

“”If Christians do vote for the nuclear weapon-loving Trump, they probably have a better chance of meeting God real soon ...

While not dying from nuclear war, many Trump supporters in fact did get to meet their God. Just through something microscopic since 2022.^[206]

Creepy behavior

In October 2016, the Washington Post obtained video caught on a hot microphone in 2005 of Trump talking to Billy Bush who was, at that time, anchor of a television show called Access Hollywood. In the clip, Trump discussed a failed attempt to seduce a woman ("I did try and fuck her. She was married") and creepily infamously described his celebrity status as a carte blanche excuse to molest anyone he wanted ("when you're a star, they let you do it... grab them by the pussy... you can do anything").^[207] This naturally became a huge scandal in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, and very possibly could have been a fatal blow to Trump's campaign had Wikileaks (with the help state-sponsored Russia hackers and trolls on r/thedonald) not coordinated their own October surprise with leaks of DNC emails, aka the Podesta Emails.^[208] Since what became known as the Access Hollywood tape was revealed, at least 26 women have accused Trump of sexual misconduct as of September 2020, allegations which Trump categorically denies but stretch back to the 1980s.^[209][210]

In 1996, Trump bought the Miss Universe Organization beauty pageant corporation (which also ran affiliated beauty pageants like Miss USA and Miss Teen USA).^{[note 11]} During Trump's first presidential campaign, multiple contestants reported that Trump would enter the dressing rooms of the contestants while they were in various stages of undress (including the dressing room of the Miss Teen USA competition, when many of the girls were underage). Other contestants have alleged other sorts of creepy behavior, such as inappropriate kisses on the mouth and boorish banter.^[211] Trump denied these allegations when they came out, but in 2005, Trump seemed to admit to this behavior when talking to radio shock jock Howard Stern.

“”I’ll tell you the funniest is that I’ll go backstage before a show and everyone’s getting dressed... No men are anywhere, and I’m allowed to go in, because I’m the owner of the pageant and therefore I’m inspecting it. … ‘Is everyone OK?’ You know, they’re standing there with no clothes. ‘Is everybody OK?’ And you see these incredible-looking women, and so I sort of get away with things like that.[212]

Extramarital affairs hush money

In addition to the sexual misconduct allegations, Trump has engaged in several affairs, alleged and confirmed. Prior to his presidency, in one early, highly gossiped about case, Trump reportedly cheated on his then-wife Ivana Trump with a model (and eventual second wife) named Marla Maples. This led to his first divorce.^[210]

During Trump's first presidential campaign, two adult models, Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal, allegedly accused Trump of having an extramarital affair. In the case of McDougal, the National Enquirer bought the story for $125,000, but never ran it. (Later, the office of the National Enquirer admitted that they buried the story "to prevent it from influencing the election".)^[213] In the case of Daniels, Trump's personal attorney Michael Cohen chose to pay Daniels $130,000 in order to keep quiet about the affair. Cohen then sought, and received, reimbursement (to the tune of $420,000, paid in monthly installments) from the Trump organization to cover this expense.^[214][215]

In 2018, the Wall Street Journal published an article detailing Cohen's $130,000 payment.^[215] This opened a flurry of investigations into whether there were any financial shenanigans associated with the hush money, resulting in multiple convictions. In August 21 2018, Cohen plead guilty to eight charges of tax evasion, fraud, and campaign finance violations that occurred due to the hush money payment. Cohen told the federal court that Trump directed him to make the payments. One week later, the Manhattan District Attorney's office opened an investigation into whether the Trump Organization also broke any crimes. In 2022, two Trump Organization companies were convicted of all 17 charges of tax fraud it was indicted with; its chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg also plead guilty to fraud and tax evasion charges.^[215]

Reactions from the "Moral Majority"

You would think that after decades of preaching family values and supposed Bible-based morality (including a huge evangelical trope regarding the supposed evils of pornography),^[216] the Religious Right and the Moral Majority would be quick to condemn and distance themselves from someone who allegedly committed marital infidelity by fucking a porn star. However, this ended up not happening; instead, many top fundamentalist Christian leaders were quick to completely defend Trump's alleged porn-star-fucking. Usually, the defense was something along the line of the politics being more important than the sin.

Robert Jeffress:

And let’s be clear — Evangelicals still believe in the commandment: Thou shalt not have sex with a porn star... However, whether this president violated that commandment or not is totally irrelevant to our support of him.^[217]

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, who previously said evangelicals were willing to give Trump a "mulligan" for his past transgressions:

The President has not engaged, to our knowledge, and I think we would know, in any of the behavior that he did in the past, prior to the election. What he has done is he's actually followed through on political promises.^[218]

Franklin Graham, going for the fake news defense:

President Trump I don’t think has admitted to having an affair with this person... and so this is just a news story, and I don’t even know if it’s accurate.^[219]

Jerry Falwell Jr., who ended up being no stranger to this type of sin:

He is not the same person now that he was back then. I believe he has changed... That is why our faith is based around the idea that we are all equally bad, we are all sinners, we need Christ's forgiveness. That's why evangelicals are so quick to forgive Donald Trump when he asks for forgiveness for things that happened 10-15 years ago..^[220]

A Pew Research poll showed that white evangelical support actually increased after the Stormy Daniels affair was reported.^[221]

For many, the events all but confirmed the moral hypocrisy of these evangelical leaders, even leading to a rebuke in the National Review.^[222] A few commentators saw the hypocritical quotes as proof that the only "values" evangelicals really valued were worship of the patriarchy and the white male privilege, and noted how many of these evangelicals who were so quick to forgive Trump were hardly forgiving (and in fact, outright hostile) when it came to other "sinners", particularly LGBTQ individuals.^[223][224]

Presidency

Trump's ambitions for the Oval Office began years before he actually won the 2016 Republican Party presidential nomination. Indeed, he's been involved in politics for quite some time.

Following an escalating series of gaffes and scandals in the run-up to the 2016 Presidential election, at least 160 Republican leaders withheld or renounced their support for his candidacy.^[226] Despite significant backlash from the public and his own party, he won the Republican nomination, and against all odds, was elected President of the United States, despite having lost the popular vote.^{[227][note 12]} On Inauguration Day, Trump had the dubious honor of having the single largest number of protesters in American history – the Women's March.^[228]

Despite Trump's campaign mythologizing about his "coming from outside the system" and being "free of cronyism" (imagining a Democrat-disgruntled working class being the ones to carry him into office), his actual supporters generally have above-average incomes, typical of the same voter demographic that has always supported the GOP.^{[229][note 13]} In American terms, Trump is pretty much styled himself as the second coming of Richard Nixon, complete with his enemies lists and paranoia. In turn, Trump actually appears to have secured the conspiracy theorist vote,^{[230][231][note 14]} a demographic which, these days, appears to include both himself^[232] and his trophy wife.^[233]

A 2021 informal and unscientific poll of 142 presidential historians rated Trump 4^th last among all of the 41 presidents who had completed a term, followed by Franklin Pierce (appeased The South to no avail), Andrew Johnson (first to be impeached), and James Buchanan (whose incompetence and pro-slavery sympathies helped bring about the Civil War).^[234] Not to be underperformed, Trump came in dead last for moral authority and administrative skills.^[234]

Trump-Russia connection

“”While this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.

—William Barr quoting the Mueller report in his summary.[235]

Despite its popular name, the Trump-Russia investigation or the Russia probe examines more than ties between the Trump campaign and Russia. Other countries with potentially illegal connection to Trump and his associates include China, Israel, Qatar, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. In particular, Trump, his daughter Ivanka, and her husband Jared Kushner have business interests in Qatar, the UAE, Israel, and China.^[236] Nor is it limited to the office of the Special Counsel; there is a separate criminal investigation by the FBI.^[237] In fact, by December 2018, investigators have begun scrutinizing virtually all aspects of Trump's public life, his presidential campaign, his inaugural committee, his charity, his business dealings, and his presidency itself.^{[note 15][238]} Meanwhile, the House and Senate Intelligence Committees, the Senate Judiciary Committee, and the House Oversight Committee are conducting their own investigations on alleged Russian meddling and any collusion with Trump aides. These are arguably some of the most high-profile criminal cases in United States history.^[239]

The investigation of the Trump-Russia connection is not limited to the office of the Special Counsel; it has also included a separate criminal investigation by the FBI^[237] and may include other as yet unknown investigations. In mid-2018, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein revealed a broad effort by the Department of Justice to combat Russian "information warfare" waged against the United States to undermine her democracy and critical infrastructure. Indeed, the Russian attempt to influence the 2016 Election was "just one tree in a growing forest", he said.^[240]

On March 22, 2019, Special Counsel Robert Mueller submitted his final report to Attorney General William Barr. Barr informed Congress in writing he would brief them on the "principal conclusions" and restated his commitment to "as much transparency as possible." Polls show that Americans would like to see the report. Earlier in the month, the House voted unanimously in favor of a non-binding resolution urging the Justice Department to make the report public.^[241] According to Barr's summary of the report's findings, Mueller found no evidence of any collusion between the Trump presidential campaign and Russia. Because Mueller did not really answer the question of whether or not Trump obstructed justice, Barr asserted there was no concrete evidence for it. However, Barr acknowledged that Russian officials had offered to assist the Trump campaign. The end of the Special Counsel probe does not mean the end of legal troubles for Donald Trump, who still faces investigations from New York state prosecutors and from Congress.^[242] During the Special Counsel investigation, FBI agents traveled across the United States and to numerous other countries. Some witnesses were interviewed immediately after they had landed at an American airport. Charges were brought against dozens of individuals. However, no Americans were charged with conspiring with Russia.^[243]

Even then, in 2019, just two months earlier it was revealed that after Trump removed FBI Director James Comey over the investigations into Russian interference in the 2016 election, the FBI began investigating whether Trump was a knowing or unknowing asset of the Russian government assisted by Russia to act against the interests of the US government.^[244] And yes, Trump has put forward policies clearly in favor of the Russian government's interests, most importantly on the matter of the NATO alliance of the US as the leading country of the alliance along with European countries, Turkey, and Canada, with Trump indicating in public statements that the US could abandon the NATO alliance.^[244] And that's just brilliant for all of us, right?

Undermining democratic institutions

Democratic backsliding is how democracies become authoritarian states.^[245]

How to destroy a democracy

• Centralise power ☑ Trump made it a mission to hollow out all functions of government that aren't his direct word. Start with a brutal budget that shows a narcissistic level of discontent for the poor and those in need,^[246] then cripple the non-elected civil service,^[247] and then weaken the state department monetarily^[248] and kill its diplomacy.^[249] Job done, the military-industrial complex has never been stronger.
• Empower the junta ☑ Naturally, Trump's autocratic nature repays the police unions who endorsed him in the first place, and this pays himself to give even more methods to abuse authoritarian tactics. Mass arrests occurred on the literal day he was inagurated.^[250] If that wasn't enough of a statement, Trump handed back police access to excessive military equipment,^[251] used his rhetoric to destabilise the law itself,^[252] made mass crackdowns and arrests a normal part of the day,^{[citation NOT needed]} and using secret police tactics to kidnap and terrorise protesters.^[253] Even in this brief summary, it poses terrifying similarities to how other tyrants used the police to enforce their agenda.
• Attack the media ☑ Once you have empowered the police to be your personal weapon, the next step is to terrorise the press. Trump implemented a massive crackdown against reporters so they couldn't report on his actions,^[254] allowed the police to repeatedly arrest reporters for doing their jobs, outright ordered police to tear-gas reporters,^[255] and loathes American journalism so much that he directly ordered violence against journalists.^[256] Again, this is exactly what tyrants do.
• Post-truth alt-right rhetoric ☑ As discussed extensively before, Trump's rhetoric has the power to cause violence and instability, by it's sheer power to manipulate the truth, and then repeated ad infinitum. His massive personality cult^[257] relies on the ability to cling to the insecurities of his followers.

Democracy watchdog Freedom House's report states that Trump's victory was a destabilizing threat to democracy.^[258] In 2017, The Democracy Index listed the U.S. as a flawed democracy, but the reduced rank was not caused by Trump.^[259] The lower rank was instead caused by the same factors that won Trump the election and contribute to the rise of far-right parties in Europe.^[259] That factor is the decline of trust in government.^[259] A lack of confidence in government may well lead to political apathy, lower voter turnout, and consequently a government that more poorly represents its people (along with currently anti-democratic measures such as Voter ID laws and gerrymandering, and arguably the first past the post system and the electoral college). And it's equally worth noting that Russia often has a hand in democratic backsliding, namely in the former Soviet sphere and post-communist countries.^[260]

Of course, you would expect Donald Trump to find a way to get himself impeached due to his complete ignorance of democratic principles. And whaddya know? On December 18, 2019, Trump became just the third President in United States history to be impeached, in this case due to a coordinated campaign within his administration to pressure Ukraine for dirt on his potential political rival, Joe Biden, in the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. The US Senate almost immediately voted to acquit President Trump on February 5, with Mitt Romney being the only member of Trump's party to vote for removal on either count.^[261]

Cabinet members, or how to create a cesspool

He ran on a populist platform, pledging to "Drain the swamp", meaning prevent Wall Street from controlling government, not a destructive anti-environmentalist platform. Now that he won, that means all of his supporters (and some former detractors) are lining up for sweet positions in his administration, including Wall Street. Besides promising to "hire the best people", he also promised to "drain the swamp", but his nominations and hiring practices prove that instead of draining or filling the swamp, he's creating a noxious cesspool; the people he chooses tend to be either on a pillage-and-burn mission or totally unqualified for the job. The worst thing is that his supporters don't care^[262] as long as the cesspool monsters are not "politicians", whatever that means. The result is possibly the most fervently right-wing cabinet in recent memory and one that's still filled with quite a few politicians.

And this isn't going to go into how swamps are, in reality, biodiversity-rich hubs that provide a ton of benefits, not like Trump cares a single bit about the environment. Trump may be draining literal swamps, which is hardly a good thing, as he's threatened national parks by trying to allow exploitation and decreasing their sizes.^[263]

The Trump team was actually well-prepared to fill the cabinet just before the election. Chris Christie, who had run against Trump in the primary but then joined the campaign, had prepared a 30-volume set of dossiers on possible cabinet picks that was ready one day before the general election.^[264] Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law, had a grudge against Christie; Christie as a US Attorney had previously sent Kushner's father (Charles Kushner) to prison for illegal campaign contributions, tax evasion, and witness tampering. The 30 volumes were summarily thrown out, and Christie was fired two days after the election at the behest of Kushner and Steve Bannon.^[264] The vetting process was then led by Vice President-elect Mike Pence, who hired overwhelmed 20-year RNC staffers to do the vetting from scratch.^[265] Said one vetter:^[265]

“”You know, I'm like, 'Oh gentle Ben [Carson] is unqualified and thinks that pyramids store grain or whatever. Great. At least he's not beating his wife and his wife's not appearing on Oprah [a reference to Andrew Puzder].

Another vetter said:^[265]

“”I think I truly understood what less than half of the people were being vetted for. Totally inadequate resources for the overall process. ... We would probably run through dozens [of contenders] a day.

Policies

Starting right on the first week of his presidency, Trump has begun dismantling Obama's legacy. This is indeed one of the guiding principles of the Trump administration.

His policies prove that elections do have consequences. Policies have virtually always ranged from ignorant to borderline, or outright, cruelty. It's the USA's consequence for letting their political spectrum stunt on the left-wing while creeping ever further to the right. There is a lot of history behind this, but here are some highlights of far-right policy in full blow:

• Kids in cages: Immigration policies of Donald Trump reach a level of callous that defies reality. The most infamous of which was separating Mexican families at the border and placing children in literal cages,^[266] as well as pretty much leaving immigrants to commit suicide in ICE detention.^[267] Even elsewhere, in Virginia reports emerged of children being stripped and forcibly injected with drugs without their consent,^[268] and with pregnant women being left to miscarry courtesy of ICE torture.^[269] Such savage and vicious policies look more like a Soviet gulag than anything, but rest assured that this is all the work of Donald Trump; a man so willing to ignore common decency for his own gain, with followers either completely blind or equally as heartless.
• Reversing civil rights: As well as scapegoating and torturing immigrants, don't think you're off the hook unless you are white, straight, protestant Christian, male and a "true American conservative".^{[note 16]} He cut or outright removed federal government agencies and budget relating to civil rights,^[270][271] banned Muslim-majority countries entry to the US^[272] among other religious discrimination under the "religious freedom guise",^[273] dozens among dozens of anti-LGBT actions which empowered homophobia,^{[274][275][276][277][278][279]} and hosility to women including cutting funding for many organisations,^[280] ramping up the abortion gag rule to absurdity,^[281] pushing abstinence-only education,^[282] and inadvertently worsening the college campus sexual assault epidemic.^[283] Remember, "the cruelty is the point". Even after succeeding President Joe Biden's mountains of work to undo the damage, the ripples are still felt.
• Drain the swamp, literally: Earlier we mentioned "draining the swamp". Again, it works both ways because Trump couldn't give one shit about the environment. Eager to boost the coal industry,^[284] Trump crippled the EPA to a shell,^[285][286] which has caused unnecessary suffering and death elsewhere.^[287][288] This is not all; Trump squeezed down national parks and monuments,^[289] made massive price increases to renewable energy with cuts to federal funding of such,^[290][291] left Puerto Rico to rot after a hurricane,^[292] and most crucially, left the Paris agreement until Biden brought it back.^[293] This obviously had disastrous effects over the four years, and a pattern with many of these is Trump's pattern to intentionally cut policies and relief that will help people, putting his far-right narcissism in full display.
  • ... and fuck the animals too: And to rub some more salt in, Trump removed regulations on animal food and let puppy mills and experiment labs go on with extreme animal cruelty, since reporting of such incidents was demolished.^[294][295]
• "Edyucayshaun": Because making America great again is such an important thing, Trump appointed the Secretary of Education as someone married to Amway fortune and anti-public education activist: Betsy DeVos. Having no qualifications to her name and being a fucking fundamentalist is a lethal combo, as she campaigned for a voucher system that doesn't work,^[296] reinstated ACICS despite them propping up diploma mills,^[297] lied to the Senate,^{[298][note 17]} and definitely had not visited struggling public schools on purpose.^[299] In an already deeply flawed education system, it's nice to see Trump not concerned about US education sliding into Eastern Europe tiers.
• Foreign policy chaos: Trump is, as you may expect, a warmonger and a seasoned chickenhawk. While predecessor Barack Obama was criticised for foreign policy especially regarding human rights, Trump took this beyond defensible bounds, with his administration ordering record numbers of bombings and airstrikes on Afghanistan,^[300][301] Yemen,^[302] and Somalia,^[303] at a horrific civilian cost. He did this with almost no accountability, as he revoked an Obama-era rule on reporting civilian deaths in drone strikes.^[304] While he wasn't "bombing the shit out of" people, Trump pretty much caused instability anywhere you found him, moving the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem,^[305] which obviously reignited civil unrest,^[306] viciously sanctioned Iran beyond the bounds of safety,^[307] successfully alienated the United fucking Kingdom of all countries by lying about them imposing surveillance of Trump Tower,^[308] and— oh, screw it. Just read our page about it and watch the madness unravel further. In 2019, Trump and John Bolton attempted to organize a coup against Venezuela, and Trump claimed Venezuela was "really part of the United States".^[309]
• Blatant authoritarianism: Just see above ...

The first post falls

Stung by the results of the 2018 midterm elections^[310] — when Democrats gained control of the House^[311] — Donald Trump got a bit angry about the lack of funding for his border wall, and shut down the federal government for the longest period in US history.^[312] It really stuns even the most staunchy idealist looking at Trump's sheer inability to learn and childish abuses of power on full belt. This loss, and the ongoing Russia probe, made himself distance from the ordinary presidential duties, or so it seems, sending aides, including Vice President Mike Pence, to various events in his stead.^[310]

Such behaviour, and the shift seen in the voting population, would prove an omen for Trump's catastrophic loss in 2020.

American carnage

Following the murder of George Floyd^[313] at the hands of an on-duty police officer named Derek Chauvin, protests broke out nationwide, with hundreds of cities hosting thousands of people speaking out against police brutality, white supremacy, and authoritarianism. Trump, having given the police and himself far too much extra power by this point, responded by calling on the military to "dominate" the protesters.^[314][315] He lived up to his word by calling in hundreds of out-of-state National Guards to patrol the streets of D.C. against the mayor's wishes. This led to numerous instances of police-driven and police-instigated violence against even reporters and journalists, with a grand total of 140 attacks on journalists from May 28th, 2020 to June 1st, 2020.^{[316][317][318]} Anchored by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, President Trump and Attorney General William Barr ordered the police to teargas peaceful protesters so Trump could walk across the street and take a picture with an upside down Bible in front of a church, in a perfect encapsulation of his presidency.^{[319][320][321]} He would later use Homeland Security to continue cracking down on protesters, including kidnapping and detaining people for questioning in unmarked vehicles,^{[322][323][324]} and teargassing the fucking mayor of Portland,^[325] unmistakable hallmarks of authoritarianism.

White House Outbreak of COVID-19

Throughout 2020, Trump refused to take adequate action against coronavirus,^[326][327] downplayed and lied about its severity,^[328] outright hindered efforts to get masks delivered to people,^{[329][330][331][332]} ignored expert advice to wear masks and socially distance,^[333][334] while politicizing mask-wearing nationwide despite their effectiveness against the virus,^[335] purged anyone who dared to speak out against his orders,^{[336][337][338][339]} repeatedly held "super-spreader" rallies without masks,^[340] threw out the idea of injecting disinfectant to stop the virus,^{[341][342][343]} and pushed to reopen businesses, schools, and the rest of the economy while suppressing warnings against doing so by scientists and doctors.^[344][345] A study conducted by a group of economists at Stanford University calculated that these rallies were responsible for at least 700 COVID-19 deaths (not necessarily among attendees).^[346] The day before it was reported that over 200,000 people had died, Trump was claiming the disease "affects virtually nobody,"^{[347][348][349]} while the US fell into an economic and humanitarian crisis.^[350]

By January 20th, 2021, his last day as president, he presided over a grand total of 400,000 deaths from COVID-19, and one estimate in October 2020 of worst-case total US deaths from COVID was 620,029^[351] has essentially come to pass by June 2021. Given that initial disease response (lockdowns and mask-wearing) is critical in reducing total deaths,^[351] a large proportion of the total US deaths would be attributable to him regardless of whether the deaths occur after he is out of office. A post-Trump analysis by a Lancet commission report in February 2021 estimated that 40% of the 470,000 US COVID deaths (188,000 deaths) could have been averted if Trump had taken the pandemic seriously; the study compared death rates among G7 countries.^[352][353]

Oh, and it was found later he intentionally^[354] botched the public response, claiming he "didn't want to cause panic", yet stuck on spitting invectives against Asian-Americans,^[355] leading to catastrophic spikes in anti-Asian racism across America, which has lasted even through 2021.^[356] Even after his departure from the White House, many of his federal judges were blocking federal and state government agencies from enforcing policies intended to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Not only is this leading to more cases and deaths, but it is preventing the government from responding to future pandemics. This goes all the way up to the Supreme Court, where three of six conservative justices were appointed by Trump, because they ruled in favor of allowing churches and other places of worship to be exempted from pandemic restrictions on account of "religious liberty."^{[357][358][359]}

In late September, Ruth Bader Ginsburg died of cancer, and her last wish was for her not to be replaced until a new president was inaugurated the next year. Despite the Republican party arguing for such a delay when Antonin Scalia died in early 2016, Trump ignored her wishes and immediately nominated Amy Coney Barret, Ginsburg's ideological opposite, and held a Rose Garden event announcing Barret's nomination.^[360] Within days, it was revealed that Hope Hicks, a White House aide, had contracted COVID-19. First Lady Melania Trump tested positive, but Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump, Eric Trump, and Donald Trump Jr. tested negative. Campaign manager Bill Stepien tested positive, as did Ronna Romney McDaniel, the RNC Chairwoman. Senators Mike Lee, Ron Johnson, and Thom Tillis all tested positive. Former Counselor to the president Kellyanne Conway and former New Jersey governor Chris Christie were also tested positive.^[361]

Trump revealed that he had tested positive for COVID-19 and was hospitalized at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, as he was said to have trouble breathing. Doctors revealed that he had exhibited symptoms on October 1, including a "mild cough, and some nasal congestion and fatigue."^[362] Evidence suggests Trump actually had the infection on September 30, but proceeded with his plans for a public rally that evening and a fund-raiser on October 1.^[363]

"Yes, you! Box your stuff! Out the front door!"

Sure enough, tens of millions of Americans were utterly sick and tired of his incompetence at leading America^{[citation NOT needed]} and decided to get rid of him. November 3rd a somewhat delayed reaction, and even with the vote count incomplete due to mail-in ballots, Trump demanded to have the votes stop and declared himself the victor.^[364] Nobody cared, and the count went on. On the morning of November 7th, 2020, everyone was relieved to know that President-elect Joseph R. Biden, Jr, the gaffe-shooting Amtrak machine had won,^[365] and was set to be sworn in come January. In fact, Trump lost his reelection bid by a simply staggering margin against the Democratic nominee, losing no less than five states that he won in 2016^[366] and losing the popular vote by at least seven million.^[367] Worse? Trump got taken out in Georgia and Arizona. Two Republican strongholds fractured a little, faulted to Trump's incompetence and unpopular Republican policy as well as officials in these two states, knowing full well how unpopular Trump is with most people, working extremely hard to try to get the general public voting.

In the following months, the most watchful observers braced themselves for the biggest, yuugest, most beautiful meltdown in Trump's entire lifetime; already he had tweeted:

“”I WON THIS ELECTION, BY A LOT![368]

—Actual tweet by @RealDonaldTrump on November 7th!

His most loyal supporters broke into utter hysteria. It was shaping up to be a hilarious and shocking period. Trump continued to deny the results and eventually filed dozens of frivolous lawsuits while spreading baseless claims of election fraud.^[369] In 2021, only weeks before Biden's inauguration, the recording of a secret tape was leaked, showing Trump attempting to pressure Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R-GA), whose home state went for Biden, to "find" enough votes to flip the state.^[370] Despite the established insanity of his presidency, not one person expected his final attempt to hold onto power to go as far as it did ...

Coup attempt and second impeachment

While the aforementioned phone call certainly qualifies as an impeachable offence, on January 6th, 2021, in perhaps the single most infamous and dangerous thing he has ever done, besides his horrible handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, Trump instigated an attempted self-coup by egging his armed supporters into storming the fucking Capitol, so they could stop Congress from certifying Biden's win in 2020.^[371] Said supporters were actively trying to assassinate multiple members of Congress, including Vice President Mike Pence, who refused to reject Biden's certification (which isn't even in his powers as VP, for obvious reasons), and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi; and it's quite easy to infer that they likely would not have stopped there. The ensuing mob violence killed five people^[372] and nearly led to the slaughter of an entire branch of government, as the entire Congress fled underground and evacuated the building, leaving the Capitol at the whims of Trump's mob until the National Guard came in to retake the building.^[371] In the midst of this chaos, Trump refused to deploy the National Guard (Pence did it instead), ignored panicked calls from his fellow Republicans, and reportedly relished in the violence being done in his name and by his words (read: cruelty).^[373]

After Congress reconvened and certified Biden’s victory, Donald Trump became the first President ever to be impeached twice. He is also the only incumbent president who refused to accept defeat during the election, the only one to have instigated insurrection, and the only one to have incited an attack on the Capitol. Although he was acquitted after leaving office,^{[note 18]} the damage was already done; his legacy is marked forever by this event, and it can be brought up at any time to paint him as the extremist that he truly is. This mark will be hard to scrub off, as he was permabanned from most of his social media accounts right after this event, due to the very real fear of more violence incited by his dangerous rhetoric.^[374][375] Gone is his ability to incessantly babble his way out of a bad situation, and people are left with this final memory of his presidency.

With nothing else to do, he gave a Farewell Address in the tradition of most Presidents the day before he hit the the road.^[376] January 20th, 2021 was a day that many anticipated. He decided not to witness Biden's inauguration (The first President to skip inauguration since Richard Nixon, and left for Marine One in the morning. He made a speech at Joint Base Andrews, implying he could be back in some way, before getting on Air Force One for one last time to his Mar-a-Lago estate. To the cue of YMCA, Trump finally left D.C., and as one last act, pardoned tax evader Al Pirro.^[377] The Trump era finally came to an end, but the post-Trump era has begun.

Post-presidency

For the time being, Trump remains somewhat adamant on returning to the White House in 2024. While super early polls suggest Florida Governor, Ron DeSantis, as a strong contender, Trump has claimed that he could beat him, though DeSantis says he isn't interested in taking the White House.^[378][379] Biden has been stumbling in bad luck with inflation and foreign policy, and because of the growing hostility towards the current administration, some have speculated that Trump could ride his way into a second term in 2024, and given the current state legislations making voting even harder, he might actually get his way. This is in spite of Trump taking his support of Putin to a new low by praising the invasion of Ukraine and refusing to condemn him.^[380][381] In March 2022, Trump announced if he is to run, Mike Pence would not be his running mate, which if he follows through would be the first time since Ford in his failed second term election bid in 1976 to pick a different person other than his first vice president as his running mate.^[382]

Mary Miller rally

On June 26, 2022, Trump held a rally for U.S. Representative Mary Miller (IL-15), in which she made a remark claiming the overturning of Roe vs Wade was "a historic victory for white life", with Miller clapping while Trump nodded and smiled in agreement.^[383]

FBI visit

On August 8, 2022, the FBI executed a search of Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate, looking for documents meant to be turned over to the National Archives.^[384] On August 12, the search warrant was released to the public alongside court records showing that top secret documents, including nuclear secrets,^{[note 19]} were recovered during the search.^[384] The warrant specifies three federal laws suspected to have been violated, including the Espionage Act (18 U.S. Code § 793).^[386] Many of Trump's supporters were furious over the raid and has led to multiple violent threats and acts towards the FBI, with some politicians even calling for abolishing the Bureau altogether.

2024 bid

Speculation that Trump would run again started almost as soon as he left office in 2021. The speculation finally ended on November 15, 2022, when Trump formally announced he will run in 2024.^[387] The DOJ has also said that Trump's 2024 candidacy won't stop criminal proceedings against him.^[388] However, as of Nov 25, 2022, it is uncertain whether or not a Special Counsel will be assigned to the case.^[388]

NFT, WTF?

“”"I can’t believe I’m going to jail for an NFT salesman."

—Baked Alaska, Capitol rioter, after Trump's big NFT cards reveal[389]

On December 14, 2022, Donald Trump posted a video on his Truth Social account with the caption, "AMERICA NEEDS A SUPERHERO! I will be making a MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT tomorrow." The post featured a video featuring a comic book cartoon of Trump ripping off a suit to reveal a superhero costume with a letter "T" as laser beams shot out of his eyes. Speculation was rife on social media what this announcement could be, with possibilities for the announcement including Trump announcing a running mate for his 2024 campaign or Trump announcing a return to his recently un-banned Twitter account.^[390]

The next day, Trump announced the big reveal, which turned out to be... NFT digital trading cards. Priced at $99 each, the cards feature hilariously machismo-style cartoon-ish images of Trump cosplaying as an astronaut, a fighter pilot, and more. Many of the images used in the cards reportedly were lifted and crudely altered stock footage and clothing photos found on the Internet.^[391] Even by the usual low standards of NFTs, the cards were widely seen as ugly, cringe, beyond parody, and a very obvious scam designed to grift his supporters of more cash.^[392][393] This announcement resulted in widespread mockery on social media.^[394] Even many conservatives (including Steve Bannon, Fox News editor Chris Pandolfo, BlazeTV host Chad Prather, and others) were flabbergasted and embarrassed by Trump's "Pokémon cards" (as Prather put it in a tweet).^[395][396]

Despite the WTF nature of the NFTs, the grift was successful: all 45,000 pieces sold out in 12 hours, raising millions for the company that produced the NFTs ^{[note 20]} and for Trump (who licensed his name and likeness to the company).^[397][398]

Indictment and arrest

On March 31st, 2023, the day that a lot of us were dreaming about, Trump was indicted for paying hush money to a porn star.^[399] To no one's surprise he did not take it very well, claiming that it was a political "Witch-Hunt" and that Alvin Bragg was "doing Joe Biden's dirty work".^[400] Certain other groups claimed it was a sign that the deep state would soon be exposed; the credibility is non-existent.^[401] To add another bucket of salt to poor ol' Donnie's wounds, he is now to face 34 felony charges. Needless to say, it's not looking very good for the Trump party nor his chances of winning reelection in 2024.^[402] He was arrested on April 4, 2023.^[403]

Rare moments of sanity

“”Our country is divided and out of control. The world is watching. Our country is totally divided and our enemies are watching.

—Trump accidentally says something truthful, but lacks the self-awareness that he is both the benefactor and partial source of the divisions.[404]

Despite his deplorable reputation, Trump is no exception to the stopped clock principle. Here is an incomplete list of the [somewhat] right things he has done.

• He regularly calls out the neoconservatives and their hired help.^[405] His annihilation of the Club for Growth was also on point.^[406]
• Trump's comments on George Bush having advance foreknowledge of the September 11 attacks and the lack of strategy post-9/11 from the Bush administration have led some in the right-wing news media^[407] (even confessed truther Alex Jones^[408]) to label him a "truther", although this isn't very accurate, as Trump backtracked from some of the advance knowledge comments, and he is not known for his truthiness.^[409] He also believes the famous “28 pages” redacted from the official 9/11 report were done to please the Saudis,^[410] which would appear to be partially accurate.^[411]
• On the bureaucracy front, he dropped a requirement that federal government agencies report on their Y2K preparedness 17 years after it came and proved to be a big pile of nothing.^[412]
• His administration sided with South Dakota in a Supreme Court case that allows states to collect sales tax for all online stores, even if they don't have physical establishments in the charging state.^[413]
• His claims on the troubles with (unfettered) free trade are largely correct.^{[414][note 21][note 22]} The Trump administration withdrew the U.S. from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and worked on modernizing the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
• Impressed by the Bastille Day parade in Paris, Trump said he wanted to top it in the U.S., but later decided against it, citing the tremendous costs involved.^{[415][note 23]}
• He signed into law a bill that upgrades the birthplace of the famed civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. in Atlanta, Georgia, into a national historical park. He also signed bills linking historical sites related to the civil rights movement and commemorating the first Africans' arrival in the English colonies in Point Comfort, Virginia, in 1619.^[416]
• Despite his "tough on crime" policies, he commuted the sentence of Alice Johnson, a first-time offender who was sentenced to life imprisonment on nonviolent drug-related charges.^[417] Trump later granted Johnson a full pardon.^[418]
• He issued an executive order forcing the Department of Defense to provide army veterans with mental health facilities after they leave the service.^[419]
• His administration banned bump stocks by defining them as "machineguns", which are illegal under the National Firearms Act.^[420]
• Even though it was jab at the Obama administration, he issued a pardon posthumously to former heavyweight boxing champion Jack Johnson (1878-1946). In his lifetime, Johnson was prosecuted for transporting a white woman across state lines in his car.^[421]
• During the 2016 Presidential Campaign, he advocated for allowing people to purchase health insurance across state lines. However, he has not so far implemented this plan.^{[note 24][422]}
• He supports paper backup ballots.^[423]
• On March 16^th 2021, in a blow to Trump-worshipping anti-vaccination conspiracy theory movements such as QAnon, Donald Trump urged America to get vaccinated for COVID-19, calling it "safe" and "something that works".^[424] His followers booed him at a rally in Alabama, but he tried to quell them by saying they have freedom.^[425] On the insanity side though, it was later revealeed that the Trump White House overruled a proposed 2020 CDC policy that would have put some limitations on church gatherings during the pre-vaccine phase of the pandemic, likely resulting in increased deaths Trump's supporters.^[426]

Iraq War?

In 2002, Trump appeared on Howard Stern's show and voiced his support (such as it was) for the Iraq War based on the "business opportunity" in the region (as Clinton put it) in 2011. However, Trump personally had a financial interest in opposing the war in Iraq and expressed concerns about the war soon after it had started: by 2004, it was well-known that Trump was an opponent of the Iraq War.^[427] In Las Vegas, Trump swerved the entire Republican Party, blasting the war louder than any Democrat would have:

Thousands and thousands of lives, we have nothing. Wounded warriors all over the place who I love, we have nothing for it.^[428]

Then, during the election, Trump used the Iraq War as one of the most common sticks to beat Clinton with, even going to far as to suggest Barack Hussein Obama and Hillary Clinton were the "founders" of Daesh for leaving a power vacuum in the region: a power vacuum Trump also would have left, as he was calling for the immediate withdrawal of the US from Iraq as early as 2007.^[429] When asked about running mate Mike Pence's decision to vote in favor of the Iraq War, Trump rather patronizingly said that Pence was "entitled to a mistake", and as for Hillary, "she's not".^[430]

It is clear then that Trump's views on Iraq are not as well-informed as they initially appear.

List of nicknames

“”Long live Emperor Trump!

—A Chinese fan on social media[431]

Donald Trump is a man of many nicknames: "The Donald",^[432] "John Miller",^[433] "John Barron",^[434] "David Dennison",^[435] "Don the Con",^[436] "God-Emperor Trump",^[437] "Mr. Brexit",^[438] and Cadet Bone Spur.^[439] One might also add "The Waanald", in light of his constant whining on Twitter and elsewhere whenever someone says something about him he doesn't like.

In China, he is also known as "Donald the Strong", "Grand Commander", and "Uncle Trump". Many Chinese despise the political correctness in Western societies and see themselves in Trump, whom they consider genuine, which is unusual for a politician. Another reason for their fondness of the head-of-state of a geopolitical rival is that Trump, unlike his predecessors, has no appetites for discussing human rights and democracy with China and prefers to discuss trade. Moreover, Trump seems to recognize that China, as well as its president Xi Jinping, as an equal.^[431]

During the George Floyd protests, Trump hid in the White House basement and turned off the lights, a feat that earned him the nickname "Bunker Boy".^[440]

Trump supporters

La Familia Trump consists of the usual suspects: a pack of celebrities as unfit to hold office as the man himself. We have dossiers on most of them:

• Jake Angeli: Became a terrorist to defend Trump.
• Joe Arpaio: Cartoonishly-corrupt sheriff of Maricopa County. Arpaio, whose department has been sued multiple times for racist policing practices by the federal government, declared "I'm with him to the bitter end."^[442] Subsequently repaid in full with a presidential pardon for his sundry crimes and human rights violations.
• Herman Cain: 2012 Presidential candidate for the Republican nominee. Died after catching COVID at a rally.^[443]
• Kenneth Copeland: Creepy televangelist who plays as a spiritual advisor for Trump. Supported him in 2016, and maniacally laughed at Biden's victory.^[444]
• Anti-PC crusader Ann Coulter: Hopped on the Trump Train early^[445] but appeared to sour on his 'half-baked tweets at midnight'. What's that old saying about a speck in your neighbor's eye?
• Dinesh D'Souza: Such a big Trump supporter he made a movie about it.^[446]
• David Duke: Practically inevitably, the former head of the KKK tweeted that Trump was "the only way to stop the commie Bolsheviks". Bizarrely, Duke also endorsed Tucker Carlson for VP.^[447]
• George Galloway: Here's a tricky one: Who would be a more terrible president, Donald Trump or George Galloway?^[448][449] Fellow Brexiteer Nigel Farage appears to agree with Galloway on this one.^[450]
• Sean Hannity: His inner construction worker cannot resist.^[451] Compared Trump to King David, who "had five hundred concubines", ffs.^[452]
• Alex Jones: Vaunted anti-government loon, is spreading the Trump Gospel – in essence, becoming a cheerleader for torture, the surveillance state, deportations, and zero-percent corporate taxes – all in exchange for a plug from Donald on his show.^[453]
• Arthur Laffer: Trickle-down needs to be brutally murdered because it won't fucking die on its own.^[454] (Shouldn't you be wrecking Australia's economy right now?)
• Greg Locke: Pastor who denies Joe Biden won, and that Trump is the legitimate winner. Also thinks there is a pedophile ring in D.C. tunnels.^[455] Locke has recently renounced his support for Trump, due to his promotion of COVID-19 vaccinations.^[456]
• Michelle Malkin: Sees which way the wind is blowing and announced she would be "pulling the lever for Donald Trump." This from the woman who called him a "conservafraud" two years before. Others might have taken offense at Trump calling them "born stupid", but not Malkin: she couldn't Stump The Trump, and hopefully gained "wisdom" from the experience.^[457]
• Ted Nugent: Of course, no collection of wingnuts would be complete without Nugent.^[458] Political life lessons from him are like filling the seats at the BET awards with KKK members.
• Mehmet Oz - He looks healthy to me! What do you think, studio audience?
• Dennis Prager: Admits he only supports Trump out of hate for the left. One of the most adamantly anti-Trump talk show hosts of the past year was, in fact ... Dennis Prager.^[459]
• Dan Quayle: The people who know what the job actually entails want nothing to do with Trump.^[460] That should tell you everything you need to know. Dan Quayle does, so there's that.^[461]
• Donald Rumsfeld: Trump's not doing so well in endorsements; he'll take what he can get.^[462] Let's speculate on other stupid endorsements he may get. Lynndie England? Ollie North? Is G. Gordon Liddy dead yet?
• Michael Savage: Called Trump "the Winston Churchill of our time."^[463] We live in savage times indeed.
• Phyllis Schlafly: Marital rape supporter stay-at-home mom and Equal Rights Amendment opponent.^[464] Now deceased.
• Martin Shkreli: "Most hated CEO in America" and convicted fraudster.^[465]
• Ben Stein: Once a flack, always a flack. "He wants a peaceful, calm America."^[466]
• Brenton Tarrant: Made the questionable decision to express his support for the Donald in his manifesto published before a terrorist attack.^{[467][note 25]}
• Andrew Wakefield: In case you thought Trump was the stupidest person in the room.^[468]
• Allen West: Wanted Trump to constantly visit Texas in 2020 in order to fanboy over him.^[469] Not surprising, given their shared love of unorthodox interrogation techniques.
• Kanye West: Trump's token black supporter.
• Milo Yiannopoulos: Refers to Trump as "Daddy".^[470] As the official spokesman for the Internet's sewer, Yiannopoulos half-jokingly yearns for a God-Emperor Trump to transform America into some sort of a fascist monarchy.^[471]

Similar people

• Benito Mussolini: Trump has adopted from him, consciously or not, many of the same gestures, rhetoric, body language, scapegoating tendencies, and authoritarian impulses all the way back when he was first a candidate for president.^[472] As President, these parallels are now no longer just parallels, but profoundly problematic executive policy.^[473]
• Silvio Berlusconi: Il Trump Italiano. Just subtract a foot of height and add underage Moroccan prostitutes.
• Boris Johnson: British Trump, from the anti-Obama racism and anti-immigrant stances to the terrible hair and larger-than-life image as a media personality. As Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Boris also caught flak for his less than stellar response to the coronavirus pandemic and tested positive for COVID-19.^[474] He also purges members of his own party for disagreeing with his policies, causing some of his ministers to also resign in protest.^[475][476] He also ran afoul of the Supreme Court, which unanimously found he illegally dismissed parliament to prevent them from scrutinizing his no-deal Brexit plan.^[477]
• Rodrigo Duterte: Former president of the Philippines who's also the oldest to be elected to their respective countries' highest office. He's been called the "Trump of the East" due to both being "self-professed political outsiders with a penchant for tough talk and shocking turns of phrase." They're known for misogynistic comments, outlandish bombast, impulsive and violent rhetoric, and being in favor of the death penalty for drug users.^[478]
• Andrej Babiš: A former Czech Prime Minister, who changed the tax system to benefit himself, has fingers all over the media, dominates the agriculture industry, and keeps trying to screw with his political opponents while complaining about entrenched corruption, insulting his critics, and inflaming anti-Muslim/refugee sentiment.^[479][480]
• Janez Janša: Former Prime Minister of Slovenia, Ivan Janša is known for making false claims, dressing up bald-faced lies as truths, accusing critics of being puppets to George Soros, promoting conspiracy theories on Twitter, including 2020 election denial-ism, which has earned him the nickname of Marshal Twito. He is a fan of Trump, an ally of Viktor Orban, and a notorious bigot who rails against migrants and journalists, even calling reporters "presstitutes." His career reads like a mix of Orban and Trump: beginning as a pro-democracy advocate, he turned hard right while in power, presiding over cronyism and corruption, dabbing into Antisemitism and Islamophobia, embracing climate change denial and anti-migrant rhetoric, and parading misogynistic language, up to publicly calling female journalists "washed-up prostitutes." With a coalition government in power, he has taken steps to degrade democracy and defeat any limitations to his power, including passing a law that removes the rights of most NGOs to take part in environmental assessments of infrastructure projects.^{[481][482][483][484]}
• Jair Bolsonaro: Brazil's most dangerous man who served as president from 2018 to 2022, Jair reads like he was bred from a Trump cloning factory. He once said to a woman who accused him of rape, "I would never rape you because you aren't worth it." He's incited violence from his supporters, and he is a notorious homophobe, racist, misogynist, and an incendiary reactionary on every social issue imaginable; he praised a dictator (Alberto Fujimori) for strong leadership, paid homage to a fascist colonel who tortured dissidents (including former President Dilma Rousseff), and repeatedly scapegoats society's ills on the weak and vulnerable. He even says "the only difference [between me and Trump] is that I'm richer!"^{[485][486][487][488]}
• Doug Ford: Canadian premier of Ontario, a "businessman turned anti-establishment politician", a "son of a wealthy entrepreneur" who "rails against elites" and "often shuns expertise". But similar to Boris, he has a stranglehold on power despite his own party not really liking him very much.^[489][490] He also awards family friends and political allies with patronage,^[491] and also attacks basic democracy by willfully ignoring court rulings in defiance of what the people say, as he changed the size of the Toronto city council to prevent them from voting against his policies in defiance of the courts saying such a thing was unconstitutional.^[492]
• Sebastián Piñera: Former President of Chile, another businessman-turned-chief of state, who resembles 2020-stage Trump, as an outright authoritarian who ordered the deployment of the military against peaceful protesters.
• Recep Tayyip Erdoğan: President of Turkey, another bloviating, loud-mouth racist authoritarian who ushered in a rise in xenophobia, racism against minorities (Kurds), violence against leftists (mostly Kurds and Turks), and attempts to overturn election results that didn't go his way (i.e. redoing the mayoral election of Istanbul only to then have his party lose by an even bigger margin).
• Benjamin Netanyahu: Former Prime Minister of Israel, who used fearmongering tactics against Arabs and Muslims to get elected, conducted a sterilization programme against minorities (Ethiopian Jews for Bibi, ICE detainees for Trump), antagonized Iran to help his reelection efforts, caused a political crisis that reached downright authoritarian levels (Bibi trying not to get indicted for corruption while navigating Israel's parliamentary politics; just about every major policy for Trump), refused to vaccinate a huge segment of the population (Palestine for Bibi, all of America for Trump), and dealt with a corruption investigation while in office.
• Narendra Modi: Prime Minister of India, infamous for presiding over thousands of race-related murders and inciting violence (against Muslims and Christians) as Chief Minister of Gujarat, with many criticizing his inaction at best and his outright hateful language as escalating the crisis at worst. Just like Trump, his party is known for courting fascists (the BJP even came into being from a group that was actively inspired by Nazis).

See also

Spawn of Trump

• Authoritarianism of Donald Trump
• COVID-19 pandemic#Calling Doctor Howard, Doctor Fine… Doctor Trump
• Foreign policy of Donald Trump
• Infrastructure policy of Donald Trump
• Presidential candidacy of Donald Trump
• Rhetoric of Donald Trump
• Conservapedia:Donald Trump achievements – the go-to source to prove that little has been achieved since January 20, 2017.

Trump shell companies

• Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House – Michael Wolff's book about the Trump campaign and Trump's first year in office.
• Know Nothing Party: Rick Perry publicly called Trump a "Know Nothing" shortly after Trump announced his candidacy.^[493] (And when Rick Perry thinks you've gone out to lunch, well ...)
• Ultracrepidarian. Also, hire ghost writers to write bestseller books in your name about how smart and rich you are.^[494]
• Nepotism – his daughter (Ivanka Trump) and son-in-law (Jared Kushner) are advisors to the President and are unable to get more than temporary security clearances due to being possible blackmail candidates.^[495]
• Paradise Papers – offshore money, which may or may not have been used for tax fraud, and happened to have named 12 filthy rich men in Trump's orbit.
• Pissgate
• Secure the border

Trump, the game

• Fun:A day in the life of Donald J. Trump
• Fun:Quantum Trump
• Fun:Trump insult generator
• Fun:Trump synonym generator
• Fun:Trump tweet generator

Trump subsidiaries

• Pat Buchanan: A failed paleoconservative presidential candidate who shares many of the same nationalistic ideas about free trade, foreign policy, and immigration.^[496] Naturally, he was an early and enthusiastic Trump supporter.^[497] (Buchanan and Trump were opponents in the 2000 Reform Party presidential primaries.) And what do you know?^[498]
• Charles Coughlin: An American Catholic priest who became the granddaddy of right-wing populism, nationalistic demagoguery, and globalist conspiracies.
• Paul LePage: I miss the old LePage, straight from the 'Go LePage, talkin' 'bout the soul LePage, set all his goals LePage,^[499][500] I hate the new LePage, the bad mood LePage, the always-rude LePage, spaz in the news LePage^{[501][502][503][504]}
• Ron DeSantis: Governor of Florida, who goes beyond just being a blowhard. He actively prevents masks from being enforced,^[505] he refuses to promote life-saving vaccines,^[506] he punishes government employees for accurately reporting on COVID deaths,^[507] and he dabbles in outright authoritarianism every time he feels threatened by regular people. He is the closest thing to a "Smarter Trump" that we can see.
• Rush Limbaugh, or should we say "Rash Libel" for the content of his venomous prose? bloated and self-indulgent shock-jock, who like Donald Trump related provocative statements with little regard for their truth so long as they fit right-wing memes. For that he was awarded a Presidential Medal of Freedom from Donald Trump. He is Trump's "intellectual" prophet even if without much honor.
• Joseph McCarthy: There are at least 40 million illegal immigrants. Some people say there are 30 million illegal immigrants. It's probably somewhere in the middle. 32, 33, 34 million.^[508]
• Richard Nixon: Who indirectly led to the bastard even having a chance at the presidency due to Roger Ailes and the Southern Strategy.
• Sarah Palin: Basically a Nostra-dumbass. She foretold Trump without even knowing it.
• Vladimir Putin. Russian dictator and war criminal seeking an American puppet, he found a predictable puppet in Donald Fredovich Trump. (Russian naming style gives a middle name from the father's given name. Donald Trump's father was Fred Trump).
• Ronald Reagan: A B-radio and film personality who completely changed his politics to appease his masters at GE TV theater. He was picked out of a hat because the name had a high recognition value. He didn't actually decide anything; he just read the lines he was given.
• Shinzō Abe: He was a far-right nationalist and former prime minister in Japan. He is in retrospect often referred to as "Trump before Trump".^[509]
• George Wallace: The OG non-PC presidential candidate. At least Wallace didn't use racist dog-whistles.

External links

• "Donald Trump Campaign Offered Actors $50 to Cheer for Him at Presidential Announcement", The Hollywood Reporter.
• "Donald Trump: 'I Could ... Shoot Somebody, And I Wouldn't Lose Any Voters'" – We're not sure the world is ready for a mad emperor Gordon Gekko.
• "The End of the World" — a 1958 episode from a TV show featuring a conman named Walter Trump, eerily similar^[510]
• Sesame Street mocking Trump: Ronald Grump Builds The Grump Tower, Grouch Apprentice with Donald Grump. Trump is so petty, this is why he wants to destroy the National Endowment for the Arts, which funds Sesame Street.^[511]
• Match of the Millennium. Trump Alert!
• See the Wikipedia article on Donald Trump sexual misconduct allegations.
• How intelligent is Donald Trump?
• The many nicknames of President Donald J. Trump.
• In four years, President Trump made 30,573 false or misleading claims: The Fact Checker’s database of the false or misleading claims made by President Trump while in office. (Updated Jan. 20, 2021) The Washington Post.
• His YouTube channel
• His Twitter Account - Elon Musk unbanned him
• A Rake's Progress — Trump's life story foretold in the 18^th century

Trump language

• His insults toward other candidates, The New York Times.
• The language he uses – is it "bigly" or "big league"? Neither – it's big lie.
• Donald Trump limerick generator
• Donald Trump Insult Generator, TIME.

Videos

• Never forget.
• RNC Prays For Democratic Defeat, Trump Victory - The fact that they're literally praying in an empty room is a powerful statement. So alone in their righteous anger.
• Donald Trump is the President!
• Building Trump's Wall. The B1M.
• The Tsar Spangled Banner. Sheet Music Boss.
• Donald, where's your trousers? Performed by Garret Dillahunt (as John Henry) and Mackenzie Smith (as Savannah Weaver) in Terminator: the Sarah Connor Chronicles.

Notes

References