this post was submitted on 19 Feb 2025
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[–] btaf45 1 points 19 hours ago (1 children)

Americans loathe the political establishment.

Yes. We certainly do loathe Traitorapist Trump and his billionaire oligarch clique.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago) (1 children)

I don't contest that Trump is an oligarch. Whether he is part of the establishment is (or rather was) a matter of definition. If, by establishment, we mean the specific cliques that run the two party system, then he was an outsider. He had the cash to run in their circles, but they despised him. Thus came Hillary's "pied Piper" strategy to encourage the media to pay attention to Trump in the Republican primary. She never even dreamed he could beat her in the general.

If we are being more general and referring to both the moneyed and political establishment then, yeah, he has always been establishment. He might not have been allowed to sit at the establishment cool-kids table, but he was one of them.

Still, none of that is relevant to his brand. He successfully positioned himself as an outsider breaking through the walls of power. That's what has made him so politically invulnerable. The more the political establishment and their talking heads talk about how bad Trump is, the more voters liked him. The list of things that Trump did or said that would have destroyed an establishment politician is a mile long but, in every case, it helped him.

[–] btaf45 1 points 10 hours ago* (last edited 9 hours ago)

If, by establishment, we mean the specific cliques that run the two party system, then he was an outsider.

Traitorapist Trump is by far the most "insider" there is in the GOP right now. And also its chief oligarch.

He successfully positioned himself as an outsider breaking through the walls of power.

He has successfully positioned himself as a pathological liar in a party that has loved dishonesty for many decades. He has successfully positioned himself as a fascist in a party that increasingly despises democracy and freedom. He has successfully positioned himself as a dumbass in a conservative movement that has been anti-science for centuries, opposing not just climate change but evolution and the idea that the Earth revolves around the sun and that the Earth is round and not flat. All Trump did was figure out how decadent and depraved the GOP had become before others did and got in front of it.

The more the political establishment and their talking heads talk about how bad Trump is, the more voters liked him

Trump is the most despised politician in the history of America. Ordinary Americans hate Traitorapist Trump way more than any "political establishment" ever did. The Baby Trump balloon and the Naked Trump statue weren't created by any "political establishment". What you are really saying is that a certain class of voters LIKE TO BE LIED TO by politicians, and LIKE POLITICIANS WHO ARE CRIMINALS, and WANT POLITICIANS TO BECOME MORE CORRUPT than they were before Trump.