ehhhhhhhh no
Chou Toshio
i have a lot of friends who are moderates. i don't know about you, but the "shock to the system" you are attributing to trump generally turns into a humorous discourse on late night talk shows which turns his antagonisms and evil actions into those of a goofball emperor who can't tie his own shoes; the outlook that our current president lacks sensibility and motivation or a clear goal is not only false, but outright misleading and pernicious in outcome. the idea that a "shock" or an "insane event" can fundamentally change a system which recycles itself on spectacle every decade is laughable. a bit over a decade ago we started a never-ending war, and a bit over a decade later we've already run full circle back into the same machinations and conclusions which led us to continuing that war back then. certainly going to war and reaping nothing in the long run would wake people up and "question the system," but it clearly did not. there exists no event that can shake the fundamental trust that everybody in america has towards its electoral / political system.
what are we going to talk about in the next 4 years? everyday our president does something absolutely ludicrous, but by the next 24 hour news cycle it is either brushed aside, or turned into the butt of a joke. if people could make look at the man in office without the scope of
lol he's orange or
lmao he's so incapable!! we could possibly make process, but sadly that appears impossible at this rate. by the time this is all over we'll be back at square one and ready to elect him again. like i said, all my moderate friends detest trump, but at the end of the day their heart belongs to the current structure and changing it is tantamount to anarchy to them.
on "digital awareness," contrary to your assertion of higher awareness of trickery and buzzwords and whatever other tactics that are used, i only see an acceleration of these techniques in an ever-growing metadata age. i can claim "fake news" all i want, but at the end of the day that term has already been relegated to a punch-line or something like that. the people who were targeted by these campaigns haven't improved their logical perception or changed their understanding of modern media. you can post a million articles from wsj / nyt about how russian firms use metadata and mass bots to produce false pieces, but those sources are already compromised by trump's crusade at worst, and inaccessible at best.
i don't think that trump's presidency signals the death knell for white victimhood either. the victim complex has only skyrocketed in recent months and continues to be the trump card for the party's future. white victimhood is probably the absolute best tactic for drawing in moderates as the majority of that central group agrees that saying the n word is bad or something, but at the same time feels threatened by a nightmare of becoming a minority or admitting to contributing to systematic causes of discrimination. everybody in my town would probably agree saying slurs out loud is bad, but ask them if they feel if they personally contribute to inequality or if they identify as something other than american and all bets are off. identity politics for the white majority is at an all time high; keep in mind the situation manifests itself as a very eloquent argument that appeals to both the liberal and the conservative. take it from somebody who watches fox news daily whenever i am at my own house, white identity politics is the face of modern conservatism (unless you're white and muslim, like in the case of syria, which then your identity is portrayed as something else).
here's a good analogy. trump is the martin skhreli of politics. people look at somebody as a hero because they're "exposing the system by abusing it" or something like that. these people are assholes, but people treat their abhorrent shitty terrible evil actions with valor because they believe for whatever shitty reason this expose will change anything.
i'm watching fox news right now. it's black friday. people are rushing to stores on this day of sale because they can't afford any other day to purchase what they need. and they're sucking off the market and praising the holy tribunal of the economy, what a life.