From: Vogel Responds to Brian Hales

[bill4long]

Brian Hales clearly has no concept or understanding of group dynamics. He gullibly thinks that early Mormons couldn’t be fooled by a charismatic type, but completely ignores how many were fooled by Adolf Hitler and are fooled by Donald Trump even today.

I won't disagree. (I'm not a Trumpist.) But it would be good to add Adam Schiff, Nancy Pelosi and a whole host of hoax-makers to that list. And the current idiot in chief.

[drumdude]

Brian Hales clearly has no concept or understanding of group dynamics. He gullibly thinks that early Mormons couldn’t be fooled by a charismatic type, but completely ignores how many were fooled by Adolf Hitler and are fooled by Donald Trump even today.

I won't disagree. (I'm not a Trumpist.) But it would be good to add Adam Schiff, Nancy Pelosi and a whole host of hoax-makers to that list. And the current idiot in chief.

I haven’t seen much of a cult of personality developed around Biden. He’s about as charismatic as a bowl of warm milk. But that’s what the country felt like it needed after the Trump fiasco.

[Kishkumen]

I won't disagree. (I'm not a Trumpist.) But it would be good to add Adam Schiff, Nancy Pelosi and a whole host of hoax-makers to that list. And the current idiot in chief.

There is a substantive difference between slimy politics as usual and an unhinged cult of personality.

[Res Ipsa]

Split thread, UR4; Moved to Paradise, not Mormon topic — RI

[bill4long]

I won't disagree. (I'm not a Trumpist.) But it would be good to add Adam Schiff, Nancy Pelosi and a whole host of hoax-makers to that list. And the current idiot in chief.

There is a substantive difference between slimy politics as usual and an unhinged cult of personality.

Clinton. Obama. Trump.

Okay. I get it. Cults of personality.

Unhinged any more than you personally about your point of view? I'd like to see convincing evidence.

You're just not that cool or smart.

[Gadianton]

I haven’t seen much of a cult of personality developed around Biden. He’s about as charismatic as a bowl of warm milk. But that’s what the country felt like it needed after the Trump fiasco.

I was going to say that right-wing abhorrence for Nancy Pelosi has nothing to do with left-wing worship of Nancy Pelosi. In fact, it's almost as dumb and nonsensical as Trump worship. When a right-winger criticizes Nancy Pelosi, their credibility takes an immediate hit for me. And this has nothing to do with me necessarily liking anything about her.

Several years ago, after I'd just moved into my new place and met the right-wing guy on my walk, he really took me by surprise with some of his forwarded right-wing emails. I was aware of the right-wing email phenomena as I had received a few as far back as the late 90s, and spuriously during the early 00s (I actually created my own right-wing email around '02). But I was a little shocked about just how influential they were for right-wingers, with my new friend being case in point. Anyway, most of them were incomprehensibly dumb. Nancy Pelosi was often the subject during that brief time I allowed this guy to forward me his trash. I didn't get it -- other than being a Democrat and being female in a high position, it wasn't clear what the outrage was about. In contrast, I at least comprehended swipes at Gavin Newsom and Bill Clinton (yeah, he's still a thing for 60+ Republicans).

I remember one was a joke this guy read; a guy is driving through a small town and hits an old cow, and goes to the door of a farmer and has a conversation about the accident, and somehow the conversation reveals that it wasn't an old cow that he had hit, but it was Nancy Pelosi. And my friend is laughing hysterically. Can't stop. I couldn't see how it was funny or had anything to do with politics. I could never figure out where the outrage to Pelosi was coming from.

Now that I think about it, I'll have to ask my friend. I haven't seen him for a few months and it may be a while before we cross paths again, but I'll keep it in mind to ask him about Pelosi. I'll ask him for one specific thing Nancy Pelosi did that he thinks was bad. And if he can't answer that, I'll ask him for one specific thing Pelosi did -- period. In fact, I'll start there. I'll bet he can't answer it. I'll bet after all his outrage toward Pelosi that he can't name a single thing that Pelosi did in her entire career.

[Moksha]

Lumping hydrogen and helium together with sarin gas seems the stuff of lazy and misleading chemistry.

[Kishkumen]

Clinton. Obama. Trump.

Okay. I get it. Cults of personality.

Unhinged any more than you personally about your point of view? I'd like to see convincing evidence.

You're just not that cool or smart.

LOL! Wow. Got your goat, evidently, without intending to.

You are not a Trumpist. You just react like one on DM.

OK. So, I never said that Democrats don't respond favorably to charismatic personalities. Obviously they do.

What I said was that Biden was not the focal point of an unhinged cult of personality. That is irrefutably the case.

[Kishkumen]

I was going to say that right-wing abhorrence for Nancy Pelosi has nothing to do with left-wing worship of Nancy Pelosi. In fact, it's almost as dumb and nonsensical as Trump worship. When a right-winger criticizes Nancy Pelosi, their credibility takes an immediate hit for me. And this has nothing to do with me necessarily liking anything about her.

Absolutely. Nothing. Right-wingers hate on Nancy Pelosi because she is good at her job, she represents what they dislike, and she disrespected their god, Donald Trump. I would say that hatred of Nancy Pelosi is more akin to leftist hatred of Mitch McConnell. It has nothing to do with Mitch's charisma. It has everything to do with his skill at frustrating Democrats' efforts to accomplish much of anything.

[Gadianton]

There is a substantive difference between slimy politics as usual and an unhinged cult of personality.

It may be he's one of a growing body of examples of a cult of criminality. According to Peter Zeihan, Barack Obama was a cult of Personality. Trump is something a little different than we've seen before.

Putin and the Kim regime are examples of cults of personality and they are criminals, but I'm not sure they qualify for what I'm thinking about (I could be wrong here) because my impression isn't that the personality cult brought them to power or significantly keeps them in power. But even if that were true, there is still a difference.

Trump is of the same genre as Sovereign Citizens who just make up whatever, and then never surrender, especially in the context of conflicting with the law. If Trump decides that green is red and red is green, then it's a matter of convincing enough followers in the right places to agree with him and point to the grass and say, "red". Unlike gravity, being president isn't one of those truths that persist when you go to sleep at night. If Trump and Rudy can wink at the Supreme Court or a few election officials and get them to say, "oh yeah, you're right, you did win!" then at some point he might succeed at being president.

Sovereign Citizens will be arrested over and over again for the same things and they'll just repeat the same string of nonsense. "I wasn't driving, I was travelling." It appears that folks who are able to tap into the zombie mode required to join the cult have a whole lot of determination and energy to continue. Maybe at some point, the cops will see that car without plates, roll their eyes, and let it go because it's not worth the hassle.

That saying, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing" is more like "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good (people) to tire of the repetitive nonsense of fanatics."

When Ajax speaks, you've got to slap him down every time. That's one thing that's heartening about all the lawsuits, I think it's a little risky, but it's one way to turn their game against them, in the one limited parallel of persistence. I've heard Arizona might get in on the dogpile, I hope they do.