What is it that Trump knows, but what the left has forgotten?
I am certainly not a fan or supporter of Donald Trump, but I have to acknowledge that he has understand (intuitively, not intellectually!) something about politics in general that his opponents and critics seem to have forgotten: that in politics (maybe even in life in general, if we subscribe to the philosophy of Schopenhauer or Nietzsche, as I do) at the end of the day everything boils down to power : Who is powerful and who is not (the "who" need not be a person, in most cases it is a group with a person as head, but the real power is in the hands of the group, not the "head" )
Trump, Putin, Boris Johnson, Bolsonaro, Matteo Salvini ... and their enablers and supporters know that power is not a tool in order to realize lofty ideals and moral values, but that it is the other way round: values and ideals are tools to gain and maintain power. That is the most profound insight of Nietzsche when he wrote about the Christian "morality of slaves": the weak invented certain values and ideals in order to undermine the position of those in power and to get themselves into a position of power; in the case of Christianity it worked very well : the former slaves became masters, and one of their most important tools in this struggle was their specific sort of morality. And of course: once the former slaves have turned into masters they conveniently ditched the ideals and became ruthless craftsmen of power struggles.
That is the crucial thing that most partisans of the Left have forgotten: that all their values and ideals are ultimately nothing but means to gain as much support as possible to finally grab political power, in order to serve their (economic and cultural) interests (their personal interests and those of their supporters).
This Machiavellian worldview may shock the starry-eyed who still believe in values and ideas as ends in themselves, not as tools in an eternal power struggle, but when they aspire to translate their ideas and values into reality they should learn that only those in power are able to change the course of the world (or only a tiny fraction of the world, their personal environment)..
Values and ideals without the Machiavellian / Nietzschean will to power, and a certain amount of ruthlessness associated with it, are junk and completely worthless, they are nothing but fictions and mental farts.
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Those who value power definitely have an advantage, either in politics or the corporate world. Those who do value power will tend to rise to the top, stepping on heads all the way up. They don't care about the people they threw under the bus, because to them it's the greater good that they be in charge. However this is paradoxical, because if someone on the bottom attempts to do this they will be shot down and prevented from advancing because they do not work well with others.
Happy_Killbot
Level 7
Sep 15, 2019
1
@mongo1977 Sometime after middle management and before becoming a department officer. It depends more on how the internal hierarchy is structured than anything else.
You could also say its around $350,000 +- $25,000 is when material power hits critical mass, although some have calcualted it to be much lower.
@mongo1977 About 29% ( 739/ 2473 ) of all billionaires do not have a college degree.
Only 30% of all fortune 500 CEO only have a bachelors degree.
The correlation between scholastic achievement and wealth is weak the higher you go, indicating that schooling can only earn you so much return on your investment.
Lets say there was a major promotion and you were up for it. For the sake of argument, lets say your opponent has had a slightly superior sales performance. If the opportunity presented itself to steal some of your opponents clients, thus giving you a critical edge and possibly earning yourself the new position. If you have dirt on your opponent, you might try a smear campaign to undermine their credibility to the promoting authority, or meddle in their personal affairs to attempt to weaken their performance. If you don't chose to do these things and instead stick to "moral superiority" your opponent will not hesitate to do the same to you, and then they will have the position and the power.
Superior achievement is in and of itself a resource, same as number of sales, marketing ideas, or charisma. If you lack these resources, you may be able to supplement others to achieve the same job. For another example from real life and in the post, trump became powerful by leveraging his popularity and charisma without having any former political achievement.
@mongo1977 The "dirt" could be fictitious. Suppose you sent them an email with an incriminating link, and when they clicked on it they were redirected to some shady site they shouldn't be accessing at work. I've seen this happen in real life.
If their is legitimate reason for someone in charge to be ousted, they should be removed. I guess all I'm saying here is that social Darwinism is real and doesn't always favor talent or skill, in fact in certain situations skill can actually hinder performance. When I was in the military, I observed that it wasn't uncommon for individuals with specific duties to stay in those positions if they were exceptionally good at it. Then people with less skill gained superior position. This happens all the time.
@mongo1977 I would agree that the ability to manipulate both people and the system is a skill strongly favored by social darwinism, and this can be verified accurate by the number of psychopaths in positions of power and people who are on welfare who magically get a job as soon as their term expires.
I do not have any idea what you mean by the oxymoronic " don't mind a bullshitter if they're honest" What does that mean? By definition, a bullshitter is someone who lies and an honest person is someone who doesn't bull shit.
So are you saying that the quest for power is nothing but a quest for ego gratification, and that platforms and policies are nothing but tools for obtaining and maintaining that power?
Sounds like politicians alright. Apparently groups with the most ego-ridden leaders are the ones that conquered neighboring groups and survived.
All that talk about making the world safe for democracy was nothing but posturing. And the big fuss about climate change, is the same?
WilliamFleming
Level 8
Sep 15, 2019
1
You give Trump way too much credit. He is a liar, thief and a conman and stupid people took the bait.
End of story.
RiverRick
Level 7
Sep 15, 2019
4
Enough stupid people took the bait for the republican and Russian bag of dirty tricks to put them over the finish line. Republicans are Machiavellian in that whatever it takes to win is fine with them even if it’s criminal. End justifies the means.
The competition between ideas has always been about supremacy, and as you've pointed out the ability to 'impose' your will, ideas and values, on others. The question lies in how this is done and how much the idea can be sold as "for the benefit of the people".
Trump actually plays a masterful game of maintaining the spotlight on himself, sucking the news oxygen from competitors. These are indeed 'interesting times'.
Pompey
Level 6
Sep 15, 2019
1
What He knew was Steve Bannon, Or whomever helped Him with electoral strategy.
How many votes did he lose by? Yeah, No 3D chess here.
CapriKious
Level 7
Sep 15, 2019
2
"How the Hillary Clinton campaign deliberately "elevated" Donald Trump with its "pied piper" strategy
"An email released by WikiLeaks shows how the Democratic Party purposefully "elevated" Trump to "leader of the pack""
"In its self-described "pied piper" strategy, the Clinton campaign proposed intentionally cultivating extreme right-wing presidential candidates, hoping to turn them into the new "mainstream of the Republican Party" in order to try to increase Clinton's chances of winning." [salon.com]
Daco2007
Level 7
Sep 15, 2019
2
Yes, I'd heard about this strategy too. They assumed Trump would be the easiest to beat.
What you've written is mostly true.
However, Trump didn't win anything by knowing something others didn't.
He is a malignant narcissist who duped a bunch of uneducated voters; who the establishment and its billionaires knew was easily seduced by compliments and Twinkies; who was perceived by the decent voter as the better option (with hope his antiestablishment rhetoric was the real deal) and who was up against the WORST democratic candidate, ever.
Athena
Level 8
Sep 15, 2019
5
I think the point he is trying to make is that malignant narcissism and twinkies is the thing that the left forgot about.
For whatever reason, people responded to it. Clearly the resources available to trump, ( not him specifically ) enabled his claim to power, and those resources were gained by having power in the first place.
I got his point.
Whatever the Left didn't consider has nothing to do with what Trump "knows" or "understands" that they don't. He is a malignant narcissistic who was, and is, just acting out his nature.
Please go away, loser.
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