Trump

[pogo]

One more instance of copying: the slogan “Make America Great Again” which they’ve made the theme of the conference:



The problem also being that the slogan is meaningless if you don’t say when “again” refers back to:

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc ... ns/491993/

[KlaxonCow]

And the thing is, even that was plagiarised from Maggie's "let's make Britain great again", as used in many of her speeches - itself a nationalistic pun that's been said by innumerable British politicians, including Churchill, going back an awful long time.

You see, in the British context, it's a pun. The name of the largest British Isle is "Great Britain". So "let's make (Great) Britain great again". A rousing nationalistic call to arms, wrapped in some linguistic humour.

(Reagan was a big admirer of Maggie and, truth is, what Americans call "Reaganomics" is basically just Thatcherism in its American incarnation. He admired her policies and basically just copied them. And, apparently, wasn't above lifting campaign slogans too, even when, umm, the "Great Britain / Britain great" pun doesn't actually work anymore.)

So, really, the trail of plagiarism on that phrase is extensive.

(I note that some Americans have even picked up on this and utilise the "Let's make America Great Britain again!" variant to poke some clever fun at what was, after all, a perfectly vacuous phrase - more joke than any practical policy - when it was uttered way back when in the British context, anyway. It never meant anything. It still doesn't really mean anything. "I will endeavour, in this political position, to improve things for this country"? Really? I'd bloody well hope so. That ought to be taken as read for any campaigning politician that their intent is to make things better. As opposed to what, after all? Some hypothetical opposition who're campaigning on their desire to make things much worse? Sounds bold, but is perfectly fucking meaningless.)

[pogo]

To be fair, it’s not just a reference to “Great Britain”, but an attempt to invoke an spect of the American psyche, that it’s the greatest country on Earth. In Britain we’ve gotten used to not thinking like that anymore, with our loss of Empire and as the rest of the world (including the US) has caught up and overtaken us. But the US still thinks like that, perhaps better captured by the phrase “American exceptionalism”.

The problem is it means many things to many people. It often means America is the most free, but does that mean the freedom to bear arms, or the freedom from fear of violence (made worse by the prevalence of firearms)? It means economic freedom, but is that freedom for individuals or freedom for firms from government interference. And so on.

So you need to be more precise when you say you want to Make America Great Again. Republicans have not given a firm answer, though in many cases they seem to be reminiscing about a time before Obama and before Bush junior. When someone else called Clinton was president. Which seems an argument for voting Democrat, not Republican.

[Dio]

Isn't that the genius of the slogan? By not specifying a date, everyone can pick their own, even if it's all contradictory. It's all about making you feel like you're voting for your own happiness. (And someone, in some meeting somewhere, will have used that phrase without doubt).

[pogo]

It’s great to motivate your base, yes. But it can be just as easily be appropriated by the opposition, or demolished with the simple question of “when was America great, that you want to go back to again?”. It’s not much use winning over undecided and uncommitted voters who can read into it what they like, such as e.g. the best way to Make America Great Again would be to put another Clinton in the Whitehouse.

[Little stoned kiwi]

It's a bit like Peter Molyneux promising to make a great games again.

[Dio]

or demolished with the simple question of “when was America great, that you want to go back to again?”.

That's a naive and weak attack. It's never been a good idea to use facts and logic to counter emotional appeal, and in recent years that appears to be getting even worse. So a factual question like that is weak.

Ignoring it is better, deprives it of oxygen. Countering it with an emotional appeal of your own is better. Most risky is to attack it emotionally, by trying to stand the candidate against a background of making things worse, but you need an emotional base to that not merely a factual one.

[pogo]

or demolished with the simple question of “when was America great, that you want to go back to again?”.

That's a naive and weak attack. It's never been a good idea to use facts and logic to counter emotional appeal, and in recent years that appears to be getting even worse. So a factual question like that is weak.

But Trump isn’t going to be always on stage, free to say what he wants. He will face the press. He will be in debates. There will be other opportunities for the media and public to challenge him and Pence as the campaign proper gets underway.

The debates in particular could be key. Even more than the Republican primary debates they are a chance to really examine what each candidate stands for – there’s no room to hide when there’s only two candidates up there. Probably they will just confirm what most people know already, that Trump is unfit to be president. It might make sense for him to sit them out, but I don’t think he would be able to resist given how full of himself he is.

[KlaxonCow]

or demolished with the simple question of “when was America great, that you want to go back to again?”.

That's a naive and weak attack. It's never been a good idea to use facts and logic to counter emotional appeal, and in recent years that appears to be getting even worse. So a factual question like that is weak.

It's even worse than that.

Because if Hillary were to utter “when was America great, that you want to go back to again?”, Trump's simple counter is to turn to the audience and say "is Hillary saying that America has never been great? Is she saying that there was no time when America was great, as she can't think of any such time?" and he's demolished her.

She can then be painted thereafter, in her own words by repeatedly showing the footage in attack ads, as "provably" an "American-hating liberal" who's never thought America was ever great, and so on and so forth.

Republicans already use that narrative and this would simply be feeding into it, making it seemingly true.

Don't even go near touching that with an extremely long bargepole. But, yeah, it's for reasons like that that political debate can't get out of the emotional appeal and it's trapped there, inside this irrational bullshit forever. Because you can't use a reasoned argument against an opponent who's just using pure emotional appeal (see Brexit referendum for more details).

If politics were Pokèmons, then emotional appeal would be "super effective" against reasoned argument.

[pogo]

Ah, but they don’t really get to ask each other questions. The debates are much more them answering questions put by a moderator, or moderators.

So, Donald: “When was America Great?”. He would be stuck as his promise to make America Great Again is pure rhetoric, and has no meaningful policies behind it.

Hilary: “When was America Great?”. “I think it’s pretty great right now. We have a strong economy, more people have healthcare than ever before, gay marriage is now legal, we have renewed relations with Cuba, got Iran to agree to end its nuclear weapons program, and are respected around the world. It’s not perfect, there is still work to be done. Which of us do you think is best qualified to do that?”

That’s the flaw in “Make America Great Again”. There isn’t really a time when it was, for everyone. Sure, once upon a time whites were more dominant, but since then there’s been civil rights, Loving v. Virginia, and decades of progress since.

[phattslagg]

Or, she could simply take the initiative and start with "Donald Trump says he wants to make America 'great' again.." and then destroy him from many angles as to why this is rhetorical bullshit.

[Dio]

What, telling the rest of the world the Donald's slogan? I think he might be fairly happy about that. The first thing out of her mouth is his own words.

[phattslagg]

What, telling the rest of the world the Donald's slogan? I think he might be fairly happy about that. The first thing out of her mouth is his own words.

Except they're not his own words - they're nothing more than a tired cliché, to which you seem to be accrediting too much power. Trump doesn't own that phrase, unless he becomes the only one willing to utter them. There should be little risk in an experienced politician like Hillary using Trump's slogan as a stick to beat him with.

[merman]

Of course, Trump talks about taking jobs back to America while sourcing his merchandise from factories in Mexico.

And when Donald Trump Jr represented his state's delegates, he said he was proud to put Dad OVER THE TOP.

If there is one thing we can say about Trump, he is over the top - although he also combs it sideways a bit.

[zip accident]

A long time ago I read a version of this:



Later, when I heard about Trump, I wondered whether it was the same guy (the name sounds completely bogus to me), apparently they both wear trademake black suits.

Now I look at his website, and he's 100% behind Trump.

Is he for real?