Since World War II, the ideology he represents has usually lived in dark corners, and we don’t even have a name for it anymore. The right name, the correct name, the historically accurate name, is fascism. I don’t use that word as an insult only. It is accurate.
.. Trump also tosses little bones to the religious right, enough to allow them to believe that he represents their interests. Yes, it’s implausible and hilarious. At the speech I heard, he pointed out that he is a Presbyterian, and thus he is personally affected every time ISIS beheads a Christian.
.. What’s distinct about Trumpism, and the tradition of thought it represents, is that it is not leftist in its cultural and political outlook (see how he is praised for rejecting “political correctness”), and yet it is still totalitarian in the sense that it seeks total control of society and economy and demands no limits on state power.
.. Whereas the left has long attacked bourgeois institutions like family, church and property, fascism has made its peace with all three. It (very wisely) seeks political strategies that call on the organic matter of the social structure and inspire masses of people to rally around the nation as a personified ideal in history, under the leadership of a great and highly accomplished man.
.. This is how strongmen take over countries. They say some true things, boldly, and conjure up visions of national greatness under their leadership. They’ve got the flags, the music, the hype, the hysteria, the resources, and they work to extract that thing in many people that seeks heroes and momentous struggles in which they can prove their greatness.
New York Times profile of Trump: Aug 26 1980
I realized then and there, Mr. Trum concluded, “that if you let people treat you how they want, you’ll be made a fool. I realized then and there something I would never forget: I don’t want to be made anybody’s sucker.”
.. Architecturally, what M. Trump calls the hotel’s “sleek glass frame” has already been criticized. “It is the sort of flashy hotel one would expect in Atlanta or Houston, but certainly not in New York,” wrote Paul Goldberger in the New York Times. “It is essentially an out-of-towner’s vision of city life.”
“I’ve always been interested in art.”
A visitor observed that there was no art in Mr. Trumps’s office.
The developer considered this for a moment. Then, with a smile, he pointed to an idealized illustration of Trump Tower hanging on one of the walls.
“If that isn’t art,” Mr. Trump said, “then I don’t know what is.”
Putting Donald Trump on the Couch
What’s more mysterious are the roots of his vast insecurity — his compulsive need to trumpet his wealth, his smarts, his popularity. What is he compensating for?
When Hollywood wants us to understand a character, it gives us a Rosebud — an event or an object, like the wooden sled in “Citizen Kane,” that reflects the character’s essence. Mr. Trump’s Rosebud moment, I learned recently from a story on WNYC, happened one day in 1964, when he accompanied his father to the opening ceremony of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge.
As Mr. Trump recounted the story for Howard Blum in The New York Times in 1980: “The rain was coming down for hours … But all I’m thinking about is that all these politicians who opposed the bridge are being applauded.” Even as a wet-behind-the-ears kid, he wanted the reporter to understand, he couldn’t abide the hypocrisy of big shots. “In a corner,” he continued, “just standing there in the rain, is this man, this 85-year-old engineer who came from Sweden and designed this bridge, who poured his heart into it, and nobody even mentioned his name.
The ribbon-cutting ceremony of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge on Nov. 21, 1964. Credit Associated Press
“I realized then and there,” the budding real estate mogul and future Republican front-runner concluded, “that if you let people treat you how they want, you’ll be made a fool. I realized then and there something I would never forget: I don’t want to be made anybody’s sucker.”.. “Donald must have made a conscious decision that day in 1964 to make sure his name was prominently stamped on everything he built.”
.. “Great salespeople truly understand the people they are dealing with,” Mr. Trump has written. And who are the people that he is closing his presidential deal with? People who are afraid that they are being made suckers too. Mr. Trump’s angry certainty that immigrants and other losers are destroying the country while the cultural elites that look down on him stand by and do nothing resonates strongly with the less-educated, lower-income whites who appear to be his base.
.. Doug: Here’s the irony: Trump IS now ‘the man’ making everyone else HIS sucker.
He is NOT the engineer who designs his buildings: HE is the one who puts HIS name on the buildings and collects the rent and reputation. (and when ventures go belly-up with bankruptcy, someone else takes the hit for it)
A Heckuva Job
The point is that those predicting Mr. Trump’s imminent political demise are ignoring the lessons of recent history, which tell us that poseurs with a knack for public relations can con the public for a very long time. Someday The Donald will have his Katrina moment, when voters see him for who he really is. But don’t count on it happening any time soon.