Sure, all I have to go on from the other side of the Atlantic is the internet. So in that regard, kinda like the AI.
One of the big surprises from the POV of me in Jan 2024, is that I would have anticipated Trump being in prison and not even available as an option for the Republican party to select as a candidate for office, and that even if he had not gone to jail that the Republicans would not want someone who behaved as he did on Jan 6 2021.
I am surprised the grandparent poster didn't think Trump's win was at least entirely possible in January 2024, and I am on the same side of the Atlantic. All the indicators were in place.
There was basically no chance he'd actually be in prison by November anyway, because he was doing something else extremely successfully: delaying court cases by playing off his obligations to each of them.
Back then I thought his chances of winning were above 60%, and the betting markets were never ever really in favour of him losing.
Whether he would win the general was an open question then. In the American system, your prediction should never get very far from a coin flip a year out.
It's the White House that wanted Trump to be candidate. They played Republican primary voters like a fiddle by launching a barrage of transparently political prosecutions just as Republican primaries were starting.
And then they still lost the general election.
Yes, that is what he thinks. Did you not read the comment? It is, like, uh, right there...
He also explained his reasoning: If Trump didn't win the party race, a more compelling option (the so-called "50-year-old youngster") would have instead, which he claims would have guaranteed a Republican win. In other words, what he is saying that the White House was banking on Trump losing the presidency.
Well, I guess, if you are taking some pretty wild speculation as a reasoned explanation. There isn't much hope for you.
Maybe it was because the Democrats new the Earth was about the be invaded by an Alien race , and they also knew Trump was actually a lizard person (native to Earth and thus on their joint side). And Trump would be able to defeat them, so using the secret mind control powers, the Democrats were able to sway the election to allow Trump to win and thus use his advanced Lizard technology to save the planet. Of course, this all happened behind the scenes.
I think if someone is saying the Democrats are so powerful and skillful, that they can sway the election to give Trump the primary win, but then turn around and lose. That does require some clarification.
I'm just hearing a lot of these crazy arguments that somehow everything Trump does is the fault of the Democrats. They are crazy on the face of it. Maybe if people had to clarify their positions they would realize 'oh, yeah, that doesn't make sense'.
How the heck did you manage to conflate line of reasoning with claims being made?
> There isn't much hope for you.
And fall for the ad hominem fallacy.
> crazy arguments that somehow everything Trump does is the fault of the Democrats
While inventing some weird diatribe about crazy arguments claiming Democrats being at fault for what Trump does, bearing no resemblance to anything else in the discussion.
> They are crazy on the face of it.
As well as introducing some kind of nebulous legion of unidentified "crazy" straw men.
> that doesn't make sense
Couldn't have said it better myself.
> Maybe if people had to clarify their positions
Sad part is that asking for clarification on the position of that earlier comment would have been quite reasonable. There is potentially a lot we can learn from in the missing details. If only you had taken the two extra seconds to understand the comment before replying.
Like when hearing something out of left field, I think the reply can also be extreme, like saying 'Wuuut????, are you real?".
I do see claims that the Democrats are at fault for us having Trump. Thus anything that happens now is really a knock on effect of Democrats not beating him, so we blame Democrats instead of the people that actually voted for Trump or Trump himself.
So hearing yet another argument about how Democrats are so politically astute that they could swing the Republican primary yet completely fumble later, just seems like more conspiracy theories.
If you mean your own comments, yes, I saw that too. Your invented blame made about as much sense as blaming a butterfly who flapped his wings in Africa, but I understand that you were ultimately joking around. Of course, the same holds true for all other comments you supposedly keep seeing. You are not the only one on this earth who dabbles in sarcasm or other forms of comedy, I can assure you.
> Like when hearing something out of left field
The Democrats preferring to race against Trump instead of whomever the alternative would have been may not be actually true, but out in left field? Is this sarcasm again? They beat Trump before. Them seeing him as the weakest opponent at the time wouldn't come as a shock to me. Why you?
> So hearing yet another argument about how Democrats are so politically astute that they could swing the Republican primary
There was nothing to suggest political astuteness. The claim was that they were worried about someone other than Trump winning the Republican ballot and, because of that, they took action to grease the wheels of his victory. Even the most inept group of people would still see the motive and would almost certainly still take action. That it ostensibly worked is just as easily explained by dumb luck.
>"It's the White House that wanted Trump to be candidate. They played Republican primary voters like a fiddle by launching a barrage of transparently political prosecutions just as Republican primaries were starting."
This really did sound like it " suggest political astuteness"
And, so all the way back, I responded sarcastically. If Democrats could 'Play Republicans like a fiddle", because they wanted Trump to win the primary. Then what happened? Where did all that 'astuteness' go.
1. What suggests that astuteness is required to "trick" the gullible? Especially when we are only talking about a single instance of ostensible "success", not even demonstration of repeatability. Dumb luck remains just as likely of an explanation.
2. Under the assumption of easy manipulation as the phrase has been taken to mean, why do you find it unlikely that Trump couldn't have also "tricked" them?
In fact, if we buy into the original comment's premise, the Democrats not recognizing that Trump could just as easily "play them like a fiddle" suggests the exact opposite of being astute from my vantage point. But the view from my vantage point cannot be logically projected onto the original comment. It remains that the original comment gave no such indication either way. Where do you hear this "sound" that you speak of?
I just think 'playing like a fiddle' typically means a lopsided power dynamic where one person has much more knowledge, or skill. So I'd assume it was implying Democrats were in a superior position. Not, that Democrats just got lucky once. This going back and forth pointing fingers about who was playing , seems like too many layers deep.
it feels like this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMz7JBRbmNo
And that is an equally fair assumption. But it is not written into the original comment. You cannot logically project your own take onto what someone else wrote.
Your quip "So it is the Democrats fault we have Trump???" presumably demonstrates that you understand exactly that. After all, if you could have logically projected your interpretation onto the original comment there would have been no need to ask. You'd have already known.
Still, how you managed establish that there was even potential suggestion of "fault" is a head scratcher. Whether or not the account in the original comment is accurate, it clearly only tells a story of what (supposedly) happened. There is no sensible leap from an ostensible historic account to an attribution of blame.
You seem to indicate, if I understand you correctly, that because you randomly had that idea pop into your head (that Democrats are at fault) when reading the comment that the other party must have also been thinking the same thing, but I find that a little unsatisfactory. Perhaps we need to simply dig deeper, freeing ourselves from the immediate context, and look at the line of thinking more broadly. What insights can you offer into your thought processes?
The original comment did seem to imply that the 'White House' was in control, with a plan, and 'played' the Republicans.
The original comment made the connection that Democrats were taking action. If I'm allowed to assume that when someone makes a comment, that sentences are related. That sentences can follow one another and be related in a context.
And as far as my context viewing the comment. I have heard this idea ::
Trump is doing bad things -> Democrats failed to beat Trump -> Thus Democrats are the cause of bad things.
The original comment seemed to be in that vein. To attribute much greater responsibility to the Democrats for our current situation, instead of the people actually doing the bad things. aka Republicans. They are actually doing the bad things.
Yes, it claims that the Democrats took action. That does not equate to blaming Democrats.
You could blame the Democrats for what they supposedly did if that's what the randomly firing neurons in your brain conclude is most appropriate in light of the "facts" presented, but blame is just arbitrary thought. It doesn't mean anything and certainly wouldn't have a place in an online discussion.
You also agreed with me in that interpretation.
Your reply >>> "Yes, that is what he thinks. Did you not read the comment? It is, like, uh, right there...
"
Are you sure you aren't using this circular logic to keep someone engaged, in order to have someone to talk to?