Primetime speech – delivered with shouty spirit but no cheer – betrayed a figure dogged by a cost of living crisis and the looming release of the Epstein files

It will go down in history as the “Bah! Humbug!” address.

But this was not an address by a self-confident man dishing out Christmas presents to the nation. It smacked of desperation from one who can feel the December windchill of opinion polls – a Reuters/ Ipsos poll on Tuesday showed just 33% of US adults approve of how Trump has handled the economy – dissent in his own Republican ranks and the Jeffrey Epstein files looming on Friday.

The speech also revealed Trump’s need for a reliable foil. Over the years Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have been useful nemeses for a man and movement defined less by what they are for than what they are against.

  • TheDemonBuer@lemmy.world
    135·
    1 day ago

    “Eleven months ago, I inherited a mess, and I’m fixing it,” Trump said, starting as he meant to go on by telling a lie: he claimed that inflation was the worst in 48 years when he took office, when in fact it had come back down to 3%.

    He went on to place blame at the feet of Biden, previous trade deals, immigrants and what he described as a corrupt system.

    Fascists can’t actually solve problems, even though they will tell you they’re the only ones who can. They don’t have problem solving skills, that’s why they’re fascists. They blame, deflect and scapegoat, and do it very aggressively and forcefully. Unfortunately, many people mistake that for strength. But fascists are not strong, they’re weak, and they try to compensate for their weakness by acting very strong, in very superficial ways. That’s why they are so focused on hyper masculine performance.

    REAL strength is not an over inflated ego, it’s not threats and cruelty, it’s not being ignorant and proud of it, it’s not unnecessary aggression and violence. Real strength is accountability. Weak people think it shows strength to never admit when you’re wrong, but that’s completely false. Real strength is owning up to your mistakes, but not so you can crumble into self loathing, it’s so you can learn from them and become better. Real strength is learning, it’s knowledge and understanding.

    You can’t fix a problem that you don’t understand, and you can’t understand a problem if you are unwilling to look at it honestly and critically, without bias. But that takes humility and weak people think humility is weakness, and they think arrogance is strength. The opposite is true. Humility is STRENGTH. That’s why fascists can never lead, because leadership takes real strength and they don’t have it.