Yeah :(
But don’t get me wrong, my views were based on him not willing to do even that, so this still calls for re-evaluation
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Biden is not better than Trump on the border. Better in some ways and worse in others. As far as undocumented people who have been living in the USA though it’s not really close. Afaik Biden hasn’t been doing the rounding people up stuff that Trump was doing and anything like undocumented kids getting to attend school or get student loans or anything like that I think there is a pretty clear division and Trump is a lot worse.
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I mean, there are very fine people, on both sides.
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Biden has a much better range of outcomes because he is capable of changing his mind for the better.
Whereas Trump will only change his mind for the worse when the Steven Millers of the extended MAGA world suggest even more heinous shit than Trump’s tiny brain is capable of envisioning.
I suppose you could trick Trump into doing good if you can convince him that it’s a way to get revenge against one of his perceived enemies.
Sounds like a theoretical construct more than something that could actually happen. Could you think of any examples?
Well he banned bump stocks but that was apparently a ploy so congress didn’t have to vote and with the assumption that SCOTUS would scuttle it.
Trump really is a genius thinking several moves ahead of his competition
Many are saying
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Or he actually likes gun control, which is one of the few things he’s been consistent on for 50 years or whatever
I think he randomly clicks buttons.
Edit: I suppose both could be true but I’m skeptical he has any principles that he cares about
I assume this was Mitch driving the strategy (if this is accurate).
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Not truly, and certainly nothing he cares about more than personal success and adulation. But I do think he has (or had) a “uh, let’s do something about this gun situation…” instinct. He voiced it at one point and his people freaked the fuck out, so he never said it again and would now deny ever saying it.
This is a stretch, but I guess a positive thing about Trump is that he cares about his public image (maybe the only thing he truly cares about) and could maybe be influenced by popular opinion in a way regular pols couldn’t. The fact that Americans overwhelmingly support gun control might actually matter to him. You could also see this with other publicly popular but politically unpopular positions, especially anything that attacks “the swamp”, like banning congressional stock trading.
I’m skeptical that he could ever get it done in a competent manner but there’s at least a chance of him making the right noises on a couple of things like this. (And then others in power shut it down because the donors would hate it.)
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But damn, maybe Trump truly is the only chance this country has at gun control. If anyone else tried to do it, his base would riot. But if he tried it, maybe they’re so deep in the cult that they’d be like “we love our guns but Trump is right”. Or maybe he spins gun control as a way to attack “inner city crime” or some other dog whistle and his people eat it up.
Man this is depressing to think about.
https://x.com/byelin/status/1802689138719617286?s=42&t=BdGqezUVNXch4IkOIkahig
Part that is snipped is:
This voter was so frustrated that the program was stopped, that he’s gonna vote for Trump.
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Narcissists like Trump don’t think this way, I don’t think. It’s too organized and calculating, whereas he’s pure reactionary. To Trump it is better to provoke the effusive praise of the people right in front of him than it is to target some abstract majority support. His ego can just say that the poll/election results that show he isn’t broadly popular are FAKE NEWS but the 100 low info Republicans cheering him and calling him a God are things that feed his emotional needs.
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Trump is pushing for mass deportation and isn’t doing other crap like pushing for religious tests.
This is my next sentence.