Trump's New Recruits

[Nevilledog]

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Jan Hartman
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"Saturday night’s Ohio rally was not a typical Trump carnival, and it was not just ridiculous—it was dangerous," @RadioFreeTom writes.

theatlantic.com
Trump’s New Recruits
He’s embracing the QAnon conspiracy theorists
3:33 PM · Sep 19, 2022

https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2022/09/trumps-new-recruits/671480/

No paywall
https://archive.ph/f1n26

A Reckless Escalation

Trump rallies can often seem ridiculous, not least because Trump himself is inherently a ridiculous person. He grips the podium and shouts, his sweaty angst giving rise to a reddish tinge apparent even under the thick layer of orange-hued chemicals he slathers on his face. In these moments, stock phrases and gimmicky asides pop out of his mouth like lottery numbers churning to the top of a Powerball machine.

But Saturday night’s Ohio rally was not a typical Trump carnival, and it was not just ridiculous—it was dangerous. His embrace of the QAnon conspiracy theorists represents a new expansion not only of Trump’s cult of personality, but of his threats to sow violence.

Despite his seeming inability to remember anything from one thought to the next, Trump has a kind of lizard-brain awareness of danger—only to himself, of course—that guides him when he’s faced with threats. His reflex in such situations is to do whatever it takes to survive, including bullying, lying, threatening, and breaking the law. He is in political and legal jeopardy now, and he has decided to escalate his war against the rule of law, the American system of government, and the American people by embracing and potentially weaponizing QAnon.

The QAnon movement might seem as ridiculous as Trump, but it is tragic and hazardous. As my friend Rob Tracinski wrote recently, it is “an online grift that got out of hand and became a worldview,” and millions of people now believe that there “is a global network of pedophiles who secretly run the world and control our politics so that they can abuse children.” This is no ordinary conspiracy theory about commies fluoridating the water; the emotional punch of threats to children has already led to near tragedies and, in some cases, disastrous outcomes involving unstable and violent people.

*snip*

[Celerity]

1. K & R for visibility

[Goonch]

2. False QAnon Conspiracies in Politics: Trump Embraces QAnon at Rally

[Jade Fox]

3. How prone to actual violence are the QAnon nuts?

That's what I wonder. Are they a serious threat, or just more of the video game veterans who love to dress the part but have no combat experience in the real world?

[kimbutgar]

4. I felt sorry for the children at that rally they all looked stressed and scared