Trump is our 'boy in the bubble' -- a right-wing information bubble
In a storm of national challenges, perhaps the most urgent one is this: The president inhabits a different country from the rest of us.
It is a land where the novel coronavirus is harmless. Where hydroxychloroquine is still a miracle drug. Where President Trump’s handling of the pandemic is an example to the world. It is a land where Black Lives Matter is a movement of looting and violent subversion. Where the Confederacy is part of “our heritage.” Where police brutality is the desired norm. It is a land where every bad poll is a political plot, and the “silent majority” will always ride to Trump’s rescue.
Trump is not only using this right-wing information bubble to exploit his supporters. He also seems, increasingly, to have taken up residence there. As his failures have multiplied, his hold on political reality has loosened. Trump has become our boy in the bubble, with an intellectual immune system too weak for him to survive exposure to reality.
In one sense, every president struggles with this temptation. All of them live in a world of high security, familiar advisers and a cocoon of deference. How can you really be wrong when they play “Hail to the Chief” as you walk in the room? In most presidencies, this tendency is fought. Working with allies in the National Security Council and the State Department, I helped introduce President George W. Bush to a series of dissidents and human rights activists from Sudan, North Korea, China and elsewhere. Their stories touched Bush and focused his policymaking. At the White House, I sent Bush articles harshly critical of his foreign policy — which sometimes angered him but generally provoked discussion. This did not guarantee good results, but it enabled serious deliberation.
Trump has systematically removed sources of dissent and critical thinking within his administration — people such as Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats. Sycophants now occupy those posts. From the start, the president expressed distrust for the U.S. intelligence services — even publicly preferring Russian President Vladimir Putin’s word over their findings. Trump has recently disputed the views of government public health experts and tried to shift and sabotage their professional advice.
For Trump, everything is politics, and all politics is personal. Disagreement with his impulses is taken as betrayal. Dissent is disloyalty.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trump-is-our-boy-in-the-bubble--a-right-wing-information-bubble/2020/07/09/9aad6b18-c20d-11ea-9fdd-b7ac6b051dc8_story.html
In Trump's right wing bubble it was the Moops who invaded 8th century Spain, and there can be no disagreement.
