Distraction is a great strategy when you don’t want other people to know what you are actually trying to do. Donald Trump has taken that strategy to a whole new level by including “volume” in his distractions. There is an old phrase that states, “If you can’t persuade them with logic, baffle them with bullshit”. Trump appears to have mastered that concept, although whether he is bright enough to have conceived it himself is an open question.
The sheer volume of executive orders that have come out of the White House since his inauguration, and the mountains that are apparently still to come, may well be an attempt to distract the media and the public from his more nefarious goals. If you make enough noise, what is actually going on is easily hidden!
Watching Trump in his impromptu press conference with “Tech” leaders, it is obvious that he is declining in mental ability at least as much as everyone thinks Joe Biden has. That raises the question of who is actually behind the current avalanche of executive orders. The obvious answer is the architects of Project 2025, who have been working for four years or more on how to consolidate power in the White House and turn the presidency into a dictatorship. In that sense, Trump is their willing puppet, not that such a designation in any way excuses him.
The other outcome of the “avalanche” is that it is a great way to fulfill campaign promises while knowing that many of the executive orders will be rebuffed by the courts. “Hey, I fulfilled my promises, its not my fault that the courts/media/radical liberals overturned what I promised I would do”.
I always thought that cultivating the MAGA diehards was a brilliant strategy, which was way beyond Trump’s ability to come up with it himself. His son-in-law, Jared Kushner, maybe, be certainly not Trump himself. It’s just too far removed from his existence to have crossed his mind and, besides, he obviously despises them. Distraction by volume is again something that is difficult to believe can come from a senile, arrogant, egomaniac. Someone(s) is/are pulling the strings, and that is even more frightening.
If any of this is true, it behooves us all to look closely at all the executive orders, discard the “noise”, or at least set it aside for future analysis (much of it will have some serious consequences), and look for those measures that push us towards a dictatorial takeover. Make no mistake, that is the goal of the second Trump term: President for life and complete control: A combination of an ego trip and a “stay out of jail forever” strategy.
Someone sent me a quote this week which sums up the dilemma we find ourselves in when we are bombarded by Trump’s avalanche of executive orders. It said, “My desire to be well informed is currently at odds with my desire to remain sane”. It reminds me of the old latin saying, “Illegitimi non carborundum” (Don’t let the bastards get you down).
Executive orders will apply almost exclusively to domestic considerations. He can hardly issue executive orders for other countries, although his speech to the Davos meeting this past week, and his suggestion today that Egypt and Jordan absorb the Palestinians, would indicate that he thinks he can. (Presumably, he is supporting the Israeli Government’s goal of moving the western border of Israel to the sea thus eliminating Palestine and the Palestinians).
It is in the area of foreign policy that the real danger lies, if you set aside for a minute the decline into dictatorship at home. The domestic nonsense will be painful, but can be reversed in two, or four, years-time, even though some of it will have longer terms repercussions. Foreign policies are a different matter entirely.
Cozying up to Xi and Putin can have consequences that will not be easily reversed. Giving Putin free rein in Ukraine, and maybe Poland, giving Xi the space to invade Taiwan and take over the South China Sea completely, will not be reversed by anything short of a World War, as I have said before.
As a side note to this, it was interesting to see that Trump’s message to Putin this week included threats. That is against his previous buddy/buddy communications. It could mean that he is conveniently lying in public while talking to Putin quietly, or it could be evidence that harder-line Project 2025 members are pulling the strings – we shall see. In any case, Trump’s actions must be watched very carefully.
If all this sounds plausible/paranoid, you are right but, to finish with my over-used favorite saying, “Just because you are paranoid, doesn’t mean Trump/String pullers aren’t out to get you”.
