• @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        English
        231 month ago

        Upside is the cult of personality is attached to Trump, and no one else has been able to pull it off him. Trump is only effective because somehow, for some insane reason, he, personally, has a lot of devoted followers.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          91 month ago

          The cult is attached to Trump, yes. But when he dies his followers won’t suddenly wake up from their madness and flock behind a “normal candidate”.

          They will still go for the crazy ones who act and talk the way Trump did. There may not be a second Trump, but they are lost nevertheless.

          • @[email protected]
            link
            fedilink
            11 month ago

            But, hopefully, they won’t fall in line behind a single successor and instead splinter into a bunch of smaller, competing factions.

    • babybus
      link
      fedilink
      English
      17
      edit-2
      1 month ago

      Yep. When a dictator dies, it doesn’t necessarily lead to democracy and prosperity because the system is broken, and the next person simply assumes the absolute power.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        English
        111 month ago

        He doesn’t have “D” next to his name and has shown no indication of rationality, so yes.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        71 month ago

        Some will, some won’t. Cults of personality don’t tend to fare well without their personality, and Vance has all the charisma of a used tissue, so it’ll come down to how skillfully he can navigate things.

        Remember, a LOT of right-wing Christians think Trump is either a prophet, an agent of God, or (in some cases) literally Christ Himself. That’s an awful hard act to follow when your prophet doesn’t get taken up to heaven in a fiery chariot, or your Messiah doesn’t rise again after 3 days.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          21 month ago

          It they luck out the removal of the fda might lead to mass ergot poisoning then. Actually, fuck, a cynical government could absolutely just dose large chunks of the population with entheogens, the cia has pulled shit like that.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          English
          21 month ago

          I was talking about this with a friend not long ago and he floated the idea that Tucker Carlson could maybe replace Trump. He does have a fan following. The idea worried me.

          • @[email protected]
            link
            fedilink
            41 month ago

            I think some would likely float off to other charismatics like Flynn, RFK, Carlson, and various other grifters like Rogan. I can’t see the movement uniting behind another figure that I know of right now - Trump WAS the syncretic glue, and I don’t see anyone else being able to be all things to all men.

      • Bakkoda
        link
        fedilink
        English
        41 month ago

        Will they get a choice of it all goes really really haywire? I mean their faces are gonna get eaten regardless.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          31 month ago

          That’s the question. Let’s say Trump makes himself dictator. Who’s going to inherit the title when Trump eventually dies from old age or from falling out of a Russian window?