Look up to meta tactics instead of down at muddy short term details. In this way we can vaguely understand and predict without specific facts and as things happen.
The apparatus of manipulation specific to Trump’s cult will continue to exist, and in fact be amplified, by martyrdom of the fallible man. He didn’t create it. He doesn’t maintain it. He doesn’t even benefit from it anymore beyond propping up his ego. A symbol is whatever you make it, eternal.
Many of his contrarian actions were and continue to be the input for exercises is doublethink: a useful tool. But, he’d make a shitty puppet dictator because he simply can’t follow the script. Even an intelligent fascist wants literally anyone else, just as everyone left of them except the accelerationists.
I’m applying the basics of Bernays, Herman, and Chomsky. I’m not an expert. But, this isn’t rocket science, either.
Nothing you are saying suggests that the manipulation you are loosely referencing would actually create the lightning rod they need in such a short period of time. Maybe they can find that person, but it would need to happen quickly–very quickly. They usually require a lot of trial and error, which they don’t have time for. That’s the problem the Dems are having with whether to replace Biden. Will Kamala be able to rally folks to the polls? It’s all manipulation. The speed is the key here with such short timeframes.
Here, I’ll do the hard one: Gary Newsom with AOC selling out principles for lifetime admission to the club as VP. If not AOC then another Justice Democrat will go for it. This would short term quickly and easily unify the big tent under a compromise platform with long term certainty of fully neoliberal outcomes. It’s not much different than the last two cycles.
It’d be even easier for Republicans with a dead Trump as a symbol. Give it a shot. Show me you’re worth engaging with.
