[Help] Coping strategies for Donald Trump

jcdenton08 said:

Oh come on. This is very dramatic.

He can’t have another election due to the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution. So you’re right there, he won’t be running again for President in the ballot boxes.

The guy is a scumbag, sure, and he’s a nutter to boot with a cult of personality built around him. But there’s absolutely no way he’ll be able to change the Constitution to have a third term.

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A1X said:

The problem with the constitutional guardrails is they’re only worth anything if people are prepared to be sufficiently brave to stick to them. This, more than ever, means physical bravery in the face of threats and intimidation. The last few years could have looked a lot different had Mike Pence not decided his loyalty was to the constitution and not to Donald Trump on 6th January 2021.

And as of yesterday, Trump now has a 1,500 strong militia who can now buy whatever guns they want (as they are no longer convicted felons) and who have complete loyalty to him. Who’s to say they don’t try to storm the Supreme Court to get their way in the same way they nearly managed with the Capitol? And if they do, who’s coming to the rescue of the occupants, as the DC authorities all report to the President?

As it is, I don’t think he’ll get another term because of the dementia, but the general point remains.

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jcdenton08 said:

I think America is too “free” for this to happen. Look at the attempted coup in South Korea, and most of those lads aren’t armed to the teeth. If an attempted coup of power does occur, Trump would end up with two the neck. It just won’t happen IMHO.

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A1X said:

Let’s hope so. But the fact it’s even a vaguely plausible outcome should be enough to make anyone worry.

Still, I’m sure it’s all “lefty tears”…

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goldstone said:

Trump's re-election is the best thing that has happened in the USA for four years. Possibly also the best thing for the rest of the world. The guy is far from perfect, but just look at the alternatives. When I heard his statement that from now on there are only two genders, male and female, I knew we were on the right track. Those are the words of a man blessed with common sense.

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goldstone said:

Trump's re-election is the best thing that has happened in the USA for four years. Possibly also the best thing for the rest of the world. The guy is far from perfect, but just look at the alternatives. When I heard his statement that from now on there are only two genders, male and female, I knew we were on the right track. Those are the words of a man blessed with common sense.

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Brian Munich said:

My main coping strategy is that his pro-business-but-f***-everything-else philosophy has already been very good for my pension and share portfolio, which is very heavy on US tech stock. It's very kind of all the rednecks in Hicksville to have considered people like me when casting their votes, coz I can't imagine Trump gives a shiney shit about them.

Other coping strategies are the comfort that it's only 4 more years, at the most, and let's face it, he's not the healthiest, is he?

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Bakero said:

I'll embrace the absurdism; sympathising with immediate victims of his policies while rolling my eyes at the moments of ridiculousness. It's beyond my power to change it so it won't stress me out or anger me

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jcdenton08 said:

I’m pretty confident he won’t have another term or make any (serious) attempts to do so.

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Professor Plum said:

Sadly, I think you may be wrong on this one. Russia also had a 2-term limit until Putin arrived and made a presidential decree to allow multiple terms. Trump is a great admirer of Putin, and they have a good relationship despite the stage-managed occasional bellicosity. Trump has already made some slanted references to his plan to reshape presidential power. In fact, I think technically the constitution says no president can serve more than 2 terms but it doesn’t state a strict time limit for the 2nd term. In other words it’s possible he could simply continue on as president. However, the resistance to this would be so strong and, frankly, probably violent, that I doubt he’d get away with it.

Returning to the main topic, I agree with you and others who say that the best policy is to block out, as far as possible, exposure to Trump and everyday news. I’ll never be able to eliminate all knowledge of world politics, nor would I want to. But I realised some time ago that I was an utter news junkie. I would listen to phone-ins, podcasts, and religiously watch Question Time, PMQs, Newsnight, Sunday morning politics shows blah blah.

It didn’t make me happier. The opposite. It was squeezing all joy from my life and stressing me out. I finally learnt that the political world will continue without my constant monitoring and that my constant interventions in newspaper comments and Reddit and other online forums will never change a single opinion, just as my views never alter after reading the opinions of others.

The Thread Ignore function here is the most magnificent of features. I do sometimes comment on political threads as they pop up but I quickly put them on Ignore as I sense myself being drawn into yet another pointless game of political ping-pong. All this does is stress me out and damage relationships with other posters who I’m sure are actually pretty decent people. It doesn’t help that I don’t fit into a convenient political party box which means I usually agree with some views a person has and strongly disagree on others. It gets too, too complicated for my small brain to manage.

Trump is an attention-seeker by definition. It’s a personality trait that his impact, and his popularity with some, is actually founded on. I can do nothing about Trump except deprive him of a miniscule flake of that attention he needs. It makes no impression on the external real-world of course. But it makes me feel significantly better equipped to shelter from the fountain of shit he has just activated.

Thank you for listening, and I hope some others might just reconsider their relationship with social media and 24-hour news, and reflect on how much good (or otherwise) it’s doing to us as individuals, and as a society.

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Braggfan said:

If it helps, I think a lot of the crazy outrageous stories are diversions. I think his team produce a lot of extreme inflammatory stories, designed to agitate people like us, because it diverts our attention away from the things he really wants to do. I find that helps me to manage my anger towards him, knowing that its his plan to bait people like us. He wants us to be angry and distracted.

In terms of things like reversing all the diversity and inclusion schemes that I read about this morning. We might not be able to stop him doing that, but we can do something about the world around us. We can be kind and respectful to those in the world around us. We can stand up for those who need it. We can stand in opposition to those views. And if we hear people around us repeating his claims, then we can call them out. He might change the laws in America, but he can't change the views and opinions of people around the world.

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goldstone said:

Trump's re-election is the best thing that has happened in the USA for four years. Possibly also the best thing for the rest of the world. The guy is far from perfect, but just look at the alternatives. When I heard his statement that from now on there are only two genders, male and female, I knew we were on the right track. Those are the words of a man blessed with common sense.

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BrightonCottager said:

My blood pressure rises at the sound and sight of him, his entourage and 'experts' analysing his latest destructive / mad ideas.

My coping strategy is to avoid news and current affairs and listen to Radios 3, 3 Unwind and 6.

What are yours?

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