“What do you think happens with the economy, the war, any of that?”
I got a lie, fat fuckin’ lie ‘bout a law idiots obey
They made it easy, cheaters have their way
You hi di ho, you’re livin’ on your knees
Forget the rule
Oh, oh oh oh, idiots rule
Forget the rule
Oh, oh oh oh, idiots rule
Now there’s a time but I say none like now
Men, there’s a time where idiots are bound
If there’s a pole planted in your back
Then you’re a fixture, you’re no man
Forget the rule
Oh, oh oh oh, idiots rule
Forget the rule
Oh, oh oh oh, idiots rule
C’mon, kiss you, motherfucker
Fuckin’, suckin’, take it
Idiot, idiots rule
Idiot, idiots rule
You idiot, idiots rule, yeah
You know that man you hate?
You look more like him every day
Hi di hos
Too good shoe won’t save your soul, yeah ha
Idiots rule, idiots rule
Idiots rule, oh, yeah
Songwriters, Stephen Andrew Perkins, Perry Farrell, David Michael Navarro, mEric Adam Avery are from Janes Addiction of course and this was written in the early 90s or earlier.
One woman in an interview on television last week was asked a straightforward question, “What do you think happens with the economy, the war, any of that?” She responded with a sentence beginning with “I know nothing about it,” and ending with “but I know that Trump takes care of it.” That’s not a detailed policy critique. That’s a woman stating, with satisfaction, that the man on her television is handling things.
It’s infuriating, but let’s be methodical and explicit about our diagnosis. We have a situation in which our decision-making is irrational, and we have a set of accompanying rationalizations that help us justify why it’s rational. I think it’s worth trying to understand one in light of the other.
Let’s begin with the former, because it seems easier to dissect. There is value in making someone’s identity contingent on a political party, but the more that happens, the more that person is going to interpret anything negative about the party as a statement about their personal dignity. In their heads, “not my party is wrong” is not a concession to objectivity, but a defense of who they are. Therefore, they will accept exponentially more misinformation from their preferred party’s mouthpiece than they would from another source, because they have, in their minds, crossed that threshold of self-betrayal to hear “not their” party’s criticism.
In practice, this means they’re subject to confirmation bias when it comes to what their allies say, and they’re especially inclined to believe in the threat posed by their enemies, and the need to “defend” themselves against them.
We live in a world where everyone has an information source that is not shared by everyone else, and therefore everyone is exposed to a conception of reality that diverges from those who don’t have access to it. The Democrats never go on the GOP driven news shows.
If you believe, as I do, that that means there are many people in this country who believe their opponents are existential threats to the country, and that it’s rational for them to use whatever means necessary to prevent the other side from exercising power, you’re not wrong, but those rationalizations are often used to justify actions that have nothing to do with stopping an imminent national disaster. The crisis is a tool, and there isn’t one being used more frequently by either side than the one involving the “withering away of democracy.” Both sides are exploiting the crisis to justify actions neither would otherwise take, and neither has necessarily taken them with any great thought. The problem is that one side lies about the other side being evil, or better yet, they do not lie. They project. If Trump or his people are saying that someone is doing something at all, let alone doing it badly, or if its corrupt, it is because they do it themselves. They do that all of the time. They literally telegraph every move that way, and the Democrats still do not get it.
If Trump or his people are telling the world that something is evil because of what someone else is doing, it is because they are doing it themselves. There has never been a time in recent history when the GOP and Trump have called out something or someone while they themselves were not doing it even worse.
His supporters just go with it, and the reason the GOP and Trump lie all of the time is because they can. Their supporters listen to it. They just do whatever they are told, and the GOP and Trump know it. That’s why they do it.
While Trump’s fans just parrot whatever he says, in essence, he could kill someone on Fifth Avenue and still have a huge following, to paraphrase. He can grab women by the pussy while he lies more than I drink water. I also thought that lying to scare people into voting went out in the early 2000s. I had done a documentary film, along with the music for the film and its soundtrack, that centered on those tactics in like 2011.
It’s honestly gotten worse, and it is because the GOP knows they can do it. That is because, on a good day, Trump supporters are zombies who do whatever he says. Honestly, they are pretty much clueless about how anything works, let alone how to act like thoughtful human beings. That is, in part, why in debates or conversations they tend to fall back on yelling and calling people names, like you heard in the fourth grade. They have nothing to say, so they yell and call people names. Trump acts that way. They are also lazy because they just listen and do whatever they are told to do without doing any due diligence. Read the Full Article on Substack!
