One odd thing I've noticed about followers of the Trump--an ability to tolerate the same behavior in him they feel justifies their hatred of "the Libs." They will concede his lies, his sexual infidelities, his grotesque boorishness, even his outright crimes and selfishness. They celebrate his disloyalty to his allies in the same way they embrace his attacks on his critics. He often, and often proudly, embodies every sin and evil they claim to detest in their enemies.

Its almost as if they finally have found a champion that can use the same tools that those they loathe use--or at least, they think they use. They want sexual prudery, but Trump is anything but: he's a confessed predator. They glory in his ability to not pay his fair share of taxes. They lionize his ability to cheat the system and game the economy and body politic for his own benefit. I don't doubt that if incontrovertible evidence surfaced that Trump was an atheist who had paid for a dozen abortions they would simply look the other way. And when he gets into bed with the Russians, suddenly its all right. Hitler got into bed with Russians too, and then he betrayed them.

What I detect here is the desire of the bullied to have their own bully to follow. I've even heard those that say Trump is actually a tool of Divine Providence placed here to inflict the same indignities on their oppressors that their oppressors have inflicted on them. They find a delicious irony that God has used the same tools of the "elites" against those elites. Unfortunately, they got the wrong elites.

Those who feel life has passed them by, who have found themselves exploited, abused, cheated, enslaved, betrayed, simply want to inflict the exact same punishment on those they feel have done those things to them. Hitler promised the Germans he would do to the Jews exactly what the Jews had allegedly done to them. The fact that the Jews never actually did those things is irrelevant. They were just placeholders. And they were envied for their success and their sense of family, faith and community. Yeah, I know they don't like it when the parallels in history are pointed out to them. Of course they don't like it. Its precisely because they are obvious.

As I've mentioned here before, I believe there is a fundamental human psychological principle at work here. When people are being abused, and are themselves too weak or to cowardly to abuse back, they pick an abuser who embodies the very properties of those they feel have humiliated them. Our folklore is filled with examples, the mean drill sargeant (its all right, he has to prepare his troops for combat), the Dirty Harry cop (criminals don't deserve any better), the teacher who canes his students (the little punks need discipline), the brutal football coach (he's teaching the boys on his team they have to be MEN to win). And of course, there is always the tough guy, take-no-prisoners, take no shit from anyone boss. The entrepreneur-Fuhrer.

Its all a form of perverse collective masochism, its what led Johnny Reb to enlist in the CSA to fight for freedom--the freedom to own his own slaves. And when he came back from the war, defeated and humiliated, he joined the Klan.

We always like to think of ourselves as coming to America looking for freedom, open spaces, economic opportunity, religious tolerance. But we wound up as slaves, sharecroppers, tenement dwellers, industrial serfs and religious fanatics. Instead of breaking those chains, we instead found it easier to enslave others.

And of course, those who managed to avoid that fate, who were able to progress without exploiting their fellows, who found a way to improve their lives by means of contributing and cooperating, and yes, some luck and hard work, well--they are the new Jews, aren't they? They must be punished, it must be them who have condemned the rest to humiliation.

Yeah, you're right. Fascism is around the corner.