Thursday, July 27, 2017

Is President Trump a tragic hero or villain?


Aristotle thought a tragic hero should not be defined as a virtuous man brought down, but simply a man who evokes fear and pity brought down.

On President Trump's side we have the powerless populist/nationalists who nevertheless elected Trump, and on the other side against him we have the powers and governments of the world, including the most powerful lobbies of Wall Street, Oil, the Israelis and Saudis, as well as the Big Media, the unelected Deep State, the Democratic Party, many in the Republican Party, the academic world, all of show business, etc etc.

They all attack Trump, often with dirty tricks, and when Trump becomes frustrated and angry and shows his flaws they say his administration is in chaos, a chaos they caused. They would like to drive Trump mad, and sometimes they seem to be succeeding. In spite of all this Trump has done more for populism/nationalism than any leader has in very long time, in going against NAFTA, open immigration, political correctness, cultural Marxism. etc..

But it is not yet clear to me if Trump was or was not controlled by the Israeli and Saudis lobbies all along, since he has almost immediately given them both exactly what they want, the power of America supporting their every nefarious action. Or perhaps Trump uses changing values and virtues to fit his own personal power.  In that case his populism was a demagogic con to get elected, and he would be more a villain than hero.

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