Topic on Talk:Donald Trump

No.

While Trump has his issues, I think calling him "The Caligula" doesn't fit and is too much. The point says the following;

"The Caligula: Trump matches many of the qualities listed in the article, most notably his extreme behavior (very obvious after his 2020 defeat) and his intolerance of disagreement or things he doesn't want to hear (it's not for nothing that his own press secretary invented the phrase "Alternate Facts"). And while he's never renamed a city for himself, one need only point at all the gaudy buildings he's built with his name on them, or his frequently-expressed desire to add his face to Mount Rushmore."

Here's part of the description of the Caligula on that trope page; The Caligula will be wildly irrational, violently moody, very intolerant of being told anything he doesn't want to hear, and probably afflicted with a god complex. He may indulge in renaming cities or even the entire country after himself. To do anything the Caligula finds displeasing is to inevitably be dragged off to a grisly death or worse. Of course, this could also happen to those who have not done anything at all. Due to their continuing close proximity to the Caligula, members of the Court (decadent or otherwise) will be the primary targets of his fits of rage.

I contend that this point should be removed for the following reasons, including how for all Trump's flaws there are several traits of a Caligula that Trump does not have;

• A major argument against it is how Trump allowed freedom of the press. For all his overused cries of "fake news!", if Trump was a true Caligula, a lot of journalists and quite a few newsanchors - given how much the mainstream news media has gone after him - would be in jail or worse given their near-constant attacks on him. While there are laws in the U.S to protect Freedom of the Press, a true Caligula wouldn't care about those laws and probably even Make It Look Like an Accident.
• Caligula's are characterized by violent intolerance for opposing views; violence of the physical kind. If Trump was violent towards who opposed him, the detractor death toll would've matched the COVID death-toll.
• Putting his last name on buildings he or his company had built is debatable. It would be like calling Richard and Maurice McDonald caligulas because they named their fast food franchise McDonald's after themselves. Egotistical of Trump, most likely. Caligula, not sure. Citation needed about the desire to put his head on Mount Rushmore.
• When the CHAZ/CHOP happened in Seattle, which was technically an insurrection, Trump didn't react with immediate violence, like an actual Caligula would (even though he could've used the legal excuse of the Insurrection Act). He threatened to invoke it, but again, a true Caligula wouldn't have waited or given any time with threats.
• While he can get nasty verbally, even the people in his Cabinet who he fired replaced didn't end up imprisoned or worse.
• Trump is the first President in decades to not to start a war and actually helped create a historic peace agreement.
• If Trump really wanted to take Capitol Hill by force - as horrible and wrong as the Capitol Hill Riots were - as President he would have had better resources to call on than a mob of angry civilians, eg; the National Guard (one more reason I contend he didn't deliberately incite that riot).
• Forr all the legal wriggling Trump did at times, he tried to work within the bounds of the legal system while Caligula's tend to disregard that system... plus Trump hasn't imprisoned his opponents or executed them/had them fall to unfortunate "accidents".

I apologize if this dipped into politics, I only brought up those points to explain the reasons behind my use of a trope. I admit I can get carried away in arguments in general on any subject, I also think that - just like people who like Trump - people who hate Trump can let how they feel about him get in the way of facts. Plus, a person in power can have an ego, like Trump, but not be the Caligula.

In light of this, I suggest we drop the point of "The Caligula", what say you?

Okay, let's see how well Mr. Trump matches your own description:

"The Caligula will be wildly irrational, violently moody," Trump flies into rage about the most petty things, complaining about football players kneeling during the National Anthem and ignoring important issues, to give just one example. He ranted about the destruction of statues of Confederate leaders and swore he'd change Mt. Denali's name back to Mount McKinley, as if he was offended by the idea of letting the Native American name for it become official. In many ways, he brings to mind George H.W. Bush's attempts to make flag burning a crime due to one isolated incident, but the difference is, Bush backed off when told how silly it was.

"...very intolerant of being told anything he doesn't want to hear" Making even one negative comment about him was sure to result in an angry tweet storm until he was kicked off.

"...and probably afflicted with a god complex". Here is one psychoanalyst who says he does, and I can supply many more:

https://www.alternet.org/2020/02/psychoanalyst-breaks-down-trumps-god-complex-and-our-dangerous-collective-addiction-to-his-unhinged-behavior/

"He may indulge in renaming cities or even the entire country after himself." If he has authority to name something after himself, he will:

https://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/donald-trump-loves-naming-article-1.2728810

"To do anything the Caligula finds displeasing is to inevitably be dragged off to a grisly death or worse." He proposed mandatory death sentences for cop killers, prison terms for rape victims who had abortions and the doctors who performed them, and wanted to mass-deport DACA residents, which is, by the way, a practical death sentence. Not to mention wiitholding disaster relief from Puerto Rico and claiming the pandemic was a hoax, simply to avoid admitting he was wrong.

"Of course, this could also happen to those who have not done anything at all." Here's an article explaining why he should be charged with negligent homicide for the deaths caused by him ignoring issues:

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/11/this-is-trumps-fault/617159/

"Due to their continuing close proximity to the Caligula, members of the Court (decadent or otherwise) will be the primary targets of his fits of rage." Describes Mitch McConnell's situation to a tee, plus those of many other Republican leaders:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-revenge-tour-impeachment-republicans-b1798179.html

Would the military have sided with Trump had he attempted to impose martial law? Doubt it. He dug his own grave there too:

https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/trump-s-losers-suckers-troops-scandal-call-action-america-s-ncna1239433

IMOHO, the only reason Trump was unable to have newsmen and political opponents killed or otherwise silenced is because in this day and age, it's hard to do so secretly. That and the fact that, as much as he tried to be a dictator, he was too incompetent to do so. He'd have been caught, and he'd have been arrested. The Secret Service would have turned him in had he tried. One big irony about that, btw, is that abusing his own "secret service" (forcing himself upon their wives and daughters of the Praetorian Guard, the armed bodyguards protecting him) is what got the actual Caligula killed.

Thus, IMOHO this Trope is the perfect one to describe Mr. Trump.

Again, I ask, WHY do you spend such time and effort to defend him?

I defend him because every criticism that applies to Trump has already been said ad nauseum even here, people are getting so blinded by their hatred of Trump they ignore his good qualities and if not for me (and Robkelk, GethN7, Labster and maybe LooneyTunes), I think threads for the Trump page would've dissolved into a close-minded cesspool of castigation. IMO you hate the man as much as you might think I like him. Why do you spend such time and effort demonizing him?

While you raised some valid points (for one, I would like to read those other psychological analyses regarding the idea he has a god complex, that raises interesting questions), there's some points I think you got wrong;

• "Trump flies into rage about the most petty things" citation needed.
• That article in the Daily Mail claims he's named 222 companies after himself but doesn't provide a list, so that claim looks dubious. And as I explained using the analogy with McDonald's, I don't think naming a business after yourself qualifies you as a caligula.
• Trump's administration did send aid to Puerto Rico for Hurricane Maria prior to that billion-dollar package. The idea that he didn't... a lie can get halfway around the world before the truth has put its pants on (not a source I'd usually trust, but they have video footage this time... and even a broken clock is right twice a day).
• Funny that Trump gets accused of doing nothing against COVID in the early stages... but he tried to restrict travel to China in February 2020 after getting word of COVID, and when Trump did that was labelled xenophobic for it. Trump's damned if he does, damned if he doesn't.

I also have two questions. Who are DACA residents and how is mass-deporting them a practical death sentence? (a two-parter question) If Trump was the tyrant you want to think he is, why didn't he even TRY to impose martial law?

IMOHO Since there's a difference between how Caligula treated his "secret service" and how Trump treated his that point is irrelevant.

IMOHO China and numerous other tyrannical regimes in this day and age have successfully killed newsmen and political opponents, so your theory as to why Trump hasn't done that rings hollow.

While the trope stays for now since Robkelk pulled rank, after all this do you still think the trope fits as much as you said?

"The Caligula will be wildly irrational, violently moody," Trump flies into rage about the most petty things, complaining about football players kneeling during the National Anthem and ignoring important issues, to give just one example.

Let's not forget that the chef at his own restaurant recently recounted to the Washingtonian how Trump made a fuss because a dining companion got a bigger steak than he did -- by something like half an ounce. That's pretty irrational.

AND that the Secret Service had to pay $3,000 a month for the right to use a bathroom when Trump extended their duties to include his children.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2021/01/14/secret-service-bathroom-ivanka-trump-jared-kushner/

While paranoia is paranoia, I can understand how it happened given the insane amount of hate Trump's copped.

I hear this excuse so often, "all Trump gets is hate from Democrats, Democrats are haters, Democrats are the real bigots", all while trying to excuse an act of terrorism.

Let me share something with you, okay?

On December 23, 2016, former New York gubernatorial candidate Carl Paladino gave an interview with a conservative website called Artvoice. When asked what he would like to see happen in 2017, Paladino replied "Obama catches mad cow disease after being caught having relations with a Hereford. He dies before his trial and is buried in a cow pasture next to Valerie Jarrett, died weeks prior, after being convicted of sedition and treason, when a Juihady [sic] cell mate mistook her for being a nice person and decapitated her." After then being asked "what he would most like to see go in 2017", he replied Michelle Obama; I'd like her to return to being a male and let loose in the outback of Zimbabwe where she lives comfortably in a cave with Maxie, the gorilla."

After refusing to apologize for this horrific and blatantly bigoted comment (telling the Buffalo school board to "Go [expletive here] yourself" when they demanded it), he was fired from his position on the school board and kicked out of the teachers' union. Resulting in, it seemed, every Republican pundit at the time screaming about his First Amendment rights being violated.

Where was the outrage then? I'm not even going to get into all the Birtherism crap that Trump himself started, his name calling, and how Obama was criticized for his tan suit, for some inane reason.

In the end, Trump didn't exactly do anything to convince us to like him, and I'm pretty certain inciting an insurrection is not helpful to a politician's PR.

Of course, in all fairness, I can't be 100% certain, seeing as Trump was the only one foolish enough to try it.

I neither mentioned nor meant Democrats, I just said Trump was being paranoid there and that he gets a lot of hate. I think you just did the textual equivalent of putting words in my mouth.

While it's off-topic to the tropes, could you give me links for those quotes please? I'm not going to ask to remove the Caligula now.

Keeping in mind that violence only very rarely leads to death, it looks to me like the trope as defined applies to him. The trope stays on the page.

Part of the Caligula trope is characterized by deaths, but I'll leave the point for now. I will reply to Henery VII's previous large comment, but that's just a formality.

MOD: @NormAtredies, I've lost track of how many times members of the Moderation Team have told you this: Tropes Are Flexible.

Very well, I'll let it go. While I think Trump gets a bad rap and approve of some things he's done politically, he's definitely done things he shouldn't and has issues.

there were a few parts of the Caligula trope that Trump met and since tropes are flexible (I didn't know they could be flexible in that way) I fully concede the point.

ALSO MOD: Given preponderance of the fact most if not all of the qualifications are those Trump has fit, and I say this as a former supporter to some degree, I concur it should stay.

Trump did some things I liked politically. However, I cannot and will not ignore most of the things mentioned under the trope are also true.

Very well, I'll let it go. While I think Trump gets a bad rap and approve of some things he's done politically, he's definitely done things he shouldn't and has issues.

there were a few parts of the Caligula trope that Trump met and since tropes are flexible (I didn't know they could be flexible in that way) I fully concede the point.