FlannelJedi@tumblr

Sometimes I catch a little flack for saying, “Republicans are evil” but nah … I never feel bad for saying it because it’s true.

How heartless do you have to be to block common sense gun regulation right in the faces of the students who recently survived a mass shooting?

Civilians do not need an AR-15. Anyone who believes that the 2nd Amendment means owning absolutely ANY weapon you want is childish and emblematic of white male entitlement. And yeah, I’m keying in on white men. They’re the overwhelming majority of mass school shooters. And no, I’m not worried about “being nice” or hurting a gun owner’s delicate little, snowflake feelings. It’s past time for all of that.

Keep in mind: Florida’s Governor Rick Scott and Florida’s Attorney General, Pam Bondi - they both pushed to lower the age requirement for buying AR-15s. The Parkland mass shooter was 19-years old. Not old enough to buy liquor, but old enough to buy a lethal weapon of mass destruction in the state of Florida. And Donald Trump’s federal budget cuts funding for mental health services and also cuts funding for background checks. Republicans obviously DO NOT care about “the children” or they wouldn’t have spat in their faces.

I just read an interesting story about the way Trump likes to golf. At first, I thought it was an inconsequential puff piece, but it turned out quite revealing. Trump loves golf. He plays it constantly. Even when he probably shouldn’t. Many of his golf buddies have been interviewed about his skills on the course and they all had basically the same thing to say.

He cheats. 

Not a little bit. 

He cheats A LOT. 

It starts with the initial drive. He will often take several mulligans until scoring his first stroke. Meaning he keeps hitting the ball until he is satisfied with where it lands. However, if he does hit it into the woods, the ball will somehow magically appear back on the fairway by the time he reaches it. Due to his caddie rooting around in the tall grass and tossing the ball back to civilization. 

Then Trump gets into his cart and since the rules don’t apply to him, he drives it straight onto the carefully manicured green. No one is supposed to drive on this delicate grass. There is video of Trump doing this. And he drives with gusto too. I was surprised he didn’t do a few donuts. 

And to finish the hole off, Trump never actually takes his final putt. He calls this a “gimmie.” If the ball is close to the hole, that’s good enough for him. I guess he just assumes he would have hit the ball in. 

Some of the people who have golfed with Trump say he often brags about winning championships and setting course records. After seeing him play, all of these people say that is most likely bullshit. 

Pretty much everything about Trump’s golfing experience is a lie. Not only that, he doesn’t even try to be sneaky about it. He cheats in plain sight for everyone to see. It’s like a card hustler pointing to the cards hidden in his sleeves before a hand. I’m not even sure why he plays. I mean, technically he doesn’t really play. He just goes through the motions to make it seem like he is playing. The whole point of sport is to challenge yourself. That’s what makes it fun. I don’t understand what Trump gets out of the experience.  

I remember back when the original Doom came out for the PC. I loved that game and played it nonstop for weeks. One day I found cheat codes on the internet and at first it was very exciting. I had unlimited ammo and turned on God Mode. Nothing could touch me. Initially, it was kind of awesome. I was plowing through demons like they were paper people. I was getting to levels I couldn’t reach before. But that excitement quickly faded as I played. I discovered that I was getting very, very bored. Overcoming the odds, fear of dying, progressing through the game using my skills, reflexes, and wits… that’s what made the game fun. These cheat codes had turned this once exciting game into a total yawnfest. After years and years of playing in God Mode, how is Trump not totally bored with golf?

I guess this article struck a chord with me because it showed that Trump doesn’t even take the things he claims to love seriously. Even in a game where the outcome means basically nothing, he cannot stand to do poorly. He must lie to himself and others while playing. Nothing is more important than maintaining his ego. It seems like there is nothing too small that he will not lie about. There is nothing so inconsequential that he will not try to cheat. In every aspect of his life, that’s who he is. A liar and a cheater. Nothing is sacred. 

https://www.sbnation.com/lookit/2018/1/30/16949990/donald-trump-cheats-at-golf-suzann-pettersen-lgpa

https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ftw/2018/01/30/6-people-who-have-accused-donald-trump-of-cheating-at-golf/109934954/

People use it to sell you things. They’ll start by having you agree to a statement like “You want to save money, right?” to which anyone would say “yes” and then tell you about a sale that, if you like saving money like you just said you did, you’d be foolish not to take advantage of. It sounds stupid, but that act of verbally committing yourself to that idea makes you more likely to buy the product because you want to prove to them (and yourself) that you’re consistent.

In other words, the more someone actively and willingly commits to an idea, the less able they are to deviate from it.

So, how does this connect to politics? Remember that phrase “too big to fail?” Basically, the more a politician actively and willingly says something or acts in accordance with a certain belief, the less able they are to admit, or even believe, that belief could be wrong. They just can’t. Like, the human psyche just finds it so immensely uncomfortable to be inconsistent that it would feel torturous to admit they were wrong.

So when I see things like this, where he keeps doing this thing and saying he’s great at it even though he obviously isn’t, I remember this principle and think about how it must be acting in his head. He’s said so many times how great he is and how good he is at everything that his opinion of himself is literally too big to fail.

Food for thought.

Source: Influence: Science and Practice by Robert Cialdini (really easy and informative read, I recommend it)

BONUS ROUND: How can you avoid falling into this trap yourself? (ie being so wrong but completely unable to admit it)

Instead of committing yourself to specific beliefs, commit yourself to general beliefs like “I want to protect those unjustly oppressed” instead of “I hate the police”, or “I want to be a force for good” instead of “I’m a woke person so I always know what’s right”. This makes you more able to change your mind and re-orient if new information comes along that proves you wrong, while allowing you to still stick to your core beliefs.

We don’t even need a disney remake of Mulan. Look at this.