In this post, I feel like you’re talking about two different types of smarts. But I think mostly you’re concentrating on public relations-type smarts, like in the comment below.

he definitely lacks the kind of smarts that help you understand the actual universe, but our shortcoming and dealing with him is that we don’t grasp his motivations. For a lot of people it seems like he’s been going senile for several decades, but he acts very much like a true narcissist, and they concentrate intensely on winning people over, getting praise, and screwing over their enemies. That’s where his smarts are.

There are a host of assumptions behind words like "smart" and "intelligent", and they are the reasons people who hate Trump,refuse to consider them, while those who support Trump reach for them first when describing him.

It might be better to ask if Trump is "effective". Something that remains completely unexamined is how Trump took over complete control of the institution of the Republican Party. He forced Mitt Romney to retire! A stupid/dumb/senile guy is simply not capable of that, but someone hauls out that damn Fran Leibowitz quote and end of conversation.

"Come, let us reason together." Great line, and whoever "we" are, we're still trying to make it work. That's not politics and never was. To belabor the obvious, politics is emotional and by and large the modern iteration of Democrats does government (policy), not politics. Anyway, whether the appropriate word is "smart", "cunning", or "puppet", emotional manipulation will win every time. All that to say this post is right on the mark. If the next question is whether Democrats will finally surrender and stoop to politics, then my take is that isn't going to happen - at least not with the current lineup. Keeping in mind that most or all of the folks reading these posts are "abnormally" engaged with this stuff, I'd say that Democrats overall have the leadership they wished . That is, go along to get along, don't make waves, we're comfortable enough*, etc.. Historically, that's a position that tanks always roll right over. The situation needs a very different response - or party.

I mean, no he isn't? Do words have meaning anymore? He's objectively dumb, obviously dumb, transparently dumb, flagrantly dumb. He can hardly string two sentences together, he has the vocabulary of a 6 year old, when he expresses opinions about anything he's nearly always completely wrong. His first term was a great example of what happens when you have a dumb person in charge of a very complex country - an abject disaster. His second term is different - there are lots of smart, very people behind the scenes feeding him lines and the types of (relatively) smart people that curtailed his stupidity in his first term have been completely eliminated.

What we need to come to grips with is the fact that we've been completely owned by someone so indescribably stupid. And that's because Americans are drowning in a cesspool of ignorance and propaganda. We live in a country where "stupid" is an extremely successful strategy. He's stupid, but in America, stupid sells.

Machine Ds run a genteel mafia, superficially responsive to the public but mostly deeply responsive to the machine donors. For a very long stretch Rs were mostly the same: Tip and Ronny yuckin' it up. The Trump takeover of the Republican Party has transformed the party into a garden variety fascist kleptocracy. But here Trump (meaning his "minions") have clearly been very smart: he's leaving the D machines alone, meaning the Pelosi's, Jeffreys' Schumer et al machines more or less are chugging right along, business as usual. Being in the minority is so relaxing: no work to do. <shrugs> For those Ds, why would they rock the boat? Nothing but grief there.

So: very smart.

We live in a vibes based world where it’s all about the feels. Continuing to try and appeal to reason in the face of this reality is madness.

That’s why the “no oligarchs” tour was resonating with people. It didn’t require some deep thinking exercise, it just tapped into the rage most people have (or should have) about rich people fucking the rest of us over.

I would say that Trump is cunning. He is not intelligent or educated. In fact he is incredibly ignorant and incurious. He is also charismatic in a way I fundamentally repulsive but that is effective with his cultists.

Good post. It’s a category error that liberals make constantly - “smart” (or really expensively educated) = “good or ethical”

That we STILL make it even though the last 20 years have seen a steady parade of expensively educated people who are absolute fucking moral and ethical HORRORS is amazing.

He’s smart AND bad. Why is this so hard for people?

Evidence of unevolved amygdala-brain rubes grows with each passing day. Elno says that the "cadence" of his rapid, unplanned dissassembling phallic 'splosions will increase "with upcoming flights at a rate of about one every three to four weeks." I am wondering how many females he is paying each month to be impregnated for his desired future legions. They should all be forced to publicly admit it AND live in the rocket fallout zones.

This is EXACTLY why I don't think people should be speculating on whether he is cognitive decline. A lot of what is happening is intentional. It is not "whoopsie, gramps can't find the forks in the kitchen anymore so he is taking away COVID vaccines from pregnant women."

He is smart in criminal ways that most honest people don't apprehend because of lack of experience and lack of criminal imagination. I have been tripped up in real life many times by such lack, by people in all classes of society and various levels of power and authority. With age and experience, I have become a skeptical curmudgeon with much better anticipatory instinct through the School of Hard Knocks. Ouch.