The Cure For TDS
by C.A. Matthews
January 6, January 6, January 6, January 6,
January 6, January 6, January 6, January 6, Orange man bad, Orange man
bad, Orange man bad, Orange man bad, Putin, Putin, Putin, Putin, Putin,
Putin...
This is the extent of Dem/liberal political analysis.
— Peter Daou (@peterdaou)
https://twitter.com/peterdaou/status/1699443420249411676
After I read the
above Tweet*, I'm convinced that former Dem campaign manager Peter Daou has completely
snapped out of his Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS) and returned to
the land of rational human beings. Some Dems’ obsession with Donald
Trump became so intense and illogical at times over these past seven
years that I often worried they had lost their minds.
It was as if TDS sufferers had fallen into a deep, dark abyss and could no longer see
the light at the top to climb toward and free themselves. To this day, some add to their Trump obsession by listening to mainstream media
pundits such as Rachel Maddow repeatedly making baseless accusations
against the former president.
According to Maddow, Trump was somehow in league with Russian President Vladimir Putin
to win the election, in spite of the lack of any credible evidence to back this assertion up.
The entirety of the “Russiagate” fiasco has once and for all been disproved. That revelation should have put this unusual phobia of Trump
to bed for good, but the mainstream media pundits continue to feed its sufferers by amplifying Trump’s current
legal woes and his strident supporters.
Obsession is defined by Psych Central as “a recurring thought of
something or someone, where it always seems to be in a person’s
mind.” According the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (5th ed.): “You may
be dealing with an obsession if you experience stressful thoughts or
urges that cause you to try to make these thoughts go away or calm
related stress.”
Peter has broken free of his obsession concerning the former US
president. His Tweet parodying the repetitiveness of thoughts of
TDS demonstrate how he has gotten to the point
where he is able to observe others' fixation on Trump, and he
no longer is drawn into their obsessing over the “Orange man bad” any more.
This is good because Peter is now free to concentrate his abilities
on important matters, such as working as Cornel West's campaign manager for the 2024 presidential election. Peter is free to help Dr. West in his advocating for universal health care, forgiving outrageous
student loan debts, and providing homes for the homeless.
I bet Peter even
has more time to enjoy his music. To be free of an
obsession that clouds your thought processes is a liberating
experience. It can bring about inner peace and hope for the future,
instead of a life full of negativity and pessimism.
Peter has rightfully concluded that he has no control over Donald
Trump’s actions or the consequences of Trump’s actions. That
responsibility lies solely in Trump’s hands.
Other recent Tweets
indicate that Peter has concluded that the corrupt justice
system in the US will probably keep Trump and his high level
compatriots from suffering the indignity of prison, because wealthy
white persons in the US don’t generally ever see jail time for
crimes they’ve committed. Caitlin Johnstone says it well:
None of the world’s worst people are in prison. Most of them are
quite wealthy and respected, because they benefit from the abusive
status quo that laws are set up to protect." --Laws Don't Exist to Prevent Wrongdoing
To obsess over the lack of fairness in
the corrupt US justice system, while doing little or nothing to
expose and end it except to snivel, whine, cry, or obsess over its
unfairness, is a waste of time and energy better used elsewhere.
So, how did Peter break himself of his TDS? Is there a vaccine or cure
for it? How I wish there were!
I believe Peter cured himself by finally facing himself in the
mirror one day and saying, “Is this all there is in life? To
complain about an ex-president who has terrible taste in hairstyles
and spray-on tans? Couldn’t I be doing something better with my
time? And who is continually telling me that I should obsess over
Donald Trump? I need to ignore that person or persons for my own good
and warn others to do the same.”
This is how the cure works—in the self-acknowledgment that you as a TDS sufferer have been led to believe (by not entirely honest people) that Trump is an existential threat to
you life and that constantly worrying about him is the proper response to this
perceived threat. By rationalizing that you have better
things to do, and that obsessing over Trump doesn’t solve anyone’s problems, you are able to see where you first
contracted TDS and how to avoid contact with the “carriers”
of TDS from now on.
Who transmits TDS? Rachel Maddow and her fellow neoliberals are quite good at it. However, the original transmitters of TDS were those
who came up with using Trump as their excuse for their problems in
the first place—the Democratic Party, particularly the Hillary
Clinton faction.
The Dems don’t do political analysis Peter has concluded
because it’s so much simpler to repeat the mantras “Orange Man
bad!” or “Putin puppet!” over and over again. It's just easier to scream epithets at others who disagree with your position rather than to
actually reply with a rational statement like, “We didn’t
advise Hillary to campaign in the Midwest, so she lost the
election to Trump in the Electoral College. That’s about the extent of it.”
Admitting their responsibility for Hillary's big loss in
2016 was just too much for the DNC bigwigs obviously. They simply went off the deep end. Or did they actually sit down and carefully plot
this “Let's blame everything on Trump” game step-by-step? Either way,
it became an convenient excuse and has worked to keep their followers
united in a bizarre, cult-like way.
Nothing could be more cultish than coming up with a common enemy
to focus all the group members’ hate and fear on rather than taking
a calm and logical look at what actions could have been taken to avoid
Clinton’s election loss.
Cults are often led by a charismatic leader or leaders who are
thought to be are all-powerful and can do no wrong. These leaders are
usually charged with fighting an “evil” against all odds for the
protection of the cult members. Picture Hillary Clinton as the “guru”
of this DNC cult and Trump as their “devil”. You can see
how rank-and-file Dems were easily manipulated into putting their stamina into crying for Trump’s head and blaming him for every
little thing the DNC ever did wrong.
Flip this scenario on its head and put Trump in the guru
position and name Hillary as the devil, and you’ll readily
see how the Republican faithful have stayed in Trump’s corner to this
day. Why would they think their beloved leader Trump is guilty of
any of the crimes he is charged with? Isn’t that how the devil
operates—falsely accusing the innocent and blaming them for the
devil’s own nefarious activities?
If there ever were a better reason to ditch the duopoly and
become a proud independent or alternative party voter, avoiding the obsession-cult of TDS is it. Americans have much more significant matters
to tackle. Our planet is literally boiling/burning up. Rich ex-presidents can take care of
themselves.
Peter has freed himself from an awful burden of believing
there are any significant differences between the two biggest
political cults—I mean factions—in the United States. Once
you have divested yourself from the belief that we have a democracy
in this country (see the definition of democracy in last week’s blog), and
you’ve decided that becoming embroiled
in a cult-like organization that spouts off nonsense Tweets like, “If
you’re for peace in Ukraine, you’re a Putin lover!” is wrong, then you’re
essentially vaccinated against TDS for good.
I won’t claim you won’t ever need a “booster shot” from
all this neoliberal nonsense from time to time. We’re all human,
and humans do tend to slip now and then. But at
least once you’ve cured yourself of TDS, you’ll rest in
the knowledge that it is possible to walk away from a cult—I mean a
political faction, red or blue—without any dire consequences. Peter has.
As a free and independent voter, your self-confidence will grow.
You’ll trust your own observations and will be able to think things
through for yourself without the extraneous commentary from the propagandists. You’ll feel stronger—strong enough to reach out to others who are doing
positive things to bring about a better country and a safer and
healthier world. The cure for Trump Derangement Syndrome ultimately is to become
your own person and to act—not react—when challenging times come
your way.
*Who calls the formerly known as Tweets “X posts”? Nobody
really.
Breaking News:
https://twitter.com/CornelWest/status/1701045524713840690
Just announced, running on the Party for Socialism and Liberation ticket: Claudia De La Cruz & Karina Garcia
@votesocialist24
https://votesocialist2024.com/volunteer
Related Articles and Interesting Links
(How Not To Say) I Told You So https://continuousrev.blogspot.com/2023/05/how-not-to-say-told-you-so.html
Psychology of Obsessions https://psychcentral.com/ocd/psychology-of-obsessions#definition
Fighting Words https://bernie2016.blogspot.com/2023/09/fighting-words.html
Honest Government Ad--Visit Canada https://youtu.be/u7s-BgfcFXw?si=TqOW-zXFh2ia8Tc9
‘A Reckoning’: 500 Groups Endorse March To End Fossil Fuels
https://popularresistance.org/a-reckoning-500-groups-endorse-march-to-end-fossil-fuels/
As student loan payments resume, millions face a lifetime of debt while Wall Street profits https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/09/08/bxjl-s08.html
US Intelligence Official: Media Misleading Americans About Ukraine’s Battlefield Success https://scheerpost.com/2023/09/08/us-intelligence-official-media-misleading-americans-about-ukraines-battlefield-success/
USA & NATO responsible for Ukraine war, German & French public say in poll https://geopoliticaleconomy.substack.com/p/us-nato-responsible-ukraine-war-poll
Waves of Strikes Rippling Across the US Seem Big, but the Total Number of Americans Walking Off the Job Remains Historically Low https://scheerpost.com/2023/09/05/waves-of-strikes-rippling-cross-the-us-seem-big-but-the-total-number-of-americans-walking-off-the-job-remains-historically-low/
Ukraine’s ‘Biggest Arms Supplier’ Orchestrated 2014 Maidan Massacre, Witnesses Say https://scheerpost.com/2023/09/07/ukraines-biggest-arms-supplier-orchestrated-2014-maidan-massacre-witnesses-say/
US Open tennis players “fall by the wayside” as COVID-19 surges
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/09/05/gsjw-s05.html
Belgian Minister Says What Biden Won’t: Israel Is Wiping Entire Palestinian Villages Off the Map https://scheerpost.com/2023/09/05/belgian-minister-says-what-biden-wont-israel-is-wiping-entire-palestinian-villages-off-the-map/
From the formerly known as Twitter:
https://twitter.com/blackintheempir/status/1699575590632804461
