> I know many MAGA types, they are my friends and relatives. Heck, I am close friends with people who’s political opinions I consider completely insane. And most of them would blanche at shooting Panamanian civilians in Panama.
Why do you think that?
Ignore that MAGA people have at best a tactical relationship with the truth, and do not quite get how things work. They appear to think that Trump's rhetoric is a perfectly normal way to treat allies and do not understand how it—and the lack of significant pushback from other Americans—is doing a great job of harming the United States' reputation. Getting Ford and Poilievre to align against the US was an achievement.
The US would not be invading a Panama that is labouring under a dictatorship. The US would not be invading a Panama on the edge of a nasty civil war. The US would be invading Panama because a perfectly functional democracy does not want to give up key elements of its sovereignty to anyone, least not the country that had signed a treaty recognizing the Panamanians' rights. The US, for its part, would be invading a country imagined as having stole American land, populated by people who refused to be Americans and who could plausibly be linked to migrant infiltrators who posed a lethal threat to the US. Trump said so.
American invaders, here, would not act as good guys.
Right! But my point is that the almost-inevitable brutality against civilians would make an invasion lose domestic popularity very quickly. And that loss of popularity would include chunks of the Trumpist base.
Was that point unclear? If it was, I'll have to rewrite it!
I should add here that my point is not that the entire Trumpist base would turn against an invasion. Heck, most would not, and the rally-around-the-flag effect means that the invasion would probably gain some support even from outside the base. But it would still not be a good idea from a domestic political standpoint.
No, the point you were making is that MAGA people would be upset about civilian casualties.
The point I was making is that you are probably, sadly, wrong. If things got as far as Trump’s United States invading Panama because the Panamanians refuse to give up their national territory and the violent narcissists in power in Washington respond with force, pretty quickly MAGAts will find ways to justify lots of dead Panamanian civilians.
Who knows? They might even celebrate it, or winkingly deny it. See the response of too many Russians to Ukrainian civilian dead.
Is anyone else having trouble seeing the comment section on these posts?
> I know many MAGA types, they are my friends and relatives. Heck, I am close friends with people who’s political opinions I consider completely insane. And most of them would blanche at shooting Panamanian civilians in Panama.
Why do you think that?
Ignore that MAGA people have at best a tactical relationship with the truth, and do not quite get how things work. They appear to think that Trump's rhetoric is a perfectly normal way to treat allies and do not understand how it—and the lack of significant pushback from other Americans—is doing a great job of harming the United States' reputation. Getting Ford and Poilievre to align against the US was an achievement.
The US would not be invading a Panama that is labouring under a dictatorship. The US would not be invading a Panama on the edge of a nasty civil war. The US would be invading Panama because a perfectly functional democracy does not want to give up key elements of its sovereignty to anyone, least not the country that had signed a treaty recognizing the Panamanians' rights. The US, for its part, would be invading a country imagined as having stole American land, populated by people who refused to be Americans and who could plausibly be linked to migrant infiltrators who posed a lethal threat to the US. Trump said so.
American invaders, here, would not act as good guys.
Right! But my point is that the almost-inevitable brutality against civilians would make an invasion lose domestic popularity very quickly. And that loss of popularity would include chunks of the Trumpist base.
Was that point unclear? If it was, I'll have to rewrite it!
I should add here that my point is not that the entire Trumpist base would turn against an invasion. Heck, most would not, and the rally-around-the-flag effect means that the invasion would probably gain some support even from outside the base. But it would still not be a good idea from a domestic political standpoint.
No, the point you were making is that MAGA people would be upset about civilian casualties.
The point I was making is that you are probably, sadly, wrong. If things got as far as Trump’s United States invading Panama because the Panamanians refuse to give up their national territory and the violent narcissists in power in Washington respond with force, pretty quickly MAGAts will find ways to justify lots of dead Panamanian civilians.
Who knows? They might even celebrate it, or winkingly deny it. See the response of too many Russians to Ukrainian civilian dead.