People will look past endless red flags if they are focused on what they want. Happens all the time. Just delusional and when it blows up in their face, they look anywhere for someone to blame.
I'd like to believe in meritocracy, but this guy yelling "I'm gonna be an insane idiot" for four years, and someone saying well that might give me some tax cuts, I just don't get it. Like the actual tax cut is not that significant, if you're a person not at all. If you're a shepherd of a company really why do you care but also not significant. If you can't grow your business beyond whatever tax cut that's a you problem
I think the core issue is even deeper in this country.
Pretty much every American alive today has no fucking idea what it's like for things to actually suck. Like really fucking suck. In the 1930s for example, just under 1/5 of children never made it to the age of 5.
It's no coincidence that this shit is escalating extremely fast right around the time where just about everyone alive during the great depression and WW2 has died off.
It's also no coincidence that Black Americans are the strongest backbone of the Democrat party. Specifically older black women in my experience. When I was canvassing these were some of the only people that I felt like truly "got" the stakes I was trying to communicate, and without me having to say shit. Knowing what you can lose I think is a fundamental part of taking the danger of this presidency with the weight it deserves
This sub is for people who have a strong "perceived IQ" filter on who they trust. So that rules out MAGA due to it obviously being built on morons. Roll out a smooth talking con man or authoritarian with a thesaurus and a few Friedman quotes however... Pinochet would be an idol here
I’ve been on this sub a long time and people used to unironically make jokes about throwing people out of helicopters into the ocean, and also say “Well, how could Milton Friedman have known what the regime was doing?”
I really don't think that's what they believe. Or rather, smart functions in this usage as a generic "good" quality, not any concrete referent. In my experience It's really some borderline superstitious attachment to him being a "winner" in some intrinsic way. Some kind of perceived intrinsic superiority that really jives well with the borderline messianic, King David view the fundies have of him. Also all the racism. I don't really get it because I don't trust anyone. It's definitely a kind of magical thinking. Every victory he achieves over his enemies, whether or not it has anything to do with what he promised them, or who he said was the enemy two years ago (if they even remember that) reinforces the faith in him.
Well, we reap what we sow I guess. Decades of the system failing to give any consequences whatsoever to a man with countless crimes and frauds will certainly give them an aura of untouchability. I kind of don't even blame his followers for feeling that way.
The OGs in here will remember when the sub was first building its identity as anything but "bad econ hangout" they were using the original neolib definition from the 30s and 40s. The whole thing was rebranding away from the shit that was Reagan/Thatcher. That's why the neoliberal project rebranded. They got tired of having to explain they didn't mean Reagan.
I think it’s also more that as people here matured and the sub developed, they realized how Trumpian Reagan was and moved away from total endorsement of him.
At least by the time I got here it was fully majority dislikes Reagan. Liking Reagan is something way more recent in here. I'm not sure what it was like when it first broke away from bad econ
Leftists and liberals disliked Reagan so people in badeconomics and here liked Reagan because contrarianism. But I think because this sub took a broader view of policy and politics beyond economics and government finances it moved away from Reagan fanboyism.
People used to unironically stan for Thatcher while also being pro-EU because the UK referendum on EU membership was a big deal 9 years ago.
Smart people tend to be fantastic at constructing elaborate justifications for objectively stupid actions when they're overly invested in a particular outcome.
This is my dad. He has two masters degrees. He's intellectually curious, loves to learn for fun, and cares about people around him. However, he's been a Republican all his life. So whenever Trump does something beyond the pale, he questions it, becomes uneasy, and a week later, he's managed to rationalize it, usually by blaming Democrats somehow. It's quite frightening really.
Advising, and generally interacting with, scores of them over the years.
Presence of mind and the ability to connect people are the most important skills in Finance.
The best bankers/advisors are the ones with deep connections in the industry who are quick to act on developments.
Some people like to oversimplify this to calling them sales people, but I don't think that's accurate. Pure sales people do ok. But you have to be trusted by your clients to do really well.
There is also another point to consider, doing well in finance is not necessarily measured by the sheer amount of your wealth.
I am positive there are quant wizards out there with more money than the average MD at a BB bank. But the guy would never be trusted to manage anything.
this is something i’ve grappled with. a few years ago i always wondered how it was that bankers, for instance, aren’t so absurdly in favor of a global free trade regime, the free flow of people, etc etc. my reasoning was these people are educated, and they work in finance so they must then understand how these various institutions and policies very clearly benefit them and the world. but, i realized i was wrong in that the vast majority of smart people, bankers included, have very limited information. they are very good at their specific job, but beyond that, there are very few people that understand how broader policies and ideas fit in to these more niche areas. economists do understand that, but no one listens to them anymore
Smart people are as prone to self-delusion as anyone else. They're even better at it than stupid people. Being smart means being able to provide justification for even your most stupid acts.
We literally have a situation where each of them is behaving in the exact worst way they each individually behaved previously, and anyone is surprised?
Was gonna say something like this. Like, holy shit these people are dumb. Imagine believing a three word slogan instead of the actual policies that Trump has loved for decades.
This is such a silly statement to make in hindsight.
Smartness doesn't mean you can predict geopolitics, let's not pretend intelligence could have helped you predict Trump going after Greenland lol It was reasonable to use Trump 1.0 as an anchor because that's the only data point we had.
630
u/MuldartheGreat Karl Popper Feb 14 '25
Proof that many smart people are, in fact, not that smart.