Navigating a Whackadoodle World: Episode 19; or Strategies and tactics don’t always lead to good, do they?
In which my student and I discuss how tactics and strategy work together, and discover a disturbing truth about both.
If you have enter this story in the middle, click here for the table of contents.
“I heard you scream in my head last night while I was watching the news,” she informed me without looking up from her book.
“What’s that?” I asked. “I hope I didn’t scream anything stupid.”
“Not stupid,” she grinned. “You yelled, ‘Nooooooo! That’s not a strategy, that’s a goal.’ You sounded pretty disgusted when you yelled it.”
“And what was I so disgusted by?”
“An answer that one of those television pundits gave to a question.”
She was going to force me to pry it out of her. “And the question was?”
“The main lady asked her guest, ‘What’s is Trump’s strategy for the 2024 elections?’ Then the guest answered, ‘His strategy is to stay out of jail.’”
“Let me guess, that’s when you heard me yell inside your head.”
“I heard it distinctly,” she nodded. “Then, after wailing ‘No,’ you went on a tirade about how Trump has no strategy. He makes impulsive decisions using his gut. That he even brags about how quick acting he is, like it makes him seem more manly.”
“Well, just because someone is quick to act, doesn’t mean they can’t have a strategy,” I reminded her.
“So you think he has a strategy?”
“I think that he has certain tactics that he plays over and over again in order to achieve his goals.”
“So is that a strategy?” she asked. “I mean the last time we talked about strategy, you said that it was all about keeping your eye on your goals as you use the tactics available to you to achieve those goals. At least that’s what I think you said.”
“Close enough,” I agreed.
“So then he does have a strategy,” she concluded.
“Well, I have to admit that when has a goal, he digs in and doesn’t let up, and he certainly knows how to wield his tactics.”
“Like what?”
“Well,” I thought back. “He really knows how to brand himself.”
“I’ve never really understood what branding is?”
“You know when you go to the store, and you see certain products, and you know that they will always be consistent. Campbells Soup, Crest Toothpaste, Listerine, Hersey Bars. You hear their names, and whether you like the product or not, an image immediately comes to mind.”
“Yeah.”
“That’s branding, and you have to admit than when you hear Trump’s name, an image and an attitude immediately comes to mind.”
“And being able to brand yourself is a tactic?”
“I think that I would call it a tactic. People seldom wake up in the morning hoping to start a good brand. They want a good brand to achieve their goals, and I think Trump’s goals have always been money, power, acceptance, and celebrity.”
“What other tactics does he use?”
“He’s very good at media manipulation,” I offered. “He knows how to keep himself in the news. You know, when he was first getting started in New York, he would call up the local gossip columnists using an alias, and tell them some juicy story about the mysterious Donald Trump. Anything to keep people talking about him.”
“Is that what he did at Mar-a-Lago after the FBI searched his club?”
“That’s a perfect example of media manipulation,” I agreed. “He could have kept quiet about the search, and nobody would have cared, but he broke the story himself so that he could control the narrative.”
“What do you mean, control the narrative?” she asked.
“If you tell the story first, anyone who tells the story later has to defend their version, against yours. That’s called controlling the narrative”
“Oh,” she said simply.
“He’s also mastered the fake apology,” I continued.
“What’s that?”
“That’s when you apologize for calling someone ugly, with something like, ‘I’m sorry I called her a dog, but have you seen her?’ I think he thinks that it’s funny, and shows how cleaver he is.”
“But how does that help his brand?”
“People who agree with him, do think he’s funny and cleaver. He gets to say, ‘I apologized’ in the media, even thought everyone listening knows that he isn’t sorry. His behavior just makes him seem more manly to his fans. Trump is not a guy who apologizes. Apologies show weakness, and he has no weakness. That’s also why he gets away with his lack of transparency.”
“How is he not transparent?”
“He doesn’t want to show his taxes. He doesn’t have to explain his motives. Anybody who does understand him is just stupid. Anyone who disagrees with him is a moron. Of course, he’s great with people who agree with, and will do ask he asks. It’s just when people start to question him that he decides they’re not worth his time. Real men don’t need to answer questions; real men give the orders.”
“Doesn’t he also Gaslight?” she asked uncertainly. “Using words, and repetition, and stuff to get people to doubt their own ears and eyes. I think that heard he once said, ‘Repeat the same lie often enough, and people will start to believe it.’”
“I’m not sure if he actually said that, but I think he’s learned the tactic. His behavior sometimes reminds me of anther strong man.”
Hitler’s primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it.
The OSS psychological profile of Hitler, describing his use of the big lie.
“Forty-five would be really pissed if he knew that you were comparing him to Hitler.”
“What, poor little inconsequential me. I’m not worth his time. Besides, I’m not comparing him to Hitler,” I insisted. “I am comparing his tactics to Hitler’s.”
“So why do think his fans are so into him?”
“If I hazarded a guess, I might say that it’s because they share his worldview. They look at him, and they see strength, and they are tired of all the weak sissies out there. They want a leader whose not afraid of calling people names, taking control, and telling people how it is. They can put up with his lies, his intimidations, his threats, his misogyny, because that’s what it takes for a real man to succeed against the radical liberals out there turning our boys into girls.”
We sat silently for a while. She was doodling in her notebook. “Strategies and tactics don’t always lead to good, do they?”
“Not always,” I agreed softly. “I suppose it has to begin with the goals of the strategy.”
“Is that why you spend so much time writing about how much we need an accurate map, a moral compass, a full sail, a steady rudder, a solid anchor, a loyal crew, and a personal commission?”
“I suppose it is,” I conceded.
“What’s that poem by Ralph Waldo Emerson again. The one you called his personal commission?”
To laugh often and much: To win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children, to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty, to find the best in others, to leave the world a bit better whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you lived. This is to have succeeded.
By the way, Emerson didn’t write it. It’s by a writer named Bessie A. Stanley, who was responding in 1906 to a contest held by the Emporia (Kansas) Gazette, which put its readers to the pointless task of defining success. People loved it and recycled it, and by 1951 Stanley’s winning paragraph was being misattributed to Emerson in a syndicated newspaper column by midwestern journalist Albert Edward Wiggam.
“Emerson didn’t write it?”
“Nope. People just attribute it to him because it makes the quote seem wiser, and they never learned to research attributes on Google. They do the same thing with Einstein all the time. It’s still a pretty nice personal commission, wouldn’t you say?”
“Lovely.” She said, distracted.
“You okay?”
“Yeah, I just have a lot to think about.”
“Fair enough,” I said. Soon after, we finished for the day.
i read one of his books he didn't write (ghostwritter) in which he said it didn't matter whether publicity was good or bad. Publicity helped his brand no matter what was said.