A Quote by James Vance
Well, I think it's just remarkable how wrong the conventional wisdom was. It was utterly shocking that Donald Trump won to people who live on the coasts, but to people who live in the areas that I come from, it was utterly predictable. And that suggests something really, really broken about our political culture.
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We don’t just live in a celebrity take-down culture; we live in a take-down culture. People will find anything about you and twist it to where it’s weird or wrong or annoying or strange or bad. You have to live your life not only in spite of people who don’t understand you - you have to have more fun than they do.
I think that live music is really pretentious - all of it. I hate festivals and live shows, because as soon as I get on stage, I start performing for people and it becomes about sex, banter, and skill. They're looking at me and not thinking about themselves. I'm thinking about how cool I look. It's just stupid - all live music is really stupid. I wouldn't encourage going to see anybody live, ever. Not even me.
Donald Trump has no design to transform America. Donald Trump doesn't think America is second-rate. Donald Trump doesn't think America's guilty. Donald Trump doesn't think America owes people things. Donald Trump doesn't think that the borders are to be wide open so that anybody who wants here can come here because we've screwed them at some time in the past.
I think that when people read fiction, they're really reading for wisdom. I am. That's what most of us really love. If we read a novel that rocks our world, it's because there's something in it that we didn't know already. Not just information but really wisdom - sort of what to do with our information. And wisdom comes from experience.
The problem in our society is the ego psychology and conventional wisdom about "look out for #1." That conventional wisdom thinks that "love your enemy" is to some a principle no one can ever live by.
I think people need to see Prince live to really understand how remarkable he is.
Im extremely honest, and I pride myself on it. I dont try to be shocking. Im playful, and I know when something Im saying is maybe shocking, but its just the truth, I never wanted to be scary to people or upsetting to people. I simply want to live the way I need to live.
In America we're seeing the emergence of Donald Trump, who's the anti-establishment candidate, if you will, who's bucking all the conventional political wisdom on the basis of the fact that so many Americans feel that they've been left behind by the political system and that it's working to entrench advantage by insiders, rather than advantage the people of that country.
All of this unrest and all the riots and all the protests, really the anger is at all of you who voted for Donald Trump and voted for Republicans. That's really the nub of it. They're angry at Trump, but Trump wouldn't be there if it weren't for you. They are angry. They feel rejected. The American people, and I've already told you how they think of Trump voters. They think Trump voters are uneducated, Deliverance types. You're fools, you're idiots, you're uneducated, you're unsophisticated, you're just an embarrassment, you're an American embarrassment.
Michael Kruse made the point that, on the one hand, this seems all totally unprecedented in American politics; on the other hand, it seems somehow utterly predictable in the context of the personality of Donald Trump.
Why can't we have a voice? What's the difference between an athlete having millions or Donald Trump? Every time a politician talks, they talk about what's wrong with America. Well, he's an athlete who is also saying something is wrong with America. Why is it that when he talks, people say, 'How can he talk about oppression and make millions?' Well, Trump is talking about it. Hillary Clinton is talking about it. And they have more money than most athletes.
People that voted for Donald Trump, people that support Donald Trump really, really believe that they were gonna lose the country if Hillary Clinton won.
There's a stupid trend in American politics right now with people who have no experience with politics and no grasp of public service as a profession just deciding that they're going to jump into it. The obvious figurehead of this whole "I am an idiot, therefore I can be a politician" is Donald Trump. People think that ignorance of a profession is somehow qualifying for that profession. It's utterly baffling.
The most awful thing about power is not that it corrupts absolutely but that it makes people so utterly boring, so predictable.
In the case of Donald Trump I think you've got to accept that a lot of what's going on in political discourse is based upon judgement. How the economy works - how people work - what will come to pass - what will not come to pass - what is possible - what is not possible. There is this whole modal dimension. There's a lot in politics that is making a judgement about what might be and can be and would be. Trump frightens a lot of people but there is a bizarre possible world in which it turns out as he's vindicated, though most of us think the evidence is against it.
If everything in the environment is utterly predictable, you become bored. If it's utterly unpredictable, you become frustrated.
