Winning

To his opponents, one of the most puzzling aspects of Donald Trump’s persistent appeal to his base of supporters is how they can continue to back a person with such blatant character flaws and low moral fiber.

Take his history with women as an example. He’s a convicted sexual predator who has admitted committing crimes of this nature against numerous victims. Yet Trump retains support among enough Republican women to lead in the polls against Joe Biden, a man with no such history of sexist abuse.

But what Democrats have to remember is that from a Republican perspective there is precedent for this inexplicable phenomenon. Bill Clinton was accused of multiple acts of sexual misconduct when he was president, including having an inappropriate relationship with an intern — and lying about it in a failed attempt at a coverup.

Yet Clinton survived these scandals and an impeachment attempt, and remains a popular figure among the Democratic base, which largely dismissed his actions as the imperfections of an otherwise good man.

As fas as I can tell, therefore, partisans on both sides care less about the morality of their leaders than whether they can beat the opposition. It’s the same in sports — fans largely tolerate complete jerks and cheaters as long as they help their favorite teams win.

Let’s face it. America is one big winner-takes-all sweepstakes where it is a given that you should try to win no matter at what cost — to your values, ideals or fundamental beliefs.

Sadly, most Americans seem just fine with that. 

But one more thing. I am not in any way saying that Clinton is the equivalent of Trump when it comes to the existential threat to our democracy. Clinton was an incredibly efficient president, despite his personal flaws, and has been a respectable statesman since leaving office.

Whereas Trump is the most dangerous person in the world.

HEADLINES:

• Gaza's al-Shifa hospital in ruins after two-week Israeli raid (BBC)

• Israel rocked by largest protests since war began as Netanyahu faces growing pressure (CNN)

• Israeli airstrike on Iran’s consulate in Syria killed two generals, Iranian officials say (AP)

• The Russians Sent A Platoon Of Grenade-Hurling Robotic Mini-Tanks Into Battle. The Ukrainians Blew Up The ‘Bots In The Usual Way: With Drones. (Forbes)

• Even before the revolution, America was a nation of conspiracy theorists (AP)

• How Republicans texted and emailed their way into a money problem (WP)

• How Xi Jinping plans to overtake America (Economist)

• Taliban ban on girls’ education defies both worldly and religious logic (Al Jazeera)

• Can We Engineer Our Way Out of the Climate Crisis? (NYT)

• Cancer signs could be spotted years before symptoms, says new research institute (Guardian)

• Election disinformation takes a big leap with AI being used to deceive worldwide (AP)

• Intense April storm to threaten much of U.S. with severe weather (Axios)

• Ready or not, self-driving semi-trucks are coming to America’s highways (WP)

• The internet may not be big enough for the LLMs. (Verge)

• We’re Focusing on the Wrong Kind of AI Apocalypse (Time)

• Google DeepMind unveils ‘superhuman’ AI system that excels in fact-checking, saving costs and improving accuracy (VentureBeat)

• Man Coming To Terms With Fact That Shower Not Getting Any Hotter (The Onion)