I think Trump is dangerous because he's a particularly explosive combination of Evil and Stupid.
Evil alone (i.e. intelligent evil) isn't as dangerous most of the time, because usually it's manifested as ultra-egotism -- usually if they're smart enough they don't come to government at all. Because, as Trump saw, that's just asking to get shot in the face; although sometimes e.g. in the form of racism taken as a life goal, there's more power-seeking, but then intelligence excludes most stupid forms of racism as simply demonstrably false, and it's very difficult to run on blatantly evil missions like that, post-Hitler.
Stupid alone obviously is useless: they usually don't even achieve power, and if by sheer luck they do, assuming they're not evil, they just fumble around and ask for assistance without too much damage, and might end up resigning or being effectively sidelined.
Now Trump isn't 100% stupid, or 100% evil. He's a very dangerous combination: he probably really doesn't believe in climate change due to very seriously stupid propaganda (in turn produced and stimulated by evil parties) from the far-right/inforwars/whatever, which is pretty stupid. You can even disagree climate change is harmful for yourself (some scientists even did -- at least a few decades ago), but denying it just reflects not having studied the matter at all or listened to anyone that understands a tiny bit of the science. And he is evil in the sense that he might think that, even if this were true, the US stands to profit from oil (again, evil and stupid!). He is evil in his reckless commitment to rile up hate speech, while not seeing the policies he is pursuing are incredibly stupid, and just self-destructive.
The end result is I expect this to be a huge enormous mess for the US, but also for the world. We live in the same planet, and unlike some who like to cheer on their perceived enemies' demise, everyone will be affected if the US (and for example the science they support) destroys so much value. Just like Russia and others, they hold massive nuclear arsenals. I shudder at those who cheer for US's total demise.
The hopeful thing is that insanity inevitably shows how great sanity is. Evil tends to self-destruct. Just do what you can, and brace for impact. Then rebuild from the wreckage. Never lose hope in human potential for good stuff. Good night and good luck.
Racism, ironically, doesn't discriminate. Anyone can be racist, even otherwise "intelligent" people. I agree that racism precludes my idea of intelligence, but there are plenty of conventionally intelligent people with some really stupid beliefs across the spectrum.
Second, evil can self-destruct, but it can also reign for millennia.
Agreed. Basically, intelligence doesn't transfer from one task to another in a straightforward manner, unfortunately. More gravely, people can find ways to self-censor that are very powerful and very unfortunate (i.e. fooling yourself).
Also, I don't really like to portray people as evil. That tends to dehumanize them and try to separate them into something entirely different, and something distant. Much has been said about this post-WWII, and I agree. Those are people like us, just from a different psycho-social background, which could have been our own; and there is always the possibility of change, if not from leaders from followers. To me the greatest danger of claiming evil is when you stop (or try to get people to stop) thinking there; when you try to find the exact source of harm and carefully explain your reasoning, that's less bad. I didn't know what else to write instead...
Evil alone (i.e. intelligent evil) isn't as dangerous most of the time, because usually it's manifested as ultra-egotism -- usually if they're smart enough they don't come to government at all. Because, as Trump saw, that's just asking to get shot in the face; although sometimes e.g. in the form of racism taken as a life goal, there's more power-seeking, but then intelligence excludes most stupid forms of racism as simply demonstrably false, and it's very difficult to run on blatantly evil missions like that, post-Hitler.
Stupid alone obviously is useless: they usually don't even achieve power, and if by sheer luck they do, assuming they're not evil, they just fumble around and ask for assistance without too much damage, and might end up resigning or being effectively sidelined.
Now Trump isn't 100% stupid, or 100% evil. He's a very dangerous combination: he probably really doesn't believe in climate change due to very seriously stupid propaganda (in turn produced and stimulated by evil parties) from the far-right/inforwars/whatever, which is pretty stupid. You can even disagree climate change is harmful for yourself (some scientists even did -- at least a few decades ago), but denying it just reflects not having studied the matter at all or listened to anyone that understands a tiny bit of the science. And he is evil in the sense that he might think that, even if this were true, the US stands to profit from oil (again, evil and stupid!). He is evil in his reckless commitment to rile up hate speech, while not seeing the policies he is pursuing are incredibly stupid, and just self-destructive.
The end result is I expect this to be a huge enormous mess for the US, but also for the world. We live in the same planet, and unlike some who like to cheer on their perceived enemies' demise, everyone will be affected if the US (and for example the science they support) destroys so much value. Just like Russia and others, they hold massive nuclear arsenals. I shudder at those who cheer for US's total demise.
The hopeful thing is that insanity inevitably shows how great sanity is. Evil tends to self-destruct. Just do what you can, and brace for impact. Then rebuild from the wreckage. Never lose hope in human potential for good stuff. Good night and good luck.