Apologies that this touches on areas already covered. I wrote it when the thread first appeared by found myself, er, unable to post for a while.
Millions are still drawn too Hitlers charisma today. Historians have argued if we can find anything to add to why this happens then all the research and debates have been worth it.
I think this view has been overlooked when it comes to Trump+Johnson.
Am not saying they both want to dominate the world etc etc, it's more about why people are attracted to these people so strongly. the majority of the UK despise Johnson and Trump . they know they are Narcistic corrupt lying psychopathic racist traitors yet we still have millions who still adore them no matter what they say or do, why is the question. gullible doesn't answer the question. they wilfully close their minds to anything bad they do.
Although immense differences between the evil of Hitler and Bozo/the orange anus, there are parallels with their attraction to a certain section of society.
Let's start from a position that, no matter the political direction and positioning of a country, there will always a proportion of the electorate that feels disillusioned/ignored/angry/missing out/under threat. It's human nature. The proportion will vary, and quite substantially, based predominantly on the overall economic health of the country in question (coupled with how effectively the economic proceeds are distributed)
At times of economic doldrums (or worse), more people feel disillusioned/ignored/angry/missing out/under threat. And they become easier prey for forces out to harness their anger for their own political purposes.
Hitler actually had economic prosperity for all Germans* at the heart of his beliefs and doctrine. But he also had the rest of his programme, which was vile and murderous and nationalistic and ultra-authoritarian.
(* well, not all, but you get the generalisation)
He was able to sell his poison because Germany was on its economic knees. He wove a narrative of blame that, to many of the German people, seemed plausible. The Treaty of Versailles (some truth in it); Jews and their control of the financial system (not true); Bolsheviks and socialists holding the country back and in league with the Jews (also not true); trade unions and workers' rights hampering economic progress (again, not true).
Once he embedded in the minds of many Germans who to blame for their economic woes, he then set out his solutions. Not everyone fell for his bullshit, far from it, but with his henchmen having increasing power as he climbed the political ladder, first many of those on the political fence sat on their hands then those who mildly opposed it followed in keeping schtum, then those who strongly opposed it were silenced anyway. Acquiescence secured through apathy and jackboot.
The same broad timeline of
angry population>create bogeymen>offer 'solutions' has been used before Hitler, and most certainly used since, becoming increasingly honed in method and technique in more recent decades.
Apart from the level of evil, a key difference between Hitler and the likes of the orange anus and Bozo, is that the latter two couldn't give a flying fuck about the plight of the masses. Their motives are a combination of narcissism/ego and being the frontman for a financial elite who want to preserve their wealth and privilege (including the privilege to dodge tax and hide assets)
But both have been able to take advantage of the simmering anger amongst their respective populations. The orange anus span the fable of him 'making America great again' by bringing back outsourced jobs and reopening mines and steelworks - a promise that went down well in the Rust Belt - and interweaving this with supporting the fears amongst conservatives and millions of militant Christianists that there was an political establishment intent on making the US the new Sodom and Gomorrah for fornicators and abortionists and transgenders and Muslims and blacks. Oh, and don't you know that they're the same political establishment who are in league with the Wall Street suits who have got rich by closing down American industries and shipping the work off to China? Throw in a pandering to the racists and white supremacists, and you have his base, located in the right areas, which was enough to secure victory in 2016. This all helped by the emergence of 'echo chamber' social media, which reinforces their beliefs.
Of course, his MAGA promises were largely hollow, and many ordinary people who voted for him in 2016 in hope he had the solution to their economic woes were again disillusioned come 2020.
In the UK, a new focal point for hope for a better economic future initially coalesced around the anti-EU movement.
Actually, we can trace it further back, to 1997. It was a time filled with hope and optimism for a brighter future after years of Tory shithousery. millions put their faith in New Labour to put things right for everyone. That first Labour term at least was a brilliant time - economic stability, growth, social progression, investment into crumbling public services, a young and energetic PM. The gloss began to fade in the 2nd term, especially after the idiotic and nefarious Iraq Invasion, but it was still a broadly positive time. Problem was that the economic stability was built on foundations of blancmange, fed by consumer debt - Tory deregulation of the FS industry allowed a conveyor belt of new debt creation by parcelling and selling debt derivatives, and backed by a house price boom; and by government debt as it ran a fiscal deficit for several years due to a resolute refusal to raise income tax rates to pay for their [very necessary] and built hospitals and schools using the discredited PFI/PPP schemes that gave profiteering shyster corporates a licence to print money and costs the taxpayer massively more than if they'd been funded conventionally.
The two would normally have led to inflationary pressure leading to rising interest rates to take the heat out of the economy by suppressing borrowing, but it all coincided with a period of importing deflation through outsourcing manufacturing and, to a lesser extent, services, so they balanced out. The 2008/9 GFC laid it all bare, though.
By then, there was a realisation amongst a growing number of 'ordinary working people' that, whilst the Labour years were better than anything under the Tories, not much had changed in terms of the fundamentals. Yes, many people were and felt a bit more prosperous and the NHS and schools were a bit better... but the millionaires were now multi-millionaires, the multi-millionaires now billionaires. Most people were a bit better off, but the wealthiest were a lot better off. It had been
good but could and should have been so much better. With a fairer distribution of all the wealth generated during that period.
Even then, though, there was little appetite for a return to Tory rule in 2010. In what should have been a shoe-in, Cameron couldn't secure a majority
One area the Tories were making progress in, though, was in social/cultural issues. Thanks largely to a toxic right-wing media peddling hate, the narrative of lefties, Muslims, immigrants being to blame for the economic woes faced by people gained traction. And, of course, blaming the EU. Again, the emergence of the echo chamber nature of social media (along with the manipulation by both domestic and overseas - ahem, Russian - agents) really assisted this.
The emergence of that frog-faced fascist Frottage with his 'easy solutions' and nationalist-nostalgia struck chords. So much so that by 2015, UKIP were a serious political force, with the Tory Party in danger of erupting into civil war and possibly splitting. In response, Cameron chose to potentially throw the entire country under the bus to hold the Tory Party together, at least until after the 2015 GE.
And that's where Bozo comes in. Pro-EU at heart, he chose to swing behind Vote Leave because he believed Remain would win, but he could position himself as the darling of the anti-EU majority within the Tory membership, and be in prime position to oust Cameron when the Tory civil war inevitably erupted again once Remain had won.
As we know to our cost, it didn't go to plan. One of the central themes of the Leave campaigns that struck a chord with many within the electorate was a variation on the orange anus's 'political establishment' strawman. The UK/Vote Leave variation was about 'Brussels bureaucrats' and them acting against the interest of 'ordinary working people' in the UK. Obviously the biggest chord struck by Vote Leave was over immigration.
But hey-ho, Bozo would twist it to his advantage. He'd already made an ally of Bannon and that group, and by 2019 they had helped him replicate and adapt much of the blueprint that propelled the orange anus into the White House. The targeting of specific sections of the disaffected with dog-whistle messages, based not on trying to win the economic argument, but spreading fear (that their culture was being whittled away through immigration, lefty-Labour, queers and transgenders, etc) and hopecasting a super future for Ol' Blighty by harnessing the multitude of post-Brexit freedoms. And again, he rehashed the fight against the British political establishment (the 'Notting Hill luvvies' who don't care about 'ordinary working people', especially in those oik northern towns, and instead want us to take millions of immigrants and convert to Islam and have mixed gender toilets and remove anything and everything with a link to our glorious past). this all despite him and most of his cabinet being from money and having gone to public school and Oxbridge, and being bankrolled by multi-millionaires and billionaires.
So - and realising I've waffled on far more than I intended, so apologies - my answer to the question "What draws people to Johnson + Trump" is that there's a whole lot of people in the UK, USA, wherever, who have been - or feel they have been - failed by the broad socio-economic model that's been in place decades.
They want the government to make things better for them. Due to 'mainstream' Tories and the last Labour government (read successive Democrat and more mainstream Republican for the US) not really achieving that, and having a majority of the media constantly telling them who the 'real enemies' are, they are more open to snakeoil salesmen who seem to them to understand them and their concerns, and want to address them.
