When I was still working before I retired, one of our most effective business-to-business (B2B) sales tools was something called “FUD.” It’s an acronym for Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt. The idea was to persuade a prospective client that either doing nothing or deciding to go with another vendor would be a risky decision. One that would lead to bad outcomes.

IBM used to have an expression that it used to very great effect: “No one ever lost his/her job by hiring IBM.” IBM was considered the safe option when it came to anything related to computers, software, and technology solutions.

Donald Trump and his Republican sycophants are doing their best to spread fear, uncertainty, and doubt among the electorate in their efforts to get Trump re-elected and to maintain GOP control of the Senate.

Trump is claiming that, should Biden win in November, American cities would dissolve into “chaos and anarchy” — as if Trump, thanks, in a large part, to his militaristic actions in cities like Portland, hasn’t already escalated chaos and instigated violence.

He and his cronies are telling white suburbanites that, under Biden, their American Dream will be lost when minorities, the poor, and members of MS-13 infect their suburban enclaves. Trump and the Republicans are suggesting that, should Biden win, these guys will be your new neighbors. Yikes!Trump has threatened to “very quickly” stifle riots on election night if Democrats organize protests against his potential victory by employing a law allowing him to deploy active-duty troops domestically.

“We’ll put them down very quickly if they do that,” Trump told Fox News host Jeanine Pirro when she asked him how he would stop potential riots on election night should he win. “We have the right to do that, we have the power to do that if we want. We’ll put them down very quickly if they do that. We have the right to do that, we have the power to do that if we want. Look, it’s called insurrection. We just send in and we do it, very easy. I mean, it’s very easy. I’d rather not do that because there’s no reason for it, but if we had to we’d do that and put it down within minutes.”

Trump believes that creating chaos and violence and spreading uncertainty and doubt about such things as mail-in ballots and the legitimacy the vote, will benefit his political power and help him win in November, thus allowing him in power for the next four years — and potentially beyond that.

He is aggressively selling FUD. All you have to do is vote for him to avoid fear, uncertainty, and doubt. He is the solution to the problem. He alone can fix it. Even if he has to deploy the military against American citizens to do it.

Just to demonstrate my point about spreading FUD, this came across my newsfeed this morning:Caputo — without evidence — accused career government scientists yesterday of “sedition” in their handling of the pandemic and warned that left-wing hit squads were preparing for armed insurrection after the election. This is crazy. Caputo is crazy. Trump is crazy.

This is spreading FUD.