The Trump cult

[tarheelbillie]

Yep. Basically the Kevin McCarthys and Cheneys and Lindsey Grahams and Karl Roves - the wealthy GOP business elite and their lackeys - thought they could gain and maintain power by appealing to the bigotries and sexism and homophobia and class and social resentments of white working-class people. In effect they'd wage an all-out culture war so they could gain power and implement what they really cared about, which were massive tax cuts and deregulation and the gutting of government programs created as far back as the Progressive Era and New Deal, all to enrich themselves beyond belief. And in their arrogance they thought they could just throw a few culture war bones and some red meat at their base to keep them voting Republican and that they could maintain control of the party and that all would be well.

And they succeeded beyond their wildest dreams, but they gradually lost control of the monster they created and now it's been steadily turning on them, one by one. Some, like Cheney and McCarthy (and Thom Tillis for that matter), have already been driven from power (if not wealth), while others like Graham are reduced to being suck ups and toadies to a guy like Trump to stay in office. They created a Frankenstein monster that they no longer fully control, although certainly they've achieved most of their initial goals, so I doubt many of them care, although my guess is that people like McCarthy and Lynne Cheney (and Elise Stefanik and others) are bitter about how things ended for them. I don't believe that any of these people (most of the GOP elite) are sincere culture warriors. and they've always known their culture-war bullshit was a lie, which in some ways makes their actions even more despicable than the true believers in the party.

GOP's smartest move was that they got religion. That was the worm on the hook for the evangelical Christians.

 

[Centerpiece]

I used to wonder how it was possible that Trump could have won in 2016, and then again in 2024, given how emotionally toxic and depraved he is.
I don’t wonder anymore. I think he won for that exact reason. Because he carried at least one broken shard to reflect the broken shards in millions of others.
If you’re a racist, you found your guy. If you’re a misogynist, you found your guy. If money is your only religion, you found your guy. If your heart is armored shut, you found your guy. If you mock the disabled, you found your guy. If intelligence makes you insecure, you found your guy. If you’re a sexual predator, you found your guy. If you trade in humiliation and conspiracy and filth, you found your guy.
If you’ve never done a single hour of emotional inventory, you found your guy. If you cheat, stiff contractors, bankrupt your obligations, and call it savvy, you found your guy. If you lie as easily as you breathe, you found your guy. If cruelty feels like strength, you found your guy. If white grievance is your comfort food, you found your guy. If your ego is a black hole no title can fill, you found your guy. If warmongering fuels your ego, you found your guy, If empathy feels like weakness and dominance feels like oxygen, you found your guy.
If he’d only carried one or two of these pathologies, he might have been dismissed as just another loud, damaged man. But he carried a buffet of them. That was the appeal. Millions could locate themselves somewhere in the wreckage. They didn’t have to agree with all of it. They just had to recognize a piece of themselves in it.
It was never really about him. It was about the validation. The absolution. The permission. He didn’t invent the resentment; he amplified it. He didn’t create the cruelty; he normalized it. He gave millions the intoxicating relief of hearing their ugliest impulses echoed back at rally volume.
Trump is a symptom. The deeper illness is collective. If there’s one sentence that defines his power, it’s this: “He says the things I’m thinking.”
And that’s the part that should chill us.
Because what does it say about us that so many were thinking those things? That tens of millions of Americans harbored resentments so deep, so seething, that they were simply waiting for a demagogue to baptize them as virtue? That after decades of supposed progress on race, gender, and equality, so many white men felt so threatened, so displaced, so furious, that cruelty became a political platform?
Maybe we were living in a fool’s paradise, mistaking silence for healing, politeness for progress.
Now the mask is off. Now we know.
And knowing is a far more dangerous place to stand.
– Michael Jochum, Not Just a Drummer: Reflections on Art, Politics, Dogs, and the Human Condition.

Agree with all except the last line.
I think “knowing” isn’t more dangerous. I think not knowing is more dangerous.

What’s the old adage? “Know thy enemy” or “keep your friends close, and your enemies closer”.

I think now that we most definitely know about all those millions amongst us, we can see them. Before, they only came out at night with hoods on. Before, they wore a hood and only came out at night, then they’d go back to being your barber or your grocer. At least now we can see them in the broad daylight. We know who they are now. We can identify them, shun them and boycott them.

Before, I had no idea who was burning a cross in my yard. Now I know exactly who it is. They somehow feel LESS dangerous, not far more dangerous, but less.

 

[finesse]

Agree with all except the last line.
I think “knowing” isn’t more dangerous. I think not knowing is more dangerous.

What’s the old adage? “Know thy enemy” or “keep your friends close, and your enemies closer”.

I think now that we most definitely know about all those millions amongst us, we can see them. Before, they only came out at night with hoods on. Before, they wore a hood and only came out at night, then they’d go back to being your barber or your grocer. At least now we can see them in the broad daylight. We know who they are now. We can identify them, shun them and boycott them.

Before, I had no idea who was burning a cross in my yard. Now I know exactly who it is. They somehow feel LESS dangerous, not far more dangerous, but less.

I'm pretty sure it was the deacons who burned the cross at our house. They asked for my stepfather's resignation the next Sunday. It sure didn't pay to preach a sermon in favor of civil rights in 1966 in Lenoir County. Who cares if the Southern Baptist Convention said it was Race Relations Day?