Cromwell

Some commentators on the right argue that Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election are justified by the left’s denial of his legitimacy in 2016 and thereafter. Are they correct?

No, because there are two fundamental differences in the situations:

1. The objections to Trump’s legitimacy after the 2016 election were primarily moral, not legal. Hillary Clinton sucked it up and conceded promptly. There were demonstrations, but no barrage of frivolous lawsuits, let alone efforts to get state legislatures to appoint their own electors or semi-serious discussions about martial law.
2. The left’s complaints were based in fact, not fantasy. Trump did, in fact, lose the popular vote by a significant margin. He did, in fact, receive (and welcome) assistance from the Russians, and subsequently attempt to compel Ukraine to intervene in the 2020 election on his behalf. Just because his campaign’s communications with Russians didn’t meet the standard for a criminal conspiracy doesn’t mean they didn’t happen, or that they didn’t matter. Trump’s objections to the “rigged” vote, on the other hand, are supported by nothing but the fevered imaginations of some of his most rabid supporters.

The PBP/Reactionary deal on regressive tax cuts, deregulation, and conservative judges has been the cornerstone of the GOP since Reagan. Historically, the Reactionaries were content to let the PBPs run the show for most of that period, and were satisfied with a few public relations crumbs here and there. Reactionary deference disappeared, however, as a result of a variety of factors and events, including: the abject failures of the George W. Bush administration; the emergence of Fox News and right-wing web sites; the impacts of globalization and technological change on white male workers; threatening demographic changes; and legal decisions expanding the rights of sexual minorities, to the consternation of conservative Christians.

While Donald Trump’s economic ideas were impeccably PBP, his rhetoric was consistently Reactionary, which distinguishes him from all of his GOP predecessors. With his defeat, is there any hope that the beast will be releashed? Based on the overall outcome of the election, no; if anything, you can expect the Reactionaries to be more, not less assertive within the GOP in the next few years.

In a few respects, mostly dealing with foreign policy, Trump deviated dramatically from GOP orthodoxy. These included:

1. A strong aversion to military interventions, particularly in the Middle East;
2. An almost complete lack of interest in human rights issues, except cynically for leverage in negotiations;
3. A preference for dealing with dictators over elected leaders;
4. A willingness to openly discuss using nuclear weapons;
5. A willingness to meet with foreign leaders without making the customary preparations;
6. An unjustified phobia about trade deficits; and
7. The enthusiastic and arbitrary use of tariffs, even against close allies.

How much of this will survive him? Probably not much. The most interesting question involves #3. If the GOP continues to lean towards authoritarianism at home, how can that not impact their views on foreign policy? How can you plausibly extoll the virtues of liberal democracy abroad as you openly undermine it at home? As the man on golf cart likes to say, we’ll see.

As I’ve noted innumerable times before, the foundation of today’s GOP is an unwritten agreement by which PBPs get tax cuts and deregulation for business, and Reactionaries get socially conservative judges and inflammatory culture wars rhetoric. Trump has delivered in spades on both sides of the bargain, which is why he retained such strong support among Republican voters in November in spite of his inept and uncaring response to the pandemic. His ideas on most domestic issues, including climate change, the environment, relations between business and labor, inequality, affirmative action, support for Christianity, and immigration are completely within the mainstream of the GOP.

These elements of Trumpism will be carried forward by the party’s next leader, regardless of who it is.

That’s exactly what they are doing by denying aid to state and local governments. Maybe someone should point that out?

Plenty of commentators are speculating about whether Trumpism will survive the fall of the man on golf cart. The question cannot be answered in a meaningful way without a definition of Trumpism. There are three elements of Trumpism: personality; orthodox GOP substantive ideology; and heterodox ideology. In this post, I will address the first of these.

It is often said–largely, but not completely, correctly–that Trumpism is nothing more or less than Donald Trump himself. Here are the most striking aspects of his personality:

1. Narcissism;
2. A complete lack of interest in policy details;
3. Faith in gut instincts, not expertise, which is viewed with suspicion as being associated with the “deep state;”
4. Intolerance of opposition;
5. Demands for complete loyalty, while giving none;
6. A short attention span;
7. The use of capriciousness as a negotiating tactic;
8. A belief that truth is whatever serves his interests rather than an objective concept;
9. A rejection of the very concept of public service, which causes him to put his own interests above his country’s;
10. The belief that in all human transactions, there is a winner and a loser, the identity of whom is dictated by power, wealth, shrewdness, and status;
11. Intellectual inflexibility (i.e., the only way he knows how to practice politics is to throw red meat to his base); and
12. An odd combination of whining and belligerence, based on the apparent belief that an evil, powerful establishment has denied him the status to which he is clearly entitled.

Most of these characteristics obviously won’t be shared by his successors, regardless of how disagreeable they may be. The exception is the last; it is difficult to imagine any GOP nominee in the foreseeable future who doesn’t campaign as an outsider grievance politician with a huge chip on his shoulder. That part of Trumpism, alas, is undoubtedly here to stay.

Every year around this time, the right starts bleating about a purely fictional “War on Christmas.” This year, I’m sure the complaints will focus on state coronavirus regulations designed to prevent unnecessary deaths. As if Jesus told his disciples that it was OK to walk around infecting people in late December.

The real war pits the GOP against blue states. This one is getting more virulent with each passing day. First, we had the limits on the SALT deduction in the Trump tax bill, which were justified as a measure to stick it to states with high taxes and levels of service. Now we have the refusal to provide relief to state and local governments, even though history tells us that it creates a double benefit, by maintaining both employment and service levels. Furthermore, there are plenty of red states that will be forced into unpopular service cuts without federal relief; the problem is hardly limited to blue states. Mitch and his henchmen are unmoved; making blue states squeal is the overriding objective here, not using federal powers to promote the welfare of America as a whole.

If blue state representatives acted in the same way, they would deny relief to Texas and Florida for damage caused by hurricanes on the basis that the residents of red states should just suck it up and be the rugged individuals they purport to be. That won’t happen, of course. As I’ve noted before, but it can’t be overemphasized, blue Americans may in some cases think themselves superior to their red compatriots, but red Americans deny that blue Americans are Americans at all. That is a fundamental difference between the two parties.

It isn’t the welfare of the American people; we already learned that in 2009. It certainly isn’t the suffering of hundreds of millions of residents of blue states; they can go to hell, as far as he’s concerned, even though their tax money keeps his state afloat. No, what really moves Mitch is, as you might have guessed, the prospect of losing his job as Majority Leader! His two Georgia senators are taking a beating for doing nothing on the pandemic, so action on a stimulus package has suddenly become imperative for him.

Pathetic, but true. It tells you how Biden will have to manage him for the next two years.

The gist of the Flight 93 article was that the state of the nation was so dire, the electorate was fully justified in putting its fate in the hands of an outsider lacking the usual qualifications and personal characteristics to be president. What did we have to lose? The status quo had to be disrupted, whatever the costs and risks, because it clearly led to ruin.

Judged by those standards, the Trump years were a success. Invincible ignorance, divisiveness, corruption, and violations of constitutional norms were just different ways of overturning an evil establishment. The worse it got, the more Trump was viewed as fulfilling his promises to the base. They shared his sense of grievance with the establishment, and adored him for trying to shatter it by any means available, even if he did it for himself, not them.

Trump eroded our faith in our liberal democratic system, but he didn’t replace it with anything except himself. In about a month, he will be gone. What happens then? Will faith in the system be restored? Will it be overturned in favor of illiberal democracy or fascism? Everything is on the table now. Dramatic change is no longer unimaginable.

No pressure on you, Mr. President-Elect.

Donald Trump decided to engage China in a ruinous trade war in which American farmers were, as one would predict, the most prominent victims. He responded to the plight of these supposedly rugged individuals by giving them handouts and thus increasing their dependence on the state. In spite of this, rural areas voted overwhelmingly for the thrice-married former casino owner from New York over a bland, avuncular Democrat. Why?

It isn’t because farmers have an issue with big government; they have relied on federal programs for years. It’s the culture war, of course. Rural residents view the GOP as the party of self-reliant, hardworking, oppressed white Christians, and the Democrats as, well, the opposite.

It has to be pointed out that this kind of cultural and political division is hardly just an American phenomenon, as anyone versed in European history can tell you. The difference between America and Europe is that our federal system gives a disproportionate amount of influence to rural residents, so their opinions matter more here than elsewhere.

What can the Democrats do to resolve this problem, short of amending the Constitution to reallocate power? They can put more emphasis on rural redevelopment plans and infrastructure. They can pick candidates who look and sound like farmers. Above all, they can throttle down the culture war, and make it clear that white Christians have a valued place in their vision of America.

The bottom line, however, is that most of this will only be effective on the margins for the foreseeable future. Converting rural America is going to be a hard slog, with Trump, Fox, and the rest of the right preaching the gospel of division every day.

The McConnell Project, of course, is locking in minority rule by confirming as many conservative judges as possible, while denying approval to anyone left of center. The Biden victory obviously interferes with that objective. How will McConnell respond? Will he give every Biden appointment the Merrick Garland treatment?

I don’t think so; that would be an obvious violation of his constitutional responsibility, and one without precedent. McConnell prefers to bend the rules or make new ones rather than engage in blatant violations of the ones that are already written in stone. He will just process Biden’s nominations very slowly, reject anyone the base really hates, and hope that things return to what he views as normal after 2024.

Mitch McConnell is a man with an agenda. When Trump was busy cutting taxes and appointing conservative judges, the two were enthusiastic partners. Otherwise, McConnell was careful not to provoke him, but he mostly ignored him. Trumpian outrages were met with silence or masterly equivocation. Whether you took that as assent or objection was up to you.

You can be certain that Trump will be demanding unceasing resistance to the new administration from GOP members of Congress after January 20. How will McConnell respond? In the same way as before. He will brush off Trump’s comments politely and do exactly what he thinks is necessary to regain power, which, in most cases, will not involve following the Trumpian line.

If you want to take power as a fascist, and you don’t have a strong following in the military, you need a large group of violent thugs with snappy team t-shirts under your unquestioned control. Mussolini’s guys wore black; Hitler’s Germans predictably went for a duller brown look.

We have plenty of right-wing militias in America today, but they aren’t prevalent enough to be much of a threat, and they aren’t under a single command. Will that change in the next four years? Will someone–either a recognized right-wing leader or someone we haven’t heard of yet–try to put himself at the head of these groups, and use them to win power?

It could happen; Trump didn’t do it, but he has shown the way for harder men with his authoritarian rhetoric and open disdain for liberal democratic values. Keep your eyes on this issue during the next few years.

Like John Bolton, William Barr knew everything he needed to know about Trump when he was offered the AG job. He understood perfectly well that Trump was capricious and corrupt and vastly more committed to his own interests than those of the nation. He accepted the job, anyway, because his agenda largely meshed with Trump’s, and because he thought he was smart enough to keep the man on golf cart under control.

Guess again, big guy! He probably thinks he salvaged his reputation by resigning. What he really did was point out how stupid he was to work for Trump in the first place. He’s a moron, not a martyr.

Life in the time of Trump.

The battle lingers on.

The man on golf cart says he won

But now his chance is gone.

Inauguration’s weeks away

And then he’ll have to leave.

Half of us will celebrate.

The other half will grieve.