OPK wrote: ↑August 31st, 2020, 6:53 pm
FWIW, I live in a really red part of the country and hear all of this a lot. Whether you agree or disagree with this critique or its factual accuracy/inaccuracy, it is widespread where I am and is based on issues that motivate the right.
When folks on the left ask “how can anyone vote for Trump?” Wheat has provided a good insight into the answer.
I agree with OPK’s point here, but the “insight” that Wheat provides cannot be separated from the substance and quality of his argument. So I want to address that directly and thoroughly. I will not tag quote Wheat’s list of the Trump “policies.” I will refer to them generally, some specifically.
As I have posted before, I see Trump’s base as in 3 parts. Looking at the reasons Wheat cites for voting Trump Republican, I see no mention of such things as abortion, gay marriage, “religious freedom,” so I assume Wheat’s concerns are not those that top the list for white evangelicals. I don’t know whether Wheat thinks himself in the white working class, but generally the list he provides seems more typical of what I’ve termed come-home-to-Trump traditional Republicans.
First, Wheat says he is voting not for Trump but for “policies.” His reference to the media destroying good candidates is unconvincing, and is all-too-typical of Trump World’s view that the MSM is the fount of so many of our problems. Biden’s winning the Dem nomination was something of a fluke, true, but it had nothing to do with a destructive media. He won because of Jim Clyburn’s vocal, impassioned support at a key moment (SC primary). Biden got momentum. He’s not the most impressive even of the Dem centrists, but he does have a strong legislative and policy record. And in terms of character, competence, leadership, and accomplishment, he’s miles ahead of Trump.
Wheat concedes Trump is a “narcissistic ass.” True enough, and widely acknowledged by many Trump voters. But that only begins to describe the dangers of Trump’s grotesque character. That he is the proverbial dictionary/Wikipedia definition of a sociopath is enough on its own to disqualify him from any national leadership position, much less the presidency. Ditto for his pathological mendacity, or his history of sexual predations. Aided by Attorney General Barr, he undermines the rule of law, foundation of American democracy, daily. He’s a lifelong cheater in his business dealings, failing to pay workers, defaulting on loans repeatedly. Among the things we will learn from Trump’s tax returns, sooner or later, is that Trump turned to Deutsche Bank and Russian mobsters for money because New York banks were fed up with his cheating and lying, with his all-too-standard “business practices.” He’s a grifter, through and through. New York banks knew that 30 years ago.
So, does character pale in comparison to policy? Is character just unimportant in the 21st century, passé, in choosing the most powerful person in the world?
Has Trump exhibited either competence or leadership in this catastrophic pandemic? He has not. Indeed, in his rejection of scientific expertise, he exhibits what has become a key characteristic of Trump Republicans: distrust of experts and disbelief in science. Trump and his followers increasingly adopt loony conspiracy theories, such as QAnon filth. Wheat slips in a run-of-the-mill conspiracy theory: “I wonder who is pulling [Biden’s] strings from behind the curtain?” If you’re truly concerned about string-pulling, you might consider Trump’s role as Putin’s useful idiot. Are you truly concerned about what’s behind Trump’s curtain?
In this regard, consider Wheat’s examples of foreign policy issues. The implication that Trump has made us stronger in the world is laughable. Trump has deserted European allies and has strengthened China immeasurably and disastrously. Is China a longterm threat. Yes, and Trump’s illiteracy in American foreign policy is a gift to China and to Putin in particular. It will take years to repair the damage Trump has done to our foreign policy and international trustworthiness. Who cares about Europe, or Asia, or the Pacific region? Build walls.
In general, Wheat relies as much on slogans as “policy” to justify a vote for Trump — though Wheat preciously insists it’s not really a vote for Trump. “Globalism out of hand, support police, rebuild military.” This isn’t careful, detailed, grunt-work, serious policy, which Trump doesn’t do, period. He does impulses, as even his closest associates admit. Impulses. From the Oval Office, golf course, Mar-a-Lago. Impulses.
And the most telling slogan of all: America first, which Wheat labels a “philosophy.” Well, if it’s a foreign policy philosophy, it’s isolationism, comforting perhaps to head-under-covers Trump know-nothings. If it’s a political philosophy, it’s neo-fascism, an echo of the America First Movement of the 1930s. Is World War II old news? Like Biden, whose time has passed?
Many scholars who study fascism warn that it’s on our doorstop. It’s not coming; it’s here, now. Trump ran a fascist-themed campaign in 2016, and has in the last 3 years encouraged his supporters to see in him a unique “strongman” who will “save us.” The fascists and neo-Nazis know he’s one of them.
Trump is no conservative, as actual Republican conservatives, painfully deserting their beloved lifelong party, now write about daily. The Trump Party is not conservative, but radical-reactionary, a nostalgic impulse to return to the 1950s via a cult of strongman personality. Purveying his racist “white nationalism,” Trump is no patriot. MAGA, dog whistles to rogue police and militiamen-in-waiting, louder and louder this summer. American chaos and carnage, drowning out, Trump desperately hopes, death rattles from Covid.
Trump’s “policies”? Impulses from a sociopath. “Philosophy”? Fascist white nationalism. If one cannot see through Trump, one is practicing willful ignorance. Which is immediately endangering the survival of our constitutional democratic republic.
To vote for Trump’s policy impulses is to vote for lawlessness at home and American irrelevance abroad. To vote for his MAGA philosophy is to vote for fascism.