Democrats are "birtherizing" Trump. It is ugly. It is probably working.
It can backfire.
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| Republicans chose Trump, on purpose. |
Democrats are birtherizing Trump with the Russia collusion probe. Democrats who blame the 2016 general election loss on Hillary Clinton being such a bad candidate ignore history. It wasn't just Hillary. It was Trump. Trump knew how to destroy other candidates.
Donald Trump caught a wave and he was very formidable. Trump re-defined a powerful political dynasty, turning Jeb Bush from the consensus favorite into a weak, low energy loser. He knocked out senators Graham, Paul, and Rubio, men who had worked for years to gain reputations as leaders of key Republican interest groups. He knocked out Chris Christie, a then-popular governor with blue-state credibility. He knocked out an admired neurosurgeon, a businesswoman.
Then, using Oregon as a late primary indicator, after the field was whittled down to clear choices of different brands of Republicanism, Trump stood against Senator Ted Cruz, who represented pure and angry conservatism, and John Kaisich, who represented centrist Republican judgement and maturity and experience as a longtime member of the House and currently the popular governor of the key state of Ohio.
Republican voters chose Trump. Trump was not a weak candidate. He beat strong candidates, some 16 of them.
He did it with a technique that observers--even partisan supporter observers--find ugly and demeaning of the process. He trafficked in juvenile name calling, in exaggerations and outright lies, in rumor spreading. He got partisans to help spread his conspiracy theories. As this blog has observed, he redefined politics in America down to a professional wrestling spectacle, and demonstrated that that was exactly what the American media and American voters actually wanted. He did not create this. He exposed this. It is where news-as-entertainment has led the country.
He did, and does, things even his supporters consider indefensible, but which they justify by saying not that Trump is good but that others are worse. Trump is a thug and bully, but Hillary is a crooked murderer, Obama is a weakling and a Muslim lover, Nancy Pelosi is a San Francisco socialist, Chuck Schumer is a schmuck, and Democrats are whiny losers.
Democrats are "birtherizing" Trump. Democrats have jumped onto the Russia collusion story, treating as treason--or at least arch stupidity--every possible connection between Trump, Trump's family, and the Trump campaign with Russians. Every connection is treated as devastating breaking news. They are creating smoke and doubt. They are energizing the Trump haters.
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| All Russia all the time. |
The ironies are multiple. Fox News hosts are shocked and angry that anyone would openly question the legitimacy of a president, notwithstanding having eagerly done exactly that in providing a platform for Trump and others to birtherize Obama. MSNBC has gone to all-Russian-conspiracy-all-the-time news. Every panel discusses the same issues: just exactly how treasonous was the Trump campaign? Capital crime treason? Major felony treason? Simply attempted treason and utter incompetence? Is Trump indebted to Russian oligarchs? How indebted exactly? Why won't he reveal his taxes? Do they hide the way he laundered Russian mob money?
Trump has burned enough Republicans that they are not comfortable providing him unqualified defense. Jeff Sessions needed to recuse himself, GOP officeholders are required to consent to investigations by presumably impartial investigators. This could go on for a decade. Trump calls it a witch hunt but the GOP establishment is saying that investigations must proceed. Too much is on the record to call it all nonsense. Republicans got the election result they wanted, but they have a 70 year history of distrust for Russians, even if they are not communists anymore.
Democrats are loving it. They get to revel in rumors and conspiracy theories. The resist-Trump social media is abuzz with news. Russian prostitutes peed on Trump? Well, Trump cannot prove it did not happen, and it is more probable than that Hawaii hospitals, newspapers, and the state's official birth records were forged 50 years ago in a secret conspiracy. Trump defined down what it takes to be a credible conspiracy. And Donald Junior did say "I love it."
Does "it" mean a treasonous Russian government conspiracy to commit theft to subvert American democracy? It depends on what "it" means. This is all reminiscent of the Whitewater investigation by Kenneth Starr, which meandered from an Arkansas land deal (no wrongdoing found) to setting up a surgery trap in an investigation of Bill Clinton's sexual history with Paula Jones.
It is all so delicious. It is payback.
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| Nine years too late for John Kerry. |
There are two problems with this for Democrats. One is that Trump is fighting back aggressively while Obama took the foolish and weak position that mirrored what Michael Dukakis and John Kerry did when they were attacked. Obama scoffed and ignored birther innuendos and accusations, which gave open field for the rumor to spread. He learned nothing from Dukakis being called a commie-lover and Kerry being called a coward. Trump, however, knows what to do: call it a vicious lie, denounce the accuser as fake news, and turn the subject into an attack: the Trump formula.
The other problem is that Democrats are the party of good government, and conspiracies of government disfunction and treachery are self-destructive to the Democratic brand and mission. If governments can be corrupted by foreign and domestic treason at the highest levels, then how can we trust government to supply single payer health care? When MSNBC becomes an equivalent of Fox, it damages long term Democratic policy. Democrats want social cohesion, not Darwinian self reliance. Democrats want government to work. They want it to be credible.
Democrats are enjoying the short term exhilaration of giving Trump some of his own medicine, but what worked for Trump and Republicans will not work for Democrats. When Democrats behave like Trump they create a political environment in which Trump--not they--thrive.
The Russia collusion story is a karma boomerang for Trump. But it could easily be a karma boomerang for Democrats, too.
2 comments:
The goal is to delegitimize Trump to his supporters. Unlike the birther tactic there is some truth to the story.
After the Access Hollywood revelation Trump opponents thought he had finally revealed the low character most everyone else saw and now would be disqualified. However his "apology" was sufficient to his evangelical base, who love nothing more than to forgive a sinner, to keep him in the game.
Maybe the Russian connections will reveal a prosecutable crime. I suspect even then his cult will not abandon him. It appears the tactic is to weaken, frustrate and isolate him, perhaps by forcing resignations of his family members as a start.
I browse cult postings on occasion. Recently one stated "It's a proven fact that lowering tax rates on the wealthy stimulates the economy". This is not an educated opinion, but a piece of dogma taken as truth because it emanates from a source that also promotes racist and bigoted ideas that this person agrees with. It is this intertwining of hate and fear with public policy that the Regressives use to gain power.
I hope you're wrong on Democrats birtherizing Trump. It not only failed to deny Obama a second term, it humiliated the birthers into fanatic status. I fear the Russiagate over-scandalizing of Trump will end with the loudest Democrats being tarnished as the "wingnut left" self deluded with overwrought conspiracy fantasies. Questioning Obama's birthplace had ample supporting facts for reasonable suspicion. But once he released his birth certificate, ardent birtherists became a national joke and Obama got his second term in part by backlash against them. Russiagate backlash could get Trump reelected. Diligently investigate yes, but Democrats are looking fanatical from my perspective.
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