"If [shutdowns] would have worked, it would have worked the first time. The only thing flattening is the American dream. Californians should be irate. They should be furious."
Tomi Lahren, on Fox
Americans are of two minds. Head and heart. Reason and emotion. Superego and id. Rules and freedom. Democrats and Republicans.
Democrats are the stodgy adults. Trump and Trump-ism are teen-agers.
Every adult understands self-imposed constraints exercised by one's "better judgement." That prudent, responsible-self attempts to guide the freer, more impulsive, more selfish, and in the immediate moment, happier self. Everyone on a budget who avoids an impulse purchase, or a diet who resists a dessert, experiences the two minds.
A Fox News clip displays what is now the two sides of Fox, the news side and the opinion side. It is also the two minds of the American public as regards COVID. The news anchors introducing Tomi Lahren note that COVID is spreading and we Americans need to do something, don't we? We cannot just avoid the reality that people die from COVID. Right? That was the adult voice.
Tomi Lahren is young and attractive in the Fox News style of young, blond, heavily made-up women in tight dresses. She projects confidence and outrage. She is mad as hell and she isn't going to take it anymore. Her message is that masks, social distancing, and lockdowns hurt businesses and that they aren't fair to them. The price of lockdowns is too high. The old and sick ought to take care of themselves. We tried lockdowns for two weeks, sure, she said, that much was OK, but eight months is ridiculous.
Besides, California Governor Newsom is wrong, wrong, wrong. We don't need insulting and condescending billboards telling Californians to wash their hands!. Our leaders work for us! We pay their salaries! Lahren speaks in italics.
Trump-ism is not going away with Trump. For one thing, Trump isn't going away. He is positioning himself to hound and undermine Biden, to make money now and be ready for a re-run by himself or by Don Junior. Trump located the populist nativist emotion that lurked under the surface of the GOP electorate, the one Pat Buchanan spoke to in 1992. It was buried under Bush family popularity and the GOP tradition of free trade and international engagement, but Trump energized it and re-aligned the GOP.
Democrats worry that Trump is ushering in an era of authoritarian anti-democratic government. Trump isn't the problem. He is bad at authoritarianism. His flagrant and proud effort to get Republicans to overthrow an election and keep him in office certainly portends an authoritarian future, and Trump sets the stage for one. Republican officeholders who let him ignore Article One constraints, and now are silent as he attempts to get legislatures to ignore an election, are all bad signs. But Trump himself is no dictator. He is too much a narcissist. He wants adoration and loyalty, and people exercising power make people unhappy. Trump outsourced his one big policy gain--judges--to people who knew and cared about judges. Trump isn't a totalitarian. He doesn't want social discipline. He wants native-born "real" Americans to be freer so they will love him. And many do.
Rules and self-restraint are for the nanny state tyrants and experts. They are for scientists who think they need to check their work on vaccines. Rules are for Democrats.
To better understand Trump-ism, understand Tomi Lahren. She, like Trump, wants people to be free of killjoys so they can take care of Number One. She wants freedom to do her thing, for TV celebrities to make a lot of money, and for businesses to be open. If crowding into bars and restaurants spreads the virus, so what? Let seniors do their thing and shelter.
Trump-ism is a mood and a response to the constraints of "better judgement" adulthood. It is an angry, anti-elitist response to the failure of rule-based multilateral globalism to preserve the standard of living of working Americans. It is a response to regulations involving climate and the environment that constrained fossil fuel exploration and plastic straws. It was a response to social customs and rules that require acceptance of diversity and inclusion, whether Americans were ready for it or not. Now, with COVID, it's a response to rules that limit people's livelihood and personal behavior.
Democrats are the grownups in the room, stodgy and constrained, maybe, but sensible. They support those rule, norms, and constraints. They expect to be thanked and appreciated for playing that role. Not entirely.
Trump is the voice of rebellion against all that "better judgement." Trump-ism defines it as freedom. Me first. America first. People like their freedom.
3 comments:
Entered for John Flenniken by Peter Sage:
Studying the social reactions in the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic I see similar reactions to masks and business closures recommended by community health professionals of the day. There was exhaustion from quarantine and shutdowns. Reactions to mask wearing and gatherings varied State to State and city to city. Newspapers and radio were the way people got their information; and, of course talking to people whom experienced the flu. Rumors flew and you can read peoples reactions at the time, covering up the dates and overlooking the old newspaper feel, you hear and see people saying the exact same thing today. The same as Peter’s blog today.
So what is different this time to another pandemic? Well it’s the political action/reaction that never jelled. At the highest level it was treated as a distraction from Trump’s messaging. The Covid Task Force nightly news conference was capturing higher ratings than Trump’s Tweets; and, his approval rating fell to the lowest level of his four years. Something needed to be done to hang onto power.
With an election on the horizon Trump tried to mobilize his base with his well choreographed rallies and plans for a wild Republican Convention in North Carolina were thwarted moving it to Jacksonville Florida. Again the subtext was that the virus was harmless if you weren’t old or sick already.
Then came Trump’s own personal bout of Covid19 and a White House hot zone. Throughout his term in office Trump marshaled the forces of the right to organize and protest as he is the master of smackdown. Rumbling noisy convoys carrying Trump’s banners and guns, these supporters resembled ISIS rolling into Mosul, confronted the cities where racial justice and anti-Trump demonstrations occurred. His supporters were enraged and acting as conquerers.
Now that the election is over and the Electoral College so poised to deliver 306 electoral votes to the Biden-Harris ticket, the last hope for a weak strongman wannabe totalitarian is to cause chaos with the process. All the while his supporters are being lied to and conned by FoxNews and the Trump Leadership PAC. And if that doesn’t work try to hold (steal) the office by force as there is still much that can happen when a Weak strongman wannabe tries to hang onto power. January 20th 2021 can not come fast enough.
Even if I even wanted to "understand Trumpism", Lahren would be the last person I'd ask.
It seems others agree with my recent assessment:
https://twitter.com/thehill/status/1336326450463424512
"The Arizona Republican Party late Monday asked supporters if they were willing to give their lives in the fight over the results of the presidential election.
The party retweeted right-wing activist Ali Alexander's promise that he is "willing to give my life for this fight."
"He is. Are you?" the state GOP added."
The Republican party, in Arizona, at least, is now a full on death cult, and apparently endorsing violence against election officials, or self-immolation.
To channel Bill Murray, at least the anti=science republican idiots will continue to infect and kill each other, "at least we've got that working for us".
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