"Explaining Stuff."
Joe Biden went to South Carolina to show Americans an alternative world view to the one voiced by Trump.
New York Times
Donald Trump has a talent Democrats have a hard time crediting. Trump can explain stuff. He communicates a world view. It is persuasive to a near-majority of voters. Trump explains that it is a dog-eat-dog world. Countries scratch, fight, and connive to take advantage of each other. It is nature. The same is true within America. Powerful elites in finance, media, universities, culture, technology, business, and government have rigged the system to their advantage. Bad people are out to get us: Democrats, liberals, woke scolds, trans people, Socialists, Communists, gun confiscators, Muslims, Blacks, China, Mexicans, NATO, the media, election officials, RINOs. Law enforcement and the courts have been infiltrated and corrupted, too, Trump says, so they are a threat to regular Americans and Trump personally. It is us versus them.
In this way of "explaining stuff," the prosecution of Trump is proof of the widespread corruption of the system. Christian voters are mentally prepared for this explanation. Corrupt authorities were desperate to silence Jesus.
A stolen 2020 election fits a larger pattern in Trump's explanation of the world. Of course Democrats and their allies scratch, cheat, connive, lie, and steal. It is the way of the world. Nearly everything is rigged so, of course, are elections.
He plays to win. People who don't use their power to advance the interest of their team are saps. This world view is not just a right wing or Republican idea. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren also say the system is rigged by powerful interests working in secret. They point to big businesses and their lobbies, to conservative financial elites, to the Federalist Society, the Koch Brothers, and now Clarence Thomas' benefactor, Harlan Crow.
What reality -- what explanation of stuff -- is the alternative to Trump and Trump-ism? It isn't just choosing different malefactors. In that case the fight is over whether drug companies are bad because, as the left says, they lobby Congress and gouge prices or because, as MAGA says, they lobby the CDC and create vaccines with microchips that track people.
Biden is attempting to sell democratic normalcy, arguing that American democracy is fragile and it requires that people play by the rules. It is the opposite of conspiracy. "We are Americans. We can do anything if we do it together," he says repeatedly in speeches. He says it with a pleading tone. He praises bipartisanship. It presents the president as a head of state, not party leader. It argues for limits and restraints and loyalty to law, not power. It posits that the president and indeed all of American government works on behalf of all the people, not for one's own side in a civil war of red versus blue teams.
Biden was in South Carolina describing major infrastructure projects that were funded by the Infrastructure bill. In South Carolina, which he lost by 12 points. He had the right message.
Look, folks, on a very serious note, when I ran, when I got elected, when I proposed these pieces of legislation, I made a commitment that I would be president for all Americans, whether their elected officials voted for the — the events or not — all Americans, whether you voted for me or not. And I’ve kept my promise.
In fact, some analysts have said that the laws I’ve signed are going to do more to help red America than blue America. Well, that’s okay with me, because we’re all Americans. Because my view is: Wherever the need is most, that’s the place we should be helping. And that’s what we’re doing. Because the way I look at it, the progress we’re making is good for all Americans, all of America.
Biden's message will be a harder one to sell. Confidence in institutions is at a low ebb. Gallup reports that confidence in the presidency and the Supreme Court are at 26-27%, in the criminal justice system at 17%, in newspapers at 18%, in TV news at 14%, and in Congress at 8%.
Biden is urging Americans to trust one another and work together. It is the right message. I hope he can sell it.
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7 comments:
Peter, an astute observation of reality.
This Biden message is not getting attention, as it has not chosen sides.
If only more people could read this, and fully understand what is being said.
Neither side, left or right, will accept this. Somewhere there is a speechwriter that is on to something. Perhaps more amplification by the media will help get this message out.
Unlikely, as the media wants conflict. Conflict attracts eyeballs. And advertisers want large audiences. The truth isn't very newsworthy. People pay to watch people fight, to teams competing.
Biden’s message deals in facts, but a lot of people are apparently bored by reality. Trump’s message deals in sensational lies, “stolen election,” “witch hunts,” etc., which resonate with people as crazy as he is. Of course, pointing out how crazy they won’t change their minds, but neither will facts and reason.
They failed at destroying our economy over the debt ceiling, so now they have the Defense Bill in their crosshairs. Yes indeed, Lindsey Graham was too right when he observed, “My party’s gone batshit crazy!”
Mizz Lindsay is shoulder deep in the craziness , and has been since the day after his "best friend", John McCain died, notably leaving instructions that Trump was not to be at his funeral.
I generally agree with this assessment. Be of good cheer.
Joe Biden, and Democrats generally are winning elections that matter. Even the corrupted Supreme Court couldn't swallow the imperial state legislature hairball.
Pay attention. Biden is messaging hard to the center, who are paying attention to the important issues, and appalled by the GOP racism, homophobia and misogyny. (aren't you?)
Republicans are watching Christie gain traction by attacking Trump. I predict they will join him soon, knowing his negatives will likely push him out. So with De Santis on his right and everyone else on his left, and his only hope of escaping prison a highly unlikely win or endorsing a candidate who will pardon him, which would be fatal in the general, Trump is effectively done.
But hey, I'm a Progressive and we are preternaturally optimistic.
No, TFG does not explain stuff. He lies about stuff - he lies about everything.
Americans have to many attention-deficit deficiencies to deal with the truth and nuances of life.
Biden is an honest hardworking man. He's got my vote (again).
In 2016, Chris Christie endorsed Trump and became his right-hand man. It wasn’t until after the 2020 election that Christie turned on him. Trump, on the other hand, hasn’t changed a bit. He’s consistently malignant. According to FiveThirtyEight, Christie’s poll rating as of today is 3% and Trump remains close to 50%.
I wouldn’t count on Christie catching up to him any time soon. Trump is likely to get hit with even more indictments, which will undoubtedly again boost his ratings. We all know how much Republicans love politicians that hold the rule of law in complete contempt.
Trump connects on an emotional/mythic level. Biden isn’t even broadcasting on that channel.
Watch Trump with the sound turned off and something’s happening. Turn Biden’s sound off and he disappears.
That doesn’t mean Biden can’t beat Trump again. But if he does, I think it will be more because Trump repelled people than because Biden attracted them.
I have heard a number of political commentators say that the only Democrat Trump can beat is Biden, and the only Republican Biden can beat is Trump. It might be accurate to describe the upcoming presidential contest as “the evil of two lessers“.
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