Blog Credo

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

H.L. Mencken

Wednesday, July 17, 2019

"The Right Racist At The Right Time"

Interesting discussion as to whether Trump's racism will hurt him in 2020.

Again, I think it hurts him in the suburbs.  It rallies his base a little, but it creates conditions that will force the same dynamics that led to the Blue Wave of 2018.

My larger worry is that we have seen how political loyalties create political positions. This is much less true left of center than on the right, because the left's natural state is internecine fighting. The right tends to fall in behind whomever is leading the party.  At the moment, Fox News is leading the party, so whatever shows up on Tucker Carlson's White Power Hour is what burbles out of Trump's puckered pie hole a day later. 

What is happening, sadly, is that calling Trump a racist - while 100% accurate based on everything he's said and done in his adult life - is creating the knee-jerk defense of him by Republicans.  As a result, racism will now become the default position of the GOP.

A common refrain in the early days of Trumpistan was "This is not who we are."  By 2020, it will be who 40% of the American people are.

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