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

Thursday, September 12, 2024

Fever Swamps

 Undeniably, the viral moment from Tuesday's debate was the eating cats and dogs nonsense from Trump. It has already become a meme, which is a sure way to predict it's hitting all the corners of the country. The sweaty desperation of MAGA to somehow explain or contextualize his nonsense and claim he "won" a debate where it rhetorically lit the podium on fire and took a dump on the stage is telling.

What's more interesting is the central role that Laura Loomer seems to have played in getting him to embrace his most nakedly racist and unhinged self and how that's creating divisions within Trumpistan. Marjorie Traitor Greene actually called her out for being racist. Part of MAGA's pitch to White voters is that the "Woke Mob" claims everything is racist or sexist when really it's White people being oppressed, but even Greene is like "that's racist." Most likely there's interpersonal shit between the two of them, but still. 

Trump's campaign is at a pivot point after that debate, in much the same way Biden's was after June's tilt. If you're a "normal" GOP strategist or campaign worker at some point you have to consider your own future. If Trump, in his sweaty desperation, goes towards Loomer's baffling nonsense then what little competence surrounding Trump could bail. Harris and Democrats already seem to have a sizable advantage in GOTV efforts, and if MAGA collapses in on its own ridiculousness, that's moment I have been waiting for for eight years.

If we can get enough MAGAts and/or Republicans to stay home in disgust, then maybe Texas and Florida (and their Senate seats) come into play.

Josh Marshall has always said that Trump mastered a form of "dominance politics" over the GOP. Harris made him look the fool, made him look weak and small. That has to eat away at his support, since that dominance is all his support is based on.

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