The Grand Illusion
The unequivocal “Guilty” verdict in the Trump hush money case has pundits and politicians all scrambling to answer one question: How will that verdict affect the November election?
The problem with focusing on that question is that it ignores a far deeper and more important question and that is how on earth such a profoundly unethical and unscrupulous man is still in contention for the presidency.
Trump had already been convicted of sexual assault, followed by two separate convictions of defaming the woman he assaulted. Now he’s been convicted of thirty-four felony counts of falsifying business records. He’s claimed that he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and get away with it. And the day after the latest guilty verdict, the news came out that he’s suing his niece for revealing details of his sordid behavior dealing with his own father’s estate.
That doesn’t even take into account his attempts to turn a mob on his own vice president and his attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election. Or the boxes of classified material he illegally tried to hide at Mar-a-Lago. Nor does it include report after report of his vindictiveness, or his unparalleled record of documented lies.
Yet he’s still in close contention for the Presidency.
Some pundits claim that much of the vote for Trump is more of a vote against the too-liberal Democratic Party. That may be, but Trump’s record on carrying out his professed agenda is abysmal, possibly because his real agenda is simply to obtain personal power. Despite the Trump and Republican rhetoric on illegal immigration, both Biden and Obama actually have done more to slow the flow of illegals than Trump did, but they couldn’t say much because too many Democrats oppose stringent immigration controls. Biden’s done more to bring jobs back to the U.S. than Trump ever did.
Yet Trump is still in close contention for the Presidency.
The right question just might be:
Why is half of the United States so desperate that they’ll vote for a lying, scheming criminal whose greatest skills are wildly exaggerated and fallacious self-promotion and vicious untruths?
The truth-free circus of right wing media piling conspiracy upon conspiracy for the last 30 years on Fox News, talk radio, and their Internet equivalents have created a Republican base that will believe anything they are told by Trump and his surrogates. And they have been told that the things you just listed are not true and that Trump has been framed by their common enemies. Any Republican politician that goes against Trump’s wishes is driven out of Republican politics and the post-politics gravy train. Hence Nikki Haley, bending knee and kissing the ring last week.
The election will be decided by the relatively small slice of Americans who don’t pay attention to politics or social media, and who will look up in a few months, and be surprised to find the Biden and Trump are the nominees for president.
Grey, very well said!
Elections in the US hinge on “undecided voters” who are capable of voting for Obama, and then Trump. Who are these people?
You have to remember that Trump hosted The Apprentice for 14 seasons. His schtick has to be a popular one.
Whenever I speak with someone who is aghast that Trump was elected and could be again, I ask them if they ever watched The Apprentice. And, pretty much, the answer is No.
But a ton of people had to be watching. This cartoon version of an executive tickled the fancy of many Americans before Trump ran for office.
His manner and the assured way that he believes his own BS is very convincing for many people.
As has been said many times, his supporters take him seriously but not literally. And his detractors take him literally but not seriously.
(This is an edited copy of a comment I made back in 2020, in response to “SF, FANTASY, OR ALTERNATIVE HISTORY?”)
For what it’s worth, I take Trump largely literally and very seriously… just like Hitler, whom, incidentally, Mussolini called a clown.
Thank God for your views on Trump since you are my favorite writer, I was worried when I saw you talking about him, I didn’t want to give up these books! I re-read the whole recluse series each time you come out with a new book, and each time i find more in them. I hope all is well and I will sleep well knowing my favorite author has not fallen down the vortex of Trumpism and all of its hate.