Binded by the Right

A dear friend asked me earlier, 

"Mike, I guess my real question is how in the hell do we get through to Trump supporters? And actually, I have another question now... How do I unfriend someone?"

        I attempted some sort of explanation, which turned into a rant, so here goes!

        Darlin’ I have asked myself that over and over. Facts just bounce off them like nerf balls. I have asked several people who I have known to be rational and sane, or so I thought, to make a list of the "good," or even just "effective", things the Trump administration has done, or tried to do, and then let's have a measured, realistic discussion on the merits of what they have recorded. So far no one has taken me up on it.

        When an individual defends the indefensible, and cannot or, more to the point, "will not" lucidly tell you why, we are pretty much left with the conclusion that their reasons are ugly enough that they don't want to give voice to them.  These could be racism, bigotry, LGBTQ bias, xenophobia, whatever. Unfortunately, more recently we have also seen a disturbing increase in what I would call “religious supremacy bigotry” since no one talks about it or has named it yet. Not talking about any particular faith, here, but about the segment of society which is so convinced that the dogma of their particular brand of religion endows them with moral superiority sufficient to justify forcing their beliefs on their employees and society in general. These are American Mullahs - the Robertsons, Falwells and Franklin Grahams among us who apparently see Trump as a new messiah. Some have even analogized him to King David and Jesus. Of course, his secular bullying mirrors their extremist Evangelical polemics. This isn’t accidental, since he has played to their particular brand of bigotry from early days of his campaign, even though privately, he would almost surely avoid contact with them if possible. Then we have that perfect storm of religious intolerance and toadyism, Mike Pence, who just yesterday publicly compared Trump favorably with Dr. King!

        One exception is that set of true believers who actually believe that tax cuts on the wealthy are sound fiscal policy, even when: 1) They, themselves are not, and never will be, in any higher marginal bracket than they presently are, or 2) They have continued believing in Supply Side economic theory even when data from Three Republican presidencies disproves it. Eisenhower was POTUS when we had the highest marginal tax rates ever (91% top bracket) and the economy performed well, despite inflation. Reagan and Bush 43 both ran on a “Tax cuts for the wealthy” (Reagan backed off in 18 months!) platform and both left record deficits.

       These folks also tend to cling desperately to the conviction that all private enterprise is more (efficient, moral, fair?) than any government enterprise. This, of course, in spite of the fact that two such federal (and Socialist!) programs, Medicare and Social Security are efficient and well run and, in fact, the odd fraud cases which have made headlines are the result of non-government entities defrauding us all.

       The first set of stimuli, the biases, is at least understandable if reprehensible. Prejudices are learned behavior in most cases, and Trump has simply and, without a doubt, intentionally, stoked the fires in these people’s dark hearts. These are unfortunates who will never have friends who are appreciably different than they, themselves, because they’ve been taught that all (insert racial/religious/national label here) are not to be trusted, befriended or treated fairly. The person who pre-judges, based on appearance, has never eaten an oyster.

        The second, the economic policy “reason,” is more unfortunate because economics misconceptions spur social prejudices, too. “They’ll take our jobs!” No, Abner, they won’t, because ether they’re too skilled to do the manual labor for which you are suited or, needing to survive in an increasingly hostile economic environment, they’ll take the jobs you’re “too good” to do. Even Reagan’s ultimate VP (Bush 41) called it (supply side, or “trickle-down” initiatives) “Voo Doo economics” and he was wealthy. People who look to Trump for economic wisdom are looking at a man who, given just under half a billion dollars by the time he completed college, the vast bulk of it the product of his father’s tax evasion, has still managed to be forced to declare bankruptcy 5 times!

         There are reasons, mostly perhaps ugly introspection regarding his own financial rocks and shoals, why Trump disdains the likes of Jeff Bezos, Warren Buffett, Paul Allen and Bill Gates. They started with nothing, worked hard, and became wealthy. Gates and Buffett have, Allen did, and Bezos is in the process of, giving much of that wealth away charitably.  Trump, on the other hand, started very wealthy, went bankrupt several times, alienated almost every working person who ever did contract work for him, defrauded students in a sham university, and spent much of his pseudo-foundation’s money on himself (portraits, autographed Tom Brady helmets) even though there was precious little actual Trump money involved. In fact, the Trump foundation’s single largest “donors” were Vince and Linda McMahon (yep, from pro-rasslin’s WWE!) She now heads Trump’s Small Business Administration. How weirdly coincidental is that?

        Of course, none of this resonates with the true believers. For one or more of the reasons limned above, they are immune to facts – “Blinded by the light, their brain cells are loose, another blunder of the Right!” (apologies to the Boss.)