Old_Trapper70
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Dec 17, 2014
- Messages
- 2,383
http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/08/03/welcome-to-donald-trumps-america/
"For over a year, pundits — especially Republicans who have a stake in legitimizing their party’s abject surrender — have been claiming that Trump will eventually pivot from his extremist positions. They said this before the primaries, they said it after the primaries, and they said it even after the GOP convention, when, as on other occasions, Trump was deemed “presidential” for his ability to read a script off a teleprompter. But his moment of relative composure was short-lived. Trump has spent the last week encouraging Russia to hack Hillary Clinton’s emails and attacking the family of a deceased Muslim war veteran — just two examples of “gaffes” that, in a regular election, would destroy a candidacy.
But this is not a regular election, and Trump is never going to pivot.
What Trump is doing — and has been doing all along — is pivoting Americans toward his bigoted and paranoid worldview.What Trump is doing — and has been doing all along — is pivoting Americans toward his bigoted and paranoid worldview. He has made extremism mainstream to the point that David Duke now feels comfortable running for Senate. With his encouragement, his supporters have attacked non-white and non-Christian Americans. And, in its desperation for ratings, the financially struggling U.S. media has been key to normalizing Trump, giving him more airtime than any other candidate and often failing to challenge him on his lies and his bigotry.
But Trump is not just a media creation. He has stoked bigotry and fury over the state of the economy — abetted by the media — but these problems existed long before his campaign. After all, the middle class has been declining since the mid-1970s, when wages began to plummet and manufacturing jobs disappeared. And if Trump loses, these problems — now hitched to a virulent strain of nativist politics — will remain."
"For over a year, pundits — especially Republicans who have a stake in legitimizing their party’s abject surrender — have been claiming that Trump will eventually pivot from his extremist positions. They said this before the primaries, they said it after the primaries, and they said it even after the GOP convention, when, as on other occasions, Trump was deemed “presidential” for his ability to read a script off a teleprompter. But his moment of relative composure was short-lived. Trump has spent the last week encouraging Russia to hack Hillary Clinton’s emails and attacking the family of a deceased Muslim war veteran — just two examples of “gaffes” that, in a regular election, would destroy a candidacy.
But this is not a regular election, and Trump is never going to pivot.
What Trump is doing — and has been doing all along — is pivoting Americans toward his bigoted and paranoid worldview.What Trump is doing — and has been doing all along — is pivoting Americans toward his bigoted and paranoid worldview. He has made extremism mainstream to the point that David Duke now feels comfortable running for Senate. With his encouragement, his supporters have attacked non-white and non-Christian Americans. And, in its desperation for ratings, the financially struggling U.S. media has been key to normalizing Trump, giving him more airtime than any other candidate and often failing to challenge him on his lies and his bigotry.
But Trump is not just a media creation. He has stoked bigotry and fury over the state of the economy — abetted by the media — but these problems existed long before his campaign. After all, the middle class has been declining since the mid-1970s, when wages began to plummet and manufacturing jobs disappeared. And if Trump loses, these problems — now hitched to a virulent strain of nativist politics — will remain."