When people are conned they do everything in their power to rationalize the conduct of the conman rather than admit they were lied and stolen from. They don’t want to feel complicit in being harmed and thus seek to blame others for their choices.
"He was just distracted by the antifa mob a few blocks away - even someone as strong as him could've been thrown off by how hateful those 'peaceful protesters' were! And do you think Joe Biden even *owns* a Bible? At least Trump took a stand for Christianity!"
I genuinely wonder how much a Biden campaign message of "Trump is actually scamming you because that's what he always has done" would resonate. The Pod Save America guys have previously noted (and they are not the only ones) that messages focusing on the corruption of Trump (as opposed to the racisms, the unhinged rants) does actually seem to reach swing voters.
As has been pointed out sort of by Matt in this post, it's actually not the case that Trump's racism, authoritarian tendencies and just general unhinged behavior hasn't harmed him. But sort of oddly to me, of all the different angles to take against Trump, the pure corruption of his entire life has been oddly muted from Democrats as far as I can tell.
Completely agree that Trump's scamming of "regular folks" is probably a much more effective attack strategy on his support base and enabling support base - let alone because it's still happening (Trump PAC donations that have almost entirely gone to his pockets and not to "Stop The Steal" efforts, campaigning, etc). The dirty tactics his PAC's take to default his supporters into recurring automatic donations, "doubling" amounts pledged in the fine print etc. Run some ads of former supporters and/or family members of supporters who were pushed into financial dire straits as a result of this aggressively scammy means of maximizing small donors out. Run ads of those who were ruined and defrauded by Trump U and other Trump investments. Small business former partners with Trump who were screwed. Etc.
Unlike his "sex scandals" and "threat to democracy", this kind of stuff hits at a core of Trump support that I see from many Trump supporters is that underneath his rough edges he's a "good guy" that really cares about America, his supporters, etc. And that's what justifies his rough edges, he's "fighting for us", "fighting for America", etc. There is a lot of denial about what a con-man Trump actually is, and that his supporters are his primary marks (and not other politicians or "the deep state").
One of the most effective attack campaigns I can recall is the one against Mitt Romney and Bain Capital from the 2012 campaign - that ironically emerged from the Republican primary (Newt Gingrich I think was the sponsor for this), that portrayed Mitt Romney as a cold blooded rich guy gleefully putting thousands of the types that would become the media depiction of Trump supporters out of work, and put a face to the forces that had been decimating all these "middle America" towns and regions. And it worked - not so much in the primary for Newt, but in the general election because the Obama campaign picked right up where this left off and used it as their primary attack on Romney, who did go on to lose a lot of the white working class base that had been tacking Republican (and who again, became the focus for the 2016 Trump campaign) as a result of this portrayal - and let's not forget what a massive lift this for Obama, who was otherwise running as an incumbent with lowered popularity running for re-election in the midst of a deep economic recession. I wonder if there's still juice to squeeze on his working class/middle class support to remind these folks that Trump is just another rich Republican scamming the base.
I’ve always wished everyone had gone this route instead of going all in on Russia. I don’t think most people even know about the corruption while he was in office.
Or over the "Access Hollywood" tape, part of Trump's "appeal" (for those he appealed to already) was that he was supposedly a "guy's guy" that gets the "hot chicks". The obsessing over that hot tape and trying to disqualify Trump because he's a pig only confirmed that image for those who already knew this about him and hated him already, or for those that already knew this about him and loved him already... IOW, it didn't really move the needle for anyone, not even Paul Ryan who removed his endorsement from Trump for all about 5 minutes until the polls showed that Trump was actually strengthened by the scandal in the Republican electorate.
I would add it was a particularly weak attack from Hillary Clinton, whose husband survived his own sex scandal strengthened, and with a heap ton of her assistance in painting the Ken Starr investigation and report as partisan motivated and that "sex scandals" of politicians were not politically disqualifying in the first place...
My theory on this is that a lot of leftists think all rich businessmen act exactly like Donald Trump does in a business context, so what is there to point out to anyone who says they respect business leaders?
I actually don’t think it’s just a “leftist” thing at all. I actually think tons of regular non leftist voters think tons of politicians take literal bags of money with dollar signs on them as bribes. And reality is there is just enough real life examples that I sort of get why; see Spiro Agnew and see Duke Cunningham.
But I bring up those examples because it’s not like voters just said “who cares” and it’s not like the GOP said “”witch hunt”. Both had to resign. So even in a world where voters think Trump level corruption is rampant, it’s not like people actually like it or don’t care.
That's politicians. I am referring to Trump during his pre-political business career. As Matt explained in this post, Trump was exceptionally corrupt compared to other businessmen, in a way that even say Jeff Bezos has never benn shown to be. I think a lot of leftists see no difference between the business career of Trump and Bezos, so they see no point in highlighting examples like the one Matt gave that show Trump is a very special scumbag.
That may very well be true, but that's an argument to not left "leftists" run all aspects of a campaign ; P this particular line of attack is to directly target Trump's base of support, the ones that think that Trump is a great businessman, "good guy with rough edges", "fighting for them", etc. There's such a vast and rich record - that is still ongoing - of how Trump screws his supporters and people like his supporters. It gets at the heart of how they otherwise justify Trump's "rough edges" because they think it's all in their service.
>When people are conned they do everything in their power to rationalize the conduct of the conman rather than admit they were lied and stolen from.<
I've always thought this explained at least some of the dynamic as to why so many less affluent folks vote for right wingers (not just Trump). It's a resentful nihilism born of deep, prideful, hurt. What's the matter with Kansas, and all that. If everybody voted using some reasonable facsimile of rational self-interest, Democrats would control 511 seats in Congress.
Nah, the point of “what’s the matter with Kansas” discourse is that people place value on more than just the legible but limited universe of government benefits. The “rational self-interest” angle takes a too-narrow view of what people place value on (heck, it’s why charity exists). Some people’s beliefs do, in fact, pay rent.
I think it’s also about respect. As someone wrote, poor whites with low education will rather vote for someone whose policies hurts them than on someone who looks down on them. One of Biden’s strengths is that he doesn’t seem to look down on uneducated white people yet he struggles for other reasons (part of them being his own party’s penchant for cultural elitism).
Nah. There's such a thing as "enlightened self-interest". You have to be extremely short-sighted to vote for authoritarianism. Just ask Mikhail Khodorkovsky how supporting an authoritarian leader in pursuit of riches worked out for him. (Obviously many of our elite _are_ this short-sighted. It doesn't change the fact that they're behaving in a willfully-ignorant, self-destructive manner.)
Personally I am a winner from the post-New-Deal regulated-capitalist order that has existed in America for the last almost-century. I want to preserve that order. Which means ensuring that we offer opportunity to as many people as possible, and tamp down on rich people engaging in Marie Antoinette antics that could inspire mobs with pitchforks and torches. I can afford to pay higher taxes to help ensure that nobody in my country lives in abject poverty. I can deal with having new apartment buildings that "change the character of my neighborhood" in order to jack up the housing supply to the point that the people whose services I rely on can afford to live close to their jobs. Etc.
Some rich people regarded FDR as "a traitor to his class". In fact, he was all that stood between them and a collapse of the system that might've seen mobs storming their mansions.
I don't think so. Upper middle class people aren't financially independent (they have to work). Republicans as a party are deeply committed to weakening the safety net. That doesn't seem to be in the interests of anyone who's not rich. Republicans have an extremely poor record on protecting the environment. Do UMC folks prefer dirty air? Many upper middle class Americans are LGBT. Many upper middle class Americans get abortions. Many upper middle class Americans don't want to bequeath a world to their grandchildren facing worst case climate change scenarios. Many upper middle class Americans have preexisting medication conditions. And so on.
Republicans lower taxes on the upper middle class.
If the environment, gay rights, and abortion are relevant to this discussion, then I'm not sure why you are so convinced that Republican voters don't actually have any self-interest in the things that Republicans do.
I've always understood the "what's the matter with Kansas" thesis to be that low income people often vote against their economic interests and in line with their culture war interests, and my thought is that the upper middle class is doing the same thing.
"Republicans lower taxes on the upper middle class."
Actually Trump's tax cut raised my taxes by around $3-4k per year, mainly because of the SALT limit. That's the case for many families with incomes in the mid six figures.
To be clear, I'm actually fine with that. If I were re-writing things I'd keep the SALT limit, and I'd put the Mortgage Interest deduction on a schedule to phase out over thirty years by phasing down the amount of principal it applies to (so you don't get windfall losses / gains on a mortgage that was taken out this year, but going forwards everyone can adjust).
But I do find it somewhat ironic that a lot of people who vote for Republicans on the "maybe they'll hurt other people but they'll help me" theory got burned.
"I never thought leopards would eat MY face," sobs woman who voted for the Leopards Eating People's Faces Party.
I used to piss off a right-winger I worked with by saying, "I'd rather give taxes to the government for poor people than have those people break into my house and get it." He never really figured out how to respond and eventually just moved to the libertarian utopia of Idaho.
If everyone voted with rational self-interest, the Republican party would move leftward on some key issues, and things would get very tight again.
It is this precise dynamic of refusing to move just a TINY bit to the left (that is all it would take for lots of centrist voters) and instead faling into the "let's gaslight everyone, let's gerrymander everything, and win that way" that is killing us, and creating this maddening partisanship. The nation would be so much healthier if the party would try to appeal to the median voter instead of just doubling down on nutjobism.
" It's a resentful nihilism born of deep, prideful, hurt." - Yeah, real mystery these people won't vote like you want them to. You clearly have so much respect and compassion for them.
I know it, huh? The nerve of me thinking that most people are misguided for voting GOP. Why, it's almost as if I think that Democratic policies are objectively better!
My initial reaction to this article was going to be "how about finding some people who trusted him but got ripped off to establish he's a grifter in a negative ad campaign?", but after reading this, I now worry that that could be daunting....
I feel like every other day the news has on someone who trusted Trump and used to work for him or support him and then got burned and now hate him. Whether it’s Michael Cohen or James Mattis or his former contractors or whoever.
I usually avoid Trump-focused posts, but I admire how Matt can take this topic that makes people on both sides insane and lay the facts out calmly, logically, and relentlessly to the devastating conclusion. Hard to argue with any of this! A perfect cheat sheet for engaging people you know who are considering voting for him. I’m glad it’s not paywalled.
Growing up in the Deep South the Trump archetype was fairly prevalent. I’d most closely identify it with the small town corrupt politician or preacher (in some cases the politician may also be your preacher). Southerners love a scoundrel and they love them even more if they are a godly one.
A godly scoundrel doesn’t need to be deeply and devoutly religious but it’s crucial that he say the right things that make the congregation go “mmm hmm, yes lawd”. He needs mix up some jokes with the fire and brimstone. Multiple wives are a must. Quirks that play against type are good “Oh, did you hear? He doesn’t drink at all!”
I always disliked the fact that so many adults seem to be taken with these characters when I was a kid. It’s actually one of the earliest things I remember disliking about small town southern life, the accepted corruption with a veneer of godliness to make it all okay.
Reminds me of the car dealer in Friday Night Lights. Also, if we're being honest, Bill Clinton had more than a bit of this quality about him (fortunately he really was trying to do right by The People, and The Country).
I definitely think that there's something to the idea that Bill Clinton laid the ground for Trump in some ways. When the Dems decided to rally round him rather than ask him to resign the Republicans definitely noticed that permission space was wider than previously understood.
There's more to it than that, such as Bush II completely disgracing the Republican establishment.
The weird thing is that it all rubbed off to the detriment of the more square, more earnest, less personally reckless, more careful, less rascally, less horny, less *fun*, more *boring*, and more *sanctimonious*, Al Gore and Hillary Clinton.
I don't agree with that. Clinton engaged in a consensual relationship with an adult. He wasn't scamming working Americans via fake real estate seminars. He wasn't swindling retirees out of their savings by selling them bullshit casino stocks. He wasn't strong-arming other countries to provide dirt on campaign rivals. (Bill Clinton's race against Bob Dole was entirely proper and dignified). Donald Trump is rotten to the core.
Democrats were right to rally around Bill Clinton, lest a precedent be established whereby a president's political opponents can hound him out of office for no reason.
Even in the 90's this looked fairly bad. Particularly when Bill lied and attempted to cover it up. If the republicans hadn't overplayed their hand with the impeachment, then this likely would've tainted Bill, Hillary, and any Democrats who stood by him far more.
And Trump exploited Bill's past behavior in the 2016 election when defending against his own sexism and exploitation. [1] It was just a bad look for Hillary and the Democratic establishment to have stood by such a scumbag and that likely did diffuse Trump's own scandal.
One of my first political memories that has real impact on my world view, because it was one of the first big stories that happened when I started to truly pay close attention to the news. Which means I remember a lot of the coverage.
I bring it up because I think we're having a sort of collective "Mandela Effect" as to what happened. I think post #MeToo, there has been this sense that the issue at play was the abuse of power and specifically the power differential between an intern and Clinton. And given there were literally thousands of articles written, I'm sure some of them touched on this.
But let's be real. The biggest part of the "scandal" was just purely, there's sex going on in the White House. There's a reason Monica Lewinsky was slut shamed horrendously by all sides, media and comedians; including GOP politicians, conservative media and the Christian right. There's a reason Kenn Starr felt this need to include the most graphic details in his report (remember the blue dress). It was all designed to scandalize America and also cater to the sexual mores of the Chistian right. It was all "eww look how gross this all is". The front and center case against Clinton was complete about the salaciousness and the intimate details. And I genuinely think this is why the public wasn't moved by the impeachment.
I agree with you completely in retrospect the biggest part of the scandal was Clinton exploiting his power. And I actually think the most criminal or at least "impeachable" thing he did was basically get Monica a job at the UN at the expense of another candidate so she was no longer around. Like whoever that candidate was probably has a case to be made he/she was directly harmed by Clinton's actions.
The power difference was definitely not the focus that it needed to be although it was discussed. I think the fact that it was sold as a sex thing and not a sexual harassment thing was partly because that term was so new but it did leave folks thinking they were picking between "slut supporter" and "prude" rather than "abuser" vs "abused."
Trouble is, the modern #MeToo perspective is not that widely shared. This is another case of progressives fooling themselves into thinking their attitudes are widely shared, when they in fact are not. The big thing that came out of the #MeToo movement was that sexual harassment was more common than a lot of people thought, but laying that out (and prosecuting a casting-cough rapist) was not enough to effect the serious societal change that supporters of the movement expected.
Agree that even by the standards of the time (I was working in DC) it was bad. Hilariously in retrospect, I thought there was literally no way that any human could endure the magnitude of shame unleashed by the details of the affair and that he would have no choice but to skulk away out of public view.
To me, the legalistic lying, the power differential, and the credence it gave to all of the other allegations were all factors, though perhaps owing to my midwesternness I also thought it was deeply unseemly. My mom, though, had a different take and didn't think it was as bad. I think that having worked at a big company as a young woman in the 50s/60s she had probably experienced actual condescension and/or harassment, so maybe this, being consensual, was less offensive to her.
Based on the way we’re meant to think of these things post-#metoo, I think you’d have to take Juanita Broadrick’s rape claim very seriously. Frankly at the time I dismissed it out of hand.
Completely agree. He arrogantly failed to recognize that the media would and could not protect him, like they did in Arkansas as governor and for all of the other cheating politicians. Matt Bai wrote a great book several years back about how cable news and the 24/7 news cycle caught Gary Hart by surprise. He normalized bad behavior by lying to the public on live TV. Hillary enabled it by not divorcing him. Everybody was more concerned about beating the other side than doing the right thing. Trump saw this and took it into overdrive, thanks to social media. Al Franken did what Clinton should have done but failed to realize that Trump had flipped the script again, so he lost his career. Had Democrats called Clinton to the carpet like Republicans did to Nixon, we opened the door to this whole mess. The 90s were bad in many ways. Unchecked self-interest took over all of American society.
That is the least of the allegations against Clinton and the evidence against him for many of those are at least as strong as the similar allegations against Trump/Kavanaugh.
Clinton does seems like a seminal moment as far as “politicians will never be held accountable electorally for universally-known lapses in personal probity.” The implicit takeaway is licensing arbitrary amounts of indecency for public figures. I think this also actually ties into the mailbag question about civic virtue: Americans stopped valuing it and decided that anyone who thought that we should demand things like not cheating on your wife was a sucker. Only profits / electoral victory matter.
It was a lot easier to have “civic virtue” in the absence of 24-hour cable news, and even worse, social media. Plenty of past Presidents successfully projected the image of sober statesmen while having affairs on the side that the public knew nothing of, or at least it was not the focus of political news. The big problem with Clinton is that he was apparently so compulsive in his behavior that he could not heed the warning from Gary Hart’s fate, that it was no longer possible to have affairs outside of the spotlight.
Basically wrote the comment I just did but with more brevity and clarity.
Lot easier to be JFK in 1960 then in 2024. Hate to break to you Boomers but JFK was a scumbag. And let's also talk about how his father created the family fortune shall we.
My understanding, admitting that I may be wrong, is that despite the legend of Joe being a bootlegger, that's pretty well been dismissed by historians, What he was was a shrewd investor with a great sense of timing. He played the market in the roaring 20s and cashed out not long before the crash. Having lots of cash he bought up underpriced real estate and Hollywood studios. Seeing the end of prohibition coming he bought exclusive rights to the importation of high end Scotch and Gin and was ready to quench America's greatly increased thirst as soon as it was legal.
I feel like people have forgotten what Larry Flynt did during the impeachment scandal, and that it led to the resignation of the man who was about to become Speaker. I wonder if Livingston regrets his decision.
I think you're underestimating just how prevalent this was in the past. In fact if anything it was worse in a world of pure machine politics. In NYC, Jimmy Walker was most famous, but Tammany Hall as a machine was famously brazen in how they conducted themselves; including how the conducted themselves personally. Politicians visiting brothels was actually a pretty common and well known occurrence.*
In fact Tammany Hall is sort of a good comparison. Matt alluded to this, but voting as a purely transactional commitment with no thought to the personal mores of the candidate has a long history. The difference is what you're looking for in return. 120 years ago, it was "let us drink in the taverns and give some jobs to some guys in the neighborhood and you got our vote" and now it's "go ahead and take whatever money you want, just give us tax cuts, bans on abortion and being unnecessarily mean to libs and we don't care".
I've always thought that there would have been a different outcome if the Lewinsky affair had come out before his reelection. I think Clinton would have lost a primary, I'm not sure to who, and if he didn't I'm pretty sure he would have lost the general with a lot of democrats defecting.
I think the American people would have expressed displeasure with his actions if given a chance for a referendum directly on them. Overturning an election is just a different thing than just losing one. Maybe in part because of the no one likes to admit they were conned.
I know he was even more popular at the end of his term despite the scandal, but a lot of that was Starr and the Republicans over playing their hand, especially with the hyperpartisanship they were displaying which was still new at the time.
I suspect that if, say, Bill Bradley had been President instead of Clinton, the Republicans would still be in love with Trump today. I'm not inclined to believe in the "permission structure" theory of politics.
This is one of the problems with left and center politicians: we might win more elections if there were more skillful, intelligent scammers who are sincerely interested in promoting the Greater Good.
But no one thinks Trump is godly, he doesn’t even pretend. He does pretend to be a good businessman and, as Matt explained, in a scummy way, he sort of is.
Yeah this is my point, two claims Trump actually makes about himself are that he is a savvy businessman (semi-true) and that he champions the interests of his followers (wildly false) and the truth about this is different from hypocrisy.
I don't think any Christian conservatives actually believe he became a devout Christian. What they believe is that God uses imperfect tools to achieve his goals.
Yeah I've seen this line of thinking a lot as sort of post-hoc generalization for supporting someone that a Christian conservative could never support. Seen a lot of quotes about how the bible is full of imperfect vessels for advancing God's plan.
Because their own faith is paper thin! The people who do crazy stuff like cite Isaiah verses as Trump prophesy are basically not Christians anymore. It's more of a civic religion kinda thing where they are taking their political and social views and providing a religious justification for them as some kind of rationalization. Or, if you're more on the left, you might point out how Christian nationalist and white supremacy groups seem awfully cozy these days.
I actually think these two issues are more connected than they seem on the surface. Much of the US has a sort of weird alternative version of Christianity that could grow and develop along side slavery or segregation. If your income as a pastor requires you to preach to a bunch of slave holders, there is a lot of Jesus's message about non-violence, equality, charity, etc that is pretty uncomfortable to focus on. There is a reason that John 3:16 is a favorite verse of the Christian Right and not the Sermon on the Mount. If all you have to do is believe, that frees you up to still engage in white supremacy. But a Christianity that focuses just on dogmatic belief and adhering to the sexual more of the letters of Paul to keep you from dealing with the rest, can pretty easily warp into a faith where literal readings of noah's arch, conformity to patriarchy, and rejection of homosexuality become the issues of salvation and that can is a faith that can align itself pretty comfortably with nationalism and dictatorship pretty easily.
Lots of people think Trump is a tool of god, thus imparting an important "godly" quality to him. If you think he doesn't pretend then you haven't seen enough of his rallies.
When people are conned they do everything in their power to rationalize the conduct of the conman rather than admit they were lied and stolen from. They don’t want to feel complicit in being harmed and thus seek to blame others for their choices.
Yes
Tell that to my Uncle who is now a proud owner of a Trump bible.
Just show him the picture of DJT holding the Bible upside down. Straight up Antichrist symbology.
"He was just distracted by the antifa mob a few blocks away - even someone as strong as him could've been thrown off by how hateful those 'peaceful protesters' were! And do you think Joe Biden even *owns* a Bible? At least Trump took a stand for Christianity!"
Biden literally attends the church my aunt goes to and has attended church more than any President since Carter.
I genuinely wonder how much a Biden campaign message of "Trump is actually scamming you because that's what he always has done" would resonate. The Pod Save America guys have previously noted (and they are not the only ones) that messages focusing on the corruption of Trump (as opposed to the racisms, the unhinged rants) does actually seem to reach swing voters.
As has been pointed out sort of by Matt in this post, it's actually not the case that Trump's racism, authoritarian tendencies and just general unhinged behavior hasn't harmed him. But sort of oddly to me, of all the different angles to take against Trump, the pure corruption of his entire life has been oddly muted from Democrats as far as I can tell.
Completely agree that Trump's scamming of "regular folks" is probably a much more effective attack strategy on his support base and enabling support base - let alone because it's still happening (Trump PAC donations that have almost entirely gone to his pockets and not to "Stop The Steal" efforts, campaigning, etc). The dirty tactics his PAC's take to default his supporters into recurring automatic donations, "doubling" amounts pledged in the fine print etc. Run some ads of former supporters and/or family members of supporters who were pushed into financial dire straits as a result of this aggressively scammy means of maximizing small donors out. Run ads of those who were ruined and defrauded by Trump U and other Trump investments. Small business former partners with Trump who were screwed. Etc.
Unlike his "sex scandals" and "threat to democracy", this kind of stuff hits at a core of Trump support that I see from many Trump supporters is that underneath his rough edges he's a "good guy" that really cares about America, his supporters, etc. And that's what justifies his rough edges, he's "fighting for us", "fighting for America", etc. There is a lot of denial about what a con-man Trump actually is, and that his supporters are his primary marks (and not other politicians or "the deep state").
One of the most effective attack campaigns I can recall is the one against Mitt Romney and Bain Capital from the 2012 campaign - that ironically emerged from the Republican primary (Newt Gingrich I think was the sponsor for this), that portrayed Mitt Romney as a cold blooded rich guy gleefully putting thousands of the types that would become the media depiction of Trump supporters out of work, and put a face to the forces that had been decimating all these "middle America" towns and regions. And it worked - not so much in the primary for Newt, but in the general election because the Obama campaign picked right up where this left off and used it as their primary attack on Romney, who did go on to lose a lot of the white working class base that had been tacking Republican (and who again, became the focus for the 2016 Trump campaign) as a result of this portrayal - and let's not forget what a massive lift this for Obama, who was otherwise running as an incumbent with lowered popularity running for re-election in the midst of a deep economic recession. I wonder if there's still juice to squeeze on his working class/middle class support to remind these folks that Trump is just another rich Republican scamming the base.
I’ve always wished everyone had gone this route instead of going all in on Russia. I don’t think most people even know about the corruption while he was in office.
Or over the "Access Hollywood" tape, part of Trump's "appeal" (for those he appealed to already) was that he was supposedly a "guy's guy" that gets the "hot chicks". The obsessing over that hot tape and trying to disqualify Trump because he's a pig only confirmed that image for those who already knew this about him and hated him already, or for those that already knew this about him and loved him already... IOW, it didn't really move the needle for anyone, not even Paul Ryan who removed his endorsement from Trump for all about 5 minutes until the polls showed that Trump was actually strengthened by the scandal in the Republican electorate.
I would add it was a particularly weak attack from Hillary Clinton, whose husband survived his own sex scandal strengthened, and with a heap ton of her assistance in painting the Ken Starr investigation and report as partisan motivated and that "sex scandals" of politicians were not politically disqualifying in the first place...
My theory on this is that a lot of leftists think all rich businessmen act exactly like Donald Trump does in a business context, so what is there to point out to anyone who says they respect business leaders?
I actually don’t think it’s just a “leftist” thing at all. I actually think tons of regular non leftist voters think tons of politicians take literal bags of money with dollar signs on them as bribes. And reality is there is just enough real life examples that I sort of get why; see Spiro Agnew and see Duke Cunningham.
But I bring up those examples because it’s not like voters just said “who cares” and it’s not like the GOP said “”witch hunt”. Both had to resign. So even in a world where voters think Trump level corruption is rampant, it’s not like people actually like it or don’t care.
That's politicians. I am referring to Trump during his pre-political business career. As Matt explained in this post, Trump was exceptionally corrupt compared to other businessmen, in a way that even say Jeff Bezos has never benn shown to be. I think a lot of leftists see no difference between the business career of Trump and Bezos, so they see no point in highlighting examples like the one Matt gave that show Trump is a very special scumbag.
I just don’t think that’s true.
Fair enough, agree to disagree then.
That may very well be true, but that's an argument to not left "leftists" run all aspects of a campaign ; P this particular line of attack is to directly target Trump's base of support, the ones that think that Trump is a great businessman, "good guy with rough edges", "fighting for them", etc. There's such a vast and rich record - that is still ongoing - of how Trump screws his supporters and people like his supporters. It gets at the heart of how they otherwise justify Trump's "rough edges" because they think it's all in their service.
No one wants to admit they were a sucker
>When people are conned they do everything in their power to rationalize the conduct of the conman rather than admit they were lied and stolen from.<
I've always thought this explained at least some of the dynamic as to why so many less affluent folks vote for right wingers (not just Trump). It's a resentful nihilism born of deep, prideful, hurt. What's the matter with Kansas, and all that. If everybody voted using some reasonable facsimile of rational self-interest, Democrats would control 511 seats in Congress.
Nah, the point of “what’s the matter with Kansas” discourse is that people place value on more than just the legible but limited universe of government benefits. The “rational self-interest” angle takes a too-narrow view of what people place value on (heck, it’s why charity exists). Some people’s beliefs do, in fact, pay rent.
I think it’s also about respect. As someone wrote, poor whites with low education will rather vote for someone whose policies hurts them than on someone who looks down on them. One of Biden’s strengths is that he doesn’t seem to look down on uneducated white people yet he struggles for other reasons (part of them being his own party’s penchant for cultural elitism).
I found Dying of Whiteness’s anecdotes to be unconvincing evidence for this broader assertion.
It can be that and that they are mistaken a lot what will benefit their material self-interest.
If everybody voted using some reasonable facsimile of rational self interest, most of the upper middle class would vote Republican.
Nah. There's such a thing as "enlightened self-interest". You have to be extremely short-sighted to vote for authoritarianism. Just ask Mikhail Khodorkovsky how supporting an authoritarian leader in pursuit of riches worked out for him. (Obviously many of our elite _are_ this short-sighted. It doesn't change the fact that they're behaving in a willfully-ignorant, self-destructive manner.)
Personally I am a winner from the post-New-Deal regulated-capitalist order that has existed in America for the last almost-century. I want to preserve that order. Which means ensuring that we offer opportunity to as many people as possible, and tamp down on rich people engaging in Marie Antoinette antics that could inspire mobs with pitchforks and torches. I can afford to pay higher taxes to help ensure that nobody in my country lives in abject poverty. I can deal with having new apartment buildings that "change the character of my neighborhood" in order to jack up the housing supply to the point that the people whose services I rely on can afford to live close to their jobs. Etc.
Some rich people regarded FDR as "a traitor to his class". In fact, he was all that stood between them and a collapse of the system that might've seen mobs storming their mansions.
I don't think so. Upper middle class people aren't financially independent (they have to work). Republicans as a party are deeply committed to weakening the safety net. That doesn't seem to be in the interests of anyone who's not rich. Republicans have an extremely poor record on protecting the environment. Do UMC folks prefer dirty air? Many upper middle class Americans are LGBT. Many upper middle class Americans get abortions. Many upper middle class Americans don't want to bequeath a world to their grandchildren facing worst case climate change scenarios. Many upper middle class Americans have preexisting medication conditions. And so on.
Republicans lower taxes on the upper middle class.
If the environment, gay rights, and abortion are relevant to this discussion, then I'm not sure why you are so convinced that Republican voters don't actually have any self-interest in the things that Republicans do.
I've always understood the "what's the matter with Kansas" thesis to be that low income people often vote against their economic interests and in line with their culture war interests, and my thought is that the upper middle class is doing the same thing.
"Republicans lower taxes on the upper middle class."
Actually Trump's tax cut raised my taxes by around $3-4k per year, mainly because of the SALT limit. That's the case for many families with incomes in the mid six figures.
To be clear, I'm actually fine with that. If I were re-writing things I'd keep the SALT limit, and I'd put the Mortgage Interest deduction on a schedule to phase out over thirty years by phasing down the amount of principal it applies to (so you don't get windfall losses / gains on a mortgage that was taken out this year, but going forwards everyone can adjust).
But I do find it somewhat ironic that a lot of people who vote for Republicans on the "maybe they'll hurt other people but they'll help me" theory got burned.
"I never thought leopards would eat MY face," sobs woman who voted for the Leopards Eating People's Faces Party.
I used to piss off a right-winger I worked with by saying, "I'd rather give taxes to the government for poor people than have those people break into my house and get it." He never really figured out how to respond and eventually just moved to the libertarian utopia of Idaho.
If everyone voted with rational self-interest, the Republican party would move leftward on some key issues, and things would get very tight again.
It is this precise dynamic of refusing to move just a TINY bit to the left (that is all it would take for lots of centrist voters) and instead faling into the "let's gaslight everyone, let's gerrymander everything, and win that way" that is killing us, and creating this maddening partisanship. The nation would be so much healthier if the party would try to appeal to the median voter instead of just doubling down on nutjobism.
>If everyone voted with rational self-interest, the Republican party would move leftward on some key issues,<
True.
>and things would get very tight again.<
I dunno. Things have never been tighter. But it's an interesting thought. Maybe they'd get even tighter, who knows?
I mispoke a bit, I meant the popular vote, which republicans have won only once in about 30 years.
But I see your point, too, in the absence of extreme partisanship, you can get elections like when Reagan carried 49 states.
" It's a resentful nihilism born of deep, prideful, hurt." - Yeah, real mystery these people won't vote like you want them to. You clearly have so much respect and compassion for them.
I know it, huh? The nerve of me thinking that most people are misguided for voting GOP. Why, it's almost as if I think that Democratic policies are objectively better!
My initial reaction to this article was going to be "how about finding some people who trusted him but got ripped off to establish he's a grifter in a negative ad campaign?", but after reading this, I now worry that that could be daunting....
Because even when those people speak out the people vested in the scam not being revealed disregard both their eyes and ears.
I feel like every other day the news has on someone who trusted Trump and used to work for him or support him and then got burned and now hate him. Whether it’s Michael Cohen or James Mattis or his former contractors or whoever.
I usually avoid Trump-focused posts, but I admire how Matt can take this topic that makes people on both sides insane and lay the facts out calmly, logically, and relentlessly to the devastating conclusion. Hard to argue with any of this! A perfect cheat sheet for engaging people you know who are considering voting for him. I’m glad it’s not paywalled.
The article will be read in full on swing state TV spots across the country. The ad buy will be expensive, but worth it.
Start a GoFundMe
Growing up in the Deep South the Trump archetype was fairly prevalent. I’d most closely identify it with the small town corrupt politician or preacher (in some cases the politician may also be your preacher). Southerners love a scoundrel and they love them even more if they are a godly one.
A godly scoundrel doesn’t need to be deeply and devoutly religious but it’s crucial that he say the right things that make the congregation go “mmm hmm, yes lawd”. He needs mix up some jokes with the fire and brimstone. Multiple wives are a must. Quirks that play against type are good “Oh, did you hear? He doesn’t drink at all!”
I always disliked the fact that so many adults seem to be taken with these characters when I was a kid. It’s actually one of the earliest things I remember disliking about small town southern life, the accepted corruption with a veneer of godliness to make it all okay.
The Righteous Gemstones are an excellent parody of that archetype. Albeit, for mega churches.
Exactly what came to mind!
Reminds me of the car dealer in Friday Night Lights. Also, if we're being honest, Bill Clinton had more than a bit of this quality about him (fortunately he really was trying to do right by The People, and The Country).
I definitely think that there's something to the idea that Bill Clinton laid the ground for Trump in some ways. When the Dems decided to rally round him rather than ask him to resign the Republicans definitely noticed that permission space was wider than previously understood.
There's more to it than that, such as Bush II completely disgracing the Republican establishment.
The weird thing is that it all rubbed off to the detriment of the more square, more earnest, less personally reckless, more careful, less rascally, less horny, less *fun*, more *boring*, and more *sanctimonious*, Al Gore and Hillary Clinton.
I don't agree with that. Clinton engaged in a consensual relationship with an adult. He wasn't scamming working Americans via fake real estate seminars. He wasn't swindling retirees out of their savings by selling them bullshit casino stocks. He wasn't strong-arming other countries to provide dirt on campaign rivals. (Bill Clinton's race against Bob Dole was entirely proper and dignified). Donald Trump is rotten to the core.
Democrats were right to rally around Bill Clinton, lest a precedent be established whereby a president's political opponents can hound him out of office for no reason.
Uh, from our modern #MeToo perspective, Clinton's behavior looks extremely bad. He exploited a huge power differential to take advantage of a young woman. Furthermore, Bill already had a track record of such behavior, or at least allegation there of, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Clinton_sexual_assault_and_misconduct_allegations
Even in the 90's this looked fairly bad. Particularly when Bill lied and attempted to cover it up. If the republicans hadn't overplayed their hand with the impeachment, then this likely would've tainted Bill, Hillary, and any Democrats who stood by him far more.
And Trump exploited Bill's past behavior in the 2016 election when defending against his own sexism and exploitation. [1] It was just a bad look for Hillary and the Democratic establishment to have stood by such a scumbag and that likely did diffuse Trump's own scandal.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Clinton_sexual_assault_and_misconduct_allegations#2016_United_States_presidential_election
One of my first political memories that has real impact on my world view, because it was one of the first big stories that happened when I started to truly pay close attention to the news. Which means I remember a lot of the coverage.
I bring it up because I think we're having a sort of collective "Mandela Effect" as to what happened. I think post #MeToo, there has been this sense that the issue at play was the abuse of power and specifically the power differential between an intern and Clinton. And given there were literally thousands of articles written, I'm sure some of them touched on this.
But let's be real. The biggest part of the "scandal" was just purely, there's sex going on in the White House. There's a reason Monica Lewinsky was slut shamed horrendously by all sides, media and comedians; including GOP politicians, conservative media and the Christian right. There's a reason Kenn Starr felt this need to include the most graphic details in his report (remember the blue dress). It was all designed to scandalize America and also cater to the sexual mores of the Chistian right. It was all "eww look how gross this all is". The front and center case against Clinton was complete about the salaciousness and the intimate details. And I genuinely think this is why the public wasn't moved by the impeachment.
I agree with you completely in retrospect the biggest part of the scandal was Clinton exploiting his power. And I actually think the most criminal or at least "impeachable" thing he did was basically get Monica a job at the UN at the expense of another candidate so she was no longer around. Like whoever that candidate was probably has a case to be made he/she was directly harmed by Clinton's actions.
The power difference was definitely not the focus that it needed to be although it was discussed. I think the fact that it was sold as a sex thing and not a sexual harassment thing was partly because that term was so new but it did leave folks thinking they were picking between "slut supporter" and "prude" rather than "abuser" vs "abused."
Trouble is, the modern #MeToo perspective is not that widely shared. This is another case of progressives fooling themselves into thinking their attitudes are widely shared, when they in fact are not. The big thing that came out of the #MeToo movement was that sexual harassment was more common than a lot of people thought, but laying that out (and prosecuting a casting-cough rapist) was not enough to effect the serious societal change that supporters of the movement expected.
I sort of agree. But I think you might be being a bit too sanguine about the impacts of #MeToo.
As an example. I genuinely think the McDonalds CEO who resigned in 2019 is not compelled to resign in 2000. Heck, I feel fairly confident he's not compelled to resign in 2015. https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/09/business/former-mcdonalds-ceo-fined/index.html#:~:text=The%20Easterbrook%20saga,consensual%20relationship%20with%20an%20employee.%E2%80%9D
Agree that even by the standards of the time (I was working in DC) it was bad. Hilariously in retrospect, I thought there was literally no way that any human could endure the magnitude of shame unleashed by the details of the affair and that he would have no choice but to skulk away out of public view.
To me, the legalistic lying, the power differential, and the credence it gave to all of the other allegations were all factors, though perhaps owing to my midwesternness I also thought it was deeply unseemly. My mom, though, had a different take and didn't think it was as bad. I think that having worked at a big company as a young woman in the 50s/60s she had probably experienced actual condescension and/or harassment, so maybe this, being consensual, was less offensive to her.
Based on the way we’re meant to think of these things post-#metoo, I think you’d have to take Juanita Broadrick’s rape claim very seriously. Frankly at the time I dismissed it out of hand.
Power imbalance? Did he threaten her in some way? Or are we now deciding that Presidents can only have sexual relationships with other heads of state?
Completely agree. He arrogantly failed to recognize that the media would and could not protect him, like they did in Arkansas as governor and for all of the other cheating politicians. Matt Bai wrote a great book several years back about how cable news and the 24/7 news cycle caught Gary Hart by surprise. He normalized bad behavior by lying to the public on live TV. Hillary enabled it by not divorcing him. Everybody was more concerned about beating the other side than doing the right thing. Trump saw this and took it into overdrive, thanks to social media. Al Franken did what Clinton should have done but failed to realize that Trump had flipped the script again, so he lost his career. Had Democrats called Clinton to the carpet like Republicans did to Nixon, we opened the door to this whole mess. The 90s were bad in many ways. Unchecked self-interest took over all of American society.
That is the least of the allegations against Clinton and the evidence against him for many of those are at least as strong as the similar allegations against Trump/Kavanaugh.
I don’t think Hillary consented to Clinton’s betrayal but I guess only certain kinds of legal dishonesty matter.
Clinton does seems like a seminal moment as far as “politicians will never be held accountable electorally for universally-known lapses in personal probity.” The implicit takeaway is licensing arbitrary amounts of indecency for public figures. I think this also actually ties into the mailbag question about civic virtue: Americans stopped valuing it and decided that anyone who thought that we should demand things like not cheating on your wife was a sucker. Only profits / electoral victory matter.
It was a lot easier to have “civic virtue” in the absence of 24-hour cable news, and even worse, social media. Plenty of past Presidents successfully projected the image of sober statesmen while having affairs on the side that the public knew nothing of, or at least it was not the focus of political news. The big problem with Clinton is that he was apparently so compulsive in his behavior that he could not heed the warning from Gary Hart’s fate, that it was no longer possible to have affairs outside of the spotlight.
Basically wrote the comment I just did but with more brevity and clarity.
Lot easier to be JFK in 1960 then in 2024. Hate to break to you Boomers but JFK was a scumbag. And let's also talk about how his father created the family fortune shall we.
My understanding, admitting that I may be wrong, is that despite the legend of Joe being a bootlegger, that's pretty well been dismissed by historians, What he was was a shrewd investor with a great sense of timing. He played the market in the roaring 20s and cashed out not long before the crash. Having lots of cash he bought up underpriced real estate and Hollywood studios. Seeing the end of prohibition coming he bought exclusive rights to the importation of high end Scotch and Gin and was ready to quench America's greatly increased thirst as soon as it was legal.
Ironically, in Hart's case, he might have been set up by Lee Atwater:
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/11/was-gary-hart-set-up/570802/
I also wonder if elite Republicans felt taken for a ride after Bob Packwood was forced to resign in 1995, then Clinton was popular during impeachment.
I feel like people have forgotten what Larry Flynt did during the impeachment scandal, and that it led to the resignation of the man who was about to become Speaker. I wonder if Livingston regrets his decision.
https://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/time/1998/12/21/livingston.html
I think you're underestimating just how prevalent this was in the past. In fact if anything it was worse in a world of pure machine politics. In NYC, Jimmy Walker was most famous, but Tammany Hall as a machine was famously brazen in how they conducted themselves; including how the conducted themselves personally. Politicians visiting brothels was actually a pretty common and well known occurrence.*
In fact Tammany Hall is sort of a good comparison. Matt alluded to this, but voting as a purely transactional commitment with no thought to the personal mores of the candidate has a long history. The difference is what you're looking for in return. 120 years ago, it was "let us drink in the taverns and give some jobs to some guys in the neighborhood and you got our vote" and now it's "go ahead and take whatever money you want, just give us tax cuts, bans on abortion and being unnecessarily mean to libs and we don't care".
I've always thought that there would have been a different outcome if the Lewinsky affair had come out before his reelection. I think Clinton would have lost a primary, I'm not sure to who, and if he didn't I'm pretty sure he would have lost the general with a lot of democrats defecting.
I think the American people would have expressed displeasure with his actions if given a chance for a referendum directly on them. Overturning an election is just a different thing than just losing one. Maybe in part because of the no one likes to admit they were conned.
I know he was even more popular at the end of his term despite the scandal, but a lot of that was Starr and the Republicans over playing their hand, especially with the hyperpartisanship they were displaying which was still new at the time.
I suspect that if, say, Bill Bradley had been President instead of Clinton, the Republicans would still be in love with Trump today. I'm not inclined to believe in the "permission structure" theory of politics.
I call foul on this characterization of Buddy Garrity.
Ha. I couldn't have remembered his name if my life depended on it.
I learned this hack today: https://www.google.com/
This is one of the problems with left and center politicians: we might win more elections if there were more skillful, intelligent scammers who are sincerely interested in promoting the Greater Good.
But no one thinks Trump is godly, he doesn’t even pretend. He does pretend to be a good businessman and, as Matt explained, in a scummy way, he sort of is.
Yeah this is my point, two claims Trump actually makes about himself are that he is a savvy businessman (semi-true) and that he champions the interests of his followers (wildly false) and the truth about this is different from hypocrisy.
He made his money the old-fashioned way: he stole it.
A lot of conservatives genuinely believe that Donald Trump became a devout Christian around 2016.
It seems self-evidently absurd to liberals but a lot of conservatives really do believe that.
I don't think any Christian conservatives actually believe he became a devout Christian. What they believe is that God uses imperfect tools to achieve his goals.
Right. That's why there's this whole "King David" thing (when he's not being compared to Cyrus).
"Kind David" maybe. Cyrus? Never - he was "the great" for a lot of reasons that I don't think the Donald can claim.
Yeah I've seen this line of thinking a lot as sort of post-hoc generalization for supporting someone that a Christian conservative could never support. Seen a lot of quotes about how the bible is full of imperfect vessels for advancing God's plan.
It's almost too perfect. You can simultaneously believe that he's a complete scumbag while supporting him since he's doing God's work.
If God is using assholes to do his job, well...
I've heard "He's a baby Christian" from them many times.
Well, he does spread the Gospel. He just gets a nice royalty from ever copy that's sold.
He totally does pretend! It’s a paper thin act, but it’s there, and plenty of people seem to buy it
Because their own faith is paper thin! The people who do crazy stuff like cite Isaiah verses as Trump prophesy are basically not Christians anymore. It's more of a civic religion kinda thing where they are taking their political and social views and providing a religious justification for them as some kind of rationalization. Or, if you're more on the left, you might point out how Christian nationalist and white supremacy groups seem awfully cozy these days.
I actually think these two issues are more connected than they seem on the surface. Much of the US has a sort of weird alternative version of Christianity that could grow and develop along side slavery or segregation. If your income as a pastor requires you to preach to a bunch of slave holders, there is a lot of Jesus's message about non-violence, equality, charity, etc that is pretty uncomfortable to focus on. There is a reason that John 3:16 is a favorite verse of the Christian Right and not the Sermon on the Mount. If all you have to do is believe, that frees you up to still engage in white supremacy. But a Christianity that focuses just on dogmatic belief and adhering to the sexual more of the letters of Paul to keep you from dealing with the rest, can pretty easily warp into a faith where literal readings of noah's arch, conformity to patriarchy, and rejection of homosexuality become the issues of salvation and that can is a faith that can align itself pretty comfortably with nationalism and dictatorship pretty easily.
Scamming people is good business now? A good businessman creates something of value. Ayn Rand would have kicked this douchebag to the curb.
Lots of people think Trump is a tool of god, thus imparting an important "godly" quality to him. If you think he doesn't pretend then you haven't seen enough of his rallies.
He's selling Bibles!
John Goodman in Oh Brother Where Art Thou - the archetype. Good description!
Mayor Marion Barry is the Black urban version.
The "they might be a scoundrel, but dammit they're OUR scoundrel" impulse is strong
To quote the great Randy Newman song, Rednecks, “He may be a fool but he’s our fool. If you think you’re better than him you’re wrong”