Wednesday, May 4, 2016

"Never Trump" Becomes "Maybe Trump"?

Worth a read is Jonathan Chait's article in New York Magazine in the aftermath of neo-fascist narcissist Donald "Rump" Trump's victory in Indiana and his presumed capture of the Republican nomination. Chait looks at the forces which have created the most dysfunctional and bitter Rethug primary in memory, where the various media-wired Governors and Senators have dropped quickly by the wayside. Once masked by corporate-style Rethug politicians and their courtiers in the media, politics on the right has now become so openly toxic, delusional and ignorant that a Rump-style figure was bound to emerge sooner or later to the applause of the mouthbreating tribal base. So what will happen between now and November, when the "Never Trump" contingent and various conservative freelancers have a choice to make?  Chait's take:
"Virtually the entire Republican apparatus will follow Trump sooner or later, because without the voters, they have no power. And those voters have revealed things about the nature of the party that many Republicans prefer to deny. Whatever abstract arguments for conservative policy — and these arguments exist, and a great many people subscribe to them earnestly — on the ground, Republican politics boils down to ethno-nationalistic passions ungoverned by reason. Once a figure has been accepted as a friendly member of their tribe, there is no level of absurdity to which he can stoop that would discredit him. And since reason cannot penetrate the crude tribalism that animates Republicans, it follows that nothing President Obama could have proposed on economic stimulus, health care, or deficits could have avoided the paroxysms of rage that faced him." (emphasis added)
Some right-wingers are vowing not to support Rump. Some are yakking about a conservative running on an independent ticket and some pundits may even vote for Clinton. We remain skeptical of their willingness to part from the tribe that has nurtured them and that will threaten them with banishment if they don't fall in behind Der Trumpenfuhrer as they march off the electoral cliff in November.

3 comments:

Silver Spring Bureau Chief said...

Thank you for the U of M shoutout in your Norm Ornstein post, Mr. Hackwhacker. You know, Chait is also a U of M grad. Have your allegiances shifted?

Grung_e_Gene said...

Trump will get the 27% (h/t Balloon-juice.com) who support the Republican candidate no matter what, the question is what percentage of Republicans will fall in line? I'd put it at 90%. Der Trumpf will lose out on white educated women and minorities and get roughly the same white male vote. Ending up with a 12 to 14 point defeat.

Hackwhackers said...

SSBC -- As Johnny Carson used to say, "I didn't know that." Once a Badger, always a Badger, but props to the U of M for their great graduates.

Gene -- I hope you're right about the spread in Nov. The Dems need to make sure the "undecideds" understand what they would risk in a Rump regime.