The Racism Is A Feature Of The Con

Matthew Yglesias tells us "it’s impossible to understand why the Trump Show we see on stage works without appreciating what’s happening behind the scenes and who benefits from it."  In other words, follow the money:

On Monday, Brian Schwartz of CNBC reported that “Trump, Republican National Committee turn to titans of industry to help raise over $100 million in second quarter.”

That massive haul of financial cash comes in part from people who backed Trump in 2016. But it also features big bundles of cash from donors who supported other GOP candidates in the 2016 primary and then stayed aloof from Trump. It includes people like Stephen Rosenberg, CEO of the real estate investment partnership Greystone. Rosenberg backed Hillary Clinton in 2016, but wrote a $360,600 check to the Trump reelection campaign — and I’m guessing it’s not because he appreciates the way Trump drives liberal elites wild with his blunt talk.

Trump’s signature tax bill didn’t pay for itself as promised or lead to a massive surge in business investment, but it did boost bank profits to record levels. And it spurred a massive series of stock buybacks that benefitted rich people who own lots of stock and corporate executives with stock-linked compensation packages. He’s approving a Sprint/T-Mobile merger that will raise cellphone plan prices for consumers, repealed net neutrality regulations, and in one of his first acts decided to allow internet service providers to sell private user data to advertising companies.

Under Trump, decades of steady progress on non-climate air pollution have finally been reversed, and his administration is hard at work writing new rules that would increase water pollution levels as well. [snip]

This agenda, no less than Trump’s racism, is an absolute disaster for America’s immigrants and communities of color who are generally lower-income and more vulnerable to corporate abuses and pollution than more privileged people.

But critically, it is also an absolute disaster for the vast majority of white people. There are simply very few people who benefit from a combination of more pollution and less economic competition, and there’s no way for the tax cutting to balance that out unless you’re part of the tiny minority of the public that derives the majority of its income from stock ownership.

Trump’s politics of racial division are not particularly popular — his approval ratings are worse than those of any prior president at this point in his term except Jimmy Carter — but it’s still true that framing Trump as a symbol of white privilege is almost certainly more favorable to him than framing him as a person whose governance has concrete material implications for Americans of all ethnic backgrounds.

Neo- fascist con man Donald "Boneless Racist" Trump and his rotted- out Republican Party are focused on what they've always been focused on:  the plutocrat class.  That's certainly not news, as conservatives have been conning low- and- middle- income white people for over a century by fanning racial animosity while they steal more and more wealth from suckers like you see at Trump's Nuremberg rallies.  At this point in time, the conned are fully reveling in the racist con, since Trump hates the same people they've been taught to hate.  That's called "winning" in Trumpland.

The problem for Trump and his rotted out party may be that the con, which has historically been encouraged by dog whistles and winks, now is full- blown, public racism as seen in this week's Nuremberg rally in North Carolina.  A line many of us saw crossed early on in the Trump era (starting with the "Mexico is sending rapists," continuing through the Muslim travel ban, and into the Charlottesville, VA, episode) has now been boldly and irretrievably crossed in July 2019 in the minds of some in the mainstream media and a significant majority of Americans, who see this and don't like it.  While it makes some Republicans nervous that the game is up, it still may not be enough to drive the plutocrats and their millions away from Trump, as they've already shown what they value, and it certainly won't make a dent in Trump's hardcore, white nationalist, knuckle- dragging base.  But they're not a majority in this country.

Democrats can and should still make the moral and political case that Republican racism is part of the larger con to "comfort the comfortable, and afflict the afflicted," regardless of race or ethnicity.  To coin a phrase, the racism is a feature, not a bug of the Republican con.

Speaker Of The House And Speaker For The House?

Matthew Yglesias makes an interesting point about the future of Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and the incoming Democratic leadership in the House, and suggests a possible solution to the current infighting:

The debate over current Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi’s future in House leadership has turned acrimonious and, given the nature of the argument, personal. But if you step back a bit from the infighting, it’s easy to see that Pelosi and her critics are making fundamentally compatible points. 

On one side, Democratic Party loyalists and the bulk of the House caucus feel that Pelosi’s earned the job — she’s good at it. She holds the caucus together. She raises astounding sums. She’s arguably better at the job than any other modern speaker. Pointing to her competency, Pelosi and many of her allies accuse her critics of sexism and ageism. 

Pelosi critics, meanwhile, don’t generally dispute that she delivers in the House. Their objection boils down to the fact that they do not think Pelosi is a strong communicator who should serve as the face of the party, especially as the newly elected Democratic majority in the House becomes the major locus of resistance to President Donald Trump. 

It seems pretty clear at this point that Pelosi is going to triumph and retake the gavel. And as an effective leader, she ought to move to address her real weakness; she should make sure that someone else is in place to serve as the unofficial national party spokesperson — someone who goes on television to argue with Trump and the Republicans.  (our emphasis)

Pelosi has recently described herself as a "transitional" future Speaker, willing to step down at the end of the upcoming Congress.  That she sees herself as a transitional figure indicates she views one of her key roles to be cultivating a new generation of leaders in the House, grooming new legislative leaders to take over when she relinquishes her gavel.  With the blue wave election, she has more talent than ever to work with (though we would disagree with some of the prospective candidates for spokesperson Yglesias comes up with).

(We should point out the obvious -- that, no matter who the Democrats make Speaker of the House, the Republican bullshit machine will do its very best to demonize that person.  However, their efforts in the recent mid- terms to scare their mouth- breathing base with the prospect of a Pelosi speakership didn't seem to turn out to be the winner they thought it might be.)

Having a "Speaker For The House" who would be a good communicator in the media- obsessed environment we live in, while a Speaker Pelosi manages the business of the House in her incomparable way is an intriguing idea.  It may not be exactly what Democrats in the House end up doing, but some variation might be the solution to the infighting we're seeing, which distracts from the real struggle -- containing the menace in the White (Supremacist) House.

Quotes Of The Day

"I wrote this book because the president's attacks on me symbolize his destructive effect on the country as a whole. He is undermining America's safety and security, and eroding public confidence in its institutions. His attacks on the most crucial institutions of government, and on the professionals who serve within them, should make every American stand up and take notice." -- Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, in a statement announcing the December 4 publication of his tell- all memoir, "The Threat: How the FBI Protects America in the Age of Terror and Trump."  McCabe is one of several FBI officials whose text messages related to the Russia investigation have been ordered released by Putin asset Donald "Rump" Trump.  (How about moving up that publication date a month or so?)

"Republicans have decided that Trump can’t be held accountable for anything — ranging from the alleged groping of Jill Hart, to creepy peeping at teenage beauty pageant contestants, to the numerous acts of grand and petty financial corruption that he continues to be involved with as president of the United States. And now the party is no longer in much of a position to hold anyone accountable for anything."  -- Matthew Yglesias on why Republicans will stand with Kavanaugh in spite of the credible accusations against him.

Vote them out!  Vote them out!