Trump Can't Stop Showing His Ass... And Harris Can Kick It
He Is Who He Always Was
Donald Trump is a sexist, racist, misogynist buffoon — and those are his most positive qualities. Ever since Trump became a bona fide political figure in 2015, the mainstream press has been priming us for some kind of pivot to normalcy. It didn’t happen when he called migrants rapists, or when he called for Muslim bans and to lock Hillary Clinton up. It didn’t happen after he praised Nazis as “very fine people” and it certainly didn’t occur after he told people to inject bleach as a safeguard against COVID-19.
Within hours after surviving an assassination attempt, Trump was right back to being the trashy guy he has always been, because that is who he is at his core. His personality and world view was frozen in place early in his life, perhaps when he was a mere toddler, and it has not advanced a single iota since then.
We’ve seen it manifest since Vice President Kamala Harris entered the presidential race, and it was on full gory display as Trump all but donned a Ku Klux Klan shroud as he spoke before the National Association of Black Journalists.
Trump accused Harris of having “turned Black,” and I take him at his word that this is what he believes. Far from being a Machiavellian schemer, Trump is a big-footed stumblebum constantly stepping on top of rakes that slap him square in the face. He is the beneficiary of luck, wealth, and the boost attained from being a wealthy, straight, white male.
As the late Minnesota Vikings coach Dennis Green said, “They are who we thought they were.”
The press holds out hope that Trump can pivot, “grow in office” or “strike a somber tone” but he cannot. He doesn’t have that gene in his body. My personal theory for why they hold on to this ridiculous notion is that Trump secretly being a normal human being beneath his bluster will justify the votes that the parents and grandparents of many national reporters have made in Trump’s favor.
If Trump isn’t really a bigot, then Mee-maw is absolved. But this fantasy keeps being torn asunder by Trump himself because he cannot help his own cause. The guy keeps getting Mee-maw and Pawpaw’s votes precisely because he expresses the hate they hold in their hearts.
I don’t think Harris and other Democrats should shy away from this aspect of Trump (which is pretty much all there is to Trump). The America of 2024 is a far different country than the one of Trump’s youth and our collective history. Racism, misogyny and homophobia aren’t dead, unfortunately, but they are not in the majority either. America is not yet the progressive wonderland of left-wing dreams, but our world view of tolerance and support has been ascendant for decades.
Sometimes the haters get so loud they drown us all out, and I would certainly argue that there needs to be a complete reworking of how liberalism and progressivism communicates, but the exclusionary voices are not the norm.
As Harris and other Democrats have made clear: The bigots are the “weird” ones.
This means there is little downside in taking the fight to them. One clear way to rally allies to your cause and out of their self-imposed slumber is a common enemy. Trump, JD Vance, and the rest of the Republican Party and the conservative movement excel at this.
They are almost cartoonish in their villainy and retrograde beliefs and they are aided by the mainstream press that is terrified of directly confronting them, even though they know more than most how out of touch these views are. So the task falls to us.
Call them out, talk smack about them and the people who would have them sit in our highest seats of power, appointing fellow cranks to the federal judiciary and stuffing the bureaucracy of our government with true believer cultists. With rhetoric, our national dialogue must constantly be submitted to the equivalent of a chemical wash.
Holding up these guys (and they’re almost all guys) as perfect examples of bad Americans helps to create a rallying cry far more effective and long-reaching than the smears of vulnerable communities that form the spine of Fox News’ broadcasts.
Repeating, either through direct quote or impression, “look at these dumb weirdos being dumb and weird with their dumb, weird ideas,” is a worthy and admirable task. The press is largely the right’s co-conspirators when it comes to normalizing this weirdness, so the task cannot be left to them.
Don’t be afraid to take them out to the verbal woodshed. These are very bad people and those who do not pay attention to politics 24/7 are largely unaware that there is an entire party and political movement like Trump out there. It clashes hard with the national notion of what a normal candidate and movement are.
If Trump and company are going to show their rears, learn nothing from it, and repeat behavior that went out of style with black and white television, don’t give them a moment of peace to rest in their filth.
It’s the right thing to do for America.
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— Oliver
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My purpose on this planet is for this dog to experience eternal comfort.
I suggest that the billionaires like Musk, Thiel and others who have been backing Donald reconsider if they want to be known as the ones who funded the racist, fascist rapist who lost. It won’t age well that they backed a loser. Bad enough that they backed him when it looked as if he might win, but a loser is really a bad look.
Trump’s NABJ meltdown is an ad for Vice President Harris’ campaign. Why he thinks that playing the race card against an accomplished, well-spoken Black womsn is a winning strategy is beyond me. It didn’t work on President Obama and it’s not going to work now.