Tag: GOP

Scholar explains how the conservative movement transmits ‘sanitized versions of white supremacist ideology’

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As the longest sustained period ofracial justice protests in American history segues into the heat of election season, dark shadows have appeared, from the vigilante killing of protesters in Kenosha, Wisconsin — and widespread conservative defenses of the teenage accused murderer — to ludicrous charges against protesters, including “terrorism,” to the Trump administration’s crackdown on federal antiracism training, calling it “anti-American,” and Attorney General Bill Barr’s call for protesters to be charged with sedition. 

So much for the notions that Donald Trump has no ideology, or, for that matter, that getting rid of him will make America great again. In July of 2016, I wrote about why such views were myopic: “Trump advances core paleoconservative positions,” researcher Bruce Wilson told me, including “rebuilding infrastructure, protective tariffs, securing borders and stopping immigration, neutralizing designated internal enemies and isolationism.”

Trump’s record as president has been surprisingly consistent for such an erratic figure, with his purely rhetorical support for infrastructure as the most notable exception. And therein lies a key to the current moment: With infrastructure removed from the equation — the most broadly popular position Trump’s ever embraced — the remaining white nationalism stands out in stark relief, highlighted in the frenzied push toward violent confrontation around the election, and beyond. Continue reading.

The five dumbest Republican arguments for Trump

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None of Republicans’ commonly deployed arguments for reelecting President Trump are tethered to reality. The paucity of logic and factual support for their rationales suggests many on the right, even “respectable” columnists and elected officials, actually support him for reasons they’re loath to admit, whether it’s because they share his apocalyptic view of crime encroaching on the suburbs or are eager to see a country purged of immigrants.

He will give us law and order: If public safety is the concern, the unnecessary deaths from covid-19, which might exceed 200,000 by Election Day, and the anxiety over leaving our homes for fear of joining 6 million infected Americans surely make Trump’s tenure the most dangerous for ordinary Americans. Each week, we have been losing twice the number of Americans killed on Sept. 11.

No wonder Trump loves to highlight any domestic scene of disorder, mayhem and looting he can to frighten White Americans, arguing that if law enforcement “dominates the streets,” we will have public order. This is preposterous. We cannot go to war with millions of demonstrators. That’s simply impossible, not to mention morally objectionable. The demands of the protesters, among them police reform and voting rights legislation are entirely legitimate. But so long as Trump denies the legitimacy of these concerns and the presence of systemic racism, we will not have domestic tranquility. Continue reading.

How Trump inoculates his supporters against reality

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Donald Trump has failed at almost every venture he has undertaken. That started long before his presidency, with a string of business failures. Nevertheless, he has excelled as a con artist. That is demonstrated by the question that has haunted so many of us over the last four years: why are his supporters so loyal, no matter what he says or does?

A lot of ink has been spilled over that question. Much of it has focused on what makes his supporters so vulnerable to a con job. But in an expansion of his term “epistemic closure,” the writer Julian Sanchez has provided us with insight into how Trump inoculates his followers from reality, truth, and facts.

Continue reading “How Trump inoculates his supporters against reality”

Trump desecrates a public monument in the finale to a convention of lies

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THE REALITY-SHOW president turned his party’s convention this week into a spectacle befitting his true expertise. The televised festival of exaggerations showed voters a warped version of this country, in which circumstances are both far worse and far better than the facts support — depending on what makes President Trump look best.

His acceptance speech Thursday night, a seemingly endless recital of by-now familiar falsehoods, was notable principally for when and how it took place: before a crowd of more than 1,000 mostly unmasked people on a White House lawn festooned with campaign insignia. Mr. Trump managed to merge contempt for public health with desecration of a public monument, the final and most jarring of the convention’s exploitations of the perks of public office for political purposes. Earlier in the week, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo spoke from Jerusalem, where he was traveling on government business, and the president granted a surprise pardon and staged an on-screen naturalization ceremony, two of whose participants-turned-props weren’t even aware they’d be starring on national TV.

The speech elevated the darkest themes of the convention. The Republican National Committee chose not even to adopt a platform this cycle. In other words, the party no longer stands for anything. So it was unsurprising that, relying on a mixture of hyperbole and lies, both Mr. Trump and the speakers preceding him highlighted what they’re against. Joe Biden, Mr. Trump said, is a “Trojan horse for socialism” in whose America “no one will be safe.” Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) summed it up earlier in the week: “The woke-topians will . . . disarm you, empty the prisons, lock you in your home and invite MS-13 to live next door.” All this scaremongering was accompanied by outright slander of Mr. Biden, against whom Republicans leveled unsubstantiated corruption charges — and whose record and platform alike Mr. Trump distorted into almost a parody of radicalism. Continue reading.

How the GOP Became a Cult of Personality

It started years before Donald Trump’s emergence.

As the Republican Convention kicks off on Monday, the GOP announced that they would not create a 2020 party platform. Here are the relevant statements from that resolution:

Whereas, the RNC, had the platform committee been able to convene in 2020, would have undoubtedly unanimously agreed to reassert the party’s strong support for President Donald Trump and his administration…

Whereas, the RNC enthusiastically supports President Trump and continues to reject the policy positions of the Obama-Biden administration, as well as those espoused by the Democratic National Committee today, therefore, be it Continue reading.

Fox 9, Fox News, Trump campaign blow dog whistle on MN Freedom Fund

On Monday, Fox 9 aired a seven-minute story by reporter Tom Lyden, a dramatic segment it termed an “investigation.”

Unlike many stories where that term’s used, the subject of Lyden’s story is not trying to hide what it’s doing. The Minnesota Freedom Fund is a bail fund. It puts up the money for people held in jail pending criminal trial or an immigration hearing. 

Established in 2016, the nonprofit was accustomed to a certain level of fundraising and budgeting, raising six figures annually which it typically allotted by the thousands. Then George Floyd was killed by Minneapolis police officers, thousands of people flooded the streets in protest, and the Minnesota Freedom Fund became the go-to resource to get arrested demonstrators out of jail.

At some point, celebrity Twitter caught hold of this notion. Lil Nas X, Janelle Monae, Chrissy Teigen, Steve Carrell, Seth Rogen, and Don Cheadle donated, among many others, and urged millions of followers to join them. Continue reading.

Sinking Trump seeks to squash GOP dissent

The Hill logoPresident Trump is seeking to squash lingering dissent within the GOP, lashing out at Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and former Bush administration official Tom Ridge after the two offered implicit and explicit criticism of the president.

The intraparty spats come as some cracks show in Trump’s typically overwhelming support among Republicans.

Polls show Trump trailing presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden by significant margins in some key battleground states, raising fears among some Republicans that the party will lose both the White House and Senate in November. A new poll on Thursday showed Trump 13 points behind Biden in Florida. Continue reading.

Conservatives’ tributes to John Lewis open them up to scrutiny of their actions on civil and voting rights

Washington Post logoPraise for the legacy of Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.) dominated social media Saturday following news of his death from pancreatic cancer. He was 80.

But some of those reactions have been called empty and mostly for show. For people who shared the lawmaker’s politics, the only true way to honor him is to help advance his policy initiatives.

Fellow Democratic lawmakers testified about his contribution to U.S. history. But so did those who disagreed with Lewis on fundamental issues, thus attracting accusations of hypocrisy. Continue reading.

GOP to Trump: Change tune on mail-in voting or risk ugly November

Republican officials throughout the country are reacting with growing alarm to President Donald Trump’s attacks on mail-in ballots, saying his unsubstantiated claims of mass voting fraud are already corroding the views of GOP voters, who may ultimately choose not to vote at all if they can’t make it to the polls come November.

Behind the scenes, top Republicans are urging senior Trump campaign officials to press the President to change his messaging and embrace mail-in voting, warning that the party could lose the battle for control of Congress and the White House if he doesn’t change his tune, according to multiple GOP sources. Trump officials, sources said, are fully aware of the concerns.

The impact could be detrimental to the GOP up and down the ticket, according to a bevy of Republican election officials, field operatives, pollsters and lawmakers who are watching the matter closely. Every vote will count in critical battleground states, they argue, fearful that deterring GOP voters from choosing a convenient option to cast their ballots could ultimately sway the outcome of races that are decided by a couple of percentage points. Continue reading.

‘Hyperpartisan’ right-wing news sites are thriving in Minnesota

The Nieman Journalism Lab has some bad news.

In a study tracking hundreds of “hyperpartisan” news websites across the country, the Harvard-based organization has exposed many that are “masquerading” as state and local reporting. In reality, they’re often funded and operated by “government officials, political candidates, PACS, and political party operatives.”

Based on previous research by Columbia University’s Priyanjana Bengani, Neiman sifted through these hundreds of urls and pinpointed them on a map of the U.S., all to study how these left or right-leaning news sources are being deployed and where. Minnesota has at least 15 of these little pins studded across the metro and in the greater regions of the state – all with a conservative tilt.

In fact, the vast majority of the sites listed in our state belong to the same network: Metric Media, which claims to have over 1,000 different news sites. Titles include SW Minnesota Today, SC Minnesota News, and South Hennepin News.