Such a great article, I couldn't agree more. There is no Trumpism without Trump. I read Michelle Goldberg's article about Sourab Ahmari in NYT. It was at best damning with faint praise. He was claiming that GOP should become party of multi racial working class and had no kind words for Trump. However, a large portion of GOP base is not poor or working class (at least in traditional sense of that word). Most are business owners, professionals or well paid blue collar workers - plumbers, lineman, truckers etc. Absent Trump, the party will become entertainment movement - conspiracy theories, showmanship etc.
And I have say, I would prefer establishment GOP which advocates for low taxes and personal freedom over working class GOP imagined by Ahmari.
Some conspiracies shouldn’t be given up, specifically Epstein and the Iraq War, because both are true and both have a very idenitarian lesson if understood correctly
Scott, one thing I was curious about your opinion on is how we need to challenge the power of blue America by forcing their own ideology in their face even more. Things such as forcing even more immigrants into their neighborhoods and forcing them to accept things like low income housing. A huge theme in American history is that it is always these Champaign Socialists championing all these egalitarian ideas even though they are never subject to the same consequences. Should a second Trump presidency use the full power of the federal government to force these wealthy, far-left, not diverse communities to accept things like low income housing and more illegal immigrants that we can’t deport in order to get them to drop these ideas and what they demand for the rest of America?
Even if this was possible it would be counter-productive. It's better to use those resources to deport them to Latin America than to waste time moving them around within our own country while destroying the last nice parts of it.
I think that's a very valid point and I agree with you for the most part but my concern is that when an immigration hawk president leaves office, then all those aforementioned areas will all go right back to demanding that everywhere accept illegals and low-income housing (except their own communities of course), and will have learned nothing. I am thinking about this in terms of the long run because we need enough of Blue America to abandon things like the blank slate theory. Wealthy Blue areas hold these views because many of them don't experience it firsthand and there is a bottomless supply of people who will invade our country from the rest of the world. If we are to stop it, then we need a majority of America on our side and I don't know what else it will take for these far-left, non-diverse communities to wake up.
"This could change with good leadership. Trump and Tucker Carlson had the power to keep the base focused on what matters. Trump still demonstrates this capacity with his resistance to following the Right’s latest frivolous obsessions. He hardly noticed Bud Light and he wonders why conservatives say “woke” so much."
Trump kept the base focused on what matters? I'm pressing X to doubt. Trump in 2020 promoted the following:
1) Moving the US embassy to Jerusalem
2) A platinum plan for blacks in the wake of historic riots
3) Criminal justice reform "The First Step Act"
4) LAW AND ORDER tweets
He notably did these things while listening to people like Jared Kushner and Tim Scott while humiliating and laughing out of the room any nationalist voices whom we assumed were our foot in the door like Jeff Sessions and Kris Kobach. He saw them as DISLOYAL so they had to go.
I don't know where you're getting this idea that Trump was this guy who was solely focused on enacting pro White policies as president when his own executive branch agencies did so much to target and censor white people.
In fact, Trump himself was largely responsible for taking the focus away from actual nationalist issues and moving it toward baseless WWE style politics as you decry here. Yes, Trump himself did not promote things like QAnon, but he did promote one toxic, enduring idea: that being America first was equivalent to being Trump first. Put his personality first and worship him at every opportunity was the only consistent, enduring feature of MAGA. That's why so many establishment Republicans were able to get their foot in the door and rebrand as MAGA overnight, because they just personally complimented Trump.
Yes, his base may have been motivated by the Great Replacement during January Sixth, but you perform a sleight of hand by automatically associating their concerns with Trump himself and what he promoted on that day which was the most immediate factor in driving them into the capitol: a baseless theory about protests being able to overturn the election by pressuring Mike Pence to reject state electors. That was just as dubious as believing that space lasers caused the Maui fires to generate favorable real estate for elites. But through only one of those theories did Trump raise millions from his supporters.
I don't really get how you manage to turn an issue of conservative normies getting easily distracted into Trump worship. You also seem concerned that people aren't somehow upset enough over Trump being indicted when it has been getting constant wall-to-wall coverage in conservative media. Trump has been using that coverage to fuel his political campaign and fund raising, where he is currently polling number one. You are upset that a) DeSantis supporters still think they can win where Trump has runaway popularity due to his indictments and that b) Trump is so put upon for not getting enough sympathy from the right over his indictments. Pick one.
In short, this is what happens when you make a political movement a personality cult. You decry the future of Trumpism without Trump, but I look forward to the day when the right finally moves past him and actually advances serious, tangible policies related to immigration, border security, crime, investigating liberal politicians, starving woke institutions, etc.
Never at any point in your anti-Trump tome did you identify a leader to replace him. We see a good picture of the Right without him at the moment and it's just the carnival without the identity issues. You also fail to acknowledge what the Right rallied around before Trump. The Tea Party was directed to focus primarily on fiscal matters. Trump's 2016 campaign activated the base to focus on what mattered. Of course, Trump had his failings. But hoping he goes away and the Right becomes super BASED as a result is just wishcasting. There is no leader waiting in the wings to keep the base focused on the identity issues at the moment. DeSantis talks about drag queen story hour and Bud Light more than immigration, for instance. He also passed a hate speech law.
Such a great article, I couldn't agree more. There is no Trumpism without Trump. I read Michelle Goldberg's article about Sourab Ahmari in NYT. It was at best damning with faint praise. He was claiming that GOP should become party of multi racial working class and had no kind words for Trump. However, a large portion of GOP base is not poor or working class (at least in traditional sense of that word). Most are business owners, professionals or well paid blue collar workers - plumbers, lineman, truckers etc. Absent Trump, the party will become entertainment movement - conspiracy theories, showmanship etc.
And I have say, I would prefer establishment GOP which advocates for low taxes and personal freedom over working class GOP imagined by Ahmari.
Some conspiracies shouldn’t be given up, specifically Epstein and the Iraq War, because both are true and both have a very idenitarian lesson if understood correctly
Scott, one thing I was curious about your opinion on is how we need to challenge the power of blue America by forcing their own ideology in their face even more. Things such as forcing even more immigrants into their neighborhoods and forcing them to accept things like low income housing. A huge theme in American history is that it is always these Champaign Socialists championing all these egalitarian ideas even though they are never subject to the same consequences. Should a second Trump presidency use the full power of the federal government to force these wealthy, far-left, not diverse communities to accept things like low income housing and more illegal immigrants that we can’t deport in order to get them to drop these ideas and what they demand for the rest of America?
Even if this was possible it would be counter-productive. It's better to use those resources to deport them to Latin America than to waste time moving them around within our own country while destroying the last nice parts of it.
I think that's a very valid point and I agree with you for the most part but my concern is that when an immigration hawk president leaves office, then all those aforementioned areas will all go right back to demanding that everywhere accept illegals and low-income housing (except their own communities of course), and will have learned nothing. I am thinking about this in terms of the long run because we need enough of Blue America to abandon things like the blank slate theory. Wealthy Blue areas hold these views because many of them don't experience it firsthand and there is a bottomless supply of people who will invade our country from the rest of the world. If we are to stop it, then we need a majority of America on our side and I don't know what else it will take for these far-left, non-diverse communities to wake up.
Liberals are not like this. They can get carjacked and mugged by magic and still blame white people, not worth the effort changing their minds.
"This could change with good leadership. Trump and Tucker Carlson had the power to keep the base focused on what matters. Trump still demonstrates this capacity with his resistance to following the Right’s latest frivolous obsessions. He hardly noticed Bud Light and he wonders why conservatives say “woke” so much."
Trump kept the base focused on what matters? I'm pressing X to doubt. Trump in 2020 promoted the following:
1) Moving the US embassy to Jerusalem
2) A platinum plan for blacks in the wake of historic riots
3) Criminal justice reform "The First Step Act"
4) LAW AND ORDER tweets
He notably did these things while listening to people like Jared Kushner and Tim Scott while humiliating and laughing out of the room any nationalist voices whom we assumed were our foot in the door like Jeff Sessions and Kris Kobach. He saw them as DISLOYAL so they had to go.
I don't know where you're getting this idea that Trump was this guy who was solely focused on enacting pro White policies as president when his own executive branch agencies did so much to target and censor white people.
In fact, Trump himself was largely responsible for taking the focus away from actual nationalist issues and moving it toward baseless WWE style politics as you decry here. Yes, Trump himself did not promote things like QAnon, but he did promote one toxic, enduring idea: that being America first was equivalent to being Trump first. Put his personality first and worship him at every opportunity was the only consistent, enduring feature of MAGA. That's why so many establishment Republicans were able to get their foot in the door and rebrand as MAGA overnight, because they just personally complimented Trump.
Yes, his base may have been motivated by the Great Replacement during January Sixth, but you perform a sleight of hand by automatically associating their concerns with Trump himself and what he promoted on that day which was the most immediate factor in driving them into the capitol: a baseless theory about protests being able to overturn the election by pressuring Mike Pence to reject state electors. That was just as dubious as believing that space lasers caused the Maui fires to generate favorable real estate for elites. But through only one of those theories did Trump raise millions from his supporters.
I don't really get how you manage to turn an issue of conservative normies getting easily distracted into Trump worship. You also seem concerned that people aren't somehow upset enough over Trump being indicted when it has been getting constant wall-to-wall coverage in conservative media. Trump has been using that coverage to fuel his political campaign and fund raising, where he is currently polling number one. You are upset that a) DeSantis supporters still think they can win where Trump has runaway popularity due to his indictments and that b) Trump is so put upon for not getting enough sympathy from the right over his indictments. Pick one.
In short, this is what happens when you make a political movement a personality cult. You decry the future of Trumpism without Trump, but I look forward to the day when the right finally moves past him and actually advances serious, tangible policies related to immigration, border security, crime, investigating liberal politicians, starving woke institutions, etc.
Never at any point in your anti-Trump tome did you identify a leader to replace him. We see a good picture of the Right without him at the moment and it's just the carnival without the identity issues. You also fail to acknowledge what the Right rallied around before Trump. The Tea Party was directed to focus primarily on fiscal matters. Trump's 2016 campaign activated the base to focus on what mattered. Of course, Trump had his failings. But hoping he goes away and the Right becomes super BASED as a result is just wishcasting. There is no leader waiting in the wings to keep the base focused on the identity issues at the moment. DeSantis talks about drag queen story hour and Bud Light more than immigration, for instance. He also passed a hate speech law.