Last month we were told that our pass-the-popcorn moment – I mean, our long national nightmare – was finally over: Presidential candidate Donald Trump would implode now that he had dared to question Republican Senator John McCain’s heroism.
But lo and behold, he’s still hanging on to front-runner status for the Republican nomination. How is that possible?
The short answer is that the inside-the-Beltway crowd – not for the first time – confused its own perceptions with those of actual voters.
Inside the Village, Mr. McCain is a sacred figure. After all these years of being a conventional ideologue, he is still perceived as McCain the Maverick. And despite his warmongering, he’s still considered a wise man when it comes to national security, and he is a near-constant presence on the Sunday talk shows. So the villagers expected everyone to recoil in horror when Mr. Trump ridiculed Mr. McCain’s war record – you’re only supposed to do that to Democrats.
But the Republican base really doesn’t care very much. Whatever they may say, its members aren’t all that impressed by military heroism. It’s not just the treatment of John Kerry when he was running for president – think about how little Republican voters seemed to care when we killed Osama bin Laden.
And they really, really don’t care about some old guy who lost an election.
Mr. Trump surely hurt himself a bit with his recent attack on Mr. McCain, but he still embodies the base’s id in a way that the Village doesn’t seem to understand.
Trumpism
Not surprisingly, Talking Points Memo’s Rick Perlstein, our foremost expert on the rise of movement conservatism, has the best take so far on the Trump phenomenon.
As Mr. Perlstein says, nobody should be surprised to find that there are a lot of Republicans who are furious and won’t take it any more: “This is important: Conservatism is like bigotry whack-a-mole,” he wrote recently. “The quantity of hatred, best I can tell from 17 years of close study of 60 years of right-wing history, remains the same. Removing the flag of the Confederacy, raising the flag of immigrant hating: The former doesn’t spell some new Jerusalem of tolerance; the latter doesn’t mean that conservatism’s racism has finally been revealed for all to see.”
And crucially, a key part of conservative mythology is that the silent majority shares this hatred, and that it’s only the liberal elite with its political correctness that is keeping Americans from saying what they know to be true. (It’s similar to the constant trope from Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly that anyone who disagrees with him is a “far-left” type, no matter how mainstream the person’s ideas.)
So why shouldn’t the Republican base rally around “The Donald”? The elite considers him ridiculous, but the base has been told again and again that the elite is corrupt and anti-American. The base has also been told again and again that it represents the true views of everyone except Those People. So why shouldn’t its members go with someone who is their kind of guy, in style as well as substance?
Help us Prepare for Trump’s Day One
Trump is busy getting ready for Day One of his presidency – but so is Truthout.
Trump has made it no secret that he is planning a demolition-style attack on both specific communities and democracy as a whole, beginning on his first day in office. With over 25 executive orders and directives queued up for January 20, he’s promised to “launch the largest deportation program in American history,” roll back anti-discrimination protections for transgender students, and implement a “drill, drill, drill” approach to ramp up oil and gas extraction.
Organizations like Truthout are also being threatened by legislation like HR 9495, the “nonprofit killer bill” that would allow the Treasury Secretary to declare any nonprofit a “terrorist-supporting organization” and strip its tax-exempt status without due process. Progressive media like Truthout that has courageously focused on reporting on Israel’s genocide in Gaza are in the bill’s crosshairs.
As journalists, we have a responsibility to look at hard realities and communicate them to you. We hope that you, like us, can use this information to prepare for what’s to come.
And if you feel uncertain about what to do in the face of a second Trump administration, we invite you to be an indispensable part of Truthout’s preparations.
In addition to covering the widespread onslaught of draconian policy, we’re shoring up our resources for what might come next for progressive media: bad-faith lawsuits from far-right ghouls, legislation that seeks to strip us of our ability to receive tax-deductible donations, and further throttling of our reach on social media platforms owned by Trump’s sycophants.
We’re preparing right now for Trump’s Day One: building a brave coalition of movement media; reaching out to the activists, academics, and thinkers we trust to shine a light on the inner workings of authoritarianism; and planning to use journalism as a tool to equip movements to protect the people, lands, and principles most vulnerable to Trump’s destruction.
We urgently need your help to prepare. As you know, our December fundraiser is our most important of the year and will determine the scale of work we’ll be able to do in 2025. We’ve set two goals: to raise $115,000 in one-time donations and to add 1365 new monthly donors by midnight on December 31.
Today, we’re asking all of our readers to start a monthly donation or make a one-time donation – as a commitment to stand with us on day one of Trump’s presidency, and every day after that, as we produce journalism that combats authoritarianism, censorship, injustice, and misinformation. You’re an essential part of our future – please join the movement by making a tax-deductible donation today.
If you have the means to make a substantial gift, please dig deep during this critical time!
With gratitude and resolve,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy