This is Jim Smith's personal (political) blog. His real estate writings are posted at www.GoldenREblog.com.
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Tuesday, July 28, 2020
“I’m More Fearful of the Radical Left Than I Am of Donald Trump.”
Tuesday, July 21, 2020
It’s Useful to Know the Arguments Trump Supporters Make About Their Man
Researching and writing this column has given me an insight which many readers don’t have into what Trump supporters believe to be true about their candidate and what they are being told about Joe Biden. In addition to sampling Fox News (the primary diet of Trump supporters), I get lengthy emails from readers who are under the president’s spell — and who will remain under his spell no matter what the president says or does between now and the election on Nov. 3rd.
I have identified three principal themes to the Trump campaign strategy — and those themes will continue to work for his unquestioning and sheltered “base.” These themes are reinforced and given legitimacy by the base’s sources of information and opinion — the president’s tweets, Trump-promoting media like Fox News Channel, and emailed memes and narratives which are forwarded unquestioned by millions of Trump followers. Here are some of them:
To counter theme #2, I would like Joe Biden to request a town hall program on Fox News, and speak out if he is denied such an opportunity. Pete Buttigieg was given that opportunity by Fox and did an excellent job of countering whatever negative narratives viewers may have had about him. How could Fox justify denying the same opportunity to Biden? Since theme #2 is that Biden is senile and “doesn’t know he’s alive” according to Trump, a town hall meeting would be a perfect opportunity — better than a debate with Trump — to counter that narrative.
And then, of course, there are the conspiracy theories propagated online and in Trump’s tweets, which are too numerous to mention here. Click on that link.
Although Trump supporters aren’t inclined to do so, I recommend Googling each outrageous claim sent to you, or go directly to www.Snopes.com to get the background and truth. Whether it’s “too good to be true” or “too bad to be true,” it probably is not true.
Tuesday, July 14, 2020
Why Did Trump’s Top Republican Critics of 2016 Become His Top Apologists?
As John Bolton and others have explained, everything the president says and does is with re-election as his primary consideration. The same is obviously true for his Republican enablers in Congress when you revisit what they said about Donald Trump in 2016, as detailed in this excerpt from chapter 7 of the best-selling book, A Warning:
New Jersey governor Chris Christie said the candidate lacked the credentials for the nation’s highest office. “We do not need reality TV in the Oval Office right now,” Christie lamented. “President of the United States is not a place for an entertainer.”
Senator Ted Cruz
lambasted him as a “narcissist” and “utterly amoral.” Cruz argued that voters
could not afford to elect someone so unfocused and social-media-obsessed. “I
think in terms of a commander in chief, we ought to have someone who isn’t
springing out of bed to tweet in a frantic response to the latest polls.”
Representative
Jim Jordan, a leading conservative and one of the founders of the Freedom Caucus
in the US House, wished Republicans in Congress had acted sooner to “avoid
creating this environment” that allowed someone like candidate Trump to rise.
Texas governor
Rick Perry labeled Trump “a cancer on conservatism” and a threat to the nation’s
future. “The White House has been occupied by giants,” Rick noted. “But from
time to time it is sought by the small-minded -- divisive figures propelled by
anger, and appealing to the worst instincts in the human condition.” Perry said
the businessman was peddling a “carnival act that can be best described as
Trumpism: a toxic mix of demagoguery, mean-spiritedness, and nonsense” and that
he was running on “division and resentment.”
Senator Lindsey Graham told American voters: “This is not about who we nominate anymore
as Republicans as much as it is who we are.” He bemoaned that the party had not
taken the long-shot candidate more seriously. “Anytime you leave a bad idea or
a dangerous idea alone, anytime you ignore what could become an evil force, you
wind up regretting it.” The senator said he would not vote for the man, who he called a “jackass” and a “kook.” Those who know Lindsay understand that he
wasn’t using those words lightly. He meant them.
John
Thune, one of the top-ranking Republicans in the Senate, expressed reservations
throughout the race, but after the Access Hollywood scandal, he said the
party no longer needed its candidate. “Donald Trump should withdraw and Mike
Pence should be our nominee effective immediately,” he tweeted in the wake of
the scandal, with only weeks until the vote.
Many
other elected conservatives chimed in throughout the campaign, calling the
Republican nominee a “bigot,” “misogynist,” “liar,” “unintelligent,” “inarticulate,”
“dangerous,” “fraud,” “bully,” and “unfit” for the presidency….
[South Carolina congressman Mick Mulvaney declared Donald Trump is] “[one] of the most flawed human beings ever to run for president in the history of the country”… Roughly twenty-four months later, Mick would become Donald Trump’s third chief of staff.
Last week I wrote that readers of this column who support Trump seem reluctant to answer the question, “How do you feel that the man you support is adored by alt-right extremists, white supremacists, etc.” Three readers responded, but none of them actually answered the question. Here are excerpts, with uncorrected spelling and grammar:
Robert L. wrote: "I would imagine that YOU might likewise be 'adored' by people whom both you and I find not to our liking. You, too, have little control over their liking or disliking you. I do not question you because of who likes you. Rather, I question you for developing such an inane theory by which others are berated."
Tom B. wrote: “Your challenge to Trump supporters to justify their support of him in view of the far right extremists who also support him is a false dilemma. One does not have anything to do with the other. Just as support by communists and socialists and extreme leftist loonies who support Democrats does not preclude you from also doing so. Nor does it imply that you identify with or would associate with those groups. This is not a case of 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend.' I think that the reference to 'deplorables' by Trump and those self-identifying as such is for the most part a mocking and taunting of Hilary Clinton who was beaten by those she so insulted."
Tuesday, July 7, 2020
There’s One Question That Trump Supporters Don’t Want to Answer
Because of this column, I have been blessed with a flood of correspondence (mostly emails) from people who love President Trump. I respond to every email, resulting in a few continuing exchanges by email with many Trump supporters.
Frequently, when replying to emails from those who defend Trump, I ask the following question, which is universally ignored when and if they do reply. My question is, “How do you feel that the man you support is adored by people who you probably consider deplorable—white nationalists, neo-Nazis, alt-right racists, and anti-semites?”
Trump supporters accept Trump in spite of his crudeness, his misogyny, his adulterous past, his associating with people like Jeffrey Epstein, his slandering of our allies and praising of murderous dictators like Vladimir Putin, but they decline to comment on how he elicits support from those Hillary put in his “basket of deplorables.”
I find it interesting that Trump himself, according to multiple reports, refers to his fringe supporters as “the deplorables,” as if he accepts and courts them. But how does that make his non-deplorable supporters feel? They won’t tell me. (Maybe their emails following this column will give me a clue.)
Is it possible that Trump’s non-deplorable supporters secretly like those statements and policies that excite the deplorables?
Could it be that supporting the incumbent president — typically an honorable thing to do — is a socially acceptable way for them to express feelings and beliefs that they wouldn’t otherwise share? To many people. “Make America Great Again” sounds a lot like “Make America White Again.” That is, it seems, what Trump’s opposition to all forms of immigration — legal and illegal — is about. Recently he suspended the granting of work permits to all foreigners for all kinds of jobs, not just for picking our fruits and vegetables.
He expressed it clearly in January 2018 when he said that Norwegians would be more welcome to move to the United States than immigrants from “shithole countries” such as Haiti or African nations. Such language is abhorrent — unless you actually agree with it.
In a previous column, I described how a fellow Realtor supports Donald Trump because his policies — specifically his tax cuts — have benefited her. (She has accepted the spin that it was a “middle-class tax cut,” when those cuts were really just a cover for a vast giveaway to the wealthy.)
I have heard from others who agree with her. Apparently, statements by Trump such as the one above aren’t enough to outweigh favorable opinions of the man based on self-interest. I prefer to think that persons like my Realtor friend overlook rather than approve of Trump’s racist comments.
I don’t believe that anything, including this column, will convince anyone to stop loving Trump. Their biases and support based on self-interest run too deep. We can only hope that what the polls tell us is true, that, despite the mud that will be thrown about Joe Biden — “mob boss of the Deep State” — there’s enough revulsion toward Donald Trump, the person, and enough opposition to his racist attitudes, that he will not succeed in winning for himself another term.
As John Bolton has said, our great country can survive one term of Donald Trump, but I’m worried about its ability to survive a second term.
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Thank you for your support
Some readers have asked how this column has affected my real estate business. A few Trump lovers have said they will never use Golden Real Estate because of the “venom” I spew. Thankfully, others have said they will now definitely use our agents for their real estate needs. Thanks!