The Trump Movement Keeps Telling Us Who They are
The MSG rally.
Trump held a big rally at Madison Square Garden yesterday. All indications are that it did a great job of stoking the flames of the politics of Us versus Them.
Some headlines of relevance.
- Via Politico: Trump’s New York homecoming sparks backlash over racist and vulgar remarks.
- Via CNN: Trump unveils the most extreme closing argument in modern presidential history
- Via the NYT: Trump at the Garden: A Closing Carnival of Grievances, Misogyny and Racism.
- NPR’s report on Morning Edition today is quite a contrast: Trump and Harris campaigns concentrate on swing voters in the homestretch.
- And I fear that this, from the Daily Beast, is wishful thinking: Donald Trump’s Racist NYC Rally Was Vile. It Was Also Political Suicide.
Where to start?
How about “comedy” time?
That’s Tony Hinchcliffe, whose website describes him as a “world-renowned comedian.” He apparently tours with Joe Rogan. He is also a podcaster. I think I have heard his name before, but that’s about it.
He went on Twitter not long after his comments went viral to complain that it was just a “joke,” stating that “these people have no sense of humor.”
But, of course, labeling a US territory populated by Hispanics as “literally a floating island of garbage” is unlikely to be funny to many people, the least of which being Puerto Ricans. Moreover, such language is clearly racially coded and fits into Trump’s broadening “othering” language.
And of course, as Ben Meiselas notes, Trump has been talking a lot about garbage of late in the contest of immigration.
And there is this screeching from Stephen Miller that fits the theme (the second Tweet):
By the way, understand how Miller’s rhetoric would be appealing to a lot of listeners, as well as. I mean, I get it: if the gangs, cartels, and “criminal migrants” are all “gone,” who would argue with that? But, of course, one suspects that to Miller pretty much all migrants from the south are “criminal migrants.” Even if we assume that he is fine with non-criminal migrants (spoiler: he isn’t), then we know that all of this talk about crime and the border is part of a broad othering that is linked to other fascistic rhetoric from Trump and his supporters that I have recently noted.
At a minimum, the fear-mongering (Rudy’s Palestinian bit) and racist-coded/misogynistic (e.g., the Black woman has “pimp handlers”) language was strong.
Or she might just be the devil.
And as Rupar noted on the attached Tweets (that I cannot avoid for some reason), the valorization of Trump based on the assassination attempt, and the nebulous usage of “they” is very much part of the politics of “us v. them” that is at the core of fascistic politics.
Indeed, it is hard to listen to these clips and not see what Stanley noted in his book, How Fascism Works. “In the rhetoric of the extreme nationalist, such a glorious past has been lost by the humiliation brought on by globalism, liberal cosmopolitanism, and respect for ‘universal values’ such as equality” (4).
The whole “garbage” thing above fits, especially the notion that people from the outside (immigrants, Palestinians, etc.) are a range to “us.”
And on the front of degrading values such as “equality,” we get this:
The whole thing is a non sequitur, insofar as concerns about diversity, equity, and inclusion are not antithetical to hard work. But, of course, the mythology is needed that people with jobs and wealth got there solely because of hard work and so things like DEI (and affirmative action before it) are simply designed to help lazy persons of color get ahead when they don’t deserve it.
So, look, on the one hand, campaign rallies can be weird and will certainly be off-putting to opposing partisans. But all this (and more) is well beyond that. The valorization of Trump in a thoroughly unhealthy way, it is full of racist attacks, and it is, above all else, very much the politics of Us versus Them.
One last one from Tucker.
Trust me, I don’t trust Tucker.
Hey, Tucker, this you? Remarkably, Tucker also claimed that Trump had liberated him from having to tell lies. I will say, he is making an effective rhetorical appeal to stoke fear in the population. But, of course, it is more fascistic Us v. Them with a sprinkling of replacement theory to boot. The liberation of which he speaks is the ability of your racist uncle to be racist and feel like he has been freed from any criticisms for being such.
If Tucker feels “liberated” it is simply because he is free to spout his white nationalist garbage. And let’s not forget the ironic fact that he lost his job at Fox News for lying about the 2020 elections.
(And if anything thinks RFK, Jr. should be anywhere near health care policy…well, ugh).
BTW, worth noting.
The depressing part about all of this is that there is a substantial percentage of the country that loves and buys it all. And then there is another large slice that ignores all this nonsense because they can’t fathom voting for the other team.
Bonus Clip.
Let me note this Mike Johnson clip, if anything to make the following observation: I guarantee you that “your father’s Democratic Party” was also being accused of being Marxist. So, at a minimum, his rhetoric is close to “normal.” It does contain the typical lazy lack of ability to figure out whether to call them “Marxists” or “socialists.”
Funny, then, that there’s one lie he still feels compelled to tell: that he likes Donald Trump.
Seeing this all laid out like this is very disturbing. JFC, what the hell??
I’m going to need to crawl under a rock for the next 8 days. This is all so gross. I have to keep hoping that this is a strangely noisy subset of people, because it’s all so appalling.
I have to assume they are going into full get out the vote mode, really rallying the base. While this stuff is awful, as usual, I will be surprised if it changes many votes. The base loves this stuff, the rest of the GOP shrugs it off and there aren’t really many undecideds.
Steve
This is why it’s such a huge failure of mass media to have spent so long “fixing” Trump’s racist conspiratorial ramblings. He’s a tiny-dictator horror show waiting to happen, advised by toady racist authoritarian lovers. He announces it constantly, and major media outlets keep cleaning it up. It’s hard for them to explain just how Nazified this scene was because they’ve spent so long acting like all those times he said 95% of this during his regular rallies it was no big deal.
@ptfe: x1000
Cannot upvote hard enough.
Also, there’s been a string of arson fires in ballot drop boxes in blue areas: one in Maricopa County in AZ (in a blue area), one in Portland OR and another this morning in Vancouver WA.
They are liars and cheaters.
Dr. Taylor, did you miss the bit about the black folks carving watermelons for Halloween? Just another moment in the litany of racism.
I will say one thing, though, the crowd did not seem to be entirely loving it. Or maybe the microphones weren’t picking them up as enthusiastically as it was in reality.
@Gustopher: His comments about Latinos got the most attention so far, but he did also make jabs at blacks, Jews, and Palestinians. It’s why he thinks he was being equal-opportunity, though to my knowledge he didn’t tell any jokes about white people or Christians.
@Jen: Multnomah County went 360k Biden to 86k Trump in 2020. I don’t think there are enough ballot boxes to burn in Portland to offset that difference. More seriously, burning ballot drop boxes is an act of desperation. Basket of deplorables has become an understatement.
[…]
World-renowned comedian/legend in his own mind, potayto/potahto.
@Gustopher:
I hadn’t seen that. Good Lord.
Trump also said that he and Mike Johnson “have a little secret” that will help them win the House. Link
@Monala:
I saw that in today’s issue of Heather Cox Richardson’s substack, Letters From and American. She expounds it’s a plan to redo Jan 6 by making it impossible to do the electoral count, and throw the election to the House.
Aside: at work when I click on links to Threads, all I get is the site’s logo. Same if I type threads.net in the browser’s address bar.
I don’t know what the audience is for any of this stuff. It’s like cringy pablum about democracy turned upside down and made into motivational speeches about being the best scumbag you can be.
Saw a clip of Tucker calling Kamala Harris low-IQ and he was definitely on something. Someone else compared this comedian idiot to Don Rickles, but Rickles told jokes about powerful people. He just didn’t insult Puerto Ricans and more importantly he was actually funny. It’s like a whole different class of human out there. Not only the ones who eat it up, but the dimwits who waive it off.
@Just nutha ignint cracker: He apparently tours with Joe Rogan
I think his days of touring with Rogan are over. Rogan and his people are smart enough to know when to ditch a minor leaguer who is a liability.
A few insights I had not noticed:
“CoxRichardson“
@Just nutha ignint cracker: Sure, but that’s probably not the case in Arizona.
It’s okay for me to be furious about this. Yes, it smacks of desperation, but it’s also seriously frightening as it shows a very deranged state of mind.
I’m struck by this from Tucker Carlson:
Of course, this statement is not to be trusted, not only because Carlson is so obviously a liar, but also because of the extensive record of the public Trump and all the other “off camera” accounts that contradict this account of the private Trump.
But, what has me puzzled is Who is this statement for? The MAGA mob loves that Trump hates The Other. It is one of his biggest draws. Why does Tucker feel it necessary to assure the Trumpists that The Donald is, IDK what, a decent, gentle fellow when the lights & cameras are off?
Or is there buried deep inside his psyche and the psyche of other Trump enablers some small vestige of shame, some little voice that recognizes that if Trump is what he so clearly projects himself to be, then they are supporting a monster.
That’s likely too much to ask of Tucker Carlson, but there might be something more to be done to shame “the large slice that ignores all this nonsense because they can’t fathom voting for the other team.”
Gawd, the backstabbing at Trump HQ must be epic right now.
Statements from the campaign that none of the speakers’ comments were vetted beforehand coming right on the heels of statements from the campaign that state the comic planned a joke calling Kamala the c-word and that was removed as going too far.
So, what is it kids? Were the comments reviewed or not?
1992 Pat Buchanan would be too wishy-washy for this event.
@Jen: Perhaps he asked about whether it would be appropriate to refer to the sitting Vice President as a c—, was told no, and didn’t mention the watermelons and the floating island of garbage and the rest. It’s possible.
But, no one thought to cut his microphone and gently escort him from the stage with a comment of “well, that was a thing that happened, let’s get a round of applause for this racist fuckwad, I guess.”
@Gus: But not later Pat. He could have riffed on his blood and soil stuff from later in his career.
They know America’s Hitler messed up bigtime:
“They don’t have time to vett every word a person is going to say and even if they did that doesn’t keep a Kamala plant from going off script and saying whatever racist shit he was planted to say. No way. Use your brain, 8 days before an election, in a city with 1 million Puerto Ricans, with Kamala lagging, this fits right into the Kamala Harris & AOC playbook, and this comic is a liberal who would never support Trump. This was a racist plant from the Democrats.”
Trouble in MAGAland. Lmao
The REPUBLICAN Trump Movement Keeps Telling Us Who They are
(credit where credit is due)
My neighbor’s aunt’s friend know someone who knows that Tony Hinchcliffe, was paid by the DNC to harpoon the rally! Isn’t it obvious?