Category Archives: Trump

Picking on the Vulnerable

Evangelical Christianity, Exploitation, Gender Warfare, Trump

 

The Republican Party in the US is spending millions of dollars on ads attacking the LGBTQ community in the last couple of weeks in the campaign, demonstrating once again that their dominant ideology on this subject, is the ideology of the bully. They want to pick on the most vulnerable people in America. That’s what bullies do.

The Republican claim trans people are the demons destroying America.  According to USAFacts, “Approximately 1.14% of the nation’s adult population, or 3 million Americans, identify as transgender.”  How is it possible that less than 2% of the population consisting mainly of the most vulnerable people in the country could possibly be a threat to the country?  This tiny group is a big problem for America? This seems absurd.

 

According to the Bible in Matthew 25:40 Jesus said this in Matthew 25:40 “… inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me.” That seems like the Christian attitude to me.  The Republican attitude seems more like the Anti-Christ.  We should be protecting the vulnerable not scapegoating them.  But bullies don’t protect the vulnerable; they attack them.

Yet Christians are the most consistent supporters of Donald Trump.  In fact many of them believe Donald Trump was chosen by God to lead their country! How is that possible?

 

Q

Death of Truth, Right-wing Extremism, The Sleep of Reason, Trump

 

The next incident at the Pizza restaurant in the bizzarro world of right-wing radio and radical right-wing extremism was even crazier than all the others. This was the rise of Q who claimed that everything Alex Jones said was true, that Hillary Clinton was a murderer, that a Deep State runs America, and that a ring of pedophiles who worshipped Satan were kidnapping children and keeping them against their will in the basement of a pizza restaurant. Led by mythical and mysterious Q a new movement was formed to defend president Trump from perceived left-wing attacks by the Deep State. That movement was called QAnon, in honour of their leader—Q.

As Justin Ling said, “A whole new class of do-it-yourself broadcasters emerges online to introduce the masses to their new hero.”

 Jerome Corsi became a supporter of the QAnon conspiracy. He said QAnon was actually military intelligence. He said it came from Trump. He claimed to know the identity of Q. QAnon was a group in the Pentagon that was close to Donald Trump he said. Trump of course did not care what QAnon did, or how divisive they were, or destructive of society, so long as they treated him kindly. As always with Trump, no one mattered but Trump. He lived in a universe where only Trump matters.

Trump said, “I don’t know very much about the movement except I understand they like me very much, which I appreciate, but I don’t know very much about the movement.”

And that, of course, was good enough for Trump. No matter how wild the conspiracy theories were promulgated under the name of Trump, it did not matter to Trump, because Q supported Trump. That was all that mattered.

 

Nonsense on Steroids: Hillary Clinton Child Trafficker

American Fascism, Conspiracy Theories, Death of Truth, Hate, Right-wing Extremism, The Sleep of Reason, Trump

 

In the fall of 2016 Right-wing talk radio was consumed by a bizarre conspiracy theory that Hillary Clinton and an evil cabal of liberal elites like Tom Hanks were supposedly involved in trafficking young children for sex while worshipping Satan in the basement of a Washington Pizzeria. It was nonsense on steroids but that did not stop conspiracy purveyors like Alex Jones from spreading these vicious lies in the service of his leader Donald Trump. And right-wing radio was abuzz with this rubbish.

Less than a week before the presidential election of 2016, Jones interviewed a private investigator and conspiracy theorist about this crazy conspiracy theory. Supposedly, also involved were disgraced former Congressman Anthony Weiner, the Clintons and a private aircraft called the Lolita Express.  This was the craft that took many young girls to Jeffrey Epstein’s private island in the Caribbean. The island was often referred to as the island acquired local nicknames such as “Island of Sin” and “Pedophile Island” not entirely without reason. The mere mention of this island or Epstein was enough to send American conservatives into rapturous hate.  This was a vast and constantly metastasizing conspiracy theory, fertilized by insinuations from Rush Limbaugh that the Clintons, while Bill was governor of Arkansas had Vince Foster, a party worker, murdered. There are many constantly evolving and growing versions of the nastiness that went on there.

Alex Jones calls these claims from the investigator “seismic, historical, wow.” Breitbart Radio devoted a whole segment to this conspiracy theory. Right-wing radio was energized like never before, and, of course, this also energized Trump’s supporters just before the election and there was nothing Hillary Clinton could do about it. Breitbart Radio alleged that Hillary Clinton went to this sex island with convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. They said Bill Clinton went there at least 20 times, and Hillary Clinton at least 6 times.

As Justin Ling said on his CBC podcast The Flame Throwers,

“New elements are getting bolted on to this conspiracy theory. Suddenly Clinton is part of a Satanic Cult. Children are being sacrificed and they are begin kept in a secret location.”

 

It did not matter that the conspiracy theory was wildly false.  It sent nasty dust into the air to cover Hillary Clinton with outrageous allegations that were impossible to counter and ushered in nasty rumours that spread through Right-wing radio and the Internet like wildfire.

Yet this bogus claim, had serious real-life consequences. One rabid listener to all the crap on Jones’s show and right-wing radio, Edgar Welsch, from South Carolina, took it all seriously and after leaving his wife with a voice mail message that he was likely going to die, drove from his home with loaded guns to Washington D.C. to rescue the children from the basement of the pizza restaurant. He was unable to find a basement in the restaurant since there was none. He found no victims just young families enjoying pizza and playing games. Sadly, Welsch, was arrested and criminally charged with assault with a deadly weapon for his reckless actions that had been fueled by Alex Jones and his colleagues on right-wing radio. Jones actually pointed the gun at someone he saw in the restaurant, but fortunately, no one else was hurt as a result of the reckless actions of Jones and the other right-wing radio hosts.

We should also remember how Donald Trump shortly after being elected President in 2016 told Alex Jones how much Jones was respected.

All of this was part of the right-wing American assault on truth that has, by no means, diminished since 2016

Grab her by the Pussy

Right-wing Extremism, True Believer, Trump, Trumpism

 

By and large all conservative right-wing radio broadcasters jumped on the Trump bandwagon. One of the few exceptions was Wisconsin broadcaster Charley Sykes. Sykes soon realized that he was no longer welcome in the Republican party or among Trumpsters and resigned his position as a radio host and wrote a book called, How the Right Lost its Mind.

By then Trump’s dominance of the Republican party and the right-wing was complete. As Justin Ling said on his CBC podcast The Flame Throwers, “Trump owned the Republican party. He owned right-wing radio. He owned the narrative. And it seemed like nothing could change that.”

There was an astonishing moment during the 2016 US presidential campaign where it seemed like Trump was done. This was the incident where a recording was released where Trump was bragging that he could sexually assault women and they would do nothing about it.  “You can grab them by the pussy, if you’re a star they let you do it.”

How possibly could a campaign survive that? It seemed impossible. I remember when I heard the story about this incident and I said to myself, with some comfort, at least now his campaign is over. He is dead. But I was wrong. I was dead wrong. Trump was not dead; he was alive and well.

He once claimed that he could stand in Times Square and shoot someone and he would not lose support. His followers were that staunch. And, incredibly, he was right. His fans were deliriously loyal.

 Similar incidents, each seeming to be campaign killers, occurred repeatedly, and yet Trump’s campaign lived on. He mocked handicapped people. He mocked veterans. He mocked John McCain for being a prisoner of war, and his supporters stayed by his side. They must have thought he was like Jesus who could do no wrong. It was nothing less than theological devotion by his fans.

 As Justin Ling said,

“Each time something like this would happen, Trump would be counted out by the mainstream media, but each time all of his friends on right-wing radio found ways to rationalize his behavior, and rally the base to his cause and his campaign.”

 

The only thing that made sense, was the presumption on the part of Trump’s supporters that if the mainstream media said something about Trump it must be false! When liberals cried, the Trumpsters were joyful.  That seems to be continuing. For example, his convictions for felony offences have not significantly dimmed his support. Perhaps they have even amplified it.

 Like a god, Trump can do nothing wrong as far as his supporters are concerned.

 

Never Trumpers

Right-wing Extremism, Trump, Trumpism

 

In 2016, during the Republican primaries, many members of the Republican establishment had no use for Donald Trump. Many considered him a liberal!  Others considered him a clown. Few considered him a serious candidate for the Republican nomination. Many of them said they would never support Trump. They were the ‘Never Trumpers.’

Mark Levine was one of these. This is what he said, early in the campaign: “These bully, dirty tricks, Nixonian tactics they are only going to backfire. So, count me as ‘Never Trump.’ At some point you gotta stand up to it. I do not like bullies, and I never have. So, I will not be voting for Donald Trump, and he can thank Roger Stone.” That not only sounded good, but Levine was right. Trump was a bully and did not deserve votes, but soon, like so many others Levine choked on his words and supported Trump.

Too many of the never Trumpers were never brave. This was particularly true of those politicians who believed they needed to show support for Trump because they thought they needed his support to win their primary. They caved at the first opportunity.

Alex Jones: never met a conspiracy theory he didn’t like

Conspiracy Theories, Death of Truth, Right-wing Extremism, Trump

 

Unlike the ‘Never Trumpers,’ Alex Jones was an early supporter and a long-standing supporter of Donald Trump. He was all in for Trump. Bombast loves Bombast. Bullshitters love bullshitters. Trump and Jones fawned over each other in a dubious mutual admiration. Society.

In the past Jones had said Democrats and Republicans were all part of the same wicked game. He said, “the politics of George Bush and Obama are identical.” He had no use for either of them. But like so many, Jones saw something different in Trump. And he liked what he saw. Jones said that he was a populist and believe that is what Trump was too. He was not wrong about that.

Alex Jones was on the extremes. As Justin Ling said on his CBC podcast The Flame Throwers,

“So far he has stoked fear of a new world order shadow government, accused George Bush of plotting 9/11, claimed that the Sandy Hook elementary shooting was a false flag operation, claimed that  secret Satanic cults made up of government leaders who sacrificed children, vaccines caused autism, there was a Jewish cult running the world, that billionaire Bill Gates was trying to eliminate minority populations, accused Glenn Beck of being a CIA operative, said the government was adding estrogen to the tap water to feminize the population, accused George Soros of organizing a chemical attack in Syria to discredit Bashar el Assad, floated unsubstantiated claims about voter fraud, and so much more. “

 

He also believed Hillary Clinton with other prominent liberals was part of a Satanic cult to sexually molest young children in the basement of a pizza restaurant in Washington D. C. He urged his viewers to go to the Pizzeria to save the children. One of them went their armed to rescue the poor children, but he could not find any of them. He couldn’t even find a basement. You can sum up Alex Jones by saying he never met a conspiracy theory he didn’t like.

 

At the time Jones was a pariah among right-wing radio hosts, but that did not stop Trump from embracing him. When Jones interviewed Trump on his show Trump said, “Great to be with you.” He also claimed Jones was very well respected.

 

The future president of the United States was pleased to be with and be interviewed by Alex Jones the man who believed, or at least claimed to believe that those first graders at Sandy Hook school were child actors who were a part of a hoax perpetrated to help government officials take away guns from extreme right! Later the parents of those children sued Jones into bankruptcy for spreading such lies.

 

Jones swooned over Trump. As Ling said, “In Jones view Trump was going into the belly of the beast, the murderous swamp beast that is the deep state.”

And this is what the next president of the United States said about this extreme bullshitter:

“Your reputation is amazing, and I will not let you down. You will be very, very impressed, I hope. And I think we’ll be speaking a lot and in a year or two years, give me time to run things, but you’ll be saying, but a year into office you’ll remember this interview and you’ll be saying ‘Wow, he said he would do and he did a great job. You’ll be very proud of our country.”

 

Watching the president of the United States fawn over one of the worst conspiracy theoriests was sickening.

 

 

 

Immigration is Key

Immigration and Refugees, Right-wing Extremism, Trump

 

Rush Limbaugh said there was one main reason Trump was leading over all other Republican presidential candidates. That issue was immigration. He was probably right. Republicans were deeply unhappy with prior Republicans like George W. Bush and then Jeb Bush who promised action and failed to deliver. They wanted action. Their resentment at immigrants, whether rational or not, was driving them to Trump. They wanted radical measures like a ban on Muslims or a ‘big beautiful wall.’ They did not want mild mannered Republican talk. They wanted action and in Trump they thought (wrongly as it turned out of course) that Trump would deliver action.

The broadcasters of right-wing radio understood this, even if the Republican establishment did not. Steve Bannon also understood this. He kept driving Trump on immigration and in the 2016 election Trump won a surprising (to many) victory.  I think immigration was the key to that win. Just like it was key to Joe Biden’s unpopularity in 2024. A lot of Americans expect their president to take firm and decisive action to control things on the border. They believe Joe Biden made a big mistake when he cut back most of Biden’s executive orders to hold back illegal immigration, or at least what they perceived to be illegal immigration. They believed this opened the floodgates to illegal immigration shortly after he took office and then did little to change things until just before the election in 2024. Kamala Harris was appointed Biden’s immigration Czar and many believed she did nothing to make things better while she was Vice-President and hold that against her.

Right or wrongly—wrongly in my view—many Americans believe Democrats have “opened the borders” and they don’t like it.  So on we will know what the American voters in 2014 think about this. Will it be enough to  crush Harris’ chances for election? Time will tell.

 

 

A Wrecking Ball

Right-wing Extremism, Sexual harassment/Assault, Trump

 

As Justin Ling said on his CBC podcast series about American right-wing talk radio, “And these radio hosts start to look at Trump like one of their own. When he gets attacked, they are the ones cheering him on from the side lines.”

The radio hosts rallie to Trump’s side no matter how outrageous he was. When he said he could grab women by the pussy they supported Trump. When he said John McCain was not a war hero because he was captured and he liked soldiers who were not captured, the radio hosts stood by him.

As Brian Rosenwald said,

“What happens most of the time, is these media and the left and these lords of political correctness they say this, and person tucks his tail between his legs and disappears. They go away. They abide by the judgment. [with enthusiasm] This guy is not doing that. And he very much realizes his audience is fed up. They are fed up with Republicans who don’t seem to get results. They are fed up with these Republicans they see as playing the Washington game. And they want someone who is just going to be an unvarnished champion who is going to fight for them in their battles and when he sees it makes the left angry is going to say, “Good! You deserve to be angry.”

 

The Trump supporters wanted a wrecking ball, not a ballroom dancer. And that is what they got.

It did not matter much to them what he wrecked either. The entire establishment deserved to be wrecked. His supporters loved it when he wrecked things and the left and the establishment and their media peons got mad.  The madder the left got the more the Trumpsters liked it.

 Of course, the Republican establishment was horrified by Trump’s rise. They didn’t want a wrecking ball. They had too much to lose. The Trumpsters had nothing to lose. By Trumpsters here I do not mean all of Trump’s supporters. He had plenty of support in the establishment too. They just thought they could control Trump. They thought Trump  would be their wrecking ball and he would not wreck them! By in large, of course, they were right. After he was elected, he no longer wanted to drain the swamp. He wanted to wallow in the swamp! The line about draining the swamp was all for show. That’s what Trump did best: be the showman. Not the real man.

While the Republican establishment thought Trump would fail and their supporters would desert him, the right-wing radio hosts recognized him as one of their own. They saw in Trump a fellow traveler. They wanted the rage machine. They did not want any namby-pamby lily-livered leaders. They wanted anger. And nothing less would do.

Matt Lysiak  the author of  The Drudge Revolution: The Untold Story of How Talk Radio, Fox News, and a Gift Shop Clerk with an Internet Connection Took Down the Mainstream Media Hardcover  explained that all of this was instrumental to the rise of Trump. As he said,

“Donald Trump would not have finished in the top three in the GOP primary if it weren’t for Rush Limbaugh and Matt Drudge. I will explain why. The populist wave in media has been growing from Rush Limbaugh and then blown up by Matt Drudge. And without that opening somebody like Donald Trump could not even run. When they said, ‘we’re supporting him, everybody under their conservative ecosystem followed suit.”

 

They all bought into a wrecking ball for president, and that is exactly what they got.

The Republican establishment was cowed.  Jeb Bush had worked for years building up support and financial help, but he was out of the running for the GOP nomination in no time during the 2016 Republican presidential primary race. So too were all the other “normal” Republican candidates.  All were traded for a wrecking ball. According to Matt Lysiak the two people who deserved most of the credit for this were both from talk radio—Rush Limbaugh and Matt Drudge.

American talk radio had produced a king. A King who raged.

 

The Talk Show President: Trump and Obamacare

Right-wing Extremism, Trump

 

As Justin Ling said on his CBC podcast, “On issue after Issue, Trump is taking his cue from right-wing radio.” This is what he said about Obamacare: “We have a disaster called ‘The Big Lie—Obamacare.’ They said Obama lied when he promised that people would be able to keep their insurance if they liked it. And according to radio talk show hosts, this was a big lie. They said this was “enslaving the nation to big corporations.”

Right-wing radio host Michael Savage called for “an outright ban on Muslim immigration.” Donald Trump responded this way:

“Donald J. Trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out ‘what the hell is going on.”

 

Trump outright stole that idea from Michael Savage right-wing radio host. Right-wing radio hosts had been throwing fuel on this issue for so long it finally was adapted by a presidential candidate. Savage did not mind. He was flattered. He thought this would be good for America. He even said, “I’m going to take credit for architecting Trump’s messaging.” And of course he was not the only one. Many right-wing radio hosts were building Trump’s platform. Right-wing radio built Donald Trump.

 

Author Brian Rosenwald explained,

“Trump is not just parroting the lines. He is fully immersed in this character. He is everything that people’s favorite hosts were: he is a fighter. Like people who called in to Rush Limbaugh saying, ‘Thank God you are on the air Rush, now we have a voice. If you interview people at Trump rallies, they are saying the same thing. ‘We finally have somebody to fight for us. He is doing exactly what those hosts have been doing.”

 

 

The right wing hosts made Donald Trump. Trump is the talk show president!

 

The Talk Show President

Freedom to Read, Right-wing Extremism, Trump

 

 

In January 2011 at the annual Washington correspondent’s dinner, the Washington Capitol, like much of the world, laughed at Donald Trump. He was a joke. Just before the dinner Donald Trump had spread the lie that Obama was not born in the USA.  And this was Obama’s chance to get back at him and he took it. Until that night he had been very restrained about this birther story that really annoyed him and which he knew was a racist trope. Obama produced his official long form birth certificate and said Trump could now concentrate on issues that really mattered like “did we fake the moon landing.”  Everyone laughed. He mocked Trump as Trump deserved to be mocked. But in the process, he made an enemy. A Bigly enemy. Trump was stone cold mad. According to Justin Ling, “Trump looked like his head was going to explode.”

Trump had ridden the birther conspiracy for 3 years, pushing himself onto the national stage unlike ever before.  The fact that the Washington media was now scorning him might have been an asset. In the world of right-wing politics it certainly was no drawback. 4 years later as a self-proclaimed political outsider Trump descended the golden elevator in Trump Tower to launch his second campaign for the Republican nomination. He was about to become the most famous man in the world! Life was good.

As Trump said that day:

 

“Our country is in big trouble. We don’t have victories any more. When is the last time anybody saw us beating let’s say China in a trade deal? They kill us. The U.S. has become a dumping ground for everybody else’s problems. When Mexico sends its people they’re not sending their best. They bring in drugs. They bring in crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume are good people…We are going to make our country great again.”

 

 

And of course, the message implied: Only one man can turn things around. He is a strong man. The man we need. Donald Trump. Only he can save us. That is the clarion call of the fascist. It is dangerous out there and only one man save us, and he is a strong man.

I am not saying America is fascist. I am saying there are many fascists in America and they are attractive to a lot of Americans. Fascism could happen in America. It is by no means impossible. We must be careful and wise.

And of course, like any wanna be fascist Trump had his scapegoats in the cross hairs: immigrants. As he said, “I am going to build a great, great wall on our southern border and I will have Mexico pay for that wall.”

Most of the press did not take Trump seriously. Most people did not take Trump seriously. That included me. The Dummy. I thought, like so many others that there was no way Trump would win the Republican nomination. I was wrong. Bigly wrong.

Rush Limbaugh did not laugh. He took Trump seriously and he loved what he heard. He said, “I tell you this is going to resonate with people.” And he was right! He also made another wise comment: “The more the media hates this and makes fun of it, the more support Trump is going to get.” And he was bigly right again.

The extreme right would never be the same again.