I have lived in my neighborhood in Los Angeles for 12 years, far longer than I’ve ever lived anywhere else. Obviously, I love it.
Yes, I know — according to right-wing suburbanites, there is no greater hell than California, where you can’t go a day without being carjacked by crackheads, shot by MS-13, and swallowed whole by an earthquake. Worse of all, our gas is six dollars per gallon.
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Love is in the air. Or maybe it’s desperation. Who can tell anymore?
In any case, this week was Valentine’s Day, and happy couples snuggled on dates, unhappy couples forced displays of intimacy, and single people either ignored the holiday or shrieked that they hate everyone who has ever been in a relationship anywhere at any time.
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Our self-identity forms our core.
For example, you might consider yourself to be a radical vegan who aligns herself with the needy.
Perhaps you’re a high-powered corporate exec whose net worth and golf handicap are numbers that measure your very existence.
Or you could be a Gen X Latino progressive who loves Korean horror movies and has a thing for Kate Winslet.
Yeah, maybe.
But one thing is highly likely: You see your “political affiliation not as a choice but as an identity; that is, something not subject to change with time.”
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No, it’s not your imagination.
The Trump Administration really is that chaotic, incompetent, reckless, arrogant, and bizarre. It’s a wonder that this gang of hate-filled lunatics hasn’t destroyed the country already.
But of course, if you are a true Trump fan, none of this matters. Either you deny that there are any issues, and everything is going more or less according to plan, or you admit that there are real problems, but it’s not the president’s fault. In the latter case, a natural follow-up is, whose fault is it then?
I’m glad you asked.
According to the most ardent of right-wingers, Trump is not a blithering, easily confused gasbag who is in way over his head (I can see why you might think that).
No, all of his self-inflicted wounds are actually the mechanizations of the fabled “deep state.”
For your edification, the deep state is “a body of people, typically influential members of government agencies or the military, believed to be involved in the secret manipulation or control of government policy.”
This belief in a secret government means that “with varying degrees of credibility and credulity, conservatives have fed stories that Mr. Trump is the victim of sabotage by an adversarial intelligence community full of Trojan horse holdovers from the Obama administration.”
You see, it’s not that the Republicans have horrific ideas and terrible execution, it’s that the deep state — often with a sinister liberal agenda — is thwarting them.
But there are a couple of problems with this hypothesis.
First, despite acres of exposés and essays and think-pieces about the deep state, no one seems able to pinpoint exactly who is in charge of it — or even who the exact members of this cabal are.
Second, if the deep state is so damn efficient — and again, is also determined to crush conservative ideas — then why couldn’t it have, I don’t know, fixed the fucking election in the first damn place?
For that matter, how is that shadowy liberals are able to trip up Trump, without leaving any fingerprints, and yet they can’t implement any truly progressive ideas on a nationwide level?
I mean, if you can frame the president for false crimes and get away with it, it should be a snap to, say, repeal oppressive voter-registration laws, or keep public education intact. For that matter, whatever happened to that liberal-socialist conspiracy to steal everyone’s guns? When is the deep state going to get going on that one?
The truth is that liberals are mocked as wimps, as powerless, as perennial losers at the ballot box — right up until conservatives start fucking up. Then all of a sudden, progressives have this vast reservoir of influence and secret strength, which they dish out wildly against overwhelmed, heroic conservatives.
In this scenario, the Republican Party is not an uneasy alliance of corporate apologists, religious nuts, xenophobes, and crazies, who can’t agree on anything other than their hatred of liberals. No, it is a virtuous organization of (overwhelmingly) men who are too good and decent and pure to be a match for those backstabbing, cheating, and unbelievably powerful progressives.
Sounds reasonable to me…
By now, you’ve seen the research that implies Trump voters were more motivated by racism than… well, by anything else when it came to casting their ballots.
We can certainly debate the root causes of Trumpism, and it’s unlikely that historians will ever agree on one concrete reason for the election of man who sounds more like an intelligible dementia sufferer than a sitting president.
Think of all the variables — from the Comey letter to Russian hacking to misogyny to American’s perpetual hero worship of celebrity. All are plausible reasons why destitute people in small towns looked at a smug billionaire with no governing experience and thought, “Hey, why not?”
But two factors seem most salient. The first is a love of authoritarianism, which many studies have pinpointed as the single most common trait of the Trump voter. People with this trait “have little tolerance for deviance. They’re highly obedient to strong leaders. They scapegoat outsiders and demand conformity to traditional norms.”
Other experts have subdivided this trait into populism, which “is a type of political rhetoric that casts a virtuous people against nefarious elites.” Populists also have a “deep mistrust of any group that claims expertise.”
However you want to define or dissect it, this all sounds like a hardcore Trump voter. Indeed, I still believe the authoritarian/populism vibe is the primary reason why we have the Orange Menace in the White House. It is also the main reason why his base continues to support him, despite the glaring lack of accomplishment in his first 100 days. They are, after all, “highly obedient to strong leaders” and don’t believe anything that experts (i.e., the mainstream media) tell them about their Great Leader’s failures.
But what about that racial thing?
Well, this recent study made the bold claim that “racial attitudes made a bigger difference in electing Trump than authoritarianism.” The study’s authors state that “we’ve never seen such a clear correspondence between vote choice and racial perceptions.”
Of course, this goes against the common refrain that Trump voters are all salt-of-the-earth types under such economic stress that they tragically fell for a con man’s bluster.
Just don’t say bigotry had anything to do with it.
Conservatives embrace this idea because it allows them to believe there is no racism in their movement (and more important, no prejudice within themselves). It also helps them in their quest to dismiss progressives as a bunch of hypersensitive whiners who play the race card nonstop.
And many liberals agree with this because they don’t want to appear to be a bunch of hypersensitive whiners who play the race card nonstop. Also, some liberals foolishly believe they can somehow win over extremists if they are just nice enough. Plus, liberals are often just wimps who don’t want to be, you know, all rude and shit by calling someone a racist.
However, a significant chunk of Trump’s supporters are indeed overt bigots. After all, those Nazis aren’t cheering for Elizabeth Warren. And our common sense tells us that many more Trump fans are, at the very least, a bit leery of ethnic minorities.
And as these studies show, the prevalence of bigotry within the Trump movement is not just anecdotal. We have statistics and everything.
“Wait a minute, you lying Latino,” says the fervent Trump supporter. “How could America have elected a black president if we’re so racist? Huh?”
I’m glad you asked. In my next post, I’ll discuss this apparent contradiction.
For now, you’ll just have to trust me when I say that there are some very good reasons.
Hey, remember when I said that too many liberals were genuflecting to Trump and insisting that he was all presidential and shit now, just because he successfully gave a mediocre speech? And remember when I said that was nonsense, and that Trump hadn’t changed and never would?
Yeah, that was last week. And I was right.
So now that we’ve further established that liberals are acting like a bunch of abused spouses, how do we focus on creating a new mindset — one that doesn’t play into conservatives’ hands?
There are, of course, a number of strategies. But I would rather focus on what not to do.
For starters, let’s drop the ludicrous suggestion that progressives need to “get outside their bubbles.”
“But wait,” my fellow progressives wail. “We lost the white working class, and it’s because we’re just a bunch of spoiled, condescending, pampered elitists. We need to kiss their boots and tell them how great they are, in the desperate hope that they’ll vote for a democrat.”
Sorry, but when it comes to reasoning with a hardcore Trump supporter, there is very little return on investment.
First, the truth is that most Americans live in bubbles — defined as clusters of like-minded individuals who tend to line up on politics, culture, religion, etc. In fact, there are apparently up to 11 different Americas, which makes sense when one considers how vast this country is. Furthermore, Americans have always lived in bubbles. It’s just more obvious now with the rise of social media and academic studies.
And yet, it is only now that we’re hearing “get out of your bubbles.” And it is only liberals who are being told to do this (despite the fact that the Democratic candidate actually got millions more votes).
I rarely hear the reverse. That is, how come nobody ever says that people in the Midwest and the Deep South live in their own bubbles, and that perhaps they should try to understand the viewpoints of the dreaded coastal elites?
In fact, one could make the case that “rural and exurban people need to see more of America. People do not understand the depths of how little rural America travels and sees other people and cultures.”
And if I haven’t mentioned this in the last nine minutes, I’m from Wisconsin, and I’ve probably spent more time in rural America than the vast majority of liberals. So I can tell you, the rural conservative bubble is much stronger and more impenetrable than the urban progressive bubble.
Yet it is liberals who are told to “stop ranting and seek out” Trump voters for their opinions. However, when a progressive actually attempts this, it’s all shouting and insults, and nobody ever changes his/her mind. Or Trump supporters don’t bother to show up to the conversation — because they don’t have to.
In fact, I have yet to see one of those “opposing sides come together” kind of stories where the instigator was a Republican. And the reason is obvious.
Conservatives have the default setting of being “the real Americans,” and asking them to do anything to upset their world is political suicide and culturally shameful. Meanwhile, liberals would rather be punched in the face than get accused of being elitist, so we had better bend over backward.
In essence, conservatives who refuse to compromise are principled and strong. But liberals who do the same are smug.
It’s all enough to make you want to stay inside your own little bubble.
Recently, I badmouthed those liberal celebrities who blame themselves for the rise of Donald Trump. Of course, our titans of the entertainment industry have bigger problems to face, like opening the correct envelope, so I’ll leave them alone.
Instead, I’m going to focus on progressives in general — be they famous, infamous or completely unknown — by pointing out a disturbing trend that has emerged since November. This is the tendency of leftists to absolve conservatives of all responsibility for Trump’s election. Even weirder, my fellow progressives are saying it is our entire fault that America has a cackling xenophobe in the White House.
Indeed, many good leftists are bowing their heads and admitting that it is the most malignant of monsters — political correctness — that explains, “more than anything, how the left created Trump.”
Progressives are shouting that the left abandoned the white working class, and that liberal elitism pushed rural voters away, and that liberals became bullies and gave conservatives no choice (no choice at all!) but to embrace Trump.
All this strikes some other liberals as whiny and self-indulgent. But I disagree.
I believe that it is the political equivalent of spousal abuse.
It’s clear that some liberals have been punched, degraded, and insulted by conservatives for so long that many progressives now accept the horrible image that right-wingers have created for them.
Just like in cases of spousal abuse, liberals are justifying the repulsive behavior of many conservatives, releasing them from blame, admitting the ill treatment is deserved, and then lining up for more.
Let me be clear. I am not making light of the issue of domestic violence. Some of my friends and family have suffered through this agony, so I don’t employ this metaphor lightly.
But it is eerie how so many progressives, no matter how much they are slurred and ridiculed, turn around and say that we had Trump coming, just be virtue of being liberal.
Remember, right-wingers never blamed themselves for Obama. Hell, they shrieked that liberals were idiots who had destroyed America by voting for a Kenyan socialist who was going to take away all their guns. Obama’s election only increased conservatives’ disdain for progressives, and it lead to zero self-loathing or reflection on the part of conservatives.
So why are liberals prone to accepting blame for the actions of conservatives, even clamoring for it at times?
Well, there are many reasons for this.
First, liberals tend to be nicey-nicey and avoid hurting anyone’s feelings (that conservative chestnut has a grain of truth to it). And in this case, progressives don’t want to get all mean and point out that many Trump supporters are straight-up misogynists and racists.
So progressives imply that Trump supporters are merely misunderstood, and that if we just charm red-state America enough, these people will forget all about their hatred of gay marriage and fear of Latinos.
It’s just that easy. Yup.
Of course, we would have to ignore statistics like this one: “A whopping 39 percent of Trump voters believe that women who get abortions should face legal punishment, an opinion that is otherwise so unpopular that even the anti-choice movement disavows it.”
But of course, they can’t be criticized for that loathsome viewpoint. It’s all the liberals’ fault.
Far too many leftists are saying we must reach out and plead with Trump supporters, who in turn don’t have to change at all. It is the progressives who must alter their worldview. This is despite the fact that Trump lost the popular vote (overwhelmingly) and has one of the worst approval ratings for a president this early in his administration. No, let us — the progressives — drop all our principles and try to understand the fury of a small group of conservatives, even as they deride us as dim-witted, latte-sipping wimps.
This brings up another point, which is that liberals are insulted routinely, and yet, we have not used this as a pathetic excuse to “blow up the system” or whatever euphemism the right wing is using to endanger democracy.
“But wait,” the bruised and battered liberal says. “We made them hate us, because Hollywood skewers them mercilessly in popular culture.”
Hey, here’s an interesting statistic for you. Latinos are the most underrepresented group in popular culture, and when we are shown, it is usually in stereotypical or highly negative ways.
No, the white working class has no idea what it’s like to be mocked.
But let’s accept the argument that the entertainment industry — and by bizarre extension, all of liberal culture — has been vicious to conservatives. Well, liberals don’t say, “suck it up, snowflake,” because that would be, you know, not nice.
Instead, the self-loathing liberal says that this is perfectly reasonable grounds for embracing demagoguery.
Think about that.
We’re basically saying it’s ok to get annoyed that, for example, many black people prefer the term “African American.” And not just peeved, as when one rolls his eyes, dismisses something as silly, and then goes about his business.
No, we agree that the logical reaction is to fly into an eye-popping rage and vote for a narcissistic nutjob. How in the world does A follow B? Why is becoming furious at the idea of women getting equal pay somehow acceptable, and even more so, a solid rationale for voting for an unqualified man-child who is cozy with dictators?
But progressives ignore these reddest of red flags, and they simply say, “Hey, right-wingers, we apologize for asking you not to slur Asians and refrain from throwing shit at mosques. We don’t know what we were thinking.”
Again, this is the political equivalent of saying, “I’m sorry I made you so angry that you punched me in the face. I’ll go get your beer now.”
As a final example of this twisted tendency, look at how many liberals are falling over themselves to proclaim Trump “presidential” now that he has successfully delivered one insult-free, semi-coherent speech. This most meager of accomplishments has convinced many progressives that Trump is a changed man, and will do the right thing, and will be the president for all of us.
And he bought me flowers and didn’t hit me on my birthday and he’s a changed man it’s different now don’t you see he really loves me and it will be better now and…
And…
And…
We’ve already pinpointed two reasons why the future looks bleak for the GOP when it comes to attracting Latinos. Basically, Hispanics are younger and becoming better educated, both of which align with liberal values.
But there is a third reason for sparse Latino attendance at future Republican conventions. And it’s an obvious one.
It’s because the GOP has treated Hispanics like shit.
Yes, it really is that simple.
Now, this isn’t a perception issue or poor marketing, which is what many GOP strategists want America to believe. No, it’s the cold hard reality of the Republican Party’s offshoot of the Southern Strategy, which was to demonize blacks in order to convince white racists to vote GOP. And it worked, at least for a while.
The later version of this strategy was to paint immigrants in general, and Hispanics in particular, as an invading force and a direct threat to America. And this too worked, at least for a while.
Clearly, most Republicans aren’t racists. But their willingness to tolerate subtle bigotry — and at times, overt racial animus — has finally caught up with their party.
After all, such politically loaded ideas as Prop 187 were SB 1070 were Republican proposals, no matter how much the party wishes to distance itself from them now. And the GOP’s presumptive nominee for president couldn’t get through the announcement of his candidacy without slandering Latinos.
No, this isn’t some left-wing plot. Republicans did this to themselves, and as much as they want to complain that Democrats are the real racists and conservative values align more with Hispanics and blah blah blah, none of it matters.
Latinos see Trump and his minions clamoring to build a damn wall, and they see GOP policies of the recent past, and they see statistics like this: “56% of Republicans viewed immigrants as a burden on the country; just 17% of Democrats said the same.”
And then Latinos vote Democrat. This is despite the fact that Democrats haven’t been great for Hispanics, and that Latinos have been excluded “from leadership positions in progressive institutions and, some would argue, from involvement in the movement as a whole. “
When you have only two choices (i.e., our current political system), you go with the people who have merely disappointed you, and not with the people who actively hate you.
Interestingly, some commentators say the GOP would be better served by focusing on African Americans, which is ironic and even a little laughable. But it isn’t stupid. After all, “it is generally easier to grow market share when starting from nothing.”
It is also an acknowledgement that Latinos are a lost cause for the GOP, at least for the near future.
So what are the odds that over a decade from now, lots of thirtysomething, well-educated Latino Millennials will vote Republican?
Well, the chances are only slightly better than the odds that there will be a Republican Party at all.
As threatened, new fatherhood has sapped my time and energy to the point that I am barely able to rant and rave effectively. I have no doubt that this will change as my son gains maturity and I gain perspective, but for now my updates will be succinct (which is a nice way of saying that they’ll be really short).
First, as I’m sure you know, President Obama is at long last finished with attempting to compromise with conservatives who would gladly push him into a wood chipper if they could get away with it. The president is moving forward on immigration reform, joined by a few Republicans who insist that they never ever referred to a pathway to citizenship as “amnesty.” Of course, we could have had all this progress years ago, but as I’ve written before, some people always need to scream and fight and threaten to overthrow the government before we just go ahead and adopt the progressive idea. I have no idea why this is the route to reform, but it just is.
Second, I noticed that my infant son is part of yet another growing trend. Apparently, the state he was born in (California) now has more Latinos than white people for the first time since statehood. This was a surprise to some.
This news came out just about the time my son was born. Is it coincidence, or was he the tipping point?
What do you think?
As we all know, there are few absolutes in life.
Yes, water freezes at thirty-two degrees, inertia affects all objects in motion, and the Chicago Cubs will find a way to lose. But most other things are open to exceptions and nuance.
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