Tag Archives: MAGA

There’s No Method To His Madness

The New Republic recently ran an essay titled “There is No Method to his Madness. He’s Simply Insane.” I couldn’t agree more.

The article began by noting that past heads of state have sometimes pretended irrationality in order to confuse opponents, but noted–confirming what any rational observer has already concluded–Trump is not among them. For one thing, he clearly lacks the intellectual capacity to devise such a strategy. Or any strategy.

It’s not just Trump’s unpredictable tariff policy that appears insane. His entire administration is defined by madness—in both senses. On Friday, he went on another incoherent rant on social media, claiming once that the 2020 election was stolen from him and rewriting history to blame all of our current problems, including Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, on Joe Biden. In other Truth Social posts, he’s boasted about being a king and claimed that the “European Union was formed for the sole purpose of taking advantage of the United States.”

If these acts were merely confined to deranged posts, perhaps one could argue there’s “method in his madness.” After his rant on Friday, Trump gave a speech at the Justice Department wherein he kvetched about various imaginary enemies of the United States (which, coincidentally, are his personal enemies) and made clear that he expects the department to serve as an extension of his personal wrath. Similar delusions have led to the dismantling of USAID, a wasteful visit to Fort Knox to check if the gold had been stolen, and continual talk about annexing other countries.

The article goes on to detail further evidence that our would-be King has no (mental) clothes, despite his courtiers’ efforts to find method in the madness.

What makes the insanity so dangerous, however, isn’t simply Trump’s ignorance of governance and economics, but the venom that characterizes his approach to others, and the festering resentments that impel his actions. Trump is a limited intellect and damaged ego occupying a human body;  fears and jealousies and grievances–not strategies or principles–prompt his eruptions, and explain both his grandiose fantasies (comparing himself to Winston Churchill, annexing Canada) and his tacky decorating fetishes (gold toilets).

While it would be inaccurate to describe them as principles, there are a few long-standing grievances that predictably motivate Trump’s constant stream of illegal (and often ridiculous) Executive Orders. Our mad king thinks he is in a position to take revenge, not just over the legal system which (finally) was holding him to account, but over all those people who sneered at him over the years–those “elitists” with their intellectual and cultural bona fides, the businesspeople who made their fortunes without ripping off suppliers or hiding in bankruptcy court, the women who found his “charms” unpersuasive.

Politics gave Trump the adulation he wanted, but from people he clearly despises.

Those long-standing resentments explain so much: Trump’s war on a legal community defending rules he regularly broke–and his special animus for the lawyers who had the nerve to represent people antagonistic to him. His refusal to allow disclosure of his own GPA undoubtedly sheds some light on his efforts to destroy intellectual inquiry on the nation’s campuses. Both his own resentments and the need to pander to his MAGA cult help explain his efforts to turn academia into a mechanism for Right-wing propaganda.

As for the roots of his White Nationalism–his definition of “DEI” as discrimination against White men and his ferocious efforts to return women and minorities to subservience–I can only assume that he agrees with MAGA that his White skin is a sign that he is superior and that any effort to ensure fair treatment for women and minorities is an attack on that superiority. (Unfortunately, his entire administration demonstrates the folly of believing Whiteness denotes even minimal competence…)

Bottom line: the United States has a president who is ignorant, petulant and demonstrably insane. He is also, in all probability, a Russian asset. Our constitutional system of checks and balances is currently not working, because members of the GOP majorities in the House and Senate fear the mad king and are not living up to their oaths of office, and the Supreme Court’s majority is ethically compromised.

The remedy must come from We the People. And it begins by acknowledging the truth of that last paragraph.

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Cultural Revolution?

In a recent newsletter, Paul Krugman compared the Trump administration’s anti-DEI (i.e., pro-racism & misogyny) efforts to China’s cultural revolution under Mao.

Once you’ve seen the parallel between what MAGA is trying to do and China’s Cultural Revolution, the similarities are everywhere. Maoists sent schoolteachers to do farm labor; Trumpists are talking about putting civil servants to work in factories.

The Cultural Revolution was, of course, a huge disaster for China. It inflicted vast suffering on its targets and also devastated the economy. But the Maoists didn’t care. Revenge was their priority, never mind the effects on GDP.

As we’ve seen, China’s efforts failed–albeit not without years of unnecessary suffering. As I’ve previously opined, changing a nation’s culture rarely if ever works. But our would-be king–unhampered by anything suggesting intellect or competent appointees within his “administration,” is certainly trying to fulfill the most ardent wish of his MAGA base–taking American society back to the 1950s (or perhaps before), when women were pushing out babies and doing the dishes in the kitchen, and Black Americans were subject to segregation and confined to subservient positions.

That effort requires eliminating evidence of the worth and competence of women and Blacks. Accordingly, I did a search for federal websites that have been scrubbed of references to the contributions of women and black people.

Here’s what I found.

The Department of Defense undertook a significant purge of DEI-related content, resulting in the removal of profiles and articles about Army Maj. Gen. Charles Calvin Rogers, a Black Medal of Honor recipient; the Japanese American 442nd Regimental Combat Team; the Navajo Code Talkers (including profiles of Indigenous veterans; women veterans such as Lisa Jaster, the first female Army Reserve graduate of Ranger School); historical figures like Jackie Robinson, who served in the Army during World War II; the Tuskegee Airmen and Women Airforce Service Pilots; and notable gravesites of Hispanic and Black service members at Arlington National Cemetery.

Some content has been restored following public outcry, but many of those pages remain inaccessible .​

NASA removed profiles of women and people of color from its website. The profile of Rose Ferreira, a Dominican-American intern, was taken down and later reinstated after public backlash. However, the restoration led to harassment directed at Ferreira, highlighting the challenges faced by individuals whose stories were previously celebrated .​

The National Park Service revised its content to align with the administration’s directives. Those erasures included the removal of mentions of transgender individuals from articles about the suffragist movement; changing terminology from “LGBT” to “LGB” and omitting the word “queer;” altering language in articles about the Underground Railroad, including removing a quote and image of Harriet Tubman and the term “slavery.”

The Small Business Administration removed a photograph from its website depicting a diverse group of individuals, including women and people of color, in front of a whiteboard.

Other federal agencies that have complied include the Department of Veterans Affairs, which has removed content related to LGBTQ+ veterans; the Federal Trade Commission, which has deleted over 300 posts, including those reporting on antitrust actions against tech giants; and the State Department, which altered the language in international travel advisories, replacing “LGBTQ+” with “LGB” and omitting references to safety concerns for transgender Americans abroad.

I have no idea how many Americans visit these sites; certainly, the information that has been deleted is widely available elsewhere. (In the age of the Internet, erasure of information previously available is a pipe dream…) That said, these alterations provide additional evidence (as if we needed it) of the central preoccupation of the White Christian Nationalists and other assorted bigots who form the majority of MAGA adherents.

It remains to be seen whether those who supported Trump because he promised to reward their racism–to return them to social dominance– will be steadfast in that support despite the chaos and damage being done to the economy, public health, science, education and the rule of law, among other elements of accelerating collateral damage.

As Krugman admonished readers, looking for rational strategy in Trump’s hysterical assault on DEI and “woke-ism” (aka equality and humanity) is a fool’s errand. “Don’t try to sanewash what’s happening. It’s evil, but it isn’t calculated evil. That is, it’s not a considered political strategy, with a clear end goal. It’s a visceral response from people who, as Thomas Edsall puts it, are addicted to revenge.”

Mao couldn’t change his culture. I don’t think Trump will change America’s, either. But we’ll suffer while he tries.

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Defending The Rule Of Law

As the Trump administration careens drunkenly from outrage to outrage, laying waste to the American Idea, there is one “through line” to the Dear Leader’s petulant and bizarre Executive Orders and (ungrammatical) pronouncements: virtually all of them violate the laws of the land. (My husband will read of some Trumpian action and ask me, “Can he do that?” and my response is usually, “It’s against the law, if that matters.”)

The Constitutional crisis we are currently experiencing is Trump’s disregard–not just for the laws he is ignoring–but for Court orders requiring him to obey them.

I don’t know how this crisis will turn out. I have hopes that the increasing numbers of protests will encourage at least some Republican Senators and Representatives to re-grow their spines (although here in Indiana,  Senator Jim Banks–a dim, smug self-proclaimed Christian Nationalist–is beyond hope). In the meantime, there are emerging signs that the legal community is prepared to defend the rule of law against our Mad King and his merry band of lunatics.

I was particularly pleased to read a Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals decision authored by Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III, because it confirmed a point I’ve repeatedly made on this site: whatever descriptors you want to apply to Trumpism and MAGA, “conservative” isn’t one of them.

As Josh Marshall wrote at Talking Points Memo 

If you had told me in 2005 that 20 years hence federal appeals court Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III would be writing a paean to our lost liberties and freedoms under a Republican president, I may have politely suggested you seek some help.

The entire order is worth reading. Wilkinson clings to the hope that the judiciary’s “brethren in the Executive Branch” will recognize that the rule of law is “vital to the American ethos.”

Wilkinson’s defense of the rule of law is being joined by individual lawyers. R. William Jonas, Jr., a partner in a law firm in Mishawaka, Indiana, recently shared the following letter he’d written to the Indiana Bar Association.

I write today as a member and Past President of the Indiana State Bar Association, and as an officer of the court who swore on Oct. 9, 1981, to support and defend the Constitution of the United States and the State of Indiana. To fulfill my oath, I write today in the wake of the decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit attached here.

The U.S. government “snatched” Kilmar Abrego Garcia from his home state of Maryland, and, in utter disregard of his constitutional right to due process and a specific court order, and transported him to an infamous prison in El Salvador where it is now claimed that he is beyond the power of our courts. We know from reading the Fifth Amendment that “no person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law.” And “no person” means exactly that – it includes everyone from Jesus Christ and the twelve disciples to Jeffrey Dahmer, Ted Bundy, John Wayne Gacy or Gertrude Baniszewski.

 It is the duty of the Indiana State Bar Association, to speak in support of the opinion of the court and the right of due process which is at the very heart of the rule of law. Some might say that we should be silent because we shouldn’t be taking political positions or because it might cause people to terminate their memberships. To these folks, I say that we all have sworn to uphold the constitution and the rule of law. This association is rightly proud of its efforts to promote leadership through the Leadership Development Academy and civic education through the Indiana Bar Foundation’s civic education program “We the People: The Citizen and the Constitution.” If we remain silent, what message do we send about leadership? About civic duty? If not us, who? If not now, when?

              Judge Wilkinson wrote

It is, as we have noted, all too possible to see in this case an incipient crisis, but itmay present an opportunity as well. We yet cling to the hope that it is not naïve to believeour good brethren in the Executive Branch perceive the rule of law as vital to the American ethos. This case presents their unique chance to vindicate that value and to summon the best that is within us while there is still time.

Now is the opportunity for the ISBA to speak up in support of the right to due process and the rule of law, and to urge the local bars of Indianapolis, Evansville, Allen County, Lake County and St. Joseph County to take similar action. It is an opportunity to urge the faculties of Indiana’s law schools to join the chorus – as Judge Wilkinson says “while there is still time.”

Now is the time for all of us to speak up–and resist.

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Hayek’s Warning

Among the many–many–frustrating elements of today’s political discourse is the media’s insistence on characterizing MAGA and the Trump administration as “conservative.” That consistent misuse of language is right up there with the persistent sanewashing of what any sentient American recognizes as insanity coming from he whom a friend recently called “that malignant moron.”

There are multiple ways in which today’s GOP is dramatically inconsistent with genuine conservatism. At the very least, people with a conservative philosophy are notable for wishing to conserve elements of society that have value. Indeed, one of the historic differences between conservatives and liberals has been the reluctance of conservatives to endorse social and institutional changes when the status quo has rather clearly outlived its usefulness.

Conservatives have also been believers in free trade–a belief endorsed by the Republican Party of the past.

True conservatives are thus appalled by the Trump/Musk radical destruction of America’s constitutional and legal framework–and by the incredible and destructive economic ignorance displayed by Trump’s fixation on tariffs.

One of the historical icons of genuine conservatism was Frederich Hayek; back when I was a Republican (and Republicans were largely conservatives, not ignorant racists), Hayek’s Road to Serfdom was required reading for conservative intellectuals, so I was interested to read a recent Bulwark column by Charlie Sykes, in which he noted that Hayek had addressed the reasons for the periodic emergence of Trump-like figures.

Sykes quoted Roger Kimball, for a 2016 essay titled “How Hayek Predicted Trump With His ‘Why the Worst Get on Top’.” (Sykes notes that Kimball has subsequently joined those who fawn over “Dear Leader.”)

The Austrian-born economist and classical liberal, who played such a central role in the emergence of American free market conservatism, had a keen understanding of the temptations of authoritarianism. That’s what makes his warnings seem so prescient. “’Emergencies’ have always been the pretext on which the safeguards of individual liberty have been eroded,” he wrote. Hayek’s chapter on “Why the Worst Get on Top” in his classic work, The Road to Serfdom, diagnosed the populist impulse that would lead to the demand for ceding power to a “man of action.” This is “the position which precedes the suppression of democratic institutions and the creation of a totalitarian regime.” At some point in a political or economic crisis, there “is the general demand for quick and determined government action that is the dominating element in the situation, dissatisfaction with the slow and cumbersome course of democratic procedure which makes action for action’s sake the goal. It is then the man or the party who seems strong and resolute enough ‘to get things done’ who exercises the greatest appeal….”

Hayek described several preconditions for the rise of a demagogic dictator, including a dumbed down populace, a gullible electorate, and scapegoats on which that demagogue can focus public enmity and anger.

Hayek thought that the more educated a society was, the more diverse members’ tastes and values would become, and the less likely they would be to agree on a particular hierarchy of values.  He observed that the desire to create a high degree of uniformity and similarity of outlook in society requires descending “to the regions of lower moral and intellectual standards where the more primitive and ‘common’ instincts and tastes prevail.”

But in a modern society, potential dictators might be able to rely on there being enough of “those whose uncomplicated and primitive instincts,” to support his efforts. As a result, Hayek said, he “will have to increase their numbers by converting more to the same simple creed.” Here is where propaganda comes into play. The “man of action,” Hayek wrote, “will be able to obtain the support of all the docile and gullible, who have no strong convictions of their own but are prepared to accept a ready-made system of values if it is only drummed into their ears sufficiently loudly and frequently.”

Hayek predicted MAGA in his description of the third and most important element of demagoguery: the need to identify an enemy. It is easier, he noted, “for people to agree on a negative programme, on the hatred of an enemy, on the envy of those better off, than on any positive task. The contrast between the “we” and the “they”, the common fight against those outside the group, seems to be an essential ingredient in any creed which will solidly knit together a group for common action.” If you want the “unreserved allegiance of huge masses” you must give them something to hate.

There are some things our “malignant moron” knows instinctively…

There are a number of labels we might apply to Trump’s supporters. “Conservative” isn’t one of them.

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Telling It Like It Is

As Americans try to cope with the national lunacy being imposed on us by the cretins in charge of our federal government, two essential elements of our current disaster have become too obvious to ignore.

First, voters did this. Granted, not a majority–most voters cast their ballots for someone other than the cult leader, and a disgraceful number of American citizens didn’t even bother to vote. Trump’s “victory” was razor-thin–but it was a victory, and we are reaping the consequences of that disastrous civic failure.

Second, the overwhelming reason voters supported Trump was racism. Those voters didn’t cast ballots for the destruction of America’s global dominance, or for the evisceration of Medicaid and Social Security; most of them (if they followed actual news and knew what was going on) would oppose measures hobbling the IRS’ ability to audit our billionaire overlords. No–what they wanted, and what the administration is providing, is culture war, an effort to take the United States back to the social arrangements of the 1950s and before, a time when LGBT folks were closeted, no one had even heard the word “trans,” women were in the kitchen, and Black people “knew their place.”

A recent essay from Jennifer Rubin in The Contrarian examined the language MAGA employs in an effort to veil that obvious effort. Prominent, of course, is the administration’s war against “DEI.” (It’s so much nicer to rail against letters of the alphabet than to use the N word…)

As with “CRT,” the MAGA censors, thought police (aimed at rooting out “improper ideology”), Great Replacement paranoids, and outright bigots cannot tell us precisely what “DEI” is—they merely know they are dead set against it. Teaching children to hate America. Making whites feel guilty. Quotas. None of that resembles the “DEI” practices utilized by universities, employers, researchers, and government entities—but that’s irrelevant to them.

Nuanced concepts (e.g., outreach to recruit Americans of all backgrounds, medical trials to ensure women’s physiology is taken into account) do not appeal to people who think Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick epitomize “merit.”

Increasingly “DEI” in the MAGA dictionary has come to mean “Blacks” or “women” or “a convenient scapegoat who represents the ‘other.’” A plane goes down? DEI. A museum pays tribute to the greatness of Jackie Robinson? DEI.

Increasingly, the anti-DEI mission has become an explicit attempt to blame or erase non-whites, females, and other disenfranchised groups. Remember when they used to oppose “canceling” people and policing speech? MAGA ideologues no longer hide their core belief: that white men are inherently qualified, the “true” history of America has been made by white males, and non-white men are to blame for all calamities.

What Rubin correctly calls a “ham-handed effort to bolster white advantage” doesn’t conceal the obvious. The goal is to resegregate America, to return the country to what White Christian Nationalists believe is the proper, “Godly” order of things: dominance of White Christian Males over everyone else. As Rubin notes, if we had any doubts of that goal, Trump’s repeal of LBJ’s Executive Order 11375 gives the game away.

LBJ’s Executive Order “gave the Secretary of Labor the authority to ensure equal opportunity for people of color and women in federal contractors’ recruitment, hiring, training and other employment practices,” The point was simple; if the federal government was contracting with private firms, it had the right to demand that those firms refrain from discriminating. If the composition of the relevant workforce was markedly different from local demographics, that didn’t necessarily preclude contracting, but the business would need to show that it had taken affirmative steps to recruit a more representative workforce.

In other words, the government wasn’t going to use our tax dollars to reward intentional discrimination.

As Rubin points out,

The anti-DEI crusade seems aimed to repeal the fundamental statutory and constitutional protections that prohibit discrimination and give meaning to “All men are created equal.” After all, if the MAGA crowd really wanted to root out unfairness and promote merit they would insist we reject unqualified white appointees and dump legacy admissions at colleges and universities schools. Instead, the anti-DEI crusade aims to bolster white entitlement and eradicate any sense of obligation to right society’s wrongs.

The war against “DEI” and the effort to make “woke” an epithet are intended to cloak MAGA’S racism, misogyny and anti-Semitism with neutral language, to pretend that efforts to address systemic inequalities are the problem, not the inequalities themselves.

Ironically, in voting their fears and bigotries, MAGA folks voted to retreat from the foundational principles that really did make America great.

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