The Chris Moeller Archives

Trump for the nomination

Donald Trump is a breath of air. Not fresh air, but that feeling of guilt you’re experiencing for wanting to hear what he has to say next has to do with the way he punctures the rules of so-called “civility” that have governed Washington throughout your entire life.

This dawned on me this morning as I watched “Morning Joe” Scarborough interview Trump by phone on MSNBC. Scarborough is cozying up to Trump until the Donald inadvertently steps over the line by insulting one of the cable news talking heads that Scarborough evidently considers “a friend.” Only then does the mood turn serious and Scarborough change his tone, which up until then had been specifically deferential over the issue of how Trump has been treated by FOX News.

Unfortunately, Trump is challenging common decency on issues such as immigration, the Iran nuclear deal, and militarism in general, but the dinner party set in Washington is used to a more veiled form of ugly rhetoric, the dog whistle variety. They’re poised to take Trump down, instead, over bad table manners.

Is Donald Trump deaf to issues of racial oppression? Definitely, and so are 16 other Republican presidential candidates, including a black guy. Does Trump say sexist things? Well, he’s a Republican. His misogynist comment during the debate about Rosie O'Donnell didn't elicit any boos and none of his opponents chastised him for it. The encapsulating issue of the first televised debate is the way the establishment media has responded to comments Trump made about debate moderator Megyn Kelly after the debate. In a soundbite that Trump abandoned mid-sentence, he seemed to be implying that Kelly’s aggressive questioning of him on the air was a byproduct of her menstrual cycle. (He denies that he was going there with the statement in question.) Trump, therefore, is cast as the sexist. Nobody else. But in the same week, the GOP establishment’s consensus choice marionette, Jeb Bush, made the proclamation, "I'm not sure we need half a billion dollars for women's health issues." Wow.

In American politics, I’m largely for anything or anyone that blows up the system. Donald Trump would make an awful president, but not more awful than any of the other dolts in his party’s field. His level of verbal extremism has probably been a boon for Bernie Sanders’ campaign over in the Democrats’ camp. There has been surprisingly little discussion of how the Democrats are running a self-described Socialist as a candidate, which I feel would otherwise be a media obsession if not for the Trump distraction. Later, when the attacks on Sanders reach their peak, he can be cast as the adult in the room.

Trump winning the Republican nomination would be even more advantageous for Sanders. They are, alternately, the anti-Washington options, so one’s electoral success should raise the prospects of the other, correct? If Trump doesn’t win the nomination, then he’s got the money-- and the gumption, he argues-- to run as a third party candidate. And that improves the likelihood of an independent “left-wing” candidate joining the fray to challenge Clinton after the corporate Democratic machine anoints its candidate next summer, swatting Sanders aside. The duopoly is famously terrified of third-party challenges, but there’s a school of thought that the money-changers would have more tolerance for a four-person race than they would for a three. In an albeit-very different time-- 1912-- four presidential candidates each drew vote totals in the millions in the general election. Theodore Roosevelt’s Progressive Party was the reform alternative to the Republicans and William Taft that year, while the Socialist giant Eugene V. Debs presented a pointed challenge to the Democrats’ choice, Woodrow Wilson. I dream of a general election ballot next year that has each of these names: Trump, Bush, Clinton, Sanders.

posted by CM @ 7:24 PM