Yes, well, freedom is wonderful. On the other hand, if you're dead, it's a tremendous drawback to your sex life.
(Image by (From Wikimedia) Usien, Author: Usien) Details Source DMCA
Can you believe that? She says I'm not leader enough for her. Who was she looking for, Hitler?
-Fielding Mellish
Saying Trump has changed America for the worse is weird to my ears since it implies he has changed it in some fundamental way. Americans have been hearing the same things Trump has said for years and years from various right-wing politicians, what to speak of the legions online who have said the same or said much worse. All Trump has done is to inject some showmanship into the Tea Party political movement. That "new right" has gained in popularity ever since the right-wing electorate evolved over the last 25 years into the Tea Party movement.
The effects of globalization and "free trade" on the American economy has been well-documented. Those economic changes have radically altered right-wing politics. Their politics used to be more concerned with cultural agendas. The right-wing media machine which came to power alongside Reagan in the 1980s was due to the schemes of Wall Street and The Chamber of Commerce people to try to take back the political power lost by them from the political gains of the left in the 1960s and '70s. To learn more on this see wikipedia for "The Powell Memorandum" on the corporate reaction to future Supreme Court Justice Lewis Powell's memo from 1971 at click here or for a long and more in-depth view there is an essay by Bill Moyers from 2012 called 'The Powell Memo: A Call-to-Arms for Corporations' at click here
That led them to hire people like Paul Weyrich and the biggest televangelists in order to create a new media machine in order to saturate the masses with corporate propaganda. That is well documented and well known and there is no need to go into that here.
But suffice it to say, the media machine they created was for the purpose of stoking "the culture wars" in order to increase the number of GOP voters. Since the GOP had control of the white house from 1981-1992, they couldn't very well complain about the economy or anything they controlled in order to rile up their voting base during those years. Therefore the media machine they created was for the express purpose of demonizing the left in every cultural way they could conceive. From stoking racism in their demeaning of black Americans as criminals and unbearable loads on the economy due to the "welfare state," to constant religious fear mongering about evil and Satan and so on. And I mean that in the literal sense. Their agenda in part was to inspire hate and fear of the left as agents of Satan, agents of sin, as the new greatest threat in the world as the communists were being tamed by Reagan.
The GOP Wall Street agenda attained complete control over America during the Clinton years (1993-2000) under the guise of the "Third Way" politics of "The New Democrats." Their ability to push through their free trade and globalization agenda was finally realized. The Clinton's left-wing based looking "good cop routine" was welcomed after the right-wing based "bad cop routine" of the Reagan-Bush years. They both played the left and right for suckers - and Wall Street was back baby!
The right-wing media machine whose purpose was to demonize the left, went merrily on its way. But changes in America were too many for their audience to ignore. Ever since the monetary gains of the globalist free trade regime for Wall Street and the big banks gave them the budding new world order they long craved - where nation states are subordinated to global business concerns, their gains were seen as being offset largely on the backs of the millions of Americans who saw their jobs outsourced to China. That loss of income created a ripple effect across the economy, and a feedback loop whereby less money was being put in the economy by less spending due to the loss of higher paying jobs, which caused less production, which in turn caused even less spending, leading to less production, and on and on. There was no end in sight to this downward death spiral of the American economy and loss of working class wealth.
The GOP electorate though was still "being handled" by the same right-wing media machine whose purpose was to keep their attention on cultural conflicts with the left. That inevtably led to revolt against the GOP among the working class GOP electorate. That revolt ultimately manifested in the Tea Party phenomena, which was largely led by the dormant John Birch Society whom the Koch brothers were closely affiliated with - in fact their father was a founding member. The Birchers were the Alex Joneses before Alex Jones. In fact he cites their literature as the main inspiration for his worldview. And with that worldview being at the heart of the Tea Party, the old guard GOP media led culture war lost much of its resonance with the angry GOP electorate. Battles against the "satanic left" was no longer a priority like the GOP media machine wanted it to be for more and more of their electorate.
The Bircher aka Tea Party worldview is a conspiratorial based ultra-nationalism. Religion plays a small part as does culture, but in the main their goal is to remake America by ending the globalist or new world order conspiracy to take self-determination away from Americans by ending nation-state sovereignty - which they have been raising hell about since the 1950s. At that time the Bircher enemy was seen by them as a world-wide communist conspiracy in league with Wall Street and corporate America, and the far left, whose purpose was to create a one world governing system and end the sovereign nation state system. It was a template that has been expanded upon and taken up by countless conspiracy theorists ever since. After the fall of communism their ideology focused on the globalists who they see as continuing the conspiracy for an end to the sovereign nation state system in favor of a new world order corporate fascist one world governing system.
Their agenda in the form of the Tea Party toppled much of the GOP old guard and inspired incipient fear among the rest. That new electorate is what Trump has tapped into with such great success. The old guard GOP tried to rein in the Tea Party, but their globalist past complicity could not be hidden. Most of the GOP electorate has lost faith in the old guard, and the humiliation of their mani man for this election, Jeb Bush, was the result of that loss of faith. Trump drank their milkshakes with relish.
Trump's secret to success was simple to calculate. The mass of GOP candidates couldn't do what he has done simply because of their complicity with globalization. The ones that tried to ride the Tea Party wave were no match to an experienced NYC salesman/TV showman. His competition seemed timid next to him. And timidity in these trying times inspired fear of an ineffectual leader. The ones that tried to rely on the traditional religious right were simply outnumbered by the Tea Party voters. All Trump had to do was push ultra-nationalism and act like he is in a cage match against a conspiracy of globalists evildoers. He even speaks like many right-wing Americans speak when they are among their peers. If you think he is an anomalous aberration in American life you are wrong. The mainstream media pushes that angle because they fear Trump as president, their idea of Trump as "The Great Inhuman Beast" is simply propaganda - and his followers know it because they or some of their friends speak like Trump speaks. What to speak of Wall Street people. Not all of America is as post-racial or post-sexism or post-nationalism as the mainstream media likes to pretend is the norm everywhere, but unlike them most everyone else is united in being post-politics-as-usual.
Trump's campaign may in the end simply be an act to gain power. But he read the room correctly when no other GOP candidate even came close. He embodies, at least in words and theory, the majority view of the new GOP electorate due to The John Birch/Tea Party worldview rise to power among them. They are not going anywhere for the time being. If Trump loses there will be a concerted effort to take control of that electorate by competitors to Trump, both within and outside the GOP. Which means a Trump conviction for some crime or another may be constantly tried in order to steal his thunder. Who knows what the future holds for those voters? Trump is certainly not an ideal leader for their movement since he has way too much baggage. If they had a more likeable leader it would be much more difficult to defeat them.
The bigger threat to the globalist establishment is from the left of Clinton. Their numbers are larger and their message is more universal than the Trump Bircher Tea Party movement. Their demographics naturally grow as the older generation is replaced by the younger who trend left. Whereas the opposite is true for the Trump electorate. Trump's personal power could be watered down by a rush to exploit his voters by many if Trump loses. Or if he indeed does create a new media organization it could succeed and end up taking over the GOP, forcing many of them to create a new party or leave the party. We must assume that the movement created and organized around Sanders is also going to try to be co-opted. It will be interesting to see what the Democrat party will do with them if they win the White House. Surely they must see the handwriting on the wall and will attempt to appease them with some big gestures as soon as possible. If anything, that will be a victory for everyone.
