Trump’s Stirring the Pot, and Praying for a Big Reaction

Change is hard work. There comes a point in politics where groups seeking big change --or undoing change-- come to the realization that they’re not going to achieve their goals as fast as they’d like. Or maybe even never.

It’s a moment of reckoning where the viewpoint of the glass being half full or half empty influences the future course of fervent believers in the cause.

For some, the next step is about taking the long view, and working to build the kinds of political infrastructure and alliances needed to keep their ideas alive. Sometimes, it is just enough to understand that there is water in the glass at all. 

And then there are the pessimists, the half-empty types. 

I believe we’re coming to the moment of truth for many of the people who believe that Donald Trump is The Answer. And we need to pay attention to the potential for disruption and/or violence rising throughout the country.

Aside from the collection of grifters and schemers seeking to loot the public commons, there are pockets of people who see Trump as a means to a destructive end. The most obvious of these are the “end of times” fundamentalists who see the President as an enabler of the Rapture. 

Trump’s political outlook continues to dim, as his inability to act rather than rant becomes increasingly apparent. While he paints himself as the victim, he can’t or won’t see the consequences of being a bullshit artist. 

Thinking that somehow the Dow Jones industrial average is an indicator of a good economy, ignores the tens of millions out of work, many of whom will see their past jobs disappear.

https://twitter.com/RBReich/status/1277431525101858817?s=20

Saying the administration won’t allow health insurance that discriminates against people with pre-conditions, while arguing for abolition of what little safety net we have, doesn’t mean squat when 23 million people have already lost their employer-based coverage and another 20 million will be left out if the court agrees to end Obamacare.

Also, there's the fake news virus. I'll just leave this right here:

Bragging about having a hand in designing Navy warships won’t inspire loyalty when bounties placed on American troops in Afghanistan become public and it’s obvious that the administration either didn’t know or didn’t care. You can only yell “fake news” so many times before people become skeptical.

And then there those who don’t give a damn about the trivialities of Trump’s reign. They see this period as an opportunity to right past wrongs, and destroy the overlords of the deep state.

Hillary Clinton called them deplorables. The President calls them his base.

What the President is doing these days involves keeping his base angry to the point where reality can’t get past the din. 

There are the daily signals, retweeting a Florida retiree yelling “white lives matter,” amplifying bizarre conspiracies by the fringe Q group, and openly defying the single measure capable of countering the pandemic, all going beyond the boundaries of decency, honesty, and patriotism.

Remember the presidential messaging encouraging followers to “LIBERATE” Minnesota, Michigan, and Virgina? The gun-toting grifters that descended on statehouses to protest the tyranny of COVID-19 restrictions, heard those messages loud and clear. 

Nick Martin’s The Informant newsletter tracks the far right, going into granular detail on extremist activities and ideology. In cooperation with The Trace, they’ve produced a remarkable report on the connections between the Boogaloo movement and firearms suppliers.

Boogaloo types vary in what flavors of right wing thought they consume, but the underlying premise is the notion of creating an accelerant episode triggering a general uprising or civil war. They skirt the scant restrictions imposed by the social media they use for recruitment by claiming their references to violence are ironic or humorous.

• The Trace has identified 35 more dealers and manufacturers of firearms or tactical supplies across the country that have posted references to the boogaloo on social media. They range from small town stores to multi-million dollar manufacturers of AR-style weapons, like the South Carolina-based Palmetto State Armory.

• We also reviewed the online presence of 548 federally licensed firearms dealers in Michigan, where armed protesters converged on the state capital, and identified 48 with active social media profiles. Six of those posted memes or hashtags referencing the boogaloo. Eight promoted insignia from militia groups like the Three Percenters, an armed anti-government group with chapters around the country. Another six promoted COVID conspiracy theories or encouraged disobedience against state lockdown measures. Three made suggestive posts about shooting looters during the protests.

[...]

• The use of humor to cover up intentions or shift the boundaries of acceptable discourse has a history in the alt-right. In 2017, The Huffington Post published excerpts from the style guide for the Daily Stormer, one of the largest white supremacist outlets, instructing supporters to employ jokes instead of screeds, noting the latter may be a “turnoff” to potential converts. “The reader is at first drawn in by curiosity or the naughty humor,” it stated, “and is slowly awakened to reality by repeatedly reading the same points.” According to historian Elaine Frantz Parsons, the use of humor as a way to destigmatize extremist ideologies dates back at least to the creation of the Ku Klux Klan. 

• Whether the inflammatory memes that boogaloo supporters share reflect their true beliefs can be hard to pin down — and some experts say that’s by design. 

So those anti-mask demonstrations are partially affiliated with the more extreme elements of the diehard gun nuts crowd. 

And they overlap with other right wing causes. The third attempt to recall Gov. Newsom has businesses listed as signing and drop-off locations including gun shops and shooting ranges — with addresses in Borrego Springs, Carlsbad, Fallbrook, Poway and San Marcos. 

The anti-vaccination people are also part of the protests against wearing masks, and they overlap with another group out there operating beyond the realm of sanity; the so-called QAnon. Their beliefs are based on interpretations of vague online postings by an individual, “Q.”

QAnon is all about conspiracies, and their rhetoric overlaps with the President, who they believe is on a secret mission to round up pedophiles operating under the protection of the “deep state.”

As various predictions of mass arrests and coup attempts have come and gone, the tales of despair have gotten wackier and wackier, glomming on to whatever news stories are getting the most attention on Fox. The talking heads of the rightwing network return the favor, a whole new group of social media followers pick up on the misinformation….wash, rinse, repeat.

From HuffPost:

• In early April, another QAnon-backed conspiracy theory got a boost from Fox News. After QAnon supporters aggressively pushed the baseless claim that Microsoft founder Bill Gates — who is helping to fund COVID-19 vaccine development efforts — will somehow implant people with microchips for tracking and depopulation purposes, Fox’s Laura Ingraham quote-tweeted a post about Gates and vaccines, writing: “Digitally tracking Americans’ every move has been a dream of the globalists for years. This health crisis is the perfect vehicle for them to push this.”

• Later that month, QAnon found an even greater megaphone in the president of the United States. Throughout the crisis, QAnon backers including Tesoriero have been calling on Trump to replace leading infectious-diseases specialist Dr. Anthony Fauci with Shiva Ayyadurai, a Senate GOP candidate and scientist who is staunchly opposed to vaccines, and who has promoted QAnon in the past. As the government had to enhance Fauci’s security detail in response to far-right harassment, an April 10 YouTube video of Ayyadurai accusing Fauci of being “embedded in the deep state” racked up millions of views. Two days later, the trending hashtag #FireFauci was retweeted by Trump himself.

• Now, QAnon is wielding its bolstered momentum to propel fake news about the killing of George Floyd into the mainstream — exacerbating a national tragedy while displaying its own prowess as a purveyor of disinformation in the runup to the presidential election.

These groups on the fringe --the shock troops of Trump’s base, are not per se dangerous, despite the rhetoric and testosterone-fueled posing. Peel back a few outer layers and you’ll find infighting, ego-clashes, and a lack of discipline.

What makes these groups dangerous is the proselytizing of their extreme pessimism. 

Their mass communications of doom and gloom conspiracies via social media, and to a lesser degree Fox, can (and has) incite random actors to carry out violent or terrorist acts that are statistically predictable but individually unpredictable.  

Given that current events have not been particularly favorable to Donald Trump, his ace in the hole could well be stochastic terrorism, misinformation spread by followers that inspires something really bad. And, of course, Trump won’t be blamed.

Pay attention, folks.

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