Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

What if We’re the Bad Guys Here?
nytimes ^ | 08/02/2023

Posted on 08/03/2023 5:09:48 AM PDT by devane617

Donald Trump seems to get indicted on a weekly basis. Yet he is utterly dominating his Republican rivals in the polls, and he is tied with Joe Biden in the general election surveys. Trump’s poll numbers are stronger against Biden now than at any time in 2020.

What’s going on here? Why is this guy still politically viable, after all he’s done?

We anti-Trumpers often tell a story to explain that. It was encapsulated in a quote the University of North Carolina political scientist Marc Hetherington gave to my colleague Thomas B. Edsall recently: “Republicans see a world changing around them uncomfortably fast, and they want it to slow down, maybe even take a step backward. But if you are a person of color, a woman who values gender equality or an L.G.B.T. person, would you want to go back to 1963? I doubt it.”

In this story we anti-Trumpers are the good guys, the forces of progress and enlightenment. The Trumpers are reactionary bigots and authoritarians. Many Republicans support Trump no matter what, according to this story, because at the end of the day he’s still the bigot in chief, the embodiment of their resentments, and that’s what matters to them most.

I partly agree with this story; but it’s also a monument to elite self-satisfaction.

So let me try another story on you. I ask you to try on a vantage point in which we anti-Trumpers are not the eternal good guys. In fact, we’re the bad guys.

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Miscellaneous; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections; US: New York
KEYWORDS: badguys; davidbrooks; demagogicparty; media; newyorkslimes; newyorktimes; taterbabies; trump
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061-8081-93 next last
To: devane617
The last couple of paragraphs from the story:

If distrustful populism is your basic worldview, the Trump indictments seem as just another skirmish on the class war between the professionals and the workers, another assault by a bunch of coastal lawyers who want to take down the man who most aggressively stands up to them. Of course, the indictments don’t cause Trump supporters to abandon him. They cause them to become more fiercely loyal. That’s the polling story of the last six months.

Are Trump supporters right that the indictments are just a political witch hunt? Of course not. As a card-carrying member of my class, I still basically trust the legal system and the neutral arbiters of justice. Trump is a monster in the way we’ve all been saying for years and deserves to go to prison.

But there’s a larger context here. As the sociologist E. Digby Baltzell wrote decades ago, “History is a graveyard of classes which have preferred caste privileges to leadership.” That is the destiny our class is now flirting with. We can condemn the Trumpian populists all day until the cows come home, but the real question is when will we stop behaving in ways that make Trumpism inevitable.


61 posted on 08/03/2023 7:04:41 AM PDT by ShadowAce (Linux - The Ultimate Windows Service Pack )
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: devane617

62 posted on 08/03/2023 7:10:06 AM PDT by yefragetuwrabrumuy ("All he had was a handgun. Why did you think that was a threat?" --Rittenhouse Prosecutor)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Lazamataz

Actually, they will.

________________________________________________

I hate to admit it, but you’re probably right. Only time will tell.


63 posted on 08/03/2023 7:13:47 AM PDT by Bishop_Malachi (Liberal Socialism - A philosophy which advocates spreading a low standard of living equally.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 38 | View Replies]

To: Yardstick
Sheesh, David. A hint of promise and then....

"Are Trump supporters right that the indictments are just a political witch hunt? Of course not. As a card-carrying member of my class, I still basically trust the legal system and the neutral arbiters of justice. Trump is a monster in the way we’ve all been saying for years and deserves to go to prison."

Maybe, we are the bad guys here? Nah, SCREW the uneducated! Hang his sorry ass!

He "deserves to go to prison" for what? Being a "monster"? In the ways you have been saying for years? What did he do? Rape his daughter in the shower? Grope and sniff little girls? Tell us, David, what makes him a "monster"?

64 posted on 08/03/2023 7:22:29 AM PDT by Hatteras
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 47 | View Replies]

To: Oldeconomybuyer

Its about how people see things. Republicans see see Democrats as misguided and need to be shown the true way. Democrats see Republican’s as evil and need to be destroyed. To them Trump is Satan in disguise—New Hitler, Stalin, Putin, Pol Pot. He will open Gulags, bring back slavery, Force all to go to brainwash churches, force women to have babies and stay at home. Trump is unredeemable evil. Biden, no matter what crimes he has done, even mass murder, is excused because he holds the right political views and because of them, will never do bad things (save to keep Evil Trump from Power). If you believe that guff—put out to win elections—I can see why people are fanatical about their hate Trump movement. Who would support Hitler, KKK, Nazis, and death. Supporters must be a mad as Trump—brainwashed bots that must be stopped and de-programed.


65 posted on 08/03/2023 7:39:03 AM PDT by Forward the Light Brigade ( Ride to the sound of the Guns!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: albie

The first sentences expose what thoughts drive their projected view of others. It’s nothing but projection, they don’t actually understand or know why people disagree with them. They just assume they’re ‘the good people’ so anyone that disagrees must be ‘the bad people’.

The Dunning Kruger effect in action.


66 posted on 08/03/2023 8:28:09 AM PDT by fuzzylogic (welfare state = sharing of poor moral choices among everybody)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: MuttTheHoople

Good god the arrogance.


67 posted on 08/03/2023 8:48:49 AM PDT by DesertRhino (Dogs are called man's best friend. Moslems hate dogs. Add it up..)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 9 | View Replies]

To: NobleFree

“Are Trump supporters right that the indictments are just a political witch hunt? Of course not. As a card-carrying member of my class, I still basically trust the legal system and the neutral arbiters of justice. Trump is a monster in the way we’ve all been saying for years and deserves to go to prison.”


68 posted on 08/03/2023 9:00:07 AM PDT by DesertRhino (Dogs are called man's best friend. Moslems hate dogs. Add it up..)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 32 | View Replies]

To: devane617

President Trump spent decades in the public limelight and no one ever called him a bigot. Leftists lie about anything to further the cause.


69 posted on 08/03/2023 9:29:23 AM PDT by subterfuge (I'm a pure-blood!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: devane617
Members of our class also segregate ourselves into a few booming metro areas: San Francisco, D.C., Austin and so on.

They drool over the thought of turning us into India with permanent castes.

70 posted on 08/03/2023 9:37:54 AM PDT by liberalh8ter (Ephesians 6:10 - 18)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: devane617

The idiot morons at the Slimes are starting to figure things out.


71 posted on 08/03/2023 9:49:19 AM PDT by Responsibility2nd (Tagline for sale.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: FamiliarFace
Not one person I know wants to go back to 1963.

In 1963, we had money based on silver and (sort of) on gold.

We did not have affirmative action; racist laws were largely limited to several States.

We did not have the Gun Control Act or the Hughes Amendment.

The welfare state was much smaller.

We did not have the EPA.

Rates of drug addiction, VD, divorce, out-of-wedlock birth, fatherlessness, and abortion were all significantly lower.

Sodomy was illegal in most states. "Gay marriage" was an absurdity. Genital mutilation of children was not merely illegal but unthinkable.

The US murder rate was at a historic low.

We did not have a "war on drugs".

Don't accept the bad guys' premises.

72 posted on 08/03/2023 9:50:29 AM PDT by NorthMountain (... the right of the peopIe to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 17 | View Replies]

To: MuttTheHoople

When people talk about winning an election by a “landslide”, THAT is what they’re talking about.


73 posted on 08/03/2023 9:51:50 AM PDT by NorthMountain (... the right of the peopIe to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 21 | View Replies]

To: READINABLUESTATE
I just wanted the rest of the article.

Are you aware that the owners of this site were sued by major news outlets early in FR's history for posting the entire article? That is why, ever since, most of the articles must be excerpted.

Open this link to FR's front page and scroll down to:
Important Legal Notice re: Copyright Restrictions

74 posted on 08/03/2023 10:59:08 AM PDT by Albion Wilde (Either ‘the Deep State destroys America, or we destroy the Deep State.’ --Donald Trump)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 44 | View Replies]

To: Albion Wilde

I found it on CFP in full, but thanks for getting back.


75 posted on 08/03/2023 11:03:31 AM PDT by READINABLUESTATE (Make orwell fiction again)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 74 | View Replies]

To: MuttTheHoople

I have a graduate degree and have no clue what those menu items are.


76 posted on 08/03/2023 11:05:37 AM PDT by gitmo (If your theology doesn’t become your biography, what good is it?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 9 | View Replies]

To: devane617

I won’t be fooled.

If Trump’s numbers weren’t so big, they wouldn’t be printing this.


77 posted on 08/03/2023 11:07:34 AM PDT by simpson96
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: READINABLUESTATE

I went to archive.ph and read it for free. The rest of it is garbage, too.


78 posted on 08/03/2023 11:07:43 AM PDT by gitmo (If your theology doesn’t become your biography, what good is it?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 15 | View Replies]

To: devane617
“The Trumpers are reactionary bigots and authoritarians.” No, I am most not a “reactionary bigot” nor an “authoritarian” but you guys are the bad guys.
79 posted on 08/03/2023 11:08:18 AM PDT by Chgogal (Welcome to Fuhrer Biden's Weaponized Fascist Banana Republic! It's the road to hell.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Brian Griffin

1963. My mom, myself and my brother were returning to Guantanamo Bay to rejoin my dad following the Cuban Missile Crisis. President Kennedy was assassinated shortly thereafter.

Tough times.


80 posted on 08/03/2023 12:36:36 PM PDT by gitmo (If your theology doesn’t become your biography, what good is it?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 24 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061-8081-93 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson