We Need More Trump...

The Full Loathsome Should Be Mandatory

“He adopted the podium voice familiar to his comrades—rambling and undisciplined, at times shrewd and amusing, at other time ignorant and unhinged, and periodically laced with antisemitism and mind-twisting conspiracy theories…”

Who dat? Trump? No, it’s Saddam Hussein, described by Steve Coll in his riveting new book, The Achilles Trap. When I asked Coll about the similarities, in our next Night Owls podcast (#12), he laughed and pointed out that Trump hadn’t killed two million people—a crucial distinction, of course. But, the style…Basic Authoritarian Egomaniac Crazy. That scans. Most of us have forgotten just how strange and winding a road any given Trump speech is. Only the zealots sit through them. But maybe the rest of us should. Here’s Bret Stephens on watching one:

I watched the rally with my mother, who found it reminiscent of the style of the Mussolini regime under which she was born in wartime Italy. She was referring to the incoherence, the bombast, the grandiosity, the extravagant lies, the demonization, the xenophobia, the bogus nods to religiosity and patriotism, the references to himself with the royal “we,” the condescending sops to his toadies, the ecstatic gaze of the people arranged behind him on the stage. But there’s also an undeniably comic aspect, too, especially when he riffed about how he had taken the moniker “crooked” from Hillary Clinton (who is now “Beautiful Hillary”) and given it to Biden, who used to be “Sleepy” (and probably still is). I admit I sorta giggled, against my better judgment. The whole thing was sorta like, “Il Duce, Live at the Comedy Cellar.”

And here is a 40-minute slice of peak Trump idiocy, courtesy of Steve Schmidt. Watch it only if you have a strong stomach.

Or maybe, watch it even if you hurl. We need to be continually disgusted by this guy. We can’t let his vulgarity diminish into the routine. You must always remember, whatever your politics: We don’t want our kids thinking that this is what a President of The United States sounds like. The TV networks, except possibly Fox, have let him slide. They used to broadcast his wall-to-wall madness, but received criticism for trolling for ratings on the cheap. Now, we only get Trump’s greatest hits (or misses). We need the tedium of his solipsism. An account I read of Trump’s harangue at CPAC over the weekend noted that the crowd was kind of silent, maybe bored. That’s news, especially at the hell-hole of wingnuttery that CPAC has become.

But we need to see it, especially as Trump has gotten crazier and more messianic, especially since he’s been upfront at his desire to sic his “Justice” apparatus against his enemies, if reelected. (Saddam used to lock up his nuclear scientists just so he would know where to find them—i.e. not on the lam.)

We all need to take a deep breath and listen. We need to reinvigorate our outrage. We can not let him become the “same old” Trump. Indeed, the Democrats should be paying to broadcast his ultra-crazy “So God Gave Us Trump” ad. Poor old God; (S)He gets saddled with the worst of human behavior, from the Crusades to Joel Osteen’s bling. If I had one wish for the nation—and this is, admittedly, a longshot—it would be that by Election Day, we would all have gotten mortally bored with the guy. (I was going to add that we’d gotten more interested in Joe Biden, but that would not necessarily be a good thing—sort of like waiting for crashes at stock car races.)

Iran Into Trouble

Speaking of the God-damned, theocracies seem to have sell by dates. Iran pretends to be a theocracy—Mohammed would blush—but it’s actually a military dictatorship, run by the Revolutionary Guard Corps. And it’s not doing so well, according to my invaluable podcast mate John Ellis:

Almost three-quarters of Iranians want a secular government instead of a theocratic dictatorship, an anonymous state-run poll has revealed. The survey also revealed that less than one in 10 people think women should be forced to wear a hijab. The poll suggests a major shift in attitudes towards Iran’s religious regime has occurred since the 2022 Women, Life, Freedom uprising. The movement saw protests erupt across the country after the death in morality-police custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, arrested for the improper use of her hijab. Over 15,800 Iranians of voting age across 31 provinces took part in the fourth anonymous study run by the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance. The last one was in 2015.

I was in Iran for the 2009 elections, when it seemed the regime might be on the way out. On a march to Green Party headquarters, I remember being dispersed by a squad of Basij (the religious police) riding motorcycles, swinging truncheons. You just don’t want to ever hear the sound of skulls cracking (My hotel’s lobby became a triage ward.) Never underestimate the power of state violence. But it’s good to reminded, given the intelligence and dark humor of the Iranian people, how much they hate their government. I hope I will live to see them free.

Immigrants Will Save Us

Some interesting pieces and non-pieces about immigrants and the economy. The best is from The Washington Post, about the boost that immigrants have given us in recent years:

Immigration has propelled the U.S. job market further than just about anyone expected, helping cement the country’s economic rebound from the pandemic as the most robust in the world.

That momentum picked up aggressively over the past year. About 50 percent of the labor market’s extraordinary recent growth came from foreign-born workers between January 2023 and January 2024, according to an Economic Policy Institute analysis of federal data. And even before that, by the middle of 2022, the foreign-born labor force had grown so fast that it closed the labor force gap created by the pandemic, according to research from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.

On the other hand, there’s Paul Krugman, still cluelessly searching the economy for reasons why the white working class has gone rogue. This is a traditional liberal trope, famously demonstrated by the dyspeptic Thomas Frank, in What’s The Matter With Kansas. Hint: It’s not the economy, guys. It’s the culture, stupid. It’s the fact that liberal elitists inflict Diversity, Equity and Inclusion programs on most campuses and corporations. It’s that the mainstream media insist on calling sex-change operations “gender affirmation.” It’s the constant special pleading from minorities (and majorities, like women), who have made unprecedented progress over the past 60 years. And yes, it’s a heavy dose of Good Ol’ American bigotry, especially toward immigrants. I must say that Krugman’s disgust with, and inability to understand, rural “white rage” is especially disappointing. But then, he’s an economist….and those folks famously don’t understand people.

But then again…

It is the economy, at least in part. The inflation part. This Washington Post column by Heather Long lays out the real cost of inflation during the Biden presidency:

The White House, the news media and Wall Street largely focus on the monthly reports that say how much inflation rose over the past month and year. For example, the latest read was 3.1 percent from January 2023 to January 2024 — down significantly from 6.4 percent a year ago. But many Americans think about inflation over a longer time, focusing on the cumulative increase since 2020. The number that sticks in most people’s heads is 20 percent. This is roughly how much inflation is up since the coronavirus pandemic began. (It’s up about 18 percent since Biden took office).

That is not chopped liver. Especially the rise in interest rates. My sense is that Joe Biden is getting a bum rap here. Inflation has been a global phenomenon. It would have been pretty much the same if Trump had been re-elected, as King Donald of Orange would have tried just as hard as Biden to bribe the public with emoluments that turned out to be excessive.

I’d say that Biden just can’t get a break, but his unwillingness to address the border has been an unforced error. And his too-steadfast support of Israel’s “over-the-top” rubbling of Gaza may cost him Michigan. We’ll see if he addresses those in his State of the Union next week. Most SOTUs fade from memory quicker than a Pharma ad, but this is going to be, in Biden’s words, “a big [freaking] deal.” He’d better have his game on.