Will Trump’s base tolerate firing Mueller?
So now Trump is threatening Mueller with some sort of undefined consequences if Mueller, as special prosecutor, dares to investigate the Trump family’s finances.
I doubt if even the president’s most fervid supporters think that Donald J. Trump has been honest and above-board in his business affairs. You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows. We may not know the details—the specific transactions, the quid pro quos, who got what in exchange for what, which banks were involved, if laws were broken or shortcuts taken, if bribes were paid, if lines were crossed, if America’s interests were sold out—but it’s pretty obvious that Trump, the businessman, and/or his underlings has probably been in more secret meetings with shady characters than any mafia boss ever was. If not, why is he so paranoid about Mueller?
One of my favorite games—an obsession, really, albeit a frustrating one—is to try and put myself into the head of the typical Trump supporter and see what makes them tick. It’s hard, because these people are almost like a different species. I can put myself into my dog, Gus’s, head. I can look a cow in the eye and sense its humanity; I’ve watched spiders on my balcony spinning their webs, and I swear I get a sense of what it’s like to be a spider. But those red state, nationalistic, Christian “patriots”? Like I said, it’s awfully hard.
I don’t doubt that, in their own minds, they’re good people. Hard-working, patriotic, family-oriented, God-fearing, charitable. Of course, all those descriptors could just as easily apply to Democrats, or Independents, or atheists (well, maybe not the “God-fearing” part), or Communists, or Wiccans, or anybody else; they’re not the exclusive province of Republicans, although too many Republicans believe they are. Where I get stuck is in trying to square the circle of how these Republicans can stomach Donald J. Trump when he contradicts, in the most vulgar way, everything they claim to believe in.
Like his business practices. The same typical Republican I envision has probably had many bad run-ins with greedy bastards, like mean landlords, heartless bosses, bureaucratic despots and others who seem to go out of their way to make life miserable for everybody else. Indeed, this is a large part of the tea party’s appeal: it is a stick in the eye of all those petty dictators who, given a little power, abuse it. Chief among these dictators are businessmen who stomp on little people. Everybody hates them, Republicans and Democrats alike. Everybody knows that the rich don’t care about anyone but themselves. Everybody knows that the laws are stacked against regular people and heavily in favor of the rich, who own congressmen and Senators and can buy judges. And those poor, disenfranchised white folks in the Rust Belt know this more than most; they see the corruption, the influence-peddling, the way the rich get away with murder while the working stiff is crushed into the dust.
If there’s a poster child for this kind of rich bastard, it’s Donald J. Trump. That laid-off, middle-aged, white Rust Belt guy knows it. I don’t care if he’ll admit it or not, he knows that Donald J. Trump is a really bad character, an awful role model for his kids, the worst example of how America creates and protects this class of robber barons. Donald J. Trump is the kind of guy the ex-steelworker has loathed all his adult life—the kind of guy he’s dreamed about throwing a beer into his face. Trump with his bimbos and mistresses, his jets, his mansions, who doesn’t pay his bills to lowly vendors, who bullies women, who intimidates anyone brazen enough to question his bullying with the threat of lawsuits, a guy who as far as anyone knows never had a religious thought in his life until he realized he needed the evangelicals politically. Nature never created a more loathed antagonist for the ex-steelworker than Donald J. Trump.
And yet—I return again and again to the paradox. The ex-steelworker wears his MAGA cap every day, reads Breitbart, learns about the day’s events from Limbaugh and Alex Jones, and tells everyone who will listen that Donald J. Trump is the greatest thing that ever happened to Christian working class people. I keep thinking, He knows that’s nonsense. He has to. Nobody could be that stupid. But the solid 80% of Republicans who still support Trump is proof that, Yes, people can be that stupid. Or stubborn. Or misinformed. Or drunk. Or blinded by fury, and superstition, and hopelessness. Or a combination of all the above. Watching those poll numbers that show Trump’s support continuing strong among the GOP, I feel more and more like I’m living in a Loony Tunes cartoon. Or a madhouse. Surely, I tell myself, this can’t go on much longer. Surely, there has to be an end-game, and sooner rather than later. Surely the U.S.A. cannot continue along this insane path. Surely these Republicans will awaken from their coma and see the world afresh, with clear eyes. Surely it must happen.
And yet it doesn’t…
I can answer the question in your headline in 2 words: Of course. Or one word: Yes.
Just read the recent article in the New Yorker about Trump supporters in Western Colorado.
I’m in Redding, in far northern California near the Oregon border, and it’s the same. Christian radio, angry right wing radio, and all the news is “fake” unless it comes from Hannity.
If you have time visit Manton, I would love to show you the area, Alain.