.

There is a tendency in the Anti-Trump resistance for some people to deploy the rather obvious charge of ‘hypocrisy’ when Trump, his administration, and his allies perform crude and obvious actions that they have deeply and loudly criticized among their political opponents.

The list is nearly endless and stretches back decades to the Clintons, through Obama and Biden. Money donated to the Clinton Foundation, was in reality monies going directly to them, proof of their ‘corruption,’ however billions washed through Trump’s various crypto schemes are unworthy of any thought. Still images of Obama nose in the air peering down at someone solid proof of the man’s narcissism, egotism, and arrogance. Trump’s display of nearly clinical malignant narcissism, merely proof of his opponents ‘derangement.’

The reason the charges of hypocrisy are pointless is that they miss a fundamental truth, every single attack is not launched in anything approximating ‘good faith.’ These people care not one iota for the truth of the matter but only for the effectiveness of their attacks. The point isn’t about what really happened but only to win the ‘news cycle’ and drive down their opponents’ support. The moment a particular tool or weapon ceases to be effective it is discarded.

It is a waste of time and resources to answer any of it with ‘hypocrisy.’ That merely invigorates the charges, often patently false, providing Trump and his allies with even more opportunities for attack.

Weakly bound voters I think are more likely to be swayed with attacks that simply go directly at the man and his administration’s criminal and authoritarian actions without reference to any hypocrisy. His solidly committed voters, motivated by racism, or self-interest and simply the delusion that a Democratic politician is always the wrong choice cannot be dislodged with this charge.

.

Throughout its long history humanity has tried many systems of government. Evolution molded us for hunterpgatherer bands that function on interpersonal relationship and knowledge. Agriculture and creative intelligence exploded our populations well beyond that scope and ever since we’ve grappled with creating systems that work efficiently but also with a freedom that at very least sates individuality to the point that people are satisfied enough to not burn it all to the ground.

History is replete with Kings, Emperors, God-Kings, Oligarchs, and religious domination. For the last several centuries the newest and boldest experiment has been democracy.

Amid the various forms and systems, the essence of democratic governance is the concept that in some method the populace, rarely the entire populace, is polled and their preference in party or person is elevated to government. The assumption being that a widely distributed method of selection will tend to marginalize extremism in favor of moderation in rule. There have been spectacular failures, NAZI Germany for example, where the populace selected quite poorly and that points to the flaw of democracy that looks to be uncorrectable.

Self-selection.

The men and women who put themselves forward to be chosen have self-selected. Only those who want to be in power are options for the populace to elect from. While the nobility of service is real and there have always been and always will be people for whom service is their goal they never have and never will be the only ones in that pool.

Power attracts those who want to abuse it for their own selfish needs or twisted ideologies. The pool from which the populace can select will always be tainted by the greedy, the corrupt, and the evil. As such the possibility that the greedy, corrupt, and the evil secure power for themselves is unavoidable.

I am not advocating abandoning democracy, it’s a flawed system that has far fewer flaws than the rest but it is not perfect and your franchise is a terrible power you must always use wisely.

.

When Reagan ascended to the Presidency in 1980, he often described the Republican party as a stool with three legs to describe the major divisions of the movement as: Family Values, Fiscal Conservatism, and Anti-Communism.

One can argue with aspects of any one or all three elements, but I do think that description pretty much told you who and what made up the GOP at that time. There are some deluded fools who think it still has bearing but the legs of that stool have long since been replaced with three new ones.

Cruelty to the Queer, Looting Public Funds, and Isolationism marbled with a rich vein of white supremacy are the new legs.

What little compassion for others in the old ‘Family Valuers’ crowd, and there hadn’t been much to begin with, has boiled away with its concentration in the homophobic transphobic, and woman-hating stew it has become.

Fiscal conservatism, however, it may may have erred with ‘supply side’, now makes no pretense at sane or rational monetary policies or decisions. The last Republican president, who is also the current one, ran the debt and deficit to insane amounts and now wants to add trillions more to it with additional tax cuts for the very wealthy.

The isolationism of the new GOP is unmistakable, democracies are derided and left to suffer invasions from militaristic and expansionist neighbors while the deep and binding commitments of the post war era are abandoned. The white nationalism is plain when books about racism are removed from the Naval academy, but Mein Kampf is left for the cadets to read.

From 1980 through about 2003 I was a registered Republican, but the mark of true wisdom is not being free of mistakes but recognizing when you have made them.v

.

Before I start let me state without qualification or evasion that Elon Musk, unelected and unaccountable, should get the fuck out of our government.

A recent spate of vandalism against Tesla dealerships and charging stations has erupted on the news cycle prompting the President to declare the acts as ‘domestic terrorism’ with promises of persecution. This is turn has caused some corners of the left to insist that it is ‘just vandalism’ and not terrorism.

I would maintain that acts of violence, against people or property with the goal of effecting political change, in this case driving Musk from his position of power, is pretty much the definition of terrorism. It occurred within our national jurisdiction and presumably from American nationals making it thoroughly domestic. Simple logic renders the inescapable conclusion that these acts are indeed ‘domestic terrorism.’

That’s not the real fuck issue.

The real issue is that this administration will in no way or in no manner treat all acts of domestic terrorism equally. The pardoning of the violent insurrectionist who attempted to overthrow a fair, free, and legitimate election is proof of this. Further evidence is the legal action against the man who organized pro-Palestinian protests.

When Trump promises to use law enforcement against some persons but not others, he is employing the fascist credo ‘For my friends, everything; for my enemies the law.’

.

The affirmation ‘fake it ’till you make it’ has long been one employed to fight the dreaded ‘impostor syndrome.’ To be a writer with confidence, act like you have that confidence, play the part until it because a reality for you. This applies to nearly all areas of human activity; act the way you want to be, and it will help you become exactly that.

I think there’s a dark mirror-universe version of this effect as well. I think if you want to be that thing you are act is fairly irrelevant. You will tend to become what you pretend to be, even if that was not your original intention.

There’s an activity, principally online, known as ‘owning the libs,’ where people, mostly men, perform in a manner to provoke anger and outrage from liberals and then rejoicing in the fact that you managed to make the outraged. The fact that there’s an entire community of people acting this way is of concern because in my opinion many of them are ‘faking it’, being homophobic racist until they ‘make it’ actually becoming homophobic racists.

Compounding this effect is the presence of actual homophobic racist all too eager to welcome anyone to their ranks. The pressure of conformity within any social group is powerful, humans are social creatures, and those drives are very hard to overcome. Pressure to conform to the hateful community eventually molds those ‘pretending’ into actual adherents.

So, maybe that ‘okay’ hand gesture wasn’t really and truly meant as a white power symbol, and maybe that ‘roman salute’ was just someone throwing their heart to the crowd, but such things a welcomed with great joy by the fascists and racists and positive reinforcement changes people. Sometimes they fake it until it makes them Nazis.