Reflections on MAGA 2024
To say that Donald Trump is the worst thing that ever happened to American politics would be analogous to saying that the horrible smell in your kitchen is the worst thing that ever happened to the raw meat you left out on the counter overnight. That is to say, the truly worst thing is not the after-effect, nor even the effect itself, but rather the cause — namely you, you Americans, who in your carelessness neglected to preserve the perfectly good meat you once had. Now we all live with the stench.
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard, two people whose Putin apologias are so pure they might as well be delivered in Russian, jumped on the MAGA hearse the very same week, offering the same essential explanation for their respective decisions: Trump is better for Putin. Putin, of course, agrees — so much so that even he felt the need to muddy the remarkably transparent waters just a bit, by “endorsing” Kamala Harris for president. Donald Trump’s entire political career since 2016 has been, in part, a Kremlin psyops coup. But the veil has been lifted so self-evidently now that Putin himself sees how counterproductive this obviousness might become in November. His political future, his hold on Russian power, and perhaps even his personal freedom and survival, depend on a quick and radical change in U.S. foreign policy regarding his unprovoked military invasion of Ukraine. Counting on the long-typical American weakness, short attention span, and voluntary surrender at the moment of truth to which we have all become accustomed, has become too great a risk for Putin to run, especially since the nations of Europe, apparently feeling the seriousness of their danger at last, have refused to fold in advance as they usually do. This leaves Putin’s old Trump card as the best option remaining. Hence the friendly visit and flattering words from Putin’s leading international agent and mouthpiece of the moment, Viktor Orban. Hence the ramped up propaganda about the American establishment’s “forever wars,” about the Russian desire for peace that the U.S. supposedly subverted unilaterally for the benefit of the big defense contractors, and about the “NATO provocations” that “forced” Russia into the Ukrainian conflict as a matter of self-defense.
But the MAGA millions will vote for Trump all the same, even those among them who used to see clearly what Putin was, and can see right now what he is. Trump’s continued willingness to play admiring lackey to the KGB thug, and his promise of a quick end to the war which can only mean — and which Orban, after his meeting with Trump, explicitly said does mean — forcing Ukraine to cave in to Putin by withdrawing U.S. aid, will be no bar to their continued and enthusiastic support for Trump. After eight years of swallowing this farcical fraud and all the pathetic lies of convenience, these people have trained themselves to an infinite malleability in the name of their favorite celebrity — and, as usual, in the name of their political tribe. “My party, wrong or wronger.”
