Friday, February 11, 2022

Tweet Of The Day- An Archetypal Republican


Nancy Mace's adoration of Donald Trump is not unique in the Republican Party. Moreover, her timing . characterizes the approach of her Republican Party toward legislating and other aspects of governing.

Mace claims President Trump lowered taxes, increased wages and employment, made America safer, confronted China, and presided over an increasingly strong nation and free and democratic world.

In 2020, the murder rate rose to its highest level since 1997. Admittedly, the President of the USA has little influence over the incidence of murder, a reality GOP pols and pundits are neglecting as they trumpet the increase in murders over the past year or so. Joining them is the mainstream media, which assists the GOP by ignoring context- the decline in many categories of crime and the far greater roles played by local and state governments and others in fighting crime.

Public health obviously didn't improve in the Trump Administration, most obviously through the spread of Covid-19, much of which was preventable. We all know that the President told Bob Woodward, author of Rage, in February, 2019 that he "wanted to always play it down. I still like playing it down because I don't want to create a panic." Instead, Americans died.

Trump told Woodward at the time also that the coronavirus "goes through air" but didn't see fit to inform the American people.  After publication of Woodward's book, the President stated in September in a White House briefing

This is stuff that everyone knew. There’s a report that I have here someplace where China said it was airborne earlier than the statements I made. People knew it was airborne. This was nothing. When I say it was airborne, everybody knew it was airborne. This was no big thing. Read the reports. China came out with a statement that it was an airborne disease. I heard it was an airborne disease. I assumed it early on.

As explained by CNBC, Beijing made conflicting statements as to whether it was airborne. However, this was not the only time that Trump, whom Mace argues "took on China directly," shilled for mainland China on the disease.  The President praised the Asian behemoth at least eleven (11) times for its handling of the coronavirus.

But then, Trump shilled for dictators maybe as often as he flushed classified documents down the toilet. Though freedom and democracy declined, rather than expanded, around the world during Trump's tenure as President, that was a continuation of a 15+ year trend. Rather, Trump's larger contribution was to express his love and respect for dictators  across the world.

Similarly, Representative Mace's impeccable timing contributes to an understanding of her Party.  The previous day, Trump had lustly endorsed the incumbent's primary challenger, stating "Katie Arrington is running against an absolutely terrible candidate, Congresswoman Nancy Mace, whose remarks and attitude have been devastating for her community, and not at all representative of the Republican Party to which she has been very disloyal."

Mace's obsequious remarks were not made despite Trump's criticism but partly because of it. Intimidated by and enamored of, "strength," Macy employed the adjective "stronger" twice and once claimed the President had "taken on China directly."

When in September, 2020 President Trump rationalized his minimization and trivialization of the novel coronavirus as "leadership," he remarked "Certainly I'm not going to drive this country or the world into a frenzy. We want to show confidence. We have to show strength."

The obsession with strength exhibited by Donald Trump and Mace characterizes, to a lesser extent, the Republican Party generally. Republicans are not seeking agreement with Democrats or trying to solve the nation's problems. The interests of the country are not secondary for them, nor even tertiary. The more America falters, they reason, the greater their electoral prospects, bipartisanship be damned.  Winning is their business and their only business. Neither Democrats, nor what there is of the liberal media, understand this.

 


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