The Failure Conspiracy
by digby
I can’t help but enjoy reading hysterical essays from the Wall Street Journal these days even though Trump’s popularity with tens of millions of Americans makes me feel sick to my stomach when I stop to think about it:
Before they gather in Cleveland for their convention, it’s not too soon for Republicans to begin thinking about what exactly a Donald Trump defeat might be like…
[W]hat happens if Mr. Trump decides he can’t win and no longer is willing to throw good money after bad. Unless they were born on a turnip truck yesterday, campaign vendors will be the first to figure it out. Look for them quickly to cut off services rather than get stiffed in the inevitable Trump campaign bankruptcy filing.
Mr. Trump’s harsher Republican critics are kidding themselves to think Mr. Trump is crazy or unstable and will suffer a breakdown. More likely, he will simply and coldbloodedly toss the ball to the GOP, saying, in effect, “If you want to pay for some events or TV, I’m available. Otherwise I’m done.” The GOP would then have to shoulder the dual burden of propping up a minimally respectable Trump campaign while also distancing its down-ballot candidates from Mr. Trump so they might survive.
And that’s the optimistic scenario. Mr. Trump has learned the value of audacity. He might well decide to cover his retreat and preserve his amour propre with a flurry of lawsuits and conspiracy theories about a “rigged” election.
He’s already begun putting narrative flesh on these bones. He speaks of “crooked Hillary” and increasingly of the Clinton Global Initiative, Bill Clinton’s philanthropy, and what he calls the Clintons’ “politics of personal profit and theft.” In his trade speeches, he portrays the Clintons as members of a nefarious global elite that has enriched itself while foisting impoverishing trade deals on the U.S. middle class.
He perhaps will throw in a few suggestions that foreign governments hold hidden leverage over Hillary because of her hacked, illegal email server. He’ll mention Bill Clinton’s pardon of Marc Rich.
Republicans can also expect to be a target of his accusations. He doesn’t need to be plausible, just tell a story that justifies his own stance that he didn’t lose, the other side cheated, “Washington elites” conspired against him, etc.
If the Trump endgame is destined to go this way, Republicans should hope it does so early, ideally before the convention is even over. To date, Mr. Trump continues to tease top GOPers and conservatives with the idea that he may yet come their way, turn his formidable talents to advancing conservative causes. This merciless exploiting of Republican romantics has begun to seem like something out of “The Blue Angel” or Lucy with the football.
Republicans need a strategy, and lots of money to fund it, to preserve their House and Senate majorities. Do they know it? The thing they should fear most: An autumn dynamic in which Mr. Trump believes the best outcome for him personally is one that does as much damage as possible to the long-run GOP cause.
I’m fairly sure that ship has already sailed…
Trump is a conspiracy theorist and he will almost certainly claim that the election was rigged against him. He already says that and he hasn’t even lost yet. But let’s face fact, this theme of rigged elections is a big one in all political circles and not all of it is just the more understandable abstract complaint about big money dominating the system. Current conspiracy theories are all about literal ballot box stuffing and nefarious criminality. Meanwhile, the very real problem of vote suppression, an actual fact, is being driven by another nonsensical conspiracy theory, “voter fraud.”
We seem to be in one of those periods where everyone believes there’s a conspiracy behind every door. It’s tiresome but it happens in times when people lose faith in institutions. If there’s one person who will use that sentiment to excuse what we hope is going to be his massive failure it’s Trump. And he’ll find a way to turn a profit at other people’s expense. He always does.
“THE SYSTEM IS RIGGED!”— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 3, 2016
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