Same old, same old ain’t working
“If you smell what the Rock is cooking,” so to speak, it’s long been clear that MAGAstan is more about posturing than policy. It’s about Trumpish attitude aided and abetted by his fans’ poor short-term memory. Donald Trump can say one thing on Monday and the opposite on Friday and fans couldn’t care less. Just as long as whatever he says is delivered loudly and proudly with the same shameless, in-your-face insincerity. Wrestling fans eat that shit up. They pay good money for it week after week. It’s not Sondheim or Shakespeare, but it’s theater.
Digby yesterday mentioned the “stale sameness” of the Trump rally and “the weird hypnotic nature of his speeches.” But it’s that sameness that mesmerizes, like endless Grateful Dead improvs, like the old Latin mass and Gregorian chants. People can lose themselves for a while in the rhythms and harmonies before returning to the real world. The attraction of sameness, of pithy catchphrases, of the anticipation of the all-too-familiar you know is coming, is something the left, with its demand for novelty, has never appreciated. As Anat Shenker-Osorio says, repetition is important. And so is repetition.
Donald Trump’s problem now is the novelty of not being in control. In a courtroom, he’s not in charge. His accustomed delaying tactics are failing him. His raging won’t be tolerated. He’s sweating. He’s flailing. He’s all over the place on abortion now that it’s clear the backlash from this week’s Arizona ruling threatens his reelection, the reelection he was counting on to keep him from ending his life in the slammer.
Behold. He’s backpedaling as fast as he can.
His cult won’t care. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t hit him over the head with it like the folding chair conveniently left beside the ring.
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