What's up with that?
This seems to be the main ammo loaded in all the half-cocked Trump supporters arsenal. Why is this line of thinking so convincing to them? It really seems to be the core of their ideology.
Negative Partisanship. A lot of this began with Newt Gingrich who was an expert at demagoguery. He helped shatter norms and etiquette and since 1994, demagoguery has been the right’s de facto strategy. Think to Vince Foster and how that poor man was used to foment hate, anger, and paranoia on the right.
That’s why.
Both political parties have this but that doesn’t mean it’s expressed equally by them. Both Jon Boehner’s book and Tim Miller’s book go into this. Over the last 30 years Republican politicians have campaigned using anger and fear but governed on tax cuts, deregulation, and a bunch of other really unpopular policies. These policies are even unpopular among their own voters. Yet, Republican voters have been trained to hate “the other side” more so they’re more motivated to prevent Democrats from winning than anything else. Fox News has been key to their success because tax cuts for billionaires isn’t popular and doesn’t motivate anyone to the polls but seeing a whole bunch of brown Spanish speakers from Central America, trans athletes, and black people demanding equality most certainly does.
Along comes Trump working lockstep with Fox News and social media algorithms and now the Republican base becomes supercharged. Hillary Clinton was perfect because she was so despised by the right and Trump was perfect because he knew how to demagogue so well. Again, you don’t have to be for anything. Watch a Trump rally even. He never details anything that he’ll actually do policy wise (build the wall isn’t a policy). But man oh man, is he able to get people fired up and excited to hate “the others.” And “the others” can take any shape depending on the moment. It might be the squad, it might be the media, it might be “the establishment”, etc.
Let’s look at it today, has anyone here heard what Republicans are going to do to combat inflation? Have they ever articulated anything? Yet, they’re poised to retake the House. Why?
Negative Partisanship.
We saw a similar dynamic in 2018. Democrats didn’t need to come up with a detailed message other than, “we’ll try to hold Trump and this endless chaos accountable.”
But negative partisanship is your answer. You don’t have to be for anything, just against the other thing. So when you hear criticisms about Trump of the lack of actual solutions from Republcians, the default response isn’t to defend those unpopular policies (if they even exist). The default is to play the whatabout game. It’s a deflect and usually results in playing whack a mole with conspiracies.
Remember, a lie will circle the world before the truth has enough time to put its pants on.
- It’s easier to not know issues.
- It’s easier to not have to be held accountable for your poor voting decisions.
- It’s easier to not have to defend positions or candidates.
- It’s just easier to hate the other side more. Sure, “my side” might not be great (my side may still be trying to overthrow democracy) but “what about” your side? Your side has kids using kitty litter, men competing in girl’s sports, pedophiles who suck adrenocrom to stay young, inflation, gas prices, and Hunter’s laptop! So while my side remains imperfect and i don’t have any solutions and am not for anything I am definitely against your side because your side is like totally worse!
