“I’ll give you five bucks if you can bite your ear.” The older kids at the elementary school I attended used to enjoy offering this challenge to the kindergartners. Five bucks, a life-changing amount of money to these kids, led many to jump at the opportunity. It didn’t take long for most of them to realize it was a hopeless effort. There were always a special few kids, however, particularly committed to a belief in their unique capabilities, who kept trying for an embarrassingly long time.
This is now America’s special political landscape. Over 70 million Trump supporters appear to offer unwavering support and admiration for the very stable genius who, in 2016, proclaimed that he alone could fix the dysfunctional American government. He didn’t fix it when he controlled the entire national government in his first term, presumably because Democrats were mean to him. Eight years later, at least he let us know that he has a “concept of a plan” to deal with the ongoing disgrace of healthcare in America.
With many grand promises made on the campaign trail, dispersed via his signature communication technique, which he calls the weave, where he endlessly assembles a compound of bullshit upon bullshit, he graciously accepted victory and referred to his many promises with a new slogan : "promises made, promises kept.”Now, less than a year into his second term, and clearly lacking magical abilities to lower prices, end wars, or reduce the debt, the entertainer in chief is finally losing some of his key audience. Thanks to a drama provoked by POTUS’s former sugar daddy, Elon Musk, goading the internet about Trump’s relationship with his old pal Jeffrey Epstein, some loyalists are now questioning how trustworthy Trump is. Unfortunately, like the child continuing to try biting their own ear, many persist in their support of Trump, certain that he’ll eventually get around to fixing everything. If it weren’t for the potentially irreversible damage being done to the social fabric of American society, this would all be hilariously entertaining. But alas, as one GOP representative recently consoled her constituents over their concerns with healthcare cuts in the recently passed Big Bill, “we are all going to die”.
For nearly a decade, many Trump supporters have followed the QAnon conspiracy with religious zeal. In many cases, QAnon believers have cut off or lost relationships with non-believing friends and family, an expression among believers being, “We’re your new family now.” In more extreme cases, Q believers have gone as far as murdering family members. The theory itself reads like the plot of a rejected low-budget movie. Outlandish and incoherent, some proponents believed that JFK Jr. never died and would eventually return to win the presidency. Although the JFK Jr. narrative was too goofy for some, most at least believe that a global elitist cabal consisting of celebrities and politicians is participating in a human trafficking operation where children are sexually abused, terrorized, and sacrificed in order to extract adrenochrome, a substance which elites allegedly use to strengthen their evil dominion over society. Perhaps the main character of the story, now deceased billionaire Jefferey Epstein, was believed to be orchestrating the operation by supplying girls, a private jet, and a private island where the cabal’s most illicit activities took place. Epstein would allegedly record powerful elites with underage girls and blackmail them to carry out the cabal’s agenda. Ironically, a celebrity elitist and long-time friend of Epstein himself, Donald Trump, has been claimed since the beginning of QAnon to be the chief executive in the battle against these evil forces.
For four long years of Trump’s first presidency, true believers faithfully waited for the day Trump would once and for all expose the evil and bring to justice those behind it - Democrats. As the days went on and the forces of evil, such as Tom Hanks, Bill Gates, and the Clintons walked free, believers cooked up new theories about how these and other enemies had in fact already been tried and executed, and that body doubles had for some reason taken their place. When in doubt, slogans such as “where we go one, we go all” and “trust the plan, enjoy the show” assuage those that Trump now refers to as “stupid” and “weak” people who believe in QAnon theories. Trump, according to his remaining flock, is playing a game of 4-D chess that transcends rationality, morality, and constitutionality. Sadly, over the last decade, the political party that has historically identified as the one conserving traditional values and promoting limited government has long since cheerfully abandoned all prior norms and priorities in order to conform to the whims of its charismatic television personality. Trump’s most recent metamorphosis on the QAnon subject, however, could be the crack in MAGA’s firmament that allows a bit of critical self-reflection into the movement.
Since Trump began campaigning for the presidency in the 2016 election, he had an awareness of how loyal his supporters were that few could have believed. The womanizing billionaire from New York City, who files for divorce and bankruptcy more often than he attends church, took over and remade the party of family values, limited government, and fiscal responsibility in his image. The party now stands for little more than being a platform for offering praise and support to whatever Trump wills. Trump, in a visionary moment on the campaign trail in 2016, famously described just how devoted his supporters were when he said, “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn't lose any voters, OK.” The 4-D chess master, however, miscalculated his moves around the Epstein and QAnon subject and appears to have shot himself in the process. A long time coming, this injury cannot be healed merely by applying gauze.
In 2020, during an August press briefing, Trump commented for the first time publicly on the QAnon conspiracy. While he said he was aware that the movement was gaining in popularity and that followers “like me very much”, he confessed that he didn’t know much about it. A reporter kindly summarized the theory for him by saying, “the crux of the theory is this belief that you are secretly saving the world from this satanic cult of pedophiles and cannibals, does that sound like something you are behind?” The President said he was unaware of those details and then cheekily added, “is that supposed to be a bad thing or a good thing, if I can help save the world from problems, I’m willing to do it.” In the next breath, Trump added, “and we are actually, we’re saving the world from a radical left philosophy”. Though Trump played coy regarding QAnon, it’s difficult to believe that he was truly unaware of the movement’s beliefs. After all, by the time of this press conference and in the following years, Trump, along with numerous allies, lent credibility to the movement by retweeting QAnon posts. Despite kidnapping plots and murders having already been inspired by the movement, and the FBI warning that the movement could serve to facilitate domestic terrorism, MAGA continued to indulge the QAnon tale. Without a doubt, the attempt to overturn the 2020 election on January 6th couldn’t have taken place without the years long cultivation of the myth that MAGA’s ultimate goal was to defeat the evil forces behind the deep state. In this nearly decade long game of “what could go wrong”, Trump and the QAnon world simply ignored the fact that the man at the center of it all, Jeffrey Epstein, was cut from the same cloth as his long-time bro, Donald. While Q influencers profited off of ad revenue and merchandizing, the President gained loyalty never before seen in American politics, and the loyal followers kept the faith that one day it would all make sense. Meanwhile, in reality, with his party once again in control of the entire national government, Trump can’t manage to lower prices for gas or groceries, let alone expose the meddling villains behind all the bad stuff in the world.
Since Trump came into politics, he has demonstrated his invulnerability by saying and doing things on a daily basis that would end the career of any other politician. Within a few sentences, he frequently contradicts himself, demonstrates zero knowledge on issues, occasionally mutters incoherent noises confidently, and on special occasions discusses genitals. Throughout his first term and during his interregnum, many wondered what it would take for his supporters to abandon him. From failing in his first term to deliver on his agenda of building a border wall and repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act, mismanaging a pandemic, and attempting to overturn the 2020 Election, over seventy million Americans have managed to rationalize their support of him. Now, less than a year into his second term, Trump continues to display an inability to follow through on campaign promises and a careless ineptitude that erodes American integrity at home and abroad. Whether it’s erratically applying tariffs only to pause them days later, failing to lower the cost of food and gas, failing to resolve the war in Ukraine in his first 24 hours, sending the military into American cities to “liberate" them, insisting he has unlimited power/is not obligated to follow court rulings, and is entitled to a third term, Trump has set outrageous and previously unimaginable precedent for executive overreach and incompetence. Now, in an attempt to deal with his supporters’ demands to release the “Epstein-files”, he has simply and abruptly decided that the entire story is a “democratic hoax” and those who have believed it are “stupid…weaklings”. This absurd crescendo of stupidity, rather than his objective failures and federal overreach, has produced what appears to be the most significant challenge to his supporters’ faith in him. While it remains to be seen how his fumbling of this issue will impact his support and MAGA’s long-term influence on American politics, it makes it crystal clear that a key threat to the American experiment is the electorate’s ignorance, abandonment of reality, and retreat into fantasy. If the American republic survives this decade-long fever dream of good vs evil, where absolute faith is placed in a singular savior figure, it will only be done by that same public clawing their way out of the hole that’s been dug by conspiratorial rabbit holes, delusional wishful simplistic thinking, and 24/7 entertainment. It will take a serious effort to develop a working concept of how the American government is set up and why. In doing so, the electorate will no longer be persuaded by candidates who suggest they will fix everything by virtue of their deal making charisma, use name calling as a primary means of rebuttal, and blame the cost of food and gas on the opposition party's vice president as if there were levers in their office that controlled such things.
The last ten years have been a painfully long teachable moment for the American people on the importance of voting and the consequences of elections. While there has been some increase in voter turnout recently, in the 2024 election more people simply didn’t vote at all than voted for either candidate, with nearly 90 million eligible voters not bothering to cast a ballot. Though written laws offer some safeguards, nothing is to prevent an authoritarian takeover if broadly supported, whether explicitly or tacitly. Merely voting for different candidates offers a false hope unless the public develops a sense of personal obligation to preserve the American government so that future generations may have the opportunity to enjoy its benefits. As in the founding generation, compromise and enlightened dialogue are the only way forward. Short of that, America will continue to slide into a perpetual state of rage-inducing entertainment, finger-pointing, and brain rot.
Few things can interrupt this ongoing descent like deeply felt, authentic inspiration. In today’s ready-made age of mass production and algorithmic spoon-fed conformity, this is a rarity. Thankfully, previous generations have left a stockpile of inspiration. One brief instance is a 1930’s poem written by Kahil Gibran titled, Pity the Nation. The nearly one hundred year old poem captures the current state of American decadence painfully well in a way that is likely to resonate with readers regardless of their politics. Its implication is perhaps that a nation in decline must breathe new life into its traditions and values or die its shameful and inevitable death.
Pity the nation that is full of beliefs and empty of religion.
Pity the nation that wears a cloth it does not weave.
and eats a bread it does not harvest.
Pity the nation that acclaims the bully as hero,
and that deems the glittering conqueror bountiful.
Pity a nation that despises a passion in its dream,
yet submits in its awakening.
Pity the nation that raises not its voice
save when it walks in a funeral,
boasts not except among its ruins,
and will rebel not save when its neck is laid
between the sword and the block.
Pity the nation whose statesman is a fox,
whose philosopher is a juggler,
and whose art is the art of patching and mimicking
Pity the nation that welcomes its new ruler with trumpeting,
and farewells him with hooting,
only to welcome another with trumpeting again.
Pity the nation whose sages are dumb with years
and whose strongmen are yet in the cradle.
Pity the nation divided into fragments,
each fragment deeming itself a nation.
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