So...as we know, Cenk Uygur of TYT tried to reach across the aisle with MAGA to appeal to them on the idea of populism, and...it's not really working. And the humanist report just had a video basically gloating about it in a 'see i told you so" kind of way, and while I understand it content wise, I kinda didnt like the tone.
I mean, I was always skeptical of TYT reaching out to MAGA, because politics is a left/right issue, and the problem of the establishment is one of corporate power. But that doesnt mean that you try to build a coalition with these irrational right wing populists. As noted in previous articles I wrote on it, it's largely a worldview issue. And that's where THR and I agree. Mike talks about trying to reach out to MAGA family members and those guys being so insanely brainwashed they're unreachable, and they are. Like...80% of the MAGA base, or around 40% of voters, are like this. They're a lost cause. Which is why no matter how bad trump gets, he seems to stick around a certain floor of support. Trump's numbers are resilient despite how bad he's doing because his supporters are just too far gone. They really are. I mean, we saw this with Iran recently. originally, 20-27% of people seemed to support the war in Iran. This seems to be going up to 40% now. What happened? MAGA decided to suddenly back a war because Trump did it. And these are the kinds of people Cenk was trying to reach. Oh, they're anti war? Are they? I mean they were, until they were for it. And they kinda flipped on a dime here. The fact is, they're very much now pro war, because they got marching orders from their boss and now suddenly support him. These guys are the kinds of people who would drink the Kool Aid if Jim Jones told them to.
And that's the problem with trying to appeal to MAGA. Sure, maybe like 15% of Trump 2024 voters are reachable. However, these are the people who supported him last year when he had 50-51% approval rating in line with his vote share...and now he's down to 42-44%, where he is toay. Yeah, things can shift something like 7-9%. And that's what we see in polling. But again, that's only around 15% of Trump's base. The rest of them are die hards for him.
And yeah. Mike talked about something that's important, and it's what I mentioned in regard to ideological trajectory too in the past. What determines trajectory is worldview. Worldview is an anchor. When people talk about "leaving the left", often times it's because they're just ideologically unmoored from it. However, with me, it's different. Because my values are consistent, and I know what my values are. I am mature enough to know where i do and dont fit into the coalition and how to pick and choose my battles without turning into a rightoid. Many fear people "leaving the left" because they fear people questioning and rejecting their ideology. But what makes me so consistent is i can actually have certain debates over specific topics or nuance, whereas most actual "left the left" types just have no coherent worldview or set of values. i do believe at the end of the day cenk does have some left wing values, although they do shift right on some issues, and that they disagree with the so called "max left", which is the topic of this video, Mike kinda going full blowhard in saying the max left was right. Well...yes and no. I do think there are issues worth considering a tactical retreat from based on polling, some of the less popular trans stuff with 20% of the population, some level of immigration and guns. Being a dogmatic extremist idiot just turns off people who dont share those values at times. You gotta bend. but you can only bend so much before you either break or make a poorly aging tactical error. I dont think cenk sold out, but he did make an error in thinking he could align with MAGA. And yeah, Mike called it, as did I. It's always been an ill advised alliance with them not having a good chance to win people over.
And you know what? You need to hammer that home with that 15%+ of MAGA that is reachable. Some have shifted already, others may be thinking about leaving. And right now with the war in iran, if you notice, I kinda frame things on "america first" terms sometimes. Now, I do it from a point of genuine conviction, but I do spin it like "okay so werent half of you anti war? where are you now? dont say WE hate the troops, we arent the ones causing another iraq, etc." Ya know? Use that crap against them. Because to some degree theres nothing wrong with a country prioritizing its interests. It's just a matter of actually identifying what those interests are and how to best achieve them. And that's where i disagree with "america first" types most. I dont think pure isolationism is a good thing. i think it's short term thinking. I dont think this "murica F yeah" attitude is helpful and it creates resentment. The best way to achieve "america first" goals is through multilateralism and the rules based liberal order that we had until trump undermined it. And I know this because 1) i've studied this academically in college, and I understand international politics quite well, and 2) I've lived through the bush years, and even Trump bashed Bush for getting us into unnecessary wars.
And again...if these people cared about principles...they SHOULD be against this war. But they're not. Because they're in a cult. Period, plain and simple. And yeah, most of MAGA is a lost cause. And you cant exactly reason people out of positions they didnt reason themselves into. You need to BEAT them and DEFEAT them. And this is why i hate the "compromise" people. F compromise. I dont wanna compromise with views I see as fundamentally evil, or out of touch with reality. I wanna BEAT them. Rather than try to compromise with the right, I wanna get the rest of the population to reject their values so we can build their own coalition. I dont care about meeting them half way. I care about DEFEATING them. That's been my goal from the start. To defeat them so thoroughly and generationally that their coalition collapses and becomes unelectable. By building a supermajority around the alternative. Not playing pattycake with them and meeting them half way. As I said back then in reacting to Cenk's idea of compromising with them, the problem with the establishment is they're already too conservative and they already compromise too much. No, I wanna DEFEAT the right, not by offering a moderate version of their values, but through an outright rejection of them and the building of something else. Only then can we actually move on from MAGA productively. Otherwise youre compromising with a bunch of unreasonable nutcases. Have fun with that.
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