If Donald Trump will walk away from the White House one day with nothing else to show for his half-assed efforts but a ridiculous East Wing ballroom, a trade war no opponent will have strictly adhered to, his face on Mt. Rushmore or, God forbid, a potential third term, he can at least take pride, bibliophile that he is, in knowing a new addition to the highest tier of the dog whistle lexicon has been cemented in place thanks to him and his sycophants.
Forget communism, terrorism, wokeism, DEI, calling someone a Nazi or saying they’re Hitler. Now, it’s “political”.
It’s not a neologism, and certainly not a new accusation in the world of politics. Both parties have used it for years as an excuse for why the opposition has stalled or outright buried a bill, or forestalled some endeavor. It’s because those efforts simply didn’t favor their political party, and would serve to benefit the other. By which I mean the constituents for that party who’ll put them in power, and keep the other party out. Which, too, they will say is the only one that truly represents the “American people” .
By which they mean the constituents for that party who’ll put them in power.
Two-party politics makes the idiocy of the American political world go round.
It’s important that your faith in the leaders of the political realm never waivers. It will, of course. Often. Especially if they don’t believe the same things you do, or don’t go about shaping the country the way you want it to look. This is in a democracy, now. And one of the mechanisms they use to restore that faith is the implication (or outright accusation) that those who reveal the cracks in the hull of the ship, or just point out that it’s headed over a waterfall, are bad people who are afflicted with the mental disease of thinking improperly. And the most prominent way they’ve been conveying it to voters these days is by calling those efforts or ideas “political”, which is how only very bad people would act or think.
And if those people say we, as leaders, do it? Well, they’re lying. Because that’s what very bad people would do.
When the jobs report came out August 1st and were markedly lower than predicted, Trump fired the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics for doctoring the numbers, without giving evidence, saying the report was a “political” attempt to make him look bad. No evidence ever surfaced, because it had more to do with this quasi-radical Trump administration (read: Trump and his ass-kissers) policy than some other reason he made up because he can’t stand reality when reality makes him look bad.
Her only crime, it seems, is having been appointed by Joe Biden. Because that made her a target for this new(ish) type of accusational warfare.
Same thing with Jerome Powell, head of the Federal Reserve: “playing politics”. Trump wants Powell to steeply lower rates to help boost the economy. And he won’t. Why? Because Jerome Powell is smarter than Donald Trump. Or at least knows the business of economy better than Trump, and man who’s run numerous businesses into bankruptcy and been over a billion dollars in debt in a heyday that was supposedly to have made him a billionaire. I’m not going to say they were bad business moves on Trump’s part. If you know the game, you know how to play it. And Trump knows the game. But that game. As a president, you can’t run a country the same way.
And same thing with the Episcopal bishop of Washington, who called for mercy on people who have historically had it tough in this country. “She brought her church into the World of politics in a very ungracious way. She was nasty in tone, and not compelling or smart,” Trump declared, after probably fuming that another person reminded him that there are human beings that exist other than those who attend his rallies and kiss his ass.
And the same thing with the official White House response to Trump not being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in October. “The Nobel Committee proved they place politics over peace,” said White House communications director, Trump id fragment and one-man echo chamber, Steven Cheung.
Honestly, if I paid attention to Trump’s Truth Social account, I could probably come up with about 500 more.
In the world of politics, concision is crucial, brevity is key, sound bytes dominate the landscape, and reverse accusation is more powerful than admission in convincing people to stop remembering something, and move on to the next important issue. “Obama treason!” Seriously, the only thing that beats a false accusation is a greater preponderance of false accusations. In this world of shouting back and forth over a virtual property fence, shooting rifles and artillery over a social media No Man’s Land, whichever side claims to have the most evidence, and screams it loud enough for longer, wins.
According to their side, anyway.
But is Trump guilty of the same “political” crime of wordplay? You bet.
I could give several examples, but Trump’s take on former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro’s trial for fomenting an insurrection after an election loss (sound vaguely familiar?)—one at which he was convicted in September—is enough. The prosecution was political, according to Trump. Why? Because Bolsonaro was the Donald Trump of Brazil. I can’t think of a better way to phrase that. Trump even cited the case as a reason for imposing 50% tariffs on the now-liberal-controlled country.
It’s saying, I’m going to punish you politically (economic measures are political measures, too, because they affect that country’s politics greatly) even though I have no evidence you’re punishing someone politically. Therefore, the only person playing politics is the person screaming, “They’re playing politics!” Factually speaking.
Political apostasy by millions is what helped hoist Trump, the most media savvy president in history, up onto a heavily-reinforced presidential stage. It’s no wonder for that reason, despite all his perennial vacuity, the man would be clever enough to resort to the most base and effective forms of thought control the country has ever seen. Assertive, selectively-focused and limited-fact-based name calling.
After all, he did learn from Roy Cohn.
