benami164_BRENDAN SMIALOWSKIAFP via Getty Images_trumpwalking

The Messiah of Mar-a-Lago

Jun 17, 2020 Shlomo Ben-Ami

The US was a tinderbox of racism, inequality, and broken politics well before Donald Trump entered the White House, but he lit the match and added fuel. Unless Americans vote him out in November, putting out the fires – and repairing the national and international damage – may well become impossible.

TEL AVIV – US President Donald Trump says he is “the chosen one,” and many of his evangelical supporters agree. But standing, Bible in hand, in front of the historic St. John’s Episcopal Church in Washington, DC, after the police used riot shields and tear gas to clear the area of peaceful protesters, Trump had more in common with Jesus Christ’s donkey than with a savior. Far from liberating a fallen civilization, Trump is pushing one to its breaking point, creating precisely the kind of mayhem that many of his evangelical supporters believe will precede – and necessitate – the arrival of a messiah.

Trump ran for president in 2016 on the promise to “Make America Great Again.” His campaign for re-election in November pledges, with all the clueless arrogance we have come to expect, to “Keep America Great.”

Is this the same America that is facing widespread protests over systemic racism and police brutality, and in which the law-enforcement officers who are supposed to keep the peace are routinely stoking violence? The America where the police kill black men at 2.5 times the rate of white men?

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0 Comments on this paragraph, 11 Comments on this article

David Lentz Jun 21, 2020

Trump noticed the lack of accountability for the elite in America and seized on it.
So the real issue is that “no accountability for judges, police, elected officials, Presidents” in America
Trump said only he could fix it
So he got elected
But has only used it to seize the opportunity to be dictator
Hilarious
Now people are saying well maybe the police should be held accountable
But then the police will resist as they unconsciously or consciously know their masters the elite are not held accountable
It’s too late now
Trump will be the emperor
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Raja Rajamani Jun 18, 2020

What is the use of writing in this journal which is a professional one, sort of left wing populist, and will have minimal impact on the American voters.
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Marc Laventurier Jun 18, 2020

Trump isn't Voldemort - he's P.T. Barnum whose hero is Rupert Murdoch. Elements of the american public include the identifiable 'authoritarian' type (22%, classically) but more decisively, decades-worth of 'suckers' who were Barnums' stock and trade. That, reinforced by right-wing propaganda reaching back to the cold war and commercialized by Murdoch, Ailes et al., coupled with the 'electoral college' designed to appease slave-holders, and you have the formula to finally fully realize the towering hypocrisy at the core of american 'ideals', 'exceptionalism' and 'dream', and to reveal 'the city on a hill' as TrumpLand. What's the matter with Kansas? As comic Ron White says, you can't fix stupid...

A trump second term would be the warm-up act for the right-wing media empire that was his original motivation. Fox seems to carry advertisements for geriatric markets, such as colostomy bags; trump would optimize profits by cutting out the middle-man.
- Raja Rajamani Jun 18, 2020
  
  You are right. Trump is going to get elected again. For many reasons. Biden. Damage and looting done in the name of BLM. Hard core unwavering support. Incumbency. Electoral College. Knack for calling a spade a spade, which to even his skeptics sounds appropriate eg China.
  - kevin kanter Jun 19, 2020
    
    Raja Rajamani…
    I think your reiteration of some of the main drivers of the Trump movement is leading you to a despair and an unreasonable capitulation that "Trump is going to get elected again". There is a broad understanding of the Trump self-promotion and its dark underpinnings and implications that did not exist in 2016, but was evident in 2018. Yes, there is a gathering repudiation of such Trumpist ideology as well as a more powerful force. The American people do not like the boring re-hash of the circus - which is what Trump does like to try to recreate. Boredom of Trump will lead to abandonment of his circus.
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- Marc Laventurier Jun 18, 2020
  
  Be warned - for the first time in my experience with PS, the first submission of this comment above didn't display at all, so after an hour I screen-scraped the text from my 'profile' and resubmitted, now somehow resulting in a double-barrel of moneys for your amusement...
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Marc Laventurier Jun 18, 2020

Trump isn't Voldemort - he's P.T. Barnum whose hero is Rupert Murdoch. Elements of the american public include the identifiable 'authoritarian' type (22%, classically) but more decisively, decades-worth of 'suckers' who were Barnums' stock and trade. That, reinforced by right-wing propaganda reaching back to the cold war and commercialized by Murdoch, Ailes et al., coupled with the 'electoral college' designed to appease slave-holders, and you have the formula to finally fully realize the towering hypocrisy at the core of american 'ideals', 'exceptionalism' and 'dream', and to reveal 'the city on a hill' as TrumpLand. What's the matter with Kansas? As comic Ron White says, you can't fix stupid...

A trump second term would be the warm-up act for the right-wing media empire that was his original motivation. Fox seems to carry advertisements for geriatric markets, such as colostomy bags; trump would optimize profits by cutting out the middle-man.
A new reply to this comment has been posted.
Jan-Pieter Van Niekerk Jun 18, 2020

Agree, that it is highly likely that most of the ' policy shapers' at the Republican side, agree with Trump. And going further on that idea: even if Biden would win (by a clear margin or not), we know how the Republicans in Congress will behave. We saw during Obama and Clinton. However way this will go, we (i.e. the world as a whole, incl America) are in for four more years of trouble.
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Christopher williams Jun 18, 2020

The danger of Trump is clear, both leading up to the election and what he might do afterwards if he won (or even go close). But the longer term concern is how the Republican party has made virtually no effort to have an alternative to him, suggesting that his views are in line with the vast majority of the party.
It is hard to accept such a situation; would a left-leaning democrat 'earn' a similar following if elected?
The risk of extremism - on both sides - must be taken seriously. There could be as much danger of Trump launching his TV network to encourage his followers into action, having lost the election as having him win it. Of course, Biden is a better choice - and the world leaders would all be happy to see it - but whether he is strong enough to control the Trumpists is very doubtful.
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Emanuel Müller Jun 18, 2020

This comment was removed by a moderator. Replies to this comment may also be deleted. Please note that we moderate comments to ensure the conversation remains topically relevant. We appreciate well-informed comments and welcome your criticism and insight. Please be civil and avoid name-calling and ad hominem remarks.
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j. von Hettlingen Jun 18, 2020

Shlomo Ben-Ami says too much is at stake in November. Should Trump win another term, it could “embolden” him “to act even more irresponsibly, even criminally, and make his toxic legacy irreversible.” Despite declining approval rating, Trump might still win in November, even though a large and growing number of Americans seems to realise that Trump is not the sort of leader that Max Weber (1864-1920), a German sociologist, philosopher, jurist, and political economist, believed should “be allowed to put his hand on the wheel of history.”
The problem is that the US “was a tinderbox of racism, inequality, and broken politics” well before Trump came to office. But he “lit the match” and added fuel to the fire. Then he “held himself blameless” for the inferno. As always he refuses to take responsibility, when things go wrong. He has been accused of responding too slow to the health crisis, or misleading people into ingesting disinfectant after he dubbed it a possible treatment for Covid-19.
“Unless Americans vote him out in November, putting out the fires – and repairing the national and international damage – may well become impossible,” according to the author. There seems no way for Trump to win, unless he cheats again, plotting to beat his rival, Joe Biden. In 2016 Hillary Clinton won the popular vote against Trump by 3 million but still lost the election. Biden will win more votes than Clinton, but Trump could still win the Electoral College with the help of his ardent fan base of supporters: evangelicals, white supremacists, rural Americans….
Trump wants to stop people from voting by mail, and Republicans are also against it, because it would make voting easier, lifting voter suppression. They also know that there is little support for their agenda. The only way Trump can win is to do whatever it needs to rig the election. There’s no assurance that he will accept the validity of the election results. He sees mail-in voting as a plot to steal the election. He had once suggested that he might emulate what Xi Jinping and Putin do, to stay in office beyond the Constitution’s eight-year limit.
In order to convince the American public that Trump really has lost is to make sure Joe Biden wins a resounding victory. It would be a nightmare if the election is both close and contested, instead of a wipeout for Trump. In Michigan, the outcome could depend on mail-in voting, which Trump has sought to discredit. He could demand postelection recounts when the votes are not in his favour. But Putin will also make sure that his cyber trolls will do their job to help his stooge win – like in 2016.
If Biden were to win a narrow victory, Trump could contest the results and claim he had actually won. He could turn to his supporters, urging them to take to the streets and take up arms. The military could be put on high alert, and he could pressure government officials to pick sides and sort out the competing claims about who won. A supine Justice Department led by Attorney General William Barr might bolster Trump’s claims by issuing statements that the election was tainted.
The world is watching the November elections very closely. People outside America are eager to see the back of Trump. Yet it is up to his voters to decide. Many Americans do not mind Trump shifting “public money from the social safety net and education to the military.” Having the world’s largest defence budget makes them feel safe, even if it means abdicating global leadership and letting China fill the vacuum. Most Americans care little about US foreign policy.
But the rest of the world feels the huge impact when Trump flouts “diplomatic norms”; withdraws from multilateral accords – Paris climate agreement and the nuclear deal with Iran – insults and betrays allies; bullyies other countries, bending them to his will with threats and sanctions. Trump has no clue about making his country great, all the ingredients to make it happen are lacking: the ability to project soft power.
The two military strategists, Captain Wayne Porter and Colonel Mark Mykleby, claimed in 2011 that “national security depends not only on the capacity to respond to threats from foreign powers, but also – and perhaps more important – on the ‘application of credible influence and strength.’ That influence, in turn, depends on America’s success in providing a “pathway of promise” for US citizens – and a model for the world.”
The author is right about Trump being incapable of promoting civilian values, fostering competitiveness and innovation, protecting the environment, investing in social services, health care, culture, and education, and delivering opportunities to younger generations. It is depressing to watch how his ignorant supporters rally behind him. Sadly, they have been brainwashed by right-wing media.
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Elizabeth Pula Jun 17, 2020

Excellent opening paragraph. In fact any symbolic parallels are beyond sacrilegious, as an exceptional example of total antithesis of ethical, spiritual principles in action.The fact is rooted in group total unawareness of the real conceptualization process to UNDERSTANDING.
Ben-Ami, you have documented the worst symbolic event to date of this century. I have confirmed that attempt of process, based on evidentiary action.
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