Doubling Down

Donald Trump is no fool. Sure this legacy looks bad. Whether his firestorm candidacy sustains to the nomination is very much in doubt, but his escalating statements of outrage, regurgitation of non-existent “facts” without retraction even in the utter absence of tangible proof, have made it very difficult for the mainstream Republican Party to stand behind his policies were he to be nominated. His candidacy is a running joke in the foreign press, and his statements are often used by ISIS itself to prove that the United States has mounted a very real “war on Islam,” a fear that resonates with too many Muslims who are beginning to believe that they now have to take sides, mostly against the U.S.. Given his substantial lead in the polls, ISIS has little problem using Trump as a reflection of true American feelings or intentions, a recruiting bonanza.

He may be also forcing GOP to take positions that will push Trump into a highly divisive third party candidacy if he does not get their nomination. As Republican candidates have pretty much uniformly condemned Trump’s rather blatantly unconstitutional effort to ban any Muslims from entering the United States until the government figures out “what the hell is going on,” he is able to use this rejection by party stalwarts as reason why his agreement to support the ultimate GOP candidate is now vitiated. As outrageous as his positions might be, The Donald most certainly knows how to cater to his base, who just love his non-PC utterances. He knows how to cater to their fear. He understands demagoguery like no other.

Aside from his soaring popularity with an ultra-conservative constituency, Trump is also doing what he knows best: staying in the headlines. For a mostly self-financed campaign, Trump’s ability to stay in the press is a Godsend in free publicity. The Washington Post (December 8^th) explains: “He’s like a professional wrestler in his ability to say things that keep him at the center of attention. Trump accounted for 81 percent of all social media mentions about the 2016 GOP candidates [on December 7^th], according to our analytics partners at Zignal Labs. Including Hillary and Bernie, it was still 66 percent. Even for Trump, who has dominated the online conversation since getting into the race, these were record-breaking numbers. He received more mentions in the hour after his statement went out than any of his rivals received all day long. Of the 630,000 Trump-related Tweets on [December 7^th], more than 148,000 mentioned Muslims or Islam.” The Post provided the above Zignal chart to reinforce their point.

With the remaining GOP candidates fighting a defensive battle against a seeming Trump juggernaut, media players are making money hand-over-fist as SuperPacs and the candidates themselves grab media space and time like heroin addicts looking for a fix. “CBS chairman and CEO Les Moonves, speaking at UBS Media conference on December 7^th was less than subtle about this horn of plenty: “We have a year of political advertising that looks like it’s shaping up to be pretty phenomenal…. We have 16 GOP candidates throwing crap at each other. It’s great. The more they spend, the better it is for us. Go Donald! Keep getting out there and–this is fun.”

We know the problem with this rabble-rousing, reminiscent of America’s bout with yellow journalism in the latter half of the 19^th century. “Yellow journalism was a style of newspaper reporting that emphasized sensationalism over facts. During its heyday in the late 19th century it was one of many factors that helped push the United States and Spain into war in Cuba and the Philippines, leading to the acquisition of overseas territory by the United States.” Office of the Historian, U.S. Dept. of State. It didn’t do a lot of harm outside of the U.S., because we were hardly the global power we become after World Wars I & II. Today, however, our domestic sensationalism echoes around the world. Expediency to get elected has long-lasting consequences on this over-connected planet, particularly to a nation clinging to its dwindling position as the biggest and most powerful country in the world. We could not be losing bona fide allies or growing enemies as fast as we are without such sensationalism.

I’m Peter Dekom, and the more we engage in baiting those we fear, the more we will have to fear… for real.