I will never understand the Trump cult (and I have a degree in religion and philosophy). I just can't understand how anyone looks back on the four year Trump reign of terror and sees it as a Golden Age. Think about it. The one legislative achievement was a tax cut that enriched the richest (and raised my taxes). And his time in office ended in near economic collapse caused by his botched response to the pandemic. I guess it was all worth it for a judiciary packed with right wing ideologues. Right?
I heard the indictment news in a text message from a friend as I emerged from a sightseeing tour of The Parthenon in Nashville, TN. The Parthenon is set in a huge field, where people were happily sunbathing on a beautiful spring day. The song, "Ding Dong, the Witch is Dead" from The Wizard of Oz immediately flooded my brain. I pictured my 72-year-old self acrobatically flipping across the huge field with sheer joy, the music blaring from on high. Unfortunately, no one else seemed to be in this delusional mood, so I controlled myself until I reached my car, when I let out with a few "Yippees."
It occurred to me later that in my mind I must regard Trump as a Witch. Hence for me the "witch hunt" terminology makes perfect sense.
Unfortunately, the media helps to promote this propaganda by publishing what they say without saying that it's not true. trump gets more free publicity than any other candidate in history.
As always, a great article! What would it take for democracy-loving people to create our own counter-narrative? Anat Shenker-Osorio is great at doing the qualitative research on political message framing and coming up with talking points for activists, but it frustrates me no end that we can't seem to scale it to push back against the Right's propaganda. Help!
Agree. An analogy is like fly-flishing where you cast your rod out (2024 election cycle). We must determine where we want to be then -- and plan backwards our goalposts.
That is how they do it. That is what the pro- democracy stategists must plot out backwards. It's always opposite -everything they do!
John WIlkins introduces my favorite word, "insurrectionist." Rachel Maddow the other night ticked off the requirements to run for president: 35 years old, etc. I was waiting for her to mention the 4th recommendation in the Jan 6 report: Fourteenth Amendment, Section 3. I will just quote the last sentence, "The Committee notes that Ms. Wasserman Schultz and Mr. Raskin have introduced H. Con. Res. 93 to declare the January 6 assault an insurrection and H.R. 7906 to establish specific procedures and standards for disqualification under section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment in the United States district court for the District of Columbia." In short, Trump can't run for president because he engaged in an insurrection; he incited an insurrection; he gave aid and comfort to an insurrection. Wake up, Rachel, talk about this, please!
So true! So sad that autocracy has crept into our politics. The insanity kool-aid the GOP drank seems to have consumed them, and sadly, it's contagious to those willing to worship an immoral, unethical, and narcissitic creature who begs his believers for money at every turn.
I decided to post a reprise of Trump stiffing subcontractors to MAGA followers to see their replies, as this is an issue for which they might have sympathies/concerns. Uniformly, the response was “fake news”. (USA Today, Fox News). I suggested they call the guys in the articles, to ‘do their own research.’ Suggestion rejected.
My experiment brought home to me the autocratic right’s success in destroying trust or even interest in facts. It is a deeply disturbing condition and we have to figure this into everything we say and do.
However, our chats did de-escalate from abuse to dialogue, a plus! I’m reading Mehdi Hasan’s Win Every Argument.
The dialogues slowly do move the needle i have noticed progress too in this way. I'm going to read Medhi's book. Thanks for sharing your experience, appreciate. This is where it's at.
Thanks for a succinct description and explanation of "propaganda" in the context of the Republican response to reasonable indictments of Trump. Knowing how it works is the basis for creating a media based response to these attempts to organize our beliefs around a fictitious narrative. We can all write a letter to the editor of our local newspapers calling out this behavior for what it is and supporting the evidence-based rule of law implicit in the indictment process.
How could Trump have happened? How could anyone ever buy into the Trump psycho shit circus? Its just so mind boggling isn't it. I got help to understand the phenomenon or should I say education from reading and studying the work of several scholars on the subject. But the one that really hit home the most for me is Ruth Ben-Ghiat. I think what Ruth teaches about the history of fascism, propaganda, leader cults and her 5 tools of rule explains and demystifies the riddle of Trump's appeal better than most anything out there! (Jason Stanley, Tim Snyder etc. not with standing).
How does Trump do it? Once people buy into a leader cult they then can be easily manipulated. Buying into a leader cult means forming a bond of love and loyalty with that leader. Bonds of love are strong. This is how authoritarians derive their power. Their followers can be made to believe anything and once that happens violence isn't far off. Trump famously said "I could shoot someone on 5th avenue and not lose any votes" he was right! On Jan 6th we saw how powerful big lies can motivate MAGA cult followers into violence and insurrection. Since then, over a thousand of his rubes and lemmings have been convicted and sentenced in court.
I think its important to recognize Trump accomplishes this because he is a genius at propaganda and demagoguery. In terms of skill, rhetoric, performance, stage crafting, victimization etc. I believe Donald Trump ranks right up there with the very best fascists and strongmen in history in my opinion. Including Mussolini, the Fuhrer and more recently Berlusconi etc.
Great points. I think there is a lot also to the idea that Trump plays a buffoonish character on television. He is more contrived actor than many give him the credit for. He lacks book smarts, but I agree, he has genius in these other arenas.
I've heard from a few sources that Trump's special sauce in this regard is using a pseudo-science technique called neuro-linguistic programing. With a skilled and trained practitioner, it apparently works similarly to hypnosis, but without direct commands, working more to create associations, manipulate loyalties, attitudes etc. The cult deprogramming expert Dr Steve Hassan discusses this in detail in the excellent podcast, American Psyop
Gary, I think you present a great description of some of Trump's skills and the ways in which he accomplishes some of his propaganda and demagoguery methods. I agree that Trump uses “victimhood” as a method for misusing and exploiting others, and generally presents this victimization to shield a self-image of superiority and delusions of magnificence. Whenever Trump is called out on his corruption, he just blames others that he is the victim in the situation. I recently read an article that this is a classic and destructive form of what is often called malignant narcissism!
Trump has used victimization throughout his entire presidency including harassment, CNN media attacks, a victim of the pandemic, his impeachments, accusations of conspiring with Russian agents, etc.. But in actuality, Trump is almost always the wrongdoer or lawbreaker.
The article asserts that Trump’s victimization is genuinely alarming as it has permitted him to be a cruel bully, dishonest crook with no responsibility or shame – and the article avows that Trumps pathology is fundamentally self-destructive which is what I guess we have been seeing all along!
Indeed the victimization card is a key component of fascism. It both creates sympathy and justices violence and cruelty at the same time.
History shows the self-destructive nature of fascist leaders. Hitler died by cyanide capsule in the bunker and Mussolini was shot by partisans and later strung up by piano wire in the streets.
American democracy and Donald Trump can not survive the other.
FYI Professor, as you probably already know, more strange stuff is happening on twitter. I follow you but your tweets never appear in my feed. I realized that yesterday when I noticed a tweet from a Fox host was in my feed but when I checked your feed there were several (all actually) that you had posted far more recently that I was never shown :-// So if you see folks suddenly liking tweets from the last several days then it means they are experiencing what I am. Thanks you for all you do and I wish you the very best of luck in everything you are working on =]
"....Propaganda (System of organizing belief)"....
The upcoming 2024 US election some are saying will have the highest levels of misinformation and influence strategies in history. There is a balancing act that must be protected with freedom of speech while also protecting the voters’ ability to get the crucial facts regarding elections correct as well.
The Democrats in the U.S. Congress proposed the “Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimidation Prevention Act” in 2021, which would prohibit deceptive practices, false statements, and voter interference regarding federal elections -- however, the legislation was stalled.
Furthermore, the misinformation being criminalized is also very important in understanding an actual violation of the first amendment. Paul Smith, an election lawyer and senior vice-president of the Campaign Legal Center, says spreading false information with the intention of interfering with an election is campaign fraud and is not protected by the U.S. Constitution! But “you could also make an argument that if people don’t trust the voting machines, they won’t show up to vote,” Smith has also said, and his talking points have “become popularized by conspiracy theorists, Trump, and has led to gray areas” of propaganda!
Finally, voting rights groups in the past have advocated for laws against deceptive methods that would protect voters from misleading information about voting in the “lead up” to an election. Distributing flyers or social media posts with incorrect information regarding voter eligibility, are often used in minority neighborhoods.
I mean, the hubris of an obese octogenrian promoting themselves as Rocky is just mindbending. He needs a golf cart to get to tee! You might be in a cult if that is anything but ridiculous to you, lol.
Hard to gauge if any of this messaging is having any real impact. There does not seem to be any threatening protest planned or anything like Jan 6 in the works. But the likes of Sarah Kendzior mention that we should not expect that sort of response but rather sporadic terrorist attacks from far-right extremist cells. According to this thinking, the focus on Waco is very much meant to conjure that controversial FBI raid that killed so many gun toting religious zealots and inspired in part the Oklahoma city bombing. Trump and gang are seemingly trying to harness those same violent undercurrents. My $0.02, Trump is looking for a means to ignite civil war as a means to restore his power, but is not likely going to get a whole lot of traction.
Thanks Diane for your focus on 2024; and how we can work backwards from there and establish roadposts and guide posts to get us safely to 2024 success.
You nailed it again! Trump is the number 1 insurrectionist!
I will never understand the Trump cult (and I have a degree in religion and philosophy). I just can't understand how anyone looks back on the four year Trump reign of terror and sees it as a Golden Age. Think about it. The one legislative achievement was a tax cut that enriched the richest (and raised my taxes). And his time in office ended in near economic collapse caused by his botched response to the pandemic. I guess it was all worth it for a judiciary packed with right wing ideologues. Right?
I heard the indictment news in a text message from a friend as I emerged from a sightseeing tour of The Parthenon in Nashville, TN. The Parthenon is set in a huge field, where people were happily sunbathing on a beautiful spring day. The song, "Ding Dong, the Witch is Dead" from The Wizard of Oz immediately flooded my brain. I pictured my 72-year-old self acrobatically flipping across the huge field with sheer joy, the music blaring from on high. Unfortunately, no one else seemed to be in this delusional mood, so I controlled myself until I reached my car, when I let out with a few "Yippees."
It occurred to me later that in my mind I must regard Trump as a Witch. Hence for me the "witch hunt" terminology makes perfect sense.
Unfortunately, the media helps to promote this propaganda by publishing what they say without saying that it's not true. trump gets more free publicity than any other candidate in history.
As in wall to wall coverage of a Trump branded plane landing and taxiing to a gate. WTF.
Yes, it reminded me of what Hitler did making it look like he came out of the clouds.
As always, a great article! What would it take for democracy-loving people to create our own counter-narrative? Anat Shenker-Osorio is great at doing the qualitative research on political message framing and coming up with talking points for activists, but it frustrates me no end that we can't seem to scale it to push back against the Right's propaganda. Help!
Agree. An analogy is like fly-flishing where you cast your rod out (2024 election cycle). We must determine where we want to be then -- and plan backwards our goalposts.
That is how they do it. That is what the pro- democracy stategists must plot out backwards. It's always opposite -everything they do!
John WIlkins introduces my favorite word, "insurrectionist." Rachel Maddow the other night ticked off the requirements to run for president: 35 years old, etc. I was waiting for her to mention the 4th recommendation in the Jan 6 report: Fourteenth Amendment, Section 3. I will just quote the last sentence, "The Committee notes that Ms. Wasserman Schultz and Mr. Raskin have introduced H. Con. Res. 93 to declare the January 6 assault an insurrection and H.R. 7906 to establish specific procedures and standards for disqualification under section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment in the United States district court for the District of Columbia." In short, Trump can't run for president because he engaged in an insurrection; he incited an insurrection; he gave aid and comfort to an insurrection. Wake up, Rachel, talk about this, please!
“How Propaganda Works” by Dr. Jason Stanley
Pulling it all together in a 20 min video presentation a 7th grader can understand:
https://youtu.be/09maaUaRT4M
So true! So sad that autocracy has crept into our politics. The insanity kool-aid the GOP drank seems to have consumed them, and sadly, it's contagious to those willing to worship an immoral, unethical, and narcissitic creature who begs his believers for money at every turn.
Sadly some middle-class Americans admire the wealthy so much, they hitch their wagon to them. Much to their own peril.
I decided to post a reprise of Trump stiffing subcontractors to MAGA followers to see their replies, as this is an issue for which they might have sympathies/concerns. Uniformly, the response was “fake news”. (USA Today, Fox News). I suggested they call the guys in the articles, to ‘do their own research.’ Suggestion rejected.
My experiment brought home to me the autocratic right’s success in destroying trust or even interest in facts. It is a deeply disturbing condition and we have to figure this into everything we say and do.
However, our chats did de-escalate from abuse to dialogue, a plus! I’m reading Mehdi Hasan’s Win Every Argument.
Diane what a factual conversation starter.
The dialogues slowly do move the needle i have noticed progress too in this way. I'm going to read Medhi's book. Thanks for sharing your experience, appreciate. This is where it's at.
=]
Thanks for a succinct description and explanation of "propaganda" in the context of the Republican response to reasonable indictments of Trump. Knowing how it works is the basis for creating a media based response to these attempts to organize our beliefs around a fictitious narrative. We can all write a letter to the editor of our local newspapers calling out this behavior for what it is and supporting the evidence-based rule of law implicit in the indictment process.
How could Trump have happened? How could anyone ever buy into the Trump psycho shit circus? Its just so mind boggling isn't it. I got help to understand the phenomenon or should I say education from reading and studying the work of several scholars on the subject. But the one that really hit home the most for me is Ruth Ben-Ghiat. I think what Ruth teaches about the history of fascism, propaganda, leader cults and her 5 tools of rule explains and demystifies the riddle of Trump's appeal better than most anything out there! (Jason Stanley, Tim Snyder etc. not with standing).
How does Trump do it? Once people buy into a leader cult they then can be easily manipulated. Buying into a leader cult means forming a bond of love and loyalty with that leader. Bonds of love are strong. This is how authoritarians derive their power. Their followers can be made to believe anything and once that happens violence isn't far off. Trump famously said "I could shoot someone on 5th avenue and not lose any votes" he was right! On Jan 6th we saw how powerful big lies can motivate MAGA cult followers into violence and insurrection. Since then, over a thousand of his rubes and lemmings have been convicted and sentenced in court.
I think its important to recognize Trump accomplishes this because he is a genius at propaganda and demagoguery. In terms of skill, rhetoric, performance, stage crafting, victimization etc. I believe Donald Trump ranks right up there with the very best fascists and strongmen in history in my opinion. Including Mussolini, the Fuhrer and more recently Berlusconi etc.
Great points. I think there is a lot also to the idea that Trump plays a buffoonish character on television. He is more contrived actor than many give him the credit for. He lacks book smarts, but I agree, he has genius in these other arenas.
I've heard from a few sources that Trump's special sauce in this regard is using a pseudo-science technique called neuro-linguistic programing. With a skilled and trained practitioner, it apparently works similarly to hypnosis, but without direct commands, working more to create associations, manipulate loyalties, attitudes etc. The cult deprogramming expert Dr Steve Hassan discusses this in detail in the excellent podcast, American Psyop
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bonus-episode-with-dr-steve-hassan/id1652143101?i=1000597386924
Gary, I think you present a great description of some of Trump's skills and the ways in which he accomplishes some of his propaganda and demagoguery methods. I agree that Trump uses “victimhood” as a method for misusing and exploiting others, and generally presents this victimization to shield a self-image of superiority and delusions of magnificence. Whenever Trump is called out on his corruption, he just blames others that he is the victim in the situation. I recently read an article that this is a classic and destructive form of what is often called malignant narcissism!
Trump has used victimization throughout his entire presidency including harassment, CNN media attacks, a victim of the pandemic, his impeachments, accusations of conspiring with Russian agents, etc.. But in actuality, Trump is almost always the wrongdoer or lawbreaker.
The article asserts that Trump’s victimization is genuinely alarming as it has permitted him to be a cruel bully, dishonest crook with no responsibility or shame – and the article avows that Trumps pathology is fundamentally self-destructive which is what I guess we have been seeing all along!
Thank you Diane.
Indeed the victimization card is a key component of fascism. It both creates sympathy and justices violence and cruelty at the same time.
History shows the self-destructive nature of fascist leaders. Hitler died by cyanide capsule in the bunker and Mussolini was shot by partisans and later strung up by piano wire in the streets.
American democracy and Donald Trump can not survive the other.
FYI Professor, as you probably already know, more strange stuff is happening on twitter. I follow you but your tweets never appear in my feed. I realized that yesterday when I noticed a tweet from a Fox host was in my feed but when I checked your feed there were several (all actually) that you had posted far more recently that I was never shown :-// So if you see folks suddenly liking tweets from the last several days then it means they are experiencing what I am. Thanks you for all you do and I wish you the very best of luck in everything you are working on =]
"....Propaganda (System of organizing belief)"....
The upcoming 2024 US election some are saying will have the highest levels of misinformation and influence strategies in history. There is a balancing act that must be protected with freedom of speech while also protecting the voters’ ability to get the crucial facts regarding elections correct as well.
The Democrats in the U.S. Congress proposed the “Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimidation Prevention Act” in 2021, which would prohibit deceptive practices, false statements, and voter interference regarding federal elections -- however, the legislation was stalled.
Furthermore, the misinformation being criminalized is also very important in understanding an actual violation of the first amendment. Paul Smith, an election lawyer and senior vice-president of the Campaign Legal Center, says spreading false information with the intention of interfering with an election is campaign fraud and is not protected by the U.S. Constitution! But “you could also make an argument that if people don’t trust the voting machines, they won’t show up to vote,” Smith has also said, and his talking points have “become popularized by conspiracy theorists, Trump, and has led to gray areas” of propaganda!
Finally, voting rights groups in the past have advocated for laws against deceptive methods that would protect voters from misleading information about voting in the “lead up” to an election. Distributing flyers or social media posts with incorrect information regarding voter eligibility, are often used in minority neighborhoods.
I mean, the hubris of an obese octogenrian promoting themselves as Rocky is just mindbending. He needs a golf cart to get to tee! You might be in a cult if that is anything but ridiculous to you, lol.
Hard to gauge if any of this messaging is having any real impact. There does not seem to be any threatening protest planned or anything like Jan 6 in the works. But the likes of Sarah Kendzior mention that we should not expect that sort of response but rather sporadic terrorist attacks from far-right extremist cells. According to this thinking, the focus on Waco is very much meant to conjure that controversial FBI raid that killed so many gun toting religious zealots and inspired in part the Oklahoma city bombing. Trump and gang are seemingly trying to harness those same violent undercurrents. My $0.02, Trump is looking for a means to ignite civil war as a means to restore his power, but is not likely going to get a whole lot of traction.
Thanks Diane for your focus on 2024; and how we can work backwards from there and establish roadposts and guide posts to get us safely to 2024 success.