Remember
James Carville’s Clinton era campaign slogan, “It’s the economy, stupid”?
Well,
as Forrest Gump said, “Stupid is as stupid does”. None of us are immune from
saying and doing stupid things. But many of us seem to enjoy the liberating
feeling of being stupid and not knowing it. Enter the Dunning Kruger Effect, named
after David Dunning and Justin Kruger. They described the cognitive bias in
which people with limited competence in a given area of expertise overestimate
their abilities.
This
applies to our politics more than ever. What many voters think they know is far
less than what they actually know. Everyone who took Trump at his word unwittingly
embraced this effect. But Trump’s true believers aren’t the only ones suffering
from this quirk of cognition. Enough swing voters also fell into the effect. They
didn’t bother to educate themselves about Trump’s crime spree and propensity to
be a pathological liar. They likely spent less time thinking about how to vote
as I did while writing this little essay.
I’m
going to argue that believing falsehoods and ignorance of vital information affected
the election more than anything else. So naturally the economy has become the media
punditry’s explanation for Trump’s win over Kamala Harris. After all, there was
a serious rise of inflation. The fact that it was brought down didn’t get the same
attention.
Pro-Trump
and corpo-media did an excellent job of blaming Biden for post-pandemic supply
chain issues that aggravated global inflation, while the Democrats did a poor
job in messaging its causes. The economy is strong, manufacturing is up, and
unemployment is low, but we are still stuck with the higher prices elevated by global
inflation and corporate greed.
Yes,
inflation was a factor, but I reject that simple excuse as the most significant
influence.
The
reality is Republicans are better at propaganda. They have their own mendacious
media empire to catapult the propaganda. Hell, they’ve even had Russia in their
corner since Trump came along. The most powerful weapon to destabilize the US
was dropped into Putin’s lap.
True
to the authoritarian playbook, Republicans and the far-Right mastered
scapegoating and the blame game. Democrats were weak in both their own defense
and offense, as in framing their opposition as a threat to democracy, decency,
the rule of law, and the truth.
Democrats
should have run footage of J6 and Trump’s praise for his thugs 24/7 throughout
all of October. They didn’t. They failed to exploit the far Right’s greatest
flaw.
Merrick
Garland’s painfully slow initiative in investigating Trump’s crimes took its
toll. The final nail in justice’s coffin was hammered in by Trump’s authoritarian
and corrupt partisan allies on the Supreme Court. “Presidential immunity” was never a thing in
the history of the republic, until the derelict Court decided to reject our ideal
of equal justice under law and openly enable Trump’s criminal behavior. How the
hell did these NOT have profound significance in the election?
I
suggest there are several more factors that had far more influence than the
economy. Apathy, ignorance, emotional manipulation, and the intellectually lazy
and incurious low information voters all took a toll.
It’s
the disinformation, stupid.
Trump’s
endless stream of lies was amplified by both corporate media and his
sycophantic propagandists. Mike Flynn’s Q-Anon domestic psy-ops fed his marks massive troves of lies and wacky conspiracy theories like “Pizza-gate”.
Youtube pushed this disinformation exponentially. Gullible people fell for it all.
It’s
the hate, stupid.
Trump’s
rallies were nothing but extended Orwellian “Two Minute Hate” rallies, inciting
constant anger, and fueling groundless scapegoating and blame in the minds of
his gullible true believers. The free press was called the “enemy of the people”
while Democrats and judges holding him accountable were labeled “the enemy within”.
It’s
corporate media’s “horse race” normalization and “sanewashing” of a criminal,
stupid.
Age
was a critical issue with Biden, but magically not for Trump. Trump’s obvious
criminal behavior and resulting indictments were basically ignored after his circus
of lies and outrageous rhetoric became the next day’s headlines.
It’s
social media, stupid.
Twitter,
facebook gossip, and Trump’s so-called “Truth Social” became primary sources of disinformation for duped buffoons who “did their own research”.
Exhibit
A: “They’re eating the dogs in Springfield!”, howled the man who sent an angry
mob to storm and desecrate the Capitol, terrorize Congress, and beat cops bloody
to overturn a fair election he lost.
Exhibit B: Many Trump voters didn't understand the consequences of their support for Trump until it was too late. Buyers' remorse is setting in. Many Arab third party and Trump voters are realizing Trump's ambassador to Israel said, "There's really no such thing as a Palestinian". Google searches for "How to change my vote" and "Will tariffs cause inflation" spiked after Trump won. Searches for "Did Joe Biden drop out" popped up on Election Day!
The reality is this: Everyone who voted for Trump is either misinformed, willfully ignorant, believes his lies, or just doesn't care.
In
short, “It’s the stupidity, stupid”.