Sore loser

by David Benjamin 

“Now it is Biden’s moment… The moment of an American who understands that you can’t sculpt from rotten wood, and so every democracy requires the foundation of truth.”

— Roger Cohen

MADISON, Wis. — I’m the eternal political optimist, even in the wake of  two presidential elections that would’ve prompted Pollyanna to kick a hole in a stained-glass window. To further shake my faith, a number of major pundits have opined that, though Donald Trump is facing White House eviction, “Trumpism” will linger stubbornly in the body politic.

Other editorialists are making earnest, although somewhat convoluted, efforts to define the term, Trumpism. In popular usage, however, it boils down pretty plainly to racism, tribalism and triumphal ignorance. These moral mutations are hardly novel. They’ve been elements of America’s fractious democracy since our beginnings. They are ingrained among us, timeless and pernicious but — in the optimistic view — not destiny.

Like all its jingoist and know-nothing forebears, “Trumpism” feasts and flourishes on a diet of lies, slurs, buncombe and propaganda. This crapola flood seems worse in the era of Trump because it moves so much faster and spreads so prolifically on social media platforms whose robotic algorithms are calibrated to incite paranoia and heighten animosity. 

The paranoid style in American politics, as explained long ago by Richard Hofstadter, thrives on the madness of crowds and cultivates hostility toward a free and critical press. Throughout the 20th century, the first act of a despot in his coup d’etat has been the seizure of the radio waves, or TV networks, or — nowadays — Twitter (on which, as a sign of anti-democratic progress, you can tell a Big Lie instantly to twenty million people without the expense of staging a revolution).

Through its opportunist enablers, Trumpism has thrived on legislative paralysis and scorched-earth obstruction. The Republican barons of the Senate have fostered the illusion of an imperial presidency by rendering their own body impotent. Forsaking legislation, they focus exclusively on packing the federal judiciary with subservient judges, most of them thrust improbably into a dizzying prominence that they never could have imagined if measured by their merits. 

But here’s where my optimism kicks in. The chameleon ideology of Trumpism will linger among us, as it has before by any other of its many names. But Trump? I’m skeptical.

On 20 January, Trump’s erstwhile Richelieu, majority leader Mitch McConnell will be alone in his office — door closed — shoutin’ Hallelujah and doin’ the Eagle Rock. Mitch will welcome Trump’s departure because, to his chagrin, this regime has been a circus act that thrust him too often into the spotlight’s glare, on TV, right next to Trump. He’s the kind of guy who feels no qualms about raping and strangling Lady Justice, but preferably in the wings behind the scenery, her screams drowned out by corporate applause while the curtain descends and the stage goes dark.

Mitch, not Trump, is now the GOP boss. Racism, tribalism and triumph ignorance will become McConnellism, but will not be called such. Mitch won’t crow about taking charge. Chances are he’ll allow — even encourage — Trump and his parasitic kids to set up shop in the private sector and whinge to their heart’s content. Mitch, meanwhile, will turn his carapace on Trump, never to suffer, patronize or praise him. They have shared their last podium. Liberated from the orangutan on his back, Mitch will secretly summon Lindsey, Ted and the rest of the wrecking crew to his office. He will methodically contrive the sabotage of the Biden presidency and the continued usurpation of the federal judiciary.

“Trumpism,” as a media mantra, will live on annoyingly, but Trump will go back to being a B-list celebrity and a never-ending meme in the dark corners of social media. His only vestige of power will be his ability to stir the emotions of a vast personal nation of groupies, bullies, zealots and bigots in ugly red caps. His faithful will still mingle among us, brandishing their AR-15s, growling their grievances, strutting, fretting and frightening the horses. This is hardly new. In all its diversity, America has always tolerated a performative subspecies of self-exiled outcasts who accomplish nothing and do little harm, but style themselves as rugged outlaws for whom compassion, social grace or even good table manners represent a capitulation the invisible thieves of their pioneer souls. Trump will be, until a windier blowhard comes along, their Viagra.

The Post’s Paul Waldman has suggested that Trump’s “Trumpists” are now firmly embedded in the Republican Party. He contends that Donald Trump will reign, despite his defeat, as the de facto “leader” of the GOP, and implies that powerful Republicans, kindly old Mitch McConnell most notably, will bow to Trump’s impulsive, erratic and vindictive dominion over them, forever.

It’s a bird. It’a a plane! It’s a pig?

Trump has neither the alliances nor the self-discipline to sustain the political power that landed in his ample lap on 6 November 2016. After 3 November 2020, no legitimate TV network will ever again hug him to its bosom — as did NBC in its calamitous decision to cast a failed casino tycoon as a paragon of capitalism. Although Trump will for a while haunt “Fox and Friends,” as well as Breitbart, AON and talk radio, his segments will gradually peter out. As Trump news becomes old news until it’s no news at all, it will dawn on everyone in Trump World that Trump ain’t president anymore. 

A cult can’t last without a pulpit. Joe Biden took the pulpit.

Now in America, I hear liberals lamenting the narrowness of Biden’s margin, as though winning the seventh game of the World Series on an infield error in the 15th inning sullies every heroic effort, all season, that made the victory possible. Winning, like death, has no degrees. Biden has won. 

And Trump is what he despises most in the world. He’s a loser. 

History tells us that Joe Biden will be stymied at every turn by Moscow Mitch. Nevertheless, Biden will still be president, still possessed of the power to mobilize the federal government and enlist every state governor in a program to contain, at last, Covid-19. Biden will end the torrent of lies that has been pouring from the White House. He’ll retire the term “fake news.” He’ll turn Cabinet agencies back over to civil servants who know what their doing. He’ll fire, ideally by mail, Louis DeJoy. He’ll hire back the Inspectors General and, along with them, I hope, the banished heroes of the Trump purge, especially Andrew McCabe, Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman (and his brother), Olivia Troye and Marie Yovanovich. He should give them all a raise, back pay and a promotion. If he’s smart, he’ll name Sally Yates Attorney General and stand aside as she clears the wreckage left behind by Jeff Sessions, Rod Rosenstein, the idiot Whitaker kid and Bill Barr.

Which means, of course, that U.S. Attorneys at the Southern District of New York, as well as Manhattan D.A. Cyrus Vance and New York Attorney General Letitia James can buckle back down to their myriad probes into Trump’s grifts, cons, scams, financial crimes, shell companies and porn stars. Does Cyprus have an extradition treaty?

Joe Biden will have a lot to do and a lot of barbed wire to clear. But he will be, refreshingly, a leader worthy of calling himself president, commander in chief and leader of a free world.

And Donald Trump will not.