When Ivanka talks, she tries very hard to project “strong confident businesswoman”.
With me, at least, it does not work.
Today the reason I find her so creepy finally hit me.
I am fairly advertising-resistant. I watch ads with a very practiced eye and listen with a very practiced ear. False/misleading/incomplete claims leap out at me and I sometimes actually speak out loud to counteract certain statements to keep them from having any psychological effect on me.
Ad: Aren’t you hungry for Burger King now?
Me: No, I’m not, and in fact I am never hungry for Burger King.
Ad: Nothing works faster on pain relief!
Me: All ibuprofen works in the same amount of time.
Ad: Buy one get another one free, just pay processing and handling.
Me: It’s not free if I have to pay an extra fee for it.
See what I mean?
So, when I watch Ivanka on television and hear her talk, a place in my brain can’t help registering “spokesmodel reading a script”. She always sounds as though she is practicing a voice over for a commercial. The message I get from her Stepford Wife delivery is: “My dial is set to ‘poised young woman’. See how well I have memorized my talking points? See how well I read my lines? I make it look so natural!”
Except it is anything but. Like any successful fashion model she has learned exactly how to hold her face to get certain angles and mimic certain emotional states. But I can see the gears turning. Everything about her public speaking is unsettling to me.
Am I the only one who reacts this way? Tell me if I am crazy.
There were even people here praising her RNC speech, when I thought she looked and sounded like a wind-up doll. Turning her head slowly and deliberately. First to this camera. Then to that one. Now to the third one. It all seemed very programmed. Animatronic.
It reminded me of the parody fossil fuel industry ad in Chapter 4 of Stephen Colbert’s brilliantly prescient book America Again, Rebecoming the Greatness We Never Weren’t (a must-have audiobook for all Colbert fans):
Colbert: So here with more on the exciting opportunities provided by America’s oil and gas producers is the attractively authoritative yet approachable woman from those ads.
Voiceover woman: ...and you can trust me. Because I’m speaking with a clear and soothing tone of voice. I’m speaking slowly. So you know that what I’m saying is true.
Not all advertising is designed to sell a specific product. Some advertising is just meant to enhance the perception of the brand in general. Ivanka is part of DJT’s perception molding. People are supposed to look at her and make positive associations with her that they then transfer to him.
*
Ivanka has really thrown herself into being a walking talking advertisement for DJT. More than most non-spouse family members do during campaigns. More than I have ever seen any candidate’s child do in the past. She was desperately needed as counterweight to his bull in a china shop hypemasculinity. She was reassuring to the “complementarian” fundies who want their men to be men and their women to be girls.
Women were supposed to look at her and think “So modern and yet so traditional—successful yet still soft-spoken and feminine, not domineering like Hillary those pushy ugly loud feminists.” “A beautiful young businesswoman who still has time to be a devoted mom!” “And look at her fashionable clothes and shoes!” She was the perfect anti-Hillary for a demographic DJT most wanted to reach. By association with Ivanka, DJT could soften his image and make it appear as though he values women, reassuring all those soccer moms and WalMart shoppers that they should ignore the evidence of their eyes and ears with respect to his bullying and misogyny. Regardless of what the family would like you to believe, Ivanka did take over an important part of the First Lady role during the campaign: the “he can’t be a bad guy if I love him” role. She defended her father during the pgrabbing incident more effectively than the actual first lady did.
But since I don’t want to live in a mansion or drive a Ferrari, a commercial that starts out with those elements has already lost me. Similarly, I don't want to be anything like Ivanka. Watching her did not create a mindset that made me more favorable to DJT’s message. I find both her image and her reality off-putting. Successful businesswoman? Born on third base and thinks she hit a triple is even more true of her than of GWB. I don’t want her knock-off fashion business, I don’t want her over-rehearsed spokesmodel persona, and I definitely don’t want to be looked at by her father the way her father looks at her.
As far as what men are supposed to think when they look at her, I will not speculate, but she does seem to say “I’m very passionate” a lot.
So when it came to me and people like me, Ivanka’s appeal backfired. His bad reputation rubbed off on her, not the other way around. Since then we have seen her lines being dropped by some retailers for poor sales. A lot of folks looked at her and thought “ick! how can she let him photograph her and pat her down like that?” and “why is she trying to make us believe that he treats women with respect?”
Still if she had not been involved in the campaign, DJT might have gotten a smaller percentage of the women’s vote than he did. This YouTube comment says it all: “...you can judge the parents by how their children turn out as the apple does not fall far from the tree. If Ivanka is the result, then I am hopeful for president-elect Trump's term in office.”
Every time she denied she wanted a role in the White House, those people wanted to believe her. Oh no, she wasn’t some ambitious woman like HRC, who had the nerve to act like she was on the staff when WJC was elected. Ivanka would *never* do anything like *that*!
I wonder what they think now, all the people who watched this interview moment and thought it was real:
Note how deftly Ivanka barrels right through Lesley Stahl’s attempt at a follow-up question (“but you won’t be *in*s...”) by continuing her talking points as if she had not been interrupted. Playing the daughter card, hitting all the talking points for the soccer mom vote: wage equality, child care, education, opportunities for women. “But not in a formal, administrative capacity.” Oh no. Surely not.
But DJT wanted her on the staff, presumably because he can’t function at a high level without her. She knows how to manage him emotionally, just looking at her feeds his ego, and according to him she is always pushing him to do the right thing.
Now she has a West Wing office, holding daddy’s hand and making sure he doesn’t bounce off the walls, being his eyes and ears in meetings when he is too distracted with moving things around on the table to pay close attention.
DJT has never worked hard in his life. He delegates the real work to the people under him. All he wants to do is complain when things don’t go well and take credit when they do. As a result he has no trusted people he can bring in from his previous life. His profound isolation and loneliness mean that he only has family to turn to. Technically they have found a way to claim it doesn’t violate the nepotism laws to have a daughter and son in law running the country for him. Poor Mike Pence. No wonder they are engineering these 50-50 votes in the Senate to give him something to do.
Just like Bannon, we can’t stop Ivanka from taking the job. Unelected, not even subject to congressional approval, we can’t stop her from getting a security clearance. One former NSA employee expressed this in an LTE:
...I question the casual manner in which Ivanka Trump, the president’s daughter, is being given access to classified information. With no official position within this administration, where is the proof of her “need to know”? With no oath of office or other pledge of confidentiality, how will she be held accountable for violation of secrecy rules? Indeed, what training will she have received before being made privy to such information?
All that is left to us is trying to counteract some of the propagandistic effect she hopes to create.
She will draw fire from DJT for a while as Rs desperate for a distraction try to capitalize on whatever positive visuals they can get out of this. A woman with influence in the White House, but not “that woman”. Looks, proximity to power: whispers of Ivanka’s own presidential run are already all over Right Blogistan. She has the ear of the president and possibly more standing with him than anyone else working in that building now. That’s a lot of unearned authority for someone so new to the political game. Who knows how she will try to make use of her access to foreign leaders, briefing meetings and classified information?
The press and the public are the only way to hold her accountable. And since she is an inexperienced politician, she may stumble into controversy sooner rather than later.
Stay on top of the situation with her brothers and her continued connections to the family business.
Keep an eye out for any violation of secrecy, transparency and ethics rules.
If she makes public pronouncements, fact check her. Challenge her. Push her past the weasel words.
Don’t normalize this grift. It’s bad enough that things have gotten this far without heavier pushback. Don’t be afraid to take her on for fear of the mud they will throw.
She is fair game.
By taking this job and this title and this office in the West Wing she has forfeited all rights to the “I’m not an adviser, I’m just a daughter” card.
She has forfeited all rights to the “children are off limits” card.
And if we get in her face someone will certainly accuse us of being “anti-woman” in 3...2...1…
It doesn’t matter.
She’s officially an advertising prop for the DJT administration now. No different than any other spokesbot. Just as if she were KAC or Scary Spice or RNC PR BS any other member of the DJT community relations team.
I suppose it could be worse.
They could have given her a commentary job at Fakes News.
Hmm, I better not give them any ideas...
PREVIOUS TRUE BLUE REPORT diaries
Mar 29: “It’s just that valuable” — do you know the MAIN reasons Ryan wants to pass the AHCA?
Mar 28: Nipping at their heels
Mar 27: In cheering Republicon failures, think like a surgeon
Mar 26: Dare we hope the tide is turning? Or is that unrealistically optimistic?
Mar 25: Sheldon Whitehouse, Al Franken, Bobby Brooks, Betsy Anderson, ACA phone callers
Mar 24: HaHaHa-Ha-Ha You’re gonna need Congressional approval and you don’t have the votes
Mar 23: Rcons hate Obamacare for selfish, greedy, racist reasons, but not enough to fix it.
Mar 22: Neil Gorsuch’s attempt to seem wide-eyed and innocent makes him look even worse
Mar 21: Using Trump as a bad example—no Trump Sleep, Trump Food or other Trump habits
Mar 20: Is DJT a compulsive liar, or out of touch with reality? Five scenarios...
Mar 19: A budget is a moral document—a statement of public compassion
Mar 18: Ribbons: CBO scorers, Senate Intelligence Committee, Judge Derrick Watson
Mar 17: They know DJT is lying. Here’s one sad reason they follow him anyway.
Mar 16: Mick Mulvaney's ignorant, callous, evil, Republicon definition of compassion
Mar 15: Message Discipline 101—Pushback against Rcon talking points re DJT 2005 tax return
Mar 14: Message Discipline 101—Pushback against Rcon talking points about Obamacare repeal
Mar 13: Culture, Civilization, Rural America, Working Families—the missing word is a “tell”
Mar 12: The Rcon definition of Christians is as wrong as the Rcon definition of Democrats.
Mar 11: Ribbons: A Day Without a Woman, Native Nations Rise, Voting Rights Act still lives
Mar 10: How to talk to people who have trouble understanding actions have consequences
Mar 9: Where’s the fire? The real reason Rs are trying to rush TrumpCare through Congress
Mar 8: Message Discipline 101: TrumpCare, RyanCare, GOPCare, DonTCare—what’s in a name?
Mar 7: How very hard it is for a woman to go a day without paid (or unpaid) work
Mar 6: Can DJT really be stumbling into the exact investigation we want?
Mar 5: How is it even possible that deplorables see a man of faith when they look at DJT?
Mar 4: Blue Ribbon Winners—Chris Hayes, Malcolm Nance, Cierra Fields
Mar 3: I’m glad Bannon, Conway, Carson, Sessions, Miller, et al. are in the DJT Administration
Mar 2: “In every major fire it always starts with smoke. And smoke is what kills you.”
Mar 1: Am I the only one whose skin crawled at the Carryn Owens BIRGing moment?
FEBRUARY
Feb 28: Spinspotting 101: Special Prosecutor for what? It’s so easy to answer that question
Feb 27: Spinspotting 101: I’ve seen no evidence because I haven’t looked for any evidence!
Feb 26: If Neil Gorsuch were a man of integrity, he would decline the S.Ct. appointment
Feb 25: True Blue Ribbons: Russia Flag trolling, Dixie Swastika grabbing, District Days demonstrating
Feb 24: There is no such thing as a compassionate conservative
Feb 23: Chief of Staff, Nat’l Security Advisor, GOP Head, President Bannon—too many hats!
Feb 22: DJT has a few questions for you—SMURF THIS POLL!
Feb 21: The end of “access journalism” means it’s time to #sendtheinterns
Feb 20: KAC lying low for now… can we banish her (and all her ilk) from the airwaves completely?
Feb 19: DeVos cartoon, Ruby Bridges, unearned unhappiness and childlike faith
Feb 18: Blue Ribbon Winners—Vice Adm. Harward, Melissa McCarthy, and intel whistleblowers
Feb 17: And Ain’t I an American?
Feb 16: Please tell your family and friends—If you regret your DJT vote, speak up NOW
Feb 15: R-supported forced childbirth laws deny the autonomy of women
Feb 14: What did the president know? Everything. When did he know it? From the beginning.
Feb 13: Coping with The Madness of King Donald by hoping political comedy will save us
Feb 12: The Poverty and Justice Bible
Feb 11: Blue Ribbon Winners—Swastika removers, Ninth Circuit Panel, and the Persisterhood!
Feb 10: The first three words of the Constitution are “We, the People” not “I, the President”
Feb 9: Who first inspired your political activism? Who inspires you now?
Feb 8: We cannot and will not be silenced—Here’s what to do if they try to silence you
Feb 7: Plain Talk Tuesday: Tell people the Affordable Care Act is the same as OBAMACARE
Feb 6: Interview Skills 101—Internalized oppression and what Ryan Lizza did right. BRAVO!
Feb 5: These protest signs with Bible cites will confuse and befuddle RWNJs
Feb 4: Blue Ribbon Winners—Temple B’Nai Israel, Judge Robart, CNN, Senate Phone Callers
Feb 3: Not rich, not smart, not a good businessman, not a winner—DJT is NOTHING he claims to be
Feb 2: Thursday action—Encouragement, thanks, and apologies (pick one or more)
Feb 1: July 7, 2009 to August 25, 2009 and September 25, 2009 to February 4, 2010
JANUARY
Jan 31: If you’re on overload that’s part of their plan—there’s more than one way to #resist
Jan 30: Interview Skills 101 for reporters attempting to interview KAC and other Rcons
Jan 29: Blessed are they who hunger and thirst after righteousness
Jan 28: Blue Ribbon Winners—Women's March participants and #NoMuslimBan demonstrators and...
Jan 27: I wish Steve Bannon would tell me to keep my mouth shut
Jan 26: Thursday Action—Have you ever written a letter to the editor? Here’s how to start
Jan 25: The Asch Conformity Study, inauguration crowds, and the importance of speaking out
Jan 24: #ResistTrumpTuesday—good news day or another paying dues day?
Jan 23: Spy the Lie 101: How to enjoy watching Rcon spokesbot interviews, even KAC!
Jan 22: Why I prayed for the President* today
Jan 21: The only silver lining in the midst of these clouds
Inaugural (!) diary: Stop expecting Republicons to make sense