As I was watching the train wreck known as our government shutdown unfold, it came to me that the Orange in Chief was clinging to an impossible defense idea that appealed to “average” voters in much the way that Ronald Reagan stuck to his notion of a “Star Wars” missile defense system, even though, when he first proposed it in 1983, it was no more than a fantasy. Reagan’s famous “Star Wars” speech announcing the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) on March 23rd of 1983 came at a time when his economic policies had brought national unemployment to soaring new heights and his popularity to plunging lows. In other words it was a major sham to change the subject of public debate at a time when Reagan was seen widely as...a major sham.
It wasn’t hard to see the parallel to Reagan’s Star Wars propaganda and Trump’s efforts to cling to the notion of “The Wall” along our Mexico border. Trump was peddling his wall as the solution to every problem dealing with “those people” coming across the border, much as Reagan peddled Star Wars as an impenetrable defense — the ultimate hard-on, if you will, stiff, long, thick, and able to knock down the most macho of bad hombres coming our way. Minor details, such as it not working worth a lick, didn’t matter. A strong nation needed strong defenses. ‘Nuff said.
Trump clings to The Wall because he knows that his base clings to it. His base is formed by people whose thinking is so concrete and literal that they cannot tolerate even a hint of nuance or “but you know, analysis shows...” that might be thrown at them. Walls work, in their minds, because, well, their minds are pretty much the same as Trump’s. If they see it on TV, it must be real. This is why his statements about walls working for “rich, and powerful, and successful” people work for his followers so well. After all, rich folks on TV have...walls. Or, you’re a rich folk, and have or want a wall (interesting to see rich suburban developments throwing up eight-foot fences like crazy these days).
To give up on the notion of the wall, for the followers of Trump, is to give up on the very notion of what gives his base their primal security, based on their primal source of fantasy. Might must make right, even if what might claims to be right — and effective — is pure fantasy. Because they’ve seen it on TV. Or, at least, on Fox News. To say that The Wall was fantasy would be like saying that Viagra commercials weren’t true — you know, the ones that kept cable news alive for decades. Fantasy dependency fed fantasy dependency, and, voila, here we are, in the thrall of Trumpsanity.
However, as Trump’s poll numbers begin to sag, and the reality that the wall isn’t going to happen in any way, shape or form like Trump said it would, it seems that Trump’s, er, sagging poll numbers are pointing to the need to find something else to stiffen them up. Enter today’s announcement by the Don-old of a new space-based missile defense initative. Oh, My. Goodness, I thought. At the same point in his presidency as Ray-Gun was coming up with a fantasy for his (much-wider) base, Trump is trying to change the subject with a bigger, stiffer, and more fantastical piece of flim-flam. Because, TV.
When I Googled this announcement, of course the Fox News piece came up first, followed by the Republican appeasers AP. Fodder for the right-wing spin zone, in lieu of not being able to spin it at the SOTU address that’s been scratched by Trump’s war-against-workers shutdown. But of course, there is no Soviet Union as an eminent threat (in fact, the former head of their KGB spy agency, Vladmir Putin, is Trump’s best bud), and, yeah, Iran, blah-blah, but...does anyone really buy that. Not the way that the Cold War packaged essential fear of the Soviets as a cornerstone of American patriotism.
And yet, you can be sure that the right wing will push this hard, in spite of the obvious incongruity that Trump is asking for another wicked-expensive-and-useless thing in the middle of a government shutdown. You see, there are only so many pages in the right wing playbook, most of them dating from the Reagan and Gingrich era. So, if the focus groups say The Wall isn’t working, well, see how may hands go up when you mention nuclear missile threats. If the numbers look good, well, go for another round of Star Wars. After all, they know how to script that whole story pretty well.
I think that Democrats are building a more and more effective response to this madness, mostly by sticking to reality and pulling out the rug from beneath Republican fantasies gently enough that it won’t rile swing voters, but strong enough to dislodge right-wing influence over them. In the meantime, we’ll continue to grow the base, and build a strong, repeatable, credible, and acceptable narrative for what a future under Democratic rule will mean for the average person in America. Who is, after all, no longer, Trump’s base. In the meantime, don’t expect Star Wars II to go away — but do expect that it won’t change the fundamental narrative of Trump’s decline and fall. I hope.