That said, I don’t want to downplay Trump. I have enjoyed his rise as much as anyone has. I revel when the Republican base exposes itself (you know what I mean). I relish watching the Republican establishment first pshaw then rend their garments and now puff out their cheeks in righteous indignation. And it still is hard to think of it as dangerous rather than some of the best entertainment around. It was safely confined to the basest part of the Republican base, 10% or so of the electorate out of a far higher percentage that we already knew were enthusiast supporters of stupid.
Still, there is an advantage to giving much of the credit to Jeb!, Ted, and The 30: it could short circuit a positive feedback loop. In the loop in question, lessor stupid that goes unchallenged paves the way for greater stupid, which paves the way for lessor stupid to seem even less stupid, which paves the way for greater stupid to seem lessor, and so on and so on. Had Jeb!, Ted, and The 30 been challenged for their lessor stupid, we would not be debating greater stupid now.
But how do we make sure that Jeb! and Ted get proper credit? Why did they not get credit in the first place? Do a Senator and a former Governor warrant less attention than does a business mogul? What if the Senator is every bit as obnoxious an extremist and clearly aspires to the same bat-sh!t crazy base? The former Governor is, I admit, little more than a tepid campaigner with stale, hackneyed, and discredited policies. But he’s a former Governor and a Bush at that; surely he deserves the same amount of attention as Donald the Entertainer.
The press thinks not, though. They have skin in the game. Earlier, they were chasing ratings that only The Donald could provide. Now, their non-stop coverage means that they have decided that higher ratings are to be had by playing to the confrontation rather than by coddling. If challenging stupid comes down to the media doing its job and fulfilling its civic duty, it was a nice republic while it lasted.
So, it’s up to us. We have to make sure at every opportunity, spoken, written, or drawn, that everyone recognizes that Trump was a late comer, here. Jeb!, Ted, and The 30 led the way on this, and they deserve credit for that.
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