Don't swing at everything

Trump will release a firehose of outrages, but only a few will matter to most Americans.

I didn’t watch the inauguration. I thought about writing a piece about how yesterday recognized two men who represented opposite strains of the American zeitgeist. Martin Luther King, Jr., embodied the hope and idealism of a country that offers all people the freedom to pursue their dreams with equal justice under the law. Donald Trump represents the repudiation of that dream, crushing the hopes of immigrants and offering special treatment for the wealthiest Americans. I didn’t write it, though. Instead, I ran errands.

I left the house about 11am while Joe Biden was still president. As I drove by my local BP station, there was a tanker truck filling the underground tanks. I noticed the price of regular gas was $2.67. I thought, “Damn, that’s low.” When I came back from my errands a few hours later, the price had gone up to $2.89 and Donald Trump was president. A sign of the times.

While I didn’t watch the inauguration, I did check out the aftermath on social media. I was dismayed to see that Biden offered preemptive pardons to people in his circle. He set a precedent that ensures Trump will do the same for people who actually commit crimes during his administration. He also gave Republicans the opportunity to post memes reading “Innocent people don’t need pardons” and muddying the waters for an ill-informed public who thinks both sides throw out baseless accusations. He gave up an incredible amount of moral high ground and that’s about the only ground liberals hold right now.

Trump issued a host of executive orders and proclamations, none of which were surprising given what he said he would do, that claim far more power for the executive branch than the constitution allows. There was a bit of a collective howl from liberals and progressive, but they took their greatest offense at Elon Musk.

After jumping around on stage like a contestant on The Price is Right, the billionaire ended his comments by thumping his chest and throwing up an outstretched arm. Progressives and the news media went nuts. They accused Musk of giving a Nazi salute and sucked up much of the oxygen on platforms like Bluesky and Twitter, or X as Musk calls it.

Musk and Republicans denied it, of course. They immediately started posting photos of Democrats with outstretched arms. That didn’t quiet progressives, though.

My take is that Democrats and progressives still haven’t learned a goddam thing. We’re swinging at everything, confusing what doesn’t matter with what does. Musk may have been making a Nazi salute or he may have just been reacting to the crowd or he may have been baiting liberals. Who knows? Regardless, it’s just a distraction from what matters. It’s the outrage machine, designed to distract liberals and conservatives from what Trump and his cronies are really doing. Most of the American public doesn’t know Musk made the gesture and not many of them believe it was a Nazi salute.

Forget Musk for the time being and get back to the executive orders and pardons. Trump just pardoned a bunch of really bad people. Find a few examples of criminals and psychopaths and make them famous. Accountability and rule of law are at stake. Trump is allowing criminals to get away with assaulting police, desecrating the Capitol, and plotting insurrection. That matters and I believe you can make people care if it gets enough sustained attention.

Trump signed an executive order that ends birthright citizenship for people born to immigrants who came here illegally. That’s clearly unconstitutional. Progressives should find stand up, successful people whose citizenship is now threatened and introduce them to the public. We’ll see exactly how far the Supreme Court is willing to bend to Trump when this case comes before them.

Trump also called the increase in immigrants at our southern border an “invasion,” implying that our country is under siege. He declared a national emergency. He could use the language to violate the rights of citizens and, possibly, suspend habeas corpus, arresting and imprisoning people without cause.

The Trump strategy is to trigger liberals by unleashing a firehose of undemocratic and authoritarian actions and hope that they swing at everything. The American public, with it’s limited attention span, will tune out the worst of the abuses along with the performative ones. The job of Democrats is to identify which abuses will capture the public’s imagination and hammer it home. They will have more success focusing on one or two outrageous abuses than trying to get people to pay attention to all of them.

Their biggest mistake will be to swing at everything.