I don't think defeating Trump will defeat MAGA: Without Trump, MAGA would evolve with new leaders who are more capable than Trump. That's because MAGA is a social force that has evolved since the Obama administration from the "Tea Party Movement" where Americans for Prosperity recruited and flew activists to meetings and trainings to fight Obama-era "reforms." About this time, the early 2010s, Republican politicians were becoming very friendly with US paramilitaries, which evolved to play a role in January 6.
The current crop of paramilitaries are not very effective and certainly not smart. The leader of the OathKeepers is a trained soldier who shot his own eye out, and the leaders of the Proud Boys invited a journalist to cover their Jan 6 planning meeting in a parking lot. Jan 6 was an ill-conceived shit-show rather than a well-prepared coup. Trump is not stupid but is ignorant and short-sighted with the primary goal of lining his pockets rather than steeling a disciplined movement to transform the US. Trump is smarter than his soldiers like any con man is smarter than their "marks," but he is selling others' ideas rather than developing a program of his own. Trump is a salesman, not a revolutionary. He is original only as an avatar for a larger authoritarian movement that today has a given the extreme right-wing of the Republican Party a mass base that caused leaders of the Republican Party to fall into line behind him. I expect the MAGA movement to "learn" and evolve further, probably without Trump if he loses the election, and eventually attract leaders who are more visionary, ideological, and dangerous. My two cents. Mark -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#31162): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/31162 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/107221592/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. #4 Do not exceed five posts a day. -=-=- Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/8674936/21656/1316126222/xyzzy [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
