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Wednesday, July 8, 2020

UPDATED: The Meaning Of Left Gangsta Theater

Gary Gindler has an insightful article at American Thinker this morning: The Gangsterization of the Democrat Party. In a way it complements what we were discussing yesterday in Trends In Voter Thinking. In that post and the comments that followed we noted:

1. The intentionally flawed structuring of mainstream polling at this juncture.

2. Troubling signs for the Dems in polling results, nevertheless.

3. Further ominous signs arising from harder data, especially voter registration trends and the thinking behind those trends.

In the comments, readers also raised two additional positive factors for Trump:

4. Trump's record setting fund raising has only accelerated as Antifa and BLM have taken to the streets in Blue cities and the Establishment has embraced a radical eradication of American history and a war on Whites. Meanwhile, Trump has put his fund raising to good use by building a GOTV operation that dwarf's that of Biden.

5. Trump has enjoyed massive turnout, running unopposed in primaries--a sure sign of massive voter enthusiasm--while Biden has struggled even though all other candidates have long since dropped out.

Gindler's thesis, in a sense, plays of these clear signs of a coming Trump victory. Indeed, that is his basic proposition:

... it looks as if the Democrats know that Trump has already won the 2020 election.

The point of the Gangsta Theater, then, is simply to attempt to induce Trump to expend the massive political capital he has built up in responding to the astro-turfed "protests:

Democrats are pushing Trump to waste his political and monetary capital on the fight against the Democrat rioters in the Democrat states and squander all the political ammunition before the official start of the presidential race.

You will hear GOPe voices calling on Trump to "do something," to appease, to repress. Trump isn't falling for any of it so far, just as he refused to invest his political capital in shutting down the country--leaving that to Blue state and local politicians, who now own that issue:


[Trump's] team focuses on election issues.  So while riots concentrate in heavily Democratic states, nobody should expect any reckless movement from the White House.  Stopping vandalism in the states that traditionally vote for Democrats will not offer Trump a single electoral vote.  In a simple Machiavellian way, Trump forces the electorate in such states to enjoy the preview of socialism they dream of.

However, by putting the onus on Blue state politicians for the craziness of the Left, we may see a few states (Minnesota?) flip red where the Dems were able in 2016 to eke out narrow victories. At the very least, Dems will be forced to expend resources defending states they were previously able to take for granted, while Trump's base of support will remain largely unchallenged.

The Gangsta Theater strategy is a strategy born of desperation. But so far the Dems appear to be once again underestimating just how canny a politician Trump is.

UPDATE: A significant update via Breitbart: Americans Defund Democrats in Statehouse Elections as Democrats Seek to Defund Police.

Desperate strategies, as outlined above, can backfire significantly--and in unexpected ways. Dems and the Left, deeply afflicted with TDS, with Trump living rent free in their heads, may not have factored local politics into their strategy--even though it was their own Tip O'Neill who famously propounded that "All politics is local." But that was a different Dem party.

Americans significantly decreased contributions to Democrats running for state legislature seats in the second quarter as the Democrat Party has turned hard left, fundraising information announced this week shows. 
The lackluster performance by Democrats at the state level could have broader national implications. First off, state-level political trends sometimes forecast later looming national trends—”from the State House to the White House,” the saying goes. 
But more importantly, the state legislatures elected this year will handle redistricting next year heading into the 2022 cycle—influencing the direction of and perhaps control of the U.S. House of Representatives for the next decade.
The drop-off in Democrat Legislative Campaign Committee (DLCC) fundraising—which has Democrats $20 million shy of their stated cycle-long goal of $50 million total—comes as their Republican counterparts nearly doubled the total raised by Democrats in the second quarter. 
... 
“Placating the woke Left’s tirade against America may play well on Twitter and cable news, but it looks like anarchy is too tough a sell for liberal enablers like the DLCC to persuade donors to keep contributing to their radical mission,” Lenze Morris, the national press secretary for the RSLC, told Breitbart News. “Defunding the police, overreaching economic shutdowns, and shaming those who are proud of their country – it’s all a bridge too far for Americans, and state Democrats right now own every bit of this ludicrous agenda.”

22 comments:

  1. Interesting article, but the author is a bit of a boffin.

    1. Democratic Party is in an echo chamber, where they have Most big tech, Wall Street, Fortune 500, Hollywood, universities, most larger religion groups, non White groups, and non profits on their side.

    2. The MSM is doing a huge amount of gas lighting / propaganda. A phrase I hate is “mostly peaceful”. So much of the violence is under reported / ignored. Over 600 police injured in the protests, but you don’t hear of that. Lots of Black on Black killing, that is not reported. Trump is high lighting this, the press secretary was perfect exiting yesterday showing the presses hypocrisy on the Atlanta’s 8 year old death. The way Trumps Mt Rushmore speech was described in the press.

    3. Lots of fair weather GOP that are afraid of being tarred with Racism.

    4. Trumps efforts to go around the censorship used against him.

    5. How Trump ran against the uniparty, and the corruption in both parties, and hatred of Trump. Luckily the Senate does not do secret ballots. The way the eGOP has done their best to sabotage Trump. The actions of so many government people against Trump.

    6. I can’t prove it, but I wonder how much of the GOP is controlled opposition.

    7. I wonder what China is doing against Trumps re-election.

    8. Democrats are trapped in an ideological purity contest internally.

    9. Democrats hate Trump at a derangement level. The Democrats have been trained if they just raise the pressure a little, the GOP will fold. Trump just raises them a bit more.

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  2. We need to think about what happens after the election. America's enemies have already succeeded in destroying public confidence in the integrity of our elections. In neither case will the losers believe that the result is legitimate. What happens then depends on who loses.

    If Trump wins, Democrats (i.e., Communists and their globalist backers) will reject it because they only believe in elections when they win. What we see now is just a warm-up for the event. That's a dangerous place to be.

    If Team Creepy Joe wins, then Americans (if I may take myself as representative) will reject it because we can already see the gigantic thumbs on the scale from tech monopolies, news media, the deep state, woke lunatics, and BLM terrorists. We will not pour into the streets, but I would expect people to get very quiet because they realize that further discussion is pointless. That's also a dangerous place to be, though it would take a bit more time for the danger to materialize.

    America's problem is not that we have elites. Every large country has elites. Our problem is that we have crummy elites who lack civic virtue, are self-serving, and are often stupid. If they act in time, they can head off the looming disaster by setting aside their petty squabbles and calling for national unity. President Trump and Chuck Schumer shaking hands on television and making a joint appeal could go a long way toward doing it. Yes, I know that neither of them is easy to love. Yes, I know that our most dedicated enemies such as Ilhan Whatever-her-real-name-is would never join the effort. But it could at least be tried. I think it should be.

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    1. "I would expect people to get very quiet because they realize that further discussion is pointless. That's also a dangerous place to be, ..."

      Very dangerous, but that's what the Left is aiming for.

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    2. "We will not pour into the streets."
      Probably, but many will work toward succession, esp. among major elements of the military.
      I keep on presenting the analogy of the 1936 murder of Sotelo, which was the last straw for Franco, spurring him to lead the coup bid which started the Spanish Civil War.
      A Biden win could easily be the last straw for today's versions of Franco.
      Question is, how hard/ fast would the DS move, to sabotage such secession etc. efforts.

      "Trump and Chuck Schumer shaking hands...."
      It's too late for that to do any good, unless accompanied with a huge change of expressed attitudes from Schumer & his ilk, esp. toward white men.
      Otherwise, any such gesture would hardly have a shelf-life, longer than that of the Nazi-Soviet Pact.

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    3. And, it's not just about white men, but about most of the country (save for a slew of Upper-middle class brats in powerful positions).

      See Tucker, on how the MSM lies about "the country they *hate*", on 6 July, c. 7:45, at
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=64GgCVqRLzU .

      Seeing as Tucker is likely the most trusted man on the Right (save for DJT himself), his being *so* clear, about what the Left now is, sets the stage for the Right to get ready to rumble, one way or the other, if Biden wins.

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    4. "Ilhan Whatever-her-real-name-is"

      It's Shabab. Ilhan Shabab.

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  3. It's a good point about the blame for the violence (specifically the lack of a response). Trump has made clear he would come in with a federal response if the local politicians asked for it, but they won't ask for it--instead they are apoplectic that Trump would even think of doing this.

    Let the liberals own their failure to respond. It will be hard to convince people Trump is to blame for their lack of political courage to quell the violence from their political party's fringe. The media will spin the blame that way, of course, but most people will not buy that spin.

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    1. In fact, Trump has behaved in a very principled constitutional manner, respecting federalism.

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  4. Great posts, mark, and solid commentary. Allow me to posit this bit of Dimocrat strategery: yes, the Dims know Biden has almost no hope of winning a straight up election so they aren't planning on a straight up election. Instead, they are intent on creating several narratives, to wit..1) that Biden is hugely popular per the (fraudulent) polling and the expectation that he will trounce Trump; 2) that the country is coming apart at the seams, in chaos, in economic disaster, Jimmy Carter malaise etc...; 3) that Trump is an unprecedented threat/dictator who may need to be removed forcibly (hence the Traitor Generals like Powell, McCaffrey etal comparing Trump to Hitler), and; 4) the need for nationwide mail in voting bc Zombie Virus too dangerous etc... Taken together, the Dims first plan is to steal the election with fraudulent mail in ballots if possible and remove Trump if he resists. If Trump somehow overcomes the cheating ballots, they will claim Trump cheated bc, obviously, all the polls said Biden would win and "we're not going to allow Trump to steal another election like 2016 (russisrussiarussia)." The Dims then let loose the brown shirts to riot and destroy on such a scale that Trump will be forced to call on the military at which point the Dims scream "Dictator!!!" and have the Traitor Generals seize power in a coup, then install a "provisional government" to restore order until the chaos (they created) subsides, including the confiscation of privately owned guns which the Dimocrat Media prove are the cause of the riots and unrest. Mail in voting will be permanent nationwide and Dims will have a monopoly on state, local and federal power thereafter. Far fetched? How about I tell you that the outgoing Dimocrat president will conspire with the FBI, CIA, DOJ, and State Dept to rig fhe 2016 election and, failing that, to set up a conspiracy in the Republican Administration to take down the duly elected president? Now THAT'S far fetched.

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    1. Not far fetched at all, Tschifty.
      The obvious way for DJT to try to counter these narratives is, for Durham to show that the Dems indeed did conspire with the FBI, CIA, DOJ, and State Dept, to rig the 2016 election.
      While there are likely some Traitor Generals who would consider such a coup, their fear that rank & file could frag their asses would weigh heavily, esp. if the would-be fraggers are moved, by Durham's busts, into huge distrust about the motives of those who spout Leftist lines, and who may lean toward backing such a coup.

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    2. Such coup etc. narratives may also get riskier if we keep seeing more liberals breaking ranks from the Left, e.g on Cancel Culture.
      Yesterday's issue of Harpers' was a start, featuring an ant-Cancellation letter from 150 intellectuals, incl. c. 20 household names (to "well-read" persons):
      Margaret Atwood, Chomsky, D. Brooks, Chomsky, Frum,
      Fukuyama, Gitlin, Haidt, W. Kaminer, Kasparov,
      McWhorter, G. Packer, Pinker, Pollitt, J.K. Rowling, Steinem, Bari Weiss, Gary Wills, Yglesias, Zakaria.

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    3. Whether they dare to try install a "provisional government" figures to hinge much, on whether Espy cares enough about this prospect, to move to transfer would-be plotters, to posts where they can be easily watched, and rendered rather impotent as regards this scenario.

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    4. Helpful readers' comments on "Liberal and Leftist Writers Condemn Cancel Culture...." (in Harpers) can be seen at Legal Insurrection (post of yesterday).

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    5. And, a gem from Ben Shapiro, on the Harpers' letter caper:
      "Not sure who’s *funnier* — the cancel culture maniacs insisting that cancel culture doesn’t exist, while *trying to cancel* those who disagree, or the brave souls who signed a letter decrying cancel culture, then immediately unsigned the letter, out of *fear* of cancel culture."

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    6. And, a snark(?) from Tim Carney:
      "I kinda thought the Harpers letter was pointless. Then it instantly outed everyone who WANTS there to be a climate of fear. So it was a great service."

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    7. And, I should've put Rushdie, and maybe Jennifer Finney Boylan, on my list of household name- signatories.

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    8. Yes, Mouse, Espy worries me. Along with way too many of the top brass in the Army and AF who seem to have been hastily promoted in Obama's last years for their lefty bonafides while other officers with doubtful loyalty to La Revolucion were purged or sidelined. Anyone out there with contacts in active military w insight on this?

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  5. This has been a long time brewing, Neill Maccauley Jr is case in point. Citadel grad, US Army LT in Korea, long after hostilities ceased, UT grad, university professor, Army War College professor, supposed, more than likely, CIA collaborator, and an officer on Castro’s revolution in Cuba.

    In 1953, when Neill was a teenager, Castro outlined his communist ideas and plans in a speech, I believe it was at his trial.

    Yet, supposedly, from Neill’s own words, he was just an idealistic Army trained officer who sought adventure and to help the downtrodden of Cuba.

    Uhhh ... maybe.

    Even he admitted he pulled the trigger and those killed deserved it.

    This is what is happening right now in America.

    - T D

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  6. On the same topic, several blogs discuss Biden's recent comments calling cops "the enemy". The Trump campaign ads just write themselves.

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    1. Isn't that the truth?

      https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1305342/Trump-news-Donald-Trump-US-election-2020-latest-Black-Lives-Matter

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    2. That page shows a blank in Firefox etc.
      Any ideas?

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    3. Never mind, I found another browser, Bing.

      Delete