America's Game of Thrones
Getting That Jim Jones Treatment
Dearest Reader,
Oof! What a week. So Vice President Kamala Harris resoundingly lost her bid for the presidency to Donald Trump. In the end, it wasn’t as close as polls suggested. The new president-elect won 312 electoral votes to Harris’ 226, a two percent lead for Trump to take the popular vote (the first time in 20 years), secured the GOP Senate majority and will likely win the House, as well. Also Trump’s second term may furnish the opportunity to appoint two more Supreme Court Justices should Judges Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito retire. This is a crushing defeat for the Democrats. I have been contemplating what to say and frankly I feel like I’ve been screaming into the void for the past few years. Facts don’t matter to a large swarth of the electorate and sadly the Democrats have no moral authority or strategic vision for this country. America is a society determined to hide from the truth of its history, the truth of its future (climate change), the truth of American neo-colonialism and militarism, and perhaps most importantly the truth of America’s unique brand of white supremacy complimented by the patriarchy.
I’m going to riff a little here because the scale of what I see coming, as the “hopeful realist” that I am, is challenging to express. The time has come to sharpen our minds and roll up our sleeves.
Okay, so despite her obvious qualifications, Harris was hastily presented as the democratic candidate for the presidency in a shotgun wedding with the nation. After President Joe Biden’s disastrous debate in late June, I was the one among my close friends who pitched Harris as a possible last ditch opportunity to stop Trump. Almost everyone I can think of either didn’t know who she was in any substantive way or whatever they knew made them a bit critical of her. To Harris’ credit she did an amazing job under the circumstances of mounting the most consequential presidential campaign in modern history within about 107 days. Nevertheless, she and the Democrats were chasing a long shot to victory.
It was recently revealed that Biden’s internal polling at the time of pushing Harris into the campaign said that Trump would win the election by 400 electoral votes. The president-elect currently has 312 electoral votes, so Harris effectively improved the results of an seemingly inevitable defeat. In addition, Biden “nominated” Harris without consulting anybody. As Nancy Pelosi recently declared in a post-election interview, as Democrats scramble to explain their blunders, President Biden slyly pushed Harris out front moments after publicly announcing his withdrawal from the race. This maneuver alongside Biden’s very late departure forced democrats to forgo a competitive primary or explore other potential candidates—though, again, Harris was more than qualified. This may explain why Harris had such a hard time distinguishing herself from Biden since he bestowed her with this opportunity. Between Gaza and this election debacle, despite a rather remarkable slate of legislative accomplishments, it appears that Biden is kind of a villain.
I wonder if Harris understood Biden actually catapulted her off a “glass cliff”? The “glass cliff” phenomenon refers to promoting women or people of color to positions of authority during periods of institutional distress, under circumstances that all but assure disaster. This way the institution can scapegoat the person they set up for failure as the source of whatever systemic problems they are trying to cover up or at the very least the doomed candidate provides a distraction from bigger systemic problems. I spoke about the “glass cliff” at length in the case of former Harvard University president Claudine Gay who was pushed out earlier this year during all the college protest drama—read my analysis in The Trial of President Claudine Gay. Sometimes women or people of color on the “glass cliff” survive or even thrive, but they do so despite the circumstances they are in. Harris mounted a failed bid for the White House in 2020, so perhaps her ambition and a sense of duty made her feel like everything was destined…and within reach this time.
Though running mate governor Tim Walz was a lovely and welcome addition, neither candidate could stop a seemingly inevitable GOP victory nor seamlessly navigate the headwinds against them. In fact, for the first time in 120 years and during a global inflation crisis, incumbent politicians worldwide are being ousted. As a result, in this election, ALL fifty states shifted to the right lavishing Republicans with a comfortable victory. The covid-19 pandemic and attending crises made voters desperate for change. However, a rising number of fascistic or autocratic leaders are co-emerging to present themselves as arbiters of change—though it’s not a change that will serve democracy.
Far-right leaders and political parties like Trump and MAGA Republicans are rising across the West, in particular. These politicians exclaim virtues of violent masculinity, white supremacy, xenophobia and delusional visions of greatness harkening back to a bygone era where white men ruled over everyone without intrusion. Furthermore, in the U.S. a growing mass of aimless prime working age (25-54 years old) men unable to find steady work or cultivate healthy romantic partnerships have been largely ignored by politicians for years. This year the Trump campaign spotted an opportunity. In this election, disaffected men were the Trump campaign’s secret weapon—delivering between 49% and 56% of votes for those aged 18-29 years old. Men aged 30-44 years old voted for the GOP at 53%.
White women also proved to be as reliable as ever turning out to vote at 53% for Trump whereas 45% supported Harris. In 2016 Hillary Clinton was also rejected by a majority of white women in favor of Donald Trump. Although some suburban white women and former GOP voters backed Harris, this demographic was vastly overestimated as a base of support. As I said in last week’s newsletter—entitled The Happy Happy Joy Joy Election—aside from white men, white women are the most reliable voting bloc for Republicans as defenders of white supremacy and patriarchy which undergirds their identity and community. White supremacy is, as a reminder, the belief that the white race is superior to other races and that white people should dominate society. Thus, to uncritically accept whiteness or white privilege, one inevitably perpetuates white supremacy.
The Harris/Walz campaign’s fixation on courting more white, conservative, suburban, wealthy and independent voters made them neglect their traditional base of black, brown and working class voters. In this regard, Harris and Walz made a number of missteps that signaled to their traditional base that the Democrats took them for granted. At the same time Trump pandered to communities of color and working class people increasing his base of support across the board: black men voted for MAGA Republicans at 21% versus 12% in 2020, black women at 7% verses 5% in 2020, a whopping 55% of Latinos and 38% of Latinas versus 40% and 37% in 2020, plus Asians voted at 39% for Republicans this year compared to 28% in 2020.
The GOP has managed to erect a tenuous, increasingly diverse coalition on the basis of assuring access to white privilege and confidence in violent masculine leadership. That’s the “Occam's razor”—simplest explanation and usually most accurate—in understanding how so many diverse people could vote against their own interests by supporting a racist, sexist, classist convicted felon. By opening the MAGA tent, Trump is extending access to white privilege and a crass expression of masculinity—for America that’s a bargain built into the DNA of the nation.
Returning to the Democrats, some 9 million voters didn’t even show up compared to 2020. And now, the party committed to defending democracy has almost no political power. Furthermore, many Americans seem uninspired by the Democrats’ poor messaging despite their oft beneficial policies. Many Americans are actually angered by the Democrats’ moral bankruptcy in championing a ‘plausible genocide’ in Palestine and extolling the virtues of women’s reproductive rights when 70% of the slaughtered victims in Gaza are women and children. In fact, children make up 44% of those killed by the state of Israel with U.S. weapons; children aged 5-9 years old make up the majority of that tragic grouping of victims. But as I suggested before, by abandoning black and brown voters, as well as, the working class, Democrats sealed their fate. In the wake of this election, the party is facing an existential crisis because it is no longer clear what they stand for, having shunned their own ethics to in turn lose a very consequential election.
For those who have been reading weekly, I have been tracking political trends (and more) trying to encourage critical thinking plus a measure of love in how and what is communicated. Indeed, with this decisive victory by the GOP, the American electorate has bought into MAGA’s stated mission to reshape the country vis-à-vis Project 2025. A world of hurt is coming that will remind Americans why the rule of law matters and why representative government is essential. The GOP has been on the march with a “reconstruction 2.0” type mission for over four decades. However, conservative oligarchs like the Koch Brothers or the Mercers didn’t foresee Donald Trump swooping in in 2016 to coopt their carefully constructed gumbo of propagandized voters, think tanks, non-profits, corporations, lobbyists and donors, but here we are.
There are various reasons why the GOP won so big starting with Biden’s poor judgement and larger global trends, as previously suggested. I could wax poetically about voter concerns over the price of groceries via corporate price gouging, challenges with immigration exacerbated by climate change and U.S. foreign policy disasters, an affordable housing crisis or increasingly alienated young men. But, I think that the greatest unifying factor in this election is America’s founding principle of white supremacy with patriarchy as a close second. I think it’s especially important to explore white supremacy this election because though sexism is something most women understand, almost no one but those critical of anti-blackness seem to truly understand what the f*ck just happened. For example, the cooptation of “woke” from black culture by white liberals has been further bastardized by white conservatives making “woke” into a dog whistle for white supremacy. So now, to be “anti-woke” is to be in support of maintaining white supremacy. These concepts didn’t come out of thin air, but are part of the mise en scène of fascism.
Some conservative and so-called liberal pundits or thought leaders are down on “wokeness” because their egos are so threatened by the thought of deconstructing white supremacy and running the risk of discovering they don’t have much else to stand on. I interrogate white supremacy all the time and have yet to meet anyone who has significantly emancipated themselves from it. Interrogating white supremacy for white people is like confronting a family secret that everyone would rather keep buried. And for people of color indoctrinated to favor whiteness or proximity to whiteness over their own cultures, white supremacy must also be protected from scrutiny lest it turns against them. For this reason Donald Trump and MAGA are ascendant. As I have said before, I consider Trump a cult leader, emerging at a time of economic uncertainty and sweeping cultural change, so his supporters are more like acolytes enthralled to a charismatic leader.
Some may be surprised to learn that followers of infamous cult leader and minister Jim Jones, who murdered hundreds of his followers in a mass murder-suicide in 1978, were mostly African American. Jones, who is white, preyed on the hopes of working class, religious black people and others during the height of the civil rights movement leading a social justice oriented, multiracial congregation called the People’s Temple. From the pulpit, Jones described a resonant, unjust world and that his church was the solution—he offered the change they needed. These acolytes helped Jones amass a fortune and construct a secluded commune in Jonestown, Guyana before killing themselves and each other in hope of salvation from an unjust world. For this reason, I’m doubtful the majority of those following Trump and MAGA will turn heel before it’s “too late”…whatever that means. I mean, just examine how we got here. Everyone knows about Trump, his shoddy leadership, vices and crimes and yet he won the presidency for a second time, performing even better than he did previously.
Humans are susceptible to con artists, narcissists and the like because people like narratives that give them a sense of security and purpose—like the American Dream. The GOP provided a simple coherent story to “make America great again” and scapegoat undesirable “enemies” akin to Jim Jones. At the 2023 annual CPAC conference Trump exclaimed, “I am your warrior. I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed: I am your retribution.” The Democrats, on the other hand, lacked a coherent counternarrative this election, creating an opening for fascism or autocracy to creep in. The thing about fascism or autocracy is that it emerges gradually, but quickly becomes a barrage of assault on norms and institutions so inundating and disorienting that the next thing you know you’re voluntarily sipping a cyanide-laced cup of punch in Jonestown. This coming age in America (and the world) will likely strive to suppress descent and free speech, which has already begun, so we’re going to have to think long and hard about how to navigate through Trump’s Amerikkka because he’s just getting started. Now, maybe Trump has other plans than what I laid out here, I’ll keep my eye out, but I doubt it.
Just remember, whatever you do—do not drink the Kool-Aid.
With Love During End Times,
Agunda