#1: Get the fighters fighting and keep them fighting
Harvard Prof. Levitsky explains that that “hardball tactics” will kill democracy.
Keeping everyone fighting increases the polarization.
The more polarized the society, the more people are willing to tolerate “hardball tactics” from their own side
Keeping the fighters fighting means:
- Keeping the Democrats and Republicans fighting each other.
- Getting the Democrats to fight each other.
Getting the Democrats to fight each other is easy for someone like Trump, who knows how to exploit the weaknesses on the other side.
Have you noticed that conservatives and authoritarians tend to fall in line behind a leader, while non-authoritarians tend to splinter?
That’s because authoritarians seek uniformity and dislike complexity. (For more on that, see Jon Haidt and Karen Stenner’s essay in 👇
Liberals on the other hand embrace complexity and diversity.
Authoritarians naturally fall in line behind a strong leader. Non-authoritarians don’t.
I’m old enough to remember when the joke about democratic primaries was that they were circular firing squads.
Expect Democratic infighting to get worse now that we have army of pro-Trump Putin-sponsored bots making trouble and encouraging Democrats to attack their own.
The bots are getting more sophisticated. See Mike Farb’s thread here.
Lots of liberals will take the bait.
#2: Feed the victimization-outrage cycle
It’s counterintuitive that the GOP see themselves as victims—but they do.
From Yale Prof. Jason Stanley: Dominant groups who believe nature forms a hierarchy feel victimized by equality by an expansion of liberal democracy.
Thus when “inferior” groups seek equality, the dominant group thinks the inferior group want to displace them at the top.
What’s actually happening is that the oppressed groups want equality.
But if people hold a hierarchal view of nature, the demand for equality feels threatening, because they think the people demanding equality are actually trying to achieve power over them.
They feel that they’re losing something.
This feeling of loss has been explained by numerous scholars and theorists.
For example, see Levitsky and Hofstadter.
Here’s how the victimization-outrage cycle works:
- Trump tells his base they’re victims. “Others” are taking what is theirs.
- They feel that he understands them.
- They view him as brave enough to speak the truth in the face of “political correctness.”
- Trump implements a cruel policy targeting a minority ethnic group, like this one.
- The left spins with fury and outrage.
- Trump’s base concludes that the left cares more about “others” than “true” Americans and are thus the enemy.
- Their loyalty to Trump increases.
- Trump’s base, to help him win, enthusiastically embrace his destructive lies. If you missed it, see my slate article.
- The left becomes even more outraged at the blatant lying; and
- Trump’s base cheers to see the liberals enraged.
Notice that #1, “Keep the Fighters Fighting” and #2, “The Victimization Outrage Cycle” form their own cycle, each feeding the other.
Part #3: Demonstrate Strongman Tactics by Breaking Rules and Defying Norms.
Trump tells his base that he alone can Make America Great Again, where, of course, MAGA means return America to a white dominant patriarchy.
Trump tells his base that the left controls the “media,”and universities. He tells them judges, bureaucrats, and law enforcement (the “deep state”) favor the left and are against him. (He’s a victim.)
Thus the left is a formidable enemy that he alone can defeat.
To demonstrate his strength, he breaks rules and norms. His critics spin with outrage. His base cheers.
#1, #2, and #3 are interlocked. Each feeds off the other.
#4: He Inoculates Himself as a Lawbreaker by Undermining Factuality
This, in turn undermines rule of law.
In the face of the Mueller probe and other investigations, Trump never devised a traditional legal defense.
Why do I say that? Because he’s constantly changing his story right there in public. As everyone knows, people who change their stories are not credible witnesses. Moreover, he obstructs justice and intimidates witnesses right there in plain sight. You can’t prepare a traditional legal defense while obstructing justice & intimidating witnesses.
He uses a non-traditional, Putin-style defense.
His defense is to lead us into a post-truth world by undermining factuality, using the propaganda techniques Putin has perfected.
Steve Bannon explains how:
There are lots of tried and true techniques for accomplishing this:
- Drench the public with a firehose of falsehoods.
- Insist that everyone else is lying or presenting “fake” news.
- Change your story right out there in public and have your media wing (Fox) act like it’s normal.
- Persuade people that all politicians are corrupt liars (“Clinton and Obama did it too”) Also known as Whataboutism.
If all politicians are corrupt, going after Trump is purely political.
Each side then prefers their own corrupt liar to the enemy liar/ “Trump is a liar,” they say, “but he’s OUR liar. The democratic candidate is the enemy liar.”
From @TimothyDSnyder Eventually people conclude that the truth is unknowable, and they give up trying to sort truth from lies. It’s the ultimate in skepticism and relativism.
Without truth, you can’t have rule of law.
These techniques allow Trump to undermine the results of any investigation, or even a jury verdict. He’s a victim! It’s all a deep state plot!
See? Who needs a traditional legal defense?
I haven’t even gotten to voter suppression, but this is long enough.
Note that if you get Democrats angry enough at each other, many of them will stay home and not vote. So we tie back to #1: Keep the Fighters Fighting.
