Take 1:
The difficult rhetorical lesson – if there is any perception that one’s economic situation is not as good as it once was, that belief cannot be engaged with any claims about human rights, rights to live how one wishes, civil rights protections or any such claim.
This perception can be very minimal. For example, if people perceive that the price of eggs is “too high” this will be a reason to dismiss a candidate, even an incumbent, who has a very strong foreign policy record or even economic record. The perception of the economic situation is connected directly to the President.
This means that people will shop at their preferred store, buying their preferred brands or even things that are unnecessary (lampooned in many great memes where an Xbox or PS5 is in with the groceries) and calling it the President’s fault that they can’t afford things.
This is also imaginary – the “better off” might have never taken place. Or it could be an imagined price from prior years. Or it could be a fantasy of what things “should cost.” Such communist fantasies like price fixing are very persuasive to right-wing voters: “A cheeseburger shouldn’t cost $20!” But they will also believe in the power of the free market, or assume the market is a natural force, like the wind and we have to adjust to it.
This is very dire for the rhetorician – any suggestion of a declined economic power, even a fantastical one, will beat out concerns for national security, domestic terrorism, corruption, selling secrets to the highest bidders, colluding with foreign governments to benefit oneself (kleptocracy) – all things that we have seen in Trump’s previous administration but are ok with because we could be really rich one day or rich people should be protected because they are what the country is all about. The idea that one has a very small chance of becoming a millionaire will always outweigh human rights for other citizens, particularly ones you have no connection to at all. The strategy must be one of identification first not division first – and certainly not the Harris ads that I enjoyed but did not help accomplish anything where supporters of Harris were cast as liars, hiding their true vote from friends and family knowing in their heart the right thing to do. It just doesn’t work, because identification/division doesn’t work this way. People love belonging and being a part of something; they don’t want to be shown that it’s an act.
The solution is hard to come up with out of context, but an economic focus is the name of the game. Once that perception is there the stain cannot be removed with “caring for other people.” We don’t have a society that works that way. People are very happy to watch others suffer (emphasis on others) so they can get a nicer car. Thinking about how to run a campaign in that environment is tough, but appealing to the loss of rights or exclusion of the needy isn’t going to do much except make the people who would already vote against the economic fantasy feel good.
Take 2:
“economics” is a catch-all that allows people to articulate deep-seeded racism and misogyny. For example, one can easily vote for the extreme right-wing candidate saying that economics are the bottom line, that they will be better off under such a regime, and conceal a more ruthless and horrific claim, that they don’t trust women, minorities, or foreigners. Even children of immigrants are suspect here. There is a genetic purity to nationalism which makes it well and truly fascist. Belief that American-ness (or any nationality) is genetic or only fully realized by a particular sex is the perfection of the fascist rationality. The conclusion becomes: Your life is meaningless unless the state can use you up. The dialectical rhetorical form is seamless. When people say “I’m voting for economic reasons” they are not voting for their own economic well being, that much is clear. They are voting for a general “economic” sensation that women, minorities, and foreigners (legal or not) are not in their correct places. They need to get back in their boxes and have children, servile minimum wage jobs, and leave. The variant of this is “they’re taking our jobs!” and the newest variant is “They’re eating the pets!”
Take 3:
The media handed the election to the right-wing by mistaking their role in society to give everyone a turn at the microphone instead of being critical about how people put their thoughts together. A well meaning, mass-media journalist can consider it ethical to “report on how people are voting” and then leave the statements out there to flap in the wind. They assume the viewers will be critical themselves and see the flawed reasons people share about why they are supporting this or that candidate. The media’s function – which we haven’t seen since 2020 during the “voter fraud” work of Trump – is to point out the lack of evidence, incorrect connection and assumption, etc. This work is only being done by the comedian-news, something we’d be better off without, where comedians sit with all the trappings of the mediated journalist and dispense the ridiculousness of politics. This has no effect on anything except to make us feel good about our preconceptions. The media, instead of sharing preconceptions and conclusions, should be engaging those by bringing in the experts to respond to the statements of the person on the street.
But mediated journalism will not do this as they are a multibillion dollar business. Instead, they will run with whatever people are saying, unaware (hopefully) that repetition on a national stage isn’t persuasive but informative. The June debate between Trump and Biden is a great example of this where the media decided, without evidence, to repeat over and over again that Biden had a “disastrous debate performance” and give no examples. They were focused on our focus on his elderly mannerisms, not the policies he cited and the accomplishments he touted. Trump’s comments were far more insane claiming Biden should be in jail, calling him a weak Palestinian, and other such statements.
This graphic is a good example of what I mean. Here they present this data in a way that encourages engagement from and with the “journalists” who are hosting the program. These talking heads discuss the meaning of this data and simultaneously convey through the power of national media that there is a relationship here, not between perceptions of investors, not due to outside forces – even some coming from overseas, and not because of the policies of the Congress and President a term or two before them. This implies a spurious and direct relationship between the election of a President and market changes. It’s worse than a mistake, it’s encouraging reasoning that is damaging to any form of democratic order.
Another example is the repetition of the Reagan line “are you better off now than you were four years ago?” This metric is a begged question at best, and harmful, unethical equivocation at worst. For a journalist to ask an average person at a rally or a poll this question is unethical journalism without specifics. It just creates content that can be sliced and diced and served to keep us watching.
The media has helped craft the stage for fascism to steal the show and they won’t care – they are little more than “content creators” now, happy to get views and recycle clips of interviews time and time again until they are no longer getting attention. The role of the journalist is to craft the narrative, share the story of what’s happening, not hand the microphone around for everyone to speak on a national stage. Oddly, organizations like Braver Angels and the like think this is the solution – no criticism whatsoever – so we can continue to have family dinners while the country turns its hegemonic blade to its own throat.
We absolutely do not need Intergroup Dialogue to understand one another nor do we need Braver Angels so we can all go to brunch together or have dinner as a family and enjoy our company. We need a media and a rhetorical culture that celebrates inquiry, asking after the equivocation and begged question, and finding out more about your own stance. It’s not a good thing to know what’s good for the country or be right. It is a good thing to share that view in hopes someone will push back against it with critical faculty.
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