Thread by @doctorow

The equilibrium in US elections is a balance of:

* pleasing rich people (who give party figures sinecures via consulting/speaking/think tank fees) and;

* terrifying the base into turning out by pointing out how awful the other guy is, what with all his plute-osculating.

1/

A feature of this equilibrium is that the unfitness of the other side is a gift to your own side. The worse Trump is, the more establishment-friendly the Dem candidate can be.



2/

In other words, Trump needs to get slugs to vote for salt and Biden needs to get turkeys to vote for Christmas, and the optimal way to do that is by pointing fingers at the other guy. That way, you don't have to promise voter-pleasing policies that upset the donor class.

3/

A transformative politician who turns out the base also flushes out establishment opposition: lavishly funded smear campaigns that suppress your own voter turnout as a necessary cost of heading off voter-pleasing, plute-punishing policies.

cnbc.com/2020/02/24/mik…

4/

This "demoralize the other side's voters" game is a race to the bottom. It predates Trump, though, as is his method, Trump accelerated it. He took the lid off the salt-shaker and demanded that his slugs vote for a gush, not a sprinkle.

5/

There's something seriously cult-creepy about the maso-fascism of Trump's GOP, where deliberately inhaling virus droplets is a sign of loyalty and being hospitalized for exposure after a Nebraska rally is a badge of honor.

pluralistic.net/2020/10/28/tru…

6/

Fool me twice we don't get fooled again: the crowds of stranded vulnerable people after Trump's Georgia rally last night, hitching rides with strangers in sealed vehicles, huddled on the ground for warmth - they must have suspected this possibility.

https://twitter.com/JulieNBCNews/status/1323142004256157696

7/

It's a Trumpian innovation: not just frightening your base with boogeyman tales about the other guy, but also inspiring them to eternal cultlike loyalty by performatively abusing them, even killing some of them. That may scare some off, but the remainder are bone-loyal.

8/

If you've stuck by your guy after he invited you to a ratlicking party and then left you to die of exposure at the end of a lonely country road; then no rape scandal, no tax return, no unjust enrichment leak will budge you from your position.

You've drunk the bleach.

9/

That's why it's such a goddamned nailbiter of an election. As Nate Silver reminds us, it's not just that Trump has been volubly signalling his intention to steal the election - there's a (slim) chance he could actually just WIN.

fivethirtyeight.com/features/im-he…

10/

Winning the popular election is basically impossible (<1%), but that's not how the GOP wins, anyway. The Dems have won 7 out of the last 8 federal popular-vote tallies. But Trump could very well carry the Electoral College.

11/

Silver points to data showing that Biden's gains are coming from Republicans who are sick of Trump, not Democrats who sat out the 2016 election but decided to cast a vote this time around.

nytimes.com/2020/10/12/ups…

12/

These GOP Biden voters are slugs who used to vote for salt-sprinkle, but draw the line at maso-fascism, the lidless salt-cellar free-pour.

The Dems who sat out 2016 and plan to sit out 2020 are turkeys who are done voting for Christmas, no matter how bad the other guy is.

13/

"The other guy's worse" electoral strategy was always going to reach a breaking point. Eventually, politicians HAVE to offer us something to vote FOR, not AGAINST.

eof/