Trump came to power with many mutually contradictory or simply impossible campaign pledges.
For example:
- Trump cannot build that wall or get Mexico to pay for it.
- Trump cannot make coal cost-competitive with fracked natural gas, so he can’t bring coal jobs back.
- Trump might be able to bring back some manufacturing; but automation and robotics are eating up manufacturing jobs faster than they were/are shipped overseas. What jobs will be available will be highly skilled and not available to the less-educated of Trump’s supporters.
- Trump cannot have big tax cuts, build up America’s infrastructure and the military, and also shrink the budget deficit.
- Trump cannot “drain the swamp”. His appointments are more of the swamp.
Here are 282 of Trump’s promises; I’m sure you can find many more examples like the above.
So Trump has a huge problem: how to keep his supporters happy; or at least distracted.
The longstanding remedy for rulers like Trump is to keep up a steady supply of public enemies for his supporters to chew on.
The public enemy du jour is flag-burners.
With a little effort, we can perhaps predict what “public enemies” Trump is going to tweet about over the coming days. I invite you to do so in the comments.
PS: Via thinkprogress, we get Newt Gingrich’s insight into Trump’s behavior:
Gingrich explained that Trump diverts the media with “rabbits,” or unimportant stories to throw them off from pursuing real stories. As an example, Gingrich referenced the media’s five or six day long focus on Trump’s irritation and possible internal feud with adviser Kellyanne Conway’s over her critical remarks about Mitt Romney’s potential nomination as U.S. Secretary of State.
“[The Apprentice] was a remarkably popular show,” Gingrich told Fox News host Jenna Lee during the interview. “[Trump] understands the value of tension. He understands the value of showmanship. And candidly, the news media is going to chase the rabbit. So it’s better off for him to give them a rabbit than for them to go find their own rabbit. He’s had them fixated on Mitt Romney now for five or six days. I think from his perspective, that’s terrific. It gives everyone something to talk about.” “He does not think of this as chaos. He thinks of this as creativity,” Gingrich added.
Whether Trump’s behavior arises from personality disorders, character defects, or low animal cunning, it is the effects that matter, and that we have to deal with.
