Other than perhaps the red MAGA-hat wearing folks that show up at President Donald Trump’s it’s-all-about-me rallies, the recent congressional testimony by Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, that his former boss is “a con man” was of little revelation to most of the world.
Even those who believe he’s “not a politician,” “not beholden to special interests,” “is a businessman,” “telling it like it is,” “conservative,” and other hard-felt reasons know he’s conning them.
But then, they think that about every politician. However, there is a difference between a politician persuadingyou, and a politician conningyou.
For a voter to know the difference is a matter of being truly honest; it isn’t enough to just say, “yeah, I know he’s a jerk, but so was Obama,” or as some evangelical conservatives like Jerry Falwell Jr. reason, “We’re never going to have a perfect candidate unless Jesus Christ is on the ballot.” That reasoning means your fine with things, no matter how bad, just as long as your self-interests are protected.
More illustrative is Robert Jeffress, pastor at the First Baptist Church in Dallas and a member of Trump’s Faith Advisory Group. In August 2018, after Cohen confirmed that in 2016 candidate Trump directed him to pay hush money to keep porn start Stormy Daniels quiet about her 2006 affair with Trump, Jeffress said this to Fox News:
“I know a lot of people are still perplexed — why are Christians so supportive of Donald Trump? Well, it’s really not that hard to figure out when you realize he is the most pro-life, pro-religious liberty, pro-conservative judiciary [president] in history and that includes either Bush or Ronald Reagan. I think that is why evangelicals remain committed to this president and they are not going to turn away from him soon.”
Evangelical opportunists like Lynch and Jeffress don’t buy Trump’s con, they just factor it into the calculus for moving their agenda. That’s why they supported Trump in 2016. In a way, they have become the very devil they’ve made a pact with.
For Trump, as long as he gains from championing the evangelical Christian interest, he’ll do their bidding, and they, at least most of them, will support him.
But evangelicals are not alone in cold-hearted calculating to have their myopic self-interest served, regardless of whether it damages society and the nation.
U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell, Republican majority leader, is unapologetic about it. A few weeks before Election Day in 2016, Democratic President Barrack Obama convened the legislative leaders from both parties to tell them about Russian interference in the elections. McConnell refused to sign a bipartisan statement condemning Vladimir Putin’s government.
Former Vice President Joe Biden told the Council on Foreign Relations in January 2018 that McConnell "wanted no part of having a bipartisan commitment saying, essentially, 'Russia's doing this. Stop.' " Biden realized then that “the die had been cast … this was all about the political play.”
For conservative Republicans, who rejected Trump until he vanquished their candidates in the GOP primary, the political play is partisan self-interest—stacking the appellate courts and the U.S. Supreme Court with conservative judges.
Unable to sway voters against typically Democratic-authored, legislation, i.e. affordable care act, common-sense gun regulations such as universal background checks and voting reforms that ensure every voter can cast a vote, Republicans want Trump-appointed judges to strike down moderate legislative initiatives not based on conservative interpretations of the Constitution—exactly what McConnell and Republicans falsely accuse Democratic-appointed judges of doing.
Certainly, McConnell and Republicans know Trump is a con artist, but until he stops serving their purpose – tax cuts for the wealthy, conservative judge appointments, abolishing consumer and environmental protections – they are content. For McConnell, it’s also personal: Trump appointed the senator’s wife, Elaine Chao, U.S. Transportation Secretary.
What helped the Big Con most, and where Russia contributed spectacularly, is social media—the gateway for disinformation (more so than even Fox News), misinformation, lies, falsehoods and the herding of voters into partisan corrals where many users of Facebook, Twitter, et al undiscerningly grab at whatever piece of information confirms their biased world views.
Trump is a con artist, but most everyone is in on his con. Tens of millions of voters pulled the lever for someone they, in the not too distant past, would have otherwise rejected—an unprincipled, authoritarian, real estate developer who thinks not terms of serving the people or of meaningful programs to help people; not even in terms of actual negotiation, but in simple transaction: what can you do for me?
As Danish writer Hans Christen Andersen warned in the 19thcentury, nearly half of American voters today choose to believe the naked Emperor wears fine new clothes rather than admit the Emperor wears no clothes.
