While it is plain as day, what many people fail to take into account when strategizing against tfg is that the connection between him and his cult is EMOTIONAL. Not only that, but many casual voters outside the cult are easily swept up in the emotional appeals and stories that they use to campaign. And a huge part of the problem prying them away from the cult is that this emotional attachment does not respond to facts. They will flat out deny reality rather than acknowledge that Joe Biden has done a single thing that helps America.
I recently had an interaction on X where I mentioned that we have record oil production. Despite two different sources, the rightie was not buying it. All of the other Biden accomplishments I listed were just “Democrat talking points.” Sigh. Then he challenged me on the border, saying I wanted to avoid talking about it. I had actually been lying in ambush on this topic, and I jumped … and sandbagged. I posted my links from the Libertarian Cato Institute regarding immigrant crime, and tfg’s poor performance regarding getaways.
New Research on Illegal Immigration and Crime
This research establishes that immigrants are less likely than native born Americans to commit crimes of all types. Also, undocumented immigrants are even less likely to commit crimes.
Trump’s Border Policies Let More Immigrants Sneak In
This shows that under Obama in 2016 they had an estimated 100,000 people sighted but not apprehended. It rose steadily under tfg to 150,000 a year in 2019.
So yes, I mentioned sandbagging. I was waiting for the inevitable mention of the recent murders committed by undocumented immigrants. He brought up seeing two videos of “illegals attacking police.” He might as well have brought up the young woman, Laken Riley, whose bloody shirt the right wingers have been waving for weeks. This gave me the opening to directly address emotions.
I started by talking about how Trump attacked immigrants for the same reason that Victor Orban did in Hungary. All autocrats and wannabe dictators “other” some group for their followers to all hate. For Trump and Orban it is immigrants. For Hitler it was Jews and Gypsies. (I know it goes much deeper, this is X.)
I told him that his two anecdotes and accompanying videos are impacting him emotionally, and blinding him to the overall data and truth, which is counter to what they are trying to sell him. Then I posed this series of questions, which I believe that, with the proper lead-up, can lead to a chink in the armor, an opening for consideration and introspection however brief.
Is it rational that Trump can shoot someone on 5th Avenue and not lose any supporters? Or is it emotional?
Is it rational to support an adjudicated rapist facing 91 felony counts? Or is it emotional?
Which party was flying flags in 2020 proclaiming “Because Fuck Your Feelings?”
I took my best shot at it. Haven’t heard back after those, after a very long back-and-forth. I see the current demagoguery over Laken Riley as a chance to put a mirror in their faces regarding hypocrisy and their non-rational attachment to tfg. People resent being manipulated. And when they can see the perspective/context that the political right is trying to exploit this tragedy by manipulating their emotions, they may respond by snapping out of the spell. I am certainly open to other takes on this, however ...
In general, I believe that we need to do a much better job of targeting voters emotions in campaigning. Stories to counter their stories matter. It is a battle to create the more appealing narrative, the one that has a more visceral impact. This is part of what Rachel Bitcofer is talking about with playing hard ball with them. Traditional liberals tend to feel bad about counter-punching on stories like this. It feels like WE are exploiting the story in a way. My personal take on that is a moral one. The exploitation that they are ALREADY attempting needs to be opposed — strongly and with intent. That is not exploitation, it is modern information warfare. And this is an information war we can’t afford to lose.