NYT Rebecca Solnit: Why Republicans Keep Falling for Trump's Lies

[Donkees]

Why Republicans Keep Falling for Trump’s Lies
Jan. 5, 2022, 5:00 a.m. ET

By Rebecca Solnit

Excerpt:

When called upon to believe that Barack Obama was really born in Kenya, millions got in line. When encouraged to believe that the 2012 Sandy Hook murder of twenty children and six adults was a hoax, too many stepped up. When urged to believe that Hillary Clinton was trafficking children in the basement of a Washington, D.C., pizza parlor with no basement, they bought it, and one of them showed up in the pizza place with a rifle to protect the kids. The fictions fed the frenzies, and the frenzies shaped the crises of 2020 and 2021. The delusions are legion: Secret Democratic cabals of child abusers, millions of undocumented voters, falsehoods about the Covid-19 pandemic and the vaccine.

While much has been said about the moral and political stance of people who support right-wing conspiracy theories, their gullibility is itself alarming. Gullibility means malleability and manipulability. We don’t know if the people who believed the prevailing 2012 conspiracy theories believed the 2016 or 2020 versions, but we do know that a swath of the conservative population is available for the next delusion and the one after that. And on Jan. 6, 2021, we saw that a lot of them were willing to act on those beliefs.

The adjective gullible comes from the verb to gull, which used to mean to cram yourself with something as well as to cheat or dupe, to cram someone else full of fictions. “Not doubting I could gull the Government,” wrote Daniel Defoe in 1701, and Hannah Arendt used the word gullible repeatedly in “The Origins of Totalitarianism,” published in 1951. “A mixture of gullibility and cynicism is prevalent in all ranks of totalitarian movements, and the higher the rank the more cynicism weighs down gullibility,” she wrote. That is, among those gulling the public, cynicism is a stronger force; among those being gulled, gullibility is, but the two are not so separate as they might seem.

But gullibility means you believe something because someone else wants you to. You’re buying what they’re selling. It’s often said that the joiners of cults and subscribers to delusions are driven by their hatred of elites. But in the present situation, the snake oil salesmen are not just Alex Jones, QAnon’s master manipulators and evangelical hucksters. They are senators, powerful white Christian men, prominent media figures, billionaires and their foundations, even a president. (Maybe the belief that these figures are not an elite is itself a noteworthy delusion.)

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/05/opinion/republicans-trump-lies.html

[Botany]

1. Why Do Republicans Keep Falling for Trump's Lies?

BTW Melania looks thrilled to be with TFG

















BTW I think down deep "they" know that Trump is lying but "they" are OK w/that because he scratches their
racist itches.

[KS Toronado]

3. Had a repug tell me he knew Qrump lies all the time

And that was why he admired him. Go figure.

[Botany]

6. Most of them know that TFG is lying but to many of "them*" that makes 'em happy because ....

... they think he is "owning the libs" and making us have "a sad." They like that he and people like
the asshole Governor of Montana or Idaho who shot a collared wolf that was in a pen and it is rubbing
"it" in our faces.


* Never forget that "they" are the minority in America and if it wasn't for the electoral college,
gerrymandering, electronic voting machines, court packing, and an oversized footprint in the
media in much of America they would be in the dustbin of history very soon.

[KS Toronado]

13. Very true

[Trueblue Texan]

10. You must know something I don't know about Cracker Barrel.

Please educate me!

[Botany]

14. Cracker Barrel had a history* in some places of being nasty to people of color and its ...

... patrons tend to be older white conservative folk. We had one in central OH that was well known for being
anti black. I don't know if it is still that way.

* I don't know if that is still true. BTW I hope I am wrong in both cases.

[MotorCityBeard]

32. They were not just anti-black

I remember in the 80's reading stories of how they fired employees just because they were gay. Because of that I have refused to patronize any of them, and still won't.

[Botany]

33. I have been to a C.B. once with some then family members and the food was enough to keep me away...

... from then on. Maybe they have changed their anti-gay and anti-people of color actions since when
I was aware of them in the 80s and or 90s.

[IrishAfricanAmerican]

18. The last time we stopped at one...

they had a cover of The Dearborn Independent framed and hanging on the wall above our table. Someone in corporate must have approved that. Last time I'll ever go there.

The Dearborn Independent, also known as The Ford International Weekly, was a weekly newspaper established in 1901, and published by Henry Ford from 1919 through 1927. The paper reached a circulation of 900,000 by 1925, second only to the New York Daily News, largely due to a quota system for promotion imposed on Ford dealers. Lawsuits regarding antisemitic material published in the paper caused Ford to close it, and the last issue was published in December 1927. The publication's title was derived from the Detroit suburb of Dearborn, Michigan.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dearborn_Independent

[Farmer-Rick]

24. It's kind of wishful thinking for them

They know over half the crap dribbling out of TFG's mouth is imaginary but some of those things he says they wish were true.

There's never been a president in modern day that has so blantly catered to racist, homophobes, ableists and mysoginist. He does it out in public and they love that. It makes these awful stupid people feel good because someone finally hates the things and people they hate. They are loyal because normal people will not stroke them like he does.

The GOP are so awful that most Americans won't vote for them because they are merely tools for the oligarchs and everyone knows it. So to get enough votes, TFG and the GOP have to cobble together enough hate groups, idiots and crazies to vote for them. The conspiracies are just fantasies used to lore in and identify those fools who will vote with their hate over everything else.

It's the filthy rich backing it all so they can continue to gobble up all our national wealth. Notice how even Buffett failed to help workers in his own companies. It's all about their money.

[uponit7771]

31. THIS !!!! ☝🏾☝🏾☝🏾

[sarchasm]

2. "...meaning has become transactional."

sums it up pretty good.

[Achilleaze]

4. Repubes are on knees awaiting today's droppings from their Gull-in-Chief

[KS Toronado]

28. He's even doing the Nazi salute.

[Hotler]

5. it's not their gullibility, it's their boiling hate for Democrats and Liberals.

Repug politicians are the way they are because that is what their voting base wants. They want anyone that will bring hate, pain and suffering to the Dems..

[gab13by13]

8. Yes, that is part of it.

Saying they are gullible leaves most of them off the hook. Babies aren't born hating other babies, babies aren't born racist, misogynist, bigots, Dem haters, they are taught, they are raised by their parents to be that way. This is another reason why people on the right hate education. Going to college sends the haters into a different environment where they find out that people different than them aren't really that bad. They can learn critical thinking in college, to think for themselves and to not blindly accept, believe what grandpa has been telling them.

Once they are programmed to hate it is really hard to undo that, and that's on their parents. Kids don't watch Fox News, their parents do and it ends up being an endless cycle of zombies.

They aren't gullible, they hear on Fox what grandpa has been telling them.

[radical noodle]

20. There's a difference that's obvious

between the gullible and the haters. Those who are gullible and believe the lies are usually people who have been shown to be gullible about things other than politics.

I have a long-time friend who voted for Obama and was pretty centrist when it came to politics. She's very intelligent but has never been good about judging people. She picked two terrible husbands and is still living with the second one. She admires people who I wouldn't trust at all. She is constantly being taken advantage of, yet doesn't realize it. Somehow she fell for trump's lies hook, line, and sinker. She's just simply gullible and she believes many of the lies being shoved at her because she doesn't want to believe she's gullible and misjudged him (if that makes sense). Once that bad choice is made, she clings to it until it's literally yanked away from her. She may finally believe she was wrong about trump if he goes to jail for his wrongdoing, but I"m not even sure about that.

I feel sure that there are many others who are like her, although I agree that a majority of trump's followers are also simply haters.

[teach1st]

7. Here's a link to the NYT article with no paywall

Why Republicans Keep Falling for Trump’s Lies

I subscribe to the Times, and can "gift" ten free articles each month.

[robbob]

22. Thanks for that!

Is there a limit on how many people can go see the full article? I was able to, but will 100 more visitors be allowed to read the article for free? Just curious…

[teach1st]

27. Yes, but it's time-limited

From NYT:

Once you create a gift article, you can share it as much as you’d like through any of the gift article share options for the remainder of the calendar month. The article can be viewed unlimited times in the 14 day period before the link expires. While an article is open for access, anyone you share it with will be able to read the full article.

https://help.nytimes.com/hc/en-us/articles/360060848652-Gift-Articles-for-New-York-Times-Subscribers

[scipan]

29. Thank you so much

Great article.

What’s often described as a weakness of the Democratic Party — the existence of a variety of views and positions, freely debated or even fought over, and a restless, questioning electorate — is a strength of democracy. The Republicans remain committed to punishing and casting out dissenters — such as Representative Liz Cheney who has been ostracized since she accurately recognized the criminality of Jan. 6 — only further inhibiting open debate and, these days, inconvenient facts.

[olegramps]

9. There will always be totally delusional people, but that is not the problem.

The problem is that the vast majority of so-called normal people who are in the top positions in the Republican Party refuse to not only denounce the absolute lies, but actually encourage it by their silence. Some, actually who spoke out denouncing the insurrection and blaming Trump, such as the powerful minority speaker McCarthy, have reversed their condemnation and now deny any of Trump's responsibility. They have even gone so far as to now claim that it was staged by Democratic sympathizers to discredit Trump.

[gab13by13]

17. Just ask them why they were using burner phones and encryption?

[Trueblue Texan]

11. They demonize liberals and Dems the way the Nazis demonized Jews. nt

[The Jungle 1]

12. The really scary part.

Republican leadership knows he is lying!!!!
Trump has ended anything that was left of honesty in American politics.
We are in a bad place.

[Mr. Ected]

15. A lot of it is brainwashing

Once you establish the maze, it's simply a matter of refilling the cheese and watching them salivate.

They've been conditioned and will respond to about anything, including a call to arms to go to civil war.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

16. There's a difference between "falling for" and "embracing."

[rgbecker]

19. This paragraph struck me...why Climate change and Covid vacinne is not supported by GOP.

Of course, some of these stories are proxies for existing beliefs. Birtherism was a roundabout way of saying a Black man could not possibly be a legitimate president; the ruckus about critical race theory is wrong that it’s actually being taught in schools but right in that how we think and talk and teach about race has shifted from when whiteness was unquestionably supreme. Issues from climate to Covid are anathema to the right because solving them would require large-scale cooperation, in conflict with the idea that individual rights should be paramount. That may be why conservatives framed all Covid precautionary measures as violations of individual freedom. Dying for your beliefs has taken on grim new meaning: Since vaccines became widely available, counties that voted heavily for Donald Trump have had nearly three times the Covid-19 death rate as counties that voted for Joe Biden.

[lonely bird]

21. Why?

Fear.

They want to believe because someone put out front that their fear was justifiable and provided the scapegoats for that fear. They fear loss of being “special” due to changing demographics. Thus CRT offends and, more importantly, scares them.

I will also add that humans seek reasons for why things happen. It cannot be that something simply happens. There must be a reason. This makes conspiracy theories as well as religion appealing. Once “the other” is employed an enormous world of conspiracy is opened.

[TheBlackAdder]

23. They may be adults, but they have the mental development and maturity of a pubescent teenager.

.

They just never fully developed fully.

.

[peggysue2]

25. The Money Quote

It’s as though Mr. Trump’s supporters believe they can bully truth itself into submission.

This is the whole scheme in one simple sentence, the Bible passage of all autocrats and oppressors:

Bully the truth into submission, the facts and those wielding them.

That's the only way they can win, take control. A small tweak in the above would read:

Mr. Trump’s supporters believe they can bully truth itself into submission. Because that's what they're doing right now at local school boards, at townhall meetings and social events--intimidating, shouting down, threatening anyone who won't sign on (or at least stay silent) to their agenda.

We've seen this picture show before in human history. Fascists of the past didn't pussy-foot their way into power; they goose-stepped across the necks and souls of their own countrymen.

It's not an "as though" moment. It's a given in real time.

Which is why we fight. Which is why we must fight. Or be forever damned.

[Midnight Writer]

26. This from the paper that gave us Whitewater headlines and Saddam's WMDs on a daily basis.

[live love laugh]

30. AND that continues to muddle facts instead of reporting them. nt

[gratuitous]

34. Indeed

I can sum up why Republicans like to buy whatever horseshit the former guy is peddling in two concepts: racism and fear.

But why do the media keep falling for the lies, repeating whatever the former guy blarps up without so much as a raised eyebrow?