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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe Model For Trump's Media Relations Is Joseph McCarthy
THE MODEL FOR DONALD TRUMPS MEDIA RELATIONS IS JOSEPH MCCARTHY
Trump and McCarthy share not only the kindred traits of demagoguesbombast and the manipulation of public fear in the service of their own endsbut a curiously close, almost familial resemblance. McCarthys hallucinatory anti-Communism was facilitated in part by a kind of swaggering masculinity that he deployed to differentiate himself from his patrician G.O.P. colleagues. He distorted his record of military service to portray himself as a fearless fighter against unambiguous evil. As with Trumps, McCarthys world view was defined by a hypertensive, conspiratorial outlook. A conspiracy theory typically rests upon the extrapolation of a single shred of suggestion into a skein of unverifiable assertionsas with McCarthys 1950 claim that two hundred and five Communists had infiltrated the State Department. An internal government document had noted a number of employees whose background checks had revealed unspecified but troubling information, but there was no indication that these individuals were Communist moles. Trumps Presidential campaign has been a miasma of conspiracy theories, virtually from the outset. Yet those parallelsdisturbing as they may beare surpassed by the similarities between Trump and McCarthys relationships with the press.
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beachbum bob
(10,437 posts)frazzled
(18,402 posts)He was the guy behind McCarthy's tactics (and standing next to him, directing the circus), and he was Trump's longtime confidante and lawyer. Cohn always had the "names" on a piece of paper in his pocket, though he never produced it. A flim-flam man.
Every time my husband sees some Trump shenanigan, he say's "That's a Roy Cohn maneuver."