Pete Buttigieg Just Terrified Trump By Destroying The Myth Of MAGA

[babylonsister]

Posted on Sun, Apr 14th, 2019 by Jason Easley
Pete Buttigieg Just Terrified Trump By Destroying The Myth Of MAGA


Mayor Pete Buttigieg wasted no time in destroying the myth behind Trump’s MAGA and making a real appeal to rural and Rust Belt communities.

While kicking off his presidential campaign in South Bend, IN, Buttigieg said, “And that’s why I’m here today. To tell a different story than make America great again. Because there’s a myth being sold to industrial and rural communities, the myth that we can stop the clock and turn it back. It comes from people who think the only way to speak to communities like ours is through resentment and nostalgia. They’re selling an impossible promise of returning to a bygone era that was never as good as advertised to begin with. The problem is that they’re telling us to look for greatness in all the wrong places. Because if there’s one thing that the city of South Bend has shown it’s that there is no such thing as an honest politics that revolves around the word again. It is time to walk away from the politics of the past and towards something totally different. So that’s why I’m here today.”

Link to tweet

Buttigieg is right. Trump did sell a myth to rural and Rust Belt communities. He sold them on the belief that he had a time machine and could take them back to the time when prosperity, not unemployed, opioids, and despair filled their streets.

more...

https://www.politicususa.com/2019/04/14/pete-buttigieg-just-terrified-trump-by-destroying-the-myth-of-maga.html

[lillypaddle]

1. Are you kidding me?

Dumbass trump didn't understand a word of that.

[DeeDeeNY]

40. His base didn't either

That is the problem

[TwilightZone]

2. Trump promised to take them back to a time that never existed.

It reminds me of the clowns who bleat about taking their country back but can never say from whom or explain where it ever went.

[cstanleytech]

5. True and part of that unspoken promise by Trump was returning to the era of Jim Crow which

many of his base yearn for.

[Blue_true]

6. Yearn not only for a return of Jim Crow laws,

but also a time when an unmarried woman had no real future or good job prospects. They want a time when only White men truly had a chance of advancement and even of getting a job where they could advance to begin with. They want to return to a time that can't possibly exist in a modern world.

[cstanleytech]

7. Yup and it's rather pathetic of them.

[Blue_true]

10. I grew up in the South.

I remember that even after passage of the civil rights act, there were still Whites Only facilities in my area. Blacks had the crummiest jobs because that was all that were offered. Even an educated Black person who didn't teach in the still segregated schools could not find a job as a retail clerk, bank teller, insurance adjuster, ect. Yet, some Whites today complain about handouts to Blacks. White society had been getting handouts from the country's founding until laws against job discrimination finally took hold, and even today, past discrimination has left a continuing legacy of inequity. Any White that truly want to make America great would instantly set about stomping out discrimation of all types, many simply won't do that.

[JudyM]

18. "Handouts" is a potent word of theirs that we should be using to explain the actual truth...

Handouts to corporations, donors, cronies, etc ... Take that word loaded with resentment and turn it on its head.

[INdemo]

21. In 1968 in Jacksonville Fla,while in the Navy

4 of us (all of us in uniform)walked into a restaurant with a Black friend. We sat down at a Table and the waitress walked over and said "I can serve you all but I wont serve him" So we all walked out.
That was 4 years after civil rights bill had passed.

[Blue_true]

37. You and your friends did good. nt

[better]

35. I grew up in the south as well.

And boy does this ring true. I'm perhaps a bit younger, so my memories do not include whites only facilities, but I am most certainly familiar with the animosity and resentment. I was raised to reject racism, but it still took me moving out of the south and having my horizons broadened for me to begin to adequately see just how pervasive the racism-motivated misinformation is, and how widely people believe things that are simply not true, because they failed to recognize the critical omissions from pseudo-truths they grew up being fed and having reinforced. I know many people who are genuinely not racist, yet support policies that are in fact rooted in racism, though they have absolutely no recognition of that underlying fact.

That's part of how I try to use my white privilege to eradicate white privilege, in that it's much easier for me, as a white dude, to illuminate things like this for other white folk without them feeling like I'm attacking them. I think we would have much better results if we could get white folk to understand that the problem isn't necessarily that they are racist, but that as a product of their privilege, they have been allowed to fail to observe a great many things of which those without our privilege do not have the option of remaining oblivious.

[Recursion]

26. Bingo. It's easy to make wages go up when you exclude two-thirds of the workforce (nt)

[Texin]

30. The gauzy good old days were great for white males with jobs that paid for their familes.

Those good old days allowed non-college educated white males opportunities to get a decent job with wages high enough to pay more or less comfortably for their middle class expenses. Those days, however, were not all that great if you were a woman, or a person of color. Sure, there were the few women - mostly affluent - who were allowed by their family's financial wherewithal to go to college, but they were expected to be pursuing their husbands and not a self-fulfilling professional job. If you happened to be a person of color, you could mostly forget about it and just try to get by on whatever means you could. And try to stay alive in the process.

Unfortunately, for the nostalgia-prone folks, technology supplanted manual labor for the most part, and that's the only thing these folks are capable of.

[CaptYossarian]

33. It existed in the early 1860s.

Slavery, lawlessness, guns everywhere, and no EPA, OSHA, or Dept. of Education.

[DallasNE]

3. One Area Where He Has Turned The Clock Back

Is agriculture where he is implementing the policies of Ezra Taft Benson. Those of us old enough to remember that know that was a period of a lot of farmers going bankrupt. That era turned many mid-western states blue. After Kennedy and Johnson reversed course those states started to turn back red (helped by the Nixon southern strategy that also appealed to racist rural America).

[Blue_true]

11. I don't understand. How did Kennedy and Johnson cause those

states to turn red? Was it pushing for civil rights and job opportunity for African Americans?

[DallasNE]

17. They Started To Turn Red

After prosperity returned, which was the Kennedy/Johnson years, the farmers were gradually sucked in by the Nixon southern strategy. Rural America has long been racist. Will pocket book issues win out over their racist fears? It happened once, can it happen again? Remember, George Wallace did very well in the primaries of 1968 in both Michigan and Wisconsin (Wisconsin may have been Republicans voting Wallace since Nixon had the nomination locked up by then.

[Blue_true]

36. Ok, I understand better. nt

[Beartracks]

4. The myth was also that Trump cared enough to follow thru on those hollow promises at all.

Even if he did have a time machine, he would've used it to enrich himself. He has never ever given two shits about the people of America.

===============

[caraher]

8. I don't think Trump supporters ever believed we could "go back"

Sure, the slogan says "Again" and all that. But what unifies them is that they (mostly) hate all the same people. As long as it's OK to express that hatred in rhetoric and in through the machinations of what passes for Republican rule, they are satisfied. They know coal isn't coming back, they know manufacturing won't be what it once was. But the cover of "economic anxiety" gives them license to fight culture wars and cultivate bigotry under the MAGA banner, and that is all they really ask of Trump.

This is also why is obvious lies and defective character simply don't matter.

Sure, it's nice to poke holes in Trumpian logic, but in the end this is never going to be about persuading his base to abandon him. We need to turn out the sane people en masse behind whatever candidate emerges to end this nightmare.

[Duppers]

24. "fight culture wars and cultivate bigotry" - GREAT post!

And yep, "never going to be about persuading his base to abandon him," because they're insane.

Again, great post!

GOTV.

[NewJeffCT]

27. That was what happened in 2016

Cambridge Analytica and Russia weren't there to help with GOTV for Trump. It was to keep certain segments of Democrats/progressives from turning out to vote, to keep moderates/independents home and to make sure that rational GOP types did not vote for Clinton - some progressives voted for Stein or stayed home; some moderates and rational GOP types voted Gary Johnson or maybe stayed home instead of voting Clinton.

[Aussie105]

9. Trump promised a fantasy land

where everyone got what they ever wanted, more than they needed, more than they ever dreamt of.

And the gullible, deluded, poorly educated, easily led, fools swallowed it, hook line and sinker.

The whole MAGA dream fell apart for me when I realised it meant different things to different people. Heck, ask 100 people what they thought MAGA implied, and you would get 100 different answers.

(For me, the MAGA dream peaked when 'The Wizard of Oz' film turned from black and white to colour. But I was a child then.)

[cvoogt]

12. that article title is misleading

I like Buttigieg and I would like to think his stance would scare Trump or the GOP, but the article presents no evidence of this. It is a bit hyperbolic.

[thesquanderer]

13. It's a Jason Easley headline, what do you expect? (n/t)

[BannonsLiver]

14. A lot of that going around lately.

[PatrickforO]

15. While I doubt if Trump is 'terrified,'

this really is a brilliant observation from Pete.

There really is no such thing as an honest politics that revolves around the word 'again.'

I notice, too, that Buttigieg is a rising star around here, and has now passed Bernie.

[rwsanders]

16. Just my opinion, but the fact that he '50's "sells" so well, doesn't speak well of rightwing boomers

I did the math and most boomers were little kids then. So most of them want to go back to a time when mommy and daddy were there to take care of them.

[samnsara]

20. im a boomer and HELL NO do i want to go back to :

...women and girls having to wear dresses to work and school even in that meant walking to school in 20 degree weather....kotex belts (dear gawd), nylons with seams ( give me a break) oh and the garters too. ...and Segregation!!!! oh HELL no. Sleeping in curlers..instant coffee and tv dinners? Thats progress? So let them go back to that era but dont drag me there.

[SharonAnn]

43. And there was polio, measles, mumps, chicken pox, and childhood leukemia was fatal, etc.

No seatbelts in cars and certainly no airbags.
Separate Help Wanted ads for Male and Female
No birth control pill or other forms of birth control

etc.
etc.

[samnsara]

19. dang i missed his speech..and i missed (yawn) tiger woods...

...according to morning joe i wasnt even in America yesterday.

[Celerity]

23. here you go

the last introductory speaker starts at 1 hour, 20 minutes in, it is worth watching

Buttigieg himself starts at 1 hour, 33 minutes

[Lonestarblue]

22. I am really liking Mayor Pete.

He is saying the things that need to be said. I just changed my primary preference to Mayor Pete. I really like several of the other candidates, but Mayor Pete is standing out in a good way.

[ck4829]

25. K&R

[sfwriter]

28. " America deserves our hope." was another line.

Yeah, the more I hear of him, the more I think of West Wing script.

[greymattermom]

29. That time existed in the South

where segregation was legal and enforced, where every place had to have 4 bathroom and 2 water fountains, where folks had to live in certain neighborhoods, and where Jews couldn't buy houses in certain neighborhoods either. For everyone who thinks they are white and would survive, think again. When religion rules, you will get wars between different brand of Christianity. Forget Jews and Muslims. You white Christian folks will be killing each other.

[RicROC]

31. from 2 drinking fountains to 1

The people who struggled against having 4 bathrooms and 2 water fountains:

for Democrats who fought institutional racism, this was a moral undertaking.

for Republicans, they made the change because 'why pay extra money for double inventory'?

[RVN VET71]

42. We white christian folks been doing that for 2,000 years.

Killing each other, I mean. It's a thing. Used to be very popular.

[the_sly_pig]

32. "Terrified" ?

I love the Mayor Pete. Hope he wins. But nothing terrifies Trump. He knows he has the Senate and the Supreme Court. He has the US Attorney General. Trump is the master of "S/he who gives the least f***s, wins".

He's coming to Minnesota today just to troll Ilhan Omar. After years of listening to the Mueller report hype I guess I'm just burned out.

Impeachment. I would imagine impeachment would be terrifying.

[marylandblue]

41. It's the opposite. Narcissists swagger and bluster because they are scared to death.

A narcissist is afraid you'll find out he isn't perfect, not realizing everybody already knows it.

[Faygo Kid]

34. As of now, he's got my vote

My first was for George McGovern, so I'm slightly older. But I like the cut of his jib.

[onit2day]

38. Trump ran virtually as a democrat. He lied saying whatever U wanted to hear

That said I don't think you're headline is supported by the quote. Better if he'd said he wanted to make America America Again. We've always been great, especially when it comes to hypocrisy lol.

[brewens]

39. It's funny that the only way trump could really have maybe brought some of their jobs back, would

have been some kind of command economy like the Soviets had. Issue a decree that from now on, only American steel could be used in this country, then subsidize them to make it happen. I actually think it could be possible to make something like that work, but probably not very well with the people at the top demanding that most of the gains go right to them.

[Initech]

44. That's it, I'm officially switching!

Go Pete go!!!

[pansypoo53219]

45. you can't stop progress, you can only delay it.